The Bill Simmons Podcast - Part 2: Cleveland Survives, Knicks-Sixers, and Whaddya Do for Denver, Houston,  and Atlanta With Zach Lowe

Episode Date: May 4, 2026

Join The Ringer's Bill Simmons and Zach Lowe LIVE on Netflix as they react to the Cavs defeating the Raptors in Game 7 to move on to the conference semifinals (1:19). Then, they preview the Round 2 matchups and try to figure out what some eliminated teams should do in the offseason (28:49). Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Zach Lowe Producers: Chia Hao Tat, Eduardo Ocampo, and Chris Wohlers The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Mary, which is also available on Netflix, along with a whole bunch of comedy movies that I covered in part one. Zach Lowe is a podcast, Tuesday morning, Thursday morning. And I really hope we have better games to discuss than the two we had today. Two Duds, two Game 7 Duds, unless you were fans of Cleveland and Detroit. This game felt like it had potential, this Cavs Raptors game, heading into halftime. There were some great storylines at play, including LeBron next year, Cleveland? Oh, boy.

Okay, we're going right there. Mitchell trades, Mowgliadis? like, let's go. And then Cleveland's like, hold on, hold your horses and took care of business. I mean, you can revisit all the storylines next round if that doesn't go badly for the Cavaliers. It would be interesting to see how the Cabs and the Pistons coming off just like gnarly series where they just couldn't get untracked offensively against, you know, particularly I think the Cabs against the Raptors team that's just weird and big and super switchy.

If they both those teams get to the next round and they're like, okay, this feels a little bit like more conventional basketball to us. We feel a little bit of like a sigh of relief even though, you know, Detroit is a gnarly team themselves, but it's just, Toronto's just a different kind of team. They're built differently. They're a weird team to play against. Missing multiple players that they're paying lots of money to.

This is my first question for you. Is it kind of embarrassing for Cleveland that this went seven games? I don't, I don't think so. Cleveland and seven was my pick, so I'm not surprised at it won seven. Yeah, but did you know, quickly and Ingram

were basically going to be scratched from the series? Quickly scratched the whole series. You knew going into the series that it, I remember saying it's probably bad for their offense and good for their defense. The Ingram won, as he was not exactly letting the world on fire in this series, but there's just a certain critical massive talent

you need to beat a team like Cleveland four times in seven games. And as critical as you want to maybe be of the way Ingramon played, it's just you're just asking too much of guys like Jamison Battle and Moll. and, you know, Jamal Shed, God bless him, had an unbelievable series, and then the jumper deserted him

in the second half of the game today. It's just like these guys were marginal NBA players going into the season, and you're asking him to get you over the finish line on the road in game seven against the team that has four guys who have made All-Star teams pretty recently. It's a tall, it's a tall order.

So is it embarrassing? AJ Lawson is furious that you didn't mention him. Well, he's furious at everybody because he looked like you wanted to start a fight from the moment he got into the game. I found the whole, thing delightful, but, you know, who did he flag her really? He wrapped up Jared Allen and threw him to the floor, got called for a Flager 1.

I don't think it's embarrassing. Toronto's a pain in the ass to play against, and, you know, Cleveland could have won game six easily. They could have won game four easily. They ran away with it tonight. In a way, by the way, for, look, I don't want to, like, damn them with faint praise, but it was nice to see Cleveland come up against the team that basically looked them in the and said, you guys have wilted under physicality in the playoffs before.

We don't really have a lot of other ways to beat you, given our talent deficit, other than beating the hell out of you and seeing how you responded. And like, Jared Allen in particular came for the fight today and took the fight to Toronto. And like, good sign for the, for the cabs, I think. I thought Struz was incredibly important. Yeah. The two guys I had written down, Max Struz had a shout out to heat culture, throwback game. And Jared Allen had a shout out to.

please stop throwing me in trade rumors. I'm happy here. I don't want to be the fall guy this summer kind of game. He was especially in the third quarter. I thought he swung it. And if you're Toronto and you're looking at it a big picture and you just did that crazy extension for Pertil that made kind of no sense when it happened.

Hasn't even really kicked in yet. And seemed either unplayable, semi-playable, or sort of playable, depending on where you caught him in the series. But Jared Allen was just running amok. And then the other thing, Hardin, wasn't bad. We were headed

toward maybe sort of an old school throwback, terrible James Hardin playoff game and then actually he got going and then once they had

a bigger lead then he looked very comfortable. He got going in a way that look, we're predisposed to be nervous about James Harden

in big playoff games. He was three of nine from the floor. He controlled his turnovers. He only had two turnovers, which is big. He's had some high

turnover games. But he got like, you know, Jacobi Walker stuck his arm in the cookie jar, got a three-shot foul. There was that one drive that I think it was the third foul on Scotty Barnes where they were kind of running parallel on a Hardin drive into Lane and Hardin kind of veered sideways into him and Scotty Barnes also kind of veered. I was, it was, but it just seemed like Hardin had reached the stage where he was saying to

himself, I just got to junk my way to attend free throws. That's the only way I'm going to have a productive game. And that makes me, that makes me a little nervous, just a little nervous. he was active defensively for James Hardin. He was. He wasn't bad. And then Mitchell, who finished with 22, 9 for 20, he was another one that kind of came and went.

That first half definitely had the makings. Oh, yeah. Makings of a collapse. The crowd was really nervous. Tariko and Reggie were on it. They could feel it. And they finished the half strong. I think it was seven points with, I don't know,

90 seconds left or something. then Cleveland made a couple shots and a couple of plays. At the time we got to halftime, I was like, okay, let's take a breath. Then top of the third quarter blew them out. So from a Cleveland standpoint, I don't know what I learned. They're going to be going into this Detroit series, which is an even more physical athletic version of what we just saw with Toronto, with the bonus that they actually have a guy who can create good shots and good shots for other people.

had this weird mix of Barnes, who's not quite ready yet as a creator. And then RJ Barrett, who I thought, I don't know, I thought he increased whatever his trade value was, is heading into the last year of his deal. I actually liked his competitiveness.

He had the big shot in game six. But that was really it. Cades, another animal from those two guys, I think, as a crunch time guy. At the same time, I mean,

Detroit was a better defense than Toronto this year. There are two of the top five defenses in the league. I think Detroit was second. Toronto was fifth. They're just a little bit more conventional than the Raptors are, particularly when they put C&B at the 5 and just switch everything and muck your whole life up. And it's just going to be interesting to see if, like, the Cavs offense, even today take away the offensive rebounds.

They just didn't look very in sync. Like Hardin and Mitchell don't look in sync with each other. There's just been a lot of dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, their assist rate is weighed down. They're taking way more pull-up threes in this series. I think a lot of that has to do with, Toronto just sort of drags you into that style with their switchingness and the way they play. I bet they feel a little bit looser against Detroit, which sounds paradoxical because Detroit is a nasty,

physical, great defense. I just think they play a little more conventionally. But I think it should be a good series, two teams that should be super hungry to get to the next round. All these teams should be super hungry. I mean, Embed and the Sixers have never made it out of this round in his tenure there. The Knicks have all the pressure on them to duplicate last year's run and get better than that. So it's going to be a fun second round in the east, I think. Cleveland out rebound in them 60 to 33. Holy smokes.

