The Bill Simmons Podcast - Part 1: Scary Brooklyn, Trae's Leap, Milwaukee's Moment, and the Smart Conundrum With Ryen Russillo

Episode Date: May 31, 2021

In Part 1 of the two-part Sunday podcast, The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo to discuss Round 1 of the NBA Eastern Conference playoffs. They talk about the Nets' shellacking of the Celtics in Game 4 as well as some tough decisions Boston may have to make during the offseason (3:00). Then they discuss the Bucks sweeping the Heat, how Milwaukee will match up with their likely Round 2 opponent in the Nets (26:00), the 76ers' 3-0 series lead vs. the Wizards as Philly looks ahead to face the winner of Knicks-Hawks, another Knicks loss to the Hawks bringing the series to 3-1, Trae Young's phenomenal play, how New York should handle Julius Randle's contract, and more (51:00). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Ryen Russillo Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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where we debuted a couple new podcasts recently. No Skips with Jinx and Shay. And Season 2 of Flying Coach. Peter Schrager, Sean McVeigh. You can check both of those out on The Ringer Podcast Network as well as the new R rewatchables coming Monday night. It's a movie that came out about 20 years ago. It is a movie that is directed by somebody

who became an even bigger director after the movie. And that's all the hints I'm going to tell you. But it's coming out Monday night. Coming up, part one. Me and Rossella, we waited until after the Celtics-Nets game to break down the playoffs in the Eastern Conference. And then after Mavs clips later today, we're going to put up

part two after we finish taping that one. So a little two-part extravaganza for you. It's all next, first Pearl Jam. All right, Ryan Rossellos here taping this at 630. You just watched Celtics-Nets. The Nets killed the Celtics. They looked like they were trying to score 150 points. They left their starters in until there was about a minute left in the game. They basically just took turns torching Tatum and the Tatumettes

because he didn't really have any help out there. But, Russillo, this is only the 12th time we've seen this team with the three guys. Now, they're playing a team that is a 500 team that had no rim protection because Robert Williams wasn't playing. They didn't really have any shooting and couldn't really defend them at all. I don't want to say that this is what the rest of the playoffs is going to look like,

but this is the, this is the hypothetical awesome version of what the nets looked like. It was pretty impressive. It felt like they made every single shot they took. Yeah. Look, I think the only reason they lost game three is they're up 19-4 three and a half minutes into the game like these guys suck and then they just were like oh you know and tatum played one

of the all-time games any celtic has ever played in a playoff game and marcus was incredible in game three and even though kemba was was you know just another bad shooting night from him like there were all these guys making these big-time effort plays. The oddity of this series is that I think this is actually kind of the toughest we've seen the Celtics look. They've actually cared more. They've shown more fight. They showed a lot more fight in Game 4,

but I'm going to stop myself because it's just not even close. I mean, there's no Robert Williams. We know Jalen's been out. Then no Kemba for this one. There were rotations in this game, Bill, where I think it was like fournier langford semi grant williams i mean wait a second don't forget about the iconic semi grant jabari three out of the five guys on the floor to start the second quarter that was rough right so you know brooklyn

can do whatever they want when they want to in this matchup and i think actually some of the most impressive stuff is that the second quarter start where kairi and duran are out and harden just goes solo but he can just do you know you're getting thompson switches on him he toasts him every time you get forniana switch he toasts him there's no backline help so i think the biggest mistake you can make if you're a celtics fan or anybody like that going well if they had done this or played this guy or all these different things like there's just not even close. Like Brooklyn probably should have swept this and they're going to win game five. These things, you know,

they're not even close. And they didn't sweep them because Tatum played the best game of his life. And I've seen, I think pretty much every great Jason Tatum game. The one on Friday night was different. It was him putting all the pieces together, him realizing the inside-out thing, drawing contact when he wanted, solving double teams, and just, it was 50 hard points. He scored 50 relatively easy points against the Wizards, right, in the playing game.

He's going against Bertans and Rui Hachimura, and he played really well. The Friday night was different. They fell way behind. It looked like they were going to roll over. The Nets thought the sweep was happening. They're going to be out of there by the weekend. And Tatum kind of just didn't want to let it happen. I thought tonight, same thing. He played really well. He ended up with 40, 10 for 22, 17 for 17 from the free throw line. It

felt like he could have had 30 free throws, but the takeaway for me, considering how young he was, but also who he was going against was, you know, just comparing him and Durant because Durant was unbelievable tonight. He had a, he was 14 for 2011 for 11 free throws and got any shot he wanted. 14 for 20. I don't know if he hit the rim on any of his makes either, but you know, watching those two go head to head as a Celtics fan who's trying to figure out what Tatum's ceiling is, it was one of the first times I was like, oh yeah, I don't know if he's Durant 2.0,

but there's a chance he could be the best scoring forward in the league other than maybe Luka in two, three years. I thought the stuff he showed, I was really blown away because his teammates weren't helping him. There was no other threats on the floor. Even when Kemba was out there Friday night, it's not like the Nets were like, oh shit, we can't leave Kemba.

Marcus Smart, they just left wide open this whole series, basically. Fournier is who he is. He had no help whatsoever. He had 90 points in two games. And just think, when you accept that Luca's a guard, Tatum will be even higher in your forward rankings. I know.

I changed my mind depending on how I have to do the All-NBA. I want to hit a couple big-picture points, questions for you. First off, I think that might have been Marcus Smart's last Boston game. Well, they're not eliminated yet. The home game, I mean. I mean, that might have been it. I think the next time we see him, they're playing the video thanking him

for his seven great years in Boston as he's on whatever uniform he's wearing next year because they're not gonna bring this team next year. They're not trading Tatum and they're not trading Jalen. And if you don't know what Jalen means to the city and the organization, you saw it Friday night when Kyrie kind of did his little intimation thing

and Jalen just shut it down with this four and a half minute, basically monologue. That was incredible. Um, those two guys aren't going anywhere. I think if, if there's a move to be made, unless there's a Kemba trade, which we can talk about in a second, but I think Marcus has real trade value. He, he looked like himself with crowds, but has been pretty uneven this season. Has a tradable contract. He's got one year left. And I think that was his last home game. You're way more on this than I am.

You're definitive about it. This is the second time you've brought it up this season. I mean, I don't know. I mean, I know he's been offered because he really is the only tradable piece. I would think there's probably a difference of opinion amongst the team of what he means to them in the future. And look, for the smart fans, the people that love him

and love all the intensity, all the stuff that he brings, like, I understand, right? I'm not trying to, like, dump on him because I've had my frustrations with him, all right? Because he does care, and that's important. But I think it's always been a challenge with him kind of understanding how much better the other two guys are. And I don't, I don't, that's a hard thing. It's a hard thing for a young player, you know,

and it's a hard thing for a guy who's thinking about the next contract and all that kind of stuff. So you're more definitive about than I, I'll always be like, well, I don't think they're just going to wake up and say, we have to get them out of here. Cause that seems harsh. I just think it's like, if you're retooling this thing,

you don't have many options. Cause Kemba is basically untouchable at over 70 million the next two years. I'm not saying definitively he's out. I'm just saying they're not going to bring back this team next season. And he is by far, if you're just being smart about it and you're using experience and savvy and reading the tea leaves left and right here,

he's the most logical guy to get traded. I think he has the most trade value and I don't think they're trading Tatum and Jalen. And I think Kemba is untradeable, which I want to get to in a second. Here's the thing with Marcus. I think he has more value to teams that haven't been watching him day in, day out,

because I don't think he's the same defensive player anymore. You saw it tonight. They hardened Kyrie and Durant. Now granted, those are three incredible guys, but I feel like 2018 Marcus would have had a better chance to defend those guys. I don't think he's as athletic as he was three years ago.

