The Bill Simmons Podcast - Ep. 176: NBA Trade Talk With Kevin Clark and Sean Grande

Episode Date: February 14, 2017

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons brings on Ringer staff writer Kevin Clark to discuss the trade of Serge Ibaka (5:00), Rob Hennigan's coaching hires (10:00), the only Magic players worth keeping (15:00), and Bill Belichick's draft-day trades (21:00). Then, Sean Grande, the voice of the Boston Celtics, joins to discuss potential Celtics deals (26:00), Isaiah Thomas's miraculous fourth quarters (31:30), Iverson vs. Isaiah (38:00), how playing style has changed in the NBA (45:00), Marcus Smart's value (53:00), Jaylen Brown's rookie season (57:00), and Andre the Giant at MSG (1:00:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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A lot of good stuff going on there. We're going to tape this for the Ringer NBA show and it got carried away. Now this is just a full special bonus podcast. We didn't tell them what we're going to tape this for the ringer NBA show and it got carried away. And now this is, uh, just a full special bonus podcast. We didn't tell them we're going to do Sean granny coming up a little bit later to talk about, um, this crazy Celtics season, the chain and the fact that they might have a chance to get the one seed now, if Kevin loves that for a long time and also what they should do in Isaiah Thomas's, um, meteoric rise into becoming at least an offensive superstar. But first we have Kevin Clark from the ringer who is the most tortured magic

fan. I know he's also the only magic fan I know. So he has both of those titles, but there's a Serge Ibaka trade today. Orlando's falling apart. We're going to talk to him first. It's an all NBA edition of the BS podcast. Here we go. All right, we're going to talk a little hoops today. It's a Tuesday, almost afternoon. It's sunny in Southern California. It's not raining, at least until later in the week when the rain's going to come hard and fast and furious. It's been raining at least until later in the week when the rain's going to come hard and fast

and furious. It's been a very strange winter. It's always a strange winter if you're an Orlando Magic fan. We're going to talk to Kevin Clark from the Ringer first. He's on the line. We were bothering him on his vacation. He just worked his butt off for the Ringer for six straight months with the NFL and decided to take a nice peaceful vacation

this week. And his favorite basketball team, the Orlando Magic, just made yet another terrible trade. And Tate, we were talking about whether this is the process. What would you call this? It's not the process? What is this? It's like the anti-process?

The never-ending process? What is it? The exorcism. Well, first of all, I want to be clear. You're not bothering me on my vacation. be clear you're not bothering me on my vacation rob hennigan is bothering me on my vacation fair um i mean this is this is really bad um this is like the it's like you know how midway through lost everyone realized there was no plan but there was no real ending yeah um that's what this is is that all of this sort of oh he's doing this

to to clear space for this. Like, it's just not going to come together. Yeah, it's not. It's the eternal rebuild. It's not the process. So last June, they traded the number 11 pick in the draft, which turned out to be Sabonis, who's on OKC, and Victor Oladipo, who was eligible to negotiate an extension last October for Abaka. And when they did this, people were confused because, for one thing,

they had Aaron Gordon on their team who played Abaka's position. That seemed like a red flag right there. Abaka was only under contract for one more year, and then could be a free agent. That also seemed like a red flag because you have to re-sign him and you have to resign him and you have to be pretty much good for him to want to stay there. And then the third red flag was then they went and got Bismack Biambo in

free agency for a lot of money. And suddenly they had Nick Vucevic. They had Abaka. Is it Vich or Vic? Vooch is his nickname, it's Vooch. Vooch is his nickname because it's Vooch or Vic. No, I know,

but it's Vooch. Is it, does it end Vic or Vich? I've really got to figure this out before my life is over. It's Vic. Vooch or Vic. Before we get into the Celtics, you have to figure this out.

This was Zach Lowe's, this drove Zach Lowe crazy because Zach Lowe married somebody who was Croatian and I could never get the vich vic thing right and he would yell at me and I've gotten it wrong so many times I can't remember which way is right anyway that four big they basically had four big guys in a league where everybody has gone small and nobody plays more than one big guy at the same time unless it's like you know rare exceptions like Utah and there's enough minutes. Now they're playing Aaron Gordon at small forward. It's a disaster.

And finally they cut bait today. They realize Ibaka's not coming back. They trade him for Terrence Ross, a perfectly fine swing man. I would say he's above average, maybe, slightly. He's like an eighth man, maybe. Maybe he's not average. We lead the league in eighth man. Right, so there's an eighth man. Maybe. Maybe he's not average. We have a lot.

We lead the league in eighth man. Right. So there's another eighth man for you. He makes $10 million a year. And you got the worst of their two picks, which I really thought was the most insulting part of this because they have their own pick. And they have the Clippers pick.

And the Clippers pick. And they had so little leverage that Toronto's GM was like, we're going to give you the worst one of those two first round picks. So they basically, if you include the fact that they gave Tobias Harris away for nothing, they basically traded Tobias Harris, the 11th pick and Victor Oladipo for four months of Serge Ibaka, Terrence Ross, maybe the 24th pick, and enough money to sign Bismack Biambo, the center that they didn't really need because they already had a center. I'm hard-pressed to find a worse plan than that.

Can you even come close to explaining it? No, I mean, it started in 2012 when he traded Ryan Anderson for Gustavo Aion. Obviously, there were contract issues there with Anderson. He was about to become very expensive. But, I mean, the pattern is to take assets and turn them into nothing. I think because Hennigan won a few trades, because he got Vooch in the Dwight Howard deal.

He also got Al Harrington in that deal, by the way. You know, he had Aaron Aflalo turn him into Evan Fournier. That was good. He won the first Harris trade as far as getting four months of J.J. Redick going to Milwaukee in exchange for Tobias Harris and Beno Udre. That was a good trade. But that's only because of the sheer volume of trades he's done. Of course he's going to have some good trades. So for me, it's just every single thing he's had, that's the history of

the magic, whether it's Shaq, whether it's Penny, whether it's Dwight, we've turned assets into nothing and ended up with nothing. And this is just a continuation of that. As far as this goes, Hennigan fits the magic culture to a T. So I think you were on my podcast last summer when the magic were doing all these dumb things. And we were like, why are they doing all these dumb things? We couldn't understand it. We were very dubious that it was going to work out. And it worked out even worse than I thought. But it really starts.

I think Hennigan was okay. He did a good job with the Dwight Howard trade. I mean, he had no leverage whatsoever and somehow got some assets out of that. The night that it fell apart for him was the night when Sam Henke looked across the table at him like Teddy KGB and ate his Oreo and just basically stole the first round pick from him. He took Alfred Payton, didn't seem like he wanted him, made no sense with Michael Carter Williams. It was an idiotic pick, but took him hoping that Orlando would be like, wait a second that was our guy wait what if we gave you our pick two picks later and we'll throw in something else and it's what happened it's I don't think I think it's the only time in the NBA draft that I can remember that a team picked a guy hoping that the team behind

them would immediately panic and they panicked they ended up, they traded two spots back and gave up a future first-round pick that I can't remember how good that pick was. But from that moment... It was Dario Sarge. Right, it was Dario Sarge, but then something else, too. You got a future something. And from that moment on, he was never the same.

Like, he got his pants pulled down. Well, yeah, and then it was just bizarre moves. I mean, we gave up Maurice Harkless for nothing, literally like a conditional second rounder, and Maurice Harkless would be one of the best players in the Magic right now. So I think that once – I think Hennigan, you know, he's almost like Peyton Manning in 2003, where when everything goes perfect, he's great.

