The Bill Simmons Podcast - All-Star Reactions, Brooklyn Blake and Trade Deadline Predictions With Ryen Russillo 

Episode Date: March 8, 2021

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo to discuss a condensed NBA All-Star Weekend; They talk about the All-Star Game, the 3-point contest, slam dunk contest, along with some All-Star storylines (3:15). Then they discuss Blake Griffin signing with the Nets (46:15), NBA trade deadline predictions (1:04:00), and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, if you love the NBA, check out Real Ones on the Ringer NBA show with Logan Murdoch and Raja Bell. They did an awesome interview with Darren Williams, the old Utah Jazz Nets player who used to be in the NBA. Told a bunch of great stories. Check that out on the Ringer NBA show. 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 gangs 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

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listen to the end of the episode for additional details. You must be 21 plus and present in select states. Gambling problem called Win 100 Gambler or visit rg-help.com. We're also brought to you by theringer.com as well as the Ringer Podcast Network. We just launched a new podcast tonight, actually, on the Ringer Dish Podcast, which has tea time and jam session and me and Jacoby breaking down the challenge every Wednesday night. Well, twice a week for the next five weeks, Nora Princiati and Nathan Hubbard have launched a podcast. It's season one of a new podcast on The Ringer called Every Single Album. And their season one is going to be about Taylor Swift.

They did her first album. They're going to break down every Taylor Swift album chronologically, what it meant to her career, her legacy, and a whole bunch of great stuff. Nathan, longtime music industry guy, former musician, Nora Princiati, one of the biggest Taylor Swift fans. They've clicked over Taylor. And this is a really cool podcast it's not just a podcast about an artist but about business industry, creativity, all kinds of things

so you can check that out first one is up tonight, next one is coming Thursday, it's on the Ringer Dish podcast, speaking of things coming on the Ringer Dish, or the Ringer Podcast Network, new rewatchables coming tomorrow night. New Jack City, 30th anniversary.

It's kind of an amazing movie. I got to say, I hadn't watched it from start to finish in a while and could not have enjoyed it more. So that is coming tomorrow. If you want to watch it before then, it's I think on HBO Max. So there you go.

Coming up, Priscilla and I are going to break down the All-Star Game and a lot more. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, we're taping this. It is 8.05 Pacific time on Sunday night. Ryan Rosillo is here. We just watched the All-Star game. I basically made Rosillo just do stuff for this podcast. I was like, you have to watch the All-Star game. You have to watch a TV show that we're going to mention a little bit.

I didn't watch that. You don't really like the All-Star game that much. I have gone in waves back and forth with the All-Star game. And I'm actually in an I-like-the-All-Star-game mode of my life. And I think it's because there's so many players that I just like watching that I just like seeing them on the court. I don't care that they're not playing that hard. I don't care that it's become basically a four-quarter three-point contest. They've added all these things. I just like seeing all the guys

on one court. Shoot me. I'm sorry. Yeah. I don't, I don't have a problem. It's kind of like extra bowl games. The thing that people get really upset about extra college football bowl games. And you're like, just don't watch them. Who cares? It's on a Tuesday. It's early December. Like that's for those two fan bases. That's for whatever the bowl coalition is, you know, like that's, that's on them. You don't have to watch it. And NBA all-star weekend when it's normal, it's for kids and it's a celebration of league. And that's great. So anybody that enjoys it, like I'm, I'm all for it. I guess the only thing that's not going to sit here and do two hours of negative all-star stuff. Cause Hey, we got Rosillo. Great. Um, I just would like to

see guys play together, like in some version that somewhat resembles a real game just to see how guys would play off of each other because I think that's at least what we saw. Even though guys, it wasn't like guys were killing it in the 80s and 90s anyway, but you could see moments where it felt like, oh, that's kind of cool, like Jokic and Steph together.

Like, what would that be like in a normal season? And you don't see any of that. No. And at some point, they stopped trying until the last five minutes of the game. And it happened sometime in the early 90s. And I never really agreed with it or understood it. I've always

said the game ebbs and flows depending on how many playmakers you have in there. And we're going to talk about tonight's game, but I was looking at the 2004 box score. Okay. Compared to today. And I may have even done this on a podcast before.

I don't remember. But you think like the playmakers we had on the floor, and we did not have Durant, but one team had LeBron, Luka, Curry, Chris Paul, Dame, and Jokic tonight. So there's six guys who can create a shot for themselves or somebody else. The other team had Kyrie and Harden and should have had Durant. Those are nine guys that are really fun to see in an all-star game, right? And that's even before you get into Giannis and some of the shooters that we had out there tonight.

You go to 2004. This was the West team in 2004. You're going to love this. Starters. Kobe, KG, Tim Duncan, Yao, and Steve Francis. City. That was, what would be fun about watching those five guys play basketball together? Oh, you know, Kobe, KG, and TD, three all-timers. But those five together, I don't want to watch. Off the bench, Ray Allen, Shaq, Sam Cassell, Paisa, Dirk, Andre Miller, and, oh, I'm sorry, Brad Miller, not Andre Miller, and Andre Karolinko. Andre Miller would have added some excitement. Andre Miller would have at least been able to set other people up.

So you have a team where basically Sam Cassell, who is a point guard, but more of a shooter, could run a team, but wasn't like a Steve Nash, Jason Kidd type. So that team basically had no awesome, I'm here to serve everybody else, create shots kind of guy. Here's the East team. Jermaine O'Neal, Allen Iverson, Ben Wallace, Tracy McGrady, Vince Carter. Again, good basketball players, but who is the straw that stirs the drink? Off the bench, Kenya Martin,

Jamal McGlure, Ron Artest, Baron Davis, Michael Redd, Paul Pearson, then Jason Kidd. And I think either this year or next year, I made the joke that Jason Kidd should just be like the automatic quarterback in the Thanksgiving touch football game where it's like, he's just the point guard for both teams. But my point is we have so many more playmakers now. This is why I like watching the all-star game again. You have basically half the guys out there

can do stuff that isn't just either for themselves or follow some sort of, you know, job description. True. But that's within structure and there's no structure. There's none to it whatsoever. Like all I'm looking for is the MVP storyline. Like who wants to pretend they don't want it, but who really wants it?

Who just flat out wants it? You know, Kyrie at the beginning. Giannis, you know, look, I'd rather Lillard had gotten it, you know,

um, with the way he closed at the end. I thought Steph had a chance. He had to make a couple more threes. He missed a couple in the fourth quarter. I think he missed like three possessions in a row. But he wasn't like hunting. And then Lillard clearly was hunting at the end. Like, all right, I want this.

But Giannis in a timeout reminds everybody, hey, I'm open. And you're like, dude. He had 22 points before anybody even noticed because no one cared and he's tall and was around the basket. So shockingly, like his stat line and never missing. I know people are going to be like, what are you talking about? It didn't feel like an MV. I mean, I don't know. I'm like, oh, cool.

I guess Giannis gets it because of the stat line. But it wasn't it wasn't exciting. There was not even score towards the end because guys actually were going to contest up there. So I thought for moments, I guess maybe I'm surprised that there isn't a little bit more with the egos in the league, which you get, where there isn't somebody really pushing the limits of selfishness, knowing, okay, if I have a great closing six minutes here, this thing's mine. There's a real balance. But you don't think that was Dame? I felt like Dame was sniffing it near the end.

Oh, yeah, he was. But it wasn't necessarily egregious? I felt like Dame was sniffing it near the end. Oh, yeah. He was, but it wasn't necessarily egregious. And by the way, they all went in, except for one. He took 20 shots in 21 minutes. Towards the end, because Steph was doing stuff where Steph was trying to get it going, and then he took the one from deep for game at 167. But he was still playing a little bit within,

I'll take one, and if I come back down, I'll get somebody else going. But you're right. Dame towards the end there was like, okay, let me see if I can steal this thing at the end.

And he almost did. I'd rather he got than Giannis. Giannis had 35. He was 16 for 16. The biggest thing that happened in this game was no Embiid. If you had said, who is the most important player

on their team just for this particular game, it actually was Embiid because he was, I think one of the reasons Durant picked this team was he was like Embiid will be this, you know, huge mismatch on both ends. I think Embiid would have probably had like 35 points. They ended up losing by 20, but, you know, it just opened up everything for the honest side.

A couple of fun storylines that I noticed in here. Okay. And this is the fun thing about the All-Star Game, right? Did you take notes? I did. Look at this. How many notes? Do you want to see my notes?

I took a whole pad full. I wrote one sentence and I was like, what are you doing? You're the guest. There was some Steph Dame stuff. Steph came out and it looked like he might have 15 threes. And they showed Dame a couple of times on the sideline, politely applauding. And then Dame came in and was like,

now I'm going to shoot some threes. They each played like 20. They were high-fiving each other at the end of the first half, a lot of that stuff, but it's still a rivalry. I'm sorry. Like those guys are on each other's corner. There's no question. It could be like you at ESPN. There's some host on one of the shows and you could be as friendly as you want, but that guy's on your corner and you're going to want to beat him. And I did feel like that That never happened to the ESL. Yeah, that's true. You're a bad example. Steph and Dave, though, you know... It's a great point.

It did seem a little territorial. There was... Not only did we have that game this week, right? The second-to-last game for Golden State where Steph is lighting it up. Dame's had a terrible game. And then Steph had a missed three and then he had a missed layup.

And then Dame hits those two stepbacks and then he gets the charge against Draymond. And even though Lillard's overall line wasn't very good, it's another moment where Dame has had this run of closing. He has, I think, since 12-13, 29 game-winning or tying shots with no time left or something ridiculous. Aren't his clutch stats this year particularly crazy?

It's like 60-something percent. So he's that guy. your your first point was great because i did notice it and it is it's not like it's new but you know how tough it must be for somebody as good as damian lillard to watch for six minutes and not be a starter and i understand this is the all-star game but like for him to go all right i gotta like in what world would i ever not be in the main group and today's the example of it because he's not going to get the votes so yeah i think there was definitely that's a great pickup on by you because it played out throughout the entire game that's how it closed too with dame kind of being like hey i'm taking over here you had your chance you pulled it from half four now i'm gonna hit it

and steph has a great trump card with all this because he plays with, he was doing the joyful Steph thing tonight. Ultimately, he's got the three rings. So at some point he's like, Dave, you take the second half. You keep taking those shots. It's good. It's good.

You do your thing. You know, it's, it's just that little twinge of, I do think there's a rivalry between those guys. And I don't think it's like, oh, fuck you. I'm not into that stuff. It's just like they're on each other's corner. Their stats are similar. They mean as much to each of their teams.

They play in the same conference. And, you know, Dame's from Oakland. Like, there's a lot of stuff going on there. Okay, but do you think it's going to be way worse for Dame? Like, Dame, you know, I don't know how much of it is social media or what, but I'm sure there's not a moment Dame Lillard thinks that Steph Curry is better than him. I've never

once thought Lillard was better than Steph Curry. And you can talk about super teams and all that different stuff, but when Durant was out and they played in the Western Conference Finals, you know, I mean, Golden State wasn't even trying to sweep that series and they smoked them so that's

that's a tough one I think for the Lillard crew to get past but at least this year and in those clutch moments it's tough to top Lillard and it's just kind of funny that they did it in the

All-Star game which you know look they're up 20 but you mentioned the I can't believe I'm not starting factor which I think is a real thing in these games

totally right Dame is one I think Harden was the in these games. Totally. Dame is one. I think Harden was the other on the other team. I'm sure he was okay with it. No, but just like, you know, he, he, those guys know they're two of the best 10 guys in the league, even though we have 11 guys. And then there, so other like little tiny storylines in there, there was some Chris

Paul, James Harden stuff. Were you watching carefully? Yeah. James Harden had a rebound and took off and Chris Paul, nobody's, nobody's running more than I would say 52% speed in the first three quarters of this game. Chris Paul chases him down from behind.

Like he's DK Matt Kev on that interception. And, and James is like doing his thing. He thinks he's going to do like on that interception and James is like doing his thing. He thinks he's going to do like some Eurostep and Chris comes from behind and takes the ball and then James kind of gave him a little shove and there was a little like those guys, I'm not sure they're good, right?

No. There's still a little something. Yeah, I don't think there's anything good there at all. I liked it. So I enjoyed that. I thought that was really fun. Paul also, Paul had a drive where it looked like he did get fouled and he immediately went

and got on the ref's ass in the baseline. And then he looked at the bench and put his hands up like, all right, all right. I'm not going to go full Chris Paul in the All-Star game too. I think there were what?

