The Bill Simmons Podcast - Brooklyn’s Bad Luck, Lakers Scapegoats, and Kyler’s Big Whiff With Raja Bell and Joe House

Episode Date: January 19, 2022

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Raja Bell to discuss Kevin Durant’s injury and how it fit right into their unlucky season. They also discuss the Lakers’ lackluster regular season and poorly constructed roster, the formidable Cavaliers, the exciting Grizzlies, and more (3:28). Then Bill talks with Joe House about the NBA All-Star ballot, the Cardinals’ wild-card loss to the Rams, an NFL divisional-round preview, a golf season primer, and more (1:03:50). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Raja Bell and Joe House Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, our Prestige TV podcast is killing it right now. Sunday nights, breaking down Euphoria, Joanna Robinson, Nora Prenciotti. Me and Joanna and Mallory Ribbon, we broke down the Yellow Jackets season finale on Monday. That is up over an hour of theories and guesses and theories explained, all kinds of stuff. Really fun podcast.

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Raja Bell came on. We're talking about two coaches who are struggling through weird seasons for different reasons. Frank Vogel on the Lakers and Steve Nash for the Brooklyn Nets. We're talking about the ramifications of KD's injury and Cleveland and Memphis

and a lot of the other NBA storylines as we head past the midway point. And then Joe House comes on. I have to fill out my all-star ballot by Friday, so I'm going over the preliminary picks with him. I talked a little about Kyler Murray, golf, and best food in the remaining NFL playoff cities. So that is all coming up. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right. Raja Bell is here. We're taping this. It is Tuesday morning Pacific time. Haven't had Raja on in a while.

He is on The Real Ones. Is it The Real Ones or Real Ones? I think it's Real Ones. Yeah. I think it is Real Ones. There's no The. It's Real Ones. You and Logan Murdoch,

you can hear them twice a week on the Ringer NBA show. You can also see Raja prowling the sidelines of Florida football and basketball games, um, doing parent coach stuff. Uh, speaking of coaches, so Nets and Lakers, I want to talk about them through the prism of coaches. And we'll start, we'll start with our guy Nash who takes this Nets job. And it's been one of the all-time soap operas basically from the moment he showed up. He thought it was like, Oh, this is great. This it's been one of the all-time soap operas, basically from the moment he showed

up. He was like, oh, this is great. I'm taking over this team with Durant still in his prime, come back from an injury. Kyrie, one of the top 20 players in the league. We have some assets. Maybe we make a trade. We're going to be contending for a while here. And his top three guys, I think, have played 16 games together total. He's had injuries. He's had the Kyrie COVID saga, which is ongoing. And then finally, Durant breaks down last week. He's got this weird roster with all these kind of guys past their prime. Rookie's not ready to play yet.

Guys on two-way contracts are trying to navigate anything. And then the pressure of just being one of the league's signature teams. How worried should we be about our guy Nash? Because he seems okay on the sidelines from a stress standpoint. Remember when Obama by 2012, all of a sudden his hair was white? I haven't seen that

with Nash yet, but it feels like we're heading there. This was stressful, Raja. Yeah, this is stressful. I've said this before, Bill. I felt sorry for Steve a lot. And I would say that he's uniquely qualified to handle what's going on there. Because you know him like I know him. He's always optimistic. There's always this sense of, that's why he's such a great leader, right?

It's going to be fine. We'll figure it out and we'll let our culture just be the guiding light. And as long as we're in line with that, things are going to work out. He's got this great way about him. But man, you need some help. And some

of the cards he's been dealt with the team, with the concessions made for certain players on the team, with the inconsistencies of availability. And I mean, it's really just hard to establish culture in that environment, right? So even if you were this great establisher of culture and your culture could guide you guys as a North Star through all of these dark times, well, shit, you haven't even got a chance to really instill it because you've been missing so many parts and it's such a revolving door of

people. And so I've often said, I felt really bad for Steve having been the first gig or his first gig. And that was before, that was before the soap opera that is this year, you know? And I would say to you, I said to my wife, we were watching the game and while he hasn't gone gray, I said to, I said to my wife, man, Steve looks tired. Yeah. He looks, his face looks tired. So I shot him a text and he said he was good. But yeah, man, I mean, I think when you know someone like that, put it like this, when he first got the job and I was thinking about going to join and write, I said no, and they look good. And then they got James Harden. And I was like, shit,

like that would have been a great gig. It looks like they're having a blast. And now, I'm like, best move I ever made. Seriously. Well, you think how much luck plays into all this stuff, right? And just like they're killing the Celtics in

the first round last year. And everybody's like, oh my god. How is anybody beating this team? And then from that moment on, it just all goes to hell. There's some stuff that was under their control though, that I feel like, you know, like, like Harden not being in shape. I have this, I have this video, the all-star game was in LA in 2018. And for whatever, I never do this, but for some reason I was taping a play from the all-star game. And it's Harden in the corner, Westbrook's on him, and he just easily goes by Westbrook and scores. But the striking thing was how incredible shape he was in four

years ago. And he just looks different. And now it's like, he can still get to where he wants sometimes, but it's almost like watching the old guy who's awesome and pick up basketball, who still knows what he's doing. But I think from a durability standpoint, I would worry about him too. Durant went down because Nash had to play him too many minutes. And then the Kyrie saga, but the heart of not coming in shape when we had what, four or five months between the end of the playoffs last year and heading into this year. It was such a weird way to start the season. Then Kyrie COVID right after. And I don't know, man. Sometimes it's luck, but it's also, it's kind of self-imposed bullet wounds. And it's like this weird combination of both of them where now I'm looking at it like,

are we going to remember this team the way we remember your son's team? Where we look back and we go, how the fuck did that team not make the finals? But that's how we look at it now. And are we going to look at the Nets that way? It's a good question. As far as James Harden goes, and LeBron's kind of like this for me.

Still brilliant. I mean, I'm the biggest LeBron fan out there like this for me. Still brilliant. I mean, I'm the biggest LeBron fan out there, but not the same guy. Right? Like still can do things that other people can't. But if you compared it to what he was six years ago, like he's not the same guy. Don't get by people the same way. Like still has great lift, not the same lift. Like that's just father time.

Right? Like it's just father time. LeBron takes care of himself in a way that no one else does. As it pertains to James Harden, he's not the same guy. I don't doubt that that skill set and ability is in there somewhere, but sometimes when you go somewhere

and that role changes on you and it's not all on your back and so you can just take a breath whatever that looks like whether it's not you know conditioning the same or having whatever it looks like I don't know because I'm not in James Harden's like circle to know how he works and stuff but sometimes if it's not all on you

maybe it just changes the way you approach it fractionally and NBA is one of those fractional type of games when you're talking about the best players on the planet, right? Like it's any little advantage and the separation is not as big as a lot of people think. And so if you lose your edge,

then you do kind of become a different player. You're still very good, but maybe just not what you were somewhere else. Well, I say this on the behalf of the normal people. You were not a normal person in your 20s because you're a professional athlete. You had to stay in shape. But for us normal people out there,

you hit this point in your late 20s when your metabolism changes a tiny bit where you realize, oh, maybe I can't stay up till 3.30 in the morning three times a week drinking and then having pizza at two in the morning and all that stuff. And all of a sudden you're like, wait, did I gain weight?

I remember I got a treadmill when I was like 28, 29. So I was just like, I was getting a little chubby and I started playing video games on the treadmill and I worked it up. And the only reason was because you get older, your body changes. And I wonder with Harden now, he's in his early 30s. He's been in the league since 2008 or 2009.

I can't remember what I'm looking, 2009. And sometimes you get older. And the guys who've had the unbelievable careers, the real true top 20, top 25 guys, some of those guys were able to have this second life. Like Kobe's a great example, your guy. Kobe has the second peak from 08 to basically 2012, right at the point when you kind of could go either way as a superstar, right? You could move into that next stage where

you're a star, but Kobe has this 2.0 thing. Jordan had the same thing. Even Duncan, who was so steady for so many years, but figured out how to play with basically one and a half legs, because one of his knees didn't totally work. I wonder with Harden, sometimes that's it. Your body changes, and if you don't do enough to fight it off, you kind of are who you are. So in a way, i'm more impressed that he's able to still get a lot of the production that he used to get when i don't feel like he has the same quickness anymore yeah i mean that's an interesting it's an interesting thought and like just to kind of dig into it a little bit i think a lot of the guys that you're talking about maybe this has something to do you know with the way the game is played today

versus I'd just be interested to see how the player like James Harden, if or of the like, in this game where everyone has the ball in their hands and there are these amazing shot creators and there's all this space, but you're often very far away from the basket, which requires either deep threes or really good first

steps to get where you want to go right um how do you evolve into a different player because kobe like you know i guarded him for for a lot of his career he just you know when i guarded him in philly we were out on the perimeter when when i was really young and he was like a relatively young super super superstar yeah he was beating you with his quickness you know it was but then he just became surgical like on the elbow area or with his back to the basket and so it didn't have to beat you with pure athleticism anymore you know mike mj did that too yeah like it became a different game for them tim d did it a little bit where I'm better than you.

I'm more cerebral than you. My skill level is higher. I might not jump the same or have the same twitch, but I've just reinvented myself as this offensive player. But the game at that point kind of lended itself

to being able to do that because you had players touching the ball on all different spots of the court. Now everyone touches it basically in the same place, out on the perimeter.

