This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2014, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Jazz forward Gordon Hayward posts on his personal blog fairly regularly. His latest update — tweeted with a link on Tuesday — came equipped with this title: "If I played @KingJames 1-on-1, I'd crush him. My new blog on why I'm the best".
Let's just say the post generated some interesting comments. And a lot of them. In fact, there was so much traffic to Hayward's blog that it crashed — earning some national attention and even some laughs in the process.
Hayward, of course, wasn't talking about basketball. He was writing about his favorite pastime, playing video games. League of Legends, to be exact. And it's safe to say Hayward was taken aback by a lot of the reaction he received in the hours after he published the blog.
"It's crazy," Hayward said. "It's comical some of the tweets I received about it. I try to do a blog fairly regularly. It's something that's fun for me to do, let people in on my life a little bit. It takes away the monotony of training camp."
For Hayward, yesterday represented some of the potential pitfalls of social media. Twitter can be a good thing for a professional athlete. It can also be a headache when things surface that are taken out of context.
Obviously, Hayward said, he wasn't talking about playing against LeBron on the floor. Some people got it. Some didn't. Others criticized Hayward for having a non-Jazz related hobby.
Many athletes have passions or hobbies outside of their sport. Hayward's is video gaming, and he makes no apologies for it. His previous blog focused on what he did this summer to fill his body out and become stronger in the weight room. That — no surprise — went over much better.
"The problem is people think we're only basketball players," Hayward said. "I'm committed to the game and love the game, but we all have lives outside of basketball as well. There are fans that want to see how we are away from the sport, and others that want us to just focus on that and only that. I think social media is great, as long as we handle it the right way."
A real road trip
A lengthy period away from home. Playing in consecutive games. Facing what coach Quin Snyder said will be hostile environments.
The Jazz will be gone for seven days and play four games — two against the Los Angeles Lakers, one against the Clippers and one against the Oklahoma City Thunder. Along the way, a young team will see a back-to-back for the first time in the preseason, and it will face stars in Kobe Bryant, Chris Paul, Blake Griffin and Russell Westbrook.
In other words, this next week will be as good a test as any in preparation for the regular season.
"It's a road trip," Snyder said. "It's a true road trip, and one that will be good for us. We'll get to see where we are and what some of the things are that we need to work on. The Portland trip was different because it was just a single game. This is our first true trip. I'm interested to see how we handle it."
Are they back?
Jazz guard Alec Burks and forward Carrick Felix are classified as game-time decisions for Thursday's game at the Lakers.
Burks missed Monday's win over the Clippers with a bruised left shoulder. Felix has missed the entire preseason with an injured shoulder. Each took part in practice on Wednesday, non-contact only.
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