The Deep 3 Podcast - We Picked 1 Word To Describe Every NBA Team's Season | Ep. 144

Episode Date: June 6, 2025

1 word that perfectly sums up every NBA team's 2025 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 & New Merch! 2:38- NBA Finals Game 1 Reaction 38:08- 1 word intro 39:27- Knicks 45:40- Hawks 51:22- Lakers 57:25- Cavs 1:05:03- Pelicans 1:11:35- 76ers 1:17:33- Hornets 1:19:00- Bulls 1:22:04- Heat 1:22:47- Nets 1:25:42- Wizards & Jazz 1:30:00- Pacers 1:37:35- Thunder 1:42:22- Grizzlies 1:46:49- Spurs 1:50:08- Bucks 1:53:33- Trailblazers 1:57:40- Magic 2:01:50- Suns & Mavs 2:06:00- Rockets 2:09:02- Kings 2:11:52- Warriors 2:16:00- Pistons 2:19:25- Clippers 2:21:30- TWolves 2:26:30- Raptors 2:28:25- Nuggets 2:32:50- tiktok time Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Y'all, it is 10.25 p.m. Thursday. June 5th. I'm here to tell you, live reporting from the scene. I looked across my TV about 30 minutes ago. And I saw the devil in Oklahoma. I saw him at play. I saw sacrifices being made. I saw blood magic voodoo going on on the court. And his name, the man perpetuating all this, Tyreece motherfucking Halliburton. Y'all, we are here. As you see about the title. We're going to give you one word to describe every single NBA team season. But before we get to that part of the episode, we got to talk about what we just watched live. We're here recording an instant reaction to game one of the NBA finals in which Tyree's Halliborne and continue to do haliband things and find a way to win against teams that the people don't think they should win against.

What is you going through y'all's mind right now? He is lucky that this is not 300 years ago because he would have been, he would have been on trial. That's a witch. That is a straight witch. Okay. I thought you go somewhere else I was going to.

He said 300 years ago. Yeah, I know. I was okay. I know. I was like, wait a second. Yeah, man. The Pacer did it. The Pacers found a way to win

in a game that they were losing for 99% of it and that is not an exaggeration mathematically. Crazy, crazy game. We're going to talk all about that, give you our reactions. Do all that before we get to the main part of the episode.

But before we get to that, we have a low announcement to make. It is time for our seasonal merch. The TD3 summer collection of merch is here. You see I've been wearing it We've really been wearing For a few weeks

Some of y'all have noticed Mo has one shirt on With the sun on it I got this crew neck That has the flowers In the basketball If you guys have noticed I've been wearing this other shirt

I think I'm showing it on the screen right now So you guys can look at the visuals This is other shirt That has an orange on it Mixed with the basketball Heat been wearing that for a while We got a hat for you guys

A bunch of T-shirts Full line of our summer Collection for you guys Going to be available for the summer I like it a lot We were hooping the other day Having her little photo shoot And man

my attributes plus 10 that day you're hooping in the merch Absolutely got you feeling like Tyrese Alberton I don't deal with the devil Not Tyrese Link in the description for this new summer merch We're gonna keep promoting it over time But as you guys see it's out now

It'll be here when the episode's out Hey man check that out Drop a like on this video And yeah man Let's get you to our final predictions I don't keep some predictions Our finals reaction I mean, I don't know what to say.

So let's talk about game one. The final score, Indiana Pacers 1-11 to 110. This was a truly inexplicable game. In the first half, the Indiana Pacers had 19 turnovers. We watched this first half and said, yep, that's what you thought would happen. The most aggressive, insane playmaking defense we've seen. in our lifetime as fans probably, is leaving their mark on the game.

They're running the ball pressure to really, really have their way with this Patriot's offense, which was so great for three playoff rounds. They hit this buzzsaw. Not a surprise, right? And then the second half came around, and the Pacers did exactly what they've done

throughout three playoff series every single time. They stayed in the game. They chipped away at the lead, slowly, slowly, slowly. Got in position for when the fourth quarter comes around. They can out-clutch you.

And my God, did they just out-clutch the thunder? finishing with what we said the Tyreys Hellebron game winning mid-range jumper what are y'all's current thoughts I mean I I we were we were telling you because because at half time

I have time all of us are sitting there and we're like yes they're up by double digits this should be a 20 point game yeah it was a very bad thunder out game that they the offensive shot making was so bad they should have been leading by a lot more than they were

and you you felt it especially in that third quarter because they came out they were a little bit aggressive and you're kind of just waiting for all third quarter for the thing that the Thunder have done in especially at home in these playoffs, which is we are going to not only turn the ball over,

we're going to score off of this, and all of a sudden this 12-point lead is going to get to 22 and it's going to be wraps on it. And we've talked to all playoffs about how as soon as you get up 10, 12, right, if you're the Thunder, you don't let that lead go. And they, you know, Indiana, they hung around, they hung around.

It got to 10. and I was looking at you and I was like listen it's getting kind of scary you're having PTSD flashback because I saw there was a knee smith three and I said oh no I said oh no that's exactly how it starts Donovan the whole second half was like

my stomach hurts my stomach hurts I'm scared you would have thought that there was an armed assailant with a knife to his loved one's throats the way Donovan was frightening could you feel it at this point and the craziest part was and the reason why it was so scary is because Tyrese Hallamor was getting abused on defense.

Like Oklahoma City was going after him every single time. Offensively, Lou Dort was making life so hard. There was a point, especially in the fourth quarter, Tyrese was just off in the corner. Andrew Nemhart was out here getting his bag work off. And Indiana was still able to come back. And you're like, okay, this is not good if you're the Oklahoma City Thunder because everybody else is getting going.

And you know that, like you said, slowly but surely, they're just going to be there, be there, be there. There's going to be some stupid wild shot that they take. And lo and behold, it's Tyrese Halliborne to win the game. Yeah. When I, after witnessing that game, I just, it just feels genuinely chilling. Like, what the fuck did I just watch? I feel like I've seen the Grim Reaper in person come back and just slay human beings

live in front of my face. Because there's no way we're, we're continuously watching this game in the second and third quarter and even earlier in the fourth. And it feels like the Pacers aren't able to. jump the eventual hurdle and close the game within five to four points to three points. And that happened, obviously, towards the end of the, or towards the final few minutes of the game. Andrew and I'm hard, I said this during the game, and I wholeheartedly mean this to my heart.

He is the most dangerous 11 point per game score that the NBA has ever seen, ever. Yeah, he was a big part of that come back to. Obviously, he ended with the Halliburton jump shot. He hit a big three stepping back over Shay, who he got some room on. against on a stepback. She had a solid late contest, but it was a late contest. Namhart smacked that shit in his face. That really, really was like, that was the biggest shot, I think, to getting this lead back into single digits and making them have that comeback. Yeah, man, I mean, so the story of this game is the fact that despite an amazing defensive performance in second half,

Thunder offense once again, shit the bed. You, you know, you got up and down games about the playoff run, especially against the Nuggets. You had really bad J-Dub games, really bad check games that kind of made that series go longer than it should, gave the Nuggets games that they should have one, especially early in that series. It's kind of a similar story to what we just saw. J-dub, 6 for 19 from the field, 1-4 from 3. That hurts. Chad Holmgren, 2-4-9 from the field, 0-4-1 from 3.

Kaysen Wallace, 3-4-9 from the field, 0-4-3 from 3. Aside from Lou Dore and J-dub, none of the 3-point shooters made more than 1. Nobody came to shoot besides those two guys. Yeah, and that's tough. And especially for Chet, this is something that you clearly saw the difference for Miles Turner, where in the New York series, Kat was able to really, really attack him because Cat is very quick and very big. Chet is not that.

He tried that early in the game. They really made a big effort. They put the ball in chess hands. It didn't go well. And Chet just doesn't have that size or that first step, Lightcat, to really attack Miles Turner and put him in a lot of conflicts. And any time that Chet was going downhill in trying to throw his shoulder into Miles Turner, Turner was like, all right, fine.

like I'm here right that's the one thing that I know for a fact you are not going to bully me and so you you weren't able to see chat really take advantage of of opportunities right there so on that on that front that like that was that was an answer that Indiana showed that they have which was especially critical considering that Oklahoma City changed their starting lineup and they finally went away from too big they started case in Wallace and we've talked all all playoffs long about how as soon as you put another wing, another smaller player, having Chet at the, at the five, that's where you get those advantages. He wasn't able to take advantage of that.

Yeah, exactly. But the defense took advantage. Defense got a lot better with the small ball on us. That's fair. You're right about that. You're absolutely right about that. But there's only so much that you can give up when Chet is over here grabbing six rebounds and he's being slutted out by Aaron Newsman Seacum and Miles Turner.

He just looked overall like going to bat to what you said, Donovan. He looks like he was a step behind throughout the entirety of the game. His impact wasn't really what we thought it would be, especially with him being unlocked at that five position. And now if I'm someone like Mark Dagnall, I look at that, I evaluate that. I'm not saying I'm like making a quick move and forcing Hardinstein back into that starting lineup.

But I'm definitely heavily raising my eyebrows and maybe it's just genuinely not ready yet. I would relax. Dude, that's not why they lost at all. They had more offense rebounds in the start of the second half than they did. there's a lot of long rebounds to let that low rebounding number they just did not make any shots at all

the defense was amazing with the small ball lineup you don't force 19 turnovers by accident in the first half getting Jason Wallace out there and having the four guards that's the big reason for the going to small ball

it's not even offense it's when they're smaller they're better defensively they had to go big against guys like the nuggets because of yokech and whatnot but all season their defensive rating

in their lineups with multiple guards and only one big have been by far their best that played out exactly as you'd expect I'm obviously you want chet to shoot better from the field

offensively that is important but I don't think the defense and like the rebounding and closing out possessions was anywhere close to their biggest issue no they got their asses beat on the boards usually they get what was the what was the final outcome I believe it was like maybe 38 to 56 or something like it was like that level of ass whooping just cannot happen and that's where i'm like yeah no chat you have i don't want to reevaluate him and snatch that chain immediately but having as i say a hard and son reinsert into the lineup is not as it's not a terrible idea Bro, they kicked their ass in the second half. Exactly.

That's what I'm saying. That's why I'm like... It ended up to 64 total rebounds for the Pacers to 47. That's a disgusting asshole. But again, it would have been a 25-point game, though, they just made some three-point shots in the first half. So I'm not going to put that as a biggest reason they lost, but obviously, you're right, it can't be a 27 difference.

Like, it's not. And I look at someone like, I see how... 17. Exactly, yeah. Correct. And I just didn't like... I wasn't a humongous fan of chat tonight. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, definitely can be he did not play a good game. I'm not trying to... Defendom State play bad game, but I wouldn't reevaluate the small ball thing at all. Maybe you want to give Hart and some more minutes. I mean, take advantage, but the one big, like that element of it worked because the biggest thing is defense, I think. Yeah. But yeah, that's a big rebounding difference.

That's quite large. Yeah, I think for me, like, the biggest thing if I'm okay, see is I'm staying the course. I still, obviously, tonight, inexplicable. You can't, you can't give up a 15.4th quarter lead with like nine and a half minutes to go. Yes. That should not happen on your home floor in any situation. However, the entire game, you feel good.

Like you said, with the defensive performance, you feel good. Even though that Jada, there were a couple shots where I'm like, eh, like, you probably, you probably took that a little bit too early, right? Like, he was taking the middies that Indiana was giving him, but some of them were early in the shot clock. Some of them were some long twos. You were like, maybe you could get a better shot than that. So you'll, you know, you'll go back in game two if you're, if you're JDA and you'll find some

some better shots and better opportunities. You're going to shoot better. You're going to play better. There's that. But I think for, for OKC, this is definitely something where now you really have to tighten up and the, you have to win every game by 20. Do you feel good? Yeah, because this is, this is their one.

And Indiana let's let you know, like, OKC has their superpower of their. defensive versatility, Indiana superpower is devil magic. And the fact that they can stay in these games. And if there's any slight crease, if they can win it, they're going to go ahead and take it. And so you know exactly how dangerous

they are. You can't play around anymore. And their devil magic is being able to just consistently carve and knife into the defense and make passes that you really don't think that they would try. They make the most audacious and blatant passes. The millisecond that it's available.

Andrew Nymard does that obviously Tyrese Halliborne does that Even Aaron Needsmith Whatever he Whenever someone else is open for a quick second He's more than open It's just contagious over there to swing that fucking ball No matter what it is

The Patriot shot 46% from 3 Just like they have this whole series We talk on our stream about it I said OKC and 6 as my final guess Just because this team is gonna shoot the shit Out of the ball And part of the OECD defense is to give you open shots To they want to funnel them to the shooters

In positions that they feel the best about obviously But when every single shooter in their rotation shoots over 40%, especially from the corners, you're going to have to play good offense, OKC. Like, this is going to happen. They shot 36% as a team, 10% less. 39% from the field, OKC. This is just the same story we saw against the Nuggets where they should win a game. The defense works perfectly.

They go small and put more perimeter defenders out there that can make plays, and they get 14 steals because of it. That worked. That worked clearly. Miles Turner had his way with Hardinstein and Pass. series, you can eliminate that by putting him on the bench and you get more mobility, get more defensive playmaking. That works completely.

Nothing matters, though, especially against a team this good and this disciplined if you're not going to have baseline level shot making. You clearly have to have competency offensively, and we know this team has this type of floor. Can you do two things? Can you check, one, the fast break points? What were the fast break points? Because, OK, see, did such a, they did such a good job.

10 to 11. Okay, see, and that, that feels insane. Yeah. The Knicks, the Knicks were allowing Indiana to just run up and down all the time. And now you finally get to like an actual defense. And it felt like, OK, C was like, you're just, you're not going to get those easy buckets. You're not going to get super instant layups off of runouts off of May baskets, all of that stuff. And the fact that any time that there was a May basket, Ludo was like, where's Tyrese?

I'm on him early. And they were doing such a good job. And especially because they had the four guards in the lineup, they were able to, they were able to switch on a lot of the actions up top and really make India to take their time. Like, like you said, that is very repeatable and it is going to work. Like, you just have to shoot better.

You have to close out these games. Yeah, it's really not even like, obviously. So, yeah, they can rebound better, but that's baked into the strategy. They're always going to get out rebounded because they're prioritizing fast break defense. That's why they only had 10 fast break points and the prioritizing having more defensive playmakers get those deals.

So that give and take is expected. it just you have to execute better in the fourth quarter like there's very few i think adjustments you need to point to the thunder like is there anything else big picture that you watch and you're like oh that was a bad decision that firstly no it's hard to call back but i will say one of the main things that i that was super interesting was seeing how uninvolved tyrese halberin was they attacked them a lot in i think maybe the second end of the third quarter yeah and it felt like they went away from that so maybe that's something again that should be re-evaluated.

But although I will say, I did see Tyre's Halliburton in the fourth be a little bit more active. But still, if you're going to pick on something, Tyrese Halliborne is the one for that. And I feel like they went away from that. So maybe that's one thing. Just look at this. It's all blue. It was wild wire into the end.

We made our predictions right before we began our second half of the episode. And I, if I remember correctly, you guys said, OKC. And I said Indiana by like two or three points. I hate myself so much. Did I want that to happen? Did you say that? Yes. I don't remember that.

I did see that. I hate that I said that. I didn't really mean it. But God damn it, it was right. I think I said OKC by 8. And that's what it felt like because no, no, it was hilarious.

All game, Indiana was making plays. I'm like, oh, big shot. OKC up by 10. It was just a consistent 10 point lead. And I guess that speaks to the super high floor of the OKC team overall because their defense is so ridiculous. Terrible, terrible,

shot making game. And they're up by 10 for almost the entire. game like look how much thick blue is in the middle here yeah it's it's it's crazy but for india for indiana one shout out to obitopin because at the very start of this game he was awful he he was bad and we were looking around we're like he he he's gonna have to sit down because he had some bad turnovers he was not making a lot of shots it was it was not looking good he came out in the second half and even um later in the first half once he finally got settled in his three ball was

flying you saw him being more active he was yes he was really really important to double up on that too another player who was given a lot of shit to but he actually had more of an impact than he needed a more positive impact than he needed a negative one was bened mathern you look at his box where i think he put up like five points three rounds and two assists super impactful considering how physical he was on defense and also naturally his ability to get to the line he's one of the more imposing players on the pacers he's not your traditional pacer player who is super straightforward with his moves necessarily but seeing how he was able to not get a shot off very well i think he shot one for five but still be a brute force and let his physicality be known getting into it

with as a hard and sign and just like consistently clambering his way into the rim is so important because they don't have many guys like that on this roster yeah they do you talk about matthin yeah they they really let okay see no don't don't play rock okay c play a j mitchell tonight and so it's Like, you know, stop playing around. Stop messing around. They got very cute in the first half. Yes. They tried to do the thing that Kat did.

They tried to attack Miles Turner with Chet. He drove it a lot more than he usually does. You can tell it that that didn't go well. And then AJ Mitchell Lintman, minutes. I showed you guys a tweet in the first half. I forgot who tweeted it. Said this is the most disrespectful finals ever by Mark Dagnall. Yeah.

And it almost worked. Again, it's so hard to talk about this because you're wire to wire that much in the lead until the very end. like you you can it didn't work obviously they didn't win the game but when you're leading for 90% of the game it's like yeah your decisions ultimately work for a majority of the minutes played until the last few in which the patient just do what they always do and make big shots it's kind of how the you were talking about as a nix fan in the last series you're like we outplayed them all game what are you supposed to do differently I don't know yeah it it really it really was PTSD as we were getting down to to the end of it because and they showed a graphic at the very end of of players who have hit like game time or go-ahead shots in the last five seconds and playoff game since 97 and the people on the list is it's uh lebron it was like lebron uh Tyrese and it was some other uh like go i think it was a Celtics little person yeah it was some other like you know all-time player and the the fact that Tyrese has five of those shots and like three of them

are these are in these playoffs maybe even four if i go back and count he's on an all-time run of shot making stepping up to to the plate whenever the team needs it it's it's one of it's one of the wildest things I've ever seen and to see how he took that shot with zero rhythm he was not very much productive none of his shots look like he's in rhythm especially if it's a shot within like within the the three-point arc if it's a midi I'm like man that's break like it never looks good that's what's funny in so many these game winners there's shots he doesn't usually take yeah that is not something that has in the normal Tyrese Hallibur and shot diet.

It's something that you say, that bullshit, oh, it's in the road. It's just outlandish. He gets so good at everything. Inexplainable. Once that clutch moment comes up, there's less than three seconds left, Tyreys Halliburin gets amazing at everything.

He just becomes flawless, and it makes no sense. And like, okay, so I guess the question is, does this change your outlook? When we did the playoff predictions, I said OKC in six, I was weirdly, I was the biggest defender of the Pacers,

and then you guys said, okay, C, and five, does this change your art decision? at all? No. I still think that OKC dominated again for a majority of this game. And it's okay. We've seen them have lapses before and we've seen them respond. And while they are, well, okay, I said that like Jdub and Chet passed the test in the, in the Denver series and they came through in the Minnesota series and everything was fine. We still know that like Jadab still, he's not like a top 10 player in the world like he doesn't have these these he's the offensive consistency from him

isn't something where you're like yeah every night jadab is going to give me 25 a night yeah so these things are kind of baked in a little bit it's weird that it happened in game one i thought that this would happen in like game three or game four but i still feel really good about okay c it was game one against the nuggets too right when mark dangnall choked it so like yeah we've seen this story before yeah so i'm still i'm still going okay cm five i am backpedaling a little bit here it is i still believe okay she's going to come away with this series but it's going to be a lot harder for them because this this is unlike any other team that they faced in the first half you guys said they had what how many turnovers do the patients have 19 19 they finished

the game with i think five in the second half yeah in the second half i think they finished i think they completed the end with like five complete turn their total turnovers for the game were 24 yeah so they only have five more turnovers to finish out the game that is ridiculous that is uh they they have such a they have an amazing floor that's able to keep them in the game and all they need is a string of plays to go the right way whether it be like 50 50 hustle plays whether it be insane stupid magnet balls from guys like miles turner whenever they happen when you can get them or whether it be like andrew nimhard just straight up prison ball i'm going to kill you and and it doesn't matter what I see,

who you are in front of me. I'm going to give them another game because they aren't it to me. I don't want to. You think I want to step back on my word? No, I don't. I said earlier, like, Pacers are going to win this game,

and I didn't want to say it. I just have to give them a game. But after seeing how they walked down, OKC, and it's inexplainable, I give them another game at home specifically as well. But I don't think, again, if OKC comes back and win this in five, I'm not going to be surprised whatsoever

because going back to things you said, Like this type of shooting, this type of shooting from OKC is, it might be one of, genuinely one of their worst shooting nights of the entirety of the playoffs. They've had a couple of those, though, that felt like they're going to be the worst night of their entire playoffs. There's no way this team wins four in a row. Like, when we're talking on the stream, I was like, we need to respect the Pacers. Y'all are way too optimistic that it's going to be five. This Thunder team has these floors. And what I said in that stream was why I told you guys I was like not confident it would be four or five like you guys were.

The Pacers are so much better than the Nuggets. we get bogged down in the idea that the nuggets push the Thunder to 7 and we treat these playoff outcomes of the series like it's like proportional like oh if they got to 7 that means clearly they're like close to the same level and this team lost in 5 so they're proportionally 20% better

that shit doesn't work that way the nuggets were not that good the Thunder played down the competition gave them games they shouldn't have the Pacers are several tiers above the nuggets and they have been since January 1st they cannot beat this team four times in a row with this offensive infrastructure the Thunder will have games like this in which the shot is just not good enough and obviously the Pacers are a tier above the teams that they got by even

with that they'll still win the series but it's going to be at least six games I think and now now that they lost the first one I guess you could think that could go seven now because winning four in a row is very difficult yes but also offensively I don't know if it can get worse than this and so if you got 2% more offensive you're okay see you probably end up walking away with this game and Shea ended up with 38 points B plus game from Shea. It wasn't a great Shea game. Even though that he almost had 40, which is, again, speaks to the level that he's at.

But there were a lot of times where it didn't feel like Shea was really in a rhythm. In the first half, he only got to the line two times. The second half, you know, OK, see, they got in the bonus and he started getting there. So it was a little bit better. But offensively just getting into his spots and knocking down shots time after time after time, it wasn't there. he took he he scored 38 he took over 25 shots right the the overall efficiency of his game that is normally there wasn't there today so i think even if everybody else shoots the way that they do you can get a a slightly better she and again probably walk away from a game like this

and that's why i think it is also clear there's nobody on that team that can guard him oh yeah of course not yeah we knew that yeah she's performance is never a question to me like yeah a 46% from the field, 46, that's low for Shea standards because he's had one of the best scoring seasons we've seen. But it really comes down to the fact that he only had three assists because these motherfuckers were bricks. That's really what it comes down to is they did not finish the plays that he set up for them.

He dimed Chet for a drive on one of them. He missed a damn near open layup. There's a late contest, but he should have made it. In a one point game, there's so many margins that could easily flip it like you said. So, yeah, I'm not, again, I'm not worried they're going to lose a series or anything. But this feels to me like the win the next two

lose game four win the next year for that something like that and okay c and six like four in a row is just really hard to do against anybody that's as good as the Pacers yeah i agree with you i feel like through that too like no matter what happens in this series you're almost always going to be having the two stars behind shea which is jada vinchette under a microscope continuously for their offensive wolves no matter what in the awesome no matter what happens the off season like you're going to want the same price is going to want to juice up this roster even more which sounds insane to say have the assets and flexibility castaways on all that to do so but that's something that has to happen if they want to get to that next level of just genuinely unbeatable which sounds insane again i know because they damn near won 70 games in the regular season but they're just not unbeatable it's so funny because there's so many things you want to talk about like okay c was locking up so much of what the Pacers do and there's so much to talk about there but like they lost the fucking game so it's like damn guess i got to give it to the Pacers but the way that okayc was like they were manhandling him man they were obviously dominating with the steals in the first half but the way that they were switching their smalls on the siakum and miles

turner and like begging the pacers to post them up constantly against guys like caruso and then locking that shit up like it was a master class defensively for three quarters like it was so good it's like it's hilarious they didn't win this game yeah exactly with how good of a defensive performance was needed their shoes to be competent and they couldn't even do that you know how pissed I'll be if I was Lou Dort, man. That was one of the greatest games of Lou Dort's life. And dude, Lou Dore is going to give us some stinkers, too. He's had some, the Nugget series.

