The Bill Simmons Podcast - Western Conference All-Stars With Zach Lowe (Ep. 315)

Episode Date: January 17, 2018

HBO and The Ringer's Bill Simmons is joined by Zach Lowe of ESPN to discuss the angriest NBA fan base (02:00), locks for the Western Conference All-Star starting lineup (04:30), Anthony Davis vs. Karl-Anthony Towns (19:30), the Cavs potentially trading for Boogie Cousins (34:00), their current All-Defense first team (55:45), if the Rockets are legitimate (58:30), the Isaiah Thomas–Paul Pierce drama (01:07:00), and the most bizarre story in the NBA (01:11:15). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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And now they reunited on Monday night. It's up there. It's on The Bachelor Party Podcast. Juliet cried twice, which I think is hilarious. Cried just for pure joy of doing a podcast with Jacoby, who she sees all the time anyway. But if you want to hear that, you can find it on Apple and wherever else you get your podcasts. Coming up,

another old Grant Lamb friend, my man Zach Lowe. But first, Pearl Jam. All right. On Tuesday, I did Zach Lowe's podcast, The Lowe Post, and we talked about the Eastern Conference All-Stars as well as the Clippers-Rockets fight and a couple other things, like who's the MVP leader, things like that.

Now he is on my podcast, and we are doing the Western Conference. But first, Zach, the fallout from yesterday's podcast, who is the angriest? Milwaukee Bucks fans continue to lead the league in anger. Wow. Just lots of anger. Where was Chris Middleton? Who was on my list? He is on my list. Chris Middleton. Stop it. Compare Chris Middleton's numbers to Paul George's numbers. I'm just saying, just, just do it as a thought exercise, but they are, they, they, I don't know what happened in Milwaukee. Like 18 months ago, they crossed the line from like, we're just so happy to have Giannis on our team. This is amazing too. We hate everyone. We hate everything. Our whole, we hate you. We hate our team. We hate our coach. We hate everyone,

but it's just a lot of anger. I follow Ben Thompson from Stratechery. He has two accounts. One is which called at no tech Ben, which is basically just him complaining about the Bucs. And I had no idea Bucs Twitter was such a dark place. It really is dark. And they're so mad at Jason Kidd. They're angry at everyone. It probably stems from, this is just a guess, but an entire century of losing.

And then also getting completely robbed in the 2001 playoffs against Philly, maybe the combo of that. And then Jason Kidd doing stuff like, you know, what was the four point thing he did when he was up four? What'd they do? They fouled. What was that crazy thing he did this year? I honestly, it was one of those math conundrums that was so crazy that I felt like, wait, am I being stupid? No, I'm not.

I just went through like a whirlpool of confusion. Poor Milwaukee. I mean, they did. They were worried they were going to lose their team. And now the team's staying so that there's that big side. They have the number one guy you had won under 30, I think. There's a Davis versus Giannis argument we can have, but Giannis is younger.

And I think they should be a little happier. And by the way, Chris Middleton is not an all-star. They should be a little happier, by the way, smack in the face to Milwaukee. Dismissive smack in the face. He's not an all-star. Who watches Bucs games and goes, wow, Chris Middleton, one of the best 24 guys in the world. All right, Western all-star. He's missing smack in the face. He's not an all-star. Who watches Bucks games and goes, wow, Chris Middleton, one of the best 24 guys in the world.

All right, Western all-stars, four locks and one non-lock. And I think it's safe to say the four locks are – actually, no. I'm going to say three locks. My bad. The three locks are James Harden Kevin Durant and Anthony Davis and there are two arguments left to be had well one is Curry vs. Westbrook

which is a conversation we have to have we're just talking about starters starters and then the other argument is who is the third frontcourt guy in the West so before we do that how many locks did you have for the, for the entire team?

Cause I had 10. I would say 8.5. 8.5. Yeah. Okay. Let's do the, I think all these starters are locks. Here are mine. Okay.

Harden, Curry, Durant, Davis, LaMarcus Aldridge. We're four out of five similar. Okay, what do we disagree on? So I've always been the guy who's like availability matters for All-Star, right? Like I left them beat off last year. You know, once you miss 10, 12 games and it's close with other guys, I got to hit you a little bit. Yeah.

So I can't just slot Steph Curry in as a starter. I can't do it. So all I can do is put him in as a backup. And all the fans of other teams whose guys have been screwed before, whose guys I haven't picked before because of availability say, well, how can you even have Curry on the team? This is a two-time MVP who's the best offensive player in the

league and the total identity of the best team that we might see in our lifetimes or certainly over a four-year. So the rules are different for him. But with another strong guard candidate that I think deserves recognition, I just token you get to be a reserve on Zach Lowe's All-Stars this year for Steph Curry. So I put Jimmy Butler in the starting lineup.

Oh, I thought you were going to say Lou Williams. I got excited for a second. No. It's been Lou Williams All-Star buzz. It's really delightful. I got excited for a second. No, it's been Lou Williams, all-star buzz. It's really delightful. Uh, I get it. Look, I'm not going to argue you wrong for me. It's like Curry is a transcendent player. I can't fault him because he's brain is ankle. If this was all NBA and he missed 30 games, it's a different conversation. He's so good when he's out there, and I think he has been 98% as good as he was in the 2016,

the crazy MVP year he had. He's been just ridiculous. It's ridiculous. The stats are basically the same. In 2016, he was a 35-7. This year, he's a 28-5-7. In 2016, he was 50- 45, 90 club, which he, I think he might've created, right? Nobody had done the 50, 45, 90 club. I don't think that's

happened before. This year he's 49, 41, 92. He's shooting one less three a game. He's basically the same guy and his, his ceiling for a typical Steph Curry hot game is as high as anyone's ceiling. And I think when you're talking about who can just kick somebody's ass in a game, it's about, what, eight, nine guys? And he's way at the top. And Anthony Davis, as we saw last night in Boston,

is also in that conversation. But we have more guys who can just go in and destroy somebody's team, guys, this year than we've had in a long time. Curry, look, ultimately, who cares, right? Jimmy Butler, Curry, whatever. You want to start Curry, fine. I just feel like for my own internal consistency, I need to ding him a little bit. I wrote this even when he was quote-unquote slumping it was like at 37 from three and was was saying i got to get above 40 when he got hurt i wrote a kd or steph

kind of column and it just it was like even when he wasn't making threes at his normal rate the increase in free throw attempts the increased comfort even even over how he had where he was before driving to the rim and drawing contact and finishing. He just looked like a guy who was like, I'm in complete command of every aspect of the game at all times. I agree. And look, we talked about this yesterday on your podcast. I gravitate toward the best teams, especially in the pedigree and the things like that. Jimmy Butler, I think, is the other guy for this. Now, we can have a whole Westbrook conversation a little bit later.

But what Butler's done on both ends and how he kind of wrested control of that team quietly and slowly. And then by this month, it was his team. But I went to a Clippers-Wolves game last month, and it was clear they were still kind of battling with the whole thing. And it was clear he was really frustrated with Towns and just frustrated in general with they weren't collectively playing the way he wanted to play. And now it feels like it's his team. The two-way stuff and the intensity and the competitiveness and the leadership has been really cool. And I got to say,

that's one of my favorite trades in a long time. That felt like a really one-sided trade last June. But the fact that Chris Dunn has turned into at least a half-decent starter, and then Markkinen's been a way better pick than I expected. And now Levine's back. Hopefully, they're not going to give him $150 million. But that was a really good trade. I like that trade for both teams. Where do you stand on that one? I don't think it's possible really to argue any other way. And really the interesting part is going to be two years from now or a year and a half from now, whenever it is about, you know, what does Jimmy Butler want to do and how much money does it take to get him to stay in Minnesota? It'll take the max, I'm sure. And how many years and how does he age over that contract? Because that was the downside risk for them.

And also, we haven't seen Patton play, the kid they got with 16, which was the piece of that trade that everyone was like, why did the Bulls give up another thing? So there's sort of a TBD on that. But yeah, I think I love marketing. Dunn's been really good. And Levine is just coming back. So it's a fun trade. You don't follow college really.

