The Deep 3 Podcast - We Ranked Every Center In The NBA | Ep. 154

Episode Date: August 15, 2025

Today we rank the top 30 centers the NBA has to offer! 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 2:35- Top 30 Centers Rankings 2:00:01- tiktok time Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Isaac, guess what? What? My shirt is dry this time. Oh, you can't water yourself this time? Yeah, no. Why, you tell him, Donald's the one who cares? I mean, he's a shirt watcher, apparently. He was a lieutenant titty watcher.

Weirdo. I hope you guys saw the last week's episode to see what we're talking about. Mo does know what a drink. It was hilarious. I do now. You learn from that day? Yeah, I learned I got my sippy cup with me. Nice.

But if you're here today, we are here for week five of rank. season. And today, as you see by the title, we're ranking what I think is the second most interesting position in the NBA, maybe the first, honestly. This is going to be a good ranking. We're ranking the top 30 centers in the NBA. Hell yeah. I was in, I feel like I see this every week, but genuinely I was sitting down staring at the same like seven, eight, nine names of list, names on this list, and it's constant shifting them. I hate this position so much because it's so like vague, you know? Yeah. It's a, This is probably the most year-over-year difference I've had on one of my lists.

Like the last four, they've been like somewhat resembling the previous year. There hasn't been a ton of change outside of some young stars, you know, taking a jump. Maybe some old guys falling off. I think my list this year is completely different than it was last season. Yeah. I don't know. I feel like even at the top, like the, like the, actually, you know, maybe right. I think like the top moved around.

The middle tier for me, I felt like maybe the like literal placement was a little bit different. Yeah. But the way that I feel about a lot of these centers, especially the guys who are in, like, the middle of their careers, you know what, like, what their flaws are, what their strengths are. And I do feel like for centers, knowing what somebody is good at and knowing if they have a fatal flaw, that paints so much of how you see somebody. Yeah. I think my overall, what I value from the position might change a little bit for some of these guys. Really. So we'll see.

It'll be an interesting list. Before we get to that, if you're watching on YouTube, do us a favor. Drop a like and subscribe. Burnadi platforms. Leave us five stars. a review. Check out house call. Check out episode seven. That will be dropping the day before this episode. In that one,

we are going to be power ranking every single NFL division. So essentially our predictions of who the best teams in each division will be should be an interesting one. Should be one that you get to you guys real mad at us, yelling at us, because why we think your favorite team sucks or putting them second in the division will be a fun time. Okay. Let's do it. Now let's rank

some NBA centers. I mean, I don't know what to see. Pray on eaters, rejoice. You guys know how this works. We can get into this. We're going to reveal block by block of five until we reveal the full top 30. We're going to be taking turns talking about our list. First up is me from 30 to 26 of my centers.

I have Brooke Lopez at 30. How the Mighty have fallen. This man is old. Zach Eadie at 29. Nicole Roussevic at 28th. O'Neika, Kongu, at 27. Daniel Gaffer at 26. Holy shit, this list is already starting off to a blazing start.

Very different than yours? Pile of ass. Oh, because on Yaku's too low? I think a yaku's too low. There's a lot of good centers, man. You're right. There is a lot of good centers, but I think Okongwu in his like mid to late season, ascension and insurgents,

really, it really moves me. Concerting what he did defensively, how he showed a lot of offensive hub capabilities, although it wasn't used that way. Or he's prioritizes that he showed so many flashes when he comes to just being able to hit certain passing lanes. And he attempted to spread the floor as well. And he's like growing on that from the year past. So I think he should be higher.

I don't hate them yet at all. I'm not low on him. I just think this next, honestly, the top 23 centers, I just really like a lot. So the next tier is guys that I think have maybe a little more traditional of a floor that I feel like makes them more portable to every team. You know, like basically they're bigger run protectors or they're better. lob threat, stuff like that that I think I value a little more than the, like, I don't even how you call it with Anyaka, there's unique skillsets he has that aren't nothing, but you need to be like really maximize those with the system.

Like you said, the hub stuff, you got to go out of your way to make that valuable. You got to use him in a switchable way to make the perimeter defense valuable since he's not going to be the biggest for protector, all the stuff that I lean slightly like towards Gafford, who O'Neke is much better defensively than Gafford, but I think the play finishing of Gafford is being a traditional role man is super valuable. But he's outside defense, though. Yeah, he's not great a defense. But I also, I don't love Oneyaka's offense like you do, but I do like his defense.

So I went towards Gaffertz slightly. I don't know about Gaffer's asset defense, but he's not as good as Nyeko. So you're right there. But I do think his offense is super valuable. So that's why he's above the guy who I think is pretty good on both sides. But again, they're close to each other. I think one for one for one, Unyko is just a better player. You could say like, obviously Gafford.

He's one of the best, he's literally one of the best finishers in NBA history, bro. Like, he won on a streak of just not missing shots. I remember if it was last year or it was like two years ago. So I definitely get that I'm not mad at you slipping those those guys are super close I think they're like I don't think they're close I think it's I think Anya because like a whole tier Maybe two tiers above two tiers

For sure because I think Gaffer's just like damn near You have to use them in a very specific specific Simple simplistic way which is good There's nothing wrong with that But I think when it comes to individual skill sets And what separates like good bigs to like Oh shit like you're one of the better bigs in the league Okongwu has that crown

I love a good simple big. A good simple role man, block shots, catch lobs, give me vertical spacing. I applaud the nice simple bics. And I already see where his mind is going at for this year. And I know why your opinion has changed. Because you went through this entire year with no big. And the entire year, he's like, can we just get anybody to play the center position? And so, like, mediocre to you, you're like, that's pretty damn value.

Keep in mind. Keep in mind. I can definitely I can totally see how this entire list and this entire summer you're like yeah if you can just be a passable big

you can be one of like I do like you more than than some of the other guys That's not that But I will say Everybody on his list Would have changed my fucking life As an electric fan last year

Every single one of these players I would have prayed for Rousseavich to come on my team last year That's funny Yeah I mean obviously you're a hot fan You're Brooke Lopez in a playoffs Yeah I understand you like in Kong

more than I do But again it's really It's not even about Gaffir I don't really care about that. You can put them above Gafford. I don't really disagree with that. The next five will be interesting conversation because I think the next few I feel stronger about

that I'd rather have than Okongue. Okay. Who's next? Let's see who you got. All right. At 30, I got Kavon Luni, 29, D'Andre 8. 28. Oh, look at this guy.

20, of course. I'm noticing some right now. 28, Klancapella, 27, Gaffert, and 26, Mitchell Robinson. Mitchell Robinson is super low. Listen, I'm not the lowest on 8 in here. And last year, both of y'all, both of y'all, because I went back and I was looking at last year's ranking just to see like, okay, how much of things have changed or whatever. And I had an Aiton at 26 and both of y'all were like, oh, you're just doing way, way too much all this. You were getting on me saying that you had to come out here and defend Aiton.

And I'm glad that you now see what I saw. I still think you're doing too much. That's still too low. Aiden is not the worst player in the NBA. That's why he's 29th. He's not the worst player in the NBA. He's a 209th. Starting center, starting NBA center.

Last year, that's what he was. Now, going into next year, I think obviously around LeBron and Luca is going to be different. I told you. So, because he has the passes. Anywhere in that 24 to 29 range, that's where DeAndre Aiton is. And I do think that a lot of the Aiton conversation, especially going into next year, I'm with you. I do think at the end of this next year, if we look at Aiden and we're like, yeah,

this is about like the 17th, 18th best center in the league. Like, that's probably the worst case scenario. That's probably. And guess where I put him? that's terrible though because he wasn't that last year but like that's that's best case scenario playing with

no playing playing with with luka and once again everything that I thought about aton last year remains the same this year and you still have a guy who is trying to him going to to the Lakers is the best case scenario

for a reclamation project on a number one overall pick and it's like all right come on I understand it the floor of Aiden and what he was last year is grossly exaggerated I think I think people talk about him like he was Jackson Hayes like he was shit beneath my shoe like he should have

been on the court and it's really by proxy of what he's paid the expectations of him being number one pick and then leaving Phoenix and saying oh this is your team you should get more usage right he did not get more usage there the situation he was in why not because he was playing with no point guards in a Chauncey Billups offense that was complete bullshit a ridiculous offense that he himself didn't help himself with with the I don't know intangible attitude problem stuff that hasn't it doesn't do with his skills yeah completely phoned it in it fell apart we've seen that story before right so he's not beneath criticism for how it went but i'm not gonna ignore the horrible situation he was in for his skill set he is not the type of big that you can say

this is your team go get buckets they have used to get right you want to shoot mid-range shots right go go go go go score 25 yeah and he wants to play the way that's not how he should be playing in his and in his defense on that point there's like four bigs in the league who you would actually be like yes go ahead take all these shots take take whatever um offensive liberties you want from wherever spot on the floor so like I am with you on that. Like, he does, he does deserve that. It is, it is funny, though, how you're explaining the situation. I do feel like you are minimizing.

You're like, listen, like, yeah, like, he phoned it in. He had a bad attitude. All the intangible stuff. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it matters. Like, that's, that's massive. Yeah, I agree. You know, and so, like, for me, when we are seeing this year after year after year,

yes, sometimes we do see guys where we take them from losing, from losing teams in bad situations and you put them in a situation where you actually have good expectations, decent infrastructure with Luca, with JJ, who we all feel comfortable about LeBron, all that, and things get better. But also, this has been going on for four years of the intangibles, the intangibles, the phoning it in, the bad moments where all of that has been very consistent. And so at this point, I, at this point, I'm not willing to just brush it off as like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that was just a part of.

of like that like that was a product of the situation and like it's very understandable I do think that's who he is and so that's why he's for me a it's just never going to be super high on no I get it because but I think we look at those plays where like people screenshot a play where he's not moving around and it's like best screen kills it's hilarious people think he did at every play yeah and that's not how the game works he played a lot of possessions most of them were fine he was not being maximized offensively and defensively the effort came and went and it was not great like I said I agree but he is not People think, like, because again, people weren't checking for Portland Trill Blitz games.

He missed a lot of games last year on 10th, they took off without him for reasons that I don't think were because he was gone. They just put a lot together that people think that's every play. Like, he's the laziest player. And then NBA does nothing well. He still has a lot of strength. He still is a 15 and 10 guy. Not a 5 and 5 guy. People treat it like it's nothing.

And I don't think it's that hard to be the 20th best center in the league. And I think he's somewhere around there. And I think next year you said a worst case scenario, he'll be like 17th. I mean, best case scenario, I think best case scenario, he's like 12th. Like, he's going to be. really good when put next to competent ball handlers that can feed him the rock he needs to be treated in a play finisher situation not you're the main playmaking hub as an offensive big like he was on that team before they you know he went out they moved towards denny as a main ball handler and

kind of shifted things around but he was horribly miscast yeah yeah i agree with you for sure but also like on that no i think definitely next year he could be anywhere from like 20 to like 10 he has a wide range yeah but i'm just solely going based off of what he did last year and he's so like disgustingly ridiculously talented. There's no other dude outside of the top 10 who can like roll out of bed and have a terrible year and put a 15, 16 and 10

on like 55% shooting from the field considering he also is a big who likes to take his like his mid range shots. Yeah. I just hate like how like a day's go everything feels like of course there's so many like you guys mentioned there's so many times where he checks out fully defensively

and he's just doing a whole lot of nothing. He's setting like super soft screens. He just doesn't hit on on a lot of the things that you need your center to head on at all. And he especially didn't do that last year and then on top of that too, which is another caveat, and like, it's not becoming a worry for me because who the fuck

is worrying about DeAndre Hayden? But this band hasn't played 70 games since his rookie year. Fair. So he's just consistently hurt as well. So it's like Yeah, I feel you and I understand all that. And then I see Kinkapela above him. And I'm like, see, come on. Clinkapela, I can rely. I feel

more comfortable. And last year, I'd feel more comfortable with Clint Capella starting on my team. Get them, DeAndre Aiden. Last year, I'm doing it. Clickipella's not missing no games because there's a little bit of snow. He is not missing no games because there's snow on the road. He hates.

I don't hate, I don't hate, I like Aiden. He's a cool player. He hates Cleopella. Don't listen to this lie. He hates him. When it comes to these two, I'd rather have Capella over Aiton. Easy. Last year, yes.

I believe, I believe you. But you said, I feel good about, I feel more reliable about Capella. You feel. I remember last season You felt Capella was reliably shits That's what you felt last year And it was not far from that too He was not far from that

No I believe you're Aiden Hey I'm not saying 29 is like I believe you I just feel like with that logic Capela should be 44 No no He's 28 he's right above him too So I'm not gonna say I was the biggest fan of Capella

Obviously like he's there for a reason He's like this range for me right here Is like you are you are very good at You are damn near one of the best at what you do at this position. Coppola's just good at being big. He's a big body. You can grab rebounds, bro, at this, at this age.

His defense fell off a cliff because of injuries and age and all that. But he's a special team's player at this moment in time. Same for Mitchell and same for Gafford. Okay. No, I think I'm going to go down with the ship as an apologist. I'm just going to, until the day he retires, I'm going to be like, I promise he was not his fault fully. So I understand that I'm going to be outliers to believe we're going to be screaming by game 40.

Get this Bohemian off. my team. That's the vocabble use. Even outside the Lakers thing, I still, like, I ranked them higher last year. I don't feel like differently about him. I'm annoyed by the year went, but it is not entirely his fault the way it went.

And I think people don't give him any grace, which I understand. It's not like he deserves a ton of grace for all the reasons we talked about. But I think people take that annoyance and treat it like he's much worse and the floor is much lower than really is. Like 29.

That's crazy. Lutie is cooked physically. that's why he's 30 but he's like so much better in these guys I also think Mitchell Robinson should be a little bit higher but that's a different conversation yeah that's that's perfectly fine I have no like strong ties when it comes to

moving who's my first time because I think I've mentioned in this range too do I no okay okay I have Winter Carter Jr. at 30 Mark Williams at 29 Yonis Valenutinus at 28 Clint at 27 and then Brooke Lopez at 26 Wow this is all nasty man those bottom three did not make my list. Window Carter Jr. didn't make your list.

He made yours? Yeah, he did. I think. I'm not high, but he did. He made it. No, I should have put him above Brooke Lopez. Brick Lopez probably should have fell out the list. He's like, Wonder Carter Jr., he's cool, right?

He's there. The same thing for Jonas, like, that's kind of goes along, like, you're there of like, if you just need, when we get to February and people start getting hurt and you just know that, hey, I need somebody who's going to be seven feet tall, Jonas Val Chinas can step in and be seven feet tall, and he can do big man things. He can get you a very solid. 8 to 10 points, right? 8 to 10 rebounds and just be competent out there.

And for bad teams in the league, he can be your starting center. And it's like... The Tidie inspector's tripping on this one right now. I think you just suck, man. I'm not going to lie. Yeah, he blows. For bad teams, like, he can...

He is serviceable enough to where... Anybody is. What does that mean? I've never heard that be a strength of a player in my life. You are bullshit right now. You can be decent on a bad team. 100%. bad a hundred percent you are there's there's 30 teams in the league you hate the last three guys

on your list anyways you don't come on a lunatican jump three inches off the ground right now you understand this can be the 28th best center in the league and it's fine i'd rake 40 before i say his he's gonna he's gonna he's gonna show up he's gonna do his job he's gonna be a professional and that's gonna you know he will be healthy i guess that's one thing that you could say and that's and that's it because honestly as i was going through this list and i was looking at a lot of the games played. The centers get hurt a lot. Their low key is like,

it's not a lot of centers that you can look at where year over year they're playing 70 games, 67, 68, and Yonis is going to be there. And so I do think having an available big that can get you through the season, there is some value in that. So yes, he can be at the bottom of my list. Okay.

I don't know, man. I don't know. I think he's terrible defensively. I think he's hard to play with offensively. I think there's very little, for me, they latch on to you to say there's a trait that I want on my team, besides large and healthy. And I think there's about five of the names I could say before him. Give me Drew U-Bakes. He's large and healthy.

Oh, no, I can't pick Drew Ames. What? He'd be calling the police. Drew does? Oh. I don't know the background about this. You remember? He called the, I think he called the police on Isaiah Stewart.

What do you call the police? Like, because they had the, they had the fight in the tunnel like before the game. and there was a police presence because somebody had to say, hey, do you think he called that one one or was he like, security?

Like down the hall. Hey, let you to me. Either way, either way, the authorities were called on Drew Eubanks' on his behalf.

Okay. I can't have that. Wanda Carter is the biggest faller since we started this two years ago. Facts. We haven't heard of car like top 15. He had a promising year. Since Palo Van Carrow came in these doors

and on touches have gotten more towards him over the years, every year, Wanda Carter is just more and more minimized that, he has not shined to me a single time these past two years. He's gone down from 15 points per game to two years ago. Again, I'm assuming points per game, which is very, you know, rudimentary.

I was shocked when I looked at his, at his page. It was a lot of... Then 11 last year and 9 this year. And effective focal percentage went down to 49%, which for a 611 center that doesn't shoot, that's egregious. He has not been good under the room. He is, you know, seven rebounds a game in 25 minutes. It's fine.

He's probably the average 10 if it was a full 36 minutes per game, but... I don't know, the team just continues to minimize him. He doesn't shine in much at all offensive or defense to me. Like, he's kind of just been a replacement level for two straight years. Yeah, like, 30s a good spot. Shout out to the magic for having, like, one of the better center rotations that any team could say they have him. They have Mo Wagner, Gagobadatsi, and I guess Jonathan Isaac for an accountant as that as well. He feels, you're right.

He does feel very replaceable. He's higher, though, especially compared to like Jonas Valenciunus and I guess Mark Williams too because he does have like yesterday he has yeah he's had moments he is better than yesterday but um last year is placement is so yonis his placement is so accurate though it's because i promise you because yonis is the backup to who nikoliochish yokech is that one he's the backup he's right there at like 28 through 31 that's all the thing if you have the backup for the best player in the league that's the gap it is perfectly fine to be in this range i just don't It is okay.

It's not. I mean, again, the names you put below him. That's the issue. Like, who do you leave off? You're looking at here. Who'd you leave off? I don't even remember who my first comes. Is Gaffer on your list?

Yeah. Is Eadie on your list? No, Ead is not. See, Ead is so much better than Valjean. I have some concerns with E.D. Oh, play off PTSD. I'm getting cooked off the dribble by John Morant. Playoff PTSD.

Already hurt for next season. Yeah. I'm very nervous. Came into last year with the ankle thing. And it's like, you know, we've seen it time and time again with guys who are seven four, seven five, all that. And so it is, it is kind of scary seeing, seeing the, the concerns that you know are going to be there manifest themselves so early in his career.

