The Daily Zeitgeist - What's Old Is Old Again with C.J. Holmes

Episode Date: November 10, 2022

Miles and Jack were honored to be joined by the Warriors writer for the SF Chronicle, C.J. Holmes on today’s episode! The trio discussed Milwaukee's dominance, Cleveland looking dangerous, the Dubs looking to turn things around out west and plenty more!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm Keri Champion, and this is Season 4 of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. Every great player needs a foil. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Listen to the making of a rivalry.

Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Capital One, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports. I'm Keri Champion, and this is Season 4 of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark vs. Angel Reese. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's basketball.

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With a hint of mischief. One episode at a time. Buckle up and listen to In Our Own World on the iheart radio app apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts trust us it's out of this world we're back and milwaukee continues to dominate cleveland is looking potent to say the least meanwhile the dubs are suddenly looking to turn things around in the West West, y'all. And we'll discuss some of that and plenty more with the Warriors writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, CJ Holmes. On today's episode, I'm Miles Gray. And I'm Jack O'Brien. And this is

Miles and Jack Abadusi's teacher. Thought you could beat. I don't know. There was a delay. I might have won that one. We'll have to go to the tape. Brian, let us know if it was a photo finish. Anyway, welcome to the latest edition of Miles and Jackababboosties. CJ Holmes from the San Francisco Chronicle. Welcome, CJ. Thank you so much for joining us, man. Jack, Miles, thanks for having me, man. Anytime, anytime. Man, well, I was saying before we started recording, what's old is old seems to be the theme of this early part of the nba season i mean we got we got the lakers you know the lebron led lakers we got the kd led net we got the clippers with kawaii we got chris paul you know the the sons have looked pretty decent but they've been chris pa Paul's having a rough one.

And Golden State, also a little slow out of the gates. Is it age? What is it, CJ? It's making me feel young. I'm like, Chris Paul is old enough to be my father at this stage. Making me feel young, but I don't know. How are you feeling, CJ? I mean, with the Warriors' struggles, I think right now,

11 games into the season all signs are kind of pointing towards that bench you know heading into the season i think fans were expecting the loss of a guy like gary payton the second auto porter junior damian lee namania belizza four veteran rotational guys that were able to help them win the championship last year and although you know all four veteran rotational guys that were able to help them win the championship last year. And although, you know, all four of those guys left in free agency, the idea was that, oh, you know, in comes Dante DiVincenzo, which is Michael Green, you know, two vets you can kind of just plug and play. Moses Mooney, Jonathan Kaminga, you know,

they're going to be a year older and wiser. They'll plug right in. And, you know, the Warriors will be able to keep up their winning ways I mean I'm one who thought that myself but I think it was greatly underestimated the time it would take to get these guys on the same page in terms of chemistry you know you got to think of fact that guys like Moody and Kaminga were basically at the end of the bench last year they didn't play much they have some NBA experience but they I don't think they had enough entering the season to assume

that they'd be amazing rotational players right off the bat. Another thing is, you got to think guys like Dante DiVincito, he's been hurt for the last, like what, eight, seven, eight games? And Jermichael Green, these are guys playing in that warrior system

for the first time. And that's, you know, if you ever played for Steve Kerr, you kind of know that that's not a system that's not necessarily easy to grasp. Yeah, I have paid for him. Yeah, I get it. So like all those things kind of coupled together,

it's led to a slow start for that bench unit. And then if you look at the numbers, you know, the Warriors have one of the best starting fives in the league. And then as soon as those reserves start trickling in, whatever lead they built slowly starts to evaporate. That's kind of been the theme through the first 11 games of this season. And while the bench isn't completely to blame in all this,

they certainly do have a lot of the blame. James Wiseman, in particular, has been getting a lot of that blame. He's the guy who now finds himself on the outside looking in when it comes to the rotation. So the the guy who now finds himself on the outside looking in in terms of the rotation. So the key to the Warriors getting back on track this season is to figure out this bench rotation. Steve Kerr experimented a minute

with more lineups than I could even count last night and almost proved costly. Luckily, Wardell decided to go for 47. Yeah. That was last night's game. That was Golden state versus the kings that the the warriors were able to pull it off snap that streak last moment yeah but uh you know one thing steve kirk said after the game is playing like this isn't sustainable expecting

steph to you know put on throw on his superhero cape and drag us to victory that's not gonna be sustainable over the course of the season eventually those young guys that bench they're gonna have to figure it out they're gonna have to match they're gonna have to step up and until they do golden state's gonna continue to struggle speaking of young guys figuring it out i do just want to talk about the other side of the coin that i opened up talking about with the you know the people that we're we're used to being like well it's it's lebron it's k going to cook, they're going to be near the top of the standings. I feel like the young guys have come in this season and just kicked in the door. He's 27, which is wild. Donovan Mitchell, 26. Tatum, 24. Luka, 23. All of them are averaging over 30.

