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SALT LAKE CITY — There is nothing new in reporting that everyone believes the Jazz will make a deal. But once again the trade market has changed and new possibilities have opened up.
The Jazz have assets that most teams would love. However, they are now short their starting point guard Mo Williams for the next six weeks or so, and still could be looking for their point guard of the future.
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With the trade deadline less than a month away the rumors will grow both for who the Jazz have available to trade, which seems like everyone and no one at once, and who is out there for trade.
Trade deadlines in the NBA and MLB have natural buyers and sellers. Buyers sell future stock to get a present payout and sellers look to the future or for money. The question that comes up is whether the Jazz are buyers or sellers.
With no Williams the Jazz could start to falter and become sellers, if they stay close they might believe a return of Williams keeps them competitive.
But if the Jazz pull the trigger who is out there for them to acquire. Teams buying won't have great draft picks, but there are some very interesting names that the Jazz could work with.
The biggest could be Rajon Rondo. While there is nothing official about him, but Bradford Doolittle of Basketball Prospectus, via ESPN, posed the question as to whether the start guard should be traded to shock life into the Celtics.
"A trend that has become increasingly true during the Garnett years: The more Boston's offense depends on [Rajon] Rondo, the less efficient it is overall."
He goes on to list some trades that could work for the Celtics and one is with the Jazz, "One I like is Rondo, Brandon Bass and Courtney Lee to Utah for Al Jefferson and Mo Williams, who both have expiring contracts. Perhaps the Jazz could figure out a way to work roster deadweight Raja Bell into the trade, as well."
This would be the Celtics buying short for a big run and adding flexibility for the future. The Jazz would have their future lineup set.
But, he adds that this is very far from being realistic. However, Rondo just got suspended for a game, so who knows how the Celtics front office feels about him.
Another player whose name has been thrown around would be Rudy Gay. The Memphis small forward is being paid a lot of money to under-produce on a team that has or had title aspirations earlier this season.
Chris Herrington of the "Memphis Flyer" wrote about possible trades and included a trade with the Jazz. It wasn't high on his list, but it would be Gay and Hamed Haddadi to the Jazz for Marvin Williams, Enes Kanter and Raja Bell.
Another wild name would be Dirk Nowitzki. Totally a long shot, but recent comments from Nowitzki has indicated his desire to compete and ESPN's Tim MacMahon wrote about his doubt with the Mavericks.
"We knew that coming in, that eight or nine new guys on one-year deals is not really an ideal situation, but what else is there to do?" Nowitzki said. "So either you break the whole thing up and trade me, or you get a bunch of one-year deals and try to be a player next summer. That's the decision we made, so now we've got to fight through it."
This would be the Jazz thinking they could win this or next year, but adding a shooter like Nowitzki could make the Jazz a very scary team.
But all of these teams might not need what the Jazz have to offer exactly. However one team does and they might have the biggest chip around. That would be the Sacramento Kings and DeMarcus Cousins.
The Jazz wouldn't be taking Cousins back, but be part of a three- or four-team deal that would give the Kings help on the front court and give the Jazz point guard help. The Celtics, Bobcats and Pistons, all have young point guards, Rondo, Kebma Walker and Brandon Knight, and according to Kevin Pelton would make sense for Cousins to land.
ESPN's Joe Kaiser wrote about how to help mid-level teams with a trade and talk of the Jazz acquiring Toronto's Jose Calderon. "Adding a pass-first point guard the caliber of Calderon would significantly upgrade the team, if only for a season. The only question is whether the Jazz would even want to go after a player in the final year of his deal."
Another trade in that article is the Jazz trading Millsap to the Rockets. He uses Patrick Patterson and Terrence Jones as pieces the Rockets could send back and maybe Royce White, their first-round pick who has been suspended for not taking a D-League assignment.
This story could change in a week and probably will multiple times before the trade deadline. The Jazz hold a lot of good chips that teams want so there might be a good deal lurking that no one has talked about to push a title contender over the top and shape the future of the Jazz.
