The Bill Simmons Podcast - A Mavs Tailspin, Luka’s Future, LeBron’s Feet, and Playoff Seed Dodgeball With Ryen Russillo

Episode Date: March 27, 2023

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo to discuss the Mavericks being in panic mode and the consequences of wasting another prime Luka Doncic year (2:25). Plus, Lakers predictions, the Grizzlies finding their groove again, and a really important Bucks-Nuggets game (34:00). Then they run through the scariest Eastern play-in teams, the Warriors’ playoff hopes if they secure the 5-seed vs. the 6-seed, the Celtics’ stabilization, and more (49:19), before closing with MVP, All-NBA, Dumbest Team of The Year: 2023 Edition, The Retradeables: The Porzingis Trade, March Madness thoughts, and more (1:09:35). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Ryen Russillo Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

what the hell is going on in Dallas? We're going to talk about that next. This episode is brought to you by my old friend, Miller Lite. I've been a big fan of Miller Lite, man, since college days when I was allowed to have beer. I think nephew Kyle is a fan too. Miller Lite keeps it simple for us. Undebatable quality, great taste. Picture this. It's game day. All the gang's here. You're tailgating outside the stadium. It's a great time for beer. Or how about when you're standing at the grill

and the smell of sizzling burgers is in the air? Moments like that. Or when you want a light beer that tastes like beer, that's delicious. You don't want to load up on those heavier beers and then you only have two of them. Then you feel tired. Your stomach feels full.

Miller Lite, it's your friend. It just accompanies whatever else you're doing. You're super happy with it. Opening an ice cold Miller Lite can signal the beginning of Miller time. Miller Lite is the light beer with all the great beer tastes we like. 90 calories per 355 mil can. So why not grab some Miller Lites today? Your game time tastes like Miller time. Must be legal drinking age. This episode is brought to you by Prime Video. You know me, I can't go a day without sports. I really can't. And now Monday nights are all

about hockey. That's right. There's a new exclusive home for streaming Monday night NHL hockey, and it's on prime all season long. Watch prime Monday night hockey deliver unreal plays. The biggest goals can't miss moments. Matthews, McDavid, Crosby, the NHL's best. They're all on prime prime Monday night hockey. It's on Monday. It's on Prime. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where if you love succession, we broke it down on the Prestige TV Podcast. Me, Joanna Robinson, Sean Fantasy. That is up.

Andy Greenwald and Chris Ryan also talking about it on The Watch. The best show going right now. Very excited to have it back. We're covering it at least twice a week on the Prestige TV Podcast because Big Waz and Chris Ryan are going to be putting up precaps on Thursdays or Fridays heading into the next

episode. We're also covering Yellow Jackets on the Prestige TV podcast as well. I have a new Rewatchables going up on Monday night. It is a movie that came out in the last 35 years. There's your hint, but it's a good one. Made a lot of money. Pretty famous movie. That's all I got for you.

One shiny podcast with Tate Frazier. March Madness. I don't know if you're following. Pretty crazy. Talk about at the end of this podcast, but Tate broke everything down. I know we always say wild with tournaments, with sports,

but March Madness. Pretty wild this year. Johnny Carson, wild, crazy stuff. Coming up on this podcast, Rasil and I are going to try to figure out what the hell is going on with Dallas. What does this mean for Lucas' future? What does this mean for the West playoff picture?

Since we talked a week ago, 50 things changed in basketball, so we tried to cover all of them. One thing we didn't cover, we taped during the Warriors-Timberwolves game, which I just watched the fourth quarter of and the Warriors completely choked in the last minute and blew the game.

So we had some kind things to say about the Warriors, could they get to the five seed? That's coming up later. It's already dated, so I'm just warning you now because the Timberwolves, Carl Anthony Towns, made two big shots down the stretch and they won and the West Play West Point slash five through 12 situation continues to just be really, really, really confusing. So we talked about that way

later, but coming up, Luca, the Mavs, Rosillo, it's all next. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, we're taping this a little before 545 Pacific time. Ryan Vassillo is here. We've been watching basketball. Weekend, we'll talk March Madness a little bit later. We're going to talk about the Dallas Mavericks to start. Dallas Mavericks in complete crisis mode. Rosillo, they just lost two out of three in three days to the Charlotte Hornets,

who are in the Wimbledon sweepstakes, who do not have LaMelo Ball anymore. And have been in the running for most inconsequential league pass team this year. I don't know where they rank for you, but I've probably logged my usage rate with the Hornets is probably about as low as any team. It was really embarrassing for the Mavs. They traded their 2029 for Kyrie. I think they were thinking maybe offensively they could just overpower teams. They can't rebound. I think they got out rebounded by like 18 today. They don't get stops. And this is a team that even if they sneak it in the play and nothing's going to happen. They made the Western Finals

last year. This has surpassed Zion. You did the biggest disappointments thing on your pod on Tuesday. I think Dallas not making even the play-in would be the biggest disappointment of the season. What are you seeing? What's wrong with them? Well, it's funny because you're right. When there's a tie on the TV for another game charlotte's rarely winning it at this point

but for us to be on the west coast and you and i are texting this morning and i'm thinking like dallas loses to charlotte the other night they were 16 and a half point favorites that's the largest spread a team has lost all nba season so it's 10 a.m. and I'm like, I got to make sure I'm in front of the TV for Dallas Charlotte because I have to see what's going to happen. And it gets off to a horrible start. The oddity of it in the first half, I don't think any of the other starters besides Kyrie and Lucas scored any points. And so then Kidd changed it up to start in the second half. And I actually thinkallas was trying i mean there's defensive stuff that you can see but i didn't see a team like the first game you go okay whatever weird stuff happens this caught him off guard but then to lose to him again immediately and it didn't

seem fluky like they couldn't guard um and you know, when Dallas gets bogged down offensively, like you know what it's going to be. It's going to be a lot of predictable stuff, but Luke is so good and Kyrie's so good in ISO that it's still going to work a lot. Luke had a 40, 12, and 8. Yeah, and he got off to a bad start. Pretty convincingly.

I think he missed his first six shots, too, on top of everything else. Look, I don't even think we're at the point, despite all the Kyrie stuff, which is pretty, you know, whenever everybody's like, hey, why don't you do this? But you don't do it with this guy. And we're like, hey, when when somebody else catches up to the Kyrie bingo, then we will probably criticize that guy as much as we criticize Kyrie. Is that OK? But to this point, I don't know that this is solely about Kyrie. The problem is that Vinnie Smith was very valuable as a wing defender,

and now you find Bullock or Hardaway Jr. in some of those roles. And they can't rebound. They got out-rebounded by 21 today. Luka was their leading rebounder with 12. Kyrie wasn't, like, upgrading from the Dinwiddie, whatever point guard situation they had, to Kyrie was not like upgrading from the Dinwiddie whatever point guard situation they had to Kyrie was not really what they needed what they really needed was

a rebounder defender somebody who could clean up stuff they just don't have it the Christian Wood you go back to the Christian Wood trade in June where they gave up the 26th pick in the draft and some contracts took a fire on him they trade Dinwiddie and DFS and their 29 first for Kyrie,

who's a free agent who could bolt. And then that looks bad. On the flip side, they have a top 10 protected pick to the Knicks, but they have one of the top 10 worst records right now. So they might actually keep that pick. That would handicap them going forward. They have their picks for 24, 25, 26, 27. But if somehow they keep their pick this year, I was on the phone with somebody today talking about them, and we were having a debate of, do you just shut it down if you're the Mavs and just try to get the eighth pick in the draft and just throw the season away? And you really can't because of the Kyrie piece of it, because he might not come back. I don't know, from what you've seen,

do you like the combo of Luka and Kyrie, especially Kyrie at this point in his career? Because that'd be the first thing I would try to figure out. Are these the two guys you want to build around? You want to build around Luka, but does this combo make sense, especially with the point of the career that Kyrie is at right now where he misses 20 to 30 games a year? Well, there's two things. Personally, if I were GM and Kyrie are on the team and the owner said, hey, we have to re-sign him to a four-year max, I would say

you just fire me then. Because I'm not doing that. What about a three-year deal with a team option? I would still say please fire me. Give me time to find another job. But this is different because it's Nico Harrison who's from Nike had the relationship with Kyrie. I believe that that's probably some of the motivation behind this where it's like maybe we can kind of figure him out. But I don't even know that it's really on him now.

I don't. I mean, part of the other reason they were losing games and in this bad stretch is Luca missed five games. If you look at some of the overall stuff, the offense has been pretty similar, a tick better, worse ranking-wise. Defensively, you know, it was really weird because they turned this around last year

because they figured out their defense. Now, we know the personnel isn't the same, but they're a bottom third defense, and since this last stretch, they're kind of like in that 25th range. Well, Kyrie's not helping on that front. I kind of default to the rule of you can't watch,

like if say they miss the playoffs, right? After you gave up the resources and protecting the asset, I mean, the default is usually the team would resign Kyrie knowing that it's like, well, even if we don't like the way it works, we're just going to punt on this whole thing.

Then how do we replace anything that's even close to that talent? How do we replace that kind of asset just against the cap? So, I mean, what would you do? Sign and trade him. I don't know to where, but I still feel like he has value because he's so respected just for how talented he is with the actual players. So many guys in the league love him that I feel like they could turn him into something.

This is really bad, though, for Dallas. Since January 1st, they're 15-23, which is the eighth-worst record in the league. Everybody else who's in there except for New Orleans is a team that is headed for the tanking sweepstakes. Last year, if you remember, they started out slow and then went on this rip-roaring

run. And the league was a little different. I don't think the offense was as good day-to-day. And just in general, they had a better, deeper, more complete team. This year, it's like every move they made didn't work. They signed JaVale with their mid-level. Can't play him.

You can't trade him either. You're just stuck with him. The Christian Wood thing, for whatever reason, he never clicked with Kidd. Well, he's never clicked anywhere. Well, that's what we said when they made the trade. It's like, this is a flyer. Don't think that this is anything more than a flyer

because he's not reliable and he's only been on bad teams. What is he? We didn't know. Well, here's what he is year by year philadelphia one year charlotte one year milwaukee one year new orleans one year detroit one year houston one plus years like then they moved on from him yeah now um actually no houston it was two years. Why do we pretend this is a mystery? You know, he's an incredibly talented player, but he's very focused on kind of what he's doing and the other parts of the game.

And look, some of those other stops is not entirely fair. It wasn't like he was playing an entire season, but it seems like anybody that's had him in their building has been like, oh, okay, like we're over it. So I think it also gets back to like the luca thing because now luca's in that that range of okay you're drafted holy shit okay this guy's going to be an mvp this is he was what has he been mvp favorite two times coming in even in those clipper series losses bill you're like this is insane what this dude is capable of nobody is denying

how incredibly talented he is and the fact that there's not much you can do with him with his dribble drive angle understanding and some of the passing. But he's such a high usage guy. I don't know if it's that he only wants to play that way or if you can only build the team that way

so then he plays the way the team is built. I have a hard time knowing exactly what the best way of picking everybody around the league saying this would be the best center for him this is the best opposite guard these are the best forwards like yeah i could figure it out but it's not realistic you could ever do that as a gm and say hey i get my four magical guys to play next to luca i think he's a little harder fit and knowing exactly how you're going to put somebody else around him agree and and i do think we should talk about much like we did with harden these guys that are so

distinct that you have to put around this specific team around them should they take demerits for that because i just felt like with harden he had the ball so much he could only play with these certain types of players that's what was cool about watching him with philly where he he unleashed this you know other part of his game i think about that a lot when I watch Luca because I don't really like watching the Mavericks and having all season. And part of it is because I just don't like watching that kind of basketball. I didn't like watching with Harden. I don't like watching here. I don't like watching Atlanta when Trae Young has the ball all the time. I just don't enjoy it. I like when I like inclusive basketball. I like when, you know, like somebody like Jokic, who has a 27 usage rate, but still feels

like everything runs through him. I don't like watching the Mavericks. And if I'm thinking, what kind of team do I want to build around this guy? He's this amazing one-man show. They got to the final four last year. So that's good, right? And at the same time, if you're making excuses for him, I was looking, sometimes this doesn't matter at all. When you look at the stats, when a team wins and a team loses, you ever look at those? Sure.

