ESPN’s Hollinger on the Preseason Jazz

Posted by Bryan Hickman on October 07, 2008

‘Hollinger: A Fruitful Forecast’

This story is about a week old, but, as far as I can tell, it hasn’t been covered here.  So, I figured I’d make it my inaugural post on Jazzbots.

Over at ESPN.com, John Hollinger has released his 2008-09 forecasts for every NBA team.  If you skip to the end of his Jazz forecast, you’ll see that he predicts that we’ll finish 58-24 this year, putting us first in the Northwest Division and, more surprisingly, first in the Western Conference.

How’s that for optimism?

Of course, Hollinger’s forecasts, much like his season-long analysis, are based entirely on statistics.  Given the overall efficiency of the Jazz’s offensive system, such an approach is inherently tilted in the Jazz’s favor.  For example, last year, the Jazz spent most of the season in the top five in Hollinger’s Power Rankings.  In fact, at the end of the regular season, even though five Western Conference teams finished with better records than the Jazz, only Boston had a higher rating under Hollinger’s formula.

So, yeah, Hollinger’s ratings don’t always pan out in the real world.

Still, it isn’t as though Hollinger’s ignoring the Jazz’s real-world weaknesses.  He points out that the Jazz commit an astronomical number of fouls per game.  This places our opponents on the free throw line more often than would be ideal.  In fact, according Hollinger, this was the primary reason the Jazz lost last season’s playoff series against the Lakers.  I think a lot of us Jazz fans, having attended the Jerry Sloan School of Basketball Indoctrination, hold up our high foul numbers as we would a badge of honor, claiming that it’s the hallmark of aggressive defense.  But, Hollinger has a point when he says:

More generally, the major hole they dig themselves into with the fouls makes it virtually impossible for the Jazz to have a championship-caliber defense; the only reason they were even in the hunt last season was because they led the league in offensive efficiency over the second half of the season. That’s been the case for Utah ever since Sloan adopted the foul-on-every-play strategy near the end of the Stockton-Malone era (their Finals teams fouled at much less prodigious rates) — the defense has been average at best every season, because you can’t be at the top of the league giving away this many free points.

Hollinger also noted our weakness in interior defense, echoing the concerns of virtually every Jazz fan on the planet.  He attributes much of the Jazz’s foul-prone nature to the fact that they can’t seem to defend anyone in the low post.  While this is rightly cause for consternation among the Jazz faithful, Hollinger doesn’t see it as an insurmountable problem, due mostly to the improvement of some of our young wing defenders.  He ends his forecast by stating:

OK, they foul on every play. The good news is that if they just cut the foul rate a little bit, they can be good enough defensively to allow the offense to win games for them. And we have reason to suspect they can pull that feat off. Between Brewer’s emergence as a stopper on the wings, a likely reduction in playing time for high-foul players like Harpring and Collins, and, more hopefully, some recognition by Sloan that this state of affairs must change, it seems plausible for the Jazz to improve here.

If so, it’s hard to argue with them in the West, because they’ve got everything else. The Jazz have go-to stars in both the backcourt and the frontcourt, have multiple scoring weapons surrounding them, and have arguably the deepest team in the conference. That last point is important, because this team is tailor-made for the regular-season grind –it can easily survive minor injuries and slumps and has no player who is too indispensable.

Additionally, they’re still on the upswing. Williams is 24, Boozer is 26, and every key player except Harpring is in his 20s. Okur and Korver are both likely to have better years than a season ago, but nobody except perhaps Harpring projects to sharply regress.

Add it all up and the Jazz, perhaps a bit surprisingly, came out with the top record in the West when I projected each team’s outcome — beating out the Lakers by a single game. L.A. has the higher ceiling, and arguably so does Houston, but the Jazz have a far better likelihood of getting close to their roof.

Taking things a step further, picking the Jazz to have home-court advantage by virtue of the best record in the West means one almost has to pick them to win the conference, too — between the altitude and the crowd’s impact on the zebras, this team is nigh unbeatable at home. It’s a crowded race and they’re one of three teams I see as having roughly equal odds of making it out, but if I have to pick a horse out West, this is the one.

Oddly enough, this seems to be one of the most unduly pessimistic off-seasons among Jazz fans that I’ve ever observed.  You can’t read a Jazz-related blog or message board without encountering barrage of complaints about our off-season moves (or lack thereof) or proposals to trade away core members of the team.  While I don’t suggest we all just ignore our team’s weaknesses, I think Hollinger’s predictions and analysis should give all those naysayers at least a little pause.

4 Comments

Jared Conger on October 07, 2008 said:

this article was great, it made me feel slightly vindicated in the eyes of the national media after the bombing that the USA Today did when they had the Jazz finishing at the 8th seed in the West.

Clint on October 07, 2008 said:

It was nice to see someone give the Jazz some credit. There has been so much hype surrounding the Lakers and Bynum that this article was a breath of fresh air for me.

Linda McFarland on October 08, 2008 said:

Great to read the nice comments but even nicer to watch the pre-season game last night. Even tho it was first game where the rookies don’t play a lot and a little unsettling about the injuries so we couldn’t see how Boozer has decided to play this year, there was some showing of great promise from almost everyone else. What about Brewers extra strength and weight??? And even more than that, what about the desire he puts into a pre-season game? I was pretty disappointed in Koufas and think that he just is’nt a good fit for the Jazz and Coach Sloan. He looked overweight and looked a little lazy in my eyes. I just don’t think we can wait and wait and wait for him to mature past the dyeing his hair silver and over indulging on the money he makes. I would have liked a little more excitment from AJ. With all the talent we have this year, our key (in my fabulous estiment) is we have to have maturity from everyone to realize why they may not get the playing time but be thrilled that the team T-E-A-M is winning and that they are part of the team. See some of you in Salt Lake tomorrow night.

JayD on October 10, 2008 said:

I want to say that I enjoyed your veiws in this article . It is nice to know that there are some people that give this team some credit . I have to agree that we have one of the deepest and best team in the league .
I also agree with you clint that it was interesting how much they focused on the Lakers and the return of Bynum to even mention much of anything else that was going on with the Jazz . Well we won , even if it is only the pre – season .
I am excited to see more of them the rest of the pre – season .
GO Jazz !!!!!!!

Leave Your Comment

How do I get an avatar for my comments?
It is easy and completely free. Just go to Gravatar.com and sign-up with your email address. Gravatar is globally recognized, so your avatar will show on every Gravatar-enabled website or blog.