Ja, 23, is right at 29. Like even Shea Gilgis, who's 24, is averaging close to 30. Or I think he's at 30 right now. So it's like all the young guys are just, I don't know, they're playing out of their mind. We talk about a theory on here that like the NBA is progressive and it gets better and better every season. The players get better and better because they're just like building their games on top of the games of the players they've seen come before. And it feels like we're seeing an especially big ramp up in how good guys are. I mean, one of the most exciting players in the world is still too young to play in the NBA this season with Wemba Yama. Like, it really feels like there's a balance of power shift that this is obviously very early, but we're seeing a balance of power shift to the young guys in the league in the early running is is what i think could be happening i feel like if you were born in the 80s

you know we had our time i was born in the late 90s but yeah i can imagine that this would be hard for you to uh look at yeah no i mean it it does feel like that, though. Like, there's a disembarkation point or something where we're seeing the elders be like, okay, we're starting to really show it. And at the same time, we're really starting to actually begin to see what the future of the league, like the future stars really are as they cement themselves. Yeah, there's definitely a shifting of the guard going on,

you know, if you will. You know, you still got your old heads out here balling, you i guess lebron's decent enough still even though la is not playing well uh yeah right steph is still steph uh katie is still katie but you know like you said there's such an influx of young explosive scoring talent right now in the league and uh they're starting to kind of wean out the old guys yeah in a couple of years, all the names you mentioned, those guys are going to be the face of this league. LeBron, Curry, KD, four to five years from now, it's going to be a new era in the NBA,

led by, I don't know, a Shea Gildas Alexander or a Jason Tatum. Luka Doncic is probably the best of the entire bunch, right? I mean, this guy is 23 years old out here putting up numbers hitherto undreamt of. So it would definitely be interesting to follow going forward. He's playing uncle ball in the driveway on the whole league, is how I feel about Luka. Like I was talking earlier about, there's's no like when you play luca you're playing within the framework of playing him more so than like how can we affect change in his game i don't know if that's if we're quite there

because he looks so dominant so comfortable and how he how he's playing so when i see things like that i'm like wow that's like a whole that's like a whole other edge, too, that players are really starting to showcase. He looks comfortable. That's a really good way of putting it. He looks so comfortable and he can do whatever he wants at any moment when he's out there on offense. And it's always been that way.

I mean, Luka's been like that from the moment he stepped into the league. And it's crazy because you've watched what he did his rookie year, and it's crazy because you've watched what he did his rookie year and it's like man it's gonna be scary to see what this guy's gonna be like and you know once you get some nba experience under his belt you know three four years from now and all that is starting to come to fruition right now yeah i mean you guys think luca is like the mvp front runner right now maybe? I think Giannis has to be.

We're 10 games in, right? That's what I was saying. LeBron and KD both look good, but they're looking good in a way that is still not translating to wins. The Bucs are 9-1 and Chris Middleton still hasn't played yet.

He's putting up 33 points, 12 boards, boards five assists shooting 57 percent from the floor and and playing like you know defensive player of the year caliber defense i feel like it's his to lose and it does seem like it's been long enough that people are gonna be like all right we're not bored of this anymore we'll we'll let him have it donovan mitchell also just i think we're looking at people putting up real wacky numbers i mean last week when we're talking he was just he was like he was only second to like wilt chamberlain for like coming to a new team and just like having the averages he was it is a really just such an interesting time because like to your point i would always go to bed being like we got lebron and ad will be okay and then the more i look at i'm like we got lebron and ad

and there's that that shift is something that i'm like wow that i mean that just goes to show you how much better they're like there are so many people performing at a high level now that it just things aren't the same and like you say jack old is looking like it's old don't count us out you know don't count the geriatric millennials out just yet i mean tatum has to be in the conversation like i do i do think tatum yannis and luca are probably and then ja are probably like the four people who like just being passive and then maybe Donovan. Yeah.

