Markkanen-Kessler: The Twin Towers are from the Utah Jazz

It’s been 53 games, a gigantic bite of the season, and the Utah Jazz still there. A team that transferred its two stars, Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert, at the price of gold, to get into a full reconstruction after seeing that very good was not enough. And that he also got rid of Bojan Bogdanovic, Royce O’Neale, Joe Ingles… A hard core that broke when he felt that he had reached a ceiling and that he had no hidden rings, no trips to the Finals. But those 53 games have passed, and these Jazz who should be paying a toll in the sewers are still positive: 27-26, five wins in seven games after a stretch in which it seemed that they were slowly slipping towards a lower place. logical. They have played well all season, they are in the playoff zone/play-in permanently and, above all, they have touched jackpot on the first level of your remodelsooner than could have been anticipated.

The first success is Will Hardy, a rookie trainer of only 35 years old and who came from the successful Celtic pattern. The second, and the loudest, is Lauri Markkanen, who at 25 didn’t really know where he was: at what point in his career and with options to become what. The Finn, finally, did have a star inside. The Jazz took the risk, in the operation mitchelland they have given the Nordic power forward freedom and responsibility that have unlocked his best version: almost 25 points and 9 rebounds per night, with all ready to be chosen all star for the first time tonight, when reservations are announced of an event that will also be held in Salt Lake City.

The third success is Walker Kessler, a 2.13 and 22-year-old center who was chosen with the number 21 in the last draft. A pick of the Grizzlies who went to the Wolves and that the Jazz they scratched, with a keen eye, on Gobert’s massive move. A player of mechanized movements, the typical white center who seemed from another era and apparently green for the nbaHowever, he has been a revelation, an excellent intimidator who, beyond physicality, reads the game wonderfully, knows what he always has to do and places himself where he is useful in attack. Simple, very important. No drama or gigantic salaries, something not unlike what was expected of Rudy Gobert. Things are sometimes that simple. The last success is to give value to a batch of players between veterans (Conley, Clarkson) and outsiders (Sexton, Beasley…) with whom the Jazz will be able to play in this last week of the market. We will see, we will see…

Against Toronto Raptors (131-128) all those benefits amassed another victory pretty and important: Lauri Markkanen started badly but finished very well (28 points, 13 rebounds), with a lot of weight in a last quarter in which the rhythm of Mike Conley also appeared, decisive (19 points, 8 assists) to secure the victory. Clarkson’s points (23) and Beasley’s shots (14) helped, but Kessler was the one who once again caught the eye: 17 points, 14 rebounds, 7 blocks, 8/10 shooting. He started the game with a festival of blocks (four without finishing the first quarter) that pointed to a triple-double, something that nobody has done in normal season with the Jazz jersey for almost 15 years: Carlos Boozer on February 13, 2008. It didn’t get any worse because, basically, the Raptors began to avoid the gigantic, shooting more from other positions. finally scored 68 points in the paint, but with an inefficient 45%. The Jazz, on the other hand, added 54 points in the zone… with 77%.

The Jazz knew, they have done it many times in this course, to compensate their sins of youth with talent, joy, daring and a basic common sense in attack: the ball in the hands where it has to be in important moments. With that, it was enough against some Raptors that are a mess, now at 23-30, twelfth in the East and with a lot to say in front of the mirror in these last days of the market. We’ll see what they look like on February 10, how similar they are to what they are now. Pascal Siakam (21+10+5) started badly, tempered later but was eliminated due to fouls at the end. The numbers of Barnes (18+14) and Trent Jr (20) far exceeded their impact in the game, and only the heroics of Fred VanVleet (34+12+10) gave real options in the last quarter to the team of a Nick Nurse who seems to be in a mess too. But Conley and Markkanen appeared and the victory stayed in Utah, where the pairing that the Finn forms in the zones with Kessler is much more than could have been expected. In the present of course, and we will see in the future and in this new beginning of the Utah Jazz.