So it's like, he barely made my list, even though I love Edie. And I do think he's low underrated, especially after the playoffs where people treated his worst case scenario where he's getting cooked as like, oh, that must be doing every game. It's kind of like the NFL QB discourse where people see you in the playoffs and forget about the regular season. He did a lot of good in the regular season, especially in the second half. I think he was largely above average, starting center. but I agree with you in general that I don't know I need to see him be able to hold his own in the playoffs against isolation when he's picked on to that degree

See what you said just now directly applies to someone like window Carter Jr because he had a good playoff series against the Boston Celtics and even like towards the back half of the year he was generally like much better much more aggressive and assertive as well again I'm not like shaming you for putting him at 30 but he for sure is better than Jonas Valentuna's like bare minimum yeah I could have put Wendell Carter up to 28. I could put him above Vosovic. But I know Voswitch is hard to rank just because like he does have some offensive strengths. I don't want them anywhere near my team, but he does he is talented in some ways. And he's existed on good defenses before. So he's not like a total anchor that's impossible to play with. But again, I don't want him on my team at all. So I put him 28, but it's probably a little low.

If I ask you right now what window Carter Jr. shot from three last year, what would you say? It wasn't good. It was like what he shot from three percentage wise? Like probably 28. How many attempts was it? on 150 attempts. I'm guessing he shot 17%. 27. 24% damn. Yeah. He's been

wildly inconsistent. Mind you inconsistent. Mind you, inconsistent. That is the second time in his career he shot 24% from three. But two years ago, I think this is actually the third time that he shot 20% in the in the 20s from three. Two years before this, he was at 37, 36. So there was a little flashes. It's always in low volume. But yeah.

Inconsistent stretch big, which is one of those things also, I think we're kind of realizing in the modern NBA, not as valuable if you're not going to be a real stretcher of the field like a lot of people were like oh when lively starts shooting threes what's going to happen that'll be like one three a game shit won't matter shit won't matter at all

I think we've kind of seen a lot of people less romanticizing of like mediocre wannabe stretch bigs stretching the field if you're not going to be like a real shooting threat it's not that valuable or bare minimum I think the bar is like if you're not going to say like three four threes a game like I'm not going to call you a stretch big at all

yeah I'd rather have a traditional big that's going to give me vertical spacing and be a lob threat than somebody who's masquerading as a stretch big. And if you're saying that, I can understand why you have someone like a Kongwu there because he is very much in that same vein as someone who's trying to hang his hat on something. And that's something that's been

he's been trying to enforce in his game. Yeah. Again, I'm not, as we say the same thing every year at the Congo, I'm still waiting for it to come together. But I do see the flashes of that being a special player. But right now he just kind of feels like a tweener to me that like isn't for him to be like the real maximized version of him, I want him to be a little more

aggressive of a lop threat and that's just like not his body type you know so like i i struggle with that unless he becomes like truly one of the premier switchable defensive bigs which i suppose you could on the right defensive ecosystem i'm just kind of waiting for all the tangible stuff i mean all the interesting stuff to become like top of the lead strengths okay okay that that is an interesting bottom five this is going to be a chaotic list we are all thinking about the center position incredibly differently yeah we are these will be insanely different list i love this next tier donovan who is your 25 to 21 oh my god At 25, I have Mitch, 24, I have Aiton, 23, I have Vooch,

22, I have Gaffert, 21, I have Yacob Perkins. Like, you really have got to have Gaffir than Aitin? I'm gonna do this whole episode. I'm gonna keep saying all these names, and I'm like, what? Okay. Absolutely, yes. Last year, not going forward. I'm talking about last year only.

Yes, hell yeah. Put him with Luca and, dude, one's playing with Scoo Henderson, once playing with Luca Donchich, and then obviously, let me tell you. traded. Luca had Gaffert took him to the finals. If the Lakers don't make the finals,

drop it 8 and down to 30, down to 31. If you hurt Lucas legacy, you're off the list for the rest of your career. I think with non-star bigs, like those two, like Potal, especially like Potol,

because I think he's interesting. There needs to be a lot of contextual understanding of their roles because especially in the modern NBA, these big men are so reliant on the system they play with. Like, you put Miles Turner on the nets or something

where he's not playing with Tyreus Halliburton. Nobody gets a fuck of Miles Turner. Like, your situation matters so much and that's the now I'm saying that's the biggest gap between my a and view you guys are like I'm not saying I'm making that like this the entire thing but like

fit is a huge part of the other list for me and how I think you'll fit with other teams how you'll fit in good situations mediocre situations etc I just think you put Aitin in a mediocre average point guard situation he'll clearly show his top 20 okay cool I'm not a fan of it that's really just it I have felt this way

for three plus years now I think you're soft and you suck how about that? I have felt this way for three plus years. Okay, so we can all agree that the Lakers situation is going to be the best situation that he's been in in about four years, right? Yeah, since 20 or 21. Yeah. If it does not go the way, if he doesn't get to top 12 this year, right, if it's not best case scenario, which is honestly like, it's easy to imagine, but it's also hard to get there and like actually. Yeah, it's really well.

Yeah, like actually put it into practice. We'll say top 15. Yeah. But like, if he gets into this situation and it isn't the perfect, like everything that we imagine can happen whenever you're playing next to Luca and LeBron and all this stuff, again, I don't think you're going to quit it, but if it, but like, if it doesn't work here, then this, like, especially for me, where is it going to work? No, I agree. Listen, if he can't succeed with any big who can't succeed with Luca Donchage, you're the problem. will not be in my top 30. Jackson Hayes gave a good 20 games post-Luca

where we said they'll be fine in the playoffs because Jackson-Hase is playing stupendously. He was playing really good. That's because he's playing with Luka. Any big ever can do good with Luka. So you're right. If he can't succeed with Luka, it's done. I'm over it.

Because that is, like there is no greater stimuli maybe in NBA history than being a big man next to Luka Danshich. That is besides like being a shooter next to Shack or a shooter next to Yannis, or maybe next to LeBron. Like between those driving kick guys, Lucas the best, besides maybe Chris Paul, the best set-up guy of big men I've ever seen.

So if he can't do this here, it's over. He's on the ultimate, in the court of public opinion, he's on the ultimate prove-it deal where, like, you are going to be on the biggest team and the biggest market with the best players, like everything is set up for you to have one of those years. And if you do not have one of those years, it is 100%. At this point, everybody's going to be looking on you. I promise you nobody's going to blame Luca. nobody's going to blame JJ Reddick for not being able to scheme something open for

for Aitin it's not how it's going to be perceived you know that you're right but I do think Redick is also going to mean easy target if things don't work so I wouldn't throw him in there but nobody will blame Luca but Redick he might catch some blame that's funny okay so you have total 21 I like that Gafford 22 back to a Mosette earlier and I put him higher than the yucca not good enough defensively for me to put him quite this high like I'd rather have Mitchell Robinson but he brings the interesting conversation I think we'll get to on this tier of my list where he can't play play big minutes.

Mitch? Yeah. That's why I have him low. I agree. But there's a few, there's like three bigs on this list that we'll get to that are like short burst demons. And I think I value that pretty high a little more than you do.

It's time mode on your list? No, no, no. But he would be a couple years ago, but he's two cuts. And like, I was, I was looking at, at Mitch's game logs before this. And I knew like that I felt a certain way about Mitch. But when I saw it, I was like, yo, this is ridiculous. ridiculous and it really is a product of this his his placement and the way that we are thinking about him is 100% a product of what the next situation was and the fact that jalen brunson is

not a good defender and then you double down on that and cat's not a good defender and so asking for 20 minutes of mitcher robinson who can move his feet any like just so so slightly better than than cap you're going to change people's lives but also yo you shoot at like 30 something percent at the free throw line and so that and that makes that makes it even harder to play in in short minutes and in short burst because I know if I only have 10 minutes of you actually being on the floor I can file you I can get you out the game quickly and now what you know and so it's it's very very hard to where even if you are putting him on on other teams and you want to give him 25 minutes a game one his cardio probably can't allow for it and even if he does then the free throw stuff

happens. And whenever you do push him, he, his, his movement gets very, very lazy and sloppy as as basically everybody when you get tired. But it feels much more, um, uh, push for, for him because he's always had some like dumb fouling issues. But when he gets tired, it ramps up to another level. So that's why I have him at 25. Okay. Yeah, that's a good point. I honestly did forget about the foul, uh, foul Mitch thing in the playoffs and how like, much of a distraction that was and how hard was to play him so that's a good reason to put him a little bit lower than I did but I don't know he's so great at all the big man stuff when he's on the court and like you mentioned the conditioning thing he's been so injured the past two years that I'm like if he has another reason though yeah but

it's from one main injury right because he got hurt a couple years ago and took forever to come back this year from that same injury well he's had or no did he react right before the season starts it's just it's a lot of just like general lower body in uh gotcha it is because like he's at he's had some knee stuff he's had some ankle stuff which was exasperated by who mr. and B. And so you've had a, you've had a lot of just like weird knee things here, ankle things, some foot stuff. So it's just general lower body. Yeah. I just think such a valuable weapon to have off the bench as this like insane rebounder finisher giant body that like has legit good instincts on the rim as rebounder and shot blocker that like if if there was any way he was healthy and could

like really develop and like take those strengths and expand him to full minutes. He's a top 13 center if that's the case. Yeah. And obviously he's not ever going to get there for all the reasons you talked about. but I still like that I guess it's a it's a question of like would you rather have a Potal who's extremely well-rounded really good center that's going to be available play 30 men tonight for you be solid or the 18 20 minutes of just like really like game changing presence down low and mr. Robinson that's a question to me it feels game changing because it's only 18 to 20 minutes if you were extending that out to 30 minutes and you got the extra 10 then you would see a lot more you you would see a lot more of his flaws so I yeah it's it's it's It's very tough to move them up. I mean, I remember like two years ago I had them much, much higher.

But I think after this playoff run and seeing his weaknesses still be there and still be even still be things that the Knicks still had the game plan around. Yeah. And basically their entire championship hopes, like rested on the fact that like can we have any seven footer who could play defense. Again, it's it's much more about the situation that the Knicks are in rather than where Mitch in like his true, true impact. I'm not going to lie. A specific group of people are going to be pissed at you guys. They live up north. And you guys have been who?

The Canadians. They don't care about Yacopoto like that. They care. They care about Yacobana. They care about Yacopoto. I don't know they care about Yacopo. And I think you guys are incredibly sleep on specific things a part of his game. Like what you said about him and Richard Robinson, I value him in so much.

think just because of his kind of mediocre, mediocre situation helped mask all that. But he was so good last year. He's wildly important. There's so many elite big man stuff that he's good at, but no one just really cares about because it's like, oh, you're on dispersion and you're irrelevant. And you've been on, like, very forgettable teams. He's just been a part of a very forgettable team. That's why he's so easy to gloss over.

He's good. I don't know. No one's disrespecting him. So I had him in the bottom 24 a couple things. One, he's actually never played, even though he's been like, a starter basically is over never never actually legitimately played 30 minutes and I he's been at like

29.6 whatever but the 30 minute mark never gotten there the last two years hasn't played over 60 games and I I think he's just very very solid he's a very good screen setter he's a good drop big he's really slow on the perimeter though he's did a burn by he's not like good up on

guarding up on ball handlers he's drop if he plays too low and doesn't have a good point of attack defender to fire over the screens can be easily exploited but you know I think he's a rebounder. He's a good screen setter. Very good fundamental drop big in that way. I think the other thing that's like very important by him that you're missing it on too. I think when it comes to big are small guys being a bit being able to abuse him that may be a little bit exasperated genuinely. I think he's a better defensive anchor than you're giving him credit

for. And then also when it comes to how he's setting screens and how he's able to there's only like maybe three or four bigs in the entire league who's able to use their. non-spacing ability as an advantage because of their passing chops too. And Yacoporto genuinely is one of the 10 best bigs at that in the entire league. No, he's good for sure on offense. I think I really, I don't necessarily mean small guys isolating him. I think he's really bad at guarding stretch bigs on the perimeter. I think if he hasn't to come out and defend a pop, he's pretty easy to get rotation

and blow by in that way, just because he's a little slow-footed. But again, I have him higher a little bit. I also like Yaka-Purto, so I'm not here to argue against him. I just, I don't feel ashamed for not putting him top 15. whatever. I think the guys above them is like when things are going right, I think the upside for the guys above them is a little bit higher than we're put a total. But he's good though. Okay, who's your 25th? 21st. 25 special teams player section. I got Stephen Adams. 24, Brooke Lopez. Next tier, next system. We have like a ton of young guys who are really good, but can't necessarily figure

things out just yet for whatever reason. 23, Nick Klasson, he's like, he is the definition of that. 22, Winda Carter, Jr. and 21 Jalen Duren. Okay. Our list are so different. I've classed much higher. I would have classed and higher, but I'm just simply going based. I know he's so much better than what he was last year. You keep saying that.

So you're only going off last year? Like, I'm not reflecting so harshly on just one year. Like, it's kind of like a year over year ranking, like what I think you are and what you're going to be next year. Like, mixed obviously performance. But like, I'm not just reflecting off last year. Is that what you're doing? For the most part, I'm going off of last year.

If I was to give him a jump, I think he probably would be higher. He would definitely be higher than Winter Carter Jr. and Duren, and I could see him into the next year. But seeing how badly he's falling off defensively and how it just feels like he... It's easy to feel uninspired if you're in Brooklyn over the last few years. And I've... Situation situation for me.

I give a lot, like, if you're planning over there, I can give you a pass. But when Aiton does it, shut up. No, he don't deserve no damn pass. Because Aiton's done it twice. Yeah. Enged into twice. I will never. Oh, my gosh.

Brother, they fired normally when you have standoffs between a coach and a player, they pick one. They fired Monty Williams and still traded Aiton. They said the vibes here are still so bad that you have to go. I will never. That transaction log stays with me so much because it is so crazy that the team that drafted the number one overall pick that had just been to the finals that needed some type of just like quick reshaping and had just traded for Kevin Durant

was still like, yeah, we're going to get you out of here. That's wild. So you were low on him because the sons are fucking stupid and made a terrible roster decision. That was a stupid trade looking back. Like getting Nurkich in the door, like that was a horrendous trade. No. That was, it just wasn't smart. Getting Nurkich was stupid.

I think that it's crazy that he had put them in a position to where they felt that they had to move on from him. Yeah, I get that. But also they didn't have to do anything. But like nobody moves on from number won overall picks in the first four or five years of their career bad teams that makes stupid decisions they had tried to get rid of him before and then the the Pacers you know had the off sheet and then they were like okay fine we'll finally pay you the sons had questions about him from like year two on and so I don't I don't think that I don't think that the

son's being low on Ait for the first like or I guess after like the first two years of his career I don't think that that screams oh the sons are stupid I do think that there's something there to where it's like, hey, the way, the way Aiton is moving, how do we actually feel about this guy? And that persisted throughout the rest of his tenure. It persisted throughout his time in Portland. And now he's on his third team. And I don't really like him. So everybody else, yes, you can get Grace. DeAndre Ait, no, you can't. This as long as you realize it's purely emotional. This is long as you realize that you don't like him. I literally just gave out like a five-year sample size of people saying, I don't like the vibes of this guy. And you said, yeah, it's purely

emotional. It is. Well, what you're saying, like, I. I understand the, okay, so there's not nothing there. Again, obviously, it didn't work out in the locker room for Aiden and Phoenix. That wasn't for no reason. One, him and coached in like each other, we know that. And you said he left. Apparently it was because him and Booker also didn't get along for probably reasons like that, you're saying. But also like, hey, coach, and the star don't rock with you?

Yeah, again, I'm not saying nothing. But at the day, you're like, they made this trade, like, no matter what, that was still a stupid trade that didn't work out for them. So, again, all these things that come back to the Aiden thing are also based on like, like you said, the log of events that happened and it's also based on like perception of how you meet expectations well do you and the expectations haven't realigned yet that he's a solid center that like has his flaws do you think that it would have been better if they didn't like a in do you think that it would have been better for them just to let him sign the offer sheet with indiana and walk out the door no i think they should just dealt with it and the coach was gone and they should have not had a

reactionary gym that said we had to change his whole team identity and do all this crazy different changes get bradley beale get nerk get all this crazy stuff even if you have a guy who was beefing with the coach and then even after you got the coach like you just said didn't rock with the star player that's an assumption I don't know exactly

what if Booker would have dealt with it I imagine that they would have just stood Pat and just let it develop and they just like have their team with Aitn Booker, KD and just continue to let's keep going and say new coach will get the best of him

and let's try to put these together yes that would have worked out better than trading it for Nurtage I can assure you that would have worked out better if they kept Aton and Tumani Kamara they should have been patient probably would have been because of Kamara

Yeah. Exactly. He would have changed their needs. That's Kamar would have changed them. I brought him up. You didn't. So I think, yes, they should have been patient. And that, again, I'm not saying Aiton is without flaws or anything you're saying

is incorrect, but I think it's all exacerbated by the way it went and the way defecitations haven't realigned. But okay, I like how you said Stephen Adams is a special team player. That's how I thought about him too. It's in my next year. But I have three straight special team players that I think are in that tier that I know you a lot. Okay. Oh, I didn't, I put Stephen Adams all.

I didn't put, I didn't put the special team around. So we're Stephen Adams. Come on. I didn't, I didn't put the special team. Same thing with Mitchell Robinson. He's also fair. Mitch is the other special teams player, one of them. I just think that center is a position of like, you need a rotation of Biggs.

And having one of these premier special team players is so valuable to me. Mm-hmm. I agree with you. Okay. Next year, I have Isaiah Stewart at 25. I don't know if y'all ranked them or not. Isaiah Stewart is fantastic. I wanted you so bad.

I wanted to do so bad. He's incredible. I mean, relax, but he's really good. Nasree at 24. Jalen Dern at 23, Walker Kessler at 22, old man, Al Horford at 21. Fuck, I just realized I didn't rank Al Horford. You know, you're fine. It's fine. He's pretty old now. Damn.

But I do so. No, it's not fine. It's not fine. I should have ranked out of her. He's hard because like any year now, it could be over. He could be cooked. So I don't, I don't like, that might age okay. We were saying that for three years, man. Exactly. But, you know, we keep saying that, but he is slow. He is slowing down. He is slowing down. So if you tell me next year, he's full on. on low minute player that could be possible. But yeah, for I guess

reflecting off last year, since I don't know what he's going to be next year, I do so think he's around this valuable level. Yeah. Okay. I love where you place Isaiah Stewart because he was so wildly good last year on defense. Obviously he missed a lot of time because through injuries and all that.

