NBA trade rumors: Boris Diaw traded to Utah Jazz

The Utah Jazz have reportedly upgraded the front court with a veteran presence by trading for forward Boris Diaw with the San Antonio Spurs.

According to Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical of Yahoo! Sports, the Utah Jazz have traded veteran NBA forward Boris Diaw to the Utah Jazz.

Diaw is a 13-year NBA veteran who has played on four different teams. He had spent the previous four and a half NBA seasons with the San Antonio Spurs, winning the 2014 NBA Finals and coming up a few games short of winning it all in 2013 to LeBron James and the Miami Heat.

This is an under-the-radar move that will hopefully help Utah get over the top and make the 2017 NBA Playoffs. Jazz head coach Quin Snyder is a disciple of the Gregg Popovich coaching tree, serving as Mike Budenholzer’s top assistant in 2013-14 with the Atlanta Hawks before getting the Jazz head coaching gig.

Diaw will help the Jazz as a “3 and D” type of player coming off Snyder’s bench. He’ll play the 2016-17 NBA season as a 34-year-old stretch four. Diaw is a career 36.2% shooter from the outside, and at 6’8″, has the wingspan that Snyder might want to have for players on his second unit defense.

This trade with the Spurs seems eerily reminiscent to the one San Antonio made with the Hawks last season involving center Tiago Splitter. Both players were key role players with the Spurs that are going to a team coached by a Popovich protegé to improve these clubs’ respective bench units.

Trading for Diaw may not be a high profile deal for the Jazz, but his veteran presence and great student mentality from his time in San Antonio might be enough to help Utah get back into the Western Conference Playoffs next spring.

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