The Bill Simmons Podcast - Phoenix Rallies, GSW Needs CPR, Trae’s Stock Plummets and the Lakers’ Highway Widens With J. Kyle Mann and Haralabos Voulgaris

Episode Date: April 19, 2023

The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by J. Kyle Mann to discuss the Suns beating the Clippers to split the series 1-1 (2:01), Trae Young's negative impact on the Hawks, Knicks-Cavaliers Game 2, Draymond Green's suspension, whether the Warriors are dead, and more (21:49). Then Bill is joined by Haralabos Voulgaris to discuss the Warriors-Kings series and Lakers-Grizzlies (53:29), Heat-Bucks, Finals picks, and more (1:41:00) Host: Bill Simmons Guests: J. Kyle Mann and Haralabos Voulgaris  Producer: Kyle Crichton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Coming up, we stayed up late for Clip Suns. Are the Warriors dead? Should the Hawks trade Trae Young? 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.

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And listen to the end of the episode for additional details. You must be 21 plus and present in select states. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit rg-help.com. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where we put up a new episode of the Rewatchables on Monday night. We did Alien, one of the most influential sci-fi horror movies ever. Me, Sean Fennessey, Chris Ryan. It was a Hall of Fame episode. Had a great time. We recorded it in our revamped studio that we have just started messing around with recently, last couple weeks. It's great. We put up a thing on Twitter, Chris's Wayne Jenkins impersonation of Wayne Jenkins being an alien. But that whole video is going to run on YouTube. Wednesday afternoon, youtube.com slash at Bill Simmons.

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He stayed up late with me for Quip Sons. We talked about all three Tuesday games and Trey Young's future in Atlanta. Fun conversation. And then my friend Haral Bob Bulgaris, we taped with him earlier in the day before the news of Draymond's suspension, which we were guessing might happen, but it happened. He's out for game three. We spent a lot of time talking about whether the Warriors are dead or not, some historical science from the past. We talked about the Lakers. Is the path clear now for them to be the best team in the West, that they can stay healthy? Talk some poker. A lot of good stuff coming up. It's all next.

First, our friends from Pearl Jam. All right, taping this part of the pod. It is a little after 930. Tuesday night, just watch the Suns rally back and beat the Clippers. The series is tied at 1-1. Kyle Mann is here. There's a moment there in that first half when it got dark.

If you were a Suns fan, if you're a KD fan, if you're a Chris Paul fan or a Booker fan, where it was like, oh my God, are they going to fall down 0-2 to the Clippers? Are they going to get swept? For five minutes, my head was going all these different places, but they righted the ship. What did you think watching the game? I mean, this game in particular, this matchup of players like i i was going through i just want

to like make some like broad kind of like observations about like the collection of guys that are in this series like i pulled this just to be sure um you know in the past six seasons there have been let's see there have been 39 guys that have attempted over a thousand non-paint mid-range attempts and three of the top 10 most efficient guys are in this game um this is like a just battle of mid-range iso masters if you're like a youngster out there wanting to learn the mid-range iso game i feel like this is basically master class should just put this on their website and just use it for that purpose. But, I mean, early on, I think they had some trouble. I mean, it seemed like the tone of the game was set

with how aggressively Westbrook was playing. I mean, just denying everything, denying every catch for KD, making his life difficult. Then he picks up those two quick fouls, and it kind of felt like a little bit of a shift of energy. And then Kawhi gets going. I feel like we got kind of a reminder of how special Kawhi is. But then the energy just kind of shifted back.

It felt like once Phoenix got into a rhythm, because I just kind of feel like they have more scores and playmakers than the Clippers do overall, which I don't think is a hot take. It's crazy that this isn't the most fascinating round one series because Warriors Kings has taken the cake on that one. Booker plays 45 minutes. Durant plays 44. And they're playing again on Thursday. I'm just flagging that right away. Because one of the things that jumped out in game one was, hey, the supporting cast. What's going on there? Phoenix. How many of these guys do we actually trust? I think Monte Williams looked at the same thing and said, hmm, the supporting cast.

What am I going to do? Oh, I'll just play my two best guys a combined 89 minutes. Booker was incredible. He was torching Westbrook in the second half. Durant still has that. Don't you feel the new guy energy is still from Durant a little bit? He looks like he wandered into the pickup game sometimes, and he's fitting in because he's smart. He knows how to play basketball, but it still feels a little new car smellish, right? So, yeah, I mean, we're talking about a really limited sample size. I know you've talked a lot about, and I did a whole project about this, about just how impactful can a midseason trade be. But this is kind of uncharted territory. I mean, for a guy that, you know, these players all like each other and know each other. So it's not like they imported some stranger, you know, and they're all smart basketball players. But I think the thing about this that is going to make it flow and have kind of natural synergy once they get into a rhythm

is that these guys can all shoot, dribble, and pass. I think KD is an underrated passer. I think he's grown as a pick-and-roll player over the course of his career. And Booker had some phenomenal – other than just being in fuego hot, he's passing the ball well. And that kind of allows Chris Paul to pick his spots, which I don't think Chris has ever really been in this situation with this many...

I mean, the Harden thing, but this is probably the two highest quality players I feel like that he's played with at the same time, I'd say, unless I'm just forgetting something. No, it's the most normal, high-quality guys that he's played with. Wherever he's been, it's the most normal, high-quality guys that he's played with. Wherever he's been, it's people like...

Blake was always a little awkward and he was always bowling a China shoppie. They had a pretty effective screen role they used to run. But for the most part, I felt it was always

a little clumsy. DeAndre was the other best guy on that team. New Orleans, he basically had Tyson Chandler and David West. David West probably was the guy best guy in that team. New Orleans, he basically had Tyson Chandler and David West. David West probably was the guy that he had the best chemistry with until he got to Phoenix.

Yeah, he's got an embarrassment of riches, but there was in that first half, it did kind of seem like, it was like one of those CP's looks wash games. And then he rallied. It was like he had a really good thing of Gatorade at halftime or something. Yeah. The, from a Clipper standpoint,

it's just been so much fun to watch Kawhi with his, in his A plus game. Um, just, you know, Raheem was tweeting about, uh, the,

this is a case for load management. This is why they do that. Cause he looks 100%. He could not look more fresh. The Suns were just throwing the kitchen sink at him trying to fuck him up. I was looking at his playoff career stats since that 2017 season when he almost won the MVP. This is the 61st playoff game he's played. He's basically been 30 a game in the postseason. Now, he hasn't been in the postseason in two years,

but for the most part, he's been 39 and 5. 30 points, 9 rebounds, 5 assists, 51% shooting for six years. And you can feel it in every game. It just feels like him and Durant, they're just constants. You know you're going to look at the box score and they're going to be between 26 and 34, right? Somewhere in that range. Yeah, that stretch he had from 2016-17 to 2020-21

where he was playing. I mean, it's a 60-game sample of playoff games and he's at 30 points, like you said, and nearly five assists and shooting almost 40% from three. Man, the thing that kills me about him is like, when you watch his strength is so immense that like, it's not demonstrative. I mean, you watch some guys like Giannis fly around the court and Giannis has that lean strength, but he's kind of knocking into people. Like when Kawhi, you'll watch people like Akogi was up on him and Kawhi could just move him really subtly like he doesn't

have to push off and throughout this game I was just really amused at how I almost felt like Landry Shamit was like the the awkward nerdy kid trying to avoid the attention of the bully you know like on Freaks and Geeks whenever they would try to avoid the bullies I just felt like Shamit was like doing whatever he could to stay away from Kawhi, but Kawhi was just hunting him relentlessly. I thought that was going to be a problem, but I think the bigger problem for the Clippers, again, in this, we talked about the mid-range mastery here,

Stan Van Gundy set the record, I think, tonight for saying drop coverage on a broadcast. I think he said it something like in the neighborhood of 30,000 times. And that's an issue for them. I don't really know what they're going to do because Zubach is just not fast enough to check Booker or Durant at the level of screen. Maybe they go Batum. Batum's played center. I looked it up 41% of the time. I mean, but even he isn't what he used to be in terms of like lateral quickness.

Well, Van Gundy set a lot of records during this playoff series. I think he talked about contested shots. Priscilla was saying like he over and over again, the almost contest, got to contest that better. And then, uh, and the drop coverage stuff. I think we're spoiled

though, because yesterday's announcing we had Ian Eagle doing that. Where's King's game? And it was just magnificent. It was great. Brian Curtis did a thing on the PressBox pod with Shoemaker this week about how we're kind of in a golden age for play-by-play guys

with Mike Breen and Ian Eagle and Kevin Harlan, which are three of probably those five or six best play-by-play guys we've ever had. And they're all doing playoff games at the same time. I hadn't thought of it that way, but it, it, you do notice it when it's not one of those three guys, right? Yeah. I mean, I personally, I like, I like Steven Gunny. I enjoyed when he popped over and was doing college games. I just enjoy his kind of mania. I don't know. I love whenever

you can find those clips of him coaching where he just starts screaming and he almost looked like he made himself dizzy because he got so amped up in the game. I don't know. I'm a big fan of both of them. Gunny Brothers on the call. The Russ's comeback. Russ had 28 today. He wasn't as effective as he was in the last game.

But the fact that he's relevant at all is pretty. I wouldn't call it Travolta Pulp Fiction level comeback, but he was somebody that I had completely written off as being any sort of anything in any playoff series ever again in my lifetime. Had you written him off completely or did you feel like somebody was going to tap into him somehow? I mean, I wasn't optimistic going into this. I love that comparison about like great directors can kind of stunt cast people that other people couldn't kind of like, I guess Belichick was like a master of that, right? He's like that guy that you guys think has no value.

He could come over here and be awesome for us. Like I'm trying to think of the best examples of NBA teams that have done that. I mean, some of the, it's always like you have to have like incredible infrastructure to like pull that off. But I guess, I mean, Ty Lue, the bell chick of the NBA, right? He, it seems like he's gotten through to him in terms of like communicating effort, but also Russ has a lot of kind of personal motivation in this series that is pretty obvious and apparent across the board.

Cause I don't think him and CP3 are boys. And obviously the Kevin Durant thing goes super deep. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, I'm trying to think the best rejuvenation was probably Bob McAdoo. He's basically out of the league. The Lakers kind of just grabbed him and all of a sudden he had that 82 Lakers team,

which I think is probably the most underrated, like high, high level championship team. Like I was when I was doing my book, watching some of the stuff they were doing that year, like they were running full court press shit and all kinds. They were so athletic. They were just ridiculously more athletic than anyone else who was in the league at that standpoint. And McAdoo was had been done and they basically brought him back to life. Westbrook's not quite at that level, but he's certainly way more impactful than I ever imagined. Another thing happened in this game, the Scott Foster streak. Scott Foster now trends on Twitter every time he gets assigned to a game. And I don't know if it's my Twitter feeds me stuff

they know I might be interested in, but it's on that right side of the screen. And it just said, Scott Foster's trending. I'm like, Oh no, what'd he do? Oh, he just got assigned to a game with Chris Paul. Um, and it was a whole day of, Oh my God, Scott Foster, Chris Paul, sons are screwed. And yet, uh, the sons actually won. But when I was, I was in the car for the first half and the announcers were complaining about like, Oh, Scott Foster, we got to watch this. Can you remember another ref in recent history who has a shadow over playoff games that he's pretty notorious. And there are a few guys that have had problems, but I don't really, I can't. Yeah, you would love TV Teddy if you're not, if you haven't checked him out. But no, man, I can't think of another one.

I mean, if they presented you with like Scott Foster on your Twitter trending like 100 days in a row, how many of those days would you particularly not click it? I feel like that's just like right acutely in your wheelhouse. Yeah, Elon knows. Yeah, but I guess Bovetta was like this once upon a time. That's a good one.

There was some Joey Crawford stuff where it was always kind of interesting to see where he would go. But Foster is definitely the leader of the pack. So, Booker cooking today. Cerruti wanted us to do a Kentucky draft of everybody who is in the playoffs right now. And we're picking the guys right now from a most impactful standpoint. Who would you want in a playoff series?

You're a Kentucky guy. You're the perfect guy to do this. Is Anthony Davis number one for you? I think so. I think so. I mean, there's always the risk, you know, the very obvious risk that he's going to fall down. He's fallen down. He did that even when he was here all the time to the point where it kind of became comedy. But yeah, there were times where we thought he was dead, you know, even during the big tournament runs. We're like, is he okay? Because he would fall and he would just kind of look like whenever those like pop up tents would fall down and there'd just be a pile of like the rods and you had to kind of straighten them out. No, but you said it the other day on the pod.

I think that like, I, I think that when he's healthy, I still think he's the most impactful defensive player in the world. Like, you know, end to end, like he just, and you saw some stuff with like Mobley tonight that kind of reminded me of AD where like, you know, you'll get in like a transition sequence and you'll see him in a two-on-one and just be like I'm punting I'm not even gonna try because he's just he's I still think he's that level of of impact player defensively especially agree he'll probably fall down tomorrow um second pick De'Aaron Fox is that

crazy I mean I had him second team all NBA. He's torching the Warriors right now. How is he not the second best Kentucky asset at any playoff guy you'd want? He's been good, man. I mean, he's been great. Good doesn't even cover it. I mean, he's been at the Warriors cannot stay in front of him. They can't keep him out of the lane.

Some of that was like they started with Kuminga in the game, and I was talking with KOC about this. He just kind of played himself out of the game. Some of that was like, you know, they started with Kuminga in the game and I was talking with KOC about this. He just kind of played himself out of the game because he couldn't guard anybody. But I don't know that I would have Fox 2.

