The Bill Simmons Podcast - Part 1: Kyrie Trade Reactions + Deadline Predictions With Ryen Russillo and Joe House

Episode Date: February 6, 2023

In Part 1 of a two-part podcast, The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo and Joe House to give their reactions to the Dallas Mavericks’ trade for Kyrie Irving. They discuss the assets the Brooklyn Nets got, whether they would they have taken the risk associated with trading for Irving, whether there are any other big trades coming, and more. Host: Bill Simmons Guests: Ryen Russillo and Joe House Associate Producer: Isaiah Blakely Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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So we got that. And then coming up on this podcast, normally we just have Sal on. We blew it out today. We're doing a two-parter. Part one coming up right now. The Kyrie trade happened. Ryan Rosillo and Joe House came on. and we talked about that, the trade deadline,

all the different ways the Kyrie trade affects it, and whether it's a good idea to trade for Kyrie Irving in the first place. You can probably guess where I stand on that one. It's all next. Part two coming later tonight with Cousin Sal. Stay tuned for that. Here we go. Let's bring him in.

Pearl Jam. All right. Taping this part of the podcast. It is 1.23 p.m. Pacific time. It's a semi-emergency pod. It's hard to call anything involving Kyrie Irving an emergency at that point because he's just a constant ER. We were hoping that he would get traded at some point before I did my Sunday night pod. It happened.

He went to Dallas. This was probably the most predictable trade, I think, out of all the ones on the board, except for the Laker deal. And I never felt like the Lakers were going to pony up both picks. I never understood how that was going to help this Nets team that is still getting this vintage Durant season. And Dallas seemed to be the most desperate. So I'm here with Ryan Rosillo and Joe House. Rosillo, desperation. You're a history guy. You're a screenwriter, renaissance man, boat owner. But most important, a history guy.

Desperation sometimes leads to greatness, but a lot of times leads to some really, really regrettable mistakes. How desperate was this Dallas move for you? Real desperate. Kyrie's the last guy we get into business with maybe in all pro sports. It doesn't make any sense. And it's just funny because now you have a new fan base that's trying to tell all the other fan bases

that have had a relationship with them how they're wrong and they haven't figured it out. You know, like, no, no, you don't get it. Like, no, in Dallas we'll do this. But like, oh, okay, cool. Got it. No problem. You know, I wouldn't borrow $ dollars from Kyrie I'm serious like I forget fucking signing him trading for him and having him be a partner with anything I think he is one of the most detrimental guys as far as like team it's just so funny too because people are like oh Nico Harris

he's got a background with Nike who the fuck was Dur durant then like if he's gonna do this to durant you think the nike executive somehow jumps in front of durant so um look all everything i'm gonna say is super predictable everybody's heard it before so this isn't anything new i just can't fathom going you know what we'll give up assets for this we'll do it but that's what happens in this league when you're special and he still is special house i felt like the mavericks were going nowhere and were on the hamster wheel and just did not have enough around luca plus they get more predictable over the course of a two-week playoff series we're still and i've talked about this endlessly that style of basketball doesn't seem to work if it's a seven game series as well this does on paper make them harder to play if it works out.

And if you just say, can we just get, can we get four months out of you, Kyrie? Can you do that? Versus where they were before, which was nowhere. On the other hand, I totally agree with Priscilla. You know, you, you get into business with Kyrie and it eventually turns out the way we all know it's going to turn out. So where do you stand? Yeah, I think it was a reasonable risk for Dallas because I don't think you can continue to just tread water the way they have been.

It is abundantly clear that not re-signing Brunson was a mistake. You think so? It's demonstrably clear now. that not re-signing Brunson was a mistake. That they were... You think so? It's demonstrably clear now. Before the season started, it was clear. Now it's demonstrably clear. But they can't continue to just tread water when Luka is putting up these kinds of seasons

that he's putting up. The West is tough. So you take a swing. And the West is open. That's the other thing. I'm sure they're looking at this like, shit, let's plug in 27 a game for Kyrie and let's make believe he's making a huge contract run. Russell has his hand over his face.

That, you know, all right, this is at least something versus like Spencer Didwitty and Crutch Time. I think I'm glad you brought up the Brunson thing because this happens a lot in sports. The first big mistake leading to the second even bigger mistake. And it all goes back to that four years, 55 for Brunson that they could have had at various points last season they didn't do. And there's a world where they could have just made this trade anyway, but also still had Brunson and gotten super weird with Brunson and Kyrie and Luka. Now it's like shit.

But, you know, this feels like a retroactive, we fucked up the Brunson thing. Luka's starting, what do you think, Rosillo? Starting to look at them a little side-eyed? Just like a couple little side-eyed glances? what the f what are we doing yeah i think i think luke is kind of in the group of you know whenever you're talking about the next guy that gets upset i mean they've been kind of quiet they've been quiet for like almost six months remember we were kind of like who is it who's the next guy and it was like oh it's kairi again

that's weird like he gets into this again uh yeah I think Luka's you know if you're arguably the best player in the league I'd still take Giannis over him but he's in that conversation the list is is pretty short with Luka and what he's capable of doing yeah but that's that's the other thing though that I think is really hard is that like when you think of how you want to build with Luka you know you look at the talent of Dallas you're like well they need to raise the talent okay well you raise the talent technically with one of the worst you know guys that go all right well how how committed is he gonna be and it's like well his history is he's the least committed of any superstar so enjoy but you know it reminds me a bit of the iverson to denver thing with mellow where it's like you've got to do a better job you've got to put people around Mello and then you're like oh cool we got Iverson and then you

realize that like Iverson kind of needed to have his own team Mello probably then needed to have his own team Luka to maximize Luka kind of needs his own team yet at the same time like I like when there's another guy who's really elite at attacking with the ball in his hand on his own and that's certainly kairi so uh they did a pretty good job with brunson and luca changing roles and and having that work but you still felt like you know one through eight it needed to be better to compete in the west so i guess i understand like that part of it it's just that um you know i don't know like are they saying it's a rental so it's not that big of a deal? You gave up a first and two seconds

and two decent players. And honestly, Finney Smith's contract's really good. And he's good. You know, he's all right. So 12 million a year this year and next, basically. So they, I guess you could look at it as like, if this doesn't work out, we get an added 32 million in salary next year.

I think they'd be at around 110. The cap's going to go up next year and maybe they think, all right, we've at least carved out some cap space to do something. I remember I talked with Michael Pina about this on my pod in December. And I was more bullish on the Mavs swinging for the fences for Kyrie

than he recoiled in horror. And this was during the whole anti-Semitic movie thing. But I thought it was going to be Dinwiddie and Powell's expiring and that's it. House, they threw in more than I expected. For a guy that they clearly had to trade, that the Nets, you could just tell. And people around the league were saying it too. The Nets were like, this guy will actually try to sabotage our season if we don't trade him.

We got to get something back. We can't waste this Durant season. I was amazed that they also threw in the pick. I thought Finney Smith and Dinwiddie for a guy who has just been all over the map now for five, six years, it seemed like a lot. Now you're throwing in a pick too.

And they have that weird situation where they have another pick that's out that's got protections on it. So this is really like the last time they can trade a first round pick for a few years. Were you surprised it was that much house? No, no. There was a genuine competition. I believe that the Lakers were having intense conversations. I think the Lakers were really trying to figure out a way to get them without giving up both of those firsts that they have. They're the most coveted assets in this trade market coming up. And I think the rumors involving Phoenix and other teams were genuine enough also. I think there was more than one phone call being had. So you believe the Phoenix one?

I was calling bullshit on that one. I think they had a phone call, right? I'm not dismissing the possibility. I just think it was a competitive market. It wasn't Dallas bidding against itself in this instance. I think when the people were saying like five, six teams, to me that's a phone call and the Clippers calling and being like, hey, what about Robert Covington and John Wall and, um, and just like whipping together bad contracts. And then that's going, no, no thanks. And then it's like, well, add that to the list of teams who called about Kyrie. To me, it was Dallas and it was the Lakers.