And, um, you know, there's, I think there's been some wear and tear. I think he, he played really three years ago. And, um, you know, there's, I think there's been some wear and tear. I think he, he played really, really hard. Um, and I don't want to turn this into a dump it on Marcus thing. I just think next year is a contract year. I think he's going to want to get paid. And I think they're going to look at this and go, all right, if our best three

guys are smart Tatum and Brown, where are we going? And odds are not anywhere. Yeah, and I always kind of look at it as like every fan base, everybody can get really selfish about your own shortcomings. It's like, all right, what can we do? What can we do? Usually your options are pretty limited. And if they want to bring back Fournier on any kind of deal, then they may be having to move some pieces around,

hoping to just have more depth where it's not some major move, but the depth is somehow cheaper in order to avoid what could be a huge tax bill to have all of these guys back. I mean, that's, that's where the Fournier thing comes in. And it's also where the rest of the trade exception where you're like, okay, but you know, I know everybody get really excited and reading these Beal articles because the trade exception lined up with his salary. And you're like, yeah, that's not the way it works. Like the person you're getting in the trade exception usually has to be somebody

that people are ready to move on from. So the Kemba part of it at 30, what is he? 36 million and then 37.6 million player option, which we can probably go ahead and report. He'll pick that one up two years from now. I have this for you. Right, go ahead. I have the worst active contracts right now.

This is what they have next year, year after. Kevin Love, 31 and a half, 28.9. Wall, 44.3, 47.4.

I think that's the worst. 47 million for John Wall. Russ is 44.2, 44.2 straight. Kemba's 36 next year, 37.7 next year. Porzingis, 31.7, 33.8. And then the sneaky 36. He's got three years left. Wiggins is 31.6 and 33.6. And he's arguably the most productive if you're trying to win out of all these guys. Russell is 30 and 31.4. Horford's 27 and 26 and a half. And Hayward, I'm throwing on here just because he gets hurt every year.

29.9, 30.1, 31.5. My point is, if Kemba's getting traded, I think it's for one of those other guys on the list. And the Celtics aren't taking back John Wall. Kevin Love, maybe. I think the Cavs would have to trade Sexton to open up the Kemba thing. But then that, like, I don't understand why would they do that? Especially if they want Garland to be the future. And then it's like, okay, so what are you going to do?

Have Garland play off of Kemba, which I know they've tried to do with Sexton, but you just hear more complaints out of the Sexton part of the combination than you do Garland, right? The Porzingis thing, right. We're hearing those stories about the guys on opposing teams saying he's not going to pass it to you. Right. The ball.

The rare trash talking where they're actually undermining the style of play. Porzingis is the most logical, just on paper, like, oh yeah, problem for a problem, especially the way he played on Friday night. Right now, Clippers Dallas is happening. He might have 35 points tonight. I'll sound like an idiot. No, it hasn't been great. And I've defended Przingis a lot, but I mean, it's just

not that great. And I think you would agree whenever I make the rounds of calls, you know, something I'll always ask. Hey, you hearing about anybody getting mad? Like, who's the next mad guy? You hear any whispers or anything? And right now, it's pretty quiet on that front, but as far as like, who do you think a big name like Przingis is

available? Well, you're taking three years back with him so maybe there's a kembo porzingis something um putting a shooter next to i don't know i actually think kembo might be untradeable um i don't know that i would trade for porzingis anymore because i just i think it's kind of that group of guys that are too tall for their movement. Yeah. Like that are so big. They're always going to be hurt. I don't know.

Yeah. That one's. So the reason I bring this up is because I think people are like, yeah, we should trade Kemba and we'll get it. And it's like, you're going to really not get anything back for a guy who two straight years has had knee issues and is a small guy who just

has not looked good against good teams. Even before he got hurt in this series, he just didn't look good. He's he, we did remember that weird website I found where it was like your head to head match up against the guy. Yeah, we still don't know what it was based on. Whatever that site was. Kemba was just getting destroyed. He was like bazooka Joe in those matchups. So I just think the Celtics team is going to look differently. And I think with smarts contract, he's the most logical guy. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm not reporting anything.

Don't aggregate this. I just feel like that might've been his last home game. I'm I'm not confident to know that it's like, I wouldn't say anything like that. I just think you look at it this way. You go, you still have two great wings and a chance for one of them and Tatum to be a top 10 guy. And they're young enough that you're going to reset the deck. I, I know this is like frustrating

and almost sounds like loser talk, but I just think it's reality talk. When you look at some of these teams that are coming up short, you know, for the Celtics, it's always weird because you go like, Oh, you know, they couldn't get past the Eastern conference finals. And I'm like, man, you can make an argument all three of the years they made it to the Eastern Conference Finals, they were kind of playing above their own seat. There's something fluky about it. Yeah. Like, it was almost, you know, hell, the first year with Isaiah Thomas at 50 wins, that's one of the worst one seeds ever. And they were probably trying to rebuild and reset things.

And then it's like, man, the East is so bad and we're competitive. And that's what everybody wanted Brad Stevens stevens um to be massachusetts to be named after him so i don't know i still feel that way yeah i just think you should feel good that you have those two guys despite the fact how disappointing this is but as far as like the nets and the matchup and all this stuff i mean it's just they're worlds apart they're worlds apart we're talking about three hall of famers on one team that doesn't even need to play defense and they could have they can score whenever they want and That's the only reason why. I think they just took their foot off the gas when you're up 19-4 like

that in game three or this is better than sweep. I was thinking about this with the Clippers too. The Celtics, similar builds, right? Two awesome wings. Jalen got hurt. But the league is so deep now from a top-heavy standpoint.

I made my list of top 40 just in case we ran out of stuff to talk about. And I was kind of stunned by how good the 40 is. And I was stunned by, you know, what I thought like the top tier was and things like that. And it's just like, we're just in a talent boom right now. So if you have Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum on your team,

that, that might just be a round run loss unless you add other guys. Cause all of these teams that we get to 16 playoff teams and 12 of them have a ton of talent, you know, Washington had Beal and Westbrook and really nobody else. And they're just getting demolished by Philly, like demolished. Those games weren't close, you know? And then Miami who makes the finals last year. And it seemed like it was seven years ago when you watched them this year, it was like, wow, they don't have enough talent. It was against a team they beat nine months ago. So I just think we're pretty loaded these days. Yeah. The depth is great. And for the listeners to,

to get a little chuckle out of this, cause I know we were going to do our top 30 a few months ago and I did it and I, you know, had it pretty pretty good i had like 33 guys maybe and i was like all right i could be argued in and out of a couple of them here as the game started today bill sends me a text he's like hey i did my top 40 players in case you want to do that and i'm like dude like i'm not the game's already started i know i know and i appreciated it and i want to hear it from you but i go i'm like looking at my notepad as we're in the beginning of Atlanta, New York. And I'm like already taking down other stuff on Trey that I was looking at. And I look at the text and I just go, ugh.

And then I think like, this is going to suck. I'm not going to be able to do it. And I go, you know what? Because I'm not. I'm just not going to be able to do the 40 the way I want to right now. I just need it. I'll do it later on. We'll do it at some point.

You can do it or whatever. I just, I couldn't, I couldn't pull it off on top of everything else and watching the games. I have a couple of quick next things because we got to move on to some of these other series.

