The Bill Simmons Podcast - Houston Blew It, KD Is Weirdly Underrated, and Cobra Kai Rules With Dan Devine and Shea Serrano | The Bill Simmons Podcast

Episode Date: May 2, 2019

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Ringer staff writer Dan Devine to talk about Round 2 of the NBA playoffs including the Rockets' struggles against the Warriors, Playoff Harden, the Rockets no. 2 guy, Kevin Durant's impact, the 76ers battling back against the Raptors, and more (3:35). Then, Bill talks with Shea Serrano about the upcoming film 'John Wick 3,' and the ending of [SPOILERS] 'Cobra Kai' Season 2 (1:12:54). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast on the Ringer Podcast Network, brought to you by DAZN. This weekend, DAZN. Canelo Alvarez, Daniel Jacobs, champion versus champion, live from Las Vegas, live. Three world titles on the line. Who's going to take it all? I'm really excited for this one. Here's how easy it is to do DAZN.

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theringer.com, where you can read about, as usual, just we have killer Game of Thrones content, killer NBA playoffs content, Ben Lindbergh's book about the book that foreshadowed the last MLB strike. Robert Mays wrote an awesome feature about one of my favorite comics, Anthony Jeselnik, who I think has the top three Twitter feed for me, Kyle. Oh, wow. Really great. We're not a Peggy. If I could only keep... What are you talking about?

I just don't... I'm like, that's the most insulting thing you've ever said to me. I'll cut it out. No, keep it in. I want America to hear that. Wouldn't a Pegman is a Jesselnut guy?

I don't know. He's hilarious. I just thought you were somebody older. I watched all 19 episodes of the Jesselnut offensive. Okay, I'm sorry. That's terrible. How dare you?

Binge mode, episode Hey, I'm sorry. That's terrible. How dare you? Binge Mode, Episode 3, Game of Thrones. They finally broke it down. Mally Rubin on Death's Door just got so sick after the last episode. Somehow,

was able to rally and do it. Hey, check out Luminary because that's where the rewatchable is. 1999, we did Cruel Intentions, a movie that has aged

in just a spectacularly crazy way. Crazy, flat out crazy. Go to Luminary. And if you subscribe, you can listen to that one. You can also hear the Rewatchables we did earlier this week with Mean Girls on the regular Rewatchables feed. Coming up, we're going to talk to Dan Devine for the first time, Ringer NBA writer who joined us before this season and has done fantastic work for us unfortunately he's a Knicks fan but other than that he's a good guy

he's on and then Shea Serrano we're going to talk about the Spurs demise we're going to talk about John Wick 3 which is coming up which he's already seen and most important we're going to talk a spoiler laden edition of Cobra Kai season two, which we both devoured. I watched with my son. I think he watched with his sons and we love this show. So we're giving our review for Cobra Kai at the end

of this podcast. Coming up, our're taping this. It is noon Pacific time, Thursday. So if anything happens NBA-wise over the next couple hours, don't blame us. Dan Devine on the line from the ringer. I wanted to start about talking Warriors Rockets first. Warriors up 2-0. Game three is not till Saturday night. What was your biggest surprise with these first two games?

I guess I was kind of surprised that eventually everybody shut up. The fact that after the, whatever that was, 48 hours of everybody losing their minds about calls, everyone just kind of played basketball in game two. It was sort of refreshing, wasn't it? It was kind of nice to see. Yeah. I still feel like these teams haven't brought the best out of each other yet. And maybe that won't happen. There might be too much familiarity.

But my big takeaway is, and this isn't a groundbreaking take, but I think the Rockets really got knocked out of this series by the refs in all kinds of ways because it was twofold. One, they lost their composure in game one. Then they lost their composure after the game. Then they kept losing their composure. And I think the unintended consequence was it kind of galvanized the Warriors. I really felt like the crowd was in that game in game two. And I felt like the players were really into it. Now, it's a playoff game. Obviously, they're going to be into it anyway. But when you open the door to that whole, you guys only beat us because the refs helped you kind of angle, that's the last thing the Warriors the Warriors is to kind of let the Warriors beat themselves, right?

You know, when they start throwing crazy passes around and they're, you know, loose with the ball and, you know, they go away from stuff that works for minutes at a time. And you're sort of like, well, if you know, Steph's reaching in and picking up cheap fouls. Like if you just didn't do that stuff, you would never lose a game. But sometimes, whether it's sort of a collective boredom born out of how much they've already done together and whatever in the five years of long seasons and all that, sometimes they need sort of a galvanizing wake-up call. And when they get that, they're like, oh yeah, let's defend like crazy and let's take care of the ball

and let's focus on this possession and then the one after that and then the one after that and then before you know it, you're down 15. And so I think you kind of saw that in game two they were ready to go from the opening tip they were like you know super locked in flying all over the place draymond has completely erased clint capella in the beginning of this series and it kind of puts houston in a spot where you know how many guys can they even play in this series you know and so like the warriors being really locked in, whether that was just a function of this was the time they were going to wake up anyway, this was the opponent

they were going to wake up for, or the way things opened up in the series, you know, they're here. You know, Houston has their full undivided attention and it doesn't seem like that's a very good thing for the Rockets right now. Yeah, that's a good point about the biggest competitor for the Warriors is the Warriors. And it almost seems like a better strategy going against the Warriors is to do the whole thing where you're just constantly praising them. If the Rockets had come into the series and been like, look, these guys are great. They're the best. It's an honor to just be on the court with these. And you do that. Maybe that's what Portland or Denver should do next round because then the Warriors get soft, they get comfortable. The worst thing you can do is make it seem like it was an accident that they won. And if it wasn't eight on five, we'd be up on nothing right now. All that does is kind of wake them up. And I think this Warriors team has been bored off and on for the last two years. I was looking up the stats. I didn't even remember this. The Warriors went 67-15 two years ago, Durant's first season. Right, it was like quietly 67 wins, right? Did you even remember that?

67-15. Yeah, I think I would have guessed, because I remember the last two seasons are 58, right? So I would have guessed somewhere in that ballpark. But no, yeah, that first season with Duran, it's crazy because it was a lower win total than the year before that. But then they were just sort of, you know, had the ultimate in case of emergency break glass thing. And yeah, no one even came close to touching them.

But yeah, they've been at such a high level. It's like cruising altitude for so long that, you know, you can sort of understand that it's going to take something every once in a while to bring the nose to the plane back up. But it's a bummer just as a fan that this whole series had to sort of be opened up with and be characterized by the officiating stuff. But, I mean, listen, if it's what lights a fire under the Warriors' ass, then maybe we get a couple of cool rounds after this. Assuming, of course, I shouldn't be saying it's over after two games. But maybe we see something closer to what the Warriors really can be, you know, now that the pilot lights on.

I feel like it's over. And I rarely say stuff like that. And I picked the Rockets to actually win the finals before the playoffs. But I don't think it's conceivable to beat this team four to five times. It's a math thing. If game seven was in Houston, maybe, but you're talking about, I just don't see it. I think you have to steal one of the first two. And then on top of it, let's talk about Harden. The year that he had in the level that he went to, it sucked me in. I wasn't ready to say that he was the best offensive player

in the league and all that stuff, but he did it so many nights in a row. And you're there in Brooklyn watching league pass every night, write great pieces for us. The totality of what he was doing at some point won me over. And then we get to the playoffs, and starting with that game three in the Utah series, all of a sudden it seems like kind of the old James Harden again,

the James Harden that we didn't like as much in the playoffs. And he has not been able to get it going. Do you think this is just a bad stretch? Or do you think in a playoff series when somebody is playing him over and over and over again, the familiarity of that becomes a disadvantage to him. I think it's probably a little of column A and a little of column B. You know, it is conceivable that at this time of year, and it's what we've heard so many times now,

when you get down to May and he's whatever 90 games deep with the usage that he has and the minutes that he plays and all that stuff, he starts to wear down in ways that, you know, take the legs out of the jumper a little bit or make it a little harder for him to get to the line or those sorts of things. That might be part of it. There also might be part of it that's like, at this time of year, you're playing against, you know, the Jazz were, you know, that wasn't as long a series as I guess a lot of us thought it might be, but that's an elite defense that had a plan.

It just looked crazy for two games, but it kind of took some of the starch out of him over the course of the last few games of that series so you know there's something to be said for and then the Warriors obviously when they lock in and when they play with that Hamptons 5 death lineup they're like you know that's about as good as a defense can get when you've got a healthy in shape Draymond captaining everything so he's playing against you know the best defenses that you can see. So there's some of those things that, and you know, yeah, the tendencies of, you know, we're, here's how we're going to keep our hands out. You know, the, the Spurs had that sort of hands up defense a couple of years ago, where when we're going over screens, we're just, you know, like literally like, you know, hands up, uh, you know, I'm on, you know, I'm a captor at

this point or I'm a prisoner. Like I'm not going to put anything near you. Cause I don't want to get that reach in. And it, you know, over the course of time, you get enough reps of having to deal with them. You can maybe, you know, bevel off some of those edges or you can, you know, reduce the advantages that he can create. And then it comes down to shot making. And then it comes down to how many, you know, how great a job can you do with the limited opportunities you get? And I think what you see in this series is,

and I don't know that it's necessarily any shade to James Harden, but Kevin Durant is a superior shot maker to him. Kevin Durant and guys like Kawhi Leonard over in the Toronto series, they are going to get the hardest shots you can get, but they're going to get them in ways that they can make those shots. And Harden, maybe because he's taking, like, tougher, further out, more dangerous sort of shots that are higher variance, like, he's just not hitting them at the same clip.

And, you know, the rest of that roster around him is sort of like, well, when that's not going your way, then what do you do? And unless you have superhero Chris Paul, which I think we might be saying goodbye to that player, then I don't really, there's not really a whole lot of answers for Houston. So you need the best version of Harden to even have a chance here. But it's, yeah, the sheer, like the weight of all those things together might just sort of bog him down by this time of year.

