Brian Windhorst & The Hoop Collective - The 3 Hottest NBA Teams + The Most Interesting Team To Watch At The Trade Deadline

Episode Date: February 2, 2026

Brian Windhorst is joined by ESPN's Tim Bontemps and Tim MacMahon to discuss the Hornets’ hot play, a huge shooting night including an MVP level performance from Shai Gilgeous-Alexander to power OKC over the Nuggets. Then, the guys talk about a big night at MSG where the Knicks showed the promise of their roster ahead of the trade deadline continuing their strong play of late. Next we break down why the Cavs may be the most interesting team to watch at the trade deadline before awarding the highly anticipated January Cojones Factor Player of the Month. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

Out here on the West Coast, it's still Sunday night, and the Grammy's after parties are raging. So I just want you to know, guys, I could be across the street at the Grammy after parties, but no, no, we had to make sure that we got our full coverage in here. Joining us from New York City, where he was at the Nick's Victory, over the Lakers at Madison Square Garden earlier this evening is Tim Bonteps.

Hello, everybody. Atmospheric was good at the garden tonight? Yeah, fun atmosphere, as always, when LeBron comes to town. We'll see if it's the last time LeBron does come to town, got himself into the All-Star game, and dapped up all the Knicks players after the game. So, celebratory mood. Luca flipped off Jalen Brunson after the game.

Well, not after the game. I thought it was, or maybe I saw he tried to help him up at one point during the game and after Jim took a charge. No, he literally, I mean, he was obviously joking, but he walked over, you know, in the postgame like hug party, he flipped him off, reminiscent of Larry Bird and Michael Jordan after that series in the last dance. I see that right here now. It's pretty funny. Joining us from Ball Arena where he's just gotten through out of the locker room, the Thunder locker room, after the Thunder had their most impressive win in a few weeks. is they, I wouldn't say they limped in to Denver, but they have not been playing their best basketball,

and they reminded everybody who the champions are by laying it down against the Nuggets, is Van McMahon. Howdy, partners. You know, I thought it was really nice of the NBA to schedule a Luca versus Jalen Brunson game on the one-year anniversary of the trade that shipped Luca out of Dallas.

Just a, you know, a little reminder of that draft class duo that got away. I will say that I think we podcasted last year earlier than we podcasted tonight on that night. That is not true. Yeah, well, you're having a slightly less stressful evening tonight. It's just a weed trip. Just a wee bit. By the way, I want to do a special shout out to the San Antonio Spurs.

They channeled NBA media today. I don't even know if you guys know this because you were at games. The Spurs did something that so many NBA media do on a daily basis And so many of our fine listeners, I'm sure, and fellow Americans Do you know what that is? Flew day of a game? You're on the right track, but not quite. Flew in and went right to the arena, I believe.

Had postgame beers? All right, I'll just add in the suspense. They changed planes in Atlanta. That's right, folks. They changed planes in Atlanta. They took off from Charlotte a day late. Their plane had a problem with it. It diverted to Atlanta.

They switched planes. Not sure if they stopped at the Delta Club in the meantime. And then they got on another plane, just like hundreds of thousands of people do every day and made it to San Antonio and whipped the – put up 37 in the first quarter and crushed the magic. Yeah, when we have connection problems, though, they don't bump tip time back for us. They did bump that one back a little bit. Wimby was questionable. And then I think he reminded himself, hey, I got to play a certain amount of games to get awards. And he went out there and had a pretty dominant performance.

I always think it's good when Wembe has 15 free throws and four three-pointers. I think that's the golden ratio we're looking for. I think it's good when he has five blocks and four steals. That's also helpful. By the way, speaking on the Spurs really quick, it's worth shouting out to Charlotte Hornets who beat them the final day of the month. of January. I just want to quickly read the Hornets line for the month of January. 11 and 6 record, offensive rating of 121.1.

The defensive rating of 109.6, which was 5th in the league over the month, and a net rating of 11.5 for 100 possessions. Just, we're shouting out the Hornets. The Charlotte Hornets, I believe, ended up with the best road point differential in a month

by a team in NBA history. Mm-hmm. They have been playing high, high-level basketball in Charlotte. That's why. When they are good, they're like untouchable, but they do sometimes sub their toe. But like they are, since they've had their, basically their team healthy, their starting lineup that they're using right now, they put the moose in. By the way, have you, there's been a thing, you know, Musa Diabate, their center,

who's, I think since he moved in the starting lineup, and they got Brandon Miller back there's something like 12 and 1 or 12 or 13 and 1, I don't know what it is, when they've played. And he, I'm not sure he embraced the Moose nickname, but they love calling him Moose, and he started embracing it. And I think, you know, we should all focus on embracing this and getting this to grow, because I love the concept of a guy embracing a name.

nickname of the Moose. I just looked up, by the way, I just looked up that lineups numbers. I was not to do that. 22 games, record of 15-7 for Lonzo Ball, Con Canuple, Brandon Miller. Probably Lamello. Lamello.

Lamello, not Loneso. L'A, L'Nove. There aren't many money numbers for Lanzo that are very good. That's right. Lamello Ball, it's late. Lamello Ball, Con Cunupple, Brandon Miller, Miles Bridges, and Musa Diabate. 22 games, 15-and-7 record,

193 minutes. Offensive rating of 140.2. Oh my gosh. A defensive rating of 109.7 and a net rating of 30.4. That probably won't continue, but they have found something. By the way, in that game, that went over the spurs you mentioned, Musa Diabate was the most impactful French big man on the floor that day. It was not a banner performance by Victor,

and he elected with less than a minute to go to take it. very ill-advised, like 30-footer. His team was down three, but they didn't need three, and he certainly didn't need that three. It was a hero ball shot for sure. Yeah. So maybe it was his ode to, Ode to Lamello. Lamello's taking a few of them. Even Lamello was like, whoa, bro. Let's talk about shot selection there, buddy. Anyway, speaking of three-pointers that were not ill-advised, but well-intentioned was the Thunder tonight. So the Thunder come in, tonight's game. I think they were eight and five in their last 13 games, which for most teams would be pretty good. For the Thunder, it was like, whoa, are they, you know, are they shaky? The fact that they

are missing all these perimeter players, you know, was, you know, she was a factor. But they have not been able to hit threes. They, I think, I didn't look up the numbers before the game, but I looked them up on Friday. And over that 13 game stretch, I think they were 26 in the league in threes. They are not in a lead three-point shooting team anyway. They run through stretches. They have some good three-point individual shooters, but their numbers were down. Chet's numbers were particularly down,

