PTI - Panthers Win the Cup! + Buss to Sell Lakers

Episode Date: June 19, 2025

Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser discuss the Lakers, the Panthers, and the Oilers. 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. Pardon the interruption. but I'm Mike Wilbon. It's National Panic Day, Tony.

What are you panicked about? I'm Tony Kornheiser. I think my hairline is starting to thin. What are you thin? Oh, I'm panicked about that. You know, I gave into that one in 1994. I didn't know you were still grappling with that one. Well, it just sort of happened to me within the last few weeks, it seems to me.

What am I panicked about? I'm also panicked about doing this show live. Welcome to PTI, boys and girls. In today's episode, Tariq Scoob will takes the mound. The Sun and Fever Scuffle and Tim Legler joins us for five good minutes. But we begin today with the breaking news that the Bus family has reportedly entering into an agreement to sell the Los Angeles Lakers. Jeannie Bus will reportedly continue to serve in her role as governor, but the new owner will be Mark Walter, who already owns the Dodgers. The Lake Jerry Bus bought the Lakers in 1979 for $675 million. $1. ESPN is reporting that the sale price values the team at a record $10 billion.

Wow. Wilbon, what of the buses meant to the Lakers and what does this do for the team's future? Tony, the buses have meant to the Lakers and, of course, we're starting with Jerry and moving on through Jeannie, who was really controlled and managed the team and represented it lately since his death. as much as any ownership in modern times has meant to a team and a league. You want to compare him to Jerry Jones and the Cowboys? Okay.

And he had the team. He bought them about 10 years before Jerry Jones got into the NFL. But Tony, the buses, they put a brand of basketball out there that continued what Jack Kent Cook had already started, you know, with the fabulous forum and Wilton, Jerry West and all that. Yeah. Bus came and he winds up, you know, maneuvering. to get a guy named Irvin Johnson, and then they have what is literally called Showtime, and that brand is as important to the NBA as anything other than the Boston Celtics. Those are the two pillars on which the league is built and has been sustained.

And the bus family did that in Los Angeles, the capital of entertainment. And how can you have anything but glowing things really to say about the Lakers as they continue now as they have LeBron and they went out and got a Luca, and it continued in the Baltimore. and it continued in the bus family way. Jeannie did that. So they've meant everything to the Southern California sports and to the league. Do you want to go to the full disclosure

about how close you are with Mark Walter because he's a Northwestern boy? I don't want me to say it. He's a Northwestern alum. He's a trustee. He's somebody. I know he still lives in Lincoln Park. I love that he's bought the team.

Nothing is going to change with the Lakers. Nothing is going to change because what Mark Walter has proved with the Dodgers is he spends a lot of money and he acquires good talent. Under his watch, they got mooky bets, they got Freddie Freeman, they got Shohei Tani, and they've won. They've won championships, as the Lakers have won championships. And yes, the buses get all the credit in the world, drafting magic, trading for Kobe, signing LeBron, signing Lucas. So I think it's going to go on the same trajectory that it's been. I don't think you have to worry. I don't think LeBron's

going to say, oh, get me out of here. I don't think any of that's going to happen. I mean, I think this is an easy move for the league. You know, you know who the bad owners are. And the buses were not bad owners, nor were they intrusive owners, though they did like, Jerry certainly did like publicity. And the Walter, but he's not an intrusive owner at this point, right? Right? So we move on. No, Mark is not an intrusive owner. And look at what the Dodgers do. Like the Dodgers go out and they get whoever management decides they're going to get. And they're in contention every single day of every single season. this is what he does.

They win and they hire the smartest GMs, and that matters. Let's move to the NHL and the Florida Panthers winning their second straight Stanley Cup by pounding Edmonton last night 5 to 1 and taking the Stanley Cup final series 4 to 2. Florida was up 2-0 after one period. Ultimately, Sam Reinhart scored four goals, two empty netters. And neither Connor McDavid nor Leon Drysidele scored a point. Well, on, what does this game in this series say about the? the Florida Panthers.

They are great. They are champions twice over. And I'll start there, but quickly just take a little side trip that says this show will be probably the only one that is not going to give in to the nonsense of calling them a dynasty. Two is not a dynasty. And maybe people, I don't know, under 60 years old ought to look up dynasty and figure out what that is. They're great for now. That's enough.

They went out and went back to back. and they beat what we still think is the best player in the world in Connor McDavid. And let me go specifically to the goaltender, Mr. Bobrovsky, who probably ought to be getting more credit than he's even getting. He's getting a lot, but not enough. Because Tony, as you know, a great goaltender in the Stanley Cup playoffs, and particularly in the final, has a disproportionate effect on the outcome, like an ace who can go, you know, two or three times in a series, or a great, you know, first ballot, Hall of Fame quarterback. That's right.