Yeah, the playoff games are starting to add up for him, just from a pure math standpoint. You're talking about since he got to Houston, he's now played 69 playoff games. He's taken nine threes a game in those playoff games, and he's made 31 between 36 and 38, depending on the season. But he's really only had one playoffs that statistically looks pretty good in Houston, where in 2015, he was 27 a game, 7.5 assists, but shot 38% from three. And the numbers kind of look like what his numbers normally do. If you go back, if you go back and just look at his last three seasons, so the 17 playoffs, the 18 playoffs, and then these first seven playoff games, he's shooting 30% from three, 40% from two, only getting to the line nine times a game, which is lower for him. That's amazing. Only nine times a game, which is lower for him. Oh, that's amazing. Only nine times a game, right? Only nine is, yeah. I can't believe I said that.

But that's a pretty big sample size too. And I don't think they can win a title if he's going to make 30% of his threes. So my question is, does he have a hot streak in him or is regular season Harden a different beast than playoff Harden? Because there's been other guys like that, that in the regular season Harden a different beast than playoff Harden? Because there's been other guys like that, that in the regular season, they did their business one way

and in the playoffs, for whatever reason, the production tailed off even 15, 20%. But that's a pretty big margin for a team that really, really, really relies on him in a lot of different historic ways. What do you think about that? Yeah, I mean, I think that's, it's become, when it was one series, you could write it off, right? When it was, you know, there was the questions

with that Spurs series a couple years ago of like, did he just, did he get exhausted because of the push for 82 games and MVP? Did he, you know, was there, you know, was he sick during that second round series? You know, was it just the accommodation of those things and the defense that he hadn't seen before or whatever? But yeah, you build a body of work.

And at a certain point, there are players who, the rarest players are the ones who can maintain their regularities in production or increase it against the best defenses, against the best competition at this time of year. And at this point, yeah, we're getting to a point where we just haven't seen that. I don't know that I would believe that it's like impossible for him to do that i think if he you know he comes out in game three and is able to get a few a few down early get to the line a few times early

establish that rhythm you could see absolutely a you know 40 45 point kind of game for him where uh i mean it might not be making 50% of his shots, but skewing more toward his regular season numbers. And you get that rhythm with the step back. You're able to create some distance and, you know, get yourself in a sort of a more comfortable rhythm. I think you could see that. But, you know, to your point, doing that four times in five games against this defense where

they can start with Iguodala on him. They can, you know, have Draymond forever lurking behind him.'re taking away the lobs they're you know forcing them to floaters they're putting them in really the sort of difficult positions and they've got multiple bodies they can throw at them it's a really really tall ask and you know down the line whether we know we will look back at these things and say you know harden was somewhat of a mirage because he never got to that level again in the playoffs, or we say he ran into the greatest team of all time four times or whatever. You know, I think that remains to be seen.

We'll see how that sort of comes out on the wash in years to come. But I think when you've seen this a few series in a row now, you've got to start wondering, is there something about what he is doing that just doesn't translate quite as well? And the players that rely on free throws, yeah, those dry up a little bit because the game gets called a little bit looser

and because teams are a little bit better able to avoid those fouls. But the drop-offs in three-point percentage especially is really tough because so much of his game, especially this season, Charks wrote for us earlier in the season the way he's sort of like pushing the boundaries of the league and breaking that with the volume he's shooting. If he's not making those, then the math turns against Houston in a pretty significant way. So I'd like to see that kind of hot streak just because I think it would make the series more fun and it'd make the playoffs more fun as a whole.

But I think you kind of have to see it to believe it at this point. Yeah, I'm bummed because I really thought this was going to be a classic series. I really did. I thought this was going to be one of the all-timers. And we've seen this happen a few times over the last 20 years. I think most famously with the Mavericks and the Heat in 2006. And the Mavericks had a much, much, much better case for flipping out about officials.

But it definitely affected them. And especially after game five, they still had the series coming back to Dallas for game six in 2006. But at that point, they were just a show. And Miami went and took it from them and took the title. I think in 2002 with the Kings, there was so much fuss about game six that it kind of overshadowed that in game seven, they that's that series was on a platter for them.

They were home. They had an amazing crowd. They had multiple chances to win down the stretch and in overtime, and they just missed a bunch of big shots. I think when a basketball team really gets fixated on things aren't going our way, this sucks, like it can be really damaging. And sometimes it's justified

if you really feel like you're getting hosed. Like the 2001 Bucks got hosed unbelievably in that Sixers series, and we're able to kind of fight it off and give more of a battle. But in this case, I guarantee the Rockets are going to look back at this and think, man, we should have done that differently. And especially the front office.

I couldn't believe they're leaking stuff about the game. Did you ever, could you imagine that they were doing that? Leaking the calls from game seven. Meanwhile, they missed like what 26 straight threes what are you complaining about the officials that was crazy i mean yeah like it's i i i had forgotten that you know the the degree to which uh mark cuban had done some of those things after the 2006 files too you know like the the you know the reams of data and whatever the spreadsheets about how certain refs call certain things and those sort of reports.

I don't know. I mean, you're a conspiratorial sort. I am. I love this stuff. You're somebody that likes leaning in those directions. To me, I always sort of look at it and say, if you're talking about an overwhelming preponderance of calls, I get it. If you're talking about a lot of other things that you could have done better or differently on your own to impact the outcome of the game. I feel like I have a hard time seeing the refs are out to get us thing.

I tend to think that stuff works out in the wash. But I think there's a point where if that is what you are so singularly focused on, maybe you blow a couple opportunities on the margins. And in these sorts of series against an opponent this good, the margins matter so much that, you know, I mean, we're still talking about, you know, both of these games wound up within a couple of possessions apiece. You know, so if you are just locked in on, you know,

we're getting screwed over this way and that, and you're not, maybe you're 5% less focused on the next play. Maybe you're 5% less focused on the next rotation, whatever. That stuff matters. And you can't afford to give up those edges against a team this good. Not to sound like I'm on first take, but I do feel like the Rockets brought some of this on themselves too, because when you're constantly challenging the refs with the flopping, the semi-flopping, falling down on threes, putting your legs in opponents when you're shooting, and all the little tricks that these guys are so good at,

especially Harden and Paul. And they've been good at for years. And I would say they're in the starting five of guys who just know how to work the refs when they have the ball. At some point, the refs become gun-shy, especially on the road. And I don't think that part got overstated enough. These games were in Golden State. Referees are always going to mentally, subconsciously skew a little bit

toward the home team, home crowd. It's not as bad as it used to be in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, but it's still going to be there. And these guys don't want to make a mistake where they call a foul on a three, and then it turns out James Harden flopped or James Harden was the one who threw his legs out. So they're great in those guys on a higher, on a higher curve, I think. And that's why some of those didn't get called. I actually thought in game two, Scott Foster, who's, who's one of the all-time referee banes of my existence.

I, uh, I thought the, I thought that crew was great. I thought that was one of the best officiated games I've seen in years. I mean, at one point, one team had eight free throws. The other team had 10. And it was late in the third quarter, the fourth quarter. I never noticed the refs that whole time. So I don't know. I think the only time you noticed anything was when there was the double text on Draymond

and Nene. And it was almost like that was a good way to get control before things got out of hand because then you were like, yeah, we'll rescind those later. Like, don't worry about it. Right, right. Like, right now, everybody just, you know,

chill out, calm down, let's get back to what we're doing. And so, yeah, it's weird. You know, when that, when the officiating crew came out, everyone was like, you know, Rockets fans went nuts. And then even, you know,

Warriors fans were not particularly thrilled to see Scott Foster and Ed Malloy too. I don't know that those guys have a whole lot of fans across the league necessarily. But, you know, as it turned out, once everybody just kind of

moved past that and dialed into the game, and each team made a concerted effort when they went into the game to not start griping, then that stuff just kind of melted away and you didn't notice it for a while, which was a refreshing change of pace in some of the playoffs that we've seen.

And we should also mention, these are two extremely hard teams to officiate. You have Houston, Harden, and Paul are way up there on the hard to officiate scale. And then the Warriors, like, they're just setting moving screens the whole game. And you can either call it immediately or not call it. And they're so good that as the game goes along, they're going to add 3%, 6%, and that becomes impossible too. And I think Durant's a really hard guy to officiate, especially if he's being guarded by somebody smaller.

Because we saw this in the last series with the Clippers game, Beverly was just mauling Durant in game two and just getting away with foul after foul after foul after foul. And the rest of the lady happened because he was 10 inches shorter. And then I went to game three and the refs immediately were like, look, you're not doing that this game. He had three fouls in like two minutes. But I do think sometimes we forget that some of these teams are really hard to officiate. Like, I think the Celtics are relatively easy to officiate.

They don't drive to the basket and shoot jump shots. They don't want to take layups or free throws, so it's nice and easy. They don't rebound. Like, there's all these things that go in your favor. Quickly on Chris Paul,

who missed, I thought, the biggest shot of game two when he had a wide open three, when they had real momentum and a chance to cut it to three with under a minute left. And it was yet again, it was another added to the finals game. I think he's going to go down as one of the best

40 players ever. He's certainly going to go down as the best point guard of his generation. And yet the playoff resume, which is ultimately how we remember these guys, it just hasn't been there. Most famously, 2014, one of the all-time choke jobs against OKC, which is one of the most damaging sequences in the last 30 minutes I think any great player has ever had. 2015, they blow the 19-point lead or 15-point lead, whatever it was, to the Rockets, Josh Smith, all those dudes bring the Rockets back. They leave that one on the table. Just year after year, last year was the year it might've happened, ends up getting hurt in game five, not his fault. And then this year when it

really seems like they need a little extra something, something from him. And I'm not sure he's at that point in his career anymore where he can give it to them. What do you expect from Chris Ball at this point in his career? Yeah. I mean, it's really tough. He's shooting 26.8% from three in this postseason, which is just like, that's hard to come back from if you're a team that relies so much on your ability to get those isolations, that pick and roll play and bomb away. You need that guy to keep other teams more honest than that. I expect Chris Paul to be a defensive pest. I expect Chris Paul to score like 18 to 23 points. And I expect Chris Paul to, you know, not grab the game by the scruff of his

neck. And I kind of hate saying that because I love watching Chris Paul grab a game by the scruff of its neck. Like that was, that's been one of the coolest experiences. You know, there was, when he was in New Orleans, there was that one game, I think it was game one against the Lakers. And it was just like a perfect point guard performance. Yeah, I remember that. And it's like, it's always such an amazing thing to watch. And even last year, you know, putting away the Jazz, he had 40 some odd points.