And I don't, I was wondering if your dumb ass team was going to try to trade farmhouse. No joke. I'm seriously seriously disappointed i literally have was i went on the radio yesterday here in washington and said i don't understand why they wouldn't put bradley beal up immediately and say take bradley beal we'll take back kairi and and then just tell kairi go do whatever you want you know we'll we'll go do a deal with somebody else for the buyout like i don't know if that's's allowed under the collective bargaining agreement, but Kyrie wouldn't have to come here. He could do whatever he wants for the next four months.

But the only way for Washington to get out from under the situation that it's in is to get rid of the Beal contract. And there was an opportunity staring right in the face. But, Russillo, that's a better trade for the Lakers. If it's just one pick in the Westbrook contract and you get Beal, I think that's what the Lakers need. If you're going to tell me they have a legitimate chance to compete for a title, at first I would laugh because you'd be relying on a guy who's 38 and a guy who can't stay healthy for more than 10 games in a row.

But they don't need point guard big men. What they need is a shooter. And if you just put Beal on that team and you just turn Westbrook into Beal, basically, I do think that makes them better. And it's a nice spot for Beal because now he's the number three guy. So I wonder if there was ever a three-way possibility with this trade.

I don't know. Do you think Beal gets traded, Rossello? Well, a lot of it comes down to him. You know, if they're okay with it. And this is what we've been saying about Beal from day one of all these rumors is that everything I'd heard was that he was pretty content in Washington and that he was hoping to get the five-year and then he would kind of take it from there. And that's exactly how it's all played out. This has been going on for a long time and he's the least vocal about it. You and I totally disagree about what Beal's market

would be. I think in a trade you could do better than westbrook in a first for veal i really do i mean if you can get this for kairi then you can get it for bill we can all say oh it's too expensive the contract's too long if bill were a free agent this off season he'd get the four-year max from somebody he just would even if i think we all agree he's like a comically kind of like perception like i just think the perception of him is way beyond what he actually is as a player like i think he scores a house house doesn't think that at all house is all in i'm bradley bill he loves him no i'm not gonna do it i you can't bait me into it i'm not doing it again i look i think the lakers players wanted uh this deal players still

seem to just really like kairi it's It's one of the strangest things ever. They like him. They like him as a person. They think he's a good hang. All right, cool. Got it. But eventually, you have to rely on people to be there if you're competing for something. So I think it's kind of strange. It also speaks to, I think, how desperate LeBron is and all those guys. When you'd heard, okay, what would the Lakers do? I'd heard the Lakers are just not giving up 27-29 unprotected for somebody that doesn't guarantee anything. And Kyrie's a bad guarantee. And especially when you look at LeBron's age and Davis's health, as you pointed out, like I think they, the Lakers are like, maybe we would trade these if it was a certainty.

But if it doesn't guarantee us even winning a playoff round, then why are we moving some of these picks? So it sounds like LeBron stand off with the front office. Go ahead. Well, you and I both talked about this on each of our pods and then together on this pod about the concept of because the Gobert thing was the ultimate example of this. If you're going all in on somebody like that, where you're gutting seven years of assets, you better at least be getting back like Anthony Davis in 2019. And now, you know, you're a title favorite with a real chance to win the

title. I think when, when you start trading real assets and you don't even know if it's going to win you an extra playoff round, that's where I have, I think that's where a lot of these teams get in trouble. That was the DeJounte Murray trade. As much as I think we all like Murray, I just don't know what it guaranteed Atlanta. It's like, does this even make them better? I don't even know. It's the same thing as Vooch. It's the same thing as Gobert.

And so you've had these trades where you're like, wait, you're giving up real stuff here, like three unprotecteds. Now, granted, the Vooch thing was two top four protected, but the crazy thing about the Gobert trade, I don't know, I don't think DeJounte is there yet, but the Gobert trade has one piece that you wouldn't do the deal for now.

And there's still like five pieces to go, four pieces to go. Unfortunately for Vooch and the Bulls, I get what they were trying to do, but you wouldn't trade Carter, Franz, or a top four protected 23 pick straight up for Vooch. You added all those things. So, you know, when you're looking at this for Kyrie, you know,

you can say, oh, the pick is 29. Who cares? Two seconds. Who cares? Dinwiddie. You know, who cares? I actually, for somebody who didn't always love Dinwiddie's sort of single-mindedness, I thought his run in Dallas was a lot more productive.

Like, I think he fit with them because they needed somebody to kind of go when Luca wasn't around. But I, you know, I know, I know Kyrie's better than all these players. He's clearly a rotation guy. Oh yeah,

totally. Yeah, he's fine. But I want to pick up on what we're talking about in terms of, of playoff impact. I mean, it is worth it. Hat tip to Kevin Hench to,

to revisit the history of Kyrie in the playoffs since he got the divorce away from LeBron. Right. So in 2018, he's with the Celtics. He's injured. Terry Rozier takes the cells to the Eastern Conference finals. Wait a thousand house. To be fair, he did some really good press for Uncle Drew during that playoff run. If you remember, like he did my podcast, some others.

So I feel like that's a W for Kyrie. Did he go to game seven? No, he didn't show up to game seven against Cleveland, and everybody made excuses for him because they still wanted to kiss him. Including me. I was like, ah, you know, he had nasal surgery. You knew immediately. You were like, this isn't good.

He can't show up. It's like, no, no, he's super vain, And he had this nasal surgery and everybody was making excuses for him because they still wanted to keep him around long-term. That was 2018, 2019. He quits on the floor. We watched him quit against the bucks. It was,

you know, a true revelation. Well, we, we have the beautiful, we have you driving him to the airport. That's how we got the, the,

you driving him to the airport thing That's how we got the you driving him to the airport thing. 2020 hurt 2021. Hold on. The 2020 hurt, but also pretty happy not to come back. Remember that? Because he was out for the year. Yeah. Not super interested in playing.

Like could have played. Didn't really want to suggest that they start their own league. Like, you know, it was a checkout. Right. Didn't really got got Kenny Atkinson fired basically yeah so said we don't need a coach yeah these are just playoff runs this is the playoff runs 2021 um the Nets beat the Celtics in the first round and then he got hurt over the course of it so he wasn't available to play in the epic matchup against the Bucs that Kevin Durant's big toe will forever go down in the history of NBA what-ifs with the Bucs and the Nets, honestly.

And then they got swept last year. So not a strong playoff performance over the last five years. Well, people say it's like one playoff series they won. They won seven playoff games total with those two guys. And these were in 2019. These were the prizes. It was like, KD, it's in the hall of fame for whatever conversation you want to have about, um, things that looked awesome on paper in the NBA that went completely sideways. Like I know Zach called Harden and Kyrie and Katie. He was like the greatest hypothetical team ever. I honestly, I personally, maybe I'm biased, but I still feel like it's Len bias with the 86 Celtics. If you just put him on a 67-win team

that was considered the best team of all time, just add him to that. To me, that's an even better hypothetical. But for what they turned all this stuff into, I forgot how many picks they gave up in the Harden trade. And I still don't, like there were four swaps, but two of them aren't going to matter. 21 didn't matter. 23 is not going to matter.

The 21 swap is my favorite of all time. Yeah, right. They were like, hey, can we make this a swap? It was like, okay. They got first in 22, 24, and 26, and then they got swaps in 25 and 27. They threw in Allen like he was a free set of tires.

Then they turned Harden back into Simmons and Curry and two firsts that weren't as tasty. And Simmons, I almost feel like he's a section eight at this point. I mean, like Kyrie, I don't trust either, but at least with Kyrie, we've seen him play really good basketball 20 games in a row. I don't know if we, do we see that Simmons again, Rosillo? Is he gone? Did you write him off or is it like a borderline write-off? Where are you with that?

I think there's like, even the best version of him, there's some real questions. Like, I don't know. I don't know when this is ever going to turn around. Like it was off from the beginning. He wasn't playing. We're even suggesting is he even happy not playing? Like he looks like super engaged in his civvies and on the bench.

