The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 16: NBA w/ Juliet Litman & Chris Ryan (guest hosts!)

Episode Date: October 27, 2015

Guest hosts Chris Ryan and Juliet Litman hijack HBO's Bill Simmons' podcast for their own action-packed preview of the 2015-16 NBA season in a special edition of "Sources Say." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This podcast is brought to you by HBO because they were nice enough to give my boss, Bill Simmons, his own television show. That's launching next spring. Thanks, HBO. Newsflash, you don't need cable or satellite to watch HBO anymore. Just download the HBO Now app and start your free one-month trial today. Hello from the other side. I'm Juliette Lipman. I'm Chris Ryan. And we are guest hosting the Bill Simmons podcast today. Yeah, we'll probably have our own podcast feed a little bit later in the NBA season,

but right now we're just squatting on Bill's feed. We cannot wait to get into it. It's the first day of the season. Let's go. Never fear, Bill will be back later this week. Let's jump into it. We're California dreaming of NBA gossip. We're just, we're sounding the alarm and we're reconstituting and we're back because it's the first day of the NBA season. Yeah, it's Christmas. A lot has gone on. Even though it's Halloween, it's Christmas. NBA Halloween is kind of like Christmas for NBA fans. Let's just jump into it.

It's a great point. Over the weekend, two notable Halloween parties to discuss. Number one, the official team of this podcast, the Oklahoma City Thunder, had their annual birthday slash Halloween partyeen party at nick collison's house now that we're we're without andrew sharp i feel like this this can become the official podcast podcast of the thunder that it wants to be it's like california's top thunder podcast there's probably there's probably one that's like bigger more important in the state of oklahoma washington might have a good thunder podcast. They might. They might still be holding that hope. Holding it down in California. Anyway, so Nick Hollison every year has a Halloween party.

Yeah. It's kind of nice how Halloween and the NBA season always coincide. It's like really a festive week. Yeah, it's like we all dress up and then the guys come out and play. So the Thunder came out with some pretty good costumes. Mitch McGarry out here dressing like he's in dodgeball yeah so let's talk about how like they so specifically like targeted their own demographic as like millennials kind of like because so you have mitch mcgary dressed up as a

character from dodgeball which is not like a i think it's like a really good rewatch cable movie but i don't know if it's a classic of american comedy nor are there very many iconic characters it's like not even old i mean like old school who's the guy who threw wrenches at people's nuts in that movie i have no idea it's rip torn but i can't remember his character's name i also like justin long is in that movie if justin long is in your movie it's probably not iconic sorry bro um so yeah i feel like mitch mcgary like we've been on mitch mcgary's train for a while but he was hitting threes in preseason who knows what's gonna happen this season and getting concussed do you think he makes it through the season he seems injury prone but without getting

another concussion or just in general no you're definitely gonna miss time mitch mitch plays too hard he's all hard that's why i love this thunder team they've got so much heart so then you had uh russell westbrook going as stephen adams that's the best which is like so meta and so perfect um he even got like arm tattoos to be like stephen adams and actually then i went back and looked at stephen adams sleeve his tattoo sleeve have you seen that no it's intricate it's like really full-on does it have like a a narrative to it or is it more just like you know i'm not sure i'm not sure steven adams is like kind of reminding me of like nba justin bieber but like not a horrible he just seems like

a genuinely good dude what did he say about his look this summer that he was letting himself go he's letting himself go he doesn't and so russ got like a a wig to like have long hair he wore the number 12 jersey got a mustache yeah i just i think that like Ross doing that. Ross' past costumes also sort of mirrored that. Didn't he go as Pornstache from Orange is the New Black last year? So it's basically the same costume with a thunder jersey. It might have been the same wig. That's a great point. And then KD went as Martin Lawrence from Blue Streak.

Yeah. Which I've never seen, by the way. Have you? I've seen it. I don't really remember the characters of the story. Is that on Netflix streaming? How far out of his way did Kevin Durant have to go to see that movie? Well, I've seen it. I don't really remember like, like the, the characters. Is that on Netflix streaming? Like how far out of his way did Kevin Durant have to go to see that movie? Well, I don't know.

They might still have video stores in Oklahoma city. That's true. They might still have blockbusters there. And then, um, I didn't notice, did Dion have a, did Dion Waiters have a costume? And who do you go as? He was pinky from next Friday. Not even the original Friday. Okay.

That's right. Cause he had like three pictures. So I don't know, obviously if you were a listener of NBA After Dark you may remember that um I am to Waiters Island as the last member of like like that is my Florida Gulf Coast I was there through the crash I kept my apartment maybe I wintered elsewhere but I kept my real estate and now I feel like the market is coming back you are kind of like um dion waiters is your wilson and you are tom cruise and cast away tom hanks and cast away yes yes you guys have a beautiful life together let's go over dion waiters this summer shall we

sure first of all coming into a contract year a contract year that could like feasibly see dion waiters get more money like tristan thompson like i don't really know anything could happen this summer could happen dion waiters has lost some weight which is sort of reverse muscle watch shout out to Lang Whitaker then he got um started working with shooting coach and he found that his foul shots were going to the left so he decided to just move over to the right and now he is almost to the far corner of the right hand side of the foul free throw line have you seen video of that? Yeah.

