The Bill Simmons Podcast - Part 1: The Legend Steph Curry Drops 50 in Game 7 With Ryen Russillo

Episode Date: April 30, 2023

In Part 1 of a two-part podcast, The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo to discuss the Warriors advancing past the Kings, Steph Curry’s historic performance, how the Kings should view this season, looking ahead to Lakers-Warriors, where Curry belongs in the NBA Pantheon, and more. Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Ryen Russillo Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Coming up, a Sunday two-part extravaganza, part one, Warriors, Kings, Steph Curry, the legend. It's all next. This episode is brought to you by Prime Video. You know me, I can't go a day without sports. I really can't. And now Monday nights are all about hockey. That's right.

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Finally did it. Finally doing a Nerdverse movie. Yeah. That's all I'm going to say. Coming up on this podcast, Ryan Russell and I are going to break down Warriors Kings, the legend that is,

not only Steph Curry, but Kevon Looney, who is now the best center in NBA history. It's all next. Part one. First, our friends from Pearl Jam so All right, we're taping this. It is 321 Pacific time.

Steph Curry was so great and the Warriors-Kings game was so fascinating. We decided to make this its own part one. I'm here with Ryan Rosillo, another person who is appreciated and just been in awe of Steph over the years and felt like he was underrated. Now he's properly rated. And this was in the Steph Pantheon, Rosillo, a legendary one. They

were underdogs in Sacramento, plus one. People like me were wondering, is this it? Just a week ago, could they get swept? How badly could this go? Then they blow game six on a Friday night. They're playing 38 hours later in Sacramento. And there's some momentum for like, this could be it. What will the Warriors do if they lose? And then Steph just lays the smack down. And it was awesome. And everything about this game was awesome. I loved it. Your thoughts, and then we'll keep going. I'm just so happy I get to do this job sometimes. I would say more often than not, I don't have days like this where I'm sitting around, I'm watching

Steph, I'm in awe. I think everybody realizes that I love him. I'm like, now I get to talk about him. I get to talk about him for a living and talk about that game because I think it was really clear early on. The 36 hours thing was huge. It played a factor in the line, especially coming off of the loss in game six,

where it's like, wait, are they going to run them to death in this game? And then it's going to be this quick turnaround, younger team on the road with their road record, which is just so bad that it was almost fluky. But him looking for his shot early, looking like he was exhausted at times, him realizing Klay had nothing had nothing i mean it's not

just clay's missus clay was out of it the entire game so i think he kind of knew hey i'm gonna have to do this in a very non-curry way you know 38 shots for him is a career high i think so you look at the numbers and he was still efficient but i don't think he prefers to play this way but it was a necessity so there's a bunch of different factors about all the games and stuff, but go ahead. One other thing on that, Kerr, the way he was resting him in the first half was telling me that even Kerr and the coaching staff was probably thinking,

we need a monster game from Steph or this isn't happening today. Because they took him out twice. They took him out right before the six-minute timeout, and then they took him out again in the second quarter. And even when I was watching Kerr in the first quarter, I felt like he was conserving energy. It was a little like that LeBron game I went to the other night where he was, it was like a, it was like a fast jog, but it wasn't a run. It wasn't like hard cuts off the ball.

They were saving him on defense. And it was like, he was kind of saving himself for the second half. It reminded me of that game six Houston in 2019. Remember he had that just, all of a sudden the second half he blew up. We've seen him do this before where he kind of waits, he waits, he waits, and then he strikes. And it reminded me, it was pieces of all these different great Curry road wins, which I want to go through with you in a second. But didn't you feel like he was kind of pacing like a boxer almost yes and no i think you're right about all of the rest stuff i mean they took him out two and a stretch in the third quarter where i was like wow they're gonna sit him down early like a seven minute mark and then they brought him back at like the low sixes but

there was a lot of real time that had been stalled and the smartest staffs like you know when you have fucking 10 assistants there should be somebody's job just to right well teams are really good at it you know teams some teams are really good at it and clearly they are and then we got that really good mic'd up stuff which isn't always the most rewarding but in this case it was where he went to step and was like look i'm gonna make sure we get you we may just take one of our timeouts we have four four timeouts. We may just burn one to get you rest. I think there was another time where he was down on the court. He stayed down because I think he knew, but he also looked for a shot earlier in this game than other times. And he even mentioned that after the fact. So he was 28 minutes going into the fourth quarter, but his 28 minutes are different than everybody else.

Granted, he's conditioned to it because it's how he's played his entire career. But it's one thing when you start every possession, and he had to finish all of them too. We always talk about how the play starts when he makes a pass. But when I watch this kind of thing, do you immediately start going through the history books and think of pyramid stuff? We're probably too quick in the segment to jump into that.

But as you're watching it, what are you thinking about? I had two things. One, I started thinking about the great road wins that they've had over the years, which I think, you know, if you start this Golden State kind of run in the 2015 season when they won their first title, just going through over and over again, this team's kind of been at their best on the road. Memphis game four, 2015. That was the first one. They were down 2-1 in the series. Remember everybody was like, oh, it's this team. Are they just a regular season fluke? And that was the first one they really led the smack down. The famous clay game, 2016, OKC game six. Game four in 2016 against Cleveland when they went up

3-1, but Draymond punched LeBron in the balls in the end. But that was like, we are the best team. Fuck you guys. And it just felt like that series was over. They did that again in game three in 2017 in the 18 finals in Cleveland. They have that 2018 Houston game seven. They have that 2019 Houston game six that you and I love when Curry just went off, it's my favorite stuff game ever just because it was the two halves and everybody's dumping on a minute,

you know, kind of exposed Houston a little bit too. So I really know Durant was just set up for the whole thing. Uh, 2019 Toronto game five, where it seemed like the series is over. Then it wasn't. And then the coup de gras last year,

Boston game four. But if you go through those games, so I just listed 10 games, including the one today. And in nine of the 10 games, Steph was awesome, right? Just his threes, four for nine, six for 12, seven for 13, five for nine, seven for 15. The 2018 finals game three was his one bad game. Four for 11, five for 14, seven for 14. And then what was he today? Seven for 18. And he's making like six, seven threes a game in these huge road games. And that's the thing when you factor in, oh, it's Sacramento. Oh, their crowd's going to be crazy. The DNA of this Warriors team, they just don't care, right? Over and over again. Who has seen scarier atmospheres in this team? And it just bounces out, or at least it bounces off him.