But it's all, it's all those young guys are, are the conversation for MVP right now. And I'm guessing you guys have Steph out of that conversation right now, simply because his team is not winning. Yeah, I guess that's right. I will,

I will admit to using such brute, uh, inelegant logic, caveman logic, if you will, uh, to determine that. But I mean, like to your point earlier, I, I don't logic if you will uh to determine that but i mean like to your point earlier i i don't know if you said it on mike yet but it is hard to discount the warriors especially

off of yeah they've seen before but i'm just i just to ask like how do you see clay fitting into all that right now you know because that's another one where i'm looking and i'm like okay he's he's going through something, something happening. You know, I think we kind of like overblow the whole Clay's struggling narrative. Kind of look at Clay season to season over the course of his career. He's always historically been a guy who takes a little while to get going. Right. That's a good point.

to get going right um that's a good point but the one thing that kind of you know threw me entering the season is you know clay finally had a full well i guess as full as it could be considering the fact that they didn't stop playing basketball until june but clay had a full off season under his belt no injuries and the idea was clay was going to come in and you know fully rested healthy and just lighted up from game one. But it was strange this offseason because Clay kind of shared with us out in Vegas. We're not in Vegas. We're out in Japan. And we see that Clay's a scratch for the first preseason game. And it's like, what's going on?

And he shares with us that he kind of had a mental block from playing pickup this summer because that's how he hurt his Achilles a couple years ago. And that prevented him from playing a lot of pickup pickup this summer you know because of you know that's how you heard his achilles a couple years ago and that prevent him playing a lot of pickup ball this summer so he kind of entered the season not necessarily in basketball shape in terms of like getting up and down the floor and like all the reps that come with that and that kind of just just had me pause it's just like you know this isn't the way you want to start the season you know me in particular i think clay had a strong finish the year last year you know he wasn't he wasn't overly efficient offensively in the finals but you know he had his moments he has moments throughout the postseason and say what you want about his offense against the celtics in that six game series but he played

damn good defense yeah um and i thought there would be more carryover into the season then you know he had that one preseason game. I think it was against, like, what, Denver or something? Or he split it up. It's like six for six and three. And you just think, like, Klay would be ready to hit the ground running. And then, you know, the first game of the year gets here. And now we're 11 games in. And, you know, he's on pace to have, you know, career low efficiency.

Is it going to stay like this all season long? You know, for the warrior's sake, I hope not because clay being clay is obviously very key in their championship aspirations, right? Clay has to be clay. That's kind of the piece that most assumed would fall into place this

year, but it's, it's really early clay has faith that, you know, Rick Celebrini, you know, the warriors head trainer, he has faith that Rick Celebrini, the Warriors head trainer, he has faith that Rick's... They've kind of been limiting his minutes early.

He's probably not going to play in back-to-backs for most of the year because the goal is to keep Klay fresh and available come playoff time. He's going to be needed the most, assuming they make the playoffs. I mean, it's going to happen at this point before it's seven.

But yeah, Klay has to be K clay for this team to be at their best and uh right now he's not and his struggles offensively in terms of efficiency at times hurts the entire team yeah by the way just like some stray stats on the guys we were talking about luca is shooting 70.7% on drives this season. And that's well, you know, taking on the third most drives per game. Also leads the league in assists off drives per game. And I'm pretty sure he still hasn't scored under 30 in a game, which really, like, just looking at that run of numbers of, like, just game by game, 32, 35, 37, 41, 31, 44, 33, 35, 36, reminds me of when I was a Jordan fan.

And I couldn't catch every one of his games, but I would just be looking at his stats and just being like, man, he's unstoppable. This guy's good, huh? Man, have you guys heard about this Jordan guy? I think the number's supposed to be this high normally. Okay. And then Ja still shooting 45% from three, which is something, you know, he was shooting like 70 through the first couple games,

but he's still putting up a lot of threes and shooting at a pretty good clip. So that's pretty interesting. Should we hit our underrated performers of the week, Miles? Pretty quick. Let's see. Who are we looking at this week's Mad Boosties underrated performers of the week? Some of the

people that may have flown under the radar. I know first off... Oh, yeah. Evan Mobley with 11 points, 8 rebounds, and 8 blocks. And went over the pistons. I don't know how that didn't how that wasn't anytime anyone's getting up into the duct towards double digits and blocks or steals like i don't know man that's that's wild that'll make your whole week and like yeah annual fantasy that's

that's pretty good oh yeah yeah and i remember like that i think jabari shared that like stat with us and i was my eyes were watering because i think it was like right before the lakers were about to play the calves and i was like you know we gotta look at this kind of stuff right now i gotta say man russ coming off the bench the six man of the year we talked about it pre-season jokingly we're calling him six man of the year. Yeah. Through five games, we were like, they got to try the six man thing. Like, I really think that makes sense as a strategy of like Russ as a off speed pitch coming at the second unit. And they've looked much better, which isn't saying that much, but they now have a couple of wins under their belt. I could see them tearing off a little run of games, probably leaning more towards golden state, tearing off like 10 in a row than the Lakers tearing off 10 in a row.

