Each answer is delivered with calm precision. Eye contact is made and maintained, a definite rarity. Every careful response betrays a humility that is rarely found in the NBA, much less from a 21-year-old rookie.
And yet, Donovan Mitchell’s metronomic delivery is almost a little too perfect. This isn’t exactly a criticism of the Utah Jazz guard, especially given the inherent discomfort associated with interactions like these; imagine answering a barrage questions as you prepare to trudge off, groggy and harried, on your daily commute. At the very least, Mitchell certainly makes one’s job less difficult. It just feels easy to question if there might be cracks in the façade, that for someone who has achieved as much success as he has in such a short time, his velvety-toned answers might just be too humble.
In this sense, Mitchell epitomizes the Jazz, a team that no one is quite sure what to make of this season. After spending all of last year attempting to woo Gordon Hayward to re-sign with the team — and falling just short — Utah bounced back admirably. They acquired Ricky Rubio as part of Hayward’s pursuit, giving the pass-first point guard a new lease on NBA life after overstaying his time in Minnesota. Joe Ingles, a fan favorite, was re-signed to preserve a sense of continuity.
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They bolstered their bench with versatile free agents, adding capable bodies to a group that seems to have a bandaged foot perpetually dangling out the hospital door. And they brought in Mitchell, pulling off a trade with the Denver Nuggets in what many believe was the steal of the draft.
Replacing Hayward and his underrated talents wasn’t possible but they did the next best thing by getting deeper, and possibly improving on a larger, albeit diluted, scale. The team with a revolving-door of expectations — exceeding them one season, falling short the next — was surprisingly on the upswing again.
But expectations do not determine the outcomes of actual games, nor can they preserve the health of their players. They lost a key contributor before the season started in Dante Exum, who was supposed to back up Rubio or possibly start alongside him. Joe Johnson, a competent player even at age 36, has played in just seven games. Rudy Gobert, the gangly enforcer of Utah’s stifling defense, has been out since early November and is expected to miss several more games.
“He’s just gotta go through it, have success and failure and learn from it.”
The Jazz have tread water despite the growing list of injuries. They stand at 10-11 and have won three in a row. Head coach Quin Snyder has his roster playing stingy defense (holding opponents to just 99.3 points per game, fifth-best in the league). But Utah is also about to start a brutal December schedule where they play nine-of-15 games away from home, go on a six-game road trip, and face a number of playoff-contending teams, including Golden State and San Antonio, as well as Houston and Cleveland twice each. Treading water, even should Gobert return to full strength, could quickly become drowning in losses.
The endgame for the Jazz comes into question, then. With a number of other Western Conference teams battling injury or inconsistency or both, the playoffs remain a real possibility for Snyder and his crew. The inverse is an option, too; jockeying for improved position in next year’s draft. But there’s an overwhelming sense that a full tank isn’t really an option and that, moreover, Snyder will find a way to get the most of the players he has. The team’s veterans are simply too good to be that bad.
In the middle of all this is Mitchell, who has become a fixture of the starting lineup on Nov. 10. It’s difficult to assess if he has helped or hindered Utah’s success. The Jazz have gone 7-6 with Mitchell as a starter and 3-5 with him as a reserve, but that might have as much to do with sending Rodney Hood to the bench, where he seems best suited for a role providing instant offense and not much else. Mitchell’s stats have improved as a starter; he sports higher shooting numbers even as his usage has decreased and has undoubtedly embraced the role. But he is still struggling as much as you’d expect any young rookie would.
According to Snyder, it has less to do with whether Mitchell is a starter or reserve but an adjustment to a new role as an occasional point guard. Or, perhaps more pointedly, it’s Mitchell’s ability to evolve from a raw, gifted athlete that will be the biggest challenge for him this season.
“Donovan was a guy who I don’t think there was such a thing as a bad shot for him at Louisville,” said Snyder before a recent game in Orlando. “He just played hard, took the game and attacked. We want him to continue to do that but there are other people on the floor. We want him to help facilitate offense at times, in addition to being able to take his shots and finish plays, as well.”
Snyder believes that Mitchell is “doing a heck of a job absorbing it all” but admits that softening his instincts is a work in-progress. “There’s always going to be, each game, things for him to build on, like all of our players. But for him in particular. His decision-making. He drives to the rim and can he finish over a big guy or does he need to drop it off to our big guy? Does he need to kick it out and throw the ball to the corner for an open 3? Does he need to try and draw the foul? Those aren’t things that there’s any script for. He’s just gotta go through it, have success and failure and learn from it.”
