The Bill Simmons Podcast - The Clips Steal Kawhi and PG-13, the Battle of LA 2020, Russ's Next Team and the Swipe- Right Decade With Chris Mannix and Marc Stein | The Bill Simmons Podcast

Episode Date: July 6, 2019

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by SI's Chris Mannix to discuss Kawhi Leonard and Paul George to the LA Clippers, OKC's massive trade haul, a new favorite in the Western Conference, what��s next for Russell Westbrook, the Lakers’ roster additions, and more (5:44). Then Bill talks with the NYT's Marc Stein about Lakers vs. Clippers, the "swipe-right" generation of basketball players, and more (1:14:30). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's emergency BS podcast episode that Kyle had to wake up for the first time in the history, like what, the last 15 years at nine o'clock in the morning? Come on, that's wrong. Episode of the Bill Simmons podcast on the rigor podcast network is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. ZipRecruiter. Let me tell you something about them. They have a high sports IQ.

You know how high that sports IQ is? If they were running OKC, they absolutely would have sent Paul George packing for seven first round picks or whatever the OKC got. Having a high sports IQ is super important. When it comes to hiring, you don't need a high hiring IQ. You just need ZipRecruiter. They send your job to over 100 of the web's leading job boards with one click. The tech doesn't stop there. It scans thousands of resumes, finds people with the right experience for your job, actively invites them to apply, get qualified candidates fast. So effective, four out of five employers have posted ZipRecruiter

to get a quality candidate through the site. Within the first day, my listeners can try for free. Go to ZipRecruiter.com slash BS. ZipRecruiter is the smartest way to hire. Meanwhile, SeatGeek is the best app for buying and selling tickets to sporting events, concerts, and more. What's more? Wrestling? Matches. Those are matches.

Matches? All kinds of stuff. I like more. More is exciting. I need more clarification on more. There's a lot of more out there. For $10 off your first SeatGeek purchase on any game or sporting event,

use promo code BS, download the SeatGeek app, or go right to SeatGeek purchase on any game or sporting event, use promo code BS, download the SeatGeek app or go right to SeatGeek.com. We're also brought to you by TheRinger.com, the world's greatest website where everybody thought they had the weekend off and then Kawhi gets traded like in the middle of the night on Friday.

Now everybody had to work. Great staff, great people we have. You can go to TheRinger.com, read some of the pieces we wrote. You can listen to The Ringer NBA show. They taped an emergency pod late last night, KOC and Chris Ryan. Speaking of The Ringer Podcast Network, Stranger Things came out, and we have that covered. We did the Recapables, the podcast where we cover some deep dive TV stuff sometimes.

We have Re recapables episodes for all of the new season three episodes, as well as a preview on the watch. And then I think Chris Ryan is going to be breaking down on the watch as that comes. Four huge thumbs up for my kids on the Stranger Things season. One last thing on podcast.

We have a new one coming July 9th. It launches on Tuesday on Luminary. It is called Break Stuff. It is the story of Woodstock 99, a festival where just about everything went wrong. It is hosted by Stephen Hyden. You can listen to it on Luminary. Just go to luminary.link slash ringer

for all the details. All right, coming up, Chris Mannix, Mark Stein, who knows who else? First, our friends from Pearl Jam alright so here's what it was like in L.A. last night. We had an earthquake.

We had our second one in, what was it, Kyle, 36 hours? Yeah, something like that. It was July 4th morning. I felt the first one. And it was like one of those cool earthquakes. You didn't know where it was coming. It was shaking for a while. And then you kind of realize, oh, shit, that was probably really far away.

It was probably a bad one. And then you feel bad. The second one last night, I didn't even feel. And then you kind of realize, oh shit, that was probably really far away. It was probably a bad one. And then you feel bad. The second one last night, I didn't even feel. And it seemed like it was, some people thought it was even worse than the one before. And then you're on CNN all night. You're watching. Try it. They're explaining what four shocks are.

I'd never heard of the word four shock or never really thought about it before. Just confusing. Then it's like, are we going to have a worse one? And everybody's just in earthquake mode here. And then, out of nowhere, the NBA blows up. And Kawhis go to the Clippers. Paul George being traded to the Clippers. The Thunder get one of the great hauls I think anybody's gotten in a trade.

We're going to talk about that with Chris Mannix in a second. And it just blew up. Kyle became a strangely memorable night. Not a pleasant one for you because at about 1130, I was like, you have to wake up early in the morning. We're going to be taking a pop. I was out. I was like, all right. No more shots. So I had a feeling Kawhi was going to drag it along all week just because everybody signed so fast on July 1st that he was the one just getting the attention all the time. And it was like, well, this is cool. It's just the Kawhi sweepstakes now. We did a podcast with Ryan Rossello on Tuesday that I just could not be more proud of where I feel like we kind of jinxed the Lakers a little bit. It was great. I even said it right before we brought in Rossello. I was like, we're going to proceed through this podcast like the Lakers got Kawhi. And it makes

me super happy that we were wrong. I'm just delighted to know it. But I think what was happening as we learned from the reporting last night and this morning was that Kawhi needed time to try to convince OKC to trade Paul George to the Clippers, the team that he wanted to go to all along. So a lot of this adds up and my instincts were wrong. It was actually not about Kawhi trying to just kind of milk the moment and be in the limelight for five, six days. It was about putting pressure on OKC to either trade Paul George to, I guess, Toronto or to trade him to Clippers. I still don't know how the Toronto trade could have worked because the Clippers gave up so many more assets. They gave up the biggest haul we have ever seen. And we're going to talk about

that and a bunch of other stuff with Chris Mannix from DAZN and Sports Illustrated right now. All right, Chris Mannix, I'm going to remember last night for everything I just mentioned with the earthquake and just how bizarre last night was. But as the day the little brother Clippers finally turned the tables on the big brother Lakers, how will you remember it?

I mean, it's a little bit of that. And kind of, I went into this process thinking, like, we'd learn a lot about what matters to Kawhi Leonard. And, you know, Kawhi, every time I heard the Lakers as a possible destination, it never synced up with little that I know about Kawhi, which is basically that every time he steps out there on the floor, he thinks he's the best player on the floor. He thinks he's his team can win no matter who's around him. So the idea of him kind of joining a super team never really synced up to me. I think it just,

we kind of learned a lot about, you know, what I learned a lot of what Kawhi values. He values playing alongside someone that he's close to close with, he's a good friend with, and he wants to play in Los Angeles and ultimately wanted nothing to do with the Lakers. I'm sure there's a million reasons behind that. I'm going to go in order. I wrote some things down, some notes, and we can just hit them one at a time.

The first one, Kawhi just capped off the greatest FU run that I can remember an NBA player having since the MJ days, where he rips through for four rounds, got the limelight, somehow lands himself in LA, but not for the Lakers, for the Clippers, the team that it seems like he wanted to play with all along, ends up getting the second star with them, which became apparent over the course of the week that he really needed, and sticks it to LeBron, who is his biggest rival of this decade, I feel like. By the way, Kawhi's won two titles.

LeBron's won three. I think they're the three best forwards of this decade. So Kawhi pulls this off. This feels like the last piece of this little competitive thing he had with LeBron for most of this decade that we didn't even really realize was going on, that he's now taking the mantle as the guy. And you have Durant goes down with the Achilles injury. LeBron is getting on in years. And I do think you're right. I think part of this was Kawhi

didn't want to be on LeBron's team. He actually wants to be the LeBron of this scenario. Are you confident from a health standpoint that he can deliver and be the durable guy that he would have to be to become the guy in the league? I don't think he's ever going to be a 75-80 game player ever again. I think he

can get up to the high 60s, low 70s, but what Toronto did with him last year, I think is going to become the norm because you saw him at the end of the playoffs dealing with that injury in the leg to the point where like when you went inside that raptors locker room and asked players about what was going on with kawai they would tell you it's like every day we walk in and we ask him if he's good to go yeah and i don't think that's i don't think it's going to be, it's going to change over the next few years.

I think you're going to continue to see him operate on that load management schedule where they try to keep in that 65 game range and get ready for the playoffs. Now, does that mean he can't be, you know, the Jordan of this generation or the man in this league? I don't know.

I think as long as he plays all, you know, 25 playoff games or whatever it is, I think that's fine. But I don't think we'll ever see him... Put it another way, I don't think we'll ever see him as an MVP in the league based on the number of games he's not going to be able to play. Well, to put a bow on this Kawhi thing, so he tries to get out of San Antonio a season and a half ago. And we keep hearing that he wants a bigger profile and that potentially wants to end up in Southern California, all that stuff. Only plays nine games for the Spurs that last year.

By the time the summer rolls around, it's hit the point from a trade value standpoint that the Celtics aren't even considering Jalen Brown in the Sacramento pick for him. Which now you look back and that's insane because he's the best point in the league. Philly's not even considering Covington, Sarich, Fultz, whatever else they would have had to throw in without giving up Simmons and B. They're not that interested either. And then within a year, he wins the title. The Kawhi sweepstakes becomes a thing 4th of Kawhi on the 4th of July that becomes a thing he ends up in LA he flips the tables

on LeBron he gets his second guy and now they are the favorites to win the entire league I think they're just under 3-1

and even though we're going to talk about all the stuff they gave up in the trade in a second, but I think I agree. I think they are the favorites.

What do you think? I think, yeah, at least to come out of the Western conference, like anything else, you got to see how they all fit together. And, you know,

Kawhi has proven that he can step into a new situation and succeed at the highest possible level. They got some holes there. I mean, their, their bench is okay. You know, the front court, we'll see how that all shakes out. But I would make them right now the favorite to come out of the Western Conference.

But I still look at the East, and, you know, you give Milwaukee another year together, let's see how this Philly team, that supersized Sixers team, how that kind of shakes out. I don't know that I'd make them an overwhelming favorite, but at least to come out of the Western Conference right now, I'd say they're at the top. So they have Kawhi Paul George, Tres Harrell, Beverly,

Shamit, Lou Williams, Zubach, unless he's flipped in a trade. And Moe Harkless is expiring, which is important because I was looking at it today. They could package him, Jerome Robinson, and you can put in Thornwell potentially, but you can get a guy who is in the 17, 18, 19 million range if they package the contracts correctly. And what's interesting is Andre Iguodala is at 17 million.