Nine free throws combined, which was just lovely to watch. Yeah. There is so, another tiny storyline. Beginning of the fourth quarter, they need 24 points to watch. Yeah. There is so, another tiny storyline. Beginning of the fourth quarter, they need 24 points to win. And Chris Paul does the, alright, now I'm slowing

it down and doing my fourth quarter pace. Yeah, with no clock. Yeah, it's like he's on the side. It's like, what are you doing? You're not running the Phoenix center. I enjoyed that. He had to get a little aggro because he's Chris Paul. That's what he does. No, but it's a great, but he, there was no clock bill and Weber's like, oh, he's going to slow the's what he does. No, but it's a great thing. There was no clock, Bill.

And Weber's like, oh, he's going to slow the game down. And you're like, no, you guys still have to get to 170. It doesn't matter. Yeah. The Luka thing was interesting. Do you know how many minutes Luka played in this game? You watched the whole game. 17? 32!

Oh, really? God. He had that one stretch where he hit a couple threes. He was three for seven. I don't know if you saw the skills contest. My son loved everything tonight. My son is right in the wheel. He's 13. He's right in the wheelhouse.

Shout out to the foreigners, huh? Love skills contests, all that stuff. Yeah. So Luca mailed in the skills contest and then kind of mailed in the game. He was just kind of jogging up and down. He wasn't really involved. I didn't realize he played 32 minutes. That's hilarious.

He did nothing. Oh, he had eight assists. But I mean, assists in this game are a joke. It's just you throw it to the guy ahead of everybody and then they just get a layup. Well, and Jokic wasn't really involved either. And it made me wonder if like all the established dudes were like, yeah, fuck Jokic.

Well, I mean, let's carve them out. You're burying the lead then if we're talking about established guys mailing this one in, because once LeBron looked like he would all it on that dunk attempt. I mean, you know, yeah, he played 13 minutes, missed five shots. All of his threes was like, all right, see you guys later. Kyrie was was great. I was on a couple different text threads where people were joking about that. He was playing harder than he did during the Bucks playoff series. I saw that joke at multiple, multiple text threads. He was really good at that game though. Um, the Jalen Brown, that subplot, I really enjoyed tonight. Jalen Brown. Cause sometimes with these games, when you actually watch them, you're like, eh, that guy doesn't totally belong out there.

You know what I mean? Like year after year, you'll be like, oh, nice story. That guy made the All-Star team. And then you watch him in the game and you're like, eh, it's kind of a notch below. You can just kind of see it on the court. I know it's the All-Star game, but I do feel that way with some of the stuff. Jalen looked like he belonged.

Like, to me, he looked the same as any other swing dude. And I was psyched because he's on my favorite team. Yeah, see, I would think that the local media, because really, everything we just saw here, no one's different. Nothing is different now, okay? Giannis doesn't

like, if you're doing a show tomorrow saying, does this mean Giannis truly is the best player in the world? No. We've already tried that game. It didn't work out, right? Does this mean LeBron's getting old? No. Does it mean Lillard, you would want him on your team to take the last shot, maybe even step? Well, more stats than just today would say that, yes,

that's been the case this past year. But if you're going to do a Celtics breakdown and go, now, you know, Jalen belongs. Jalen belongs. And you're like, why? Because nobody's playing any defense? Jalen was just a touch more aggressive. I'd actually put Jalen in one of the top three guys

that were like more aggressive than you'd expect at the all-star level, which I have no issue with whatsoever. But I don't know. I don't know that there's ever been anything from this game. You know, we always have to try to have something mean something. And this game for two plus hours doesn't change anything. You just refuted my point.

I didn't appreciate it. Yeah, but I mean, come on, really? So do you feel better about Jalen today? I do. Here's the thing. I wanted him to go out there and act like a guy who belonged as one of the best 15 guys in the game.

And I thought he carried himself that way. I was excited about it. Because the worst case scenario, and this has happened, we've seen it, is the guy goes out there and they're terrible and you're like, oh, now that all the best guys are out there, you kind of don't look like one of the best guys. I know it's like a weird eye test thing. It is. It is because honestly, think of it this way. The game we just watched would be the easiest for any regular person to score a bucket in.

So then we're going to say that because a guy who's in the NBA looked better. I don't know. I just don't buy it. Sorry. How did you think of Zion tonight? I was disappointed. My son was really bummed out. He was just furious because my son this is basically like watching 2K for him.

And so every alley loop, he just thinks the guy's going to make. And Zion missed at least three of them. How about the alley-oops to Steph and to Paul? How about Kyrie's two-hander in traffic? Did you see that one? Yeah. I mean, he's... Look, there's never a moment where I watch Kyrie

and I'm not impressed the entire time. You know, so... Hold on, I have a greenie tease for you. Coming up, I'm going to explain to you how this game helped LeBron James' legacy. 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 November. 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. So I was trying to think, one of my favorite running jokes lately is the LeBron media mafia. And I was trying to think how they could spin LeBron, who basically mailed in the game and he should, because why would he put any miles on himself in this game?

He did exactly what he should do, but how they would spin this after. And I realized what it was going to be. LeBron is now four and O as a captain. Nice. So maybe like, I don't think it's first segment on the jump tomorrow, but maybe third segment, somebody theorizing like, I don't think it's first segment on the jump tomorrow, but maybe third segment.

Somebody theorizing like, is it an accident? LeBron's 4-0 as the all-star captain? I mean, that's how smart this guy is. Even when he's picking his all-star team, he's just at a higher level than anybody else. You think Michael Jordan in the 90s, would he be 4-0 as the all-star captain? I don't know. I like it. Good one. I knew? I don't know. I like it. Good one. I knew you'd like it.

I do like it. A lot. I'm back. I lost you with my Jalen Brown stuff, but now I've won you back. I'm like you with the LeBron Mafia, where I'm so excited now to look forward to what it'll be. You and I, people don't realize how much time you, me, and House spend texting about the LeBron media mafia

and how much we enjoy it. We've become like the Woodward and Bernstein of it. But we're always on it. We're always on it and we'll say like, oh. Honestly, that point, somewhere Shabazz Napier sitting being like, I told you motherfuckers he knew what he was doing. Could LeBron go 7-0 as the All-Star captain?

Will anyone ever beat this? Does that, will there be LeBron stans that go 4-0 as All-Star GM, but then will MJ stans be going off tonight being like, Jordan never played this poorly in an All-Star game? Jordan never bailed in 13 minutes. How about this one?

Flip piece, same argument. Okay. Does LeBron's 4-0 as All-Star captain prove that he's going to be an incredible NBA owner? Yes. Yeah, I think so. Somebody, but the thing is, we're joking. Someone will say this. Someone will be like,

look, he did a great job putting together all-star rosters. You know, the big thing with LeBron, too, is I think the first time they did this, he picked Giannis, and he did it because he wanted Giannis to know how special he was in case when Giannis was a free agent, he would come play with him. So when he did it, and by the way, that's confirmed. So when he did it this time, I was like, huh huh does he think he's gonna like ask out he just signed an extension now that part is just me talking um but i just i know the first time through that this there is a free agent recruitment element to how guys were drafting teams when it

first came along right i actually think this draft, I thought it was interesting. The difference between LeBron and Katie, how they picked their teams. Katie went almost all like kind of one-on-one specialist kind of playmakers where LeBron kind of gravitated to either really fun players or guys who were versatile offensive guys. And you see the two teams and it's kind of like what their mindset is, like who they're more comfortable with. LeBron drafted a whole bunch of guys that he never really gets to play with in real life,

but just kind of wanted to be around. Durant was just like Harden, Kyrie, you know, going down, down the line. These dudes that just like, all right, you throw him the ball. We'll all stand here and then we'll crash the boards. Wait, did Durant say I need some size

and he took Sabonis over Gobert? Well, he had Embiid. I think that was why. Oh, all right. Because I'm trying to remember how that played out. It might have been the other way around. I don't know.

But Gobert was dunking tonight like he was dunking in traffic in a playoff game. Did you see how excited he would get? He would start flexing and like doing stuff and guys are looking at him being like, dude, nobody's within five feet of you.

What are we doing? The other team doesn't have a center. What are you doing? I think he probably had a little spur up his ass because of the whole... Those guys going last again? Yeah. Yeah.

I hate to do this, but I'm going to do it. The 24-point rule in the fourth quarter. I'm just kind of talking it out of my head how that would actually work in the regular quarter. I'm just kind of talking it out of my head how that would actually work in the regular season. I'm not against it. Versus, I guess my question is, I'll give you the choice. We can either keep basketball the way it is,

or I can give you the 24-point rule in the fourth quarter, but no more replay reviews. We just get to 24 points, nothing's reviewed. Which would you rather have? Well, if you're telling me no reviews, then I'd like to just keep it the way it is. I mean, the reason this ending is appealing because there's no stoppage, but there's going to be no stoppage in this one. So I'm not

anti the ending here, but... You're not anti 24-point rule? I'm not. I'm not. Like, not. I'm really open to trying to find ways to get that drama back, but the easiest fix would be to take the reviews out. Do you know the final minute of the Iowa college game today took 20 real minutes?

The final minute took 20. Stop it. Who is this for? Who's on the side of this is great. Keep it going, guys. Every business is about growing right that's all these guys are doing that's why the nfl is going to put games on one day it's going to be on every day it's gonna be on seven nights a week all right and every single sports

league is trying to figure out a way to grow the audience whether it's international or having baseball games in japan or having games in mexico city for the nfl and you know all these different things that we're trying to do, or we're seeing the leagues try to do, imagine trying to explain to somebody, be like, well, what do you do? Like, well, we sit around the game still. How long do the games take? I like two, two and a half hours. Okay.

That seems kind of long. Is it fun? Yeah, it is. Like, but sometimes it'll be a review and be like, okay. So like the final minute. Yeah. Sometimes the final minute takes like seven to 10 minutes. And guys stand around and look at a monitor. And then they talk and they go back and look at the monitor.

And then the announcers complain. And then everybody just stands there. Like, man, when is that? Can I watch that tonight? I mean, the person would be like, that sounds insane. I wish I'd love to go in a time machine and tell myself a lot about 2021. But this would be one of the things I would definitely, 1995 me would have been completely confused by, wait, what? So it's just the game stops? Well, what happens if the

other team has momentum? Wait, and then there's a five minute break? Momentum doesn't exist. And then you'd say like, well, that must be good because everybody's happy because they get the call right, right? You're like, no, actually they don't. Half the time, yeah, half the time we wonder if they got it right. So do they review it to get it right? Well, they review it to try to get it right, but they'll see something that made it wrong, but they'll confirm that it was right even though they know it's wrong because they can't make the right call

because there's different rules about what's right and wrong. Oh, and then it's like, we'll spend seven minutes trying to discern if it's a block or a charge, but one play later, somebody can block the ball off the backboard and the ref can miss the call. And we're not going to review it. Yeah. Yeah. So there's no rhyme or reason.

Basically. So that could be, and then we just move on like nothing. It's, uh, um, slam dunk contest tonight. It was a tough one.

You know, here's the thing. This goes to my theory with podcasts too. You can have the greatest idea for the pot for a podcast. And if the hosts stink, the podcast isn't going to work. You could have a terrible idea for a podcast. And if the hosts are really good,

the podcast might work. You could have a slam dunk contest with the best players in the league. And I don't even care if the dunks are that good. I'm going to enjoy it. But you could put, I follow the league at a really high level. I didn't know who the guy in Indiana was. I'd never seen that person before. I didn't know who it was.

I thought they were filming a movie. I was like, is this an actor? Is this a new Ron Shelton movie they're filming? This isn't, oh no, this is actually the guy. Two things. One is, I think the scoring should go from one to 100. I don't understand why they've stuck to the one to 10. That was an idea in 1984 when they're throwing this together.

Just make it one to 100. Give it way more flexibility with the numbers. And then I do think YouTube might have killed the dunk contest. Like my son has watched every dunk contest on YouTube. There's no dunk we can see now that would be impressive to him. So unless Zion's in it or whoever, he's just going to be disappointed. So I don't really know the fix.

I don't know why it just became so uncool. Like we had a G leaguer win it one year. Hell, it might've been the D league when the guy won it. And then you have Cassius in it, who again is zero dunks. And you've got to be really locked into either college hoops or the Pacers to know who he is. And, you know, I don't, I don't think that that's necessarily fair.

