
NBA Over/Unders, Part 1: The Northwest and Southwest Divisions With Ryen Russillo and Joe House | Starring Wemby, Jokic, SGA, and Luka
The Bill Simmons Podcast- 295 views
- 15 Oct 2024
In Part 1 of a three-part podcast, The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo and Joe House to run through NBA win totals for the Northwest and Southwest Divisions.
(4:27) Thunder
(15:10) Timberwolves
(27:50) Nuggets
(40:50) Jazz
(46:34) Trail Blazers
(55:40) Mavericks
(1:05:45) Grizzlies
(1:17:05) Pelicans
(1:23:15) Rockets
(1:31:19) Spurs
Host: Bill Simmons
Guests: Ryen Russillo and Joe House
Producer: Kyle Crichton
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Coming up, one of the biggest podcasts of the year, NBA Over-unders. They're here next. We're also brought to by the Ringer Podcast Network. Put up a new Rewatchables on Monday night. It was the live show we did in New York City of Silence of the Lambs. Great episode. You can also watch it on the Ringer Movies YouTube channel. It is scary month on the rewatchable, so more horror movies coming the rest of the month. I hope you're following all of our NBA content on theringer. Com, Ringer Podcast Network. Work all of our basketball podcasts. This is our time of year. We love mid-October. Nba is coming, football is here, college football, movies, TV. I love October. It's great. But you know what I really love? Breaking down the over-unders for four and a half hours with Joe House and our buddy Ryan Massillo. We do this every year. House and I have been doing it dating back to the Great One days, and we added Rassillo to the cast. It was like when they added The Rock to the Fast and Furious franchise, literally, right down to the biceps. But we are going to break down over three parts, which will be staggering.
This is part one, part two, part three. We'll go up over the next 12 hours. I'm doing two divisions at a time, guessing the over-unders for every NBA team. Will they go higher? Will they go lower? We love doing it, and we love bringing in our friends from ProJap. We're here. It is Tuesday afternoon on the West Coast, the annual NBA Over Under's podcast, the most exciting podcast of the year. 30 teams, three parts, three guys who have had a lot of success the last two years with this, Joe House, Ryan Rosillo. We are combined. Last year, I was 6-1, House was 3-2, and two, and Rosillo was six and oh on locks. The year before, I was six and one, House was four and two, Rosillo was three and two. That's not nothing. I will just start out by saying this, I don't feel as confident about this year. I thought this year was really hard, Rosillo.
I had a hard time with this last night for a bunch of reasons. Google sucks. You type in something like, Hey, how's Kyrie here at Home? Games and StatMuse is like, I don't have that for you. But Elgin Hayes shot this on back to Elgin.
Elgin, hey. Oh, my God.
You're like, Thanks, Stapp Muezz. It's a big EG. Please print media. Please still exist. The NBA preview world is a fucking disaster right now.
It's really bad. I couldn't even find those depth charts that I sent you guys last year where you could just screenshot each. They didn't even have those anymore.
At one point, I went to the Pelican's depth chart and just had Zion and DeJante, and I was like, Does everybody already hurt? So I think I caught it in the middle of an update. Or then it'll send you these YouTube pages where, again, some videos are good, so I'm not talking about everybody else. But I'm like, if this guy has cried after a round one exit, I don't want his takes on his team. So it's a disaster trying to preview this stuff right now.
That definitely wasn't house because house's team hasn't made round one in six years.
I am very nervous because I didn't think this year was very hard at all. But I am by far the most casual of anybody on this table, so I'm happy. Casual house, it feels fine.
We've been together for three straight days and you were doing research the entire time, so I'm not going to accept Casual House.
It's just to try and get the names right. I mean, all I'm doing is researching the names.
Did you notice that Bill just included the last two years instead of just last year? I did.
I was trying to bump my numbers up. You're still nine and two the last two years.
What's the aggregate? 26 and something?
I feel like two years ago when you were winning, we got weekly updates on it. It was very quiet this year.
We're 26 and eight as a group the last three years. I'm a team player. It's a lot of money. I'm like Jalen Brown. I just want to win titles. We're We're going to do two divisions to start out. So rude.
It's not your team.
That was a compliment. Jalen Brown is selfless. Okay. He's not selfless.
I mean, the Olympics thing felt that's what is left in everybody's mouth, I think that taste.
Not my mouth. I didn't care that he didn't play the Olympics.
My mouth was fine.
Thought he had a great summer.
Great.
We're starting with the Northwest because that is probably going to have the best regular season team in the league, the Oklahoma City Thunder. Their over-runner is 57.5. How has that been monitoring FanDuel, and some of the over-runners have just been going up and down because they're getting this action 10, 9 days. So this was 56 and a half. It was 55 and a half, and now it's 57 and a half. They are minus 140 to win the division. They are plus 340 for best record. They are plus 130 to be the one seed in the West, which I think is my favorite bet of the three parts. Sixty plus wins is around plus 180. Last year, they were 57 and 25, and they added Alex Caruso and Ezea Hartenstein. Rosillo, why isn't this over and under even higher than 57 and a half?
Probably just because of the West. There's some good teams in the West that are going to be completely left out. Then obviously, you just start with the uncertainty of whatever the injury storyline is. But I'm with you. There's no way they're going to be worse. If it's smooth, maybe they're just afraid to set a number at 61 because it's just such a massive number. I'm not going to go through every team's stats here, but their stat profile off the charts, except for the rebounding rate, which was comically low for a team that was this good. And so they've addressed it. And they also addressed the weird gitty problem that they had where they played them in a playoff game, then people were going to sag off of them. And now Caruso adds a space for them. And a better defender, even if you still like gitty skillset, which I think I do.
Well, and then young guys who are now a year older, who got a little taste last year. House, this seems to me very similar profile to the Celtics last year. Really good starting five. They have a bench. Young team that's going to be durable for six months, which I think is important, and I think they hit this.
Yeah, the only thing I think is holding the number back, holding it down, is they're so young. They just made it last year, made their first long longated run into the playoffs.
Yeah, elongated run. I would say it was elongated run. I don't know if it was elongated. It was two rounds.
They made it into the playoffs, and that's keeping the number.
I'm not counting that as your first malapropism.
They are long, though.
They're so good on defense. They're so effing good on defense. They're going to be an incredible defensive team, and they have redundancy at all the positions, and they're young, and there's injury luck that they had last year. But even if that bites them in the butt this year, they're going to be effing good.
They still have that. Yeah, so they win. In 22, they won 24 games. 23, they won 40. Last year, they won 57. In this year, I think they're somewhere in the first half of the '60s. I would say in the 62 range. Seems fair to me. But, Rosillo, crunch time. I guess this is a playoff's question more than a regular season question. But you have Chet, you have Jalen Williams, you have Dourt, you have Caruso, you have SGA, you also have Hartenstein now, you have Wallace, who I think is going to definitely probably be better than it was last year. I liked them last year. Wiggins, Isiah Joe, and other Jalen Williams. I guess my question is, who is their five those six, seven times a year in the playoffs when it's like, all right, who's our five? I think it would be Hartenstein and Chet with Jalen Williams, Caruso, and SGA. But now I don't have Dord out there, and I don't have Isiah Joe at the shooting. It's a good problem to have, But I just don't know what they're going to do. I guess the good thing is they go big, they can go small, they can have a shooting lineup, they can have a defense lineup.
Who are they playing? I think you're right, house. At least they have the option now. That was the thing that drove you crazy about it. We spent time talking about it. The trade deadline would just be in whatever you think of Jalen Williams, too. Space the floor a little bit. We know he's going to take a handful of annoying charges, but they didn't have it. As much as we all like Chet, there's just certain nights where it's like, this guy's getting his ass handed to him.
Well, remember the rebounds in the Dallas series? I think I bet him to have the most rebounds in the Dallas series. I think he had 20 total. He just got his absolute ass kick by Lively and Gaffard. So now they saw that.
If the other team's big, they both play. If the other team's wing heavy, then Dore will be in, and they'll split it up.
Can I make a nerdy basketball point?
Yeah.
One of the things I liked about Hartenstein heading back to the Clippers was when they would put him at top of the key, and they would run offense through him. I was like, What's this? This guy's like Bill Walton at the top of the key. They're like, Why don't they use this more? Then the Knicks really used it. I wonder with OKC what that's because they were so Shay dominant last year. It was either Shay or Jalen Williams. I wonder how much they're going to run and what it's going to look like. It's just an extra wrinkle that I think they needed.
His awareness as a big in his passing is way... I didn't really catch on because I wasn't a Clipper season ticket holder, but some of the stuff that I saw with him with the Knicks where he'd be attacking the rim and the big doesn't give it up there. Then there'd be somebody else crashing, which then encourages everybody else to go, Hey, follow Hartenstein. Follow him, come to the other side, cut off of it. He was just finding guys wide open. The fact that he could still allow that late pass right before it looked like he was going to go up at the rim contested. That's what Presti wants to do, man. He wants to load this team up. There's so many teams, the last one I'll make, at least on this part of it, there's so many teams. When I do the depth chart, I'm like, Denver would kill for that guy. That guy, oh, my God, Denver would love him. Would Ken Rich Williams be with Denver? Yes.
This is awesome. We now have a seventh man. Make shirts. House, is this the team? Is there another move with them? Because I don't want to go through all the pics they have. They They have probably the best batch, I think, of pics of all the teams that have a shitload of pics. They could swap with the Clippers this year. They have Clippers unprotected next year. They have a bunch of stuff down the road. Dallas, top two protected. A couple of Denver pics, near where Jokuj might be riding horses four years from now and not even playing in the Nuggets. Would you do anything? Or is it early in the run here, you don't need to?
I don't think you need You just sit tight. You hope that you don't have any injuries. But if you do have injuries, you have all the flexibility in the world at the trade deadline or even before that to address it. You just try and run this team out there and let these kids win 64 games and grab the number one seed and get on to the playoffs.
I think I agree with House.
I would be willing to do something here, but it would have to be-I just don't know what it was.
I went through the Ringer top 100 and I'm like, there was one guy.
Who's the guy?
Yannis. Granted, everyone would trade for Yannis, but if it goes badly, and we'll talk about this in part two, Milwaukee goes badly, and Yannis is like, I want to keep winning titles, guys. Can you just send me to a place where I can win titles? And then an OKC is like, we have a lot of pics and a lot of stuff.
If they sign Thanasis.
There's one more.
I would do something only because the are going to become so redundant. We're all excited about their depth. We're excited about the youth and all of these things that it can't be somebody that's already blown out three franchises. Harden all of a sudden said, I think I want to go to the Thunder. I'd be like, I'm good.
He's like, I'm ready to come home. Right.
Full circle.
Let's do this. Okay. He's like, We're good.
There's certain guys I would still stay away from, but I think I'd be more proactive, even if... I think I'm picking the Thunder to win the whole thing. Why would you want to disrupt that?
I already have it at plus 750, and now it's at plus 625 because everybody's getting used to the fact that the NBA season is about to get here. That's why this win total, it was 55 and a half six weeks ago. It was 56 and a half three days ago, and now it's 57 and a half.