And so it's going to be interesting to see these guys start to lose those steps. Like, how do they reinvent themselves as scorers if that's their job? Dirk's another good example of that. Dirk just basically, second half of his career, just masters the foul line. It's like, I'm going here. Nobody's done this

quite this way before, but this is now my spot and you're not going to be able to stop me. Kobe. Paul Pierce did it too. Yep. And I think you mentioned LeBron, not the same guy athletically, but has also reinvented himself

in some really smart ways, right? He has that crazy step back three that if I'm the other team, up until about two years ago, you're throwing a party every time he does that shot in the last three minutes of the game. It's like, please, keep shooting that. And he would shoot it sometimes if he was trying to get

in some mano-a-mano contest with some shooter on the other team. Ultimately, a bad shot. You always want him going to the basket, posting up. Now it's like he's got this crazy step back three that he makes more often than I'm kind of prepared for. I actually don't know how it goes in as often as it does. And then he's also around the rim a lot more than he used to be. I mean, considering going back to the JJ Barea days, but he can punish people now and he's stronger and he's figured out like this, whatever 3.0, 4.0 version. So I guess with Harden,

I mean, we're talking about the same thing. What is the reinvention stage for him? Because he's reinvented himself a couple of times, especially like 2017, 18 range when he was basically like point guard, three point shots and free throws. That was it. Now he's kind of like point guard James,

but there's moments, really sloppy moments. Like the Cavs game I was watching yesterday where, you know, he just knocked over somebody when he had the ball because the guy just, Garland just jumped in and got a charge from him right under the Cavs basket. Just atrophy stuff. And you saw it with Iverson. You were there for the heyday of Iverson. He didn't take care of it. And when it goes, sometimes when you don't take care of it, it doesn't go. I don't know how hard Harden works, but I know that he's not in

the right shape. Again, I don't know him either. It appears to my naked eye that he doesn't look like he's in the best shape either. I think, another good point, he's probably, he morphs into a different type of player, more PG-ish, maybe not as prolific a scorer as he was, but still brilliant with the ball in his hands and so on and so forth. And if I may, like, you know, just to defend him a little bit, like when you're playing the point, when you're playing the point, I had a knockdown drag out with my 12, 13-year-old the other day in practice. He absolutely hated me, told his mom I was every name in the book. But he's changing from a two to a point. And it's a really difficult job. And that was after cooler heads prevailed and we sat down.

And so I said to him, I said, listen, man, this isn't going to be easy. You're making a transition from a player that's got very limited responsibility for what the team looks like as a whole to one that is really orchestrating everything that takes place. And so as that pertains to James in the, in, in, in the chaos that is the Brooklyn, Brooklyn nets team from night to night,

it's gotta be really hard for you to look great when you're trying to orchestrate like and make all this music and all these instruments fit in and you never know what instruments you're going to have from night to night like do you know what i mean like sometimes you don't you know a lot of your instruments aren't orchestra quality instruments right and then you know sometimes your orchestra quality instruments are there sometimes they're not and so just in his defense i think kind of their unstableness as a team might lend it lend itself to like him not looking you know great at times yeah i think i'm probably too hard sometimes with this stuff because i do feel like when you're a professional athlete your number one job is to optimize whatever your body potential is like what

what when you think about it like you show up on time and you get the most out of whatever God gave you. I know you probably talk about this with your son too, but my son wants to play tackle football next year and he's really serious about it. And he really wants to play and he wants to have an impact. And it's the first time we had a real conversation like, look, it's not just about the games now. If you really want to do this this and he hasn't started doing weightlifting and all that stuff yet, but he's going to, and it's like, look, now it's an everyday thing. If you want to be great at something, it's putting in the time day after day, after day, after day. That's why, you know, it's such a bummer Durant got hurt because I thought his comeback this year was just so incredible.

I'm sorry, last year, but then leading into this year where because of the weird team he's on, he had to play this crazy minute load. And I thought he did a better two-way job this year than he did last year. Last year, I thought he would just disappear on defense a lot. This year, took it a lot more seriously

it seemed like from the games I saw. But they also had to put too many minutes on him and now he got hurt. And I wasn't shocked. Were you? No. But again, one of those injuries, I mean, he had a young name, Bruce Brown. Yeah, Bruce Brown kind of fell back into

his knee. I don't know. That's not a warrant here. I can't hang that on Stevie in the franchise for overplaying him. Although you were overplaying him, and I would bet dollars to donuts that he would get hurt at some point. The freak one happened before the overuse one happened. Right? Right. Maybe a blessing in disguise for them.

Like, hey, you shut him down for four to six weeks. If I'm looking for a silver lining, you shut him down for four to six weeks. Like, if I'm looking for a silver lining, you shut him down for four to six. If we can tread water, that accumulation of minutes and wear and tear isn't nearly the same when he comes back. I don't know. But I think it was bound to happen, Bill.

They were just... It's a good point. It was a freak injury, but also with the use that they were doing. I mean, he had one game where I think they played him the entire second half against Indiana. Yeah. It was a lot of stuff like that where,

and it's interesting because we've seen this with great players who became coaches because they're great. They were great players. They look at it as like, Oh man, I would have played the whole second half. And you know, like they,

they kind of, they look at their own great players. Like, well, I would have done that. And that's how they see the world. Right. So look at their own great players like, well, I would have done that. And that's how they see the world, right? So Nash is probably going, eh, KD's fine. 39 minutes, 36 minutes, who cares? I know he is because I do the same thing

at a much lower level. And I forget often that I blow out a calf in game, I don't know, one of the Western Conference finals, and we have a chance to win a championship, but that's because I'm one of the leaders in minutes that year, and I never want to come off the court, and Mike's got a really short rotation. And so you quickly forget.

No player ever wants to come out. You don't want to come out. You ask me if you want me to come out. No. What are you talking about? But sometimes you got to protect people from their own competitive nature for the greater good, which is trying to stay fresh, trying to stay healthy. I feel the same way

about LeBron, Bill. I say it all the time. I love that LeBron is defying all odds in terms of what he's doing at his age. But that's not sustainable for him. Even if it is through 65 games, that body can only take so much. It's too much of a workload for him to just be trying to squeak out a game here and there. Yeah, and we'll talk about Vogel later, but he was taking heat from Laker fans that I knew for stuff like playing DeAndre Jordan. Why does he keep playing that guy? I think he was just looking for any way to try to reduce the load on LeBron. And then finally, they just had to start playing with the five because their season was about to go in the tank. I have some more KD stuff, but let's take a quick break. We'll come back.

This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring, he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too. You won't win the Super Bowl, but your fundraising will support mental health, suicide prevention,

and prostate and testicular cancer research. And if you don't want to grow a mustache, you could still walk or run 60 kilometers, host an event, or set your own goal and mow your own way. Do great things this November. Sign up now. Just search Movember. So the KD thing, it's just such a bummer. I think he had one of those careers, which is still in progress, obviously. He's still in his prime, where we're going to look back at all these different moments and go, oh man, why did that have to happen?

Why did this? And I wish that hadn't happened. And it's just like, that's where we're heading now. He's been in the league since the 2007 draft and you have all these little moments, why did Klay Thompson have to get hot in that game six when they're about to make the finals? Why did KD have to get hurt that one year with OKC? Why did Westbrook have to get hot in that game six when they're about to make the finals? Why did KD have to get hurt that one year with OKC? Why did Westbrook have to get hurt that one year? Why did everybody have to get hurt that third Warriors year, right as they were about to cruise to a third title? Why did everybody have to get hurt last year? Why did his foot have to be six inches over on the line? Why did he have to pick the one guy in the league

who refuses to get the vaccine and now can only play road games and not home games? It's just over and over again. He just, you know, he's won titles. He won an MVP. I think he's one of the 10 best players of all time by any calculation. But you need some luck with this stuff too.

Kobe got luck at a really important point when Memphis was like, hey, we're giving away Pau Gasol. We're not going to talk to any other teams. Any interest? Sure. Here's a really shitty offer from awesome. Here, you have Pau Gasol now. That's really

lucky. With Durant, it's just over and over again. The only luck he's had was that the Warriors had all that cap space in 2016 and he was able to join that team. But that became a curse for him too, because then everybody's like, fuck you. Why'd you go to the Warriors? Why didn't you form your own thing? So in a weird way, the free agency, even the one time he had free agency, didn't move his way because the smartest move for him was the one that everybody got mad about. But I just wonder when is that guy going to get a break?

And then you think like our guy Nash, when is he going to get a break? Nash didn't even make the finals. You had like one of the best teams of that whole decade. Never made the finals every year. Something went wrong. And now this year with Brooklyn, same thing.

And it's like, do we need to have an exorcism with those dudes? I don't know. That's tough. And I, you know, Kevin Durant is the most gifted scorer. It's the best scoring forward ever. It's not even an argument. I'm reluctant. I mean, Larry Bird was ridiculous. Larry's the guy. There's my guy.

He's right behind me. No, no, absolutely. And I caught him at the end of his career. And I've dug back into his videos just because I think it's ridiculous. But Kevin Durant is one of the two, three best scorers of all time. It's not even a question. Well, hold on. The Durant-Bird thing, the difference between them as scorers,

and I would say Bird and Dirk are probably tied for second. Durant, I still haven't met the person who's like the Durant stopper. Bird had moments where, like you watch Rodman in the late 80s against Bird and you go, oh man, he's really making them work. You know, he had, Durant has never had that guy in his entire career.

Who's the guy who's like, yep, I'm here to stop Kevin Durant. Never happened. Well in his entire career. Who's the guy who's like, yep, I'm here to stop Kevin Durant. Never happened. Well, there you go. I mean, when I first saw Kevin Durant up close to Seattle, and I had seen him at Texas, and I'm not paying great attention to college basketball, but I knew who he was.

