Utah Jazz Call Their Shot & Draft Ace Bailey | Rachel Nichols & Chris Mannix

Utah Jazz Call Their Shot & Draft Ace Bailey | Rachel Nichols & Chris Mannix

this is where the draft got really interesting ace Bailey who has had a hell of a couple of weeks the Ruckers freshman um elected not to work out for any teams i believe that was the first time ever that a USborn uh player a US prospect has not worked out for any teams before the draft it was believed coming into the draft that Bailey wanted to stay in kind of that northeast corridor he was looking at Washington he was looking at Brooklyn those two teams drafted sixth and eighth he did not work out for the Utah Jazz jonathan Gavone over at ESPN was the most plugged in guy that I know on these college prospects he said that Utah was not his preferred destination or one of his preferred destinations but Utah said “You know what i don’t give a i don’t care i am drafting Ace Bailey because we need someone like Ace Bailey.” What did you think of how Bailey handled the draft process and Utah taking him kind of sight unseen in this draft
it’s one thing not to go work out for people and and his agent’s point was hey he worked out for everyone at the combine and everyone got the chance
which his agent should know is not the same thing
which is definitely not the same thing it’s another thing to cancel on teams which is what he did schedule workouts and then cancel them it’s another thing to have it out there that oh I prefer this destination i prefer that destination and by the way if that turns if if that’s bad reporting you could come out and say “Hey hi I’m Ace Bailey i’m on social media i’m telling you guys right now i have a direct line to all of you people which didn’t exist 20 years ago i that is not true i don’t have that that nobody ever did that.” So that tends makes me tend to believe that in fact he did have preferred destinations which is not something I think sits well in this league when you’re a rookie so I I I don’t think it was good advice i’m not sure how staying in the Northeast qualifies to also have the Pelicans on your list which was one of his quote preferred destinations i
mean I guess they’re like when it comes to Western Conference teams they’re the most one of the most eastern most Western Conference teams i don’t know i’m making up at that point
absolutely no sense i mean one thing I read and again because we didn’t hear from him directly on this setting any sort of record straight you know one thing I read reporting was oh he wants to where he can just jack up a lot of shots i mean I I don’t know
what the was wrong with Utah that he can jack up a lot of shots there again a lot of it same thing with the Northeast Corridor a lot of it doesn’t make sense when you put it all together again he could be a great kid a great leader and this could end up being a blip that we all laugh about later i’m not willing to sentence him to anything based on getting advice from an agent on your way into the draft but I do think that he now has a little bit extra to prove to people about being a good teammate about being a leader about being someone who is hungry and a sponge and ready to learn and ready to play your role and all the things that are valued for rookies in this league because he’s walking in with not a great reputation because of the last four to six weeks
this did feel kind of amateur-ish how it was all handled and we have to acknowledge that Ace Bailey has a young agent a new agent that he works with as his representation he’s not represented by a Rich Paul or a Bill Duffy or a Jeff Schwarz the the powerhouse agents that do stuff like this look maneuvering to one team is not a new concept i mean you know guys get promises all the time they shut down workouts and they try to steer themselves to that destination but how Ace Bailey did it felt kind of ham-handed and it felt kind of amateur-ish
also it’s one thing to steer your way in certain circumstances the bottom line is the NBA that team that drafts you has your right for seven years seven years so it’s not like you can go be a problem somewhere a guy a veteran on an expiring contract you can guide yourself to certain teams or a guy like Kevin Durant who the question was would he sign an extension and therefore should we give step up for them you can guide yourself to certain teams even if technically you don’t have a no trade clause or you don’t control your own rights you have influence with these kids coming into the draft they have no influence that team has your rights for seven years so steering yourself as a rookie I I just think it’s a mistake I think that it’s a reputation mistake I think it’s a mistake he can 100% % get over but I just think the bar is a little higher for him now to prove himself
yeah and he hasn’t done anything catastrophic here he He’s And even in his interviews he didn’t really say a heck of a lot but he didn’t say “I don’t want to go to Utah.” So that
he’s got that going for him i think I
I think once he gets to Utah
and starts working with that staff led by Will Hardy who’s one of the best head coaches I think in the NBA I think he’s going to really like the circumstances that he’s in and and I’ll give Utah a lot of credit here the easy thing to do would have been to pass on Ace Bailey and draft someone like say Jeremiah Fierce like they drafted a point guard later in the draft anyway they could have taken the 18-year-old Fierce good prospect out of Oklahoma a lot of people I’ve talked to think he has a really high upside two three years down the road that would have been probably the easy thing to do ace Bailey though is the big swing when you look at the Jazz roster like who are the shot makers there they just don’t have him like Lowry Markin is kind of that guy but who knows how long Lowry Markin is for Utah they dangled him in trade talks last year almost had a deal done with Golden State maybe they do it again this summer because Lowry even though he’s not old doesn’t really match the timeline of of this team the Keonte Georgees and you know Isaiah Collers and all the guys that they’ve drafted over the last couple of years um they need a bonafide shotmaker and Ace Bailey showed me last year at Ruckers he is a bonafide shotmaker like you can kind of squint Rachel and see those shades of Kevin Durant like you can see it like you know he’s a couple inches shorter um you know maybe not quite as dynamic but I I can see the shotmaking there he shoots a the three really fluently he shoots it Yeah it’s just it’s just everything about his offensive game just looks like it’s going to progress really well he was just a freshman last year you give this guy a couple of years I can see him becoming an all-star level scorer in the NBA we’ll see how the rest of his game develops i don’t know but I can see this guy becoming that kind of score and that’s exactly what Utah needs they have been desperate to go and get that type of player and look I don’t know exactly if we’re being honest who is making the final decisions in Utah right now you know Austin A was just hired as the president of basketball operations justin Xanic is still there danny A I don’t know what he’s doing between you know 18 holes at Pebble Beach like is he having the final say on these draft picks but something about Danny A and and look Austin to a degree too because he was part of this when the Celtics drafted Jason Tatum back in 2017 jason Tatum did not want to go to Boston jason Tatum was hoping that he slipped one more pick and went to the Phoenix Suns danny A who had already done a deal already did the Markeel Folultz deal you know moved out of the first overall pick to get to three
didn’t give a damn was like “You know what doesn’t want to play her i don’t care you’re coming to play here.” I had that same kind of vibe with Ace Bailey who knows if it’s going to work out but the Tatum thing worked out pretty well and now here he is with a maybe a Tatum-esque type of player who can be uh the face of your franchise yeah yeah and look for them it’s a win because as you say he’s evaluated as a top three talent and they got him sitting lower on the board this is a team that felt like they got not cheated out of the lottery system might want to use that word but sort of you know the ultimate bad luck and possibly an idea of hey maybe we need to fix the lottery system utah and Washington have been beating the drum for that the most and yet they didn’t make it into that top three and they got a top three talent so let’s see what he can do again I just think he’s got to prove himself a little bit more in the off-c court areas than he would have had to six weeks ago but I also think he can do

Chris Mannix and Rachel Nichols discuss how the Jazz ignored Ace Bailey’s team skipping all workouts and drafting what many think is a future superstar
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