The Deep 3 Podcast - The Most Disappointing NBA Players Of 2026 | Ep. 180

Episode Date: January 19, 2026

NBA players that have failed so far this season! #nba Check out the TD3 merch: https://the-deep-3-shop.fourthwall.com/ Listen on Spotify!: https://open.spotify.com/show/3elbbqVumwqz8wlIdknsLW Listen on Apple Podcasts!: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-deep-3-podcast/id1657940794 Follow us on TikTok!: https://www.tiktok.com/@thedeepthree Follow us on Instagram!: https://www.instagram.com/thedeep3podcast/ Isaac's twitter: https://twitter.com/byisaacg Mo's twitter: https://twitter.com/Mojo99_ Donnavan's twitter: https://twitter.com/Dsmoot3D NBA players that have failed so far this season! #nba Check out the TD3 merch: https://the-deep-3-shop.fourthwall.com/ Listen on Spotify!: https://open.spotify.com/show/3elbbqVumwqz8wlIdknsLW Listen on Apple Podcasts!: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-deep-3-podcast/id1657940794 Follow us on TikTok!: https://www.tiktok.com/@thedeepthree Follow us on Instagram!: https://www.instagram.com/thedeep3podcast/ Isaac's twitter: https://twitter.com/byisaacg Mo's twitter: https://twitter.com/Mojo99_ Donnavan's twitter: https://twitter.com/Dsmoot3D 0:00- Intro 1:33- Disappointing NBA Players 1:03:45- NBA news recap 1:31:18- tiktok time Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Donovan, what has disappointed you most about the NBA season so far? Well, obviously, the New York Knicks are not undefeated. So that has been the most disappointing thing. That was your expectation? Yeah. I didn't think we would lose the game until the All-Star break. And this is your average New York fan. Y'all can have it all.

Oh, you average is New Yorker in general. As you guys do about the title today, we are going to discuss the most disappointing players in the NBA. And we're not just to give you our picks. We are going to react to your picks for the most disappointing players. I made a YouTube community post asking you guys to let us know which players haven't played up to the standards you set for them before the year you guys let us know all of your picks

there was a lot of them a lot of hating a lot of cope from fans who see terrible players on their team who they expected a lot from whose team paid them a lot of money we're going to dive into all that today it should be a fun one man

life he's signed because he has a feel on his team that we'll discuss today and maybe one that's not on this team. Any more? Please play the intro. Yep, yep, yep. Cue the intro music.

We'll talk about some new stories after that, getting to everything that happened over the weekend. Check out House Call. Check out Friday's episode in which we gave every single NBA team. One trade they should make it the deadline. Now cue the intro music. We're throwing it back. Whoa.

That's crazy. He was bragging. I don't need it. The cranium is crazy. Oh my God. rejoice. We're going to jump straight into your picks for the most disappointing players in the NBA this season.

Obviously, some of the heavy hitters that we all know, we've talked about all year as being disappointed are going to be on here. Try to pick a few others and maybe we haven't given enough conversation to about why they've been so goddamn ass this year. So we'll see everybody's picks. We'll talk about if we agree why it's happening. And at the end, maybe we'll give us some picks on our end for who we think has been disappointing.

All right. First off, Moe is going to say Jalen Johnson if he doesn't average 50 after that Tray Young trade. That's hilarious. and I understand what he means. No, as of late, of course, Jaylon Johnson has been embarrassing. We've made, like,

incredible shift in our team. Yo, Cid McCollum, I have some words for him that I cannot say on camera, bro. But he is like, everything that you feel about Bradley Bozeman over there under charges,

it's the exact same way. And if you watch House Call, that's why you should watch House Call. If you know, you know, he is terrible. He has to, dude, since he's came onto our team, he's been making no shots

and he's been pounding the air out of the ball. and he's been like the most obscene black hole I've seen in my fucking life, bro. Don't give him Bradley Boson allegations. Give him Quinn Johnson allegations, if anything. No. Hell no.

Hell no. He doesn't do a damn thing right on the court. I've seen so many Hawks fans talk about C.J. McCollum, and it's like, oh my goodness. He's in danger. Okay, well, he can be Mackay Bechton. You call him Bradley Bowes and that means you want him dead. No, no, no.

Give Mackay some respect. He has like at least something he can hang his hat on. T.J. McComb is coming from the Wizards. McCoy Beckton is of a lot. damn thing you hold his hat on this year. Hell not. Not this year, but previous. He didn't have jacked shig and hold his head on. Bring you. And they gave him money. He brought him in to be some answer. No, he's been Kaibectin. No, I bet. Nevertheless, Jalen Johnson has not been averaging 50 in these last few games since

Trey and Trey Young. How are you feeling right now about seeing Jalen Johnson have his worst few games of the year as a scorer at least? Directly after the expectation because they trade Trey Young, finally going on him. Obviously, this lends to the natural reaction. Shit changes when you get first option. coverages. Maybe he's not such a bright star after all. I think anyone who thought that he was a number one first option off the rip, you were just like simply misguided when it comes to your judgment of Jalen Johnson, his development. We all knew he was really good, but I don't know if you're saying like, hey, he's going to be a top 10 player in the NBA. I said that before. I said that when

we made our top five players in like the next 10 or top 10 players in the next five years. But right now, it's not five years from now. That's all I'm saying. This guy's the goat, man. He's He's the best because he's just like, bro, nobody was saying that, but I did say that. I did not say that. You have no proof of me saying that. Also, average 50 is crazy. He hasn't scored 50 points in the last three games combined. It's been that bad.

Honestly, I think. 13, 12 and 12. CJ and also Quinn Snyder, you do not belong in the city of Atlanta anymore. We need to like leave these guys in McDonough or something like that. Put these guys in like, I don't know, some random Savannah, Georgia. They don't belong in Atlanta at all. Okay. So I'll throw that on there real quick to see your reaction, but obviously, let's get into the real.

Disappointing player's picks. Can you guess what Ced McCorm's usage rate is since he used the percentages since he joined the Hawks? 47. 47. It's not that. I think it's like 33. It's still ridiculous. The highest on the team.

Too goddamn high. It's ridiculous. Next pick. He says, Luca, honestly, even though he's probably my favorite player, he has been really inefficient. And I thought the more bit Luca would give at least an effort on the defensive end of the ball. I don't think he was out as prime for good, but there have been better versions of him, such as 2023, 24,

which I'm hoping it gets back to. I wanted to lead with this, because this has been a big talking point online. I feel like Luca has seen a tremendous PR shift for the worst. I think there's probably more people right now that think Anthony Edwards is better than him than there is people that think he's the best point in the world. Like, he firmly has lost his place

in the best world conversations for this season. Whether right or wrong, whether right or wrong, this has not been his best year. In fact, it's been one of his worst years in terms of his flaws coming to light and people are kind of starting to reckon with the reality of his downside of his style of play. Where do y'all stand on this? Man, it's so interesting because at the start of the year,

we had a whole conversation about Luca and how his play style has changed and he's not necessarily the best version of himself. I'm not going to go as far as to say that his chain has been absolutely snatched. But I will say, like, that lock that secures your train, your chain is definitely loose for Lucas specifically. The class was a little dangling. Exactly. Yeah.

Like at this point in time, it has like a lot to do with him and how he needs to probably in the offseason or whatever is recalibrate his game. But more so like the guys behind him right now probably aren't even behind him anymore. Ant Wemby and whoever else you want to potentially throw in that conversation. But it's mainly them. It's really Anne. Like Ant's been so insane that like I don't know if I'm willing to go there and say, aunt has passed him up as the clear fourth best player in the world behind the three MVPs.

But it's not crazy. Like, I fully have to respect that opinion. If you do think today as currently constructed, you would rather have Anthony Edwards and Luca Donchish for a variety of reasons. Yeah, it's interesting, too, because I do think that with the, like, he has multiple things going for him and then multiple things not going for him. Like, the PR coming into the season was very much, we're going to big up Luca.

We've seen the work that you've done in the offseason. We think that this is going to be the thing that, like, takes your game to the next level. We are rooting for you that MVP is on the way. And then you get to actually playing games And it's like okay well nobody on this team can play defense and we're not expecting you to be the best defender But like we were also kind of planning on some people trying to You know like help you all just like a little bit so then it's like So that you can actually go go ahead and like get your game off now that none that like none of that is happening

We're just in this weird bubble of Luca just going out playing looka basketball and it's it's not leading to wins like that probably was never going to lead to wins if you can't guard anybody this way. So it's like he's getting a little bit of both sides where it's not his fault, but also he's not helping the problem. I think two things are true. He's not having his best year. And it's giving a window and opening to allow you to kind of view those downsides more than the upsides or at least come to more of a reality in your before in which the big moments, the playoff rising, kind of massed over some of the weaknesses that might have happened in the regular season. He has never had dominant teams in the regular season, at least in the Dallas Mavericks. The one year he had his second half of the season after the trade deadline with the wind so crazy was the year he was an MVP conversations.

The reason he doesn't have an MVP is because he's never had a one seed. He's never been one of the best teams, right? And that's mostly given credit to the fact that his Dallas Mavericks rosters were subpar. We know the story. He got too good, too fast. They never built a good young core around him. They were always trying to build a contender on the fly, which is hard to do, especially when you make a miss like the Chris Osperzingis move, letting Jim and Brunsson walk. It was a tough time, right?

I think those excuses, which aren't invalid, kind of masks some of the, the weaknesses of his game that probably also contributed to it and probably contributed to why it's so hard to build a roster around a player that's limited some ways, particular in some ways, despite his strengths. And now, this team, the Lakers, do not have anywhere close to the ideal roster to massive weaknesses. So they're coming out to shine even more. That's allowing people to kind of get their licks in while it's really, really not ideal for him play style-wise. But, in the day, he's kind of not making threes. That's kind of the real story here, I think. while all those

criticisms may be valid he may be a little overrated or whatever I think the idea of him being watched at 26 that part is overblown he is not that dissimilar to what he was in 2024

when he had his crazy magical season the difference is that year he had one of the greatest three point shooting seasons of all time when it comes of shot difficulty we were up here talking about that during that year

he shot 39% from 3 having essentially the same three point shot diet he has now ridiculous step back off the triple threes that were going in like crazy now he's shooting

33%. A lot is made of his lack of room pressure this year, which is true. Only 15% of his shots come at the rim this season. It was only 19 in 2024. He's been a low room pressure player for a long time that's really supplemented by crazy shot making. And this year he's having his best mid-range scoring season of the year. So I do think even though the rim volume isn't quite what it once was, and if for most

players I criticize that, Luke is an exception because he has outlandish mid-range scoring gravity and his playmaking from the short mid-range area is next level. so I do think the lack of rent pressure isn't this obvious catch-all thing that makes his offense as valuable as it seems as it would be for other players so I don't think he's washed I think if he was making threes

he wouldn't be having this conversation he'd be unguarable one of the best players in the world still but at some point he needs to make some goddamn threes do you think so do you think that that is that him not making threes is just something that we're just going to be a part of like this season we're going to get to the off season and then next year it's like back

or is this like because you can you can look at it like that and say, eh, it's Luca, he'll get back. Or you can look at it and say, this is the first time where we've seen year after year, like he's never been this like crazy, crazy athletic guy. Yeah. But like we've seen the rim pressure drop.

We're seeing these three point numbers drop. I'm not worried, but I'm noticing. You can definitely notice. Yeah, yeah. You can look at it out on both sides. And so I think like, depending on really just how you feel about Luca, if you like them, if you don't, like you'll either notice or you're not notice.

Yeah. But that's kind of, that's kind of where we're at. I do think also for the thing. Real quick. We'll move on. I think a point to that what you just said with the question you opened up about, is that noticing or is it giving him bail? I think that's important to say because we're not talking about someone who's been

god-awful. And if he made threes, he'd be good. We're talking about someone that's still been a great score, still been averaging 30s, still been incredible. But it's a difference between having one of the best offensive seasons of all time two years ago and a good all-star season that is still all-MBA, but not quite best point in the world level. That's where I'm saying that's just three-point difference to me, mostly.

If he was playing worse than this, then I would say we need to put some credence to the fact that, oh, you're just three-point reliance. But he has been so goddamn efficient from the mid-range, has been so goddamn efficient from the rim, that I'm willing to say that a lot of it does boil down to the three-pointed shot. Gotcha. And they are like, especially with Luca, and obviously it's to a different level because he's at the top of the league. But when you also have this like, this like narrative around you that you're this like all-time playoff riser, we also just have to wait until the playoffs get here to, to, to,

to get the full value of what Luca brings. And they're the 60th right now, game out of the four seed. They can have a home playoff series and go through that. And we can have a game three when Lucas taking a step back three for the win. And now all of a sudden we're like, oh my God. Like, Luca just had 3010 and 10 and he's bouncing this guy out in the first round. Like he's back. We, it's January right now.

Like we have to wait three months to really get a full idea of whether or not, like, we think Luca is actually like falling off or if it's just yeah and I'm coaching through the season the team's kind of weird but when it matters I'm here and you know what's so what's going to be so gruesome about these next three months we're going to have to like sit down through this lucca discourse and instead of watching guys like PJ Washington Derek lively and whoever all his other like wing defenders that he had back there to back him up back him up and help not big up his game but hide blemishes we have to watch jake laramia rui hatchingero whatever marcus smart can give you which is good stuff these days and uh all these guys who just don't necessarily aren't aren't equipped to like help

big up his game and until like that like once april once may and all that hits i refuse to look at luke and take his crown away from him when it comes to being the third or fourth best fourth best player in the world for me. So I think I'm willing to say that he's definitely, that I'm willing to say he's definitely does not deserve to be in the conversation with Janice or Shea right now. Yeah. And so he starts playing better just because that bar is so high that I think like it's not really saying I'm out on Luca to say that those guys are just simply earning a little

bit more respect at this moment. I do so think we can get back in those conversations quite easily if certain things flip like the team construction to your point or his three point shot going in, which three point variance is such a hard thing. Man, you shoot the shots. Like at some point it does fall back on you with his volume, right? you maybe, maybe stop shooting somebody. Like, notice your slump and adjust.

Like, I don't know. So I'm going to hold him back a little bit in terms of that combo. But I'm not necessarily going to, like, put him behind Anthony Edwards, Victor Wobanjama, et cetera, for what you just said. I do think, though, I don't buy the fact that he's physically taking a step back and is a worse player now or whatever. I do think there's some criticism to be had about the mental side of his game this year. I don't know if maybe it's because I'm just watching him more closely as a Lakers fan now,

watching every single game opposed to a lot of games like when he was a Mav. You're going to say, he's a gunner. Well, kind of. Well, no, I always knew he was like a

high-volume shooter, obviously. I think this year he's done a poor job of balancing the playmaking to scoring load. And I think it might

be because the supporting cast is so lackluster. He's looking at these guys you mentioned like Jake Loravia, Jared Vanderbilt sharing the goddamn

court with him. He hates DeAndre Aton because he doesn't set hard screens. He fucking despises him. Aiden and Reeves have an amazing chemistry. Aiden and Luca,

not so much. I think he subcum. Yeah, right? Like, I obviously can't blame him. I think he, like, subconsciously feels lack of trust around the guys around him, which is obviously understandable, given the fucking terrible talent, that he seems more score first than he has been in past years.