And it was like Harden couldn't, you know, couldn't quite get there at that point. So he was the one to push him over the finish line. And yeah, I have that fear of, I'm watching a guy who looks you know just when you first look at him looks like the guy i recognize but then as the game goes on and as you're focusing on like okay he can't beat that guy off the dribble anymore like he uh he gets into traffic and it's harder for him to get out and you know the the you know the the legs aren't quite in the shot as much anymore. He's still got great hands. He's still got a brilliant mind.

You know, he can move the pieces around the chessboard, but, you know, he's not taking the initiative or taking the pieces like he used to be able to do. And that's, you know, that's a bummer, but also that's a function of, again, you know, you're playing against teams that you can't afford any slippage against, any drop-off against, and this is kind of where he's at.

And that's where, it looks like where he's at right now is just he's no longer an A, like an A-lister on the same level, like, you know, for him and Harden to be the two guys at that level that you need to be able to compete in this sort of star-clustered league, he's just something a little less than that. And that, you know, with the contract that they gave him, with the expectations that they have for him and the role he needs to play, that's a dangerous, dangerous place for the Rockets today. 33 years old, 950 regular season games, 98 playoff games. His 100th playoff game will be game four.

It's a lot of miles, especially for a little guy. Yeah, for a six-foot point guard. I mean, you know, guys age like bananas, you know, like it starts, it starts to get ugly fast. So, um, you know, the, the history of guys around that sort of that size and profile, um, once they get on the wrong side of 30 is, is a little bit troubling. Like, especially with the injuries that he's had, you know, hamstring stuff is, you know, those things linger and, you know, there, there've been other issues along the way. So's had, you know, hamstring stuff is, you know, those things linger and, you know, there, there've been other issues along the way. So, um, I I'd love to be wrong about that. Um, you know, we, we, I know at our site, we had looked at that sort of all

season long wondering like, is this the time to kind of do the deep dive into is Chris Paul in a different portion of his, his arc and, you know, Charks wound up doing that and did a wonderful job with it after Paul came back from injury. But, um, it's, you know, the, it looks, you know, Charks wound up doing that and did a wonderful job with it after Paul came back from injury. But it's, you know, it looks, you know, the more evidence you get, the more it sort of looks like we're just, you know, we're seeing him maybe having, we may have already seen the very best of him. And I'm not sure what that means for the Rockets, but I don't think it means anything good. We're going to take a break, but I have a hot take on this. That's not even that hot. It's actually lukewarm, but hold on. We'll take a quick break.

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All new BMW 3 Series. Don't be driven by technology. Drive it. BMW, the ultimate driving machine. All right, here's my take. Chris Paul, not one of the two best players in the Rockets anymore. Oof. Well, that's bad news for Houston.

I think Eric Gordon is more valuable and I think he's better. I think he's the second best player on the team. He's definitely been better in this postseason. There's no doubt about that. I mean, part of that is just, you know, he's younger. Right now he's healthier.

He's more versatile because he's a little bit bigger defensively. It's like, yeah, it's almost like you supersized Chris Paul a little bit. Like a lot of the same sort of stuff, like he's a little fire hydrant, but he's just like a little bigger, a little longer. I was really impressed at the degree to which Gordon kind of took Donovan Mitchell out of the first round. Like me too. That was, that's not an easy cover. And, you know, he basically stuffed him in a locker for five games. And yeah, that's the kind of thing that, you know, Chris Paul used to be that kind of guy, right?

You would say whoever the best sort of perimeter player, even if he's taller. Yeah, all right, put Chris Paul on him and he's going to like, you know, make life miserable for him. And right now, yeah, Gordon has definitely been, I think you can definitely safely say that he's been their second best player in this postseason. And they just need a lot more than that because they can really only play like six what six and a half seven guys in this series comfortably yeah if capella's getting destroyed then you're like you're really relying on austin rivers you're really relying on daniel house um you're crossing your fingers and saying four hail marys and putting gerald green in the game know, there's like a lot of stuff that you, you know, needs to go right that you can't necessarily bank on.

And everything gets harder when you can't put Paul right up at the top of that marquee. I think he's clearly the second best guy in the team. He did not have a good first half of the season. And I didn't know, watching it in real time, I didn't know what was going on, whether it was like the burden that Harden was taking on, whether there was residue effect from game seven last year

and all that stuff. Really the second half of the year, he's been good. And then in the playoffs, I think he's been really good. And I think he's one of the better two-way players we have right now. I'd actually be interested to see him on a different team, which isn't going to happen for at least a year because I think he's a free agent after 2019-20. But part of me wonders, was there more to his game? Had he been like the true number two guy in a really good team, what would have happened?

Because there's not a lot of like really skilled two-way guards in the league at this point, right? I feel the same way about Clay Thompson. We pigeonhole these guys as you're going to be in the corner, you'll get to shoot eight, nine threes a game and you're going to guard the other guys, other team's best guard, but that's who you are. And it's like, do you think there was more there with Eric Gordon?

Absolutely. I mean, you know, you think back to whatever that was, you know, it's 2011 lockout and the, the, the Chris Paul trade that, you know, sent him to LA. He was like the centerpiece of the return, right? Yeah. There's that like unfortunate hostage photo of like him and Chris came in and now Fruka Minu and whatever, those guys that came back. But, you know, and then he, you know, there, there's just the persistent injury issues, which has, you know, as we've seen over the years have been a big problem with New

Orleans, uh, different iterations of the team, but plays nine games, his first season in New Orleans, 42, his second, you know, never played more than 64 games during his time in New Orleans. And that's like the ascent to his prime, ages 23 through 27. And so all of that, you know, that kind of like nasty bowling ball driver that he was in L.A., he never, we never really got to see that grow and mature. And then by the time he's like an almost like a distressed asset when he gets to Houston in 2016 and all of a sudden then the minutes start to, and there's 75 games, 69 games, 68 games. But you're still seeing, like, he's more of the spacer.

He's more of the, like, somebody else breaks down the defense and kicks to him, and then he attacks, you know, against them being sort of shuffled up. He's never, not really, like, the primary, you know, guy actually doing that breaking down or, you know, getting the usage at that same level. Nor should he have been on a team with Harden like that. Right.

Do you watch, do you ever flip channels when the All-American games are on and watch those? All-American? Oh, you mean like the McDonald's games? Yeah. Not really. But I know that when he was coming out, when he was going to Indiana, it was like, this guy is revolutionary, right? Yeah.

And the guys from that era, I think, you know, you had three years in a row where Durant was in the 06 game, like his class. And then Gordon's class was 07. And then the 08 class were all the guys that were in the 09 draft, basically. But the 07 game is fascinating because there's a bunch of good guys in it. And for some reason, when they pick the teams, so this is the 2007 East team. The players you would know on it are J.J. Hickson, Johnny Flynn, Dante Green, Costa Cufas, O.J. Mayo, Nick Cleathis, and Patrick Patterson. It's like, all right, I know some of those guys.

Right, Dante Green, who I believe went in the first round of the big three draft last night. Right, right. So that's what his destiny was. They were playing the 07 West team, which had James Harden, Blake Griffin, Eric Gordon, Derek Rose, Michael Beasley, Jared Bayless, Kyle Singler, Cole Aldridge, and Kevin Love.

And James Anderson. Oh my God. James Anderson, the legend. He's like the ninth best guy in this team. How did they split those teams up? That's like the worst job anyone's ever done. Completely fair and equitable distribution of power. No question about that. I don't know what, somebody must have had money on that game. So quickly on Durant, who's been out of his mind here for two weeks. And this happens every so often with him.

He's one of the best 12 to 14 guys ever. He is one of the best four forwards ever. And every once in a while, he'll go on a hot streak and people are like, whoa, you know who's really good? Kevin Durant. Oh my God, whoa, he's really good. Man, he's one of the best offensive players we've had. Why do people constantly have to be reminded that Kevin Durant is one of the best basketball

players we've ever had? What is it about him? I don't get it. I mean, he's paying the tax. This is he, like he there's, it's like the, the beginning of LeBron in Miami where people were just like, I don't give a shit. I'm not voting for him. You know, like this is, you know, he made that choice and he went over there and he put his thumb on the scale and he ruined the league and yada, yada, yada. So like I'm not going to give it to him. And no matter how good his numbers are or how efficient he is or whatever, I'm not going to put him in top two, top three, top four MVP voting because how valuable can you be when you also have that whole galaxy of stars with you? I did the same thing. I did our big awards ballot.

I don't have an official ballot, but I did the awards ballot for the site. And I was like, I don't think I can put either Durant or Curry top five because they siphon sort of the votes off of one another. And then you get to this time of year and you're like, oh, yeah, that was stupid. That's a really dumb thing to do. If you're just, but I mean, obviously there's a difference between the season and just the way that, you know, the value of a player sort of overall. But yeah, I mean, you get to this time of year and he's just the, he's the skeleton

key. He unlocks any defense you can throw at them because if you, we saw last year, you switch everything, you grind it down. He's the isolation score that can get his shot over anybody and hit it against anybody. You put him head up with LeBron in a seven game series and it's not going seven because he's the one that can play him straight up. I've always sort of felt like, and I think he said it in conversation with you, that idea that when he beat LeBron in the finals the first time,

he sort of took the reins and the passing of the torch moment. I think a lot of people arched their eyebrows at that and didn't really buy it, but I think Charks has written about that. We've talked about it a few times in different posts that we've done um i don't know that you can say there's a a single player in the sport right now who like collects and compiles and aggregates elite skills uh any better or to a greater degree than him maybe fully healthy kawai maybe you can say that but um But there really aren't very many. And, you know, obviously LeBron, you know,

will get respect in that conversation for as long as people have that conversation. But if you had to start to pick one guy to win one game right now, I don't know that you'd go very far or that you would take anybody before Durant. It's just that, you know, the context in which he put himself, you know, gets him it takes 5% or 10% of the luster off or whatever because people just don't want to give it to him yeah I agree with that

I was looking at the 2016-17 MVP so that was the year he went to the Warriors they won 67 games he had a really good season he was one of the best 5 players in the world and he was 9th in the world. And, uh, he was ninth in the MVP. He had, he had, uh, two votes for fifth place and that was it. It was one of the, one of

the bigger fuck you votes of anybody in MVP. I mean, we've had some good fuck you votes like LeBron in 2011. I think he was like third or something. But yeah, I think we get confused sometimes between regular season versions of somebody and playoff versions of somebody. And it's the same thing what would happen with LeBron where LeBron would play well in the playoffs and people would go, it's ridiculous that he should be the MVP every year

for 10 years. And it's like, that's not what we're supposed to vote on. We're supposed to vote on the regular season, what happened in the regular season, and who affected the game night after night the most and who affected their team the most, who was the most valuable to their team. I had my MVP this year.

