The Bill Simmons Podcast - KD's Epic Run, NBA Super-Whiners, Fear the North, and Throne Game With Ryen Russillo | The Bill Simmons Podcast

Episode Date: April 29, 2019

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo to discuss the Spurs' playoff exit, Rockets-Warriors, Bucks-Celtics, Blazers-Nuggets, and more. They talk about the surge in players complaining about the referees and Kawhi Leonard and his impressive performance against the 76ers; they share the latest Gym Corner, answer mailbag questions (3:30), and [SPOILERS] recap 'Game of Thrones' Season 8, Episode 3 (1:45:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tonight's emotionally drained episode of the Bill Simmons Podcast. Ringer Podcast Network brought to you by DAZN. Stream over 100 fight nights a year without the pain of pay-per-view, including the one this weekend. Canelo Alvarez, Daniel Jacobs, champion versus champion, live from Las Vegas. I would call this a can't miss, Ryan. That's what I'm hearing on the streets.

Can't miss. Canelo, boxing prodigy. Daniel Jacobs. One of the best human interest stories we have in the fight game. Fought all the way back from cancer. And now there's going to be like 17 middleweight title belts on the line. At least three. Somewhere between three and 17.

But listen, you can check it out. You can subscribe to The Zone right now. And I highly encourage it because that fight is coming up. We're also brought to you by SeatGeek, the best app for buying and selling tickets to sporting events, concerts, and more. I recently used this to kill a mockingbird in New York City. Oh no, I used it for Mean Girls in New York City, actually. Riz Siki's great. You just go on the map. Whatever is like dark green, you want those tickets.

That means it's a great deal. Mean Girls is what? A play? It's now a play. Oh, I didn't know that. And it's now a Rewatchables podcast as well, coming this week on the Ringer Podcast Network. When it comes to a lot of stuff on Broadway, I lack.

I have a lot of holes in my game there meet you and me both brother for ten dollars off your first ck purchase an any gamer sporting event use promo code bs download the ck app or go right to ck.com if you missed all of our nfl draft stuff check out the ringer nfl show check out dual threat with ryan rossillo check out all the awesome pieces we did about it on TheRinger.com and Game of Thrones, obviously. We have the hashtag TalkTheThrones, our big Twitter show, which is the biggest audience we've ever had for the big Winterfell battle. That's what we're calling it now. Ryan and I are going to be breaking that down at the end of this podcast because we have just a ton of spoilers. Ryan has some questions. I don't even want to spoil those questions, but

I can't say it's a happy Ryan Russell right now. We're going to get to that. Yeah, we'll do it. I don't want to spoil it at all. Coming up, we're going to talk basketball. Nephew Kyle is here. Oh, and by the way, Binge Mode is coming out Wednesday night

and we'll break down the 85-minute episode. So don't forget about that as well. And then one more thing, Channel 33, we're putting up tomorrow my daughter she's come on and done for realsies on this podcast every once in a while her 14th birthday is this week i asked her what she wanted she said one of the things she wanted was she wanted to do entire episodes of for realsies oh we did it she did it with liz kelly kyle it was like shockingly good it. She might be a prodigy. Yeah. Let me do more.

But yeah, if you ever want to know about teen culture, tune into Channel 33 tomorrow. That's when that episode is dropping. Coming up, Ryan and I have a lot to get to in the basketball world and then Game of Thrones as well. But first, our friends from Tic Tac and Melatonin. Oh yeah, here they are. gosh this is such a family production now it really is gotta hand somebody something i'm gonna show up one day and your wife's gonna be here in the podcast studio and she's be like we're doing to do something on chicken dishes it feels like what bills out we're just i want to talk about how to braise a chicken uh lots to talk about since the

last time we did this dame lillard hit the 37 footer and ended the okc season we'll get to that later the most topical thing to talk about where's rockets game one it feels like the finals uh what doesn't feel like the finals is just the whining. There was whining during the game. There's whining after the game. It really feels like we've hit some officiating tipping point where this is just now how we watch basketball, where we're going to debate what's a foul, what wasn't a foul. People are foul blaming, foul shaming James Harden. You caused this. If you didn't flop so much, then maybe when you actually did get fouled, people would know you got fouled. Everybody's complaining. It is the most ornery series for an impactful series that I think we've

had. And it's only game one. I hate this stuff, Ryan. I'll start there. I know. And the thing is is i wanted to tell you and we do a really good job i think when we hang out we eat and do our routine we don't talk about really how we're going to do the pod yeah and i almost requested is there any way we can talk about the basketball part of this first but no let's do that are you serious yeah let's talk basketball because i don't think it's wrong to do the ref thing first i just don't enjoy it because there's so much good basketball stuff even wasn't a great game but there's just all these little things that i enjoy way more let's get it out in the top that we just hate this and we hate it i

hate it i hate it i hate it nobody likes the nba more than us and it's i just have days where i'm like oh cool every possession everybody's acting like a kid was kidnapped. It is. So Michael Lewis was on this podcast. We ran it last week. He's doing this podcast. Yeah, I listened to his. Yeah, yeah.

And he was saying how if you really study this stuff, it's the best players are the ones who are always bitching. And now you have this series where you have Chris Paul, James Harden, Kevin Durant. You have the four Warriors. You have six of the best, most entitled guys in the league, and they're all in the same series, and they think they should get every call.

And that's, you know, the Harden thing. I don't know. We're doing it, so let's just do it. No, no, it's just like... Well, because I don't want to do it until we do it. All right, all right. So let me ask you a basketball. Let's talk basketball first. Okay.

So what are your basketball reactions about what this game meant for the rest of the series? This was mano a mano. So there was two mano a mano things going on this weekend, right? This was Kawhi against the Sixers and Kawhi asserting himself as the best player in that series. So regardless of how that series plays out, Kawhi has laid the groundwork. I as the best player in that series. So regardless of how that series plays out, Kawhi has laid the groundwork. I'm the best player in this series. And maybe the best player in the East.

And maybe the best player in the East, but I'm definitely the best player in this series. So that was the first thing. Second thing was, it was Durant versus Harden, and Durant was better. And this was, we talked about this last week. You asked me, who would I want in the playoffs? And I said, I'd want James Harden.

And you were like, I don't know, dude. Haven't seen him do it in the playoffs yet. I think I would take Durant. And then you made me waver. And I'm like, fuck, you're right. Durant won the finals of VP, beat LeBron twice. You saw it today. I mean, we saw it in game six.

Game six against the Clippers was just one of those things. I was in Boston. I was in my hotel. And guys are texting me, being like, when are you getting here? And I'm like, I don't know. I don't think I want to be around anyone I just want to sit in my room and watch this and just not

be distracted by anything the thing was he almost did that in game 5 too I felt like they went away from him he had like 45 I felt like he had 60 in that game he's had over 200 points in 5 games there's 4 guys who did it it was Iverson, Jordan

Iverson, Jordan. Iverson, Jordan. LeBron. LeBron. And Kevin Durant. That's it. That was a great call because we saw that on SportsCenter. Great stat. And your outburst for it was great because it was perfect.

You go, wait a minute. That's a real stat. Because if you think of all the stats that get thrown around, like, okay, what does that really mean? How does that change with a three-point shooting now? What do we, you know, some of the older stats, I always kind of go, what does that really mean? How does that change with a three point shooting now? What do we, you know, some of the older stats,

I always kind of go, you know, a lot of this stuff's pace. Like when those guys are screaming about will Chamberlain not having the MVP last week during the playoffs, it was Van Gundy, Breen and Jackson. And they were talking about wills numbers.

And you're like, if you go back and look at those rebounding numbers, they're off the charts, but it's also because guys just dribbled and took a shot immediately. Like it didn't matter. And they weren't always good shots. So you're right about the Durant thing. Like no one thought that, you know,

even though Harden's going to have an MVP year and may win it and, you know, would be justified in winning it, I don't know that there's any basketball world where I actually think he's a better overall player than Durant. And what Houston's doing with the switching of everybody thing, which they do, and this is not a knock, but I always get a little freaked out about game ones and then assuming that it's going to look like that the rest of the way.

Like Capella was a non-factor, and they couldn't really play him because you knew Golden State was like, look, even with the Cousins thing now, which isn't a huge knock for them because Looney's been really good. He's good defensively. The Bogut minutes are okay. They're going to go small, so they start small with this thing with livington in the starting lineup and then when houston switching all that stuff it was just okay we don't know if clay is right

steph didn't really have it going over his overall numbers are pretty good but that durant switch like if you're just going to invite us into these bad switches we're going to take it and the crazy thing is i think houston would take all of Durant shots that he had in the fourth quarter. Those were incredible shots. So all the things that will change that we can point to of the outcome of this, I still feel like if you're Houston, you're going, even Durant, these are ridiculous.

Well, he had 11 at halftime. He finished with 35. Right, but the step back. It was ISO a lot. Yeah. It was mid post catch. It was basically like it was everything. Steve Kerr always talks about movement, fluidity, keep the ball moving, keep things going, keep

cutting. And they just abandoned all of that because it was their best chance to win that game. Because Houston's extending everything. They're taking away the threes. The Warriors took 22 threes, which I think is the worst in a postseason game. Well, they had nine at halftime because I was texting with a friend of mine

and I was like, first of all, I don't know how the announcers don't notice that, but the Rockets were basically taking away the threes and they were okay with the twos because the Warriors were like 59 percent at halftime or something yeah they were five for eight to start yeah five for seven to start the game and then they have one for eight stretch after that so then you tack on another i don't

know they only had one more make uh i actually thought i thought the rockets did everything right in that game capella was awful you called him a non-factor? I thought he was actually worse than that. And he botched a pass underneath in the last three minutes that was like earlier in the year he was just catching that and dunking. I don't know. He's hurt, right? There's something wrong with him. I can't keep up with who's hurt and who isn't

because then you see at the beginning... But I actually think he's genuinely hurt. Because I had heard Clay was like legitimately hurt. I think he was. And then I know everybody cringes as soon as you start doing the steph is a little banged up thing um he's one of your least favorite quarters but it's just i i'll tell you like i don't think he looked 100 right i think there's some movement stuff with him where i'm going oh this is starting to look like 2016 a little bit but then harden like how crazy was that right before the game shows up we see a picture

with him with cleveland indians kid and he's got his left hand wrapped yeah and you're like wait a minute is this a lebron why he just got swept rap or like what kind of rap are we talking about here on the hand so it's just a lot of fortnight last night i don't i don't think it's it's fair to go hey i know these guys are more hurt than these guys or what is it with capella i also think there's just some basketball stuff where bigs at times looked totally like they're non-factories against golden state and there's other times where the big will beat you up and get a bunch of rebounds that's not the case with capella can i can i bring this to a big picture for a second even though golden state won and even though durant was the best player in this game i actually felt like this was kind of a moral victory win for the Rockets.

They didn't play well. They were never out of the game, no matter how bad they was going. It was never, it was always like, oh my God, the Warriors. Yeah. And then it's like, oh, they're up six. Oh man, they're not. Oh, they're only up eight. And it just felt like the Rockets were around the whole time.

Think of the way the first half ended. Now, granted, Golden State was atrocious with turnovers to start the game. Then they always are. That's their thing, though. They're freaking sloppy. They just are. They've always, this entire run,

look up their turnover numbers. They're always one of the worst teams in the league. But this felt like egregious in the first quarter. Yeah. We were like, what are you guys doing? Yeah, they were careless. Yeah. And then, you know so

there was all the math there where it's like well look how poorly shoot houston shooting but they're getting free throws but golden state's turning it over a ton so all these things were kind of balancing each other out but houston was getting good shots i don't mind if you're missing shots when you're getting good shots and i felt like they were getting the shots they wanted the pace of the game was what they wanted and then when you think about this 27 misses in game seven from last year straight and then it was like the first eight yeah and you're sitting home being like they've missed 35 threes in a row against the same opponent over the course of two years in the playoffs that's just that's ripken the other thing i liked eric gordon started out the game he was like oh for six from three to start the game

but i liked the way he was playing i felt like I've watched that guy a lot. I had season tickets his first couple of years of the Clips. He's not always healthy. He's a little streaky. He's almost like a baseball player. But when he has it going and he's locked in, you can kind of see it immediately. Even though he is missing early, I felt like he was in that game on both ends. And there was a him versus Klay thing. I felt like that was that Daryl actually started a week ago. And all the Warriors fans are mad about it. Daryl is basically making them equals. He had some interview that he did.

And he said, well, and Eric's actually more versatile than Klay. Something like that. So the Warriors fans are mad about that. I thought Gordon brought it tonight. I thought Chris Paul looked good like he he looks about as as frisky as you'd want him to be for May right considering he's always breaking down right around now well he shouldn't I mean it shouldn't be a breakdown thing I mean injuries are just gonna happen yeah but I mean think about the way he was used this year. And there's no reason. It's not like he's coming off 82 here or even 70.

So they paste that part. Well, Tucker looks good. Their bench was okay. Tucker had a bad game. But he's just looking at the box score. He's in the mix. He's getting rebounds and traffic. You can't just look at his 0 for shooting.

