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Utah Jazz: Stronger Brewer vows to improve defense

Brewer is so humble, the consumate teamate. This year could be the potent mix of peaking players and others coming into their own to make quite the monster.

How anybodys body fat% can be lower then AK on this team?

What good is Brewer to the Jazz if he cant shoot? True his defense is good but he brings no threat to the offense we need to start Miles and develop Miles

Brew I love ya man but if you cant shoot you have gots to go!!!!!

Well, Calgary, there's something covering AK's skeleton but it ain't muscle. I'd put Andrei at about 7%. Anywhere under 5% and you'll see very good definition. Almond and Brewer definitely have the lowest body fat; Boozer is probably right around 5%.

As for Brewer's shooting, hopefully he's improved that some, but it's less important. A team needs 2 perimeter guys. The Jazz have that in Okur and Williams. Even AK takes a few 3's every game. Brewer's strength is cutting to the basket. He's extremely talented around the hoop. And that should be his game. Get open underneath and Deron will find him.

But I laugh when he said he'll try to funnel his guy towards the interior defense. Huh? The Jazz have interior defense? Ronnie...you better shut down your man off the dribble. If he gets by you, it's a clear path past the matadors named Boozer and Okur.

The Jazz don't have trouble scoring points--they have trouble defending. You do not need your 2 to be a great shooter when you have Mehmet Okur. In fact, it works better to have a 2 who can post up and chase offensive boards when you have an outside-shooting 4/5.

In the past three years, they have been consistently killed by opposing 2s. Last year Brew began to change that, but he was not given much help by the guys in stripes. With his performance last year, the refs will start to give him more benefit of the doubt this year. By next year he will be the Kobe-stopper that we have been lacking. Almond can come in when Okur is off the court.

How many 3 point shooters do we need? We have an overload of them already and I think that is one of the problems. A 3 is huge when it goes in but if you live by the 3 you die by the 3. DWill lost the National Championship his last year at Illinois because his team couldn't hit the 3 that day. I like the 3 but I do believe that palyers use it too much. UNC beat Illinois because they pounded it inside and got hit percentage shots. If DWill drives and Booz gets shots underneath then the 3 will be open but you need to play inside out and not outside in and now a days it seems that so many fans want see it played outside in. Let DWill drive and if it isn't open and Booz isn't open then he can kick it out for a 3 but I hate the mentality of 3 first and it seems that many fans want all 3 point shooters even if they can't play defense(Almond, Miles)

yea for spark24 & jazzfan, we don't need our 2 spot shoot at a high level, we need him to stop the other 2 spot from the other team. brewer doing find, i rather have him defend, then have korver not play defense and then would have to double team leaving too many open three's. brewer your the man and I hope you step up your game and for CJ miles, i rather him come off bench, getting harping minutes!

Brewer definitely needs to work on his three point shot and I'm sure he has and I'd put money on his 3 point % going up from last year, but what the jazz really need is defense. That is why Brewer plays and CJ sits. If this team can buy into playing team defense all game long all year long we could be cutting down the nets, seriously. Who has a better starting five than Utah? Maybe the Lakers and Celtics.

The NBA needs more players like Brewer and Millsap.

The best move the Jazz made last year was allowing Fisher to leave. You can see how improved the two Ronnies are in his absence and increased opportunity.

Brewer's mid-range shot has been money last year and will get even better, despite his unorthodox release. He was nervous during the playoffs and his shooting suffered a little, but that shouldn't be the case with more experience.

Thanks Kevin for letting Fish go, drafting Brewer, signing Ronnie Price and opening up the roster spot and playing time for them to develop.

Brewer averages over 12 points a game as the 5 option on offense. Stop the whining that Brewer can't shoot. He doesn't need to shoot. He needs to stop McGrady, Kobe and anyone else who lights the Jazz up year in and year out. And the Miles stuff needs to stop. CJ hasn't done a thing since they drafted him except to con Kevin into giving him a big contract. And you AK haters need to go away.

