Donovan Mitchell, Rudy Gobert Sharing Ball Has Been Primary Reason For Strain

Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert went weeks without any communication after both tested positive for COVID-19 in March.

Gobert called Mitchell on March 12th, then texted and later directed-messaged him on Instagram, but never received a response.

Gobert and Mitchell had friction before their positive tests. 

One high-ranking Jazz source categorized the pre-pandemic issues between Gobert and Mitchell as “a 2 out of 10 on the NBA drama scale.”

“You know, I tried to put myself in his shoes,” Gobert told ESPN’s Tim MacMahon. “There was a lot of fear, and I think more than anything, he reacted out of fear. That’s why I don’t really blame him. We all have different character; we all react differently. When it’s something like that, when he tested [positive] for a virus that we don’t know a lot about, it’s scary. It was scary for me, and I’m sure it was scary for him.

“The most important thing is what you do from there.”

One month into the NBA’s hiatus, Gobert and Mitchell talked.

“We told each other what we had to say to each other,” Gobert said. “We are both on the same page. We both want to win. We both think that we have a great opportunity, and we know that we need each other. We talked about a lot of things, but the main thing was that we are on the same page and the fact that our team needs us. We can win together. That’s the most important thing.”

“Right now, we’re good,” Mitchell said in a virtual news conference with reporters. (He declined requests to comment for this story through his agent.) “We’re going out there ready to hoop.”

According to several Jazz sources, the fact that Mitchell as the ball in his hands the most has been the primary irritant in what is an overall successful partnership between he and Gobert.

“If you take a paper towel and just drip water on it, the paper towel is going to get moist and then it’s going to get damp and eventually it’s going to break,” a Jazz source said. “Rudy has to pick his spots, and Donovan can’t react to everything. Sometimes you have to play chess and appease your teammates.

“It’s not about being right all the time. Sometimes it’s like, ‘It happened and let’s move on.’ Is it about you trying to prove your point to one another or us trying to win?”

Gobert will often air his complaints about not receiving the ball during games and again in film sessions.

“I understand that I’m annoying. I can be very annoying,” said Gobert, adding that he knows Mitchell’s job is difficult as the focal point of defenses. “I think maybe because he was really good really early, I’ve been very demanding and maybe in not always a positive way. Sometimes you don’t realize it.

“Like with me, people can be hard on me and I can handle it, but for some guys, it can become very frustrating. I can understand that 100 percent. Donovan has gotten better every year since he’s gotten here. I think he’s going to keep getting a lot better. It’s pretty much, I’m the a–hole.”