Memphis, very smartly. I hate when teams buy out guys for no reason. Memphis very smartly is like, yeah, we're not buying him out. We're going to trade him. They could pretty easily flip some Harkless, Jerome Williams,

second round picks and add a good dollar to this nucleus. What else do you think they need to, uh, to actually win the title? It feels like they need one more veteran swing. They obviously need a second rebounder slash rim protector person. I'm not sure Zubach is the guy, but those guys have been perennially pretty easy to get.

If you were their GM advisor right now, what would you advise them to do? Yeah, I mean, the size upfront is, is something that's going to have to be addressed, especially if you're, and I'm not sure how they wind up playing Kawhi and Paul George together, whether it's kind of a two, three, three, four kind of mix there. They were interested for the last few days in Marcus Morris. He was someone they were, they were really trying to get ahold of, but Marcus is kind of holding out for a bigger deal i don't know where that deal is going to come from now for marcus morris given that everything's kind of the cap space seems to be evaporating really quickly uh but but somebody like that who can swing between multiple positions and give you some flexibility in that front court

i mean i i think they now become i they now become the premier destination for the last remaining minimum guys. And if you get into the buyout market in a few months, or six months, whatever it is, they're going to become the most attractive destination. Like, if you're a big man that gets bought out, aren't you looking immediately at the Clips and saying, I could help that team

win a championship? That's where I want to go. So, I don't know if they get everything squared away in the next couple of weeks, but in the next few months, I could see them adding just what they need to be that championship team. Well, they won't have any picks left to put in. We'll talk about that in a second. I do think you need seven slash eight guys,

at least to start the season with who are competent. And you can in December, January, February, find the other two guys. I think we've seen that over and over again. The 08 Celtics were like that, where it wasn't a finished team for a while, and then it became finished. We've seen a lot of teams do that. I think they need one more rebounder shot blocker. They had to do this.

I think, moving to one of the other points I wanted to make, this is the biggest haul anyone's ever paid for a player. Now, they paid it for Paul George. It was really to get Paul George and Kawhi together. So you can't think of it as just a Paul George trade. And yet you can because that's what OKC got for Paul George, a guy who, by the way, has a metal rod in his leg, had surgery on both shoulders during the spring. We don't even

really know how bad the rotator cuff was. It might've just been an actual torn rotator cuff. The details have been a little sparse for that, but he also had a torn labrum on the other side. And he's going to be 30, I think, in a year. And this is pretty risky. I mean, they paid more than the Lakers paid for Anthony Davis. Again, they had to do it. And this was the only way they were going to steal LA from the Lakers is to do this. I don't think Ballmer wanted to sit around and, you know, watch Clutch just continue to build the Lakers over and over again.

The risk element of this, I don't think could be understated. Am I overthinking this? Because you just said how Kawhi, who knows with his leg, he's definitely not an 82 game a year guy anymore. Now you're throwing in four playoff rounds too. And then on top of it, Paul George,

who's been under the knife now a few times, I would be a little nervous about this if I'm a Clippers fan, because if this doesn't work out, you have nothing now. You have nothing until 2025, 26, no way to rebuild other than cap space. What do you think of that? Yeah, I think that's all true. But the flip side of it is what would they be if they didn't make this deal? And let's say for the sake of argument, if they don't make the deal, Kawhi decides to either go to the Lakers or back to Toronto, whatever. There's not a lot of avenues for the Clippers to get significantly better over the next couple of years. I mean,

we know what the free agent landscape looks like next summer. The trade market at this point doesn't seem great. Yes, the Clippers would have a bunch of draft picks they could deal, but we saw in Boston how well that works out when you don't have an obvious trade partner to go and work with. So the way the Clippers looked at it, it was either this or three years of mediocrity. And then you're counting on your team to succeed with these draft picks, which might be middle of the pack or later,

hit on second-round picks. There just wasn't an alternative here. If this is what Kawhi Leonard went to them with and said, you get me if you get Paul George, and you're dealing with Sam Presby, who's probably as good at this as any GM in the NBA, you're not going to come out of it unscathed. So I just think they had no choice in this matter. And Sam, look, Sam held them over the barrel on this one. And look, there's a deeper conversation to be had about why the funder agreed to make this deal. I'm not sure I buy the whole, well, we didn't want to wind up with an Anthony Davis type situation. I don't know if I buy that with two years left on the guy's contract, but Sam had these guys over the barrel and he took full advantage of them in this field.

It's a crucial point about the Clips and this is why they had to do this. I don't feel like the Lakers had to do the Davis trade because I think they were going to get them in a year and I'm not sure who they were bidding against. In this case, as you point out, the Clippers

are in purgatory if they don't make this trade because you just go through the best players in the league. Kawhi, Giannis, he's not a free agent for two years. James Harden, Houston's not trading him anytime soon. Curry, Anthony Davis, he's taken. Jokic isn't going anywhere. LeBron's in the Lakers. Embiid's not going anywhere. Paul George, who I think is a top 10 guy, he was availableant's not going anywhere Lillard's not going anywhere Bradley Beal's not opening a new stadium for you Old Depot, two years away Doesn't have the same star power as Kawhi

Kyrie, Kemba, those guys aren't going anywhere Butler And all of a sudden, the best players in the league are gone Now you're going to the younger list The Donchit Zion guys You're not getting any of those guys So what they're looking at for the next three years is a season resembling what they just had, where they're really smart.

They figured out the cap space. They drafted well. They did all these little tricks to stay relevant, but you're losing in the first round. Or maybe you're getting to the second round, you're losing then. You're not really getting anywhere. So they had to do it. You bring up the OKC thing. I'm with you. I think it is such bullshit. If they're going to say like, ah, we had to, we didn't want to have an unhappy super bullshit. This is an awesome trade for them. And you do it a hundred times out of a hundred. I think the feedback I'm getting just talking to people around the league is like, that's, it's their dream to be in a situation like this, where you're getting somebody who's willing to pay 220 cents on the dollar for a player. I thought the Davis trade hall was the biggest trade hall

anyone has paid in NBA history. I went through that case in a previous podcast. This is actually a bigger trade hall because you're getting three unprotected picks, which remember a year ago, everybody was saying, oh, unprotected picks, you can't get them anymore. Well, we've just seen two different trades where unprotected picks happen. They get three of those from the Clippers. They get two pick swaps and they get two Miami first rounders as well. And they get Gallo on an expiring and Gallo was good. I mean, Gallo was a borderline all-star in the West last year on an expiring deal, which OKC can either flip or keep him.

And then Shea Gilgis-Alexander, who I think is really good. I actually like him. Would you rank him ahead of the three, all three guys that the Lakers had to give up to get Davis? Would you rather have him over Ingram, Lonzo, and obviously take him over Josh Sharp?

But where do you rank him against those guys? No, I'd take Ingram over him in that deal. I think he's neck and neck with Lonzo for biggest upside. I like what he does. Great body for that position and a terrific defensive player. I think Ingram still has that kind of alpha score type potential, at least in him. But Oklahoma City...

Well, hold on one second. The only thing with Shea is that you have him two more years locked up on the rookie salary thing now. That's the only thing with Ingram is you're going to have to pay him in a year. And unless he proves over the next

nine months that he's actually somebody you'd want to commit 75, 80, a hundred million, whatever it takes. I, these Jamal Murray getting one 70 from Denver, um, those kinds of contracts, it's really like teams are terrified now. They're just completely overpaying to keep guys because they're worried about two years down the road being in this situation that some of the teams is somewhere in. I personally rather. If he shows, if he shows,

if Ingram shows like, like David Griffith is not going to offer him that kind of deal unless he shows what that he's capable of it next year. And if he shows that like you pay Brandon Ingram, you're not paying anybody else on that roster. They've got a bunch of guys that are on low salaries. So Brandon Ingram is not going to like prohibit you from going out and signing somebody in 2021.

So that, that's like, I mean, I think they'll gladly pay him if all of a sudden he and Zion turned out to be this tremendous next year. So I don't, I don't worry too much about Ingram salary given their books right now. So I interrupted you go,

what were you saying about OKC's assets that they got? Well, no, it wasn't like, here's the thing, Bill. I want to, be able to i want to know like you know the narrative coming out of oklahoma city and i was talking to somebody there just before we started taping like it is that you know they didn't want to uh you know get into a davis situation they didn't want to have their their whole process disrupted by the kind of dysfunction we've seen across the

league. But I want to know, did Oklahoma City and Sam Press, they'd look at the Paul George, Steven Adams, Russell Westbrook dynamic after one season, putting aside the injury stuff. I know Paul was hurt last year, but they've now had two playoff appearances with those two guys. Did they look at it and say, we probably can't win with this group? And even though we didn't want this to happen and the moves they made leading up to it, the Mike Muscala signing, Alex Burks, that tells you they were trying to go for it next year. But when this was presented to them, did part of them like exhale a little bit and say, all right, we have an opportunity here to get the biggest trade hall ever in exchange for a guy that's really good, but maybe we can't go all the way with.

Maybe we can't win a championship with this core. That's something I think is unknown with Oklahoma City's decision and all this. I don't think it's unknown. I think this was the all-time get-out-of-jail-free card. That roster was going nowhere. If anything, they were going to be a repeater tax team this year,

and I am not convinced. I think they would have had to attach assets to get rid of Roberson's deal or maybe even Steven Adams. Steven Adams was available two weeks ago, as you know. I mean, I think there was- Yeah. Untradeable. Untradeable at this point. Yeah. And the other one is Schroeder, who, you know, that trade for Carmelo still made sense because they would have, keeping Carmelo last year would have cost them like an extra a hundred million dollars or something with the tax. But that team was going nowhere. The Westbrook, I think as the lead guy on a championship team is just unrealistic at this

point. I don't see it. I think it's more realistic to me that his body's going to start breaking down. And then you have Paul George, as I mentioned, who has had three pretty significant injuries here. And I'm sure they were delighted to get out of this while pretending they were blindsided and disappointed. FYI, I'm sure you've heard too. I've been hearing the last couple of months that Paul George had buyer's remorse going back to OKC and all that stuff and wished he hadn't done it differently. And there had been a lot of stuff about his agent, Aaron Mintz, and Rob Poinca, the Lakers GM who had had a rivalry going way back.

And that was the reason Paul George didn't go there. That was the reason Julius Randle left. And I think Paul George always wanted to end up in LA. That was what we had heard for two years. And I think it was almost like one of those honeymoons where you're in Vegas, you're with this girl, you're having a great time. And then it's like, hey, let's go get married.