Now, if Boozer could only get Ronnie's mind-set. It'd be a scoop for the Jazz. Boozer needs to be more impressive with his defense and less impressed with politicians. Get focused, Booz!

Sure glad to have a player of the caliber and desire to improve that Ronnie's shown is few years with the Jazz. You can bet D-Will will reward him with more easy baskets.

I like your points. I will argue one thing though. Morris Almond may not be a good defender (yet), but CJ is. In fact, if you'll remember the LA series, CJ did a decent job on Kobe in limited minutes. He probably only guarded him 5-8 possessions the whole series, but I remember one of them that was a block shot on one of Kobe's turnarounds. I like Brewer, but I really think CJ will have a largely expanded role this year. I will be very surprised if he doesn't average at least 8 points per game, and I think fans will be surprised at how good of a defender he is. With Sloans comments about putting AK at 5 sometimes, I wouldn't be shocked to see Ronnie and CJ on the court at the same time a LOT! Imagine how athletic that lineup would be. Deron, RonnieB, CJ, Andrei and PMillsap. I think we may see some very unique lineups this year due to the emmergence of our three really good 23 and under shooting guards. Don't be surprised if Almond is gone. I REALLY like him, but I like Ronnie and CJ a lot more!

Brewer is doing what you expect a lottery pick to do.....start and keep getting better. Athletically this guy is off the charts and his shot,although goofy, should be solid enough to keep him on the floor for major minutes. He matches up due to his athleticism with NBA 2 guards better than anyone else we have...except maybe A.K. CJ has below average defense, Mo and Korver, forget about it. If the Jazz are to improve into title contenders, the young guys, D-will,Brewer,Milsap and maybe Koufos, in that order, are going to have to lead the way. Fess is headed no where.. A.K. can improve his shooting,Booze maybe defense, same with Memo, but those guys are what they are at this point. I don't see major improvements that could put us over the top except for the young guns having even more of a break out year! looking forward to watching the young guys have break out years!

CJ has played very well when he's been given the chance, and the jazz are undefeated with him in the starting line up. So stop hatin on CJ

Why is everyone hating on Miles' D? He's an excellent defender. He's longer than either of the other two three's and he's extremely athletic (allbeit, not as athletic as Brewer). I must have been watching a different CJ Miles than all of you were last year because I thought that in the limited minutes he had he was very good. I'll check out a couple of websites and see how they rank him.

Defense wins championships. I think they needed last season in order to learn the importance of defense...especiallly when it comes to winning on the road. We have a lot of weapons and this could be the year we surprise a lot of people and win our first championship...IF defense really is our commitment!!

Some very good points being made here.

I actually think that the SF position may be a better spot for Brewer given his skill set and added bulk. I think that is one of the reasons why Sloan is talking about playing him there and I like the idea.

I predict that Harprings minutes will be down to about 10 a game this year, if he is healthy enough to play. This will open up more time for CJ to play both at SF and SG.

I like Jerrys idea of playing a little more small ball, I think it is a great thing in small doses. But if the Jazz want to be a serious contender come playoff time they really need better team defense with less fouls. They also really need another serviceable big, someone who can guard a Tim Duncan/Shaq/Bynum type for 10-15 minutes a game when called upon. Hopefully another year with the same group will help with the team D and Kosta or Fes can step up in the middle, if that happens I think this Jazz team will have all the pieces they need fot a title run.

but if not....

The 3 point shot is under rated and under utilized. A good overall shooting percentage for a team is north of 50% and a good average for a player on 3's is what? 40%, 45%?

Break it down and shooting 33% from 3 point range is the same as shooting 50% from 2-pt range. If we shoot 18 shots - make half on 2-point range we have 18 points. If we shoot 18 3 pt shots and make only 6 (33%) we still scored 18 points.

I suspect we will see a surge of long-range shooters like jaycee Carroll and McNamara as the future of the NBA.