After spending some time in Vegas for the NBA Summer League, The Tribune’s Utah Jazz beat writers, Andy Larsen and Eric Walden, return to discuss all the team’s new players — from the guys who’ll be in the starting lineup, like Mike Conley and Bojan Bogdanovic, to the guys who’ll be fighting for the 13th through 15th spots, such as Nigel Williams-Goss, Miye Oni, William Howard, and Stanton Kidd.
Along the way, Andy and Eric have some glass-half-full/glass-half-empty debates about what exactly Emmanuel Mudiay and Jeff Green can bring to the rotation.
At 2:40 • Who’s more likely to be the 15th man — French import William Howard or Summer League defensive whiz Stanton Kidd? Or someone cut from another team’s training camp?
At 6:50 • Why did the Jazz decide to bring back 2017 draftee Nigel Williams-Goss, who appears to be the fourth point guard on the roster?
At 12:25 • Miye Oni, the last of the team’s 2019 second-round picks, is the one who got the NBA contract, while Jarrell Brantley and Justin Wright-Foreman got two-way deals.
At 18:47 • Tony Bradley won the battle with Willie Reed to be the third-string center. But will he even get as much of a role as Ekpe Udoh did last year?
At 19:50 • Andy is worried about the Jazz having to depend on “bad player” Emmanuel Mudiay should Mike Conley and Dante Exum get injured. Eric counters that signing a 23-year-old former lottery pick that’s not necessarily a finished product to a minimum deal is a low-risk, high-upside opportunity.
At 29:41 • Regarding Jeff Green, Andy is again concerned about his “frustrating decision-making” and lack of rebounding, while Eric again embraces the silver lining, saying Green profiles as a new Jae Crowder-type but for a third of the price.
At 34:50 • The guys are in agreement about Ed Davis, citing his superb defense and elite-level rebounding as reasons that spending the “room midlevel exception” on him was a great decision.
At 38:09 • While everyone knows that Bojan Bogdanovic shot 42% from deep last year, we break down some of the other things Bogey is excellent at.
At 41:40 • Concluding with Mike Conley, Eric and Andy discuss how the majority of these moves were made with a definitive emphasis on improving the Jazz’s offense.
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