The Bill Simmons Podcast - Minnesota’s Coming, OKC’s Here, and We Can Save the NBA Season With Kirk Goldsberry and Bill’s Dad

Episode Date: March 13, 2025

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Kirk Goldsberry to discuss the Timberwolves' late-season surge, exciting Western Conference Round 1 playoff possibilities (2:26), the Thunder beating the Celtics for the second time this season (28:33), and Bill and Kirk's pitch to completely revitalize the NBA (51:10). Finally, Bill talks with his dad about being in TD Garden for the Thunder's 118-112 win against the Celtics, Patriots free agency buzz, the Bruins' decision to trade away longtime wing Brad Marchand, and more (01:16:45). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Kirk Goldsberry and Bill's dad Producers: Kyle Crichton and Chia Hao Tat The all-new, fully electric Audi Q6 e-tron is a new way to experience driving. Learn more at audiusa.com. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Please visit theringer.com slash RG to learn more. Listen to them to this episode for additional details. It must be 21 plus presidents like States game problem, call 1-800 gambler or visit RG dash help.com coming up. Not only are we going to talk about basketball, I'm going to fix basketball. Next. This episode is brought to you by Verbo private vacation rentals with Verbo. You always get the whole house.

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New rewatchable is coming on Monday night. I'm just going to tell you what it is right now. Days of thunder with Tom Cruise. It's officially sports movie, but Tom Cruise 16th rewatchable is moving for him. Congrats to him. Just setting all kinds of records. Great guy. Uh, so you got that coming up.

You can watch that in the ring of movies, YouTube channel, or you can watch that as a video podcast on Spotify, just like you can watch this as a video podcast on Spotify. Uh, we're also brought to you by Fanbill sports book, where I hope you're checking out the 30 on 30, which we do every Friday. I tweet out my pick, try to get 30 plus score, a little boost. So stay tuned for that. All right, coming up. Kirk Goldsberry and I are going to talk about some things we've noticed as we head into the home stretch of the NBA season. And then more importantly, Kirk's class did this big study of how to fix the NBA

season and we're going to dive into that. And it's really cool. And I urge you to continue to listen through the pod until we get to that part. And then I brought my dad on because he wanted to do a Boston sports report and went to the OKC Celtic game last night and I had to indulge him. Anyway, that is next. Here are friends from Pearl Jam. All right, Kurt Goldsberry is here.

You can read him on the Ringer.com. You can listen to him on various Ringer podcasts. He is based in Austin, Texas, where we saw each other after a depressing Spurs sun game, sun's game with no Wemby and with sun's team imploding. Um, we have something really good that we're going to talk about later in the pod. This big picture idea that I'm excited to throw at the world. Short term, there's been some stuff going on as we hit these last 20 games and I talked about this with Rossello two Sundays ago that there's

always a team right around now that starts making a surge like Dallas did last year, like the Celtics did a couple of years ago. And it's like, who, who's the team? We talked about possibilities, kind of glossed over Minnesota and Minnesota kicked Denver's ass last night. The three point shooting has gotten way better. There are 11 and O and the last 11 Randall games stuff's kind of happening.

Yet they're in the seventh seat, golden states, 37, 28, Minnesota's 38 and 29. Um, are you a believer yet? Easy schedule, just a great matchup for them against Denver. Is something happening? What are you seeing? Well, I've always liked this team. And I feel like they traded Carl Anthony Towns in part because of the new CBA.

And I think it sort of took them off course. I'm a believer that they're gonna finish this season very strong for a few reasons. One, you just pointed out Julius Randall is playing his best stretch of basketball since he's gotten to Minnesota. He missed pretty much all of February. That's important because they went five of seven in February, but they won those last

11 games with him. I think five in January, now six straight in March. Well, what are you saying that's, what's he doing differently? Because in the, in the first part of the year, it looked like a bad spacing fit. It looked like a weird who's who should take the shot this time. And it just, it just seemed off. So what changed? I think he's playing, he knows his teammates better and he's making better passes.

Like at his best, he's a scorer who can also pass. And I think during this stretch, I haven't looked it up. I think he's leading the team in assists. So you have, you have go Gobert obviously is the defensive anchor. You know what Ant is gonna do as a scorer. I think he's sort of your second scorer and maybe your primary playmaker when things are going well for him.

And without him, their second scorer, Bill, that's a pretty big question mark for this team. So I think his biggest thing is scoring and playmaking and just filling that void below Ant on the box score. And here's the sneaky thing with this team. They have the easiest remaining schedule of all of the Western Conference competitive sort of teams, that top seven group. And it's by a landslide. They have this home stand where Orlando, Utah, Indiana, and two games against the Pelicans coming in. This current win streak could extend to 11 very easily.

And I think if there's anybody that's going to catch that group two to five on the Western Conference standings, it's the Minnesota Timberwolves. So I really like their chances of finishing the season pretty strong. Yeah, it's interesting because in this run, they're 16 and nine in their last 25, basically, um, I think 16 and eight last 24. So the, the, the records better, the schedule has been pretty easy, but they

did go two and one against OKC and they beat Denver twice, which I think are good signs, especially now that the Lakers don't have a center. Maybe those are the two teams they have to look at. I was studying it today. I test wise, I didn't really notice it until the last week. Um, just that they seem happier playing together. I thought last night they looked like last year's Timberwolves was noticeable. They might feel like they have Denver's number, but looking at all the numbers, the three point shooting is way better, right?

So Nas in his last 25, he's 41% from three and he's 18 and seven and he's having a really nice free agent run. We talked about him on the worst contracts pod, talking about how all these moves they've made, especially the Go Bear extension, might have screwed them to keep Nas. And then Timberworld fans are like, we're keeping Nas. And it's like, well, you made this Carl Anthony town straight to save money.

Which leads me to believe you're not keeping Nas, especially if, uh, if you have this new ownership, but who knows he's playing 33 minutes a game. Um, and he's been great. Conley in his last 17 is shooting 48% from three. And he looked like dead, dead legs washed up the first six weeks of the season, right? That surprised me more than anything. I didn't think they were going to get anything out of him anymore.

And it seemed like he wasn't going to be able to play a crunch time for them. And then deep in Shenzo is the other one since Christmas. He's missed some games, but 16 points a game, 47% from three. And he's playing 29 minutes a game. So you say how they don't points a game, 47% from three. And he's playing 29 minutes a game. So you say how they don't have a second score and you're right, but they've been able to patch it like nozzle. I have a big game. Dante have a big game. Randall might have like,

it feels like they're all rotating. Who's the second guy. And they're pretty good. I'm surprised Dillingham isn't having a bigger impact for them, but maybe they don't need them. Yeah. Dillingham is, is a nice rookie story, but like, come on, we, we, we're talking about a team that had Western conference title aspirations at the beginning of the year and a rookie really isn't going to slide into that and make a lot of noise.

I think D-Vincenza is a great, great sort of similar thing to Randall. He's, he's gotten time to learn this team. He's fitting in. But remember last year, I thought this team had the best vibes in the playoffs for a while. And a lot of that had to do with Nas Reed, who is like the spirit animal

of the whole Timberwolves fan base. Never say anything negative about Nas Reed, Bill. Right. Alexander Walker. I'm sorry he's gonna be on New Orleans next year, but you guys are right. Or Washington, wherever he's gonna go. Somebody with calf space. Uh, Alexander Walker. I'm sorry. He's going to be on New Orleans next year, but you guys are right. Or Washington, wherever he's going to go. Somebody with calf space, Brooklyn, who knows?

But they're big and they're physical and they're long and they gave, you know, what everybody forgets. Like they give, they give some, they gave Jamal Murray a lot of problems last night. They gave MBJ a lot of problems last night. Uh, when they're really at their best, you know, they have McDaniels on defense, uh, they're long on the perimeter, they're playing hard. And when those same dudes that are playing great perimeter defense are also knocking down shots like that, there's a really good team. That's a really good team.

And I like it. Uh, and there was a couple of times last night where I thought Randall, like, yeah, it's like what it looks like. He'll just take it right at, right at Joker and just overpower him. And that's another thing he can do is go get an unassisted bucket, uh, in a way that some of these catch and shoot guys can't do. Sounds like he's won you over. It sounds like the Randall fan club might have to make room for you.

Dude, he is like the ultimate hot and cold analytics guy. Yeah. Even there are even whole seasons, Bill, where you're like, this guy's terrible. And then the next season, you're like, this guy's an all star. Yeah. Even there are even whole seasons bill where you're like, this guy's terrible. And then the next season, like this guy's an all star. Yeah. If he has sort of a legacy for the stats nerds, it's like, he is the hardest guy to pin down maybe in the whole league. Uh, and so he's, he's been a frustrating guy to characterize even through the

most advanced numbers, uh, over the last five years. Well, they also have this weird bench because Shannon had a couple of really good games for them. Like when they beat OKC by three last month, end of February, Shannon played 29 minutes in that game. Alexander Walker played 35, McDaniels played 42, Nas played 40. They didn't have Go Bear. They didn't have Go Bear. They didn't have Randall, but they, they're able to, the nine through 11 guys, which is something I think Cleveland has.

I think the Celtics have to some degree and OKC has 20 guys. It literally doesn't matter on OKC. They could be like, Oh, Jalen Williams isn't playing. Fine. We got three more guys. We could just slide in there. But, um, I do like their depth and they have a little more depth, Minnesota. Then, uh, I was thinking,

it also seems like they're getting a little more than McDanis was starting to look like a possible worst contracts guy, but he got going too. And then, you know, the, the, the big thing for me when you're thinking about the late surgers is do you have like one of the best nine guys? Do you have one of the best eight guys? You have one of the best six guys? Do you have one of the best eight guys? Do you have one of the best six guys? Edwards is somewhere in the 10. You know, you could have him, you could have him eight,

you could have nine, wherever. But during this little 24 game stretch where there's 16 and eight, he's 29 a game. 8.9 free throw attempts and 10.4 threes. And I mentioned that because I felt like the threes were too high before. And I want, I, I ultimately like in the playoffs, I think the free throws have to be next to the threes. I want like in a playoff series, I want 10 and 10 from him, something like that.

But, um, you know, he has some stinkers every once in a while. He'll have like the six for 19. He'll have the seven for 29, but for the most part, like, I'm kind of happy where he's at in this season after the season. Where are you at with him? I think he's ready to be the best player on a playoff team that's going to win one, maybe two rounds. It's hard for me to see them winning two rounds, just the, I respect for the rest

of the West, although one of the more sort of emergent stories with last night is they give the Nuggets a very difficult time. And it's not just last night. I think it's five straight against them. Yeah. And it is because Jamal Murray, who has been great, you know, the Nuggets are, you know, you, you, you can set your watch by this guy's going to be great, but Jamal Murray, they seem to have his number.

And I think if you can slow down Jamal Murray, you have a good chance to beat the Nuggets in the playoffs. And I think this team is built to slow down the Jamal Murray's of the world because of their perimeter defenders. Uh, and I think Anthony Edwards is just the kind of fourth quarter crunch time score, go get a free throw, go get a bucket. I think he's there. Um, and I think they're really well rounded. The last thing I'd add Bill is I do like their coaching.

