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There may not be much excitement for Jazz fans coming out of Thursday's NBA draft. Odds are that whoever Utah picks probably won't make a huge impact on the team next season.

Maybe not for the next couple of seasons.

Pending any possible trades, the Jazz have the 24th, 30th, 42nd and 55th picks. So … not exactly the best position to be in whether you're a team exec or a fan.

But Utah is not alone in terms of looking for players who will help later, not sooner, according to ESPN basketball analyst Fran Fraschilla. He sort of I-told-you-so'd on a conference call to promote his channel's coverage of this year's NBA draft at 5 p.m. Thursday.

"The simple fact is this NBA draft will probably feature 14 or 15 [college] freshmen," he said, "and one, two, three international teenagers in the first round. And it has become what I said five years ago and is now cliché — it's a baseball draft. For the most part, teams are drafting on potential and for the future."

Fraschilla is not arguing that there are no draftees out there who could have an immediate impact on a team. Just that those players are few and far between.

"You still have to look for the mature player that can have an impact on your NBA roster sooner rather than later," he said. "But by and large ... teams are likely to have to draft more potential versus production, and that ensures that most of these young players are not ready to make an impact in important NBA games."

Of course, there's going to be a period of adjustment for players coming out of college. Even for those who played for top-flight programs. Even for those who played all four years of their eligibility before entering the draft.

"Very few of these guys are going to have an immediate impact on the NBA because … college level is Double-A baseball compared to the NBA, which is really the Major Leagues," Fraschilla said.

Even if the Jazz are somehow able to trade up for a top-10 pick in the draft, the odds are still long against that pick contributing in a major way anytime soon. Even the top picks generally only "have an impact on their team if they go to a bad team," Fraschilla said.

A lot depends on what happens in the offseason, of course. On who the Jazz sign to new contracts and what trades they make. But it seems unlikely that a rookie, particulary a younger rookie, will get much playing time because it's not like the Jazz are one of those bad teams.

The fact is that Thursday night, despite all the hype on ESPN and NBATV (which also will telecast the draft), neither Utah nor any other team will know where it stands. Oh, the TV analysts will make pronouncements because that's their job, but they'll just be guessing.

As will the teams doing the drafting.

With lower draft picks, "basically, you're rolling the dice," Fraschilla said. "You pretty much are flipping a coin and you're just hoping that you've evaluated correctly a guy that has kind of slipped through the cracks already."

Which is not to say that there's absolutely no hope of the Jazz drafting a player who eventually will contribute even with a late second-round pick.

"It's been proven in the league," Fraschilla said. "You go down every roster, every team's got two or three or four guys that slip through the cracks and have become good players."

Scott D. Pierce covers TV for The Salt Lake Tribune. Email him at spierce@sltrib.com; follow him on Twitter @ScottDPierce.