And sometimes you're like really into not dressing up and like hey this is fun I'm like man so then he'd had moments you know but like that Celtics game is a great example first half they were minus 13 without him plus 10 with him 23 points swinging his favor he was he was pushing the basketball he was great in transition and then he all of a sudden didn't want to take like a couple layups and jock Vaughn didn't put him back in for the last seven minutes right and so it was like oh we're kind of still doing this so you know i think there are improvements on is this guy ever going to play but i think there's still massive question marks about like where his head's at with certain moments and you know again this this trade doesn't really you know it adds a couple shooters i would

look i mean dinwiddie can do a lot of things. Finney Smith's more of a complimentary guy that's going to hit shots. But, yeah, I mean, I wonder between now and Thursday what the Durant conversation is. Oh, that was going to be my greenie tease. Coming up next. I want to chime in. This has been Brooklyn's last big trade. Go ahead.

Chime in, House. Just on the Simmons thing, I think what you uh and the guys um from the most recent bs pod where you're doing trade proposals as the trade deadline approaches he needs to simmons does i think yet have a chance it just isn't going to be in a big market he needs to go somewhere that's quiet and small the san antonio proposal was great i think even portland you know the soccer moms there could nurture him back to too much intensity for him. I don't, I don't see it. He needs, you need to have your a dog and your B dog in place in any situation. Who's the lowest, who has the lowest attendance

right now? What's that? That would be a good spot for him. Charlotte. Yeah. Maybe Charlotte's a nice spot. San Antonio, uh, coming up next. We'll wonder, is this the last big move for the Brooklyn Nets? This year, you only need one app at your Super Bowl party, and it is FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. Download FanDuel today and use promo code BS so you can bet Super Bowl 57 with a no-sweat first bet. You'll get up to $3,000 back in bonus bets if your first bet doesn't win. FanDuel lets you bet on everything from the money line to point spreads to who will score

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All right, we're back. Greeny's radio show, by the way, has an exclamation point, I noticed, because it was accidentally on, ESPN was accidentally on in my car when I got in at like 10.05 the other night. And on the Sirius, it said, Greeny! With an exclamation point.

So I think the exclamation point's part of the show. Rosillo, you should have tried that. It should have been, Rosillo and Cannell! With an exclamation point after the Cannell. They wanted to put it, when it was SVP and Rosillo, they suggested a question mark after me.

Is that true? I would believe either version of this. That you were joking? So we're going to talk about the, let's talk about the Nets part of this. And then I want to pivot back to Dallas and some Kyrie stuff. The,

I still feel like they have enough to be a second round team in the East with KD and some awesome role players. And whether Simmons, they get anything out of him, whatever. But I like Finney Smith. You know, I don't want him as my number two guy on a playoff team,

but if he's a cast of characters with Claxton and Curry and people like that, he's a good guy for them to have. And KD's fantastic. So half of me is wondering, you know, maybe they do one more thing around the edges, but they try to sell KD on like, hey, man, let's just just ride us out this year. The Kyrie thing got weird. Let's let's try to win some playoff games.

You owe this to Jacques Vaughn, the whole thing. There's the other part where it's like they might just say, fuck it and see what they can get for him over these next five days. And you have teams that just have a shitload of picks like new Orleans and Memphis, they have picks and assets and, you know, house like new Orleans. If they just put Ingram and Dyson Daniels and a bunch of picks on the table

and they have the Lakers picks, they have other picks from future they're loaded. And it's like Brandon Ingram, Daniels, and some other stuff. A, would you think about it? If you're the nets B, would you even think about it? If you're the Pelicans, when you don't know what's going Brandon Ingram, Daniels, and some other stuff, A, would you think about it if you're the Nets? B, would you even think about it if you're the Pelicans when you don't know what's going on with Zion?

It all comes down to KD, right? We'll know in the next 24 hours. It feels like he'll say something. He's been very, very quiet over the entire pendency of the announcement. Might have been a long night last night. Well, no, I mean, since Kyrie announced that he wanted out, nothing from the KD camp, right?

I mean, I was scouring before we jumped on here. Really, really dead quiet. We'll know in the next 24 hours. I think there's a reasonable case for the Nets to be competitive, especially defensively, like Simmons, KD, DFS, O'Neal, and Claxton. It's just like as good a top five lineup defensively. I mean, you're going to have to be creative scoring-wise with Harris and Curry, and it

puts a lot of pressure on KD. But, you know, Russo is talking about Dinwiddie's offensive efficiency and the role that he plays. It's not crazy. I could see them winning a round. Do they make it to the Eastern Conference finals? Probably not, because the Eastern Conference is tough as nails this year. But if you're replacing the stats, could Dinwiddie give them like 15 and 7? And Kyrie was giving them like 26 and 6.

So you're basically losing 10 points. And you're losing the ability Kyrie had in close games to just take over for three, four minutes. But on the flip side, you're also losing all the baggage that comes with him day-to-day, week-to-week. And there's some Ewing theory day to day, week to week. And there's, you know, there's some Ewing theory elements to this too, I think where that whole Nets team might be like, fuck this. Let's, let's go on a run. What do you think happens for Silla? Yeah. I mean, at this point, like as much as I think we all like Katie and I've talked about it and going back this summer, it was like kind of tougher. Cause it's, I mean, man, I really like him. I really like him. I feel like he's more's more um i don't know if revealing is the right word but i just feel like kd does the best

job of being a real person you know like i feel like he's authentic yeah right yeah and i in you know doesn't mean you're gonna like everything uh especially the course of your career playing out publicly like this so this summer you're like dude you just signed the extension and now you want out and you're the one that wanted to be with kyrie in the first place and everybody who had any inroad to you told you do not hit your wagon to this guy this is fucking stupid and he did it anyway because they thought it was fun hanging out like all-star weekend once uh which players are just the worst gms and I, I wonder now, like you'd have to think KD, some part of him is like, Hey, this is good. Cause the thing that sucks for the Nets is Kyrie was playing well.

And then I started thinking, okay, he's solely about the next contract. So he's going to rein in all the bullshit here for a couple of months. But I'll give Kyrie credit that it wasn't just about that. Like, I guess he probably felt like he wasn't going to get the extension the other hilarious part is he actually gets a two million dollar bonus on the trade kicker here because he's he's the guy who wanted to yeah look at it he's got a trade bonus fucker got a bonus incredible the league is in an incredible place so uh i would have to think i would have to think that Durant was like, okay. So as opposed to sitting around here the next couple days going,

oh, Durant's going to want out because his buddy's gone. Is he still deep down in his inner circle going, I can't believe they did my guy this way, right? He's got to at least think, let's play out the season and then see what happens, I would hope. We don't know what the promises were. And it's the same thing with the LeBron extension.. Cause if they, Katie signed that extension a year ago. And if he said, Hey, part of this is you're going to re-sign Kyrie to an extension too. And like,

yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. And then Kyrie, the Vax thing happens and they kind of back off that. And I do think that was one of the things that drove him to be a little ornery last summer. But if you're KD, I feel like you're probably psyched that this roller coaster is over. You know, I would be excited to get off like, all right. Interesting four years. It's impossible to say because of what we're still mentioned. He's beloved. Kyrie is beloved.

Yeah. Nobody gets more hugs and dap and and and you know whispers in the ear at the end of any every game it was really it's always been weird like when blake was up and he wanted to go somewhere he went to the nets because he liked kairi um i know bill and i used to just freak all the time after those celtics games before they turned this franchise around last january it's like you get your ass handed to you by the nets the first thing you do is go make out with Kyrie after like, give me a break. He's lying on the leprechaun.

We're like, what's going on? This guy's your opponent. He hates the city. He goes out of a way to make some point. And then when somebody calls him out for something, he's like, oh, it's your fault. And you're like, okay, whatever. I mean, that's again, I just cannot get over like every Nets blog, every Nets Twitter feed, any fan-based thing that had some kind of following.

