Things to look for this season: Morris Almond

If you've been following this blog for a while (perhaps by some court ordered mandate or potential Gitmo torture method) you may have noticed that I associate C.J. Miles' trials and tribulations to that of the works of Shakespeare. (And really, it's almost apt!) Morris Almond (or 'Mobe' as I like to call him) requires a whole other author to describe him -- probably Charles Dickens. Most specifically the whole "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" bit from A Tale of Two Cities. For Almond the two cities are -- obviously -- Salt Lake City, Utah and Orem, Utah. These are the respective homes of the NBA's Utah Jazz and the NBA-DL's Utah Flash franchises.

Orem, Utah	Salt Lake City, Utah
Morris Almond is the star player for the Utah Flash, the NBA-DL's Impact player of the year who gave teams 50 twice that year and was involved in everything from the All-Star game, H.O.R.S.E. and set league scoring records.	In the Salt Lake he is a guy who only gets burn in garbage time, and seems to be unremarkable in any distinct way . . . save for his lack of hustle on defense and below average quickness and court vision. (3 assists last season, total)

Morris Almond is coming off quite the 'tale of two cities' Rookie campaign in 2007-2008 -- if it wasn't made absolutely clear by now already. This season his Rocky Mountain Review Summer League ball had ups and downs, but over all it showed us that he is a dynamite scorer with NBA ready moves -- but does not really grasp the team game yet (hence the name "Mobe", like "Kobe"). His work so far in the Pre-Season has been -- pretty much -- more of the same of what we expect of him -- just in less minutes.

• 8 points per game
• 12 FGM - 29 FGA (41.4 FG%)
• 7.25 Field Goals Attempted per Game
• 1 Shot for ever 2.45 minutes played
• 1 - 3 from the three point line (33.3 3pt%)
• 7 - 9 at the free throw line (77.8 ft%)
• 1.5 rebounds per game (RPG)
• 0.25 assists per game (APG)
• 0.50 steals per game (SPG)
• 1.25 turn overs per game (TOpg)
• 17:45 average minutes per game (MPG)

Ideally he'd have more than 1 assist in 4 pre-season games -- but let's not forget that is probably better than what he was getting in Summer League this past season. Some of his troubles must stem from the fact that he is essentially two different people depending on if he's with the Jazz or the Flash. In Orem his role is that of 'The Man' and he knows that on every offensive possession his team has the best chance of making a bucket if the ball goes through him. It's pretty much a continuation of what he had to deal with his last two seasons at Rice in the NCAA's. When he's wearing a Jazz uniform it's completely different -- he's at the bottom of the totem pole and his role is completely different. The offense doesn't run through him, it's his job to be a cog in the larger Utah Jazz offensive machine.

In some ways we kind of know who he is, and what he can do -- there's very little benefit to having him run in the NBA-DL anymore because it's not like that improves him as a player, nor does it better prepare him to play with the Jazz (as what the Flash need out of him is pretty much the opposite of what Jerry Sloan wants to see from him). That said, what three things should we look forward to this season from Morris Almond?

1. Pass the Rock more -- Being a good offensive player is more than just being able to give other teams' buckets. If he's not going to get on with the hustling, rebounding and defending -- the least he can do is learn the playbook and make passes. I'm sure it's quite discouraging to actually pass the ball to an open guy in the NBA Developmental League, only to have him clang the shot. I watched every Summer League Game and I saw Morris passing the ball, only for his team (and his boxscore) to be rewarded with nothing. Pretty much he's been somewhat classically conditioned to dislike passing. Here I am being all Mr.Psychology and getting past the FA-err and try to figure out why he's seen as an offensive black hole. Whatever the cause, he has to break out of it. My solution would be with the Cognitive-Behavioral therapy of systematic desensitization. Basically, the more time he plays with other guys who can make shots the more and more he'll understand that positive results can happen when he passes the ball. He hasn't really played with good players (even in garbage time he's running out there with Jarron Collins, and not Mehmet Okur), so it's not like he's had good targets. If he's running around against second string guys with Korver, AK and Millsap I'm sure we'll see some more passes -- after all, passing is contagious.
2. Get caught up in a numbers game -- See what I did there? I put him on the bench in our team in Salt Lake City . . . I guess assuming that a) Brewer and Miles start and b) Harpring is still out for part of the season. The grim reality is that there are too many talented people for too few minutes. (96 total at the wings -- Brewer and Andrei need at least 30, and Kover needs around 20, so that leaves 16 TOTAL to be divided between C.J., Morris and Harpring) If you just take out guys playing small forward there's only 48 minutes to go round for four guys -- which is just insane any way you slice it. The time Morris does see on NBA courts are going to be high pressure situations for him as he tries to make a name for himself and earn more playing time. Basically this could just lead to him jacking a lot of shots as that's probably what he does best. That's quickly not going to fly with the Jazz brass, and even though it doesn't make him better, makes it harder for him to adjust to his role on the Jazz, and reinforces bad habits -- eventually may lead to him playing the majority of this 2008-2009 season in Orem . . . just like last year.
3. Take it out on the NBA-DL -- And that's just going to make him angry, and cause him to go all Hulk like on the NBA-DL out of frustration. (After all, he can audition for other teams that way, as it's filled with scouts, and after he drops 50 a few times next year some Shooting Guard anemic teams may drop Kevin O'Connor an e-mail or two).