But when he was on the court, so fucking impactful and he like helped of course like off the course of shape their culture and being like mean aggressive in the short or whatever. but genuinely his like return's and his ability to just like move his feet

and shit like that so goddamn important you finally also gave up the gimmick of being one of those like fake stretch bigs as well and started honing in on what really got him into the league in the first place

which is just a menacing defense I love this place for him yeah he's just like a legit like really good shot blocker yeah I think per 36 minutes he'd average like two and a half blocks a game if he played full time starting minutes and for most of last year

he was better than Jalen Duren I ended up putting him a little bit higher He improved a lot in the second half of the season First half of the season I was worried I was like fuck it's over he's just not good But I think his defense improved a lot And obviously he's an interesting offensive player With the room finishing with the physicality

He plays with as a roller he can just dunk on people Doesn't have postrooms or anything but he can do The Dwight Howard drop step dunk on you thing That will develop continue to be interesting But defensively I think he made So much improvement over the course of the season From being legitimately dreadful In drop coverage like his deep drop

were instant buckets for the first two years of his career into last year. And I think he looked solid as time went on last year and really kind of figured it out that I put him above Stewart. But honestly, I thought about that a lot. I don't feel good about him, Reed, and Stewart are hard for me to rank against each other. They're all so different and all so flawed. Yeah. I think naturally Stewart just gets the job because of health issues and whatnot and the other

like incredible holes in his game. Yeah, it's just low, the lowest ceiling for sure because offensively, just nothing special. But, Nas Reid is, like, obviously, like, the shooter, the interesting bucket getter,

but, like, defensively at times, there's some warts that show up that I show at him. He's the poster boy of what you hate when it comes to, like,

your prototypical players. Yeah, he's, he's, he's, like, more interesting as a power forward. So I think,

like, on the center's list, it's kind of hard. But, I mean, there's versatility there can play both. So that is, I guess,

a plus to his game. But I don't know. He, the most up and down player in terms of his skill sets defense. I will say what helped me gauge how I view Nazreid. I have him higher than you, but it's not like insane. Yeah. It's hard for someone like Walker Kessler and I guess Al Horford and other like just very like super stable guys to have a bad game compared to Nazare. It's so

easy for him to have a bad game because he's jumping on, you bet your ass. He's jumping on every single pump fake that there is available. You for sure he's like getting blown by at the three point line you know sure like maybe here and there who have he'll block a shot once in a while but it's so easy for him to have a bad game and like once in a while yeah it's so easy for him to have a bad game considering how volatile his play style is yeah and that's why like like nobody wants to hate on osprey because he's so likable and such a cool interesting player having that handle and that shooting ability from that size but like you said like remember the early parts of the playoffs like he had some dreadful playoff series where when the three point shot isn't falling he just

doesn't bring enough of the floor setting stuff that like a Kester brings as a screen setter and a role man which Kester's also not a good offensively so that's a bad example

but whoever it may be as a more like traditional big you said it's harder for them to have a bad game what that means is they have a higher floor because they do stuff without the ball in their hands

that bring traditional big man value and a team defense and team offense that Rej just doesn't do that he's a shooting guard at the place center which is super valuable to have

when he's on that's crazy game changing but when he's not on you see a lot of games where it's the gimmick kind of runs a little dry yeah I mean, everybody else is cool.

Like, I like the Horford placement. Kessler, I mean, I have Kessler just a little bit higher. I think for him also, it's like, for a lot of these bigs, if we can get you into a decent situation, we can really show, you know, what you're good at. And the jazz just, they've been playing, you know, fake basketball for the last year and a half. So it's, it's, they're at the peak end of we got to get you out of it. We got to free Kessler. Yeah. it's like there's really not much like this in the sport I can think of that like if you're a role man traditional center and you're not playing with a good point guard that can pass like it's impossible for you get your game off you can't just like do it yourself and figure it out the mud and just figure out how to get buckets like you need to be set up and I think the fact that he has a reputation he has despite playing with the guard he's played with says a lot I agree if he could go to a team that has like if he could play with Tyrese Halliburton Jesus Christ he would be incredible top tip yeah similar I feel like the center

position is so you're right, I agree with you when it comes to how dependent they are on on what's going on around them. And almost, and it almost feels like so when I think about centers and how I compare them to one another, I feel like my mind starts to go into like football mode and it's super comparable to how a lot of quarterbacks and shit, how Tiles call, like they can fall off, not fall off, but they won't have the year that they're supposed to have based off of the O line being fucking ass or their fucking backs or other. They're blockers and shit like that.

Just like not being what they're supposed to, what they're supposed to be, you know? Yeah, it's like a tight end that doesn't have a QBD throw it to him. He does out there just blocking, not catching the ball. You don't watch it and feel. I know how I was calling you type in. But yeah, you know, a romance center is definitely like a wide receiver, a tight end that needs to get the ball thrown to them.

Yeah. Okay. But also to that end, on the other end, they're not defensively. Exactly. And Kessler is fantastic defensively and doesn't rely on anything. And that's why he's higher than Gafford. I agree. Okay.

Next tier. Mo, who is your 20 through 16? So at 20, I have Anya Kangwu 19. Nicola Vutzovich, 40% three points in the last year. Nice. Walker Kessler, 18, 17, Nazreid, and 16. And I have Derek lively. I will say, he had a ballot back year.

And if you're going to say, like, if you're going to be one of those bigs that shoots, you actually got to lean into it and do it. That motherfucker was doing it last year. We was doing it last year. It was much better than the year before. Now, do I think 19? no but he but he did like he did play much better last year than he did the year prior so i can see like where his rep bumps up yeah if you want to respect the skill set cool that's fine a little too

high for me but i do understand it it's kind of like those things like whenever we are like lower than the consensus on the bonus just because like the skills are there but you know it's hard to play that way so that's why i put vuce switch so low for similar like standards but okay yeah if i'm if i'm again if i was doing it from your perspective in terms of who would I'd rather have on my team, he's not going to be 19. He's going to be towards the back half of that list. He's going to be towards like 25, 20

or so. I guess is why he's 19 right now to speak. So, yeah, I don't feel bad about this ranking at all. He might be 20. That's why he's 19. He's making a list where you have the freedom to say, yeah, he's probably going to be about 25 on his list.

And it doesn't put him at 25. No, no, I said that if I had the mindset of Isaac when it comes to do I want this part of my team. I'm just basing this right now off of how you perform last year. Okay. But yeah, everybody else, everybody else is cool. It makes sense. I think, yeah, the only person that I think is too high is Vooch, but everybody else I can

see being in this range. I feel like Vucevich, naturally if you're a part of the Chicago, was like no one's going to think of you highly unless you're a young player like modest or I guess Kobe White or whatever for a whole lot of reasons because your best player is Busevich that's the ecosystem you're in yeah and he shouldn't he's not supposed to be the best part he shouldn't be that at all but knowing what he was able to do last year yeah it's not his fault he's important at work that's not that's not on him yeah yeah exactly and knowing what he was able to do last year having one of the better years over the last few years of his

where specifically very serviceable. He would make so many teams so much better because he has a hat to hang on on one end, which is offense. That's the part I don't know

if I agree with. I don't know if he'd make a lot of good teams better or not. That's the part that's difficult. He didn't say a lot of good teams. He didn't say a lot of teams. So he owned his Montchunis thing

where he'd make a shit team better. He would make them better. He would make, he would make, which team would make better? I don't know. The watch to Wizards. Okay.

Team that are 24. You know who was at Forest Center? Jonas Valenutas. Got to tell you. Those are real teams, too. They deserve. All teams matter. All teams matter.

They deserve some placement. They deserve some placement. For the theoretical center, that would make them better. No, but he definitely would make, I think he would have made Atlanta better last year. He would have made the Orlando Magic better last year. He would have made the Utah Jazz better. Of course, the Wizards, he would have made it. The Lakers better.

Okay, naming that tanking thing doesn't count. He would have made the Lakers better, for sure. I was joking about it really. I don't think he made the Lakers better. Yeah. But magic is interesting. I mean, they need spacing, but like there's so good defensively and he'd hurt that. Like, I don't know.

They're so good defensively. They need to give some, my man. I know they do. They need to be balanced. Something up. Yeah, exactly. But okay. Obviously, this is like, do you have made the suns better?

Yes. What the fuck? Yes. They had Nick Richardson. Richards. Richards. Yeah. I guess.

I don't know. What a disgusting conversation. Yeah. Okay. So this tier is basically my previous tier. So this is like, I'm starting to see where we differed. We basically just flipped these entire tiers. So I think mine is going to be your previous tier.

This is crazy. Even below. Donovan, who you got? At 20, I have Jalen, Duren, 19, I have Al-Horford, 18. I have O'Cohmong, 17, I have Kessler, and at 16, I have Porzinius. Porzinius is so hard to rank, man. Very hard. It's tough.

It's not even just the injury thing. He wasn't as good last year in a lot of tangible ways. But then it's also the injuries. Yeah. And obviously, you know, that really scared. Us not knowing what he has is very wild and the fact that the last two like major injuries or ailments have been things that doctors are like, hey, call up 10 of the doctors because we've never seen this before and this is about to be a case study.

Like they're going to, they're going to teach classes on Porzingis in 10, 15 years after the research is done. And that makes me feel very, very weird. And so when you add that, which is honestly very consistent throughout his career, you add that to the to the drop in play last year. I do think that the idea of Porzingis is very, very good. But even in the year that they won the chip, they went through the entire playoffs without him.

And last year, it was on again, off again. He was basically unplayable in the playoff series against the Knicks. Like when he's there, are you going to be getting the version of Christopps that was playing two and a half years ago in Washington where that was a legitimate good, reliable, player who was awesome. I don't know if you're going to get that. Well, you didn't this help the first championship year.

He was great. He was better than that year, actually. Like, he got hurt in the playoffs and they won without him. That's just a testament because the team was fucking all time so they can succeed without him. But in the regular season, he was dominant. Like, he was a, when he was there versus when he was off with a difference of team being a regular, really good one seed and one of the best teams we've ever seen in the modern NBA. So he was incredibly important.

And that's why I think last year we gave him credit for that. I didn't ding him for being injured a lot. But this year, he was just like slightly worse in every way, except shooting threes. He had the best three-point shooting year. of his career and that kept him afloat thank god because he shot 41% for three which is obviously great if you can do that do it it helps a lot but everywhere else he shot 5% worse of the rim 2% worse on flutter range 15% worse on long mid range jumpers overall from midrange 5% less like he was just slightly worse slightly less mobile has slightly less touch inside slightly less capability blown by people

slightly less capabilities of attacking small guys like everything to slow down a little bit last year from i'm assuming the injuries or maybe just bash you in touch for a year whatever may be and obviously defensively he looked a little more rickety too like i don't know if he's going to be just like losing a step or if it was a bad year where he needs to get another year healthy or what it feels like it feels like a combination of both and even if the health does come up you are getting older and so that comes down a little bit so he'll be 30 next year which isn't old but for a seven foot four guy who's dealt the injuries of the whole year is kind of old exactly So I'm not a hundred percent sure.

And something about the Hawks, like they just be, you know, just slightly cursed. So I can definitely see a world where everyone's all high on the Hawks and he gets there and like, damn, Porzingis is useless. That sucks. Like, that's super possible. Yeah. I think you're right. When it comes to, I could see a war like that happening, but also I can, on top of that

too, I could also see where you said Perlingas is what, 30? Because 30 can feel like 35 because all the injuries is like. snacking on top of each other. He had some undisclosed illness or whatever was going on last year. But again, the reason why he's still like this high is because he has superstar game breaking chates to his game, which is the ability of block shots to be a really good defender on that. And also be a sniper.

One of the three best big man shooters that the game has to offer. And so with, again, you can, I can also think of him as like a special teams type player. Now what makes it sound crazy is that he's not. there when you need him to be special, but he's shown over the last two years that he can be like a genuine issue and do great. That's fair. I think that like out of, out of whatever tier that we're starting to put like special team centers in, he's the highest because he's the, the other guys are special teams players

because that's just the role that they can feel right now. He's the most talented out of that group. And so like obviously like the injuries have played a part into it. But if you need to scale up with him and ask him to do a little bit more, if he is playing at that time, he's capable of doing that. Stephen Adams cannot go out and get you 15 points if need be off of straight, you know, buckets or bad work or threes. If the ball is not coming off the room, Stephen Adams is not going to, it's not going to score. Well, the ball comes up the room every play. Damn near.

So that's a pretty reliable. But I see what you're saying. Interesting, we're having the conversation because this is where my special team's list comes up. And Porzingis is the third player in my special team's tier. At 20, I have Yacopold. Now, I have a special team's tier. Oh, my God. At 19, I had Mitchell Robinson, 18, Stephen Adams, 17, Poizengas.

Those are three special teamers, and that's the clear order for me that those three guys belong in that eight and at 16. There's no way you believe eight is genuinely at 16, man. There's no way. I'm not reflecting off just last year. Like, I don't think it's useful to do a one-year sample size in this. But I mean, I mean, that's fair. I think it's how to give you four years. I think it kind of is useful to gain.

I think it's better than potel. I don't think he's better than POTO last year I think POTL is a cute role player that became really good and I think he's good so you view him through the lens of like look at these cool stuff he does he's such a good screen setter he's so good as a rebounder

oh this fundamental good stuff and then Aiden you're like you should be a star oh you're a good screen setter oh he's not a good screen setter but you're a good rebounder you're a good dump off man you should be doing more and we view him of what he can't do versus some other guys like a POTL

or who else is on these tears like a Kessler who you have there that we ignore that he's bad offensively because he's no lower standards. We don't expect him to be a superstar. So we say, look at him. He's such a good young rim protector. Where Aiden, we only focus on the negatives

and not the positives or he legitimately has as many good things as POTL does, Aten also does many good things. You can quibble. Where we have to stop is that he doesn't do the fundamental things really well at all. I think that is grossly exaggerated. He is not out here, not grabbing rebounds,

not setting screens out here last of days ago, laying on the floor. You cheated like he's not playing real basketball. when the low lights are there but most of the time he is a normal basketball player that isn't the strongest at all these things

like screen setting is the one I find the most annoyance with that I think would be the biggest issue with the Lakers he's a weak-ass screen setter that that's always been his game I hope he gets better at that with better coaching

but he wants to slip that's that type of screen setter he is that's two types of bigs someone to screen set hard and give their guards open someone to slip so they can get out of the password bucket he's a slipper

if that's what you mean sure but I don't think he's out here never playing defense It's not like he's out here a cone every play. Like that's not his actual game whatsoever. I think if Yacopoto was on the Lakers or even the Portland Trailblazers, he's passed that last year or this year,

he's making those scenes better compared to what ate the ceiling, not the ceiling of Aiton, but the actuality of Aiton, genuinely. Because I think he's much better, he's a much better defender. The passing chops are definitely like underrated when he comes to talking about his game. The screen setting and also the lob catching that he'll be able to, Aten's a better lob catcher. I said, he's a better lob catcher. He's a good role man.

He's a good role man. Not necessarily a lob catching, but he's a good role man. You're right. Yeah, exactly. And that's a very important aspect that helps make changes. And when you consider all those things,

he's a better player. He's a better player. I don't think he's, I don't think he's going to be a better defender next year whatsoever. Again, absolutely he is. I will bet money that he's going to be a better player.

Who the fuck do you think Puddle is? I will bet money that he is. He is a regular drop big. He's a good drop big. He is not mobile in the perimeter. He is not changing the game. He is attackable in a playoff setting by elite guards. He's attackable by stretch bigs. I've seen for years now, especially,

because I remember this specifically because cat dropped 60 on him. Every time Cass sees him, cat fucking feasts because cat's a stretch big guy attack off the dribble. Yeah. That's because his ass be out of breath. That's why. He'd be running up there. That's why. Pottle is regular. He's good, but he's regular. I'm not going to sit here and act like that's an unachievable bar for DeAndre Aiton. And you said last year he'd make the Trowblazers better in that scenario. I fucking doubt it. Everything you're talking about that Poto does well as a role man and stuff. Is Skook going to throw him the ball? Is Simon's throwing him the ball? the situation was dreadful for bigs.

None of their bigs were good offensively because the situation did not allow their big to be good offensively. And I think put them in whatever situation you want, if you want to pick Poto over Aden because you don't want the headache at the personality side, cool, I understand that. That matters clearly. It probably matters more than I'm giving her credit for, but in terms

of their abilities, I do not think POTEL is when it comes to the nuanced things, I think POTL would have been better over there in Portland because he would have helped his guard so much considering how good of a screen setter he is and how how well he would help navigate and make passing lanes clear. Ayn doesn't do that shit at all.

Yeah, that is a strength. That is a strength he has better than Aiden. I agree that that is something he does better. I'm not saying Aiden's better at every skill set ever. That is a clear strength he has. But that's why I'm like, I think he would 100% make Portland better. That's why I'm like he would make that seem better because he, I don't know, I don't have to talk about the defense things. But the offense thing is like, it's clear

where his value is. You're talking like puddles in fucking all defense level. I just talk about him compared to Aiden. That's all. I think people, the Aidan thing is purely narrative-based. The Hayden thing is completely narrative base where we assume he's a black hole. Purely, insofar, that we're into this level. Purely, in so far that we're talking about him

as being like a terrible defender. He is not a terrible defender whatsoever. That is just not true. He is not a bad defender. He is a flawed defender that doesn't give total intensity on the Trow Blades like he should. He has clear defensive strength. He is not a bad post defender.

He is not a bad drop big whatsoever. He can block shots. Like, he's mobile, especially for his size. Like, he is not a bad defender. Racking like he's a fucking black hole. That is not true whatsoever. I'm not saying that. I am saying I can't wait for October

It's gonna be cinema And it's not It's not even October Because we can go through the first two months of the season And you're gonna go and you're gonna be like You know what? Like he's still figuring it out I know Let's get to January

He's gonna see how much Let's get to the trade deadline Let's get to the trade deadline To the mid-gritty when we're on a Tuesday in Milwaukee And you got and you got to see 8 in play And also that's what I want to to see your, your opinion on Aiden. Again, I feel like I have a very clear opinion

who Aiden is. He's a bad screen center which will annoy the fuck out of me. He will have his lapses off ball which will annoy me, but he's a very good drop big for his standards for the 16th best center. Not saying he's DPOY level. He's a good drop big who is mobile can switch on the perimeter. He is not an easy cook when you get a guard on him, especially

wings on him. You can, in J.J. Reddick's switching scheme, he can switch and he will be very good at that. I can assure you that. When he gets in these situations where he gets to dump off and Luca, he will average more points because he will be just Lobb merchant with Luca He has the mid-range ability He is a good shooter

That is a tool to have When it's not your offense's main thing With him doing it Because nobody can set up the easy stuff When that can be a stealing razor Whenever he's playing in bench units Without Luca That'll be valuable

There will be pros and cons And I think it's more My whole thing is more Like the names below him These three names below him I think Or I guess I use your guys' list Since they're different Like Kessler

Not good offensively yet Nas Reid Not good defensively Vucevic shit beneath my shoe Defensively A Kongu tweener that I don't feel Is ready to contribute in like playoff level basketball

but he's fine but like maybe I don't want to sit on him but you know like doesn't have the clear strengths I think your list Porzingis special teamer Kessler

bad office scene list basically Duren I gave him credit for being better in the defensive in the back half of the year Aiden's a better defender than Duren

I don't know that's a hot take he is a better defender than Duren still he wasn't last year I don't know it's hard it's very true

but it's hard it's hard to talk about because it's just short sample size for Duren yeah and he played 40 games in which it was like a fallout with the team so maybe I don't know

That's hard to discuss just last year. This is beautiful. Do you think Aiton fell off last year physically? Like, no. If you felt like two years ago, he was a better defender, then you should feel like he will be next year. Like, last year was a weird year. He didn't forget to play basketball.

