Is a Derrick Favors trade on the horizon?

2017 was an interesting year if you are a Utah Jazz fan. There were some playoff highs and some 4th of July lows. The Emergence of one Donovan Mitchell happened as well, brightening the outlook on 2018. It’s the 2nd day of January, and I welcome you to your Tuesday downbeat.

Wow am I glad 2017 is done. That December schedule was something else. And by something else I really mean it was absolutely horrific. Hopefully we start seeing the W column grow now that we’re through that brutal stretch. Just how brutal was it?

Click on the tweet and go through the thread to see how the rest of the schedule breaks down by month. Hopefully January goes a little better and the Jazz work themselves back into the playoff picture. The injury bug hit, the losses piled up, and that may have pushed the team into a deep hole. But I still see a potential playoff team when these guys are clicking. A team that could strike fear into opponents if they were awoken. Hopefully they reveal that sooner rather than later.

The Jazz offseason clearly did not go as GM Dennis Lindsey had planned, but that didn’t prevent him from bolstering the roster with solid depth. That depth has showed its value so far as guys have gone down. Look at this to see what I mean.

That’s the average rank of several advanced stats. The Jazz are tied for the most players in the top 100 with 7. Unfortunately there currently is not a single player in the top 50. That won’t always be the case, however, when Rudy is healthy and as Donovan continues to grow. If one top 50 player were added via trade, free agency, or the draft then this team could be dangerous again real fast. I’m still confident and excited about this team’s future despite what the current standings indicate. Dennis Lindsey has assuredly been working tirelessly to turn this team back into a contending roster.

Gobert_the_Destroyer gets us started off with an End of Year Look at the Utah Jazz:

The 2017-2018 Utah Jazz season has been a study in frustration.

First, the bad, so so so much bad: ...

Read through to see what went wrong, but also what has gone right so far this season.

Fesenko for President comes at us again, this time with some thoughts about reshaping the Utah Jazz Roster.

I think most Jazz fans would agree that the current Jazz roster needs some reshaping. Although there are many things to like about this Jazz team overall and many things to like about almost all of the Jazz's individual players (if they can fit into the right role), it's a roster that doesn't quite mesh.

Do you agree or disagree with the proposed moves?

This is my favorite part of the downbeat. Where I get to remind you each week that you're the best fanbase in the NBA. And we’ve got some more fan posts to prove it!

This hasn’t been mentioned or discussed much, so I thought I would take a moment to bring it up here.

And because I know a lot of you won’t go read the description, I’ll give you a few a few brief details. Here’s the full link if you’re interested.

The NBA 2K League Qualification starts January 1 and runs through the 30th. Players must win 50 games in NBA 2K18’s Pro-Am mode and complete an online application (check out NBA2kLeague.com) during that time frame. The qualification is open to anyone around the world who is 18 or older and playing on a Playstation 4 or Xbox One...

The league will host a live draft in March. The draft order will be determined using a lottery system. Each of the 17 teams will draft five players to their roster as 85 players in total are selected to become professional NBA 2K League athletes...

Players will move to their respective cities in April to begin preparations for the start of the season. They will live in a house or apartment provided by the team...

All players will be paid a competitive salary. They will also have the opportunity to earn additional compensation through league tournament and playoff incentives. Also, players will have the ability to sign endorsement deals with outside sponsors.

I thought it was fun that the Jazz decided to take part in this. Not every team joined up, so to see them make the investment is cool to see. So you gamers out there better start practicing, training, and preparing for your big chance!

Bill Simmons and Kevin O’Connor jumped on their podcast to discuss One Thing for Every NBA Team. Start at the 46:38 mark for their discussion about Utah. The main point talked about was their opinion that there is clearly a Derrick Favors trade waiting to happen. Simmons goes as far to say that the Jazz are a top 3 most likely team to make a trade over the next few weeks before the deadline. Do you think a move needs to be made? And what move might that be?

Somehow I haven’t really discussed Donovan Mitchell much in this downbeat. That needs to be fixed. I poked around his Twitter likes and found that he like the following tweets:

He must be learning from Master Rudy Gobert how to have an ultra competitive edge, continue to find motivation, and embarrass people with freezing cold takes. And we are only beginning to understand just how good he’s going to be.