Like, if you think of skateboarding, people say, like, well, what is there left to do? The people are always evolving. They're trying to figure things out. I think we've seen dunks, whether it's Aaron Gordon throwing some stuff down. We're like, okay, that's incredible. I mean, we even thought the dunk contest was kind of dead 20 years ago. And then Vince came along. You know, so we've been having this, the dunk contest is dead

thing. Was it magic Johnson one year just started going nuts, screaming the dunk contest is back. The dunk contest is back. I completely agree with you. That doesn't sound like him. Yeah. Like the dunk contest is where you dunk it.

Um, I like, I like the idea of changing the scoring. Cause you could tell on the first cash is dunk. That was a really good dunk, but he just wasn't going to get a 50. You're not getting a 50 because everybody just got started here. And so I'm not going to get on the judges or anything. I think you could change it that way,

but I don't know that anyone's ever going to care. If you sold somebody on the dunk contest, you'd be like, oh, is that the best players that are good at dunking? And you're like, no, it's anyone that doesn't think it's uncool for them and it's borderline rotation players that are good at dunking? And you're like, no, it's anyone that doesn't think it's uncool for them. And it's borderline rotation players that do it. So, you know, I don't, I don't know what the fix is. I don't know how all of a sudden you can make something cool because let's

face it, NBA players, like they're not going to touch anything that they don't think is cool. And to be in the dunk contest isn't cool. It's risky. It's just not cool to be a part of. So none of these guys are going to do it. Like the whole vibe of the dunk contest has been gone now. So even the dunk part of it, the physical part of it, there there's probably like, I would never make the assumption that we can't ever see anything again, but you can't have guys in there that like people don't know who they are. It's pretty weird. I did like Simon's kiss dunk though. I thought I really did enjoy that one. I think he came as close as you can come to kissing the rim without actually risking the ball hitting your face or something. Uh, the skills challenge

was equally horrible. I thought they made a big mistake, not having Lamello and the skills challenge just to have them there. If he's your biggest star rookie this year, right? And Obi Toppin, they had in the slam dunk, but I just would have had Lamello there. I really enjoyed the three point contest and I'm not going to apologize either. Guess what? It's fun to watch Steph Curry shoot threes against other guys. I'll watch that in any scenario. And I think he means as much to the three-point contest as Larry meant to it in the mid eighties, where if he's in it, I'm just watching it. I'm in. Well, it would not only was it that, I mean, it went down to the last ball. It was great.

It was, that part was fun because you actually, by the way, you're going to see some of the best shooters in the league go, okay, I'm going to go ahead and do this. So, you know, that, the three-point shot at least, I mean, imagine if it were, you know, John Lauer. You know, Ben Simmons. That I'd actually watch.

Me too. That would be interesting. Maybe you do that. Highest highest minute total guys that take the least amount of threes and then have them do the I maybe Squills competition should have been stuff like entry passes to Kwame Brown if we're doing this you know well that's skills challenge they had was Sabonis against Vucevic in the finals I don't know what happened this used to be like a point guard, like De'Aaron Fox type of contest. I don't know what the hell was going on. We just had these lumbering centers.

I was really, really confused. Another confusing thing. House pointed this out. They sang the Canadian anthem, even though we have no NBA teams playing in Canada this season. I would have scrapped it. Sing the Tampa National Anthem.

I don't know. Then you're going to end up on BuzzFeed the next day. Why? Does the NBA hate Canada? You know, just the times. Times are unpredictable right now. So I think they just want to avoid an international incident.

Fair. And then. I mean, I said Lowry wasn't a Hall of Famer. I got death threats for two weeks. So, you know. Breaking. My wife, who watched some of tonight's events with me and my son, has announced that Jason Tatum, in her opinion,

is the best-looking NBA star this year. That's her word. Yeah. She thinks Jason Tatum is the best-looking basketball player this year. I don't have any notes on that. So congrats to him. Yeah. Is that true?

What's going on with his facial hair? I don't know. She was growing some of that straggly stuff. I never quite have any notes on hotness. So congrats to him. Yeah. Is that true? What's going on with his facial hair? I don't know. Because he was growing some of that straggly stuff. I never quite understand with the younger guys. But hell, you know, guys my age used to rock goatees

and soul patches. So, you know, I don't want to hate. All right. We did 30 minutes on the All-Star Game. What's audible? You were texting about this today.

Because now we're heading into the second half of the season. We're going to have playoffs soon. It's really the title starting to feel real. And you're texting about this today because that now it's now we're heading into second half of the season we're gonna play off soon it's really the title starting to feel real and you're texting about most insufferable that team just won the championship right afterwards narratives going team by team what what would be the most annoying to just kind of be bombarded with for three days so i'll let you have the floor. Let's start with Brooklyn. Right. Just understand that we're likely going to end up with an ending where it's one of these teams. So Brooklyn,

if they were to win, then Kyrie was right to take time off, even though he didn't tell anybody what he was doing. Um, and some people think he took time off to tank his trade value. Um, that Harden was right to force his way out of Houston, which again,

I'm not even anti that he forced his way out as much as just watching how he went about it, where you're like, you're just, you're throwing passes almost out of bounds on purpose, just to be, I mean, that pass to John Wall, I hope, is in the highlight video when he's inducted into the Hall of Fame. So it'll be a

good for Harden. He was right. Kyrie was right. And Kyrie was right to get out of Boston would be the other piece of that. right. And Kyrie was right to get out of Boston would be the other piece of that. Well, he might have been right to get out of Boston. You know what I mean? So I don't even care that Kyrie left Boston because that last season watching it

was so tough to watch anyway. Although the zag on that if the Nets were to win would be all the people that trashed Nash, specifically one guy saying, I hope they lose every game this year because he was hired. Then that would be sort of like, oh, well, hey, Nash might have been the right guy. So get ready for that one if Brooklyn

wins. The Philly one is a layup. It's like, oh, all you guys that thought Embiid and Simmons couldn't play together, and they still can't play together offensively. I'm never going to, but whatever version it is of Simmons, that's so incredible defensively, the way, you know, he works through the offense, but I still don't know. I'm still a little worried about, you know, those closing time minutes. You know, that Utah Jazz game,

he took one putback shot with eight minutes left in regulation and into overtime. That's one shot attempt. So when I watch him, I still see a stagnant combination between the two, but it hasn't mattered

because Embiid's probably your MVP. But it'll be that if they win, it'll be because those two play so well together offensively, when I'm not sure that's quite the case. And then there'll be a lot of Sam Hinckley retroactive credit. So that's where I was going. I would actually vote that

first. I think if they won the title, it's a lot of the process was right. Victory. Sam Hinckley was a genius all along. It'll be all that stuff. There's going it's a lot of the process was right. Victory. Sam Hickey was a genius all along. It'll be all that stuff. There's going to be a ton of that. Look, Pablo Torre is the number one wave flagger for

Hickey. And look, Pablo's had great access to him. I don't know if there's another connection there, but every time they have a nice little run, it's like, trust the process. And I'll think, so what are we talking, like eight years since he was hired and they haven't been out of the second round? Like that is some just unbelievable trust.

Like it doesn't even have anything, you know? So, um, that'll be the other one. And then I think if the Lakers were to win it again, which is certainly a real possibility here, LeBron being at five, MJ being at six, but LeBron's already started his campaigning when he started saying this summer, I've won the two toughest championships ever, which I think he arguably did against Golden State.

I would disagree with him with the bubble championship, but he is positioning himself in a way to compare favorably, even if he's behind the total number of Jordan by saying that. Like when I hear him say that, that's me thinking, okay, the guys got together and came up with this. And now they're going to start, you know, hammering this home as some way to say, like, even if he ends up at five, he's better than Jordan.

But these are just all things that I say are going to happen. There's a twist to that. It'll be LeBron's five was harder than MJ six. He didn't, he didn't have to take a year and a half off to rest his body. He stayed in the whole time. Absolutely. Jordan left the game. LeBron never quit.

It'll go further than that. If Phoenix wins, you didn't mention this in your text, maybe Robert Sarver was a great owner all along. Did we underestimate Sarver? I don't think anybody's going to do that.

You sure? If Utah wins, it'll be they were the best team all along, but small market, the media didn't ever want to acknowledge how good they were. They did this despite the mainstream media who really wanted a big market and a big star to win the title. ever want to acknowledge how good they were. They did this despite, despite, uh,

the mainstream media who really wanted a big market and a big star to win the title. Well, here we are. I just don't think that one's mainstream enough though, because for all the anti-hardened stuff, which I think some is very justifiable. I think some of the criticisms of McIver are completely justifiable.

I think the pushback on some of the LeBron stuff while still acknowledging how special he is and that he's, he's right there with Jordan right now for me, you know, he is, you know, I don't, I don't think that's a very, that group might be two guys, man. It really might be two guys. And it's, and it's those two, you know, I haven't spent as much time thinking about it and going through it all again, but those are so mainstream. Those, those are, Those are constantly updated daily things on like, where are you at with Harden? Where are you at with Kyrie? Where are you at with Ben and Joel?

Or where are you at with, you know, what LeBron's legacy is going to be? The Utah one's a good one, but it's just not, again, it's to the national media point that you just made. I just don't know that it's repetitive enough for it to end up on that, right?

Well, don't worry. The league will fix it so they're not in the finals anyway. Oh, man. They're so good. Conspiracy Bill is here! Are you willing to admit that they could come out of the West? No. See, I am. I don't know why you'd be so dismissive

of that. I'm just not there yet. No, listen. It's the 2014 Spurs angle. I get, they're just not there yet. No, I listen, I, I, I get the, it's the 2014 Spurs angle. I get it. I just think I don't want to overreact to this first half of the season. Cause I think so much of it had to do with luck and who didn't get COVID and who did, and who didn't have one injury. And you know that I think they, they were, they probably had the luckiest first half of the season Just from all the Dumb stuff that could submarine a team

For a week, two weeks, whatever They didn't have any of it So No, like Dallas had the most Arguably Or I don't know It's the top three most The Celtics had a lot of it

Like they Right as Tatum gets COVID Right as they're taking off I think a lot of teams got hit with it I think Philly had a lot of weird shit Toronto had a lot of weird shit Miami had had a lot of weird shit. Miami had a shitload of stuff. Miami. I mean, the Wizards actually had a stretch there. I don't think they played

for over a week. They missed like five games. All right. So we can talk about Utah having a better run of it. By the way, LeBron said this in his press conference today. He was saying they asked him why he played 36 to 37 games. He was like, what is the reason? He's like, lucky. I just got lucky. I didn't have any of this stuff

happen to me. So Utah was lucky the first half with just games played and who stayed healthy. Yeah, but they smashed the point differential. They did. And even without Conley, they still ran through teams. Even in that loss against Philly.

This is so interesting to me because you were the you kind of planted your flag on regular season basketball and playoff basketball are two completely different animals last season. They are. I just think they're good. Now you're swimming it back.

No, no, no, no. I'm keeping my flag there also allowing me to watch the first half of the season. See, look, I picked Utah to win the West last year. Now, yes, I was trying to be a little different. Did you? Yeah, I did. Ooh.

Did that win anything in the Zag Awards or no i would definitely try to every now and then when i just feel like everybody's doing everything different all you know or doing the same thing i was like you know let me let me see what happens here because i still wasn't you know i was still in that mode of we always felt like one of the super teams had to have that great third guy and then we realized like the last years, actually, you don't. Because there isn't a Golden State with Durant. There isn't a Miami with the three dudes. Now we have it again in Brooklyn right now

when Harden goes over there, so we could be back to that. But the Lakers actually didn't need that third guy. Really, the third guy for them last year in the playoffs was Rondo. But when I watch Utah, I think there's stuff there that translates. They're defensively solid. They shoot the hell out of the ball. This is two years in a row. Defensively, they slipped. I think the Gobert thing is resolved.