I can't quite get there just because the playoff pedigree of some of these other guys is better. But, you know, there's no denying how phenomenal. And I do think

the Sabonis pairing has done a lot for Fox. Like, I think it's like lessened some of his weaknesses and enhanced some of his strengths in a good way. So who's number two for you? I'd still have Booker, too, I think. I think we saw the shot-making for him late game.

I believe in it a little more than I do with Fox. And I think he's just a more well-rounded player. I think defensively too. I think we're seeing him play some pretty good defense in these playoffs. I think I'd have him too. I think that's fair. I think I agree with you, but I also think we just put another chip on De'Aaron Fox's shoulder.

His shoulder's full of chips. We just added another one. Obviously, Malik Monk is four. Who do you have? I'm kidding. SGA, I guess, would be four, even though we've barely seen him in the playoffs. But he's got to be a top four.

We can't have a top Kentucky guy conversation and list four guys and not have him be one of the four. Yeah, I had Shea three and I had Bam four. I think Murray Fox is more of a conversation for me if Murray is fully healthy, just because we've seen it's the same thing. I mean, we've seen Murray really do it in multiple rounds on in multiple situations. That's kind of my thing. What else does Fox have to do? He's completely destroyed the Warriors. I know. How does he win your love, Kyle, man? This feels like some 2017 baggage. Oh, no. It's more, I've had a hard time.

I don't know. And I've been open about this. I've always just had a hard time with Fox. I mean, I've tried to give him a lot of credit, and he's answered a lot of the things that I had problems with. It's one of those things. I don't know what the cathartic moment's going to have to be for me to flip the script on him.

I just, I don't know. I mean, you're not wrong. I think that the Fox-Murray-Shea conversation, I would personally pick Shea still, like in terms of the drawing the fouls and stuff, and I think he's just a tough cover still. But I don't know. I don't know what the answer to that. You've cornered me in a way that I don't have a great answer,

honestly, on the Fox thing. I hope this ends up on a Kentucky message board. I picked SGA for the season. I had him first team on NBA and I think I had him fifth for MVP. But the stuff that Fox is doing against the Warriors has my head spinning. Talk about it with Laurel Bob later in the podcast. Would you have... Man, I can't believe how many good Kentucky guys there's been. How did you guys not win like 10 titles? Don't do this to me.

Why? Why can't I do this? Look at this. I'll just read America the list. This is just an order of points per game. SGA, Booker, Anthony Davis, Julius Randall, Darren Fox, Kelton Johnson, Cat, Bam, Maxie, Hero, Jamal Murray, PJ Washington, Quickly, Monk, my guy Shaden Sharp, Jared Vanderbilt, Trey Lyles. It just goes on and on. It's a hell. It's probably 19 deep, honestly Vanderbilt, Trey Lyles. It just goes on and on. It's probably 19 deep, honestly.

I mean, you start getting into the Diallo, winning Gabriel, tie-tie range, and that was a grab bag of like, I don't know what to do with a lot of these. Willie's not even in the league right now. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's a legit. And then you think about Shaden.

I don't know, in a playoff game, what would Shaden do if he's getting open shots? He's just like a pretty... He's a chaos element. I don't know what he would do in the playoffs. He'd be a fast-hitting one, honestly. Well, you know I have

a ton of Shaden stock. The case for trading Dame Lillard is not just what you get back because that team's not winning a title in the next couple years of them anyway, but also now you go full rebuild, then you can really see what you have is Shaden Sharp. I think if they do the redraft

from last year, he's higher than seven. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. In my eval of him, I kind of came to the conclusion. I was like, there is definitely a world where we could look back at this draft and he's as high as a redraft and he's as high as two. I mean, he's that kind of came to the conclusion. I was like, there is definitely a world where we could look back at this draft and he's as high, like a redraft, and he's as high as two. I mean, he's that kind of talent.

I'll be curious to see. I was telling Kevin, if the Blazers get up in the top three-ish range and they somehow could get a shot at Scoot, I find that pretty fascinating. If they wanted to go forward with those two guys, that is a lot of athleticism in a backcourt, man. But, yeah, it's super deep. There are a lot of guys through here. And how we didn't win the titles during that era,

I probably need to write something about this at some point because I have a ton of thoughts that I've been thinking about for the last decade. But honestly, it's probably roster building and Cal's preferences. And there's a lot. And bad luck here and there. But it's hard to defend with the depth of the talent, man. It really is.

Well, with those one and done guys, sometimes you just get them a little bit early, right? You're getting them in the soap opera TV actor phase of their career, like before they became movie stars. You know, like growing pains can't be like, how did we not win the Emmy with Leo? It's like Leo was 14. It's good. For the redraft,

Palo, Jalen Williams has to be second for me. Santa Clara, shout out to the Sharks. And then three's kind of up for grabs. There's a lot of candidates for three. Kessler's probably, I would say, the favorite, but from a talent standpoint, I was so disappointed Sharp didn't do the slam dunk contest, even though the slam dunk contest is dumb and All-Star Weekend is stupid. But I just feel like Sharp would have gone on the map in a totally different way.

I don't know if the average basketball fan understands how athletic that dude is. You have to be like stealth league pass fucking weirdo nerds like us to see it he needs a branding moment i think that's kind of like i feel like the dunk contest has lost that power like maybe just because it's it's different for every guy you know i guess but like the superstars don't want to take a ding i guess there's just a lot of upside if you're an unknown you know if you have an incredible dunk contest moment which i think he would have and very likely would have won but yeah i mean i i think it's of course we'll have to see

chet play but a lot you know um yeah i'm with you on jaylen williams at two though i'm a big obviously oh i forgot about chet yeah because chet wasn't on my list because he didn't play last year i kept waiting for him to come out of the locker room, like professional wrestling, where it was like one of the playing games and there was just like glass breaking and music. It was like, my God, what's that? Oh my God, that's Chet Holgen's music. Where'd it come from? And he just came out and played 25 minutes.

The rubber band man. It'd be like a Jason Isbell, like a love song. All right, let's take a break and we got to talk about this trade-off situation. The NBA playoffs are here. Turn crossovers into cash with FanDuel. Visit fanduel.com slash BS right now. Place a $5 bet.

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So Trey Young, who in the first two games where the Hawks got lambasted by the Celtics, the only glimmers of light, of hope, of anything was when Trey Young was not in the game and the offense revolved around DeJounte Murray. This is kind of what it's looked like this year for them. There's been a little push and pull and there's been a your turn, my turn kind of feel to those two guys. Trey, as the point guards in the league, get better and deeper and we're just more and more good guards

to decent guards just everywhere. And as the Curry generation kind of trickles into the league, every year it gets worse for him defensively. And you look at the Celtics team that just has all of these guards. We talked about it Sunday. It's a worst case matchup for him. And there's been trade rumors about him anyway.

And he's gone through two coaches already, and the instinct would be like, oh, well, they'll just trade him. I think it's a lot harder to find a Trae Young trade than maybe people realize, where the asset that you think you have versus the other 29 teams in the league and who's set at guard,

who's set with their expensive guys, that list gets small right away. I tasked you, could you find four teams that would make sense for a trade? Did you get to four? I got to three with some help from you guys. I mean, when you start looking across the landscape

of the league and you're just thinking about who would potentially make a move like this fit kind of is really difficult like when you start looking at like the the different the different teams like where would he fit basketball wise who would be willing to take him on i think part of the problem here is just that i think that atlanta dug in a little long you know i'm kind of a believer i've heard you know i'm going to act like I'm some financial expert or guru, but I've heard financial people talk about whenever you're trying to build up,

you're trying to save some money in a serious way that it should probably sting a little. You want to save a little bit where you feel it. I just feel like when you're trading a player like this that you maybe have questions about, that you should trade them a little early so that it stings a little bit like you got to catch people off guard a little bit you know like because if you wait like i feel like they've waited to the point where the market is just rough for him in a way where it i i don't even know what the fit would be that like for him basketball wise it's more about just like what team would be either desperate. I don't know what the word would be. Like what team, I don't want to say dumb, but I mean like basketball-wise,

I just have lost a lot of faith in him. I mean, the one that you all brought up that I thought was, Cerruti like recoiled in terror when we brought up Orlando. He didn't want to hear that at all. Houston was an interesting one. Well, Orlando, if it was, they have cap space and let's say they get like the seventh pick and Atlanta's like, yeah, we'll just take the seventh pick for Trey. You have to take his salary.

Trey's 40 million next year, 43, 45 and 48. Cerruti got like, I felt like he was pissed on the text thread. I didn't even think he was like having fun with it. He was just like, no fucking way. Keep that guy away from us. The Houston thing, I guess, is interesting, but I don't know how he fits with Jalen Green. That sounds like the worst basketball team.

Those are two high usage rates guys. And it just sounds like not that much fun for other guys. I was thinking San Antonio as a possibility. Oh, like the stunt casting thing a little bit? Yeah, here's a talented guy. Here's a guy who's had success. He made the Eastern Finals, even though it was a little fool's gold.

We don't have a max guy necessarily because we have those Keldon Johnson type guys. And maybe we could fit them into our infrastructure and teach them how to be a little more of a team first point guard. Possible. Washington, that would be a classic Washington move to trade like Beal for Trae Young. And I don't even know who would have to throw in a pick in there. And then the only one I could think of was if Utah said, fuck it, we'll bet on the talent.

We have all these picks. We don't really necessarily have like a, you know, I guess they have Clarkson, you know, that they could throw back in the trade. Maybe they could take on some side. I don't know. But that's it. I mean, I couldn't really come up with any other names.

Even you say he's from Oklahoma. Wow, that would make total sense, Oklahoma City. They would never in a million years. They have Gideon Shea. They would never even consider it. Yeah. OKC has insane size on the perimeter. There would be no reason to pivot away from what they have going on.

I was thinking Minnesota. That what they have going on. I was thinking Minnesota. And that's purely me going on. They took a big gamble with Gobert. They saw something in him. I was like, maybe Cat gets moved at some point. And you think, but Trey and Anthony Edwards together. It almost makes me think that it would go the opposite way. But it brings so many questions about play style, man.

You'd have to assume he'd have to change his style of play. He brings into all these questions about how you build your roster. Because if you have a guy, speaking of Charks, Charks used to have this saying, when you draft a little guy and he's a big part of what you do, you're out of the little guy business. You're in a totally different business, which is you automatically are in the Philly 2000s situation where you have to build

around your Iverson type player. This is a crazy stat that I pulled up the other day. When Trey is off the floor for the Hawks, the Hawks pass the ball literally 30 more times per 100 possessions and they turn the ball over half as much so it's just you were talking about them looking good i mean yeah they look different when he's not on the floor and i just don't i don't know how you sell that to somebody else yeah i was thinking like his usage rate which you know has always been in like the 33 to 35 range basically. From the moment he got there and they do the Luca trade and it's like, this is his team. We think he could be our Steph Curry,

right? They're coming out of the gate with that. The kid's like 20 and it's just trace team, trace team, trace team. There's no bad shot he can take, right? If he's within 35 feet,

it's fair. It was like watching parents with a kid just letting the kid do whatever the fuck the kid wanted. It's like, what time you want to go to bed tonight? I'll go to bed at one in the morning. Well, you're eight, but that's fine. That sounds great. Want some chocolate? How about a Coke before you go to bed? That's kind of how Atlanta treated him. And then it's like, oh, you don't get along with your coach? We'll fire him. We'll bring in another coach. And he had the ball all the time. And then they had the carrot of they had a little playoff run. And even people like me and Rosilla, who were very firmly on the, we don't think this guy's a winning player side. We were like, all right, well, they're winning with this guy. So I guess

we're wrong. But that turned out to be an even worse thing because now you're like tripling down and like, see, everything we're doing with this guy is the right thing. And now he's five years into the league and we've seen this. This is stuff that happened in the previous generation all the time with the Stefan Marbury, Steve Francis, those guys where they'd put up stats, the results weren't really there, but they're treated like superstars and they weren't. I don't know if I'm ready to get there with Trey. I think the thing that alarms me about him is that he just doesn't shoot the three that well.

And that's like the all-time misnomer with him. In your head, you're thinking he's this 40% Stephen Curry type of three-point shooter. And he's really not. He makes one out of every three. And that's kind of who he is. And he doesn't play defense. So what am I getting?

Yeah, he's had a tough week, I feel like, on the ringer. I feel like we've been pretty hard on him. And whenever we talk about him not being a winning player, I agree with you. But I always feel like I have to like clarify, like double back and clarify that. Like, I don't think that it's the, he doesn't want to win. Like he's a competitive son of a bitch.

Like if you watch it, he's a villain. I love when he's in that mode. Like when he, when he's like, and he seems to get riled up by it, but it's just like he has all these, he just has these play style things. Like he's way more talented than like Marbury and Steve Francis like he's an incredible passer but you're right like the I think the Curry thing is following him almost in a similar way to like the KD thing followed Ingram for a long time you know where we were just like well he's not KD we thought he was KD it's like

well who put that out there who like started that messaging? Should we just judge him on that forever? Trey is a legitimately great talent. It makes you wonder if his shot selection changed, would that percentage change? Because he settles a lot. He takes a lot of really tough threes in transition. But we saw tonight when he comes up against these teams in the East, like Boston, that are physical and can switch him, put him in a crowd, make him put air under his passes to where, like, the help can come.

Like, he is somebody that has issues. And it's like, I don't know, maybe he should, like, look at the way Chris Paul played over the course of his career and figure out how to emulate that in a way, you know, because Chris Paul never really ran up against these issues in the same way. Yeah, but the problem is Chris Paul, he was a pure point guard who went into games thinking, how am I going to get all the stuff I need, but also make everyone else better? I don't feel like Trae Young is a, how am I going to make everyone else better?

