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Today's episode, the best podcast on the Ringer podcast network brought to you by Spotify, which has the best listening experience around right now, you can change your speeds to as tight as one point to if you're not quite at one point five person, but you want to go more than one. I recommend one point. You can check out all of their great charts that measure podcast from hottest trending to biggest to by genre. Whatever you want. Check out podcast on Spotify.

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Listen to podcast on Spotify. Were also brought to you by Fandor, where we have the ultimate hoops ringer contest. There's a fan to a contest every day, their playoff games five our entry fee per contest. If you win tickets to the leaderboard series during the NBA Finals, where are the winners?

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Will compete for a share of the cash ring or swag and to be deemed the sole survivor, the ultimate hoops ringer. There's still time to enter contests for a chance to get into the leaderboard series during the finals. What are you waiting for? Learn more. Enter at Fandor Dotcom Slash Hoops Ringer age and location restrictions do apply were brand to buy the ring or Dotcom and the Ringer podcast network. I put up a special rerun podcast over the weekend when Chadwick Boseman dad we had him on on my podcast in November.

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He was really great. I really had a good time with him and he was so obviously such a good guy. Shocking news, just such a bummer. It was amazing to see the huge outpouring from everybody the last two days. Sometimes you don't realize how special somebody is until all the sudden they're gone. But you could definitely feel that over the weekend. Such a unique, talented actor. Anyway, if you missed it, we had an awesome conversation.

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You know, check that out in the archives. New Rewash was coming on Monday as well. So stay tuned for that. Coming up, Russell and I are going to go through the hoops weekend. First, our friends from Pearl Jam.

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All right, it is eight twenty Pacific Time. Just another incredible Jamal Murray, Donovan Mitchell shootout. We'll talk about that. We're talk about which team match ups the best. And we're talking about the last 72 plus hours with the NBA a little bit. Ryan Rosillo is here. You texted me. I need to be hosed down after that Murray vs. Mitchell battle most my friend Hensch texted me, has there been a more insane shotmaking duel like that over the course of two weeks?

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Then these two guys have been having kind of hard pressed to think of any other example ever or you mean recently I thought you were going to go Dominic Bird, even though is one game now, this is insane.

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This is I.

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I go ahead, you start and then I'll I'll jump in later, because I'm too I'm afraid I'm going to go for five minutes on. Well, I'll just be honest, I wager that Utah tonight, the theory being Mitchell Murray can't do that again. He had 58, 42. What is he going to have three straight forty point games like nobody's done that. That's like Iverson. Twenty one territory. And then, of course, Murray puts up fifty.

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I don't know what Utah is doing defensively. I have no explanation for it. I don't know why they just weren't trapping them and trying to get the ball out of his hands. Anything. At one point near the end there, Jordan Clarkson was just on an island against them. You can guess how it turned out, but Denver made all the adjustments in this series. They kind of suddenly figured out how to shift their offense more toward Murray, less toward Jokic.

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So then when it doesn't work out for Murray, they have Yokich as a second option, which is bonkers because I voted him for third for MVP. And this series that I thought was over after four games now looks like not only is Denver have all the momentum, I don't really know what you do for Utah because you only have seven guys. Two of them are very good of you can't hide defensively for whatever reason. What do you do if you're them?

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How do you fix this for a game seven?

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Well, you have to hope this guy starts missing shots. I mean, we can sit here and talk about adjustments. First of all, a couple of things here. Murray and his last three games. Fifty points, eleven boards, seven assists, nine and 15 from three game five. Forty two, eight and eight for eight from three. That's seventeen to twenty six overall. And in game six we just saw fifty point game from again, five boards, six assists, nine to 12 from three.

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And that was after game one. We actually thought Denver was going to be the problem as Mitchell puts up fifty seven. But Murray close that game out Murray the unstoppable one. So if we want to talk adjustments, which everyone will talk about, but I don't believe the adjustments are always there, especially when it's something like this, like what we just saw was this special. So if a guy's never going to miss I don't know what you're supposed to do, especially when it's the two man game, which I think is incredibly predictable over the years.

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And kind of help has led to me having, like, limitations on my expectations for Denver, which I think are totally justifiable because we're going to dig into who Murray has been because this is not who he's been. He's never been this this is insane. So if you have a two man game where Murray and you're right. Has had more usage now, they've flipped it between he and Jokic. You can't keep two with the shooter because you're actually leaving guys like Jokic And then by the way who's who's an unbelievable passer.

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Yeah like a three on two hockey situation. Exactly. So if you're leaving him to make a decision, I think all the other times we've seen four on three you have one of the biggest, best decision makers, great passers in a really reliable shooter. There was even that play, which is a classic like, hey, how come they don't just switch back out of bad switches? Can they try to do that with Gobert left Jokic wide open for a second boom three.

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No problem but Utah's you know I know what's going to happen is that we can say Oh you got to double team, you've got a double and you got a double game. You know what Mark Jackson brought it up in the Clippers game against Dallas when Kawhi was destroying Dallas. You go, you got a double and you got a double team. They brought a double immediately, a pass dunk, no contest. So these guys are not that easy to double.

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So say you want to trap Murray. OK, fine. But just like you said it gets back to Jokic four on three and then the only thing I saw Utah do was they switched Jokic defenders so it would be a wing Schulich at least now it's not Gobert having to chase this guy around this huge screen and that didn't work because look when you're not going to miss there's not really much you can do. On top of that throw in Jerami Grant eighteen points for a seven back curry.

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If Murray's not going to miss and Grant's getting you eighteen and burying four threes you're going to lose. Well I would have left Porter open and just doubled with his guy trapped or anything. What's Murray.

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It's funny. He's like when when my son has too much sugar and he just gets this look in his eyes and you're like, oh my God. And he just kind of know it. The next half hour is going to be like Murray's one of those basketball players. He gets that look and you're like, oh, no. And especially if you're betting against him or rooting against them, they're hits a point with him. We're just like, oh, this is it.

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And he was very Jekyll and Hyde over the first three years of his career because last year in the playoffs, he did this a couple of times. So you're like, wow, man, imagine if you did that more often. Now he's twenty three. He's rounding into maybe this is who he's going to be. And what he's looked like in this series is a cross between Steph Curry and Damian Lillard. Honestly, if you're going to if they're going to have a baby, it would be Jamal Murray in the series.

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I had said something after game one to go know Murray, look out if he's this and then. And look, none of this is new. It's all the fan bases, but it's like, oh, he's always been this bullshit. Never been this. No. And like you just said a year ago, game three against the Spurs in a game, in a playoff game. He had six points, but he was only two of six. How does the guy who just dropped fifty one year ago, I get getting older and more experienced.

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That usually took six shots in a playoff game. And then in Portland, game two, he was six eighteen.

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Game seven, he was for eight games, two and three this year. Is he was a man those that was that was the rapper Murray. Yeah, I mean, we're talking a week ago we had 14 and 12 and now he's turned into I guess Lillard at least from the production standpoint. But this is nuts. Here's the weird thing about Murray and there's a misconception about like how good of a three point shooter he is because games like the last three.

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But you know for his career. In two. Thirty six point seven percent from three this season. Twenty twenty thirty four point six percent from three. And then you go in the playoffs last year was thirty three point seven percent from three. This year, he was fifty two point four going into the game. So now he's got to be like fifty five percent. It's a breakout party. It's what it is. And I think we all thought he had the talent.

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I just didn't think he'd ever be able to do it consistently. I didn't think something. And this is something fell into place in his brain.

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With with just his control of the game and just we've seen it happen, it's happened in the past with other guys, I just didn't expect it would be him in the series. I thought the series is over after game four.

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Well, it looked like it was over because Mitchell was reminding us of what his ceiling is and he was nuts. Again, I mean, they were combined. The Mitch and Murray series are going to this Glengarry Glen. No, I do think it'll be a you know, we have these series every once in a while where it's like Arenas versus LeBron and you have those kind of the shootout series.

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This this turned out to be the star of round one, this series. And then if you're Denver, like Jarek's and I, we did a podcast before game five. We're just talking about. You know, could Denver move money for Ben Simmons, like would you do that is what Spurs value. And I was kind of like the fit with Marion Yokich. Now, the way he's playing now, you're thinking, well, no matter what happens in game seven.

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I think he's an untouchable now and Yokich is an untouchable, and now Porter is the great X-Factor, that thing today, Porter sucked in that game, he was rebounding and that's it. And I just think the more I watched his youth, that team, especially the last two games, they just don't have enough guys. And you could really feel it today. It's so hard for them other than Mitchell to just get consistent offense from People Connely, the go bear, who really seems like he wants the ball more.

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There's there's moments where they were they were trapping Mitchell. Twenty five feet go bears coming out, like, give it to me, I'll do something. It's like, what do you do it? I don't know what the answer is for them unless it's like a Jordan Clarkson heat check, which they were kind of hoping for tonight. You can give it to them. So when they won all the games, when it looked like this thing was over, they were playing like the highest level of basketball.

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I think I've seen them play all year long. And you sitting there looking at Denver going, OK, you hold off Mitchell, and now you're playing Utah. It's like three perfect games. Go ahead. We're almost twenty in the half one of the games. And it looked like Jokic was just stuck because the perimeter defenders are not very good for Denver other than maybe Torrey Craig right now they have Gary Harris back and they go right. Jokic I mean every every lob to go bare isn't always Jokic is fall.

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I mean he was screwing up some of his coverage on some of it but then you think wow like Gobert who at times. You know, just like I always try to bring up these game to game situations where it looked like he was a major problem for them in Denver, had no answers. And just because this has happened, it doesn't mean now there's no way that that Utah can win Game seven. But Connely to get any shots. Ingles had some amazing playmaking games in there.

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Mitchell was perfect. But the problem as as Mitchell starts to bail and everyone around him, you can see them revert back to that one dimension. And I don't think they same five points in that game. Yeah, I don't blame him for not wanting to kick it out to Neang for three late in the game. But yeah. Well, look, Utah is just I don't I don't really have a real in depth. Like, I don't want to hear a seven page synopsis or a breakdown of what happened here, because when Murray's going to do this to you, I don't really know that there's a lot of answers.

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Denver did. I didn't think Mike Malone had a very good first four games. The most important thing he did, especially like in today's game where he basically stripped down the Millsap minutes and just went more athletic and put the ball in his hands and played a more Murray played forty three minutes in that game. But you know, I was thinking big picture that this series now is a memorable series and well you know well as remember that guy was the best series of first round.

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There was this one. It is crazy both of these guys were guys in the draft that some people loved, other people weren't sure about, and when they got drafted, it seemed a little too late in each case because I remember the Celtics were picking between Jaylen Brown and Murray at three. Right. And I think it was a real battle internally about which way to go. They went with Brown, but then Bender went forth to Phoenix, Kris Dunn, fifth to Minnesota, Buddy Hield went six to New Orleans and Murray fell to seven to Denver.

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And then you go one year later, the Mitchell draft, where marketing goes seven. The draft makes sense until after seven, Nikolaenko goes eight to the next Dennis Ben Smith nine to Dallas, Zach Collins tenth Malique Mark 11th, Luke Kennard 12th. And then Mitchell and Adebayo go back to back thirteen fourteen. But you think like I do wonder if the chip on the shoulder thing does help with some of these guys. Right when you go the four to six picks a little too late.

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Sometimes it's the best thing that can happen to you. Not that that's the main reason these guys are so great, but it's almost better to go thirteenth and second, you know. Yeah, might be better to because the team that you land on, although, you know, Detroit doesn't exactly I don't know, it's probably more of a Kennard problem than it is a Detroit problem. I continue to be just amazed at the shotmaking mid level, the acceptable shot.

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And it's something I brought up with this year's draft class where I go. All these guys think they can shoot and they a lot of them can't, but they're still taking the shot because the grown ups are taking these shots. But to think you can come off these screens and pull up from twenty five, twenty eight feet and you're like, I'm good. I mean, there's too many possessions. There's too many people now taking bad threes because everybody's taking threes.

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But the special players like these shots were just a coach were yelled at you about these shots. I don't know, ten years ago.

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What about the one when Murray they got the steal and he just pulled up from twenty eight with four minutes left. It wasn't even a fast break. There's nobody under the basket. And it's like ten years ago somebody would've had a heart attack. Yeah. I mean there's too many guys giving up layups. Like I don't know if Oklahoma City's primary offense now is drive. Get a good look at a layup, kick it to door in the corner for three.

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I still can't believe Lou Dort took nine shots in the first playoff game. I know. I know. But despite the three point dispersal that we've seen from some guys, you're like, why? Why are you taking this shot on the high end of it? This the top of this league is so talented. It's so deep. I mean, if I were doing radio the next day and you go, oh, man, you can't take Mitchell over Murray now, I mean, that be the mistake.

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But this is somebody who's never scored twenty points a game for a season. You pointed it out. His career, three point numbers are good. They're not off the charts. He was thirty four percent this year and now he's had a week plus where. I mean, I look, I'm not putting him in my top ten because that's insane. He hasn't proven that. It's just not who he is. That's not even actually even discussing. He is a guy who is better in the playoffs than the regular season from what we've seen, or at least like he's I don't even know if that's true, though.

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I mean, know I'd like them. Last year, I thought he had some big games. I mean, he was up and down, but he certainly, you know, rose to the occasion in ways that we didn't expect last year. And now he's made another leap. Again, I part of it is he's not great defensively. Neither is Mitchell. Yeah. And, you know, these guys are great offensive players. I don't know if the all around tag could really stick to them, but if I also think Murry's handles a little tighter, maybe just watching them closer and closer.

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But if you can shoot like that but also survive in traffic with your handle, it just opens up so many other things for you. The shotmaking thing you'd think like these are the kids of the the current generation, right? 12, 14, 13 and 14, those Warriors team. So you're talking seven years ago. Mitchell and Murray are both sixteen and they're in a union high school and they're rounding into who they're going to be. But now there's this whole evolution of basketball coming.

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And that's probably the cutoff for if you're like sixteen, you're like, oh, man, maybe I'll just shoot from there. You know, there's this Liberation's so that you have what we're seeing now. I didn't think Mitchell was going to be shoot the threes like that. Can I ask you if you're the Clippers after watching these first six games? Who would you rather play in round two, because I would have said I'd much rather play Denver up until three days ago.