I may be in the minority here, but I really think that the bad parts of the NBA-DL outweigh the benefits of sending Morris down there. I don't know what they do down there in Flash practice, but when it's game time they want to win, and they do that by having Almond shoot a lot. I only watched about 5 or 6 Flash games last season, and it doesn't look like they do anything but post him up, or run plays for him. Jerry doesn't call those plays in Utah -- so it's not like sending him down there makes him any better prepared for playing for Jerry. The best way to make him earn playing time with the Jazz is to -- I dunno -- have him be on the active roster? And for the record, he had more asissts per game with the Flash than Harpring did with the Jazz (and with better shooters) . . . I just say put Harp on the IR, and have Almond and others take his place. (unless we are playing Ron Artest or Carmelo Anthony -- he completely takes those guys out of their games)

Cool RMR Pictures!

You don't have to be completely Jazz obsessed to enjoy this (or maybe you do), but I really enjoyed BasketballJohn's pictures (via SLC Dunk) of the RMR. I'm totally going to steal all of these, but give credit where credit is due! Thanks BBJohn! Keep up the great work!

Things to look for this season: C.J. Miles

Ceejay had a newsworthy summer -- like last season, but even more absurd this time around. As a quick recap, C.J. opted not to play in the Rocky Mountain Review Summer League for the Jazz for the 2nd straight year (something which made life hard for him under Jerry Sloan the next season); the Jazz made him a restricted Free Agent anyway by offering him the minimum that they had to; he didn't sign that contract and played the waiting game; eventually Oklahoma City offered him a multi-million dollar, multi-year contract ($15 mill / 4 years); the Jazz then waited a full week; before finally matching the offer sheet, which it was concluded was dirt cheap. I can only hope that his 2008-2009 season will be more eventful than his off-season -- which really was 'much ado about nothing'. (He was a young RFA who was offered a pretty cheap contract for 4 years and was matched)

The next step, now that he has some level of financial security (unless his financial planner is MC Hammer), is to actually work on getting that next contract after this one that he just signed. He does have his work cut out for him this season has he has to develop from a 'that guy who plays when we have injured starters' to 'that guy who always contributes'. Sure, the Jazz have a legion of swingmen who can give other teams several looks: Ronnie Brewer (6'7) -- starts at the 2, and can play 3 Andrei Kirilenko (6'9) -- starts at the 3, and can play 2 Kyle Korver (6'7) -- can play the 2 or the 3 Matt Harpring (6'7) -- can play the 3 or the 2 Morris Almond (6'6) -- can play the 2 or the 3 Paul Millsap (6'8) -- can play the 3 Ronnie Price (6'2) -- can play the 2 But . . . there is only 96 minutes at the swing spots to give out to those guys -- and one other guy -- C.J. Miles. For him (or anyone) that's a lot of competition.

One thing that C.J. has going for him is that in his 120 game career (+8 in the playoffs), is that he just turned 21, and is the youngest out of that entire crew. Additionally, aside from Harpring and Kirilenko, he's been with the team the longest (this will be his 4th training camp with the Jazz). Essentially, he has the most NBA experience with the Jazz out of that younger shooting guard crew, while being the youngest.

Another 'thing' that C.J. can be happy about is that the Jazz seem to do well in games where he actually starts (9 - 4 last season, 5 - 1 in the last 41 games of the regular season). In those games he has scored 11, 6, 7, 6, 8, 2, 7, 9, 2, 13, 4, 7, 29 -- which averages out to 8.5 ppg in 20 mpg. That's a nice improvement over his season averages of 5 ppg off of 11.5 mpg. He spreads the floor pretty well, and shot the ball at a very acceptable rate for a shooting guard last season: 47.9 fg%, 39.0 3pt%, 78.8 ft%. When extrapolated to playing 36 mpg he (statistically) becomes a 15.5 ppg scorer who also gets you over 4 rpg, nearly 3 apg, and nearly 2 spg. (And yes, for those who wanted to know, that's basically what Hornacek was giving the Jazz in those glory years) Should C.J. be playing 36 mpg next season, or even start for the Utah Jazz? Mostly definitely no, but he does have the tools to be a solid contributor.

What are three things we should look for this season?

1. Just be on the floor more -- Play in 75 games, and averaging greater than 13 mpg for the season should be a good start for Miles. His career has gone from 23 games to 37 games to 60 last season. The Jazz coaching staff should try to get him playing in almost every game by at least, the 2nd quarter -- after all, the Jazz Brass didn't sign him to a $15 million dollar contract just so he could continue collecting splinters on the bench. Kyle Korver can become a free agent, and really, the Jazz should focus on a guy like Miles who can become an okay defensive player instead of giving playing time to the pacifier that is Kyle Korver (he shuts up an immediate need, but may slow down progress in other areas).
2. Be a better shooter -- Again, the main competition for playing time right now appears to be Kyle Korver. I do love seeing Korver knock down threes, but I do believe that the future can be Miles. In order for Miles to be on the floor more one of the things he needs to do is become a better shooter -- particularly from three and from the free throw line (two Korver specialties). For the majority of the season CJ was shooting around 43 % from three, but it tapered off as the season finished. He needs to finish above 40% to be considered a really good three point shooter. Additionally, as a guard he needs to be hitting above 80% from the free throw line. I'm not expecting him to become one of those 88-92 ft% shooters, but he needs to be better than Deron Williams for sure. (If he's not, then there's no point in having him in the game at the end of the game when the other team is fouling) If he's going to get playing time at all, it should be at shooting guard, and if he's going to get playing time at shooting guard, he has to be at least comparable to his competition there. He needs to be a high 40%/40+%/80+% guy. Right now he's a high 40%/high 30%/high 70% guy. Korver's career averages (5 seasons) are 40+%/40+%/high 80%. [With the Jazz last season Kover was a 47.4 fg%/38.8 3pt%/91.7ft% guy] For Ceejay to take some of Kyle's minutes, he's going to have to shoot that efficiently, or near to it.
3. Continue getting better on defense -- One thing that Ceejay can get better at is on defense. He's only going to get increasingly stronger, and right now is miles (if you excuse the pun) ahead of Korver in terms of foot speed, quickness, lateral quickness and athleticism. For example, Korver plays more minutes per game, but gets less steals than Miles. At some point, Jerry Sloan is going to buckle and end up playing whomever can play defense better . . . and Miles has the tools to get better (especially when you factor in that he's only 21 and he's going into his 4th season in the NBA), Korver is going to be 27 by the time the playoffs roll around this season, and he's not getting any younger, or quicker. Eventually C.J. Miles should get better at defense (keep improving at his current rate, he doesn't need to make a quantum leap), and he should eventually start to play more regularly, and more minutes per game.