But once he started to see the plan sort of, like you said, Hinky just sort of stealing his lunch money during the draft. And then once that started to deviate, he just started to panic. Kyle O'Quinn gone for nothing, you know, replaced him with Jason Smith who was gone after a year. I mean, it was just, it was a series. He did not have a plan B or a plan C or a plan D and now we're on like plan F.

So in 2015 he took his own, yeah. And I really liked his own, yeah. I, uh, you know, granted just Hazonia, and I really liked Hazonia. Yeah. You know, granted, just watching him on YouTube and stuff, but just seemed like almost like Marco Bellinelli on steroids or something. Like just had this very athletic swingman game that made sense with the way the NBA was being played. And to say that that pick has not worked out would be to almost belittle how bad the pick was.

On top of it, it turned out to be one of the better drafts. So they missed Porzingis by one pick, but then a few picks later, you just have this incredible run of Justice Winslow, Devin Booker. You had Miles Turner, Trey Lyles, even Kelly Oubre, and even Terry Rozier at number 16. All of them have been better than Hazonia.

But did you like that pick at the time? I loved it. I think if you watch what happened around the Hazonia pick, for instance, hiring Scott Skiles, who's a coach who hates young players, and saying, you develop Mario Hazonia, who mario zonia was very cocky when he came in he had that line he played for barcelona and someone said did you ever see messy play and he said something to the effect of well messy needs to come see me play i mean like he was talking so much trash i'm like yes this is the guy and then he couldn't play defense he couldn't go on the floor he couldn't crucially

shoot threes which is a problem for a three-point shooter. And so his confidence was gone by Christmas time of his rookie year, and all of a sudden Scott Skiles was unhappy. And so you just get into a situation where, I mean, maybe in a vacuum, maybe, and we say this all the time, but if he was on the Spurs, he'd be averaging 20 points by now, but the magic just surrounded him with mistake after mistake and just did nothing to develop.

And at this point, there's questions about his attitude, about his work ethic. I'm pretty, you know, we had a conversation a couple weeks ago about what you would trade for his own. Yeah, I'd pretty much take anything at this point because I think in Orlando, he's beyond salvageable. Yeah, that's another thing with Hennigan is how bad his coaching hires has been. Jacques Vaughn, pound for pound. What's your energy?

Jacques Vaughn, pound for pound. Jacques Vaughn, pound for pound was almost hiring the guy from Weekend at Bernie's. And then Skiles for a year. We're still on our third coach. Even Frank Vogel, very good defensive coach. Below average offensive

coach. Maybe average to below average. I really like Frank Vogel, but those Indiana teams were defense defense defense with the roster that he has here i don't know i just don't know what the game plan is with that and then uh it's just weird like i it's one of those teams like tate and i were talking before you called in they're almost like a junior college you pass through orlando yeah to try to get your life together before you go to a real college and then you become a real basketball

player. I'm like, oh, I'll never forget that year I spent at Oklahoma Community College that got me ready for Kentucky. That's kind of what the magic has become. We have not run an offensive play since 2011. I ran that by SportVU. The last offensive play was 2011.

Aaron Gordon does certain things really well, he cuts to the basket I saw a stat the other day that basically no one is more successful on cuts to the basket than Aaron Gordon, and yet we've built an offense around Alfred Payton dribbling around for 20 seconds and then, you know, keeping it up basically, or passing it

to Aaron Gordon who then takes a jump shot instead of cutting to the basket at this point, it's motivation and energy. I mean, Frank Vogel continues to complain about energy, which makes it the third coach to complain about energy. And there's two things you can do. Either get energetic guys, maybe don't trade away Victor Oladipo, or you just, you know, have a coach who motivates them.

I mean, I don't understand why everyone fails in Orlando. It's unbelievable at this point. I don't understand why everyone fails in Orlando. It's unbelievable at this point. I don't understand it either. And what's crazy is the Celtics were so desperate to trade up in that Justice Winslow draft. And were offering all kinds of goodies to get up to number four, number seven, number eight, number nine, whatever. That Hazonia pick had way more value than just the fact that it was the number five pick in a draft. Like they could have just moved down, picked up more assets and you know,

it's too bad. And, and, uh, not too bad if you're the Celtics, but too bad if you're the magic. And I don't really know, like who do you build around now?

Do you build around who, what, like just strip the roster down? Who do you care about? Yeah. I care about Aaron Gordon and that's it. You do you care about? Yeah. I care about Aaron Gordon, and that's it. You don't care about any other player? Evan Fournier is under contract, a good contract.

But, I mean, if he's your starting two, are you really winning that many games? I think he'd be a decent sixth or seventh man. He's certainly the only, you know, at some point during the season, he's the only capable scorer. I think the Magic have so many slump-prone guys, and they all tend to slump at the exact same time. That's why they lose 10 or 11 in a row every year.

I really think that Gordon and maybe Biambo, Biambo's on a fine contract. I think the criticism of it is a little bit overblown. And then, again, Fournier is affordable for the next few years. So those guys are fine. I mean, Peyton can't shoot. We had a thing on The Ringer this week about Rajon Rondo and how guys without a jump shot can't win anymore. And thank God we drafted one in the lottery with Alfred Payton.

And so I don't have a lot of hope for anybody. I would have been okay paying Oladipo. I mean, that's better than this. That's better than paying Terrence Ross $10 million a year. I really paying Oladipo. I mean, that's better than this. That's better than paying Terrence Ross $10 million a year. I really like Oladipo. And unfortunately, he's on a team now where everybody just stands there and watches Wessel Westbrook dribble around. Or as Magic calls him, Wessel Westbrook. They just watch him dribble around for 20 minutes.

And he shoots every once in a while and every once in a while somebody gets to catch the ball. I would still love to see Oladipo on a good team being used correctly. I believe in that guy and I think he plays hard. His stats aren't terrible. It's not like he's having a bad season for them, but he's never really played with a point guard who goes into a game going, hey, I'm going to make these guys better. I'm going to get the victim of the ball here, and this guy and it just never happened. He had an end-of-life

form, Jameer Nelson. He had Alfred Payton who couldn't get in the ball. I mean, yeah, he's never... He played point guard his rookie year essentially in a sort of Russell Westbrook scenario, and he was great at creating his own offense. But, I mean, he just needs a guy who's going to give him the ball in the right spot,

and he's never had that. That was horrible when they did that. That was like one of those, we're trying to tank, but we're not going to admit that we're tanking, so we're going to play two guard at point guard for big stretches of the season to just sabotage our own team. And who cares if it does any damage to this guy's career at any point? I didn't understand that. It was exciting.

Here's the destiny for Hazonia. At some point, he's going to either leave or they'll trade him to give him away. He'll flame out another team. He's going to go back to overseas for three years. He'll win the EuroLeague MVP. And then the Spurs are going to sign him. And he's going to be freaking awesome. And it'll be like the next Manu for them for like three years. He'll win like the EuroLeague MVP and then the Spurs are going to sign him and he's going to be freaking awesome and it'll be like the next Manu for them

for like 10 years. That's my prediction. He's definitely going six for nine from three in game six of the finals in like seven years. He's going to find the right team and he's going to be good. He's not,

I'm not selling all my stock yet. I have a lot of Alfred Payton stock that I might have bought a few years ago because I liked them. And I think the ringer piece today was right. It's like if you're one, you're two, or you're three, can't shoot, you're effectively screwed against half the league. Like you see with OKC the other night.