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But after game five, game six. I don't think I'd want any part of this Denver team. I think their ceiling is higher than the United. Denver, so hit or miss, though, and I'm not going to fall victim to this right now because, you know, before the series, we were all kind of collectively down on Utah right now.

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But I'm not I'm not high on either team. I'm just saying, if I'm the Clippers, who would you rather play? Yeah, but you would have there's no way you would have said this five days ago, so because I didn't know Jamal Murray was fucking cross between Curry and Daim lowered, this is new information.

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He said 50, 40 to 50 it back to back games. But my opinion has changed. Yeah, I think I'd rather do with Gobber than Nurkic or excuse me, not Nerka Shokichi. So, yeah, I would rather talk. I just think Utah's depth, you know, they it looked like they're going to be able to patch it together, but you look at this game. Neang played 20 minutes. He was terrible. He was minus 19 and 20 minutes, Clarkson 30 minutes.

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And then Morgan played two minutes. Bradley played five minutes. They basically played seven guys. I don't think you can do that against the clips. Look at the wings, too. So Utah has problems. Russell Neil has to chase Murray around the entire night. You can't take a break. You can't put Ingles on him. You can't put Mitchell on him. I mean, Mitchell got him in this kind of confusing, chaotic. No, it wasn't even really a switch.

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It was just loose ball. I mean, Murray went right by him to a strong hand and he went away from the pick and he went around Murray. But then he beats Murray or excuse me, Murray beats Mitchell. And then you're thinking, oh, you got him. And then I think O'Neale or somebody recovered and contested and he hit like a sideways floater and you just go right well what are you supposed to do there. If you're the Clippers you'd rather play Utah because the lack of depth because what are you going to do with the wings if you're Utah Mitchell's going to have an outstanding mismatch.

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Yeah. Yeah that's a problem. So you don't. Hey by the way, Denver also good matchup to them because they have a lot of dudes to throw at Murray. You know, they got Beverley, they got Reggie Jackson. They could if they wanted to mess around the throw Kawhi and George on them. And then they have Marcus Morris to do at least one cheap shot, get him in trouble, get a double tech situation, whatever we do.

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Anything on Morris? No, I think his behavior spoke for itself there in the third round. I think he's trying to set the tone. I think he's I think he's positioned himself as the tough guy on this team. And I'm going to do it. Tough guy, Marcus. Smart stuff.

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Yeah. You also with Gary Harris back to at least defensively, there's options there. There's Grant. There's Harris going against the clips, you mean? Yeah, I mean, clips are better, clips are better than both of these tapes. I think this worked out great for the clips. The Dallas series, as we're going to talk about a little bit, they get a bunch of fortuitous things happen in that. And then this series, these are two round one teams, in my opinion, as great as the Murray thing has been.

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Um, but yeah, it's when you think like. We still weren't sure about Murray really in any way a week ago. He's he's the winner of the round one breakout star. I think we say Overline did this over here over Lukáš. Well, Loukia was already a star, right? When he says that one guy who's like, whoa, this guy. And I think he's that guy this year. So not Jaroslava. Now, I can't give it to care.

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I can't give it to semiannually. I mean, that stuff quickly, let's talk about just the last three and a half days, because I thought the players got a lot of good stuff done. I mean, some of the stuff they got with the arenas and the voting and you think, like on Wednesday, it seemed, you know, everything was happening so fast and they're throwing stuff out. And you weren't really sure, like, all right, what's their strategy?

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They didn't have time to come up with a strategy. But over the course of two days when they decided to stay in the bubble and really push for some stuff, it did seem like some really good stuff happened. I thought they did a good job. On the jump on Saturday, Paul Pierce was on with Matt Barnes, Rachel Nichols talking about like there is some meaningful progress that the NBA spearheaded there since Wednesday. And I don't know, the part of the reason to go down in the bubble was to use the platform.

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Use your voices, try to get shit done, and it feels like that happen for the most part. Yeah, as I said on my iPod this week, I mean, if the players to the point that they didn't want to play, then I support the players. You know, I was going to sit there and say, hey, I love basketball. You guys need to start. I never felt that way. I mean, like a lot of people Wednesday, wherever you were.

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All right, let's go. And then you're like, oh, something's going on here. I did think. By the way, everything you said is right, I mean, to be able to use these arenas to and they should be able to use these arenas, you know, the public get screwed on these these deals are always bad for the public all the time. They're sold this bill of goods and all the things that they're going to do.

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And a lot of it is kind of hard to confirm in these guys, even though I'll argue sometimes not every owner does because it says on paper has that much liquid to be able to pull off some of these moves. They always get hooked up because this inferiority complex that you have in the cities and never wanting to lose a franchise. So, yeah, I'm glad that the players, you know, it's pretty powerful when you realize, like, hey, we can actually get some shit done here if we don't want to go and play.

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I do think there's another part of this that I thought was just interesting in that if you have four or five buddies and you want to say, hey, do you want what do you want to do tonight? There's no way you're all going to be on the same page and to have hundreds of players and then staff. But it was really about the players, not all on the same page that first night in that first meeting that it was apparently really heated.

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I don't think any of that should be that surprising. And I don't think it actually should be seen as a negative. Like, part of me at first was like, wait, you guys can't like what are you like? What exactly is the plan? And then it was like, well, look, Milwaukie decided to do something because it meant something to Milwaukee because it was close to them. And that's cool that Milwaukee, like Milwaukee, couldn't go ahead and make sure everybody else is on the same page.

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Let's have a meeting. Let's have a committee and know they made the decision. They made it immediately and they decided to go out there and play. And I guess a lot of people from some of the stuff I heard were upset on Wednesday, but they slept on it. They talked it out a little bit more. They got some stuff done. But I think the plan was always that they were going to come back and play where there were just a million different stories going at a bunch of different places.

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Like I went back and read all the stuff and I'm going the timeline of it was was all over the place. But I think real things happened here, despite the fact that sometimes I think there's a push for change that isn't realistic, given the amount of time, you know, there's sometimes you're like, OK, this can happen. Some of these decisions can be made by owners. But some of the other policy stuff like you understand that this isn't going to happen overnight.

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I was amazed. I was I was fascinated by the ballroom on Wednesday, just how unmanageable it is just from getting opinions from different people. Because I was asking, how many people do you think we're in there? And it seemed like before the coaches left, because I guess the coaches left maybe a third of the way in or they told them to get out of there, right? Yeah, they told me to leave. There was like two hundred and fifty people in there.

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So think about how big that is, because I've been in meetings like I've had all hands meetings for the ringer, for my TV show or whatever, where you have, like, I don't know, fifty people, 70 people crammed in a room. And it's it's really hard for like everybody to have a voice. Everybody's sometimes you have to pass a mic around two hundred and fifty people is the size of like a big wedding. That's I think about like you're at a wedding and the best man is giving a speech, you got it.

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And how big like the room is, you've got to have very quiet down, quiet down tone. He's going to speak and just to have an open discussion with that many people, I can't even imagine they even had mikes. But supposedly it was like Chris Paul and Iguodala were leading it and then a couple other people were in. But I don't even know how they pulled off. Just being able to make as much progress as they did on Wednesday night, I, I honestly didn't read enough about it.

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I would have read more stories. Yeah, because some of it was was like all over the place right where the Pat Beverley stuff. Michelle Roberts came out and he basically just went at her. It was like, I pay your salary. And she was interrupting her. And then people were saying, no, that's definitely not what happened. But then it was like Xbox was one of the guys who said it happened. It was like, what did he do that because it was his teammate?

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Look, something happened, all right? I was told something happened. But the way it was told to me was, you have to understand, this is a room of two hundred plus millionaires, sometimes 100 hundred times over, and they're the best of the world that what they do. And there's going to be a confidence in your position because her whole life, like that's kind of what's led you to this point. You've been the man throughout your entire life and whatever your status is in the NBA once you're in that room.

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I can't imagine how difficult it was to try to figure it out, but the other part that always I think like just because we'll get quotes and this happened before the bubble was even announced, this thing was going to happen. If you want, we can get quotes from somebody saying, I don't want to go back and play. Now's not the time. And then it starts to shape the story. And we'll quickly forget that there's usually like another couple hundred guys that actually want to keep playing the season.

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And it doesn't mean that everything that's going on isn't impacting them. Jamal Murray was in tears after a 50 point game because of everything that he's gone through, but he clearly wanted to be out there and play. So I think you can be emotionally drained, but still want to be in the bubble. And I felt like a times will get quotes that are released from somebody that doesn't want to be there or is questioning the entire thing when we'll actually ignore the majority of players.

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And this is twice now because when the bubble thing was happening, remember, you and I were talking, I go, wait, am I reading this wrong? Is all my information bad to most of the players? Not want to actually restart the season. Wow, that's weird. And then the vote comes in and it was a landslide by the players to come back and play. Let me ask you a question, though.

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Do you think there will be? I don't know if the right way to say it is a bill do. But do you think there will be some? Pushback. From the owners down the line. And that ultimately it's still an employer employee relationship and this is going to be factored in to some of the CBA stuff. I just wonder if there's a day coming where there'll be some resentment from 30 billionaires that go. I understand why, because of what happened, why you stopped playing.

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But we're also still the ones in charge. I just wonder because I mean, publicly, we all know the players are fully supportive here. For the most part. It's just something that crossed my mind. So I don't know. I'm asking you. I think they'll get through the next couple of months because they all know how important it is and so many good things are happening, but it's kind of the elephant in the room, right at some point, especially if the fans can't come back next season right away.

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These guys are going to turn into businessmen. And I think that's why one of the reasons it's so important for the players to get as much as they can out of this situation right now, which they have very smartly and to their credit, have pulled off and. It was hard to. There was so many conflicting reports about, especially from that Wednesday, but there was some generational stuff going on, too, you know, and I thought, Steven, when he talked on first take about LeBron, that I'd heard the same stuff that when LeBron spoke on that Wednesday night, like some of the younger players, felt like he was condescending, you know, and you think like so when you're just talking about other factors beyond the stuff that everybody's talked about, you're talking about this owner player relationship that they can pretend everything's good.

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But at some point they're going to have to figure out the CBA and it's going to become a leverage battle. We're not there yet, but it's looming. And then this generational thing where you have, you know, the honest generation, this new generation. Yanase, by the way, the best player in the bucks, the team that boycotted the game and started the whole thing and how the generational thing plays out, because I always feel like the best players control the league.

[00:29:50]

It's usually the veterans. That's, I think, the main reason why we're in the bubble in the first place because of Chris Paul and LeBron and people like that. But the generational side of it did come out a little bit in a way that is I thought was healthy ultimately on Wednesday night. I'm glad. I'm glad they are. I'm glad they slept on it, because it did seem like from all accounts, it was getting a little tense and it did have something to the generational stuff.

[00:30:14]

I mean, the LeBron part, too, especially because it was reported that he didn't say a word. And then it's like, well, no, that's not what happened, because apparently, as you're saying, and heard the same thing, that he pissed some dudes off in there. But that, I think, is the whole point, like think of any group of people. Anybody you know, your electric union, 200 people at a wedding, like you just said, I don't care who you are, it's not going seamlessly.

[00:30:39]

You're not all wrong in the same direction. Yeah, you just aren't. So when you heard these stories about arguments or people being on a different pages, I didn't really look at it is like, oh, it's a negative. Like these guys can't figure it out. I'd expect a room of that many people to not be able to figure it out. And the fact that, you know, look, I still think the guys wanted to play.

[00:30:59]

And that's why after a few days removed from getting some things that they wanted, getting people on the phone, that they felt like we're being sincere, they got something done. Because I'll tell you, I don't know, 10 years ago. I don't know how the story would be covered, I would have never thought it could have happened when we were hearing the rumors the beginning of the week, like, oh, they may the players may end up boycotting some games.

[00:31:20]

I'm like, wait, what is that going to happen?

[00:31:23]

And I just we know that the Celtics and Raptors, they met. And what's interesting is Celtics, Raptors and Bucks, I think are all in the same hotel and the Celtics and Raptors bed about about possibly boycotting game one. And I think the Bucs were thinking about it as well. And, you know, that's the other crazy piece of this is all of these people are of the same place. So you're having meetings and interactions that just could never happen in any other situation that you'd never going to have all these teams in one place.

[00:31:51]

I think everything about it, everything about this week feels historic to me. Yeah, this is this is like a new precedent of what we are willing to believe can happen in sports. You don't mean like I'm saying, ten years ago, I would be like I don't even think players would players even say, hey, let's just stop playing games. I don't know that whatever happened, the bugs were totally happy forfeiting that game. That's what they were going to do.

[00:32:16]

That was their forfeit, right? Yeah, forfeit. And it was going to be three, two. And they're like, we're good because they went, well, wait, we didn't want the rest of you guys to shut down and everything. But then the other players, I think some of the arguments were, well, when you guys do that and we can't go out and play whatever, I mean, none of it really matters. And by the way, I know historically, Bill Russell in the boycott's.

[00:32:35]

Yeah, there's been a lot look, there's that kind of stuff that's happened before. So I want to act like it's never, ever happened. But I'm just saying, at least in recent memory, it's something that I don't know. When I first heard the rumors are beginning the week, I wasn't 100 percent sure if I believed it was something would actually happen. And then there you go.

[00:32:52]

Awesome. Awesome response by everybody. A really cool week for the league. And I don't know, they made a difference, which was the whole reason they were down there.

[00:33:02]

Can I add to that real quick, though, because the announcers keep saying these guys are so removed, they may not realize what they're doing and how it's resonating. It's like, you know, they have Internet.

[00:33:13]

Yeah, they definitely I'm pretty sure they're all aware of everything that's going on in social media, especially a group of guys. This young guy, I'd be shocked if they didn't know how big of a deal this has been the last couple of days. All right. We're going to talk about the rest of the playoffs in one second, taking a quick break.

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All right, so our guy Loka got knocked out. And you I heard them talking on the telecast about it, and then there's been some stuff online about moves they're going to make this summer, and you've got to get a couple more playoff guys in there and they're close. Stuff like that. Here's the problem. They don't have any cap room. No seems important there at one hundred and ten point nine million on the cap for next year. And that's not including my cold's draft picks, stuff like that.

[00:34:57]

They have poor Zink's and Hadaway, just those two guys there at forty eight million next year.