I like their coaching staff. I think they're built for a playoff series. I think they make adjustments. I think they're not one of these coaching staffs that just goes in and does what they always do. Uh, so I liked how they're built. Um, and depending on the matchups, which I think is the biggest story in the Western conference bill going into this last 20 game stretch, 15

game stretch, how these seeds shake out is going to be fascinating. Who gets who in the first round is going to determine a lot of who makes it to the conference finals. Cause some of these matchups are really good for one side and really bad for the other. And, and I think that Minnesota Denver matchup is a great example of that. It's a great point. OKC 16 and eight in their last 24, including four losses of either one or two points, fifth net rating.

And they play okay. See really well too, which we should mention Denver. They're built to be Denver and they have all these athletic wings to throw up Murray and they have size to throw not as much size as they had last year with towns, but they still have a bunch of size to throw a yolk edge and. You know, they're, it's just a good matchup for them. Doesn't mean they'll beat them in the playoffs, but it's a nice matchup. OKC was interesting because when they played those games, and I thought those games were really fun to watch, there was a competitiveness, fuck you, athleticism

piece that you rarely, the physicality, you saw it, we're going to talk about OKC Boston in a second. OKC, even though that I think the myth on them is they're undersized when they're really not anymore. Or they're skinny. They're really physical. And I thought I think Minnesota likes it and they like playing it. And I thought those games, I thought that was a good sign for them that they hung with them. They also have a lot of guys to throw at SGA who nobody has shut down all year, but they probably have the best chance, you know, and then, uh,

and they have a guy on their team who's not afraid of any of them. You mentioned the matchups. So we're taping this in the morning on Thursday and Golden state and Minnesota are basically fighting for the six seed. Gold state is 37 wins. Minnesota is 38, but Minnesota has played more games. And there's a world where Minnesota gets six and Denver gets three.

And that's our three six. And Denver's like, fucking A. God damn it. Why is that our team? Just the matchups in general, like Golden state, I'm sure, would, doesn't want to see Denver at all. Cause Yoko Jones them.

Yeah. Minnesota would be delighted to see Denver. You just go through and it's like what you said, it's becomes a little rock paper, scissory. I was waiting for Houston to drop out, but Houston's kind of hung on here. Houston still has a three game, three loss lead over Golden State and a four loss lead over Minnesota and they're the five seed and then the Lakers who, you know, we don't know how long LeBron's going to be out. That's another team that could potentially drop, but they'd have to drop a

lot down the stretch. So, uh, a lot of shit going on, but we could end up listening to this Goldsbury. We could have Minnesota, Denver as a three, six. We could have Golden state, a three six. We could have golden state Memphis as a two seven, and we could have Lakers Houston as the four five with Emma Adoka and Dylan Brooks against LeBron. The two guys who have really gone at him in the last two years. That'd be super fun. And then the other one that's in play is the one eight with okay.

Seeing the Clippers, you know, the Clippers trade SGA to okay. They make this okay. C has their pick this year and there's just all this history between those teams. So, uh, that would be the most fun version. I think of the four matchups. Yeah. Another thing to watch on strength of schedule. Cause the Western conference is brutal depending on, on how your

script schedule sort of shakes out. The Lakers and the Grizzlies are on the opposite end. They have a very tough remaining schedule. So the Lakers sort of hanging on to that fourth spot right now, as you mentioned without LeBron James, the Rockets have won four straight. They could surpass them. You could see a world where the Lakers, the Timberwolves and the Warriors are really good teams, but all going into these first round series as a road team.

Yeah. And many of them with championship experience. Obviously the Warriors and Lakers have some championship experience. So it's really interesting to me. I think in a nutshell, the hottest teams at West, not counting the Thunder have been hot all year or the six and seven right now, uh, in the

Warriors and Timberwolves. And that just, that just sets us up for a great, great first round. Uh, not to mention the talent over there, the superstar talent, the all-star talent fighting for these slots is just off the charts. Well, what's funny is Minnesota is a really good road team. They're 20 and 15 now on the road, which I think other than OKC is the best record in the West. The Clippers are a terrible road team. They're 14 and 20. I don't think the Lakers care where they play and they're going to have Laker fans at any whatever.

I think it matters for Houston though. Houston, I kept waiting to fall off. And it felt like it was going to happen a couple of times, but they're kind of lingering around, hanging around and Lakers Houston would be a really, really fun kind of old school new school series. I don't know how the Lakers are going to hold on if LeBron misses three to four weeks here. And who knows? We've seen him recover really fast sometimes and recover really slow other times when there was less at stake. But when you take him out of it, but you take his, you take the rebounding defense, second playmaker thing on top of all the other stuff

they've already lost and it just feels like insurmountable for them. Yeah. They'd lost that game in Brooklyn the other night. And I think that's a fair indication of the kind of game they can lose. Yeah. You know, and again, the West is just jam packed. I think two to five is separated by a game or something like that. Um, so you start losing at Brooklyn.

You're going to drop the rockets. As you mentioned, are hot. They've won four straight. Uh, they're gonna, they're going to're going to win those, those kinds of games. So it is, I think it is fair to expect the Lakers are going to drop. Their next ones are at Denver Friday, home sons, home spurs. Might be able to go two and one in those three. Home nuggets, home bucks, home bulls.

Josh Giddy Renaissance is here. three home nuggets, home bucks, home bulls. Josh Giddy Renaissance is here at Orlando, at Indiana, at Chicago, at Memphis, home rockets, that's the rest of the month. So they have to go 500 of that in that stage. But, um, do you care if you're the, if you're the, uh, seven seed. So you're probably playing the Clippers in the seven, eight game, right? With real stakes because you don't wanna see any part of OKC in round one.

And you're playing the Clippers at home. Like it would suck to be the seven seed and have the extra game, but if I'm golden state, I'm fine, you know? All right, fine, we'll beat the Clippers in the seven, eight and we'll just play the two seed. Like it's not a complete disaster. It's a disaster if you lose though.

It's terrifying. You got Kawhi Leonard, Ty Loo on the other end. You got one game. I love the planned tournament because it makes these- Me too. It sets up for real meaningful games. And you know, I think the executives and the coaches at these teams much prefer the sixth slot to the seventh slot just because of the

uncertainty, the stress, you're locked in. Yeah. They, and you let you get another couple of days to game plan your, your three seat opponent in a playoff, uh, matchup. And that's a huge deal too. So do you like the seven, eight, nine, 10, or would you go seven, 10, eight, nine? I like, I like how they have it because if you finished seventh, I think you've got to get beat twice at home to get kicked out of, I like the format.

I think the seven eight format is cool. You know, and one, and it gives you this advantage to get in. Um, what are your thoughts on that? I, part of me wonders if it should be seven, 10, eight, nine, and then the seven still doesn't necessarily it's not a winner go home for the seven, 10. They would still get to play the eight, nine with home court, but the way they have it, I think probably makes more sense. And the seven, eight is usually a really good game.

I mean, part of the problem with the plan this year is the 10 seat in both conferences sucks like we we're, it's at least in the, in the West they have an excuse because of what happened to Dallas, the zombie Mavericks. Yeah. But there's still the 10 seed. The zombie Mavericks with Spencer Dinwiddie and I don't even know what center they'd have left

and PJ Washington, they might actually be the 10 seed. Phoenix is just like, guys, we've been trying to make this clear for two months. We want to have the season from now. We don't want to be in there, but you go to the, the east and it's like, ah, all right, Chicago, that Chicago's 27 and 38. It might be in the, it might be in there. And then you look at Miami who's 29 and 36. They've lost five Joe house on the ringer gambling show for the last two weeks.

He's convinced Miami's tanking and his thing on the last two weeks on the ringer gambling show is bet against them. Second half live bet against them. They take a lead first half. Then they throw it away. Second half. I don't know if that's true, but they're a fucking mess and bam looks terrible lately. Um, anyway, I think the nine 10 in the East has a chance to be one of the more depressing playing games we've had, maybe the number one. Yeah, Bulls, Heat.

Bulls, Heat, who don't even want their pick, right? You just hope that the Orlando Magic, because the Magic and the Hawks, they could be decent playoff teams if they awaken from, you know, these pretty dark stretches. But how long do we have to wait for Orlando? Apparently longer than two months.

Yeah, so really, so right. Magic or dead. Sucks is out for the year. Like, the Magic are a cross-off to me. Atlanta at least has all of these wings when they get everybody back and healthy, and then the random Trey Young, who the hell knows game. Yeah. And they have some size that could always be the con, a con glue in a playing game with like 24 rebounds. I feel like Orlando is a cross-off. Sorry, Saruti. I think the Cavs and Celtics deserve to have a pretty easy first round series.

I think they will. I mean, look at this. The Cavs are going to get Orlando, Miami or Chicago. Unless one of those teams beats Atlanta. But yeah, I think Atlanta is like, I'm not going to say they're frisky, but they're 32 and 34. I've watched them a lot. I have a, I have an over bet on them. And, uh, just in general, I kind of enjoy watching them and I think they're,

they're not bad, you know, they need a way. them and I think they're, they're not bad. You know, they need Jaylen Johnson. Yeah. With Jaylen Johnson, they're a good team. Yeah. The Hawks, unfortunately, Jaylen Johnson over for the year, but you know, this is why you believe in Zach Riesache. This is why he's been the number one pick on them. Um, let's, let's take a break and then we'll talk about OKC and Boston.

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opt-in required bonus issued as non-controllable profits boost tokens. Restrictions apply including any token expiration and max wager amounts. See terms at sportsbook.fielded.com. Game prom, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Visit rg-help.com. Hey, before we talk about OKC in Boston quickly, the bottom seven right now, Washington 13 wins, Utah 15, Charlotte 16, New Orleans 18. That's going to be our bottom four for capture the flag. Then we have Philly 22 wins, Brooklyn 22 wins, Toronto 23 wins. Rossello is furious. Toronto is making a run at their season over out of nowhere, even though

they were supposed to be tanking. So Philly right now is in the five spot. They keep their pick if it's in the top six and they're doing everything that they scratch Paul George for reasons that remain unclear for the season and beads out and Philly's going for it. And I think if they get the five spot, it'd be pretty hard for them to get jumped twice. So in a weird way, uh, this could work out for our guy, Darrell Murray.

You went to Sloan conference in Boston. Weirdest Sloan Conference ever. Well, Dorca Palooza, they did the, uh, they named the transaction of the year. Uh, and the MB extension did not win it. Didn't get it. Oh, wow. It was the Luka Donsich trade. The Luka Donsich trade, uh, the Paul George deal did not get the transaction

of the year, but it was given to the Los Angeles Lakers. But yeah, I got to see the Boston Celtics play the Philadelphia 76ers more like the Delaware 87ers the night I chose to attend. Yeah, tough one. Tough one. They're two and eight in their last 10. They are doing all they can as they should.

