David Locke: The Utah Jazz scored in landing Ace Bailey in the NBA Draft
Don’t miss your chance to win big every week on the zone. This week on Win Tickets Wednesday, you can win tickets to The Offspring and the Supercharged Worldwide and 25 Tour. September 6th at the Utah First Credit Union Amphitheater. The Offspring with special guest Jimmy World and Newfound Glory. Get tickets now at livenation.com. Listen to the zone all day Wednesday for your chance to win. We’re joined once again by David Locker, Radio, Voice of the Utah Jazz. David, good morning. A Friday morning with talent that is fully developed not in a youth movement but rather on the backside of a career of excellence, the masters of the morning looking as good as they possibly could for their old age and absolutely the contrast of where the Utah Jazz are right now with young potential developing. Now this is potential fully developed at its most excellent. DJ and PK Great to see you this morning. Great to see you, David. Let’s get a Let’s get you a layup right out of the gate. Get you an easy bucket to get you started. All right, which Jazz rookie have you been most impressed with? I mean, Ace Bailey’s got it all. We’ll see what happens. It’s going to be a question of maturity. It’s going to be a question of work ethic. It’s going to be a question of how the millions of dollars affect him. It’s going to be all those same things that every other 18-year-old that’s ever embarked on this crazy world. But this kid’s got it all. I mean, he’s got it all. It is awesome. So, we’ll see. I mean, there’s no like I think you and I had this conversation about probably now three weeks ago where I was like, I don’t get the narrative around Ace Bailey that he was like this riskreward pick. I I saw no risk at all. I still see no risk at all. Like your worst case scenario is a 69 NBA body that can shoot. Like that’s going to survive every time. But your best case is oh my goodness. How about some handlers that maybe could derail him? What’s a concern there? Um yeah, you already answered it. But I don’t know because actually what I’m here’s my pause. My pause was due handlers. I was trying to actually figure out whether the premise is true, right? So like DeJonte Murray slid to 29th in the NBA draft or whatever it was because the people around him were supposedly bad and one of them got arrested while DeJonte was like in the back of the car or something like some crazy story like I don’t know like right like but that’s why he slid to 29. That’s factual. Hasn’t derailed his career really. Um, so I was actually pausing on the premise like John Morance what came to mind. Are his handlers the reason and is that derailing his career? Probably a little. So, but that’s pretty extreme, right? Like that means literally you have a guy in your car taking a laser thing and pointing it through a team bus to the other side. Like that’s pretty craziness. Sure. But there was some noise leading up to it. Yeah. I mean that’s advising. Yeah. So, yes, that’s all of all of the things that have happened. I mean, more often than not, honestly, what I’ve seen in this league is parents. So, like in Seattle, I watched parents destroy careers much more than handlers. Oh, I I would include them in the list. Okay. So, yeah. So, this is the same thing that every 18-year-old’s ever entered the league with. How do the people around you, parents usually the case more than anyone else, deal with the fact that their child now has $5 million and that’s another five coming the next year and another five coming the next year and 80 coming after that and what happens and how does the kid deal with that? It’s not natural, right? I think I’ve said this on this show before. My kids are the exact same age basically as Walker Kesler and Keonte George. Both Walker Tesla and Kee George are gonna make a hundred million dollars. If I had a chance to give my kid a hundred lives, I wouldn’t give either of my kids their Walker Kesler or Keonte George’s life, even with a what they could do with 100 million. I just I think it’s unnatural development. I think it stunts growth and I think it leaves them with 50 years at the end of their life with no idea what to do, which is a whole hell of a long time. I do. 60 years. I think it’s a little bit hastened now because they’re getting that money in college. Oh, that’s interesting. That’s really interesting. I thought about that. I mean, not the 50 million, but they’re getting some they’re getting substantial amounts of money relative to their peers. That’s super interesting. And wait, build on that, PK. What’s your thought on how that will impact their entry into the NBA? Yeah, that that’s real interesting because we had that uh down in uh Texas this past week. There’s a kid named Carlos Allen and I want you to remember that name. He plays a defensive line for the Houston Cougars and he