[00:35:06]

Before before we get to what you would do if you're a Dallas. My first question to you. Is 20, 20 the last year, this decade that Luca gets knocked out and around one. If he's really this special top five, potentially top three, and I've always thought those guys can win a series at least in the first round on their own, but the biggest thing is a real problem, because I think by the end of the year, we always felt pretty good about him with.

[00:35:39]

Would you agree? I felt like that was their upgrade move, if they wanted to get frisky because I was building a team around Lukáš, I would want to build a team that looked like the Celtics where you just have disposable big guys, but you put your money on the wings. People like Jaylen Brown type guys. Those would be the guys I would want to look. I would think this wouldn't be my first choice. No, but considering what they gave up in prison is that is a no brainer.

[00:36:06]

Yeah, right.

[00:36:07]

But now that we have another leg injury for us, which is significant, I mean, it is not the end of the world, but it's not a strain and it's the other it's the other leg, too, which is a concern.

[00:36:20]

Yeah. And, you know, tall guys, we've talked about this many times, the game to go, you go seven, two and up. Just weird shit starts happening like what are like the total the durability success stories other than Kareem, once you get like above seven two, it always seems like, you know, Ilgauskas Smit's, poor Zangas, like those at the end beat you seven, two and up. I just get a little nervous.

[00:36:47]

So I don't think they would trade for zingers, but I do think. I do think he would have value. I do think you'd be you'd be selling relatively high and I do think there's teams out there like, for instance. If they called, I called the Wizards. And just said, pausing is for Bradley Beal, let's call it in who says no? Wizards now, because is. Because of everything we just said, injury, propensity for injuries at that size, I mean, hell, I remember when Duran was going to be a free agent, I had people that said they have they have doctors.

[00:37:25]

They just don't trust that his feet are going to stay healthy. And you're like, oh, shit. Yeah, but look, he's he won like two rings after that. So it's not like it hasn't worked out, but it's also not like he's been incredibly healthy the entire time too. And again, not to say the business is even in the same neighborhood is as CD, but Brasilia's is thirty six million in three years. That's probably why it's a no from a lot of teams.

[00:37:46]

So I don't think it's impossible. I don't like it's impossible to say Luca doesn't get out of the first round next year, but I know he was unbelievable. I mean, he's thirty ten and eight on forty nine and thirty four percent shooting in a series against team a team with a lot of really good wing defenders. And he he worked them all without. I mean think about who is number two options were once basilicas went down and then get ejected in game one and Lucasville still put up those kinds of numbers.

[00:38:13]

Yeah. If I'm Dallas, I'm probably not panicking because I look at this series and I think of this is the series that went as wrong as it possibly could have from the ejection to look at getting her to that percentage gets hard. You just say, man, if we do this series twenty times, is there a version where we're throwing some haymakers and this is going to a game seven go in deep stuff like that? I guess with with the poor Zangas thing, I think you would have to run it back.

[00:38:39]

But I would call some of the dumb teams. Right. I think you have to kick the tires on Beal just to make sure they're not going to trade him. Go to Sacramento. Sacramento's always want to do something weird, right? Little little heeled Baguley. For passengers, you do it in a second right now, who would who would do it, Sacramento or Dallas? Dallas. And Sacramento did that. Well, any question that starts with Will Sacramento, I'll just say yes, right?

[00:39:14]

Well, my answer may answer.

[00:39:15]

The question is, this is the last time this decade he gets knocked out of around one. I think he's too good to be that certain because I because I like to say things that we have no idea if it could be proven or not. I'm just looking at the bird of a..

[00:39:30]

We have to keep track of the next 15 years. We're going to check in when you're 70 and that Lukáš predictions close to working out.

[00:39:36]

It's great. Twenty, twenty nine. I remember that time I told you he was never going to lose in round one ever again. I'll call you. I'm like, he still hasn't lost the first round.

[00:39:44]

You're like Luke Perry Bird magic. Those guys, by the time they were twenty two, they're just making Rantes, I think LeBron, once he hit twenty two, he was at least around two every year. So if he's an all time guy, got to make round two every year, he had a 50 50 plus wins and and make round two. I don't know what they do with the poor gas thing though. And I don't know, like let's say you're running New Orleans and they call in like and they and you can kind of tell they wouldn't mind having the poison gas conversation.

[00:40:16]

How nervous would you be about him physically trading for really especially if I already have Tzion on my team. Yeah, I think that would be your answer. We can't do you guys realize we have zero hour to get a look at this? I thought huge this year is a huge win for Luka. And I did worry last week that that Clipper game, the awesome Game four, would be one of those games that like a month later. But I it wasn't that great.

[00:40:38]

I still feel like that's going to be his version of, like, I don't know, MJ is such a low point game now, MJ, sixty three point game, not not as iconic as that, but like that I am now in the map. With a Ben Ferguson game, Kirk Gibson's home run, bigger deal Christian home runner, Luke, don't think it's Kirk Gibson home. I think it's the version of the sixty three point game where it's just like, oh, that was the game.

[00:41:04]

He's put it. He went on the map. But you're more anti the sixty three point MJ game than anyone I've ever met in my entire life, because I think the forty nine point game was just as good.

[00:41:14]

The game one game, he basically has the same game.

[00:41:17]

It just didn't have two overtimes.

[00:41:19]

We were doing the watchable series every week. Bill and I would text back and forth. I go, well, let's just do this. Let's let's do an eighty six Celtics game. Let's do the Bulls sixty two point. You're like a lost. He did. I was like, OK, but that's that's iconic and be OK. What about this game. Like now we're going to do this one, OK, the next week. What about this one now due to this one I was like, all right, you know what?

[00:41:40]

I've learned that we're going to do this, bill. It's the Bill Simmons podcast. We're not doing the sixty three point game. I thought you'd like the most of the choices. I liked most of the choices. I just learned early in the process that I was just going to say, yes, I was like sixty three point games, a little overrated.

[00:41:56]

It really. I see. I just. You just read it. He lost. Hey, did the Mavs win that series now? But they won that game. They won the Cooloola game. All right, let's let's go to the biggest question in the podcast. Rockets, Lakers, who do you root for? Me, who do you root for, who does Ryan Rosillo, you don't you don't gamble deep down. You get attached to certain players, certain storylines.

[00:42:23]

You try to be objective, but there's that 10 percent sports fan. You're like, I'm kind of root for this team like Dallas cuppers. Deep down, you're rooting for Luka to be allowed to be more fun of local since you don't really care, right? Lakers. Rockets. Rockets. Probably your least favorite basketball game, probably since I've known you. I didn't know there was something like the 80s that you hated before I got to know you.

[00:42:47]

I don't like the way Seattle used to screen, but. Yeah, and then the Lakers, who are just the Lakers, it's just fun to root for them to do badly. Who are you rooting for, Mr. Dougherty?

[00:42:57]

Mr. 405 over here. Lakers, maybe there isn't any probably about it.

[00:43:02]

I did a whole segment on this last year. I just said, hey, for all those times where you think somebody doesn't like your team, I'm just telling you, I don't like your team. I can respect Houston. I like D'Antoni. I like Terrell more. I respect what he does. But I'm not going to keep doing this. I mean, I feel like I do this every single week. I will be I will be all Lakers.

[00:43:19]

I'm going to ask Jeanie Buss to meet up in Manhattan Beach. I'll be like, hey, where are we going for the game? Let's cheer. Let's cheer the boys on. So you're like all in on Caruso. Like, you're just going to imitate being a Laker fan next. Yeah. How underrated Caruso is. I'm going to say Caruso, you don't see it in the stats, which I actually think is kind of true. It see, it's already happening.

[00:43:38]

I'm going to tell you that Coosa Kuzma just needs more time with this group.

[00:43:42]

Kuzma would be a star and any team that's instead of seeing like Jr Smith and waiters are watching, I'll say you have you have no idea though their ceiling is a lot higher than others. And what happens if we get Rondo back and.

[00:43:54]

No, no for Jason Waiters you got to do the thing like hey man, don't be surprised if they steal a game.

[00:44:00]

Yeah absolutely. Waiters will get you twenty. He's not afraid he's going to win a guy out there.

[00:44:04]

You know what I'm gonna do? I'm going to stick up for Brandon Ingram, pretend he was this good the whole time in L.A. So I'll tweet at some people about the pelicans and go, Ingram was always this good. I'll say Kawhi actually did want to play with LeBron. What else could I do? Or you can do one of our tricks.

[00:44:19]

You could do an environment and crutches that we're going to go do later.

[00:44:23]

People don't realize how good Dwight was. Dwight has been way better than we ever thought he was going to be. We have we still rearing its ugly head at some point. He's definitely reared its ugly head. Where do they do Harkaway when he's out there and the Laker fans lose their mind?

[00:44:39]

Thought zero. We thought it was going to be a zero or maybe negative 10. And it's at least a 50. For his minutes for Dwight, yes, he's been confident. Howard, I'm not. But whatever it is like, Dwight couldn't be Dwight, he can be annoying, disruptive Dwight because when he accepted it and because LeBron is there, so that gives him time. There's still three rounds left. There's there's still a couple of that. You haven't you haven't beaten the Clippers.

[00:45:10]

Who do you have as your Lakers best five push comes to shove. Here are the five guys that they have to play with their backs to the wall because I don't even know if they know what it is yet.

[00:45:22]

Well, the closing group. When they go small is 80 LeBron Pope, Caruso Kuzma Right and then if there is that a five that wins the title I have some bad numbers for you.

[00:45:37]

I mean there's I just I can't believe how much Caldwell Pope plays like I really can't. He is basically their Wannamaker and every once in a while he does ok but it's just like to think that he's not going to rear its ugly head as we get to nut crunch and time here in these last two rounds, potentially like I just don't trust that guy. No, I mean, it was.

[00:46:01]

If everything you wanted in the mid-range stuff that we thought was a problem, some of the shooting in the bubble, he made every single midrange shot against Portland, he was incredible. LeBron has got a bad two games as far as a shooting standpoint. And he was 11, 18, 10 or 12, 14 and 19. So he was perfect again. But when I went through the top five guys in minutes or top six like Pope, was it and again, this is five games, but pope at least 40 percent of his threes against Portland.

[00:46:31]

But that's about it. He was like a these guys were so below the baseline efficiency that you would want for players. He was bad, Kuzma was bad. Danny Green's been kind of a mess and Caruso is not an offensive player at all. I mean he just isn't. He did a really good job against the pick and roll as the primary defender on the guard on the pick and roll and some of that stuff. So some of those numbers are pretty good.

[00:46:53]

But the closing unit for them. Yeah, and I actually think that they would like the Grossmith thing isn't working at all. There are no signs that other than that he has been good for two years. What the hell are they thinking with that?

[00:47:08]

What I'm trying to think like Danny Green, though, to see I'm trying to remember because I think Green has the green has to be out there when we get to nut crunch time just because he's done it so many times. Caldwell Pope is the guy I would not trust. And against Portland, if you're Caldwell Pope, you're like, this is great. They've got Hasin. Yeah, I know him better than that guy.

[00:47:27]

Yeah. When you go to minutes, Danny Green was was actually third in minutes, but some of the minute stuff with Portland, I mean, once you figured out like, hey, Portland can't really guard anybody, this thing is over.

[00:47:39]

Last night was was a tough night for everybody who had had held on to the Simon stock. It would be like if there was a little like a ratty, ratty boob comeuppance and remember how much Simon Buzz there was there was even some of this. I think I started like that guy. I think I started assignments. And then it's like, wow, here's his moment right here. Dames, dames gone. It's Simon's time. And then you actually got that ready.

[00:48:07]

Maybe someday I will like you right now, if you're a person you were traded to the Celtics, would you become a Nets fan? I just think this will be his last basketball team. He has to go to Europe his to fulfill his destiny of playing in Greece or Italy or something like that. That was amazing how much they needed Carmelo just to not lose by 40 every game like he played Real Madrid. He was guarding the front since Saturday. No other playoff team would have had Eddie would have played Carmelo for one minute.

[00:48:39]

Yeah, and then people went Carmella's really proved that it's like, yeah, he proved he could be a mediocre guy in a playoff team. But he's just old, it's you know, this is what it is, I I admire that he was in there and he made a couple of big shots and stuff like that. But when he's guarding like LeBron, LeBron must have thought it was like, this is the greatest round one he ever could have had.

[00:49:02]

And they have got to be guarded by Carmelo Anthony like Lenny the LeBron love from Melo, where it's this like LeBron when you were the focal point of all of this criticism and all these topics, and then you you become like inherently like dismissive to anything. LeBron has been doing this for years. A lot of guys, quarterbacks do this all the time where if you were to say LeBron like, you know, Florida, Florida's got a lot of coastline and he would say, you know, a lot of Everglades, though, too, you know, and you'd be like, what, like like what are you talking about?

[00:49:33]

And so, Melo, this whole thing was a win for Melo because it just became overnight that he couldn't play like he wasn't good enough to play in an NBA game, and he proved that that was never the case, but it was always about fit. Hey, when you come in here, are you going to accept a role or are you going to be disruptive? And then once Portland had other injuries to the wings and then guys opt out and they were like desperate to keep the guy around and give him buckets.

[00:49:54]

But LeBron, it's just funny. It's a very funny LeBron observation that he was after the fact, like Melo, Melo Melo and you guys and Melo Melo. And it's like, dude, you could have had Melo on your team for two years. Four years. Yeah. You didn't. So you're like a way station for four, almost washed up NBA stars. Melo is the one that you over the last four years you're like, I'm good.

[00:50:18]

Kind of weird. Let's do announcing crutches. So I've noticed the two best and they're announcing crutches are people don't realize that that that or this guy doesn't get enough credit for dot, dot, dot. So let's use Jason Tatums defense as an example. Anyone who watches basketball this year knows that Jason Tatum is an excellent defender.

[00:50:45]

No, in fact, this is why I made him second team, all NBA. But then you watch these games and the announcers and I and it would be any crew. At some point Tatum will do something incredible on defense and he'll immediately get the this guy doesn't get enough credit for his defense or people don't realize how good Jayson Tatum is defensively these days. So I just think we should take some stuff off the table. For these announcing crutches Tatum's defense, you're no longer allowed to say that people don't realize is good a defense.

