Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective - Dame Returns to Portland, Beal Buyout Reaction For Clippers & Suns + Bad Injury News For Mavs & 76ers

Episode Date: July 18, 2025

Brian Windhorst is joined by ESPN's Tim Bontemps and Tim MacMahon to react to Dame returning to Portland, Bradley Beal’s buyout including how it could help lift the Clippers to the top of the West and where the Suns go from here before talking the latest injury news for Paul George & Joel Embiid for the 76ers as well as Dereck Lively’s injury for the Mavs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, sports fans, the ESPN app has all of ESPN all in one place. The ESPN app is your home to thousands of live events, ESPN shows, and originals across every ESPN network and service. And now you can check if you already have ESPN Unlimited as part of your TV package for no additional calls. Visit activate.esPN.com to learn how to access your account or sign up, then start streaming in the ESPN app. It's all of ESPN all in one place. Sign up or activate now. Hello, welcome to Hoop Collective podcast. We talk about the NBA, which we are doing on, I guess, it's Friday morning for Tim Bontemps in Portugal. Is that right?

After midnight on Friday morning here in Portugal, yes. All right. And it's Monday evening for the rest of Monday. And it's Thursday evening for the rest of us. You did so good on the time today. You've got all the times right earlier. You got the times right right now. it was going so well, but then we couldn't quite land the plane.

What is this hat, by the way? This is a new hat. Yeah, but here's the thing. We recorded the full pod earlier. Seriously, what is that? Ireland. Ireland. The open championship is going on in Ireland this week.

There are a European hat situation right now. Yes. So we recorded the whole pot earlier. And then we had a piece of breaking news. And that's what we're going to talk about here before we pick up with McMahon, who's flying back from L.A. right now, back home to Dallas. So, all right, in what I think has to be termed, a feel-good story and one of the greatest contractual maneuvers that the NBA has ever seen, but we'll push that off,

push that off. Dane Willard is going back to the Portland Trailblazers on a two-plus-one deal, two years plus a player option, basically at the mid-level exception, $42 million. $1. Bontemps, great for the Plale Blazers fans for the 2025-26 Trailblazers. I guess it'll be nice to have Dame Lillard there. We're going to push the contract off, but I guess it'll be a fun press conference. Yeah, I mean, my first thought when I saw this, as you'll appear later, there was a rehearsal dinner tonight in in Lisbon, Portugal, where I'm at for this wedding. You must, you sound stone cold sober, so you must not have had that good of a time at it. Well, I have a young son who didn't really want to sleep.

So I spent about two hours trying to put him to bed. But after I got done with that, I walked out of the room. And a few minutes later, I got a tweet from Shams announcing that this Dane thing was happening. And the first thing I thought was, this is an awesome story. Like you said, Dane going back to Portland, super cool, you know, gets a no trade. clause, which I think is extremely smart by Aaron Goodwin and Dame's management team to make sure that he has some control over his future because that is a, you know, that's the kind of mid-sized salary that could easily be putting a trade later. So good for him to have that locked in. And yeah,

to your point, it's the Blazers who seem to be wanting to try to win this year. That's all the indications that we've gotten from them. Well, you don't trade for Drew Holiday. Right. Trading for Drew Holiday, all the other stuff they've done. Now is $40 million essentially in dead money on their books for the 25, 26 season. That is a very hard thing to square. Now, the dame thing in a vacuum honestly totally makes sense to bring him back to Portland

on a mid-level deal. I think he's going to be probably at worst a third guard next year. Like, that's fine. You know, if he is anywhere near, you know, if he comes anywhere remotely close, the player was before the injury, that's a huge win for making 14-ish million next year. But I just don't really get what Portland's trying to do in general.

Like, are they, like, they have this roster that doesn't really make a lot of sense. We've talked before about they've now drafted centers in back-to-back years. They draft Yonge Johnson 16th overall after drafting Donovan Kling in the year before. Can they actually play together? I don't know. They have, they have, they've had Scoot Henderson and Shaden Sharp that they drafted high in the lottery the last couple of years. They haven't been starting. They've been starting behind veterans. They've been blocked. Seems like Scoot's going to start now, but they also trade for Drew Holiday. They also now have Dame, even though Dame's not going to play this year. Payton Sharp, I'm still don't think he's going to start as I think a 23-year-old

fourth-year player. We still don't really know what to make a him. They trade for Danny Obvia on a great contract. He's a very good player, but by the time they're really ready to win, in theory, he's going to need to pay a lot more. They didn't trade Robert Williams when they seem to have opportunities to, and now he's been hurt again,

and I don't think he has any value on the market. I just, it's just hard to really square what it is they're trying to do in general. And I know that doesn't really matter because we probably should just be talking about cool it is that Dana's going back, but, you know, I just keep looking at the Portland

roster and the moves they've made, and I just don't really see what the strategy is. Okay, so let's acknowledge at the start here that it really, really sucks that Dame Willard had that injury. When it happened in the calendar, which probably wipes out all next season, as he was coming back from a blood clot at lightning pace, I'd never seen anything like it, to try to help the team, you know, try to get Janus on a playoff run, that, you know, he was It was a tough situation for him in Milwaukee because he didn't envision himself going there. I want to acknowledge all of that.

And I want to acknowledge that he really just wanted to go to his adopted home of Portland and that's where he was going to rehab. And now he can rehab. Like all of that is cool. If you're a Blazers fan who've really kind of been in the wilderness the last couple of years,

you're really excited about Yang Hansan. My friend from Shanghai tried to tell me how to stay it the other day and I still don't get it. That's it. Yang Hanson. It's very simple. Yeah.

Anyway, you have to be really excited about him. You're seeing him doing some stuff in Summer League. So even though the Blazers are really underneath, you know, probably 10 or 12 rosters that are better than them, you know, okay, maybe I'll give them the edge of the play in. You know, there's some things to be excited about and the idea of Dame Willard coming back and being in a Blazers uniform where you have great memories of that decade where he led them to all those playoff victories and those great moments in the Western Conference finals one year. like let's acknowledge that all of that is awesome. Or in the case of Dame unfortunate and he deserved a break. We spent a lot of this upcoming podcast talking about the sons buying out Bradley Beale. We talked a lot previously about the bucks buying out Dame.