But it really bounces off the team. Yeah, it didn't feel necessarily that way. They were missing every single free throw in the third quarter. They were 4-13 from the free throw line. And, you know, there was just something, not that anything is new at this stage of watching Curry this long, but when he made his free throw after he'd missed the two, and he started cheering himself.

Right. He started cheering himself a little bit. And you're sitting there going, this guy missed a first-round series game seven, so none of this should even matter to him. But his calmness, and even some of the great ones, those little moments where you go, are you guys comfortable out there right now?

Like, who is this guy looking, hoping maybe somebody else takes the shot? Is he, is he, you know, we've seen teams with real resumes, players are going to be a hall of famers where I think you would agree. There's times you're like, I think that guy's a little tight right now. I've never seen that with Steph. He may turn it over. He may do something that's actually careless. Um, he's going to miss a shot like everybody else, but I've never, ever watched him thinking, Oh, this is too much for him. Or he just doesn't have it.

I don't even know that. I don't think Klay was bad because the Game 7 demons got to him. I just think Klay sucked today after having some really good moments in the series. He had good shots. He just missed them. I liked all the shots he took, though. But there was a lot of stuff with him. There was very early on, you could see those lazy passes to the cut to the middle.

He screwed up the inbounds, which was almost stolen. There was a lot of stuff with him. There was very early on, you could see those lazy passes to the cut to the middle. He screwed up the inbounds, which was almost stolen. And then Draymond went to him to be like, no, I'm inbounding it now. Then immediately after that, there was a loose ball where he kind of Cam Newton did and let the other guy go ahead and get it. And he goes, what? Miss free throws wedgie three. And then he hits a shot after that. So I kept waiting for him to kind of break out of it. And then it got so absurd at the end

where the game's basically over. I don't know if Sacramento, like, did they not want him to break Durant's record, which he did. That's the most points we've ever seen in a Game 7 in playoff history. Yeah, probably should have mentioned it sooner. Yeah, right. That was it.

He now has the record for the most points ever in a Game 7, and they were completely selling out and doubling, and Clay still kept missing everything. So, you know, I'm watching all this going, this is incredible. But none of this, I hate when teams do this because it's really not sustainable. Can we go back to something you were talking about, about his ability over and over again to kind of not only not seem nervous, but rise to the occasion a little bit?

Because, and especially having all of this happen to all those road games I just mentioned, because I think some of the great NBA players have had this quality. There's a performance aspect to that, right? They're, they're in hostile territory. Like that was always, I love that the most about Bird. Like he always loved going into somebody's house and beating them. And I think Jordan was the same.

He going down the line house and beating them. And I think Jordan was the same. He gone down the line. Yeah, I was, I was going to wait like 10 more minutes, but I just wanted to get it. I at least wanted to get the first one out. But I do think a lot of these guys, they like when the crowd is against them.

They like, they like the sound of when it gets silent. They like like that last three and just kind of milking it in. I think that's one of the things with Curry. You would think this team would be better at home, but in a weird way, I liked them more on the road. The shit he did in Boston last year in game four was unbelievable because that's the best crowd and that team was really good. And he fucking annihilated the crowd. They were dead like my dad like stumbled home broken it's like we can't beat this guy it's such a rare quality to have in basketball and it's i don't think he

gets enough credit for it well because i think 16 really stung them you know it was like the height of just dumping on things maybe in the nba or maybe it was the beginning point it's certainly not the height because it's probably continue to build like a snowball but blowing a 3-1 lead the play against kevin love where clearly he settled for a three i don't think he could not get past kevin love if he really wanted to and then the around the back thing to iguodala where you're like what are you doing and he has an awful game seven in that and then it became this weird like you know the the peak mvp stuff for him clearly that bothered lebron was like wait you actually think this guy might be better than me and i don't know that any of us felt like wait i would start my team with curry over lebron he was having better seasons but when lebron

blocked his shot in cleveland and had this look like i'm sick of this and it felt like a little bit more personal so he he has those late moments. That carried through to 2018. I'd feel like that went all the way through when he was at Cleveland. And I remember us talking about it. That finals game won. It got a little aggro with them. I think it bothered LeBron all those last Cleveland years.

You're totally right. All you had to do was watch those games and see, in a way, good for LeBron. I'm glad he cared. I'm glad he had pride and took it that personally. Then he started complimenting him like crazy, hoping for some reason he would leave Golden State to be a sidekick. But didn't you guys have dead bodies of us at a party? Yeah. You want to be my teammate?

