The Hayward Love Affair - Part II

-- Conflicting feelings abound as we say goodbye



It's been almost a month since Gordon Hayward did me way worse than any ex-girlfriend ever could. This break up was mean on a host of levels and no that's not intended to be a video game reference as much as we former Hayward fan-boys may have enjoyed it. The dumping was public, it was drawn out, it felt insincere, it provided that moment of false hope where you trick yourself into believing things might work out, and worst of all it came on a holiday. What girl would dump a beau on Christmas? On Valentine's Day? At least wait until the day after Gordon.

I was equipped to take the news in the best and worst way possible: with Bear Lake as my backdrop I had built-in advantages to cheer up a depressed heart, but my phone's internet connection was weak, the local bandwith strangled by the numerous 4th of July descendants. I refreshed and I refreshed and I refreshed and each time the tweets yielded no updates. My hopes increased; no news is good news they say. But turns out the app just wasn't working. Phones always play the most underrated roles in breakups.

I've read everything written in the aftermath of Gordon's departure. I had to because I loved Gordon with all my heart. By the time he finished his first season somehow Hayward bypassed Paul Millsap, Deron Williams, Andrei Kirilenko, and Ronnie Price (just kidding) for my 3rd favorite Jazz player of all-time. That may sound to you like revisionist history but I have the bloggings to prove it. He was so much like me and our state in general I had no choice but to love him, even from day one. Hayward was the NBA version of me. Consider:

- He grew up in middle America

- He went to a small college
- He liked tennis

- His dad was the religious leader of his congregation

- He looked like a goofball

- He was white

- He was born to the Jazz on my birthday
- He was cheap
- He wrote a blog

- He played video games

- He ate at Olive Garden
- He was a family man

- He hustled

- He hated Ty Corbin

- He got punked on his first day at the job

The one area he differed from me is the older he got the better he became. No, Hayward wasn't and never will come close to the level of a Karl Malone, but it sure seemed like he was enrolled in the Mailman Summer Improvement course, debuting each new season something we hadn't seen before.

So yeah it hurt. A crunchtime lineup of Rubio, Ingles, Hayward, Johnson and Gobert with Exum, Hood, Favors, and Mitchell off the bench could be pegged as a 60-win candidate without smirking. Could the Jazz have vaulted past Houston and OKC to a 3-seed? Could they have overcome nearly 20 years of Spurs torture to climb past San Antonio? These were all realistic goals. It's not like Hayward was leaving the 2013 Jazz. He fled to a team that had two more wins than us. He left Rudy Gobert -- excuse me, 2nd team all-NBA Rudy Gobert -- to go play with a 5' 10" point guard who might be out of Boston in 11 months.

But you know what hurts the most? It was the time. A lot has been made of the fact that we waited seven long years for Hayward and the Jazz to get good and the moment it finally happened the key to the whole thing left for Boston ... but that's kind of false on two accounts. First off Hayward was good long before this year. He was 3rd in the league in 3 point percentage as a rookie. He was putting up 29/6/2/2 box scores in must win games in the final days of the 2012 playoff race, aka his second year in the league. He averaged a 14/3/3/1 on sizzling 44/42/83 percentages in his third year and that was under Ty Corbin, a coach so miserable he couldn't even tank right or last more than 28 games in Sacramento. In Sacramento!!!!

But if you're angry that Hayward left right when things got good boy have I got news for you. We weren't waiting on Hayward for seven years ... we were waiting on him for 13. The year was 2004 when the Jazz relieved the Knicks of Tom Gugliotta's ugly salary and took a 2010 first round pick in exchange. You thought the last seven years were a wait? Remember what it felt like in 2007 when we were the up-and-comers in the Western Conference Finals with a chance at a high lottery pick coming down the pike? Remember in 2008 when the Knicks were within two games of the worst record in the league and we dreamt of them stinking it up for two more years? Remember 2010 when we got bounced from the playoffs for the 3rd straight time by the Lakers but we knew lottery reinforcements were finally coming?

That pick became Gordon Hayward. We'd waited for that pick for so long, prayed for so many top-3 possibilities, assigned it so much value, that when the long awaited choice turned into a goofy, white fellow who was far from the 'elusive' big guy we'd hoped for, the crowd had only one response: they booed. 

I was there. It was my birthday. I cheered. Not because I knew Hayward, or what he'd become, but because I couldn't bare the thought that something I'd waited so long for could be terrible. In a way my Hayward love affair was born of desperation: "This guy has to be good. He just has to be."

In 2017 he was so good he outgrew us. And so it was that a seemingly measly trade in 2004 ended up being the centerpiece of free agency 13 years later.  I went from high school to having a 20-month old in that span. I went from afro to baldness!1

1. I'm no linguist expert but there has to be some irony that a player 13 years in the making would have the word 'time' in his nickname, right?

The day after Hayward's announcement Garden City was deserted and the LTE network returned to my phone once more. I dialed up Hayward highlights like a slob scrolling through his ex's insta account. I relived the day Hayward beat LeBron at the buzzer. I watched the highlights from the day Hayward dunked on Milwaukee and became a man. And then I went back one more time to say goodbye to my favorite Hayward highlight of all-time. 

I've never seen a Jazz player do that. Chase down one guy and block him after your teammate turns it over? Sure. But then to block another guy right after your own teammate fumbles the ball away again? And then to lead the fast break and give the ball up on the other end? Never have I ever.

Keep in mind this was the third game of an east coast road trip, the Jazz's third game in four nights, the first of which you might recall went to quadruple overtime(!!!) against the Atlanta Hawks. There was no reason Hayward should have had anything left in the tank for that play. There is no reason he should have gone up for that second block after Burks passed the ball right to the other team. And then after having denied the opposition twice if anyone ever deserved to take a glory ball shot it was Hayward and what does he do? He makes the right basketball play and picks up not even an assist but a measly hockey assist. It was then that I knew, all the aforementioned aside, why Hayward had become my favorite Jazz player since 12 and 32. All he cared about was winning basketball games. No matter the team, no matter the season record, no matter the fatigue, no matter the stats, he would do what it takes.

You don't have to look far for proof. Do you think Hayward could've added four points to his average this year if he'd aborted Snyder's system? Yup (go to this article if you're doubtful). Do you think he could've added a couple more points if he loafed on defense like Harden or Westbrook? Sure he could. Do you think that would've boosted him to all-NBA status, and to the potential of a $50 million increase in paycheck? Probably.  But Hayward plays within a system and Hayward plays defense because all he wants to do is win. If Hayward thinks that Boston and his college fling Brad Stevens provides a better chance at that than Utah, then so be it. I disagree with muster but as far as breakups go it's one of the better excuses I've heard.

When Boston comes to town next season the memories of draft night will repeat themselves. Jazz fans will boo Hayward, they'll prefer a big guy (Gobert), and I'll be there, applauding, because I could never boo a player I loved that much. I'll be feeling desperate too, like I did the night of June 24, 2010, only this time it won't be desperation focused in Hayward's favor. It will be that my team proves him the hell wrong.