The departure of All-Stars Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell may have caused the biggest waves, but the ripple effects were just beginning.
Utah Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell, right, cheers center Rudy Gobert up after a play in Game 3 of an NBA first round playoff series at Vivint Arena in Salt Lake City on Thursday, April 21, 2022. Both players were traded during the offseason. | Mengshin Lin, Deseret News
It’s hard to pare down and recap the last six months for the Utah Jazz, much less the last year. Though, in trying to do so the one word that I keep coming back to is change.
Everything that’s happened to the Jazz in 2022, every change that the team has gone through, has been the result of the successes and failures, trials and tribulations and the wins and losses of many years.
Obviously there’s been personnel changes, with new faces from top to bottom. There are new members of the front office, a new head coach, and many new players. But there are also new jerseys, a new approach, different goals, different expectations and the evolution of those things is still ongoingChange is almost always difficult and nearly impossible to avoid. But the changes that the Jazz have gone through in the last year have had an impact not only on their own present and future, but that of the NBA as well.
That’s why, when deciding what the top story from 2022 was, it couldn’t be anything other than the first big domino to fall in an offseason that will forever be remembered by the entire basketball world.
