The Bill Simmons Podcast - NBA Playoff Character Awards With Chris Ryan and Tyler Parker. Plus Jackie MacMullan on Celts-Bucks, and Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament

Episode Date: May 6, 2022

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Chris Ryan and Tyler Parker to discuss Tyler's five favorite characters in the NBA playoffs (2:21). Then Bill talks with Jackie MacMullan about the Celtics-Bucks Round 2 series currently tied at 1-1, the difficulty of officiating Giannis Antetokounmpo; Celtics head coach Ime Udoka helping his team find their identity, why it is so difficult to predict the series outcome, and more (41:29). Finally Bill is joined by Jeff Ament of Pearl Jam to talk about going on tour for the first time since the pandemic, navigating working as a solo artist while still remaining an integral part of Pearl Jam, why the Utah Jazz haven't been successful with their roster, Seattle's grunge scene in the '90s, rumors of the SuperSonics returning to Seattle, and more (1:18:43). Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Chris Ryan, Tyler Parker, Jackie MacMullan, and Jeff Ament Producers: Kyle Crichton and Steve Ceruti Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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So check that out. Coming up on this podcast, Tyler Parker, Chris Ryan, we're going to talk about the characters of the NBA playoffs through one and one-fourths of the postseason. Going to hand out some awards.

Jackie McMullen, the Hall of Famer. We're going to talk about Celtics-Bucks, the most fascinating matchup series of round two. And some of the stuff we've seen with the Celtics as they've evolved over the last six months. And then last but not least, Jeff Amant from Pearl Jam. He's going to be talking about music, sports, basketball, life in the early 90s,

the Sonics, maybe coming back to Seattle, and a whole bunch more. But before we get to it, let's bring him in. Pearl Jam! All right, we have a rare off day in the NBA playoffs, which allows us to go into the underbelly, where my guy Tyler Parker likes to live from The Ringer, TheRinger.com.

The weird, the wacky, the strange. Chris Ryan is here as well. Chris, you're still cranking out the watch? Yeah, every once in a while. Hey, you know what would be funny, Tyler, is if you did a hard pivot to deep analytics as soon as you got hired here and you were like,

I've left all my jokes in the past. This is my blue period. I'm only talking Vorp and Windchairs. Yeah, yeah. No, I got a lot of assist rate stuff for this week. So I'm excited to get into that. Tyler comes out and just talks about hunting Luka Doncic for 35 minutes. Just points per possession every time they went after Luka.

When they attack DJ, it's 1.6 points per possession. Tyler, walk us through your favorite characters as we are about 1.2 1.2 into the playoffs. 1.2 tenths?

How does that work, Chris? 1.14 into the NBA playoffs? 1.25, yeah. Who's your favorite character, Tyler, so far? I mean, so do you want to go one to five or five to one? What do you think, Chris? Five to one? Five to one.

Let's build up. Can we do like two honorable mentions just to get my feet wet? Yeah, just like an appetizer, a little pigs in the blanket. Yeah, absolutely. This is good. Top 25 starting at 32. Yeah, I mean, let me pass the tray around. Let me see what kind of finger foods I got in here really quick.

Hold up. Let's do, I mean, Pat Bev. Absolutely, Pat Bev has got to be honorable mention. I mean, if only for Dievendorf on top of the scores table after the play-in game. I mean, that in and of itself is enough to get an honorable mention for sure. What about his step-back threes in huge moments of an actual round one playoff series? I enjoyed that as well.

It made me feel so bad for Timberwolves fans because I know they brutal love him, right? Like, you've got to buy into it, right? You've got to buy into the antics. You've got to embrace it because it it's gonna be part of your team. So you just gotta decide, hey, I like this now. But then in the end,

he's like, oh no, did we give him a little bit too much confidence in himself? We don't need Pat Bev taking big shots at any point. Definitely not step back threes. Did you guys see that after the jaw game the other night,

he was just like, well, I'll tell you, we never let him score 47 on us. This is great. I really want losing team commentary on what they did better than the team that advanced. Yeah, he definitely should take it a break from the playoffs for better.

LeBron went to the Maldives. Is LeBron honorable mention? LeBron just kind of wades in and out with these tweets. He called NBA writers. Is he coming up, Tyler? I like, I, I,

I like the move to just kind of go like, like just get a little tipsy every night, get a little wine drunk every night and just kind of just, just let the takes get the takes off, man. Like that's what the people want. Give the people, he still has an opportunity to become a big storyline in the playoffs.

We know he likes that. So just do it. Tweet every game. He should live tweet every game. Chris, it would be like after the Emmys, if Jason Bateman just one night was watching some show and was like, I don't know who these dweebs who vote on the Emmys are doing, but I'll tell you this,

Julia. Under the better. What? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I thought his takes so far. The thing with LeBron,

like, and the tweets are mostly just that, like, he's like, I was into their early stuff. So it's always like, I've been watching this guy since he was 12. I have his early singles.

You guys weren't messing with him when he was independent. It's like... So far and mostly, it's just like Jaws special, Tyrese Maxey is special. So it's the usual. But I like that he's always like,

I've been scouting this guy. Yeah, he's very much like... I saw them when they were still called Mookie Blaylock. Yeah, right. Yeah, I think he needs to weave in an old guy. You know, like maybe a Bismack Biambo. I remember this guy early on thinking,

this guy's going to be playing for 12 years, and now here we are, it's year 12. Something like that. Maybe just to mix it up. Kevon Looney is a great locker room presence. I want him to go the next step, which is just to start claiming people that we know he didn't know about.

Like, I'm not going to claim Jose Alvarado. He should have just been like, I've known this guy. I've got people in Puerto Rico. They told me about him. Yeah. I was following his AAU stuff with the Wrens. I knew he was the 16 and under tournament.

That's what I knew. All right. Any other honorable mention? You want to go to number five? Honestly, Alvarado was kind of an honorable mention for me. So I feel like I got it in there. Yeah, that's good. Let's go on to five because it still has to do with Memphis.

Really, the Memphis T-Wolf series in general. But Ja, Ja doing the we in Minnesota now tweet after the whatever most historic comeback in NBA playoff history. I forget if that was exactly what it was or not. It felt that way. 25 once and then 27 again or something, or I forget. But during the game, you know, they've got this mic'd up stuff and there's never anything of value or substance in there hardly ever but during this game cap for some reason did the you know yeah we in minnesota now and uh

and jaw after the game just tweeted that and i'm i that's that's what it's all about to get getting stars going at other stars for stuff that they said in a game that they would have had no idea that they said it if not for the fact that and you don't you probably cat probably doesn't say that except for the

fact that he knows he's mic'd up oh yeah you have to say the most generic kind of yeah yeah yeah so it it's uh I mean, I loved, I love that. That was amazing. You know, and you opened the door here, Chris, when the guy knows he's mic'd up in the pregame warmups, they kind of have to feel like it's night at the Apollo.

They're walking around, look at this guy. Hey. They have this weird kind of frantic energy. They just had too much coffee. I enjoyed that. One day, I'm going to get the upper tier subscription to the mic'd up coaches that

isn't during the commercial break or leading into or coming out of a commercial break. I will get the pure Doc Rivers being like, I got a T-ton! I'm Ruby Harris tomorrow! I can't take any more dig deep, get boards, get back.

You got to want it more. I really want what are these guys actually saying? Well, you know what ruined this? I remember this specific moment, 2018. Steve Kerr pulled Durant over and told the Michael Jordan story to him. Remember? When I was playing with Michael and he did this minute long story, they ran it as a mic'd up.

Everyone on social media went nuts that he told this Michael Jordan story during a game to Kevin Durant. Like what the fuck is, what is this coaching style? And the Warriors were really pissed about that because we were doing the courtside NBA show that year. And after that, it was like, yeah, the mic'd up stuff has gone south. We're just not getting

as much good stuff. There is a version of the mic'd up that it reminds me of like when they do the real world or Survivor or all these reality shows

where you know they have better stuff than we actually see in the reality. You know, like there's some editor who gets super high with his buddies and was like, hey man,

did I ever show you the Menage a Trois from Challenge Season 7? They're like, what? And then he's just queuing it up. And this guy's got all the goods, but he's got 19 NDAs. That's probably what the NBA has. They must have a million NDAs with the editors, right?

There are those like Paul Thomas Anderson interviews from whenever like Boogie Nights is coming out and he's talking about doing the Sundance labs and he's like, Oh man, I got a Christine printed a chase. We're in there looking at that. And you know,

there's just the basketball version of that is no question. Um, all right. What do you got for number four? Chris Paul, ladies and gentlemen, the, I mean,

to go 14 to 14 to close them out that, that series, it felt like it was one, it was one of the most Chris Paul series that you could possibly get. You got everything that he provides. You've got him hitting some dude in the nuts, which is a staple. You've got, shout out to Julius Hodge, never forget. We always appreciate Julius Hodge.

I mean, he's the what? The only other dude since Wilt to have a perfect game in the playoffs? Yeah. 14-14, 33-8 or whatever it was. That's kind of nuts. And then also, like, an extension of that is him

and if you saw him and Devin Booker last night after the game, whenever they started to talk to them about sort of hunting Luca and all those possessions that they did, they share a little smirk, a little kind of look with each other. And, you know, in the same way that John Katz stuff where you can just sort of see like, oh, no, like they're not afraid not afraid to let the other superstar know how they feel about them in this moment. I like that stuff. I much prefer that than like, yeah, but he's a good player. We got

to get back on the other end. He's such a beast. We just want to make him work on the defensive end. It was a little bit like he can't hang with us on that. I like the gamesmanship and trying to kind of rile him a little bit. I like that stuff. Well, he also had, there was that moment

when he torched somebody and then he just stared down the Dallas bench for like 20 seconds. Yeah. And who was it? Reggie Miller was just, because Reggie Miller

can sniff out all the, I'm trying to fuck with the other team stuff. That's really the one value to having Reggie Miller as the announcer. He's still looking. He's still looking at the announcer. Look at Chris. He's still looking.

He's still looking at the bench. I was like, this is kind of good. For me at that moment, the series ended. I don't think there's any roadmap for Dallas to come back unless somebody on Phoenix gets hurt because you think yesterday, everything goes right. Aiton gets in foul trouble. They're hanging around. Luca

has a big first half. And then second half, it's just Phoenix asserts their dominance. It doesn't even matter who plays center. Yeah, and that was the most cruising Phoenix regular season juggernaut performance they've had, I think, in the playoffs. I know that they played, obviously,

well against the Pelicans, and they closed that out. But this was the one where I was like, man, this team is just like a locomotive. That's how I felt the whole year and then the Booker hamstring scared me.

There was a moment right after the Booker hamstring when their odds were actually lower than the Warriors or that like the Warriors had better odds to win the title

than the Phoenix State just because of the hamstring. But now that seems stupid. We were also all doing Pelicans whippets. We were just like, what if? What if they can do it?

That's true. That's a good thing to remember next year. Pelicans whippets. We were just like, what if? What if they can do it? That's true. That's a good thing to remember next year. First round whippets. No, this is the whole point of the playoffs is that when a series goes like 1-1 or 2-2, everybody talks themselves into the nine seed beating the historically good one seed. And it's the best part.

You're like three days of wondering whether Herb Jones is better than Devin Booker. Right.'re like, you have three days of wondering whether Herb Jones is better than Devin Booker. You have three days of being like, is this Herb Jones? Is Chris Paul officially done? Has Herb Jones figured him out? And then he torches. Are we sure that Larry Nance

needs to move out of the way for Zion going forward? The Herb Jones thing got to a point with me where I was looking up Kawhi's first two postseason stats to see where they're going to get Herb. I got to a point with me where I was looking up Kawhi's first two postseason stats to see where they're going to get to Herb I was like

are we running back Kawhi right now no I didn't get the memo it's great stuff the Phoenix thing they have all kinds of swagger it's really hard

for me to especially now with Gary Payton out because I think he would have been important against Chris Paul in the next series now who knows maybe against Chris Paul in the next series. Now who knows?

Maybe it's Memphis in the next series. I don't even know what's going to play out with that. But it's all set up for Phoenix now. Boston and Milwaukee are just going to beat the shit out of each other for seven games. And Phoenix seems like they're set. The Luka piece of this, you know we're getting it one summer.

I don't mean to sidetrack your list. You know we're getting it one of these summers. The Luka is finally taking this shit seriously, and he has three chefs and two trainers, and he's using Seagal's trainer from above the law. You're going to get a good lighting pick in gym of some abs that you've never really known about before, for sure.