First of all, the Boston crowd was awesome today. They're down 25 and they're acting like they were down two. Like they're really into the game. I think they're excited to be back. In the first quarter, it kind of had a

upset kind of feel to it. And then unfortunately, the benches had to play and all of a sudden the Nets were up nine. But when we were growing up, and I remember most famously with Ralph Sampson at the game after he punched Sechding when he came in and the crowd was like a

Roman Coliseum. And I did feel like it psyched him out. I've been to games where players got psyched out. In 2021, I don't feel like crowds getting on players and booing them works the way it used to back in the day. I think all it does for somebody like Kyrie is it makes him mad. It makes him try harder. And it puts a, uh, you know, it puts a burr up his ass and he, and he's actually more likely to play better if you're doing that. I'm not saying the fans shouldn't have done that, but when they were on him like that, I was like, oh shit, he's going to play really hard today. And he did, he was like doing tip-ins with two minutes left. They're up 20. He played half as hard as that in the 2019 playoffs maybe something good would happen for the Celtics he was awesome

and you're right like I think I think there's something with him where I don't I mean look when you hit a shot like he did in 16 why is he gonna be phased in a Sunday afternoon up to one on the Celtics who aren't that good right so it's Peyton Pritchard and Semmy Ojale the fans

are being mean. It's not like the fans shouldn't do that. I have Langford in the switch. Although Langford probably has a better chance than some of the other guys that get caught in the switch. Right. The crowd's yelling at Durant.

Durant's the best going forward probably of all time. He's not going to be phased by this. He's probably just going to hit a three his next time down. I guess my point is, I don't know what else fans should do. I almost wonder if we should use

a little reverse psychology and you're just applauding the guys in the other team every time they do something. Oh, that was brilliant. Kyrie's brilliant. What an honor to be here. You just kind of psych them out or just silence would be the other thing that might work. I don't know. I don't,

I don't know what the answer is. You know what the answer isn't is chanting for taco fall with four and a half minutes left in a playoff game. That's so embarrassing. That was rough. Can I tell you something? And I mean this. And it's nothing against taco, by the way. I just think that you're a home crowd. You're the Celtics and yeah, it's a playoff game. It's not February. Right. Exactly. I think there was a lot of kids in the crowd today. Here's the thing. I would have rather seen Taco Sorry, I just dumped on thousands of kids.

I would have rather seen Taco in the second quarter than Semi Ogilvy and Grant Williams. Honestly, in all sincerity. Semi, yes. Grant had some decent moments. If he's out there, at least the Nets aren't going to be able to drive to the basket. It was a layup line for them.

At least if the 7'6 guy is in there, they're thinking for a split second. Yeah, you know what they're thinking of doing? They're thinking of setting 5-1 screens. And now Taco's 30 feet away, waving his arms all over the place. Do that. That's fine. How about play his own with Taco? I can tell you how that's going to look. Play his own.

So you do think there are adjustments to be me because i would like this would be local radio 101 like if i were doing the old call-in show back in the uh the zone days be like all right you know what can they do like ah we need more minutes from this guy and you're like no there's no there's no there's no magic there's nothing's happening here this thing was over before it started. You know what should have happened is as it became a layup line, somebody should have creamed Harden or Kyrie or one of those guys

because it's the playoffs and they don't have that Morris brother on this team, right? They don't have like Markeith coming in. Well, the first couple quarters of the Morris brothers, fourth quarter, I don't know. You know what I can't believe? I can't believe there isn't somebody that when harden just absolutely forum shivers them off like fournier ended up in the

in the stanchion he just gets shut yeah i can't believe there isn't a guy that's like i stink it doesn't even matter if i'm out here and he just chucked me to the ground again i mean i agree nobody wants the fine i can't believe nobody's really lost their minds after getting chucked to the ground by harden i they just accept it it. It's really weird. Harden was awesome today. Yeah. I mean, the thing is, is they can, they can run all of that stuff with just him. Like the start of that second quarter when he's like, okay, I'm going to do my Houston Rockets deal against this Celtics team right now where they're, I mean, the guys they had out there for the second quarter, that wasn't even fair. They should have just said like, hey, we're going to start the clock at six minutes and have you guys up 10 more.

When they get up eight, it feels like the game's over because it's like they're never going to screw up enough possessions for you to be able to go on a 12-2 run. The odds of them scoring is basically 50% every time. The other thing, it reminds me of the rock and roll hall of fame or something. And granted, like this is the best the nets are going to look because next round, they're going to play Milwaukee.

Giannis is going to be out there. You have Brooke Lopez in the middle. You have holiday being floating around. Like the bucks are significantly, significantly better defensively than Boston is significantly. So this is the best Brooklyn's ever going to look, but the game today, it felt like the rock and roll hall of fame when they would have those things

where it's like, all right, now Tom Petty is going to play with Prince and Eric Clapton. And then each guy kind of steps out and it's like, Oh shit, that's Prince. He's doing a solo now. And then it's like,

there are Clapton's good. They can just go from guy to guy. And it's like three of the most talented offensive players of this era. And two of the most iconic offensive players of this era and two of the most iconic offensive players of their generation um so when you see it all together you're like fuck this is tough yikes you're like joe harris's kid rock and like clapped and doesn't want to stand near him i'm just trying to just trying to think of other guys here i gotta say one thing with the Nets

and I think this bodes well for them next round I still think the Bucks are going to beat them but their role guys are all frisky right? yeah, Brown, I mean Blake is just out there now like captain role guy I mean he's trying to get charges every single possession super fit, Claxton

super physical Claxton is incredible and that he has accepted who he is on this team so much more like a Georgia I was like all right you're huge but what's with this point guard two guard stuff yeah and then Tyler Johnson he'll pick you up full court and annoy the shit out of you and try to poke check and stuff like that they have like five guys like that so So from an energy standpoint, I actually think that bodes well for them for the playoffs. The interesting thing about this series

was DeAndre didn't play. They're going to need him at some point and that will open the door for teams to either do hack at DeAndre, try to get him in switches, things like that. They didn't have to play him this series. But at some point, they will. Yeah, that'll be the Lopez-like deal.

Because this thing is, even if you bring in DeAndre, you go, okay, does it make sense to have DeAndre that far away from the hoop with Lopez? Let's talk about the Bucs. We'll take a break, and we'll come back and talk about them. 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, you could still walk or run 60 kilometers, host an event, or set your own goal and mow your own way. Do great things this November. Sign up now. Just search Movember. All right, so we were talking about the Bucs

right before we went into that break. The Bucs looked awesome against the Heat, and they didn't even play that well, which was the frightening thing if I'm a Nets fan or a Sixers fan. It's like, it's not like the Bucs shot the lights out. It's not like Giannis was incredible. It was just those three guys together

have become really good, and it's going to be a big three verse big three series next round. Um, just what they did against the heat. How much of you that would you attribute to revenge? Plus the bucks are just a really good defensive team versus maybe that he thing was just fluky last year. What would you,

if you had to see, saw that, well, I don't think revenge, I don't think revenge was, Versus maybe that heat thing was just fluky last year. What would you, if you had to seesaw that? I don't think revenge was the main factor. I looked at an awful heat offense. And I mean, if you go over the numbers, and again, we're only talking about four games in the same matchup, and these can be misleading. You know, I remember last year,

we were looking at Houston's small approach in that OKC series where it was a seven gamer, where you looked at Houston's defensive numbers after that, and you're like, hey, look how great their defensive numbers are. And you're like, yeah, it was kind of Chris Paul and a timid Shea Gilgis-Alexander, Lou Dortz taking threes. Schroeder had his moments, so it wasn't like this really tough offense that you had to slow down. But if you just go based on what Miami did offensively or what Milwaukee did defensively to them, Miami was at like 95 points per 100 possessions in this series. That's almost 10 points worse than the next worst offensive team so far in the playoffs

four games in the Knicks. So when I was going through and doing my own prep for each series, you know, the emotional side of you was what if, you know, what if they're in their head a little bit? And every time I kept coming around to like another fact about who Miami really was, I was like, why would anybody pick them? No one like in the only reason anybody was picking them, which I understood was it like an emotional hangover from the previous matchup. So, I mean, Giannis shot it awful and he kept shooting. Rebounding was great. Defense is there.