Sometimes when a team loses, the guy's stats are a little better, or sometimes they'll be the same. Most of the time, nine out of 10 times, there's no lesson to be had. It's really interesting in his case though, when Dallas wins this season, he's averaging 36, nine and nine, 51, 41, 77% shooting. And they have a 130 offensive rating when he's on the court. That's when they win. When they lose, he's 38 and eight, 46%, 27% from three. And they have a one 10 offensive rating. So on the one hand, everything falls on him. And if he has a bad game, they're going to lose. And if he has a good game, they have a really good chance of winning. On the other hand,

they've kind of built the team that way. And now you could say, well, that's why they got Kyrie. They wanted to diversify and all that stuff. But now you have two of your five guys can't guard anybody. We thought when this trade happened, I don't think either of us really liked it, but I also understood it because it was a panic move. And the panic was, well, at least if this doesn't work out, Kyrie leaves as a free agent. We sacrificed that pick, but at least we have cap space. I don't know. I went through all the free agents today. Who's the guy you're getting? You're getting Fred Van Vliet for $40 million a year? You're getting Vucevic? Who's out there that solves their problems? I don't see anybody. Probably on the higher end of the destination cities in the NBA. No state tax. Yep. Can't ever mention that without mentioning that part of it. So remember how Cuban would talk about all the different ways very early as an owner.

I think we've covered this before, so I'm not going to spend a ton of time on it. But he wanted the visitor's locker room actually to be awesome because he wanted potential free agents to go, wow they this is a first class operation all the way through so we did the ringer i know you gave me a hat when i showed up give you a hat i was like we were first class here's your hat yeah it says r that you know that's that means something uh but you know i don't know i don't know if it's like i sometimes i think things happen it doesn't mean anything boston forever couldn't get a free agent and then all of a sudden they get al horford and gordon hayward like immediately right and so it was like, wow, they, you know, maybe, maybe it's a cyclical thing. So they're in a really tough spot. They're in a really tough spot, but you know, despite the Kyrie stuff that is totally fair to factor in all this,

it hasn't been great. Uh, I think they're what three and eight now with the two of them in games. Yeah. And you know, he's already had a couple moments where you just go, them in great uh i think they're what three and eight now with the two of them in games yeah and you know he's already had a couple moments where you just go you're gonna do this again man you're gonna start calling he had a guy thrown out of the stands today which again i have no idea what that guy said so i'm not gonna take sides here but you know with kairi there's always a little bit extra so i don't know if that's what like luke would mention that he had these personal issues going on and he's not having that much fun and all this kind of stuff. And it just, look, it just feels really bad right now.

And maybe they get into the playing game, but I don't know. Yeah, to what end? What are you doing? Unless, I mean, in a playing game, they could beat anybody just because Luke could be incredible and he could have 50. I want to do Kyrie after the break. I have a couple more Luca things for you.

I think we can agree this is the worst under 30 situation for one of the top 25 guys in the league or top 20 if we're saying. I'm sorry for under 30 years old guys who are all star

or better. I think this is my least favorite situation from a big picture standpoint with the lack of picks, with the team they have around him, with kind of the, I don't know what's going to happen with them with free agency,

but I just don't see a road for this team to be that successful despite having one of the best players in the league. I don't know what their moves are. Like they would have to get really, really lucky. They got lucky five years ago that Luka fell to number three and then somebody was dumb enough to trade him

but if you look at some of the other stuff they did like the Porzingis trade initially I don't think that worked out the way they thought Porzingis also can't be counted I mean look he's still a very talented guy you're always waiting for the next injury

they flipped him for Dinwiddie and Bertans, so I'm going to say that didn't work out. No, but the funny thing is Dinwiddie was actually pretty good for him. He was somebody that was a little ISO heavy, and I think he found a way. Keep going. Dinwiddie, DFS, and the 2029

first for Kyrie. It's heading toward not working out. They have some draft stuff as great as the Luka thing was. They did miss on a couple guys. They missed... I mean, going back the last 10 years, everyone missed on Giannis, but they had the 13th pick, didn't take him. 2017,

they missed on Mitchell and Band. They took Dennis Smith. 2020, Maxie was sitting there. I mean, really, Luka, if you're just going to say last 10 years, how do you feel about the Mavs as an organization? You start with the Luca thing. You're like, that was unbelievable. That's one of the best trade and moves that anyone made in the last 10 years. After that, it starts to get a little dicey. You start talking about, well, Maxie Quiba,

the DFS, they've been around the fringes with free agency, but for the most part, it's been pretty rocky. And it feels like it's going to get rockier. And we've seen Haral about came and went. We see Nico Harrison's in now. They're about to get rid of Jason Cade. I would assume he's not going to make it out of this year with how that's gone. So now you're on another coach.

And then you have all the off the court stuff with some of the sexual harassment stuff they had in the office and things like that. This has been a rough 10 years for them or so. But it keeps getting back to like, what does Luka prefer? I mean, does Luka want the ball this much? I think sometimes with the math, you'll go, well, this is how good he is, points per possession, so why do we want other people getting the basketball? But that's not really the way basketball is played. If you're watching somebody else do everything, you're not going to fight for rebounds as much. We both hate it. Right.

To stand around is just not conducive to then coming through. The counter would be, well, why did they make the Western Finals last year? That's how they were built last year. Well, they played built last year. Well, they played defense last year. They played defense. And the thing I, you know, it's my Mark Sanchez Jets rule. It's like you finished in the Final Four. Do you go into next year where you're like, hey, you are one of the four best teams and a chance at a title?

No. So they were in the Western Conference Finals. But nobody was going into it this year thinking alright this is a team that is on the short list of contenders it was wow nice run you know because Luka was going to start getting a ton of shit if he couldn't advance a little bit in the playoffs he gets to the Western Conference Finals but I

have no you know look I'm not around the team I don't have any answers when it comes to like what does Luka prefer but when you look at the assets the Kyrie decision and then Luca basically admitting which I think is kind of a good part of him he hates losing so much it makes him fucking miserable yeah but there's also another part of it where I don't enjoy watching him some nights where I'm like you're just gonna let everybody have it all night long and pitch

about calls that the refs are right about on a lot of these, too. He's first-team All-NBA worst body language. No question. By the way, we went 17 minutes. We didn't even mention the Brunson decision, which was the single biggest reason they're in the spot they're in. They lost a top 35 player in the league for nothing. But Brunson wasn't going to be that.

Brunson wasn't going to be that with them. He was never going to be asked to do that. He was really good with them. He's awesome with the Knicks. He's beyond what I would have even expected despite liking him. But I don't know that you ever get the opportunity to do that.

Still a good player. You're right. To lose it for nothing. Yeah, you're right. I don't know. Fundamentally, I don't know the answer to your question about what does,

what kind of style does Luka want as a basketball player? Because I think him versus Harden, even Harden at his MVP peak, he never had the ability to overpower people on the low block like Luka can. I mean, that's the, he has that thing that we waited for 10 years for LeBron to have.

He can already do it, right? His three point shot, I think will get better for the most part, pretty erratic, you know, like for how many he shoots, he's probably 33%. He's in the lower end, but in general, like, does he want to play faster? Does he, does he want to be a guy who makes everybody better? Does he want to get to just 33, 12 and eight? I mean, 33, eight and eight, something like that. And that's what his ideal thing is. And then how does everybody else fit into that? I just don't like when somebody has the ball this much. And I think we're both in there. I have this stat for you though, Russo. I went through the best under 30 year old guys who missed the playoffs. It's a little bit of a longer list than I expected if you're going like top 30 players ever.

Kareem, 1975. Hakeem, 1992. Will Chamberlain, 1963. Kobe, 2005. KG, three straight years, 05, 06, 07. Still a national tragedy. Charles Barkley, our guy, 1988 and 1992. Dwayne Wade, 2008.

Now, none of those guys had the plan. I think to miss the playoffs with the plan is even worse and more embarrassing, especially you have two teams in there that got destroyed by injuries or were kind of trying to tank and then kind of talked themselves into fighting. I think them finishing 11th or below

with a Luka season where he's going to finish with... I forget how many games, but it's not like he missed 30 games. I'm going to look that up as we're talking. This is pretty bad. He's missed 59. No, he's played 59 so far. Look, the old Barkley rule was a good one.

It was like, if you're a superstar in this league you win the first round and then you'll lose to somebody the team that's better or you're 48 to 50 wins no matter who's on your team that's the right Duncan row Tim Duncan was winning 50 games every single year it didn't matter who was on his team so I think when we grew up that was kind of the deal like you knew who those six or seven guys were you're right that's the best way to put it it didn't matter you'd be in the playoffs. You'd probably win the first round. The league is a lot deeper now. But if you're Luka, I don't know that there's

anybody who said he's not a top five player in this league. If you don't even get into the playoffs with the play-in, that's a disaster. Disaster? Like all time? Wow. We'll be looking back 30 years on his basketball reference page going, wow, no playoffs,

nothing. Not even the play-in game that they don't even keep the stats for. There's a Jason Kidd piece to this. This would be the third stop that he flamed out in. Now, he had a lot of success last year. I actually thought, we both thought he did a good job last year. I do wonder why Quinn Snyder didn't wait to see how this played out in Dallas before he grabbed that Atlanta job because I wouldn't I wouldn't exactly be running

to coach that weird Atlanta team. 2024, quickly, their future. Kyrie Irving, Christian Wood, Dwight Powell,

all free agents. Hardaway has two years left at 18 and 16. Berton's expiring next year at 17. Kleber's tied up three years 33. Bullock's basically expiring next year at 17. Cleavers tied up three years, 33. Bullocks, basically 10 million next year

and then half of a guarantee the year after. They're stuck with JaVale for six and six. They could basically, they could buy out Bullock for five million. They could stretch Bertans if they wanted. They could get to like 85, 86 million in cap room and try to get, you know, Vucevic, Van Vliet, Draymond, Pertl, Lopez.

They could try to spend on somebody. Or they could try to trade for a salary. Like the Zach Levine type of player, if somebody's just like, we want to get off this contract. Other than that, I don't really know what their moves are. And the only benefit of them losing their pick

to the Knicks, if it was like the 11th or 12th pick, would be that then they would have some picks to trade the next couple years. It's pretty rough. JaVale's got a player option

for $6 million. That he's taking. I'm going to say he, I mean, it's just right now. Yeah. Well, when I was kind of kidding after I'd seen the nets in person,

you know, in that absolute flame out by the Celtics, you know, this is going back. Uh, I'm back in LA now, but you know, I was,

I was back East for like three plus weeks and I'm watching the nets and I'm going, this would actually be the perfect Luca roster around the opposite guard. And Mikael bridges who can create and certainly create more than we ever get to see in Phoenix, but also can defend. So you need the opposite guard to be kind of a creator, but you need him to be able to defend as well. You need a rolling

big who's actually going to want to play defense. And I actually think Claxton's a very competitive player. I like Claxton a lot. And then you would need kind of like different pieces around. But then if you sit there and go, okay, this is exactly how we want to build around the rest of these guys. It's like, do I have four years? Because the NBA doesn't work that way.

You can't overhaul your offensive line or your pitching staff or your bullpen in one offseason in the NBA. You can't really do that. And that's why the Kyrie part of this is so fascinating because I always go by the Daryl Morey rule. They wanted to keep Dwight Howard despite having no reason to want to keep Dwight Howard in Houston because they didn't want to lose the asset. Let's take a break. I'm going to talk about Kyrie quick. This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at

Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too. You won't win the Super Bowl, but your fundraising will support mental health, suicide prevention, and prostate and testicular cancer research.

And if you don't want to grow a mustache, you could still walk or run 60 kilometers, host an event, or set your own goal and mow your own way. Do great things this November. Sign up now. Just search Movember. When you ride transit, please be safe.

Yeah, be safe. Because what you do, others will do too. Others will do it too. So don't take shortcuts across tracks. Don't do that. In fact, just don't walk on tracks at all. Not at all. Trains move quietly so you won't hear them coming.. Don't do that. In fact, just don't walk on tracks at all. Not at all. Trains move quietly so you won't hear them coming.

You won't hear them coming. See, safe riding sets an example. Yeah, an example for me. Because safety is learned. It's learned. Okay, give it up. Give what up? Really?

Really, really. This message is brought to you by Metrolinks. All right, here's your Kyrie refresher course, because I think people don't like to look stuff up when they talk about Kyrie. They did make the finals in 2017. If you remember, a pretty unhappy Cavs season until the playoffs.