You're going to get a jacked look. Bathing suit photo? No, here's the thing. He're going to get a bathing suit photo like by the no, no. Here's the thing. He's going full Alexander scars, garden, the Northman, you know,

like he's going to be walking around with a bear pelt chanting in front of a fire with like a 16 pack. People are going to be freaked out. I, I definitely like there could be some St. Bart's pictures from far away. Like how they do the Bradley Cooper with the models where it's like clearly they had a photographer in the woods but they

didn't like Luca just strolling along in St. Bart's and it's like oh my God that guy looks like the freaking Randy Orton or somebody okay Tyler give us who's next for you got three left this is number three this is number three yeah we got

Doc Rivers I actually thought I thought he was going to go number one but I'm Got three left. This is number three? This is number three, yeah. We got Doc Rivers. Oh, thank you. I actually thought he was going to go number one, but I'm interested to hear the case for three. He totally could have. And it's, you know, they're really, honestly, three to one are kind of interchangeable for me.

I love them all. But no, I mean, Doc, I mean, I don't even really know where to start. Doc defending himself for, I don't even really know where to start. Doc defending himself for losing these playoffs. Yeah. When he tried to defend himself for the Magic Pistons loss and these other things. I just sort of like, why would you even think this was a smart idea? Why would you? What did he think would happen?

He was going to come out and be like this is how all of y'all are wrong and that everyone was just going to be like oh wow we didn't think of that you're right sorry doc like it doesn't he doesn't compute to me at this point he's so dead set on he just he hates people questioning this dj stuff so much. He does not like the feeling that he's wrong about this. And it is just like that. And I think that first, I think you should leave sketch from the first season

with Tim Robinson and he's leaving the job interview and he tries to pull on the door and it doesn't go. And the interviewer is like, oh, looks like you pushed. And Tim Robinson is like, actually, no.

It goes both ways. And he Robbins is like, actually, no. It goes both ways. And he keeps pulling and it obviously doesn't, but he can't be an idiot, right? He has to be right. There's no way he can't be right. He can't look like a fool. And he keeps pulling, keeps pulling, keeps pulling, and then the door rips the door off and he just rips.

But that's Doc to me. Just like, I can't admit that I'm... Even though he kind of is when he plays Paul Reed more minutes, you know what I mean? Even though it's just sort of like a ceremonial starting thing for DJ, any minutes for him at all at this point is just absurd. Yeah, and also, Paul Reed does make Jaron Jackson

look very careful out there. When it comes to accumulating fouls in a few minutes, there are a couple of things that have like happened for the Sixers where it's like, this isn't actually Doc's fault. It's not Doc's fault that Matisse didn't get vaccinated and couldn't play in the Toronto series. It's not Doc's fault that Joel Embiid got elbowed in the face. Although, is it Doc's fault that Joel Embiid was out there

with three minutes left when they were up 29? You could make that argument. And yeah, the DeAndre thing is just like, it really does feel like a guy who's like I am no longer going to be the coach of the Sixers so I'm just completely defending my personal reputation here because there doesn't seem to be

any like maintenance to his position as the head coach of the Sixers and it's all about like I am defying the media who think that they know how to coach better than me, an NBA championship winning veteran coach. I was on multiple text threads yesterday

with people wondering if Doc was intentionally trying to sabotage his last series so that he could go coach the Lakers. Not that I don't think that's true, but that's how weird the DeAndre thing was because it's clearly such a bad fit. I mean, I don't think that's true, but that's how weird the DeAndre thing was because it's clearly such a bad fit. I mean, I don't love plus minus, but sometimes plus minus,

like if you're, every time you play, you play seven, eight minutes and your team's minus nine, minus 10. At some point that means something, right? Like it meant something during those Perkins OKC years. Sorry, Tyler. I appreciate it. Thanks for that.

But it just in general, when something doesn't pass the sniff test, the other thing is any sort of sharp analytics mind would say, look, you're outmanned. You don't have Embiid. He's your best player. He's either going to be the MVP

or runner-up MVP. Just mix it up, man. Play a bunch of short dudes. Shoot a ton of threes. Try to have some variance. Maybe you'll hit 25 threes and you can swing this. Otherwise, there's no route at all for you to win this game. You're not beating them

conventionally. It's never happening. You're not winning. And they just won't do that. I just think that in his nightmares, he's going to see Bam getting offensive rebounds and that's something that he can't take. I think that for a guy who's just like, I have a couple of seven-footers on this bench, so I cannot in good conscience play five-ball at center

or play Tobias at stretch five or something like that and watch Bam essentially just like play pop a shot on us for the rest of the series. So he's just going to do this. It just hurts him fundamentally as a coach. Yeah, it's like, I think it's just as like his like basketball disposition is such that he is like,

I cannot watch this happen. And then last night when we, when the Sixers were playing the heat, like they just couldn't hit the broad side of a barn. So going small wouldn't really have mattered. Tyler, you think Dave, Dave Yerger,

Yerger, Scherger, Yeager. How do we say his name? Yeah. I think it's Yeager. Yeah. Dave Yeager.

You think he like brought it up like very tentatively one day the coaches having coffee at like 830 I'm gonna ask Doc if we should just shoot a punch or three don't do it Dave

don't do it Dave don't bring it up he's gonna get super pissed no no do it later do it like he you know Doc gets a little groggy around 330

do it then he's like no I'm gonna do it now ask him before his driving range session like before yeah maybe like Doc can I hit some balls with you maybe he does let's take ask him before his driving range session. Maybe like,

Doc, can I hit some balls with you? Maybe, maybe does that. Let's take a break and then we're going to do number two and number one on the title list. You can make every NBA playoff game

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So many ways to play. Best of all, when you do win, you'll get paid faster than a fast break. For the Friday night games, I would be looking at Phoenix to sweep Dallas. Phoenix right now, they're either it's even or they're like getting a half point. Maybe it'll get to a point by game time. I like them.

I still like the over. Maybe do a little adjusted. Bring that down to like 216, something like that. Get a little money line on it. And then you figure DeAndre Ayton, he's not going to have nine points and get in foul trouble again. He'll have more. I'd go 10 plus points for him,

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and in West Virginia 1800gambler.net. All right, Tyler. I don't know if we talked about Doc Rivers enough. This clearly feels like the last series for him, Chris.

You're a Sixers fan. This feels like the end of the road. Are we, is it Mike D'Antoni next year? Is this even a good job for Mike D'Antoni? Because I feel like if I'm him and I look at LaMelo and LaMelo's just this race car in the garage and it's, I'm not sure I trust the engineers

and I'm not sure I trust, you know, the model, but I know that car goes fast and I know I've succeeded with Jeremy Lin and Nash and all these other dudes. And it's like, I kind of want to get that LaMelo Ball race car. What do you think he does? Yeah, I mean, it's also a question of like,

what's a lesson? Would Mike D'Antoni prefer to be in a more or less intense environment? I think that the Sixers are always going to be one of the most talked about franchises for as long as like Daryl's there. There's always this possibility of some weird trade, of some drama going on.

Whereas in Charlotte, I think you could probably just be a league pass all-star team and have a sick offense and start to tinker with Lomelo and make him into Steve Nash 3.0. Isn't that what he would want at this point in his career? I feel like it is. Well, I mean, I think Philly's probably closer

to a championship contender than Charlotte is. So if you're Mike D'Antoni and you're like, this is the last ride, then you probably want to go to Philly. Tyler, I'm going legacy if I'm Mike D. You're not winning a title with this Philly team. I'm going full seven seconds or so in 2023. How does this add to my hagiography, basically?

Yeah, I think personally I would rather just have Taylor Jenkins. I would just rather, can we just get another Chris Finch? Is there just another nurse guy out there who's like, yeah, here's how you win basketball games? Yeah. What do you think, Tyler?

Do you think that Harden's going to be there next year? Do you think that Harden's going to be there next year do you think that Dan Tony wants like all of that you know baggage and drama

also entering the mix you've got just you know just the Sixers in general right like it's just like a charged up situation

you've got Embiid who's you know never shying away from the sad thing this time around is it's not even like Icarus, where it's like he scores 42, but then goes out all night and sucks the next game. It's like he's just slow.

He's just got old. So, I mean, he's not getting separation. He's not getting that blow-by stuff. And it's just tough. And his shot just seems a little like, do you have both contacts in? You know, like, are we sure? He's slow and he lost his legs. He lost his burst. it's not there anymore

nba history tells us nine out of ten times it doesn't come back there's a case where he could go chris paul plant diet and just completely try to change his body and try to recapture it but are you betting 270 million dollars on that so when we get i mean this is probably going to be the subject of like 17 podcasts over the course of the next couple of months. But when we look back on it, will the Simmons-Harton trade be the least consequential blockbuster ever? I tried to make that case as it was happening. But we were all like, just like... I thought there was a chance that it might actually be a sucky trade for everybody.

Yeah. I mean, I just... I don't like the idea. It's not my money. I don't like the idea of them paying him the maximum amount in 36 if this is what he looks like at 32. I could see Tyler maybe two years 80 or two years 85 to at least buy the chance that he might come back.

Yeah, maybe. I mean, you don't want to lose him for nothing. Tyler's out. I mean, I like you know you don't want to lose him for nothing I'm Tyler's out I I mean I'm not a I'm not a hardened guy I it's if I were Dan Tony I would take the Charlotte job in a heartbeat and I wouldn't be two seconds about it personally I like the hardened thing that scares me is he's getting to that point now that a lot of old players do where when they fall, you can tell they were really worried about it and they're falling as slow as they possibly can. That's like me right now.

Yeah. And it's like how Shaq used to fall when he was late in his career. It was just almost like a cow. It's mummified. You get a little mummified. Bill's got cue cards like Brando in The Godfather. I'm not even here right now. Dylan Berkey, CG Admi. Yeah, I

would be super nervous about tying my future to Harden and plus Embiid. It's not like he's been a picture of health either. I look at for D'Antoni with Charlotte, just the Lamello. All the stuff he loves. Lamello's one weakness is he

can't guard anybody. So you tell that to Mike D and he's like, I'm even more intrigued. Yeah, right. Wait, so you're telling me our defense is going to be awful? Neither can I! We got that in common! This sounds awesome! You've had my curiosity, now you have my attention. Who's number two, Tyler?

Ann Edwards Jr. Anthony Edwards' dog has his own Twitter account that Edwards made for him. The dog tweets in the first person. It's one of the best things in my life right now. Yeah. He calls Edwards pops. Edwards went on NBA Today. And he's like, and people that follow the NBA know this.

I'm not saying anything surprising, but he's one of the most likable players to come to the NBA in a long, long time. And watching him get interviewed is honestly just fun to me personally. And I do not think that with a lot of athletes, because like we were saying earlier, there is sort of a very, the answers can get very stereotypical. And Edwards is still young enough. He's not that way at all.

And they asked him about the Twitter account, about the dog. And you can tell they thought he was just going to kind of maybe just joke around about it. And he just was completely sincere about how much he loves his dog. He said, hey, he's the best dog in the world, man. Somebody just asked me, what is my dog doing right now? I said, he's watching himself dog in the world man somebody just asked me what is my dog doing right now i said he's watching himself man he knows how to feed himself he knows how to let himself outside he knows how to do everything he's my best friend he's the best thing that happened to me as far as joining the nba and like he's always there if i have a bad game i go home

and he's going to be the same person no matter what he it's like i mean i I love it. I love it so much. Oh, my God. I think I've texted Jimmy Kimmel maybe five times since I left the show with like, you should have this person on as a guest. Oh, yeah. And I sent him all the Anthony Edwards Jr. I was like, this is like,

there's never been a celebrity more in your wheelhouse than Anthony Edwards. This is the most likable athlete. He's in the running for most likable celebrity. Like if he had been the Met Gala, I would have been excited. If he was added to season three euphoria and was on an episode,

I'd be like, that's amazing. Great choice. Can't wait to see how that goes. I honestly want the twins just to sign him so that he can keep being in the sports public eye for the summer. I just want him to be like, yeah, you know what? I'm going to go out and play right field for a week or two. And in the meantime, I'll do all the dugout interviews. Wait a second. Let's talk through this. He's such a good athlete.

He's talked about it. He could have been in the NFL. Yeah. Yeah. Because like Michael Jordan, he had to do, you know, he's six foot six. There's some holes with the baseball thing. I do think Edwards could go out there and go like one for four. Probably, probably. He could at least make contracts. No problem. Somebody should just challenge him.

Hey, Edwards, can you, you think you could make the twins right now? He'd be like, what do you mean? I've already made them. He would get, I mean, that's the, that, that interview that he, where they asked him about that. That's the same interview that he, where they asked him about that, that's the same interview that he said that he thinks he's the best defender in the NBA. Yeah. You get both.

You get the sincerity of, like, I love my dog, and you get the irrational kind of confidence. And maybe that's true about him one day. I mean, he could be a monster on that end, right? But like, right now, obviously, but I love the, yeah. He's my favorite. Please protect him at all costs. I feel like the 2009, 10, 11 OKC,

when they had all those young guys together, I just love those guys. And I even went for no reason at all. I wasn't even writing about them. I just went down to go see a game and go to a practice and just meet Durant and Westbrook and Presti and all these dudes. I just kind of,

yeah, I just wanted to go. Yeah, I remember hearing you talk about, I remember hearing you talk about going to that practice and how they were just like going at each other's heads the whole time and it was just like full ball. Yeah, there was a lot of like

good testosterone in that practice. A lot of like people competing against each other in sprints. But Edwards, to me, is like, just protect that dude. That's why they have to trade Russell. We just need him out. He's like Axe's wife in Billions. He's like, we just got to get her out. Every scene, we're going to show now.