I had Giannis Harden. I had Jokic third. I had Lillard fourth. And I couldn't figure out a fifth. And I ended up putting Paul George as the fifth because I just felt like he meant more night to night to his team than anyone else did. Never in a million years did I think Paul George is better than Kevin Durant. Right, right, right. You know, and that's kind of the folly of these things. I was, I remember being really frustrated about this when I wrote my book that we didn't have playoff MVPs that, uh, there were just certain years where

somebody was the finals. And like Tony Parker was the Oh seven finals MVP, but it's ludicrous. Tim Duncan was the most important player in that team, you know? Um, and I think in Durant's case, he has been the best player in the playoffs two years in a row and now this year he's the best player in the playoffs again so that's three years in a row in 2016 he stunk in the biggest game of his OKC career

unfortunately for him but that had a chance to be four years in a row if they had just won that series and gotten rid of Klay Thompson and the Warriors. But this has been a pretty significant second half of the decade for him. And I think you could make the case that he was the best player of the second half of the decade at this point. If they win the finals again, he's got three straight finals and all the team success he's had and what happened to LeBron with the Lakers this year. Durant, year after year, has been 50 to 67 wins unless that one year he was hurt.

I think they won 47. But year after year after year, no matter who else was on the team, the guy's team won. Yeah, and has continued to sort of grow his game, you know, like to the point where he's, he was basically their backup point guard for a lot of the season. Or, you know, all the different stuff that he can do now, like when

he locks it in and he's like defensive player of the year caliber kind of guy for games at a time, all of a sudden he's the center in some of these lineups and stuff like that. Um, yeah, I mean, it's, it's good. It's a great, like, you know, fodder for debate kind of thing, because I think people are never, people are never going to give him that level of respect for what he has accomplished during this Warriors run because of the context in which he accomplished it. But why didn't we do that with LeBron?

I mean, we did, and then we kind of gave up on it. And even when he went back to Cleveland, and by the way, I'm not trying to turn this into a KD versus LeBron thing. It's just more, to me, it's more of like a perception thing. LeBron went back to Cleveland, and by the way, I'm not trying to turn this into a Katie versus LeBron thing. It's just more, to me, it's more of like a perception thing. LeBron went back to Cleveland. It's like, he's coming home. He's going to retire here and all that.

It's like, that's not why he did it. He did it because they had Kyrie Irving and they had the number one pick in the draft. They knew they could trade for Kevin Love. He knew they were going to spend a shitload of money and he knew they were going to contend. That's why he went back to Cleveland. It wasn't, I'm coming home. He wanted to win a title there, but it wasn't like he was going to spend a shitload of money and he, they're going to contend. That's why he went back to Cleveland. It wasn't, I'm coming home. He wanted to win a title there, but it wasn't like he was going to retire there.

Right. Right. I wonder if maybe it's because LeBron got his teeth kicked in, in that first year, that first year in Dallas, like people felt bad. We went too far there. Yeah.

There came a point where it was like, um, all right. Like, you know, yeah, he gave his pound of flesh a little bit, you know,

like he's, you know, he's, he spent his time in, you know, uh, you know, you, you know, he received his sentence from the court of public opinion like, you know, yeah, he gave his pound of flesh a little bit, you know? He spent his time in, you know, he received his sentence from the court of public opinion and, you know, time served and let's move along. And then he came back and he earned those titles. You know, that Heat team won, you know,

one of the greatest NBA finals ever with the comeback against the Spurs. And, you know, winning back to back and, you know, so on and so forth. Like, he, and, you know, him elevating his game to that level, like, there was that crazy, and winning back-to-back and so on and so forth. And him elevating his game to that level, there was that crazy win streak and there was the month and a half where he was like 65% from the floor or whatever,

the insane shooting efficiency. And so he sort of elevated his game to be worthy, I guess in air quotes or whatever, of that stature that he sort of put himself in. And so, like, by the time that was done, it was like, okay, you know, yeah, fair enough. It was like that was your four years of college and you grew up and now you're going on to something different. Whereas with Duran, it was just like, you know, he goes, you know,

from school into, like, a seven-figure job and has like zero struggle along the way and just continues to like get promotions and promotions and promotions and accolades and accolades and accolades. And people are like, enough. You know, what's the fun of this if we're turning the competition slider down? I think that's an overblown way of thinking about it,

but I think that's probably why some people would view those cases differently. And that's why I think it's fascinating. It'll be very fascinating if Kevin Durant decides to go to a different team this summer, say hypothetically one closer to where I live that I maybe grew up rooting for and changes the perception of him. I'd be interested to see if that happens. But you're absolutely right.

In terms of actual just on-court performance and skill and everything like that uh you know dude has been at a very different level the last few years and you know we might be seeing the best version of that right now i think you know they're both great lebron's had a greater career i think the difference with them is lebron has to be the center of attention with his team for the team to succeed the most. If he's kind of on the side or doing the dueling banjos thing or whatever, like what we saw with the Heat in 2011, I think it's hard for him to always figure out how he's fitting in. And the one thing I've always been impressed with Durant with was his ability to vacillate between supporting guy and main guy and how comfortable he is, how he can affect the game if, if he scores 16 points or if he doesn't get a lot of shots in a game and, but yet has that switch where he can turn it on.

And, you know, I watched what he's done with the Warriors the last few years. He talked about it. The first pod we did, he talked about how hard it was to learn how to fit in with them and how to move with the ball when nobody had ever really told him to move for eight years. And then how to share shots and all these things he's learned how to do. But then you get to a series like the Rockets where they really need him. The only way we're really going to score down the stretch here is if we put you on the right side and we clear out for you,

and it's like old school basketball, one-on-one stuff, but he can do that too. I just think he's a really unique player. We certainly have not seen anybody built like him. I think it's really hard for a forward to wear all the hats that he does during a typical game. Bird was able to do that too, where he could affect the game if he only took 10 to 14 shots, something like that. I don't think Nowitzki was ever on that level. I think Duncan was, although Duncan, whether he was a center or whatever. But very rarely can somebody kind of see what the team needs and then figure it out from there.

I always felt like LeBron, his best situation was always the one when he was running it. And I don't mean that in a selfish way. I just mean like that's kind of how he was conditioned for the first seven years of his Cavs career, where it's like he had the ball all the time and that's just what he got used to. I think Durant got out of the OKC thing just in time where he was able to learn, you know, a couple different ways to play, not just the way they used them in OKC. Does that make sense? Totally.

And I mean, in fact, I think he's, you know, he's been on the record a few to a few different interviews, some of those big takeouts after he made the choice. Like, that was what he was looking for. He wanted, like, it was not just about going to win a title. It was about, according to him, like, expanding his game, figuring out it's not just a pursuit of hardware. It's a pursuit of something, you know, to hear him tell it, like, something bigger, something purer than that.

If you give, you know, given, as you said, you know, we've never seen somebody sort of this build, this size, this talent base, all these sorts of things. You take those materials and say, what is the absolute bleeding edge maximum of what this player can be? That's, according to him, that's what he wanted to find out. Like, what if you put me in a context where I have to grow these other parts of my game? I have to push, you know, push past my comfort zone and get these sort of weak points into

strengths. And with, you know, with Ron Adams on the defensive end as an off-ball mover, as somebody who can, you know, cut and screen and play a role and be a facilitator and, you know, a high efficiency passer, but a low turnover guy, all these sorts of things. And so he's ironed out like every wrinkle there has been in his game to the point where you look at it and it's just pristine. And that's why, you know, Charks wrote that story calling him basically like the ultimate player at this point. And I think it's really hard to, if you're just talking about what he is as a basketball player, it's, it feels like this is

maybe if he's maybe reached that pinnacle, um, may, and the scariest thing, or maybe the most exciting thing is maybe that's not true. Maybe there's even another level that he can get to here. But I think what we're seeing in this post season, you know, the way he just decimated the, the, the, the Clippers in round one, the way that Houston just has no answer for him. I'd be really interested to see if they move on and who they face down the line, what kind of matchups could even give him problems at this point. Because I think he's reached a level where it's just like,

whatever thing it is that you can do to me, I have the answer for it. And it's pretty impressive to watch. I remember with LeBron in 2013, the third Miami season, when they had the 27 game streak, the first four months of that season, I felt like he went to a whole other level. And that was the one time when it, like he was using all the pieces of himself and he didn't even totally care if he had the ball all the time remember when he was like the first two months of that season we were wondering if he could shoot 60 percent for

the season yeah and he was all about like the efficiency and uh like competition with wade like you know yeah your field goal percentage has got to be above 50 or else you're trash right yeah and there was a team play element to what he was doing and the way he was playing off his teammates in a comfort. And I thought that was the best stretch of his career. What I'm seeing from Durant lately makes me feel like that. But he's also done that. He's played like that the last two finals too. I feel like he's gotten to this thing.

