Who to accompany Lauri Markkanen in the Jazz racket next year? Last season, Will Hardy most often aligned his leader with John Collins, in addition to Simone Fontecchio, Kris Dunn and Collin Sexton. Results with this five: 13 victories in 20 outings.
But can the assumed turn towards youth change the cards? Could Walker Kessler, 23, pass in front of the former Hawks player, 27?
“ I really like being a starter. That's something I pride myself on and enjoy, being one of those guys that starts the game with energy, intensity, fire, and sets the tone. It's something that's close to my heart, that's for sure. “, already displays the latter.
Last year, he started in the five 66 times in 68 uses. Being a 6th man is not really in his DNA: he has hardly come off the bench since his rookie season with Atlanta. Just hearing his coach, nothing is decided for the coming season.
A variety of profiles
“ There are a lot of factors that go into choosing the center: Walker, John or Drew (Eubanks)? », asks Will Hardy, citing a third interior, from the Suns. The technician therefore has a quantity of profiles.
But if his need was for a natural pivot, the name of Walker Kessler should logically emerge. Even if the man who has sometimes been compared to Rudy Gobert did not achieve a statistical breakthrough during his second season compared to his rookie year.
“ I'm not going to worry about it. I'm just going to do what I have to do, attack every day, be a pro, play hard and do whatever the coach needs », Unpretentiously displays the young man, whose association with both John Collins and Lauri Markkanen, pushed to position 3 in a “tall ball” version, has not really been conclusive in the past.
Do not “get fired up” about the five
“ We saw Walker play with the starters last year. We saw John too, and we learned things about these two situations. The current team is obviously a little different from the one back then, but we try to watch this series of games, see what comes out of it and try to learn not only from the pictures, but also numbers », continues the coach.
In this case, John Collins brings more in attack when his competitor is focused on defensive tasks. “ I've talked before since I've been here about how everyone gets excited about the issue of incumbents and non-incumbents. For me, it's: we have 48 minutes. Let's make the team work as well as possible », refocuses Will Hardy.
The latter still has an orientation for the days to come: “ Walker had a very good summer. He had a very good first day of training, but we have to see until the restart. We clearly have to make a decision between now and then, but I expect to see Walker play with the 'starters' during the pre-season, and we'll see how it works. »