They played Bam perfectly where Bam didn't really ever figure it out. Butler was terrible. You know, so this that series, I think game one was like, well, you know, if something goes here, something goes there, you know, you never know what could happen. And then it's like, no, actually, like this is a problem. Miami has a real offensive problem. And I think it had way more to do with the matchup than it was just revenge mode. we nailed it a week ago when we said that felt like a weird game one must win for Milwaukee that once they got over the hump of that game, it was going to be smooth sailing. I didn't, I didn't think they would sweep, but, um, they just dominated them. And my buddy Hedge diehard,

crazy Boston fan. He made me this graphic of the heats field goal percentages last year, their best four guys versus this year and like each guy was 10 to 15 percent lower than a year ago and he's like these fucking guys they got hot for six games we should have been in the finals i couldn't defend bam like it was a bad matchup for boston with the bam thing well i can't get over the hero game i can't get over that one game when he had like 38 or 40 he just said And then Iguodala hitting five threes in the final game wasn't awesome either.

But yeah, it's... I think if you look at that 2020 Heat team now, they become this weird aberration team. They go into this room with the 2007 Cavs and some of these other weird finals teams

we have, where we're going to look back 20 years from big, the fuck happened that, Oh, that was the bubble year. It'd be like one of those, but, um, the Butler legacy, we were talking on this podcast about Butler as like, is he have to be considered a top shelf guy? He's going against LeBron and AD and he's single-handedly winning two finals games. And, you know, he was the dominant player in the Eastern conference and what does this mean

for him? And, and now it's like, he, he was awful and talk to, talk to big game. Yeah. And look, this isn't about shitting on Jimmy Butler. This is just responding to everything that Jimmy Butler has been about because when guys win and it makes sense, I mean, this isn't, but when they had that run last year, then it became this kind of like forced storyline that he was always one of these real guys. And he was proving it that he was always like a tier one guy that could carry a team when in reality, like he's flirted with being a top 10 guy. I think like one

season for the rest of his career. I mean, I'm talking about like the real years of production. I've never really seen him as that. I, you know, everybody would want Jimmy Butler. All right. I'll take Jimmy Butler. You'd love to have Jimmy Butler, but it's like, well, he's in the final. So now what do we do? You know, is this guy a top five? Is he a top six guy? And then of course they go into the playoffs. He's like, don't worry about it. Like I've got something up my sleeve. I've got all this shit. And it's like, no, you got swept and you shot it like crap. So, you know, and he's Miami. So, you know, we're going to forget that any of that even happened in like three days, you know, it's not going to be some, he's not a big enough of the

star for him to actually have to pay like some of the criticism price that other guys would have to pay for saying all the stuff that he's been saying about him and his team and his game for months. When reality was like, they were a decent team and they look, they came out of the East. Nobody else did good for them. Um, but I don't know. I think we end up making more mistakes about who players are in those winning moments than we do when we kind of step back and look at the bigger picture and realize like Butler's really good. Everybody liked Jimmy Butler. He's not a top 10 player in the league. Top 10 is crowded anyway. I did second team all NBA for him this year, but it was, there were major multiple injuries that he was great this year.

And he had a really good second half of the season. Yeah. I won't read you my top 40, but if we're just, if we're just starting with these 11 guys and that this is a no particular order, LeBron, Katie,

Giannis, Luca, Jokic, Embiid, Curry, Kawhi, Dame, Davis, and Harden.

Butler's not in that group. Yeah, I mean, that's a really good point. Because it's like, all right, you voted him second team all NBA, so that means he's 10 best. It has to do with missing games. Like, if you redrafted the entire league for one season, Butler would not be one of the first 10 picks. And that's okay.

If you go next five, Tatum, Holiday, Young, Williamson, Mitchell, and then Paul and Gobert. Now I have 17 guys I just listed. You have Holiday that high? I'm just listing guys. Okay. All right. I actually do have Holiday in top 20 now.

All right. But you just brought him up. It felt like 13. So you're not saying that's an order. No, no, I was, I was going out of order because I didn't want to make people think I was reading off a list, but I do think holiday was the top 20 guy for me. The stuff he's doing defensively,

like, you know, in Boston was like, back. This is so incredible on defense. Like drew holidays, incredible on defense. And I hate myself for not voting for him for first team,

all defense last year. He should be penciled in as long as he's on this level. He's the best defensive guard in the league. And that's it. It's done. Yeah, for the guys that out there think they have one of those lockdown guys, you should just watch Drew for entire, especially closing quarters. Watch him and then go, oh, my God, it doesn't look like that.

So the Heat, quickly, because I want to get to the Bucs. So this Butler thing, they're going to make a big thing about, we got to get to the bucks. So this Butler thing, they're going to be, make a big thing about, we got to get a second star. They actually do have cap space. Yeah. Like 20 million.

They renounced a bunch of guys. Yeah. And then the old Depot thing, I don't know what they do with that, whether they had an under the table deal with him or not. Uh, I do think old Depot would have helped them not get swept against the heat, but I don't,

I'd be against the bucks, but I don't think he would have made a difference. I drag it. Sounds like he's probably done. He's done at that number. Like the cap holds they have on none and Duncan are really low. Yeah. So there's some stuff that they could do there,

but you know, maybe they do a one year for Oladipo, but that's when you go, okay, it was at one year and you guys came to some, I mean, it just like Oladipo can never get back. It's just scary that it's, like, now two years.

It's not like he's that old. It's like two and a half. But two years of this. Yeah. Or, you know, do you, if you're Miami, because we always have to prepare ourselves for this, is there some name we're not even thinking about that's really mad in July and all of a sudden Miami's in play? Well, Clippers 19, Dallas 16 right now in the first quarter.

But Kawhi would be, you know, the most fascinating. We'll talk about this in part two because we'll know what happened. But the most fascinating what-if name in this free agency is going to be Kawhi. If the Clips got bounced in round one, he's going to be in the Miami Knicks. He'll be in that whole vortex. Lowry would be the other one. Yeah, well, that's a completely different level. And, you know, Miami doesn't have any assets for picks.

And that's why the Lowry stuff. No, but they do have Hero. If they wanted to basically upgrade from Hero, if they felt like Hero is who he is, he's like this awesome heat check guy, but could he be a top three guy on a title team? Probably not. So we'll see.

They're going to be an interesting team to watch over free agency. And they talk a big game. They're always in the middle of it. I love Justin Termini's tweets about this. We got to get Justin Termini out. I love that guy. One of my favorite Twitter accounts, but he had a great Jimmy Butler tweet. I think it was something like, has anyone ever talked more and delivered less than Jimmy Butler? And I was like, that's not bad. I mean, other than the finals thing, it was a lot of losses.

Jimmy does talk a lot. He said the media certainly likes him, but, um, yeah, we got to get him on. Uh, do you think,

would you consider Middleton holiday and Giannis a official big three? Uh, you know, what are your big three standards? What do you, what do you look at when they get the resume sent to your house? I'm a little more difficult about it. Like I remember looking up a big three thing and NBA.com ranked, I think, the top 60 big threes ever.

And I think there was one with Paul Millsap and Joe Johnson. So whatever above that is, that's my standard. That's my cutoff. Once you go there, it was I might have to send you this article. It was one of the funniest things ever and i think it may even been a slideshow and i'm just going through it going you know at this point you should have just stopped the exercise at like your 35th best big three i feel like there's been probably nine or ten total big threes like legitimate big threes in

our lifetime well okay what's is chicago a big three team in the 90s? No. Does Rodman count as a big three? No. No. All right. No, he doesn't. What about, I mean, Shaq Kobe?

Not Rodman at that point in his career. You could argue that the first Rodman season with the Bulls, maybe, because he was still Rodman. But the last two, no way. I know our standard is going to be way beyond it.

Basically, it turned into if anybody got a third guy, then they'd put him in some team logo, and they were like, oh, that's their big three. When in reality, it isn't that many. The Lakers had Wilt, Baylor, and West at the same time when Baylor still could jump. And that's a pretty good one.