There's the saving the season for the Philadelphia 76ers is keeping that draft pick in a good draft. That would be really good draft. If you get in the top five in this draft, you're getting like a legit dude. Yeah. And so they have to do this. How crazy would that be after all the hype and buzz about them, if they ended up with like a top three pick?

I mean, that honestly, that'd be insane. What were the odds? I guess the odds were actually half decent. Um, I'll remember even forget the Georgian and the Georgian, um, and beat stuff. They have a pretty good young back court and McCain and Maxey here. Like they could have a young core if they hit on this draft. Yeah.

So it's, it's crazy. I know the cap they're in cap hell. They are in cap hell if they hit on this draft. Those pieces. Yeah. So it's, it's crazy. I know the cap, they're in cap hell. They are in cap hell for the rest of this decade. But if they have rookie players playing over value, that's a pretty good deodorant for that situation. The Embiid thing's tough. We've been this down this road with, uh, injured older centers, and you're just kind of held hostage by it for a couple

of years. And then somebody write the story and beads knee feels the best it's ever been. And, and bead full scrimmage today. And then he plays two games, it gets hurt again. And it's just this cycle you don't want to be in. Um, Washington, Utah, Charlotte, New Orleans, the shocker in that group is New Orleans. We knew somebody in the West was gonna have the year from hell and they were a really good candidate, but for them to be in the top four of the lottery

is nuts with the kind of talent they have. I mean, honestly, that's crazy. Yeah, they're deep. They can survive a few injuries, you'd think, and still be better than this. Better than this. So here are my OKC Celtics takes, and might, we might call my dad at the tail end cause he went to the game after, after you go.

But, um, I, first of all, OKC has beaten Boston twice and I watched both games and I thought they deserve to win both games. And I thought SJ was the best player in each game. Uh, there was no KP last night, but okay. So you didn't have Jaylen Williams. So I'm not going to make excuses. The free throw advantage was way skewed toward okay. See, I thought that was more a result of how both teams played and what they're trying to do.

The Celtics took 63 threes, which is fucking absurd. Um, but the thing that, that has jumped out to me over and over again with okay. See, they play so fucking hard and they're so physical and they're so good defensively and the switching that they do. And they're just so committed to a certain level of intensity and competitiveness. It's going to sound like I'm making an excuse for the Celtics and I'm not. I think I've watched it over and over again. I think teams have a lot of trouble going through an NBA schedule and then you play

OKC and they're playing like they play and it's like, you can see it. Like the guys, and then the quotes after the game, Tatum said it, Jalen Brown said it. Like we didn't do a good job of matching their intensity. That's been, this is why this OKC team has been so special as a regular season team. They're fucking animals. Yeah. You watch him. It's like every guy in the team is completely beasting out going crazy.

They're, they're just like, and if you're not ready for it, you can see it and you can fight back, you can claw back. They do it again. And they just over and over again, make these teams look bad from how hard they're playing. So my question to you is it's a one night thing that works. Could you get used to it over two weeks? look bad from how hard they're playing. So my question to you is, it's a one night thing that works. Could you get used to it over two weeks?

If you're playing them in a series over the course of seven games, would you eventually figure out how to match what they're doing, at least competitively and physically? I don't know if last year is a fair precedent, but yes, you could if you have a very physical, strong front court like the Dallas Mavericks did. That seems like a thousand years ago now.

But yeah, it seems like they are by far the most physical, nasty defense and that depth really enables them to play almost like with line changes. They had that perpetual sub story, uh, this year, this week, but they have such a great deep bench. Um, but as you mentioned, they didn't have Caruso who's one of the biggest dogs on the team and they didn't have, uh, Jay Williams didn't matter. Didn't notice just other guys just came in flying around. And one of the things that crossed my mind yesterday is that could the second

five best players on Oklahoma City be a playoff team by themselves? That's the kind of thing I was thinking like, oh my God, this team is so deep. Right. You take one of the backup bigs, you take Kason Wallace, you know, you take one of the Jalen Williams. They have so much talent. Um, but the coolest thing about them is they're all aligned to play this ferocious defensive style. One of the crazy stats from that game last night though,

is like, okay, the 63 threes, we can talk about that. They play like that and you only get 12 free throws. The Celtics only shot 12 free throws. Now Celtics fans might say this or that or the other thing, a lot like you said, it has to do with your 63 th was, it was nine free throws when the game was being decided. So they, they weren't getting in line at all. But the got three at the end. And then here's the stat that I thought I was looking at it today.

SGA again was a magnificent player, but he drew 10 fouls himself on the Boston Celtics, he drew 10 fouls himself. He puts you in foul trouble, like it or not. And Jaylen Brown was the Celtics player I was most sort of concerned with after this game, because he was, he got off to a slow start. Uh, he started, started getting hot in the fourth, but then he entered, he entered the fourth quarter with two fouls and he fouled out with three and a half minutes left.

What happened? SGA got him twice. SGA got him with some of the foul merchant stuff twice, his fourth and fifth fouls, nobody's going to remember that because they remember him fouling Chet at the end, but he had the fifth foul because of SGA sort of antics there at the elbow, but SGA does that to you. Derek White fouled out at the end. SGA needs a nickname, maybe the bonus because he's just always drawing. The bonus.

Yeah. He's just always in the bonus. When does Jalen Williams and Derek White both foul out in regulation? I don't know. SGA is a pretty good nickname on its own. It's a good acronym, but the bonus is solid. I like that one. Well, it just, I was looking it up. He's drawn 10 or more fouls by himself like 11 or 12 times this season.

Well, it's funny. I was talking to obviously have a lot of Celtic fans in my life, some of whom don't watch a lot of OKC. And all the Celtic fans were so mad at SGA for like the fucking foul baiting and all that stuff. And it's like, this is, he does this every game. He's the hardest guy in the league to guard like hands down. Uh, Rossella and I talked about it the other day when we were talking about the MVP stuff with him or Jokic. She's having one of the best guard seasons in the history of the league. And I haven't seen a team figure out completely how to guard him yet.

You can throw, it seems like part of the strategy is try to throw bigger guys on them. Like the Celtics did with Brown. You think on paper with Derek white drew holiday, perfect guys to go against him, but he always gets the matchup he wants. He always gets the shot he wants. He's always either able to get to the rim, get a foul or do a little pull up. And, uh, I haven't seen anyone stop them yet. And if you're going to make the case for. Okay.

See two in the title. It's like they play harder than everybody else and nobody can stop their best guy. Seems like two pretty good things. Yeah. You can't hate him for what he's doing. I mean, he, like we define athletes in different ways, but in the 2020s, we've really started to understand that guys who can change direction and decelerate better than other guys are athletes. Those are the, those are top tier athletes.

Uh, we learned that with Luca and Harden. Um, but this guy just makes it so hard to have proper defensive position. Um, even for guys like Derek White and Jaylen Brown, who are incredible at that. Yeah. And, and then he layers on this off arm, hardenism where he snakes his left arm when he's dribbling with his right hand into anybody's defensive arms. And then he flails and it's there it is. And that's what happened to Jalen Brown on first fifth foul last night. So most scores do this though.

That, that, like the thing that the reason I still think Brunson's the best, the best flop foul baiter guy is he's also doing it off the ball. He's doing it when he's on defense. He's just flopping around like a Marlin SGA is just purely trying to get to the free throw line. Yeah. Well, there's three guys, whatever trick I can do to get it.

I looked it up. There's three guys who are drawing six fouls themselves per game. In other words, they're fouling out the equivalent of a player on the other team. Wow. And it's, you got Jaylen Brunson, your favorite. There's SGA. And then there's the one guy who actually deserves to be on that list, Bill, which is the most physical assaulting player in the league right now, which is Giannis.

Who? Oh, I thought you were going to say Scoot Henderson. Well, and Celtics fans- My guy is back, Scoot Henderson. Didn't he? Rossello and I are alive. I'm so excited. Dude, the next needed-

He was unbelievable. He looked like fucking 2010 Russell Westbrook yesterday. I was going nuts. Yeah, he's still right. We're good. We're good on the Scoot Island, or whatever we're gonna call it. But I would say the Celtics fans also can't complain about this off-arm hijinks that Jason Tatum and Jaylen Brown both played.

Listen, that game played the hits for things that are going to drive Celtic fans crazy. Tyler Ford as the ref. Just, I think there's a lot of, a lot of he doesn't like us stuff. The free throw advantage spoke for itself. SGA is super frustrating. And then Jalen had his worst game in a couple of years, you know, and you can't survive no KP and a horrible Jalen game like that. If you're going positives for the South, Tatum was awesome again. I mean, I just feel like he's gone up. We're selling it.

We talked a couple of weeks ago about, I still feel like it's in play that he could make go to that last level. Marcello thought I was being a little too optimistic on it. I think he's at least going up a half level and I think there's an intensity and competitiveness to that that I just don't feel like was totally there. That physicality that is just at another level. They're also Maz is putting a bunch of minutes on him, which I like and don't like, but like he played 45 against the Lakers and I think 42 last night and he wants to be out there.

And, um, I think that's the best thing that Celtics have going for them right now. Yeah. I think bigger win for the thunder than it was a loss for the Celtics. And same, I would say about that Cleveland win in the same building a couple of weeks ago, the comeback win that was bigger for Kenny Atkinson and the Cavs to win in that building for what's coming down the road. Again, I don't think there's anything to worry about. If there's one thing to worry about in Boston, it's Christoph Spurzingis, like get well soon. This weird injury, yeah. Yeah, let's get that guy back. He needs to get there before I make any judgment about where the Celtics are in this title defense.

But dude, he hasn't been there. And then that's an issue. We need to get him back in the fold to see this fully fledged Celtics title defense. Um, because I think teams like Boston, OKC are good enough to beat them without Christophs Forzingis. I think that's one of the lessons we've learned over the last few weeks that the Celtics team isn't quite as dominant as they were last year, and maybe that there's better candidates, uh, to upset them in the postseason than there were

last year. Well, there's definitely hungrier candidates and hunger becomes such a big part of this as the season goes long. I, uh, it's funny, like I'll get texts from people sometimes or I'll hear it on a show or a podcast. And people, we have to do this thing now about, uh, okay. He's not getting enough credit. When will people start talking about okay. See, first of all, I think people are talking about them and we did this on Sunday. Um, I'm at the point with this, where if you're not taking okay.

Seeing Cleveland seriously as the two best teams in the league that have the two best chances to win the title. I just feel like you're not watching the season. They're passing Cleveland's had two 15 game winning streaks. I don't know what else they have to show us. That team is awesome. And Mitchell is having a great year. And if like they play OKC in a series, he'll think he's as good as SGA.

Like to me, they check all the boxes and OKC now that Chet's back, that was when we were talking to my dad, I think later, but my dad came away, like he hadn't really seen a great check game in person. Chet's been a fucking beast since he came back, you know? And I just think they can go small and big. I think OKC is awesome. I think beating them in a series is going to be really, really, really hard, especially with their good home team too. They get a good crowd.

