Utah Jazz listening to trade offers on their franchise player

By Andrew Buller-Russ

·Updated: June 29, 2024

The 2022 NBA offseason brought a lot of change to the Utah Jazz, where they traded two franchise players in Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell. They’ve yet to recover since.

We can’t act like the Jazz didn’t set themselves up for a bright future; they’ve collected a ridiculous amount of future draft picks, and Lauri Markkanen, the centerpiece of the Mitchell trade, has become an All-Star and the team’s new franchise cornerstone.

Yet, two years after acquiring the Finnish Marksman, now there’s talk that the Jazz could move on from the NBA’s Most Improved Player from the 2022-23 season.

According to ESPN’s NBA insider Adrian Wojnarowski, the Jazz are open to listening to trade offers for Markkanen this offseason. While he noted they’d prefer to keep Markkanen, they are at least considering their options. However, it would take a “great, great deal” to get Utah to agree to a trade.

Woj adds that the Jazz wanted to get aggressive adding pieces around Markkanen this summer, but after coming up short in their pursuit of Mikal Bridges, now teams are wondering if Utah could become sellers.

The Jazz are open to listening to trade offers on Lauri Markkanen, per @wojespn:

– Utah was seriously in on acquiring Mikal Bridges, and now teams wonder if they will pivot to sell.

– Utah would like to keep Markkanen “in a perfect world,” but teams are preparing aggressive… pic.twitter.com/SjWXmDuhVA
— Evan Sidery (@esidery) June 29, 2024

Lauri Markkanen stats (2023-24): 23.2 PPG, 8.2 RPG, 2 APG, 39.9% 3PT

Markkanen, a 27-year-old 7-foot-power forward, would fit with just about any team in the NBA. His elite shooting ability makes him a lethal scoring option, and he moves well for a player his size. Plus, you won’t find many power forwards as tall as him.

He’s under contract through the 2024-25 season and is currently eligible to sign an extension, one that will likely be a max contract. Yet, he’s set to have a cap hit of just $18 million next season, which should make it easier to find a trade that may appeal to Utah, but as Woj mentioned, it would likely take a massive collection of picks and/or players heading back to Utah.