Three thoughts on the Utah Jazz’s 119-103 loss to the New York Knicks from Salt Lake Tribune Jazz beat writer Andy Larsen.
1. How worried are we about Lauri Markkanen’s efficiency?
Lauri Markkanen struggled tonight. He shot just 6-22 from the field, including 1-10 from the 3-point line. To be sure, he competed in other ways, getting 10 rebounds, two assists, two blocks and two steals — but we know Markkanen can be better than that.
Every player can have a bad game, but it is true that he has had more of these games this season than in his first two with the Jazz. After a couple of years in a row with a effective field goal percentage around 58% — about 75th percentile in the league — he’s down to 54% this year. That also happens to be about 54th percentile in the NBA.
Markkanen’s calling card is his high volume efficiency. If he’s only middlingly efficient, he’s still a useful player, but not a star. The Jazz just locked him into star money for the next five years. So how concerned are we about the slip?
For me? Not super concerned. Like, a two or three out of 10 concerned.
Visually, Markkanen’s taking much harder shots this year. He’s getting a lot of moving threes off of screens, and they’re frequently contested. They’re still catch-and-shoots, but more difficult ones. Statistically, 23% of his shots were wide open last year, and that’s fallen to 19% this year. He’s also on pace to take more shots that the NBA describes as “turnaround,” or “fadeaway,” or “running” when compared to last year.
It’s not just his 3-point percentage that’s down (from 40% to 36%) but also his 2-point percentage is down (from 56% to 52%). That makes sense to me, too, given that he’s playing more minutes next to Walker Kessler than last season. Kessler being near the rim makes it more likely Markkanen has defenders around to meet him.
Teams are “top-locking” him more than ever — essentially, they’re denying him from getting the ball on the perimeter. But Kessler’s presence does mean that the backdoors and cuts that he used to rely on as a counter for that are more easily defended.
Basically, I think it’s more likely than not Markkanen’s downturn is about the context he’s playing in being worse rather than his own shortcomings. The truth is you can always make excuses like this for any player’s fall — but these ones make sense to me. Markkanen is 27, and downturns don’t usually happen to 27 year olds.
2. How about Keyonte George’s defense?
The Jazz have the worst defense in the NBA, with a 120.7 defensive rating. But it gets 10.6 points worse when Keyonte George is on the floor than when he’s off it, per CleaningTheGlass — a number that far exceeds the other Jazz players.
I think there was a swell there where, before the ankle sprain, George was trying harder on defense. Unfortunately, upon his return, I don’t think he’s regained that same level.
There are just so many plays where George looks like a passenger: a player who could make a difference in a situation but doesn’t care to. I like that he turns and runs to get back here, but man he just doesn’t compete at all once the ball is in front of him. He should be moving his feet and his arms to contest this layup.
George expects Sexton to switch here, but why? There’s no screen, and no prayer of keeping Cam Payne out in front. Walker Kessler has to scramble, which leads to the layup:
These are the soft doubles we talked about in the Triple Team last game, and yep, still not a fan. But George doesn’t give himself a chance to make a difference — his arms are down by his side, his movement not quick, and it’s a capitulation.
As Mike Breen says, this is better individual effort from George here. But he simply can’t move his feet fast enough and gets blown by Josh Hart, not known as a blow-by kinda guy, for the easy dunk. Especially with no rim protection behind him.
The thing is, George should be at least a decent defender. He’s listed at 6-4, pretty good size for a point guard. He has a 6-7.75 wingspan, really quite long. But he doesn’t use that length to any effect, and then has a penchant for just giving up on plays too soon.
Right now, he’s the worst defender on the worst defense in the NBA. That’s not a strong position for a player to be in, and it’s imperative he improves on that end of the floor.
3. Cody Williams' terrific game in West Valley
While the major-league team was losing, there was some good news in Jazzland on New Year’s Day: Jazz rookie Cody Williams had the best game of his professional career at the Maverik Center with the Salt Lake City Stars.
Williams had 36 points on 13-21 shooting (5-8 from three), and added three assists, three steals, and two blocks to the mix. Here’s the highlight video:
Some notable plays, if you’re looking to save some time:
• At 0:48, very good individual defense followed by an emphatic block at the rim.
• At 0:58, just a terrific cross court pass to find a corner shooter when the help man had helped too much. Terrific vision early in pick and roll to notice how the defense is set up and exploit it.
• At 1:49, a tough floating midrange over the smaller defender.
And if you watch the whole video, you can also notice just how easy a lot of these baskets were: the Rio Grande Valley Vipers were, uh, not exactly defensively stifling on this afternoon.
Still, despite the lower level of competition, I’ll take Williams taking 20 shots in the G-League over him being along for the ride with the Jazz. I hope the Jazz in the second half of the year force feed him more possessions, but given that they’re not doing that for now, this G-League experience is okay too.
Editor’s note • This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.