When we walked out there at the tip, and I stood next to that cat i remember looking over at mike like what in the f do you think i can do with that like it i can't he literally doesn't see me down here like i can't it's just a unique uh combination of size skill athleticism is pretty crazy but uh yeah if you, if you're just 30 a night, every night, every year, it's nuts. Yeah. Come on,

man. 30 nights. It's like, if he doesn't get 30, you're like, what happened? You get in foul trouble. Like I would never,

ever put myself in the breath with some of the better NBA players ever come through the league. But having said that I was a 13 year NBA player, right? So I was doing something right. I was okay. Yeah. ever come through the league but having said that i was a 13 year nba player right yeah so i was doing something right i was okay yeah you know what it felt like the nights where i did score 30 do you know how much of an output physically it took to score 30 points they were they were some of the best nights of sleep i ever had not because i felt great, but because I had just done such an amount of work. To do that

on a nightly basis, this is just cake for me. It's unbelievable. And when I say that, people are going to be like, okay, no, I mean it's unbelievable. You couldn't fathom being able to do that. It's incredible. So to

do that 70 out of 82 games? Whatever. I don't know what you would compare that to man it is the you are the the best ever and at what you do like i don't know who that is but that's what it is it's you know bill you you're random dude i do this a lot man you're random dude. I do this a lot, man. You're random dude at, I don't know. Let's say your men's not, not like an LA fitness. Let's say your local men's run that it's got some good players at it. You know, that person often thinks that they could hop in an NBA game and,

you know, survive. You're wrong. You could not like, you're not, you're not going to survive. You're not going to get a bucket. Like,

you know, so you're skewed already to what you think it is. wrong. You cannot. You're not going to survive. You're not going to get a bucket. You're skewed already to what you think it is, and you just don't really appreciate what's going on. But that guy, he's getting 30 when my job as the best defender on my team is to try to stop that. I've watched two days of film on everything he does to try to take it away. Our whole team scouting report for the morning and pregame was all predicated on the plays that get him the ball where he wants to get it and stopping that. And I've got all of that flying at you. And every single night you drop 30, unreal. It's unreal. Also from different spots, I was looking for this. Kurt Goldsberry did this zone thing

of the most points scored in every zone. And so it's like, I don't know, probably like 25, 26 zones on the court. And Dirk has six of them. And they're all basically around the key. He scored the most points

in each of these zones. Now, Durant will probably pass some of these people on the zones, but I think Durant, when he has the ball on the right side and he can go right and shoot that little jumper on the baseline is one of the five or six most unstoppable shots in the history of the league. I went at the Skyhawks, Skyhawks number one, it's always going to be number one. But I haven't seen really anybody figure out how to stop that. Sometimes they jump at his legs when they know he's going to do the move and it'll oftentimes be a foul, but that's the one time where they, they try to knock him off balance. So he loses his handle. And I think about him a lot compared to Tatum because I have to watch Tatum all the time. And Durant's handle is so much better than

Tatum's handle. It's like the biggest difference between them. Because I think a lot of the same pieces are there. Durant's shot is more consistent. I mean, obviously he's better, he's taller, all these things. But ultimately his handle and his ability at seven feet to just go wherever he wants, but then be able to spring up and every time it's the perfect shot. And the thing with him is, this is why he clicks with Kyrie because he really works at this. You know, it's like to him, he's like

he feels like he's an artist. And all he wants to do is play basketball and work on moves and work on his shots and these things. And that's why he loved Kyrie because Kyrie is like an artist. He's ambidextrous. He has the perfect kind of finishes left, right,

step backs. I think those guys clicked just because the artistry of what they were doing, they could connect with each other. I loved watching Durant this year on this weird, crazy Nets team. I don't care who I'm playing with. I'm

getting between 30 and 35 points today. That's it. Can't stop who I'm playing with I'm getting between 30 and 35 points today and that's it can't stop it I just I feel I've said it earlier on this pod and I will include Kevin Durant in it when I'm talking about feeling bad because what starts to happen is it becomes a narrative about you right like if you're Kevin

Durant or even Stevie if they can't get that done about your ability to really lead you know and I don't think they've been dealt a fair hand. I think the rug was pulled out from under them with, with obviously the, you know, the whole COVID situation and the vaccine versus non-vaccine and the

decision being made. And I'm not even going to get into that, but like you're missing a part of what that was supposed to be. So if ultimately it doesn't work or come to fruition, like, I don't think it's a fair narrative, but I think you are, you were on the right path.

Like ultimately that, that those are going to be questions that people ask if we sit in there and saying, well, how come he never got to a finals? Like either, you know what I mean? Like that's right.

Without, without curry and Juma. Yeah. Um, I actually heard on, it's not a radio or a podcast recently. I heard somebody, this is how crazy the net season is.

Wondering if the nets were better off not having one of the top four seeds in the East, because if there was a game seven in each round, Kyrie would be, you'd have Kyrie for the road game. And I'm like, this is where, this is where we've reached for our guy Nash

that he has to get a five or below seed so he can have one of his three best players in a game seven. This is where we've landed. That says it all. That says it all. You know, the other thing, it hurts me to say this.

I don't like when guys are washed when they pass that point of no return. You can see it, especially in basketball. It's the most obvious of all the sports. It happens in every sport, right? Dante Hightower for the Patriots. He's too slow now.

He was an amazing middle linebacker. He was one of the biggest reasons we came back against the Falcons. Like, incredible Patriot. But now he's too slow to be a middle linebacker and you could really feel in the Buffalo game and it happens. I watch Griffin and Millsap

and it's just like, these guys aren't guys you can have in a playoff rotation anymore. And I think they were actually, with the way this team was constructed with the three stars, Joe Harris is the fourth contract, Patty Mills as the mid-level exception.

And then you need to get lucky with six, seven, eight, and nine. And they just haven't. De'Ron Sharp is interesting. It seems like they're kind of nudging toward him and nudging away from Claxton, who's going to be a free agent. Other than that, they have two-way guys that you can't even use in the playoffs, so they're actually relying on now. But the fact that the Griffin piece, which they had last year, I don't know why he was good last year, not good this year, but the fact that they don't have him, they still need

some sort of center big guy when everybody's back, which they had with Jared Allen. They had to throw in to the Harden trade. I'm voting Jared Allen for the All-Star team. He's a fucking throw-in because Houston's like, hey, can you get us one more pick? They're like, cool. All right. I'm voting Jared Allen for the All-Star team. Who's the fucking throw in? Because Houston's like, hey, can you get us

one more pick? They're like, cool. All right. I guess we can trade Jared Allen for a non-lottery pick in the first round. Houston's like, great.

Let's do that. So it's just that the roster is really flawed. And that's the other thing where they're going to spend over a hundred million on luxury tax Russia and they still have a flawed roster. How's that possible? Well, that takes me

to the next person that I'm going to have to feel bad for. And maybe I shouldn't, but I like him because all of that falls squarely on the shoulders of Sean Marks. Yep. That's not a Stevie issue. That's not a KD issue. That's a Sean Marks issue. Right. Well, we'll see what happens. I mean, they're going to get some reps with Kyrene Harden without KD.

The KD injury, he's had this, a version of this before that he had with the Warriors that, that we actually did a podcast with him right after he got injured when he was on the Warriors. And he was like, I thought I was out for the year.

They do the MRI. It's like, no, it's actually MCL. It's a couple of weeks. We'll see. It could be four weeks. It could be three weeks. It could be eight weeks. Who knows?

The only silver lining, if you're them, is at least Kyrie and Harden on these road games can play together. I think, I'm wondering if they're going to just say fuck it and just pay the fine and have Kyrie play home games. Because what's weird is the unvaccinated guys on the other team can play in Brooklyn, and that's fine. But if you actually live there, you can't.

So we'll see. But speaking of a front office screwing up a team, so you have this Lakers situation. There was a story today in The Athletic that Frank Vogel was on the verge of getting fired after that blowout loss the other night. Then the Lakers came back. They beat the Jazz last night. A really weird game where Stanley Johnson became the best player in the game. And I was watching it, not understanding it. A lot of Utah awards popped up, which we can talk about later. But Vogel,

everybody's been saying this for two months. Vogel is going to become the fall guy for this. I'm not positive he cares. He got an extension. He won a title. And it's ridiculous to blame him. But you think like, is it Vogel's fault they traded

all of their depth for Russell Westbrook? Is it Vogel's fault they re-signed Talon Horton Tucker and let Caruso go? Is it Vogel's fault they re-signed Talon Horton Tucker and let Caruso go? Is it Vogel's fault that they thought DeAndre Jordan and Trevor Ariza could still play basketball when we have three years of evidence now that they can't? Was it Vogel's fault that they drifted towards shooting and ignored all the Rajah Bell types

that actually help teams win titles? I just don't know how this is the coach's fault but this is how professional basketball goes exactly how it goes and i i'm with you in the camp of not so sure frank vogel's gonna care like at this point it's another situation that i'm not envious of the coach to have to be in it's just it is a mess and i would ask the question like if you were gonna fire him if you were gonna fire him after the loss what because you won the game that changed like like you know what I mean like what what are we doing here I don't know I don't understand like go ahead and hang it around

his neck and and let's be done with it and let's move on no it's not his fault like he didn't have anything to do with that um I would be interested to know again huge huge lebron fan huge lebron fan but i was in a front office in cleveland um with lebron on the team and i want to be clear lebron never like comes hey i want you sign this guy right now like that's not the way that works right but there is some sort of dialogue between you know your best player and the franchise and the gm as it pertains to talent that he thinks might work with him you know that's just a prudent thing to do like you're gonna go in and be like hey man you think you can rock with bill like did bill yeah man bill's gonna be great boom um i can hit 18 footers i think i would be able to fit in go ahead right i want to know how much i want to

know how much it was a collaborative effort how much of it was a collaborative effort between you know the front office and LeBron because I do know he favors certain dudes and I know this as a fact when you are an aging player and LeBron is that

you see players from your prime in a light that they're not in all the time anymore. Right? Like, because it's just, you're looking at it through your prism, right? I'm still that guy. And so X, Y, and Z was my nemesis seven years ago. He's still the guy.

And it doesn't work like that. You know? And so that's interesting to me. We used to talk about this with Doc Rivers. When he took over the Clippers they would keep gravitating to these guys that always played well against the Celtics when he was there at the Clippers

the best one was when they signed Byron Mullins to some contract because he'd had this one awesome game against Doc and he was like oh we got Byron Mullins it's like that you he had the game of his life against your team but he would do that over and over again. With LeBron, that's a great point with Westbrook.

He's judging him from four years ago, Westbrook. LeBron's not on League Pass watching all the Wizards games last year. He also clearly drove that signing. Like, there's no two ways about it because the stories that came out after were, I invited Russ over. We had wine. We talked about what it would look like. I think they really thought, we'll make

this work. You put three great basketball players on one team, they'll figure it out. And I was borderline apoplectic and I can't stay in the Lakers. So on one hand, I was delighted that they made that trade because you knew it was such a low upside, high downside. But I was more just stunned as in 2021 that somebody could make a mistake like that. That was a mistake that's out of the 1980s when they would just go get random dudes and throw them together and be like, oh, oh, I guess that's not going to work. This is like we had mountains of evidence that Westbrook can't play off the ball and that LeBron has to have the ball all the time.

