Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective - Flagg To Play Point Guard? Rockets Ready For Finals? Southwest Division Deep Dive

Episode Date: September 2, 2025

Brian Windhorst is joined by ESPN's Tim Bontemps and Tim MacMahon to preview everything you need to know about the Southwest Division in the Western Conference. The guys break down what to expect after a wild offseason in Dallas, if the Rockets are ready to compete for a championship, what to expect from Wemby, if Ja Morant will be back to an elite level and much more! Plus, what Thanasis Antetokounmpo returning to the Bucks means for Giannis. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Labor Day evening. Joining me from New York City's, Tim Bontems. Donald McMahon, I'd get cleaned up after the pot the other day followed through. Clean shaving.

Like mid-season, clean shave. Join us from Dallas, Texas. Post-Labor-day work. Yeah. America wakes up to go to work tomorrow. Not us. We're not working for weeks. Join us from Dallas, Texas.

Band, McMahon. Howdy, partners, back from a little, a break trip to Costa Rica, living that pure a via, sipping on some of those imperiales, but now we're back. I just want to say that the pod was traveling all over the place this weekend. Yeah, I was in L.A. Back to age to O. Sunday night.

Jackson went down to watch Syracuse get annihilated in Atlanta. It's a rough trip. I took in the L.A. Sparks, Washington Mystics game on Sunday evening. Key battle for playoff lives. Mm-hmm. Sparks were victorious. Kelsey Plum brought him home, 14 points in the fourth quarter.

Yeah, McMahon, who didn't have pre-check for the first 15 years of pre-check's existence, we were trying to see how long was you going to take him to get through customs tonight, and we said, hey, do you have global entry? And he said, what's that? I believe the direct quote was,

I don't know what that is. I don't know what that is. Which I said, I would have been all my life savings. That was like 18 minutes. that wasn't bad. Some of the like finding, you know, getting to the car where it was parked in a different terminal. It is just dumbfounding that for as much as you travel, I mean, global entry is one thing. The fact that you went as long as you did without precheck in Dallas where there's a bazillion people flying is pretty insane.

I have to say. They used to be pretty good with the priority lines. They've slacked off on those. Now, now some of these things don't even have the precheck line. But anyways. I'm going to say that I was, this is something that's going to be interesting. apparently Bontemps talked McMahon into joining one of these guillotine fantasy leagues. Now this is a Matthew Barry thing.

Did Matthew Barry come up with this? I have no idea who came up with it. A friend of mine just asked me to do it today and I asked a couple friends, including Big Ban, who went to his fantasy football. And I knew you didn't really want to play fantasy football so I didn't ask you.

But McBan does. So McMahon's new. Yeah, a new concept. You know, it's like a Survivor League. Right? Everybody knows it survivably. Kind of like that, except for this one, whoever is, you don't play head to head.

18 teams, whoever's worst is done for the year. Their teams go into the free agency pool and then, or their players, rather. Oh, that's interesting. Off you go. So 10 bucks, if it had been more than 10 bucks, I probably wouldn't have done it, but the price is right and so off we go.

I feel like McMahon has, Bontem sometimes surprises me. Like, man got the second, I got the second pick. Who'd you go with? I win Bijon Robinson over Sequin Barclay. He is a show in his Texas. Well, also, Barclay gets, one, a little bit concerned about Barclay after last year's workload. Two, he gets robbed of touchdowns all the time.

Bontem sometimes surprises me what he knows about. All of a sudden, like, he'll, like, know stuff about, like, Formula 1 or, like, Formula 2, like who's leading Formula 2 and he'll know like... There is a Formula 2, though. I have no idea who's leading it. Well, whatever. My point is like some of these...

Some sports. Sometimes you'll like Bon Temps will be like, oh yeah, so-and-so won the Zurich Open last week in like tennis. And I'm like, okay. So I would wager that McMahon would trounce Bon Temps with his NFL knowledge,

but like, Bon Temps is sneaky with this kind of crap. Here's the thing. I used to know a lot about football now I watch a lot of football but don't know nearly as much that's what they say about Bill Belichick okay

we talk about the NBA I just want to note I just want to note just because we had a little moment thanassas of Tena Kumpo re-signed with the bucks over the weekend

I'm just going to say two things about that one whatever doubt that was left with Janus and you can ask 10 different people and get 10 different opinions about how much much doubt there was. Obviously. There wasn't much and now there's none. Well, there wasn't much by, you know, mid-August, but there was some doubt earlier this year. Let's just be honest

about that. That's number one I'm going to say. So, you know, Phanasis resigning. And look, I have a personal relationship with Phanasis. Happy for him. Friend of his pod. Yeah, been on the pod. I mean, goodness. I'm happy for him. Greece is doing pretty well. Big guess for you get it. Euro Pasket. Yonis is Duncan. Luca is screaming at his teammates and putting up triple doubles, which rarely happens in European basketball, so that's good. Joker putting up crazy numbers.

Joker is untouchable, and Lowry Markin is putting up 40-point games. Everything is normal. Don't worry about it. And Fonis is playing, apparently, spectacular defense. He said that's what sold the bucks. I'm getting his deal done. Yeah.

And the second thing I want to say about this is, I have 0.000-0-0 issue with the ball. bucks giving Thanassus a contract if it makes Janus one percent happier during the season. It's probably more than one percent since we know how close he is. I have zero percent problem with it. The only person that should have an issue with it is Costas. Or what's the younger brother's name? I think it's Alex.

Yeah. Like at some point it's like, hey, bro. Like pass the sticks. Come on, man. but no, listen, it is not the only time in NFL, or I'm sorry, NBA history that a superstars had an extra roster spot assigned to him because of somebody he got along with very well in the locker room. This happens to be his brother. And so if that's what helps keep you on us happy, I would say it's a wise investment. Listen, they get superstars in the NBA get extra lockers.

They get extra staff members. they get extra large hotel rooms, they get extra privileges, get extra coaches, it's fine with me. Good, good work. Probably a more efficient use of money as opposed to cutting Dame Liller with $100 million

and then spending it immediately on Miles Turner. Well, in real honestly, like a minimum spot, is it their 14th or 15th roster spot? Do they still have one of whatever? I guess it's their 15th spot. Okay, whatever. The last man on the bench, he is a hype man. Like, there's plenty of times that the last spot on the bench goes to a guy who is a vet,

who's good for the locker room, who ain't going to play. Absolutely. This happens to be a guy who's related to the superstore. The actual, I mean, the actual interesting thing about this is they have, they actually have 17 players under contract, including a mere cost. who they signed earlier this summer from the Clippers, who is a decent rotation wing and should play a decent amount for them. And Andre Jackson, who was a pretty high second round pick a couple years ago, who I would guess since he's on a non-guaranteed deal, is probably less likely to make the team now. But they are going to have some interesting end of roster decisions to make because I'm pretty confident the guy who just signed will not be getting cut in training game.