The Blazers will almost, not quite, but almost have as much money as Dame and Beal are costing those teams on the books just for this year. Combined. Dame and Beale combined. almost what they've got on the books. And this is a jaw-droppingly historically great contract. Maybe it is just less. I thought it was more. But yeah, no, it probably is just less. Okay. It's an crazy amount of money. Yeah, I think Dame is 23 on the Buc's books and Beale is 19 and change. So call it 20. So 43 and this is going to be a little under 40. Whatever. The point is, the point is it's wild that they're going to have $40 million in dead money. And this is a history. historically unbelievable contract situation because this is like I said, this is a two plus one.

So Dame is committed to the Blazers for two years. Now I'm sure he intends to not play anywhere else. I'm not saying he is, but he could obviously opt out. Let's say if he comes back in his grade, he could opt out. So he's committed to the Blazers for two more years, for which he will be paid $28 million. But he's only going to play one of those years because he's going to miss this season. So Dame did a deal where he's going to get paid $28 million to play one season with the no trade clause. while he is getting $23 million in buyout money from the bucks. It is a brilliant, wonderful turn of events for him.

And karma says you should have got it. The other thing I want to say is one more thing. And correct me if I'm wrong, Bontemps, Dame in fact did ask for a trade from the Blazers. Now, you can say that it was okay that he did that because they were going another direction. they were skewing young. And I agree with that.

But Dame was no longer in Portland because of his personal decision. So yes, he's coming back on this is wonderful. But it wasn't like he was sent away because the Blazers decided to, you know, decided to send him away. He asked to be traded. So I know that it was a bad ending. There was some hard feelings and this will be, you know, this will salve that over. But like, am I being a jerk, Pontemps for saying that?

The relation there was pretty weird at the end. You know, like we talked, we talked about a lot at the time. I don't really, I still don't really understand the Blazers position during the negotiations in the Dane. Again, another thing, it was just hard to really follow. They didn't, Miami was very interested in trying to talk to them about Dame and they simply refused to talk to Miami at all. And, you know, the Bucks came out of nowhere and got them a deal. And, like, you know, they sort of fell into their lap and they did a nice job with it. They've now turned around and traded for Drew Holiday anyway again.

Right. Very odd. The Drew Holiday and Dame Lohr are both on the bucks now. It's very strange. Yeah. The roster doesn't make a ton of sense, but I'm not going to stress about it because that who knows what the roster will be in a year. No.

Yeah, I know. It's just funny that because of two torn Achilles for two different players, Damon and Drew Holiday, who were traded for each other, we're now on the Bravesers together. That's just a strange coincidence. But yeah, I mean, look, though, it's a surreal thing. for him to be back in Portland, I think it's a super fun story. You know, we're going to talk later about Devin Booker and maybe him staying in Phoenix.

I think it's really cool. You know, Dame, obviously, has had an unbelievable career and some of my favorite moments watching as a fan over the past 10 or 15 years have been the Dame shot to beat the shot to beat the Thunder. I mean, you can argue that the reason the Thunder won the title is because of Damien Lillard because that shot he hit. That's a long journey, but I get it. That's a long journey there.

Back in 2019, well, back in 2019, that shot that he hit, that ended that Russ, B.G. Carmelo team like that. They blew that team up that summer. Obviously, Russ gets traded to Houston. Paul George gets traded to the clippers to get all the stuff back. It turns into J. Dub and Che and the rest of this history, right? But, but yeah, it's a very cool story. And I'm really happy for Dane.

He's one of the best dudes in the league. Like you said, stopped seeing him get hurt, especially the way he came back in record. time from the blood clot and it's going to be really fun to see the letter all in a portland form again in a year in 16 months or something it is it is just an incredible piece of work for them to get $20 million and again I do think that Aaron Goodwin deserves a ton of credit for getting this no trade clause because look we've talked about it there's uh there's the ownership change on the horizon in Portland there could be all sorts of changes that come with that maybe they would want to use Dames salary to trade in a year or whatever. And now that's off the board. And Dane's going to get

to stay there as long as he wants. He wants to stay there for three years. He can be there for three years. He wants to be there for two. He can be there for two. You know, it's good for him. And it's going to be a fun story to see in a year. And we'll continue to wait to figure out what exactly the plan is in Portland. Why are they doing this? You can say a lot of things. What's going? He could not say no to this. And I'm sure he's happy to say yes, but he also could not say no. I mean, look, he's been a rough couple of years from a personal level, I would say the last couple of years of a pretty rough. Well, do I just mean it's just for, I think, you know, I don't know how much fans know, but like his family, his family was back. Like, I don't know

how much any fans know this. His family was back in the Pacific Northwest. He was in Milwaukee. He's talked in times about how tough a situation that was for him. Obviously, then he gets hurt. but, you know, obviously, everything I've heard, the brief time I've poked around about this in the last hour or so since it happened, getting a chance to be back home with his family, not having to worry about moving around anymore, being locked in for a couple of years, back home in Portland. Like, all that was incredibly appealing to him.

I'm sure it would make sense to anybody. And it's going to be a lot of fun. And look for a team that really is trying to have Snood Henderson take the next step as a player. You got Drew Holiday and Dave Lillard mentoring him. that's the one thing I'll say about this situation. Like, there are a lot of people to have around on those two guys. Their locker room will be spectacular.

I don't know how they'll be on the floor, but their locker room is going to be spectacular. But two of the best dudes in the entire league. And I will say this. Dame owes a Valentine to the Milwaukee Bucks organization because it's not what he wanted. It's not what the Bucks wanted, but them cutting him when they did opened this up.

And I mean, his preference would have been to stay in Milwaukee and, you know, been playing for a championship, but this is a heck of a turn of events that will ply salve to the terrible turn of events with the, uh, with the Achilles. Um, okay, well, we're on to the regular pod that we, uh, taped earlier. And, um, thank you to, uh, Bontems for staying up late in Portugal. Thanks to Jackson. Adios, everybody. Well, then how do you say goodbye in Portuguese? I have no idea. I know how to say thank you in Portuguese. That's, I, overgados, thank you. That's the only word I know. That's, that's all you're going to get. That's right.

Obrado. More Hoop Collective Podcast after this. Hello, welcome of the Hoop Collective podcast. We talk about the NBA, which we're doing on Thursday afternoon in Portugal and early morning in L.A. and

midday here in Nebraska. We got the times right. Big win. By the way, this is our first take. Usually there's like two or three takes. All right. Joining us from Portugal, still there, Tim Bontops. Hello, everybody.