sat down and he started telling us I was there with Alex Curry and Hans Olsen and I’m I guarantee you they can verify this and if DJ you were listening I was listening this you should go back and listen to this interview David you’re going to find it fascinating. The kid was when he started breaking down how he was investing his money and why and he wondered how the 17 and 18 year olds what they were thinking and what they were doing and he was worried for them. He sounded like such an old man but you wanted to hug him. He had such perspective. He was so grounded. It was unreal. It was a great interview. Send me the link if you don’t mind. and he’s a little older being an upper classman, but he was talking about commercial real estate and how he doesn’t intend to touch any of this money minimum 10 years from now. And I was just blown away what he was saying in the wisdom and somebody and he talked about a friend that he had a relationship with who was telling him about commercial real estate. Man, you got to get into it and you’ve got the money and you got to do it now. And it was just fascinating to me to listen to him speak and and somebody got to him and he listened and that kid I don’t know he’ll play it down in the NFL. I don’t care. But I guarantee you in 15 20 years from now as much as you can guarantee something that can be guaranteed that that kid is going to have a great life. Yeah. I mean I think you know and that I think any of us who’ve raised kids anything you can do to get your kid a great life is more important than anything else. So that’s pretty cool. That’s great to hear. I think it’s, you know, we had a jazz player many years back who was so bothered. I mean, it can go both ways, right? So, this person was so bothered by the amount of money they were making and not doing anything. They weren’t playing at the time that they weren’t cashing their checks because they were embarrassed because their checks were basically as much money as their parents made every year. Sure. And so they were like and they hadn’t done anything and they were sitting on the end of the bench and was like, “No, no, you got to cash your checks. Like we got to get you on direct deposit. Like you got to like like no no you got to like if you don’t want to touch this money that’s fine. If you want to do something with it, fine. But like embarrassed that his two hardworking parents who had normal jobs making 50 $60,000 a year and here his checks were 50 and $60,000 a year a month or a every two weeks. Yeah. every paycheck. Yeah. And so I mean it’s so Ace Bailey, but this isn’t unique to Ace Bailey and it’s I think we have to be really careful. It’s not unique to race. It’s not unique to socioeconomic background. It’s life 18 like you know I don’t want to like reveal all our stuff but like yeah I’m dealing with a 20-year-old is driving me bonkers right now. And it’s a miracle I didn’t swear right there. Um, I mean, and to be clear, you’re not talking about a jazz player right now. Miracles happen. No. Right. Like I can’t like handle it. Up at 1:30 in the morning last night, like walking around the house cuz my brain’s going crazy with frustration. So, it’s like that’s just life. That’s what 20-year-olds do. But most 20-year-olds don’t have 5 million. And most 20-year-olds don’t have to play with 20,000 people booing or cheering them and don’t have to play have social media commenting on them. It’s really hard. So, what is Ace Bailey going to become? I have no idea. But he’s 69. He’s 210. He’s got a 71 wingspan. He’s got an 811 standing reach. He’s got a soft jumper. He can dribble enough to get to whatever spot he wants to on the floor. It seems he can rise up in a jumper that nobody can stop. He can He plays right now with relentless energy. When he jumps, he’s five inches taller than everybody else on the floor. He’s incredible. Yeah, I liked the simple rebound he got off a free throw miss. Uh that and he was not on the inside. He was two spots removed and it was a simple play, but I just thought, “Wow, that’s just enormous athletic ability.” My my favorite play of the entire two days is he’s running to the corner and I say to Ron on our broadcast, “Wow, this has got to be really weird for Ace Bailey right now. He’s just running to the corner and he’s not touching the ball in possessions. He’s never done this in his life. He’s every possession he’s ever been a part of has been a part of getting in the ball.” And we swing the ball to the left side of the floor and he’s in the corner. It’s like the third straight possession he’s not going to touch. We miss. He flies in from the right corner, grabs the rebound on the left side of the rim, has the athleticism to come down, collect himself, change direction, one dribble, back up, and dunk. I was like, “Oh, yeah. Having said all that though, isn’t the pressure really on uh Caniple at this