They only went 51 and 31. LeBron and Kyrie played 146 games combined, and they weren't in a good conference, but there was a weird feeling around them all year. Kyrie asked for a trade-off season. Plays for the Celtics. Amazing start, remember? They won the 16th straight at one point.

They were 23-5. They were 46-21 when he got hurt. We never saw him again that season because he hurt his knee. Make the playoff run without him. 2019, plays 67 games. They're 37 and 30 when he plays. They lose him round two in five. It's one of the worst playoff series any star player has had in a while. Everybody's ready to drive near part of the

end of it. Just to jump into, that was a miserable team to watch. And all they did was talk about how awesome they were without any of them doing anything collectively like kairi had his ring obviously from 16 but that team carried themselves like they were back-to-back champs hitting a blimp and you'd be like what the fuck why do you like it's like man when we have our guys nobody can beat us in seven it's like well what about five games what about five games because the mil Milwaukee series was awful. It was awful. He had a really interesting quote in Logan's piece about Jalen Brown this week

where he basically said, that was a really rough year. So many guys wanted to play. Everybody was competing against each other for minutes and you're supposed to be brothers and you're on your team, whatever he said. But he basically admitted that that was a disaster behind the scenes, which it was if you watched it.

Sorry, can't help myself. Read the piece and it was awesome. Logan is terrific. We all know that. There was one quote in there where Kyrie said, quote, sometimes I could say this for myself, sometimes our individual goals are before the team goals and he had to adjust, meaning Jalen Brown. You think about our team. I want you to really look back at our team that we had and see how talented we were. And we had a lockup in every position. It was two, three guys in every position. So it was not only competitive with me and JB, but it was competitive amongst all of us. And that wasn't the best recipe for team success. If you're competing with your brothers every day, breaking news, being deep and talented actually not good i screen grabbed it i read it and i fucking gasped i was especially you're the leader of

the team you're supposed to be able to work that out you wanted the challenge hey brad we're a little deep and that's that keeps wanting to beat me in practice this is throwing me off and because everybody's so hungry here and competitive it's it, it's, it's making us too competitive. And I think it'd be better if we were worse and more just lax about everything. You know, in his defense, he did, he did prove my too many guys theory that I've always said about that. I always argue with Daryl more about the famous too many guys theory. Kyrie just laid it down. So he leaves. He goes to the Nets. He played 20 games in 2020. Then that was the pandemic season.

He didn't want to play in the playoffs. He wanted to start another league and was like, nah. I was going to bring that up. They were 35 and 37. They were 8 and 12 when he played. They made the playoffs and he decided to skip it. He didn't want to go to the bubble. And that was when he started the rivalry thing. None of us should go in the bubble. So he decided to skip it. He didn't want to go to the bubble and that was when he started

the rivalry thing. None of us should go in the bubble. So he did that whole thing. Skip the series. 2021 played 54 games, missed 18. They're 38 and 18 with him. This was he actually played pretty well

but he got hurt in the playoffs. 2022, they're 14 and 15 with him. He refused to get vaccinated, didn't play in road games, only played 29 games. They got swept in the playoffs and he was absolutely terrible the last three games. Terrific in the first game. And he wanted that game winner so bad in game one.

He hero balled it. And when he didn't get it and then everything just kind of went downhill from there. So, yeah. So I would say that was an unhappy ending. And then 2023, 54 games in Brooklyn. It was really good. And he looked at our trade request in June. Came back.

Kyrie out of nowhere asked for a trade request when they were playing pretty well. And Katie was hurt. He was 24 and 15 in Brooklyn. He's six and 10 in Dallas. Oh, wait, don't go back to the summer when he said he was going to take the mid level for six million to go somewhere else and then picked up his option 24 hours after that report came out you have that uh so if i'm just going backwards happy kairi teams i think the 2018 celtics were happy for i would say two-thirds of that season that that his first year there that team was playing hard and playing well and and you know when you know, when he got hurt, it was too bad. Cause I actually liked, there was a nice little veteran it's in their prime with young guys and had a nice

vibe to them. And then that 21 Nets team had it going there in that Celtics playoff series. And then everybody got hurt. There was a stretch in Brooklyn this year when they played well for, I'm going to say three weeks when Durant, Kyrie, and just all the drama calmed down. And they actually, after Nash got fired. And that's about it. And that's a six-year span. And we could go seven if you want to talk about the 2017 Cavs who somehow went 51 and 31 with a healthy team and the best player of that whole generation.

Yeah, I mean. Just the evidence is mounting is the point he's missed 181 games in the last 6 years his playoff record 2018 on is 11-11 he's been missed or he's either missed or been hurt in 4 of the

last 6 post seasons and his playoff stats since 2018 22-5-5, 43% shooting. I'm going to say we probably talk about him too much. Not us, but just in general as a basketball community. But I think to wrap this up, though, I'm not putting any of this Dallas on him yet.

I'm not either. That's a poorly constructed team that needs a rebounder and a rim protector, and they don't have either. And I get that it's like, okay, if we get to the playoffs, could we have two of the best on-ball creators, shot makers? Is there a way we can play enough defense where we're just outscoring you because if you help off one? Yeah, it's 140 to 130.

Right. I kind of get it because I also think there is a Luka problem. And I've talked about this because I just think it's really interesting that traditionally the dudes that pull the power play are the American guys. It's not the foreign players. That doesn't mean I think it's never going to be a foreign guy. But would you get to a point whenever you have somebody this special, like everything you're doing as a team is hoping that guy's still happy and doesn't have the agent call that one day saying, you know what? My guy wants out.

We should also mention Kyrie is playing hurt right now, and he does get hurt a lot for a smaller player, which goes back to the Lakers wanting to give up two unprotected first rounders for him, which I would assume that they're happy that trade didn't happen, right? Because their point guards

haven't been the problem. And the depth that they got has actually helped them. And I think what, just being able to keep that second first rounder and getting all the guys they had was a way better outcome.

Like, would you rather have Kyrie and neither pick? Or would you rather have your 2019 pick plus Vanderbilt, plus D'Lo, plus Beasley and a little more flexibility and Schroeder playing for you? I'd rather have that.

I would rather have that. I would rather have not moved a top four protected pick just to get Westbrook out of there. And I think it doesn't guarantee. You moved a top four protected pick for zero guarantees. Although when you watch the Lakers now, despite what happened today against the Chicago team, we've got to give Cerruti credit for. He wanted us to bring up the Bulls two weeks ago. He's like, Feisty Bulls.

No, he did. What are they, 10-5 in their last 15? Something like that? And they put it on him today in LeBron's return, which I'm sure we'll touch on a little bit here. But other than the loss today, there's a lot about the Lakers I like, but it's just kind of funny when you play the standings game with the Lakers. It's like, oh no, nobody was going to want to play them. I don't know, they could still lose in the first round. And the fact that you're giving up a pick to, like nobody would look at Lakers and go, oh, pencil them into the second round, maybe even the Western Conference Finals. Maybe you are if you want to get attention on TV that day. But I don't like moving picks like that, especially in the future, especially knowing that this window

for whatever the Lakers, they're going to have to get really creative on the fly in a couple years here because the LeBron thing will be over. And Anthony Davis has been fucking awesome in March. He's not a great long-term bet.

Except for that game when he screwed up like four times in the last 15 seconds and cost them the win. Yeah, but he's been really good. He has been good. And he's playing. So, you know, the rebounding numbers and he's actually hitting three.

I mean, he's not taking that many threes, but the shooting part of it where last year you were like, can this guy not shoot anymore? Like what happened? Like there's no way he's just not going to be able to shoot anymore. So LeBron had a, had a quote today about, uh, about the, he said two doctors recommended season ending surgery, but then he went to see the LeBron James of feet determined he'd be able to return. Um, back to your point about them trading anything. So you have LeBron who in the last four of the last five seasons missed 27, 27, 26, and 27 plus games. And then you have Davis who in five of the last season, six seasons, or his last five seasons, 26, 10, 36, 42, and 26 plus games that he's missed.

I wouldn't call these guys the durable twins. LeBron once upon a time was the most durable star we had in any sport. But now, I looked it up today, he's almost at 65,000 minutes. He's 100 shy. Only Kareem has ever played more than 65,000 minutes. And like, guess what? You can't play basketball for 30 years. I'm gonna go out and make that prediction.

As you get older, you're gonna start getting nagging injuries and things are gonna happen. And it can't be like a Tom Brady situation where you could just throw the ball second early and you could just really try to take care of your body while trying to get through the regular season. Basketball, you can't. Basketball is pretty unforgiving. You can step on somebody's foot. You can point your knee and all of a sudden, because you're fucking old, your knee might go the wrong way. I just feel like everybody is like,

oh, watch out for them. Tell me both of those guys are going to play for 10 straight weeks. I would say the odds are like 5-1. Right? At this point, Davis, not exactly Mr. Durable. LeBron, 20 years of NBA basketball on him, not to

mention all the AAU and all the stuff when he was younger. I just think it's a lot to ask. So I'm less afraid of that Lakers team, I think, than other people. I want to be respectful of it, you know, because you're right. If both those guys are rolling and Vanderbilt and Russell's actually been, you know, in 11 games, even though he's had a couple of different injury spots here, you thought at the very least, like you'd have to rein in it a bit because it wasn't his team, even though Edwards is a better player in Minnesota and he provided at least a little bit of shooting i mean i still wouldn't

want to get in the d'angelo russell business and i'd be scared to death of giving him a contract but you understood it but vando's fucking awesome um like they deserve a lot of credit for just kind of finding a way to be one of the worst three through nine option teams to just turning that around and that's you you know, again, where the pick comes in that I still don't like that deal, but it is weird where you'll, you'll see some Lakers. I was like,

okay, if they have all their guys, nobody's going to want to play them. Okay. I want to be like, I'm not, I'm not saying that's not a possibility, but you also have to give me,

they also could lose in like six games in the first round against another team. That's healthy. Or it could get swept. Like, or somebody, you know, But you also have to give me, they also could lose in like six games in the first round against another team that's healthy. Or could get swept. Or somebody misses game three and four of a round one series because they tweaked their hamstring. I think the thing people forget, and especially LeBron has tricked people a little bit because he'll have these games where he looks like he's one of the six or seven best players in the league.

Because when he's humming on all cylinders, he probably is. The problem is when you get older, you can't sustain that day in, day out. And I think when you get to the playoffs, I think it's too hard. It feels like he's not 100% healthy and is already kind of planting the seeds for us, right? Everything he does is intentional. So he puts that thing out today. Two people thought I should shut it down for the season, but I found the LeBron James of feet. What's he really trying to tell us with that? He's trying to tell us I'm still hurt. So there's already a caveat now with whatever happens next. He's basically said, I'm not healthy. I'm playing hurt. And two doctors told me I should shut it down. And then you have Davis who, as you said, has been the number, you always have that joke about how he's been the number one guy in the league to,

when he goes down, you don't think he's going to get up. Happened today. He got hit with a ball in his finger. And I was like, oh my God, he just broke three fingers. He didn't. They taped him better and came back in the game. I just don't think from a durability standpoint that this team coming out of the playing can hang with the top three teams. I, we just watched, this has been a pretty negative podcast so far. I apologize.

We just watched Memphis and Atlanta. And I realized during that Memphis game, like kind of sleeping on Memphis a little bit, like Memphis is going to be the two seed now. And they're finally healthy except for no Brandon Clark and no Steven Adams, but their top four guys they finally have all together again. And I'd kind of written them off in my head

and I realized watching that game, that was a bad idea. They're still pretty good. That's going to be a hard team to play and that's, you're looking at them or if you're a seventh seed, you're looking at them. If you're an eighth seed,

you're looking at Denver. And I'm sorry, I just don't think the Lakers are going to beat Denver in a playoff series unless somebody in Denver gets hurt. I don't see it. Well, I'm glad you said that about Memphis because the entire time I felt like, man, everybody's just off of Memphis.