If we get back to that version of Lood Dort, what did he finish tonight? He had like, he had 17, I think. Yeah, he finished with five of six from three, five of nine from three by the end, 55 percent, five or ten from the field, 15 total points. Match cost on both ends of the board. Four steals, two blocks.

Damn. Crazy block in the fourth quarter. He was insane defensively. Yeah. Well, yeah. Chet's going to be better than two of nine. from the field so that's a safe assumption they're not going to have him attack miles turner as much they're going to play back in the normal rhythm with him and have him focus on doing this stuff

he was doing before they clearly the game plan was to quit the ball in his hands and that threw everything off because it wasn't working that'll fix itself you can assume a jdub redemption he's up and down player not just a down player but then again i mean all it takes is a couple downs in a row and things get spooky but we can assume there will be bounced back there that alone makes them win this game so no reason to panic but you know same thing we were saying in the nugget series the whole series we were like oh they'll fix us they'll fix this they'll fix this they ended up not fixing it three times in a row not in a row I should say but three times out of seven games and we had a game seven that we didn't expect so it's not out of the realm of possibility that the patient's pushes

to seven I I can't say that either they got to show up they they use that I have it's really that's really that's really for nine minutes and we we were making fun of uh of richard Jefferson because once the league got down to seven he was you know he got on the bike he was like this is a 48 minute team you have to do everything and we're like man yeah yeah yeah they got it locked up and then again point three seconds left indiana takes their first lead of the night it was it's really the night yeah yeah yeah i don't know it was literally wire to wire yeah yeah thought there was a couple it was there was one lead change there was one tie and one lead change oh my god and i believe it was for the siacum free throws as well yeah i think that those

street those gave him the lead what I will say this morning Anthony Richardson shoulder injury out indefinitely another sacrifice another blood sacrifice first it was Caitlin Clark that it was your word out indefinitely they don't have time people for his return

yeah so I said it's getting spooky out there in Indianapolis yo that front office is that cooked to me I think I tweeted that Tyrese Halliborne has inexplicable level of ice in his veins ghost blood in his veins we know where you're it comes from.

He's amazing. It's so funny. It's so hilarious this archetypal player he is that he's this past first point guard that isn't a great score but every single time it counts he becomes a great score

whether it's a close-out game and it gives you 30 or it's three seconds left you need one bucket he got you like he's so hard to like gauge because when we talk about these players in the league right now in their standings

just off this playoff run it's small sample size biased to a few shots in most cases I'm like don't overreact to the sample size there's not 12 players I'd rather have than him right now fuck it he's top seven bro don't ask me to list he's top seven like we talk about this on the live stream on the hot takes thing

where we're talking about gauging this and then we were like I was joking like if you do just this and playoffs like he's got to be topped in right and then you were like fuck it keep going he's the goat he's the best right now and like that's how it feels like at a certain point if he just keeps on succeeding where does it end where do you stop extrapolating playoff success when you're gauging him against other players

I don't know And he Yeah And today was also funny When he had the shot Because every other time That he's hit a shot He's done something crazy

Like he did the choke sign He was doing the big balls Today he was just like Nah I do that He was so calm So nonchalant with it This team's too good for him To get ahead of himself

He knows I can come back to bite you Yeah He said listen I got out Scott free Doing the choke sign Game 1 Not gonna try my luck yet

Exactly And that's just a good business Susan But yeah I mean I can't believe this I really can't believe it went down like this. The Pacers are.

I can. They're amazing. Yeah, this is what they do. I can believe it just fine. This is what, this is the OKCMO to blow it on offense when you have a generational defensive performance. Yeah. And this is the Pacer's MO to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and find a way to contact the devil within the fourth quarter and make it work.

Are they the team of destiny? Yes. There's just one specific play with a few seconds left. So what are you not seeing? I think it was like 20th quarter. it's a dirt run it's a 2011 maves i think it was like 24 25 seconds off on a clock or whatever it was one of the last positions of the game for okay c and shay got filled up with the ball and then you passed it over to jadub last not last second at all jadup had plenty of time to cook but in those

instances like that like your your guy your superman your batman needs to have his robin ready at all times for no matter what and sometimes that robin's going to have to masquerade as a batman yeah Batman and Robin talk just simply just wasn't fucking there and that play makes me wish damn bro like if jada wasn't to do that i just would rather he wasn't ready hope that i just would rather wish they just kept the ball in his hands he doesn't got playoff experience he's not the fouls it's getting to yeah the thing is the reason i'm not i'm not concerned at all like when this happened to the nicks early in the series i think there was so one it was like small sample one shot changes everything right but throughout the course of the game you saw a lot of

areas that they the patience outplayed them and you say well that can keep that very feasibly can't keep happening they have these advantages i feel like they have no advantages here that like really shined in that way you know like oh never not let me not say that they have a three point shooting advantage in rebounding too sure but like again that's defensive rebounding specifically yeah like again part of that's by design with the way they get back in transition so that's good that's gonna happen against every team okayc he plays hopefully not to this extent exactly that's a key point but sure but Like, but I'm not, normally it's a 10, 10 rebound difference to today of a 17. That's more than you want, but that's not something that I'm going to be like,

that'll decide the series, you know? The three point shooting difference, that can be the Pacers path back into it. But if you look at the other side of the court defensively, I don't feel like J-Dub and Chet had bad games because they have lockdown defenders and our lockdown schemes that slow them down. They've executed very poorly. So like, sure, it's never only one side. Clearly the defense has to make them execute poorly.

otherwise everybody would do well every game but I do feel like it is fully in OKC's hands to just play better rather than Neesmith is the answer to guard Jaylon Williams

he's not going to have a good series all game stuff like that like I don't feel like there's big takeaways on that side to make us really spooked about the Thunder

so is it's gonna be okay it's gonna be okay it will be so shout out the HACA shout out the Pacers for just having a dope-ass

performance and once again having a moment whether or not it becomes something bigger we will see but either way

way you need shout them out man it's it's not it's like we've talked about all playoffs it's not like we're playing this series over a hundred games and it's some wild sample size right a whole season it's a seven game max you need four you got one yeah yeah shout out shout out to you because you did you did what you had to do and it doesn't matter how it doesn't matter how you get these these games it doesn't matter if it's some crazy avarition of shooting or some wild shots you got got made you made the wild shots you made the plays when you needed it to and now the the team that was on the you know everybody for the last week right everybody's kind of already assumed that okay c was going to win this series and we've you know kind of push past that in a lot of

conversations of like well you know if they get two are they the next dynasty this and that before they even finish this one exactly we can't go there yet right we can't do that they they set to get four they have six chances to do it now it's it's real work exactly we feel good but you can't assume anything yeah dude the nicks beat the celtics we had these same conversations every game and they went down three one before jason tamm's injury again you played you said you don't play these games a hundred times if they played a hundred times the nicks probably went 72 of them but in this seven game sample size that matters they lost three before they won one like it it'd be like that and are were the nicks the better team overall and a hundred times sample

size? No. Does it matter? No. This is going to happen again. We've seen the story play out. Nothing is certain. And the Pacers have gone on the road multiple times. And back to back series, they've gone on the road and gone up to O. They did it. This team is good. They did it to Cleveland. They did it to the Knicks. It's, it's scary right now. Exactly. It is scary. And that's the main thing I was trying to talk about on the stream when we were, I had to have the discussion, we were just like debating the difference in which we would think that Thunder would win. It's like, no, I think the Thunder would win,

but the Pacers are too good to act like it's going to be some four or five game sweep. All the casual mass media that, like, Instagram posts like that, everybody's treating it like it's a foregone conclusion of Thunder win. I'm like, there's a difference between heavy favorites and certainty. And people way too often misconstrue those things. I'm like, we're pretty fucking sure that Thunder should win. Tons of times in sports, things happen that shouldn't happen. Nothing is a certainty for sure.

Yeah, I agree. next game i'm hoping and i'm looking forward to chet bounce back game really a bounce for all their goddamn role players there's been plenty of times where i see chet go ahead and drop a smooth seven points nine points and it doesn't matter because everyone else is able to fill in and chip in where they can offensively by hitting a couple extra threes tonight just wasn't the night for that yeah yeah you can't get a terrible check check game and a terrible jad of game at the same time that's just tough well you can unless tyre's halberton snatches your throat but yeah.

That's what we keep talking about you can't do this to win Tyrese Hallibur did a game winner it came down to one play yeah and then Shea missed a very makeable midi and then Tyrese Hallibur made an insane midi

that's the margin of victory we're talking about here so we can make these conclusions we can say you can't do this you can't do that it's a game of one play at a time they keep doing it one play decides these games

so no grand takeaway from this one I guess is what we're really saying okay see and five though I'm still standing there on that yeah I think Whatever you felt before the series, if you're a Pacer's fan, obviously a reason to feel good. You got one. Snatched Home Court advantage, so you should feel good.

If you believe in the Thunder beforehand, like all of us did, no reason to change your pick now. They should have won this game. Should have could have, would, of course, but this is a game for confirmation bias for all sides. Yeah, I agree. We're all locked in. And with that being said, let's get you on to the second hour of this episode where we're going to talk about one word to describe every single NBA team season. And we're back for our two of the show. We're here to talk about what the title says.

As you guys heard by the beginning of this episode, we were actually recording this before the finals game. What do you think happened? You're speaking to your past self. What do you think they saw? I'm going Thunder by 11 tonight. Okay, that's strong. I am going Indiana.

I think this might be their only, not their only chance, but I think they come out, surprise the OKC Thunder and win by like three points. Well, you guys have already seen the outcome. you guys were you heard us react to the outcome you will have what's your pick thunder by whatever okay but comfortable victory under buy whatever eight I don't know comfortable victory thank okay but like you guys saw about title we're here to give one word to describe every single NBA team season so you know but around the end of the regular season like two weeks left we degrading every

NBA team season and that was about the regular season and like how they performed this one's gonna be a little bit more vibes based I guess and it's also accounting for the playoffs which we didn't have for that when things change massively for many teams depending on that so we're going to kind of give a single word to sum up what this team should be feeling coming off of this year and then obviously say a few more words to describe that and talk about it but really boil it down to one single word donald you can go first who's your first team we've talked about them a lot we would just we'll start off with the new york nix okay uh invigorating invigorating that's it that's an interesting ass word i think i think you've seen it's a colorful word

I know. You've seen the Knicks. Like last year, they had their run and they got to the second round, loose to the Pacers, everybody gets hurt. But it felt like, okay, we're building something here. And then now that you have this run where they make it to the East of Conference finals for the first time in 25 years, you have Jalen Brunson doing the Jailen Brunson thing, you go all in.

There was an energy there. And on every single game, it felt like it was going to be a do-or-die moment for the Knicks. And then the fact that you fired Tom. you fired Tibbs after the season, you are now injecting a whole bunch of new expectations onto the team going into the off-season, going into next season. A lot of things within New York basketball

are just now elevated. And so I just think the entire season from start to finish was very invigorating for the Knicks. That's a decent word. Yeah, I was kind of thinking about it, like injection of life, I think. Yeah. So same thing. you just use a better vocabulary word for that because we all season did not talk about them like a team that had a chance to make the finals and they clearly did they were close they were a couple games away from really really being the biggest surprise the season honestly because of how much we had little little faith they could beat the top two teams in the east so that alone the run adds extra life gives you a new fine expectation that you're going to carry in the next year whether or not it is like not i don't want to say deserve but whether or not you should carry that in the next year you will you will have higher expectations now with the new coach like even

more reason to be excited because you can say, hey, Tim's held us back. We get a smart brain in there that does more offensive juice to the team. So that's a new life added to the fan base. Did you guys see on Twitter just, I think it was last night or two nights ago, we saw PJ Tucker, Janeland Brunson, and I think Kat, they were all out in the clever way. It was the whole team. They were celebrating

the Tens firing or something like that. They were not celebrating. They were turt dancing on his fucking grave. This is my narrative bag. That was a team outing for morale, purposes. You go out, you hang out. Why was it morale so high? Huh? Why was morale so high? What are they celebrating? You just finished a long season. It was a very successful season. Even after the tip thing, and this is one thing that I did think about where, yes, I was massively

disappointed and you can call this hope, or you can call it perspective. At the beginning of the season, I was like, this team has to make it to the Eastern Conference Finals. That is where they are going to go. And because we thought you are going to lose in the conference finals, to Boston like that's going to be the thing as the season goes on you realize they're going to play Boston before the conference finals so we kind of just wrote them off early the fact that they still got to the conference finals by beating Boston as a whole the season was a very it was a success like it from whatever your your expectation I mean unless you thought they were going to win the finals which not many people did except you right so like this this season was was very well it went

went well so you're you're celebrating a successful season yeah I think you have reason to have hope now going to next year like you you have a good excuse to be optimistic about the Knicks which I feel like at best in the recent years you had cautious optimism at best yeah now I think you can consider them especially with the east be neutered a little bit with Jason Tatum RIP being out for at least the next year the calves being at the very least having more question marks that give you even more reason to doubt than you already had at the very least so you have lots of reason to say next year could be our best chance

of winning the East that we've had of your lifetime. Yeah, I agree. The foundation is there and I think at very least again, you will not be as good as you were this year which is still like very high for the East and Conference.

Three seat is the floor. And it might be a little bit different just because like the way that a normal tips team plays every game matters and you're going to go after every game and you have all these starters playing big minutes.

So there's a floor there that you might be able to reach. We still don't know who the next coach is going to be. We'll see what happens. We'll see, you know, whoever is named and their offensive principles and where they come from and their values and all those things. We'll see how that, you know, ultimately ends up affecting the team. But, no, it was a good season. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Undoubtedly, there's a positive takeaway from it. And I would say about a month before the playoffs, there was so little hope, I think, in the Knicks fan base that there was going to be this positive outcome. Like, it was a pretty defeated fan base during that stretch towards the end of the regular season where they were looking little iffy and the Celtics were as great as they were all season. They looked like they were full of life. Obviously, the Cavs had nailed the one seed.

There was not a lot of hope from the fan base. We were all watched. We were all watched because it was like, hey, Detroit is not anything to snuff at, right? Detroit had a lot of momentum going in. And you're like, listen, if you don't take care of business, if you come out and think it's suite which they loki did right like they there was a situation where that could have been a seven game first round series yeah and the nix had already lost two games at home to detroit in that in the first round so going to in game seven it's not it's not anything that you could have just

you know put in pen we spent towards the end of the season they faced the boston celtics the cleveland cavaliers and the detroit business of course like those losses don't really mean much because it's april basketball march basketball but they were trailing just a there you left the regular season with a trail of L's from top tier teams. It's a stench. Yeah. And like we spent the last three weeks bullying you because it's funny and you're easy to get riled up and because the Knicks were like just the funniest thing ever for

you specifically and the storylines that you were buying into. But despite that. It happened. No, no, no. Just like convincing yourself they're going to come back and win. And it was fun to be like, come on, man. They're down three one. But after the dust settles and after it's no longer funny to make fun of you.

because they're out of it, you very much should feel good about this team. Yeah. But not that good. I do. I agree. But not too good. I feel great. I will say, a team that I feel so many things about is the Atlanta Hawks. I think the best word that I have. Yeah, fuck it. Let's just address it.

Let's just address it. Let's do it. I haven't had the opportunity, thankfully, to talk about the Atlanta Hawks over the last like, bro, it's been like a month, two months. And my life, the quality of my life is amazing. I sleep better. I eat better. my lifts are better bro my skin is glowing my teeth shine a little brighter i don't know what it is but i'm just starting to notice some type of consistencies the only thing only reason we've said

the hawks at all anything pertain to them the past month is to say point guard x and point guard y are better than trey young that's all we've done hawks narrative wise is damn brunth is so much better tyree so much better and then we talked about a kongwu for like two seconds in the draft clip that we did the other day we kind of called a mid aren't even nice the best word that i can come up with as a hawks fan right now as in the making of this video as in the month of june is that i am feeling frenzy like i feel hope i feel optimism but also i feel worry why because right before the season ended we fired our gm for our assistant gm who's apparently been all not all around the league but he came from the spurs and the golden state warriors and i feel good because

we have for the first time ever again we're mid 37 wins 41 wins blah blah blah i get it but this is the best foundation that we've had in the strongest core of young players around tri young that we've ever had that could be conducive to winning we have a vision but also at the same time too we just fired our gm of course these tri young rumors are all over the place we lift on several important picks over the last few years whether it be dion j hunter or well i don't say dion j hunter but kobe buffin is like the person who sticks out like a sword thumb. So I feel like very frenzied because I'm like, okay, we got a new GM, completely new mindsets in the building. We have the 13th pick and 22nd overall pick in the, in this upcoming draft, which is very important. We don't know

what we're going to do with Akongu and Klankepella. It's, I'm assuming we might want to start Okongu, but is he really the center for the future? And then the biggest talking piece of it all is like, what's going on with Tray Young? Why is he over here talking about how he wants to stay with the Atlanta Hawks a couple weeks before our GM gets fired. What is going on? So I feel frenzied. Yeah, that's a good word because I think especially over the last two years, specifically last year when you like rebuild the roster, it does feel like you guys are in a like dash

against time to figure out if you can maximize Trey before his value goes like absolutely down because there obviously like he's a small point guard. there's already been, you know, a lot of conversations about can you win with Tray Young as, you know, one of the two best players on your team, this and that. And so the fact that you traded for Dejante Murray and then had to walk that back because you were mid. And then now you're rebuilding. You got, you got Reese and Shea, you got Dyson Daniels. You're trying to figure out what all of this means. And is there a way that you guys can get above that nine seed, 41 games, you know, 42 games line? It, it does feel like there's a mini era that's coming

into a close that you guys are trying to see if you can extend a little bit more. So frenzy does make a lot of sense to me as a term for you guys. Yeah, exactly. And then, like, as I see a close to the era, potentially, I also see like a new beginning because it's like, holy fuck, we got the most improved player of the year. We pulled off one of the best trades in the NBA over this past season when it comes to exchanging Dejante Murray for Dyson and Daniels. We have a defensive player of the year.

We have a potential all-star on our roster who just, literally needs to be healthy. These are real pieces. We have the number of overall pick who a lot of people, like me, admittedly, kind of just like shunned on shun day one, but he had a fantastic rookie year.

Optimism is there. Okay. Yeah, it is. You're ahead on the right direction is like the way to phrase it, I guess. Like optimism in terms of like we're the next up, no. But training in the right direction,

the spark of optimism has been laid. You will see what fuel they add to that fire. But yeah, you at least see the spark. Just so many. It's just a frenzy, bro. That's still overall, like, encapsulating. We're just so many thoughts for this team, and I don't know where to go.

Yeah. And it's like, whenever you're operating on, like, are we going to be bad mid or good mid next year? You're like, yeah, they'll be towards a good side next year. They're turning towards the five seat instead the ninth seed. Go to hell. No, that's real. That's real.

Like, next year is not going to be a year that make a big jump. But you can project them to be on the high end of the midscale next year. Cavs, Cavs, Casers, Knicks, Magic. I assume Boston's going to be good still. Well, depending on what they do, which that's going to be a fun when we get to them. But those four, those four, and then let's just say you guys climb up to five,

that's good. Yeah, yeah, you're training in the right direction. You're not ready to be a great team yet. They're not there yet, but they're on the high end of mid and they can take another step. I feel like you're talking to a puppy right now.

That's good, man. Good job. That's exactly what I'm doing. I'm talking to some. Keep grinding, bro. You'll be all right. I'm talking to someone to damage. Stay consistent, bro.

Still consistent, bro. Bro, post 10 times a day. It's all about clip farming. some people back to your Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Lemon app. Does Gary E. Yeah. Dude, you gotta post a thousand times a week. NFTs.

And you would know this if you bought my course to 10 out of a month. Dude, sell your shoes and buy a camcorder. Garage sales every Saturday, 9 a.m. Sell Trey Young now. You don't need them. Okay. So that's the Hawks. Let's stick with the trend of our teams first up front.

We'll go to the Lakers. My one word to describe the team. I, Lisa Al-Gaiib. Who? What? Wait. Luca Dantzic is the only thing that matters for this season. Obviously, there was the downside.

I was looking at me like, I thought since what's going on. That's for us. We have. So in other words, the one, I'll use one term to describe this team. I said, a three word phrase instead of one word. Yeah. A new hope. He said two words.

Nash and Paul. Well, you all cheat and I use three, a new hope. I think is the phrase because for this season, the only thing that matters is the fact they got Luca Donchich. Obviously, they showed us reason to believe they could make a run. That shit was a house of cars. It was fake. It was false.

It was Fugazi defensive schemes that worked in the regular season did not work in the playoffs, right? So the reason we had optimism for them this year, false hope. But before we even gained that false hope when they made that trade, the only thing that was talked about day one was, okay, so the next era of the Lakers is here. they're going to move past the LeBron era. Right now, we're kind of juggling both.

But eventually this is all about building towards the Lucidantia era that comes next. And that's all that I can take away from this is going into the summer, I'm already over the playoffs loss. Like as soon as I saw, this team didn't have the juice in the first three and a half games. Once you got to that middle point in the series, I was like, okay, so they just don't got it. I have no reason to care anymore. They clearly are not built for this year. Oops, I was stupid for having hope.

Now I'm like, okay, so how do we make this Luca Dantzsche's era work? how do we retool this team this summer to give our new hope everything he needs to lead this team towards whatever comes next yeah because if every team in the NBA right now like we just did a massive redraft Luca goes where like three at worst wembe shay because she's still younger uh yokech he still has a good amount of years then it's like luca and yonis not not lucas younger than i think i would yeah but she's a safer bet right now i think but yeah it's for that's a debate MVP yeah yeah but even even even with with I think, I think if we're doing a redraft, because the same reason why you would take like

Shay over Luca, you would take Luca over, over Yokic, because Yokic is near and 30 and Luca's not necessarily there. Yeah. And I didn't mean Shay, I meant Shay's younger than other stars like Yokish and Janus. Yeah. But yeah, so like, Luca is one of those like foundational pieces in, in the league. So yeah, it doesn't, it doesn't really matter. And they have, they are one move away from getting the thing that we all said that they

needed all year long, which is they need an actual big. They did not have any playable big men in that in that series, at least at least not playable to JJ Redick. And the fact that now you have an offseason where he can be involved fully into player personnel decisions and not only get a player that fits with Luca, but fits with what JJ wants to do, that's massive for them. Yeah. And you could say one of the words that describe this team as disappointment, if you'd like because we did all truly believe that this team had it in them to somehow after such a monumental trade make a run in the playoffs like it wasn't completely ridiculous for us to think they had a chance to win a playoff series at least one right like yeah they very well should

have won one so they did fail in some regards but you know it's not the most important thing while people like me allow myself to have hope and be a fan and truly just believe like oh they're bringing it all together once the dust settle it's like okay it's not shocking that that was false hope It's not shocking that that didn't work out the way we wanted to believe it would. So with that being in mind and with, you know, taking a step back and realizing what really matters to the future, it's all about next year and the next year and the next year, the next three-year window while you have Luka under control before you can inevitably decide he wants to stay or go. You probably have at least a year and a half, two years, maybe three of a runway to prove to him he should be here long term. That's what it's all about.

And if they didn't do this trade, I don't know what that runway would have been like. You would have had 40-year-old LeBron, AD over 30. damn i don't know like you wouldn't have had a long window in front of you whatsoever this probably would have been more like lebron's about to announce a farewell tour and you should trade ad before he loses all his value and now we have the complete opposite of that as in terms of a long-term path in front of us if i was to get into the weeds a little bit more and talk about a specific player luca dantsich and describe one word for him going into next year based off of this season is like bomb that he has a time bomb on his chest

because I don't, there isn't a player who has as much pressure to perform at like God tier all time level like Luca Donchitz since we've seen LeBron as a Laker or since you could even say since we saw, um, KD joined the Warriors back in 2016. Another thing that helps put more pressure on to Lucas for me personally, I mean, I like narratives. This is what this episode is about. Some dude in your draft class, 2018 specifically just won MVP and he might win an MVP and an NBA championship. If I was to tell you two, three years ago that Shay was going to win an MVP before Luca Donchitz, you would be so shocked.