Let's get her out. Put her on a... Yeah, it's like, all right, great. They're getting divorced. She's out. Great. Good move. Russell is the's like, all right, great. They're getting divorced. She's out. Great. Good move. Russell is the Axis wife of the situation.

I'm with you. All right. Number one on the list. Let's hear it. Number one. We're just in general because this is what they want, the referees.

Oh, yeah. Referees have been... Great choice. I want to highlight in particular... And I'll do the... not as consequential one first. Tony Brothers, specifically just for the back-to-back charge calls that he had last night, where I've just never seen an official really try to take over a game on back-to-back plays like that, where he's almost attempting to refute himself.

Yeah. One thing with brothers, there's a lot of photos and I found one last night and tweeted it of players and coaches, like multiple, like three, four or five people all in complete disbelief and really not even upset, just like kind of hurt and confused by a call. He's one of the leaders of that.

Scott Foster, people get fucking mad at. Brothers, it's more like just people with their arms up going, I don't understand. Are you watching the same game? Yeah. Brothers, you talk about those young OKC teams. Brothers was like the first ref that Durant had a problem with. Everybody was like, what is going on here?

Durant's never upset about anything. Incredibly nice guy by all accounts. Yeah. I have a ref before you get to your next one. Go ahead. This is one my dad and I have had multiple texts about. It's my dad's least favorite ref. You know him as number 39.

White guy, Tyler Ford. He did game two of the Bucks Celtics. And he has reached the status of when you see him, it's just an immediate bummer. You're like, oh, man. Oh, no. So, Tyler, step it up. He went to he's refereed

233 regular season games. Sixth season. Oh, yeah. This guy. Yeah, that guy. Short crew cut. Kind guy. Yeah, that guy. He's a short crew cut. Yeah. Kind of looks like the bad guy cop in about seven HBO shows. Right. Yeah, like a nondescript Marine who

was doing some stuff he shouldn't have been doing. He goes rogue. He might show up in We Own This City, Chris. We could just see him in episode four going rogue. You know who I am? Yeah. You don't tell me how to who else do you have Tyler I mean Scott Foster was the number one

you could pick the extender he is a nickname now the extender an unbelievable nickname by the way I was recently on a flight with Scott Foster I sat next to him did he extend the flight yeah when we got to the

gate, he was just like, nobody deboard yet. We're just going to suck it in. Let's just sit in each other's breath for a little while longer here. I'm going to stand in front of y'all. Everybody look at me. Look at me the whole time. But we're just going to hang out here for a while. I mean,

this has been 20 plus years with this guy. What else were you going to say about him, Tyler? No, I mean, there was the moment in the Celtics-Bucks game where him and Ed Malloy got caught on the mic dub thing being like, who's Jack Harlow? And Harlow tweeted that out. And they, of course, because they have to figure out a way to get some eyeballs on them and they want to be

stars they then the official nba referee account does some basically like a little short parody video of uh of harlow's video for his song nail tech they try to like kind of do their own version of that and so you've got scott foster with like a rolling suitcase going through a hotel lobby, like dapping, you know, Stu Jackson up or whatever, you know, ignoring other people, stuff like that. And it, they go to the car. It was one of those things like, I don't know if you've ever seen like, you know how you see sometimes a bunch of teachers get together and do like a sketch to let the students know what the rules are for that year or something. And it's like a bunch of, it's a bunch of teachers just sort of dancing along and trying to look cool and funny. It reminded me a lot of that, like sort of like

a bunch of like youth ministers who are, you know, like trying to like let loose a little bit. But Foster's, there was a, I played high school basketball in like a tiny country town in Oklahoma. And we played in this tournament once where our locker room, we had to share it with the officials for that game. There was an office within the locker room and that was where the officials changed.

We did not realize this until at halftime we were already in there we're going through the you know whatever halftime and uh official comes out he's holding like a thing it's almost like it looks like a can of spray paint or something we don't know what is going on says boys turns or walks to the sink turns around it's moose he puts moose in his hand and he mooses his hair there at halftime while we're going over our halftime adjustments. Was it Scott Foster? After the game, we're sitting there going through post-game talk,

everything like that. All of a sudden, door to the office swings open, out walks this exact same official, butt naked, says, good game, boys, and walks to her cell. He had to get the moose out. That's the Scott Foster energy to me.

That is what I think of when I think of Scott Foster. Just total obliviousness, always center of attention, you know, like, also looks like a villain in a teen. He's the third FBI agent. He's just the guy standing next to the guy and his partner. Yeah.

And you're just like, why do I know this guy's face? Has he been in every single diehard movie? Like, what is this? And this has been, this goes back to the seventies. I mean,

there's been referees my whole life that took this kind of stature where you saw them, these guys, they almost become like the sheriff in a low-budget action movie. Like back in the day for us, Jack Madden was like the guy that the Celtic fans never, he had this famous call in the 1973 playoffs when the Knicks made this comeback and the fans were convinced Jack Madden hated the Celtics. But there are all these fan bases that are convinced Scott Foster hates them. Or he hates their team or he's working against them.

And then there's probably some other fan bases that like seeing him. I remember my dad and I went to game five of the 2008 NBA Finals after the big comeback. Celts are up 3-1. And we thought we were going to close them out. We were super excited. And we saw Scott Foster and we were like, oh man. And guess what he did?

The extender did his job. There was some extending. And the Sears went back to Boston. But I just, I think he likes, I think he likes thriving against the crowd is one of the things with him. Although I guess he did it in Memphis. He was in Memphis in game two. But some of these guys like going into the den and just kind of swimming against the stream. They like the energy of it.

Pavetta was like that too. Why do you think that in situations where it's not going to be like, he doesn't stand to extend the series, right? Like it's a game seven or something like that. And it's a situation where it's, you know, Chris Paul's playing in it or it's one of these players that he's got a vendetta against or it's Joey Crawford, Tim Duncan and stuff like that. What does the NBA have to gain

by keeping them on that? You know, it's like, are there not enough good refs that they can't just, so that that's not a talking point. They know that they've taken care of that. I think they enjoy it. Here's my non-conspiracy take. I think this series ebbs and flows. So coming out of Game 2, Boston's going to send all the Giannis charges that weren't called in that game in Game 2.

They're going to send it to the legal office. They're going to be like, hey man, Giannis is just bowling over people. He's not Earl Campbell. This is a basketball game. This is not a running back. Who's trying to get to the goal line. You gotta,

you gotta crack down on this. So then the refs go into the game and they have these things in their head. All right. Giannis does that. I'm calling it this time. If somebody is jumping over the back on the rebound, I saw that tape. I got to crack down on that.

And I think they go into the game. It's not like they're biased. They're biased against what the instructions of the league were to say, hey man, this is drifting too far this way. You got to pull that back. That last game was way too physical. You got to crack down early. First quarter, a lot of fouls. And I think that's

I'd like to think the magnanimous side of me would like to think that's how it goes. Does that make sense? That's what I hope. That's what I hope is happening. I think the shame really is, this isn't that funny, is just that in the beginning of the season with the changes that they made to

the foul calls with Harden and Trey Young and everybody and looking for calls there, it felt like the flow of the game was so much better. It just felt like games had a little bit more back and forth, a little bit more up and down, and that guys weren't getting rewarded for stuff. And now it just seems to

I guess it does in every playoffs have grinded to a halt with a lot of this. I like that it's more physical. The Dylan Brooks thing, I think, was... When you're getting more physical, you're going to have more outcomes like the Dylan Brooks thing. All right, we got to go. Tyler Parker, read him on TheRinger.com. Chris Ryan,

hear him on The Watch, hear him on The Rewatchables. Last week, this week, we're doing Beverly Hills Cop 2. One star from Roger Ebert. We'll talk about that, but we'll cover that on Monday night. Anyway, good seeing you guys. This episode is brought to you by Prime Video.

You know me, I can't go a day without sports. I really can't. And now Monday nights are all about hockey. That's right. There's a new exclusive home for streaming Monday night NHL hockey. And it's on Prime. All season long, watch Prime Monday night hockey deliver unreal plays, the biggest goals, can't miss moments.

Matthews, McDavid, Crosby, the NHL's best. They're all on Prime. Prime Monday Night Hockey. It's on Monday. It's on Prime. All right, Jackie McMullin is here fresh off her fantastic Icons Club podcast about the NBA legends. It was a big, big, big one. Took a lot of time. It was almost

like writing a book, right? It was like writing a book, except for the number of chapters kept changing. We got there though. We did. Yeah, no, I'm happy. I think I'm happy with it. I hope people were. It was long and arduous, but worth it. I enjoyed... I care about the past, and it was fun to talk to some of those past legends that I think get forgotten sometimes. Me too. I care about the past than the present.

Chris Paul is part of the past than the present. He's still destroying everybody doing his thing. And he was great in the Icons Club. He was very good. Let's talk Celtics Bucks. It feels like the winner of this series is making the finals. The defense is at a level

that's out of the 90s and 2000s and even a little smarter, more sophisticated. And you have Giannis at the peak of his powers. You have Tatum potentially swimming in the pool now with these guys. I don't know if I'm willing to say he's officially a top four, top five guy yet, but he's definitely in

the bathing suit with his feet in the water. But just the Giannis piece first, we talked about a little on Sunday with Rosillo, just clearly the best guy in the league now. What is it about him that jumps out to you, having watched his whole career? Well, if you start with game one, struggled a bit from the floor, but I've always said the most underrated part of Giannis is his court vision and his ability to find the open player. I think something like 13 of his 18 passes

led to Bucs baskets. So even when he's not scoring efficiently, he's finding the open man. And, you know, big guys don't generally do that. And I remember Bud telling me way, way back when I was talking to them, Giannis was in the early process of developing and becoming who he became. And I don't think Bud was even his coach yet. I asked him, like, when you first got with him, like what was the thing? And he said, it was absolutely his ability to see the whole floor for a guy who hadn't played a lot of basketball. Cause I'll contend that that's the one skill that you either have it or you don't.

And if you have it, you can, you can enhance it. But if you don't have it, it's really hard to learn how to develop it. And I think Giannis has had it from the jump. And so aside from his physical presence and his composure, which I think is a really big part of his success also, Bill, he doesn't get rattled, even when he gets frustrated with the referee or something that Jason Tatum should learn a little bit about, frankly. He always maintains his composure. And when you're the leader and everybody's watching you, that's really important.

You know, it's easy to forget now, like the 2013 draft, which I did the telecast for, and we were comparing him to Paul George because he was six foot nine. And it was like, this is a small forward with who's athletic and has point guard skills. And then he started to grow and he went to Milwaukee, but Jason Kidd still tried to make him a point guard, at least for a couple seconds there. He saw him as like this potential Magic Johnson, see over everybody, court vision guy.

So he did always have this, but the difference now is physically he's become one of the most opposing players in the history of the league. I mean, it's like, it's like, well, it's Shaq, it's LeBron and it's Giannis. These are the four guys that if they want to get to the basket, the ref really has to think about, do I have to call this differently because of the physical advantages this guy has? What do I, what is my, what's my role here? And great body control. Just incredible body control. Because it's great to be big and strong, but we've seen plenty of guys who come through the league

that don't have that same body control. In fact, when I watch Joel sometimes, I'm always like, whoa, slow down just a tad. Yeah, sometimes when he lands, it makes you nervous. Yeah, Giannis and LeBron always landed correctly.

It's unbelievable, really. Yeah. So I think he's way more in the LeBron ballpark than I think I was ready to consider for a long time from a physicality standpoint, especially the second half of LeBron's career. When you're talking about like kind of 2014 through now, when he added the extra muscle, he kept the athleticism for the most part, but really kind of learned how to put a shoulder into people, how to just get to the basket, how to bounce off people. He was always going to get the call. Giannis to me feels the same way, where Giannis is like, if I put my shoulder down, the other guy's going backwards.

They will call it a couple times, but not every time. And this is, if my shot's not falling, I always have this. You know what I mean? Right. And that's why Celtics fans should be worried because, you know, he hasn't played great yet. I mean, he's done some amazing things, but he's averaging five and a half turnovers. That's not going to keep. I don't think that will continue.

They got smart in the second half of game two, I thought, and started using their shooters as screeners. So because, you know, Grant Williams, Rob Williams, Horford, they've all done a really great job on Giannis one-on-one. They started to realize, like at game one, they're trying to double team. That's suicide. Yeah, that was stupid. Suicide.