I would say so. All right. Our divisional wheel, we're looking at the divisions, has spun down McMahon Way. Oh, we go from Cab's Corner to my neck of the woods, huh? That's right. Southwest Division, part of the I-35 corridor, a healthy representation. We get a nice slice of it. It's still weird that Oklahoma City is not in this division for geographical reasons,

but that goes back to the olden days of, you know, not many people could actually name all the teams and all the divisions. I'll be honest with you. I always have to look at the sexual. Yeah, the Atlantic and Pacific divisions are easy, and the southeast is pretty easy because they're all literally in the southeast. The rest of them, it's like good luck. Yeah, the Thunder being in the Northwest Division,

the legacy, I suppose, of the Sonics is a little bit ridiculous. us. But anyway, we're going to start there. Why don't we start with the Mavericks? You want to start with the favorites? We'll start with the Mavs. Start with the Mavs. Hometown team, bro. We're going to bring you back into the country. We start with Katz Corner the other day. We'll start with the Mavs today. Ease you off that Costa Rican survey. By the way, one thing, one thing. It was wild. We were texting the other day and McMahon, who was in a, in a, in,

in Costa Rica, which is mostly, I believe, in the Eastern Time Zone geographically, and Texan is in Mountain Time. I was blown away by that. How much do we believe, think that McMahon knew what time it was there? I looked it up on my phone because I was like, is there some chance that there have been a bunch of surveys that have been consumed early in the day? And it was, he was bang on. No, no, I figured out real quick because, okay, I had to find a sports bar

that would show college football. And we had to watch the Hoop Collective Showdown between the horns and We all-Hawks State. I wasn't going to bring it up. I wasn't going to bring up. It didn't go well. A tough one for Archman.

But the sports bar that I found opened at 11. I'm like, perfect. That game starts at 11. I know it started at 10 there, so I missed the first hour. Turns out of community. I was going to say you missed you much.

Anyways, back to, let me just say that, you know, every, Every week on threads, I do a little Q&A. Ooh, self-promotion. Yes.

Recently, someone asked me if we would do a podcast. Jackson, you'll have to chime in here and see if you think this is feasible. Since the I-35 corridor is your home base, someone asked me if we would do a podcast, like, in a car on I-35, like do a live podcast. Jackson, I don't know if the sound of the road would be a little bit, be a little difficult. But McMahon and I- Jackson, ace producer can make it happen, of course.

Listen, if there's like a Mavs-Spers playoff series, or we could even do Mavs, Thunder Spurs, who knows? Thunder Spurs would be a too long to drive. I'll be honest with you. I've done that. I did that drive for Thunder Spurs way back in the day. For a guy who talks about I-35 all the time, Bond Temes, McMahon doesn't touch it.

We don't believe in driving. I get you right on. right on up to Oklahoma City. That is true. So McMahon and I, I got stranded in Dallas going to Oklahoma City for the West finals last year. McMahon drove me from Dallas to open. True Squire.

He was there on the dot, ready to go. He was. He was very early in the morning. True squire work. I did tape like a two minute long, like little mini pot of us talking, looking at I-35, but then I decided not to give it to Jackson. So. What the hell?

I didn't like the product. All right. Dallas Mavericks. Back to the maps. ESPN's never failing prediction, group prediction, has the Mavericks as a play-in team at 44 and 38.

So the Mavericks are very difficult to predict for a variety of reasons. Well, I can think of one. The primary one is because we don't know when Kyrie's coming back, although he's ahead of schedule. He's on the court at least doing some light shooting and stuff like that. There's a long way from being on the court, obviously, to playing NBA basketball.

But I think more than anything, you don't know if Kyrie is going to be able to get back in like All-Star. I would say last year he was on track of you in all-N-B-A to that kind of form this season. So that makes it very difficult to predict. Then obviously AD's durability is going to have a big impact on how they fare. And then there's a lot of talent on the roster, but it's kind of a funky roster. It's a very front court heavy group. Aside from Clay Thompson, especially while Kyrie is out, it's a pretty light on the shooting department.

department. And then, you know, we all obviously think Cooper Flag is going to be really good. Certainly, that's not exactly like a out-on-the-limb type of opinion. But how much is he going to be able to drive winning and like what exactly is his role going to be as a teenage rookie? Yeah, I mentioned the other day on the last spot we did that as part of the forecast that did a story picking five teams based off the records we projected that. I would go over and under the number. And Dallas is one of the teams I picked to go under the number. And it's for this exact reason. They have one ball handler on the roster in DeAngelo Russell,

who you're expected to have the ball in his hands. And what do you get with DeAngelo Russell? Well, he's A, he's not all that great. And on top of it, he's not often that available. He's missed more than 20 games in more seasons and he's played less, he's missed less than 10. So if he's out for any chunk of time, They've got, I mean, they're probably going to have the ball and Cooper flag's hands a lot, which will be great for his long-term development.

It probably won't be great for his short-term, short for the team's short-term winning on the court. As McMahon said, this is a very funky and interesting roster. It's a huge roster, but it is one that's going to struggle from a shooting and spacing standpoint a lot of the time. Let's see how healthy this group is in general. Anthony Davis misses time. Derek lively has had, unfortunately, a bunch of different issues. issues. And it's health.

Surgery. Yeah. Right. So let's see where he's at. You know, they're going to be a very interesting team to watch for a lot of reasons all season. Number one, obviously being how does Cooper play? But I don't like that number based off the difficulty of the West and just the amount of things that I think could potentially go sideways this year, despite the fact that if they are fully healthy and if, say, Kyrie's back on March 1st, if they can get into the play-in and be fully healthy on April 15th,

they're probably going to be a team that nobody's really going to want to see in a seven-game series because they've got a couple stud players, and they're a huge, interesting team that could cause some match-up issues. Yeah, I don't think it's insulting to say that the Mavericks are likely going to be a playing team. I think the question is, you know, can they be a dangerous playing team? You know, they have cleaned, like they got a real strength coach this year instead of, you know, the silliness that went on last year. You know, they've cleaned up some things. They had a ton of turnover on the coaching staff. I mean, another thing to monitor, too.