But I'd say that it's still, it's definitely made them a lot more exciting to watch and made them seem like they've like come together as a unit and he's embracing it. And as a cool story. Yeah. I have, look, let's, let look, let's get some more wins first

before we start exhaling. I'll say that. I'm always like, wow. I mean, I'm even watching games where the Lakers are losing and just because Russ is playing well, suddenly I'm becoming like, yep, here we go. We're going to win but we're not actually ignoring the important part, which is the score where we're down

14 and then realizing okay, well, that's not how that works all the time. But it is hard for sure. Dennis Smith Jr., just one other line from earlier this week. Dennis Smith Jr. brought 15 points, 8 assists, 7 boards, and 6 steals off the bench for Sacramento. Now that is a great story. My man was about to go play in the NFL. Yeah.

A lot of people, I feel like, weren't talking about him other than whatever happened. And he's had some pretty amazing performances. I just always felt like he got such a raw deal. I was working at the Dallas Marine News, Dennis's rookie year, when he first got drafted by the Mavericks.

Always seemed like a good kid hard worker um he's definitely showed a lot of flashes during that rookie year and you know then Luca came to town and obviously they couldn't play together as all dominant guards and he's kind of just been bouncing around the league ever since and uh I'm just glad to see him you know he he played really well uh when the war when we were down in Charlotte and the Warriors were down in Charlotte last week got that game-winning stop on Steph at the end of regulation, ended it over time.

So it's just, you know, DSJ is definitely one of the feel-good stories of the year. And I'm glad to see him finally find a home in Charlotte. I'm interested to see what's going to go on with his usage and playing time. It's like he'll have all his balls back. Yeah. But I mean, again, like a again like a ball dominant player who's probably not enough to be the like marquee player in the starting unit but if you bring him in as like an off-speed pitch who's like just way more athletic and fast than anyone in your second unit like that's that's pretty good

like you that's a good weapon to be bringing off the bench. Yeah. All right. Let's take a quick break, huh? Yeah. We'll be right back. I'm Carrie Champion and this is season four

of Naked Sports where we live at the intersection of sports and culture. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry, Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Every great player needs a foil. I ain't

really near them boys. I just come here to play basketball every single day and that's what I focus on. From college to the pros, Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Angel Reese is a joy to watch. She is unapologetically Black. I love her. What exactly ignited this fire? Why has it been so good for the game? And can the fanfare surrounding these two supernovas be sustained?

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So tap in to Off the Edge with Cam Jordan's podcast podcast your ultimate playbook for all things football and not football listen on the iheart radio app apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts and we're back and this is the section where we kind of look at different plays performances that blew us away I mean that's kind of just what we do the whole episode we're just trying to get blown away by basketball all day

I'm excited I mean do we just start like you said the most exciting player in the NBA that's not in the NBA too young too young to be in the NBA too young we were talking before and we're trying to

figure out you know at first a lot of the talk was like can you believe this guy is doing all this stuff at seven like we've never seen a guy this tall do all this stuff but is the conversation where I'd be like we're not really seeing somebody play like this and then on top of that he's a seven plus footer because it's just I'm i'm having trouble processing what i'm seeing all the time with him like again i feel like i'm watching like my creative player go off in 2k and like looks like he's having fun like again one of my favorite things about watching him and watching his highlights is that he looks like he just woke up from a body switching comedy or something just like oh my god this is so fun look at this i'm

gonna shoot a three off one foot and i have just like perfect touch this is like a layup what it's from three for me and his teammates seem to be having fun one of the plays that got us excited was his teammate just like threw the ball in the general direction of the hoop and it like went way over and he just like goes up and gracefully like grabs it and like puts in a like a alley-oop jump shot but he's like falling down and still just makes it look super easy with his touch right like it was funny that point he made of like him being on like comedy shows like he like goes to bed one night it's like man if only i were right tall you know right i want to be big no but like really really big i have all the tools if only i was seven foot four yeah next thing you know he's like wait give me give that kid the ball real quick shoot it victor it's wetty it's wetty coach what happened to me overnight but yeah it's

it's i can't i'm so excited to see him play but again i'm always gonna just be a little weary because when you have people with such unique bodies like him you never quite know uh but my goodness i'm i'm definitely i'm rooting for him but while his pictures are the one of the ones of him like standing next to rudy gobert that's the one yeah those are the seven one right like those are the pictures always just blow me away yeah it's insane yeah it's like he was like as if gobert came to like wimby's like basketball camp yeah and he's like and at the end i take pictures with all the kids that are in the camp victor wimby i'm a and a fan of his yeah uh hey what's your name young man uh rudy gobert okay ruddy nice to meet you man all right cool it's so wild like warriors twitter is wild like