He's a playoff guy. Yeah. He ended up, I mean, if you just look at 39, what was it? Yeah, 39 minutes over 4-0 points. That looks terrible. But he's actually still an important guy to be out there so look i'm not i'm not knocking him any of that i just capella was the one that stood out to me it's like whoa what's wrong with you then there was a lot of nene and there was this crazy moment well offensively at least there's this crazy moment near the end when I think Durant was at the line. Durant or Curry was at the line.

And they brought Nene in. Or maybe Harden was at the line. They brought Nene in for the rebound, for the free throw, and it ends up. And all of a sudden, now Curry gets switched on him. And Curry makes the three to win the game. And I was like, why is Nene out there? Biggest possession in the game?

Is that my best five? Because they had a chance to sub there and if the naysay and curry that was after the durant turnover that was like you know we'll we'll be forgotten forever because it was horrible i mean i'd like to see the replay of it again from a better angle because you know look again everybody's like oh he got fouled he got fouled he got fouled he got fouled the whole freaking game. But Golden State, when they lost to Cleveland in 2016, they invited themselves into awful switches. They would get out into these switches on defense,

and there are times where they didn't even have to switch. They could have fought through it, or they could have recovered, and Cleveland killed them with it. It was happening a lot in that series, and it's a huge credit to Cleveland. Houston goes so slow that when they switch you that they give you time to get back to

the right matchup that you want defensively. Yeah. I'm not going to sit here and knock Houston's approach and all that stuff because they can win this series. We just know that as slow as they go and as iso as the hardened thing is and trying to you know when curry who is i think one of the smartest players in the league except for he's so stupid when it comes to his own foul management

yeah i can't believe like he gets the fifth and he played good defense but he still was putting himself in a bad spot when he felt like he was being iso that entire position but then he tried to reach in again that could have been his sixth they didn't call it like at one point i was convinced he was going to foul out you position. But then he tried to reach in again. That could have been his sixth. They didn't call it. At one point, I was convinced he was going to foul out. One of the things that everybody loves about Coach K is that he coaches to fouls really well. So if a good player on the other team has too many fouls and he's still in the game,

they'll make a point of just forget our offensive flow. Let's keep attacking that guy. Houston has no offensive flow to necessarily get out of. And they didn't attack curry enough or they went slow enough where it allowed curry to get back to on a guy that wasn't like part of the initial action so well wait hold on on that point this is an old school low field goal attempt game oh yeah 75 for the warriors 74 for the rockets that's like out of, you know, the 2003, 2005 range. The difference is the Rockets take 74 shots to take 47 threes.

So when they're on the road, this was my big picture point is this was exactly the game they wanted to play. Yeah, right. The pace they wanted to play. The amount of three-pointers compared to two-pointers they wanted. They got three really good performances from a volume standpoint from the three guys they wanted. Harden would make all the shots.

But Gordon, Paul, and Harden, they wanted those guys taking most of the shots. Yeah, but Gordon had 27. So Gordon, I would agree, is a really underrated guy. But I'm saying they got 35 threes out of those three guys, which is what they want going into that game. How about Gordon's layup when he drove one on three at the end of the game? And I'm like, how, what? You know, I think McKinney might have been in and then he just went eyes wide open. And I'm like, all right right let's go do this so I think the points that we're making here are the same in that if you're Houston I know

I know you're upset and we're gonna get to all this now I just think they're gonna win the series though I this this game didn't change my oh so you picked Houston I did and I still think they're gonna win the series did you pick him because you bet on him or did you bet on no I bet on them before the playoffs I think they're better and not sure that i'm ready to say they're better i think they can win this series i'm picking golden state in seven because i just think it's it's that kind of series like when i hear people like oh whatever warriors and five where i'm like what like i don't know how you could be that dismissive of you houston is because houston's gonna have houston's gonna have one of those games where the threes are just barraging you to death,

and there's really not much you can do. But look at everything that went right for the Warriors in this game. Draymond and Iguodala were combined 13 for 16. That's not happening again. I'm sorry. Durant, 24 in the second half. I mean, he can keep doing that, but I think that's kind of... I don't know that that many makes that he had like three possessions in a row

that were just stupid. I don't even know if that's repeatable for him. So I'm agreeing. We know he could do it, though. Yeah, okay. But I mean, that's... But seriously, if you're Houston, you're breaking down that film afterwards, defensively, like, okay, there's not...

Like, even though when you get switched on to Paul, Paul does a good job. I'm still making you work for that despite the massive height disadvantage. I think a home team is supposed to win game one. The Rockets played the exact same game they want. The exact game they wanted to play going into it. It didn't totally turn out the way they wanted it to, but they can replicate it. And that was my takeaway from this game.

The Warriors have really no plan B. out the way they wanted it to, but they can replicate it. And that was my takeaway from this game. Right. The Warriors have really no plan B. Like they kind of, Kurt emptied the basket for game one, I felt like. He had, he started Iguitala, was using small lineups, was doing all kinds of stuff. And I don't know. Now he's kind of shown his cards. I look at this Warriors thing from a big, big, big picture standpoint. And, you know, the between the radar stuff,

if you read between the lines of the way Kerr talks about the team and the way the guys talk about it in general, just this five-year run, how debilitating that is. Five straight finals where, you know, MJ was in three straight finals plus game seven, Eastern conference finals, and like took a break from sports. You know, LeBron did eight straight finals goes into the summer. Doesn't even really seem to care what TV's on the next year. Like he was like, I need a break. I'm like, I'm okay. If I don't make the finals a show, but I'm okay. Throwing away this one year, I'll do my best. But if it doesn't make the finals this year but I'm okay throwing away this one year I'll do my best

but if it doesn't happen this year it's actually maybe a good thing I can refuel my batteries you're going down the line it's just hard to do this it's hard to do 8-9 month seasons year after year after year and you see Clay start whatever's wrong with him which we both heard the same thing

something's wrong the ankle thing I think he's just a tough dude but I think he has a bad ankle sprain curry's starting to break down um this is feels like the last stand that was my feeling heading into this series and i think they feel that no matter how this plays out if they win the title again i think this is the last version of this team maybe bob myers goes maybe durant goes you know maybe they reinvent what they are but this is this is really starting to feel like last stand to me and if they got along better than maybe it would be a rallying cry and uh i don't you know look i don't think they got along great last year some great text threads. Can you imagine? Can you imagine if Durant found out he wasn't on one?

There's two, but then there's another one with the other four guys. There's not one with him. And the rumors swirling around. Can you imagine the stuff that they hear? Oh, yeah. If there's stuff that we hear about Durant's whole thing. So I think you do go a little too body language expert on stuff. I know.

That's one of our big differences. Yeah, right. Where I feel like writers, and now that I'm a writer, I get it a little bit more. You're a writer. Right. That you guys love all the dramatic storylines, even if sometimes they're total overreactions,

that if the Rockets beat them, it won't be that the Rockets have this great approach and this great system because they're still not as talented as Golden State it has to be that there's all these underlying things that people love pointing out after the fact but I know last year it wasn't this this really connected group and they still despite being down three games to two to Houston feeling like you guys don't even look like the Warriors anymore. Like that's real toughness to come back and win that series the way they did. And, you know, Cleveland wasn't going to be much of an opponent. I just think it's worse from a chemistry point.

I just think it's been worse this year. Because of the exhaustion thing too? Because I'll buy that. I think just the constant where's everybody going stuff. And, you know, people work together for a couple of years. They get tired of each other. It doesn't have to be the biggest thing in the world. Anyone in any office gets tired of each other after a while, you know, you get a little

bitchy, but in this case, you know, I think you can pull together. I think what the difference this time around is the hierarchy flipped really over the last two weeks where this is like Durant and Curry, this is their team together. And it's really feels like it's Durant's team now. And anytime they need anything, they, they go through him. They look for him. They're running more stuff than they've ever run before these last two weeks.

Even in that game five loss to the Clips, he just, it felt a little 2000, little 2016 OKC-ish. How he was being used and what the usage rate was. Yeah, it was bail us out. Oh, yeah. I mean, I don't even know. I don't know that they're running a ton of stuff. I think a lot of it is save us on this possession.

Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Yeah, and I feel like when curry first came onto the scene and took it to that next level in 15 i remember going this is so amazing and different that like there part of me that was like is this gonna be this fluky year that somebody shoots this many threes and hits this many and then we realized that just shooters were expanding their abilities yeah you know and the thing that i always think that's kind of funny about the evolution of basketball is i think about being younger kids and and i remember when mike mcgill i think pulled a 540 okay um no 540 520 it'd be a 520 right so it's like a turn and a half on a skateboard so instead of a 360 or 720 um no no it was a 5 540 yeah and uh it was like my god like one and a half turns and then guys just keep pushing it they just keep pushing the limits of all of this stuff like think of all the the x game stuff where you look at guys pulling

tricks and you're like i can't believe that guy like tried to double backflip professional wrestling's like this too guys are doing like 720 flips off the top rope great point i'd say receivers are catching balls that no one's ever caught before but it's really more the gloves than it is anything else yeah but then when old-timers try to tell you that like the world is humans are evolving bigger faster stronger but old-time basketball players seem to think the only people that aren't evolving are basketball players and to see Curry kind of be at the forefront of this expanded shot range. And unfortunately, I think a lot of guys in the league take shots when they're not even ready and they're so far out. And that's a whole other thing.

But it was real. It became real. So when Curry isn't doing that in playoff games and he's running through stuff and getting everybody distracted and the defense still moves in this way where they're focused on him because you just have to. When he has a game like he had in game one where he's not taking any of those shots, really. Yeah. The fuck you three, where it's like,

I'm just going to dribble up half court and transition and pull up from 30 feet and hit it and turn around before I even look. When he doesn't hit any of those, it feels like you're seeing some diluted version of him. Except when you look at the box scores and everything that he had with the clippers like he had a great game six he was incredible in game one he had like four good games in that series but people look at durant and what he did in game six no one's ever going to talk about curry and i know

it makes it sound like i'm defending curry here he's had a couple bad games by his standards the key point to this it's like the tyree Hill point, right? Throwing away all the shit that's happening with Tyreek Hill now, but when he's on the field, he could have three catches for 50 yards but have a massive impact on the game because anytime he's in motion, anytime they send him deep,

the defense is so worried about him that it opens things up for everybody else. That's what Curry's been doing for five years now. And that's what, it's a great comp. He opens up space and fear else that's what curry's been doing for five years now and that's what it's a great opens up space and and uh and fear it's a great comp because you you'll watch the chiefs and go why don't you just throw it to hill again right and when i watch curry i think all of us do when you're watching curry you're like well why don't you just pull it from there like you can take that shot now houston that's clearly the game plan keep everybody up front

here shut a lot of that stuff down and if they're going to leave to rant one-on-one with defenders all the time like i can never understand like i i get everybody has their system and these are our principles and we can't deviate from any of this stuff but to never want to change a look up on somebody like hey look on first dribble send a double just just you know hey guys next time like dan tony can communicate that and i know it feels like oh somebody's going to hit this wide-open shot. I don't care. I don't understand why people don't, like, try to just run a zone at Houston every now and then.

What's the worst that's going to happen? They're going to hit a three? Well, they're going to do that to you, like, 30 times a game anyway. I want to point out that— Maybe not 30, but— The Warriors are basically a seven-man team now if Bog bogut's not gonna play so if we're just talking about game one over reactions to the series that's i think gonna decide the title unless kawaii just goes on a legendary run or the celtics collectively get super hot or whatever happens i can't believe we didn't open

with the celtics they their five starters played 40 43 37 34 41 mckinney played nine looney played 16 boga played five livingston played 14 they don't trust mckinney played nine. Looney played 16. Boga played five. Livingston played 14. They don't trust McKinney. You can't play Bogan in this series. Jordan Bell, you can't play. Jerebko might have a moment in this series. I wouldn't rule it out.

But really, it's a seven-man rotation. And then from the Rockets' standpoint, they have their starting five. It seems like they can trust House, Nene, and shumpert i wouldn't personally trust gerald green he's minus 16 and seven minutes in this game i love that he had a general green moment today though when he hit that three on the only shot he took in the game like gerald was he because i just i can recognize these things from being a bad pickup hoops player yeah but green hits that three and then looks around super annoyed like and he goes now come on

like as if the rest of the team was gonna go yeah you know what he's fucking right he's right we should make those let's let's hey let's pick it up a notch yeah you see he's right he made some good points so yeah i think this is gonna this is going to be a seven-man rotation versus an eight-man rotation the rest of the way. If Shumpert's in the eight-man, though, do you like what you see from Shum today? No, I just think they're going to have to play him. I don't think they have any choice because you can't play.

Chris Paul played 36 minutes today, which is a lot for him. When they dialed him up last year in this Warriors series, he got hurt. I don't think it was a coincidence. But my bigger, bigger, bigger picture point. But for Paul, just to jump in there, for Paul's 36 minutes, how much is he actually moving on offense? I don't know. This is not a Paul 36-minute Clipper thing.

