In his sixth season overall but his first with the UtahJazz, MarkkanenLauri had his long-awaited breakout. His individual progression and the opportunity provided by his new team both played a big part. TakeNote
last week. “And I’m like, ‘He’s actually a lot better than what I expected. Or at least for his home team, he is. And if we can get, meanwhile, claims there was absolutely zero ambiguity on his part when he saw what Markkanen was doing.
That changed with Finland, where he was asked to, by default, do much more — and quickly proved himself capable., who had played just a couple handfuls of games with Markkanen in Cleveland last season before getting hurt, had seen enough glimpses, brief flashes of more in practices and games that, upon their trade to Utah, he boldly declared that fans would be in for “a treat” watching Markkanen.
“Markkanen is the No. 1 option, so just giving him that title and just guys knowing ‘We’re going to play through him; this is who we want to play through every single night’ has given him confidence,” added the Clippers’ Ty Lue. Utah Jazz forward Lauri Markkanen as the Utah Jazz host the Los Angeles Clippers, NBA basketball in Salt Lake City on Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2023.
Instead, rather than have Markkanen be the ball-handler, he’s far more often a screen-setter, freeing the initiator, then drifting behind the arc for 3-point attempts. In his eyes, Markkanen’s individual success has not come in a vacuum, as pretty-but-empty numbers on a going-nowhere roster, but are serving a greater purpose within a team construct.
“It’s not a bad comp. When you look at what they can do — in the sense we’re talking about Dirk at 25, not the end of Dirk’s career — those numbers are exact, so that’s not a bad person to have a comp,” Kidd said. “You talk about one of the best players in the world to be able to play that position and do it on a nightly basis, and Markkanen is going to hold up to that. That’s pretty special.
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