Joining us from Los Angeles, where he's doing NBA today this week. And I watched some of the red carpet at the Espe's McMahon. Were you banned from there as well? Howdy, partners, imitation got lost in the mail. Must have gotten sent out maybe when I was covering the finals or something, and I just didn't see it. I didn't hang out with Dave McMiniman, but another Dave, a listener, slid in my DMs,

me to go play pickup basketball. It was a mediocre performance by me. I was the oldest guy by at least a decade or so. He told me there'd be middle age and then there's all dudes in the 30s. I was like, what happened here? So that's how I know my S.B's Eve. Here's the question that Dave McMinnemannum cannot answer on the record. Do you think he would have preferred being on the SPS red carpet or at a pickup game last night? I don't think there's any question. The answer is playing pickup. He would answer that on the record too. No, no. Dave was in heaven. He was red carpeting. His little Eagles got the team of the year. He had front row Joe seats.

Hey, Dave McMinneman loves hooping, but he loves being celebrity Dave. All right. Well, we did have another significant transaction when we've been waiting for for a while this week. The Phoenix Suns and Bradley Beale came to a buyout agreement. The final number was $99 million. And the Sons will wave and stretch. that over the next five years. That's just a hair under $20 million a year on their books. And Beal, you know, he had permission to discuss contract terms with other teams. It was wide

open. That was allowed. His agent Mark Bartlestein told me he met with five or six teams over Zoom, met with Steve Ballmer, met with Tyloo. Most importantly, I think, which we'll talk about in a few minutes met with James Harden. Hardin played a key role here. And he signs a two-year, $11 million, or he hasn't signed yet because he hasn't cleared waivers yet, but you know how this goes. I've got a feeling he will. Yeah. And by the way, there's no team that can play in right now. So actually, he will be clearing waivers. I did have somebody asked me about that. So let me just, let me just clarify that for a second before I toss it to you, Bontems. The waiver process goes like this. Just we're in mid-July

and we've got some time to. Sure. We got time. Okay. Player gets put on waivers. The way that you get that player is there's a reverse order. The team with the worst record gets to go first and the team with the best record gets to go last. So what it works is the player goes on waivers and if you want to put a claim in, you tell the league office I put a claim in and the team with the worst record gets them. But to play. Just like a fantasy draft or fantasy league for people who play. Don't start fancy drafts with me, buddy. You're going to only confuse me. way we pick up a snake graft. Oh, my God.

So anyway, to claim the player, though, you've either got to have enough cap space to take him or you've got to have an exception to take him in, which because Beal makes $52 million or something. Even with the buyout, it's $39, or I guess it's what, $46 million because it's $7 million each year. Nobody's got $46 million in space. Right. No team has $46 million in space. So Beal will pass through waivers and become a free agent. This is understood. So he, you know, priority sports who Mark Bartolstein is the CEO of, he can say we're going to go to Clippers for two years and $11 million.

It's about 5.4 in the first year, which is everything the Clippers had left on their mid-level exception. So, Bontem, here's what I was going to say to you. Before we talk about the, actually, let's talk about the sons of this first. Because Damian Lillard got released a few weeks ago, and we already have seen a $113 million wave and stretch buyout, and because we knew that Bradley Beale was going to be bought out for some period of time here, I think it dulled reaction that we have $100 million going on to a team's books for the next five years. Yeah, Brian, look, the sons have been an abject disaster for a couple of years now from a roster building perspective. And this Bradley Beal wave and stretch is the culmination of that.

You wrote a really good story. I recommend everybody go read it that lays out why and how the sons chose to do this and why the clippers got them, all the various permutations of it. A lot of them will get through. But the first thing you say in there is that this is about money. And then you go into all the reasons. No offense to the reasons you put in there. This isn't about the other reasons.

This is about saving Matt Isfia over $160 million this year along. because the Suns go for being in the second apron to being out of the luxury tax completely. And this entire Sun's situation is exactly what I covered 10 years ago with Mikhail Prokroff and the Brooklyn Nets. It's literally the same thing. Brash owner comes in, says, damn the torpedoes, I'm going to spend infinite money. Nobody can stop me. I know better than everybody. It's going to be fine. Makes a crazy trade with all the draft picks to get an older veteran player to try to immediately win a title. wins. I think they won one playoff series with Kevin Durant, pretty sure, just like the Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce team. Then the team starts to struggle. The owner goes, you know what,

if we're not very good, I don't really want to spend $200 million on a team and then starts making rapid cost-cutting moves to then hand really good draft picks to other teams in the league. In this case, it's going to be multiple teams. In that case, it was the Boston Celtics. And look, let's also just be honest. If we go back a couple of years now, the suns have been going back and forth on all of these moves the whole time. They take on Bradley Beale. They say they're going to spend money left and right. They give out all these second year player options on deals to make them allegedly more tradable, which was not true to cost them more money.

Then they immediately start giving away picks and pick swaps to get rid of campaign to get rid of Isaiah Todd back then. They then give Royce O'Neill and Grayson Allen big contracts in free agency to keep the assets going forward. Now they can't trade those guys. They're stuck with all this money. So now they wave and stretch Bradley Biel for the rest of the decade and try to argue that it gives them more flexibility to build around Devon Booker, which it doesn't. Like the idea that, oh, it's no big deal for the Sons to have $22 million in dead space on their books for the rest of the decade is crazy. Like, look, this isn't Milwaukee. I can understand the bucks doing that as much as I don't think it's going to work with Miles Turner.

You're trying to keep Yonestine Coupo on the team, and it's Milwaukee. It's not a cap space destination. I understand at least the rationale behind that, even if it's still a crazy move. Phoenix is a free agent destination. They could get guys to go there. And now they're giving up 10 to 15% of their cap to wave and stretch Bradley Beale to save the owner money when we were always told the owner was going to be all in on winning. money was no object.

All of this stuff has just not made any sense. It's why I've kept saying it's as bad a situation as you've ever seen in a history of the league from a roster standpoint and from a draft big standpoint and an overall management standpoint. And, you know, even in your story, they're arguing that Jalen Green and Devin Booker are going to fit well together. Like that, that, I do not see that. Like, I just, this situation is really rough.