He's playing on defense, though. Yeah, he is. But, I mean, you almost get to take a break in Houston's offense. I don't know. Playoff minutes. I don't think the 7-versus-8 rotation thing is going to be the deciding factor. I don't think it's as. Playoff minutes. I don't think the 7 vs. 8 rotation thing is going to be the deciding factor. I don't think it's as big of a factor. I don't think it's a deciding factor. I wanted

to bring it up because the bigger picture point. I think this series is going to take a lot out of both of these teams. There you go. And you got Portland next round. I was not impressed with Denver in that last series. And let's say Portland beats Denver in five and gets some momentum. Whoever comes out of this series is going to be limping to round three.

I don't think Portland's better than either of these teams, but I would want to play one of these two teams after this series, you know, and they like, think about last year, same thing, right? Just a slugfest. Seven games, brutal. They get to the next game. Cleveland should have won that game. And LeBron was, I mean, LeBron played the best game I've ever seen him play. But it was a nice time to kind of catch them after the seven games. Now they have to play two series after this.

I just think this is going to be a brutal series. And I think there's going to be heavy heavy minutes heavy shot load people just bitching it's going to be it's a real aggro angry series everybody's gonna be upset the whole time we haven't even had a real bad blood yet but man to come out of this and have to play two more rounds is fucking brutal yeah that's an absolutely great point and i know that you know throughout the course of the season doing these and checking in because, you know, really didn't start picking them up until after the Super Bowl. And we're looking at OKC and it was before they really fell apart at the end of the year. And the thing I kept thinking was, you know, I feel like emotionally they have the guys on that team and the Durant factor that if they're playing each other, you know, say in the Eastern or Western Conference Finals, you know, who, because the seating all got switched around, but that they would have kind of that edge to them

that they'd be able to go out there and compete. But we still hadn't discovered really what Houston was going to end up finishing the season at. And Houston, in a way, has gone under the radar about how great they are. I don't know, I've brought this up before, they're number one defensively, they're number two in defense,

number one in net rating since the All-Star break. And I don't love Utah because I don't like one-score teams. I just, in the playoffs, if you have one guy that can kind of get a bucket on his own when everything falls apart, I'm not going to like you. But they were, I think they were clearly superior to them. So they're coming into all this stuff. And we ended up being wrong about the OKC thing because they couldn't even get out of their own way and they start falling apart and they clearly have confidence issues and we've already talked about the thunder a bunch but houston emotionally should be so motivated because of what happened last year and because they've played each other enough in the

playoffs now despite houston having more different pieces than the golden state does i don't think any of those guys like there's no more of the, we can't beat these guys. They're going home, not, hey, we hung it. They're pissed. They're pissed. And of course, they're even more pissed, which I think now is probably a good time to transition into really what was the talking point of the entire game.

Well, just to hold that point, the last point just with the Warriors in general is nobody's afraid of these guys anymore, especially in Oakland. And that's been something that's happened all season i do think it matters i do think like just the way teams whether it was like the kung the king's sons type of teams or fellow contenders have just gone in there and like yeah fuck you guys we'll play with you and i think they brought that on themselves a little bit too, though. And I don't know that anybody could stay that charged up

five straight years like this. I'm not even saying it's them. I think, honestly, I think it's more a case of so many teams play like them now that it doesn't really feel that crazy to play the Warriors. Yeah, the lineup of death, we don't even call it that anymore. Three years ago, it was like, oh, my God, all these guys are on the same team. Look at these shooters. And now it's like, teams are like, fine,

we've played you guys already. We get it. So the thing that they haven't had before is Durant at the level he's at now. I mean, the guy won two finals MVPs. I felt this way when I saw game three in person in the Clippers series, because he had 40 plus that night,

but that one felt like he could have had like 70 if he was really like, I'm taking 40 shots in this game. The array of shots that he makes during the course of a game, I feel like he's at the peak of his powers as a scorer. And something's a little bit different about him. He seems a little more engaged the last month or so. I definitely felt like he was coming and going during the season there's definitely this this separation thing with he and curry that is turning into knocking curry and curry's still like the fifth best guy in the league but

the rant's just better it's just what what he did in that clippers game that you went to and then you know to go back to game six and see some of these shots and i know look i know he's made a ton of these in his entire career but you know last year in the nba finals it was looking like curry was finally going to get his finals mvp yeah and then couldn't hit a shot well this let's take a break because this leads to a point i want to bring up let's take a break talk about heinz mayonnaise transforms ordinary foods into an unforgettably creamy experience. You might forget your coworkers names or what happened three seasons ago on that show that

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Holy mackerel. Check it out, Heinz Band. All right. We're talking about the officiating in one second. I wanted to bring up quickly, I think this is an important point. It's based off what we talked about last week and we didn't get into it. I felt like as good as we could have. There's a championship belt for the best guy, right? LeBron had that belt basically from,

I think, 09 to last year in the finals. He's the best guy in the league. When the moment came, that was the guy you wanted. And I think he held that title for as long as anybody. If you go before him, so I made a little list, Kobe 08, 09, Duncan 03 to 07, 08 range. I feel like he was the guy and maybe he didn't win the MVP more than those two times in a row, but it was like in a series, that's the guy I wanted for five years. Yeah. Duncan, honestly honestly i think you could even i mean duncan's different and it's harder i think for people to understand well it depends on your age on this one but like you want to throw it into the post on a big key possession you're like yeah

with duncan you did you actually teammate he got better in the playoffs best two you might be sure changing them seriously i mean that's i mean duncan like, I think I picked the Spurs to win for 10 straight years. I'm serious. At one point. Before him, it was Shaq from that 99 to 2000 season through the third title. Before that, there was a year where there was nobody the year after Jordan retired, that lockout year.

Nobody had that crown. Nobody even kind of knew who the best guy was who austin crozier well he was just depending on the night uh but then it was obviously jordan and hakeem hakeem the two years jordan was out but jordan that whole decade and you go backwards barkley that one year magic 87 to 90 bird 83 to 87. Moses, 81 to 83. Kareem, 78 to 81. I could keep going. Kareem, 78 to 71. Well, Kareem had- No, I'm not arguing it. Kareem was 70 to 75 and 78 to 81.

He had two different prologue stretches. I'll put this on my Instagram so people can see the list. Bob Pettit, 57 to 58, 59. 56 to 58. Yeah, Bob Pettit. He's on there. Bullet Bob. Russell, 58 to 66. Wilt, 66, 68. Jerry West, 56 to 58. Yeah. Bob Pettit. He's on there. Bullet Bob. Russell 58 to 66.

Wilt 66, 68. Jerry West, 68, 69. Vacant 69, 70 season. And then Kareem.

My point is, I think Durant might actually be grabbing the belt. I think we might be watching it right now, which is funny because when you look at the regular season, like, I think this has been a big, you would know this better than I would, so you can confirm or say something.

But I really feel like, you know, he goes to win because he kind of wants to find basketball happiness. And then, you know, it's kind of, it's a thing with me, right? Like I know in my life I could be happier at times. Yeah. And then you move and you're like, man, everything's going to be different. It's like, yeah, if you're the same though, nothing's going to be different. It's like, yeah, if you're the same though, nothing's going to be different.

You know what I'm saying? So Durant moved and then he hasn't admitted the part where it's like, you need to do a job of being happier, man. Yeah. The cloud's going to follow you city to city. Yeah, right. It doesn't matter where you're going until you make the changes.

And he is clearly doing that. And I think in the quest of trying to have the undisputed belt here, he's like, wait a minute. So now I'm up here and I win and I get the NBA finals, but I still don't get to get the belt. It wasn't just that. He didn't have the – we've talked about this, but it was still Curry's team.

Yeah. And he was Curry's team, Curry's city, and he could never change that. But now I think – I don't even think he's thinking that way anymore. I think he's thinking like, LeBron's out on the best player in the league. I'm going to prove it right now. And that was the feeling I've got the last two weeks. Okay, except though,

he has spent the entire regular season hearing he's not the best player. Because I think he's smart enough to know after going through the grind these last few years, like, I'm going to, I just want to be ready in April. I really think he picked the spots. He was up and down,

had some shit happen, but I just think he's like this spring I'm flipping the switch. And he actually flipped the switch. And that's why I went different guy. The moment the playoff started. And that's why though, when we do this stuff all season long, and I always feel like nobody agrees with me, but when do this thing it's like harden's the best player in

the world huh i'm like well his numbers are incredible hey janice like he's probably the best player in the nba now and you go okay but like this thing is there there's it's regular season player though no i know but regular season but when we start saying stuff like this guy's the best in the world like to me there's levels there's levels where you're slowly like stacking all this stuff yeah that's beyond how sick your stats were for any given season so you know to look at yannis all year was in was not same thing with harden but there was always a part of me that's like, do I really want to say either of these guys are actually better basketball players than Kevin Durant is?

And back to the point that we got with last week, it's like, I don't really blame you for picking Harden. I disagreed. I made my, you know, mild argument about Harden in the playoffs and how bad he's been in certain big games. And yeah, you know, if he keeps doing what he's doing, I don't think Houston's going to beat them. This is what Steve Kerr said today.

Kevin's run this past week has been off the charts. He's the most skilled basketball player on earth. He's one of the most skilled basketball players to ever play the game. There's never been anybody like him. 6'11", handles the ball, shoots threes, passes, defends. Just an unbelievable talent. I think after we lost game to the Clippers, he just felt like he had to turn it up and lift us to another level. That's exactly what he's done. And that's the difference, Tim, when we talked about this last week and this week.

He added this gear to his game that I don't think anybody else has the capability of doing. And I got to be honest, I wasn't sure if he still had it in him anymore because he's 30. It's been like 11 years. Yeah, I know. I don't know. I didn't know if he still had it.

I didn't think he didn't, but it's nice to see. I'm happy. If he keeps doing this, like no one is really even allowed to say anybody's a better player in the world than him. Well, and his argument is from the moment he beat LeBron head-to-head in 17, he's been the best player in the league. Right, but the counter to that is- That's what he thinks.

Yeah, okay, but then the counter would be- He's like, what else I do? I beat LeBron in the finals two years in a row. I'm the best player. With a much better team. True. So that's, I'm not knocking him for it. I'm just saying-

I'm saying if you were Kevin Durant, that's what you would tell your friends. They'd be like, who's the best player in the league? You'd be like, I beat LeBron two years in a row. I'm the saying. I'm saying if you were Kevin Durant, that's what you would tell your friends. They'd be like, who's the best player in the league? You'd be like, I beat LeBron two years in a row. I'm the best player. What's the point? Why do we have these series? I'm not saying I agree or disagree. I also think you have to convince yourself

you're the best player. True. That's part of being the best player. I think I would even be like, man, Tristan Thompson. Like, yeah yeah i should have won this one it's i gotta say as as somebody who just loves basketball i'm bummed out james hardin isn't doing better in the playoffs i really wanted him to go to another level that's his mo man he just has some of these games but it started last series

yeah no i know it's like dude, you're supposed to go. You think he was that bad in game one? What do you mean? You think he was that bad in game one of this series? No, I think he was fine. Because he wasn't. No, I'm saying he was fine. Yeah, the game.

My point is this guy was transcendent for a long stretch of the regular season. And I was like, I hope he does that in the playoffs. And he's not really doing it. And it's a bummer. Well, things happen to Harden in the playoffs and he's not really doing it and it's a bummer well things happen harden in the playoffs well and i've pointed so now it was going into game one so regular season and i looked this all up on all the houston years today regular season free throw attempts playoff attempts regular season playoffs this year 11 a game playoffs this year seven and a half last year 10 a game last year 7.8 in the playoffs 2017 11 free throws a game till 10.9 then it barely dipped down it's it's

always the last four years it's always less free throws and it's it's dramatically less can i make an excuse for him i think with the way houston has played the last few years when you see that every time over the course of two weeks between five and seven times a series it's just easier to defend oh it's absolutely easier to defend so I think that's why his free throws

are down I just think teams have a better sense of what to do so let's do this now then yeah let's do it we have so we cool yeah because let's do it because we have way we have so many other things to talk about right but when i watch harden in these games and like there's a there'll be a couple utah games he wasn't getting any calls and i'm not saying that's necessarily even a bad thing but you know i think officials because they're doing these series and they're like okay well like i'm doing this game in this playoff series. Like I'm not worried about a red eye to Milwaukee tomorrow. And I, you know, so like we can really, I think the refs kind of pre-scout the stuff and say, let's, let's make sure and has gotten that call so much in the regular

season, I think that's part of it too. So I think there's definitely a defensive awareness and a pattern to it where you're more used to it. You start doing some different stuff. You become more comfortable. I mean, that's the whole point of these seven game series. But the refs, it was clear in the beginning of this one, if they felt like it was 50-50 on the contact with Harden on a three-point attempt, he didn't get the call early. And because everybody complains so much, I think sometimes these guys take themselves out of it, even though, look, Harden still ended up with, what, 35 points? So when Harden didn't get the first one on Klay to the right side,

Harden actually extended his hands down, his arms down onto Klay. But it probably should have been a foul. The second one with Klay was worse. It looked like he was in whatever the landing area is and is anybody who's listening this is screaming that they know what the landing area is no you don't because i don't fucking know anybody like you could tell me and pretend you know the NBA doesn't know either they don't know this one where he took the three but he's he kicked his feet forward so he landed a foot forward that was the second one that was the last one that was the dream on one and i've watched it i'll show it to you again if you want i have no i saw it i he started two feet behind the three-point line at the top and his

left foot lands a foot over inside and that to me has to be a no call it has to be one million percent because if you're telling me that no one can ever land in the landing zone but the offensive player gets to determine where his landing zone is then fucking pack it up because this game's got no shot because if you're going to call that every time in this fake landing zone that everybody thinks they know what it is it's it's totally you won't be you'll never be able to contest a shot so sometimes Harden's selling of it and for people to go and Harden was bitching about it after the fact and Draymond went back at him and all of these guys bitch incessantly it's actually brutal but Harden Harden hurts himself

sometimes the officials because if your rep is like hey Harden you know make sure we know make sure like he's not going to get some calls, but at the same time, I'm not going to feel bad for him when he takes 15 free throws and he actually pushed off on Draymond with the right arm on that non-call. He had another play with McKinney

where he grabbed his forearm and tucked him in and gets the call. Harden's in the black, okay? When it comes to the lifetime free throw deal, Harden's in the black here, okay? He's doing all right, but he's not thinking of it that way. Harden's in the black here okay he's he's doing all right but he's not thinking of it that way yeah exactly he's batting 50 55 percent Harden's never going

to think that way no really most athletes even bad ones are they're never going to think that oh you know what I've gotten a few calls my way it's just not the way that it works so the evolution of the way the game has been called in the way that it's just basically about players tricking refs all the time and the refs let a little bit more, like a little bit more land is given up in this battle between player and ref every single season. It started with flops 10 years ago,

and then the rip through, and these bullshit threes where a guy jumps into the defender and they try to correct all this stuff. This game is so much about tricking the official that when the official doesn't fall for your shit, you're irate, not because you're a liar, because you've been conditioned

to get that call all the time. So you actually think your argument's a justified argument, and that, to the bigger point, is why I think we have so many issues with players and refs now. I blame Reggie Miller. I think he started it.

