The Bill Simmons Podcast - The NBA Midseason Power Poll With Ryen Russillo

Episode Date: February 20, 2023

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo, and they go through seven tiers of the NBA. In each tier, they pick out which team they like the most going forward and which team they like the least. They wrap up by taking a look back at the 2012 four-team Dwight Howard trade. Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Ryen Russillo Associate Producer: Isaiah Blakely Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you go to nbarankings.theringer.com, you can find our top 100 players in the NBA ranked, which we do pretty much every month with little synopses, everything else. I did my trade value thing last month, 9,000 words. If you've missed it, the top 70 assets, plus we even have the league pass rankings, our favorite players on league pass. It's all there, nbarankings.theringer.com. It's the Bill Simmons podcast presented by FanDuel. Football is in full action. FanDuel's highest rated sports book is the best place to bet at all. We've been doing pretty well on million dollar picks this year. I love the first month of the season because you have to go into the season thinking, I think Pittsburgh's going to be good. I think the

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So why not grab some Miller Lites today? Your game time tastes like Miller time. Must be legal drinking age. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. I have a new Rewatchables coming on Monday. Sean Fantasy and I did Whiplash. Stay tuned for that. One of the better movies

from a rewatchable standpoint of the last 10 years. We're going to explain why we dove into it hard. Thanks to everybody in Salt Lake City for turning out for two live shows, one with Ryan Rosillo, who's about to come on this podcast. And then we had the Ringer NBA crew. I think we had six people on stage at one point. Both shows sold out. Talking Hoops. Everybody loved it. Great to meet the listeners and the readers and the fans. We plan on doing a lot more of these. We're going to do one in Memphis

next month. Actually, the Mismatch is doing two. One in LA and then one in Memphis. House and I might go to the Memphis one. That's going to be in late March, but we like doing this stuff. It is so nice post-pandemic to get out there in the real world again. We're gonna be talking basketball in a second. Sunday Nights with Rosillo is back.

First, our friends taping this. It is 1 o'clock LA time. We don't care about the All-Star Game. It's fun to watch, but ultimately it's not. We're not going to wait until after the All-Star Game to tape a podcast. Ryan Rosso is here, fresh from the streets of Salt Lake City. Did a live show yesterday. We're going to break through all 30 teams, have a little gimmick for you.

How was Salt Lake City, though? Tell us. It was great. Look, I've been to Utah a bunch of times. The show was terrific. So thanks to Wise Guys for having us. And yeah, I mean, other than that, it was good. I got to stay in Park City a little bit, too, so it's good to be back.

What was the best question the crowd asked? Hmm. Was there like a Kyle Hive? What happens? Does Kyle have like a crew now? Big time. The governor of Utah showed up to see Kyle. We thought it was a joke.

We thought we were being scammed. And somebody from the governor's office reached out to Kyle. And so they were in there and then we actually met him. Jesus. The governor is actually here he was thrilled i think he got his picture taken with kyle kyle's affecting state laws so we have a bunch of stuff for for the last call so early here i was like wait a second what is it midnight in utah no it's like one and then i think it's like even a little bit later some of

the places that are further i the whole idea that you show up there and it's weird i think it's like even a little bit later some of the places that are further i the whole idea that you show up there and it's weird i mean it's something we talked about in the show yesterday you just yeah people that haven't been are like whoa what what's what happens like what do you think happens it's like salt lakes like denver right well the thing i don't understand is when you have these sports weekends they should be waving at least like for one weekend, some of the rules, right? I've always said this, like Dallas has this issue. There's some cities where they just apply the normal rules for a normal weekend. But meanwhile, they've spent all this money to bring all these people in. It seems like they should make it fun for one weekend, but

that's why I always think it's funny that Boston never gets any of these things. Cause they'd be like, wait, what time does the train stop? And they'd be like, what time does the train stop and they'd be like wait where's where's this like salt lake's really easy indy is really easy to get around right some of the dallas too denver's pretty easy dallas fort worth can be you know new orleans for the most part is all right there uh miami can be a little houston's a total sprawl but uh well i always kind of joke like whenever you're like how come boston hasn't had any of this stuff one they're like dude we don't even need it you know there's probably that but if you got through the infrastructure for it it's funny because i was talking to somebody about boston getting the all-star game and they were like yeah but it's i was like you know what whatever i mean the streets were set up in the late 1600s give it a break well it'd be worth

doing it once just to see if it's as much of a disaster as we think it would be i actually think it'd be pretty good the weather would be the great as we think it would be. I actually think it'd be pretty good. The weather would be the great variable. I think it would be great. I didn't have a variable with weather. No. And there's plenty of other, exactly. There's other places I've gone. I mean, that Dallas Fort Worth Superbowl, the Green Bay Pittsburgh one, that was the worst. So you were there. I mean, that was my favorite Superbowl ever. Nobody could get in. It was, if you made it in early, it was the greatest time ever. There are no people. We were at the EA sports party. You would have thought it was a private party for like 20 people great at bismarck he's up there djing there's no one can make it and then no one could leave and then people were

getting let like there was one group that the taxi driver just couldn't handle driving anymore and he threatened to just say you know what like you guys are getting out of the car and then the guys were yelling it was bad i mean it was really but yeah, back to the Boston part. I think my favorite one is when they, the Olympics were coming around and nobody, nobody, people were like, why do you want this here? Like, what are you talking about? And that didn't last very long. Yeah. That flamed out. So we're going backwards from 30 to one. I made a list and you're going to feel free to argue with some of the rankings, but I did my power poll that I've tried to do every month. But we're going to attack the power poll in sections

going from 30 to one with two questions. Which team would you want to be going forward? And which team would you not want to be? So I'm going to read the sections with the records and then we'll talk about which team do we want to be? Which team do we not want to be? So the first section, the worst section, the trauma for Yama section, this is a number 30, San Antonio. They're 13 and 45. They haven't won in a solid month. Number 29, Houston's 14 and 45. Number 28,

Detroit is 15 and 44. And then Charlotte is 17 and 43. Kudos to us. We called this in the over under podcast before the year. We were like, wait, why is Charlotte's over-under 35 wins or whatever it is? They're going to be terrible. They are terrible. So those are the four worst teams in the league. Which team would you want to be going forward out of those four? San Antonio, Houston, Detroit, or Charlotte? You can pick one.

I'm going to go Houston. I'm not going to say I like watching them play this year and we could get into the particulars of it, but they have four guys that I like. The other thing I like about Houston's roster is I really like a lot of the role players. The only problem is they don't know the role players yet. And I wouldn't say tanking in this case, but when you're rebuilding, it's very challenging when you have a roster of 14 dudes that all are worried about their second contract and all think that they're going to be Hall of Famers. That, I think, is part of their problem.

We could get deeper into it. I don't think we need to, but if you're telling me between Jalen Green and Shingun and Tari Eason and Porter, who hasn't been playing much lately, but I like a lot of the pieces. There's more talent on, on, I think that group there, other than, you know, the Detroit, the Cade injury.

If you told me it was Detroit, I wouldn't get mad about it, but I think it's really between those two options and who you'd want to be. I didn't love any of the four options, to be honest. I would, I wanted to say Detroit, but I just don't have enough information on that Cade injury. And it makes me nervous that they shut him down so fast. If he was healthy, I would say Detroit. Houston, I agree with you. There's pieces. I don't know where the pieces lead to. At least they hit with Eason. They have something to point to from the Harden trade finally. They're not going to get the swap this

year, but Eason is the first piece that we could say, well, at least they got that Eason. They have something to point to from the Harden trade finally. They're not going to get the swap this year. But Eason is the first piece that we could say, well, at least they got that for James Harden. They have some flexibility too. There's some rumors Harden might come back. I was thinking a bit of it. I was surprised that I didn't love any of the futures. And it's funny that neither of us mentioned Charlotte because they probably have the best player

out of the four teams in LaMelo. But that Charlotte team, that was my answer for no, and we'll get into them in a second. The Houston thing though, it feels like that would be the most fun Wembanyama team out of the four, right? If you're going to be San Antonio, Houston, Detroit, Charlotte, I would like to see Wembanyama on that team. I'm not sure he would want to be on that team. What would you think would be his choice if you just gave him those four? Yeah, I know this is where it's going to get really interesting this summer, man. What if he does the Eli Manning? Right, little Steve Francis. Or just like, eh, Houston, no. Yeah, I need a different team. I would think Houston would make more sense from a market

standpoint. You could argue, well, wait, San Antonio has all this great infrastructure and that they're terrific at doing this. I don't know. I feel like that time's kind of passed. I mean, maybe it's still true. I certainly would trust them more than Charlotte. I actually like a lot of the things that Detroit's done. Detroit would be my pick if Cade Cunningham were playing right now. If Cade Cunningham were playing right now, I'd tell you I'd rather have him over Mello. I still think I would rather have him over Mello injured. Charlotte's the team I'd least want to be out of this group. Yeah.

When you factor in ownership with it, it's a no brainer and I don't really know what they're doing. You know, I don't, you don't want to pay Jalen McDaniels. Okay, fine. But I mean,

this is what happens when you win the Gordon Hayward sweepstakes and he plays half of his time there. I had them as this was the team I would not want to be. So I wrote down some stuff. First of all, three playoff appearances since 2002. Three. This is before LeBron came in the league. They have three playoff appearances. Two sweeps out of the three. The other one was a seven game loss in 2017 to Miami. This year, they're 29th offensively, 25th defensively. They're shooting under 33% from three. If you're looking at assets,

it gets grim pretty fast, right? Lamello is obviously an asset. I had him top 40 trade value. I like Mark Williams. I liked him in college and they're finally playing him now. He's become a double-double guy. Rozier is definitely a playoff guy for somebody,

but probably a third guard. And then PJ Washington, who is going to be a free agent. Other than that they not a lot of assets on this team am i missing anybody anyone else you'd like no not really i mean book night it's been nothing uh and then there's a couple like a write-off or there's a couple other picks that just aren't even a part of the equation which i imagine we're going to see more and more here as as they tank um but i you know this is just talking out loud because i don't know anything about when my yama other than i've heard his agents are like rounding down on his height like he's getting he's so tall he's like the first player i've ever heard of where it was like they actually

they won't they won't give him the other you know, the extra inch going the other way. Yeah. Cause you've heard he's seven five, right? Cause that's, that's kind of the word on the street. Kareem did this too. Kareem was like a legit seven four, but just wouldn't really own it. But he was, everyone said he was. And Bill Walton was the other one. Bill Walton was seven two, but always said he was six 11. He never wanted to be a seven footer. I think McHale was another one too. McHale was another one too. McHale was probably seven feet. Yeah.

