Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective - LaMelo Ball Trade Reaction + The NBA’s Huge Coaching Drama & Kawhi’s Uncertain Future

Episode Date: June 26, 2026

Brian Windhorst is joined by ESPN's Tim MacMahon and Vince Goodwill to react to the Hornets moving quickly on a deal to send LaMelo Ball to the Wolves for a haul of assets. The guys debate who won the trade, what this means for Charlotte and if Minnesota can contend with Anthony Edwards and LaMelo Ball as their star duo. Then, the guys break down the drama surrounding Blazers' hiring of Micah Nori including the coaches who have been angered by the deal that some have found to be disrespectful. Then, we talk about Austin Reaves' huge contract with the Lakers and if that may force a big move from the Pistons. Finally, will we see the Clippers move Kawhi this offseason and why that is a huge point of emphasis around the league. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Wayfair, every style, every home. Hello, and welcome the Hoop Collective Podcast. We talk about the NBA, which we're doing on Thursday afternoon. Joining me from Dallas, Texas, where he was on television with me this morning, bright and early, Ban McMahon. Howdy, partners. Hey, anybody's seen Bon Temps? Haven't heard from them in a while.

Bon Temps. Bon Tems. Don't recall. Joining me from somewhere else in this building in New York City, where we've been talking a lot about today's topic, which is La Millevillevilleville getting traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves as Vince Goodwell. What up, though, Wendy? What up, Doe.

Oh, what up, Doe. I like it. By the way, McMahon, the other day, amazing moment. We're on the hoop stream set. Yeah, the Green Rolfes moment. Yeah, that was cool too. But Ibuka O'Cori, the gun guard from Stanford, Speed Demon, he came up when he was getting ready to relocate his whole life to Detroit.

And Vince Goodwell provided him with the Hennessy glasses. What do you call him? Hennessy tent. That's the Hennessy tent. He put him on and it was like, welcome to Detroit. I think you were the official. Detroit welcoming committee. Listen, didn't need him anymore.

Detroit's in his rearview mirror. That's right. He's here in New York City. All right. We have a guy who's headed to Minneapolis, and he's going to need a car carrier, and he's going to need some snow tires. Josh Green? Josh Green, too.

They're going to need some minutes of forward. I don't know if you heard, but they traded their, practically whole front court. Okay, so I thought it was possible that Lamello Ball might get traded this year, because for various reasons we can talk about. The idea of him getting traded to Minnesota in basically a deal that came together very quickly, McMahon, that caught me off guard. So Lamello Ball goes to be Aunt Edwards,

new running mate, new backcourt mate, new double team buster, new co-star, new must-see TV grouping. You thought Lamello wasn't on TV a lot? Well, get ready because he's going to be. and the NBA changed shape a little bit with this deal on Thursday. Yeah, and it's a fascinating deal. And look, at this point last year, going in the season, I personally had a lot to say about Lamello,

about how I didn't believe in him, about the immaturity, about the erratic game, unreliability, all those kind of things. He had the best season of his career. He was a driving force in kind of the, darling of the NBA, at least the second half of the season. You know, they found that starting five that had the best net rating in the league. And clearly what happened was Jeff Peterson, the Horn's General Manager, thought it was

fools gold, didn't believe in it. And, you know, last year, Bobby Marks and I wrote the story early in the season about the three max point guards who people thought would be available on the trade market with not much of a market for them. Well, the Hawks traded Tray Young and didn't get a huge return. The Grizzies would beg for you to call them about John Morant right now. And then the Hornets, let's be honest, they restored the value to a certain degree of Lamello Ball and they pounced on the opportunity to move off of him and kind of hit the reset button

in terms of the culture of that franchise. and riverboat gambler, Tim Connolly, pouncing the opportunity to add a star caliber player alongside Ann Edwards to kind of, you know, tell those vultures to go circle somewhere else for a little bit. And, you know, it's a swing. It's a swing. It's a risk. I get why the wolves took it, but I don't know about you guys, but the majority of the people I've reached out to around the league, the immediate reaction is great deal for the Hornets.

Yeah, I think that's the sense that I got. I think it's because of the return that they got. The first round picks, the swaps. We all know first round picks are gold, and this is the first big deal that we have in this new lottery era of uncertainty in first round graphics. I'll say this.