So now you're playing them straight up. But, you know, if Grayson Allen, for instance, is setting that screen, you can't afford to do that. You've got to you've got to account for him, especially at home in Milwaukee, because as we've learned from the history of NBA playoffs, guys like Grayson Allen, Bobby Portis, probably even Pat Connaughton, even though he's from New England, they're just going to play better at home. It's a better environment for them and they're going to hit open shots. So I'll be interested to see if they go to that more. They also did a little bit of the dribble handoff with Giannis. I mean, they're going to find ways to use Giannis, even if it isn't getting him to score. And I, you know, he missed a lot of really easy shots. Yeah. A lot of drives to the basket where he was a little off balance. And that's a credit to Boston's defense for sure. But I don't think we've seen the best of, well, maybe we did in game one. Milwaukee's defense was incredible, but by no means is this, this series is to me,

is such a toss up. It really is. I said on Tuesday night, the, one of the things that I think made Giannis so special now is that even when he's not very good, he still has this massive impact on a game. Right. He's impactful. Yep. Kind of like the last level. I think all the great, you talk about icons club, like we, if we just talk about like

the best 15 guys ever, the best guys could always impact the game, even if they weren't scoring. Right. Or they could impact the game just by being out there or their physicality or something. I think it's something actually Shaq was maybe, if you're talking like top 12, 13, 14 guys ever, Shaq was somebody that sometimes he could disappear from a game, right? He'd get in foul trouble or his foul shots would go sideways, something like that. But, you know, somebody like Jordan, somebody like LeBron.

LeBron can not shoot well in a game, but he can still do 19 other things. He's always present. He's always in the game. And that was what I felt like Giannis out of anybody we have now, even if he's not good, he's still going to be really good in the game, you know? And I think that's why he's the best. Yeah.

And he's so young. We haven't even seen the best of him yet, which is really scary because you look at his shooting and what he did from last year to this year and improved just the form of his shot. And, you know, obviously he's been shooting well in this series and something else that I just don't believe will, I just don't think he's going to shoot 38% for this series from the floor. I don't believe it. And the three point shooting, you know, I've never been sold. I understand why they have him do it. You know, Bud loves the threes, but that's the other thing for game three.

There's no way on this earth the Bucs will shoot only 18 three-point shots. That's not happening either. The shot chart from Giannis from the last couple years to this year, even that's changed. He's another piece, if we're talking Icons Club and somebody like him. He does seem like he tries to add

and evolve each year. The guys that we grew up with, that's what made them different. Each year they came back with something else. And it seems like he's in that mode too. And you think about that'll be as Luka hits his mid-20s, whether he's in shape. And then what is he adding each year?

What is he going to bring? How about some defense? Might be a good start. I know. Just saying. A little bit of defense. And you can't tell me a guy like him can't do it. I don't believe that.

I believe that he can. You know, people say Kyrie Irving doesn't defend. There were points that we've seen him where he gets his mind made up. He can put out, you know, he can perform beautifully on the defensive end. If he actually trusts. Yeah, effort. And, you know, because he certainly has the basketball intelligence to do it and so does Luka for sure.

So, you know, and Giannis already has that piece. I mean, Giannis is in the discussion every year for defensive player of the year. Two-way players. You know, Paul George, I remember coming out of USA Basketball, Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum,

particularly Tatum, you know, Greg Pava just pulled him inside and said, you could be Paul Pava just pulled him inside and said, you could be Paul George. You could be an elite two-way player. And he challenged him to do that. And last year, as you and I discussed, he fell short on really on both counts. And this year, you can't give Jason Tatum enough credit for what he's done this year because he, someone got to him, whether it was E-May or Brad Stevens or all of the above or his agents or whomever, or maybe just himself. He started to understand ISO doesn't get it done.

Move the ball. Trust your teammates. The ball always comes back to you when you do that. And I think that's the biggest leap for Tatum. If you look at his assist totals, he's just shared the ball so beautifully and consistently, especially the latter part of this year. And that's why, to me, he's taken that next step. And the defense.

Well, yeah, the defense is always there. I don't think he could have done what he did to Durant in the first series a year ago. Well, he wasn't

willing to, right? He was so frustrated all the time. I think he's just grown up, right? These kids are young. These guys are all young. Giannis is still young. How old is Giannis? He's 26, I think. I mean, come on, 27, something like that. These guys are so young. So much growth to be had still for these guys.

You were at game one. Were you at game two, too, for Bucs Celtics? I was not. I was not. Yeah, you were at game one. Yes, I was. Which was a frustrating... Oh, brutal. The December Celtics, they returned, came back. But you know what? But the Bucs made them come back. I mean, I give so much credit. You know, we've known forever what Bud's strategy is, and that is build a wall in the paint,

dare you to beat us from the three-point line. And that's how they're going to live and die. That's been true, you know, from the very beginning. And I think, you know, I couldn't, you know, Brooke Lowe's best was so important in that game one. He was just a tyrant in the paint and the way he, I don't know how many blocks he had. It didn't matter. It was the amount of shots he altered, right? That stat that doesn't show up in a traditional stat line. He was so important. And, you know, the Celtics got smart in game two. They said, all right, this guy's got a lot of miles on him. He's a little older. Let's not bow right into him. Let's make him move. Let's make him, you know, get out of position,

make him uncomfortable, make him have to defend. Yeah, a little side to side action. Right. And I think that made a huge difference. But I give the Bucs, as bad as the Celtics were, I think that had so much to do with what Milwaukee did to them. Drew Holiday was fantastic, you know, game one. And I don't know what his shooting percentage was. It wasn't great. All I know is every time they needed a big shot, he made it. Every time.

And that's the underrated part of game two about Jay Brown, too. As great as he was offensively, he did a great job on Holiday in game two, I thought. Well, Jalen, you and I text a lot about Jalen, wondering what his consistency and his ceiling, just where are we

going with this? And, I thought that was a weirdly important game for him. Oh, tremendously. They needed him to show up

in a real way. There was a scenario where if he was bad again, that starts to become a little bit of a story. Like, wait a second, can we count as this guy as a true number two in a championship team or not? He was so bad in game one. It almost seemed like, is he hurt? What's going on here? He'll have those every once in a while, but he responded big time. I'm still not sure he's 100%

healthy. He's also going against, you know, Holiday Holiday who really had a bug up his ass this series my theory was the Marcus Smart defensive player of the year stuff where Holiday's like oh okay

so I'm not the best defensive guard anymore okay and he's been a man possessed I mean the full court pressure with him right you mentioned some of the offense

where he's doing that Oscar Robertson spin stuff going back and forth getting the basket and Jalen I thought stepped up to the challenge so that was encouraging and yet where he's doing that Oscar Robertson spin stuff, going back and forth, getting the basket. And Jalen, I thought, stepped up to the challenge. So that was encouraging. And yet, I have no idea what he's going to play like in game three.

I know Tatum will miss some shots, but I know generally what I'm getting from Tatum for the most part. The field goal attempts and whether he's getting calls, that's usually the variable with him. Jalen can just suck sometimes. And I think it's not like a lack of effort or a lack of preparation with Jalen Brown. This is just my opinion. I think he just wants it so badly he presses and forces the action. That's 100% in my mind what he did in game one. Jalen Brown's at his best when he's flying downhill into the teeth of defenses, actually better in

transition, of course, much like Ben Simmons at his best when he's in the open court and he comes barreling down the court and he's really, really hard to stop. And I think Jalen Brown just made up his mind. This is what I'm going to do. This is how I'm going to score and force the issue. And the stuff that was driving me nuts in game one was, you know, the I always hate the ISO. And both he and Jason fall into that occasionally, you know.

And I thought in game one there was some of that and that's bad enough but then when you start dribbling the ball between your legs and moving you know what are you doing make a move make a move and live or die with it and because you know of all the things that happened with jace jalen in game one seven turnovers i mean that is just unacceptable. Absolutely unacceptable. And give him credit. He, he did everything he needed to do to respond in game two. And I thought the biggest thing he did was just let the game slow down, slow down. You know, they, his first bucket, which I'm sure was by design was that little mid range pull up jump shot, which he can hit in his sleep. That's a

great shot for him. No matter what the analytics guys say, both Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown can hit that shot, and they should hit that, especially in a series like this. And, you know, they did a better job, I thought, of screening for him. I think everybody was just in a hurry game one, right? Everybody. And I do think there was a little bit of overconfidence too. You know, I read, I forget who, and I apologize to whoever did write it,

an interview with Grant Williams in advance of that series talking about how he was going to stop Giannis. And I'm like, what are you doing? Yeah. Why are you talking about this? Why is anyone letting you talk about this? You know, the idea that you could stop Giannis is absurd. And he said, you know, he said that.

But just to even discuss what you might do to try to stop him is just not a good idea. So I just, I don't think they came in with the right mindset. You know, I thought it was great with the Bucks didn't game one in terms of jumping their, their ball handlers and, you know, trapping them like Derek White, Derek White brought the ball up the car and all of a sudden these two huge seven foot guys are surrounding him. And he was like, what the hell? I mean, he wasn't ready for it. The coaching staff obviously didn't expect it. You know, there were, I think he had three turnovers in that game. So the Bucs did a lot of really smart, good things. They're a well-coached team. So I just, you know, the Bucs

will do something smart again in game three to counter this. That's just how it's going to be. The full court pressure. I was waiting for a team to do that to the Celtics because they might have set the record this year for the most successful team that didn't have anybody who could dribble more than 10 feet without potentially getting butterfingers or whatever. Nobody on this team has a lights-out handle. And the Bucs went into game one,

you could feel it immediately. They were like, all right, we're going to make you dribble all over the court. And we don't trust that you can do that. Right. And then we're going to make you pickbble all over the court. And we don't trust that you can do that. Right. And then we're going to make you pick up the dribble and pass out of a double team, which the scouting report on Derek White suggests that perhaps maybe he wasn't very good at that. So, yeah, it's a fun series.

Yeah, that trade will be discussed if the Celtics lose this series. Because one of the reasons you get Derek White is insurance in case any of the guards get hurt or Jalen Brown gets hurt. And this is a guy, he was on Team USA. He had some big moments with the Spurs. You would think for what they paid, first round pick, pick swap, chase Richson. We both love the trade, right?

We both love the trade. I still do. I think defensively, he's held up his end. I mean, I'm not big on plus minus in general box scores. He was a plus 22. But as you know, real plus minus is the better indicator of that because it tells you who you're guarding and all that. So defensively, he's doing his job. But, you know, he looks to me like a guy that's instead of taking a shot and saying, I'm going in, I hope it goes in. No, no. You got to say, man, this thing's going in. Like Jalen Brown, even when he struggles, do you ever doubt that he thinks that shot's going in? No, he's sure it is. There's a weird confidence thing with weight. Yeah, right now there is. You can feel it.

I haven't gone to, I'm going to go to game five, I think. When he shoots the open three, you can tell from the crowd reaction as he's shooting it and when it misses that the crowd doesn't think it's going in either. Like nobody in the room thinks it's going in, which is a bad place to go way back. You were covering this team. Gerald Henderson would have moments like this with the crowd. Yeah.

I remember the guy used to sit in our row. He just couldn't stand Henderson. Henderson, wide open, whatever. He'd miss it. And the guy would be like, Henderson. And he would just like slap his leg. But he was one of those. It's the worst thing.

And it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because when the whole crowd's going, oh, come on, please go in. That's not exactly what you need. He doesn't have the greatest body language either. They should have a body language rehab person work with him. Just be like, no, stick your chest out. Look like you belong.

All that stuff. I want to talk about Ime Adoka, which brings me to State Farm. When a new season starts, some fans assume they know who has the best chance of making the playoffs and the finals, but then a 500 team catches fire at the perfect time and has a magical title run down the road that surprises everyone.

Well, I'm surprised by Imei Adoka. We haven't talked about Emei Adoka enough on this podcast and especially like first couple months was really what is this guy doing like I don't understand it and then hands off very hands off in the couple months yeah the toughness that he's been able to

instill which I think when I talk to people around the league they're so impressed that this Celtics team is now tough. It was not a tough team. This was a team that got bullied, that got knocked around, that would immediately crater the first time.

They weren't getting calls, all this stuff. There was a great moment where Scylla and I talked about it on Sunday in the second quarter of game one when they sucked. And they just had two bad plays in a row. And he called timeout and the camera got to him. And he a row and he called timeout and the camera got to him and he was just mad and he, and he goes, the fuck are we doing? Like he just was like a frustrated, like, you know, 11th grade teacher. Um, but what have you heard from being

around the team just about him and his personality and how he was able to crack through with some of these guys? Well, it's kind of interesting because like you, the first couple of months, I'm like, is he going to call them out for all these ridiculous, stupid things they are doing? Is he going to make them be accountable when they're yelling at the refs instead of getting back in defense? All the things that drove me crazy about the Celtics last year. And he was strangely, at least to me, strangely silent those first couple of months. And even his own coaching staff, because I would talk to some of them from time to time, would say, we want him to get in their grill. But I think he,

you know, honestly, Bill, I think he was building trust first. And then when he got that trust, then he's like, okay, here's what you're not going to do anymore if you want to play for me. And then he had some accountability from them because he had built up their trust in them. Because I think those guys, all of them coming off last year were a little bruised. And I don't care how good you are and how great you are. You know, Tatum was mad he didn't make All-NBA. Jalen Brown made the All-Star team and then was like, what the heck? You know, he didn't even play in the playoffs last year.

