Will Hardy reveals the biggest piece of advice to the young core going into the season

With the NBA playoffs long out of reach and NBA Draft Lottery odds the only scoreboard that matters, Will Hardy transferred his message to a a young Utah Jazz roster. Forget rigid scripts. Think for yourself. The Jazz want their players to become decision makers, independent thinkers capable of directing their own careers. Speaking after the All-Star break, Hardy laid out a philosophy that stands in stark contrast to the hyper-structured world of modern NBA player development.

The Jazz, who are near the bottom of the Western Conference with one of the worst records in the league, are relying on the reality of reconstruction. Victories are rare. Minutes for the young core are plentiful. They need to find out who has the capacity to take control, not simply follow orders.

“With all our young players, we encourage them to think freely about their career, about their own development,” explained Hardy. “It’s about who they want to be as people, where they want to end up as players, because I think in today’s world we have so many individual coaches. We have strength coaches, and the staffs have gotten bigger.”

The alternative, Hardy warned, is dangerous passivity.

“So it can be easy for the players,” Hardy admitted, “if they want to, to check their phone, see their schedule. They come to the facility and get what they need for breakfast. We say they’re vitamins that you need to take. They go to the gym, and it’s two sets of something with eight reps on the court, and we tell them where they can go on the court, and we tell them where they can shoot every day. for themselves.”

That hands-off existence, Hardy believes, carries a long-term risk. One day, the structure disappears. Free agency is coming, a trade means joining a new team, or life after basketball must be considered. Players discover that they never learned how to fly their own ship.

“It can be a slippery slope,” Hardy noted, “because the day will come when they realize they’re not in control of what they’re doing.”

Hardy was careful not to overwrite any solution. He admitted that not every young player is ready to accept the agency right away.

“I think it’s a case-by-case basis, but we have to encourage all of our athletes to think about it,” Hardy said. “As you get further in your process, some guys might feel like they’re taking that agency. Certain people might not want to take that agency because they’re not sure what to do with it.”

In a season defined by accusations of angst ( Jazz was punished $500,000 from the NBA earlier this month for resting healthy players in a way the league deemed harmful), Hardy’s approach doubles as practical and philosophical. With little loss in the standings, the franchise can allow players to experiment, fail and adapt on their own terms. The goal isn’t to produce more losses, but to produce more confident professionals who will thrive when the franchise eventually contends again.

It remains to be seen whether each player will accept the freedom. Hardy acknowledged that some will crave the convenience of a printed schedule. However, in a rebuild where the future far outweighs the present, the Jazz are betting that those who step up and make up their own minds will be the ones who matter most when the tank is finally finished.