When he was younger, he was the best passer in the league. I feel confident in that. Like, I was saying that for years, and I know I wasn't saying that for no reason. It doesn't look that way today. He's still obviously a good passer. If you just watched him this year, you would not think this is one of the greatest pastures of all time. Yeah, yeah, I agree. But that, more so, in my opinion, it has to do with all.

the talent around him because he has that mindset where I have to get this shit out of the mud and myself I'm not dropping 40 we lose him and that's not necessarily been the case 100% of time but it's fucking felt like it to this in this point of time and when it's so it's so hilarious looking at the supporting cast these all these guys around him outside of obviously like lebron and um reeves these guys on other like legit contending teams that are not talent deficient like the detroit business excluding them look at the Denver nuggetes look at okay see you look at i don't know, the Houston Rockets or even the Minnesota Timberwols, they wouldn't even be like the eighth man off of the bench. They'd probably be pushing like ninth man. Yeah, the roster is

quite horrible. The depth is terrible. Now, Austin Reeves is out, and I think that's been popular owner talked about because I still have two superstars, but like they're missing a top 20 player in the world this year. Most teams that lose a top 20 player look a lot worse offensively, and I think him being there covered up a lot of the holes roster-wise early in the season. When Reeves is there especially, Luca doesn't need to be so score first. You know, like he still is Luca, so he's going to be the high. volume lead score. I do think there's some part of him that should, even with the roster being bad,

lean into the playmaking a little bit more, which is easier said than done from not being with the team for all the reasons we talked about of like the confidence he probably doesn't feel in these guys. Maybe that is just like the reality, right? Maybe he just can't trust these guys. The roster is trash. But I would like to see a better balance there, especially when LeBron and Reeves are there. Yeah, maybe.

But I think if we're like, if we are ascribing this to, to Luka and just being like, hey, man, Like you are like kind of wilding with the with the shot. So like you. I will choose to be on his side just because one of all the things that you said about the talent around him. And then also you know that like you're going to have to win these games 125, 130 right, to 125. Right? You're going to have to outscore people.

And so if the option is I'm going to take this shot or I'm going to let you take this shot. And we have to get to 120 points. Go ahead. Just stay over there. I'll handle it. Don't worry about it. It's okay. Yeah.

And the day, if he had better screen setters, if he had better, more reliable shooters, everything would flow more positively. And like, it would be a chain reaction where the playmaking looks better, where that opens up scoring opportunities,

et cetera. So it's not his fault. I think most of this is overblown a little bit, but I think in general, recognizing the patterns in his game and coming, at least to have more awareness of the downsides is probably good.

So I think for some years he was kind of treated as a little too flawless, maybe, but we didn't do enough. Like, if we were having a top four combo, we would talk a lot about Janus's weaknesses. We would talk about the lack of three-point shot before this year, the need for spacing

that I think he's kind of dispelling a little bit. Lucas downsides outside of like a general catcher all not good at defense. Probably weren't discussed enough. Now we're going a little too far and it'll probably bounce back when they finally had the team give us a success. But overall, it's probably good for conversation,

I think, to have a more honest conversation about them. This is going to be the fourth time in five years that because right now he's on pace to do it so four time in five years that luka leads the league and field goal attempts and the only break that we had was last year when he only played 50 games instead of 65 yeah so every year this is going to be the the luka model he is going to take mad shots he is going to lead the team and lead the league and field goal attempts yeah i think and that's why i do think if the team was better you probably would feel a little bit more of yeah of his playmaking you know what that does it probably just goes to show you the razor

than margins of a play style like this. Like you really do need an ideal circumstance around him more than say Curry because the offense isn't so dependent on his maybe he's a bad example, but whatever the example is, because the offense isn't so dependent on them with the ball in their hands every single play,

he really does need to have those green setters. He really does need to have those role men, really does need to have those shooters because if the ball is not in his hands then you're not doing much else. You know what I miss the most when it comes to watching Luke in, what was like one of the more fun parts

of his passing game specifically, whenever he would just dime the ball behind this head and just slip it without having no vision of like no no vision of the actual player it's himself and that just doesn't exist anymore because your Vanderbiltons behind them. Exactly. Yeah, so yeah, overall, I think it'll be fine.

I think he'll get back to being an MVP caliber player. We'll get back to being in contention of our championships. We'll probably win one to Lakers because history says that type of stuff happens to them. Overall, I think it'll be fine. Yeah. Next player. What we got up next?

we have, who skipped one, Alex says Rob Dillingham, you traded a future first to move up and take him just for him to fall out of the rotation two years later. Yeah, I mean,

listen, you got to change stats about Bones Highland. Ah, damn. This is, it sucks. And trust me, like, this sucks for the wolves too. It was like, if we could assign

Bones Highland two years ago, oh, we would have been fine. Like, if we didn't have to trade, trade a pig and go out and feel like we had to reach to go get Rob, we would have been in a month.

much better position right now and even down the road. I think it always just sucks whenever you have a team that has a clear flaw and they are aggressive to go and fix that flaw. And at the time, you're like, you know what? I don't know if this is going to work out, but salute to you in your front office for at least trying. Because some people have, some teams have flaws for years that they never, never tried to address. And the wolves try to do it.

And it just didn't work. And they went with the safest route that they could do, which is, we need a guard. We're going to go to the guard factory itself at Kentucky. And we're going to pick a Kentucky guard. It hasn't worked out. It's just incredible bad luck, man. And I kept on saying, I've said this before, but this move will literally cost them at least two years of Anthony Edwards prime. Very minimum.

Unfortunately. It's also unfortunate because the reasons for his struggles are like not reasons you can see developing into not being an issue. He's not going to grow. Yeah. His shoulders won't get wider. It's so funny. It's like a year after he was drafted, the NBA just officially quickly moved off of his archetype. Facts that got in on a sinking ship.

Yeah. Tough. Next up. Ooh. My sweet glorious king, Sir Benedict Matherin, as a child are her tales of his valor. He, however, has never failed to disappoint. Breakout year? Nope.

Back to the G-League for you, bud. Also, Mo looks so cute today. How do you feel about that? I mean, this is my own comment. What do you mean? Before we start recording, Donovan said Moe's easy to draw. I said out of the three of us, he is the easiest to draw. Mo, you didn't have a response in that moment.

How do you feel about that now, having it being brought back up on camera 20 minutes later? So what about my face? Let's like I actually dive into it. What about my face makes y'all assume I'm easiest to draw? At least I'm on a face of hair. I could see that. Okay, I'm probably the hardest to draw because I have glasses and I have non-flat hair. so I'm disqualified.

Between you and Donovan, what makes you easier to draw that isn't a racist? Your features are slightly more 2D, where mine are 3D. 2D? Your features allow you to be drawn in 2D, whereas I feel like mine is slightly more... I require three dimensions,

whereas you're a stick figure. I don't know. I mean, is that good or bad? It's neither. It's simply... the thing I could I could see that and I can try to like have an argument against that but I really I really can't I think I agree with that for sure you agree your 2D 2D's fair to say 2D I'm really I'm like really looking at you and me right now and I'm like yeah I would I'd

rather draw myself faces a little wider yours is like narrow and for me personally I know about y'all but drawing in coloring in between lines was beating my ass and i was younger man yeah that's a you problem i can stay in between the lines nevertheless benedick matherin yeah i think you know what everybody in the state of indiana y'all all suck today like this this whole season is just lost and i do think for him it is it is kind of like damn we don't have We don't have Tyrese here. We don't have miles starting. We are not like we are not so bound to the style of play that made us go and you were this like this off speed pitch that you weren't a quarter of it. I am just noticed. He was not listen to a damn thing. That's what I'm saying. I feel like my word is a very valuable. We do not give a table about the pieces this year. Like I was saying very valuable words. Where do you got on right now?

I've actually won this many time. Here on the show? Yes. I don't. I don't remember. That I remember really? I feel like he's lying. I promise I'm not.

But you are right. Let's say. It's fine. Just go. I'll get by the piece. I can not put into words how much rage is instilled into my heart, watching the clunkiest duo of all time in Paulo and Franz. It has to be the most on-court dysfunctional star duo of all time.

relax. Dysfunctional star dual of all time. All time is a lot. But in modern NBA history, amongst like franchise players that I see what he's getting at. Obviously all time is dramatic. But can you remember a fit

between two stars as clunky as is that are so talented and like two players that have everything in their capacity to be top 25 players in the world being such unnatural fits for each other after so many years together? I can't remember.

I remember, and maybe I'm not remembering it clearly. Yeah. I remember the Ben Simmons, Joel, and B not being like as, as much synergy as we expected it to be in terms of like a big and a center. That's up there. That's kind of, yeah. Like in my mind, that's kind of like the poster boy of like, hey, like talent can get you to a certain place, even if it's not like 100%. I think it's a good comparison though to talk about this duo that like that fit didn't make sense at all. really having joel and b play with a point guard who is essentially a power forward that can dribble

with no spacing and like that clearly is a non-starter but it works because joel and b could shoot you can space it for a little bit could do some pick and pop stuff and kind of sacrifice some opportune paint touches to enable ben simmons and he just simply was so talented as an MVP level player and also ben simmons was an elite cutter back then too so like if simply if he didn't have the ball on his hands like he would be used find his way to be used to in other ways yeah they just have spot stuff with him. He could screen and bench units. Like there's,

there's a lot of things he could do to make up for it. And Joel and Bid was so goddamn good that the talent barrier. Exactly. They shattered through it. Yeah. Neither one of these guys are that goddamn good. Neither one of those guys can space the floor

as much as Joel and Bede could. Neither one of those guys are as good of a defender as Joel Embed is. And damn sure it's as good of a defender as Ben Simmons was. There's a lot of things that they just quite, aren't quite good enough to overcome this, it feels like.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Or at least they haven't been thus far. I'm not saying I'm fully out or anything like that, that they have to blow it up necessarily. Like everything he's saying is right. I think two things has to happen. Either like similar to the Boston Celtic situation between Tatum and Jalen Brown like years ago,

one of these guys had to develop into a fucking, I don't know, top seven player in the fucking league. I don't know if either these guys can do this at this moment or really what I want to aim towards is coach Mosley has to be fired. He has to be gone. He is not a good offensive coach at all. And the fact that one of like the simplest metrics that I see that's so annoying is seeing how Desmond Bain is and he's, even slump in his slumped as late or whatever, but his three-point attempts this year has like gone down rather than being up in a team that's in more need of something like that. How are you not maximizing or utilizing him at all?

That just goes to show that this entire tenure of Paolo and Franz and them like trying to gain some synergy together just hasn't been conducive at all. Yeah, definitely that. They definitely use Desmond Bain as more of like a three-level slasher and playmaker, which I also don't hate. You know, we were saying like it would be nice that a point guard next to them so they didn't have all the bow handling duties as 2.4. So I kind of like that part, but yeah, it can't be used to sacrifice the three point volume.

Like that's obviously what they need the most from Desmond Bain. Yeah. So that's not ideal. And I agree, Jamal Mosley is not the guy. Yeah. But also, like, let's say there was a guy in there who's really, really fucking smart and is the best in the league at utilizing offensive talent and can like do whatever the best case scenario is for a coach to make up for the lack of skill combinations that makes sense. Let's say they had instead of a very, very average coach the best possible. What does that even look like?

asked Paula to be more of a score. I mean, more of a screener. He doesn't want to do that. He's not good at that. I mean, maybe, but that's also, that's a, that is a coaching thing. Like, you have somebody who's not, who's not good at that. Figure out a way to make them either, to make that weakness either not show up or make them better, like help them get better at that certain thing.

Yeah. And, and like try, at least try it. And for us, like, you're asking, what does that look like? I don't know. I'm not getting paid $5 million. figure it out. That's Jamal Moseley's job. That's what everybody else, like, that is what the money's for to figure it out. And so I don't know if, if, like, what the offense is going to look like when they eventually figure it out. But we're getting into a space where next year, Franz is going

to make 40 million. Palo is going to make 40 million. Desmond Bain is going to make 40 million. Jalen Suggs is going to make 32. That is a hundred. That's like, there's over like $150 million. That's too much of money for too many like unproven players. Like, shout out of the desert. And of course, he's been proven. He's like, you know his role in the league and he's damn near like maximized his potential what it looks like to be the best version of himself. That's yet to be said for someone like Powell for sure.

And we of course want to see someone like Franz like reach another level. Jaylon sucks is Janeline sucks. Like he's developed perfectly fine as a player himself. And we've been witnessing the ascension of someone like Anthony Black to all great news. But for these two, to have that level. commitment, just entirely too much. Yeah, I think both are true.

Jerome Mosley needs to be better. He's dealt quite a tough hand. That end of the day, if neither one of them are going to be extravagant three-point shooters, neither one of them are going to be extravagant off-ball players who are compliment the other one with the ball in their hands. It's just kind of tough. Evan Mobley doesn't crash the boards

because he's behind the arc now and isn't an offensive weapon with his confidence. Man. Tough. Not much to say here. We've talked to Evan Mowbleu's been to death. I understand why you're disappointed. Yeah. The Evan Mobley whole conversation now, it kind of makes me, it's like my brain has, there's two sides of my brain.

I'm kind of scared to move off of someone like Jared Allen. But then also I'm like, I just would rather just put this entire, put all the pressure on Evan Mobley and just see what this experiment looks like. Yeah, that's kind of my thought now is one, they're already benching Jared out a lot in these games. And like it feels like the relationship is running his course in some ways. That we thought Evan Mobley was a good enough player to like rise to a top 10 level or whatever the peak apex, Aepid Moby looked like to you,

despite the fit concerns of the big next to him. When I say fit concerns, just like playing next to another non-spacer, and Moldly made himself a spacer. We thought maybe he could just continue to do that. Maybe he can't. Maybe he just needs some ideal offensive pairing next to him. He needs more space to operate as a slasher and doesn't need to be the guy that's on the perimeter space and the floor for somebody else.

And maybe that means moving off of Evan Mowgli. Yeah, and you can do that. Moving off at Jared Allen is something that's been talked about for what, like the last maybe two years for sure. two and a half. Go ahead and rip the bandaid off. Yeah. It's just,

just do it. Also, this team is broken. Derry's Garland's hurt again. Like, it's stuff. It's, nothing,

nothing is going to happen with this. Yeah. A lot of young Wizards players like A.J. Johnson and Balakulah Bali are doing nothing. You remember like,

was it last year when Wizards fans and Hordits fans had like a whole argument between whose young core is better? Yeah, they're tremendously down right now. Yeah, tremendously down. I don't know,

actually. Sar and Kishon George. done just enough that it's not tremendous. Yeah. But man, they better draft somebody great in this draft. They better get their version of La Mello

or the version of Kahn, I should say. Yeah. That's the key point, especially in that conversation because that, that argument was happening pre-draft. And it was happening before Khan got there. Now that Khan is there,

like, because I was Wizards FC. But now that Khan is there, and now I'm switched. You have, you have to go. How would you respond, Wizards FC?

Who will you draft in the top five of this year's class? Do you have, do you have to go get somebody? But to his point, the below Kula Bali stock I had two years ago, when I, you've been getting a last year, I think I was high on him, but then he came out poor and I was like, come on, man, let's get going. Yeah. Shit is liquidated.

Yeah. Behind the scenes, I sold it all. I sold for pennies on the dollar. I got out well, I could. Man, he sucks. He sucks. Like, just like, very clear language as somebody who had very high beliefs in his frame, his defensive wiring, his finishing ability, hoping the jump shot would develop over time.