Even though Mitchell, and this is a really cool thing that I'll notice with him, he's had stretches where he blew us away because it was so unexpected. He goes where he goes, and you're like, man, this thing is real. Are you paying attention to what Donovan Mitchell is doing here and he's got an attitude

and like his ballsiness to his game when he went in a bead when he went at him to try to dunk on him and got the and one because like i was like i don't know how many other guys would even try in today's game because they wouldn't want to be embarrassed he didn't give a shit but he also kind of reverted back to the guy that didn't have a lot of help in utah in a couple of those leaner years where they're basically you know just over 500 where I was like, oh, no, is he going to turn into one of these dudes that's so talented but now is making horrible basketball decisions by forcing the issue so much? And he's not that, but he was doing it, I think, because he was trying to go at Simmons, and Simmons got the better of him defensively. So that was just one of those moments. But overall, I think there's a lot there that I really like that I'm surprised

you're kind of doing it's new and they're dismissive, even though, yeah, my original point is true. There's never been a bigger separation between regular season playoff basketball than what we've seen the last few years. I can't get past, if I'm in the last five minutes of a big playoff game, the other team is going to have somebody better

than whoever Utah's best guy is. And I can't get past that point. So it didn't matter with the 2014 Spurs. But if you think back to that Spurs team, they hit some 1970 Knicks type thing that they had going on with the ball movement and three-point shooting. The ball movement was the start of the Golden State thing. People repositioning, moving around.

But they also had Parker was a really good option. If a game ever got close, so was Ginobili. You could always throw it to Duncan, stuff like that. The Philly-Utah game, I thought, even though it was one game, Mitchell wasn't great. But there was something telling about it that it basically became Mitchell against Embiid, and I just liked having my money on Embiid in that game. So that's the thing I can't get past with Utah yet.

If they win, it has to be the totality thing, the 2014 Spurs thing. But you also need the opponent to kind of be on the other end of it like Miami was in 2014. I don't think that 14 Spurs team would have beaten how many title teams out of the 2010s. Yeah, and not many because we're talking about two of the greatest rosters we've seen. I thought that 14 Heat team was pretty weak if you look back at it.

Wade was kind of washed up. Wade was like half a Wade at that point. Their role guys were terrible. Remember Chalmers was playing a lot. And by the way, LeBron was already LeBron was doing like the classic body language like I'm distancing myself from these guys.

As we're getting smoked. Like when the rematch you're talking the rematch, right? I'm talking rematch. When they were doing the rematch, he is not afraid to let everyone in the audience see that he's like, man, can you believe these fucking guys? You could feel it. Last most insufferable post-title narrative,

the Clippers will never win the title, so we don't have to worry about that. Coming up, Blake Griffin go to the Nets. I have some thoughts. That's next. So Blake Griffin got bought out by the Pistons. They saved $13 million on like $66 million worth of his salary.

And I still don't understand why teams do that. I would just much rather have the guys in expiring and play a game of chicken with them. If I'm an NBA team, I'm supposed to be competing in a 30 team league. It's always like, oh no, it wins goodwill with the agents. The agent, yeah, that's what everybody always says. Fuck that. I'd be like, you know who would win goodwill? Maybe he

should have done more for the $180 million I was paying him. Anyway. That would go over well if you were a GM today. If you said that. You think so? Yeah. I'm going to work on that. Send out a tweet, like a daryl mori tweet but instead it's like this fucking guy mailed it in 66 million to go shoot me because daryl is you know he's really good at social media and he's incredibly supportive

of everybody i mean he's dropping g league shit left and right but it would just be it would be hilarious if there was an anti-that GM who just went, can this guy hit a fucking shot? I swear to God, I've never seen Drebko ever hit a shot in the fourth quarter. Who signed this guy? El Alamino. Whatever. I have a two-part question for you.

True or false, Daryl Morey on Cameo? True. Second question. How much do you think Darryl is charging? Well, I don't think he can charge.

He can't charge a ton because it'd be a bad look. Like, that would be weird. I think Ravel charges a ton. So, I'm going to guess like 50 bucks for Darryl. $999. What?

Yeah. That seems like a lot of money for Darryl. Emmett Smith isn't even that much. he's doing it for the aclu okay well now charity all right great job by him all right great job daryl darren revell is charging 50 oh really i think he dropped that maybe it was a demand thing that still seems like 48 too high i don't get it I just don't get cameo. With that said, I've sent my daughter multiple cameos from Siesta Key Stars and it like completely made her day. She had these Siesta Key Stars being like, hey, Zoe, good luck with your soccer season. And she was like delighted.

And it was like 39 bucks. Sarah and Carissa did it for my birthday and they did all Bravo housewives. Oh, they, they made me out to be like this real estate mogul. And one of the housewives was like, Oh, it's too bad. I'm taking, you sound like a real catch.

And I was like, Oh, this is, do I follow up here? Cause they don't always get divorced. Is this the seeds? Like I'm here for you. You should have,

you should have maybe followed up. It's a tough day. It's been a tough day for me well you know the Megan Markle thing is a tough one for you I couldn't even watch it I taped it it's going to take a couple more months have you ever told that story in a podcast yeah like twice in the last couple weeks alright there you go

we're going to talk about Blake Griffin so he signed with the Nets this is one of those things where if you were in a coma in 2014 and you woke up, you're like, hey, what happened? Tell me who are on the different NBA teams. I was like, well, the Nets have Kyrie, Durant, Harden, and Blake Griffin. You'd have been like, what? How many teams are in the league?

Like five, right? You would have had like a heart attack. Is it an earthquake? What have we? This is not the same Blake Griffin. And here's my question for you. Get ready. Are we sure he's better than Jeff Green?

He's not. He hasn't been this year. He hasn't been this year. He's not better than Jeff Green. You know what was really funny about this? And this is been this year. He hasn't been this year. He's not better than Jeff Green. You know what was really funny about this? And this is always this thing. And look, for the people that listen to this pod, how locked you are into the NBA or just, you know, you like Bill. But there's always this reminder at times how obsessed we are with something. When you'll see the reaction, be like, oh, it's a fucking rap.

They got Blake. And you're like, wait, what? Now, it might be a rap before he showed up okay yeah but to think that somehow the blake we've seen this year in detroit is now this missing piece this big that they're gonna add um you know but who knows i mean the thing is as we've seen what we know. Well, we know that it's going to be a different opportunity for him with Brooklyn because whoever the fourth and fifth guys are, are just wide open all the time. All the time. We know. Okay.

What do we know? He doesn't have his athletic ability anymore. No, he doesn't. He doesn't. It's, I mean, that thing that went around about how he had inducted since 2019, it went way deeper than that. And look, I'm not saying this to be critical. I really enjoyed watching Blake Griffin play

for years and years and years. I think he had a great career. I think he's going to the Hall of Fame. I thought he was the third best player in the league by the end of the 2015 season when the Warriors won their first title. I really did. I thought he was the third best player in that playoffs. he's had eight surgeries and he can't move anymore.

And I don't think switching teams is going to change that. And, you know, you can look at any metric and this is something I've talked about before on this podcast. There's no metric better than just looking at somebody's basketball reference page year by year by year. And when you see somebody who is like 22 points and 12 rebounds and seven, eight free throw attempts a game, and it starts going down and all of a sudden they're 12 and five,

they're three free throw attempts a game, they're shooting 37%. Like there's no coming back. So if the question for me is like, can he be as good as like Larry Johnson on the 2000 Knicks, right? No, I don't even think it's... Oh, wait.

I was thinking of like early Larry Johnson. No, I'm saying Larry Johnson near the end on those Knicks teams when he was like athletically compromised, had a bad back. The Heat series stuff. Yeah, or the 99 finals or the Raptors series next year.

Could he be somebody that hits a couple threes, knows where to go, what to do, isn't afraid because he's been in a bunch of big games, kind of knows what his physical limitations are, knows how to play basketball, doesn't need the ball. Like maybe, but I would still rather have Jeff Green. I'm sorry. And if you're telling me he's going to get the minutes over Jeff Green,

I think that's a mistake. Unless there's some athletic Renaissance coming for Blake that we are, you know, you watch league pass. I watched league pass. I didn't see it in those Pistons games. I saw a guy who couldn't move anymore. No,

but I also thought it was a weird spot. Cause he still kind of felt like it was his team. And Jeremy Grant's like, no, those that's that shit's over. And you almost, I felt like Blake almost gave up on his aggressiveness too like okay this sucks you know this just isn't working out so he was trying not to get hurt no I just I think he was bummed out I think his bat I think he was basketball bummed out on top

of everything else and yeah the reason the Nets thing was almost immediate is he and Kyrie are apparently really cool um and the biggest reason why I went to Brooklyn is because of Kyrie. Uh, well, he's, he's, you know, my draft class theory,

when these guys who are right around the same draft class and they knew each other since that a, you turn them in, in Vegas when they were all 15 or whatever, he's just known all these guys forever. And, you know, this is kind of why you don't want your players to be your GM,

you know? Cause these guys obviously are like, we want your players to be your GM, you know, because these guys obviously are like, we got to send Blake Blake's available. We've got to get them. They're not watching Detroit on league pass. They, they're not factoring that he's had nine, nine surgeries.

Well, I just think for Brooklyn though, because they're so limited after the trade and then they're limited because they, they've been doing all these shorter deals to avoid certain tax parts of it. I mean, obviously they're going to pay into the tax, but if you've been looking at what they've been doing, and I remember some former GM, I forget who it was, was writing about, hey, this is what they're going to end up doing because this is going to be the cheaper way to get through this. And so then to add Blake, I think it's just another body to throw in the mix.

So I don't know if this automatically means he gets all Jeff Green's minutes. I also think because of those guys, now there are going to be a couple games where he has some opportunities and probably puts up some decent numbers, but your original point's the best one. When you go to basketball reference and you see a massive decline in rebounds,

free throw attempts, steals is usually a good one because it just means like... Yeah, and you're like, okay, so you just don't move around that much. You're not getting to the free throw line as much. You're not fighting for rebounds the way you used to.

You're not jumping into passing lanes. You know, you're not... There's an effort thing there because your body just isn't responding around that much. You're not getting to the free throw line as much. You're not fighting for rebounds the way you used to. You're not jumping into passing lanes. You know, you're not, there's an effort thing there because your body just isn't responding the same way. And you don't, you're right. You don't see like a guy in those three-year declines and then have come out the other side of the curve. We're like, oh, cool. He's back to 22 and 10 again. Like, no, it's over. So I think he just went there to be happy. He's tight with Kyrie. And I think he'll have some moments, but the overriding,, bigger picture reaction to it was like, oh, Brooklyn, as if this is unfair. You're going, okay, well, you guys haven't watched him in Detroit at all.

As a three-point shooter, he's 33% for his career. He really only had one season that you'd be even a little bit fired up about. His 2019 Piston season was really good. He took seven threes a game that year, shot 36% from three, got to the free throw line 7.3 times. So that was two years ago. He turned himself into, remember? I mean, back to your years when you had him at peak athleticism,

the biggest hangup in his game is you could see he was thinking about a shot. Like he would get it and it should have been up, and then he wasn't comfortable. That's a hard thing to develop, and he deserves a lot of credit for that, where he got to the point where it's like, okay, when I'm supposed to, when I get this look, I can't even think about it, and he actually turned himself into a shooter.

I think if he's out there, the other team's not guarding him. They're delighted that he's out there. The thing is, there's always one net you're not guarding because these other three guys are so insane. Right. Look at Brown and these cuts. Look at Joe Harris's numbers right now.

Even Jeff Green's had some moments. So I think the scary thing for the rest of the league is just you're always going to be leaving one of those other guys. So that's where I think Blake will probably have a couple moments, but I don't know that it means the difference. So that's my next point. KD and Harden, let's give them 37 minutes a game. Let's give Kyrie 35.

So I'm already at 74. I'm at 109 minutes. You can only play 240. I'm going to give Joe Harris 30. I'm going to give Bruce Brown 30 because he's the best player in the league. So now I'm at 169 minutes. I have, I now have 71 more minutes to play with.

Let's give DJ 25. I'm saying in a playoff series. Let's give, I mean, he's 23 now, so right. Let's give Sean at 18. How many do you want to give Shamit though?

And Shamit, Shamit 18. I'm at you want to give Shamit though? And Shamit. Shamit 18. I'm at 43. Now I have less than 20. I have Jeff Green. I have 15. And Claxton. Let's say Nick Claxton gets the other six. I just don't know

who Blake's taking minutes from. And if you're telling me it makes more sense to play him than Jeff Green, I don't see it. Because with all the jokes we've made about Jeff Green over the years, you can still switch with him on D. He can still make an open three. He can still run the four. So I, to me, this is like,

I actually think it would have been better for Blake to go to a team where he could have, that actually could have needed him. You know, that actually like maybe needed real minutes for him. And I don't, in my opinion, it was not the Nets. Okay. And I would put in Luau Caballero in there too because he's been alright. I think he's got a little toughness to him, a little bit more edge than maybe if you

haven't watched him. The Claxton thing is kind of interesting because Claxton, when you watch him out of Georgia, the most frustrating thing was like, does this guy not realize how enormous he is? What's going on? Like he played offense, like a perimeter guy, like way too much perimeter,

but it was still really flashy when it was right. And it was exciting, but it still wasn't smooth enough. Like some of these other six, 10 freaks that we have that actually are like legit perimeter players. But if you've watched, and I know you have, cause you had a ton of Nick Claxton stock.

