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Utah Jazz coach Quin Snyder says his goal every game, every night and every day is for his team to improve. Win or lose, he underscores the question and the question’s answer: Did the team get better? That’s what he focuses on, he says, even more than: Did the team win the freaking game?
Two things: 1) Do you believe he really does that? 2) Is that some highfalutin concept that is sweet-faced and misplaced at the top reaches of NBA basketball? Because, you know, in that space, winning is all that counts.
The whole improvement deal does sound a little late here, like something a Junior Jazz coach might properly say to his 11-year-olds.
Or, to some, it sounds like an excuse or a rationalization.
Listen to what a lot of NBA coaches say after their team loses a game or a string of games during the regular season. They talk about needing better communication, better concentration, better execution — all the mental stuff.
What they almost never say is, “You know, my team just isn’t good enough. We’re just not talented enough. We might as well pack it in because this group of guys is going nowhere.”
They don’t say that — even if it’s true.
They can’t.
But the track the Jazz are on is different. They actually are among the most talented teams in the NBA. Which is to say, they just might be good enough — if they stay healthy — to win the title they seek.
If that’s a fact — some will argue they are talent-sufficient, some think otherwise — the more you look into what championship coaches and players claim about winning those championships, the easier it is to believe that once a team is at least in the ballpark, talent-wise, it really is the mental approach that makes the difference.
Snyder is a smart man. He’s seen his team finish with the best record in the regular season and get bounced in the second round. He is fully aware of the importance of staying healthy and … yeah, getting better. Preparing for the battle ahead. And if you pay attention to champions of the past, that preparation is a big, big deal.
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar wrote a piece for USA Today a decade or so ago, discussing what it takes to become a champion and his words would take most readers, especially cynical ones, back to amateur levels of ball.
Come on, Kareem. Get real.
Funny thing is, he was being real. He admitted the benefits of having great players on a title team, how important that is, but he said there is much more to the equation. His credibility on the matter is tough to question.
The first word he used was … conviction.
“Without conviction, it doesn’t matter how much natural athletic ability you have, you will never rise to the level of champion. … Conviction is about being dedicated to becoming the best athlete your mind and body will allow you to be. … You have to see yourself as a champion long before you actually become one. Sure, it’s a major advantage to be born with an abundance of physical gifts. But even competitors who may be less physically gifted than others can reach the top through effort, determination and preparation.”
Yeah, that sounds like something out of a tired motivational speech. And it got worse, Jabbar quoting from John Wooden’s list of 15 qualities that lead to success, which included everything from industriousness to loyalty to cooperation, but the six-time champion swore by those principles, as individuals and as a team.
He quoted two boxing champions.
“A champion is someone who gets up when he can’t,” said Jack Dempsey.
And this, from Muhammad Ali: “I hated every minute of training, but I said, ‘Don’t quit. Suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion.’”
Jabbar also stressed the importance of unselfish attitudes for any championship-hungry basketball team, essentially doing what’s necessary to become a living, functioning organism that allows for individual talents, but also benefits from them connected to the whole.
Two additional questions, then: 1) Do the Jazz have the talent? 2) Do they have the mental capacity to have learned from lessons of the past and to collectively function and sacrifice under pressure to win it all?
Answer those questions any which way you see fit.
The Jazz have three All-Stars — one, the best defender on the planet, one, a veteran point guard who has seen pretty much everything there is to see, and one, a rising young presence who isn’t so young anymore, who has absorbed past lessons, who is driving the Jazz forward.
None of those guys — Rudy Gobert, Mike Conley or Donovan Mitchell — seems satisfied in any way to sit back and allow accomplishments and acclaim and bank accounts of the past and present be enough.
In addition, they have the guys who finished first and second last season in the Sixth Man of the Year voting. And they’ve strengthened, made more deep and diverse, their bench.
Everybody knows all of this.
Everybody understands, other top teams are really good, too.
Everybody gets that the Jazz are not perfect.
But talent-wise, they are in that ballpark.
They’ve experienced the disappointment and heartbreak of the past, of being compromised in one way or another in the postseason, of coming up short.
Hear Mitchell, the team’s leader, talk and the message is clear: Nothing’s been good enough so far, much more is yet to be done, much work and focus and sacrifice are required, all the stuff that that Kareem Abdul-Jabbar fella mentioned has merit. Turns out, he was getting real.
Jazz players have pointed to the ascent of the Milwaukee Bucks as an example. Learn, climb, get punched, learn, climb some more, get punched, learn, climb, and punch somebody else, punch everybody else.
Translation: Improve, get better, swallow whole what Snyder is serving up.
And then, as Ali, the great fighter, said, “Live the rest of your life as a champion.”
Follow @GordonMonson