Gordon Hayward and the Utah Jazz Need Each Other

No one is making the argument that Gordon Hayward is great. This is strange because Hayward is going to earn about $63 million over the next four years—the largest amount of money he's allowed to make over that period—playing either in Charlotte or (more likely) in Utah. The articles about his soon-to-be-signed max contract are not about his transformative properties as a basketball player, but about how the Jazz are too lousy and thin not to hang onto him and how, sure, if the Hornets have the cap space, they might as well give it a go. Hayward exists as a series of apologies and cautious projections. He kind of sucked last season, but he was trapped on a talent-deficient team that asked him to do too much. He's only 23 and can conceivably improve by a lot. Paying him upwards of $15 million per year might not turn out to be a Larry Hughesian investment.

Hayward is exactly the sort of player you consider moderately-to-grossly overcompensating if you're running a pathetic-to-mediocre small market franchise. Before Cleveland believed they had a shot at LeBron, they were also thinking about extending Hayward a fat offer sheet. The reactions among Cavs fans ranged from God, no to Um, fine. Gordon Hayward is not a player you exalt. If you're optimistic, you talk yourself into the idea of him. He is the air-conditioned restaurant, you are the sweaty pedestrian.

Zach Lowe tells us this is NBA economics at work. There are several teams with cash to spend each offseason that are trying to move up in the world, except they aren't in New York or Los Angeles and are not a borderline title contender, so they throw the bank at someone who might sign. This is how we end up with unloved players getting paid like franchise ones. A wave of dull, mocking baboon laughter envelops NBA Twitter when deals like this are announced, but what other route can you take, if your team plays in Minneapolis and is bad? Going full Sam Hinkie isn't an option for everyone, and you can't do it year after year.

The effect Gordon Hayward getting too much money has on Gordon Hayward is diminishing. It brings attention to all the things he's unable to do. He cannot, for instance, run an offense by himself for long stretches. He can't score 20-plus points a night efficiently. He can create his own shot, but those shots tend to be contested 15-footers. When you're on the verge of taking up a fourth of the salary cap, you are suddenly recontextualized. People become considerably less tolerant of you not being Young-ish Carmelo Anthony.

That's a disservice to Hayward, because he's interestingly skilled. He can pass and defend and, surely, he would shoot better than 30 percent on three-pointers if he played with someone who could get him open looks. He would be awesome on the Pacers or Warriors or Mavericks, but those teams can't pay market price for him. Even if, all other things being the same, he were an unrestricted free agent, he couldn't possibly pass on multiple-houses-for-life wealth to make $8 million/per trying to win a championship.

Because of this, players like Hayward and teams like the Jazz are necessarily twinned. Not-great players sign inadvisable contracts with low-flight organizations because the two parties need each other. They go .500-ish together, in both a literal and metaphysical sense. Then players like Hayward hit their late 20s and, having achieved utter financial security, sometimes skip town to play fourth banana elsewhere on a slightly-less-than-optimal contract. A new batch of not-great 23-year-olds becomes available. The Jazz gaze upon an à-la-carte-breakfast-spread-danish selection of players. We'll pay too much for this one, we guess.

This is a cycle that self-perpetuates if and until a transcendent talent comes along, almost always via draft luck. It's a reality Oklahoma City fans are perilously close to becoming familiar with, should management screw up the beginning of Kevin Durant's prime. It's why Wolves fans are made crazy by their franchise turning 18 combined seasons of either Kevin Garnett or Kevin Love into one playoff run that didn't end in the first round. (Apparently small markets should beware of basketball genius Kevins.) It inspires a dread specific to people who live in small-feeling cities. Like it might just be this—bleak, then acceptably shitty, then bleak again—forever.

It's why Clevelanders and Memphians should cherish special players, but those guys are easy to appreciate. It is perhaps also a reason to be more grateful for Gordon Haywards, who are in a stage of pupation, trying to grow into someone more substantial and reliable. At their absolute worst, they score a lot, usually in a way that's less excruciating than the way the rest of the team scores. Without them, the NBA's lower-middle class would lapse from figurative unwatchability into something that actively offends our taste. Here's to the moderately to grossly overpaid semi-star. Here's to merciful competence.

Colin McGowan is a contributing editor at Sports on Earth. His work has appeared at Deadspin, The Classical, and Salon. Follow him @cs_mcgowan.