Favorite jazz musicians from Utah?

[taterguy]

If you can't name any, then can someone explain to me why the NBA team from Utah is named The Jazz?

And how many lakes does Los Angeles have?

[Forkboy]

1. I know why the Lakers are named the Lakers, but the Jazz has always fucked with me.

I could look it up, obviously, but what's the fucking fun in that?

[KamaAina]

2. Because they stole the team from New Orleans

and didn't even bother to change the name. :grr:

Same deal with the Lakers; it sounded better when it was the Minneapolis Lakers.

[taterguy]

3. So why aren't they called the Utah Thiefs?

[MajorChode]

6. Because their fans would have had to buy new t-shirts

[Drunken Irishman]

11. They didn't steal anything.

[KamaAina]

13. But then, if they were a pristine expansion team, and not stolen from anyplace,

why the anomalous name "Jazz"? :shrug:

[Drunken Irishman]

14. Give it up...

Teams move. It's part of the game. Utah didn't just go over to New Orleans one night and grab the Jazz. The Jazz left because they were losing a boatload of money there. They couldn't afford to play in the Super Dome anymore and had they stayed in New Orleans, the team would have folded. So there were two options: Relocate or end it all. They didn't want to end it all.

They moved to Utah (weren't stolen by Utah) originally as a temporary move until they could find a permanent home. They were looking at places like Miami and Minnesota as possible locations down the road. They kept the name Jazz because they didn't have the money (remember, they were hemorrhaging in New Orleans) and didn't want to spend money on a name change knowing it was very likely in five years the team was going to move to Minnesota or Miami and probably go through another name change. So they kept the name Jazz for cost reasons.

What they didn't expect was for the Jazz to find success a couple years later. Their first full NBA season here was the 1979-1980 season. And they finished with two less wins than they had the final year in New Orleans. But by 1984, around the time they wanted to relocate the UTAH JAZZ to Minnesota or Miami or Kentucky or some other state or city not named UTAH or Salt Lake City, Utah had won its first ever division championship and were in the playoffs for the first time in franchise history. What would follow? Utah would make the playoffs 20 straight times. Only two teams in NBA history had a longer stretch in their history (Portland and Buffalo). The Jazz established themselves as one of the most successful small market teams in American sports history.

Now that isn't to say they still didn't think about moving. We almost lost the Jazz in 1986 to Minnesota (again) because they were playing in the small Salt Palace and Sam Battistone, the guy who originally had moved the team from New Orleans to Utah, still wanted to relocate the franchise to a bigger market. Miller, who had purchased 50% of the team in 1985, bought the other half in 1986 and kept the Jazz in Salt Lake City for good. A couple years later the franchise began plans for a new state of the art arena in downtown (something dogging the New Orleans Jazz, since they played in the old Superdome - a freakin' football stadium) and in 1991, the Delta Center (now the Energy Solutions Arena) opened.

So don't come at me with this BS Utah stole the Jazz from New Orleans. They didn't steal nothing.

We got the Jazz fair and square. They hadn't established themselves there like maybe the Sonics had in Seattle long before moving to Oklahoma City. They were a team that was five years old when they moved. They were one of the worst teams in the league (their best season there was when they went 38-44). They might have had strong attendance, but there were no plans for a new arena down the pike, they had a helluva time competing with the Saints and it was not economically feasible to continue playing their basketball games in a football stadium. Not many teams can get away with that - especially when they're trash. Only Atlanta and San Antonio recently has played their games in a football stadium (the Alamo Dome after the HemisFair Arena) and that was for only nine-years before they got their own arena.

Like I said, had the Jazz never moved, they would have folded anyway. The franchise had no future in New Orleans because of money issues and their lack of a true home. Did you know in their second to final season in New Orleans, the team had to go on a month-long road trip because of Mardi Gras and had they made the playoffs, the Superdome was already going to be occupied by other events - forcing the team to find another place to play their playoff games? That is not professional. That's not how you hold on to a professional team. That was very ABAish and it's big reason the team left.

So there you have it. Utah didn't steal anything. Our governor and Salt Lake's mayor didn't fly down to New Orleans in the wee hours of the night, take the Jazz hostage and fly them back to Salt Lake, forcing them to play here.

They were offered a team and they accepted because Utah had seen so much success prior to the NBA with the old ABA and the Utah Stars. That was only five or so years before the Jazz moved and Utah had been burned on getting an NBA team when the NBA decided against putting a franchise here.

In 1976, the Utah Stars and Spirits of St. Louis had announced they would merge with the Stars, forming the Utah Rockies in hopes of being part of the ABA-NBA merger that year. It didn't happen. Only Utah/St. Louis and Kentucky were the two ABA teams left out of expansion (the NBA expanded with Denver, New Jersey, Indiana and San Antonio, all former ABA teams).

1979 brought about a chance for Utah to get that NBA team, even if temporarily (which it looked like at the time). What city would turn down the opportunity like that?

And hell, it wasn't like New Orleans owned the Jazz anyway. Battistone did and it was a business decision to move the franchise.

Happens all the time.

I mean, how do you think the NBA returned to New Orleans? The Hornets certainly weren't an expansion team. lol

[Ptah]

4. Donny and Marie Osmond

[Kali]

5. ...

:spray: :rofl: :thumbsup:

[fishwax]

8. .

:rofl:

[jobycom]

7. Louis Armstrong, Pete Fountain, Jelly Roll Morton

Hey, if they stole the team from New Orleans, why not a few jazz musicians to go along with it?

ANyway, what would the have called the team if they had changed the name? The Polygynists? The Choir Boys? The Salt Lakers?

[fishwax]

9. John D. Fitzgerald

but he's more well-known as a writer :)

[MiddleFingerMom]

10. Brigham Youngblood. n/t

[Drunken Irishman]

12. The Jazz...

Were named the Utah Jazz because the team couldn't afford a name change when they moved to Utah. They also thought the move would be temporary and in a few years they could up and move to either Minnesota or Miami. So it would have been pointless to change the names, buy new uniforms and other goods for a team that most thought would be gone in less than five years. The only alterations made to the logo was the UTAH replacing the NEW ORLEANS. However, the team proved to be far more successful than expected and the Jazz stayed in Salt Lake City. By this time they had already become more known as the Utah Jazz than the New Orleans Jazz and the name was never changed.

And truth be told, the New Orleans Jazz were trash. They never had a winning season and never made the playoffs. All the success that came with the Jazz franchise happened here outside of one player - Pistol Pete Maravich.

People who are uptight over the name need to get over it.