[00:51:20]

LeBron passing. We know LeBron is an amazing passer. Please don't tell me that that LeBron doesn't get enough credit for his passing. He led the league in assists to share. We always get passer Doc Rivers plays coming out of a timeout. You know, he doesn't get enough credit for how good he is coming out of time out. I actually think he gets too much credit. I think it's the other way. It's overrated, underrated.

[00:51:43]

So he's going to be no matter what, there's always going to be a slight hesitation with you on doc.

[00:51:47]

I just I think too much bad blood. I think it's enough credit. I like Doc Rivers, Dwight Howard's hands. Does he like you? Probably not. People don't realize how good Dwight Howard's hands are now. I think they realize who's the second best player in the league in 2011. People don't realize and he doesn't get enough credit. Brook Lopez, his defense is getting enough credit your fire with these. He's a really, really good on defense.

[00:52:15]

I'm just saying I'm ready to table those. Do you have anything else? Yeah, I got a couple.

[00:52:21]

Did you know that Dwight Howard and Josh Smith played a year together? People don't realize, yeah, that one was a big one, the other one of my all time favorites, different sport is Clayton Kershaw and Matthew Stafford, played together in high school. That one has just been absolute beaten to a pulp. How about people don't realize what a good offensive player Domantas Sabonis has turned into? I hadn't really thought about that one major bothering you. Well, he made the all star team, I think people realize it now is really good.

[00:52:52]

People don't realize how crafty Goran Dragic is. He doesn't get enough credit for it. I have a bigger one.

[00:52:59]

Is just Lillard being underrated. You're like, no he's he's the third best point guard.

[00:53:03]

He's definitely properly rated at this point. Yeah, I mean, he was so underrated for so long that you just go, what do you want? You've got to you have to have more than sort of a weird Western Conference. Finals appearance is actually pretty good compared to some other guys, but that's that one. And we are both very pro Lillard on this. But in a million years I don't think anybody takes him over Harden or Curry. I just, I just don't think you do.

[00:53:26]

People don't realize what a good defensive player Anthony Davis is. That one's insane. I mean, he's only been this good for this long and can switch on to everything. People don't realize how passionate Kevin Garnett is, night in, night out. People don't know that Larry Bird is from Indiana and had a growth spurt. Oh, that's another good one. The growth spurt thing with Yoni's people don't realize when the Bucs drafted him year six nine. Yeah, now we do.

[00:53:57]

That's why we we know that he's seven feet. Now, I think Tatum's defense is the funniest one to me, I would say. One of the one of the four best wing defenders at his position, now, you put Kunai over him. Do you have like a whiteboard in a shed out back? Yeah, whiteboards like a beautiful mind. Just Russell Simmons over here where you're just where the fuck do you keep track of your your top my top 40?

[00:54:26]

I don't know that one. I just threw out wet. How about I'm not saying it's not possible, but how I want to know how you came to that conclusion. What three winged defenders do you like more than Jayson Tatum right now?

[00:54:38]

Why Kawhi won. Definitely. Ben Simmons, Ben Simmons over probably Ben Simmons, I still love Draymond. Yeah, true drama, and I don't even know what position he is anymore. Yeah, three months he's doing this whole, like, personality thing that he signed with CNN. He killed it on TNT. Like he's starting to that Berkeley corner. He's starting to liet, I think starting to look he's starting to get it in now for four, five years from now.

[00:55:08]

All right. People don't realize how how good of a talker Draymond Green is. Michael Kids enough credit for it. People don't realize that after after his career is over, he's going to have a lot to say. No, no, he's been pretty talkative. He's been pretty talkative. We're going to take a break and come back in a second.

[00:55:28]

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[00:57:03]

All right, weird question, Priscilla.

[00:57:05]

Should they have tweaked these playoff rules a tiny bit in the bubble to have more of a home court advantage because you watched that Toronto Boston game today and you think, wow, this this couldn't have worked out for the Celtics better just from a pure basketball standpoint, only go to Toronto. Weird place to play a lot of noise. Tough place to win. Toronto's super comfortable there and here. It's like the bubble you're playing. The Toronto sound effects is something we've noticed over the first three weeks.

[00:57:35]

I was thinking like even if they had said the home team got the ball every quarter. Even that's better than what they have now. What's your take on that? Do you have a take? My take is usually it starts with why do we have to always tweak everything here? And I know it isn't fair. I mean, but fair hold. The whole thing is, hey, guys, it's not going to be ideal. You know, when you start hearing about guys being there two plus months and then especially everything that happened, none of it is ideal.

[00:58:03]

I'm OK with that by possession. But I think the real problem would be, do you just do it by seeds? OK, so if you're the higher seed, you get the possession every time because there's also some of these teams. If at least if you've gone back to the beginning of the playoffs, where you may be the five seed, but you're a game behind the four seed, where then there's other teams that are separated by more games.

[00:58:22]

So again, if it was just the possession thing for you, if you had home court.

[00:58:26]

Yeah, not only home court. Yeah, I get it right.

[00:58:28]

Your home court. So that means for those games one and two you get I'm OK with that. But I feel like the NBA was a little concerned with how much can we really do stuff that's never been done before to try to make up for what's really a sacrifice for everybody.

[00:58:43]

What about the five rowdiest fans from the home court team's fan base gets to sit behind the road teams bench during the bubble. So like Boston games three and four, now we're bringing Murph and Sully in the DJ bug. We just put him right behind. They can still get kicked out like it's a real game. They're wearing masks now.

[00:59:03]

I just think you're asking for fights because guys are so bored right now. I mean, have you noticed have you noticed how much like Patrick Beverley and Russell Westbrook, they're like the sixth man right now in some of these games before Westbrook came back and played. But like Beverley, there was a call when Dautrich threw the ball at the ref, which he did in Donchak is a huge complainer. Deserve the technical thrown at the Kennedy.

[00:59:25]

Beverley was already on the court. It was almost like he anticipated it. So I think that that part of the arena has been so active because there's so many guys that are so bored that it would get way worse because then if you're one of five guys heckling a team, you can't feel you can't, like, kind of hide out with the other sixteen thousand people. Well, at the very least, I.

[00:59:44]

You have others. That's the thing. Yeah, that's really it. That's all I got. I don't know what else you could really do. I mean they're doing all you know, they do the cues from the home team scamps.

[00:59:54]

So it makes it feel like it's a little more familiar when you're home. But really there's no way to advantage it. And I think for Toronto that, you know, I'd be bummed out if I was Toronto. Like, I'm down with nothing in the series. Boston's in control. I think it's a weird matchup for Toronto anyway, which we're about to to talk about. But, you know, I think for them specifically, it's really going to hurt them.

[01:00:20]

And I think it's going to hurt Milwaukee, too, against Miami, because Milwaukee really, you know, could turn it on at home. And they got a lot of energy from that crowd, especially Yanase. Miami's a weird team. You know, they're that team that could just make seventeen threes in any game. So at the same time, I like it because this is the most organic who has a better team situation we've seen from a playoff standpoint.

[01:00:43]

But it's just weird that the regular season has meant so little. Did you think especially we had both one seeds loose in the beginning. What else do we have? We had the Clippers well split with Dallas before they were eliminated. And it was something that was brought up was, you know, we always hear this about role players, right? Role players in playoff games disappear or, you know, have a moment. But you can't really count on them because of the playoffs.

[01:01:07]

It's entirely different because the setting, the backdrop. And then we started hearing, well, you know what? It's easier to shoot with these backdrops because not a big arena. OK, totally. By that, there's no real pressure on, you know, but when as I heard that being brought up more and more, especially after just the opening couple games of the playoffs. Yeah, I just I couldn't help but push back on it and go, OK, so does that mean everything we've seen is a lie?

[01:01:28]

Does it mean that everybody talent wise is closer and it's just that the superstars are better dealing with circumstances because it doesn't make any sense. Movement, size, shooting skill, all of these things are real, like I think they're real from the years of watching these games under normal settings. But we were desperate for some sort of conclusion to why the playoffs started out the way they did. And guess what we got? Portland can't play defense. The Clippers are better than the Mavs, especially without some guys.

[01:01:50]

You know, Milwaukee isn't they? They were ready to forfeit a game against Orlando and they still like their chances. Three, two. Right. So it didn't really kind of play out the way I think some were searching for some new outcome that at least, you know.

[01:02:07]

What do you think in round one? What do you think the most glaring of this was normal? This would have really helped this team situation, because even though Boston was better than Philly and I still think Philly probably would have rolled over, I still think Philly in a game three with their backs to the wall down to nothing with that crowd. It could have gone either way. Right. The crowd could have lifted them or that crowd could have turned on them in the second quarter.

[01:02:31]

But I. I just think that Philly crowd in games three and four would have been so much more profoundly impactful, for better or worse, for that Sixers team, because if they're down three. In game four, they're getting booed that whole game, so we missed out on that, too, we missed out on some of the bad stuff.

[01:02:47]

Yeah, it's it's two answers. You're right on Philly. They're back. Game three. They were incredible at home this year. Yeah. Insane record. And you like their chances. But the end game, especially without Simmons, is probably what the hell's wrong with this team? Look at these bad contracts. When does Brett Ryan get fired? So I still think we got the conclusion to the Sixers part of the story that was probably going to happen if we had great success.

[01:03:10]

What about Lakers game one? I think it would have been hard for Portland to win in L.A., especially when they haven't really had an important playoff game and what, eight years, the depth of Tibet and energy for that first game? I think it would have been nuts. Portland's not win in that game.

[01:03:27]

Yeah, it would have been tough for Portland. We'll talk about them later. I want to talk about the Celtics because. It was an impressive job by them today. I think there were some mismatches and advantages in their favor that I know both of us felt like we're existed for them as Zak picked them to win in seven. I think the wings and and the fact that Kemba looked better and the fact that they could kind of survive with Gasol out there, which they certainly did today.

[01:03:56]

I was thinking though, big picture. It was the first time I started to allow myself to think like, oh, man, could they make the finals like and I'm not saying they're ever going to be Toronto. I'm not jinxing it. I'm not doing that stuff. But you just think like, all right, they get through this, then what happens? And I was thinking, big picture. It's weirdly their best window to actually win the title over the next three years, and you wouldn't think that because Tatums, young, brown, young, the whole thing, but you look at their salary cap situation where they're not going to be able to replace whatever that Haywards salary cap spotter's, even if he option for next year.

[01:04:34]

It's basically this year, next year for that Tatum, they're going to have to pay. So they're going to be at a point Tatum Brown Kemba Those three guys are going to be the entire salary cap. They don't have any of these draft picks left that they knew they were getting that Sacramento pick a year and a half ago. They knew they're getting the Memphis pick last year now. Now it's kind of circle back to, you know, they don't have this awesome pick every year that they could at least shot.

[01:04:58]

That's gone then you think in the east you've got no Darren in Brooklyn. That's changed next year. You have Milwaukee, who's going to have home court again next year. And Giannis who I don't think either of us feel like has hit his peak as a player. You have Philly who's not going to be as much of a mess as they were this year. Next year you have the Lakers and the Clippers who have been together for a year and they'll just have, you know, more of a more of a team kind of thing.

[01:05:27]

And then you have Luka and Giannis. So we're going to be the two most important guys in the league. They're going to be better next year. So in a weird way. This is kind of a nice window for the south, and I don't know if the window is going to be as juicy it is as right now, though, home court advantage. That makes sense. It makes a lot of sense.

[01:05:44]

When you started, I went, OK, here we go. And then I got to be like, you did. You didn't even I landed the plane. You did. Golden State has to be a gold state. Right. And it's I think no one forgets. Durant and Kyrie are on Brooklyn, but it doesn't feel real until we actually get to see those guys in Durant's arguably the best player in the league. So you go, oh, wait.

[01:06:04]

Like, whatever it is, it's going to look good. It's just a matter of does the Kyrie part of it work, which, you know, whatever. I have my bets already placed on that.

[01:06:11]

I think the only thing that would change that is that Philly could conceivably be worse. Maybe there's a better version of Miami in another year or two, but I mean, unless Bam takes it to a perennial all star, you know, third team, all NBA type of stuff, as much as we love bam, does he take it to that level?

[01:06:28]

And here and here on Robinson, I could see that being better next year. Well, they should be better, right? Because they should be better. But the Toronto thing, because of VanVleet and how much he's going to get paid, I don't know how they're going to pull that off or at least you know a year later. The only thing that I would say. All right let me just try to counter because I agree with you I actually the more I think about it, the only pushbacks I would have is that if Tatum ascends to where we think he could go losing Hayward and not feeling that slot, maybe Tatum in maybe that's a wash rinse, like he can maybe carry a team for an entire series, the best version of Tatum.

[01:07:04]

And even that doesn't feel as locked in all the time. What if Giannis leaves though.

[01:07:08]

Right. And that would be for a year. Because the reason I was thinking about it, I was thinking about the 2012 season, which has some similarities to this season where you had the condensed regular season in the playoffs and you had some big injuries and and some other things. And OKC just kind of. All of a sudden, they're in the finals and all of a sudden they're kicking ass and they're like, wow, they're windows now and then they didn't get back there and you just never know what the league.

[01:07:34]

Sometimes it's been a recurring theme on this podcast, that's for sure, between injuries, cap subtheme gels together, some team self destructs they to take a break right now. And, you know, you go forward a year. I don't know if the E is going to be that that take, but I think Boston will be better because their younger players should get better. But. And I mean, that Brooklyn team, that's like a contender that is just gone this year and and the upside of they have some trade pieces, there could be a CD, Chiri, third star kind of mega team thrown together that I'm fearful of.

[01:08:12]

You know, not DeAndre Jordan. Now, not not DeAndre is not the guy. And then Milwaukee, whatever they do, you know, like if they fell short this year, they'll do something that they would. This be the Chris Paul thing that we revisit after the season where I didn't really ever think he was going be traded before the season just because of a number. But would Milwaukee and I'm not going to say it's the same thing because I trust Milwaukee ownership more than I trust Cleveland ownership.

[01:08:41]

But Cleveland, four years, every single year, every off season and basically every trade deadline trying to convince LeBron we're going to do everything. And ultimately what they did was made it harder to make the team better. So they made minimal improvements that were going to lead to long term problems. And you wonder, like, let's say Milwaukee loses to Miami. I mean, I don't think it's impossible. I've seen plenty of people picking Miami here.

