I don't think anyone saw this season playing out the way it has, but now that the season is coming to a close, I figured I'd go back and look at my preseason predictions and see how I did. Below is a copy of my original post, with successful predictions in bold, and errors with a strikethrough. After the bullet lists, I'll have a few comments
Positives (bold: good, strikethrough: bad):
-
Williams
and Rushwill come back from injury and play well
-
Kanter and Favors will each post at least one 20/20 game
- Trey Burke will be a top three vote getter for RoY
-
OKC will be the only WC team to sweep the Jazz -
Trey Burke will have at least one 12+ assist game
- Hayward will have at least one 20/7/7 game
-
The Jazz will sell out at least 25% of their home games
-
Favors andKanter willbothdouble their APG -
Corbin will have clear offensive and defensive schemes
Biedrins will have one game where he posts a double double and plays great defenseHayward or Kanter will be considered for MIP award
Negatives (bold: bad, strikethrough: good):
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Alec Burks will show he is an above average bench player (6th or 7th man) and not a starter
- Kanter and Favors will not average a double double (though both will be close)
- Trey Burke will be a below average starting point guard all season long
- One of our starters will miss 10+ games due to injury
- Average attendance will fall quite a bit throughout the season
-
One of our "core 5" will become the new defensive scapegoat now that Al is gone
-
Hayward won't improve his rebounding - Favors will not get DPoY consideration
-
Corbin will struggle to alter his schemes when the flaws are exposed
Neutral:
- Corbin will be fired very early or not at all
We will be involved in a minor trade at the deadline, sending or receiving a 2nd round draft pick for someone who won't get/hasn't gotten any playing time- Evans won't participate in the dunk contest
- Richard Jefferson will be the new Tinsley (not great, but better than we expect and a solid mentor/
bench leader/injury sub)
The new jumbotron will get mentioned by national media once a month until the all-star breakRush will connect with another player like Gobert and Clark have connected
Overall, I was about half right. Unfortunately, most of my correct predictions were in the negatives category. To discuss some specifics:
Marvin did play better this year than last, so I count that as a success. He hasn't played great, but he's pretty close to his career averages, which I think is all we could realistically expect.
Favors didn't hit a 20/20, but he did have a 20/18 game against the Spurs.
I though Trey would have more 10+ assist games. He has 6 thus far, and I though he would at least have 10.
Attendance has been worse than I thought, but ticket sales are still good.
I'm glad I was wrong about Alec. I thought his ceiling would be a 6th or 7th man, but he's shown that he deserves to start.
I was surprised that Kanter became the defensive scapegoat. I thought it would be Trey (who hasn't been good defensively, but didn't fall into the scapegoat category like Kanter did).
Jefferson has played too much, but it's hard to say he hasn't exceeded expectations.
I thought Corbin did start the season with improved offensive and defensive schemes. I don't think they were very well defined (especially on defense), and they definitely haven't been successful.
I also think that Corbin has made better adjustments to those schemes than he has in the past, but he has struggled to make those adjustments successful.
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