I think, with the guards, with Jalen Williams being out, we talked about it the other day. Anyway, I don't know if Denver's game plan. I don't know if Adelman said anything after the game, McMahon. But Denver was absolutely collapsing as an understatement on Shea tonight, which, like, it's not like it's never been tried before, but they completely sold out on collapsing on him.

And he just kicked the ball out to wide open three-point shooters, and they dropped 19 of them. Yes, 19 of them. Shea had 13 assists, and I think 10 or 11 led to threes. So Shea had 13 assists and 16 field goal attempts. He ends up with 34 points on 16 field goal attempts with 13 assists. Kaysen Wallace knocked down 7-3s, career high. I say career high, I mean the whole career. I said, did you ever hit seven threes at Richardson high school? It was like, no, absolutely not. But seven of eleven from three for him. And, you know, he knocked down a couple. Then the bass is getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And that was, you know, like, he's the, he's a guy who teams are going to dare to shoot threes. He's shooting at 37 percent this year. You know, the volume's not that high. But tonight was going to be a high.

volume game for him and he stepped into him and was knocking him down. Aaron Wiggins hit a few, like I said, 19 of 48. And it is like that teams are going to try to force the ball out of Shea's hands as much as possible. And they're going to have to have role players knock down threes. You know, Lou Dorskopf knocked down threes. Caruso when he's back, you know, Jalen Williams, J. Dubb, when he's back, especially, you know, as he continues to get that shooting risk. hopefully back into form coming off the surgery.

They're going to have to be able to knock down good looks at threes to make another run through the Western Conference playoffs. And, you know, tonight was a test to that that they certainly passed. That's all true. But at this felt like a game where the MVP of the league decided to make sure his team was going to get a win. And like that was a MVP performance from Shea for a team that has been deal with all these injuries, has not been playing well, been scuffling games left and right,

going up against DeKoleokich, who came back on Friday after missing a month and immediately was unbelievable again. And, you know, it felt like this was a night where She said, all right, like, yeah, we haven't had our best stretch. We've had some injuries. We've had some problems. But we're still awesome. I'm still awesome.

We're still the defending champs. And we're going to go into Denver with Nicole Yokic back. and make a statement. And obviously the rural guys helped hitting shots and making plays, but Che was unbelievable in this game and just completely set the tone. It felt like all the way through. I was going to say, like Chet Holmgren mentioned,

we were glad that Joker was playing because we wanted to, you know, basically they wanted that test. They wanted that challenge. And both these teams, I think these are the two best teams in basketball. They're also two of the most injured teams in basketball. You know, the Nuggets, Christian Brown and Kim Johnson are pretty close to returning. Aaron Gordon, unfortunately, is going to be out for a while. You know, but the Thunder, Jalen Williams, still out.

Alex Caruso still out. Like, both these teams have dealt with a ton of injuries. But Joker coming back, the Thunder were glad to see that because they wanted to face him, and they wanted that kind of challenge. Peyton Watson had another excellent game tonight, and it's one of the reasons why I think, even though this was a setback for the nuggets, I think they loved the position they're in on February 1st. They know that to beat Oklahoma City four out of seven,

they're going to have to be at the top of their game. They were not. You know, Yokic had a brilliant return on Friday, or he had 31 points in like 25 minutes or something. Yeah, 31 points, 12 rebounds, five assists in 25 minutes. I was talking to Scott who was at the game, who's like, you can make fun of his conditioning all you want, but his conditioning wasn't good, you could tell.

He looked a little bit more rusty in this game, and of course you give the Thunder credit, but they forced, he had six turnovers. He did throw a no look behind the head pass to the corner for a three at one point. But Yokic, you know, not on top of his game right now. No, but, and so the guys who really were, able to carry them during the month or so that the Joker missed, we're obviously Jamal Murray, who's finally an All-Star now, Peyton Watson, who did have a great game of night, and Tim Hardaway.

Murray and Hardaway both had big time shooting duds tonight. You know, one reason the nuggets are so excited about what they have, especially once they get healthy, is bringing in Cam Johnson, bringing in Tim Hardaway Jr. Peyton Watson's development as a shooter, Murray having the best year of his career. They feel like this is the best shooting lineup, the best shooting team that they've had around Joker, but Hardaway and Murray couldn't buy one tonight.

Well, and listen, like you said, Brian, the reason they feel good about the position they're in is when Yokic got hurt a month ago, we were going, well, could Denver be in the plan when he comes back? Could they be, you know, hanging on to sixth when he comes back? Like, where are they going to land? And they come back essentially tied for second in the west.

And again, assuming Yokic stays healthy, I don't think they're fall below third. And if they're in second or third, what does that mean? That means they don't see Oklahoma City until the conference finals. And if you tell Denver, hey, you guys go through the season and you have to get to the conference finals and see Oklahoma City there. the Nuggets would sign up for that healthy back in October. They certainly signed up for it now. And that's where the Peyton Watson Renaissance he sat over the past month. The way Jamal has played, like you said,

very much deserving of being an all-star, like playing the way he needed to from the start of the year all the way through has been massively important for Denver. And all of a sudden, you're sitting here with them weathering this Yokic injury and coming out the other side in the exact same spot they were. in great position to to set up what would be if these two teams

are in the conference finals. I mean, talk about a pretty titanic matcho. I mean, there's a great series last year in the semifinals. Conference finals

between the guys who could finish one, two, and it'd be pretty fun. Yeah. And I don't know, is David Adam

and a rookie head coach? He's got a couple playoffs series under his belt. Yeah, he's a rookie head coach. I mean, that would happen, like, this isn't in baseball,

like, if you like, you know, there's like a number of games. Like, by the way, speaking of that, Is Mitch Johnson a rookie head coach? Yeah, it's interesting.

