Joe Jazz Fan heads into Dr. Feelgood’s office for a scheduled midseason appointment/checkup, lays his weary soul down on the sofa, punches up a pillow and …
Hey, Doc, how’re you doing?
Now, now, what’s with the frowny face?
Well. The season got off to a better start than I expected and that was a nice surprise. I mean, Lauri Markkanen scoring the way he has … who expected that? Not me. He had a career average of 16.4 points coming in and look at him now, at 23.9. We might not have to suffer through the All-Star game right here in our own city with none of our players participating. That would suck.
Jawohl. It would. But so will watching Donovan Mitchell going for 40 in that game for whichever team he ends up playing on, just to rub it in.
Ouch.
It’d be a kick to the onions.
Is that a medical condition/diagnosis?
It’s just the truth.
I’ll tell ya, Doc, I still can’t get used to seeing Don in a Cavs uniform. It hurts me. It seems unnatural. I used to hear fans sitting around me whispering that he quit on the Jazz last season, that he wasn’t all that good, and just when I started to lean in that direction, what does Spida do?
He launches in spectacular fashion for 71 points, shooting from the moon to win an overtime game. That was the most points scored by an individual player since Kobe went for 81 back in 2006.
I know. Only four players not named Wilt Chamberlain have ever scored that many points in a single game.
MJ never did. Bird never did. Kareem never did. LeBron never did.
Amazing, Doc. Should have been doing that for us, right here in SLC.
Picture in your mind what the Viv would have been like if Mitchell did that during a home game here. The place would go … bonkers.
Is bonkers another clinical term, Doc?
It’s a basketball term for what happens when your team is fortunate enough to have one of the world’s best scoring guards and you’re fortunate enough to watch him do something that hasn’t been done in almost two decades.
And we traded him away because management got a little frustrated with the Jazz’s inability to go deep into the playoffs.
If Jazz management had been that antsy back in the Malone-from-Stockton days, the team never would have gone to the Finals in consecutive seasons.
Huh?
If you look back at those years, you’d see that the Jazz postseason results pretty much mirrored what the Mitchell-Gobert teams were doing in the playoffs before the hatch got pulled on the whole endeavor last offseason.
Is that true?
It is. I’ve got it right here in my notes. Let’s see … Mitchell and Gobert in 2017-18 went 48-34 and lost in the second round of the playoffs. In 2018-19, they were 50-32 and lost in the first round. In 2019-20, they were 44-28, lost in the first round. In 2020-21, they were 52-30, lost in the second round. In 2021-22, they were 49-33 and lost in the first round.
That’s a lot of early exits in the postseason. Maybe it was worth blowing it up.
Here’s what John and Karl did in their first handful of years: 1985-86, they went 42-40, lost in the first round. In 1986-87, they were 44-38, lost in the first round. In 1987-88, they were 47-35, lost in the second round. In 1988-89, they were 51-31, got swept in the first round. In 1989-90, they were 55-27, lost in the first round.
Hmm. The good stuff came later. What is it they say about the virtues of patience, Doc?
Julius Caesar said: “It is easier to find men who will volunteer to die than to find those who are willing to endure pain with patience.”
No, not that one.
Ben Franklin said: “He that can have patience can have what he will.”
Getting closer.
Arnold Glasow said: “The key to everything is patience. You can get the chicken by hatching the egg, not by smashing it.”
Who’d he play for?
Beats me. But the Jazz smashed it.
You think Danny Ainge jumped the gun, Doc?
Perhaps. Now it’s the fans who must be patient.
Yeah, we have future draft picks. A bunch of them. But I’ve never seen a draft pick make a jumper. I’ve never seen one haul a rebound. Never seen one win a game. … What do we have to do, wait until 2027? I hope we’re all still alive by then.
There were no guarantees with the odd couple, Mitchell and Gobert. The Cavs are doing well, they’re like 18-4 at home this season, and so is Mitchell, who’s averaging nearly 30 points, five assists and shooting better than 40 percent from three, but the Wolves are behind the Jazz in the standings, so …
I suppose. But, Doc, I don’t know if we can suffer through what’s happening now. Granted, everything’s all packed tight in the West, but if the postseason were to start today, the Jazz would barely make the play-in game. Vegas thinks they’re going to win 16 more games than they were projected to get before the season started, but even that’s bad news. It’d be better if they would either fly high into the playoffs, come what may, or fall flat as a means of increasing their chances at Victor Wembanyama, the Boy Wonder from France. They don’t want to be in no-man’s land, the dreaded middle.
That’s exactly where they’re going to be. Not good enough to soar, not bad enough to suck.
Expletive.
I hear ya. But with Charlotte and Houston and San Antonio and Detroit in the mix, it was always going to be tough for the Jazz to out-tank those tankers.
What’s your advice, Doc, for us Jazz fans. What are we supposed to do with all this, whatever it is … sports depression? Complex chronic feelings that … I dunno, the Jazz will never win, will never reach the top, will never get to where we want them to go?
Aaach, i feel you. In the old country, I used to live and die with Schalke 04, my favorite Bundesliga team. Fussball. They never won, not enough. It caused anxiety, a sense that my own identity was tied to the team’s success, and both were slipping under the waves with every loss. I was invested, too much so, emotionally, psychologically. Here’s my advice, then — let it go, at least a bit. Play with the kids, read a book, read a stack of books, watch some movies, binge a TV show, help a neighbor, play bingo. Pick a different team in a different sport. Pick a winner. That will help you care a little less about this mess. And, you’ll see, it will be OK.
Thanks, Doc.
One last thing: Never watch the Cavs play, don’t listen when You-Know-Who goes to the line and the Cleveland fans start to chant, “M-V-P … M-V-P … M-V-P.” Better to watch Congress attempt to pick a Speaker of the House.
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