Nick Wright of First Things First on Fox Sports One is no stranger to bad takes. A noted hot-take factory and alleged content thief, he usually focuses on big-name players and teams, so the Utah Jazz have not been victim to his reactionary reporting. That changed on Tuesday when the talk show host suggested that Donovan Mitchell is not a championship-caliber player.
Utah Jazz: “If Donovan Mitchell is the best player on your team you can not win a title”
While it is true that the Jazz have had little playoff success in Mithcell’s five seasons it Utah, it is absolutely asinine to suggest he can’t be the best player on a championship team. With the right pieces around him, Mitchell could absolutely lead a team to the NBA Finals.
Recent history suggests that I’m right. Mitchell, Devin Booker, and Jayson Tatum all play similar positions, and both of them have gone all the way to the Finals in the very recent past. Yes, Mitchell is slightly less efficient of a scorer and plays worse defense, but he is the best volume scorer out of those three and is arguably the best playmaker and all-around offensive weapon. If Mitchell were surrounded by an ideal lineup of a pass-first point guard, a true three-and-d player, a rim-running power forward, and a pick-and-roll dominant center, then the Jazz could be in excellent shape.
How might this lineup come together? They could trade for John Collins, an athletic, defensive-minded forward, and they could also make a move for Myles Turner, who is not quite on the same level as Rudy Gobert but poses a much better threat offensively. Conley or Patrick Beverly could be that guy, and Bojan Bogdanovic is still an elite shooter.
It took Tatum and Booker five and six seasons to reach the Finals, and Mitchell is entering year six, so he’s only a season or two behind schedule if all goes well. Nick Wright suggested that Mitchell could not bring a team to the Finals. That’s true. No one player in the game right now can get a team to the Finals alone, aside from maybe Giannis, although Kris Middleton had a career year in 2021.
LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Steph Curry, Luka Doncic, and Nikola Jokic all need help, in the form of solid…
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