So when I think about that 16 moment, it felt like there was a lingering like, oh, wait, you know, Steph's not, he doesn't quite have it tonight. He doesn't quite have it tonight. And certainly there are box scores. You'll look back and go, what are you guys talking about? He had like 27, eight and six. It's like, yeah, but not all those games the same. Like sometimes I feel like I'm more inaccurate just going back and looking at game logs all the time and not remembering how it felt. But he has from whatever point start point that you want to give him, because there's certainly moments before 16, what he did in just changing the entire series in 15 against Cleveland once he realized what they were doing defensively, I just like stacking the chips. To me, he's only

adding now to this. He's adding to it because I think there's some unsurpassable things that I know you touched on this week for where he could actually land at the end of his career. But I like the people that are the best having moments where it's clear that they're the best, and it just can't be argued on a Monday. I like that you brought up how the 2016 thing gets held against him in an abnormal way. Like even in those 10 road wins I gave you, here are his stats. I'm just giving you points, rebounds, assists. 33, eight and five, 31, 10 and nine, 38, six and five, 26, 13 and six, 27, nine and 10. Then the one bad game in 2018 game three, 33, five and four, 31, eight and seven, 43,

10 and four in Boston last year. And then the game today, like these aren't just like good games. These are fucking awesome, killer games. And I did feel like, and I saw this with LeBron the other night, who's at probably a different stage of his career than, than Steph. Cause he's older. He's got more miles on him. But there was that Tom Brady sense of today where I'm picking my spots. I don't want to burn all my chips now. I know when I need my legs. I know I need to peak in the second half. As you point out,

Clay doesn't really have it. I don't like the look in Wiggins' eye either. So it's probably going to have to be me. We're kind of abandoning Poole. Yeah, Poole. Poole, like Kerr, God bless him. Kerr cares about Poole's confidence as much as I care about my kids. I thought today, if you told me Poole was going to get zero minutes today, I would have said, that makes sense.

He's unplayable. Well, they can't. You can't do it anymore. Yeah, but you can't. There's just too many times we'll watch guys have bad games that aren't main guys and be like, oh, you can't really play that guy but you can't like there's just too many times we'll watch guys have bad games that aren't main guys and be like oh you can't really play that guy and it's like i don't i don't know that it's a bad game or bad like he was unplayable this whole series they bailed on like kaminga's not getting any real minutes he was he was garbage time i mean

payton's a defensive substitution basically he only had 16 but he was in foul trouble but defenchenzo is really the guy they bailed on today right so you can't bail on pool and even chenzo and have gary payton being found so so pool was going to get some minutes he's clearly stuck right now because he only kind of knows one speed to force it not playing off of other guys which is what i thought was so great about last year is that even though he does force the issue i think it's it's complimentary but like you just said i mean other thanoney, who else did you like today? Even though I think the defensive assignment of going with Peyton and Draymond

against the Fox-Monk matchup, this is the part we haven't got to here with Sacramento. Oh, I'm ready. Right. Yeah, because I'm not going to crush Sacramento at all, but those two guys just weren't up to the task. And you're like, where are they? Where are they? Oh, look what's happening on defense with the two dudes like they've sick these guys on them

and now it's over and the game really should have been over in the third quarter it's funny because i'm sitting there watching i think it's 87 87 81 and i'm like three throws no but it's 87 71 87 81 and i'm like this is only a six point game doesn't feel that way but it's the free throws but it's also the offensive rebounds. Like this thing should be 12 and then Clay gets the end one, the four point plane. It's a 10 point game going into the fourth. And I was like, this could be, that could

be it. Like that could be the moment, even though, you know, I have a lot of time left. They blew it with the replay when Clay hit that three because Curry, you could see him in the corner of the TV, did this like running fist pump thing. And I was like, give us the replay of that. That's going to be great.

And they just never showed it to us. But I think he did like a 20 foot fist pump because he loves Clay. Like those guys, it's not just that they've been together a long time. And plus Clay was struggling. So I think, you know, he just really wanted it for him. You mentioned the Sacramento thing.

So there was two points in this game when I actually felt like it started to get dangerous for Golden State. And the biggest one was what Sacramento's up 45-42 in the first half. And Curry misses the two free throws and it comes back down and Sabonis hits a 15 footer and Sacramento's up five. And I don't type a shit load of notes, but I type notes when I feel like something's super important. And I, and I was, I, I don't type a shitload of notes, but I type notes when I feel like something's super important. And I was typing danger zone for gold and Steph hit a three as I was typing. He went from,

he missed the two threes or two free throws too. He just, and all of a sudden it was a two point game again, but it felt like for about 45 seconds, it was like, Oh, I could see this being like 55, 42 in a heartbeat. The problem for the Kings, you know, Fox, Fox was bad today.

If you look at his hand, he had like, you know, he had a thing on his index finger. I just didn't feel like his shot was the same. Okay. But how bad did you think he was in game six? Cause I kept looking for it. And other than a couple of baubles there, I don't look, I didn't love his handle the last three games you're right he made some shots but i mean he like airballed a three today i it was a factor it was i'm not trying to diminish it

but i don't want to hear like he shouldn't have been out there because i still brought them something all right no and he helped them in game six sabonis was the one that shot the best but the key was monk never really got going. And I think he was four for 14. He only had 14 points. His over under like gambling today, I think was like 18, which is a lot for a bench player. But I do feel like one of the things the Warriors went into today was like, we can't let that guy be to like give Sabonis and Fox their 55, whatever they're going to end up with, but Monk can't have 25 again. So they took him out and Sacramento shut 12 for 47 from three. That was one of the reasons I like Sacramento. How many game sevens have we watched? When you haven't been in these games, especially

when the momentum starts going against you, all of a sudden, short arm of three there, everyone starts looking around. It got a little hot potato-y there felt like but it's just tough when you haven't been in these for Sacramento do you feel like where would you rank this season failure couldn't get out of round one

huge triumph that they took the Warriors to game seven so you go huge triumph who's took the Warriors to game seven? So you go huge triumph. Who's calling this a failure? I mean, you've got to be like, what are you, slapping your kids around? I'm throwing words at you. Yeah, no, I don't mean you.

