1 Thing Each Jazz Player Must Do Individually to Help the Team Win

When the next NBA season decides to tip off, the Utah Jazz will be one of the most surprising young teams in the league.

With a good mix of talented players, exciting young guys and having picked up two lottery picks in the latest NBA draft, the Jazz is ready to get back on track and into contention in the Western Conference.

After enduring the worst season in team history last year and adding several new players to the mix, the Jazz will undoubtedly improve over its last outing.

With more consistent coaching, better team chemistry and the addition of Mehmet Okur and a couple of solid rookies, it will get better as a team.

While the team will improve overall, here is a list of one thing that each Jazz player must do individually to help the team get better.

Listed here are the players who are still under contract with the team. It remains to be seen if Andrei Kirilenko, Ronnie Price, Francisco Elson, Earl Watson and Kyrlo Fesenko will re-sign with the Jazz and be with the team next season.

Mehmet Okur: Gain Confidence After Injury

After appearing in only 13 games last season while attempting to come back from a serious injury to his Achilles tendon, Mehmet Okur has become a bit of a forgotten player for the Jazz.

He will need to work hard to put the injury behind him and gain the confidence to play basketball at the high level he is accustomed to. Even after his body may be ready, Okur is going to have to work through the mental side of his return.

It may take him a little while to fully regain the form that he showed when he was "money," but when he does, he will help the team more than anyone can anticipate.

He will continue the present a difficult matchup as a center who hangs out and shoots from behind the three-point line.

If Okur is not able to make a solid comeback this season, his career may be in jeopardy as he is in the last year of his contract. It is a big year for him, and the sooner he rebounds from his injury, the better.

Al Jefferson: Focus on Defense

After taking some time to adjust to the team last season, Al Jefferson went through a long stretch where he seemed to carry the team on his back offensively and led the team to several wins.

While his offensive skills and production are not in question, Jefferson needs to work to improve his skills on the defensive end of the court.

With the amount of frontcourt players the Jazz will have this season, if Jefferson does not focus on defense, he could quickly find himself on the bench or involved in a trade.

To say that the interior defense of the Jazz was not good last season is an understatement. It is time that Jefferson steps it up defensively and become the difference-maker there. If this must come at the expense of his point totals, it is a sacrifice he is going to have to make.

Enes Kanter: Play Basketball

Aside from playing in the recent Eurobasket tournament for his home country, Enes Kanter has not played a lot of basketball over the last couple of years.

Drafted after being ineligible at Kentucky, he sat out last season and does not have a lot of recent experience behind him.

The best thing that he can do is simply play basketball. Kanter needs to involve himself in as many basketball-related activities as he can. Pick-up games, early-morning practice sessions and even going one-on-one with old friends in Turkey would help.

As he plays, his skills will continue to develop and he will get a start at catching up to the time he would have spent in NBA summer leagues with the Jazz.

Perhaps he can even give Jimmer Fredette a call and be a part of his All-Star game.

Paul Millsap: Get the Swagger Back

There were a lot of reasons for the decline of the Jazz last season, and all of the coaches, players and fans were affected.

Paul Millsap was no different.

The thing that Millsap needs to do is to regain the swagger that we have seen from the undersized power forward whose play made it easier for Jazz fans to not cry about losing Carlos Boozer to the Bulls in free agency.

One might only look to the early season game in Miami last season to see the ability that Millsap has to overtake games and be a dominant player on the team.

As Millsap gets back to the no-nonsense style of play and high intensity that he has been known for during his career, it will help the team to be energized. As other guys step up and do their jobs as well, it will help to free Millsap to get his attitude back.

Alec Burks: Learn His Role

After being passed over by bigger colleges, and again passed over by several NBA teams in the first round of the draft, Alec Burks has a lot to prove to those who may not believe in him.

Burks seems like the type of "chip on my shoulder, something to prove" kind of guy, which can be either a good or a bad thing for his career and for the team.

While Jazz fans would be more than happy to have a guy with that type of attitude, he needs to learn to back it up with his play so that it does not become a distraction. His skills are not in question as he is the type of player the Jazz needs as he is good at creating his own shot and scoring.

The best thing that Burks can do is take some time to learn and create his role on this team and show off his skills before he starts talking about it. Maybe he can take a lesson from Paul Millsap on how to quietly go about being a star.

By making sure to find his place on the team and not creating unnecessary distractions, Burks' play on the court will help the team to improve this season.