after their uh loss down in new orleans you see on twitter it's like you know like the scouting shut it down scouting victor women now the graphics was like a warrior's logo on it shut him down blow it up yeah so the shot that was i think got a lot of people's attention was he like kind of did a testing drive to his left the guy kind of got in front of him he went behind his legs like four times then made a move to his left and just like shot a three like it was a layup off one foot and just wet just he shot it as if it wasn't even in doubt that it was going in i mean james harden has yet to master the running three i was like when he got and he's like what 17 yeah yeah no that was like that was wild when dirk was doing that from mid-range when he would do like the kind of one foot just rising up so

quickly that you're not even able to like think about contesting it and he's releasing it like higher up than you've ever seen a shot released but yeah miles to your point like the size of his body and like we we were watching a clip of did you see the clip where kd made his defender to like just straight up do the split i was in on gafford yeah oh wait where is it that picture was wild like like the actual like picture from that crossover was so yeah my man was on the ground like rethinking his entire career. He had that face down moment where he's like, I've been fully flamed. I don't know what to do.

The first move, he does a single stride from the NBA three-point line all the way inside close to the free throw line. And it's just such a wild stride like that stride is one of the wildest things and it's just we were like man do you remember when he came into the league and everyone was like his body's not gonna hold up to the rigors of the NBA and it's like actually he had like his body is one of the most miraculous

like but you didn't know that coming in and like that's the question around Wemba Young is like is he just going to have like the strangest superhuman body like Kevin Durant happened to have that's going to be able to like hold up and

just bend in the wildest directions. Cause like when you just like freeze frame on that stride from Kevin Durant is like, wait, the human body's not supposed to be able to do that. That's that is just special. Well, for our measly little six foot people legs, of course we can't cover that kind of ground. But I mean, yeah, it's, it's a, it's a it's you you don't i don't envy him

in that situation uh when gafford just goes face down there's just like i love when somebody knows they're like okay i got cooked right there like there's just no point like where he just had to be like i gotta think about my life decisions real quick because he knew katie was just gonna sink that in front of him and he did and you know thoughts and prayers obviously thoughts and prayers i'm just glad katie knocked it down there's been a lot of like million dollar moves of two cent finishes this season yeah i mean i think maybe that's why we're celebrating this one so much like yeah he did it he did it he did it and maybe that's uh my confirmation bias out there being like come on geriatric millennials

put some on the board it can't be all al horford for us he's also ball like he's still like putting up great numbers i saw somebody like complaining that well he's got his worst plus minus i think it's like yeah his team is bad like his starting five is still figuring things out and isn't playing well that can't just be like well this is kevin durant's worst plus minus of all time without acknowledging that they are in a uniquely like kind of rough situation at the moment. Right. How do you guys feel about plus minus? Just like generally,

like as a stat, I think over long periods, it can be useful, but it's so misleading. Like in a game to game situation, it's like, you Like in a game-to-game situation, it's like you can't really say if Harden is playing with Embiid or if they're staggering them,

and suddenly Harden's fading back to playing with Korkmaz. That does a big difference. It feels very dependent, and there's probably better like statistical regressions they can run that do a better job than just the very like it feels very blunt instrument right i mean because it's it's purely off of just box score metrics right there's no yeah well i mean i think it is it is a bit limiting for sure. Palo also having one of the better kind of runs of a rookie

at the beginning of their rookie season that we've seen. They're just fun to watch. I mean, he, again, this is why I'm... He's another guy who is playing, I don't want to say disrespectfully, but it's like he's not playing like a rookie it just feels like he's sort of like okay thank you are y'all ready for me to play now thank you

I'm really enjoying myself out here and I will play with the confidence of 1000 sons the stars not the team consistently watching him play I'm like this is somebody who's not making it hard to debate whether or not he's, you know, he earned that that top spot, whether or not he can continue on. You know, I'm an Auburn guy. And to be honest, I was completely salty on draft day when Paula went over my guy Jabari Smith.

But I think it's pretty clear, like you said. Right. I think it's pretty clear now you said right i think it's i think it's pretty clear now uh who the better prospect is it's a it's a it's a marathon right not a race now they're both pretty young hopefully they both have long careers ahead of themselves but you know paulo is without a doubt you know gotten out to an early lead like yeah that's ridiculous. Yeah. At the very least, like just from the eye test, you're like, well, the magic have a talent there. Okay. At the, if I'm even like, that's the worst thing you could say if you even wanted to like not give them all the praise that you could, which is like, I mean, that's, he's looking every day more and more like a genuine article for sure.