So I think they came in a little salty, but also a little, you know, bruised, for lack of a better word. And I think he built up some trust with them. And now when he lays down the hammer, they know he means it. It's not for show. It's not for the cameras. It's because they need it and they respond to it. And he's tough on them. These film sessions, he's tough on them. And Brad Stevens know, Brad Stevens was, I think, I think he's one of the best X and O coaches I've ever seen. But that's not his personality, to get in your grill and let you have it. It never was. And maybe, you know, I think in the end, after a few years,

that's why his voice was, they were having trouble hearing his voice. So give him a ton of credit. I was worried about that staff. I thought there's not enough experience on that staff, but he brought his Portland boys with him. And by all accounts, they've been a great support system for him. You know, Will Hardy is a star. I'm really surprised he's not in the coaching mix for some of these openings, but I'm glad he's not. Cause I know, I know highly everyone thinks of him. I look, this is just me speculating, but I wouldn't be shocked if he gets that Spurs job

whenever Pop decides he's done. Oh, so you believe in that conspiracy theory? I do. There was a rumor going around that that's why Becky Hammond went to the WNBA because it was known that Will Hardy was getting that job on Pop's step down. And I never knew.

I still don't know if that's true, but I'd always heard that he was waiting. All I know is that everybody has this incredible respect for Will Hardy, who looks, for those of you who don't know what he looks like, he looks like he's 21 years old. He looks like this. But he's just impressive.

He has done the interview circuit in the past. He's interviewed for head jobs. Everybody comes out of there very impressed. So I do think it will be his time he's locked in like going to the games him and Nime

really have a really nice yeah well they've known each other they have a nice thing he'll hop up and he'll tell them stuff and it's never

there's never like a dynamic of why the fuck are you telling me this now it's the fourth quarter they've been through it together you know they both grew up

in the Spurs organization it feels a little Tibbs-Dockey actually oh there you go yeah yeah it does I mean, this now, it's the fourth quarter. Oh, no, no. They've been through it together. You know, they both grew up in the Spurs organization. It feels a little Tibbs-Dockey, actually. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Yeah, it does. I think he's really valuable. I'm surprised.

I watch the assistant coaches all the time. It's like one of my favorite things to do when they pan to the bench and things are going south. Because one of the guys that I hope gets another chance someday, because he was quirky and all, but I think he's a really good coach. He's Dave Yeager, you know, and he's on the Sixers. I was just going to mention that. Yeah, and he's on that Sixers bench.

Like, what are we doing? Yeah, it's so funny to watch him. I don't really know what he's thinking or saying, but I watch him and I'm like, because he can't help himself, you know? He's expressive. He really can't help it, but, you know, well, they're in trouble.

They struck oil with Udoka. That was really turned out. Man, was I nervous about it. But, you know, they're in trouble. They struck oil with Udoka. That was really turned out. Man, was I nervous about it. I went to one game first two months, and it just seemed like he didn't like the team. Well, do you blame him? Yeah, no, I don't blame him. But he had this

demeanor to him, like, I can't basically, I can't fucking believe what I'm watching for four quarters. I was like this isn't good and it made me think like wonder where this goes though one guy that he really seemed to like was smart and smart would come over and they would talk and they seemed like they had some connectivity and I think

that's evolved to the point that that's got to be one of the reasons smart kind of blossomed the way he did as a two-way player but that's smart too as that's just Smart's personality. No matter who's coaching him, he's the guy that, whether you like it or not, he's going to be right there in front of you. So there's just some really endearing things about Marcus that makes it hard to turn your

back on him. All right. I'm glad we did that. Even when you assume a team won't see much of the postseason, there are always a few surprises along the way. It's like people that assume they can't afford great insurance, but then they discover that State Farm has surprisingly great rates, like a good neighbor. State Farm is there. Get a quote today. I think whatever, however the season in series plays out, the one thing I think I, the two

things I can take away from this season with the Celtics are I do not think they will split up those two guys, at least for a couple years. I think this at least proves the level that they're playing at. Whether Milwaukee's a touch better than them or not, they have the best player in the world, that I'd be okay with the loss. You know, it's like one of these two,

there's three really great teams right now, and two of the three are in this series. And then the Marcus thing, I think now we're hitting a point where I could see maybe he retires with this team now. There's like a Marcus Smart retirement night. I would have said no way in October, November. Seemed inconceivable. But he made the necessary adjustments too. So he goes out with that injury and he's out for a while and they're moving the ball. And he comes back and it's the trade

deadline. And there were, you know, people then interested in Marcus Smart. There's always people interested in Marcus Smart because as salaries go, his is pretty reasonable, really. Yeah. Who's now, especially for a guy who is now the defensive player of the year. And I, I, I'm, you know, I think there was some conversations that like, look, we want to keep you, but here's what we need you to do. You know, we don't need you to take 10 threes a game. We don't even need you to take six threes a game. We need you to distribute the ball and be that

badass and be a leader. If you do those things, we're going to be really good and we'll keep you. We want to keep you. That conversation I think had to happen. He probably heard some of the Celtics need a real point guard stuff, I'm guessing. Yeah.

So I'm not a real point guard? There did seem a little of that. It's great. Look, there's going to be no shame how this series plays out, I think, for either team. If the Bucs lose, they can point to the Middleton thing. I thought they really missed him in game two. And that's a real guy who was their crunch time scorer in the finals last year. And if the Celtics lose,

I think it will at least partly be because Smart wasn't healthy. And, you know, he skips game two. My guess is they felt like they were going to get that one. The Bucs got the one they needed. They had the adjustments and they were just kind of hoping, all right, if we can steal this game, we buy Marcus now five, six more days here, and now he's ready for the weekend.

I think he's going to be ready for the weekend. You haven't heard anything, have you? Well, he said he wanted to play. Adolkos says he played. You know, Brad's the only one. Brad did radio here today in Boston and said, well, he's improving, but we'll have to wait and see. I'm not sure. So I'd be shocked if he doesn't play game three.

Honestly, I was shocked he didn't play game two. I don't think he could move on that leg at all. No, no. I'm not questioning that at all. I was surprised too. Then I heard he can't push up the leg. The fluid had built up in his knee. The quad injury

now then goes down to your knee and all that area around your kneecap and it was really, really swollen. So, I mean, he's a, he's a kid that plays,

you know, um, he's a kid that plays. And I'll tell you the worst thing in the world that happens to guys is when they don't play because of injury, that that's the, uh, stigma that gets attached to you.

And that happens sometimes incredibly unfair. Sometimes not incredible. I mean, he's the one guy where I was like, he must actually really be hurt if he's not playing. Because he's a maniac. What's your prediction for this series? I'm going to bail on you.

It's too close to call after two games. I agree. I'm sorry. I just can't. I think it's just good they're going to take turns winning games and we'll get to six or seven. Yeah. They're too close. think it's just good. They're going to take turns winning games and we'll get to six or seven. And yeah, I just,

they're too close. So good. I just, it feels a little bit to me like when the bucks were down two to nothing against Phoenix in the finals last year. And you're like, Oh, they can't do it.

They can't win. Blah, blah, blah. And then all of a sudden he just turned it on to a level that was just made us start talking about him as one of the great players of all time. Now, the difference is Middleton isn't there and you can't stress enough how important Middleton is. You know, I had mentioned earlier to you about on the second half of game two, which if I'm a

Celtics fan should make, would make me extremely nervous because a couple of things happen. Just like little glints of the Celtics reverting back to that ISO ball, one and done shots, you know, they've got to move the ball. But also if you're a Bucks fan, I would be really encouraged by the changes they did make, you know, screening for Giannis with their shooters. And then just a couple of those dribble handoffs, which of course there's where they really miss Chris Middleton. I mean, he was the best with Giannis in that regard. So I think they've, you know, near the end of that game, solved some ways to, even if it's not Giannis ending up scoring, ways to use Giannis to get themselves better shots. So if I were the Celtics, I'd be a little you on that one. I felt that weirdly, the second half went so badly for about a quarter and a half there that it, it freaked me out for, instead of coming out and being like,

yeah, we led by double digits for three and a half quarters. What a great sign. I was like, ah, man, a lot of end of the shot clock shots, a couple of 24 second violations,

white and Pritchard went off a cliff. Do I trust either of those guys in a game three? No. So there was some... Yeah, we'll see. I think this is a great series. I really do.

And I think Phoenix-Golden State maybe has a chance to be a great series. I'm still not sold on this Golden State team defensively. I think there's a world where Phoenix just slices

and dices them and we're like, wow, why did we think Golden State was going to beat them? Hey, you better hope they get there. You better hope they get there. You know, Gary Payton being out, he's the guy that stops John Morant. You better hope they get there.

You could feel that game too. Wait, last thing before we go. The Celtics, who I think were last, when you think back to November in Boston, the Pats were hot. They'd won some games. Mack Jones, Fever. Red So won some games. Mack Jones, fever. Red Sox had just had a really good season.

People were fired up about the Bruins. The Celtics, it was like same old, same old. People were out. Now we get to May 5th.

We're taping this on May 5th. Bruins are just getting annihilated by Carolina. Like annihilated. Wow. My dad is about as upset as I've heard about the Bruins in a while. The Patriots...

It was a terrible game last night. Although my girl, Emily Kaplan, the new sideline star for ESPN, just got to give Emily some props. She's really good. That was a really good hire by them. She's a great writer too. She's my pal from around the horn. I can't say enough about her. She's so the bruins in the tank patriots in a really rough spot coming

off a controversial draft and just in general like from a talent standpoint in the afc it's hard to make any case for them they have one of the most six or seven talented teams. And then the Red Sox have been a catastrophe. This is the worst Red Sox season. A closer. They need like eight guys. Everybody's hitting like 170. Yep. Yep.

So the Celtics have somehow emerged as the star of the Boston scene. Did not expect that four months ago. But I got to tell you, there's still great faith in the Patriots. And even with this draft controversy, I think people still put Patriots number one. I really do. People are still talking about that draft

pick, however many weeks later it is. I think the Patriots are still king. Interesting. Even now? Yep. That's my read on this city right now. They're not ready to bail just yet. Nope.

Well, if you're ranking favorite athletes in the city, is Tatum first now? No. No. People love the Patriots. People love Mac Jones. Now, they should love Tatum the most. They should love Tatum the most. You have Mac Jones first? I don't. I don't. No, I'm saying that as you think most popular. I think people like Tatum, but they need to see more. I think last year scarred their fans quite a bit.

I really do. Listen, he's unbelievable, Tatum. It's unbelievable, the turnaround. I think it's so impressive because so many young players don't ever make it. Like that turnaround, right? So he gets shut out of all NBA. And if you guys don't think that matters, just look the millions of dollars but also just bragging rights like that kind of stuff really matters to the nba players and um like jay like ray allen always said yeah being an all-star

once means nothing can you do it four times in a row you know same thing with champion be a champion once you got to do it more than once all that kind kind of stuff. And so for Tatum, I just think this was a real, like he felt like he had a lot to prove. He spent a lot of time during the off season getting himself ready to prove it. And I would say he's done it without a doubt. I mean, I do believe he'll be in the top five of almost everybody's MVP voting. Most people's, I mean, he's not going to win, obviously. It's going to be Jokic again, I think with Embiid and Giannis getting votes and then a drop off from there. But, you know, some people have Booker on their ballot and

you know. I had Booker. I had Tatum for first team all NBA, but I did not have him for, I had him sixth for MVP, which you're going to vote for five. I thought there were a clear three and then a clear next three. Right. John, did you have John? No, I had Booker four

and I had Luka fifth. See, I don't see how you can vote for Luka Doncic as MVP with the start he had. I just can never reward a player for that. I didn't feel awesome about it. Shame on you, Bill Simmons.

I know, I didn't feel awesome about it. The last four months, though, they'd won three best records in the league. Yeah. So at some point... See, I would pick Tatum over Doncic because he was start to finish a player that brought it

and did what he needed to do on both sides of the ball. I'm always like the defense. I did first team all NBA for him. Okay, good. I didn't have a voltage here for the first time in many, many years because I'm sort of retired except for when I hang out with you, Bill. Wow, I would have used you as my conciliary.

I didn't know. Oh, before we go. What happened? Rudy tells us Dylan Brooks suspended for game three. Not surprised. No, not surprised. I actually wouldn't have been surprised that they did three and four for him.

