Andy Larsen previews the NBA Draft which begins with the 1st Round tonight, Who will be there for the Utah Jazz at 10 + more

The Utah Jazz Beat Writer for the Salt Lake Tribune forecasts tonight's opening round of the NBA Draft from a Jazz perspective

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
Time to talk Utah Jazz hoops withour Jazz Insider. Here, I'm a
Bill Riley Show, Great towns ofrecent games, injury updates, trade rumors,
and more. Now here's Bill Rileywith our Jazz Insider on Utah's number
one sports Talk ESPN seven hundred andninety two point one f M. Six
hours away from the NBA Draft beginningtonight, Jazz picking at number ten.

(00:25):
Gordy Spence and I will do somedraft coverage here beginning at six tonight,
Jazz at ten, twenty nine andthirty two. For now you have to
figure ten or somewhere in that range, twenty nine and thirty two. We'll
see. Our next guest probably hasa little bit more intel on that is,
he does his best to work thephones today to see what they may
be doing inside the jazz war room. Our friend Andy Larson, beat writer

(00:47):
Utah Jazz Salt Lake Tribune, joiningus on draft day today. How are
you, Ednie? I'm good,Bill, How are you doing? Fantastic?
Just really curious to see what theJazz might do. One guy we
know they won't be acquieting today orany day in the near future, is
Mikhail Bridges. A guy that wasa hot name that they would have liked
to have had somebody like him.He's now part of the Villanova four with

(01:08):
the Knicks. But what you readtoday is the Jazz hit here with three
picks, two in the first round, one of the second round, certainly
a lottery pick that could be valuable. But what's your guess as to what
you know, zannik in Anger thinkingand doing today? Yeah, look,
you know, I think they're stillgoing to try to be aggressive in both
the trade and the draft market.I guess the pick and player market.

(01:30):
But justin Dennek admitted on Monday,But look, this is it's hard to
bet on a deal happening because ittakes another team to make to accept one
of your offers, right, AndI think we saw that a little bit
yesterday where yes, the Jazz wereinterested in mckel bridges, certainly, but
not at that price, and franklyprobably not at anything within one or two

(01:53):
picks of that price, right,Like you're talking about sending out maybe three
picks and a player in order tomake that work, or the Knicks sent
out five or six, six anda good player, Boyan mcdonovich. So
you know, and I think that'sthe problem that the Jazz will continue to
face in the trade market right now, is that it's really a seller's market.

(02:14):
And you know, right they sayby all indications that they want to
buy rather than selling lowry Markinin forexample. So, you know, I
think draft wise, I think theyare looking, you know, multiple reports
and I've heard as well that theyare looking to kind of package twenty nine
and thirty two to move up inthe draft a little bit. Whether that

(02:35):
gets you to the late teams orearly twenties, it's not yet clear,
but clearly I think there are acouple of players that they have in mind
that they'd like to select tonight.Just a quick thought on the Bridges deal.
You said the price was too highfor the Jazz. Do you feel
like the price was too high forthe Knicks or the Knicks in a different
place where they could challenge for achampionship and are willing to kind of sacrifice

(03:00):
five years down the line for MichaleBridges today. Yeah, look, I
understand that line of thinking, andyeah, you know, obviously they are
much much closer to a championship thanthe Jazz are, and so it kind
of makes more sense for them togo maybe all in on the extra piece.
But I also look at I youknow, I don't I did think

(03:21):
they paid too much, and Ido think that it probably isn't the best
thing for them to do from afranchise point of view. I mean,
I look at how the Boston Celticswere able to acquire Chris tops Zingis,
Derek White and Drew Holliday for franklyless or equivalent value to what the Knicks
just gave up, and I think, you know, rather than looking at

(03:42):
it as adding the last piece,they should be looking at adding, you
know, adding not only mckel bridges, but other pieces to that roster.
And by giving up five or sixpick yesterday, I think that, you
know, makes it more difficult tomake that happen, to really challenge the
Celtics moving forwards. Andy Larson,Salt Lake Tribune Jazz Beat rider and Insider,

(04:02):
we're talking draft today with the UtahJazz You mentioned something that I don't
think most jazz fans want to hear. I think most people want them to
be buyers right now, not sellers. Why would they say, what would
the scenario be or what would theplan be? In your mind Andy,
if they're selling Lowry Marketing. Yeah, I mean again, the indications right

(04:24):
now are they are want to holdon to him. But the truth is
that the Jazz are stuck in themiddle right now with Lowry and the current
core that they have. I mean, you won thirty one games last year,
you were fifteen games out of theplayoffs, even fifteen games out of
the number ten spot to play intournament. But you are also only drafting

(04:46):
number ten in this year's draft,right Like, It's a pretty bad place
to be as a franchise, andso you either need to move up or
move move down, right Like,you can't have another season like they had
this year, and you can't haveanother season like they had in the year
previous. You know, it's justnot a good place for an NBA franchise
to be. And so the casefor selling Larry marketIn is bottoming out and

(05:09):
taking advantage of the franchise talents thatare in the twenty twenty five draft.
I mean, that's really what thetrade was about for Brooklyn is that they
were able to reacquire their picks intwenty twenty five and twenty twenty six,
and now all of a sudden havea good look at some of these players
and rebuilding their franchise around them,rather than sticking in the thirty to thirty

(05:30):
five win zone where you know,they don't have a lot going on with
Bridges as their best player. Youknow, I think the Jazz are in
kind of a similar circumstance with theirtalent on the roster right now. Here's
the only thing I would say,Andy, if they chose the bottom out
route this year, I would questionwhat their direction or thought process was the
last two years. Does that makesense? Why are you waiting to Why

(05:55):
would you be waiting till year three? And I understand what it is now,
but to me, that would bea real failure in I don't know,
leadership or direction to wait three yearsto hit the reset button when then
you're starting that clock up again andyou're probably then four years, three years
removed from being where you want tobe. I don't know. I know
why they would do it, butI would question why did you wait till

(06:17):
now to do it? If that'swhat you're doing now? Yeah, agreed,
And look, you know, Ithink they've tried to do that in
year one of the rebuildings. Youknow, the year after they traded Donovan
and Rudy. I did you know, I think they thought they would be
a twenty five to thirty win teamthat year. You know, I do
not think that they thought they wouldbe good. And then all of a
sudden they started the season twelve andthree and immediately we're out of the Victoriambyomena

(06:41):
race, right, Like, there'snot even time to to trade Mike Comedy
then, because you're you have wonso many games so quickly, Like,
I think what you can criticize thenis how to trade deadlines? The last
two years have been have have beenapproached? Yeah? How last year in
general was approached, you know,look doing things like acquiring John Collins,

(07:05):
not giving more playing time to theyoung players and so on and so forth.
Yeah, then you're right if youif you truly think out for year
three like it it is, youdo, you know, start to question
the moves of the past. ButI do think you know, the past
is the past a little bit,and you have to look at the situation
as it is now and say whatis the best thing for the Jazz do.

(07:29):
And even if you've made mistakes inthe past, I don't think you
can use that and let that coloryou're thinking to make the wrong choice.
Now. Now look, buying maystill be the right choice. And you
know, you and I don't knowthe open market as well as they do.
And maybe there are players available thatwill allow them to improve for next
season. But if those players aren'tout there, then I just don't think.

(07:55):
I think worst case scenario is goingthrough another year like last here next
year. Talking to Andy Larson fromthe Salty Tribune, with the draft now
a little less than six hours awayfrom starting, it's much more secretive process.
Now. There's no interviewing potential Jazzmen. There's no talking to Walt
Perrin or Gordy Chiaza or any ofthe coaches that work them out anymore.

(08:18):
So it's a lot more talking toagents, guests, work, trying to
dig around just a little bit.Doesn't feel like this is a top heavy
draft in any way, shape orform. The Jazz are a ten Xanik
has said, what do you saytwo days ago, we already know if
the draft was now, we knowwho we'd take, and they want to
take the best player. So what'syour sense of tonight? Hanging tight at

(08:39):
ten? Do you think there's somebodythey really liked, they'd move up to
get in the five, four,five six range. What's your gauge for
tonight, Andy, Yeah, youknow, again, I think staying at
ten as most likely, and Ithink they do have one or two players
in minds, you know, especiallyhoping that a you know, multiple reports
have said that Cody Williams would bea guy that they're interested at taking a

(09:01):
number ten if he's available. Youknow, both Tony Jones and Rafael Barlow
reported that, and I, youknow, I think that makes sense for
the Jazz is you know, anotheryoung wing player who you're certainly going to
have to develop and and certainly youknow, probably not ready to play major
NBA minutes, but you love thepotential given what he can be in his

(09:22):
his size, his length, hiswillingness to pass the ball, skill on
defense, and so on. JonathanGavoni at ESPN reported that, yes,
look, they're they're interested in tradingup to maybe number five, get a
Stefan Castle or a player like that. That's really interesting as well. And
I think most drafted analysts would putCastle as a slightly better prospect than Williams,

(09:48):
just because he's a probably a littlebit more accomplished playing act playing as
well as he did last year,playing as part of a good team last
year. You know, I thinkit's it's going to be interesting to see
if they're willing what they would giveup in order to move up those five

(10:09):
slots. But then, you know, the worry with Castle is the shooting
side of things, where I thinksort of Williams didn't shooting much last year,
but did make a higher percentage ofhis three point shots. So interesting
question for sure, you know,I think again, ultimately most likely as
they stay at number ten, butwe'll we'll see in the next six hours

(10:30):
if they stay at ten. Isthere a guy you like that could be
in that range? Again, it'sguesswork, but we have a pretty good
idea who's in that eight to twelveor thirteen range? For me, I
know that what they did a yearago in Keyante George, but a guy
that could be there. I reallylike Rob Dillingham a lot, and I
don't know if he would be atten, but the pedigree of Kentucky point
guards his explosiveness. He feels morelike a guy that could play point.

(10:54):
I don't know, but I wouldn'tmind seeing Dillingham. But if you do
that, you're pretty much saying KianteGeorge isn't our guy, and he's likely
to be a guy coming off thebench. But I'm not so sure.
Danny Ainge didn't hint at that alreadyanyway. Yeah, and you know it's
funny. I don't love Dillingham asa prospect at all, just because of
the defense, right, Like,I do think he's a bad defensive player.

(11:16):
I think he might be the worstdefensive player in this draft. And
I'm worried about his comments where hesaid he doesn't particularly care about playing the
defensive end, right Like I dothink he's very talented offensively, you know,
maybe the best shooting and passing combinationin the draft. I want guys
to play defense on this team thatfinished last in the league defensively last year.

(11:37):
Right, But you're right that,you know, then you have two
kind of small guards with Kyante andRob Dillingham as as a backboard, and
I don't know that either can reallywork as a NBA shooting guard. So
you know, I would probably takeKeyant George over Rob Dillingham right now as
a prospect, But you know,I don't know if the Jazz agree or

(12:01):
disagree with me. You know,I think, to me, at number
ten, I'm looking for someone withmore size and Look, I think there
are a bunch of wings in thisclass who I don't love, and none
of them I'm sure are going tobe good NBA players, But I think
they're you know, a certain numberof them are going to work out.
So whether that's Cody Williams from WattisBuseller to Ron Holland or to John Solon

(12:26):
or like any of these kind oflengthy wing players who can kind of maybe
more theoretically than anything but shoot past, defend dribble and you can put your
development staff on them and have themimprove over the course of a number of
years. Like, I think that'sprobably the direction I would go with the