And we'll see what happens with these. young guys they got this summer. We'll see. Maybe Colin Malawak is going to be a really good player, getting him in the Kevin Durant trade. Maybe Jalen Green blows up getting to Phoenix, maybe. But it's hard to look at this B.O. thing as anything else other than just a giant exclamation point on what's been a disastrous two and a half years of Matt Isbiel and the Sons. Yeah, more than anything, that's exactly what this is and what the KD trade is. An admission that the Matt Ishbia Air and Phoenix has been an absolute disaster. I like your use of the word abject.

That's a great word. It has been an abject failure. And Matt Isbius's philosophy that he has repeated over and over again has always been money. I'm not worried about money. I'm going to outspend everybody. I'm going to go all in on winning a championship every single year. And then you look up and you're like, dude, you didn't crack.

the freaking play in last year and you're, you know, historically expensive. Like it just, it reached a point where it's like, okay, dude, we're not anywhere even remotely close to contending. I mean, not remotely close. And this was an opportunity for him to save $175 million this year when he had up all the tax and all that. And really just they have a shovel. They are trying to dig out of the huge hole that they, that they've created in the last two and a half years. They got nickels on the dollar for Kevin Durand. I won't say pennies, but definitely nickels on the dollar. I mean, they still owe more in picks than they got for him on the way out. That's a disaster. And then, you know, as you said, Beal, you don't just get to, you know,

wash your hands of him. He's lingering on your cap. He's going to count four times as much on the son's cap for the next five years as he is on the, on the, uh, Clippers cap this year. I mean, it's, it is, it really is with the lack of picks, this creates a little bit of flexibility, but, uh, you know, to your point, any flexibility this creates is outweighed by the fact that he's counting almost 20 million against their cap for the next five years. I just want to have one more quote because Bobby Marks had a great story in the second aprons that ran yesterday. And he had an incredible quote from Matt Isfia that he told Ramona after last season. So a year ago, right? I just want to read this flow. Bobby said, remember the now infamous comments by son's owner

Matt Ishvi after the 23, 24 season? Here's the quote. Quote, I understand all the rules that come with the second apron. I understand exactly what the CBA tried to do. I read it. I know what inside and out and we made a calculated decision that we think the team with the best players wins. Would I rather have Brad Beale, Kevin Durant, and Devin Booker than just having two of those guys? I'd rather have all three 100 times out of 100. And they don't think there's another GM or owner or CEO that wouldn't say the exact same thing. This is Ishby admitting that he was wrong and it was an expensive mistake. So Bobby Marks gave me the numbers in this story, which he believes that when you include everything, including the distribution that you get.

by being out of the tax. You get everybody else's tax money. He thinks it's a $175 million savings for the sons this year. Now, at the end of the day, when you're talking about billionaire's money, I get that some fans don't care. And I don't even, that's fine with that. I'm just going to say to you that from a straight spreadsheet standpoint, saving $175 million alone in one year is probably enough to talk you into.

making this. A no-brainer. It's a no-brainer from a money-saving standpoint. The problem is trying to claim it's something else. Okay. Yeah. The other thing is if you don't, if you include the money that you don't pay bill this year, it's like over 200 million. But obviously, obviously the, they're going to have to pay him the money eventually. He's going to get the full 99 million. Having said that, the, you know, it doesn't help you on the court. Now, the one thing that in talking to folks with the sons that they say, and they're, by the way, to be clear, Buntams, they're not arguing that this is the driving course. No one. No one's celebrating this. But when you are, when you are in the second apron, as they were last year, and everywhere you turn, you run into a wall and you have a bad

team. Yeah. It's tough to get through your, your days and your weeks, okay? And now at least, they're out of the second apron. And yes, they get their mid-level exception back, which they're not going to spend probably right now, but they get it back next year when they would have been in the second apron too. So, you know, is that going to solve their problems? No. And by the way, getting out the second apron so you can aggregate and stuff again matters less when you don't control your draft pick for the next six years, which they don't. And by the way, one other thing that is very central to this whole discussion, when the sun's traded for Mattisfield, when the sun's traded for Bradley Beal and they gave up the pick swaps and the second round picks, people were like, it's not that

much for Bradley Beale. It's a good trade for the Sons. Yeah. The Sun's not getting Bradley Biel to give up the no trade clause to do that deal. It was a catastrophic mistake. There's a reason other teams were not trading for Bradley Biel. They didn't want to deal with that no trade clause. There's a reason why the first thing, Mike Winger and Will Dawkins, when they got there, what did they do? They got Bradley Biel off their books. Why? Because they didn't want to have that no trade cause because inherently, what does a no trade clause mean? As we talked about with the Brown James. It means the player dictates how things go. And if the sons could have traded Bradley Beal for other stuff, they probably could have done that, wouldn't have had to wave and stretch them.

And this whole thing might look a lot different. But instead, they had no choice but to do this. And that's why this is such a complete disaster now. You may say to yourself, well, why did the sons let Bradley Beale go out and talk to all these teams? Because even though Bradley Beale wasn't going to be traded and therefore he's no trade. Clause really didn't come into play here. This is an important factor. And why did Bradley Bradley Biel give up 14 million? Why was it not 17 million? Why was it not 8 million? The answer is because the Sun's already had wave and stretched guys on their roster Nassir Little. And who's the

other one, Bontems? E.J. Leda. E.J. Lidda. Former Ohio State Star. Yeah. Because they already had those guys, Beal had to waive that money to get under that. So Bill still had leverage. You know, This was the bare minimum. The number he gave up was the bare minimum he had to give up in order to make it legal to wave and stretch it just so people are clear. So for the Sons to save the $175 million this year, they need to be able to leave $14 million on the table. And so that meant Beal had leverage. Because I think that's the other thing. Like, you know, I see Sons fans saying, well, why couldn't they get them to leave more money on the table?

Well, you imagine that they tried. I'm sure they tried. Also, Brad Beale would just, I think Braddillo and Mark Bartolstein would have very simply said, we don't have to leave any money on the table. You guys want to get rid of us. You can get rid of us. And the only reason they gave off this much is because they wanted to leave. So people were saying, well, how come this is taking so long?

Well, the answer is because Beale completely and fully vetted the market and talked to everybody. Even I said in this story, because I talked to Mark Bartolstein on the record, he asked for permission from James Hardin's agency. to talk to James Hardin. Now, when he said Mark Bartolstein, Mark Bartolstein asked for permission. Mark Bartolstein, Bradley Beals' representative,

asked and received permission to talk to James Hardin. He didn't want there to be any shenanigans. I mean, by the way, like players talk to guys who are not their agents all the time, but he wanted it all to be on the up and up. And so that was part of what was going on here with this whole process. But the reason all of that went on was because for the sons to have, to get that savings, they had to play ball with Bradley Beal.