Mind you. This is the third Aiton discussion. I know. Every single year we talk about it. Every time he's coming up, we talk about it. He's most polarized and player out of the worst. He is,

it is going to be, honestly, like, in terms of, in terms of all narrative, the Lakers are first team, top team, easy. You got Aitin trying to prove that he's not trash. You have, you have Luca trying to beat the 300 pound allegations. You have LeBron. I mean, he's been doing a whole media tour for his weight. You have, you have, you have LeBron fighting against, you know, old age, doing all this

stuff, trying to show that he's still mobile. I can walk around a golf course, all that. And then you have JJ Reddick trying to prove that he isn't just, this like super wound up, you know, coach that can actually do stuff. They have stuff at every single position. It's amazing. I was over it after the last time I was over it until the Yakopoto was so much better thing and I was like no no no come on Yaku Poto I like I like Yacopolda a lot

we don't have to act like that's an unattainable marker for someone that's on the higher end uptainable it's definitely attainable I'm not saying does he want to attain it though yeah exactly that's all the conversations I hate this bullshit nobody's saying besides the screen setting thing which is real and the off ball lapses

allowing cutters like there's no hardly any talk about Aiden's actual weaknesses and his skills it's just like he's a bitch he doesn't want it and that's so annoying because there's real tangible ways to talk about his strength and his weaknesses he don't get to the line either man

he'd be going weeks without a free throw bro yeah and how disgusting that is that's the part on talking about the offense because he gets no rem attempts given to him in that offense it was all straight he's not even he's been that for his entire career it's not even the Portland Trugglers offense you're underline

you're definitely skipping over that and acting like it's not a true weakness but I'm going to get to the free throw line yeah yeah okay sure that's also he's not he's not imposing or you say he's like he's not imposing at all when it comes to what he is he's not what do you mean he's not imposing like okay there's another thing like what the fuck does that mean nobody fears he's not using his big ass frame to get to the line

say it actually like make contacts at all say he likes to be a finesse big in that body somebody yeah he is a finesse big finesse makes to be talented like rag like that's like how much to argue with he's not imposing okay i don't know what to say to that like genuinely You know exactly what it is. He's obviously not a good free throw, but it's also, he also, the free throw rate dropped in a half from Portland versus where it was in the Phoenix Suns. And it still wasn't on my high point. Like three free throws to one?

Well, I'm looking at percentage. It was 12.8 in 2021, 2021, 2023 is last year of Phoenix was 10% shooting foul percentage. Last year dropped to five. It was literally three to one, bro. Yeah, like, he's never been that. It went from 10% of his football attempts to 5%, which is like in half. 5% is abysmal. And surprise surprise, it's a clear drop off one from 10 to 10.

to five when he went from Phoenix to Portland and I agree he's not that's never going to be the best thing I'm not saying he's about floss I'm not putting him at five I just think the names that below us are fine starters I'm only 15 quality bigs I think not being able to again like hit on certain things you're seeing as your floor is like lower the floor is a lot lower compared to other guys who you will walk in you know what they're going to give you and you'll be happy regardless of fact his floor is lower for sure that's like his floor is 100% lower we've seen that in the past years I agree yeah okay yeah I'm not I'm not putting him I'm not putting him anything crazy.

Like all the good above average centers are above him. The like everybody we're talking below are like solid starters. And I think he's the best of the solid starters. God, man. Lakers tax is crazy, right? I've been, Lakers tax. Fuck out of here.

I've been doing it for every year. This is misunderstood tax. Misunderstood. It's hilarious that the most time we spend a single debate this whole year ranking season is the Andre and Rizakipodal. I know. Irrelevant. What are you doing?

Nobody's going to have a clear opinion on the side for next year. I guarantee you. 15 through 11. 15 to have Nick Claxton, 14, Derek lively. 13, Turner, 12, Hartinstein, and 11 Zubach. I struggled so hard between 10 and 11 with Zubuch. That was so I'll get to the name. Jared Allen is the name.

That is a hard debate for me. Who'd rather have Jared Allen or Zubuch? Zubach. That's clear to you? That's tough. At this point, it's not a landslide, but it is not a landslide, but it is clear in my opinion that I think I would rather have I think Jared Allen's more talented offensively

last year's a much had a better defensive year he was amazing defensively I think also if Jared Allen the main thing happened Jared down last year he played less minutes a little bit because they played more in Mowgli at center so that was the main difference in the last year in the year before when we were like oh this is an all-star level guy his production went down a little bit he's he's not just like a lob finisher role man like he's

legitimate talent with the ball in his hand he's he's developed that a lot over the last couple years this the the album placement it's really hard because he's also a guy where it's based off of situation where if he was playing on another team and he was the only big there, then it would feel a little bit better. But because you have him and Mobley and then you have two small guards that aren't amazing defensively where like you really have to pick and choose your spots there, then it's like, all right, are we going to play you to close games? But also the fact that like as Mobley is ascending, now there really

is just less space for Allen to take up on that team. So it's kind of tough. I thought about So those two are, if you was Zubwatch at 10 or even nine, like the name at nine, I could think the name at nine. I noticed there's a certain European knot here. I ranked above him just because I'm like, salute, respect your skills. I'd rather have Zubach than fucking Sabonis, obviously.

So if you put Zubach as high as like eight, I don't blame you. The real debate to me was between him and Alan, who are two guys I like a lot. And I was like, if I was starting a team X, I have my start point guard, I have my positions,

who would I rather have on my team right now in like a fantasy draft? I slightly lean Jared Allen, but like just barely. That is so hard for me to decide. Okay. yeah it's it's super close it's super close i think genuinely if jared allen was had the if he was prioritized like zubosh was last year and had that one-to-one relationship and was given more

offensive responsibility you could have a conversation with me telling me like yeah jared allen with those like ancillary skills that he has too is a better player than zubots i think it's it's close i flip every day they're even they're like i don't know what their two k overalls are but if it was up to me they have the same exact overall to me yeah uh zoobotch is bigger better post defender better rebounder Allen's more mobile can guard the perimeter a little bit better I think is a little more offensive skill in between like they both have their nudges neither one of them have blaring weaknesses besides the fact that neither of them shoot which i don't really go fuck about perfectly even to me okay but i mean miles turn seems right derogly seems right claxon

cool heartenstein is is interesting i i think that this is the right range for him but it's also like man if he wasn't playing on the thunder his his skill set and his passing ability and like you were talking earlier about there's a very limited amount of bigs who can use their non-spacing as in advantage yeah heartenstein is that and probably the best of that yeah and so like if he was if he was the lone big on on the team or even if o kc's like offense was set up a little bit better to where when to where it's not to she and everybody else he he could be top 10 yeah and that's the thing like we kept you can mentioning they weren't better

last year for certain people. I'm not trying to do that at all because last year when Hartstein's like a backup now who actually started most of the year because of injuries but he wasn't the 12th most productive center last year

but I'm just trying to gauge who I think are the best who I'd rather have on my team who I think provides the most value him and Turner is a debate for me just because I think Turner probably another player that we probably focus on the downside and not enough

on the fact that he has a quick trigger three at seven feet tall which is pretty valuable so if you want to put Turner one spot ahead and put Hardinstein down I'd understand it, but I also don't feel too bad about that. Yeah, no, I think I would rather have Hardinstein compared to Turner because I'm just so focused on like the floor of the players and I think obviously Isaiah Hardinstein's floor is higher than Turner.

Like Turner's bad games are so, they're so wildly bad and... That's something like a point you just made. You're focused on the floor of the players. I think every, especially Big Man, everybody has a bad floor for some extent. I know what you're saying that some people are more. I don't focus too much on the floor because I feel like with any player, you're like besides the best players in the world that are like they are the situation almost every player is like you have to be in a situation that makes sense for you so I don't like I guess it gets back

to Aden where I'm trying to have to like I'm trying to have to judge people over like what it look like if you're in a shit situation I try not to do that too much so like Turner is probably the best example of that but like I also feel like at 13 like anywhere from 11 to 15 that's the most fair range for Turner you know because I think like you You have the quick trigger three. You have some of the shot blocking stuff. But like the inconsistencies defensively and even offensively are both there where you can really get into a lot of stretches where his shot is not falling.

If you have, if you're playing anybody in the top 10, those guys can take advantage of him defensively, at least the guys who have offensive skill. So the center position is so good right now. I can't believe Zubash is potentially 11. I'm sure he's higher for you guys. Probably close to like seven or whatever. There's like 11.

Zubash is like just below all-star level. There's like 11, all-star-ish level bigs right now. Yeah. Okay. Who's next? Next up. Okay. So I love at 15.

I have Miles Turner, 14, Isaiah Hardinstein, 13, Sabonis, 12, Puezingis, and 11 Yakop proto. This guy's Canadian. That's the only thing. That's the only thing. I have my passport upstairs. Is he Polish? He's Australian.

Austrian. Austrian. I missed the L. That's crazy. I've come to a revelation that I genuinely believe Yakopoldo was the most underrated player last year. He's up there. And he's been one of the more underrated players

over the course of his career. Because again, naturally like situationally and it's boring to watch like players nail the hard stuff. But he's genuinely been one of the best at. So one of the best. at so many underappreciated skill sets in the league at this position. You know what? I agree for sure.

I think 11's crazy, but I agree. If you take off the ranking, if you look at this five in a vacuum, I could squint my eyes. I can see it. Yeah, if you want to tell me you think POTL is better than Hardinstein, I don't agree, but it's like, okay. It's close. Those guys are flippable.

I see what you're saying there. POTL is a little bit less gimmicky with like the passing stuff. Hardinstein does. Maybe you say it has a higher floor with the, traditional big man stuff and he's just like real sound that you'd rather have that than hard a sign or turner but then i'm like sabonis and i'm like i know i'll hate on simonis more than anybody but like at a certain point i've the point three months assists are insane that like i think that's over like people gasped that like fantasy basketball ass mindset too much with players

like sabonis but like it's not nothing i'm like subonis is so much more talented than total we are never getting invited but he's talented in the wrong ways that's the issue i know so i agree there's another thing like i i i'll be the first one to point out that subonis is like impossible to win with with his style of play he's also like he's a talent the wrong ways he still does a lot of positive stuff though he's not a bad player you're all right like he is again we talked about players who are able to use their non-spacing ways combined with their passing and maximize that subonis is the face of that alongside hard Einstein as well but it's it's like you said it's just so hard for me to imagine like what team would he be placed on and immediately like raise the

value the ceiling the situation has to be so perfect he can go to phoenix oh he'll be sure be nice that'd be a team a team like phoenix or you don't have any like true true playmakers you put him on a team that stripped uh and don't have no real identity yes he's gonna raise the fuck out of that for no unironically him and booker would be a nasty combination yeah him with the off wall garlic booker that'd be fucking filthy i would love to see him on the warriors i need to do that stuff but like him and that system would be nice that'd be a great way to That would feel disgusting. It would work, though.

Him and Dremont. Him and Dremont, just standing at opposite corners. That would work, though. Sabonis, Dremon, and Steph would be a revelation. I'll fuck up their defense. And Jimmy? I don't know.

Luni is not like some great defender, and they were getting by with him. They were getting by a Queen Post. So Bonus is like. They were not getting by going to pose in the playoffs. He got no minutes in the playoffs at all. It was cute. It was cute towards end of the season, man.

But, nah. I think it would be fine, especially with Dremont next to him. Anybody works a dream one unless you're a black hole. And like Sabonis isn't a black hole defensively. I don't know if I guess him from like how I view about it. He's not like walking bucket every time. He's just very, very neutral at best.

I think just with his physical limitations that he'll never be an impactful shot blocker or rent protector. But he's not like some atrocious team defender that doesn't know where he's going and picking roll coverage. I just think like 13 obviously I do think is the low end of where you could put Sabonis. because he is he is better than than poisingus and he is a guy who you can run an offense through and that is extremely valuable yeah but it's it's so hard especially like on a individual level when you are trying to rank people out once once you get in your head i can't win with this guy then it's a it's a very hard balance to find of how do i parse your talent versus your production versus what I deep down know that if we're going to if we're going to make the

Western Conference finals are you going to be the number one offensive like offense initiator are you going to be you know this this kind of guy and so it's very tough but I think we also can't treat the whole idea of like I know we can't win with you we can't treat that as like Bible just because like no that's what I'm saying like on an individual level because like obviously everyone has biases once you what you feel that that way about a player it's so hard to change that internally until you see the player win. Like, Sabonis will have to win a title for you to be like, oh, you can't win with you. Or like be a two seed like Sangun where it's like, okay, so I guess you're, you can win with

that play style. And like, Sabonus is better offensively than Sangun in a lot of ways. Defensively, Sengun laughed him, which is why he's higher on my list. Yeah. But like, I don't think they're, I honestly, that probably played a big part of it is like I had to put Sengun higher. And then I've looked at it and I was like, I can't put Sengun fucking 10 spots higher than Sabonis.

Like they have to be similar to each other. Like they have strengths and weaknesses. and, like, I'd rather have Singoon because of some style of play preferences, but they're in striking distance. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I agree. They're in striking.

This is very interesting, though. Very, our list are so, I've never, we've never had a list for three of them. We're all so different like this. And they're also, sometimes we have, like, two of us have the same list. And the one of us at outlaw, every guy, I'm like, oh, look at this guy tripping. None of us have any similarities. Yeah. Still numbers of similarities.

Wow. Wow. At 15, I have Nasreid. At 14, I have Miles Turner. 13 I have Derek Lively, 12 I have Claxton And at 11, I have Hardinstein 12 Claxton is so absurdly high I love this. This is so subjective of a position

Again, everybody Everybody except for DeAndre Aiden But like If you, because like If you can take Claxton And if we can do Some type of like White Savior movie where we like

Go and like bring you out the hood and like I take you to the private school across across the city, right? Put you in a good situation. You can get a D1 scholarship. If we do the blind side, but with Nick Claxton, he's awesome.

And if you look at his numbers and his production, it is so clear when you see the moment, Kevin Durant leaves, and you see the moment that everything in Brooklyn blows up and the stuff

that they've been doing for the last two years. But I really feel like if he's on a decent team and on a solid team, all of his strengths will be shown again. And he can be one of those, one of those guys that you really rely on, on having a center who you know is going to, you know what his strengths are.

And he is very plug and play and can do that for a lot of teams. So I, I like that. I wish he was a good rebounder. It's the only thing. That's not, I've been a little bit lower up into 15. I agree with you in principle. Like, we can save his ass. I promise you we can save his ass.

Just like, Aiden, I throw it in there. But he's such a, his bad rebounding makes me feel like the level to which we can save him. is like only so high where like I'm getting to be more I care more about that a little more unless you're like about the rebuttal unless you're like one of the best from protectors in the NBA

or one of the best offensive players in NBA and I can point to that if you're just good at those things like I need rebounding to be part of your defensive profile to be one of the best yeah that's fair I think what also helps obviously he at his best

I think he is top 12 so he could sneak into like the lower end at top 10 at his absolutely best because of what he can do defensively. Remember when he was like in DPLY convos, back when Katie was there too? Like that's how good he legitimately was. And I think what also helped the Brooklyn net see so much success around or just him

in general. What also helps like not, what helps me not fixate on the lack of rebounding is seeing how good he is on the ball when it comes to his ability to handle it during the frass break. Like having that random ass niche skill thrown into his game changes the world. for me personally and I will put him higher at his best and I think next I don't know if it's going to happen next year but the second that he does have a good situation maybe it does happen next year because they have like a thousand point guards

and shit and they need to throw a ball to someone like he can definitely get back into those combos yeah so yeah so yeah he's at 12 am I the highest on on nodsrie you are yeah yeah so I mean you had read at like 17 so it's like I did have me 17 I definitely did not somebody just had somebody just had knowledge Oh, yeah, I did. I had me 24. I had a mess 17. Okay, so he, I have two spots ahead of him.

I just feel like the, the archetype of Nasreid, while the shooting inconsistencies do piss me off a lot, having somebody who's 611, 7 feet, whatever, that can legitimately shoot and score and handle off the dribble and do all that stuff, it does change your offense and it does give you a dynamic that very, very few teams in the league have. and so I do like that from him and so that's why I had him at 15 Miles Turner Derek lively I respect them a lot but they are also two guys

where I'm like you're playing with two of the best passes in the league and so like I don't know they could they could you know be hired but also it's kind of where they're at yeah they're thinking the 10 all stars in the top 10 so it's that's fine putting them in his tears very fair being one of the best I guess star reliant guards that like

feast in a good situation is perfectly fine. Like I said, every big needs a good situation in some extent and putting them right below the stars that like make the situation

is completely fine. Yeah. And it's also giving them credit for, hey, you guys are in that situation and you capitalized on what you were able to do. Wait, so I left Zubach,

again, there's like 11 stars actually. I live Zubach at 11. You put a bonus out where they put them to 13. Who does you leave out of that tier? What do you mean? Like, because there's 11 all star level players on this list.

And you, go higher. Go to the next two? But no, who'd you leave out? I'm curious because, like, again, I love Zubosh. He loves Sabonis. Hmm. Wait, who was your previous tier?

Did you put somebody, Dumlo? Kessler. I don't know. I feel like you might have forgot somebody's name then. No, just keep going. I think we're fine. Okay. 10, I have Jared Allen.

9, I have Sabonis. 8, I have Gobert. 7, I have Singoon. 6, I have Kar and Thi Touts. Hmm. So you put, so you put a Bama on a bottom number five? Mm-hmm. Oh.

Then who did you? Oh, it's in B. Wait, he's not on the list. It's in B. Wait. No, I didn't. Okay. Sorry.

We'll get there. Yeah, I was just trying to speak through it. So here's 10th and 6. So you have Allen at 10s, a bonus at 9. Okay. Fair debate. Gobert at 8. So,

oh, so you have Zubachat 5. Oh, nice. Why are we trying to? I'm trying to lay low. Yeah, yeah. I'm trying to lay low. Yeah, yeah. Okay, okay.