C.J. Miles: Find Consistency

C.J. Miles has heard this criticism more than any other since he came into the league as an 18-year-old draft pick.

It is well known that Miles will be the team's top scorer one night and then not show up for the next few games.

Miles has played well enough for the Jazz to pick up his option for the next season, but it is time for Miles to find the consistency that he has not yet been able to show. If he is able to do that, he will become a reliable scoring option off the bench which will help the team to not have a drop-off when the starters rest.

If Miles struggles through another inconsistent season, it will have a big impact on his career and he will not be back with the Jazz when his contract is up.

Derrick Favors: Gain Confidence and Attitude

If the Utah Jazz could have found a way to move up to take Derrick Favors in the draft two years ago, it would have done it.

As the key piece in the Deron Williams trade, Favors no longer has the rookie luxury of looking like a wide-eyed 19-year-old player who is learning the game.

After watching him finish the season strong, it is evident that Favors has the size and talent to be a great player in the league. He now needs to have his confidence catch up.

The biggest thing that he needs to work on is to gain a bit of attitude to go along with his talent. Maybe he can adopt the Paul Millsap toughness, or learn how to play the position from Jazz legend Karl Malone.

Either way, Favors cannot hide behind being a rookie and his potential, and it is time for him to step up. While he will get the playing time needed for him to develop, he will need to find a way to stay on the court, gain the confidence and create a tough attitude.

If he can do this, on the defensive end especially, it will be a huge boost to an interior defense that is in need of an upgrade.

Raja Bell: Develop Leadership Skills

During his time with the Utah Jazz, Raja Bell has been a lockdown defender, a high-energy guy and a player who did anything to help his team win.

Oh wait, that was the first time around.

After joining the team prior to last season, the Jazz thought that he would become the player the team had the last time. Instead, Bell had a tough season where he did not meet expectations.

At this point, the best thing that Bell can do to help the team is to develop his leadership skills and help the young guys to better understand life in the NBA.

As one of the veterans of this team who has been around the league, his role may turn to being less on the court and more to being a leader on the bench, in the locker room and in practice.

Bell may have some basketball left in the tank, but if he struggles like he did last year and can accept a leadership role, he will be able to help the team to be more successful by leadership rather than by scoring baskets.

Devin Harris: Learn the System

Devin Harris got an unfair evaluation of his time with the Utah Jazz last season.

After shaking off the cobwebs of having been stuck in New Jersey for the last several seasons, Harris had all of 17 games to make a mark among Jazz fans. 

Accounting for injuries and the fact that he was the replacement point guard to All-Star Deron Williams, Harris did not have much of an opportunity to succeed.

Harris will have a much better season next year and will have had a chance to settle into the team, learn the playbook and create a better rapport with his teammates. He will have a much fairer chance to learn the Jazz system and learn where his style of play will fit with others.

Him being healthy will also help, and Harris will elevate his game to the point where fans will accept him and realize that the Deron Williams trade was not so bad.

Gordon Hayward: Prove the Doubters Wrong

For most of the season, Gordon Hayward did not do a good job of justifying why he was the player selected with the long-awaited first-round pick from the New York Knicks that the team got in a trade several years earlier.

At the end of the season, Hayward left the Jazz and its fans wanting more as he showed them a glimpse into his potential when he took over some games, surpassed his career-high several times and helped a shorthanded team beat the Lakers on the road in Los Angeles.

The thing that Hayward must do is the thing that he has been doing his whole life. He must prove his doubters wrong.

Hayward is set up well to do this next season, and as he continues to get more playing time, he will continue to gain confidence and get better.

As he grows up in the NBA, Hayward will become a solid player for the Jazz. He is one of the young guys who will be exciting to watch develop and win in this league over the coming years.

Jeremy Evans: Bulk Up

This one is pretty obvious for the young second-year player.

Jeremy Evans has the athletic ability and potential to be a really good player in this league. Last season, he was seen rising up above the rest of the players to grab a key rebound or finishing an Earl Watson ally-oop pass.

The biggest thing for him to do is to get physically bigger. Hopefully, his offseason regimen has consisted of working out, eating and doing anything he can do to build muscle mass and bulk up.

Maybe he has the same condition as Andrei Kirilenko and former Maverick center Shawn Bradley where he simply can't gain weight, but if he can grow a bit, he will not get pushed around as easily and it may help him with his defense.

For Evans and the Jazz, it would make a big difference next season for the team, and help to prolong his NBA career.

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