So what are we doing? No, I hear you. And having said I hear you, I thought it might work. Did you really? No, I've said it. I thought it might work. I thought, and here's, you know, yes, I knew that. I did. I've said it. I thought it might work. I thought... And here's... Yes, I knew that.

I did. I know Russ has to have the ball. LeBron has to have the ball. Somewhere deep down inside of me, I wanted to think that the two of them, at this point, knowing it was probably the last go-around, were going to be able to figure that out. And what I thought, with two aging stars, right?

Both on the back side of it, what I thought could float them was the one star that wasn't in the same class as them in terms of age and point in career, which was AD's kind of young, vibrant. And both of you take a little bit off your plate, let him go to work, and then become, and none of that's come to fruition. So I'm kicking myself in the ass because I should have admit. Either it's a beautiful train wreck or they'll have moments like last night where it kind of clicks a little bit. Westbrook has a dunk over Gobert. Westbrook has

the game-clinching three-point play and Stanley Johnson comes in. He's doing stuff and now it's like, now Davis comes back, but defensively, it's just never going to happen because it's too hard for them to sustain even like a C plus defensive effort. So if shots aren't going in for even a quarter,

they completely fall apart. And you know, the LeBron at this point in his career, like it's a little like the Brady had this issue on the Patriots where not only is he incredibly famous and not only does he have the ball a lot, but he's also playing in some cases with people who are like 13, 15, 16 years younger than him who grew up watching him and maybe idolizing him.

And it's hard to play with your idols. Kobe had the same thing. Jordan had the same thing when he was on the Wizards. You're not really a teammate at that point. You're kind of levitating above everybody. Davis, he's fine with because same agency and he's a little older. But for the most part, you're relying on some of these young kids who grew up watching LeBron. And now it's like, hey, here's a huge pressure situation. You've got to make these fourth quarter shots. I don't know. It's just, it's a mess. And I don't know how you fix it. Cause the worst thing about the Westbrook trade for them, I keep making this point is it

removed all their flexibility. If it doesn't work, you have no plan B. And that's why I hated the trade. I didn't hate the chance that they took as much as the fact that because of his contract, there was no way out. You do this and it doesn't work. You have no outs. And LeBron, he's got under contract this year. He's under contract next year. Same for Westbrook. Westbrook might be a little tradable, more tradable next year because he's an expiring.

Still going to be tough. He's going to be at like 47 million. And when you have no outs at the age LeBron is at, the ship has probably sailed. So they're going to need Davis to come back and they'll need Davis to be the best big guy in the West other than

Jokic is really their only path for this working out. That's it. I mean, that's the only... And I don't... You know, this is hard for me to say, but I'm going to say it. Like, the style that LeBron plays was a championship bringer.

The bubble was weird for me, Bill. Like, the bubble year, yeah, they won the chip, but, I mean, there's so much going on that year. Like, I don't know that if that had been a regular season and you had to play that out, I don't know that they were going to be my favorite to win a chip. I'm glad they did. I was pulling for them, but the style LeBron plays,

the league has transitioned to a lot of people getting a lot of touches, a lot of playmakers out in space and pace. Well, when you play with LeBron, it's all the antithesis of that, right? It's a lot of people kind of standing around. LeBron's got the ball and we don't of that, right? Like it's a lot of people kind of standing around. LeBron's got the ball and we don't really want to run. Like we don't want to get up and down as much, you know?

And so I think it becomes harder and harder, not only because they're like, it's this generational gap. And some of these guys might be your, you know, have idolized you. But I think stylistically, not a lot of people play that style anymore, you know? And so you get all these pieces whether they're great pieces or not but you're not even getting the best out of them because of the style that you play and if you're gonna do it then you've got to be lebron from three four years ago like do you know what i mean like you got and ad not just not just bronc because i like again i think what he's doing is amazing but ad's got to be the dude you're talking about like you know russ you gotta cut the shit with all the turnovers

and you have to be the russ you know at least in the in the limited amount of touches you're gonna get you've got to be that russ from three or four years ago and if you're not gonna all be those people because we're our ball's not moving and we're slow and all of that and we don't defend then you don't have, you're a 7-8 seed, man. Like, you ain't winning nothing. There was a really fascinating moment yesterday in the Utah game. Like, four minutes left,

Westbrook wasn't back in. And Russel and I were tight. They finally put him back in with like 3-14 left because they had made, they were playing better when he wasn't out there for a variety of reasons. Uh, mostly because they usually play better when he's not out there.

Um, and we're still, it was like, ah, Vogel had to put Russ back in. Like, cause it was in play for, he just was going to get benched for the whole fourth quarter,

which if you're Vogel and, and you feel like the heat is on, that's the last thing, right? You'd be like, fuck it. I'm rushing out. I got to go with the five guys that have a chance to win. You said something interesting about the stylistic stuff with LeBron because I've talked about this before. And of course, people get mad because God forbid, it sounds like a critique. It's not. Some guys are just harder to play with than other guys. And I think about this a lot with the Celtics. Tatum and Jalen, with the way their offense has kind of devolved, are really hard to play with.

They're one-on-one guys. They don't have a point guard. And over and over again, you have these young guys that play with them that are forced to basically stand in the corner. They're not enabled in any way. And you said you've been watching a lot of Memphis. The thing that jumps out at me with Memphis is how non-ball dominant Ja is. They really, really, really go out of their way to enable all these other people.

And Bane gets possessions and Brooks gets possessions. They'll run stuff through Kyle Anderson. And they're just, the ball's moving and nobody has it for too long. And Ja will happily go to the corner or it'll seem like he's going to the corner. Then all of a sudden they're setting him a sneaky pick. He's coming around.

But it's inclusive. And that's why it's like, why has Bane developed like he has? Well, because they wanted him to develop. Whereas I look at a guy like Neesmith, who I really liked on the Celtics, who I thought was coming on last year. And now he took a three corner three yesterday. They hit the side of the backboard and he's borderline unplayable. And it's because he's just told to run to the corner. He's not enabled at all.

So going back to the LeBron thing, like I think this is, we've seen a 12 year sample size of this now, where other than Kyrie, and other than Davis, I think he has been a little hard to play with. Like Kevin Love definitely goes to Cleveland, and his career's really not the same for about four years there. But somebody like Malik Monk,

who was hot for five games, and now all of a sudden, he's not playing crunch time again. But how do you get in a groove when you don't have the ball a lot? Also, how do you go to other people when you have LeBron James on the court? It's like this chicken and egg thing. So we're going to tell

LeBron to stand in the corner? That doesn't make sense either. Absolutely. It's hard to develop people. I think Kuzma is a good example of this. Kuzma has been the best guy in the Wizards now for a month. And with somebody that you would watch in Laker games, you'd be like, is this guy even an NBA rotation guy? I don't know.

Yeah, you need opportunity to develop. You need opportunity. I'm not judging. It's a very difficult thing. I've said this about me before. When I was in Utah before I went to Phoenix, our offense was kind of wide open.

Now, we ran Jerry's style, but within that style, I posted up a little bit. I had the ball in my hand on the wings. I came off the pick and roll, and I was learning how to play pick and roll. I wasn't great at it, but I was learning, right?

No one had ever given me the ball before in the NBA, so I didn't know shit. I was running around just defending and running wild, but I was starting to understand how to score. Like, oh, I get in this situation, I get a switch. Just be patient. I'm going to be good. I got something on me that I can cook. I was starting to learn. And then I went to Phoenix. And it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Those were the best years of my life, the best teams I ever played on. But my game stayed right there. Stagnated. It just stopped. I became a run to the

corner shooter. That's what I was going to be. It just stopped. I became a run to the corner shooter. That's what I was going to be. It was probably the best thing because I don't know that I was good enough to play the role of anything better than that on an NBA level. But the point is, I have experience with that, right? Like you're now your job, like get it to Steve. He's going to run pick and roll and you guys are going to shoot when that pick and roll doesn't work.

And so I was like, you know, as was getting paid well, and we wanted to win. And so then you dig into that role and be the best you can. But as you're trying to develop talent, like I was older, but as you're trying to develop young talent that can kind of help LeBron or someone like that, I mean, there's got to be opportunity, right? You've got to get off the ball a little bit to give them the breath to kind of to grow. Not that LeBron doesn't, but the style that he plays, it's not enough for everyone out there to really kind of dig into who they are as a player. Well, and there's also certain guys that it makes sense for them to be on a team like that. Like the Celtics have Grant Williams, who I had given up on last year, but I think has emerged as a rotation asset this year.

And the reason is he just became really good at corner threes because he's not, he's too small to post up. He's a good, he's a good rebounder. Um, but ultimately you're not going to run plays for him. So if he can't learn to shoot from the corner, there's no reason to have them. Right. But he learned how to shoot. Now he's one of the best corner three guys. So it's like, he makes sense. But when I look at some of the perimeter guys in the league or even some of the point guards, like after watching Dennis Schroeder for half of the Celtics season,

I can't believe he played with LeBron. It's such a bad combo. Schroeder's like, the defense is just sag off him completely. And I can understand why the Lakers were anxious to get rid of him. But I look at a guy like Kuzma as a really good example of sometimes it's not awesome to play with an incredible player because Kuzma has blossomed in a way that if I was a Laker fan, I would be

losing my mind. That even just Kuzma for Westbrook is a terrible trade. Kuzma at $16 million for Westbrook for $44. That alone is a horrible trade, not to mention you gave two other guys in it. Well, listen, people, it's hard to hear, but that 2001 Sixers team, I got there late, and I was around for that run, and then the next year, and that was Allen Iverson offensive team,

and then you were gritty and grimy defensively i i'm not gonna say any names but there were people on that team that you know you're like shit i i want the ball like i'd like yeah i'm i'm an nba player like i want to taste it i i can do some things and it just you know the opportunity wasn't there so you know that kind of exists and it puts you you know it exists and it puts you in kind of a box, but that box can make you more valuable, like you said about Grant Williams, like you said about me. It made me more valuable. People wanted

me because they knew that I knew what I was coming in there to do. I was coming in there to defend and I was coming in there to shoot the ball. And there were no mistakes. I wasn't going to be stepping on anybody's toes. And that's what made that 0-1 Sixers team so special for how it blended with Iverson because it's really hard

to find those guys that blend. Iverson top three or four most difficult guy I think to play with because he had to have the ball all the time. And that was just the way it went. And he was going to go 13 for 30 and 12 for 29 and that's just the way it was going to go. Plus slower pace.