Both team shot 28% from three. As you mentioned, it was a rock fight that took forever. And we had multiple stoppages and reviews. And I thought the refs were really, really bad from a one-sided standpoint. And I had no dog in the race. I didn't really care who won. But I thought, I just felt like Toronto didn't get a call for two and a half hours other than a couple on Struz.

But it didn't matter. Mowbly was in foul trouble for a lot of the game. Yeah, I didn't love the whistles. But it was a classic road team game seven. You're not going to probably not getting those calls unless you're Philadelphia in Boston. Okay. All right. Were you watching Jalen Brown's Twitch stream during the game?

Is that what you were doing when this game went to reviews? Were you watching Jailen on? I think it was Twitch. I'm not on Twitch. I'm not really, I don't really know what's going on there, but I saw some clips. on Twitter and he was not happy with the flopping and the officiating, I was told. There was some directors cut Jaylen stuff going on. Definitely one of those, start getting texts.

I'm like, oh, no. Oh, boy. Here we go. He even, I think, hinted that in the last three games, there was refs in each game that were not on the level, which I don't know if that, how well that's going to go over. Yeah, does that count? Does Twitch count for NBA, like, monitoring purposes?

Does the league office get to... I think everything counts. Everything counts. Okay. Yeah, they're pretty, they care every time the refs are insulted by players or coaches. So that was going on. And then the other thing that happened was inside the NBA, they did the gone fishing for the Celtics. I was proud that I made the boat.

So did Matt Damon and Ben Affleck and John Krasinski. And then at the front, reenacted in the Titanic, Mike Brable and Diane and Rossini. And they did not acknowledge it, but they were laughing. And now it's a big thing on social media. So those two events were more, those two social media events were more excited than this game, I think. So I did see the clip on Twitter

of them talking about the boat and Ernie saying there's our friend Bill Simmons on the boat and John Krasinski and then they were just like, and there's other people on the boat. Some other people are on there. I don't know. All right.

I got to say, it was really funny. Here's a word from Kia. I would love to have been like when they created it, there had to have been a meeting. It was like, are we doing this? We're putting them on and we're doing the Titanic pose. We're good with that.

There had to be someone who was like, guys, I don't know. And then someone else who was like, screw that. That's funny. We're doing it. And then it got green lit. Well, nothing would be more fun than inside the NBA

being in fuck it mode with the SPN over the next couple rounds. Just been like, yeah, we start pushing the envelope, guys. Can you handle it? Big, big, big picture. You mentioned Cleveland versus Detroit, which is our round two matchup now. These teams have played entertaining games during the regular season. I probably have slightly higher hopes for this series than most because I think there's animosity on both sides. You have the Schrooter piece where he used to play for the Pistons and he'll be up to stuff.

That's every series with Dennis Schroeder. Yeah, I know he's been on every team in the league, but I always enjoy that. was he he was on toronto too right yes he was yeah he's like i just figure he's played for every team but we have that we have uh you know max drus no stranger to uh to the physicality uh we have the beef stew jland durren combo battling the uh the two soft-spoken calves guys but i i thought i remember watching one of these games and cleveland seemed really comfortable going against Detroit. And I think my lean, even though I don't really like this Cleveland team that much at all, and I think they give up a lot of open shots. I'm just not sure Detroit's going to be the team to

exploit that. So I got to look at this more, but my lean would be Cleveland and six, and I don't feel good about it. I don't feel good about either of these teams coming off the series. I'm going to take a lot of tomorrow and go back and watch some of the games that they played and get a sent to FuGuard too and what the matchups are going to be and strengths and weaknesses of all that. I think it should be a long series. I would probably slightly lean Cleveland, but awesome performance by Detroit today. We already thought about that.

Yeah, and you made like the Struz, Duncan Robinson heat culture cast off battle is happening. Forgot about that. That's a good one. I think it would be a funny subplot if like mild manner, Jared Allen, like if Beefstue did something and he just like snaps, just Jared Allen just snaps and like nose karate or something.

and just stuff we didn't know about Jared Allen and it just, who knows? Anything's possible with beef stew. We have a, we have some open for a reason guys on both teams. A lot of them. I assume the calves will probably just put hard at on Thompson. Right?

Maybe. I mean, you could, you could put Evan Mobley there if you want to have him as a help defender. I mean, it's one of the reasons why Suggs was guarding a Sart Thompson is to have your best help defender, you know, be the help guys. So they could, some people put their centers on Thompson.

and sort of risk it. They could put Jared Allen there and put Mobley on Stewart. There's a lot of different things they could do. Was that a Kenny Adkinson, I saved my job game tonight? It would have been interesting offseason in Cleveland. I mean, you remember we did our draft of all the playoff guys, and one of them was hot seat, sneaky hot seat category coach, and I said Kenny Akinson or Chris Finch,

Chris Finch has answered all the questions. And I said, by the way, I don't think either of them should be, but I do think this is a very pressurized season for Cleveland, which is why that second quarter felt so, fraught because you know everything that's at stake, particularly when you make a trade like Garland for Hardin, like your messaging to your team is pretty clear. Like, hey, guys, it's kind of now. Like, let's do it. What do you think LeBron was doing watching that game? Like, deep down, rooting for Toronto to open up a Cleveland possibility? Because we still don't have a LeBron team next year.

Don't you think he's... It might be the Lakers at this point. Don't you, well, I mean, why wouldn't it be the Lakers? Like, what, again, a lot of it comes down to money, right? Like, what kind of deal is going to be willing to take, but the LeBron that played the last two months of the season with Reeves and Luca, it worked perfectly fine. Wouldn't you think LeBron is relaxing and or, I don't know if you've heard this, but he spends a million dollars a year on his body. So he might be, he might be trying to get ready for the freaking Oklahoma City Thunder. That's what I'm going to assume was happening. You know, I think I was ground zero. He's 41, Bill. I don't know if you've looked that up recently. He's 41 years old. LeBron James. All this player ever to do.

name 130 things. I was ground zero for the LeBron spends a million dollars a year in his body story. Really? Yeah, because I did it in 2016. I did it on a pod because I spent time with somebody in his circle who was telling me that. So I talked about it and for some reason we got aggregated and became a story. But I'd like to feel like I was Dr. Oppenheimer for that one. Just kept going for the next nine years.

I always like to throw Oppenheimer. I was going to say, I don't know if you want to keep comparing yourself or other people to Dr. Oppenheimer. You know, he's now they're making movies about him. Maybe my favorite Christopher Nolan movie, by the way. Oppenheimer. Really? Yeah.