Oh, John Collins hasn't gotten a shot in a couple of minutes. I better take care of him. That's not really what he does. And even if you go back to that 21 playoffs, where we averaged 29 a game, 9.5 assists, shot 42%, 16 playoff games, three-point percentage, 31, you know, turnovers, four.

He just had the ball a ton and it worked and i and i think we probably overrated it in retrospect because whatever was going on with that weird philly team you know that they beat the knicks in round one that next team now we look back at that next team like man that next team yikes yeah that was like julius Julius Randle, Derek Rose on his last legs. And really, there just wasn't a lot there. And then the Philly series, I still don't know how Philly lost that series. And then they go against the Bucks and Giannis gets hurt during the series. They lose in six. But I think there's talent there. I'm with you, which is why somebody will talk themselves into trading for him and giving up something real for him because they're going to look at the glass half full of it.

But in the East against teams like Boston and Drew Holiday in that conference, there's real issues for him long-term. And the other thing with Atlanta is they have another guard who it seems like they play better with. It just seems like that's kind of Murray's team. Yeah. Even though it's not his team. Murray's a two-way player. I mean, he's a guy that brings a lot. He has great size.

He's just not as conditional. I think sometimes you reach a point where it's just like, maybe it's just better for everybody just to have a reset. It's probably better. Now, at that point, you're probably not going to get the quarters on the dollar, the cents on the dollar that you want in the trade, but I feel like we're far past that anyway, honestly, with him. I'm not sure how it's going to end.

That is a big, big salary that they gave him. Would you rather have Derek White or Trey Young? If I'm trying to win a playoff series, it's probably Derek White, honestly. He's going to blend into what I'm doing. Yeah, he's going to blend into what I'm doing. I know people are going to point to the counting stats and be like, he's so talented.

It's like, yeah, but that's taking the place of efficient offense. That's always my problem with the inflated counting stat thing, with the Russ thing. From 2016, it was like, yeah, crazy counting stats, but there's all these, the ceiling, I'm going to hit my head on the ceiling at some point. That's how you got to build a team. 20 points in a game, how many guys could put up between 22 and 28 if they were just on a bad team trying to get stats? I think the list is a lot longer than people realize. It's longer than it's ever been.

Yeah, look at the bad teams like Houston, San Antonio, a team like Detroit. Sadiq Bey was like, it felt like he could have gotten 30 in any Pistons game, but that team was going nowhere. Jalen Green had games where he'd have like 38, but that was a 20-win team, whatever they ended up with.

San Antonio would have the same thing, random dudes on a random night. So I'm always really dubious of how you're getting the stats. Celts look great. I mean, this is the perfect round one series. This just couldn't have worked out better over playing that crazy Miami team. Instead, they just hit the lottery. They get the Hawks, a team they know they can beat. I think they beat them seven straight times. None of these games have been close. They're just overpowering them. It's not worth talking about.

Cavs-Knicks, the most interesting thing about that one was something that I think was easy to predict and Russell and I talked about on Sunday. Darius Garland's really good at basketball and they made him irrelevant on Sunday. Today, they really made a concerted effort to get him involved, get him going. He had an awesome game. He dunked. There was a Darius Garland dunk. And the Knicks had that air of like, we kind of got the game we needed to get already. he dunked. There was a Darius Garland dunk. Um,

and the Knicks had that air of like, we kind of got the game we needed to get already. Get some banged up guys. We're good. Moby. I thought looked way more like Moby in this game. Um, what'd you see in that,

in anything else in that Cavs Knicks game jumped out? Uh, I think that the crux of it, you hit like, I mean, the Knicks obviously were wobbly and hobbled and you know josh hart they didn't get the same kind of like out-of-body experience from him in this one like he wasn't as active on the glass i think they kept jalen brunson off the off the free throw line there were a lot of different things that worked another big thing

too is that you know a court they sat a coral just flat out sat him. I mean, he played two minutes. Deservedly. Yeah. And you combine that with the fact that Garland is a guy that is, he's such a smart player. The balance for him between playmaking and scoring, I think he is so, he almost has a Steve Nash quality where you're like, you remember Nelly used to get mad at Steve Nash and like scream at him to like shoot the ball. I just feel like Garland is so deferring in some situations that when he actually is aggressive, it just unlocks everything for them. Like you're not going to,

I think like Donovan Mitchell had like one of the highest field goal attempt like accounts of the season in that past game. You can't rely on him like that. And I was, I went and looked it up.

Like his aggressiveness shooting the ball just unlocks everything like you know it's his dribble pull-up threes he's shooting 45.7 percent on dribble pull-up threes this year that's uh second spectrum but um jesus yeah i mean the more aggressive he is on ball the more you know it opens up for them and it'll be for and it just trickles down the line like you know it gets lavert was screening for him. And it just trickles down the line. Levert was screening for him. It gets everybody looks.

He had 11 free throws tonight too, which I liked. He's a passive bystander in that Sunday game. For some reason, it turned into the Mitchell show and then it turned into a Mitchell Brunson thing and Garland was kind of hanging out like Merrill Chalmers in the 2011 Heat.

It did not make sense to me. They made a concerted effort to kind of give him the car case today. Mitchell only took 11 shots. Now the game was mostly decided, but to me, that was why I thought they were going to win the series because both of those guys,

depending on what's going on, can control a quarter, can control half of a quarter. So they figured out that balance. And then it seems like they stumbled into something with how to defend Brunson if they needed to, where they're sending a second guy at him and just kind of giving them different looks other than just having them cook somebody one-on-one. But here's the thing, it's a pretty young team and they're going to New York for three and four. Crowd's going to be locked in. And they do have a little bit of an issue with the backup big situation, which dates back to the

getting rid of Kevin Love for no reason. Even today, it's a blowout. Moby plays 39 minutes and Jared Allen plays 35, right? That game was over two and a half quarters into it. There's foul trouble possibilities with those. It's a dangerous game by game bet with the Cavs because Moby gets the two quick ones with four minutes into game three or whatever, and they don't really have a lot of options. The other thing is they unlock LaVert a little bit too. He played 40 minutes tonight. So maybe they're just like, all right. So basically the shot distribution of instead of having Mitchell take 30 shots or 28, Levert gets 16, Garland gets 17 and some free throws and Mitchell 11. Mitchell's not going to take 11 shots every game, but the balance was better.

Do you like Bickerstaff as a coach? Because my jury is deliberating right now and they have Chick-fil-A and they just ordered some tuna fish and they got some sodas and they're not sure. I'm always hesitant to make these calls just because there's so much that goes on. There's so much. You can kind of look at the strategy. And I always joke that people attack coaches in a way that like is hard to like argue with they'll just say something kind of like nebulous and vague and you're like well i don't know it's like but with like with him they made an adjustment today but they have a lot of things going on that i think are more like roster building issues rather than

you know like i don't know how many moves he has it's kind of similar it's kind of similar to ty lou and that like they have some like big guy issues that i don't know that they're going to be able to to shore up maybe they stagger mobley and allen in some kind of way and like run them separately at the five so that they don't run into issues another thing too is that like um you know in this game like you know they didn't get as much efficient offense out of randall they didn't get as much efficient offense out of out of rj I feel like the Knicks are going to have a big game. I don't know. You think this one's going to go six or seven?

You feel like it's going to go the distance? If you had to pick one series to go seven in round one based on everything we've seen so far, I think this might be the pick. It's a great matchup. It's going to have, it's just going to have some ebbs and some flows.

I think for the East, this would be the pick. West, Suns, Clippers, maybe. I still wonder, like, the KD thing is so hard to figure out with that series, where he might just be comfortable by game four. Be like, all I figured it out I'm not the new guy anymore yeah give me the ball I'm gonna have 45 um but uh I would say Knicks Cavs which not surprising because we talked about that before the playoffs all of us like all right that one smells like it could go six or seven. I think the Grizzlies-Lakers could have gone, had seven-game potential, but it's just between Ja,

now it looks like he's out at least for game two, and all the other injuries they had. I'd find it hard to believe the Lakers aren't going to win that series unless one of the two guys goes down. Yeah, and then I was going to say too, the other big thing that came out tonight, I is that like it certainly seems like the kings if draymond's not going to be playing it's definitely seems like and there's a whole lot of like legacy draymond stuff that i think just inevitably is kind of like unearthed by by what happened here especially when they're

trying to extend their window but it just kind of feels like the kings are going to have the warriors in that like arm wrestling position where the arm is totally at a 45-degree angle. It's like, how are they going to get out of this? It's going to take some voodoo from the basketball gods, I feel like, for them to recover. But I kind of am with you. The Knicks and the Cavs are just evenly matched. I like that they have a lot of young guys. It's still both of these teams are pretty young.

They're trying to get over the hump. It's just a mano-a-mano thing. Whereas the Clippers and the Suns, it's just sort of an evolved version. It's a lot more veteran-driven kind of a thing. But it could go seven. Those two, I think, are the most interesting to me, though, honestly. Haral Bob's coming up and the esteemed gambler,

the legend. And we talked a lot about warriors versus Kings, not knowing that Draymond had been suspended because we taped it earlier today. So quickly on the suspension thing, um, they mentioned how it was his previous history factored into the suspension, which I'm pretty sure I've never heard before from the NBA.

I don't want to 100% say I'm positive, but I'm like 98% sure they've never said that before. Part of me wonders Adam Silver being there and seeing Draymond really trying to rile up the crowd and kind of a crazy way, whether that factored in too. But this felt like a fuck you to the Warriors from my vantage point, from the league. I don't think the Warriors are the most popular franchise, even though in some ways they're the model franchise, right? They bought the team, they increased it as an asset, they built around homegrown players. They built a new arena that they financed themselves. They do a lot of that stuff. But there's definitely an arrogance with them. They blew up the salary structure last year

with how much they spent on that title, which basically led to some of the stuff we've seen And the Draymond thing, you know, 2016, this year, I just wonder if that had been a different team, whether that person gets suspended for a game. Like if that was Jason Tatum, would they have just said, oh, he's not normally like that. Maybe it was an accident. Like it really did seem they brought Draymond's history into it and that was how they made the decision with that said he definitely stopped them

wouldn't you be annoyed if you were the Warriors though like I I just I don't know I but I guess that's kind of that that is sort of like a zoomed in and zoomed out like look at his career because if you think about the way he's officiated, he has this relationship with the officials where he can push it further than other guys can. And they're just kind of that familiarity just changes things. And within the organization, people people are like, well, that's just Draymond. And you just kind of put up with it to a certain extent. But yeah, man, like including past history is bizarre. I don't know that I think it's right.

Honestly, like I don't know. I don't know that that that is a good precedent to set. You think I just I don't know that I think it's right. Honestly, I don't know. I don't know that that is a good precedent to set. Do you think? I don't know about that. I don't think it's a good precedent at all. I do wonder, the Warriors behind the scenes have done a lot of bitching over the years about

Draymond getting suspended for Game 5 in 2016. And it's justified bitching because they could have rescinded the flagrant and gotten to play. I don't think shit like that should decide a championship in a lot of ways that decision did. So I don't think the Warriors have been shy

about that over the years. So it felt a little like to bring in football like Goodell when Deflategate happened where he brought in the Spygate baggage with Deflategate as part of the penalty for it where they were just like,

fuck this guy. So I asked Bob coming up in the next segment, hopefully not stepping on it too much, but I was like, do you think, is it possible the Warriors could get swept here?

Because there's a lot of elements and we, in the next segment, we bring in a lot of the history and some of the teams from the past that just, that the great teams that just died or the very good teams that just all of a sudden died. I feel like the Kings could sweep them and we broke it down. So I'll ask you, what do you think? Is the sweep in play for you now? Yeah, absolutely it is. Because for a number of reasons, the Warriors are leaning very, very heavily on tough shot making right now.

They're not getting the downhill cutting that they normally get. And the defensive issues, I think, were existent already in this. We saw what they were like on the road. I think one of the big takeaways from this is that we've all been excited for Sacramento, and it's been so long since they've been in the playoffs, and they're playing this style that you wondered if it was like, okay, they're getting people back on their heels during the regular season. People aren't ready for this energy that they have in the playoffs.

But the Warriors kind of went through this a little bit too and they were coming up where we were just like no come on like you don't believe it until it like actually solidifies and has happened I think that's been one of the big shifts is that like people were kind of like patting the Kings on the head on the head and being like good job all right we're happy for you guys you made it in I think the big thing here is that like it's real I like that's the thing and it's like the warriors had their issues i don't know that like the kings are going to go on to win the title but absolutely they can sweep them now if it's going to be 3-0 you just wonder at what point they are going to get up so much energy for that closeout game maybe they shit their pants and they don't seal the deal because they're gonna have to do it on the road but yeah i mean i think it could it could happen i don't know that like i don't seal the deal because they're going to have to do it on the road. But yeah, I mean, I think it could happen.

I don't know that like, I don't know if it will, but it definitely could happen. Like, you know. Well, I hate bringing in Kings history. This would be awful if they don't win the series now. You take a two nothing lead. You have game seven at home. Draymond suspended for game three. From a matchup standpoint,

the Warriors really only have one guy who can create a shot at this point. And they've figured out how to stymie that in a lot of ways. Offensively, you have multiple guys you can go to every game that seem like they can have their way. And it's just like everything is lined up. And they'd have to lose four out of the next five to blow this series, one of which won't have Draymond Green. This would be a fucking disaster loss. I hate to go there, but holy shit. You couldn't put this on a platter better than right now.