Wabanyama, people who have stood next to him, there's a picture online of him and Rudy Gobert where he looks like he's like four inches taller than Rudy Gobert. And this was like a year ago. So a couple of weird things about Charlotte. They have three 20 point scorers this year, which I think is hilarious.

This proves our theory that anyone could score 20. There's a hundred guys in the league that could score 20 points a game. But if you look at just recent history, that 2018 draft, they were drafted in 11 and SGA was on the board, didn't take them. Now a few people kind of whiffed on SGA, but that's one where, you know, they, they ended up, I think they, they flipped whatever that pick was for Miles Bridges, which seemed like it was a decent idea for a few years, but now he's gone. And then last year they traded that Durham pick at 13 and got basically nothing for it. They got a future pick, but you go backwards. 2, 5, 3, 8, 9, 12, 9, 2, 4, 9, 9, 22, 11, 11, 12, 3, 11, and then 13, 15 last year.

To only make the playoffs three times is impossible. Especially the way the East was lined up too. I mean, I'm glad you brought up Bridges just from a basketball standpoint. He was becoming a dude yeah he was and then to just have what happened where from just the front office part you're like okay now we have we have nothing nothing to replace this this piece that we thought was going to be part moving forward you know and i don't know what that'll mean for lamello or whatever but i well i theorizedized in the trade value column that could he be the first one that tests this max thing? Because we just assume every guy's going to sign the max and then get out after. But in

his case, maybe you play it out because the cap's going up and he could be worth so much more money off the court if he's in a different market and he's not on a team that's 25 and 57 every year. So somebody's going to do it at some point someone will do it someone will do it you're right uh but it's it's such an advantage like i remember we were talking about with a couple other guys previous years and nobody does it nobody does but i i agree with you i think at some point someone will i don't know when charlotte is the team i would not want to be all All right. Next, next poll 26 to 23. We got Orlando at 24 and 35 Chicago at 26 and 33,

Indiana at 26 and 34 in Utah, 29 and 31. I called this group, the stealth tankers, because any of them could tank if they really wanted to, but all of them are kind of hanging around, hanging around, hanging around.

And we're going to get in this situation when there's like 12, 15 games left, the odds to get that fifth spot in the lottery are pretty good. You get like 10% odds at the topic. And then I can't remember what it is for the second pick, but it's, you know, if you, if you, if you're in the five spot, the combo of that is pretty good. It's like probably a one in six chance. Uh, but if you go through my answer to yes, for this is probably the same as yours for which team would you want to be going forward. It's got to be Orlando with the Franz Wagner-Paolo combo with the way Markel has been playing lately with some of their big guys. There's been a little Jonathan Isaac.

Forgot how much I like this guy defensively. And they have their own pick plus Chicago's top four protected. So they are in the best spot immediate future. But you could also make the case Utah with all their picks and some of their young guys. You might want to rather be them. Or you could say Indiana with Halliburton. And they're really fun to watch and a good coach. Who do you have for that one?

It's Orlando. And I don't really think I had to think about it all that much. Because despite the future pick equity that Utah has piled up here, I'm just big on knowing what I have. If what I have is two really young multi-option wings in Paolo and Franz, where Franz's drives are incredible, I think Paolo would become a better shooter. Most of these guys do. They're this good. His passing, you have the two things that everybody already wants Fultz is way better than people give him credit for Wendell's a terrific player Suggs I think at his worst is a terror defensively like he ends up playing bigger wings you know some of those Celtics games would

be going after Tatum and like Tatum wasn't ready for it it was kind of funny so Suggs is definitely a buying stock guy offensively he's been kind of a disaster but there's something I agree a disaster is too playoff thing there well offensively he's been really bad um it's not what you want for somebody you're picking that high but i i don't think i think disaster is kind of harsh for him so you add that to lottery this year they're getting the chicago pick if it's outside of the top four and i know we could just play the pick game and marketing's been terrific and kessler looks like a real keeper but i think it becomes a paloolo and Franz and whoever you want to put third on the Magic roster as it stands now against-

And those two picks. Against what? Lowry, Kessler, and then who's the third person? So I don't, yeah. Even with the picks, I think it's Orlando. We had Cerruti. I don't know if you've heard of Steve Cerruti, but he was, he popped on the podcast on a, on Thursday,

talk a little magic future with us and about he's very, you know, you've heard him talk about this. He's very concerned with the timetable. He's a big timetable guy. This isn't our time. Like he didn't want Donovan Mitchell. They didn't want to trade for him.

He's that doesn't fit our timetable. Does Fred Van Vliet fit our timetable? Not sure. This is a team that could make a move if they wanted to get frisky immediately, right? With those two firsts, there's multiple guys that I just don't have a feel for. Please don't aggregate this, people. But the Jalen Brown thing, I have no idea what's going to happen with this if the CBA doesn't allow them to pay him a max. I don't think he's going to stay for a 25% discount

for what he would make as the best guy in another team. But I just think we see this league, there's always four or five guys available per year. We talk about this constantly and they're in position. If you're just looking at who's in position to make a big deal, they are in position. The Knicks are in position, a couple of, Utah, New Orleans,

anybody that has picks, but Orlando with these two picks right away, where you can decide your destiny immediately. Like what if Chicago is the seventh pick and Orlando is like the fifth pick, you know, into this draft and teams could just be like, this is great starting over. So I don't know where that goes. What do you, what do you feel about the whole timetable thing? How long would you wait? Cause you're about as high on Palo as anybody. I want it on the record, I'm not a timetable guy. I'm not either. I think it's one of the most overstated, dumb things in team building that goes. If you have a chance to add something you think is really good, and not specific to Orlando's cap space, but just if you have that cap space in general, you better use it before it's gone. You can get cute with it and say, well, this guy perfect he's a couple years older or whatever so what are you going to do keep paying

your own guys not use the cap space and then not have it and then never bring in anybody like there are sometimes these windows where you really like your roster depending on the scheduled payments to the players but all of a sudden you have some cap space so i'm not telling you bring in anybody and i know that you're a little worried of taking the ball out of Franz's hands and taking it out of Paolo's hands. Paolo should be used to it after Duke. But I'm okay with having a guy. I know this is like who's six or seven years older than the other dudes. And what are you going to do? Wait around for perfect?

You know, that's the other thing teams do with cap space or not wanting to trade all their assets and everything. And, you know, look at the Knicks here. This has been an awesome story. Brunson's been incredible. But when I watch RJ Barrett now and the way they use him, even though those traditional counting numbers are still pretty good for him, I'm like, imagine if you had Mitchell, imagine if you had had Mitchell, but you were kind of like waiting, you know, the way it was explained to me is the Knicks were kind of like, well, yeah, but if we, if we do that, then we can't get the next guy. And it's like, one, you already got one in Brunson, but I don't like waiting for something. It's hard enough to add somebody who's really good in this league to go, ah, he's not perfect.

He's a little bit older. That's when I think you start getting a little too cute about it, make mistakes. I think there's something to be learned from the Tatum Brown thing, even though there was a lot of flukiness with that, with just how they got those picks and then the fact that they out of this cap space and they had a really good coach and we're able to add Horford and Hayward and Kyrie in a pretty fast time. But I look at the reps that those guys got really early in their career, right? Tatum was a rookie going to game seven in the Eastern finals against LeBron. Brown, every year in his career, he's been in the playoffs and big games, except for the one year he got hurt. And now you look at them where just the, the day-to-day how they approach basketball, the professionalism they have, they have all

these playoff games under their belt and they're like ready to win the title. And part of that happened because they sped up the timetable, whether it was inadvertent or not, they were just thrown in some big games. I want to see that. I'm as high as you are on Franz and Paolo. Like you had a tweet, it was a very Unruh Silla-like tweet. You don't normally do tweets like this,

where you said the, would you say the Paolo ceiling was Tatum potentially? And I actually agree with you. Cause to me, he's like, he reminds me almost of like, I compared him to a tight end in the trade value piece. Like he's like how Gronk could block and go deep and go over the middle. And it's like, what is this? And I feel like Paolo's like that.

I watch a ton of Magic games because I just like watching their guys and they're on early. It always kind of works out where I'm like, all right, what's on? What do I want to pick from here? And I go, you know what? I'll throw the Magic back on. Because I just like West Coast game, what's on? What do I want to pick from here? And I go, you know what? I'll throw the magic back on. Because I just like- It's a four o'clock West Coast game. Yeah, they really are.

And after Cade got hurt, when I swear I've watched more Detroit than anyone would ever think because they're just always like the first thing on, I go, all right, I guess I got a half hour, 40 minutes of uninterrupted Pistons hoops here on the West Coast. But I feel like I have a good read on him.

And this is somebody who like, and I've got the receipts for it. Like when I watched Tatum at Duke, I couldn't believe that he wasn't more of a conversation, but I think it was all the Fultz international stuff that he had done where he just was unbelievable. And Fultz had a dunk the other night, by the way, they lost the game. He had a dunk the other night, I guess it was the Toronto game where it was so filthy. You were like, oh yeah, that's, that's why this dude was at that level radar-wise. So to say Paolo could beat Tatum, you're basically saying Paolo could be a top six player in the league, which is still more unlikely than likely.

What I like about Paolo is that it's his driving. Tatum's drives now are the best they've ever been. They weren't always this way. So, you know, and then Drew Hanlon checked in, Tatum's trainer, who you could guess was probably a little more pro-Tatum after that tweet. But I'm like, look, from a ceiling standpoint, I'm not saying he's the shooter Tatum is now. I'm not even saying he's the ball handler he is now.

