The Utah Jazz may have been rebuilding and tanking for stretches, but they still managed to make life harder for the Golden State Warriors in a big way.
The latest example came with Jaren Jackson Jr. ESPN’s Anthony Slater said on “The Hoop Collective” that Golden State was in the mix before Utah got there first. “They were sniffing around that,” Slater said.
Utah’s package helped swing the deal. The Jazz gave up two young players, Taylor Hendricks and Walter Clayton Jr., along with valuable draft capital. However Golden State tried to match it, the Warriors ended up going in another direction and settling on Kristaps Porzingis instead, a far riskier option than Jackson.
That matters because the Jazz got the player they wanted, and the Warriors missed out on a much cleaner fit. Utah looks like a team on the rise.
Golden State, meanwhile, looks like a club sliding the other way. Beyond adding solid rotation help such as Georges Niang, the Warriors are basically running back the same team that missed the playoffs last season.
And this wasn’t the first time Utah stood in Golden State’s way.
The Jazz also declined to give up Lauri Markkanen when the Warriors came calling. Utah was reportedly asking for the kind of return it eventually got for Walker Kessler, but that still didn’t change the outcome. Markkanen would have made obvious sense next to Steph Curry as a No. 2 option, with his shot creation and stretch-big skill set giving Golden State another layer offensively.
Put it together, and Utah has played a meaningful part in Golden State’s recent slide. The Jazz didn’t set out to derail the Warriors, but by holding onto Markkanen and beating them to Jackson, they’ve helped shape the path the two franchises are on now.
In Other News...
Keyonte George Just Gave The Jazz A Tough Contract Question
Keyonte Georges next contract has become one of the more interesting questions hanging over the Jazz as the calendar moves toward the start of the season. The fourth-year guard is entering the final year of his rookie deal, and Utah still has not reached an agreement on an extension, leaving the front office to weigh his place in the long-term plan against the realities of the market.
The timing matters, too. Draft classmate Amen Thompson just landed a five-year extension with the Rockets, a development that could shape how the Jazz view Georges value and leverage as they sort through their own negotiations. Talks can continue until the October 19 deadline for rookie-scale extensions, so there is still time for both sides to find common ground, but the longer this stretches out, the more it becomes a decision about how Utah wants to define its future. [Read more 🡒]
Jazz Just Got A New Sign Of League-Wide Respect
The Jazz are getting a clearer signal that the rest of the league expects them to matter next season. Their 2026-27 regular season slate already carried a healthy national spotlight, and the NBA has now added two more games to the mix, giving Utah an even bigger stage against a pair of high-profile opponents.
Those newly added NBA TV matchups come against the Lakers on Nov. 23 and the Thunder on Jan. 15, adding to a national schedule that now stretches across NBC, NBA TV, ESPN and Prime. For a team trying to keep building relevance beyond its own market, that kind of exposure is the sort of detail that tends to follow real momentum. [Read more 🡒]
Jazz Still Have One Obvious Hole In Their New Center Rotation
The Jazzs new look in the middle has already become one of the quieter pressure points in the wake of the Walker Kessler trade to the Lakers. For now, Utah is piecing together its center rotation with Jusuf Nurkic and Jaxson Hayes, a workable stopgap on paper but one that leaves a different feel than the steady rim protection and rebounding Kessler brought.
That is why Brook Lopez keeps coming up in the conversation as a possible addition. He would give Utah the kind of floor spacing and interior defense that fits a modern frontcourt, but even he would not fully cover every part of the Kessler loss, especially on the glass. With the Clippers weighing ways to reshape their roster and potentially chase draft capital, Lopez sits in the middle of a situation that could affect more than one team before Utahs frontcourt picture is settled. [Read more 🡒]