They have Roberson and they have Anthony Morrow, who's been in a slump for two years, those guys are playing big minutes and they can't shoot and it's just too easy to stop and it's too easy to shade other guys over. And then you look at a team like the Celtics in Utah the other night. They just spread the floor. Everybody can shoot and they render Gobert like useless. He's almost irrelevant in the game because they're so spread out. He can't figure out where to wobble over to.

I'm with you. Basically, you have this year's lottery pick, you have Aaron Gordon, and then a bunch of 7th, 8th, and 9th men. Would you trade Vucevic or would you keep him? Yes. Well, it depends. I mean, there were all those rumblings that Ibaka would get incredible trade return, et cetera, et cetera, and all of a sudden we got Terrence Ross in, what, the 25th pick for him.

So, I mean, I would keep Vooch around. He's a really good anchor for a second unit on a good team. So I think that you could make a case to keep him around. But I also think that a contender could use him. I mean, you know, I still go back to Danny Chow's comparison. He's a poor man's Ennis Cantor. I agree with that. I think he could that a contender could use him. I mean, you know, I still go back to Danny Chow's comparison. He's a poor man's Ennis Cantor. I agree with that. I think he could help a contender,

and I think, you know, a contender would be okay trading a nice package of picks or a good young player for him. I just, it all comes down to the return. I don't think he's essential to the new rebuild, the eternal process. The re-re-re-re-rebuild. You know, I was thinking they were kind of screwed with Ibaka because there was just no trade market to him.

And I noticed this when I was trying to figure out who could trade for Carmelo a couple weeks ago. You basically have 13 teams with a winning record. You have maybe four of those teams until today had the right mix of expiring contracts draft picks um lesser assets to kind of make a three for one or two for one or four for one whatever it took and abaca's market was basically the celtics toronto maybe utah and maybe at Atlanta, you know, because Atlanta has splitters expiring contract.

They had their own first pick and that's it. No, no other team that would make sense. They can't trade him back to OKC because you have to wait a year to reacquire a guy you traded and you just go on down the line and that was it. So I thought when I, when Woj tweeted Toronto's traded for a Baca, I was like, Oh, and. And I actually tweeted this. It was like, oh, it must be. I bet it's Patterson, Jacob Pulte, the first rounder from last year,

and then this year's number one. And then you see the trade, and it's like, oh, okay, Terrence Ross and the worst of their two first rounders. But nobody else was bidding. Obviously, the Celtics were out. So I think the same thing's got to be the case with Vucevic, where it's like, makes sense on paper, but who's bidding for him and what are you getting?

Exactly. And I think the big failure of the Hennigan regime, especially this year, has been just misunderstanding the trade market. We signed Jeff Green to a one-year $15 million deal. He's shooting 38%. He's shooting 38%, and he actually looks worse than shooting 38%. He looks like one of the worst players I've ever seen, okay? Why would you do that if you're not trying to trade him as an expiring type thing?

I mean, it's just like they've set up to have a blockbuster mid-year trade because, look, I think Hennigan knows he's on the hot seat. They need a star, and they're not going to get one. So I think he was getting a Baca. He was signing Jeff Green. He's done this a couple times with veterans in the past. He was gearing up for a massive mid-year trade. And it's just not going to happen.

The trade market is just different this year. Yeah, and unfortunately, it's the type of team that is the perfect trade partner for a Damian Lillard trade. But yet their assets didn't pan out. Like if Hazonia was really good. Right. but yet their assets didn't pan out. If Hazonia was really good, and you do like, all right, what if we do Hazonia, Vucevic, our number one this year, and you just kind of overwhelm them with pieces,

but they don't have the pieces, and what do you do at that point? I think, I really like Gordon, but I also think there's a little bit of the, sometimes this happens in the NBA, these young guys, everybody gets all excited about them. Oh, this is the year for – and he's really never done it. He's had a couple of really great games, but we have no idea if he could be good.

And a dunk contest. And we have no idea if he could be good for 82 games. We have no idea if he's the perfect four. I like him. I think he could, he's had some really nice moments against the Celtics where you watch and go, Oh Jesus. But, uh, it's interesting to me, Vogel compared him to Paul George when he took the job and I can safely say

he's not Paul George. He did. All right. The jury's in. Yeah. Well, I feel bad for you. I know you love the magic. Yeah. It really hasn't been that much fun. And the sad part is the glory years where you had to root for Dwight Howard,

who's one of the least likable guys to root for in the NBA. And that was the highlight of all of this for you. I call those the Hedo Turkoglu years. Smart. Smart. I like it. The PED year. Yeah.

Were you also taking performance enhancers or was that just the team at that time? I had incredible fourth quarter cheering stamina and I don't think it was natural. Yeah. Last thing, just quickly, 30 second football question and then you can go back to your vacation. What is your prediction for a Jimmy Garoppolo trade? Oh. Oh. Oh.

I think this is playing to my audience, but I also think it's possible. I think one of those teams with a – you know, that's interesting. I don't think you're going to get one of those top five picks. I know you're thinking about the Niners or something like that. I don't think it's going to happen. I think you're looking at a high two from're thinking about the Niners or something like that. I don't think it's going to happen. I think you're looking at a high two from a team like the Niners or the Browns. I would say minimum we're getting number 12 from the Browns.

Ooh, okay. Okay. That's the floor for me. I think it's going to be one of those, like, you know, pick 33 through 38 is what you're looking at. How dare you? How dare you? Two-time Super Bowl champ Jimmy Garoppolo available and you're looking at. How dare you. How dare you. Two-time Super Bowl champ Jimmy Garoppolo available,

and you're telling me teams don't want him? The guys won two rings. How about Jacoby Brissett positioning himself as the heir apparent to Garoppolo with all those Brady t-shirts? That was the unheralded storyline, is that he so badly wants to be the new number two, that Brissett was just wearing Brady jerseys for the entire playoffs. The unheralded storyline is that he just, he so badly wants to be the new number two that he would, Bursette was just wearing Brady jerseys for the entire playoffs.

You wouldn't trade Garoppolo and 32 for number two. If you're San Francisco. Um, move back 30 spots. Um, I, I don't, I would not take that.

No. Okay. My dream – Well, see, I mean, look. I wrote this on Friday. My dream is for Belichick to move into the top three and then trade backwards 20 times. I feel like everything in my life has been leading to that moment on my draft day.

I'm going to have five paramedics on hand with my dad if they have the number two pick. If Belichick got the number two pick, you guys would end up with picks 14 through 32. I feel like it's in play. That's how much you would trade back. I think we could get this entire second half of the draft. This would be Browns and Patriots alternating.

That's it. The Browns have like 80 picks in this draft. I think we get every third round pick. If he starts out with number two, I think he could just keep moving backwards until it's like, for the third round, the New England Patriots are on the clock for all 32 picks.

And that's our destiny with this. It'd be great. Enjoy your vacation. Enjoy your vacation. Thanks for weighing in. And maybe when Orlando gives away Vucevic, we can do this one more time. I'm not looking forward to it. Alright, take care. Alright, see ya. Bye.

We're going to call Sean Gray in a second, but first I'm telling you a second time about SeatGeek. Our presenting sponsor. They can help you find the best seats at the best prices, fully guaranteed with their revolutionary grading system.