How does that go? Well, yeah, you know, they have a ton of turnover. But like Frank Vogel is the lead assistant coach. Like, tell me, a lead assistant coach with stronger credentials in a league than Vogel. So it's hard for me to be, you know, very critical of that. You know, like I said, it's going to be an interesting season. I think it's going to be a very kind of up and down season. And then it's also like it's a difficult team to evaluate because it's a team that is very much in a win now window,

but they've just drafted an 18-year-old generational talent with number one overall pick. So there's a lot of Funkiness And by the way You talk about how huge they are You know They've got these two lob catching centers Who have both shown

They can be very productive players But those are guys that you You bring in To play with a pick and roll genius Who's not on the roster anymore I don't know if people have heard He is He is still on the Vitsky way

They put the big overall watch billboard right there off in the Vitsky way of Luka Donch. It says, Cowboys never die, but they do get traded, apparently, both him and Michael Parsons. But, you know. Or they do sign with free agents. Free agents, like, I'll go ahead, never mind. Yeah, Mike Parsons got traded. Sorry.

And then sign. But, you know, like, and even like Clay Thompson, like Clay Thompson was brought in to, you know, provide spacing and play off of Luca to get a bunch of wide open threes off a Luca. So they've got a lot of pieces that I don't necessarily know how well they all fit together. And like the, well, Nico Harrison thinks they fit together pretty well because he keeps extending these guys.

So he extended Kyrie Irving this summer, which is, you know, no-brainer. Three years, $119 million. Kyrie could have opted into his contract, but did a new deal.

He extended Daniel Gafford, three years and 54, so $18 million. in there. And PJ Washington, I believe last Friday became eligible to be extended. He is in the last year of a contract paying him $14 million and a strong candidate to be extended as well. That's a, that's doubling down on this roster. I think the max on that would be four for $89 that he's eligible for in an extension. As a quick as a quick commentary, his max, which is different from the max. The max, he's eligible to, yeah, to be clear.

And we need to do a better job as media of differentiating that. In fact, we need a different name. How about just the most he can extend for it? Well, that's fine. Instead of using next. But you know that if that's what he signs for, people will say he got a max extension. For fans at home, he's not allowed to extend for more than four years and $89 million.

So if he extends for that, that's because he's not able to get more than that. But look. The Kyrie thing is about Kyrie is one of the faces of the franchise, and they had to pay him and Kyrie compromised and played ball to give them, you know, by taking a little pay cut, to give them the wiggle room of having the salary slot to sign DeAngel Russell. And certainly what he ended up signing for is a lot less than, I believe he anticipated getting going in the free agency process,

certainly before pre-injury. Gafford, notably, his extension is for the most he could get and remain trade eligible. That doesn't mean he's getting traded, but it means that he does remain eligible. And Daniel Gafford, whether he starts with the Mavericks or not, is a top 15 center in league. Is that fair, I think? It might be a little high. But he's good. I have to think about that.

But he's a good play. He's a quality starting caliber center. To go back to the thing we've talked about many times, that is a tradable deal. Exactly. That's my point. He's a quality starting caliber center, whether he's starting for the Maverx or not. That's a contract that puts him right in kind of the middle range. It's a very tradable contract.

And, you know, PJ Washington's role this year is going to be interesting. I don't think it's out of the realm of the possibilities that he could start and have Cooper flags. starting at the two. I was going to ask you, because of how funky this roster is, what do you, obviously we haven't got the training camp yet, but if you had to handicap it, what do you think their opening night starting lineup is? Assuming people are healthy.

Who are they playing an opening night again? I believe they're playing the Spurs. Correct? Spurs again, which seems to be like an every game thing, or an every year thing. So if Cooper Flagg starts on opening night, who's he guarding? Well, part of that depends on, I think, who else is starting? So who else is starting?

Anthony Davis is starting. Honestly, well, so that gets back to this. PJ Washington guarded the best one through four player last year. Nico Harrison, and I think it was the draft night press conference that he did, you know, made a point to say, you know, PJ was watching Cooper Flagg workout and made a point to mention that, you know, he said to PJ, hey, you think you can play this guy? And PJ was like, oh, yeah.

And I thought I kind of read I don't remember the exact comment, but I kind of read that as a hint of, hey, PJs might be starting alongside this guy. So I'm not going to make a prediction. I'm just going to lay out the possibilities. Daniel Russell, I believe, is going to start as obviously a stopgap for Kyrie. Cooper starting, right? Cooper starting. Either Gafford-Livoli starting, AD starting. The Gafford-Lively thing to me, that's not that because I think.

they pretty much going to split time. The big question to me is, will it be PJ Washington in a jumbo-sized shooting not so much lineup, which would mean Clay Thompson's coming off the bench, which let's just be honest. Like you started every game last year, is that correct? I believe so. If Clay is coming off the bench, that's going to be a story. Are we sure? Are we sure? because this is why I asked, are we sure they're not going to start, let's say Derek lively, soon he's healthy, Anthony Davis, PJ Washington, Clay Thompson, and Cooper Flagg at Point Guard. We sure they're not doing that? We're sure they're starting DeAngelo Russell over Clayton. I cannot completely rule out that possibility. I've had no conversations about this.

I would be stunned if you start Cooper Flag at Point Guard. I'm not saying he's not going to play point guard. Listen, they've talked about it. They've talked about it a little bit. and it might be easier to start in October I don't know I would be stunned it might be easier to start him at point guard than it would be to have Clay Thompson come off the bench so Clay came off the bench for 14 games in the 23 24 season for the Warriors and it's no secret that he hated it felt disrespected one of the reasons that you know that there's a lot reasons he decided to leave the Warriors. That factored in. It was also like when he came to the Mavericks last year, there was a very clear guarantee of a starting role. And he's not coming off the bench in

this scenario behind Kyrie Irving, where that would be harder to argue. Right. I was actually surprised last year that they went to Clay closing on a case-to-case basis on a game-to-game basis as quickly as they did. I just think, you know, a guy is with Clay's resume and his pride, if you're asking him to come off the bench, you know, I don't know if that's going to be awesome. Like I said, it's one thing if he's starting behind Kyrie, if he's coming off the bench behind Kyrie Irving. It's another if he's coming off the bench behind DeAngelo Russell. I'm very curious. I'm just fascinated to see how this plays out with that. Yeah. And whatever, like, that's a possibility. but whoever's coming off the bench there to me is a much bigger story,

whether it's Clay, PJ, or DeAngel Russell, then... Right, because Russell coming off the bench is a big story because it means Cooper Flag is your point card. Right. That's a much bigger thing to me than whoever's starting at Center just because I think that will go back and forth and I think they'll pretty much come close to splitting time with AD not that many minutes at Center.

