NBA Trade Rumors: Utah Jazz preparing to pivot and trade Lauri Markkanen?

NBA Trade Rumors: A latest rumor has the Utah Jazz seriously thinking about pivoting toward a rebuild and trading Lauri Markkanen.

Heading into the start of this offseason, the overwhelming belief was that the Utah Jazz was going to be aggressive in their pursuits of landing All-Star talent next to Lauri Markkanen. However, with two big names already off the trade block, there may be some hesitation on the Jazz’s ability to find the right target to help improve the team’s roster to a more win-now position.

With the start of NBA Free Agency on the horizon, there could be some second-guessing taking place inside the Jazz’s front office. There’s a chance Utah could be changing courses as we inch closer and closer to the chaos that potentially awaits when free agency opens.

According to a recent report, after missing out on Mikal Bridges, who the Jazz were interested in, there’s a growing belief that Utah could pivot and might already be open to listening to offers for Markkanen. With the way the start of the offseason has gone, there’s a real scenario in which the Jazz end up trading Markkanen this offseason.

It could be difficult to predict what a Markkanen trade package could look like, but you can get a good idea of what that could be by looking back at the deal that the New York Knicks sent to the Brooklyn Nets for Mikal Bridges. The Knicks sent five future first-round picks and a salary filler to the Nets for Bridges. If you had to guess, that’s probably a good starting point when trying to outline what a trade of Markkanen could look like.

At the very least, the Jazz should be asking for an All-Star level young players and 3-4 future first-round picks. That’s the baseline and then the market would then be built on a theoretical bidding war that would then take place between teams.

In short, the Jazz should get huge trade offers if they’re willing to listen to inquiries for Markkanen. The big question is whether the Jazz would actually pull the trigger on a deal when push comes to shove. Right now, that isn’t easy to predict. But the fact that they’re even listening to offers tells you enough about how open they are to potentially pivoting toward a rebuild and, in turn, trading Markkanen.