Just any time I didn't like them or Bill didn't like them or we said something negative about them, it was like, oh, you're just butthurt because of the Celtics. It's like, no, the 19 team was one of my least favorite teams I've ever watched play basketball. I was thrilled he moved on, but the same thing's going to happen with Mastin. He's going to get like 38 in a game here soon. And then Cuban's going to tell everybody.

I think that's one of the weirdest things about the Kyrie experience. The Kyrie thing, when it goes well for a week or so and everybody's just blindly all back in. Yeah, it's crazy. Like when the Nets had that run. Post him getting suspended on that, he comes back and they're playing well. And he turned on TV and somebody's like,

you know, Kyrie's here to remind you, there's no more skilled guard in the league right now. Like, this guy's taking time out. What are you talking about? He's not going to do this for six months. There are odds for gambling on the title. Like, house, what did the Nets odds get to? They were like the number three favorite in the East.

Like people were expecting this was just going to keep going. Like the good ship lollipop. Yeah. Yeah. I went on to see how the Dallas odds moved. I looked at that too. I was surprised. Yeah.

Yeah. They jumped ahead of the Clippers. The Dallas is 14 to one now, Rosillo for title. That's what I couldn't believe. Like, what are the the nets go to like 50 to 1 or something after this they're down to 22 to 1 yeah all right the thing with kd like because right before we started taping i think chris haynes was saying how the sons are really interested in duran i just don't think if you're offering me eight and bridges and some firsts like i just don't think that you're offering me Aiton and Bridges and some firsts, I just don't think that's enough. I'd rather ride with KD toward the playoffs. He was one of the four best

guys in the league. See what I can get and trade him this summer versus like, all right, I'll take 50 cents on the dollar now. Because the one thing KD is not going to do is be like, I'm not playing. All right, I'm going to fake. I'm going to have a sore calf. I have calf soreness guys. I'm out. He's not going to do that. He'll be unhappy, but he'll still play. He loves playing basketball.

I don't, I just don't see him doing that. Um, what I don't also don't think there's really a KD trade out there unless it was New Orleans. And if I'm New Orleans, like they're, what are they? Three and 15 in their last 18, something like that. We don't know when Zion's coming back. So yeah, they just got this is the time to go all in. I thought he looked good against Denver. They fought hard against Denver, but they're just losing games all over the place. It's really bad. Part of that is obviously not Zion, but if we're sitting there at times thinking like I did,

that that was the deepest roster, you can't have this kind of disaster stretch. The problem is, can you get in the Durant business if you're in New Orleans? Or Memphis. That would be the other one. They have the assets too. Do they have the assets? Desmond would have to be in it, I think. I think Bain has to be in the trade.

And they have a bunch of picks and they have, you know, they could get there with the contracts, but they'd have to get a little creative. I don't think they would want to. That team just doesn't seem like they want to make big moves. Yeah, I don't know. Everybody seems to be in this OG and an OB thing, like multiple teams making offers to Toronto and like a couple firsts and players. Like OG seems to be the target for a lot of people. You know, Cleveland wants to figure out that number three position in their closing group, and I don't think they like their options as of right now. The Dylan Brooks thing is getting worse and worse, I think.

And he's kind of like – maybe he's good that he's delusional from a competitive standpoint, but he's kind of delusional about a lot of different stuff where he's just like, man, I'm just targeted. And you're like, yeah, because you're dirty as shit. Right. It's like when Draymond goes on this thing about like the rest won't leave me alone like dude you before the ball is thrown up you're on somebody's ass like it's it's instant like it's you know a lot of these guys that pretend that everybody's out to get him it's like

well so uh durant would certainly change they're like hockey enforcers where what the claude lemieux ken lindsman types from years past, those guys that they're just always around when guys are falling down or going flying into the boards. At some point, we're going to start looking out for you, buddy. Durant would definitely like, if Memphis said, hey, we do a really good job on the margins, this changes a lot. Where are the favorites now in the West?

That's the kind of trade, Matt, that we're talking about with the durant whereas it feels like a lot of the trades recently you see the trade and you go okay what have you guaranteed yourself as a franchise and you're like i don't know might not be any better you're like well then why are you doing this what do you think s that's the conundrum of this entire upcoming trade deadline with the exception of the lakers, who can definitely get better and try and make some kind of legitimate run in these playoffs. And Toronto is like, you know, it's the invasion of the body snatchers, right? They're harvesting bodies.

Toronto seems to have the most bodies available. I still think Kuzma should go uh on the market by the way i i really do think that washington he is going to leave here if it notwithstanding whatever uh you know uh play in tommy tries to come up with in the way of an extension by the way kudos to you thank you for playing tommy oh i'm so happy. He's playing Tommy organically. That was great. I was really hoping it would catch on. I'm, I'm, I'm all the way in.

I couldn't be any further in on it. Um, but the, the KD on Memphis would be incredible. And I guess as we were sort of talking it through, if the price is Bain, which really feels like a high price, you got to get Dylan Brooks out of there.

Dylan Brooks got to go for all the reasons you guys just mentioned. But man, KD with those guys, we've been begging for Memphis to get an adult. I mean, Steven Adams is one adult, but they need somebody that can help them on the offensive end at the end of games because they have been horrendous. The bummer is that Porter isn't an asset because Porter, Porter in paper, if he was awesome would be a centerpiece of a KD trade. Just hypothetically where you're like the Nets get, they can rebuild around somebody who's going to a potential 25 points a game

guy. Denver goes for it in the biggest way possible. And they're the favorites in the West anyway, but Porter, you know, he said there's no way from a health risk standpoint. And then there's the Golden State possibility too. This got blown away by the Kyrie thing,

but we found out today that Curry seems like he's got like a pretty decently severe injury. I didn't even really fully understand what those ligaments were, but they said multiple weeks and you look at where they are in the standings and they're like a three game losing streak away from being the 11th seed. So I don't know how that affects them with the trade deadline too. So what do you think?

They're not really a panic team, but if there was ever a time to cash in some of those chips for a real guy, I would say it's right now for the warriors before they're all of a sudden the 12th seed yeah the curry thing is is definitely frustrating because i thought he heard it when he stuck out his leg hunting for a foul uh in a game earlier this week it might have been the minnesota i saw that yeah you're right and he was he was down and he was holding it and then it's all wrapped up and then it gets knocked and it kind of turns and you know these are these are kind of weird injuries for somebody that's – it's not like he's that old. Even the shoulder thing, I was watching that game.

It was just him reaching for a ball, and you're like, oh, that's not great. So he misses a month there. You're right, because I used to kind of look at Golden State going, hey, they're a couple weeks away from being like a three seed if they have two good weeks. But they lose to Minnesota. They sit Draymond and Clay against Denver, a couple weeks away from being like a three seed if they have two good weeks but you know they lose to minnesota uh they sit draymond and clay against denver but honestly i don't think they're winning that game anyway uh the way denver's rolling right now so yeah maybe but you know

kaminga still has nights where i'm like i think it's too early to give up on him weisman tries but he's like a linebacker that's a rookie and it's thinking the whole time and it's like late to the hole so he's trying but you know when i had hollinger on he was like a linebacker that's a rookie and it's thinking the whole time and it's like late to the hole. So he's trying, but you know, when I had Hollinger on, he was like, you know, the tax hit with him for next year's number is massive for somebody that's still a huge question mark. So would they try to move off of him? But it's like, okay, but what are you doing? You're moving off of him for an expiring that brings you value. So, you know, a lot of us are really good at saying this guy's got to be gone or they have to do something or whatever. And it's just when you hear about some of the prices on guys, like I was talking to somebody about like what marketing would cost.