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They have tickets for everything. Even my mom uses SeatGeek, and my mom is so technologically inefficient that she went from Culver City to my office yesterday and took La Cienega the whole way, which is an inside joke for LA residents. But if you take La Cienega the whole way and then take the right on Sunset, you're technologically inefficient. So just for the record, and even she uses SeatGeek and can figure it out. So check out SeatGeek. Download the SeatGeek app today or check out SeatGeek.com for a whole bunch of cool things. All right. Back to the podcast here, Sean Grandy.

On the line right now, my favorite basketball play-by-play guy, the radio voice of the Boston Celtics, and somebody that I get to listen to now because of Sirius and because of TuneIn. Now I get to listen to my own broadcasters. Sean Grandy, how are you? You know what's amazing about Sirius and you being in LA, we have a, Max and I have a whole new group of fans from LA because we're driving, it's drive time. Perfect. It's great. In LA. So who knew? You know, everyone was really like, when you said, wow, my favorite, people were like, wow, this guy must be really good. Then you said Celtics, and then you lose your credibility.

Oh, he's a Boston guy. That's what Simmons likes. You're really good at it. And there's not a lot of, well, there can never be play-by-play on play-by-play crime, but there's just not a lot of good play-by-play guys. I'm sorry. Don't say anything. Just sit there in silence and don't acknowledge the statement. But listen. You't say anything. Just sit there in silence and don't acknowledge

the statement. But listen, I'm telling an announcer to sit there in silence. That's like torture. I know. So the the the Magic traded for or they traded Serge Ibaka to the Raptors today. I'm guessing the Celtics kicked the tires on it. You followed the Celtics team all season. My guess is that, you is that the rebounding issue is the issue. Serge Ibaka doesn't totally help with that. My guess is that they're laying in wait. Do you think they have a big trade in them before the deadline

next week? I'm skeptical every year that everyone's got a big trade in them. And then we have that year like two years ago and nothing happened to the deadline. Then like nine minutes after the deadline, 48 deals happened because everybody was so desirous of making a deal. I don't... I wonder...

I've been skeptical all along that there's that big deal available. I think there were some nice pieces. Ibaka was certainly one of them that would have fit what the Celtics need. I think everyone's talking about the defense and the rebounding, but let me throw you at least a little wild card or at least off the scent a little bit and down a different path,

which is that two years ago the Celtics won more games than they were supposed to because Isaiah came over and became the sixth man. You could score whenever you needed to in a second unit. Last year, Evan Turner very quietly had a sixth-man caliber year, and he could get you a bucket when you needed one in the second unit. Celtics don't have that. The times you've seen it from Kelly, Marcus Smart, to me, I wouldn't trade Marcus. There's almost nobody you could name in the NBA that I would give up Marcus Smart for.

I don't care if he goes 0 for 20 because he'll make a play for you every night that will help you win, but he's not a go-to guy where you need a bucket on that second unit. So that's something that the Celtics don't have. So while everyone's thinking big and everyone's thinking of Vucevic or they were thinking of Baca or somebody to solidify the rebounding, Celtics were actually hanging in there. They've sort of given up on the defensive rebounding in that they don't think it's one of the critical things you need.

You have to be better at it than they have been, certainly. And I tweeted the other day when I informed Brad Stevens that they were no longer 30th in defensive rebounding. He said, did somebody drop out of the league? That was his response to that. So you have to be better, but I don't think it is priority number one. I think defending multiple positions is priority number one, and then priority number two would be to make sure,

like you see a lot of teams, what that does for Toronto is it makes their second unit so much better. That's what's separating the elite teams right now because there are a lot of teams, what that does for Toronto is it makes their second unit so much better. That's what's separating the elite teams right now because there are a lot of teams. Washington is one of them. You see them all. Utah is another. The starting five is really, really good,

but the drop-off when you get to that second group is enormous. That's been a big advantage for the Celtics, even if they are missing that Evan Turner type this year. But they have a flexibility to them that I thought Toronto was missing, and that's why I thought it was a dangerous trade for the rest of the league that Toronto did that. Because, first of all, Ibaka is one of those, the better his teammates are, the better he's going to be.

He's just a guy that knows how to fit in with all kinds of things. But now they can go small. Now they can play Ibaka and Patterson and Carroll and Lowry and DeRozan. And they just have a different look. And that's one of the things that I think the Celtics are missing. The Celtics have all these different lineups, but there's one thing they don't have is when, you know, when they're getting out rebounded,

when like Tristan Thompson and Kevin Love are out there and they don't have that Kenneth Farid guy that can come in and be like, I'm going to get seven rebounds over the next five minutes. We're not going to get destroyed here. That's what we're missing. I use we like I'm on the team. But the Amir Johnson, Tyler Zeller, those minutes. Hey, go get a rebound.

Yeah, the Amir Johnson, Tyler Zeller minutes, even if it's 15 to 20 a game, if that's going to somebody who can grab some rebounds, I think that would make a big difference on this team. Celtics right now are in this. I mean, you're in a 36 hour renaissance, especially if they beat the Sixers on Wednesday night and the Kevin Love injury, where people are

legitimately going to be thinking about the number one seed and starting to have these fans, oh, you know, LeBron's going to rest for a while, you know, they're going to rest guys, maybe that number one seed is in play. But meanwhile, if you want to go on the other side of it, the games you're talking about, the one that jumps to the forefront of my mind because it might play out in the month of May,

is the night that Valanchunas got about 89 rebounds all in a row in that third and fourth quarter. So you're looking at guys, okay, you're not going to see Rudy Gobert in the playoffs. You're not going to see some of these guys. But yeah, you're talking about Tristan Thompson, you're talking about Valanchunas. These are the lineups that the Celtics will have to neutralize. Yeah, I watch them

almost as much as you do. There's certain matchups that are scary for this reason. Well, two reasons. One is the rebounding thing, but the other thing is they have to hide Isaiah on defense. It's not a secret. So when you go in and get to Washington, and they have John Wall and Bradley Beal humming at the same time

and now it's like, what do we do with Isaiah? Put him over here on Otto Porter. That's not good. Same thing with Toronto. When Lowry and DeRozan are going at the same time, where does Isaiah go? On top of that, then you have Valanchunas who

one of the few teams in the league he just seems to torch is the celtics and it's weird like those are two of the worst matchups in the league for them and both of them are the probable second round opponents one of them if they make yeah and they're certainly aware of it the dirty little secret of this run of isaiah fourth quarters which in boston has become less of an NBA game and more of a Broadway show, in which everyone knows exactly what's going to happen, but they want to come out

and see the finale of Hamilton. And they've been dying to get tickets to see it, and then it actually happened in front of them. And it's an amazing thing to see, and I've stopped talking about Iverson in comparison, because Iverson didn't even do the things nobody's done. What we've seen him do in the fourth quarter for the last six weeks, it's been mind-boggling when you're trying to process something you have

never seen before, that he just does whatever he wants to do. However, the dirty little secret of it is the Celtics aren't outscoring teams in the fourth quarter. They go into the fourth quarter up by three and they win the game. Isaiah scores 18 in the fourth and then they win by three. Because defensively, the fourth quarters have been absolutely atrocious because Isaiah competes on defense. He competes.

There's no question about it. But we were 18 hours removed from watching him. Rick Carlisle set up pick and roll so that he would have to guard Dirk over and over and over again. And it looked like my five-year-old trying to guard me one-on-one. And the Celtics were going to get, they know, they concede the damage that that is going to cause. You just try to minimize it. He's so good offensively that it makes up for it.