And then two weeks later, you're like, oh my God, what did I do? The worst part for him is he has the four-part My Journey episode that's still on YouTube of his free agency chase. And the party with Westbrook and all that stuff. The most telling thing, the most shocking thing to me the last 24 hours,

and there's been a lot of shocking stuff, was that they seriously pursued a Westbrook and Paul George to Toronto trade. Woj reported that this morning. That tells me the clock is on Westbrook now. And really, there's not a lot of teams. It's Miami, Orlando, or the Knicks, I would say, are the three possibilities for him. Do you expect Westbrook to get traded the next nine months? Yeah, I think right now, I would say that he gets traded before the start of the season. Me too. I agree.

It's a conversation. They've got a great relationship with Russ and they'll be above board with all this. They'll work with him on making a deal work if that's the direction they decide to go. The timelines just don't match up anymore.

A couple of years ago, a few years ago now when Durant left, you could still keep Westbrook around, have that type of first season where it's the Westbrook show, and try to find ways to make it work. But he's 30 now. And unless Sam's got another rabbit in his hat that can pull a Paul George type onto that team, I don't know how you make it work. I don't know how you make it work within the timeline that you're now setting up with that group. So I think they'll aggressively explore trade options when it comes to Westbrook. The funny thing is I agree with you, the teams that, that you mentioned there. I mean,

I can't imagine Westbrook being happy trade to Orlando, but, um, what would have happened if Boston had struck out on Kemba Walker, like Russell Westbrook sliding into that cap space and Boston setting a bunch of draft picks and Jalen Brown back is like a Danny Ainge thing to do. Oh my God. That would have been,

I'm telling you, but that would have been. I would have left. I would have moved to like Europe. They've just started following the Premier League. He would have talked about it.

He would have looked at it. I don't feel like, do you really feel like any smart front office would want that Westbrook contract at this point? That's why I feel like I think Miami and Orlando are the two teams. Now, Orlando has been pretty clear.

They like their team. They like their nucleus, all that stuff. But I still feel like they're starless. And you get Westbrook, you're on the map, whether that makes sense to actually win a title, which I don't think it does. At least you're relevant. And right now they're not. And they're in a city where their legacy is just stars leaving them. It's Shaq leaving them.

It's Dwight Howard leaving them. And I don't know, Westbrook at least gives them an identity. I think Miami makes more sense because Miami doesn't care about luxury tax. They have proven over and over again that they will gravitate towards stars. Stars like playing there. It's a good outcome for Westbrook to end up with a good organization. And he's in Florida, no state taxes, all that stuff. And then on top of it, they actually have pieces that they could trade for him. and he's in Florida, no state taxes, all that stuff.

And then on top of it, they actually have pieces that they could trade for him. They have a couple expiring contracts. Goran Drogic makes 19 million. They have one more expiring that I think is at like 10. They have Justice Winslow that could be the centerpiece of something and they could even throw a BAM out of bio. I don't know why they would,

but it could be a get out of jail free card trade for the Thunder where they get off that Westbrook trade, they get out of the luxury tax, which I still think they have to shed double figures. Don't you think they'd have to also get under the luxury tax with the Westbrook trade, right? Yeah, they'd have to find a way to, yes. But Miami makes a lot of sense. Because Miami will take anybody that has talent, and you're right, they don't care about the tax.

They just don't have draft picks. And I would imagine in a deal like this that Oklahoma City's going to want to keep hoarding those draft picks. I don't see Orlando working just because, unless Russell says to them, I want to go to Orlando. I don't think they deal in there. I just think that the relationship is, is that strong and, and, and all that they've done together. along to change their mind and this is the kind of thing where you can get over on them because the knicks have all their draft picks now they've got some some decent young players nothing great outside of rj barrett but some decent young players and they could conceivably create some flexibility with some deals uh of their own down the line that's the team that makes sense sending into new york getting a bunch of draft picks but plus some decent young players back and of their own down the line. That's the team that makes sense. Sending him to New York,

getting a bunch of draft picks, plus some decent young players back and rebuilding from there. Every Knicks fan I know would have a heart attack and not in a good way. They would not be happy with getting the, the Knicks trading everything

for 30 year old, 31 year old Russell Westbrook, whatever he is now and getting him right as he started to go into his decline phase would be the most Knicks move of all time. It really would. But it also proves why it was so stupid for them

to spend $52 million next year on 10th men. I'm not counting Julius Randle, but I just want to keep my cap space open for as long as I possibly can until I know what else is going to shake out. And the Kawhi chip was such a big chip. It was clearly going to affect somebody somehow, however it played out. And I just would have rather kept the cap space. Instead, they locked all these guys up. They can't trade any of those

guys until, is it mid-December or is it January? I can't remember. December 15th is when they can make those deals. Right, so if Westbrook was going to go there and by the way, it will be a theme all summer and I'm going to torture every Knicks fan I know with it. I'm going to send texts, Westbrook! Knicks fans are going to have

everybody I know will have, no, no, we didn't do that right. I'm just fucking with you, sorry. But I could totally see them trading R.Jj barrett and 30 million dollars of expirings for westbrook and then being like we've got our star good luck with that one he has he hasn't gotten out of the first round in three years we're gonna take a quick break quick break to mention that this episode is brought to you by miller light here in the ringer, we have our disagreements, but there shouldn't be any debate about this. Miller Lite is the great tasting light beer with only 96 calories and 3.2 grams of carbs. That's fewer calories and half the carbs of

Bud Light. So there's really nothing more to talk about. If you have a real argument, let me hear it. Until then, stick with Miller Lite. Miller Lite, hold true and since we're here quick reminder Break Stuff our new podcast that launches Tuesday on Luminary it is the story

of Woodstock 99 a festival where a lot of crazy stuff happened and if you want details on how to listen to this

go to luminary.link slash ringer it's really good it's hosted by Stephen Hyden. And if you're a music buff, I learned a lot.

It's really good. Check it out. Great stuff. All right, back to the pod. All right, we're back. I wanted to mention the Orlando thing really quick. You said how they wouldn't trade him to, they wouldn't trade Westbrook to a team

without his consent, basically, or without him knowing. It doesn't seem like he, we're not sure he was in the loop on the Toronto thing last night that was reported, which was the most shocking thing of the night to me that, that it was on the table for Westbrook and Paul George to go together to Toronto for Siakam contracts and picks. I personally don't think,am, contracts, and picks. I personally don't think...

I just find that hard to believe Messiah would trade for Westbrook. I'm sure he allowed himself to be strung along, but was also excited to increase the price that the Clippers would have to pay, knowing that he's a competitive guy who's seen the whole landscape. And at least he wants, if somebody's going to trade for Paul George,

at least make them price up. Do you think he actually would have traded for Westbrook? Well, first, I agree that Masai's hatred for the Clippers ranks right up there with his hatred for pretty much anything in basketball. I mean, for everything that, everything the Clippers did this year from, you know, kind

of the goofiness with having somebody show up with a Clippers polo on every single Kawhi Leonard game to just the shadow recruiting they did of Kawhi behind the scenes. This did not go unnoticed, obviously, within Toronto. So I can buy the idea of like, let's just let's just hint that you're a possibility to drive up the price at the same time. I mean, you don't want to take West Westbrook, but if Westbrook means George and Kawhi also stay,

don't you do it? I mean, doesn't that guarantee you like a three year championship window? And if you have that versus what you have right now, I mean, Toronto is facing maybe a complete teardown. I mean, we're sitting here. Free agency might not be over because I don't know what the Raptors are going to

do. I mean, they might strip down that team for parts and deal off Kyle Lowry and Ibaka and Gasol over the next couple of weeks or months. I don't think he wanted Westbrook. I think he wanted Kawhi to come back to the same team and him to tweak it along the way, but if it meant getting Paul George into that mix, I think he would have done it.

Well, here's the other thing. Do we know for sure Kawhi would have stayed in Toronto if they got Paul George? That part remains unclear to me. It's more clear that by trading for Paul George, it would have made it so much harder for Kawhi to go to the Clippers because then he's not going with the second guy. But it doesn't necessarily mean Kawhi wouldn't have then gone to the Lakers. So it's almost like you would have to be like, hey, Kawhi, we're doing this. Does that mean you will resign here?

And I haven't heard that piece of it. I'm stunned. Well, you talked about Toronto. We didn't even talk about them. I don't feel bad for their fans because they won the title. And this is the price of winning the title sometimes is now you have a rebuild. So that's great. But it had to have been weird for them to go to bed last year. I guess some of them would have gone to bed last night thinking Kawhi was going to stay. I thought he was going to stay. As it dragged along and it became clear

something was holding him back with the Lakers. It seemed like Toronto one and one or two years with the one year option, something like that. And I was talking to some people about it. It doesn't seem like he wants to deal with Clutch and LeBron and being the third wheel, all that stuff. And it doesn't seem like the Clippers were able to get that second guy.

And that was what it came back to me over and over again. I thought he was going to go to the Clippers all year. And then once they couldn't get the second guy for him, the Toronto thing became so much more realistic. I feel bad for the Raptors fans, but at the same time, they did win the title.

How do you feel? I mean, I thought he was going to go back as well just because it seemed like Toronto had earned so much equity with him and the belief that I think that was inside Kawhi

and inside Kawhi's team that even though it was a, it was an older roster with some of those core guys with Lowry and Ibaka and Gasol that Messiah Jerry had proven that he can find the talent to put around him to make it successful. So I thought that was going to bring him back. I also didn't think, I don't think he ever was looking hard at the two plus year deal. I think he was taking the

same approach that Carmelo Anthony did during his free where it's like, I'm going to get the money. And then if it doesn't work, I'm going to kind of force my way out or I'll figure it out. It's like Paul George did. That's now the Paul George. That's basically what it is. So I think he was always looking at that four or five year deal to guarantee him the money. And then he could kind of, you know, dictate what happens.

I just, I got to give Kawhi credit for like, I mean, this was a master manipulation of the process. Yeah. He took his time. He, however,

he dealt with Paul George to convince Paul, go to Oklahoma city. That worked. I mean, there aren't great GM who have pulled this off. A player basically orchestrated all this and made it all happen. It's also made me think, Bill, like, do you have to have any kind of conversation again about player tampering?

Like, Sam Presti's got to be losing his mind in some ways because this happened with Durant. And, you know, Presti was kind of leading the charge, you know, to clean up tampering in the NBA for a while. Yeah. Now you have, you know, Gouache Leonard basically directing Paul George to request the trade. And ultimately it happened.

So, you know, we discussed like that. It all worked out for Oklahoma city in a pretty good way, but I mean, this is another example of, of where tampering has just taken on a whole new meaning. I don't even think they look anymore. is another example of where tampering has just taken on a whole new meaning.

