The NBA off-season has officially started and we’ve already seen some pretty big moves just today: The Atlanta Hawks declined their option on Jonathan Kuminga’s contract making him a free agent, Andrew Wiggins signed a 3-year, $64 million deal to return to the Miami Heat, and the biggest of them all (so far) is that Ja Morant was traded to the Portland Trail Blazers in exchange for Jerami Grant and Kris Murray.
While all of that is very exciting, and there will surely be more on the way (probably as I’m writing this article), we have to address our biggest elephant in the room: Walker Kessler. We’ve known for a while now that the Jazz front office and Kessler’s management team are not aligned in contract extension talks. Reportedly, Kessler and his camp want around $30 million a year and the Jazz are more comfortable offering around $22 million a year.
There is always the chance that Kessler signs the $7 million qualifying offer, which would allow us to have him on the roster next year but it would make him an unrestricted free agent after the 2026-2027 season. There’s a lot of salary cap science that goes into these kinds of decisions, but I think I can speak for most Jazz fans when I say that having Kessler on this team is better than not having him on this team.
It should be noted that, in theory, the Jazz could go over the $165 million salary cap and into the luxury tax/aprons by re-signing Kessler to the contract that he wants. When you have a player’s Bird rights you are 100% within your right to do that as an organization, the question then becomes “would the Jazz do it?”
I would love to live in a world where the answer is “yes” and we can see what a healthy squad can do now that we landed our big fish in Jaren Jackson Jr. and drafted Darryn Peterson with the #2 overall pick in this year’s NBA Draft, but someone has to keep their feet on the ground, and today that’s going to be me.
I want to brace for impact as much as possible, so if we can’t come to some sort of agreement with Kessler and his camp, I think we should be looking for some replacement options. Full disclosure – I don’t think that any of these would be able to be the same kind of player that Kessler is, but with the opportunity in front of us to win games and potentially make the playoffs, we have to do what we can to capitalize. Without further ado, here are some of the best (realistic) fits we could add to this team during the off-season, in my opinion.
Kevon Looney
It was recently announced that the Pelicans would not be bringing Looney back to New Orleans, so that means that his rebounding talents are up for grabs. He isn’t exactly a spring chicken, but he’s on the right side of 30 for now.
In very limited minutes last year (14 per game) he was able to pull down 5.6 rebounds a night, and considering that we now employ Jaren Jackson Jr., having someone who can do that specific thing is vital. If he’s given any sort of real minutes on this team he would be liable to grab 8+ rebounds a night. He would also bring a certain level of grit that this young team would benefit from.
Sandro Mamukelashvili
After declining his player option, Sandro is going to have plenty of suitors calling his line. He had a bit of a renaissance year averaging 11 points and 5 rebounds a night while shooting 38% from 3 in 80 games for the Raptors last year. He was also in contention for 6th Man of the Year for most of the season, and with an expanded role here I think that he could deliver even more.
With the league trending the way that it has for the past decade, providing elite spacing for your ultra gifted offensive players is paramount. If we could offer a lineup with spacing that includes Markkanen, JJJ, and Mamu, then guys like Ace Bailey, Keyonte George, and Darryn Peterson would have a field day. I’m not saying that I need it, but I kind of need it.
Jock Landale
Landale is in a very similar spot to Mamu; he had a great outing in Memphis and Atlanta last year, showed his scoring ability (10 PPG), his rebounding effort (5.7), and shot well from 3 (38% on 2.8 attempts a game). I think it would be a lot to ask Landale to be as good of a backup as Nurkic was last year, but he just might have to.
In an ideal world, Landale would be a compliment to our Center room including Kessler and Nurkic, but he may just have to step up if we call his name.
Neemias Queta
This one will need some outside interference to accomplish, but it isn’t outside the world of possibility. At the time of writing, the Boston Celtics just picked up the team option on his contract, but there has been a lot of smoke to the idea of Rudy Gobert making his way to Boston in exchange for Derrick White.
IF that were to happen, Queta becomes a bit redundant in their offense. I’ve written about Queta on my personal blog, and my feelings about him have only gotten stronger since publishing that piece. Queta became a full-time starter for the Celtics last year and averaged 10/8/1.3 blocks a night. He displayed much more rim presence than before, he’s an incredible lob threat, and he would be able to step into Kessler’s role effortlessly.
It would require trading someone like Brice Sensabaugh or Isaiah Collier to make the salaries match (not to mention the draft capital that Brad Stevens would extort), but again, desperate times.
Robert Williams III
For this last potential selection there are plenty of reasons to be worried, but if things worked out for us, we could be in a very good position.
In a bench role for the Trail Blazers last year (17 minutes per game), Time Lord averaged 6 points, 7 rebounds, and 1.5 blocks per night. He also managed to add to his game this deep into his career by shooting 39% from 3 (don’t get your hopes up too much, it was about 0.5 attempts a game).
The biggest, and most glaring, issue here is that he hasn’t been able to stay healthy for his career. He did play 59 games last year for Portland, but he’s only managed to play 50+ games in a season 3 times in 8 years, and the last time he did that prior to this year was the 2021-2022 season. I’m sure that Boston Celtics fans could tell you what I’m going to tell you now: the juice is worth the squeeze. Adding Time Lord to this team would only add dimensions to our offense and give another weapon to Keyonte George. It also gives our Center depth different looks and allows us to play different schemes with him and Nurkic. Time Lord’s ability to still be this effective of a defender despite all of his injury history is remarkable and I think that we could be the ones to benefit from the rest of the league’s skepticism. I mean, you watch the tape and tell me that you wouldn’t want to see him in Utah.
The off-season is just as fun as the regular and post-season for me, but how are you feeling about it? What trades do you expect to happen? Do you think that the Jazz can get active in the trade market? Sound off in the comments!
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