So let me ask you a question. Do you think he did that on purpose? No, but I think he wanted to do a hard foul. I agree with that. So that's just a nuance that people should consider. I don't think Dylan Brooks, it might have been a dirty play, but I don't think Dylan Brooks is a dirty player.

And I think there's a difference. I think he's a very physical player. Yeah, but I'm all right with that. But Kerr said before that game, we know this is going to be the most physical game we play in these entire playoffs. He knew they were going to come out like that. But Kerr said before that game, we know this is going to be the most physical game we play in these entire playoffs. He knew they were going to come out like that. Going way back

to the 80s and 90s, there were games when the game was starting, you were like, this is going to be physical. I know what's going to happen. Anything to do with the Detroit Pistons. Right. But that's a good example. Detroit would have these games where like,

hey man, no layups today. No dunks. Everybody's getting hit. So I think Memphis had that mindset. He really missed badly on the swipe.

He did. If you're going to make the case for it was a dirty play, he missed it by so much that it was like, all right, that's a little weird. That's also a little freaky

how Peyton fell. Yeah. Sometimes guys, they roll it over. He put his, he put his arm out, which is usually a little dangerous. Do I think it was,

uh, see now I'm gonna get in trouble. Do I think it was dirtier than when Dwayne Wade hyper-extended Rondo's elbow? No. Hmm. To me, that was worse. Cause Wade like stuck his leg out

to trip him too remember that he pulled Rondo backwards and kind of tripped him from behind I thought that was dirtier personally but I mean it's just a different world now

everything like the flagrant ones that they call I'm like okay that's going to be a flagrant one but it really shouldn't be in my opinion half the time

I just don't I was pushing for I think it should be flagrant one two and three I think they need to add a level because like

to me Draymond wasn't a flagrant two on Sunday but it was kind of a little more than a flagrant one so I don't know there's some middle ground

that they're not hitting anymore in general though too many replay reviews yeah way too many like and it's weird because they're in

a situation where they're reviewing everything. Gotta get this right. But then with four seconds left in the Warriors-Grizzlies game, can't review that. Rule says we can't.

So it's like, all right, so we can't review. This is literally the biggest play call of this game and we can't review this? But you can review

like every block and charge that we have for 44 minutes? I don't get it. All right, Jackie. It was great to see you. You too. Check out the Icons Club, which you can find on the Book of Basketball feed. And I know you're

coming back for... Because this series is going to go for a while. So I know we'll see you again at some point during this series. All right. Sounds good. Thanks for coming out. See ya. This episode is brought to you by Movember. The mustache is back with a vengeance. Look at Travis Kelsey. Before he rocked that Super Bowl ring,

he rocked that super soup strainer. Grow a mustache for Movember. You'll do great things too. You won't win the Super Bowl, but your fundraising will support mental health, suicide prevention, and prostate and testicular cancer research. And if you don't want to grow a mustache,

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of American Express. Terms and conditions apply. Visit amex.ca slash business platinum. All right, Jeff Amens here. The last time we podcasted together, it was early in the pandemic. We were on a phone. Were you with Eddie Vedder or were you in separate places? I think we're all in separate places, right? Yeah. I had just driven to Montana, which is where we go when there's pandemics. That's right. Yeah. So we were in three different places on phone, trying not to interrupt each other. I think at one point, I had technical difficulties. I had to leave. You guys just kept the podcast going. And now it's a lot more normal.

You're back on tour. You were in San Diego at the Pearl Jam last night. What was that like to be back? Oh, man. It's so great. I mean, you can... I mean, it almost feels like if we retired for 10 years and came back and, you know, like the 10,000 biggest fans showed up in one room it was sort of that amazing

it's really good was that the first walk me through the last two years when when have you played together and who was in the room that was obviously the biggest room you've had but but have you had any little testers what was going on uh yeah we we did four shows last fall we did uh like three ohana festivals and then we did a festival in new jersey um kind of hoping that uh things would turn around a little quicker than they than they have and we're and we're out here right now with masks and testing every day and doing sort of what um the nba taught us to do right well you also you released an album and then you didn't get to promote it,

which is weird. That's not usually how it goes. That happened in 2020. Yeah, I think this is the third time we've rehearsed the songs. Seriously? Yeah, we just, you know, we never, I mean, we got to play the songs

on those four shows last year, but it wasn't enough. You didn't get to play the songs on those four shows last year, but it wasn't enough. You didn't get to play them enough times for them to be part of your muscle memory. So we kind of had to start all over again about two and a half weeks ago and relearning them. How many times do you have to play those songs as a group before you feel like you guys all have control over it?

Because I know nothing about this stuff. You could tell me it would take three times or it could take like a year to really master. Well, it's probably that big of a variety. Some songs, everybody connects with the rhythms and whatever. The crazy thing is like five of us write, so all of us have different right hands, like we sort of strum differently. And so we sort of have to learn each other's rhythms a little bit, but, um, uh, yeah, there'll be a few of these. That'll take us a few shows to sort of for them to be, uh, you know,

in our minds where they should be. Well, what was the highlight from San Diego last night? Oh man, there's a lot of highlights. I mean, there, there, there's so much going on that it's hard to, you know, I think it was hard for Ed to even, I mean, he, you know, we didn't even get to mention Roe v. Wade or, but yeah, a lot's a lot's happened in the last, I mean, it's really been four years since we've been on a proper tour so um uh

yeah there's lots of catching up to do and Ed grew up there and so he's you know he's got family and friends and and so and that we couldn't see you know like we're we're in a bubble so you see him in the crowd and you wave to him Bill Walton was in the crowd of course he was oh my god yeah of course he was but he but we got a spotlight on him and he had his arms up as he, as he does. And that's, you know, that stuff's exciting for me because those basketball guys are my real

heroes. So. Right. Well, we're going to talk about hoops. I saw Eddie, he, he performed here a couple of months ago with,

uh, you know, so yeah. Yeah. And the energy you could really feel, you can feel it at Coachella too, where people, you know, Earthlings. Yeah. Yeah. And the energy, you could really feel it. You could feel it at Coachella too, where people, you know, nobody was able to go to live music or if they did, it was briefly. And then all of a sudden it got pulled away again.

And so you feel it with the fans, but you could also really feel it with the band. Like they were just excited to be out there and doing their thing versus, you know, being in some garage or, or some rehearsal place or whatever. Yeah. I mean, that combined with Andrew Watt, who we've done a little recording with, who played guitar with Ned's band. Like he's a, you know, he's been a fan, he's been a fan of Pearl Jam since he was eight years old or something. So he's up there on stage with Ed, you know, it's gotta be pretty amazing. So. So when you got, cause you've done solo stuff too,

you have the band, which the band has not wavered since the early nineties. Yeah. And then sometimes people go off, but you guys have always been able to navigate that. But how does that, how does that work? Like,

like how did the personal dynamics work? Do you, is there ever any questions of like, well, wait, why are you doing that? Why isn't that for us? Or what makes somebody want to kind of go off and leave for a second and then come back?

I think in the early days, it was weird. I think Stone was the first guy to have a side project. He made a record with Brad. And I think we sort of worked through it at that point. And then everybody went and did kind of their own things at that point. I mean, I was like 95 or something, 94. And I think it's been good. I think everybody goes off and we put on a different pair of shoes and play some different people.

And 80% of the time, it's not nearly as satisfying. is, uh, satisfying and it might be a lot more work because, uh, everybody in Pearl Jam, um, shares the load and, um, we have no problem reaching out to one another if we need help with something. And so, um, you know, it's just, it's just the difference between like a brotherhood or, you know, the, whatever, the 60 Celtics teams that were together for all those years. It's just easier. But it's good to go off. Well, you can see it with some of the NBA teams that are succeeding now in the playoffs, like the Celtics.

I think one of the reasons they've been so successful, at least the last four months, is because Tatum and Brown and Marcus Smart, they've all been together for a while now. And then Horford came back and he was with those guys for a couple of years. And there's some continuity that the way the league is now where things just shift and guys jump teams and we have another super team. Then this guy goes here, the contracts are shorter. So guys are bouncing around and the continuity matters. It feels like more than it used to. But it's, you know, I would have thought that with the Jazz this year. I mean, I'm a Jazz fan because I'm friendly with Quinn. And, you know, that team baffles me a little bit

because that team's sort of the core of that team's been together. And why doesn't Rudy and Donovan get along? I don't, I just don't get it. Well, in that case, that's the continuity you don't want, right? That's like the band that's ready to break up after five, six years. But the Celtics felt that way at the beginning of the year. It felt like Tatum

and Green weren't, you know, like or Brown weren't getting along and it took Marcus to get pissed off and yell at him and, you know, and it took Marcus to get pissed off and yell at him. And, you know, and it's got to be great having Al Horvath. And the coach seems great too.

It seems like they respond to that guy. So that's, I mean, this is the first Celtics team that I've ever kind of liked. Oh, wow. This is exciting news. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of part of the reason

I wanted to do the show. Yeah, the coach came in and he was a real hard ass. Yeah. In a way that almost seemed like self-destructive. Yeah. And by December, after the nighttime he lit those guys up, I think all the Celtic fans were like, what the fuck's going on with this guy? This is not how you do it. But it worked.

Yeah. guy. This is not how you do it. But it worked. And those guys are all tougher and they're way more cohesive and he really gave them kind of a I don't know, kind of a spine. It's a way tougher team than it was the last couple years. And you can feel it even yesterday when they came back in game two. We're taping this on a Wednesday.

They came back in that game two. They were just really physical. Physical with Giannis and just tough in a way that I don't feel like they were last year. And that's kind of been the mode they've been in since the All-Star break.

I mean, I've seen a couple games where I was like, that's kind of the best defense I've seen in like 20 years. Yeah. And then Milwaukee was slapping around

the first two games too. The defense was nuts. I mean, this series is going to be so great. I mean, I'm going to miss one or two of them because we'll be playing, but I wish I could but I wish I could be at every one of these games because I would go if we weren't on tour, I think.

So you go to the Utah Jazz games? What's the deal? Are you just watching on TV or are you able to go to them? Um, I mean, there was a six, seven year period where, um, I mean, I don't know that many guys, um, any coaches and stuff, but, um, uh, Larry Koskoviak was a Montana guy who was at university Utah and then Quinn Snyder, um, his brother, Matt and I had been friends for 30 years and played in basketball leagues. And, and so we'd, we'd, we'd make a trip three or four of us and, and go down and just watch basketball for, you basketball for three or four nights in a row and sort of get the red carpet. You know some folks, and that makes it nice because you get good seats. Yeah, and it's close.

It's close to Seattle. You know what's crazy about Salt Lake is it's a very popular NBA player city, which I would not have expected. Why is that? I think they like that it's a very popular NBA player city, which I would not have expected. But why is that? I think they, they like that.

It's a little discreet. I think they like the nightlife. I think, you know, that or the, what the version of the nightlife is in Salt Lake. I think they like the, the woman and the people that are there.

And it's just, I, I think it's a little more NBA friendly than people might realize. Yeah. People think the opposite. Yeah. There's a rebelliousness there too. I think because of the church, there's a little more NBA friendly than people might realize. People think the opposite. Yeah, there's a rebelliousness there too, I think, because of the church. There's a lot of kids who are younger people that want to party and get out and get after it and drink Coke and drink caffeine. Have some Mexican Coke with extra sugar in it.

Well, there's with the back to the Mitchell Gobert thing, my theory on this, cause I read up on it. There was a couple of really good stories about it on ESPN. Typic man wrote a really good one. It seems like a philosophical difference between the two stars where you have the one star Gobert who really should be the,

the foundation of this defense oriented like almost like 2000s team and everybody's on the same page and it's just like basically the defense would be the best part of the team and mitchell is like this new wave offense first guy it's not really a two-way player at all he would be better off on a team like dallas where you're just spread in the floor and it's five shooters and he could just attack. So they don't make sense together. And I think people thought that made sense together because they're getting wins.

But they kept falling short in the playoffs. Then this year, they seem so dispirited. It just seems like one of them has to go. And it's probably going to be Gobert. This is the first year that it felt like the body language was off. You just see Donovan kind of give up.

He wasn't playing hard defense either. Not that he was great before, but he really wasn't this year. Yeah, but at least he was playing help defense and getting steals and stuff before. I mean, this year it didn't seem like he was getting much of that. I hope they figure it out. I mean, I pull for didn't seem like he was, you know, getting much of that. So I hope they figured it out.

I mean, I, you know, I mean, I pull for Quinn. I really like Quinn a lot. So. Well,

there's rumors he might be going to the Lakers and that's, oh man, you know, that's in play too. I don't, who knows? Well, you know,

if that was a better situation, I would say go do that. But is there a worse situation right now? That's tight. It's a tough situation for any coach. It's like, here's... I think they're going to be able to trade Westbrook. For who? It's just...