All their one seed conference stuff People are all seeing the same things. I'm not ready to announce my pick yet. There's one other guy that I thought would be interesting for them is Trey Murphy in New Orleans. Because if New Orleans, and we'll talk about them when we get to them in more detail, but if New Orleans is at a point where there's no market for Ingram, Murphy, they didn't sign to an extension. He's a restricted free agent in a year, and you have to do that. But also, what do you do with Ingram? And maybe the move is you can get more stuff for Trey Murphy and keep Ingram and Ingram's... From an asset standpoint, it makes more sense to trade him. Then if you're okay, see, that's exactly what you need. If you're going to add somebody to this team, it's somebody who's just dead-eye, three-point shooter with size who can just come in and make shots.
You No, that would be unfair. I mean, that would be like the 2017, 2018 warriors.
It's so stupid that they're this good already and they have all of these picks. That's Presty. I don't know that we're ever going to see a run of roster creation also, and then we can do whatever we want. I think in the years that we've talked about this in the past, some people have described to me, certainly not Presty to me, but other people saying he's just going to keep drafting and drafting and drafting, and you're going to know, and maybe some people are lost in the shuffle and it'll feel like a wasted pick, but it just gives you that many more chances to hit on something really special. Instead of stuff like, I love some of the- Well, and to do stuff like the Caruso thing where now we can just put Wallace.
Get in the guinea spot. Also get Caruso, and they can just keep doubling, tripling down. They also have the ability to just... It's like when you read those stories about Jeff Bezos, whatever that island in Florida that he buys houses on, and he's like, Yeah, I'm going to get that house, too. And the guy's like, It's not for sale. And it's like, It is now. How about 75 million? And the guy's like, I guess it is for sale. That's what OKC could do if they want one more shooter. And it's like, Well, we're not trading Trey Murphy. What if we give you three first and we'll give you Wiggins and a pick swap then? And they're like, I guess we're trading them. They have the ability to do that. I think we all see the same stuff. I don't see a scenario where they're not a 60-win team unless somebody gets hurt.
It's the only seven of their top eight guys played 75 or more games last year, Jalen Williams of the eight top rotation guys played the least, and it was still '71 games.
I will keep making this point as we go through the teams. You saw it last year with the Celts, these younger teams with durable young stars are just better bets with overs. Whereas we'll get to maybe there's a team where the best part in the team is announced, I'm no longer playing back to backs for the rest of my career. Who would do that? That might be a team that I'd be less excited to take. All right, so we're all in over for OKC. I'm just going to say now, this is a lock for me. Coming out of the gate with a lockereruny. You guys don't have to decide now, but that's going to be a lock.
It's on the lock list.
Yeah, it just makes it easier this week.
The next one, all of a sudden, it's going to get harder here because Minnesota is our next one. Their over-under has bumped up to 51.5. It was down this morning to 50.5. Then it went back up to 51.5. Minnesota action all over the place. Division plus 270, conference 5-1, title 10-1. One seed, 13-1. If you think they can win plus 5-60. Now, this team, they lost Karl-Anthony Towns and Kyle Anderson. They added Julius Rano, Dante DiFincenzo, and Rob Dillingham. Rosillo, what does the team Built to beat Denver do after they actually beat Denver?
Well, I don't know what the cat market would be because talking teams, it was like, Oh, a cat got traded. Then it was like, Were you upset that the front office didn't shop them more?
It wasn't like, Why didn't we get a call?
This wasn't Pal to the Lakers.
This wasn't the guy in your fantasy league who made a trade and didn't tell anyone else everyone's mad at him?
Yeah, because there would be teams like, Yeah, we don't really know that we wanted Cat anyway. But I guess you just wanted to be asked if you wanted him. But they apparently really wanted DiVincenzo, who, by the way, has turned into Larry Bird in the last two weeks.
I love it. Chipping everybody.
I like DiVincenzo a lot. Me, too. Is this a runaway train? Because it's the cat DiVincenzo trait.
Wow. Julius is upset about that.
Julius is an expiring, and it's like, show us if you're going to stick around or not.
Are you really going to play Randall, Gober, and Nas Reid to close a playoff game? You're not.
You're probably going to play Randall and Nas Reid.
Depends on who they're playing.
The fact that they got DiVincenzo, the more I stare at this, It just seems like the Knicks called them for towns for two straight months. Are you going to put Dante in there? No. Okay, all right. Hanging up. Then two days later, Hey, what about towns? You ready yet? Putting Dante in there? No. Then something snapped when I think they realized Robinson was just not coming back anytime soon. They got him. I think it really hurts the Knicks. But this guy is what they needed. He's a guy who doesn't need the ball that much, who can handle the ball, who's unafraid in big moments, who can save them on the nights that Edwards doesn't have it, or Edwards is being shut down, or Edwards is in foul trouble. It's weird to say this, but I like him on that team more than Towns. I know Towns is way better.
Yeah, talent for talent, it feels insane to go, I get it. When the trade happened and you're looking at the pieces, you're thinking, Okay, well, talent in. Even if you don't like Towns, you feel like New York wins the Especially when you look at the need for the Mitchell Robinson timeline, Hartenstein's gone. You're like, this is really nice because now you have this stretch five option who doesn't have to be the primary.
It's a better team for him. There's no It's a good question. The Knicks are a better team for Tim.
We'll see because I can't stand him. It's been established.
We've discussed it many times. There's a record. But I'm with you.
I thought there were times with the Timberwolves last year where it was like, Jay is not really an attacking on-ball guy consistently enough. I think it's why they- Remember, he died in the Dauciers. Yeah, and Conley just isn't really a guy who's going to be breaking down a ton of dudes off the dribble anymore. I think it's why they were like, Hey, we don't have a ton of flexibility anymore, so let's go after Dillingham, so an on-ball creator. And not that DiVincenzo is going to be running everything, but he can just do so many different things.
It's more uncertainty for the defense.
It's an incredibly good fit. It's such a good fit. In addition to all the basketball skill and everything, what we've seen the last two weeks, that swagger works. It's going to work with this team. It's going to help Anthony Edwards. It's going to help because Anthony Edwards is ready to put his imprint on the league.
You went through- Did you see that clip?
Tell me about the clip.
Which clip? It was a random preseason game. What was it? Sunday? Yes. One of the great days in New York sports history. He gets caught with Brunson on the side. Oh, yeah, that one. You saw that one? Yeah. He's just like, I'm shutting this guy down. Brunson's doing his Brunson. They clear out for him, and he's doing all these different things. And Anne's just with him the whole way, and he's talking shit to him, and then forces a terrible shot, which the Knicks actually get the rebound. But after he did it, Ant did like the, I just hit a walk-off home run in baseball, double fist pump scream. He was like, I fucking locked that guy down. I mean, if you're looking for different types of lineups for a series where it's starting to go sideways because Gobert is getting exploited or whatever, I like their flexibility more.
It also means more Nas Reid. If you look at last year- That's the thing. Nas Reid played 81 games and still played less total minutes than Kat because number one pick, face to the franchise there for a little while, turns the keys over to Ant because he had to, because Ant was the better player. I think Ant did a really good job of massaging all that stuff. But then it's like, I was okay giving the keys to Ant, but now I'm giving him a fucking Nas read. So what's going on here? Kat, they were 10 games over 500 without him.
Right. And also he got hurt every year for 15 to 30 games or 15 to 30 games, whatever. I am in over for this house, and I battled on it, but they were 56 and 26 last year. And we didn't even talk about Randall yet. Randall is such a divisive guy with the Knicks fans. I have Knicks fans in my life who are hardcore. You guys don't understand Randall's really good. He did all this stuff. Then I have other fans in my life who are like, Get that guy out of here. But he's in a contract here. He brings something different to them. I think it gives them a lot of Gober insurance. There's a mutual- Where you can go Nas and Randall at crunch time. You just don't have to worry about the Gober piece.
Yeah, I like that Chris Finch and Randall are on the same page in terms of the incentives. They have the same incentive in terms of the outcome for the player and the team this season. So you're going to get the very best version of Randall, in my humble opinion, because I I have immense respect.
I would say 90% chance of that, 10% chance of people are like, Man, Randall looks bummed.
Why would he be bummed?
Not enough touches? If he's not playing crunch time, if it's a weird fit. My immediate reaction was the ball stopper piece of this with Edwards, and we love Edwards, I think, as much as anyone. But he gets a little ball stoppy from time to time, and then Randall definitely does. I thought it was one of the biggest- The two of them together is weird.
Not only the need and the positional fit and the stretch five that makes the Celtics have to defend a stretch five, if that's how the playoffs play out. There's a bunch of reasons why I still like this for the Knicks, even with my cat doubt. I know we'll probably do more on this then, so it's a bit redundant. But Randall ball stopping was another thing that I loved for the Knicks here because it's a real thing. He's incredibly talented. When you look at all those years, he's putting up 20 plus, I think 26 in one season. You're going, Man, this guy's talented and he can really pass. He's always been able to pass going back to college. But then there's a There's a limitation on who you are as a team with him as the number one option. Even in the rare times the Knicks had, Brunson, O'G, and Randall altogether, it's like an incredible record. It's an awesome net rating. I think if it had played out more and more and you'd had playoff moments, I think they may have gotten each other's way. Now I think it's more defined.
I'm a Randall apologist. I think that when we go back and look at those years of him with the ball stopping, he was the only option. He knew it. That was it. That was like, I didn't have any other way of doing it.
You're putting up 24, 10, and 5 for a couple of years in a row. He was all MBA a couple of times. He might turn out to be the underrated guy in the trade, which is weird because he's good. But we could be in December and people going, Wow, Randall's really good. Didn't think he'd be at this good on the Timberwolves. It's like, yeah, he's good. But I could also I'm going to see another version where it's like, wow, this is still clumsy and it's mid-December and they haven't really figured out how to integrate all these guys. Quick question. Is Towns Ewing theory eligible for either of you guys?
No. Okay.
I think they were- He's the number one pick. He's probably headed to the Hall of Fame with his stats because everyone makes the Hall of Fame now. Just pull up his numbers. Michael Cooper just made it.
Pull up his numbers real quick in the playoffs against Dallas.
Are you with me on pushing back on his self-reclaimed best shooting big of all time.
I've been trying to position that. I need a little more time to think about it. Can I have one more day to mull it over?
I think slow release catching threes are a little different than off the dribble pullups from Durant. I think there's a slightly different... Why did that become like, Well, he's pretty tall. He shoots it from three pretty good.
Yeah, he's right. One of the biggest reasons I wrote my book was because I didn't want people in the year 2050 to think Karl Malone was the best 12 players of all time. Good job. I had to do it. Good job. It really drove me to 700 pages. The next generation of me, I would hope proving that Karl Anthony Towns and Dwight Howard weren't as actually impactful as the numbers in the OMBAs made it seem would be a catalyst for them. Because he is definitely going to be 25 years from me like, Wow, look at those Towns numbers. He must have been amazing.
He is the epitome of this. The epitome. I did this when Derrick Rose retired, He wins the MVP that year, and you understood why he won it. He won it in an overwhelming first-place vote.
It was like 78 to five or something crazy.