And then also I do, i do want to talk about matt ryan of the lakers not not of the not of the not of the atlanta no no oh yeah formerly the fact that we now have two people in professional sports with a combination of the two like most boring guy names like the two most boring boy names matt and ryan like when i was growing up everybody i knew was named either matt or ryan and they just combined those two and it immediately bounces off my brain every time i hear it but yeah big game winner this game this game was absolutely wild uh to the point that i went to sleep being like man the lakers just really can't catch a break right as they were about to catch an amazing break i mean this that was an

amazing uh game tying three-pointer i look i had to watch because i was like come on give me give me a reason to keep going please and they did fantastically there's this breakdown where ray allen's watching it and i just love ray allen really just giving his analysis as just like a sharpshooter on just how wonderful this moment was and just how much like you know it's clear like matt ryan he's he's been practicing that he's got to get it in a three-point country it's to ryan what's fascinating about that is because we all dream of hitting a game winner. You do the countdown and what happens is kids don't get to that lift like they would get in this situation and you're always trying to get that lift in your training because that's what happens. Like you see that he looks comfortable

doing it because he's been there before. He had look down to see see where he was on the on the line on the court uh but that's everything uh with this shot is he was able to get lift and get separation he had a slight fade away to it but he still had great lift on it you know every time you walk in the gym that's how you want to shoot yeah yeah well said well said think, like, previously, right, he was delivering DoorDash. Yeah, that's why I said he delivers, man. Oh, wow. DoorDash come through. They need to work that in. He needs to be sponsored

by DoorDash. The NBA needs to be doing a partnership with DoorDash. He needs to, like, they need to have courtside seats where you can get your cheese fries delivered by Matt Ryan during the game i would let him focus because you imagine they're just like all right man so you're a delivery driver again you're like no i i just i've been working really hard to get in the league no no

no no man we love they used to do doordash now we're gonna have you deliver pizzas and all kinds of stuff and people might not recognize you from that one clip but we will know and it'll be hilarious darren fox's game winner versus versus Orlando was a lot of fun. Josh Hart had a game winner. I don't know, man. This has been a really fun season. Just a lot of young people taking things to the next level. Scotty Barnes looking really good.

Zion. Zion's been finding his place in the offense. He'll find it. He'll find it he'll find it and then every week I feel like Ja has like last season every week there was an amazing offensive finish but now it seems like that block that blew our mind last year where he just like went up and caught it and kept flying up towards the rafters. Like he, he has like incorporated that as a part of his game that he's now like one of the best shot blockers just coming from the weak side. And yeah.

And again, he's Spider-Man. That's what, like, that's what it's like. He's just so agile. He's covering the floor. And I love when,

right when he realized he's like, oh wait, I could block this. When he steps in the key and he gathers his momentum to jump up as a former high jumper i was like look at how he's gathering like really getting your arms to drive those arms up uh i just want to watch that again because he it's it's his job where they have gotten to cut to deficit but then boston is here and like spider-man like it's a miracle he's always able to land on his feet you know yeah and look with great power comes great responsibility you know so far i think

he's wielding that correctly all right all right should we do one more break come back and do the most famous segment in podcast nba basketball podcasting uh rapid fire should we do that yeah yeah yeah we're ready ready. Let's do it. I'm down. I'm Carrie Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports, where we live at the intersection

of sports and culture. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. I know I'll go down in history.

People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Every great player needs a foil. I ain't really near them. Why is that? I just come here to play basketball every single day, and that's what I focus on. From college to the pros, Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Angel Reese is a joy to watch. She is unapologetically black.

I love her. What exactly ignited this fire? Why has it been so good for the game? And can the fanfare surrounding these two supernovas be sustained? This game is only going to get better because the talent is getting better. This new season will cover all things sports and culture. Listen to Naked Sports on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

The Black Effect Podcast Network is sponsored by Diet Coke. Wake up with football every morning and listen to my new podcast, NFL Daily with Greg Rosenthal. Five days a week, you'll get all the latest news, previews, recaps, and analysis delivered straight to your podcast feed by the time you get your coffee. No dumb hot takes here. Just smart hot takes. We'll talk every single game every single week, but I can't do it alone. So I'm bringing in the big guns from NFL media. That's Patrick Claiborne, Steve Weiss, Nick Shook, Jordan Rodrigue from The Athletic, and of course, Colleen Wolfe. This is their window right now. This is their Super Bowl window. Why would they trade him away?

Because he would be a pivotal part of them winning that Super Bowl. I don't know why, Colleen. Catch the podcast, the NFL Daily with Greg Rosenthal every day. Subscribe today and you'll immediately be smarter and funnier than your friends. And who doesn't want that? Listen now on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, here we go. It's Cam Jordan from New Orleans Saints here to tell you it's going down.

On season two of my podcast, Off the Edge with me, Cam Jordan. Can't stop it. You know what's going to happen. Can't stop it. That's right. Catch new episodes every Wednesday, all season long. That's what you look for in year 14, to do more. No days off.