I don't even think they look anymore. I think there's been an unwritten rule that effectively started a year ago, but really went into effect this year that once the final starts, whatever, everything's fair game. We saw it with, it's July 1st, six o'clock. Everyone's supposed to be starting to talk right then. And 20 deals were announced in an hour. So that can't happen without tampering. I think everybody has just agreed now. All right, we're all going to do it. So here's how it goes.

It's become the highway where the sign says to go 40 miles an hour and everybody's going 60. And that's just how it is. But isn't this different? Isn't this different a little bit? Because, I mean, Paul George has two years left on his deal. Like, I get it that, you know, Kyrie and KD may talk about where they're going to go in mid-June or earlier.

Yeah. Even like during the season, like Spencer and Dinwiddie and whatever recruiting he was doing of Kyrie Irving. This was a guy with two years left on his deal. And Kawhi, at least what it sounds like, is telling him to go request a trade from your team and putting them in a tough position there.

That to me is just kind of, that just takes the tampering to another level. We've gone from talking to guys in the final year of their deal to talking to guys with multiple years left in their deal. Yeah. I do feel like it started in 2016 with Durant and the Warriors when it became clear

that they were texting him during the season. And the Paul George thing, are the Clippers culpable in any way? I don't know. If Kawhi's like, I've called Paul George. I've been texting with him. He says he would be open to a trade. He's not happy there if you guys could get him i'll come is that tampering because i'm not i'm not sure anymore i don't know what the line is but if i'm the clippers and i have kawaii leonard telling me that guess what i'm gonna do anything i can to get paul george the price they paid is really staggering for a variety of reasons um first of all, 2022 looks like that's going to be the draft that has the high school

players in it. And that was the draft I thought would be off limits in all trades. And yet everybody is just throwing around 2022 picks. All the picks they gave up, they have no future whatsoever. Conversely, OKC, I just think they're in an unbelievable position now.

Them and the Pelicans with all the assets they have at least have the start of something. Where the Pelicans have Zion, they've drew Holiday. They're a lot closer to competing, I think. But in terms of how badly it can go when you're just looking at the tail end of something, this is like what happened with the Celtics when they did the KG and Paul Pierce thing.

It wasn't just that Brooklyn gave them the get out of jail free card. And they had to take Gerald Wallace's contract with it too and all that stuff. But they were at the end of, end of the run. It was over. There was, there was nothing more to milk out of that cow. And I'm with you.

I think OKC was like that with this Westbrook-George combo. I don't, where were they going this year? Even if Paul George comes back healthy, that worked out great for them. Yeah. And like, I mean,

again, they thought that, they believed they could make a run. Like you go out there and get Alec Burks to shore up the shooting and Muscala and all that stuff. Like they believed that

that group coming back as long as Paul was healthy, like that they could do it, but that's foolish. And it, it, well, but like, I don't know if they thought they had a choice.

Like, I don't know that, that they ever imagined before a couple of days ago that this deal would possibly be on the table, that a team like the Clippers would be in the position where they'd have to give up more than what the Lakers did for Anthony Davis. I just don't think they ever foresaw that, that that would be there.

And once that was there, it's like, Oh yeah, boy, we, we hate losing Paul George. Like we, we could have won a championship in a couple of years.

That may be what they're saying. They're probably having a little bit of a celebration behind closed doors. Quickly. You mentioned, uh, Toronto's crazy situation in there. And now they have Lowry and Van Vliet make a combined 43.5, just those two guys. Serge Ibaka is on the books, 23.2 as an expiring.

And Gasol is on the books for 25.6 as an expiring. So they are looking at over $90 million in expiring contracts of veterans who, you know, I think have decent to pretty large size appeal on the trade market. The problem is everybody chewed up their cap space already. And this is, this is why I never understand why these teams chew up all their cap space on the first week of July. This happens every year.

And then all these teams have these contracts and they can't do anything with them. You know, or they don't have the cap space to get like Toronto's like, hey, here's Kyle Lowry. You want him? I'm like, I'm sorry. Used up my cap on Joe Schmoe and John Schmuck. But pretty funny. Miami, I think for Westbrook could be the one. Wait, I had a couple more things for you really quick. Well, let me just say, Toronto

there's two options there now where you could just keep this group together see what you can do next year as like a 6C, you know, whatever you want in the Eastern Conference and then let those contracts just come off the books. Because if you do that, you, you can, you can rebuild without having to make any significant deals. Cause you don't want to take back, you know, a con somebody with extra years on that contract. But I would, what I expect them to do is to aggressively shop these guys and see if you can get another expiring deal and a draft pick out of it for whether it's Lowry or a Bach. I mean, you've heard this too, over the years, like the running joke in the NBA is like for the last, like five, six years,

Messiah Jerry has kind of been waiting to do this. Like there's been a, there's been a teardown coming in Toronto. Like the joke amongst, you know, different people was that like the, the press release to announce the firing of Dwayne Casey was been written for like six years. Like he just kept winning too many games for them to let him go. Like this is, this is something that's been on the Raptors radar for a pretty long time. The, the possibility,

even the eagerness to kind of rebuild this thing. Now they have Siakam. Now they got Van Vliet. I don't know if either one of those guys are number one players on a championship team, but you have two kind of building blocks. Well, I mean, yeah, I don't think so either,

but you have those two building blocks and you can go out there and if somebody will give you a first round pick for Kyle Lowry and another expiring contract, you do it. Same thing with Ibaka and Ixal and start to rebuild

some of those draft assets. Well, I remember talking to Daryl at the early part of the decade. This like, Ibaka and Exalt and start to rebuild some of those draft assets. Well, I remember talking to Daryl at the early part of the decade. This like, you know, he's done a really nice job of keeping the Rockets competitive and always trying to get a star. And he had his whole philosophy of trying to get three stars, which we've talked about in this podcast a million times. But he was also really jealous of the teams that had a chance to do the rebuild. And I think one of the funniest things about that OKC trade is all the GMs.

That was kind of their dream trade to be in this scenario where you're just sitting around one week. You have a team that has no chance to win the title. And then out of nowhere, the Clippers come in and they're like, hey, we have to have Paul George. Well, he's not available. Well, what will it take? Well, it would take seven first round picks and Shea Gildress Alexander and Gallinari's contract. Hold on. We got to talk about this. We'll call you back.

And Sam Preston's like, what? Wait, I'm going to get five first rounds and two pick swaps and a young guy to build around and this is, how did this happen? I guarantee he's delighted. I guarantee it. there's no way and and for you're right about whether daryl or other gms gms by nature are are builders and you know like look at what tim conley was dealing with for a minute with with the wizards like everyone looked at that situation was like why would tim conley leave you know denver besides the money factor you've got the nuggets team that's this close to potentially being a championship team but there was an appeal for

Tim Conley not just of going back to the DC area but to tear that whole thing down yeah and and rebuild a team over the next three or four years general managers enjoy that like that's fun for them when they get to that that top level certainly winning a championship is, but you know, getting beaten the second round of the conference finals, that just like eats at your soul. If you're a GM in this league. Yeah. And I think Danny's a good example, you know,

that run ends. And I guarantee the most fun three years for him was those first couple of years with the Brooklyn picks coming and getting to take chances on the Isaiah Thomas types and being that guy in your fantasy league, who's not really trying to win, but he's not tanking either for keepers. And he's just kind of seeing where things are going month to month.

And I think that's every GM's fantasy. To put a bow on the Toronto thing really quick, the Wizards seem like a natural trade partner for them because they could give them Beal. You'd have to take John Wall's contract. And if you're Toronto, you just give them expirings and, I don't know, OG Anami, Ananobi, something like that. And you'd be like, the prices, we'll give you a pick. We'll take Beal back. We'll roll it. We'll roll the dice with wall.

And that would be an interesting way to reboot. I don't see a lot of options for Washington with, uh, with, with that wall contract, by the way, I meant to mention this too. Do you think Washington's like the guy in the fantasy league who's upset that the,

the Paul George trade package happened, but nobody ever called them to see, to see if they wanted 70% of that for Bradley Beal, because they would have taken 70% of that for Bradley Beal yesterday. Right? I don't see the Bradley Beal stuff. I don't, I can't really wrap my head around because everybody in Washington has told

me that he's like Ted Leonsis, his favorite player and getting past, like getting a Bradley Beal trade done means getting Leonsis on board with it. And he's not. So maybe if you can attach John Wall to it, that changes the calculus a little bit. That's why I always thought, you know,

I don't know where the Miami stuff came from. That was more like, you know, players on ESPN operating as reporters, like bringing that stuff up. But like it made some sense to a degree because, you know, before this catastrophic injury, Miami would have taken on John Wall. They would have taken that contract and said,

we can rehabilitate him to a high-end player. If they were going to get Bradley Beal out of it too, I could see the Heat rolling the dice on that. But again, I don't know what they'd give up to make it appealing to Washington besides just taking that wall contract. I think if they could have given up Shea and Gallo and two unprotected picks and one of those Miami picks for Beal, I think Washington, at some point, there was a number that they would have been overwhelmed by that was probably less than the Paul George number. But Kawhi, maybe Paul George was his guy. I want to talk about the Lakers,

but we're going to take a quick break. Let's take a break to talk about Google Fi. Doesn't it feel like most phone plans just weren't made with less than mine? Between bad coverage, paying too much for data you don't ever actually use, crazy roaming charges.

Come on. Google Fi is a phone plan by Google made with features that people like you and I actually want. Features like free international roaming. So you never have to worry about calling up your provider to let them know you'll be traveling. I hate that. Three networks in one. You can stay connected wherever you want, from your home to your office, everywhere in between. Google Fi works on your favorite smartphone so you don't have to switch phones just to switch plans. Another thing I hate.

In fact, it's as easy as just downloading the app. You only have to pay for the data you use, plus with bill protection. If you ever do use a lot of data, your bill is capped at a reasonable amount. Learn more at fi.google.com. That is fi.google.com. Switch to Google-fy, a phone plan by Google. Back to the podcast.

Okay, the Lakers, they overpay for Davis, a guy they could have gotten in a year, under a lot of the same principles as this Clippers thing. The only difference is in this case, in the Clippers case, they had to overpay because they're not getting anybody otherwise. In the Lakers case, there were no other Davis bidders. And it seemed like the biggest overpay,

I thought, in NBA history. Now you look at what happened with Kawhi. Even though the Lakers only end up with Davis and LeBron, do you think that now the Lakers, it was actually kind of smart for them to lock down Davis because you never know. And when shit changes in the NBA, all of a sudden now, now Davis could go somewhere and you just don't know, or do you think this is a massive, massive loss for them?