Basically, what we need to look for this season is the continued improvement of CJ, he's a young player still, but he's not a rookie, or someone who doesn't understand the game. He's going into his 4th season, and as such, his expectations should be higher than that of someone like Morris Almond. Look for improvement, and if he is able to display said improvement, he should get more playing time. Deron Williams is a huge CJ fan and suggests that we should expect as much. [They were both picked by the Jazz in the 2005 NBA Draft, and both were raised and went to high school in Dallas, Texas]

YouTube Tuesdays! The man they call Mobe

As far as roster depth at SG goes, it's not like the Jazz brass are in a bad spot. Sure, there's no Superstar playing SG in our offense, but it's not like our offense is built around a Superstar Guard who takes a lot of shots either. Do any of the Jazz guards have what it takes to be a superstar? Probably not, but out of what they currently have, you can clearly see that at least ONE of them may one day be an NBA All-Star. Having to divvy up 48 minutes between three point ace Kyle Korver, super athletic Ronnie Brewer, a 4th year player who is only 21 (C.J. Miles) and the Impact player of the year in the NBA-DL (Morris Almond) isn't as bad as having to split that same amount of time between Greg Ostertag, John Amaechi, Curtis Borchardt and Jarron Collins. (and yes, we almost made the playoffs with that at center) That's why I suggest that the Jazz brass are not in a bad spot, because they've been in much worse spots before.

Today we're going to see Morris Almond break the D-League scoring record, and while the length of this video does not span a large sample size of the game, we can clearly see the makings of a solid offensive player. Certainly, it's not a bad thing if the 4th guy on your shooting guard depth chart can score 50+ in a game (which Almond has demonstrated in his games of 51 and 53 points last season) in an American professional basketball league (which the D-League is). I probably look at Almond's game a lot differently than other Jazz fans who are holding out for a complete player. I don't expect him to be Ray Allen. I don't expect him to be Dell Curry either -- Almond's game somewhere in-between those two.

Morris Almond wowed fans and opposing coaches alike last season in the NBA-DL, though this season he must try to impress Jerry Sloan with the other parts of his game besides offense. Photo by NBAE/Getty Images.

As I live in Detroit I get to enjoy a lot of exposure to Pistons players (heck, Preeti (if you don't know who she is then sucks to be you) had dinner with Chauncey Billups tonight); one player that I've had a good hard look at has been Rip Hamilton. He's not the most athletic guy around, nor is he a great one on one defender. (If he was, then the Pistons wouldn't get killed by LeBron every other game) Rip isn't a complete player -- he's not going to dunk on other guys, or beat 3 guys off the dribble like Kobe does. On offense he runs other guys through the Reggie-Miller-hamster-wheel-of-death, gets open, and makes jumpers. Aren't those the only shots that SGs really get in our offense anyway?

With this information (that the only shots for SGs in our half court offense happen to be the types that Rip gets and makes) I heartily envision a spot on the floor for Almond in the future. Why? Because Morris Almond (if plugged into such a system) can perform that well. He has all of those moves already and can be just as efficient. He only looks like a chucker who never gets assists because we've only seen him play with marginally capable point guards and really bad players everywhere else. Just check out the video, and try convincing yourself that if he played with Deron Williams, Carlos Boozer and the pass-happy Andrei Kirilenko that he wouldn't be able to keep the defenses honest more than Brewer does with his broken shot.

Almond Tops Scoring Record [1:37] Uploaded by sanskrit953263 -- Earlier in the season Almond had scored 51 points, and he breaks his own (and the NBA DL's) record with this performance on January 30th, 2008. He ended up shooting 19-34 (3-7 from three, 12-14 at the FT line), and added 6 boards, 2 steals and 2 assists. He's never going to get to shoot it that much in a week of NBA action next season, but it's not like he was chucking the ball, he's the only offensive player on his team (hello triple teamed?) and he still managed to shoot 55.8 fg% on his way to 53 points !!!

The YouTube comments section is interesting to read, especially how non-Jazz fans suggest that he has some, albeit minor, Kobe-like skills with scoring the ball. (Particularly with his post up game, which is good for a guard, and as his Jazz teammates Paul Millsap and Ronnie Brewer tease, how he never passes the ball) That's basically why they named him Mobe. Looking at how smooth he plays on offense, I can easily see why the name has stuck.

Do I think he should start? No. Do I think he should get a chance to show his stuff with good players? Yes. Realistically, he is a season or two away from being a legit NBA player. Watching him in summer league I came to the conclusion that he was not learning anything new by playing with guys worse than him. For him to get better he needs to play against guys who are better than he is -- essentially, NBA players. His defense is not so hot (but he does try and has a good blocks to foul ratio, one of the better ones on the roster for sure).