Like, you were just collectively off of Memphis. And that's, it's been the last few seasons, but it's felt like real specific times, it's the rush to like write everybody off. There was a stretch where it seemed like everybody was just off of Golden State when Curry wasn't even playing. I would say the last pod we did, it felt like, man, you know, when they beat Milwaukee without Giannis on that Saturday night,

like I still didn't feel great. They had the Memphis losses, but now they put it together and you're kind of like, well, wait. And again, it's sort of dependent upon whatever happens with Wiggins here if that's even an option at this point but I'm just I'm kind of just glad to see Memphis win nine to ten because it didn't make any sense that they were that bad without Adams and whatever you think about jaw right now there might be just from a basketball standpoint a real positive that he likely gives way less of a shit than everybody else does i also how about this if if he's cleaning up his act a little bit and taking

it a little more easy off the court i think that's going to help his basketball i'm just going to i'm going to make that crazy proclamation but i don't know a little better for him i don't know what really was going on you know like i don't know i mean something was going on because they they were pretty open about like we had team meetings about this and yeah okay even the stuff they said about we've now decided to fly out after games instead of sticking around and like you can't say nothing was going on here right he's 23 year old kid i'm not saying nothing i get it but i think he'll be in a better situation now that they're cracking down on some things. Right. But 23-year-olds can do things that are amazing

that aren't in John Moran. He made a shot today. He drove left. The baseline? Yeah. We didn't even talk about this. Dominique Wilkins was impressed. It was an 18-foot fall away that he like audibled on

because somebody cut off his driving lane. He's just like, all right, I'll just fall backwards at a 45- degree angle. Oh, that was different. He had the baseline reverse where it looked like he was totally cut off. And Dominique was like, are you kidding me? Oh, there was that one too. I was thinking he just casually made this 18 foot fallaway. And I was like, Jesus, what did I just watch? Hey, Jackson, I think the good thing about the job part being out is that I think we've seen more from Jackson initiating his offense. Bane is incredible.

You know, Brooks is hit or miss, but I think he's necessary on a team in a way. You know, when I look at teams, I always want that one wild card and he's that for them. Can we say Brooks has the championship belt right now? For that guy on a playoff team? Like that guy. You know, Matt Barnes belt. No, it's like the draymond belt draymond had it for years and years i'm not ready to take it from draymond then i don't know about that but do you think draymond is as intent during games to fuck with people like like dylan brooks is now game to game to game draymond's he's he's taking a step back in the games. He's a little

older, he's a veteran. You think? I don't know about that. Dylan Brooks was trying to talk shit to Trey Young today and Trey Young was like, what's going on? He was talking shit for like a minute to him. Dylan Brooks is like, he's got a little Pat Beverly he's grabbing from all the greats. Pat Beverly

Draymond. Pat Beverly hit that hook shot on LeBron today, and he did the too small to him, and then made sure he saw it and then did it again. So Pat Bev got the win on that one. I'd like to hear from more former players that were up and down on two ways, telling me who's scared of who.

That's been a lot of fun lately. What were we on? Look, the Memphis, to tie a bow bow at least on the Memphis part of it, I want them good. I want them in this thing. Because back to your Sacramento open that we did, we went 20 minutes to start it all. Who do you feel great about coming out in the West?

And it changes every single week, which speaks to the fact that I might be up for anything now. I might be more open to the idea of Sacramento with a bad defense finding a way out of this. But I think Memphis has proved now over two weeks and Jock coming back that them winning the West shouldn't be a surprise. And it felt like everybody had already turned the page on. Guilty as charged. But you know what?

Like we have to mention the denver win against milwaukee we should have done it earlier so i don't know how you want to do it i'm not trying to take over your episode here but we can't not mention that win because it was fucking awesome i had it right here because the two things that happened this week since we uh like when i did the playoff picture i laid out sacramento was the second seed mem Memphis was third. Denver was in a real swoon. It felt like Embiid had grabbed the MVP. And a week later, Denver seems fine. Memphis has moved into number two.

Sacramento had a horrible week. I mean, if you were a Sacramento naysayer, this was the best week you've had all season. And it just looks like Denver, they got out of whatever funk they were in the Milwaukee win, which I watched every minute of was really impressive because Milwaukee was trying. I, that wasn't like, Oh, they caught Milwaukee on the wrong night. Like Milwaukee was into that game. Giannis was into that game and Denver just played really, really, really well. And it goes back to the whole, they're just good. They're a really good home team. When they want to be as a one seed,

teams come in there with the altitude and they push the pace. I really liked what I saw. I thought it was a good sign for them. I promise we'll get back to Denver here. Do you think that you're overstating how bad the Sacramento week was because Boston was a mess and then they put it on them? Because they've won their last two games since then.

I thought the Boston loss was a really tough one for them. No herder, though. Well, that's fair. Don't laugh. Don't laugh. Okay. Fair. There's about 700 Bucs fans listening freaking out. They've already tweeted

because no one's ever won on the second night to a back-to-back. You got Milwaukee, but they blew out Utah the night before. But here's the thing. The Bucs are fine. I'm not even remotely worried about the Bucs, but the way that game started, I got to admit,

Denver, they've had their bad stretch. They've won three in a row now. The Nets game was dicey. They pull it out. They beat the Wizards, which is a cure for a lot of teams. But the start of that game, I'm like, Milwaukee's insane. They're so good. They're still the best. I think we both think they're

a pretty safe bet that they're the favorite by far. But there was a lingering in the moment being like, is Denver going to play with them today? And then Murray goes off for 18 in the first quarter. I thought the physicality of it was like a wake-up call. I mean, Giannis only had three free throws

up until maybe the end of the third quarter, so I know he ended up having a few more later on. And all the eyes on kind of like the Jokic-Giannis thing, where there's just no way Jokic is going to look as imposing as Yanis despite what the stat line says. That visually always seems to hurt Jokic in that kind of matchup. All I'm telling you is that

I thought that win meant a ton for Denver. It doesn't change anything I think about Milwaukee, but the first few minutes I was scared for the Nuggets and I want to make sure we sound positive about them because they deserve it. Jokic slightly outplayed Giannis.

Murray versus Holiday, which was supposed to be a Milwaukee matchup. Holiday wasn't great in that game. Murray actually played really well. I'd like to go back and see how many the makes were actually against Holiday. I'm just saying that matchup of best guard against best guard, who's going 26 points who's gonna have nine my money would

have been i'm worried i have the nine you know what else was the biggest thing is like it was weird the first bench unit for denver that looked like they were surviving the non-yokich minutes and then there was like this flurry from milwaukee for a minute where it looked like a negative 10 and you were like ah shit it happened to him again from that moment on the other two times where you had the rotation guys come in they held their own and then milwaukee couldn't make a shot for like a really long stretch there yeah uh to close but it just that was a really nice win yeah the zeke nagy who came back fairly recently but i feel like he has six weeks yeah every time he's in there, I feel like they're not losing anything with him.

So I'll be interested to see if they can carry that over. But yeah, I think Denver, whatever they went through, it feels okay. And I'm not worried about the Bucs at all. With that said, the Bucs, this is another thing that changed

since we did this last week. The Bucs-Celtics thing has gotten way closer where Milwaukee's 53-21, the Celtics are 52 and 23. They play Thursday and it's basically like whoever wins has the tiebreaker over the other. See, that, I'd kind of given up on the Celtics

being a one seed and it felt like the Sixers were going to pass them. Sixers stumble a little bit because Harden gets hurt. And now it feels like Sixers probably the three seed, which means we get Sixers-Milwaukee if that happens, three, six. Wait, Sixers-Milwaukee, you mean Miami? I mean, I'm sorry, Sixers probably the three seed, which means we get Sixers Milwaukee if that happens. Three-six. Wait, Sixers Milwaukee? You mean Miami? I'm sorry, Sixers Miami.

Yeah, my bad. Sixers Miami, that's not nothing. Miami will go into that game being like, we will at least be tougher than these guys. You will not give up on Miami. I love it. I won't. By the way, Brooklyn's ahead of them after the win today.

Yeah, but Miami can't go lower than the sixth seed, though. Because they'd be a division champ. So that's why Brooklyn, even though they're the sixth seed right now, really, they're the seventh seed. Because somebody, either Miami or Atlanta,

has to be the sixth seed. Can't go lower than that. You don't hear this segment a lot. The athletic division, Somebody, either Miami or Atlanta, has to be the sixth seed. Can't go lower than that. You don't hear this segment a lot. The athletic division, best division in all four major sports. That's coming up next. Actually, let's take a break. What does possible sound like for your business?

It's having the spend that powers your scale with no preset spending limit. More cash on hand to grow your business with up to 55 interest-free days. And the ability to reach further with access to over 1,400 airport lounges worldwide. Redefine possible with Business Platinum. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Terms and conditions apply. Visit amex.ca slash business platinum. Life and death were two very realistic coexisting possibilities in my life. I didn't even think I'd make it to like my 16th birthday, to be honest.

I grew up being scared of who I was. Any one of us at any time can be affected by mental health and addictions. Just taking that first step makes a big difference. It's the hardest step. But CAMH was there from the beginning. Everyone deserves better mental health care. To hear more stories of recovery,

visit CAMH.ca. Let's keep going on the positive front. Chicago, who for some reason right now is still a 10 seed, and they feel like the most un-10 seed-y team possible because they're 36 and 38, but that easily, you know, I would say that,

I don't know what their Pythagorean formula is for the season, but I would say they're probably underachieved because I've personally witnessed them losing a couple of dumb games. I feel like that is the most dangerous of the play-in teams. If you're giving me Brooklyn, Atlanta, Toronto, and Chicago,

and it looks like it's going to be those four, the Bulls would be the one I would fear. How would you rank those? I'm giving you Brooklyn, Atlanta, Toronto, Chicago. Well, Atlanta should be the easy pick here, but it isn't. I don't think that Quinn was going to be able to change what he wants to change. I still think the roster, they just should be better. They should be a better basketball team.

I'm not even talking about the Trey part of this. It's just they should be better. It's a talented team. And Sidney Bay has been terrific for him. Donovich is playing. Hunter missed every shot, I think, today. And I tweeted that I think he's my new Jeff Green. Because DeAndre Hunter will have a couple moments where I'm like, holy shit.

Look at this guy. And then you're like, oh, whatever. I agree with you because I knew your feelings were hurt when we said DeAndre Hunter, when Woz had him as one of the worst contracts for 490. You were just violently upset about that. You might be right. You might be right.

I don't know that it's that high because it's not expensive enough to be that bad. All right, let me just answer your fucking question here. I'm going to say, God, this is tough. This is really tough. It actually might be Toronto. So you would be more afraid of Toronto than Chicago. The irony is they might be playing in that nine,

10 playing game, unless one of them can get a little bit hotter and pass somebody. I, here's my thing with Toronto. I've watched them too many times when they're right in a game with four minutes to go. And then something happens and they end up losing by three or losing by five or it's just fit.

They feel beatable down the stretch. Chicago has real guys. They can go to down the stretch. Chicago has real guys they can go to down the stretch. And Vucevic now playing for a new contract. They got Levine going today. Levine's been definitely up and down this season, but he seemed pretty engaged today. I don't know if that was an audition for the Lakers or what was going on.

How about... There's drives that Levine will have in a game where I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. His start point takeoff, if you were to say, if there was a way to time the fastest player from zero to 10 feet, I don't know if anybody's faster than him in the league.

And the Lakers are trying to figure it out. They've been really good defensively in this stretch. You add LeBron back to the mix. He wasn't the sole reason, but they just weren't very good defensively today. Chicago might, I don't know, because the Torontos, whenever you look at the half-court numbers, they're always not great. If they can move the ball, they can get out and transition. They're far more dangerous. I liked all their length. I don't like year two Scotty Barnes because I had high hopes for what he could become. I still think it's a little clunky at times.

Sometimes it's really good. Siakam's numbers are always great. The Van Vliet part of it's sort of weird. Siakam's numbers haven't been as great lately. Overall, I'm just saying. I get it. Let me ask you this. You might be right with this because if you rank the fear factor,

would you rank Trey 1, DeRoz derosen two siakam three i would have fear factor who am i fearing like betting on them no if you have to go right of the four teams in the play on in the play-in in the east if i don't have trey i don't not have trade number one on that list. For one game? I'm the most scared. So I'm looking at the March stats right now. And I don't even know if this includes today.