But yes. The honestly, okay, so the biggest debate for me here in this tier was Sangun and Gobert. Because with Sangun, Sangoon showed last year, really, like, and I was, I was sitting about it, and I was like, oh, man, like, I really liked what I saw from Sangu. And I don't know, like, it's a real debate. I wouldn't even try to, like, put Gobert, like, low or whatever. I was really trying to think him and his offense, and that entire offense wasn't great, but he was the only one who can try and go get buckets. You saw a leap from him defensively. So now that you're there,

how do I feel about that and I do feel like he is really rising up there No I agree Gobert's also hard Because Gobert took a step back offensively But also defensively The team really right of their ways

In the second half of the year Obviously started really poorly We're all like holy shit Was this all a mistake Trading in Carnalty Towns It's not going well And then defensively In the second half of the year

They were once again elite And everybody kind of treated it Like it was just like Something that just happened to be done About the power of friendship And not because Gobert was back to DPOI level Because they figured some spacing stuff out

with him and Randall and their positioning on defense and everything Gobert was once again amazing defensively last year so I'm willing to put people above him like you said

that I wouldn't put him past years just because I think the offensive the difference between being bad offensively and like fucking atrocious like he was last year is meaningful

so I also dropped him a little bit to around this range I'm not mad at him I don't think I did that but I'm not mad at that at all yeah I'm not mad at that too I think I did this I think I did the same exact thing

I believe let's see let's reveal our full top 10 range at 10 I have Jared Allen nine Subonis 8 Bam 7 Sangoon 6 Rudy Gobert Okay

And so I'm saying Like these five plus Zubotch Zubach is really in this tier clearly Like I have them lower But like

The tier is here This is so hard to rank Like You put Zubach at 5 I'm not mad at that at all Like somebody tells you They'd rather have Zubach Than Gober and San Goubara

And I'm not mad at all But also someone tells you Better have Sabonis and Jared Allen I'm also not mad at it at all Those seven names Aren't so hard to rank Yeah And I don't know

I'll talk about Zubachianian when we go up but so at number 10 I got Jared Allen we're all in lockstep for the first time probably will be not one of the last times but the first time so far of this list nine I got ruddy go bear eight Zubach seven at Hongroon and six I got sang go hammers okay so yeah again like in the in this stretch I talked about between five and 11 mope Donovan put Zubach the highest end you put in the middle I put my lower end like what a hard player to parse between situation strengths limitations like interesting yeah he's he's a he's a he's a he's a fun dude to to talk about but obviously i mean chet seven um those finals in his head that's not bad

at all you know i think you guys obviously obviously it's not it's not bad but like i do think that i think you guys are letting your biases when it comes to like player archetype completely dominate this list which i can understand i'm just looking at this from like you know, 10 years from now when we're still making videos or when I'm talking to my kids about where a player was from the start of the career to where they get, I'm going to tell my kids like, yeah, like, year two chet was, he was great, but he wasn't like, he was elite, but he wasn't like one of the best, like five best centers or whatever it is in the NBA because he had to overcome hip issues. He had to overcome shooting inconsistencies. He had to overcome having bad hands at

times. And this year, that was that. Next year, I think he easily be top five for sure. He should be that but unbiasedly looking at where he was at this year and what he's shown throughout the two three years of his career if you want to say that like i think he's perfectly fine at number seven that's not crazy i mean the range is obviously he's in big but he's the second best offender in the NBA i think and that matters to me a lot you're all you're right offensively that was it's been a struggle from the injury so it's not insane but like i'm taking him over st goonsdale and i know rog's fans hate that they've hated that forever he was an all-star so they feel like they have fuel to their fire.

I understand it. Holmgren also will be an all-star if he was healthy. So I don't care too much about that. And if you want to say health is a difference there, absolute. That's fine, I guess. But I think I'd rather have the DPOI-level defender

who isn't ready to be a star-level offensive player yet, but is already one of the most impactful defenders in the NBA, even in the playoffs when he struggled offensively. He had a master class defensively for most of the playoffs. There were some downshuters, obviously, some up-and-down play on that into, to be fair. But more often than not, he was great defensively. for the whole playoffs the advanced stats bear that out his impact numbers are insane for the

whole playoff run insane for the regular season i test one of the best shot blockers already mobile can play drop can switch can help on the weak side like total full class defensively so honestly for right now him being top five is similar to when go bear is in top five for years where i'm like offensively the weaknesses are the weaknesses but defensively for this position it matters so much that that still overweighs it for players like like singoon who are good on both ends but not when the best offensive players are a position, not one of the best defensive players of position. I respect going for the balance there,

but I'm also completely fine going towards a guy that's dominant on one end. And I can understand your point about us liking the archetype a little bit more. Like I do get that and I will acknowledge a little bit of that. But I also want to give Chet some grace because he was playing out of position basically like the second half of the year. Like he's he is a, he's a center. and they were playing him at power forward with him in Hartenstein to get a specific look

and so it was for the betterment of the team or for the betterment of a specific look that they knew that they were going to have to use against a Yokic or like because as soon as like they use that against Yolkich we get to the finals, what happens, boom, we're going to now we're going to take Hartnstein out to start out the starting lineup

and we're going to put you back at center and we're going to put Kays and Wallace there. So that, him, I think the Thunder leaning so heavily on that lineup was very clearly them trying to do what the Timber was did a year ago, two years ago

where they said we have to have as many big bodies on the floor as possible and we're going to start with that and we are going to build because when we play the Nuggets we know that the best playing

in the world is over there and we need to have the tallest and the best defenders in the starting lineup at all times and then we can kind of move around so everything was kind of

a setup for that apex point once we get into next year, they're not going to start Hungren and Hart and Stey. Tett is going to start at the five. And I think offensively you're going to see a benefit from that. And defensively, he's just still going to keep doing what he does. And also

that's why, like, he is top five. Do I agree with you when it comes to that? But like, like, every, I can pull your leg and be like, yeah, Singoon, he was in a good situation, but it wasn't necessarily the best to optimize certain things, which is spacing that he needs as a guy who's going to be. He's probably

one of the three or four most physical bigs that the league has to offer. But also his second option was fucking trash his second option shot like 34% from the field giving you like nine points a game or whatnot the spacing was horrendous and that just generally mucks up so much that sangoon thrives as so next year obviously has kd and he's going to have so he he has kd he has dFS so much that that team improves so much when it comes to what singoo needs to thrive and be even like i think he's one of the five best offensive players in the centers, one of the five best offensive centers in the league.

That's why I was able to nudge him just a butt, just above, um, Ted Hongrum. So that's why I'm not convinced that the main thing holding him back was spacing. Obviously, it helps anybody to have better spacing. So I'm not saying it's nothing that that will help him to some extent. His shot around the rim,

his touch was off all year. He's clearly he, he made big strides defensively. And I think the thing Rockus fans talked about a lot, it was how that clearly took a little bit of his legs offensively. And you saw that fatigue and late games come out. That's why he's missing a lot of bunnies. I think his shooting touch had been bad.

And no matter what, he said he's one of the most physical download players at the position, which is true. I don't think he's a type. He's not like a attack from the three point line, need spacing to make those reads like LeBron type of center. Like he's scoring from post positions where spacing isn't necessarily the biggest deal. And I think he'll get that off the game regardless, no matter what. The shooting touch is way more important to me that he needs to improve on. I think you will. So I'm not low on him.

I think seven's a good spot. You can put him a six above Gobert if you wanted to. That'd be fine to me. but I don't think that it's nearly as detrimental to his success offensively as Homegren playing the four when his whole thing is his main strength as an on-ball player is he's faster than most centers he's not faster than most power forwards so his ability to attack off the dribble is hampered a lot playing the four and I think that's just a way bigger deal in comparison yeah I will say the the lineups next year where Katie is off the floor

and Sangoon is the main offensive creator he's going to eat though because I do like they will have like you said they will have at dFS jbarre smith is is going to uh it's going to be there hopefully we can get like a healthy season yeah healthy season his playmaking wheat for sure he's really good at setting up three he's he's going to be like offensively i think sangoon is going to have uh probably like his best overall offensive year next year just because of the personnel that that they brought in and the situation that he's going to be in so six isn't crazy i think for me i'm just arguing more for yeah just for chet to be top five but even at like at the end of next year we go into it and actually not five the five at the top it is very hard

to break into but sangoon offensively especially if he gets back to where he was he can do it you know like two years ago and some of the touch comes back he can be a top five i think uh he'll have his playmaking gear for sure and i think that's what he needs to do to like break into that i don't necessarily think he'll ever be a great score i don't see what y'all see like just make the spacing better he'll get better i don't think he has that much more room to grow as an on-ball scorer but I think he can get to the point that like sub bonuses at for those few years he's been dominating where he's like eight assists per game putting up triple doubles

all the time I think Sengu can kind of live up to that playmaking bill he got as a prospect where it's like one of the best passing centers I think that's the part that's most hampered by the lack of offensive talent around him and I think if you have a year where KD's the main score Seng Gets a little bit less hard shots so efficiency goes up a little bit and he averages like 17

points and like six and a half assists that can be the best version of him but I don't think it'll be because he makes like a big scoring leap yeah that's fair but I think there is a lot a lot of meat on the bone as a playmaker. Because he's really good at creating shot opportunities and like generating pain touches, drawing two bodies and kicking it out to shooters.

They just have nobody to finish those plays. And that'll be a huge area of growth. Yeah. All right, but the rest of the top 10, pretty solid. I will say there's one player who's like clinging on to top five and he is, I think this is going to be his last year for me

probably ranking in top five center. Oh, you'll put Bam? Yeah, see, I'm at eight. He's last year for me. I'm sick of Bam's ass. I'm tired of that shit. dude BAM plays a lot like Sengoon offensively now And that's not a compliment because Sengoon is better at it

BAM's offensive production is insane I forgot I saw some tweet where somebody I saw a no bag tweet I got to find That was really funny But like BAM's offense Obviously he's got more and more on ball As Jimmy Butler got older and then exited the team And it's for the worst

His on ball game is hideous They need to put in a position where he can once again be a play finisher we talk about all regularly season every year for the last four years his rim field goal percentage or percentage of his field goal attempts coming at the rim has plummeted continue to get more and more mid-range oriented

and for the first half of the season the shots were not falling and it was terrible he did get better in the second half of the season so hopefully he carries that momentum going forward but he's just such a jump shot oriented player now that does not generate rim pressure that is not a good jump-off valve actually I shouldn't even say good

he just doesn't do it because that's not how the team's built anymore they have less on-ball option so he has to be the on-ball option and it's just such a weird miscast for me And that's what I'm saying. He got imported at his job. And his company is being run by this old man. This old senile man.

Say it. Yeah, this old senile man. And so I am giving him one more year. I was also able to put him in my top five because there was an open spot. Yeah. And so that was kind of, that was kind of it for for Bam. Wow. I just noticed that you put towns at number six.

interesting amazing amazing offensive year I you're the lowest on him compared to all of us obviously whatever there's there's a lot of things I will say I was shocked throughout all of last year because one cat was who been he was he was he was he was playing so well throughout the entire year I was just very surprised that a big man who wasn't great offense or who wasn't a great defensively was as embraced as he was by by the fan base i actually was like kind of surprised by that but in the playoffs and mind you it's also it's a two-way thing like it's brunson's fault that cat's defense is exposed and it's also cat's fault that brunson's exposed as well like it goes hand in hand and so i don't want to put it all on cat and not

give jaylon brunson any flat because that's real but at least brunson can step in and try and take a charge and the the foul trouble from cat still was there and it it gets very annoying because there are times like after every after every game whenever he gets into into foul trouble after a game some former players come talk to him he's like yo bro like you got to stop foul it and cat's like word word he's like he's like word well I know I got I got to stop this Stop doing it. Like, relax. Like, I, this is the first year.

Clearly, Gobert's number six for me. So this is the first year I've ever ranked Towns above Gobert. Yeah. It was just because Gobert's offense was so bad this year. And Towns had the best year offensively. And I gave him a little bit of credit. But yeah, I share your sentiment. It got, I mean, because we're talking about Mitch Robinson.

It got to the point where 20 minutes of Mitch Robinson was going to save the next season. And we kind of, you know, like throughout the entire year, we kind of knew what the, what the fate was and if, you know, if the first two games in Boston didn't go the way that they did and they didn't rise to the occasion and the Celtics didn't choke and all that. And it was like a perfect storm for them to go and win that series. But we had a very clear picture of, okay, this team is probably going to look a certain type of way because of the limitations at the one and the five. Man, I wish I'd rather have Zee watched them, BAM for this past year. Oh, this past year for sure. I'm giving BAM credit. It's something. If you put BAM, if, like, if BAM was

this is obviously but if he was in Aten's place next to Luca Bam would be in a different conversation with a good pastor like that but even like Cade put him next to Cade band would life would be entirely different if he had a good person to set up

the big man and like force him to do that I don't know if it's coaching that needs to be done to like actually that's wrong way to phrase it because I'm not doubting Spolshra but I don't know if like they're empowering him to play this way

or they need him to he wants to whatever the whoever's pushing the levers to get him to be this on ball score I hate it and if you're in a if we were in a part in the multi verse where there was a different coach that was like, no, you're going to play like you did when you were at 22, I feel like we're in a different conversation.

But the way it's training, I don't even see it changing. That's the problem. But I think next year we'll see the exact same thing, but I don't necessarily see him getting good at that. I mean, probably just because the offensive talent and the offensive creation isn't amazing. So we probably will see it. But he is an all world defender. So I still had to keep him high.

But I don't know. It's tough. Because I really fucking hate his offense now. Like, it's all it's, it's not cool. I guess it's kind of Gober level. He's more talented offensive than Gober. obviously but like I think he's not providing offensive value right now in a way that leads to winning so like he's more talented clearly and like if you put him in that shoe

and minimizes role he'd be better offensive than gobert but I think for their roles in their team I don't even know I don't know if he's a better one option than gober is a better fifth option right now you know what I mean like for their role of like the screen setter roller guy let's put gobert as the third option offensively and let's see what happens well again you never do that you know it's not his role exactly and so like that's the that's the that's the point here and you're making it And whoever is pushing the levers and because of how the team is constructed, he has, he is like very, he's talented. We've seen glimpses of it like two years ago where like you were like, okay, maybe he can step out.

Maybe he can't create. We've seen some of that. But maybe all of that is just much better you doing it as a tertiary offensive option rather than you being the number one option because you know, you know exactly what that's going to lead to. It's going to lead to you guys being in the playing, being 40 and 42 and then getting swept in the first round. And now the reason why I'm scared is because the East of Conference is so bad. And the Miami here are going to convince themselves that they have a chance. And that chance is going to run through Bam, taking another step offensively and Tyler Hero doing what he does. And they're going to try and push that.

And they're going to be 40 and 42. They're going to get to the 60 because the East is trash. That's so bad. And they're going to move forward. Yeah. And honestly, it's not going to get better either because I think they're going to keep starting where at Center. And Bam's going to be like power forward full time. So that's just more reason to continue to play this jumpshot oriented game

He's just out Harrington now That's just how they're gonna be deploying him And like listen man out of Harrington with DIPI level defense is a great player But I don't know I don't love it as much as I did a few years ago Maybe he are moving but they're not going nowhere bro Yeah man this is so hard I don't feel good about any of these I don't feel good about my order and I would don't feel good about what I would change either

Because it's so difficult I've never struggled as much with it here I'd be if I was to switch up some right now I think I'll I would easily, like, probably want to bump up Zubas to maybe five, but I don't know, actually. But Zubash is hard. Let's really, let's go. Let's go to the top of. Yeah. Okay.

Top five. Let's reveal them all. I have towns at five, home green at four, and beat at three, Wembe at two, Yolkich at one. I have Audubio at five. I have towns at four, Wembe at three, Mbid at two, and Yokich at one. I have Zubach at five, Bama at four, Chet at three, Wembe at two, Wembe at two. Yoki Chow at one. Weren't beat at.

I just didn't feel like doing the exercise. Yeah, fair enough. I'd rather you do this, honestly. I really like... Low was your birth pressure? Yeah, I didn't even feel like doing the stuff. We've talked about it so much. We're going to talk about it.

Yeah. And I just, it didn't... He's seen the article. He has some shame to his game now. I put him... I'm doing what I always do, what I do with Zion. That max interview changed me. I'm doing the same thing I do with that major player.

That's so real. Now I play It really is like I consider doing the same thing With Zion last week too Where I was like I don't I don't know if I want to Come in here and yell for 10 minutes

About how About how you're not available Yeah I did the same thing I do with Zion Where I gauged what he was When he was on the court And I tried to say Take away the injury thing

Because that's who the fuck knows How to parse that With Joelle and beat especially How good were you when you played And in previous years When he played he was MVP level He wasn't that this year I think he averaged a low

Under 24 mostly because of just like lower usage and he looked a step slow he looked rusty in every way everything was a little bit worse i would still clearly rather have that than what home grid in town did this year but wendy was good enough when he was healthy that i said okay i'll put wendy above imb with all the question marks obviously and just what he was a slightly diminished version of himself maybe embit comes back next year and for the 35 games he played he's once again averaging 30 being a superstar on both ends maybe he'll look back up the two who knows but i feel pretty safe that when they were available wendy was better last year but outside of that i can't put him beat any lower than that yeah that and that's yeah at this point i'm just like hanging on hope when it comes to the and beat stuff clearly i don't have any like super strong narrative other than this is just like similar to how i placed lillard last year or in our point guard rankings i this is just simply like a damn rare legacy fit for me because okay i see i seen you two years ago and he was averaging like more points permitted than will or something absurd stat like that he was averaging like 35 points coming off of his MVP seasons he was just moving difference and then coming into this year

have it be so wonky wearing like a whole goddamn cast on his leg basically sucks i'm not going to rank him out of the top five until we actually see him on the court being washed you know and he wasn't quite that this year again he wasn't quite MVP level so i lowered him below wendy but until we see him be a subpar player when he's on the court i'm not going to lower him too much just out of like principle of how i treat the other injured guys but again if we were doing a who you'd want on your team like a value list he wouldn't be top 30 because i don't think we're going to see a single year where he plays over 50 games for the rest of his career so he wouldn't i wouldn't touch him with a 10-foot pole if it comes to team building and who i

physically want my team in like a real life scenario but i treat these thought exercises and the ranking players of who would rather have i had to win one game today if i had to win a single game who's better one game give me a meat's toll number three clearly uh yeah uh i just and i don't A lot of times, like, you try to do it in a vacuum. A lot of times when I do the tiebreaker, it is like, but I rather just have this guy on my team. And so for, for Embed, it's also not that. Like, I'm also just like, I have no idea when the next time we're going to see him play basketball.

Yeah. And again, you know, going forward, like, there's, he literally could come back again and be terrible. We don't know. Or it could be a god again. We don't know. Like, it is so unbelievably unknown that if there was ever a year to just not rank him, this would be the one. Because who the fuck knows? I think we did this couple years ago at Porzengis

where we just didn't rank him because it was like, who the fuck knows the Porzegas is going to be like? And he came back solid, but it's tough. All right. Can I get off my Zubodg's Glazer real quick?

Go for it. Listen, so Zubach is top five. Zubach defensively is one of the best bigs in the league. Offensively, obviously he's in a great situation, having a passer like James Harden. Chris Paul is there this year. So no matter what,

whenever Zubach is on the floor in whatever combination, he's going to have one of the best passers, literally of all time on the floor with him. Offensively, especially as the clippers have evolved to go without Paul George, you have Kauai for, you know, 40 to 50 games a year, you're going to have Bradley Bill for 40 to 50 games a year. All of these moving wing pieces are in and out.