You would call me a fucking moron. Chains have been snatched. Exactly. Chains have been snatched. And that is the most, one of the more shocking things to develop over the last, I don't know, seven, eight months. Of course, Lucas went through a hell of a lot of things, whether it'd be him being traded, him being injured, and all that.

But there's a lot of pressure on him specifically to be peak Luca better than ever. And he needs to break new barriers or at least reopen them so he can enter his name with these conversations again. I think the word to describe the next year is pressure. I said for this season, I said a new hope. But like I'm calling this guy the chosen one. Yeah. I call him Lise and Al-Gai.

That's the chosen one from Dune. So I'm calling him like the king. Like he needs to be the one to like lead this team. So that in itself includes a whole lot of pressure. So that's definitely the way to describe Luca over the next year. He has everything on his shoulders. Fair. All right.

My next team, let's go. Let's stay out east. I'm going to go, at least stay out east with me. Cleveland Cavaliers. Okay. Controversial. That's the word? Yeah.

Okay. Controversial. They went over. What did you say? I said, what are they? I didn't Ross. Okay. They won over 60 games.

God forbid. They had, they had a great. a great statistical profile. You had, you had DeMitch taking less, right? All the, all the high vibes were there. They looked like a team

that was on the inner circle of the title contenders. Yet throughout the entire regular season, it was kind of split on like, if you were a ball noah and you're like, yeah, Cleveland is like that. Or are you saying,

this is the same team from a couple years ago that keeps, that keeps, you know, going outside. I don't really trust them. Darius Garland had a great, year, All-Star, all that, once again gets hurt, has the playoff performance where he's coming in and out.

And now we're sitting here in the off season, there's still, you know, reasons to question about like, okay, what is next season going to be like for this Cleveland Cavaliers team? Him and Mowgli and Hunter all got hurt in the playoffs. They go out in a very weird way. And so now this entire season where it was one of the best seasons post-Lebron, you look at them and you're like, hey, I don't really know what they are. And if you look at them and you say that team, they were frauds the whole time, you have a section of people that can legitimately be like, you're stupid.

Look at everything that they did for the entire regular season. They just got hurt. You just did all of this. They should run it back. They'll be fine. Or you can say, this team was fine. It's just injuries. And there's still another side that can say, nah, that was just regular season.

They had opportunities in the playoffs. It didn't work. I still think that while they were extremely good, there are still a lot. of questions about Cleveland and their roster construction, their makeup, what happens to them and the amount of dog in them, you know, like, there's, there's a lot that we still need to find out about a team that won 64 games last year, which is kind of weird. Yeah, that's why the word I would use is frustrating because there's all these questions and you have no clear answers whatsoever. For everything you said, the haters are right but wrong at the same time. The optimists

are right and wrong at the same time. It really comes down to whether you value sample size and process or just raw outcome in the playoffs not here to say which one's the right answer but everybody has fuel to their fire like you said and if you're the calves what do you look at from this playoff run and say we can learn from that you clearly don't have enough perimeter defense i think the picture is exposed that regardless of who's healthy but the lack of primitive defense is really really exasperated by the fact that your offense is neutered by the injuries so you could say we didn't set the defense up to succeed well because of the injuries or maybe it's vice versa maybe you would have lost anyways because the defense was a problem regardless there's so much

air, so little concrete answers, you have to really look within and decide, like, what you want to hopefully be better in a better circumstance. Yeah. That if I'm the front office, I am, this is incredibly frustrating. Like, there's zero, zero clarity. Yeah, I agree. There's almost questions when it comes to every single player on this roster outside of Evan Mobley and probably Donovan Mitchell.

Even Donovan Mitchell. There's questions about DeMitch. Even, yeah, but even Donovan Mitchell, like, he didn't have the greatest regular season whatsoever, one of the, not worst of his career, but it's not an outstanding. any regular season at all. Very forgettable Donald Mitchell season, which he somehow ended up

first team all in the year. Forgettable? Forgetable. He didn't have a spectacular year. Yeah. I mean... I mean, okay, forgettable when it comes

to his personal career. Okay. No, it is forgettable. I mean, he took a backseat and like said, I'm not going to have the high usage

so everybody else can thrive. That is part of it. But he also went a long part of the year not quite having the scoring effectiveness that he usually does, especially at the rim. We talk about that all year.

So I think forgettel is probably the perfect word because it's not bad. It's just like, not, it's a footnote. I always hear Forgetta won't be like, that's trash.

Of course you hear that. I'm not surprised. But also in the playoffs, like he had a few crazy games when everybody got hurt where he almost won scoring 48 points and like people remember those games

and think, oh, the team got hurt, he put the team on his back, Demich is fine. He did his job. He was kind of a black hole in some of those games. Like some of those games,

he took it upon himself to revert to old DeMitch and say, I'm going to have to get a lot of buckets, which you understand because everybody's injured. That man had, a 45%

usage rate and average three assists per game that just doesn't make any sense I mean shout out to you he was playing some Montaella's basketball

for a little bit you did what you had to do and like part of it is because he lost guys and had to revert to that part of that is he was like pushed into bad habits by a good defense

that really took the took his bad habits and put them pressure on them for him to do that and he just did it so he's not fully absolved of blame either so I agree

I said to say even more frustrations because you don't even know if your best player is at fault exactly And then that leads me to question next, up in line, Darius Garland, his health abilities and how, again, how reliable or sustainable he can be in the playoffs. Those are just straight up for super frustrating questions because you can't go based off anything because he hasn't even had the opportunity to showcase what he can do when he's 90 to 100%.

Next up, we got Jared Allen. What the fuck is going on? People want me, people over here thinking that if I trade you, Evan Moby will be empowered and my offense will be a lot. lot more fluid. But also at the same time, you are very much a part of my my superpowers as a regular season or just the NBA team in general because I have the ability to have to have basically two starting lineups when you're a part of this roster. We have, we are the twin towers with you a part of this organization. Yeah. So it's like all around when it comes to their core players outside of Evan Mobley, you have major questions. Yeah. And even Evan Mobley,

I don't have questions about this, but he didn't have a super aggressive scoring playoff series with the Pacers. And I think that was because everybody else around him, the team really went away from him in like a schematic way and didn't empower him enough and then put him in position to succeed. But also the patient did a really good job taking his ball handling away with like the ball pressure they put on everybody in the roster. So even him, it's like you better, if you're going to play center, you're going to be asked to be a bigger score. You better be ready for that. If I'm Cleveland, the moment we get to March 1st, Derris Garland, sit down. I'm just I'm going to put you on ice

I'm going to put you in bubble wrap We don't even talk about that Yeah he's like I just I have to get to a playoff run Where you are healthy and at least Right at the end of the season Everybody's hurt right whatever I need you to be 85%

Once we once we get to the playoffs Not even man he needs to be healthy Like you're right He needs to be healthy For someone like him especially His player profile like you have no room for error When you're that small This is three times

This is three times It's hard for small guard to play through injury at all. Yeah, that, that Darius Garland has not been 100% whenever the Cabs have been in a playoff type of scenario. And like you said, if Jared Allen is there, that's your, that's your superpower to kind have two lineups. If Darius Garland isn't there, you don't have that ability, right?

So like he has to be there. So they're going to have to figure out. It's like having a door with a no handle. It's fucking useless, bro. There's been a lot of rumors about potential Darius Garland for Jaylon's Suggs trades. We'll talk about that in future episodes when we get into like looking forward to the offseason more, but those are the type of questions that are in the air right now because of everything you're mentioning with the lack of health that isn't his fault. Like I maintain,

I don't blame people for getting injured. It's not their fault unless you're like at Zion Williamson situation. You're coming in and like unhealthy like out of shape than maybe. But especially in a Darius Garland situation, it's not his fault. But if you get unlucky every year, it's hard to build around. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. Okay. I'm not going to lie. Someone just made me excited. Do you have the new or pelicans or? Oh, I do. Keep you talk about them because he just mentioned him like

oh my God I've been dying to talk about them I don't even know how to talk about this right now do you do you have a word

for them it's not it sounded like you were very excited to the new ones unknown complete unknown D&D

yes the question is not question the word to describe their season because we're not talking about looking forward yeah

this season is to be determined that's how you describe the season because they had a season from hell everybody got hurt they had a grizzy

type of season Herb Jones got hurt immediately Dejante Murray RIP's Achilles got hurt immediately Zion played 30 games looked mid for 15 amazing for 15 hurt again

there is so much unknown with this team it's all to be determined and if we won't look forward a little bit what's your takeaway from the season is your foundation is to be determined because they didn't get the number one pick

they didn't get number two picked they didn't get something that you could say we can draft a potential star so you're not going to find your new foundational piece for sure in the draft this year there's so many Zion on question marks

whether or not he should be your future star whether or not he should be in the NBA now since that we have looming charges that who knows where that goes

but if it's true he's fucking out of here so that's another looming element of it that he might be the biggest sicko in the league all of a sudden if that ends up being true

what the fuck do they do about that because you owe him a lot of money and all of a sudden you're looking at a fucking I don't even know I was going to say a name but you know

a something situation and Joe Dumas in a press conference a couple days ago which was after the news broke of that said they still plan on Zion Williamson

being their foundational piece, being their franchise player. So that was already question marks with do you want to put your eggs in the basket of the guy who's never available? Now he has a looming court problems that are to be determined.

If it's true, you definitely don't want to put your eggs in that motherfucking basket because that is a horrible basket that you should want no part of anything that has to do with that type of stuff on your team.

I can't imagine a player in terms of the space they're at in their career that this is a worse thing for their long-term value in the league. You already were on thin ice and now you're, about to fucking hammer that ice with a drop a grenade on the ice like yeah who knows what

they should do and you mentioned joe dumars they have an entirely new front office they got rid of david griff and they still have they're still in a good position but john williamson is not nearly as safe as he used to be through all the injuries like he this is one of the biggest like okay this damn near a boomer bus season for you bro because this new front office has tape on you they have they have your catalog of games and how available you've been over the last i don't know four or five years and it's interesting because this front this new front office is left with djante murray who i think he tore as achilles or something crazy like yeah he did and he's getting paid up until 2028 he has a player option in year 2020 so there's he there's stuck with him

for quite a little bit they do have crazy who has who in my mind is on the verge of becoming a all-star caliber player and he very well could be that depending on what the pelicans do this right do next regular season. C.J. McCollum is still there. Okay. But outside of that, you still have plenty of questions outside of this roster. I'm happy that they got someone like Kelly Owinnick

during the middle of the season. He's there. They've been clamoring for a stretch five alongside on the ones, and he could be that answer. But this team, again, similar to like the Atlanta Hawks in my mind, it's just like a frenzy of questions. Yeah, and again, it's also exasperated by the fact that you might have a nasty man on your hands.

That makes it so difficult to know what they should do like Joe Dumars he I guess he has to go on the podium and say we still trust in the guy but you know that front office is panicking because you already aren't sure about it and I just got here I just got this job yeah like you already had a question mark do you want to put you want to rely on a guy who's unreliable and now he might play for Rackers Island next year like it's so much to figure out without even mentioning the other guys in roster there's Trey murphy trade rumors right now I don't know if they're that's crazy but I guess they could sell high on him if they felt they're far away like they can go in so many directions that it really comes down

to this new front office what direction they want and then we didn't even mention they have one of the biggest trade pieces that the NBA has to offer in those Milwaukee trade picks and swaps as well so they're still in a one of the better positions in the NBA to pivot into you know next level stardom and they can they can trade for God knows what depending on what happens with Tray Murphy and all that. But they're not dead in the water But they could easily fuck up the situation Oh yeah yeah

They have a lot of they have several good paths in front of them They have to fare out which one they want And the Zion Williamson question And really muddies that up Because that depending on which way that goes Can ruin several of those paths If you're stuck with his contract And he's not going to be on your team

This team feels like it needs to be sold And relocated Like it really does It feels like they need a complete reset From top to bottom And again they try to do that with the front office but with a with a new front office with a core and a team that just basketball wise you've had to tear down and reshuffle because of injuries you've also had to

do that because of you know looming lumen stuff with your star player that you don't you don't know like if this if this were a movie or if this were a video game you you you turn the game off and you just restart like it wouldn't be anything where you're like yeah this this makes me feel very, very good about where, where we're going. I'm just starting a new dynasty. That's it. So this year they have the seventh overall pick, not the greatest pick, but not the worst place to be in.

Next year they have, yeah, exactly, I agree. Next year they have the rights to swap with Milwaukee in 2027 as well. They have the right to swap with Milwaukee. And then they have their own first round picks going for pretty much. They have so many decisions to make. They can make a big. gas blast and trade for God knows what, bro, the next superstar who's out and try to pair him with Zion Williamson, or they could steady try to build this homegrown through

the riddled pieces that they've had. This is so much to talk about with this team, and I'm just excited to see where it starts. I think it all starts on draft night for them. I'm unexcited to see it. I'm not excited at all, but anything. Yeah, I very much don't want to see it, because it's, looks like it's going in a nasty place I do not want to see okay there you go well my next team up similar is situation to the norens pelicans is the phillade office 76ers okay i cheated a little

bit i have two words for them hard 75 they need to lock the fuck in hard 75 they need to lock the fuck in paul george put that mic down joel and b please figure out what's going on what that means. Please. Jared McCain. I love the side businesses, bro. You are thriving. I love, I love the media personality that you're becoming, bro. Just so it's clear. Hard 75 is three words.

Oh. That's hilarious. Back in the 75 hard. You don't know what he's saying. In the 75? It's 75 hard. I've always heard people say hard 75. I swear to God. Hard 75 is wild. And you look up Art 75 on TikTok.

how people are saying. No, I know, I'm telling you, it's 75 hard. Wow. Yeah, look that. 75 hard. A tactical guide to winning. Yeah. To winning the war.

Well, that's a book. That's what's from, I guess. Yeah. Okay. 75 hard. Does this mean like 75 days of hard work who get your life right? Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Just being like super strict and disciplined. That's a good word. They need to lock in. That's the lock hyphen in. So it's one word. Lock in is what the 76ers need to figure out because they're similar to the Pelicans in that there's paths in front of them, they have to lock in

and figure out which one I want to go down. It kind of feels like their path they're choosing is get the very most you can at the Joel Embedier. We're not going to punt unimedia yet. We're going to try to get him healthy

for next year. Loeb managed the living fuck out of him in a way that nobody has ever been low-managed before. This man is not playing two consecutive quarters. We're going to low-manage him within games. He's not going to play more than three times a month.

We're going to make sure he's available for the playoffs. They're going to go to extremes and try to get the most of that, see if they can get a bounce back year for Paul George healthy. and then probably use the draft assets to kind of like tobo friends. They got a third overall pick, bro.

They got blessed. So they're probably going to pick Ace Bailey because he can probably they're going to try and make him like a 3-and-D guy at first and let him grow into his wings, but pick a wing that can contribute next to their stars. Like it feels like they're going down the path of we're staying loyal to him beat for at least one more year. Obviously there's questions there.

There's a lot of questions on whether that's the right path. So figuring that out, it's very similar to the Pelicans. Yeah. And that's why this last year, like their word is just hell. like that's that's where you that's where you were it's a good thing we paired them the pelicans because they're very similar situations yeah and so you have everybody on your team getting hurt everything that that went down the whole you know podcast debacle that played the team so self and self-inflicted self-inflicted debacle like it did not need

to be a storyline I feel like they have even less rude all you could have just stopped making the podcast and yeah you didn't have to announce anything or just keep doing it like at the point you were so deep in just like keep doing your thing like nobody gave a fucking anymore and then when the season's already lost now i'm a lock in if you were just kept going nobody would be talking about this podcast do you know how mad i'll be filed a six just fan man man he'll be so piss you lock in when it's over but yeah um they have even less room for error compared to the new one's pelicans because of naturally the age of their stars on this team yeah and they they can easily fuck this fuck the situation up and in my mind if they miss on this pick right here like

they're completely done. There's no hope for anything the Dwell and B era is already looking really fucking weak but I think with this pick missed it's beyond it's gotta cross their fingers and hope it's not over like at this point there's very little reason

to leave this season feeling good about the Joelle and Bede era like everyone like this season was kind of like a collective funeral for the prime Jewel and Bid and maybe it's premature maybe he comes back after another surgery and looks to be he still look good news on the court

he's not incapable of playing basketball anymore like it's not a great go situation where the injuries pile up and he sucks now. It's not quite that. So maybe we're premature and he has at least one more year of 50 games in him. But that's the bar now is 50 games. We're not even hoping for 70 games anymore. The bar is so low and there's so much room for variance that at the best, best case scenario in terms of the way you can view this team, it's a bad bet. That the possible the bet hitting, the possibility is there. You could get some joll and B play that still is one of the best players in the league, but it's not a safe bet

whatsoever. And as all they can hope for is bad odds going in their favor. We're going to talk about them a lot in the offseason, especially as we start to get more news about Embed and whatever, you know, ramping up he's doing, whatever, wherever recovery it is. It's over. It's done. That's how it's all that's good. But betting on the Sixers to have, I don't know, if in their mind, their goal is still like, we want to win a championship next year, you're trying to hit a 20-leg parlay. if you're trying to do that. It's not anything that you can realistically be like, yeah, we actually have a shot

on this. That's how I'm going to describe the six years this year and going forward. They are now bad bet. That is how we refer to them on the show. They are bad bet. Damn. Every year, really, the history says every year they are a bad bet. Even when Jerome B was healthy, some of those bad bets weren't necessarily they're false, but now the bet is as bad as bad as it's ever been. Damn. That's tough. With that being said, though, I do think they'll probably get a better version

of Paul George next year within reason. Expectations will be recalibrated a little bit And I think he could look a little bit better You know, he still defended well this year But you need so much more to go well For you outside of Paul George looking slightly better Did you see any clips of Paul George on the I forgot what podcast it is

I think it was That Barso podcast with those two dudes from Philly And then Gillian Wallow Yeah Yeah it was funny as hell Because of course They're natives to that city and all that They were talking so much

kindhearted shit to Paul George and they talked about how disappointed the city was with him and how they basically want him out of there to his face and it was hilarious. All right, we got to speed through some of these teams now. Donovan, who's your next team? Speed through, sorry

to the Charlotte Hornets but this last year was a simulation. Simulation is your one word Charleston. This is one of those years where like I know, I know like you picked a bad team on purpose And you're like, I'm just going to, I'm going to bench all of my guys.

I'm going to get all the drag picks. I'm just going to take. And there's that. Yeah, there's not a lot of hope. You hired a new coach going into last year, but you still have all the same questions about Lamello. Brendan Miller missed a lot of time. Your number one picks, I'm blanking on.

Tijon Salon. Thank you. Again, a forgettable rookie season. Definitely auto sim rookie season. Yeah. So, Shrano Hornet, your last season was a simulation. Yeah, I think that's a good way to phrase it for keeping a light on them because obviously we've talked a lot about the lack of faith we have in their future. Obviously, the lack of faith we've begun to have with their star player in how much questions we have with Lamello after being, I think overall we've been Lamello optimist as a show over the years. My optimism is dead. It's on life support. Show me a little bit of something next year. I can come back, but it's on life support. The beeps are real slow, few and far between. It's not a strong heartbeat right now on the Lamello Island for me.

Yeah, his PR is slowly dwindling as we speak, naturally because there's other stars who's continuously, like, surpassed him in the NBA rankings. Yeah, life support. I'll call that. Your team is on life support. Next team up, since you want to speed along, Chicago Bulls. Okay. I think the best word that I could come up with for them is delirious. Just like, you're just like a disturbed person.

If you're a Chicago Bulls fan, you've had a really disturbed. NBA year you were super close to getting someone like Cooper flag disturb hilarious put all your keys in for Josh Giddy you finally traded Zach Levine

but for basically nothing and you sat on his trade value for entirely too long the list of names Alice Cruiser from last year follows that as well you just are just a you're just a really disturbed person right now in the NBA landscape because of the you just been

sitting on your hands the entire time. You don't know what to expect. You don't have no real expectations or a pathway for this team because they are the opinion of this NBA hell for everything. Yeah. Yeah. The foolish is kind of where I would go. If you start in the offseason of last year and then go all the way up to here, it's just it's a lot of bad asset management and just wrong, wrong practices. Regardless of what the outcome ends up being, you didn't necessarily do things in the most optimal way and so for that reason it's like all right you're choosing you said earlier about the hawks being on the good side of mid the bulls are on the bad side of mid they're on the mid they're right in the middle they had a good second half of the year

mid the mid the mid the mid I'd say a bad religion is how I described that freg ocean song is about loving someone who doesn't love you back bulls fans that ownership to group does not love you back they don't go fuck about the fans they care about your money being siphoned their pockets They will do the worst thing every single year in terms of getting you with the championship product that you want because the love you pouring to this team you want it to be rewarded with good play

at the very least, they'll never get it. And then won't even pretend you'll get it. You'll just get bullshit every year and you're going to like it and you're going to put your butts in seats and they're never going to change. Caruso is helping a team win a championship issue.

And they got no draft weeks for it. And instead you guys got the 65th best player in the NBA that you're going to pay $35 million a year to continue to make you be mid of mid, and you're going to convince yourself that it's good. You can convince yourself that him plus white plus bozellas can maybe do some stuff.

You're going to convince yourself you can be the pacers. You can operate from the middle and slowly make smart moves over and over again. Those smart moves do not begin with paying Josh Giddy $35 million a year. I can assure you of that. That's so sad. It sucks because it's going to happen.

Why is Billy Donovan still one of the longest tenure coaches in the NBA? What does he do? He puts butts in seats. He keeps a job. He has an easy, safe job. That's great for an NBA head coach. Most people aren't promised that type of job security. You know, from that output of life, you are correct.

There's no expectations to do anything other than win. 41 games a year. It's a fantastic job. I guess so. I guess so. We can move on the man. What's my next team? I have the Miami Heat's.

Pergatory. That's the word described this season. You ship Jimmy Butler off. Now you're simply like, and I say purgatory, not even in like a terrible way in just like a literal way. You are in between eras now. You are in between whatever destination you left versus where you're going. You're firmly on that card right now trying to figure out which lane you want to go down,

figure out where Pat Rally is and it sends you, which star path you can go down, which path to attain that star are going to go down? Is it going to be a tank and draft? Is it going to be a signing trade like you got Jimmy Butler with? Is it going to be a Tyler Hero, take the keys, take us to the promised land? Good God. You don't know yet.

There will be a lot of questions to answer for you this summer and really next trade deadline as well. But right now you're just simply in wait and see mode, pure MBA purgatory. Good for you. All right. Next, for me, the Brooklyn Nets, yeah.

Foundational. I think that they won in the all season. You got your, your picks back, which is, it's a very, very, it's a very big key to tanking,

right? It's one of the reasons why we're talking about like Janus and if you're the bucks, it's like, I mean, should we trade him? Because we don't have control over our picks.

So why would we, you know, trade the franchise player like that? So you have, you have the nets. They go out. get, they get their, their picks back. The coach that you just hired,

Jordy, from all, from, you know, from everything that looks like, this, that's a, that's a good coach. And that's somebody that you, that you can actually see building a, a culture for this team, wherever you decide to go. You tried to tank because of him and the players that you had in, in the building.