More Hoop Collective Podcast, after the... this. All right. Let's go down south a little bit to a place where I think McMahon will find himself more this year. The Houston Rockets, who are favored to win this division, made a little moves on this roster in the offseason trading for Kevin Durant. Wait a minute, let's see what our forecast is. By the way, this is where we had all of our people. There's like 50 some people that steal money from ESPN. I believe they have. I believe they were second. They were second in the West, projected at 54 and 28, one game better than the Denver Nuggets.

This offseason, they obviously traded Jalen Green and Dylan Brooks for Kevin Durant. They signed Fred Van Vleet to a new contract, deemed him to take a pay cut in a one-plus-one, which wouldn't be surprised if he opts out and changes that salary next year, but he took a pay cut. signed Dorian Finney Smith in free agency, away from the Lakers, extended Jabari Smith Jr. on a five-year deal, I believe, with no opt-outs. Re-signed Stephen Adams. Yeah. Be a backup center.

Signed Clint Capella. To also be a backup center. One of the stranger moves of the summer was signing Clint Capellas. June 30th, like, wow, Clint Lapella is going to be a rocket again. That was true. And three, I mean, the biggest thing was three guaranteed. years for Clint Capella. I thought he might be on a minimum deal this offseason. And instead he got I mean, it's not a huge deal. It's three for 21. But still, like I, I mean, it's really, it's a sign to me of

Houston really leaning into this multi-big lineup and like giving Stephen Adams nights off. And like, they're, they're going to be playing big lineups a lot. Yeah, Stephen Adams is never playing them back to back again. He's going to, his minutes will be managed very carefully during regular season. But he had a heck of a playoff series. And they did the numbers, I don't have them in front of me, but the numbers for that double big lineup, both during the regular season, which, by the way, they first tinkered with that during AD's

Maverick's debut. When AD dominated the first half, they kind of started tinkering with it in the second half, and AD got hurt too. But then it's something they used very successfully down the stretch of the regular season. in the playoffs helped them make

that series against the Warriors competitive but they couldn't win that series for one simple reason they didn't have a go-to guy they do now

they certainly do by the way we didn't mention Alparan Shingoon Turkey A is 4 and O in the Eurobasket Serbia

yes they are 4 and O in the Euro basket they play Wednesday I mean, they're going to both advance to the round of 16. I was looking up the, I was looking up the numbers on the, uh, on the double big lineup while you guys were talking. Shengun, averaging 20 points on 68% shooting in Eurobasket.

Yeah. Nine rebounds. And how about this? We know he's, uh, you know, he's calling him mini Yokic. I don't know if he wants to hear that. But we know that they, uh, the guy, the guy can handle the ball and create in, in, 27 minutes a game, averaging seven assists a game. He's a very good passer. The question with him is can he be a primary offensive hub? Not primary, but he can do some stuff, man.

I mean, he's really something. He's a really interesting player. He's awfully young and still developing. He's very good. So the Stephen Adams, I'm only using the regular season numbers because the sample size is much bigger for that. But in 41 games in the regular season, total of 162 minutes, those two guys together had an offensive rating of 122 and a defensive rating of 92, a net rating of 299, and an offensive rebounding rate of over 50%. They hammered the boards.

Well, and here's the thing. Last year, the Rockets were a really bad shooting team, but it didn't matter when they had those guys out there. There's a couple vacuum cleaners out there grabbing all the shots. And that is going to be fascinating to see how that looks, obviously, with Kevin Duran as part of it now. Yeah, and they're a better, a significantly better shooting team now because they added one of the all-time elite shooters in NBA history as their go-to guy and Kevin Duran. And then Doreen Phine Smith is quietly a little shooting upgrade. Now, he's probably a 20-minute-per-game guy for them. He's not going to play heavy minutes.

And, you know, like last year, he basically was playing the whole season on one wheel. But he's another 3-D guy or desperately needed 3-D guy. And then hopefully some of their young guys are going to develop. And I believe Reed Shepard will have a significant role that also upgrades their shooting. Yeah, so Reed Shepard is actually one of these things you're going to keep an eye on early in the season to see what he made dookos willing to let him do. But the Rockets fascinating. We talked recently about Kevin Durant, you know, going to the last year of his contract. point out that we're now into September.

We have no contract extension. I don't really want to go over it all again, but I just thought we should point that out. It's reminding everybody the rockets have done a very good job with their contracts. So just leave it at that. Nor Tartarison's contract extension is not done yet, at least. I believe the Rockets would like to have Tauri Usen's extension done first just to kind of know what kind of math they're working with.

That'll be interesting to see if that one gets done. I'll be curious. on that. All right. Let's head is it I-10 you take from Houston to San Antonio? The longest highway in America, I believe. Is that the longest highway in America? Sure. I believe so. It runs from like...

I believe it's Jacksonville to Santa Monica. Yeah, I was on it. I've got a great I-10 story from my freshman year in college, but I'm not comfortable telling you how... Oh, damn. I get excited there for a second. It involves a U-Haul and more... Coming from St. Pete, Florida, heading in the world.

getting pulled over it, but that's all I'm going to go with. I've heard that. I've heard that story before, and that is not a podcast story. After you were summarily dismissed from another institution. It is not a podcast. I wasn't dismissed. I think I still have some community service hours. We didn't get served.

I wasn't dismissed. Oh, man. All right. All right, San Antonio. Victor Wenbenyama, we are hoping we'll be back and ready to go at the start of the season. All indications are, it will be. That's a big factor. Looking forward to having Victor in our lives again.

A lot of good stuff happening at Eurobasket. Victor not being there. A bit of a bummer. Okay, so the Spurs with the two big things that they did in the offseason, they drafted Dylan Harper with the number two overall pick. There was some curiosity about whether they might make that pick available. They did not. Very happily took Dylan Harper at number two.

He had a pretty good, didn't play that much in Summer League, but showed some good stuff. And then, you know, the big thing was they signed Deerrin Fox, probably the biggest contract. I haven't looked this up, but my guess is it's the biggest contract in history of the franchise. There was another pretty big thing. Pop retired and they...

Well, that's true. Pop retired. Yeah. And they promoted... Mitch Johnson becoming full-time head coach. Yes, that's key. I mean, that was how they finished last season. So it wasn't sort of a change.

But, you know, it wasn't necessarily a slam dunk that Mitch Johnson was going to get that job full-time. but, you know, did well. I think it, you know, it also helped that he has a very good relationship with Victor. You know, last year after Pop had the stroke, Mitch Johnson, you know, he was the guy who worked out Victor before every game. You know, every, you know, some of the assistant coaches split up certain players and they will, there's a routine that they go through. And Mitch Johnson was promoted to, you know, interim head coach. And he stayed working out with Victor before every game.