I did. You know, all of these guys that are big and they play in that dunker role and Harden's a master at it. And Kyrie's just as good. And Durant can, can do whatever he wants to. There's this resurgence of players that put up these like big productive

minutes. And I'm not saying it's like 20 points, but they're putting up these awesome like numbers in limited time because they're so efficient because they're wide open. Everybody just collapses and leaves them. And so Nick Claxton, if somebody just said to him, Hey dude, awesome numbers in limited time because they're so efficient because they're wide open. Everybody just collapses and leaves them. And so Nick Claxton, if somebody just said to him,

hey, dude, whatever your long-term goals of yourself as a basketball player, that's great. We're going to put those on a shelf because you're going to be dunking everything every time you're in. You're going to be like, watch Capella video

and see what he did with Harden and you're going to do the exact same thing. Like, hell, you might have 20 points in a playoff game because of the way a team defends you. Blake stats this year is 12 and five, 37% shooting 32% from three, 3.1 free throw attempts. We'll see that to me, this is, if you're getting the Blake that we watched first half of the season, this is somebody that will be the Mitch in the Mitch Richmond ceremonial role, not really playing. If they feel like athletically,

they can bring him back in some way and that there's, and he's telling those guys, I'm not where I need to be yet, but maybe I will be in a couple of months, you know, give it, give me, give a chance.

He's got DJ on that team too. Obviously they were very close. Um, there is a fun path. Like, look, I'm not saying it's a hundred percent chance that he's done. I would say it's 90, but let's say he actually became, he worked his way back a little athletically. He found some, I don't know. He started doing Pilates, whatever, and became a fun role player on this team. And then, core. Getting to play Doc,

in, if they played Philly, getting to go through Doc, and then in the, in the finals, he could play the Clippers, right? Or Phoenix,

Chris Paul would be fun. There's some fun, like, storylines with him, but I just don't think he's good enough for it to matter anymore. It hasn't been great. I think we're on the same page. I have nothing else to add. By the way, does that

mean... Yeah, everybody likes Blake, I think. Does that mean that you think Phoenix and the Clippers have a better chance of coming out of the West than Utah? No. Okay. I don't know what to think. I think this is a weird year. I think we have to be prepared for

a 2020 heat scenario with about nine teams. I think this is a weird year. I think we have to be prepared for a 2020 heat scenario with about nine teams. I really do. I think with the short season COVID, all this, all the shit, like the, the baggage from last year's playoffs. And then this season starting right away, I'm just not crossing people off like I would in normal years. Remember there were some years like 2018, it would be like three teams could win the title. That's it. I have no other teams. I have these three teams. How many teams right now do you okay with? Like nine or

ten. Okay, so nine or ten? That seems like a lot. I don't know. Let's do it. Let's go through it. Okay. This wasn't even planned. I don't think we should need prep on this. Am I allowed to put the Celtics on this? Well, let's wait to see how long it takes before we get there, and then we'll address that topic.

I think Philly could win. Brooklyn. Milwaukee. Miami Heat. Utah. Phoenix. Both LA teams. And I cannot rule out Denver yet, so that's nine. I'm just not ruling Denver because I think

they have a trade that they could make that would change their destiny. So I got nine. So that's nine with Denver, not including Boston. Not including. Yeah. So how about this? Eight, not including Denver and Boston, who I think could change their destinies with trades. Boston's the most obvious. We could change our destiny trade team just because they have that crazy exception. Okay, but what do you think? Are we going to

do any trade stuff on tonight's pod? Yeah, I have it coming up next. I have Charlotte as my 11th team as a wild card. To win the whole title? Well, if Monk, if he keeps going like this, I just don't think you can rule him out yeah i have some trade stuff um yeah let's do that now so i wrote down all the trade targets look at this i really did a lot of homework god you did a lot of homework this is the least amount

of prep i've ever done for one of these. The least. You know what I realized? What? Sometimes you just got to... I felt like I could take the podcast. I feel like I could have a nice little stretcher. I'm going back. I'm on my iPad a little too much. What I do, I like to self-evaluate sometimes.

I wasn't taking notes enough. Sometimes I like to sit with a nice piece of pen, nice white sheet of open paper. So you did some real homework, though, on the pod. So you don't tell me about any of this. I usually always prep along with you. This one, because it was All-Star, I wrote down one note. Usually I prep on the iPad, but what I find is when I prep with the notes,

my brain works better. Yeah, I just kind of remember stuff better. You know what I stopped doing a few weeks ago? I put my phone away during games because I don't want to text i don't want to text anybody because i i was just because the season has been so weird and the no we we know what this is so we need to keep repeating it over and over again but i felt like i'm like are you watching these games are you really watching these games and you need to you need to kick your ass here a little bit because i went through like a week or so where i go i know what's happening i know what's going on but i wasn't watching it's like all the people yeah the people who watch

twitter instead of the game that'll never think they watch the game but so then i was like look it wasn't even twitter for me it was it was texting and i was getting text and i went you know what i'm gonna give myself i need to to restart this and i can't get lazy and i also started doing a little bit more player stuff where I'm just watching players now for longer stretches, because that's always a nice reminder of like where you're at with a guy. So anyway, enough about me.

So I'm just going to throw some trade questions at you. Okay. If you're Sacramento, this is question number one. If you're Sacramento, do you question number one. If you're Sacramento, do you trade Heald or Barnes? Barnes. I mean, Barnes' deal is still a decent deal. It's what?

Got a couple of years on it. I think it goes into 22, 2018. Yeah, Barnes is 22.2. And it goes down. Yeah, it goes backwards. It's a much more favorable deal. Healed is 24.2 and it keeps going for another couple of years. And so I've been, I've been watching Barnes a lot the last couple of weeks because I do think he's a real Celtics possibility. And I've said this on other pods. I just think he's been really good this year. I I've been

consistently surprised by how impressed I am by him game to game. And he's been really good this year. I I've been consistently surprised by how impressed I am by him game to game. And he's somebody I was never a big fan of. I think he's been up and down. He had a couple of weird Dallas years. He's also been in a lot of big games. He's one of those guys. You think he's like 33, he's only 28. And I think he's a guy who could make, he could, He could make threes. He's shooting them really well this year, but he can also you can throw him the ball with like seven seconds left on the shot clock and he can actually create a shot.

And what the Celtics really need is a wing who can spell Tatum or Brown and play with them together. It's their glaring hole. Barnes is 17-6. Shooting 49%. He's 39% from three. He's getting to the free throw line almost five times a game. And a great guy by all accounts. If I'm Sacramento, I'd rather keep him and trade Buddy and play Halliburton more. And I

think Buddy would have real value. But I don't know if he would have more or less value than Barnes, but I just think teams prioritize shooters so much. I would rather keep Barnes than trade Buddy. So that's where I stand. That's a tough one. And maybe other people look at it as easy. I'll tell you this. When I've asked teams about who's available,

just in general, like, hey, what are you hearing about whatever? At Sacramento, the front office was told, we're not sellers. There's this group of stagnant franchises that want to taste the playoffs, and they don't want to make it seem like they're rebuilding when they just were rebuilding over and over again. and things going in the wrong direction, I'm sure there's a time where you re-evaluate it and say, all right, what's the market for the guys? I think the Barnes market would be less competitive. So I think Barnes would bring, or I think he'll bring you back more, but maybe you're right.

Maybe, you know, Barnes, I think, takes a ton of shit because he was so bad in that 16 finals. There could be big moments where the most eyeballs are on you, and then you can't really shake that. When for the most part, like, look, he's not a superstar, but he's a pretty good offensive player.

You know, he's had a nice career. He's young. The contract gets cheaper. So it's not like he's a rental here. So I would have to think for a decent first, you could probably get it done. But I'm sure Sacramento, if they're saying no, it'll start with, hey, we need a young player and a pick, too, on top of everything else.

But Barnes might actually be a better fit to get healed out of the Fox-Halliburton rotation. To stay in Sacramento. That's how I feel. So Buddy Heald, he's having a weird year. He's taking 14 shots a game. 10.3 of them are threes. And he's a 38% three-point shooter 38% three point shooters. He's basically just a

three. All he wants to do is shoot threes, which is fine. I actually think there would be more valuable teams for him to be on for what his specific skillset is. Right. It's just real expensive. Right. So, but if he's 15 million a year, you're excited about it. If he's in that Joe Harris Bertons range, but now you're paying the extra thing. So you start looking at like, you know, Atlanta could put a Snell Rondo package together with a young guy for, for healed. The like Charlotte could get Zeller and Biambo,

whatever that, not that they need. Wait a minute, Buddy, Buddy wasn't that bad. It was 494. So he's at 20.2 and 18.3, and then he's unrestricted again here in two years. Buddy is? Yeah. I thought he had three years left.

No, he has a declining one too. I mean, it's the same thing with Vucevic. Vucevic goes from like 28 to 26, 24 to 22 million. Let me throw this trade at you. All right. Green, Danny Green and the Mike Scott and Maxie. Okay. I was wondering if you're going to put a player in there

that I'd want. And let's say a future conditional first for Buddy. And you put him on that Sixers team. And now I can space the floor with Seth Curry, Buddy. Now Simmons is my only non-shooter out there with Embiid and Harris. And that's a really tough team to guard. I like it. I actually do.

Because you put another shooter out there. And look, Danny Green, it's going in the direction that you'd expect. I mean, Danny Green's been in the league a long time. He's done some great things. The counter, if you're the Kings, they're like, why do I want Max at? I have Hal Burton and I have Fox. No thanks.

I would just rather have the rookie contract. I don't care about the other pieces of it. But, you know, again, some of these owners go, I thought we were just rebuilding and now we're doing it again. Even if it's a better basketball decision, they just have a hard time with it. But again, some of these owners go, I thought we were just rebuilding, and now we're doing it again. Even if it's a better basketball decision, they just have a hard time with it.

When I heard that thing, and look, by the time I hear it, it can be outdated. Or it was like, hey, Sacramento's supposedly not. They're telling front office, we're not trading, we're not trading, we're not trading. I'm not predicting that. The trade deadline's the 25th. We're still talking about two weeks. Sacramento would actually be malpractice if they didn't make some trades.

Exactly. Dallas is another one. And Dallas has that weird thing with the Porzingis picks that makes it hard for the new trade picks. But they have the James Johnson Boban expirings that basically add up to 20 million. You could put in Josh Green, their first rounder that they took last year and basically say, cool, we'll take buddy healed off your hands. Uh, I do think it makes more sense for them to trade him selfishly. I hope they trade Harrison Barnes. Cause I think he would really help the

Celtics. So, all right, that's our first one. Second one. Do you think Al Horford is a piece? Actually, let's take a break and we'll come back and we'll talk about Al Horford. Al Horford. So, if you're Chicago, Charlotte, or the Knicks, you have a legitimate chance to be like a six seed. You might even be able to skip the play-in teams

and just go right to the playoffs where you're locked in. If you're the Bulls, you know, you have an all-star who can go mano a mano with people at the end of games. You have the auto porter expiring. You have a bunch of young players. Al Horford's been playing pretty well in OKC this year. Billy Donovan history, obviously.

Could teach Wendell Carter a few tricks. That's a possibility. Or the Knicks. It gets a little tougher with Charlotte because I think they would have trouble adding up to the thing. But if the Bulls got Al Horford, and let's say they gave up Otto Porter and a conditional first-round pick

where it's top 10 protected this year or whatever, would that be worth it if you're the Bulls? Would it be worth it to actually try to be a good team this year? They're another one of those teams, although I wouldn't say they're as stale as, say, a team like Sacramento. But they're fun. They're a lot of fun to watch. I've been more of a Zach fan this year than ever before,

and it's pretty obvious why. And Kobe White's been a lot of fun for them, too. And this is without marketing and there's still some wendell carter moments there which is funny because i think he projected to be kind of like an al horford type even though i liked horford better than carter coming out of the draft but he just did some of these really smart things at duke in a limited amount of time there that you're like oh wow like this guy really sees the game he's a smart player at such a a young age. And it hasn't really happened the way you would hope if you were a Bulls fan. The problem with Al is that it's still $27 million next year. And then it's partially guaranteed.