But it had to be people who were ready to shoot if he passed to you or people that rebounded and played defense. And so that 01 team had a lot of those guys. And then as they tried to replicate that over the next five years, guess what? It's hard to find those guys. And it's hard to find guys who are happy to do that. And you had Aaron McKee and Snow and Mutombo and all these dudes, but there weren't a lot of them. No, there weren't. And you started getting...

You did. You started getting into the space that we're talking about with LeBron, where you got younger talent that has to grow and there's just not enough room for them to grow with the way you play. Like, like, Horton Tucker, who I don't know if he's an NBA

starter or not. From what I've seen, he's probably not. But I know this Lakers team makes no sense for him. He seems like somebody, he's a little, he reminds me of, it's weird because they're different, but Karis LeVert, same kind of way, where Karis LeVert's kind of, he's over here and he's

going to do his thing. And TJ Warren's a little bit like this too. Like these guys that are kind of he's over here and he's going to do his thing and TJ Warren's a little bit like this too like these guys that are kind of these one man scoring people they're probably not that much fun to play with but on the right team you need guys like that I don't know how those guys have ever made sense with LeBron yeah only

it just doesn't those guys for me it's probably not fair to them but I always see anytime you say a name like that and you describe a game like that do you know Those guys, for me, it's probably not fair to them, but I always see anytime you say a name like that and you describe a game like that, do you know what they are for me? It's probably not fair. It's generalization. Losing players?

No, but there's six men on good teams. Yeah, right. You just plug them in. You let LeBron come off the floor. You let him go crazy. If he's cooking, great. If he's not, we're going to go right back. There are degrees of six six men but like you know those guys and i play with a lot of them just they're gonna get buckets what i do is get buckets i had one tell me once sometimes when you

ask somebody to play defense it just takes away from their offense that kind of guy you're a six man but come in get buckets right and that by the way that's what cleveland needs right now yeah because i think cleveland i watched them again they won another one yesterday Get buckets. Right. And by the way, that's what Cleveland needs right now. Yeah. Because I think Cleveland, I watched them again. They won another one yesterday. The chemistry is unbelievable. They have three just banger young players. The Garland and Allen and then Mobley,

who's my favorite player to come in the league in a while. But the one thing they need is the guy you just mentioned. Because they lost Colin Sexton, they lost Rubio. Rubio is really, even though he wasn't shooting that well, he was important for them because he was inclusive. But then now they need the one guy who can carry them for little seven-minute stretches in each half, right? When Garland's out or whatever. There's the guy that I tweeted yesterday, Eric Gordon would be the absolute perfect guy for them to get.

And they have Rubio's expiring. They have picks. He can come off the bench. The good thing about him is he actually isn't just the, it's all about me guy. He can also, like we've seen him be able to play with, uh,

with other people too in another scenario. So, um, I, I tweeted the standings yesterday. I was stunned by how close the Cavs were to the top. We're in situations where the Cavs and Memphis are legitimate top four teams,

which I don't even know what the odds would... I mean, in each conference. Like potential top four seeds in each conference. If you were to ask me who could win a championship right now, both of those now, like, like both of those names, like crazy. But if you look statistically at what they're doing,

both of those names cannot be left out of that conversation right now. As far as statistics, you can't, can't leave them out. Well, you think like, and I was trying to figure this out because we're, we're past the midway point, but all-star games coming.

So it's a good reset. I still, figure this out because we're past the midway point but all-star game's coming so it's a good reset. I would still put my money on Milwaukee in the East just because of the pedigree. Now Holiday's out. They'll probably get Lopez back in time. I think Miami, I've been watching them a lot lately.

Miami's the team Raja would... Out of the 30-team Raja draft, what team would I want to play 12 minutes for? Miami's your team, right? Yeah, Miami's fun. They get it. Lowry and Butler are just screaming incoherently at each other and chest bumping.

It's like game 42. Yeah, they get it. But they have the shooting. Bam's coming back. And I think that's... At some point, they're it. But they have the shooting. Bam's coming back. And I think that's, at some point, they're going to be the sexy upside pick in the East,

especially if we don't know when Durant's coming back. But Cleveland is so fucking weird to play where they're just like, we're just going to play three big guys. And Mobley is so special defensively. We're going to be allowed to do this. And we are going to zag. The league league zigging. We're zagging. We're going to do this. It's really weird to play. And somehow we are awesome defensively. We get stops and we have a special player in Garland who,

um, who in the last three minutes of a game will get us good shots. And that's going to be enough. And so far, it's been enough. Yeah, I mean, I don't see everything coming. But some of this you could see. Like Atlanta, you know, I kind of, people hated when I said, I kind of saw this one coming. Like some things you see coming. I had no idea that this was coming.

What did you not like in Atlanta? Too many guys? Yeah, too many guys. Too many guys kind of at similar points in their career. You know, I thought a year ahead of schedule last year. So, you know, that kind of puts young people, especially into the weird summer space where the hunger isn't always there. Like there were a lot of things that I thought

would kind of have them take a step back. But I couldn't have called Cleveland. Even after my buddy Kobe Altman told me. He was like, we really like what we have going on and all that. I was like, yeah, okay. But good talking to you. I talked to Zach Lowe before

the season and we were just batting around teams. And I was afraid to tell anybody that I really like Cleveland's team because they just had a bunch of guys I liked and I was all in on Mobley like all in and I was like I kind of like Cleveland and Zach's like I do too

and we just like we had one of those moments and we took them for the over we did the over unders I thought they had a chance to be like a playing team and maybe go like 43 and 39 would be like the high upside. What's been shocking to me is that they can get stops and create good shots over and over again in crunch time. And I did not see the Garland thing coming.

He was a little bit polarizing in the draft. Rosillo loved him. Some of our guys loved him. But, you know, undersized shooting guard as a point guard, you just never know with that. We've seen it go either way. I think what's been cool about him is how innovative he is offensively and how fucking

competitive he is. And it goes back to, we've talked about this before, just competitive people. I'm just always gravitating toward them when I'm drafting, especially at the high level. Do you give a shit? Garland gives a shit. He's tough. Anyway, I like that team. You've been watching some Memphis, and we can end on this.

Memphis has been the darling, especially it's been a big podcast topic the last couple weeks. They have a trade to make. I'll be interested to see if they make it because their chemistry is so good that you could argue don't make the trade, but they have three first-round picks.

They have Adams, who's an expirer next year, Kyle Anderson. Would you mess with this team? If you're the GM, would you try to upgrade anything, or are you just riding with what you have right now? I think I'm riding, Bill. Because I think this team,

more than a lot of other teams, is built on that chemistry, that vibe that they seem to have. You talked about John Morant's willingness earlier in the pod to kind of be over in the corner and off the ball and now trusting that I'm going to be brought back to the ball and it's not that I'm just going to wither away over in that corner. There's a lot of trust that goes into people being willing

to give up a little bit of themselves or give up the ball a little bit for the greater good. And that comes off the screen when I watch them play. Like, you know, it comes across like a fun team to be on, a fun team to work with. And so I don't, you know, if I could upgrade and I didn't have to give up something like integral to what we were doing out there, maybe I would. So if you're talking about a draft pick, maybe,

and I don't have to give up one of the main P like there was something out there. I wouldn't say no, but I'm not giving up any of the pieces that are really out there playing meaningful minutes. I can't do that. Um, yeah,

I would have said Adams as the piece, but there was a moment I was watching bulls grizzlies yesterday. John got wrapped up by some bulls guy who held on to, I think it was Tony Bradley, held on to him too long. Ja got mad and shoved him. Adams comes right in, grabs the guy behind him and pulls him away and was basically like, you will not touch

Ja Morant. That's it. Don't do that again. He might have the least amount of value on the court. I haven't looked into the statistics, but I'd argue that a dude like that, he's probably behind closed doors, one of the backbones of what they do there.

Do you know what I mean? Beloved teammate and the first guy in anytime anything's going on. So I actually wouldn't trade him. Yeah, but I love the reason, not that you asked me, the reason, first of all, I've been on John, like the John Morant signature shoe deal.

I like Memphis. This isn't two weeks from me. I've been telling, like, come on, man. Like, man, we got to pick up on Memphis. But they just get up and down. Like, they're number one in the league in fast breaks. They turn you over. They're out.

They're aggressive defensively. They're in the passing lanes. And I just love how it's opportunity for dudes like Bane and like Dylan Brooks, who I didn't see coming a few years ago. But just is like... Your spiritual son, Dylan Brooks. Yeah, you talk about competitive. I'm not taking any shit from anyone.

And yes, I could do... They have a bunch of cats like that, and I really enjoy watching them hoop. Yeah, you could have definitely been on that Team yeah I'd like to play on that team Now Dylan Brooks is Dylan Brooks is way better than I thought he was going to be but the way They get down the way they They strap up the way that ball moves I would Yes I would that's one of

It's one of a handful of teams that I would have liked to play On really fun see the League's just fucking deep. We're going to do all-star picks with House in a second. The fact that the East is now deep from a talent standpoint, and the West is, I mean, you think of all the guys that are injured this year, we don't have Davis,

and we don't have Dame, and now we don't have Durant. We have Kyrie half the time. We lost Jamal Murray. We lost Michael Porter. We've lost seven or eight guys on top of all these awesome young guys that we have.

The biggest thing is this 2021 draft I think has a chance to be remembered as impactful because Mobley and Cade and Giddy and they just Kaminga as a fucking X-Factor Kerr casually dropping

Giannis in a Kaminga sentence last week I was like whoa! Kerr likes him anyway alright Raja we'll let you go back to what's the plan today Curd likes him. Anyway. All right, Raja. We'll let you go back to... What's the plan today? You have a prodigy QB son. Yeah, we're going to a workout right now at 2.30.

