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SALT LAKE CITY — The Utah Jazz are in a familiar place, back in the NBA lottery for the fourth time in five years. This summer, the Jazz are likely to own the 12th pick in the draft, with only a 2.7 percent chance of moving up into the top three picks in May’s draft lottery.

It’s a spot Jazz fan’s are far too familiar with. But this lottery should feel different than years past, as the Jazz are no longer relying on the draft to provide a franchise-changing talent.

Last season, the Jazz finished with an identical record to the Boston Celtics, resorting to a random drawing to decide the tiebreaker. The tie broke in the Jazz's favor and led to the team selecting Dante Exum with the fifth overall pick. Before the season, there was huge pressure on rookie Exum to blossom into not just a starter, but also an above-average NBA player. The 2014 draft was long billed as the best draft since 2003 when the league welcomed nine future All-Stars, including LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.

Andrew Wiggins, the draft’s top pick, has lived up to the billing, leading all rookies in points per game, ranked fifth in rebounds per game and ninth in assists per game. Wiggins also won four of the six available Western Conference Rookies of the Month Awards, losing out to the Lakers' Jordan Clarkson and one prized Jazz rookie.

Not so fast, it’s not that prized rookie. In addition to drafting Exum, the Jazz selected Rodney Hood with the 23rd overall pick of the first round, a pick acquired in a previous trade with the Golden State Warriors. Hood, the lesser known of the two Jazz rookies, finished the season ranked sixth among rookies in points per game and sixth in 3-point percentage. Of the six shooters, Hood attempted more than double the 3-point attempts of the next closest qualifier.

It's a spot Jazz fan's are far too familiar with. But this lottery should feel different than years past, as the Jazz are no longer relying on the draft to provide a franchise-changing talent.

Hood isn’t the only young Jazz player currently outshining his draft position.

In 2013, a draft thought to be one of the worst in recent memory, the Jazz selected Trey Burke with the ninth overall pick and Rudy Gobert with the 27th pick. Burke, to his credit, won three of the six Western Conference Rookie of the Month Awards in his first season and still has the third highest points per game average of all players from his class. He's second in assists per game. And yet, like most other players in his draft class, he stands in the tall shadow of Gobert.

Gobert is second among his class in rebounds per game for his career, despite having played the 15th most minutes. Gobert also leads his class in win shares, a stat measuring the estimated number of wins contributed by an individual player. Gobert is considered among the league's best defensive players and finished third in the league in blocks per game, despite starting in fewer than half of the games he appeared in this season.

While it’s too early to get a full understanding of the value of Hood and Gobert compared to their respective drafts, it’s safe to assume both previously unheralded Jazz men would be picked significantly higher than their twenty-something selections.

While the Jazz outperforming their recent draft position is unlikely to put them into the Western Conference Finals in the near future, it should allow Exum much-needed time to develop into the upper echelon player the team expected when drafting him last summer. It should also allow Jazz fans an opportunity to enjoy the upcoming draft lottery, knowing that even without a top 10 pick, the Jazz have shown an ability to discover top-tier talent.

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Ben Anderson is the co-host of Gunther in the Afternoon with Kyle Gunther on 1320 KFAN from 3-7, Monday through Friday. Read Ben's Utah Jazz blog at 1320kfan.com, and follow him on Twitter @BenKFAN.

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