The Bill Simmons Podcast - Two-Hour NBA Trade Deadline Extravaganza (Ep. 324)

Episode Date: February 8, 2018

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by his old ESPN buddy Ryen Russillo to discuss Isaiah Thomas's value in the NBA today (6:00), OKC's positive outlook for keeping Paul George (13:00), the pitfalls of the NBA salary spike (20:00), LeBron's new teammates (34:00), LeBron's next move (54:00), and the impressive upcoming 2018 NBA draft (1:06:00). Then, another former ESPNer, Tom Haberstroh, offers his thoughts on who won the trade deadline and the one trade that didn't happen that should have. Finally, Joe House hops on the line to give his opinion on what it would take for the Wizards to give up John Wall. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's special in motion trade deadline edition of the Bill Simmons podcast on the Ringer Podcast Network. It is 1130 Pacific time. The trade deadline is a half hour away. We're brought to you by ZipRecruiter, our 2018 presenting sponsor. With just one click, they instantly distribute your job to over 100 job boards, a whopping 80% of employers who post a job on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate through the site in just one day. Ryan Rosso, that's the exact same percentage of roster turnover

that the Cavs just had, 80%. My listeners can try it for free at ZipRecruiter.com. ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire. Meanwhile, SeatGeek is the best app for buying and selling tickets to sporting events, concerts, and more. For $20 off your first SeatGeek purchase in any app for buying and selling tickets to sporting events, concerts, and more for $20 off your first SeatGeek purchase in any game or sporting event. You know what to do. Use promo code BS.

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Where do you stand in the Miami Vice movie, Russo? You know, I felt like with a tweet you had recently about how underappreciated it's been,

I feel like I didn't give it a chance. You feel you haven't appreciated it. Well, that's the kind of trailer where I go, nope.

Immediately. And I know that that's kind of your wheelhouse. I don't think anybody appreciates that stuff more than you do. So your tweet, I felt like it's just a slight piece of guilt about not recognizing it. And maybe it's worth it. If I'm stuck in a hotel and it pops on, I'll give it a chance. All right. I'd really appreciate that. Thank you.

Also, the Ringer NBA show, we have a podcast going that we started about an hour and a half before the trade deadline. At one point, they reacted to something from Fake Woj. There was an Emmanuel Moutier trade. The Cavs, complete chaos. Check that out on the Ringer NBA show feed.

Coming up, my old friend, my old ESPN teammate, Ryan Russillo. And then a little bit later, Tom Haverstraw as well. A bunch of old friends. It's a reunion, butillo, this is the first trade deadline you have spent in your jogging pants, and I can't remember how long. How's it been for you? Yeah, it reminds me of when I asked when I was bartending, I was like, can I get today

off? They were like, why? Thursday's busy. I was like, what's the trade deadline? They're like, you know you don't work for a team and you just bartend. I was like, yeah, this is a pretty busy one. I think that's when the Celtics had those three first rounders, and I was hoping they were going to trade it for like Gary Payton. Oh, yeah. I just sat around with my legal pad, just, you know, paying attention.

I had a little dial-up compact Corsario. So it's almost the exact same thing, except my house is a little nicer. So more people call me back. We're going to get into what's going on with you later. Let's talk about the complete blow-up, the detonation of the 2018 Cleveland Cavaliers. I'd like to start things off by saying, and I tweeted this earlier, but I'm stealing from myself. I'd like to thank the Cavaliers one more time for trading Kyrie Irving to the Boston Celtics.

Thanks. Thanks again. That was great because they've just punted on everything they got for that trade except for the Brooklyn pick. How much of what happened today had to do with the fact that they screwed up that Kyrie trade? Well, I think a lot of it had to do with it. You know, when, when that trade went down,

it was really weird because prior to the trade happening was a Tuesday or something that weekend, I was talking to somebody and they're like, you know, it really feels like Kyrie's just going to come back. Winning solves everything. He's still under contract for two more years. See if he can't figure this whole thing out, and it doesn't look like he's going to get traded. And I was like, all right, you know what? That makes sense.

And people get upset. People get emotional. But Kyrie's a different dude. So maybe once Boston was like, look, we're going to throw in that Brooklyn pick too, I think that changed some things. And for Cleveland, I don't think anyone truly understood who Isaiah really was.

I mean, he has a great story. He's made all of us in the basketball world wrong numerous times. I mean, how wrong can we have been about this guy coming out of the draft? And then with Sacramento, it was a real deal with Phoenix. And then he's like, should he really come off the bench? And then it's like, this guy's getting MVP consideration. But I think you would agree with this. Everything was set up perfectly for Isaiah last year in that offense.

Everything was for Isaiah. And the biggest thing about his numbers, I mean, he's incredible what he did for the Celtics that last year. But there was never a second guy that was going to say, hey, you know what, can we not run a high-screen role like that every single time? Run more action for me. Can I get more shots? Avery Bradley wasn't going to say that.

Horford's never going to say that kind of stuff. So it felt like those numbers were a little inflated and like a perfect scenario for him. So when Cleveland got him, they thought, okay, we replace Kyrie scoring, and Crowder's this great two-way player who I love with the Celtics and an amazing contract, and then you think about what the Brooklyn Picks asset's going to be.

Well, I don't know what happened there, but Isaiah One isn't healthy, and he can be a little prickly, and I think he and Crowder were perpetually annoyed that Lou wasn't Brad Stevens. And then they kind of start teaming up and then they have their little clicks and Isaiah calls out love. And, you know, I was watching the game last night where they're trying to run the screen and roll with LeBron and Thomas. And you're like, what are you even doing? Cause Thomas, when he goes to set the screen, it's not impactful enough to get the defender off. I think they switched at once. So, you know, when he goes to set the screen, it's not impactful enough to get the defender off. I think they switched at once. So, you know, when I looked at all of these things combined, it's obviously really frustrating.

But the Isaiah thing, like he never was going to be the guy he was with the Celtics with a different team, especially as a co-star to a guy like LeBron. Yeah, there's two separate things off that. One is that he had an absurd hot streak last year and it was hard to tell as it was happening whether this was the player that he just was from now on or whether he was just red hot for four months because that four-month stretch he had basically from when he came back from injury in December all the way through when he got hurt again around late March and then came back in April and was still basically put up the same stats, but was not totally the same physically, but it was one of the greatest stretches any guard has ever had from an efficiency standpoint, scoring all that stuff.

So there's a chance that he just got like crazy, crazy hot in the perfect situation. But more importantly for me, like, you know, physically just not even remotely the same guy. And it was his athletic ability and his recklessness that I thought was what made him special. And you could just see it. I actually really, I think they made a real mistake bringing him back too soon. Because he might have had more trade value if nobody had seen him play. And it was just like, no, no, he's closer.

He's closer. But if you're scouting a Cavs game and you're watching that and you're watching a five, eight guy who doesn't have his athleticism anymore, who was already defensive liability, that suddenly just becomes an expiring contract and that's it. Do you think they should have brought him back when they did? Well, based on what we saw, no, but I don't think Isaiah wanted to sit it out because this is somebody that was consumed

with the idea of all the money that he was losing. He felt like if the Kyrie trade doesn't happen, he's like, well, whatever, Boston will just max me because I'm the king of the fourth and all these Celtics fans love me. And I always feel guilty criticizing him because of all the things he said. I mean, what he did in that Wizards series

and the way he played and carried this team. You're like, I can't believe this team's the one speed. I can't believe the way these guys carried this and we thought it was like a nice little pickup from phoenix to bring him off the bench yeah so then he's looking at his you know he's looking at money that he thinks is supposed to be in his checking account that isn't going to be there anymore and i think that really freaked him out i mean even i was watching espn today and they had mentioned how he would be coming off the bench to the Lakers. And then Thomas' agent texted Rachel Nichols saying Isaiah will not be coming off the bench. So this is the kind of stuff where he's trying to figure out, how do I get all that money that was coming my way?

Which I still think the Celtics, despite how great he was, if he was still there, they would have been reluctant to pay him all that. Because Ainge is great with that stuff. Ainge doesn't give out the bad contracts. And the way the cap space is kind of drying up here because of all these contracts the last two years, it may have been a weird market for him anyway. And they said, hey, go to market and come back to us. But now you're right. If I'm a GM, I don't know what to do with him.

Maybe it's a one-year deal to just get to the salary cap floor and be able to sell some jerseys if you're a bad team. But he's so bad defensively that Cleveland never figured out a way to hide him. You've got to talk. You've got to say, hey, you've got to help Isaiah here. You've got to be ready to bail on your guy. And Brad was good with that, and Lou wasn't. Or Lou was going, all right, I've had a few weeks here,

and I can't figure this out. Yeah, it's a one-year deal, maybe with a team option for the second one, where the team puts in all kinds of protections because if his athleticism never comes back he's not really an nba player at that point he's a 10th or an 11th man i do think i think a couple teams crazy i know it's but i'm not disagreeing with you either i i we were talking about that i was over at the uh at the ringer studio because they were filming the that. I was over at the, uh, at the ringer studio. Cause they're filming this stuff. And I was saying like this Isaiah thing, like he was an MVP candidate last year. He was probably at the end of the year, he was like the seventh or eighth best player in the entire league. And, you know, there's a real chance that they misdiagnosed his injury too,

which is something they don't really want anybody to talk about. And I don't know the whole story, but I know that they thought Isaiah's injury was one thing. And then it turned out to be another thing. I know that he kept playing, even though that he was hurt. I know that they fired the entire training staff this summer. So clearly they didn't realize that whatever the injury was, was that injury. And man, that guy was looking at a hundred million. So there's one part of it. And then the other part is I thought what happened yesterday with that Lou Williams contract extension was jaw dropping. The fact that this is a guy who almost made the all-star team, who is only 31, even though it seems like he's been in the league for a hundred years and he gets three years, 24 million. And to me,

this is the new NBA. This is where we are headed. And this is why the Lakers had to trade a number one pick, or had to give up Larry Nance just to get rid of Jordan Clarkson and get a late first rounder from the Cavs. Because you can't pay, in this new economy, you can't pay Jordan Clarkson $13 million a year anymore when Lou Williams is making eight. And I look at Marcus Smart, who I think was thinking he should be getting $50 million for four years last summer. What's his contract look like now? Three years for 15? This is where the NBA is going.

And to take on that Clarkson contract and then take on all that George Hill money everyone was congratulating the Cavs today I think they got a little bit better they definitely needed to blow it up and do something but man they took on a lot of money and this is a big risk if LeBron doesn't come back what do you think just from a player standpoint what they gave up what they got back God there's so many other things I want to answer, but I think the most important thing is make sure we don't talk for 30 minutes and not talk about Cavs. You know, I was sitting here and I was looking at it all, and I was kind of looking, you know how sometimes you have a thought and the other smart people that you respect have

the complete opposite thought, and you're like, wait, am I an idiot right now? So I really like this trade for both teams. You know, I understand what the Lakers are trying to do, and they're trying to take a swing at this thing but i also think that they've tempered expectations and it's pretty obvious and ramona had that piece where it's like hey don't get mad at us if we don't get anybody awesome this year uh i think the headline thing for those that think lebron is already gone that the calves are idiots because they just made it way easier for the lakers to go after lebron and then to add another player. I don't know if Paul George is leading.

I mean, he's a tough guy to read. And, you know, Presti's been all in, and Presti must feel like his math is that the risk of losing him is out there, but I'd rather take the reward of seeing who he could be, and I'm sure they're really pumped about what they did against Golden State, what they've done against the better teams in the league, but I'm still not, you know, like, I don't want to get into, like, okay, because they beat Oklahoma, or excuse me, because, okay, she's beaten the Warriors twice,

but that means that they're better than them. I'm not going that far with it. So if George isn't there, Cousins, you don't know what to do with him this offseason. Like, who would that second guy be for LeBron to pair up with the Lakers? And then I really don't think LeBron wants to go to the West, and I know he doesn't want to tag along to the LeVar Ball show. I mean, can you imagine if Lonzo's still there and LeBron went with the Lakers

and then LeVar's doing like postgame saying LeBron needs to pass it to my son more? Like he's not dealing with that stuff. Yeah, I don't think there's any way he goes there without them trading Lonzo as part of whatever unfolds would be my guess. Totally agree. So when I look at collectively what the Cavs did here, like sure they brought in $55 million worth of contracts, right, with control on two guys with Nance and Hood.

But they also sent out $26 million with Crowder's deal, which was great when he was good. Right. I don't know how that's going to work. He just lost it. Right. And then the player option for Shump, $11 million. So he's going to pick that up in today's

new nba and then it and channing are are expiring so for people that are like oh well you know the cab screwed this up they brought in more money well they were never going to be a free agent player anyway so it doesn't really matter so you'd almost rather if you're not going to resign the asset and isaiah thomas trade him for another contract when you're that far over the cap so right i like what they've done i like what they've done. I like what they've done. They clearly needed to change this locker room. The stories from there coming out of there, you're like, man, this is ridiculous. And honestly, like, who's Isaiah to call out Kevin Love when he wasn't, like,

been playing a couple weeks? I know. And so, you know, Clarkson is, you've seen him. I like him. I've always kind of liked Clarkson. He's not perfect. He can play both positions. Nance is finally, like, a young, energy, bigger guy that can run with lebron and play in small lineups hill's money scary for next year

but whatever they'll figure out and hood depends on which night you watch him if you watch him that night against the pelicans you'd be like so he's an mvp right you're like well no sometimes he doesn't play a ton so yeah i mean is there stars no but go ahead i was just gonna say he's it's funny they got two of the best feast or famine kind of fringe guys in the league, right? Fringe starter guys, Clarkson and Hood. You catch either of those guys on the right night, and you're like, oh, my God. He's having a breakout game. And then the next game, it's one for 12.

