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Utah Jazz forward Gordon Hayward is hitting for 20 with ease, how does he stack up historically?

Some of this data came as a shock to me

By AllThatAmar
Russ Isabella-USA TODAY Sports

Over the last four games the Utah Jazz have had a player score 20 or more points six different times (Gordon Hayward x3, Derrick Favors x2, Rodney Hood x1). The Jazz are still the slowest paced team in the league, and have been a slow team for a number of seasons -- so there are just fewer opportunities to score big. Yes, they do boast the 10th best ORTG in the league, but volume is hard to get. So I think it's special for our team to be breaking out of their slumber and having big performances from their best offensive weapons. That got me thinking . . . where to our current players rank compared to the four plus decade history of this team. When you look at the regular season and playoffs games combined, you get a pretty long list of players (via. Basketball-Reference.com), n=115. When you organize it by player position you get the following:

Utah Jazz 20 Point Games (Regular season + Playoffs)
Point Guards # Shooting Guards # Small Forwards # Power Forwards # Centers #
1 John Stockton 269 Darrell Griffith 291 Adrian Dantley 416 Karl Malone 1283 Mehmet Okur 146
2 Deron Williams 185 Pete Maravich 232 Gordon Hayward 112 Carlos Boozer 195 Al Jefferson 97
3 Rickey Green 83 Jeff Malone 133 Andrei Kirilenko 90 Thurl Bailey 173 Rich Kelley 30
4 Jim McElroy 49 Jeff Hornacek 100 John Drew 70 Paul Millsap 91 Spencer Haywood 28
5 Trey Burke 28 Gail Goodrich 43 Matt Harpring 69 Truck Robinson 81 Jeff Wilkins 25
6 Devin Harris 13 Nate Williams 37 Aaron James 44 Derrick Favors 47 Greg Ostertag 5
7 Mo Williams 11 Bob Hansen 27 Bryon Russell 35 Enes Kanter 19 Joe Meriweather 4
8 Carlos Arroyo 8 Alec Burks 26 Donyell Marshall 34 Ben Poquette 15 Mark Eaton 3
9 Henry Bibby 7 Ronnie Brewer 21 C.J. Miles 33 Danny Schayes 10 Melvin Turpin 3
10 Derek Fisher 5 Raja Bell 19 Blue Edwards 13 Ron Behagen 10 Otto Moore 3
-- Jerry Eaves 5 Terry Furlow 19
11 Freddie Boyd 4 Louie Nelson 17 Tyrone Corbin 11 Tom Boswell 8 Felton Spencer 2
12 Howard Eisley 4 Rodney Hood 16 Chris Morris 10 Fred Roberts 6 Mike Brown 2
13 Jay Humphries 4 Gordan Giricek 12 Kelly Tripucka 10 E.C. Coleman 5 Neal Walk 2
14 Duck Williams 3 Randy Foye 9 Bud Stallworth 9 Antoine Carr 4 Rudy Gobert 2
15 Carl Nicks 2 Ron Boone 9 David Benoit 7 Tom Chambers 4 Eric Leckner 1
16 Keith McLeod 2 Kyle Korver 8 Marvin Williams 5 Danny Manning 2 Jarron Collins 1
17 Raul Lopez 2 Jim Barnett 6 Allan Bristow 4 James Hardy 1 Mel Counts 1
18 Slick Watts 2 Wesley Matthews 4 Carey Scurry 3 Larry Krystkowiak 1 Rick Roberson 1
19 Billy McKinney 1 DeShawn Stevenson 3 Richard Jefferson 3 Paul Griffin 1 Wayne Cooper 1
20 Bryce Cotton 1 John Starks 3 Bernard King 2 Scott Padgett 1
21 Eric Maynor 1 Shandon Anderson 3 J.J. Anderson 2 Tony Massenburg 1
22 Milt Palacio 1 Devin Brown 2 Adam Keefe 1 Trevor Booker 1
23 Dell Curry 1 Ollie Johnson 1
24 Freeman Williams 1 Paul Dawkins 1
25 Gus Bailey 1
26 Stu Lantz 1

  • Point Guards: Trey Burke is already #5 on the list for lead guards, and that is pretty much his role right now under Quin Snyder -- to be a scorer. I think as the season continues we may see Raul Neto get on this list, he had 15 last night and it looked effortless.
  • Shooting Guards: Alec Burks is #8 on this list, and may climb that if he ever gets healthy again. Hood is in the 11-20 range, but at his rate I wouldn't be surprised to see him add a few more 20 points games over the next few weeks.
  • Small Forwards: G-Time is #2 here and he's going to be #2 for a very long time. I don't see him passing the HOFer AD any time soon. Also, yes, this entire piece is a product of me getting nostalgic of that Marvin Williams 20 PT game he had that gave us all very high expectations.
  • Power Forwards: D-Favors needs the ball more, this much we can agree on. Trevor Booker makes this list, but I can see Trey Lyles passing him over the next few seasons for sure.
  • Centers: So current bigman Rudy Gobert only needs one more 20+ game to tie Mark Eaton, and two more after that to tie Greg Ostertag. There really hasn't been a lot of scoring in the middle for the Jazz outside of Big Al and Memo. (And really, if you add it up, only 7% of the 20 point games from a Jazzman came from the center spot -- 14% from PG, 21% from SG, 20% from SF, and 39% from PF, rounding up.)

There were some obviously epic scorers in Jazz history. With how the Jazz run their Xs and Os right now there isn't that one player responsible for scoring every night. It's easier to gameplan if you have one, but the Utah Jazz of 2015-2016 just do not. I do feel, really, that we're going to see more and more 20 point games from Hayward and Hood, and less from Favors. But more than anything else, I think Favors would be a more reliable 20 point option with his still nascent offensive game. He gets to the line, he finishes in the paint, he cleans up on the offensive glass, and he can hit spot up jumpers and play the pick and roll / pop game. He just needs more touches.

What was the most interesting thing from that data that you saw that I didn't? Share it in the comments section!

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