The Celtics had Sam Jones and Havacek and Bill Russell. Pretty good. I'll allow those are those are like top 40 all-time hall of famers like that's kind of where i like to my big three to land it really started with the celtics with parish bird and mikhail that was the first time people started saying big three big three yeah that's the first time people said it i mean because that poster with those three guys was like the first time, even though, you know, it was fairly dismissive of the fact that worthy magic and Kareem were on the other side. Uh,

what about Westbrook? Beale, Rui, Hachimura. Beale, Bertans, Westbrook. Uh,

when it, there's been some good force, big threes like they, Houston had that kind of semi washed up Barkley with Dret, with semi washed up Drexler and Hakeem. They're like, big three. And it's like Drexler can barely move at this point in his career. And then they kind of flipped Pippen in there.

That didn't work either. Barkley's rebounding rate was still terrific though. So I won't hear it. He was great. I didn't like skinny older Barkley as much. It was like when you have that friend who is the husky guy in college who was awesome. And then he's like, Hey, I went vegan and you see him and he weighs like 158 pounds. You're like, where's my friend? Yeah. I don't like when that happens. I had a buddy that had like a weird blood test cholesterol scare. Now granted he drank and smoke

and always ate fried food all the time, but he wasn wasn't he was a big guy and he was from europe anyway so i don't think smoking's bad for you when you're from like russia but he he decided like he got freaked out and then he went like crazy you know he's eating cucumber slices and strawberries and like just went complete and i showed up and he answered the door the shirt off and i go i think i'd rather you have high cholesterol. Yeah, it happens sometimes. Speaking of Milwaukee really quick, the Bogdanovich thing is such a funny one for this playoffs where who knows if they ever had him

or if they leaked that they thought they had him. I think they definitely had him because the first time I found out anything about it is another team texted me and said hey our like numbers guy said that this doesn't even work like they actually can't do the stuff that's been announced so it wasn't like a hey because i know that it turned into supposedly teams were telling on them and the tampering part is all gray area any so i think the league would have allowed it but i was researching this again today because on both ends but i actually

researched it too. Bogdanovich added to this Bucks group is, is pretty scary. And it still gets back to Sacramento where you go, how do you not just match? How do you just let this asset walk? Because he's completely changed to Atlanta's Ben, which I know we'll get to later when we get to that series.

Yeah. So I did the research too. And we've never gotten a full, here's what happened story. It depends on who you read and who you talk to. Honestly, my, what I heard is that they thought they had a deal at some point, his agents were either involved, not involved. I've heard two different sides of that, but for that deal to work, as you said, his salary had to be a certain number. It wasn't as high as what Atlanta was going to pay him. Milwaukee was like, it has to be this. I don't know what it started at 14 or 13, whatever it started at. But Atlanta really wanted to sign him. And Atlanta's like, Hey man, we'll, we'll go to 18. So his agents were like, well, fuck that. We're not going to take 14 so he could be like the fourth dude in Milwaukee.

We went to 18. And that was it. That's how it died. But I really do think Milwaukee thought they had him. And if they had him, especially Dante goes down, they still have Connaughton. They still have Forbes.

They have some PJ Tucker chicanery they can do. I guess they could play Jeff Teague if they really wanted to. I never thought Dante was that good. It's just another body and six fouls, stuff like that. But Bogdanovich is a whole other animal. And if they had him, I honestly would think this is a layup for them to at least go toe to toe and beat Brooklyn. I think they would be Brooklyn with Brock Donovich. I still think they're going

to be Brooklyn, but I don't feel as confident because that this series might just come down to that guy in the corner. Who's like Forbes with three minutes left. And it's like, fuck, that guy's got to make a shot we have these big threes going against each other it's like or it's like Brooke Lopez you know it's going to come down to some weird guy on that team and that's when we'll think about Bogdanovich yeah look Tucker his analytics like you're not going to like him um when he wanted out of Houston you know he handled it differently he was he was quiet about it but people knew he wanted out of Houston, he handled it differently. He was quiet about it, but people knew he wanted out, which made sense. He had, again, this is depending on what you,

he had the single worst plus minus of 450 NBA players. Yeah. And yet when you bring him in, you know, okay, we know there are certain times if we want to go small, we can trust him to be out there. And maybe he gets cooked in some of these switches, but I think there's an effort. There's a pridefulness with him.

We're like, Hey, I'll take a PJ Tucker in my rotation. You never know because Milwaukee is probably going to try to figure out like what they want to do with the Brooke Lopez lineup versus going five out and having Giannis initiated. The funny thing about Giannis, I mean,

he still shot 20 times a game. He shot 6% from three against Mike. He shot 6%. And he kept taking them. What's that? One for 15? Two for 30? 6% is really bad.

It's not good, Bill. One thing I like about Tucker is I do feel like he'll fuck with Durant. They've known each other forever. I think he'll go with thoseant. They've known each other forever. I think he will go with those guys. Honestly, it seems like the book's out with Durant. I don't know if you've noticed this. You watch a lot of basketball. You're home

some nights watching hoops. Ew. The Durant online Durant has now morphed into on-court Durant where people chirp at him the same way they would chirp at him on their replies because they think they can get to him. And his head's on a swivel.

Like he's yelling at people courtside. He was next to the Celtics bench like three or four different times today, like talking with those guys. Three different Celtics made a run at him in this game. I feel like the word is out. Like just start shit with Durant because he's got rabbit ears basically.

And it's like he is online. And I feel like that's, don't aggregate this. This is just what I'm seeing. Watch the television. I do feel like teams feel like they can annoy him. I noticed it too. But what I saw was, was a positive for Durant. Like when Grant Williams is talking shit to you and you're Kevin Durant, like how far is that conversation going to go? You're just going to hit a three in his face. Right. Like Durant's looking at him going, cool, man. You know, you're Grant Williams. Like what, what are you going to do? You know, like I didn't walk by

Berman at ESPN being like, eh, you know, highlights are a little shaky week 12, buddy. But he is the only great player that just randos seem to go at. Like Grant Williams isn't talking shit to LeBron. No, but you know what?

This is always one of those things that I think is funny because we've both seen it, and I don't want to turn this into a huge segment, part of what we're doing, but whatever I think the tier above me is, I'd be like, why do you respond to any of this stuff? I don't really respond to much of it because it is a colossal waste of time. Like if you try to imagine the person that's arguing with you about something, I'd be like, whatever, I'm not going to do this.

Maybe like once every few months I'll say something. But then I'll think like somebody above me, like, why would you do it? You know? And then when you realize like the most, like the highest level of politicians in this country can't handle being criticized that it's just for some people their exercise of getting through it is responding to all of it so the idea that once you're at this level of success that it's just you don't have it like all of us are different and for durant like he's just he'll always be this way but i saw a guy that people were chirping with where he wasn't affected by it at all today.

Like I thought he was kind of looking around being like, how dare you even challenge me as he hits another jumper in everybody's face. Well, Von Milwaukee, I'm, I'm definitely doing the PJ Tucker. Um, Giannis doesn't talk really any shit. I, he's like the most benevolent superstar we've had in a while. Well, what about Middleton or Drew? All three of them. Really? Yeah, pretty quiet. Brooke will crush a guy and apologize.

It'll be kind of weird how that plays out. That's probably why a guy like PJ Tucker would be like, we need somebody in here that's got a little more attitude. Gun to your head right now, Brooklyn versus Milwaukee, who are you taking? I think all my Brooklyn content sucks. So, I just don't, you know, I picked Philly

because there's some things I really liked about Philly. It has nothing to do with this Wizard series. I'm not like watching this series going, man, I love my Philly pick. They're handling the Wizards. The Nets are horrifying, man. They're horrifying. We'll see. We'll see. I mean, you're picking

Milwaukee for the same reason why I picked Philadelphia, I imagine, right? I really think Milwaukee's good. I do, too. I can't wait. I think there were some moments in this Boston series. Boston's completely undermanned. I was texting about this before game four

where I was like, I'm going to be really interested to see how Brooklyn responds tonight because they just haven't had enough reps together with adversity. Now, it looked great tonight, but they're playing a team

that was trotting out below average NBA players for half of their roster, right? The only way the Celtics were winning tonight is that Fournier had like 35 or Marcus Smart was like 11 for 13 from three. There had to be some variable that was basically...