I'm sorry, man. He shoots like you. It's rough. It's tough. It's not great. It's not a good sight. I took that as an insult, man. Yeah, he should.

It's a good shooter right there. The law, blah, blah, below. The skills didn't develop at all. The high efficiency we had a couple years ago, have proven to be small sample size, have proven to be a product of the role he was in. As more touches have gotten him on ball. He has not gotten better at it.

I'm just out. It's so damning. Like, when it comes to Agent Johnson, like, cares, you know, he was just a, throwing in that trade and he was he had a moment though he had a moment for sure five games but but nobody really like looked at him as like a budding star like someone who can like who would make the Milwaukee books sick as hell that they got off of him so early like he's just a very inconsequential person you know but in terms of balaqul bali yo we gave up danny we

wanted to you we wanted you to be what denny is right now something of that nature i thought you were gonna kill bridges one day the three-point shot came around You are not. Tough. Come on, man. Ethan Jack says, Payton Pritchard. More opportunity did not equal a boom, unfortunately.

Yeah. I mean, sometimes this happens. I see Celtics fans debate. Who's better? Him or Simons? Who should they keep long term? It's tough. Assume you can only have one

small-ish, non-defensive slanted guard in your rotation next year. I've seen debate online. Come on, man. Keep the fan favorite around. Yeah, give me Payne Pritchard. He knows it.

It's been around. for a minute, six men. Did he win six men of the year last year, two years ago? I can't remember. He went out of the year? No, because Malik Beasley got it. He ended up winning it. I can't remember who on.

I thought, I thought Beasley got it. Interesting. I can't remember. That was a convo. Who on? Why can't remember the award last year? It's a mostly irrelevant award. That's all you can't remember.

Oh, no. Payton one. Yeah, yeah. I thought he won. I thought he won. Now, I will say, Payne Pritchard, like, what did you expect out of him? I didn't expect any type of like,

he's going to be a 25%. did we're talking about it all this year so i never believed in that i think you we did it have we did it have joking yeah you definitely said it too but we did it have joking where we were like buckets need to be had yeah we were like jalen brown's an average 30 Peyton's gonna be the next whoever average 25 like it was half in jest just to talk about the fact that they were so downtrod in talent wise that someone had to step up you know what I remember I think we were talking about like who's gonna be the next jailin brunson or whatever and i was like oh maybe nemhard and yeah maybe so we weren't like it wasn't like a legit prediction but we were

talking about it in jest because it was funny but also there was some seriousness to it that he he was the type of guy that had we three years you said he could handle more workload and yeah that's how it goes right somebody has to step up and take those touches it proved to be jalen brown who can step up and handle more of a workload i don't know if it's necessarily a criticism of pate and pritchard just kind of how it worked out yeah i think the fact that the fact that payton pritch got to be the six men of the year that's the accomplishment and that's probably the the ceiling yeah the the fact that like tatum is not here obviously everybody moves up but if you are starting your core and you're like yeah

Peyton Pritchard's gonna do this as a legitimate championship core that's probably not what you want. I was very much looking forward to seeing Christian Brown play this season after who's in most improved player talks last year but even as a big fan of his it's hard to justify how bad he's been offensively even before the injury.

Yeah this one's tough. This one is very tough given the fact that the two point shot fell off a goddamn cliff I'm sure he's still a great chance of some score I'm sure just slashing and everything is still there can still dunk on your face any given moment with it's nasty he slashes with. If he can't shoot threes, all that becomes far less palatable. And that's why he had such an amazing rise last year, because the three-point shot became respectable. That's kind of what you need for all these

guys that the Devere Nuggets specialized in drafting in. All these athletes who have terrible shots and hope to develop. This year is Peyton Watson. Last year is Christian Brown. Aaron Gordon's three-point shot developed over time. That's kind of their MO. It's fixed these broken shooters. Going back to being a broken shooter makes it real tough, especially when they trade for Cam Johnson, had to figure out, ideally you want to keep both those guys long term. But now Peyton Watson's rising. It's like, damn, do we got to drop? one of these guys off to keep Peyton Watson because he's too good now. He's the best of these three. All of a sudden,

Brown looks like the most disposable one. When you start talking right now, make sure you say Brown and out, Braun. Braun. Extensions, extensions, extensions. Now, I've personally been burned by a contract extension myself, but seeing

that happen in this fashion, just completely fall off the wind. Three points shot, don't look remotely as close of what it was last year, even the year before that damn year. Sad stuff to see, especially considering the attention everyone else. It is very similar to Descent Danes, wasn't it? I think Dexon is worse. I don't know, actually.

That's still useful in a few ways, but, man. Cashing it on one good three-point shooting year getting paid. I hope we talk about Dyson later. I hope. Yeah, maybe we'll see. Jared McCain, after an impressive rookie season, getting sent to the G League in the sophomore year was the least of my expectations. Me too.

Me too. It's tough. It's real tough. We talk about it at length. part of it is just he got squeezed that rotation a little bit when they brought in Vijay Edgecombe. What is wrong with you? Donovan pulled up his skim shoot.

No, I did it. I did it. I just typed his name into Google and that's what came up. Yeah, it's mostly just like the roster kind of went past him. He doesn't really have the spot. He just did. Having roster squeeze plus an unfortunate injury to your wrist as a shooter, just a perfect storm of terrible, terrible circumstances.

This is easily one of the worst. I always believe, like, when it comes to a young player situation at all, when it comes to a young player and how they find their way in the league, their early circumstances are, like, what defines the rest of the NBA career. And he got, this is like the absolute worst case scenario. You got, someone got drafted, not into your necessary position, but they drive from another guard. You faced an injury, like a kind of serious injury, too.

That's a chew off track. And then on top of that, too, like, you already, you are your archetype in the league is kind of viewed as less valuable as well. I'm not going to sell my stock, though. I remember last year. He was incredible. We were talking about him as one of the more high floor shooters, clearly good players for a long time. I'm not going to allow myself to forget about that yet.

This season is a mulligan. I'm just going to ride it all out to matter what happens. I hope he gets traded. I hope it gets a different opportunity with another team that has more minutes for him. Yeah. But I'm not selling my stock. I agree. J-dub.

The Thunder got so much worse after he came back. Another one. These goddamn wrist injuries, man. and now it's not even the wrist hamstring. Yeah, which we'll get into after the segment. So it's like, I mean, the wrist injury will,

I will give him grace for that. Because the same way that we're talking about, Jeremy Kane. Obviously, like, J-Dub isn't a shooter in that sense of like his game is predicated on on that. But for any NBA player, and especially one that is one of like the second offensive option

and like the second offensive creation. on your team, it's very important. And so I do think that we had to give them a little bit of grace there. But it does like, it does knock everything down where you're coming off of this year. You start the year 24-on-1. And then J-Doh comes back. It's like, man, we're going to get so much better. No, we're not.

Yeah. You know what's unfortunate? Last year, the Thunder, after adding Hardinstein, adding Caruso, we're so clearly the best team in the league to me by a wide margin that like assuming things went to plan, I was like, it's so obvious they should win the title. And this year, it's so obvious why if they fail, this is why they won't. Like it's so abundantly clear if it goes poorly and they don't go back to back, why? Like it's been in front of us the whole time, the J-Dub injury. He sacrificed this year to win last year. His risk got so fucked because he played through it for the entire playoff

run. He hurt his risk the week the season ended, played four playoff series on a broken wrist, won a championship on a broken wrist, scored 40 in the finals on a broken wrist, every single time pounding the ball, dribbling, shooting, putting more and more damage to that ligament. If it's going to be a year-long recovery because of that, sacrifice his body for a ring is what it is.

It's hard to go back to back when you do something like that. Tough. Chet. Start averaging 28, my brother. We need AJ Mitchell, y'all. I pray you can step into these shoes and be the second creator. I pray to go out and get someone at the deadline and make up for it.

Lou Dork, ship his ass out, make up for it. Just want to throw that shot in there for no reason. Just remember he's been god awful. But yeah, so that's two things. We will know if they don't win the championship. We can look back to this time and say it's so clear. J.W. got hurt. Ludoort fell off and the shooting wasn't going to make up for it.

Damn. Or not good, but whatever. Yeah, just as what it is. Dyson Daniels, going from historic season, averaging over three, steals a game, motion-proof player, and nearly winning DPOY as a shooting guard to shooting 11% from three-point range. This has to be studied.

Legendary fall off. right after we had this whole contract negotiation. Yeah, he hasn't hit three at three in months. Do you know the last time you hit two threes in a game, do you know what that happened? I'm going to say, 20, 23. It's January right now.

I'm going to say opening night. No, I'm going to say last season. I'm going to say April. Brother, it was April. It was 87 degrees outside. It's two degrees outside right now. We went through multiple seasons of these shenanigans. Right after you went up to us,

you had the audacity. No, you was not working on your three-point shot during the out-season. You did what you did. I understand you're a bad getter. But you went into the out-season. It seems to be that you did nothing when it comes to expanding your game. Just to ask us for $30 million a year, you got your $25. Cool.

That's great. But next season, rolling into next season when that new check hits, this has to happen for the first time in NBA history. You have to donate at least half of your check to the fans of Atlanta, because you're not doing nothing for us. Not even the fans. Donate half of your check every single month to the impover. please, the guys who keep the lights on,

the guys who keep the floors clean, the guys who go ahead and give people hot dogs and taking it all that, right, because they're providing more value all around to the experience than you are, like half of the side, half side of the court is gone. How is your game just like depleted like that? 11%. 11? He doesn't even take

three like that anymore. It's quite unfathable. Dude. As a magic fan, Desmond Bain, four first on Picks to go all in on some certified mid was pure asset mismanagement. And you know what? That is kind of right.

He is, well. Four first-on picks. He is mid compared to other players. He went for four first-on-picks. He is definitely the worst of the bunch. I can understand that. There's a lot of guys. I mean, McKell Bridges went for five.

Yeah. Gobert went for four. And, like, O'Berger had so much more value to his team. Has McHale been worse than Bates? He's gone ghost more, but he hasn't. No, no. So he hasn't been worse. Maybe he was needed less.

I'm just trying to rank those three. and just trying to put Bain in the middle of that to say, yes, like for that value, he has been mid, but we talked about it earlier. This situation is bigger than you, Desmond Bain. Exactly. It's not your fault. But I will say, when it happened,

we came up here and we were like, it's too many bicks. I get it because you need this type of player. You need the spacing bad. And you're at the time where it could behoove you to overpay on a player because it could take you over the top in a wide open Eastern Conference that, while yes, it's an overpay, we can understand it.

If it works out in the end, so be it, right? it hasn't quite worked out so maybe it was just an overpay. We'll see. We're playing more time to be had. They're just getting healthy. When they're five best players on the court together, they're incredible.

Give them more time, see what a playoff run happens. If Deson Bain's skill set proves to be the difference in a playoff series, if they'd finally be the Cavs if they're getting their backs blown out a couple times in a row. Great. Yeah. But thus far, maybe it is leaning towards just being the overpaid, it was on paper.

Yeah, I think both of those things are true. One, of course, like he's not best put in the position to actually drive in the offensive philosophy. There's just no philosophy over there in Orlando. Then I'll talk about that too. The four is a four is a regis. Yeah, it was a lot. You win some, you lose some.

Yeah. Maybe it's a slight loss. Maybe it's a, it was worth it. We'll see. I still don't understand how Miles Turner is seven foot with a seven-four wing span and is averaging a measly 5.3 rebounds. The world might never know.

He's been like that, brother. What do you mean? Like, this is his MO. And he still doesn't understand it. And I'm right there. You this is this has to be one of the if not the most one of just one of the most frustrating archetypes in in the NBA who do you think has more lower body strength Who squats more miles Turner or your dad?

Oh, definitely your dad if your dad for two weeks prime Yeah, it's said your dad 10 years ago your dad So not prime steven smoot. There's a demon. Oh yeah What? Demon. Demon. Yeah so you got him what do you think his squat numbers were I guarantee you probably I don't even know I think you would clear like 375

Clear If he was squat Squat like that Probably yeah Clear I know he's doing that Yeah he could Camiles turn of clear 375

No No he's not putting It's probably pretty hard to squat a lot When you're 7 feet tall to be fair And that's why Definitely cat This man was a lock For an all-star starter

Last season And now he's scoring 20 once Every three weeks the more I watch him play, the more I realize that he's not good in set systems run by coaches. He needs to be playing his own brand of basketball to thrive as a player. That's why he was so good last season.

Tibbs just gave him and bruns on the ball and let them sort it out by themselves. I'm a Knicks fan, by the way. Donovan, do you agree with King Swid's 76's assessment of why Crowns and has been so bad this year? It's a perfect assessment. Really? Yeah, it is.

I haven't heard this narrative. Tell me about it. I'm not tapped in. I mean, the good and bad part of Tibbs' offense is like, It's going to be efficient and it's going to work because we are going to give our best players the ball all the time. And for a cat, for somebody who's like super reckless and is like super talented, he can be a positive offensive player in the aggregate because he's getting so many opportunities. But whenever whenever you are saying like, hey, we want to play a little bit more structure.

We want you to be more decisive with the basketball. He hasn't been there. And I think we saw early on in the year just figuring out his role. And even now in these in these past couple games or even just like just overall, you've seen you've seen Kat not be able to fit in. And like Mike Brown has called out Kat because of his passing, which has honestly like there's been, there's been a lot of moments this year where the passing has been better.

But Mike Brown was like, yo, like we, we knew like that like double teams were happening. like you just have to be a better passer out of double teams and really like called him out in front of everybody and that's something that I think you are seeing. I'm at the point right now where I thought I was going to be last year, which is, yeah, this is just not going to work. And I was able to kind of push it to the side. They're not winning a chip this year with this group, with this core, with those two guys being their best players.

And like, obviously at this point, Brunson, if it won for for mom donnie brunton would be the mayor like it's his city you know and so like he's not going it anywhere cat is the one who has to go of course 110 percent like you can only you can only have so many defensive liabilities while also having i'd be wildly inconsistent

offensively and there was a play specifically i hate that we forgot to mention it last week where they were off against the kings and some some catastrophe happened offensive i think so many bad plays i guess So good dash to react to you. And yeah, when you lose to the Kings, right? Like, get ran by the Kings?

Yeah. But there was a play where he was on the ground and they were playing four on five basketball. And then the Kings had gotten a long rebound. And the ball was going towards Carnetony Towns. And he was given like this half-ass jog. And he came to a point where he's got a wide open three while he was just like completely eliminated himself off the play because he was just too busy moping, pouting around. And that play right there just like blew up in my face and it told me and it gave me like the whole vibe and what this season meant for Cat and How was just pretty much like over when it comes to what the expectations were.

How he was seen as like an addition to the team, which he was in last year. And to some ways you can tell convince me like he's still in addition. But when it comes to where you're trying to be at hell not like he's not he's not leading to that at all. Yeah. It's been a it's been a weird thing too because the the vibes have the vibes have the vibe. have decreased year over year and which is honestly something that I think a lot of people and a lot of good teams can kind of relate to it because one the vibes have decreased because the expectations have increased you're no longer this like very fun 42 43 win team where like

everything is okay we came into the year saying you should win the east you should be in the eastern conference finals and now that you actually have some expectations on your bag and now that you actually have to be good a majority of of the time you're having a hard time. So what I'm hearing is fans and go keep you impatient with them. At all. Cute, humble team that took the New York City by storm no longer good enough. It's no longer good.