And it was such an absurd price that I was like, okay, he's really good. He's an all-star and it doesn't look like they want to move him. But the prices can change obviously pretty quickly the day before the trade deadline. So we'll see. I'd be very scared to trade cominga just for the record wiseman and moody i would i would seriously consider but i it's too early with cominga i'm with you rossillo he has moments where you just go jesus this is a come back to haunt you kind of talent well this is an inflection point though because they're out of time they that this is what happens when you fuck around at the beginning of

the season when when you know one of the beginning of the season. When, when, you know, one of your, uh, cornerstone franchise players punches another player in the face and you go and lose every game on the road, you know,

to start off the season there, they're, they're out of time. Now they can't afford another three weeks. It's, it's a precisely the point that Rosillo just made, which is, you know,

Oh, it looks like they were kind of rounding into a form where they could rip is, you know, oh, it looks like they were kind of rounding into a form where they could rip off, you know, five out of seven games or seven out of nine games, and now they're looking at the three seed. They can't afford to just tread water anymore and, you know, risk being below 500 in mid-March. It's just going to take too much energy. You can't expect that out of Steph,

but that's the timeline now for when he's going to come back. If he's going to miss games through the trade deadline, which is what the reports earlier today say. But they said weeks. I know, so that's mid-March, right? It's not great. I thought the Suns were going to be the team that fell out, and the Suns are the team. Rossello just made that three-seed point. It actually might be the Suns were going to be the team that fell out. And the Suns are the team.

Rossello just made that three seed point. Like it seemed like they're going to run. It's actually might be the Suns. By the time they get Booker back, they could be in striking distance. And if they can make one little crowd or try to get one more guy, that might be the team. I have a couple more questions for you guys. The weird career hall of fame. I was just jotting down some names

because I think Kyrie is just, I don't know. I'm not saying these are rankings, but it's just, if you're going to have the discussion, Kyrie has to be immediately mentioned. Now it's just one of the weirdest careers of any star we've had.

House's guy C-Web, I think is there. I think Grant Hill, when you think like Grant Hill was future of the league, then it looked like he might never play again. And then all of a sudden he had this weird renaissance with Phoenix, just from him becoming this potential face of the league to just kind of like this redemption role player story. That was strange. Spencer Haywood, which I wrote about in

my book, just one of the crazy, and he just made the Hall of Fame, but just one of the crazy missed opportunity careers over and over again. McAdoo, who was an MVP and was carrying Buffalo, and then just started getting traded around the league. He was out of the league. The Lakers rejuvenate him. Rodman's on there. And Rick Barry was the other one. Rick Barry's very strange career. He goes to the ABA, has to sit out a year, hurts his knee, comes back. All of a sudden, he's the best player in the league. Kind of flames out with Golden State a little bit. Ends up being one of the first free agent signs with Houston. What other weird career guys are there for you, Rosillo, just off the top of your head, where you just look back and you go, man, that was weird. I'm throwing this at you unfairly. Yeah. No, thanks. I appreciate it.

I think Iverson has a little weirdness to him, though, towards the end, just because it was over so fast. Yeah, the last five years. It was like a boxer who all of a sudden you're like, oh, my God, this guy's done. I'll never forget Ricky Williams as a running back and just seeing from one year to the next, once everything had taken its toll on him physically, All of a sudden, you're like, oh, my God, this guy's done. You know, I'll never forget like Ricky Williams is a running back. And just seeing from one year to the next, once everything had taken its toll on him physically, like he wasn't breaking tackles anymore. The first time you made any contact with him, he went down.

It was just so alarming. And that's something you see with a fighter. All of a sudden, it's like, OK, the punches hurt him now in a way that never hurt before. And it's not, you know, apples to apples with Iverson, but like Iverson has the standing. And, you know, I feel like there are certain players today, although I'll give Harden a lot of credit here. Like you're sort of hostage to that player. Like the Packers are hostage to Aaron Rodgers. They were hostage to Brett Favre in the past. We have basketball players where you're kind of held hostage by his skill.

And that's what the Sixers had with Iverson. And it does remind me of some of the stuff we're talking about at the top of this pod. It's like, okay, what's the perfect thing to do? Like, has Dallas actually done the right thing with big switchable shooters and trying to maximize everything around Luka? Because you don't want Luka playing off the ball for extended periods of time when he's the best option with the ball in his hand in the league. So I still don't know.

Look, Kyrie's going to score a million points. Everybody's going to get excited at some point and so maybe it's a quick run through it all but when Iverson get gets to Denver and then you realize like oh it's hard for him to play with another one as talented as Carmelo so maybe the Eric Snows and the Aaron McKees and like maybe these were always the right people to have around Iverson and then Iverson just starts going from stop to stop to stop. And it wasn't – Kyrie's done this to himself. But you know what I mean?

Kyrie has self-sabotaged in a way that we've never seen before. You could talk about Iverson's professionalism or whatever, but the dude always wanted to play basketball. So that was the only one I could think of. I could think of more. Yeah, it's hard because it sounds like we're talking about guys who that may not have uh fulfilled their true promise their true potential so it takes off guys whose careers were cut short by injury um so like

not derrick rose because his career was derailed by yamming yeah right exactly so it Exactly. So it's like, is it Derek Coleman? Like, you know, who we had growing up, you know, the kind of guys where it seemed like they had all the tools they should have come in. Uh, that's almost like a different conversation. Yeah. Like to me, C-Web is just super weird looking back and I'm still disappointed by it. But when you think like he came into the league and it just seemed like he was going to be the best power forward of all time, he was on that really fun golden state team. And then it totally flamed out and your team traded for him. And they traded a bunch of picks for him and Googs.

And it was like, this is going to be great. And Juwan Howard showed up and it was never great at any point, except for that one, like playoff series. And then, you know, I,

and then they just became a distressed asset almost to get Mitch Richmond for him. And then he flips it around again with the Kings. But then he has this whole last stage of the career where he's on Philly and Detroit. He's bouncing around for like, what was it, like three, four years? I thought that was a really weird career. I want to update my answer. I think my answer is Dwight Howard, honestly.

Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. Because of what he showed us early on in his career and thinking about guys that sabotage themselves kind of in every situation. Once he got himself out of Orlando, he didn't really cover himself in glory. Yeah, the thing with Kyrie,

growing up when we loved basketball as kids and it was the cocaine era and there would be these, these guys that had drug issues that teams would keep talking themselves into, into taking a chance on, right? Like Michael Ray Richardson, you know, the Utah traded for him, Golden State traded for him, the Nets. And they each time like, no, no, he'll be fine here. And then after six months, they want to get rid of him. And Kyrie's like the modern version of that, where it's not, it's not a drug problem, but it's just his behavior. So erratic, but at the same time,

the talent's there. And these teams over and over again are like, nah, maybe, you know, different situation, put them next to Luca. Like, I'm sure. Don't you think we're so that they must have watched like the 2016, the last three games of those finals and watched how Kyrie played off LeBron and thought like, this is the one guard in the league. That would be the perfect guy to play off a guy like Luca. Cause he's done this. There's a track record of him succeeding. And then you start watching those tapes and you just go, maybe. And then all of a sudden you're making the trade. I don't know why we, I mean, it was seven years ago.

That's what I say. You're watching those on VHS? What do you want? They burned onto a DVD? Yeah, I mean, it was... The only reason we care to keep bringing this up is because he is so damn talented. That's what it is. If I owned a team or if I were a front office

and somebody said, hey, we can do this. And I'd be like, were we giving up anything? Like, yeah, we're giving up a few things. I'm like, all right, we're done. Because even, you know, the argument that, well, it's just a lease. Okay, cool. So you're psyched for leasing players for a first, you know, a first. And Dinwiddie and Finney Smith, who are legit rotation guys on a decent team. So that's not nothing. I just love the Lakers part of it because I can't wait for the cryptic or not cryptic LeBron statement about it.

LeBron could give a shit about unprotected picks in 27 and 29. He wanted to trade Colin Sexton, that lottery pick, in that deal. He wanted to trade it for DeAndre Jordan. Yeah, and they were like, okay, we'll trade it if we know you're going to be here. It's like, well, I can't do that. And they're like, well, guess what? We're not doing it. You know?