And Durant is like teasing him about how he's going to start getting like infractions for going over the line. So he's got that going on. I like, just for one second. I like that for two reasons. I feel like that's like, um, kind of like a window unintentionally into Durant's like mindset where he really feels like. It's also Waiters' mindset where it's like, oh, this is easy.

I'll just move over three feet to the right. Instead instead of like i'll correct my actual shot and like do something different with my muscle memory anthony mason had moved his like moved his whole body like he started like crouching so that when he didn't have to bring the ball down so low um i personally don't think i'm like a very good uh dion observer anymore because i just keep picking up on things and like darnell mayberry or worse younger anthony slater tweets where it's like chris pass from dion and i'm like well this is the reincarnation of magic johnson on the court like this is an understatement the thunder beat writers are all in on dion and so am i and who would know better than us also dion continues

to be an exemplary philadelphian absolutely so he seems to have been making made in america the festival that happens every summer in philly into his own so he had a lovely party there with meek mill whoa he's partying with meek yeah that is so dion he's like keep it with me yeah yeah i stand with meek and it just seems like he's he's like he's probably coming off the bench he likes playing in billy donovan's system um i'm a big billy donovan supporter i'm really excited for thunder i think they're gonna win the win the finals Wow a few other things About the Thunder that I noticed this summer Dion was part of the group that came

Together much like the storied Seahawks team did They came to Southern California for their workouts In Over the summer you know like unofficial But Katie and Ross were Leading them and I just feel like that their commitment To team chemistry

seems like obvious to me like one of like their strategies was like it's like team together because you have to have like in Oklahoma City there's not a lot else I mean no offense but you're not you're not selling the nightlife you're not selling cultural institutions necessarily you're really trying to sell the ghost hotel yeah and we always looked at this team like as if like it was an it was graduate school right it was like an extended college experience where Oklahoma was basically like a very collegiate atmosphere for these guys. Speaking of chemistry, Dion Waiter sent a tweet on the 25th of October that said, No lie, I have the best teammates I could ever ask for. No BS, it's real love and a brotherhood.

Just something I wanted to share. That's beautiful. And then he put a couple of lightning bolts up, which i assume were thunderbolts yeah and then i i looked at his twitter because i haven't in a while and his background is still his picture from the calves so do you think he manages his twitter page though uh i just think he maybe just like nobody has ever changed his background i feel like dion just like was looking for a home from the minute he got to oklahoma city like katie and ross tried to like bring him in you're right by making sure he was like had a good locker room placement and I do and also I remember him I like I'm tweeting like him and Anthony Morrow were like

talking trash about um Panthers Eagles oh yeah and like I don't know I just feel like that's it's a good it's a good vibe I feel like actually this Thunder team like now hopefully KD stays healthy that's like the thing that I'm most excited about is having durant back he scores me like 52 points in two games yeah like on 20 of 29 shooting yeah um i feel like this team like is kind of a return to the previous like the 2010 thunder or like you know when they first moved and everyone's like oh it's like stay home play video games together now they're they're not staying home playing video games but like they've grown up together and they're like ready but it's so crazy how young they are like this is the first time that katie says he's ever dressed up for halloween which is a little bit odd and also

russ said he's never shaved yeah russ told maxim he's never shaved in his life he says he doesn't grow facial hair i mean russ has had a great summer he really has he got married so i think it was did royce or who asked him about taylor swift they asked him about basically if he had heard ryan adams's' Taylor Swift covers record. And he was just like, who's Ryan Adams, bro? I love it. I bet Russ loves a new Adele song. He'd probably sing it in his car to himself.

Let's talk about another team that's very important to this podcast. Okay. Mavs? Also celebrating Halloween. Sure. They went as a basketball team. Finally, four years later, Darren Williams has finally arrived on the Mavs. They landed D-Well.

I was trolling Mavs Moneyball, the SB Nation blog. Trolling? Not trolling. You were trolling. Sorry. I was lurking. That's an internet term that kids use. What's a meme?

Yeah. I was lurking. Just catching up with the Mavs. Sure. Seeing what's up. Getting ready to emotionally embrace that squad on the internet and um i read something that like darren williams one of the reasons he wanted to sign with the maps was because they have like a storied medical team i was like huh that's interesting i didn't didn't know that was a case and then i was just thinking about who's on their roster right now. Chandler, my number one.

Microfracture. Microfracture surgery that was kept secret all summer. Sure. And Wesley Matthews, new acquisition. The strongest man alive. Apparently. Okay, so we interviewed at our previous job at Grantland. We interviewed Wesley Matthews in June, right?