Like mild disappointment? No, I think it's, you had the longest drought in NBA history. You had an awesome regular season. You have a roster you feel good about um certainly it's not perfect you have a coach that i think did an incredible job one coach of the year all your guys are young keegan who i wasn't always the highest on and certainly beginning of this series you're like wait he's active and then he actually became like the dude who looked like he had the

most poise he had two huge buckets that was kind of keeping him in it there. And I was like, oh, wow, like Keegan Murray's getting to his spot. I wrote down three. I wrote down unafraid Kings hyphen, and I wrote down three names. Who do you think I wrote down? Keegan. There's one. I still would have Fox on that list.

You thought Fox was afraid today, dude? No, I just wrote unafraid. Well, then Terrence Davis. We put it down. I had Terrence Davis and Lyles. I don't know that Terrence Davis has woke up afraid a day in his life. And Lyles was the other one. I actually thought Lyles seemed pretty comfortable

out there for what I was expecting. I was expecting Barnes to play like he did. Sabonis, who I watched all year, just anytime somebody gave him the 15-footer, he was like, thank you. Or anytime somebody played off him, he would just bulldoze him.

I don't know what happened to him in this series. He was fine. Didn't you think from what we saw in the regular season to this, was a different guy a little bit? I do think their repetitive dribble handoff stuff that in the regular season, this was a different guy a little bit i do think like their repetitive kind of dribble handoff stuff that in the regular season night to night if you're not prepared for it's going to get you and i think it's one of those things in the series where i don't even know how much i even saw it today honestly because the other problem is all right go ahead dribble

handoff from the elbow we're still not bringing anybody up there so when you think you're turning the corner on your guy that gets caught up in the wash or the big who's going to retreat, the bigs are already there. So it doesn't matter. I mean, it's really funny about everybody's obsession with drop coverage now in that when it looks bad, everyone wonders why anyone would ever do it. Yeah. Right? Like why would you ever do this when it's bad? But I don't think it ever gets any credit for when it's good and what actually deters the offensive player from thinking that he can do. And the Sabonis part that I loved in the storytelling of today's game

is he hits that first open one, and it's the first commercial break, and they come back, and they're building it up like, ooh, Sabonis hit a jumper. This guy just lights out all year from 15 feet. Yeah, but as if that was going to kind of change and he was going to start taking them. I know he hit another one around the problem. Because I was with you.

I thought it'll be forgotten. But I'm glad you mentioned it because I thought there were two moments with the lack of any kind of balance for Golden State. I was like, Sacramento might be able to pull this thing out. And then it just, the offensive rebound, Looney, they were up 14-3 in offensive rebounds with multiple minutes remaining in just the third

corner. Looney was just another level man. Hold Looney, because we got to start the next segment. Hold, I like that. Yeah. 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,

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off. I repeat, $100 off when you sign up at youtube.com slash BS. I saw a couple of things in the draft for Sillow that got me excited about the NFL season. I was very pumped. We're going to talk about the draft more in part two. I was very, very pumped about my guy Boutte from, uh, from LSU that the Pats got in the sixth round. I'm excited that Bryce Young is going to have his own team in Carolina. What, uh, give me two guys that you were just pumped for where they landed. I love the Seahawks draft. And because Witherspoon was slowly becoming one of my favorite players. And then it's like, wait, how high is this guy going to go?

Yeah. And he went probably the highest he could have gone to Seattle. It's like a Russell Westbrook 2008 type of situation. He just kept climbing. Yeah. And that's the credit to Preston. My favorite one's Evan Turner because I'd be banging the drum

going, how is this guy not a top lottery pick? How is he not a lottery pick? This is crazy. Then he goes as high as he does. It's like, man, that's your guy. I was like, I don't know if I like him that much. Right, right. But he was just so skilled and all of it was put together. So Witherspoon, give me a fourth one.

Witherspoon and give me Mayer, the tight end, who I can't believe went in the second round of the Raiders. Yeah, what happened to that? Dude, I watched him. They didn't have anybody to throw to last year. There was a bunch of challenges for Notre Dame offensively, and yet they'd still get him the ball. And the playmaking after, like, I'm shocked he went in the second round.

And I would stake my college football evaluation career on the line. Say that he's going to be an impact guy. Yeah. In the Gronk area? Not exactly Gronk, but a little Gronk-ish? Yeah. A little bit Gronk-ish? I do think we should come up with a definitive list of who you can't compare people to because when Pitt had the kid who was also 6'1 who played D-tackle and he went I don't know 19th um I think the Tampa defensive lineman

Kalijah I forget and yeah they were like comps Aaron Donald I go no no you can't you can't do that like you can't there has to be a list so I think Gronk is on that list of like no one can ever but you can only say like a wee bit Gronkish but you can't say Gronk yeah there to be a list. So I think Gronk is on that list of like, no one can ever put the- You can only say like a wee bit Gronk-ish, but you can't say Gronk. Yeah, there just should be a list of all the four major sports where you go, like there can't be a hockey player in 15 years that reminds anyone of Connor McDavid.

Okay, like you're just not, you're not allowed to do that. Let's do that list for part two. That's a fun list. Hey, if you're into this football as much as we are, it's time to sign up for NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube and YouTube TV. You can watch it all go down this fall.

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I know it's an ad, but like I'm actually in. Four boxes with nothing else on it, just games? Great. Good job, YouTube. Sign up today. Get $100 off at youtube.com slash BS. Terms and embargoes apply. No refunds. Offer ends. 6-6. Device restrictions apply. Okay. Kevon Looney. There's this special list that's kind of over there. We have the Pantheon. We have great big time players. And then there's like the great role players, which it's almost like calling them role players in fair. The guys like Parrish was like this,

you know, Lambert was like this. There were guys that you win titles with that you would never say potentially was an all-star. You wouldn't call them a role player. The most recently the Warriors had Iguodala who was not a superstar when he was on Golden State, but is the kind of guy you just have to have if you're trying to win a title. Bosh became an overqualified version of this because it was supposed to be the big three.