Ooh, I love podcast. I love side talk. No. It's not there. And especially after last year, they got to the Eastern Conference finals with a team that everybody thought was inherently flawed. And they overachieved for sure. Like, we just to forget that they beat the Knicks.

I mean, they beat the Celtics. Celtics, none of us thought it was possible all year if they beat the Celtics. All we talked about for a calendar year, since that trade happened when they got Crown of the Towns is there's no way in, fuck, you can defend a Boston Celtics offense that is epitomized modern basketball with a defensive anchor like cat and a point of attack defender like Jalen Brunson who epitomize everything that doesn't work defensively in modern basketball. They overachieved for, you know, they just got it out the mud, they figured it out, they made more shots, they slowed down the Celtics offense.

We don't got to go back and talk about why. But those flaws then disappear. Just because they overachieve and they find a way to win a series that they shouldn't win, doesn't mean we can assume those flaws won't exist the next year. Sometimes you get lucky and sometimes over the long term as more sample size builds and regular season and playoffs. Those flaws prove to be real. Not a part of this conversation now, but I am so curious to see how they pivot in the offseason and what their next move is. It has to be trading cat because you're not going to go in.

But what does that look like? What do you like when I get for him? Who's going to like. Janice! No, but like you do. that honestly like is the that's the obviously like the pray for yeah yeah that's the you trade him for rj barry and yacob purdle you take it yaka perrtle is a traditional big that can defend the rim a little bit a little bit flawed rj barry you probably flip and try to do something else that salary can you do me

can you do me please yeah any thank you thank you know i got you thank you that you hate that do yes i mean it's supposed to a salary dumb thing you'd move you reroute rj barry realistically hopefully bring in another wing that's a little bit more 3 and D and cheaper and yeah you would roll with perdle who hope you gets healthy and fits better can do some heart and Stein stuff as it's like traditional room protector yeah it's a lose lose situation it's a salary dump to get out of that era if if we at at this point i'm okay with with big swings and big misses whatever if they step back on purpose if they yeah if they do that when you're in this era of the eastern conference and of nix basketball and you go out and you fire tibs

You bring in Mike Brown and everything is supposed to be, you know, on the up and up. You trade Carl Anthony Towns for RJ Barrett. I'm not going to be the funniest thing. Again, in Nakapurto, I will lose my money. Well, it's hard because he makes so much money. I understand that. I wasn't a suggestion. If salaries weren't a factor, Jared Allen for Kat saves everybody's lives.

Again, we can do that. But you can't. And I would be okay with that. It's impossible. He makes so much money. That's so hard for the Cleveland Cavaliers and their current roster construction, unless you get real creative with some kind of three-team deal

they have to get out of the second apron and then find a way to add that is what the money makes almost $40 million more than Jared Allen. That is what the money is for to be a GM. Go be creative. I don't get the more handicapped.

Leon Rose, you should not sleep. I need three white boards with red tape everywhere for you to actually figure out how to trade this, how to trade this man, because right now,

and like, it sucks because he played so well last year and the timely shot, making that he had, especially like in the Detroit series, there was, you know, he had the crazy step back. At every single term, Kat was doing the things that people asked for him last year and he played so, so well.

And to come into this year, from, again, from the start to where we are now, nothing, nothing looks, looks good. And then you even have Mikhail and OG and their ups and downs, which is honestly expected because they are, like tertiary and whatever, you know, for. fourth-eary option. Fourth-year. I have no idea what that word is. Me either.

But that's their roles. Quadrissary. You're getting a good due season. The bad part also, it looks like Mitch Robinson is going to leave. Like that riding looks on the wall. So if you go into this off-season and you lose the one big that actually can help you be a competent defense at times, this entire experiment is going to go down in flames. And I hate it because Carson, two weeks.

did something the other day where he was uh he put up the the the on and off numbers with like brunson and cat and it was like yeah like you can't do this and i was like guys like brunson is a winning player like he can do it and he's being dragged like this is not supposed to happen like he people are going back and relitigating a lot of the stuff that that is that has been said about brunson and has been said about the ability to win with a with a small guard which historically they are true and i and i do understand it but especially in Brunson's case because he's been so clutch and he's been so good. I want to push back on it so much.

And it's like, yes, it's hard to win with a short guard who's not great at defense. But it's not his fault that like Kat got put there too. Like it's tough. Yeah, I feel like someone like Brunson, like there's only even a few exceptions in the history of the league. And I feel like Brunson just might be good enough if the situation was perfect around him. And obviously the next situation is far from perfect. extending out and looking at the whole car and the town's thing

numbers below are since last season it's actually worse for this year alone it's extremely difficult to build a truly elite team when your best player is one of the worst defenders on the planet and probably impossible when your second star is also an awful defender, Nix

and this shows Jalen Brunson offensively when he's on the court their offensive rating is three points better than he's on the bench but defensively their defensive rating is 10 points worse leading to them being better with Jalen Brunson not playing by 7.6 points overall. Becky Hammond. They called her

a mad woman, bro. Now this happens sometimes with Starr is because coaches, especially old school coaches like a Tibbs, will rely on their star player to carry bench lines with all their worst players. So that sometimes will put them in a lot of lineups that are bad and worse than lineups

when the second and third best player in the team play together. But the logic there is Brunson will keep those bad lineups from being slightly bad, opposed to being horrendous. That happens to Shea this year. When they're on the bench, lineups, they usually put J-Dub and Chet together

where Shea plays at all the shitters that can't shoot. So that mighties the type of stuff up a lot in terms of baseline on-off numbers, but the defensive rating is no coincidence. Yeah, and again, like I understand it. I understand we've talked really since the day that this has happened about the flaws. I just think that for the next, like,

it is time to figure out what the, what the pivot is because you, you went out and you fired. And at the time, like, I thought it was the right move. It was the right move. The way that they were playing offense in the playoffs last year was so uncreative, was so, was so retro, they did not have any modern concepts that they were legitimately running or going to in crunch times that can elevate them. And that wasn't a part of what they were doing.

I thought it was a good thing. Now, I wish that they probably could have gotten one of the top. here candidates instead of being rejected by every single candidate that they had and relied on like their sixth option in my who would like them again i can't remember they interviewed everybody and and like mike brown was one of just like the last guys at the party so the other guys who wanted to go the jobs they either like took other jobs or because remember they really wanted like jason kid or something and they oh yeah they try to poach them yeah they try to poach a lot of people and it was like you went into this thing without a clear plan of like of an actual candidate that could have been

hired your whole plan was yeah we're going to fire tips and then see if we can poke somebody from another team like that's not a serious plan to go to go out and get a coach so now that now that you're here you are kind of committed to to mike brown and you have this whole this whole cat thing I don't know if they rock together I have no idea and it seems like it's not the the coach second star combo that you would want out of a championship team and that's another what we didn't talk about. We talked about how last year they overcame the weaknesses and maybe this year they're just sample sizes proving that won't happen every year.

It's also a coaching thing. Like maybe this isn't the coach firm like you just said. And that also happens a lot that. Yeah. Kat was the second star for Brunson when Tibbs was coaching for better or worse that fit mesh together. Maybe we don't need a re like I kind of re-litigated last year and called it a fluke in some ways. Maybe that's not even necessary. Maybe it's just the coaching difference. It kind of was. Do you remember what their plus minus was for the playoffs?

No. It was a negative. It was zero. Oh, so it was like a, it was like a Laker situation where they just, when these clutch games but weren't necessarily better. Every game that they won was like a clutch game in the last two minutes. Somebody's hitting a clutch shot.

Somebody's getting fouled at the end. They were either losing by seven or they were winning by two. And it was... Fuck, let's do it. They were lucky as hell. The Celtics were better. They never deserved to be there.

The Celtics choked and lost the series. The NICs didn't come forward to win the series. We were here to slander Boston and say the Knicks are benefactors of the biggest choke job of the last 10 years. How about that?

There's nothing more than I love the next slander, man. The Pacers deserve to beat them. They should have swept them. Okay, let's go. Swept them. It's hilarious. They should have beat them in a bigger margin because they were that fraudulent. Game one still haunts.

But like all of all of that happened. And it's like, it's the Dan Campbell thing of like, hey, man, this might be our own shot. Damn. Damn. You're right. You know, this might be the only opportunity that you get to legitimately make a run. and you tried to switch some things up and sometimes things just don't go your way

and right now it's looking like the Knicks had their opportunity and could have been in the finals, right? Again, probably got smoked out by OEC but could have at least put yourself in that situation where you had just overcome a giant two weeks ago against the Celtics. Let's see what you could have done,

especially against OKC who was missing a whole bunch of threes was able to get pushed to seven games twice. Who knows, right? Will flip a coin, who knows? But that version of the Knicks and even the version two years ago where everybody got hurt, those two might have been the best opportunity to win a championship or to get to the finals in this Brunson era. And I have no idea if it's ever going to get there again. That's a good point.

And you know, listen, it is January 19th, midseason basketball. They are two and eight in their last 10 games. They are. It is bad right now. And I think it's bad for reasons that were predictable and that track with preconceived notions. So it's real. A lot of teams go through slums at this point in the year. They could come together at the right time like they did last year and make a run in which we did not believe in them at all.

For some similar reasons, maybe Brunson just rises again and carries them to places we didn't think they could happen. That's happened for like three years in a row. They keep overachieving because his individual brilliance in the playoffs mixed with some other stuff too, not to say it's only him. But that could happen again and they could get back to where they were in the conference championships. But at this point, I think, I think you're right. I think this is a lion's situation. I think they had their best chance and now we're just back to reality. And one more piece of pessimism.

Whenever the cat thing, like let's say we go another year with, with cat, with three years removed, whatever, Jalen Brunson is not taking a pay cut again. Nor should he. The next, the next contract that he takes, if it's another one of these situations where he's, you know, essentially Pablo, Pablo Toro, please don't do anything. But if he's leaving like $100 million on the, on the table, I have no idea what that. Dude, I thought that was like a more so good guy. I thought that was. you but but yeah like brunson brunson not taking a pay cut in two years or whatever whenever the next extension is up that's also going to then put you in another situation where you are not going to

have as much flexibility to surround yourself with a mckelle burgess with an ogy with a cat like yeah that's going to be a very very weird it was also a fake pay cuff to some extent in terms of the sticker number yeah yeah like he did that people don't know he took one less year in his contract which is the big reason why the 100 million dollar number is so big because that's like $60 million off of one year. He looked about $40 million less, I think, rough numbers, I don't remember exactly. For those four years, I think the contract was,

instead of getting the fifth year, because after that he will have 10 years of service. I can sign an even bigger deal with when the cap rises is even more, three years from now, even hugeer numbers. So he's going to get most that back in terms of the next deal. And I guarantee you with the relationship he has with the Nix, they were like, take this deal and we'll for sure give you the next one as long as you don't fall off a cliff.

So that number's coming in a few years, like pretty much guaranteed. Yeah, it was tactical. Yeah. It's just going to be so hard to navigate things. That's why I asked earlier, like, how can you, like, pivot off the cat stuff while also, like, not necessarily making your team that much worse. And I forget there's a second apron team. They're one in, like, the more firm second apron teams as well.

So even then, you're going to have to jump through so many loopholes. I mean, you can't aggregate his salary. My big hope. My big hope is that the Pelicans pick does not end up in the top four. and then that pick becomes, again, just, it's still going to be valuable, but it's not the crown jewel of the offseason. So then that pick doesn't become top four. Then we take cat, whatever picks we have in the summer, and we say Milwaukee, you guys are desperate,

please give us yon. And that's what, that's my hope at this point. I don't think the Hawks are, all right, have like any business getting honest right now. They have so many other questions saying. Exactly, which is why he should be a nickname. The Hawks are not getting honest. If that pick is a top four pick, or top three pick even, they're taking their young star and running. They're not getting yonis.

Yeah, you're not doing it. They're going to pair Camboozer and Jalen Johnson have a grand time. Yeah, we have no business doing that at all. Yeah, but Sean ain't getting them either though, for sure. Yeah, probably not. But at this point, no one's getting honest. At this point, Janus isn't even sure who's getting yonis. We'll see.

He just want to hang out and, you know, eat chicken nuggets and cheese curds and pull up a spoon king. Like, that's it. So, yeah, I have no idea. Yeah. All right, well, that wraps up our segment of the most disappointing players in the year. let's get over to our news of the weekend reacting to some quick tweets talking about the little headlines that we missed and we'll start with the NBA London game the Grizzlies once again played the Orlando Magic remember they played them on i think Friday in Berlin was is a two-part series of europe games in which

they do some outreach adam silver's out there a bunch of NBA officials are out there big showcase for the league in that first game john Morant did not play they got beat pretty handily by the Orlando magic Anthony Black dunked on four people. In this game, John Morant did play, and he had a great game. 24 points, 13 assists, five rebounds, seven of 13 from the field, hit three out of four of his threes. They beat the shit out of the airline of Magic. Beat them to a pulp.

Palo Baner was asked, well, it's a difference in these two games, why it had such a huge lopsided difference in the outcome. He says, I think the main difference is John Morant was there. In this game, not only John Moran play well on the big stage, feels like the catalyst of maybe some mending of some bridges with the Memphis Grizzlies because after this game, he was asked about this and about just the general thing that's going on

with the Grizzlies, the call it a schism he's having with the team. He said, I got a logo on my back and that should tell you where I want to be. He has a grizzlies tattoo. He said, I want to always remain here. He led with loyalty. He said, I'm a loyal guy. I think I noticed an energy shift in Grizzlies' Twitter. People were like,

to figure out how to make this word. This is our guy. We ride or die with John Morant. They're back on. They've convinced himself he should stay. Have you convinced yourself he should stay? And this is how toxic relationships work, people. They go ahead and show you what you want for two seconds.

They lure you back in and then they continue to treat you like shit afterwards. It's two weeks later. Yeah. If John Moran could shoot 7 to 13 every night. Yeah. We would not be having this issue. 75% of 3. If he was after 20 and 10 on 70, on 30, on 30.

5% from the 3 point line, we would not be having the conversation that we're having. And I think this game did show you that they are really, they're a good guard that can create offense away from being a very good team. Like, it really like, I wish we had that.

I know. Like the reason why we thought this team would be a playing level team would be just like, you know, a solid team. All makes sense. Like they have a lot of good things going for them. If they had an all-star guard, everything would be different.

And if he didn't get hurt and they had a real big that could also do his part. That part's unfortunate. So it tells you two things. One, we got a whole. and pray that John Morant can be the guy. Two, if John Morant is the guy, he's worth keeping. So maybe we don't take a tiny deal and trade him just to trade him.