But . . . is defense really a Jazz priority in the first case? We win games by out scoring them, our paint area is patrolled by our small forward and our bigmen don't play any defense. To fix our defense we'd have to break down a lot of our current structure. It's almost better to keep getting better at offense, because we sure as heck can't stop anyone from scoring. I guess this is what will only make Almond that much more important to our future -- I'm sure that he will become the best offensive player out of him, Korver, Brewer and Miles. Again, Rip Hamilton has flaws, but he can be an All-Star, I'm sure we can coax 12 ppg out of Morris Almond 2-3 seasons from now.

Statistical Breakdown of the RMR

This year the Jazz had only three players on their Utah Jazz roster who participated in the Rocky Mountain review: shooting guard / shooting forward (as opposed to small forward) Morris Almond, 50% prospect/50% project center Kyrylo Fesenko, and 19 year old Rookie Kosta Koufos. Our squad also featured a former NBA player in Yaroslav Korolev (a lotto pick by the LA Clippers). Following that we had two guys who had games of destiny during the 6 game review (Kevin Lyde and Tyrone Brazelton). Lastly, solid, but unspectacular back-up power forward Hiram Fuller had some good moments over the period of the Rocky Mountain Review. That said: here are their per game averages! (These may differ from the NBA.com website slightly because their stats are for up to game 4, where these include all 6 game stats)

Player	Pos.	Mpg	Ppg	FGM-FGA	FG%	FTM-FTA	FT%	3PTM-3PTA	3TP%	Off. Rpg	Tot. Rpg	Apg	Spg	Bpg	TOpg	PFpg
M.Almond	SG/ SF	28	18.5	5.8-13.0	44.9	6.2-7.7	80.4	0.7-2.0	33.3	1.0	2.7	0.5	0.8	0.3	2.2	2.0
K.Koufos	C/ PF	19	8.7	2.7-7.0	38.1	3.3-3.7	90.9	0.0-0.0	0.0	2.0	5.7	0.7	0.3	1.0	1.2	2.3
T.Brazelton	PG	15	7.5	3.0-6.3	48.0	1.0-1.0	100.0	0.0-1.0	0.0	0	1.8	1.8	0.5	0.0	1.3	1.5
Y.Korolev	SF/ SG	14	6.0	2.2-5.0	44.0	1.0-1.4	71.4	0.6-1.0	60.0	0.6	2.2	0.2	0.6	0.4	1.4	2.2
H.Fuller	PF	16	5.0	1.8-5.0	36.7	1.3-2.0	66.7	0.0-0.0	0.0	2.2	4.5	0.8	0.2	0.3	0.7	2.5
K.Fesenko	C	17.5	4.5	1.7-3.7	45.5	1.2-2.2	53.8	0.0-0.0	0.0	2.3	4.8	0.8	0.5	2.2	2.7	2.3
K.Lyde	C	6.5	3.2	1.5-2.5	60.0	0.2-0.3	50.0	0-0	0.0	1.8	4.0	1.2	0.3	0.3	1.3	0.8

Morris Almond: As we can see, Morris Almond played the most minutes per game, took the most shots, and finished the review with a grand total of 3 assists. (Which looks exponentially worse when compared to his 78 total shots attempted) He also managed to pull down nearly 3 rebounds per game and almost 1 steal per game. His last three games of the review were much better than the first three -- averaging 22.3 ppg (47 fg%), 3.0 rpg, 0.67 apg, 1.0 spg and 1 made three a game. (All better than his Review averages) During that span he also went to the line 29 times (a shot under 10 FTA / game), which is exactly what we want to see. Statistically speaking he had a strong showing on the scoring side of the ball, he didn't get many assists -- but that doesn't mean he didn't evolve into a guy who can cognitively percieve that someone else on his team has a better shot than he does. During the first two games he would die with the rock instead of passing it off, but as early as the game against Iran (RMR Game 3) he was passing the ball up to guys who had open shots and good looks. Unfortunately they just didn't go down, and perhaps if Almond was playing with NBA level shooting talent he would garner more assists. After all, he's more likely to pass the ball to guys that can put the ball in the basket instead of guys who suck. His defensive stats were not that great, but that said, his defense did improve over the course of the Review. I think that if given the opportunity, put in a system where he's no greater than the 4th best player on the floor, and given the ball only when open, he can be a valuable NBA player -- not unlike Rip Hamilton.

Kosta Koufos: This rookie had some ups and down in this review, looking very shaky in the opening game, then having a double double in the next, then the next one finishing with only 4 points and 5 boards, and so forth. One of the main criticisms I have of his game (as supported by statistical evidence) has been that for a guy who was touted (before the NBA Draft) to have a strong offensive game (particularly shooting the ball) his FG% was horrible. He was a killer at the Free Throw line (leading the team with a 90.9%), but from the field he shot only 38.1%. That is really bad. That's Kenny Anderson bad. What is worse is that he continued to shoot the ball at a very high rate: 42 total shots, 96:40 total minutes played -- that's 1 shot ever 2.3 minutes on the floor. For a point of reference, Carlos Boozer -- the focal point of our offense who scores over 21 ppg @ nearly 55% -- gets 1 shot every 2.2 minutes on the floor. What's the difference? Six (6) whole fucking seconds!!! Seriously dude, pass the ball a little bit, huh? After the first three games I felt like Kosta's stats were an inflated sham, as he would end up making a shot off of the work of someone else, while missing all of his shots that were created by himself (post ups, jumpers). Furthermore, his rebounding stats would get bumped up each game by a sequence where he'd tip the ball to himself, or get a cheap tip-in. He did lead the team in RPG with 5.7, and did solid work on the defensive glass -- thanks to the solid defense of Fesenko who changed many a shot that ricocheted right to the Big Greek. In the last three games Kosta played much better, shooting 47.6 fg%, being a consistent offensive force (10.3 ppg) who also made a solid effort on defense (5.0 rpg, 1.67 bpg). I was amazed at how poorly he shot (1-3, 3-11, 2-7, 3-8, 3-6, 4-7), and may have been a little biased against him, but I think that his performance indicates that down the line (2-3 seasons) he'll be a solid NBA player.