It's a weird place to play. Their fans are good home team too. They get a good crowd. It's a weird place to play. Their fans are like really rabid. They affect the game. They affect the refs. And, uh, I don't know. I just like, they're the favorite on Fandel for a reason. They have the best team and they have a guy who can score on every team in the league whenever he wants that matters.

Dude, I'll remember it was Tim's last season. I think I was at the Spurs and yet we had the playoff series up there and. That place is insane. It's a very difficult place. It hurts your head. That was my takeaway in the 2012 finals. Like I actually had a headache after the home games. It was like, this is too loud.

I, my head hurts. Not to go full Spurs deja vu, but it was like that 2012 Spurs team was so great. You remember that? That the team didn't make the finals. And OKC came back with Harden and Ibaka and took them out. The Spurs were one of the... Dude, I wrote the Grandland piece after the Spurs killed somebody about how this had a chance to be like a generational team.

And I think OKC swept them after I wrote the piece. Like they were up to one game too, like by 30 at home and San Antonio, and then didn't win the rest of the series. That building is a very, very difficult place. Well, especially when you have, you're putting young and hungry guys in there. And you know, look, you look at the game yesterday and you go back and watch the fourth quarter, which I did this morning. The Celts missed wide open shots. A bunch of them in the fourth quarter, whereas okay.

So he actually made some shots and the big guy you have written behind you. Um, I think cause you want to remind yourself to talk about him was Wallace. Wallace made the two dagger shots of the game and Wallace was awesome. And Wallace is one of those guys. Like I do the trade value list. I was like, where does this guy go? Cause there's no way they're trading him. What's he worth?

Like he, if somebody's like, yeah, we'll do this. We'll give you this awesome player. Give us back Wallace and some picks. Presti is going to go, no thanks. Um, you know what I mean? I'm actually going to keep Wallace. Thanks. Thank you though.

Thanks for your interest. They can't pay all these guys. And Wallace has written on my board because he deserves to be because he played really well last night. His starter made those big shots. Five of six. Great shot blocking guard like Derek White. He loved that. He's awesome. And just another great young two-way player in Oklahoma City. By the way, 21 years old. Born on November, 2003, two years in, they have them at least for two more.

You know, I SGA, I'm sure we'll work with them a tiny bit for salary stuff, but they're going to have to pay Chet and they're going to have to pay Wallace and they're going to have to play Jalen Williams on top of SGA. That's going to be really hard. Dort and yeah, like Wallace, Isaiah Joe, Isaiah Joe was so SGA took his, his rest at the beginning of the fourth last night and that Celtics were making noise. And then he hit his own like killer three at the top of the arc. Yeah. The depth, I think this has come up with a couple of teams we really like out West. Depth is going to be a real separator.

It gives you versatility. It gives you sort of injury insurance and Oklahoma city has the biggest depth. I think your team had the most depth in a way last year. Um, just could play so, so well this, this year, I think the thunder and the calves can match that. I couldn't agree more. Well, the other thing is. Okay.

C has way better variables than the Celtics do. If you're telling me I'm getting everybody for four rounds with the Celtics, I feel great, but I have Horford who's I think 39 who's still playing 28 minutes a game and they're still counting on him in a real way. I have drew holiday is 34 has got a fucked up hand. I have poor Zingas who I just have no idea when he's playing and when he's not playing at this point. And it's like a pleasure to see him, but I don't trust that he's going to be out there a hundred percent of the time. I have Pritchard who's hit or miss depending on the game and the matchup.

Um, whereas I look at OKC and it's like, it would really have something weird would have to happen for any of those guys to get hurt. They're all young. They're all, you know, same thing for Cleveland. It's a mostly young team that's, you know, you'd have like, Daris Garland got hurt last year cause he broke his jaw, somebody hit him in the head. Um, but I just think the durability and consistency of those young guys, when you combine the hunger piece of it, it's, it's going to be a challenge for the Celtics. This is going to be a way different journey for them this year.

Like even right now they're two seven. They'll play the Hawks. Let's say the Hawks are the seventh seed. They'll beat the Hawks. That's not going to be like the most fun series. Like the Hawks are, you know, they're, they're, they're not going to roll over. Then they'll have the Knicks or Detroit in round two. That's not going to be easy.

And then they play Cleveland or Milwaukee probably. And that's before we get to the finals. And I need all my guys to stay healthy the whole time. Like it's, it's just going to be way harder. Yeah. Well, the, the, the Indiana conference finals last year, right? That, you know, that this is going to be leveled up. So that could be every round. Yeah.

And they won last year, which you can't sleep on. Like it's so much harder to do it the second time. Let me ask you this Detroit, New York, if you had to pick that series right now, who are you taking? I've listened. So I watched the entire Knicks Portland game last night as my wife and I also watch, watched a paradise. So I had on the iPad watch going back kind of back to paradise is the perfect

show you can watch while you're also doing something else. Um, the Knicks have had, they pulled out some of these, some of these late ones. And I kind of think they needed that game last night. I thought Bridges really needed it. Bridges had was threatening and just become like this appendage. And, uh, I thought that was a really big game for them. Towns hit a couple of huge threes down the stretch in the fourth quarter. But, uh, I actually think these, this Brunson injury, which you never

want anybody to get hurt, but I think it's a, it's a weirdly okay thing for them because now they have to use this different muscle. I thought they were way too reliant on him. And now it's like, Hey guys, McHale Bridge is a good offensive player. Maybe you should give him the ball every once in a while. Hey, Towns is a good matchup for the last two minutes of a game. So I think they're going to figure some things out about the supporting cast that's gonna help him when he comes back.

That's all good analysis. What I see on my end of the efficiency landscape is over the last 15 games, Detroit has the second best net rating in the entire NBA. I know. I look at this constantly and they're the one outlier, where you're like, why is this team there? It's because they have you know

Cape Cunningham Malik Beasley Malik Beasley turning into Klay Thompson. I don't think many of us predicted that but he is averaging like 43% yeah, three-point range 2016 Klay Thompson. Yes, he's shooting almost ten a game and he's making 43% of them it's one of the best catch and shoot seasons of all time. And, you know, they are playing great defense, um, in a way that the Knicks are not. I think they rebound. The rebounding is the other thing they get second chances. They control the boards.

They have size and they're nasty. It's like a nasty team. I wouldn't want to play him if I were the Knicks. But you know, we want to see what the Knicks get hold. But anyway, I just thought throw that in there. I like that every guy in the Pistons is ready to get in a fight. Talked about it before, but I just, I love their attitude on everything. And by the way, they have a realistic chance to get the four seed.

So we're taping this Thursday morning, Milwaukee is 36 and 28, Indiana is 36 and 28, Detroit's 37 and 29. Yes. And playing better net rating wise, name a stat from the last 25 games. I'm going to look it up right now as we're talking. Um, just last 25, this is nuts. I have all these bookmarks for the net ratings. And I have like 15, 25 and 20 Detroit 69, the last 25 and there's six defensive rating and do they, they have the second best day, as you mentioned.

Like that's a, that's not a small sample size. 25 games is fucking that's almost two, two months. It's like seven weeks. And they have a great offensive player. And I know if you haven't gotten a chance to enjoy the Cade Cunningham breakout season, it's, it's appointment. Would you vote for him for, for, uh, most improved, most improved who are our candidates?

I'll give you them right now. Do you have a vote? I can't remember. No, I do not have a vote. I have a vote, so I'm not allowed to bet on this. I always want to mention that. Oh, there it is. Yeah. Oh, he's the favorite minus 270.

Is Mobley in there? Dyson Daniels is plus 220. Mobley is a hundred to one. Now I will get... The crazy one is Pritchard as the favorite for six man at minus 240. Malik Beasley is plus 300, which tells me nobody's watching the pistons. Cause I would have thought Beasley should be the favorite at this point with how important he is. And he's like, they're, you know, they're number two crunch time guy. And I tied Jerome is down to 25 to one. It used to be 55 to one. I think he's in there too.

I think he's in there too. And then I guess Nas at 25 to one. I, I don't really think of him as a bench guy because it feels like he starts so much and there's always somebody hurt, but he's in there too. Who would you have? Would you go Beasley? No, I'd go Cade because I think it is the most significant. Oh, for improved you'd go Cade. Yeah.

What was the other, oh, Beasley is six man. Yes. I mean, as a nerd who loves catch and shoot stats, like this guy, this season is incredible. It's, it's, it's up there with the best catch and shoot seasons we've ever seen. Well, you know, you know what, with the thing with Beasley that I noticed at the end of games, when they're coming out of timeouts and the other team knows they're probably

going to run a play with him coming around on a three and they're like treating him like he's Klay Thompson in 2016. This is not, this is now like, oh, this is a nice story. We've, we're well beyond that. Teams are treating him like he's aoy Thompson 2016. This is not, this is now like, oh, this is a nice story. We've, we're well beyond that. Teams are treating him like he's a real guy because he's been a real guy. Yeah. And what he brings to that team's offense

that needs more offense is, is very important to their recent success. And Cade is a perfect distributor. I love what they're doing. And they, they are not, I think you're right. Milwaukee and Indiana sort of fading while they're scorching. I don't think they'll end up as a sixth seed, which should be good news for, for next fans.

There's just no good stats with Milwaukee. Like last 25, they're 12th, right? Last 20, Right. Last 20, there's 16th. And then you go, if we do, well, last 15, same thing.

They are, they are Jesus. Oh, night. That's not bad for last 15. So there's signs of life, I guess. But Detroit's played better for them for seven weeks is, I guess, the big point. Let's take one more break and then let's do our thing. I'm really excited for this. This Friday, grab your friends.

Novocaine? I thought you'd be dead by now. Get to the theater and experience the movie audiences are calling. An adrenaline rush of a good time. It's a big screen blast. Find a badass. I know, all right. Novocaine, Friday. Are you crushing your bills?

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So when I was in Austin, Texas last month for a live show, we went to your sports business class at the university of Texas in Austin had a bunch of really smart people, um, who had been working for a while on a big project. So you explained what the project was. Yeah. Like, so when the semester began, I'll take you back to January of 2025 and, and you and Rosilla and a bunch of people were doing check-ins on the NBA vibe. And at that time, the story was ratings are way down. And so

we designed a case around what's going on with the NBA and what would you do to change it. And we had a bunch of students, like 40 or 50 students, and we'd work with Fandul. They'd send us some of their handle data, which was really interesting. So to go beyond just TV ratings and look at betting handle as a proxy for interest in the league as a sort of a second. Especially the live betting and the, yeah, all that stuff. Yeah.

Because the theory is like, whether you gamble or not, I think we would all admit if there are more bets on a game, that probably means more people are paying attention to it. It might not just be on in the background, people are actually paying attention to it. And the key thing we found right away is that it is a good proxy for interest. It makes a lot of the TV ratings stuff we saw early in the season,

which sort of troughed in December and rebounded with that famous Christmas night game between the Lakers and Warriors. And now we're slightly down year over year, but I had the students like, hey, what would you do? What would you recommend to the commissioner of the NBA to improve the popularity of our broadcasts and the overall league itself?