I guarantee he was the only head coach in the NBA last year who was out there pregame rebounding for a player. But if there's going to be a player you're going to rebound for in San Antonio, it's going to be Victor. So I assume he's graduated from beyond that. But he's why I was, you know, I kind of had a foot in both worlds. I don't know for certain, but I would wager that Sean Sweeney, the new associate head coach there, who had been J.K.K.K.K.K.S.R.R. He'll take over the Victor pregame work out.

Well, that's, I bet a lot of money on that. I would recommend that for Sean if the option is there. I'd recommend it for Victor based on the people that Sean has worked with in the past. You're pretty good for both sets. So one of the big things about the Spurs, and we've talked about this before, but I think it'll be a talking point around them is how they're going to handle their three yards. So they've hugely invested in Deer and Fox. Obviously, when they traded for Deer and Fox, they had no idea they were going to be a high

lottery team because they didn't know that their season was going to collapse. But they had a very good idea. They'd be given him a four-year max extension, which they did. That's true, but they didn't know they were going to have Dylan Harper. No, for sure. So they've got Don Harper, then they've obviously got Stefan Castle, who was a rookie of the year last year. And, you know, Devin Vestell doesn't play ball handle.

He's a two. But he's a two. He's a two. So, you know, you have those four, you know, you're going to have difficulty if you you play the cell at three. I mean, they can play the cell at three, but there's going to be some,

some issues that. By the way, I should point out, they also had an interesting maneuver signing Luke Cornett away from the Celtics. Yes. Three year,

$30 million deal. I think it was a $4 million deal, basically, but the back two years are not guaranteed. Right. So they, you know, the race to get backup,

quality backup, quality big man depth. I won't say backup, just to be nice, but quality big man depth in the Southwest Conference is strong. Southwest Division. Southwest Conference is a little bit of a different thing. That's true. You're right. Southwest Division.

This is, you know, that's when it be the big thing, is how are they going to fit everybody as minutes there? And, you know, this team is not competing for the championship. You want to see Dylan Harper play. You want to see what he's got. You didn't mention it earlier, but in our forecast, they were tied with the Mavs for 44 wins. And again, to go back to the piece I had the other day,

they were another one of the teams that I picked the under on. And it's for these reasons. Like, if you just look at the roster, like obviously, as you have been fond of saying, nobody really wants to put any kind of ceiling on Victor. And if you just say, hey, Victor is going to be back and play like an MVP and the Spurs are going to win 47, 48 games, I'm not going to sit here and tell you that's crazy. But if you look at the roster, it's incomplete, I would say.

And they're very light in the front court as you just laid out. You know, they don't have a ton of depth at the three or the four. They're very backcourt heavy. Those three guards don't really fit together, at least on paper. It's going to be fascinating to see how Mitch Johnson handles that and how they play together and what that looks like this year. Because to your point, Stefan Castle needs to play. Dylan Harper needs to play. Devin Vassell has had a bunch of injuries.

He needs to play. De Aaron Fox is obviously going to play. That how they manage all of that is going to be very interesting. And it feels like a team that is still probably a year or two, probably at least a year, and a couple of moves away from really being a team you look at and say, all right, this team is fully ready to go. They're going to be a top four, six team in the West. They're going to be challenging Houston.

Oklahoma City and Denver and the elite teams in the West. I imagine these guys are going to be tough to play on a nightly basis, especially Victor's back playing the way it was last year or better. But it just feels like the jigsaw puzzles don't seem to quite fit together yet, which is okay. Like they got young guys. They got to figure it out. I don't know how, I don't know,

are they really that thin in the front court? I think so. They got Harrison. I mean, Harrison Barnes at this point probably should be coming off the bench. I would say Kelvin Johnson should be coming off the bench. And those guys are, those guys are really their only forward-sized guys on the future. Jeremy Sohan. What is Jeremy Sohan?

What is Jeremy So-Han? That's a great question. Like, what is he? I don't know. And does Carter Bryant play much as a rookie will see? He's another guy who needs to play. Like, he's a really interesting young player. He is a wing-sized guy.

He needs to play. But again, his shot is another guy who his shot is a real. question, but if he can ever shoot it, he's got a chance to be a tremendous defensive player. But yeah, like, again, he's another guy that's not a finished. He's actually not a bad player, not a whole lot of people. He's a rotation player. I will say, I would say he's more of a two, but he's another guy to play on the wing and shoot the three.

You talk about their roster being incomplete. I think I should point out that Harrison Barnes and Kelly Olenick, $32 million in expiring. I don't know if they extend Jeremy Sohan. He is extension eligible, but if they don't, that's $40 million in expiring, and you know they've got a trove of picks. So I'm not saying they're going out hunting to like try to walk down the thunder, but they are in position if they want, if they see an opportunity to reformat this roster in like a two or three for one trade with some draft picks if they wanted. And the first traditionally had not been a team that made splashy trades, but they did last year. They did last year And you know

When there was Yonah stuff up in the air There was sort of out of the corner of your eye You're watching San Antonio Yeah they opted not to get in on the on the KD bidding as it was Despite KD putting the spurs

On his list And you know Wendy you predicted that The combination of breakfast tacos And Wiminyama Which makes San Antonio An attractive destination I think we started We have started to see that

sort of boxing, you know, made sure he got his way there. I'm just saying I had to drive from Austin to San Antonio recently. And those are the same city. There's no gap in those cities. It's Dallas, Fort Worth kind of thing at this point. It's a little farther away. But like, you know, like Austin, San Antonio is like, it's basically connected now. That's how much those two cities have grown.

Right. Yeah. I think they're in a really good spot overall. obviously be even well beyond Victor. I think Dylan Harper is going to be really good. I think Carter Bryant's got a chance to be really good. I like Stefan Castle. It's just the piece is just, it's, they're all,

there's a lot of awkward fits. It just, it's going to be, they're going to be one of the, to me, the most interesting teams to watch in the whole league this year. Obviously to see how Victor does and to see how these different pieces fit together because clearly we're going to be waiting to see if Victor can be part of the next contending team.

and what the spurs do to put pieces around him is going to be a critical part of what that looks like. If the spurs were in the east, where would we pick them? Fifth, maybe. Yeah, probably fifth or six. Like, they'd probably be somewhere around where Detroit's at, maybe, I would say. Yeah. Here's a thing. Like Detroit, they've got one really, really good player.