It was even bigger than that. It was a massive spread. It was like single digits for LeBron, and then I think, A 100 votes or something for Derrick Rose. In the moment, you're like, Hey, you know what? It makes sense. The one-seed young guy is new. Lebron is being held to a LeBron standard from the previous two years when he won the MVP. You go back and look at that on I'm going to reference right now and you're like, What the fuck was wrong with you guys? I know.
I wrote a column picking Rose passionately.
I like to believe that in the moment, you could still be right, even if the data years later That doesn't make any sense. I think towns is the opposite of that, where people are going to go, Look at these. This guy was nasty.
Well, with that said, perfect team for him right now. If it's in there, if he can be an actual impactful guy who can play four straight play-off rounds- Is Bridge is going to take four shots a game?
We got to save this for the next part.
Yeah, let's save for the next. Last question before we get the overs. Edwards, 12 plus play-off games, 27 plus points per game, 44% field goal, 22 and under. Just the guys of all time who did this. Amari, Anthony Edwards, LeBron James, Kobe, Luca, and Kevin Durant. We were going nuts about Anthony Edwards, and I was like, Slow down. Stop with the MJ stuff. Slow down. I was like, Well, fucking A. He's killing everybody. Can we at least talk about how it feels a little MJ-ish without offending MJ? It would cool. Then round three, it went backwards. Then in the Olympics, he's basically a heat check guy in the Olympic team. But now I think it's been forgotten how awesome he was. I wonder, does it go up a level? Does it actually, as good as last year was, was the play-off to start as something else? That's the number one reason I'm going over 51.5 because I think he really will give a shit week after week during the NBA season, which is what you need for overrunners.
Yeah, I wondered with the Dallas series, in the mistakes, there's some big mistake possessions there with him. But as you pointed out, House, I mean, Kat was 38 and 24 splits against Dallas. If Kat is just hitting a few more of these open shots, they might be playing for an NBA Championship. I know it doesn't feel that way with the way Luka and Dallas all gelled together until they ran into Boston. But I'm with you. I'm going over, even though it's like you're sitting here at the West going, Man, the reason Vegas is putting these projections lower than you would think at the top is that you have to find where are you finding all of these wins with how good 1 through 13 is. But I don't want to go under 51.5 for the amp point that you just made.
That's so good. It's an easy over for me. I don't think the West is 1 through 13 good, which is fun.
We're about to get to. I love it. Let's take a break and we'll talk about the Nuggets. Coming back, we're going to talk about the Nuggets. I just quick Rob Dillingham thing off of Minnesota. Yes. Fascinating preseason stuff from him. I don't know what we're going to get from him during the season, but I'm excited for it. There's a couple of moments where it's like, whoa, they could actually use this. This is unpredictable guy who can just go by people and do things.
They're a good front office. The fact that they were that proactive and then knowing with all the pick tax still do on the Gobert deal, that when they did that, it was like, you know what? It makes you feel good when you're watching me. They're like, they need somebody else going to attack from the other side with the ball in his hand.
What's Conley going to look like eight months from that. Exactly. Because he was running on fumes in round three.
If Dillingham doesn't go to Kentucky, is Reid Sheppard the number one pick?
Well, I think now that we know what we know. Well, House and I, we're going to talk about Richa Shay Island later. I don't know if you've been on Red Fin.
No, this is unbelievable. I mean, you want to talk about an all-time pivot in two and a half months.
Is it really a pivot?
I didn't have an opinion. I'm out on trying to predict guys. The only thing I knew for sure is that the Wiz shouldn't take Alex Sari. Where's Scoop from?
You didn't like the-Croatian?
It turns out Scoop's from Bulgaria.
Now it makes sense.
Now it makes sense. All right, the Denver Nuggets, they're over and under. It's 50 and a half, which seems offensive because Nicole Jokuj is in the prime of his career, and he's one of the best 15 players of all time. They still have Aaron Gordon and Michael Porter Jr. And Christian Brown and Jamal Murray. Now they have Russell Westbrook, which I can't wait to talk about. Joguj has never played with an NBA player. I'm starting to wonder if he ever will. Because we thought Murray was going to take a step up, and it went backwards in the playoffs. Then the Olympics, I don't know what happened. Was he out of shape? Was he hurt? It was awful, man. It was so awful. Now, they're stuck with their contracts unless they can figure out a porter trade because he makes a lot. Gordon's got an extension coming up. They just paid Murray. This is the team. Joguj might go through his entire without ever playing with an OMBA guy, which if you look at the 15, 16 best guys ever, all of them have played with awesome guys and not him.
It's a bummer. I understand the thought process that led the Nuggets to signing Michael Porter Jr to the contract that they signed it to. But to me, that's like the Fulcrum contract. That's the thing. They invested so much in that guy that it prevented them. They lost in consecutive years, guys that helped win a ring. And what they have coming up talent-wise is just not there.
And they're missing pics, too, because they have some pics going out the window later in the decade. So it's going to be really hard for this team to get better, which is how we get to our guy Russ.
He's back. See him set a screen the other night? That was fucking awesome. He's like, What are these?
Six teams in seven years.
Off-ball screens? You can do these?
Six teams in seven years. The 2017 MVP.
I think there should be a... Even though he's an MVP and he's going to go in the Hall of Fame, I think if you're on that many teams in that short of time, you should have to wait a year.
To not be in the Hall of Fame? Yeah.
Hey, you're eligible this year, but people were talking about you being one of the best players in the league, and you ended up in that many different cities in that short amount of time.
But all for the same reason. It's teams that talk themselves into what he does. I thought he was He's actually really good in the Clippers regular season.
Which team did he make worse? I'm going to try and do a little wet.
Well, House is your pro wet because he made the Wizards good.
He taught Denny Obvia how to be a professional early in his career. The guy wasn't going to learn it from the organization.
That was his Hall of Fame plaque.
But look, the guy just got a career out of it.
What are you doing, meth? If Russ isn't there.
It's impossible to say. In Washington. Meth isn't big in Washington.
If only he had been there for Jordan pool in time.
Oh, my God. Who knows?
Russ is playoff team since 2017 when he won the MVP, starting that playoff year, what do you think their record is in the playoffs? Russell Westbrook's playoff teams.
It's got to be a handful of games below 500, maybe 10 games below 500.
I'll give you this, 44 games total What's the record?
Well, if it's 44, it's like, I don't know. It's 27 and 17. I was going to say- 17 and 27?
15 and 29.
It's 13 and 31.
Oh, my God, it's even worse.
Yeah, it's not good.
But it's the whole point. I get what LA did because they had health concerns, and it was like, Hey, his energy alone. But they did it because of the resume and the profile and because active players are so enamored with Westbrook, they're not watching him critically. They're not watching how he fit in. If he has the ball every single time down, he is so overwhelming, athletically and physically. His attitude, he will get you production as you saw in Washington. That's what we wanted from Scoot. But once he is off the ball, it's a waste of everybody's time. Denver is so thin in the bench. I think they were one, desperate to think they were adding somebody. Apparently, Jokuj wanted him there. They even gave him the second-year option on it when it was an odd deal. They're so thin that I understand why Denver is doing it, but I would just simply ask this, closing big-time games, you're not taking the ball out of the best player in the league's hands. So what is Westbrook doing to your spacing? We've already seen that not work at all of these other stops. Once he had to be off the ball, he's not a useful player.
Can I give you the zag? Sure. Can you imagine how amazing it would be if Russell Westbrook, at this point of his career, he was in the 2008 draft, just turned into this amazing Jokage teammate? We were like, Whoa. I didn't realize he could do all this. This is like Bill Walton on the '86 Celtics.
Second Bill Walton.
Look at these back cuts. No?
Why was he hiding it.
That's what I mean.
I also look.
It would be an amazing tag. It was in here all along.
He couldn't get anything done in the Dallas series when they needed him desperately and they became unhinged. They did. They couldn't play him. That's my last. Everybody knows how I feel about him as a basketball player. But that last stretch against Dallas.
If I gave you house, I gave you Westbrook is a playoff asset. Westbrook is waived in January so he can catch on with another team. You could only pick one of those two options. What would you pick?
Playoff asset, because I think this is going to be the greatest feat of the Joker's career. Who has Russell Westbrook played with? At this stage, you got to play with LeBron. That's pretty good. You got to play with KD. That's pretty good. But the Joker is an entirely different animal. All we've seen, the thing that all of us love the most about him. That's pretty good.
Paul George, Durant, Harden, Kauai. They're good. Why? They're good. Everybody's enamored with him. They're good. Yeah, Bradley Beale.
The Joker is different. The Joker sets his guys up. The Joker is team first.
Maybe it's 15 minutes a game where it's just like when Joker's not in the game, can you just do the offense? That's fine. That might be what it is.
For how screwed they are with the roster and the money and the cost. They couldn't match the Bruce Brown thing. That's different. The KCP price is scary for a guy that even in a playoff game, you're like, Did he play last night?
I thought that number was too high. What was he, 7.8 points a game in the playoffs?
If he had zero points in a playoff game, would you be shot?
Is he in? Did he play last night All-Stars for you? Totally.
And yet, you look at what's happened here, and Calvin Booth has been drafting guys. You're like, Okay, that guy's played a little bit more. And then you have just that age-old conflict between front office and coach. There was a couple of years ago where they were so banged up. They didn't have really any offense to close games. And Malone still wouldn't play Michael Porter Jr. Because he was so mad about his defensive lapses. And Porter Jr. Was atrocious defensively. Terrible instincts, always made the wrong read, would jump in his lane that he wasn't supposed to. So Malone, hardcore old-school O. G. Type of coach, I can't have those defensive mistakes reward you with minutes. It's like, Dude, you don't have anybody else. You can get a bucket. And so I think the disconnect from what I can tell is that Booth, he keeps drafting all these guys. Like, Strather maybe has a chance. Payton Watson is fun and athletic, but none of these guys are shooters. Christian Brown is going to go up from, I don't know, is he going to play 35 minutes He needs him to be the 35 minutes of game starter.
It's so bad. They also talk themselves into Sarij, which is like, he's like discount Westbrook for teams talking themselves into him. Remember the Warriors last year? Like Sarrich, like in November.
Good pass or shooting numbers. Sarij. Also, second rookie of the Year voting. It's a little trivia. That was a tough one. It was a little charge for you.
Remember that? No.
Keep it moving.
Over Under is 50 and a half. This comes down to if Murray sucks or is Just can't get it going this year. It's a late bloomer. It's going to be really tough to hit this. But they were 57 and 25 last year. I just can't go against Jokuj. I also deep down don't want to. But 51 and 31, he's the best player of his generation at this point. I just can't. I feel the same way. I did this last year with Luka, and we argued about it, and you were like, That number is too low. I just can't believe Luka is not going to win that many games. I look at Jokuj, I'm like, He's going to have... So he'd have to have 32 losses to lose this. He's going to lose 32 times. The guy plays every game. So I'm going slight over. I don't feel great about it.
Yeah, I'm going under. I think the regular season ceiling for this team is 50. I don't think that there's a move out there because of the contract constraints, but they need talent. They're just not good enough. You can't play Christian Brown however many minutes they're going to play him.
