Alec Burks had a little stretch of games around the start of December that made me think he had re-turned the corner and was back to his old scoring self. Spoiler alert: he wasn’t. Well, he kind of was. For a bit after that, he was doing some things, then Quin Snyder decided that it would be better if he just sat on the bench with Raul Neto and clapped.
There was a time that Jazz fans considered Burks one of their core pieces moving forward, after he averaged 14 per game for them on good percentages in only his third year in the league. There was a lot of hype for him and his “Houdini” shot-making ability, then injuries happened. Frickin’ injuries, man. First Greg Oden, then Alec Burks, now (jinx alert) Kristaps Porzingis. The overall funness of the league has been diminished so much by the fragile ligaments and joints and tendons and everythings of human beings.
Burks showed some real promise in the first game of the ‘offs when he scored 10 points in 2 minutes against the Thunder. I’ll let you figure out how many points he would’ve had had he been permitted to play a reasonable amount of minutes. Hint: it’s a lot. But now, with Rubio out (FRICKIN’ INJURIES MAN), he’s getting a chance to make an impact. He’s playing real minutes now! He kind of sucked last game, but tonight, you could tell the commentators were surprised with the shots he was making. The Jazz commentators, on the other hand, were probably super excited but not at all surprised as they yelled “HOUDINI!” after each of his crazy layups.
That’s what sucks about these playoff games. No home commentators to push the highlights over the edge with their excitement. I hate Reggie Miller so much.