Who asked us not to spoil Homeland for him. Yes. I hope he's caught up. It's a new season. Should we just spoil Homeland for him yes yes I hope he's caught up it's a new season should we just spoil Homeland for him now what is happening on Homeland right now I've stopped watching okay sorry Wesley Matthews you're on your own so he came in wearing an Aaliyah shirt which was not the most shocking thing the most shocking thing was that uh he said his he was like moving along faster than usual with his rehab on his Achilles yeah but let's be clear like when we were talking to him he was like just out of the part where he could get up out of his bed by himself so it wasn't like he was like I'm doing suicides and slapping the backboard and

this was in June four months ago yeah something like that May Achilles usually is like a year long if not if it's not a career ender it's like takes a year to come back yeah and then there's always the question of whether somebody will be as good as they were when they come back and wesley matthews was such a dynamic player but two-way player he was a great defender and just like it seems like a good guy he's awesome yeah like really enjoyed him so i if there's anybody i hope comes back miraculously fast from an achilles injury it's wesley matthews is he playing tomorrow uh he played a little bit in preseason yeah i mean it sounds like he is they're opening at phoenix i don't know if he has a limits i may or may not have memorized the dallas maverick schedule

i don't it's gonna be a tough watch though like if you like zaza patchouli is on that team now what was his halloween so they had a picture i think it was taken by justin anderson who's with a rookie yeah from virginia i don't know why i know that uh that he took the picture i know why because i sent you a link from zaza patchouli and it was a regram of justin anderson it was a party hosted by darren williams who dressed up as macho man randy savage yes and the the jerk dressed up as lurch which was hilarious and the channeler was who um like a caveman i think really i think he probably just wanted to take his shirt off okay i think he just wanted to like take his shirt off probably okay sexy caveman sexy caveman um but it's like an interesting move by darren williams like he's just been like kind of trashed

yeah it's also kind of funny to think about um like when a new player comes to a team and immediately imposes their leadership well he's from dallas so maybe it's like sure i mean but it's not like that doesn't give him like automatic like first seat at the table as long as jerks around it's jerks team sure yeah and it's and rick carlisle is a pretty like like i'll be interested to see how darren williams gets along with rick carlisle because rick carlisle is notoriously like tough on point guards on point guards as rajon rondo would would uh can attest he's an even jason kidd they had some issues yeah um and then you know another person who has come in and imposed their will on a team seemingly is paul pierce oh my god uh our our los angeles clippers let's get into it let's move

let's talk about some rivalries that we're looking for it was a really good summer for rivalries and then there was no better one than the like hot stove burning hot singed beef between the clippers and the warriors yeah and they have not they have not let it drop. It's only getting hotter. And the Warriors just smoked them in preseason. But it was weird. It was like, why are you trying so hard? But Chris Paul got ejected from that game, which is crazy. And they didn't have Steph.

And in this last game, it was pretty chippy, although Draymond afterwards was like, if you think that's chippy, wait. And then after the game, Sean Livingston, who's like really quiet like dude was just really steamed about blake he said like blake was wrapping him up and throwing elbows and it was just some goon shit and he was just like what is up with that guy and like if they want to play that way we're going to play that way if they want to talk we're going to talk so we know interesting zach had done zach lowe greatland had done an interview with Doc Rivers earlier in the summer.

And I think that's where all this stuff sort of started, right? Was Doc was like, it's, it's like luck is involved in winning any title and they were lucky they didn't have to play the Spurs or whatever, you know, like whatever they, he said. They didn't have to play us either. Right. Well, by the way, didn't they beat you three, three out of four times in the regular season? Yeah. three out of four times in the regular season. And you had a scrub on the bench,

like elbow on his way out, Draymond Green on national TV. It's like a pretty bad luck. But that could be interesting, like heel turn for Blake, where he kind of goes from being- It's not really a heel turn because he's been, that's been his rep.

I feel like he would go from like crybaby to aggressor. Yeah, I mean, there's only two channels, but I think in public perception blake was like an mvp candidate like how he carried the team when you know went through injuries last year and like he was really the backbone of that team and especially in the playoffs like he was everybody was just like this guy is charles barkley this is amazing it's like he's interesting though there's there's almost no one else in the league for me who like the the uh off the court like it just seems like so fun Like I would love to hang out with him I just like don't I mean he's really good

I just like don't enjoy watching him play Is he the biggest star who is still publicly disrespected That's a good question I mean Harden sometimes But I don't feel like people talk trash about Harden In the press as much Also this was like not really covered but all of the players Chose Harden as their MVP over Staffs Like the players like Harden in the press. Also, this was not really covered, but all of the players chose Harden as their MVP over

Steph. The players like Harden. He's a cast. He's very socially people love him. You know who does not love him? The people of Malibu. Because after he had that birthday party where he set off fireworks late into the night, he was being sued. I thought he was living in Calabasas this summer. With Chloe? Yeah.

I think so. Calabasas is close to Malibu. Did you see the bling ring uh yeah i didn't i don't didn't necessarily know that that was supposed to be like an accurate map of los angeles well you just go over the hill you're right at the beach um so we've got that that those issues and then inside the clippers there's still like there was see here's the thing was mentioning the clippers this summer there was that whole bit about the team president and dot clashing right and the team president wanting to get involved with like some more basketball issues jillian zucker there was a lot of background yeah

and there was a lot of there was like a kind of like organizational chaos going on and then of course with the deandre thing which was um probably the defining moment of our personal relationship um you and me yeah i mean like in terms of like i'll never forget that day me neither i knew we were at a bar watching it all unfold there was bad service in the bar so it's hard to refresh twitter but that seems to you know i think that that was supposed to be this real like moving forward from that they got deandre back and it was like a galvanizing kind of event but even even from that you know they brought in a lot of other players they brought in lance stevenson they brought in paul pierce strong personalities guys who want to use the ball a lot.

