Little expected of Jazz

MEXICO CITY — Making fun of a franchise in transition is not exactly the national pastime in Mexico, where tonight in Mexico City the Jazz open their eight-game preseason schedule against the Dallas Mavericks.

North of the border, however, taking potshots at coach Jerry Sloan's youthful rebuilding bunch seems to be the in-thing for pundits and prognosticators from sea to shining sea.

"Poor Sloan and the Jazz faithful are in for a culture shock," ESPN.com's Marc Stein writes from back East.

"Don't look now," chimes ESPN Web site contributor Frank Hughes, Stein's Seattle area-based colleague, "but the upcoming season's version of the Jazz could be the worst team in NBA history."

Guesses as to how many games the Jazz might win in 2003-04 vary.

Athlon Sports Pro Basketball magazine suggests "the best the stripped-down Jazz can reasonably hope for is 30." Pro Basketball Preview says 21.

Then there is Hughes, who seems to be the most-pessimistic of predictors.

"Behind Karl Malone, John Stockton and Jerry Sloan, the Jazz has been the NBA's metronome, its sunrise, exhibiting professionalism and talent at the same time, making the playoffs every season, going to the Finals twice, placing the Wasatch Mountains on the world map," Hughes wrote recently. "Now, with both of those future Hall of Famers gone, the Jazz is going to continue its consistency. It is going to be consistently bad. And I don't mean like Los Angeles Clippers bad. I mean like the nine-win Philadelphia 76ers bad."

Those are stinging words heard loud and clear in Utah, where the Jazz have been perennial participants in the NBA postseason for the past 20 years — including 19 with now-retired point guard Stockton, and 18 with now-Los Angeles Laker Malone.

"I think we're gonna be a better basketball team," said Kevin O'Connor, the Jazz's senior vice president of basketbll operations, "than people are giving us credit for."

Which really is very little, by the way.

Stein has the Jazz rated dead-last in his preseason power rankings. Ditto for InsideHoops.com, though it does so somewhat grudgingly, writing, "It seems wrong to have the Jazz ranked lowest in the league."

Still, so many do, in print, in opinion, and deep down in their hearts.