[01:09:06]

Whatever you're going to I'm going to be one of them about in about 20 minutes. OK, so if that were to happen, it just. Does the front office say we need to be bold and maybe really take a swing and it's funny, I know you have this happen to you, but you'll talk to teams that are stagnant and that are bored and they'll say, you know, we're kicking this around like Westbrook was one of them. Where you go, do we just say, fuck it, do it?

[01:09:34]

Because, you know, we're not that interesting. We're not breaking up anything that's going to go any like, do we just do it? And the answer, like 99 out of 100 times is now we're good.

[01:09:43]

Yeah, but you know.

[01:09:45]

Yeah, but we know we've seen the last five years and I think it's because contracts got shorter and because of all the player movement and it's the age of player movement. Every off season, there is multiple huge moves, and that brings me back to this this Boston point, like I know is I know what the league is right now. And the E seems super winnable, and I watch the West and the Lakers, they figured it out against Portland.

[01:10:11]

I could see that Houston series, which we'll talk about a little bit later in the podcast, is such a bizarre series that cannot be happy about it. And then the clips when I was playing like that, he's the best player in the playoffs. So it's still a team that feels like it's feeling each other out. And a lot of ways even today in Game six, don't change. All the sun gets hot and you're like, oh, my God, is this going to go seven?

[01:10:34]

I still don't 100 percent trust them. So to the Boston point, like there are two guys short. There's still Wannamaker. You got it. Robert Williams was all over the map. He missed at least seven defensive. He was either late on a rotation or is in the wrong spot. But then he'll do a couple other things. I think Brad is just like this guy will do five good things for bad things were still plus one. And the good bad thing thing about the Wanamaker had some classics today, but yet Tatum Brown Kemba.

[01:11:04]

Is is is is that the best big three left? Whoa, who's got a better third Kemba? The Lakers have the best two, right? I'm saying best three. Who's got a better third than Kemba. Oh Westbrook Harden Jeff Green. Yeah fuck it. Sorry you're right. No not look back on this this day. Let's stay on. This is it, is it. Clay, Steph and Draymond. I'm talking about teams left in the playoffs.

[01:11:32]

All right. The final eight.

[01:11:33]

I'm just running through my head right now. I mean it's not OKC, it's not Utah's third guy. It's certainly not Denver's third guy. It's not Miami's third guy Dragic Bam and Butler Clippers you could say Harrell Lou Williams.

[01:11:48]

They're not as good as Kemba at Arrowhead. Everybody's going to probably lose on the third portlands out Milwaukee's third guy.

[01:11:56]

You know we'll take your pick because I think what's interesting about Boston is a playoff team is they do they have the three, they have the best as far as like the most reliable three. Yeah I don't think that's crazy statement.

[01:12:06]

Are we forgetting anybody? Because I don't want to I want to make sure we cover. I think that we're not forgetting anybody.

[01:12:12]

I think what makes them an interesting playoff team is you're not going to have all three of those guys disappear in the same game. You know, when you have three and I think the Clippers. Let's say Campbell is on the Clippers, you is not going to disappear pretty much every time in a playoff game, but if he did, you'd have the Kemba wrinkle, which is, you know, I guess Lou Williams would be the discount version of Kemba in some ways.

[01:12:37]

But what struck me today is I didn't even feel like the Celtics played that amazing. They got great shots, I thought there was a world in which they actually could have played like 20 percent better than from Toronto coming out of that game. I'm terrified by the shots Boston got every shot was great. They missed so many layups and little four footers around them when they missed wide open shots left and right. Then Toronto was going to a zone. And it's like, all right, this is working for two minutes.

[01:13:05]

And then all sudden it wasn't anymore. Like, what adjustments do you make if you're Toronto? What do you do?

[01:13:11]

Well, the biggest thing going into this series, which I wish I had studied a little bit more prior to Sunday's pod, but, you know, everything was kind of all over the place was that Toronto's the number one transition offense in the NBA, but they're going up against the number five transition defense. And you could even see on Lowry drives the stuff with VanVleet It was almost like the mini Giannis Well we always talk about the Giannis wall. You could see Boston in transition trying to cut that off because when you look at Toronto's half court numbers and these are pretty significant if you go there half court points per possessions and just half court.

[01:13:44]

So we're not talking transition half court sets. Toronto 16th. In points of possession, according to Cinergy, cleaning the glass that cleans up those numbers a little bit takes out garbage time. Yeah, 18th. And then there's another site that's PBP stat's. Where they're actually following a dead ball, so an inbound Toronto, they set up their half court offense, their 24th in the NBA in points per 100 possession. So they're essentially a bad half court offensive team.

[01:14:16]

So if you as Boston, who's been really solid all year in transition defense and I think even for a series brackets, these guys are tuning up even more. And we're talking about Tatums defense, who's incredible defensively, even though he had such a slow start offensively, his defense was awesome. Smart makes a million little plays. Yes, he drives me crazy, but there's a million little plays in there. Just other guys have no interest. Not even they're not even aware that you're allowed to do those things.

[01:14:39]

Yeah. And then you have Jalen, who has the size and the athleticism to hang with some different people. So if I'm Toronto and I go, we are about transition offense and we beat all the bad teams were average against five hundred teams. Boston wasn't great against teams over five hundred either. So they're about the same there.

[01:14:57]

But without help with Hayward. I loved Boston in this matchup. Without him I reluctantly picked Toronto. And I'm not trying to freak out about game one because we both know the shooting side of it. Boston is going to shoot that. Well, Marcus Smart not going to let you up from three. Toronto is going to shoot this poorly, but the transition part of this matchup favors Boston all the time. So if they can make Toronto be half court team.

[01:15:18]

So what do you have in Toronto's offense? You have two smaller guards that aren't really dribble drive guys or dribble pass guys. They're big set screens, but neither Ibaka Gasol roll. So that means you have to just kind of stay out and contest them or two on the driver and it really comes down to like, are they going to let S.A.M. go and try to create off the dribble, which I still don't necessarily think even though we saw it a lot last year.

[01:15:39]

But when Kawhi is not on the court with you having Suhakam be the focus of the offense to kind of dribble, drive and create on his own, and even though the numbers are OK, that's a problem. So I think all of these different things in that first game, I thought that was Toronto's biggest mistake today when they when they were really trying to establish the outcome on the low post, stuff like that. I was delighted as the Celtics fan, like, please do that to stuff I'm worried about is all like the high screen stuff with your guards and you guys just wearing down Kemba over and over again and you know VanVleet and Ibaka high screen and stuff like that.

[01:16:14]

We're just like putting Myles on Kemba during the series you post the knapsack on like we can handle that one and I'm not even, I just don't think he's that good of an offensive player. I think he's good but he's not good enough to like, you know, take it to town against Boston's wings on the low post. I don't understand that at all. And then they kind of they figured it out as the game went along, but then they couldn't make a three.

[01:16:36]

And, you know, it's tough to overreact when a team goes ten for forty on threes. But on the other hand. Boston really didn't play with that, but yeah, they went 17 for thirty nine from three, the defense was really good, defense is good, but they missed a lot of stuff around the rim did. I felt like I gave away a lot. I didn't think they were that great on off.

[01:16:54]

I thought they got good looks, but they weren't closing off.

[01:16:57]

Tatum was missing layups like they highsmith's that dismissed at least three or four layups. James, they missed an alley oop, one of his three things blocked as usual.

[01:17:07]

Wannamaker looked like he didn't want to be out there today. But, you know, that's what happens. That's why you're a backup, at least in the regular season. The Robert Williams thing was funny because when he first came in, he misses two Alberca threes immediately. And I thought Brad was going to call a time out and go, Hey, time Lord. And then, hey, Serge, can you come here for a second? Hey, Rob, this is Sergio Barca, right?

[01:17:27]

He makes what he does. He came back. He's been killing the Celtics for ten years. For some reason, the gets Boston. I just want you to say hi to him real quick.

[01:17:35]

Can we go back to the second thing, though, because. Are you? You sound too critical of them. I just don't think he's like a super talented, offensive player. I think he's a good offensive player. But to me, it would be like if Boston went into the series and like, we're going to post up Jaylen Brown. I'm like, why what? Why are we doing that? That's that's he's not that guy. He's he is the guy that he's been you know, he's he's transition three guy.

[01:18:04]

He's wide open three guy. He's set him a screen and he curls off, goes to the basket, stuff like that. But why he puts them off. And I know the Toronto offensive. I know nocere Kompas up. But if you're the Celtics, that's like a delight. If they're doing that, you you have so many different guys who can defend a serum type. Yeah, that's a I just I just wouldn't I just wouldn't do that.

[01:18:24]

And, you know, he tailed off and you were talking he was twenty three a game this year and you mentioned either on my iPod or we needed the iPod. One of them you were talking about how his shots went down as VanVleet is VanVleet usage rate went up stuff like that. I just don't think he's an elite offensive player. I think he's a really good offensive player but not an elite offensive player. So running everything through him I thought was a really weird choice.

[01:18:49]

Now I'm criticizing Nick there so I think is the best coach in the league. So I just want to I just want to say that I'm not saying I know more than Nick nurse. I just think I think they misplayed it. I think they thought they could get an advantage out of that and get him going and it they fell in their face. How often do you think that we see stuff that may not make sense in the short term, but is part of a long term thing where it's like, hey, S.A.M. hasn't played as well?

[01:19:11]

He shot it poorly in the seeding game. Thirty nine percent. He was forty two percent from the floor against Brooklyn. Thirty one percent from three lackluster.

[01:19:18]

I'm going to go. Yeah. Do you think that has anything to do with it? Maybe. I just think that's playing right into the Celtics strengths. As you said, the transition defense is great and they're really good at defending swingman who post up that. It's semi semi them. Maybe he couldn't move semiannually. Right. And I mean, this is the most valuable semi's. Looked at the game in a year, their weaknesses Kemba defensively and the Raptors, I think as his series go along are just going to attack him with their guards and just make him constantly have to do stuff defensive and then Wannamaker to a lesser degree too.

[01:19:56]

But I think if you're the Celtics, you know it's such an interesting team and I was ready for to hear a conversation today about it with the announcers. They didn't do it like cancer. Who I thought was really effective in the Philly series is just out for this series. And Brad does that with him where he's just like, yeah, take the next two weeks off.

[01:20:15]

Well, we're going to need you for round three. It's crazy. Kanter was huge in the Philly series in a couple of the quarters and now I guess they must have looked at him like Yeah we don't want him twenty five feet to the basket. He's just not going to play. But I do think that's an advantage for the Celtics team. Never weirdly malleable lineup depending on who they're playing, is one of the reasons the matchups favored them against Toronto.

[01:20:37]

I thought I didn't like Gasol, especially in the last seeding game. That was the game where I got excited about Boston against Toronto. But wait a minute, a pick Boston, pick Boston. And I just thought losing the Hayward piece was was such a problem because it was just another wing that could chase these guys around because they kind of start with they put you right about the Kemba VanVleet like I would expect more VanVleet Toronto then went to bigs Then they were like Can we just go really big against Boston and every time he felt like Toronto because I always feel like any team that's halfway decent makes them kind of run.

[01:21:07]

So you can see a team down twenty, they're like oh my God they've cut it to six like that. Actually I feel like that happens more often than it doesn't.

[01:21:12]

But every time Toronto would crank up that pressure, they cranked up that pressure to start the third quarter defensively. Corner three Jaylen Corner three Kemba Corner three Smart if you like. OK and then they had a nice little push again where I think they got it to like eleven and then they brought the pressure up nice runs baseline and finishes with the dunk. And so the zone thing that ESPN got really excited about, there were two possessions. They ran a big roll of coming back from break.

[01:21:36]

We'll take a look at Nick thrown in the zone. I mean, if a coach I suppose if I were an NBA coach, I would run a box and one like twice a game and then tell before I ran box and run so that everybody gets excited.

[01:21:48]

Genius like Forcillo is willing to do anything. This fucking guy Boxun, one or two out of one hundred and ten, you get a triangle to this guy's unbelievable.

[01:21:55]

He doubled the inbound fucking mad man, but he the zone didn't do. I don't I didn't.

[01:22:02]

I can't always keep track of exactly how many zone possessions there are because sometimes you think it is and then it isn't in the coach. It's like, no, that's not what we're doing. And they certainly know better than we do. But Tice dropped a pass and Tatum lost the dribble. It looked like it really didn't have much to do with the Zone. And then when they went with the bigs, that didn't really do anything. I think it's two things.

[01:22:19]

Like you said, it's seeing a VanVleet who was terrible. He sioc them and Lowry were so below their standards that yeah that's just going to be fixed in the next game. It just will be. I have a theory though.

[01:22:31]

I'll throw you at the end of this so it'll be attacking VanVleet or excuse me VanVleet attacking Kemba and I expect that they may have moments where they on Gasol where they just say Hey let's go small and let's see if we can out small or maybe they're scared of the wing. I don't know or flip side, I actually think they should post up Casal, they posted them up once and I was like, oh shit, I hope they don't start doing that.

[01:22:53]

I don't know about him now. He's he's always he's always given the Celltex problems.

[01:22:58]

And he's big when it's a good ten. Yeah. Back when I was in college. But yeah. I mean I would just go, I would rather go to him than see them on the low post I guess is my point. Let's let's take a break. Can I before the break ask a question. Yeah. So I know how much you hate it when I interrupt the breaks. What if I throw a theory at you. Yeah. That is certain to upset our brethren to the north.

[01:23:24]

Yeah. What if Toronto Post Kawhi. Regresses back to the Toronto that was overwhelmingly disappointing in the playoffs and we just don't know it yet.

[01:23:35]

Oh, like Kawhi was the kryptonite for for that. But now this is who they are for the next 20 years. The fans don't care. They're so psyched. They won the title. They're good. I don't know about that because then it would be like, wait a minute, they have a winning pedigree. They understand it. But I mean, this was a group with Lowry that was again, it was different. Coach, I don't know.

[01:23:54]

It was just something that popped my head. I just wrote it down. I meant to ask it to you. And I don't even think I believe it. Just something rather.

[01:24:00]

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[01:24:50]

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[01:24:56]

I want to talk OKC, Houston and then Miami's chances in round two. I don't want to say it was a tough break for OKC because everything that happened in the bubble Wednesday, Thursday, Friday had to happen and should have happened. But if you're talking about a team that was in a better shape, just basketball was on Tuesday night than they were this weekend, it's OK because it bought Westbrook enough time to come back. And I don't mean Houston in a better spot.

