Thank you Greg for allowing us a glimpse in your life as owner of the Utah Jazz franchise. I do not recall a statement ever made directly to the fans. I am confident that the Jazz would not be in Utah if the Miller family did not love basketball and Salt Lake City. I find it hard to believe that the NBA in Utah is a huge moneymaker. 20,000 seats avg. $70 ticket = $1,400,000 a game, 2 games = just under $59 million and we think the Miller family makes bank. haha! Last I checked that doesn’t even pay current players salaries. Not to mention the event staff that is required at every game, or the building etc. I thank the Millers for bringing the Jazz to Utah and keeping them here!

My mid-season MVP is split between Wes Matthews & D-Will.

My favorite player this year has been Wes Matthews. His hustle is very contageous and his attitude toward the direction of the team is unwavering even when he gets few minutes coming off the bench.

D-Will can be a dominant force & explosive plays speaks volumes to the rest of his team, like his dunk in Miami before Christmas. He took some heat for the way the team played in LA earlier in the year, and the following week when the Jazz went up against Orlando, San Antonio, and LA again D-Will was the driving force in turning all 3 of those games in to wins! The fans are behind you D-Will, as well as management- like Jeremy said before “nut it up and expect your players to nut it up like you do night after night.”

Booz- Thank you for being a vocal leader on the floor and saying “get that shit outa here” every time someone else blocks a shot. Or “grab it Memo” whenever he pulls down a board. I listen for that every game. Your passing has been phenomenal this year. Your outside shot was short earlier in the year and now your consistently knocking down the 15-20 footers. Defensively you say you’re going to step it up, lets see it on a more regular basis. Here’s a goal, take something from your Duke brotha down in Houston and draw a charge or block a shot for every time you get your shot blocked.

Memo- keep shooting the 3. You’re a shooter. you’ll find your range again. In the mean time, review your game film from 07-08 1st round series vs. Houston. Whatever you did in that series to help your team win will benefit your team every game. You were my MVP of that series.

Ronnie Price- I saw you in the airport back in August with Paul. I was happy the Jazz resigned you because of your energy. You haven’t failed us. I love seeing you and D-will on the floor together. Thank you for playing defense, sacrificing your body and avg. more block shots than the taller guys on the team. Last but not least, trust your shot.

Wes Matthews- keep it up. ‘nuf said.

AK- You’ve become complacent. I like the self confidence you have in your outside shot. Thanks for putting some weight on during the offseason to show some commitment to the team this year. Take it to the rack and shoot it in the paint! You have the ups and the ability to pass if necessary. I want to see you posterize somebody! I get sick to my stomach when i see you throw crap up and expect the refs to bail you out.

Kyle- Get your knee better. Good hustle on defense when you are out there, but its not there yet.

Millsap- I think I speak for the rest of Jazz fans. You (like Wes) are the definition of Jazz basketball and we want you here for a long time. Continue to progress and crash the boards. You are a double double guy with 30+ minutes/game. When the calls don’t go your way, you’re still effective, we see that you’ve been screwed on calls since the day you got in the league. We don’t blame you for the fact that the officials can’t see what everyone else does. Keep focused on the game.

CJ- Your 3 point shooting is decent. But for the love of all that is good and holy drive the lane and posterize somebody! Get in the mix, grab some boards. You haven’t been in the lane with the ball all year. Literally, all year. Your defense against top players has been fun to watch as you mature into a good defender. That intensity is not present on lesser opponents. You of all the current Jazz players has the ability to play ball similar to Jeff Hornacek, but you have to learn how to get a shot in the lane whether you go all the way to the rack or hit 8-10 footers. You have become too predictable for defenses. Force you off the 3 to take 2 steps in for a lower percentage less practiced 22 footer.

Fes- you need more minutes. Very good work attacking the basket when on offense. I wouldn’t be suprised if you have more blocks than Boozer and Okur throughout the season even though you average 35 minutes less per game than they do. AMAZING how you don’t play more.

Brewer- You’ve filled your roll and continue to improve year to year. You are the best off the ball cutter on the team, and you find the receiving ends of passing lanes very well. You are amazingly unpredictably predictable.

Coach Sloan- (will never read this). The team has shown a tremendous amount of success when falling back on the system. Your discipline and structure are needed in the world and especially the NBA community. Each player knows which shots to practice before the game because he knows what shots he will get out of the sets you run. That will always work. My simply question for you is if you had to chose one or the other, is it more important to have 1. a successful and happy team or 2. a 2. successful and disciplined team? I simply ask because in 22 years I have seen you show positive emotion very few times, I can recollect one time when Stock hit the 3 over sir charles to go to the finals. Someone has to put together a video of “moments of positive expressions (Coach Sloan edidtion)”. I can appreciate the desire to keep emotions in check due to the ebs and flow of a game, but at the same time, to become “invested” as Greg Miller says, doesn’t that require some level of emotional investment?