You weren't necessarily able to do that. All year long, we talked about, are they going to trade Cam Johnson? That didn't necessarily, that didn't happen. And it, lokey feels like, they at least for this past season you wanted to keep a veteran and at least one like above average you know asset on the roster so that you can actually win games and not just be a complete dumpster fire of a team last year felt like something for them where you won 24 games

is it 17 games no is it good no but it is something that for the new era of brooklyn nets you now have something that you can build on so i do think that last year was pretty foundational for them. You see the rumors that they're trying to trade Cam Johnson plus pick 18 for another lottery pick? It's a smart move. I haven't seen that. I would hate that. In terms of asset management, like, turning this draft is like top heavy,

but like nine through 20 is kind of flat from everything that experts say. I'm believing them because I haven't done the most research yet. So if that's the case, Cam Johnson is somebody you could have got two first on picks for. Maybe they'd be bad for some picks in a contender. Maybe you don't value that to each their own. But in terms of just pure bites at the

apple, turning what could be three, if you count pig 18 plus two Cam Johnson picks into a little bit better pick if you went up to like 10 with the rockets or whatever that would be terrible asset management Yeah that's not the greatest asset manager I agree but maybe they have a very specific guy that they're enamored with

And they want to cash, they want to sneak in and grab them And if that's the case hey like all power to you He better be fucking really good though I would just trade up with something other than your best asset If we're trying to move up 10 spots Like it's not like it's insanely hard to do that That using Cam Johnson as that fodder unless there's more coming back as well as that lottery pick

or unless it's like a top six pick which then I guess I would understand but I don't imagine any of those teams are leap into do that Yeah probably not But even if they keep Cam throughout the season Like I would be shot I was kind of shocked he didn't get traded at the deadline last year I would be floored if he was still on this team

At the end of next season as well Yeah I was next team oh Next team similar to the Brooklyn Nets Are the Washington Wizards My word for them is anchored for the first time in maybe damn near 10 years eight nine years they finally have somewhat of they're building an identity and they have something to weigh them to hold them down

which is literally defense you have Alex Saar the number two overall pick last year who didn't have the greatest rookie season but you walked away from his rookie season very feeling very good about that pick and seeing his outlier skills as a big whether it be his mobility the shot blocking his ability to do very very unique things at that size on the offensive end with his handling his playmaking and all that you have a lot of good pieces on this team we even talk about um damn what's that other french guy belabbal the other french guy yeah the other french guys there's so many french dudes in the league i know i think the wizard's word is progress like they just they're simply early in a rebuild they make a progress this year the young guys

they picked had flashes yeah reasons for optimism They weren't bus. Yeah, I agree. You could very well be like a team like the Utah Jazz, who just have been in the same state for several reasons. I guess we can just quickly move off the Wizards. I could double up and talk about the Utah Jazz. The never-ending tank.

Again, just despair. Like, they are the definition of two words, empty calories, bro. They just don't do much. They play games. They are one of the NBA teams. Exactly. Over the last few years, they had a good surprising year.

Oh, my God. Lair Mark and came up to the scene as one of the best forces of the league has to offer. We're blah, blah, blah, any age is making all the, he's making moves in the league. For what? Second round picks. Moves are being made.

Yeah. I don't know if he's doing too much. He's like moving fast. Yeah, he's like that Kendrick Perkins dribbling move, just hella bag work off. He's making moves. Are they used to know, but he's making shit happen.

Transactions are happening. He wasn't he a part of the Luca Dantus trade? Just like so casualty. Yeah. And he didn't even know he got bamboozles and he being part of looking down to the trade. Exactly. Like I don't know what's going on over there.

I feel so bad for those fans because also on top of the lack of moves or whatever you want to call it happening, you paid liar marketing what he paid, what he deserved, but also just like, yeah, what's really going on here? You demanded a hell of a haul for him

when you dangled him out in the trade market. And then what really like nailed it in the coffin for you, I guess this NBA season slash off season as well is seeing that you guys dropped off in the NBA lottery and you guys have I think like the fifth pick or something like that and you take all year

for the hopes of someone like a Cooper flag who would have been the greatest representation for your organization I get ready to speak concanipple wrong Duke White you're getting the other one

sorry guys shit's sad man which I mean I like concanipple but you're right they needed a lottery look they needed a Cooper flag Dylan Harper That's where it ends for that They needed somebody of that stature

That you have that much of a ceiling to as a prospect Not to say they can't get a star at pick five You always can And you should draft better than they have in the past But man they needed all the percentage help they can get I agree Coming in as the worst NBA team last year Just to end up with the fifth pick

Man tough same with the wizard same with the wizards They dropped even further Yeah And like you blew the Cody Williams pick seemingly You have Collier who is a hit for pick 20 but I don't he's not transformational as a franchise that could be a good piece

you have no transformational pieces right now and they are too deep into this rebuild to not have a franchise guy you can't even like restart the rebuild because how much lower can you get from here they could get lower they could they could ship Larry Marketing out right now yeah it won't be hard

Larry marketing for Paul George and pick three who says no get off the trade you get off the contract it wouldn't even do it they don't they don't play they don't play laurie anyway that'd be that'd be dumb as fuck for the six years of the i'm just kidding it's interesting though but for the spurs i don't know oh oh okay now casking trade for laram marketing book it i would love it okay next team uh Indiana Pacers we haven't talked about the finals merch the finals guys right now we're talking about them later well we have we

would have already talked about them for you guys for us is later so that's why Indiana Pacers, what's one word we can describe this team? Just unforeseen, really. This is completely unforeseen in the best way. Nobody saw this coming, is what I'm saying. It is the most, probably the most surprising finals of the last decade in terms of the final's appearance. It's them or I think which year was it, one of those heat years, they were the seventh seed?

I think the second one, right? The 23. I'll go, yeah, the Miami-Denver one, I think it's probably a little more. They were the seven-seat for that one. I think they were the one-seat for 2020. but no no they're the ones in 2021 they were the eights you're right no 2021 I think they were the one scene

they didn't make it really both those Miami years that was surprising that Jimmy Butler dragged him there so it's like that or Halliburton dragging them or Halliburton and Seaccom dragging the pages there it's as of the last decade some of the most surprising picks to make the finals just because this team was not bad

at all they were very good but they were very good in a way that very few people expected to translate to a finals birth when you had the looming threats of the Celtics and the Cavs. Obviously, they blitz the calves. We know the injury part was part of it, but they still beat the shit out of them. So it's fair to say they would have won either way if you want to take it there because they won by such an easy margin. It's just the primary, they're going to be the benchmark from now on of how to be a good team that remains good, gets a little bit better

every year, continues to do their thing while everybody's sleeping on them. It's unforeseen because everybody in the mass media, including us, sees the success, sees the amazing net rating in the second half of the season and says, all right, whatever, prove it to me. Show me you can win without superstars prove it to me prove it to me you can beat the reigning champs in the east prove it to me you can beat the 64 win team in the east yada yada we'll believe it when we see it we saw the shit and nobody thought they would but here we are they prove everybody wrong the anti tankers they have their poster child yep if you are one of those people that are like tanking is unethical you should not do it you should stay good the whole time you can look at the paces

and be like this is what they've done their entire existence is not tank and even though they it's their first finals appearance in, you know, in 25 years. They could have had one. Listen, they could have one in, in 04. You had the malice at the palace. They've been in conference finals a decade ago. They've had a whole bunch of opportunities. And it's funny because every single decade, you look up and the Pacers are involved

in something pretty monumental in NBA history. And it's because they are always giving themselves a chance. It's because they're always good. And they're never saying, you know, we're going to. bottom this thing out because you could be a team like the Washington Wizards that never figures out how to get out of the rebuild or like the Hornets would be a better example. The Hornets never are able to really, really go from the bottom to like a top three seed in the conference.

When Kemper was at his best, they were sneaking into the playoffs, 8C, 40 and 42, that, you know, that type of team. Indiana is saying we're just never going to be that We're gonna we might be mid sometimes But guess what our highs are gonna be high And they should they should be commended for how they've like built this And another way to describe the season is trust in the process The first 15 games of the season

We had no faith in them Remember Tyrese Halliburton started so poorly By the first 25 You was wigging on them in a Telitw suit man Dude I was pissed as a Tyrese Halliburton supporter for many years Those first 10 games he looked so goddamn awful I was like yo I give up on him being top five point guard. I think that's what I said is that he will bounce back. I do not believe he'll

continue to average 12 points per game and seven assists. He'll get better, but I no longer believe he's going to prove to me he's a consistent top five point guard. I firmly said I am out on him as a top five point guard. Now, we soon learned after that, that was a early season reaction. We soon learned, okay, he's done with injury. I said, okay, windows open. Show me that that is the reason why get healthy and show me because I still do not have faith. And another part of it is they, despite the injury, like that's not the only thing. They made a big change to their office. to start this season. It was far less Tyrese Halliburton ball. His usage rate was lower. It was way more empowering of the ball handlers. They did this egalitarian thing to make sure that the offense

isn't one note with your stars running pick and roll. We're going to play through everybody, make sure everybody has a rhythm, make sure all five players can attack off the dribble, kind of like 2019 Raptors in that way. And when it wasn't working, I was like, yo, Rick Carlisle, give Tyrese Halliburton the ball, play through him, find a way to get him a rhythm. He looks so bad in the system. I did not trust the process I had given up on them I was so motherfucking wrong this team blitzed the playoffs

because of that style of play it played off in the long run everything all the lumps they dealt with by getting Tyrese used to that getting everybody else in the roster used to that that led to them being disappointed start the year they learn from those losses they learn from those adjustment periods

and now they're so much better than they ever have been yeah I think the word for them another word for them also two words winning margins bro They just do all the things that you necessarily won't think is moving mountains whatsoever, but they just win every small trade you can think of, whether it be trading for the exchange between Malcolm Brogman and Aaron Neesmith a couple years ago, or it could be hell. Like when they traded for Obie Toppin in the summer, I think it was 2023 or something like that,

and they just traded, they got Obie Topper for just simply two second round picks. They blew the doors out of that trade, you know, and we can also talk about the obvious Tyrese Heidelberg trade or when a year ago, when they traded for Seacum, Pascal Seacom for basically, it feels like nothing. The trade package was Bruce Brown, Kira Lewis Jr., Jordanora, and two first round picks in the 2024 NBA draft. Basically nothing. They ran away with that trade. and to see them just continuously just make the right moves transaction-wise

is damn mirror a blueprint for every middle of the market small market team in the NBA Who was those first-up picks It was a Jacoby Walter and was shed the other one?

I forget But it was not players that'll blow your mind like the fact that they gave up picks in a draft that is deemed to be poor for draft standards Yeah, Jarus Walker and I forget the other one

But yeah Yeah, Jarus Walker and better at Matthew No, I'm saying In 2024 picks They gave up to the Raptors Oh Yeah, the ones

They gave to the Raptors In that trade They gave them picks That became Jacoby Walter At 19 Where it was And then I forget What the other later one was

So they gave up poor Draft capital And a poor draft For Pascal Caccom And a bunch of contracts That do not matter Fantastic trade To what you're saying

Yeah, I agree And then What's so funny Is like earlier today I was looking at Just the history Of the Indiana Paces

And how What rumors They got themselves to remember back in like 2022 when they yeah they offered diondra a like a fucking massive bag yeah do you know what that could have done to this organizing that would have decimated everything damn i'd rather be lucky than good butterfly effect works out thanks god yeah i'm just out of this team i'm very i'm always happy to be wrong about a team when they're just like ethically better like they just played the game the right way quote unquote and they just blow my expectation out

the water because i don't believe in them that's i'd much rather be wrong about that than me believing too much in a team. So shout out the Pacers. And shout out Tyrese Halliburton for once again being clear top five point guard after I gave up on them. All right. Next team. Because I gave up so hard.

Next team, we're going to go to the other finals team. And we're actually going to keep it pretty short because we've said the word for the thunder is just juggernaut. Nice. And so we've said everything that we've needed to say about the thunder in our preview on Tuesday, T3 Tuesdays, you know, you know what I'm saying? Tap in. They're amazing.

And you have an ascending MVP in Shea who just went to a completely different level. You have Jaylon Williams who defensively got to a new level. You got Chan Hong Green who we saw flashes of another step. You know, the injury kind of deroged everything. But in terms of team chemistry, depth, your star being that good. And going into an all-time level team, that's what they proved this year. And that's what this entire year has been about. And so it's been, it's been super, super fun.

At least for me, I know some of you all have hated it. But it's been very fun watching Oklahoma City really climb up the ranks in terms of a team that two years ago was 40 and 42 made the play in, one to play in game, and then got their doors blasted open by Minnesota. You come back next year, one seed, fell in the second round. Once again, one seed, almost in 70 games. now you're in the finals and there's a there's a situation where you might lose less than 20 games this entire year that's insane the 80 and 20 happened they want 80 games before they lost 20 that's insane and you know you said some people didn't enjoy it because they hate them not only do they have they not enjoyed watching the thunder succeeds in this play out for him they've not enjoyed

watching us enjoy it they hate that we enjoy the thunder so much every time we say anything good about the clear juggernaut that's going to be dominating the west for years to come ideally if things go well for them and they say healthy and whatnot, people hate that we enjoy it. Here's the glaze. Every time I speak as glazed because I'm acknowledging

the clear, legendary player in front of us that's on the all-time great team for an individual year. All we do is acknowledge that and we enjoy it because it's awesome to see as fans of sport and they're, yo, get it out of your mouth. How is he talking?

And it's great because at a certain point if you keep saying these things are happening, this team is good, they're going to do X, Y, and Z and they just keep doing X, Y, and Z, at a certain point, when does Glaze become seeing what's in front of you? It's just having eyes at this point.

Like, it's just like, yeah, this team's going to make the finals. They made it. Get it out of your mouth. They hate them so much, man. They hate them so much. I don't get it. And we told you this back in June. It's not even like we saw the first 25 games and we're like, oh, yeah, like, this

is definitely a title team. The moment they got Caruso and especially the moment they got Hartstein, it's you added one of the best perimeter defenders in the league. And then the one roster weakness that you had last year was, hey, you guys don't have a backup big. Let's just go get one of the best backup bigs in the league, who was a starter on a Knicks team that was very, very good in the playoffs last year. You have no question about either of them and their playoff experience, whatever, you know, standing up to the moment. They've just, they've hit every benchmark along the way. They've answered every test along the way.

And they've been a juggernaut throughout this entire year. I saw a comment on our, I saw a comment on our finals hot takes video where we were. reacted and someone was like I didn't know this was an okayc thunder fan podcast I was like it's an NBA fan podcast and if you enjoy the NBA there's a good chance you enjoy the young best team in the NBA that is you know putting their names in history it's an enjoyable story yeah I agree again similar to what I said about the Indiana Pacers them just winning margins okayC they are the poster boy for that they do it in every single team building a facet that the NBA has to offer over the in the free agency, the trade market, or doing it through

just, yeah, free agency, trade market, and all that. So it goes back to the cruiser thing that you mentioned hitting in the 2022 NBA draft twice, which is so rare to see in Chet and Zadab. And then it goes back to, it all starts with like the Paul George trade to that happened years ago. Feels like an eternity now. Yeah. And so for all that's hand, the one word I'd use to describe them is just completion.

this year like you're seeing the process of rebuilding this team on the fly i've been saying all year that it's one of the best rebuilds of all times especially when you think about the timeline and the height they're reaching it was really like a three or four year window like you said starting with trading paul george tanking for a few years getting shake in that trade then getting check getting jd up etc this year's just the completion of that journey i agree we're seeing the fruits yeah the fruits yeah the fruits yeah don't call him that because it's never mind some team that feels like the complete opposite yeah especially with other narratives.

Something that feels like the complete opposite to OKC are the Memphis Grizzlies. Nice. A couple years ago, they felt like OKC in terms of like seeing the camaraderie between teammates,

seeing a young star point guard who we all thought had MVP type potential, which he still does argument or whatever. But when it comes to... Put that on pause. Yeah, fine. He's all NBA potential. We'll say that.

that's fine regardless his name has diminished just a little bit and value of raw and the NBA has in perspective has changed when it comes to how consistently can you win with John Moran and can you reach those levels it's not only John Moran it's this entire team that needs to be questioned and my word for them is just straight up damn like there's so many period yeah damn like this is such a what a way to go out what a way to go you fire head coach just a couple games before they NBA season is over. Jared Jackson, Jr. has one of the most embarrassing

first round playoff performances that the NBA could offer you over the last five years from an all-star level player. Is he all-B-A? Jared? No, I don't think he ended up making it. Oh, wait. I can't remember actually. He might have because I think I saw, I think I saw Grizzly fans be in an

upwar about it because now they might have to pay him a humongous bag because of contract stipulations. I can't remember if he made there or not. But yeah, he was in that running, so it won't be surprising. I think their word is crossroads Because we've said this for several teams now There are paths in front of them This one's a little bit different

Because someone like the Pelicans Someone like, who's the team, the Sixers They are He did not by the way Okay He did not Thank God The Grizzlies picked their path

And they've done a very good job Of maximizing that path For the most part right That path is just run its course So now it's like what's next I guess is the word really Is like what is the next chapter going to be

Because they You've seen now the ceiling of this team going down this path and this style is not good enough. You just fire Taylor Jenkins, right? So that's kind of throwing the white flag up for this iteration of the team. You can't just replace the coach and running back next year, I think.

You can, I guess, not as the wrong possibility. They might if there's no other better option, but I think you can't do that and expect to get over the hump. You have to make some type of big change or at least a few small changes to give yourself a better version or a slightly different version of what this is. I don't know what that's going to be, but

they're certainly at a crossroads or they have to make a tough decision. They, yeah, they have to recalibrate everything that they thought. Everything that they thought was possible with their team. Two years ago, after they, after they lose to the Warriors in the second round, like you said, they are like the young team. And you could, you could have thought about them being like, oh, the Grizzlies are going to be, you know, the next one's up. They'll make a conference final soon. Even coming into this year, it's like, oh, my goodness, they're getting job back. They can have all this death.

They just had a Zach Eadie. They have, you know, a big body down low again. And they're just not that good. And so now because of everything that John Morant has done and the situation that he is, you know, currently in as your best player, you have to rethink who you are. Do you still think that you are a slight tweak away from making the conference finals out West and giving yourself a chance at the finals? Or do you say we kind of have to take it a step down and maybe rebuild a little bit on the fly and do a retool rather than a rebuild? but they just have to figure out where they are and be honest with themselves about the spot in the championship race that they are yeah that's a good thing honestly

i kind of prefer their situation to a lot of other teams because like compare them to the calves the calves have questions because of their lack of playoff success and it's so ambiguous because all the the noise in these equations that you don't know what to do this shit is unambiguous as hell for the grizzlies you know clearly your team is not good enough you do not have the top end talent to compete with the likes of Oklahoma City. It's not going to happen with this iteration of the team. You know that for certain, I think. I think maybe maybe fans would disagree with that. Maybe people have more hope because of early season success and the things that went wrong. I guess you could tell yourself there is hope. But I think if you're honest with

yourself, they need more juice. You can debate where that juice comes from. You can debate how drastic of a change needed to get to that juice, but they don't have it. And that is good, I think, that they have that clarity. Yeah. I agree. I agree. So many decisions to make. Well, not really so many. There's like this really big, massive decisions to make, which are seismic. Yeah. Next thing we got is the San Antonio Spurs. The word to describe the Spurs in 2024, 2025, looming. They are around the corner. They are looming as a major threat in the NBA. They are not there yet, but you see them around the corner. You know they're coming and you know it's going to be fierce when they arrive. But the roster shows work to do when we still making progress. Obviously, the blood clot

factored into that maybe they would have already arrived in the late season push that didn't happen, who knows? But as of now, with everything that happened, the moves they made, the moves that are left to make, the decisions that are left to make, and the draft and what to do with that pick, whether it's pick a player or trade it, they are looming for sure. It might

be another star trade that they do, if they get like a Kevin Durant or get a Janus, God forbid, and it becomes a three-team, I mean, a three-star team next year, and all of a sudden they're firmly in contention, or they play it slow. They have maybe one more year of looming where they're good, but not amazing it where they have this young core with yearn and wemby or you know maybe it's something even more

foreseen that we don't see coming a combination of both whatever path they go down they are around the corner and they will be here as a major threat in the west pretty soon when i see blood clots you better watch out i'm knocking blood clots out man yo i'm so upset he the the the level that wendy was playing at and the things that he was doing on a nightly basis it makes me so upset that we then like we couldn't see that for a whole season but now like you said that that lumen is such a great word because we get a full offseason where dear fox can actually heal his hand where wendy can can come back you're going to have a full off season again also we've we've kind of passed over it but like Greg popovich and his health issues was also a major major storyline

and so now that you have a legitimate like you know Mitch is the guy yeah and he's going to be there from from start to finish that's also another plus that you have in san antonio and not like a question of like is pop going to come back is he not what's that you know like what's going on with that situation they have a lot of good things born for them so i do i am very hopeful for what they're going to do next year damn brad blood costs got hell of victims i just remember earlier in the years in the summer then assar thompson like he wasn't able to play because he had blood clots Damien Lillard

As I had blood clots too Yeah Damian Lillard Just faced that shit And no We got a lot Blot Cots up Yeah but Dan gave him hands though They fuck blood clots up

He did Yeah bro like yo God damn They kind of on a run right now Fuck That's kind of crazy man Yeah but thankfully he's recovering from that And they don't forget

Blood Clots to Blood Clots to Chris Bosch from us too man Again when I see Blood Clots when I see Fuck blood clots all my homies hate blood clots but yeah they obviously just have so much potential man

like they're just their tip of the iceberg is another way to describe it is that everything you've seen from this team obviously they're not good yet is tip of the iceberg actually you haven't even what the hell is this

I know look at that guy you haven't even seen the tip of the iceberg in terms of the team that it's still completely underwater but for wendy specifically it's so tip of the iceberg like he's so good already and so far away from how good he'll be

and that that is abundantly clear that like you all you've gotten is a taste of it You still haven't even gotten the whole load. All right. So let's talk about the team on the screen as well. Okay. The Milwaukee Bucks.

That's my next team. Okay. Scary slash spooky. Either one, right? Whichever one that you would like. Spooky. I like that. At every turn, you are scared about what was going on with this team.

Right? You start out, you start out even, even when they were, whenever they were like, they were good. And they win the, the end season, the Emirates. NBA Cup. Hell yeah. They win that. Oil money. And then you look at that and you're like, hey, this team's kind of scary.

Like, they might be able to do something. And then they trade for Kyle Kuzma, jump scare. Right. Dame, dame, he tears his, his Achilles. Damn, frowny face. Incredibly scary. Now we get to the playoffs and you're going and you're playing the Indiana Pacers and they're just, listen, they're over.

and over just in your face running running through your face over pounding scary right the pace is looking extremely scary and again we are now in the offseason the yannish trade rumors are up and if you're a Milwaukee bucks fan you're looking at the future of this team and it's like man it's getting spooky out here every single every single checkpoint of this team season something was going a little bit wild yeah so you are in the off season with a lot of uncertainty and you're just kind of scary because it can really go either way. And even if Yannis comes back, we have another year where it's just going to be honest, no day.

And this team was leaning on Kyle Kuzma and once again, another jump scare, Kevin Porta Jr. Brooke Lopez, oh my goodness, right? It's just, Doc Rivers? Ah! It's just, it's threats all across the roster, all across the team. I don't know. I'm just scared. I think that's spooky is how you describe their next year for sure.

Yeah. I think for this year, deterioration. The roster just slowly, slowly deteriorated over the last few years. And this year, for all the reasons you said, the deterioration was just like accelerated. Trading Chris, Brooke fall off, getting KPJ, getting Kuzma. Well, I guess I was trading Chris. Then obviously finalizing with the dame injury. Just.

And they even went through like some random ass, some random ass drama with Bobby Portis. Like he randomly got suspended for 20 to 25 games. Bobby Portis on Roids. I forgot about that. It was pain killers. like it was so random bro and obviously not to say Bobby porters is moving mountains but he's an important very important piece for this team and because of how talent deficient they they are or they were still are actually he that move mounts for them so forgot about the PED so much shit

happened with this roster of us oh much and scary I guess is is the best way to put put it for Milwaukee bucks fans he just chipped away little by little and now you have no hope to me of next year being a real contender I think that's out of the equation you have to hope that Janus is okay with that and that he just rides or dies for the city he very well might be okay with that he might be okay with staying there forever and he just likes living there wants his legacy to be the debucks guy forever but if he cares about winning a title in the next two years there's no way he wants to stay unless he is I don't know blind yeah but he might be loyalty over winning that's very possible so it's not a guarantee

you request to trade but you just know that if winning is the main thing there's no chance these days. I have a question. What was the word they used for the San Antonio Spurs? Looming. Looming. Okay. I'm going to steal your bag.

Damn it. But it's to a much lesser degree. Okay. My next team is the Portland Trailblazers. Okay. They are. If the spurs are looming, they're peaking. They're like, they're like.