But there was a gap. He planted the seed. I blame Reggie Miller. I think he started it. But there was a gap. He planted the seed. I hate it. I hate what's happened in the sports. Like they just, the NFL announcing that now we can challenge pass interference.

I can't wait for how bad that is. Instant replay and just debating whether the officials made a good call or not. It passed the, this is crazy point like six years ago and it's just worse every year. And it's a hundred percent worse with the NBA because this has become Van Gundy's passion point is to just litigate every call.

So you, when we're watching these games that are the biggest games, here's eight replays and here's Van Gundy. I would much rather hear Van Gundy talk about the game. I don't care about his opinion on whether it was a good call or a bad call. I really don't. I don't care about anybody's opinion, but it's just become ingrained now in the games that we're watching. And I think this series over any series we've had, this is just going to be what we do for two weeks. And it's a bummer because I think we should be talking about Durant versus Harden, the Warriors' last run.

There's all these great sub points. Whether Dan Toney has it in him to pull out a series like this, he has in his whole career. And it's these little moments like the nay on curry on the biggest play of the game you know it's just these little tiny moments but they always seem to go against him i can't believe i just think there's better things to talk about and that's why i'm glad we started with the basketball part of it but this is the overriding thing this will be the lead of the talk shows this is like you leave this game and you see how it's just talked about in the

social media sphere. I don't know. That term didn't really come out as hot as I wanted it to. I still enjoyed it. I can't tell. Like, am I the idiot? You know, am I the one? But I just I know that's not true because I look at the Chris Paul three against Livingston that he hit that actually went in.

Paul tried to do almost a somersault into Livingston at his side yeah and there's people going now if you want to talk about the contact at the top i would concede that because there was but nobody's bringing that up everybody's like no no livingston got into his landing area and you go what like when did everybody come in landing area expert so i just what's we we did did this enough. Cause I think the players, the player, the NBA though has, it has a, it's, you know,

the least objective person in the world is an NBA player when the ball goes out of bounds, but it's become, I just, you know, we did enough. Let's move on. We have so many more things to talk about.

I did. I can't find the email, but a reader sent me a really good idea for this, where if a player goes nuts after claiming he didn't commit a foul or he got fouled or whatever, and the replay shows he was full of shit, we keep a full of shit count. So Draymond's like, oh, show the replay. Oh, he did hack that guy. He's saying he didn't.

Add another one of the full of shit thing. And if you get to nine full of shits, you're suspended the next game. Well, remember they were finding people for flopping? Yeah. That stopped. Then they tried to do a thing. It was over 10 years ago where they said, enough of this. This was 10 years ago about the interactions of players and refs.

They gave everybody a tech in the first month of the season. Yeah. And then they're like, this isn't going to work. So I don draymond you know draymond should get seven texts a game every time he commits a foul he runs 50 feet what he did after his first tech and then you know as much as i love the game of him he was really good today i just i'm like do you really are you that delusional and then like when he guys like he and chris are like, man, everybody's out to get me. Fucking wake up. What, you did this to yourself.

You did this to yourself because every fucking call is the end of the world. And you should get way more technicals than he actually did. Well, I told you about going to those Clipper games, though. I didn't even want to go to the game anymore. Between him and Blake and Doc, it was like. Well, that's trifecta oh it was like it was just the bitch trifecta every single you ever asked doc about it but i'd be like man i did an interview when i was like you complain every call he's like yeah i know he's like it's terrible uh let's uh let's take a quick break because there's so much more to talk about.

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and free two-day shipping. Go to getroman.com slash bill. Once again, free visit to get started. Getroman.com slash bill. Speaking of coaching and refereeing stuff. The president is back. Greg Popovich. Oh, wait a minute.

We're doing the Spurs. Let's just bang it out quick. What happened? the president is Greg Popovich. Oh, wait a minute. We're doing the Spurs. Let's just bang it out quick. What happened? Pop. End of the game up, down four. It's almost even shot clock. It's a few seconds.

It's like 25 seconds left. 20. Jokic stands at midcourt. Time just ticks away. Pop's motioning. He went out onto the court. Went on the court. I'm not sure sure what he was motioning i always thought the foul was you cross your arms is the foul thing or just like you grab your arm like you're jerking your arm off or that's also the one two three kid he was just gesturing like he was telling guys to run up but you couldn't tell what he was doing

um and then he kind of stopped and then just all this time clicks off and then they miss right at the shot clock and DeRozan gets a rebound, no timeout and the game just ends. It was absolutely one of the most appalling things I've ever seen for a team season end. And then after the game, of course, because everybody loves Popper, it was like, well, it wasn't Pop's fault, it was the player's fault. Well, he didn't do it. He was telling them to call timeout. It's like they would have had a better chance of winning that game if Pop had actually picked the chair up and done a Bobby Knight throw of the chair onto the court

and gotten a double technical because at least it would have stopped the clock. Honestly, that would have been a better move than just gesturing kind of wildly, but not really. And it's like all the players can hear him. It's like, why aren't your fucking players looking at you? You're the coach. Why don't you practice this stuff?

You're down four with 28 seconds left. You don't practice game situations. Why don't you call timeout when you get the ball? I thought that was absolutely unconscionable. And here's the funny thing. They lose game six, 2013 finals, up five with 28 seconds left. So he knows you can come back from this. They're down four.

Foul somebody. Guy misses one. You're down five. You make a three. You're down two. Like, what are you doing? I thought that was insane. Yeah, especially from him.

Because even though his act is so tired and he's the unfunny golfer who just wins a tournament he's no he's bill murray at pebble beach it was done about 10 years ago the act yeah he's the best coach he's the best coach it's not even it's not even i don't want to say it's not even close unbelievable wine collection incredible palate but he he thinks it's hilarious and it never is and it it drives me nuts but i separate the two because he's awesome and anyone that i've ever talked to that's been through that system they're like i'm gonna coach everybody do the development thumbs up for pop the us against them mentality it's all awesome one of the four best nba coaches ever but he fucked up the end of that game.

He did. And it wasn't, you can't blame his players only. You can't. Okay. But somebody like LaMarcus has been around. DeRozan has been around. You guys,

although DeRozan doesn't get that far in the playoffs, but he's, it's the first round though. He should have been comfortable. I, what, how can none of you guys know? How can none of you guys know game,

clock and situation? It reminded me of the plucky, well well the 12 seed always beats the five but like the double digit seed in the ncaa tournament that's hanging with the big boy the whole time and their coach is like been there 30 years he's from backwoods wherever the fuck and this is like going to be a shining moment and he starts running four corners with eight minutes left up four and they're just pissing the game away possession by possession and then late at the end because to me NCAA tournament I'm fouling kids and I'm fouling them early because kids are going to screw it up it's just what it is and it just felt like this I don't want to use Belmont as the example so I'm not gonna use Belmont but it felt like that it felt like wait a minute have you guys not and it's the

most been here before coach but it's not all on pop like even though i would actually i don't want to beat up on pop the coach because i think he's awesome i some one of those players has to at some point go wait a minute what the fuck are we doing somebody needs to teach pop the sign language for foul because i thought standing on the court yelling foul at one point he was just waving his arms throw a chair on the court seriously you're watching your season tick away it did feel a little bit like hey we're gonna lose this one jesus this is hey by the way do we feel better about our okay you had one last thing on that? Well, six years ago, he took Duncan out twice. Miami hit two threes and saved their season in game six of the 2013 finals.

And everybody raced to defend him there, too. It's possible to be a great coach who can also royally fuck up in a big game. Well, if you've done it for 20 years. Yeah. Hey, Belichick went for it on his own 30 against the Colts. Belichick had a couple bad ones. You probably liked that, though. Let Derek Fisher get that crazy shot off in 04.

He's had some bad ones. I hated that shot. The 06 foul by Manu, not Pop's fault, but here's the point. I thought it was terrible, and I think that, to me, that is like, if your guys aren't looking over at you to know what to do down forward 28 seconds left, and they're ignoring you, even if you're waving your arms. To me, it looked like he was waving them to go up and, like, press them or something. Now I think you're making too big of a deal out of it.

Fail. You're down four. How am I making a big deal out of it? I think it was a whole season. It was a fuck up. It was a really bad one. It's embarrassing. Weird shit happens in sports sometimes.

And a player, one of the five guys that have been out there in this series. It's a seven game series. Like one of you guys can't figure out to go up there and foul this guy out. Can we go a little deeper with the Spurs? This is the only team in the league

that still takes a shitload of long twos and doesn't try to offensive rebound. I mean, they play like we used to play in 1983. This sounds like it's deeper. I think Pop didn't do a great job this year. Windows closed, huh? They have LaMarcus Aldridge and DeMar DeRozan on their team. I'm not arguing about it.

I'm not telling you the Spurs have some magical run. Two of the top 35 guys in the league? They should be an above 500 team. Yeah, I thought they looked disastrous at one point this season, and then they came back and they finished incredibly strong. They're in a game seven against a Denver team that only had two guys show up and was dying to give that game away. Dying to.

Dying. That game sucked. They were like, what else can we do? Should we just throw you the ball? Should we put the ball in our own basket? Literally dying to give the ball away. And they had DeRozan and Aldridge who have been in a combined probably, what, 80 playoff games?

90 playoff games? And they couldn't even get to 90 points? I don't understand why the Spurs are pretending that the whole revolution is not happening. They're just like, fuck it. Okay, but what would the revolution do with two guys that have lived on long twos? Aldridge and DeRozan.

I would just have gone to Aldridge in that game against Jokic. To me, he's got to have 25 shots. Do you imagine DeRozan and LaMarcus sitting around on a Thursday night watching a Houston TNT game and they're just on the couch being like what the that's so far whoa

that was like 27 feet what's that line Aldridge should have been their biggest advantage in that game though yeah he's been in a bunch of playoff games he's a really good low post or kind of what what do we call a mid post score yeah he's

like when he gets it going it's you there's nothing you can do with it because the problem is so we're not sending derrick white to the hall of fame by the way no derrick white had a had a 36 point game he's the next tony parker he was off he wasn't on he wouldn't even put him out in the game to close that game by the way in game seven he was like we're done i think he was over seven maybe he he was over seven he was over seven okay so you know derrick white had 28 in the first half of the other game and you're like oh here we go here we go and here first of all derrick white is miles through what people thought he would be um as a

player like he's he's been really good they do a great job with their guards all the time considering he should have been like a 12th man he's been a vast improvement but he's still derrick ray yeah i mean that's just kind of the way it's supposed to be i mean jamal murray game you know the whole thing is like okay well what's jamal murray going to give you and he had these stretches where he was horrible but he closed game two well he was awesome can i ask you a jamal murray question he was great by the way in game seven with those floaters so just you know it's worth bringing up for a guy that young on certain games. Because if they don't get anything on Jamal Murray, Portland's going to smoke them. I think Portland's going to smoke them anyway.

But if they get really good Jamal Murray, they can play with them. I tweeted before the game, I thought he was going to have 37 points or six. That's about right. But he had like 23. He was actually like dead center. Can I ask you a question about the Nuggets? I don't know if I can answer it. Why is their go-to play a high screen with Jokic and Murray that ends up with Murray

getting this shot from like 19 feet to the right of the foul line where he's falling away from the basket and it doesn't even seem like he thinks he can make it? He has a lot of drives where he's like, this isn't going to work. But why is that their play? Why isn't that play in. But why is that their play? Why isn't that play in a different part of the court? If I showed you the pages of notes with questions that I had about these two teams watching this series. It was a bad series.