I file players into two categories. Do you drive winning or do you influence winning? I think lamello ball is an influencer of winning. When you look at the usage. He's definitely an influencer. Oh, he's an influencer. All right. Like, the fact that he had a top 10 usage this year, and we don't think of him as being

a top 10 player, his uses was higher than K. Cunningham, higher than Nicola Yolkich, a shade behind Anthony Edwards. Like, I'm very curious to see how those two guys fit together. You got to get the ball to ants' hands. You got to be able to get someone who can get him the ball in places where he can make things happen without being faced with double-te. teams. Also, La Mello Ball is a guy who can shoot six, seven, eight, threes in a game. Six, seven, eight. Yeah, six, seven. There you go, Wendy. Good job. Good job, buddy.

There you go. All the threes in the game in the way that he hasn't had another perimeter explosive player. Let's, let's be honest, y'all. The Julius Roundle thing had a shelf life and had a high and hard ceiling, more so a regular season ceiling than a playoff ceiling. The Lamello ball thing might have a lower floor, but also has, a higher ceiling. I want to see this young man harness his game and be able to fit next to Anthony Edwards in a way that this is your reliable co-star. Can we count on the Mello Ball to be on the floor, to be available, to make the right decisions? Those are the questions that I got that I still have because last year could just very well be an anomaly in the grand scheme of things. And that's the bet the horns are making. They had to do something for Ant. They had to do it.

I mean, like, I mean, whether this, so here's the thing, to explain why the point guards are, the value of the point guards is tough. There's, and this used to be, but this is one of Bon Tem's big things. There's so many teams out there that are set at point guard, okay? There's just, there's just not that many teams that are in need of point guard. By the way, the wolves were one of them, okay? So you have those. Then you have the fact that how many possible franchisees, point cards just went in this draft. Four-ish. I mean, maybe they'll end up being more,

but like those teams don't need it. All right. So then you have the fact that, you know, Trey Young, Jom Morant, because he's in this bucket too, and Lamello were on max contracts. So Trey had one year and $50 million left. Now he's opted out and re-signed. But he went for, if you just so you remember, that deal was C.J. McCollum and Corey Kisper. A column was an expiring contract. He ended up being a very good for the Hawks. They started winning immediately. He was big for them in the playoffs.

He has since signed a one-year extension. And they have drafted Kingston Fleming's, who will be their franchise point guard, you know, going forward after some tutelage from CJ. This trade, Lamello has three years and 130 million left on his deal. And his production is, you know, substantial. He's averaged 20 points a game pretty much every year. He hits a high volume number of three pointers, high volume assist guy, plays high tempo, can really drive your offense.

But $130 million for a guy who basically missed two whole seasons with ankle injuries, it's a high bar if there's a number of teams that need point guys. It's just hard to do. And so I don't think Charlotte was dying to trade him, but I think Charlotte was like, we got, God Khan Kniepple, that's the guy we're going to build around. He's 21 years old. If we can get a return for Lamello that we like, we probably should do it now because he's coming off a season where he only missed 10 games and showed some durability. And they get, you know, three swaps, four draft assets, three swaps and a first round pick. And, you know, Nas Reid, who, you know, they need big man help.

And, you know, is a floor-stretching big man who has, you know, has, you know, he's sort of, he's a little up and down last season, but, you know, a quality player. And it clears out the way for them to sign Kobe White to a three-year, $25 million deal. Now, Kobe White shot, I think, 40% from three after he got traded there last year. So, you know, you've got, you've got that. You've got him to balance that with, with Cinnipple. and he's going to be, God,

see how much cheaper? So it's 25. So Lamello is at 44. Yeah, Lamello's 44 million over the next three years. Kobe is going to be 25 million. Yeah. And he won't score quite as many points, I don't think.

But it's going to be somewhat comparable production for a lot less money. And you have the assets. And, you know, you have money. to pay Brandon Miller. Brandon Miller is a contract extension eligible this summer, clean up your books. And I don't think Charlotte thought that they were like with the same roster

was going to be a top three seat in the east. A few things here. A GM that I asked about this deal, one of the things he said about Lamello was Jeff cleaned them up and got him out, smart. Jeff Peterson. Jeff Peterson, the Hornets GM, basically saying, hey, LeMello had minimal value a year ago, had a good year.

You know, they won some games. He was on the floor, restored his value to a certain point, and boom, pounce on an opportunity to trade him once there was some value. So I don't buy that, like, I think the Hornets went into this summer saying he's got value, let's get a deal and move him. I don't, oh, they weren't shopping. I don't buy all that. I'm not criticizing it.