Peekaboos. They're like sneaky. You know, they're sneaky. That's what they are. They're sneaky. They're just, well, they're coming. They're not coming out of nowhere, but you see, yeah, you see, you see the little turtle head peeking out they're not this this past year they won they're edging good god

that's what i wanted to use for the san antonio spurs but i didn't want to say it that's what literally filled up for the san Antonio spurs that is a good spurs one you're right the spurs is definitely edging us but um yeah the porlor trailblazers are you're old spurs fans are edging tonight oh my god send me the time every eight two times a game but yeah the porland troopers are definitely sneaky because they damn near just trotted their way into 37 wins and no one really cares they have one of the more stable young cores at the NBA has to offer it super deep they have like eight and nine they're like eight and nine players deep that are just valuable NBA players that a lot of NBA teams would love to have but they don't have

necessarily the guy yet they have identified guys who can be a part of the core one of the biggest ones is to moni kamara who just like is one of the best defenders in the NBA one of the best three three d players specifically as well then you got of course deni of dia who had to his own to to his own metric and scale a breakout year and he's been every bit of what scouts projected him to be back in the 2020 2020 NBA draft you have major question marks when it comes to your guard rotation you don't know what's going to happen with scoot but it feels like the star potential that he had just a couple years ago is definitely out of the question because of the lack of

his lack of ability to stand out on the court in any degree offensively specifically then you got shed and sharp who's just up and down and consistent he had a injury riddled year of course you well no he didn't I lied um he just had a very up and down year and there's been a lot of times he's just coming off the bench and it's just like you don't know how to gauge him or see real value with him didn't make a leap this year he just continued on this path exactly so they are very close to next year we could look up and they're winning like 40 games and whatnot. But speaking of speaking of this year, they're just a very sneaky team and you can't. Yeah, exactly.

It's like you don't expect there's nothing you really think about. You can't just like you said. They won 37 this year. Next year, they might win 40. Yeah, exactly. The West is crazy, bro. What's is crazy. But this past year for this past season for them was such a massive success, success.

And no one envisioned them winning 37 games at all whatsoever. That's true. I love that sentence also because you can really make any prediction then just be like, yo, the West is crazy. Yeah. It's why I don't know what's going to happen. You know what you're right too. It is crazy. Like we never know what's going to happen. Nobody has ever predicted the West standings correctly, I think, in the last three years. Not a soul has got it right. So that's fair. Like we could very well look up and they could be, who knows, they may throw out a massive bag to a random ass veteran and they could be shit like a top five seed next year. and that's not out of the realm of possibility

because their defense is that ferocious as well. Over the last 30 games of the NBA season, they had a better defense than OKC. Now does that mean much? I don't know, but just know that they were an elite defense in that caliber. Okay. Could you imagine how good they'd be if Scoot was a star?

They injected a star point guard into there. That's all they're missing. If Scoot was John Wall, this team would be amazing. Oh, my gosh. This team would be on such an amazing trajectory if Scoot was what he was hoped to be at the high end. Yeah. everything else going for them yeah exactly and now they're in a position where they have to sit down

and retool but we can just save that for an offseason conversation right now okay don't what's your next team or is my team okay uh Orlando magic how do we describe them um construction what's the opposite of progress the opposite stationary the Maryland magic season is stationary they made absolutely zero progress in any meaningful way, I think. I guess Palo and Franz got a little bit better. They put up better numbers, so that's good. You want to see that. But as a team, absolutely zero progress because the shooting concerns are still there,

the offensive concerns are still there, everything that we came into the season saying, if this breaks right, they'll be this good. None of that broke right as well as health. Obviously, Sugs I heard too, which is a big part. I'm not here to say that they suck or anything. The Suggs part was, you know, unfortunate. Yes. but all your eggs can't be in the Suggs basket

you can't be that make or break I think I obviously I've talked a lot about via I've made these points via Palo Van Carroll discourse but I think at large the magic are talked about in very lazy ways where everybody says oh well they have no shooting so what can you expect right

they got no shooting nothing else is possible so we pretend all the flaws of their stars are purely because of shooting the flaws their team are purely because of shooting I don't think that's the case I think top down their offense sucks in a lot of ways that starts with their best players goes on to their role players, goes on to their coach.

And none of that really improved to me this year in a way that I am excited for. I'm still excited by what will happen when that improves or if it improves. So I'm not like selling my stock on them by any means. They still have a bright future, but you did not see the progress you want this year. I think if you're a magic fan.

Yeah, I think stationary is cool because I remember last year, whenever we were going into pregnancy and they ended up getting KCP, it was like, okay, that's good. Is there anything else? Like, do you want to make another big move? Because you knew that like KCP,

was at least expected you're expecting him to bring some shooting he didn't have a great shooting year over there but you also were kind of waiting on them to go get a point guard with a little bit more creation or going or getting a point guard who can actually set people up that way you didn't have to put all of that on friends on fronds and and palo and so this offseason it's kind of the same questions are you going to be able to go get a shooter and are you going to be able to go get a point guard who can play with these two guys so we're not just watching you know palo who kill him all day or franz who kill him and and work like that and so yeah stationary is fine because we're again we're in the same position that we were 12 months ago yeah i think

palo ben caro strengths got stronger he got better he had flashes of the strong driving some of the weakings are still there in terms of the bad habits franz the strengths got better when he was the on ball star for those games where palo was out he was incredible playing like an star, the shooting was just as bad in the late half of the season. So in terms of them specifically the stars, they progressed, but not weakness-wise. And then obviously the shooting is still a problem. The lack of a backup point guard is still a problem. There was times where they had D. G. Augustine starting and it was a revelation. D.J. Augustine's old ass who just joined the Rockets front office today because he was purely a competent point guard. They need competent

playmaking that's still a need there. I don't think their bigs made big progress. Like their young players, like the Jed Howards of the world, all the other guys like that. Who else in the room? Not even Cole Anthony. It's Jed Howard. Anthony Black. And who's the other one I'm forgetting? Trey.

It was their pick. Tristan de Silva. Tristan de Silva. Those guys weren't bad by any means, but nobody made like a big leap from that group, I think. So everything just kind of remained where it is, I think. I just want to say again, Franz shot 19% from three on seven attempts a game in the playoffs, in the Boston. That just can't happen. And guess what?

guess palo ban carroll the strength of the the heights continued to stay high he had a lot of points for game in the playoff setting there was still the flaws in offensive process that that led to some iffy lineups with him being the main playmaker there so we'll see they did they have to figure out the figure out the um organization of talent needed to maximize those guys and we still don't know what that is thanks all right i want to double up here um is not not because of not because they have the same word but just because both of them were very like they're bad teams yeah okay um phoenix

suns unsettling disturbing yeah diarrhea I was like damn you just wanted to stop every just messy

honestly honestly honestly honestly honestly we've talked about how especially once we got past like the all star break why the hell are we watching the suns man this team sucks it's awful

you look at all the hope i keep going back to how high we were on phoenix after preseason basketball last year and we're like man yo booedah holders coming in here whole scheme is changed oh my god ryan done he's going to be the savior and then this team even with kevin dera and debon booker and and bradley bill they are they're they're awful and they they the vibes were bad the coach gets fired they don't have control over any of their picks you watch the team team and it just was not a fun watch and it was unsettling to watch the phoenix sons in 2024 2025 the phoenix sons taught me a valuable lesson to never believe in talent just because

they're talented damn that's the only take from preseason that i really feel bad about is believing of the sons and not even because like the the idea of believing in kevin durant and devon booker getting better over time and the reasons we thought they're supporting cast get a little bit better it wasn't the worst process in the world i don't look back and like we're fucking morons but it went so unbelievably bad that I'm like how dare you have at one point believe in them it is so disgusting to see how well that wrong that went that I'm like whatever I got to do to never believe in something like that ever again I'll do it yeah so so yeah so that so that was the son's word secondly the Dallas Mavericks freedom freedom freedom the Dallas Mavericks freed themselves

from logic they they freed themselves from consensus thought from group think wow and they freed themselves from jail after getting bailed out in the in the draft lottery this year is about being who you are authentically and doing what you want and not allowing wow for better it works yourself and not allowing the world to put their limitations on you they broke every mold this year and nico harrison especially because now that you have cooper flagged you can look at yourself in the mirror and say i did it my way and i can live with that nico said nah I'm gonna do my own thing freedom is the word

for the Dallas matter of whether right or wrong time will tell history will tell the history books will tell us whether or not Nigo made good decisions but he made his own decisions and nobody can take that away from him

he got it I have no words for that man I have no words for that as a girl man that's all you can ask for is just to live your life and living your truth and they did that so shout out to them

yeah and like there's not you much us to say they just they just feels like insane like they're the last 24 months for them felt just like a long ass drama movie bro like they feel the highest of highs when it comes to make reaching the NBA finals

after the year prior to that missing out in the play in and falling into the lottery getting up Derek lively then you have a season of a lifetime make it to the NBA finals after you had a slow start and you kind of rejuvenate your roster midseason would

when it comes to trading for PJ Washington and I use single-handedly dismantle the entire franchise in one singular night by trading away the franchise in Luca Dongeant and now it's a rebuilt in like three months the fuck it's going on man

like I'd be sick to my stomach I'd be a bro it feels like a roller coaster sick to my stomach you love your mom's in the hood somebody should smoke the mutes, smoke the mutes. No.

Crazy cliche sounds like 80% of that. So I think my next team is the Houston Rockets. And for me personally, this is personal for me because I've been super loud about how ass, not ass. I didn't think they were going to be very good this year.

Before the season. Before the season, exactly. I didn't think they were going to be good before the season. They proved that. they proved me wrong I'm sure you tell me why you didn't think they're gonna be asked you thought they were just too young and weren't there yet right

yeah I believe they just weren't there just yet and I think they need they needed to figure out more pieces on the roster and where they laid along I wasn't foreseeing this defense this ferocious demons that defense that just felt like they threw constant haymakers that's my word

for them they just throw consistent gut punches all around the court in all areas on the defensive end whether be the of assar or a men thompson being one of the i don't know maybe eight best defenders in the NBA and just he's a he's a wonder boy damn near when it comes to what he's able to do on the court at times then you got jailing green who you don't expect a haymaker from him on most nights but randomly he can give that shit to you and he can look like prime jordan or he can look like

the last two years of deion waiters of his NBA career you never fucking know when it comes to him There's just so many moving parts of this team that will get you while you're not paying attention. And that's why my word for them is just, you know, they're a hate maker. I think their word is force, just pure force and just really just brute force and finding ways to be unique and just forcing your identity, not capitulating to any group think about what modern basketball is and playing to your strengths. That's what they did. They want with pure force this year. They said no offense, no problem. We are going to be so good at defense

that we become good at offense because you run so much in transition we know we don't have shooters we have really fast young athletic players we're going to play into that we know defense has to be our thing we're going to play into that they just unique is really the word

to describe them is they are the most unique team in the NBA and they found a way to make it work. Very happy for them. Yeah because like I think the reasons that people like you could have believed they're not ready yet weren't even bad reasons looking back

like the ways they became good are weird or unusual are not the normal path for a team to become a two seed. You will never see a team be this good and this unique of a style with this little shot making and shot creation

and playmaking across the roster. It is like a really like one and a hundred type of young team to make this type of leap in these ways that I don't even think you just feel bad about it. You should just be like, hey, props to them on doing things their way. Yeah.

Yeah, because they still have questions about it. They gave Jaylen Grette and the contract that they did in the structure that they did because they're like, eh, I don't really know. And then you finish the season there and you're still sitting here like, yeah, I don't really know. yeah yeah they they want in spite of their weaknesses because their strengths are so strong

i think i the weaknesses you and everybody else identify weren't even wrong it just didn't matter in the end but the process was not bad i think yeah so shout out them they just got the shit out the mud and figured out a way to be good nice great story my next team is the sacramento kings the only word to describe the season is mid like we can just go towards the normal thing we say they are who they are they are who we thought they were they are a perpetually mid team that does not make good decisions ever that does not have, you know what I mean to phrase this? When the trade happened and they traded Deeran Fox and got Zach Levine back, I said that this is not a good return, but if we grade this on a curve for Sacramento Kings basketball and what

their goals are, it's a goddamn A. I guarantee you they will be mid and they will be competent mid and they will score points and not succeed anything ever with this trade getting Zach Levine in the door. And that is precisely what happened. They had a goal in mind and they reached it. Whether or not that goal should have been the goal in mind is another question for another day. Yeah. But for what they want to do, they did it. Yeah.

For someone who has context of the NBA, that's the best way to put it. But if I'm a new fan, new fan, my word for them is just like discombobulant. I'm like, wait, what? Like, you see Zach Levine and DeMarterosan just a couple years ago on the Chicago Bulls and you think that this is the best move for your organization alongside a like a super non-shooting big. and DeMontas a bonus. Now, maybe super nonchering is too harsh. She did take like two threes a game and shot 41%.

Salute. But needless to say, like just so confusing, so wildly confusing. They never made a move over the last, over this past, this season, everything that they've done, word for word, has just been straight of confusing. The firing of their head coach, Mike Brown. The trade for Deerner Fox wasn't confusing. Of course, you do what you do right by him. send them wherever but the process in that is just so nasty it's just a cease and devoid of hope

i think trading de erin you don't want to do that you felt it was necessary i don't think anybody king's fan won't be outraged by that because of the way it happened that it was borderline mutual that they both realized this wasn't going to work out derian said yeah you should probably trade me i'm not demanding it but you probably should trade me and they were like bet we got to do we got to do that in and of itself is not a nightmare scenario you can trade dearon fox but the way in which they went about that trade, the way they decided to pivot to trying to be exactly as good as they already were by getting Zach Levine. And they got worse because the fit with Demar wasn't good. But the goal there was to be exactly what you already were, which wasn't

fucking good to begin with. They chose to go down the already bleak path and said, we're going to do the best we can to stay exactly the same. There's just no hope there. There's no optimism possible when the best you can hope for is the same. You can't hope for a teardown to get better in the future. You can't hope for imminent success by getting a better player than Aaron, all you can hope for is the same bleak-ass path you've been looking towards for the past three years. There we go. I'm not saying no words about that.

Yeah, fuck them. Next thing, my guy, is the Golden State Warriors. What word do you guys and give the Warriors? I think they got hope for the first time in a couple years. Rejuvenation? Yeah, rejuvenation. That's the best word to do it. That's the best.

They, obviously, the two timeline things didn't work out. We're past that. They have to maintain the timeline they've been on the whole time. And the timeline, it's Steph Curry's timeline, they elongated that timeline and rejuvenated it by adding another old and Jimmy Butler and kind of gave themselves a puncher chance to make it out of the West.

Didn't work out because the Steph Curry injury, which is devastating, obviously, because they had a real chance of at least making it to the conference finals. We'll see what they could have, what type of power of veteran leadership they could have done. They push the thunder, who knows,

but they could have sold themselves, and it's possible. They didn't get that. But I think take away the heartbreak of the Steph Curry injury and look at the season as a whole, You came into the year and immediately were met with, God damn, this team sucks. This is the 10C.

This team has no hope at all. The death of two timelines led to both timelines going outside. And now at least the initial timeline that shouldn't be your main one, probably, but it still is. It got life added to it via Jimmy Butler. They looked the best they looked in several years. It is fully rejuvenated. And I think next year, assuming Curry, Draymond, and Butler can maintain the level of plate they had this year, which I don't see any reason to believe won't be the case.

They'll be a really, really good team again. Yeah. I'm still hurt that we weren't able to see them in that second round, like, healthy because the Steph's hamstring and because Jimmy Butler's booty hurt. And so I'm just like, it sucks because if you could see that, especially seeing how Minnesota's offense performed, not only in that series, but in the series against the Lakers and in the competition, this whole playoff run, Minnesota's offense wasn't amazing. If they were able to get a little bit of a push, we really could have gotten OKC,

Golden State in the in the conference finals and then like you said who knows right I think the Thunder still win that but whatever yeah I haven't having this team and also anytime that you watch a Warriors game they're not going to let you forget that this team was rejuvenated yeah they're going to put up the graphic of hey you know this team was 18 and three after they got you know Jimmy Butler and their defense is better and the offense was better and so having having him there it gives you a lot more flexibility because now we don't have to spend the summer thinking can Jonathan Kaminga re-earned the trust of Steve Kerr and be the second option and can he score 20 and fit in

this motion? We don't have to do that anymore. You can you can potentially find a move for him and get some more assets, get some more value and get players that are actually going to play in this rotation. Yeah, you know your team's identity now. Yeah. It was a big, big question mark for the first two months of the season. Man, I remember during the first few months of the season. These guys were really, really, they're really relying on someone like Jonathan Kaminga and just finding scraps from Buddy Heald. They called him again, like a splash cousin and whatnot during the first 15 games. October Buddy Healed was something to behold.

We did episode two weeks into the season that was the most underrated player on every team. We said Buddy Healed. I would never come underrated now. But he was on such a heater, I was like, I guess we got to respect it. Maybe Steve Kerr figured it out. Maybe this is Buddy Hill for this season. October and November basketball is also like, it's not fake, but it's very cautious because the buddy heel was going crazy.

La Mello ball was averaging like 35. Tyrese looked horrible. Jeremy McCain was out here dropping 30 winning games and stuff like that. Yeah. It's a fun time. Yeah, that part's real. He's a superstar. No, I know.

I know. This was an especially wonky start to the season for sure. Yeah. I really love how Jimmy Buller came in there. He just like reassured everyone of his roles by his playstyle. like he by him being thrown into that starting lineup he made some like moses moody moody a pivotal like solid three indie piece because he just naturally fits alongside step curry the entire time and also he has a very specific solid role with jimmy baller which is just catch and shoot play a whole player ass off on the defensive end so i like rejuvenation rejuvenation that's a great great cool for that all right my next team the detroit pistons okay competency yes this is all that anybody has wanted for honestly for a long time for the pistons but specifically in the kate cuttingham era you've seen some of the trash lineups and some of the awful teams that that

he's had to play with and the moment that you went out and said let's get this guy who's played in the league for at least nine years and can be an adult in the room let's get two of them you have your best season in a long time you've won your first playoff game in years and this is the first time that you've also actually been able to get a real opportunity to look at what do we have in Kay Cunningham as our franchise player we got average level NBA players what do we have from him do we actually think that he could be a franchise player the answer is unequivocally yes you got that answer now this offseason you can look at the pistons and say yeah okay we need you to improve here here and and to help you do that we're going to go out and get XYZ players to

further help your development. They were competent for the first time in a long time and that is a huge, huge win for Detroit basketball. Yeah, that's what's all you got to say is competency. Like the bar was so low for them. Like, you can't people are going to forget in a few years

just how miserable the start to Kate Cunninghouse career was. Like, brother, last year they have, the last year they achieved what felt like the unachievable in making history in the worst way possible. They had 28 straight losses.

That's damn near two calendar months without winning. Fuck, man. The depths in which they crawled out from is remarkable. And that's the only story of the season. They were surprisingly good and they could have made a playoff push. They lost the first round. It doesn't even fucking matter

in the grand scheme with things. All they needed was competency to be able to get a little bit of playoff reps. They could have got swept and they'd still be on time because they made the playoffs and got significant progress. They could have lost in the play in turn. It would have been significant progress. They could have been the 11th season

and not made the play in tournament and it would have been significant progress. So everything else was gravy. No, K. Cunningham didn't have a great playoff run. He needed those reps to learn from that. Hopefully he comes back from that a little bit better and we continue to see him make these steps forward. They started this year.

Overall, if this was grades for the year, A triple plus. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Man, for their fans this year, this season felt like three words for you first day out like this is their first opportunity to be like man i'm free i can like proudly say i'm a pistons fan get it out the mud we do we do bro even trading for did they trade or was it just a off a regular um signing after yeah

did they trade you for who shrewder dennis shirder yes the trade for him yeah amazing trade also he he he again like helps exemplify with this organization is about man so first day out for these fans for sure happy as fuck for them yeah they got tennis got traded to the warriors and traded to the pistons like two weeks later oh you remember when dennis shirder was supposed to be the answer for the warriors that was a weird couple weeks yeah you don't often see a player get traded for and then traded again at the deadline yeah very very strange season only only someone only someone like dennis shoulder can achieve that bro very very strange season for dance i got one more team i got two

And my team is the Los Angeles Clippers. My word for them is, bro, God send. Like they... God send. Yeah, they were saved this season because one of my biggest talking points prior to the season starting was like, yeah, if they have a poor season, which I was anticipating on happening, they're fucked because they don't have their first round pick due to the Paul George trade happening. And they were a godsend, not only for them, but us as NBA fans, bro. O.K.C. would have had a fucking lottery pick if they would have. one if if the clippers were not as good as they were this season seeing what james hardin was

able to do and hell who deserves even more problems in james hardin is tyron loo just getting the most out of his guys consistently being one of the smarter motivating all those words NBA coaches one of the best that the league has to offer god send bro and just keep them alive until kauai was able to come back and do what he did for the last i don't know three 25 games a year god send i would describe this season as maximized they got every ounce of productivity they could out of every player on this roster. We got the best Norm Powell season of his career, the best Zubot season of his career, the best season of James Hardin's post-prime career, I guess we'll call it that.

Outside of Kwai Leonard, who was obviously the big question mark that led us to believe they would fall to the 1011 C potentially if things went poorly, they maximize every single other player they could to escape that fate. And yeah, we talked about at late all season. They're one of the biggest surprises of the year out of pure hard work determination, good coaching, maximizing talent. And that's all you can take away from this is With them, their future is so

Their future is the now They just are stuck with this team As what it is unless they want to completely blow it up Which wouldn't be smart Given their asset situation All they can hope for is every year To get the most of this group And they damn sure did that this year

Typical Typical clippers They always find their way out Somehow some way I don't know about that But they did find out the way out this time They did not bottom out Yeah they're always stable

And they just been reliable No matter of whatever reason historically they are not but over the last 10 years yeah they've definitely found ways to reinvent themselves next time I got the Minnesota Timberwolves

another one I'm going to cheat because I can't think of one word but one phrase is very important proving the haters wrong that's how you describe their season everybody was including us up in arms when they traded Carltony Towns for we talked about it

mostly emotional reasons mostly dude you finally got good how are you going to change it all now what the heck we don't love Julius Randall don't hate him I guess but you figured it out with Kat and how you're going to start over again? How are you going to do Anthony Edwards like that?

He finally got what he needed to be in one seed, yada, yada. We all didn't like it. And we neglected some parts of it because of that. There was obviously a lot of nuance involved in that. But overall, the reaction across the entire NBA media landscape was, what the fuck are they doing? Bold move, I guess, but I do not think it's going to go well. And then that was immediately followed by it not going well to start the season. And, of course, everybody up here, everybody in TV, podcast and whatever,

use the fact that we didn't like it at first to give ourselves confirmation bias to say see, I told you it won't work. It's never going to work. They're going to have to blow it up. And the reality is, we shouldn't have reacted so hard to the first 20 games because surprise, surprise, they need time to figure it out. They need time to figure out this new style of play around

Julius Randall to make him fit with some pretty unique players in Rudy Gobert and Anthony Edwards. And what you know, eventually they figured out, they figured out the best places to put all them on the court to make them synerdraz off each other. They found ways to maximize Randall's passing and Gobert is a loft threat in the dunker spot. rather than the main pick and roll big with Randall in the corner.

They figured out all the small stuff that requires time to figure out. It could never be done overnight. And they got to the point now that I think regardless of how the playoffs went down, they lost the better team, that trade was in pretty unequivocal success, right? Yeah, I agree. There was real downsize to the cat thing that we all, like, we all decided to look past and pretend the cat fit was perfect, even though a year before that we fucking hated the cat and Gobert fit.