Then you have some outs. Right. But you're still going to be on the hook for $14.5 million when he turns, what, 37? I think. So that's a lot, you know, it'd be one thing if it's a rental and expiring or something like that. Um,

but that's, that's a lot, man. That's a lot of money for him, even in a slightly better version of him than a ridiculously miscast role with the Sixers. What if I didn't even have to give up a first? Okay.

So he's like, we just want to get out of his contract. Give us Porter in a second. And we're, we're good. We'll call it in right now. You never know with Presti. I mean, look, he pulls that deal off where they take on Paul

as if they're taking back the damaged asset. And then he's able to flip Paul for assets because Paul ended up being a better player than Westbrook was. So he might say, hey, why do I want to trade Horford now? If I have him next year, it's the one year plus the partial guarantee, which is still, again, $40.5 million. I mean, we're talking about somebody how quickly, it's a nice reminder, Bill, how often we're like, this is the worst contract. This is one of the three worst contracts, the most untradeable contract. And then the guy gets traded and might get traded again here.

Some teams might be looking at Horford, watching him going, he was doing a pretty good job with that young group. He could come in here and help us. So I don't think you're totally off. I think the Bulls part of it makes sense. I just don't think he moves gray anymore though. And, and I'm probably as big a whore for defender nationally as anybody. I mean, have you watched enough of the thunder where I don't know,

is he worth 27 million next year to have on a roster? The case for him is he's a rotation guy. Um, great clubhouse guy. Sure. Somebody who can play at the end of games. You know what he is he's a rotation guy. Great clubhouse guy. Sure. Somebody who can play at the end of games. You know what he is, what he can do. For Donovan, that's a great guy to have on your team.

And if you feel like we actually have a good team with a lot of young talent, it would be nice to have a guy like this on our team. We don't really have anyone like this. You know? That would be the case. Speaking of old, overpaid guys, older, does Kevin Love have trade value for you?

Unbelievable question. Um, forever the market on love people would call Cleveland, Cleveland would expect an asset. And the team was like, no, we're doing you the favor because you guys signed him to a stupid extension. And that was the disconnect. And that's why it was never moved. And I think why Cleveland kind of liked having a guy that was connected to that championship run with all these other young players. And you have to pay somebody. I don't even think about him as a player anymore. And I'm not saying that like as an insult, but it's just been so, you know what I mean? Like, I don't even think about it anymore. And the thing is, is there's no way there's not some healthy version of him. That's not still helpful to a good team, right?

So let's say San Antonio calls Cleveland and says, we have Aldridge's expiring. He's kind of luggage at this point. We'll just trade him. You get out next two years of Kevin Love's contract. Give us Kevin Love. We're throwing in nothing else. I think they're going to want a piece.

Seriously. Really? That's what it was on him forever and it's i mean who i don't know that anybody'd be in a hurry to take on 60 million the next two years from him but that's what teams would say about it you know when there was three plus years left on the deal going hey you know what's what's the kevin love thing and they'd be like well hey make us an offer. We want a piece. I mean, I understand it's part of the negotiation, but I don't even think of him as a part of that group moving forward. I keep thinking about the guards and Coro. Can I read you his games played the last couple of years?

2018, 59. 2019, 21. 2020, played 56. I guess it was a shortened season. This year,, 2020 played 56. I guess it was a shortened season. This year he's played two. I can't imagine they think they're getting an asset for a guy with that kind of salary. To me, if I'm Cleveland, like why wouldn't I want to get out of that contract? Great.

Give me a get out of jail free card. I want to build around Jared Allen and my guards anyway and Okoro. And one more good draft pick. Kevin Love doesn't help me in any way, shape, or form. Look, I would think so, but... Think about him on the Spurs. Put him in the Aldridge spot on the Spurs if he's got something left in the tank.

On that Spurs team, how they would use him gets pretty interesting. Is he what, 32? He'll be 33? Yeah. I guess everybody that's 32 would be 33 at some point. My next question for you.

Should Toronto trade Kyle Lowry? So the word on that one is that Lowry's been telling everybody for over a month that he is getting traded. Which is interesting that he's already like, yeah, I'm out of here. So I don't know if that's him saying it. I don't know if that's some understanding that he has with the front office.

I don't know that part of it. But whenever you ask about Lowry, you're like, well, he thinks he's leaving. Can I give you a trade? Yeah, I think they should trade him, by the way. I mean, there was one rumor that I saw about it that was kind of ridiculous. The Philly one? There was a Philly one that didn't make any sense. I mean, there was actually a fake Philly one.

Somebody was trying to say that it was a done deal, that it would happen. It would make sense, you know, the Nova thing. But, I mean, how much would you really give up for Lowry? Would you want to give up Maxie for Lowry if you were going to bounce in a year? Let me give you this trade. All right, look out.

Gary Harris this year or next year. RJ Hampton. Bull Bull. That's too much. And a second. Where are you with Gary Harris? I'm in change of scenery land with Gary. I think Gary needs a new team.

You think it's just that, huh? I think it's like Jeremy Lamb in OKC. He's the memorial Jeremy Lamb. I just need a fresh start. Can I get a fresh start anywhere else? So you could argue they should have to throw in a first because they're taking year two of Gary Harris's contract. I think Denver needs to do something.

And this is why I didn't want to cross them off of my title contender list because they do have a package to get one more good guy. And FYI, like Lowry is like fucking perfect for them. They, you just draw somebody up in thin air. That's exactly what they need. Like that third guy who's good bag.

Hey, Jamal, can you fucking show up tonight? Trying to win the title here. I want to win a title on two teams. Let's go. You know, I think he'd play well with Yoko.

I just like, what do you have Harris's contract at? Cause I have him. I have him this year and next year. Yeah. This year and next year. Okay. All right.

Yeah. I mean, he, that kid made some money. He's made 84 million over this run. I was with somebody about him like look that's just too much to pay for a defensive specialist i mean gary harris did not turn in the person that they expected to be when they gave me 84 million dollars it happens um but he's so removed offensively and he missed time again this year so i don't know if he's ever going to be something you'd want

there the thing i love about lowry is like look what he's done with van vliet look how he's ever going to be something you'd want there. The thing I love about Lowry is look what he's done with Van Vliet. Look how he's fit in. And for all the Lowry stuff that drives me crazy, and I'm justified because there's a part of it, like, hey, if everybody played like Lowry, it'd be like if everybody wanted to go 100 miles an hour, there'd be some problems. And if everybody wanted to play the game like Lowry,

it would get really annoying. But the positive part of Lowry is that he is as good with the ball as he is off the ball. And he's perfect at understanding moment stuff that point guards used to always have. Like we're a point guard, we go, okay, I need to get mine. We've screwed up the last three times down. Or I need to get this big guy involved because he's lagging a bit defensively. Let me make him feel better about himself. Okay, this guy hasn't hit a shot. He missed the last. I'm going right back to him. Lowry gets that stuff like a traditional point guard better than a lot of guys in the league and because he's so good off

the ball i i think he could help out anybody and even though he's had those awful awful playoff stretches um which were legitimate concerns about him it just feels like he's at a point in his career and age where you know i don't know that all of a sudden now like he would revert back to this guy that we saw there for a bunch of years where you're like man this guy can't hit a shot so well then the other piece you left out was he's such a competitive playoff guy and does so many fucking annoying things going against him and i had like i didn't leave that out i know i mean i had I had like PTSD after playing against him for two weeks. All the fucking shit he does. And I think if you put him

on a real team like Denver, Miami or whatever, like he always talk about like, oh, could this guy swing it? Like it's like Buddy Heald and it's Harrison Barnes, things like that. Lowry can completely change the character of your team. Like if he goes to Denver, he might literally change what their team's destiny is

by the shit he does game to game. I really think they need somebody like that. So yeah. And if you're going to be a guard, you can't be a ball dominant guard and screw up the Jokic part of it. No. Because that's, you know,

Jokic this year is so much fun and his understanding, his brilliance is also selfish in a way where he'll go oh okay so this is what we're doing it was like the canner game that they had a few weeks ago he's a canner is gonna have to defend me they don't have anybody else he had 28 shot attempts with a couple minutes ago in the third quarter because he knew he had canner on him whereas there's another game where he'll take like nine shots because he goes i'm gonna get somebody else going here so you know look denver needs to defend better for anything for this to happen. Denver needs to defend better. And then we've, we, I think some of that, the truth. Yep. But I also think, unfortunately, the truth about Denver feeling like they took a step back is a team gets to the Western Conference finals. You start acting like they're supposed to be with that elite group and you're, you're flirting with having Denver there. But the Jamal Murray thing feels more and more like a mirage that we saw in the playoffs.

Like, you know, I think the guy who was before that and the guy he's been since that, that was just this unbelievable run. And it was great. The timing of it was great. But just as expected, he's going to do that again in the playoffs

and play like one of the five best players in the world. I mean, that's what he was doing for long stretches there. And I don't know that that's going to be something that he's going to repeat because it hasn't happened this year

during the regular season. Does John Collins get traded? Well, we know he turned down the $90 million extension. We know going into the year that Lloyd and Travis both apparently were in the hot seat before the season started. And that's why when Nate McMillan decided to come on, they were like, all right, well, that's to replace Lloyd. I mean, this is not secret stuff that was going on. If you're Travis, if you're going to trade Collins, you've got to make the playoffs to save your job. So that means that if you're doing a Collins deal, the word is that they're really looking for a contributor to come back. I mean, look, they've got to get DeAndre Hunter healthy. And then I think Atlanta solves more of their problems than anything that comes back in the Collins trade.

But I don't know. What do you think of Collins? I don't think there's a trade for them with him. Because you're just getting like assets and future stuff. And there's not an actual guy. If you look, they have Snell and Rondo add up to 20 million, right?

So if you put Collins in that trade, now you can get a guy in the twenties. I just don't know who the guy is. Cause they have a weird team, right? They have, if you look at their team, they have guys at every position.

It's not like we need. They're oddly deep. Yeah. They're, they're deep, but with guys, you know, that I'm not sure I like in a lot of the cases. So I actually think they're better deep. Yeah. They're, they're deep, but with guys, you know, that I'm not sure I like in a lot of the cases.

So I actually think they're better off keeping Collins and hoping, you know, either that nobody goes max restriction on them. They can still match whatever contract with them. I'd rather keep them. I think he's really good. I think he's really talented. That's fair.

That's a better way to's fair. You're right. That's a better way to say it. You're right. He's very talented. I have... Look, for whatever reason, I end up on them a lot. I also enjoy watching them. I don't know that I'd say

I enjoy it all the time either. Well, I have the under on their win total for this year. So I enjoy it. I enjoy when they lose. But you know, like Trey was having that terrible game against Miami and you're like, all right,

what's this guy going to look like? Is it going to be different with Nate? Is Nate going to have to rein him in a little bit? And then the guy comes in and takes three 30 footers in a row, hits all three of them and wins them the game. Like Trey Young won that heat game in three possessions. It was nuts. And they were deep, deep chucks.

If Bagley was a tiny bit better or maybe even a lot better, there's a fun Collins-Bagley trade. Look, I'll give Bagley this. Bagley's just not good enough. I did about a two-week, like, I'm going to pay attention to Bagley deal. Yeah.

Because there was another stretcher I was paying attention to where it felt like the perimeter guys had just given up on him and he'd be cutting and showing his hands and then he'd be like, oh, I'm not going to get it again.

Fuck. And then would go through the play. That kid works. like he'd be cutting and showing his hands and then he'd be like, ah, I'm not going to get it again. Fuck. And yeah, would go through the play. That kid works like he, I'm not talking about off the court. I don't, I don't know what his deal is. I heard he's a good kid.

Um, but it's not working out clearly, but he, he, there's a, there's a, he's not giving up out there. I'll give him.

I agree. Like there's a, there's a positive Bagley spin that if you bring him in somewhere, like it looks like he cares and he's trying to fix this thing before it totally goes off the rails. Now I wouldn't bet on him

all of a sudden being like this really under, you know, underrated guy that's actually like really, really good or anything like that because it's, there haven't been enough positives.

