During the Playoffs, coaches tend to tighten up their rotations. But that doesn't mean depth isn't important. To the contrary - now depth is more important than it was during the Regular Season, because even having 8 guys on your roster who can be effective, day-in/day-out, throughout an entire four quarters of basketball in an elimination type of scenario is a luxury most teams don't have. And lack of depth, on top of questionable roster construction, is what ultimately did the Jazz in.
For instance, there's nothing wrong with having Hassan Whiteside as a backup for Rudy Gobert, since those types of centers tend to get into foul trouble a lot. But you also have to another C on the roster, one of those stretch-5 types like Bjelica. Why? Because sometimes the big, lumbering center strategy doesn't work.
That's especially true now that we have players regularly doing crazy shit like shooting step-back threes early in the shot clock. Sometimes both teams will be playing like that, not even letting 10 seconds go off transpire before shooting. And in those cases, a traditional, lowpost C is of limited effect, because even players on his own team will sometimes shoot before he's in a position to secure the offensive rebound.
Also, I remember when Mike Conley signed that ridiculous contract in 2016. That was what I refer to as a "legacy contract", the type a team gives to a star player they drafted who has stuck with them, even through the garbage years. I remember when Kobe got a contract like that, and also I believe Dirk. But the difference is that Conley, even if he did have his moments back in the day, isn't a franchise player.
And I know I may be bringing that up unfairly, as that contract already expired a year ago. But dude is still making $20million+. And it kinda reminds me of that episode of Friends where Monica bought those shoes and then had to wear them because she paid so much dough or whatever.
At his salary, it'd be hard for a franchise to rationalize benching Conley, even if he deserves it. Even worse, he makes the kinda dough that could be spent on a couple of quality role players. And the reason I bring that up is because it seems to make more sense, at least to me, to let Mitchell start at the point. And then, you may even do something creative like start Clarkson at the 2. But such a move, as it now stands, would further expose the lack of depth on this team.
And where the Jazz are weakest is actually at forward. Bojan Bogdanovic is supposed to be one of the best European players in the NBA or whatever. But it's like the Jazz are living a nightmare.
You always hear about salary cap and all that shit, but it seems that most teams are able to pretty much chase who they want and let the chips fall where they may. The Jazz are like really top heavy, but after 3 or 4 players the name recognition and talent level seems to drop off enormously. And you know, that kinda shit can work during the regular season, or if you have a bona fide superteam. But not so much in the Playoffs, as the Jazz only have two perenial-ish allstars.
And to make matters worse, it's like who wants to play for the Jazz anyway? I've been following the NBA through four decades now. And in that time, as far as players that Utah didn't draft, Conley is actually the biggest name to ever join the roster. And he did so via trade, not as a free agent completely under his own will.
CONCLUSION
I would personally say that Rudy has to go. It probably also wouldn't be a bad idea to trade Conley, but Gobert going to a team that covets his skillset, such as maybe the Kings (off the top of my head), can reap 2 or 3 really good players in return. Another squad that could obviously use someone like him is the Nets, though I don't know if they have the trade chips (Ben Simmons? LMAO).
The Knicks were criticized for recently attending a Jazz/Mavs game, reportedly having interest in Jalen Brunson. And maxing out Brunson sounds exactly like some dumb shit the Knicks would do. And they're also said to be interested in Mitchell. But that's another team that's deep enough to theoretically pull off a trade for Gobert, though it probably isn't likely since they already have Robinson.
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