They just figured it out. So we took that to mean, okay, they figured it out. going to be good forever. No need to try anything else. But that fit had real perils. Maybe they said to themselves, the cat-go-bearer thing has a ceiling that we've reached. We want something with a little bit higher of a ceiling. And they tried something new and it's worked unequivocally. Yeah. I think they viewed the cat stuff as as great as he is when it comes to certain things on the NBA court in order to reach that next level. And also contractually as well, he's paralyzing as a player. Yeah, the financial part was a big part of it. And the financial

thing was real. We all acknowledged that that they pay him too much money. And it was going to be hard to get out of that but in doing this trade i think too much was made of their flexibility like they're not going to get that much better and like have this many they're not going to get another star like say trade randall right like i think that part was a little overstated but what was understated was a fact that this team would be just as good if not better with randled than cat and that part they proved all of us wrong yeah i think like the the phrase that we used to them would be inflection point yeah because for all the reasons at the start of the year but even now at the end we're not nobody's out here killing um and because of the series that he had everybody understands

you play a really really good defense you're not going to have 35 every single night whenever you're playing a team like this but we are saying okay like you went through this it's time to get better right like it it's just very simple and playing i don't think anybody has any doubt about about aunt and his ability to improve or his his ability to be a score but it was very very that, you know, he has to go and add some things to his bag. So now you look at the Timberwolves and you look at the offseason. And with Ant and his growth and then with Randall and his decision and a lot of the financial decisions, the front office also has an opportunity where they have to make decisions

and they are at an inflection point of how do we want to construct this team around Ant for the next two to three years? Are we resigning Nasreid and Keel Alexander Walker? How do we feel about Rudy Gobert? Are we going to get off of him early or not? Like there's a lot of questions that they have. So it is a very, you know, we can go one way. We can go another.

And that's what they have to figure out. And Roger's finally signed with the Steelers. Of course, right before mandatory minicamp. He decided to stay home for all the OTAs and finally signed, of course. Tactician, man. Tactician. I think another word that I would use for the Minnesota Timberwolves is resurgence. And also you could, I guess another synonym is vindication for all the things

going back to what you said about what a lot of people said when it comes to how they felt about the cat trade and expectations and all that earlier we talked about how paralyzing cat felt i think still like there are some things about someone like julia sandals games and also maybe just how this organization this roster is right now there are paralyzing things that legitimately will stop you from being at the top of the NBA but they did a great they did a great job of lessening those lessening the amount of times and what will take for you to you know be real they lessen the amount of roadblocks I would say yeah that's the best way to put it yeah shout at them next team my guy is the Toronto Raptors

so they're the only way to describe them tell me one word for this is going against the grain everybody tells them do one thing and they said nah do my own thing and it's a thing that contrarian contrarian yep the Toronto Raptors you These things can be boiled down to contrarianism, I guess. Because everybody said, obviously, after they finally traded, I could go back even further. They took forever to trade Seacom and O.G. and Anobi. Everybody was clamoring, get rid of these guys, restart, sell high.

They did not sell high. They sold medium at best. And finally went down to rebuild. And then this year, after doing that, everyone wanted them to actually commit to a rebuild, go for the number one pick, do things slowly the right way. And they went out and traded for Brandon Ingram. after keeping Agapoto and said,

we're going to kind of not do that, actually. We're going to try to be good. 10-foil on head thinking. Bridger's going to be good. That's our goal. You thought we were tearing it down. You thought we were trading these guys to tank and get another superstar to pair of Scotty Barnes.

Nope. We were tearing them down to continue to try to be good just in a different way. And time will tell over that's right or wrong, right? I actually do kind of like the Brandon Ingram and Scottie Barnes fit more than a lot of people that have been hating on the Raptors. I haven't hated on them at all process-wise.

I think it's strange and a little bit unique, but I think the vision is there. And, you know, again, we'll see if it works out and they're proven right. But at the very least, it is a unique, contrarian way to go about trying to build this team that you have, you have to prove the doubters wrong, I think, because there is reasons to believe it's not smart.

It's not impossible to do well, but they have some proving to do. Never let them know your next move. Yeah, there you go. That's it for the Raptors. Yeah, you're going to keep Raptors fans on their toes at all times. They're so interesting. All right.

Are you done? Do you have? We can go for it now. I'm good. Oh, I've, all right. My last team is the Nuggets. Okay. Reshuffling is the word for them.

Obviously, you fire Mike Malone. You fire Calvin Booth. It is a reshuffling in the front office. You had to endure a very, very rough start from Jamal Murray. And because you lost KCP in the offseason, you had to, once again, reshuffle because you had to figure. out where that depth was going to come from. Russell Westbrook ends up being a super important part of your team.

And because you have guys like Darya Sarich and Zignaji who are just, are not playing, you have to figure out. What are we going to do? When you get to the end of this year at the end of the playoff run, you know Yokic is going to be there. You know that you want to keep Aaron Gorda around and Jamo Murray. Is Michael Porter Jr. going to be there? Because you let Casey walk and you use that.

money elsewhere because you're trying to, you know, deducted tax, do all that. MPJ, his money is coming up and you feel like you're, you're a little, I'm forgetting the word, wow, you don't have a lot of options. Yeah, you're limited. Thank you. And so now you are going into next season thinking, how can we make this team better? How can we continue to extend the championship window around Yokic? It's going to take some reshuffling, some retooling.

that's what this entire year kind of borrows down to. Yeah, it's so funny because it's like every single time that we want to look at this Nuggets roster, figure out ways to get better, see one of the immediate ways outside of MPJ is like, okay, you look at someone like Jamal Murray and then he goes on a random st, puts up like, gives the most random team, 35, 40, you're like, well, okay, fuck, we can't trade him because he looks like the normal version of himself. So you're right, they do feel like very limited and almost like handcuffs into certain things and it's going to be a tricky situation for them to figure out a way to uncuff themselves

without the keys. Yeah. So, yeah, when I think about the Nuggets, it's, I mean, they overachieved in the first, in this entire playoffs, like the Clippers, for a lot of that series, felt like they weren't in control and felt like the opportunities that were open. If it wasn't like a 50-50, who's going to get this game? It felt like the Clippers had a lot of moments who was 60-40 and they should have won those games and Denver just out hustled on algorithm, right?

I'll execute it all that stuff. And then nobody has been able to really push OKC and you think about, like, we're going to look back at this playoffs and be like, the fact that OKC was in a seven game series with this version of the Denver Nuggets is insane and it's a testament to the turnaround that Adamen was able to bring the team to and the level of control, Yoko, just, able to have over a team and over a series and game and all that. So I'm not sure where the nuggets go from here. They obviously have to make moves.

I'm very curious to see what direction they ultimately choose because your ceiling and as we're seeing in the league, your ceiling and your windows are lower and closer than what you actually think that they are. The house's funny collapse. Can't wait to see what they do. I genuinely have absolutely zero clue What they're gonna do this summer Which means the answer is probably fucking nothing

But I don't know Surely they gotta do something It'll probably be minimal I hope it's more than minimal But I genuinely have I don't even have like T leaves to point to Zero I clue what they're gonna do Yeah

I'm interested in seeing what they're gonna do It's like so hard to point to someone like MPJ It's hard but it's not hard Because of other irrelevant things But he just had arguably the best regular season of his career put up like 19-7 rebound shot 50% from the field hyper efficient and then he walks into the postseason not injury riddle but he gets injury riddled throughout the postseason through the clipper series and his value is just immediately diminished and so when it comes to like when you value what other teams would want to snatch and grab and will give you a sizable amount of assets for it's immediately like MPJ because he's still young his contract isn't like fucking egregious he has value and his skill set is doable that every team needs in the league so

stuff cool and as every team we have one word for every single team season described it some of them gave you a little bit more than one word had to cheat a little bit but we've described what every single NBA team should take away from this season and with that being said this man has a crown in his hand you know what time it is I have the confession I for some reason I stole the other crown from the last episode or it was the stream I think it was a stream I took it home with me for no reason. I'm like, bro, why is this here?

What the hell? You know what that means? In your car. Crown eater for fucking life. Cameras on or off. It is me regardless. But when I go to sleep, I live,

eat, breathe, crown eater time. That's what I am. I'm going to present. I'm going to crown tattoo soon. I'm lying. I'm not. But it's time.

And there you have it. We're on a TikTok time. Welcome to TikTok time. Being. Today we're going to begin But talk about one of our favorite topics NBA jerseys We're going to begin with aesthetics talk

You guys know how it goes And today We're going to pick the best NBA city jersey In every single NBA team's history And when I say that, just know I'm lying You click the title, you thought it was every team It is every team in the Eastern Conference And next week we'll do every team

The Western Conference. It'll be a two-part video You guys will see this back-to-back weeks Yeah man There's eight years of city jersey so far That's crazy We can go through all 15 teams teams in the east pick the best one and they do the same thing next week for the west stop the count now eight years is crazy man fuck time is flying i wish you did not say that 20 18 is the first

one that she was eight years ago time is flying great all right you guys know how it goes we're going to pick the best one first off we got the boston celtics what is the best jersey here listen well first of all i know it's not this year this year suck yeah this is the worst it's been running for the worst the worst the selthics actually have the worst collection on this entire list we're starting to low bar their design team is not very good yeah look at the top Bro. Great bullshit. Listen, I'm not going to lie.

Top bro. I'm not going to lie. 2020 didn't hate it as much as everybody else did. But. I respect that they actually did something and did the Celtic look and did something for the city, the Irish population. I'm glad they tried in 2020. The other years, it's, I don't, there's very little city influence in 2018 and 2019. But with that being said, it looks goofy.

The 2019 one underrated, right? I guess. No, no, no. There was an earned, because there used to be city jerseys and. Earned jerseys, the earned jerseys were four teams that made the playoffs the year prior. Earned one is a, it's the, this city jersey, but it's flipped. It's a green one with like white lettering and stuff. That one is fired.

This 191 is not, is not great. To me, this is between 22, 23, or 24. 24 is kind of out of it. Yeah, 24 is out of the race. I like the wood on the sides. It's unique. I like that they showed homage or something, but okay. To me, it's 22 or 23.

23 is more character. 22 is plain, but it looks. looks kind of good. It looks classic. 22 looks more classic. It looks like it's a part of their regular, like, lineup. You know what 22 looks like? It looks like they're copying the Lakers.

And the Lakers, like, old school and they're like job shopping thing, but like making it like the Celtics. I think for a city jersey, we also have to keep in mind that these are supposed to be city jerseys. They're supposed to represent the city, not just look good. I don't know what 23 represents, but it probably looks the best. It has the most character. I'm going 23.

I'll go, I'll go 23. Low key, I know it's very, very plain. 21 is kind of cool The fact that it looks like the banners Oh yeah you're done Nope That's the coolest concept It looks absolutely terrible though

That's way too much text Yeah not for a jersey I understand the concept I love the I'm giving a props for that Okay best concept Worst execution I think 23 is

Don't know the concept But the execution is probably the best 203 is my favorite You know what I found out The other day Actually yesterday with Donovan at the gym I heard that they're taking out cursive in schools

In elementary schools Yeah kids are dumb Who we heard it from Who was kind of demented a little bit not gonna lie yeah he's he's had some some head trauma before oh so I've heard that kids have a hard time

reading cursive and have a hard time reading books in third person brother is that true in third person in third person third person quite as well fuck cooked wow anyways next team the Milwaukee bucks a lot of blue going on here but I think one of the best collections on here

they really leaned into the blue a common theme here the first one 2018 all these teams did so little they're just there's no city elements they're just random jerseys yes burn 19 i will say that for sure what 19 needs to be burned burn burn is this supposed to be that kodak i forget i don't know but i remember their their

court their home court specifically ass they matched along with the jersey too just felt so bad one of your it felt like a deep one of your worst opinions what you like 19 i like 19 a lot 19 is cool i don't i don't love it but i think these blue ones are clearly better to me 23 is by far the best one here 23 is one the better city jerges to me i adore you know wear that jersey. Adored. I love that jersey. Okay, let's cross some stuff off.

18, gone. 22 feels more like an updated classic rather than the city. So we'll go to that. 23 or 25. Are we out on Cream City? Cream City's in the running, but 23 and 25 edge it out to me.

Cream City is a generational jersey for me. It is between 20. We're all split all over the place. It's between 20 and 24 for me, person. Hey, sounds like we should go Cream City. It sounds like we should pay homage to the legends. It's the only, it's the only consensus that we have. Cream City, it is.

It's consistent, and it's creamy. And who doesn't love that? Exactly. It's fan favorite for a reason. Everyone likes it. Number 2020, Cream City, you win. You need Cream City in your life always, bro. There's literally no life without the cream in the city.

What would I do without going to Cream City? Exactly. How would I survive? Exactly. My fellow Creamy brethren, we're here to respect Cream City. All right. Brothers in Cream. You're disgusting.

Cream on. Next up Chicago Bulls Some real hits Hit or miss To me You got some hits though 22 is easily

Number one 22 22 is fantastic 22 is fire 22 is fire Okay 22 and 19 are my two favorites

And normally I don't even Like black jersey like that I'm going 18, 19 and 22 on my top three 19 did a great job With the idea The idea of making it the flag

Is cool as fuck And And that's about it, though. I don't love the execution nearly as much as 22. Yeah, I'm a fan of 22 and 23 personally. 23 is also pretty nice. But 22, man. That font is beautiful.

The red is striking. I like it a lot. Okay. So 25 out, 21 out. 20 is atrocious. What the hell were they cooking with 20? Again, 20's not atrocious. 20 is terrible.

This is very, any jersey that has like really big logos up front, I always see them. And I think six flags jerseys. It's six flags. It reminds me of the sleeve jersey. Yeah, I hate that. That's what they were doing. Okay. 22 for you.

I'm cool with 22. Okay, that's an easy one. That one we can fly through. The Atlanta Hawks, strong collection. Anything outside of M.O.K. You guys are going to hell. I never forget. He was putting off for MOK like a couple years ago.

I was putting off for MOK. You did. You were in your MLK, yeah. Oh, I was. You were giving MLK for a couple of years. You were 18. Trash. Yeah.

17 is pretty cool. I mean, 19 is pretty cool. 19s but it's like too modern yeah it's kind of I feel like 19 feels a little bit mystical you know what when 20 hit the streets and they did peach tree for the first time was revolutionary 23 is an even better version of that though if you could combine them what I'm if you could take the Atlanta and put it where peach tree is then I like that I don't like having the the peach tree on the yeah the Atlanta I love cursive I love that that typeface I'm gonna go 23 23 is tough for me I probably lean towards emma

okay of course number one and then we didn't speak a people about 22 at all loki because it feels like a classic jersey yeah i mean it's cool and so loki i really like 25 any words for 18 the first i like i like i like 25 a lot and in 26 when what they're gonna do is they're just gonna flip it and make it blue with white or whatever something like that i do not like 25 at all that might that might hit 24 is stupid but kind of grown me a little bit i don't know why it's unique it's unique as hell i'm not gonna pick it i'm not gonna pick it's unique as hell it's a unique as hell it's a regular jersey I like

Lowercase ATL is hard Yeah I like it I hated it at first But now looking at it Compared to every jersey league It's so unique So we're going 23 or 20 or 20 I'll go

We're split again I'm going 21 I'm gonna go 20 I'll go 20 I'll go with you We'll go 20 I'll be the type of year Okay Pete Street it is

The Cleveland Cavaliers To me 24 and 25 are amazing I even 23 really They're kind of on a three year hit streak of fantastic jerseys. I really like 24, the simplicity. I'll go to the blue in 25.

Wow. It's kind of easy for me. I just see like beautiful progression. Like the worst one, obviously, he's 18. They got better every year. They got much better every year. I agree. I can 23, 24, 25, sign me a friend of me.

Yeah, that's very fair. And I'm going, I'm going 25. Yeah, I'll go 25. I honestly, one other better jerseys in Cavs history, I think. Yeah. Whenever we talk to Darius Garland, he said that, the that 21 was his favorite um i don't i don't mind it it is sneaky i like the concept of it because you're taking the letters from the rock world hall of fame i wish the execution was a

little bit better because it does end up looking like a ransom note yeah and i'm just i'm not with that for 25 listen me me personally my favorite color is that shade of blue like baby blue carolina all that stuff that's what that is so i'm going 25 23 24 and 25 this is such a good job of being like not doing a lot being very clean like 24 and 25 especially it's just two colors and it's very slick goes really well with their new jerseys they brought in around those times the calves are on top of the aesthetic game for me right now they perfected their swag they did shout out 25 Miami heats started off with a bang slow we got ones they were on a run 18 19 and 20 is the only conversation that we can have and to me it's white I think I think 18

I think they started the best one but I could see an argument for 19 one block I think 21 is an atrocity and is a crime against humanity but I know the youth loves it I think I might lean Fuck them kids They can't read They can't read

They can't read third person What am I taking your opinion? You can't read You can't I'm not doing that 21's out 22 again Rantam Note out 23 same concept out 24 and 25 die

Dumb and dumber out My intelligence by thinking that I would think this is cool I'm going 18 okay 18 or 19 you're the one picker poison they're both fantastic green the motor city the Detroit Pistons a pretty under probably an underrated group but I don't know the first five are kind of ass but the last three are pretty good 23 23 is hard man that green works I like 2023 easy one yeah it's easy you know where 23 comes from right nope where it's a big Sean inspired he

oh he was creating this right I mean how much you love director or some might that boy but I We'll see. My guy. Man is washed. 25 is also very good. Wobody, wobbley, wobble. Relax. I wish I'm not going to say it on the show because he's too vulgar, but there's a one bar that I always tell you that ruin Big Sean for me.

Go listen to the song too good on the Big Sean Metro one mixtape. I have to say he, there's a new feature that he just came out with when there's a line. I was like, damn it, I'm trying to defend you so bad. Oh, man, it's cooked. The Charlotte Hornets Buzz City Where are we going Are we going with the CLT

Keep the classic No I'm not going to lie All these jerseys suck ass None of these are good 22 I don't like gradient a lot

22 is actually the best one That is a Ben 10 jersey I'm sorry That looks radioactive I think Ready me up Get the watch ready I'm shape shifting

But you're right It's probably the best one I think 25 is the best one Probably Yeah you know why Because it's a regular ass hornet shirt It's not doing too much.

That is the same thing as the one above it. The same thing is Buzz City. It just has Hornets. How do you go from being the most popular team or one of the most popularly teams because of your graphic designing abilities in the 90s? Yeah, in the 90s to now just being an afterthought. This is by far the worst set of city jerseys. It's even worse than the Celtics, I think.

And it's so disappointed. Also, 19. I see 19 and I get PTSD because I see Tony Parker in a watch. Oh, my gosh. I see a wash Tony Parker number nine. And I'm like, oh, my God. That's a Tron jersey. Yeah.

Nope, nope. I guess we can go 22. The New York Knicks. These are. Has to be one of the kith ones, I think. But 22 is also really strong. Classic hits, except for 21. We've had some, we've had some good ones.

The fire department one is also pretty cool. 21 was absolutely atrocious. That one is bad. I'm so mad. That is gross. I'm so mad. Anytime that you start putting sentences. Yeah.

On the front of your jersey, you've done too much. Doing entirely too much. Would that be said, I'm going 25. I like the white kith one a lot. the blue kid is also really good yeah either either one of those two and I'm gonna go this year

I'm either 25 or 2018 for me person 22 is super strong as well yeah a good amount of good hits here your Orlando magic my god 2018 is terrible that galaxy when you wish upon a star jersey

I forgot that they did that dude someone threw a rocket whoever created that when I was made him dumber when I was saying this up in prep for I saw a picture of Mo Spates wearing that I wanted to throw up What do you have against most spates?

One, he was very washed at that time So it's a forbidden jersey And then it has galaxy on his chest through legs The shorts are also midnight stars like this It is bad It's like those 2015 galaxy pants people were wearing In middle school awful I think the best ones are either 24, 25

I might lean towards 25 from me personally They're gonna come in they're gonna be like Middle School in 2015 damn I said middle school it was 20s school It was 2015. We're sophomores in high school. Yeah. Yeah, I was 10th grade.

21 is cool. I do like the influx of the orange. That's nice. That's the easy one to me. Really? Yeah, easy one. It's really 21 to me. Yeah.

I love 21. 21 and 24 are my two favorites. Okay. But you hate the Dallas Cowboys, and that is a Cowboys jersey. It says Orlando. So. I see a star. I see navy blue and I see silver.

All right, 21 gets it. There you go. Time breaker. 20 is literally a Tron jersey. That looks exactly like. Tron. 25, you have a special place in my heart. 25 is also good, but I think the

one of the last time you watched Trond. You've made a lot of references. When was the last time you saw it? Well, there's a trailer out right now for Tron Legacy. Okay. You watch it? Fuck, no. I'm not watching Tronleleger.

Starred Letto. Hell now. God, no. The Toronto Raptors. Oh, these are so many hits. Every year was a gold OVO jersey until this year. As soon as he got spanked up inside of him. We can't associate him.

He got wop, wop, bop, they dropped him on his shirt. is it no more this one they're all pretty good though that actually is very fun this is the most consistent fire linens it's extremely funny this is crazy that's probably not why they did it but the correlation is there

I like 18 a lot personally but I think all 20 is really good too that simple font well how do you guys feel about 22 don't like it it might be the worst might be the worst it's a little jumbled

yeah I'm going I'm going to go I'm gonna go at 18. I think like obviously it's always nice whenever you can get

like a black jersey and a white jersey and it's like man what if they just switched to this full time but the black one and the way

that they started out with that one I really I really do like that yeah okay 25 is underrated I like the novel of 25

when you look at it side by side it's not as clean of a jersey but I like the novelty of it yeah 21 maybe I would ever wear

25 like if I would never wear I would never wear this is not for fits Absolutely not. Yeah, whereas most of these gold ones, you could get a fit off with it. 21 is cool. 20 is the best for fits, I think.

But 18 was really good on court. But 20 is good for wearing with clothes. I picture like 18 through 24, specifically all the black jerseys. You get that with the black and gold sixes. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Or the G&P sixes, yeah. Okay.

I'm putting together 27 fits. Oh, my goodness. You get those sixes, black skinny jeans with a little bit of rip. Oh, my God. Get a little flannel. On top? He got it. I'm killing the game.

I'm killing the high school. The Brooklyn Nets. 2019. Easily. Easy. Easy. Yeah, 19. I will say 22 is incredible.

That's a throwback jersey. That's cheating. They went to a jersey they had in the 90s. 19 is an original. It pays homage to an element of the city with the big and smalls. Coogee just sweaters. Yeah. Perfect jersey.

It's, it's. I just remember them DeLo days back when he revived that city and gave these guys hope. There's a one picture of him doing the ice. Yeah. The meme is a way. with that Cardi song for sure

19 19 is on City Jersey Hall of Fame 20s it does too 20 is really good Yeah it's cool But it pales

in comparison to 19 Especially because you changed from Brooklyn to bedstine Yeah You're doing too much

Yeah it's a little goofy It still I mean it pays homage To the city And the designer So it's cool But I like 19 more 18 is bullshit

We'll look at 18 That's so stupid Your brain's at man The Philadelphia 76ers And my first thought is 19 is absolute bullshit. That is true. 19 is trash.

That looks bad. It looks like a sweater. 21 is also trash. Dude, 20 is so hard. 18 is fantastic as well. 25 and 22, that rainbow is nice.

That's what I was going to say. I like 22 a lot. I like 22 as well. But I also like the cream of 20. You know I'm a big cream guy. Exactly. Respect the cream. But 22 and 25.

One of those two has to win to me. Me personally, I'm rocking with 20. then 22 it is yeah I'm going 22 23 is in bad news though 23 looks good on court the Indiana Pacers

see they start are all 19 19 is nasty this is a crazy just so much noise there's no consistency 23 is trash I do not like 23 there's so much going on

on these jerseys I know you guys know I hate 24 and 25 23 looks like pamper's I don't know why I just think a diaper but I see that right big ass overalls

21 obviously looks like a classic jersey but it is 19 is so bad It is awful That is fucking horrible So are we going 22 For the best one

22 or 18 21 Actually 20 is clean No it's not No it's not And these are the options And you guys In the ones you just said

I like 22 I like 22 out of the ones you name the most Then we'll go with 22 I don't love any of these But yeah We can go 22 I mean they've been wilding out For three straight years

Yeah these last two are so I hate them I know the young fans like them I hate them Charlotte Horn. The Washington Wizards. Might as well be. This is no contest.

Nobody's saying any words. 23. Absolute classic. Perfect jersey. Especially because they followed up with the bullshit of 24. 23 wins in a landslide. Shout out to cherry blossoms.

25 is also decent. They did a better job with the district thing with the color scheme. Yeah, because it was in a Game of Thrones jersey. Yeah. It still is a little bit,

but at least the colors make sense. 24 is so goddamn random. 25 is like, that really spilled the death of city jerseys. That 25, that 24 jersey was jumping the shark For the city jersey program It was really the end of the end You're like, why would you do that?

