If the Jazz wanted to trade Lauri Markkanen, they've already missed the train.
Ending their rebuild with Lauri Markkanen as a centerpiece was always the Utah Jazz's primary plan. And that's pretty remarkable, considering how he arrived in Utah in the first place.
Markkanen was part of a draft-night trade from Minnesota to Chicago, where he spent the first stretch of his career. As an off-ball catch-and-shoot threat, he did his job remarkably well, scoring at a strong efficiency and posting double-digit scoring averages in every season of his career.
When he joined the Cleveland Cavaliers, he played even less power forward than ever before, filling in space around the perimeter and serving as a three-point shooting pressure-release valve for the Cavs' stars.
To say that Markkanen was an under-the-radar player in the grand scheme of the NBA would be an understatement -- he was viewed as a bit of a toss-in addition in the deal that sent Donovan Mitchell out of Utah, with Collin Sexton being the main draw of the exchange.
Everyone knew about Lauri Markkanen once the Jazz started winning games though.
Clutch buckets, poster dunks, and highlights galore, Markkanen set the league on fire in his debut season in Utah, eventually earning the nod as an All-Star starter when the festivities were held in Salt Lake City.
He broke onto the scene in his first year with the team, and seeing as the Jazz were major sellers in the trade market during the infancy of their rebuild, many speculated that Markkanen would be dealt sooner rather than later.
Season after season, rumors spread about Utah's intention with their Finnish phenom, and proposed trades appeared left and right every February.
Perhaps the closest Utah ever got to trading Markkanen was when the Golden State Warriors sent offer after offer in hopes of getting one of the most efficient scorers of the stretch-four ilk, but the Warriors' offers were insulting as they offered their garbage and unwanted players in hopes that if they offered enough nickels, the Jazz would hand over a crisp $20 bill.
But Moses Moody and some draft picks didn't move the needle for the Jazz. Shocker.
Here's the point: if the Utah Jazz wanted to trade Lauri Markkanen, they would have struck when his value was the highest. Keeping him on the bench for the past few seasons in the hopes of losing more basketball games hasn't been conducive to boosting his value across the league.
But the Jazz don't care about that; they love Markkanen, and they're keeping him.
He's been a key piece of their plan since the beginning, and now the pair finally gazes upon the horizon of a brighter season -- a season of winning.