I just don't buy that whatsoever. Now, as far as your point about like Cody, uh, Kobe White being able to, like if you put their basketball cards together, I think the production will be pretty similar. If you look at the impact, though, the Hornets had what would have been the best offense in the league when the mellow was on the floor. That offense cratered. It would have been a bottom five offense just based on his numbers off the floor. Look, concanipple, that's clearly going to be their guy going forward. He benefited tremendous. from playing with Lamello ball during his rookie year. Lamello assisted on 110 of his buckets. It's more than 20% of his buckets.

A lot of those other shots that he got, those good looks at threes were created off of Lamello breaking the defense down, and the ball starting to ping around. The Mello, or just the pace that he play with, the Mello's impact on them offensively was much more than his counting stats. And I say that as a guy, again, I count me as a, mellow skeptic. Now, for the wolves, it's kind of a whack-a-mole as far as problems. Yes, ants going to be happy with this. Yes, you've got a potential solution, a potential star

solution to what was a glaring hole at point guard. But in the whack-a-mole thing here is pop, you've got a power-forward problem now. You know, somebody with the wolves told me, we went 48 minutes of outstanding power forward play to zero. Now, I'm guessing they'll bump McDaniel's up to the four. They might start those three guards with A.O. to sumu. But they've got some things to figure out and not a lot of flexibility to figure out

as far as what they're going to do at that four spot. I think one of the things that has happened here is that there was a lot of questioning the wolves after the Julius Randall trade, including by us, me especially, about salary dumping. And there's been like, well, okay, well,

This is, you know, they put the money back. Not quite. There's still vastly reduced salary because Randall, you know, Nasreed's salary and Randall's salary is slightly higher. But it still is going to put them in position where they're not going to be able to use their exceptions, or use their full mid-level, I don't think. And if they're going to be in the tax, I think I don't know if they're going to use their many mid-level. So they are going to have to add to the team,

but I don't know what their mechanisms are going to be. But I've got to tell you, that starting five that they have. If it's those three guards, McDaniels and Rudy, and by the way, Rudy's going to be happy. He's going to be getting lobbed up and he's never been more important to this team. Yeah, he's going to be happy on one end of the floor. He's going to have to cover up for a lot more on defense because this playoff has shown. It's hunting season.

Like, you find a mismatch and you start hunting that mismatch. This goes, this goes without saying. But on the other hand, Lamello's never had back protection like Rudy. Well, and Lamello is at least 6 foot 7. Like, you know, I used to say about one of Lucas's, one of Lucas' greatest defense of strengths is you can hide them on multiple positions. And I'm not kidding about that. Same thing with Lamello.

Like, you don't want them, bang them necessarily with, like, physical fours. But, you know, you can pick one through four. What's the weakest link for the other team offensively and give mellow that assignment? I don't think you can because he's so slightly built in such a health risk that I don't think you want to do that. I think you want to keep mellow where you can see them and tell him to guard your yard a little bit. Like Anthony Edwards is already going to be taxed as is. He's one of the best two-way guys in the league. He's going to be taking one of those matchups anyway.

You've got to think about this. They've gotten from being, from lack of a better phrase, Gurfy, To be a little bit on the skinny side. Yeah. Right. All right. All right. Listen,

do what you got to do. Sorry. Sorry, Wendy. I know you were there for a cringy moment at the draft where Shump did not bailed me out in any way, shape, or form. By the way. You've got a theme. You've got a type. By the way, you know, Vinny and Shump are, you know, our brothers within the hoop collective family.

And, man. Cousins. Okay, fine. man, three and a half hours of live television with Shump and Vinny. Let's just say, you know, have you seen that video of that jet that just did like the low pass? It's maybe this is on my Twitter, aviation Twitter. You see what the wing almost hits the ground.

We were like that a few times. Yeah, I can believe that. Where Shump, you know, corrected, get up in the air, or Vinny corrected pulled up. But I'm just going to tell you it was an entertaining three and a half hours. I was, you know, just leave it at that. That's kind of like if Lamello's games go forward. four overtimes. They're entertaining three and a half hours.

You might be skimming the ground or, you know, you might hit your head. I wasn't going to get us, Wendy. I wasn't going to get us fired. I was not going to get us fired, Wendy. No, you didn't. Hey, Terris Shannon Jr. has some girth. And he's going to have to,

Chris Finch is going to have to play him, going to have to rely on him more than he has in the past. Well, and Yon Jé, let's not free, I mean, there's a lot of excitement around Baranget, the Wolves number one pick. I mean, I would have to assume. I don't know this to be sure. I mean, I'll do some reporting on this.

