Utah Jazz: Complete grades for the 2019 offseason
By Alec Liebsch
Draft night
After the Utah Jazz traded their own 2019 first-rounder, most would think they didn’t have much to do on draft night. That was proven untrue, however, as Utah made three additions in the second round.
The first selection, originally belonging to the Indiana Pacers, was used on Jarrell Brantley from the College of Charleston. He’s a do-it-all 4 with the height of a wing (6’6.5″), insane wingspan (7’1″) and huge frame (252 pounds).
At a mid-major like C of C, you would expect an NBA prospect to carry a heavy load. No more than 18.1 percent of his plays came from any one type, giving him the most diverse offensive resume in the draft. It amounted to a stat line of 19.4 points, 8.4 rebounds and 2.4 assists.
Brantley’s 3-point shooting numbers leave a bit to be desired (33 percent), but he did convert 1.200 PPP on catch-and-shoot jumpers overall.
His free throw clip of 79 percent is a good indicator as well. When not asked to do everything offensively, he shows solid potential to be effective off the ball.
Despite being tasked with such a heavy workload, Brantley’s efficiency was quite high. At 1.035 points per possession, he ranked in the 88th percentile among all D-I players.
Though his assist-turnover ratio was below 1.0, his playmaking skills are developing and likely won’t be a huge part of his role at the next level.
As long as his shooting and passing become passable, Brantley can have a solid role as a rotational big.
Grade: B
With their own second rounder (No. 53), the Jazz selected Justin Wright-Foreman, a jitterbug guard out of Hofstra.
Across his four years for the Pride, Wright-Foreman developed an advanced offenssive game. Like his new teammate Brantley, the Hofstra product was asked to do quite a lot for his team.
The Queens native won back-to-back CAA Player of the Year honors in 2018 and 2019, averaging 24.4 and 27.1 points per game in each respective season.
Despite such volume, his efficiency did not wane, as Wright-Foreman finished the most efficiently of any high-usage player (minimum of 20 possessions per game) last season.
A huge part of that efficiency is from his marksmanship as a shooter. In 2018-19, Wright-Foreman drilled 42.5 percent of his 3s, which came on a huge sample (259 attempts). Over all four years he connected on 38.6 percent of them.
His blend of on and off-ball skills will work quite well in Utah. He won’t have to start, and can form a two-headed attack with one of Mitchell or Conley. So long as his decision-making doesn’t spiral out of control, Wright-Foreman could have his two-way contract converted sooner than expected.
Though not the tallest player, at just over 6’0″ in shoes, Wright-Foreman has solid length (6’7.5″) and size (186 pounds) for the position. That frame allows him to fight through contact when attacking defenses, which he’ll do plenty of at the next level.
That size and length will help on the other end, but likely not enough to win a starting job. Defensively he was hard to analyze at Hofstra, as the Pride played a zone defense. He did defend averagely when asked to guard on ball though, ranking in the 49th percentile of isolation defense.
His attentiveness off the ball was mediocre, but being fully engaged on that end was hard to do with his offensive load. In a mismatch setting he will likely be targeted, meaning that lineups including him must be defensively strong at other spots.
This likely limits his ceiling to sixth man duties, but bench scorers are still a commodity in this league, especially with his shooting numbers.
Quite honestly, I’m not sure how he fell in such a weak draft. Wright-Foreman will have a role at the next level, because he can flat-out score, and do so efficiently. The value is great, and he could be one of the biggest steals (relative to draft position) of the entire draft.
Grade: A-
After the draft, Utah traded for Golden State’s second-rounder (the Jazz will send $2 million to GS), Miye Oni of Yale. Oni is a two-way wing who played as such in college, measuring 6’6″ with a 6’10” wingspan and weighing 206 pounds.
Those measurables scream NBA wing. But does his actual game?
Unlike the other two draftees, Oni wasn’t the focal point of Yale’s offense. Whether this is a good or bad thing remains to be seen, but seeing him in a role was valuable for projection purposes.
Oni averaged 17.1 points, 6.3 rebounds and 3.6 assists for an egalitarian Bulldogs team that made the NCAA Tournament. He did so on above-average efficiency too, ranking in the 73rd percentile in PPP.
A big part of this was his shooting, where Oni hit 37 percent on 3s and 79 percent from the free throw line.
Oni also has good athletic traits to run in the open floor, which he did quite a lot for Yale. Though at the next level, his bread and butter should be in a spot-up role, where he finished in the 88th percentile among D-I players last year.
Quite frankly, he doesn’t create much for himself. If dared to attack the basket, his mediocre ball-handling and scoring traits will be his demise.
Granted, the Jazz excel in developing these so-called “limited” players. In Utah, Oni could develop such a game and be a passable, two-way wing. At this stage of a poor draft class,, that’s all you can really ask for.