But I think the ball handler that Tatum was when he first came in, the Tatum drive package, and then seeing where Paolo is now as a rookie, like it's kind of this big driving shot creating. And if he develops that shooting part, and I think his passing is already beyond what Tatum's was when they first came into the league. Certainly. I don't think it's that crazy when I watched him play,

knowing that it's still not all that likely that Paolo, you know, the better bet would be that he's not a top six player, but the fact he even has this kind of chance, I think is the thing that's so much, it's just why I was just so excited watching the guy play. First step is great. The post-up stuff that he's kind of flashes from time to time is really unusual for how old he is. And it just seems like I'm with you. Like we're looking at the worst version of him, which was, you know, I remember going way back when they were talking about trading Jalen for Kawhi that one year where it was

like, you could trade Jalen for a year of Kawhi. And my case, I was against it. And I was like, if you look at Jalen versus Paul George, just where Jalen is now, where Paul George was in 2012, 2013, it's realistic. You know, it's exceedingly realistic. He can be as good as Paul George. He could be like a 24-point a game. He's already at the point Paul George was at,

and he has a lot of the same build and all the things he brings to the table. And I feel the same way about Paolo. You wouldn't compare him. It's not like it's like, whoa, he looks like Tatum. But he brings all this scoring stuff to the table that That's just unusual. Like he brings four or five different things that you just know he's going to be in the high twenties at some point in his career, if he doesn't get hurt. Right. Wait, like if I said to you lowest points per game, Paolo is going to average per season.

If he doesn't get hurt, the over-under would have to be like 28 a game. I'm going to tell you a story. and I agree with you, by the way. I agree with you because I just – but maybe the scoring gets impacted just because there's other people that end up taking shots. Like how many shots do you want to be taken away from Franz? So to get 29 a game when there's another dude that's going to be getting 20-plus every night, and that's who Franz is.

It's just still funny to me to see Franz have these drives where it's like are you not are your guys not watching what this dude does and of course we know there's a lot of advanced scouting but i still think there's moments where the other team still isn't ready for it sometimes there's like some white guy bias with him like they they seem surprised by him sometimes i don't know if it's just him i mean when some of these dudes at the end of the bench get called in late, and it's like switch fest, like we're just hunting white dudes. Well, Sam Houser has that with the Celtics.

Right, and he holds up a little bit better. He's got a bullseye. And Houser, like really, he'll fight sometimes. Like he guarded Giannis last week on a play. Giannis was like, what happened? I thought I was going to go right by this guy. Well, then he did. Once he was like, okay. Next time he did. First time he didn't though uh i look i'll tell this quick story i was in chicago

for the combine it's before the draft right and i know mike miller and dan frank who are part of the group that represent palo and because i've known those guys a little bit you know i got invited to you know hey come hang out and they were like all right who do you think's one and i'm around like people, basketball people, as we're hanging out, having this conversation, right? You love Chicago. And I already know, I do. But I know what's going to happen.

They're going to give me the Paolo presentation without any computer. There's no PowerPoint. It's just they want to pick my brain and see what I think. And I was like, look, I think there's moments where I see Jabari and the smoothness and his size and the way he's so smart defensively. And I was like, I can see it a little bit. I'm like, Chet, it's the kind of thing you're scared to death of. I'm like, but you know, I'm like, I would go Palawan at that point. I, you know, cause it was a weird year going through those three guys. Like I was changing my mind a little bit and I'd go back and I'd think about it. I'd be like, man, do you really want

to pass on Chet? Like, look, Jabari's already a 3 and D dude at this size. Are you kidding me? And you start digging into it a little bit more and you're like, man, Paolo does so many extra things. And Mike Miller just looks at me and goes, hey, man, look, he's our guy, but he's got some shit to him. He's got some shit to his game. And those other guys don't have it. And again, I doubt he cares I'm telling the story because he's talking up his client. But the thing is, it wasn't a lie.

It wasn't a lie. And it's not fair to say that Jabari doesn't because he's in a different situation. Chet isn't even playing. But like Paolo, whatever the numbers are, when you watch him, you see these moments where he's like, fuck you guys. And just drives and everybody dunks on him.

Hits big shots, you shots, gets in there. And that's one of my favorite things about young players that are supposed to be great. Like, hey, we see all the talent, but when somebody pushes you, how do you respond? And I think Paolo has that. And that's why when Mike was saying it to me, I was like, okay, am I getting the hard sell or not? And it wasn't the hard sell. It was the truth. It's like when Tatum dunked on LeBron that first year, it's only one play, but it was still kind of a moment. It's like, whoa, okay. I think that's a great call.

Yeah. Let's take a break. We got plenty more teams to go through. Bill Simmons Podcast is presented by FanDuel. The NBA season kicking into post-All-Star break year. There's no better place to get in on the action than FanDuel. The app is safe, secure, easy to use, exclusive offers, boosts, and more all month long. And when you get paid fast, they also have lots of ways to play, like the spread money

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Orlando, Chicago, Indiana, and Utah. So Chicago, 24th and Utah. So Chicago, 24th in offense. They're my answer for no, and I think they're your answer as well. There's no team that has a worse future out of those four than Chicago. Their 23 pick is top four protected, so they might be able to keep it. I still don't know why they didn't blow it up. Right now, the Hawks are the eighth seed, 29 and 30, and Chicago's 27 and 33. So you could say, oh, maybe we'll sneak in. I just don't see it with this team. I don't think they're good enough offensively. What were they getting? What were they getting if they blew it up? I would just rather go backwards and try to get one of the top four picks and try to keep my pick.

I just would value that more than, oh, cool. We made the plan. Maybe we can beat the whiz. They're going to do nothing. They're not good enough. I just don't think the assets that they have were all that valuable. So they're just going to kind of ride it out and see where they are. It doesn't seem like Levine was valuable. I think that was the surprise for me. I think teams are afraid of him and the knee. Yeah. And I also think that he's probably on that short list and next guy that's got some status in the league that goes, all right, enough of this. And you can And the knee. How come I'm playing off the ball? Yeah. And he's already hinted at it a few times. This isn't exactly like secret shit here. Other than Patrick Williams, who's pretty much untouchable and should be,

I've liked his improvement. I just don't think asset wise, there's enough here. I mean, we haven't even talked about the Pacers and I think there's probably three guys on the team that we love. Hell, I even kind of like Miles Turner again.

I do too. Just because I like watching the Pacers. Yeah. I actually think if Halliburton hadn't gotten hurt they'd probably be 500 right now and they'd be in the mix for like a seven seed when he was out if you run the numbers it was the worst offense in the nba yeah like other teams like san antonio can't score and the pacers had the stretcher they were even worse because he was gone next category is no man's land this takes us from 22 to 18 new orleans 26 and 21 portland's 20 and

30 washington's 20 and 30 toronto 20 and 31 and atlanta 29 and 30 i just think from an asset standpoint you'd still want to be new orleans going forward um the zion stuff is incredibly alarming to me yeah it just makes. It just makes me really nervous. We thought we finally like, hey, what if we get like a year out of it? Wouldn't this be cool? Like that's all we were hoping for. It's a hamstring injury. It's going to be three months now.

Did you watch the game? I was watching it live against Philly when it happened. And I was like, uh-oh. And here we are. It's this like you knew he was hurt january 2nd he got hurt but then it's to to have it go this long and then the latest update still like this kind of tbd deal yeah and there's just so much bad buzz about the the training recovery stuff with him and i don't know what to believe and not believe but he he definitely has top five bad buzz

for are you working hard enough to get back who knows hey we can only judge by the results is that he keeps having these injuries that a lot of guys just don't have and i don't know enough about it recently i know in the past it wasn't the greatest scouting report right so and then you factor in ingram was actually playing really well again now but that toe injury took forever uh i still love the roster and the picks i mean they've got that lakers pick this year what do you allow yourself to how many dreams have you had where you woke up where the lakers had the one pick and you wake up the next day they're 27 and 32 i was looking fan duel had regular season wins odds that they put up this weekend that for the most part, they're trying to bait you into bets, right?

But the Lakers, the Lakers were 40 and a half over. So they'd have to go 14 and nine to hit the over, right? And they're putting that there for a reason. They're trying to get equal money on both sides. So I'm not saying, you know, this is like, they're like, this is the right number to get action both ways. I don't see a world where they go 14 and nine with the team they have. When you throw in the, what am I getting from LeBron? Is he going to play every day? What am I getting from Davis?

And what am I getting defensively from, from that backcourt? When you're putting Russell and Schroeder together, we're, I guess we're jumping ahead to the next group, but, but I look at some- Save it. Save it. We'll save it. Because I don't want to dismiss. Cause I like this group here. No man's land. Yeah. Um, so we would still like new Orleans, Portland, Washington, Toronto, Atlanta.

You'd still want to be new Orleans out of those five going forward. If Zion can come back in time, you know, that's a nightmare nine seat or 10 seat. If Zion is just healthy in April, but I just, I've given up guessing that he's going to be healthy. He's played less than 125 games, I think, in his career. I think you just have New Orleans too low. I don't even think they should be in this tier. Well, they've been getting their ass kicked, though. They were 3-14 out of 17 games at one point.

They lost 10 straight. They're 4-2 in their last six. So maybe we're both right in that. Coming back a little bit. Right. The Ingram part of it, I think, has been kind of cool. They've got the third easiest schedule remaining of any of the teams in the NBA, which I think is really interesting.

When we get to Dallas, they have the easiest schedule in the NBA. That's the way. Some of the Philly schedule stuff gets really tough. But again, we'll save that for later. Sacramento, too. It comes down to a roster thing where I'm still going to default to New Orleans. But if we were doing this next year, if we fast forward to one year from now,

like Zion had a tweak, his calf, then I'm done. I think this is the last year with me for Zion where I can have any expectations, but I still do. I still love the roster. I would take this roster over Portland, over Washington, over Toronto, over Atlanta, over I still do. I still love the roster. I would take this roster over Portland, over Washington, over Toronto, over Atlanta, over the Lakers, OKC. Again, we're factoring all the picks. That's a little different. Over Minnesota, over Brooklyn. I would still take it over a ton of rosters because I think it's so talented. But I mean, it's been a brutal stretch and it's been bad news again for the guy that makes it all go. It's frustrating because there's such a blueprint

now for how to succeed in the NBA as a superstar. LeBron is in year 20 and the way he took care of his body. And that's all everybody talked about that last month. But even you read like some of this stuff, like Tatum, Tatum after the finals, like made these subtle tweaks, change his diet, like just little things. Cause he just wants to keep getting better and he wants to be more durable. And you've watched the durability from him this year. And at some point the light bulb's going to quick for Zion, I think, but man, we're now, you know, we're, this is, this just, it should have quick by now, especially after he signs that big deal. Portland, I don't know what they're doing. And they're just kind of, they're like that guy in

your fantasy league. That's just, just making trades to make trades. It's like, wait, what happened? You don't have Josh Sharp, now you have Tybo. Washington is the favorite to sign Russell Westbrook, which I actually kind of like. The two teams where Chris Haynes reported today for Westbrook were Chicago and Washington. And I said, that makes sense to me. You don't want them if you're tanking, and you don't want them if you're a good playoff team. You want them if you want toing and you don't want them if you're a good playoff team. You want them if you want to like make the playing game. And Washington clearly is motivated to make the playing game and be 42 and 40 or whatever. And Chicago didn't throw away their season and,

you know, and he could come in and supercharge either of those teams, at least a little bit. But if he went to Washington, I think they would be, you know, at least you'd have to beat them. You know, they're not, from a talent standpoint, it's a weird team. Poor Zingas, Westbrook. Who knows what you get for Bradley Beal, Kuzma. They have a bunch of wings. It's not like the easiest team to play.