This is definitely one of those Ricky Bobby, don't put, I feel like you just putting that in the air. I feel like all Sacramento is praying and just saying the rosary. I don't know. Well, on the flip side, even Curry just winning game three without Draymond. So it's going to be Looney, Kaminga, super small with Wiggins at the five. What do they do? They're not really deep. Jermichael Green's unplayable. like super small with Wiggins at the five. Like, what do they do? They don't, they don't,

they're, they're not really deep. Jamichael Green's unplayable. So, you know, and Draymond is the best defender in the team by far other than Wiggins. It's basically those two. So you couldn't stop this team anyway.

Yeah. Even when they go small with Draymond, they've tried. I mean, they've tried there. They're just getting pulverized on the glass. Like, I just don. I said this to somebody last night. I was like, I can't believe I'm'm just like, man, I need to, like, snap out of it. Like, this really – because I've kind of been throughout the year, I've been a little bit, like, eye roll at, like, the discussion around the Warriors.

We're like, are they done? Are they dead? And I was like, I have to see their dead body before I'm going to believe it. You know, like, I just – I thought that – but they're trouble, man. Like, the Kings have something real here. And they, I just don't, I don't know that they have a defensive adjustment that's going to work for this

because Kaminga can't stay on the floor. We're going to talk about it with Ralph Bob next. Kyle, man, great to see you as always. I'm going to make you stay up with us later as we keep doing these during the playoffs. Good to see you.

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All right, we're taping this. It is 11.20 a.m. Pacific time on Tuesday. I am joined by the man, the myth, the legend, Haral Bob Valgaris. Once upon a time, the 2004 finals, a massive upset. Kobe, Shaq, Carl Malone, Gary Payton, the dream team.

They win game one and they end up getting smoked. Did they win game one, Bob? No, they lost. They lost game one, won game two. Yeah, won game two in overtime, I believe. Right. Yeah.

And then game three on, you start riding Detroit. You're like, I don't like the smell of this Lakers team. Detroit is younger, faster, hungrier. I'm going to ride the Pistons. And the rest was history. Yeah, that was one of the better ones for sure. I think at the start of the series, the Lakers were like a 7-1 favorite,

if I remember correctly. It's pretty crazy. Yeah. Wow. It's pretty clear after game two that the Pistons were just way more athletic, way more physical. They got almost every loose ball.

We're getting to the free throw line more. We're actually shooting threes too, which the Lakers, they didn't shoot a ton of threes back then, neither team, but Pistons were getting more threes I think than the Lakers if I remember correctly but I don't exactly remember they were deeper

their depth was a big factor the Lakers basically Malone was hurt they had three and a half guys their bench fell apart they're getting old there are all these signs but we ignored all of them which brings us to Warriors Kings we're going to go through history with some other times this happened but Warriors, Warriors down to nothing.

First time in the career, they've been down 0-2. There's some signs that this parallels some other times this has happened in history, but just fundamentally when you watch this, do the Kings feel younger, faster, hungrier, all that stuff? Just eye test. Definitely seem faster. I mean, they both are on a similar offense, but the speed in which the Kings are executing is marked. There's a huge difference between that. So I would say definitely faster. Hungrier, sure, maybe. I mean, the crowd definitely helps.

The thing people are forgetting is this is a Golden State team that won 11 games on the road this year, just three games more than the Pistons won on the road. So we shouldn't be too surprised that they're struggling as much as they are. They haven't been a good road team all year, but it does look like the Kings are

right now a little bit more... I mean, the one thing also as energy group realizes is the Kings aren't even really shooting well. That's the other part of it. They're not shooting well and they're still winning. I think they shot like 24% or something like that from three last game and one. So it's not like they're getting hot and lucky. If anything, they're just kind of outworking and out executing and certainly from an athletic standpoint, they look markedly better. Game one, I chalked it up to Fox. Fox was amazing,

which he's been really good all year, but he was amazing in that game. And Malik Monk was, you know, he might do that once or twice a series, just transcend it offensively, which he'll do it from time to time. Game two, Warriors make the adjustments. They're used to the crowd now. They won't get the same Monk game, and the Warriors are going to win. Right when Draymond gets thrown out, it felt like for about three minutes there, the Warriors really looked like last year's Warriors again. They had Peyton and Wiggins out at the same time

with Draymond, with Klay, with Curry, and they were flying around defensively, and the Kings were matching the speed, which I was like, this isn't great. And then Draymond gets knocked out of the game. That flips, that flips the emotion in the crowd. It felt like Curry was going to go into fuck you mode for a second, but they were just doing so many things with him. It was hard for him to get on track. I was alarmed for the Warriors that the Kings were matching their speed, even in the moments leading up to the Draymond game. It was the first time I was like, wait a second, did I have this series wrong? Because the Kings were matching their speed, even in the moments leading up to the Draymond game.

It was the first time I was like, wait a second, did I have this series wrong? Because the Warriors were favored and they were probably favored too high. But I just like, this is the classic, oh yeah, this would be a nice little, they'll throw some haymakers, but ultimately the Kings, good learning experience. A little like when the Warriors played the Clippers that year,

Mark Jackson's last year. And the Clippers, they got a lot of good reps. And so, all right, we'll carry this over next year. But the Kings, like, I don't know. I actually think the Kings are going to win this series. And I actually think that the sweep is possibly in play because the thing that really scared me. Well, I mean, I'm not disagreeing that they'll win the series,

but like a sweep, I'm not saying they won't sweep, but that's a pretty huge prediction, I think. I don't know. Look, they gave up 1.4 points per possession yesterday when Green was out. They're clearly much better defensively with Green. The question is, can they score with them?

And they also are faster with Green in there. So the Green ejection was big. The game was still tight at that point. So it could have gone either way. I think the main thing that I would be worried about if I were Golden State is I just don't think they have

the depth or the ability. They don't have any way of getting Curry to get a shot off. They're not able to create anything. They're kind of depending on Wiggins to create his own shot a little bit because nobody else is really creating their shot for Golden State. They're aggressively guarding Curry, which is making it very tough for him.

They're doing a good job switching off the ball. Yeah, I mean, I agree with you. The Kings look like they're much the better team, but I don't see it being a sweep or anything. I think there's a more likelier chance that it goes back 2-2 probably. You just made my case why there could be a sweep. And by the way, I'm not predicting that. I'm just saying for the first time, it felt like it was a play for me because what alarmed me about the Warriors, Curry was the only guy who seemed like he could create his own shot. The fact that

Poole, they got Poole and Kaminga and DDV combined. They played 33 minutes. They were one for seven. Poole was awful and I think he's hurt. To me, he doesn't look healthy. I don't know what's going on with him, but

if he's not going to be even 70% of pool from last year's playoffs, Clay, as good as I think Clay has been, considering where he was a year ago, he can't create his own shot against this team. There were multiple times where he had the ball and he had to kind of create something, couldn't do it. They're just kind of out of options. And I do feel like this reminds me of football

where somebody's offensive coordinator or defensive coordinator goes to a new team as the head coach, and then they play the old team and they know all these tricks of what to do. I've never seen, for the Kings who are not a good defensive team, right? They're not. During the season, they were fundamentally below average. But the stuff they were doing against Curry, I thought was really high level. It was really smart. They figured out all these different ways to either make him get rid of the ball or to make him uncomfortable.

They kind of knew when he was getting the ball. And I thought it was alarming because I didn't think the Warriors run would end like this, but I feel like it's in play now. Yeah, it's interesting because they both, both teams, both teams basically run the exact same offense. The difference is one team's just running a lot crisper.

They're getting more open. The way they're defending each other is different. That's the other thing. Fox is basically able to get into the paint at will for the most part. And so they're playing drop coverage versus him as floaters. It's very efficient. He's able to get where he needs to get. The other one thing is if you watch the way they're guarding Sabonis,

they've kind of had to get away from the Sabonis dribble handoff game just because the Warriors are playing off him so much. And Sabonis really hasn't gotten anything going super efficiently. They got a little pick and roll action going with them later. But Looney's done a good job versus Sabonis, but they haven't really guarded anyone else effectively. There's nobody else who they've taken away. They took away Sabonis

and that was about it and even Sabonis had a decent second half yesterday. Well the other thing is their best defense for the Warriors Peyton has to be out there right? Peyton seems like the only guy on the team who can I'm not even going to say guard Fox but at least make him work for whatever he's getting. I think Wiggins can guard him.

I think that's the other one who can guard him. But now you're taking Wiggins off somebody else. Yeah, they don't really have anyone else though. I mean, when Monk and Fox are out there, it's a challenge for sure. Right. That's what I mean. Yeah. But when they're starting lineup, it's not that big of a deal, I don't think.

I mean, Herter's done a decent job versus Curry. I just think that it'll be very difficult. I mean, Golden State is an awful road team. They have been a good home team.

I'm not sure why they're as bad as they are on the road. I'm not saying this is the... I'm not discounting everything, but that's a tough arena to play in. Kings played great. Their crowd definitely energized them. And it's not like Golden State this is the... I'm not discounting everything, but that's a tough arena to play in. Kings played great. Their crowd definitely energized them. And it's not like Golden State was really like... I mean, wasn't ever really good all year anyways. You shouldn't have expected that much different, I suppose.

You know what's alarming to me, though, about the Kings on the road? I mean, the Warriors on the road, because I've watched this a few times now, really since last couple months when they started to get in, at least we got to avoid the playing mode. I've watched games on the road where they've played hard and gotten pretty good curry games and still lost. The infrastructure of what they have, I think, like yesterday is a good

example, right? They get nothing from all the pool guys, Steve Vincenzo, all the kind of wildcard guys. Basically nothing from any of them. And it's like, okay, if we just can keep Curry under 35, if they're playing Peyton and Draymond Green in the fourth quarter, those guys aren't scoring. So now Clay or Wiggins

has to have basically an awesome game to keep them into it. Wiggins, he's been better than I thought, but still seems a little rusty. And then Clay, Clay cannot create his own shot. If it's just like, hey, Clay, carry us the last four minutes, he's not going to be able to do it.

I don't know. I'm pretty alarmed for the Warriors, and I think it's going to come down to, ironically, Poole. If Poole can't give them extra offense, I just don't think they can score enough points to keep up with the Kings. They got to get to like 120. Yeah, I think

they're clearly, obviously, they look like a much better team than the Warriors. But again, I'll just go back to the fact that this is a team that was 33-8 at home, I believe, Golden State was. Yeah. And so now they're going back home.

But the pressure's on them. I mean, look, both of these games are must-win games, for sure. So it'll be interesting to see how they respond. They've never been in this type of a hole before. But they were down 2-1 in the finals last year, were they not? It's not the same, but it's the finals versus

The difference is, last year you had Poole. Poole placed 22 games last year in the playoffs. He's 17 points a game, 51% field goal, 39, 3.92 from the line. This year he's averaging 10.5 points a game in the two games. Yeah. Shooting 29%.

Yeah. So if you remove him from last year, there's no way they win the finals last year. Zero chance. None. Sure. Yeah. They definitely need to get scoring from someone else, whether it's Poole or whether it's someone else

that maybe wouldn't expect. But yeah, I agree with you. Can I throw a first take-y kind of point at you? I'd love that. Kyle, you might have to turn the camera on. So I made this point in mid-March about Curry and through the prism of Aaron Rodgers and a little bit through LeBron, where Curry's such a great guy and a great teammate

that if this had been another superstar, they would have been like, what the fuck? I'm 34. This is my run right now. We've got to go all in on this year's team. Basically exactly what LeBron did, right? LeBron did a lot of passive aggressive stuff in the summer, in the beginning of the season, during the season. He just kept throwing stuff out there like, what are we doing? I'm LeBron James. How are we not making moves? I

don't care about future. Just subtle, subtle, subtle stuff. And then finally they go and they get Rui, who whatever, but they gave up really nothing for him. Then they make the big trade. They gave up the one first. They get Russell back. They get Vanderbilt back. They get Beasley back. Now they have real depth, right? And now they have this situation where Russell, every once in a while, would be good in a playoff game. Vanderbilt really gives them stability, a little like what Peyton gives the Warriors. Beasley will have one game in the playoffs. Rui already had his game in the playoffs, but they just have depth and they have different things that can happen with their roster now. And it really helped them. Plus, they lucked out with Reeves. The Warriors went the opposite way. They didn't really do anything other than they traded Wiseman to get Peyton back, who they could have kept. And other than that, they did this bridge the two errors thing. And now you're really feeling it, man.

Like you look at DiVincenzo and Poole. Michael Green was another one of their signings. That didn't work. It does feel like they did a little bit of a disservice to Steph. And he'll never say it, but it's true. I thought that last year. I thought that going into last year, just to be clear. And then they managed to win.

So they're in a tough spot. I mean, their luxury tax bill is absurd. They can't really add any players. Every move they make is additive in terms of the amount of repeater tax and stuff that they have to pay. But yeah, I mean, the move clearly... I think they feel like they nailed it because they went young and they

still won. But it's not like these young players are anything special. That's the other thing. None of these guys... Who are you going to build around? Are you going to build around Kuminga? By the way, have you seen Jordan Poole's contract? It's not a great contract. Are you comfortable with that guy's contract as a one-way... At best, a one-way player

who can only play offense at best? His contract hasn't even started yet, Bob. I think it kicks in next year for like $30 million a year. I don't know if it's tradable. Yeah, it's an absurd contract for a guy who is very skilled offensively,

but a scorer. He can't really pass very well. He doesn't, he's one of the, he's, he's, he's arguably the second worst. Well,

I'm sure there's some other ones, but that's maybe a little bit hyperbolic, hyperbolic, but he's, he's, he's definitely one of the worst defensive guards in the league. I'll say that he's, he's up there in the top five for sure.