So right now the season is 82 games. It starts on October 22nd this year. It ended on April 13th. It's 24 weeks, 82 games. The play in is the mid April. First three rounds of the playoffs this year starts April 19th. Ends June 2nd. So it's seven plus weeks for those three rounds.

And the final starts June 5th and ends June 22nd. And your students decided what? Got to start later. Move the start 45 days later in the calendar. Another opening day is in December. You still get that Christmas slate and you go into July bill. And this is really for one main reason, which is to get away from the monster that is football,

specifically NFL and college football, which hogs all of our attention, it hogs my attention in the fall, it hogs your attention. We think that there's a compelling case for the NBA to consider moving out from under that boot of the football attention. And then in the attention economy, I think if you play more of your games in January,

February, March, April, May, June, July, there's a much better chance for better television audiences and other sort of signs of interest. So two things with that. They're launching the season, October 22nd, they're going against the world series, they're going against the, the NFL season has really kicked into gear. All the teams are starting to play better. It's like the height of college football. The presidential election.

Oh yeah. Every four years of presidential election is coming. Um, and they're just popping right in the middle of that. And people are like, cool. Thanks. They're going the way they have it structured now. They're basically going against the NFL for the first 11 weeks of the NBA season. So it's, it's like 45% of the season.

They're just going head to head against NFL. Now the playoffs, there's less games eventually. They have the, I talked about how stupid this was a couple weeks ago. NFL ends, Superbowl ends. The NBA has already done their trade deadlines. So they lose that whole bump from whenever that happens. And then they go right to the all-star break. And what happens during the all-star break?

There's no basketball and everybody's complaining about how bad all-star weekend is. So that's, that's your first arrival. And then what always happens is we hit the end of basketball and everybody's complaining about how bad all-star weekend is. So that's, that's your first arrival. And then what always happens is we hit the end of February and there's good basketball games and people are like, Whoa, the NBA has got really good. It's like, now the NBA was really good. Actually you just, you were concentrated on the football. So I was like in 45 days seemed like a lot to me. And I did all these different, I sketched it out a bunch

of different ways and I think 45 days is around the right number. So the first thing I did was 42. So if you move everything 42 days, that's six weeks. Right? That starts the season on December 3rd, the week after Thanksgiving. At least that's what would have happened this year. You start December 3rd, 24 weeks ends May 25th, play in May 27th to May 30th. First three rounds, May 31st ends July 21st. And then the finals go July 24th ends August 10th.

That seems too late to me. I love second. To me, the goal should be, how do we get away from football as much as possible? How do we take advantage of all of June instead of having the finals end on like June 18th, June 19th? Why are we throwing away June? And then could July really work for us? And I think we both agree it could and your students, I mean, talk about the case they made for July.

Yeah, July traditionally, and we had, uh, we were lucky enough, Bob Eiger came to our class a couple of weeks before and said, there's a metric called HUTs, households using television that traditionally says July is a no-fly zone on television. Like that's why there's no new shows. But with streaming and the changing landscape of media consumption, even he was saying, this is no longer the case.

Like, July is open for business. There's streamers that are launching huge shows during the summer now. I think it's a little bit antiquated to say that there's no business case for playing high level basketball games. It's a lot antiquated. Yeah, I don't think this shit matters anymore. The whole model of TV goes from September to May.

We have three networks and we release stuff and we have sweeps and like, it's fucking out. Shows can hit any time of the year. If you're on vacation, you bring your cable package with you. All of us are bringing Hulu or YouTube TV or whatever it is with us wherever we're going I do think it is a fair criticism bill to say that the NBA Finals being in July would be annoying to a lot of the key stakeholders whether those are the players the coaches the executives the people running the buildings

People in Phoenix or Los Angeles might not want to be in town in July. Those kinds of thoughts are relevant here, but ultimately I think there is a strong business case to be made that we could play the playoffs in the finals later in the spring than we currently do. That's where I landed, That's where the students landed. Um, and I think it's, it's compelling enough. The league should consider it. Well, so there's two big things. One, the number of weeks you could just get away from football is just the 100% positive that's it.

Like you're not equal to football. You're not going to be, it's a way bigger audience. You don't have the gambling fantasy stuff that football has. You don't have the ability for everybody to mobilize around Sundays. And football is getting better and better at doing their own schedule. They're better at, oh, here's a Friday game. Oh, now we're going to have two Christmas games. Oh, now we're going to tackle Saturdays.

Like football is just going to get better and better at killing the NBA during these first two months. So the more you can get away from that the better and then I just feel like for the NBA April May June July should be the peak months and all of July. So one of the things I was looking at If you moved everything 42 days, but you had a 76 game regular season So everybody loses three home games three away games. Sorry, you guys just signed a 76 billion dollar season. So everybody loses three home games, three away games. Sorry. You guys just signed a $76 billion deal. You'll be fine. That would start the season on December 3rd, but ended on May 11th, 22 weeks, 76 games.

Play in May 13th to May 16th. First three rounds, May 17th to July 7th. Now we're talking. Finals, July 10th to July 7th. Now we're talking. Finals, July 10th to July 27th. And now all we've done is we've targeted, basically post-NFL draft, our three best months of the season. We don't have to worry about the NFL at all.

It's out. And the only thing we'd have to worry about is like the freaking Olympics. But I don't think the NBA player should send our guys to the Olympics anyway. So we're fine. Um, with that, so I've asked NBA people about this in the past and they said the biggest reason they wouldn't move it is because of the summer schedule because we need our summers.

It's the two months off. Our kids are home from school, whatever. Counter, you'd still have August. During July, you're working anyway with the Vegas summer league. That's become like a, almost a two week event. I would get rid of Vegas summer league completely and use that so that we're done July 27th. The draft is July 31st. Tone down summer league. Don't make it this huge thing.

And then you basically get August and September and half of October off before we get the pre- that makes way more sense to me. Yeah. I think it would make way more money too. And there's a one word that hasn't come up, which explains why it isn't like this already. And that's baseball. When the NBA started avoiding baseball on the calendar was that, that era's

version of avoiding football now. Right. You know, Mickey Mantle and the Yankees, we can't compete with that. Like let's, let's start our season right after the world series. Like that's, that was the logic. This is now an updated version of that where Mickey Mantle and the Yankees is now Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs. And one further point, what did Disney just do this week or last couple of weeks

is get off of their baseball relationship. That's one of the major media partners and they need inventory later into the spring and summer. There's no Sunday night baseball anymore. Well, let's put, you's put the first round of the playoffs into April, May, June, and give them more summertime content for those key moments,

because they're also strapped down with football for the entire fall too. So I think there's a lot of compelling reasons to think about this from a media perspective, and as a league that's trying to gain more eyeballs and revenue in an attention economy that's increasingly competitive and increasingly in the sports world dominated by both pro football and high level college football in the fall. Yeah.

If you're being smart about this, everything moving later also means the trade deadline is after the NFL season. Your all star break and all star game. If you have one now that's moving to mid March, maybe even during March madness. Maybe you just don't have an all star game anymore and you just have all star break is March madness. I still love Chris Ryan's idea of having all-star break actually just be bi-weeks with 10 team bi-weeks, three weeks in a row,

or each set of 10 teams gets one week off. And I would get rid of the all-star game. I don't think it works. If they want to have some sort of big corporate event, make that the NBA cup whenever you have that. But the big thing to me that we know we're right is because some of the stuff that they're already doing is a reaction to the fact that football is just killing them, right?

Moving the TNT Barkley show from Thursdays to Tuesdays during the NFL season is a direct concession that you're getting destroyed on Thursday nights. Right. Just period. Doing this NBA cup thing is a direct concession that nobody gives a shit about the NBA in late October, November, and December, and you need to do something to be like, Hey, we're over here. They just need to move it.

And here's the other thing, Kurt Goldsberry, we know expansions come in 32 teams. If there's ever a time to go to a 69 game schedule, it's when they do these expansion teams because 32 games, you play the other 31 teams twice, right? You have four, 18 conference, 18 divisions. So you play everybody twice and you play everyone in your vision one more time. And it's 69 games total. All right. So let's start the season, December 10th. So you play everybody twice and you play everyone in your vision one more time and it's 69 games total. All right.

So let's start the season December 10th. Let's end it May 4th. Let's play a 20 week season. Let's start the plan May 6th and May 9th. Let's play the first three rounds, May 10th to June 30th. And let's start the finals July 3rd and on July 20th with a 69 game schedule. There's no fucking way you can tell me that's not going to be better for the NBA. If attention is good, then that's better.

Uh, and I think the other thing you mentioned in there is like make the NBA cup, the all star game right after the Superbowl, that's our welcome back to the NBA moment for football. It's so it's such a great format. Shout out to the NBA for adding that. It really makes those, those meaningful one game events that the NFL has taught us are so great. But the NBA Cup is a winning addition to the calendar. And I think you're right.

I think we could survive in July. I don't know about summer league in August. That's a tricky part. There will be people who are annoyed. You just have it for the, don't make it as big of a thing as it was and just make it like, I thought that if you're going to do a counter on this, the hardest thing to figure out is the college season ends, kids graduate, but you wouldn't be able to have the draft until July and end of July.

So none of those kids would know where they're playing, who they're working out for, for an extra six weeks. That's not nothing. Maybe you have the draft between the regular season and playoffs. I don't know. But that's the only part I can figure out. Well, so the, let's say, you know, early April college season ends, you know, if we're not starting until December, who cares if the draft is not till the August

or whatever, I think that's fine. Right. Those kids are all working out on whatever. I think that's fine. Right. Those kids are all working out on themselves. All right. Screw the rookies. So just, I'm going to go through this one more time. 69 game regular season. Once we have 32 teams starts December 10th, ends May 4th.

We could even say, we'll give everyone next week. We'll start May 11th, but let's say May 4th. The playoffs are done. First three rounds on June 30th. Finals goes July 3rd, right before July 4th, which would be cool. Um, through July 20th and we're done on July 20th. So we basically, if you shorten the season and then move it and it's a month longer, and now I'm concentrating all my best stuff in May, June, July, that's how you win and this is how they have to think. And if they don't start thinking this way, I'm concentrating all my best stuff in May, June, July. That's how you win. And this is how they have to think.

And if they don't start thinking this way, I'm going to really start thinking that they need the leadership at the top. I know they got this giant media deal, but these are easy fixes that they should do. Well, and the other thing that I think is starting to percolate out there is this rumor of alternate leagues coming around.

And I think that it could be- It's not a rumor anymore. It's not a rumor anymore. It's not a rumor anymore. And I wonder, you know, in an era where live golf came in and this Saudi soccer thing came in, if the league keeps jamming us up with 82 games and making it such a slog, if they don't show some concession to the athletes or the players, are they making these rival league potentials more attractive to some of their talent around?