But what he settled into was a little of whatever the Looney role was today. I always loved Looney. I never understood. I remember there was one year where he was a free agent and they just kind of got him back for, it was like, I don't know, five million a year. I was like, that's weird, man. I like that guy. That guy's, you know, you can throw him in games. Now it's gone to another level.

What's going on here? He had 320 plus rebound games. Is this more Sacramento? Is Looney hitting his stride? Like, what are you seeing? It's definitely partly Sacramento. I mean, when you're a big rotation of Sabonis and Lyles, and then where Sabonis sets up on the floor and everything else.

But I felt like the Looney part that anybody that's been watching him knows how special and how important he is. But they used to have more options. And now they don't have any options, really, unless they want to go with Draymond. You know, there used to be more depth, that position Wiseman was supposed to be somebody they could use for 18, 20 minutes in this role.

And then they move him out because courage just wasn't playing them. And then it's like, Oh wait, they actually don't have like any other kind of piece that they feel good about there. Despite, I think over the years, you know,

whether it's Bogut, whether it's Festus, you know, they've, they've done some different things. Spates was kind of a different kind of big. Bogut was the most successful of all of them, I think. He was actually legit important for them.

And when he was banged up in 2016, I thought that affected the title personally. It totally did. Because first of all, you're talking about somebody who from a skill set could still score a lot of points if he wanted to and was okay. He could run a couple of plays through him. He was additive. Well, he passed and about somebody who, like, from a skill set, could still score a lot of points if he wanted to and was okay. He could run a couple plays through him. Like, he was additive.

Well, he passed, and his screens were murder. Like, he was just going to kill you. He was going to rescreen you. He's going to get – I mean, he even admitted to me. He was like, I got away with everything with Golden State. He's like, the ref would kind of like – Clay would let one go, see if it was going to be three in a row, and the ref would start getting into it. And he's like, and I would just kill somebody on a screen.

I mean, he said on the podcast would be there were screens I could set with Golden State because the officials would get so caught up in the moment that if I did that with Milwaukee. So anyway, let's go back to Looney. When he, you know, we were trying to talk about like the Dallas-Golden State matchup in the Western Conference Finals last year.

And Dallas was like really picking up like a lot of national momentum. Granted, knocking out the best team in the regular season at Phoenix. Golden State kind of in this weird malaise of what's going on with them. This is now multiple seasons of this, by the way. It's like, well, what's going to happen

with the Luka match? Golden State's like shit. You have to bite them so they can feel something. You have to beat them at home in a game six for them to go, ooh, I feel something now. Now I can play. They all have thick earlobes. When Looney started switching out

and holding up in front of Luka last year, I remember being like, okay, what can't this guy do? He's the rare big that can stay on the floor. Well, now he's added passing to his arsenal now that now he's running like like at the top of the key like bogut trying to find cutters and shit i did not remember this version of that two years ago it's also a comfort thing though it's like hey you know what these passes are actually gonna be kind of easy because there's one guy that everybody always freaks out about makes mistakes with the other players so if you just let everybody

run through the first thing and just wait like there's going to be somebody else open but he is he was their second most important player today i mean obviously he's kind of taking the wiggins spot last year wiggins was their second best guy it's great this year i thought it was going to be clay but it was that i mean at least for the first series unquestionably loony And I don't know if this is something they do by design. I've never, I've never talked to anybody about it, but the Warriors front office seems to like guys that have that amazing high school track record. Looney was a five-star. He was the 10th overall player in his class. I mean, Duke offered him, he goes to UCLA, he has these hip injuries. He was much more of an offensive player. So I think there's probably some stuff in him that physically he's not capable of, but yet still sees the game a certain way because he was a different player when he was a lot younger.

And whether it's Patrick Baldwin, who they drafted, who was a big time high school guy, the Kaminga profile. Now, granted, those picks are in the lottery, so you're going to take them anyway. I mean, even Nico Mannion was a five star. It just feels like Golden State will go, right well wherever we're picking like what you know what was this guy oh this guy in high school was a five star this guy was like a top 20 overall all right well look you know we could screw this up a different way let's go back to the high school track record and see if maybe they in Looney's case was just injuries um from a big picture Golden State standpoint it's interesting to think about them against this Lakers

team where I'm still not sure Steve Kerr knows who his eight guys are. Do you think he does? Yeah. No, I'm saying I don't think he does. I think the Lakers kind of weirdly, because they added all these dudes at the trade deadline, I think they kind of know what their team is.

That was one of the reasons if you're going to pick them to make a finals run, it's like, ah, they're eight or nine actually makes sense. And you know, if like DLO doesn't have a one game,

one game, maybe Schroeder plays more. They have like a little Rui kind of throw him out and see if there's anything there with him or not. Uh, for the most part, Reeves is going to be out there. And then AD,

if he can stay on the floor and you know, they kind of know who they are going state. Like we went into game seven. I didn't even know if Poole was going to play. You could have told me Moody was going to play 25 minutes. I'd be like, all right. Maybe. I don't know. Now they're going in this

Lakers series with some... The Lakers have size. If Davis decides to be engaged, that's a real problem for them. Like that, like Draymond can seem a little small in this series that they're throwing LeBron and AD out there. But on the flip side, um, Draymond's kind of a nice matchup for LeBron at this stage of his career. And I think the Curry piece of it, him going around, I know they'll put Vanderbilt on

them. Um, but I, I do, I just like the matchup. There's lots of fun stuff here. I think each side can take away the other side, what they like to do. And Looney's going to be the key against Davis. He's going to keep working and keep pushing them. I don't know what they're going to do with Vanderbilt, because at times it didn't look great against Ja, and then Rui goes off offensively, so that kind

of like trumped, hey, let's, if we're going to have Rui, especially with the size, you know, that's part of Rui's game. Sometimes you're like, God damn, that guy's big. I would expect that we'd see maybe Kaminga come back to life here a little bit. Maybe just as a body match type thing with LeBron. Like a throw him out there, first two games?