So, like, if you're the Lakers and you're thinking about what AD is like four years from now, that's not a fun exercise. When you're thinking about LeBron likely not being on the team four years from now, although he continues to do the impossible from a scoring standpoint, you're like, so now I have to give up these kinds of picks for kairi who's a terrible stability bet

like i'm actually impressed by the lakers where the lakers are in this weird spot where lakers fans wanted kairi yeah lakers fans wanted it to happen and so did everyone who didn't like the lakers like they both they both wanted the same thing. And that's very rare. It's very rare. I'm really disappointed today. This is a loss of a day. Let's take one more break. When you ride transit, please be safe. Yeah, be safe. Because what you do, others will do too. Others will do it too. So don't take shortcuts across tracks. Don't do that. In fact, just don't walk on tracks at all.

Not at all. Trains move quietly so you won't hear them coming. You won't hear them coming. See, safe riding sets an example. Yeah, an example for me. Because safety is learned. It's learned. Okay, give it up.

Give what up? Really? Really, really. This message is brought to you by Metrolinx. Coming back, we were talking about the Lakers. House, does it make more sense to trade both of those picks to try to win a title with 38-year-old LeBron and can't stay on the court Davis?

Or does it make more sense to go the other way and try to see what you can get for Davis? Because if Kyrie can get two rotation guys that are number one pick, I have no idea what Davis could get, but I think it's a lot, lot, lot more than that. But what would you do if Palenka called you right now? I was like, hey, need some help. LeBron's putting some pressure on again about those picks. Not really psyched about the choices out there. It's like Brad Beal, maybe. Zach Levine, taking a lot of money. We'd have no future the rest of the decade.

What should I do? What would you tell them? Trade the picks. Picks don't matter to the Lakers. When was the last time that picks mattered to the Lakers? The Magic Johnson draft? I mean, you got to trade the picks. This is their one best opportunity.

Anthony Davis is healthy. We've got, you know, two consecutive weeks of Anthony Davis healthy. We got a nurture. Actually, I would shut him down. Three's coming up. Shut him down. Let him have some rest. It's been easier to keep him healthy because they don't want to pass him

the basketball. He's just running three point lead at three point lead. What would you do, Rosillo? I mean, the problem is when you're trading Anthony Davis when he's healthy, you're not going to get anything close to Anthony Davis. You know, he was insane the beginning of the year. I've defended him. I've said I expect him to come back and play well again.

But now he just falls down all the time. I just can't. I do not know what they're doing with his regime. I think he's somebody who probably needs to be lighter as he gets older. Like that's the only way to sacrifice this. It seems like he wanted to get enormous and strong and be more durable, but I don't think, I think he needs to do the Tim Duncan thing where Duncan extended his career.

You know, there was a point there with Duncan and the foot problem where you thought like, I wonder how much longer this guy has. And it was like another seven years. And I think that's a huge credit to the way he changed his body and decided okay if i'm going to be older i need to be lighter so i don't know if davis can find a way to salvage this at any point but um you know lebron doesn't give a shit about any of that stuff he's not exactly a great partner long term when it when it comes to those things so

the fact that they didn't do this is probably a little surprising but it still was the right move. It was still the right move. So they thought they could do better. Yeah. And I also think there's like, we're talking about picks. Remember four and six years from right now, that means all these guys are gone. Like everybody in this roster is probably not there. Right. They may, and this would be the smart thing to do is that I still think, you know next player that's upset, hey, you can be the face of the franchise, whoever that is.

We're talking about a disgruntled player multiple years from now, but it will happen. They become, I think, a more realistic destination if they have a couple picks to throw that team, if it's not a free agency thing. They already can figure this stuff out way ahead of time. You know, this is what agents are for. But I don't know that they want the cupboard to be bare beyond everything they've done with the Davis trade, which ended up becoming an exorbitant price, more so than we thought when the first deal went through.

So I think that's what they were going to want to kind of do. And be like, look, no matter what we do, we're doing stuff for you guys when you're not not going to be here so maybe we're not going to just do whatever you want we we really um we cross off the possibility that that kd says i want to go to la and that's where those picks go i don't think it's enough okay unfortunately gobert trade as we talked about last week has blown to smithereens any sort of realistic return for a player like KD. It's almost like the price now is 160 cents in the dollar. That's just where we are from now on. And until, what did I say on the pod the other day, that it was like gas,

when they just gas arbitrarily goes up and you don't know why, I feel like that's what these first round picks now. It's like, nope, the price now is three firsts and three swaps. And that's just what the price became. And I don't know if that should be the price for a 34-year-old KD, but these owners and there's testosterone starts going around and they get excited and they, look, I made a splashy trade. I've done this. That's why this Phoenix thing, you know, the new owner syndrome, Matt Ishbia.

I guarantee he's kicking the tires as hard as humanly possible on KD right now, because that's like the classic new owner syndrome. But in this case, they'd be getting one of the best 15 guys of all time. I just don't think they have enough. I think if you're Brooklyn and you're trading him, you got to get a real piece back. That was my issue with the Houston trade for Harden. They got all those picks back. They never got like an actual piece.

They just got a bunch of picks that, you know, we'll see how it goes. We already know two pick swaps went down the drain. I'm going to redoallas's crunch time right now but real quick though i think you made a great point like all of these trades i think the headline sounds cooler when you can round it up with the swap saying hey we got seven we got seven first possibly and you're like okay like one erdy isn't happening that was a swap that year which was again i've already brought it up but it was just so like imagine negotiating that be like hey we have potential swap this year in case you lose

30 in a row we went 30 in a row it's like okay fine that's like fine um i need something yeah no but i need something i need like one thing that was real beyond oladipo and when you're trading what was great about the age like yeah like, yeah, the age gets right. What does he get? He gets Kessler. He got marketing. He got sex. No,

he got our body Vanderbilt. He got like real, real pieces back that you can then flip again on top of all the picks. And I thought that was Houston's mistake. Even if they kept Jared Allen, they still at least have Jared Allen, but, um,

Kyrie Luca, Tim Hardaway, Jr. Maxie Kleber, Dwight Powell, Josh Green, Christian Wood, and Reggie Bullock. Does that sound like a Western finalist to you? I mean, it's not inconceivable, especially the little hidden gem in there is Josh Green. You've been watching Josh Green green any last couple weeks dude goes downhill and he's getting minutes and dallas has been seeing it like i don't know they they it all depends on kairi which makes it so goddamn hilarious but well that's why they make the trade right because they think josh green can take most of those those uh finney smith minutes and then kairi is on paper a massive upgrade on did witty except for all the off-court stuff but yeah but but two guys all of a sudden that are creators

that are creators you know uh when they get the ball and and can handle the ball and go go to the basket where two weeks ago you look at that roster and it's like we don't have any of those guys it's just luca we stare at luca i hope this we're so you think this spurs anybody else in the west which is wide open to talk themselves into a trade that maybe they weren't talking themselves into like i'm i still have my eye on sacramento i'm still waiting for them to do something i just yeah but i don't know who they believe something's happening i think sacramento has i'm not saying you're wrong first of all but like memphis to me has other pieces where if they wanted to do something you

go hey okay we had to give up the one asset and we gave up some unknowns with their first round picks you know i've done a pretty good job evaluating and adding to this where sacramento you know maybe it's harrison barnes but i don't think they want to get rid of keegan not get rid of fox not get rid of sabonis um you know they brought in monk her Barnes, but I don't think they want to get rid of Keegan. They're not getting rid of Fox. They're not getting rid of Sabonis. Yeah. You know, they brought in Monk. Herder's been really big for them. So, like, what – again, I'm just kind of talking out loud here.

I think Memphis' path to bringing in somebody in is a little bit easier than Sacramento, where it feels like – remember how Boston, a couple years ago, all of their guys that played were good, and they didn't have the contract to move for the next guy because they weren't going to want to move any of their guys. I don't know if Sacramento has enough flexibility with the way the contracts are. So, if it's Barnes, Murray, and just a slew of firsts and pick swaps for KD, the Kings aren't having a meeting, at least like wondering if they should do that. Well, I don't know what we're talking about Durant.