Yeah. Next game, one for 12 for three points and eight turnovers. So, you know, whenever, like, this is the thing that always annoys me about the way we talk about this stuff to be like, well, you know, once you've already decided what your take is,

if you're kind of like married to it. And if you think the Cavs are a dumpster fire, and if you think LeBron has already decided he's going to leave, and by the way, I'm telling you right now, he's not made that decision. Okay. But if you are buying it,

because everybody tells me that when I say like, I look, I still think Cleveland's the favorite to keep LeBron every people in the league are like you're a moron yeah but you're if the argument is which one of these four guys who's coming in today are going to convince lebron to stay then i go all right i'm just taking a knee here i've lost the argument like none of these guys are convincing lebron to stay but what could happen which is what i thought the cat should have done is rework this thing before the deadline like they are, and then figure out what's available out there

for a love in the Brooklyn pick on draft night. And see if that is in play for the next mad NBA star, which we average about two a year. So I really like the Lakers trade. I watch a lot of Lakers because I'm on the West Coast and there's only like three or four West Coast games every night, maybe even one. I think Nance is legit good. And he's somebody that I think could play crunch time for them and gives them a little athleticism, some defense, and more importantly, some offensive rebounding, which they have none of

and some, you know, a little bit of shot blocking, but he's just a good energy guy. And they needed energy, I think, more than any other team in the league Clarkson, I'm not a fan of as much as some others. He's fine. He's certainly better than Isaiah Thomas at this point of Isaiah Thomas's career. Unless something dramatic happened. I didn't love the Rodney, Rodney hood, George Hill trade. I thought George Hill looked washed this year. I just thought he looked washed. And, and you know, you don't think that's Sacramento. I thought George Hill looked washed this year. I just thought he looked washed. You don't think that's Sacramento? It might be, but that makes me nervous too that, oh, I don't like my situation,

so I'm not going to play hard every night. I just think he looks – I think he's had a lot of injuries over the years, and I think athletically he's not the same guy. Hood is feast or famine. I'm not positive I would have made that trade. I think they could have done better if you're talking about, you know, an extra year of Shumpert and an expiring. And, you know, if they're going to take money back, there were other places I might've gone with teams that were more desperate to get rid of longer contracts. I still don't understand

if I was a GM, I'd be trying to cherry pick guys off Charlotte. I like the guys on Charlotte. They just have bad contracts. I think Nick Batum's really a potential 3 and D guy who's done it before, sleeper, who hasn't been great but has had some moments lately. And if you're going to roll the dice on more money for more years, I would have rather done something like that versus George Hill. I just don't know what George Hill gets you. Well, you're right about okay so i'm supposed to be pumped because this guy mailed it in in a situation that's like yeah and when it's 19 million that's scary whereas boris d out like his resurgence with san antonio was probably one of the most unlikely nba stories that i can ever

remember i mean he was openly like yeah yeah, I hate it here in Charlotte, and I'm going to get that. And then the Spurs figure out how to use him as this big post-offensive guy that are running their offense through, and he makes a ton of shots. You go, and the Spurs, like the Spurs. But Batum, you know, they're taking money back, and then there's Batum money. I mean, he's 24, 25 and a half,

and then a player option in 2020 21 for 27 million yeah it's it's a goper that's that's that's like you remember how we used to do stuff where you go okay what are the 10 most untradeable we used to do all the time yeah i would do it on the pod and i'd go all right the 10 most untradeable contracts the nba and you didn't feel like 10 was enough slot and then the league did this great thing where it was funny because all the analytics guys got credit for it. He's like, oh yeah, these analytic math guys, there's no more bad contracts anymore. And then I think the players association made a huge mistake by not softening the cap. As soon as it was presented by the league and the owners, they're like, oh,

the owners are trying to screw us. So just no out of principle and i can understand them wanting to do that but now you have tyler johnson making 20 million a year and then you have as you mentioned the lou williams deal so there's there's money out there that i think these teams are still trying to figure out like okay now we know we're flooded with a ton of bad contracts. Right. So because who wants to take these and now no one, no one wants to touch any of these. But my thinking though, but my thinking though, is that as you said earlier, there's, they're not a free agent suitor anyway.

Their cap is shot to hell regardless of how this plays out. So if that's the case, I want to get the best bad contract possible that I can turn Shumpert and Fry and Rose or whatever combination that led to them getting George Hill and Hood back. I don't know if that's the best they could have done, those two guys. So let me present it to you.

Would you have done Shump and matched something else here? Do Shump and Jay and take on Batum at like almost 80 million remaining the next three years or Hill who's about 23 million with next year's 19. And then a guarantee for like, and then he's out of like three or four. I would rather have Batum and then have, and rather have the last two years. Cause I just don't think Hill's going to help.

I would have, but I would have tried to, I would have tried to make it be like Shump and JR, so that Charlotte's taking more money on, but it's still not the totality of that Batum contract, something like that. Yeah, and they might have done it. They might have done it.

That's all that canvas stuff happened. And they might have thrown in like Kid Gilchrist, too. Well, we'll do that, but then you've got to give us this. And I just think Charlotte wants to dump money. And if the Cavs don't care about money these next couple of years, that's maybe a team I would have gone after.

But, you know, it's funny you mentioned that point about two years ago. I was talking to my dad last night and he was like, what was the name of that lady who took over the Poiriers Union? I was like, Michelle Roberts.

And he's like, yeah. And he goes, boy, she screwed things up, huh? And I was like, Michelle Roberts? And he's like, yeah. And he goes, boy, she screwed things up, huh? And I'm like, what do you mean? And she goes, remember a couple of years ago when they wanted to stagger the salary cap? Because they were like, this is crazy. Don't have all the money being that first year, spread it out over the next three, four years. And she was like, no way. And she screwed up. And now you have this situation where, I mean, how many bad contracts from 16 were there? Like 20, 20 disasters. And Lou Williams is going to make 8 million a year. It's ludicrous. They totally screwed that up. The Evan Turner deal. I was like, what? Yeah, no, no, that's wrong. I was like,

call.com. Tell us, tell the editor they it's wrong on the site. And they're like, no was like, what? No, no, that's wrong. I was like, call.com, tell the editor it's wrong on the site. And they're like, no, no, no, it's right. And then it's Alan Crabb. And we used to have this joke on my show because any time a contract would come up, I would go, okay, we have to figure out that there's a bad one. There has to

be a bad one. And then everybody would be like, no, no, no, no, Ryan, the cap goes up. I'd be like, oh, does it? Yeah, are we sure no no ryan the cap goes up i'd be like oh does it does it yeah are we sure are we sure the cap's going up how right and every single guy any contract that came out i'd be like man that's you know like this is this that's a lot for reggie jackson oh no ryan the cap goes up so we kept using this drop over and over and over again all the time of like the cap goes up as if like guys like you or i don't know that the cap goes up but now it's turning out that they're like yeah a lot of those are bad speaking of dad though and lou williams this is incredible that this is all lining up this way my dad called me

the other night and was watching the 81 eastern conference uh fixer self thing 81 that's my that's my that's my happy place. Right. And so my father calls me and goes, hey, when you get mad at the older players for ripping today's game, you're right. I was like, thanks, Dad. He goes, they're not playing like the way guys move,

it's not even close. And then he proposed this, and I'm going to ask you this question now. My father thinks that Lou Williams would have been the third best player in that series in 1981. Oh, man. I don't think he cracks the top five. I don't know.

I'd rather have Mo Cheeks. I'd rather have Tiny. It is funny, though. I was going to tweet it, but I didn't want my dad to get killed on Twitter because sometimes he looks at my mentions and i didn't want him to be like hey who's who's who's you know balls 64 you know who's at balls 64 asking if i'm at balls 64 that might be a real person right yeah listen the quincy jones interview yesterday has opened the floor for everybody over 70 to have opinions on everything all the time.

I might give my dad a podcast now. 70-year-old people and up do not give a fuck. They're ready to roll. I had so many Quincy Jones tweets lined up, but I was like, eh. These are all going to be received the wrong way. It's too popular. You know, it's funny, though, you mentioned that series because it's been something I've been thinking about just in general with the NBA because you have all these guys going down,

and it's really hard to assess the wear and tear with how hard everyone plays night to night. And you watch a game like Game 7, Philly-Boston, which was ferocious and is a rugby match, basically. But on the other hand, if you watch it, everybody's packed toward the rim. There's not nearly as much sprinting, running, jumping out, any of that stuff. Chasing. Chasing, running around. Guys could take plays off on defense. It didn't matter. Dr. J barely

played defense. And Bird obviously was like a free safety, just kind of hanging out in the paint, trying to jump passing lanes. And now the way the game is played combined with everything's televised, everything's on social media, you know, think about James Harden four years ago when he just got trashed for how bad his defense was. And it actually made him start playing defense better. Um, I just wondered, I really, the 82 game schedule now I think think is is nearing catastrophic proportions and it's something they have to reevaluate i had i think they have to drop 10 games what do you think well this will be great because tom and i have had our battles aberstro and i over different injuries and and the rest and and he's you know that's his thing that's his baby and i'm not

a caveman about it, you know, but I just, I don't know what to do because they gave him spring break for All-Star Week because of LeBron, which is awesome. They start the season two weeks too early, or excuse me, I shouldn't say too early, but they started two weeks earlier. And then as soon as guys started getting hurt,

I started hearing the rest people, the rest army, say, starting the season this early and not getting warmed up is leading to all these injuries. And you're just like, dude, pick one. There's far less back-to-backs than ever before. I've gone over this with the league where they would call me to be like,

will you please understand this? I know. They're so testy. No, but it's actually great because it wasn't some spin. They go, will you morons stop saying four games in five nights? Like half the league in like the last year they did it had one. You know, and yet people go on TV and be like, and they got to stop with this four and five.

You're just like, dude, it doesn't even happen that much. So then they got rid of those. So you might be right. i just think that the bodies we've seen this evolution of the human being in this league that is so ridiculous the fact that guys like yannis and porzingis can move the way they move and be that big you know and bead like he's up faking guys into drives from 30 feet away and it works. That's stupid. Like who invented these guys? Like where are they being created?

And when you add all of that movement and the guys at this size, you know, Moses Malone's one of my favorite players ever. He didn't move like this. So I actually think my theory is, and maybe the rest of the guys are all right. Okay, some of the stuff is indisputable. But every injury isn't just because of rest in the schedule i think that guys are actually putting themselves in a more dangerous situations because of their own athletic ability inside yeah i i think both things are right actually but you're right like you know 1981 that series you brought up mikhail was considered a freak. He was a six foot 11 guy who had great footwork and long arms. If you put him in now, I don't even think, you know,

he'd be good. He'd produce. He'd be, he'd be a very effective player. People wouldn't be calling him a unicorn because they'd be looking at Giannis and Embiid and all these other guys, but those are the unicorns. Mikhail's just a dude with long arms and some footwork. So the athletes in general are not just like the unicorn guys, but I think the point guards and the speed of the younger guards is outrageous. And then you watch in college and there's like four more coming. Every year it's like four or five more crazy, fast, quick, skilled, ridiculous shooting, just awesome guards are coming into the league. And we're kind of reaching a tipping point.

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code BS. My buddy, Mike Mendelsohn collects basketball cards and baseball cards and all these cards and the Alfred Payton draft. I sent him a text and I was like, I like this guy, Alfred Payton, you should, but you should load up on his rookie cards. And he reminds me of it probably once a week. So apologies to him. I feel like half the guards in the league have to play in Phoenix. Like it's some rule that got passed. They have to pass through. Yeah. It's almost like going to the rookie, the rookie symposium thing.

Where are we going with all the point guards we have? Are we going to reach a point where teams are just playing two at the same time and that's just the way it is? And we have 60 point guards who you just can't keep off the floor for less than 25 minutes a game. Where do we go? It's a great question. And it speaks to so many things that

we've seen challenged and changed in sports in the last few years right because there's nothing there's nothing worse and you you know you probably have ways about you that you go well whatever i'm pretty successful so why would i change what i'm doing um but what if there's a better way to do what you're doing like i look at at football and go, it wouldn't take us like 70 years to go, Hey, maybe we should just pass more instead of running into 20 dudes. And you're like, yeah, maybe this is just a better way to do this. And it's happened with the NBA where you could just make a real simple statement where you go, yeah, the NBA started doing this weird thing where they started playing the best five guys. They didn't worry about position. They didn't worry about size.

