NBA Open Thread
By 
No reason for a Tuesday open thread since the league didn’t schedule any games so everyone could vote. Good for the NBA. So let’s do it today and let’s talk about…..Utah?
The Jazz were supposed to be terrible this year. When it was clear they would not win with the Donovan Mitchell/Rudy Gobert team, they decided to tear it down and start over, maybe with a little tanking to get Wembanyama in the 23 draft. They got the Wolves to trade a ton of picks for Gobert and then moved Mitchell to the Cavs. Mitchell especially has played great in Cleveland.
But somehow, the Jazz seem to be an actual good team! We are three weeks into the season and they are 9-3. They are leading the Western Conference! Now, we are still early, but 12 games into an 82 game season isn’t that early. At the very least, they are pretty torpedoed their chances at a super high draft pick. They are already 6 1/2 games up on Houston, who is at the bottom of the West, for instance. That’s a lot to catch up on a team that might win 20 games this season. But hey, winning is winning. Winning is fun. Winning brings in the fans. I don’t say this out of any love for the Jazz or their fans, who are pretty racist and generally disagreeable. But I always feel bad for players in some shitty tank situation. And this isn’t that. Lauri Markkanen has taken a huge step forward and is average 22 points and 9 boards a night. That’s a big part of it. Jordan Clarkson and Mike Conley remain the solid players they’ve always been. I suppose the Jazz were going to move those guys for more picks, but at this point, I don’t think you can really do that. Maybe if they slip going forward. And I think the chances of the Jazz winning the Western Conference is zero. But could they avoid the play-in? Yeah, maybe.
Fascinating amount of success given the situation.
Unfortunately, the two ESPN games tonight are garbage–Knicks-Nets and Lakers-Clippers will be an exciting set of failure big market teams playing failure basketball. But at least we can watch a damn basketball game without being inundated with horrible political ads, a cancer upon the nation.
Anyway, this is an open thread for the NBA or other sports. No elections.