But Levine in March, 11 games, averaging 30 a game. DeRozan's at 25.4. That might not be counting what's happening today. I fear those two guys together the most. Because at the end of games, they're going to get good shots if they're invested enough. And the point guard position, as goofy as it is,

like Beverly playing 29 minutes a game for them in March, you and I aren't huge Pat Beverly fans, but at least he's not going to be fucking scared in a playing game or whatever. They're going to have guys that he loves playing games will not be scared. Kobe white,

who has had a very strange NBA career, but I always like him and I always think he plays hard. I don't think he's scared. Um, I don't know. I think Patrick Williams, I don't know what he's going to end up being, but at least he's playing minutes so he can guard whoever somebody's best

small forward is. That's the team I would fear out of those Atlanta. I can't get there with, I don't, I still don't totally understand what I'm watching with that team. I thought, I think Collins has been bad this year for him. He's just,

I don't know what he is anymore. He's, he's not going to make three point shots. What am I watching? Yeah. You're not a great rebounder. I don't think you're an awesome defender, but the thing that made you special was you were the shooter of size, but you don't make shots anymore. So what are you? Yeah, I almost

wonder if Sadiq Bae should be in the closing group because they closed with Capella, Hunter, Collins, DeJounte, and Trey, obviously. You don't have to guard Collins. He can't make a shot anymore. So, yeah, I think these play-in games, which, you know, I like the play-in more than you, but I think this year will be good because we actually will have, on both sides, really fun play-ins.

I've never said it's not going to be fun. I just think there are certain years, there'll be certain years, if we do this long enough, where you're going to go, wait, the 7th seed won how many games? And the 10th seed, like, yeah. They have to prove this again, despite the advantage for the 7th at home

one game. I get it. So we're 53 minutes in and we didn't talk about how Paul George got hurt. And that Clippers team, and they're doing the thing, oh, it's two to three weeks. I'm telling you, Paul George will not be waltzing back in for round one. Even if he comes back,

he'll be on a minute staying. Calling it. Is that a guess? Calling it now. I hate when the teams do this. It's always longer. Nobody's ever been like, whoa, we thought it was going to be three weeks, but it turned out to be two and a half. It's always longer. And in this case, his knee went

who? LeBron James a feet. Who's the Michael Jordan a feet? Oh, I don't know. Did he retire three times? I don't know. Wait, to be fair to the teams here, because this gets brought up a lot,

is this as nefarious as people make it out to be? Sometimes it is. I'm not saying nefarious. I just think you can't put a time frame like that on recovery. I think they should say like two to five weeks. Okay. But what they do do is they'll say two to three weeks and then we'll reevaluate, right? I mean, that's the Zion. Yeah. So it's really our fault. We're not eating the signs well enough. I think they're actually telling us something that's fairly easy to understand. But then when the two to three

weeks from now evaluation happens, the guy isn't ready. We act like, what the fuck? The reason the Paul George thing... First of all, Phoenix is locked into four. And we thought it was going to be Clippers' sons for a while. The Clippers right now are 39 and 36. The Warriors are 39 and 36. And the Warriors finally seem like they have a tiny bit of momentum. The reason I bring this up, it seems very conceivable to me that the Warriors can get to the five seed

and we could have Phoenix Golden State round one. That's a thing that is now looming in a real way because I think it's more likely the Clippers go backwards a little bit because we haven't even factored in his Kawhi. They have nine games left. Is Kawhi going to play all the or they have seven games left. Is Kawhi going to play all those We've talked about this every year too. I want to play Phoenix when Durant hasn't really played a lot of games and doesn't have his feedback. Let's play them right now before they kind of figure out what their team is, get them early. And then if they can knock out Phoenix in that one, then unfortunately for them, they would have

Denver in the next series. Okay. A couple of things here. I'm really glad you brought up the four or five because I'm looking at it going, if Durant's cleared and good to go, it could get really weird the last couple days because I actually think teams won't do what you're saying, where it's, hey, get him early. You and I have disagreed about this in the past. I think it is,

I don't know that there's a right answer on this one. I know you think you're right, and obviously I think I'm right, but you've said this in the past with the Lakers, I think when they were getting Anthony Davis back, it's like, get on it now. And it worked out for Phoenix the year that that happened. When they got them in the first round, it was at the six games or whatever.

The problem is you'd have Denver in round two, if you're in the four or five. So if you're going state, you can actually say, Hey, we could be six and we might play Sacramento. And then we, that's what I'm saying. Right. Memphis. That's what I was going to get to is that despite your theory about getting Phoenix earlier, I'd rather play Sacramento than Phoenix and Durant because my guess is one of the superpowers that Durant has is as soon as he comes back from all of these assorted injuries, he looks like he's first team all NBA immediately and hasn't missed any time. So if I can get on the other side of Denver

and miss Durant and play Sacramento and it comes down to the last day, although everybody else is going to be jockeying too so it doesn't guarantee anything, I think that's where it could get kind of weird and I would prefer just miss Durant early. Did you see the Phoenix Kings game on Friday? Yeah, didn't look good.

If you're a Phoenix guy. That seemed like a legitimate crisis point of the season for Phoenix. And it's funny because they won today. They righted the ship. Or last night. When was the next time? All these games are... That was last night. Last night. Yeah, they beat the Sixers last night. My bad. And they played really

well against the Sixers. There was a good athletic piece about how that Friday game was alarming to Phoenix. It was the first time they were like, holy shit, we are now down arrow. And they rallied back, they beat Philly, they feel a little better about themselves. But it did start to feel like the season was slipping a little bit for them because the Kings did absolutely everything they wanted to them in that second half. That was just an unbelievable offensive basketball for them. And it went back to my point that I said when I went on Termini and Eddie's show on Monday about, I just see a lot of mediocrity with the Suns. I just see a bunch of guys that seem to be 10th and 11th men. I know Durant's going to come back and swallow up 36 minutes a game. But for the most part, I just don't think their supporting cast is that awesome. And the Kings

were just running them out of the gym basically in that fourth quarter. But anyway, they got the mojo back a little bit. So, all right, let's talk this out. So we're having a team meeting. You, me, Bob Myers, Steve Kerr, the Lacobs are there. And we're all like, Hey, who, who brings it up? Like, Hey, should we try to get that six seed? What do you think? Should maybe, maybe sit whoever, or do you just say, fuck it? This is the first time we're playing. Well, let's just ride this and see how it goes. We'd have to play all these teams anyway in the, in the, in the playoffs. I don't know. I would kind of ride it. I personally would rather play Phoenix. The Denver part's

more worrisome because Denver has, I think, been their kryptonite team this year. Golden States. Yeah, which is crazy because a year removed, it wasn't even close. It wasn't even close last year, and Wiggins is the only difference as far as the Golden State side of it,

really, for the most part. I mean, we can get into the Gary Payton part, which, you know, I think he's kind of a matchup guy, whatever. Anyway, the point is this. It ends up, like, remember when the Clippers did this and then everybody's like, if you're built to be a contender, like TV segments fucking love this.

Yeah. Because what'll happen is if you're the champs, you're the defending champs, you don't care. You play whoever. I don't know. I don't have a problem with team strategizing around it. And if you think there's another team that's a really bad matchup and it gives you a better chance of getting into the first round,

like I would just go, do you want, you'd rather play Durant in the first round instead of Sacramento? Is that what you're telling me, Steve? Like if I'm Bob Myers, like you'd rather do that? Fine, go ahead, do whatever you want. But I'm telling you like, you know telling you, talking heads like us think it's the least manly thing you can ever do, and then

everybody crushes you for saying it. And then if you lose in the playoffs, which is more likely anyway, especially because Golden State isn't exactly a favorite anymore, they'll say, oh, they should have never done that. That showed that they doubted themselves. It's like, you know, it's TV. It's perfect TV. Last year, Milwaukee fucked it up, and we argued about that last year,

but that ended up... I think they deeply regret that they did that. Remember, they were like, ah, let's skip it. Who cares about the seeds? And they ended up all of a sudden having to play Boston in a game seven. I'm looking at the West.

So you're saying you would ride it out'm looking at the West. So you're saying you would ride it out just for the record. You would rather you would rather just finish out the season if that means you get to rant healthy with Phoenix

in the first round and then you're in the one four matchup if you were to get through that against Denver you would rather that. If I'm Golden State I'm just trying to play well

for multiple weeks. The most important thing I can do is just like, can we put together three good weeks where we look like a contender? I wouldn't want to be like, hey, we look good twice. Now let's start jockeying for a six seed. I want to see like real sustained something.

And if we have to play Phoenix in round one, so be it. We could beat those guys. You could also add to it. It feels like Memphis is out for blood whenever they play them after last year's series. Those were two losses recently for Golden State. It's like, wait, you're going to lose these guys twice? But Golden State looked really good against Philadelphia. But I also think bringing it all back in, I think Philadelphia has been on this absolute heater.

Harden misses a couple games. Golden State straight up beat him. Phoenix, it looked like Embiid was like, I'm spent right now for what I've been doing. I don't blame him, but he looks spent. But the Phoenix part of it that's really weird. Remember when

Roberson and Perk would be on the floor at the same time for Oklahoma City? You'd go, why would you ever? Back then, you would still kind of do it. Oh, then two non-scorers out of your five? Right. Like, I have nothing to say about Phoenix. I don't care if they lose every single game the rest of the regular season.

Because if Durant is lacing them up and walking out to center court for game one of the first round, then that's all that matters. Because the Suns had a lineup the other night where it's Paul, who's pretty diminished offensively. And I hate his foul hunting. Like it's gotten really gross the last couple of weeks, but they had Torrey,

Craig, a Kogi who's actually a better pastor. I think that people realize then beyond boat, that's three completely non-creative offensive players playing with Booker and Paul. And at times, even in the win against Philadelphia, and then certainly against Sacramento, even though they scored a million points, you're just going, you don't see many offenses have three dudes

that can't do anything with the basketball, even though Golden State will flirt with it at times too. Here's that Philly Warriors game. Golden State has the ability to do the same thing Boston can do against Philly, and I think it's Philly's kryptonite, is those multiple guards just spreading Philly out, spreading a beat out, and it works against them.

Boston can do it. They have the guards. The Warriors were able to do it with their guards because they can. The good thing for Philly is not a lot of teams can do it. But those two teams specifically have a style that they can't match up with. And I don't think that was a fluke loss against the Warriors. Just like when they play Boston, they're in trouble too.

This is their kryptonite. Smaller lineups, spread them out. And they got out- Slashing too. Yeah. And then the P. the PJ Tucker minutes late to close you know he's just out there missing threes where

you know he's at 21% 22% this month so that could just be this month if you want to go that way with it I think the other part too is like I've been on pools case a little bit because the mistakes seem so monumental he was awesome yeah he's good that's another team that like the other night, though. Yeah, he was good.

That's another team. The whole thing that's crazy about the Westville is there's going to be teams that still don't know who their rotation is when the playoffs start. Well, they may know it, but they will not have seen it until the playoffs start. The Celtics, who I thought were in a lot of trouble a week ago and just seemed like they were just headed in the wrong direction.

They were able to get their mojo back a little bit. Now they two game lead over Philly and it looks like they would have a game seven if they play them around two. Plus they got away from Miami and they're going to play right now. It's either going to be Brooklyn or the Hawks or whoever. And that, that seven seed. So all that worked out and they still have the puncher's chance

at going against Milwaukee. So I know we probably say this every year, but this really does feel like there's the most flux we've had. I don't remember just like the rollercoaster ride of this team looks done. Oh, this team looks good again. I don't feel like I'm like an overreactor

with the regular season, but it really does seem like we've had a lot of flux, like an unusual amount. And then you watch March Madness where all the one seeds and two seeds get basically taken out. And you're like, maybe this is just basketball now. Maybe it's the variance.

Maybe it's the three pointers. Maybe we just have too many good basketball players. Maybe it's harder to be dominant. I don't know the reasons, but all of this all seems tied together this week where it just feels like anybody can beat anybody. You know, Charlotte beating Dallas twice in three days. Sure.

I just watched, you know, a nine seed make the Final Four. Okay, but think about Denver's bad stretch. Were you writing them off? Of course not. No. Boston's bad stretch. Like when Rob Williams is on the court, he's their there I believe second

best plus minus guy all season you look at his offensive rebounds you look at his defensive rebounding numbers he's like in the top percentile of players but that goes back to the Davis LeBron piece though where it's like when Rob Williams is on the court but it's like well he's never on the court yeah he's on the court briefly and then he's not on the court again. So to me, he's this tantalizing guy that I just don't trust. Smart, I think, is at least admitting now that he's not 100% healthy, which was good, and they got Grant going again.

Those three guys, that was like 10 days ago. That's why I didn't feel good about Boston. Those three guys were three huge guys for them last year, and either they weren't playing or they weren't playing well this year. Now it's a little better. Yeah, the Rob thing, I can't tell you you're wrong with that because you see it.