But one of the positives is I do like his attitude and I think he's trying his ass off to try to figure out a way to make this work. It just doesn't fit with what's going on. Yeah, and doesn't Julius Randle's success with the Knicks this year make you think differently of guys like

Bagley? I've always liked Julius. Look, I argued Julius over Marcus Smart, and I was wrong, and I don't know that I'm right again, but, you know, whatever. But he was somebody who was never in the right situation and had a lot of right again, but you know, whatever. But he was somebody who was never in the right situation and had a lot of bad luck and six years went by. He was actually okay in that Lakers run, I thought. I mean, his dribble drive for a guy his size,

Bagley doesn't have anything like that. And now that Randall's passing on top of everything else and he's hitting threes. But back to your Collins thing, he puts up really good numbers and he has some moments where you're like my god look at this guy but I think Hawks fans would agree

there's a handful of moments where you go what's he doing right now do you ever notice any of that stuff or I think it's he's playing on a team that's just completely built around Trey Oak which has to suck

I think it sucks to be John Collins honestly well Collins already did He's playing on a team that's just completely built around Trey Oak. Which has to suck. I think it sucks to be John Collins, honestly. Well, Collins already did it. He's got to be like, imagine if I had a real point guard, I would be having so much fun right now. Like a real point guard who actually cared about him and watered the plant and was like, I've got to make John Collins awesome tonight. He doesn't have that. No.

Now the Hawks fans are going to be like, oh, you're saying trey young's not a real point guard i mean a point guard in the sense like the true point guards right which there aren't many but this is right but they're plant waterers yeah we already covered this on the lowry thing but yeah yeah like anybody's ever played any level of anything anywhere no and i don't want to do a big trey thing about this because he's he's been no we've covered it but we've covered this. Look, John Collins himself,

it got out that he complained to Trey about the way he played. And I'm not even sure whose side I wanted to take in that, by the way, despite some of my criticisms of Trey, which clearly were true. And, you know, we're down to... We're on coach number two and we'll see if it ends up looking any different.

But there's something to... Even as talented looking any different. But there's something to, even as talented as Trey is, there's something to be like, hey, I want to reward you guys a little bit more. But then people just say, oh, look at the assist numbers. You're like, okay, we're talking about somebody who has the ball in his hands as much as any three players in the league.

Chris Paul is a good example of this, right? Best example. He, despite some obvious limitations with our friend DeAndre that's another thing I'm monitoring Chris is bound and determined

to turn him into the kind of big man that he wants to play with Aiton's not there no but Chris is really trying to make it happen and he's put sincere thought into it each game this is a subplot that he is monitoring that he really cares about

and if it's ever going to happen for DeAndre Ayton, Chris is going to help make this happen. I know you have a lot of thoughts on this. I'm just saying John Collins is not playing with somebody who's going to the stadium that night going I'm going to put some real thought into John Collins today.

I'm really going to unleash John. He hasn't played with that guy yet. No, but that's why. That's why I'm interested to see what his next two, three years look like. Right. But there's also the part with Trey because his whole life he's had to tell people, like, all right, you're going to, you know. I understand Ty's approach to

everything and i get it and i and you know as i've watched him grow in certain areas um you know so i don't i don't blame him for being like fuck this i'm taking over because everybody's doubted me forever and now look at me i make the all-star team last year uh and all that stuff but yeah i think there's just moments where the other guys on the team, I mean, I said this, it's better than it was. I mean, dude, during his rookie year, it was bad. Like I could see it towards the end of the year.

Like if it was a miss and there was a few possessions, the other guy would bring the ball up the court and not get it back to Trey. By the way, this leads me to our next question. Speaking of Trey, is Rondo on this team in four weeks? You know, Rondo doesn't like the nickname, but God, there's nothing more fitting than him. Think of who

that dude was with the Lakers. A spot up shooter who was nailing threes. And now I think Rondo just wants the ball in his hands. I think he just loves yelling for the ball. I can't believe he signed with this team and I can't believe everybody thought it was a great idea. They wanted somebody to talk to Trey. I felt like a voice

crying in the wilderness. It's like, oh, Rondo, veteran leader. What? Rondo's been on like seven teams. Yeah, but he was so good. I mean, do you remember how good he was at the Lakers? How ridiculous that run was? Yeah, he was playing with LeBron James. You can't fuck around with LeBron James. Over and over again, we've seen these dudes

go on LeBron's team and, you know, he's been able to... I mean, Dwight. He made Dwight Howard happen again. Dwight Howard's still getting paid. Dwight's been good for the Sixers, by the way. Yeah, he has. He kind of changed his career.

Bagley? Get traded? Yes or no? I say no. Think they got to roll the dice one more year with that. I haven't heard anything. Markkinen? Don't know. I mean, just because...

He'd already be on my team. I would have Monk and Markkinen just running pick and rolls on my team now, the GMF. They'd be like, how did Simmons get both of those guys? How did he know? You'd have your offense.

You'd be the M&Ms, and you'd be like, all right, now we're going to watch some Cade video of Oklahoma State. Because if you guys are my central offensive weapons, we're not winning many games and I want you guys to meet your teammate next year. I haven't told you my Cade Cunningham thoughts?

I can't wait to hear them. I'm a little flaccid. How many games have you watched? A couple. So he's like exactly what you always want. He's a big moment guy. He's a big moment guy and you're not feeling it. I need to watch more.

I definitely need to watch more. So I'm not comfortable talking about anybody right now. They're talking about him. Like he's like the surest of sure things. And when I watch the games, I see somebody who's pretty raw. I'll watch some more, though. All right.

Who does he remind you of? I'm not ready. I'm not ready to do any of this. You're not even ready for the who does he remind you of? I hate doing it when I'm ready. Okay, great. I just need to see more.

I'm a little flaccid. You sure that's not a medical thing? Ken, Miami, and Boston get one more guy. We don't need to talk about that. This is my favorite one. Actually, we'll take... Kyle, do we need to take one more break or are we good on breaks?

We're good. I mean, it's DAI, so we can do whatever. Leave that in. Great. Leave that in, Kyle. Would New Orleans trade Brandon Ingram this month? This month? No. Yeah. You don't think so?

No, I don't. If you're trading Brandon Ingram, what would you want? A lot. Like what? Oh, boy. If you're trading Brandon Ingram, what would you want? A lot. Like what? Would you want a two for one or would you want a star back? There's no one for ones anymore in this league. Whoever's trading the really good player just loses. So if Ingram's there and he's as talented as he is,

this is all because you want him to get out of Zion's way, right? Yeah. Aggregators. This is just me. It's just that one man and Ingram to go to another team. Leave Zion alone. Just so Stan doesn't have to run

every out of time out for him. I think Stan's afraid of Ingram. That's the only acceptable answer. There appears to be a lot of it's still Ingram's team moments where I'm with you on the Zion thing. He's a career loser. Well, I wouldn't go

that far. I think Ingram's a really good player. But there seems to be a team hierarchy thing. Okay, fine. But I mean, it's not like he's a 10-year loser. I need you to really be a loser before I'm ready to write you off as a loser. I'm not saying he's a loser like I'm calling this person I met at the coffee shop a loser. I'm not saying he's a loser like I'm calling this person I met at the coffee shop a loser.

I'm just saying, as an NBA career, he is lost. He's been on losing teams every single year. Correct. So why is there a hierarchy that Brandon Ingram is at the top of

when Zion's shooting 61% this season? Because Zion's played like 50 games in his career. Just get out of his way. And I don't think Ingram's good with it. I really don't. I watch a lot of New Orleans. I don't think...

I think Ingram thinks like Zion's like his Robin. I don't get it. Oh, I definitely think that's true. I definitely think that's true. And I think Stan plays into it. And I'm with you because every time Zion has the ball and he's bringing it up, I don't know, nobody has proven

that they can stop that at all. And it's so much fun to watch. It's actually, I'd say right now, the single most fun thing to watch in the NBA where I'll change the channel when he's subbed out. And when he's back in, there's a TV that's always going to be on the Pelicans when it's the Zion

point guard thing, because it's hilarious. And then when teams try to like make a Giannis wall with it, sometimes it's too late. And then he's making some passes that are incredible but i don't know what the numbers are on it i'm just doing eye tests here it feels like in in these some of these moments and then they bring zion out for the fourth and then i think sometimes they bring him back too late for the fourth which is kind of like a weird sub pattern that they have there but it it feels

like it's understood that it's ingram's team when it looks like Zion in this bulldozing one-on-one thing where his handle is so tight and his center of gravity is so low to the ground. That looks like the best offensive option all the time. And it seems like they're not in any hurry to let that transition happen. My number one pick for an offensive option is the guy who's shooting 60%

who also gets fouled all the time. Call me nuts. I did the math. And when he gets fouled, he doesn't even look who also gets fouled all the time. Call me nuts. I did the math. And when he gets fouled, he doesn't even look like he gets fouled. I did the math. Yeah, I did the math. That usually is more effective

than option B. The 60% shooter who also gets fouled. Are you talking down Ingram, though, just to make your Zion point stronger? No, I think Ingram's a good player. Yeah, all right, good. Because I'm not ready to start trashing Ingram. I just don't understand how anybody could watch

these Zion games and go, yep, still Ingram's team. I'll tell you right now, I don't understand a lot of the stuff the Pelicans are doing. I think they're searching for a rotation, and I think it's too easy to criticize when you say, oh, they still haven't figured out

their rotation. Well, we're not good, and you have all these different players. I don't mind when teams don't have a rotation of eight, and they're trying to figure it out. But they've had some closing moments with Bledsoe when I'm like, I think Hart should be out there more. Hart and Bruce

Brown are on my all-time 2020-21 league pass favorites. Bruce Brown's the MVP. Hart's been way up there, though. Then they'll do a thing where they take adams out and then go with melly to try to finish small and then melly doesn't play the next game yeah and then you know alexander walker will be the guy for a little bit and now they're

on the kyra lewis thing where kyra is showing you what he showed in college he can get by guys but he's totally lost defensively i I mean, Miami had this back cut stretch where they were just opening out five out and they would have like somebody set a screen at like the break point and then somebody would just run behind that and it was just layup lines. Like guys, no one would ever help or switch.

Kyra got caught in a couple, to be expected. I mean, he's halfway through his rookie year, but they're trying a bunch of different things there and I don't always get it, but maybe that's what happens. They were number one in offense and number one on defense in February. Do you know that?

Or excuse me, let me rephrase that because that would have meant they were good. They were number one on offense and number 30 on defense in February. Sorry. Makes sense. Well, leads me to my question. Brandon Ingram, good player.

What position is he and what position is he if I'm a finals team? Is he four? I think he's good enough to handle. So could he be Durant? But Durant could defend. I don't think Ingram's

a good defender at all. That whole team stinks on defense. I'm throwing this trade at you. This would be my last fake trade I'd throw at you. I don't think this trade will happen. I just think it's a good trade. I really like it. Ingram to Sacramento for Halliburton

and Barnes. Who says no? Kyle, you might have to queue up the video player for that one. Probably the Pelicans. Probably the Pelicans. But not definitely the Pelicans. Probably the Pelicans. Yeah. But not definitely the Pelicans. Probably, yeah.

I mean, Ingram's ceiling and who he is. I mean, Halliburton's been a hell of a nice player. But it feels like it's a Halliburton for Ingram trade. And I know you love Halliburton. And he's so much fun because he's just so smart. And he does those. I like Barnes, too. I like rejuvenated Barnes.

Yeah, I'm not doing that if I'm the Pelicans. I got to do better. I'm probably not either. I want to pick, too. I'm askingjuvenated Barnes. Yeah, I'm not doing that if I'm the Pelicans. I got to do better. I'm probably not either. I want to pick too. I'm asking for the Kings first round pick as well. Then that becomes more interesting. Wait, you mean like

an unprotected 21? Yeah, like a top seven protected 21. Oh, well then that's that's different. Okay. That's all I have for you. Let's talk about jenny and georgia i made you watch the pilot yeah and i didn't watch it you didn't watch it no you dick i know

i didn't mean to be a dick about it i actually told you i was like all right fine i'll watch it and then i didn't i gave you one assignment i thought that case we're gonna be doing every other sunday and i thought it would be a good assignment to give you pop culture And then I didn't. I gave you one assignment. I thought that we're going to be doing every other Sunday. And I thought it would be a good assignment to give you pop culture assignments of things people are watching in the Simmons house to get Uncle Ryan's reaction. But you just blew the segment. No, I was going to do it this morning. This could have been our parent corner. I know.

Cowher brought me to breakfast this morning. So he's living in a hotel now. I don't know what's going on. Because he sold his his house but he hasn't moved into the new house yet yeah yeah that or he got kicked out i don't know it's one or the other no his other house isn't ready yet he sold his house and he's moving somewhere else so i'm losing a manhattan beach buddy and so my whole day got thrown off and you know know, the other thing is too, is I bought a new car. So I was at the dealership for like four hours, just battling like I'll fucking leave right now.