They're going to. Yeah.
Murray's not good. He can't be healthy, and he's not good. So I wish Denver the best of luck.
Well, Murray is good. He just hasn't been.
When is he good? When's he going to be good?
It's been six, seven months. Six, seven months.
How many games is he going to play?
I'm not giving up on Murray. He was so good two years ago. Yeah, I'm not giving up on him. Yes, he was.
We're betting on this year.
Not two years ago.
I thought there was a when was he good throw in there. Yeah.
No, I think you phrased them wrong.
No, it is. We're using present tense.
Sure. All right.
Present tense.
Canada was tough. House is so shook from- No, I bet against him.
I won money betting against Canada.
No, but just him not playing fourth quarters in the Olympics. Nothing. Although I guess Jason Tate didn't either. What do you have, Russell, though? Over, under?
I hate going under Jokić. I hate it. If you look at the last four years, 57 wins, 53 wins, 48, 47. That's a little irrelevant. But there's a couple of stats here that just shock you when you do their resume. They were last in three-point attempts per game, and then they were also 29th in free throw attempts per game. So you're like, where? Now, it's another year. Whatever you think of KCP is, I think we're fair about it. You have to guard them. There's still other nights there. When you look at the depth chart, you're like, All right, back up Russ, Strather, Hunter Tyson, who I did love in the combine, Payton Watson, Sharich, or Zeke Notch. I'm going to go. Sounds like an under. I hate it. Well, I can't go over, over, over, Minnesota, Denver, and OKC. I got to pick one to be an under, and it was a coin toss between Minnesota and Denver, so I'll I have some unders coming for the rest of the division, so I felt fine about it.
I can't go under on Jokey. He's in the prime of his career. I just can't. Mike Malone, that's probably the right-I don't feel good about it. It's fine. It's one of my least favorites.
Eight straightovers for Malone. You're bucking the trend. The under is popular. It's minus 132. Everybody's plowing into the Under. The public plowing into the under.
I would not bet this. We're talking about may not, but if Murray... I mean, even with weird Murray seasons, remember the start of last year? Yeah. And they still won 57. I know. And they should have been the one seat.
I guess the best thing for this is Jokuj plays, right? Yeah, sure. It's a good case.
And by the way, two years ago, when he lost MVP, he took under 15 shots a game.
What it really is, is Michael Porter Jr. Making a leap that we're still waiting.
We're being traded for Brandon Ingram.
Yeah, I don't know. What does that happen? Every quote I get from that guy, I'm like...
I'm just saying, like How do you get to a mid-50 win team?
There could be a draft of when you hear a quote from this person.
That'd be good hoopsite spin-off. Let's do it then. Just anonymous quotes.
There's usually an Andrew Ries quote.
That sounds like Dwight Harc. We all go.
This sounds like a podcast. You guys have shows.
Utah Jazz, over and under 27 and a half. They were 31 and 51 last year. They added Cody Williams, who's had a couple good Twitter montage videos so far. I don't know what the fuck this team's plan is. They just have a shitload of pics and a bunch of young guys. They did not want to trade Lory Markinen. I also don't think they want to be good. My assumption is they're going to do what they did last year, which was they started out '26 and '26.
They've done that the last two seasons.
But then they traded guys who were helping them, including your guy, Fontanecchio. They finished five and 25 down the stretch. I feel I feel like that's who we're getting this year, not the 26 and 26 team. This is going to be an under for me, fellows. Where do you stand, Marcelo?
Do you know why they signed Markanin?
Yeah, because he's really good, and they also did in a way where he's an eligible to be traded now this year. It sounds like- Why would you do that?
Because I think for whatever they were getting for him, they already have a bunch of pics. Nobody made an awesome offer.
I think people did make an awesome offer. I don't think they wanted to trade him.
Why? Who made an awesome offer? Golden State?
I think they acted like they were going to trade him, and then we're like, No, we're not. I think Ainge fucks with everybody.
Maybe. To what end?
But he did this in Boston, too. He'd be like, We're rebuilding. We're trading for Isaiah Thomas. He was just all over the place.
Because Isaiah Thomas was free.
But he's an asset guy. He's like, I think marketing is an asset. If you're not going to bowl me over, I'm keeping them.
Yeah, but they're in a weird spot because they still owe the pick from a Derek Favors salary dump from '21. So they owe it to OKC, of course.
It's either it's one through 10 protected this year, one through eight protected next year. So there's our answer. They have to be in the bottom 10. There's our answer.
It's 27 and a half. Exactly. That's probably in the bottom 10. That's 31 wins last year after, as you said, a disastrous torch job. Colin Sexton was good last year. Some of these young guys, either Quiante or Taylor, Filipowski, it's pretty incredibly cool.
Does this team have the most guys that you've watched tape on trying to figure out how much you like them?
Yeah, because I don't like since a bar.
I'm going to crunch some since a bar again.
Juzang, I got. Jason Preston had the commercial that everybody liked.
Cody Williams, you were fascinated by.
Yeah, I didn't really get that one. And then the Filipowski stuff, it was like, We'll take you, buddy.
I'm enriched by having-John Collins, player option, hanging around. I bet he exercises it.
Playing 26.5 million. We're recording right now, John Collins.
I'm sure on you. Obspa is picking up. Sham Sharani, a BSP. It is reported. Credit to agent at Excel.
I'm going over. Will Hardy. Fuck it. Let's roll.
Oh, my God. Really? You're going over? Yeah.
They're too well-coached.
I think they told Will Hardy, one more year of this, and then we'll start trying to be good. Would be my guess.
Walker Kessler. Because the thing is-Imagine what Denver would do for Walker Kessler.
Well, I think the Knicks tried to get him. The Knicks tried to... They were pursuing him all summer before they finally, I don't want to say, settled about towns.
Larry only played 55 games last year, too, and they still won 31.
Yeah, but the West wasn't what it is this year. I don't think.
Well, it wasn't terrible. It's not like it's a completely different landscape. That's better. Okay, but I mean, one of the other things that was weird about this season, which should make it easier, is that there wasn't that much movement. A lot of these teams feel pretty similar. I don't know if you guys felt that. House did. House breathed through this.
Utah's, we have all these different teams that have all these pics, and she's like, They have a ton of picks. I don't love the Utah picks. You mentioned they have basically all their own except for the one you mentioned. They have a bunch of mini and Cleveland picks for the rest of the decade, which I'm just not that excited about. Cleveland locked down their team. They're good. We'll be talking about them later. Minnesota, I'm pretty bullish on for the rest of the decade, and that's really all they have. The big one they have in '27, they can swap picks with Lakers, and God only knows he's going to be in the Laker.
Is it top four protected?
I think. Is that what it is? Top four?
That's what I have on the hand. You're right.
The research this weekend was- But other than that, so they have good batch of pics, but not any We pick the... O KC is like, We have these two Clipper pics, and they're incredible. We could probably trade this for somebody.
Things can change, though, quickly because you're also talking about 27, 28, 29 unprotected. True. Minnesota is, I think, a top five protected in 20. I mean, who No, it's this league.
Something really weird would have to happen, I would say, with Minnesota because Edwards, by the end of this decade, will be 27.
Edwards will be a Laker, dude.
You think?
I just wanted to see your face.
Trying to think how that's going to be aggregated. Rassillo says Edwards.
No. Laker. No. Simmons disputes Rassillo rumor.
Simmons eviscerates Rassillo rumor.
Without words.
Simmons torches Rassillo take.
Future in Doubt.
You're going over.
Will Hardy.
Okay. I am under.
Rolling up the sleeves. The guy loves a challenge. House.
You're the tiebreaker. I am over. Just out of respect.
I'm winning this one. Over, brothers.
It's fine.
Here's the thing. There's only two bad teams in the West. There's between five and seven teams that are bad in the East, and Utah needs to be in the top 10. Keep that pick, and I think that has to be somewhere in 20s.
I think 30 wins is still bottom 10.
Well, here's the team that's not going to win 30 games. The Portland Trailblazers. Their over-under is 20. They're 80-1 to make the playoffs. Eighty to one. They're 21-6 to win last year. They added Clingin. They added House's guy, Abdiah. You ended up loving Abdiah.
He made a giant leap last year. He really played on this.
The contract is incredible, by the way. Do you realize what that contract is? Four years, 55 million, and it actually goes down. So in the fourth For the year, it's 11.875. So it's the Bob Carrington pick, and then second most favorable of all these three picks in '29.
They lost Malcolm Brognen. They gained Robert Williams back of Celtic Fame. They added your guy, Devante Graham, who swung the playoffs when he made a couple of shots against Denver last year.
He'll get you 20. You get him the looks.
First question, are these the 2024-25 Trade Machine All-stars?
Totally. Oh, yeah.
Wow. I'll give you- Because I have four teams that fit that. Deandre Hayton, 34 and 35 next two years. Anthony Simons, 26 and 28. I can offer you Jeremy Grant, 29, 32, 34. Denny Avdie, great contract for Soulja, spelled it out. Rob Williams, need a big guy?
I think this team is going to- He's not going to play.
You don't think he's going to play?
Well, he's hurt. Even when he's healthy, he's hurt. Remember the '22 finals?
He feels like a February trade. They have multiple guys that I think will be available. Dua Reef.
I liked him a little. Thibault.
Who's that guy they have that I love?
Kamara. Yeah.
They won't train him. He's not available. But I'm going Under. I think this team is going to suck and will be the worst team in the West. House?
It's Under. Yeah. No hesitation, reservation. Chauncey Billups got into the Hall of Fame. That's going to be the thing he gets to hang his hat on for this season.
There was a funny thing at the end of last year that I know we're still a loved. We're DeAndre and put together five, six weeks of good games.
You want the numbers? You want the splits?
But then puffed his chest out a little bit about it. Oh, yeah. You're finally getting to see the real me.
People don't understand that I've accomplished everything except individual accomplishments and team accomplishments. He didn't say that. I'm waiting for a player to actually say it at some point. Aiton is still only 26. Before the All-Star game, he just didn't shoot a lot, and other guys just shot all the time. He was 14, 10 to 56% from the floor. Only 18 games after the All-Star break, but he was 23, 12, and a half. A couple of assists, 58%. He doesn't shoot any free throws anymore. Not that he was a high free throw guy, even in Phoenix. But there'll be somebody that will talk themselves into him as an option because there's some teams that need centers out there. Now, I don't know. You're talking about a significant investment in that.
You mean like New Orleans, a team that does not have a center?
Doesn't have one right now. They might need They would have to get creative. Of course, nothing's really impossible in this league. But I don't think Aton necessarily loves the whole part of you've got to go out there and play.
There's fans outside the playing part?
Yeah.
But See those 20,000 fans that are paid to be here?
He's so talented. He's so gifted physically and all this stuff. Look at those numbers he gave you post All Stars. So he had a nice run. And then Scoot had a nice little pre and post split where he basically just shot more.
Wait, can you hold this?
Yeah, go ahead.
No, the Scoot part.
Yeah, you're right. That should be the end of the Portland segment.
How so they've been better off taking the Miami trade?