Zubach has been able to grow and expand his offensive game. Every single year he gets better and he has improved at, do I want to say this? Yeah. honestly like at an exponential rate that he's a he's improved at and so i do think that even among among these among the top five the only two people who i think will improve more than him are wendy and chet and that's just because they're 20 and 21 or you know they're they're in their young 20s and zubatch is like further along in his career but if you tell me next year

zubach is going to take another leap off offensively and he's going to be even better you're looking at one of these centers that putting him on any team is going to instantly make them one of the five four best teams in the conference the clubbers won 50 games and like yes james hardin was amazing and he was setting everything up he was also mad and efficient and they were allowed to do a lot of the things defensively because you have great wings but as you see especially on the next side you can have like good defensive wings you need a big to anchor that in the back zubach is doing that and he's allowing the clippers to have one of the better defenses in the entire league.

And he's such an insane rebounding year. Like, it was such an asset to them that he was so just dominant on the boards. All that's true. And I don't feel bad about him in a vacuum being the fifth best center. It just comes back to how many players also could be the fifth best center right now. Yeah. Like, I don't feel bad at all about you picking him over any of those conversations, but also vice versa. Like, like, so you put him right above towns because he's better defensively as a main

different shader? Yeah. Okay. That's fair. But, like, also, I guess. the argument against him would be that like yes he had made a scoring leap but also you mentioned it was because hardin was there and like that enabled it that he was about as good as he was before but they played more through him than hardin whereas you know towns is still much better offensively

much more play through him guys so like that's where it's hard to parse that but again i'm not mad at at all like he was all defense which i know that's the hard thing for me is yeah if he was all defense every year that's what i knew he would be then yes i'd put him this high i'm like was that a one year the team defense was insane he was the best player on it so he got that nod because the Clippers team defense was ridiculous and a lot of times centers get the nod for a team accomplishment

if he comes back and does that again this year then he'll fly my rankings if I can say this is one of the best defensive anchors that year by year will be a walking top five to ten defense clearly he should be above towns clearly he should be above Sabona as Jared Allen every rank below him that will be the case for sure but I'm not sure if I should

believe that year by year yet so I believe it now because even Even last year, going into last year, like, we were talking about Zubbite as like, oh, this is one of like the best drop bids in the league. Like he's, he's had a reputation of being one of the better defensive bigs in the league. And so as we've seen that progress, now this year finally got to a spot where he did get the recognition. But also because the defensive teams are so small because you only have two instead of instead of three, there's a lot of guys that can. be an all defense level player. We had 15 players instead of 10 that get that nod.

And I shouldn't make, sorry, I shouldn't make it sound like that's the only reason. I mean like on that level because I don't think in previous years he was all defense level. Yeah. I'm saying like even going into this next year, even if he's not on an all defensive team, I do still think that he can be kind of close to that level. And he just might not, you know, get the nod because like, Wemby's going to be, hopefully, you know, Wemby's healthy, Chet's going to be healthy. That's two spots already gone.

And so obviously those guys are better than him to hire than him, whatever. But once you get past all of that, we had a third team, he can easily, on a year-to-year basis, be one of the 15 best defenders in the league and be that level. Definitely. And be like that caliber of player, I just, I just think that, like, him getting that non coming off that year, there was every year where when you do have to give him that credit and you have the track record of him improving, I do feel kind of safe with the trajectory that he's on.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. if we're doing like the way like especially as most described is like reflecting just last year totally fine with that and if you if you truly believe it would be that again going forward which I don't disagree with that's totally fair then I get it

I guess it's just like the names I was debating against I feel a little bit a little bit more sure of what they are whereas like I don't doubt Zubatch I love Zubach too but it's like I don't know like 27 year old career year it's just kind of hard to like to put that in your head as concrete versus other guys who have been like

a more clear trajectory they are a star I've been a star for a little while and that's not fair to him at all that's not like smart that's just like the hard bias he's working against him right now yeah you you can say oh 27 career a year but you also say 27 like 27 stepping into your pride yeah we've seen that plenty of like someone like i guess the most random player who i can think of who just like had the most random assertness of being into like a legit star little tier star but still star someone like Kyle larry like he he's been around the league for a minute and he's and he didn't necessarily pop until his like second year

I believe off top of my head in Toronto. And that's when he was like established his career as one of the better point guards in the mid-2000s, mid-2010. So if he's on like that similar arc, I can 100% see something like that. So of all that shoe wise, bam and Shihong and him both of him. I feel like you described somebody that,

damn, that thunder's crazy. It's storming in Chicago. Okay, so Chet, super high on chat. I just think Chet is one of the most talented players. Yeah. Like you mentioned earlier, archetype thing we're stuck up on when you are the archetype and it is incredibly valuable it's pretty important and and listen the same thing happened to me with with palo where i like i saw the

first five games i was like i've seen all i need to see the first the first uh like 10 games of chet where he was hooping offensively there's there's not a doubt in my mind that he can be not even competent an above average offensive player in in the league and so and so i i know it i know it's there I know that he's... But is it there yet, though? That's what I'm saying. I don't think it's there yet. This is the first off...

Think about this, right? This is the first off season that Chet's going to have where he's not rehabbing. And so, honestly, the biggest knock that I would have on Chet is the thing that you've been saying for a while that I've just pushed it back

just because I like him so much. But if you want to say that the injury concerns for you is why you drop him, I do understand that because it is why this is going into year three and he's, again, first summer that he has had to rehab.

He comes into this year, off the championship he's actually healthy the hip is going to be okay i fully expect that chet's going to walk in and be given 20 and 10 d p he was going to be the d p o why he was ahead of wendy when he was playing for those 10 games well they got to caught him but yeah he was in the running yeah yeah but he was he was up there so you know that you're getting d p oi level defense you know that the offense is going to be better and so that's why i see your point so i i do think ched already has that even just because the year before as a rookie he he's moved substantially better than he did this year post hit break like we've seen it in his first

instance here and i guess it's a same thing i've been saying for all these lists i want to be contextual with this i don't want to just be reflective of what happened and only look at the outcome and rank them and maybe maybe this isn't logically applied to everybody else but like i feel nothing certain in his world i don't want to speak with too much certainty but i feel damn when you're 100% certain that he'll walk in the next year if there's no more injuries the summer and he comes in 100% healthy has a full summer to develop i feel certain he will look how we he would look to start this past year. Well, he would average 18 to 20, whatever may be.

No, it was like 24. He was hooping. No, but he wasn't going to sustain that. I don't think. But whatever the number is, call it what you want. He will look substantially better. In J-dub's offense, right? It was different because Isaiah Hardinstein wasn't there as well, and he's a big part of the offense.

Whatever the numbers are. I don't care. Whatever the numbers may be, he will, once again be moving like he did as a rookie. He will be stronger and able to attack Smalls better. He'll still have that quickness to attack off the dribble and be the mismatch against centers that he was as a rookie. You cannot put a traditional five on him or he was frying them. there was one regular season game which he fried go bare off the dribble because he was a thousand times faster because his legs were much stronger and more better condition than he was

post hip break i think hopefully the jump shot comes around that'll be the swing factor of what version of his three-point shot we see but even without that the handle was clearly not where it was pre-injury the mobility was not where it was pre-injury the leap was not where it was pre-injury he could not get off the ground that hurt is rebounding that hurt is finishing at the rim he has several finals dunks that he just missed because his legs were not where they should be clearly because he broke his hip and could not do squats for nine months

that is a big deal it wasn't nine months what was like four months he was out you can't do squats when your hip is broken you can't work out your legs you can't do

basic weight lifting when your hip is broken I'm assuming I'm assuming he's doing squats this summer I'm assuming he's gonna come back with strong legs and can run faster

jump higher like we've seen him do as a rookie it's not like some guys like you use palo's example I'll use palo's example we say the theoretical stuff about him

can he shoot efficiently from the mid-ray range. Can he play defense better, rotate better, be blah, blah, blah, blah. We haven't seen it yet. We're assuming because he has the tools and we have seen guys before him make those improvements and get better and better. We've already seen Chad do all the things. We just didn't see him do it most recently. Yeah, we've seen him have the ability to do those things. Defensively, he's done it at the highest level possible. Only thing that tells me that he doesn't, Chronicle, is the defensive player of the year award. And that doesn't mean much

to me at all because we all think he's, I think he's one of the, three best defenders in the NBA right now, whatever way you want to discuss that. But seeing the inconsistencies last year and even in his rookie year, too, they worry me. And I have the utmost confidence just like you. I think next year is going to walk into, I don't know, 18, 19, damn near maybe 21 points per game or something like that, for sure. But I'm not just, I'm not hasty enough to go ahead and say like he's, no, he's like number three or he's number four or anything like that because I am, I feel like I am

seeing where he's at right now, and I'm continuously putting in more money as to him and his stardom in the NBA and where he's going to eventually be at. He's just not that just yet for me. I know what you're saying. But even even at his diminished state, let's use the playoffs. Let's say that is who he was forever and he did suck offensively forever. I would still, if I'm trying to win a championship as a Thunder, I wouldn't have traded him for Carltonty Towns. Yeah. If he is the way that he was in the playoffs, he might not be three. That's a good way. Yeah. Three's a little high for Of course

course but we're like That's the bad comparison Towns's the bad Well yeah I just used her four

I don't know I'm not arguing him against Wemby so I used yeah before if I was in

that finals last year and you ask me if I am Sam Presti if I am the coach of the

OKC Thunder would you would you trade Chet for Towns right now and think of a better

chance of being the pitchers in the finals I would keep Chet Humgren and that's

my that's my end game factor is like even right now that's why ranked him right above him. If I'm trying to win a championship, I'd rather have Chet, I'd rather have the DPOR. Yeah, that's fair. Also,

let me tell you something. What? It's the last year I got one, be at two. This the last year, this man, I've, I told you. You want to talk about hasty? I told y'all, he's crazy. Listen, I told y'all from the moment he got drafted, and I've seen it on Twitter and now people are copying it. I did it first. I've been calling, I've been calling him the avatar, and now just because he worked out with the monks. They're like, oh, he's air-bending. I've been saying he was Avatar. He's out here. He was working with monks. He's working with Kevin Garnett. He's doing everything.

If we can get these damn blood clots, once again, blood clots when I see you. It's on. But like, now, for real, though, like, Wembe and his ascension, it is, it is very fun. And like, obviously, Yolkes is going to be one, you know, moving forward, basically probably until he retires, whatever. But Wemby and, Wembe and, Wembe, defense and his ability to carry the spurs defense when they don't really have anybody else who can who can defend as he is offensive game and learning like where he can have his his go-to spots and become more of a like go-to score wherever all that you know going forward like i feel like every 10 15 games we can look at wendy and say oh he's taking a leap he's taking a leap like

He learns at such a fast rate, it's crazy to where, obviously, I haven't met two, you haven't met two, you would have him at two if you didn't, you know, for MB, whatever. But it's, I feel like how tangible his number two in the world is at the center position, it's going to be stamped before we get to Christmas next year. Yeah. Is he turning that him and Wembe, because now that Anthony Davis is out of the position, back to power forward, if let's assume MB doesn't play next year, let's say it's worst, case scenario he plays zero games when you can turn such a tier of their own like it's just them

too as only superstar bigs on here like as much as we like chat like he's not that's out of question everybody else no it's fun i was talking about how i feel so bad about zubot not being in my top 10 and how i wish they could put them like eight or whatever and five through 11 are all so close those are all like low level all stars there's a ton of like barely all stars at this position and then two just like fucking supercharged mega transformer beings at the top of the list that changed the way basketball's played and three if you kind of beat we'll see what we get from him but outside of that like four through 11 12 whatever wherever you want to lower that tier teach the run if you want to add hardinstein or turn or whatever like wherever that ends for you

so interchangeable yeah it's it's it's it's like s tier and then a jump to b tier not yeah there's not even like an a tier yeah there really yeah there's no a tier unless you want to i guess you can put towns a tier people might know it's going to be fun this is going to be the list that we have the most disagreement in the comments from easily yeah like i'm going to get called an a Apologist, which I deserve. You're going to be an impede hater like always. I don't know. So the nerds, the people that know are going to say I'm too low on Zubach.

The casuals are going to say you're too high on Zubach. Like it's going to be like so much back and forth. They're all going to call us Chet Hongren Glazers. Fair enough. Who cares? I'll die with that. Yeah. Certain hills, I'm going to die on the Holmgren Hill.

I'm going to die on the Aiden Hills. Never going to change. Okay. Actually, no, they can change. My money change. You don't even believe in it. I got one you left. Might change.

But in Congren will never change. Yeah. yeah that's fair that's fair this is what a season finale man what a season finale we're not done here this is a position finale yeah exactly

we're not done ranking shit come on we have like four weeks of summer left before we actually we'll get preseason basketball man this was crazy this is the most dead summer ever so we're gonna rank some shit because there's nothing to talk about this is the slowest season

we promise you might get four more we'll see how I feel this is the best way to end the positions ranking by far yeah the first four pretty shock not a ton disagreement And this is the biggest disagreement we ever fucking had.

Wow. I know what's crazy. I don't think any of our lists are good. I think we all just, it's impossible to have like a good list you feel good about. I'm not feeling like mine is perfect, but it's...

I like my list. I think looking back at it, I would... They're all bad. There's like a few things that might shift here and there may like two or three things, but I feel pretty good about my list.

I feel pretty good about my list. I can't wait to get by them out of top five. I can't. I just... I'm really. ready for one beat to come back. I'm ready to watch him play again. Yeah.

You know what I'm ready for? What's you ready for? What's going on? For you to catch that crayon? I start screaming. We move. It's TikTok time. Welcome to TikTok time.

That's how you chopper sauce? Yeah, exactly. We guessed. I got some big shit on my car for you. What I'm talking? Once again, we're starting with the House Call plug. If you're here right now and you skip the TikTok time, do us a favor. Check out episode 7 of House Call.

You can even skip the TikTok time there. There's stuff for you to watch there. An hour of TikTok content, just like here. Go check it out. If you want to watch the full episode, you'll see us power rank every NFL division, basically predicting who we think is in a win-each division. Controversial topic. So we'll see how it goes.

If we're right or not, we probably won't peak because it's hard to predict it. But outside of the Housecall, we are today gonna start with the game we've done the past but haven't done a long time I'm gonna show you a series of NBA smiles and you have to guess

the NBA player by their mouth you want me to look at grown men in the mouth don't act like you haven't done this before don't act like you're not a pro don't play different for the cameras you do this shit consistently

you do it on your free time too I do not even whenever you study game film of mouth I guarantee I will not get a singular one right you called yourself like a mouth nowhere before though because we've done this before they don't call me there

Or we've done something similar. I don't know if you're aware that everything you say is documented online forever. I realize that. My digital footprint is amazing. You have like seven and a half hours of words on camera every week.

We've seen you call yourself a mouth number. Trust me. Isn't that crazy? That's insane. So much talking. But it is now. Well, when we get back to streaming. But like you said,

so you're guessing the player by their face, but only the mouth portion. So can you guys recognize your favorite NBA players of all time? Let's do it. First off, whose mouth is this? They got veneers. Them teeth a little bit too perfect.

They are good teeth. Okay, they're not, they're not, the veneers are very, very, like, you think those are porcelain or something? I think, I think it's, it looks like braces slash invisaline, because veneers are very, are much brighter than that. Maybe they're good veneers. No, this looks like Tony Gonzalez. No, if people, people who have millions, people who have millions of dollars go out and get

the finest veneers possible, they want you to see that they got vizal. They're always, I think there's more good veneers than you think. You just don't notice it because they're good veneers. No. Okay He'd be no one else I know This is the type of thing

The Donovan's I know I know Listen We guys We know some people We'll be getting You know

Veneers off of Instagram Oh Okay Off of Instagram I don't know What he's referencing Okay Whose mouth is this?

This look I am genuinely At a loss Former player Not a current player Right now This guy's tired Rick Fox

No is not Rick Fox Shit Charles Barkley This is Charles Barclue Okay Look at He got veneers

for show. Those are good veneers. Yeah, he got veneers for sure. Sorry. All right, Charles. Okay, first guess, though, he got it right. Okay. Maybe he isn't out there.

Maybe he's a veneer nowhere. Next up, whose mouth is this? That's Zach Edy. You know what? The little mustache gave it away. Yeah, I think it may be a mustache. Yeah, the mustache gave it away for sure. Before I did it, I didn't have the mustache shown.

I was like, this is too hard. There's some lips. The mustache gives it away instantly. Okay, see, mouth nowhere. All right. Yeah, instantly, too. Ew, man. This is Tyree Taliburton.

It is. Okay, the face of her gives me away. He got your little chin thing. This is Tyre's Aliburton. She's so wildly hard, but I get it. He's a big smiler.

That is a happy man. He was going to go on that run, man. In fact, this is for me today before the season. He already knew what type of the vibes it was going to be for this year. Exactly. He knew what to expect. Black magic by his side.

He can defeat anything. This is right after he sacrificed the first goat. Then he knew what was coming. Okay. So you guys, listen, you're perfect so far. Who's mouth is. this. Ooh, man.

Is this, this, Peyton Pritchard? That's not Payton. No, no, no. Obviously, you're on the right racial lines. Obviously. You're working in the right direction.

Pain don't have no facial hair, though. But it's like, stubble, though. Like, it's also very small lips. Tala Hero? Not Tyler Hero. I don't think Tala Hero is a mustache

like that. Gordon Hayward? That's Gordon Hayward. What the hell? I told you, Mona was everything about Routts. He's going to get them all right. What made you put Gordon Hayward on this?

Is that man retired, man? I try to think you a curveball, but there's no curveball strong enough for Mo's mouth knowledge. He knows everything. I do not accept these allegations. I thought this is a deep cut, but apparently, you know. Not deep enough, buddy. I got to go deeper. I got to go deeper for Mo.

Next one. Whose mouth is this? Beer's not connecting. It's Cominga? This is not John. No. Kvon Lulie. I'm thinking Luni.

Really? Yeah. What did you guys see? Come on, Looney. I don't know. But I can kind of see it. Maybe like this Drew Holiday? No, no, Drew's connects. I'm getting caught up. Retired player. Retired player. I thought you the hint.

Gotta be retired player. This is the hardest one on this list. Jamar Crawford? Not Jammer. Hand on now. Huh. No, not doing. This is a hard one. This is a player.

Rondo? What? Imon Shumper. Not Amon Shumper. 2000s player. Two thousand's player. This player isn't unknown. you guys know this player but you're probably not thinking about them

Kwame Brown. No better than Kwame Brown. I don't think you guys are going to get this one. This one's kind of hard. Shit. Not a player that comes in mind, but he should. But he should. He should be on your mind. Oh, um, shit. Go ahead. Baron Davis. No, you guys are just naming black players. None of these guys like anything like this. I mean, I was a man. Someone Hispanic. Who do you want me to do?

What do you mean? It looked like this guy. I don't know. Oh, yeah, I wouldn't have got that. Nope. Zero chance. Also, you nasty fuse and Ben Wallace in a bull's jersey. Yeah, I wouldn't have got that at all. Zero chance. Yeah, it doesn't change our guessing.

I know. It doesn't matter. But you aren't nasty that that's a picture you chose. Oh, I didn't choose it. Next one. Who is this mouth? That is Anthony Davis. Yeah, a little too much beard is shown for this one.