When you see him in the game, he just impacts the game in so many ways that aren't just, hey, this many rebounds, this many blocks. I mean, he had a follow today where the shot was up in the air. He was at the top of the key and he beat everybody to the spot, gets the rebound and won. And you're like, well, that looks different. I mean, if they don't have him against Milwaukee, they have no chance and they still might not have a chance with him. Well, they have Grant, our guy.

Grant's going to be like like I'm in this league for one reason I'm the honest stopper only one guy can stop the freak from Greece and it's me Grant Williams maybe Thanasis

that'd be awesome if his nickname somebody held up a sign and said Grant Williams the honest stopper he would the thing about Grant is he would wear Giannis Stopper as a t-shirt

in the locker room. He would do stuff like that. All right, one more break and then some MVP stuff. So I first came to Edward Jones with a great deal of trepidation. When I first met with my advisor, and I really was feeling vulnerable about what I would have to share, I was of course pleasantly surprised to find that there was absolutely no judgment and a lot of support. And when it was time to get serious, he really took my hand and helped me to do that. Edward Jones. We do money differently. Visit edwardjones.ca slash different. As the world's population grows, so does the need for resources like Potash

to support sustainable food production. This is why BHP is building one of the world's most sustainable Potash mines in Canada. Essential resources responsibly produced. This is what BHP has committed to Canada. The future is clear. It's happening now at BHP, a future resources company.

To discover how, visit bhp.com slash better future. Alright, MVP. Embiid Jokic is just going to come down to this incredible Monday night game and then maybe even the last eight games. Wait, you don't have Giannis in it?

No, I think he's third now. I think he had a chance a couple of times to grab it by the balls. But one of the things I think about with MVP is, are you the first guy I'm going to think about for the season or one of the first? And I don't feel like Giannis would be one of the three guys I think about.

He just had a typically great Giannis season. I don't want to penalize him for it, but at the same time, if he had really destroyed Denver on Saturday night, I think he had a chance to grab it by the balls, but he's never really had that moment down the stretch, whereas Embiid

and Jokic seem to keep elevating. I don't know. They took over the one seed against a Boston team that started 20-5. They won 16 in a row. Middleton hasn't even been close to being himself. Giannis is absolutely still alive for me. But we...

Alive for you for MVP. Okay. Well, we still both think he's the best player in the league. Yeah. What happens now with the fourth and fifth spots? Because everyone has just had Luka in the fourth spot because of the season he's having. But I'm just telling you, I'm not going to vote for him

if they have a losing record. And I'm 100% not voting for him if they don't even make the play-in game. So for me, I'm operating from, he is now out of my top five. They're 36 and 39 and probably missing the plan unless they show something the last two weeks. I just will not put him on a ballot.

Uh, it's going to be weird because Tatum has not been great since the all-star break. That's why I bring this up. I don't know who is the fourth and who's the fifth. How is Tatum not in the top five? Despite the, cause you you know by the way the overall numbers are still like i have them four and i don't feel right now i have them four

and i don't feel good about it but see the problem is is that's your own locked in to the celtics day-to-day thing where you're probably i mean i'm complimenting one of the four best teams in the league i don't feel oh you're saying're saying... I'm saying you're hesitant and you're being too negative, probably, despite... Look, we've watched all the games. It hadn't been great for a while. He got it going again.

Would you say he was averaging 39-5 since the All-Star break? It was nuts, yeah. And I'm like, I'm watching all these games. This does not feel like a 39-5 night after night. Well, it also kind of speaks to the thing we were talking about with the explosion of these stats. You can frame a lot of this.

But for anyone listening to this being like, there's no way you guys can have Tatum fourth, especially if you look at the overall post-All-Star break and everything. I'd be like, okay, all right. Feel free to tell me who's at four or five because it's hard, especially if Luka isn't in the playoffs our friend just determined it because i thought i have fox right now is my fifth and he thinks the bonus is the most valuable king and i i don't like i'm not even totally against that argument if somebody wants to think that because everything fuels through in their half court. All the stuff, Sabonis,

his ability to play off. What he did for Herter is unbelievable. I have Fox as the MVP. And I think SGA is in there too. If OKC finishes with a winning record somehow and makes a

seven seed and they finish two games better than Dallas, they don't have a big guy. What is that team? They just have a bunch of young guys and SGA and some swing guys and Giddy can't shoot. How is this team going to be in the play-in? Because they play so hard.

They're smart as hell. They play so fucking hard. They're athletic and they're well-coached and he's really good. So, yeah, who else? Who else is in the mix for those two spots for you? I love the Fox call because it just felt like he couldn't

even be mentioned through it all and you're going wait, like why? It almost felt like a marketing thing. The clutch stuff with him is the clutch last five minutes we talked about when we did the Sacramento thing two weeks ago. It's still ridiculous.

He's still crushing it. Tatum's going to be one of the five. He is. And by the way, it's a six-month award. I would have Tatum for Fox 5, but in light pencil. And I don't think Luka can be in there right now. As great a season as he has. And this is why maybe they...

Did they, out of the 40 trophies Adam Silver created, did they create a best stats trophy? Or coolest stats for a guy that didn't make the playoffs? He'd win that one. Great stats. Luka, is he the Mike Trout of the NBA? That's coming up next. Uh,

what if jaw goes on a tear with the last eight games? He was awesome today. Um, yeah, jazz and play. I mean, I have right now.

I wonder how many voters, I wonder if voters will ding him for, I wouldn't, but. Do you have Luka in pen for first team all NBA with two weeks left?

I do. In pen, not pencil? Yeah, I'm not, you know, what do you want me to do? Put Jha over him? Do you want me to put Mitch? No, I still have him.

I have him and SGA. And right now I have Fox and Ja's second team. The interesting one is Dame because it looks like they're shutting down Dame. And Dame's at 58 games. That team's going to be 12, 13 games under.500 by the time they finish the season. And I've already made this rule years ago. I didn't vote for Bradley Beal a couple years ago 12, 13 games under 500 by the time they finish the season.

I've already made this rule years ago. I didn't vote for Bradley Beal a couple years ago when he had that big season when they had the losing record. I'm not going to vote for Dame if he plays 58 games on a 31-win team. As great of an individual season he has, I'm just not going to honor that one. There's too many other good guards.

The Curry one is getting interesting because Curry looks like can get to I think somewhere between 58 and 60 games if he keeps playing. With his stats, I think Curry is in the mix there for 13 mom, D.A. guard too. Hold on. Let's look that up because I thought it was

mid-50s. Golden State has played... Curry's played 49. 32, 75 has played I just lost it there. 32-75. And he's playing 50 right now, so he's at 50. He's at 50, so that'd be six more games, so he'd get to 56 games.

56 games, yeah. Well, if he's at that, if he plays the rest of the season, I think he is one of the guards. Right? I think it would be him and Mitchell for my third team guards right now. And I would bump Harden. Harden missed

more games, so I think Harden's probably out. So I don't know. But again, this is just a snapshot right now. I don't know what's going to happen in the last two weeks. Okay, so that means no Brunson? Where are you on Brunson? I don't have brunson in there it's it's mitchell and dame and curry and harden i think are my four you don't have brunson over harden for

speculation purposes no i don't think so i thought harden was awesome for like three months i just think his ceiling is is higher than brunson though one thing is, I think Jalen is pretty much locked up that 13-mile NBA forward, especially with the 40-point today. He'll bump his stats, but there's a possible DeRozan maybe kicking the tires on it if Chicago keeps winning down the stretch here, but right

now, I would say Jalen's in the lead for that, which I think out of anything probably has the most salary cap ramifications of any of these votes. Giannis Tatum, first team, right? I just want to see where I were the forwards Giannis Tatum Butler Randall second team and then I have Markkinen and Brown third team

but I'm monitoring the Utah thing because if Utah ends up going 36 and 46 I'm going to have to reevaluate that one Markkinen feels pretty penned in at this point yeah if Utah ends up going 36 and 46, I'm going to have to reevaluate that one. Marketing feels pretty penned in at this point. Yeah. I was going through it this morning. I think Jalen deserves it.

And he plays forward more than he plays guard. Yes. When you look at his metric stuff, though. It's pretty rough. It's really weirdly like way behind, way behind other guys that you're like when you're going through it all yeah you're like oh okay the usual guys okay this makes sense this makes sense and then you're like wait how far down do i have to scroll for jalen brown but it doesn't match what you see when you're watching his his assist turnover thing, I think he's like 360th in the league for his assist to turnover ratio.

Not great, Bob. It's like 3.4 assists, 2.9 turnovers. If you saw Bob, the actor Bob from Mad Men in person, would you say not great Bob to him? I wouldn't. No, I don't think I would. I've seen him twice in town.

Do you want to throw the not great Bob at him? No, because I can't imagine how long that's... It's James Wolk. I've seen him twice. And the first time I was like, you have to. And then I didn't. And I didn't the second time.

After the second time, you just can't. So you have Jalen as six forward. Can I throw one other name at you that I was becoming more and more enamored with? Is our hero Evan Mobley. See that alley-oop he had to Allen today? I don't know if you caught that.

Probably not. What happened? He had an alley-oop pass. He caught it at the free throw line, like one dribble down, drive, collapsing defenders, and he threw the alley-oop to Jared Allen. It was awesome. It's funny how the great players

or the potentially great players, that second half of their second season, they really start putting shit together and you see it with them. Cleveland, kind of sneaky. What's their record? They're 49 and 28 48 and 28 um and i can personally name like six games they probably blew in the last two minutes but um they've kind of been the contender that nobody's talked about or had any conversations about and it does talk like yeah they have a losing record on the road i mean there's there's a couple other things in there and then their record against the

500 teams. Um, they have a losing record too, of the top four teams are the only one of the top four. There was an interesting Giannis talking about mobile earlier in the year and was he, he kind of blessed them, you know, the great players they'll bless these young guys. And I always think it matters. Like I remember when I was doing the pods with Durant, he blessed Devin Booker who hadn't really done anything yet and was like, I love that guy. I think that guy is going to be really great. I always pay attention when those guys in that age range of like 27 to 33

start raving about some guy who's like 20, 21. Because it's always genuine. There's really no reason for them to do it. They usually really mean it when they do it. And Giannis had that whole thing about Moby. Like, I think he could be me if he does blah, blah, blah. I think in a few years, he has a chance to basically be me. And I was like, that's interesting that he's saying that now, especially to somebody that he could play against.

To me, the My versus KG stuff, I still feel really good about the arc he's on. I think KG was probably a little more developed offensively. He always had that 18-footer. He always had that little drop step, a little jump hook even early. Mobley, I don't think, is as advanced with some of his stuff yet.

And the three-point shot isn't there yet. But defensively, to me, he moves the same way that Duncan and Garnett did when they were young. And he can jump off anybody and he's just such a fucking weapon. So anyway, I have him lingering for my sixth spot.

All nice things? No way. No way. No way. He's just not asked to carry the burden. All the other names of these guys that we're talking about. Everybody should want Mobley. I still would like to see more consistent, but

he's not asked to do the things that these other guys are doing that I couldn't give him that sixth spot over the other names that we're talking about. I agree. I want to see how these last eight games go. Cause I do think he's putting together a streak or he's putting together something rookie of the year quickly. Everybody's kind of trying to talk themselves out of Palo.

Um, I think just out of boredom because he's had it locked up for five months. I know. So Rudy is really upset about this. This is the most upset I've seen him in a while about really anything. Cerruti's a generally happy guy. There is a little tiny bit of Jalen Williams momentum

since the All-Star break where he's 18, 6, and 4. 54% shooting, 42% from 3. Really, really, really, really good high-level defense. That's really the only one that would breathe on it. But I haven't seen anything to make me think

Paolo isn't the work of the year, especially the burden that he has game to game. Jalen's been awesome. You know, smart teams are like, man, he's really good, he's really good. And then, you know, it was like, oh, he's not going to, you know, we started talking to people

before the draft process, like, where's this guy going to go? And then it was like, slowly, every few weeks, you'd be like, he's not going to be there. And then the next week, you'd be every few weeks, you'd be like, he's not going to be there. And then the next week, you'd be talking to people, you'd be like, oh, he did five spots up. And, you know, Presti has a lot of these, man, on his resume,

where he was the guy that was like, nope, I'm taking him. And he's been terrific, and he can do way more in the NBA as a rookie than maybe we thought when he started off, and maybe he's going to be awesome. There is no way you can watch these two dudes for the last six months and think he's more deserving a rookie of the year in comparison to what Paolo's done.