He's got his quarterback trainer. Then we got varsity basketball at 3.45, Bill. And then right after that, I got my seventh grade team at 6. So I'm pretty packed this afternoon. So you're coaching the seventh graders? Yeah, I coach a high school team and I coach seventh graders.

Yes. So the seventh graders, a little touchy, right? It's a touchy age. Seventh grade's touchy. It's a lot going on. Got hormones going on, all kinds of things.

They're become little buttheads like right around there. Like some of them are little buttheads already. Some of them are... Yeah, so it's hard to keep the reins. You got to keep the reins real tight with that group. My least favorite grade. Anyway, all right, Raja, we can listen

to you on real ones on the Ringer MBA show. Good to see you as always. Thanks for having me, brother. Anytime. All right, Joe House is here. He is doing a little house of carbs experiment on our revamped food feed, which is now called Ringer Food. He's also on the Fairway Rolling podcast

and with Warren Sharp on Fridays on the Ringer Gambling Show. We're going to talk NBA first, just because Raj was on. We were talking NBA. I have to put in all-star picks by Saturday House. It's surprisingly non-controversial for the most part.

I'm going to throw some questions. So, you know, you look at, you know, the starters, which the fans have input, who the hell knows how it's going to play out. But Embiid, Durant, Giannis in the East. And then the guards I've seen go different ways. I'm going to vote for Trey and DeRozan.

Some other people would push for Levine or Harden there, but Trey's offensive season. DeRozan's a forward. I'm cheating a little bit, but I just feel like those have been the best five guys. Embiid, Durant, Giannis, Trey, DeRozan. Durant's not playing because he's hurt. Does that five sound right for you,

or would you throw in Harden or Levine? I don't have any quibble. Who's going to replace Durant in the game? We don't care about that for voting purposes? We don't. We don't. But that does come into play because my next seven, Levine, VanVleet, Butler, Harden, Garland, Jared Allen, Tatum. I have to have two Cavs. I love that team. I have to reward them. So LaMelo was on the outs for me.

And it basically came down to Van Vliet, Harden, Garland, and LaMelo for three spots. Tatum makes it just because the forward pool is so weak this year. LaMelo I have as 13th, but he gets in because KD's not playing. And this is like my most important thing with the All-Star game this year is LaMelo has to be in the game.

That should be our number one priority, right? It's a really, really important addition to the mix because of the kind of player that he's revealed himself to be. He has so much swag, so much flair. He

deserves it. Charlotte is playing very well and they've continued to be above water, even with, you know, Hayward, the typical Hayward in the lineup, not in the lineup. Um, I guess, you know, I have to, to, for the starting five thing, just give a real quick shout out to Levine. Yeah, he's been, I, I, I fear him. DeRozan, I think he's earned it. I love that, you know, he's getting all this shine and we're talking about MVP and he'll get some votes and that's cool. Good for, good for DeMar to, to get to this level to, you know, constantly working his ass off to reinvent his game, to get better. I don't fear DeMar DeRozan. I fear Zach Levine.

Interesting. Yeah, they're 1A, 1B. I just DeRozan because of what he brought to that team and some of the end of the game shots and just how ridiculously, meticulously efficient he's been in the fourth quarters. But yeah, if you're going to get tactical, if you're going to get tactical and go,

wait, you can't have DeRozan because you already have three big, you have three forward centers on the team. So you got to have two guards. I'm fine with putting Levine there. The Lamello thing, we always talk about how the all-star game ebbs and flows depending on how many fun point guard type people there are. And we've had years where Chris, but once Steve Nash retired, where it was like, oh my God, and Jason Cade was another one that we lost.

And then it was like, oh my God, there's so much pressure on Chris Paul now. He's the only one who knows how to run an all-star game. LaMelo is going to be just really important for the next 12, 15 years. By the way, not that the all-star game really matters, but it can be an awesome, fun, upside viewing experience if the point guards are there.

And on top of that, we do continue to use it as a marker for a player's achievement. As we look back at the top 75 rankings of this year with the anniversary, number of times on an All-Star team do weigh in a little bit. Yeah, and also who's out there with seven minutes left.

A lot of times it's a nice reflection on who the best eight to 12 guys are in the league. Because for the most part, you know, Dame was out there for a couple years and now he's out. But you think like you go to the West, the West is tougher because

Jokic and LeBron and I think Curry just from, even though he tailed off a little bit, I still think those three are going to start. But then,

do you just go with three guards? Because the best five guys in the West this year have been Jokic, LeBron, Curry, Morant, and CP3. And that's who I'm going to vote for.

It's bending the rules a little bit because you're basically doing the three-guard lineup. You could say Curry can play off the ball, whatever. But that's my next question for you. Are you okay with me bending the lineup? Of course. Yes. We're in positionalist NBA. That's the era that we're in.

Okay. Because if you weren't okay with it, now we have to have the Carl Anthony Towns conversation. I had him as my bubble starter guy because Luca missed too many games and he needs to be penalized for coming in too heavy. Towns, somebody that you and I have been incredibly frustrated with over the years,

I really like what I've seen this year from him. Critical love. Yeah. Well, and we have long wondered whether his inconsistency is attributable to franchise instability, coaching instability, coaching underwhelming coaches.

Weird teammates. Yeah. Weird mix. Sure. All of it. Yeah. So are you buying Townstock? Where are you? Because I like them. Sure. I'm buying Townstock.

Me too. I'm rooting for them to make the playoffs. I think the West is more interesting if Minnesota is in the playoff mix. Well, it would be fun to have Edwards in the playoffs. My backups would be Towns. It's weird. The West is

very easy to figure out. The backups would be Towns, Luka, Mitchell, Draymond, Booker, Gobert. And then I have Murray as the 12th guy. I think he's been one of the 12 best guys I saw in the West. I've seen a couple, there's other lists I've seen out there where like maybe Edwards gets in there. There's some Andrew Wiggins buzz.

Paul George can't be penalized because he missed too many games. He's got to be on there. I get it, but I think Murray's been really good. I mean, to the point that it's inconceivable now that they would flip him in a Ben Simmons trade. I think he is a better asset and he might actually be more of a winning player than Simmons is. So that's my 12. And I don't really think there's an argument.

What do you think? It's not, it's, it's, I think you're right. I would love to figure out a way to get Edwards in, but I don't think it should come at the expense of Murray. Um,

well, somebody will get injured too. Yeah. The actual all-star game is in for four or five weeks. So I'm sure out of those. Well, somebody will get injured. Yeah, the actual All-Star game isn't for four or five weeks, so I'm sure out of those 12 guys, somebody gets injured. Just

very small arguments. Jared Allen or Mobley? I went with Allen because I think he's been more consistent. I just absolutely love Mobley, but you can make a case, Allen's the second best center in the East, unless you want to call Giannis the center, then he's third. But either way, it feels right for me to pick him over Mobley. But

I freaking love Mobley. It was hard to leave him off. And I'm hoping if there's one more injury, I think he's the next bubble guy after Lomelo. Oh, wow. That's interesting. Yeah. So Allen or Mobley, you'd go Allen, it seems like. You have Mobley ahead of Bridges? Yeah, I have for bubble guys Mobley, Jalen,

Bridges, Holiday, Sabonis, and then it dips off to that Bradley Beal, Middleton, Hero group. But yeah, I just think, I just value the winning stuff, right? And the Cavs have, the Cavs aren't that far away now from having the best record in the East. And it's because of Mobley and Garland and Allen over anything else.

So, and the stuff, the fact that Mobley defensively can guard anybody allows them to play these weird big lineups that nobody knows what to do with. They're really hard to play. It's just because of what he can do. So yeah, I value the Mobley thing, but I'm probably overthinking that because I value the winning stuff too much. He's going to make all rookie first team. He will remain in the conversation for rookie of the year if he can remain healthy.

And I think that's enough for him. This will be the last year he's not in the All-Star game. So, Evan Mobley, if you're listening, this is your last year. I agree. Murray or Edwards, you agree with me on Murray over Edwards? As long as you can assure me that Edwards is going to get in because of an injury, yes, that's fine. And you're okay with Luka not being a starter?

I am extremely okay with Luka not being a starter. There has to be a price for the fork. The fork has to cost you something. Who do you have as your MVP so far in the I-can't-believe-you-came-in-this-heavy rankings for this season? Luka over Harden, right? Oh, it's got to be Luka over Harden, yeah.

Because we... And I don't know whether this is a function of media hype or what but you know every year the last couple two years we've entered the season with Luca at the top of the odds as an MVP candidate and both

times he's shown up fat right I was thinking about it when we were in college we used to go to the all You Can Eat at Papa Gino's on Tuesday nights. And we would go to Fat Dicky's and you could see how much barbecue you could eat in two hours. And we would go to the Ground Round because they had the chicken wings thing. And we would drink beer and all this stuff. Luca isn't really much older than we were in college when we were doing all that stuff. Maybe we just have to think of him as a college kid, basically.

Somebody who's going to make some mistakes, do some dumb things. And when he's 25, all of a sudden, that's when he's going to find yoga and gluten-free and all these things. But right now, he's like we were. Well, we only went to those places after we played basketball for three hours.

That is true. Like we created the calorie deficit and then we refilled. We refueled and refilled. Do you think people still do that? We actually did. I feel like we were ahead of our time a little bit in the late 80s, early 90s.

We would use the exercise to then justify the overeating. Not that you needed a lot of justification for the overeating, but we would feel like we had earned it in some way. I don't feel like Lucas really came into the season feeling like he had earned the calories, would be my guess. Not sure. Yeah, I agree with you.

Okay, so this is the least controversial all-star kind of process we've had in a while. I wish there were more fun arguments, but there's just not. Let's talk football. Kyla Murray, I knew somebody was burning me yesterday. I didn't know if it was going to be the Rams or the Cards.

I fell into the, when in doubt, take the point strategy, which is usually the right strategy. Because there was a scenario last night where Matt Stafford just throws four picks. What was stunning to me was how bad Kyler was. Like, it felt like he was on his way to that Jake DeLome January 2009 game.

