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This off-season the Utah Jazz will be taking part of the Las Vegas Summer league for the first time. So long cross country flights to Orlando, hello moving past old grudges and moving on with our lives! (I love this new Jazz front office, btw) The team has not made any official announcement just yet; however, through sleuthing you can find out some of the people who are currently scheduled to play for the team.
They are point guards Trey Burke, Dante Exum, and Diante Garrett; shooting guards Ian Clark and Khalif Wyatt; face up tweeners Rodney Hood and Malcolm Thomas; and centers Rudy Gobert, Greg Somogyi, Erik Murphy, and Jason Washburn. This is an incomplete list, as it's only 11 players. In the last two seasons the Jazz brought 17 (back in 2012) and 19 (back in 2013) players to summer league. I can expect that the Jazz add a few names to this list by the time the games start -- they did just finish working out 90+ players during the predraft period, and just worked out about another 30 guys in a free agent mini camp.
Player | Pos | HT | WT | Age | From | Last seen | Last team | League | ||||
1 | Trey Burke | 1 | 6 | 1 | 190 | 21.65 | Michigan | On Team | Utah Jazz | NBA | ||
2 | Dante Exum | 1 | 2 | 6 | 6 | 190 | 18.98 | Australia | Drafted | High School | Australia | |
3 | Diante Garrett | 1 | 2 | 6 | 4 | 190 | 25.76 | Iowa St. | On Team | Utah Jazz | NBA | |
4 | Ian Clark | 2 | 1 | 6 | 3 | 173 | 23.31 | Belmont | On Team | Utah Jazz | NBA | |
5 | Khalif Wyatt | 2 | 6 | 4 | 205 | 23.08 | Temple | New Face | Springfield Armor | NBA-DL | ||
6 | Rodney Hood | 3 | 4 | 6 | 8 | 215 | 21.71 | Duke | Drafted | Duke | NCAA | |
7 | Malcolm Thomas | 3 | 4 | 6 | 9 | 225 | 25.66 | San Diego St | On Team | Utah Jazz | NBA | |
8 | Rudy Gobert | 5 | 7 | 2 | 245 | 22.03 | France | On Team | Utah Jazz | NBA | ||
9 | Greg Somogyi | 5 | 7 | 3 | 242 | 24.77 | Hungary | Predraft Workout '13 | Alba Fehervar | Hungary | ||
10 | Erik Murphy | 5 | 4 | 6 | 10 | 230 | 23.70 | Florida | On Team | Utah Jazz | NBA | |
11 | Jason Washburn | 5 | 4 | 6 | 10 | 242 | 24.09 | Utah | Free Agent Camp '14 | Brussels | Belgium |
Yeah. Right now it looks a little heavy at point guard and center. I can understand why Raul Neto isn't urged to play here as instead got the blessings from the Jazz to play for Brazil this summer. A return to the floor where the magic happened will be good for Ian Clark, and I hope he gets the ball in his hands. He didn't with the Jazz last season.
With this type of roster the team should try to speed up the tempo, and be able to attack the defense from a number of angles with dribble penetration. The bigs are really big and should be able to box out, get rebounds, set screens, and get out of the way. I think it would be silly to see the team try to run the Alfense and post up a big guy and see if he can go one-on-one, which is what the team did in Orlando the last few years.
I wonder who the Jazz front office will fill out this team with. The games start in 10 days, and the Jazz schedule can be found here. (It's worth the look, it's a detailed view of the times, dates, and locations of each game so you can better plan your trip)