I didn't like it. Where I would go like, hey, is this the problem? So you're watching game one. And then I started with this Jokic theory where I'm going, I wonder if in the playoffs this becomes easier to defend because you have so many guys waiting for your seven-foot center to throw in an entry pass to all these other guys and it's usually only murray milsap i thought was actually despite what the stats will tell you it was like one of those guys where if

you watch game seven he was a little glue guy yeah he was a he was a glue guy bad bad stat guy can i give you a little san antonio on this because when this series started i didn't really know what to make of it because i really thought I charged ahead with my pitchfork ready to burn down the last couple years of pop. And you just weren't there with me. I'm not telling you that his system is right. I was just doing it for the fun of it. Because I was trying to zig. I take this podcast serious.

What I was trying to do is I was trying to zig. I thought you'd be with me. The zig was sitting there. I grabbed it. I think there's a point where it's like, you know, in the moment, people want to write the second thing that just happened on somebody's tombstone.

And I don't think it's going to be not calling, or excuse me, not having a foul used there. Yeah, he's one of the four best NBA coaches of all time. That feels low to me. That series was embarrassing. Okay. They're not that good. And I actually don't know if Denver's that good. Oh, no. Right. I. They're not that good. And I actually don't know if Denver's that good.

So our... Oh, no. Right. I know Denver's not that good. They're a two seed that barely beat a team that doesn't shoot threes, doesn't offensive rebound, and had below average point cards. And then game seven at home. Our playoff rule with the teams, like, okay,

let's look at some road records here. And those are the two teams with a bad road record. So I didn't really know what to make of it. I figured Denver would win, and they won. So i feel like the pre-series analysis is on point can i point out something historic that you may want to put in the paperback yeah did you guys already go paperback probably huh yeah well 10 years ago we can do another one that book's been out for a while can i write the forward yeah it sounds like a solid endorsement. The Spurs have had so many weird game ones and playoff series based on how the series

actually ended up going. Oh, this year they win that close game against Denver, but we're like, oh, here we go. Spurs again. They lose in seven. That's not even the weirdest one. 2017 second round game one. They lost by 27 to Houston.

And you're like, it's over. Houston's just going to spread them out. They got no answer for Harden. They won four of the next five. 2016, second round against Oklahoma City. They won by 32 points. Yeah. They lost four of the next five.

Like, ah, the Thunder can't hang with them. And then the Thunder went on. They lost four of the next five. Like, ah, the Thunder can't hang with them. And then the Thunder went on. They could have won the whole thing. 2014, they had a... This isn't a bad game one. They won seven games with Dallas in a 1-8 matchup. Wasn't like Vince Carter

hit a couple shots in that series? Yeah. And then they ended up winning the finals in five games. And they smashed Miami in the rematch. They won seven games. That was during the Dallas series, we thought oh my god,

the 2013 finals broke them. They're going to lose to Dallas. They went seven games with Dallas and then in 2012... Are we really going to read the entire playoff history? No, this is it. Last one. Oh, I'm sorry. Do you not like all this research that I wanted to list to you?

Western Conference Finals versus Oklahoma City. They won game one and two. And you're like, you know what? Oklahoma City, no shooting, no depth. Thunder won the next four games. Well, you left out the iconic one from last decade. The Stefan Marbury's greatest playoff moment. The Suns beat them in San Antonio.

Game one, remember? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And OT, he hit like a game winner, I think. I thought you were talking about... That's a good ESPN classic game. When Barkley went up to Marbury, it was like, you guys are next. Did that happen?

Yeah, it was in the best of five. Oh, with him and KG. Yeah. No, Pop's a top four coach, and I think... Who are the other three? I mean, you've only referenced it 10 times. Here's my favorite Pop. Well, Arback, Phil Jackson.

Lenny Wilkins. I forget who the fourth one is. Maybe there's only three. Pat Riley. Fair. Brad Stevens is five. I think Popovich winning... Stevens is four and a half.

Popovich winning the 2014 title was one of the great coaching achievements of our lifetime because that team was broken and he rebuilt them and was able to somehow get them past their version of game six, 1986 World Series kind of level loss. And they regrouped and won the title the next year, which is fucking hard.

I'm surprised you would use that as a comp and i'm not saying if you went to that comp just because of the boston thing but game six and 86 was 10 times more devastating well that would have the whole fan base part of it yeah game six 2013 was the most devastating playoff loss ever. By any team. In my opinion. Unless you went bird steals the ball. But the stakes were higher because they're about to win the title. They're about to win.

And they don't. It's never happened before. It's the closest anyone's ever come. There's so many amazing things that happen. That would be a good rewatchables. Oh my God. All the little stuff like the Ginobili missed three, or the Ginobili missed free throws. I wrote a

column about it a year later. I laid out everything. In traffic. The first three LeBron misses, four Spurs touch it before Miami got it. Four guys are going for the rebound and they all somehow don't get it. Wade tips it. It's amazing. That's why if I wrote a book

about the basketball history, I'd be like, could have gone either way. Chapter like well could have gone either way chapter one could have gone another way by Ryan Rosillo I think what bothers me is and the only reason I ratcheted up for this which is partly for sport

we're not allowed to criticize pop for some reason I feel like everybody should always be allowed to be criticized no matter how much they've done i just don't know how deep you want to go on this is my i don't i want to move on it's like i go you're right it was wrong it was collectively a fuck up in an unbelievable moment but i don't know that any of us are gonna remember that in a year you will well we'll remember it if he retires and bill self becomes the next spurs coach. And that happens the next like six weeks.

There you go. There's the one that needs to be taken out of. Well, that's not even, you can't even take that out of context. Is that your call right now? That's not my call. I don't know. I'm just saying a scenario. That was pretty specific.

It's a scenario. It's possible. It's just. Imagine if they had a deal for Self. You could be the Spurs coach coach more of a front office guy but like say greg popovich retired i don't know a couple weeks from now and bill self became the new coach something crazy like that what if they had a deal what if they had that would be weird a wink wink deal and then pop calls self is like hey i hate to do this is off i need one where there's no fucking way that's my last game ever i hope it's not i would come back if i were if i told everybody i was retiring

and that was the last play of my career i'm coming back for another year i think bill self is a name to watch in nba coaching circles right now because the house is on fire and when the house is on fire people jump out windows and run all right get my drift i'm paying i'm paying attention yeah okay now now i'm gonna be on some kansas bug oh yeah we had new zealand the entire place freaked out after your stephen adams thing like hey his contract all you said was stephen adams contracts a lot i don't know could you flip him for something it led the news down there i was getting google alerts all week and i'm like why new zealand yeah i love it down there i want to go we love you new zealand all i was saying was they have no moves they're the team is the team for the next couple years this podcast has got some juice well this you know bill self who knows it led TV news in New Zealand

I wish I could do a good accent sports scribe Bill Sim this won't go back east we're doing some sort of British thing it really did lead the news though no this isn't a joke they love Steven Adams in New Zealand email from

Eric Meyer. He says, Dame Lillard is the Andy Roddick to Steph Curry's Roger Federer. If they switch places five years ago, would the Warriors run have been any different? Would the Blazers have excelled anymore if they had Dame?

I don't agree with that. But I do think it's interesting when somebody's in the league and there's a better version of that person and we end up thinking a little bit lesser of the second person we probably should kind of like the frazier muhammad ali thing well it's like the drexler michael jordan thing drexler was really good yeah and then they went head to head and jordan destroyed him and then they're in dream team and he was like jordan's lackey on the dream team and jordan was just killing him in practice and drexler's career was never the same but clad

drexler was still really good drexler actually benefited that's 50 players ever he benefited from us not knowing what the hell was going on because you would hear about this dude yeah and you're like my god there's this jordan guy that plays for like he's a jordan but he's in western conference they played like like you just didn't see it and so i remember being a little kid going oh man is and then you know you get older you're watching could he not dribble with his other hand was he on thumbs he was gonna be well he was awesome he was awesome but i mean well he's there's a big gap between jordan and then how many names you have to get to to get to drexler he uh was a fantasy basketball guy, Clyde Drexler. If you played fantasy basketball, you knew who he was. Back to the Dan Lillard thing.

So he's on the playoffs so far, I think. Although Durant is now trying to grab the title to the playoffs. The lease. Yeah, the Lillard thing when he hit that shot for about 24 hours. Lillard first round, owned the first round. Yeah, but what was going on for those 24 hours was

you know, but you always bring this up. Like when you bring up the Lillard hours. Own the first round. What was going on for those 24 hours was... You always bring this up. When you bring up the Lillard All-NBA voting the last few years, this is not... If you're doing the, man, people don't talk enough about Lillard, that means that you may not be paying attention. He's going to make second team All-NBA

this year. He was the third guard mentioned in every conversation behind Curry and Hart. He's going to be second team. Last year, he was first team. He made a second team and two thirds previously. I looked it up. His last four years, he was 26, seven, and five. He is definitely the second best three-point shooting point guard behind Curry. I looked it up. I couldn't really come up with an alternative he's either the fourth or the fifth best guard this decade so it's curry harden i think chris paul's third and then it's dame or russ depending on what you care about yeah and then the paul thing is just

based on chris paul's had a better decade than dame lower did i mean no i know but he's he's obviously they're turning in two completely different directions. Yeah, I'm just talking this decade. Yeah, yep. Decade's over. That's right, it is. It went fast. It's shocking that Lillard was one of the best five guards

because he's only been in the league seven years. They end up getting him because they somehow convinced Billy King that Gerald Wallace is worth a top three protected first round pick. They only liked three guys in that draft. It was all time egregious. That was the line. Yeah.

When they made the trade, they're like, we only like three guys in this draft anyway. And then he doubled down on it later. He's like, look, we studied the draft. There are only three guys we liked. It's February. We haven't even had March Madness yet. I remember the first scout I talked to was a Western Conference scout who went to go see Lillard

and this team thought they had him they're picking around I don't want to necessarily say but it was still in the lottery but a little bit later and he was like you got to see this Dame Lillard man he's like he's actually probably Damien then so you get to see Lillard like have you seen him?

I'm like no you know he's on the radar I you seen him i'm like no i've you know he's on the radar i'll you know check him out he goes this is this is this kid like he's gonna be able to go he's like you know i don't he's like nobody else has really been up there or whatever and then the next time i talked to him like i at that point watched him and paid more attention and then he's like well we're not getting him it's like he goes after the half the league was there i don't get there's no by the time june rolls around there's no freaking secrets with these kinds of guys but because it's weber state you're thinking is there a chance we can get this guy we what where is weber state big sky isn't it big sky conference is it but what's what state is it in weber it's it's in the state of weber where's weber it's uh ogden utah i've been there

ogden utah yeah i've been to ogden um i remember one time i went to a dirks bentley concert in madison square garden and then had to fly directly to utah and from salt lake to get to provo i got on a shuttle bus and if you want to ask if i was hungover after dirks bentley concert and then flying across the country next morning the answer would be yes and uh i was on a bus with a bunch of people getting dropped off at different churches on that shuttle. And that was not the best fit for me that day. You ever been to Provo? You'd like it there.

I'm going to do a quick episode of the reread rules for you. Okay. This is my 2012 NBA draft diary. And it's a diary I'm keeping a diary of watching this with Jacoby and House so at 8.05 I wrote questions asked in my living room after Portland's pick

what conference is Damian Lillard from again? has any top 10 pick ever had more highlights that happened against white people? Is it Weber or Weber? Has anyone ever picked a backup point guard this high? Did they just pick Jared Bayless again or am I crazy? Are these highlights from Division I games? Answers.

Big Sky, no. It's Weber. Yes, Johnny Flynn in 2009. It's unclear. And yes. And then I went on to make fun of the pick for a couple more pairs. That's pretty heroic of you to do that rereadable. Hey, listen, man.

Draft diary, I'm not always going to bet 100%. I've had some big hits. I've had some big misses. Let's take a quick break. We got a lot more to come here. Let's talk about ZipRecruiter. Let's talk about the difference between working hard and working smart. Greg Popovich,

during the last 30 seconds of that game, last 25 seconds, working hard on the sidelines, waving his hand. I don't know if he was working smart. He's working hard, but you want to work smart. That's what really matters.

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ZipRecruiter. The smartest way to hire. Can we just rip through the series as fast as possible? Because I want to get to a couple of emails and I want to get to Game of Thrones. Whatever you need to do. We're going to look at the odds for the playoffs.

When I look at my watch, it's not boredom. I'm just looking. Well, you got to drive. I don't want you to hit somebody on the way home. At this time of night, we're practically neighbors. When I leave here, I'm like, I'm surprised you don't hang out more often. And then I look at, I go, oh, that's why.

By the way, you in for Willie Nelson next week? No. I don't want to go either, but we're going. Series lines. Denver minus 140 over Portland. Portland's plus 115. I would take Portland. Toronto is minus 455 over Philly.

