The Downbeat #1639 - "Will the Jazz's Future Exceed its Past?" Edition

As you may have heard recently, the Utah Jazz recently worked out several draft hopefuls or potential mid-season additions. One of them that stood out to me was yet another Aussie who goes by the name of Hugh Greenwood and/or Legolas. Here's a snippet of his interview (courtesy moni @ jazzfanatical)

Have you talked to Dante Exum or Joe Ingles?

I saw Dante [Exum] walk through. I heard he was out in California but I saw him walk past, so I’ll try and catch up with him. And Joe and I have had a good relationship for a number of years now. So he reached out to me. I told him I was gonna raid whatever he left in his locker, so — he’s size 13 as well, so I’m gonna have to have a look around. But no, he gave me some words of advice.
What were said words of advice?
Just play hard. Play hard, work hard, which is, it’s second nature to us Aussies. You know, we play hard. It’s how we get this far. And just to experience, just have fun. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be here, and it’s an honor to be here, so just have fun.

Source.

Starving for fresh, yet grainy pics of players from your favorite team? Then look no further!

Wonder how this guy looked in today's pre-draft workout. pic.twitter.com/MEb932yhl5

— Jody Genessy (@DJJazzyJody) May 27, 2015

A few people who witnessed the workout mentioned that Exum looked visibly bigger and/or taller (this is the part where you start daydreaming and salivating at the thought of a defensive-focused 6'7" superstar point guard on our team)

Seems fairly unbelievable to see that noticeable of a difference after a 6 week span, but hey, crazier things have happened to growing teenagers..

Isn't it a great relief to have a coach/GM combo that gives you hope in the franchise's future? The last several years of Jazz fandom have been a bumpy ride, but with the current core of players and management in place, it's apparent that the Jazz bottomed out a year ago and are on the upswing.

Consider this your occasional mandatory reminder that the Jazz have had 8 coaches. EVER!

Due to this, I easily can say that Coach Quin Snyder is already a top 3 Utah Jazz coach of all time! After one season! Even with a losing record! I mean, look at his competition...the pre-Layden era Jazz teams were practically the Clippers of their time for a decade.

Source: Basketball Reference

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Speaking of coach-related news, Chicago Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau was fired yesterday. This happened despite him making the playoffs for each of his 5 seasons coaching for them (conference finals appearance the 1st season), dealing with his star player getting injured and playing less than half the time, and milking his team for all they got to winning 65% of their games while he was coach!

From a numbers standpoint, it just doesn't make sense. However, there have been numerous reports that it has been an issue of the infamous Chicago management and the hardheaded Thibodeau butting heads and just not getting along in general for quite some time now.

Edit: Take a read from the perpretator of Woj-bombs himself on what I found to be the best analysis of what went wrong between Bulls management and Coach Thibodeau: Why Bulls management could never accept Tom Thibodeau's success

From someone who doesn't really care for the Bulls, this situation looks like history repeating itself all over again in the form of Thibodeau and the Bulls acting the parts of George Karl and the Nuggets a couple seasons ago.

Recent coach of the year consistently overachieves with his team during the regular season despite not being given much to work with; coach's team also consistently chokes in the playoffs; management doesn't appreciate coach's talents and fires him; team becomes irrelevant and semi-regretful for letting go of previous coach.

We'll see if that last part holds true for the future Bulls.

Also, Jazz fan bias test: Would you take Thibodeau over Snyder right now?

Let us know in the comments!.

After getting to this point of the downbeat, I began thinking one of those of deep Utah Jazz related thoughts that I begin to think more and more of this time of the postseason: Will the Jazz's future exceed its past?

Hear me out now, the Jazz have a deep enriched history of incredible players both on and off the court. In my biased opinion, I would say the Jazz are the best NBA franchise to have never won a ring, mainly due to the fact that both of their finals appearances were against 1 of the greatest teams of all time in the late 90s Chicago Bulls.

Furthermore, I would say the only team that even rivals the Jazz's legacy while simultaneously being championship-less is the Phoenix Suns.

Anyways, back to my original thought. Will the Jazz's future exceed its past? Will the reign of Coach Snyder ever get the chance to surpass late-90s Sloan/Malone/Stockton? Will it even be better than the DWill/Boozer/Ak47/Millsap/Okur Jazz? I highly hope the latter is true and I really want to believe that the former is true as well, but even a hopeless optimist such as myself thinks that the current Jazz are lightyears away from even approaching the pantheon of Jazz greatness that the late-90s Jazz accomplished. I really hope they prove me wrong.

Enough with my tangent, it's time for some Jazz trivia for my fellow Dunkers!

Is there any current Jazz player that has broken into the top 10 all-time Jazz ranks in career points, rebounds, assists, blocks, or steals?

Find out by testing the limits of your Jazz knowledge with this quiz:

Click here for Jazz quiz for career leaders

If anyone beats my score of 47, please leave a comment below. I wish to know who is more obsessed with Jazz trivia than myself.