But you mentioned what else is left and you mentioned the Knicks. And I don't want to talk about the Knicks. Whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm just saying. Actually, you know what? Let's take a break and I don't want to talk about the Knicks. Whoa, whoa, whoa. I didn't, you know, I'm just saying, I'm just saying. Actually, you know what? Let's take a break and then I'm going to talk about this really quick. Hey, let's take a break to talk about Luminary. Specifically, if you're a movie and a podcast fan like me, you need to check out The Ringer's new show, The Rewatchables 1999. It's only available on Luminary. This is a spinoff series of the Rewatchables podcast

that we've had for the last couple of years where we break down, deep dive the hell out of our favorite movies that we can't stop rewatching. 1999 was a great movie year. I was making the schedule for our Rewatchables for this year and there were so many 1999 movies, we were like, holy shit. What about a spinoff series?

The rewatchables 1999 dissects the most iconic movies from an all-time great year in film. You know the categories, the most rewatchable scene, who won the movie, best quote, Dion Waiters award, could this movie be made into a Netflix series? All that stuff.

We even added a, what is the most 1999 thing about this movie category made into a Netflix series? All that stuff. We even added a, what is the most 1999 thing about this movie category? Just for this, we did American Pie. We did Cruel Intentions. Big Daddy is coming up. Me and Joe House are doing that one and a whole bunch of other ones. And you can check out other great podcasts they have,

like Hannibal Buress' Handsome Rambler. Guy Raz's Wisdom from the Top, Trevor Noah, Let's Talk This Out. Luminary gives you access to a bunch of other original shows from innovative, dynamic creators you can't find anywhere else. The app is free to download. Use it to listen to thousands of podcasts, including ones you already love, like this one. All enhanced within an easy-to- use interface with personalized content recommendations. Get your first two months of access to Luminary's premium content for free when you sign up at luminary.link slash Simmons.

After that, it's $7.99 per month. Luminary.link slash Simmons for two months of free access. Cancel any time. Terms apply. Luminary.link slash Simmons. You mentioned the Knicks. We've only seen him in the position

of really carrying a team in the old school, traditional, I'm the only great guy in this team, get on my back, fellas way, was his MVP year when I think Westbrook had gotten hurt for, how many games did he miss? He probably missed like 35, something like that.

But Durant had this just incredible statistical year. I think he was like 32 and eight. It's close to 50, 40, 90 splits. And it was really one of the better statistical years anybody's had. And that was really the only time he's had to do that. And I guess like if he won a title again here with the Warriors, which it seems like

that's becoming more and more realistic, it kind of would be fun to see him try to do that on an inferior team. And maybe that's the last challenge for him. I don't know. What do you think? I know you have a team in mind maybe for that. I mean, I don't like the suggestion that they're inferior, but I will say, yeah. And it's kind of funny because you saw it a little bit earlier this season, too, in a sort of smaller sample. But when Steph went down for like a month there or three weeks there, like beginning of November, and Durant had to kind of be the entire offense. Yeah. And the production was kind of, I mean, the record wasn't great, but the production was kind of nuts. He had that like, you know, it's like over a 12-game stretch,

33.3 points, 8.3 rebounds, 6.2 assists. The three-point percentage was down because that was sort of down for him all season. But the playmaking reached a different level. He had that run where it was like 40 points in three or four straight games, 51 against the Raptors, and he was just like a monster. And to your point, what you mentioned earlier, you go like, oh, right. This is Kevin Durant. Like he can just do everything at an elite level.

I would be, I think as a fan, just seeing what that looks like unleashed. That was like, in the same way that I, and honestly, I felt like that about the Westbrook season where I was like, I want to see what it looks like if you turned it up to 11 and then tore the knob off. I kind of feel like that. Now, as we've gone on, we've seen, you know, there are diminishing returns on that with, with Westbrook and particularly with a play, you know, with, with his individual sort of strengths and weaknesses as a player, like that, that can only propel a team so far. Maybe that would also be true with Duran. If you like had him using 35% of a team's possessions and he's the, like the primary initiator,

he's handling the ball all the time. I kind of doubt it because I think he's just so, so much more of a complete player, but I'd be really interested to see what that looks like and what kind of team you would put around a player like that. But, but yeah, the point,

the larger point is obviously I personally, I would love it if he was in New York personally,, that would be a kind of a wonderful thing to see. I don't know that it would make him really happy because I don't, I think dealing with all the stuff that comes with being on the Knicks doesn't seem like it's particularly fun. But wherever he decides to do, you know, whatever he decides to do,

if he decides to go down that path of like, it's my team, I'm the number one guy, everything is running through me. I think that could be a really fascinating sort of experiment. And so, you know, you built yourself into this complete player over the last few years. Now, like, turn that loose on the league and see what it looks like. I remember the first pod we did with him. I think Rich came on at one point and somebody asked, what was the most points he'd ever scored in a game?

And he said, like, 66. And he said like 66. And it was like the famous Rucker Park game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I was like, what about a real game? He's like, I don't know. He's like, I don't care about how many points I'm going to score in a game. To me, the more interesting thing, I'm paraphrasing what he said, but it's something like this.

He was like, to me, the more interesting thing is, can I score in the 30s for like three straight weeks? Like he cares, what he cares about is the consistency of the excellence, not like, oh, like a Devin Booker, I had 75 in a game. And it's like, yeah, your team won 18 games. I think he, like to him,

I could see him being on the Knicks and saying, and be like a month straight where he scores 35 points in every game, like that kind of stuff. I think that's what floats his boat. He really doesn't. I don't think he cares about point totals. I really don't. I think he cares more about like the flow of what's going on.

Is he feeling it? Is the team winning and doing what it takes to kind of win? I've, I've been to games where it seemed like he could add like 70 and he just doesn't care. Like once, once the game's over, he checks out. Which is, it's, it's remarkable to be, to have somebody at that level, to make that choice, right. To be able to be like, yeah, I could, this could go as far as I want it to go, but you know, I only need it to go so far. Um, the selfish part of me would always love to see what it looks like if you let it go as far, if you push it as far as I want it to go, but, you know, I only need it to go so far. The selfish part of me would always love to see what it looks like if you let it go as far, if you push it as far as it could go. But, you know, yeah, maybe that's part of what makes him special is that he doesn't need that.

Yeah. 27 a game for his career. And then in the playoffs, he is at 28.9 now. Jesus. Oh, no. I'm looking at LeBron. I'm sorry. No, he's 29.1. 29.1. 29.1.

7.8 rebounds, four assists on 47, 35, 86 shooting splits because the early part of his career, his first playoff seasons, the shooting numbers were down.

But, yeah, I mean, an absolute monster uh the likes of which we've very rarely seen and fyi the 29 a game cannot be taken lightly because you're talking of i looked this up actually for the pot i wanted to give you one little nugget that you could take when you go to pick up pick up your kid later you'd be maybe dropping love that. Maybe drop it in the car. Only seven guys have played 100 playoff games at least in the first 11 years of their career and averaged 28 points a game in those first 11 years. Now, he's at 29. MJ's number one. West is two.

KD's three. Hakeem, Elgin, Shaq, and LeBron. I'm going to say that list again. KD's three. Hakeem, Elgin, Shaq, and LeBron. I'm going to say that list again. KD's three? Yeah. Jordan, West, KD, Hakeem, Elgin, Shaq, LeBron. That's the company he's in. And by the way, the playoffs are what matter,

not the regular season. So you're talking about, this is one of the great playoff performers we've had. He has a chance to win his third straight title. He has been relevant really for this entire decade, at least as a playoff guy. And this is substantial. And he has a chance this year.

This has a chance to be his signature playoff. He's at, I think, 34 a game now. Small sample size, but if you average 34 a game for like 15 playoff games, you're now in a different category. There's only a couple guys that have done that. So very quickly before you go, biggest surprise for you in round two so far? Hmm.

I think the fact that Philly held Toronto like that in game two, I think the fact that Philly held Toronto like that in game two I think the fact that they really quieted them down Toronto I thought was going to I just thought the matchup was such that Toronto was going to run through Philly basically and so seeing that defensive performance from the Sixers in game

two seeing Ben Simmons like there's so many issues with Ben Simmons, and, you know, people, you know, there are great things about him. There are things that people have an issue with. You know, if Kevin O'Connor was here, I'm sure we would have a much longer conversation about it.

But seeing the way he competed defensively against Kawhi Leonard, like, you're not going to stop Kawhi from scoring, but he was working his ass off around every screen, getting, you know, getting small to get around screens, getting big to get in his airspace, all that sort of stuff. I thought that was like, it was really, really impressive. And for them to go out and have that kind of performance against a really good Toronto team to like knock them on their back, back on their heels, even on a night

where you had a less than a hundred percent in bead where he wasn't, he wasn't scoring like that. Even when Simmons was barely touching the ball on offense, like I thought that was really, really impressive. So, and surprised me. Like the other series being, you know, 1-1 or even Golden State being up 2-0 over the Rockets, like that's not shocking to me. I kind of thought that this, you know, that they're just too thin and sort of the pieces in Philly maybe just didn't match up the right way for them to be able to put together that kind of performance.

It was really, really impressive. I think now it forces Toronto to have to answer some questions, and I'm pretty interested to see what they come back with. The piece you wrote today for The Ringer, you mentioned how Brett Brown's big brainstorm for Game 2

is to move everybody around and put Embiid on Siakam, which is weird. It's something I certainly never would have thought of. And it threw off Siakam and kind of threw off the Raptors from what they wanted to do. I guess the catch would be, it's a little bit of a gimmick. And now the Raptors have some time to figure out really how to exploit that. Because if you're going to put Embiid on Siakam, now I have to rethink how I use Siakam in a way where now maybe I can pull Embiid away from the basket

and that opens up a whole bunch of other things that I might want to get going. So my guess is if Philly sticks with that, I think Toronto will have some wrinkles ready. And I don't know if that's a sustainable gimmick. It worked, it did what it needed it to do, but I'm not sure it'll keep working. Yeah. You very well might be right about that. I think what makes it really interesting though, is that it sort of puts to the test this, like,

what level is Pascal Siakam at? You know, like if he's, if he's ready, if he's like good enough to be able to say, all right, I, you know, I took that shot and now I come back to it and I have an answer for it. Then I think it paints the sort of near future for Toronto in a very different light because right now he's a guy that like, you know, the statistical community loves and the NBA nerds like us love, but hasn't really broken through in a big way because he's like the second or third or fourth guy you would think of on that team just by name recognition. But if he comes back against this and is like, no, I'm going to put up big, big performances against Joel Embiid in the second round of the playoffs,

all of a sudden it's like, holy shit, this guy's here. So it sort of puts him to a challenge, to a test, and how they respond to it I think is going to be really fascinating to see. It's funny, except for the Warriors, because they're just too talented. Their enemy is themselves. Every team has one guy who is kind of the guy that their fan base is secretly not sure. If the playoffs get shoved where it's on that person's lap, is that person going to come through?