But I tweeted this a month ago, and I think people thought I was crazy. Because Cleveland is the best team in the conference and the team that's probably going to the finals. In a weird way, they match up the best with Cleveland out of Toronto and Washington. They have the right guys to throw at the right problems on Cleveland. And Avery Bradley, I hope he's healthy at some point for the rest of my life.

Avery Bradley guards Kyrie better than anybody guards kairi i i kairi demolishes 90 of the league and for whatever reason avery just can kind of stay in front of him make him work kairi might get his points but avery makes him work we the celts have multiple guys to throw at lebron the rebounding thing is an issue but it's a team that they can kind of hide as a on which makes them a little more dangerous. But like, man, that Washington team,

I'm really hoping they screw up the trade deadline and they don't add anyone to their bench because their top six is, is that team's a real problem. I don't think that team's going away. They absolutely are not. And I, you know, if you're the Raptors,

all of a sudden you're looking at, you know, Toronto was stride for stride with Golden State in December. They weren't just beating people. They were beating people up. They had a four-game lead in the division. It looked like they were going to walk backwards into the two-seed. And then there was that game in January that I just referenced with Valanchunas,

and that was, in your parlance, that was a little brother game. That was, we're not ready to hand you the division yet. You know, there's still a gap between us. And all of a sudden, you know, the Rosen injury. And my concern about Toronto was, and we probably talked about this, the wild card for what I thought clearly was the second-best team in the conference coming into the season, as much as everyone was ready to annoy the Celtics, was all of the miles on Lowry and the Rosen with the long playoff run,

the national team, and then another long playoff run. You're putting a lot of weight on those two guys who play a lot of minutes. Anyway, but Avery Bradley might be the key to this. Listen, you talk to players in the NBA in real conversations, not interviews and microphones in their face, about the guys they don't want to play against. You'd be amazed. With names I could mention on Golden State and Cleveland and all around the league, guys will tell you that Avery Bradley is maybe the most underrated two-way player in the NBA, making this run, in which the Celtics have won 10 of 11, by the way, without him, even more remarkable. His plus-minus is towards the bottom of the entire Celtics' run.

You can do whatever you want with numbers. But the fact the Celtics have kept winning games is stunning to me. And how many close games they've won this year. And the big question we'll find out in May is, have the Celtics been lucky throughout the course of the season? Or have they just learned how to win? And are they really good? And do they believe that they're going to win games at the end?

Because I'll give you a great number, because I don't want to get all John Hollinger on this whole thing. But I'm a big scoring margin person, as it pertains to getting a real sense of how good a team was during a season. The Celtics scoring differential was better last year when they were 19-19 than it is right now when they are 36-19. If they were both teams out last year, they'd have some big games.

Here, they win close game after close game after close game, and their margin, which is about 2.8 right now that's really small for a team that's 17 games over 500 toronto has a much better scoring margin utah has a much better scoring margin and the celtics yet have have found ways and you just don't really know until the playoffs when the team hasn't done it yet or have they been lucky during the regular season or are they just that good you know late close i'm really glad you brought this up because I have a lot of thoughts. I like

all the advanced numbers that are out there. I think we've gotten better at putting the numbers together. The offensive rating stuff, the five man plus minus, all that stuff. I look at all of it. I think it's interesting. I think there's little things you can take away from everything. But

the difference with the Celtics team and why I don't think it's lucky is go back to that first game in Oklahoma City, right? Westbrook, the Celtics are playing great. And in the last couple minutes, Westbrook just becomes Westbrook and is just the best guy on the floor. And you watch that game, you leave that game as a Celtics fan, you're discouraged because we just don't have a guy like that. When it comes time to go mano a mano with Westbrook,

there's maybe nine guys in the league who can do it. We don't have a guy like that. All right, fast forward to the home game against Oklahoma City. Same thing. Westbrook just turns it on. He becomes Westbrook. Even Heintzen who will would rather like drink acid than praise an opposing player even he's like that was amazing you gotta give it up

to Westbrook but what's changed in the last two months is Isaiah has turned into a guy who can go toe-to-toe with those guys and that's why like I don't give a shit about oh you know on defense this happens. Actually, if you look at the fourth quarter, their defensive rate, it's all fine. You can show me any number you want. All I know is that basketball at some point comes down to, here's my best five and here's your best five. You're going to score and I'm going to score and one of us is going to blink.

And Isaiah can score on just about anybody in the league right now. And I don't think this is a fluke. I think he can get to wherever he wants on the court. And I think he's way better than Iverson was offensively. I was, I loved Iverson. I ranked him 12 spots too high in my book. Iverson wasn't this efficient. Iverson couldn't get to the rim like this. Iverson couldn't create contact over and over again. He couldn't make shots in the lane over base. I mean, this is insane what we're watching, and I don't think it's a fluke. And I told you that's why I stopped using the Iverson thing and I started using, I think we talked about this too,

but I started using the Roy Hobbs thing. Whatever he wants to do, he does. Even last night, which was a pedestrian fourth quarter by his standards, which I think he had seven points in the fourth quarter, there's a fearlessness. Maybe this has to do with the way the game is played now versus the way it was played when Charles Oakley was on the court

and not being dragged out of buildings. There is no fear. Maybe there should be for little guys going in one-on-four. But knowing that he can maneuver, There's not even that hesitation. Yogi Ferrell, by the way, who's the real thing, who's going to have a future in this league and going to get paid. The difference right now, and you can see a lot of little Isaiah things in the way Yogi Ferrell plays, but there's still that hesitation

when he starts towards the basket because he doesn't know yet that he can make it through that maze, that Eddie Murphy golden child thing when he's in Tibet and he has to somehow jump from pillar to whatever. Why I thought of that movie that I've done in 30 years, I have no idea. You don't know that you can make it to the other side. Isaiah knows he can make it to the other side. He has so many different

ways to score. He's reached that point in the NBA where you've been in the league a few years and know what you can do, but your athleticism is still either on the way up or hasn't started on the way down yet. And that makes him a very dangerous man. And I think the things I've noticed watching him from last year to this year, the number one thing is they don't call him for the push-offs anymore.

He gets superstar respect from the refs. Like, he's going in, he's this little guy who attacks from all angles he's got long arms he's i mean the biggest asset he has is his arms are like the arms that a six foot four person would have so when he goes up he still has to create a little space with the defender and they used to call him for that push off and they just don't this year so that's one thing the second is and i don't know if he worked on this over the summer if he just got better at it but he's kind of mastered that 12 foot in the paint step back shot float that high arcing 12 footer that i just don't remember him making every time last year and then the third thing is he's making crazy three pointers you know and this like, we saw last year the right kind of team

would just defend Isaiah a certain way and he couldn't adjust. And you definitely saw it in the playoffs. This year... Jump work two years ago. Yeah, yeah.

This year teams are going into fourth quarters going, all right, here are all the things we have to do to stop Isaiah Thomas. And he's still scoring.

And it's like, oh, I'm in the corner with Cody Zeller. I'm just going to take a step back 25 footer over a guy who's 15 inches taller than I am. And he's just making them. And I, again, I don't think it's a fluke anymore. I think this is just who he's become. Confidence is a very scary thing. And the biggest issue with Isaiah's whole life has been about doing what he

was told he could not do. And the biggest concern for Celtic fans is now that he has the ultimate respect. You're talking about him getting it from officials. He absolutely is. Second straight All-Star game, he's got to be running around looking for things. There's no going to the hotel. There's no tags on his mattresses in the hotel. They don't respect me.

