Utah Jazz: Joe Ingles is one giant shoulder shrug

Joe Ingles has a cult-like following among fans of the Utah Jazz. This season, however, his on-court performance has deteriorated. Sadly, this is the new norm.

Since first arriving in the Salt Lake Valley in 2014, fans of the Utah Jazz welcomed Joe Ingles with open arms. At the time, he was already 27 years old, having spent the first eight years of his professional career as a bit of a globetrotter playing in Australia, Andalusia, Spain and Israel.

And it makes sense — getting beyond the search for a place to call home, many Jazz fans saw in Ingles what they see in the mirror every day: a normal, unimposing figure with a scraggly beard, receding hairline and a body that likely won’t turn many heads at the local swimming pool.

From a skin-of-his-teeth starter to a lethal threat from behind the 3-point line, Ingles’s six years with the Jazz have largely proven fruitful. In fact, decades from now, millennial Utah Jazz fans will tell their athletically-average grandchildren of the time a Jazzman “just like them” (Ingles, of course) completely shut down Paul George and his “Playoff P” persona in the NBA playoffs.

This is the stuff of legends, right? Well, it was …

This season, things have changed — and not for the better, unfortunately.

Rightly so, while Mike Conley continues to catch the bulk of the criticism from #TakeNote Nation, this season, Ingles is putting up a pedestrian 9.8 points, 5.1 assists and 3.9 rebounds per game in 30.1 minutes.

Yes, Ingles might have the edge over Conley in per-game assists (4.1) and rebounds (3.3), but in spite of maintaining his spot in Quin Snyder’s starting five, with fewer minutes per game (28.1), Conley has still managed to beat out Ingles as a scorer, nabbing 13.4 points per contest.

And while we’re on the topic of scoring, it’s one thing to struggle with putting the ball in the basket. I get it, the rim’s 18 inches in diameter. From end to end, a basketball is roughly 9.5 inches wide — it’s a hard thing to do. It’s yet another to simply avoid taking shots altogether, especially when you’re open enough for a quick smoke break before the ball ever takes flight.

Joe’s a career 40 percent three-point shooter. Yet, since coming back from the All-Star break, the “gravy” of Ingles’ game has plummeted with him shooting a mere 28.6 percent from long range.

That’s Russell Westbrook territory, people.

Reporting on Wednesday’s 114-103 loss at home (the fourth consecutive of its kind, mind you) to  Jayson Tatum and the Boston Celtics, writes Sarah Todd in an article for the Deseret News:

"“What’s more alarming than any percentages is that Ingles is passing up wide-open looks and saying that he went one of three in 26 minutes is a bit of an overstatement. Ingles took each of three shots Wednesday in his nine minutes of play during the first quarter. He didn’t take a single field-goal attempt through the final three quarters of play.”"

The skinny of the situation?

Whether part of the starting lineup or coming off the bench, Ingles is an invaluable member of the Utah Jazz’s rotation when he’s able to reliably defend on the perimeter and shoot from deep. Fifty-eight games into the 2019-2020 season, he isn’t doing much of either.

Hate to break it to you, Joe, but Snyder doesn’t need yet another “ball mover” to knee-jerkishly swing the rock around the 3-point arc. The league is full of guys who do this. They’re young, inexperienced and making the league minimum — not contributors of real, meaningful minutes.

The happy-go-lucky, laissez-faire personality with which Jazz fans have come to associate Ingles has been cute for the better part of his time in Utah, but things have unexpectedly taken a turn for the worse — now’s the time to buckle down and salvage a season that’s quickly slipping away.

The Utah Jazz have many urgent questions; Ingles could be the key to answering a few of ‘em.