And it's not going over perfectly with everybody. Like Jamal Crawford was reportedly like a little bit frustrated with not being included in the Clippers recruiting click that Wednesday goes to see DeAndre. Click, click, click. I love that. Interesting is also Jamal Crawford was like, he's not their best player,

but like last season was one of their most important players. And was the one who was being like blamed like it's like when they're like the bench sucks yeah you're like oh i come off the bench right but he was the only serviceable bench player and like and would save them by being a shooter through like you know the kind of the middle of the quarter like when people were resting also it's interesting because i uh i have a theory jamal crawford's like actually pretty popular around the league i think yeah it's i mean you're all right with his theory so i mean he is he's like known as being popular so it's interesting that he feels left out it's like i have a theory the world is getting hotter too that's also true um but uh i'd be interesting to see how paul pierce coming in like him just like assuming he's like there's a lot of cooks

in the kitchen yeah a lot and also they've got lance and it's like doc is like a shrinking violet so there's just gonna be a lot of like i mean i think that because they're veterans and because i mean they're already one of the best offenses in the league and they have so many pieces and now like they can survive injuries who makes a move first the knicks getting rid of mellow or the clippers making a trade the dicks yeah i think the clippers are gonna one more season real keep it together for one more season i don't believe in the squad like i just don't they'll i think they're all they'll implode and like for all paul pierce's professionalism we thought they were gonna implode last year when they had no players and they kept it together and they did implode though they did that's one of the worst that's

true that's one of the worst playoff losses of all time. That was an incredible implosion. It's like, how do you even come back? I mean, like, I don't know. It's really bad. And Chris Paul getting kicked out of a preseason game. He said to the refs, like, don't treat me like a child. I have two of my own. That's true.

It is true. Yeah. His kids are quite cute. Yeah. Cameron's really getting cute. I think she's like three now. Him getting kicked out of preseason game and Blake being more aggressive is interesting. Maybe they'll just be even more hated. Let's move on to another team we don't like, which is the Rockets.

Who do you think you're going to dislike more, the Rockets or the Clippers? I'm going Clips. I think Clippers, probably. Ty Lawson's redeeming. He's fun to watch. Yeah, I'm really pulling for Ty. I like Corey Brewer, too. Me too me another friend of the pod totally ty lawson going without a guarantee contract is also really interesting yeah like that is like uh seems like some kind of like

contractual turning point and i'm really into this league did i tell you that you are did you do some like research on it no i just like really enjoy watching him play it i think he could be i mean while dwight is already we're all here's what i'm not into for the rockets and this is why one of the reasons why i probably like besides the fact that i like aesthetically don't watch like what like watching them play basketball is i hate dwight injury watch and i feel like when you look at the rockets news page like if you look for rockets news results it's it's already all like well dwight's not gonna fly because his back hurt and Dwight's knee is like giving him some problems. So he's going to rest it here.

And it's just like, just, you know what? Call me in the playoffs. Right. I bet to say, like, is this going to be another season? Feel free actually to just take a vacation. Another season of Dwight just taking it, just taking it off until April. The one thing that did pop up on the Dwight meter this summer was a couple of weeks ago. I think the Orlando Magic president, I don't know if he still is or if he was just the president when dwight was there said that um when he was with the magic dwight

howards like they said like who do you compare yourself to and dwight howard was like mandela and ali and jordan and like they were just flabbergasted that's embarrassing that's also like patently false that is not correct it was a quiet kind of quiet dwight summer though like what was he doing uh yeah he was he was pretty quiet i don't really know back to the clippers for a second i also i keep forgetting that josh smith is on the clippers i know like that's crazy and lance yeah so they have on the bench they have paul pierce lance josh smith jamal crawford awesome rivers that's like that's a good that's a good second there's like it's almost like you need

three beat writers to do that from like if you because you have so many potential storylines it's like when this the coach's son who was forced to like carry a huge load in the playoffs is like the ninth most interesting thing in the team it's pretty incredible it is pretty wild also like will they try to change deandre jordan at all like after like a crazy off season like what like will they be like was there any kind of like promises made to him but like what kind of player yeah like is there are they gonna play through him more and what happens when they shouldn't what happens when Haka DeAndre just comes back right although he did spend a lot of time this summer I think working on his free throws I mean you would think that he would spend his entire career working as free

throws good point yeah um and also one other Clippers uh fight before we move on to my favorite feud is Matt Barnes versus Doc Rivers fun summer for for Matt Barnes. Oh man, it's a tough one. But we didn't do a potter on Barnes and Derek Fisher. Yeah. I mean, I think that it had like when it was first breaking and everything, or when we were, the news was first coming out, it had like a meet me in Temecula vibe, which was why I think people enjoyed it all. But obviously there are overtones to it and like there are implications to it that are disturbing. But by the same token, I haven't really read much about it since then. But it sounds like it was also wildly overblown.