Milwaukee is down to minus 129 against the Celts. Rockets are now plus 325, which is ridiculous. I think Portland should be favored in that series, even though they don't have home court. We saw from the Nuggets in that game seven, two guys plus Millsap, as you

said, is a glue guy, but they're so dependent on Murray being the second guy, and there's just nobody else if he's not. And really the first guy to look at the hoop in crunch time possessions. Jokic got better at taking shots, but it's still not his game.

He doesn't want to take all those shots. So Portland, and this happened sometime in the playoffs because there was that year, going back 30 years almost, 1990. KJ, Jeff Hornacek, Phoenix made the Western Finals. And it was basically those two guys and Tom Chambers. It was like, they're not going to make the Western Finals. Tim Perry on that team? Yeah, it was just a hodgepodge team, but sometimes it happens.

We knew heading into the playoffs, somebody weird was going to make the Western Finals. It was like the Celtics against the Nets in 2002. Yeah, it was just a hodgepodge team, but sometimes it happens. We knew heading into the playoffs, somebody weird was going to make the Western Finals. It was like the Celtics against the Nets in 0-2. Yeah, true. That was, what? They're in the Eastern Conference Finals? I think the difference with Portland making it this time around is the way, if Lillard can keep this going,

he's at least somebody at the end of games. And I think Kyrie is like this too. And I think Kawhi is like this. And it goes back to what we talked about last week about the guys you really the bread your butter butter your bread guys either way butter bread butter butter bread it's 11 o'clock now and i'm tired um but he at least if it's golden state and they're banged up and they've just come out of this series and it's a little toe-to-toe action with durant he, he can actually go toe-to-toe.

And I think that's the difference. When we have these wonky teams that make the conference finals, the difference this time around is this guy's really good. And this guy will not be afraid. He'll think he's the best guy on the court, even if he's not necessarily the best guy on the court. I think Kyrie's like this too.

The longer the Milwaukee-Boston series goes, the worse it is for Milwaukee because we're going to see in a game seven when it gets super tight and it really comes down to two or three guys on each side and Kyrie will be ready for that. I want to know who the third guy on Milwaukee is in that situation. Well, it's not Eric Bledsoe. My God i mean he i made a joke on twitter i was like we'll see what they look like when they get him back for game two uh i saw that that was good that was my kind of humor yeah i know that was that was like hey we'll see bill later today well him and him and lopez were two for ten if your second option like middleton's the second option but

so if we're doing this now we're looking at this series i still after the pacers thing i didn't know i know that i still don't know here's the thing though the celtics like this is the part where the kairi are they better without kairi thing looks really stupid i agree because he's great for the way milwaukee plays defense now the free the celtics don't take free throws anyway yeah And Kyrie, as much as everybody hates the long two, I think I want him taking long twos as much as any player in the league. I'm sure there's numbers that are going to tell me there's a couple guys ahead of him.

He's just a great shot maker in those spots. It's comfortable for him. That's why I always think shooting is really funny in that certain guys will hit decent numbers in corner threes or they'll find some things, but you can see there's no, there's no gauging like great shooters, no kind of distance and angle. And like, I just, all the mechanics, I have to take something off, put a little, something more on it with my legs, extend it out. I can shoot it in different ways. Like Dirk could

always do that. And Kyrie has that. I can be a little off balance. I can be going side to side. I can step back on you. I can go in, I can, I can pick it up right off the dribble. I can be a little off balance. I can be going side to side. I can step back on you. I can go in. I can pick it up right off the dribble. I can do a lot of awkward different things. And that's where Kyrie's offensive ability here is like, that's where you look at him and go, okay, this is somebody. And look, we all know how special he was after the 16 finals. Hold on, there's one other piece to that.

He doesn't care if he's on the road or at home. Not at all. There's only a few guys like that. Not at all. Now, you know, we're doing- Probably enjoys being on the road or at home. And I think there's only a few guys like that. Not at all. Now, you know, we're doing... Probably enjoys being on the road. Yeah, right. Who knows?

He's like, this is cool. Yeah. I like shutting this crowd up. And Horford's been in like over 100 playoff games at this point. And Horford was the MVP. I know the final numbers you could argue. What Horford did in game one... When he plays like that, it's very hard to beat them.

Yeah. And, you know, for Horford haters, it's understandable. Like when you pay a guy horford did when he plays like that it's very hard to beat them yeah and i you know for horford haters it's understandable like when you pay a guy that much money and he comes in you're like okay this is gonna be awesome we get to throw whenever you get that kind of money especially in a place like boston where the pressure is as much as any nba city you think well wait a minute isn't this guy supposed to get his buckets at the end of close games like well that's not really what he does so everybody kind of knows his deal now but the little things that he's doing at least in game one and what he'll be doing throughout the entire series against Giannis is incredible and this is the start of the Brad Stevens stuff again because you didn't think okay

against Budenholzer he's going to be like out or he'll um he'll be totally out coaching this guy but I was I was so impressed with the discipline defensively of what Boston was asked to do yeah with Giannis and how they kind of change up their their double teams and there's a second like it's not just hey you only double team in this situation like that's an incredibly smart team to be able to do some of this different stuff they do defensively and then any of the Giannis in transition wall building stuff that they do there was a play um in the first half where Giannis was bringing it down along the right side in transition, and Connaughton went to the three-point corner, and Jalen left him there

and came up to be like a third guy in that wall at the free throw line, and Giannis got it to him, and Connaughton clanks it. And then the other offensive possessions are, hey, I'm stuck, Giannis, I'm stuck. All right, Brooke Lopez, you take a tough, weird three. Like, if that's what you're going to do. Like, I thought Milwaukee had some defensive issues that surprised me for the number one defensive team. But offensively, you knew what Boston was going to try to do against Giannis.

We've already seen this before. Wait a second, that was the stunning part of this. They didn't seem to feel like nobody else. Right. It didn't feel like anybody else was prepared. There was no surprise in the game plan. And it was likewaukee was completely flummoxed by it i thought that was really weird really weird and other than that stretch where miritich hit a crazy three middleton had that and one where he got caught in the air and still hit it and then middleton hit kind of a

slower in transition pull-up three from deep because jalen was like you know damn i gotta contest you out there that was that 15-0 run that made it 40-40. And they missed a bunch of jump shots during that too. Early too, I thought. Boston, I'm like, man, they could have a crazy lead in this game because I loved all their looks. Giannis was four for 16 from two. I mean, this year he shot like, I think, over 65% or something on two-pointers.

It was some crazy stat. I mean, that was a bad... From a gameplay, hey, here's what we're going to run. Here's what you're going to run. Milwaukee has to be more ready with the other scorers to go. Some of you guys are going to have to burn them on this. This goes back to the Denver thing, though. You can play that way during the season and it's great and it makes sense and you're shooting threes and the math makes sense all that stuff but now when you get here and

you're on sunday abc and it's like all right pat connington knock yourself out go ahead we'll give you like four of those if you make them we'll start guarding you but let's see it he was two of ten one of seven from three yeah and uh yeah look back on that compact content had 10 shots in 24 minutes the weird thing for me is ilia sova why i i'm just not a fan i i actually thought we'd see dj wilson this series because i think he's good but uh yeah i mean i thought the celts were going to lose in five. I really did. I thought the Bucs, I thought this was going to be like just a Giannis unleashes Holy Hell series.

But I also thought if they can just keep it going and creep closer to do or die games and a do or die game six, do or die game seven, I really think it favors Boston because you look at this Milwaukee lineup and even Brooke Lopez hasn't been in big games. at game seven. I really think it favors Boston because you look at this Milwaukee lineup and even Brooke Lopez hasn't been in big games. What's the biggest game Brooke Lopez has ever been in?

Like he was terrible. Like round one with the nets and Joe Johnson, but one year against the bulls, like these guys haven't been in big games. Even Giannis hasn't been in that many big games. So I think that favors Boston. I thought what Pierce said was crazy. I know they want him to say crazy stuff on TV.

To say this series is over, Boston is going to win, that's nuts because Boston can go cold any game. Boston's weirdly not as effective at home as they were last year, certainly. I just think this series is going to ebb and flow. Giannis will have a game where he has like 47 and just destroys them, and it's going to happen. I don't know if it'll be game two or when. I'm with you in that Giannis, I mean, he's just too good

that he's not going to have some absurd game, but you can't do this by yourself, especially the deeper you go here. And I was kind of waiting to see what Boston was going to look like here against a much better team because I just didn't think the Pacers were that good. It appears that everybody's a lot happier than the monthly soap opera that was this team.

That's another thing is people are like, now it's all good. What are you going to say now? And it's like, look, we're just talking about stuff as it happens in the moment the celtics team was profoundly unhappy all year which they only that's an indicator that the playoffs are going to be unhappy they've somehow fixed it i think it's great but it doesn't change the fact that they were really really dangerously unhappy there for four to five months in an unprecedented way they all admitted it yeah they talked about it publicly over and over again.

This coach admitted it. The star player apologized to the team multiple times. And told us about it. Yeah. I was a dick. I'm trying to change my behavior. So apparently it's good now. And I'm not saying it because of the game.

Wonderful. Just being back home, I'd heard things are better. Everybody feels better about the whole thing. It's like, okay, now it's playoff time. You know, Kyrie. Let's put it behind us. Yeah, one of the theories that, you know, this is where he's ready to shine. I think from a basketball matchup stuff, the stuff that Boston wants to do in this,

everything went according to plan in game one. Like, so if you just looked at game one, you go, wait a minute, Milwaukee's in real trouble. Well, here's what else. I'm not ready to do that because i've also like it was always hard for me to buy into this boston team is this the best i felt about him all year yeah absolutely but i don't i'm not going to sit here and write off the number one seed with you know the mvp perhaps in yannis even though you know what else went in their favor? Brogdon. Yeah, because that thing's turning into the KG injury of 09. If Brogdon's going to miss this series, I actually do think Boston will probably either take it to seven or win.

Because he has always hurt them. He allows them to go small and do all these different things with their lineup. That can be a problem for Boston potentially. But just two things to note just as we go along with Boston. Look at these numbers for starters, though. I'm sorry. Just Brooke Lopez, 26 minutes, 1 of 5.

Bledsoe, 25 minutes, 1 of 5. Like to think that he only played 25 minutes in this, granted it got kind of blow out of you at the end. And they needed him to play like 45. Right. Sterling Brown, 22 minutes, 1 of 7. And then there's one other bad one here. I forget where it is.

Yeah, Ilyasova. He ended up, well, he's 0 for five and three. Wait, two Boston notes. Brown has been playing really well for four months now. And I love the way he did it, too. He just said, enough of this shit. I'm just going to be aggressive whenever I can. Not out of control aggressive, though.

If you were GM, who would you value as a trade asset more, Brown or Tatum? Tatum still. Okay. The other thing is Hayward once again had a really nice game. What I liked about the game here, I don't think I had shots. I still felt like he had an impact. He's just really comfortable now. And he's playing with a certain pace and speed and he mixes it up. And his slashing kick game's games back he just seems really confident again he really does seem like utah hayward again not ready to go there but well not ready to go like him being 13 mile nba but yeah his style the way he's playing is the way he played in utah right absolutely i mean he's taking 20 shots a game in Utah. I took eight in this game.

Philly, Toronto. I think Kawhi is, is he's just such, such a bad matchup for Philly on both sides. He eliminates the best thing that they have going for their team other than a bead,

which is like the size on the perimeter and their ability to overpower the wings and all that stuff. And then, you know, he can basically, Oh, Oh, that guy's hot.

All right, I'll take them out. Whoever kind of starts to catch fire on Philly, he can just take them over for a couple of possessions. This is going to be the Kawhi series. I really feel that way. I felt far more confident picking Toronto in this one than I did the Milwaukee-Boston one. I just feel like Toronto is so easy to know exactly what they are, when it looks right,

how it goes. You add in the fact that Siakam is this insane scorer and you're like, oh, so they just added another guy that can get 30 in multiple playoff games along with kawaii who you know i don't think it should be this reminder like hey man that kawaii guy's good because when he came out of the scene in those finals it was this this coming out party we were like oh my god like he's he's like in charge of this whole thing he's actually one of the better playoff performers we've had in the last 25 years. Like just statistically. Yeah.

So then you look at Philly being lost against him and his, his finishing has never been as flashy as those other guys. I remember talking to Windhorse about this when I was in studio with him at ESPN once. And do you remember like when LeBron, and I think maybe even duran at one point had gotten caught up in this where they were talking about like kawaii's ascendance of like you know he's kind of like in that group with you guys and they were both and i don't want to be screwing this up i know at least it was definitely one but i feel like duran could cover this too but it was almost this dismissive like wait a minute you think he's at our level yeah and it was other players that are

the clear tier one guys feeling like it was disrespectful to assume that he was at that level and the thing is he just he has been and he has been for a long time minus the year that he was gone but this is really kind of what he should be or what he's shown us in the past like this shouldn't be a surprise to anybody it was just just, I think, easy to kind of forget where he was for a bit because of how everything went. Well, the surprise is because he missed last year. They were so careful with him this year, and he missed so many games because of the load management

and all that stuff that, I don't know, I just never thought we would see him kick ass for two straight months, which we seem like we're in the process of watching. But he still was, when he was playing, despite all the games that he took off this year, which I don't know if it was load management or... Maybe they're just being careful.