Dominate action. A goaltender does that for you. And so Brobrovsky was the guy in that series. He had control of it. The bad moments he had are so few. I now have forgotten them already. No, I agree with all of that. Look, it's easy to make fun of South Florida as a hockey destination

because there's no snow and there's no ice. But this is three years in a row into the finals. And back-to-back championships, right? we can dismiss dynasty in this regard. There's no such thing as a dynasty of two. It starts at three. I prefer four and over a five or six year period, but they are on the verge. Amen. They have a chance because they put these things out there already. Here's what they did last night. Again, they went up two nothing in the first period again. Over the course of the series, Mike, they outscored Edmonton 13 to four in the first period. And it was nine nothing in the last four games.

So they were always in the league. They outscored Edmonton, the team that we think of as the offensive team. They outscored them 28 to 17 over six games. Like 28 goals in six games. That's a lot of goals. That's really a lot of goals out there. I'm going to give you this small statistic that I find meaningful. The Panthers led in the series for 255 minutes and 49 seconds.

The Oilers led for 33 minutes and 51 seconds. That's domination home. Yes, it is. That's what that is. And it also set a Stanley Cup record. It did. Yeah, that is domination. Wow.

Let's turn then to the Oilers. McDavid says he's disappointed by how things finished up, but has, quote, a lot of confidence and belief, close quote, in his team moving forward. Tony, where does a second straight loss in the Stanley Cup final actually leave McDavid and his Oilers? It leaves them. knocking on the door. And maybe, in the words of the great

Bum Phillips, next year they'll break down the door. Actually, what Bum said is, kick the son of a bleep in, but this is a family show, so I didn't want to use that. Mike, I don't believe there's any particular reason to get off the Oilers now. I don't believe that they are necessarily receding. I know that Zach Hyman, who missed

the series, and that may have been the turning point for all we know. He's 33 years old. But Connor McDavid is 28, and Leon Drysiddle is 29. They are in their prime at the moment. And don't forget, they just went to the Stanley Cup finals two years in a row. I mean, okay, Florida was better, but they were right next to Florida. So I think the long-term bet is still Connor McDavid to win one of these things. Tony, I would stay with them as well,

but they need some help. And how about I specify younger help? The Oilers are the oldest team in the NHL. That usually can continue to work if you've won and you keep an old group together. We seen that in both the NHL and NBA. But they haven't won. And to break through, they're going to have to go out and get somebody in, oh, maybe they start with goaltender. Not that you necessarily want a young goaltender, but they're going to have to be better there late in the Stanley Cup playoffs.

I mentioned Bobrovsky, while on the other hand, Edmonton is, you know, shudling back and forth with their goaltender in the championship series, not going to work. So, I mean, Drysidal and McDavitt are going to need help in that. guard. Right. So, I mean, the goaltending got them to the finals. It just didn't buoy them in the finals. The larger issue here is Connor McDavid and his greatness, his all-time greatness. He just became the first guy for nine seasons in a row to score 90 or more points and not win a Stanley Cup. We have talked about this on this show. Does it detract from his all-time stature if he never wins a Stanley Cup? And we both concluded, Mike, that it does. Because in high...

The two greats have all won it. They've all won it. I'd love to see him win it. And again, I think he is a good long-term dad. A couple of things concerned me. In the last two games of this series, he scored only one point. And last year in Game 7, he did not score. But he and Drysiddle had 33 points each in the playoffs

by far the largest margin of scoring. So let's take a break. Coming up, Tyrese Halliburton says he'll do everything in his power to play in game six. but should the Pacers consider playing a healthy substitute? Instead, we will ask Tim Leggeron. We're also going to ask legs what moves, if any, Coach Rick Carlisle might still have left. You know what I wonder about Mike with the hockey?

Can Florida keep their free agents? Can they sustain this team with these people and do it again? Because at some point, people say, I want money. Marchion and Bennett. Game six of the NBA finals is tomorrow night. in Indianapolis where we find our great friend ESPN NBA analyst, Tim Legler. Let's start with the most important person. Maybe on the court, maybe not tomorrow.

Tyrese Halliburton says he's going to do everything in his power to play in game six despite his right calf strain. How much of Halliburton, Tim, is enough to justify, you know, starting him over a healthy player? Oh, boy, that's a great question. To put a percentage on it, I mean, I'm thinking you've got to be at least 80 percent or maybe more, in my opinion. And here's the thing. The bottom line is this, Oklahoma City is going to know immediately

what the threat level is for Tyrese Halliburton. And you saw it the other night, particularly as the game wore on, and in that fourth quarter, they knew he was a non-threat. He cannot get downhill. His speed's not a factor. Can't push off because of the...