I think so, too. He was 15 minutes away, not 90 miles away. The original story was that he drove from Santa Barbara, where he was at training camp with the Grizzlies, to... To kick Derek Fisher's ass. Yeah. And that's not what happened. Or his wife's house, right? Yeah.

They're still technically married, but they're separated. Right. Gloria Govan. Basketball wife. And I am a huge fan of Gloria Govan. You are? Yeah. I love her cooking YouTubes.

Oh, interesting. He didn't, Barnes never looked that happy to be in them. He was always like, hey. No, but he actually was like, they made tri-tip one night and they made some salmon the other, like one video. And he looked like he knew what he was doing. I have one comment. She was like, you're in charge of this. he was like i know i've got some commentary though

on this cooking videos nba wives being like into cooking and stuff oh god if you like aisha curry steph's wife right if you're married to an nba player just get a cook get a chef it's better for them like just like i don't know like it seems like one of the great things of being rich they're like cooking together as a family brings families closer i guess so i mean not in my family because like we just it always was like a source of acrimony like i mean isn't that why people make meals together steve nash and like jj reddick and like players like that who are like really obsessed with like their diet yeah like lebron and bosh has a cook yeah like bosh likes cooking sure okay and also adrian bosh is a

fucking boss like i love her so she can do whatever she wants but i just feel like if it's better for your career and the livelihood of your family if you have like someone who is like a clean natural chef and like i don't know like i don't on the real like aren't those guys like a lot of the times like their wizardry is like steam the broccoli yeah steamed broccoli like i can yeah okay so like right gloria covan just steam the broccoli like let's move on i don't know like i don't i think it's cool if you want if you want to be like a chef it wasn't a barefoot contestant there were like three youtube videos let her live you know what i mean it's really directed at isha curry i guess she's bottling her own olive oil now too i just feel like you should

use the largesse that you get from being an nba player to invest in a really good cook who will like keep your career going well okay that's my point okay that's it what were we talking about noted thanks evie brown um so matt barnes and eric fisher let's just move on there's nothing new to add there it was just like that was just bizarre honestly like say they both have like questionable personal backgrounds and like both have like no histories going into this but like on a strictly basketball level i don't want my coach 3 000 miles away from the base of the team's operation yeah yeah i mean i guess like it's like it's a it's a free country and if if he is in a romantic relationship like

he has every right in the world to like go visit like his girlfriend or whatever but it's always strange to me when stuff like that happens at a time when you theoretically should just be like all in on your team and doing everything you can to be prepared for the season right i agree and i guess i think he like missed his flight back or whatever so like even if it was the weekend like he was free it's like there was repercussions vibes that i get from like the way that the new york coachingaching and leadership Situation is being developed that It wouldn't shock me to see like a

Christmas Phil appearance Like I'm just saying I think he's really too old to coach and you probably physically just can't do the grind But there's Something about like some of Fisher's comments that feel like very like I just work here And if I'm Derek Fisher's boss I'm not happy with my employees

Performance yeah Tibbs floating around on the ether oh it seems like tibbs right now is like on like a tour of like sitting next to powerful basketball people in the stand yeah why wouldn't you i know it's a it's a great it i think that if i was a coach of a championship contending slash like high end playoff team right now in the nba and i had owner who was especially itchy to get into the playoffs or do very well, I would be looking over my back. Now, Tibbs is not hunting for jobs,

but Whitman, Blatt, these guys who had shaky job situations in the past, I would be very concerned that one of the winningest coaches in the last five or 10 years of NBA is just hanging out, lifting weights, and eating cheeseburgers suspiciously quiet summer from blatt too no big no grand commentary it was all about just basically tried to play down expectations it's just like we haven't won anything yet so we shouldn't be expected to win anything or like right like we don't deserve to say that we're favorites i wonder if like um just because of like the lebron industrial

complex like if there hadn't been the whole tristan thompson brouhaha like if there just would have been more contrived storylines about the Cavs and such. I think also because Kyrie is out until probably December at least. Forgot about that. That's just going to be like a... And that's good for the Cavs because I think if the Cavs are a little bit better than 500 for the first few months, everybody's going to be like, yeah, we'll wait until the next half of the season. Yeah.

I guess because they're lucky they're in the East. But again, not that he's a huge offensive threat, but he's a big part of the team. Shumpert will be out for a while because he broke his wrist on a lob in practice, which is amazing. And then Kevin Love's not completely back yet. He's playing tonight, though. Yeah, because they were even talking about how important he's going to be. The Cavs open up their season tonight, Tuesday night, against Chicago. And as if President Obama

didn't have enough world conflict he was overseeing, he's got to watch Jimmy Butler and Derrick Rose. Who's the two-point guard of that team? I will not let this die, no matter how hard these guys try to kill it.

Me neither. It's my favorite feud in the NBA, and I believe it's real. So three weeks ago, the Chicago Sun-Times did a piece that actually had the phrase sources say, or according to sources. And it was basically like, Jimmy Butler likes Derrick Rose personally, but does not respect his work ethic.