So Siakam is good. I almost voted him for third team on NBA. He's been amazing but the sixers are now putting this series in his hands right and saying we're gonna move all this stuff around siakam is basically gonna have to beat us now and we don't know if he can do it and then if you go like to milwaukee milwaukee looks great when eric butzo's playing well i don't trust eric butzo like he ultimately he's gonna to swing that Boston series one way or the other.

Denver, everybody knows it's Jamal Murray. If he has it, they feel like they can beat anybody. If he doesn't have it, it feels like they can't beat anybody. In Houston's case, weirdly, it's Capella. Because now that he's been just completely neutered in this Warrior series, I was surprised how dramatic of an impact that's had on him. And I also, I know Draymond's really good.

I don't understand how they've taken out Capella to this degree, because you would have thought watching the last series with all the success Harrell had on the screen roles, I just would have assumed Capella would have also had the success. I don't know what the difference is. Do you have an opinion on that quickly? I think part of it might just be sort of, I don't know, for lack of a better term,

like relentlessness. If you go away from Harold, if you let him just sort of roam, he's going to roam and knock something over. He's going to screen somebody blind and open up a flare on the backside. He's going to work his way eventually to Lou Williams to open him up. And Capella, it's kind of like you can kind of stuff him in a drawer a little bit. Or if he's just hanging around at the dunker spot on the baseline, you know, you're not—you don't have to— if you aren't super worried about the lob because you know you could— like Draymond can play up and faint at Harden and then get back and contest it or whatever if the help defenders are ready to

launch in and intercept those passes it's kind of like what can he do and he's not making himself useful in other ways like he's not rampaging up to go set screens and roll and whatever he's not he can't do anything with the ball in his hands really besides finish and not that that's I mean that's a very valuable skill, but it's not impacting the game in other ways. And then on defense, like, you know, Harrell, you know, is a smaller guy, but he's also really, really active on the perimeter and he's smaller and he can get around screens

and he can, you know, work through those sorts of things. And Capella is kind of like if they get him on an island, whereas that has been a real success for him in years past, it's sort of like Tristan Thompson. Like that was a really important skill that he had. And then all of a sudden he didn't have it. And so I don't know, I don't, I'm not saying that like Capella has lost that skill, but I'm saying if he's not really great at it right now, he becomes a liability on both ends of the floor. So then, yeah, you're, uh, you're, you're praying for Daniel House.

You're trying to figure out what the answers are on the fly. They can't not play him. He just, he has to not get destroyed in the minutes that he's out there. I think for Philly, it's Ben Simmons is the guy for their fans. And just in general, their swing guy. But sometimes it's Butler too. I don't know who it is for Portland

because, you know, I guess you would say McCollum, but he's actually been pretty reliable. He's been awesome. Who would you say? Would you believe Ennis Cantor? You know, I own property on Cantor Island. Sort of an archipelago, maybe a few sort of disparate land masses. It's great. He's been, like, he is rebuilding his reputation as an on-court basketball player in real time. Like, I can remember our friend Zach Lowe at one point calling him, like, a dogshit player

because he was, like, you couldn't, as Billy Donovan said, like, you couldn't play him in pick-and-roll coverage in the playoffs against teams that were going to attack him. He's been awesome in the playoffs. He's competing his ass off defensively. With one arm, basically, he's battling on the glass. He took the ball right at Jokic to try to attack him,

make him work on defense. He's been great. He's been everything they could have hoped for. As a buyout guy, picking him up off the scrap heap when the Knicks let him go, as like an in-case-of-emergency backup behind Nurkkic and now he's maybe the third most important guy on that team um it's been pretty remarkable and it's and frankly kind of cool because like there comes a point where you you think like I know exactly who that guy is and I don't need to really think about that guy too

much anymore I know yeah you and you and Rosillo talked about D'Angelo Russell sort of like that it's like I kind of know who that guy is but but Cantor is a veteran. You know, it's not just like a 21 year old is going to develop a new skill. Cantor, it's like, we have a track record here and he's saying like, no, actually you can play me right now. And I'm going to, you know, work my ass off to be valuable here. Um, whether that's just like sort of contract year, um, you know, push or whatever, like I, it, it seems like it really matters to him to be like, yeah, no, you can play me right now. And he's been awesome. If he's really good, then

Portland could absolutely wind up in the conference finals. And I don't think anybody would have expected that coming into the season after the way last one ended. I feel vindicated. I never gave up on him. And I still think Donovan should have played him in 16. He's like, all right, he's getting destroyed, but the rest of your team stinks too.

So at least he could do a couple of things. In case you're wondering, the guys for Boston, there's not one guy. There's like four of them. And the hope is that two of them don't sail south in the same game, which is what happened in game two. Because it's basically Tatum, Hayward and Brown. They need two of those three guys to play well in a playoff game. If they go one for three, it's dicey. And if they go over three, you know, write it off. It's done. But, uh, you saw in game

two, uh, cause they can always rally if one of those guys doesn't show up, but if, if two or three, then, then they're in a lot of trouble. This was fun. Thanks for coming on. Thanks for everything with Ringer this year. It's been really fun to work with you. I know that, I know you're a big fan. You have a lot of fans with the, with the staff, especially the copy desk, Craig Gaines' crew. You're a pros pro. Take, you tell people what you're going to write. You turn it in. People love it. I mean, i shouldn't get a whole lot of credit for that like that's that's literally that's literally the job but um yeah i i will say i like i so i got to i got here that before the start of the season

and you know whatever you can shine this on you can cut it out if you want but like it has been an amazing experience working with like real professional people that have like uh a safety net and they want to make what's to want to make the best version of the thing. It's been super, super cool. And so, yeah, that's been my pleasure. And the people that I've been working with, with Justin Verrier and Danny Chow and Chris Almeida, the other editors, it's been awesome.

So my gig is to try to write one thing that's interesting a day, and it's been a lot of fun to get to do it. So hopefully, but I will say, as you said, thanks for all you've done this year. I was like, shit,

am I getting fired now? Am I getting fired on the podcast? That'd be rough. Um, but yeah, no, I, I,

frankly, I, you know, tell me off air who you'd be getting for me. I'd like to know some names. No, I would, I would never do that to you.

Dan Devine. Thanks so much. It was a plus. All right, we're going to call Shea in a second. Let's talk about Voodoo really quick. Streaming app, library of over 150,000 titles available to rent or buy from the latest Hollywood blockbusters

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How'd you know? Because we wanted to watch the Karate Kid. And my son said, go to Voodoo, see if they have it. Oh, wow. Reach Ben Simmons' ears then fast forward a couple days later Fighting With My Family

is available to buy he said go to Vudu let's buy Fighting With My Family so Vudu taking off with Ben Simmons switch platforms good for him unbelievable

Vudu.com slash rewatchables sign up for that start watching today catch up on I don't know what the next one is. I think we're doing John Wick.

John Wick 2 might be the next Rewatchables we're doing, but you can watch Mean Girls and listen to that one, whatever. Before the next Rewatchables episode, just go to vudu.com slash Rewatchables and sign up. Right now, we're going to call

Shay in one second. Just wanted to mention May 2nd. Always an emotional day for me. My daughter was born on this day, Kyle. Happy birthday. She's now 14. Such a nice kid. I put up a little Instagram story about her.

If you ever look at my Instagram, it's S-P-T-G-U-Y 3-3. But you know what's funny when you when you have a kid I'm just gonna tell a quick story about childbirth not the gross part of the childbirth story

but just the actual one you remember all the parts of the day leading up to when the kid was born because you know it's like one of the five

most important days of your life maybe even top three I don't even know but you remember every little beat it's like one of the five most important days of your life, maybe even top three. I don't even know. But you remember every little beat it's so new and it's so scary and you're just constantly worried something bad's going to happen the whole time. So your senses are all like just heightened. And it's funny, I can't remember what I did like three weeks ago. And I still remember like every single thing about that day, including my wife was in labor. She, she had like one of the, like a false labor a couple of times. Oh man.

Like we went to the hospital the night before and they're like, no, no, you're not ready yet. And that morning she's like, I think I'm ready. And I'm like, ah, I haven't even had coffee yet. So I go, I stopped, we're driving to the hospital. We're going to Cedars-Sinai. And, but I hadn't had coffee and I'm like, we're going to be at the hospital.

Like, I haven't had a coffee. So we stop at the Starbucks on La Brea in Detroit. We go in and there's this actress there who played, who was professor,

somebody, Lucinda Nicholson from 90210. She had an affair with Brandon on freshman year of college and saw 90210. So we're in there and I'm like, wow, that was weird. So I walk it out in my coffee and I'm like, you're not going to believe what I saw in there. My wife was like, drive!