And then they've got a bunch of interesting people. Well, Deer & Fox is a better player than anybody else on the Pistons. But after that, they've got a bunch of really interesting, young players that we have to see how they fit together and what they look like. And I think that's what this year is going to be about more than racking up wins. Yeah. And the Pistons zoomed out of their rebuild last year. Now they're a developing team, but that's proven they can be a competitive team.

The spurs have to make that jump this year. They're not rebuilding anymore. They're still tinkering. They're not a finished product buying stretch. But it's time to zoom out of the rebuild to being competitive, which, hey, that might be ninth in the Western Conference, but it's time to be, you know, to take that jump and be above 500, and it's damn sure time to be better than the 25th ranked defense. Now, the primaries in there with the 25th rank defense is because Wemby ended up missing, you know, close to half

the season. They had a 110 defensive rating with Wembe on the floor, would have been the fourth ranked defense. Without him, 118.2 would have been 29. just in case you were wondering why Luke Cornyette was such a priority for them. More Hoop Collective podcast after this. All right. Let's head, I believe Memphis is on I-40. Okay. Maybe I-65? I fly there.

You fly from Houston and San Antonio, buddy. I know how you roll. True. And you stand and for years you stood in the regular line. All right. Memphis. So let me just say, first off, they were picked by the ESPN group to go 42 and 40. That's 10th, the edge of the play in.

I was talking to a scout last, or actually an assistant coach, an NBA assistant coach, and he was going on a tour of colleges to study their coaching methods, It's like just to take some time in the offseason, and he was going to some power conference colleges and visiting their coaches. And he was in the middle of this trip. I think he visited five or six schools across the country on this trip. And he said that in three or four places, when he walked in and saw the assistance, and he couldn't believe it, not that somebody was doing this, but that he actually kept seeing it over and over the course of this 10-day trip. they were looking at Tuamus Izalo's sets that he had been running when he was with Paris Basket.

Right. Not necessarily at Memphis, but they were reviewing them. Like, you know, there's, you know, Isalo is, you know, obviously the, you know, Zach Kleiman won a bidding war with Will Dawkins of Michael Winger in Washington to get Zahlo last year. but there's like these just these all these devotees out in the coaching ranks who loved the way still are studying the way he ran stuff in in Paris. He played fast, ran a lot of pick and rolls and shot a lot of threes. So and we don't we didn't get a feel for that last year in Memphis.

You got hired March 20th or something. It's also not what they were doing most of the season. Well, but he was in, yeah, he was an assistant. He was the lead assistant, but it was such a strange thing. And we covered all this last year when they had the coaching change midseason. And it wasn't only Taylor Jenkins, obviously, who got fired. But it was Noel LaRoche, this back row assistant who was winning the offensive philosophy tug of war and running the system that basically had no screening. And it's a very interesting, a lot of interesting concepts, a very interesting system.

but the superstar hated it. And if the superstar hates it, it doesn't tend to last. So he didn't last the full season either. And then you have Gasolo getting the reins in late March. Like how much can you put in in late freaking more? I think there's nine games left in the regular season. Yeah, the answer is not much. Yeah.

But obviously he's got a full off-season training camp preseason. It'll be his offense. it just won't be nearly as potent of an offensive team as it was last year. Right. So let me go over there, maneuvers from the offseason. So they, in the arms race in the Western Conference, maybe they would argue that they didn't downgrade, but they traded Desmond Bain,

they're arguably their third best player. I think resets the word that is preferred. Okay, sure. I think if we go back to the end of the playoff run, because it is worth mentioning when they got smoked, by the thunder, Zach Lyman, I'm paraphrasing this a bit, but essentially said, you can't look at this team and think we're a contending team in the West. And his actions this summer would indicate that he believed they needed to take a bit of a reset.

And they got, we all like Desmond Bain a lot. I think we all think he's a great fit in Orlando, but they got a ton for him. And I'm not sure it moved him that much farther down the standings. Yeah. So that may be true. And maybe they're going to be, they would be a play in team either way. But maybe not. Anyway, so they got, you know, the key player that they got in that deal was Kent Tavius called Well Pope in addition to the first round picks.

They renegotiated and extended Jaron Jackson Jr. made his contract five years in 240, and then he almost immediately came up with a turf toe injury, needed surgery, and we'll be might miss the start of the season. More most importantly, though, kept him out of free agency next summer because he was a guy who was going to be an understricted free agent. and there were plenty of teams around the league wondering if they were going to have a shot at him, especially when he did not make all-MBA and didn't win defensive player of the year. And then dust didn't qualify for a supermax extension. And to go back to what we talked about with PJ Washington, because Jaron Jackson was on a descending deal, he could not really get an extension to where the Grizzlies typically would have been able to get him to resign,

which is why they made moves last summer to clear cap space so they could give him a bunch of money up front. So they could extend them. I can also tell you the turf toe happened before the signing, the announcement is just in the opposite order. Fair point. I appreciate you pointing that out. If you have Capspace in the NBA, you can use Cap Space many different ways. You don't just have to sign a free agent.

You can absorb a contract from somebody else. And one of the things that's rare, but we do see it, is you can use that cap space to give a player who's under contract more money, which is known as a renegotiation and extension, which is what happened here, which is what Bontem's just described. They also signed Santiago-Al-Dama to a three-year contract extension, I believe, about $52 million. Their big free agent addition was plucking Ty Jerome off the Cleveland Cavs in a three-year, I think about a $30 million deal over $3, $27 or $30, something like that. One of the top guys for $6 million in the year last year.

And then I don't know how much of a role he'll play this year. but they made a draft night move, which they've been known to make draft night moves before, trading up to get Cedric Coward using, I think they used, Bond Thompson, they use one of the picks that they got for the game. They used one of the picks from that trade.

And I expect Cedric Coward to play. I don't know if he's going to start, but, I mean, they need guys to play on the wing. And assuming he's healthy, he missed a bunch of last year. I think he had a shoulder injury at Washington State.

He played five or six games. and he was a late riser in the draft process. I believe he started his career at D2 or D3. Really interesting backstory. But you see him. He's a 6-7 wing, like he looks the part, and I think he's got a chance to be a rotation player for them this season, but we'll see.