And that had just been the latest salvo of a series of sort of just like subtle to not so subtle reports about their relationship. That really like, that exploded during the playoffs where derrick rose kind of seemed like he you know i mean it was pretty clear that those guys were all like tibs is gone this doesn't count or whatever but like derrick rose wasn't really passing to him or what was he doing not shooting in the last few playoff games the last playoff game he was like refusing to shoot yeah i'm like making jimmy butler like carry the offense it's sort of like fine you do it and then derrick obviously had a pretty tumultuous summer which we have like zero comment on i think i have nothing yeah um and then but but as far as his relationship with

jimmy there was also some stuff where jimmy came out and was just like immediately was like i'm ready to play point guard right yeah was that exactly what he said or something approaching that which i think was you could be taking like a million ways like maybe he's just like i'm ready to like expand my repertoire or like i'm ready to like fill in if i need to be like hey if you want to like trade them for mellow like you know like uh so jimmy and derek then did some damage control like we're just like you know we're friends we're friends and like this three weeks ago it was just a pretty pointed report and i think the sun times piece says i think it says bulls source but it might even say bulls player and i don't know if it's like ex-bulls player or whatever but it was like jimmy does not respect derrick's um you know derrick's work ethic he wasn't busting his ass in

practice which is not how a leader should be on the other hand derrick rose who's now wearing a face mask because uh taj gibson accidentally broke his orbital bone yes uh i really wanted to be butler and he was like having some depth perception problems with the mask on just because like it was just difficult to see or whatever but in terms of playing in fred hoiberg's offense is apparently he's just like it's the forces running through me i feel it like i'm running downhill like we're seeing the force awaken well no but the bulls are definitely the team that's been like we can't wait to get out there and run right um and so then you've got all that noah moving to the bench noah's noah's moving to the bench meritage and noah out but

they got dunleavy who's out right who like you know it's like a crucial piece he's not like the guy but yeah i mean they have a good team and they're gonna probably be pretty good but so there was just a very like pointed like derrick rose gifted jimmy butler a watch that was like you know very expensive yeah it was like i'm still the don here yeah but also just like we're buddies i'm giving him a watch um one thing also we have in our notes is that apparently jimmy butler's blowing people away with his energy that just makes me go they do two a days and he could do a third yeah tons of energy interesting huh i also like the fact that jimmy butler's like protege is doug mcdermott me too he took him out to san diego to work out this summer oh my god also i feel like

jimmy butler is like expanding like what is his territory like it's kind of like chicago might be off limits for him because derrick rose like chicago's son so he's like wasn't he hanging out with mark wahlberg in beverly hills like i just feel like he's trying to like really expand the connection there i don't know i don't know like and is Doug McDermott gonna start hanging out with Mark Wahlberg like that's a really he starts hanging out Donnie Wahlberg totally that would be hilarious and Jenny McCarthy who's from the Chicago area it's perfect oh yeah they're married Mark Wahlberg didn't go to the wedding though um I just I'm interested to see how this goes for Jimmy Butler because it just seems like

i mean he you know he had a huge season last year but like how high is his ceiling i don't know if it's like i think that he would probably i think that that's where the rose thing kind of comes in in a different way because i think for jimmy butler he probably sees the ceiling as being like a foundational nba superstar and i mean i'm not sure i believe that but i also won't rule it out one one other feud we don't even have on here but I just wanted to mention was uh Paul George versus his team oh yeah Paul George versus the idea of positions yeah Kevin Durant coming back don't fence me in man let him be great um Kevin Durant coming back has kind of overshadowed Paul George coming back because he played those last few games at the end of last

season yeah but I'm really excited to have him. Yeah, I feel like we'll be able to watch Paul George without holding our breath, because there was a couple of moments in the end of last season, I think there was that last game where he got carried out of game and it was just like, Christ. This is awful. Yeah, please no. We don't need another

fragile man in the Midwest. Prayers up for PG. I also was reading the Indy star profile of monte ellis and it's like it said like if he um had to have a different career he would be a fisherman and paul george also loves to fish so like i would love it if like by some like cosmic like weird occurrence that monte and paul george like love each other and have a fishing show yeah have a bass fisherman show oh my god that would be great i would like i would like quit my job to work on that show on their on their youtube web series monta and paul go fishing you'd be like the siri appleby of uh the siri appleby of that that show from unreal

i just wish we could get reggie jackson on that show i mean on that team i keep forgetting reggie jackson plays the nba he's okay so he's on the pistons sure which is like kind of a weird i don't know the pistons who are carrying now like 13 million dollars of dead money because they've gotten rid of granger and josh smith and brandon jennings is not back yet right no because he has a normal recovery time from an achilles injury yeah which happened a lot earlier than a lot it was like a january injury wasn't it i don't know what this did different variations on achilles injuries it was shortly after um josh smith got waived because brand because Brandon Jennings like seemed freed and like he was playing so well like nine in a row and then yeah and then Brandon Jennings got hurt um Andre Drummond giving up money in in Detroit or like

putting off his extension so that they can I guess sign other people I guess so to make a playoff run I don't know what's the plan there I feel like Stan Van Gundy is like kind of wading into hanky territory a little bit like does he really know what he's doing even what he's doing but they don't like who has their number one option on on offense reggie i guess so like stanley johnson is not going to be like no people are excited about him but like on dudes no he's certainly not they're like he's like coming off the bench He's a rookie. What does he know? They have Cantavious Caldwell Pope. They got a Morris, too. Wait, didn't the Morrises have beef with Cantavious Caldwell Pope?