Even when the no trade clause was out of the picture, they still had to play ball because he still had leverage because of the situation they left themselves in. That's what we're getting to. And quite frankly, Bradley Beal wasn't in a mood to do the Sons any great favors either. Because let me just tell you, that's a guy who sat there last season.

And despite the fact that he had a no trade clause, his name was in trade rumors for months. And, you know, he felt disrespect. And I'm not guessing he told me this stuff on the record. He felt disrespected by that. He felt disrespected by, you know, in his eyes, being demoted for a little while to a six-man role. And this was last summer, or I'm sorry, last season, I'm talking to him after the trade deadline. And basically he said, you know, hey, you know, like KD, I didn't want to be traded.

in the middle of the season. You know, Beal's got a wife, he's got young kids. He didn't want to uproot his family in the middle of season. But he said in the summer, there's a lot more options. You know, there's a lot more time to figure things out. And so, look, Beal wanted out, but he wasn't going to do any charity work for Ishby on the way out. He was going to get as much money as he could get.

One other thing about Beal last season. Okay, he averaged 17 points, shot about 49%-ish, shot about 39% on threes. Yeah, his numbers are really similar to the guy he's replacing with the clippers, Norman Powell. Okay. So let's just pivot to that. So he had the lowest usage rate of his career last year.

Now, whether or not you think he should have had the ball more, that's another conversation. Whether or not you side with Mike Boodenholzer who wanted basically to have him more become a spot up shooter and defender as opposed to a ball handler, how are you want to say it? The point is, Beal got the ball the least amount of times in his career. Even when he was a rookie, he got the ball more. more than he did last year. When you're making 53, actually this last year, he made exactly 50. When you're making $50 million and you average 17 points, people are not going to be thrilled.

No. More Hoop Collective Podcast after this. But now we're going to pivot to the Clippers. So why did he choose the Clippers? He obviously had a number of teams who were interested. The Clippers won out. A couple of reasons. one, Ty Lou, who has a very good relationship with players across the league. Ty Lou is from the St. Louis area. He's returned to the St. Louis area. Mexico, Missouri is where he's from, but it's on the, you know, it's, I wouldn't say

it's a suburb of St. Louis, but it's, if you're going to Mexico, you're flying to St. Louis and they'd take it a drive. And take a little drive. So Ty Lou is from the same area of Bradley Beal and therefore has known him for decades. Yeah. The second thing is, Hardin called them up. Hardin called them up and made the pitch. And here's the pitch that Hardin made.

He said, all right, last year, I played 79 games. I played the fifth most minutes. I need to offload some stuff here. And you are going to, I need you to help me. I want you to have a bigger role. Okay? I need to offload some. Two, Norm Powell thrived in this system.

And I made sure, I took, you know, I think if you're Harden, you're saying, I took care of Norm Powell and I took care of of Avica Zubats. They both had career years. Yeah. I'm going to take care of you. And the reason that this matters to Beale isn't just for his ego. Beal is 32 years old and he got a one year plus a player option. He can be a free agent in a year. Okay. He's in a year if he has a great year. Exactly. He's going to want to get the money back. In fact, he could end up in the black here depending on what happens. Very easily. So that was the other thing Hardin said. He's like, look, look at what happened with with Norm Powell.

I loved Norm. We're going to work together like Norm and I did. Three, when I came here to the Clippers, I was in a tough spot. I washed out of Philadelphia. I thought things were going to go well there. It didn't work out.

I end up coming here. I got to rehab my situation. The Clippers promised me A, B, and C, and A, B, and C happened. He goes, you can trust this organization. So he says those three things. I'm sure there were other players, by the way, on the clippers who reached out.

But Hardin met with Beal, Hardin met with the representative, sold them all. The Clippers had $5.4 million left of their mid-level and said this is what we're going to offer you. So as Bontems pointed out, he gave up the absolute minimum

that he could to get out of the deal with Phoenix, and then he got the every penny that he could from the clippers. So he maximized those two things. And McMahon, now, Biel slides into a team that is too deep at every position. They are not the perfect team, but they finished last season, 18 and 3. They go out in seven games and the series you covered in the first round, Clippers.

Did you cover that first round? I didn't cover that series, but it was a series. Seven game won at that. It was the first round left the conference series, yes. Anyway, McBan, Biel slides into that team. And I assume the way I was told by, I won't, I can't, the Clippers have hands off. They can't talk to Bradley Beal yet because, you know, rather than they can. But, you know, the Clippers can't say anything because he's not their player yet.

But I think there's a strong expectation. Let's just, let's just say he's going to be Norm Powell on the Clippers section. It's going to be there starting to. Yes, of course. The business of the Norm Powell trade is now done. The Clippers make that trade with the anticipation that they're going to be able to slide Bradley Beal right into that starting shooting guard spot. And look, Bradley Beal for $50 million with a no.

Trade Clause is a terrible contract. Bradley Beal, for $5 million in change, for ninth man money, are you kidding me? This is a tremendous value addition for the Clippers. And look, Beal was miscast. He was miscast in Phoenix. It was a bad fit. He's not a bad player. He's not a supermax player. He's not a superstar. He's a good player, though. Even in Phoenix, the guy over two years average 18, 4, and 4 on 50, 40, 80 shooting. You know, but like last year, there were times Beal was taking the toughest defensive assignment. Are you kidding me? That's ridiculous. That's not what he does. And like, this is a team. You mentioned it's too deep. You know, I called it the best team in LA

yesterday, and I don't think that's a controversial comment. Of course, I had Lakers fans all mad about it. The Clippers have five guys. It's unquestionable. Yeah, the Clippers have five guys that would be the Lakers best defensive player. I mean, five, two bigs and three on ball guys, at least five guys. Like people think, I think a lot of people still think of James Harden as Houston James Harden, ball dominant James Hardin. You know, the guy who, you know, some people would say he was tough to play with because he dominated the ball so much.