Kyrylo Fesenko: Everyone on planet earth hates this guy -- and I fail to see why. The Utah Jazz have a glaring hole when it comes to interior defense. Fesenko is a 7'1 beast who weighs over 300 pounds and is agile and strong like a Siberian tiger. He is a limited player who does not try to do anything crazy. (1 shot ever 3.8 mins on the floor) The only things he is good at is playing interior defense on guys without fouling them (or letting them score easily); changing countless shots during the course of the game; and being a big enough of a force to send back over 2+ bpg. How is this not precisely what the Jazz need for a guy to come off the bench, run around, hit people, and play big for 10-12 mpg? The major criticism of him is that he has a questionable work ethic (based upon unsubstantiated rumormongering by media members who are not privy to jazz practices, and opinion by possibly jilted ex-coaches), and that he has 'regressed'. I just don't know how true that is, unless you had unreasonable expectations for him. Compared to how he performed in last seasons RMR (2007-2008 stats can be found here), some early conclusions can be made.

	MPG	PPG	FG%	FT%	Off. RPG	Total RPG	APG	SPG	BPG	TOPG	PFPG	BPG / PFPG
2007	16.3	4.8	58.8	45.0	1.3	4.3	1.0	0.5	1.3	1.7	3.8	0.342
2008	17.5	4.5	45.5	53.8	2.3	4.8	0.8	0.5	2.2	2.7	2.3	0.956
Diff	+1.2	-0.3	-13.3	+8.8	+1.0	+0.5	-0.2	+0.0	+0.8	+1.0	-1.5	+0.617

The first thing that jumps out at you is his offensive production. He's scoring at a much lower % from the field, and even though he is playing 1.2 more mpg, his over-all scoring is down. (not shown: he's getting to the line 1.2 times less per game as well) To me these all indicate that he's not playing with a good point guard. Last season the Jazz were run by Dee Brown and Brian Chase -- two guys much better than who we had running things this season. A PG is able to get his big man good shots. No point guard = no easy shots. While Fes' FG% looks horrible, do keep in mind that if you eliminate his last game (arguably his worst), his FG% for the tournament was 64.2%! His FT% went up markedly, by nearly 10% -- which shows that he put the time in and improved that. Over all, though, his offensive stats were much less than what some people expected of him. It's probably a good thing that we're not needing another scorer on the team -- especially not from our back-up center.

On the defensive side of things everything went up, expect for steals (which stayed the same -- but how many more spg do you expect from +1.2 mpg?). He boarded more, and probably would have had more if he wasn't the primary defender for: bigmen, anyone driving, and people taking any shots in the paint. (He would have to run out to challenge shots, preventing him from getting easy boards) Two big facts happen to be that he fouled a lot less, while playing more minutes, and his blocks went up. What does this mean? That his block to foul metric is much better than it was.

Last season he accrued only 0.342 blocks : 1 foul -- which means that he'd have to foul 3 times in the span it would take him to get 1 block. This season it was a completely different story, as he was getting nearly as many blocks (13 total) as he did fouls (14 total). This is an improvement of +0.617, which is pretty huge. What is this metric all about? Well, David Robinson (a pretty good blocks guy in his career) blocked 2954 shots in his life, and fouled 2835 times. This gives him a score of +1.042. By comparison, this RMR Fes' score was +0.956. David's score is for 34.7 mpg, while Fes' score is for 17.5 mpg.

34.7 / 17.5 = 1.983. If you take that modifier and enhance Fes' stats by it you get a kid who with that kind of playing time is capable of blocking over 4 shots a game without fouling out. You know, something that is ridiculously Mark Eaton-esque. Do the statistics indicate that Fesenko has regressed from last season? Absolutely not. Therefore, idiots who look at differential stats and not inferential stats should shut the hell up. Additionally, for anyone that cares to look at who's better (Fes or Kosta), one is clearly a better offensive weapon. The other is a much better interior defender -- and my metric supports this:

Fesenko (0.956 blocks/fouls) > Koufos (0.428 blocks/fouls)

RMR Game 5 & 6: Wins and Losses

Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images

The Rocky Mountain Review has finished for yet another off-season, and all had a good time. Well, some had a better time than others. The Jazz finished 3-3 after beating the Atlanta Hawks in Game 5, and then losing to the Dallas Mavericks in Game 6. The true winner in these types of things are the fans, who get a chance to see the stars of tomorrow -- today! (or something to that effect) Over-all the Jazz played their regular style of RMR, where wins and losses are ancillary towards playing 16 people every game and not giving your younger prospects any real chance to get better.

"Given the Jazz's investment in Fesenko, there's no way he should only be playing 13 minutes in a summer-league game. These are opportunities for game experience that won't be there come November and probably won't be there in October, either.

It's also difficult for the Jazz to criticize C.J. Miles for skipping the Revue when Fesenko is playing so little. If it's so important to the development of their young players, then the Jazz's young players need to be playing 25-plus minutes right now." (Siler, 2008, The Salt Lake Tribune)

That, however, is a tangent. First the games! (and their long overdue reports!)

Game 5: Utah 83 - Atlanta 78

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	Final
Utah	20	18	25	23	83
Atlanta	14	21	26	21	78

The Jazz avenge their Game 2 loss (Atlanta 72 - Utah 63) in a game where the Hawks played their bench guys much more than previously in the review, essentially handing this game to the Jazz. Coach Corbin only played 9 bench guys for this game, and Kosta Koufos actually came off the bench to play 21:48 of game time. (Fesenko only played 12:48, but hey, no one on the Jazz bench seems to have a good reason for that, so we'll stop talking about it.) While this game did not have the spectacle of the game vs. Iran, or the sense of dire urgency as the New Jersey game, this game was entertaining enough for the fans of the home team. The Hawks were pretty much a four man wrecking crew of Acie Law IV (21 points, 5 assists), Thomas Gardner (11 points, three rebounds), Olumide Oyedeji (9 points, 7 rebounds), and the dangerous Luke Jackson (16 points, 4 assists). Only Law started for the Hawks, and played over 30 mins.

On the Jazz side of things it continues to be the Morris Almond show (29 points, 50+ fg%, 3 rebounds) and whomever happens to be on the floor with him. Almond and Law both went 8/10 from the FT line and were attacking relentlessly. Almond suggests that it was the 4th game of the review, and hints as though he has to play his game, furthermore,

"My game is not going to change over night," (Almond, 2008, NBA.com)

This is obvious, as in this system and with his quality of team mates he's not going to ever become a distributor. Ultimately, the Jazz would win ZERO games if Mobe doesn't end up taking the most shots for the team. Sure, he's not 'getting his team mates involved' (according to the guys on the Internet), but I've seen him pass the ball countless times to guys who botch the play and rob him of assists.

Game 6: Utah 70 - Dallas 82

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	Final
Utah	18	9	19	24	70
Dallas	24	21	21	16	82

The Jazz break their three game winning streak by getting rounded up by the Dallas Mavs in, pretty much, the ugliest possible way. Despite winning the points in the paint 44 to 26, *and* winning 2nd chance points 16 to 4 the Jazz still managed to dig themselves into a 20 point hole after three. How? It's pretty easy when you go 26 for 73 (35.6 fg%) as a team, and 1 for 12 (8.3 pt%) from deep. Morris Almond and Kosta Koufos (both starter this game) finished the game with 14 points a piece. While Fesenko played almost 10 more minutes than last game (this time coming off the bench), he only finished with 4 points off of really poor shooting (2 for 8) which ended up destroying his fg% for this tournament. (from 57 fg% down to 45.5 fg%) The only good thing from this game is that Morris Almond showed us that he can do more, getting a couple of assists and locking determinedly locking down Gerald Green into an 11 point (3 for 11) night. Kosta has his best shooting game and played quite well. (4 for 7 shooting, 6 for 7 at the free throw line, 2 blocks, 2 steals and 1 assist) Contrasting that, Fesenko put up one of his most frustrating games, and emphatically finished the night with an impressing dunk to end an unimpressive Rocky Mountain Review for the Ukrainian giant. To add insult to injury, not only does this last game resonate loudest in our memories, but with Kosta's good play, and Kyrylo's poor play, the big Greek finished the tournament with some better looking numbers.

W5 (5 factors that influenced the last two games):

Who: Morris Almond -- He's the only guy on the team who has played close to 30 minutes every game, and the only guy who shoots the ball more than 10 times every game -- no wonder he's our scoring leader!

What: Improvement -- This is something (outside of Almond's better all-around game in the loss to Dallas) that no one has shown except for the 19 year old Rookie Kosta Koufos. He has had his ups and downs, but he really came on strong in the last two games (averages of approximately 12 ppg, 5.5 rpg, 2.0 bpg, 54 fg%, in 22 mpg).

Where: The Three Point Line -- No wonder our team had to score in the paint and at the line so frequently? The Jazz team went 2 for 20 over the last two games from deep. 

Why: Talent Level -- This year's Rocky Mountain Review team was one of the least talented squads in recent memory. The three best players on this team were two late 1st round picks and and mid 2nd rounder. Back on the 2006-2007 Rocky Mountain Review our team had Deron Williams (starter, All-NBA 2nd team, Olympian), Ronnie Brewer (starter), Paul Millsap (could start on our team), C.J. Miles (has started for our team, just signed his 2nd NBA contract), Dee Brown (The Cousy Award winner in his Senior year of NCAA ball) and Rafael Araujo (a Top 10 lottery pick). How this team won 3 games amazes me, and probably is just a testament of Morris Almond's raw scoring ability.

How: Internal Development -- Jazz GM Kevin O'Connor has pretty much made the roster pretty solid, and lots of talented guys probably don't want to try out for the Jazz summer league team. Probably this is because the Jazz have 15 guys under contract (now...) and most of the young guys have been developed internally -- leaving little incentive to try out for the senior team. That said, I wouldn't be surprised to see guys like Lyde, Paulding, Korolev, Fuller and Brazelton be asked to come back in October.

Stats!

More on this in the next post!

What's next? Veteran's Camp in October!

Unexplained Hiatus

Hey readers (readers . . . readers . . . readers . . . echo . . . echo . . . echo . . .) -- sorry for the unexplained hiatus. What can I say? My Clark Kent Job needed some extra attention these last, uh, million years. What has happened in the time period? Well, the RMR finished, CJ's offer sheet by Oklahoma City was matched and . . . uh . . . stuff. I'll get right to it!

RMR Game 5: Initial post-game thoughts

The Utah Jazz came back from their disappointing loss at the hands of the Atlanta Hawks (RMR Game 2, loss 72-63) to win game 5 83-78! It was a back and forth game where the Hawks gave their bench some more run, and the Jazz (this game coached by Ty Corbin) continued to play 14 guys. Kosta Koufos came off the bench and he had a really strong 2nd quarter and played well in the 2nd half. He was active, he got some playing time alone on the court playing center, with Fes on the bench, and the Ohio native looked waaay more comfortable playing the 5, instead of the 4.  He and Fes both had strong games (combined: 13 points off of 5-8 shooting, with 8 boards and 5 blocks) for the limited minutes they continue to play -- Koufos with 21:48 and Fesenko with only 12:48. [Btw, in games where Ty Corbin is the coach, Kyrylo gets about 14 mpg; alternatively, when Scott Layden is the coach, and Ty the assistant, Kyrylo gets about 20.5 mpg.] Aside from the young prospects, it was really the "Acie Law IV vs. Morris Almond show". They combined for 34 shots and 20 free throws -- fueling the offenses of both teams. Almond had 29 points -- and for those keeping score at home: so far in 5 games he has played 140:22 minutes, taken 63 shots, has 97 points (19.4 ppg) and a grand total of 1 assist. One. Uno. Ekh. Une. He has 12 turn overs though, so that makes him a very special player.

Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images

RMR Game 3 & 4: Wins vs Iran and Nets

Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/ NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/ NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/ NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/ NBAE via Getty Images

The Jazz Rocky Mountain Review squad won these last two games coming from behind both times. Is this because the starters for the Jazz are that much worse than the other guys? I don't really know. The Iran game was filled with a very great, festive atmosphere that is more akin to other International sporting events than a summer league game. I was surprised at the strong showing by Iranian fans, and had no clue that there were so many Persians in Utah . . . then again, they are pretty much an invisible minority.

Their national team really brought it strong early, and had hot shooting to thank for. They were much quicker than the Jazz and their starting center (Hamed Ehadadi) was straight up 'housing' anyone that defended him. Eventually Fesenko got fed up and had to start blocking his shot. Thankfully he was not a major concern for the Jazz in the 2nd half as Morris Almond injured him in the 2nd quarter. USA! USA! USA!

The game was a celebration of sport, and the Jazz fans (usually called mean names by players of other teams) were very classy and the Iranians threw roses into the crowd after the game. Somewhere dark and evil, David Stern smiled -- the seeds for a globalized NBA were being planted that evening in Utah.

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	Final
Utah	14	24	23	21	82
Iran	22	7	16	12	57

As for the other game, the game last night vs. the New Jersey Nets was very entertaining -- but mostly for basketball reasons. Early on Jaycee Carroll (who has some Utah roots) was playing like Leon in Above the Rim, just shooting everything and being unstoppable. Thankfully, Carroll has no defense to speak of, and when it counted our guards Tyrone Brazelton and Morris Almond were just too much for the one man show. The Jazz were down by 14 but scraped their way back and won it thanks to the stellar play of Brazelton, Rickey Paulding and others. The Nets have a lot of talent on their squad (at least on paper), but Brook Lopez (#10 draft pick, 2008), Sean Williams (#17 draft pick, 2007), Chris Douglas-Roberts (1st rounder on some mock drafts, 2008) and crew did not do much.

	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	Final
Utah	13	22	27	25	87
New Jersey	22	23	18	16	79

The game was tight in the 4th quarter, and the Jazz were able to pull it out, winning by 8.

W5 (5 factors that influenced the two wins):

• Who: Morris Almond -- he has been the only guy on the team that has shown that he has a solid future as an NBA player, this may be his last off-season playing Summer League
• What: Game of Destiny -- the Game of Destiny is basically the best a player will ever play, it's a single game that vastly outstrips their true playing ability. It's a maximal score, and not a typical one . . . it's a Game of Destiny. Kevin Lyde had one against Iran (6 pts, 14 rbs, 2 ast., 1 stl.), and Tyrone Brazelton had one against the Nets (16 pts, 7-9 shooting, 4 ast., 1 stl. -- all the money baskets down the stretch going 1 vs. 5)
• Where: The Paint -- over the last two games the Jazz have gone for 34 and 32 points here, and that accounts for 40% of the scoring. Is this a high number or a low number? It's the largest slice of the pie (FT is 25% of our points the last two games, and 35% have been points outside of the paint), and as a result, the only place this team is consistently scoring in.
• Why: The Playbook -- The coaches Ty Corbin and Scott Layden are reading directly from the script that Jerry Sloan, Phil Johnson and the rest of the Jazz Brass hand down to them. Every play attempts to dump the ball inside and go from there. This has been effective with Fess (1st play or so of the game he backed in on Lopez and scored on him), but less so with other guys. The desire is to get points in the paint, and not take jumpers. Part of this is the playbook, the other part is the talent level. This isn't a RMR team that includes Deron Williams, CJ Miles and other shooters . . . the only real NBA player right now is Almond, and his 17 ppg cannot off set the fact that no one else is really an outside threat. (Save, perhaps, Korolev or Paulding)
• How: Bench Play -- 13 guys have played in at least 3 games (out of 4 so far) for the Jazz, and they continue to go deep into the bench every game. This makes some guys have less than stellar stats, but the talent level drop off does not appear to be so huge -- and when the other team's bench comes into the game against ours, the Jazz bench goes on a run or two. If it was not for them, the Jazz would be 0 - 4 right now.

Stats!

Here is the official boxscore for the game vs. Iran, the game vs. the Nets, and the combined stats for the first four games (scroll to the last page on these sheets for the most updated info on the Jazz). I want to talk about the stats in a later post, so I won't get too into it. Quickly though, in the last two games: Almond has 34 points and 0 assists; Fesenko has 5 combined blocks and steals in 30 mins of action; Kosta has gone 5 - 15 and continues to get lauded in the press for his solid play. He's 19, sure, but he's also trying to play in the NBA. Let's not bring age into it and talk performance.

What's next? The Atlanta Hawks, RMR Gm. 4 on Thursday!