And it was like, kick it in. And so, yes. And every time I see Lucinda Nicholson in anything I always think about how I was starting

to tell my wife the story about running into her at a Starbucks and my wife was just looking at me with like no pupils in her eyes

at any point so we drove there and now 14 years later I have a child that is 5 foot 8 and is super talented and is a very nice kid

and was even on her own podcast last week on channel 33 for realsies check it out did a really good job happy birthday z we love you uh all right let's bring in shay serrano on the line right now he is doing a six episode podcast about john wick it is called with a pencil you can find it on the ringer podcast network right now we're gonna talk about john wick in a second we're also going to talk about cobra kai which we'll put at the yes we'll put a tail end of this podcast so if people haven't watched it yet we don't want to spoil it for them uh but first we'll talk about the spire shay shay serrano how are you i am fantastic how are you um were you surprised Popovich was coming back

maybe seems like it no no no he's doing the Team USA in 2020 so you know why would you leave before then just ride it out oh interesting so you think he stays at least one more year does Team USA

and then either retires after that or just rides out the contract. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's my guess. I don't know if you saw how the Spurs season ended, but you were down four with like 30 seconds left and the Nuggets had the ball and everybody just stood there and Jokic held it for like 20 seconds and then the game ended. Did you see that? I think it's important that I tell everybody right now that you did not tell me we were going to talk about this. Otherwise, I would not have answered the phone. You told me we were

talking about Cobra Kai and that's it. Yes, I did watch it. I watched it on my computer and on my phone and on the television all at the same time. I couldn't believe what I was watching. It was fantastic. It was perfect. I always want to see a thing that I've never seen in a basketball game before,

and I had never seen the Spurs in a game seven do what they did during that moment. So it was great. I loved every part of it. Thanks for bringing it up. Where do you stand with LaMarcus Aldridge these days? I'm super pro LaMarcus Aldridge now. Okay. All right.

I'm super pro. He has done everything we needed him to do these past two seasons as like the main guy on the team. I love him. He can do, he can, he can do nothing wrong for me right now going forward. He, he was like, he was the lighthouse in the storm. You know what I'm saying? Okay. What about, uh, the trader Kawhi Leonard? Are you following him in Toronto? are you rooting against him? This is my trick. I'm going to only tweet nice things about Kawhi, but secretly, I'm still a little upset.

So at my house, I'm not going to be nice to him. But on the internet, I'm going to be very nice to him. On the internet? Do you think Kawhi even has the internet? Do you think he knows what the internet is? He's going to get it in six years when he finds out about it. do you think Kawhi even has the internet? do you think he knows what the internet is? he's gonna get it in six years when he finds out about it

it's gonna blow his mind he's gonna find eBay and just order a fucking 1999 Bronco another one or whatever as he was driving a Chevy Tahoe yeah maybe a personality

I actually like that he just owns it now I watched that thing with Serge Ibaka I thought that was the most fascinating piece of content in 2019

the thing with Serge Ibaka made him all this gross food and he ate it and I've never been more jealous of somebody else's content

I felt like that was the most ringer thing that anybody made in 2019. I don't know how we didn't have it. I'm actually upset. Serge Ibaka is, he's so good on that show.

Like, everybody wants to talk to Serge. Yeah. He just gets to talking and being all charming and you're like, oh shit, I want to tell you every secret

that I've ever had. He's wonderful. He's definitely blossomed, right? Because we did, we did a documentary with him when we were at Grantland

and I did a podcast with him he was comfortable he was like surprisingly personable but I never felt like five years later

he was gonna host like this really funny cooking show with his teammates I'm very jealous of that idea though I really want to acquire that for the ringer in the, in the, uh, off season. Um, John Wick, we are now two weeks away,

but you've already seen it. You've seen John Wick three. Yes. You not only have seen John Wick three, you came in the office and you bragged about seeing John Wick 3, which I didn't appreciate. You're very braggy about it. Without giving anything at all away, is it the best one of the three? It's the best one of the three, Bill. It's incredible. Incredible. Okay. All right. That's all I need to know. That's all I'm going to tell you. I can't tell you one single part of the movie without ruining one single part of the movie. You know what I'm saying? It's unbelievable how good it is. You're just going to sit there from the moment it starts, Bill, until the last scene in the moment. You're going 180 miles an hour down the side of a mountain on a motorcycle that's set on fire is what it feels like.

Wow. It's great. What did we do to get this and Hobbs and Shaw in a 10-week span? Who do I thank? Who do I send money to other than the movie theaters? I don't know, but let me know when you find out because I would definitely like to send them all of the money we have in my children's college savings account. It's funny to have two commercials in the NBA playoffs mix right now that each time they come on, even though I've already seen them nine times, I'm locked in every time. Every time Hogs and Shaw comes on, I'm like, all right, let's do it again.

Let's run it back. John Wick. Did you go see Avengers? did you take the kids to that? we're going tonight it's been like impossible to find five tickets you know you have to do the ones where they the movie theater by our house

is like they assign your seats for you you pick a seat so every day I've been checking like there are only two showings we can go see before their bedtime. It's like a four and a five or something like that. It's a seven-hour movie or whatever. Yeah, I think it is.

We finally got five tickets all next to each other, so I'm excited to go see it. I told you my son saw Curse of La Rona. How do you say it? That was pretty terrible. Pretty bad. Curse of La Rona? That was pretty terrible. Pretty bad. La Rona? I don't know.

What is something like that? La Llorona. Oh, La Llorona. Okay, sorry. Yeah, there you go. That was good. That was good. It took seven years of Spanish.

I know how to roll my L's. So my son saw it, and it was probably a mistake because he now refuses to take bathtubs and he's been on the internet every night reading about scary Mexican tales that may or may not be true, which there are a lot of on the internet. So a mistake. For people out there with 11-year-old sons who like horror movies, don't go see that one. Because now my son's... I don't see him bathing at all now because he doesn't like to shower. That might not be it. Have you seen this one or no?

No, we haven't seen that one yet either. It feels like a rental. Larry and I are going to see that one. The boys didn't want to see it. Yeah, yeah. It's a movie you rent. Yeah, it feels like a rental. That was...

There's a couple of those that are like that um we just saw fighting for my family fighting with my family the wrestling movie which my son's on the theater but you know i like to support the rock franchise that one was really that was really solid too um all right let's do it it's time cobra kai cobra kai so um we watched we watched we banged it out of my house last week i finished it like five six days ahead of you which i was really excited about and uh and then two nights ago my son's like hey dad, dad, you want to watch Karate Kid? I'm like, okay. He's seen it 10 times. We watched that one. I got to say the last half hour of Karate Kid 1 really does hold up 35 years later.

It's really, really strong. It's amazing to me how they were able to reinvent that movie into this YouTube series that I devoured. And I was really mad after the last one. Why was I mad, Shay? Because you were madder than I was. What happened? Now we're in spoiler zone. If you haven't seen it yet, turn the pot off.

We'll see you next time. Why were at the end of season two? Yeah. Why were you mad? You were mad even more mad than I was. And I was really mad. Because they tried to kill Miguel. What are you doing? What is happening? why were you mad you were mad even more mad than i was and i was really mad because they they tried to kill miguel what are you doing what is happening with season two okay i have several

issues with the with season two of cobra kai but let me say these are like these are stylistic issues these are not was this a good it's a great show season two is a lot of fun to watch it's wonderful yeah we like season two now we're's wonderful. Yeah, we like season two. But it's like, now we're going to complain about it. We love season two. We love season two. Let's complain about season two. I don't understand how you have Miguel Diaz,

the best character from season one. Yep. And then you just throw him in the background for season two. Like, you've got Shaq down low. Throw him the ball and let him cause some trouble. Let's get bad Miguel Diaz out here just bullying everybody. We didn't get it. That was the one thing I wanted to see in season two.

I wanted bad Miguel Diaz, and we did not get it. It was a little bit like the last Game of Thrones episode where they had the dragons in their hip pocket and weren't ready to unleash them. I felt Miguel was like a dragon. Like, you've created this great character. He's so good. Unleashed a dragon.

He's so good, Bill. He's so good. What are they doing? I felt like they were trying to create this extra layer of maybe he's not sure he should be this evil. That's absolutely what they're doing. Yeah.

But it didn't work because they didn't really devote enough time to it. It was kind of, yeah, they threw a couple scenes in there where, where there were hints that he was about to become a good guy, but they never committed to it. And FYI, I wish you would ask me and Shay because we would have told you,

no, go the other way, dial it up, make him a worse guy. It was weird. They gave all of his bad guy stuff to the guy with the Mohawk. I can't, I'm blanking on his name. Hawk. Hawk. Eli. Yeah. They made Hawk more of a bad guy, but Miguel was somehow in the middle straddling these two worlds of good guy bad guy and I disagreed would not have done that I disagree with that as well at the end of season one when Miguel has made the full turn and he's just a bad

kid in the tournament and he's like taking the cheap shots and doing all this stuff that was the best part of the series it was so much fun to watch him finally hit that ball it was fun to watch him knocking these kids down and then standing over them, screaming at them like what a bad guy should do. And yeah, I thought we were going to get that in season two. And he's such a good actor.

The kid is such a good actor. He's so good at like one second just making you be all the way in love with them. And then in an instant, he can turn it on and be like he can be intimidating which is hard to do he can be intimidating without saying anything or doing anything he could just do it in his face we got like a little glimpse of it when he was like uh when he was bucking back against crease and he was like no that's not what the sensei is teaching us and crease walks up on him and you see it in his face and i was like oh shit we're about to get the crease versus mig Miguel Diaz fight. Yeah, this is happening.

And we didn't get it. But we got the Hawk and the Diaz fight, which was unbelievable. Two bad guys just sort of going at it. And Miguel right there, he's like, I'm going to show you I'm a little bit badder than you are. And fucking smashes his face off of his head. It was unreal. I love Miguel Diaz so much. Might be my favorite character on the internet right now

if we count this all as TV Taylor is first Taylor from Billions and then Miguel Diaz right underneath Taylor from Billions is first? Taylor from Billions is incredible over Miguel Diaz? over Miguel Diaz right now because they didn't

give me bad Miguel Diaz season 1 give me that Miguel Diaz over now because they didn't give me bad Miguel Diaz. Season one, give me that Miguel Diaz over everybody else. Season two, Miguel, you know, I don't know. I think part of the reason they were doing it too is to set up the thing at the end where he falls off of the stairs. You have to feel bad for him in that moment. You know, if like, if they had done that to Johnny

at the end of Karate Kid, you would have been like, good fucking, I hope he's paralyzed from the waist down. I hate Johnny. He was such a good bad guy. I think they were giving you just enough so that you still genuinely loved Diaz so that when that scene happened, everything fell out of you. You know, it struck me watching, especially the last episode, whether it would have made more sense to have bad Miguel Diaz. I agree. You know, I agree with you on that side

and kick Johnny Lawrence's son over the railing. And it's like Miguel Diaz has gone to even a more horrible place. He's basically tried to murder somebody now. I think I would have liked that direction more than the direction they ended up with, where now it's like Johnny Lawrence's son. How could he do that? You almost killed him. And now they're going to set up some inner turmoil. I'm not sure I'm as interested in that character.