I would assume it's Charlotte asked for Berenge. I would bet for sure. And my guess is, like, my guess is the wolves were like, listen, we're not, I don't know this. But my guess is that the wolves are like Berenge's off limits because they needed Berenge to be part of this. And look, Berenge is a rudy understudy. I assume he's going to be about a, you know, 16, 18 minute per game backup this year, but he's the eventual replacement. And if Rudy and Berger are both healthy,

they should have 48 minutes of lob catchers and rim protectors on the floor, which is going to be critical because they are pretty small, as you guys are saying, outside of that. Can I make a quick point, though, like about these swaps and you see, oh my gosh, three swaps and the first round pick is impressive. Look, Zach climbing to Memphis would do backflips to get

a fraction of this for John Moran. But the swaps are kind of funny money here. The 2028, I would wager on the wolves being better than the Hornets. The 29, they owe that pick to Utah top five protected. So that's old, now the upside's high, But it's only a swap. I need like a white board to figure out.

Because the lottery, new lottery rules like top five protected, like who knows how to project that thing? And that's the thing. It's only a swap if it's in the top five. So it's soaring high upside, but very unlikely to convey. And then the 2030 is it's like a swap of a swap where there's another swap played it. I don't know the exact. That's fair. But it's,

their draft, this is where you get the catch-all draft assets. So. Yeah. But my point is, the volume of the swaps doesn't necessarily mean there's value in those, especially in these circumstances with all the asterisks on.

It's a sticker. It looks like a sticker price. And then you get down to what it actually is. And I appreciate you breaking that down. Okay. I will also say that Mark Lurie and Alex Rodriguez, this is going to be an expensive team. Still going to be an expensive team.

I just hope they can cater the team playing still. Well, this is going to be an expensive team. And they're probably going to add a little bit more to it. So Tim Connolly, he goes, he's been big game hunting, hunting. He really couldn't do much big game hunting when he was in Denver. he did make that Aaron Gordon trade. But he's done big game hunting ever since he got to Minnesota, trading for Gobert. You know, then the Julius Randall swap tried to trade for Durant, tried to trade for Janus,

trades for LaMello, like, say what you will. The man is on the phone and he's aggressive. And listen, people killed Connolly for the Rudy Gobert deal, and it ended up being a great trade for the wolves and help them have the most success. chapter in franchise history. And even the people I talked to who thought that the hornets got the best of the deal, they're like, hey, but respect to Tim Connolly because the guys got a set of Cajonis on them. Yeah.

There will be a lot to digest with this trade in the coming days and a lot more. So we always have surprises in the summer. And this is certified one of them. More Hoop Collective podcast after this. McMahon, we had a lot of player transactions going on this week. Obviously, we're going to have a lot more player transactions. Who knows what will actually happen player transaction-wise from when the time we record this until the time it posts. But that's the nature of the business these days.

But honestly, I was very interested in the story that you posted on the second day of the draft and had nothing to do with players and had nothing to do with draft picks. and everything to do with the hiring of Micah Norey as the new head coach of the Portland Trailblazers. And I wish you could take us through what you wrote. Yeah, and to clear, everybody in the coaching community loves Micah Nore and respects Mike and Nore and thinks that he is ready and deserving of a head coaching job. and I talked to several coaches who are absolutely irate about the circumstances, specifically the structure of this contract. And this is Tom Dundon's work. This is that Stanley Cup winning Dallas-based billionaire,

who in his brief time in the NBA, has been notoriously cheap, frugal, doesn't travel two-way guys for the playoffs, has had layoffs, no late checkout. I think if you're at the hotel, you're probably got to find somewhere else to eat lunch, all kinds of stuff. And man, that's how he conducted this coach and search.

Which, by the way, started midway through the season while Tiago Splitter was working his ass off under insane circumstances leading your team to the playoffs and you're interviewing mid-major coaches who are telling you, dude, I make more money than what you're talking about offering at a mid-major. in college. Yeah, but I think the salary is secondary to the...

The salary is secondary, because this is... Micah Nori accepted a contract as a rent-a-coach. And that's the best way I can put it. Coach on probation. That's all. It's a one-plus-one-plus-one contract. It's a three-year deal with team options for the second and third year. And I'll be honest with you.