So I just thought of that now. I would be a little nervous, though. I'd be a little nervous about, you know, if I'm if I'm any of the non major markets and I'm getting into the Durant business, I can't be surprised by anything. Meaning this summer him going, okay, this is cool. We made it to the conference finals, but I don't want to be here. I have another one for you. Do the Knicks start wondering, is there a Knicks meeting right now? They still have all their picks and all their assets.

They have Randall. Not nothing. They also have RJ if they wanted to go that way. At least if you're the Nets, the return of Knicks first, to me, is more attractive than Kings first. Because I think the Kings are going to be good over the next handful of years. I think they're young enough to be good. The Knicks might suck right away. Like, you know, they, they, they,

you, we haven't gotten 70 games. You're betting on James Dolan. Yes, that's right. And even with KD over there, you know, he plays 55 to 60 games a season. Is that enough, you know, to keep them out games a season is that enough you know to to keep them out of the lottery i don't know right it's 34 he's had some injuries we didn't take a proper victory lap for our over under pod which emerged our big bet was uh we love the kings right that

was like the one we love the most we love we that. We love Denver. Yeah. We love Denver. We love the Hornets. We love the Hornets under. I think we did well on that over under pod this year, but it's February. Let's not, let's not pat each other. I, you know, the fan to a future bet we did that they boosted was Milwaukee and Denver to win 50, 50 games each and the Kings to win 35 games, which I think they're like five away from. And what's crazy is we're Milwaukee is the one we'll be sweating out. I'm not. Cause there's a world where like, it's like somebody gets injured for, you know, two weeks or whatever. Um, okay. So we're still out. You don't even want to make a prediction for Dallas

or your prediction is this is going to end badly are you is this a wait and see are you like all things are in play where do you land well no i i know exactly what's going to happen he's going to have like 38 and luke is going to have 40 and they're going to beat some team's brains in and it's going to look awesome and then people are going to go on tv saying like why did you doubt and then kairi's going do something really fucking stupid again and we're gonna go oh so that's all that's gonna happen that's fair there will so there will be like a tnt game and they'll combine for like 84 points and people are like whoa best duos of all time yeah i don't get i don't get what happens in some of these shows like you know jamal crawford had one the other day he was like how come we don't give harden his flowers retroactively and we do for luca and you're like all right he

won the mvp and then the other four years that he didn't win mvp he was second three times and he was third the other time he's been on every all-star game um harden now is a diminished version of himself despite still putting up really good stats and by the way for the heliocentric guys that adapted harden probably deserves the most credit for doing such um because he's done a really good job making sure that you know other people know they're bigger priorities than him and it goes on and on and on and you're like okay what kind of point are you trying to make here about Luka and Harden because all Luka has to do is flame out in like five straight playoff years and then people will start to doubt Luka too like that's all it is. It's just, you're a star.

And then if you don't get it done in the playoffs, whether it's your fault or not your fault, then we put you in the disappointment category. And that's all that happened with Harden because he put up these massive numbers, which I still don't know the public was educated enough to understand how inflated they were because of him having the basketball every single time. It's happened with other players too.

But it was like, it was such a weird TV point where it was like, was such a weird tv point where it was like what are you asking why why people started to dislike harden and they haven't done it with luca yet all you have to do also harden was in his harden was in his late 20s lucas lucas 23 the other thing we we gave him a goddamn flower shop it wasn't flowers it was like one of the most vigorous debates over that entire era was why isn't he winning consecutive mvps why are guys jumping over him and and you know it was a legit argument where there was lots of support for harden the reason that that people aren't going out of their way to remember all the great of james harden is because

quit on two teams in 18 months. Yeah, that's it. That's it. That's why. When he didn't get picked for the All-Star team, and it's a joke that I made in my podcast, like when I meet somebody new and I'm like, well, look, it was a fishing trip. It's not really that big of a deal.

A lot of the stuff that was written was wrong. I've got to explain it every time. And it lingers. And for Harden, like he missed, what, 16 games and posts on Instagram? The disrespect. Now, granted, Philly is a doctorate-level organization for having their players think the world is out to fucking get them. I know Daryl Morey has started to use the super, super advanced Kia power rankings on NBA.com as his argument for his players.

I don't know if there's anything more scientific and analytics today than the Kia power rankings for players. But, you know, you just, you look at this stuff and you go like dudes love feeling as if they're persecuted. Like they love this concept that everyone is out to get them. It's like most of this shit's really easy to explain where you go, oh, okay. And by the way, when we can't keep saying how talented the league is

and then be surprised a couple of really talented players are left off, I would have loved to have De'Aaron Fox or Anthony Edwards on in the West. And with the Curry injury, like both may end up having this workout with the Zion stuff and everything else. But then, you know, you go through,

like I read an article for Jeremy Grant being a snub. I'm like, sorry, not clicking on it. Like it's not- 24'm not clicking on it. Like it's not just true. 24 spots. That's it. 24 spots. It's supposed to be hard. 34 good players.

Yeah. Right. Also, the dumbass fans, some of whom might even be listening to this podcast, voted for Kyrie to make the All-Star game.

That was hard to spot. Kyrie shouldn't have been in the All-Star game. He got suspended during the season. That should be automatic. You don't get to be in the All-star game maybe but straight stats like I went into it being like Kyrie was the mistake here uh he shouldn't have been a starter he shouldn't have

been a starter but I don't know that he's not one of the 12 guys considering games played and some of the numbers they're putting up in the standings everything else but you know Harden as Hal said do you think you can quit on two franchises in 13 months and have a coach who's not related to you at all going, yeah, I want to reward that guy? Yeah. Coaches are, yeah. Let's get that guy in there.

Good guy. All right. Did we cover everything? I think we did, right? I think we got there. What's, Rosillo, biggest trade you're expecting this week? Biggest team to make a trade this week? Is there anybody you're expecting this week biggest team to make a

trade this week is there anybody you're like you're going to be pissed on thursday if they didn't make one i just am kind of like curious like what the og and ob price is going to be because i feel like i have a good read on some of the offers that have been made for him and it's serious like so toronto may just say all right let's let's you know let's do this but then there was like a cam reddish trade that i heard where i'm like why wouldn't they do that like it was for somebody who actually plays and it's like no franchise has ever liked a player and not liked him at the same time than cam reddish and the Knicks. I think, I know everybody said this, but Toronto, I think makes multiple trades would be my one big prediction because I think

there's a lot of stuff out there about how that's like just an unhappy team. And at some point you have to either pick trades or you have to figure out what you're doing with the coach. And maybe they're planting the seed with Nick Nurse. Cause I noticed that, uh, one of those pieces that was written, it was like his salary, which has never been disclosed until now is 8 million a year. And I was like, Oh, they're doing the old ESPN trick where they know they might get rid of the person. So they're going to leak his salary to make people go to Nick nick nurse makes eight million a year that's so much um so that made me wonder if they're going to pick getting rid of him versus the trades but how so it'll be one or the other right it's not going to be the same thing coming back in october yeah i i they are

at that crossroads of reboot versus retool and who can we hold on to that makes this a quicker kind of, you know, we're, we're back being contenders again. Go get Wemby. Yeah. It's pretty obvious. Also like probably not awesome for Scotty Barnes to hear during the

summer that he was untouchable in a KD trade. He's like 19. So yeah. I don't know if you guys heard him, you know, KD there, they're asking about me. I was untouchable. Like he hadn't, he'd only had one season. So I don't know, maybe cause I'm still, I mean, Rosillo has the most Scotty Barnes stock, but

I haven't been psyched about how he looked this year, but maybe this ultimately would be a good thing for him. Yeah. I just want to see Memphis. Memphis has to do something. They cannot roll into the playoffs with this team as it's currently configured. It's not a playoff contender. I don't even see them making it into the Western Conference Finals as currently configured. I know that a lot of what has occurred over the last couple weeks is attributable to the Steven Adams injury and what a glue guy he is and everything. Shannon sharp. So then Shannon sharp is ground zero for the grids going sideways. It really is. Yeah. That's the moment that happened. They fell apart.