Did they? Yeah. Oh, great. Wasn't there somebody like he doesn't have any heart? Am I making this up? I don't know. I'm just going to read you this roster. Okay.

This is great. Hold on one second. Joel Anthony, Aaron Baines, Steve Blake, Reggie Bullock, Cantavious Caldwell Pope, Spencer Dinwiddie, Andre Drummond, Darren Hillard, Ursan Ilyansova, Reggie Jackson, Brennan Jennings, Stanley Johnson, Jody Meeks, Marcus Morris, Anthony Tolliver. That's not really... This is a team made up entirely, except for Drummond. It's like the last three guys you draft in fantasy.

When you're like, I have $3 left. These are people who had three good gains on their former teams and like found a home like oh my god this is crazy cheese island svg's island of misfit toys oh good luck to them this is gonna be a really weird team to watch i just can't even get over it um all right let's move on but i'm so excited speaking of sam hanky let's move on. But I'm so excited. Speaking of Sam Henke, let's talk about some Sixers. Oh, God. Yeah, well, talking about, like, the Sixers will probably win, like, 20 games this year. Maybe more, maybe less.

I'm feeling good about Stauskas. This is Stauskas' real rookie year. Look, I'm fine with the process, but it's dark. It's dark right now and bead being alone in a hotel room drinking a pitcher of a shirley temples pitchers yeah of shirley temples is upsetting so there was a piece that came out about a month ago now right yeah that was about why where mb is at and like how this all went down with like his re-injuring his foot and whether or not it was done because he was not wearing his boot enough.

And he was partying and dunking and in layup lines in Vegas during summer league and how, um, they wanted him, like they wanted Sam Hinkie and Brett Brown to like stop him from going to Vegas. And he was just like dead set on going. And it sort of was like the first really big public statement about like a

lot of rumors you had heard about like his diet being like, not entirely healthy speaking of having a personal chef uh his personal chef is definitely like applebee's it's not it's not like the healthiest stuff according to this article and um like the sixers have refuted a lot of that but he's gonna miss the season maybe he comes back for like the last five games or whatever but if i'm mb at this point i i want off the sixers not because of like what the system and the process but because the only way we know about these mb problems is because someone at the six can you think is there an example of somebody who just like had anything even approaching like his injury problems for the first two or three years of their career and then just had like a

great career like no no i mean like brandon roy greg odin like that that's who i think of when i think of him brandon roy had actually a pretty decent career but I'm trying to think of who else missed their rookie season and then did great. New Orleans did but New Orleans had a normal injury that he fixed and also he took a lot of time to come back from it

that's why I think the Sixers are proceeding with caution and they keep saying it's not about the next 10 months it's about the next 10 years and in the meantime they have Julio okafor who looks good he does yeah it plays the same position as joel and bead uh i think i would have rather have oak for um porzingis looks really good though well let's keep talking about the sixers though what about stauskas um we gotta talk about him i'm really excited about stauskas you've anointed a rookie again rookie again decided that he gets to have his rookie season over

He's back with his girlfriend He's free of Boogie Why did they break up? I don't know but they ruined some high school prom by breaking up So this sucks Part of Stauskas' second rookie season They should go to that school's homecoming or something So anyway back with his girlfriend

Finally learned who Adele is This podcast is brought to you by Adele by the way About a week ago he was like a week ago never heard of adele but damn and then like these liner notes posted like the the statement adele had put out for announcing her album and then like a couple days later he was just like damn adele flames and had like the the hello video up i love it i mean he just also put up like a twit pic of his notes from his iPhone. And so it's just like a whole you want to do a little reading here.

Sure. Let me just say his tweet. Adele tweet was wow. Couldn't name you one Adele song, but this is definitely worth the read. 100 emoji. And then he posted like some really long note. Like you said, it started with I'm normally not this open with my followers, which I don't think is true.

I feel like we know a lot about Nick Stauskas' emotional state for someone who claims he's not that open. But I had some good vibes to start off my Saturday. Don't judge me. LOL. Kids, stop with the LOLs. Like only use what's actually appropriate. I'm actually laughing out loud.

Yeah. Like right now at you. Nick, let's just read a few lines of this. A few bars, if you will. I was in the middle of a workout the other day with one of our coaches working my way back into shape from injury. His injury wasn't even that bad, by the way. He's playing this week. I was frustrated with myself because I wasn't performing the way I know I'm capable of. Coach stopped me in the middle of the workout and said, man, look what we're doing. Look at our lives right now. We are blessed. As I began to shoot my free throws,

I really thought about what he was trying to say to me. It was a Friday afternoon. I was alone in the arena with my coach, but we were playing all caps basketball. It's kind of like he's found God, but he's found basketball. Yeah, right. Is this what happens after your rookie season in Sacramento? Is this when you get away from boogie? Yeah. It's like you finally know what the purpose of life is. It's like you can enjoy the little things. I'm excited for him. Also, Stauskas, as we know, does not drive. So being in an urban city is huge. I just feel like this is good for him.