Similar kind of arc as far as the college path that Jalen Wells took, and Jalen Wells took mark a smart starting job last year. And certainly we'll be, we'll be replacing Desmond Bain in the starting lineup this year. Yeah, certainly projects to be a long-term starter there. Also, Zach Eadie, who was their lottery pick last year, had off-season ankle surgery. He's going to miss the start of the year, too, likely. Yeah, it was pretty significant surgery that he, I think he gave an interview I saw. I'd like to give, I think he, I'm not sure he would give credit for it, but I remember seeing any

he was basically like I didn't have a choice it had to be done. Well, he'd had a bunch of different ankle sprains over time. They eventually said, we got to do something about this. And hopefully it takes care of the problem. So he had a really nice rookie year and, you know, is going to be an interesting piece of them going forward. There are moves with Desmond Bay. We've mentioned this before, but it's also a vote of confidence in Jalen Wells,

that their second round pick in 24, who played a big role last year. So there's a lot going on. and none of that is even evaluating how many games John Morant's going to play. Because out of everything that we just talked about, John Morant's availability and effectiveness will probably be way and above. Like obviously you need Jerry Jackson to get out there and play. He's their second best player. But, you know, this team, if they're going to go back to being a top four team,

which they were for several years, it was when John Morant was an all NBA player. And he hasn't been that for various reasons for the last few years. And so, you know, it's important to note all that stuff. You talk about playing fast. You talk about playing with a lot of picking roles, but a lot of shooting around them that all should play to the strengths of John Moran and should also, frankly, pay to the strengths of Ty Jerome coming off the bench behind him. Like that, I thought was a sneaky good signing for Memphis,

despite, you know, tie out of rough playoffs. He has some flaws, but you saw us here at the Cavs, similar kind of up-tempo free-flowing system. He can do some damage offensively. So, but yeah, like everything with Memphis goes back to job. Morant and what version of John Moran are we going to see? And can he ever get back to the heights he was at a few years ago when he was, you know, looked like he was going to be one of the faces of the league? Yeah. The change in the offense late last season was about, okay, hey, we're moving forward with Ja. We've got to try to put him in a position to be at his best, try to maximize John Morant. Now, we'll see. this summer was about committing to Jaron Jackson Jr.

for the long haul and trying to put themselves in a position to kind of retrofit the roster around Jaron Jackson, Jr. And they took a wait-and-see approach on making a long-term commitment to John Moran. So take that for what it's worth. Just so I think it is worth pointing out, though, while you are correct. he does have including this season three entire years left on his deal. That's true. But when you have a franchise player who has an opportunity to extend and the team doesn't offer it,

it's worth note. Sure. I think that fall, I don't remember which recent pot it was on. I would say this John Morant discussion falls right into the tray on discussion. Well, it's going to fall into the team. We're going to talk about next in a second. Yes. I just thought for fans to know it's worth pointing out.

Right. one other thing I'm going to mention. Ken Tavius Caldwell Pope, he shot like 39% or better on threes for five straight years, won a couple of championships with two different teams in there. And then last year, after getting a pretty big contract with Orlando, basically had a dud year where his shooting plunged and his effectiveness plunged. He is... It's not super stunning, though I like the signing at the time.

Well, he's also... not 36. He's, I think, about to turn 32. Well, what I was going to say was, while I like the signing for Orlando at the time, it is not stunning that a guy who needs to be set up for shots, struggle to hit shots with a team where Jalen Suggs, a very important player, is a ton of time. And there's not a lot of offensive creation on that Orlando Magic team. Like that, you know, playing in this system next to John Morant, I would be surprised if we don't. I'm not saying KCP's going to get back to being where he was with

Yokic, but I'd be surprised if he's as bad as he was last year. Yeah, they might have bought low there. By the way, he already is 32. Yeah. So, okay. All right. The New Orleans Pelicans, our projection for them, it's, it's a rough one. 26 and 36, 26 and 56. How many teams were worse? Our project. That's one. I think just Utah. I think total there were four, but I will tell you in a second. Okay, so that would be projecting a likely top five pick going to Atlanta next year. They are tied for fourth.

So Utah had 19 wins, Washington had 20, Brooklyn had 23, and then Charlotte and New Orleans each had 26. So yes, at best, projecting a top five pick on average, going from the Pelicans to the Hawks and the Derrick Queen draft night trade. Well, so, yeah, so I would just say that, you know, Joe Dumas, not Joe Dumars, Joe Dumars is the president, but Joe Dumars gets hired there. And then very interestingly brings in Troy Weaver, who was obviously the GM in Detroit, but last year spent the year in Washington.

With a couple X Thunder guys and Michael Winger and Will Dawkins. Right. And I don't remember if he was the title, was an advisor or whatever. But the interesting thing about what happens here is Troy Weaver comes in, longstanding, you know, helped build the Thunder's last generation team. You know, he was the guy who was, you know, on the front lines a lot of time that the scout. that helped the Thunder draft those guys. That's why he got the job in Detroit. And they instantaneously make two seemingly highly influenced decisions that Troy Weaver would have.

One, as we mentioned, the Derrick Queen trade, the Draft Night Trade, where they go for Derek Queen. A DMV guy and Troy, Troy Weaver, very famously, Beyond Work, Washington is a DMV guy. Yes. And I believe his son was on. was a manager at Maryland last year. Not that he would listen to his son for that choice, but he probably paid very close attention to the Maryland games.

And then they trade for Jordan Poole, who was in Washington last year. Well, not only did they trade for Jordan Poole, but they traded for Jordan Poole and Sadiq Bay, who once upon a time, I'm pretty sure Troy Weaver drafted with the Pistons. That's right. That's right. May have proceeded. I'm going to double check that,

but I'm pretty certain that was during while he was with the Pist's. So I just, I'm, I'm, I'm making a bit of an assumption. I'm not trying to, like, report that. But I think the fact that they went and got two people that Troy Weaver, like, was pretty close to last year is an indication of Troy Weaver's already having a big influence with Joe Dumas. So the thing with them, obviously. That was, by the way, just not to interrupt, but Sidipe was part of Troy Weaver's first draft. Okay.

Jean-Tie Murray recovering from Achilles. We're not sure when he's going to be able to return. That's a huge setback. Zion Williamson, he missed a bunch of games at the end of last year. They were tanking, I don't know, but he had a back injury, but he once again wasn't able to finish the season. His contract remains non-guaranteed. He's got three years and like $120 million or something up on his contract,

but because he hasn't played the games, he remains non-guaranteed. I think this year is guaranteed in the next two or not, just to be clear. At one, no. Hmm According to Bobby Sheet, it's guaranteed Maybe it's guaranteed now But at one point it was not guaranteed There's all times

I triggered dates and weight clauses Joe Dumars came out when he got the job And said we're bringing Zion back There's no drama with it Well, because there's also Like there's a lot of question About whether they'd shop Zion And

He has no value right now So well I think I was relatively no value Just to be clear It's not like you buy that You wouldn't be selling high I do think there are teams

that would be willing to take a chance at him. Where New Orleans is at, they might as well see if they can turn it around with them. That's their only hope. And certainly they're only hope the way they went through the offseason because they clearly believe in Jeremiah Fears, who they drafted seventh overall. That's the thing. Jeremiah Fears is, if you're a Pelicans fan and you're going to be distracted from LSU football for the fall, I think it's to watch Jeremiah Fierce, who was wearing number zero, which

Zero fears. This is the fascinating thing about where the Pelican is to So the draft Zero My Fears, who's the seventh overall pick out of Oklahoma, really young, dynamic point guard. It's going to be a really interesting guy to watch. Zero Fears is a pretty cool nickname. He's clearly got a big personality. I hope it works out, and he's a really good player.

