Utah Jazz: Buy and sell on every free agent this offseason

The Utah Jazz have already made a couple of trades to free up money for free agency this offseason. Do they buy or sell on each of them?

The Utah Jazz had another solid year in 2019-20 despite the issues of COVID-19. Rudy Gobert suffered his share of criticism for the way he acted prior to the league shutting down thanks to him testing positive. Like a true professional he apologized and helped pay the salaries of arena staff.

On the court, Joe Ingles struggled with his new bench role while Bojan Bogdanovic fitted seamlessly into the offense. The same cannot be said for Mike Conley but as a true professional, he worked his way into the Jazz style of play.

Donovan Mitchell showed that he is going to be a star in the league for a long time, helping the Jazz to sixth in the Western Conference. They could have finished higher except for the OKC Thunder and Houston Rockets finishing with the same record.

The Utah Jazz are willing to make moves.

During the season the Jazz decided to trade the disappointing Dante Exum to the  Cleveland Cavaliers and the Jazz came alive. Clarkson helped spur them to victory after victory and helped them into the playoff slot they got.

In their first-round matchup with the Denver Nuggets, Mitchell exploded and had a battle with Jamal Murray. This will go down as one of the best duels in playoff history. They were within one game of moving through to the second round before the Nuggets came back to win the final three games.

Now the Jazz have to make some free-agency decisions as they have three players they have the option of resigning. These players are Juwan Morgan, Emmanuel Mudiay, and Jordan Clarkson. Let’s see if the Jazz should buy or sell on each of these players.

Juwan Morgan

Juwan Morgan, the 23-year-old rookie out of Indiana originally signed an Exhibit-10 contract with the Jazz in August 2019. He was then waived prior to the season starting. Then the Jazz signed him to a deal in November.

Morgan, a 6’8″, 230-pound power forward never really found himself at home in the NBA. He only played 21 games and averaged 1.7 points and 1.4 rebounds in just 6.4 minutes per game. He didn’t have a great many highlights for the season.

Morgan did have two games where he collected five rebounds but he also had a game in the bubble where he collected five fouls. The game appeared to be going at a faster pace than Morgan could handle.

It is fairly safe to assume that the Jazz are not going to pursue Morgan in free agency as they are looking to move up the standings. Morgan’s impact actually moves the needle backward. He is actually one of ten Jazz players to average less than 6.0 points for the season.

The power forward position is one the Jazz need to address in the free agency period. They currently have Royce O’Neale starting and opposition teams tend to attack him rather than Gobert. Morgan, however, is not the answer.

Verdict – Sell