They just said, hey, do we want to put the best five guys out there at the same time and see what happens? So the great thing about point guards now is that there's no – a combo guard is a necessity where it used to be a dirty term back in the day. Like, oh, is he a one? Is he a two? We didn't want point guards to shoot. Now, if your point guard can't shoot, you're screwed. It used to drive me

crazy with Doc Rivers. Because I remember in 08, there was a lineup that was clearly the most effective lineup, and you remember it too. It was just KG at center with shooters around him and Rondo. So not Perkins? No, not Perkins.

Did you see that rumor, by the way, that Perkins could get brought into the Cavs to help with the locker room? I don't know if it was real or not. I think Stein had it, but I've got to double check. Kevin Durant said he was the greatest teammate he ever had. So maybe that's what they need. They just need chemistry. I said this on yesterday's pod in the Ringer NBA show,

but apparently Dwayne Wade was a real locker room lawyer and uh and and was it was not it was not a great situation at least partly because him but the uh the celtics one when they when they spread out with posey and house and ray allen it was like oh that's eye-opening why don't we just play those guys and then you even see like that 2012 Celtics Sixers was on the other day and I'm watching it and it's like 69 to 65 halfway through the fourth quarter. And like Brandon Bass is out there and Elton Brand playing on one leg. And meanwhile, both teams had like small ball teams that they just weren't even exploring. And you watch that game and it feels like it was 17 years ago.

You know, this was five and a half years ago. This was. Yeah, it's not that long ago. That's what's amazing about this. You go, like, there's certain things. I've made this joke before. I don't think I've done it with you. So I don't want to, you know, it's nothing worse than.

Please try it on me. Yeah, we got it. No, but when I see ads for fast food companies celebrating that they're serving real chicken now, it's 2018. Like, that shouldn't be – I shouldn't be psyched that chicken is now real. You know? So sometimes when I think about sports, I go, you know, we just – now, granted, some people were just really stubborn. I mean, there's nothing more stubborn than just old school guys in their sport and the way we did it. I mean, just every NBA guy like I can't. It drives me nuts, even though I like some of these guys personally, how they talk about the game today as if it's awful.

Meanwhile, everybody else is evolving. Everybody else is getting better. Skateboarders are doing more ridiculous stuff, but basketball players are just getting worse. So it doesn't make any sense. It's just not true. There was a mentality in the draft for a long time where it's like, well, we can't take a point guard. We have one. Now I think

that's changed. If Phoenix has the fourth pick in the draft and it makes sense to take Trey Young, they're going to take Trey Young. They're like, all right, we'll figure it out. We have two guys who will be able to shoot from 25 feet and to take Trey Young. They'll be like, all right, we'll figure it out. We have two guys who will be able to shoot from 25 feet and create shots

for everybody else. We'll be fine. We'll get killed defensively. We'll play in the 130s. Let's go. Let's do it. And 10 years ago, you wouldn't have thought that way.

You just would have been like, we have Devin Booker. We're not taking him. No, but think about all the other draft stories, too. You'd be like, how did you guys screw that up? They're like,

well, we already had no Palacio, so we couldn't. Somebody like, oh yeah, that's right. No Palacio. You had a log jam there.

That was our, our old friend, Chris Wallace, who made everybody. I wasn't saying that about Chris. Well, no, no,

I'm going to, I'm going to bring this home. you know, people make fun of Khan. And I I'd like to think I'm the leader of the pack for taking two straight point guards, but not taking Steph Curry, which I think like when my, as soon as my son starts to care about the history of basketball, that will be the thing that confuses him probably the most of anything that's happened. But I can't remember if it was,

if it was that draft or the year before, but Chris Wallace took Hashim Thabit over James Harden and Russell Westbrook. Right? No, not James Harden and Russell Westbrook. No, no, no. It was Love and Curry. It was that draft. It was that draft.

Wasn't it? Yeah. So he took, yeah. And as it was happening, no, it was the Kevin Love draft so it was 2008 right yeah that's what I'm saying Hashim came out the year so it was Westbrook that's what it was

so Westbrook and Kevin Love were in that draft and Memphis' attitude was we need a center well don't take Hashim to beat none of us are positive he's going to be good well we need a center. Well, don't take Hashim to beat. None of us are positive he's going to be good. Well, we need a center.

And they took him. And they passed up on Russell Westbrook. Although it would have been high for Russell Westbrook, but that was just the mentality back then. Now if somebody did that, we'd lose our minds. Yeah, we, by the way, I didn't help you out there. That was the con draft. It was Curry. OJ wasn't in out there. That was the Con draft. It was Curry.

OJ wasn't in that one. That was Love before that. It was Blake, Hashim, James Harden, Tyreek. That's what it was. James Harden. So he passed on James Harden, Rubio, Steph Curry. Right. OJ was the year before.

It was OJ. It was Beasley, Mayo, Russ, Kevin Love. Chris Wallace did that too, though. He took Kevin Love and then traded him for O.J. Mayo. He still has a job. It's amazing. That's why I got confused. I was kidding.

My Chris Wallace screw-ups missed up. By the way, still the GM. Still pulling it off. Nice guy. I love Chris. Nice guy. Great guy. The fact that it's still going

is incredible by the way if we were GMs we would have screwed up I would have taken Malik Monk at somewhere

between the 6th and 8th pick this year and I would not I would have ignored my scouts telling me how good Donovan Mitchell

was going to be and I would and now I'd be making fun of myself if I was a GM. So it happens. What's your worst call ever? I think Emeka Okafor over Dwight Howard. I was on the same page with you on that one.

I loved him so much that run. It still wasn't 100% in on the high school thing. I wasn't sure. And it, it wasn't even, and Emeka was okay there for a little while, but it's still, even with the bad second half to the Dwight Howard chapter,

it's not even close. Another one was Derek Williams over Kyrie Irving. Ooh. Yeah. That's, that's a weird one. All of my draft mistakes have, have the biggest ones have come with high school guys and guys who didn't have enough of a look in college.

And I've always I've always had a tough time handling that. The best ones I've had are the ones like Durant over Odin. Chris Paul should be the first pick. You were all over that. Yeah, Chris Paul was a big one. Guys I've actually watched in college and really studied and have formed hard opinions on that's usually when i do better but i was wrong i'm malik mock i don't know if he's on the wrong team or whether not going to the knicks like broke him or what yeah that's not you'd still get maybe

a one-year extension you wouldn't get fired yet because of that one yeah i'd at least have to do leak something to my most trusted media reporter explaining why I made the move I made and to try to spin it in some way, right? Yeah, you would say, well, the marketing guys are really big on Monk because we had these shirts left over with a bunch of M's. We think he's a star. The M&M's are in trying to get

a campaign. There's a lot of stuff that... Everybody starts blaming the family. Remember they blamed Red Arbeck for Joe Forte. It was Red Arbeck's pick. Yeah, Red got hosed on that one. Yeah, Red Arbeck did it.

Red Arbeck was like practically in a nursing home, like even feeding tapioca to himself. They're like, that was Red's pick. It's his fault. That was terrible. He was buddy with Joe Forte's high school coach, wasn't it? Was it something like that? Yeah, he had been to his camp.

Anytime somebody went to Red's camp, it ended badly. This is incredible, by the way, that we've been able to come up with that 2001 draft, was it? Twice in the same pot. Although maybe not totally surprising. One of the great drafts. I always thought Sergei Monia was going to be really good. One of the great drafts. I always thought Sergei Monia was going to be really good. One of the great drafts.

You had like Tony Parker go 27th, Zach Randolph going like 19th. And like, if you did that draft over again, the order is probably the most different of any draft other than the Giannis draft. The Giannis draft is like. I could play this game all the time.

Oh, the Giannis draft is like aliens will study the Giannis draft 15 million years from now, wondering what the hell happened. But you know what? Like I've talked to Hammond about that when they took him, when he was still with Milwaukee. And he's awesome about it.

He's like, Hey man, I didn't think this was going to happen. No, nobody did. Come on. I love, I love when teams do that.

Like Bob even does that. He's like, yeah, Kawhi's incredible. Like we liked him. We didn't think this was going to happen. By the way, one of my favorite,

this could be a whole book. So I'm giving you a book idea. It's not, yeah, Kawhi's incredible. Like, we liked him. We didn't think this was going to happen. By the way, one of my favorites, this could be a whole book. So I'm giving you a book idea because I'm pretty busy. But the 2001 draft, I started thinking about maybe wanting to do this if I do a radio show again, where you go back five years ago and look at your show notes and be like, this is what we were actually arguing about five years ago on a show. And the lead up to that draft was, remember, the Wizards had the one pick. They took Kwame Brown.

One of the takes, back before we even knew they were takes, was that Jordan to help him compete he was going to maybe come back and play and then play with Battier and take Battier number one because Battier was the most NBA ready of any of the players in the draft.

And that would have been the right pick. Oh no, Gasol was in that draft. Gasol was the one they screwed up on. Gasol went third. Yeah. I was thinking about this the other day because somebody, I'm looking it up right now, somebody tweeted just the 2000 NBA, I'm sorry, the 2011 All-NBA team.

So 2011 is not even seven years ago. Six and a half years ago. Here is the 2010-11 team. First team, KD, LeBron, Dwight Howard, Kobe, Derrick Rose. Second team, Gasol, Nowitzki, Stoudemire, Wade, Westbrook.

And then third team was Aldridge, Randolph, Horford, Ginobili, and Chris Paul. Wait, was that the... Oh, no, the next one was the weird one. 2012. Yeah, 2012 was KD, LeBron, Dwight Howard, Kobe Bryant, and Derrick Rose. It was six years ago. Kevin Love and Blake Griffin.

Right, so we're talking about the size. Yeah. Andrew Bynum, second team All-NBA in 2012. How about that Bynum trade? How can everyone lose? Oh, my God. Yeah, that was... At one point, you're like, I think the Aflalo side won.

I remember writing a piece for Grantland in 2011 when the lockout was about to end about Aaron Aflalo was going to make $50 million or something. I was like, nobody understands what's going to happen with this economy. And Aaron Aflalo might be like the third best two guard in the league. Now we're loaded with two guards. There's been a nice two guard resurgence, I feel like. And I think Harden needs to make the finals,

but Harden is now assembling a legitimate case to be the fourth best two guard of all time. Yeah. We were really two guard light there for a while. We really were. I remember when Wade was, you know,

going, I'm the third best one ever. And I'm like, yeah. Wow. Like maybe he is. Yeah. That's crazy.

I have him fourth. I think. What are your four? I think West and Kobe are above him. And then there's a third guy that's over him. I had him fourth. Who'd be the third guy? Kobe.

For two guard? Yeah, Kobe and West. You're kidding, right? Jordan? Oh, yeah, Jordan. There we go. Yeah, Jordan. I thought You're kidding, right? Jordan? Oh, yeah, Jordan. There we go. Yeah, Jordan. I thought you were messing with me.

I was blanking because I had the goat at the top. Yeah, Jordan, Kobe or West. Kobe probably has the edge of West because of how many years he played. West has those just stupid numbers. I have a younger brother. He's in high school. I'll be like, hey, look up Jerry West's numbers. And he thinks something's wrong.

He's like, what? How it says that he scored like 40 a game, every game in the playoffs. Well, that's the thing. If you, if you're doing like 20 year generations, yeah. 20 year generations, like Jerry West played 13 years or 14 years, which is like 23 years now. It would be like if him playing until he's like 43. And I think the fact that Wade's kind of his prime

was just not as long as it should have been for the era he played, right? He came into the league in 03. His peak was basically 06 through the 11 finals, I would say. And since then he has not been a top 10 player and just has not been able to stay healthy and stay on the court, which is weird because in this era, he should have had a 20-year career.

So I don't know. It feels like he's on the tail end now. But doesn't he have one of those styles when he was at his peak where he knew it was going to take its toll? I mean yeah if you have like an all first team plays bigger than they are he's he's on it you know genoble would be one of those guys the way wade played for a guy his size he played a lot bigger but he was always going up and always getting contact and i mean we can go over the free throw contest that was the

maps final his first ring but i you watched him and you go, this is going to catch up to him at some point. Yeah, you're right. I don't want to say he mailed it in, but he was definitely playing when he wanted to play. And it definitely rumped people the wrong way in Chicago because it was like, wait a minute, you're going to tell us who's a leader and you just decide I'm not going to play? I also believe towards LeBron's run at the end of Miami that, you know, they'd get to the arena, they'd be ready to go. And then right before tip, LeBron would be like, what?

And I'm like, Wade's not playing. So that's just definitely slowed whatever we thought the accumulation of stats was going to be at the end. Like he was never going to be a dirt guy still shooting as well, you know? So basically you're also laying out the case for Gronk right now. How dumb was that retirement story?

Is Gronk still playing in 2022? Probably not. I don't know. He's still only 29. He's 29. Man, that dude's taken some... You were there. You're a Pats fan. All of a sudden, it was over for Ben Coates overnight,

it was like, wait, we're done? This is it? This guy was a video game god. He's catching 80 catches a year, and then it was just over? I think with tight ends, and bringing it back to your weight point, the guys who play above their height and above their physicality and are just battering rams, it is hard to keep up. That's one of the things that's made the LeBron thing so amazing

that he's now through year 15 of just banging off dudes. Even yesterday, the game winner against Butler, Butler's just mauling him, and he just easily shoves him aside to get this crazy turnaround jumper. Did you see on the one where he tied it where Isaiah was waving his arms to the top? Yeah, I think that clinched the trade. You know what?