Oh, that's a great question.
Hero, Jowich, Duncan Robinson, two Miami first and one Miami swap. And instead they did Aten, Drew Halley, a Milwaukee, 2,029 first, and two Milwaukee swaps. So I'm going to make the case they actually still did the right thing. I just don't think they got enough for Drew. I agree with this.
If it weren't Miami, would you say?
I think... Here's the thing. I was just telling somebody this the other day. Miami and their whole little annoying media machine that they have fucked up that Portland situation. To that point, Joe The Cronen and the poor one people were like, We are never trading with those fucking guys. They ended up making the Dame trade. They get Drew back, and now they're like, Drew's like, I want to be in a contender. We got you. We're going to trade you a contender. They still won't trade them to Miami. The that probably needed them the most. All the shit Miami did that summer led to them not getting Drew holiday, who also would have blocked Boston from getting Drew holiday. Instead, they had to settle for Rozier in February.
What did they do? When you say all the shit they did, they tried to force Portland. What are you talking about?
You were there that summer. They did 90 different ways about how fucking stupid Portland was for not taking their hero deal. We were calling it out on the podcast. All these different media people that, let's be honest, are a little Miami heat friendly, and they were super agro about it.
But everybody else is wrong was my favorite part. It was like, no, everybody else is wrong. So your bias is the right one.
Got it. I think Portland got pissed off because the fact that they didn't trade Drew to Miami Miami? Tells me they were pissed off. Plus, I've heard they were pissed off.
Look, Hero was so bad in that Celtic series. Especially, I mean, Miami was struggling for bodies. So normally you wouldn't be like, Hey, you're checking. We have to put Caleb on Tatum, so you're going to be playing. You're going to be carding Jalen Brown. And those games would start. You'd be like, This is ugly. Hero is a really talented guy, but he probably profiles a little lower than he does.
He wasn't what Portland needed.
I'll tell you that much. And then with the contract, I could totally understand Portland going, we don't need another guy that just comes in that's a high-level shot-making, flawed player and all these different things. I don't know. The eight in part of it, it It depends on what you think of Aiton. It depends on what you think of Aiton.
Would you rather have Aiton? I think you and I were higher on him than most. A couple of years ago. I feel like they needed to nail that holiday trade. Maybe the other team was the Clippers because I think the Clippers were pretty desperate pre-hard in trade to do something, make something happen. And that could have been another place for him. All right. This is an important part of the podcast. It's a new gimmick for the over-enders. We're doing an investor relations call. I didn't tell you this was coming. It's Scoot-Henderson stock. We do this call once a year. We have some Scoot stock.
I wish we only did it once a year. I feel like we do it seven times.
Some call in the meeting in order. Racela, how are we feeling?
We feel like The analysis was correct, but the outcome is wrong.
Tremendous upside. Still, all the upside that we imagined is there.
But we have a guy, Jalen Sugs, down at our Orlando branch, who still is bullish on Scoot, so we're going to follow his lead on this trip. Yeah.
Got to be honest, the goggles freak me out a little. I wish I had known about the eyesight before we bought that big position on Scoot.
The breakout video of the preseason stuff where he said, What did you learn? He was like, The food scared me a bit.I didn't see that one.It's not wrong.
Which food?
They were like, What did you learn about your first year? He was like, Oh, the food. I was like, Fuck it.
Damn it. How about slashing cake? I'm not giving up, but-We can't. We can't now. We're too many shares.
Totally fine.
There's no way. You would just be getting out of...
It's a hold position.
It's a hold position.
It's a hold position.
I would tell investors, though, we've got to diversify it a little bit.
The Nasdaq 500 is looking good, guys. Let's get back in.
You might want to just S&P 20% of your position on this. He was terrible. But here's a stat for you. If you go per 100% Possessions, all players in the NBA, Scoot was the second worst in turnovers per 100 Possessions. Now, he did have that second half. There were some nights, but some of that's fool's gold. Sometimes the biggest mistakes in evaluating are made during those last six weeks of the NBA season where guys are mailing it and you don't really know who's playing. But at least we had something, right? It's like Caleb Williams against the bad NFL teams after a tough couple of games.
You can't even like-Put Caleb Williams in front of three bad defenses, you start feeling better about Caleb Williams.
I can't even enjoy the bad games or the bad opponents with Caleb Williams. Anyway, so second worst in the turnover per 100, guess who's number one? Wemby. So we're good.
Wow. All right. We're journey in the meeting. Over.
Over? Oh, yeah. Over.
So you went over on everybody except Denver?
Did I?
Over on Portland? Yeah.
Why? It's a low number.
It is a low number. It's true.
Yeah.
Well, It's not low enough, in my opinion. We're going to take a break, and then we're going to do the Southwest. All right, the Southwest includes the Dallas Mavericks that made the NBA Finals last year and have an over and a half wins. They are plus 130 for the division, 5 to 1 for the conference, 11 to 1 for the title. Plus 650, one seed. Last year, they're 50 and 32. They finished 24 and 9 in the last 33 games, and then 12 and 5 in the first three rounds. They had a 28 and 9 stretch at some point before they hit the finals. I feel like that's the Dallas team we're getting. Even before we talk about all the ads and the drops, they lost Eric Jones, they lost Hardaway Jr, they lost Josh Green, they added Clay, they added Marshall, they added Grimes, they added Dinwiddie. I don't understand why this team wouldn't be like a, at least a 52 and 30 team. That's before we get into the Luka MVP stuff. Rosillo, is Dallas better, worse, or the same this season?
They're better because I really like what they did. I love Najee Marshall. We all know that. I even like the Grimes pickup a full season with Gaffard and Washington. But then having a lively combination there. Then Jaden Hardy, who I thought was just really scary, except amazing, athlet, coming out in the draft. You've just seen a few moments with him, even if he's just green light as soon as he laces him up. I think they're better, but I still went under by a hair.
It's interesting. Shacked.
Okay. Well, it's 50 and a half, and they won 50 last year. So you're saying they win 50 again this year, 49?
Yeah. I mean, it's just more about the West. I mean, you could even break through some of the numbers where it's funny because there's a lot of stuff where it was like, Oh, you have to ignore the year long numbers because they're a different team now and the defensive numbers are better and all this stuff. And some of it improves. There's a defensive jump in there. Offensively, they're basically They're basically the same. Three-point stuff, they're basically the same. But they were 12th in net rating post All-Star break, and they made it to the NBA Finals.
What about the Super Bowl hangover, though?
I don't see it with them. I got screwed up.
I got screwed up. Wrong sport.
There's a little Kyrie baked into that, too, maybe. Okay.
We did get the very best- Said and did all the right things last year.
He's like Ripken right now.
It's a great point. It's a great... Wow. See, I didn't put Factor into my analysis. The Kyrie variant.
What's 48 or 49? That's what I'm thinking. I don't think they're going to be bad. It's the same Luca premise, but the number was so low last year.
Not mature Kyrie. This is just who he is now.
Maybe it is who he is. I mean, that's great. That'd be awesome. But also the funny thing is he completely skates through having awful playoff performances now because-Really bad in the finals.
Yeah, it's a good point.
I think he wanted it so bad because it was Boston. He's burning the sage and he's talking about all this stuff and none of it matters and what his time. There's a game three- Money is a construct and it's like, yeah, but you really want to stick it to Boston. It fucked you up a bit out there.
Game three, which I watched over the summer when Luca fouls out with four minutes left. There's that moment where it seems like this would be amazing if Kyrie ends up saving the day here and making it a 2-1 series. It was all set up on a platform, and then he didn't come through.
Yeah, and there was a sampling of that and the nets where he decided, Oh, I'm going to try to take this. But it's over. We said this after the final. The boss of Finns should cheer him now. It's over.
It's like when we cheered Rivera? Yeah, just like- 2005 opening day. Yeah, that was awesome. That was the fucking best.
How- He smile, too. Remember, Rivera just started laughing.
But that's Rivera. It was so hard to not like Rivera.
I mean, I hated him, but yeah.
No, but he was one of those guys where you're like, Yeah, this guy's cool.
I think I mother fucked him for eight straight years. But yeah, no, he was awesome.
House, Luca is 33, 9, 9 in the last two seasons. He is 30.9 points a game in 50 playoff games, second behind just MJ. He's 28.7 points a game for his career, which is only Jordan and Wilder higher. He might have had the best six-season statistical start to a career since Kareem Abdul Jabbar has no MVP house. I think he wins the MVP this year, which is one of the reasons I'm going over. I think in the MVP odds, not allowed to bet on it, but I think he's the logical MVP choice this year because Embiid's out. Jokuj, I don't know what he would have to do to win another MVP. I just don't think anyone's voting for him again. Unless Edward steps up or SGA, he has just 32 a game.
I think SGA is probably on the one line, like a one seed with Luka. If you had to do an MVP bracket, who would the one seeds be? It's probably Ant, SGA, and Luka.
If OKC goes 64 and 18, and SGA averages 30. A lot of people voted for him last year. Yeah.
But You did great in the voting.
I would pick Luca because I just would find it hard to believe he's not going to win an MVP because he's too good.
I feel the exact same way. I am super over on this Dallas team. The only thing that can derail it is injuries. You have to say it with a little more oomph in this situation because Kyrie and Luca have both missed chunks of time over the years. But my notes say Luca MVP year. They went 24-9 over the last 33 years.
It's year seven, which is always a Good time. Luka plus 3:30 on FanDuel. Shay is plus 4:10. Jokuj, 4:80. Yannis, 8:1. Edwards, 9:1. Brunson is 12:1. I don't think anyone else has it.
I have them basically taking the place of Denver. In Denver, 57 wins last year. I have Dallas jumping all the way up there and Denver going back down. They're basically trading spots.
This sounds like a lock for you house.
It's going to be close. I have it in brackets right now, but I really like what they did. I think they got better. I think the guys that they brought in are better than the three that they said goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.
I have another question for you, house.
Go ahead.
On the scale of stars reinventing themselves as role players on new teams with 2001, Mitch Richmond being the lowest, and 2013, Ray Allen being the highest, where is Clay Thompson going to be?
Oh, wow. Reinventing.
Closer to Richmond or closer to 2013, Ray Allen?
Sorry about I like it closer to Ray Allen. I think they're just going to ask so little of him. I don't think that they need a ton, and it's going to be splashy when he comes in and hits five threes in a quarter. Everybody's like, Oh, my God, they have Clay. Look at what Clay did. I don't think that they're going to put the pressure on him to do anything. It was too much pressure. He couldn't do what Golden State needed him to do last year. I think he'll be fine for what now he's going to ask of him.
He still averaged 18 a game, but then when you get through the summer and you read some of the stories and some of the quotes and even some of the stuff Draymon and Steve Kerr and Curry said, it really seemed like he was a mess last year, emotionally.
It does seem like that.
I think he had a lot of trouble with the last two years, and especially when he didn't get the contract. He just seemed like a mess. Even people who loved him and played with him forever were like, he needed a fresh start. Now, I don't know what point of his career is at. I didn't think he could play defense anymore, Rosillo. I didn't think he could guard anybody.