point?” Because Edgecom, who went as the third pick, well, he looked awesome. I mean, you didn’t didn’t take didn’t take a lot of brain power sitting there in the stands at the Huntsman Center to figure out why Philly would want VJ Edgecom. That was pretty clear pretty quickly. Yeah, that was that was Donovan Mitchell, Dame Lillick, Summer League right there. So, we can look back and say Charlotte blew it at four. Um, Charlotte may have blown it at four. Ace Bailey becomes an all-star. Yeah. But purple Lamborghini baby. Didn’t we talk about this last week? Or is that with Scotty? I think that was with Scotty. So, the one thing, and this is Charlotte’s problem, you can do whatever you want. And they’ve had a weird offseason if you kind of look at all the players they’ve brought in and who they are and what they like what they’re like cuz some weird common threads. Um, you can do everything you want to try to like have a good culture, but as long as Lonzo Ball is on or LaMelo Ball’s on your team and arriving in a purple Lamborghini and then I think on other days arriving in a teal Lamborghini, that’s going to be the dominant culture of your team. And maybe if you had concerns about all the things we just talked about with an 18-year-old, that’s not the place to put him. And you can decide what you think of Brandon Miller and hiding a gun and whether that was legit or not at Alabama, but he was involved in that. And you can’t decide what you think of what Miles Bridges did because that’s really clearly defined as horrific. Yeah. So that’s not a great environment. If those are your three dominant personalities and the purple Lamborghinis rolling in every day in Charlotte, they may have sided away trying to find and for whatever reason they believed Coniple was more stable than Ace Bailey. Whether they’re right or not, I have no idea. And whether that’s true or not, I have no idea. Yeah, it might have been something with the composition of their team, which I think you should never do. I think you should always draft the best player available. 100%. Like if Ace Bailey is I mean I don’t want to get stupid here but like I know who I think Ace Bailey is if it all comes together like it’s awesome it and and he would be better than all three of those players. So you draft Ace Bailey. So give us ceiling and floor so that you’re not completely out of your tree. You can give the floor also. Ceiling and floor for Ace Bailey. I’m in the ceiling. Tracing Grady. He’s 68 215 and can get wherever he wants to go on the floor with the dribble if you can figure it out. Like an eight feet, make shots. Um, that’s pretty unlikely. That’s a seven time allar Hall of Famer. So, let’s not get too excited. Uh, too late. Too late. Too late. Floor is a 69 kid who can shoot. He plays a lot. That’s pretty good. I don’t know who it is, but who’s a 69 athlete that’s in the NBA that can that can shoot? I mean, he also, by the way, I mean, he really does have a lot of similarities to Jason Tatum. Um, like body-wise, size. Mhm. He’s probably more athletic, less basketball IQ at that stage. At least that’s what somebody who knows both of them very well told me. Um, who’s 69 and can just shoot 38% and plays 25 minutes a night in the NBA? I mean, there’s a hund of them, right? Yeah. Right. Cooper flag. Yeah. I mean, there’s a hundred of them. See what he did there? That was good. That was pretty good. Um, yeah. I mean, I was still like, yeah, right. Like, I don’t know who that is, but there’s a hundred of them. There’s like I mean I guess floor is that everything goes wrong, right? That like you get involved the wrong people, you get involved with substances, you get like you lose it, right? Like that’s the floor. But that’s every kid’s floor. That’s not East Bailey’s floor. That’s every kid’s Yeah. Roy Tarpley. So, right. I mean, there’s the floor. Every kid’s at risk of that. Um, so I think from a basketball standpoint, like this was my point during the draft, like I can’t really find like you’re 69 and you can shoot. You play 30 minutes a night in the NBA. Like you’re Brandon Miller at that point who may be all right. You’re your floor is Jabari Smith. Okay, great. He’s better. He’s more athletic. His body The other one that jumped out to me, the other one I would say, and I’m not a scout and this sounds so super scouty and I really try to avoid this because I have such respect for the guys that actually do this for a living and I don’t want to sound like I know what I’m talking about. But you know, the one that actually was most impressive to me was when he was bringing the ball up the floor pressure and he was able to get low with his whole body on the dribble. Like his body just moves correctly. Like if you think about Jabari Smith, Jabari Smith doesn’t quite move right. Actually, I thought Nicole Topic for Oklahoma City was good, but his body doesn’t move