Like even House was like, I wouldn't care if they signed Westbrook. I'd be excited for it. Because what is this team doing anyway? Where's your Westbrook take? He has to go somewhere where he doesn't have to change. And I think Washington's the perfect spot. I mean, this Clippers thing made zero sense to me whatsoever.

You just added all these wings. Ty Lue, it's cool that he's going to have options. And the early signals are that it's Eric Gordon. So I'm not going to do the full Clippers thing here. But when you bring him in, you got to play him and you got to let him be him. And that list is really, really short. And I don't think the clippers should have been on that list i'm all for it for him in washington i would be because he's already been there so he kind of gets it they kind of get him it's where they are they like 10 and 5 in their last 15 too like there's just washington has these stretches sometimes during the season you're like wait

are they good are they like a tough out i still wouldn't be afraid of them necessarily in the playoffs, especially when you're talking about what they'd be facing at the top of the East if they make it through the play-in. But it is, I don't know how long that list is. Is Billy Donovan absolutely sure that he would want to do it again? I mean, that would be a real full circle moment there after the years of Westbrook going, just not like basically just let him do whatever he wants.

Like, would you be able to do that again? It's like a conjuring sequel. He's like, I thought we blessed the house. I thought I was out of this. I didn't see. I'm not a big horror movie guy. You are though. You love the scary ones.

I fucking love them. Did you see the menu? Yeah, I liked the menu. I thought it was pretty good. I thought you would. Best record since Christmas. Denver, 21 and seven. Celtics, 19 and seven. Philly, 19 and good. I thought you would. Best record since Christmas, Denver 21-7, Celtics 19-7, Philly 19-7, Milwaukee 19-7, Washington 15-9. Fifth best record since Christmas.

Danny looks like he might be a bit of a player now too. I don't think we mentioned him. Yeah. Are you shaking your head a bit on me? No, no, no. I don't mind him because i think he's yeah yeah he's a little feisty right he's not like a rollover swing man like he you know he there's some elbows he'll throw um there's there's some stink eyes he'll give i kind of enjoy him but he you know he's an eighth guy um yeah if you look at the numbers since christmas like portland's 11 and 14 new orleans is 10 and 17, Atlanta, who is on this list, 12 and 14,

but it's a pretty big sample size at this point. I had Atlanta as my team I wouldn't want to be going forward. And it's not just because I hate watching them, but their payroll is 170 million for next season. They don't have their 25 or 27 firsts. They have a 26 pick swap in the Murray trade, which, you know, San Antonio, Atlanta, odds of San Antonio would be good in 26, who knows?

Young goes 37 million, 40 million, 43 million, 46 million, and then a $49 million player option in 2027. And he was a really tough trade value guy because I just think you have to cross off a lot of teams with him, right? How many teams would actually, are unhappy enough with their point guard position or desperate enough for a star that they would want to pay what the premium price would be for Trey.

So they're kind of, I don't want to say they're stuck with him, but I just don't think he has the same kind of value as some of the other young stars. Like would Brooklyn give up all the stuff they got to try to get trey young probably not so i know you know i know you don't mean all but like yeah you know what i mean yeah right three picks they give up like three of the first or something like that would houston you know give future assets up would with the with the bull say fuck it let's go with toronto say hey

let's let's uh let's talk about Siakam and Trae Young? I don't know. I don't know what his value is, but I think that team's kind of a mess. I haven't liked anything I've seen from them this year. I don't think Atlanta's the right choice for the team you'd least want to be out of this group because I still like the roster enough. And with Trae's stuff, I don't need to repeat myself all over again here. The value for him,

I think we should all be reminded of the Kyrie Irving lesson that we all got taught that there were still four or five teams that wanted him. Again, after all the Brooklyn stuff. And Trey doesn't have anything close to like Kyrie's resume of discontent. I mean, it's pretty clear that I don't think people like Trey.

So I don't know how that's going to be figured out. I just see where he finished up the player voting too. I was like, whoa. Yeah. And the money is not nothing. No, it's not nothing. It's a pretty big haul. The money for Lillard and Simons moving forward.

And then they got a grant decision on top of that. So you have Portland as your team. You want to be going for it. I'm just talking it all out here. Like Portland isn't something you look at today going, that's going to be a great time. Washington should be at least nominated for the worst option out of this with beal's contract perzingis injury history and the fact that he's going to get paid again by them and that's why they and they want to bring back kuzma

that was part of the ruey hatch emerge like matthew yeah you're right they were both like i overrated that they have all their picks going forward. But you're right. The Porzingis could get hurt tomorrow. Picks is certainly part of it, but you can't then put Oklahoma City seventh in your power rankings. Right. Although I fucking love watching that play. I mean, come on.

You can talk me into it. Hey, look. Toronto's in a weird spot here. Ananobi, who apparently everybody wanted, didn't meet the price while he was out again. He doesn't play in a lot of games, man. Look at his numbers. You got to pay Van Vliet or let him walk

or facilitate some Kyle Lowry deal where they ended up winning that trade big time by not paying Lowry and ended up with Precious. So there's some little pieces there. But Toronto, that roster's heading for this weird purgatory thing here, too. Well, the van vliet piece is an issue too he just changed agents he's going to be a free agent right and i just don't think he's a 30 million dollar a year guy i don't and i thought brunson was 25 and that's maybe van vliet's low 20s but after that i just don't like

it and i think we all like barnes i would have liked to see a bit of a jump this year, and we haven't. So I wouldn't pick Atlanta out of this group of who I wouldn't want to be because I know I'm stubborn about this. I still seem to like the talent, one through whatever, but they're going to have their own issues with Bogdanovich. I wonder if the Sadiq Bey was Bogdanovich insurance.

And then if the trade thing continues and doesn't improve, not the numbers, but you got a DeJounte decision there as well. But I would still take the talent on Atlanta and their questions over the talent and a lot of the same questions for the other teams in this group. So your pick is Washington or Portland? I would not want to be Washington. Okay. Fair. I think you made me waver on my Atlanta pick. We didn't even factor in the ownership piece of it too. The ownership has to factor into this. So you have the Atlanta owners

and the Washington owner who's asleep. That's different. He hasn't spent his sleep for 20 years with his basketball team. At least the hockey team's done well. But, all right, we're moving on. Hanging around. Five teams. Lakers, 17th, 27 and 32. OKC, 28 and 29. Minnesota, 31 and 30. Brooklyn, 34 and 24.

And the Knicks at number 13. 33 and 27. We probably both have the same for the team we would want to be going forward as OKC. It really would have been fun if Chet had played this year. How many wins, like realistically, how many wins would he have been worth for that team? Let's say three. Yeah. Okay. I was wondering how big that number was going to be. You're right. Let's give them three. Now they're 31 and 26, right? They're like a borderline in the mix for like a four or five seat and headed in the right direction.

They struck oil with fucking awesome Jalen Williams, the swing man. That guy, wow. Just over and over again, Presti has crushed these picks, and then they have a top 12 guy in the league now. SJ is a top 12 guy. And Giddy, who I love. And Giddy. They play their ass off.

I mean, we don't even talk about Lou Dort anymore. They are, in their last 15 in the NBA, like I kind of just do last 15 game snapshots and compare everybody to everybody. They're 6th in offense and 11th on defense for a team that's supposed to be tanking. They, like, get better. And you watch them certain nights going,

hey, I mean, look, any Boston fan can tell you they weren't ready at all. SG didn't even play in that game. And it's like, actually everybody already kind of knows what they did. They are the opposite of so many young teams we see in the NBA where they, they kind of know what they're doing and they play with a sense of pride,

which is like really unheard of. Cause it's one thing that... Usually you have pride because you've done something. These guys are just prideful when they go out there. I was so impressed. I talked about this on the pod when it happened. But with that LeBron scoring record game, how they handled their business that game. It was a 15-minute break, especially with a young team.

That should totally mess you up. There's so much history in the building. And it was like the break ended. They came back out, kept kicking their ass since December 1st. They're 19 and 16. That's a almost half a season sample size, 35 games. And that I actually would have thought that was a tiny bit higher. So man, you throw in all the picks they have and that Paul George trade is going to go down as one of the best trades of the last 25 years. Maybe in the top three. Because we haven't even seen

what they got from the picks yet. But to get SGA, they already got Jalen Williams. I think Trey Mann was the, they already got him out of that trade. And they have all the, all the picks haven't even really manifested themselves yet.

Okay, just to finish though, would you say then, like as we've kind of balanced this topic around, hey, I like Orlando better because of the players. themselves yet okay just to finish though would you say then like as we've kind of balanced this topic around hey i like orlando better because of the players i know utah has a million picks but like it's a combination of not only okc's talent from what we've seen this point and knowing okay and the dump truck of picks is coming here too it's the fact that they have a guy that we think could be the best guy on a contender at some point, SGA. Orlando doesn't

have that yet. Would Minnesota, because I think we'd both agree that we'd probably rather have Anthony Edwards than any single player on any of the rosters in this group? For the next 10 years or the next five? I don't know. Do you think there's a difference? I think I would rather have SGA than Edwards. Over the next five? I just, maybe I'm drinking too much SGA Kool-Aid. Like, what else do we need to see? He's averaging 30 a game. He goes toe-to-toe against every star in the league.

