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Utah Jazz Player to Visit Utah's Dixie Aug. 3
By Stephen Vincent
A Utah Jazz player will be visiting the St. George Recreation Center at noon Aug. 3 as part of the city’s Junior Jazz program. 
The player (yet to be announced at press time) will first speak to attendees and then conduct a basketball clinic.
Admission to the event is free and is expected to last around 90 minutes.
This is the third year a Jazz player has visited the Recreation Center. Two years ago, Jazz guard Randy Livingston visited. Last season, second-year Jazzman C.J. Miles visited and spoke to a crowd of about 400 kids, said Rosey Rosander, who oversees the Junior Jazz program.
“The guys did a very good job,” Rosander said. “They work very well with the public, and they're always willing to answer the questions of the people there, and they're good with the kids.”
The city is encouraging children to wear their Junior Jazz jerseys to the event.
“The ones who wear their Junior Jazz jerseys are the ones the players are more apt to call on,” said Rosander, although he stressed that if a child doesn't have a Junior Jazz jersey, he or she is still welcome to attend.
Rosander said he is not expecting the visiting Jazz player to be one of the top Jazz stars, such as Carlos Boozer or Deron Williams; rather, he is expected to be someone like Miles and Livingston – a Jazz player fighting for a spot in Coach Jerry Sloan's regular rotation.
Because the event is taking place in the off-season when some of the players are away from Salt Lake City, the Junior Jazz program sometimes struggles to get players assigned to visit the various program locations, as was the case here. 
The trips by Jazz players to the recreation center began when the city joined the Junior Jazz program three years ago. Previously, the St. George city leagues had been run independently of any other organization.
Because of the distance between St. George and Jazz headquarters in Salt Lake City, this event is one of the few that involves the Jazz directly in St. George's Junior Jazz program.
“Obviously, if we were up north, we would get a little more attention from them,” Rosander said, “because it would be easier for them to send staff and players to hold clinics.”
Still, Rosander said, the city's affiliation with the Junior Jazz has been a positive one this far. Rosander added that one of the benefits of having a Junior Jazz program is that it allows kids to get discounted tickets to Jazz games.
Last year, around 200 people in the St. George area took advantage of that program and got tickets to the game.
Another benefit Rosander said is the recognition that comes with a name affiliated with an NBA team, and the Junior Jazz program is a well-known league that has over 65,000 participants.
Each year, a Jazz player visits each Junior Jazz program. The Jazz players visit programs along the Wasatch Front during the season, and visit the leagues outside that area in the summertime.

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