It might be. Over the Dark Night? Yeah. I loved Oppenheimer. I thought it was, I thought it was a masterpiece. I didn't even know where to go after that. By the way, you just made me think of something that I absolutely loved. No, it was just a totally random thing I was going to do later, but

somebody so this guy A. Chester 99 on Twitter. Sure. He somehow went through and found the record holder for points for every point

total between zero and 100. So for instance, Greg Kite has the most zero point games in NBA history at 295. 295 zero point games.

This was the one that broke my brain. It might be the greatest stat of ever heard of. One point games. Okay. Somebody had 61 one point games and it's somebody that played in the last 25 years. And you won't guess it because this is impossible.

Reggie Evans had 61 one point games. You know, I was actually going to say it would have to have been like an inferior version of Dennis Rodman, like someone who's just out, just like that and that's because Rodman was too good. It was scrounge his way to six or five or eight or whatever. but they would have to be a player like that. Your league leader for six point games,

Michael Cage at 151. So he's on the board. Similar guy. My guy Robert Parrish, three different holders at 14, 16, and 18. Our guy, Tim Duncan, 19 points games. He had the most at 88. And then our guy,

Dirk Lewitsky, bring this up next time you're on the Amazon show. He's the career leader in 21.2. games with 82. 82. What's the biggest number? Like who, like, so is 253 the greatest single number of any kind of games on the list? Um, Harvey Catchings at 193 and Greg, that he had 193, two point games, Harvey Catchings. Okay. Great kite had 295 for zero. And then, and then, so Carl Malone is there for 23 and 24. What's weird as Kareem wasn't on here, which I was

prize. And then it gets to 25. And LeBron has the record for 25, 26, 27, 29, 30, 31, 32, 32, 33, 33, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37. And he's tied at 38. And Jordan only has 38, 39, and 40. And then we move into like Jordan, Will, territory. What a crap. I was, I read, I'll send this to you. I was reading it for, for literally 45 minutes. I've been more riveted by anything on Twitter or a while. I mean, it's just, it's a, it's a high class, high, interlegged version of name some guys. Like, oh, Greg Kite, Harvey Catchings, Michael Cage. It's just like, let's name some guys, but it has math attached to it. So I like it.

Derek Fisher has two different ones, five and seven point games. He has the records for both. But T.R. Dunn as the four point game. I really love this. I need more content like this in my life. So Cleveland barely beats a team that had settled in crunch time in game six. CMB, a rookie, Jamal Shed,

RJ Barrett, Scotty Barnes, and Walter. That was their crime. That was basically their money lineup in game six, and then they tried to keep it going in today. Probably spent,

I'm going to say, $75 million combined on those five guys this year and the girl against Cleveland that has Mitchell, Hardin, Mobley, Allen,

even Max Drews makes like 17 million a year. Noble effort for Toronto. Yeah, what happens? What happens? Let's play. What do you do with Toronto? What do you do? Oh, boy. Well, I have a lot of different things I could do because I've got all my picks. My roster is too expensive. Let me bring them up their cap sheet here.

Yeah, sadly, they're paying Ingram 40 and 41 next two years and quickly 32.5 each of the next three. Yeah, I think. Not to mention the Perto extension we talked about before. That gets ugly. I think all of those guys have now reached the territory of, I have. have to attach something to get off of them. Really? Including Ingram? I mean...

All-Star Brain and Ingram? I don't think that player option is... Maybe he's neutral and you could put him in it. He's picked it up already. He just picked it up. The player up, nobody likes no teams like player option. I mean, the quickly deal, which I didn't mind when it happened, has not worked out. He just hasn't been healthy enough.

I never liked it. You know, Barrett, his extension eligible, and you know he's walking in the door being like, hey, most successful Raptor season a little bit here, and that was a big part of it. Can we work something out? I kind of like his game. The more you watch him, he does that crafty,

lefty stuff. I thought he matched the intensity, athleticism of some of the playoff moments. They're just in a tricky spot because, you know, if they wanted to reach for the stars, right, they've been linked to Yonis before. What's the trade?

Or, like, is there a trade? Like, everyone's going to ask for Scotty Barnes. He's obviously untouchable. Is there a trade? trade that they can even do that would satisfy the other team and leave them with enough stuff in the cupboard to actually win. I think the right move might just be like, look, we know this team, this team probably is a little better than we thought based on our playoff performance. They're a pretty good team. We know what they are. Let's not get too crazy here and just see

who can rehab their trade value a little bit. Maybe there is some sort of get out of jail free car with one of these contracts. We've got all our picks. Cmb is over here with Scottie Barnes. Like, that dude is awesome and I'm not doing anything foolish with him. I want him on my team for a long time. I like Walter, too. Walter's good. I think he's a keeper. Yeah, they learned some good stuff about some of their young players in this series.

Like, Walter was totally up for this, made some big shots, had a little slump in the middle of the series. Shed's a nine-man rotation guy. Yeah, so they have a couple. The problem is that Pertil extension kills them for a Janus thing. Because if that wasn't attached to the end, and when you talked about go crazy, like, that was crazy when it happened and now it seems even crazier. but you could have had expirings and RJ expiring in two years left or one year that would have been

expiring for Pertil. So basically that would have been your expiring package and they have all their picks. They have everything so they can do every combination of picks and swaps. So that if Yannis had said send me to Toronto, they at least could have had something semi respectable. I'm not sure they're going to be able to get there the way it is now. Grady Dick just not being able to play is a pretty big disappointment. What happened on that? You liked him for a split second, didn't you?

He can do some stuff. He just hasn't made enough shots and he's not good enough defensively. And he's got some, just Walter just passed him. And there was only room for one of them in the rotation. And that's where we are. Did he do enough that he can get a Grady Dick was a problem? Twitter video in like 10 years or no. Easily.

We can make it this week if you want. It could be at least three and a half minutes long. All right, good. I just want to make sure he at least had that. Only half of the video would be Jersey Swaps. The other half would be his actual place. True. The big thing for them was Barnes had a great season.

He went up a level. I am not sure he could be the best guy on a championship game, but he can definitely be the second best guy. And he might even be able to be the Jalen Brown with his version of Tatum. I thought, you know, physically, athletically, competitively, he has everything. There's just, it's really hard for him to create his own offense. He can do it. It never feels great.

It's very similar to where Iguado was in those Philly years and even that one Denver year, where it's like, he can do it. It's probably not a great sign for your team if he's the one doing it. And he's so much better if he's kind of over here. So they got to figure that out. And I don't know how they figure it out with the roster they have. I think the Midranger is coming along. I felt more confident in it in the series than I had before.

and I really think he is the guy that would have benefited most from the idea of what Emmanuel quickly was supposed to be for this team. Sort of a good shooting like half point guard, half spot up guy,

doesn't need the ball but can work with it, can run pick and rolls both ways with Scotty and just sort of loosen the defense up in ways that a guy like Shed can't do. We just haven't seen quite enough of that combination over the last,

you know, two seasons to really see what it could be. But Scottie left a lot of guys this year. Like, like he, he left a lot of guys behind him in the NBA

player rankings like Bankero, it's not close right now. Well, maybe he's close, but like he left a guy, he left guys like that. And then he might make

all NBA and it wouldn't be like illegitimate. He had a great year. And tough as shit in the playoffs. He was ready for all of it played super hard. I'm going to thought bubble a trade that I would love them to do

and you're probably going to jerk backwards and then be upset and maybe go deep in the, thought for like five seconds. Brandon Ingram for Kevin Durant. Okay. So if I'm the Rockets, why am I doing that? I'm getting off of Kevin Durant.