Because Paolo's actually had to be the guy with Franz, and Jalen has just started picking it up production-wise. And his last month is terrific. I know Paolo couldn't make a three to save his life in February. I think he was 1 to 33 from the floor. The advanced stuff isn't awesome with Paolo, but he's also in a totally different situation because he's the prime option.

They played a ton of close games where he's going toe-to-toe against Philly, Boston, whoever, and he's the one with the ball in the last four minutes. I cannot. If Jalen Williams gets first-place votes over Paolo, I just think you're doing it minutes. I cannot... If he gets first... If Jalen Williams gets first place votes over Paolo, I just think you're doing it wrong. I agree. And people will say like,

oh, you guys emphasize winning. Not for Rookie of the Year, man. Yeah, usually the guys are in a bad spot. Unless it's... I think I draw the line when it's just, oh, this guy's putting up cheap stats on an absolutely horrendous team. That's fine. The thing with Orlando cheap stats on an absolutely horrendous team.

That's fine. The thing with Orlando is they haven't been horrendous. They've been pretty frisky and really battling and I think have had about as encouraging of a tank season as you could have. You make a key point. Look, by the way, from the jump, Paolo was 23 a game the first two months of the season. Okay?

And that matters. Jalen looks terrific. He's on this really nice run. This is a team that we all thought was going to tank maybe at some point, and they were just too good. They're too well coached. The roster's already pretty nice, and Shea's been unbelievable. You can't get so recency by... I know it's hard for all of us. I have times where I'm like, man, don't let the recency. But this is a full season award. And for the first half, if you weren't even thinking about Jalen as Powell is putting up those numbers, that doesn't cancel out. The recency of this does not cancel out what's already been stacked here by Powell.

It's a great point. It's a six-month award. The last four weeks don't count three times as much as the first four weeks. And it's the best case for Tatum to be number four because for the first three months of the season, like they were the best team

and he was the best part of the best team. So the one where the odds are weird for me is the most improved. I can't believe this is even a topic. But Quickly is like a favorite now. He's, I think, minus 120 and Brogdon's plus 150.

And it just seems like Quickly's won the award and I'm not really sure what happened. He's played more games than Brogdon. I think he's been more durable. Are we talking six man? I'm sorry, six man, not most of you. My bad. Yeah, six man.

So he's played like, I don't know, 11 more games than Brogdon. He's been more durable. Stats, Brogdon's like slightly better, probably like 10% better. He's more efficient. Quickly's had a couple big ass off-the-bench games. But it just seems like people are handing this one to Quickly, and I'm probably going to wait. I want to see how it shakes out.

I think it's dead even, though. Well, the thing thing is that double overtime game where he goes for 38 right like it was everybody was watching it we talked about it i mean the odds changed dramatically from the time we did the pod to when we saw it um it's weird i think like i don't even think of brogdon that way. I don't even like six-man. Six-man and most improved player. I just think like, hey, cool. I don't start. Here's your award. And most improved, I guess Markkinen is going to win. He's the favorite. But SGA turned himself into a 32-point scorer, 31-point scorer and took a team to the playoffs. I just don't know how to measure that. We talk about this every year. John Morant won one year

and John Morant was awesome the year before he won the most improved. I just didn't know how to measure that. We talk about this every year. John Morant won one year and John Morant was awesome the year before he won the most improved. Yeah. Cause it's usually, it's usually reserved for somebody you don't think is going to be good. Yeah. And then there'll be these junk marketing, like Cerruti shit on marketing. And now he's a 25 point a game guy like that.

That is how you would most improve in person. Apology. He did. He did. He did do the in-person. Trauma for Yama. Right now, Portland has moved into a driver's seat spot in the top six. And seems like they get it.

And it really does seem like you need to be like top six, top seven. I did want to do the dumbest teams of the year conversation really quick. 2023 edition, because I think Washington, how they handled this season. And I wasn't kind to Tommy Shepard in my trade value column, made a bunch of jokes at his expense. I actually feel worse about Tommy Shepard than I did when I wrote that column. This team took 75 games to get to the point that Joe House was at when we did our over-unders pod before the season, saying Washington should tank and be one of the five

worst teams. They didn't even trade Kyle Kuzma or Roussela. They want to resign him. They want to resign him. For what end? So they could go 35 and 47 again. I've never seen a franchise and an organization and an owner so desperate to remain mediocre. It's like there's some objective we don't even know about. There's some trophy you can win for just being between 33 and 43 wins for 20 years. But to me, that's the team, that is the dumbest franchise in the league for me this year. I don't understand the point of their season. They were trying to make the playoffs and couldn't.

They gave all that money to Beal, who is just not worth it. I don't know what their future holds. They've missed all these lottery picks. And if I was a Wizards fan, I would be losing my mind. House is like past. He's so done with them and the commanders, just from a logic standpoint, he's just like,

these are the two dumbest teams I've ever rooted for. And I don't know how everybody doesn't go, the coach and the GM. They probably need a fresh start, I would say. I can't believe Beal's going to have this kind of career. He doesn't play in enough games. He finally got the contract. All the years

of the trade speculation, we kept talking about it over and over again. It's like, I think he's going to want to get that extension and then revisit this whole thing. But you got to move on from it because I still think the perception of Beal is far greater than the return on Beal because he is a pretty talented dude.

But it doesn't win games and he doesn't play in enough of them. He plays at 50 games right now and he's averaging 23 a game during a year when scoring has skyrocketed. Yeah, like you'll look at the overall numbers 50 games right now and he's averaging 23 a game during a year when scoring is skyrocketed. Yeah. Like you'll look at the overall numbers and be like, oh, who wouldn't want that?

And he's still only 29 years old to be 30 this summer, 50 games this year, 40 last year, 60 the year before that, 57. The last full season was, was 18, 19. But it kind of speaks back to like the beginning we were talking about Kyrie where you don't want to lose the asset for nothing so that's why they keep it or whatever but yeah I don't I don't really get it and then the trade laws 15% trade kicker yeah Przingis actually has only missed like 11 games this year so they've got a decision to make on that one as well it doesn't seem like

running it back would make a ton of sense right I would have said that before the season but what do I know? I think my Mount Rushmore for dumbest teams 2023 would be Washington, Minnesota, Atlanta, and Dallas are my top four this year. Washington, Minnesota, New Orleans? No, Washington, Minnesota, Atlanta, Dallas is my Mount Dumbmore for 2023. I just don't agree philosophically

with their strategies as franchises. Just giving away Herter, I just don't understand how you just... It's like, ooh, we got a first-round pick for him and some cap space to spend on other people. I would have at least turned him into Grant Williams. Get a

real player back for him. That's not like a sell him for parts. What does he have? He's in a weird situation, right? Now we see him, all the stuff he can do off the ball, playing with people who know how to play basketball. It's like the guy's a fucking asset and trade them away for 40 cents on the dollar. I just don't agree with anything they do. The Herger move, to be fair, though, wasn't in a vacuum. And just to let the audience know behind the curtain, I always like when I get the Simmons homework assignment an hour before we're about to start the podcast,

and it's like, hey, dude, let's do this thing. And I'm like... It's a throwaway segment. Yeah, I know. All right. But I'm sitting there going like Memphis, Atlanta. I'm kind of locked in. But I know you've already done the segment.

So then I'm kind of like, all right, let me come up with a couple of these. All right. But then I thought, I have some thoughts on, let me come up with a couple of these. All right. But then I thought, I have some thoughts on that. You're a little harsher about this than I am. Because if you look at Atlanta to say, okay,

they're one of the four dumbest teams going into the season. What could they have realistically done? Even though I agree with you, the harder part, you're not getting rid of Trey at this point. You thought you were going to balance out the Trey thing with the Jante. It's,

it's not happened despite the way they stagger them. You know, it was kind of weird the other night when Trey got thrown point. You thought you were going to balance out the Trey thing with DeJounte. It's not happened, despite the way they stagger him. It was kind of weird the other night when Trey got thrown out of the game, and then they went on this nice run, but that's one night and closing a game out. Wait, hold on. Can I stop you for a split second? Because you kind of casually walked over the DeJounte part of this.

They basically traded, how many first-round picks in that trade? Well, three in total. Yeah, two in a swap. Is round picks in that trade? Well, three in total. Yeah, two in a swap. Is it two in a swap? Yeah. Plus they're going to have to pay him in a year.

And they had no idea if it was going to work out, which is why we like the trade for the asset. But at the same time, it's like, man, you better be feeling really good about your team if you're doing that one. You start trading multiple picks. Oh, it's three. It's three in a swap. Three in a swap.

I just don't like trading that many picks if I don't even know if I'm going to be a top 16. Call me nuts. Maybe I'm crazy. But just everything. They just seem like a mess. The John Collinson, they've been trying to trade him for a year and a half.

It seems like everybody in their team's available. Nobody knows around the league. Sorry, the 23's protected. It's through Charlotte, so go ahead. I just wanted to get, you know. And then Dallas, starting with the Brunson thing last year. And then going through. Just the Brunson thing last year.

And then going through. Just in terms of dumb years, I think they've had a pretty dumb year. That's my take. The DeJounte trade was 25 and 27 first rounders, 26 pick swap. And they got that Charlotte pick you mentioned, plus the Gallinari expiring. So that's a fairly big bet. Right. It's a lot for Deshante. Right. It's a lot. With Drew's injury history, the Drew Holiday price at the time, you're like, okay, that's a lot. Because usually this was

reserved for... But now it's become... I mean, after the Gobert thing, it's like in a weird way, the Deshaun Watson contract, where it's like, okay, that sets the market. We're like, well, that contract set the market for Cleveland. What does that mean? Every other quarterback is going to get that now. When Gobert gets traded for all those firsts, and it's Gobert, and then Durant's on the market, it's like, well, if Gobert got this, then what do you get for Durant? I don't even think there's a comp there. But that's on the high end for DeJounte and the fact that it's a contract

that they can't give that stuff up and not bring him back. But I think you were still stuck another year until the Trey part gets figured out because he's going to have to adapt a little bit better for Atlanta to ever take the next step. And I don't know if that's ever going to happen. Is there a team that you feel like we were underrating from having a dumb season?

Honestly, I feel like Minnesota is not even breathing anymore and guys are still throwing rocks at it. That's why I glossed over. Yeah. I don't even want to do that to them anymore. And they're going to be a playoff team, I think. They're kind of fun to watch. There is an alternate universe, Minnesota,

where Kessler's on there. They still have Jared Vanderbilt. I don't know. It's just kind of a fun team with a lot of potential in all their picks. It's like, man, these summer, these guys can make a move, but they already made the move.

Retradables, really quickly. I just wanted to go over the Porzingis trade with you. It was in 2019. The Knicks traded Christophe Porzingis, Tim Hardaway Jr., Courtney Lee, and Trey Burke for Dennis Smith Jr., which is one of the reasons I want to bring this up today because the crazy announcer on Charlotte

who seems like he's had 40 coffees, he's like a revenge game for Dennis Smith Jr. Revenge moment, whatever he's talking about revenge. I don't know if there was, I don't, I don't feel like he was saying how they gave up after the team that gave up on him and said something like that.

It's like, I don't know if Dallas gave up on Dennis Smith Jr. Like they were getting Chris Stapps, you got to give up something him. It wasn't like, ah, we're done with this guy, even though they kind of gave up on him. But you know what I mean? You got to give up something to get Chris Stapps Porzingis. Anyway, it was him, the DeAndre Jordan contract that they somehow dumped, Wesley Matthews, a 2021 first, which became Keon Johnson, number 21, and a future first protected top 10, 23, 24, 25. That was the trade.

So the trade might be finalized as of today. It also had the unintended consequence of putting DeAndre Jordan in New York for a couple months under the hood with a very dysfunctional at the time Knicks franchise and KD deciding, I'm going to New York, I'll either play for the Knicks or the Nets and DeAndre Jordan basically being,

I think this has all come out now, DeAndre Jordan saying like, you don't want to come here, this place is a mess. And they move operations to the Nets. So that was the other unintended consequence of this trade. But when I look back, saying like, you don't want to come here. This place is a mess. And they move operations to the Nets. So that was the other unintended consequence of this trade. But when I look back,

look at all the stuff that went back and forth with Sillow, it's kind of a whole lot of nothing. There's really no, like, Tim Hardaway, cool. He's been on the Mavs for four years. He got to the Western Finals. The Knicks. Got nothing. Likeicks got nothing. Like, really nothing.