I disagreed with every choice he made. He wasn't accurate. He was frenetic. He was whipping screen passes 110 miles an hour. That two-yard pick 60 through, even before that happened, it was like, what's going on with this guy? It was like watching Ben Simmons against the Hawks

was the feeling I was getting. Came out after halftime and he was, it seemed like he had calmed down, but man, he was so bad in that game. And I, I, I've also been on the flip side where you go against Kyle Lemur and he's incredible. And I do wonder like, if he was good in that game, is the result different or were the Rams just better? We'll never know because he was so bad, but it makes me really worried about what, what is this guy going forward? Because he's just been too all over the map.

He's been in the league now for a few years. And is this guy somebody who could win multiple games in a row in the playoffs? I don't know. What do you think? I'm not prepared to talk about him on an island. I'm not prepared to just say, here's my evaluation of Kyler. To me, he's inextricably linked to Kingsbury. It's, it's Kyler and cliff. What's the game plan. What's the scheme to take the most pressure off of Kyler? Um, this is the thing that we, the rule that we broke.

Yeah. We had a, an, an, a, a playoff rookie going up against a guy that has played in playoffs before. And the playoff rookies, Jalen Hurts, Kyler Murray, who's the other one I'm not thinking of right now? Mack Jones. Well, we had Burrow and Burrow versus Carr. Yeah, but that one doesn't matter. That one doesn't count. The trend that we've had and it's been around for a long time is a playoff rookie playoff virgin going up against a more experienced guy.

Even if they've only played in a handful of games, it matters. It looked like he was completely flummolimated to the speed of the game. He wasn't up to playoff speed, and Kingsbury didn't do anything to help him. The game was over in the first five minutes, like many of the games that we watched this weekend. It really did feel that way. I don't know the answer with him because he's so short that the teams that seem to keep him in the pocket,

it just seems to escalate bad decisions. But then you've seen other games where it's like nobody can keep him in the pocket and he's just running around and doing whatever he wants. But he is one of those guys that you kind of know pretty quickly what you're getting in the game, right? If you bet on him or against him.

I feel like I know within 20 minutes what I'm getting. Yesterday, I was getting skittish, really weird energy, Kyler, which you think like the QB is the leader of the team. When you see your leader look that kind of rattled, that's not going to go well. But maybe for the manifesto, maybe the rule is playoff virgin QBs on the road. Maybe that's a rule.

I think I'm going to have to make it a rule. It's been there forever. It's been out there. It's not a new thing. The other thing we have to remember if we're going to talk about Kyler is missing DeAndre. The Cardinals have sunk since DeAndre's gotten hurt.

The only credible win they had was going on the road to Dallas, beating Dallas in a place where Kyler hasn't lost. Has he ever lost at Jerry World? I don't know. Yeah, it's the one place that he kind of owns. Yeah, but that was their only win. So you're talking to Sharp. I'm going to be doing million-dollar picks on Thursday. And you're going to be doing picks with Sharp on Friday. It's tough because I really like the Niners.

I want to know what I'm getting from Bosa and Warner. Not going to like them as much if I'm getting none of one guy, half of another guy. But that line's too high, the five and a half. And I think they could win the game. They check a lot of my boxes. I don't think it matters if they're on the home or on the road. They have playmakers.

I like their defense. I think they're built to win close games. It's a bad matchup for the Packers, but if I'm not getting those two guys, that makes me worried. The Rams-Bucks, Sal and I did guess the lines, and I think I guessed four and a half, and he guessed four on Sunday night, and the line is

three, and I think it's partly three because the Rams looked so good yesterday. I agree. You're right. But that that's also a manifesto rule of beware of the team that looked a little too good the previous round. I don't believe in the Rams do you? The only interesting thing about them

in the cards game was the Cam Akers piece. I wasn't expecting that. That was an unexpected wrinkle. It adds a complexity to their offense, but the thing that was more impressive was the defense. And if they are able to mount pressure that replicates, it doesn't have to be a hundred percent aversion of what they did to the Cardinals.

But if it's 75% of what they did to the Cardinals, if they make Tom Brady uncomfortable, um, that, that, that changes the game that makes it, you know, a field goal kind of game.

Tampa has been incredible at home all season long. They just score points. I'm rooting for a shootout just because I think that would be tremendous fun. That Rams defense was something else last night. What was your worst bet of round one? Just a small bet on the Cardinals last night. I did really well, and Twitter was very complimentary. I had the under in the Cincinnati-Vegas game.

That came through miraculously. Twitter was complimentary. Wow. I know. It's hard to believe. My favorite bet of the weekend was the Niners-Moneyline, and I liked Tampa laying the 8.5. I had no problem at all with that. it's hard to believe. My favorite bet of the weekend was the Niners money line. And I liked Tampa laying the eight and a half. I had no problem at all with that. And people appreciated it. Yeah, we hit a couple of them, a million dollar picks. The Tampa KC bet was our big bet, the tease. Great one. The KC game got to where I wanted it to go, where just give them a lead. Make Roethlisberger

have to come from behind, down 10 or more, and we're golden. That's what happened. Then, they got so big of a lead, the garbage time touchdowns, which is really where Ben has been thriving the last couple years, down 20, 25. Starting to come back, I was starting to get a little worried

about we had an alternate line, 20 and a half with to come back, I was starting to get a little worried about we had an alternate line, 20 and a half with the Chiefs. And I was like, oh my God, I have to sweat this out. They were up like 30 points. It got close. They were going right down the field.

My favorite tease was Tampa down to two and a half and the Niners up to nine, from three to nine. Because the Niners, Dallas was not going to win by two scores under any iteration I didn't feel like. And so that one hit. And that was a good one. There's some good

teaser possibilities this week, especially being able to take the Bills to 8.5. That line's 2.5 right now. We're going to talk about that on Thursday, but I feel like that's a who gets it last game. And especially now that we know that the

now that we know that the Bills are just going to put Josh in shotgun and unleash him and do that thing. I think that game's going to have a crazy pace. The over-under right now is 54 and a half. Which I don't know. Still seems low to me. You could talk me into like 59.

It's like if they're going to the Bills are going to play at that pace. This feels like... Remember that Pats Chiefs game a couple years ago where it was like... What was it? 37-31 as the final or whatever it was. It feels like one of those type of games. What do you think?

The funny thing is there's a stat out there that games that close... Playoff games that close with a total of 55 points the under is eight and one but the only one is is bills and chiefs the one is the bills to the chiefs so i'm gonna play the over i mean i just i'm gonna play what i what i'm gonna what i want to root for and that's you know scoring all over the football field you're doing a food thing on house of carbs with the nfl playoffs where we're trying to pick out of the 14 playoff teams scoring all over the football field. You're doing a food thing on House of Carbs

with the NFL playoffs where we're trying to pick out of the 14 playoff teams, which city had the best dish in each conference. And then they're going to go out on the Super Bowl. Our friend Dave Jacoby's involved, Natalie Rubin, Craig Horlbeck. The way you laid out the parameters, you almost made it impossible

for the Philly cheesesteak not to win because the parameters are basically, if I go to this town, what is the most important food item that I feel like I have to eat? Then quality of the food item, all these things. Philly out of all the cities, it feels like you have to get a cheesesteak when you're there. And I don't know why it is. I don't know whether it's because Philly's in the name, whether if it was like, but if clam chowder was called Boston clam chowder, would that be like better PR marketing for the clam chowder? I don't know. But the Philly cheesesteak seems like a dominant one seed who, who could potentially unseated. Who are you looking at? Um, Kansas city for sure. I mean, Kansas city barbecue is a, is a

nationwide attack. It's a brand. You can buy Kansas City Barbecue sauce. And the Buffalo Wing, hello, like it's in the name. Both of those cities have legit claims. Like if you go to Buffalo and don't have Buffalo Wings, what are you doing? I think both of those have formidable chances to stand up here. And I'm not going to sleep on Green Bay with the brats and the cheese curds. I mean, let them stand. Now, let me ask you a question. I did get some criticism for choosing chowder for New England. There was a strong argument for the lobster roll.

Where do you stand on this as a native New Englander? I would have gone lobster roll. Is it the chowder? No, I think it's the lobster roll. I wish I'd asked you in advance. We did sort of an internet sampling to come up with what was the iconic item. And the lobster roll belongs more to Maine. It doesn't really belong to the Boston area as much. That's the reason that we gave the lean because the stadium's in Foxborough,

more proximate to Boston than to Maine. So that's the way. My only regret, and let me get your take on this, the toughest one for me was San Francisco against Dallas. And the reason it was hard is because Dallas has a bunch of outstanding food items, including barbecue and brisket, that really belong to Texas writ large. You don't say, I'm going to go to Dallas and have the brisket. And San Francisco has a couple of different things. It has Dungeness crab.

It has the seafood stew, cioppino, and then it has this sourdough that you fill up with a Pacific chowder, and that's what we ended up going with as the iconic item from San Francisco. But it was a really close call, San Francisco versus Dallas.

And I regret going with San Francisco because it means that I don't get to eat brisket this week. Where do you come down on it? Horrible. I don't like the San Francisco food scene at all. I think the Chinese food is overrated. I don't think they have signature things. And I'm just not a huge fan.

You go to Dallas, it's like, guess what? Sorry. Texas counts as part of Dallas. You go to Dallas, like we went there for the Superbowl. You were with me. What the fuck did we say when we were there? It was like, Hey, where are we getting barbecue? We went to like three barbecue places.

What are you doing? If we were in San Francisco, we weren't like, Oh my God. Oh, we got to eat this. No, we went to a bunch of them. Uh, with the, with the lobster roll thing. I mean, in your defense, we've only been close friends since 1988. We talk all the time. It would have been too hard to just send me a short text. I didn't want to corrupt it. The problem with the clam chowder as the identifiable

Boston food or Massachusetts food, whatever, is that the quality is too up and down. It's all over the map. If you're telling me like I could get the greatest, but so many people come to Boston and they go to the wrong restaurant and they get the clam chowder and either it's really mediocre or they actually get food poisoning from the clams. And then like, oh, I had the clam chowder. Wasn't that good? Whereas if you have the right lobster roll, really from a bunch of, and it could be anywhere in Cape Cod it could be anywhere in Maine, a couple Boston things it's always going to win, the right lobster roll

is fantastic well here's the thing just like in real life there was no way that New England was going to beat Buffalo so it didn't really matter but it's fair the Buffalo Wings thing here's my I'm going to zag on the Buffalo Wings thing but it's fair. Oh yeah. The Buffalo wings thing.