You've made a conscious decision to be pro only. So marketing, you went in kind of blind. Whereas I think some people who had thoughts on him in college and then it was one way or the other. I thought, I didn't think he was going to make it. I'm happily going to admit I was wrong on that. It just felt like, I just didn't see it. It felt like maybe a Kelly Olenek type career to me. He's been way better. What's your take just watching him?

I like he can. First of all, like if you're going to be a stretch big, you got to be able to like you can't be one of these Ilya Sova, Myers Leonard. I need like four seconds to get my shot off. And he's got the snap release. He doesn't need a lot of space. But he can do more stuff off the dribble than we thought. He can even kind of post up smaller guys if you switch on him and not and look like semi comfortable. But the overall is just like he plays with like an arrogance and a swagger and a confidence that is really cool for a rookie.

And particularly like, you know, you get all the, oh, another soft Euro big is what the stereotype is, which is of course stupid, but he's like a little nasty. I like it. Yeah. He's not soft. The two most underrated, well, Dragic is the most underrated nasty guy we've had in like five, six years. I think he's been in like 20 altercations in the last seven years.

Four of them with Vujicic. Right. He had a whole feud with Vujicic. How do I say that one? Vujicic. At some point in life, you're going to teach me how to pronounce the Croatian and the Serbian names. It's going to happen. I'll do my best. The Bulls-Knicks series this year, not quite worthy of a 30 for 30, but definitely the most underrated league pass rivalry. And Markanen versus Porzingis was kind of a 30 for 30, but definitely the most underrated league pass rivalry.

And Markenden versus Porzingis was kind of a thing. It was really fun to watch them go at it. I enjoyed it. That was a really fun trade. I'm really happy for Butler because I think he was super unhappy last year. I think he's an important guy. I don't think he's one of the five best players in the league,

but he's probably in the top 12 or 13. And it's nice to see him back up the whole, I want to be on a good team. I want to be the best guy on a team that can contend for the title and actually do it. They're 29 and 16. We talked yesterday, the on-court, off-court, we're not going to get too caught up in that need and five-man lineups, all that stuff, because the sample size isn't great. But he plays they're plus nine when he doesn't play they're minus eight eight point one that seems significant it's hard to argue that that's not something uh harden we both have on even though he's missed eight or nine games and you

had him yesterday you said he was the mvp so far so far i don't feel particularly strongly about it and i haven't devoted all that much thought to the mvp quite yet 32 9 and 5 is pretty crazy here's one thing that i noticed he is averaging over 10 threes a game and he's averaging over 10 free throws a game 10.6 threes 10.5 free throws now needless toless to say, that's never happened before. The 10-10 club. Can you imagine? Even five years ago, I wouldn't have imagined that was conceivable. The 10-10 club sounds like an establishment that may have hung a banner in James Harden's honor recently.

Yeah. He left the 10-10 club at 5.30 in the morning last night. Yeah, he's been amazing. And then I looked up 530 in the morning last night. Yeah, he's been amazing. And then I looked up his stats since the OKC trade, which if you go on- Oh boy, here we go. No, no, no, no, no. I'm just going to say,

somebody on YouTube posted a shitload of Grantland videos and podcasts under the username Sil Bimmons. I have no idea who this human being is, including basically every podcast I did for ESPN. One of those podcasts, which a reader forwarded to me, is the podcast you and I did after the Hardin trade, which was right after you started working for Grantland. Yep. And let's just say that we were dead on in that podcast. Let's just say that we went all in on one of two angles and we were, and as usual, history has proven us correct. Anytime we go all in on something major, major,

for the most part, we've had pretty good success rate. But James Harden, since that trade, 28, six and eight, 44, 37, 86 percentages. And he's averaged since that trade, 10.2 free throws a game. I don't think people understand how hard it is to average 10 free throws a game. How much contact that is, how hard that is on your body. Like Durant, I think had one or two years where he was over 10. Now he's comfortably in the six, seven range

because it's hard to get fouled that many times a game and it's hard to shoot 900 free throws in a season. But I think there's a real conversation now where Harden versus Wade and who's the fourth best shooting guard ever. I think the door is open now. James Harden's only 28. Yeah, let's the fourth best shooting guard ever. I think that's, I think the door is open now. James Harden's only 28. Yeah, let's give it some time.

But I mean, he's on pace to be, I mean, Wade was an impactful defensive player until his knees really started to give out. And Harden never has been. And it looks like never will be. But yeah, I mean, offensively, he is going to do things that we just haven't seen before in the NBA.

And if he does this for four more years, I mean, the career numbers are going to start to get ridiculous. I'm stunned that he's only 28. It feels like we've known him forever, but it makes sense when you think about it. He came in early in OKC and almost from the get-go, they were relevant. And it just feels like he's been in our life for 10 years because he has. But yeah, the fact that he's only 28 and has so much more room, especially in that game.

Who are the MJ, Kobe, Wade are the top three? MJ, Kobe, Jerry West. I was going to say, Jerry West, no one knows quite where to, like, he was kind of a hybrid one, two, and I've always said this always overlooked in the greatest laker ever discussion just doesn't just doesn't get enough love i thought

that kobe knight which was a travesty for a variety of reasons but magic magic saying that kobe was the greatest laker ever when magic was the greatest laker ever first of all but then jerry weiss west is just never mentioned in these things anymore because he played too long ago. People just know him as kind of the gruff GM, but it's too bad. Durant. By the way,

can I just say something about the Lakers? Yeah. So Jeannie Buss tweets over the weekend in Luke We Trust, blah, blah, blah. And well, great, great.

Lakers really coming on strong, snuffing out all this noise about Fizdale and the ball idiots and blah, blah, blah. How about more than a tweet? Like when did a tweet, like how about Magic Johnson

says something? How about that? I just, I feel like we've, it reached the point, particularly when the Fizdale stuff came out to like a tweet, a tweet isn't enough. Like come out and say something.

I, maybe, maybe, maybe she is the boss. So maybe the tweet is all that's necessary. But I kind of feel like the situation reached a point where someone actually needed to get in front of a microphone and say words. Within 24 hours of when it—put it this way. Like, if the idiot father of one of the younger writers we had at The Rer, um, came out and said the whole ringer staff hates Sean fantasy. And you know, somebody from ESPN had a microphone in his face and it turned into an actual story. I would say something within 24 hours, like Sean fantasy is my guy. I'm not getting rid of Sean fantasy. Everybody can go to hell. The Lakers did nothing for like a week,

which made me think maybe he said that for a reason. And it's not like Alonzo really defended him either. And by the way, it's not like Luke Walton's been that great as the Lakers coach. Kuzma was the only guy. Kuzma was the only guy, the real best rookie on the Lakers was the only guy to, anyway, we've gotten sidetracked

because God knows there are not going to be any Lakers in the All-Star game. So let's continue. Durant. Best two-way season he's had. He's had better offensive seasons. He's been efficient. The efficiency is where it was in the MVP season. Even though he's taken less shots, he gets to the free throw line less.

The fact that he's leading the league in blocks is the single craziest stat of the year, right? I think he got passed. Oh, he did? I think he's like third now. want to say poor zingas is now back in first uh but regardless it's it's by you know a tenth of a block or something right it's it's so he's been great and i don't know man you you watch him on this team and how much fun they have playing together and the kind of ceiling that that team has. And I don't know. I get both sides of it. I get the whole side of you quit on OKC.

You guys came so close and then you joined the competitor. But I also get the side of he completely changed his life. He moved to this new area. He's involved in Silicon Valley in a bunch of different ways. He's a businessman. He wants to this new, you know, this new area. He's involved in Silicon Valley in a bunch of different ways. He's a businessman. He wants to own a team someday and he's getting to play in the, you know, probably the best basketball team of the last 20 years. And I don't know, put it this way. I don't think he would redo that decision. Davis, who just put up back-to-back 45 and 15s.

And they ran some list that the other six guys who did it are basically six of the greatest 25 players of all time. They're on off court. They suck anytime he's not on the court. It feels like he has another level to go and maybe we're starting to see it. And I wonder, there was a lot of Giannis love. There was a lot of love of the Warriors, a lot of Cavs talk. Nobody really talking about New Orleans at all. Davis, we started to wonder, is this guy ever going to be able to stay in the court? And now it seems like he's gone up a notch. What are you

seeing? Look, I remember a year ago, a year and a half ago, Cat versus Davis became a debate. And I remember telling Horolibus, you know, I'm sticking on AD. Like it became, Cat was probably the more popular choice. I remember arguing with Thorpe about this on a podcast. Like I'm sticking with AD. And I wrote this in a piece for Grantland back in the day. It was called Building the Browns.

Like the guy's ceiling is best player in the league and one of the best players ever in the history of the NBA. And I still, I still think that. And, uh, uh, so, I mean, I do think he has more levels to get to, like he used to be able to dribble zero times than once. Now it's two or three times. Like when does this three become a reliable shot? Defensively, you know, when he tries hard, he's really good, but can still get even better. Like I just, the guy is ridiculous. And you're right. Like the one consistent all year is that they've been really good when he's been on the floor. Although I will say over the last six weeks or so, the Cousins, no Davis lineups have started to be positive slightly, at least. They were a

disaster for the first month and a half of the season. Yeah, they played the Celts last night and it is like Davis comes out. It's like, oh, thank God Davis is coming out. It's like, oh, Cousins is still out there. It is the classic James Harden and Chris Paul, same way. Durant and Curry are the same way.

Davis, defensively, it's weird because in your head, you think, ah, two big guys, you can't do that anymore. Not the league that's too spread out, but they're really not two big guys. Davis kind of plays like a six, seven guy who happens to be seven feet. And he is pretty malleable on defense. There was a couple of moments last night when he was guarding Kyrie. He's such a tough mismatch. He's a good offensive rebounder when he wants to be. I think that's a really dangerous team. I want to have like a two-minute New Orleans conversation because Drew Holiday is playing really well. And I have not been a huge

Drew Holiday fan over the years because I don't think he can stay in the court. This is the best we've ever seen him. They have three guys who are legit guys who at the end of the game, Boogie can get, they can run a play for Boogie. Davis, he can do anything with. And Drew Holiday can actually create his own shot. And it's one of those teams that even if you play good defense for 20 of the 24 seconds, they can still get a half decent shot in the last four. I think they're really tough to play. And I don't totally understand why their record isn't better because I feel like the NBA right now, if you have three guys of that caliber you should be a 50 win team you just you can have just average guys in the rest of the roster and still be awesome and

I'm starting to wonder if New Orleans is gonna maybe make a little run here what do you think well I mean it's interesting also for all-star purposes. Like you just said it. If you have three guys this good, why are you 23-20 and around 500 the whole year? Yeah. And it gets you into an interesting place where you want to say like, yeah, they're supporting cast. Like everyone was dogging the supporting cast.

And like Drew Holiday's having a great year. Etuan Moore shooting 45% from three. Like Dante Cunha, Darius Miller has been solid. They shot really well last month in December. All of a sudden, they were way up there. They're one of the best

three-point shooting teams in the league so far. Yeah. But then you remember, like, they're getting literally nothing from five of their 15 roster players.

Yeah. Like, literal zeros. Like, and then, and that doesn't even include, like, Tony Allen. So, it's kind of like dante cunningham ian clark darius miller like those guys are deep bench guys on a good team and there is no deep bench on the pelicans it literally does it might as well be me you and fantasy like it doesn't exist and so the deep bench guys have been elevated to regular bench

guys so i don't know like there's how good is the Pelican supporting cast? How much is it outperforming expectations? It's actually an interesting question because it's really just Moore and Holiday and like Miller's all right for what he is. And Cunningham's all right for what he is. And Clark's all right for what he is. And Rondo is fine, whatever. Their defense is way better when he doesn't play. Like, I don't, you know,

I don't know what to make of their supporting cast. In some ways, it's outperformed expectations and in other ways, you look at the names and you're like, oh my God. A couple guys have outperformed, but I do think they're a very fascinating buyout possibility team when we get, there's gonna be a lot of buyout guys in February this year.

They are not far away. They need like two more guys they can count on in a nine man rotation. But man, when you watch them and those two dudes are going, that team is a top five most frightening team. Like I really, I think the Celtics are really good. That whole game, they were either clawing back

or trying to hold them off. And it just felt like New Orleans could score anytime they want. I boogie has had the reason I didn't put boogie in this starting five. I've weirdly watched a lot of Pelicans cause I'm just kind of fascinated by them. And I've just seen too many games when he's just does the boogie thing. Right. It's either, he's just not trying at all on defense or he's just kind of poison on the court and just has a bad demeanor.

And it's kind of, there's something kind of infectious in the wrong way about him sometimes. And you can feel it and you can see it through the TV. And I don't know. I think that team is kind of the wildcard team right now. I don't think they're going to win the title, but I'm pretty sure I don't want to see them in round one of a series. I don't think it'll matter if they play the Warriors, but let's say they play the three seed. Let's say New Orleans gets to the six seed.

I don't want to be in a series where the other team has two all NBA guys, including one of the five best guys, you know? I, you know, the issue with them in terms of adding is that they're right under the tax, um, by, I think the tech, what is the tax? One 2119. Yeah. They're close. They're at one 18 and change.

And they are, and they've traded their last 17 first round picks or whatever it is. And their owner is, was just, his family was, oh, everybody's suing each other and he might be out of it. Who knows? I don't, not even positive who's running their team now. It's kind of Del Demps. But then Danny Ferry's advising him? Somebody's advising him. I think Danny Ferry is advising him.

I think that's actually a fair representation of the hierarchy. The question that everyone else around the league has is to what degree are the Saints people and Mickey Loomis influential? And like if you talk to the Pelicans, they don't have any power at all. They're not even there. They don't know what the hell's going on. And then but like teams that talk to them about trades get the impression somehow that those people need to be consulted at least. So no one really knows what the hell is going on. Can we say that they have the biggest organizational slash fan-based disadvantage

right now of all the playoff teams? What is the fan-based disadvantage? I think their crowd is sad. It's a sad crowd. It's a football town, right? It's a football town. They seem to have 10,000 to 12,000 people per game.

I don't know man those those they need to change the color of the seats in the Pistons arena from red to like like just put I don't know what the hell what about fake bodies couldn't they just put just put paint t-shirts

on all of them or something so it looks like there are people I don't know what but that seems like a bad one I haven't I was at some that, that seems like a bad one. Um, I haven't, I was at some games in Denver earlier this year. I hope they're picking up there. Cause when I was there,

the Warriors were in and half the crowd was Warriors fans. And the other two games were kind of dead. That's the secondary market era. I think that's one of the biggest things that changed the last five years is it's so much easier for fans to get tickets when their team comes to town. You see it with the Clippers more than anything. The Clippers have, you know, they'll barely have a crowd where there's 80% Clipper fans there. It's always like a mix of stuff.

The Hawks are technically last in attendance. I just can't imagine that a Suns game is like hopping right now. We're going to take a quick break to talk about shaving i've been shaving since college i've talked about this many times in my podcast just did not have enough hair to shave in high school maybe once every couple weeks but i was kind of forcing it started shaving in college and immediately started ravaging my neck and getting those neck pimples and just cuts and all kinds of terrible stuff. And eventually I found the Gillette Fusion Ultra Sensitive Skin Shaving Gel and I no longer get those neck sets.

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at GilletteOnDemand.com. Gillette, the home of the New England Patriots. Seven straight AFC Championship games. Oh yeah, Gillette Stadium. GilletteOnDemand.com. And then don't forget about Bachelor Party. The Ringer Podcast network. People like the bachelor. We responded. We spun off Julia lemons, bachelor party podcast into its own feed

every Monday night, right after the show ends on ABC, we post Julia's breakdown of the latest episode. And then we run a little extra 20 minute episode. Uh, usually Wednesday, Thursday with Julia and her ringer staff are talking about stuff. We've had some great guests, usually Wednesday, Thursday, with Julian and Ringer Stafford talking about stuff. We've had some great guests, Ben Higgins, Dave Jacoby, my wife, a whole bunch of good ones coming up. Tell the Bachelor super fan in your life to subscribe to Bachelor Party on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Art19, SoundCloud, wherever you get your podcasts back to Zach Lowe. All right. One last spot of the all-star starters. We both have LaMarcus Aldridge here. I thought that was going to be one of our arguments.

You know, we can talk about what other front court player you would choose. I know who the names are. I just think on both ends of the ball, he's been really good. Like just really good. Rock solid, consistent, tries hard on defense, plays hard on defense's been really good like just really good rock solid consistent tries hard on defense plays hard on defense is actually good at it shooting well you know playing passing it unselfishly

just and the team it's the team is third in the west got to reward him somehow without Kawhi without Kawhi and like by the way without Tony Parker for a while without Danny Green here and there you like everyone's hurt all the time or resting all the time. He was 23-10 in 2015, and that seemed kind of like his peak season.

He's basically doing that again. He's actually shooting even a little bit better. What's the biggest case for me is that that team's winning, and you watch them in the last five minutes, and it's basically Aldridge or sometimes it's Manu. It's not like they have a lot of options in a close game other than him that you'd really want to explore. And he's been really consistent. And I think how the Spurs handled that whole thing this summer was pretty

instructive, you know, because he clearly asked him out and he was miserable. That was another thing for years. There were all these rumors about not rumors like you would hear the Spurs and Aldridge are unhappy with each other. It's been a bad match. Jackie McMullen writes a piece at the beginning of the season, essentially saying that or said it on TV or something. And the Spurs went crazy. It's like, and then again, just like we talked about the Clippers yesterday there, then we find out, oh yeah, it was all true the whole time. Everything we were heard was true, was true. Everything that was deniedippers yesterday. Then we find out, oh yeah, it was all true the whole time. Everything we heard was true was true.

Everything that was denied was true. He asked to be traded. Well, and then Popovich comes out. It was pretty rare to hear a coach admit that they botched a relationship that badly. And he's like, yeah, I tried to fit him into what we wanted from him instead of just playing to what he's good at.

And now they're playing to what he's good at. And I think they moved him too far from the rim. Now he's a little closer. Now he gets the ball in the spots he likes. Now, my only red flag here is when Kawhi comes back. Well, that's it. I mean, that's it. What happens?

Can you still keep him happy now that Kawhi has to have the ball running through him all the time? Well, because that's like, when Pop said, like, we tried to make him into something he wasn't. He shot 0.8 threes per game last year, 0.2 the year before, down from 1.5 his last year in Portland. I actually thought they made it a concerted decision when they got him. Everyone assumed he's going to shoot threes now because this is the Spurs. And they did the opposite. They said, we're going to get you closer to the rim.

He's up to 1.5 now. So if anything, he's moved back out a little bit. But really, I don't know what they tried to make him other than clearly the second option behind a top five player in the NBA. And he was accustomed to being a first option even with Damian Lillard on the team. So I don't know that they tried to dramatically remake LaMarcus Aldridge, and now they're dramatically remaking him

back the other way. I just think it's a matter of let's see what happens. Maybe they're just feeding him more. It does seem like he's backing down and doing more of the stuff he did in Portland than he used to. He was more of a stretch the floor guy in a lot of cases from what I remember last year

where it was like, wow, it's all right. This is, I guess, where basketball's going. Now, there's been games where they've just been like, just overpower whoever. Go ahead, do your thing, LaMarcus. And he's talking a lot. When you see them at the arenas where the mics are really loud around the court,

he's talking a lot on defense. He's talking a lot. He's had a great, he's had a really nice two-way season. And better to me than any of the other guys who would be in contention for that spot. Turns 33 in July. Yeah, the only cousins in Draymond would be the other two. So let's talk about them because I had them.

I have both those guys as locks. I have 10 locks, and I think Draymond is one of the locks. Boogie is putting up the 25 and 13. He's shooting a lot of threes. I don't necessarily know if that's a great thing. I kind of like him closer to the basket. He's one of the few guys who can basically create a shot out of complete shit with three seconds left at a shot clock. My question is, turns 28 in August, one of the most intriguing free agents we've had in a while because

he could go to the right team and be great. He could go to the wrong team, and it's the biggest disaster that team's done in five years. I don't think New Orleans should trade him. But Rosillo had a tweet yesterday, our friend Ryan Rosillo. Oh, I didn't see this. He had a tweet about Cleveland's not trading that Brooklyn pick for DeAndre Jordan, these guys.

Boogie is the guy they want if they're going to trade that pick. And that would be the one LeBron signed up for. Now, we have no idea what's going on with that Brooklyn pick. And if I'm running Cleveland, there's no way I'm trading it unless LeBron promises he's staying for at least two more years, right? Now, if they could get Boogie for that Brooklyn pick, which I guess the trade would be Thompson and the Brooklyn pick, maybe they'd have to take Asik's contract back and throw Channing Frye's expiring, whatever else needs to happen. I just wouldn't do that if I was New Orleans. I wouldn't even discuss Boogie unless you're putting Love and the Brooklyn pick

on the table. I was going to say, what if they put love in the pick? That's it. I'm like, you want boogie? I'll discuss love in the Brooklyn pick. And we can negotiate that back and forth. But Thompson in the Brooklyn pick isn't happening. I'm sorry. And by the way, I don't know if I would do it. If I'm New Orleans, I think I'd try to keep boogie. And I try to keep exploring this whole thing. And then if it doesn't work a year from now,

you can just trade boogie anyway. But the fear would be he might leave. So I don't know. It's a conundrum. And I don't know what I'm doing if I'm New Orleans. And I don't really trust the infrastructure they have to make a great decision. But I will say this, people are talking about, is Cleveland done? Are they finished? Oh my God. Oh, it's falling apart. If they were able to turn whatever into Boogie, that's now a different conversation. And putting him with LeBron, that's a little more scary if I'm the Warriors.

Yeah, between LeBron, Wade, and Boogie, they would really have a lot of guys who don't get back on defense diligently in the regular season. There's no denying the talent. And Love Davis, theoretically, is a really nice fit. But, you know, the hovering issue overall of this is that Davis has clearly made it known to them he does not want to play center, no matter what he says publicly,

because they have 14 centers on the team. And Love, having now played center for a while, on a lot of nights you could rejigger the matchup so that he guards centers and Davis guards fours, but functionally on offense they switch roles. It wouldn't work. I don't know that that's ideal because you like Davis' rim protection near the rim where it's not.

I mean, they have this issue now with Cousins there. But that's an interesting fit. But yeah, deals like this, they just require so many things falling into place that it seems too complicated. Just in a vacuum, would you trade Boogie for Love in the Brooklyn pick? Let's say the Brooklyn pick is going to be between seven.

Yeah, the Brooklyn pick, I would say is going to be between seven and nine. Yeah, I would do that. I mean, I would want to have a conversation with Anthony Davis. I mean, that's the most important variable to me if I'm the Pelicans. It's like, is this going to irritate you to the point that you're going to ask for a trade? Do you like Kevin Love? Do you like Boogie?

Where do we stand on all of this? But I think in a vacuum, Boogie's better than Kevin Love. But Kevin Love is, for what he is, really good. And that pick is interesting. And, you know, Boogie is an interesting personality that, you know, I don't know how completely I trust him to be part of my long-term core. I don't think either team would do it. I think the Cavs would be too scared to do it because they, LeBron would never commit at this point. And then if I'm New Orleans, I don't know.

Westbrook, we didn't talk about. We're going to take heat for not talking about Westbrook. No, he's a lock. He's a lock, right? Well, I'm talking about as a starter. He shouldn't be a starter. Okay. Make the case.

The other guys have been better than him. I mean, he's 44%, 31 from three. 25, he's almost averaging a triple-double again. It's amazing. He's very close to a triple-double again. 25, 10, and 10, basically. 9.8, 9.9 on the other two categories. I just think...

And by the way, I don't think he doesn't know exactly what those decimal points are. I just think Harden. He might try to get it done tonight. Harden has been a better offensive player and the gap in defense is not big enough. You know, Westbrook has been overrated

on that end for years and years and years. And Butler is a two-way guy. He's just been better. Just a better player this year. My real. And Curry is is I mean like if you want now I didn't start Curry

and probably won't when I write my column next week but if you wanted to if a Thunder fan came to you and said has Curry been

that much better that playing 15 fewer games or something doesn't factor into it at all I think that's a fair it's a fair question. Totally fair.

I agree with all your Westbrook points and I would add, I think it's on him that that team's not better. And I know that's unfair to blame the best player who's played well and more importantly, showed up for every game. And it's not like he's been bad,

but that team's talented. And he was the one that kind of had to figure out how to make it work. And he did it. And that's the only reason I didn't put him as a starter other than the stuff you mentioned. It's just like, you should be better than 23 and 20 or whatever they are when you have those guys on your team.

Well, okay. So they're horrible whenever he doesn't play. So that has to factor into any evaluation. Like when he's on the floor, they're really good. And when he's not, they stink. Even if Paul George is on the floor, I think the mellow only minutes are actually good, but it's a very small sample.

And the mellow George, you know, Westbrook, whatever. They're just bad when he doesn't play. And then you look at their team and you're like, everything we just said about the Pelicans, how many NBA players are on this team? How many guys that you trust in the fourth quarter of a playoff caliber game? How many do they have? Well, their bench is Jeremy Grant, who's been fine.

Patterson, who has not been right, although he's starting to look a little better. And, you know, you're... We said this last year, and then it turned out all those guys were NBA players. Ferguson, Abrinas, Hustis, Felton, those are guys like 7 through 11. You

trust any of those dudes? I like their crunch time. It's a team that, when there's five minutes left, with the ability that they have to play defense and the scoring that they have should not lose close games. And they have all year. And I don't understand that part of it. I'm going to throw this at you with the Westbrook thing because this is where I don't trust the on-off court status as much.

So we can agree that whoever they've put in as a backup for him the last couple of years has been a dramatic drop off. So that's one problem. The other problem is, and it's a little like this with LeBron too, where when somebody is doing everything, it's almost like we're both married and you have young kids. I used to have young kids. I used to have young kids where at some point the dad kind of, the mom's doing so much that all of a sudden when it's on us, we kind of don't know what to do. You almost have to go, oh shit, I have to make eggs. How do I, and you're looking around for stuff. That's kind of what happens with Westbrook when they're not in the game. He dominates and controls so much that I think they just have trouble trying to figure out

who they are when he's not in the court. Now, I don't know that's a combination of the bench isn't great, but also when you have somebody who has that big of a shadow, I think it's tough to play without it. We saw that with Kobe and the Lakers, and we've seen that with LeBron over the years and people like that. I wrote this during the playoffs last year. I think if you talk to guys on the Cavs about why is your team so bad when LeBron sits, and this was even when Kyrie, I mean, it was like Kyrie and Love were on the floor and

they were still bad. I think the answer you would have gotten a lot of the time is because we have no offense. Our offense is LeBron deciding what we're going to do on every position. Every single play. And by the way, he's the best decision maker maybe in the history of the NBA. He should have that power. But then you take him out and it's like, oh, we don't have like a structure. We don't have an identity.

We don't have like, we just sort of do stuff until somebody shoots. Well, look at, like Isaiah had this interesting quote, I think last night about, it's tough for him to get his shot going because the Cavs don't practice. Now, this is something I heard from, I did a podcast with Richard Jefferson last summer, and he said the same thing. It's like, basically, we never practiced. And that's why we would look so sloppy from night to night. We could look good one night, terrible the other night, because basically the games were when we played. That's pretty rough when LeBron, it's a trade-off, right? Because LeBron is, as we talked about yesterday, he's playing so many minutes and he's played so many minutes over the last 15 years and he's still playing at this crazy high level during games. But the trade-off is he's doing that partly because they don't practice at all. He doesn't want to waste any miles that aren't during an actual game. But think about the effect that has on a team when you're just not practicing at all. When has that ever worked? So I don't know.

I think people seem to think it's the greatest thing ever to have LeBron as the best player on your team or Westbrook or Duran or any of these guys, but there's always some sort of something that maybe isn't as great as maybe we think. And I think for the Westbrook thing, the control and the, and the Kobe, the stuff you just said,

I think that's a, that's a real thing. But to me, it's a lot about their bench. Their bench isn't great, but we said that last year. And then, like, I don't know. Those guys went somewhere else.

And all of a sudden, they were better bench players than we gave them credit for last year. Two of them were starters. Two of them were starters. Oladipo and Savonis were starters. I mean, their bench was like Samadji, Kristen, and, you know. Well, Kristen was probably, what was he, the worst guy who played 10 minutes a game last year?

Yep, probably. But we both have Russ as a probably, what was he? The worst guy who played 10 minutes a game last year. Yep. Probably. But we both have Russ as a lock. So who cares? We both have him as a lock. And it sounds like we both have dream on green as a lock. And he, he was my,

he was those, those two Russ and Draymond were my last of my eight absolute solid locks. And then I have a half a lock that I'm wavering on as a lock a little bit. Who's that? Carl Anthony Towns. Oh, wow. Okay, that's going to be a fun discussion. Draymond, I went with four Warriors.

We talked yesterday about pedigree winning. I think it matters. I think it matters that the Warriors are the signature team in the decade. I don't think they should be penalized. Draymond is the lifeblood. He's an unbelievable defender. The one thing you can really criticize, well, there's two things you criticize him on.

One is that I do think his emotions have hurt them a couple times this year. And if they don't get to 70 wins, that's probably the biggest reason because of some games when he's self-combusted. He's also not shooting that well. And I don't know whether two years ago was an aberration. In the playoffs, his three-point shooting has been better. But the last two years, he's basically been 31%, 32%. And what's sad about that is mostly wide-open shots, right? Nine out of ten times, he's got nobody within three feet of him.

And that's kind of their kill his heel. And the one thing that I think teams look at, like, well, just let him shoot all day. We're giving him that. But for me, he's still an all-star. Like you saw it Monday night. The all-around game he played in that is on the short list of things we're going to see by anybody this year.

Yeah, I just, you know, I don't think he's been quite as good this year. I don't either. But eight rebounds, seven and a half assists, almost a block and a half, almost a steal and a half. I still think he's probably neck and neck with Kawhi. He's the best defensive player in the league when they're healthy. Like, you know, again, he's an all-star. Draymond Green's an all-star.

I have Klay as a lock. Wow. Yeah. And partly because of the pedigree of the championship, all that stuff. I just love Klay. I'll totally admit I'm irrational about it. You know, the fact that he can be as productive as he is,

not an afterthought, but pretty close offensively and that he still plays hard. He's fun to play with when they need him to get hot. He will. I just like him. And I don't think there's anybody quite like him this year. He's 49, 45, 90,

49, 45, 90 club, which is very close to that 50, 45, 90 club. We talked about with Steph. I have no problem with Klay.

Klay is on my, I have one, two, three, four, five, like seven or eight guys from my last three spots and he's one of them. I just think for all-star purposes, he's fascinating to discuss because you're inevitably going to compare him to somebody like Damian Lillard, who is the number one option on a mediocre team

who has to do so much heavy lifting. And Klay just sorts to get to exist in this dream world where he has the ball fourth most. And literally, all he has to do is move around and set screens. And when the ball comes to him, he shoots it and it goes in and then he goes back on defense. And he's a good defensive player. That obviously helps his cause but

I don't know that it matters but I also don't know how does he fare if he has to become Damian Lillard or Devin Booker or Lou Williams or someone who has to run the show I don't know the answer to that but he doesn't have to so maybe it doesn't matter

I'd wanted four Warriors. It's fair. They're a generational team. I think it matters. All right. You had an eight and a half. You'll be happy to hear, because we haven't really argued about anything yet.

I do not have Towns on my all-star team. And I don't even have him as a bubble guy. I had my last two picks were Paul George and Lillard. And it was for me, Lillard versus Lou Williams. I did the game logs. I went through everything. And Lillard has just been more consistent. But we should mention Lou Williams' last 13 games

is averaging 31 a game. 48, 46, 92 splits. They're 10 and 3 in those games. He's 23 a game for the season. His stats are creeping closer and closer to where Lillard is. Percentages are better. There's almost no difference statistically between Lillard and Lillard, except he shoots better.

I think 20 games from now, if he keeps up this pace, he'll actually be having a better season. But he didn't get it going in time. And I'm with you that I think Lillard, being the number one guy on a mediocre team. Here's why I didn't have Towns. So PG over Towns. You have Cousins, right?

Cousins is a lock for you? Cousins is on. Yeah. Okay. Cousins is not a lock for me. Oh, wow. Oh, man. He's going to block you on Twitter now.

Have you been blocked on Twitter? It's already done. It's already done. I already got blocked like two years ago. Okay. Make the case. over cousins um feel like the wolves should have two all-stars he's clearly their second best player and i think probably since december 1st or thanksgiving thereabouts something maybe joelle and beads instagram taunting, lit a fire under his ass where he's actually started to compete on defense consistently every game.

And he's 50-40-85, I think. So his shooting has been ridiculous. His passing, he had nine assists the other night. I just feel like he's trended consistently in the right direction now for six weeks. Whereas, look, I don't want to turn this into a Cousins thing because I may put Cousins on the team. I just don't think it's a no-brainer because of everything. You already said it. It's just like every game there are too many possessions where there are nine guys on the television screen

and one guy who's not on the screen. And then a lot of stuff happens and like someone takes a shot and there's an offensive rebound and like someone else takes a shot and there's still just nine guys on the screen and I just I just know what that does to the morale of a team and I do think he's played harder like against Portland the other night I thought he played really hard last night I thought he played hard on defense for most of the game other than the first six minutes of the third quarter where immediately Kyrie hit a three where he didn't step up on a screen and he raised his hand and he took the blame for it and then

there were like three or four possessions where there were nine guys on the screen and Tatum hit a three on one of them after an offensive rebound and someone else hit a three and it's not all because of DeMarcus it's some of it is because of Boston shot making but like they're just it's not all because of DeMarcus. Some of it is because of Boston's shot making, but like they're just, it's just, there's just a lot of that. There's just a lot of that. And, you know. So you're saying he's the MVP of your, why are there only nine guys on my screen?

I'll start them. Yeah. It's all fair. You know, and I don't like, it's not clear to me when you, when you watch them play and you look at their statistical resumes, is he better than Nikola Jokic? If you were building a team, which one would you want? Who do you think is more fun to play with? Who do you think elevates his teammates more?

Oh, Jokic I think Cousins is like in a situation like last night playing my favorite team I'm more scared of Cousins yeah and and that's and that's the flip side is Jokic had 29 last night I think and you're like where is this every game why are there halves where you take two shots like can you can you get your ass into the paint and do stuff I I don't know. I don't know the answer. Like I said, I haven't made decisions. I think Towns has been better

than both of them as a two-way player. And by the way, Jokic, a minus on defense, but tries hard, is rarely going to be the one guy not on the screen. Rebounds the hell out of it.

He's neck and he's like almost equivalent to Cousins as a rebounder. So I don't, you know, it's not an easy choice to me. I don, I don't know. I had issues with towns and I think it's a little tainted by the quipper game. I went to where I saw him in person where he was putting up empty stats and I didn't feel like he had a big impact in the game. And Butler was just mad at him the whole game, just mad at him. Just doesn't, you learn a lot when you go to these

games, as you know. And I like to look at the bench during timeouts. I like to look at the 20 seconds after the timeout when everybody's kind of hanging around near the scorer's table, whether they're interacting or not, what happens during free throws. And I just did not like the chemistry in that team. And it didn't seem like they liked him. And it seemed like they were really just frustrated with him that he was. And then he ended up getting his stats,

which was the weird thing. And this is a Blake Griffin thing too, or Blake Griffin will get his stats. But when you're actually watching the game and you're there, you're thinking like, like the Houston game the other night that I went to, he got his stats, but I'm watching it going,

man, he's Blake. Doesn't look good. Wow. He's below the rim. Wow. He's turning the ball over a lot, man. They're guarding with PJ Tucker. Oh, and, but then he got his stats. So I, Towns, I still feel like can go up a level and maybe, maybe playing with Butler will be the best thing that ever happened to him. And you're right. He has been trying harder and it does seem like, like, uh, I don't know whether it's Tibbs, whether it's peer pressure from Butler or what, but something has changed with him. I need to see more of it. And that's why I left him off.

So again, like if you, if, so I had Kat as half a lock, right? So if you just pretend that he's not a lock at all, I have eight locks. That means I have four open spots. And the real candidates I would give for those four open spots are Kat, Cousins, Jokic, Clay, Lillard, Lou Williams, and Paul George. So that's seven guys for four spots. Yeah, it's tough. I've texted those seven names to 50 coaches in front office guys in the last few days, just because I'm curious. So they rank these guys for all-star purposes. I guarantee you in the 50 replies, I've gotten every possible permutation of those seven in order. No one knows. It's just like, it's a complete matter of taste. Some people are totally out on Cousins. Some people are Cousins is number one. Some people the Klay-Dame kind of dilemma

that I brought up, they fall on both sides of it. It's just not really possible, but a PG is an interesting one because the numbers aren't there like they are for some of the guys, but the defense has been just so outrageously good that I'm leaning toward

he should be in. That's why I had him. I think the all-defense team this year is pretty fun, because there's no Kawhi this year, so that spot opens up. Who would you have as your all-defense frontcourt first team right now? Oof. On the spot.

Yeah, because Paul George, I think, is on list. And I think Durant's on that list and probably Draymond would be my three. A three man front court. Durant, Draymond, Paul George. Okay. So the names that are not there that are interesting to me are Giannis. Oh shit. I forgot about Giannis. Oh. Davis. Giannis is on there too. Damn. So who gets knocked out? Maybe Giannis gets in as a guard. Well, he should get in as just Giannis.

That's what he should be on the ballot. Giannis has no position. Position, Giannis. All right. So that's a great all-defense team then. Giannis, Paul George, Draymond, Durant, and then whatever guard we want to throw in there. But I always like to think like the all defense team, and you'll see some years if you go back to like the, especially like the nineties and you'll see those years where it's like, you know, Hakeem with David Robinson. But it would just be like just Michael Jordan, Pippen, Hakeem. And you just think like, oh my God, imagine if those guys all played together, nobody would score.

I do feel like we're kind of broaching that this year with some of the guys we have. Like if you put a team out of Durant, Giannis, Paul George, Draymond, and any guard who can shut down a boy guard. Just pretend Kawhi's healthy. Just make Kawhi the fifth guy. Oh my god. Well, I think we're going to have to pretend Kawhi's healthy for a while.

What the hell's wrong with Kawhi? He played the other night and looked pretty good. I'm hopeful that they're in Brooklyn tonight, so I'm going to be at that game. I'm hopeful that we can actually see him play consistently for the next bit. Pretty good in game 48 is not what I'm looking for

from one of the four best players in the league last year. But he's been hurt the whole year. I mean, they care about him being great in May. And, you know, that's what they're going to do. So you're not concerned at all about that one? Oh, I'm concerned. But like I said, I just want... Let me get to a point where I've seen him play

10 or 15 times and I hope we're at that point. And if it turns out we're not, then I'd get very concerned. If Chris Paul had played eight more games, would you have him as a lock? Whew.

Boy, the West is just a bloodbath every year. It really is. I would say it's as bloody this year as it's ever been. Let me ask you... Maybe. I would say it's as bloody this year as it's ever been. Let me ask you, let me, maybe, I would say maybe, but let me ask you a question. In your heart of hearts, do you believe in the Rockets?

No. Yeah. Most people don't. Honestly, most people in the league don't. Partly what I watched the other night. Any game, when you rely on threes to that ridiculous level that they do, league don't partly what I watched the other night any game when you rely on threes to that ridiculous level that

they do it's just too easy for them not to go in one game you know just they're just chucking them up they're taking over 40 a game now makes me nervous I really hope they're healthy in the playoffs because they should be the they're healthy in the playoffs because they should be the second best team in the nba i think they are the second best team

and i i want to see how they react when they get punched in the mouth in the first round or the second round do they wilt do i mean like they just i i said this on my pod last week and i'm surprised the rockets fans didn't yell at me like they have a little bit of a front runner vibe to them like when things are going great and everyone's healthy they're rolling everything's good right then like then like Chris gets hurt and all of a sudden every crunch time possession is game five against the Spurs again where it's step back three step back three step back three no movement no nothing and then they just like they just got they just like unravel sometimes like against the Clippers I just just, there's something I want to, they are to me the second best team in the league.

And at the same time, I am very eager to see them 1-1 in the first round against the Pelicans or something. It's just, you know, what, how do you respond? Well, Daryl's counter argument to that would be when they had both of those guys together on the four, they were eviscerating teams. That's right. But that's what I mean. I agree. They were were i went down there and i wrote a whole big thing about how it was for three weeks and and so you have a big big adversity not little adversity harden being heard as big adversity chris being heard as big adversity but it's adversity like like the spurs respond very well to adversity the rockets don't appear to so you're going to get

adversity in the playoffs somewhere, whether it's an injury or someone on another team playing way above his head or some bad calls or whatever. Like, I'm just, I'm curious. I think the one thing I noticed with them, like they're doing a lot of switching on Lou Williams on Monday night. It's not like, oh, Lou Williams is hot. Let's shut him down, throw somebody on them. That's not really what they do defensively. It does seem like the Lou Williams type is somebody that they don't really have anyone on their roster who can really shut down somebody like that. Who is it? Is it like they were putting Trevor Reese on Lou Williams and the Clippers were just running little switches to get him to get whoever they wanted to actually guard the Williams. I don't know. I think those type of guys can really hurt them in a playoff series.

But I have a better Houston question for you. Okay. Do you like watching this Rockets team? When they're healthy, yes, I do. And actually, ultimately, I do. I've enjoyed watching Chris this year, even when James is not playing, because I feel like he's playing in more space and playing a little faster and getting a little meaner.

Maybe when you get switches on him, when he gets big men switched onto him. But I get what you mean when it's just one of them. Like even with, even with CP, if it's just him, a lot of their offenses, pick and roll switch dribble for eight seconds,

check up a three or throw itrange jumper. Check up a three. Or throw it to somebody who checks up a three. I think the combo of how they play, which I'm just like semi-bored by at this point, it'll get more fun in the playoffs when those guys are together. And then they have a top three worst home crowd. Shout out to Houston. God bless you guys. Why?

I don't like the energy at all. I don't think the crowd affects the game at all. They seem bored. I need more from the Houston crowd. If you're going to have the second best team in the league, step it up, Houston. Come on. I know you have it in you.

You had great crowds during the Hakeem era. Have you watched a Rockets home game and thought, wow, the crowd's really winning this game for them? Never. It's never happened. Not since the Hakeem era. The Hakeem era, they had great crowds. I want to see great Houston crowds again.

I have one really goofy thing to throw at you before we go. Okay. So 1988, I noticed like guys were turning 30 this year. Okay. I was like, wow. Oh, Curry's turning 30 this year. Okay. I was like, wow. Oh, Curry's turning 30 this year. Interesting. And I was like, oh, Durant's turning 30.

So I looked up some birthdays. 1987, the year before 1988. I like that you had to clarify that. Here were the four best players born in 1987 ready mike conley oj mayo ty lawson and andrew bynum i'm gonna take your word for it i haven't done the research take my word for this yeah you there's no way i know you're spock but there's no way you research this 1988 one year later, Curry, Durant, Westbrook, Kevin Love, Derrick Rose, Eric Gordon, DeAndre Jordan, Nick Batum, and shout out to Greg Oden, who should have made it. And I think 10 years, if he comes along 10 years later with what we know about bodies

now compared to 10 years ago, I think he makes it. 1989, James Harden, Blake Griffin, DeMar DeRozan, Jimmy Butler, Isaiah Thomas, Serge Ibaka, Tyreek Evans, Michael Beasley. 1990, Paul George, Boogie Cousins, Damian Lillard, Clay Thompson, John Wall, Draymond Green, Gordon Hayward, Kemba Walker, Drew Holiday, Ricky Rubio. So three straight years basically built the talent pool for probably the biggest reason why the NBA is so awesome right now. Those three years was just like a freaking boon. And then you go to 91, it's Kawhi McCollum, Chris Middleton, Tristan Thompson, Derek Favors were done. So it's this three-year boom of just awesome talent for no reason at all. Chew on that.

I would be interested to hear who's 86. The years before, it was all like that 87 year where it's like four guys, five guys. So some of it is the natural age. Are there good guys that have aged out or gotten themselves injured out? It's like a cluster theory. So you're telling me that there's only one guy left in the league

that was born in 1987 or first round draft? One relevant, awesome guy. Yeah. Mike Conley is the only kind of impact guy left from the 87 year. How weird is that? Those guys are only 31. But that's the thing. It's like these clusters go and this has kind of determined the history

of the NBA where you had like the cocaine era just wipes out all these dudes. And then you have like that Kenny Anderson era of, of everybody just made too much money too soon. And we lost a whole bunch of guys from that era. And this was kind of the first era that everybody had good advantages. Nobody did anything dumb. People just worked hard. And we have this cluster that made the league. And now what's interesting about the 88 birthdays is 30, unless you're LeBron, that's usually where you should have peaked

by then as a player. The 27 to 30 range, you kind of are who you are at that point. So I think like Curry, Durant, Westbrook, I don't know how they get better than what we've seen. I would say they've hit their apex. So we'll see. Now it's the next generation. I'm sure like the Giannis, whatever his birthday year was,

I'm sure there's guys from that. It just seems like the talent pool is constantly replenished now. And then you see this college class we have coming where Dockage, you know, I know you don't care about college and the Euros and all that, but Donkic might, Darrell said there's no comp to him as like with how measuring like Euro guys. He's demolished every sort of anything that any under 20 guy has done in Euro from a comp standpoint. I've seen him play a little bit internationally in some of the international competitions

for Slovenia. So I'm very excited for him. He's 6'8". He has all the makings of being your favorite player of all time. Well, that's a bold statement. Yeah. He's Croatian, right? Slovenian.

Where do we stand on the Slovenians? I'm a pan-Yugoslavian. Of all the Yugoslavian countries, I've been to almost all of them, spent considerable Where do we stand on the Slovenians? I feel like we can't do this without I can't do this without hearing how you feel about the Paul Pierce Isaiah Thomas tribute thing which we made fun of yesterday but now in the interim it has been sort of finalized do you just not care? I think it's a little dishonest of the Celts to run the tribute video after they completely shanked Isaiah

I think they should have just let the crowd cheer for him and move on. Wow. It was a shanking. Can you describe it any other way? The guy was hurt, kept playing, kept playing, made everything worse, kept playing, played through it, jeopardized a nine-figure contract, and then they shanked him. And they did it because it was what you have to do if you're a team. You can't have the loyalty over.