(12:48):
number ten pick if I were incharge. Yeah, I know, Gordy
was a big fan of Ron Hollandas a kind of a three and D
type wing whose offense could come alongat some point in time. Yeah,
and you know it's funny, Gordyand I watched Ron Holland's play against the
Salt Lake City Stars and he hadhis worst game of the season, put
up eleven turnovers, and I,you know, we just were kind of

(13:09):
talking about it and watching that gametogether, and you know, it's it
was. He was struggling so badly, making such bad decisions as a point
guard on that team. He's nota point guard and he he shouldn't be
driving that much. And I thinkif you found a role for him where
he was willing to be a threeand D guy, maybe more emphasis on

(13:33):
the D than the three frankly,given how poorly he shot last year.
But I think he could be ahelpful player. But yeah, definitely needs
a lot of development in multiple waysto be a solid NBA player, you
know, let alone a starter ora star. Who's the player you love
in this draft? Andy, anywherein the draft, you know it could
be a late find. You know. I was a big Homy hockey as

(13:54):
fan when he was at UCLA andwhen he when Miami drafted him last year,
I said, well, that guy'sgoing to be a good player.
I didn't think he'd have the rookieyear he did, but I thought,
well, he's a perfect fit.But you know, anywhere in the draft,
give me a guy that you've watchedtape on. He watched him play
and you just really really like himand think he translates well. Yeah,
two guys. I mean I thinkat the top of the draft, I
like Ryan, I like Reed Shepherda lot. You know, I think

(14:18):
his ability to shoot, and Ithink he's one of the best, if
not the best shooter in the class. I think he projects out extremely well.
And then just the defensive impact Ithink reminds me of some of the
guards we just saw in the NBAFinals, like and Drew Holliday, like
a Derek White. And I dojust think that even though he's shorter at

(14:39):
six' two, you know,like, I think he can make a
difference on the defensive end in theNBA. And then I love kind of
on the other end of things thatat the bottom end of the draft,
Ryan Dunn is probably is one ofthe best defensive wing players I've seen play
college basketball. I mean, justwhat he does individually in isolation, as

(15:03):
a help defender in transition, it'sawesome to watch. Like, if if
you have time today, you know, Bill's audience, go watch a Ryan
Dunn defensive YouTube clip because it's justthe highlight reel is awesome, is so
much fun. He can't play offenseright now at all. You just hope
that, like the Lou Dortz orthe Herb Joneses of the world, that

(15:26):
he can develop a shot and thenbe a really useful player. I bet
on him to do that. Youknow, I'm not saying he's going to
be a good shooter year one,but I'll take someone who has his defensive
skills and tools and see if Ican teach them a little bit of offense,
you know, kind of any day, especially given where he's currently you
know, slated to be drafted,which is at the bottom of the first

(15:48):
round. I was about say,if the Jazz keep twenty nine, he
might be there, right, hemight be. You know that the ESPN
analytics say there's about a forty percentchance that he'd be available at number twenty
nine. The word it is thatthe Knicks are interested in him with maybe
one of the twenty four and twentyfive picks, so you know, you
might have to move up to gethim. But as we discussed before,
the Jazz are apparently interested in packagingtwenty nine and thirty two to move up

(16:14):
and we'll see who the player theyhave in mind is if they do that.
I mean, can the Nicks collecta few more wing players, Holy
moly, if they have Ryan donetoo, they got o g Nnoby might
be the odd man out right now. Plus you've got Josh Hart, plus
you've just you added McHale Bridges lastnight. They're just silly with wings right
now, and that might be theway to go. That might be the
direction you need to go in today'sNBA. There are a lot of NBA

(16:37):
decision makers who are thinking that wayright now. Is if you have five
solid wings on your roster that youcan play kind of all at once.
And you know, obviously they've gotJaylen Brunton, so they're going to be
playing him to the majority of thegame. Don't get me wrong, but
you have such versatility, you canswitch nearly everything. You can. You
can playmake, you can take advantageof your size by stopping other players.

