Joe Ingles is returning to the NBL, and, like any of us would, his home nation has questions regarding his 12 year NBA career. Ingles recently sat down with Pete Hooley (former NBL Champion) for an interview/test of his memory on his time playing basketball in the United States – naturally, this conversation centered around his time with the Utah Jazz, the team that he spent 8 of his 12 seasons with. Check it out below.
There’s lots of interesting tidbits in here – I knew former Jazzman Bryce Cotton
was tearing up the NBL, but a 6 time MVP?? – but what stood out to me was his quick moment speaking on Derrick Favors. At 6:10 in the video, Joe Ingles says that Derrick Favors is the best pocket-pass catcher he’s ever played with. In that moment, I felt so much validation! For years, I never felt more confident in the Jazz offense than when Joe Ingles and Derrick Favors were running a pick-and-roll, and it felt good to hear my confidence be validated by the on-court opinion of Jingling Joe. It was only ever a small part of the team’s gameplan – it obviously wasn’t spammed with nearly as much regularity as Stockton to Malone – but I, and many other fans, picked up on the chemistry present when these two Jazzmen played together.
This got me thinking; what are some of the other great Jazz “micro-skills”, meaning relatively small scale but impressive talents than you’d only really start to notice by watching a substantial amount of Jazz games? This is an interesting thought exercise – I found myself reminiscing on things that I hadn’t thought about in years. A few examples immediately came to mind:
- Bojan Bogdanovic and his pump-fake to side-step three pointer
- Karl Malone and his classic chair pull move
- Ed Davis (yeah, Ed Davis – I’m surprised my mind went here as well) and his offensive rebound tip to the perimeter
- Shelvin Mack and his 8-12 foot floater
- Joe Ingles (double dipping with Slo-Mo) and his fake lay-down pass to scoop layup in the pick-and-roll
- Donovan Mitchell and his one handed, high-speed baseball passes to perimeter shooters
- Jordan Clarkson and his boxing square-up at the first sign of any tension
Obviously, this is not an all-encompassing list; it’s easy to tell my formative years of being a Jazz fan through the players that I selected. That is why I want to open this up to you. Everyone has a few arbitrarily chosen Utah Jazz micro-skills that they have kept, sealed away, in the recesses of their mind, and this is the time to dig them back up again.
So, in the comments, tell us one of your favorite Jazzman micro-skills, and let’s spend the dog days of the offseason looking back fondly on players and talents that don’t always get the most shine.