He delivers over and over again at crunch time. Like, at what point do we just admit this is a real thing, that he's one of the best guards in the league? I think he's there. Yeah, because I'll admit- We have a long sample size now. The numbers in the beginning, you're just like, okay, number one, what is this? It's not a hot streak. He does this game after game after game. He gets whatever shot he wants. I love watching them. And you know, Edwards is great too. I think it's at least they're even, I don't know if I would be

right. You might be right, but I'd still take Anthony Edwards. But Edwards is just, I mean, the fact that he didn't really start playing basketball until 10th grade, it's like the greatest fact of anyone in the entire league. It's just unbelievable. I want to know what the neighborhood was. Was there a hoop somewhere at the cul-de-sac? I mean, obviously he shot around, but this was just like, he's like, wait, maybe I'll start playing basketball more. Because he was dribbling. He's the best player in Georgia.

There's no way he started dribbling as a sophomore, like the first time he ever dribbled. It should be like somebody needs to do like a 45-minute investigation of this. No, because they won't, because it's not as good of a story as if one day he was like, hey, fuck it, throw me that thing.

What do you do with this again? That's the way these stories are told to us. There's a really good chance Anthony Edwards was dribbling basketball before he was a sophomore in high school, is my point. I don't have evidence. I'm just saying. These stories are told to us. There's a really good chance Anthony Edwards was dribbling a little basketball before he was a sophomore in high school, is my point. I don't have evidence.

I'm just saying. Well, that's why he can't be the answer for no. Even though Minnesota has no picks left, I would still rather be them than the Lakers. The Lakers now have been decimated from a pick standpoint, and they basically have LeBron, who's 20 years in the league, and Davis, who I don't trust to play for three straight weeks. Pretty weird ownership situation, too.

That is the team I would not want to be if he gave me a choice. And I don't know what Davis' value is if they decided to move him this offseason. I don't know who's falling all over themselves. Do you think they could get anything close to that Durant deal? I don't. No, the Durant deal, probably not,

but I think they'd get more than we think. I think we're constantly reminded of like, oh, what are you going to get for that guy? Oh, he's hurt all the time. You know, when Davis is rolling, another team would talk themselves into it. Another team would say, oh, we're going to get him away from all that.

We're going to do this. We're going to bring him to these trainers. You're going to go all gluten-free, you know, whatever. I mean, somebody would talk themselves into it, but you're right. I think the Lakers, because I wonder how quickly or how motivated they were just to marginally improve this year to hope that that pick didn't end up being number one. Oh, interesting.

I like that. Well, I'll tell you this. They beat New Orleans the other night and I put on first take the next day as they were, as I was having coffee and two, you know, they have the graphics, what they're talking about, the question. And the graphics were like, are the Lakers contenders again? And are the Lakers for real? It's just because they beat New Orleans without Zion. I don't see it. I don't, I think defensively,

their guards are a nightmare for trying to guard anybody. And I just don't see, like I mentioned before about how they'd have to go 14 and 9 just to go 41 and 41 i don't see how they would go 14 and 9 unless lebron and new lebron and davis were playing every game defensively they're just not good enough i could see look i could see if davis was even close to beginning of the season davis and i think i've personally seen some glimpses of his competitiveness like there's been a little bit more fire from him.

Oh, congratulations. There's been some glimpses of competitiveness? That sounds great. I know I'm reaching. Do we need to give more money? Should we make $60 million a year and we'd get more than glimpses? What's the number? I try.

I try to find some positives every now and then. I think D'Angelo Russell, despite my history with him this season, I just don't think he's going to pull the same bullshit in a short amount of time like he's been pretty good for him like he's actually so I just wondered if they went hey deep down let's just let's just make sure we're not terrible terrible and then this pick haunts us for a long time I'm not ready to have an opinion on the Russell thing yet until the game that we know is coming over the next two weeks when there's a minute left and they're down two and they get a stop and it comes down and Russell has the ball and he dribbles for seven seconds and then launches

a 28 footer and misses. And it cuts to LeBron just with that LeBron face for like a second half before he disgruntled runs back up the court on defense, just furious. Right. Because that's going to happen. And he's looking at Martha Stewart. Let's see how it goes after that first shot. Right. I love when he finds somebody in the crowd after he wants them to know how mad he is at the teammate.

Right. Like George Lopez. Can you believe this motherfucker? Wear a shaded shirt. Is he over there? We didn't mention, so the Lakers are the team we wouldn't want to be. I'm going to come out of the closet right now with Brooklyn

34 and 24 I like their team I like watching them I think there's something there and if Simmons wasn't a complete write off if they had had first of all the Simmons from 3 years ago was with these guys this team would be actually good like a really legitimately good team. That'd be really hard to play. They're deep.

They have shooting all over the place. They have wings. They can switch on defense, but they need Ben Simmons. And he's the 13th guy on the team. And he's pretty much unplayable at this point. But I still think they're like a little better than maybe people think. They're not going to, they're, they're so deep, they're never going to throw away a game. You're always going to have to go at them and beat them for four quarters. They have these random heat check guys. I just kind of like the team. You seem disgusted.

I don't know. You know what? The Ben Simmons thing is a trigger. It triggers me. And it goes back to the fact that JJ jj and tommy got ben simmons in that sit down is incredible okay that is what every podcast hopes they have and he has the juice to be able to do it as much as anybody who's doing it right now and so it was it was really good but it was also like really revealing and what i thought was a pretty horrifying way if I were a Nets fan.

Yeah. That I was like, wow. Like when I got done with that episode and a lot of it was like, I'm still awesome and people don't understand that I can do this. And like, I do all these different things. And I was like, this guy's not even close. Like it's not. Yeah. There was no accountability at all.

It was everyone else's fault. And there was no self-reflection or anything. I thought it was an alarming interview. Exactly. I made fun of Tommy about it. I was like, whoa, did you run out of softballs or did you have to run to the big five and buy some more? I don't think it even was though like, yeah, I would have done the interview differently,

but I also would not have ever gotten it. Okay. Right, right. So at some point I would have been like, Hey dude, like this isn't, but you know, in a way, how do you get worse at free throw shooting every year?

Your profession? Like that's, that's a question that I just want to hear somebody ask him at some point. Like, do you work hard on your game? Do you work on your craft? How have you worked on your craft the last three years to get better at it? Is the question. I just want to hear him answer at some point. I just think he's a delusional basketball guy. on your craft how have you worked on your craft the last three years to get better at it is a

question i just want to hear him answer at some point i just think he's a delusional basketball guy i just think he is i don't think he likes basketball when he went and dunked in front of nick friedel last year when he didn't play remember he was like post this video and it was him dunking in the practice facility and then the guy didn't play and you were like what so then it was the carryover and then that interview and again what wasn't and i just want to make sure those guys don't like think we're no we love those guys it was i got done with that episode i was scared i was like what was that and it's exactly like that interview to me is was the foundation for the ben simmons story the player for this season and there were these little,

little glimpses like, oh man, he had a bunch of assists in the first half of this game. Remember the Boston game? It was like a 13, 10 point swing. Yeah. So it was like plus 13 with them on minus 10 with them off in the first half, lighten it up. Didn't play the last seven minutes of the game because Jacques Vaughn was like, nope, like it's not working. then jock vaughn had that long answer just two weeks ago less than two weeks ago we don't really know what we're doing and trying and whatever and it was almost like a public warning of like i don't know how much he's going to play in certain situations now he probably will because i don't really know who they are as a team but you're right bill it's it's really frustrating like forget the number one pick forget

multiple all-stars like just a guy that had a little bit more aggressiveness to him and now it's been gone it's been gone for a long time and you still have two years left and then ben simmons has to kind of go like i'm still not 100 you're like dude like okay it's a shame i really liked watching him play basketball um just before we go to break the Knicks really quick, 33 and 27. And I love the Josh Hart trade for them. It's already been born out as a, that's a nice,

nice addition for them. The, the big thing we talked about the Brunson signing a couple of times during the summer. Cause we both liked it. It is what it is. It was a little high, but that's what you have to do in free agency

to get somebody, right? You're going to pay 15, 20% extra. Whenever any of us say a little high, we should just accept that that means that's what the price is. Like there are bad contracts. It's a new car. It's just whenever it's that like extra 10 to 15 million,

we should all just shut up about it because that's the winning bid. You know, not, right. We really like Brunson and we like the signing. I don't think either of us thought he would be a 24 point a game guy. Like this guy who there's nights where he's just the best guy on the floor, just to destroy teams. And that would, that's been surprising to me.

Like he's actually a little better than I thought. And I feel like I was about as high on him as anybody. I really valued him and I thought he was great for Dallas. And I thought it was a huge mistake them letting him go, but he's even gone up a level beyond what I expected. Yeah. He's beyond a level that I expected to. I mean, some of the stuff that he's doing here is incredible as a one on a good team. Like this isn't a one on a team that sucks. This is going to be like a 47, 48 win team. Probably. I'll call myself out a little because this summer i think the only thing that could be perceived as being negative about it was

that when you bring in a free agent and you see the 100 million dollar tag and i know nicks fans are usually smarter than than other you know fan bases but it's like is this guy gonna carry us like now we're asking and i thought like okay because he played your complex with agents and i thought that that could get weird when i didn't know that he was going to be that guy and now he's actually that guy so uh yeah this is better than i thought he would be but you're right to mention the rj thing because i think that's he's not going and there was he's slow start then he looked good in december and it looked like the ship had been right a little bit but now it's going the other way again and i'm not sure it

just feels like he's going to get traded in the off season unless we see some sort of comeback again if you look at the counting stats you'd be shocked how good they still are with rj and it doesn't match the eye test yeah all right quick break Yeah. All right long, watch Prime Monday Night Hockey deliver unreal plays, the biggest goals, can't miss moments. Matthews, McDavid, Crosby, the NHL's best. They're all on Prime. Prime Monday Night Hockey. It's on Monday.

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An example for me. Because safety is learned. It's learned. Okay. Give it up. Give what up? Really? Really really. Ugh. This message is brought to you by Metrolinks. Alright, we're moving to the top 12. These are the wildcard section. Number 12, Sacramento.

They're 32 and 25. Rosillo, this was one of our locks in the over-under pod. I think the over-under was 33 and a half. And we, you, me, and House all had them as locks, so we're about to hit that. Miami have it 11 at 32 and 27. Dallas 10 at 31 and 29.

