FanPost

One week in review! OVERHYPE probably

Here we are a week into the season and i must say...

WE GOOD FELLAS (& FELLLALAs?)!

Its early into the grind of the season but so far Utah has looked much better( and sometimes worse) in a variety of areas.

Defense

This team is built to defend and we have done so at a high level so far. We have held three high profile offenses below 100, with the 87 allowed to the Thunder standing out the most. Individual quarter defense has been great. The 4th quarter in the Nuggets game was particularly great! The Jazz allowed 7 points thru a little under 10 minutes and completely decimated the Nuggets offense, a potentially top 5 unit, by forcing 8 turnovers. They would have been under 10 except two garbage time threes by Mudiay.

The first quarter vs the Thunder, and the entire game for that matter, was a complete shut down of what should also be a top 5. 13 points in 12 minutes is phenomenal. The Jazz let Melo and PG run iso plays and trusted our defenders and team defense to recover. The focus was to not let the backups and Russ beat us. 21 points from the bench and 6 from Westbrook was the result.

The Bench

The Minnesota game shows what happens when a bench unit gets loose against the Jazz. Jamal Crawford turned back the clock and saved the day for them but Bjelica and Dieng also came in and had a large impact. When our bench doesn't win the battle, then we will struggle to win games.

Other than that game, our bench has been amazing. Joe Johnson is out there using his usual slowdown, bully ball ways. Mitchell is playing excelent defense, highlighted by getting PG mad at him against the Thunder, but his offense has been a mixed bag. He's making plays, but his shooting is very poor at this point. That will changed and I don't think the Jazz are worried at all. Burks has shown that he is BACK and ready to contribute. His offense has been absent at times, Wolves game, but he is making the right reads, attacking the basket, and shooting that damn lights out! His defense has been fairly good as well. He is showing effort and has been able to get 2 or 3 easy baskets from steals. Thabo has been effective and disruptive. Exactly what everyone predicted from him, plus a couple good finishes at the rim.

Udoh

Yeah he gets his own section and he DESERVES it! Ekpe has been a force on the defensive end and has proven to be a big piece of what the Jazz are doing. He moves his feet like a guard, challenges everything at the rim, and has rebounded very well. He's had mistakes on offense with spacing and finishing but that will come as he gets more time and gets comfortable with NBA defenses (May be slow to develop since he goes against Rudy everyday). He has a 15% block rate, unfathomably high, that doesn't look to go down until people recognize his abilities. Rudy was a major problem for other teams last year but there was a drop off going to the bench. Now the Jazz have 48 minutes of elite rim protection!

This week:

We play the Clippers, Suns and Lakers. Blake Griffin looks great this year and Tedosic is awesome (out for this game however), but we should beat the Clippers with our defense. Suns are trash and are trying to trade one of the 3 actual NBA players on their team (PJ Tucker and Booker's offense are the other two). Lakers are looking very selfish despite Lonzo playing decently. I think this will be closer than it should, but the Jazz will still win.

Have a good week everyone and go JAZZ!

All comments are the opinion of the commenter and not necessarily that of SLC Dunk or SB Nation.