Wow. Just just. I'm just moving on. Just a lot of baggage. I'm just going to get out of that one. Money is about the same. And Durant gets to probably wouldn't be psyched about going to the team that their fans cheered when.

he, when he tore his Achilles during the finals, I don't know if he'd be super pumped about that one, but you could work with them. I don't love the Ingram fit in Houston with the other pieces that they have.

I'd rather try to trade Durant and aim a little differently. But how many teams are actually really going to talk themselves into being the latest team that potentially could become unhappy? Just by sheer, coincidence that Kevin Durant showed up and then things became unhappy.

Teams would talk. He's still Kevin Durant. He's going to make an all-NBA team this year. Did you vote him all-N-B-A? I sure did. So, I mean, there you go. He will, he's got just next year and then a player option, which is interesting. I think, I think some good teams would kick the tires and give Houston stuff that makes more sense,

but I will say, I don't know if you read the athletic, now they tell us story about the rockets yesterday. Did you catch that? I loved it. Well, I mean, but it wasn't, there was nothing in it. There was particularly revelatory. No, I just love when they happen. Because I think we've all sort of made the calls and made the rounds and had the meetings of like,

okay, so no one is really denying that this was actually Kevin Durant on the texts and burners. And like, and they had some lines in there like sources say it was a big issue within the organization. And, but yeah, it was. And no one on the record, off the record, privately publicly has come out and said, no, no, it actually wasn't Kevin Durant, which I don't know what else to conclude from that other than it seems like it was Kevin Durant. It's too bad. We'll save the rest of it for our deep dive this summer.

I mean, do you disagree? Nobody has come out and denied it. All evidence suggests that it is. It seemed to have had it before and after impact on the team. And it seems like it was him. And there was also lines in the story that were like the whole team came together and agreed to just like squash it, keep it in house. We're not talking about it. Like the whole thing in the athletic story, which I've also heard similar like meetings took place was just like it was what it was a huge issue.

Whatever it was a big issue. Taking a break for the pod, continuing to go here on Netflix. three, so we know all the series and Lakers Oklahoma City you basically can't even bet on Oklahoma City for the series. It's like you have to risk $3,000 to win a dollar.

The odds for the series though, a sweep is plus 125 on Fandall and OKC 4 to 1 is plus 175 and then the odds get progressively wonkier. We just had two massive upsets

last round with the Lakers upsetting the Rockets and the Sixers upset in the Celtics that from a money line standpoint were two of the biggest upsets we've had in the last 15 years. I do not think this would be the case. Is there any sort of case you could make that doesn't involve Luca comes back and immediately goes nuts? And I don't even know how they would win two games. I mean, Luca comes back plus Jill and Williams remains out, would have been a roadmap towards an interesting series.

Yeah. It doesn't seem like, I mean, the latest updates on Lucas, he's still a bit away. And I just don't know that even with, even if J. Dub, who's, I mean, when's the last time they played at this point a week ago, if they had a week off now? Well, I mean, their practices are probably more competitive than first round was. You know, I just don't see a roadmap for the Lakers without Luca to really make it a competitive series. There'll be some competitive games. They'll slow it down and play their old man basketball and like whatever.

But, you know, you're still asking a lot of Marcus Martin, Rui Hachamura and Jake LaRavia and guys that are just like the Thunder have just better guys than that. Tough series for LeBron coming off a really fun series for him and, you know, being the best guy in a playoff series. at age 41, all that stuff. And now you have the OKC pit bulls being unleashed on you. Well, it's like the father time. Father time is like the whole metaphor is just this series. Father Time versus LeBron. Here's team father time, like a bunch of guys who are 25 and younger and awesome

at basketball. You are 41 and just have at it. Yeah. You're laughing at Father Time, LeBron. Enjoy it for the next two weeks. Biggest playoff series upsets, the biggest one in the last 30 plus years was, that Nuggets Sonics one. The Nuggets were plus

1400. But then we had Cavs, Pacers, last year, Pacer's were plus 425, and then... That's number two? Well, that recently. Okay. No, number two was, we believe,

12-20-old. Oh, sure. Yeah. And then 2012, Bulls Sixers, the Sixers were 9-1, but Rose got hurt at the end of game one that they were winning. And then there's a, There's a bubble one in here and Seltzikzers, 8 to 1, Bucks Heat from 23.

Celtics Nix is on here from 25. The Nix were plus 550 for some reason. So, yeah, I don't think there's a lot to discuss with this one. It does, with that, we talked about it briefly in part one about Edwards coming back from Minnesota. Anything intrigue you about Minnesota other than the obvious? which is that they're a bunch of badasses who are unafraid of everybody. There's some Go Bear Wembe.

Edwards maybe convincing himself he's the best part in the series. Some of those spurs, young guys, maybe getting a little tight. What's the roadmap here? The roadmap is just underestimate the term of what is at your own peril. They've proven it over and over again. This is like whatever happens in the regular season, cool. They go up, they go down. They play up to the competition and down to it.

They're a really good playoff team. They're down one key guy. And we got to see how I-O looks and how Ant looks. Like they were down a lot of guys by the end of that series. But they bring a lot to the table in any matchup. They're big, they're strong, they're tough. They're going to defend. And there's a lot of interesting subplots to this series,

starting with Ant. And the Ant-Steff Castle matchup is just going to be halacious from Steff will get the assignment on him, presumably, for a lot of the series. I'm going to say nobody under 12 courtside for this series. Just to be safe. somebody brought a baby to one of the Laker games. There's like a four-month-old baby court side.

I just feel like that's, you know, you should have to really answer to some sort of parent court for that. And I did spend some time last week watching some Spurs, wolves just little matchups just to see like who guards Wembe. How do they do that? And there was just guys have been injured off and on the entire. We've barely gotten to see the real teams play against each other. But Gobert did guard Wembe for the most part when Gobert was healthy

and Wemby was healthy. And Steph did Guardian, for the most part. And there's just a lot of, look, Spurs are better. Spurs have come court. They're healthier. They'll probably win.

But I think Minnesota can make it a long series and I think they could win the series. Wemby's shooting threes and actually making them versus what Joker did last round would be one way to mess with Goberr a little bit. Yeah, always. Zombie Mike Conley?

Can it keep going? Sure. The zombie that bit of me? How long are the effects? I mean, he's, just give me 12 minutes, 12 good minutes, Mike. 12 good minutes? That was unbelievable. I thought he was washed up two years ago.

Minnesota to win in seven is 15 to 1. Minnesota to win in 6 is 13 to 1. Spurs sweep, 2 to 1, spurs sweep, and then spurs in 5 plus 195, which I think would be the smart pick. So gentlemen, gentlemen, sweep is the favorite. Yeah, maybe Minnesota wins three. I'm going to give Minnesota at least another game. I'm going to dig in a little bit more tomorrow.

I'm going to dig in a little bit more tomorrow. Watch a little more, do a little more research. But my inclination is to not underestimate the wolves. They've certainly proven it. And they've certainly proven that they've taken the nobody believes in us NFL mentality. Chris Finch after the win was not shy about saying, hey, they wanted us, did that whole thing. I loved it. I loved it.

I mean, those two teams legitimately hate each other, and it's awesome. I just want one, it needs to happen once, or Ant's got a bit over one way, and Wembe's the last line of defense, and Ann says,

I'm going for it. And I don't know, I don't know what will happen. Like, there could be just the rim could break, the backboard could break, fans could be injured, I don't know,

but I want to see it. It's Superman, too. Superman's flying into one of those guys, in the air and there's a puff of smoke. Do you want to guess what the Fandu line is for Pistons Cavs for the series? Because it's out. Who do you think's favored? I think the calves are favored by a very small amount.

The Pistons are favored by a very small amount. Okay. By a few small beers. Minus 122. A few small pears. Cavs in seven is six to one. Pistons is. and seven is four to one,

calves in six is plus 340. I would probably go exact games over the series betting in this. Really tough one. Honestly, this probably a stay away is a series bet. We can't stay away tomorrow. I know. I think we're both leaning slightly toward the calves, but I certainly would have bet my life on either one of these.

I'm going to do more of my homework tomorrow. I didn't do my homework yet because I wasn't going to do double the homework in the series Cavs Raptors just took forever. Pistons Magic took forever. So I got to do all my homework tomorrow. And then Philly Nix minus 260 over Philly. It's plus two 15 as underdogs. And then if you want Nixon seven, which would be great. That's plus 380. Sixers and seven is eight to one and sixers and six is plus 550. And if you wanted to go nuts. You could bet the Sixers sweep at 25 to 1. That's a ballsy bet. The NIC sweep at plus 550. Yeah.

That's going to be the best of the four series unless we get Ant really looking like Ann again. But I think Nix, all the storylines with this Nick Sixers series, real animosity with the Knicks and the fans toward Embed for multiple incidents from previous years. the Maxi versus Brunson kind of each side not being able to stop the other and they're probably not even going to guard each other the towns and bead

which that rekindled this weekend I'd forgotten about the tweets from 2019 what else and then OG and Nirobe being the best part in the world there's a lot of different storylines we have gone what else do you like out of this time? I had forgotten about the cat and bead stuff from all those years ago so that's very exciting

and I'm glad that everyone has done their job job and dredging it back up for added added animosity. Mitchell Robinson and B'd stuff is well known. I think it's a big McHale Bridges series. Like, you know, good finish to the Hawks series in the last game, found his equilibrium a little bit on offense. He's going to get, I would guess he'll get the maxi assignment from the jump. He's been their primary guy.

It's a really tough assignment for the Knicks. They don't have a great option. I mean, not that many people do, but, you know, Aninobees tried it. Hart's tried it. They tend to trend bigger defensively and not smaller and quicker. And Bridges, it's like, you know, everyone's going to laugh at that trade forever. As Brian Winhorst, our friend always says, if you win a championship, every trade's good, every trade's in A plus, every trade's fine. And so like, here's a series that's kind of tailor made for you to, you don't have to score 22 points. You don't have to run as many

pick and rolls as you did in Brooklyn. That guy, fine. Be Phoenix. Be Phoenix, Mikhail Bridges and play the best defense you played as a Nick and get. at us 14 points a game and like we're all going to be happy. My guess is they use bridges to do the 94 feet thing on maxi and then bring some Josh Hardin for that and then Alvarado for five minutes a half and just just putting bodies on him the entire court at all times. It's not always going to work. He's going to be faster than everybody.

He's going to get to the basket. But I think that's what you're going to have to do. You have to approach it as we got to cut the head off on this one on this team. He's the head. We got to cut it off. Alvarado and Embed are going to have a moment at some point of the season, where Alvarado is just going to be, like, annoying him around. Embed's going to be like, what is this thing down here that's annoying me?

I don't like it. And Ozao Alvarado is going to get all offended by it. That's going to happen. The Embedad flopping at MSG is going to be a point of viewing. They've already conditioned to really hate it. I know the Celtics fans were not big fans. And then you have the town piece of it, too, where you could see a, a couple double flops.

You could see towns recoiling in horror as in beat his flopping the other way and it's like a flop off. Almost like an eight mile when we had the rat battles. Every team's got a flopper. Okay, there's floppers everywhere. Jail and Brunson has not been averse to the occasional head snap flop either.

He's another one, you're right. He coming around a screen could go fly. That could be another flop off. Yeah. I mean, it's, and the crowd reactions will be awesome. And every player will act as if they definitely didn't flop. just want people to start using the flop sign more often because I think it's really fun. Let's bust it out.

I love, I, I, I love them being shit to the fans in Boston during the game, telling them to be quiet. It was like a kind of brav, it was a new level of bravado for him because it was like, could have gone badly. If you blow the game that ends up looking badly and he was fine with it. And I like him. I gotta say he's always done it, though. Like even in 2018, he was doing it.

We were like, dude, you just got in the league. What are you doing? And I like, yeah, he loves it. it gets him going. And I love that he told Philly fans, don't sell your tickets, get all the tickets. We can't have these Knicks fans

coming down on Amtrak overpaying for our tickets. We don't want it to sound like Madison Square Garden. He laid down the gauntlet for the Sixers fans who have been waiting, waiting for this team. So let's do it. Who is this a more painful series loss for,

I would say the Knicks, like for the fan bases? This is like, if I'm the Knicks right now, if I'm a Knicks fan, the seas have parted over the last week. Detroit looks incredibly, vulnerable, so does Cleveland. The Celtics are out. You had this whole Tatum Revenge thing lurking. That's gone. You have this Philly team that you've already had a lot of success with,

and there's just a clear roadmap now. Like, this is the year, right? This is the best chance I think they're ever going to have in the East to win this year right now next four weeks. It's amazing how it's turned from Hawks series is not going well. We got to fire the coach. where's the honest trade to summer, what's the move to now like, oh, the east is broken right for us. The more painful series loss is definitely the Knicks. As painful as it would be for Philly and their fans to get a taste of this and then have the rug pulled out in the same round where the rug is always pulled out for them. I think to get those three games against that team, the Celtics, and to vanquish them the way they did and to just get a glimpse of what this team could be, if they continue to play well and lose to the Knicks,

I still think it feels like a fun season with some hope for next season for the Sixers. Yeah, we got to see Embed play meaningful basketball again. Baxter became a guy. We clearly have something pretty special on Edgecombe. We'll see how far it goes. And we resuscitated Paul George. And we eliminated the number two seed Boston Celtics

our ancient, ancient rival for the first time in a long, long time. Yeah, first time since 82. in pretty heartbreaking fashion for them. Like, you gotta take some joy out of that if you're Philly. Philly's plus 650 to win the conference. The Knicks are plus 145. What's interesting about that is,

I kind of think whoever wins this series goes to the finals. Because I think if the Sixers win the series, that will mean that what we just saw for two and a half games was actually real, for real. And then they ran through the Knicks and, you know, from a talent standpoint, they're top four if everybody's healthy and Paul George is playing like that

and Embed is fine. Like you'd probably put that against any other top four. I still think the Knicks are going to win. I would pick the Knicks. But listen, man, the Sixers, if they're going to play, like they played the last two-d-half games, it's a hard team to play.

No question. I will also pick the Knicks. I would lean Nixon seven right now. I'm going to do more work on it tomorrow. But I think, Cleveland to Detroit should feel exactly the same way. They should have the same attitude of like, oh, this is open for us. I know that they haven't, you know, an 8th seed took Detroit to distance.

An underman Raptor's team took Cleveland the distance. But every matchup is different. Every matchup is going to feel different. And whoever wins that series should not be afraid of the Sixers. Like, can they stay healthy this all time? The Knicks. I mean, Detroit played the Knicks to the Hill last year in the first round. I think both those teams should feel that way too.

I don't know. Detroit, going to the death store, basically, in that Orlando series and having to take every single ounce of everything just to win in seven, I don't think it was an awesome sign for them. And then Cleveland against Toronto losing two guys,

like even just not finishing Toronto in six, not a great sign for them. In communities across Canada, hourly Amazon employees earn an average of over $24.50 an hour. Employees also have the opportunity to grow their skills and their paycheck by enrolling in free skills training programs for in-demand fields, like software development and information technology. Learn more at aboutamazon.ca.

I'm either. I got to do a couple more. What do you do is quick? Okay. What do you do if you're Atlanta? And you have Jalen Johnson at 120 for four. Daniel's at 100 for four. A Congo at 16 and 17.

Alexander Walker at 14 and 15. You're stuck with Kisper at 13 and 13. You got Risha Shea at 13 next year. Kaminga is a free agent. CJ is a free agent. And you have that New Orleans first rounder that might be in the top four. You'll be at the lottery a week from now. You could create up to $29 million in cab space if get creative.

So you could do something like we discussed in part. one where you could trade Daniels in the pick and try to get a franchise guy or, you know, an All-MBA guy or an All-Star, whether it's Jalen, Janus, whoever. Or you could just say, I like what we have. Let's re-sign McCollum. Let's try to lowball, comminga, and maybe bring them back for one more year to see what we have. And let's try to nail this pick and look at the late 2020s for when we make a run. What would you do?

Yeah, the first thing I got to do is see what happens in the lottery and who I can get. and where I'm picking. My inclination is almost regardless of that, given the state of the East in general, like, I mean, we'll see what the Pacers are just sort of sitting over here as the Forgotten Man in the East that's going to come back. You know, we'll hopefully full health. Not if they get a top four pick, they will not be forgotten.

Well, that's true, too. They'll be adding Halliburton, Zubots, and one of the four picks in a generational draft. Or trading it for who, God knows what, but probably knowing Indiana and the way they generally operate, just making the pick and saying, we're thrilled to do this. My inclination,

if I were the Hawks would be, let me let this marinate a little bit before I do anything too aggressive, depending on where I pick. I like a conglue. I like Alexander Walker. I think Daniels is an interesting player. I'm obviously not trading Jill and Johnson.

Risa She is the one we just got to figure out how do we revive this, and if not, what do we do? But let's see where the lottery balls fall first. I don't, I mean, what's the aggressive, move for them. What's what's the other what's the big move? I mean if I would poke around on things like just you know it's it's not just Janus or Stan Pat right like there's a bunch of middle ground stuff like

are there I'd have to go through the rosters are there guys we could pick off you know that are a little bit better than one of the guys we have now. Is there like a Durant like is that interesting to us at all we mentioned Jalen Brown before that's a little high price but just is are there smaller moves I can do around the fringes because I don't, you know, and McCollum, I think, would like to go back there and there's got to be a number that works. He was so good for them. Yeah, I would say they probably need some size and a point guard who could learn under the tutelage of returning free agency, J. McCollum. And there's a ton of point guards in this draft and they're going to end up with somebody good. So we agree. Wouldn't do much there.

Portland's a little more interesting. Denny is at 13 million. in next season and 12 million the year after that, which is just probably the best contract in the entire league, right? I would even have that over the Pritchard who's making like $7 million a year. They have holiday at 34 and 37. They have green at 34 and 36.

They have sharp 90 for 4 and Kamara 81 for 4. And they have Dame 13 and 14. And they have scoot and cling and still on rookie deals. So they don't, they're going to be a tax team next year and maybe even like bumping

toward the second tax. that they spend. They have all their picks from 27 to 30. They have a Milwaukee first swap. They get the best one out of Boston or Milwaukee in 29 and another Milwaukee swap in 30s. So they have stuff to trade. And they have an owner who is already getting stories written

about him every day for how cheap he is. So I don't know what to make of this. And he doesn't like it. I don't know. At first I heard he doesn't care. Who likes it? Who likes being called cheap? But the first wave of news was he doesn't care.

He reads it all and he doesn't care. And then he's being. defended by the GM, Joe Cronin's talking about. It's just not accurate what he's portrayed. Look, the stories have not been refuted. Like, the guys were in the freaking lobby because they couldn't get laid checkouts. Like, that's the thing that happened.

He does care. He paid for subs the other day for everybody. Everybody got a roast beef sub. I don't like roast beef. I'll take a turkey, turkey over roast beef. Yeah, turkey. He's roast beef and turkey. And he even had a couple of tunas.

Yeah, I don't, you know, There's this Janus noise that's out there. I started the noise a month ago and then found out that Janus didn't want to go to the West Coast. I don't. Janice wants to go to the East Coast. I don't really know. I don't know. I'm struggling to wrap my brain around that one.

Yeah, I don't like, they're a weird team because does anyone want Jeremy Grant's contract? Even Drew Holiday was spectacular when he was healthy this year. The player option in 27, 28 is pretty pricey. I got to figure out Scoot. Scoot's extension eligible. It feels, I mean, every team like Portland is just facing the same dilemma. It's like, yeah, we're pretty good. We're a young, rising team with a lot of assets.

We don't have anyone on our team nearly as good as anyone that Oklahoma City and San Antonio has at the top of their roster. How are we going to ever compete with those two teams and how do we get there? And I don't know what the answer is for Portland. other than I do like that they're building around this defense, defense, defense identity, and like we're at least going to make things hard for everybody we play. I like where they are. I don't really understand the DAME contract at all, why they did it, why they paid him for a year not to play.

That was weird. But for the most part, I'm fine with the Drew contract. It's two years. Yeah, he's good. Next year. And then the final year is an expire. And that's fine. Grant's a little tougher.