He's probably very concerned. He might tear something in that calf. If that's the case, you are better off with a healthy, player on the floor because they do have another option. Now, T.J. McConnell is not Tyrese Halliburton. No one's going to say that. But T.J. McConnell has played very well in this series. He represents quickness.

He is a guy that has repeatedly broken their defense down in the minutes he's gotten. So you have to play him more than you did the other night if you want to have a chance, assuming Tyrese Halliburton is less than 80 percent. And by all accounts, it sounds like that's going to be the case. He did not look like over at the arena today for me to be. availability. He was in a great frame of mind in thinking that this is going to be a quick fix and he's going to be closer to himself by tomorrow night. Tim, that gives me an easy follow-up then to ask you about the Pacers and their crazy number of turnovers in game five. I mean, T.J. McConnell,

as you mentioned, is quite capable. Does that help Indiana, you think, cut down the turnovers against that swarming Oklahoma City defense or is nothing going to help in that regard? Well, look, they're going to turn you over. The question is what's an acceptable number? What can you survive? You can't survive 23 turnovers for 32 points. No team can survive that. So it was really the first game that OKC not only turned him over, but they cashed them all in.

That can't happen. T.J. McConnell will help with that, certainly. He's very good with the ball quick. He can escape bad situations, escape traffic. But he is a smaller guard. and they've got a lot of quickness and a lot of length out on the perimeter. So he can help, but the bottom line is this. You've got to keep that to a workable number.

If that's 15 or below, you've got a chance against this team. I think you're going to see T.J. McConnell on the floor a lot more than he was in the previous game. I don't think they're going to have a choice. I think Tyrese Halliburton's injury is going to necessitate that. You may even see them out there together some to take some of the ball handling burden off of Nemhart and Halliburton makes it a little bit easier for, them to be, especially Nemhart, as scorer, if he's not as worn out by bringing the ball up the floor against all that pressure.

Tim, I think an even bigger problem for Indiana is Jalen Williams, J. Dub, who seems to have turned into a monster right before our eyes. You played in the league a long time. You've observed the league a long time. When a guy like this, who's an alleged number two becomes this, what do you do about him? very difficult for Indiana because you have so much attention that you've got to divert to Shea. There just has to be additional bodies in that direction. He's got a gravitational pull toward him because of his ability to just compromise defenses on the perimeter.

When you do that and that ball comes out of that area of the floor and it comes over to Jalen Williams and he's got one guy in front of him and he's got straight line dribbles, drives at his disposal. and when he's making the deep shot the way he was the other night, I'm not sure anybody can beat this team. So the key is, can you defend Shea without committing that level of attention to him? Because I think that is giving Jalen Williams just enough extra space to make this look easy. And it's, look, I'm making it sound like it's something that can be done. I'm not sure it can because of how good those two guys are.

But to me, that's the key. contains Shea with a little bit less attention if you can. And I also think Rick Carlisleau potentially plays a little bit of zone in this game just to try to keep the ball in front of you so you don't have to commit so much to let Jalen Williams have a whole lot of opportunity on the weak side of the floor, which he did the other night. Tim will get you out of here on this. You mentioned Rick Carlisle.

He has a reputation for making great adjustments. I'm going to ask it straight. What moves do you think he has left? rather than me saying, but he probably has no moves left at this point. So what moves do you think he has left? Look, I don't know that he's got a ton left by the time you get to a game six. I do think zone could be an option. They're not going to play a ton of zone.

They never have. I don't think it's a bad idea to sprinkle in some more possessions of zone to make sure that the ball is in front of you. And that means Oklahoma City knocks down a few three-point shots. So be it. you've got to give up something different than what you've given up most of this series, which is Shea Gilgis Alexander or Jaylon Williams living in the lane, living at the rim, breaking down your defense. So to me, that might be one temporary solution.

And I think offensively, for them to get this to a game seven on Sunday, this has to be a Pascal Ciacom night. And that's not as much maybe an adjustment for Rick Carlisle, other than some wrinkles maybe to get him in more advantageous spots to catch the ball. He's a guy that can win matchups in this series because he's got smaller guys on him. So if there's something different he does offensively, look for it to be something directed at Pascal Seacum, a guy capable of having one of those huge scoring nights just to give you a chance to be in this game in the fourth quarter, where then you hope your defense can get it done late and get this to Sunday.