No, I think they asked Kawhi, they said, what do you want to do? And we're going to do whatever you want because we're not going to give you any reasons for you to want to leave here other than maybe he'll leave. So they were going to do... If the guy wanted to play 12 games, he could have played 12 games this year but he this i look i watch that game and i watch

all of the score some of the stuff he was doing orlando at the end of that series i'm not saying that's some great series because it's the magic no but he doubted he was doing stuff in that series where you're like oh my like what are you supposed to do with this guy but it's never as impressive as durant not saying it's not as good it just it doesn't have this like wow factor all the time that some of the other guys have and i think it it misplaces him at times even though if he were healthy the entire three like when we were trying to do the top five in the nba you know how hard that is to do right now i know it's loaded the one wow thing with with he'll do some stuff defensively that gets wow stuff for me. But one thing that gets a wow for me,

not in the traditional sense, but I always marvel at it, is the pace that he plays with. Where no matter what's going on in the game, the situation, the crowd, he has this ability to keep it to what he wants to do at the speed he wants to do it offensively, which is something like I never thought

he was going to be that type of guy. Like Durant has the same ability, right? Kyrie has a, he offensively to me can control his surroundings in a way that very few guys can do. And I'm psyched that he's back. I really enjoy watching him and if if if we end up with milwaukee toronto or uh boston toronto whatever i i don't want to

write off philly but mentally i'm starting to write them off i don't i don't see them winning four of six unless somebody gets hurt on toronto having mbid miss a game in the first series, I'm like, oh, okay. And we've been over the Philly thing a bunch of times, so I don't want to do it all again, even though... Let's not do it again. No, I don't. But I mean, there are times too where I go,

you know, it's really funny, like when Embiid is rolling and everything's great. And it's like, you know, look at this team, look at what they could be. But I don't think they understand how much they can piss other people off and you know when imbeed makes the three one warriors joke and you're looking at jimmy butler and bead sitting there and if i remember the warriors i'd be like oh is that what it looks like to never be out of the second round

you two guys right there like you're gonna you're gonna make fun of us for losing one of the four finals we were in and you fucking guys can't get out of the second round i don't know if toronto has any of that i i mean honestly kawaii i wonder like he seems to be so oblivious to the surroundings at times like i could imagine him going to the locker room afterwards being like who's that puerto rican dude that never sits down on court side and i just i think it's like the best approach like as you're talking about being in the flow and knowing everything. It's a great point, but he seems to be so non-affected by anything that it's incredibly impressive. And maybe for all the concern about not having enough of a brand

and the Spurs holding back and all that kind of stuff, the whispers you would hear, they feel like his crew thinks he should have a bigger presence and a bigger brand we're like well they better be right right well you signed with new balance and you made fun of the fact that you don't have a brand yeah but whatever all that stuff is that that maybe limits his appeal it might be the most perfect approach day-to-day in big state games. Well, and also perfect for Toronto, which is one of the sky is falling franchises that we have in the NBA right now.

The fans are just beaten down mentally. And to flip that, you need guys who don't even notice that you're feeling that way. I'm always convinced this is one of the reasons the Red Sox won in 04. They had all these dudes that were just like, what do I care that there was a curse? I grew up in a really poor part of the Dominican Republic.

You think I care about your curse? Like it was just guys who- Bellhorn. And Bellhorn. A couple of quick emails. So Jason Z from Wilkes-Barre has a zig for- Wilkes-Barre has a zig for us. Double A.

Dame lowered 37-footer. Not that impressive. No pressure. The game was tied. If he misses, they go to overtime. They're up 3-1 in the series. Let's see him take and make that shot in a game seven down two. That can't be real.

That's a great zig. That was a real email. If you're the Suns fan. Submit that video to the First Take video feed, and you'll be on the show by the end of the week. Sam wants to know, if you're the Suns right now, do you quietly hope you get the second pick in the lottery so you can take John Moran?

No. The answer is no, you don't. You hope you get Zion. Bill from Chicago said- Do you secretly hope you get- Bill from Chicago said, since Ryan's screen debut... You're texting.

I had to. Ryan's screen debut, talking about your therapy session video. Bill from Chicago has been debating with his friends which players we need therapy for. During these conversations, I keep defending Aaron Aaron Gordon and it's gotten to the point where I've convinced myself Aaron Gordon could be better at Draymond's role for the Warriors than Draymond himself.

Aaron Gordon is a classic example of the 2005 player that we all wanted on the Suns. Remember that stretch for like four years, every draft you'd be like, you know who'd be great on? The Suns.

I believe Aaron Gordon would be a lot better with the Golden State Warriors. But I mean, how many years do you have? That goes for 100 players. Right, right. I think you have to, at this point, admit that whatever Aaron Gordon was supposed to be or whatever you hoped he was going to be, it's going to fall short of that. H. Wilson says. You're really pissed I sent a text right now. No, I'm not.

I don't care. Mood seems to have changed have changed do what you want i had to h wilson says there's a guy in my gym who comes in wearing sunglasses i've never seen him work out we're in gym corner right now he just stares down girls in the squat rack for context my gym is underground in a mall with no windows there's no reason for shades to ever be worn have you ever encountered the creepy dude or have you ever been the creepy dude at the gym that's this week's gym corner question the creepy dude i like this yeah i mean no one would admit to being the creepy dude right i mean i expected to look i'm a man uh i've i've you know i'd be lying if i said I didn't take a peek every now and then under the bill of a hat.

Yeah. But don't start doing deadlifts behind a girl in the squat rack. Be like, hey, do you mind if I sit up here? You know, that's too much. And it sounds like this guy's doing the sunglass move. Sunglasses seem downright offensive. Right.

This is where a manager has to get involved yeah why are your sunglasses on sir will he say they're service sunglasses i was in a pizza place upper crust sunglasses shout out i was driving actually excuse me i wasn't driving i was walking back to the hotel went to a pizza place near my hotel in boston guy brings a dog in and the guys behind the counter freaking out like hey man you know like you can't have your dog in here. And you're going to have to get it to go. And they're like, you're going to put... He's like, what? Ignored him three times. Definitely had an edge to him and finds it's a service dog. And the guy's like, okay, well, all right. I get that it's a service dog. And then the guy sat down and ate a slice there while the

dog was just freaking out looking at everybody's food.'m telling you right now it's a little bit like handicap passes i'm not knocking the entire industry because that would be incredibly insensitive okay okay i'm holding on for dear life right now but there's a lot of you fucking people out there that are just a little tired and know somebody at the dmv all right because i've been keeping track of it and i think the same thing with some of these service dogs where the people that need it there wouldn't be a decent hearted person in the country that would knock that good for you but a lot of you're fucking liars i would have said this for the emotional the emotional service dogs that people bring on airplanes but it's like a 75 year old dumb golden retriever. Who's definitely not providing any service.

No, that's actually stressing you out more. Yeah. Yeah. So look, if you're going to send an email to bill and say, I have a service dog and I, no one's,

no one's mad at you. The other people, we're mad at the people taking advantage of the system. Right. Those people, those people are fucking up. Like my grandmother was in a wheelchair. Every time we go to a restaurant somebody be in the spot and every now and then you know it'd be like a dude who was just a little out of shape

kyle and afton bait weather kind of sparking this no because i'm sure somebody's gonna say oh well you don't realize you know somebody, somebody's going to add you to whatever. I'm not running tests. I'm just telling, like, you know, you know right now. Like, there are listeners right now that know. They're like, yeah, my cousin's at the DMV. Like, I just, I park there for concerts. This is, I'm helping.

All right, quick break, and we'll do Game of Thrones. All right, we're going to do Throne Game, but first let's quickly talk about Binge Mode, which drops every Wednesday night. Mallory Rubin, Jason Concepcion, they break down Game of Thrones the way it should be broken down, in depth, detail,

with passion and a little craziness. Check that out. Subscribe now. Also, talk to Thrones on Twitter every Sunday night right after Game of Thrones ends. Go to at ringer to watch that and go to theringer.com to read all of our Game of Thrones stuff. We're doing everything possible.

God, it's sad, Kyle. Only three episodes left. It's crazy, dude. Can't believe it. So check out all of our Game of Thrones content. Speaking of podcasts, the Rewatchables coming back this week with Mean Girls. So check that out.

And then on the Rewatchables 1999 feed, we are doing Cruel Intentions later this week. You can only find that on Luminary. So check that out. And then check out Channel 33, my daughter's For Realsies podcast, 50 minutes on team culture with Liz Kelly and my daughter. I got to say, you're going to learn some stuff.

So check that out as well. All right, let's talk about Game of Thrones. All right, last thing, throne game. 85 minute episode. Yeah battle of uh winterfell which turned out to be a lot like the movie 311 i kept looking for gerard butler i couldn't find him when you said that when we were watching it together and you said 311 i I'm like, wow, I didn't know you were down with peanut Nick Hexum. You mean 300. I meant 300.

I feel like nephew Kyle. Why did I say 311? You said 311. Got the boom, y'all. No? I didn't know if- Why did I say 311? Because you love grassroots.

I was thinking 112. Like, I didn't know what. Kyle, is it like watching your parents play video games that have never played them before sometimes when we're watching Game of Thrones? There's a few golden moments, yes. When you guys are like, who's that guy? There's a lot of Bill and I going, who's that guy again?

What's his name? Was that, who's the dead guy? So it was like that movie, 300. 300. When you said that in the room it just everyone ignored it i'm like i thought you were talking to your kids so i was like b let's ben listen to 311 that's cool i had i had a mutual friend asked me if i wanted to play in 311's men's basketball league i was like kinda but where is it they're like it's i think it's in the palisades i was like yeah i was like i kind of would like where is it? They're like, I think it's in the Palisades.

I was like, I kind of would like to be able to tell my buddies that we listened to them in college, and now I'm in 311's men's league, but I'm definitely not going to want to drive to the Palisades two nights a week. Awesome. Tim, I'm open. Quickly, some highlights. Melisandre.

Yep. The hottest 450-year- old lady in the 1300s how about uh she made the fire swords how about jendry's age gap on his on his girls has anybody slept with like two women that are separated by 18 and 450 yeah pretty wide berth there i think warren beatty did that nobody can touch that maybe maybe so she made the fire swords happen it was looking good for the battle right then it became clear pretty quickly that they had a terrible battle plan they wiped out the entire dothraki sent them sent them up front um i don't want to be that guy but why did the dothraki have to go first tough times for them why bring out why not bring out the dragons right away

kind of saving the dragons it was basically a long two type strategy I'm just waiting I'm waiting to go Night King made a fire move that nobody saw coming they put the fire mode around, which you liked. Finally. After they lost a lot of people,

after the dragons came in and killed some- A lot of Dothraki and Grey Worm's crew again. Yeah, Grey Worm's, more tough times for Grey Worm. He didn't have enough reasons to hate his life. He lost all his friends. So Melisandre comes in and does the fire mode. And then the Night King outwits them yet again and says well I'll just have some dead dudes

we'll pile them up it'll smother the fire and then we'll go over to the dead dudes and Jon Snow and Daenerys oh shit we didn't think of that should have thought of that one the dragons just coming and going making threes from the corner then we're not seeing the dragon again for ten minutes I don't know where the dragons were that was weird i had major major

issues with strategy uh i would not call myself a military expert i would consider myself a military historian right now i don't really know what kind of timelines we're working with here because there's a lot of magic and dragons but you know reading about the revolutionary war if there's one thing that's taught us is that column fighting is just outdated and when you're running columns into the undead like what the fuck you doing you might as well let yourself on fire so for them to just stand in front of the castle there's another thing they could have learned from george washington is that the armies and it was really just a collection of militias back then they gave up new york city they had some battles long island there was this brooklyn thing and then they went this is this whole thing's fucking pointless let's

just get out of here and go to philadelphia new jersey and hang out for a bit because they were like there's no but we cannot defend new y City with the British Navy. Like, this is absolutely pointless. So they bailed. From the very beginning, it didn't really make any sense. Like, Winterfell's been a dump for eight years. And you needed to find a strategic area to

fight. And I guess you can't really tell the undead to hold off until the morning. Because back in the Revolutionary War times, they would just take winters off. They'd be like, hey hey can we just pick this shit up in the spring like all right great thank you because it's freezing yeah and they start with no landscape advantage my guys would have been digging the biggest hole you've ever seen around that castle so that they if they're going to charge me you're going down and then you're going to come back up and if you tell me that doesn't work well at least it impedes their progress because it certainly did

with the walls at some point so that was a problem no massive hole if you're going to light the moat of of things that the dragon glass kind of brackets those things you're not supposed to run into you seem all over the place they were on normandy as well you you put those further out further perimeter yeah and you light them on fire from the beginning so malisandra is just lighting the dothraki swords on fire they run into something that i guess it's just a wall of dead people it was actually really cool how that was shot that all the fire blades like disappeared and like one dude runs back he's like okay that didn't go well but why would you wait to light the shit on fire and the the misuse of the dragons this this would be like not throwing

it to randy moss if you were dante culpepper you know like you can't let moss not get looks if you had randy moss and cal and Calvin Johnson in his prime. Absolutely. And you're just like, we're going to run the ball again. So it felt like, I guess the story is that the two dragons, because it felt like a little bit of a never-ending story deal here with these two dragons. And they're like, hey, you know, there's a massive battle for mankind going on back there.