Kind of feel? If there's one thing that I would have at the top of my Kaminga scouting report for this season is that when he's assigned the best player defensively, he gets up for it. Yeah. So, you know, you can't just have Draymond solve all your matchup problems, right?

And also knowing you have the luxury of Draymond just deciding to take the soul from an opposing guard like he did a couple times in this series. Like, it's just, I don't know. I mean, with D'Angelo Russell, would they even bother? They might not even bother because Russell's not exactly somebody who's making a ton of cuts, even though he's great in the elimination game,

making everything. Coming up next, D'Angelo Russell revenge series? That's in 60. The Lakers have a lot of options. They really do. But it's funny because I look at this game today. I'm like, well, you're not going to beat the Lakers if you do this. Well, this isn't going to happen every game against the Lakers.

And I also, because I can't wait to talk about Memphis a little bit later, I'm like, what do you make of them beating that Memphis team too? Which is, you know, Sacramento, I felt like, was a far greater challenge to a team as currently designed than Memphis was. One of my wife's friends had a birthday party Friday night. Happy birthday. Congrats on the friend. And she she's like you probably can't come because the Lakers

I know that's a huge game and I was like nah I'm coming to the party the Lakers are going to kill Memphis I don't need to watch it I'll tape it in case I'm wrong but they're going to blow them out there's no chance Memphis was showing up for that game none, zero

I have a guy like who I don't know that well, but it's like a business relationship. And of course, you know what happens there. Like if anybody ever asks us for a pick, we get the first one right. That means they're going to ask us about every single pick for the rest of their lives. And if you get it wrong, it's like, hmm. And then they get it right. Like they don't take your advice.

You thought you were the expert. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So you literally can't win. So I get the I get the text on game five. It's like really like Memphis minus four tonight. I was like, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, right. So you literally can't win. So I get the text on game five. It's like, really like Memphis minus four tonight. I was like, I don't know.

I kind of hate them. I was like, I kind of hate the team, hate the whole deal. So the guy ends up not listening to me and he would have been right. And then he comes back. He's like, what do you think now? I was like, look, I didn't all of a sudden

like Memphis in the last 48 hours. I don't like this group. I'm not into them anymore. I go, this is a, it's the macro opinion. I just think these guys are not even close to being who they want you to think they are. This group right now, as they close out the season. I was like, I think they're not remotely tough.

There's nothing I like. I know I'm kind of teasing ahead to all the Memphis stuff that we want to do. And so, yeah, I felt like you on that game. I felt justified. I was like, this one, yeah, I felt like you on that game. I felt justified. I was like, this one, even if I felt wrong about getting the previous game wrong, it wasn't going to ever get into my brain enough to think I was wrong about who they were. Oh, Memphis came back from 3-1.

No chance. So, yeah, harder series. Well, we got to do the Curry-LeBron stuff here. Do we? I think we do. I don't know. I don't think we do. No, do no we got a little bit of it tell me at least pass out some pigs in a blanket for it we don't have to make it a paperback yet

what um you could you know you deserve credit for this because you literally could just release updated book of basketball curry lebron edition and put like 12 pages in the back of it. Just like 12 chapters in both of them? No, you could add 12 pages of what you already did and just, you know, you could buy an island. I think this is where, you know, once a year I express my disappointment. In retrospect, I didn't mind it at the time. I was pro KD going to Golden State, but in retrospect, especially after watching what's happened with Curry the last few years,

I'm slightly bummed out that KD and Curry were on the same team for those three years, because I just wish it had been the Steph show the whole time. And I think in 18, if no KD and they had done whatever with the salary and matched up and just had been the Steph team versus the LeBron team. And LeBron, that was the tail end of his apex, right? 2018. That was his last truly great, dominant, he could do it game after game kind of year. And Curry technically should have been in his prime right around then. And we could have just seen them collide, like two great boxers. But Curry's team was better and we kind of didn't totally get it. When it happened in 2016, I think LeBron was at a slightly different point of his career than Curry was. So now we're getting in 2023, Curry is somehow not only in his extended prime, I said

this to you last pod or two pods ago, I think this is the best he's ever been. I just think he has just complete command of everything now in a way that maybe there were 90% pieces of it here or there, but what I'm watching now, I just think this is the best he's ever been. You can't say that about LeBron. Yeah, but it's not fair. It's not fair, though, because he's 38. He's 38 and he's been in the league 20 years. He can have a quarter. So I think

we're going to have moments in this series where it's like a fourth quarter where LeBron rises to the occasion like he did in Memphis Game 4 and Curry's feeling it and we can have it. But I don't know if LeBron can do that game to game half to half the same way.

Do you? Well, we haven't seen him have to do it, but I mean, other than three-point shooting, I loved him in this series. I loved him picking his spots. I loved in game two realizing. I left this series going,

this was really impressive. Whereas there's times he could have been a 30-point score this year, and it still speaks to how talented and how dominant he is at this age, but he definitely paces himself, which I'm never going to be critical of him because it's kind of a necessity. But his, not that he doesn't understand the game as well as anybody,

but his, him knowing exactly when to ramp it up and do exactly what they needed. Again, I know the three-point shooting wasn't good against Memphis, but I had multiple moments in that series where I was like, look at what this guy's doing right now. And it's not just the block or a dunk here. It's he has to be their best player and carry them and win a series. Yeah.