I went from thinking there's no way to now thinking, he's got a year left on his deal. Some of these other teams want to shake stuff up or reset or... Even a team like Utah, which I don't know if they'll do this, but if they really wanted to blow it up and trade everybody and they're taking big contracts back for one year with a bunch of picks.

I think if you put Westbrook with a bunch of young athletes, I think it could be interesting too. I think just him getting out and pushing the ball. The Lakers didn't have any of that. So, you know, I mean, that was one part of the bad fit was that's an old half-court offense. And that's kind of not his deal. Yeah, it reminded me a little of sometimes when the super bands,

the people who've already famed, they just kind of throw a band. They're bored. They're like, oh, and then it just kind of doesn't make sense. They're like, why did you guys do this? What's going on here? I'm a Westbrook apologist. I have been my whole career.

Even now? Well, my argument now is that if you look at it, if you, I mean, he gave you exactly what he's given you his whole career.

If you look at his stats, it's the same. It's like 45% field goal percentage. It's four turnovers. I think he had less turnovers this year than he normally does. So it's like, you know, it's like, how could the Lakers be shocked? And he gave him 78 games. I mean, what did AD play 20 and LeBron played like 50 or something?

Right. I mean, that's the part that I love about him. It's just his, I mean, you know, he drives you crazy at the same time, but it's just his effort and how much he cares. And I thought LeBron and AD gave up a ton this year too, man. You'd watch those last 10 games and be like, those guys just lurking around the outside with their shoulders down. Yeah, Davis had a bizarre year. LeBron, I went to like four Laker games over the course of three

weeks. So I really got to see it in person and you could see he was checked out on the team, but he wasn't checked out on succeeding. So like they would leave, the timeout would end. And I always love, that's my favorite thing to go to. I really miss going to games. And I always love to watch the timeouts, who's interacting, how do they interact when there's a replay review, what are guys doing? And he, a lot of the times, would just walk to the furthest part of the court

just to get away from everybody. And then he would do his thing, he was very businesslike, but you could just tell he was like, this team sucks. Getting his points. Yeah, and it's just, but you could just tell he was like, this team sucks. Getting his points. Yeah. And it's just, you know, I think at some point he realized

he's got, he wasn't going to win a title with this team. He's either about titles or he's about, how many points can he get? Can he get to 40,000? Can he beat Kareem? So,

you know, he's one, he's going to be in one of those two lanes and he was in neither lane with this team. So he went for the points, but it's pretty weird. And also like, it's weird that basketball players are turning into musicians like you guys can have a you guys can have a band for 50 years if you want and we would have thought well if you're a basketball player like a 15 years now it's yeah can you get 25 yeah maybe i mean who's

the who's the next tom who's the tom brady yeah it might be him yeah could be. I mean, who's the, who's the next Tom? Who's the Tom Brady? Yeah, it might be him. Yeah, could be right. I mean, I mean, you know, the rumor that I just heard is he's, you know,

he's, he was spending a million dollars a year for his health, but then I heard he spent two this year or something like that. So yeah, I think it's easily, I think he's not the only one either, because when you think like chefs, you think all the technology that they have and masseuses and they have cryo chambers. Yeah, four or five guys on staff.

Yeah, and there are people making them food constantly and personal trainers. Yeah, it's got to be a couple million. Making them eat it at the right time of the day. Yeah, yeah. Right. I mean, it's cool how scientific it's gotten. I mean, mainly just because we're seeing this insane evolution of the athlete in a really short period of time,

which is pretty cool. Yeah, because like, in football, Aaron Rodgers might be able to do it. Yeah. You might see

way down the road, Mahomes, if he could just, he's pretty young, right? He's, you know, he's already put up

some really big stats and I think he's like 25, something like that. So, I think if he can stay healthy and then from a hoop standpoint, I think a lot of these dudes, who knows? I always wonder if like my homes and,

and like Russell Wilson, if those guys won't last as long just because of the way that they play, you know, like they're a little bit more running. I don't know. You know? Well, the way they've changed defenses where you're not

allowed to hit anybody yeah yeah that's the thing with LeBron like he still you know takes some real punishment I guess Giannis

is somebody that was thinking about him during the first two Boston games because it's so different when you're rooting against a guy yeah

it's one thing if like I could bet on on him or against him or I could just watch him on TV but when it's like my team's playoff or against him or I could just watch him on TV. But when it's like my team's playoff future is at stake, you're just, it's a different level of fear. And it's just like, God, he has that same LeBron thing now

where he could just put his shoulder into whoever and then get to where he wants to go anyway. And it's like, if you're not going to call that a charge, what are we supposed to do? Yeah. You know, and he's 27. Yeah. And he seems and he's 27, so. Yeah. And he seems like crazy durable too. Like, and there's been, you know, a couple of times

where it looked like he was out for a while and then three games later he's back. Right. Like last year I heard his knee and it was like, oh, is he done for the year? Yeah. When you think about like LeBron and Kareem, Duncan, these guys, the durability was a big piece

of when you start thinking about the six, seven, eight, nine, 10 best players. Yeah. But it's, it's the Kareem thing is amazing that he lasted that long. Yeah. With four years in college too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And then he had like, I was thinking about that during winning time. I don't know if you watch winning time. It's a really bizarre HBO show. It's I really enjoy it though. Yeah, me too. But yeah, he's like, he's in the league 11 years at that point on that show, but he'd also put five years or four years in UCLA.

So he's, you know, whereas LeBron was year 15, he was 15 years in the NBA. You know, he had no college at all. So, so by his 15th year year that was like the 2018 finals against the warriors yeah i mean was the part of it was kareem was that he was broke right wasn't that part of it that he just i think yeah he had a bad fire yeah and that's what made less money back then so you were watching winning time oh yeah i think it's i mean john riley is just fantastic holy smokes like you know i

thought the first couple episodes they were doing a pretty good job of like except for except for the jerry west character which i didn't buy just because the guy's too thick um but right it was like fat jerry west yeah but um everybody else i thought they were doing a good job the first two three episodes of just sort of like you, making every character like a villain and somebody that you liked. And then they kind of, it was a tipping point, I think, kind of happening right now with magic and just the womanizing and how bad he's treating Cookie. And, you know, and there's truth in all that stuff. You know, I think, I mean, I think all those guys made a big mistake. I think Kareem should have just not talked about it.

I think it would probably go away quicker if... I don't know. Well, I think HBO is delighted that anytime there's a controversy, they're like, awesome, please get better. And then this magic documentary that comes out of the middle of nowhere. Like they're trying to balance it out and tell the puff piece version And then this magic documentary that comes out of the middle of nowhere. Like they're trying to balance it out and tell the puff piece version or I don't know. I don't know what they're doing, but it's incredible.

You guys, you've done a couple documentaries, but you did not do the puff piece version. I didn't feel like... The Cameron Crowe one, I guess it was favorable to you guys, but I thought some of the stuff was really interesting about the soul of the band the first three, four years. It's a little like a basketball team. Yeah. I mean, I didn't want to do it just because it

just takes that year or two of your career where you're looking back and you're talking about all this. I've always just wanted to keep the thing rolling and moving ahead. just takes that year or two of your career where you're looking back and you're talking about all this, you know, and I, I've always just wanted to keep, keep the thing rolling and moving ahead. And yeah, in retrospect,

I'm glad that we did it because I think it, it sort of allowed us to sort of put a bow on that first 20 years and put it in the closet and then we could, we could move on. But yeah, I mean, I don't have any perspective of if it was good or not. I like,

Cameron's great. So I liked it. Yeah. We, we were doing, we did that music box series for HBO. We were doing documentaries. They're really like focused on like windows with a band or,

you know, an event, stuff like that. And, um, I, to me, it's like,

it was same thing would happen with 30 for 30, where if you do it correctly, it becomes a really cool document of the team or the player or the band or the artist or whatever that I think ultimately they kind of rally around there. They're like way down the road. They're glad it exists. You know what I mean? And sometimes they'll be glad right away. Like when we did the bad boy Pistons one, those guys were so happy that somebody told their story because they were just the wrestling heels for 25 years. And then it was like, oh, we're the good guys in this? So those guys were delighted.

But other times, especially with musicians, like we talked to a lot of people for that season one of the Music Box and a lot of the artists were where you were, where it's just like, I don't want to look, I don't want to go backwards. We're still trying to make music. We want to go this way.

Yeah. So I don't know. It's a hard bounce. Yeah. But at the same time, like I bet, you know, down the road,

your family will probably be glad some of this stuff exists. Oh yeah. And like, you know, like my parents and, you know, the people you grew up with and all of that. You know, I mean, I made sure to go back to my little hometown of Montana and do my part.

Right. And just because I don't know, it's like once you agree to do that stuff, it's like then at that point you want to do it right. You don't want to half-ass it or mumble through it and seem like a curmudgeon. Well, you guys, I mean, you didn't really need a documentary since you had your iconic cameo in Singles. I still get embarrassed when that gets brought up. Why do you get embarrassed? It's the 30th anniversary of that movie this year.

I think we're going to do it on the rewatchables. Oh, man. I mean, I think, you know, again, I have zero perspective. You know, the best part of that movie for me was I worked in the art department that whole movie. And it was, that was, you know, it was a blast. It was just a blast to help, you know, decorate walls of the apartment and create these fake posters. And it was kind of all the stuff that I did in the band anyway, but. Oh, so you were doing like the Citizen Dick posters? Yeah, that was all me.

Like all the fictitious song titles and all, you know, it was just fun to sort of, you know, help create these bands. And, you know, Cameron would come over every day and sit at the desk and ask what I was working on and we'd get all excited. Right. You know, so that part was super fun. But the acting, that was was yes i thought it was solid yeah it's funny that that film comes out a little late for when the actual like

movement whatever you want to call it's happening but i'm still glad i still feel like it captures something yeah you know when you look back it it's like, I'm glad it exists. I think the actors, I'm sure Cameron probably, if he had to do it over again, maybe he'd make the actors a little younger. Yeah. The lead actors,

like Campbell Scott, the lead guy, he seems like he's 30 in that movie. That guy should have seemed like he was 22, 23, 24 range. Yeah, everything was just a little sweet. You know, really what was going on at that time in Seattle, it was just, everything was just a little sweet. You know, what, you know, really what was going on at that time in Seattle was, it was a little, a little darker. Yeah, I was going to say, what do you remember? Because that's, we're officially 30 years away from that at that point. Is it just, do you even remember?

Is it just, because I barely can remember anything that happened in the 90s at this point. Everything's like a blur. You remember one story, one anecdote. What do you remember? I mean, I remember quite a bit. There was probably only a couple small periods where I was drinking. The rest of the time, I would just go out

and drink like cranberry and soda. So I remember most of it. I mean, it was a cool little scene there you know there was probably like a hundred people and half of us were in bands and you know mostly it was about going out to the vogue on a wednesday night see that was the night that they had bands and uh there was a couple other clubs uh ditto and yeah you know it was just people kind of doing the same thing,

kind of with not really a lot of hopes to be big or to sign to a major. You know, that didn't really start to happen until 88 or 89 or something. So, yeah, you know, it's just, it's a great way to be in your 20s, you know, like just making music and making art and hanging out with friends who are into the same thing and skateboarding and chasing girls and just kind of the whole, you know. It sounds like my son. I think my son's doing 99% of that right now. What do young people, because I'm sure you get asked by like aspiring musicians and up and coming bands or bands hoping to replicate anything you guys did, but what do they say? What are the questions they ask you?

You know, my niece right now has a little record deal and has been working on songs for the last year and a half. And her angle is so different. I keep saying the important thing is to get out there and play live and get your audience. And if you have your audience, you can make a life of it. And just to keep writing and keep focused on that part of it.

And it's like young people talk about Spotify hits and YouTube views and kind of all that stuff. Take time. Yeah, and I just don't know any. I mean, I do have Spotify that I listen to once in a while. And I go to YouTube when I need to learn a cover song or something. But I don't pay attention to any of that stuff in terms of... And I go to YouTube when I need to learn a cover song or something, but, but I don't pay attention to any of that stuff in terms of, well, I mean, Scott Greer,

who I think you, who you talk to, he's, he's sort of our guy. He's the one paying attention to that stuff. So, I mean, but he talks about stuff and I'm like,

I don't know. I don't know what that means. It doesn't, you know, it's like, you know, if you're on a computer for two hours, you,

you view 10 things. and what does that mean? There's no money exchange where people are really paying attention. It's just all of it. So I just don't. Yeah, like you guys released an album and I listened to the whole album from start to finish and then you go back and you listen to it again. Now, the whole mechanism is so different now.

