Utah Jazz notebook: You can never have enough big men, says Kevin O'Connor

"I have never met him before, but when I was little I followed him a lot," Kanter sad. "The time is real different so I woke up every morning at like 2, 3 or 4 in the morning and I watched him, and he's a great player. I believe he will teach me a lot because we both play center and we both from Turkey and he will teach me lots of things."

NO BOO BIRDS THIS TIME: Last year, when the Jazz announced they were taking former Butler University standout Gordon Hayward with the eighth pick in the draft, a lot of Jazz fans booed loudly. This year, though, there was no such reaction to the selection of Kanter, just a lot of loud cheering.

"When I got booed, we got a good player," O'Connor said, "so I'm hoping that's not the trend, that if we get cheered it doesn't work out. I think everybody recognized that the player we got was worthy of the pick, hopefully."

DON'T ASK AGAIN: O'Connor grew weary of constant questioning about whether the Jazz wanted Fredette with their second first-round pick.

"I'll say one statement and I won't say another thing about it," the Jazz GM said tersely. "And if you ask me again, I'll get grouchy on you. We had him in the top 10 on our board. But that's something that we feel now it's taking away from Kanter and it's taking away from Alec Burks and I'm not going to do that. That's somebody else's player."

He also bristled when asked if draft-day deals by other teams might've altered Utah's draft strategy.

"Why would it?" O'Connor said, sounding somewhat perturbed by the question. "We had our board set up the way we wanted to, and those trades without us being involved in it didn't have a whole lot to do with it."

email: rhollis@desnews.com