Utah Jazz: Biggest strengths and weaknesses for 2017-18

Strength No. 1: Interior defense

The Utah Jazz are a defensive powerhouse.

With Rudy Gobert manning the paint in 2016-17, no team allowed fewer points to be scored on them throughout the regular season — alongside Utah’s 105.3 defensive rating, which ranked third in the league.

All the talk has been about who will fill the 22 points per game void left after Gordon Hayward’s departure, but Utah isn’t expecting to be 22 points worse off this season. With the offseason additions and Dennis Lindsey’s desire to build around Gobert the way forward, the Jazz could yet improve defensively.

Lindsey made it clear to Tony Jones of the Salt Lake Tribune that the Jazz already had their new franchise player:

"“We feel like we can build defensively around Rudy Gobert. We look at him, and he’s a top 10 player and unique defender. So we wanted to build a team around his talents.”"

Lindsey sees Gobert as a building block for a good reason. The Frenchman led the league in defensive win shares (6.0) last season and would have been a worthy recipient of the Defensive Player of the Year award should the voting media have watched him play a little more than they seemingly did.

He ranked fourth in block percentage and third in defensive box plus/minus for players that played more than 50 games. If he wasn’t disposing of shots himself, his mere presence was enough to deter would-be shooters from driving to the basket.

Gobert will have some help this season after the Jazz picked up Ekpe Udoh from the EuroLeague. He was named the Final Four MVP last season along with earning EuroLeague First Team honors after posting 12.1 points, 7.7 rebounds and 2.1 blocks per game.

Averaging 1.2 blocks per game throughout his 270 game NBA career spanning across five seasons and three teams, Udoh has proven defensive abilities. He will hold down the paint and provide a steady influence on the Jazz’ second unit.