That one's easy. Too much. That is Anthony Davis. Okay. Very clear. Yeah, clear as day. Listen, you guys got to have a rebound after the fail of Ben Wallace. Some of the most iconic facial, like, I know the beard.

I know the eyebrows. Like, it's up there. He really does have one of the most, like, possible looks. Even like his facial features. Like he looks very much like Anthony Davis and nobody else. He doesn't have a look like.

That is a unique face. Whose mouth is this? This is someone old, but I was going to say, Dornpool. The mustache? You got the nasty cop mustache. Don't know

eating mustache. Trash dash. If I had the ability growing. It's like a Joe Dumars. I would 100% do it. You grow the type of mustache? A trash dash. Yes.

That's what's called trash stash? I've never heard that terrible I think it's actually like a little bit of a stubble I don't know trash stash okay does this player play right now

hell no I just play right now look at the picture yeah let's go Mitch Richmond or Tim Hardaway no I guess

it's not a terrible guess okay Mitch Richmond's crazy but no man what a pool I haven't thought on Mitch Richmond

in like two years not Clyde Drexler not Clyde Drexler this is the hardest one it's like old old it's not new I think it's old. So it's just old, but not old.

In order to have this type of, is this Julius Irving? This is Julius Irving. It's old old. Okay. Yeah. Okay. There we go. All I showed you was the lips and mustache and mo's still got it.

He's picking out mouths from the 70s. He knows historic mouth. I'm not doing very well right now. You're doing real well. Next one. Whose mouth is this? Chat home room. I might need to call my mom and confess.

Confess. Mom, I know mouths. This is Chad home. You're a looker. I don't know what's going on right now. Again, another recognizable face in every way. Nobody has ever looked like this in the history of a man. He has very pointable, pointy features.

The pointy ears, the fade makes his head look longer than it is, just unique face in every way. Yeah. Take a gander. He doesn't need to. He knows. He's like a many gander. He's as locked in.

Ew. Next one. Whose mouth is this? Someone who smokes a lot of tobacco. Tobacco? No, not tobacco. This is Luca. What is it?

Yeah, it's tobacco. Huka? Yeah, nicotine. Huka. No, there's tobacco, right? Yeah, I think that's... I don't know. I think there's...

I was a moose. Well, I think there's something that don't have tobacco now. But yeah. Yes, this is Luga Donchage. Wait, they're cleaning up the hookah game? I think there's non-tabacco ones, I think. I think they progressed so far into the science.

Well, he would know. Yeah, he would know. Huka nonchageage would know. Let's hit up Luga. Let's see him on the show. Let's ask him the ins and house of hookah. Listen, I'm surprised in the men's health. He's like, listen, I switched to a non-tabacco hookah.

It really changed my life. It's green tea base. Green tea base. I can I sugar, can I carb. My hookah's clean now. It's nice. My hookah's clean. Probably with dirty hookah, man.

What's going on? I got cough syrup in his hookah. What's going on? Have you guys seen the video online? where this dude he's like making like he's making some video about like this is a man's piece and he gets a he gets a text from a girl like can I come

over and he's like no I found my piece oh yeah I saw that one and he goes and sets up his own hookah and he sits down and like watches a movie and like it's and got his own hookah he's one of the lifestyle dudes and he sat down watching a movie like a Drew Wall's video but but he fakes a conversation

with some girl trying to come over and then turns into it drew walking turning down my visit from a woman is hilarious get a life he said no I found peace whose mouth is this last one okay this is an old player

big teeth can you go out with the bang big teeth I think I know it's kind of light skin it's feeling very like Jason Tatum but like adjacent but again again just just because light skin is he is he a guard well kept this is a guard okay

they current this is a guard No further hints I think I know where we're going right now I fucking doubt it For some reason he does have a very Recognizable features Is this Sean Livingston?

No it's not Sean Livingston Not a terrible guess For a second I got scared I thought you're gonna get it I was like what Nope not Sean Livingston Not Sean Livingston Wasn't a horrible guess though

I guess they kind of look similar Who is this? Okay so The goat The goat Shut up This lion Sean Living

Okay so we We really do Do I have to go To the list of these Is this Tyson Prince? No That's a wild No

Not a bad guess That's a pretty good guess If we were doing hot and cold That would be hot I mean not in terms of like They're similar to player But like looks I see what he was going for

Okay I'm Oh is this Um Door 2 no no it's not we always have to get to georgia if i had 10 minutes i could guess this you got 10 minutes is a lot start spamming light skin point guards yeah nah okay yeah 35 seconds rogling nope is this ice game point guards tie jerome no it's the go man this is Cameron pain

oh yeah i wouldn't have got that wow he looks he has a scruffy look now he not he used to be like this before damn i wouldn't have got that for sure how do you not get this one campaign again at the end of a goddamn clip what's wrong with you man all the great pulls you had today and you finish with this shit staying on your resume

you fake this out with the go even though that I knew that you were joking I still was in my head of like is it Jordan I don't know campaign tragic you can get your campaign knowledge up fucking Jesus Christ

staring at his Instagram after this do your homework take a job seriously literally and that's the last one okay next thing we're gonna do I'm gonna name

two NBA players both of what your point guards one is old one is new you let me know who you'd rather have on your team who's better

not who's better all time not it was better resume who is better at basketball at their peak at their peak yep

something we've done before bringing back with point guards do some names we haven't done yet first off Jeff Teague versus Tyrese

Tyres Maxi both made an all-star team both you know like complimentary players so they're superstars. Actually not even superstars in Jeff T's case. Complementary players to Damari Garel and Paul Mille's self. Yeah.

And I think that's the That's kind of where we're at. Tyrese is a complimentary piece to Joelle and B. Jeff Tee. Also, Jeff Tick has done and many people have said that he's done negative PR by telling us like how regular he was. But that's so genius though too. But guess what? I'm gonna believe you. I'm taking Tyrese maxi.

Yeah, it's easily Tyresexie. Yeah, it's easily Tyresexie. I guess you're a bum. Yeah, it's easily Tyresexie because Jeff Teague, I will say a strength of his game is that he has a fan tag. He's so great when it comes to having this in-between game is mid-range pull-up was genuinely it's better than Tari's Maxi's for sure.

But when it comes to like he's in middle of the tier point guard. Better playmaker. But only made one on that team on that team when they made like the whole team on there he's a better playmaker for sure. He processes the game probably better right now but Tirees Maxi still has like star

qualities. I think this is closer than you think. there's I think Teague is just a tier below Tyrese Macs He's a tier below In terms of like a dynamic score for sure Just because he's not the shooter that Tyrese is But I don't know like he's a better playmaker I don't know how to parse their defense

Tyrese is so young He's not a good defender yet I mean neither of them are like Yeah Teague wasn't like that I feel there's probably clips of there of Teague been like I don't get a fuck about defense I wasn't playing defense

Further at their age Tyrese is definitely better than Jeff Teague was at this age. Yes. So we'll go to Tyrese. For sure, it's Tyrese. But I feel like there's some elements of like Teague's ability as a driver and playmaker that I'm like, hold on, it might be kind of close, all things considered. Nah, I think Tyrese's shooting ability and how DP can pull it up, pull it from two.

This is a big separator. Okay. And the day I'm stuck with Tyres Maxi. I'm just saying as close as you might think. Next one. Tony Parker or Tyrese Halliburton. This is very hard. That's weird to parse.

One is a member of a legacy team playing off of them. Tim Duncan, amazing in his role as a tertiary player could be the best player on the team if needed. I don't know if they'd win championships. Tyreys Halliburton, you know, done a lot of winning, but not at the highest level yet. Hasn't finished the job. Both, one thing I can say that they have in common

other than them being leiskin is that they're not like the most impressive defenders at all. Yeah. I'm sure there's years that Tony Parker was a better defender than Tyreys Halliburton. I'm sure there's years when he was younger where he was a passable, solid defender. This is a conversation that we might be the first people

To ever have this conversation We're making human history right now, bro So it's hard to say like one-for-one situations I don't think Tony Parker could lead that Pacer's team to the finals But that's also, you know, like a specific-ass scenario I don't know if Halliburba would Hallibur would probably win championships of Tin Duncan too But I don't want to take away what Parker did

Yeah, it's just hard because like If you're playing off of Tim Duncan and you're going And you're not playing this super up and down style of basketball Can you score in the half court The way that Tony Parker did? I'm not sure so perfectly suited for that, and that's not Tyrese's game. I think if I'm rebuilding a team from scratch, I'm doing a fantasy draft across history.

I'm picking Tyrese Hellebron first. But it's a tough conversation. Obviously, okay, so I think like based on, I don't, this is, I think I'm going Tyrese. I think I'm going Tyrese because. All right, well, I got to stand it for Tony Parker. I'm going Tony Parker. I think the shooting out weighs it for me and also the playmaking is so, like, incredibly generational, incredibly generation.

And like, Tyrese has scaled a scoring up we needed and gotten buckets in a way you don't really think of it for his archetype and i'm parker also can make plays and step into a bigger role on a different team of needed so like they can both do their other specialty to some extent yeah i'm not having a clean sweep because it is closer than that yeah i'll go i'm not mad to either i'll come here but is it really would you really like i guess it's hard because in today's NBA for you said the shooting you're definitely taking tyrus halliburton but that's also a little unfair because tony parker didn't come up today he'd probably shoot the three better if he came up today.

Most definitely. It's Tony Parker's, he's quick and he can get downhill and all that. Like his floater game, his in-between game was also, was also disgusting. Is he during his Garland in today's NBA? He probably, he developed a three more shot. He'd probably developed three a little closer to Garland. He's probably, oh, even if his Garland is a better three-point shooter, he's better in-between guy.

I don't know. Maybe. That's hard. Yeah. All right. I want to see him with today's NBA. That'd be interesting simulation. Okay.

Raymond Felton or Josh Giddy. What are you talking about right now, man? We're talking about Raymond Felton for Josh Giddy. I'm going to Raymond Felton. Why? Vibes. Just want a cool guy to get along with, have a couple laughs. Hell you.

What does it come down to? Hell yeah. What do you want Josh Giddy for? Timmy is a good passer. He will feed my young prospects. Raymond Felton averaged 7.4 assists in 2008. That's amazing for 2008 basketball. As a member of the Charlotte Hornets.

Or was that Bobcatts that time? Bobcats, I mean. Yeah, close conversation, but I'm taking giddy This is probably the only end last time I'm taking Giddy on anything I will never take Giddy on anything else I'm taking Raymond Feltz. I don't want to pay Josh Gaggy 30 million Raymond Feltin will play for the league minimum

Rajon Rondo or Cade Cunningham That's a hard one Because obviously Rondo For what he does as the slashing amazing playmaker One of the best at that. Complainix of Superstars can be a step in a bigger role like we saw it later in that self-ext tenure. Cade a little more well-round as a score

but doesn't dual his strengths to the strength of the strength of Rondo. See, okay, so the jumper from Rondo is the thing where it's really separate because Ronda had any semblance of a jumper. He did towards the back half of his career. But it was never like super consistent. Yeah, but after he couldn't slash it anymore.

Yeah, like Prime Rondo did not have that jumper and it was something where every game, like every big playoff game, you're like, hey, Rondo can give you 14 tonight. Like, we can be good. But I do think, I think if you're starting a team from the ground up, you would take K just because he can score a little bit more and you can kind of fill things in around it. But if you have one other All-Star on the team, I would take Rondo.

I think I would take Rondo. Rondo had years where he was all defense on DPOI ballots while still being the primary ball handler averaging 10 assists a game. Like, he's such a unique player that doesn't check as many boxes as Cade who can do a few more things just not as well but i think maybe kate gets there eventually but i think right now prime rondo is still better and and even with once he was past his prime you still had like the playoff rondo stuff yeah where he can go and he was going places where the bulls about to win a playoff series yeah the the the lakers got got playoff rondo you got the pelicans that had their run with rondo as well

he goes into places and he does elevate their their floor kate might have a year where he contests an MVP and is better but i think so far kate's won all-star year versus ron Rondo's four-year all-star run, give me Rondo. Yeah, exactly. It's unfair for Cade because we haven't seen the finalized version of him. We did see him take a huge leap as a score specifically, but there's still some things that will hold him back from a general, like, oh, my God, like all-time thought process when it comes to Cade Cunningham compared to Rondo.

Okay, those, man, pretty soon. He might get there. We'll see. Gilbert Arenas versus Trey Young. Yeah, I'm not taking Gilbert Arenas in anything right now. Give me Trey Young. Yeah, but he beat the case. What you mean?

Let's out bet on Trey Young. That's funny. No comment. Gary Payton versus Damian Lillard. Ooh, I like this combo. Maybe the best defensive point guard of the last 40 years. I like this combo a lot.

Versus Lillian is honestly top 10 offensive point guard of all time, potentially. Like just on page by his peak. I'm not even thinking about it. I think he's easily, I don't know about easily. He's definitely top 10. He's in that conversation. Of all time.

Offensive. Like not accolades. Just like at their peak 2023 Dame. There might not be 10 better offensive point guards that I've ever played. this is incredibly close Payton was not a slouch on offense he wasn't but the level

that Dame is at offensively it's it's so rare and some of the teams that we were seeing him play with where you go back and if they got a little bit more from their front office

they could have done some they could have made some runs but I think the fact when you look at shooters Dame is probably one of the five best shooters of all time he's off the dribble stuff his ability to shoot from from deep it provides a scoring floor that i don't think not not i don't think i know like gp doesn't have the deep the two-way ability is still crazy but even gp couldn't

shut down damn and i think like that's the that's the best version that's the best option that you have to shut down dame i think dame still gets 20 at least 23 on him he's a d p oi average in 28 assists a game like that's one of the more well-rounded primitive players you've ever seen get tough made the finals it's so incredibly tough so incredibly tough I don't new combo would you rather have

C.J. McCollum or Sean Camp what are you talking about for counterfare counterpoint I'll go Gary Payton with the caveat that I'd rather have that I'd rather have that's a close thought experiment though yeah it's close

Isaiah Thomas or John Morant so John Moran no matter what but what that one year of all NBA Isaiah Thomas yeah I'm taking John Moran you're taking 2022 John Moran over that Isaiah I don't know if I would if we're going

Peak for peak best year versus best year I'm taking Isaiah Thomas they're both obviously defensive Liabilities but Isaiah Thomas's level of being a defensive liability is like indefensible Isaiah Thomas was scoring 50 in the playoffs He was I'm going to lie that one year of IT

There's a lot of players I pick over that John Moran hasn't quite at that level where I say you have to pick John Moran hasn't quite at that level where I say you have to pick job Like there's not one single year of job where he was that prolific of a score And the club score from IT that year where he was averaging he was averaging like eight or nine points in the fourth quarter alone it was ridiculous true engine of a half-quart offense we've never seen joe lead like a true

high-level offense they've always won despite their half-court offense they got to the conference finals i understand that they'd be john wall right one year versus one year we're not talking about body of work here i know for a singular year i think i'm still taking job pick the small guy listen you guys got a result richard chucking i'm taking job y'all res out with your king i'm taking I say over there, I'm over here. No, I do think that level. Like, Jock hasn't hit that stretch to that level, I don't think. Chris Paul versus Kyrie Irving.

This one was a debate all over Twitter. I saw this and it's like, oh, you guys are clearly 12. You guys clearly have not seen it. Or you've clearly never listened to somebody to talk about basketball outside of points per game. I put this here just to talk about it. This is not a conversation. Chris Paul is light years ahead of Kyrie Irving, right? Yes.

Yeah. Congratulations, Kyrie. He is the better ball handler, whatever. He has better handles. Last year he handles, sure, he is the better three-point shooter. Absolutely better shooter in general. But outside of that, like, Chris Paul got it in his by, like, a large chunk. You mentioned all those things that he's better at.

Chris Paul is also a great handle, also a great shooter. And then everything he does well, thousand times better at. Great defender. Yeah, that's the thing. People forget that he's also like an all-N-B-A-level defender as a young guy. So one of the best position as defender, top three passer of all time, great score, great at elevating stars next to him, great at elevating stars next to him. Great at elevating teams.

It literally, it really is like. Chris Paul goes to a place and instantly They win 10 more games And he boosts up every single franchise It's the complete opposite They're like three Like in an all-time conversation They're like

Chris Paul is three tiers above Kyrie It's that much of a gap Salute to Kyrie Great player all-time Obviously top 65 player of all time Whatever you want to put him Chris Paul because he played for so long And so many young people

Remember the watch version of him Is probably going to go down It's like the most underrated player Of all time I don't I hope that is I hope that doesn't happen. I hope that is false.

It is true, though, because he doesn't have the rings. He doesn't have an MVP. It is going to happen. And maybe not most underrated player, but most underrated, like, all-time legend of all-time. There's role players, people forgot about probably more than him that, like, whatever underrated means to you. But among legends that are clearly top 40 players of all time, Chris Paul is the most disrespected. If you watch more than just highlights, you're taking Chris Paul. Easy.

It's not even a conversation. Yeah. And like, and it's not even just like, even at their, even at their best, like, even if you go 2015 Kyrie versus 2015 Chris Paul I'm still

taking Chris Paul in that moment it's baffling this conversation and it's like there's real people that think that besides 12 year

so I don't want to just dismiss that as like only children because it's not just children it's just like but it is

a childlike opinion yeah it's not smart I'm not here to say it's a good opinion I'm not here to say it's defensible but like

there's enough people that I feel this way that I'm like it's worth talking about people put so much the strengths of Kyrie people really really value those strengths in particular in all-time debates

scoring on-ball buckets as like the only thing end will be all the game's about a bucket and the day score more points than the other guy why would I not pick the better score that's such a prevalent mindset that I can just like write it off but it's so crazy because Chris Paul people like the value of playmaking is so underestimated by so many people and I think another layer of this conversation too is that it helps so much considering the situational differences between the two. Carey's made it to the finals multiple times of course one of the best, maybe even the best player of all time in LeBron.