James Hardin right now at this stage, his career, is maybe the best table setter in the NBA. He's not a guy who's looking at. to get 35 a night. He's a guy who's looking to get everybody involved. He's a basketball. They're trying to get 22 and 12. Yeah, he's a basketball genius who just helped Norm Powell have a career year, just help Vita Zubots have a career year. He's, you know, as he's saying, he's trying to figure out how to win while not, you know, just wearing himself out from an energy perspective and getting a guy like this who's still a big time efficient score who can operate off the dribble is huge for Hardin.

I don't know where, I don't know if the Clippers are, you know, I don't know that they're going to make a playoff run, but they've got that potential. I mean, the West is so loaded. If the Clippers were in the East, they might be the best team in the East. It at least be top two or three. But they're a good team last year and they've gotten better this summer. Yeah, I mean, look, they turn Norm Powell into Bradley Beal, who's at worst, the same level player as Norm Powell. And they got John Collis for free. John Colleen is a really good player,

especially if he's your eighth or ninth guy. They signed Brooke Lopez to a one plus one with a team option in the second year, a great contract to back up the beach to Dubox. I've got 48 minutes of really good center play. Lopez, you know, if Lopez is playing 38 minutes for you or 35 minutes for you and having to deal with all sorts of different lineups, there are times he could run into some trouble, but he's still a good player. And as a guy who's going to be coming off the bench for them, we can space the court, bomb threes and protect the Wren. That's a great signing for them. Yeah. As you mentioned, Zubach was tremendous last year. He's only getting better. We'll see if Kauai could stay healthy. But even if Kauai can't stay healthy during the

season with James Hardin and now Bradley Beal and then all of these, like you said, all these solid role players who can guard Chris Dunn, Derek Jones, Nick Batum. Like, I think the clippers have a really good chance to be top two in the West in a regular season. I don't know what the ceiling will be in the playoffs, because again, that comes down to Kauai's health. And we've seen that come up time and time again, even though he was healthy, at least for the back half of the year and the playoffs run this past season. But these guys went 50 games last year, and I think they got markedly better. And yeah, the idea that they're in the same conversation with the Lakers, the Lakers are not nearly as deep overall as the Clippers are. I know the Lakers last year had the same record as the

Clippers. But to me, if you're going roster for roster with all the holes on the Laker roster, I don't think it's that controversial to say that this Clippers team, especially after these moves that made this summer, have gotten way better and I think are really primed at minimum. To me, it's a little bit of a funky comparison, but they kind of remind me of the George Carl Benver Nuggets team with Aviana and Danila Golanari and those guys that won 56, 57 games. Obviously, Kauai is a different level player than that team had. But that team was like 10 deep. and they just ran out good players all the time and churned out regular season wins,

I could see this clipper team having a very similar season next year. You know, one thing I would say because you look at the Clippers off season, they took their mid-level, which they signed hard. They gave hard in a $6 million raise. I'm sure he probably wanted a little bit more,

but he's 35. They gave him a $6 million raise. So he makes all-MBA. He makes the All-Star team. They bump him to $40 million a year. That's, you know, it's a representative, you know, they didn't insult him. He agreed to it.

Yeah. But they gave him. just enough money that they had the full mid-level. So then they take the mid-level and Norm Powell, and as you guys just described, they turn that into John Collins, Bradley Beale, and Brooke Lopez. That's just good work. I don't know if they're winning a championship, but it's great business. And I'll say something else.

You look at the clippers. They add John Collins and they add Brooke Lopez. You look at the rockets. They add, they re-signed Stephen Adams, they signed Clepella. Dyes. Yeah. You look at the nuggets. They trade for Jonas Valanchunis.

We assume he's going to show up and play. Size across the board. These teams are the back. Big is back. That's right. You know, for a decade plus, everybody leaned into small. Everyone's leaning into size. And that's why.

And look what the Thunder did last year. They went out and got Hardinstein, the biggest free agency edition and franchise history. Look what the Thunder prioritized this off season. You know what the Thunder did this off season before they signed Shea, Chad, Chad, Holmgren, or Jalen Williams? They signed Jay Will. Jalen Williams out of Arkansas. They re-signed the Senate. And drafted a big.

And draft to the center. Thomas Sorber out of Georgia. And even look elsewhere. Look at Portland. Portland is drafted centers in back-to-back drafts. You know, like that, I mean, people are wrecked. Even look at the calves. The calves made one significant free agent addition this offseason.

That was signing friend of the, that was signing friend of the pod, Larry Nance, to get a more playable extra big man. So look, you got to have size in the game. And that's one of the reasons why you're a little worried about the Lakers. If you're looking at the Lakers, okay, they got DeAndre Aden. That was a great job spending $8 million to get that player. They got Jackson and Hayes as a backup. Is that good enough when you're looking at all this size that you go on the Western Conference?

No, I mean, the answer, the answer is not. And also you're also looking at why the Warriors, I mean, we believe that they're going to get Al Horford. But you understand why the Warriors, huge priority was to go out there and get Al Horford because the Warriors' size is their challenge. So they- Al Horford was playing when they were the we believe Warriors. That actually is true. The other one other thing just to put a bow on the sun's part too is to give those guys some credit for all the issues they've had. I do think they have had a decent offseason at least getting some younger talent in there and making some moves that are starting to release acknowledge that they're recognizing the problems they've had. Now, they have, as McBan correctly said, they got a ton to dig out of.

But like, Mowalak is a good swing at 10. Like that's the kind of guy that could really pop for them, you know, getting, moving around in the second round and get Rashir Fleming, who's a guy that, you know, was seen as a potential first round pick. Getting him at 31 was good. Like they did, you know, Ryan Dunn and also Yadour, at least are interesting young guys from last year. They are starting to add some depth to their roster and getting some young talent in there. But, you know, obviously it's a long way to go. To your point about, you talk about the nets, I think it's a very fair comparison. How did the nets get out of the hole that the KG Paul Pierce trade put them in? They got out of the hole by stopping digging. Yeah. The shovel now is putting the dirt back in that deep hole. That's right.

So they had to pivot around. And look, they ultimately did it through free agency when they got Kyrie and Durant. And that's another story. But when they got... But they built a respectable team to put them in position to be in a fact of destination. by getting some young players. So as Bontem's just said, you know, last year's picks look pretty good. Ryan Dunn had a good year.

Yeah. They're very excited about my watch. They drafted Carys LaVirte. They drafted Jared Allen. They went and found Joe Harris on the scrapkeep. Like that, the sons have to start doing that kind of stuff. And it's going to take a while. Well, the sons have a clear-eyed view of where they are.