Pritchard scored 28, a career high. There had to be some variable for them to match points. Then I think the Nets would have scored 160 today. Yeah, maybe they would have. Maybe they would have. But I still want to see them with real adversity because it is weird. It goes against everything that I like about basketball and think works in basketball

when it's just like your turn, your turn, my turn. And that's just your offense. I've never seen it work for four rounds before. No, but the Joe Harris part of it is incredible. Like to think that if you try to help, like the only time I thought there was some kind of adjustments, if Harden's in there, and this would be something for Milwaukee,

if they run the Harden minutes at the start of the second quarter and you're not throwing a hard double when Harden's out there without Durant and Kyrie, I think that's a mistake. I think those are the minutes where you kind of look at them in the Houston minutes against the Lakers last year where Westbrook was kind of shot physically. And then you go, all right, let's just sell out against him off this high screen stuff, you know, and then they kind of stopped screening and Houston was trying to do a couple of different things, but that would be

something I would look for from Milwaukee that when it's the hardened solo mission, you might just want to sell out to try to screw him up. And then you never know, it still might not work, but it's, it's worth trying. Cause I think teams are really hesitant to do that. And as I mentioned, I think with you last week, like we saw the lesson in trying to double people how bad it can go, whether it was Doncic, you know, the Knicks didn't really want to try to do it that much with Trey. And then Trey, they did it to him a couple times today

and then Trey burned him again. But with Harden in that situation, I'd like to at least see somebody try it. I would let Kyrie get what he wants and try to take out the other two guys. It's just like, if Kyrie's taking 30 shots tonight, that's probably actually good because Kyrie, everyone's staying around watching him.

Harden can get everybody else involved. And KD is amazing. And I don't even know what you do with him. And I think KD is in the running if you were saying who's the best player in the world right now. It's hard for me to think it's... He has to be in the

first couple names mentioned, and he might be number one. Yeah, I mean, the only reason we haven't because it's been such an inconsistent season of him playing, but when he's played, he's even beyond what he normally does. He's fucking awesome. I mean, he could be a stretch five. Right. He could be... His defense looks like it's picked up, too. His defense is great.

And even though the Tatum got him a couple times, the fact that Durant is his size and he's staying in front of Tatum, who's throwing everything at him, it's just one of those battles of two really talented guys. So I don't feel like Tatum walks away going like, oh, I got you. Yeah, you got him a couple times. But I mean, Durant's trying to hold up on top of everything else.

The baskets were so difficult that Tatum was scoring. It wasn't like he was, that was what was scary about the Nets today. They had 141 points. I loved like basically every shot they took.

It felt like they could add 170 if they had gotten some threes and some layups to go in. Everything they took was a good shot. I was impressed. All right, we're gonna take a break and we gotta talk Sixers-Wiz

quickly, but then Nick's Hawks because that's been a really, really meaty one. Okay, quickly. Sixers-Wiz. I'm going to give each of us 30 seconds. Here's my 30-second Sixers-Wiz take because this series is terrible.

Westbrook's last four playoffs, he's 22-9-8, 39.6 field goal percentage, 30.8 three-point field goal percentage, 6-16 win-loss record. His last 30 playoff games, he's 7-23. That's all I got. The only negative I have on the Wizards, they're totally outmatched here.

I don't know that you're learning a lot about this. And honestly, congr have on the Wizards, they're totally outmatched here. I don't know that you're learning a lot about this. And honestly, congrats to the Wizards for even getting to here based on where it was. What I don't love is, hey, we get it, Westbrook and Beal. You guys are out, man. The rest of your teammates aren't that good. Those two guys love eye rolling

and letting everybody know the rest of the team sucks. And I think it's really lame as teammates to do that to a bunch of guys. The rest of the guys are so unproven that they're never going to say anything. And I think it's really lame as teammates to do that to a bunch of guys. And the rest of the guys are so unproven that they're never going to say anything. And I think they all kind of get along in a way. But it's just, I know you're frustrated out there. But Beal and Westbrook make the same mistakes. They go nuclear when their teammates make the same defensive rotation mistakes.

On the other side of it, the Embiid step through facing up Gafford, the free throw line in game three. I can't believe a human being like Embiid can move that way. I know this is not breaking news with him. And Simmons is just so big against the guards that it doesn't really matter. By the way, he's missed all of his free throws. Simmons is 0 for 9 on free throw attempts. We're not going to learn anything from this other than there are some really cool things with Philadelphia's offense where, you know,

they decided to double and beat at one point, then they kicked it to Curry, then they tried to play him straight up, and they just swung the ball around. George Hill's in the other corner. So you're seeing Doc kind of experiment with the defense versus spacing closing lineups, which I think are going to be probably games

where we're going to see different groups of guys. I really think we could see different groups of guys from the Sixers out there as Doc kind of figures out exactly the best closing group for each game. Well, if they play the Hawks in this natural lead-in to Nick's Hawks, this was the... By the way, kudos to Trae Young.

He's been awesome. And this is the Trae Young I think you and I both wanted to see. But it was also, this is the perfect matchup for him, this team. When we get to the next round with the Sixers, assuming the Hawks make it, they're going to have Embiid as a rim protector. I assume they would throw Simmons and Tybalt at them. Just like basically those two guys on Trey the whole time. And they're going to try to cut the head off of the Hawks by just taking out Trey.

It's the opposite of how the Knicks have done it. And I have a lot of Knicks fans in my life. All of them think Tibbs has done an incredible job this year. He's coached a really strange series. Like to me, I'm going into this Hawks series from the Knicks. Like forget about how bad Randall's been for a second. I have to take out Trey Young or at least make him work on defense. Like just,

I can't let him do nothing on defense. And then on offense, I can't let him do whatever he wants. Those two things together. I'm losing the series. And I think it's really strange that a, whoever Trey's guarding, I'm just,

let's go to that guy. Let's put more guards on the floor so he's got to guard somebody. Him just hanging out, standing next to Reggie Bullock, that's great for the Hawks. And then the other end, they just don't have the rim protection to stop him. I just think it's going to be night and day for him going against Philly. Philly has the perfect guys to guard him. They're taller, they're bigger, they're great defenders. Plus rim protection, it's going to be completely different than what he has now.

I can't believe they are so helpful to Trey Young's defensive problems. It's like they don't have any pass. I don't get it. You can sit there and say, well, Reggie Bullock can't. Well, you can't try to get him in a switch. You can't at least try something. Because guess what? Nothing else is working.

I mean, Randall's been a mess. He was better in game for RJ Barrett's been a mess. He was better in game for Derek Rose. And I think all of us love that Derek Rose has this part of his career because it looked like we may never even see this again, but it doesn't really get a lot of guys involved. And I wouldn't call Rose like an all-time creator either, as far as getting other people going. It's on him. And that part of the offense has been terrific but you know it's like okay well you bring him quickly to defend quickly can't hit a shot to save his life i don't know that anybody really screamed shooter when quickly was out there they tried nila kina for a couple possessions that's not going to happen um they they have a really it's an awful setup for the knicks so that part i don't get like i know

because i mentioned it and Hollinger said something about my tweet where he was like, hey, and then there were a few people jumping in on it. But I mean, for the most part, they don't, never mind trying to attack him, they run everything away from him. So he doesn't even have to make any decisions. He's just with Bullock off the ball, almost 90% of the possessions. I don't understand that, but it would help if your best two players actually played better. On the defensive side, I don't understand that, but it would help if your best two players actually played better on the defensive side. I don't think there's,

this is where I like, I think the first thing's approachable defending Trey in this series. Just isn't, it just isn't. It's not happening. You could see it in the first game. He's too smart against the double too. And he,

and he burned them on a couple of them here. Granted, if you want to try it, mix it up, trying to make them feel uncomfortable, that's fine. But when they play him straight up, you know,

they got him a couple of times with a hard double in the game. They lost when Deandre Hunter missed a couple of threes, you know, two back-to-back wide open threes. He hits that this thing might be a sweep, but you're right. Like that's the part of Philly where it's like, they can throw some huge, some real size at Trey, but Trey is so damn good. It's still getting space. And then the floaters. If you can do this jaw really tray floater thing, it's a whole other level of your offense.