Now, if you guys came out of a time machine right now, I don't even know what that would look like. It'd be like one song, and then all of a sudden, somebody would be doing it on TikTok, and then that's how the song would blow up. I don't know. You know, we were talking the other day, though, about how in the late 60s and 70s,

there were a lot of albums that were like seven, eight songs, 30-minute records, 25-minute records. And then I think when CDs came out, I think when the price jumped, at least I remember as an artist, I remember you felt like, oh, we're charging people 12 bucks for this thing. We got to give them 14 songs. You felt guilty. And then it just got out of whack where most records were 50, 60 minutes long. and I feel like now it's time to go back the other way. Like let's go back and make six and seven song records. And then the attention deficit thing can handle, can handle that part of it. And then maybe you make more records,

you know? I mean, I would love to do that. I would love to make a record a year or something, but yeah, like the, so the seventies were like the cassettes where you'd flip the cassette halfway through.

Yeah. And that first song on the second side of the cassette was always important, right? Right, yeah. And then all of a sudden the CD was the straight through. Yeah. And yeah, it was like right around the early 90s. I remember the Smashing Pumpkins,

that one out Melancholy album. And they did the double album, but it was like 25 songs and i was like i can't it's gonna take me like a year to decide which ones this is too much it was like being served some dinner that had seven entrees you know i would have been so much happier with like the eight uh eight to ten songs and i think you guys you never you guys never really did like the absolute I don't feel like you ever went overboard with a number of songs on an album did you I think you had I think in the middle we there was a few 13 and 14 yeah I think never more than that yeah yeah I I mean you know we there's been a lot of talk over the years about making a double record because sometimes we've had enough material, but I think we always just go back to like,

I think we should pick the 10 or 12 and, you know, leave the six for the lost dogs or whatever. Um, so. What was, I asked Eddie this too. I asked both of you this two years ago and he got mad.

It was like, what was your favorite song to perform? It's a favorite? What does that mean? But when you're out, you've been playing some of these songs for 30 plus years. Are there like two or three where you're like, oh yeah, this one still does it for me? Or are they all like that?

I think sometimes when we give songs a break, I get excited. Oh, to bring them back. Yeah, to bring them back. they're all like, you know, I think sometimes when we give songs a break, I get excited. I get excited. Oh, to bring them back. They're like, yeah. So which songs did you give a break?

What did it like? Give me an example. Well, I mean, for example, we played Jeremy last night and we had, we don't play that song. Wow. We play,

we, we probably played every six or seven shows maybe. Yeah. Um, whereas we play live every night, we play even flow every night. Um, we didn't play black last night. We play Evenflow every night. We didn't play Black last night, which was kind of shocking.

So Chad mixed it up. Yeah, I mean that's been the best part of getting out and playing shows is mixing it up every night and feeling like there's three songs you barely know and you're hanging on by a thread and it keeps you engaged. Well, now you have this whole social media thing

where the set list goes out immediately. Yeah. People can investigate it. Wait, they played that? Oh, my God. They played that one? Yeah, they weren't there, but they complained.

Yeah, they're... Horrible show. They complained about a show they weren't at. Right. You started doing some TV at. You started, you started, um, doing some TV stuff.

You're in this Hulu show. You did the music for it. That's a whole, I mean, some people have gone down that road and like Trent Reznor, I think is probably one of the best examples, but, um,

but this is a whole world that you can go down pretty easily. What appealed to you about that? Um, well, Well, I asked. I said Hulu, by the way. It's an FX show. It's on Hulu. It's an FX. So I was talking to Scott Grewitt right at the beginning of the pandemic,

and he's like, is there anything that you want me to keep an eye out for you? And I said, yeah, get me a great movie. I said, steal a Paul Thomas Anderson movie from Johnny Greenwood, please. And, uh, he came back like, you know, a month later and said, Hey, I got you a pitch for this, uh, this series. It's a John Krakauer book called under the banner of heaven. And I was like, I've, I've read it. Fantastic. I was like, yeah, I go,

that's perfect. Like I have all sorts of issues around my childhood Catholicism. And so this is going to be a good fit. And I just had a great pitch with, I've never done a pitch in my life. But I had a great pitch with Lance Black, the screenwriter,

and had a follow-up one and then I it seemed like I had the gig but for a month or so I wasn't sure if I had the gig and uh we just started moving ahead as if we were going to do this thing and then the thing got postponed and delayed because of COVID and editors and changing. And we just kept plowing through it and made all this music. I kind of had a, I've had this vision for like 20 years about how I wanted to make an ambient record in the space that I have in Montana. And we went down that road and we just sort of hit this vein

of like where we were just making really satisfying music. Um, and, and it's not songs. It's like, you're creating like this big sonic scapes and, and trying to, uh,

sort of, uh, it's like moods, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And,

and change and, and creating these moods and different keys with all these different instruments and having all these little places around the room. We had looper stations, like making music in this room. And then we would just go to these little stations and play either keyboards or upright bass and acoustic or full electric trio with his drum set and two amps.

And it was just like, it was just fun, you know, being in the room with Josh Klinghoffer and John Wicks, who I made a bunch of music with. And it was just super, you know, creative. It's like, I immediately wanted to do it with Pearl Jam. I was like, we need to do this because we could, we could write a shit ton of music doing this. But well, wait a second. we need to do this because we could, we could write a shit ton of music doing this. But, um,

uh, well, wait a second. So do you know, like, how much do you know about the TV show as you're creating this stuff? You know, the general mood, you read the book,

read the book, but is this music you would have created anyway? Or is it like, cause they always say like, it's inspired by the content, but if it's actually inspiring it, how does it inspire it? Well,

you know, the, a lot of the conversations that we had with Lance, um, you know, he kept talking about the, the, the show is about, um, you know, the earthly, uh, desires and evils, you know, uh, you know, tapped up against the celestial, you know, love and, and all that and so he he kept saying he wanted the music to sort of um take on the juxtaposition of those two forces and so that was always in the back of our head so we so we had like bells and marimba phones and you know all these chimey things in the room that we could go to all this percussion uh uh, keyboards that were like very, um, you know,

sort of the top end of things. And then we just had all this heavy, almost like black metal stuff going on underneath. Um, and, uh, yeah, it was,

it, and then once we got into it, once we started seeing episodes and once we started going back and forth between the editors and Lance and kind of all that, then that was when the real work began. And about 80% of the time we were hitting it in the right place. And then every once in a while he would just say, no, that's not really a dark scene. That's more, there's more melancholy. It should be more melancholy.

So we'd have to go back and redo that. But it was, I mean, it's i you know that's a i could do that as a day gig like nine to five forty hours a week it would be that would be very satisfying yeah lance is like now they're going to the morgue in this scene that's a little too upbeat we need a we didn't there at the morgue music yeah there's there's not a ton of upbeat music on this. There's a couple of family scenes and there's not much. There's not a lot of montages, not a lot like a Little League montage or anything. Were there scores that you love from different movies or TV shows? Because you mentioned Paul Thomas Anderson. Was there anything where you're like, man man that's like the gold standard i love that well uh you know the one thing that lance told us at the beginning was he said don't watch any other scores i want you to do your own thing forge your own path like he he was so great about that um but um i saw power of the dog and i was like oh shit that's like the greatest

i mean johnny greenwood and and very different than anything he'd done before. Um, you know, there's a, there's a, there's a song, there's a movie that I loved as a kid called the Missouri breaks, uh, Jack Nicholson and Marlon Brando. Yeah. That the, you know, the area that it's about is like 10 miles from where I grew up in Missouri breaks. And, um And so as a family, we went and saw that when I was a kid. And there's a piece in that movie that I always remember being interesting. And when I got to get this gig, I went and looked that back up and it's a John Williams score. And most of the score

is like sort of Western hillbilly music, you know, it's like banjos and stuff, but there's this one piece that's kind of a modern piece. And I, I actually listened to that a lot because I was like, that's an example of using modern music in a historical way that where it works.

Yeah. And, and so that, that was, that was sort of inspirational in a historical way that where it works. Yeah. And, and so that, that was, that was sort of inspirational in a lot of ways. Uh, just so we didn't go to the banjos and cause you, cause sometimes there's these historical scenes in under the banner of heaven,

or they go back to Joseph Smith and all of that. And your instinct is to go to the banjo. Yeah. But we, we sort of force ourselves not to and to sort of like, you know, tap into what was going on at that time with more modern instruments.

There's some, I'm obsessed with the whole score thing. Like Midnight Run's one of my favorite movies. That one has a great one where it's like, it'll kick in, it can go slow. And it's like, oh, we're on the road again to get chased by the police. And it like ratchets it up again. I mean, I was kind of obsessed with that movie for about 10 years. I need to watch it again.

It's still a classic. It's, it's one of those, you just dive in. It's like putting on a nice sweater. All right. I have two questions and then we'll go. Question one is a bass player um on the on the great nba teams there's always you know the parallel to the band the guy who yeah you know he's not gonna maybe not get as many points and as many shots and maybe not get as much attention as the best guy in the team or

the star of the team or the most overpaid guy on the team, whatever. But they got to know their role. Like Chris Bosh in the LeBron era. There's got to be that guy who's just like, all right, I'm almost overqualified to be this guy. But if I do all the stuff I'm really good at, we go up a level. Who is the guy now? Who's the guy you identify with on the teams? Is it like a Marcus Smart? That's exactly who I was just thinking of. And I was kind of thinking,

I immediately was thinking Celtics because you're such a Celtics fan. Thank you. But I've always loved Marcus Smart. Always. And it's the same reason that I like Westbrook and that it's just the effort part. Like I love the players where it's, where they are putting it on the line every

play and playing hard and get pissed off at the other guys when they're not playing hard enough. He's sort of grown into the role. He's Defensive Player of the Year. I voted for him. That's just the greatest thing ever. What's he, 12 years

into his career? Yeah, eight. Feels like he's been around longer it does it does yeah but anyway eight years into his career and he sort of worked to this place he's 30 years old and he's like yeah he's he's peaking which is and just from hard work and you know perseverance and and learning the angles and probably studying his ass off and all of it. So I, you know, that's a good example.

All right. Last question. So I was reporting and people, they better take this seriously, but Las Vegas and Seattle are getting expansion teams. Nobody believes me. I, I've heard that from NBA folks.

Yeah, it's happening. They're doing it. It's going to be for a lot of money. Yeah. I think LeBron and the Fenway Sports Group are going to be involved in the Las Vegas team and they have all the Seattle people set. And question 1A,

can we call them the Sonics again? Yes, absolutely. So you're cool with that? Because they got stolen away, so they have to be the Sonics. And that was part of the deal. Part of the deal is that we got to keep the name

and the colors. Question 1B. You guys have to play the anthem for the first game, right? I mean, who else is there

who else would you even be competing against for that? It has to be you guys. I mean, they'll probably get the guy from Train to do it. No. I think he lives in the area that? It has to be you guys. I mean, they'll probably get the guy from Train to do it. No, it's got to be you guys. You guys got to plant your flag

now. Like, hey, if we're getting the Sonics back, we're there. You got to get the courtsides. They got to give you four. And you got to play. And you just got to be like, anytime there's a big Sonics game, all of a sudden you guys are there again. It'd be great.

I mean, for 10 years, I lived across the street from the Coliseum, from Key Arena, and walked, had season tickets on the floor next to the visitor's bench where I could watch the timeouts. It was the greatest, maybe the greatest 10, definitely the greatest 10 sports years of my life Because I was hooping three days a week at that time. But to walk across the street and see that team and to see every other team, the Jordan teams, like seriously the greatest. And to walk home, to not get in a car and get on the freeway for 45 minutes, it was the best.

So I hope they come back. It's happening. I'll be the first guy in line to get tickets it could be a whole renaissance just in general Seattle just the whole thing shed the whole

like the Silicon Valley Pacific Northwest side it's you're back to your roots music and basketball it'll be

the whole thing and they could just they could hold it over Balmer's head and say this is what you could have had right if you could have worked it out with Howard Schultz. Yeah.

Instead, he's building an arena for the Clippers in Inglewood. Yeah. And nobody here likes the Clippers, unfortunately. I like the Clippers, but it's all Laker fans. It is what it is. They're never going to change that. They did say that he was crazy when he bought that team for $2 billion, and now it's probably worth $4.

Oh, my God. I wasn't saying it. I mean, it's an LA team. You know? Now the... I think in general with the media rights deal and everything.

But yeah, I heard $6.5 to $7 billion combined for the Vegas-Seattle teams. But it's probably even going up because the media rights are going up. So, who knows? Anyway,

I think it's coming back. I'm excited. You guys are back. You're touring again. Life's starting to feel normal. You're in LA this weekend. We'll see you here. I'm very excited for that. Winning time. Oh, yeah. You get celebrated at the

Forum Club out there. All right. Jeff, good to see you. Say hi to everybody. Thanks, Bill. Take care, man. All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Jeff. Thanks to Chris and Tyler. Thanks to Jackie McMullen. Thanks to Kyle Creighton for producing. Thanks to Dylan Berkey and Steve Cerruti as well. See you on The Speed on Sunday night with Rousseau. I don't have a few years with him on the wayside on the blue side

never I don't have a few years