Well, let me ask you if you're in the front office, cause you work for the Mavs and they're in that situation of, we got to extend them. We got to lock them up before the season starts under that rookie extension rule. You actually don't? The Celtics didn't do this with Grant Williams. And I think it was a really smart move. Grant Williams wanted four for 80. The Celtics were good with four for 50. They couldn't agree. I was like, all right, let's roll it over. So once you roll that over,

now he becomes a possible trade asset during the season. They're not trading him. But also like you kind of never know how the season's going to go. Now Grant Williams is now probably a three for 35 type guy, not a three for 80 or four for 80 guy. With Poole, had they not done anything, maybe you see it, even if he has a great season,

is he really signing for more than what he signed for, which was like 120 for four years? What's the downside of just rolling it over? I don't get that part. Yeah. I'm not sure. I think they thought that he was someone they wanted to build around. But yeah, I'm kind of with you. I think that... So that's just a miss. That's like an organizational... You're giving that money. He's a 100% guaranteed lock that he's

part of your core. Or you have to attach assets to try to get off him. Or he performs really, really well another year and then maybe he's a better player. But I just, I don't know. I find it very difficult to be that prototypical type of player who's basically

just a shooter and scorer who doesn't defend and can't create for others and turns the ball over at a rate higher than it should for his usage rate. And then the Kaminga piece, well, the Kaminga piece that, like if he was on the Lakers, they would have traded him. Like he would have been traded at the deadline and they would have gotten a

bunch of stuff back. They probably would have thrown in pick. Like if you, the Lakers version of how they handle the Kaminga asset is he's not on the team in March. It's like, we love this guy. He's really talented, but now he's on Utah or Detroit or wherever. Yeah. Well, you started the, the, the, the bit where you said like LeBron kind of got passive aggressive, but that's like his brand though. So it's like, it's like LeBron kind of got passive-aggressive. But that's like his brand, though. So it's like LeBron is just passive.

He's either aggressive-aggressive or he's passive-aggressive. And it's tough to build a team around him because you're constantly having to acquiesce to his demands of players that he wants. And then when it doesn't go well, then you got to deal with the comments comments in the media, et cetera. So I give, I give the Lakers a lot of credit. I mean, it's really difficult to build a championship team around LeBron James and

Anthony Davis. I mean, they really, wow. And to just start with those two, it's like, you know, you start with those two guys, how could you not build like a championship level team? Like it's pretty much about like, those are like the perfect two guys. I mean, I get it. Davis isn't healthy all the time, etc. But when Davis is healthy and LeBron is on the court, it's like

you don't have to do much to surround that team with anything. Think of the guys you mentioned. Now they're good. Oh, they picked up Jared Vanderbilt. Oh, they picked up Malik Beasley and DeAndre Russell. They drafted Austin Reeves, who's been... No, they didn't. He was undrafted. They just grabbed him after the draft. Okay. So yeah, I wasn't sure he was a second rounder yet.

And so they've got pieces now that kind of work, but it's like, what were you doing all of last year? Do you realize that the LeBron model is surrounded with shooters and away you go? What was your thought process there? Well, you know what they really, and I don't want to say they lucked out because they picked them, but just how well Reeves fits with LeBron. Yeah.

I would argue that just the, Reeves' offensive game is kind of the perfect guy to have as your third person next to LeBron and Davis, right? Because you don't need like size. You don't need, you don't need a rebounder. You just need somebody who knows how to play basketball. Somebody mentioned, I think it was Shams mentioned that Reeves reminded

him of Gordon Hayward, younger Gordon Hayward. And I was like, that's interesting because I couldn't put my finger on what Reeves was like. We've talked about him on the pod a bunch of times about, you see the 6'5 white guy and you're just like, oh, he must be just a shooter and that's what he does. He's kind of the opposite. He's crafty. He gets to the free throw line. He gets shots in traffic. He gets garbage points.

He's a good passer. Which is what young Hayward was like and he's a good passer. You know what's funny in that game? I think if you were to say who was... Russell handled the ball most in pick and roll in game one of the Lakers, but Reeves handled the ball second. Reeves ran

25 picks. They ran 25 picks with Reeves and they scored at an absurd rate of 1.4 or something. And LeBron was backing off at the end. LeBron was like, this is working. LeBron as the ball handler. They only ran it a handful of times, I think like 10 or 11 times in the game.

So that's kind of interesting. I don't think he would ever, because like I said, the model has always been you surround LeBron with shooters and away you go. But he's kind of playing off the ball here in this scenario. The thing that I thought that's kind of interesting about that series, we're jumping around a little bit,

is I don't know if Memphis ever, did they not scout the Lakers? Did they not realize you can't play drop coverage versus Reeves? Drop coverage doesn't work versus Reeves. I don't know what exactly. Of the 25 picks that he had, they ran drop coverage on 60% of them. And it's just like, it doesn't work versus him

because he's just too comfortable coming in, getting into the middle of the paint, and then either hitting a shot or making the pass or putting pressure on the defense. It's like you either have to switch versus him or you have to show and put some pressure on him. You're not going to play drop coverage versus him. It's just not going to work. I just feel like that

was the lowest of hanging fruit they could have realized. I don't think they were ready for him to run 25 pick and rolls in that game. I don't think they were prepared for that. It'll be interesting to see how they adjust in game two. It's crazy the Lakers ended up with Caruso and Reeves in like a five or six year span. Like just these, you can't say dropped in their lap because they signed those guys, they brought them in.

But these two guys who were kind of perfect playing with LeBron and then were way underrated for reasons that had nothing to do with their basketball ability. Like Caruso, just a strange-looking basketball player, right? He was a receding hairline. He's 25, white guy. He was like, oh, this guy must suck. And it's like, no, actually, there's lots of advanced metrics now

that this guy actually doesn't suck. And he became a really crucial part of that bubble run. Sure. Although he didn't shoot the ball as well in the playoffs as I think people remember. I think the thing about Caruso that's confusing is you see a guy that looks like him and you think he has to be able to shoot three-pointers

and that's not his game. His game is defense. He's a lockdown defender. He's good in the lanes. He's good on the ball. Great navigating screens. So I think that's the part that kind of like disarms people a little bit.

They think, how could this guy be good and then they look at his offensive stats and they're not great turns down a lot of shots too let's take a break and I want to talk more about the Warriors

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This message is brought to you by Metrolinks. All right, coming back. You and I were texting about abrupt ending teams. Raheem Palmer was doing a little bit about this on Twitter on Monday night too. It was the same thing. It was hard not to think of the parallels of the great team, especially when it's a defending champ and it's just ending in real time. And you're like, wait, is this, is this?

I remember I was doing the finals in 2014 when Miami just fell apart against San Antonio. And after game three with San Antonio, they went up 2-1. They won in Miami by like 19. And we were prepping for the show for game four. And I was like, I remember we were texting about it too. I was like, I think this,

I think Miami's like in real trouble. Everybody just assumed they were going to come back. I was like, I think this matchup and they're just slow and they don't have a bench. And I think San Antonio kind of unlocked them. And then those last two games, they kicked their ass and they went in five.

That team, that run ends. LeBron's 29, Wade's 32, Bosh is 29, Ray Allen's 38. So they're getting a little old except for LeBron and Bosh. The 2011 Lakers, who got swept by Dallas, they win two in a row. They get their ass kicked by Dallas, but it was gradual. It was a little like the Sacramento series.

Dallas wins by two. Dallas wins by 12. Oh, well, the Lakers are definitely winning game three. Nope. Dallas wins at home by six. Then they blow them out in game four. All of a sudden, that runs over. The 08 Pistons, same thing with the Celts. They're 2-2 heading into game five. And then the Celts kind of blow them out the last two games and that era ends. Billups, Rashid, they were both over 30. We mentioned the 2004 Lakers. The other two I found, the 96 Rockets, they win two straight titles. They go into round two against Seattle, the Kemp Payton Seattle. And I think Seattle might even be a favorite in this series.

And they swept them. They just waxed them. That led to the Rockets trading for Barkley. Their two oldest players were Hakeem and Drexler, 33-33. And then the last one was the Pistons, 89-90. They win. They go into that Bulls series the year after that was covered, the last dance.

They get swept. Their team, Isaiah was 29, Lambert was 33, Rodman's 29, Dumar's 27. So they're old, not too old. Isaiah was getting older. But it was just over. And over the course of the series, you think, are my eyes seeing this?

Or does this series look like it's over, but you don't want to admit it? And that's why I really wonder with this King series, are our eyes telling us what our brains don't want to believe yet? Because they just look faster to me. So you're still on the Warriors at home or a different

team. You want to see it with them at home before you're willing to go there. I don't think that they rate to win the series. I'm not going on a limb here. They're down 2-0 versus a team that's much more athletic and quicker than them. But I don't see

it being a sweep or... I don't know. It could end in 5, I suppose. I don't see it being a sweep or I don't know. It could end in five, I suppose. I don't know. I would like to see a lot of these series are like this. They say that the series doesn't start until a team loses at home. So I would just like to see them play at home.

Like I said, it's hard to expect them to have a good performance in game one or game two. They haven't been good all year on the road. I don't know why that is, but they just haven't. So, but yeah. Let me flip it. These guys are old. Like, Curry's 34.

It's like to play that style that he plays at 34, it's not like he needs to be able to move and run and get open. And he's not getting open. Davion Mitchell's done a great job guarding him. He's been in his shirt. They've done a good job switching off the ball. So yeah, I would just like to see

how they perform at home, I suppose. Maybe Draymond won't get ejected this time and they'll be able to defend a little bit better. We'll see. He just can't help himself. And it's weird because he's got so many different media ties now that I feel like if this was another player,

it would be a way bigger deal with people just ripping them but you know 2016 that series was over we've talked about this before but they go in in Cleveland they win game four and that game was awesome that was such a good basketball game and they beat them and if he doesn't do that with LeBron at the end they win in game five and that that's done 2019 the stuff that happened with KD at the Cl, they win in game five and that's done. 2019, the stuff that happened with KD at the Clippers game, the team was really never the same after that happened. And then this one, this is now three

instances of his inability to just control whatever goes on with how intense he is during a game. I don't know if you saw that somebody had a wide shot of Draymond when he's just screaming at the Kings crowd for like a professional wrestler

for like 45 seconds. And near the end of it, Kerr's trying to come back to talk to the team, but Draymond hasn't sat down yet because he's turned around and you could just see Kerr like, oh my God.

Kerr's been doing this for 10 years. There was that quote, right? Where I think Kerr was like, I can't take Kurt's been doing this for 10 years. There was that quote where I think he was like, I can't take Raymond's shit anymore or whatever. It got leaked or whatever it was. I don't know. He's a competitor. I think that the stomping on the guy's chest was just absurd.

It looked like he was putting out a cigarette. You see someone putting out a cigarette on the street. It was just like, what is this guy doing? And as absurd as that was, it wasn't even nearly as bad as the reaction afterwards where he's just like, does he know he's getting ejected here? Why is he acting

like this? I don't know. I thought it was ridiculous, but whatever. He's a competitor. Like you said, it's part of the fire that he has, I guess, to get a player with his athletic ability to be as... He's part of the package. Yeah, you're right. He needs that engine to get him going, to get a player with his athletic ability to be as... It's part of the package. Yeah, you're right. Look, you need that engine to get them going.

But it's just, it has to be so difficult to be around that as a player. You're trying to focus and this guy's doing this stuff, I feel like. But I'm sure they're used to it. I mean, forget about the practice thing where you punch his teammate in the face. There's just a lot of stuff you have to deal with that and the podcasting after the game and all, it's just like there's a lot you have to deal with in order to put up with what you get from him,

but you get so much defensively and even like offensively with him running the offense and bringing the ball up the court and running, you know, and executing those passes. But it's just, yeah, it's a bit much for me. He's definitely turned into a pro cons list guy where at the end of the year, they're definitely getting together and there's a big whiteboard. There's like, Draymond pros, Draymond cons. It's like cons. Might completely self-destruct in any playoff game. Might punch his teammates. Will podcast after the games. Steve Kerr is going to go in the hospital soon if he has to coach him another year. Those are the cons.

He was like, well, they're pulling on my leg. What do they expect me to do? And it's just like, I don't know, man. Anything but that. There was a couple angles that showed where is he supposed to put... I get that he kind of had to step on him maybe a little bit,

but he didn't have to stomp on him. That much is clear. You do not have to... And then he kind of made it seem like he fell by jumping forward. It looked like he was doing a skateboard trick. It was an unbelievable move by Sabonis. I'm sure it hurt, but he sold it like he was at the Royal Rumble.

I think it hurt a lot. I think when you get someone with that size, it was a hard... He didn't step on him. He stomped on him. It was... Yeah. That's got to hurt. I don't know.

We'll see. I guess they did an x-ray after or something. Who knows if that was theater or what that was. I would say theater. They want him to get... We'll probably know by the time... I'll do a little topper on this pot on Tuesday,

but we'll know if Draymond got suspended or not. Is that even in the cards? They might suspend him for this? I don't know how it's not. Is a stomp more dangerous than an overhand right? Yeah. I mean, if he would have... Yeah.

I mean, when he got suspended last time, it wasn't for the kick. It was for the consecutive technical fouls. Yeah, or the flagrant fouls, I think it was. So this would be... Well, he did punch LeBron in the balls. I mean, that...

Right, but he didn't get suspended for that. He got suspended for having too many flagrants, I believe. Or I believe that's what it was. But he knew he was at the flagrant line, though. Right.

What I'm saying is, had he not been, he would have been okay with punching him in the balls. That would have been okay. It wouldn't have been a... The irony is, he cost them the title

in some ways, right? Because I think that series is over if it goes back there. On the other hand, his game seven was one of the great random games anyone's had. Yeah, he was the only guy who was able to perform offensively in that game. He was the greatest game of his career and almost saved their bacon. And it basically comes

down to LeBron hitting that one three over Azili, getting the three free throws on him the second time. And then the Warriors just being unable to do anything. The last five minutes of that game is actually what their offense has looked like a little bit against the Kings. And that's the, that's still the part that amazes me is that the Kings even being able to play

good defense. I will say though, Mike Brown, a coach that I think once upon a time, I did being able to play good defense. I will say though, Mike Brown, a coach that I think once upon a time I did not think was a good coach, was not really so good. I thought he was an awful coach.

I remember us texting about it. I was just like, I think he got fired after a short number of games in his last stint, but his second stint in Cleveland wasn't great. Did he have a second stint in Cleveland? He did, right? He did. He got brought back. He had a quick Lakers

thing that went bad. The one thing that people forget is the game changes, coaches change, they get better, they learn, they improve. The type of offense they're running now is nothing like what he would run. To his credit, he was always a good defensive coach.

It was just his teams were very, very vanilla and unimaginative offensively. And I think that... I think you brought up a good point in the sense that with the way they're guarding Curry and how aggressively they're guarding Curry, if they don't have someone else who can be a release valve and create, whether it's Draymond who can roll and make passes or pool, if it's not pool,

then they're in a lot of trouble. The way they're guarding Curry, they played a little bit of box-in-one versus Curry last night in the second half of that game. And it wasn't super effective, but it just shows you how they realize that they're willing to shut down Curry and live with whatever else happens. And with the lineup they have out there, we had Green, Looney, Payton. I mean, yeah, you'll live with that. So it's interesting.

If Poole can't play and can't perform offensively, then yeah, you're right. They might be in a lot of trouble. Well, one of the things that I liked about... I thought Brown coached an awesome game in game two. When you think Alex Lund plays in the first half, second half, we don't see him again. He's done a good job both games, yeah, for sure.

He did. Mitchell, he just figured out, oh, today's the Mitchell game and really unleashed Mitchell. Mitchell rose to the occasion. He was great. I also like that they kept... They almost treated Curry like a quarterback

where it's like, we're going to blitz you this time. Now we're going to sink six defensive backwards and go back. And just every, felt like every couple minutes they were doing something different. I thought it was really smart. I was really impressed. I thought what was, yeah, I agree with you. I thought what was super impressive

is when you get these little TNT sound bites or whatever it was, ABC sound bites where they show, it was just like telling the team to keep on pushing the ball, keep on running, be comfortable shooting, we'll live with the results. Like we talked telling the team to keep on pushing the ball, keep on running, be comfortable shooting. We'll live with the results. Like we talked about earlier, they haven't shot the ball particularly well,

but he's still, still encouraging his players to take a lot of, you know, to, to live with the results, take threes. They understand where, what good offense is.

Um, and just the speed at which they're getting the ball. I mean, they got a fast break layup off of a, off of a made free throw the other night, which is just like, you don't see that happen very often. So how does this fall apart for the Kings? What's the recipe for them blowing this,

in your mind? Take the Warriors out of it. Just what has to go wrong for the Kings? I think if they don't win one of these two games in San Francisco here, I think there's a lot of pressure on them. Now they go back home, the series is tied 2-2. So I think in their mind, I feel like as a young team, especially a front-running team, they seem to be a bit of a front-running team in the sense that it's just easier when

things are going well. Where it goes wrong, I don't know. I mean, the Warriors figure out a way to guard Fox a little bit more effectively. I'm not sure how they do that. Maybe, you know, maybe they send, they send two Adams sometimes. I'm not really sure where it goes wrong. I guess Curry has a career clay, have like a transcendent offensive game that can happen.

That's certainly one of those guys is certainly due to go off in one of these two games. That's where it goes wrong, I suppose. But I'm with you in the sense that I don't see a lot of paths where they're just going to out-solid Sacramento. They're not as good a team. One through eight, the number of players that are playing, or nine, they're not

as deep, they're not as good. And I think that's kind of obvious at this point. Yeah, one of the things about this game... So game one, Sabonis doesn't shoot the ball well at all. Right. And he was somebody I was considering almost, could he be my number five MVP? Could Fox be like, he was that good this season and wasn't that good offensively. He's better yesterday. Yesterday, they still win game one, even though they don't get a great Sabonis game.

Yesterday, they missed a shitload of threes in the first half. That's not a good sign. And they were never out of the game. I think the combo of that where it's like, we haven't even seen them play an awesome everybody was great game yet. And they were able to win both of those without having all the...

I mean, you're not going to get the Monk game again, obviously, from game one. I don't know that that's true. I mean, Monk has been a skilled offensive Monk game again, obviously, from game one. I don't know that that's true. I mean, Monk has been a skilled offensive player. I remember... No, I'm saying the game he played game one. I mean, that was like... That's a 10 out of 10.

There's no bigger fan of his than Monk. Yeah, he may be a 10 out of 10, but he has been a consistent offensive player all year. I think where it goes wrong is like, look, I don't know if you remember last night's game. They were in the bonus. Sacramento was in the bonus from like the 10 minute and 30 second mark of the third quarter. They just got into the bonus.

I think that doesn't happen. Where does the game go? I mean, that's pretty tough to play defense when you're in the penalty for 10 and a half minutes and foul trouble. Most of the guys were in foul trouble and he was in foul trouble. So I think the home officiating definitely

been a playoff thing. I don't know. Golden State had three guys with five fouls in that game. They ended the game with three guys with five fouls. That's pretty rare, I would say. There's a lot of fouls in general. Herter had five. Sabonis had five. But Draymond,

Looney, and Wiggins all had five fouls. And Draymond didn't even play the whole game. Well, you know, the Kings were 9 for 38 from three. If you just told me ahead of the game, the Kings are going to go 9 for 38 from three in game two in a must-win for the Warriors, I would have been like, oh, the Warriors got this. How do you think they

would win? It's crazy. Well, they did shoot a lot more free throws for one, and they got into the mid-range or the long paint shots were quite efficient. Fox's like floaters, like a longer floater than a normal shot is so efficient and you can

get to it anytime that if that shot's going it's almost impossible to defend him. It's pretty interesting. He has so much confidence now and you can feel it really from the start of the year. Everything he's doing in this series is what he did all year. For sure.

That's why I had him second team on NBA. But it's different in the playoffs going against this team. You think like, oh, is he going to be a little nervous? Nope. There was just nothing. He looked exactly like it was like November against Detroit. And if you look at that roster, nobody really has playoff experience,

except for Harrison Barnes. It's pretty impressive for them to have played as well as they have in the first two games. They've got something to show there. You mean chip on

my shoulder, Harrison Barnes? Yeah. I remember what happened when you kicked me to the curb in 2016 because KD batted his eyelashes at you,

Harrison Barnes? Well, I don't know. He got a near-max contract from the Mavericks. I'm sure he was pretty happy. I guess Herter also has some playoff experience with that run with Atlanta

where he barbecued Steph's brother. Yeah, he does. Let's go to Lakers-Grizzlies. If the Grizzlies have Adams and they have Clark... Different series. Do you think they win the series

with those two guys or is it just different? Certainly have a much, much better chance. I mean, the Lakers are a big team. It's something people don't realize how big this team is. Reeves is big. LeBron's big. AD's big. These guys are monsters. Even Rui Hachimura is big. They're just a big

team. And now you're trying to roll out Jaron Jackson who's fine, but you can't depend on him to not foul out if he's alone big. And now you're trying to roll out Jaron Jackson, who's fine, but you can't depend on him to not foul out if he's alone big. And then Tillman. And they had some four-man lineups where they were playing like Kennard, Bain, Tyce Jones, and Moran. It's like

those guys, none of those guys are big. And it's a... So yeah, it's a big difference for sure. I mean, Brandon Clark was a huge factor last year in the playoffs for them on the offensive glass. And then they went away from Adams and struggled. And then they went back to him and kind of did well.

Like Adams was... Early on in the playoffs, Adams was quite effective. And then they went away from him in the one series versus Golden State. And then for whatever reason, they didn't start him. And I think that, yeah, it's a different series. I don't know. It's if AD is playing as well as he's,

I don't know if you saw his defensive numbers. They were, he was unbelievable. Yeah. I've never, that was probably one of the better defensive games I've seen from a player in some time. I mean, it kind of went under the radar a little bit because just a lot of the

other nonsense that happened in that game. But yeah, it was, he was switching, defending well on switches. He was blocking shots. He was shutting players down. I think... I forget what the exact... I mean, I can look at it, but the exact numbers of...

He held players like some ridiculously low number. He was dominant defensively. Reeves is playable defensively. I don't know. They didn't really attack him as much as they could. They didn't attack Schroeder. Do they win the series if they have those two bigs? I don't know. I'm not sure.

But they certainly are drawing pretty slim to win it without them. That's for sure. Probably they go small in game two, I'm guessing. And they just play Triple J with, you know, Bain and Brooks and Tyus Edney. Good luck. Tyus Jones. Good luck.

Tyus Jones and Morant. Good luck. Well, Morant might not even play, by the way. So that's a big factor. But good luck keeping Jaron Jackson Jr. on the court if he's the lone big. That guy is certainly foul prone. And if he's not foul prone, it's going to be difficult for him to he's the lone big, that guy is certainly foul prone. And if he's not foul prone,

it's going to be difficult for him to defend as the lone big. I mean, the four guys you just rattled off in addition to him, those are basically traffic cones on defense. So it's going to be super challenging for sure. So let's

look ahead. Let's just say it goes this way and we get Lakers-Kings, we get the 2002... Revenge. I don't want to say rigged. The most perceived to be rigged series of the 21st century in the NBA, unless you want to really go on a stealth Buck Sixers deep dive from 2001. Kings Revenge, two totally different styles. Kings trying to play super fast. Lakers trying to bully ball and overpower them. That would be one of the coolest matchups I've had in a long time.

That would be a fun matchup for sure. That would be a fun matchup. I don't know. I guess a lot of people had the Lakers as the favorites early on. I guess it's not that unreasonable. I don't know. If AV is healthy and playing this well and Reeves continues to play as well as he's playing and then they're getting decent performances from LeBron and Schroeder shows up, plays well. Obviously, Hachimura had

an outlandish game for him. I don't see that continuing. But, yeah. I'd like to second that prediction. That was a once every two weeks game from Hachimura. That might have been a once a career game for Hachimura. I'm not sure we see something like that from him again.

It's not that. Joe Haas is still mad. Joe Haas had to watch him for three years. He can't believe that that even happened. Let me throw this at you. Okay. I can guarantee you, I can't, but let's say I can guarantee you Davis and LeBron are going to be healthy for the next eight weeks.

Neither of them will get hurt. What happens to the Lakers? Can they make the finals? Neither of them will get hurt. Let's say the Lakers? Can they make the finals? Neither of them will get hurt. Let's say both of them stay healthy for the next six weeks. Yeah, I think the Nuggets are still a tough matchup for them.

I think people kind of slept on the Nuggets a little bit. Not this guy. No, you like the Nuggets? I kept them as my pick. Yeah. I actually, I like that they have a chip on their shoulder now

because people just, they kind of pushed them over to the side even though they had a home court. Yeah. They were like I like that they have a chip on their shoulder now because people just, they kind of pushed them over to the side even though they had a home court. Yeah. They were like the 2015 Hawks. They, they struggled down the stretch,

but they also, they also didn't play Jokic as much down the stretch. Um, and then they kind of had like mixed results. But, um,

are they the favorites? I don't know. I'm not sure. I haven't really thought about that. I guess I'll have to... If I said I would say they would not be the favorites, but if those guys are healthy, I wouldn't think so. I mean, it's one game versus

a team that is missing both of their two of their three best frontcourt. is a team that is missing both of their, you know, two of their three star, you know, two of their three best frontcourt. I thought there were a lot of signs with them post-deadline. There were some games.

Now, they were erratic. They're trying to figure out different things, but there was a ceiling with them that started to scare me as... The Lakers, yeah. Yeah,

I just felt like... I mean, they picked up some really... felt like... Vanderbilt is an underrated pickup for them. He's been fantastic defensively. That's something they never really had was a guy that you could just throw on someone, throw another team's best player and just have them... I watched him guard...

I watched him guard Shea Gillis-Alexander. It was on the back. Oklahoma City had a tough travel schedule at the time. But he just completely shut this guy down to the point where Shea didn't even want to touch the ball towards the end of the game. And he's just in his shirt and he's that type of defender.

And I think being able to play that type of defense with AD behind you is just such a luxury because you can take chances knowing that even if the guy gets by you, you still have AD back there. And then LeBron, as much as his defensive game has diminished, he's still a decent

help defender, weak side defender. He's not a great... He can put together six minutes too. He can't put together 48, but for six minutes, he can play. I mean, what this guy's doing at his age is like unreal. Like everyone,

you know, you can talk about how he's, you know, not as good as he used to be, et cetera, et cetera. And how he's kind of standing around while they're at it. It's just like,

dude, the guys who has played at this level at his age, it's unprecedented. It's just, it's just, it's amazing. It's really something to watch. But the one thing that does worry me is I don't know if they change the...

If they do get to the Western Conference Finals, you start playing games 5, 6, and 7, I believe, on one-day rest with travel. So imagine if they played Denver in that scenario. Would they match up with Denver? Is that the side of the bracket they're on? Would that be the...

