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SALT LAKE CITY — The story goes that during last year's NBA draft, a frustrated Danny Ainge looked around the Utah Jazz draft room and asked, "Is this fun?"
It wasn't.
The Jazz didn't have a draft pick, were in the luxury tax, and had just been bounced in the first round. There just weren't a lot of avenues to improve a team that had clearly plateaued.
One offseason later, Ainge is smiling.
"Yeah, this is gonna be fun," he said Wednesday. "More draft picks, more money to spend — shopping spree! Yeah, this will be more fun — much more fun than last year."
The Jazz enter the offseason with plenty of options. They have three first-round picks in June's draft, are loaded with future picks, and have over $30 million in cap space. That puts just about anything on the table for the team.
Or as general manager Justin Zanik put it: "The optionality that we've created, the possibilities are endless."
Utah tore down the house last summer; this year, it will start trying to rebuild it. How long will that take, though, remains to be determined. Ainge and Zanik both shied away from putting a timeline together on when the goal of a championship window will be opened.
They know they are in a good spot — they have the picks, the cap space, and the contracts needed to be in the hunt when any player becomes available — but it's hard to predict when the opportunities will come along.
But with Lauri Markkanen's season and Walker Kessler's emergence, there's been a little more excitement about the prospect of a potential deep playoff run from at least one person of the Jazz front office — namely, team owner Ryan Smith.
"You guys aren't the only ones asking us when we're going to be good, how good we're going to be this year. We get asked that question by Ryan all the time, too," Ainge laughed. "He's anxious to spend his money, and we're anxious to spend it."
Again, he wants to have a bit more fun this offseason. That fun will start with the draft.
As of now, the Jazz know they have the No. 28 pick, but their other two are still unsettled. The Minnesota Timberwolves' pick could climb as high as No. 12, depending on play-in tournament results (and random coin flips). Utah's own No. 9 pick could move up into the top 4 — or drop a bit — depending on how the lottery turns out.
Ainge joked (or was it a joke?) that a few white lies may lead to the Jazz being able to bring in just about any first-round prospect.
"You know, bring people in that we're looking at for the 28th pick and we can tell them that we're looking at him for the ninth pick — just kidding, all you agents listening," Ainge said.
Jokes aside, the Jazz plan on looking at a lot of different players. The team will bring in at least 10 people to the draft combine in Chicago next month, and the Utah practice facility will be a busy place leading up to the draft.
"Lots of draft workouts. Getting to see them up close and personal and get to meet them. I think it's big in the draft process," Ainge said.
Unlike previous seasons, the team will not announce most of those draft workouts, claiming it will give them a competitive advantage by not having competing teams know who they've had in.
The draft, though, is far from the only big item on the offseason agenda list. The Jazz have multiple players — including Jordan Clarkson and Talen Horton-Tucker — with player options that need to be squared away, and they also have to decide on some non-guaranteed guys, like Kelly Olynyk.
"That's going to be between the player and their agent to make that decision and then we'll deal with that, accordingly," Zanik said about the players with options.
When it comes to Clarkson, specifically, Zanik said: "If he's a free agent — obviously, we love Jordan, and he's contributed so much to this year and during his entire tenure here."
Zanik also heaped praise on Olynyk's season, and said that he anticipates the veteran big to back in Utah.
As for the season, Zanik and Ainge both were pleased with what they saw from the competitive Will Hardy bunch.
"The team was scrappy, connected, and we got to find out a lot of different things about our players — things that we really needed to know as we continue to try to open up a championship window," Zanik said.
They know they found a good young coach in Hardy, a still-young All-Star in Markkanen, and a surprising rookie center in Kessler. That's a good start to a rebuild, so has that accelerated anything?
"We're not going to put a timeline on it. … It's just a continuous timeline of us trying to make really good decisions," Zanik said.
Even though they are anxious to spend Smith's money, Ainge and Zanik know sometimes it's best to stay patient. Could the Jazz theoretically be ready to compete for a title after this offseason? Sure — just don't bank on it
"I just think it's realistic," Ainge said about tempering expectations. "It's not like there's 10 different opportunities. There may be one game-changing player that comes available this summer. But anytime there will be a game-changing player involved, we're in the game; we're in the conversation; but, yeah, those just don't happen. I've been at this long enough to know that you have to temper it because you can't panic and you can't rush into bad decisions."
No matter how much fun you want to have.