And it had to smack them in the face by not even making the freaking plan with that historically expensive roster, but they've recognized, they've said, hey, Booker's a franchise guy, we've got to surround him with defense, youth, and athleticism. That's been their priority, and there's a long way to go,

but they at least understand they're not a little tweak away from being a title contender. The Nets ended up taking DeAngelo Russell, turning him into an all-star, and trading him for Kevin Durant. Now, they didn't have to trade him for Kevin Durant's another story.

I mean, that, yeah, that's on, I mean, that's on. Okay. Sure. David, would you say they maximize the Angel Russell? Yes. Yeah. Yeah, I would. Let's see what happens.

Let's see what happens. A little bit of a charitable rewriting of history of that. All right. Let's see that. The next, look, the Nets did a lot of bright, a lot of good things building out that roster to set it up to get those guys. The only thing I'll say is the Nets were able to do that because they could have, they could generate max cap space.

And these guys had Devin Booker on the roster and they have $22 million. is dead money on the roster. By the way, before we move on, can I just say something about Devin Booker's contract? It's your podcast. You got a player option. I shouldn't say that like Devin Booker is a bad way, a bad thing, by the way. Having Devin Booker is good to be clear. He got a player option in that deal.

Why wouldn't he get a player option? Why wouldn't he? I get, I just figured if you're giving him a two-year extension that wouldn't just No, the owner came out and said, we have to give Devin Booker all the money. It's a pretty easy negotiation if you're Devin Booker and his representatives. I wouldn't say, just give us all the stuff and we'll say okay, we'll sign. Devin Booker's blind loyalty to the son's organization is of immense value. Can you imagine if Booker forces a trade trying to put butts in those seats?

I want you to think what Devin Booker got here. he essentially agreed to a one-year extension. He agreed to giving the sons one more year because he got a player option of the deal, which I wouldn't have thought was a guarantee. And he got, he promised the sons one additional season and guaranteed himself 140-something million. That's pretty good.

It's pretty good business. Or by the way, at Tomlbaker just says, as we've talked about before, if he just wants to be with the sons for his career, like, that's cool. Like, I don't think there's any issue with that either. Like, I'll be curious to see where his mindset is on this in a year or two. If this team turns into what the Nets were, post moves. And in the Western Conference, it's going to be tough for these guys to be, I think,

a playing team with the team they have. But if he wants to stay there, by no means that I think that's some sort of flight on Devin Booker. But it is going to be a big hill to clap. Just like it wasn't on Damien Lillard in Portland. Right, right, exactly. All right. Out east, we had our, we had our friend of the podcast, Nick Nurse, on the podcast Saturday night in Las Vegas. Thank you again to coach for coming on.

And then on Monday. The second, the second closest thing to the Memphis Christmas injury update. The Philadelphia 76th was medical update. Well, Paul George Medical Update arrived. my guy. Paul George has arthroscopic knee surgery. We did not know what's coming. Here's the important line from that release. The important line from that release is he will be re-evaluated prior to training camp. That, to be clear, to people at home, does, I guess it's possible. But it's very likely means what that Paul George will be checked out before training

camp and then we'll get another update on when his next update is going to be. By the way, that's three, that's two full months from that, two and a half months from that. We're going to get a checkup on the status of Paul George. And in a very long story that's released on ESPN.com yesterday, Joel and Bede said, there's no timeline in his situation, and he hopes to be ready for training camp. So the Sixers, after a year of injury situations, so Paul George and Joel Lapeed, are two and a months of training camp in the exact same situation

that we're all asked. Six days ago, Darrell Mori held a press conference in Las Vegas on the state of the Sixers as many general managers do. And at that press conference, he said, we're really excited. I'm summarizing. This is not the exact quote. So we're really excited about some of these young guys.

We're excited about VJ. Edgecom. We're excited about Jared McCain coming back. You know, we're going to really try to get Quentin Grimes under contract. But for us to get what we're going, we've really got to have Joel Paul George and Tyrese maxi. And I know that that's like, of course,

but he said that last Friday. Yeah. On Monday, we have... Paul George. Paul George undergoing knee surgery. And on Wednesday, we have this... We haven't had any... And Darrell has said the Jowell thing,

but Jal hasn't said anything. Right. So the first quotes from Mbid for six months? Yes, since February, January, February, something like that. So he says, there's no timetable. I mean, if I'm a Sixer fan,

I know, I know that Darrell, I'm sorry, McMahon, I'm stepping all over you. I'm sorry. You're good. I understand that, you know,

I think Darrell made some headlines at the, and, you know, when he had his convention, Sloan conference last spring, when he said, you know, he feels like the Sixers fans,

a lot of times only operate in anger. And he, they've had a lot of reason. But God, this is so frustrating. This has got to be so frustrating. I mean, it's, especially when the East is,

there's a semi-truck lane in the east. So drive that. It's wide open. And they, like, they have the two worst contracts in the NBA now. You could have an argument about Beal that contract no longer exists or, you know, it's just a number on a spreadsheet. Yeah. There's a ghost. There's very few contracts that are even in the discussion. If for no other reason, then, just the amount of years and dollars left on them, there's just very few contracts that long. And then you add in the injury on certainty with both costs. It comes down to production for pay. And unfortunately, like, both these guys are unbelievably talented.

I mean, Joel and Bede, you know, we're a year and a half removed from him playing the best big man basketball. Well, no, I'm not going to say that because joker's unbelievable. But playing at a historically dominant level, like, you know, more points than minutes. I mean, the wilt type of things. But, like, what could be doesn't matter if he never. plays or if he barely plays or when he is playing, he's dragging his leg around the court. And then Paul George, you know, we talk about what a great summer the Clippers had. Well, it turns out they had a pretty good summer last year, too, even though it didn't look

good at the time, basically saying, hey, we don't want to continue to be in the Paul George business. And again, he had a great year's last year with the Clippers, but just unfortunately, at this point in his career, his body is not reliable. He's not on the floor frequently enough to be part of a foundation. They didn't announce the nature of the injury. And look, I respect Paul George's. Paul George has to has to, you know, he has every right to protect his medical information. I get it. But like, I don't know what that injury is. Well, and to say it's arthroscopic, like at this point, of pretty much every knee surgery is arthroscopic. Yeah. I mean, an update and an update in 10, an update in 10 months, or 10 weeks, not 10 months, is not exactly an encouraging timeline.