But as we know, the history would tell you, the history of the league would tell you, that if you're playing a rookie guard, a lot of minutes, probably going to be really rough. And Jeremiah Fears is a really young rookie guard. So for a team that just traded their unprotected pick in next year's draft. And look, Derek Queen played with Cooper Flag at Mount Verde in Florida last year on a absolutely loaded high school team that had four first round picks this year. But obviously, Cooper and then the Derrick Queen, Ace of Newell went to Atlanta and Liam McNeely went to.

the Hornets. Like they were an incredible team. He's a really talented player. Maybe he turns into an excellent player. It wouldn't be out of the ground. But they made a huge bet on those two young guys. And as a result, if you look at their team with Trey Murphy coming off a labrum tear surgery, Herb Jones coming off to laborum tear surgery, Dejante Murray coming off Achilles.

Derek Queen coming on. Derek Queen already had wrist surgery. Right. He had wrist surgery. You got Zion with his health issues, obviously, at all times. Like, it's hard to see how this is going to go a lot better than the record that the forecast indicator is somewhere in that ballpark. By the way, they did get in on the Southwest Division, Big Man, Bacca Big Man race, signing Kavana Looney, who leaves the issues after a long time. I think that the Pelicans are going to be the worst thing you can be in the NBA.

and that's a bad team that doesn't benefit from being bad. It's the worst thing you can be. Yeah, it's not great. It's not great. Yeah, that is great for Atlanta. That is well said. That is a McMahon Pearl of Wisdom. Yeah.

Well, they're going to be saying that Atlanta all year this year. Go Pelicans opponent. Yeah, the hot. Every night. It's a really rough spot to be in, man. Yeah, this is one of the things that also one of the best ways that you can build up your team and the you know the Celtics want to

build a championship team this way that's the way the you know this is the other side of what you're talking about McMahon you know this is what the Thunder are trying to do this is what the Rockets are trying to do is you know have somebody else's draft picks so that you're you don't

get punished for twinning some games so if you're Atlanta if you can win games while having the draft picks of bad teams that is a cheat code obviously it goes about saying to having a lot of success. As you said, that's the opposite.

That's the best thing you could be. That's right. That's right. That's right. It's how the Celtics got Jason hit him at Jalen Brown. As you point out, it's how the Thunder and Rockets are hoping to get talent down the road. And it's going to be something to watch all season because that,

that Derek Queen trade, like let's say the Hawks get a top three or four pick and next year's draft where there's three or four studs in the draft by all counts. the AJ DeBanson and Darren Peterson and Neda met Cameron Boozer Carlos' kid. Those guys are all supposed to be awesome players. That's just four to stop my head. They end up with a top three or four pick off that trade.

And they kept their pick in this year's draft. That's going to work out awfully well for the Hawks. So it's going to bear watching. And again, we'll see what happens long term. Like Derek Queen Jeremiah fears are very talented players. Like they could end up being really good down there. It's worth point out, Troy Weaver drafted. virtually all these young guys that are part of the Pistons,

young Cornynop, Sarr Thompson and Kate Cunningham and Jalen Duren and Jaden Ivy and all those guys were Troy Weaver picks. So he's got a record of drafting players that's pretty good. So maybe those guys end up being good, but your field goal percentage should be pretty good though when you're drafting the top five. Well, I'm, well, not everybody's is. It is worth being fair that he does.

he has picked some good players. As a long time executive once said to me, one of the biggest, most important things you can do in the NBA is know how to play Aces, which you know is like, you know, you get dealt Aces in poker. The other side of that is he drafted all those good players or at least interesting young players

and then he was out of a job anyway. So, you know, that would tell you that some other things didn't go is great. Rebuilds are hard. Rebuilds always sound good. When's the best time to start a rebuild? I'm trying to compete with McMahon's pearls away. A year ago, as Brian likes to say,

one of his many phrases he repeats many times. Last year. And here's the problem. The Pelicans would be the best time for them to start a rebuild, but they can't. Well, and think about it this way, too. Maybe they think they did.

Two different regimes, but a couple rough trades with the Hawks, potentially. Go back a year ago, give up Dejante Murray for what wound up being Dyson Daniels and ended up being a lower pick

than maybe expected, but getting Aes Anuil in this year's draft for the Hawks, then you turn around to do this trade too. Like those two trades could end up netting Atlanta a lot of talent. Speaking of Atlanta, going forward. I was, did you see Zachary Rishishay got some time defending Luca and had some good moments the other day and also had a bunch of threes in that game for France? Luca also scored a lot of points. No, I know.

I mean, I'm not going to shut him down. Be unclear. Yeah, I'll say if he, if he was working that, Well, he'd probably got more time. And speaking of the other land, hopefully our guy, Bogdan Bogdanovich, friend of the pod, feels better soon, had a rough hamstring injury out for the rest of the tournament for Serbia. Obviously, Bogdown was with the Hawks for several years, got traded with Clippers last year. But big boat of the Serbians is they're trying to win Eurobasket to lose their captain from their team.

And by the way, it's another reminder, you know, obviously it's a national team injury. But, you know, when you have a team of a bunch of guys in their 30s like the Clippers do, those guys are going to get hurt and they're already getting hurt. So. True. All right. That wraps the Southwest Division. Good job, everybody. Good job, McMahon, getting in from Costa Rica.

Thank you to Bontemps. Thank you to Jackson for getting back from Atlanta. We didn't even mention his weekend going to see. I did at the beginning. Went down to watch Cues. Didn't go great. No, that's all right. He had a good time.

All right, thank you for listening and watching the HOOP Collective. We're into September now. I mean, I'm not in a hurry, but it won't be long, whether I am or not. Media Day, four weeks from today. I'm not in a hurry. And we will talk to you later. Some teams even sooner. And we'll talk to you later this week.

Pura Vita. Adios amigos.