And you can call me crazy all you want. I'm not saying if you follow soccer or golf, you've just seen this. Those things weren't gonna be real until they were. I think there's a real chance, the NBA needs to be proactive here. That's what I would say. Keep being proactive. Don't be reactive here.

There's a chance to make the NBA better. And if you look at the numbers, I think it was Laker Celtics, biggest broadcast of the year, perfect. When did that happen? After the NFL. If you put that game on a wild card Saturday, you're done. Nobody watches that. And you put it instead in March and here we have 5 million people watching

it on American television. Uh, that's a big deal. That's the kind of incremental improvement we could ramp up across the, across the business. Uh, if we got out of the way of football. Well, one of the cool things that your students say, I mean, there's all this anecdotal evidence we have anyway, that football is just destroying everyone else and that it's an absolute monster. But then the college football piece, not just NFL, where college football really crests

from the end of August, mid November, probably. And then we start getting it. So it's probably mid November range. So you're going, it's too monoliths every weekend. Right. Um, I just don't know why you would do that if you don't have to. That the only thing my big takeaway is, and I didn't really think about it toes in your class, it makes zero sense to start on October 22nd, October 23rd, anywhere in October, it's stupid.

They shouldn't do it anymore. And if they're going to move, if they want to move it to mid November, even that makes more sense. Right. But first week of December makes the most sense and they just have to start thinking that way. And I really think like, if you're just trying to get like basketball, NBA Nirvana for how a season should go, it should be 69 games.

It should start in December and it should end in July and they're going to win if they do that. One. So one of the people at the NBA told me told me is like, you know, we came up with the NBA cup as a way to sort of help the owners compensate for a loss of regular season inventory. And when confronted with the idea, hey, let's go down to 70 games or 74 games. We're going to add this in season property to compensate for that. We'll sell it to a media partner. The owners, of course, came back with, well, why don't we do 82 games and the in season tournament? had this in-season property to compensate for that. We'll sell it to a media partner. The owners, of course, came back with,

well, why don't we do 82 games and the in-season tournament and not lose any money? So I think somebody needs to do a better job of convincing owners and players that somehow we're gonna make the same amount of total revenue if we drop the games to 70, 69, whatever we decide. Cause right now that's the case that has failed to make it across the table and

land with the owners. And that's the simple reason why we still have 82 games. Hey, I have a question. How much fucking revenue do you need? We're going to have guys making $75 billion a year. Like how much is, how much is enough? You just signed a $76 billion deal. Like do what's best for the sport, try to grow the sport.

And this is the best way to do it. You mentioned the alternative league. So it's, it's being pushed by a Maverick Carter who's LeBron, one of his business guys. And when I heard about it, I thought it was, I just thought it was bullshit because, um, I didn't think it was real because I thought initially everyone thought those guys were getting the Vegas team. And then I, I don't, I think it's wide open. I don't think they have any inside track at all.

And in fact, there's other groups that I would bet on before them. And I thought this was a ploy by them to pretend they're doing, raising Saudi money and blah, blah, blah. And ultimately, all right, we'll drop it. If we get the Vegas team. That's not the case. They have got a shitload of money for this and a plan. And everything I've heard is that it's kind of real.

I don't know if they have all the money yet, but they have enough that could you form a six team league and convince five, six, seven stars to basically jump when their contracts, I think the contracts would have to be over, but I look at Luca. He's done in 26. Like that's somebody like, all right, if he's, could this be a live situation, what does he carry? Is that mean loyalty to the NBA? He just got traded.

So like, could you pay, could you build a league and have like six, seven Luca type guys, Hey Luca, here's a hundred million dollars a year. You're playing a 35 game season and you're gonna be one of the faces of this league. Like I think it's real. And I think the NBA owners are a little more worried about it than I think has been reported so far. Yeah. Imagine a world where you get paid more money

to play less basketball and travel around the world. Way less basketball. Way less basketball, right? Imagine a world where you're paid more money to play less basketball, travel around the world. Way less basketball. Way less basketball, right? Imagine a world where you're paid more money to play less basketball, travel around the world. You get to live if you're Luka. I'm not, I haven't heard anything about if you're Luka, you can live in Slovenia and make these flights to Singapore or Manila or Shanghai to play in this touring

style, um, F1 almost structured basketball league. touring style, um, F one almost structured basketball league. Again, anybody who's followed soccer or golf knows this could happen. This can happen. So to sit here and say, this is, this is, this is impossible is to be naive. Um, and. And it's also that we're in a world right now where rich people throw money at sports stuff. It's just a fact.

We're in a world now where the Saudis and everybody in that side of the world is pumping incredible amounts of money in a UFC and the WWE and boxing. Like they've completely transformed boxing. The thing that they couldn't decide to just do that with basketball is nuts. It's naive. And basketball is legitimately a global sport now in the NBA. It is a global league to its credit. I got to go to Paris and watch NBA games, but that was two games on the continent of Europe all year long.

Um, people in the Philippines would kill to see this level of basketball. People in China, people in Europe, people in Africa, Australia. This is truly a global game, unlike baseball or football. And so I think that makes it even more attractive to somebody to come through and try to disrupt it. Because you know what? Memphis and Cleveland, those are cool cities, but so are Singapore and Shanghai.

And there's real money around there. You mentioned that it's a global game. They also have players that I think unlike with some of the golfers, you have players that have huge social media footprints that if they switch leagues or did something else, they'd actually be able to promote themselves. And it's like, I remember when my contract was almost up with ESPN, and it seemed like people thought I was gonna leave and they were writing about it.

It's like, well, you can't leave ESPN. You can't leave the machine. It's like, guess what? And then all these people over the next 10 years, including myself, were able to leave and start stuff. And it's like, you don't need the fucking machine. I don't think the basketball players need the machine. I think if they were part of another league,

I think people would pay attention to it. Dude, down here in Texas, there's like more than one of my friends, multiple friends, Mavericks fan friends that are not joking when they say I'm rooting for the Lakers this year. Right. Like maybe these brands aren't as strong as we think they are in the social media era where you say, oh, Luke at Donjes is on. Not with kids.

Yeah. Oh, I'm a Luke at Donjic. Kids follow the players. Yeah, shout out to Jason Gallagher's kid again. I mean, like, that's the future. I'm just going. Jason Gallagher's kid. Just repeated mentions on the pod. Yeah.

You're right though. They're just gonna follow, they'll follow him there and guess what? They'll probably follow him too when he's playing for the Singapore Giants. Or whatever they call it. That's what soccer's taught us, dude. I mean, that's exactly how these kids follow soccer.

They're Ronaldo or they're Messi or they're Mbappe and they're going with them wherever that's going. Why wouldn't that happen to these athletes that are just as popular? Well, I'll tell you this. The NBA has to start taking all this shit seriously. They're throwing away the first two months of the season every year. The season's too long. Nobody likes it.

The players don't like it. There's all these solutions that they're unwilling to explore. They're going to add two teams and somehow keep an 82 game schedule, which is stupid. And they have all this money that they already got that allows them now the luxury to rethink this whole system. And that's how they should be thinking. And if they're not thinking that way, they need new people to run the league.

And one last, one last point about the 82 games. It's more than just too much inventory load management. If you look at the data load management really annoys fans. People don't want to turn on TNT like we did for that Celtic Sixers game the other night and see the main red claws in the Delta where Delaware 87ers. One of the reasons that happens is we're, we're, we're putting too many games out there. If we had fewer games, there'd be fewer load management situations.

We would have full full teams playing each other. The product would be better on average. Well, you'd also have a situation like Philly is now punted on their season. You don't have to watch the zombie Sixers for the next two months, not give a shit like, all right, we're out way sooner, you know, simulation mode. You can enter. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, I think that's a big thing, but I think the shorter season where games feel more like events, it takes a little blind faith to see that that could get you to more revenue. But I love your point about, Hey, well, you just locked up this huge media rights

deal. Do you really need a lot? Every people are paying the most money they've ever paid for your teams. Like this is a time now to be proactive and try to get better at stuff. And that this is going to require real vision. And it's not just like, we've come up with the NBA cup. We've added a new event to all star weekend on Saturday. It's like, we're not talking about that. Like you have a chance to actually fix shit.

All right, Kurt Goldsberry, it was fun to sit in your class. Shout out to your students. That was a great presentation. I will see you soon. Say hi to everybody in Austin. Thank you, Bill. Thank you. When the frustration grows and the doubts start to creep in,

we all need someone who has our back to tell us we'll be okay, to remind us of our ability to believe, because their belief in us transfers to self-belief and reminds us of all that we're capable of. We all need someone to make us believe. Hashtag, you got this. Walk with us, connect to the land that connects us all. Grow with us. Come together and make space for each other. Eat with us. Taste the many flavors of our cultures. Laugh with us, smile, joke, and bring each other joy.

Come walk with us. Indigenous tourism, Alberta. All right. My dad is here, um, complaining to me all during the OKC Celtic game. It's been a tumultuous year for him. He just adopted a new puppy, um, lost sadly lost Sally a couple months ago. You thought you were gonna be a one dog family and then all of a sudden you're telling me

you're getting a puppy, Ruby is the name, and now you're up with a puppy that's peeing on pads and scratching and biting you and was it worth it? I guess is my question. Yes, I think. I'm just watching it because she's been peeing on the floor all morning. Oh, good. Yeah. Actually, last night was good.

She got up at two o'clock, she did her business, went back to bed, woke me up at 7.30. She's only 10 weeks old. Sounds great. Yeah. Like you said, Molly, my wife, Molly can bring the puppy when she's 10 years old to the nursing home to visit. It's going to work out great.

All right. Good. Congratulations. Yeah. So you, you went through the Celtic game last night and you hadn't seen this version of OKC in person. Um, what was your take? What was your in-person takeaway of the Thunder?

A couple things. It's the best team I've seen all year come into the Garden in person. They seem to have 20 players that they just rotated in and out. I didn't know half the names of the players on the team. They just came in. They played great defense, whoever it was. They got rebounds, they passed well.

They didn't settle for the three. They only took the three when it was open and they had no lane to the basket. But they went to the basket a lot. I don't know if you saw the free-for-all disparity. They had over 30 free throws yesterday and they earned them. They went to the basket. They were physical. Meanwhile, we were terrible. We just settled for three-point shot after three-point shot. Nobody wanted to go to the basket. Jalen Brown had one of those horrific games that he occasionally has fouled out, which is so unusual, but he

made dumb fouls. And on top of it, it was my least favorite referee crew. So when I saw who the refs were, I was thinking, you know, this is a big game for the NBA. It's, you know, you think they could have brought in a good crew and, uh, I wish I should mention my dad's not a Tyler Ford guy. So if you see, if you see Tyler Ford doing a South the game, just know my dad's upset immediately. Yeah, it couldn't have just been me. The whole game, the subjects were, I know we

complain a lot of the sucks complain a lot on the floor, but there were some really horrendous calls last night and the disparity, you know, you're the home team, even though you're not going to the basket, you should get a few calls, right? Yeah. See all the Celtic fans were saying this, but we shot 63-3. So at that point, you're probably not going to get a shitload of free throws. You know, I, we weren't going to the basket enough. I asked, I think, Kirk and I talked about the game a little bit, but I left some stuff for you.