That would be the West Finals. Yeah, Denver's going to play the winner of the Suns-Clippers. We haven't even talked about the Suns. But yeah. That would be the West Finals. Yeah, Denver's going to play the winner of the Suns-Clippers. Yeah, yeah. So we haven't even talked about the Suns. But yeah, that would be tough, I think, going into altitude and coming back. And that's not a super long trip, but it's not a short trip either. And I think that would be something that I would be a little bit more worried about for the Lakers.

What does possible sound like for your business it's the ability to reach further with access to over 1400 lounges worldwide redefine possible with business platinum that's the powerful backing of american express terms and conditions apply visit mx.ca slash business platinum i avoided the suns because they're playing tonight after we tape this. So God only knows what's going to happen. But just in general, just your quick take of throwing somebody in like Durant at the point of the season that they threw him in and then expecting it all to just work perfectly. What were you expecting? Well,

I thought, I thought that the Clippers made a massive tactical mistake by wanting to play Phoenix in the first round, especially knowing the Paul George situation. So I'd have to eat some crow there with game one win. I think it looked like the Clippers had the best player in the series in Kawhi. It looked like, I mean, he was just surgical,

clinical, normal Kawhi. Kawhi's actually playing better as a Clipper offensively than he did as a Raptor, which is interesting. His numbers offensively are much better. What did I think? I think that it's tough to win an NBA playoff game when you have

three playable players and a half, which is what Phoenix has. They've got Aiton, who's like a half, I would say. Sometimes he plays good, sometimes he doesn't. Chris Paul definitely looks like he's lost a step. And then the guys they've got surrounding them, they've got no depth

whatsoever. Clippers are putting Zubach and Plumlee on Torrey Craig and living with the results. We've got Wainwrights coming in there, Shamit. They just don't have anybody. And so it's...

They've got to figure out... And the Clippers can just cycle through player after player after player. They've got so much wing depth. Even without Paul George, they've got wing depth. It wasn't a huge Marcus Morris game, which I'm sure you loved.

There was a little... I think he's out of the rotation. Did you see the Clippers were 50-1 before the playoffs to win the title? They had by far the longest odds. They were in the Miami-Atlanta territory of odds. That's wild. That's probably

decent value. I wonder what their adjusted I guess I could check what the adjusted series price is for that after game one. Let's move on because game two already happened. Heat Bucks just quickly because that's a Wednesday night or two the Heat, I know you followed this were 19 games under 500 against the spread

which I think is almost impossible and then they don't cover the first playing game then they win the Friday game and then they look great Sunday against the Bucs. And now Giannis is going to play, but he's banged up. And just in general,

what do you think of the Bucs supporting cast? I don't know. The thing that they don't have is they don't have anybody who can really create effectively. Their best guard is Drew Holiday, who's good, but he's kind of like a herky-jerky. He's not

explosive getting to the rim and creating for other people. He's kind of backing people down. So I think they struggle a little bit. I still think they have a very deep team. The issue with them is Middleton's health, obviously, is big. Obviously, now Giannis' health as well.

But I'm not like... After watching that one game, I'm not concerned if I'm Milwaukee versus Miami. I think it was just... They lost. As long as Giannis is healthy, I think they'll be fine. I mean, Miami has a good scheme to defend versus Giannis, but it...

We had... Brook Lopez yesterday was... Or not yesterday, but it, you know, you had Brooke Lopez yesterday was, or not yesterday, but in game one was basically a spacing threat. He was just standing on the perimeter and he was being guarded by like Max Struess and Gabe Vincent and guys like that. And it's just like, there's things Milwaukee can do.

And I think they will actually do them. Cause I do think they're a sharp team that can counter what happened in game one so that you probably won't see a result like that. I don't think Miami's a particularly good team. Now we also have the hero situation, which is not good for them, obviously. I think Milwaukee's depth is fine. I think they are what they are. It's Giannis bringing the ball up, acting like a point forward,

surrounded by a bunch of guys who are good enough to hit open shots and do things. I think their depth is fine. I think they're a very good team. I don't know how they'd match up versus the Celtics, but I think aside from the Celtics, they're the clear class of the East. Who is your

gun to the head finals pick right now? Who do you think the best team is? I would always famously said, I don't tend to make bets with a gun to my head, but if I had a degenerate friend of mine who always wanted to gamble and I'd give him like five bets a night and they'd go four and one, three and two at worst. And then there'd be the late game. He'd like, gun to your head. Who do you like this game? And I'm just like, bro, let's just relax. Shout out to E-Dog, famous poker player. He'd be like, gun to your head. Who do you like this game? And I'm just like, bro, let's just relax. Shout out to E-Dog. Poker player.

He's like, gun to your head. Who do you like this game? I'm just like, bro, I don't like anything. Let's just relax and watch it. Who's my champion pick? Is that what you said? Gun to my head? Who do you think is the safest you feel the best about team? Celtics, probably. Celtics or

I mean, the West is just so haphazard and the East is like two teams. That's it. There's two teams in the East. The West is like, you know, maybe Denver, maybe the Lakers,

maybe the Clippers, maybe Phoenix. Like there's just like too many. And, you know, I mean, we talked about Golden State or Sacramento. There's just like,

or Memphis, who was the two seed, you know, it's usually a lot. I just, I talked about Golden State or Sacramento. Or Memphis, who was the two seed. There's really a lot. I think the East is just a pretty clear whoever wins between Milwaukee and Boston. And I think Boston matches up very well versus Milwaukee. So I would say the South. So Philly is not even discussable for you? Yeah, I'm not a Philly guy.

I don't see it. I don't see... I think Emb a Philly guy. I don't see it. I don't see... I think Embiid's amazing. I don't particularly like the way they match up versus the Celtics. I don't particularly like the way they play in terms of their strategy, who they play. I think Harden is clearly a basketball genius, but he's also clearly not in top physical condition.

And it looks like he's struggling. He's, he's good. You can get a step back off, but he's not really doing much else. So yeah, I'm not a Philly guy. It's a nice matchup for the Celtics.

It is a nice matchup. I don't want to talk about it too much and, and jinx this somehow, but, um, the Celtics, I just feel I've been saying it all year. You could even see it in the Nets game last night. They just didn't

totally have the people, but when you can just small ball it and spread them out and try to just play with a faster pace, I just don't think Philly wants to do that ever. Yeah. I mean, if Philadelphia trotting out

the ghost of P.J PJ Tucker versus the Nets. I love PJ Tucker. I love that guy. But I don't know how old he is, but he's definitely up there. And he was guarding. There was nobody he had to guard. It wasn't like he needed him to shut anyone down. They just had him out there and the Nets were just basically ignoring him.

And they'd live with this slow release corner three, the odd offensive rebound maybe that he'd get that'd kind of get there. He's just like, it's difficult because if you look at Philadelphia, they don't have a lockdown defender aside from him. So when you're going to play, now you're going to play the Celtics and Tatum and Brown

and then you're going to play, I guess, like who do they have guarding Giannis? I guess they're going to put Tucker and Embiid. But yeah, I don't think the Sixers have... They made a pickup. They've got a decent wing defender, but I just don't see it. I'm not a Philly guy.

Were you surprised by how the Mavs season played out? Yeah, how could you not be surprised? Were you surprised by how the Mavs season played out? Yeah. How could you not be surprised? They went to the Western Conference Finals and then didn't make playoffs. I do think the Western Conference Finals thing was a little bit of a mirage. Fool's gold? Yeah. You can use the word fool's gold.

The phrase fool's gold. But did I think it would go off the rails this bad? No. How could you? I mean, I didn't think I went on the record saying that I don't think that that trade was something that was going to benefit their season. It certainly wasn't what they needed. They didn't need another offensive guy who couldn't guard anybody.

Yeah, it's just very difficult to have two players. I've said this a bunch in different venues, I suppose, but it's very difficult to have two players who are at their best with the ball and then expect them to be good together. You're just not maximizing their talent. And especially

in the playoffs where both guys are going to play 35 minutes. So now you've got maximum 10 to 13 minutes where you could play, you could stagger them where only one of them is on the court. Like, okay, great. Now what do you do the rest of the time? You have one of them off the ball standing in the court. And neither one of them

really excel without the ball. Luka, at this point in his career, is not suited without the ball. He's not a great catch and shoot three-point shooter. He's not someone who sets screens and rolls. He's just not that guy. He's not cutting.

He needs the ball and he's great with the ball. So why would you want to have your second highest paid player be another guy who's good with the ball and needs the ball? It doesn't make sense to me, but that's just me, personally. I wouldn't have done it. And then that's... By the way, that's discounting the fact that the guy's 31, I believe, or 30, 31. And is kind of diminutive in stature. Now you got to sign him to a

three, four-year contract. You left out the circus that comes with him. Well, I did. I even got to that. And then there's the other part of it, which I left that out because to his credit, he's been, by all accounts, a model player and a great teammate. But it's also only been two months. So let's just

wait and see. I don't know. He hasn't been a distraction with the Mavericks at all. That much is clear. Hasn't not been a distraction. I think, if anything, he's been additive in terms of the culture so far. That's everything I've heard, everything I've seen. But he's Kyrie Irving, and he's been additive in terms of the culture so far. That's everything I've heard, everything I've seen. But he's Kyrie Irving and he's got a record of being a little eccentric

at best. So I don't know. It's just a very... It's such a risky move. And what they said when they did it was they didn't see the risk. It's like, I don't see any risk here. To say that to me was just so absurd. You didn't see the risk. It's like, I don't see any risk here. To say that to me was just so absurd. You didn't see the risk in signing this guy and trading for this guy and now having to sign him to a long high-value contract. It just felt like there were better low-end options for them where they didn't have to give away

DFS and or that first-round pick. They could have went after Hurdle and they could have kept... They would have still lost the first-round pick because that's what Toronto gave up for him. They still would went after Hurdle and that would have, and they could have kept, they would have still lost the first round pick because that's what Toronto gave up for him. They still would have been in a situation where he was an unrestricted free agent. They'd have to sign, they'd have his bird rights, but they could have kept,

like you said, Dorian Fennysmith and Spencer Dinwiddie. And it's like they didn't need another secondary ball handler who was going to be like, Kyrie is amazing with the ball. He's an offensive wizard. He's a spectacular offensive player. Like I'm not taking that anything away from him.

He's an unreal offensive player, but in order for him to be an offensive, real unreal offensive player, and for you to maximize his, his value, he has to have the ball and he has to be willing to have the ball and create and have the ball for a large amount of the game and score. And,

you know, they were, they looked like a pretty good team when he was the lone guy playing. They actually played well. It's when the two of them played together that it was an issue. With two high-usage players, it always takes time for them to mesh. It took the

Miami Heat when they signed LeBron and Bosh and had Wade, those three guys. It took them a while to get going. It just takes time for high-usage players to mesh. But with high-usage players, you don't get their max efficiency. There's always... When you have two high-usage players, let's say they both have a really, really

high efficiency, you put them together, you don't get the same additive high efficiency. There's always a decrease because you just can't have it. The guy to have around Luca would be a wing defender or a big, a big who can create,

or a guard who can defend and play off the ball and knock down threes like a Brogdon or Drew holiday, or, or you get like an Anthony Davis would be a perfect. So that's, those are the guys. And I get that those guys weren't available, but just because they weren't available,

it doesn't mean you just like, okay, we need a second star. It felt like a little panicky, but I don't know. Well, you think like, and I don't know. Well, you think like, and I don't think they were the only team

that could say this, but there were some really good rotation guy trade deadline pieces, right? Josh Hart, who the Knicks end up getting. Yep. Josh Hart would have helped, I don't know,

seven teams he would have been really important for, including the Mavs. More. He could help any team because he doesn't have to start. But he didn't even cost that much. They got Cam Reddish, they got Tybal, and some protected first-round pick.

Vanderbilt was another one that Utah just at some point decided he was expendable for all the other guys they got. He was sitting there. Purtle, you mentioned. Plumlee, whatever, but he didn't cost anything. And he's somebody that played 20 minutes in game one of a playoff series.

I just felt like there were fringe moves Dallas could have made. And if they're going to put that 29 first on the table, maybe at that point you get Vanderbilt and Kelly Olenek and maybe you can dump a contract. I think Utah wanted those picks. They wanted extra future picks with no attachments to them. If you're going to do that, I would rather trade for pieces, keep DFS, try to keep Dinwiddie

and just have the totality of 19 guys. I think part of it is the immense pressure that is being felt to do something with Luka to make him sure that he wants to stay there. We did this with the Cavs in the late 2000s. This never works. When you're doing the panic

short-term band-aid moves, it actually is worse than doing nothing. One thing I will say, like the price, I mean, he's an unrestricted free agent,

so it's not that, but like the price to get a player of his caliber was quite low. Unfortunately, they weren't the team to be willing to be where it made sense.

Like giving up DFS, who was their best defender by a pretty considerable margin for a team that already wasn't very good defensively. Now you're getting rid of your best defender who guards one through five. Expect's somebody who can play in the last five minutes of a game. I don't know. I felt like even I look at somebody like Pritchard on the Celtics, I think Pritchard's like a legitimate asset. And he just doesn't play for the Celtics because they have the deepest backcourt in the league.

But that's somebody that can come into a playoff series and be a possible piece. The league's the deepest it's ever been with guys like the Pritchard type guys. Everybody has their 10th... Remember in the mid-2000s how bad some of the guys were that were in major games?