I don't think those two things are mutually exclusive. I mean, I think they, they had to lock down Davis, but they also should have known they were basically bidding against themselves. And they shouldn't have had that kind of price tag to get Davis. I don't think they needed to give up everything that they gave up to get Anthony Davis. But having him on the roster, great. I mean, you needed to do that one way or the other. And while I don't, like every GM I've talked to about what the Lakers were doing with their cap space, waiting on Kawhi, they all agree with it.

Like this is, if you have an opportunity and you think it's realistic to get Kawhi Leonard, you have to wait this whole thing out. But now that it's over and you're with, I don't know where that leaves you. I don't know how you put together a championship level team in the next two or three years of LeBron playing at his prime. I think Danny Green was kind of a nice save because Danny Green's a good player, and all of a sudden maybe you have a decent starting lineup with Green in it, but that's not going to get the job done.

They waited a long time and let a lot of guys come off the books. Guys weren't waiting for the Lakers in the way I thought they might be waiting for the Lakers this offseason. I think they should have done what they did in waiting for Kawhi Leonard, but now that he went the other way, this was the risk you took.

This is now the problem. They're going to have a hard time fielding a team that can compete with some of those top teams in the conference next year. They were all in, in a way that we haven't seen a team go all in in a while where they go all in 180 cents on the dollar for Davis, whatever it was,

and then trying to create enough cap space to get that third star. And we, how many names did we hear floated into that third star space? Right. It was like Jimmy Butler was going there. Uh, D'Angelo Russell was going there. Who else was going there? Kemba Walker. Yeah. And all of a sudden those guys start getting picked off and then it becomes Kauai. And when the Clippers didn't get anybody, the Kauai thing actually did seem really realistic because, you know, we had been hearing for

two years that he wanted Southern California. I don't really blame them for going all in, hoping that they could get Kawhi. What I do blame them for is what they did after. I thought they overpaid for Danny Green. $15 million a year for two years is just too high for him. I don't think he's somebody that should be making, you know, if he's making seven or eight, that would make sense for me. If Dallas is coming in with a big offer and you had to go to 10.

That's what I would say. I think, I think Dallas was out there with a big offer for Danny Green. But okay, then let them go. And then they pay 8 million a year for Caldwell Pope. They bring JaVale back. We've already seen these guys with LeBron. What are they doing? I would have rather just kept the cap space, taken a deep breath,

waited a couple days, and canvassed the league, and seen what was going on with OKC. Now do they want to get under the tax? Seen what Toronto want to do with those expirings. Why are you jumping the first chance Kawhi goes goes and you're just splurging on your cap? I thought that was absolutely absurd. Yeah, I get the green take there that, you know, hold on to that cap space and see if

somebody better would become available. I just think they had contingent plans in place. And you saw the second this deal went down, they reacted. It was within a matter of hours that they made all these flurries of signs. So I think they had these deals kind of locked in with their agents or with whoever

where they said, if we don't get Kawhi, this deal is going to be their own. That's why Danny Green was sitting there for weeks waiting to see what would happen with Kawhi. I'm with you, though. A smarter path might have been just kind of holding on at least for another couple of weeks. I mean, maybe you lose Danny Green, but Caldwell Pope's not going anywhere. JaVale McGee's not going anywhere.

You'd still maybe have another clutch client, Marcus Morris, maybe sitting out there. You could sign down the line. Yeah, I mean, seeing how everything shook out with Westbrook, I mean, maybe that would have been the better way to go. The problem with them, though, with Westbrook is what do you give back besides absorbing that contract? There is quite literally nothing they can offer back to Columbus

City besides cap relief. Yeah, I mean, you start looking at John Wall. I would just rather have the cap space. I don't know why teams rush to finish their team before July 8th. Doesn't make sense to me. I just don't see the rush to pay somebody full market value and then some. It's got to be devastating for LeBron, though, because I think especially you bring in Davis and there's the potential for like, oh, if we do this, we do that. And it's just not there.

I don't think they have enough. I think it would take a vintage old school LeBron season for them to really seriously contend for the title. And this guy's going to approach 60,000 minutes this year. I don't know if it's realistic for him to hit that level as a two-way player anymore. So then the flip side would be, could Davis just put them on his back and be the MVP that we feel like he had in him? He would have been the logical choice three years ago, two years ago. Who's the next MVP in the league? It was him or Giannis. We're always the two names mentioned. This is why they

can't be written off. He could just go to five other levels this year and become a 30-15 guy and become the best non-perimeter guy in the league, what would you give the odds on that? Yeah, I think it's possible. But I mean, I'm looking at this Laker team and I have no idea how they're going to play together. I don't know who's going to be in the starting lineup. I don't know who's going to be their seven, eight guys going into

the start of the season that's in their rotation. I don't have any idea how Frank Vogel's going to coach them. I mean, that's something that we're not talking about either. I mean, we kind of glossed over the bizarre coaching dynamic that still exists in LA. I mean, I'm watching Summer League last night and Jason Kidd's hanging out with LeBron

and you got Lionel Hollins in that mix. I mean, you've just got a bunch of, a bunch of names out there that it's going to make coaching that team even more difficult. I guess, look, Davis has the talent to do it. Like he's one of those rare guys that could take a big jump next year that coupled with a healthy season from LeBron could make them really tough to beat in the playoffs. But their, is so small right now i mean they need like six different things to break right they need vogel to be the coach he was indiana and like inspire some of the younger guys on the roster they need lebron to be completely healthy and work well with some of these pieces like the jared dudley types they added that roster all these things it just makes it hard to see all them coming together

and and forming plus you've got a front office like do you really trust that front office to get the job done or to find the right piece to put it no my answer is no i i don't your answer is no but like this is like i mean quiet i think it never speaks like ever about this type of stuff but like now that we have like the benefit of you know less than 24 hours or whatever it is since he made this call like doesn't it make sense that he would as a guy that has to as a guy entering like the last big contract maybe of his career don't you want the team that you trust the most to build out around you yes lebron and anthony davis are great players but it's not like

Lawrence Frank and Trent Redden and Michael Winger in that front office and Jerry West equally as important to Kawhi Leonard. Masai Ujiri, his staff were as important. That's another part of it that I think will come out eventually as being really important to Kawhi. 100%

agree. And I think that was the legacy of this free agency season, among other things. You had the little brother teams, the Clippers and the Nets pull one over on the big brother teams. And the biggest reasons were that they were better run and they had better ownership. And that was it. I think players are so much smarter now at seeing the landscape of the league and have a real feel now for which teams are well-run and which teams are not well-run. And if I'm Kawhi and I'm looking at all the shit that Lakers just did over the last few years

and how dysfunctional they've been and a situation where Magic quits right at the end of the season and then calls Rob Polenko a backstabber and Kawhi obviously respects Magic and Magic's on the record as saying Rob Polenka is a backstabber and he sees the Buss family, all that stuff.

He sees Clutch and he sees the way that anybody who plays with LeBron, if the team doesn't work out, it's always not LeBron who gets blamed. And he probably calculated all that and been like, screw this. Because from a basketball standpoint, until the Clippers got Paul George,

it did make the on-paper most sense, but there was obviously so many other things scaring him off. I look at the Lakers, looking at them on spot track right now. They're going to be atrocious defensively. I'm just telling you now. Quinn Cook, Danny Green, Caldwell Pope,

Troy Daniels, LeBron, Jared Dudley, Anthony Davis, Kyle Kuzma, JaVale McGee. That's basically their team right now. They're not going to be able to defend guards at all. And I think there's a couple other teams in this situation too. The one thing that happened was there were so many point guards up in the air

and so many point guard spots. I had done a whole thing on a podcast about there's 20... We don't know who 20 of the starting point guards are going to be in the league, which teams. Now everything shook out and there's no point guards left. Dallas doesn't have a point guard either. It's going to be a really hard position

to even find somebody who's competent. If you're the Lakers, who's guarding Steph Curry? Who's guarding Damian Lillard? Who's guarding Kyrie and Kemba? You're going down the line. Who's guarding Luka Doncic? They have a team of pretty much slow perimeter guys, LeBron and Anthony Davis. And this is not a winning roster.

Let's bring Rondo back. Okay, great. That's not going to work either. So good luck. I don't disagree. To your point though, let me just add to your point about the, the functionality of teams mattering. And I've been kind of neck deep and doing some net stuff and like how the net, like how they presented themselves and how they conducted their organization last few years, that resonated deeply with Kevin Durant.

Like that was, I don't know what, what the, what exactly moved him off New York, what moved the needle. But the, the fact that the Nets had looked so functional and had such a strong infrastructure there that mattered to Kevin Durant. I'm sure it mattered to Kyrie Irving and on the flip side of the country. I'm sure it mattered to Kyrie Irving. And on the flip side of the country, I'm sure it mattered to Kawhi Leonard.

Like if you are able, this should be a lesson every team. You don't, like everyone used to think that, you know, winding up as like the six or seven seed was basketball purgatory. Maybe it is to a degree, but if you do it the right way and you do it with guys that don't make a ton of money

and you keep some financial flexibility, winding up in that six, 7, 8 seed actually could be the best thing for you because you can show a free agent that he could step in there and succeed right away. Yeah, I mean, we saw it with the Celtics. I think we're the first one that thought that way. And then the Nets.

And I've never understood why teams would throw away that chance to be in the playoffs and get their guys' experience over getting the 14th pick, 13th pick. I to four. So that would be the incentive to shut it down. But I'm with you. I would much rather prove to people that, you know, we have a good thing here and here's where it's going and here's what we're doing. As two Boston guys, though,

I think it's always pretty fun when things don't work out for the Lakers. I got to say, I don't feel that. But again, like, you you know Danny would have gone and got Russell Westbrook. You know that, right? Oh my God. Believe that.

Is that? That Jalen Brown in like two firsts would be in Oklahoma City tomorrow. Why are you doing this to me? I mean, Danny did almost trade for Iverson in 06. Before we go, quickly, look, we all predict stuff. We all say we hear stuff during the course of the season. I was convinced the whole year that KD was going to the Knicks and Kawhi was

going to the Clippers. And I felt that way the whole year. I felt really strongly about it. The Kawhi thing obviously was a rocky road to get there, but it happened. I'm not going to take credit for it because at some point it just didn't seem realistic once they couldn't get the second guy. I'm still kind of stunned that KD didn't end up on the Knicks. When do you think that flipped? Because I don't think it flipped during the season, and I don't believe the whole, I don't believe the Nets were in the lead until we got into the spring.