Yeah, but Philadelphia is not laden with public transportation options. Although I think his price range, he could probably take Uber. I bet Uber is a better service within Philadelphia than Sacramento. Yeah. I would love to ride Uber Pool all day with Nick Stauskas. He was a lottery pick, though. He's not that poor.

No, I'm not saying he's poor. I'm just saying, like, if he doesn't drive. Who does Uber pool? I've never once used it. I'd rather go up than down, like from UberX. I'm just, I'm really happy for him. I feel like he's landing in the right spot. It's going to be better.

He's good. I think this, at least it'll be fun to watch on it on social media who are some other teams that we're really keeping an eye on this season and out here in the west we got quite a few teams a lot like on the line clippers and thunder we talked about spurs i think are interesting the four sports illustrated like like new guard covers this week are of the heat wade and winslow of um the timberwolves there's garnett and towns and then lakers there's kobe and russell it all makes sense like really young like and then like a veteran aging veteran all right like serious injury problems and then in san antonio you got tim duncan and lamarcus aldridge lamarcus aldridge is 30 years old i know

he's been in the league for like 10 years Him and Tim Duncan are like the same generation Yeah like they like They ostensibly could have been playing together for 10 years Basically so it's kind of weird To like say like the new guard in San Antonio Is a 30 year old which I just think shows They don't have the same amount they don't have the same leeway

I mean isn't Kawhi really the new guard But probably they were just like we can't do an interview with Kawhi Where he doesn't say anything Also yeah it's just like we can't do an interview with kawaii he's already won finals mvp it's not like he's like ready for like some come up like actually he needs that i mean last season maybe he was he wasn't like as dominant as people were expecting but like yeah he's really good he's gonna be for a while the the real like change over there is gonna be the point guard yeah i mean it's like everything is looking good down there like manu apparently is just like is had like i think maybe because he knows it's the last year or whatever but apparently he's playing really really well

and looks really fresh a lot of energy like jimmy butler um and then but yeah it's tony it's tony didn't look good in euro basket right no and it's really like the times that they've won the final or he is hanging out with rose burn though which is pretty cool socially though she's forever with bobby cannavale oh yeah she's pregnant with bobby it's a wonderful couple um but yeah tp you never know it's true you really don't but uh i was just thinking like what kind of point guard also like do they want to like their system is in some ways more specific for point guards than like almost anyone else i would say yeah um and you know patty mills is a pretty different player than tony parker so it's just interesting like those are their two point guards he's adapted i mean i feel like popovich like always figures it out yeah he figures it out congrats to pop i'm going to the usa basketball job old war is over it's

great that's an interesting that's a beef that did not really like people didn't really know about register on the richter scale i think the jerry colangelo popovich unless you're like a hardcore hoops head like do you know who jerry colangelo is that was such a story too because it was just like everybody there has like served in the military it's just like another patriot greg popovich another great man um who else are we excited about? Who are you going to be watching the most? Thunder and Bucks. Interesting. Yeah, I'm really excited for the Bucks. I'm really excited for Dark Giannis to come back.

Having to serve his suspension for blowing up Mike Dunleavy. I'm really excited to see Jabari back. Me too, Jabari back. I'm so happy. There was a picture the other day of Greg Monroe hugging Giannis, and I was like, I like this team a lot. Yeah, they're a fun bunch. An evil coach kid.

Yeah, and I'm curious to see what Michael Carter-Williams looks like under kid. Because kid gets a lot out of his guys. Right, he really does. But Michael Carter-Williams can't hit the wide side of a bar. And they're Shea or an agent, so who knows what the repercussions are if he doesn't play well. Just wanted to throw that out there. Where do you stand on Mario Hazonia? like how excited are you i'm pretty i'm pretty

amped i'm pretty amped for that for that magic team the the aaron gordon mario zonia depot depot peyton yeah that's that's peyton's really good that's a crazy quartet like one of those guys is definitely gonna hit and tobias harris too that's a good team yes i'm looking forward to that uh i'm just so happy the nba is back we will be doing this podcast semi-regularly who knows uh one one thing before we go i just want to highlight my favorite social media post of the week courtesy of los angeles very own or new adopted son lance stevenson son of the city son of the city son Son of the city. Son of angels. The city of angels. Lance Stevenson.

So Lance is here. Fairly quiet this offseason. Yeah. Not a really loud offseason from him. But you want to know what that means? He's going to erupt in the regular season. And I know that he's motivated because he did this incredible tweet that I texted to you over the weekend. Because it's just phenomenal. And it's a YouTube video with the caption lance

stevenson complete highlight reel colon indiana pacers all caps this is for everyone who says lance is trash so he is conveniently forgetting his entire season in charlotte there um i guess last year didn't happen and he's ready for a do-over but you know what dreams come true in los angeles that's true we're living proof we are testaments to it uh chris it's been great talking to you nice to be back thanks for listening to sources say crank the adele bye guys