But it doesn't really dispel all the reasons that three days ago we thought he'd for sure get traded. Yeah. Like, I think all my say, all the things that I still thought about the Memphis Jersey is and where they are as an organization, I still feel the same way. You should probably move off a jaw on this, like, probably, I don't want to say it lends to be even more of a sign. But it feels good to see him back and be like the normal John. John Morant that we know the normal All-Star caliber guard and seeing his three-point shot fall to

that degree specifically. There was a shot in this game where I think he took, he was like two or three cents back from the three-point line and the guy came up late and I think that's what led to him doing his celebration. Dude, okay, y'all at home, remember, on April 9th, I'm telling you this date so you can look back at our video log and try to freak this out for me. On April 9th, John Morant last season did the grenade celebration. And a few days later, I don't know when, maybe it was a few weeks later,

we talked about it and I said I know what's next he's in pulled a goddamn bazooka and you said pf I remember and I went yeah and then I said after that he's going to do AC130 inbound I cannot find that video I don't know where I said that but we fucking called it because during this game

he did the bazooka he pulled it out and went on the court please if you're watching find that clip for me because I tell me what episode it was in tell me a time step if you happen to remember so I need to find that clip who needs a ground eater to Texas to go to work yeah if there's one thing we know

we know celebrate We know foolishness. We recognize patterns. We know what's up next. Because he did it. He did exactly what we said he would. He went like this and did the grenade loss. He was saying, I know you, John.

What are you thinking? What will be the next one? I told you, AC130 inbound. How did that even look like, though? You pull out a computer, open it. Nah, that's too much typhins. Predator missile. It's a red button then.

He'll pull out something, smash it. Technical dude. But nevertheless, good to see John Moran get back on track in this one game. He's had single games before. This game just mattered a little more coming off of the, I don't fuck with y'all. I don't fuck with y'all, the whole thing they had, which I don't think he fucks with them now. It's been a couple days.

Unless he, I wonder if part of it is also like, he sees the convos. He knows he's about to be traded if things don't go well. I believe him he doesn't want to be traded. I believe he'd like to be loyal. So maybe there's some element where he's like, let me be the bigger person. Let me start saying the right things. I mean, he got to.

Like, everyone's talking about him. Like, he's a cancer on your team. Like, he's, I don't know, 2021 Russell Westbrook. You're just a bad asset. And 2021, Russell Westbrook, bro, is 33 years old, 34 years old. Brother, you're at the peak of your prime right now. You should be just starting your prime. Yeah.

Like, you should be doing everything in your power to correct your PR because, like, when it comes to the stench and stank in the lead, that should stays around you for a couple of years before, everyone comes around to the idea of you not being like either a bad player or even like just having bad vibes. It might stay forever. Like that and you might be forever this guy. Yeah.

Like I remember it took years for someone like, I don't know, Julius Randall to rewrite to rewrite his course and how people were feeling about him based on when it was coming off in New York. So yeah. And his stakes are way less than this too. Yeah. Like I don't even know who an example is or someone who dealt with this type of career just like nose dive like that really bounce back from it. Yeah.

It's more often that you never recover and never the same than you are. you bounce back perfectly. Yeah. Fred Van Vleet, on a few plans to continue his podcast after returning from injury. Hell no. I just can't see myself

preparing for a game in the midst of a slump or whatever and then wanting to get on here and do a podcast. So Donovan, I ask you, have you tuned into the latest episode of the roommates during their 218 stretch?

No. Are you happy that there's new episodes of the roommates during the 218 stretch? No. Are they still making that show? I haven't seen it like...

They are. And when they do bad, the thumbnails, they're like, we suck. And they're making the... YouTube faces and the title says like, we're trash or something. And they're on there talking about it. They got obligations, man.

I don't know. Oh, my God. They just uploaded three days ago. Yeah. Jaylen's like, oh, we're sorry. Josh's like, yeah, we suck. Man. And this kind of gets cool, I guess.

But like, I know it's not. It's not cool. I don't really give a fuck. But like, to each their own, if it doesn't hurt their preparation, doesn't hurt the preparation. I wonder how the teammates feel, though, seeing this competition. This is so funny. Yeah. One of their titles is Jalen and Josh.

addressed the losing streak. 100K views. So I don't really think of an issue with it. If I was a Knicks fan, I don't think I'd care too much because there's bigger fish to fry play some fucking defense. I wonder how their teammates feel, though.

If Ray Van Vleet feels this way, as the guy doing the podcast, he was like, I would never, how does Ogen, Nobi look at the show? Does Ogena Nobi feel anything? Maybe not. How does Mitchell Robinson look at the show? They don't really have like old vets

on the bench like that. If they did, how would they look at the show? So Michael Robinson's YouTube algorithm is not showing him the roommates. I know he's probably, he's not worried about that. Yeah. But it is like, like,

He's on Rumble. Everything is cool like when, when you're winning and when you're five and five. But then it's like, and obviously this is like very much the unreasonable fan in me. But because I, because I, I,

I, 100% know that like, yes. you can lose a game and you can still go out to dinner that night and like have a nice dinner like everything's fine and it's not that but damn it like come on man like I'm not trying to see that like I'm not trying to see you guys joke and have fun

while we're in the middle of this two and eight stretch it feels like the sky is falling and then we get it upload with you on a thumbnail like come on man like say TikTok looks what? Yeah like it's not the optics is just not great and I understand again

it's completely like unreasonable as a as a fan because you understand people still have like regular lives and stuff like that, but I'm not trying to see that. When it comes to the Fred VanVee thing real quick, I, it's something that that's been like lingering in my mind is like, I hope he comes back 110% himself because he is a heavier set guard and more stockier guy. He's not big up. No one's ever made those jokes, but he's strong. Like that's a real pro to his strength. Like he's able to guard like more, more players of this position scaling up than other guys who are six foot. Not the quickest.

It's never been efficient at all just because of his game dying, how far he likes to take his shots. But I hope he can, like, move the same. I'm so worried about that. I hope he's the same. But you're fat and slow. And you know what? I think he'll get fat and slower, and I'm worried.

That's the synthesization of what you're saying. Donovan Mitchell wants to play for Team World in the All-Star game. I don't think people look at me like a Panamanian basketball player, but I do. I would love to be on Team World if I got the chance. he went on to say that his grandma is from Panama. Shout out. Man. Nobody wants to be from America anymore for these NBA players.

They all want to be Team World. They get a singular conversation with their grandma. You know you're Panamania, right? And they want to just go ahead and embrace these dudes out of nowhere. Oh, my God, man. I hate it. Nobody wants to be on Team America in this game. Be who you are.

Come on now. I mean, obviously, I mean, not to take away the Panamanian card from him. I'm sure. I'm sure it's true. But, like, it's just. So funny, everyone's like, yeah, maybe I'm team world. Yeah. Maybe why not?

You got people like normal powers and say, you know what? Yeah, I am Jamaica too. I want to play for team U.N. Not even team USA. People are in team world. Norman. It's kind of sick. It's new.

It's different. Put me on team world. I want to play with Wemby. I'm talking a lot. Listen, that's really what. Me and Yonkers have a crazy two men game. I know it. Everyone's coming out of the woodworks.

Also, try to play to Jamaica, you're not making Team USA. That's really why. That's really what's going on. That is usually what it is. Yeah. That's hilarious. They're all the inverse of Palo who was like,

supposed to be on Team Italy, and then he decided to go to Team USA at the last second, and now they hate them. Say, fuck, these guys don't know what they talk about. Yeah. It's funny. It's just, it's so funny how many headlines we're seeing people being like,

secretly I'm not only American, so put me on Team World. That's so funny, bad. As you guys know, last week, Eric Spolcher went into a press conference and he shit all over Kalilware He said he has not been stringing together good days I would like him to get back at the level

He was playing at seven day, weeks ago Basically saying he is not good enough right now To earn the minutes that he thinks he deserves But we have follow-ups The situation has advanced I love follow-ups I love follow-ups too Kaluware on

Oh my button Kaloware on Coach Spos comments about him Honestly I'm not gonna lie I think it's crazy But I mean it's his comments I've kind of learned to control what you can control. Always a solid bar. It is what it is another solid bar.

If I don't play the second half, that was his decision he felt he needed to make. In order to produce, I guess, like you said, eight weeks ago, I would say I had more minutes eight weeks ago. Ah, fine. Yep. And then the follow question was, do you feel like you play better if you had more minutes on a consistent basis? He said, I mean, I feel like everybody thinks that, of course. So he was, he led with, I'm not going to lie, I think that was crazy. Yeah.

And you know what I think I agree. In some ways, I was kind of crazy. Now, since this quote came out too by Clow where... I'm going to show it next. Oh, go ahead. Yeah, show it right now. Got you. Two minutes here.

I'm not going to show you the whole video, but to which you're about the reference, Airspoly responded. And I think he handled it with Grace. He said, I didn't articulate that in a great way, and that wasn't fair to Khalil. I'm fully invested and invigorated

about the opportunity to develop Kalil. I think he's markedly improved, not only his approach, but his work ethic. This is a mad PR. Professionalism and his game. I do have to figure out some things and it might not happen immediately.

There's some rotations that have to produce a little better. Some of the impact and the on-off numbers have to be a little bit better. He hates this guy. He can't stand the way he walks, talks, sees him. He says, light-skinned, fragile. Says all the things like that, bro. And now he's over here backtracking

because he realizes, damn. That was actually really mean. Damn. Maybe I shouldn't have said that in the limelight about this young player who's still trying to figure things out. Yeah, it was crazy. It was crazy from Spolshah to say the things that he said. And I'm completely on Koloa Whir's side.

This is also like somebody got in Spolcher's ear and was like, hey man, like you got to calm down. Because one, there's been much worse players to come through Miami, come through the entire league. And people don't talk about, you know, young players. this openly, this aggressively in terms of like their their struggles and this open. So I think like Spoh apologizing, if it's real,

cool. If it's not, in the words of Calaisa, where? It is what it is. And you just have to have to figure out a way to make things work. Jalen Williams heard his hamstring in two games ago.

Missed last game against the Cavs. It hasn't been fully confirmed how bad the injury was, but he posted this on a story, who you're going to be with the picture of him taking his hamstring? Damn. Face not shown, dealing with diversity. How are you going to rise to the occasion? Who are you going to be?

Yeah, I'm at the point where I, when it comes to, I'm not going to be overzealous, but I will say I don't feel as good when it comes to OKC, naturally as they've been wished right now at this point about them, like, winning the championship. at all anymore because it just feels like a natural season hampered by injuries. Yep. And they still haven't confirmed the extent of this injury. He missed last game and it was without a time table to return. Real GM classified it as being out indefinitely with the right hamstring strain.

Again, it's a hamstring, but OKC has been very, very guarded with Jdub's injuries and his recoveries this whole time. And for some reason, they haven't put up an official report saying how long he'll be gone. It looked like a serious strain, though. And we're already talking about him dealing with this wrist injury. Hasn't been the same all year. Now having a maybe serious four-week-plus hamstring injury. Quite fucking unfortunate.

At this point, all you can hope for is that they can get them healthy by the playoffs. Four weeks would be the absolute best case scenario because when I think of my hamstring, I'm thinking about this season. Oh shit, Jalen Green, like you play two games for the for the sons and he's been out for like 31, 32 consecutive games. Oh, these teams are liars. He ripped the shit off the bone. He's gone.

Fly high, sweet hamstring. He's cooked out of the bone. This shit is crazy with Jalen Green. That's a different story. They are lying. Or he has the worst string hamstring of all time. I feel like it could be possible. I'm,

if I'm looking at this with the rosiest of tints, I'm going to say he was playing bad before. He is being forced off off the court. He's going to come back healthy. He's going to give his wrist just a little bit more time to heal. And this next break is the break that he needs to actually be the J-Dub that is a franchise legend. Like that's, that's what we need. And so that's the, that's how I would spin it.

However, if I'm just being real, this is scary as hell. I'm with you. I don't think it feels like this is just one of those years where last year and we see teams make runs all the time who are able to withstand injury and that's what the playoffs are about. If the Thunder aren't able to do that, they're going to be in a long line of NBA champions who the year after just suffer some injuries and aren't able to get back. Last time this happened was what?

Last year. Last year with the Boston Celtics, the year before that, it was the Denver Nuggets with Jamal Murray coming into the season, just like super injury hampered. And obviously MPJ went through his things as well. Like it just happens these days. Yeah. The lack of back-to-back teams isn't always because they're not good enough. It's more often because it takes a perfect storm to winning championship.

Every year there's multiple teams that are good enough to be champions and be that team that defines that year. Only one can stay healthy and have the best case scenario and be the one to actually win. Yeah. A couple nights ago now, Anthony Edwards had 58 points in a loss to the San Antonio Spurs. And in that game, Victor Woman Yama had 39 points, 9 rebounds,

three assists, two blocks, four for nine from three and 30 minutes of play. I completely miss this game and this is one of the games that I have to go back and watch, but I don't care at all about this game. Why not? He's bald.

Yeah. And before this game, he went bald. He's been bald. He is bald. He was bald like last week, I think. Yeah. That was when he went bald with Keldon Johnson. Yeah, well, he's a little bit couple games since then, and we haven't had a chance to talk about it.

Yeah. He's bald. He's the perfect type of crazy, man. This is so encouraging for a Spursman. Him and Kelton have been bald for about four days now. We haven't had a chance to address it on camera. How do you all feel about bald wendy? Special player.

Yeah, I think the continuation of the audience of the audience is going to average with like being bald. Like he's, if he's going to be the next version of gang signs on wall, untucked Kyrie. Yeah. He's like, he'll be along those lines. It's a nice, it's a nice alter you go. One,

I want to see this for a full year because 2009 De Wade when they came back from the Olympics, that De Wade went bald and he averaged like 30 that year. That was his like, DeWay could have been MVP year. Like I won a full season of just insane cycle. I don't have time to worry about my hair. I'm shaving it all off.

That's what I need from start to finish from Wemby. This is, this is the prophecy. This is what he started in the, season and I like the album rollout to be, you know, I like the continuation of it. Can I play devil's advocate? What's up? Do you think he's being performative?

Knowing that he's on NBA legend status, knowing his capabilities and knowing his ceiling as a player, he said a lot of things that could be construed as ore farming. Is he performatively entering his bald air early because he knows how iconic it is for a legend? because maybe he is a little bit performing man we're not going to put that is he a performative legend is he manufacturing his legistat because he's he's he's incredibly smart like he is obviously like outside of basketball a very smart individual do you think he knows what goes into building aura I think that's too cynical for him because I what's the line between performative and like I'm just

being me you know I think he's probably smart enough to put blend two together and from the jump to from the jump to from the jump don't put out legend vibes. If you say that this is performative, it doesn't stop here then. Now we have to relitigate everything. Was the monk performative? Maybe. But see, that's like, he didn't post pictures.

That somebody else did, right? Or am I misremembering that? I think he posted pictures himself as well. Okay, that's like a big deal. Like, you're going across the world. Like, if that's performing, so be it. You're in China. At some point, if you're performing, go for it.

You're doing the work. You're in where, actually, you know if it's China. Wherever he was, he will win. went there. So that's fine. But maybe he understands what's needed to build up himself as a legend. Maybe he is his own Nike in the same way they built up Jordan. So do you think that

if, if we talked to Wembe, right, we gave him two serum and we say, listen, like, were you oral farming on that? Like, was this like a stick to try and, you know, big up yourself? And he says yes. Do you have less respect for this? No, because this is still

insane. Let's make this clear. I'm not anti-Orat farming. I'm just trying to say should we identify that this is a very specific type of oral farming that only works when you're the ability to be one of the greatest players of all time and when you're keenly aware of it since you're 16 maybe we have a very very self-war individual that's you could argue doing all the right steps we need legends who cares that they're manufactured who cares if they're doing the right things to get our respect there's respect to be given somebody has to earn it yeah and i think this is like the greatest levels of oral farming and being performative too

if this is what it was because he was even younger he was even younger than when D. Wade went bald. Like, bro, this is your third year and league, you're what, 21 years old or whatever? And then I'll talk about that too. You went double bald and you forced the teammate. You brought the idea. 2026, 21-year-olds do not buzz their hair. Exactly.