correctly. Like it’s kind of got a weird gate to it and thickness and it’s just not very limber. Like Ace Bailey was getting low and crossing over in a way that 69 guys usually can’t get that low. Yeah, I got you. Yeah. And that means you have a flexibility and a like that’s that yeah separates you like Jabari Smith does not have that. So therefore he has a very hard time dribbling because he’s 69 and and then the dribble’s always high. Lowry doesn’t actually have that. That’s why Lowry struggles because his dribble is always so high. So there’s so much time in his dribble that someone can come get it. I’m not surprised, but I was disappointed that the Jazz couldn’t get more for the veteran guys that they unloaded, and I knew that that was the market, so I certainly wasn’t surprised. I think that’s a fair way to say it. Um, see, they probably were, too. I think that on paper, you look at the year that Colin Saxton had, the year that John Collins had, you certainly didn’t think you were giving a second away to get off of Colin. Um, Clarkson’s been through nine different trade or seven different trade windows and they couldn’t get anything for him in any of the seven. That was the least ex. and he doesn’t he doesn’t match a good team like he’s not the kind of player you add a team I don’t quite understand what he’ll do in New York but we’ll see um in the sense that he’s not particularly efficient with his possessions and he’s going to need a lot of them if the team’s already good then they probably don’t need someone to come take possessions um John Collins I mean here’s the funny one on John Collins and I I don’t entirely understand this because John Collins is pretty good Right. But so the Jazz actually got more value for John Collins than they paid for and they got almost nothing, right? But if you remember, the Jazz got John Collins for Rudy Gay who retired and a second round draft pick that’s next year that may never convey. It’s kind of like a fake second. And they actually got an actual second round draft pick this time. how John Collins, who was a 50, 40, 85 last year, has become valueless in the NBA is utterly beyond me. Yeah. So, doesn’t it just come down to most teams are up against the second apron and the size of his contract? Yeah. I mean, that’s it. That’s but that trumps all the good stuff that you were just laying out in an era when you need to be able to shoot the ball and he shot it so well. But the contract, the second apron, boom, it’s the business. Yeah. I think if there’s anything that took place, but it’s but I’ve been trying to find it. Like this sounds really good until you actually then try to go find the date where you could have done this. So, the question is, did the Jazz misread player value and what was going to happen with the second apron? And so, they held on to John Collins and Colin Saxton too long and their value went down because of the impact of the new collective bar group. I see where you’re going. The answer is no. No on John Collins because he didn’t shoot it well until this year at which point it was already too late. But on Ston, it would have been the moment they gave him the contract. That was the misread maybe. Yeah. And the other one on Colin, you got to remember, is he was coming off playing four games. So, he was really untradable for the first year. But could you move him at 12 million when you can’t move him at 18? It’s that kind of question. Yeah, maybe. or you just should have let him walk because contracts are less important than they than they’ve ever been. I mean, as Austin said in the his opening press conference, the two things that are changing are expiring contracts aren’t worth what they used to be. And uh teams are going to try to are no longer just handing out contracts to their players anymore. They’re going to have to watch the dollar figures on those contracts. Yep. David, we got to run. We appreciate it. Interesting one, by the way, the interesting one on the John Collins Norman Powell trade. Two really good players traded for very little. Both free agents. Both teams deciding that the expiring contract isn’t worth anything anymore. There it is. The bottom line is the bottom line. Yeah. Thank you, David. You guys are awesome. You are fully developed talent. You were not bothered at 22 years old by the tens of thousands of dollars you had flowing in. I made 210 bucks in my first newspaper job. I was going to say it was the tens of tens that were flowing in. It wasn’t the tens of thousands. Six months later, I got a raise to 215 a week. I guess I was making uh 250 a week. Santa Barbara real estate. That went a long way. Thank you, David. We’ll talk to you later. DJ and PK. It’s 975 the zone. Pablo Money coming up next. Stay with us.
David Locke joined DJ & PK to talk about the Utah Jazz and his early impressions of the team and Ace Bailey in Summer League action.