You're out of things to create that us against me against the world mentality. And it's funny you mentioned the crazy threes because in the last two games, the Utah game and the Dallas game on Monday night, he's taken them very early in the shot. It was almost like the ultimate league-wide heat check where he's taken them for the first time out of the rhythm of the game. You don't take it with 20 on the shot clock when you're up by eight with a minute 40 to go on the road.

But he's sort of testing the outer limits right now. And it's been interesting to be around him. We went, a few of us, Brian, the strength coach, and Isaiah, and I went into Turner when we were in Atlanta last month and to see the reaction, the response he got from Shaq and KG, and a lot of us hadn't seen Shaq and KG in a while, to see the reaction that he got, he understands now what's happening to him. A lot of people, this happens so fast.

When you get into the zeitgeist, and then you're in the NBA, and you're a superstar, it all happens so fast, and it's done. He's very aware of everything that's happening around him. He's really a fascinating guy. And you don't often see someone who is both performing the way he's performing and at the same time completely cognizant of where he is now, what he is doing in terms of the history of the game and where he stands right now. It's pretty cool to see. The only thing I can compare it to that I've seen in basketball, I mean, there's

been other cases. Like Nash took a big leap when he was on that Phoenix team, but to me that was a case of just the style that they were playing was a little faster. It's not like he made this dramatic leap of excellence. He was really good on Dallas

and then just kind of jumped up a notch. The only thing I can really compare it to that I remember is Bernard King in the mid-80s because I was living in Connecticut at the time. And when Bernard, the 84 season, then it carried over to 85 before he tore his knee. But somewhere during that 83, 84 season, it wasn't a very good Knicks team. And he just kind of figured it out. And night after night was unstoppable. And I watched a lot of those Knicks games because we didn't have the league pass back then and you're just desperate for basketball.

And at some point he just kind of figured it out. And it was just every night he's getting 35. And that's what this is starting to feel like where Isaiah just figured out something, you know? And this is 30 games now. Obviously, in the big picture of NBA history, it's just 30 games. But when we think about the things we can remember, and I was talking to Yogi last night at Dallas,

we're talking about Yogi Sampi, because what he's done off his 10-day contract. So we're five years from what the South Pass time goes. It's already been five years since Jeremy Lin. And that Jeremy Lin run was, what, 12, 13 games? 14 games, maybe? And, you know, Jeremy Lin has had a solid NBA career and obviously stayed in the league. But when you think about the ability for guys that came in overlooked to stay at a high level and just continue to get better and better and better, it just doesn't happen. And I do think, you know,

people have written this, and it's not like this is a new point, but the way basketball changed has really helped certain guys. And it's not just the fact that the other team doesn't have big guys because he did this to Utah on Saturday night. Utah's Gobert is the best defensive center in the league. It's the spacing and the amount of space that he has to do what he has to do. And if you just threw him into a game from like 1989, there's five guys in the paint

and he's not able to do this. And now the way everything is so spread out that when you have a guy like this, it's the most important asset you can have in the league now is somebody who can use the spacing against the defense and get to where he wants to go and do what he wants to do. And this is before you get to all the slash and kick stuff he can do, the hockey assists, the type of team he has around him. But it's the best weapon you can have. But there's a lot of guys who you could say that about.

I think C.J. McCollum is fantastic. And I think C.J. McCollum, to me, is somebody that I could see making a leap in the next year like Isaiah did this year, and all of a sudden become a 28-30 point a game guy. There's a lot of really gifted guards who are starting to figure out the spacing thing. You see it every, I'm sure

night after night, you're like, holy shit, this is just a different sport. I've never seen anything like this. I think that. I can't obviously say that out loud, even if we are on HBO. I really think you should have brought... You and I grew up, you know, not only with the other four-letter plays, but with HBO. And there's that music they played going into the movies when they would first put it on. Yeah.

It was like they would take you through this star thing. That should be the way it should be. That should be the open, by the way. I mean, that... For the podcast. You're right. Why don't I do that? I'll try to get it for you.

I don't know why you never thought of it, but it's an easy one. All right, it's a risk. Whatever penalty comes with name dropping, I will take it only to make this point. But a couple of weeks ago, the Pistons were in. So I was with, and it was a TNT game. It was one of these new Monday night TNT games. I think it's throwing everybody's equilibrium off to see TNT games and Charles, everybody else. It's great, because one of the things I thought the show, and obviously it's throwing everybody's equilibrium off. Yeah. To see TNT games and Charles, everybody else.

It's great because one of the things I thought the show, and obviously it's the greatest show, studio sports show in history, period, NFL Today, Brent, and Irv, and all that, it is the gold standard and it always will be. But one of the things that's missed being on Thursday with the exclusive games is not having all the highlights. Like I did last night. I always missed that.

In the early days, on the Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, there'd always be a lot of highlights and games for them to go through, and I think you'd get that on Mondays, which is great. But a couple of weeks ago, it's a TNT Monday game, so Kevin McHale is there,

and the Celtics are playing the Pistons, and I'm literally, I'm sitting having dinner with Rick Mahorn, and here comes Kevin McHale. And the two of them, I'm sitting in this conversation now, and it was basically like sitting in the middle of a three-dimensional 30-for-30.

So they're talking about, you know, in the 80s, of course, it always comes to, you dismiss when you're around veterans as much as I am now, you know, at the league, you learn with that grain of salt about, well, in my day, they wouldn't have been able to do this, and this guy wouldn't have been able to do that, because we all know things that have changed the athleticism, but we were talking about that, about Isaiah and these guys. Now, if Isaiah, who went one-on-four last night and beat four Mavericks

to get to the basket and switched hands and laid it in with the right hand of the rim, if he went in against the bad boy Pistons doing that, he'd be at the free throw line, but he also might be in the hospital. So it has, you know, there's no question that it has changed and guys have benefited, and it's not an accidental change.

The league is, you know, it's more popular now than it's ever been. The TV ratings are what they are. They have a whole new, you know, range of superstars and kids that are watching the game. For this reason, my son is five. He wakes up in the morning now, and pretty much the first question he asks me, other than when are we eating, is how many points did Isaiah score last night? Yeah.

This is where, you know, hey, you're a five-year-old, you're already been flying on the team plane, you're getting high fives from Marcus Smart. You're living the life that none of us ever got. But still, that's the question he asked me in the morning. So it's a far more appealing thing to watch. We reminisce about it, about the 90s, and we will watch every 30 for 30, and we'll weep for Charles Oakley getting dragged out of Madison Square Garden,

which we should have, but we build up what he was as a player in our minds. It becomes more popular now. All those guys from those 90s rough-and-tumble games, because we don't have to sit through those whole games. We can watch Jeff Van Gundy get bitten on the ankle, dragging guys around the floor during a brawl. We don't have to sit through the entire game that led to it.

You know, that's why it's unfair to compare Iverson and Isaiah in a way, because if Iverson, if you just put 2000 Iverson into this game right now, the way it's being played I think he would have been way more unstoppable than he was in 2,000 you know with the amount of space I don't know if he would have shot the threes like Isaiah did but man if you're just taking out

two to three big guys out of the painter it just would have been unbelievable for him it would have been unbelievable for Tiny Archibald it would have been great for Calvin Murphy you know it is the little guy renaissance. And I think Kyrie is the one out of all these guys. And maybe it won't happen with LeBron on his team. But at some point, he's going to have a monster season.