No, I don't think he can guard anybody either, but me either. I mean, if you asked somebody to be like, Hey, what do you think Clay shot the last couple of years from three? People would be like, he was like 41, 39. High, like almost 10 attempts per game. I would agree on the defensive side. I would agree on the same animosity in the contract stuff. There was a number out there, and then he didn't take it, and then you're like, Damn, I wish I had taken that. Then it looked like Golden State was totally fine. We're trying to reinvent stuff around Steph, whatever version of this is that we'll get But I like it for him. I like it for him because I just think off of two creative guys that have so much attention, Clay's job is going to be really easy.
Do not leave him alone. Totally agree with this. He averaged 18 a game last year, which I had forgotten.
And by the way, the whole bench thing, remember when we got his... I love Clay. I'm a huge Clay fan. I will always be. And so even all the bumpiness and him being... He was honest. He felt real. He was fucking broadly funny. In a goofy fun way. And if you want to knock them, we've got access to so many of these guys for so many years that there's always going to be somebody like, Oh, I think I disagree with that. But I loved his personality and his approach throughout all of it because it felt so genuine in comparison with some of the other guys. I'm just going to have a hard time being upset with anything about... I hope this works out for him, and I think it's going to be really easy. Like, PJ Jones had those incredible moments shooting from three. But there was a real variation there with both of those guys.
My fear, it might not manifest itself until the playoffs is you're just putting out Luca, Kyrie, and Clay all together. I'm not going to be able to guard anybody. I can't guard anybody with those three.
Just Najee comes in and saves the day. I can't wait for Dallas to experience Najee Marshall.
Did people know?
He took it under.
But like a game. Okay, fine.
Najee Marshall is going to be sick.
There were very few totals where I went. That's stupid.
What's your crunch time for this team? When round two, down to one.
Well, I was still listed as a backup, I guess.
Is Clay crunch time for you or is he a bench guy? Because I don't think he can be a crunch time guy for this team if you're also going to play Luca and Kyrie. No, it's- You're just hunting everybody. You're like, Oh, my God.
Because Derrick Jones, imagine against OKC. Yeah.
That's the thing. All their swings could play defense last year and Klay, unless something changed. All right, so I'm over. Rusillo is under.
A lot of work.
Fifteen and a half in house is over. All right, the Memphis Grizzlies, a team that I have changed my opinion on there over and under multiple times, mainly because it keeps going up house. It's at 47 and a half now. Oh, fantastic. Plus 270 for the division.
That sounds like an under.
14 to 1, one seed. So happy. Playoffs minus 245.
Last year, they were 27 and 55.
Everybody was hurt. They added Zack Eady. Marcus Smart is coming back. We'll see what stage of his career he's in. Jaron Jackson is already hurt. He didn't decide to do it during the season this year. He said, Fuck it. It happened before the season. Jaws back.
You take a special joy in Memphis injuries, and I don't know if it's because of Erna or what.
Is it? That's a little bit of it. No, but they've had bad luck. Brandon Clarke tearing his Achilles. That's bad luck. But Jaron Jackson, I do have suspicions of His skinny body, banging bodies for eight months a year. It's a lot to ask. But now they have Zack Eady. We'll talk about Eady Island later. I am under. I was way more excited about this when it was 44 and a half, 47 and a half with all the variables, with all the injury stuff, with that fact that they're counting on Eady, who I really like. I don't know what version of Marcus Smart we're getting anymore. I don't know if Jaws heads on straight. House is an under for me.
It is an easy under for me because they can win 47 games and I still win the bet. And that's 20 game improvement, which seems like the right amount of improvement for the chemistry experiment that they're about to undertake. And it has been a chemistry experiment, not for three seasons going on now because Ja can't be on the court and triple J can't be on the court.
Experiment is very generous noun. Well, I mean- Because some would say a Controversy-laden three years.
You just want a rotation. Can you have eight guys that are going to play? And they say, Oh, this is our rotation. And then next year, Oh, it's basically the same eight guys. Maybe we saw somebody in. They just don't have that.
Well, they also have. They were relying on these young dudes last year who I really liked, like Gigi Jackson, Vince Williams. I wonder if there's a little bit of a 2019 Celtics thing. Gigi's hurt. Who is? Gigi's hurt.
How long is he out for? He's out like two months. Two more months. He had foot surgery a month ago. I thought he was going to be back in time. I thought he was going to be back in time. Three months. Jesus. No.
Triple J is out.
Gigi is out. I don't want to edit that. You know what? Even the greats miss everyone so much. Hey, you lost track of a hurt grizzly. It's okay. I lost track of the 11th man on the grizzlies. But yeah, it's just That's a lot of variables for me. Where do you stand, Rasila? Over.
Great.
Look, it's my favorite stat. It is my favorite stat of any of the preparation over the last week. 33 players played in the game for the Grizzlies last year. 33. I was looking through minute dispersal, trying to look at all the injury stuff. I was like, Okay, how many games the guys play?
Who was your favorite guy that played? Was there- Maybe Vince Williams. I meant just favorite. I can't believe he played a minute for that team guy.
I thought Jeff Malone getting a few minutes was surprising.
Jeff Malone from the '80s? Yeah. How's Jeff Malone?
He was working in Home Depot, and they were like, the corner three. Do you want to get some run in? And he was like, Oh, pick up. I love this. And they were like, No, it's actually a game. So I have no, the Home Depot thing is not true. Look, they went '51 and '31. They went '56 and '26 the previous two seasons. I saw the recent jaw ad campaign where I was like, Oh, so, okay, this is what we're doing. And in reality, I started thinking about it a little bit more. I think for the grizzlies to be the best version of themselves and for jaw to be the best version of himself is he needs to be without blame. He needs to be delusional. He needs to think everybody else is wrong and just attack, attack, attack. I don't want him thinking about anything. I want him just going to the rim with this ferocity that made us all fall in love with him in the beginning. I think he's paid his dues as far as the punishment part of it. I don't want him reflective. I don't want him to see him mature.
I want him irrationally It sounds like the last four episodes of the Menendez Brothers show. Because he's not going to do- It's all circled around. He's not going to do any of the stuff that the public wants him to do, and that might be better suited for him to just get back on the court and attack. I don't think they're going to have even... There's no way. Bane played 42 games. Clark played six. Triple J actually played 66. Smart only played 20 games. Now everybody's favorite player is Zack Eady, which I think is maybe a little bit too much momentum on that one. The number is higher because of what they've been together. So I'm actually going to go the other way with this and go over.
I love it. It's fine.
I don't feel super strongly about it either way. There were more things that made me nervous about going over than under. I could see them going 52 and 30.
They'd be fine. It doesn't seem likely to me without Triple J, but they also could be a mess. They also could be a mess.Jaw's incredible.
Yeah.
This was one of three teams where I was like, All right, I'm doing the, If my life depended on it, what would I do? I was like, I just Going over on a team that has this many variables makes me nervous.
I like the over a lot more last night.
No, somebody had to take it. Why? What was happening last night? Somebody had to take it. I don't know.
I watched that ad. I think it was the first time I saw the jaw ad and I went, Hey, instead of being upset, and you're like, This guy's not taking any account. I was like, Good.
Well, let's do the jaw around outcome pie chart house. The outcomes can be first or second team all-MBA, all-star, good Are you hard or injury prone or it's a mess again? Where would you put the percentages? What would you do first or second team all NBA?12, 15%?Yeah.
Not very big. That's a pretty small slice.
What about devastating hip dislocation?No, my God. Don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do that. Come on. I would say first team, it would have to be really special. God, they were so good. They were so good there for a little stretch.
It's not like a I'd say probably 10 to 12. All-star to me, seems in the 25 to 30%.
That's the biggest slice of pie to me.
Yeah, you're right.
Good starter, injury prone is probably second biggest pie.
I just don't want to root for that.
You're right. We're doing outcome. Blame pie. Then He's a mess off the court. No. This season goes badly. He's probably 10%, 12%.
This is where I don't know how popular this is, but when we say mess off the court in the historic moments of people being a mess off the court.
Distraction that causes him to miss games.
Yeah, sure. But if you want to go through all the guys-Go through the '70s and '80s? Well, we didn't even have to do that. You can do recent stuff. Ja is not in the same tier of some of these guys that have fucked up.
My guess is All-Star.
But he also... Those guys also were not supposed to be the face of the league because the league was hoping two years ago that Ja would be the face of...
The way that we're doing- What happened with Edwards was what they wanted to have him in his job two years ago.
Exactly. That's all a Nike signature shoes.
Most exciting social media All-Star American player. Edwards took it. There's a scenario where he's awesome this year, partly because Edwards took the spot that was sitting there for him.
I like this.
It's a Zack Eady investor's relations call. We've taken a position on Zack Eady, the ninth pick in the draft. I think he's going to be pretty good for them. I'm excited to watch him because he's a weird NBA player in a league where everybody is looking increasingly the same. I like that he has to be out at the end of games because he can get fouled and will make the last two free throws. I think he's going to be really hard to guard. There's going to be certain matchups where they're like, Jesus Christ, Zack Ead has 18 points in the first half. There's going to be other games where it's like, wow, they can't hide him on defense. I recommend a small purchase of Eady stock here. Small buy, okay. You in-house?
For Verneau, very small buy. I'll add some Eady to the portfolio, but it's spec money.
Rasella?
Look, here's what I would ask, are you actually going to throw it to him in the post? You're going to do that because if we go, who led the league in post-ups last year? It was Jokić with eight. All right? Embiid was second at less than five. So that's not what anybody does. Al Jefferson led the league in post-up touches, like real post-up. That was a great era. I love Al Jefferson. With 20, and it was only 10 years ago.
If you could redo Al Jefferson or D. Brown's career, and you could only redo one, which one would you redo?
Big Al, man.
I just feel like he had bad luck for three straight years with dumb injuries. I know.
I loved him. I loved him because he just-I thought he could have been a 25 point a game guy. He was unguardable on the block. He had great feet, great hands. I don't even know that his body- It was bad luck. If you're telling me the guy that lit it up, sometimes you're like, Okay, well, he's 7'4. I just didn't think a team would actually want to run an offense that way because nobody does it anymore. I guess if you're going to take him in the top 10, then it means you're going to do something that nobody does anymore. I think the number 5 guy in post-ups was Schengen at 3.8 a game. So is Ead getting 10?
Then Schengen got hurt, and then Houston played better with Adam. Right. Wait, what's going on here?
But that's perfect because then you think of the best version of Ja, space it out, let him attack, No help.
Where's Zack Ead when that's happening?
He took two threes his entire college career. I think the Eady stuff that we're seeing is awesome. Good for him. But specific to, I guess if you invest in picking him, you're going to do that. But does that get in Jaws way a little bit?
Then, of course, I'll-So it sounds like you don't want to buy in on the house and out. We'll cover you. Small bit, small taste. I'm a little higher on him, but the Jaws thing-What is it then?
What is it?
Because there's going to be games. They play New Orleans. New Orleans is like, we still don't have a center. We're playing Herb Jones and this messy guy, and we may play Zion at center and Memphis is going to be, that's great. We're He's going to post up Zack E. D. And he's going to score on all these fucking dudes. I think there's games like that. I think he's a situational asset. I wouldn't want against the Lakers, probably not playing them. Against the Warriors, if they have Draymon, it's like, Yeah, let's see what this looks like. Let's post up Draymon a couple of times and see how it goes.