What do you think happened? Well, I don't know that Durant was ever as fixated on the Knicks as the, the public perception was. I think he was fixated to a degree on New York, uh, in part, in part because of the off the court stuff is 35 ventures, all that

thing, all the stuff he has going on right now with rich climbing that's based in New York. And I think being there had a lot of value, but once he kind of fixated on New York, the nets became incredibly appealing. The, what probably tipped the scales was that Kyrie Irving was pretty fixated on the Nets. And their relationship is pretty rock solid. So with Kevin Durant kind of being ambivalent

about which New York team he was going to go to and Kyrie Irving not being, and Kyrie Irving saying, I want to be in Brooklyn with the Nets, I think that's ultimately what pushed him into making that final decision. Here's what I think tipped the scales. KD got hurt.

I think KD was in the power seat with which New York team they picked. And once KD gets knocked out for the season, if you're Kyrie, KD's not making the choice at that point because you're the one who's going to have to carry the load for a whole year with no KD. And if KD is on the fence, Knicks or Nets, and Kyrie's like, let's do Nets, here are all the reasons and Roc Nation and the Alibaba guy, all that stuff. KD's kind of, he can pretend this didn't happen, but he's kind of he can he can pretend this didn't happen

but he did kind of follow Kyrie there I feel like and I do I do think if he was healthy and if they win the third title

and he is the conquering hero best guy in the league I don't feel like he ends up on the Nets I still feel like he picks the Knicks I really do

and I will never know obviously but I think it would have been strange to end up on the Nets if him and Kyrie could have gone to the Knicks because they have a hundred times as many fans and it's the biggest challenge left in sports is to, in the NBA is to win a title for the Knicks. I think that was one problem. I think the other problem was the Clippers were recruiting Kawhi this whole time. As you said, they had scouts at every game.

They were batting their eyelashes at him in 7,000 different ways since last summer. And the Knicks, I don't feel like... Did you even hear anything about them recruiting those guys? They're so oblivious to everything that it feels like they were born on third base with this whole thing, and they just completely fucked it up what have you heard on that well they they never believed they were

fixated all along on kevin durant and kairi irving and i don't think until those two guys actually agreed to the net deals i don't think they believe they lose it. I think they believe that they were the Knicks, and why would Kyrie Irving, born and raised in Newark, Jersey, why would he choose somewhere else? And Kevin Durant wants to be this kind of global star. The Knicks present the biggest platform for that. I mean, it was arrogance. I think that's what it boils down to. It was arrogance and not, I don't, I don't think for a second they believed that the Nets infrastructure was as valuable as it turned out to be. I don't think they believed that the fact that the Nets had Spencer Dinwiddie and Jared Allen and Karis LeVert and all these good players.

I don't think that, I don't think the Knicks ever believed that was going to move the needle as much as it ultimately did. It was a complete misread by them from the moment the season ended. From the moment their season ended. It just seemed like they assumed if KD was going to leave the Warriors, it would be for the Knicks. And they were completely blindsided by the Nets. And the Nets outworked them, out-hustled them, and out-thought them.

And that's why they didn't get those guys. I still feel like if KD doesn't get hurt and the Knicks bat their eyelashes for a week, it's pretty tough to turn down to that challenge, but we'll never know. I would agree with that. No, but I would agree with that. You know, if he wins three straight championships, he can say, I'm going to walk into New York and, and I will our team to being better and we'll figure it out from there. I think there might've been a standoff. I think

Kyrie still would have gone to the Nets, which would have created a whole bunch of different issues for Brooklyn. But I think if Kevin Durant was fully healthy and had won that third championship, it might be a different set of circumstances. Last question. You've been generous with your time. Is there anything funnier than one of the 15 best players of all time choosing to play with Kyrie Irving? We talked a lot about how it could go wrong with the Clippers. It could go wrong a lot of different ways.

Oh my God. I look at it as, I mean, this year, somebody should write a book about this year and how it all plays out in Brooklyn because you know while I think that Kyrie's going to be a little bit different because he is choosing the net

and he knows what he's getting himself into he's also going to have to change, he's going to have to be a better teammate publicly, he's going to have to get along with kenny atkinson i was talking to jared dudley about this last night and you know jared's like it might be you know first couple of weeks might be a pretty big blow up with kenny and and tyree like that's like that's just the way those two guys are built i mean tyree treats the regular season like it's

an annoyance and kenny atkinson like brad stevens treats the regular season like it's an annoyance and kenny atkinson like brad stevens treats the regular season like it's valuable and you should you'll gain something from it the difference between kenny atkinson and brad stevens is that kenny will get in your face and he'll he'll call you out and he'll you know you know go at it with you now how does kairi take that like does he take it as you know a productive thing or does it create kind of a toxic atmosphere that derails this whole thing before it even starts? Now, I'm not betting on that because I think the specter of Durant will still loom over this team and it'll be kind of this mindset of like, all right, let's just get through this season. We'll be the sixth seed. Maybe we'll make a run, win a series,

everything will be okay. But there are a few different ways where this could go south, especially if the Nets underachieve early on and you start reading those Mike Vaccaro columns about how D'Angelo Russell would have been a better fit with this group look there's a chance he matures and learns from a lot of the mistakes he made in Boston

and comes in with a different attitude and keeps the right attitude and evolves. But if he doesn't, this is a disaster. If it's the same guy that was just in Boston for the last 12 to 15 months, this will not go well. And I don't personally understand why it wouldn't be the same guy. If anything, I think Atkinson has less job security than Brad Stevens did. The Celtics were never going to pick Kyrie over Brad Stevens ever. They also had more assets and

stuff. They weren't also all in on Kyrie with KD attached. Kyrie and KD are going to be calling the shots on this team now. And I think if we've seen anything from Kyrie the last 15 months, it's a pretty dangerous guy to be calling the shots. He's erratic. He's moody. He doesn't always treat people the same way depending on the week or the day or the hour.

And who do you think, who's your odds on bet to write the giant Kyrie piece from last year in Boston? Who's the favorite right now? I mean, Jackie's got to be the favorite, right? Like she's done it a couple of times.

Yeah, but she's hoarding stuff, though. Yeah, you're right. She's probably minus 125. I think you're like plus 300. I could... Yes. Short answer to that is yes. I could piece that together probably.

The one argument for one of the arguments we're working in brooklyn is is probably spencer dinwiddie just because i didn't realize how close they were until kind of digging into it the last couple of weeks and uh you know that relationship and him starting to talk to kairi began in december and and having kind of dinwiddie there is like uh something that connects kairi to those other young guys, I think it'll be valuable because he came back to Boston after they went on their run and he really didn't have any kind of strong bonds with anybody on that team. I mean, Jalen Brown like openly hated him and, you know, Jason Tatum had a, you know,

we have the Duke connection there, but you know, I think having Dinwiddie there in Brooklyn is going to be a good thing for the Nets and trying to make it all work. All right. We can read you on Sports Illustrated. We can see you on DAZN. We got two big fights, September and November, right, on DAZN? Are those still happening? Well, we kind of hope so, Bill.

DAZN's having a little bit of difficulty closing those deals right now. Oh, wow. We hope so. All right. Well, I need the Ruiz rematch. That's my guy. Oh, that's happening. Yeah, that's done.

That's a lot. But Canelo Golovkin, I don't think that's happening in the fall. Oh, no. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, now I'm sad. Well, I enjoyed our time anyway.

Chris Mannix, thanks for coming on. Let's take a break to talk about SimpliSafe. Over 2 million burglars are reported every year, not counting OKC getting seven first-round picks for Paul George, not a burglar, technically. That's one every 13 seconds. But what's crazy is that only one in five homes have home security.

Maybe that's because most companies really don't make it easy. And let's face it, we don't like waiting in line. We don't like calling people. We don't like hunting stuff down. It's confusing. It's expensive. It's too much time.

That's why SimpliSafe is my top choice. Hands down, it protects your whole home. Every window, room, and door with 24-7 monitoring. It's just a fraction of the cost. They make it easy on you. No contract, no hidden fees, no fine print. Around-the-clock monitoring, just $15 a15 a month designed to blend right into your home. No wires, no drilling. No wonder it's won a ton of awards from the likes of CNET and the New York Times

Wirecutter. Visit simplisafe.com slash BS. You'll get free shipping and a 60-day risk-free trial. You've got nothing to lose. Go now, SimpliSafe.com slash BS. So they know our show sent you. SimpliSafe with two I's. SimpliSafe.com slash BS. All right, from the New York Times, the first guest ever on any podcast I've ever done back when it was the BS Report.

And now he's here on one of the craziest weekends in recent league history. He is a big fan of hashtag this league. He loves it. Mark Stein, this league. Hashtag this league. Jesus. That's Luke Adler.

Is it great to work on a, I don't know, on a Friday night at one in the morning at your age? I don't know. You're getting up there in years. We're old now. You're right. Is that good? Do you have to make coffee?

What'd you do? Make a latte? It is not good for my health. No, actually my wife this year, she did buy me a beautiful little espresso machine that helps in these times of crisis. No, that was insane. It's been insane.

Yeah. It's been insane for two weeks. That's what's so funny is we're on day six, but this is really being, the pre-agency was record setting and this is madness. Well, I hate to break it to you, but it's not over yet because now we have to figure out the Russell Westbrook trade. That's definitely going to happen

because you know that's happening. You know that's brewing now. That's in the oven. Sam Presti's oven. He's got Westbrook in there and he's at the trade machine. And you think that trade is going to be easy to accomplish here in the next week or so? I don't know that that one's going to come together that quick.

Yeah. Mannix and I just said it was probably happening before this season. So let's start here. Where did you think he was going to end up on July 4th, Kawhi? What team would have been your bet? It wouldn't have been the Clippers. And that's what's so funny is that we spent all season long staying with the Clippers.

My NBA finals preview was about how the Clippers were working. The Clippers had at least explored, is there any way to buy that claw logo from Nike? Right. By the right, because they wanted to buy that claw logo from Nike? Right. Buy the right, because they wanted to give that to Kawhi as part of their pitch meeting. And that obviously would have been a lovely gift to give him, since we know he wants it badly and he has been sued Nike to get the right score. It's something that means a lot to him.