(17:00):
You can guard the likes of LukaDoncic one on one. I mean,
it's just it gives you a lotof tactical flexibility that you know, is
we found out is really valuable inthe playoffs. And you when when we
know the direction the Jazz are takingfirst week of free agency, second week
of free agency obviously if they deallow remarkt in early, that will obviously

(17:21):
tell us. But you know,if they're not loading up with even secondary
guys in free agency, does thattell us they're taking a different direction.
Yeah. Look, you know,I think we'll know in the next week.
You know, I think there's apossibility that a move happened tonight.
Right Like, the draft is asignificant trade market, and you know,

(17:41):
I think you could see them dosomething there. If not, you know,
the NBA free agency starts on Sundayat two pm Mountain time, and
teams can negotiate. I'm sure we'llhear about some deals and we'll learn whether
the Jazz use their free agent capspace, you know about forty million dollars,
if they use that on acquiring thelikes of Tobias Harris, or if

(18:03):
they instead maybe leave that open totrade up, you know, trade for
a bad contract in the NBA andget another draft pick. You know,
I think that's when we we'd reallystart to see, is Sunday, Monday,
Tuesday, what their plans are forall that cap space that they have
that you know, the NBA salaryfloor will say that they have to use

(18:23):
most of it, so if you'rehazarding a guess right now, and this
is a wild guess, do youthink the Jazz go in that direction or
do you think that they try tobuild and as they said, take the
big swing, go big game huntingthis summer. I don't think I you
know, I think they have triedand will try to go big game hunting.
I just don't think they're going tobe able to in any kind of

(18:45):
logical way, right Like I don'tthink they're interested in zach Lavine. I
do think, you know, theywere interested in Bridges, but not at
that price. And I think they'regoing to find the prices are too high
for the players that they want,and so, you know, I think
ultimately they're going to keep the stasha little bit, maybe try to build
it a little bit more, andremain patient. We'll see if that right

(19:07):
opportunity to big game hunt comes up, but by most indications, that's not
out there right now, and sowe'll have to see what they do.
I mean, I think there wasa world where like if you get mckel
bridges, then you can get youcan get a third star on top of
that and kind of put together ateam that's not a championship contender, but

(19:32):
a playoff contender. It's going tobe hard to do that based on who's
out there on the free agency marketand the trade market right now. So
this leads me to this, andI hate to be the doomsday guy,
but if they don't make significant changesor upgrades this summer, does that impact
Lowry Markinin's decision to sign a longterm deal with the Jats. He's twenty

(19:52):
seven, he's entering his prime.But if he doesn't see tangible progress this
summer, does he want to signa long term deal with the Utah Jazz.
Yeah, it's a good question,it's a great question. I think.
You know, first of all,Lowry likes it in Utah, I
think more than other NBA stars haveand and will. I think he does

(20:14):
like living here. But he also, you know, in multiple conversations this
year, expressed to us over andover again how much he wants to win
right and how he needs to makea playoffs for the first time in his
career. And it's not anything he'sdone wrong that has prevented that, but
he just you know, it hasn'tbeen he hasn't had the supporting cast around

(20:36):
him in Utah and then he wasn'tquite this player in Chicago and Cleveland.
So I think he probably would becausein the end it's going to be difficult
for him to turn down five years, two hundred and fifty million dollars or
whatever a long term extension looks like. But I do think that it's you

(20:57):
know, that will be part ofthe conversation, is Hey, in order
for me to sign on the dottedline, I need to agree with the
future of this franchise and whether that'sa you know, they actually lay out
the long term plan to him andhe has to agree to that, or
if there's you know, something thatthey believe is coming down the pipeline,