Yeah, I think what ends up happening, I think what they might be trying to do is they might be trying to get Robbie back over there with Johnny. They're going to let Johnny be bad again. They're going to send Robbie with him. Miguel goes with Daniel LaRusso. And he's like, he's always been a good kid. And now he gets to be the new crowd.

Miguel Diaz would be a fantastic Daniel LaRusso. Like he has that same sort of charisma, that same sort of likability, that same almost vulnerability, but you still believe in him. He can do any of these roles. I would like to see a bad guy, Robbie Keene. If that's the play, then I'll apologize and let's go for season three. I want to see all that happen. So I don't know if you've seen this prediction yet, but I think this is a really good prediction. They set up at the tail end of season two, they set up, he gets the Facebook friend request accepted

from Allie, Allie with an I. I think they established earlier in the first season that she's a doctor, right? She's like a surgeon or something? Right, right, right. Is it possible that she's the one who saves Miguel from being like a paraplegic and fixes his back? I would love for that to happen.

They bring her in for season three. I would love it. She does the surgery. Daniel-san and his wife are on the, they kind of hinted at it. They got back together near the end of the season two, but maybe Daniel-san and his wife are on the... They kind of hinted at it. They got back together near the end of the season too, but maybe Daniel-san and his wife are on the outs. And now Dr. Allie comes

back, and now we got a little love triangle action. She fixes Miguel's back. Miguel ends up with Daniel. Allie and Johnny Lawrence kind of go down their road, and then Johnny Lawrence's son is in there too. On the Johnny Lawrence side.

That could be a good ending. Last episode, so they had a couple different group fight scenes in Cobra Kai season two, which I enjoyed. The last episode, the high school fight scene, which is just one of the most absurd, over-the-top, unrealistic.

It's like John Wick 3 breaks out of their high school. That scene was really well directed and well shot and well executed. I actually was pretty pleased with it. What did you think? I was just at lunch with my cousin. We were having this exact same conversation. I was 100% surprised at how good, how violent, how authentic that fight seemed between everybody. They're all mad at each other, first of all. And they've all been waiting all season to square off. There's no tournament this time. We don't know how they're going to get this fight.

It finally happens. It's just a fucking melee all through the high school. And these kids were fighting. They were hand-to-hand combat. This was like a junior version of the raid that we're watching. They were going for it. It was so good. It was – dude, it was so – they were so good.

Every single person in this fight was unbelievable. Like, okay, so it starts out with – what's her, what's the character's name? Her real name is Peyton. Oh, the, the, the bad girl, the waitress, the evil waitress. Yeah. I'm going to get, yeah. I know her real name is Peyton list. Yeah.

I can't, I can't remember her, her character name. All of a sudden I'm blanking on it. That was like Tori. Yeah. Yeah. And she was fighting Daniel LaRusso's daughter and they're just going out she was fighting sam and this is just spilling out into the hallway and then robbie comes in and miguel comes in and they're all they all just decide you know what we're all gonna fight everybody

and you kept waiting for them to break off you kept waiting for robbie and miguel to get at it you kept waiting for for those other two to get to get like their moment where they're just fucking battling. It was unbelievable, Bill. It was so good. It was so good. I actually like LaRusso's daughter as a character. I think she's pretty solid. Yeah, she's wonderful.

She kissed Miguel, and I was okay with it. So let me ask you your reaction on this. My son loves Cobra Kai, the actual, the dojo Cobra Kai. I think he's rooting for the bad guys as he watches this. Yes. He's into the chants. He feels like maybe Kreese has some good ideas. Maybe No Mercy might be a better direction. Should I be worried?

You should absolutely be worried. There's no way that that's going to turn out well for you. I think he likes it because in real life, you're not allowed to be bullies. Like bullies, it's frowned upon and rightly so. But the Cobra Kai show is the one place where bullies can still be bullies. So he kind of enjoys it.

That doesn't want to emulate it. Well, he kind of enjoys the whole concept of a bully, which is now basically gone and it only can live on in a show like Cobra Kai. But he likes the whole like Hawk, just being completely over the top and then getting his comeuppance at the end and all that stuff. We don't,

we don't get that in real life anymore. In real life, everybody's nice to each other and they should be. Bill Simmons, pro-bullying. We got it. I'm anti-bullying. I'm just explaining what a maniac my son is. Kyle.

Kyle's here. It's great. Kyle, are you surprised that Ben is rooting for the Cobra Kai kids over the kids we're supposed to be rooting for? Not in the slightest. Okay, good. Good for him. That's just who I'm raising.

The Cobra Kai kids are cooler is what it is. They are. That's like basically, that's what it boils down to. You watch the training. That was the whole point of the scene when they interrupt Daniel LaRusso and Robbie and Sam doing their little presentation at the festival. And then Cobra Kai comes in with all of the lighting and the fire. And they have cooler jerseys. They do cooler moves.

They say cooler things. They're just cooler all the way around. Tori is great. Miguel is great. those two as a couple I wish we would have got a little more of them that when she showed up I was crossing my fingers hoping okay she's really gonna

she's gonna guide Miguel to the dark and just let him be all the way dark and we didn't get there she was a good character good addition I also liked the double date episode I thought that was actually well executed. I'm not sure how I felt about Johnny getting back together with

some of the Cobra Kai guys. If you're going to do it, I feel like Dutch has to be involved. Dutch was my favorite Cobra Kai character. I wanted Dutch, even if they just showed his mugshot from they made it seem like he was in prison.

Dutch is unbelievable in Karate Kid. He plays like eight minutes and he puts up like 29 points and 10 rebounds. It's one of the best. He has like three of the best lines of the movie, including my personal favorite. What's the matter, Daniel? Mommy's not here to dress ya? Which I still think is the most insulting thing anyone's ever said to anyone in a movie is

that. But I was upset that they didn't have Dutch backing on this one. If he's back, if he's back on the show, does he still have the bleached blonde hair? Why did he bleach his eyebrows? That was what was the most unsettling to me about Dutch in the first part of Kid.

How crazy do you have to be to bleach your eyebrows? Crazy. Digest your full-fledged lunatic at that point. Kreese comes back. He looked pretty good. Kreese? He looks great. He looks like a movie star. When he walks on the set, you're like, okay.

Alright. I see it. But again, they gave all of Miguel's time to Kreese. And I don't know. I mean, I know you need the conflict in the season. But let me just, I just need as much of Miguel as possible. I'm ready for the Miguel spinoff is what I'm ready for. Are you happy with Billions season four? I love it.

I love Billions Season 4. I love everything about Billions Season 4 except for the part where Showtime decided to put it against Game of Thrones for some reason. Just a bad move. See, the thing is, you got to watch it on Showtime anytime. It comes on early in the day

and you can watch it whenever you want. You don't have to wait for Game of Thrones. I watched it early in the day and you can watch it whenever you want. You don't have to wait for Game of Thrones. I watched it early in the airport on Sunday. Kyle is just nodding so impressed right now that you dropped that one.

You know what you gotta do. That's smart. Good advice. I've enjoyed Billions as well and I think the Chuck speech at the end of episode four was really an all-timer.

Just really well writtenwritten and well-executed. I guess it wasn't at the end. It was near the end. The whole speech about, this stuff's going to come out about me. And it's all true. I love when characters do that. You're going to hear some stuff about me and all of it's true. All right.

So John Wick's coming out in two weeks. You can listen to your podcast right now. It's called With the Pencil. I think we have two episodes up. And then after that, you're not going to be on. We were going to have you in the John Wick 3 rewatchables, but you're not going to be here. So we have to figure out

a different one for you to do. But you already have your own podcast. John Wick 2 rewatchables, yeah. Yeah, but we got to do another one soon. We did Fast and Furious and we did Fast 5. And then when's your birthday? Are you 40 yet?

No, I'm not 40 yet. When do you turn 40? I'm 37 right now, so I got a couple years. Alright, when you turn 40, that's when we'll do the Blood In Blood Out rewatchables. That'll be my 40th birthday present to you. It'll be eight hours.

By the time we get to 40, this is my sincere hope. By the time we get to 40, I hope that I am Johnny Lawrence and you're Daniel LaRusso, and we're just at war. That's what I hope. I hope we have dueling karate dojos by that point.

Maybe you form a dojo in San Antonio. I'll form one here and we'll just see what happens. All right, Shea Serrano, thanks for coming on as always. All right, thanks to Dan Devine. Thanks to Shea Serrano. Thanks to Zoe for 14 wonderful years. I wouldn't trade one second

of them. Thanks to DAZN. Don't forget Canelo Jacobs this weekend. You still have time to sign up, order, and watch it. Thanks to Voodoo. 150,000 titles available to rent or buy. Over 8,000 titles you can watch for free on their ad-supported on-demand service.

Hollywood Blockbusters, your favorite indie films. Whatever you want. No subscriptions, no contracts. We bought the trilogy, Kyle. It was for sale. Karate Kid. Oh, wow. We wanted one.

They had all three. It was basically for the price of one. It's a no-brainer. So I can't wait to watch Kid 3 with my son because that is one of the unintentionally funniest movies of all time. Head to voodoo.com slash rewatchables to sign up and start watching today. Voodoo.com slash rewatchables to sign up and start watching today. Voodoo.com slash rewatchables. Enjoy the weekend.

Back on Sunday. No Russillo on Sunday. I'm going to have a replacement for him that is a good replacement. But Russillo, that gets nudged to a little bit later in the week. He's still coming. Not my fault. Russillo's going to like a Willie Nelson concert, something weird, right? Wasn't it a Willie Nelson concert?

Then he lied to us and told him he was 99 years old. What a weirdo Rosillo is. Uh, anyway, enjoy the weekend. He'll be back middle of the week with me and then I'll, we'll be doing the same Sunday night thing after Thrones, NBA, all that stuff. So until then, enjoy the weekend.