You know, so my favorite thing is buying a car, like, but favorite random thing. You like it. Oh, I love it. I like it too.

Ask, ask people in my life. I get mad when they buy a car and they don't tell me they were buying a car because I, I love being involved. No, I have all these theories about buying a car. Yeah. Okay. So let's do a car corner. Nice pivot. All right. This is great. Hey, don't put down money. They always try to get you to put down the money. Don't put down the money. Don't get any money. I never put down

any money. Don't put one dime down. Don't listen to them. All they want to do is like take more money. Don't put anything dime down. Don't listen to them. All they want to do is like, take more money. Don't put anything away, put everything, make it, roll it over. That's one to make it clear that you're going to leave. Unless there's a deal. All they want to do is get the cars off the lot. I'm sorry. I'm sorry to ruin it for all the car dealerships out there. They have a bunch of cars. They want to get those cars off the lot so they can bring more cars in. They have a set price for each car for how much they want to make on that car. And their goal is to, let's say they know they can make a thousand dollars in the car. That's like their drop dead point. They want Ryan Russo to come in. They want to make $4,000 off of Ryan

Russo instead of the 1,000. But ultimately they they want to get to near the 1,000 just to get the car off the lot to bring the next one in. And that's it. They don't want you to leave. The money down thing, I've never understood. Now, there's going to be people saying, hey, I live in a budget and I have, but it's still your money. So if you were buying a $30,000 car

and you put $10,000 down because you want your payment to be lower, well, you'd just be drawing your payment from a higher payment number from whatever your savings were in the first place. So you just keep your to be lower. Well, you'd just be drawing your payment from a higher payment number from whatever your savings were in the first place. So you just keep your savings. Yes. Yeah. So the whole, oh, my payment can only be this. I'd be looking at it entirely different. I always do. I go, I don't want to give you a dollar out of pocket. The payment's the payment, but I want to keep my money that I'll take the payments from the entire time.

You definitely can't say, hey, I'm here to get a deal done today and I'm not leaving without a car because you might as well just hand your checkbook over. No, you tell them at the beginning that, hey, I'm spending the whole day going to different dealerships. I like this car. It's on my list.

Can blah, blah, blah, and get them to tell you about it. Make them let you drive it around, but make it very clear you might not stay. I went to, I was going to get a truck. Cause it's been a while. I was a truck guy for a while.

Like a Yellowstone F-150? Come on. Probably like a 250. A Yellowstone action? Maybe probably a 250. Look, if I didn't have to worry about parking, I get a, I get a dually. I'd have like a hitch on the back. I'm not talking like a boat hitch.

I'm talking like, you know, they'd be like, where are you out of, Bozeman? Like, oh, Manhattan Beach. Yeah. So, because it was funny because the guy yesterday was like, don't you have a ranch? Didn't I read something about

you having a ranch? And I was like, no, dude, I don't have a ranch. That's Cole Hauser. Yeah, right. And by the way, there's another thing, I dress like an asshole

because you don't want to dress up. You know, don't wear some fancy watch. You know, you're not there to impress them. But i went to i don't know should i do this should i say that i went to gmc or does it matter i don't know doesn't doesn't matter well because i i sat down i was like all right you know i want to check out maybe the denali truck i've always liked it always like the look of it and um, um, we kind of talked, test drove it, took a number down and he was like,

okay, so the bad news, he's like, the good news is we have the truck. I was like, oh really? No shit. I just drove it. He's like,

the bad news is we're at over market right now with market demand. So our market pricing is this. So the price of the car, the MSRP is this, but we're going to be about 11,000 over because of demand. I'm like, wait, so you want me to start from a position of paying 11 grand over what the sticker is?

I was like, yeah, this is quick. And he's like, what? He goes, I'm going to sell that car today. I was like, congrats. I'm like, I'm out of here. I was like, no version of anything would I ever sit down here and argue over. Like the starting point, I'm 11 grand over the sticker. Are you kidding me? He's like, yeah, man, we're moving these things. I was like, starting point, I'm 11 grand over the sticker? Are you kidding me?

He's like, yeah, man, we're moving these things. I was like, all right, I'm out. So I didn't get that one. But the other one. This sounds like what Sacramento is going to try to do with Harrison Barnes. The Celtics call him like, hey, man, I know what he's worth, but everybody wants him.

The market's the market. They're throwing that third first round pick. You seen Bitcoin, Danny? And Ainge is going like, Austin, he's talking about Bitcoin. What is Bitcoin? So the guy tried to big time you. Yeah, I left. I left and I ended up doing something else.

So he did the whole, I'll be selling that car today either way? Yeah. He goes, I'll be selling this car either way, man. like i guess you will i was like congratulations to you i was like that's an incredible deal for you and he just kind of looked at me and i don't whatever was going on was what was going on and i just don't understand the process yes sucks you're going to be there for a long time but you have to it's almost like any real estate deal. Like you have to be able to walk away from everything. You just have to be able to walk away from it. And if you can't walk away from it, then you're going to lose. And look, there's probably times where you and I bought

a car and we still left. And the guy was like, ah, I got him pretty, you know what I mean? But never, you always win. Not even, not even when I barely had any money. Yeah. Maybe, maybe there was one time. Yeah, there wasn't one time. There wasn't one time you felt like... No, because I had somebody very early in my life tell me, don't put money down. Be prepared to walk out.

Yeah. And if you remember those two things, you're going to be in good shape because they don't want you to leave. Especially like most of these car dealerships, like there's like in LA, Van Nuys, there's this row of dealerships, right? And it's like, you know, basically they're all competing with each other. They don't want you to just be like, all right, I'll go to the next one. They want to keep you in there until they have the car sold to you. That's their goal. So whatever profit they're making, as long. That's their goal. So whatever profit

they're making, as long as it's a little bit of a profit, they're happy. They move that car out, move the next car in. Yeah. And I didn't, there wasn't some like scene I'm kidding about like yelling, Hey, I'll, I'll fucking leave. But I got some paperwork on some numbers and I was like, all right, we're close. I go, I'll be there tomorrow. Let's do this. You know, like, and this was going to be the third time I was showing up to this one place. Cause I went to a bunch of different places to try to figure out what I want to do. Cause I still really wanted a truck. Um, but I just wasn't finding the right thing. And I was like, what is it? It was like two inch lift kit. Like, what is this entry level? Like if I'm doing a lift kit, how come you guys don't do

like the real ones? You're like, ah, you're gonna have to do that custom. I was like, all right. I don't, I don't have a lift kit guy out here. My guy's in Vermont. That doesn't make a ton of sense. And so, uh, we went back in and I was like, wait, the paperwork you sent me isn't even on the right model. I was like, so no wonder this payment's so much better. I was like, you guys are wasting my time. I'm like, it's not even the right model. I go, why would you guys do this? I go, I drove all the way back to, and I was like, this is the third time I've been here this month. I go, that's it. I'm out of here. And they were like, okay, what do you want to do? I was like, I want this car, this number, and we'll see.

So I think I did all right. Kyle, did you find any of this interesting? I think that it's so funny that you bounced on me while I was on the test drive. And you have all this stuff. He knew I wanted a car. And then when I got back to do all the paperwork and stuff like that, he was gone. You talking about me?

Yeah, you. Doesn't sound like he's talking about me. I had to go. Yeah. I didn't know that though. I was all hyped up. I was like, yeah, Bill's here. He knows what's going on. And then I get back from the test drive and you're like, good luck, man. I can't wait to see your new car. First of all, I told you all of this.

All right. Maybe I was too excited about the car. I don't remember all the in-depth stuff. I think I was like, man, I wish you were sitting next to me. Well, next time I will be. Yeah. I told Julie I bought a car once and I actually got mad that she didn't invite me to come along.

I just would have pretended like I was her brother or whoever and just for the fun of negotiating with the guy. I really would have enjoyed it. Maybe this can be a side business for you if things ever slow down. You could just rent yourself out. If any of my friends were like, I'm going to buy a car today. Want to come? I'm like, yeah. Sounds great.

What time? Two o' come? I'm like, yeah. Sounds great. What time? Two o'clock? I'll be there. I loved the... By the way, not buy, lease a car. I think... Do you buy cars or lease? I lease.

I'm a lease person. When we say buy a car, it's a lease. At least... Yeah, but... I think it's... There's also... I mean, look, if we're being entirely honest, too, there's another version of a lease that's depending on what you're doing and what your preference is with cars,

if you'd like to turn them over every three years, then I wouldn't lease, all right? If I were... You know, when I were younger, I was buying used cars. I would try to find low mileage, previous model, and that's how I would get anything close to a car that I want.

But it wasn't like I had any flexibility really in it. You know what I don't miss about living on the East Coast? Is the summer tire, snow tire thing. I just never did it. I know. That's the thing. When you're in your 20s, you're like, ah, fuck it. You have the snow tires during the summer.

The snow tires during the summer. I had a buddy who used to come down to the vineyard for the summer, and he just was like, somebody stole my seasonals. And so every time we'd roll up to some place, it just sounded like an army marching down the street. And it was this big, nasty van. And it was, God, it was so funny because it just sounded. I was like, what are you doing? He goes, this is the only tires i have he's like the other tires got stolen so we're just

rocking winter tires all year what car are you the most jealous of that you have never had could be any price i've only had one sedan ever ever um so I've always been an SUV truck guy. Um, but God damn it. Ferrari doesn't look awesome. Ferrari. Interesting. Yeah. But I don't, I think I'd be over it. I don't know. So low to the ground in LA. I'm the most jealous of, uh, all those Jeep Wranglers that are like wide open. The people driving in California with like the old school Jeep Wranglers. I just, we did, uh,

we did a rewatchables about new Jack city. That's going up tomorrow. And the guys in the beginning are driving this 1990 Jeep Wrangler. And I've just, I've never had that car. I've never known anyone with that car. I'm always, you never knew anybody.

Oh, no, I never had one person in my life who had that car. That was a summer issue on the Vineyard. I know. Bob Marley legend. That's the only time you had them. Bob Marley legend.

A couple of cross sticks across the back, hung up. And then maybe if you really kicked ass, a winch on the front and a fire extinguisher to one of the roll bars. I never had. By the time I could afford a Jeep, then I didn't want it. Because one of my friends had it. It was the first thing he bought when he graduated as soon as he got his money not that he was making a ton uh my buddy sully which i know was shocking for you to hear that name but the first thing he did was he went to a lot bought a jeep and then he and i drove the jeep from atlanta to boston so it was the first year after he was out of school i was obviously still in school

because i had some catching up to do and it was was the worst ride ever. And I went, you know what? I go, this is a fun little tooling around deal. But if you actually have to go on the highway for, for 10 hours, this car sucks. Yeah. It's not, it's, it's rickety. That's been my experience. Yeah. It's, it's so much more fun to see somebody else driving than when you're actually driving it. This podcast went about 20 minutes longer than we expected. It got weird. These are your favorite kind of podcasts, though.

I didn't know if you were going to keep any of this in, to be honest with you. So I just kind of kept going. I don't know if it's any good. It's really up to Kyle. All right, we're going to wrap it up. Russillo is taking tomorrow off. You're back on your podcast on Tuesday and Thursday Right so let's just make sure

Everybody understands that and I'll tweet out something about it When I'm on with you Sunday then it's Tuesday Thursday When I'm off that Sunday it's Monday Wednesday Friday Correct? Yeah we're going to do Every other Sunday until we get to the playoffs Which the playoffs aren't still for a while What is it like mid-May? Something like that

Somewhere we have a while left Yeah's what, what is it like mid may, something like that somewhere. We, we have a while left. Yeah, we have, and we'll do a giant, uh, trade deadline,

something. If we think, if we think there's some sort of trade deadline thing, we might screw up the, uh, Sunday schedule. Um, we're selling.

Good to see you as always. Thanks Bill. Thanks for listening to the podcast. Don't forget about the new every single album podcast podcast on Ringer Dish with Nathan and Nora breaking down Taylor Swift albums one by one. And don't forget, Rewatchable is coming Monday night, New Jack City, which is on HBO Max right now if you want to watch it before we do the podcast. I'll see you on this feed on Tuesday.

Have a lot of fun guests this week, so stay tuned. On the wayside On the first sun Never lost it I don't have To ever forget