I don't know, man, it's terrible But 23 Beautiful Beautiful, bring it back And that's all of them That's the Eastern Conference Damn Next week we'll do the West

Stay tuned We're gonna do every single team In these next two weeks Okay Let's lock in Next thing we're gonna do We are gonna go to a little website That recently has been all over Twitter

All over YouTube called batter up Because they have this game where you can guess the NBA player by their jump shots which is something we've done in the past with still images this time we can do it with kind of a video

that's blocked out of who the player is so real simple we got to identify who the players we're looking at play are we got his first one looks somebody running off a screen

or a catch and shoot a little condensed jumper yeah it's a catcher shoot it's a push shot immediately like that push shot makes me think about Tray Young but he's not coming off the screens

like that at all never But he's not. That ball is in his hand. Jamal Murray coming off of a... He's jumping a little bit too far, too, as well. You don't think Jamal Murray? No.

Jamal's a good guess. I like Jamal. The way he's getting into it, that seems right. Let's see. And I'm just imagining him running off with his yoga trains. But I don't think he lands like that, though, as well. Jamal Murray, nope. It is a PG, though.

But it's not Jamal Murray. It's in the West. When the age is yellow, is that mean above or below. I have no idea. It just, yeah, I have no idea how to gauge that either. There's no right or wrong. It's a point guard in the Western Conference. Who is this coming off the screen with a condensed jumper?

It definitely looks at Trey Young, but we know it's the West. Let's go. Oh, this is Buddy Healed. Oh, yeah. There we go. No, no, it says point guard. Could he be listed as that? Fuck, no.

You think he's buddy healed? Okay, no. Fuck, I was wrong. It looks like it, though. This is a point guard. This is throwing me off. Normally, normally there's really easy. I played this yesterday.

Could this be Malik Monk? No, he's this isn't. He's a point guard. I mean, he was listed as a point guard. at the end of the season. I don't know how updated this thing is. No. Okay.

But he's 27 years old point guard. Okay. But this is he? No, never mind. Fuck. I mean, if we just think, we just think about it like the suns. Wait, are we in the right division? No, we're not.

Western, it's not Pacific or Northwest. So it's the Southwest. So the point guards out there are. It's not Fred Van Fleet. Furbillies too stocky. It's the Rockets, the Spurs, the Grizzlies. the pelicans and the Mabs

Who do fuck is this guy? I'm struggling I don't know who this is Let's let it reveal Let's give up We're starting off with an L Jose Alvarado That's a difficult word

I want to never guess that shit man They start off with a difficult one Okay you got it Let's see from here Let's get some redemption going He was not expecting that ball at all That is a Oh I know who this is immediately

It's a funny looking jumper This is Dylan Brooks Is it? Yes it? Yes is Dylan Brooks He's so awkward. Because he finishes with that one arm. Yeah.

Dylan Brooks. Immediately. Look at that. Redemption right away. Yeah, he lets go of his guide hands so, so soon. So too quickly almost. Yeah. That's a unique one that I thought we were going to start with.

Yeah. That was fast. Okay. We got one. Catch you. Kevin Rand. Kevin Rand. Post up.

Actually, no. Jason Tatum. That's Jason Tatum. That's Jason Taylor. Look at the way the follow through goes. Yeah. That's Jason Tatum. It's Jason.

Tatum for sure. Look, yeah, they started us off with a difficult one, but we got immediate redemption, two in a row, incredibly easy. Yeah, he posts up like KD. That had me at first. Yeah. But that followed through. I know it anywhere.

Next one. Okay. Here we go. Catch, shoot. Now that's McHill Bridges. You see this? I don't think so. I'm looking at the base.

It's not McHale. Those are Slenderman arms. Those, they're just too long. We can try McHale, but I just know that. Oh, is that Jane McDaniels? It's Jane McDaniels. That's the better games. Yeah, that's his base.

his feet kind of separate a little bit. They're not aligned. Yeah, that's J.D. McDaniels. Oh, it's not. Small forward. In the west, in the northwestern division. On the Timberwolves.

What? On the Timberwolves. What? Huh. It's not J. McDaniels? It's not to kill Alexander Walker. No, it's definitely not to kill Alexander Walker. That's not, it's not, it's not, not Nodagh.

It's not, it's not, put, put, Nicky Alexander Walker. Sure. How was it not Jada McDaniels? I don't know I don't know What the hell Okay now we're doing it for a damn Wait what

Is this someone who don't get no minutes You gotta be someone Okay I'm just gonna give up Because who is this I gotta know Oh that's Anthony Edwards Yeah from deep Okay

It's and from deep They kind of nerfs it His deep shot is not the same You know regular I also got full because I thought he looked skinnier In that I thought it was no his arms did look longer

Yeah The the okay Okay, we'll take that one That's a hell We could have got that I'm not taking that God damn Who is this

I think this I think this might be I can't even say That bounce follow through I feel like everybody's McHill Bridges Is this Malik Beasley I don't know man

That bouncingness is A lot of A lot of players This looks like But look at how like Tens his shoulders are When he shoots It's very condensed

Kind of reminds It doesn't even Chenzo Or is it Jamie Denos Again No no The point after the Dante I think this is a guard

The Dante Guess doesn't sound too bad I think he's a Dante Or it could be Mikhail Bridges Oh no It's in the West So it's not Mikhail Bridges Yeah

Huh He west So it's not Malik Beasley either Could this The bouncing follow through Wait scroll down to the clues again Could this be Norman Powell It's a shooting guard

Should be Norman Powell Let's see That's my guess Norman Powell It is not Norman Powell it is not Norman Powell He's not in the Pacific or the northwest So west again southwest

Jalen Green maybe Oh this might be Fredman Vleet No that's too long to be Fredman Vleet The shot is too high for Fredman Yeah And Jayland Green kind of pushes from his chestnut He elevates to his eyes

So it's like a real fundamental shooter Is that just Clay? Is that just Clay? I'd be surprised if no it's not Clay Okay we got the right It's a shooting guard in the Southwest But it's not on the Mavericks So we got Rockets

We are Rockets, Spurs, Grizzlies, Pelicans. Hmm. Trey Murphy, no. Yo, this game got us in the blender right now. Yeah. These shooting guards are difficult. Point guards are difficult. Point guards and like bigs are easy. These shooting guards are hard.

Try, try Trey Murphy. Okay. I don't think it's Trey. Yeah, I don't think it's Trey. Oh. Pelicans, though. On the pelicans. Is it Herb?

Oh, this is CJ McCollum. We're idiots. Oh, is a CJ? Yes, it's CJ. Look at this base. His base is wide. Okay, it's Eugene McCollum. He looked taller to me.

I don't know why I thought was a taller guy. Okay, we should have got that one easier. That one's a bit of a bad miss. Damn. Okay, we got it. We're batting about 500 right now. We're doing not as good as we should be, but not horrible. Caught it up high.

This is a big for sure. He did not shoot often. Ew. This Clint in one of his three attempts. That jumper is disgusting. Yeah. This is not a shooter. Ugh.

So that makes it. Oh, this is Kauai Leonard probably. No, it's not. Look at the base. And look how, like, he has no arc on that shot. Listen, the way that they're scanning it and the way that the hands are just big. I don't hate that. There's no fucking.

Look at the release. I don't hate that. No way. It's cool. Oh, you're right. It's Kauai. Yeah, look at the base. He's so lateral, bro.

Look at, of course. Look at the way he moves. That's Kauai. You got it. After all that age. I did not think those hands were Kauai. Yeah. You got it.

Okay. Redemption for you. Not for me yet. Who are we looking at? He's so slow. Yonis. Yeah. Yonis.

he's like oh shit me all right yeah that's yon that's yon that's honest he got him immediately he has zero pressure he was he was wide open no one was coming up to his ass ooh i feel like every i see jamed jennels everywhere I look

could this one finally be the jami daniels pool no it can't be jama mcdain is too much of an awkward nope it's not jama dynald's yeah he's in the east small four he kind of catapult so i'm guessing the yellow for the position means he plays multiple positions? Yeah, maybe. We're thinking...

So it's in the east. Scottie Bar. Wait, no, no. It's a USA. Yeah. So they are American. Scottie's not American? Wait, is he?

I saw, I'm thinking today. He was thinking about playing for the... Scotty's a lot of bad guess. Let's go with Scottie Barnes. He was thinking about playing for the Jamaican national team. Okay, so it's a combo guy. I'm guessing more power forward than shooting guard.

It looks kind of tall. Is this Franz Wagner? No, Franz Wagner's more of a catapult shot He has a hits right now too This might be Paula Macero See, I always confusing Because his shot is heavy His shot is heavy

Everybody here looks skinny It is palo There we go, shot is heavy See, I got to see something at the bodies They're making everybody look skinny to me So I keep thinking slender guys Yeah, it's the base and also The release of the wrist

Yeah, that's why I keep going to Jamie Daniels Yeah, I keep thinking skinny guy Let me stop looking at the body types The body types are leading me astray I keep trying to cheat it. Oh no, he don't. Oh, no, no, no. It might be subonis.

Oh, wait, no. No, he jumped a little bit too much. But it feels like... He got stone hands, bro. No, no. Let's go bono. I think subpoenas is a good guess. You clearly have a weird jumper.

Yeah. Okay, yeah. Yeah. He got stone hands. Yep. That subonis is definitely a bonus. Stiff. Okay, catch and shoot.

Oh, this is hard because it's not a good angle. No, but it's very fluid. Yeah. Hmm. This is a beautiful jump shot. What's that? What's that little hop come from? Doesn't look super tall.

Yeah, the hop. Who hops like that? Um, Jamal Murray? This could be a lot of players. It's like that almost almost like a set shot. He's very convinced. He's not getting this.

Is this Darius Garland? Wait, wait, wait, wait. Is this cat? No, he's too small. He's too small. Again, the body types, he's going to get us straight. The base, the base seems kind of wide. You could try cat, but I just, I know what it's.

not a lot of lift he doesn't look that tall you know it's not a center my guess who doesn't have the little like the condensed quick with the risk it looks a little a mellowee but i don't think it's the mellow try darius garland i think that'll lead is better yeah you're currently coming through with the most so okay combo guard age 25 in the eastern wait in the eastern conference central division kate kate's a little bit more box no that's not kate that's not kate 25 in the eastern conference central division who's in a central division it's kind of like bulls yeah bulls bucks pistons cast oh this is erneesmith you think so yeah look at the the arc on his shot nez no fuck my bad but it is them hard that's what i meant to say nem hard nem hard you just knew you saw

this past week yeah this is Andrew nem hard yeah yeah his shot is so confined yeah perfect okay that that makes sense how i see that angle's tough though yeah the angle's ass they try to screw us Oh, that's front That's wrong That's right That's right Damn I'll be dead

If you got this right man Oh my god Frantz you gotta kill Whoever made this Immediately Damn We got to fix frauds man Last one

Ooh he's a Jumper Oh he was pointing at folks too He's a He's getting into the shot Very quickly Can this be Jordan Hawkins, maybe

Jordan Hawkins I'm gonna let you have like that is a pool Let's see Is it Jordan Hawkins I was thinking Jordan pool actually Shooting Guard USA Western Conference

Uh huh Leans to the side a little bit Like the right side is forward Western Conference Shooting Guard The release is telling me a lot right now What is it telling you? He's a shooter

Shooter Shooter That's a very Very quick trigger Yeah You're losing me here I don't think It's anyone on the clippers

It can't be someone like bogged on Speak to me When it comes You gotta carry out I suck at this Fuck no Could it be someone on the Warriors Like who

He means pods Moses Moody I don't know Can't be Moses Listen I mean Let's start out a name We need we need We need more hints

We need clues It is USA, another shooting guard Fuck, nothing Okay Nothing But it's not the Pacific or the Southwest Okay That is on the south west

You know what Everywhere I go I see Nikiel Alexander Walker Fuck it Try it speak to me to kill Not Nikil Okay But he's in the northwest

Could this be a trailblazer Oh this is Shaden Sharp This is Shaden Sharp This is Shaden Sharp But he's so nonchon When his jumper Yeah Shaden Sharp

Not grateful Damn, I was so sure. We got two more guesses. We're in the right division, though. Yeah, in the division. It's not the Timberwolves, not the Trailblazers. So that would be nuggets, nuggets, jazz. Oh, is this Strother?

I think you're cooking. You're cooking. Is it Julian Strother? You got it. Julian Strother. No. What? Dude, what?

Oh, we got to walk away with this one. He's number three, not on the Nuggets. What's the four team in his division? Jazz Jazz Thunder are the last two Jazz or thunder This is not

J-Dub right No I don't think so Aaron Williams I was thinking about that too It's a shooting guard Wait wait Isaiah Joe

No he's number 11 Oh no it might wait Number three Damn why Did we suck at this No It has to be some I think it's someone

It's someone O KC Is OKC and jazz you said Yeah What the fuck do we think about when it comes. It's not Colin Sexton. It's not no damn John Collins. I don't know who number three on O'KC would be. I can't remember. I'm so bad at remembering numbers. It's not no damn Lou Dort's five. I say Joe. We sure can't be a jazz member? It's 11. It might be a jazz. That's all we're cooked. It's not Cody Williams. It's way to.

Oh, it might be Keonté George. That's my last guess. Okay. Oh, that's a shooting guard. Is he shooting guard? Yeah, he got moved to shooting yard, but. Keante George, final guess. It is Keont George. You clutched up to end it. fucking home the last one thank god we did very mediocre at this but moe definitely carried as hard shout to my my fascination with jump shots all i'm here for is to tell you who's in what division exactly that's my only value i'm here to press the buttons we are collective i'm here to press the buttons my my eyes go blind when i see that we are a team all right next thing we're going to do i am going to do it's in a category game we haven't done that in a while i'm going to listen to

category five of them i'm going to tell you to name a player from that category you have to try to not say the same person that i say and if you can get through all five levels you win we haven't done this in a while it's been a while last time i did play this game i was in new york fighting for my life yeah i very rarely won i was close though you you came close to winning several times first up name an NBA player who has led the league and assist at any point you don't say it off bet oh shit okay so at any point in history name a player who's a league and assist all right three two one trey young game's harding it's tray young kill me now of course i'm gonna say tray what the fuck he lost in round one i'm picking my favorite player yeah i'm saying him

he couldn't get past round one i should have said lebron fuck man or mad let's see a don't do you just set up for me you know exactly what you're doing you always lose right away because you never think past your initial bias yeah exactly he says it first and you picked my biggest bias ever too. You say that first thing that comes to mind every single time and you always lose.

Damn it. All right, Donovan. Level two. A coach in the east right now. Tibbs. Ooh. Oh.

Oh. Five, four, three, two, one. Charles Lee. Doc Rivers. Okay. Okay. Okay. Domain survive another round.

An elite room protector in the NBA today. A little bit harder. Narrows it down to like five to seven players. Yeah. Okay. Three, two, one.

Anthony Davis. We got Chet. I was going to say, yeah, I was about to say, yeah, I was about to say, yeah, I was close, you all, listen, my first thought was Wendy, but I thought he was going to go then. No, okay. A Western Conference Finals MVP winner, there's only been four, it's only been around for four years. Oh, Western Conference Finals MVP. Oh, the conference finals MVP.

It's a brand new award. There's only four of them. Dumbass award. Who's won the Western Conference over the last four years? Just think of the teams that made the finals in the last four years. All right, so we have, who do you have, Mavs, Thunder, Curry, Warriors. and uh nuggets three two one

okay stuff shay gildas alexander you put um tray oops she gildas alexander damn say what happened to you man balden did you almost say she

no okay last but not at least level five can you do what mo can never do a Toronto Raptors player who made the Hall of Fame so a Hall of Famer who played for the Raptors okay

This is very limited. There's only a few. I'll tell you, there's three players who are in the Hall of Fame that won't play for the Raptors. Oh, I can only say two of them confident. Three, two, one. Tracy McGrady. Wait. Chris Bosch.

I would have lost. It was T-Mack, Bosch, and Hakeem-Elazwan. The three options. Vince hasn't made it yet? Oh, did he just get in last year? Did he inaugurated yet? Is Vincent? I think he's in now.

Okay, the list is like that. So maybe that's four. I think so, but yeah. Donovan, you win. You made it through all five levels I will avenge you Listen I do it for the both of us I understand

Level one is hilarious God damn Trey Young immediately I got too excited Right before you Finish your question Instant Trey Young What are we going to do next

Next thing we're going to do We're going to do a blind ranking I'm going to list Five NBA teams That have made the finals In the last five years You guys got a blind rank them So winners and losers

It seems that have made the finals Blind rank them Okay First off, the 2021 Sons. All right, but they lost. So we can't put them at the top of the list. I'm going to five. You can be the worst loser on the list?

Okay. I'm fine with five. Unless the Miami Heat are here from 23. Yeah, I think they can't go five. All right, so we'll put it at four. I think four is, yeah, because they had a lot of depth. They had a lot of depth. First D.C.

Whether it be, yeah, like that. How to do it to them? Macau Bridges, Cam Johnson, Chris Paul, who. I think he didn't think Chris Paul go like 16 for 16 in a in in a playoff in a playoff game wasn't against a pelican or something like that no it was against the clippers I think but okay we'll go four yeah okay four for the son that's a safe bet yeah 22 warriors first winner of the list we have to go three I'm gonna say three okay okay yeah if you think that there's like an even mix of winners and losers you always say

that the wars are like the worst champion in the last 15 years. Yeah. So we'll go three for the 22 warriors. That's perfect with me. Okay. Uh, 2024 Celtics. They might be two or one. I'll go one.

It's unless, unless this year's thunder are on the list in the last five years, we probably have to give the Celtics thing. I don't know, because I feel very strongly about that 23, 23 Nuggets team. I'm, I hate to break it to you. No, that's a debate. The 24 Celtics would beat them. I don't think they would beat them. I think they would beat them.

I think Bruce Brown and Casey Pee would give these guys fits. Oh my God. Those are names we go to? Yep. We're going with the Celtics. Death pieces. Fucking. You want to put them at one?

Let's put them at one. All right. 2024 Celtics. Number one. It's fucking me, man. The 2023 heats. Five. There we go.

That's what we said. That's what we said. Okay. So all you have left is number two. We got the 2025 Thunder. You know what? At this point in time, the thunder have not completed it so they have not won the championship yet so we'll put them at two you guys nailed

this exactly right i think you didn't cook me okay yeah you can flip the thunder in south six at one and two but other than that everything is right in the next week and a half yes in this current moment we're correct okay there you go first time you guys have really nailed it i think like 100% without doubt no we're on a row next thing we're going to do i'm going to show you some NBA teams you got to guess what the team is by their points per game okay so you're going to see one through five only seeing their points your game tell me who this team is okay so their four is hooper right he's the star he's 28 you're not getting a lot from everybody else 6.8 points is kind of tragic man that's and that's and that's so replace that's that's 3 and d okay what it feels like

it feels very dirkish but I don't know if Dirk ever averaged 29 a game I'll say these teams are all from 2010 and onwards and they made the playoffs I'd give you some kind of help Okay, 20s and onward So again, listen this would fit the bill

for Dirk but I don't think that they're two Like Jason Terry was not averaging 18 a game I think he actually was close to that 18? But it's not the 2011 Mavs Huh, what I'm saying Okay, could it be like the 2016 2016 pelicans

It is not I'll say The power forward You do not commonly associate him At playing power forward See now What this feels like

Is a Kevin Durant Lead team Close It is not Kevin Durant But you're cooking Hmm Not Kevin Durant

Jason Jason Tatum Year 1 maybe Or not year 1 Yeah 1 You'd be a god I know This may be Tatum

This was a little bit difficult I started off In one of the harder ones Yeah, 13.9, very solid, 18 points. I don't think you'll get this one. I'm not going to lie. 28.7. Is this a, a LeBron year?

This is not. You're so close. Oh, we're cooked. This is the 2013 New York Knicks. That is Carmelo Anthony. Yeah, I wasn't going to get that. I started off a really difficult one. I knew you guys working at this one.

That one is very, very difficult. Okay. Yeah, I was not thinking about that. That's very good. We're starting out the one for them. That is, I can't remember. I think it's Jason Kidd. Or is it Raymond Felton?

13. Raymond felt. I forget. I did it yesterday. It's probably Raymond, yeah. I can't remember. Next up, which team is this? While they all suck.

17 points is not bad. No, but like... Do they all suck or do they play as a team? Yeah. They play as a team. We got two people scored under 10 points. All suck. This has to be a early, early 2000s team, man.

2010's team. Anything with Rashad McCants in it. No. No. No. No, my bad, my bad. Damn. Yo, 16.7 points is kind of sad.

Oh, fuck. What's that noise? Oight! This is the Atlanta Hawks? No, wasn't the Atlanta Hawks? Ooh, thank God. Oh, you met 15? Yeah.

Listen. But they all made the playoffs. You're not far off. This is crazy. Think along those lines. Huh. Could this be a San Antonio Spurs team? This is a 2014 Spurs.

Yeah. That's crazy. You said they suck. I'm like, no, they're actually all fantastic. That's crazy. Correction, they're amazing. My bet. Okay.

They're actually incredible at, actually. They did play as a team. They did play as a team. That's crazy. What team is this? Okay. You got a star. Oh, this is...

This feels, all right, 2721. That feels very... In terms of like, star duos. Yep. Feels very Jason Tatum, Jalen Brownie. It does. You're not far off. I'll say that.

That is a good... If it's not that, then it's definitely LeBron James and Dwayne Wade Co. That's for, nope, that's further off. Think back to the J.B. Jason Tatum comparison. Oh, so is this, this a, uh, a Coilander Paul George

This is the 2020 Clippers. Man, they were so, we're good. This team was stacked. He only average 21 that year? Yeah, yeah, but I mean, playing off of Coilander. Yeah, yeah.

And they were a deep team. Yeah. Okay. Good team, man. Yeah. Terrible playoff team. Next up, which team is this? Oh, this is buckets from everywhere, man. It's crazy.

What even three stars gave you 75 points a game? 27 from your three. I've only seen this type of, I've only seen this type of offensive explosion one time. And it feels like, is it like the 2021 Nets? This is exactly that, the 2021 Nets. Damn, those seven games that they play together, I was like, this is the greatest offense I've ever seen.

And if they were to play for 82 games, I think that would not have been hard to argue for it. This is the, like, they don't get talked about as one of the best teams that didn't win a finals because they didn't have time to put it together. that's one of the most talented teams ever failed. These guys won 90 games and an 82 game season, man.

They would have been so good. They would have been amazing. Yeah. I just don't make no sense. I don't care about the Nets and I don't feel invested in any of those guys' legacy. But it makes me sad, but I see that team sometimes. I'm like, we missed out on basketball excellence. Who averaged 14 for them?

Joe Harris. Joe Hale. What a name, man. This is ridiculous. How do you have three guys averaging 25 and still have another double-digit score in your because all their legs fell off? Unbelievable. Shout Joe Harris

Next up Who is this team Ooh Okay This is a pretty good team Center is your best player 24 from your center This is a one

From their league are 17 Very very very Very well rounder starting 5 Could this be the 23 nuggets This could be and it is Damn Shout out some Michael Porter Jr. Hooping

Shout to KCP Get him 10.8 points If only they still had that Okay there we go Aaron Gordon was 16 is very much needed as well You said a very well rounded team that's exactly what it says with the most well-rounded starting five of sometime yeah okay

next up who is this team 34 from your lead guard oh man this is special 25 from year two oh man this team is they're bringing bad memories who score like this not a lot of players clay's one of them one scoring like this feels like could this be like a 2015 warrior's team you think isn't clay this one of 25 points per game maybe not in 2015 nah no that's a lot of points your game. The only guards that I can think of it's like

Oh I know what this is Good Now I'm lying I don't You just said some shit Could this be Russ and PG You think we're No

PG's average 27 You should know that Oh I know what this is This is James Hardin This is James Hardin and Russ You don't know anything It's not them

It's not them either No Fuck Think along those lines though you're you oh i know what this is doesn't know what this is again where i just gets to me this is the 2024 Dallas Mavericks

oh man Luca and Kyrie at 33.9 should have been clearly Luca yes I just never think of Luca as a point guard even though they yeah really what do you think of him at us the guy big guy on the court who just play or shit yeah athlete a three who like in that LeBron thing where it's like like he's the three but he plays the one Yeah.