And I'll have my friends, who happen to be some of the NFL's biggest stars, join me on the pod. We'll give you a player's perspective of the biggest storylines, trends, and did that really just happen moments from around the league. And you know we'll have fun doing it. Ha! Yeah! Oh, and I'll have a special guest each month. Join me to mix it up a little bit. Who is it? None other than... Psyche!

You'll have to tune in to find out. So tap in to Off the Edge with Cam Jordan's podcast, your ultimate playbook for all things football and not football. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. Oh, CJ. Oh, boy.

You showed up right at the right time. Well, not to say that we wouldn't do this every episode, but thanks for showing up today because it's time for the fourth quarter rapid fire round of questioning. Now, this is the fastest segment in sports podcasting. We're going to ask you a question, and you just give us the first answer that comes off the top of your mind reflexively. Don't think about it.

Just answer. And keep it short. And if we start talking and meandering, it's up to you to stop us yeah you need to keep this segment going cj for the good of the show okay let's go start the clock you want to go first you want oh do you want i don't know i mean you tired i'll go first here i'll go first real quick yeah yeah okay consolation prize um cj hi jack uh one of the hosts of this show a quick question for you biggest surprise of the early season is it the pelicans is it the jazz is it the wolves which direction which team or secret

fourth option oh it's it's the utah jazz by far these guys are nine and three and sitting at the top of the western conference they ate three 8-3 or 9-3? They're something in three. 9-3, yeah. They're 9-3, sitting atop of the Western Conference standings, and their best player is Laurie Markkinen. And if that is not surprising as hell, I don't know what is. Yeah.

And I mean, I like how he's like, he's like, oh, that tank talk just motivates us. Yeah, this is the hell of Wemby. Yeah. Seriously. We're not us. Yeah, this is the hell of Wemby. Yeah. Seriously. We're not impressed. Yeah. We got Lori, all right?

Show him what you can do, Lori. And he's doing it. Yeah, I like it because it sets up a scenario where Danny Age is the mean owner's wife from Major League and they have a cutout of Danny Ainge in the locker room where they're trying to prove that he's a fool, probably

in a bikini of some sort. I don't know. This is just all stuff that I'm... They just windmill on a cutout of him? Y'all know what's going on here, right? Utah clearly made a deal with the basketball gods that in order to still be good post Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert trade,

they had to exchange for ugly jerseys. That's right. So in exchange for ugly uniforms, they were allowed to stay good post trading two superstars. Hey, I'll take that deal, guys. Where you at? Or maybe that's part of what Danny Inge what the what Danny and just trying to do to get them to lose like the way that the major league owner like took took away their plane. He's like, I'm going to make them play in the worst looking uniforms in the history of the NBA.

They very well might be. Yeah. All right, guys. Let's stay on. Oh, my bad. OK. OK. All right.

Thank you, CJ. Thank you, CJ. OK. Right. Right. Right. That's on me. That's on bad. Okay. All right. Thank you, CJ. Thank you, CJ. Okay. Right, right, right. That's on me. That's on me.

CJ. What else was I going to say? I was going to ask you something good. What else? Oh, CJ. Okay. Got you. Give us an under-the-radar storyline that you don't think people are paying enough attention

to this year. You know, I think it's something that's not being talked about enough is the resurgence of the Portland Trailblazers. I don't think anyone, you know, Dame's coming back this year healthy, but I don't think anyone thought that they'd be this good. I'm not sure where Phoenix is at right now, but I believe as of a couple of days ago, they had two losses this year. And both of those losses came to the Portland Trailblazers. And, you know, over the years, it's been, oh, Dame doesn't have enough help. Construction of that team isn't good enough to win at a high level.

Yet, here they are. Forward to top of the Western Conference standings, thriving. And Anthony Simons, pride and joy of IMG Academy. He's looking like a future star in the making. So, I don't know. It's just, it's hard to tell. It's kind of like the same thing as Utah, right? Is this sustainable?

I think I would like to believe that what Portland's doing is a little bit more sustainable than what Utah's doing, because I believe in Damien Lillard. But it's a surprise nonetheless. I don't think anyone thought Portland would come out the gates this good. And it's going to be interesting to see if they can keep this thing up as the year goes on. They were telling

us Anthony Simons was going to be great for a long time. And they just... we didn't listen. And now look at us. Stupid looks on our face. Looking around saying, hey, what happened? You know, that's all of us. What is a new rule, CJ, that you'd like to see implemented or altered?

Effective immediately. And it can be as wild as you want. It's not a new rule i would like to see i would like to see less of an emphasis basically long story short those three carry calls called against jordan pool in miami was the most disgusting thing i've ever seen in my life not one carry not two this man got called for three carries in the same basketball game i have never seen that before in my life you have guards across this league harry irving james harden john law all these guys they're carrying on a nightly basis yet jordan pool was singled out for three i think it hasn't

been as wild you know since then but if you want to crack down on carrying you're cracking down on entertaining basketball um because every guard in the-level guard in the league does it. So I would like to see referees kind of chill out on that going forward. I would say the last time someone was called for that many carries in a game was me right after I was watching Allen Iverson for the first time. In junior high. The last time that happened, they're like, Son, what are you doing?

