Walker Kessler was thrown into the Rudy Gobert trade and has emerged as a shot-blocking force for the Jazz. Meanwhile, Gobert has become the avatar for Minnesota's disappointing season. Read more »

The Jazz have an extremely annoying team to deal with on a night-to-night basis. So far, they've undermined everyone's expectations for them, perhaps even their own, and have done it without superstar talent. Read more »

The Cavaliers have implied that they believe their young trio have cultivated a vibe so strong that a player who's demonstrated a tendency toward tantrum will be persuaded to become his best self with their team- not just for those first few glowing months, but for good. Read more »

What Donovan Mitchell is seeking, beyond the experience of living and working in a massive media capital, is not personal growth so much as to be glimpsed from a fresh angle. Read more »

The Suns jumped from 30th in the NBA in Net Rating in 17-18 to 29th to 18th in 19-20 to third last season and first in 21-22. Read more »

Utah's division of labor has worked pretty well on paper, but the human toll is increasingly seen, and the basketball ecosystem in Salt Lake City appears to be crumbling despite still functioning at a very high level. Read more »

Rarely, if ever, has a player ever been as good as Rudy Gobert and so disliked at the same time. Read more »

The NBA has historically had a tough time rewarding elite defenders with limited or low usage style play on the offensive end. Rudy Gobert was the most valuable player on the team with the best record in the NBA but was nowhere near the MVP conversation. Read more »

The Jazz jumped from ninth in Net Rating last season to first in 20-21. Read more »

The Jazz and Suns have established themselves as two different types of main character but they're both defined by a kind of improbability, an anxiety about whether or not what they've been so far reflects what they're truly made of. Read more »

Utah's system is reliable and, save for a few instances of especially inspired passing, as predictable as the math it tends toward. Safe money lies with teams who play above-average defense while also maximizing three-point volume and efficiency. Read more »

Rudy Gobert is a tough one. He demands praise, to the point of importunance. He's sensitive to the idea that he's only a defensive stopper. Read more »

The Nuggets and Jazz will largely look the same, while the Blazers addressed their depth issues, Minnesota looks for a third star, and the Thunder begin their aggressive rebuild. Read more »

We look at the trajectory of every team in the NBA in terms of how they rank in the category. Read more »

Averaged out over a fifteen-year period, the contributions of Karl Malone and John Stockton were greater than anyone else's, but at no point during that time were they good enough to beat everyone. Read more »

While the Nuggets, Jazz and Blazers all try to climb to the elusive level of true contender, the Thunder begin their rebuild and the Wolves try to rebound from a lost season. Read more »

If Greg Ostertag is remarkable, it is for representing the stark limits of Jazz fans' capacity to appreciate players who looked like them. They wanted him to be Mark Eaton, and they would have exalted him had he cleared that relatively low bar. Read more »