So we don't think this is like, let's go nuts and get somebody awesome team. This could be another Durant destination, by the way. I mean, I think that Durant price point might not be that high if he does get traded. And I don't know that he is going to get traded. Like, does Houston have to trade him? Well, they were next time. What do you do?

KD at 44 and 46, Shengun at 35, 37, 39, and Jabara is at 23, 22, 24. They have FVV for 25 next year. Finney Smith, 39 for the next three. Adams for two more and double figures. Adams and Capella are basically 20 and 18 the next two years. Then they have a Thompson extension and they have Reed Shepherd. But the thing with them, they have some really nice picks. They're going to have that swap with Brooklyn next year.

They're going to have the Phoenix first. They have their own first and they have a Phoenix Dallas swap in 29. The Brooklyn one, I think we have to start really thinking about Brooklyn as a team that might do some dramatic stuff this summer. Because anytime we've seen a team with cap space in the position of this pick could come back to haunt us, they usually get a little more aggressive heading into that season, right? Which made me wonder, like, could they be a destination for pick somebody who had an ugly playoff exit? I think absolutely they could. I mean, they've been rumored in the honest, like on the fringes of the honest. thing and everyone has been like, well, I mean, including me, have said, why would yonest go there? Who is he playing with? And I don't know the answer to that question.

Other than the Nets probably think, if we get you honest, we can get somebody else. We have infinite flexibility, tons of picks. You know, when Sean Marks first got there and they were just in the, in so deep in the hole of picks owed to Boston and other places, they didn't do the thing where they got aggressive because they didn't control their pick, and we have to save face a little bit. They did the opposite and just ate it as a sunk cost. And I wonder if they have the appetite to do that again. I suspect that you will be right and they'll try to be a little bit more aggressive than that. Because that pick, it's a big asset and they've got the Phoenix stuff coming as well.

Yeah, the Rockets, you know, there's an argument to be made that they should just sit tight and see what Van Blit looks like, see what the team looks like with Van Blit, Durant, Stephen Adams, keep the pick, space, what it is and just take another shot at it next year. Or you can even go further and maybe go, you know what, we are contenders and we're not going to really have a chance here with San Antonio, Oklahoma City and even Minnesota. Maybe we should zag the other way. We have these picks coming. We got a bunch of young players, reduce the expectations. Hey, does anybody want Van Bled on expiring? Does anybody want, you know, this pretty decent Adams contract, even though he gets hurt every

year. Does anyone interested in Durant, just zag? I think that's a, I mean, the three paths they have to me are Stan Pat, trade Durant and or Van Vleet in a, in deals that sort of just reset your timeline a little bit about around the young guys or find the home run superstar. We're all in now. We trade Schengun plus picks, plus whatever for Janus or whoever else becomes available. And I think that whoever else becomes available thing is a big wildcard in that because other people, depending on what happens in the playoffs, will become, I mean, we've already seen. we talked about it in part one, Denver basically letting the world know everybody but Yokic, like our phones are open.

So that means Jamal Murray. Who else would be? I mean, I don't think Denver wants to trade Jamal Murray, but the fact that his name is omitted from the do not ask list, according to Shams, is interesting. But to be clear, Shams didn't say Jamal Murray's name. He just said anybody but Yokic, which obviously includes Jamal Murray. So there'll be other guys like that, depending on how the playoffs go. Yeah, there's.

you could get like a Durant, Van Vleet's expiring, and some draft stuff for Murray. On paper makes sense. I don't know why either team would want to trade with each other West. And if I'm trading Murray, I probably want two pieces back. I can't remember if I said this in part one, but I was meaning to say this to you. If I'm Denver, I'm doing nothing. You didn't say that. Oh, I didn't?

No. All right. I'll say it more emphatically. I'm doing nothing. I just had bad luck in a playoffs. I had a weird year. I had Joker playing the best basketball of his entire career, getting hurt, and then Gordon getting hurt twice.

And this Minnesota thing just was one of those weird things that happens in the playoffs every once in a while. Only one team can win the title. A lot of teams panic after they don't win the title. I just wouldn't panic with what I have. I'd want to be a little more careful. I'd really want to resign Peyton Watson. And even if I have to trade Cam Johnson to make that,

I don't know why they can't just resign Payton Watson actually spend some fucking money. This Cronkies are wealthier than just about anybody. Just spend the fucking money of Yokech on your team. But I'm bringing back Watson. I'm bringing back all my guys. I got Cam Johnson as an expiring. And I have a little flexibility.

And let's play it out and see where we are in January. That's got to be the move. I wouldn't panic. Well, my counter was going to be number one. I don't, I just, we talked about this already. I just think you have to assume Aaron Gordon is going to be hit or miss, availability-wise, for the rest of his career. Yeah, it's 13th area of his career.

This is who he is now. And so I don't, I've got to build my team with that in mind. And counter number two is Peyton Watson. I think they have to bring him back. And that's going to cost you. It's going to cost you money, which we agree. It would be great if they just paid and they've ducked the apron and stuff before. I don't think that's likely.

And so they're going to have to pay something to get off of Christian Brown or Cam Johnson, and they already owe some significant draft assets out the door to Oklahoma City of all teams in two separate drafts. So it'll be interesting. Which is another reason why they're going to be trying to stay really good. Christian Brown, I don't really understand. I thought the extension was too pricey, but it was also in the range of all these other guys that he was at least in the ballpark of that were getting between low 20s and 25, 26.

I don't understand why he was so bad. Like, how did he just lose the ability to play offense? And also, why did he stop being a shutdown guy on defense? I don't know that he was ever a shutdown guy on defense. Well, he was their shutdown guy, though. You know what I mean? Like, he was the guy they would put on the other team's best perimeter guy. And it wasn't glaringly bad like it was this year.

He couldn't guard anybody in that series. I think he's just because of the way their team is built and how Gordon has aged and been injured, I think he's just tasked with a role that he's not quite up to. He's a good defensive player, not a great one. And it all comes down 30% on threes. Like, 30% on threes and he missed half the season. Like that's, and I do think the Watson thing, although he shot it really well from three this year, especially from the corners, the two of them playing together, is that going to, how viable is that going to be? Because that's your best defensive lineup is the two of them plus Gordon. Is that, they barely played those three

together all season. But to me, Watson, if there's a number that makes sense for all parties, and I don't know if Peyton Watson is actually itching to go to a place where he would have a bigger role, like the Lakers are going to be rumored until the end of time. But I want that guy back on my team. And they still are in the driver's seat with it.

Yeah, you match any offer. And we, I don't remember the last time somebody just stole a restricted free agent it was some crazy offer. You have to go back to like the Jeremy Lynn, Omer Ossich era to, for the creativity. I just,

Peyton Watson and Gordon together as injuries, not as impactful from a talent standpoint as Edwards and Dissou and Dishu. You could just stop at Edwards, but yeah, include the other guys too. Obviously not as,

but what was interesting, about the series was Denver couldn't replace what Gordon gave them at all. Minnesota was somehow able to patch together. You know, they lost the three-point shooting completely by losing all those guys. But they were somehow able to patch together the defense and the rim attack with all the backups for those guys. Denver couldn't replace anything Gordon did. And that was what sunk them, you know?