[01:25:23]

I'm saying OKC is in a worse spot because Westbrook came back and actually looked pretty good. And it's interesting. The line on that game on Tuesday night was four and a half Houston by four and a half and on Saturday it was still four and a half. And I just think Westbrook had to open for a couple of points. But the worst case thing that happened for for OKC in that game was getting Schruder knocked out in the second half because their biggest advantage was to do the three guard thing.

[01:25:53]

Once that got removed, that game was over. Is there an adjustment you could see them making in game six or did they shoot their way out here? Yes, they can not have Lou Duop either primary offensive weapon every time he's out there, this is a you don't want to see any shots. No, I'm going about I'm a go off here a little bit because. Oklahoma City's offensive approach in game five is one of the dumbest executions of a game plan or lack of a game plan or lack of adjustment that I can remember seeing now.

[01:26:21]

Yes, there are bad teams that get blown out in the playoffs. You say they suck that day. OK, that's fine. But as far as expectations with a smart team, the team that's played well in big spots felt like they figured some stuff out against Houston. What they did in game five is I don't want to say disgusting. I don't want to say I was offended by it, but I just I couldn't believe it. I'm still here, removed from it a day later, dumbfounded that a team would allow that to happen.

[01:26:45]

OK, hey, guess what I mean. It's essentially like, OK, what are they doing?

[01:26:48]

OK. They're they're going to leave door open. OK, well, he's going to shoot nine times in the first quarter. Luchador is going to shoot nine times in the first quarter. He's going to start for seven over six and three. Well, I guess we lose. I guess we're going to lose because we're going to because it wasn't just the door, it was taking the open shot, it's that he was taking some threes. I kind of like three or four of them while the game was still kind of in the balance where he was taking with like 15 seconds or more left on the shot clock.

[01:27:20]

He is now at 16 under 16 percent from three. He has the highest volume of three point shot attempts of any player in the Thunder in this series, despite the fact he's now 16 under 16 percent. He's five, right. His five, four, three, two, two, four, three in the series.

[01:27:34]

OK, so guess what? Houston is going to leave him open. So you need to figure something out whether you mess up your shooter rotation and bring him in earlier or you have door, you know, use him in just a very different way just a couple of times to mix it up. Like I think this is something that's so overlooked with coaches is. Houston does a good job with this. Hey, the hardest thing is getting a little stagnant.

[01:28:00]

Let's do something different. Let's have Jeff Green bring the ball up and we're going to hit hard and be the screener and then we're just going to mess up like what you're used to seeing with us and just show you something here different. And it may have a lasting impact. If I'm Billy Donovan, I probably take Dawid out for like a weird substitution at nine minutes. If he's already over four from three and go, you know, let's just do something, replug in a different look, because then if we want to bring Dort back, we're fine.

[01:28:23]

And by the way, he wasn't exactly lighting up Hardin because Hardin was killing them. He hadn't missed a shot, had twenty points like that. So that's the key point. Dwight wasn't even someone hired to do that in the game. So he was and it was a disaster. You led him to continue to shoot. And here's another thing like Dinello stunk. Chris Paul took off the first half a game four, but closed so well and had like twenty two in the second half a game four with that big comeback.

[01:28:45]

He wasn't great. The no shooter things a problem. She was throwing the ball, like literally punting it out of bounds. So Gilgeous Alexander had one of the worst games I've ever seen him play again. I'm just going to mention one more time. Danylo went from twenty nine points in game one to one point game five. But Steven Adams usage rate and sometimes it's because of their lineups, but he gets a couple touches early and then they never go to him.

[01:29:05]

But he's he's sneaky, disappointing in that he forgets how big he is. He plays small sometimes like he's this big New Zealand guy with his huge family and he's tackling the ox in New Zealand during the quarantine. And we're like big, bad Steven Adams. No one would ever fight like him, then play like it.

[01:29:25]

He plays soft. He's one of those guys. You almost need him for the series where the other team has an awesome center and just bang bodies with them for a series like this. I just don't know what his role is. PJ Tucker got his third foul and we know he didn't like the call because PJ disputed it. And PJ leaves the game and the next possession after a dead ball. It's like, why don't you get Adams deep on a seal or, you know, go block to block on a screen so he can get a deeper catch, you know, just do a different action to test them out now that PJ's out of the game and Dawg takes a three.

[01:30:02]

And so that was for a team that I have. And I'm not look, we both picked Houston. Do we both pick Houston? I know I picked Houston.

[01:30:09]

I shot them as a I didn't feel great about it, but I just thought it was the best player in the series series. So I'm just I'm taking the best to find all this is is, you know, moderate expectations of what the thunder can be. I don't think that this great, great basketball team, but I think or I thought they were smarter than this and what they did in game five, I can't do this very like I feel.

[01:30:33]

I guess I just I'm I'm dumbfounded. I sat there in silence for like ten minutes after the game going like, what the fuck did you just let happen to you?

[01:30:40]

And they could have lost game three. It was basically one play, so really, like, I don't know, you look at the numbers two and. I don't know where. I don't know where he goes here. They're shooting 30, they're shooting 30 percent from three. The only the only real positive from them offensively is they're getting in the line more than Houston. But I just think Houston's better and I think Houston knows they're better. And this will lead to the Chris Paul trade this summer because there's no real way to improve the OKC team.

[01:31:13]

So they'll move in the summer. You know, Houston was upset about the free throw disparity after game four, but it was like you took fifty eight threes. Like, what did you expect? Houston actually got to the hoop at will and then, you know, Harden got a couple of calls earlier. So I think that freaks you out. If your door is a defensive player where you think like, hey, maybe if I get away with a couple of things and harden, is it going to be is tempted to drive at me the Westbrook angle?

[01:31:36]

I'm not surprised the line didn't move because the Westbrook part of this was like the most, the eighth most significant thing that happened to the game. Like he ran around. He looks, it's, it's hard to ever think that he looks wrong athletically because he's still such a specimen. But he was rusty and he was ok, he wasn't great but it didn't even factor into any of this. It's time that it's time to officially talk about it. Jeff Green.

[01:32:01]

You miss them. Is is Omar, he's basically 16 and seven. In this series. He's taken seven threes a game, is shooting forty seven percent from three, living with a personal stylist in Houston. He even has two point two assists, which is close to his playoff high for a season. This is a guy. People don't give him enough credit for how much he's bounced around, I know, because everything is so positive, I would love, like, you know, Jeff Greene.

[01:32:38]

Yeah, he's been on thirty eight teams, but enough credit for what it's like to move. He's taken a little bit from each system. And you're right, moving is a pain in the ass. You get to change the names in the bills. You've got to find new friends. You got to find new restaurants. They try to get you a bigger truck and you're not going to need it. So check the square footage.

[01:32:54]

You know, different airport. You got to get used to that. People don't give you enough credit. I can't wait till the next time an announcer says that people I don't check my Twitter, but you people can hit Twitter replies for Rosillo and send us whenever this happens because we don't get enough credit for when we point out stuff like this, this Jeff Green thing, though, they they didn't they just pick them up off the waiver where they didn't trade anything for him.

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He was just yet free agent next available. He's also one of those guys. You think he's like forty and he's only thirty three because he's been around for 100 years. And it feels like when he was on those Georgetown teams, I feel like that was a million years ago. But I can't overstate how good he's been since he joined the rockets. And naturally, I'm not going to trust that he's one of my most frustrating Celltex probably of my lifetime.

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He's my dad's least favorite. So think of the past decade. But he's doing everything you'd ever want from Jeff Green. And the irony is they really needed a guy who does the things that he does, that kind of hybrid stretch three, stretch four. I can grab a rebound. I'm a decent athlete. I can make threes, I can run the floor, I can fill the lane. All the things the good version of Jeff Green does on paper, who inspired us to do this ringer video where you could look at it on our YouTube channel.

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It's a support group when you don't want to give up our guys. And your guy was Jeff Green. And we did this whole parody video about how ridiculous this one fucking loser who will give up on Jeff Green. Ha ha ha. And now he's the second best rocket until Westbrooks. One hundred percent. How the fuck does this make sense? He got cut by Utah in December. He same time. That's right. They would love him right now.

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The Celtics, they would give him a three year extension if this is what they were getting out of him right now, imagine him giving this kind of production. Now, part of it is always been the skill. That's why people are frustrated. You're this big. He can handle he can pass. Now, I do think that there's a rule kind of like Cinderella once the clock strikes, one fifty nine left in the game, something happens. OK, yeah.

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Like there's a two minute thing with Jeff Green where that's kind of how I'll judge some players be like, OK, that's a nice three that made it, you know, whatever it is at two forty left. But are you going to make that shot with one forty. Going to make that shot with forty seconds left.

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Alexa comes in and says Jeff Green, there's two minutes left in the game and it goes up and the alarm starts going off in his head. I guess they're Phuket's some stuff up.

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It's never been. I, you know, I almost I'm trying to think of, like, equating it to your group of friends where you're constantly like, why do we hang out with this guy? Ted sucks.

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And then and then, you know, July 4th weekend, you're you're at some place, like in New England, you know, you're like it's some stretch. Like, I knew it would take a Newport, you know, Nantucket Vineyard, not I don't care whatever you want to call it. And you're like, do you know Ted has a boat? Like what, Ted has a fucking boat and then you have this epic night, you watch the fireworks, it's like one of the you bring your boat in the marina, you're waiting.

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You go out that night and then you're like, you know, Ted's all right. And then the next week you go, you know, that's not even Ted's boat. He stole it. And there's a warrant out for his arrest. And we're all now accomplices. And you go, we can't hang out with Ted. And then like six months later, he's like, hey, I have tickets to Daytona. I'll never forget when Tommy Heinsohn compared Jeff Greene to James worthy of that time, which time he for an entire season, I got to say, like he reminds me of James Worthy.

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And it was but that was the ceiling of Jeff Green because he would have these games where you have like thirty seven. Again, this is his back. Don't go over somebody. That's what makes them so fucking frustrating. But I wonder what this Houston team. It's so chaotic and so weird and so different that maybe it almost reprogramme Jeff Green's brain, so he it's like all the baggage is gone now because he's playing this sport that doesn't resemble the other eight teams that he's been on in the situations he's been on.

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It's almost like a blank slate. It's possible. It's like Memento. I don't know if there's ever that moment. How do I remember? Yeah, why?

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No, I really like Jeff Green's brain is just blank now because the Rockets weirdo system has just like, defused him. So we're at the beginning of the movie and he's like, what year was I drafted? Right. Which remember when it was me, Durant and Westbrook were the big three was former Utah, Memphis, OKC, Boston, Orlando.

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And he just like, why are all these cities on my right forearm? The funny thing is he has had some decent moments, you know, like in games like seventeen a game. And then yeah. You're talking the Cavs in game seven in Boston. He's the reason is awesome. That weird Celtics team without Kyrie to make the finals because Jeff Green LeBron needed anybody to be the second best guy for him. Jeff Green was like, um, the most disappointing player of of any top five lottery pick of my generation who's actually had a decent career.

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I'll step up. I got LeBron. I'm going to be your James worthy for this one game. But even like when he was on the Celtics, he had the hit the hard issues. So he missed that year, which I think really they traded Perkins for him and then he's out. But then he had a playoff run with the Celtics where he was really good. One year for the Celtics. Yeah, it was thirteen when they lost to the Knicks and he averaged twenty a game in that playoff series.

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So he's had he's had these flashes and at some point turned into a punch line. But for his career, he's 16, a game is played, nine hundred and eight games is a career. Forty four percent shooter. I don't know. I just I've stopped trying to figure it out a while ago. I don't understand it. I don't know if there's any way to understand it. And that's by Jeff Green Tech.

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Do you want to take a guess? He's been in the league since 07, 08. How many seasons? Four Seasons, where he's had a PR over 15. Probably like two zero zero 15 on the dot is its highest ever, and I, you know, again, PR all the stuff, it's all moving. But when you have zero seasons above that, it's really simple. He'd have that one dunk where he just posterized three players and the other team and you just be like, holy shit.

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I'll say this super nice guy, by all accounts, I'm actually happy that you're happy that he's having a moment this late in his career where he's become this essential guy and now we're playing the Lakers. Well, let's get back to that matchup. Are you rooting for the Rockets because of Jeff Green?

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I'm rooting for them for Darrow because I worry what what could happen if they don't win this series or if they get swept in, as I hate the Lakers sports? Not really, but. Well, I think they're going to go into this and they're just going to go, all right. Who's guarding Harden on your team? Every single person you're going to throw them, he's going to be able to score, so you're going to have to double him and it's just going to come down to these dudes hitting open threes, which they've been hitting.

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I would be very concerned on the Lakers. I don't know what's going to happen in this series. I'm not I hesitate to make a prediction because they could spot Davis 40 points a game and still win the series. Yeah, the rest of the guys that we went over that beginning group and maybe the closing group is different there because of this. But I have I have two quick things, though. There's never been an easier system for Jeff Green.

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So I think everything you're saying is right, like you're making the Deek programming joke. But I don't think it's really like that for off Memento. Yeah, because you just have to go. Look, here's your action on this. But for the most part, like hit those corner threes and you can still always handle enough that he did get stuck on a catch on a closeout where he can dribble a little bit and maybe make another play. And it's never been about the talent.

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But we've said this constantly. If Ben Macklemore looks like a guy who is going to get another contract, then Houston is the reason. I mean, Houston's system is the reason. And so maybe Jeff has to think about less things, but this has to be the time against the Lakers where in Houston's defense has been terrific. And again, Oklahoma still has to be closed out. But I mean, that game five things leave such a bad taste in your mouth.

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But again, if the Thunder come back and win game six, are we going to be shocked? You could have some. I would actually be shocked.

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You be shocked. Now if they do the same thing they deserve. I just think that I think Houston's coaching and their investments in this stuff have just been better. But this has to be the series, though. Going up against the Lakers were the Davis thing that makes them pay a little bit more. So, yes, I'm worried about the rest of the wings, the drop off that we've seen.

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Can you play the center? So if you're the Lakers, can you play Howard McGee? I don't. Thirty five minutes a game in this series because I don't feel like you can, but it is.

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It's very much that game to game thing where Dort looks like the most valuable guy, in a sense, the first few games that Thunder Houston series. Yeah, it looks unplayable in game five. My favorite example of this is Tristan Thompson and some of the finals games against the Warriors. It was like, get him out of here. He can't help on any of this stuff. And then in 16, when they had the comeback, the Warriors couldn't box him out.

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So some of these players are very much game to game. So I can imagine a game where it looks terrible when the Lakers have two bigs trying to cheat like Davis can chase anybody but Dwight Gevalia. They're going to do a lot of. It's been pretty good. I think there'll be nights where it looks like it's to their advantage. And I think there'll be other nights because of the way a game flows, where it looks like the Lakers are going to have to size down because the two bigs look bad.

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So I don't think it's a hey for the next seven games. L.A. can't ever get away with doing some of these things.

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I think that's one of the things I've definitely learned legacy wise. You know, I love to bring up legacy from time to time.

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What an amazing. Moment for James Harden right now. Where he's going into this series, he's going against one of the three best players ever, he's going against a team that is two of the top eight. He goes into this, and if he if he's a one man wrecking crew with this supporting cast, the guys in threes, Westbrook crashing the boards doing this stuff, but ultimately it's a nobody can guard me. I'm James Harden, I'm sending you Home series.

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We'll think of him completely differently if he if he basically cuts the throat of this Lakers team that has a pretty short window here. This is three years max. Plus you have Davis as a free agent this summer. I'm sure you've heard the same thing. There are teams out there who think they have a chance at Davis this summer. It's like they're like, yeah, if this if the Lakers thing goes badly this year, who the fuck knows?

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I don't think anybody thinks it is a one hundred percent slam dunk that he's a Laker next year, maybe. Ninety five percent. I've I've tried one hundred percent. I've told you that people had clutch clients in to work out where I was like, why, what are you doing here? And they go, Anthony Davis. And I was like, What. I know you really, and then it was I don't know that even I maybe you understand better than I do, but I think there are times where I know I'm naive about like, wait a minute.

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What like, why do you think Janice's brothers are on teams? OK, you know, and there are little little things now. It's sometimes a really stupid like Glen Davis going to Orlando because Dwight Howard liked him. That didn't matter. I think Jarrett Jack ended up with the pelicans once because they were like, oh, Chris Paul loves Jarrett. Jack, like teams will do some of this stuff. And it's exactly to your point that there are teams that are going we're never going to concede that there couldn't be some bad ending here and act like we're not in play for Anthony Davis.

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So and we've also seen it we've seen this the last five years. You can never say anybody is a slam dunk tattoo, the logo of the team on their shoulder for the next five years. And I just honestly think, though, he would leave LeBron. No, considering the family ideal there. What I do think. Is that if this goes horribly, everything's on the table, that's it, and I do think if I'm James Harden and I get to potentially knock out LeBron and Davis and the Lakers in a playoff series, this is a fork in the road moment for him.

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And a lot of ways I just can't fathom a guy goes to clutch nuclear options his way out of the pelicans and then is going to blow off LeBron because they lose to the Rockets in the second round. I don't you're I'm a Laker fan, so 18 out of 20 times. I think you're right. Who the fuck does I? My only point is there are teams out there who think that Davis could be in play if something bad happens. Absolutely.

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Yeah. Quickly, Miami, Milwaukee. I picked Miami in the series. I bet on Miami to make the finals and play the Clippers. And I love this matchup for them. I like their team, I think they have an awesome coach, I don't trust playoff bud. I think that they're sophisticated enough, both ends, to do some of the stuff you need to do against the bucks, build the wall and Zionists shoot the threes, try to make the game more random.

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I just like the matchup, I like their team, and ironically, I thought Duncan Robinson was going to be the key guy for them in the playoffs for like making a leap. The guy in round one. And I watch way too much basketball the last three weeks. The guy in round one who I was just stunned by was hero, like playing fourth quarters and like deciding what to do on key possessions and stuff like that, where they're going through him over the other guys on team.

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I think my arm is really good. I really do. I think they're a really good team. I'd be really nervous if I was. Bürki, what do you think? The part I loved about Hiro is his handle and that it's not just I mean, even Duncan has a little bit more shake to him than you, Totemic. And we we start to project some of these guys that are shooters like, oh, you know, stick him in the corner.

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Keeps you honest.

[01:46:53]

I think both of those guys are way better than that. If Fred VanVleet is going to get 20 million, why wouldn't I mean Duncan Robinson's in a different situation because of his contract. But I was kind of kidding when I tweeted out in a poll, would you trade this year's number one pick for Duncan Robinson because you just have to like hope that your pick has the ceiling that can be like a real star. But Duncan Robinson will probably get north of 20 million a year if he were just a straight a free agent.

[01:47:19]

Well, remember, we did that twenty five twenty five most intriguing guys in the playoffs. You were kind of your kind of half into it. Why didn't I want to see, you know, that in you say you know, you said some picks. I saw list and I didn't know until you unveiled that on the board, but I haven't said like 11th. I thought I didn't I didn't have hero. I didn't have Harrow in the top hundred.

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I didn't I didn't think we'd be hearing from him in the playoffs in like a significant way. And then you're watching the Indiana series and they're like calling like he's Jimmy Chitwood for like clear effort, clear for hero. Instead of a pick, let him cook.

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I always wanted to do something where everybody kind of was in on the joke, but you would just do bad interviews with NBA players and just sit down, like in a one on one with this with Tyler Hero and be like, are you doing this for Nick Stauskas?

[01:48:15]

See what motivates you every day to become the player that you are. Because a lot of people thought Nick had a chance. Nick had a chance to be what you are now. And I, I don't think it's I don't think it's a mistake to say that you're probably carrying on his name.

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Can I complain about last year's coin flip football more time. I want to hear more about that podcast, your top twenty five.

[01:48:35]

I mean, once you sound like the Wade Boggs story, I was like, oh man, check that sells pick silts pick fourteen because they lost the coin flip to Miami at thirteen. And if you go back and you look at that draft on basketball reference, it's a drop off because it's PJ Washington twelve, hero thirteen. And then it's like, all right, now now I'm in the talk myself and two guys portion of the draft. And you think like if you put here on this Celtics team with the team they have now, he you literally couldn't pick a rookie from this draft who would be the more perfect, like eighth man for this team.

[01:49:11]

Right. And instead he goes to Miami and it's gotten to the point where he's stealing minutes from dudes who are probably like, what the fuck? That dude's twenty. He's playing in crunch time. How is this happening? So I don't know. I just think I think people who haven't watched closely are going to be surprised by how Miami does against this Bucks team. Well, the regular season should give you some indication, but some people would argue it was so long ago, it doesn't really matter.

[01:49:37]

But Miami was terrific against Milwaukee, minus six hundred in the series.

[01:49:43]

I just think that's too high, there's no home court. And then the other thing with this Miami team is, you know, any game they could hit twenty threes a mess. Yeah, but and and I think SPO versus Coach Bud in a playoff thing. So, you know, it'll be an interesting moment for Yoni's, too, because there's a version of this series where Yanase just destroys bam, everybody talks about Bam. You know, this is the kind of guy you'd want and Yanase just puts up thirty five and 15 every game.

[01:50:13]

It's like now there's it's MINURSO Yanase about Middleton because, you know, Middleton put up some bigger numbers against Orlando, but I'm not impressed against Orlando. I'm not impressed. Me neither. Team is up 20 and you start filling it up in the third quarter to put the lead to twenty eight.

[01:50:30]

You know, those are not the minutes where your, you know, whenever Middleton is another one of our you know, people just don't give Middleton a no no because Middleton has moments where we just don't give them enough credit like where you go, OK, this is why you're not talked about some of those other guys. Giannis is going to get him. They can do whatever they want with Bam they're going to double the shit. I mean sports is going to try a million different things just right there with Nurse Spoelstra right there with, you know, one thing he's going to do all these top guys so he'll try to have Olynyk out there when Brook Lopez is out there.

[01:51:00]

You know, he'll he'll try to stagger match ups so that everything makes the Bucs uncomfortable, it's like, oh, you got Brook Lopez out there, he's going to have to come twenty five feet out now and he's going to have three shooters out there at all times and point guards just up to Steph, I think the key guy for Malachy's Bledsoe and for two reasons. One, I don't trust him in a playoff series at all.

[01:51:22]

At all to. I'll be interested. I think they're the best they're at their best with George Hill, in my opinion. I just like what he does for them the most. I don't I just don't want too much from my point guard. If I'm walking, like, just steer that steer the ship of defense, hit some open threes. That's it. And this is a series where I think Milwaukee is going to have to be like, hey, Bledsoe, if you don't have it, you're out.

[01:51:47]

Like, we can't fuck around. We we need we need a steady hand. And how he navigates that Bledsoe show thing, I'm more interested in that. The Middleton the other big thing and I have a message board if I can plug it here. It's Hoopes talk but it's with a Z. We have a thread going right now Oleynik Giannis draft. It's just playoff series. Put that one to bed. It's fair traffic, yeah. How well does Oleynik have to play in that series to make up for what got us one hundred forty and twelve or so who you pick it in this series?

[01:52:25]

I'm going to go ahead and take Milwaukee then, because I, I was probably more willing to just for the sake of the pod. I felt like when I was kind of leaning Miami, but I might be too much stock into the early regular season games because then in the seeding games, walky took it to him pretty good. But I guess. Wait a minute, I'd have to double check. And I'm pretty sure Miami wasn't playing anybody.

[01:52:42]

So can I ask who you think the Celtics would rather play? I think the Celtics would rather play Milwaukee. I think they would, too, yeah, I think Miami is their kryptonite team. I don't know. I don't know, though. I don't know. No, because I. I feel that way, OK, because I don't think the Celtics feel that way.

[01:53:05]

Here, all the guys who kill them on that team, Oleynik. Tragic forever is personal, it's personal for Kelly. Yeah, definitely. They gave up out of tragedy, was like, are they anti Canadian?

[01:53:18]

They switched me off for Hayward because he's from the states.

[01:53:20]

A lot of people don't know that hero is exactly the type of guy who kills the Celtics, these little crafty scoring.

[01:53:26]

I don't think they dry enough for Boston, though. Like when I saw Hero. He's just not like when I saw him introduced on draft night with the chain and his whole setup, I was like to I thought no, when I saw him drafted in the way he was handling himself, the way he dresses like he should go. Sixth, just on appearance alone, I'm like, look at the way. He's like, no way. This kid's what was it?

[01:53:48]

What was he like in college? Because as you know, I barely watch college basketball. Just were there signs of this are now shooting?

[01:53:54]

Yes. And he reminded me I have it on my scouting report. I was like the poorest of poor man's clay where he would reset himself would. That's what I love the most about Hero, is that it's a really simple thing to do. But reset yourself from a shooting position because the defenders always lose track of you, especially in college. But I don't think we saw the playmaking ability is consistent. You know, I'm not going to sit here and say I watch thirty plus Kentucky games.

[01:54:19]

I would watch my hero stuff and I really liked him. Do you really what do you think Boston was taking him if they had won the coin toss a hundred thousand one hundred percent sources. One hundred thousand percent. OK, I like your I like your confidence. Hero played one hundred and twenty nine minutes in those four games in the Pacers.

[01:54:40]

Thirty, thirty two. But it's a game. He's literally twenty years old. It's not like he's like this dude who is like the four year college guy who came in at age 23, like he's he's probably one of the youngest guys in the playoffs.

[01:54:53]

And he carries himself like he's he's doing the the Kardashian Jenner crew being like, what we get on the hero train now.

[01:55:03]

And I have always, always, always like Dragovic. I even liked when they traded the two unprotected first for I was oh. And I've always been in on Dragovic. I think when I watch him, I just think, like, how fucking annoying it would be to guard him. Hey, now you did you see that thing on TNT where they were talking about being hazed and Barkley was saying, like Andrew, Tony made them bring him a warm glass of milk in the hotel.

[01:55:28]

This is this was so good. So Barkley, they started talking about being hazed as rookies for some reason. And Barkley goes, yeah, he's like, I got his left and right there. Like, what would happen? He goes, well, he goes, Edgerton's to call me in the middle of the night to get him a warm glass of milk. And they're like, well, how would you get a eco's? I'd have to walk down a room service like Charles Barkley.

[01:55:47]

Sixty five to whatever, you know, Charles Barkley going to room service, being like, hey, I need to come down and pick up a glass, warm glass of milk and and hand deliver it to another guy and Dr. Jay would make him get a newspaper. He's like, I need a newspaper outside of my hotel room every morning, every time we're on the road. And Jack's like Scott Skiles was like, hey, look, grab my bags.

[01:56:12]

And then Shaq said to Skiles, I'm the franchise. I don't do that because that was the last time anybody tried that said. That's right.

[01:56:21]

But then Shaq mentioned that he goes, I tried to haze you because I hated everybody. He goes, but the one guy who just wouldn't take any shit was Dragic. And because I really Dragic was like, hey, where I'm from, like you don't get it. Like you say whatever but like I'm not afraid of you, I'm not like you're not going to treat me this way. And Shaq was like I think they said they went out of their practice even once and Shaq was just like after that, like I had so much respect for that guy that I was just like, oh, fucking badass.

[01:56:50]

That's Chick. Remember the Chick feud, that one playoff series with him, every check where and they add a whole like background. I think there are some girl involved from way back when, but they were like going at it every I think he's a neighbor now.

[01:57:04]

I haven't I haven't run into him yet. I'm in drag. Hey, I have some good news. CarMax is back on Sunday nights here and the best podcast, it's America's number one used car retailer, you might remember last year. They hooked up nephew Kyle, they gave him they gave him great treatment, he ended up buying a car from Carmex. Kyle, is that car still running beautifully? Has ever legal. Oh, come on. Would you would you name that car?

[01:57:34]

Kyle Maxin?

[01:57:36]

You know, during the covid pandemic era when you watched the guys in the convertibles, you know that people some people have a mask on in their car and then there's some people are like, fuck it, I'm in a convertible. I don't care. I'm living life. That's nephew Kyle right there. Thanks to Carmex with you buying or selling our friends at CarMax or on your side, seven day money back guarantee a car. CarMax, you've got a full week to decide if it's the right car for you or simply return it for a full refund.

[01:58:02]

No questions asked. And if it's time to sell, stop by CarMax today to get a custom offer on your car. You can leave with payment in hand or take a week. Think it over its carbon Karzai the way it should be. A Carmex check met today at CarMax Dotcom. All right. You don't have kids, so I get to hug parent corner. I'm going to tell a story about one of your favorite people, Ben Simmons, the other Ben Simmons, young Ben Simmons, the reliable Ben Simmons, reliable, good shooter.

[01:58:28]

All right. So he's turned 13 in November. Yes. He's been in the same room the entire life we were born. He was born in 2007. We're in the house. Right. And he said the same room the whole time. It was a baby room then five years ago, bunk beds. And it's just he has all this stuff. One day, about two weeks ago. He after he was still nursing his latest broken foot, he said to some changing rooms.

[01:58:56]

And we're like, what do you mean? It's like I'm changing rooms and started bringing stuff from his room to the guest room. And we're like, OK, so he was the guest room furnished already, guest room, had a bed in there and a desk, and it was just kind of like if like my parents stayed here, something they would send. The guest room is like, I'm now taking the guest room like, all right. So on one foot, he starts moving stuff and then finally we feel bad, end up decorating this whole room.

[01:59:23]

I had some music posters. You want to have some music and sports posters from my old office that God knows when I'll be back in there. So he got the Nirvana poster, the the big blue one. He got the Metallica poster, the NWA poster. So decorates this whole room. But he has all this Amazon money, you know, probably like two hundred dollars in gift certificates from grandparents, gifts like that. So he tells us, hey, I bought some stuff for my room.

[01:59:52]

Really cool. What did you get? Here are the two things, my son. But first thing he bought was a Saturday is for the boy's poster. Yeah. Which is a barstool thing. Yeah. So now his bar stool bends. So save them, save him a seat, save up. I'll talk to the guys. He wants to intern there next year. He could probably hang at thirteen. That's out. That's how intense like I'll get.

[02:00:17]

I would get text like big cat being like hey we went to bed early but Ben Ben stayed out.

[02:00:22]

Ben's Ben Stiller. He did. He didn't know where it came from. He just like he's like in the big boys stage right now with his friends, like at the boys. And they had a sleepover the other night. The boys were all going to say so he'd like to set it for the boys. He had no idea with his friends. So now we'd be on a barstool. Ben, the other thing he bought was a giant flag. Of McLoughlin's fake ID from Superbad and I mean Giant, it's like six by six, so you are six by four.

[02:00:50]

So you go to his room. Now, he didn't put the Saturday. He decided he didn't like the SATs for the boys if I got rid of that. I'll see if we get a refund. Big McCloughan drivers ID when you walk in. So now he's got Mikhailov in Nirvana and then he did this weird thing with blue light like blue tracking lights. So when you go in the rooms like kind of blue. See, growing weed and then he has the corner, he's got his guitar and all his music stuff, and then he's got his desk and he's got the Kevin McHale six foot.

[02:01:19]

I did an Instagram photo of it on my masteries. Get that Kevin McHale growth chart, one of my favorite items that I gave them, Kevin McHale that's in there. So it really ran into shape. And we're still trying to figure out why switch rooms. It had its own bathroom. There may be some puberty stuff going on that I don't even want to consider. Just keep me out of it. But yeah. So now he's not sharing a bathroom with his sister, which is the big thing.

[02:01:43]

That's all of it is. It's just not want to share a bathroom with a sister. Like, it's weird because you go through that phase where, you know, your siblings can become your biggest enemies. Right. And you kind of regret it. I know later on, like, I would do anything for any one of my siblings, but from age like 10 to 13, having a little sister, you know, you you just kind of in your own little world.

[02:02:08]

And so for him, it's his older sister. I look him not want to share a bathroom. That's the whole reason I don't grow corn. Wheat. Yeah. Yeah. So so that's what's going on with him. And he gets to cast off next week. Would there ever be a scenario where you would say, no, I just I'm not saying this is even something that you needed to say no to the guest room thing. I'm just sensing that Ben kind of has run of the house.

[02:02:31]

Now, we've said now a few times the one who's upset is my dad. It's my dad. Where the hell am I going to sleep? And it's like, you know, you get to sleep in of room with bunk beds. It's like, what? How did I lose this? What happened? So we got to figure that out. Anyway, that's that's my parent corner. It's it's an emotional time in our house when my son decided he needed his old room, he'd been in the same room for thirteen years.

[02:02:54]

I need I need a bathroom. I ordered a skateboard deck on second a Danny Way H Street when I was thirteen. It was cash, remember, cash on delivery. They deliver the thing to you and you had to have the cash ready. And I thought I was stealing basically like I did. The order ordered it that way. The guy showed up in my parents, like, what did you just do? And I go, I had fifty bucks and I bought a skateboard deck and they were like, what in like now that kids can just go, hey, I the Amazon stuff coming in, that's mine.

[02:03:24]

Well, some people the other one is post-paid, which we do not allow our kids to order post-paid, that as a Pandora's box where you have like a 12 year, it's like, hey, I could use a cheeseburger and a milkshake and then I'll send somebody knocking on your door if I could persuade a guy with a knife or post-paid. So I didn't even think about that.

[02:03:43]

Oh, sometimes I'm on my own case because I'll be like, don't post meit's again tonight. Like, get in the car, get out. But especially with the games back for us in the West Coast, like you're you're up at ten watching them and the next five o'clock and you go wait. You know I actually I can't really leave the house right now but kids with housemates. So what do you do on Apple iTunes. Like what do you do when ordering movies and all that kind of stuff?

[02:04:06]

Like what do you think a track of? I need I should be writing this down.

[02:04:09]

Basically, Ben's not allowed to do anything. He he had a PlayStation thing, but I ended up removing my PayPal from it because he kept buying these packs on 2K and then telling me it would be twenty dollars. And I'd like you to have a job. Yeah. How are you going to pay me back. So I had to shut that down.

[02:04:27]

So my youngest brother is twenty five years younger than me. And so when I was about let's say 35 he was ten and I had been at ESPN now for like five years. At that point my mom was Scott and one time when I came home, I threw my credit card down on the PlayStation thing and out of nowhere I'm like, why do I have like I had it. It was a card I never used and I got a late fee call and all the stuff.

[02:04:52]

I'm like, what are all these charges like? How are their two hundred plus dollars? Are the charges on this card? I never I don't even know where the card is. And they were like, well, it's PlayStation, PlayStation, PlayStation. And I went, oh man. And so, you know, because he was again and again, it's not my kid. So I'm going to handle it differently being my little brother. And I know him.

[02:05:08]

And he's he's a sweetheart of a kid. So I didn't want to be mad about it and be mean to him. But I call my mother. I'm like, what the fuck?

[02:05:14]

What's going on here? Like, he can't just did he just think that was cool? She calls me back and he said. He said, because you were on TV, he thought you were rich and you could take care of it. Good instincts. I like it, he's a hustler. Yeah, he was like, what is what's he bitching about? He's on TV. There's this new video game that they're out playing for tonight is out in case you're keeping track for it.

[02:05:37]

And it is now not cool anymore. It's not that anymore.

[02:05:40]

That ended about six weeks ago for Dave, for the most part. Now, not cool. There's this new game and I can't remember the name of it, but it almost looks like Super Mario Brothers crossed with like some futuristic world where you're trying to advance. And you know the name of this game, Kid Icarus.

[02:05:55]

I know what you're talking about, but I don't know the name. OK, well, it's this new game and Ben saying it's all the rage. This is going to take over. So keep your eye out for that, would you?

[02:06:05]

Then what what bathroom do I use now? Oh, that was Kyle's bathroom. This is a huge problem. Yeah, that's tough. That is yeah. I think you can still use it. That was where I used to sneak off to the room Bentek.

[02:06:21]

Sorry, yeah, I didn't hear there. I think Ben is probably going to lose on that transaction, Kyle, because you guys are close enough. I see how you interact with each other. I think Ben expects you to use it even though he's going to hate it.

[02:06:31]

The other big thing with. That happened for Ben was bad and came out. They actually got delayed, though, didn't it? No, it's out he was, but he was playing it this week. It's still weird, first time in 20 years, no Brady and the Pats. You're going to trade for him. Put him back on. No, I'm excited for Cam. We're all excited for Matt and Cam on our team. All right. That's it for.

[02:07:02]

That's it for Parent Corner. It's fun that parent corner back. Don't forget whether you're buying or selling. Our friends at CarMax are on your side. Check out CarMax today at CarMax Dotcom. Any last last thoughts? Any last words? No, I think I might just make up kids, though, for parent corner to fit in. Are you OK with that? In the future, you can or you could get maybe a. Maybe emails from readers, maybe you could take a readers kids story, or I could just give you extra bench stories, whatever you have to do.

[02:07:35]

I love the Ben stories. I'm actually thinking of ordering stuff that you don't want in the house and sending it to Ben.

[02:07:42]

Well, the big flag, like, how does that even exist? Why is there a flag with why seven Sky Day? Well, the rowsell. Did you check the reviews on it? I find it just so many questions. All right. So here next week, just so you guys know, we are going to be publishing this podcast, Being Rosillo on Monday night, not Sunday night. So Labor Day, Monday night, which should be a fascinating one because that's going to be coming off Kelts Rapp's Game five and then at least whatever the good game for the West series is.

[02:08:14]

So that'd be a fun one. So we're coming back then, but you'll be doing to podcast this week on your feed and then same schedule next week. Right.

[02:08:21]

Anything else to cover? Yeah. Chris Long will be on with me this week, but we'll actually just talk some football. Be nice to do that. And then the funny thing is I have a couple of games scheduled, but depending on how the series went, I didn't want to put them in a bad spot and have them come on and then have the core team just get eliminated. So let's talk about your rotation. So we have a couple of games that are definitely coming on here soon, but we'll figure it out.

[02:08:47]

Russell, I guess I did all my fantasy football homework this week. I held it off this weekend. I held it off as long as I possibly could. But now it really seems like the the season's coming back. So I'm excited for that. I have a question for you. Go ahead.

[02:09:01]

Is it wrong to think Kyla Murray is going to be the third best fantasy QB this year? I'm going to like everybody loves him, OK? When Vic came on with me, Vic was like, that's my vic. That was like kids like Breakout. Yeah, but he he was saying stuff, though, that I think it was real quarterbacking where he was basically saying, like us laymen, they can't understand it, that he was seeing stuff with Cholerae that was like, OK, and there have been other people throughout the season.

[02:09:32]

I've kind of just, you know, talking to different people. And again, these are guys that played or whatever or involved with the league that Murray is not going to turn this into Baker Mayfield, too, because I think that was Cleveland. That was a Cleveland thing they want to like. Yeah. And they they added Bekim. No, but I'm talking about like the hype for got you. The hype for Cleveland wasn't just Baker, it was the whole thing.

[02:09:52]

It was the off season acquisitions. It was the fact they beat all those bad teams in the second half of the year that we should have paid more attention to. But this specifically the conversation around of Murray has been incredibly well. I would say people are incredibly impressed by him going back and looking at the top and seeing what they saw from him. So I think the answer is yes for you.

[02:10:11]

And then the other thing we should probably announce is when football does come back south is going to be here on Sundays. Oh, you are OK. I didn't know that. All right. Yeah. S Sundays, that's all. We're moving to Thursdays. Through the we were going I knew we were going to Thursday, OK, yeah, so sales on Sundays and you could check out if you missed them at at his Extra Points podcast, but you and I could be on Thursdays and there could be some historic Thursdays in the mix for us because we're going to have Thursday Night Football, but then, you know, conference finals and finals in the NBA.

[02:10:45]

And then I think there's that the NBA draft is going to be on a Thursday, too. So it'll be a nice little wrinkle. So then you'll stay through through in basketball for probably first week of free agency and then we'll go back to you going three weeks until the next basketball season. And who knows when that next basketball season is. No kidding, I mean, they're already pushing it back, they're already basically telling us by not confirming it, that they're going to want to give these guys a break, because this is despite the accommodations and the NBA looking to try to do whatever they could.

[02:11:18]

Like Seth Curry, when he came on, I guess, what was your first impression? He's like the NBA is loaded is the amount of stuff that they're doing for us to make sure like this is as easy as possible. But Silver has basically, without confirming, is letting us know with his comments that the six week turnaround thing, he's like, we can't we can't even I don't think he wants to do that to these guys. What I've heard is they're they're thinking about this three bubble thing with twenty game.

[02:11:44]

Twenty game kind of segments, so 10 teams go to a bubble, they play 20 games, everybody goes home for two weeks reset, come back, because then that gives them the flexibility. That if fans can come back, then you're only confined to that bubble for these little stretches and then you can open it up. And so they're thinking about all that stuff right now. And I think everything's on the table. But I. I don't think it happens for February.

[02:12:11]

I mean, we're definitely. The mid-January maybe, I don't know, but I just don't think they could be able to figure it out and they really need the fans to come back, it's a shitload of money at stake. And if everybody's betting on. All right, vaccine by February, March range, and this feels relatively safe, like they're going to want to have the fans in, so who knows? Yeah, we had college football on Friday night, we had high school football, too, I was watching some high school.

[02:12:40]

Yeah, it's funny, they cut it, they cut to the stands.

[02:12:44]

Some people are in and then some people just start. But weird because then I'll all look in. And I was, you know, maybe it's just C.C.C., but I was looking at my schedule and I'm going, OK, am I going to book? You know, I haven't missed Alabama LSU since two thousand. My first game was twenty eight. I don't I don't miss those games and. I was looking into it and then the other issue, people are like, well, yeah, it's come on down.

[02:13:10]

Well, what what does that mean? Again, they're not going to put me. You know, my normal setup would be, oh, all access, but I don't deserve that now and I'm not going to get in a glass of sweet. It's the bubble outside Ham Radio SC fan in the plastic bubble. All right, Priscilla, we'll see you Monday night, eight days from now. Sounds good.

[02:13:32]

Thanks. All right, thanks to Spotify. Don't forget to listen to your podcast on Spotify, best podcast listening experience around. Don't forget new watchbox Monday night. We're doing Cocktail. It's a very special episode, the greatest bad movie of all time. Then Wednesday is going to be higher learning.

[02:13:51]

And if you love the wire, I went on way down to the whole the wire that's going to be out on Monday with Van Layth and Jemele Hill to break down the iconic stringer.

[02:14:03]

Might be his last episode episode. I don't want to spoil it, but yeah, that's what we talked about. So check it out that back on this podcast with two more later in the week. See that?