Cleveland 9 at 38 and 23, and then Memphis eight, 35 and 22. So for the team, I would want to be going forward. I'm still going to say Cleveland, even if they frustrate the hell out of me. And I don't understand. We should talk about the Kevin Love thing. What's the point of buying out somebody when you actually have like a French chance to win the contender, but I still like their team the most, like fundamentally whether what's the point of buying out somebody when you actually have a French chance to win the contender? But I still like their team the most. Fundamentally, whether Mitchell's there for 10 years, five, whatever,

I know I have Mobley and I know I have Garland for the next 10 years. I know I can contend short-term. I know there's moves I can make to always be in the mix and then long-term I'm set too. I don't care that I don't have picks.

I like that team. That was my pick pick what'd you have I completely agree with you now it seems a little I feel like everybody's so anti Memphis now it's weird it's it's definitely zagged a little too hard

but I also think people are a little too pro Memphis so now it's got to just shake out. We need some equilibrium now. All right. They also haven't been good for pretty much like a month. No, it's a little weird. At least since that Shannon Sharp game.

Yeah, there's some immaturity with that team that I think, like Steven Adams is good, but he shouldn't have been this much. Where it's like, man, since Steven Adams went out, we fell apart. It's like, what? We haven't talked about this much where it's like man since steven adams went out we fell apart it's like what i i can't we haven't talked about this you and i word for word what i think about when i see this rough stretch i'm like hey he's a nice piece but you're fucking kidding me like you guys are gonna fall like job you're this fringe mvp type of dude which i think he is and jaron's playing regularly i know the Dylan Brooks minutes have been killing them. I know they didn't have, but when they didn't have Bane in the beginning of the year, they were winning a ton of games. We liked their depth, or maybe I just

liked their options, and I'm lying to myself a little bit there. But this shouldn't happen. I mean, is it because- Also, this is the NBA season. Look at the Celtics, how many guys have been out? I think, what are their best five guys that played 29 minutes together? They've been missing Smart. They were missing Rob Williams. This is all recent, though. Jalen's out.

Other than the Smart part of it. But the season is people are going to be missing for a couple weeks. And you got to get your shit together. I didn't like a lot of it. It also seems like they put a bullseye on themselves that maybe they didn't need to do. They talked a lot of shit, and they seem like they put a bullseye on themselves that maybe they didn't need to do. They talked a lot of shit

and they seem like they're the most disliked team in the league now. But yeah, I have Cleveland over them. The team I wouldn't, I'd like all of these teams to be honest, just from a short-term standpoint, because I think Dallas will be really good with Kyrie, at least for the next six weeks before.

What do you have for, if you had to pick a date in the office poll for things are going too well, Kyrie's going to mess this up, what would you have? Would you go somewhere in April? Would you do playoffs? What would you do? Yeah, yeah, let me look at this now. All right, I'm going to say, I'm going to try to call it right now.

You're going to look at their schedule? Yeah, you really want to get a good answer here. No, so let's say. Because it's usually when things are going great is usually when he strikes. No, that's just my point. I'm going to say they're going to be up 2-1 on Sacramento in the first round of the playoffs. And then he'll do something weird?

Some weird tweet? Be up 2-1. Be up 2-1, he's going to retire. He's going to be back. It's like you're in a relationship. It's just going great. You're like, man, this has been really good lately. And then they just don't come home for 48 hours. Like,

where'd you go? What happened? Sorry. It is fun to watch them. You know, listen, I think we've been as critical of Kyrie as anybody, and I would not want that guy on my team. And I think he should be paid on a year to year contract. But when he's happy and having fun playing basketball and you watch him with Luca and some of the pieces they have, and Josh Green has played out of our ass, that's a fun team to watch. It just is. I hope he can keep it together, but I just, we know from his history that he won't. Do you hope he can keep it together? Do you actually actively root for him? No, I like Luca and I don want luca to be in this situation

where lebron was in where there's just seven years of your career goes by and the best guys you played with were kairi when he was sane for eight weeks and jalen brunson and poor zingas and it's like year eight that's what i don't want i think he's's too important. So I hope for his sake, it'll be fun. Right. I don't have anything left on the Kyrie thing. He was so freaking good in that Minnesota game. That's one of my favorite regular season games this year, watching Anthony Edwards. Yeah, you texted me about that.

I watched the second half that next day. The fourth quarter was incredible. Yeah, that's a rare. I know we all watch the games and stuff, but if you don't catch this or if you're not locked in, go back. I would say this to the audience now, if you have the capability. Go back and watch that second half. Go watch that fourth quarter in Minnesota and Dallas.

It's one of my favorite games of the season. Because Minnesota was playing hard. Yeah, and they were challenging and contesting everything. It was why there were still four or five teams that wanted Kyrie that fourth quarter. Think about what he did in that fourth quarter and the way he was giving Minnesota everything, and they were playing their asses off trying to figure out a way to stop

because Finch will do something like Finch is really good like Finch is going to say all right we'll just let it you know I love that Anthony Edwards goes after people I love that McDaniels is becoming like a really special defensive player too and like that last play against Luca where again Luke and Kyrie just sort of fucked it up because they kept passing back and forth to each other. But it was also because dude, who are these two young guys with all this size swarming us right now and making it tough for Luca,

you know, think how many last second shots Luca has where everybody knows it's going to happen. And it still looks effortless because he's that hard to deal with. So I don't, I don't, the Luca part could make them the pick i i feel like i have a couple quick follow-ups for you why do you have miami in this group with sacramento dallas

cleveland memphis you're still hanging on i am i i call them the zombies i just think they're zombies they're gonna be right from nobody wants nobody wants to admit it but they're gonna be heard from and they you know they get kevin love We didn't even talk about this. Go ahead. Do your Kevin Love thing. Cause I know this building hurt his hand and he sucked in January and they fell out of the rotation and he wasn't happy. And they, he means a lot to that franchise in the city. So they wanted to write for him. They bought him out and now he's going to go to Miami. His hand's going to be healthy. And I think he's going to help them. And my question is, cause anytime this happens, we always hear like, look,

it's important for a team to do this for the goodwill, for the goodwill of the players. You wanna show your players and you wanna show potential free agents that you handle your business right. And my question for you is, that doesn't fucking matter anymore. These guys don't care.

Look at all the shit we've just watched over the last four or five years. question for you is that doesn't fucking matter anymore. These guys don't care. We like, look at all the shit we've just watched over the last four or five years. Does any player think, look at an organization and go, oh, they handle their business, right? That's these guys. They're, they're going to do whatever is best for them. If we haven't learned that lesson over the last six years, we haven't learned any lessons at all. And if I'm Cleveland, I'm looking at this, like, I just gave away all of these picks for Donovan Mitchell. I'm a top five team in the East. I have a puncher's chance if my guards get hot

and Mobley goes up a level of, maybe I can make the conference finals. I don't want to play Miami in round one and all of a sudden there's healthy Kevin Love, like fucking a Last of Us episode, the zombie that you should have killed before and now he's back and he's hitting threes. Like, I'm doing what's best for my team.

I don't care about the goodwill of the league. That's my rant. I love the goodwill part of it. You know, that was the old, like, I know Lakers fans just think we're doing this because we're from Mass, but, you know, when they signed Kobe to that deal, and everyone's like, what are you doing?

It's like, no, no, the free agents will respect this. They will? Durant didn't even have a meeting with them. Well, Marcus Aldridge turned you down. It was like, Kobe, this deal will prove the rest of the league that the Lakers take care of their people. And it's like-

Nobody cares. Yeah, I don't love just letting him bounce for nothing because you don't know. They still can't quite figure out. My guess would be watching the way they're trying to close games, that they're hoping between Okoro, who's actually shot it better, Lavert, who I think, I don't forget the last time I looked at his game log, his numbers look better shooting-wise.

That small forward position is going to be really important, and I don't think they thought they could survive with Love as a closing group specific to what they're trying to do. He gives you insurance for the alan and moby like you know you you're factoring in i'm not these guys are gonna be healthy yeah i just don't i would have been in the room just going nuts like wait we're just gonna we're gonna pay this guy to go away like what if we need him the other goes on another team and hurts us even though i don't like um miami that much and i wonder why you have them in this group here you're probably right because i was wrong about it last year and they

were shot away for playing who would you be more afraid of in a playoff series miami or sacramento like just think about it fundamentally you're now in a playoff series everything's slowing down there's five minutes left miami starts doing their bullshit stuff we're like you can't because sacramento hasn't done it even though that but that's what i mean that's why i haven't ranked higher because i know like you know what's going to happen the miami game they're down seven bam hits his 22 foot over the one second left on the shot clock they get a stop tyler harrow hits a three they get another stop comes back down butler charges into three guys and one now they're leading and you're like what the fuck just happened we're up seven miami's

winning i but that's just i just think that i really value their experience and i wrote them off earlier in the season it was a mistake they're in their good stretch despite losing two before the all-star break but they still can't shoot they're the third worst three-point shooting team in the nba um their offense again depending on on how you want to take the snapshot of it, if you go to the last 15, they're 24th. They don't score enough. What they did last year, going as deep as they did in the playoffs, is remarkable considering offense is always an issue. And you look at their rotation and you're like, I can't believe Spoh does it night in and night out with these guys. And now you're taking Lowry out of the equation, right? I mean,

I guess you could hope that maybe there's some kind of turnaround. I think there's another argument that's pro your side of this on the love bio, is why would you want Miami to add any piece of depth if you potentially have to run into them? Like, say things do click and it all kind of works out. That's, I think, another strong argument against going, like, Miami's desperate for an eight- to nine-man rotation because they're always light. They always feel like they have less options than the other good teams in the East. Miami's desperate for an eight to nine man rotation because they're always light. They always feel like they have less options than the other good teams in the East.

And now look, the bio. So we know he was historically overrated. First of all, but no, but we know he was hurt. If it was like, oh,

he might be washed. That's different. And maybe he is, but we know he hurt his hand. We know it'll probably help. They just bother me. All right. Next group lurking.

And I have one quick last follow-up. Sorry. Who would you rather have jaw or Mitchell for next seven years or this year? Next three years, eight months. I actually, I don't, to me,

it's not a debate. I'd rather have jaw. Okay. All right. Just double check it because it is, you are right back to an original point here. Everybody is off of Memphis right now. It feels like everybody is off of them. And I, I don't know if I'm zagging or if I just go, are we forgetting? Like when everybody was playing,

they're beating a lot of teams. Like they were right there with everybody else on top of the West last four minutes of a game, especially at home. They're really tough. Ja with the ball, just going into three guys is really hard to officiate. You see, he's got to be top four hardest to officiate stars in the league right now, right? Yeah. But with him, I feel like he earns it a little bit more than some of the other guys. This is where it turned into like an anti-Brunson thing, but Brunson's right up there with Trey and Prime Harden of getting these shit calls. Yeah. He's great at it.