You're like, how the fuck is this guy playing? That's the opposite. As well as the emphasis on shooting and skill, the league has gone that direction. The players that have come up are all that direction as well. They're all... I don't know. I don't think Peyton Pritchard

would have done very much for the Mavericks, just to be fair. But... No, but I'm saying you get him for nothing. I would rather... If I don't know

if I'm going to make the playoffs anyway, I would rather try to patch together a couple small moves. And if I'm going to use my 29 first, probably not use it for an unrestricted free agent. I get why. I know they were trying

to open up cap space. Maybe they thought it was sign and trade stuff, but I don't know. It felt panicky to me. Yeah, certainly wasn't... Has not paid off yet, but I think they thought

they had to get another star with Luka and they thought he was the guy. I don't know. It's such a high risk move. It's just such... For all the on-court reasons and then you have all the off-court reasons and the age and the contract and how much... The one thing that working in their favor is they don't... It doesn't look like there's a lot of teams that are going to be able to pay him or be willing to

pay him. But it'll be interesting how happy he'll be if he doesn't get a big contract. That's another part of it. Right. Then that can be interesting how happy he'll be if he doesn't get a big contract. That's another part of it. Then that can be counterproductive. Do you want an unhappy Kyrie Irving? That doesn't seem like that's worked out particularly well for any other franchise. What would you do if you were the Hawks GM? What would you do with Trae Young? I don't think you

can be a good team with Trae Young. He just can't defend well enough. His three-point shots even come off. He is the worst defensive point guard in the league by a pretty decent margin. And I think

everyone knows it at this point. Everyone's hunting him. It's just such a challenge for him to play in a playoff series. People talk about Luka's not good on defense. As much as you think Luka might not be good on defense, I promise you he's better than that cat. It's not even close. And Luka can be a good defender when he's in shape, motivated, whatever. This guy, unfortunately, just based on his frame and his stature, is just not able to. So what do I do? I don't know. I'd probably try to trade him for sure. I would try to move off of him and build. I think he's a brilliant offensive player in terms of especially how good he is with the ball and creating and the pick and roll. All that's great, but you can get guys like that who aren't making as much money and who bring a little bit of value on the defensive

end. It's just such a challenge playing him in the playoff series when he's being hunted. And it's tough for him to be good offensively when he's being hunted all game too. It's just hard. I don't think you can. There's too much space nowadays. You can't hide a guy like that. Who do you think says no to a Bradley Beal for Trae Young trade? I would

assume the Wizards. I don't know what team would want to trade for Trae Young. It's interesting to think about. And I don't mean to disparage him because I think he's a fantastic offensive player, but I just think it's just very challenging. So I don't know what... Who says no?

A team that's trying to sell tickets and sell jerseys? Yeah, maybe. And a team maybe that has some defensive anchors that you can surround him with. Maybe there's that. But even then, it's just still... In the day and age where you can space out your fives, and now the other team's opposing five

has to play on the perimeter, and now you can just call up Trae Young and pick and roll and have him be the screen defender, and maybe they'll point switch the first time, and then you can crash versus him. If that doesn't work, if all else fails, you can have your guy crash versus him and make him box out. It's just a challenge. Do you feel like there's a sameness when you look at all the stats for the season and you're

crunching different things? Do you feel like there's a sameness to the styles or is there more variance than we've usually had? What do you see in big picture for just how basketball is being played? I think big picture, there is a little bit more variance in terms of how teams are playing. But I think, you know, you have a team like Golden State and Sacramento, those two teams play a completely unique style

to the rest of the league. Denver also, there's Denver plays unique. Like there's lots of teams in Milwaukee. There's lots of, but there's also a lot of similarities where teams are just playing five out, four out, spacing, shooting a lot of threes.

The thing that I'm seeing that's just kind of absurd with the scoring is just how difficult it is to play defense and how that just keeps on getting worse and worse and worse to the point where any drive to the basket with any contact whatsoever is now a shooting foul.

And I think the game is officiated in such a way where with all the space, you have to be able to hand check again. You have to allow that. The freedom of movement stuff was cool when everyone was packed in the paint. You had four guys in the paint and nobody else had the three-point line.

That was like... And you had all these... Remember the Pistons, Pacers game? games, 60, 70, whatever the scores were. I get that. You needed freedom of movement then. But now it's just too much. It's just like every game is a drive, wide open three, or a drive and a layup. And it's kind of boring.

I think the game is kind of boring at this point. Yeah. I think like De'Aaron Fox, I'm not sure what you do. Like these guys, Russell and I were talking on Sunday night about Kevin Johnson, who is the ultimate downhill guy, right? People are just backpedaling,

trying to defend him. And Fox has a little of that too. And I don't really know, can't be physical with him. I don't, he's just going to be able to get to the spots he wants to get to. Yeah, the pain's wide open. And if you collapse versus him, he's going to zip it to

someone for a wide open three. If you don't collapse and you try to guard a man without being able to actually hand check, scoring is just like... I remember when I first started betting NBA totals and I would always use 200 as the benchmark for how I would keep track

of the pace because most holes were around 200. You need roughly four benchmark for how I would keep track of the pace. Because most totals were around 200. So you need roughly four points a minute. You keep track. At the six-minute mark, you'd be at roughly 25 points. Now, the total is like 227.5, 231, 233. And it's just kind of like, this is a different game. And a lot of it's a three-point shooting, obviously.

But a lot of it's just how tightly the game is officiated to the point where as a defender, you can't really do anything anymore. Last question. Who's the best poker player alive right now? I was like to ask you one that breaks your brain. Who's the best? Who's the GOAT? Who's the who's the Giannis of poker right now? I mean, you said right now, so it's tough to say.

I don't know. I would say like for there's this guy Linus Lolliger who is a cash game internet guy, but also plays live tournaments

and is there's just there's just such a there's just so little differentiation between the best players in the world because they all study the same ways using PO Solver and all the different GTO metrics. There's so little variation

between how... So you have to look at the guys who play cash games because the tournaments have so much... There's a bunch. There's like four or five guys that are all in the same category. All right. So let me flip it then. Let's do NBA player poker comparisons. Who's...

Yeah, so who's Curry? Who's Curry? I don't know. These don't apply. Come on. Who's LeBron? LeBron is Phil Ives. That's the only one that probably goes. Phil Ives was the GOAT. He still

might be up there, but times are different you know like it's just different like phil ivy was the best poker player in the world for a long period of time and then things changed and these young kids started studying and now you have like guys like jason coon you have adamo you have i'm just gonna forget a bunch of people but like linus olger you have all these guys who are just so fucking... Steven Chidwick for tournaments that are just so dialed in with every little bit of tournament poker. And cash games are dead. So unless you're getting into VIP cash games.

So the other thing... So here's the thing that people don't realize. The best poker players in the world, the ones who are the most successful by any reasonable metric, which is you can keep track by money, are the ones that you don't really hear about because they secretly get into these big games. And I'm not talking about Dan Milserum because that guy did it for a minute and tried to ride a whole career. For a minute, he played in really, really high-stakes poker games and made some money and then has been talking about it forever. But there's guys who secretly go under the radar who are just grinding away in these big cash games playing heads up matches

versus billionaires, winning lots of money in obscenely high stakes games. We're talking about 5K, 10K, no limit, 25K, 50K heads up like blinds. So your opening raise is like $100,000. So I don't know. The NBA

one doesn't really... I'll give you the Phil Ivy, LeBron James ones. The rest of them, I don't really have any for. Who's Jokic? Jokic is Stephen Chubb. I have no idea. I have no idea who Jokic is. The Jokic for poker... You're talking about a game that you just sit there and don't exhibit any physical

ability whatsoever and fold and play in the most minute, minute, minute details versus a game that's like ballet with jazz and athleticism versus poker. Can we at least agree Phil Helmuth is Draymond Green? We can agree that Phil Helmuth is Draymond Green. That's a great one, actually. That's a great one.

Phil Helmuth is Draymond Green. Phil Helmuth is dream on green. That's a great one, actually. That's a great one. Phil Hummeth is dream on green. Phil Hummeth is like, has there ever been a basketball player who said they were the best in the world, but none of their peers thought they were? Was there ever that guy? Oh, wow. None of Phil Hummeth's peers think he's the best in the world. They just don't. There you go. All right. Little poker thing. You feeling okay about crypto? You always ask me this

and I'm always feel the same way. I think last time you asked me, it's doubled since then. So I don't know. It'd be pretty hard for me to feel worse than I did last time since now the price has gone up like roughly double

since the last time we talked. And how's your soccer team doing? Football team is a grind right now. We were not great. We lost to the worst place team in the league at home and had a near revolt from our fans. Our very, very dedicated fans are getting very upset. And so we're in second and now we're in fourth or third. We're like a point out of six and quite quite a few points out of second second through fifth make the play in

for the for the promotion spot first is automatically given a promotion I think we're out of we can't catch first unfortunately we've had a

we've had a rough five game stretch so it's we're down but you know staying positive sticking to the process just trying to get better

it's a learning experience for me first time as an owner of a franchise lots of unexpected things that I didn't really account for but we'll get there. It's funny how that goes right?

The first time you're in charge of something that there's 75 things you never expected. Yeah it's definitely been fun and rewarding. And I, I think like some of our fans think this is a novelty for me and that's not true. Um,

we will get better. And if we don't get promoted this year, I think we're a massive favorite to get promoted next year, but just stay and have some faith, stick with it. We're working. So when's the end of the season? Uh,

towards the end of May-ish. I think. We have seven more games or six more games left. Six more games left. Six more games left? Yeah, six more games. We're rooting for you. Yeah.

Right now, we're in the mix. Right now, we're currently in fourth place. We have 52 points. First has 59. Second has 57. And third has 53. So have 52 points. First has 59, second has 57, and third has 53. You got this. You're not as embattled of an owner as Mark Cuban, are you? No, not even close.

And I will say this. I bought this team. The team was flirting with bankruptcy. They finished 13th out of 20 with no chance of ever being promoted last year. Zero prospect. The team was not good by any objective measure. It was actually flirting with rele chance of ever being promoted last year. Zero prospect. The team was not good by any objective measure. It was actually flirting with relegation for part of the year. And the expectations have changed so much to the point where when we were no longer in first

or second, our fans started revolting. Some of our fans. So it's like, let's just be realistic here. We were 13th last year. We're currently in fourth. We had no chance promotion last year. We're in the promotion mix this year. Have some faith. I get it. We've made some decisions that some people don't agree with, but that's one of the beauties of owning a franchise. You get to make the decisions and you get to live and die with the results. And so I'm willing to live and die with my results and see what happens. You didn't make a trade as bad as the Rudy Gobert trade, did you? No, there are no trades allowed, but we did not. Did you make a move as bad as the Rudy Gobert move?

No, not at all. I mean, we fired our coach, which I think a lot of people didn't understand because when we fired him, we were in second place at the time. Yeah. But I would not take that back. That was not someone but I wouldn't, I would not, I would not take that back.

That was not someone I wanted to have a long-term, I didn't hire him to begin with. It was not someone that I saw much agreement

in how we saw the game, how we wanted to conduct ourselves. So, but some people are like, why did you fire him? It was definitely,

it was definitely a controversial decision, but we had our reasons not really going to get into because I just don't disparage people like that. But, um, but yeah, we'll, we'll, we'll, I mean, that's the hardest decision that you have to make is who you hire as your coach, because he is our manager, because he's the guy who is basically running things.

And so you just have to make sure you align yourself with the right type of people. And we hired another coach. And so far the results have been mixed. Some people I think are not a fan of this particular coach. A small vocal majority. But I think right now we're

in a situation where we have six games left. We're behind him. We are going to build, continue building and see what happens, I suppose. It's fun. Wow, this has turned into a press interview. The H-Bob stands for heat. The heat is on. It's different, for sure. It's different. It'll be interesting when I head back there

soon because it's been a whirlwind of positivity. I feel like now, because we dropped from second to fourth, I'm still rolling like three points out. It's not like we're not that far. It's one game basically. But losing to the last place team at home

was like these guys, these fans who are upset deserve to be upset. That's a game you should just not lose if you have any aspirations of being promoted. The team we lost to had won five games all year and they came into our fucking stadium and beat us. They beat us on a penalty kick

that was a call to handball that wasn't an actual handball, but it doesn't matter. There's no excuse for losing to that team. How do we follow this? Is there a website that has all the streaming? Is there anything? InSports.tv InSports.tv has the games. It's like $30 a year.

How do you follow it? I guess you follow my Twitter and you follow the Seedcastly on Twitter. And then you wait until we get to Segunda, the second division, which is the games are on. It's a much bigger deal. So third division is a grind. We played a game where the sprinklers came on in the middle of the game. That was kind of like

what third division is about. Some of the fields aren't proper size. It's different. It's a grind. We played a game where the sprinklers came on in the middle of the game. That was kind of what third division's about. Some of the fields aren't proper size. It's different. So getting out of this league is paramount. We had a two-year goal to get out of the league. It seemed like we were ahead of track. We got out this year. We still have a goal and expectation to get out this year,

but we're a little bit up against it right now. So we'll see what happens. All right. Good luck. Good luck'll see what happens. All right, good luck. Good luck with the basketball watching. Good luck with the football, as you call it. Good to see you, as always. And I'll think of some better poker player basketball.

Yeah, work on that. Work on that in the shower. All right, see you later. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Kyle Mann and Bob Valgaris. Thanks to Steve Cerruti and Kyle Crane for producing. Don't forget new rewatchables, Alien. That is up.

If you want to watch the video of that episode, it is going to be on youtube.com slash Bill Simmons at some point on Wednesday. I will see you on this feed on Thursday. Go Suns. Wednesday. I will see you on this feed on Thursday. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go.

Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. Go. On the wayside On the first side of the road

I don't have to ever forget