(21:18):
whatever it is, you know,him and his agency are going to ask
about the plan. They're not goingto just take the money and run without
you know, kind of any indicationof what they're going to be doing moving
forward. Draft covers tonight here withme and Spence and Gordy for a few
hours, and then plenty of stuffat sltrip dot com with Andy Larson coming
up as well. More interest rightnow in copa or euros for you Euros

(21:41):
by a pretty significant margin, eventhough you know, love the US,
Argentina is often to watch, etcetera, et cetera. The Euros are
a better tournament, Like the buildingsare full and the teams. You know,
obviously you're getting the top European teamsand top European players. Like I
just think the atmosphere and the dramasis a lot higher in the Euros than

(22:04):
Copo America is. Right now,yeah, I agree. I think by
the time they get to the knockoutround it gets better. But you're right,
early rounds every stadium in Germany's beenfull for every match. But again,
in fairness, as you know,you can hop on a train or
hop in your car and go fromDenmark to Germany in seven hours, so

(22:26):
you know, you can't really hopin your car and Buenos Aires and be
in Dallas to watch Argentina play inseven hours. Absolutely, And then I'll
also say it's just like I thinkthe dedication of the European fans is awesome.
I mean, when I went tothe Euros in France, I guess
yeah, eight years ago now,we went to Portugal Iceland match and we

(22:48):
heard from the media reporter to thatthat one tenth of the population of Iceland
had traveled to France to watch thegame in stadium, right, Like,
think about that's incredible. Uh.And you know the passion, the atmosphere,
the chanting, I mean everyone's standingall game. Uh, It's it's
awesome. And Copo America does havesome of that, and there are some

(23:11):
great like uh you know, Colombianfans and Ecuadorian fans, improving fans and
so on and so forth. Uh, but it's they're they're not filling the
buildings. I think the Como ballcharged too much for tickets. Like with
it, it's just a different vibefor sure. Uh. Andy, Uh,
probably the last chance we chat onthe air won't be the last chance

(23:32):
we ever chat. But I justwant to say thank you for all the
years of coming on and talking hoopsand soccer and all that stuff. And
as I've told you before, andI've said on these airwaves, there's a
lot of people that I really admirein our business in this market to do
great work. But I've always admiredyours because you took an untraditional path and

(23:52):
just followed your passion and turned itinto what's been a terrific and growing career.
So I've always admired that, butI've always really appreciated you coming on
the show with me and just talkingsports. Well, thanks Bill, And
I want to say, like,you know, I grew up listening to
you, right, like I rememberyou on on KSL and calling into your
radio show and wanting to talk UtaStars basketball right the w NBA team and

(24:17):
we're talking that and jazz, andI you know, I think part of
why I do have that passion forbasketball and sports in this market is because
I got to listen to you growingup and your show and and uh just
learning about the games and that Iloved and kind of developing that through you
doing this every day. So thankyou for that, and thank you for

(24:40):
always supporting my career for the lastdecade plus. It's been I appreciate it
a ton. You're very welcome,and let's both keep it rolling. Thanks
Andy, Thanks Bill. There yougo, the great Andy Larson. I
told you there's guys that I justadmire the hell out of and he and
I mentioned Bartle yesterday, guys thattook an untraditional path but followed their passion
and their love and turned it intoan unbelievable career. And then he just

(25:03):
made me feel really old am tellingme you used to call into my show
at night on KSL too funny.Great guy Andy Larson. Appreciate him?
Did they read his stuff on thedraft tonight at sltrip dot com. Thanks
to Jersey Mikes for being a greatpartner of ours here on the ESPN seven
hundred Jersey Mikes. They are asub above forty Utah locations, lunch,

(25:26):
dinner, and in between hot subs, cold subs, you name it,
it's Jersey Mikes. Quick time outback to talk a little Utah basketball next
with new head new assistant coach DavidEvans here on the Bill Riley Show on
the ESPNS of an hund