He does. He does fool the refs. Next group is lurking. Number seven, golden state, number six, Clippers, number five,

Phoenix, and number four, Philly golden states, 29 and 29 Clippers are 33 and 28 arrow pointing up Phoenix, 32 and 28 waiting for Katie to come back. And Philly is 38, 19. They're 26 and seven in their last 33,

which is the best record in the league. So people listening to this would be like, wait, why do you have Golden State seventh? They're a 500 team. I think people know why. I just, yeah, I think they've earned it. I also have them as my no for the team I wouldn't want to be going forward,

which was crazy to me. But I thought I was going to say Phoenix But I thought I was going to say Phoenix. I thought I was going to say the Clippers, but I'm alarmed by Golden State's books. They are in the books for $210 million next year, not counting Draymond's 27.5 player option. I think they're going to have some really tough decisions to make with Klay and Draymond down the road. Poole is already making a shit ton of money. They missed on Wiseman. They already cut bait on that.

Not sure about Moody. You and I, I think, are probably as bullish on Kamika's potential as anybody, but I do wonder what this looks like in three years. And if you're telling me the way Kawhi has looked lately, and he's only, I think, 31, and him and Paul George, 31, 32. How old is Kawhi? Well, I don't know. But you're after a few. Kawhi's been unstoppable.

He's been awesome. But you can't- That was the team I was going to pick, but I couldn't get there. I think I would rather have their next five years than Golden State's. But I might be wrong. I just, I really worry about the money and paying people for past performance, which I think is the situation they're going to be in. They,

they're going to have to pay. What are they going to do with Clay and Draymond? Is Clay a $40 million guy anymore? Well, depending on what the new CBA looks like, what 24, 25, 25,

uh, maybe the first year. I don't know. I don't know what the hell the numbers looks like. What, 24, 25? 25 will be the first year. I don't know. I don't know what the hell the numbers are going to be for guys. I think it's going to be like 60 plus million for the best players. So you'd rather have the Golden State future? I need a little bit more from Kawhi and Paul George before I start saying Kawhi has been better lately as a positive. He has been better for right now.

He's been fucking awesome. Their game against phoenix that was that was like a really nice impressive game even though kawaii took him forever to get going uh he didn't make any shots also how many here's the other thing i forgot to mention the golden state case how many how many of these injuries is curry gonna have i worry about him from a durability standpoint too. He's had a few of these now. And Phoenix, you could say, Phoenix could be the answer for no because Chris Paul's 37 and Durant is the same thing. He's had a few real injuries at this point and they've traded away all their picks.

I thought this was the toughest group to pick the no. I didn't feel great about any of the choices. I would say the Clippers not having any of their picks might be the deciding factor golden state yeah you're right i forgot about that part you're right that should be clippers are the no you're right but i don't i was wrong i'm sorry aggregators just make sure make sure you count the 180. i just did but with the right picks it's it's kind of group to group where it's like all right how much am i weighing the picks here uh you know right the current injury has been kind of weird you had the

hand one you had the knee one last year which you came back from he's got the ankles from the past the sole the shoulder one when you watched it you were like what the fuck you just reached for the ball that was that was kind of a weird like that was like an old man pickup injury um and then he had the knee which was already hurt you could tell because it was all braced up and there was some stuff that he's doing he'd gone down again so yeah it's starting to add up having said all that i still like his track record of of like is he gonna be there over kawaii's despite the fact i think you're right. I messed that up. One thing on the Paul George trade, they have pick swaps

in 23 and 25, OKC. I think they're going to be better than the Clippers in 25, right? That one might actually come into play. This year, it won't, because the Clippers are going to have better records, so you got to throw it out. But the 2025, I think OKC will actually have a better record than them. They might.

And then they have their 24 and 26 unprotected firsts too. So there's a lot left. What team would you want to be out of these four? Golden State, Clippers, Phoenix, Philly. Phoenix. I had them as well. Because Doreen and Booker is the next five years. I know I have that, and I know I can build around that at the very least.

Right. Now, this is all like, this is a weird year because every time I'm trying to figure it out, I've already talked about this. It's like, which health do I want to bet on? because i felt like boston was a better health bet i still feel like you know jaw and jaron jackson's injuries like i'd rather deal with those than kawaii and paul george's injury history and a lot of it just comes down to simple age here once phoenix has all their guys and we'll see how long that lasts, but if they have all their guys, give me that and the chance of that for the next one or two years. I also think,

I don't know. I'm optimistic on how Durant's going to age because it's the game is so easy for him. And the injuries he's had were really like, like that last one he had was just Jimmy Butler fell on his leg. Anyone on the week was getting hurt on that. So the way he, the time he puts into his game,

I do feel like he has four to five years left, but he's going to get hurt. I mean, leg anyone on the week was getting hurt on that so the way he the time he puts into his game i do feel like he has four to five years left but he's gonna get hurt i mean this is ever this is a yearly thing with him now too so it's kind of like the curry thing where maybe it's not the one devastating thing but we know we're not going to have you and now it's just this game of is there any way we can have you with a couple weeks before the playoffs start golden state thing i think it's going to be really hard to keep improving that team with the amount of money they're showing out already but i guess that's a topic for another pod last group the contenders denver boston milwaukee one was my list denver three 41 and 18 boston 2 42 and 17. milwaukee 141 and 17. i just think for me milwaukee

i've always felt this way. I'm not going to waver. Um, Denver is, is probably going to end up being the best regular season team, but you know, the Giannis, I still think is, that's the marker for the rest of the league. The guy you got to go through, you know, you have to go through at some point to win the title or get to the finals. And I like some of the moves they've made the angles thing crowder um they finally have middleton back looking normal again and i just think that's the best team yeah i don't know that i'm all the way back with middleton even though he's been back and they keep winning all these games um some of the free throw attempt stuff with him you know can usually be a sign of

like who are you becoming as a player i would put drew ahead of him as the second best player on this team because there's moments i mean granted they're playing in the boston game against boston's bench he was unbelievable i guess spent six minutes on that he was once he stripped eric white like that oh my god that game was what i said on my podcast after that game i go this is a lesson in why we all lose our shit on the guys that are really good. Like the scores that are the top 20 players, the guys that can get buckets whenever they want. The reason all these teams will do whatever they can to get them. And we spend so much time talking about them.

We get so bummed out when they make trade demands and all this different shit. Because that was an exercise. And like, this is what it looks like when you have players who can't get any separation or can't get their own bucket. Like Hauser has that drive and he's like, oh shit, this isn't gonna work grant williams tries to fucking go between his legs against yannis and you were like what is this and like derrick white who's been awesome and i've you know love seeing it because i think a lot of austin fans were like wait you guys thought this guy was good we're like no he's actually really good um drew just strips him clean and then that was the game so you can make fun of milwaukee you're like cool you went to overtime against bosses bench but i thought there was a nice little lesson in there

i completely agree with you i want to take the guy that's the best player and that he's still who seems really motivated to like really i think that some of this yokich and bead stuff was was probably good for him yeah and it's funny about six weeks ago i think i think that was a nice little fire for him whenever you see the like there'll be some yokich graphic that comes out right and you go oh my god i can't believe no one's ever done this and then there'll be some yannis one that comes out you're like wait he's the first guy to be doing this i mean it all seems to always go back to will but between them and of course mb the last year plus with this mvp debate

that's gone on and on like if you want to you can find five things for each one of the guys you're like well how does that guy not win and you're like well that's the point because that's how special this group is yokage was plus 49 on off in february okay you know? I'm glad this is good. Cause I was starting to look at like the prime five lineups, right? So who that's amazing. Who, which teams, like, what do they look like when they're five guys are out there? And that plus minus isn't as much of a swing as you would think. Like for example, Sacramento's five man lineup is like played more than again, some of the qualifiers can be how many minutes per game and all that kind of stuff but like for the most part sacramento's always had their five guys and i think it's a big part of their success they play like a team that kind of knows what

they're all supposed to be doing denver's prime five is probably and i don't know if i have this like because the qualifiers and minutes on stuff can change a little bit but i think for like teams that actually play and like hey who are their starting five well here are their five and when they play like the plus minus for them is the best group of any of those five the weird thing for denver is they've got like a massive net negative when their bench is in yeah but in the playoffs is that really going to matter all that much um well they also added two guys that i think are genuinely going to help them i think thomas brown will help them and reggie jackson will absolutely 100 help them

he will yeah and i i think they were so sick of bones i think yoka just pretty sick of it too and you know it's just i can't imagine being part of that nugget staff and then listening to these other broadcasts be like oh you know bones he's you know he's just he gets a chance and it's like all right whatever um but the reason i bring that up is that when you're looking at like Boston's five-man unit, like that number is not as high as you would have thought, but then you like their depth of everybody else. Golden State, the Curry, Clay, Wiggins, Draymond, Looney lineup. If you frame it, depending on how you –

that's like the second best five-man unit in the nba behind the yokich group yeah atlanta's group with trey dejante hunter collins and clint is way up there really good it's like that's why i haven't totally given up on them yet because it's crazy right so um milwaukee it's so funny i just looked at all this too the celtics won, they were like 8.7, plus 8.7. It's like not amazing. They're best five. Is it plus eight? Something like that, or plus eight. But I would agree with you. However I looked at it, it wasn't as overwhelming as I thought it would be, but it also speaks to like, I think they could do a little bit more stuff because

of their depth. And granted, they're kind of hitting their rough injury stretch. But yeah. Well, but it also speaks to when your bench is really good, then some of the on-off stuff isn't going to be as dramatic because you got like Brogdon and White coming in. That's why I don't, I think it's a really fun stat to look at, but I also think it can be a little deceiving sometimes because Denver's bench was just not good and it's going to be better now, but that was at least a piece of why Yoko shouldn't be plus no no NBA player should be plus 49 even if it's for seven games that's ludicrous yeah it just was something because the Atlanta thing I went oh and then because I'd heard the

Golden State one before I think at one stretch it was actually the best starting five unit um with them and then that's why they would Hey, just let us get into the tournament here. And we still have a really good chance. And I don't think it's right. You know, it's, it's just, it's hard when you're watching a team suck every other game,

go have an open mind, have an open mind. But I think that's the most important thing with a team like them. And that resume of Curry comes back. Which team would you want to be going forward? Boston, Milwaukee or Denver? Milwaukee.