I'm like, AI is doing. Please. They're like, you have to learn how to dribble a ball for a son. And I was like, well, all right. He's doing something for me. I thought you were going to say, get them to, my suggestion would be to cut down on all the celebrating on the bench. No, they got to get rid of that. I can't.

That's violence. Okay, good. Because That was way too entertaining. Good thing they're cutting down on that. That rule is violent. I'm sorry, you're going to actually be like, hey, stop being so joyous and joyful over there. That is terrible.

That's like living in a neighborhood and the HOA is like, man, you got too many Christmas lights. Why don't you celebrate like that? like having like you know having like living in a neighborhood and the hoa is like man you got too many christmas lights to celebrate and like that it's just come on now yeah let them celebrate anyway i'm sorry cj you got to keep this going man and raf you're adding our own rules and things like that um cj is a calzone a taco absolutely not i think it's more closely associated with pizza than a taco a taco is hard shell calzone is

breaded you can have a soft shell taco CJ I mean I guess but like okay is a calzone an empanada I think it's closer to the empanada family than a taco that's the right answer is a calzone an empanada i think it's closer to the empanada family than that's what i would talk about that's the right answer yeah is a calzone a danish i mean it is not a danish okay

that's fine but similar concept is it because a danish has like those like air holes on top and a calzone doesn't have it like it's got to be yeah yeah is a pistachio a calzone right is a pistachio a calzone from Is a pistachio a calzone? From afar, they could look the same. This is where we ask the tough question. You know what I mean? And this is the final tough question. Maybe the toughest of all. CJ Jacker

Miles. I've been contemplating this throughout the entire episode. And it pains me to say this. It really really does but you guys are both whack oh my god as long as as long as it's not a win for me i just want to keep my i want to keep my uh i love that yo cj through with the goat answer. Willing to go where no guest has gone before.

Hey, man, of course. You guys are great, man. No, it's true, man. You can't say something that's true and then just come back and be like, ha ha, just kidding. JK, JK. Ha ha.

No, no. This is one of the more entertaining pods I've had the pleasure to be on. Whoa, whoa, whoa. I appreciate my... JK, JK. No, no. We appreciate that answer.

Hey, that is official. That's locked in. That was the best turn on an answer I think we've had in the entire show. That was good. We got to give that up to you, CJ, man. CJ Holmes, thank you so much for coming on. What a guest. Miles and Jack got mad.

Boosties, really appreciate it, man. Where can people find you, follow you, listen to you, or read you? All that stuff. You guys can read me on sfconical.com or if you're in the Bay Area, support print. Go pick up a copy of your local paper. You can

find me on Twitter and Instagram at CJHolmes22. When it comes to Twitter, I need retweets, not likes. There you go. Amplify. I mean, until Elon messes with the algorithm again. In which case, you can follow my account, which will be a CJ Holmes impersonator account.

Check us out at MadBoosties, B-O-O-S-T-I-E-S on Twitter. And also, this week's listener of the week, we said, what's the biggest surprise of the early season? And at Tyler McDowell at GI19Pod says, the Suns and particularly

how great Devin Booker has looked. Okay. Just looks-wise. He's a handsome man. And then at Sashant Rao tweeted, most to least surprising, Jazz, Blazers, Nets, Cavs, Lakers. Yeah. Yeah.

Wow. I feel about right. That's pretty important. Cruel. Cruelty. And that'll do it for this week's lovely edition of Mad Boosties. Thanks again, CJ Holmes, for joining us. We will see y'all next week with more entertaining coverage of the NBA,

and hopefully maybe my Lakers will turn a corner. We shall see. We just don't know. All right. We. We shall see. We just don't know. Alright, we'll talk to you then. We don't know. I'm Carrie Champion and this is Season 4 of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus

Angel Reese. Every great player needs a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. Every great player needs a foil. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Listen to the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Presented by Capital One, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports. I'm Keri Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way

we consume women's basketball. And on this new season, we'll cover all things sports and culture. Listen to Naked Sports on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio apps, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Black Effect Podcast Network is sponsored by Diet Coke. There's so much beauty in Mexican culture, like mariachis, delicious cuisine, and even lucha libre.

Join us for the new podcast, Lucha Libre Behind the Mask, a 12-episode podcast in both English and Spanish about the history and cultural richness of Lucha Libre. And I'm your host, Santos Escobar, emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts.