Gordon Hayward ruined a Disneyland visit, a Hawaiian vacation, a night’s sleep in Hong Kong and a bunch of backyard barbecues in Utah.
On this year’s Fourth of July menu in Jazzland: The conversation about whether the franchise paid too much to keep Derrick Favors and Dante Exum. That subject is a lot more enjoyable than the agonizing about Hayward’s free agency last summer and his eventual choice of Boston, spoiling a holiday that Jazz fans likely never will forget.
In some mixture of self-punishment and therapy, dozens of them played along this week when I asked fans to recall the Hayward vigil of July 4, 2017.