Hoops Habit
Fansided

NBA: Off-season weakness each star should have worked on

By Josh Cornelissen

Mar 22, 2021; Chicago, Illinois, USA; Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell (45) chats with Chicago Bulls guard Zach LaVine (8) during the first half of an NBA game at United Center. Mandatory Credit: Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports
Mar 22, 2021; Chicago, Illinois, USA; Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell (45) chats with Chicago Bulls guard Zach LaVine (8) during the first half of an NBA game at United Center. Mandatory Credit: Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports /
facebooktwitterreddit
Prev
19 of 31
Next
NBA
Rudy Gobert, Utah Jazz. Photo by Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images /

13. Rudy Gobert, C, Utah Jazz – Defensive recovery speed

The Utah Jazz were an absolutely dominant team in the regular season a year ago. They led the league in net rating by a mile, finished with the best record and were top-4 in both offense and defense. Then they stumbled against a unique attack from the LA Clippers, and many fingers pointed at Rudy Gobert.

Gobert is the league’s best rim protector and thus probably its best defender, full stop. He won Defensive Player of the Year for the third time in four seasons. Yet the image many fans of the Jazz have stuck in their memories is of Gobert trying desperately to protect the rim and then sprint out to shooters against the Clippers’ five-out offense, to rather poor results.

The true problem is not actually with Gobert at all, but with the Jazz’ roster construction. They have surrounded him with a collection of bad perimeter defenders (Mike Conley is average at this point in his career) who easily allow penetration that he has to then clean up. Every time he did that in that playoff series the Clippers hit the now open shooter to can a triple. Terence Mann had a breakout game, in past because Gobert had to continue diving in to guard the rim.

Even if the problem is elsewhere, the Jazz did not make any significant personnel changes. Gobert will have to get better at recovering out to shooters when facing such a unique lineup combination. There are limits to what any player can do, but if Gobert worked on better shifting between the two worlds on defense it will help the Jazz against that flavor of opponent come the playoffs.