Giannis. Because of Giannis. Okay. I think I'd go Boston. Just because I think there's more assets and this Tatum thing with the arrow. He's only 25,

three years younger than Giannis, but then i get all the other stuff whereas with milwaukee for this year i'd take milwaukee but if you're talking like next seven then it gets a little more confusing for me but i i don't think there's a good answer if you want to tell me next seven then yeah all right yeah you got me but and whatever happens this year because i think we are in agreement on like the, this year part, the having to get through Giannis, you know,

and it's going to be weird if like something, if they were to be bouncing out early, like how happy the team on the other side of the brackets can be like, are you kidding me? It's going to be like that Denver Jacksonville situation where the Jags beat the Broncos and the Pat's got the plan with blood. So in the 96, if she championship game,

I love that. Right. Didn't have to go to Denver. That was basically Golden State last year in a lot of ways, right? They all of a sudden were in the finals and then they started playing their best basketball, but the road to the finals for them really wasn't like crazy hard.

Like Memphis was probably the hardest series for them. Yeah, you don't know, nobody wants to be like, what Phoenix was actually doing in the regular season. When you go back and look at it. And then they just skipped Phoenix. They didn't have to play him. We're taking one more break and then a quick end of the pod segment that we're going to start. We'll see if it works.

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All right, so this is a new segment. We're going to start on Sundays. Me and Rosilla. I don't know a title yet. Maybe drunk trade history or greatest 21st century trade, sober trade history. That's fine. Yeah.

Sober trade history is good. We're gonna tackle the Dwight Howard trade today. Okay. Rosilla and I love trades. We love the mechanics of how things shook out, all the different variables, the things that came out, why a team made the decision they did in the moment,

how it changed. So Dwight Howard trades a good one. This was a four-teamer made in the summer of 2012 that got the Lakers Dwight Howard. That was the first thing we remember. Orlando finally trades Dwight Howard a year late. Chris Duhon's in it as well for them. Philly gets Andrew Bynum and Jason Richardson.

Denver gets Andre Iguodala. And Orlando gets Nikola Vucevic, Aaron Aflalo, Al Harrington, Moe Harkless, some expirings. They get Denver's 2014 first, a protected Philly first in 2017, and a conditional Lakers first. Andrew Bynum plays zero games for Philly. Dwight Howard plays a year for the Lakers.

I think they get swept, then he signs with Houston. And Iguodala plays a year in Denver. And Orlando basically belatedly becomes the winner of this trade. But what do you remember about that trade in 2012 versus how we remember it now? Vegas would not have given you odds on Orlando ending up being the best end of this historically. They'd be like, we can't. Like convincingly. Right. The number has to be so massive, we can't cover the payout if it were to actually happen. And that's the first

thing that jumps out is all of these other moving pieces all the dwight bullshit the bynum part of it where he still was so young and if you're philly you're like this is how the fuck did we end up with this and all and that it would all it bounces immediately bynum that's an awesome trivia question because i'd heard it again i was like that's right he never actually played for them science was cleveland in the off season. He's a disaster there. They, they traded him to Chicago halfway through the next season. Cause Chicago is trying to cut costs.

And that was it. He was out of the league. It was, this isn't even close how much Orlando cleaned up on this. And in the moment they were a complete afterthought on what they were bringing in. And kind of shit on for what they got. It would seem like a four quarters for a dollar trade in a lot of ways. Dwight had made, at first team all NBA, I think five straight years at that point at the center position.

The 2011-12 season was a little rockier for him than the other ones, but he was still considered to be the best center in the league. And he was going to be a free agent a year. So they get those picks. This is where I love sober trade history. You got to get a sponsor for sober trade history. Maybe a soft drink. Maybe we don't call it sober trade history. Then we call it something else. Just keep it vague. Yeah. Because we don't want to rule out anybody as a potential sponsor. All right. Trade history presented by X. X to C, that's aggressive. In 2014, Orlando gets the 12th pick from Denver as part of this trade.

They trade that pick and the Philly 2017 first that they got in this trade to move up two spots to Philly so they could take Alfred Payton. So two of the three picks get turned into Alfred Payton, who becomes a bust for the Magic. Philly gets their 2017 first back, which is great. And then that ends up, there's another Sacramento trade down the road where they took a bunch of Stauskas and Carl Landry and Jason Thompson, and they get some pick swaps of Sacramento that never get borne out because they have a better record with Sacramento. So anyway, two of the three picks of this trade

get lit on fire. And then the third pick was this conditional 2017 first that was protected that got flipped into two second rounders. It didn't meet the protection. So it was number 33, Wesley Uundu. And 2018, number 40, Rodion Kureks. So none of the picks pan out.

But Flalo, who I think people thought was in the running for really above-average two-guard, kind of has a couple good years for the match. That's about it. He was good for them. No, he was good for them. When you thought about it after, like, hey, you know who's been kind of nice?

It was Flalo. A couple good years. I don't remember Al Harrington on that team. Harkless was okay. But Vucevic was the for them. When you thought about it after, you're like, hey, you know who's been kind of nice? It was Zaflalo. A couple good years. I don't remember Al Harrington on that team. Harkless was okay, but Vucevic was the big prize. And they get seven, eight, nine years out of Vucevic and then flip him for Wendell Carter, Otto Porter, top four protected firsts in 21 and 23 from Chicago, the first one which became Franz Wagner.

So this trade is still paying off for Orlando. This turns out to be one of the great trades for, they get the boost of his Jack, then they flip it again. And this is like this amazing trade and it sucked for everybody else. Sucked for everybody else. Sucked. Although I guess Denver was pretty good in 2013.

That was, that was the 55 win Denver team, Ty Lawson, Iguodala. So they got like one kind of fun year. Then there's another variable with this trade. So Iguodala signs with Golden State in 2013 as a free agent. But to open the cap space, Golden State has to trade B. Adrians and Jefferson plus 2014 and 2016 first to Utah for the cap space.

And those picks turned out to be Rodney Hood and Josh Hart. So that was the other variable. So there you go. Trade history. Well, this is a good full circle moment here, though, because the Iguodala deal, he plays in, what was it, 80 games for Denver that year. Golden State had that slot like they they knew depending on how they were building out that team because i remember what was happening it was like oh wait they're gonna end up with iguodala and it was like this multifaceted like

remember iguodala had like a really weird start to his career too because it was like hey the two ais and is he a point guard and it's a 25 point a game guy what is he yeah he's just kind of a basketball player and we didn't appreciate it enough because you get taken at a certain point it's like everybody wants to check all these different boxes it was like no he's a little bit of a different evaluation but he's still really fucking good and everybody would really want this guy on his team and in denver he has this really good run but figuring with the asset part of it, like Golden State's able to sweep in because they make those other moves.

And it was like this targeted thing. And then he becomes kind of like, you want to talk about how dumb timelines are? Like Iguodala was just somebody they thought fit. And then they had all these younger dudes. Like Iguodala was the older statesman of this younger Golden State crew at the very beginning of this thing starting to take off.

Yeah. Yeah. They made two great moves. They did that, the Golden State, like going all in on Iguodala, knowing how important of a glue guy he was going to be and better than that. But I mean, an overqualified glue guy. And then the other one was resisting the, what was it, Clay Thompson and David Lee for Kevin Love, which was on the board for them for that whole 2014 season, basically. And a lot of meetings,

I think it was split in the organization whether they want to do that or not, but ended up keeping Clay Thompson. David Lee basically turns it into Draymond. And then they have Iguodala and there we go. And then we have a little mini dynasty. So that's it. Drunk trade history, sober trade history. I don't know. We need a good thing. But for all the people in that trade, it's crazy that Orlando won it going away. They're like secretariat. And then for the Lakers, it really did seem like the axis of the league had shifted when they got Dwight Howard. It was like, oh my God, Dwight Howard. Then they ended up getting nash they trade some first for that well number two dwight

wanted to go to the nets dwight originally was like i want to go to the dan williams yeah all right that's it still need a sponsor for that one uh rossillo when are you doing your podcast this week uh we'll have the utah show the salt lake show with larry marketing as our guest we do an extended life advice so you know there's a little open there so i know live podcasts aren't this week uh we'll have the utah show the salt lake show with larry marketing as our guest we do an extended life advice so you know there's a little open there so i know live podcasts aren't exactly everybody's favorite we try to do enough for everybody that they're going to come out on monday and then we have a tape one with brian curtis and i just talking about the media with another life advice so we'll do monday wednesday and then i'll be back we're not going to do next

sunday and then i'm back yeah you're off next sunday and then we're back for good after that. Right. Did you tell Lori Markkinen that my wife thinks he's super handsome? That was her big three-point contest takeaway. Who's that guy? He's handsome. I'll send a, I'll send a pic of the two of us. We had a real connection. I have a really good friend from Finland. His son's name is Finn and a big Finnish people, great people, salt of the earth people. So yeah, I got a picture for him. It's a good example. Every once in a while, this happens, right? It happened with Isaiah Thomas,

the other Isaiah Thomas that the Celtics had, where a guy's just kind of bouncing around and you know he's talented, but he can't find the right team. And then suddenly he finds the right team. But it makes you think like how many times this didn't happen or how many guys were just floating around and just never found the right situation.

He's an example. Like he could have just been three, four more years just, oh, this guy's in front of me or I'm in the wrong offense. And then it finally comes together. Now he's discount Dirk Nowitzki. Yeah. No, we talked about it a little bit. But I mean, he was freaked out because he was like, man, when I went to Arizona, I thought I was going to be there for four years. And then by November, December, they're like, yeah, you have to be one and done.

You need to go. I just got here from Finland. Are you serious? Uh, all right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to Priscilla. Thanks to Isaiah Blakely for producing. Don't forget new rewatchables Monday whiplash going up Monday night.

See you then. See you on this feed. Probably not until next Sunday Unless something crazy happens Take care Feel the air Twinkling On the wayside I'm a person Never lost it I don't have

To ever