Utah Jazz: 5 questions with Jazz GM Kevin O'Connor News Utah Jazz

Q: All right, who's coming back? A: You waited all this time for a 'no comment'? (Laughs.) Q: Would you be surprised that Carlos Boozer says he sees his future being in Utah?

And do you believe he's being sincere? A: We've had that discussion before and I always thought that that's what he's told us. The only thing I can go on is what he's told us. ... I wouldn't comment on (Boozer's sincerity). My wife's never accused me of being a mind-reader. I don't know. This is a business decision. Everybody makes decisions based on what's good for them, so we'll obviously have to evaluate (it). Q: You had a tough one when John Stockton retired and Karl Malone left, but will this be your most challenging offseason? A: No, no. I think that one (was), when John and Karl left. Like I keep saying, Jerry (Sloan) really screwed up and won 41 games that year or else we might have Dwight Howard. (Laughs.) No, I don't think it is for a couple of reasons. One, I think we've got some good players here already and, two, it's really not in our hands. Certain players have the option to opt out and then we have to make some decisions. ... I think what you look forward to is hopefully that there's opportunities whichever way they go. ? You have to be prepared. You have to be prepared to make hard decisions. And then you've got to be prepared to live with those decisions whatever they are. ? I think there will be roster changes, how many there'll be I can't say. Q: Given the state of the economy, do you think you could have a payroll that's pushing $70 million or so next season even if it's above the luxury tax threshold? A: I think we'll make Basketball decisions based on what's good for the Jazz , because I don't think you want to take a short-term look at things; you want to take a long-term look at things ? and that's what we'll do. We haven't had that meeting yet or that discussion yet (about exceeding the threshold), and ( Jazz CEO Greg Miller has) indicated he'd like to stay aggressive. But I can't speak to that. Q: How much did Mehmet Okur's absence in the playoffs show to you guys that you can't live without him? A: Look, there's a lot of guys we couldn't live without. So, did we miss Memo? Sure. The Jazz organization and everybody else, do we want Memo back? Yeah. Would it be nice to have played this whole year with all of those guys? ? I know defensively we don't have a shot-blocker and all of that. We can talk all that we want. Those are the toughest things in the league to get and there aren't many of them. But could we have been more competitive than we were with everybody healthy? Yeah. I don't think we, maybe the last three or four games of the year, that we had everybody really in game shape to play. Then we lost Memo the last two games (and the first three games of the playoffs). Q: The NBA Draft comes before Boozer, Okur and Kyle Korver have to opt in or out of their Jazz contracts. Not knowing what your roster will look like, how difficult does that make your job for the draft? A: Not at all. You draft the best players. We're not drafting in the top three or four. ? We would take the best player. We're drafting 20th. There's going to be 19 pretty ladies go before us.