It might be a really successful novelty that I don't know.
It's like a Percy Harvin. It's like those receivers that they're like, Yeah, he's going We're going to run options with them and weird reverses and swing passes. All right, New Orleans, speaking of, their over-runner is 45.5, and they added DeJante Murray and Daniel Thais, Rizel's favorite player. They lost Jonas Valenzuunas. They still have Brandon Ingram, who they made the mistake of saying that they were probably trading during the summer, and then nobody made an offer. They don't have a center unless you count Daniel Thais. Zion's in good shape.
Yeah, he looks Jack. Looks good.
It's awesome.
Looks older and just felt like it was a fast forward to four years from now. I'm an under on I guess at 45 and a half, I don't feel great about it. I think this season's really hard, but the West is too good, and I have too many questions about what this team is going to do defensively. How much is Zion going to play? The Murray, McCollum, Ingram, Zion as four or your five guys just seems super weird to me from a ball who's going to be happy in that scenario standpoint. Those seem to be four guys that need the ball. It just feels like this team isn't the team they're going to be in February. I feel like this would be my pick for something weird. Some trade is going to happen with this team. What do you have, Vals?
I'm in the same boat. I don't like a team starting off the season with a guy that they intend to have on the roster. It feels slightly awkward.
It feels like they're a Wizards team, basically. If you've been in that scenario many times. Sure. Andre Blatch is back.
I was super blown away by Willy Green last year. I thought down the stretch that New Orleans really had an opportunity to make some noise getting to the playoffs. I really thought because they have a really dynamic roster in terms of what they can do defensively. If everybody's healthy, the guy that I couldn't fit that is Ingram, which made him so super-expendable. But he's on the roster, so it's an under for me. I just can't invest in the idea that there's upside. They won 49 games and their total is 45.5. It's crazy. Policy, and the under is minus 132. So everybody's buying the under on this team, and I'm going to go right along with them.
Rosillo, Larry Nance and Dyson Daniels were in that trade for Murray. And Nance was somebody that was finishing games for them and gave them I don't want to say small ball, but a smaller ball. I just thought he was really valuable for them. I don't like the mix of guys enough to go over, say they're going to be 46 or higher. But you're a Zion guy. You made it no secret. Where are you? Over or under?
Under. What happened to the Pelicans I love? Remember a couple of years ago, I'd be like, You You look 1 through 13. I'll take their 1 through 13. It's true. Against anybody. It was for a while. Now Dyson Daniels is gone. Maybe they can pick up Usman Jan. I'll be excited about it again. But Murray hasn't defended since San Antonio. He's got this defensive rep, and I don't see it anymore. I like CJ. I go, Man, Murray, CJ, Ingram, Zion. That should be good enough for a high 40s win total. It should be 49 or 48. Or it's a fantasy Whatever. Look, Zion's 24, and he played 70 games last year, and at the worst possible time, he goes out in the playing game. You're like, Here we go again. He'd played 29 total games the last two years. It's a bit of a Zion thing. As much as I like Herb, and I like Trey Murphy, and I think Jordan Hawkins still has a chance because I thought his shot making in that draft was the most NBA-ready shot making, and you can get stuck behind all these other dudes like a Najee Marshall.
But I think the Nantz point that you made Bill, it may be a precursor to what we have now with the main rotation. Because when you look at that matchup against the Thunder, you're thinking, okay, Valenceunis is massive, and now Chet's going to have to deal with him. And then Valenceunis is getting all these rebounds, right? But yet, Willy Green wanted to close with Larry Nantes because he wanted to be more adaptable to all the ball handling you saw with Thunder. So I think that might be part of the reason we have this version now, because Willy Green even said, he's not the five. We're not talking about fives. We're talking about positionalists. I do think there's some credence to that. But at the end of the day, somebody's going to have to guard the other centers, and it's going to be Herb Jones a lot of time. I think there's certain nights where you go.
I don't like that at all.
Dude, we love Herb Jones. Find three guys, not in the world.
I want Herb Jones like, guarding Luca.
I want him guarding everybody.
Sga. Also, they don't really have other defenders like him because they got rid of Daniels.
He's better than the disaster he was at the beginning of his career.
But even like you're bringing Trey Murphy and Hawkins off the bench, those guys aren't locking anyone down either.
Trey's pretty active, and he's long as hell.
I don't want him guarding Luca. No. Well, I mean- I don't want him guard in Tatum.
I'm going to lose those anyway, especially with a Luca one. This one, it already feels weirder than it needs to be before the season starts. So that's an under from the dog.
And where did their picks go? They have all their first. They have a Milwaukee swap in '26. They have either a Bucks or New Orleans first in '27. And that's it. That Lakers trade has basically paid out because they put that pick in the Murray trade. I said it earlier, I'll say it again. I think trading Trey Murphy might be the ultimate move for this team because I think he would bring back the most and it would solve some of the issues they have, but I don't know what the move is. Anyway, I'm going under. So we're all under on this. Jeez, tough times. I guess we'll find out how good DeJante There he is because there's been a lot of excuses the last three years. And his stats are good, and that's about it. Let's take one more break, and then we'll do the last two teams, which are probably the most fun two teams to talk about. Houston Rockets. Some action today, house. We're at 43.5 for the over-under, and it dropped down to 42.5. They're plus 130 to be in the play-in. They're minus 115 to be in the playoffs. The I wanted to read Sheppard.
This is the most fun depth chart to look at of any of the 30 teams. Schengen, Jabbari, Dylan Brooks, Jalen Green, Van Vliet as the starters. Sheppard, Thompson, Eison, Whitmore, Rasilla's guy, Landell, Steven Adams.
Jay Sean Tate, who I sneak you like for a while. Tate, Adam 12th. I didn't even write him down. Jacques Landell, the Spurs didn't know how to use him.
Is there a bigger high ceiling, low basement team than this. You could talk me in a 35 win. You could tell me they're going to win 51.
I don't know why they're going to win less. Why are they going to win less?
I don't know.
Unless it's just the math of all the wins that are available.
Well, there's one. Actually, I love this theory, the too many guys theory.
But I do have too many guys.
They have too many guys. All those guys I listed are like, I'm better than that guy. I should be playing 30 minutes a game. They have a lot of, I should be playing 30 minutes a game guy, would be my fear.
This feels like a veteran. Look, Stones did an awesome job with the roster. He has. But there's also people that would tell you, you can't do it this way because now you have 15 guys all thinking they're supposed to be in the Hall of Fame. But I mean, whatever.
I'd rather have that problem. Cam Whitmore is their ninth guy. And I guarantee in practice, he's like, I'm killing everybody in this practice.
Or he's looking at Reid Sheppard the first day of practice being like, I'm going to lose minutes of this guy.
And then Reid Sheppard makes a 20-footer in his face. This bumpkin. Yeah. Well, that's another thing. Reid Sheppard might, in some cases, be more effective than Vanv lead. They have these situations where on the one hand, you could say, Well, their bench is going to be awesome. On the other hand, they're going to be in these weird situations where somebody might be playing over somebody who's finishing games.
We already talked about the Schengen part where they- We have not.were.
They were better without him. Better without him. Jaba Smith looked great as a stretch five, basically.
If there's any coach that I trust to figure it out, it's even- I was really scared what you were going to say there when you paused.
You were like, If there's any coach I trust, I was like, No house. No. To figure it out. Good. To figure it out. Good spot.
Yeah. We've moved beyond. Yeah. No, I think that Houston is super duper exciting, super loaded. To me, the biggest challenge is figuring out Jalen Green. They got to figure out what they're going to do with that dude. Not sure that he's...
I feel this is the best I've felt about him.
Oh, well, that's great. Okay. Well, that helps me. It's a super over for me. I love this Houston team. I think they're going to be battling for seven, eight. I I think they're going to have a high enough record that they might host the 7-8 play in.
I'm intrigued by the Jalen Green question, too, Rosillo, because what did he was like 27, 28 a game there for a month. It was when Shingun went out.
I think it was the OKC game last summer.
They were real moments where it was like, holy shit, this guy's figured it out. But there's a lot of guys in this team who need the ball.
Yeah, it used to be a bunch of guys basketball without each other. It was four famous people on a podcast that have all had a really good run, and they're like, Let's start a podcast this week. And you're just like, What the fuck are you guys doing? That's how the Rockets used to look. I used to enjoy how much I hated it. I'm serious. I'm like, These guys are so...
And then- Well, we used to have that joke about whoever got the ball over half court got to shoot.
Exactly.
But I didn't feel like they were like that down the stretch last No, but I think the Van Vliet, Dylan Brooks numbers that even though when they came out, you're like, oh, my God, what are you paying those guys?
People were making China jokes for Dylan Brooks after that Lakers series when he was in Memphis. They're like, Or I'm going to get 60, 80 million bucks. What happened was, I think a couple of adults in the room and Jalen. See, if I'm a Rockets fan, I love how talented Schengen is, but I can't unsee what that stretch was like.
It's a higher ceiling with how we know basketball is played, where you have to have a guy like Jalen Green. And Schengen, it's a little more mixed on, can you win four straight rounds or the guy you're running an offense through?
And I'm starting to worry about Chabari not showing enough of the high stuff where ball handling was a question for him coming out of Auburn. And he just doesn't really get... There's a lot of like during the bad Jalen stuff, I'm like, Can you guys find him once in the corner? And it didn't seem like they wanted to. So I can't wait for Reid Sheppard dynamic of all of this. This Sheppard, because it was a team that did not shoot the ball well last year. They were 23rd from three house. They actually were better offensively than maybe you think 20th. But the thing is, this is a young team that played really good defense So can you live with Van Bleet and Sheppard at the same time? I don't know. It's endless. It's worth it.
Is this your number one League Pass team house?
They're super high up there. Definitely.
Because if Sheppard is really good. If Sheppard is like Mark Price in the early '90s, this might be the number one League Pass team for me. Super fun to watch. If he's just coming off the bench and just lighting dudes up.
I can't wait.
I can't wait either. This is the I can't wait team. We all have to go over on this team.
I mean, 42 and a half. Yeah. Come on.
The fact that they have the same over and under as the Lakers is hilarious. It's honestly hilarious. They have so much more talent than the Lakers.
I just love them, Bill. It's-right. No, I know.
West teams you'd want to be next five years. Will we all agree, OKC is first? Yeah. Is San Antonio second? Because you get Wemby.
I know. I only can see Wemby.
I'll give you six teams. Okc, San Antonio, Minnesota, Houston, Denver, Dallas.
I have Minnesota second because that's how much I believe in Edwards.
I have Minnesota second for the same reason.
Over Wemby?
Yeah. Because the team is- I have San Antonio second. The team is already there.
That kid's going to get a bunch of runs to the NBA Finals.
Because they have so many picks to play with, too, with them.
Yeah, and Minnesota is- Minnesota is like, this is the team.
But I think Houston is probably four over Denver and Dallas just because Way over Denver.
