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The Utah Jazz have released information suggesting that they have parted with point guard Jerel McNeal.
The Jazz has waived guard Jerel McNeal. Following the move, Utah’s roster now stands at 13 players.
— Utah Jazz (@utahjazz) September 25, 2013
McNeal's departure is oddly timed. Particularly because he has been consistently a) mentioned by the team (via their website or other dispatches) as a part of the 2013-14 Utah Jazz; and b) been seen working with members of the 2013-14 Utah Jazz all summer long. He was at P3 in the off-season working with Derrick Favors and Alec Burks. He was taking part of voluntary practices against John Lucas III and everyone else who happens to be around.
The Jazz recently added Scott Machado to a training camp contract. Steve Luhm (@SLuhm) speculated that these two things are somewhat related. Personally, I have no idea what happened.
Pure speculation but wonder if Jazz's signing of Scott Machado angered Jerel McNeal and/or his agent and they asked out ...
— Steve Luhm (@sluhm) September 25, 2013
Furthermore, info on Scott can be found here....
College, draft profiles, D-league, NBA, Summer League '12, '13 - all in one place -"The Skinny on Scott Machado" http://t.co/TPpbGcDZeO
— Nuno Sá (@nsanba) September 25, 2013
It's sad to see Jerel go (his home planet needs him, I guess), but he did play with us from last season and did not get into any games. As far as his Jazz legacy goes, it's slightly higher than that of Travis Leslie, but lesser than any other player who actually stepped on the court for us. For those keeping score at home, going for the gold medal in "worst ever Jazz performance" is Tim Legler 's 2 games with the team. Just awful. At least McNeal wasn't afwul.
Whatever the reason for the team parting ways with him, we still have an interesting year coming up, particularly at point guard.
As it stands the team is back down to 13 people (with Machado being one of them, but again, it's a training camp signing so far, and there will be others in the next few days). And our point guards are Trey Burke, John Lucas III, Machado, and we assume shooting guards Alec Burks and Ian Clark will get some burn there as well.
So long Jerel. Hope you find a team soon!