That's very, very not a thing that happens in modern. Back for D. Wade, that was a look. People were rocking at all the way. It's not a thing that people do these days. Yes, it is. Go bald? No, it is not. This is a very hair forward era.

People buzz their hair all the time. Sure. Army cadets. Even not even, regular people buzzed their hair. Sure. There's people who have buzzed their hair,

but it's not as prevalent as it was in 2009. I'm in these haircut streets. I'll be watching the videos. He's letting us know his next move. That's what it is. Listen, we, I told y'all.

I told y'all. I told y'all. Also, if it does happen, here's what's going to happen. If I ever do go and get the stuff, it's going to happen during the winter. I will come up on the show with a beanie every single week for six months. You will never know.

I saw a thing on Twitter too, back to the performative nature of Wembe potentially. People were talking about realizing the Spurs are the most Reddit fan base ever because they're all talking about like respectable hoops and all this stuff in a very cringe way where people were, Russ Spurs fans are tweeting like, there's something about Anthony Edwards, man. I respect the way he plays. Put so much fear in my heart way more than Shade Gildes Alexander. He plays the game the right way.

If people were like, this dork-ass Reddit fan base talking about farming respectability points. Oh my gosh. And it's so true. That is the Spurs, especially after like the Tim Duncan era where everything was like, we do things the right way. It's very, very Reddit coded. Whenby being this way potentially, kind of. They're a perfect match.

They are a perfect match. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. It was some hilarious. We saw an interviewer post game was like, they walked up to Stephen Castle. And Stefan Castle, he was like, yeah, like he knew better not to talk up to me and ask that question at all. Like him, he's not doing that. I don't envision, no, like the Vassell doing that.

Georgia boys, hell not. Oh, Dylan Harper? Hell not. No, he did cut his hair, but more so just like got a trim. Yeah, off. Yeah, what's the, because I was thinking, I was legit thinking about it the other day. What's the next way for Dilla Harper? Is he brating his hair?

Is he cutting it down? I think he's cutting it down. I guess he braids I can see braids too Yeah but I think he's gonna yeah Yeah because he he drove he to the basket And his hair was going everywhere And I was like yeah bro you gotta braid that up

You gotta lock that down Stop me if you heard this before Kauai Leonard has had the most dominant Scoring stretch of his year And he's now in Jersey Stop damn Kawhi Leonard who's having a career year Is dealing with left knee irritation

And is being sent home from the road ship for treatment Leak sources tell NBA on Prime NBA TV. He'll be evaluated once the team returns Wednesday. Other tweets of this said, it's not currently considered to be anything serious. It is a contusion. He suffered a week ago, and they're dealing with it with some caution. Okay, fair. On the other hand, Clippers. Known liars, there's been about four times in the last five years in which Kauai suffered a seemingly innocuous injury and is out for the season. So we have PTSD when it comes to this exact scenario. Are you worried? No, not worried.

because I don't have no expectations at all. I expect maybe 20, 25 max 30, and we're right around 30 right now. Great games of Kauai Leonard. And because I've like fell into this world of just being constantly let down a Kauai, I'm scarred, you know, like as a fan. I see Kauai Leonard and what he looks like at the peak of his powers. And sometimes I'm just like, how is he just not a top five, top 25 basketball player of all time when he's on the court?

It doesn't make any sense to me. Then shit like this happens, then I'm like, oh, Oh, damn. So I'm not, I'll have no worries at all. Something to monitor. We'll see if horror is happening again. This is the worst news for the Clippers. So because they've been on the fucking run.

Yeah, and a lot of, a lot of teams around them are, the tanking has started this past week and a half. You guys haven't noticed or not. A lot of shameless tanking going on now. Obviously, the Wizards, Trey for Tray Young and Benjamin, the, uh, why blanking on who I was about to say? The Jazz are shamelessly tanking now, wrestling guys, a lot.

A lot of these teams are going to do this shit around purpose while the Clippers are trying to win. So they're going to be, they're going to be a plane. team it seems. Now if Kauai gets hurt, that is highly unfortunate. Yeah, call me in two weeks. Yeah, we'll see. Kevin Durant has officially passed Dirk sixth on the all-time scoring list. That's a bucket. That's a bucket. That's all you can say is like, wow, Kevin Doret got more buckets. Cool. Yeah, he just gets buckets over the sky is blue. Nice. It was cool, though,

because he got, he got the jumper doing like a Dirk fade. Yeah, which is cool. Now, my question is, Kevin Durant is here at 3, 1, 5, 6, 1. He's passing Jordan. Yeah, how high do you think he's going to get? I think he could be top 3 maybe. If I remember correctly,

he'll pass Kobe. Another 5,000, like, 5,500, that's a lot. If I remember correctly, because I just was talked about with LeBron, I think if you average like 27, like LeBron does, and you stay relatively healthy, I think they were saying

he gets like 4,000 a season. Or is that too high? Or was a 2,800 a season. Yeah, it doesn't be that. It might be, it was like 25. No, no, yeah. Now I'm looking at 42K. That doesn't make sense at all.

So what is it like 2,800 points a season? So if he plays, if he plays, let's say he plays 60, average of 60 games, right? And he scores like 27. That's 1,600 points a season. Oh, that's all I was way off. Okay. So maybe it's like 2,000 at the high end for a full season.

And so if he does that, yeah, we're just giving him 60 games, 27 a night for the next, what, three more years? Let's just, let's just say three. Sure. Just to see where he's at. Okay. That's a lot.

Three years. That's an extra 4,800 points. On top of, on top of what he has now. So he should get to four is what we're saying. But three is pretty hard. Which would put him at 36, 4, 21, and then you include the rest of this year. He can get to be the third leading score of all time.

Okay, including this year. Damn, so he would have been, if he didn't miss those full seasons, he would have been top three. That's crazy. Yeah. And he could still get there. But he's going to have to play. He's going to have to be in the postseason like every single year, including this year, obviously.

Well, this isn't count post season, I believe. Oh, that's just regular season. All in one. Okay. No, I hate that. Yeah, the all-time is just regular season. You should count post season. Yeah, I hate that.

Why are you doing that? We should count post-season. I don't know if the order would change in the top two, but I wonder who'd be three if we kind of postseason. Yeah. Do Kobe play more in the playoffs than Nasty Man? Probably. I don't know.

I mean, they were there all the time. But then again, playoff runs aren't that long, so probably doesn't make that big of a difference. Pretty limited amount of games in comparison. Whatever buggy matters. Yep. Now, with that being said, that is in the new stories that talk about today.

Let's get on to our some TikTok topics. do it. You know, if you've been online this past week, a lot of nostalgia going on, a lot of talk about 2016 being 10 years ago. Also, he smokes him in postseason. Okay. Kobe's fourth, Carmelone is 8th.

Okay, damn. Smokes him. Good for him. I had to put down nasty men. A lot of people talking about 2016 being 10 years ago. A lot of people posting on their stories about 2016, what they looked like, what they were doing. Let's talk about,

was the NBA better in 2016 or now in 2026? We have a lot of categories to talk about. We're going to talk about every facet of the league and you decide who, which era had it better? Okay, okay. So let's start this conversation by talking about the superstars of the league. Here I have the top five players in both years to my estimation, which I think is pretty much right, given consensus.

Which era had the better superstars at the top of the league? We have LeBron, Curry, Durant, Hardin, and Kauai in 2016, Yokic, Shea, Janice, Luca, Ant-Man this year. I feel like this is crazy, man. So I'm going to decide this because, even on both sides, like, for the, and it's like overall, the superstars were great on both sides, but in 2016, we're looking at that general top five. For those top five guys have MVPs on the other side, three of the top five guys have

have MVPs. Is the gap between LeBron and Curry, or LeBron and KD, bigger than the gap between Yokic and Shea or Yokinianis? So you're saying, was LeBron clearly the best friend in the world more than Yokic's? Yeah. No. In 2016, no. this is when Curry had his unanimous MVP season.

So this is the year where Curry was the closest you could possibly imagine to LeBron. However, middle of 2016, we're just going calendar year. At the end of June, they blow a 3-1 lead and everyone's kind of, you know, throws that off to the side. So once we like got back to Earth and July 1st hit and the new NBA season started, are we thinking like, oh yeah, Curry's not there? Like is he, is he so far behind? I remember very, very like, you know what I'm saying? Because that went out the window as soon as they lost.

Either way, we had a second player. Either way, the top three in 2016 is better, I think, the 2026. Yeah, I agree. There was the first time ever in LeBron's, not career, but in his, like, prime prime, where people were actually considering, like, yeah, I'd rather have some, like, Steph Curry on my team over. It was a conversation to his point. It definitely was a conversation.

Yeah, and that's never been a conversation when it comes to Duran or any, obviously anyone else, is Curry was the only guy who was able to, like, in some people's eyes, it was justified for that year to deal. And I will say, 2016 Hardin, this is before Hardin was at his, peak. He didn't have an MVP yet at this point. He was just starting to thrive. He had second MVP in 2015, wasn't one of the MVP candidates, 2016. And 17, he was second again. He didn't get his MVP 2018.

Yeah, this was... So I don't even... I don't know if 2016 Hardin was like better than 2026. Luca. Janus and KD. I suppose that's close. Shea's having a second MVP level season after winning one. Maybe that's comparable to Curry. 2016 LeBron is better than 2026 Yokic. Yeah. 2016, Kauai was third in MVP. He's better.

than that. Oh yeah, he's better than that. That might be the difference maker. They might have had the best. The top five is 2016 might be better. You also have the greatest player of all time his peak. So it's pretty hard not to pick 2016. Yeah, we'll do that. Uh, yeah. But as a collective, even as a collective, I think the legends of LeBron Curry and Durant. Oh my bad. I was actually number two in MVP. Yeah, he was number two. Damn. No, who number three? There was a, it wasn't even a race. Oh yeah, it was unanimous. It wasn't even a race. Exactly. I think the trio of LeBron, he has more

superstar aura. That felt more generation defining than Yoko Chethe, Janice. Yeah, I agree. I think obviously, the only thing about 2026 that might have

over 2016 when it comes to start them is that the list is just longer in 2016. That's it. Okay, so the back half of this, if you extend the top 10, you can the backup of the top 10 is better in 2026?

Most definitely. I think in 2016, maybe a top 12 player that year, 13 players, DeMarcus cousins, maybe or something like that. I don't know, but he,

the guys you have now smokes. Because after this we have we have Russ. We have Chris Paul. What you said? Paul George. 2016. Okay. Paul George is up there.

Anthony Davis is killing it. Now he made the leave in 2017. I was looking 2016. He averaged 22 points per game. 2017 is when he started averaging 28 being like that top five guy. Still like that. So it's pre him. But it's also pre-Wemby right now.

CP3. Yeah. CP3 is top 10. Some people might say Russ was number six. I agree with that. I actually don't. I don't know if you're right. I think the top 10 maybe in 2016 still might be better.

Well, it's tough right now too because Halliburton and Jason Tatum are injured. Which is, I mean, it's fair, but like still. Tatum makes a difference, I think. Tatum, you know, he should be in the top five over and this was last season. So I'm with you. The 2016 superstars of top are more superstary, so they get the point here. But maybe the depth of star talent overall. If we didn't do superstars and just stars, we go 2036.

Yeah, like if we did the top 30, 2016 versus 2026, it's a clear disparity. Okay, and we'll get to some categories that might take that into account. Next up, storylines, which decade had it better? We had the 73 win Warriors in 2016. LeBron China win for Cleveland. Kauai taking over the Spurs, Kobe's retirement tour, KD and Rustell as a duo. It's 2016. Man, take me back, man.

The storyline category is why 2016 and so finally remember, this might be the greatest storyline year. Yeah. Of the last, what, 40 NBA seasons? It's like... Since Jordan? It's crazy, too, because 2016 is one of the last times. And it's the worst fault because they didn't win. But 2016 is one of the last times where on a game by game basis,

every single game is like must watch TV. Yeah. Where, you know, they lose and everyone's like, well, the regular season doesn't matter anymore. But you have that... You have the fact that, like, LeBron is trying to win, that they brought in David Blatt, fired him on MLK day because they got blown out by 30

like Kobe retiring and the 73 win warriors those two combined. And they happen on the same day. Yeah, those two combined smoke 2026. 202026 is honestly kind of a weak storyline year. I think we're kind of going through a little bit of drought as the air changes. OKC trying to become a next dynasty is the best storyline. People fucking hate OKC. It's not even embraced like it was of the Warriors.

Curry had so much more fanfare. Second best storyline is Curry LeBron and KD being unksed still got it. There's kind of a drought in the in between. Like, Luca is a Laker. Not going well right now. The roster is a far away. The Wemby Ascension is probably up there too. That's fun. But he's also been in and out.

And because of all the injuries, we've missed weeks of Wemby playing. Come play out of time, though. Maybe that'll become like a huge thing. It's going to have to carry 26 because 2016 is smoking. Damn. Yeah, there's... Wow, man. Like, what's another big solar in 2020? The Knicks being good, but they're blowing it? The Knicks aren't

good. You can see Detroit's good, but... That's not a storyline. It's like, yeah. And the Knicks being, the Knicks being back is more of a 2024 storyline than 26.

Yeah. Yeah, I put that because this is most to the year where they're the favorites with the Celtics being neutered a little bit and everything. And they're blown it. Yeah, they're not taking advantage.

The Spurs and Kauai in 2016, the words are going for 73. The Spurs got like 67 games. Yeah. They were what OKSI was last year. And we're talking about OKSI is the finding team. The Spurs were that. Wow.

Yeah. 2016 sweep peak storyline year versus weak storyline year 2016 gets a 2O lead in this series next up let's do position by position

to go toward what you were talking about with the death to star talent which decade has better guards oh my god yeah this is exactly

what I was talking about I put eight or so up here but we can extend it if you can remember some 2016 we got Curry Hardin Westbrook CP3

Lillard before he made another jump Isaiah Thomas Demarta Rosen Kyle Lowry 20s Kimball Walker throwing Jeff Teague Oh, good Lord.

2026, we got Shay, Luca, Still Curry, K. Brunson, Anthony Edwards, Donovan Mitchell, Tyrese, Maxie, you can throw Devin Booker in there. Austin Reeves in there? I think there could be a real conversation between who would you rather have 2016, Kyle Liry, or 2026, Tyrese Maxie.

But outside of that, I'm just like, yeah, man, it's 2016 sweeps once again. Obviously, Isaiah Thomas. Sweeps, I actually disagree. I don't know 2016 sweeps. I think the back three, I think Edwards, I meant to say 2026. Yeah.

Edwards, Mitchell, and Maxi pushes 2026 over the edge over Isaiah Thomas, DeMardo Rose, and Kyle Lauer. Especially because this wasn't 2019 Hardin. 2016 Hardin wasn't quite there yet. So, like, you could think Luke is better than him. Curry's better than Shea, but obviously they're both all-time seasons. This version of curry we have today smokes 2016 Westbrook still, I think. That's a good comment.

Maybe smoke. Maybe smoke is unfair. But I'm still taking today's curry, I think. 2016 Westbrook is one of the few years where you can look at, him and say like he's he's putting it together like the the westbrook essential we were so close to getting a perfect point guard and you know what's crazy i think that we are seeing curry get sold so hard by his roster that i sound crazy if curry had a good team around him i promise you would still consider him closer to lucca so i think he's still firmly better than westbrook but it's probably

a conversation yeah 2016 cp3 versus kate is so interesting cp3 smokes it's definitely cp3 smokes it's usually it's just like like i can even say that and not be looked at crazy. Yeah. And honestly, these aren't in order either. These are just names. Yeah. So,

CP3, I would take them over Westbrook, but I know it's debate for people. But I do think, I do think that like the back three is probably, like, 20206 is kind of ranked about where you would have people. Obviously,

I'm having Brenton of a cave, whatever, but those back three, I do think it's probably the same level of Damar, Kyle, Isaiah Thomas. Okay, so we'll say 2026 is a better guard talent

because of depth. We give them that point. Exactly, yeah. Biggs. In 2016, we had to Marcus Cousins. Anthony Davis before he made the real, real, real, real superstar leap. Blake Griffin, LaMarcus Aldridge, DeAndre Jordan, all NBA, Andre Drummond, all NBA. Stop the, sir.

Ford, Milsap, Brooke Lopez. No, no, no, no, no. Good God, man. Today we have Yokin, Janice, Wembe, we can stop there. We got a slight. 2014 and 2015 were really, really like the dead, dead zone of the Big Man in 2016. You see it coming back a little bit, but even here, there's Boogie and then AD who's a four at this time, Blake who's a four, the market who's a four, Al Horford. Like a lot of these guys are not bigs.

They're not, they're not centers, which is what like people think of. And you go down the list, obviously there's Yonis, but like these, a majority of these guys are centers and they are just better. I include to both positions. Even with that, 2026 has so much more talent for the big man position. The positions evolved so much The guys in the bottom of this list Are so much more skilled Than an Andre Drummond or DeAndre Jordan

Like there was a huge evolution In the last five to seven years of basketball And this is the part that 2026 Blows out of the water God damn Big Min aren't just backed in the final league Like who's the biggest Because DeAndre Jordan is a top five big

In 2016 That's so damning, right Who's the biggest one to play style? I don't know but I have 10 bigs on here Any or eight any of Gobert That's such a sweet Or Gobert Yeah, go bear.

I can name four more in 2026 that are better than Drummond. That didn't list. Do it. Let me pull the teams real quick. So I can look at him. Is Zubosh better than German? He's had an off year. But I think I'd rather have like this version of Zubosh than Drummond, for sure.

I didn't put it in a off year. So maybe you don't want to put him on there. Joelle and B's playing well again. Joel and Bauer's going back on this list. Obviously that. Yeah, I'm taking 2026 Joel and Bede over 2016, Adam out of Bio isn't on this list. Yeah.

Isaiah Hartstein is better than DeAndre Jordan. For sure. I can see that. There's so many basic a name for Ardstein. 2026 blows them out of the water. Yeah. Wings.

We have peak LeBron, peak Durant, peak Kauai, peak ball, George, 2016 is crazy. Yeah, considering all the crazy peaks.

And then you have a Jimmy Buller towards the bottom. Yeah. Considering the best three in 202026 are the same three from 2016 just way worse. Yeah. The wings slaughter from 2016.

Now it sucks. Jason Tatum's hurt, so he's not part of this. But man. Even then. I'd rather have Gordon Harry made his, was this the year he made his first All-Star team? It's one of those years. It's something like that.

Yeah, I think this was the year. He's on here because these are players that receive all NBA votes. So he received some votes? Yeah, exactly. He sweeps Pollo, of course. I think he's probably a better player than Denny at that point. It could be up for debate. Yeah, we have Denny on this list.

Like, we're getting smoked. Yeah. Shout out Denny, great season. We have Hall of Famers up and down the 2016 list. Up and down, yeah. We have Palo Van Carrow in 2026. We're having a terrible year. Jalen Johnson said have been here, man, what the hell?

Ugh. Even anything that would be losing. Yeah, whatever, either way. He saw a list with Prime, LeBron, KD., Kauai. He's like, where's Jalen Johnson? Yeah, no, I saw Paul. I'm like, why is he here? Yeah, but he's got a five-four.

I think he's not doing anything. I think Powell's a big wing. He fit here more than he did bigs. So I put him on there. Yeah. Yeah, he does. This 2016 season is one of the best wing seasons, I think, in NBA history. Like, LeBron and Katie alone make it in that conversation.

MVP level Kauai, young Paul George, even Jimmy Butler was ascending at that point. Carmelo was still around. Yeah. DeRosen was doing DeRosen things as well, solidifying. He was like, you can get a bucket.

Exactly. Like 27 or whatever was. Getting belted by LeBron. Yeah. All time wing season. Yeah. Dare I say the goat. Insane gap.

Rookie class. These are the top five MVP. These are the top five rookie the year finishers in 2016 and the top five in odds right now from 2026. Okay, so obviously you've just got to think about them as rookies. Rookie Yokic.

Can't even think of him at all. He was fun, though, was a rookie. He was like, oh, this guy's passing. Okay, look at this jubby guy making a name. Where do you come from? Rookie cat. Special. Rookie Porsingas.

Special. Pretty special. That was the time. Rookie Jalil Okafor. Kind of disappointing. Yeah, he had a, for a single year. He was getting buckets. Yeah, he was all rookie team.

Yeah, he was getting buckets a singular year. For as a rookie, it was promising, and then it fell off after that. Yeah, he's exactly like what everyone advertise him to be. he average 18 is a rookie. Like, it was pretty, but it didn't get you anywhere. Yeah. But he was getting them post buckets for sure.

Now, we'll say we have a great class in the other side. Con, revelation, flag, future superstar, Edgecombe, Future All-Star, Queen, Solid, coward, solid. I think I'm gonna go 2026. Because I think Flag,

Flag looks every, every piece as, like, advertised, and he looks like a guy that legitimately is all-star. I think, yeah, I think Flag and Khan are having better rookie years than what Kat had. Yeah. So maybe. I was 2026, I will say Kat was thought to be this next superstar.

He was supposed to be like the guy you want to put your team around for the decade and he was living up to it as a rookie. And Porzingis bred so much life into New York basketball that it was a pretty cool moment. He revived these guys because everyone thought he was ass, right? Yeah. I'll never forget. Tingis pinguish. Who the fuck is tingis, pingis? Yeah.

That was a sentiment. Stephen Siff was mad on TV. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's 2026. That was a crazy night. Super solid as well. That was such a crazy night.

Who the fuck is Tenghis Spendous? No. So we're in 2026, better class? Most definitely. Yes. Okay. Now we got teams. In 2016, we had the 73 win warriors, the 67 win spurs, the Caves, the Raptors, and the Thunder, all 55 plus.

They sure we got the Thunder trying to go back to back. Yeah. And then Pist in Spurs. Nuggets. Timberwolves as the top five teams right now and wins. Outside of the Raptors, if every single one of these teams in 2016 was to play these teams in 2026, and excluding the Thunder 2, it's a conversation.

They get smoked. Smoked. Okay. The Thunder would be the Thunder and the Raptors on the other side. But yeah, Warriors, Spurs, and Castes in 2016, all might be the championship thunders. Yeah, smoking them. The Pistons mean number two is rough in comparison. That's such a huge drop off. It's pretty rough.

The Pistons have nothing for any of these teams. Shout out the Pistons. It's compared to the 67 winspurs with MVP level Kauai. Yeah. We're kind of a weird year right now with not a lot of top-end teams. The Easton holding it up, man, at all. Yeah. The Pistons, like, listen, Jen Duren, shout out to everything that you're doing.

Ron Holland, shout out to y'all. What are you doing when LeBron and Kyrie walked in the game? Nothing. 2016 easily had better teams that defined NBA history than 2026. They ain't ever seen monsters like this, bro. We're not getting a lot of wins of 2026 so far. Kind of getting belted by 2016. Listen, nostalgia wins.

It always does. Vives. Oh, man, listen. Which decade had better vibes. Now, this can mean a lot of things. I don't know exactly how we quantify this. 2016, we had the sleeve jerseys. It was a three-point evolution.

LeBron versus Curry was at its peak. We were 17. 2026. We got the NBA Cup. That's around now. City jerseys. That's around now. Changes the aesthetic of the game.

Nike jerseys. And now we're in the parody era. There's no super teams, no Titans, battling it out. Anybody can win any given year. How has that effect the vibes? The 2016 dunk contest was absolutely insane. Oh, I forgot about that.

That helps the vibes a lot. It's over with. It's over with. The All-Star game was it was Kobe's last All-Star game. It got super iconic pictures. I don't know how many iconic pictures we have from 26, 2026 just yet either.

Pictures? Well, the biggest moments haven't happened yet, so that's hard to do. It's over with, yeah. We haven't seen what if we're going to get a blocked by James. Yeah, I'm going to give 2026 the nod, though. Even as much as I hate it. the volume of city jerseys.

I'm taking city jerseys over sleep jerseys all the time. Easily. They get that vibe point. You have you have that. I think parody era probably helps with the one. The huge thing. Parity era is good for the league. Is it? But the superstar Titans batting it out of year was pretty good vibes. It was pretty cool. And that's my point. That's my exact point when I push back on this parody stuff. It's like, yeah, it's cool. But then we get into a situation where we're halfway

through the year. And you do still want some of the top in talent. Like you do still want to see like, great teams and great basketball. And obviously, like, we're getting that, but not to the level of here's the guy who can be a top 10 player all time on a all-time team going up against potentially the greatest player of all time. And the three-point evolution stuff can't be under-talked about. We were watching the start of a new era in the NBA and it felt like that.

Like watching the Warriors usher in this jump shot revolution, that helped the vibes a lot. It felt special at that time. Especially with the goat, LeBron being at his peak of its powers. the league felt special, the coverage run the league felt special, the attention was there, I don't know if we capture that right now. For 60 years, people said jump shooting teams can't win a championship

and then the words came through and blew all of that out the water. Yeah, like the whole entire what we thought our conception of what wins in basketball was flipped on his head. Yeah, there's no phenomenon like that happening in 2026 at all. But the vibes of 26 it is, it is crazy though because

Is it good right now? Because like, I mean, I, 2026, yes. The start of 2025 and once we get to the end of the 2425 NBA year, and then once post post media rights deal, the vibes are better. NBC is fixing the vibes. NBC and Amazon is restoring the vibes. The vibes are much better in the last four months than what they were in 2020. You know what?

So I'll give them that. That, going into a playoff run with the new coverage we have, depending on how they market the games and hoping we get some good legend. matchups, the vibes could be brought back for forever now. In 2016, it's 2016 the end of like the final peak of when everyone was still like super intrigued by like the first take stuff. Like when did that stuff super, super become annoying? I didn't know.

This was at his peak though because we were starting the goat debate in 2016. Like it was at its peak. We can't discount that in the vibes. Skip Bill's was still on first take as well. He was. Or maybe just left. He just got to. Undisputed this one.

Yeah. Which. Both shows were driving at that time because we had Max Kellerman on first take at this point. But yeah, this was the peak of the go debate where like it was alive and well, everybody was talking about it and every school around the nation. Nowadays, I mean, you still do it, but you, everyone chose their side of decade ago. You have you people. Everybody could be convinced still in 2016 when LeBron won the championship. Yeah, 2016 was special, man.

The Unks in 2016 are interesting. It was Vince Carter, Tim Duncan. They weren't off the fucking whim. The best thumps was Derek. I said Derek. Dirk Nowitzki. Yeah, that generation before didn't quite carry over like this one year.

Kobe's retiring. That's the only thing they got. 2016 has vibes, I think. It's really not close. Lil Uzi was in his prime too. Ugh, man.

Luzi is prime now. And going to 2017, the vibes also got even crazier whenever Katie left and Russ had this year. Yeah. If we count in 2017 ultimate vibe year, I'll never forget the commercial

of him dancing, hitting them folks in a really awkward way with Lou Ouzi, now I do what I want in the background. No, the original was going like this. He was like, I don't know what he was doing. It wasn't like a normal hymn folks.

He was like putting his arms like a square like this. Yeah. Now I do what I want. I think there was a time where like a couple of days after Katie left in July 2016, he was in the car and Russell recorded himself driving, singing the song as well. Now I do what I want. He had the entire franchise to himself. Yeah.

And he went on to win the MVP. Give me 2016, 2017, 2017 smokes too, man. They got to call it so old. But y'all wasn't there. Yeah. Y'all wasn't in these. We were 16, not 30. Of course you like to

Some of y'all were, hey, y'all know nothing. That weren't there. So any more categories, after vibes, any more categories who's compared between the two years I'm forgetting about? Man, what else is there? I think that may be it. NBA Twitter?

Ah, undercooked, underdeveloped. It was better in 2016. Really in 2016. 2026 is too toxic now. Back then, it was way funnier. Back then, everybody was trying to get jokes off and there wasn't, well, I mean, now we're getting into a bigger discussion

about Twitter being a dead platform because it prioritizes, bait prioritizes rage bait because you get paid by the view and the Twitter algorithm promotes everything that gets interactions so you do interaction bait back then there was no idea of making money on Twitter just getting jokes off having fun now it's a toxic platform and maybe Twitter is matched but I wasn't able to to so easily call somebody a CDL driver in 2016 I'm not right the jokes are good 2016 they were there's some good jokes today like some some of the jokes today are still Alzheimer's

And I do think with some of the media accompaniment, it really just hammers the point hole. Some of the best jokes that they had in 2016, like for Katie specifically, they, oh yeah, that's when I think around that time, that's when they first birthed the My Next Chapter thing, which is hilarious. It's a top 10 meme of all time. There was great beans back then to 2016. We've already entered meme prime in 2016 during now. But the nicknames were asked so back in 2016. They called Katie Cupcake. What are we doing, man?

That's not good. That's not funny I didn't Russ That was about Russ right Because like Russ didn't call my cupcake But maybe somebody Called KD cupcake to his face

And he acknowledged it Yeah I think Russ may have called him Yeah exactly It was like an indirect shot Of like him saying something Something I don't remember the exact idea But that was based on Russ

So like it was kind of funny Yeah Sounds like 2016 It was a better NBA year Sounds like we can't argue For 2026 very hard Yeah Damn

Is what it is Next thing we're going to do Take me back We are going to do a blind Tier list Of Rookie of the Years Do you guys want to do this on Rookie of the Year's seasons

How Good They Were as a Rookiee Or based on how good they became Let's do how good they were as a rookie That's probably more fun Okay So we are going to see One, two, three, four, six, 10 rookie of the year seasons pull up

We had to put them into a blind tier list One in the top tier, two in the second tier, and so forth. First name up, Chris Paul 2004. Great rookie of the year season. Became a great player. Where does this go?

Are we looking at that as a top three rookie of the year season? Or is it just like... I think we safely go tier three. I think tier three is fine. Like we're gonna get a lot. I assume when we get LeBron up here, some other ones that were like

some older players in back in the day that were older as rookies and maybe they did more win now. All right. He averaged 16 and 8 as a rookie, which back then is great numbers, five rebounds too. He was great.

But we did a few of these tier this where we always put Chris Paul high and it comes back to bite us. I think we finally have to not put Chris Paul too high. Yeah. Okay. I'm fine with that. We've sold a few with Chris Paul specifically. And I'm telling you, this is going to be the one time where it comes back to.

How Gasol, as a rookie. He was, I think he played his rookie year in Memphis, didn't he? Yeah. Before he got traded. Yeah. Listen, it's a rookie season. It's one of the year. Yeah, it's never thought about it.

Oh, yeah, he played six years in Memphis. I'm thinking, I'm thinking about market got traded in draft. I didn't know this. He averts 18 and nine as a rookie. And that's fine, but it's not like, nobody ever talks about like, oh my goodness, like rookie rookie palis saw what's crazy. Memphis Greece is won 23 games, 18 and 9. And that's why we're going to put that on the 4th.

I wasn't around 2002. I'm not going to lie to you. I'm not going to put that on the 4th. I wasn't around 2002. I don't know. Shack, there we go. Honestly, one of the best rookie seasons ever came out. One of the best young players of all time.

Yeah. We can put this out one out. I wouldn't feel upset. Because I really, it's like him or like Kareem, one of these other players that used to do four years college. He had one of the most dominant rookie seasons of all time, though. All-Star in year one. Put him in there.

Who are you going to feel worse about? Can't. I won't. I won't do it. Dude, he ever, it's 23 and 14? 23 and 14. He was top seven in MVP votes that year? Yeah.

Yeah, that's the best rookie of all time besides the 60s guys. Number one, Derek Rose. That was good. Also elite right away. I'll put him. Should he be tier three or tier two? I'm a go tier three, but also like, like, Like that team and that, just that era of Derek Rose and him coming in and being like this new, this new like archetype of point guard of like this crazy athletic guy who could still run your team and do all of that.

Crazy. Off of vibes alone. And we get the storyline of him being in Chicago. Off the vibes alone, that's top two. It's probably not fair to CP. I guess in terms of quality player, he deserves me by CP3. Yeah. Assuming we're going to try to get like LeBron and Kareem for tier two.

Yeah. Tier three. But the vibes, man. Palo Baner. Four. Four. It was a fine rookie season. Very forgetable. Yeah. Number four. Mitch Richmond. It was forgettable. I don't know anything about Mitch Richmond's rookie season. I will not lie to you. Wow. He must do crazy to put him on this list. Okay. He might not have been crazy either. Because I'm with you. I don't, I don't remember anything about it. He has

22 points four assists. He shot 47% from two and 36% from three. So he not bad. Christ. Sounds pretty good. Before my time, you'll go two or three? Yeah. Fuck it. Mitch Richmond, I do. I am not familiar. Salute. Salute. Chris Weber The interesting rookie season We only have tier two left Do you want to save tier two For trying to get like LeBron's dream

Yes I want to save you So we gotta go tier four Even though great great young player What was I say? Oh Patrick Ewing I think we're safe We gotta use these two Tier two spots at some point

Put them up there Do you want to put Patrick Ewing And just hope that we get somebody That's very forgettable At the end for tier four Yes Fuck it why not At this point

It's not even about the player Who comes up It's about the strategy Put Patrick Ewing Was an all star as a rookie So we will go tier two Okay Blake Griffin.

Now, this is different because he cheated. He was a fake rookie. Yes. But he was an all-star and his like rookie year right as well, correct? I think he was. He was out here. Yes, he was an all-star. We only have two all-stars of rookie in their top two right now.

Yeah. Blake Griffin's got to go tier two then. Yeah. Once again, tactical. He was top 10 in MVP as well. If you get an all-star. And top 10 MVP, you get to be top three. Yep, that's fair.

I think we won no matter what. Last one, Vince Carter tier four. Damn. Now would I put Vince Carter higher probably But you know in terms of blind rankings I don't feel too bad about this The three All-Stars are up top If I knew what was happening

Then we wouldn't be making this video Was Vince Carter All-Stars rookie? He was not, we win Everything works out well, there we go I don't feel bad about that at all I think we did good I don't know if I've changed anything necessarily It's not ridiculous

Yeah honestly Top three perfect honestly Maybe Chris Weber should have been above Derek Rose Yeah that's fair That's fair to say very very much Maybe but like do I have the historical knowledge to really debate Chris Weber as a rookie versus Derek

a rookie no I do not so I feel fine about this rookie that's one of the hardest thing to have knowledge of because like obviously we're well versed on like all the legends and like whenever we need to know about all these guys but there's specific rookie seasons you had to be there to know yeah about rookie seasons for the most part aside of the famous one's like shack that everybody learns about that because it's iconic it's probably didn't put no magic up here yeah thank god didn't put magic up here Nuked us The magic was last.

Thank God. Last thing we're going to do today, last TikTok of the day. We're going to play NBA King of the Hill Handles Edition. I'm going to name two NBA players. You tell me who has the better handled? Makes a flashiness plus effectiveness. Whatever means to you, whose handle is better. Who ranks higher all time on the handle scale?

Okay. Steph Curry versus Chris Paul. This is hard. Two different type of handles. Young Chris Paul could get downhill. His handle was extremely shifting. Yeah, Steph Curry's handle is more like springy, and I feel like it's way more annoying, though, because he just runs all around the place with this handle. And Chris Paul's size, he's so small, you might be liable to get your legs your between.

I'd rather go. You're dying regardless of the fact, but I'd rather guard. If I know someone's funny, like, do me up with all these handles, I think I'd rather guard Steph Curry than CPC right now. Because he would body you too. Stop. Steph Curry has one of the most underrated handles in NBA history. For sure. Is it underrated?

It's one of the goats. I feel like everyone knows that. No, it's, it turns to be underrated. They still sleep. But I think the high end of his handles are great, but just his play style in general still comes with a lot of turnovers. Whereas, like, Chris Paul can keep the ball on a string and is not losing the ball in the same way as Steph Curry.

I think, I think prime handle Steph Curry was throwing the ball away out of like O'Rezell's passing more than he was getting ripped. But even, even then, his handle and it's a, it's a weird thing because. he uses a lot of dribble moves and I think that Chris Paul is more efficient with his handle. 100% right. Like you're gonna have to get three combos

from Steph Curry. Even whenever he was like young and quicker to get by somebody, how are we valuing that? I think we're gonna go to Cp3 or are we going like I have three moves and I'm about to do it. I think we allow flashingness to equate somewhat into this and I think they're both

highly effective so I think we can go towards Steph. If you're doing the flashiness and stuff takes away. I think maybe when they're this close in effectiveness the flashness can be a little deciding factor we can go Steph.

It's the hardest conversation to have. This is a crazy king of the hell. Steph Curry versus Trey Young. Steph Curry. Steph, yeah. Trey has a great handle. Trey has a great handle. But it's,

we see Trey's the handle in like so many more flashier ways, of course. He used to have a better handle he does today. Yeah, I think along with like the burst in quickness and because it's not what it used to be. And even like all-time conversation too, whatever. I'd rather go stuff. Yep, it's stuff easily.

And that's 27. We're talking about, oh, it's not like it used to be. And injury is our motherfucker. It's tough. Steph Curry. is Jamal Crawford. You want to talk about flashing this? Steph Curry gets beat the fuck up.

Dude. But effectiveness, maybe Seth Curry is low. I don't know, but it feels sacrilegious to say that like Jamal Crawford isn't going to be in like the top three of this conversation.

I think I would rather go Jamal Crawford because there's specific moves that Jamal Crawford birth that a lot of people do these days. And when it comes to Steph Curry, he doesn't have any like any brain breaking hand of place. The slide that from 2K and everyone did

where he goes behind the back, and he did that in real life. But Jamal, Jamal Curry, like, Jamal Curry, Jamal Crawford did that as well. True. He has a move in 2K. He's the same one.

Exactly. And I think I've seen him do it first. So I saw him, Steph Curry just does it in his own way. You don't have a Steph Curry dribbler without Jamal Crawford. We'll go Jamal Crawford. So I think Jamal Crawford deserves this, for sure.

He does have the same move in 2K. And his is actually like, he jumped, those are further. It's a little cool. Yeah. Steps just faster. So all the dribble heads use it. Or did.

I'm talking about 2K 10 years ago. Man, wrong, man. I know. I'm a super 2K. Killing Kempu. His step back was so deadly. He was incredibly hard. Oh my God.

Incredibly hard. Talk about getting your defender off balance. I can't need too many players hard. It's Jamal Crawford, but it hurts to see Kemba go. Because Kemba's peak is very like, hey, just come here. You know what's about to happen. Like, I'm going to get you with this crossover and that's it. I do think that Jamal has a little bit more ranginess.

And Jamal did, yeah, like 6, 4, 6.5. Maybe that makes it a little more impressive. Yeah, I think I would go to him. His handle, like, his handle, he's with a wine, too. He's tall. Yeah. He's shiftier than, then Kimba. He moves different.

Kemba has good, like, a high-level moves. Jamal Murray, the way, his body control is just different. He looks so, like, sling-slings. He was smooth as hell. That's what it was. So I think I'll Joe. And he's so lanky and skinny. It just looks crazy.

Yeah. Jamal Crawford versus Alan Iverson AI. Sorry. Now we're having, we're having a goat debate right now. Yeah, sorry. I think I got to go. We all know the answer. I mean, shout out Jamal Crawford.

It has to be AI. If we get Jamal Crawford points, we mean the forefather. We have to give Alan Iverson four father points. I kind of want to go Jamal Crawford. So are we saying the student be the master? I think so. Because, yeah. We have a top 10 highlight of all time.

Like, when you think about like NBA highlights, oh, Ellen Iverson is going to be there. Yeah, because of that's super-crossover. But like, come on. The Jamal Crawford. The Jamal Crawford crossover. or just dribble move where he's putting it behind his back and then jumping back to the other side

shaking everybody out of the shoes like I think that I think he does have a better handle I think I think this is I think AI is a better version of Kemba where like his peak move is like again step up step up you know what's about to happen

but if we just if I roll out a ball and I say do as many dribble moves for the next one minute as possible Jamal Crawford is smoking him in that. But there's just a simple left to right that he has the best left to write in history. For his time, Alarverson's the goat, we can say Jamal Crawford built on that

and we can put him above. Yeah, also, Alan Iverson issued in this era of carrying the basketball. So we have to docket. Oh my God. Jamal Crawford versus Shea. That real hoops. Jamal.

She's great all time. She's handles crazy. In terms of not turning the ball over, tight handle that makes him a star, She's up there. But the creativity of Jamal. If he can be down Iverson, he can be Shea.

Now if we wanted to extend this conversation and talk about where how much space is able to get from a separate get how much separation is able to get from his defender She got it but that's not the conversation right now Shea has an all-time handle that's probably the most underrated part of She's game. He's an all-time ankles.

Oh, he's the goat ankles like easily. The ankle flexibility is crazy. Jamal Crawford versus James Hardin. You're talking about using your handle to be an all-time score. James Hardin is good The amount of ankles he's taken. I feel like the combination though

of of handle and scoring prowess obviously gives James Hardin a leg up. But again, if we're saying pure handle, I'm going Jamal Crawford here. That's fair. It is Jamal Crawford. Yeah. Because the foul bait and also allowed people to like to play him in a way where like he's able to do. No, I'm being for real.

I'm being so for real. No, I know. It was a graphic thing that made it harder to guard here. It's different. Alan I've seen. Jamal Crawford, was Kyrie Irving. This is where it stops. I think,

I think Kyrie has the best handle of all time. Kyrie. We reached the top of the hill. We reached the king of the hill. Of course, this list ends with Kyrie Irving. Who else could it end with? Surprisingly,

Jamal run on a run, man. I didn't think it was going to go this far. Okay. I don't, yeah, I don't think. I thought you picked on Iverson over him,

but I cannot be mad at Jamal Crawford making to the finals. He's like that. And that's end this episode. If you're still here, comment your favorite handles of all time. Who is your favorite player to watch handle-wise? Is that say,

no, yeah, all time who is the most underrated handle to you that you enjoy watching me personally donovan spout y'all never seen him handle a rock like that ever i see some things on the court effectiveness in the jrown people still remember the indiana moment with the miss shot that was tough that was tough people still remember that was tough if they ever see you handle they'll never forget listen man i've been out the game for a minute people people always asking us to do basketball videos i'm like you should have asked like, oh, they were asking for the jump,

but like three years ago, maybe you could have happened. I haven't touched a basketball forever. I keep extending. I keep telling Mo and I keep extending the timeline. I'm getting my shoes. I'm getting back. He keeps on hanging it up. I literally mad.

Come on. I'm getting my shoes back. I will not say I'm getting my shoes back. I probably won't. I don't know if I'm basketball ever again. You guys, we're going to get Isaac to play basketball. We're going to get him to touch a rock. We're going to get him to play a singular game of 21.

I would need like six months of prep time to get back in the swing of things. Six months. Who you should try to do? You're trying to put a combo? Exactly. It's great. Just get you two weeks and shots you. No,

I really just can't need a month of like actually trying and like in the same way I go to the gym going to the basketball gym instead to like get a rhythm. Like I need to get a rhythm. I'm that out of season. I think when it comes to. That was even good to begin with. So I'm like mega not good now. I think when it comes to all the shows out there like us, I think we'd be probably

the best all around considering defense, shooting ability. You got to consider age to. Age. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? All that, I think we'd be the best. We're in like, we're a peak of our prime physicality now. Yeah.

We're not only got a couple years left of that. When you start pushing 30? We're the best. I don't care about the time. We're the best no matter what. I'm talking about right now. We got it. Not me.

Not me. I'm brown out here. I'm going to be playing tough. You definitely got that. I think I sprained my shoulder at the gym this week. And I was thinking like, imagine I play basketball right now. You sprained it? I think so.

It's like, when I go like this angle, this is my joint right here. You can't put your hand by your head. I can. but it gets like weak and it kind of hurts. I was doing a, what you call this? Lateral raises. And I think I just was doing it with like bad technique. My back was too straight.

So I was like putting too much pressure on my shoulders. How much were you lifting? I think it was. I don't remember. See, that'd be scaring me sometimes. I don't, sometimes I don't like to lift too heavy because I just worry about injuries

and I'm just like, I'd rather just get my reps. I was doing ladder raises with maybe like a 35 on both arm. And then I did hammer, hammer curls after. And I think that I was going too heavy. So put like more pressure on it. And like back to back,

I was like, oh shit. I remember I went to the gym. We all went to the gym, like Planet Fitness. Probably in New York and I did your upper body workout. I'm never, I told myself I'm never working out with you, but I'll just do the straight jail workouts. I'll be on the dip machine, pull-ups.

Maybe I'll do a couple bench here, you know. That's it, brother. I had to do shoulder presses once, and you were like, ah-ha. Yeah, fuck that. Everybody do my push-ups. But I've converted since then, though. I'm more into the lifting weights.

Well, that being said, that's the end of this episode. We will see you on Friday for the next episode. Actually, I think we can see you on Thursday. I think I'm changing to Thursday. I kind of like when we did that with the Tray Young emergency episode.

Thursday's fun. So I'll see you on Thursday to talk about one thing we got wrong about every single NBA team this season. And we're out eaters. Please be a detective

and find the John Moran clip. Oh, please find that clip.