And by the way, the last update we had on Abid was that his status would be, he would be re-evaluated in approximately six weeks. And that was in early April. Well, they get re-evaluated a lot. You know, you could say he'll be re-evaluated daily. I'm just saying that's three, that's three, what I mean. My point is like that's essentially saying, we'll hear from you in six weeks. and we're 12 weeks later and we've heard nothing. And here's a deal.

Even the plan, like, obviously they didn't plan on these guys continuing to get heard and having to undergo more surgeries. Like, things have gone as wrong as they possibly could pretty much. But even the plan they had going in the last season, Bontemps that you were writing about at their training camp in your tropical location that you were milking the company dime on. Like, dude, their whole plan was, yeah, we're going to load manage these guys.

You know, they'll both play 50-ish games. And then, voila. They'll be ready to go for the playoffs. Yeah, that was the whole plan. With, like, how were you going to establish any kind of chemistry with that plan? And now it's like if they can play, if they can get 50 games out of these guys, I think that would be a remarkable accomplishment. And they hadn't had some good news on the margins.

Like, Javari Walker on two ways, a really good deal. Vijay Edgecombe, I think is going to be a good player. I mean, the top sixers kept their pick and move. up those great news. That's right. No, they've had, they have had a good offseason from that standpoint, but it, you know, Darrell's, Darrell's quote might have been obvious, but it's also very true. Like, they're only going as far as those three guys. And if you're a Sixers fan, you're looking at it going, man, if this team could be healthy for one year, this is the year. They might have the most talent in the East if they're healthy. Now, again, right now,

we're certainly not looking at them like they're going to be healthy. But that's where, like if you're a six of fame, like after all this time, all these other situations fall away. We're sitting here. We could have a golden opportunity. And we're sitting here where there's no telling when either of these guys will be able to play. And there's no way to pivot because the, like you are, you are committed, stuck, how do you want to put it with Joel and Bede and Paul George is the foundation of that team. Because those contracts are so far underwater, there's no way to flip them for value. And it's, you know, for so long, like, teams were plotting, the Knicks were plotting.

Other teams were like, hey, you know, is it being going to ask out of Philly? And, you know, getting him locked up on that extension was seen as this great accomplishment. Unfortunately, it's not paid any dividends. I mean, Joel Bede's got four years and about $240 million, give or take, a couple dollars left. And Paul George has got three years and about 160 million. million dollars, give or take, a couple dollars left. That's $400 million in seven years of contract in those two guys. And we don't know when they're going to play. Yeah, it's tough. Hard to win that way. All right. Well, McMahon, you have to do NBA today in Bontems. You have

a family wedding to get to. Oh. Tux? You want to Tux Bontas? Yeah. Is this a black tie event? No, it's not a black tie event. The wedding is Friday. Uh, rehearsal dinner is later on later on tonight. Were we going to talk about McVan's hometown team before we went? Do you have to wear shoes at this wedding? It is, no, it is a, it is a, it is a, it is a, it is a, it is a, it is a, it is a, it's a,

shoe's wedding. Okay. No mid-range shots. No. No. No mid-range shots. No. Oh, my God.

That is true. All right. Well, yes, we had, just before we go, uh, McMahon, your team had a, uh, an unfortunate announcement that Derek lively. They're not, they're not my team. I apologize. Trust me. They don't claim me.

I understand. Your hometown. No, just look, man, Derek lively, the surgery happened a while ago. The Mavericks. That's what I thought. Like, this is not something they would have. We talk about like these, the Memphis Grizzlies medical releases and the Sixers. The Mavericks just don't do them because this is the second surgery to a starter this summer that, oh, hey, didn't hear about that from the team.

But Derek Laively had to get bone spurs cleaned up in that foot. And this is the foot where, I mean, they really just botched this thing last year, put this guy in some serious jeopardy. You know, when they thought it was a sprained ankle, ends up being a stress fracture, which they discovered after he'd been cleared to come back. He did come back late in the season. Then needed this surgery to clean up. Now, he's supposed to be cleared for camp. Obviously, we're going to be monitoring that situation. Anthony Davis, the surgery to repair detached retina is supposed to be ready for camp.

Again, we'll monitor that situation. And then obviously, Kyrie, you know, Nico Harrison said during one of his, you know, one of the in-game interviews, I think it was on NBA TV, that he's ahead of schedule. I'd heard the same, but I don't want people to be confused with Kyrie's ahead of schedule in his rehab to thinking, okay, hey, he's back in January. You still got to err on the side of caution with a guard in his mid-30s coming off for torn ACL. He's going to miss at least half the season. And that's why, like, when there's all this conversation, are the Maverick contenders, are the Maver's contenders?

Like, man, let's revisit that when we see Kyrie back in form and hope that these other guys are able to get healthy and stay healthy. because unfortunately, Anthony Davis has a long history of durability issues and as bright of a young talent as Derek lively is, he's had a lot of trouble staying on the floor in his first two years. Yeah, a lot of players have bone spurs. It's sort of a, you know, every player who has an MRI would see bonespurs. So it's probably a good thing they got to dealt with, but dealing with it so young is a little worrisome.

But all right, hopefully he is back. Hopefully there's some good news from the Mavericks. we stopped hearing about surgeries. And hopefully you have a great time at the wedding this weekend, McMahon. I'm not going to a wedding. I called you Bon Temps on Freaking NBA today this week. I mean, I am, I couldn't tell you how bad I am in need of deep, of unplugging. Vacation.

Vacation time. You might have called me worse before, but only when you were really, really bad at me. Well, stick around. All right. Thank you to Jackson for putting this together. Thank you to Bon Temps for his. he's going above and beyond from Portugal for the last two weeks. Thank you to McMahon for being on the West Coast for days on end.

Hey, listen, McMahon got up early to do the pod today. This is far earlier than the usual Bigman. Especially after pickup. Time clock. I had breakfast first too. Wow. He was, let's put it this way. McMahon has used some icy hot today after.

Oh, yeah. I'll be walking in the NBA studios with a, some icy hot as Cologne for sure. That'll really get Amman Shumford excited. Oh, man. I'm going to even get a fist bump from him. With that, everybody, thank you for watching. Listen to the Houp Collective.

Have a great weekend. We'll talk to you next week. Adios amigos.