Here's my, I'm going to zag on the Buffalo wings thing. Yeah. Great. Great. They're called Buffalo wings. Everyone has like, I could go to any city and I could get Buffalo wings.

That will be very close to the Buffalo wings. I would get in Buffalo. They're not, it's, it's not going to be like a dramatic leap where it's like, oh my God, I've never had Buffalo wings in my life. You're committing a food crime. This is a food crime. You're committing a food crime. What is the food crime? Why are they better? What is better about them in Buffalo versus another city?

They know exactly how long to fry the chicken wing in the fryer and their recipe for the sauce is unimpeachable, unimpeccable. It's perfect every time. No other city can match it? It's hard to replicate. I'm just telling you. It's hard to replicate. Philly cheesesteak.

Anywhere in Philly I go, I can get a cheesesteak and it's going to be like, wow, this is amazing. Where else am I going to get cheesesteaks? I don't even know. LA is one of the great food cities of all time. I don't even know where I would get a cheesesteaks? I don't even know. LA is one of the great food cities of all time. I don't even know where I would get a cheesesteak here. Many cities offer cheesesteaks. They're

just not anywhere near as good as Philly. And a large part of that is because of how good the bakeries are in Philly. The rolls in Philly are incredible. So I need to go to Buffalo and I need to get Buffalo wings. I think so. Before you just trot out this idea that you can get Buffalo wings. I think so. That's what you're telling me? Before you just trot out this idea that you can get Buffalo wings anywhere and they're going to be a reasonable facsimile, I think you need to go to Buffalo and have a real Buffalo wing in Buffalo.

Can I gold belly it and just get it dry ice and do it that way? You can. All right, I'm going to do that. I'm going to do that. I'll report back. So who are the favorites? We have them coming to our house right now.

I have a gold belly bringing some Buffalo Wings to my house tomorrow. Who are the favorites in the AFC and NFC then? So the number one seed in the NFC is indeed Philly with the cheesesteak. That's not a shocker. The number one seed in the AFC is Buffalo with the Buffalo wing. So we have Buffalo going up against Cincinnati with the chili. And we have Tennessee hot chicken up against the Kansas City barbecue. And then in the NFC, we have the Philly cheesesteak going up against LA Tacos.

LA was another tough one. It's so many ways to go. Tacos was the right choice. And then we have San Francisco going up against Green Bay, and it's going to be unfortunately the sourdough bread bowl up against Brats and Curds. I really wish it was Dallas brisket

tacos. That's the thing that's been haunting me. Brisket tacos. What do you mean? The Philly cheesesteak at number one was kind of unimpeachable. Philly's going to win anyway, regardless. And LA up against Arizona. Good battles ahead.

Before we go, golf starts this week. You're going to be covering on Fairway Rowland all year. You're going to be doing some fan duels, same round parlays and all kinds of stuff. Are we getting Tiger? Because you and I might be at the Masters this year. I'm just going to say it now. We really could be there this year. Are we getting Tiger?

Is Tiger going to walk by us with a golf club and a smile on his face? He might walk by us with a golf club and a smile. It will not be competing in the Masters, though. He may attend. He might participate in some of the proceedings. He will not be attending the Masters as a competitor. He's just way too far away. Physically, the

best estimates of when we might see him competitively that I think I agree with are at the Open Championship at St. Andrews in July. The thing that he confessed when he played with his son in December down in Orlando was he's so far away from having the stamina to walk four rounds of golf

because he just has to build up. Well, right. Imagine. But he has to build up that leg to be able to withstand. And the Masters especially, as you know, is notoriously hilly. So know, we had like the Bryson year, the Brooks year, et cetera, et cetera. What's 2022? What's the storyline? What's going to be the A-list storyline this year in golf?

This is, it's crazy, crazy competitive. So the weird golf season starts in the fall. They have this wraparound schedule. So they start competing. The season goes, it's a 21- 22 season. It goes from September till August. And the winners on tour so far have been all a class golfers. And the reason is because there's all this pent up demand, the corn fairy guys, the, the, you know, right, the right below the PGA tour level guys, um, were not permitted to, to come on to tour last year.

So there are going to be fewer events. Last year was a super season. They had 50-some-plus events to try and accommodate all of the events that got canceled in 20 due to COVID. This year is like the return to a normal schedule, but the winners that we've had just in this calendar year, Cam Smith won in Hawaii in this calendar year, uh, camp Smith won in, uh, Hawaii in the, um,

tournament of champions. And then last week, Hideki Matsuyama, the reigning masters winner one in, in Hawaii by shooting, you know, an incredible score on the back nine, all of the guys that have won are,

are either like top, you know, 50 guys in the world. You're not going to see long shots this year. That's, that's my anticipation. All right. If somebody was going to own 2022 in the world, you're not going to see long shots this year. That's my anticipation. All right. If somebody was going to own 2022 in some way.

It's Jon Rahm. I was going to give you Jon Rahm, Morikawa, the return of Spieth, or the return of Brooks, or Rory finally gets his shit together. Which of those? So, Rom, you think is the most realistic of those six? Just because of his sustained, outstanding performance over

a number of years, and it felt like we might be unleashing the giant with him winning that US Open the way that he did. It's January, so you could say the Grand Slam is possible. The Grand Slam is in the cards for Jon Rahm. All of his finishes in majors last year were inside the top 10. I think he finished tied for fifth at the Masters.

He was definitely inside the top 10 of the PGA. He won the U.S. Open, and he was, again, fifth or sixth or seventh or eighth at the Masters. He was definitely inside the top 10 of the PGA. He won the US Open and he was again 5th or 6th or 7th or 8th at the Open Championship. He's just a crazy stud. Now, I'm glad that you mentioned Morikawa. We're dying for a rivalry. Somebody to get up to that ROM level. I feel like

Morikawa has the best chance. And then Victor Hovland. A lot of people love how he ended the season. Victor with a K. Yeah, that's right. He won at the end of last year and a lot of people love how he ended the season. Victor with a K. Yeah, that's right. He won at the end of last year and a lot of folks, I've already bet him to win the Masters this upcoming season. Just because I wanted some good odds before he gets on

a tear this spring. Oh, so you have on Fandle right now, Rahm is the Masters favorite at plus 850. Morikawa is 12 to 1. So you got Victor. Victor's 29 to 1 on FanDuel now. Yeah, that's why I went.

Yes, that's why I jumped on Victor. Pure value. Just a guy that can do it. Should I bet on Tommy Fleetwood at 40 to 1 or set the money on fire like I have the last four years? What do you think? I can't quit you, Tommy Fleetwood at 40 to one or set the money on fire. Like I have the last four years. What do you think?

I can't quit you Tommy Fleetwood. We had this conversation about Hideki and entering the 2021 masters and his putting had been so bad and then he went out and win it, won it. So I'm hesitant to tell you not to bet on, on anybody do, do something small on Tommy, just for your heart,

just for your heart. But we do have bet the House coming up this entire golf season, presented by FanDuel. Thank God. Great job, FanDuel. And for this upcoming tournament, they've already done a boost for us. We have two guys that we love in the top 20. We have Scotty Scheffler, the American who made the Ryder Cup. He was like the last guy to make the Ryder Cup. He hasn't won on tour yet.

He was Rookie of the Year in 2020. He finished the top five at the PGA Championship out in San Francisco. And we have the Canadian Corey Connors, who shot 264s over the most weekend. If you bet both of those guys, it's a kind of parlay to finish inside the top 20. FanDuel is boosting that up to plus 300. Three to one odds for two guys, both of whom can absolutely win

the tournament. That's the bet the house this week. It's a good one. I'm excited for those because I will say house only has a couple of real talents. One is weird golf parlays one is being able to finish whatever food is left on the table for a group dinner of more than five six people and then the other one is just your ability to drink more than one bloody mary like they're

like they're like miller lights i don't understand i really love bloody mary you can have what like five bloody marys like i can drink like one and a half and then I want to throw up. You can keep going. They're like Long Island iced teas or something. I don't know why. Something about them feels like food to me and I can just keep going and going. I had four on Sunday. Yeah.

It just feels like food. Yeah. All right. So you and I are going to do a special for my YouTube channel, which launched today. We're going to do a special story. Thank you.

We're going to put that. Old guy YouTube. Old guy YouTube. I have a chance. We looked at all the over 50 YouTube stars and I really have a chance to make an imprint. But you and I are going to do a story exclusively for that YouTube channel

that I would urge people to check out. I'm going to have to change my clothes for this. Okay. Yeah, I'm going to have to change. House, good to see you as always. Good luck with the golf season. Good luck with our NFL bets. Thank you.

Yeah. All right, that's it for the podcast. It was produced by Kyle Creighton. Don't forget new YouTube channel, youtube.com slash Bill Simmons. Check it out. We decided we're going to hold the house story that we were going to tell that was going to be an exclusive,

uh, on that channel. That wasn't even going to be on this podcast. It was just going to be on the YouTube channel. And we're going to hold it because I, I, I want to dangle it for the perfect time.

Maybe it's for when we get to, I don't know, 200,000 subscribers or whatever. I'm going to hold it. I'm going to hold it as a carrot to try to, as we move forward down the road, 2022.

So stay tuned. But we are going to be putting some exclusive stuff on there over the next few weeks and months. So youtube.com slash Bill Simmons. It's cool. It's cool to see all the videos. My facial hair in different stages. When we used to have a studio, we used to have guests in the studio. I used to be able to see the people I was interviewing. So anyway, actually trying to pick some of the videos made me sad that we have been

doing the podcast the way we've been doing it for 22 months now and counting because it was a lot more fun when everybody was in person. Hopefully, we'll get back there someday. Stay safe out there. I will see you on this feed on Thursday with million dollar picks and a whole lot more

until then.