So I was impressed with him. You know what this is? I thought I was really impressed with LeBron too because he kind of knew they probably weren't winning game five and they had just played two nights before and you could see he was doing this tightrope dance of, do I use some chips in this game or not? Decided really not to. But this Curry LeBron thing at this point, it's like a hoops IQ fucking summit. I just think both of those guys, I always thought,

I mean, I wrote a column in summer 2014 about LeBron as a genius because he was such a great athlete. It was like his hoops IQ part kind of got glossed over because he was just so amazing to watch. People kind of didn't understand. Doug Collins, that year I spent with Doug Collins, we talked about all the time and he would talk about all these little things he saw with LeBron that somebody like me probably wouldn't have noticed. There's a genius with Curry too. And it goes back to what we were talking about earlier, where that sense of like, not only the moment, but what his team needs, when to kind of really step on the pedal, when to pull back in the game today, where it's like, oh shit, nobody has it. I guess I have to shoot 38 shots. I don't

think Steph ever wants to go into a game shooting 30 plus shots. I just don't. I think his dream game is like 11 for 24. Clay gets off or 11 or 12 for 13 for 24. Something like that. That sounds better. But, but this game, and this is going to be like a checker, a chess match, not a checkers match between these two guys, like trying to figure out, you know, where the weaknesses are basically. Okay. So what question are you asking about the Curry LeBron thing? Cause I think I derailed you from actually getting to the point you want to make.

I think this is, it reminds me of Hagler Leonard in 87. Where it would have been a lot more awesome to have it in 81, but it's still going to be fucking awesome. And I do think there's some legacy stuff on the line a tiny bit here. Is there a tiny bit? I do. I do.

Cause if, if, if the Warriors beat them again, right. And now it's, he's beating them in 23, in 18, in 17, in 15, right? You go toe-to-toe, you're four and one. That's not nothing. That's going to come up.

There will be a first take segment where somebody shouts that with flame coming out of their eyeballs. That's not really the best task. He's one and four against Steph. I mean, that's got to mean something, guys. It is. That's mean nothing. It is interesting. I like in these debates to pre-guess the excuses.

Yeah, well, he had Durant in two of them. Right. I mean, it could be the point. But LeBron, they did trade everything for AD, and then they did trade even more to load their bench up. Like, this team is loaded up in a way that the Warriors didn't do. They're deep and they have options,

but their third best player on any given night is usually going to be worse than another team, another really good team's third. I'm just pointing out they spent, what, nine first-round picks on this roster just to trade for guys on this roster? Ten? Here's what I want to happen.

Ten first-round picks? If Curry were to beat LeBron in the second round, and I can't believe we get this. I can't believe we get this in the second round. It's unbelievable. That's why when the Lakers were flirting with the play and stuff, I go, I don't care how you feel about the Lakers.

I don't want the LeBron thing to end now. I want to see what's going to happen. I want some big stakes, but I can't believe we're going to be this lucky. Um, you really think of Steph were to take him as, and I don't know that there's many people that have been as pro Steph. Uh,

it's always weird to me when, whenever I say anything and it's like, well, you're just dogging Steph. I'm like me, I have to be criticized for fucking being in love with a guy for as long as I have been. I've never felt like Steph was a better player.

Are you saying that's going to be open for discussion? No. Okay. But I think it moves Steph closer to a different territory. I was texting people today because I had Steph 10th all time. Right? I still had Kobe ahead of him. And I had, you know, Will, Duncan and Bird and Magic.

And then I had my top four Mount Rushmore guys. And I felt like Steph was probably, it was going to be between Steph and Kobe. Legacy wise, historically wise. That was like the next step for him. What I watched today was more in the Magic Bird area. You know? That was fucking crazy. Like, he had Looney and basically nobody else playing that well in that game.

Draymond was fine. Nobody else really played that well. And they're on the road. The crowd's fucking insane. And he basically had to go 19 and 38 and score 50 points for them to have enough of a cushion for that game to be okay. I don't know. 10 feels low for him now.

The Duncan one is always challenging for me because I think it's almost like Duncan's going to age poorly. I know, but we were there for it though. Right, right. There's no one you wanted more than that guy on your roster for well over 10 years. If you wanted to win 55 games and have a chance to make the finals every year if you had a decent supporting cast, I don't know. He was a good choice.

Call me nuts. But he's not going to age as well historically. There's going to be two guys, hopefully it's not you and I, 20 years from now, being like, I don't know. I can't believe DeJuan Wagner Jr. Jr. went for 40. No, but it's going to be that Carl Malone thing that I was always worried about. But now everybody hates Carl Malone because of the other stuff that came out about him. But I was just like,

one of the reasons I want to write my book is like 25 years from now, people are going to think Carl Malone was like better than Tim Duncan. I can't accept it. I was there for both. Fuck that. Yeah. No no i proudly would would hang i'd write a i'd write something off the back and be like this is a triumph of the human spirit you've had blurb loved his alone duncan thoughts i want to write a book just for fake blurbs like all of them on the back different books i'll be fake and then it'd be like, I can't wait to meet him. Jesus. So wait, wait. Because there is like this.

I love this. Okay. So there is almost this exercise where you could do this with anything. And for basketball, it kind of becomes tougher to come up with the right answer. But just to challenge yourself, like, why can't Steph be fourth? Why can't he be fourth all time? Right now, that sounds crazy. It sounds't he be fourth all time right now that sounds crazy it sounds like he's jumping all of these people Wilt's always a weird one to place as well as Bill Russell I'm pretty good with the top three at least for me but then I always feel like I'm

not giving Kareem enough credit and granted you know when I'm when I'm like it's almost Kareem's almost worse for me because I saw the back end and I never saw the front end as opposed to just never seeing Wilt it's like yeah age is better for me because I saw the back end and I never saw the front end as opposed to just never seeing Wilt. It's like Wilt ages better for me because I never saw any of it. So that's not always fair to Kareem. But we have this kind of resistance where