Ingles, the self-deprecating success story out of Australia, agrees with Snyder’s assessment of Mitchell. “I think he’s been really good,” he said while lacing up the Converse sneakers he’s known to wear. “We’ve got a team that kind of fast-tracks the development a little bit. There’s going to be ups-and-downs, for him and for our team, but he’s been great. Works really hard. Has a great attitude. When you’ve got a couple of things like that, that makes it a lot easier to handle those mistakes because you know their heart’s there, in the right place, and he’s been really impressive.”
“When I worked out with Chris Paul and Paul George and they told me I belonged, that’s when I was like, ‘Maybe this is the right move.’”
During the game versus the Magic, a blowout win for Utah, Ingles could frequently be seen talking to — and at — Mitchell, sometimes with a long arm stretched across the rookie’s shoulders. Ingle’s message? “Just trying to help him in different situations. One time I told him to pass me the ball because I was open,” said Ingles, echoing Snyder’s concerns about Mitchell’s evolution as a playmaker. Ingles has done what he can to help mentor Mitchell, providing advice on issues both on and off the court, even if it doesn’t always stick. “He always looks me off so I’m not going to help him anymore,” said Ingles before erupting in laughter.
But amid the joking, there are legitimate concerns about Mitchell’s future, one which is inextricably woven together with the team’s. Should he become the superstar many anticipate he’ll be, the Jazz are in good hands, with Gobert and Mitchell to lead the team into its next era of success. If the latter falls short, then years of mediocrity might result, barring the unexpected signing or mid-round selection of an elite-level player.
Mitchell, for his part, seems undaunted by the weight of those expectations. “I don’t see it as pressure,” he flatly admits. Rather than focus on hypotheticals or the opinions of others, he remains driven by his own desire to be great. “I just hold myself to a standard where I’ll make minimum mistakes. I would play the same way, whether we were 0-and-17 or have the record we do now.”
That kind of determined confidence is partly why Mitchell’s humility seems so incongruous. Despite his collegiate success, Mitchell maintains that reaching the NBA never seemed likely. “Not at all,” he says, “Just the fact that I was drafted was incredible to me.”
Mitchell grew up a two-sport star. His father, Donovan Sr., played baseball professionally and now holds a front office position with the New York Mets, the team his son followed in his youth. In fact, the Jazz guard wears jersey number 45 because Michael Jordan, probably known best as a basketball player, wore the same number during his brief flirtation with minor-league baseball. An on-field collision with a teammate led to a broken wrist and ended Mitchell Jr.’s career on the red clay.
That same injury inadvertently ignited Mitchell’s passion for basketball and, once healthy, he threw himself into the sport with reckless abandon. What he lacked in polish, he made up for with fierce athleticism. He wasn’t a fluid shooter but he would dunk over everyone in his path; his long limbs led to such defensive tenacity that a coach gave him the nickname “Spider,” which he answers to even today.
He continued to work tirelessly, even if the NBA was never a realistic goal. It took an early May workout with two NBA veterans to convince Mitchell that he should keep his name in this past summer’s draft. “When I worked out with Chris Paul and Paul George and they told me I belonged,” explains Mitchell, eye contact all throughout, “that’s when I was like, ‘Maybe this is the right move.’”
Others have followed a path to the NBA with less but Mitchell remained doubtful, even with the recommendation of “two future hall-of-famers.” It’s why a room at Louisville remained fully furnished and filled with boxes not quite sealed shut. “When I left school, I didn’t even pack my stuff because I thought I was coming back for a third year. I was expecting to come back.”
The boxes have since been sealed and Mitchell’s life in Utah has begun in earnest. He loves Salt Lake City, saying it reminds him of his time in Louisville, and he marvels at the devotion that Jazz fans have for the team. “The passion they have for basketball is amazing,” he exclaims.
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Mitchell hasn’t quite earned that type of devotion but he’s fairly on his way. Each game provides him with a learning opportunity but he almost always reciprocates with a jaw-dropping highlight, the kind that — at least for now — makes up for the mistakes that will continue to crop up this season.
Mitchell believes his short career has worked out well, so far, and sums it up, from broken wrist to lottery pick, as “a leap of faith.” The Jazz have taken a leap of their own and it’ll take more than Mitchell’s explosive athleticism to ensure the team lands in a successful future.