Thank you, Tim. It's great when we have you on. Thank you very much. Stay out of those stories. Appreciate you guys, both. Be safe. I will, believe me. Let's take one last break. Still to come, Caitlin Clark scuffles with the sun. And is LeBron right that ring culture is overstated? Well, he chased him. He went from team to team chasing rings, didn't he?

Isn't that his M.O.? Happy time, people. Happy 24th birthday, Evan Mowgli. Mobley is one of two Cleveland big men with real impact. The other is Jared Allen. Both are 6-11 and both make it very hard for a... opponents to get to the rim. Mowgli was drafted third overall out of USC in 2021 and this year was his best so far. Mowgli averaged 18 and a half points, 9.3 rebounds and 1.6 blocks a game for the

first place team in the Eastern Conference. Mowgli was defensive player of the year this year, the first Cleveland player ever so honored and was an all-star for the first time and second team all-NBA. None of this, of course, helped Cleveland when they played Indiana in the playoffs and they lost four to one. A very nice story, Tony, as you know, but the question for me is can clearly repeat that and finish atop the Eastern Conference standing in the regular season again next year. It's going to be hard. I mean, you know, you got the Knicks, you got the Pacers who are going to be feeling themselves

a lot more coming off a trip to the finals. Interesting season coming up for the Cavaliers. You didn't mention the Celtics you should have. Happy anniversary, Max Scherzer. On this day, six years ago in Washington's World Series season, just one day after breaking his nose in a bunting accident in batting practice. The Nationals A's ace struck out 10 Phillies and seven scoreless innings. The Warrior God went 6-0 through 45 innings for the Nats that June,

becoming the fourth pitcher since 1920 to post an ERA of one or lower with at least 68 strikeouts in a calendar month. Since leaving the Nats, Scherzer has gone to the Dodgers, the Mets, Texas Rangers, where he was on a World Series winner, and now Toronto. He's pitched just three innings for the Blue Jays due to her thumb injury. but he's slated for a second minor league rehab start. Today could be back in the bigs before the end of the month. All right, if he's back in the bigs, like where?

Can he help a team? There's so many teams that need a pitcher. Max Scherzer, is there a burst left in him to go from August to October? I'm just asking. What do you think? You love him. He can help Toronto. Sure, he can.

Toronto. There's a whole lot of scuffling going on last night between the Sun and the fever in the third quarter. Ref's handed out a flagrant one to J.C. Sheldon of the Sun for poking Caitlin Clark in the eye. Technical fouls to Clark for pushing back, Marina Mabry of the Sun for shoving Clark to the floor, and Tina Charles of the Sun who had rushed into the fray.

Then in the final minute of the game, the fever Sophie Cunningham earned a flagrant two and ejection for her take down of Sheldon, which Sheldon and teammate Lindsay Allen also tossed as, quote, escalators, unquote. The fever won the game by 17 will face links in the Commissioner's Cup final on July 1. Yeah, the WNBA is having some growing pains that every league has. And you got to go through them.

There's usually no shortcut. And these growing pains have a lot of sidebars to them, Tony. And so we're going to be seeing this a lot. Some people will say, oh, it's not good for the league. Others will say, well, it is because it's publicity. It's growing pains, period. People getting knocked down isn't great. Not getting knocked down.

It isn't great. Let's go to the big finish. Let's do it. The Raven signed former Packers Corner, Jair Alexander, a one-year $6 million deal. Your thoughts? He said he wanted to go and reunite with his college teammate Lamar Jackson. I understand that.

Turned down more money from other teams, apparently. Nick Castellanos was not in the Phillies lineup last night for the first time in 237 games for making an inappropriate comment toward his own manager, Rob Thompson. Does that make sense? Yeah. If the manager has authority, yeah, you've got to stand by the manager.

He's allowed to do this. LeBron criticized ring culture on his mind-the-game podcast with Steve Nash. A ring's over-emphasized. Yes, I agree with the sentiment. He's part of the conversation, right? So how do you square that? I don't exactly know.

I'd like to hear more. The Nationals lost their 10th in a row. Fell to the Rockies, got crushed. Second straight night, The Iraqis. What's up with that? Dreadful. I watched all of it. They gave up seven home runs. Four in one inning, two different relievers.

Awful. Last one, Tarek Scobulls, start against the Pirates tonight was rained out. They'll play a double-headed tomorrow. What do you expect from Scobble? Scoobble in the first game, schemes, in game two in Detroit. Good night to go to the ballpark. Yeah, we're out of time. We'll try and do better the next time. I'm Tony Cornheiser. Live TV, kids.

Ain't nothing like it. I'm Mike Wilbaugh. same time tomorrow, knuckleheads. Maybe we'll get to Pete Pro Armstrong. That would be MVP.