But even though that would have been a massive salary cap violation and impossible, the Clippers did look into that. That's how badly they wanted him. But when the Lakers got AD and the Raptors won the championship, suddenly the Clippers ended up, everybody thought they were in third. Because they thought, wow, LeBron and AD and Magic are going going to talk Kawhi into this or he's just going to say he's going to he's going to stay in Toronto on a short term deal. I think my pick honestly was I I'm the romantic, you know, that I thought he was going to stay in Toronto. That was really my pick. I thought he would stay on a short term deal. I think you were going to be right.

I think I think it had to take... Jalen's going to take shit over the next three days. By the way, anybody who gives Jalen shit, you have to fight me too. Jalen was right. He said 99% chance. Guess what? The 1% chance was OKC getting the greatest trade haul in the history of the National Basketball Association to get Paul George to, out of nowhere, go to the Clippers. That was the 1%. This was a crazy, crazy, crazy, crazy trade hall for somebody that we didn't even really know

was available. Did you hear the rumblings that he wasn't that happy in OKC the last couple months? No. And look, it's going to be talked about and more will come out. And I'm sure we're going to hear how tense it was and all that stuff.

But come on. I mean, Paul George, I mean, Paul George, he was one year into a four-year deal. And even if he was, even if there was tension after the season and you would expect it the way the Thunder season ended.

Did anybody think Paul George is going to go and ask for a trade after he made such a big deal about pledging his loyalty to Westbrook and Oklahoma City? And, you know, it's Paul George Day in Oklahoma City. You know that the mayor, he decreed that I think every July 7th was Paul George Day. No, they said it was only last year was Paul George Day in Oklahoma City. You know that the mayor decreed that I think every July 7th was Paul George Day. No, they said it was only last year was Paul George Day.

This year it's back to being Russell Westbrook Day, I think. I mean, we were killing the Lakers for how much they gave away for Anthony Davis. Yeah. Trading every conceivable asset for the future.

And the Clippers have zoomed past that with this thing. I mean, SGA, everybody loves him. Gallinari, obviously with his injury history, there are people who will take shots at him, but he's still a very productive player. Three unprotected firsts from the Clippers,

an unprotected first for Miami, and a lottery protected first that becomes unprotected a few years later. I mean, that's ridiculous. And then pick swaps. And pick swaps. Mannix and I talked about the funny thing, or maybe not that funny, is that Paul George isn't exactly like a 100% feel good about this guy's health going forward player. He just had both shoulders operated on. Yeah, both.

And has a metal rod in his leg. So, you know, they're all in. They had to do it. God bless them. I know as a kid that grew up on the rough streets of Buffalo, who had the Braves cruelly taken away, they go to San Diego. How long did you stick with the Clippers before you just quit them?

I never embraced them for one second. To me, the Braves ended and that was it. And the crazy part was, I moved to Southern California the same summer that the Braves did. They were in San Diego an hour south of me. I never once said, oh, I'm a Clippers fan now. Yeah, they're dead to you.

I covered the Clippers and I never really wanted to say that the Braves and the Clippers were the same franchise. Well, they've certainly been for a franchise that has never made the finals in Buffalo and San Diego and Los Angeles. They've certainly been involved in some of the craziest transactions

in the history of the league. You have the franchise swap with the Braves and Celtics where I think eight or nine players were flipped for each other. Tiny Archibald goes to Boston. We didn't even have the lottery back then, but the equivalent of lottery picks going to Buffalo as they moved to the Clippers, Kermit Washington, all these people. There was that trade. They gave up the farm for Bill Walton, who played really no time at all for them. They picked Danny Ferry, then traded him for a bunch of stuff from Cleveland. They had the crazy Chris Paul trade, which right after the lockout ended, that was another... People always say this is one of the craziest runs ever.

It feels like we're having crazy runs every year. But that Chris Paul trade was crazy. Blake Griffin had nowhere to Detroit. That was crazy. And now this Kawhi Paul George thing. Those are seven of the crazier transactions. They might be in the crazy transaction lead for NBA franchises.

If you want to include my Braves, don't forget that we had Moses Malone for two games. Oh my God. Yeah, that's another one. That's in my book. I wrote about that. They traded...

Don't forget... Yeah, they traded one first. ...the rookie in the air and got rid of Adrian Dantley. They traded... Don't forget... Yeah, so Portland is about to win the 77 title

and has Moses on their team and decide to trade him for one first rounder to Buffalo. Buffalo has him for what? Three weeks? Six days? He played two games, I believe, as a Brave. And then they flip him to Houston for two first round picks.

Buffalo's feeling great. They're like, yeah, we flipped that Moses guy. Got an extra pick. And then he turns out to be Moses. One of the 15 best players I've ever had. We gave away Adrian Dantley. We gave away McAdoo for too little. We ran off Dr. Jack.

But look, my Clipper beat writing career, 10 days into it, Danny Manning for Dominique Wilson. Oh, another good one. Yeah. People thought that was a new era where expiring contracts getting flipped for each other because it was happening in baseball too. We were wondering what was going on now. And Ron Harper proclaimed that he was just doing his jail time for the rest of the season and waiting to get out on GB. Good behavior. 25 years. And now the Clippers have arrived. Palmer did it. Well, and this is also the first time,

you know, when they got Chris Paul and they had finally flipped the tables on the Lakers a little bit, that Lakers team was kind of dying. And then they'd go all in with the Dwight Howard, Steve Nash trade, which is a debacle from day one. The Clippers have Chris Paul, they have Blake,

they have DeAndre, and they're just more fun. It becomes more realistic for them to win a title. They never really went head to head where they were looking side eyes at each other for nine months. This is the first time it's ever happened with the Clippers and Lakers, where you have two teams in LA that both have a chance to win the title. It's never happened. They've been here since 1984. We can never say that that's happened before. So that's pretty cool. I think that I would say, would you put the Clippers ahead of the Lakers right now

for who has a chance to win the title? Yes. I would too. We still just don't know enough about this Lakers team and the Clippers. I think there's just more confidence and slightly more confidence in what they can put around those two guys for now.

I do think LeBron and AD are going to be sensational together. Let's not underestimate what the two of them are going to be. I said to Mannix, the ceiling for that Lakers team now is AD going to another level and becoming the MVP next year. And just being like what Kareem was in the mid-70s when the Lakers got him.

When Kareem was just incredible from 76, 77, 78 with really nobody around him. I think that's the ceiling for them. I think with the Clippers, we have to make sure Paul George is healthy. They got to get enough games out of Kawhi.

They probably have a move or two to make. I think they're going to get Andre Iguodala. There's a very logical Iguodala trade where they can flip Moe Harkless' contract, throw in Jerome Robinson, some second rounders, three, four million bucks, whatever the limit is that you can give a team.

And Memphis can flip Iguodala their way. That makes sense to me. What do you think of that? I mean, I'm sure they would love it. All the contenders want Iguodala, and I still think he's not a guy who's going to give you much in the regular season, but in the playoffs, you still want him.

I just can't believe you're already plotting more trades. Well, you know, I have selfish reasons for this one though. And I'm announcing it right now. It's 1125 here on the West Coast. If Andre Agudalo comes to the Clippers, I'm giving him a ringer podcast. He can not want it. I'm still giving it to him. We're going to launch the feed. We're going to call it the Andre Goddard podcast. If he wants to host it, great. If not, we'll just have guests host until we talk him into it. It's happening. He's somebody we've always wanted. If you let him do business talk,

he might say yes. Yeah. I want business. I want leadership. I want him to have weird guests. I want him to be like our JJ Redick, but in the West Coast and do his thing. Iggy, Dre, it's happening. We're giving you a pod. Be ready for it.

Hey, Mark Stein, people keep calling this the player empowerment decade. How about this? And it rightfully is. I have a better name for it. I think it's the swipe right decade. I think it's players swipe right decade. I think it's players searching for happiness with each other and fleeting relationships where people go, oh, if I'm with this guy, it'll be great. The two of us. And then two years later, it falls apart and then they go

somewhere else. Westbrook and Paul George, KD and the Warriors, Al Horford, Gordon Hayward, and Kyrie all in Boston together. Over and over again, it's these very wealthy superstars looking for another wealthy superstar to win a title with, and then it doesn't work out, and then they swipe right and they go to the next guy.

What do you think? What fascinates me more about this one is that Kawhi's never been part of any of your swiping. Yeah. All of these guys are team USA guys on the 2016 Rio team. I was there and I covered it. Durant,

Kyrie, Deandre, all buddies. They're going to Brooklyn. We remember that all started more than a decade ago when lebron wade and posh played together on olympic teams hawaii's not hawaii hasn't spent you know he's he's been like one or two mini camps over the years with team usa he is the one who went he want first he wanted jimmy butler jimmy butler he wanted, first he wanted Jimmy Butler.

Jimmy Butler, he wanted to go to Miami. He made a run at Durant. No, Durant's too far down the road with Kyrie Irving. So he goes to Paul George, who no one on earth knew was in any way remotely gettable, and convinced Paul George to request the trade. That to me is, that is mind blowing that Kawhi, who we all think is the quietest superstar ever did that. So he's it's,

it's Godfather one with Michael Corleone, basically it's, it's everybody's underestimating him until all of a sudden he's shooting Salazzo McCluskey in an Italian restaurant. Do you ever think he was going to be, you know, putting, putting this kind of making these kind of moves? Kawhi Leonard. No, I,

I think the most impressive thing was how he handled all the leaks and all the secrecy this week, which he's gotten credit for online. He handled it to some degree because we all felt all year that the Clippers were the team he wanted. But then as it came down to nutcrunch time here this last week and they couldn't get that second guy for him. But remember, we were

basing all that more on what the Clippers were doing, not because it was coming out of Kawhi. But the Clippers clearly strongly felt they were in the mix for him. it was coming out of Kawhi. But then Clippers, the Clippers clearly strongly felt they were in the mix for him.

And that's not something you come to independently. But that's why we, that's why we were all saying Clippers, Clippers, you know, everybody knows the Clippers had

a franchise representative in countless Kawhi games. And it was just, it was an open secret that their whole summer was built around getting this guy. that's where, and you know, I said it,

I know you said it because you have tickets there and you go to games. When you would be around the Clippers, you would just feel it. They gave off this vibe of we got something cooking here with Kawhi, we think we're going to get him. Like you could see, you could tangibly feel it when you were around them. That's where it came from.