Thanks for allowing us to comment.

I don’t want to come across the wrong way so I will just ask you a few questions.

Why do the Jazz lose so many games in the last 5 minutes of a game?
Why do the Jazz lose so many away games ?

I have watched Jerry Sloan give hundreds of interviews, but I have never heard him take responsibity for a loss. It is always the player’s fault.

Losing a in the last 5 minutes and losing away games is not a player problem, it is a coaching problem. The sooner Jerry is replaced, the sooner the problem can be addressed. Yes, Jerry has some great assets, but he has never learned to coach the last five minutes of a game, and he doesn’t know how to win away games. Hey, that is Jerry, it is not the team!

I keep waiting for Jerry to retire so that you can hire Jeff (Horny). The Jazz will never see a wining season until Jerry retires.

Good to hear, you’re saying all the right things. A few responses, if you’re reading these comments:

1) Obviously you can’t listen to some of the drivel from these other posters, especially the gentleman, Robert, who posted just before me. Understand that, while some fans are uninformed and unforgiving, not everyone feels that way.

2) Most fans don’t understand the difficulties of the player market in the NBA, nor do they understand just how well the Jazz have done in avoiding the same type of costly mistakes that other teams have made. Well done for that. However, there were two mistakes that I feel are inexcusable: 1) Matt Harpring and his 4th year which was originally only partially guaranteed, until he hit a PT incentive that made if fully so and 2) Memo’s extension. In both instances, the Jazz had all the leverage, and yet it appears that we awarded them based on the good ol’ boy system. Harpring because he was a Jazz type player who gave it his all every time stepped on the court and Memo because he was everything that Boozer was not. Neither player had enough leverage to demand what they got, and yet the Jazz gave it to them for reasons that remain unclear. At least with AK and his terrible deal we had no choice. No one could ever had imagined that he would just stop playing his brand of ball the way he has. Harp and Memo, though, were real mistakes. The Harpring mistake just cost us a good young PG who could have held down the backup spot for 4 solid years. I cringe to think about what the Memo one will cost us.

3) I love the Jazz. We have been a great franchise in the NBA for a long time and its something I’m proud of. But we want a championship. I hate to say it, but it is time to tank the season. We need to retool the roster, and we have to get 2 top 10 picks if we want it to happen quickly. We’ve got to get some shooters who can actually play well in other aspects of the game, and some interior defense. Derrick Favors, Cole Aldrich and Ed Davis can provide the interior D, and Wesley Johnson or Xavier Henry can provide the shooting and all around offensive game. We need one of each, and we need to lose like crazy to make it happen. Its time to tank, don’t let peripheral concerns get in the way. Its whats best for the Jazz long term. Cut loose anyone that you have to to make it happen, and make Deron sit out the rest of the year with a phantom injury.

Thanks for the blog communication and your willingness to openly communicate with the fans.

Like many here, I’m a diehard Jazz fan since 1979. We moved to Washington State in 1999, but still try to make it to a few Jazz games (650 miles) each year. Also, we go to Portland when the Jazz play (although do not enjoy the Rose Garden’s barbaric hostility which last year included a slashed tire due to the Jazz logos on my SUV). We never miss a Jazz game on NBA LeaguePass. I have a dedicated Jazz room at home and have every Jazz logo-ed item imaginable (including a Maytag Skybox with backlit Jazz panels to cool my game time beverages).

Reading the comments, I have a couple of observations:

1. Foremost, the fact that Utah could have and support a successful major league sports franchise is almost unimaginable. What your father and mother have done for the State of Utah (including untold philanthropy) is immeasurable. Thanks from the bottom of our hearts.

2. Watching many NBA games daily on LeaguePass, I must concur with what appears to be a lack of “lay it all out” effort. My wife continually comments on what appears to be differences in intensity levels shown by other NBA teams vs. the Jazz. I thought the Denver defensive effort on Jan 2 was a blueprint for NBA success (then surprisingly, I watched the Nuggets slog through a home loss to the 76ers the next evening).

3. Another underrated factor in reduced fan interest pointed out by Al of West Jordan was emotional connectivity to the fans. We attended the Kings game on Nov 6 and had Thurl Bailey sign my ticket. It hangs in a plaque in my Jazz room. I came away buzzed. He was incredibly warm and cordial. It brought back the memories I had from the eighties. I still remember seeing Frank Layden, Mark Eaton, and others at the ZCMI mall at noon. D-Will can fill that void, own this town, and seems to want to move into that role. I hope we can get this connection re-established.

4. The reality of the NBA is that it exists for the large markets. We must accept that and collectively enjoy the challenge of doing more with less. It’s how we got Stockton and Malone.

Again, thanks!
Mike