Who is this team? Well, rounded again, 28 from your lead, 20 from your two guard, 24 from your three. I saw 13 from your four and six points from your five. So clearly, okay, so your point guard is your lead score. If we think about everybody, see, this is tough, though, because, like, having three 20 points scores on your, on your start lineup is very much demon time. It is.

But look at those bottom two. Again, stinkers. You don't do nothing. To have... 13 points of respectable arm line. To have 20... So what trios in your mind? What point guard to shoot are in score like this, though?

I think of Curry, but I immediately X them out because Durant's not averaging 24. Like, that's like almost, that's almost inverted. This does look like the 2017 Warriors, but it's not... Yeah, it's definitely not. But that's almost exactly how it looked if 24. was 28 as well yeah i think of curry i'm just thinking about high octane guards curry hardin luka can't be luca at all because you don't have two players giving you that that amount of production incorrect this is the 2025 lakers it is lucca oh and austin reese fake demon

yeah the fakess wow the fakesst i wish that was this postseason wow okay yeah this is this season that was hard that was hard who is this team okay 14 from your lead guard 19 from your center this is so evenly distributed so even very even 21 from your from your two guard 14 14 14 what are we doing 19 and 21 what are we doing three 14 points scores so 20 10 then ups I feel like this is closer who is a shooting guard center combo that they're clearly your best players but they're not that great let's think about all the two guards out here

okay this is center 19 shooting guard 21 that's a pretty unique combination yeah two guard and five I'm so and then everyone else lost right now and I'm very upset y'all cooked I'm very upset

with myself wait wait wait wait yeah one guess one guess for I cook you be I don't know 20 20 Miami Heat nope it is a 25 Houston Rockets damn damn that's Jalen Green Alperin Singh Gung

damn you Damn you Damn you, Jayle Green. And that Wingstack commercial. And especially the Wingstall commercial. Who is this team? It's a barbecue chicken 27 points per game. Damn.

This team is stacked. And he got 18, 18, 18, 18, 18 around a 28 per game score. I know who this is. Maybe he's sad. This team is lethal. I think this is the 2019 76ers? That's exactly what this is. Yeah.

Can't believe this team didn't win the finals. Damn. Damn you, Kauai Leonard. Damn you, Ben Simmons, Jimmy Butler, JJ Reddick, and is that Tobias Harris? And they lost because Kauai Leonard, shot a jumper. They went, doink, doink, doink, swish. They wouldn't want a chip that year. That would have been his chip.

Because the Warriors got hurt. If they get hurt again, who knows, that's how to know. I guess they probably wouldn't because they wouldn't be against that. But who knows? I don't know. But yeah, they would have been in the finals. They were really good matchup against the 2017 Warriors. Who did the Raptors playing the conference finals after this again?

The Bucks. The Bucks? Maybe the Bucks would be them, actually. I don't know. I mean, the bucks were up too old. The bucks were up too old. Yeah. Yes, maybe the bucks would actually beat the Sixers.

And then they built the wall and. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is the Sixers' best chance of winning one, man. This team was amazing. And then they picked Tobias Harris over me. And Jimmy Bowler left. Which team is this? 30 from your two guard is outrageous.

I'm going to lean towards, could this be like 2020? Yeah, 2020, Utah Jazz. decent guess no Utah Jazz tough Incorrect My calling was not giving you 6.1 points your game is quite low That is a certified corner sitter Is this the

2021 Washington? Nope What the fuck You think the Wizards made the playoffs? They did In 2021? In one of them years

Because remember because Rush dragged them You're right, you're right, you're right Yeah That was a very good guess That was a very good guess but that's not it though okay okay

two guards who are scores here we go I'm thinking about demo booker okay I'm thinking about Jimmy Butler yeah okay

I don't yeah he doesn't have the back end I'm thinking about wow I'm really I'm really blanking yeah you guys are sucking this one is not hard okay

it's not my final guess is you got a 30 point per game score at shooting guard a certified corner sitter at power forward a good threat at point guard a center 14 probably because the guard set him up I'm going to hate myself

you are though I'm embarrassed reveal it I give up 2018 rockets did you even try see did you even try yeah I checked out unbelievable yeah I'd be forgetting

and that's the last one went out with a dud unbelievable I check out because now every time I think about hard now I'm always thinking about him as a point guy yeah him dominating yeah And so I forgot they got Chris Paul Yep, it's him and Chris Paul cooking

All right man Next thing we're gonna do Last thing we're gonna do We are gonna put the last 20 MVP runner-ups Into a tier list Okay So all the players that came second in MVP Do you guys want to grade this based on how good

The regular season was or how good of a player they were Like all things considered We'll go how good How good as a player they were Not their MVP candidacy from that year? Yeah Okay So you know we're gonna gauge it just off of

how good that prime was in the year they became second an MVP. Let's start with 2011, Dwight Howard. Shout to him, listen, I just saw a clip the other day where he was like, man, I should have won over Derek Rose. And it's like, yeah, but not really. However, Dwight Howard. People act like LeBron came second in 2011. They're like, DeRose stole it from LeBron.

LeBron was third. He wasn't. Dwight Howard from like 2008 to 2000, really before he went to the Lakers, demon. Yeah. But with that being said, everybody on here is an all-time great because they came second an MVP. So I feel like Dwight has to be B or C.

I'm leaning towards C. I was going to say C. Yeah, probably C. Which sounds mean up front because, again, he's second MVP that was one of the best years of Dwight's career.

But these are all, these are all superstars at their peak. So I think C is perfectly fair. I agree. Because almost everybody on here is amazing in offense. And there's also a bunch of great defenders. So C, it feels fair.

You can move him up later. You got a three-time D. Is it a four-time? Well, who cares? Because we're engaging him for one year. Yeah, this MVP here. Fine. I love it. Okay.

2007, Steve Nash came second that year. Another playoff, flame out, came after this. But he might be right alongside Dwight or right below that. And it's right after he won his MVP. So he was still at that peak. He hadn't fallen off yet, really at all. He was still good enough, but Kobe won it that year? Yeah, we're going to go see.

I just think, like, especially at this point, once you won two MVPs and you haven't even gotten to the finals, that target starts getting bigger and bigger and it's like, what are you going to do? How are you going to respond? And to not make the finals again, even with that team and how revolutionary they were, I'm going to go see you.

For gauging quality of player, though, I think Prime Steve Nash is better than Prime Dwight Howard. He can't be super far ahead, though, because he's also a one-way player, but his one-way on offense is amazing. And it's probably... That's so hard to gauge.

I think his offense is a little bit better than Dwight's defense. And he wasn't like a black hole. He wasn't like fucking 25 Luca on defense where he's killing you on some plays. So I feel like he can be beat. coming off a back-to-back MVP still as good as he was

Let's start him at C And at the end If we need to Maybe we can move him up I feel stronger that is B But I'll let you guys Have it as you guys Okay

You agree Moe? I'm okay with B I want to look at his 2007 numbers But he can be movable He can be movable 2019 James Hardin This is the

He's averaging 40 Year where he lost Because Janus was a two-way demon A tier This is a good A tier for me I think him And so if you were going to look at him Steve Nash and they're going to be like one was averaging 40

one stole Kobe's MVP quote unquote yeah so people are going to view them hugely different I don't think that they're that different peak for peak like I think Steve Nash is highly underrated obviously the way he played was very different wasn't as Goddy scoring stats but I don't feel like Prime Hardin is a tier above Steve Nash no but you would tell me if you want to tell me he is I don't think it's crazy

to say he is I mean we're going like regular season alone the the ways in which James Hardin was breaking the game really is that is on a different level than what Steve Nash's I think this summer was that the summer where they like

doubled down on foul baiting and like in terms of the rest not allowing it yeah clearly not he averaged 37 or something so he definitely got one more year it's the following summer I'm saying oh probably yeah probably

yeah 2019 was his best scoring year he was as amazing as he ever was they had Chris Paul but Chris Paul was washed that was the year where he wasn't playing well and he rejuvened himself in OKCA after that but for that year we were kind of scared

of where Chris Paul was gonna be like so he had to carry an even greater scoring load if we're doing just regular season we should do A. If you guys want to say overall, who's the best player, I think B? I'm thinking A for me personally.

Yeah, let's show credit to the... You know what, yeah, let's do that because there's other James Harden seasons on here and it's the best one. So we'll give his best season A. Yeah. 2006, LeBron James. Hmm.

It's underrated. Young LeBron, insanely athletic. Yes, it's underrated, especially because the next year, next year he goes to the chip, or not to the chip, but he goes to the finals. Yeah.

I think that we can put 06 at at a. Yeah, I don't think any of these LeBron versus can be below A is fucking LeBron. Not to be a LeBron Glazier like always, but he is LeBron James. He is the best player on here. So I think this is one of the weaker LeBron years. Most of them are going to be S.

This feels like a hooker. And this, yeah, this was like around the time where you can legitimately start making arguments like, oh no, he's top three. He's top two. He's the best player in Lee. It starts right here. Yeah, this is the first year where he probably was the best player

in the week. If it was up to me, I put him in that's why I stayed silent. Yeah. I don't want to be crazy, but there's other better LeBron years than a comparison or another tier, I think. Speaking of, this is an interesting one. 20-20, LeBron. So this is the end of his prime. He was second to Janus. He, numbers-wise, was completely still in his prime, but we know the athleticism is a little bit different. But to me, this is still as good as good as any LeBron year because the defense was so good, playing with Frank Vogel, playing with Anthony Davis. He was defending the best he's ever done. He played point guard this year average almost 10 assists the scoring was still great obviously won the title

the average 10 assists you're right yeah won the title had all the IQ stuff that people love 2018 lebron for feels like ester to me to me that's clearly a different tier than 2006 go ahead and it's estier one of my favorite random ass stats that i love about this year of lebron is usually when it comes to double-digit assist average average leaders in the regular season you never win a championship outside of Magic Johnson and LeBron James was able to acquire that because of how ball dominie he was and also how great the defense was as well. I saw a similar stat about Shea this year. There's only three people that have averaged 30 and won a title.

Yeah. That's crazy. Three seasons. I think two of them are Michael Jordan and I forget the third one. Shaq probably. Probably. Yeah. I don't remember exactly, but that's only happened three times.

I saw a stat today talking about how Shea, only Shea and Shaq were the only ones to lead the league and score and also win a potentially win a championship. That's crazy. But Jordan never did that. I think it was MVP, actually. Yeah, so we're probably talking about the same thing. Yeah. Yeah, that's insane.

Okay, next one. 2016, Kauai Leonard came second. This is his best like two-way form, I think. He had the full defense still and the offense. This is the first year the offense really exploded to being superstar level. And this is- He's 25 this year, I believe. Yeah.

And when we were having a conversation a couple weeks ago about Pete Kauai, this is it. That's genuinely one of the best peaks eight-tier. The Warriors The Warriors won 73 games that year Stole all the attention Didn't the Spurs won like 69 They won 67 Yeah 60 I thought it was more

Yeah 67 They were incredible He was a best player Damn you Zaza Is it A tier or is it S I'm leaning towards A right now But it could He doesn't he's not like

It could be S It could be S But he's like the archetype of a two-way Dominate wing He wasn't a playmaker At this point of his career So he was still playing within his system he was very much like a weapon on offense score plus incredible defender but he wasn't to like set everybody up be the lead playmaker type of guy yeah but his his takeover on defense crazy was was insane and so the things that you would look at somebody where it's like all right i'm just going to go on a personal a run yeah kawai could do that on defense these are the times when teams were the person he was standing defending would just stand in the corner and not even try to be in the offense they play four on five on purpose yeah you want esther let's do it okay okay one of the best

two-way players of all time. Okay. Honestly, I think it's a bit of a stretch as tier, but I'm not mad at it. 2010 Kevin Durant, young KD. He was a pretty below average at best defender at this point.

He got better over his career, but I think when he was young, he wasn't a good defender. Amazing score already. He was already pushing 30 every year, incredibly efficient, amazing. Not as good of a pass-air as he became, but the scoring was already like P-KD.

Sounds like a B-tier. Maybe B-tier. I lean A, I think I think he's just a better Different tier player than Steve Nash Even when he was young But he wasn't well-rounded yet So that's a debatable

Yeah I mean That's very debatable He was flawed at this point of his career I'm gonna B Okay Okay You know what

Let's do that Let's go B for this one Because next up 2013 Kevin Durant A A little older A more well-rounded Yeah

We'll go A for that Even though honestly They're probably not that different But We can give them Do that And you know it's crazy he also won in 2012 God damn it dude

And he was also second in 2012 Put 2012 and 8 too Yeah just put them both right there All the Kevin Durant seasons go right here Amazing one of the best young scores I've ever seen He was outrageous off the jump If it wasn't for LeBron Kevin Durant would have easily been

The best player in the world And it would have been a conversation He could have pulled a Larry Bird I won three straight MVP awards From 2012 to 2014 if LeBron wasn't there Special Yeah like it's kind of he's Kevin Durant

so he's not like underrated but in some ways he is taking for granted with like just how insane he was at such a young age like we are numb to the insanity of Kevin Durant and then second place in 2010 as well that's so many second place finishes with scoring titles like because he had won four straight scoring titles

and that's ridiculous and that's not happening in Golden State that's not happening in Brooklyn that's happening early on in OKC and that doesn't happen today like you don't see that anymore I remember so many people specifically reporters in Oklahoma would give him so much flack about being Mr. Number 2. They would call him Mr. Number 2 always.

And it's like, bro, what do you want him to do? It's LeBron. I know. That's exactly. It's LeBron. What the hell, man? 2008, Chris Paul. Young Chris Paul, different.

This man was insanely fast, great defensively, amazing hands. Still had you striving to the rim. Obviously, he was a good shooter, amazing passer. Nick and neck. Honestly, right next to 2007, Steve Nash to me. I was just about to say B-tier. It could be an argument for A. I kind of want to go A.

But I, I feel like him and Nash are kind of like pretty identical. Yeah. I don't think it's super fair to put him up on. I don't know why Chris Paul would be hired and Steve Nash. I don't know what the argument is. I mean, Chris is a better defender. Okay, yes, you're right.

I do know the argument. He's a better, he's a better defender. At this, at this point, you can say he's a better score just because I'll, of like period, just off of aggression and the fact that like his team needed it. Playmaking right. You can't put everybody A though. Yeah, we got to put him in B.

We can move him later on. You don't think Prime Chris Paul is in the same tier as Prime LeBron or Kevin Durant. Fuck no. You don't believe that with your own two eyes. Oh, eight? Yeah. If we're talking about how good that player was in that specific year like yeah, that

that's the one. If there's any year in Chris Paul's career where he is like on that level for real it oh eight has to be I'm sure you can argue other years but oh it has to be so what makes Steve Nash not on that same level he is that's probably Steve Nash's game I'm using I'm using the defense as the differentiator

as the time as oh yeah Chris Paul was second team all defense at year NBA first team as you're as not only as like your point guard as the best player on on your team it is very rare he was 22 years old by the way demon I'm so I still want to go B but I'm very okay with A

if you want to go A I'll give you A for the defense front Okay We gotta be we gotta be cautious With our A place since from now on I know 2015 James Hardin The year he lost to Curry the first year

This is when he was a point guard The scoring wasn't quite as high But he was pushing 10 assists I'm cool with B Yeah it feels like B Yeah or is a C actually I think 2015 it is

It might be C actually It's C for me So this is the first Is it the first year? See the first or second year? First year to play point guard No, no No, actually I got that wrong

Because it was Pat Bette was there Yeah, you're right He was still listed at shooting guard actually this year But he was averaging 27.4 points, 10 assists And they had they had Dwight there This is this year too My bad I got this all wrong I was looking at free throws

It was 10 free throws I got it all wrong He was shooting ghost field This is pre-point guard revolution He's 27.4 points 7 assists His mid-ranging was in insane. I saw some highlights of the

other day back in that year. Yeah. He made the point guard jump in 2017, actually, when he lost to Russ. That's when he averaged 11 assists a game. Yeah. I got those years mixed up. Yeah, this is firmly B. I mean, firmly C to me. I agree. Just as we saw him get so much better. And with that being said, 2017 Hardin, this is when he was at

11 assists a game, full-time point guard before they got Chris Paul. Insane offensive dynamo. He was the offense, bro. Is it B or is it A? I mean, we'll go first I want to say A but I'll let you guys rock on that one 2019 was a better score

but 2017 11 assists the game is a lot It might just be by usage though He wasn't really better Just Chris Paul came in 2019 So he got less assist The I'm sorry You guys are gonna have to decide this

Because I'm going to age The 2017 like the playoff flame outs It just in my mind I can't separate it right now I understand that But this regular season I think if we went If we went 2019 in A

We got up a 2017 Right next to it I think I think he was just as good Okay And you still If you want to say He's a fraud He's a high-usid man

Whatever go for it But This doesn't feel like The most playoff important list It's part of it I guess We can't look past it But I'm not mad at it

Okay 2021, Oh man Wait 2021 Joel and B Yeah second place To the first

Yokish season Oh yeah Okay Probably B tier I'm fine with B just to keep it moving All right but then again

Joel NB was amazing Like if we're doing Peak for peak If we're not necessarily Holding playoff flame outs Against people Joelle was also an amazing defender

In this 2021 season He averaged 28.5 points Obviously he was a great defender He was All NBA's second team defense Hey man Why does everybody feel like A Wait 2021 Is this the year

Is this year Steph got third Got third? Yeah No stuff was hurt this year in 2021 yes 22 is when he averaged a bunch of points on that shitty team 21 he was hurt yeah oh because 23 i guess okay yeah the years are weird but all right oh no you're right no 21 is the year

step got third yeah he was hurt for 2020 oh wait yes because 22 they won the finals in 22 he in 21 he averaged a bunch of points and the team is trash he had the he had the hair stupid uh yeah the walkin boy so he's a great defense joel and b great defender 28.5 points per game 10.6 rebounds amazing defender amazing score one of the he's a better two-way player and a lot of the guys in a man oh man he was seventh and d p o why that year too if we're gonna put in b what's the reason i mean hate but like you know like hey but we can't put everybody we can't yeah you know you just you just said we have to be more cautious than we've added you know i think we do i think we put Chris Paul and B, and I think we put 21

Joel and B in B and 22 Juelan B in A. 22, he got the 30 points per game. This is when his mid-range number really became unstoppable. The ball handling got even better. 22 through 24, Juelan B was a different animal. The bagwork was different. Defense fall off just a little bit. For the sake of the bad work, I'm okay with A, I think. Yeah, he was incredible starting 22 onwards.

I think that's when the mid-range really took off. If we're going to differentiate and we're going to make it so he has some even splitting. I think that's how you do it. Okay. 2024. Shea Gildas Alexander. People are going to look at this and be like, what the fuck is he out here, man? He won a VP, man. He was second place in 2024. Relax. And I know everybody thinks Luca Dodgers was second place, but it was actually Shea. Yeah.

Probably it's either B or C. I go C. Yeah, probably C. Right. He got pretty substantially better this year this year. C's fair. How was this three points shot back then? He actually, I think he shot better from three last year, actually. Um, no, he did. did not. No.

He shot 35% from three last year. Oh, you're right, 37 this year. Yeah, you got better this year. And the volume's obviously higher. Okay, I'm fine with C. Yeah. Obviously, great season, but look who he's up against. He's, it feels fine to compare that to 2015, James Hardin.

This year, his playmaking got better. And not even necessarily in raw assists, but you can see it. He's reading of the game, especially in the playoffs, got a lot better. I'm fine putting shade lower. 2014, LeBron James, finished second to Kevin Durant. Oh, this is right after 2013. This is, this is S tier. Yeah, it's prime of LeBron James

This is his last year in Cleveland I mean last year in Miami When he was carrying around the corpses around him He was incredible Too good to stay there Obviously when the best players of all time Mm-hmm 2009 Kobe Bryant

Oh shit Damn Doesn't 9 See this is this is one of those Kobe years Where he's not He's not putting up 30 every night Just that mama mentality Winner

A veteran Who did lose to this year Read the game different LeBron James Yeah Young LeBron You can go have All that jumping over

People and all that That's fine We're winning championships That's what that's what's about I mean I'll put it in In B Just because it's on the In the second half

Of Kobe's career And the athleticism Isn't necessarily there So you think prime Kevin Durant Is a better player Than older Kobe? I feel like

Older Kobe's still In level of A I go ahead Yeah he's still Kobe I mean he's still amazing tactician. This is one of the smartest, best passing code we've ever seen, the way he was able to

attack in isolation in this lower era. I don't like him next to... Put him in this. I don't like him next to Embed. Oh my God. Lo-key, it could go Estier. He came off a back-to-back rings. He was still amazing. He hasn't slowed down at all. This is Estier. It's called me fucking Brian. The top-ton player of all time. Okay.

Here I am. Trying not to glaze. I know. Glaze. Glaze a little bit. Glace a little bit. He was on the first defensive team, too. Okay. 2018, LeBron James. What about that? This is like his best year offensively As a straight up Like score

As a shot maker for sure Finishing the touches Again it's LeBron James It's gonna be Esther We're gonna glaze Because these players are just on different level That's what it is 2023

Nicola Yokic When he lost to Joelle and Bede We listen You know how I feel about 23 I feel This is my MVP So A tier We can go S

well really okay we can we can go ask for 20 and that's the case 25 joach is damsure s too yeah well guess that's that's the list the guys putting up 60 point triple doubles he's elevating russell westbrook at this stage in his career to be great in 23 i've said it before and i will say it to the day that i die joel and b gets it because kentrick perkins was speaking nonsense on disney airwaves. Yo Kitchen 23 and in 25 is amazing.

Race relations. Okay, here's our tier list. Honestly, it just flows downward so perfectly. We had the most at S, the second most most in A,

third most in B and onward. Do we feel like there's anything we have to move to feel good about this before we end it? Who's the worst player on S tier?

The worst player on S tier, Kauai Leonard. I don't think Kaui Linder should be S tier personally. I think Kaui Linder look who he's up again. I'm feeling.

I'm feeling at it. I was in. We, We can drop it. We can drop it. Okay. He'll move Ku Kauai down. I think that I think that's a bit much.

Yeah. Anybody we should move down in A tier? Who's the worst per hour in A tier? Um. If you want to say Joelle and B, but I feel pretty... Nah. Because 23 and 24 are when he had his like really bad shit seasons, I think. So if you want to tell me that this version, like, I view Juel and B as like regular season-wise, like, that's a top tier peak.

Like, he is incredible. If you could have got it done in the regular, in the playoffs in the same way, we'd be talking about him the same way we talk about Janus and Yokic, et cetera. So I want to give that credit, but you could argue to me that 22 wasn't, he took a jump at 23. So if you want to put 22 down to B, I wouldn't be mad at it. But I'm also okay with rewarding him with A tier. I'm okay because the essential that he was that he was at though, like especially getting into his prime and his peak, it was, it was kind of nice and it was very special. So one of those does deserve to be up there. Okay. Yeah, all the Kevin Durant seasons. Do both James Hardin

seasons deserve A tier? yeah i mean we dropped we dropped the uh james hardin to see so i think i think i think we managed that correct we balance your hate enough yeah okay and then kevin durant yeah i mean youngest kevin durant b tier everything else a tier that feels fair steve dash and chris paul are kind of hard like steve nash is just as good as james hardin like i really want to go steve nash a tier but i know you guys don't want to do that so i won't force it i won't row the conversation, but I do strongly feel that if I'm trying to win a championship,

I'd rather have Steve Nash, not rather, I would want Steve Nash just as much as I'd want James Hardin, I think. I don't know, we're good here. We can leave it here. All right, well, there we go. That's our tier list. This was kind of hard, so I don't feel great about it, but it's hard to sell.

It's a decent. This is one of the, genuinely, one of the hardest TOS you've done. I won't be mad if you yell at me in the comments and disagree about a placement. There's a lot of subjectivity here that I will respect. Yeah. And there we go.

That's the end of that. There we go. And is that the last thing we had today? Guess what the points were game, jump shot, best of your jersey? That is. That's everything we had. That is the end of this long-ass episode. We've been here forever recording.

Yeah, man. Hope you all enjoyed it. If people were still here, what should they comment, Mo? Screw blood clots. We don't fucking blood clots over here. All right. Comment all my homies hate blood clots. God damn.

And we'll see y'all next week.