it'd be an absurd thought. Like, is it actually crazy? Is it actually crazy to say like Steph could be fifth? It feels crazy today. It feels like recency bias because he goes for 50. But is it really? It's not. That's what I'm asking. It feels crazy today. It feels like recency bias because he goes for 50. It's not crazy. Is it really? It's not. That's what I'm asking. It's not. He's at least side-eyed

the Bird Magic group now, which I have Magic 5 and Bird 6. But he's got to be in that discussion because part of it isn't just the resume and a few rings and a couple MVPs and all that stuff. It's games like today. That's when, as you start climbing up the ladder, you start banking the game like today or the game, like game four

in Boston. And that's, that's how you start going up, you know? And, and if it's him versus Kobe at this point, you know, which is now an awesome argument for a whole bunch of different reasons. Where no one would ever change their mind, by the way. No, that's, yeah, that's. No one's changing their mind. And the Kobe thing, which we haven't really litigated completely, but the thing that kills Kobe is though, you know, he was really only the best player in the league once, you know,

and he, but on the flip side has all of these all-NBAs and where it's just like's just this crazy resume. And it's a lot. He just played at a high level a lot longer. And then he gets those last two titles in a row. He gets to five. And that put him in the top 10. And that's it.

And if Steph wins back-to-back with this team, even if he makes the finals with this team, this team was a mess all year. This team was 11 and... What were they? 11 and 31 on the road or 11 and 30. We, they literally couldn't find seven guys to play game to game that Kirk could count on.

So man, if he, if he gets past this Lakers team and then, then a really tough one for us. If he somehow got to the West finals, where if it was a Steph Jokic, or for you, it'd be Steph Chris Paul, but for me, Steph Jokic would be very tough for me. Probably my two favorite non-Celtics right now to watch.

No kidding. Jokic is number two, huh? Yeah. Unquestionably. Yeah, I guess that's right. I'm not arguing with it as the pick. I guess I'm thinking back to all the times we've talked about him. Maybe I didn't know that he was your second guy. I thought I knew you. Who did you think it was? Monk or Mock? Monk Monk?

Well, Monk, he's my favorite. I mean, you know my feelings about him. It was great. We had great times in the fan club this, this round. Hey, quickly on Sacramento

before we throw it to a part two. B plus, by the way, for me. B plus. What? What's my grade on the season?

What's a B plus? Sacramento. What do we, what do we want them to do this off season? What do they need? If you were them, is it just like,

are they in the 2013 slash 14 warrior stage of things? Right. Where it's like, Oh, we threw some haymakers in that clip series, took them to seven, learned a lot. Let's stick with this core.

Or do you feel like there's a spot that they could improve? Because to me, I never loved the Barnes spot. And if they were going to go all in with their version of a Cleveland Mitchell type trade of using a player and a bunch of assets to try to get somebody good. That's probably the spot unless you feel like Murray could be that guy. But it feels like they're like a wing with size short from getting to where they want to go would be my take. I would add to that. Even if it was like a Paul George type guy. Yeah. I mean, the problem is you're going, okay, can we trade you our three B minuses for an A

minus? It's like, okay, good luck. Great plan. Good luck on actually finding that guy and executing that and then having the other team be interested and you have to include picks and all that. A smaller thing, I would love to see them add a big that gives them a chance to match up with another big. Doesn't mean he has to play all the time. Doesn't even have to play 20 minutes a game, but one

of these luxury bigs, which aren't hard to find, that give you like maybe Robin Lopez five years ago where you bring him in to be like, hey, go kick Looney's ass. Like, just change this for five minutes, please. And Murray's

going to get better. And Fox, I think, has gotten through all the... I'd love to kind of figure out a way to chart this, like the Q rating of the NBA stars of like, what was this guy available for versus his entire everything about him changing and everybody liking him and everybody hating him again right now like janice is going through this right now uh not that he'd be available for trade or anyone would turn out a trade offer including him you get the point though

there's these massive swings that can happen with players where they shouldn't be as dramatic as they probably are at times. But if I'm Sacramento, I'm disappointed, but I feel great. I really do. So maybe I'm too easy on him. I just feel great about this because I also think Murray, who I don't know that he did anything great

when he came out of Iowa. And then there's the Ivy part of it where, look, they couldn't take Ivy because they couldn't get the medicals on the guy. So they take Murray. Everybody's like, I don't know. And we still don't know who's won that one, right? I still like Ivy. But Murray rebounded in a big way. He showed some mental toughness. He will get better. This is like when this jump happens, that kind of sophomore into your junior season. And he actually is capable skill-wise of doing a few more things than just being an outlet

for threes all the time. So I would feel really good about them unless they feel like hey, we could win 50 plus games next year, but if we get the wrong matchup with Sabonis, do we get exposed again? So I think they need another option off of that. I'd feel really good about it if I was them. I would

point, I think it's fair to point at the Fox injury, even though he played and he had a good game six, but that was their guy who was the closer for them, especially in situations like today, who could go toe-to-toe with Curry, didn't really have it today. And I liked what I saw from Murray.

So for me, I'd hold the fort. I like what we have. Maybe you're ready to make some big trade if something crazy is going to happen in February next year. The next, this guy's available for three future firsts, whatever. But for the most

part, the Kings are back, man. And if the Warriors make the West finals or they even make the real finals, then that probably becomes a little bit of a better loss. If they get their asses kicked by the Lakers in round two, maybe you feel worse about it. Um, I cannot believe we're getting Warriors Lakers at various points this year.

The odds of this seem like they were like 12 to one, 20 to one, 25 to one, especially cause they were going to be two lower seeds. It just didn't even seem conceivable they're going to be in the same bracket, but we're getting it. Okay, that's it for part one. We're going to take a quick break and then we'll be posting up, I think we're going to put part two up later tonight, but we're going to start taping that now.

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