Way over Dallas? Okay, but here's where I have Dallas.
But that's where you have Jokaj and Luka.
I would have Dallas higher than Houston.
Because you know you're getting there.
You already are getting somebody who's going to go down.
That's a You're right.
The whole point of Houston is you're hoping one of these guys is it. You're right. With Luca, with this start.
You have to put Denver and Dallas.
As you mentioned, the first five years of Luca start, wouldn't you put that in perspective for the other seven guys are?
No, you got to unbubble those. Why would you have Denver over Houston? Denver is going nowhere.
Because I love Jokuj.
Denver is dead man walking.
Can people stop pretending Jokuj is going to quit in two years?
I like it.
I hate this.
No, I'm doing it because I wanted it. You did it twice already. I hate it. I wanted to get mad at it and be like, No, I'm actually going to play until I'm 40 in America.
A guy has a fucking interest, God forbid.
It's like in the Sopranos when Tony got the horse. That's Jokuj. He just likes going to the barn.
When Chris wanted to write screenplays, Tony was like, and then he invests in Cleaver. It's like, what the fuck, man?
Stay consistent. I feel like Cleaver was a good idea. House and I watched some Sopranos last night.
Loved it.
Yeah. Very. Guess what always delivers? The Sopranos.
So It's always good. Although if you binge it too hard, you could start being like, Am I in a bad mood?
It's like those hospital shows relate that, too. The Doc is great. So he binge Grey's Anatomy. The Doc was really good.
Yeah, it was really well done, well-executed.
Three overs for Houston. San Antonio Spurs, 35 and a half. This is the most- Yeah, everybody was going to take the over no matter what, so they just said, Screw it.
We're putting this number as high as we- They're just daring you.
It It was like last week in the Eagles game, the Eagles ended up there, they were favored by nine and a half over the Browns because people like Fandil were like, You don't want to take Deshaun Watson. We're just going to keep raising the line. I bet if we put it at nine, you Still don't want to take to Sean Watson. People are like, I don't want to take to Sean Watson. You're right. This line, they're like, You love Wemby. They have on the FanDuel thing, they have a Wemby special. You just have all these, Will Wemby have a quadruple double? Will Wemby have a 30, 20, and 10? Anyway, it's 35 and a half. It's way too fucking high. I don't see any scenario where they hit this. It's preposterous. It's preposterous. It's preposterous. I don't think they want to hit it.
He can't play all 82 games. The only way for them to win 36 games is for him to play 82 games.
Their starters are going to be Wemby, Sohan, Harris, and Barnes.
Yeah.
Adults in the room. Dev, Vassell, and CP3. Then Castle coming off the bench Keldon Johnson and Zack Collins and Trey Jones. It at least looks like an NBA nine-minute rotation, finally. They check that box.
Sohan is not playing point guard this year?
He's not going to play point guard and run actions. Rasella, what's the Wemby ceiling for you this year?
Because I was- Jesus.
Baby Jesus.
I was looking at all these props. So on Fandall, 24 points per game is minus 390. Five plus assists game is minus 150. 20. 12 rebounds a game is minus 230. And for him to be the block's leader is minus 480. Those are all like they're saying- All on the board because I think you have to break this team into pre and post All-Star. A hundred %. Which is why I landed at Could Wemby average 24, 12, and five and win the blocks title? And from what we saw the last two months, I think the answer was yes.
It was 24, 12, and five.
In 22 games after the All-Star break, that's exactly what it was.
23 and a half points, 12 boards, five assists. The assist stuff is He took seven threes a game in the second half, hit 33 %. That's going to get better. Yeah, the turnover number that I mentioned earlier was scoop. But it's four and a half blocks after that, and the Spurs went 11 and 16. And I think eventually, years from now, maybe it's already now, but I know the defensive player of the year voting that I was arguing for that I knew I was going to lose.
You were like, what revolutionary war guy were you like, where you're going to be on the right side of history?
Lafayette. Yeah. That might be the best answer I've ever come up with.
That was pretty good.
You were like Lafayette.
You tried to tell everyone.
Yeah. Like, Guys, just saying. Look, I think they were two different teams. Look, was Chris Paul just there to throw an entry pass to Weminyama? Thank God.
Can you imagine in practice when Chris Paul threw him an entry pass and Weminyama was like, What the hell was that? I put my hand out and you just sent him bounce pass and it went to where my hand was.
Did I tell you I ran into Chris Paul in the Vegas, in the Fountain Blue in Vegas for Summer League? It was after I'd had him for the live show. I was coming down to the lobby and then he comes up and it was just two dudes glowing in it. We talked about officiating for 20 minutes.
Officiating then Wemby?
Yeah, we didn't even really get to Wemby. Just officiating? Yeah. It was one of those things that, thank God, I'd had the live show to tie it all up together. But he was pumped. He was so pumped. I don't know if a player would ever be like, Yeah, they were my only option. But he just was so pumped about... At the end of my career, I'm going to play with this guy. I think whatever you think about Paul... I bet you when Baniama is just fired up, man. This Sohan experiment that was ridiculous. I don't think Keldon Johnson is this bad. I think Vassell is pretty good. We'll see what they have with Castle. There's a few other young guys. There's contracts here that aren't that great, but 36 wins.
I like Castle. Sadly, I have to do this. Just let House and I talk about this. You don't have to participate. House, are we sure Chris Paul has anything left? So last year, Roussel, sit it out and have a drink. Last year, 58 games, 6.4 minutes a game. 9.2 points, 6.8 assists. He's 39. He turns 40 in May. Here's the list of 39-year-olds guards who have averaged four assists a game. John Stockton. Nobody else. In fact, only 11 players total have been 39-year-old guards in the NBA. He's not only old, there's really no historical precedent for this. You're talking about end of the year, end of the career, Derrick Fischer on OKC, Darryl Armstrong, Jason Terry, Vince Carter on Memphis, How many games does he have to play?
Let's look at his assists over and under.
Right. I was trying to think, what's the best case, worst case scenario for Chris Paul? Because I thought he looked closer to maybe being on the end of the line last year. Sure. What's the comeback year from that? Is it 65 games? And he averages eight assists a game. He was 8.8 two years ago.
I think that's perfect. I think that's all that San Antonio is asking for. I think he can do that. I don't think that they're going to be asking, putting him in the position. Golden State needed him to be good. Golden State needed him to compete.
Because of Curry and just the weird team they had, they actually needed him to play defense. Now Wemby is protecting him.
I like it. I think it's a best-case scenario.
There's really no statistical evidence other than John Stockton that any 39-year-old point guard can play 30 minutes a game.
I don't know that they're going to ask him to do that. I can't imagine Popovich would ask him to I just think a nice entry pass a couple of times a night is going to be an awesome field. I think it's fair.
I'm going to read you, Best Big Man of the Last 40 Years, Year 2. Tim Duncan, won the title.
Bob Pettit.
No, I'm not going back that far. Kareem, I guess 50 plus years. Kareem won the title. Hakeem lost in the finals in year two. Khawns, 56 wins. David Robinson, 55. Shaq, 50. The admiral.
I'm familiar.
Patrick Ewing. There are only 24 wins for Patrick Ewing in year two. If you're making the case for the over, there's a, Hey, look at all the greatest big men ever. Those guys were actually fucking awesome in year two, but they were all there in a different situation.
Those teams were pretty.
I'd bet four years in college. Yeah, Ralph Samson, year two. They were in the playoffs, at least. But the picks are what's really fascinating with this team. They have Atlanta's unprotected first this They have a swap with them in '26.
That's what's crazy, too. The Murray like Bill coming due now for Atlanta.
Yeah. Oh, it's coming. A swap '26, and then they get the Atlanta's '27. They have a Boston swap. They have a Dallas swap. They have two Minnesota swaps, and they get a Minnesota pick. Sorry, one Minnesota, one swap. They have a Sacramento swap, and they have all their first. So when they decide, Yo, this guy would look great with Wemby, who are we saying last night It would have been unbelievable with Wemby?
I know this is going to sound funny. It was Ben Simmons.
Great.
We didn't say it.
You didn't see Ben Simmons last night, apparently. We were saying Theoretically, we were saying, Theoretically, the guy we were watching in some random terrible exhibition game, the stuff Ben Simmons was doing.
The Brooklyn Nets against the Washington Wizards.
House made the point. Ben Simmons. If you took this person and he could rely We do this over and over again, this is a very good teammate for Victor Wemmenyama.
He's like a second-round top 45 protected swap. I can't wait for the next Ben.
Brooklyn's like, I can't believe this. They're calling about Ben.
We'll do it. We'll wait for Brooklyn.
I do think it would work. I still think it.
So we're all going under. Under, what was it? Thirty-five and a half. Yes, it's fine. Okay, that's it. Should I roll through these one more time just so we have them? Okay. Because I wrote everything down. Oklahoma City, over, over, over. Fifty-seven and a half. Denver, Me and a half. I went over. Rosillo and house went under. Minnesota, 51 and a half. We all went over. Utah, 27 and a half. I went under. Rosillo went over. And house went over. I was surprised by that one. Portland, 20 and a half. Me and house went under. Rosillo went over. Dallas, 50 and a half. Me and house went over, Roushula went under. So you zaged against us. You did some zagging. Memphis, 47 and a half. Me and house went under, Roushula went over. New Orleans, 45 and a half. All three of us went under. Houston, 42 and a half. Heavy, hardy, enthusiastic overs from all three of us. What do the Houston fans do, by the way, when we're super enthusiastic about their team and we all go over and they're like, But you fucking hate us.
I don't think there's any fan base that hated me more than Toronto, and then Houston would be number two.
These guys still hate us.
Are you still impersonating Houston? What's going on over there?
I don't even think that's an accent from Houston.
They're like, Tommy, they all went over. No, they fucking hate us just deep down.
What the fuck are you doing right now?
I went to do a Southern accent.
I want you to do the Southern accent.
It was a bunch of accents. They're fucking Rosillo's all over us all the fucking time. That was a little better. I'll work on it.
I'll work on it before we get to part two.
I don't think there's a Houston accent.
Well, I know whenever you get it the first time.
Texas, it's an accent.
Yeah. I think there is a Houston accent.
Listen, I'm just workshopping shit, guys.
You're like the guy in the Boston Marathon movie in Walbrook. It's like, Fuck, who casted this guy? Tell him he can't do it.
Last one is San Antonio, which is 35 and a half, and we all went under. That's it for part one. Thanks to Kyle Creighton. Thanks to Gehow. Thanks to Steve Cerruti. Is he even watching this? Is he on there? Hi, Cerruti. We're coming back for part two, so be ready. On the wayside, let'a run, say, I don't have a few years with them. On the wayside, on the Must be 21 plus in President Select States for Kansas, an affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus in President DC. Gambling problem? Call 100 Gambler or visit rg-help. Com. Call 188-789-7777 or visit ccpg. Org/chat in Connecticut or visit mdgamblinghelp. Org in Maryland. Hope is here. Visit gambling helpline ma. Org, or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support, Massachusetts, or call 1877-8 Hope, NY, or text Hope, NY, in New.