I thought Dort was like the worst possible guy to guard Jaylen. I thought Jaylen could not solve him at all. He's just strong. He's smaller and he just couldn't figure him out. Yeah. It was so ironic after watching, uh, what a good job Brown did in the previous game on the Lakers. Yeah. And, uh, in this game, uh, he not only did a poor job on defense, Dork killed him.

Uh, you know, he's built like a linebacker. Yeah. He just, he really outmuscled him. Uh, you know, he's built like a linebacker. He just, he really outmuscled him. I know everybody's talked about how, what great shape Jalen Brown is in from working out all summer. And you know, he is a pretty big guy, but Dorff made him look small. Yeah. It was, uh, yeah, it was a frustrating game for everybody. So this is 51 or 52 years season tickets for you. This is my 51st year.

How many guards have you seen in person that were better than SGA? Oh, I mean Jordan, obviously. Yeah. Would you, would you put him on like the like second highest level highest level? Like he's unstoppable. And we were throwing everybody at him. Yeah, he's in the top 10 obviously. I've not seen him in person because they didn't go to the game last year against OKC.

He was unstoppable. And also, he's fluid. Like he goes to the basket, looks like he's going to be contained and gets the shot up somehow. It has a lot of tricky shots too. And they all go in. If I'm a defender, I'm really frustrated trying to go to that guy. It was really good.

I already mentioned that he has my MVP vote. Oh yeah. I don't know if you got a vote this year, but I'm going to pass it along anyway. I thought because I was in the documentary, I got a vote this year. No, you don't get a vote. Which the SGA though, an ability for us to control him reminded me of Andrew Toney a million years ago. I was thinking of some of the other, because I remember we went to that finals

game in Oh, eight when, uh, when they beat the Lakers that year, but Kobe, there was that game too, when the Lakers started coming back and Kobe all of a sudden was unstoppable for like two minutes. And there's the crowd. You can feel the energy kind of die. Cause you're going, Oh my God, what do we do? Um, SGA is a little bit like that. Like I was thinking about a series against him and you'd think like with holiday and Derek White, and then some size with Brown and Tatum,

this is the right kind of team to stop him, but I'm not sure anyone's stopping him this year. Well, I will, I will have a caveat though. He, he goes through the basket frequently. I mean, he has a very, very nice, obviously a good outside shot made a couple threes, but his game is going to the basket. Right. No Porzingis. Are you going there?

Yeah. Porzingis would have made a difference in the middle. Uh, we got out remounded out hustled. They played a two big lineup and our two bigs were Horford and, uh, Yeah, Luke Cornett, Luke Cornett. And, uh, we just didn't match up very well, but it wasn't just that they're a driving team and they had a lot of laps.

And I know poor Zingas would have made a difference out there. Yeah. But the problem is, and you and I talk about this constantly, like, Porzingis has hit the point where it's exciting to have him. You notice when he's in the game and he just hasn't played enough and there's this reason, that reason, another reason. And now I'm at the point where you think about having to get through the Knicks and Cleveland and OKC potentially, I don't think they can win all three of those rounds without Porzingis and I have no idea if he's going to be available.

I agree. Um, I was just reading the, he's missed seven of the last eight games and the one game he did play, he, he had, he was limited minutes and it's very mysterious. He has, he has this virus that has, that they can't find out what it is. He was at the game last night, all dressed up, sitting on the bench. He looked great, but he wasn't playing the game. Right.

I don't get it. You've gone to a lot of these games. What's up with the, why aren't they better at home this year? What is it? Too many threes. They get three happy at home. They don't seem to go to the,

that's one thing. They don't go to the basket the basket. That's one thing. They don't go to the basket as much. The other thing that I've noticed is that they always start slow. It's like they didn't wake up yet. Last night was a prime example. It was nine-nothing and they took a timeout. Now you have nine points you have to make up.

And what do we lose by? I think we lost by seven you know, seven or eight. I don't know why the slow starts. I don't know whether, I don't know what's going on there. They, you know, if you noticed last night, our first 10 shots with three point shots, if they're not going in, that leads to a defensive rebound, a fast break by the other team. And suddenly they're scoring and, uh, we don't work the ball inside when Porzingis isn't there. I mean, the thing is, if I showed you, if you didn't even watch the game and I

just showed you the stat sheet and it was like, we shot 63 threes and 12 free throws, we got, we lost. Like that's, that's just, that's a guaranteed loss. The guy in front of me, Mike said to me is wet almost the end of the first quarter. He said, you know, we haven't taken or made us two point shot yet. Every time it was a free or free free throw that you can't win against a team like, okay, see playing that kind of basketball, you know, it's hit or miss. Can you give us your, uh, your Tatum?

You've watched every season of Tatum's career you've been going. Yeah. I feel like he's gone up half a level. I thought he was awesome in the Laker game. I thought he was really good last night. He certainly wasn't the reason they lost. Um, and in general feels like he's gone up a notch. So what are you seeing in person?

I feel, I agree with you. He's gone up a notch. It's the you seeing in person? I feel, I agree with you. He's gone up a notch. It's the best season he's had that I've seen him play. Uh, he's, he's like a, uh, the general out there. He controls all of our offensive action. Um, you know, it's every game he takes three or four shots. He kind of wish he didn't take, uh, that may be. And I don't know whether, you know, too many times going to the basket, you

know, you don't want to be hit every time you go in there, but it seems like every time he goes to the basket, he can score. I like when he goes to the basket, but then pulls up and takes that 15 footer. I feel like that's unstoppable. It's been unstoppable the last month or so, but he doesn't do it that often. He'll more often settle, you know, he'll be out three point line. And all of a sudden I look up and the shot clocks at six seconds, five seconds. And he takes that fall away.

Pretty long three point shot and it's hit or miss. He doesn't have a good percentage on that. Yeah. I'd love to see him go to the basket more. Maybe if Porzingis was out there opening the lane up a little bit. OKC really clogged the lane with their bigs. There wasn't a lot of room to drive, which I understand from why they took so many threes. But you would

have been frustrated sitting at that game. Yeah. I didn't enjoy watching on TV. I mean, the biggest thing that shifted this year is we left last season, Tatum and Brown were kind of one A one B. Yeah. And Tatum has really, and it's not, Jaylen has had some good stretches and some bad stretches, but Tatum, the amount of stuff

that he's doing game to game on both sides is he's also the best rebounder on the team. He defends everybody on the other team. He runs the offense. I think he's having an awesome season. To me, he's clearly the number three MVP. There's some Yanis people who are like, well, Yanis is 30 and 12 and six, but I just think the Celtics are more successful and Tatum has as big of a burden and he's also running the offense.

There's a couple of other trends that I noticed. You know, it was the fourth quarter, middle of the fourth quarter and Jaylen Brown had four points and five fouls. That's your highest paid player. You can't get that out of that guy. And you're trying to light a fire under Jalen Brown right now? I didn't understand his game last night. The other thing you and I have talked about it, their bench. OKC's bench was terrific. Our bench wasn't. I know when you have a starter at everybody moves up a little bit, but I love Pritchard and I love Hauser, but in really big games against really good

teams who have a good defense, they shut them down. Yeah, I agree. Yeah, I agree. That's why I don't think Pritchard he's favorite to win six man, but I've just seen too many games where I don't think he's impactful enough. Whereas Cleveland, that Ty Jerome will come in and he'll just swing the game when he comes in. There's games where Prichard doesn't do that.

But I also think the amount of money they're paying for the top six guys in this team, it's really hard to have a bench. It's just hard to find that ninth, 10th, 11th guy when you're showing out the amount of money that they're paying. So it makes sense, but I agree. I thought, okay. See, just seemed so much deeper last night.

Okay. See, did something else that the teams that are beating us seem to be doing. They're picking us up almost at half court trying to put miles on Tatum. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, pushing us out, pushing us out further and making us so, and by doing that, when you look up at the shot clock, it's 10 seconds to go. By the way, we did that to the Lakers on Saturday.

That was one of the big reasons they, they were making Luca and LeBron like really work just to bring the ball up, which I don't understand why more teams don't do against them. Yeah. That's what, that's why Brown was more teams don't do against them. Yeah. That's what that's why Brown was so effective against Luca against the Lakers. Um, it was, you know, Brown was on, uh, um, Alexander last night quite a bit, but he's a different kind of player than, uh, Luca in person. He's very slight.

Uh, you don't expect him to be, you know, he gets a lot of rebounds. He's, he's slithered through the lane. Like very few players I've seen. Um, and Brown couldn't stop them. So would you have us, you said you saw a Boston Cleveland game in person too. Yeah. Yeah. Would you have us third with those three right now? Right now I would. Yeah, I would too.

Well, for kind of a different reason. I know that, okay, see the Williams kid didn't play last night, but Cleveland is 100% healthy usually this year. And you and I talked about it. I thought they made a couple of great additions for their bench. Yeah, we like Hunter. I always loved Hunter.

And I always, when Jerome was on OKC, I thought he's a great guy off the bench. Yeah. So who gets them both? Cleveland. Right. Yeah, I know they had Caproom, but, and that's like you said earlier,

that's where we have a difficulty. When our six players make so much money at the top. What's the, uh, what's the Patriots fever right now with the free agents and the number four pick? Well, I think people like the additions. Yeah. With the exception of why haven't we signed a receiver and why haven't we signed an offensive tackle? And like the paper today that Cam, I don't, I can't say I've ever seen Cam Robinson play,

except he is a left tackle and maybe a plug him in for a year. Yeah. It's tough. It's tough when the case for somebody is he has two arms, two legs and a head and he plays left tackle. All right. 20 million. Let's give him a chance.

Yeah. A cup of cup from the Rams. I think you think he's done. I think he's, I think it's a rep. There's some bad stats with him about getting open like year by year, the last five years where last year he just doesn't get open anymore. We don't need another guy who can't get open. Yeah.

We already have five guys who can't get open. I, here's where I've talked myself into. Um, well, first of all, I'm, I'm, I'm praying the giants take Sanders cause they don't have a quarterback and it seems like Rogers might go to Pittsburgh and they haven't done anything else. So it's like, please take Sanders. I am all in. I'm planting my flag in this

because they don't need Graham because they beefed up the defensive line. I'm all in on Travis Hunter. I'm all in on taking him at receiver at four. And then maybe in the dime packages, he comes in and plays some D back. But just, can you turn him into a top five receiver? I think you could. That's your number one receiver. You also have the flexibility.