But I was talking to my friend Hershey today on the phone about how the 86 Celtics would have played against some of these teams. And we basically, I was like, I'm not sure. I'm not sure Parrish plays that much. I think Parrish is the fall guy. I think it's like McHale and Bird and Scott Wedman. And, you know, there's a little more Sam Vincent. And it's just, I don't know. There's just no way they could have trotted out the way they did with the way

the math is. And teams would have just spaced everyone out and done what the Celtics did to Rudy Gobert on Saturday night, where it's just like, oh, all right, you're going to play that guy? Max would be playing the five. We've actually talked about this. He never shot threes, but he would have to step out and shoot threes. Here's the other thing. You've studied all the stats, and you've written them all, and you've looked at

them, and you're talking about not just going in one-on-four against those guys. What about some of the players we saw 15, 20 years ago playing with the pace that the game is played at now, with the stats? I mean, look at the stat lines we have seen this year with Harden and Westbrook and all around the league, and at the Combo, and it's

insane, and it's funny. I was talking to somebody the other day about how baseball has gone in the other direction because the statistical advantage is take more pitches, get the starting pitcher out of the game until the games are longer and less appealing to the eye. Whereas in the NBA, the statistical advantage now comes from getting the ball up the floor and shooting early in the shot clock. And the statistical advantage has helped the game become more enjoyable to watch, whereas baseball has had the other problem to try to, you know, I don't know what the NBA equivalent of putting a runner on second base will be

in overtime, but I'm sure they'll think of it. By the way, as long as I have this form, it's overtime. This is something that's been bothering me for years. Is five minutes of overtime too long? Does that reset the game too much? I think it should be four. Or, I mean, let me give you a random thing.

This is actually Brian Scalabrini and I. We don't share a lot of common views, but this is actually one of them. We sort of stumbled onto each other's overtime soulmates. Two minutes on the clock. You're over the loop. There's no fouls. There's no whatever.

To me, five minutes, you're just resetting the game. You're pushing the game too far back from an intensity standpoint. It doesn't have the feel of overtime when you go back to five full minutes left in a game. I agree. I guess the reason not to do it would be just the history of the game. It's not like putting a runner on second base where you're really

altering it that much. I mean, how many minutes are you shaving off over the course of a year? But it's like, you know, JoJo White playing

60 of 63 minutes and that's the kind of stuff that you lose. Maybe playoffs you go back to. We have to go and I have quick questions for you

and then we're leaving. Rock and roll. I think you and I are the two biggest Marcus Smart fans people think when I praise him they think I'm trying to drive up his trade value to get rid of him and all I can tell you is if there's a game 7 of a playoff series I just want him

as one of my 5 guys with 7 minutes left I want him on the court. I know he's going to make plays. I don't know what the play is going to be, but if there's a loose ball, he's getting it. If there's a charge, he's taking it. If there's rebound and traffic, he's going to get it.

The guy's just a winner. And I don't know what he is. I've never really watched a player like him. I've never seen somebody with more exaggerated strengths and weaknesses, but the ultimate package is the guy is just a winner. He makes plays. And what you just said, it sounds like an 80s sitcom opening.

If there's a charge, he'll take it. If there's a loose ball, he'll make all these plays. I said this last time on the air, if Danny wants to trade him, he's going to trade him, but I'm going to be on call waiting. I'm going to be beeping in to that call. He's going to have to ignore it. He wouldn to trade him, he's going to trade him, but I'm going to be on call waiting. I'm going to be beeping in to that call. He's going to have to ignore it. I wouldn't trade him.

I had Steve Kerr on my pod on Wednesday, and we were talking about that Game 7, about how he regretted. He's like, oh, yeah, I've watched Game 7 a bunch of times. There's things that would change with the lineups. But he wouldn't talk about what they were. But really, look at that Game 7 seven and because bogut wasn't there and because barnes wasn't playing well and they couldn't play azalea they just didn't have the fifth guy and you get to a

game seven like that and it's just like who are my five dudes who are my five guys that aren't scared who are my five guys who want to be in this moment and that's one advantage that the celtics team has is they have some guys who are not going to be in this moment? And that's one advantage that the Celtics team has, is they have some guys who are not going to be afraid in that moment. Horford's not going to be scared. Isaiah, Marcus, Avery. Jake Crowder's almost too unafraid, which I think is his flaw as a basketball player.

He's the guy who will take the biggest shot of the season and miss it and be totally fine with it. But they just have a lot of guys who are ready. Quickly. Is one of these questions going to be about Andre the Giant? Because I'll be disappointed. That's the last question. Can you explain to everybody that... We'll skip Fedor. We'll skip Fedor

for now. Fedor's fighting on Saturday night. That's like, go right to Andre. Oh, Bellator. Okay, do the quick Bellator point. We'll save it for the end. Save it for the end. Well, you got it. Can you explain to everybody that the Jalen Brown pick was actually a good pick? Because I think that's another one where people are like,

oh, you're just saying that because he's in the Celtics. It's like, yeah, Jalen Brown has a pretty good chance to be the single best defender in the league at his position in about four years. I find it amusing that anybody, and this is what Twitter is for, and I get it, draw a conclusion on a 20-year-old kid midway through his rookie

year. And by the way, look where he is compared to the rest of his, exactly, rookie class, setting the league on fire. So he's up in the upper group of it anyway. He's 20 years old. I think sometimes, you think sometimes the great Doris Burke, my dear friend, once when asked about her, all the criticism

she would get, the nonsense on Twitter, she would say, look at the assignments I'm getting. Look at the assignments as an indication of how well she's respected. Jalen Brown is playing significant minutes on the team with the fifth best record in the NBA at age 20.

That's a pretty good indication of what he brings to the table now, let alone what he will at 22, 24, 26. And I would urge people when they play, unfortunately they played the Warriors early in the season, and he only got a tiny bit on Durant. Stevens took him out of the baby carriage about three weeks ago and started to let him kind of run around the living room a little bit and bump into the coffee table a few times. But I think when they played Durant and LeBron again, I think people are going to be surprised

how many minutes he's on those guys. And I've been so impressed by his defensive intelligence and his ability to just make the right decision on whether to go under or over a screen and just all these little things, all the types of players he can guard. I don't think he's scared. I don't see, you know, he'll be in there at crunch time. He'll have like a big follow-up layup, stuff like that. He's not afraid to shoot. And he's the type of guy that where the league is going these six eight super athletic guys who can guard four positions like that's probably the number one desired thing you

would want defensively so i've been impressed i think we're gonna hear from him in the playoffs i like i really think he's an x factor i don't think he's gonna play 40 minutes a game but he's an x factor so there's a reason. Danny is well aware. He may pretend to be aloof about it. He's well aware that there's eight guards on the roster. When draft time came, there's a reason he took Jalen Brown. Yes. And not some of the other guards at Kristoff or whatever

who had a really high ceiling. There was a reason he chose what the NBA prototype is going to be. Yeah. Just so it's not a totally pro-Celtics podcast, like the Amir Johnson signing did not work out. That guy has not really helped them this season. And Jarebko, Jarebko, Jarebko, Jarebko. I know it's Jarebko, but I always call him Jarebko.

You know, he's had one of those bad luck seasons. He's almost like Tom and Jerry. He's been Tom for the whole season. He gets hit by the anvil, gets hit by the iron. That's exactly right. The plane runs into him. He's wearing that mask now. He's wearing the mask with a broken nose.