So to your point, like, yeah, you can't count on them anymore, but I also don't know who else they could bring in that could do 75% of what he does. You just have to hope that Watson, although a much different player stylistically, on both ends of the floor, just gives you enough pop and enough size to mimic it, and that Gordon still has enough in the tank for a big playoff run here and there. But yeah, the Minnesota thing, man, you can't give them enough credit. They got the big I.O. game, Nas Reid was really good.

Conley was good. Shannon, massive in the elimination game. They just, you know, got contributions from everyone. There was almost a G. there was a Jalen Clark Yokic near fight in that game, which is, you know, it is interesting that the hockey mentality, start a fight with the other team's best player. Well, he fights back. It's part that, but it is,

every time it's going bad for Denver, there seems to be a Yokic event in which he's a participant in. Sometimes not the initiator, but sometimes yes, the initiator, but I don't really know what to make of that. What did you think of the 48-hour celebration and that Yokage got bounced in round one.

Was that, who was celebrating? A lot of people. A lot of people were psyched that all of the Yokage stuff just had a giant fork slammed into it. I thought it was interesting. I mean, he had a bad series. He just, he did, like, Gober ate his lunch for a lot of the series. His jumper wasn't there.

His defense wasn't good enough. It was a bad series for him. It was his first real postseason clunker against the team that has their number at this point. The three-point shooting was bad. I went back and I looked at his, I went back and I looked at his, his, just his stats in 23 when they won,

when they went 16 and 4. And, uh, and basically rolled through everybody. His stats were unbelievable that year. That was like one, he was like 31, 14 and 10. And he shot like 47% from three. And, you know, You look at that and you're like, oh, his stats are still pretty good this year,

but compared to where he was, they weren't. So the question for me is that age 31, has he moved into a slightly different echelon of himself as a playoff guy if the three-point shooting is just not going to be reliable anymore? I'm not going there. I think he still has plenty of time left in his prime. And the three-pointer- I feel, but it's a question now. The three-pointer is a fickle animal, right?

And so you, let's say they sneak out that round. Maybe he has a hot round the next round. I don't worry too much about that. It was eye-opening that he didn't have the same level of answers for Gobert that he's had previously. In any, like in the post on the pick and roll and anything, he just didn't have rhythm to his game against Gober and that we had just not seen him run into a matchup like that before. When teams don't think he could make the three-pointer, I think it changes how they play him, what they want him to do. And I just think Minnesota was super comfortable with it. One thing did happen from that series.

I forgot to tell you. I had to drop Joker in my pyramid. Wow. Two spots. Okay. Yeah. What does that mean? Where is he?

So there's this center right at the end of level, the top level, the Pantheon. There's four centers cluster together. And I've been moving them around. I'm the only one who sees the list. That's not like I'm announcing it. but it's Hakeem and Shaq and Joker and Moses. I think he's right there with Moses, and I think you could,

I have Joker 14, Moses 15. You could talk me into flipping it, but I think Hakeem and Shaq have to be above him at this point, unless he can rally back with some sort of other playoff thing. Like, the only one finals appearance, one title, even Moses got to two finals.

It's hard. It's hard. You're too back-to-back for Hakeem. When you're in the top 15, you start to be measured by different crazy, highest-possible level things. You know, Hakeem in 95 wins the back-to-back title and just beats every team he beats is awesome. Every center he goes against is awesome.

He just destroys everybody. And Joker probably needs one of those, I think, to move up. Well, there's a lot of time, a lot of time left, but I'll tell you. We're all winner's, though. I'll tell you, those top two teams in the West are just, like, there's always injuries and things go sideways and things are windows are never open as long as you think they're going to be open and finances and all that. But it's hard to see a world where the Thunder and the Spurs are not pretty continuously awesome for, let's just say five years. Like we don't have to go too crazy. We don't have to say 10 years, 15 years, whatever.

But barring a catastrophic injury, which could happen. we don't want it to, but it just seems unlikely that they are going to be anything but like 58 plus win teams for the next five years. Well, that's why for the Nuggets, the question is I'm just studying that 22 Warriors title run. Okay, that was a team. It seemed like their window closed and then it didn't. And they had this transcendent player. A lot of weird shit happened in the league that year. There were a couple injuries.

There was a couple upsets. And all of a sudden they just swooped in and took it. could we keep this nucleus together and hang around and hope for a similar situation? The answer would be us. So that's why I don't think you can panic. I think you got to keep it together. Before we go, you want to tell us about your cameo on an Apple TV show? Sure.

I was on your friends and neighbors, season two, episode five. A show I watch. I'll talk about a little more this week, but it was delightful. And I had two. So it's up now. People can watch you in a scene. People can watch me and OG and Obie together in a scene at a party to house party scene. One of the kids people, people who watch show know one of the characters is a retired NBA star. Yeah. And so he's hosting a party and they decided to populate it with random NBA people. And one of the producers, shout out Jamie, is just a longtime fan listener and was like, let's write Zach Lowe a role and get him in here.

and I spent a day in a mansion in Long Island last year. Couldn't you have been like somebody who got murdered at the beginning of the episode? Like just you could have been a dead body lying in your own blood? Look, there was a, there were a lot. We had a little viewing party at our house on Friday. And I don't know if you saw the episode. I haven't seen it yet. Even by, even by the standards of the show, there's a lot of racing material in this way.

And they're like, you couldn't have, you couldn't have been like the random Amanda Pete. love interest for one, I was like, no, I could not. That was not going to be my role on this one. Not negotiate that one with the wife. All right. Well, it was fun. The whole cast was awesome. They were so fun. It was super fun. They made it easy. Because, you know, when you're a fish out of water like that, it's just, it's a little like, do I belong here? Is anyone like, what do I do? And they were all super nice. Well, congratulations. Now I can introduce you as your friends and neighbors co-stars, Zach Lowe. Yeah, I'm an actor now. I'm an actor now. I'm an actor.

acting. You sign up for SAG. I guess I could. You get fees, all that shit. All right. Zach Lowe, thanks for hanging out for the double pod.

We're probably not always going to do this, but with two game sevens that we thought we'd be pretty good. Neither of them were. It's fine. This round two should be fun. I'm looking forward to Nick Sixers. Thanks to Gahow and Eduardo as well.

Thanks to everybody behind the scenes at the ringer. Thanks to Netflix. There's something about Mary coming tomorrow on the rewatchables and then Zach's back on Tuesday on his podcast, breaking down a whole bunch.

stuff. Good to see you, buddy. Always fun. Always fun. Must be 21 plus in president's select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 plus in president in D.C., Kentucky, or Wyoming. Game in problem, call 100 Gambor or 1-800-Gampbell or 1-800-800-7-7-7-7-7.7. Or visit ccpg.g.gat in Connecticut

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