I heard from a whole lot of coaches. A few were ready to go on the record and backed out props to J.B. Bickerstaff, who was the president of the MBCA, the National Basketball Coaches Association. He felt like it was his duty as the president of that organization to take a firm stance on this. And as he told me, he felt like this contract, and he couched it with love for Micah. But he felt like this contract was a slap in the face to our back. value. That's a direct quote. And one of his points was you, they basically leverage Micah's dream to putting him into a position where not only are they concerned about it setting a precedent,

but it puts Micah in a really tough position. Yeah, bet on yourself. Why wouldn't you bet on yourself? Sure. And Micah's doing that. But he's betting on himself with an arm tied behind his back. because what is a critical element that a coach needs? Credibility and authority. Like if the players don't respect him, if the players think that he's expendable, how's he going to demand accountability from them? How's he going to build out a coaching staff

when those coaches are like, dude, should we just stay like an extended stay motel? Like, how long are we going to be here? And so it's an extraordinarily challenging situation for Mike and Norrie. You know, and I've got empathy. for Micah. This is a guy who has been a lifelong grinder as an assistant coach. His established a reputation is one of the best assistant coaches in the league. By the way, if you didn't, people who, like the casual fan, you probably know Micah from his halftime

interviews on the Woolf's broadcast. Absolutely hilarious guy. And you see his personality shined through all the one-liners there. But he's also a great basketball line. But he'd interviewed for like six or seven head coaching jobs. He'd been a final. He'd been a final. finalist on multiple. And he wasn't breaking through. So he feels like, man, I've got one I can take now. If I pass on this, will I ever get another chance? And was leveraged because they were also negotiating multiple coaches simultaneously in his weird game of limbo. How low can you go or how low are you willing to go? And he felt like he couldn't pass on it even with it being just a disrespectful deal. I was talking to another head coach who sort of comes from the same lineage as Mike Anori.

Okay. And he's like, for those of us who like coached in the G league and stuff like this, all the jobs we're ever going to get are going to be bad jobs. You know, we're not going to get, you know, Jason K.K. kid walking into coaching, you know, KG, Pierce and those guys. And, you know, we're not going to get the job that Steve Nash walked into. We're not going to get the job that Steve Kerr was able to get. AJ Redick, so on and so forth. Yeah, if you're like a grinder and you come up that way, you're going to get a job where it's a three alarm fire.

Maybe not a five alarm fire, but a three alarm fire. And actually, you look at Chris Finch, who was Norrie's, you know, he and Norrie are actually a lot of like. They're both from sort of small town, Ohio, both coaches the minor leagues. When Finch got that Timberwolves job, it was in the middle of the COVID year, okay? He was on the Raptor staff. He comes over and it was like, fix this situation right now and you basically can't practice. You don't even know if you're going to have your players,

depending on how today's tests go. And, you know, Finch had coached overseas. He'd coached him in the G League, blah, blah, blah. And, you know, so part of it is you're going to get a tough situation. I think that's probably why Micah took the job because it's like, look, if I sit here and wait for the perfect job, it's never going to come. And by the way, Finch's just tenure in Minnesota started without, among the coaches association as well because remember that's when gerson rosa hired him midseason

without interviewing anybody else notably without interviewing any minority candidates then president of the coaches association rick carlyle issued a scathing statement um and then ended up taking the pastoral job under incredibly similar circumstances um but you know but there was like it was a controversial hire for those reasons um and there was like there was real disgruntlement within the coaches association about that one as well. I will say this. And I said this on first take today and, you know, Vinny had an appropriate pushback is fine. If you're Tom Dunden, he came out and said that the Blazers spend $100 million more than the Carolina Hurricanes do. Okay. And he basically is like, you know,

that can't be right. And so, And by the way, I am not his advocate. I am not arguing for him. I do not have his side. I am trying to just be fair. He didn't kick the players out of the hotel. He kicked some staff members out of the hotel early and didn't give him a late checkout. And it was a hotel in San Antonio that, you know, it was a one-off situation.

It's not all road trips, okay? But we're talking about culture here, though. I understand. I'm not looking for an argument. I'm just saying. The other thing is he's, I'm just saying what he's probably seeing.

He's seeing Joe Missoula was probably the lowest paid coach in the league that first year. No assurance whatsoever. Has taken off, taking the Celtics with championship. He saw Mitch Johnson, functionally a one-year contract. They didn't have to keep him.

He wasn't making any money. Has been great in that role. Mark Dagonal, hired right out of the G league. Like he's sitting there saying probably, I don't know what he's thinking. Well, same thing with his coach in Carolina

with the hockey team and that guys made the playoffs eight years and won a Stanley Cup, but this ain't hockey. I get that. Also, one of the things he's doing right now up in Portland with the renovation of the Rose Garden.

The Rose Garden renovation is complicated. There's a lot of great journalism being done by colleagues in Portland. I am not trying to go anywhere near them. It's a complicated one because it's the city, state, and county all trying to get together. And it's like herding cats and dogs trying to get that thing taken care of. And it's a $600 million renovation of the building. And basically he's like, I ain't paying for any of it.

I'm afraid of any of it. It feels like we're making a pretty big investment by staying here and paying these tax rates. And so he thinks taxpayers should cover the whole thing. No, it's an outsider who just got to Portland and, you know, it's probably spent a few nights there and that's about it. Well, no, it sounds like what it says by, we're doing you a favor by staying here. You know what? That sounds very, you know, I've got some emails that says, I really want to take this team somewhere else. Like, it doesn't sound like that he's treating this team, like it's a civic, like a civic property, so to speak, or a civic asset.

It sounds like he is treating this team. Here's my thing. Screw all that. I was about to curse. I'm not going to curse. If you're Adam Silver in the band of owners, how do you let this guy in? And I've been asked that by multiple. Some of the coaches were like, somebody needs to ask Adam Silver about this.

Adam Silver screwed up by allowing this guy to buy the team. And what the league will tell you is that every owner has the right to do things their way. every owner has to figure out things on their own. He's already been backing him up on the record, Adam's soul. Yeah, and here's the thing. We know Adam isn't ever going to speak out of turn against one of the 30. Not publicly. Well, we know Adam is going to be political no matter what the situation is on a bunch of different spaces.

My thing in general is it sets a terrible precedent. You put Michael Nore in a completely unfair situation. like Joe Missoula and Mitch Johnson were guys who were in the building. Like adverse situation when you talk about IMA Udoka and his situation and Greg Popovich having a stroke. Like those guys were in the building and then you take over on an interim basis and you figure out the rest later. They had Tiago Splitter in the building this year.

Tiago Splitter on the second day of the damn season had to slide in when Chomsy Bill was indicted and everything else. And he took that team to the playoffs, that team not only stayed together, but got better throughout the course of the year and leapfrog a bunch of teams that we thought were better from a talent standpoint and you let him walk to the Portland Trailblazers. So far be it for me to say that I believe in him.

While Tiago Splitter is doing an amazing job under incredibly difficult circumstances, Dundon is literally discussing this position with dozens of coaches. I think I saw him at Pierce High School talking to the JV coach about it. Listen, what he's basically saying is I don't think there are certain things that I have leverage on. I don't have to value.

He clearly doesn't value experienced coach with, you know, he thinks he can cycle through coaches because he doesn't think there's value there. He doesn't value people. He values players, but not people, not coaches, not staffers, not fans. No, I'm judging on actions. He's like, look, why should I give any money to Portland? Like, I don't have any investment here. Why should I get? Anyway, it's an interesting thing.

The only thing that will matter is if it starts costing them players. Okay. If players start saying, I want to get out of here or I don't want to go there. I would love to know what Damien Lillard feels like. Because he, you know, traded or not, he's back there. And he spent all those years being the guy out front. And now he's going to have to be the guy. out front again having to, because we're not going to ask Michael Norrie these questions because

he doesn't have a leg to stand on. He's not going to speak out against the guy who can fire him at any time without any financial responsibility for it. So you're going to ask the guy who's made over, you know, $200 million who the public trust and everything else and Damien Liller, and he has to speak for this guy. Like this is, the NBA and Adam Silver really screwed the pooch unless they were in such a situation where they were afraid of the Portland Trailblazers being moved by somebody else that they were backed into this. Like, I will grant Wendy this. Whenever new owners come into situations, unless they are a minority owner in the NBA already,

it takes a few years to get assimilated to NBA culture. Like every NBA owner that comes in thinks that they can run their NBA team, like their local business that warrants at them billions of dollars. and I understand the thinking, but the NBA is something totally different and is different than the NHL. When you have staffers in Portland, Wendy, who are relieved, when they are relieved of their duties

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Plus, that signature, wait, for this price, moment. Old Navy's drapey denim wide leg. I just remember, and we'll change the topic after this, I'll never forget PJ Carlisimo. P. Jack Carlosimo, he was obviously a longtime head coach in college and in the NBA. his last head coaching job was with the Brooklyn Nets. He relieved Avery Johnson in the season. Avery Johnson, like one coach of the year in November, got fired in December.

Maybe it was coach of the year in December, got fired in January. I can't remember. And I remember he, PJ is one of our colleagues at ESPN. We love him. I remember he came in to give his first press conferences, the interim head coach.

And then he was asked, what are you expecting to get out of your meeting with owner Mikhail Prokraf tomorrow? And he's like, lunch. But I remember, like, he kind of had nothing to lose at this point. And he was like, listen, your best chance to be successful in the NBA. And this is a guy who had been in college and pro coaching for like 30 or 40 years at this point. He's like, your best chance to be successful is to have the longest contract possible with the most money on.

And of course, I think the best chance to be successful as a podcaster would have the same thing. I just want everybody to know that. I'm on the record is saying that. Well, you've succeeded. Yeah, right. I wish that were true. But the reality is that there's some truth in that.

There's some truth in that. All right. I have no idea what's going to happen with some of these big-name players. I do think the Austin Reeves contract, what we saw was a fascinating situation of leverage. the Lakers from from my knowledge he signed out four years 185 from what I was told the Lakers were were in the range of five years 150 for Austin Reeves a couple of days ago 30 million dollars a year very good contracts significantly higher than what he was making right now and I mean wasn't their final offer clearly but that's where they were in the range of and some teams in the league who thought they might have a shot at Austin, we're like, wow, if that's where they're at, we might be able to get him. You know, I think Brooklyn had some interest there. Detroit definitely had interest. And

Detroit was lining up trades to open up even more cap space. They've subsequently, you know, salary moved Isaiah Stewart. The Lakers immediately, within 24 hours of the previous discussion, raised their offer to 45 or 46, whatever it was. They increased our offer by 50. percent, 50 percent from 30 to 45 because they thought he was going to walk, right? He was leverage. So here's my question, Vince, knowing that happened and congratulations to Austin. Detroit is very obviously serious about using its space. What's going to happen in Detroit?

Who are they going to get? Because they're going after somebody. The crazy thing is the stuff that you heard over the past couple of days before now, you heard about Austin Reeves, you heard about Kobe White, both of those guys are signed. Now you have all this money. And I take people back because we're talking about ownership. Also, Tyler Hero, I'm going to throw that out there too. Still on the board.

Still on board, right? Stone aboard. Stone aboard. Tom Gores is an L.A. guy. And he was the guy who spearheaded that Blake Griffin deal all those years ago, six months after Blake Griffin signed that deal with the Clippers. and he got his star and they learned a lot of lessons in how to build a team. You have your star now in Kay Cunningham.

Do you still have the appetite to go get an L.A. Clipper? I mean, look, when you trade Isaiah Stewart, who makes $15 million a year, who's arguably the best room protected this side of Victor Wemnon Yamah and a big piece of that culture, you trade him for peanuts. You'd better have a plan. this about Minnesota with Julius Randall and Anthony Edwards. They said, what's going to happen? I said, they better have a plan. Let's see what they, let's see what they do. And Minnesota had a plan. And I think Detroit knows that they have to have a plan. They're in the championship zone.

Now, when you win 60 games and you got a franchise player in Kay Cunningham and you've got to take care of a Sart Thompson, you've got to take care of Jalen during, I've heard things that those negotiations have not going swimmingly well so far. You've got to figure out getting Kade Cunningham a co-star. If there was one team on the NBA landscape who had the glaring need going into the offseason, it was Detroit and another primary score next to Kay Cunningham, that question has not been answered yet, and we got a few days before a free agency. And listen, they had an opportunity to answer this question before the trade deadline, and they decided, and I think it was an understandable path, let's be patient, let's let these guys,

you know, let's give this young core that's ahead of schedule. a chance to show us who they are or who they aren't come playoff time. It was a real struggle to get out of the first round as a 60 win number one seed. And then they lose in the second round and it's clear, hey, you need another really dynamic

offensive creator. You need another, not just shooter, but you need another big time score and they've still got all those picks. They still have financial flexibility and now even more so. And so it's time to pounce. And I'm sure they've got

Plan A, B, C, D, E, F, and, you know, A and C or whatever might be off the table, but they've got to pounce this all season because the financial flexibility, to your point, is about to be off the board. Yeah, so I think that's important to realize they've got this window. And, you know, they still will sign Duren. They will add a bunch of money, obviously, to him. And I don't think he's going anywhere. But let me just real quick talk about the Kauai Leonard concept here.

Because Kauai Leonard is, I wish I could tell you I knew what's going to happen here. I don't know. And a lot of the league doesn't know, okay? He's coming off a season. I'm going to look up Kauai stats. Just to remind myself what Kauai did this year. So he played in 65 games, so he was able to make all NBA. He averaged 28 points.

all right that was the most points of any season in his career shot 51% from the field all right and was an absolute

beast from that mid range that we saw back to like his peak of his career really from that mid range

one year contract at $50 million by the way and shot at 39% from three point range on pretty high volume

right and and is, how old is he? Is he about 35. 35. 35. 35 in a couple days, actually. 35 and four days.

All right. So not necessarily in position to be getting a four-year max here, but definitely looking like he could get another contract. And certainly the way he's playing, you would extend that guy. You would either extend that guy or you would trade it. The last thing you would do is have him on an expiring contract. Here's the thing, guys. I don't know what the clippers want to do with him

as for the direction of their franchise. I think they'd like to extend them at a significantly lower number. Okay, but let me ask you this. Are they allowed to extend this contract right now? That's a good question. Because this contract is possibly deemed illicit. Are they allowed to extend them?

Are they allowed to trade them? Would the league, without this settled, would the league allow a trade? Can the league make a damn? ruling on this? I don't. I mean, I don't know, man. When you talk to people around the league, people, A,

thought that a ruling could come down before the draft just in case the draft picks needed to be stripped. Then you hear about, hey, if nothing happens here, and I'm a skeptic, I tend to believe that nobody has the goods, and until you actually have the goods, you don't have the goods, you cannot

indict on speculation or hearsay, or look at all the circumstantial evidence, and everything else. If you don't have the goods, then you, if you don't have more than probable cause, then you can't do anything because it sets a bad president. But with that being said, what do the Clippers want to do with Kauai Leonard? Like, they just drafted a future franchise point guard in addition to already having Darius Garland there. Are they ready to get out of the Kauai Leonard business because it's because it could be possibly too much trouble than what it's worth at this

point. Add to the fact he's 35, add to the fact that his knees and legs and lower body could be a ticking time bomb. This is fascinating to me on a number of levels. I think his athletic gifts are worth the risk, but what about everything else? I'm just, it's like, it's like one of the biggest it's like one of the biggest things hanging in this off season. And look, three and a half weeks ago at the start of the finals, Adam Silver said it's time for the investigation to be over. I agree. You know? Here's the other thing about the Clippers.

We're going to find out, by the way, free agency starts on Monday. That's four days from now. Come on. The one thing about the Clippers is important to watch. They got three guys, Brooke Lopez, Bogdan Bogdanovich, Nicholas Petum. All of them on team options. They don't owe money to any of them. They got to make a decision by this weekend.

They cut all of them that saves $53 million off. They could be a cap space team. All right. Right. Obviously they could keep him and run back with Kauai. By the way, Steve Ballmer has never indicated he wants to like go down. Like I think Steve Balmer is his investment in Kauai is so deep. I don't see it stopping. But also Kauai has, if he's allowed to be traded and he's not going to face a significant suspension, if he's, you know, either gets a light penalty or none at all. He's got immense. He's got more value right now that he's had in years. Right. So, you know, we just got. done seeing La Mello Ball get traded because the Hornets, even if they didn't want to trade him, evaluated that his value may not be able to be higher in the short term. I can't imagine if he gets out of this investigation without a significant penalty, how you can dream of Kauai's value not being higher. This is an organization that's already moved off James Hardin and already moved off of Vizzi Azubatch. And has proven to be cold-blooded. And, well, Paul George is true, but that was, they made a value judgment there. But yeah, yeah.

But I'm saying they're in the middle of a sea change already happening. But going back to Blake Griffin to Detroit, they are a ruthless, it's a ruthless, cold-blooded front office. And I don't mean that to be critical. I just mean that to be factual. It's a statement of fact. It's a statement of fact, Timmy. that's the NBA. And if you're Detroit,

is this the star with this shelf life that you take the risk on? Do you view the Eastern Conference as being, I won't say getable, right? But if you look at their roster and you say,

okay, we're going to add Kawhi Leonard to Kay Cunningham, Assar Thompson, Jalen Duren, plus whatever shooting that we can fill in the blanks on in the meantime.

Does this equal June? Does this equal? We're beating the Knicks. We're beating whatever iteration we're going to have of the Celtics and we're going to be playing in the NBA finals this year. Because you don't make that move to give yourself a two-year window. You make that move because you want to win yesterday.

And I think part of that equation has to be if you trade for Kauai, what's kind of the wink, wink, nod agreement that comes along with it in terms of a few. You better not wink, nod, blink, nothing near Kauai Leonard at this stage. You ain't asking that right. in your trees. All right. I got to cut this short because I got to go back to work. Thank you very much to McMahon. Thank you very much to Vince. Thank you to our production, especially Jackson. Thank you for watching. Listen to Hoop Collective all week long. Who knows what emergency

pods will have to do over the weekend, but we'll talk to you soon one way or another. Adios megos.