The bad luck omen, but that franchise is so goddamn smart and has, you know, a clear view of, of who they want to be and guys that they value. So that's the team that I'm most interested in seeing what happens with.

Rosillo, before we go, can we play a quick game based on our mutual love for the shots that Darius Garland gets his team at the end of games that I think we both enjoy? We like his decision-making. I wrote about it in the trade value thing. Just a quick, I'm going to just throw names at you. And you tell me,

the people who have the ball in their hands in the last two minutes, and your choices are, I love the shots they get. I like the shots they get. I sometimes like the shots they get. I don't like the shots they get. And I'm the shots they get. I don't like the shots they get. And I'm going to just throw a couple of names. And you tell me what you think.

Okay. Darius Garland. I love what he does. He goes quick. He doesn't screw around. He can, he can really start to get to that point where it feels like he can shoot with anybody,

but he's also a willing teammate too. Like, I feel like, you know, there's other guys that don't know you can pass with under two minutes to go. John Morant. I like. I think they're a little too predictable, but he's so gifted that even when you think you have him stopped, you don't. For him to rely on that, considering how well it's gone for his

entire career, I don't blame him. I just think they can get a little predictable. And I don't know if their fourth quarter offensive numbers are because they have huge leads, but they're one of the worst fourth quarter offenses in the NBA. I'm in the sometimes like camp with him. I feel, I feel like a lot of times it just seems like he's goes into the, I'm the best athlete in the forum. I'm just going to get to the rim mode, but the other team is now seems like they're expecting it. Yeah, I worry about it in a playoff series. And look, I really like Memphis. I think there's part of me that begrudgingly thinks

if everything's right, they're going to be the best team in the West, which seems a little unfair to Denver because Denver's just been steadier since they've gotten everybody back. But whether it was Joss saying we're not worried about anybody in the West when you haven't done shit, and after that Golden State game where all the young dudes blew off the media the same night. Yeah. There's, you know, after a loss, if they, you know,

there's something about the attitude of this team that I both love, and it also kind of scares me too. So maybe they're just young and this feels a little unfair, but there's little things at times with that group. Yeah. But at the same time, I kind of love their brashness as well. So I don't know.

I'm kind of like, I feel like I contradict myself a little bit on that team because I do really like them, but there's been a couple of things here this year where I'm like, why are you guys talking like this? You agree with that house? Of course. That's why I said I,

I, they need to do something by the trade deadline. I'm going to give you a layup for the next one, Russillo. Trey Young. Has he at least hit sometimes leg status or no? Yeah. I mean, to be fair, it was shot making, I have to say sometimes. But I mean, you want to talk about job being predictable.

Although I feel like I've seen Trey off the ball a little bit more to close than i have in the past but you know uh there's also the level of the calls that he'll get every now and then that make me want to turn the television off for like a week but uh yeah i don't know lebron uh depends depends on how tired he is because he'll when he goes it's still hard but you can see certain games because he is 38 where he's. Because he'll, when he goes, it's still hard. But you can see certain games, because he is 38, where he's trying to like pace himself when he's out there. And there'll be times where he'll just settle for bad threes. But again, everybody else is kind of watching him.

Yeah. So I don't know how much it's on him all the time. I love, if you're betting against him or playing against him, I love end of the game bad threes lebron is where you want to end up you don't want him going to the basket but even that's out the game when he got fouled and they didn't call up but that's like exactly what he should do because he can get he can get to the rim anytime he wants what do you think else yeah i mean the i was trying to find to pull the game up quickly enough they they uh had a very winnable game where he made a three

to put them up, and then they ended up losing the game because he took two deep threes, you know, and then they finally, at the end of the game,

they got the ball to Davis. What game was that? It was just within the last week. It was that last couple. I remember that one. Yeah. Rossello, what about Embiid? Turnovers, man.

Sometimes it's on him. Sometimes it isn't. But I could look it up again here. But like the top three guys in turnovers in clutch basketball time were Beal, Embiid, and Harden. And sometimes with Harden, it's because nobody does anything. Or sometimes when it's with Embiid, nobody does anything. They just stand there and watch him and they don't cut. And he's a really good passer.

But there's some games at the end sometimes with Embiid where I don't even know if the game allows for it. Like, okay, we're going to run our last two-minute offense in a close playoff game. We're going to just go post-touch, post-touch. I don't know. That's not really what the game is like now. I like when they give him the ball on the left block

when he's facing up like 16 feet away and there's shooters spread out and he's got a little space. I just feel like the defense, that's their number one thing they don't want to happen. When he's at the three-point line, I think they're psyched about that. And when he's down low, you can throw doubles at him. But when he's at that one spot,

I just feel like he's got that little one-legged shot. He can go into the lane and you know but when he's at that one spot i just feel like he's got that little one-legged shot he can go into the lane and do his little jump hook thing i don't know how you stop it i like him better than facing yeah because he's better at initiating the foul um you know because there's certain nights too where you're watching you'd be like he's going to get every single call here so then sometimes it's kind of like the hardest stuff you worry if there's just one group there's one crew that night that decides to make some kind of point like if he swings his arm into guys like we're not going to give it to him every time by the way lebron i think he's 11th he's 11th and three point attempts in the fourth

quarter he's 30 percent of the season in the fourth so that checks out i just want to make sure as we were talking about it then i pull up the numbers like oh actually he's 47 percent of the fourth quarter you idiots but it didn't seem like that before we go house do you want 45 seconds on the end of the wizard season over the last two games no i i this this team has been the same team uh from the beginning of the season like i came on here one of the very first games of the year uh like whatever four or five games in i'm like i'm good this is a fun team to watch i'm gonna enjoy watching them they can't stop anybody they don't even try the last two games i think they lost the second half by a combined score of like 147 to 90 or something like that if you add up they gave up 70 points or more in the second half of

both of the last two games against the the blazers and against uh the unstoppable third stringers for the nets i can't remember the guy's name cam thomas thomas that's the way i was going to call him this at this i i'm still living down calling nick richards um nick adams so i want to be very careful with names uh at the moment But yeah, Cam Thomas went off. It's fun, though. They go up. Zinger's firing from all over the place. They get up by 20.

They look good. The ball's moving every which way. They're fun. I don't have any problem with them. They're going to win exactly 36 games. Hit that over, that 35 and a half over that I bet. We'll just get on with our lives. It's fine.

The moment to trade Beal is now that I bet. We'll just get on with our lives. It's fine. The moment to trade Beal is now. I agree. I would have traded him for Kyrie. And I don't even know what the value is, but the moment is now. And you still have a chance to sneak into like Wemba and Yammer range. That's the play.

Kind of that six, seven spots are right there. Waiting for somebody to grab them. And I think Utah is staring at them too. All right, Rosillo, you got your podcast tomorrow. House? Right there. Waiting for somebody to grab them. And I think Utah is staring at them too. All right. Rosillo, you got your podcast tomorrow. House. We got East Coast Bias on Tuesday.

Fairway Rollup on Tuesday. Yeah. Okay. And then Trade Deadline on Thursday. Rosillo, just be on call. Yeah, I'm ready. Thursday. That's usually... We'll probably do something Thursday, right?

We'll do the same thing we did last year? We didn't do it last year. Did we do it two years ago? Two years ago. Three years ago? Two years ago and three years ago. Yeah, we went. All right.

We'll see what happens. We might have a bunch of trades already that might be rendered, might be neutered. It might be one of those years where it's just Monday, Tuesday, and that's it. All right, guys, thanks for hopping on. Thanks to Kyrie for finally forcing

some NBA news. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Russel on house. Thanks to Isaiah Blakely for producing part one. Stay tuned. Later today, we're going to be doing part two. Cousin Sal, Super Bowl props. Get ready. I don't have.