He can't see. He can't see. He has no peripheral vision. He's trying to rebound. I said last night, he might as well wear one of those sleep masks they give you on the airplane. Right. For all the one he's wearing now is doing it. There are holes on this roster

and Horford, it's been interesting to watch people get bored. They start trying to pick the team apart. Oh, Horford. Oh, he doesn't rebound. Did you see his stats in Atlanta? He brings a lot of great stuff to the table. If you're looking for him to get 15 rebounds in a game, you're looking

at the wrong guy. Why did we pay $30 million for him? Because he's the second a game, you're looking at the wrong guy. Well, why'd we pay $30 million for him? Because he's the second best free agent. And he's somebody that can guard any player in the low post. And five other teams would have, by the way. Yeah. How about this? He can guard any single person in the low post.

And he can shoot threes. And he's really fucking smart. And he knows where to go on a basketball court. And if you think you got the ninth best player in the league you didn't but you still got somebody who's who's a you know a very high level five in the way basketball is being played and i'm fine with that two years ago two years ago the celtics were five slots from the bottom in the nba now they're the fifth best team in the nba in two years the al Horfords, Isaiah doing what he's doing, these are all little reasons. Everybody wanted to take the express lane and do whatever the 2015 version of the Ray Allen, Kevin Garnett thing, and it wasn't going to happen.

It wasn't there. And then all of a sudden you go along the back roads and you realize, hey, we got here. We got to the top five spot in the NBA taking the back rows instead of the same instantaneous super highway we took 10 years ago. Well, they had some luck, too. They were ready to overpay for that Justice Winslow pick. I mean, that would have been a disaster, and they would have ended up losing the Jalen Brown pick out of it.

I think they were ready to overpay for Jimmy Butler last year. I would rather have the brooklyn pick right now because i think there's two franchise guys in the draft and they have an unbelievably good chance of getting one of them so you know you need a little luck with this stuff all right andre the giant very quickly we announced the documentary on hbo yesterday and uh you know let's just say you'll really i i hadn't read anything about that. Is there any article on that or any kind of buzz? And rightly so. Well, I'd put you in the top seven for people who would be the most excited to watch this.

Yeah, there's no question. I would say the only thing that strikes me is that we can see now, with the Internet and YouTube, anything you want to see in the world, you can see with about two clicks of a mouse or pushing on your iPad or touching the screen. Andre the Giant, so when we grew up, late 70s, early 80s, when you would see him, when I saw him walk into Madison Square Garden, and people would just, they were so filled with both awe and love for the guy. Yeah. The shot, you just didn't see anything like in that day and age. It was just, you just heard rumors and you read magazines about this guy. And you'd see him on TV when he was like standing on the box to make him look even taller, standing next to, you know, a young man with a 70s hair. But when you'd see him walk into a building, it was people's faces would just,

he would make them happy, and he would fill them with this feeling of like, I'm really seeing something special. And then when you get to know some people that I've gotten to know who've spent time with him over the years, you realize he was a far more layered and fascinating human being than he was a physical specimen. Yeah. Um,

I'm, I'm auditioning for, uh, for the, uh, to be in the doc, I guess. I'm trying to come up with these like,

uh, you know, documentary. I can promise you we're going to interview you because you were at MSG for a few of those. Need a couple of fans in there. Um, all right.

When are you doing the Bob Backlund one? When's the Bob Backlman one coming out is that is that going to be next that's that's the flaw in your wrestling fan resume is that your favorite wrestler is their worst champion of all time all of my i'm of my dinner and if that's a boston guy come up here and get food you come down new york and everybody would just cheer him out of the building but you're a listen there's kids who grow up, you know, your son came into the John Cena era. And if a kid's older than him, if he's got friends that are five, six years older,

they probably hate John Cena because it's the cool thing to do when you become an older teenager or whatever. So it's all, you're a product of your time. And that was sort of my entry point when I was seven or eight years old. Like in 1980, all of a sudden, Bob Backlund was the guy.

So over the years, it's always happened. Bellator this weekend? Fedor, I mean, who could have imagined a couple of years ago, I'd be calling a Fedor Milianenko fight, one of the greatest sports radio, internet, podcast, message board arguments you could have as to who is the greatest of all time in any sport. And you've written big, giant books on the subject. And if Fedor may not be, you could talk is who is the greatest of all time in any sport, and you've written big, giant books on the subject.

And if Fedor may not be, you could talk about Anderson Silva, and you could talk about John Jones, you could talk about GSP, but there's no conversation to have that does not include Fedor Milianenko and the beauty of MMA, one of the beauties of it. It's a sport that's new enough that the greatest to ever compete in it, some of them are still competing. So to get to see Fedor in real life on Saturday night fighting Matt Mitri on it,

you know, you have a lot of fun at the show. It was a big show for us in L.A. a few weeks ago. I know your son was all excited to see that Paul Daly knockout. He's going to fight again. He's going to fight Rory McDonald in May. It was a big free agent signing it. Everything that's happened in the other sports decades ago, free agency,

you know, health issues, health care issues. It's all happening now in real time. MMA is doing it under this enormous spotlight. That's pretty cool. They're going to get more and more people who are younger who have been watching these guys who are getting into it. It's just going to... And who are competing.

The younger athletes now who want to do this. Younger athletes who want to do this. They grew up to do this they grew up wanting to do it that didn't happen in the early days now you're getting elite world class national champion wrestlers and this is the direction they're going yeah I mean if we're just having a broad MMA conversation

like Amanda Nunez what she did to Rousey was like that's the difference between the old era versus the new era she comes in and she's just an athlete. She's throwing lefts and rights and she's built like a Greek god. And it's like, this is the future of MMA is bodies like that and people like that. The 10 second version is this.

MMA, Jeff Blatnick coined the term, mixed martial arts. And in the old days, in the early days of the sport, you could be elite at one thing, as Ronda was, in judo, world-class judoka. But now, if you're not a great striker and you don't have great jiu-jitsu, you're not going to compete at the highest level unless you can do all of those things extremely well. It's kind of like basketball when uh when the aba just made basketball athletic and there was that whole classic guy that that the small forward the don nelson that type and it was just

like yeah you guys are in trouble there's there's guys coming and it's it's not going to be great for you it's not walter davis is coming and julius irving and there's this is not good it's not john lucas these guys are fast and athletic and you're in trouble. He's coming. And the rest of them are coming too. So saddle up. It's not going to be the way it was. It's evolution, the way it needs to be.

Sean Grandy, this was fun. I'm glad we did this. Talk to you closer to the playoffs. And listen to you on Sirius and TuneIn and all these fun places. You don't just have to be in New England anymore to hear you and Max. I'll talk to you soon. Thank you. You can be in traffic in L.A.

Enjoy the wonders of Brandy and Max, the beautiful world we live in. Good times. All right, see you later. Got it. Thanks so much to Kevin Clark. Thanks so much to Sean Grandy. And thanks to SeatGeek, our presenting sponsor since the 1800s. SeatGeek will help you find the best seats

at the best prices fully guaranteed with their revolutionary grading system. Don't forget to check out The Watch, Channel 33, and all other great podcasts. Don't forget to check out The Ringer this week. We're doing a lot of content coming up, especially around NBA All-Star Games, so check that out.

And I have a column coming on Friday and another podcast with an old staple of the BS podcast. Somebody who's been on many times. Somebody who the listeners have enjoyed. That's the only hint I'm giving you. See you later. I don't have On the wayside