Both of them are doing hell, I mean, really strong jobs. We didn't mention with that win against Orlando. Mitch Johnson clinched being all-star coach, although there's now four all-star coaches. Wow. What the hell? Aren't there four? There are three teams.

I was the case last year, too. Yeah, assistant coaches are getting in charge of teams, too. I'm confused. I hope you guys, I don't mean you two. None of us are going to be here for the open. I hope you all enjoy the All-Star weekend. Everybody's all up in arms about some of the snubs, which we'll talk to later about later,

but I don't even know what we're going to get that night. So I wish everybody the best of luck. All right, out on the East Coast, this was a premium game. NBC had their first ever Sunday night, not first ever, but whatever, Sunday night basketball, which we're going to see for the next 11 years as part of this contract. Kittland Clark in the house. Brideon, Caitlin Clark, did you see?

I don't know you. Payton Pritchard? I don't want to, I'm a member of a pregame show. I'm certainly not going to, let's just say that there was a reaction to when Maria Taylor asked Reggie Miller to compare Caitlin Clark to somebody. He said Peyton Pritchard. And let's just say that she made a face. I'm taking page Beckers over Kate and Clark. Oh, look at you.

Look at you, Mr. Dallas. Congratulations. Our friend of the pod, Nick Nurse, fellow Iowen, has told me the story if I went up to Caitlin, introduced himself and said, how does it feel to be the second best shooter in the history of Iowa basketball behind Nick Nurse, to be clear? Oh, are you saying Nick Nurse?

That's his answer. I think Steve Kerr, his senior year at Arizona, shot like 58% on threes. So, I mean, if we're going to go into the coaching ranks to enter into there, I think that's where we're going to start. But I'm not aware of fellow Iowa native, AJ Green, another northern Iowa guy, it's a hell of a shooter. There's a lot of good shooters in the NBA. I did once want to see a coach's dunk contest, but now that Willie Green got fired, the favorites gone. What about Jamal Mosley? I think.

He can still dunk, but he's squeaking it in. Okay. I wrote a story on this stuff. I remember. I remember. It's a good story. I'm going to see Nurse tomorrow. I'm going to go to the Clippers Sixers game.

Can he produce statistics that defend this position? If you talk to Nurse about it, I'm sure he'll tell you the same story. Statistics, give him a ball, put him on the, you know, there's hoops around. He's a pretty good player in Northern. Iowa. I don't know if he actually would try to go shot for shot with Caitlin at this point. Or AJ Green, his fellow Northern Iowa along the Spur. All right. That was the line he told me.

All right. I'm going to put him on the- He wanted me to say hello to Caitlin today at the game. There was just a few people in the way. I'm going to halt the pre-game press conference tomorrow as we listen to, you know, our updates on everything with the Sixers. And I'm going to get, I want this on the record. And I'm going to do it in the press conference because I want the,

cameras to pick it up. On the spot. Can ask him that after you get the checkup about Paul George. Oh, it's a smooth transition. I'm sure he'd be happy to talk about his high school stats other than Paul George. More Hoop Collective Podcast after this. Anyway, so that was a game that the Knicks now won the sixth consecutive win, Bontems. And in this stretch, and I know that,

Six games is not necessarily that indicative of anything, but the Knicks have the number one defense in the league in the six game stretch. The Lakers crawled over 100, but I think they've held three teams under 100. And, you know, once again, you know, they really were able to generate a lot of offense off of their defense. They had a ton of offensive rebounds again. You know, I'm going to say, Joe Azula is a pretty smart coach. His methods are a little bit unique and unorthodox, but his game plans are pretty good.

And, you know, it was really interesting about how important it was to the Celtics to get Mitch Robinson off the court in the playoffs last year. And there is no doubt that for a guy who cannot really make a shot outside what he want to say, like four feet. I was going to say outside of a dunk or a layup. It's a dunk.

Mitchell Robinson is dunking the ball or rebounding the ball and kicking it out. And he is a one-man wrecking crew in the base. It is unbelievable. Like, obviously, we're around a lot of NBA players. These guys are all large humans. But the way Mitchell Robinson, the only guy that really is like Mitchell Robinson in terms of carving outspace inside is Stephen Adams, who has had a similar impact with the rockets

and in the past, obviously, with the thunder and with the grizzlies. And like if you look at the way the game is shifted, like having a guy that can have that kind of impact inside can flip a quarter or flip a half or flip a game. And it's happened for the Knicks a lot this season. Like he's just, he's done some remarkable work for them. Mitchell Robinson has 72 buckets this year. This probably isn't updated from the day,

but 72 buckets. How many of those do you think are dunks? 68. 50, but 93.4% of his attempts are within three feet of bucket. That's okay, so it's ranges three feet. I will say that he has the rare accomplishment of creating gravity as a rebounder. Because just like you and you see teams shift their defense towards great shooting and it opens up space elsewhere, the opponents.

are so cognizant, especially on the offensive glass, of where Mitchell Robinson is, that it creates gravity for the rebounders. So I think tonight, like Towns had five offensive rebounds, and some of them were as a result of Mitchell Robinson's gravity. What's the best way for the Knicks to get a good wide open three? Miss a shot, let Mitchell Robinson grab the rebound and kick it back out. Mitch Robinson is averaging 4.9 points and 4.9 offensive rebounds in 19 minutes a game this season. Yeah, I think it's been quite a few years since we've seen a guy average five offensive rebounds. I think I looked the last three, four years.

It's all been in the fours. He's got the highest. I also want to point out that Carl Towns, first off, he was named to an All-Star today. So no matter what anybody wants to say, his, and by the way, an American All-Star, I should point out, he's listed as an American All-Star. Is that correct, Bontes? That's not necessarily correct. No. They haven't specified yet, have they?

No, they have not. They're doing that on Tuesday. Well, there's eight international players, so they have a team. Well, I'm going to guess that Yonis probably isn't going to play in the All-Stra game. I believe Carl would be one of those eight, actually. But that's be that as a May. Really, I thought I saw that he was. Be that as a May.

They haven't. They named the replacement for Yannis. Yeah, they have the ability to change. Anyway, I want to point out that we know that Carl Towns is not a perfect player. And we know that there are going to be times and moments when Carl Towns is. subject to criticism. And, you know, his, it's been his case for the whole, his whole career. No one's saying differently.

However, he does a lot of positive things. The coaches voted him in as an all-star. That's number one. Number two, people were very highly focused on his plus-minus. You know, I think during the winning streak, his plus-minus is something like plus-71. He was a team high plus-23 today. know that individual game plus minus isn't, you know, it's not the BL End all, but I'm talking about six games. He's plus 71. He had back-to-back 20 rebound games, the previous two games before this,

and then today had an effective game. So, like, I'm not saying he won't have another tough stretch or anything like that, but, you know, Bontemps, I think, you know, the bottom line here is the Knicks come hell or high water, I think, believe in the core of this team and this roster. And right now, you can see why they believe in it. And while I would never make any assumptions in the NBA, their belief in this roster is being backed up in the days ahead of the trade deadline. Yeah, I mean, look, the Knicks have had a pretty soft stretch of the schedule. They played the Nets who they beat by a billion.

They won in Toronto. They went into the U.S.W.B. Cook. Well, listen, they won in Toronto on the second night of back-to-back, which is a great win, a truly great win. You know, they scuffled their way through a win against, Sacramento. They smoked Portland on Friday, which is a nice win. Obviously, you know, this is a nice win today against the Lakers. You know, but look, the Knicks also came into the stretch, having gotten absolutely obliterated at home by a tank and Mavs team. And we went into that

Nets game. I certainly did saying they better not lose this Nets game because who knows what's going to happen then. So it, like, this is both a good timing in terms of some games they should take care of business and that they did. And it also, to your point, like you're seeing Carl Towns not really focusing on scoring, but I rebounded doing

some of this other stuff, which has helped. And they've gotten back towards some of the stuff they were doing earlier in the year. And yeah, look, like, we came into the season thinking the Knicks were one of the top couple

teams in the east. Outside of, you know, that one stretch and they really kind of careen the other way, they've more or less been about the team we thought they were going to be. And, you know,

we'll see what happens over the next three and a half or four days. And if they're able to swing a deal or not, whether it's for Janus or something else. But I think, you know, at the end of the day, go back to what James Dolan said a month ago. We have to make the finals and we should win. That's what the expectations are. And if they keep playing like this, they're going to go into the East playoffs. If not the favorite to make the finals, they're certainly not going to be lower than second. if they can play anything like this the rest of the way.

By the way, the Nets had their second 50-point loss in the last two weeks today. Yeah. But listen, whatever was said in that NICs players only non-meeting, apparently were. Because they were terrible. They were the, like, they were league worse two and nine over that 11-game stretch. They were a complete embarrassment, a debacle, and they weren't playing hard. Like, it was so disgusting that James Dolan's leaving at halftime. And they've been playing hard, and they've been.

So that's why the six games is not nothing, because what it is is they basically decided, okay, look, we're going to do something about this. We're not just going to let this disgusting lack of effort fester. They've done something about it, and they've done something about it while trade, not even rumors, but at least trade speculation has been swirling about them,

none more so than with Carl Anthony Tamp. Like, you know, I'm talking to people pregame today and, you know, they're, hey, you think cat's getting traded? And it's like even independent of Yonis, they're asking that. And give Kat credit. Like, of course he hears all that noise, but you can't question whether he's playing hard right now. Please demonstrate to me the trades that you can trade Carl Towns for and know that you're upgrading. Okay, Yonis, there's one. But it's, you know, for all, you know, for all that can be said about him, you know, he puts a lot of stuff in the statute.

Now, the next, I think the Nick's next game is against the Wizards. So I don't think the schedule is going to come to more demanding. But I think Wednesday. I like their odds in that one. Let's talk about the Wizards for a second. What? We're not prepared. This wasn't a plan situation.

I would, I would like to. I'm going to listen. I would like to bring up the lineup that the Wizards played down the stretch of tonight's game in Washington. I know that last Saturday they started a lineup that the average age was like 20.7. It's like the youngest. Hold on. I didn't get to watch this, but I'm excited. This was a big win for the Wizards.

Capital W Wizards. It ain't the hell of the night, baby. Capital W. Let me. Tell me about this. I'm excited for this one. So the Wizards are playing the Sacramento Kings, the Kangs, as they might be called. And two teams fighting for a ping pong ball positioning in the lottery standings. Fighting.

And in the fourth court, yes. Listen, the Wizards were doing some fighting today. Because in the fourth quarter of this game, games on the line, one possession game, going down to the finish at home, fans into it. Yes. Here's the line of Brian Keith had on the court. Sharif Cooper, A.J. Johnson, Will Riley, Anthony Gill, and Scalal Libisie.

This is the lineup. Scal's on a 10-day. Sharif Cooper wasn't, he wasn't in the league for a while. Then the Wizards gave him a two-way. I wonder how that ended up happening. Anyways, go on. He was a little three or four-year hiatus.

And the Kings had DeMarter Rosen out there. They had Zach Levine out there. They had their core lineup out there at the end of the game. And Scal goes for 13, 7, and a couple assists plus six, six for eight from the field, 27 minutes. Hits a couple of huge shots in the closing moments, and the wizards come out on top and get the W.

And I was just very amused watching this all play out. Is that a scow revenge game? Is that a couple stints with the Cangs and show them what they gave up on? Vivek has always been a big scow fan. Maybe he'll be on a 10-day with the Kings and a couple of weeks. Go play for them. I think the Kings have lost 12 straight road games. I think it's the longest stretch in the league.

I had several people in the league hit me about this Kings game tonight go, man, what is going on in Sacramento that they're losing this game? I found the number. So last Saturday, they started an average, the lineup that they started was an average age of 20.6 years old. This is the Wizards? Yeah. It was just like they moved, it was going to be snow, so they moved it up to like noon. And somebody said it was like an ACC game. The game was at noon and there was a bunch of 19 year olds play. So Scalibisier played in a handful of games last year And he's got a total of seven points

And now his game log is gone Sharif Cooper hadn't been in the league since 21-22 I'm trying to find when the last time he scored So he had 10 points in a game On December 26th in 2019 I think that might be the last time he scored Double-digit points in a game Landry Shamet is like

why are you doing talking about the Wizards? Why are you not talking about my dominating performance off the bench today whilst talking trash to Luca? I don't think he actually talked trash, but... That has been one of the things that during this streak, I don't remember if... I think Lantern came back for the Nets game. They lost a few games when he came back,

but he, when he got his feet up underneath him and started making threes, It was coinciding with their That's right. He played in those games before that, but he went six for six from three in that Nets game. That's what it was. And he had a huge game. But him being back on the rotation and hitting shots

has been a nice boost for the Nix over the last couple of weeks after he missed a bunch of time after hurting his shoulder. But yeah, look, like, you know, the Nicks will see if they end up doing something on the margins this week. I could see him moving Gershanyabaseli at some point this week. Kios Free agent sign and it hasn't worked out to this point. I would be surprised that they get something big done.

Like you said, I don't expect the main pieces of the team to change. But yeah, like they're, they feel pretty good about where they're at. And the vibes are a lot different than they were a couple weeks ago, that's for sure. We did have a trade. We actually had two trades. Oh, this was I'm going to say. The Kings did win something this week. They won a bronze medal in a three-team trade.

That is a Sacramento King Special. It was a three-team trade involving the Kings, the Cavs and the Bulls. The Bulls got Dario Sarich and two second-round picks. You're getting them silver? We should pause again and celebrate the Chicago Bulls for getting picks in a trade. This is not something they've rarely done it. So kudos. Kudos to the Bulls.

The Bulls lost in a game. They kind of surrendered to the heat by 40 tonight. By the way, did you know the Bulls and the Heat are playing three straight times? What? Yeah. Well, they did play three in the last four days. Well, there was a game that got to postpone

early in the year because there was water or condensation on the court at the United Center. So then they ended up making it into a three-game and four-day set this weekend. You've heard it. We say baseball series, but they're not, this is actually a baseball series. This is a real baseball series, yeah.

But the heat won by 40. The Bulls lost, Josh Giddy, amongst others, were out in this game. They're now 24 and 26, 50 games in to the season. All roads what? And you know what that means. All roads lead to 39, and I'm sticking by it. They're getting passed by the Charlotte Hornets.

Like, you can, I'll guarantee you that. They're on a pace for 39 and 43 as we speak right now. All roads, baby. Every night where you see a bull's win or lost, just know, all roads lead to 39 wins. Anyway, the trade. So the calves pick up Keon Ellis

and Dennis Schroeder who's now playing for his 11th team. They did not play for the calves tonight in Portland where they won by 20, I think.

And Jared Allen was like Evan Mobley can just take the rest of the time off before the All-Star break because Jared Allen

had 40 points, 17 rebounds, five assists four blocks, two steals. That's a line. In 30 minutes in Portland tonight. Pretty good. Six offensive rebounds.

Take that, Mitchell Robinson. It's pretty good. Yeah. Sam Merrill came, his back from injury. He had six threes. That helped. Jalen Tyson hit four threes. Anyway, so this trade. And what's that get in this trade?

Sack got DeAndre Hunter. and they got off of Dennis Schroeder's contract, which they just gave. Yes. And Darius Arsarch who they just traded for. Yeah, which, like, the Dario Saro-Sorch, Jonas Valenzhenius trade was very bizarre. They took back more money in that deal.

I don't know, man. It's whatever. I don't want to focus too much of the Kings. I agree. I mean, the thing about DeAndre Hunter is he's now been traded twice in a year. And what's his contract look like? He's owed over $20 million next year. So now that's now on the King's books.

Kings are currently flirting with the second apron next year. That's a problem. And here's the thing. The Kings gave up two second round picks to get Valchunis that they turned into Sorich, who was making more money, that they then gave up two second round picks to get off of. He's making less money, but be that as it may. The Cavs gave up one of the picks to Chicago to offload that. In the case of the Cavs, Schrooter is going to be their backup point card behind Darius Garland.

It's my understanding that Garland is nearing a return from that right toe injury. They've been working on setups in his shoe with like tape jobs and like a plate in there. make him comfortable. He's, I think they're hoping that he plays on this road trip. They've played two out of five games on the road. I think they're in L.A.

for the next five days. So hopefully the sun will be in L.A. all week for the trade deadline. Yeah. So Lanzo Ball has just not been effective. We'll see if the calves are able to trade him. By the way, the cabs saved around 40 million in this deal with luxury tax and salary bond temps.

So if, if you save money and you build out your depth a little bit. Now, one thing that will be interesting, so Keon Ellis, who a number of teams showed interest in at this deadline, he is a 3-and-D perimeter player. He's a, he gets into passing lanes and plays with high effort, but he doesn't have the physical size to like, you know, you're not going to put him on Jason Tatum or Jalen Brown

and think that he's going to shut him down. I don't know. I'm not an expert. That's what the scouts tell me. He's a good guard defender, which is what they need. But if you put him next to, because that's what they got Hunter for in theory. But Jalen Tyson has played really well for the Cavs,

so Jalen Tyson is getting some of Hunter's minutes. But Ellis can be normally when you trade for a player, he can't be extended for six months. In Ellis's case, that's not true. Ellis can sign an extension with the calves. after February 9th in a week. So we'll see if the calves elect to extend him. I will say, now, Dennis Schrooter is the definition of a journeyman.

This is his 11th team. But typically what you see with Schrooter is that teams like the fire and intensity he brings in the short term. And the calves are a team that could use some of that in addition to a more reliable backup point guard. And so that's what they've done. He helped the pistons last year. He was with the pistons for like, oh, yeah, he got traded twice last year. Yeah, I said he helped the pistons last year. Yes, yes.

And then they said goodbye. Yeah, and, you know. Well, they weren't going to match a three-year deal. I mean, that's the thing. Shorter had value last summer, but the three-year contract, the third year is not fully guaranteed, but the three-year contract that Zach gave them was a surprise to the league. So the question is, you know, what else? So Cleveland, as a second apron trade,

makes second apron team makes a trade, which is hard to do. They, in their belief, increase their depth. We'll see whether that turns out to be true or not, but they believe increases their depth, significantly reduces their payroll and luxury tax payments. That's checking a lot of boxes. The players have to play well, Bon Temps, for it to actually work.

The question will be, is Cleveland done? Doing trades for, when the second apron is hard, they will, I think, seek to move off of Lanzo ball. They have Naquan Tomlin, who had another very good game with 12 points off the bench on Sunday. I think he's got three games left before he runs out of games as a two-way. So they need to create a roster spot. They would love to shave some more money off. Whether or not they can do more, we'll see.

They've been very active in talks. We talked about last week how active they were in talks. They ended up making this trade. So, Bontem said, the club. Cleveland is a team to watch over the next three or four days. I'm not sure whether they're going to be able to do anything more, but I definitely think they should be watched. I think the most interesting team to watch in the entire league.

Look at you. Because, you know, people around a league are watching the Donovan Mitchell situation. He's got one guaranteed year left on his contract. He has not made it out of the second round of the playoffs in his career. And if the calves don't make a playoff run this year, when they came into the season, coming off winning 64 games and losing in really disappointing fashion as the many people had them ahead of the Knicks

but at worst they were co-favorants with the Knicks to make the finals and instead they've been somewhere from seventh to fifth most of the season they're fifth right now listen bro they're out of the plan yes well they've gotten out of the plan but they there there's pressure there for the calves to make a run this year and as constituted right now now, I don't think Dennis Schroeder, like, this trade was fine. I would rather have Keanu Ellis than

DeAndre Hunter, but this is not going to be enough, in my opinion, to get the Cavs where they need to go this year to satisfy the pressure that's on. So is there a move they can make between now and Thursday afternoon

that is going to be able to do that? Now, we'll see if something comes up. There's obviously we've spent months talking about nothing's really happening. There's only been three trades that have been made all season so far. But they have a lot of interesting players on big salaries who can move around, and there's motivation to do deals. So I'm really interested to see if Cleveland can do something or some things

and what those some things look like if they do them. Because there's not a lot of teams in the position the Cavs are in where there's real motivation to do stuff, around the league. So they might be a place where we see some firework. So obviously it's hard second apron,

but I will say the big question for Cleveland for a year now has been, are they willing to break up their core four of Jared Allen, Evan Mobley, Donovan Mitchell,

and Darius Carlin. And the message that the Cavs sent out for a while this season, even when they were struggling, was no, we are not breaking up our core four. If we're going to do something,

it's going to be on the, on the margins, which is what they did here. I think that there is a zone here, and there are potential things that would get them to break up their core four in the next few days, but it's going to be threading the needle. When you say break up their core four,

do you mean trading Darius Garland? I'm not going to go farther than that. I'm just going to say that they're, you know, look, last year we saw second apron teams, Minnesota and Phoenix, try to do all kinds of big things of the deadline. line and they couldn't do it because at the end of the day, you're supposed to be in a box. And by the way, this trade has gotten the calves to a place where if they subtract one mid-sized

contract from their books, depends on, depending on which guy, they can get out of the second apron and then be able to aggregate salaries and do things. So there's, they're just going to be really in a market where there's not a lot happening across the league. The calves, they're the team I've been paying attention to. the most in the league over the last week. And I think, you know, if stuff happens this week of significance in the league, I think there's a good chance Cleveland will be in the middle of it.

And we might just not have much of any significance happen around the week. Right. And we may get to Thursday and the Cavs don't do anything just because second apron reality. And just the right deal might not materialize. But I think they're going to try to get better. If it's Garland, this would be a, you're selling. low based on the season he's had and the injury issues that he's had. I don't think, just to be clear, I don't think they traded for Dennis Schroeder to replace Darius Garland.

Like, just to be clear, I think, you know, that's not the purpose. I think they were, I think they needed, they felt they needed to upgrade a backup point card. I think that's what that's about. Yeah, and Ty Jerome played a big role for him last year. Basically, you know, if you want to look at it that way. If it's Jared Allen, who would be the one going, tonight's the night to get it done, maybe, fresh off 40, 17 and that line. All right. So we had the All-Star Reserves announced today.

There's going to be at least one change because Janus is going to be replaced. So LeBron James made it, which that was uncertainty. Chet Holmgren made it for the first time, rewarding him for him. He hasn't had the best month of January. He played stronger in December, but he's had a very strong season. And obviously the Thunder had been the best team from starting. There seems to be some blowback because the Clipper fans are not happy that Kauai Leonard having a arguably his best first half of a season with the, since he's been with the Clippers, and the Clippers are hosting the game. And so not only does James Hard not make it, but Kauai Leonard does not make it.

Oh, there could be some mean signs in the wall during the Allstraw game. What you wonder is if the aspiration investigation played a role. Obviously, Kauai missed some games during this season, but LeBron has missed more games. Yeah, LeBron's missed more games and his numbers aren't, frankly, nearly as good. Well, and look, man, supposedly it was the coach's vote. Supposedly the league didn't have anything to do with it. Let's just be honest, though. if you're trying to get people to tune into the All-Star game

and it comes down to LeBron or Kauai, like who's the bigger draw? Come on. Well, I hope LeBron intends to play this year. Yeah, it would be nice. If it's based on performance this season, though, it's like, Kauai's clearly had the better year. Of course. Yeah.

I mean, if you're going to say, hey, I should have been in over LeBron. And Houston's had a good season and they don't have an all-star. They have Kevin Durramp. They have Kevin to have you really want a conspiracy theory. Yadena Kupo is an international player who will not be playing in the All-Star game. And perhaps Al-Bi-Singoon will be slid in there as an international player to replace him. If they voted for LeBron because he's having a good year, not great, but good year,

and he has done so much for the league and it's the right thing to do, that's totally acceptable. If they put LeBron in and they didn't put Kauai in because it's a form of, of punishment. But what's the thing? I will say, out of things that don't leak, there's been more Supreme Court decisions leak in the last 20 years than there has been coaches votes. Right.

Seriously, do you ever remember the coaches ever? They never come out. Ever. I'm not sure anything. Rick Carlis has a thing, though, where he'll tell, like, in like, pregame press conferences, he'll mention like 16 guys that he votes for. that he voted for every year. There's no repercussions.

I don't know if there's much else to say about the All-Stars. Other than that, I don't know. That was the only. I mean, the rest of it was like, obviously, it's cool for Norm Powell, Jamal Murray. These guys have been long time, really good players, making the All-Star team for the first time. I was really happy Denny Avia made the All-Star team.

He's had an unbelievable year for Portland, super, like, clearly deserving. There was some debate, like, would he get in? I thought that would have been crazy. He did not play tonight in the Cavs that win. I should point that out. Yeah, he's to do with this back thing for a while. He's been in and out of the lineup.

But he's at an unbelievable year. Jalen Duren, great year for him. Another guy making the All-Sart team for the first time. Like, it's cool to see a bunch of guys get in, get in for the first time this year. But, yeah, I mean, it was all pretty straightforward. Brandon Ingram was a bit of a snub in the East. I didn't think so.

But Scotty Barnes got in. Yeah. I thought the East was. I thought they were all pretty good. All right. We have two things that are very important to the podcast that we need to do we need to say. One is that I'm waking up at 3.45 a.m. Pacific and it's now 1117 Pacific. So Wendy Sleep Up Day sponsored by?

It's going to be some get up grumpiness tomorrow. I love it. Having said that. He's telling me to hurry up. It's the start of a new month. Oh, we ain't hurryed up, buddy. We're slowing down. We're slowing down for the new criterion for this month's big award.

It's the start of a new month, and that means that another month just ended. That's right. That means this is a time where McMahon shines. By 3 Eastern, we'll know the 97 people who qualify for the award and why they're being selected this month. Jackson, have we gotten that mute button for Bontims yet? More Hoop Collective Podcast after this. The Cajonace Factor player of the month. You know, I always shout out the buzzer beaters.

There's only two true buzzer beaters, like buzzer goes off on the ball in the air. They're both on the same night. Powell Bankero, Emmanuel, quickly, the first guys to hit buzzer beating threes on the same night since D&PC. D.Lowe Russell and Russell and Russell Westbrook in April 9th, 2017. Oh, I'm sorry. I messed up the DeAngelo is what I meant. It's just been a strange time. Strange stint for him in Dow.

Was that the day of the Westbrook shot in Denver? You know what? I'd have to look that up. By the way, Jason Kidd, like, you know, losing his mind a little bit about, you know, criticism about playing Cooper Flag at point guard. I mean, the Mav's point card situation is a mess. Like, I don't think it's a debate. The criticism was three months ago.

So J-Kid went into that press comments with an agenda. The agenda was to rip the refs. BASC say, Cooper, I got your back. Well, he called out all three refs by name. By name. And each one of those is probably going to be a, that's going to be a, I say three refs, 30,000. Three refs names 30,000 is what I say.

The expletive-laden answer to cutting off the question that started out about the national criticism of playing Cooper Flaggart point guard. That was just Jay Kid being, you know, annoyed and grumpy. And I wouldn't read too much into that. Jason Kidd is one of the greatest point guards of all time and certainly one of the more cerebral players of the last 25 years. I don't think that's in question. Yeah. But I will say this.

But he ain't playing. He's coaching. When he says, I know what the F I'm doing, Bontems. When it comes to Cajonis Factor, I know what the F I'm doing. you shut up too, okay? That's how I feel about that particular situation. No, by the way. Oh, yeah, yes, it was April 9th, 2017.

In this very building when Russell Westbrook hit that three, still the most memorable regular season game I've covered. That's when they had the, he broke the triple double record for a season and, you know, went on a crazy comeback where he scores like the last 13 points with the buzzer-beater anyways. and eliminated the nuggets from the playoffs

and got a standing ovation from the crowd here. I think it was the Pepsi Center at the time, whatever the arena was called. It was a different era. That was a different era. Yokech wouldn't allow that for now. That's the last time they've made it last. Okay, so let's get right to it, Wendy. You've got to get some sleep.

Wendy's sleep up big, going. Actually, you've probably got to get to a Grammy's after party. You're just going to pull it all night, aren't you? I'm not even in my hotel room. Wendy's going to improve the quality. I came to the studio. Bond Timps, you know, Wendy gets wild. he's going to have some diet Pepsi baby

and he's just going to roll right on in to get up. Just all amped up. Amped up on cap. The brass balls. This is not a statistically based honor for this particular gentleman because I'll be honest, his clutch numbers for the month were, eh. But we are.

We're immediately, we're immediately off the rails of the criteria. Damn it. What happened to the mute button, Jackson? I asked for one thing. I just like that, I just like that we immediately started off with. There's no statistical.

combination of clutch and swag. And let me tell you, when Kevin Durant drills a game-winning pull-up three with three-tenths of a second left against the Phoenix Suns, marches to Half Court, and he's giving them the thumb showing him exactly where their bus is, get on out, go on home, Phoenix Suns,

then struts into the press conference afterwards and says, I don't want to be dramatic, but that's my first time being kicked out of a place. I felt like I've been scapegoated for all issues. as a team last year. Hell yeah, it felt good to beat them and hit a game winning shot over them. That's going to get you the brass balls, baby.

You're going to at least get some kind of honor for that level of swag after you drill a game winner. Bon Tims. All right. Any beef? Any beef? Thank you. I have no beef ever.

I'm just always enjoying it. It's a great listen. No beef ever. Yeah, Bon Tips is a definition of no beef. All right. The silver medalist here, a gentleman who got another honor today, a first-time All-Star, Jamal Murray. Now, listen to these numbers. 23 clutch minutes, dude had 34 points on 9-14 shootings.

Nutcut in time, one possession game last three minutes, 15 points, 100% shooting, five assist in 10 minutes. I wanted to give him the gold, but fellas, one blemish. Did you see the end of that Pistons game last week here in Ball Arena? He, it's very strange. He got fouled shooting a potential game tying three twice in the last three and a half seconds. He made four clutch free throws in the last 10 seconds. Unfortunately, he had six.

No, he made three because he missed the last one. Oh, that's right. Okay. But yeah, yeah, so that one, that knocked him down. Plus, I will just say, Tyrese Maxie, man, dudes. Tyrese Maxie, Jamal Murray was second league with 34 clutch points.

Tyrese Maxie had 47. Well, here's the thing. All the Sixers do is play. Yes, there was every single game against, yes, every single game against every single team. Doesn't matter if they're good or bad. It's a five-point game of five minutes to go and where are the other at the Sixers. By the way, Sixers coach Nick Nurse, his college,

three-point shooting looked up by Jackson. Oh. 47%. Well, how about them apples? All right. That was when the line was a little bit closer, though, but still impressive. But Tyrus Maxie, 47 points on 26 shots in the clutch, nut cutting time, more than twice as many points as anybody else. 32 points on 17 field goal attempts.

He actually had two go-ahead shots in the last 10 seconds of games, unfortunately for the Sixers, they still blew the one to the Cavaliers and gave up a bucket of the Cavs to lose that one. It was against the King, so it doesn't count as much as it usually does, but did have that game-winning and one layup with 1.3 seconds left to cap a comeback against the rooting for the number one pick, Sacramento King. So the gold medalist for Cohen is a factor player of the month.

Very deserving, Tyrese Maxie. Plus, he's the DFW native, so he gets some bonus points. They put him in space, and he's like a running back in the open field. They give him a head of steam and put him in space, and I don't know how you stay in front of him. He also might be the fastest guy in the league, so. I mean, with the ball. It's crazy. I think Derek Rose was the fastest guy.

When he was pre-injury, Derek Rose was the fastest guy I ever saw with the ball. But Tyrese Maxie, I don't. He's really fast. I think he's faster than Rose was, with all due respect. John Morant's up there. We just don't see him very often. By the way, waiting for that trade market to heat up there. I think we'll be waiting a while.

Deering Fox is up there, but I'm not going to argue with Tyrese Maxie. Yeah, I agree. Fox is very fast. That's true. A beautiful list. Thank you. Beautiful list. I appreciate Tyrus Maxie.

by the way, one of the captains of the all DFW team, which, I'm telling you, Dallas-Fort Worth will take on any other metropolitan area and whoop their butts. By the way, like, I noticed because all these Janus trades, all these alleged, you know, guys who are going to get traded

there who are from Milwaukee. Brandon Pajemski, Con Canipal, and Tyler Hero, all Milwaukee guys. Jalen Johnson? Jalen Johnson. All right, Milwaukee's got a squad, but DFWB.

Yeah. Tyrone? They got to school? I mean, the area. Well, he's not really from Milwaukee, but he, he would count. He's from Wisconsin, boss. Well, I'm just telling you, when he was a kid, they used to discriminate against him because he wasn't from Milwaukee.

I understand. But if you're giving it Milwaukee, you're giving the guy from Oshkosh, gosh. Well, and I will say Oshkosh, like, that's not, like, doesn't sound very tough. Oshkosh, it doesn't sound very tough. Don't tell that to John Halliburton. He will... Aren't there... Is Oshkosh, like an overalls brand?

It's a... There's clothing from there, yes. There's a lot going on out there in central Wisconsin. You're in your Appletons and your Green Bayes. Leave Appleton is the home of New New York Liberty Coach, Krista Marco, I believe. Who I saw at the game today. He was there checking it out.

Is he a Packer fan? No, he's Bill's fan. By the way, speaking of Milwaukee, Cooper Flagg had 49 the other night breaking a MAPS franchise rookie record that was he shared with Mark Aguire who had a 40 plus minute halftime ceremony to retire his jersey that night.

Anyways, do you know the last rookie to score more than 49 points in a game? I gave you a hand, but I said, speaking of Milwaukee. I know the answer. Wizard of the quiz. Give me some Wiz of the quiz here. Wendy, come on.

You got a guess. I don't know. Go ahead. The answer is the double nickel by one Brandon Jones. Oh, wow. Yes. I remember that. Oh, my God. But Cooper Flagg probably will go sixth in this next year's draft.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say none of those guys will score 49 points in a game as a rookie because it happens about once a decade. You've laid down the gauntlet. Of course, you have to play all both halves to score 50 minutes in a game. Yeah, there's that. All right, beautiful work. Thank you to Mark Jackson and Devon for staying up very late. Their work is still going on. Defon's on the West Coast.

I'm on the West Coast, but nonetheless. All right. Do you have anything to do in the morning? We haven't heard. We got trade deadline week coming up. Good golly. We'll be talking to you often. Hopefully there's not too many emergency pods this.

I can't take it. I'm still recovering from the one the other day. All right. We'll talk to you later this week. Good golly. Adios megos.