And that's another, again, that's another hilarious thing about this whole saga is that once the Lakers got AD and got involved, the Lakers confidence and the confidence coming from people around, around, around LeBron, that they were going to get him, that was so strong that people just stopped talking about the Clippers. And the Clippers didn't care. They didn't care that no one was talking about them. They just went out and put this mother load of assets together and made this whopper of a trade.

Well, now the Clippers and Lakers are in a death march against each other where neither of them have any assets until 2026 other than these two guys. It's unbelievable. It's like, who can stay healthy out of these two? And if one of the four, two of the four, three of the four, four of the four, whatever combination, if any of them go down or get old in LeBron's case or whatever, there's no plan B. You're in. This is it. I think the Clippers have done a better job of kind of positioning themselves for the next couple of years because they have some players on good contracts. The Lakers, what did you think of? Well, look, I mean, let's not forget they still have Lou Will at $8 million, which is like having two of the best six men in the league for free

on some of the numbers those guys are in. And again, you know, whose front office do you have more confidence in? Do you have more confidence in the Clippers with Lawrence Frank and Michael Winger and Jerry West, or do you have confidence in the Lakers? Again,

bashing Palenka is a sport unto itself, but I'm sorry. Getting Anthony Davis on his own does not put all the ketchup back in the bottle in terms of where the Lakers are. They need to make other moves before we say that they're on the right track here. What do you think of the irony of a year ago, Philly and Boston have a chance to pull the trigger on Kawhi in some way, and they back off and leave the door open for Toronto, who then wins the title with them. He goes through Philly in a legendary game seven. Now, this summer, the Clippers end up getting Kawhi and Paul George

and become the favorites in the West. I think the Sixers are one of the two favorites in the East. There's no way they get Kawhi and Paul George if the Tobias Harris trade doesn't happen, which I hated when it happened, but they end up giving the Clippers these extra assets that allow them then to put those assets to push the Paul George trade over the top

while also having the cap space. And they got to keep Shamit on a really cheap deal, who's now one of the seven guys on their title team. Pretty bizarre, this whole Philly part of this. But I think, you know what, this all really shows us is because it's this firepower era and these guys are all recruiting themselves and doing the deals themselves and

conceiving their rosters together it just shows you why you know why pressy was willing to gamble on paul george in the trade and why masai did it in toronto because if you're not in the mix to get these guys you have to take these crazy gambles. Because, you know, the stars aren't looking at these smaller market teams. And, I mean, in Toronto's case, it obviously pays off in the absolute extreme. But I'm really interested to see now, are Canadians really going to be as forgiving of Kawhi Leonard as we've all, you know, how many of us have said, Oh, they'll, they'll be safe.

We brought him a championship. It'll be, it'll be fine. Their honeymoon lasted 22 days. I'm sure it's not fine right now. Nah, he did bring them a title. I remember after the Red Sox won the Oh four title and really anything could have happened and I wasn't going to be upset. I was just so happy. And if I, what about when man city won their first title, you would have forgiven anything, right? Yeah, but it's different in soccer

because it's all about the club. The club just overrides everything. In basketball, the players, it's just so much more about the players. This frenzy is about these guys and how everybody is just transfixed by these mega personalities.

I don't know. To me, it just feels different. Well, I think we're running out of combinations for guys who want to play with each other? That's what we think. I'm trying to think. Something like happened

that nobody had even contemplated. Yeah, I mean, I guess the next chess pieces would probably be Giannis in two years, I guess. I can't think of anybody else. Everybody else has kind of

picked their team. If you go through the top 10, 12 players in the league, especially if Ben Simmons is going to get his extension, we seem pretty set now. I think there's a couple of smaller moves that we could see where, you know, I think the

Celtics are equipped to get one more guy. I disagree with you. We're never set. Well, except the Westbrook piece. I can't sit here and tell you who it's going to be. I guy. I disagree with you. We're never set. Well, except the Westbrook piece. I can't sit here and tell you who, who it's going to be. I mean, that's the thing. Whenever you say that the next question always is,

well, who is it? Who's next getting traded? You know, I can't tell you that. Actually, now that I'm saying it, I could see Houston doing something in the next 48 hours and it

wouldn't like totally shock me. It's like, Oh, James Harden's on a new team. Think about the Rockets and your Celtics to kind of be watching this, how much it pains them that they're not in the middle of any of this. I think if you do winners and losers,

I do think basically all the other teams are a winner because there's no great team now and everything is winnable. Go back to the Celtics briefly. They have the contracts now to get one more guy.

You know, they're not a finals team now, but they're one piece away. And they actually have the ability to do that. Getting farewell to Kawhi in the East and getting Kemba is not the worst outcome for them. No, and I don't think anybody else locked it up

and Milwaukee got a little bit worse. They still have some room to grow with Giannis and a second year with the core that they have and all that stuff. If Milwaukee flips, how much more pressure does that heap on the Bucs? The Bucs have had a great run

here of trying to put pieces together and make moves. If they lose ground... And then you look in the West, totally achievable for five or six teams to make the finals.

And I think Denver and Portland specifically have to be delighted that it played out this way because they're also one move away from maybe having the upper hand. And then the other thing with the Lakers and the Clippers that I think Warren's mentioning, and the Warriors as well in the West, you have three teams that we don't know about

the durability of really any of their stars, except for Curry, I guess. But with LeBron, with the hit in the 60,000 minutes, possibly even this season, Davis has never been Lou Gehrig. The Warriors are going to be scraping just to even get a 7-8 seed. There's your other big move right there.

They did a side-in trade with Russell just to basically have him as a trade ship. I know they're going to say, we can make this work and we're intrigued by the possibilities and there's a play for D'Angelo here, but let's be honest.

He's a ball-dominant, pick-and-roll, defensively deficient player. How is he going to coexist with Curry and Clay long-term? I mean, the fit just isn't there. So they will be trading Russell somewhere if they can find a fire. Don't look under the hood

for a couple months, though, and see what they have. I think that's a December-January move. I think, I don't even know if they'll trade him in December. I think that's a December-January move. I think, I don't even know if they'll trade him in December. They're not going to see Klay Thompson until most likely February.

So, they might need to keep Russell for a season. Well, bringing it back to us in the 1970s, there was a couple years there, 77-78, after the merger happened

and they moved the four ABA teams in. The league has so much talent and it's spread out so perfectly that we basically didn't have a dominant team for the next three years. It looked a lot like what the league looks like right now, where you have a bunch of

47 to 55 win teams, but you have no bunch of 47 to 55 win teams, but you have no 60 plus win team. If you had to pick who a 60 plus win regular season team would be, looking at everything that's just happened, who do you pick? I'd probably go someone in the East.

I think the West is just too stacked. Yeah, but Milwaukee probably. I would say Philly or Milwaukee. I think the West is just too stacked. Yeah, but Milwaukee probably again. I would say Philly or Milwaukee. I think Lakers and Clippers. I don't think those guys are going to play enough games. I don't see anybody playing more than 70 games unless Davis has some sort of amazing 3,000-minute season in him that we didn't see coming.

And then Clips, Kawhi is a 60 game a year regular season guy at this point. George, we don't even know when he's coming back. It seems like he might not even be ready for the start of the season. And then the Warriors, they have all their stuff. Unbelievably fascinating. And I love when, you know, we've had a 10 year run here

where we've had a prohibitive favorite every year, basically. And this is the first time that we don't have one. And you have all these teams ready to... And I always like those seasons better. Me too. I think ratings and metrics and whatever else you look at says that I'm wrong, that the general public prefers more when there's a bull for a warrior to take down but i'd rather it

be this way where we don't know and it is more wide open but also i mean this is you know this is a sport where you know one player has such a big impact that it's hard by definition for it to be wide open because there's always a team that's got two or three giants. That's just the way history has always been. You have the Giannis in Milwaukee. You have Philly. You have the Celtics are a pseudo contender again.

You have Dallas retooling around two really really fun to watch young guys. You have both LA teams, you have Golden State, you have Jokic in Denver, who is about as fun as anybody. You have Portland that people are really familiar with now. And then you have Philly. And I probably missed two teams, but there's 11 teams now that there's real familiarity with, either because they made playoff runs or because people like the players in the team.

So I think the league... Oh, Brooklyn was another one. Even though I don't think they're going to be a contender this year, at least they're on the map and they're interesting and the Kyrie stuff. Brooklyn and Indiana had a nice summer. We're not so focused on

what they did because it's second tier guys. They. You know, they've made nice moves. I mean, a lot of teams have helped themselves. I mean, the, the East,

the, the, the upper, you know, the top five, six teams, the East, I think will be,

will be a little better. It'll be, it'll be pretty competitive up there, but the West again, it's just a monster. Yeah. Mark Stein, uh,

a pleasure as always. When is the Hall of Fame stuff for you? When is that, August? September. September? Start writing your speech yet? I haven't written a word yet.

I still don't believe it. Are you going to cry? I still don't. There's a decent chance. You seem like, I could see you getting choked up a couple times. It's an emotional night. Emotional day, whatever it is. Yeah. You seem like, I could see you getting choked up a couple of times. It's emotional night,

emotional day, whatever it is. Yeah. Panini just sent me this ridiculously huge and gaudy part of myself. And I just, I'm looking at this thing and I'm just like, is this, is that real life?

What a day for the, what a summer for the Buffalo Braves. The clips are back. Mark Stein's going to the Hall of Fame. All right. Well, we'll talk to you before then. Keep in touch this summer. All right.

All right. We'll do it. Thanks, buddy. Thanks to ZipRecruiter. Don't forget to check them out at ZipRecruiter.com slash BS. Thanks to SimpliSafe. Remember, over 2 million burglars are reported every year. Only one in five homes have home security.

Maybe because most companies don't make it easy. That's why SimpliSafe is my top choice. Hands down, they protect your whole home. Every window, room, and door, 24-7 monitoring for a fraction of the cost. Visit simplisafe.com slash BS. You'll get free shipping and a 60-day risk-free trial. You've got nothing to lose.

SimpliSafe with two I's. SimpliSafe.com eyes, simplisafe.com slash BS. And don't forget about Break Stuff, our new podcast coming on Luminary on Tuesday. Thanks to Chris Mannix. Thanks to Mark Stein. Thanks to the Clippers for making this July 4th weekend interesting. Thanks to nephew Kyle. Anytime. Scraping himself off the mattress there this Saturday morning. No small feat for a young guy in his 20s in LA. We'll be back a little bit later in the week with another podcast. Until then. I feel it's within me On the wayside

On the first side of the river I'm saying I don't have to be alone