So if they get the 11th pick in the draft this year, this would be the best asset they got out of this trade. And it also steered KD toward Brooklyn. So this was the rare everyone lost a trade trade? Yeah, because when it happened,

you're like, that's all they got for Persingas? Yeah, it went nuts. Because there was still this, like, man, man you know if he ever you know puts it all together because you know at first it was he's going to be a bust right and you know there's certain guys that are just super prejudiced against any international player specifically if they're taller and white there's just this natural prejudice i mean shit it happens yokich now so then as soon as he's with the knicks he's blocking shots and he's throwing dunks down everybody like holy shit he's gonna be good

right and then he's hurt and it's going on and on they're also like so anyway when the trade went down i was like you've got to be kidding me i think i remember i was in atlanta yeah i was i was in atlanta for the semi-final uh uh one of the college football playoff games, LSU-Oklahoma, I believe. And so I was at a True Food, and the trade went down. I was like, you've got to be kidding me. And then you do some digging, and the Knicks, it felt like despite not getting back something that was a little more solid,

they were really happy to get him out of New York. It was like Phil Jackson, it was like Phil Jackson driven to some degree too. He just seemed like he was out on him. It felt like maybe now in retrospect,

maybe they had some intel on his knees that they weren't crazy about. But the DeAndre tidbit is really good. Really good. It kind of ended up being the legacy of that trade, right?

That might have swung the KDP. So I have Knicks fans in my life. I have a lot of Knicks fans in my life who are very focused on Dallas finishing 11th. Cause they would, then they would just get the pick. It's top 10 protected, right? There's a real chance that could happen, especially if Dallas is like gunning for one of those playing spots, but there's a chance this could be the 11th or 12th pick, which for the Knicks, who I think would be one of the favorites

to be in on any disgruntled superstar this summer, whoever it is, the Knicks are kind of poised and ready to trade for somebody like that. Having the 11th pick in the draft would be an asset for them. So anyway, that was the Porzingis trade. Way less exciting than I thought.

No, not the retradables part, just the trade. I just can't believe that this lingering pick is the most exciting asset from that trade. Makes no sense. March Madness really quick. What'd you see? Any lessons? Where are we with March Madness with you in 2023 yeah i mean it was it's awesome i mean to see people go that hard when the stakes are this high like i already complained about it you know as far as like the drama like the review at the end of the creighton inbounds today and it's like we made the final four no let's hang out for fucking 12 minutes now we made the final four um with san diego state getting in but i think the gaga-UCLA game was awesome because I just got back to the

West Coast and it was classic like I can't believe they're blowing this. I'm going to turn it off. Then I was like don't turn it off. Didn't turn it off. Saw an amazing back and forth of the threes and then Gonzaga's guy hitting theirs. Paul George didn't like that shot by the way.

Then UConn rolling and looking like UConn in the beginning of the year I thought Hurley was kind of interesting too being like hey once we got out of the big east it felt good again I was like oh there we go that's like some SEC talk right there yeah uh so I I love it when it's on I'm just not as attached to the stories as I normally would have been in my younger years because I would have known. Although, you know what? I wouldn't have known all the guys involved in some of the Elite Eight games we had because there's just some newcomers to this whole thing. But it's awesome. It's a great tournament. It's fun to just waltz into.

I've watched a little more than I thought, but it's fun to just waltz into this and just immediately do the Malcolm Gladwell blink test on some of the lineups where you're like, hey, tall guy on that team. It's pretty good. Tall guy. Tall guys around the room just finishing stuff or, oh, little guard making some things and just knowing nothing and no history with any of these guys.

So that part's fun. I did like Craig Korolbeck, the rewatchables producer, um, who's been at the ringer for five years. He was a San Diego state guy and he was always like bummed out about the pandemic when it shut down that team. So the fact that it's circled back and they actually finally got there. Um, that part was cool. I just feel like college basketball is at such a different place with what we grew up with that it makes sense to me you have these weird tournaments where you have a nine seed making it you know just goofy matchups it's just kind of where we're heading

whereas football it seems like the dominant teams are even more dominant each year you know it seems like even harder to get through whoever the top six is there's always like three of those top six every year. It just feels like they're in the mix. College basketball, maybe this is where we're going.

I'd have to see it happen far more often because there's a lot of results-driven analysis of this. It's like, oh, the NIL actually doesn't mean that the rich get richer because of this. I'm like, I don't know if I'm ready to make that statement. Let's see what happens. I used to think this is what was going to happen, is that you'd have lesser programs historically because they were going to keep all their guys and not have one and dones and have this continuity, the thing that we think is so important in basketball, which the NBA is like, we're good.

We don't need it. We'll just place them up once the playoffs start. The thing we always bought into and grew up with that once you know your teammates' tendencies and you're this locked unit of five people, like an offensive line, that those teams would always end up winning games. And there's still been too many recent results

where it's like, nope, they had like four or five star kids and they're fucking awesome and they're in the final four. There's still way more of that. So like if you're doing a full recap of where college basketball is going you need more final fours or more elite eights like we just had this weekend that it's about older players because i still there's to me there's not enough results that it is the lesser programs that have had guys on campus because there's also still a ton of transfers in this whole thing too so So I've seen a bit of the, Hey, this is about seniors.

It's about all these things. It's like, okay. But I've also like, it wasn't like it was in the eighties where we had the one and done guys that also did really well in the tournament. Yeah. Well, it's funny. Cause you'd think part of this would be, it's all the threes now there's just too much variance. Well, Miami came back in that game today and they didn't even shoot any threes. They just kind of came back and scored baskets and made some stops. So with the variance thing, it didn't even apply there. I don't know. I've kind of enjoyed it. I just think college basketball is just at a different place and especially with the G League. The fact that Scoot wasn't on any

of these teams I think is a blow, you know, the two best, the two best, uh, lottery picks. We have neither of them in this tournament. That's just different than what we grew up with. And,

um, I don't know. I just feel like it's going to veer more that way. Can I give you a, a lacrosse update before we go? We're not going to do any, um, succession predictions

well I I've unfortunately seen the first two episodes okay maybe you can help me then spoiler alert the reddit theory that Logan six cents he's been dead the whole time

I haven't seen that one yet I I like it though. That's a good one. Logan's been dead forever. My son now likes lacrosse more than football. That's my lacrosse update for you. Wait, he likes playing lacrosse more than football? Yeah. He still likes playing football, but he got thrown into the fire in lacrosse and he's held up and he's been playing big minutes for his high school team. And he gets this long stick and he just likes the flow of it. He said, he said he's out there and it's just, you're always in it. Even when, you know, we're on offense, you still have to be ready. And then all of a sudden, somebody might be running down the field. You got to be ready. And he just,

he likes, he likes how into it the players are that it's just goes and it goes and it goes. And it's not like football where it's like you stop. Now the offense comes off the field or special teams, or you might not do anything for 20 minutes and lacrosse are just in it. Uh, and he also absolutely fucking loves hitting people. And hitting people with their stick or hitting people when they're trying to get rid of the ball

or whatever. He just absolutely loves it. So there you go. A sport I knew nothing about seven weeks ago. My son now is completely into it and wants to keep playing and playing. It is a great parent sport. I will say that.

It's way better as a parent sport than I expected. So it's just a lot of action and it's pretty easy to follow once you know the rules. So yeah, I'm convinced. I'm convinced like all my lacrosse buddies, they were all my friends at UVM when they're talking about like what I don't understand. Like, I think you guys talk about that. You run a lot of stuff. It reminds me of like a poorly coached NBA team. It's like you pretend you're setting screens, but you're really just sort of working to have a guy take a shot. Is his slight pivot from football to lacrosse

because a D1 senior defensive end knocked him silly towards the end of the season? No, no, no. He's still in on football. He's going to play receiver and safety for football no he just really loves the cross but didn't you say there was like one play towards the end of this because he's a freshman on a high level like what he is doing this is really impressive shit okay yeah but you don't you downplay it but once i actually like looked it up

i couldn't like this is incredible that he was out there, that he's considered this good already to be playing the way he was playing. And so to be a freshman, despite him, you know, telling you he could beat you up to your face now, which is hilarious. Well, now he can because he's 175. Yeah, he finished the football season 155. And I think he realized, like, if I'm going to actually play defense, like I have to put on some weight. But the lacrosse thing... So he's a long stick D? Yeah, they call it D-pull. He has a personality. I think he'll fit right in with that group. From a parent standpoint, I wasn't thinking anything was happening this spring, right? Like my daughter, club season's

winding down. She's going to college and he was just going to have spring football practice. And all of a sudden we have all these games. It's great. I can't, you know what I'm so happy about is that we are only six years away from him graduating late from Arizona after being a fifth year senior.

And he's going to say, hey dad, I think I'm going to stay in Tucson but we've got this thing where it's the Uber for stamps and he's going to say, hey, dad, I think I'm going to stay in Tucson, but we've got this thing where it's the Uber for stamps, and he's going to be hitting you up. He's going to start Googling all your deals, and he's going to be hitting you up. He's going to be telling all of his lax bros. He's like, my dad, we're in.

We get our startup money, and you're going to feel a little guilty because you don't want to deny your kids any opportunity, so you're kicking a little bit of money, and then he's going to take a helicopter home, and he'll be like, don't worry about it. We just write it off. Sounds like a Kendall Roy 2.0. I want his first startup to be how Kyle is patient zero for making everyone else sick. Tate was so sick this weekend. He couldn't do his Saturday night March Madness pod. The lesson is always who's with Kyle, but you've been smart. Kyle's been your producer and you're not with him enough to let him give you the Ebola virus.

Some would say I'm never with him. Right. It's become actually a point of contention on the show. He just, like, I don't go out almost, like, it is very rare. And when it does happen, it is late. He goes out early on the other side of town. It's not a great fit. If we dated, we would have already broken up by now.

So when was the last time you had drinks with Kyle? Denver, because I blew him off in Salt Lake City. Yeah, Salt Lake was like the big time it was going to happen again. And I said, no problem. And then I got done with the show. And then I walked around the arena with Sar Rudy, not watching any of the dunk stuff, being in the concourse the whole time. And then I was like, I want to go back to Park City. And then dude, I got back to Park City and I'm right there. And I go, I'm not even doing this.

And I was in my hotel room by 930 and I was on the gold watching him sluice. Yeah. Kyle probably took that personally. Utah, I don't know Utah, like not maybe an ideal All-Star weekend location with some of the closings. You really want those places where it's like 4 a.m., everything's still open.

That's where you have an All-Star weekend. Yeah, but I also knew you and I were taping once that entered the mix that we were taping at one o'clock on Sunday. There's no way I'm going out with Kyle at Kyle Speed in Utah and then getting back to Park City and then back to the airport in the morning. Because as soon as I landed at L.A. and we screwed up the hour thing, as soon as I walked in the door, I was taping with you. Is Kyle still on this?

He may have hung up. Yeah. What is it do you feel let down that you and rossillo haven't had drinks um like do you feel like you hang out with rossillo enough you know the answer to this but uh i'd say the only time it really hurt was utah you spin a nice you spin a nice tail buddy but uh you could have fit it in we both know you could have fit it in so um it is what it is i'm fine uh i usually i make sure i have my buddies with me now because i know i can't count on him to yeah also he blew off me in house after the over under podcast is it this might be your new thing the russell is like this is a blow-off thing could be it's one

of your moves could be my new thing did you read a book about the art of blowing off? Like some 200 page? 178. 178 pages. Larger font. The art of blowing off. The art of fucking blowing off. Learn how to blow off and not give a shit. I think we all need to go out.

I think that's the answer. I think we have to watch a playing game at the frolic room with Kyle. I want to go to the frolic room, but I want to stay late when it gets weird. But Kyle's already in bed. He's not, he's a young kid that goes to bed early. So he may have him.

He gets his work done early. Um, all right. This podcast was produced by Kyle Creighton. Thanks to Steve Cerruti as well. Fan of the rookie of the year, Pala Boncaro. Uh, thanks to Ros Cerruti as well. Fan of the Rookie of the Year, Paolo Bancaro. Thanks to Rosillo.

Don't forget to listen to our breakdown of the Prestige TV podcast of Succession, episode one, which you can find on the Prestige TV podcast. Rosillo, good to see you. Next week,

we'll have a lot more clarity on all this stuff. I will see you in seven days.