Maybe he can play on the other side of the ball a little bit. It's just like, he's, it just seems like he's a sure thing. I want a sure thing at the number four. I want, I want like a blue chipper who would be a $35 million player a year someday. That's what I want. I agree with it. It seems like there's two sure things, uh, Hunter and Carter, and it would be fabulous to have Carter on a defensive line with the additions

we've made. Otherwise trade back. If you don't get one of those two trade back. It trade back. And maybe take one of the other tackles at 10 or 11 or somewhere in there. I do love the Drake May Hunter idea would be super fun, but I think this has been a really fun draft to follow, especially like we just need two teams to take a quarterback

ahead of us. And then it shoves the guys down and you're just watching the giants not get anyone, not make the Stafford trade, not get a free agent. not get anyone, not make the Stafford trade, not get a free agent. I'm feeling, I'm feeling optimistic that you know what happens in these drafts. Teams get really anxious. I don't have a quarterback. Yeah. There's two quarterbacks sitting there. Right.

I not going to be at all surprised if we don't see the Giants take the quarterback. Uh, they have no quarterback. I can't, I can't wait. It's going to be the most exciting draft we've had in awhile because, um, to pick this high and potentially have it work out. Um, Marshan, can we talk Marshan for a second? Yeah. Um, very, I hate the way the Bruins, uh, let our 16 year old, 16 year veteran captain of the team just walk away somewhere else, especially to an arch enemy team.

The band. That was the worst part for me was Florida. Just come on at all the teams. That's who that's who you're going to trade them to. Well, the other thing is they gave a crazy amount of money to Lin home. Yeah. The forward or center forward and he, and he's terrible. So we know Marchand gives 110%.

Yeah. He's our second leading scorer. It was our second leading scorer, uh, pony up some money. And he's a legend. He's going to retire, retire, retire up some money. And he's a legend. He's going to retire, retire, retire as a hall of fame or all that stuff. It's the part of sports that I hate. But it's the Danny age thing, right?

Where Danny age used to say, if I was running the Celtics in the late eighties, I would have traded Bird and McKaylin started over. You can't be loyal to the memories. He traded Kevin Garnett in 2013. It's like the best thing for the team is to make the move, but I don't know, you get like a late pick in the first round and it's not like this is making a break in your future.

Well, it's not even a first, it's a second round break. It's a conditional second that can turn into a first, yeah. I just think that Marshan was not the guy you traded. You work it out or you let them stay here until the end of the year. We're not going anywhere. His cousin Brian, all right. I know he took this one hard. He did take this one hard. There's nobody left. I mean, who's going to be the, well, pastor next to your number one jersey in the stands now, but other than that, nobody left from 2000, early 2010s that whole run. Right.

Now the irony is I think within the two weeks that they traded March and they, they identified next year's ticket prices, which they raised quite a bit. Yeah. So the timing was terrible. Quite a bit. Yeah. So the timing was terrible. I also, there, don't you think that Neely and Sweeney are on thin ice in terms of where we're headed and the move, the moves we've made over the last five years? Well, it's a whole generation now that they won the cup though. The month I started grant land right this is a million years ago. Yeah, it's like

You have like 20 year old kids now that barely remember it. It was for me. It was two dogs ago Right. That's how yeah, I forgot. That's how you measure dog ears or living dogs Yeah, I don't know. I don't know that cuz they have that and then the other thing is the Celtic sale that Somebody today did you see it? I don't know. I don't know. Uh, that, cause they have that. And then the other thing is the Celtic sale that somebody today, did you see it? There's four left. The four left. Yeah. And the bids are the final bids are coming in Friday. There was five. And Lori dropped out the Eagles owner. I think he, I think, uh, like pretty soon after the super bowl was out, I thought they thought they, they think they thought there was gonna be five.

When they look at a lengthy write-up in Boston, well without that, it doesn't look like anybody has the means to pay for this team without a lot of backup support. So that's one of the things about it. Well, one of the things is nobody knows the composition of all the groups. So you have all these minority partners who are going to throw them money, but nobody knows what side they picked with the four left and who's on whose team.

So it's, it's a lot of, uh, but tied to the Bruins, I think part of the play would be you'd build a new arena. And so you're paying for the team, but then you also know, like in the 2030s, there's going to be some sort of basketball arena that you build. That's like what the Quippers did. So it's really, you're like 10 billion all in. So you need like the capital behind that.

But for the Bruins, it's not great cause they're going to be stuck in this other building, they'll be the only tenant in seven years. And then the team hasn't been, you know, it's definitely arrow pointing down. So it's interesting times. A building that's going to be 30 years old soon. Isn't that crazy? Remember driving by the garden and just seeing the carcass of half of a stadium for that whole winter in 94. I remember almost 30 years ago after we'd had our tickets in the old garden,

20 years plus them taking me into this new garden to pick a seat 30 years ago now. And it, it, I know they've done it as much as they could refreshing it, but it is what it is. Uh, it's not like the new arena, like you've been talking about the Clippers place, how spectacular it is. Yeah. No, I think the Lakers are in the same boat. The Staples was built, I think in like 99 or 2000, it's quote unquote state of the art, but it's really not, it sucks. And now they're in this, what do you do? And you have the Quippers who have this incredible arena.

So I know that's going to be a piece of the Celtics purchase. You have to think arena. But you know, Boston as well as I do, there's no land. I mean, there's one part that if you go back and you read, remember when we, we were going to have the Olympics in Boston for that before it got shut down. They had a whole plan for where it was going to be. And one of the, uh, one of the big locations was going to be on 93 past, like where Emerson is going toward like Quincy and the Cape.

And there's this whole section. Yeah. And I think that's where the arena would go if I think that's the location and I think it's open. So I, whatever it'll definitely, something's definitely going to happen over the next 10 years. But that the big thing for me with the Celtic sale is like Pagliuca is one of the four guys left. He's the number two owner right now. He's the one that if he gets it, you have the stability, you keep the organization intact, if the other three guys, any of those guys get it, who knows, they just

come in like, here are my ideas. I'm bringing in my own guys and you could have just complete dysfunction. Yeah. And that really worries me. It's like the year John Y. Brown came in from Kentucky. You know, people come in from outside of Massachusetts. They come in with their whole different ideas, you know. Well, they all want to do their one thing. And then you end up in the Luka Dacic situation where you have the new Dallas owners. yeah, let's trade them. We get Anthony Davis and a pick Max Christie.

The other thing we've talked about it, if they don't have deep enough pockets, um, Brown's probably on his way out the door. Um, the tax bill is pretty crazy. It is crazy. Yeah. I think like some of it will depend on what happens in the playoffs, but yeah, I'm, I'm prepared as a fan. I'm prepared and you are too.

Like, I don't know what's going to happen. You're going to have this new owner group paying six plus billion dollars. The team, let's say they don't win the title and then they're looking at a tax bill of $200 million on top of what they just paid. And it's like, all right, first move. I've decided to do this. God only knows what that's gonna be. It could be anything.

They've already, we just got our packages a couple of weeks ago for season tickets for next year. Significant increase in ticket prices. Oh, really? Yeah, and I understand, you know, we're one of the champions. Maybe to wire you some money? I just wanted to mention it, you know. All right, I'll some money. I just wanted to mention it. You know, I'll flag it.

I'll talk to my guy. I read online yesterday that you signed a new contract. Oh yeah. I could buy some extra. So they raised, so they jacked it like 10%. Oh, it's a good, each seating area has a different percentage, but, uh, I just wanted to mention it, you know, as long as we're talking. Well, we have the episode three of Celtic City, which, spoiler alert, you popped in.

We interviewed 100 plus people. We interviewed some old season ticket holders. But that first year you bought your ticket was four bucks. Four dollars, yeah. Four dollars for the 73-74 season. Four dollars. So now it's like, what is it now like like 400 a ticket? Well, no, not that high Is it up there I can talk after Jesus they flex the tickets yeah Yeah, so there's no one price for the seat for one game

You come in and you see Dallas now, one of the terrible teams or New Orleans. It's a totally different price than the Lakers, for example. And Philly, they could probably, if Philly comes in again, they could probably tank those tickets and knock them down. But you know, it's understandable that they raised the prices. Yeah. On the Bruins end, it's not understandable for the product they're putting out and the fact that they let their captain go.

Yeah. It's funny. Like when we, when you add, we used to go to the games in the seventies and it was all blue collar, all, all like just the most normal people possible. And then the eighties, we just started watching them go away one at a time. Right. Yeah. And I remember the guy, the guy with the hat with the mustache, like that guy who was in all of a sudden he was gone and just, and it just, and then by the time we got to the fleet center, it was just completely different.

Yeah. Big bird with the sun. Yeah. Yeah. All the regular Mary in front of us, all the regulars. There's a new group of very nice people. Yeah. It's a different group. There's still some old timers there though. Yeah, there are. Yeah.

But you're like, I think you're like in the top six of longest runs now or top five. Yeah, I should be. I think. Should honor you at halftime or something. Jesus. They mistakenly say that this season ticket hold has tickets 55 years, but he got them from his brother who passed away. Right. We're right.

It's not like it should be straight through. Yeah. I mean, I consider that the same way the Lakers count the Minnesota titles. Yeah. Right. It's the same thing. Right. We had that in the episode two of Celtic city.

They mentioned how the Lakers trying to win their first title in Los Angeles. And, you know, they're not counting the Minnesota titles at all. And then somewhere in the eighties, all of a sudden they're like, yeah, and those five titles we won in Minnesota. Um, I'm sure like if OKC wins the title this year, they're not going to be like, it's our second title following the one we won in Seattle. They're not going to be like, it's our second title. Follow the one we went in Seattle. They're not going to say that. Yeah.

I think it's crazy. I guess were they the Minnesota Lakers? So they changed it in Minneapolis Lakers Minneapolis. So that's, that's what they hang their hat on, I guess. We live out there. I mean, you should have had a bit of an argument with some people about, they probably have 12 titles. I'll tell you, you should have an argument with some people about, they probably have a 12 titles. I'll tell you the Luca thing is maddening because they love Luca and that energy

at the home games is completely different already. And this is like LeBron, like obviously most pot, one of the most popular NBA players of this century and one of the most famous and one of the best, but he's been on all these other teams and it's always year to year with him. And he's a Laker, but it's, it's a little more of a hired gun. They look at Luca and they're like, this guy's 25. Like this guy might be in our life for the next 15 years.

Like you can just feel the energy shift. So when Zoe's date shows up at the front door with a little good Jersey on that's it. That's the door gets slammed. That's not, don't worry. Don't ever worry about that. Okay. All right.

Um, good to see you. Uh, congrats on your dramatic debut in episode three, Celtic city. I still can't, I still haven't hired an agent. Yeah, probably not. I don't think you need to. Okay. All right. All right.

Good to see you. Thanks. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Kirk and my dad. Thanks to Kyle and Sarity and Gahal as well. Don't forget new rewatchable is coming Monday. Prestige TV Sunday night. White Lotus recap. And you can get all this as video podcast on Spotify, which is what you should do. I will see you on Sunday with Priscilla. Have a great weekend. Should do I will see you on Sunday with Priscilla. Have a great weekend on the wayside, on the brunson liver, I'm saying I don't have it. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut or visit MDGamblingHelp.org

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