This is good, though, to bring it full circle because I want to get it back to what this means for LeBron. Only because, as I said earlier, I feel like I'm the only one that feels like he's... Here's how I understand it, okay? And there's plenty of people that tell me I'm wrong. That's fine. You know how this stuff works.

But I don't believe a decision's been made. He's not one foot out the door. The effort looked that way the last few weeks. The tea leaves are all, you know, very easily if he had left or leaves this summer, you would point to this stretch and we'll see what happens with these new pieces. But you go, you know, writing was on the wall, right? We're really good at telling you what happened after it happened. But I don't think he wants to go to the West,

and I think they're going to see what they can do with the pick, the Brooklyn pick, and then maybe it's Kevin Love, and see if they can't find a way to go after somebody else. I don't think the LeBron story in Cleveland is done, despite the fact I feel like I'm this guy on an island waving by himself to everybody that'll listen. Yeah, what they did today, they basically straddled the fence, right? They made the team better.

They took on just enough money that he's not going to be insulted by it. They made the team younger and better and changed the chemistry, which is what they needed to do. They kept the Brooklyn pick, which can go one of two ways, right? Like if I'm LeBron and I don't care what happens to the Cavs after I leave, I'm like trade the Brooklyn pick. We got to trade it, whatever. But they kept it.

Now they could still, as you pointed out, they could trade it in pointed out they could trade it in june they could package it in a deal that the nba rules say that they can't actually just give it away unless they get a first round pick back to replace it which means they could pick swap it you know and they could give let's say it ends up being the eighth pick they could trade kevin love in that pick for so and so in the 28th pick or something, as long as they get a first-rounder back. So to me, it seemed like they kept their options open, and they don't know, and either he knows and only one other person knows and he's not saying anything,

or he really doesn't know. Yeah, I'm going with he doesn't really know yet, because I don't think they're really scared of anybody in the East even with Hayward back eventually we're not supposed to talk about that the worst

kept secret for four months Gordon Hayward's coming back I don't know what you're talking about everybody just poker face no I think it's funny too because once they get the players exemption thing people are like wait a minute Hayward's coming back. No, I don't know what you're talking about. Everybody just poker face. No, it's funny too, because once they got the players exemption thing, people were like,

wait a minute, the doctor was in on it. Yeah. Whenever a team, like when anything ever favorable happens for a team, then every other fan base just goes, ah, Lee's just hooking them up again.

Like, yep, that's right. The NBA desperately wanted Duncan and San Antonio in that market. They were psyched. They were like, yes, he's a spur. I will say, if I was a Cavs fan, I would be furious if Hayward was playing in early April and we also had Greg Monroe. That would make me mad.

I'd be like, what the hell? Yeah, I know. I guess I just feel like there's not really as many conspiracies going on here. I don't know where the fit is that way. So anytime somebody's like, you're a dummy. he's gone, he's gone, he's gone, I'm just like, where? Where? And we don't know. I mean, sometimes these things, the things that could happen, we have no idea.

It's like the trade deadline when you say, all right, well, it's been really quiet. It's been really quiet. Everybody just goes out there and, you know, we don't, like even Woj doesn't have access to every piece of information. But I just don't see the Lakers thing. I think the Houston thing is a little bit more complicated. I mean, he could opt in and enforce a trade, but then Houston's going to scramble a bit.

And then basketball-wise, how would he fit with all those guys? He'll never play in Boston. It was 0% chance before Kyrie got there. It's less than 0% now, so you rule that out. Maybe the Sixers, now that Phil's gone, the Knicks. But this league now, number one free agent destinations, it'd be like, do you have nice weather, or what do the girls look like? Well, now that doesn't even matter as much as,

is there a guy already there for me? And I do think that the way we treat these NBA players, year five, year six, that are really special, and they don't win, we just start dumping on them so much and these guys have so much access to the negativity that they start getting pissed and they go well hell if lebron did it seven years ago and durant did it two years ago and whatever like i'm not doing this by myself i want to go play with somewhere somewhere else so you either nail it in the draft and you're a free agent destination because you already have another star there or you have assets like the Celtics do,

seems like every year now, for the next pissed off guy. And so I don't know who we'd be going to the Lakers with. I don't know how the Houston thing would work. The Spurs thing, you know, guys from around the league were like, did you hear Popovich talking about LeBron

when he scored his, what, 30,000th point? Just like glowing about him, you know, just going, you know, and it was like, oh, that, you know what he's doing there. And I was like, oh, wow. You know, these guys are always in tune to all those little things. So I'm not, I'm not presenting a really strong case of why Cleveland's absolutely the must stay destination.

I guess I'm shooting down the, oh, he's gone. He's gone. He's gone. And I just say, well, where, where, where give me the roadmap and nobody convinces me. I have some thoughts, but please, first, I'm going to do a Mike Greenberg tease to, to, uh, to sponsor. You ready for this? It better be a greenie tease and not just you saying that, like, I want it to be a wide open vague question that if I don't know the answer to, I will have to

kill myself later in the day. Here it is. Coming up, I'm going to tell you why LeBron James' next destination is staring you right in the face. Yes. How was that? That's good, right? No, it was a bit of a riddle. At first, I was like, this isn't good's a bit of a riddle yeah at first i was like this isn't good

yeah then it was a riddle and now i don't i'm not going anywhere and now you're like it's staring me in the face what do you mean now i'm in the car for four minutes hey quick break to talk about wine my wife loves wine she loves whining about my faults she loves wine i'm so glad i signed her up for wink it's a personalized wine membership that recommends wine specifically for me based on the results of my palate profile quiz. What would your palate profile quiz be, Ryan? Red?

I love short day after a good dinner. Alright, there's your palate. What's a great idea for a holiday gift? They're wine. Experts match wines to your personal taste and ship them right to your door for as little as 13 a bottle. Wink works directly with winemakers and growers from all over the world to create delicious wine and deliver it right to your door each month. New delicious wines

and a Pinot Perfect for the season. Sign up for Wink right now. Gain immediate insider access to the best fine wine from all over the world. No membership fees. Skip any month, cancel any time. Right now, Wink is offering my listeners $20 off their first shipment. All you have to do is go to trywink.com slash BS. That's Wink with a C. Trywink.com slash BS. What a great Valentine's Day gift. Trywink.com slash BS. All right. I'm just going to throw these randomly seemingly unrelated events to you. And you tell me what you think. Ready? Yep.

LeBron James, we know that he has two houses in Brentwood that are worth $43 million combined. I've heard this. We know that last summer Maverick Carter had lunch with Magic Johnson and Rob Polinka. And the next day, D'Angelo Russell and Timothy Mozgov's contract was traded to the Nets. that Rich Paul, who runs Clutch, who completely screwed up Contavious Caldwell Pope's next contract

and tried to think it was going to be something great, and all of a sudden he was the last man standing at the altar and had nowhere to go. All of a sudden they needed a suitor for him, and he needed a safe face. Well, guess who was sitting there waiting for him? That's right, the Lakers, the one year, what was it? $18 million contract that he had no chance of getting anywhere else.

So know that happened. Yeah, one year was big money. Now today, who's sitting there ready to help the Cavaliers and take a first round pick and some cap space off their hands? The Los Angeles Lakers who now have room for two max contracts. Now, if we're talking about this three years from now and LeBron's on the Lakers and we're saying to ourselves, all of these signs were there, what were we doing? How did we not know it was going to play out this way? Combined with the fact that I forgot to mention,

Kyrie just randomly decided he went out last year. Now, I think he wanted out because they found out they're trying to trade him. But there's also a piece of it that he wanted out because maybe he knew that LeBron wasn't sticking around after he was going to be left holding the groceries. I think he was sick of being the little brother too. I think everything you're saying is accurate, but I think there's a real, guys guys when you start to learn about kairi's personality a little bit more this year you go oh okay yeah oh my god the story is about like yeah i mean he's way more of an alpha dog than i think anybody really knew like that the people i've talked to at the celtics say he's kind of exactly like kg the way he's kind of exactly like KG, the way he kind of carries himself and he's wired

and how resolute he is in every decision and everything. So if you add all that stuff up, are we going to feel stupid in two years when LeBron's in the Lakers? Totally. Yeah, we'll feel really stupid. We will. But the two roadblocks and the first one is

who's going there with him? Okay? Yeah. And I know that, you know, Team LeBron and those guys are, you know, they love to play with Cousins. Which, by the way, could happen.

Yeah, they could go ahead and say, hey, we're going to give you a better deal than everybody else. Just blow out your Achilles. But if Phil Demps is still running the show, I could see him just wanting to re-sign him because he'd feel like, hey, with this group, we still have a playoff team,

and that's an improvement from who the Pelicans have been. And we both agree that Lonzo, the whole big baller brand, would have to be shipped out. All right, so if you're a GM on another team, would you take the last two years of Dang's contract to also get Lonzo? Obviously, there's 10 teams in the league that would do that tomorrow. Yeah, there'd be teams that do it.

Because I'm a Lonzo fan. I mean, I'm not. Me too. I don't want to bash him because of all the nonsense and everything. Because I think he seems to be a pretty good kid and a good teammate. He's a good player. I don't know he's going to be a superstar. Yeah, I felt like I overreacted a little bit the first five, six weeks

because his confidence was so bad. What worried me was that he just wasn't even remotely aggressive. I could handle the, you know, his shots doesn't look great or like he's sloppy with the ball or whatever, but he actually looks scared. And I think, you know, I think one of the things we've learned this year with the NBA, and it's something that we just have to think about all the time is, is pressure and the social aspect of just everything when you're in the spotlight

and things aren't going well, like look at Markel Fultz, the guy's unraveled. I think Lonzo, the combination of he's on the Lakers. His dad is a complete pain in the ass and he's probably embarrassed by him. He's playing in the NBA and the speed of the game is just different than it was in college. The schedule is different. He doesn't feel great about a shot. And I think I think it affected him. But to his credit, and this is why I think he might have a real chance like he really rallied before he got hurt. I thought he had good minutes for them. And I don't know. I just think if you could get him in the prices to take Dang's contract,

you might still give up something for that too. You know, you wouldn't just be like, I'll take Dang off your hands and give us Lonzo. Like, I think you'd have to give up something in that trade. Yeah. Teams really like Lonzo.

I mean, I remember talking to a team that was going to be in the lottery, and they were like, if it played out that we ended up with the two-pick, I'd be happy that you took Fultz and Lonzo was there. It's tough for him because I think he gets beat up way more than he would as another rookie, but there are times I lock into him and I want to watch him, and I go, man, this guy's just disappearing. And that was really the first run through.

I remember that Celtics game when they were at, not when you tweeted out all caps, I would rather Kyrie have taken that shot. I was actually in LA that day, too. You were. I was, and I'm kind of glad I didn't go to that game, because that's one of my least favorite Celtics plays ever, is Marcus Smart thinking about his off-season contract and ignoring Tatum and Kyrie late in the shot clock but uh I've that Celtics game when it was up in Boston he just was invisible for the longest stretch and then he got pissed about something and then he went up and he dunked it chased down Kyrie I think

on a block and I go okay this is good yeah this. This is what you want to see. And as a rookie, you don't freak out about it. So whenever I'm critical of him, the Kobe mafia has decided to take on Lonzo as their new leader, and they definitely don't like it when there's a guy like Uri tweeting about him from where we're from. But I've generally been complimentary other than times where I go, okay, he's disappearing. And I thought when they were 0-8 without him, and to say that that was the whole reason,

that was a little misleading because I went through it like six of the eight teams they had lost to were playoff teams. One of the other losses, they didn't have Ingram, and now they've actually been on a really good run without him. I think they're, I don't know if it's 7-4 or 7-2, depending on how many games I'm counting from the previous 0-8. So, you know, he's going to be all right.

And unfortunately, it'll have nothing to do with him because I think LeBron would like playing with a guy like that. But you're right. I mean, the overall thing, I remember driving around Miami when LeBron decided to go down there. And me just driving around, I go, what are we thinking? Of course he was going to come here and play with Wade. And that had nothing to do with basketball. But everything you laid out, yes. Those will be reasons to go. Why did we ignore those?

Why weren't we going to see, we were just going to the Lakers, but I can only balance everything I know and all the stuff that's out there and the information that, you know, I've gotten over the years and that I just don't think this decision has been made. And now we get to see what happens after the deadline. Yeah. And the same goes for Paul George. If they get bounced in round one by Minnesota in five games,

I would say the odds have increased that he would probably leave. If you think about the OKC Golden State Series in 2016, and I really thought OKC was going to win that series, and I thought that I went to game five, OKC was up 3-1, and I just felt like this is it. Westbrook and Russ have figured this out. I mean, Westbrook and KD have figured this out. Yeah.

And they just didn't shoot the ball well. They could have won that game, and they just didn't play that well. Game six comes around. They're going to win that. Klay Thompson gets hot. But if they win the title that year, which I think they would have if they get through that series, KD's either still there.

He signs a one-year extension or a two-year extension, whatever he does. There's no way. Nobody's ever left the championship team. It's never happened. So, you know, I think Paul George, LeBron, and who's the other marquee free agent? Is there another one? There's one more, right? There's one more, though.

Maybe that's it. I guess that is it, Thomas. Well, I think the other thing, too, is you've got to keep paying attention to this Kawhi deal, too. You go, what is actually going on here? Yeah, what are you hearing with that? You talk to people. I had heard before the story came out, you want to know how you know you have something right? I had been told the Kawhi thing was getting getting really really weird the week before the story came out and so i texted a reporter not because i wanted them like i thought

i was helping somebody out where i was kind of like hey are you hearing anything really weird about kawaii and it was crickets for like three days from somebody that always gets back to me oh wow that's always a bad sign i was, yeah, but it meant I knew I was right. But it also meant that the person didn't want me involved. Right. That's what I mean. The no response is a response in itself. Yeah. So I went, huh. I don't know if that'll be fixed.

I mean, the funniest thing about the whole Kawhi story is that he's becoming, or at least if we believe these reports, he would now be the guy we never thought he was capable of being. Like, we thought he was the perfect superstar. Forget basketball and all sports. And apparently that's not what the plan is. So, you know, that's all you can do. You can sit there like, I don't think New Orleans,

I would never want to trade Anthony Davis, but that's what everybody's waiting on. You know, let's figure that out. What's going to go on there? What happens if they don't get to keep Cousins? Is Davis going to get to a point where he goes, you know what, I'm sick of this. I'm sick of being called a loser.

I'm sick of having one playoff series. I'm sick of this stuff. You guys couldn't figure it out. I want out. Get me out of here. Yeah, I'm bummed about New Orleans. I really liked what was happening with them, despite the fact that I think they made just a slew of bad moves.

Fire too, but they've started to figure some stuff out this year. I was texting with somebody, I go, you know what's nice about them is they actually have like seven guys who can play. But even like I thought the Drew Holiday contract was an abomination, and it still might be. Yeah, it still might be,

but as long as he's healthy, it's a huge difference for who they are. That's the Blakein argument as well but like yeah you watch them with you need five guys on a basketball court they had two of the top 10 and then they had drew holiday playing really well and it's like ah who cares about the cap if it's gonna stay this way this is a team i don't want to play in a playoff series uh quickly the the calves and the Sixers are kind of looming in that, you know, it's conceivable they could be seven seed, eight seed. It's conceivable Detroit could be the eight seed. We have a preponderance of dangerous seven slash eight seed potential teams that I would just not want to see in the playoff series if I was the one seed or the two seed. Am I overthinking this or do you think the same?

I got to see more from Detroit. I mean, it's been great so far and there's a real energy. You know, that's another thing about these GMs is sometimes they're just going to shake it up just to have a new energy around a team. Yeah. And I totally understand the Blake side for Detroit and I actually understand it for the Clippers too.

Like a lot of these trades in the last two weeks or so, I'm like, you know what? That actually kind of makes sense. So I don't know. I don't know yet. I mean, Stanley Johnson's had some moments where I'm like, oh, remember this dude? Everybody got really excited about the playoffs when he guarded LeBron two years ago. This is good to see again. I've never been a big

Reggie Jackson fan, and him not playing, I get crushed for saying it, but I think, although he's starting to come around him not playing, I get crushed for saying it. But I think, although he's starting to come around a little bit, I know he was hurt last year, but I don't know with his talent if what he brings you is worth what he does when he kind of gets stuck in his ways a little bit. It would be weird to see how that works with Blake.

But I just haven't seen enough of it yet. Philadelphia has impressed me with a lot of these young teams. The Lakers had it for a while. I haven't checked it recently. The Celtics were off the charts with expensive efficiency. And the Sixers, with all of their length, despite being young, usually young teams just, it's the rule. You suck on defense for a couple years.

And they've been good enough. I just worry about them closing offensively in tight games. They've lost a lot of games where they get really stuck. And if Simmons wasn't available too, that was disastrous. Some of the games are just injuries, so I've got to be fair about it. But I've seen them get stuck offensively where I feel like that's the difference. This league in the playoffs, do you have these closers? Do you have these guys who can figure something out

when everybody's jumping their screens? And I think Boston has one of the best in the league at it. And I don't know who that guy would be right now with Detroit or Philadelphia. Yeah, with Detroit, it's probably Blake. If he can't be that guy, then that's a pretty tough contract. Philly, I agree with you. They, you know, especially in the playoffs when things slow down and stuff like that, the best advantage they have for them

is you don't play back-to-backs in the playoffs. And when Embiid is out they're they're a good team i wonder um you know we i i i'm bringing this up only because it's a conversation in the ringer office and if if you were working here you would have been involved in probably 75 of this specific conversation would you Would you cut the cord with Fultz right now? Like if Charlotte was like, hey guys, here's Kemba Walker. He's right here. Give us Fultz and Sarich.

And we're good to go. You can have Kemba Walker. He's a borderline all-star. Fit him right in. Now you can make an all-star trade. Sorry, Tate. Tate's starting to overheat over there. But what would you do if you're

running Philly? With Fultz. First of all, Colangelo's the one who made the trade, so he drafted the guy. He's going to be a little bit more married to it. But I also think there are certain teams that the playoffs are a win. Your front office is selling

to ownership. Hey, look what we're doing here in Philly now. Forget that hinky guy. We just made the playoffs. So if that deal were available today, that would be interesting. But I don't know. Unless you're around folks, what if you're in that front office

and you're talking to your staff, and you're like, what's up with Markel? And they're like, dude, he's a disaster. Then I'd move on. I would move on. Because we've seen stuff like this happen before where there's nothing worse than that guy who was drafted in the top ten, and then you trade him a year out.

That guy's never good. That guy never ends up being good. I mean, I know never is all of them. But I would be a little worried about it. And honestly, and everybody's going to say I'm doing this, but I'm not doing it after the fact. I never understood in doing all the stuff I did for the draft last year why Tatum wasn't in the conversation to be the number one pick.

I never understood why it was Fultz and then everybody else. I didn't see the tier that everybody was talking about all the time. And Fultz was really good, and that Washington team was an absolute mess, and he kind of feels like he is that combo guy that we all love now. But he's not this sick, dynamic athlete that some of those other guys have been at that position. And the fact that Tatum, maybe because he missed the first few games, but his size to bring the ball up, I'm like, why wouldn't Tatum be in the conversation to at least be

number one? So I'm not as in love, like this isn't Derrick Rose, who I loved at Memphis, and you're asking me, do I want to trade Derrick Rose without seeing him play yet? That's one I wouldn't do if I were Philadelphia. But I wasn't as much of a Fultz guy. Not that I'm saying don't draft him, but when the Celtics made that trade, I go, God, it's almost like Ainge is listening to me even though we don't talk. Well, I wonder if it plays out this way this year too I'm watching this year's draft very carefully Does it sound like I'm trying to take credit?

Does it sound like I'm trying to take credit? Because I know what's going to happen Like oh yeah, you're just another one Like yeah, check the tweets That's like me with the Kyrie trade last summer Even before the Celtics got involved I was like I can't believe Kyrie Irving's available. I couldn't get over it.

I was like, this is crazy. This is one of the best nine players in the league and they're shopping him. Like this is, this happens once every four years. But, uh, this year's draft, I wonder if, uh, who, what the, if, what the narrative is going to be versus what the reality is going to be tate who's who is there a guy who has a chance to be this year's marco faults of like he just is the established oh no he's definitely the so-and-so but we're not oh you mean the number one guy and then everybody else well no or just like a top three guy who everybody kind of just decides

they are where they are. Who might play not actually and not play. Yeah, or who is on a not that good team, and it's unclear why everybody's just penciled them into where they are. Are people going to be more careful this year? What do you think, Tate? Yeah, I mean, there's going to be Aiton probably at the top. And then, I mean, Trae Young could probably be the biggest jump,

you know, if he goes top three, something like that. I say I think there's going to be aton probably at the top. And then, I mean, Trey Young could probably be the biggest jump, you know, if he goes top three, something like that. I say I think there's going to be a Trey Young backlash. Yeah. I actually could see him with a sort of Curry-like, oh, my God, he fell to seven? What are we doing? Where were you guys? Ayton's the one that I –

He's the surefire one, I think, right now. Or the surefire one. Who's fault? I don't know that anybody could be fault. Nobody's fault, yeah. So this will never happen again. What's happening this year is crazy. Yeah, okay.

You love this draft this year, right, Rosillo? Yeah, love it. Like seven deep of just gorgeousness? Yeah, but I'll tell you, teams that I talk to, Trey Young's closer to seven than he gets one. Oh, I agree with you. I think he's going to go 6 or 7. Unless there's a...

Yeah, go number 1. Like if the Cavs get the Brooklyn pick and it's number 1, I think he's going to take Trey Young because Trey Young was at LeBron's camp just like Forte was at Red's camp. Yeah. Well, there's some Trey Young clutch rumors. Just hearing some rumblings lebron does that though when somebody's like hey we're gonna get young and first his first instinct is to insult the reporter meanwhile he's like having lunch with cam reddish right have you have you seen trey young play at

all lebron man trey young i knew about trey young before you knew trey all right now that that's been established yeah he's just so over it and i kind of don't blame anybody that's been in the public spotlight as long as him to just go all of you are stupid and all of your questions are stupid i think i would definitely be like that actually i know for a fact i would be so uh maybe it's a good thing I'm not the most famous athlete in the world. You would be Jimmy Butler if you're a professional athlete. Jimmy Butler is now – he feels himself – I love Jimmy Butler. I've done two podcasts with him, but he is the best post-game,

I can't believe how dumb that question was, guy that the league has right now. He's just like, really? Did you see him last night? I was the best. Did you see him? Yeah. The guy's like, hey, Did you see him last night? I was the best. Did you see him? Yeah. The guy's like, hey,

you know, when LeBron sent you shit back, you know, and he's like, yeah, that's what I did. I put it up there so LeBron would hit it back. Then made a face.

Yeah, like, you're the dumbest dude in the room and the guy knew. He's like, damn it, damn it,

he thinks I met it up. You know, and it just sucks. It sucks being a beat guy. So we should mention it's 1243 Pacific time, and there were no other trades other than Alfred Payton. So somehow us talking to each other completely killed the trade deadline. Quickly, you're moving to LA.

When are you moving to LA? Bought a house in Manhattan Beach. I'll be moving in a few weeks, and I can't wait. Although, if it doesn't go through right away, I know that you offered up your place. I'll do some daycare during the day, and then maybe you and I can start working out or something tonight. I got to say, I pictured you more as a Hermosa Beach guy.

I have to get used to the thought of you in Manhattan Beach. No, no, no. I just saw you in the Hermosa Beach guy. I have to get used to the thought of you in Manhattan Beach. No, no, no. I just saw you in the Hermosa Beach with the tank tops, just wandering around with a mixed drink in your hand at 3 o'clock on a Friday, and I could just see it. But Manhattan Beach, I'll get used to that thought. Right, like after a couple Texan Simmons, be like, have you ever thought about starting our own league

no or the or the 1am 1am thing hey man I'm at a bar they think we should open a sports bar in Hermosa we

we come to this meeting tomorrow by the way I'm ready yeah Sullivan's tap wants to franchise so do you think Redondo would be a good spot let's do it I'm talking to this guy Doug's tap wants to franchise. Don't you think Redondo would be a good spot?

Let's do it. I'm talking to this guy Doug here. Yeah. He says he's in. Sully and Murph are going to move. Yeah. No, the new podcast is what I'm doing now. I'm doing it once a week.

So I think you said that, right? So I'm doing it once a week for ESPN, and that's the plan, and I'm pumped, and it's awesome. And I want to have you on at some point. I would love to come on. And next time you come on this one, you have to come in and we can just get super deep and just talk about stuff. And it'll just be really intense.

I thought we were going to do some of that today. No, no, no. We can save that. We can save that for when you're here. We'll get super intense. Ryan Rosillo, give your Twitter a handle too. At Ryan A. Rosillo and it's the Rosillo pod did I force promo that or did you happen to say that

because that's the last thing I want to do because I hate it when people did it to me so I felt like I did it a little bit I've never heard force promo used as a verb I think you just made history no Sarah Goose did it to us once when I was on the zone where like the first question we asked

him he interrupted was like i'm here to talk about goose's wing like all right dude and then he promoted his chicken wings and then he like two questions later i was like you know do you think the three four is better than the four three and he's like yeah you know i tell you what i could take about three or four goose's wings right about now i was like cheeses too i had the first book agent i hired who um somehow talked me out of an idea for a mailbag book that i think would have been a home run and then pitched me an idea said tony saragusa was writing an autobiography and thought it'd be a great idea if i would ghost write it and i immediately fired him i was, if you think I should be ghostwriting Tony Saragusa's book, I'm out. I need somebody else.

And that was it. So long to that guy. All right. So next time I see you, you'll be in person and we'll do this again in a couple weeks down the road. Yeah. Good luck with the move. Thanks for everything.

Thanks for coming on. All right. See you, buddy. Thanks, Doc. See you, Dick. We're going to call Tom Haberstroh now, another old friend. But first, if you're like me and you're not so great at planning ahead for things like Valentine's Day, there's an awesome app called Hotel Tonight that helps you find amazing hotel deals at the last minute.

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download the Hotel Tonight app. Start scoring amazing deals at incredible hotels right now on Hotel Tonight. Coming up, Tom Haverstraw right now. All right, it is now 1248 Pacific time. We still kind of had my fingers crossed for some sort of late trade way after everybody thought the deadline was over.

It did not happen. The Bleacher Report's Tom Haverstraw. Is it The Bleacher Report or Bleacher Report? It's Bleacher Report. Why did I say The Bleacher Report? What's wrong with me? I have no idea. Tom Haverstraw on the line.

I think you're flustered. Yeah, I am a little flustered. Bobby Marks is staring at me on the TV, and I just wanted a little more from Bobby. I wanted some trade that we didn't think was going to happen. But the Cavs did blow it up. Russillo, our old ESPN teammate, was on before you, and we broke it down a little bit.

What were your thoughts on what Cleveland did? You know, I just read Kevin Pelton's trade grades and he gave a really harsh rating for the Cavs. I don't want to give it away because it's behind the paywall, but it's just barely a passing grade. And I thought that was overly harsh. I actually like what the Cavs did because it accomplished two things. One, they didn't give up the Brooklyn pick. And two, they got much younger. The average age of the players that they got was 26 years old. The average age of the guys that gave out is 30. They got younger. I think they accomplished both things, which is give LeBron a reason to stay better than the reason that he had in the first place. And I got to tell you, like the IT thing,

that tenure in Cleveland has to be one of the worst stretches of basketball you can imagine for a contending team. I can't imagine a worst-case scenario for LeBron beyond LeBron actually getting hurt. Why do you think – Russell and I were talking about this earlier. Why do you think – we know why Isaiah came back because obviously he's desperate to prove himself and had so much self-confidence

he's going to play himself in shape. And it didn't work. Why do you think Cleveland wanted to play him when he clearly wasn't ready yet? Yeah, so this is the crazy part is I don't think we talk enough about the fact that Isaiah Thomas in a contract year coming up opted not to go for surgery, right?

The Celtics move him, and then he comes back way earlier than I thought. And I think Isaiah put way too much pressure on himself by talking, by doing these videos for the Players' Tribune, by saying there's going to be something special here in Cleveland, and throwing some shots over at Danny Ainge a little bit. I thought it was just way too much pressure. I mean, you look at his numbers, 36% from the floor, 25% from three. Arguably the worst player in the NBA this season.

Only three players were worse in blocks, a box plus minus on basketball reference uh and they're not good they're not guys like aaron afloat they're dwayne bacon these type of guys that were only statistically worse than isaiah thomas so it was awful and when you put off hip surgery and opt not to get it you better come back healthy because if if this is going to be the best-case scenario, if you come back and you're not really an NBA player, your contract coming up this offseason is going to be worse. I don't understand what is going to happen with Isaiah Thomas. Who is going to pay up for him and bring out the Prince truck

for Isaiah Thomas, who has no ability defensively. I mean, in the 15 games that he played with Cleveland, Bill, 10 of them he didn't have a steal. If you're going to be that small, you have to be lucky both out there, right? Yeah. It was zero steals in 10 of the 15 games, and on the floor the Cavs had a 119 defensive rating when he was on the floor.

It's awful. Jesus. Jesus. Yeah. Well, you know what's funny about him going to the Lakers? It's probably his best chance to get paid. Because if the Lakers look at the 2018 class, and let's say LeBron signs a one-year extension in Cleveland, and Paul George stays in OKC or whatever, and there's just no free agent class.

They're going to be in the same situation they were in going into this season, where basically, let's tie up our cap with one-year deals and keep our flexibility. And that's Isaiah's one chance to get paid now, is if it's one year for $10 million, something like that. And then he becomes a salary cap figure. I don't see any way he gets a multi-year deal from what we've seen unless he either shuts it down now and gets surgery or shuts it down and rehabs himself or miraculously starts playing better. It's got to be one of those

three things. Yeah. I'm surprised the Lakers actually holding onto him. I guess you can somewhat have like this really interesting player play for you down the stretch if Lonzo Ball's not working out. I know he's coming back soon, but I'm surprised they're letting him come back, and it looks like he's going to be starting for them, or at least playing next to Lonzo. Oh, my God. There's so much mess today, but I heard that his agent,

Isaiah Thomas' agent was texting in all caps, like he will not come off the bench. And I kind of laughed when Luke Walton said, we haven't decided if he's going to start to be the sixth man. I'm like the sixth man, the way he's playing right now, he shouldn't be the 10th man. Right.

He's the 16th man. There's no justification for a guy having a 30% usage rate and shooting 36% from the floor. Yeah. And in a weird way, he's actually become underrated now because I think everybody thinks Isaiah is a sunk cost. But a year ago, he was an MVP candidate and having one of the most efficient years that any guard has ever had. The truth is probably somewhere in between those two worlds

unless he has like – unless this is like a Bo Jackson type of hip like his just his body is completely different now. Who knows? I just know that he doesn't have legs and that nothing he did this year looked anything like what he looked like last year. I hate my take on it with Rosillo was that I really like the Lakers trade Cleveland made and And I really liked Nance Clarkson's fine. He's hit or miss. I didn't like the George Hill Rodney hood trade as much. And I thought if they were going to dump kind of shorter term, bad money to take on longer term, bad money.

I don't know. That's where I would have gone. What'd you think of that part of the deal? I don't love it. But I think in think on the whole, you look at that they're trading out all these guys whose value has bottomed out. I mean, you look at Jake Crowder, D. Rose, Dwayne Wade, Isaiah Thomas, Shumpert, Frye. I mean, none of those guys are trading high.

They're trading low. So the return on those deals, I actually don't mind it. Now, the funny thing is, as crazy as today was, Bill, I don't think it changes the championship picture. Like, I don't think any of the contenders did anything. Golden State, Houston, Boston, Toronto. Like, there weren't any huge moves. But I still like the move for Cleveland because I think it achieves both goals.

Don't tie up your cap. Don't completely give up the Brooklyn Nets pick for a guy who might leave or something like that, a rental. But you know what? I like the pieces that they got back. LeBron can have a lot of fun, and I don't think you can discount that. LeBron can have a lot of fun with these guys. They're young, they're athletic, and they're the opposite of what he had initially i mean last

night the four guys that they had on the floor are still with the team uh in the crunch time possession where he blocked jimmy butler everyone else is on the bench they're getting young guys not old old veterans that they had on the 2014 miami team where everyone basically retired after it like this is going to be reinvigorating for LeBron. And I think, you know, Kobe Altman or Dan Gilbert, whoever is making those deals today, I'm actually pretty high on it. And yes, it just basically free up money for the,

for the Lakers to sign LeBron this summer. But I don't think that's a likelihood. Did you take it as an FU to LeBron that they didn't put the Brooklyn pick on the table? Yes. Yes. But then again, what player was going to be available where the Brooklyn pick would have been warranted? I mean, DeAndre Jordan, that's stunning to me. You might have more insight than I do on the Clippers side, but like the fact that they re-upped Lou Williams and kept DeAndre Jordan at the deadline is shocking to me, given the fact that they traded Blake Griffin, and it seemed like to me that they were just going to rebuild.

And now they just have DeAndre Jordan sitting there with Lou Williams. I guess they figured Boogie getting hurt with the Achilles injury opened up the eighth slot in the playoffs, but man. And you left out they kept Avery Bradley too, who seemed like he was a lock to get traded. Now they have him as an expiring, but they already took care of Lou Williams. And the threat of DeAndre, and I use threat. I know that's a harsh word, but if he opts in for $23 million next year,

I don't know if that's ideal considering what's happened to the NBA economy and the salary cap going forward. I'm not sure I want to pay more than 15 guys, $23 million. So if he opts in, I don't know what Bradley's market value is. Maybe their thought is this whole team comes back. Is that possible? Yeah, but what's the point? I don't know. That's NBA purgatory. Yeah. I'm with you. You don't trade Blake Griffin to Detroit and then just run it back with B-level players. I would expect that Jerry West comes in

and Doc Rivers steps down and just is the head coach, and they're just going to refresh and hit the reset button, and instead they re-up with Lou Will and keep DeAndre Jordan and Avery Bradley. That makes no sense to me. Unless Blake Griffin was this incredible cancer on the whole organization, I don't think that that makes any sense for me. It just seems like an identity crisis over there in L.A.

Who do they want to be? I think they were petrified of Blake's contract. I think that was 100% of what was going on. They knew they couldn't win the title this year. They had so much money committed to him. And you talk about the Supermax contracts and when they start getting 38, 39, 40 million with a cap that just doesn't seem like it's really going to be going up

for much more than where it is now, and you're paying 40% to a guy who hasn't made the All-Star team in three years and has had seven surgeries already, I think they just bailed. It was really they ghosted the situation. It was like looking – Quipper fans are looking around like, hey, where did our team go? Yeah, they left. They left the bar a half hour ago.

That's basically what they did and uh i don't know the lou williams contract to me was great and to get him at eight million a year like you do that anyway because worst case scenario you know you can trade it but uh i i don't know i don't understand where the league's going financially where i was saying to rusello like mar Marcus Smart turned down four years $50 million, or that's what he wanted last summer. The conversation started at $50 million, and now he's looking at three years, I don't know, $16 million? Three years, $17 million?

That and Jabari Parker, I don't know where this money's going to come from. I'm kind of surprised at how dead the trade market was, especially for a guy like Kemba Walker. I know that Nick Batum, they were trying to put that contract on Kemba Walker and try to relieve some of the money off the books. But Spurs wasn't a taker for that. I know that Nick Batum is at like $26 million a year for the next three years. But you're getting Kemba Walker at $12 million. So if you combine those two deals and you think you get Kemba Walker at a huge discount, I would take that deal.

And I'm surprised they didn't make it. That was the trade that I thought Cleveland should have made. I thought if they were taking on bigger, more money situation with the contracts they're giving up, then go to Charlotte and get Batum in the trade. And either just get Batum or go make a big play and try to get Kemba and Batum together but that's why I felt like they kind of straddled the line a little bit between the two worlds of they definitely want to shake things up but they didn't shake things up too much you know they got they got younger they added some pieces but they didn't go all in on any piece.

And now you look at, like, with Love Out, who's the second best player in the Cavs? Is it? I know. Ronnie Hood? You know, depending. Like, you see this a lot with LeBron where he plays with, like, Birdman, and suddenly Birdman's one of the top five big men in the league.

Right. Could be Larry Nance. I think you can see that with Larry Nance. Yeah. Well, you like Larry Nance, too. I think people are going to be surprised Larry Nance on this Cavs team. I could see him playing crunch time. I could see him getting alley-oops left and right from LeBron.

I think LeBron hasn't played with a guy like that in a while, that just kind of super fun, above-the-rim guy. It's kind of like having a toy. So that'll be fun. Yeah, you could kind of see LeBron was dragging, right? Like almost like tanking himself. Yeah, he's bored. Last night, I think one of the reasons

he came through last night is it's on national TV and Jimmy Butler kind of went mano a mano on him and he kind of started to become a thing after a while. Who do you think's the best team right now? Other than the obvious two. Who's the best team outside of Golden State and Houston? Yeah, so who's is the best team right now other than uh the obvious two who's the best team outside of golden state and houston yes who's the third best team i'm still going with boston i know kairi's hit a little bit of a slump here maybe it's a vegan diet i don't know he's hitting a little bit of a wall um but i still think it's boston

uh toronto toronto what scares me is that their best asset is their bench. And come playoff time, that doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter when rotations shorten in the playoffs. It matters who your best three guys are. And to me, in the playoffs, I think Boston's going to have a better chance than Toronto. I don't necessarily think that this trade for Cleveland makes them the third best team in the NBA. I think they're just going to be a lot more fun. But ultimately, I don't think they still have an answer defensively. They don't have an answer defensively.

George Hill, if he has a bum toe, like I'm not so sure how much he's going to be able to give you. And I don't think that they're defensively going to be much better or improve enough on that end of the floor because they're god awful with it and derrick rose out there i don't think that this puts them over hump so i still think it's boston uh or san antonio san antonio wow what's the case for that just pop and i think in the western conference i mean they're they're still like nasty this year. They're not, like, they obviously don't have Kawhi Leonard back, but I think this is a team that is just lurking. And last night I think they put up, like,

they doubled up on Phoenix there in, like, the third quarter. I just think San Antonio, I think they're just waiting for the playoffs to start. I think the whole Kawhi Leonard thing is they're just waiting and waiting for the playoffs because they probably know that Kawhi has like a good two months in him and they're saving it for April and May. Like that's my theory is that everything is just a holding pattern. And then they're going to put on the nitro boosters in the playoffs.

Cause I like, like that's, that's what the weird thing is. The NBA is seeing injury rates like go up by as high as 40 this year i think the league is just getting more conservative in the regular season holding guys out a lot more and i think the spurs kind of started that movement not just the dnp rest movement but i think with kawaii and other guys in the league they're just kind of being more conservative bringing them back so i think san an San Antonio is a really big buy low candidate right now. I like Toronto and I like, I like how they match up against the Celtics, unfortunately for me,

because it's just a bad matchup. And I think if they play in a playoff series, I'd be surprised. If you're a Celtics fan, you got to beat your chest. Oh yeah. I started the podcast that way. I think we can officially say the Celtics won the Kyrie trade, and they pulled one over on their biggest competitor in the East.

So, yeah, it's a chess-beating day for the Celtic fans, no question. What scares you about Toronto? Never been able to stop DeRozan. It's a team that just is super confident against the Celtics for whatever reason. It has been for the last couple of years. Their bench is good. The Celtics bench, the second unit has had scoring issues all season. And I just don't like the matchup.

I don't know why DeRozan is so tough for the Celtics to stop. Lowry's killed them a couple of times in the past, but DeRozan is so tough for the Celtics to stop. Lowry's killed them a couple times in the past, but DeRozan's the guy that really hurts them. And I really worry about putting the kind of scoring pressure that they're going to have to put on Kyrie in the playoffs when the other options are just young guys who, you know. I don't trust young guys in the playoffs totally, you know. What about Joe Johnson?

Would you like that for the Celtics? Wow. God, when we had him, I was still living in Boston. It was 2001. We had him for 50 games. And I watched him thinking, like, I'm not sure if this guy has it. He's not aggressive enough. And it was a very valuable lesson. It's like, don't not sure if this guy has it. He's not aggressive enough. And it was a very valuable lesson.

It's like, don't judge an NBA player after 50 games. Wouldn't that be amazing if they did a tribute video for Joe Johnson before they did one for IT? Well, think about that. That was one thing they avoided with this IT trade was the Paul Pierce night. Now they don't have to worry about that stupid legacy thing. Hey, I wanted to ask you because we're going to wrap it up soon. I wanted to ask you quickly about, um,

Russell and I were talking about the injuries and, and this is something you've been on. You wrote a piece for Bleacher Report right after Boogie got hurt about wear and tear and stuff like that. And, and just in general, the, the, the teams like to hear the Warriors say, like, we just want to get to the all-star break when they've already done all these schedule changes to try to fix it and then to see some of the wear and tear

and just watching how basketball is played and how much of the runouts, sprint outs and just the pace of it compared to where we were 35 years ago do we have an 82 game season in five years? What do you think? No, I don't think so either. I don't think so. I think the way this is moving where, you know, when you talk to the league office a couple of years ago, there's like, you know, there's no way we can get rid of four and

five. There's just no way we can do it with the arena availability. There's no way. And then three years later what do they do they get rid of four and five you know they they used to say that there would be no four point line and then you hear adam silver yes last year saying you know we're going to try it out in the all-star game and they're doing it they're trying it out in the celebrity game but i think all these things that were off the table a few years ago i think are back on the table and i think 82 games when you see all the injuries going up and you see just kind of the fast-paced style that we're in,

I think it's going to be on the table. And I think Adam Silver should be a little bit more progressive on this front because I think there's a real opportunity with the NFL and the way it's going to increase the rest days ahead of these marquee matchups, but also shorten. I think the mistake was extending the season rather than shortening the number of games.

I know why they did it. I know the owners and the players don't want to give up the money. If you shorten the season from 82 games to 75, but I really don't think this is helping matters that a bunch of their young stars are hurt. Like Chris stops for Zingas and boogie are hurt right now and they should like poor thing is 22 coming back from a torn acl is like worst case scenario for the knicks right now in the league like you need the knicks to be great and we just saw christaps berzingas have a bad knee for the past

six months and he blew it out um the way that he did a dunk on Giannis was unbelievable. And then he's out for the next year. It's not a good look. The measures that Adam Silver took to lengthen the season, I think is admirable. And I applaud it because he wanted to increase the rest days. I just think it might've backfired. So let me throw this out at you. They add two expansion teams. They go to 32 teams, four eight-team divisions. You play everybody in the league twice. So that's 62 games. And then you play the teams in your conference one more time each,

that gets you to 69, which you know they won't stay at. You know they won't stay at 69 because there will be too many jokes. But then maybe three more against the other teams in your division. But let's say they do three more and they get to 72. You could make up the money you lost on those 10 regular season games But let's say they do three more and they get to 72. You could make up the money you lost on those 10 regular season games with the expansion money. Maybe it all evens out. I don't know.

I really genuinely think that they are going to expand soon because I think they have enough talent now. I really do. I think the league is deep enough to support two more teams. Yeah, where would you put them? Seattle and where? Vegas? I mean, I think they should.

I think they owe Vancouver another chance. I would go Seattle and Vancouver would be my two. Vegas I don't see ever. I don't know. I haven't studied the NHL thing enough. But where would you put the second team? Well, the Vegas one is interesting because of the gambling aspect. I know Adam Silver has kind of led that brigade to legalize gambling,

and this would kind of fall lockstep with that. I know sports gambling is legal there, but this whole embracing the gambling aspect, I see that being a big, big opportunity for them. And given what they this whole embracing the gambling aspect, I see that being a big, big opportunity for them. And given what they've done with the summer league, I think there's just a lot of momentum on that side. Um, that makes a lot of sense for me, but I think Seattle is number one. And if they don't, if they expand without putting a team in Seattle, uh, like what are we doing? Yeah. Seattle should at that point declare a civil war and, and get ammunition and former military

and really try to, uh, attack the NBA. Uh, very quickly. Last question. Team, you're most disappointed. Didn't make a trade today. Oh, um, most disappointed that he didn't make a trade. That's a great question. I think it's the Clippers.

I think it's the Clippers. Oh, wow, the purgatory thing. Okay. I'm stunned that they didn't move DeAndre Jordan and Avery Bradley. I just think that they're locking themselves into, into the mediocrity, the hamster wheel of mediocrity. And I don't really know what they're doing. I think,

I think Detroit really made out on that deal in the sense that you're never going to get a guy like Blake Griffin, that type of talent on the free, on the free agency market. So if that guy's on the table, I think you make that deal. I just don't understand why you trade Blake Griffin and you keep DeAndre Jordan and Lou Will. You're locking yourself into the sixth seed.

It reminds me a lot of what Miami did this past offseason is locking themselves up for a 44-win team. Hey, they got Wade back, though. Here we go. Dwayne Wade is back. I love it. My biggest disappointment was Oklahoma City just because I I really in my head just thought they're going to get Avery Bradley. And I wanted to see it. And I wanted to see them play the Warriors in a series with Westbrook, Avery Bradley, Paul George and Steven Adams and Carmelo. I think that, I think Golden State probably would have won, but I would have wanted to watch that series. And I don't think,

I know they beat Golden State the other night, but I just don't think they can beat Golden State or Houston without more defense. And maybe they have a plan. Maybe they, maybe there's a buyout guy they think they can get. But I was just excited for Avery Bradley in the playoffs and now we're not going to get it.

Tom, what do you have to plug? The ALS Pepper Challenge. You're up, Bill. Jimmy Kimmel did it we're not going to get it. Tom, what do you have to plug? The ALS Pepper Challenge. You're up, Bill. Jimmy Kimmel did it. Your boy Kimmel did it and you got to do it now. I haven't been totally following it. Can you send me links? All right, so here's the deal.

Yeah, give us the one minute recap. I've been trying to avoid twitter i'm always on nuzzle just getting stories so i don't know if there's other twitter twitter stuff happening i'm missing it all right here's the deal um jimmy kimmel jake tapper uh kelly clarkson andy cohen all these people are eating a hot pepper for als research because my mom was diagnosed in October and I started the pepper challenge and I'm naming as many people as I can to raise money for a cure. We've reached a hundred thousand dollars. Our goal was 50 K and in one month we

got to 50 K and now we're boosting it to a million dollars. Wow. Jim Kimmel did it. He posted his video the other day. He ate a jalapeno, a serrano, and then a habanero while pouring hot sauce on top of all three of them. And he did the challenge. So you got to do it now, Bill. And I've already asked Shay and Shay says he's in. Justin Barrier's in.

I got to get you to do it. Justin Barrier's in for anything. That dude is a kinky dude, man. He probably has the hot peppers in his fridge. All right, I'm in. I'll go buy some peppers. I want to research it and see, try to come up with something that'll be more disgusting than whatever everybody else has done.

How big does the pepper have to be? Does it matter? Well, it starts with a jalapeno. No bell peppers. No dark. Garth Brooks did it and he drank a warm, hot Dr. Pepper. He was like, I can't do peppers, so I'm going to drink a warm Dr. Pepper. And Tricia Yearwood, who's apparently his wife,

ate a habanero. And that one's legit. I've done three habaneros so far. And Jimmy Kimmel did a habanero, a serrano, which is a little below a habanero, and then a jalapeno back-to-back-to-back. It was ridiculous. This was like the Spurs against Miami Heat in 2014.

It was unbelievable display from Jimmy Kimmel. So, shouts to Jimmy. Well, obviously, I'm going to take that personally and try to outdo Kimmel because I hate when he wins at anything. So, now I'll do the three that he did with a fourth one, and he can go F off. I'm in. I'll do this.

Awesome. Love it. And your podcast, Leverage the Chat? Yeah, the basketball friends at Leverage the Chat, Arnavitz and I have a top chef pod, which is called Pack Your Knives. So find my work at Bleacher Report, go do the ALS Pepper Challenge,

and you've got to think of someone who you're going to nominate. Like Jimmy Kimmel got Jake Tapper and Wolf Blitzer. I want to hear what your nominees would be. Okay, I'm going to mull it over. Good luck, though. That's great. I'm glad you're doing that.

Thanks for coming on. Good to talk to you, as always. Talk to you soon. All right, man. All right. See you. Before we go, Tate Frazier is here. He's been trapped in my office with me for an hour and 45 minutes.

Charlotte didn't make a trade. Nope. You wanted it. It was a chance to revamp their team financially that they either they didn't have or they didn't take. The only thing that they could have gotten right was Isaiah Thomas. They basically become the Lakers. Yeah.

And they facilitate LeBron's whole second coming. Yeah. Do that in a heartbeat. We're okay. We'll sit out. You wouldn't want to help LeBron. No, we'll keep Kimba. Because then it looks good.

It's like, you know, he's a franchise player forever. We put our players first. We just don't ship them away for nothing. Charlotte doesn't have the worst contract in the league, but they have like four of the top 12. Yeah. Cody Zeller for four years, like 50 plus million. Mine is the MKG, 13 million a year.

That's the one. Marvin Williams is making 13 a year. 12 a year that's marvin williams is making 13 a year 12 a year yeah tomes at like 22 or 23 yep dwight's at 23 i love dwight though i'm starting to wonder mike jordan michael jordan's not a good gm he just pays people way too quickly yeah he doesn't let people earn it you know and when he went to the wizards he tried to get rid of all this money again but it's his own. He pays everyone up front and then he gets stuck with the with the bill in the back end. It's almost like he thinks the salary cap is just a thing that you have to hit. Like you have to get to the salary cap.

Yeah, it's like, what is it this year? It's 103. Can we go over it? They're like, yeah, it's great. Well, so can we spend like 115 on one? Yeah, let's do it. It doesn't seem that he understands you can save the money. You don't have to spend it.

Or that like two years later, it might be good to have money to spend. Yes. When was the last like major free agent they signed? Lance Stevenson, 2014. That's not true. Yeah, that's the big one. Lance Stevenson? Yeah, I mean, Batum was right after Stevenson.

But I mean, Lance was the big one. Remember, he met him in Vegas. He got him to sign the contract. They had this one-on-one meeting, him and Jordan. And Jordan said that he was ready to take over the Hornets franchise. Yeah, he took it over. He took over something. He was out in six months. What was the Batum trade?

You basically took on his contract for— Shipped out Noah Vonlay. Noah Vonlay. Yep. And then Batum had a great contract year. And unfortunately for you and other Hornets fans, that great contract year coincided with this crazy salary cap flooding year of money that everybody had. And everyone thought he was going to leave.

No one thought he was going to re-sign with the Hornets. You were happy he re-signed. It was a win. This is great. He re-signed. We got him. Now we're going to make a playoff push every year. Yeah.

120 million. So what? The cap's going up. Yeah. We a win. Yeah, this is great. He resigned. We got him. Now we're going to make a playoff push every year. Yeah, 120 million. So what? The cap's going up. Yeah, we were wrong. Yeah. The Dwight trade was a good trade, though. Yeah.

Got rid of Myles Plumlee. Covered Myles Plumlee. You get out of Dwight next year. If I was Michael Jordan, maybe LeBron didn't want to trade with him. I still think LeBron's involved in the cap sets,

but if I was Charlotte, I just would have been calling Cleveland all the time. What can we do? We'll take Channing Frye. We'll take a year of Shumpert. We'll take Isaiah. I think Jordan has always thought that Kimba,

with the contract he's on, has more value than he really does. Which he really should have more value, I think Kimba should, with the $12 million a year. But I think Jordan thought that he could trade Kimba for Blake Griffin or something like that. Yeah, because he came out and said he wanted an all-star.

Yeah. I think he thought he had bigger ideas for how much value Kimba had, and then he realized he could only get IT back. I wonder if they were in on the Blake Griffin thing. Didn't really totally make sense for them as a match, but, you know. Give it to Zeller in that deal. The thing is, they have guys that I like. They just make too much money. Yeah. Like, I it to Zeller and that deal. Maybe they have guys that I like. They just make too much money.

Yeah. Like I actually like Zeller. I just don't want to pay him $13 million a year. And you gotta deal with the injuries. I like Marvin Williams as a veteran, but not for 13 million a year. Like 3 million would be great. Unfortunately for Kemba,

his salary right now, which seemed like an unbelievable bargain slash discount forever. Now it's market price. It's now swinging back around. Yeah, it's like, that's actually what you're worth, Kemba Walker. He's had the right deal the entire time. If Lou Williams is worth eight,

Kemba's worth 11 or 12. Yeah. Marcus Smart's worth five. They're fringe all-star guys, so it's like eight to 12. That's our new NBA. Yeah. Unfortunately, John Wall is not worth 40.

I think that's the number one contract I wouldn't want right now. That's the trade that I wanted them to make. The John Wall. Just take him. The fuck it. Let's get John Wall trade. Yeah.

Let's just see what happens. So it would have been like Kemba and Batum for John Wall? Yeah. Just bring him in. Just like fuck it. Yeah. Like this season is done. We're not making a playoff run.

Just sit on it and have John Wall. Let Kemba go to Washington. They probably make a playoff run with Kemba. I wonder if Washington would have done that trade. Maybe. Can we call Joe House? Call Joe House right now. All right.. I wonder if Washington would have done that trade. Maybe. Can we call Joe House? Call Joe House right now.

I just want to see if he accepts the trade. House. Yeah? We're at the tail end of an hour and 50 minute long podcast, trade deadline version, that had Ryan Russillo and Tom Haberstroh on it. And Tate and I were wrapping it up and we started talking about Charlotte. And Tate said he would

have traded for John Wall and his offer is Kemba Walker and Nick Batum for John Wall and he wants to know we both want to know if you would have just done that sight unseen Kemba and Nick Batum for John Wall right now did anybody read Jay Serrano's column today does Jay Serrano

still work for the ringer get the fuck out of here get the fuck out of here FO Get the fuck out of here. FOH Army. Kemba Walker and Nick Batum, I wouldn't let them shine my shoes. Oh, wow. That's it? That's your response?

Get the fuck out of here. You get two playoff guys. You're deep now. You're the deepest team in the East. Instead, you have a guy on one leg making $40 million a year in three years. They suck. They can't get their own team in the fucking playoffs. They stink at basketball.

No chance, Lance. So what does Tate do? Tate roots for this team that has four of the worst 13 contracts in the league. What's your advice for Tate? He was kind of hoping something would happen at the deadline. Yeah, welcome to my world, Tate. 30 years of rooting for the almost fullest.

What you do is come up with other interests and pursuits in your life. Absolutely. You root for your basketball team with all of your heart, but at the same time, you know, you think about, oh, golf season's right around the corner. How wonderful is that? The new restaurant opened up down the block. Let's go try some wonderful new lamb shoulder.

That's what you do. I don't have money for lamb shoulder. No, but Tate does have the North Carolina Tar Heels, which is where as soon as the trade deadline passed without a burp from Michael Jordan, Tate immediately went into UNC Duke ACC mode. Yes, I'm locked in now. That's a great mode to be in. That's the answer, Tate. The answer is fuck the Hornets. They go fuck themselves. That's a great mode to be in. That's the answer, Tate.

The answer is fuck the Hornets. They can go fuck themselves. Fuck the Hornets, that's your answer. What you need is Steph Curry and that Charlotte Panthers ownership group paving the way for two years from now. Steph Curry being like, maybe I should just play in Charlotte.

Yeah, he's tired of winning. I'll be near the team. Yeah, I'm tired of the Golden State. Draymond's a little wacky. He's crazy. Got to get rid of that guy. I'll be in Charlotte. My dad's there.

I'll raise my kids there. I'll be a hero. Who's a bigger hero than Steph Curry in Charlotte? I can't think of one person. It's like Peppers, Antoine Jamison, Steph Curry. They're all up there. If Steph came home, he's number one. Oh, he's number one, yeah.

Number one maybe of any athlete in any city. Dell's up there right now. But yeah, he would be beloved. He's not ahead of MJ. I mean, MJ's the GOAT. Yeah, but in Charlotte,

I think they're probably at least a little bit salty with MJ at this point. He won it for Chicago. He did. He won all those for the Bulls house. I don't know if you realize that.

He's still North Carolina's native son. Of course. Of course. The greatest. MVP for life. The greatest Charlotte Hornets moments of all time were Alonzo Mourning's game-winning shot to knock the Celtics out of the 1993 playoffs. In Space Jam.

Baron Davis made the second round one year, whatever that weird team was with all those guys. What was it like? 08, 09, Steven Jackson. There was that one Steven Jackson season. Got swept by the magic. Have you ever played in the conference finals? No.

Not in 30 years. Because you lose the Bulls. House, before we go, do you want to give 30 seconds on what the Cavs did today? It was a stunner. It was the rarest of instances where everybody on the outside looking in says, something dramatic really needs to happen here. And lo and behold, something dramatic really happened there. I, for one, thought it was a sensational trade.

I love that Kobe with a Y has left over Kobe with an E in the basketball, you know, who has the belt right now? Who has the Kobe belt? It's Kobe with a Y. Great job, Kobe with a Y. I love the Lakers trade. I did not enjoy the George Hill trade as much. The George Hill-Rodney Hood combo.

We both have healthy skepticism around George Hill. I think he's a perfect fit for LeBron. Okay, we'll see. I think he's going to be terrific. I didn't think he was that good last year in the second half of the season in the playoffs, and I thought he looked awful this year. Rodney Hood's feast or famine. We've played pickup basketball with guys like him.

You're picking him for your team, and you're not quite sure what you're getting. Supposedly, Tay Frazier's like this, too. You have Tay Frazier, and it's like, is Tay going to hit five threes in this game, or is he going to go 0 for 16? You just don't know. I really like Rodney.

That's a scatter report on Tay Frazier. I didn't know that Rodney Hood was available for so little. I lusted after him for my almost bullet. Yeah, you know why he was available? Because the Jazz wanted to trade him. That's a bad sign when they're a young team that's not even a playoff team. They're like, you know who we don't want to rebuild around is Rodney Hood. He's a Feaster family guy.

And Jordan Clarkson is too. I don't know how that works with the Cavs, having two Feaster Famiguy's. The fact that the Cavs did not give up the Brooklyn pick and that they reloaded around LeBron with Tristan Thompson and Kevin Love still in the mix, and J.R. Smith is still there, with a bunch of pieces that are guys that are hungry, guys that are hungry, guys that want to have their own individual stature rise with the king,

I'm fired up for it. You know why they didn't give up that Brooklyn pick? Because they're going to pick swap it to the Wizards in June when they make the giant John Wall for George Hill trade. And you get the Brooklyn pick out of it. You can't get at me on John Wall. John Wall is too good. Serious question. Do you think John Wall will ever have the capability

to jump on a scorer's table again? Or would he need to be assisted? I don't know. All I know is I can't wait for Tom Brady to announce his retirement in two weeks. Come on. And for you guys to start, for the Patriots to start Brian Hoyer at quarterback in 2008.

Tom Brady threw for 505 in the SB. He's fine. And took the L. Listen, we deported our defensive coordinator to Detroit, where he belongs. It was either that, Mexico, or Canada. He can go. The Lions fans can enjoy him.

We're going to make some defensive draft picks, and we've got Edelman back. We'll be back. We're ready. We're up one with ten minutes left. They had a fourth and one in midfield. If the guy drops it, we win the Super Bowl. Couldn't hold the lead. Couldn't hold the lead. That was the worst defense we've had.

And you won money. You won money. You should be happy we lost the Super Bowl. You had the money line and Eagles plus four and a half. I had to do it. I had to do it. I had to try and win back that Andy Reid money. I was going to say, the fact that you made back what I consider to be the worst bet I've ever seen in my life, the Kansas City Chiefs money line.

Tate, he bet on the Kansas City Chiefs money line in a playoff game. God, House, you sent that text in and I was like, wow, is that, I saw it too late to stop it. Contrarian, House. I felt like I witnessed a murder. I felt like the guy in the Versace TV series I watched.

I love the Versace show. Last night, but Cooninan just hammered a guy to death right in front of his boyfriend. And that's how i felt like the boyfriend when i saw the andy retex it was like watching somebody get hammered to death yeah yeah i felt that way too at the end of the game that's a good show by the way house kunanan okay for such a show and the waco show is really good too i watched the entire series of end of the F-ing World

in a night and a half. It was awesome. That was my show. That's my show of winter 2018. Alright. Who's on House of Carbs next week? None other than our old pal Adam Rappaport coming on to talk about what he served at his Super Bowl party

last week. The best way to conquer Valentine's Day like a pro, and a couple of winter menu items. We're stuck right here in the middle of winter on the East Coast. It's freezing cold. What is best to put in that belly? And when's the next Shack House? Sunday night.

We are recording immediately after the wrap-up of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am with a surprise guest. I'll go ahead and announce it now. Chris Harrison of The Bachelor. He is playing this weekend in the Pebble Beach Pro-Am. You're never going to believe this. He's a single-digit handicap because he appears on this 30-minute Bachelor show. How long is the Bachelor?

Is that 30 minutes or an hour? What do you mean I'm never going to believe this? He works for like four hours a year. All he does is stroll in and say, gentlemen, ladies, this is the final roast this evening. What else does he do? He should be like a scratch. They never show his shoes because he's got golf shoes on. He's out of the cut.

He's back putting. They probably built him a putting green in the back of the house probably. That is phenomenal. Chris Harrison. Yeah. Chris Harrison. Sunday night. Shack House.

It'll drop Monday. Shack House. That all sounds great. But Jeff Chow and I are going to Callaway on Tuesday with Fantasy and Chris Ryan, and we're getting fitted for clubs, so you can F off. Yeah. I'm going to hit clubs.

The ringer is going in. He's going rogue. The ringer is going rogue. My goal for 2018 is to go on golf trips and not invite you to any of them and just send you John Wall pictures. That's what's going to happen. The reason I'm escalating now is the wizard Celtics playoff series. We got to,

we, the shit talking has to start now. Cause I think it's going to be really good. I honestly don't fear any team in the East, including Cleveland. I think Washington, if everybody's healthy, uh,

entering the playoffs and that's a big F I'm knocking on wood. They're going to, you know, get over all of this quiet drama. Quiet? It's public drama. Everybody eats, and John Wall's feelings are hurt. We're going to get over all of that. Come playoff time, if everybody's healthy, we're going to be kicking ass and taking names. I fear no one in the East.

I think the best thing that happened to your team was that Ernie thought the trade deadline was after the All-Star break and forgot to trade his first-round pick. He had it ready. He had it wrapped up and ready to go, ready to be shipped somewhere, and didn't realize the trade deadline was today.

So congrats to you. All right, House of Carbs and Shack House, check that out. Thanks, House. Thanks, guys. All right, bye. All right, Tay Frazier, there's your answer. Check that out. Thanks, House. Thanks, guys. All right, bye. All right, Tay Frazier, there's your answer. I got it.

No John Wall for me. I think House is in denial. I think that's the next Blake Griffin trade is the John Wall get off that contract trade. We'll take him. Making fun of John Wall is my favorite thing with House right now. It's almost like a kid.

He's so sensitive about it. You don't really, you have UNC, you can't, that's your touch point. Yeah, but everyone pokes at it, so it's fine. I've built up a whole barrier. Mine is deflate gate. I just can't, I even can't handle it now. I look yesterday at the Super Bowl.

If we had had our deflate gate first round pick, maybe that's the linebacker who runs faster than a 4'9 and can tackle one of those wheel routes. At least you got your revenge last year, and then you got your revenge with Josh McDaniels against the Colts personally. Those are back-to-backs. That revenge was so sweet, and it made me so happy, and I loved it so much. GM Street, when's that coming?

I'm recording after this oh there you go all right gm street going up one shiny podcast america's favorite college basketball podcast as well thanks to ryan rossillo thanks to joe house thanks to tom haberstrow thanks to zip recruiter the smartest way to hire my listeners can try for free at ziprecruiter.com slash bs thanks to hotel Tonight to help you book amazing deals at great hotels up to 100 days in advance. Top destinations up to a week in advance everywhere else. Whether you need a sweet deal and a nice room for today, the winner of Beyond starts scoring amazing deals

at incredible hotels. Download the Hotel app tonight. Right now, don't forget about the Ringer NBA show had its own massive trade deadline show if you didn't get enough basketball today. And the rewatchables with Miami Vice went up this week. Thanks for listening. Thanks to Tate Frazier.

Talk to you soon. I feel yes, we can. On the wayside, I'm a bruised soul. I never want to say it. I don't have to.