Against Philly, I would assume, if Tybalt's out there, they can just hide him on Tybalt because he's not an offensive player by any means. I don't know if you could hide him on Simmons because I think they would then post him up, and that might actually get Simmons going. So then you,

you like, you can't put them on Seth Curry cause they'll actually run action for Seth Curry. I think he's going to have a lot of problems that, that series. And then you could also attack him with Seth Curry, who's kind of a sneaky, good offensive player.

If he's got a shitty defender on him, you know, it's just all stuff the Knicks couldn't have done. If I were the Knicks, I would not have started Derrick Rose. I actually thought that was a big mistake. And it's the kind of thing you do when you're desperate for game two because you're going to lose the game if you don't win the half.

But I think one of the best things about the Knicks this year was this bench would come in and it would kind of, it would almost be like a different team, you know, and it was, they would be one team, then the bench would come in and they would get of, it would almost be like a different team, you know, and it was, they would be one team and then the bench would come in and they would get momentum and all this stuff. I would have started quickly. Um, and I, I just, I would, they're not winning this series unless quickly gave them something. So to kind of yank them around, I don't think was the move. I would have started him. I would try to get a minutes. Cause I actually do think he can guard Trey. I think he's going to shut him down,

but he'll at least stay in front of him. And he's their only chance at all the guards they have. The other one, obviously, is Frankie Nicotine, who is unplayable. Really what this is, is it's figuring out what we saw this regular season. Now, there's a few storylines I was texting you earlier. For whatever reason, you're never allowed to mention

that when Nate McMillan took over, that Bogdanovich came back at the exact same time. And they tied it if you're going to be, you know. They clearly wanted Pierce out to not even give him a chance with Bogdanovich coming back because they wanted to fire him before he could come back. And there was that piece in The Athletic that felt like it was written by Trey Young

where they just trashed him. And look, I'm not saying anything against reporters, a bunch of reporters that I read all the time, but it was very clear like, all right, we don't like Lloyd Pierce. We're, you know, get him out of here. So that's already a problem. But they made sure once McDonavich was coming back, that there was going to be a new coach.

There couldn't be any like false hope here. I looked at some of the Trey stuff because I was like, you know what I love about this now is that he trusts guys. I don't think Trey trusted his teammates when he first got started. And I would say that creeped into last year a little bit too. But I started doing some of the usage rates and where he's been because we're talking about somebody in the league who dribbles it as much as anybody, has the ball in his hands the most, is like a top seven guy and touches dribbles per possession, number two overall in the NBA.

And so I went through some of the usage stuff in the regular season this year to the playoffs, wondering if it's actually gone up. So I know I didn't shoot it great in game four, but it's not like he's completely adjusted his approach. He's been just brute. I mean, I mean, in a positive way, but there's just nothing the Knicks seem to be able to do with the guy. And I think to finish the thought here is I don't know that this is a huge surprise. a positive way, but there's just nothing the Knicks seem to be able to do with the guy. And I think, to finish the thought here, is I

don't know that this is a huge surprise. This Knicks story is awesome, Bill. The effort, Tibbs, Randall's resurgence, you know, Barrett taking to another level. But when I would watch him the regular season, I'd be like, what are they doing? What's so good? And they just busted their ass with a team that's not even close to as talented

as Atlanta's. And I think that when you're really predictable a lot of like randall iso's far away and you want to load up on his drive side i think it's easier to kind of slow these guys down and that's exactly what we've seen through four games so i'm not i'm not surprised by any of this even though i know randall killed him in the regular season but atlanta was missing some players in those games as well i'm such a coward i thought the hawks were going to kill them and then just backed off. Because it seemed like Randall really owned them. But you're right. If you look closer at the three games when he destroyed them,

it wasn't the same Hawks team that is now. The thing that would concern me, because I know there are Knicks fans out there, like, we're going to win game five. Crowd's going to win that for us. We're going to go down in game six. Randall's going to show up and then we'll have game seven at MSG. It's like, all right, here's the problem. Like if the Hawks didn't fall asleep for like 10 minutes in game two,

this series would already be over. The Hawks have dominated and they don't have any answer for Trey. I would ask anyone this, and I already know what your answer is going to be. We've seen plenty of weird stuff happen. I mean, rarely have we had a team up 3-1 where we're sitting there talking about the team that's down, going, I love all these. Does anyone think the Knicks are better than Atlanta?

Who's answering that question? The Hawks are definitely way more talented. But listen, Game 7 is in New York. I can't count it out. I wouldn't bet my life that the Hawks are winning the series, but I would certainly feel very, very strongly that this is probably over. And look, I don't think we sold the Trey Young thing hard enough.

And I think it's interesting to compare this to Ja, because we were talking about Ja, who I think is really talented, who had, what, 47 in game two against Utah and has been incredibly explosive. But I think we both see it the same way with him. He still doesn't totally have that savvy with how to control pace yet. He doesn't totally get it. He hasn't had enough reps for how to have a feel for like, Oh, this is when I should take over. This is, I got to get this guy involved. Um, I, I have a chance to put them away. I'm going to this is when I should take over. This is, I got to get this guy involved.

I have a chance to put them away. I'm going to do this. I'm going to slow things up. I'm going to speed it up. He doesn't, he doesn't, he's not there yet. He's going to be there. I'm a full believer. He's, he's probably a year away. I think what struck me with Trey, the last two months of Trey versus what we saw the

rest of his career, there has been an evolution and a maturation. You can see it. He's evolved with how he controls the game. He doesn't do dumb shit anymore. He'll still take a 30-footer once a half. He took a few of them today. All his decisions make sense, though, right? When you're watching, you're like,

oh, this is why we were complaining because we knew he had this in him, and now he seems to get it. You remember that Harden-Capella stuff they used to do? You're just like, what am I supposed to do? Yeah. If I jab Steph Harden defensively and even try to retreat to contest Capella,

it's probably not going to work. Harden reads it, but Trey's smaller, and he reads it perfectly. And I just like that Atlanta has a bunch of different options. I'm not going to pick like Harden reason but Trey's smaller and he reads it perfectly and I just like that Atlanta has a bunch of different options I'm not going to pick him against Philadelphia if they make it um against them but I I see somebody that trusts people a little bit more and that was always my biggest issue with Trey is I just didn't feel like he you know he would he'd be like I'd rather me take an awful shot and never pass it to anybody else. I mean, I know what the assist numbers and all that stuff,

but the Bogdanovich completely changes who they are because I think it's another guy that can not only catch and shoot, but can handle a little bit. And it completely changes. Like, think how different, well, I don't know, maybe Brooklyn still comes out and none of this really matters with the Bogdanovich storyline, which we already covered. But even Gallinari,

who at times, Bill, I'll be like, does he ever move? Like, he always looks like as he's moving, it's like, okay,

this is right. And this is where he blew out as ACL. Like every time he starts getting going, like it doesn't look that smooth to me anymore or anything like that. But then he hits a bunch of shots today too. And it's size. They get Hunter back. Um,

so Hunter's the X factor for them because there's been flashes. But I think you and I both feel like potentially he's the second best guy in that team. If he can keep making baby steps as we get going through the playoffs. I just like their team.