RMR Game 4: Initial post-game thoughts

Don't worry, I'll combine the full thoughts of Game 3 and 4, but I wanted to get this out there . . . the Utah Jazz summer league team is now 2 - 2 after defeating the New Jersey Nets squad which I thought was more talented than ours. It was an exciting game where the Nets, lead by Jaycee Carroll, went up by 14. The tide turned with solid bench play by point guard Ty Brazelton and others. Eventually this game became Carroll vs. Almond -- both guards scoring on a variety of moves. Down the stretch Brazelton took over and made baskets. The 10th pick of the draft, Brook Lopez, was outplayed by Fesenko -- though the stats show things slightly differently. Lopez had 11 boards, and played over 30 minutes -- but Fesenko locked him up and helped him shoot 2 for 11. Lopez also had 5 turn overs and 6 personal fouls. Almond was stellar, shooting a shot under 50% and getting to the line 18 times on aggressive moves to the basket -- especially in transition. He finished with 24 points and 0 assists. The media continues to go nuts over Kosta's production -- you know, 3-8 shooting is an improvement actually.

Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images

RMR Game 3: Initial post-game thoughts

The jazz finally win a game, and defeat the mighty Persian empire . . . or something like that. It was a blowout, and it always looked like one. After the first quarter with their amazing fans cheering them, Iran looked like they were going to destroy the Jazz. Eventually their lack of familiarity with playing at that altitude; their lack of depth (after injuries); and their shooting that finally cooled off allowed for the Jazz to tell them, once and for all that . . .

Image created by me . . . so yeah . . . kinda silly, I know

Yeah . . . something like that at least . . .

I'd like to say that the Jazz 82 - 57 win over the Iranian national team was because of Morris Almond, Kyrylo Fesenko and Kosta Koufos . . . but it wasn't. It was pretty much Kevin Lyde's game of destiny. Hiram Fuller also had a solid game, and Kevin Kruger (of the NBA D-League Utah Flash) and Yaroslav Korolev had supporting games as well. The games that are coached by Ty Corbin feature many players, 15 total guys played tonight, Almond didn't even play 20 mins in this game. I'll post more later on about this game as more information is available.

RMR Game 2: Hawks 72 -- Jazz 63

The Jazz lost their second straight game, mostly due to the fact that the Jazz felt like showing off many of the individuals who will not be asked back to attend training camp in October. This loyalty usually affords these fringe NBA players to get enough development time and exposure to be picked up by teams in other leagues (Europe and Asia mainly). There should be some cuts made sometime soon. Onto the game then, where the Jazz had another 3rd quarter collapse.

	1	2	3	4	Final
Atlanta	16	8	27	21	72
Utah	17	14	9	23	63

While the defense took it up a notch and only allowed the Hawks to score 27 points (as opposed to San Antonio scoring 28 the night before in the same quarter), it's still not good. Utah won every other quarter, and when the coach for this game, Scott Layden, took out our three draft picks (Almond, Fesenko and Koufos) the offense screeched to a halt and the other team drove to the basket whenever they desired. Late in the 4th when Layden put those three back in, it was too late and the Hawks just kept burying the Jazz with long distance jumpers as the clock wound down. (Clock doesn't stop in summer league?) Acie Law IV was just killing it, marginal to good point guards are torching the Rocky Mountain Review team the Jazz assembled. Additionally, Othello Hunter was the player of the game, doing everything he wanted because Koufos doesn't know how to box out.

I was able to catch the Internet feed for this game, and watch it in full screen on one of my computer monitors thanks to this link. It's the same link for each game, so if any of you other non-SLC residing basketball fans want to watch, copy that link and open it in your media player of choice. The Boxscore for this game is finally up and I can involve some empiricism in my analysis this time around!

W5 (5 factors that influenced the game):

Who: Kyrylo Fesenko -- if he wasn't in the game, ATL would have won by 30

What: 3rd quarter collapse -- 2nd game in a row, this time the lead went from +7 to -11

Where: The Offensive Glass -- Jazz are strong here even in the summer league, Fesenko had three less than the entire Atlanta team

Why: Atlanta fastbreak -- Jazz got so many offensive boards because Atlanta leaked all night long, and quickly won fastbreak points 14 to 4

How: Rotation -- Atlanta went 10 deep, with all the starters getting over 20 mins of run, Utah played 14 guys, when Atlanta went on their run, the Jazz had Adriatic League benchwarmers in the game.

Stats!

	Mins	Pts	FG	3pt	FT	Rebs	Off	A	St	Bs	Pf	TO
Morris Almond	30	17	(6/13)	(1/2)	(4/4)	4	(1)	0	0	0	2	4
Kyrylo Fesenko	23	9	(4/6)		(1/2)	9	(7)	1	1	3	0	1
Kosta Koufos	22	12	(3/11)		(6/6)	10	(5)	1	0	0	2	0

How did the guys with NBA contracts do?

Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images	Photo by Scott G. Winterton/Deseret News	Photo by Melissa Majchrzak/NBAE via Getty Images
Morris Almond had a Morris Almond type of game, being an offensive force who really needs to learn how and when to pass the ball, his 4 turn overs were bad, two of which should have been easy assists to Fess for dunks. In a system where he only touches the ball off of screens and doesn't have to create he'll be good -- like a Rip Hamilton.	Kyrylo Fesenko was the player of the game for Utah. He was a defensive force, playing good solid post defense and making life hard for guys who posted up or drove, often making them take contested shots without fouling them, and allowed for Kosta to swoop in and collect the defensive boards	Kosta Koufos played much better, and had nice stats (12/10 out of a 19 year old is always nice), but he only started to play well in the last part of the game and had a couple of hustle points (tip ins, and tip rebounds) that make his stat line look much better than the game he actually played. If shooting is his strength, then give me more Fess.

What's next? The Iranian National Team, RMR Gm. 3 on Monday!