And you two are like winking at each other. But I guess they were looking for the Night King still. And, you know, there's a bunch of different things how about denarius is just awareness rating as on a madden scale 30s like you you you land your dragon you let 50 dead guys start stabbing the shit out of it like yeah make your move and then get out of there. Get up. You got to stay off the ground. Off the ground. And then when they retreated and they had the fire pit going, right? They just stared at all of them. And then they waited until dead bodies just started crossing like one little area.

It's like, why would you just stand there and stare at them? Start firing away. So the fire stops everybody and there's a stare down for it seemed like a couple of minutes seemed like it would have been a great time for the dragons to come in and incinerate everybody no they waited they waited until they started fighting again yeah and their people were getting treated like the irish and braveheart so um the hound didn't like anything that was going on and said i can't beat death. Stopped fighting for a while but then rallied back. Good line.

Arya was a machine. Huge PR. Yep. Just killing people left and right. People don't see her coming low to the ground. A little like Kemba? A little Kemba. Can go to the hoop, can work from the outside.

And then the Night King once again figured out how to get into the castle. Well, he didn't go into the castle. He went looking for... Well, he brings the ice shooting dragon in who basically demolishes everything. All his dudes get in. It feels like a cold fire. I don't know if it's ice. We didn't see it's a cold fire.

So what happens When it hits you You burn in a hell flame That's cold Like dry ice We didn't really get to see it Yeah but nobody We never really saw what happened When you got burned

By the cold fire And then we thought Maybe Daenerys Was going to take down The Night King But there was no way That was going to happen Wait can we go back

Oh we can go wherever you want I thought we lost track There's a big dragon fight There's a dragon fight there was no way that was going to happen. Wait, can we go back? We can go wherever you want. There's a big dragon fight. There's a dragon fight. I had no idea who was who. It was impossible to tell. It was shot really strangely. I love some of the shots. Most of this time going, who's that?

What's going on? It was confusing. I've never felt older watching a TV show. Yeah. But that's kind of the thing. I checked in with some younger people, and I went, I'm really afraid to send this text, but Bill and I couldn't see anything for long stretches and they go, yep.

But I think that was kind of the directors. Now I'm more of a writer. Right. But I get what the director was trying to do. I could read, I could see the director's script. I could see the cues. And I think the,

the, the, the approach was they wanted the viewer to be as confused in battle as the actual this is a boxing movie trick yeah when they film the boxing movies they put the camera right in between the guys and it's just a lot but really it's a way to just cheat and so that if it's a wide shot it looks fake if it's up close and it's frantic you feel like you're in it. Why hasn't somebody just said to the other guy in a boxing movie being like, look, this is Michael B. Jordan and he's going to punch you in the face for real.

And a bunch of times, and you're going to make like 500 grand. Yeah. That's the kind of movie I would make. Do you think like, so my wife, when we have, when, with our dogs,

like our dogs had different colored collars. So even though our dogs all look differently, but like when we had two golden retrievers, we had a Rufus, the male and Daisy, the female. Daisy had the pink collar and Rufus had the darker collar. Makes sense.

Do you think Daenerys should have done that with the dragon? So we could have told them. One of them had the darker collar. Makes sense. Do you think Daenerys should have done that with the dragons? So we could have told them first. One of them had a pink collar and the other had like a purple one. So then when they're flying around, I know who's who. You know what? Just to be fair. You knew who was who? No, I just, if the collars are going to be color coded,

I'd like them not to reveal gender. If they could be gender neutral collars are going to be color coded I'd like them not to reveal gender if they could be gender neutral collars because I don't want to assume anything certainly not with a dragon I think we'd be better off if it was like a mauve and then a green gender neutral dragon collars yeah I mean that's the name of that one that's the name of today's podcast gender neutral dragon colors yeah i mean that's still we're naming that one

that's the name of today's podcast gender neutral and kevin durant so we had the two dragons left did you feel like one dragon was better than the other absolutely oh yeah because one of them might have died i thought there was going to be another dragon might have died yeah because it it well wait a minute denarius one of the dragons went down denarius has got stabbed a billion times because again she's just lingering around yeah she's i don't i don't get a terrible job by her. Yeah, totally. And honestly, like the big name deaths, Ed, you know, Ed goes down early. Yeah, there's a couple big ones. Theon went down.

Theon and then the little girl. Jorah, yeah. Jorah was a big one. Jorah's an OG. Is he done? I mean, I felt like he's almost died a million times. Yeah, he's done. He died.

He died? You know, they didn't give us the headliner. I thought we were going to get a headliner death, like a real storyline changing death theon got a nice little redemption he got a little little shout out from bran bran said you're a good person theon had a bad run the second half of the show and we forgive you for all the terrible you know what i kept thinking of the whole time what like this is where i wish ramsey were still alive because if i want to fight the night king you want i want that twisted twisted fuck on

my side and are we gonna get to the end now yeah we still have more no that's it theon died jorah died uh i was like jorah by the way couldn't denarius just like i actually was into you or was that worse right before he dies i mean the guy has been the most whipped dude in the history of dragons and castles and you know denarius is like sorry i'm gonna bang this pirate for a few weeks you know no offense it's a good twitter poll what's right and then he's also gonna shit on your manhood to your face after he knows that I, you know, like. I forgot about that. I mean, she's just, she treats him worse than Selina Meyer treats Gary and Veep.

Well, this, I mean, this is the 1300s. You can't judge. They didn't know back then. Right. But she's in his head. I mean, she just absolutely sublets room up there. I just, I, you know, maybe it it's better he just lets him die so and branch is hanging out we're all wondering what kind of superpower because it look the odds you're sitting there watching be like how the hell are they getting

out of this one well brands so finally he does the white eyeball trick finally it's like oh good brand's gonna say this and basically just send some ravens flying around it's like really that's been waiting for this for 10 years that was your move the eyeball move yeah he actually didn't do anything he sat in a chair it's like 15 birds are gonna fly in a circle and then the night king stares him down and you're like all right what because you obviously you realize not they're not gonna lose the whole thing like because we still got seven episodes here, right? Is it seven? Three.

Oh, that's it? So there's only six episodes in this season? I actually thought, I really did think they were going to lose at the end of that. I thought there were going to be two episodes. What was going to happen the next three episodes? Cersei goes down. Cersei marries the Night King. Cersei goes down and flips it back or something.

It's like, this guy's nastier than Joffrey. I don't even think Cersei would do that. So it all ends with Arya killing the Night King. Great move by her. The dive from behind. The Night King thinks he stops her, but she rope-a-doped him. Yes, she did.

Made it seem like she had the knife high, but then she had the other one low. God, I'm with the dragonglass. Boom. End. Night King. So long. Okay.

I just have a hard time believing She gets through security. that his cabinet, that looks a bit like the Doobie Brothers, that she was just going to be able to get past all those guys and kill the most important guy in mankind. That looks a bit like the Doobie Brothers. That she was just going to be able to get past all those guys and kill the most important guy in mankind in this battle. That guy's un-freaking-touchable. And she just sneaks by everybody and stabs them?

She was moving around pretty quietly in that library or whatever. Do you think he was telling them to foul or no? Do you think he was telling them to foul or no? Do you think he looks like Popovich? No, I was just trying to draw some Night King Popovich. He had a big lead there at the end. He's basically done.

He got to where he needed to go. And really lost control of the shot clock. And to be fair to the night king someone on his team's got to pay more attention they've got to know game time situation i mean he'd spend a lot of time team bonding dinners picks out a special bottle of wine for each one look i'm just saying man i'm just saying after eight years of this the night king goes down because he gets in a staring contest with the most boring character in the entire show and then a teenage girl stabs him

wow when you put it that way by the way better better all-around day. Bob Kraft starting out at the Orchard Spa, ending with the overtime win against the Chiefs, or Aria losing a virginity and then killing the Night King? What was a better day? Oh, Aria, because that was the AFC title game. Could have been the Super Bowl, maybe different. great day for aria though huge i hope that i hope 50 years later she goes like what were the great days of your life she's like oh this one day lost my she has a better day than that yeah lost my virginity and killed the night king and saved the world it was great

um so you didn't love the aria thing Yeah, Lost in Virginia and killed the Night King and saved the world. It was great. So you didn't love the Arya thing. Who would you have wanted to kill? I just wanted something. I know how hard it is to write these scripts, man. But I was just... I think my expectations for the show, cause it's so amazing. Like I wanted something I wasn't thinking was possible.

I wanted something so clever that I spend the next few days being like, just your world being rocked. I can't believe they came up with that. I actually thought I, for me, I really liked the area thing. I was thumbs up. Kyle,

you're the tiebreaker. I liked it. I wish there was more of what he's talking about. It didn't have to come from Aria for me, but there wasn't enough of that. It just seemed like everyone was unprepared. What of the seven times Bran rolled back his eyeballs, which one was your favorite one?

The last one. The one where it stopped. When the Ravens went about, I'm like, okay, there's some magic here. Something's going to happen here.'m like okay there's some magic here like something's gonna happen here like there's gonna be some magic and then you know when the night king gets torched by the dragon and he just smiles he's like like serious and then denarius went to run at him and reminded me of like t.j mcconnell trying to dunk on yannis and i'm like no that's not gonna work and uh then all the people then all the people come back to life as zombies as as the white walkers

that was great and you're just going this is this roster is incredible i liked when he did the the slow raise of the of the hands yeah is really creepy and effective my last question do you want to answer it ask yourself no there's 10 000 dead bodies actually maybe more 100 000 dead bodies dead white walkers and just blood everywhere like what's the cleanup situation there what do they do well i imagine well who's ever left from gray worms army gets that shit detail those guys those guys hey we're all gonna run into this castle do you mind just hanging out out there with your your spears and shields you got to burn everything right just piles you're burning body piles i would i would ship it to cersei do you think now that the White Walkers are gone,

do you think the dragonglass, like 50% discount at the team store? Don't need it anywhere, right? Still selling it, but not as expensive. People are using it. Not in high demand. People are using them as paint scrapers. It's like a five in one. I liked the episode.

I thought it was good. I didn't know what was going on half the time. I can't wait to watch it again. Yeah, I need to watch it like seven times. It actually would have been a good movie theater episode. I'm surprised they've never done that. Imagine the money they would make on that. Somebody, I've heard, I've seen this bandied around.

I think it's bandied about. Bandied about. See this bandied about uh if they did saturday one day only game of thrones series finale in a movie theater and just charge like 50 bucks a ticket what would happen how much money could they make the whole thing if it was just one weekend we're just premiering this two days early if social media is any indicator i would think it would probably be one of the best what if you did it for a weekend what if you treat it like opening weekend yeah that's what i mean like if you're not just saturday so you're saying

thursday friday saturday thursday night through sunday i think it would do incredible yeah um i got up at seven in the morning today and I sat through two long soccer games in hot San Diego sun and I drove two and a half hours and I'm really proud of myself because I was actually like fairly competent on this podcast I didn't know you didn't show it at all I'm a little sunburned

I thought you were bronzing tired no this was good though I do have a gambling story before we go ooh bet on this whole had this series parlay yesterday with the spurs yep i mean not the spurs the uh nuggets so the nuggets were the last piece so if the nuggets won won this series bet that house that i made decided to hedge because i didn't trust the nuggets was spurs plus six spurs one by four i'm the first person ever who middled a bet it's first time it's ever

happened in the history of gambling that scenario where it actually worked out i was so proud of myself yeah whenever anybody said middle it i'm always like or you could just lose two other bets right it never works ever in a million years you know when it works when the spurs just stand there for 25 fucking seconds as the clock runs out with their well then you'll never forget it then i was the best i was going nuts i was so happy even as i was outraged as a basketball fan because i've never seen anything dumber in the last 25 seconds but i was like well i I just won middle it was great um what do you got to plug anything I'll do a draft recap pod and then um Zach Lowe and I are going to do this really deep playoff dive on I'm just kidding

um Ryan Marcello dual threat dual threat podcast network and we'll be back next next Sunday doing the same thing I'll be Sunday might be an issue hopefully it won't be as late why?

I got a couple buddies coming to town and it's a Willie Nelson concert on Sunday night? yeah oh well maybe we'll have to do

Monday then can we? potentially let me look at it alright I know Kyle likes it when we do Mondays. The audience.

I love the Sunday, but, you know, dude's good at life too. It's Willie Nelson. Jesus. Willie Nelson's 98. 98.

He's not really 98. 78? 80? No, he's like 84. Yeah. All right. We'll see you next week.

Thanks, Ryan. Thank you Alright thanks to Ryan Thanks to DAZN Don't forget the big fight This week Canelo Alvarez

Daniel Jacobs And Thanks to Nif Kyle For working late tonight Thanks to Tic Tac And Meltona And we'll be back Later in the week

With more On the BS Podcast.