I like watching them. They can all shoot. You like the villain part of this too, huh? I do. I do. I like that Trey They can all shoot. You like the villain part of this too, huh? I do. I do. I like that Trey kind of owns it. He's got a little sass to him. Do you like Trey Young now?

No. No, I actually really do enjoy it. I've really enjoyed watching him the last couple months. This isn't just the playoffs. He's starting to remind me of Nash. I think there's some Nash 2.0 stuff going on. I don't think he's as great of a passer as Nash was, but the stuff he's doing, it's just, he is so easily getting where he wants to go on the court. It's been really cool to watch.

Trey has the shot selection. We wish Nash had. Yeah. Yeah. He's like Nash with like a chip implanted in his head to be slightly more selfish. What do you do if you're the Knicks? Let's say they lose game five and you have this Randall situation where you could just, you just say, cool, we're running it back for you for 20.75 next year. No extension. Let's play it by ear.

Let's see how you do. Or you get roped into, you're paying him 35 million a year. You just watched him get solved really easily by here. Let's see how you do. Or you get roped into, you're paying him 35 million a year. You just watched him get solved really easily by Atlanta where they were just like, Oh, you like to do all this stuff. We're going to take all of it away. And all of the shots you take are off balance. They seem, they seem bad. It's not just that he hasn't shot the ball. Well, he, he, even the shots he's taking, he's not, not in not in balance. There's a hand in his face. I'd be really concerned to pay him 140 for four years is my point. I know that's an overreaction.

I'm just saying, as the Celtics have proven with Kemba Walker, if you miss on one of these contracts, it's a catastrophe. Unless that surprising player who I don't know who it is demands to be traded there, you probably re-sign Randall. You probably don't love the number, but at least you have the asset because you have all this cap space and there's a lot of cap space out there. So you're going to be paying more

than whatever your projections are for these players. But what's the number? Tell me the number. Is it 120 for four years? I don't know off the top of my head what he's eligible for off of this one because his thing is different because he's been on multiple teams here.

But couldn't they decline the 20.75 and then just give him a new contract basically? Because they're way under the cap. Yeah, but wouldn't you rather him? What is it? He's 20.75 next year. I have him as partially guaranteed. He's 20.75 next year. I have him as partially guaranteed. He's not

they can pay him off for a couple million. Right. Or they can sign him up for the 20.75. I would love him back at one year for that number. But that's probably not what he's going to want. It's so weird. I voted for him I think fifth for MVP. He's been horrible.

He was historically horrible in the first couple games. Don't let four games... Here's the deal. Is he perfect? No. Is he exposed a little bit? Sure. But think about where you were at as a Knicks fan. Think of where you were as an organization six, seven months ago. You were actually respectable now. But this is the whole point.

This is the Knicks issue for 50 years is overpaying these alleged superstar forwards that they can't ever win playoffs with. We know that. He had a great season. He's not a superstar. Okay, fine. You don't want him back.

This becomes Spencer Haywood, Bob McAdoo, and George McGinnis, and everybody else. How are you getting the 90% of the floor? How are you getting to the salary cap floor number that you have to get to if you let him go? Like, you're probably just going to sign him, just go like, Hey, maybe we can trade him. If we, you know, have three, I would have to keep it between 27 and 30. If you, if I'm going in the thirties, I'm just not doing it. I'm not, I'm not paying him 35 million a year when it's not like the Hawks are the 89 pistons.

They've completely shut him down. That's a huge concern. It really is. I would be really nervous about it. Right. But he is better than having nothing unless you know what those options are that maybe none of us know what they are right now. The next guy that's mad and wants to be traded there

is something like that. But the fact that they're even a respectable franchise for the first time in what 20 years but here's the thing you can have him next year at 20.75 billion you just have to say we're running this back let's see let's see how it looks we'll get you some help we have this really cool salary cap opportunity because your salary is low and we'll take care of you in a year i don't know if his agents will go for that. Yeah, I wouldn't go for that. He'll take care of me in a year. What about Rose?

Rose turns 33 next season. He made like seven and a half. And to me, he's perfect as your 25 minutes a game off the bench guy. If he's starting to think, hey, I should get 40 for two or whatever, then that comes nice and too. I would say find out what the offers are. Come back to us. Topping?

Are you feeling a little topping momentum? Because I'm feeling it a little bit. None at all? No. Did you forget Kevin Knox was on the team? I did. I did. That's a tough one. The Knox-Nitlenka

back-to-back is it's rough, not great too much Spike Lee or not enough Spike Lee for you with the crowd shots you know what, it felt good it was a return to normalcy I can tell you, too much Snoop Dogg right now I got it

too much, there's been like three or four commercials we've seen way too many times if you're like us and you're watching every game. Yeah, it's not Snoop Dogg's fault. It's not his fault. I'm just saying I'm seeing him because this goes back to last year's playoffs. We're like, oh, we're running this back. All right.

What's the one where it's like a fast food and the guy's like, oh, tasty. It's like Carl's Jr. One of those. Yeah, I think so. They're showing a cheeseburger and the guy's like, oh, tasty. It's like Carl's Jr. one of those. They're showing a cheeseburger and the guy's like kind of doing sex talk with the burger. I don't know what's going on with that one. Then there's the

one where they took Madness is Our House and they like sped it up and made it super weird. It was like, our house in the middle. It's like the Dennis Haysburg one. They had to have that one. I got one for you. Apple that usually crushes it. Would you say branding wise Apple does

as well as anybody over the last few years? Yes. By the way, when I said the Knicks first time in respectable in 20 years, that's excessive. I'd say that in Mellow run. Yeah, that kind of 2013. Right, right. When Mellow and the Pacers series, that was a respectable crew there. So I just wanted to clean that up.

Would the Willy Wonka theme song make you buy a phone? No. I felt like that was a miss with Apple. I go over people going, hey, Wonka, purple, phone, in. Let's get in line. Let's camp out for this.

But I'm probably not the demo. I'm probably not the demo i'm probably not the target on that one would a heavy breather make you want to buy a fast food oh bacon cheeseburger it's like it's like they had hired joe house to just it's like what it's like to be in the car with house when he has the internet seven hours like oh arby's like just it's so weird i don't understand how are we not better at making commercials well how hard is it i see the thing is i think they're like you know how radio stuff you would go why is it this like in the script and then you realize that part of the radio stuff is to be annoying to have some saying or some right because you're trying to get somebody's attention right like i'll never forget

like these these these timeshare ones apparently having a timeshare is a death sentence have you heard this guy like the guy's voice every time i hear it on any broadcast i'll be like i'll double check my pockets like do i have I have a timeshare? Oh, I'm good. I don't have one. They start throwing these timeshare stats at you and I get scared to death. I don't even have one. But it's just the ad works. It's in my head.

Who did your notes? I just saw that page come up. Do you have an artist's? What is that? Is that how I do my notes? I buy these artist's sketchbooks because I like writing them because I can fit a lot on a page

and then I can really think it out. I've been writing out all my notes. It really helps versus using the iPad. It gets you off the iPad. The clips are beating the Mavs. It's not a blowout, but it looks like they're in hand. We're going to leave part one here.

We're going to wrap it up. We're going to, uh, we're going to leave part one here. We're going to wrap it up. We're going to come on, uh, after we're going to tape right after clips maps and do the West, which became very intriguing with the, uh, Anthony Davis thing. So we'll save that for part two.

This was the end of part one. Rosillo. I'll see you in a couple of hours. Sounds good. All right. That's it for part one of the special two-parter with me and Marcelo. Wait for after Mav's clips about, I would say an hour and a half or so after that game,

we'll be putting up part two. I'm going to be breaking down that game as well as the West. Stay tuned for that. See you then. I want to see them on the way so I never say I don't have feelings with them. On the wayside, on the road so I never say I don't have feelings with them.