I'm not criticizing the mindset behind it, but they shanked him. And he was a great Celtic, and the fans loved him. And the moment that they could turn him into a better player, they did. I think to run a tribute video and pretend that didn't happen is weird. Breaking news, by the way, Derrick Rose is a go for tomorrow. Change your cabs expectations accordingly. By the way,

the only thing I care about the video, I don't care about the video tributes. I think it's crazy what a story it's become. I will say this. I admire, I admire Pierce for being honest. Yeah. About, I kind of want my night, I kind of want my night. I kind of want my night because he risks coming off as petty and insecure,

and people are making fun of him for that, I'm sure. But we want our athletes to be like these superhuman, invulnerable specimens. But at the same time, we want them to be honest and vulnerable, I guess, when they give interviews and stuff. And then we hit them when they're honest and they say something we don't like. I like that he's like, he's kind of putting it out there. Like, you know, you might think that I'm being petty or insecure. Maybe he doesn't think anyone will interpret it that way. But I like that he's at least he's not pretending that he's above it and that he doesn't care. He's revealing that he cares.

And sometimes like people think caring is not cool. You know what I mean? It's like he cares and he's OK kind of being out there. I kind of like that. Yeah. And it goes both ways. Right. Like when somebody like Cameron, like Durant in the podcast I did with him last year,

and he's super honest about stuff, and then he gets criticized. But then you have the flip side of it, which is LeBron, who has done a masterful job of just not saying much and presenting a certain angle of himself. But I don't feel like we've had, I don't feel like I know LeBron that well.

I don't really know what makes him tick. Like he's done a great job of being accessible but guarded at the same time and usually doesn't get into trouble. He's, again, he's masterful at it. But would basketball be more fun if he was a little more honest? Yeah.

I don't know. We seem to go back and forth on whether we want these guys to spill themselves or not i do and i think when when when guys say things like like you know i i think it was tracy mcgrady once gave an interview about you know just about how all the injuries had made him scared of getting hurt yeah and and people people gave him crap for that because, you know, again, we want everyone to be a superhero. Like, I think it's cool when athletes share stuff. Like, they're human beings.

Like, I've said that I wrote this before. Like, when Pedro Martinez had his little meltdown and, like, beamed Kareem Garcia and just, like, decided, like, I give up. The Yankees are completely in my head and I'm going to show everybody that they're in my head. That made me like him more. Like there was a very human response to a plight. You know, it made me like him more

that he was kind of a baby. Where do you stand on Embiid and some of the theatrics he's had this year? I'm pro because he knows that a lot of people are going to hate it and people are going to come after him and he's going to have to back it up. And he's fine with that. He knows that there are consequences.

He seems to know that there are consequences. Yeah. And he doesn't think that he should just be able to do it and there should be no consequences. So I'm okay with it. Over under for career games for Markel Fultz. Oh my God. What would you guess? What is the line?

I'm saying you come up with the line. If the line were 200, I would take the over, I guess. I mean, so that's 200 is three full seasons. Do you think this is the most bizarre story of this century in the NBA?

Because I'm still going with Gilbert Arenas and Javaris Crittenden. I think this is more bizarre. Bizarre. I think it's more bizarre. Is it more dramatic? I don't know. But it's more bizarre. Definitely with people around the league,

it's definitely the one that is being discussed behind closed doors with the most confusion right i i can't think of anything that's more bizarre i'm looking at the standings right now to make me to if see if just the name of a team triggers something in my head i shouldn't have said the word trigger since we're just talking about gilbert arenas but um i, I don't, nothing is coming to mind. Nothing. It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable.

This guy was like the one guy that everybody thought was a lock in the NBA draft last year, and we have not seen him yet. And his shot now takes three seconds to unfurl. And the one time there was actually public news about it, other than what Brett Brown says every day, which Brett Brown increasingly becoming unhinged about the entire subject matter, it's just making it even more bizarre slash entertaining.

Yeah, he's not happy. It just turned into a, he said, they said, he said, the agent says this, the trainer says this, Colangelo says this, the coach says this, to the point that there were entire articles that were just like, let me explain what everyone said and when, because the situation is just too confusing for anybody to keep track of. And that's just the public part of it. It's, it's. I would say the way, if I was advising him, if he called me randomly out of the blue today and said, what should, can you help me? The one

thing I would do is I would, I would have do is I would surround myself with better people. I thought the way that his agent handled that whole thing was insane. Just didn't get it. And to not be aligned with the team and having two different stories and everything was just so confusing. What's really kind of flat out perplexing is how the, is this now the fourth number one pick the Sixers have had that didn't play as a rookie? Counting Sarich?

We're going to go down a real dark black hole if we start going into the Sixers draft history. But yeah, sure. Noel Embiid, Sarich. What are the odds of that? Noel, yeah.

Noel Embiid, Sarich. It's the fifth one. Simmons, yeah. What are the odds of that? Well, when you purposely take guys who are injured and you don't know they won't play, then the odds become higher. And it's part of your strategy. Simmons got injured.

They didn't know that one. They had no idea false was going to happen. No, they did not. Do you like doing TV more? Are you more comfortable? Yeah, TV is fun. I like TV. Remember I had to put a gun to your head and put actual bullets in it

and flip the thing to try to get you to come on once? And it was fun. Yeah, you overthought it. You were good at it though. You like it now. TV's fun. I like TV. You know, it's just I have to go to Los Angeles for it, which is a long way away.

But it's for some of it anyway. I don't like how you've kind of replaced me with Rachel Nichols. Wow. That's a strong... I'm like the first wife. Now Rachel Nichols is like the second wife. I don't see her much. And I'm like, we still get along great and we still have the kids

and then custody and joint custody and all that. And it's awesome. And we have no hard feelings or anything, but, but yet I see what you have with your second wife and it hurts. It hurts sometimes. Hey, there's only, there's only one Grantland. The last time I was in, I went to the Grantland, uh, uh, uh, podcast event in October on the first big day of the regular season. I still made time for that. We're all, we're all, we're going to hopefully all get together in Los Angeles for the All-Star game. Hopefully, if that happens,

you will bring a Grantland hoodie for me, which I still don't have. You never got one. I have to go in the attic and try to find one. I'm way low on Grantland merchandise. So there's only one. When Shea Serrano came to New York to do his book event, one of his many, I'm sure he had multiple books. Future president Shea Serrano. Yeah. There

was one event where it was a panel of me, him, Rembert, and Network. Wow. And the panel was just all questions from the crowd. And someone asked me about Grantland. And I said, actually, all these years later, not that long ago, but when someone is unfortunate enough to recognize me and know who I am in public and approach me, the number one question is, was Grantland as great as it seemed? And the number two question is, are you still friends with Bill? Those are the two questions I get more than anything else. That's nice. Not, do you hate my team or how the Knicks? Those are the two.

So anyway. Well, about eight years from now and president Shea Serrano is negotiating a deal with South Korea. We'll know, you know, it'll be like, oh yeah, we first knew about him with Grantland and that's how Grantland will be remembered. That's your one shot to become the secretary of sports or whatever the common sense. There it is. That's your one shot to become the secretary of sports or whatever. The common sense. The czar. Yeah. Sports czar. There it is. That's your one shot right there.

You found the guy that you need to ride into that position. I'll tell you the one thing I'm doing with the NBA. We're going down to 75 games like immediately. Okay. Immediately. I don't think you'd get it. Well, you'd get some pushback. 75 games and we're doing the entertaining and sell tournament and we're off.

Everybody can thank me later. Zach Lowe, do you have a calm? You're doing your 10 things I think and didn't like and didn't like. On Friday. On Friday. Okay. And then I will do my all-star selections on Tuesday when the reserves are announced that morning. I'll put mine out and

then we got some other things in the hopper and then all-Star on trade deadline. All right. Subscribe to the Low Post podcast on Apple or wherever you get your podcast, ESPN Podcenter, all that places. Zach Lowe, this was a pleasure as always. Talk to you soon. Always a pleasure, my friend.

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Get every fourth order free. Visit Gillette online at GilletteOnDemand.com. Another good podcast coming Friday that includes Mike Francesa and some other stuff too. And don't forget about my column on TheRinger.com every Friday. Back soon. Thanks. On the way.