And also he happened to play one of the most talented players who you've ever seen, period. And Luca Donchins was able to make it to the finals as well. But when you take a step back outside of that, it's just been a whole lot of misfortune. And CP3's career, you could say, has been misfortune to a degree. But the level of talent that he's been able to play with is so night and day, like, worse.

brother we keep trying to put context to it we have eyes we've watched the game that's the thing some people's eyes stink and they think only scoring tough mid-range buckets is what makes a player better but Chris Paul all he does is take yeah that's what are we talking about here like if we're talking about running a pick and roll and getting to the elbow and taking that mid-range jumper and he going in every single time it's Chris Paul

better at that it's Chris Paul like there's no we should not be having that conversation we talk about handles like you said yes karee best handles of all time chris paul is on the short list in the top 10 whatever like he's he's there as well this is this is chris paul and like i'm glad that we have given these people their time they have taken too much of our time it's chris paul and we should move on there is certain opinions that like i don't want to shame like being 12 years old you know like some people like get like certain entry level opinions you but this is one that i was going to say that i think this is one of those opinions you have to shame to like make people realize

like you shouldn't be saying the shit like it's that ridiculous i think this is our first time being on the back half of the conversation and being like wow like there's actually young people would think like this and this is our unc stage for real yeah our most unc opinion is respecting chris paul most definitely yeah yeah this is one's opinions that like certain 12 rules need to maturity and this is what i call community service yep this is leading the youth into a positive direction and that's the problem right we're just trying to pass on recipes

we're just trying to make sure that we that everyone understands we live in a society exactly see when I was 13 I needed to be shamed out of thinking Carmelo Anthony is a top five player of all time I need to be told that was fucking stupid some certain times you need to have some like formative insults thrown your way

so you learn more about the game I don't like the example you use but the point is valid you actually thought he was top five of all time no I used that point on purpose oh man I was about to say Jason Terry versus Daniela Russell I'm going Jason Terry

Jason Terry, bye No conversation What are we talking about? You don't think DELO If he could have played In that team He could have Gone that off the dribble

To be all down Nope, too inconsistent Stop this Okay, well I thought maybe it was a conversation Never mind J.J.

Borea versus T.J. McConnell This is this is a conversation This is a conversation And I'm going JJ Borea These are columns need to be had I'm going J.J. I don't know Only one of these guys

Locked up LeBron Only one of these guys sent LeBron into the worst moment of his career. I'm going to Jay J.J. Burr. This other one was real close to sending Shade Gilles, Alexander, into the worst moment of his career.

Real close. This guy actually did it. Okay, fair enough. And, listen, we're getting nasty into this. J.J. Bray got a ring. We use the ring's culture on backup point guards.

I'm taking J.J. Bray. I don't know. This is a hilarious conversation. Which 10 point score was better at their peak? Fuck, man. Also, I always respect J.J. Brayor because he took one for the team after Andrew Bynum.

just knocked him out the air they were whooping them I had no idea I thought he like played for some random team towards the back half of his career but he was on the Mavericks forever he left for a couple years yeah no he wasn't he was only on the Maverts

forever he went to Minnesota Timberwolves what mm-hmm for four years yeah I came right back yeah I don't see that on his basketball reference because he was there when Luca

oh okay I see there he was there yeah in like 19 he was in Minnesota from 2012 through 2014. Okay, wow. Yeah, they blew the team up after the shit. Everybody left that team. Okay.

Next thing we're going to do, I told you guys on a community post to give us your best NBA hot takes, but this time specifically about NBA history. So these are all-time debates, all-time hot takes, stuff people think from past decades, maybe some current players

compared to past decades, a lot of different topics, but all relating to the history of the league. Offseason conversations. First off, Cody, Rickards said, Hakeem Elijah won 1994 season when he won

MVP, finals MVP, DPOI, first team all NBA, first team all defense, and third in scoring is the greatest season in NBA history. That's not crazy at all.

It's not on the short list, but isn't the number one most impressive season you can think of? No, and so I like what they did here, right, adding first team all NBA, first team all defense, because most of the time, if you win the MVP,

you're going to be first team all NBA. If you win DPOY, you're going to be a majority of the people are going to be first team all defense just trying to add in accolades when that's already built implied the biggest accolade is just missing from there and don't forget third in scoring too what an accolade so but if you go down the list of people who want MVP finals of mp and dp o why you have like you have yonis you have him koreen maybe did it maybe no it's it's only yonis michael jordan and him who won't up there who won mvp and d p oi i mean no but but mike didn't win no but in the

same season is what I'm saying because no Mike didn't win DPOI in a single year he he won the same year one MVP I don't know if he won the finals that year yeah no because he because he got DPO Y in like 87 yeah yeah I don't think he ever got DPO Y in in the run yeah I think he didn't he didn't win the finals that same year yeah so so so it's either are we picking yannis in 21 or are we picking hakeem here I think but even then like you can have a season like this and one of Jordan seasons in in 95 or whatever can still be a better season Yeah. I mean, there's years in 1992, Jordan was third in DPOI. In 1993, he was second DPOI. So it was striking distance. He just didn't win it. Probably because people like Hakeem were winning it. But I think if we're counting third in score and I can count a third in DPRY. I think all these considered with the carry job, Pachim did and how much the team is built around him as the only true like star star, obviously was a good team. People maybe downplay a little too much. But carry job and stars next to you, two way level play, winning who you beat. Like this is a very worthy pick. it's crazy it's not a bad hot take yeah yeah w hot take for sure yeah it's really not even a hot take

it's a reasonable opinion but we'll give to you next up young t willie 2021 janus is the best final's performance since 2018 lebron okay so think about that time period this is a clear w to me this is like without a doubt so since then so we're saying better than 2019 kawai yeah kawai was injured for the finals run he wasn't super dominant compared to the first couple rounds so that's not going to win it 2020 lebron and AD both went crazy. So I'm not... Oh, you're talking about running.

I thought he was saying finals performance. That's what I meant. Okay. Yeah, in 2020. Yonich in 23? Maybe. I think Yon...

The team was so overmatched. They beat the shit out of the heat. I feel like with the comeback and how good the sons were, I think Janus carried a little bit more. Drew Holley also kind of no-showed for a lot of that. Steff in 20-point close-out game. Steph's the debate.

Steph is the real conversation, yeah. Steph's the debate in terms of like the moment, how much you had to carry, how good your opponent was. But I still think it's Janus. Like the two-way performance, closing out 50 points in a game seven memorable dunk memorable block was doing everything i i might give the nod just because step had and it sucks because it happens every single finals stepf had that

one game where he couldn't shoot first time i think it was the first time in his career had zero threes in a in a playoff game and damn and they they could yeah and andrew wiggins had to come in and save the day that's that's always step would have so many more finals MVP's if he didn't have that those one games in each series and it's the same thing here. That three point variance, get you. It's the same thing here. Make your shots. You are the greatest shooter of all time.

It is. Nobody's immune for math. Relax. It's true. And so that's why he has Ziggyzis because he shoots a lot of threes and threes are more variable than dunks. That's why I That is what it is. I don't know. I'm only Joe. I'm not even joking. That's a part of the reason why a couple weeks ago when we did our

who's the best. If every NBA player was in their peak, I listen to Yokic at number two and I was jumped. Stuff like that. Well, a good thing for Steph A's. He does a lot more besides shoot those threes. That helps them. But yeah, this is a very good opinion, I think. The top three is Janus, then

Luca, I mean, Steph, and Yokic. The Lakers, I don't know, there's two of them, and they beat the shitty heat team. I think I'll give it to Janus. I think I'll give it to Janus. This is a good hard take. Sports wallpapers says, if the Spurs won in 2013, Tim Duncan would be a top three player ever and maybe in the goat conversation. Killed a back to back

Wow He'd have six rings Two MVPs Okay It'd be very similar resume to Hakeem To Kareem Here's the But it's his peak is highest Kareem

Kareem also had like Best Player in the world For a while It's always It's always weird Doing stuff like this Because It's like

You know in sci-fi movies Like you go and you change the bass And it's like You can't do that You're gonna change the space time continuum If he wins in 2013 Are the Spurs, are they motivated enough to come back in 2014? Because that was one of the big storylines for them is like you have the chip in your hand.

Fair. And then you have this entire like revenge season. And that's where you get 2014 from. I'll say yes. Does the next year happen. Yes, because Kauai was still going to become Kauai no matter what. And they were still going to be impossible to beat. Yeah, I'm assuming they're back to back.

If you're assuming that they go back to back, then yes, I do agree. Because one, you're taking a ring away from LeBron. You finally have a back to back, which they never did. in their entire run. You are undefeated in the finals. But would that mean, would that mean he's above Kareem? Kareem has a very similar resume

and was the best player of the 1980s in the early part. I don't like 70s. Well, the second half of that run, like once you start getting into like 84, especially at 87 and 88, like magic is taken over and he's the one. And obviously like in 13 and 14,

Tim isn't, you know, MVP level Tim Duncan, but he's still an all defense level player. I said 80s back in the 70s. In the 70s, he won five MVP's. the best player of the 70s by far. I think Kareem, LeBron, and Jordan can all say they were the best player in the world

for a really long time. Even if Tino can have six rings, I don't think the peak would be quite as high as those three guys. So I think he'd be without a doubt four, but those top three guys would still have the fact that they're simply a lot better. He'll be damn near right where he's at. Well, some people put him four.

A lot of other people put him towards like eight, nine. Like he falls in some list. Think about the arguments that we've had for the last 20 years and think about how heavy six and no and how much carrying that has done for one for one person it would do a lot of carrying for tim duncan as well it would i think it would make him without a doubt four just at the top of your guys without a doubt where they are he would lock into four with no argument i would put him three and so i i i think as a hot take it's a w hot take

it is good dot i think cream has five mvps that's so crazy yeah i'm so going with koreen he's gonna be mad when i start calling them plumbers okay jean jake says hey brother i appreciate you appreciate the submission alternative X TLDR congratulations or I'm sorry if something bad happens

I don't know that The short version is The best defenders of today are better than the best defenders of past generations Basically because offenses are so much better now Offensive players are so much better now That the great defenders today

Are way better than the best defenders of all time from the 90s, 80s, etc. I don't think this is a hot take This is just without or doubt true This is just common sense This is easily true That's why I think Dremont is one the best defensive players of all time in the hardest era that they help usher in

of peak offensive basketball he's maintained being the best defender and a completely change in the game neutralizing so many offenses along the way and even apply this to other primitive players you know how hard is to be a great on ball defender today when you can't hand check yeah exactly and with all the along with all those things that you said it don't take none but just like five 10 minutes of your time and watching it doesn't matter what the error is whether be the 70s with Bill Walton or the 80s

with magic and all those guys it doesn't matter because the offense just tends to be way more stationary back then, way more stationary.

Yeah. Defensive rules make it harder for defenders and offenses are so much higher level today that to me this is without a doubt. Yeah, I agree.

Okay. Next one. James Hardin is so hated that he might now be the most underrated player of all time. Underrated player of all time.

for James Harden. No, I'm not, I'm not going. I'm not going so far as a derated. Just because we talked about it earlier, I do think Chris Paul is a little bit more underrated than James. Okay, well, besides specifically number one, do you think James Hardin is in that conversation? No, I don't think so. Because the Renaissance is starting to happen. I feel like, I feel like like five, like three or four years ago, that's when the hate was really like bubbling up. And I was leading the charge and it was like, yeah, like we got them. But now as he's getting to like the back half of his career you've seen people be like he was averaging 40 he was winning MVP he was doing all this so i do think that i don't think he's the most underrated player

at this point yeah i agree i don't i don't think anyone ever like diminishes hard and for the totality of his career and how he was able to how he was able to like have so many like for the totality of his career just the fuck they do i don't really sense that dude the hardin is completely written off in some conversation some people would say say you're not winning the playoffs ever, not even a chance of you being in conversation to some people. I'm not going to entertain you being a top five, seven,

whatever shooting guard of all time. Whoa, that is correct. I've never heard anybody say not top five, seven? I think he's widely renowned as like, okay, like you're a top fourth shooting guard of all time, bare minimum. There's more haters than you think, I think. Have you ever, do you think harder

as a top four shooting guard of all time? Yes, but I do think as... All right. That's all I needed. I will say, I will say, because he's four, right? He's four right now. Like it's it's Jordan Kobe Wade

Why do you write off Jerry West in that conversation This is what I'm saying And now Now like I do think that for a while It was trending to where Hardin Especially because the MVP's and the success You could kind of lock him in At either either three or four

It was trendy for like two weeks Where you could say him or Wade As we start stacking up game sevens And game sevens and stuff like that Now you start getting into Is he has he passed Jerry West Yeah And so if you say

that he's five, okay. And I don't think it's crazy. Hardin was in Wade talks in 2018 when they pushed the Warriors and were so close to winning, but 27 missed three, he's like, okay, that's insane, right? Like, clearly he's reached this level. The 19 happened, playoff mountdown. 20 happened, lost in the playoffs. Carremen out the rails after that with the injuries and everything.

So there was a moment where he was on the precipice of breaking the weight convoes, but never got it done. Yeah. Prime Team Mac could play Shea's role, but even better in the modern NBA. Yeah, I don't agree. I do agree. I think that's a W-T take. That's a good take.

Prime Team Mac today would be amazing in today's NBA. His slashing would be so much better. I think Shea shows us that if you can be enough of a constant rim threat, constant, you know, like paint touch generator, that the playmaking being good enough can really help you lead a modern offense. But even better is where I draw the line. Okay, you're right. He wouldn't be even better than Shay, but I think he could do an approximation of that.

I don't know. Would he be, would he be, aunt? He'd be better than Aunt. He'd be closer to Shea than. I think. Hmm. Okay. I think he'd be a top five player right now.

He'd be right next to Shea, I think. I think, I don't know what his defense would be like, and if, like, he'd be, he probably wouldn't be a true, like, point guard. He'd be more of, like, a small forward-ish, like, type of guy. But I do think this general idea of him being able to use his scoring to lead high-level offense like Shea does, could definitely happen. Yolk, Janus, Shea, who say Luca at 4 or whatever. I think Luka T. Mika would be in that tier.

I don't know if he would be in that tier because. Because he's known as a lot of. like an off the dribble shot maker, but when he was young, he could really slash in the era that was like the worst for slashes ever in the 2000s. I think today with this exact way we've learned how to weaponize slashes and their gravity to be playmakers, NBA coaches are so much smarter of how to lead offense with that these days. I don't think he'd be better to say, but I do think he would be like a top six, seven player for sure. Yeah, he'd be great. I'm drawing the line that even better. Okay, even better is a little too far, but I see what you're cooking and I'll give

you a W. Kevin Garnett is the best powerful word ever from podcast account. Yeah, Tim Duncan exists, so. I mean, so the press, but this argument, really what he's saying is, peak for peak, he had a better one-year peak than Tim Duncan did. Is that, is that a, is that a respectable hot take? No. You could talk about him maybe as a talent, you could have that conversation. Well, you know, talent plus production, plus, you know, imagine them in different scenarios,

whatever the thought experiment is, you don't think somebody could say, Kevin Garnett was a little bit better defender, better playmaker, you don't think it's possible? That's possible. that's possible for sure Yeah but I'm just not giving you the You're still not getting regardless Yeah You don't buy the argument that you put him

In that situation on the Spurs Is that they could be just as good Just as good I mean obviously yes But at the same time If we're saying best power forward ever I'm not basing it off of a one year peak versus a one year peak

And we have to get a little bit more I also mean just saying Is he better than Charles Barkley all time Yes Way better defender Yeah Is that close? No

You think it's not close. I mean, they're all both like top 40 players, so it's close in number, but I think it's easily kept in that range. I think he's on the high end of it, but it's like him, Charles Barkley, Dirk. And then, oh, I forgot about it. I was going to say, dot, dot, insert player here. But like, that's kind of the range. I guess he's like, is he even better than Yonis?

That's why I'm like, he's not snicking. Well, you could also have this conversation on Yonah potentially. Yeah, you can. You can't have that, but I think it ends when it comes to thinking about Tim Duncan. Okay, so we're not giving them any leeway, Eltick? Yeah. Okay. Sorry, podcast account. The Miami Heat are the best franchise in the NBA since the 0-4 season.

So since then, they have... They have three championships. They have two championship runs of different nucleases, one with LeBron, one with Al-Lebron. They got back to the final Jimmy Butler. So three eras of teams that all did a good amount of winning. You have seven finals appearances, three chips. That's a good amount of success. That is.

They are one of the most successful teams Over the last 25 years Have four in the last eight They get it When I think about the process And how they get to the point I think there's so much meat left on the bone That they didn't capitalize off of

And I can't say that they are like the best reference It's easy to say that now Because they're between these eras But the fact that they got to the finals With Jimmy Butler when they were dead in the water In 2016 The fact that they got back to being finals level It's kind of crazy

since the 0-304 season though the Spurs have three titles the Warriors have four I don't think the heat are better than those two like Yeah the argument wouldn't be That they're more successful in those two Is that when you think about how they got to their success

The levers they pulled the talent they won with That it's more impressive and they did it more out of their like profession not professionalism But their skills as a front office than necessarily drafting Steph Curry That's the thing I don't think they pulled enough levers Okay And it compared to like the spurs and the gold say warriors like there's almost nothing i could expect more from the spurs specifically and also i

guess you can say the warriors yeah and i like i i can i'll take the heat over the warriors just because their success was a little bit more sustained and so i guess that is a little bit more about like your organization and being able to adapt where the warriors is very much uh very recent but the spurs the spurs the spurs were able to to keep winning like they were winning 50 games every single year like in terms of consistency yeah they did it so i'm not I think the spurs are better than they are. Okay. The 2019 Raptors ring is not as impressive as so many seem to think.

It was an amazing team and it wasn't just Kauai carrying. It diminishes the team by saying Kauai carried. As our resident Canadian, how do you feel? I think it's impressive, but I can agree when it comes to it, it's just not Kauai. Because they did mid-season trade for someone who was just coming off of the end of his prime in Mark Gassau. They did have Norman Powell before he was like what we know him as to be today. Pascal Siakum was just like he was still developing but he's not the player that he has to that he was at that time

but it was still amazing same thing for Ogenernobi Frevinably was there Kyle Lyra was there like during his peak years as well that was a deep ass surgery bought the incredibly deep team Danny Green ridiculous team bro you would have thought that Kyrie the way people talk about it you would have thought the Kauai average 35 in the finals on like 80% true shooting was insanely dumb

no one's ever seen it way more of a team victory than people treat it so I think the 2019 ring is more impressive for the team than people lead on and a little bit less impressed for Kauai than people lead on. I think if you were to take Kauai off of that team, that team is still winning 50 games

in the regular season. They did the next year. They still were a great team the next year. Exactly. So, yeah, I mean, again, it is a great ring by Kauai, but people treat it like it's one

the best of all time and I don't think that's the case. I think people forget that he got injured halfway through that run and was still good in the conference finals and finals, but it wasn't like

otherworldly efficiency or anything. He took a, because I'm looking at now in, the reason people think about this because round one, he was a god against the Orlando Magic. He averaged 34 points for game.

Wow. 34 points of game against the magic. So 53% from 3 and 56% from 2 was insane. And against Philly the next round, I didn't know, 27 points per game in that round against the magic because he could play as many minutes. But the next round, it was 35 points for game

against the Philadelphia 76ers on 57% effective football percentage. Game winner in game 7. Yeah. So those first two rounds, he was ludicrous. The next two rounds were still good, 28 points per game, but the efficiency slowed down because his knee got injured.

So I think people forget that that rest of that team really stepped up as the playoffs went on Seaccom stepped up a lot stepped up a lot like everybody did the part and that's when he started a whole trend in a wave yeah yeah Milwaukee and Gold State was a team team team team thing

shut up why next one Kevin Durant has a better all time peak than Kobe Bryant's get this off my screen I mean just their movies it's not crazy I think if you're looking at them like best through your peak for best through your peak they're both in like the top 12 of best players of all time yeah it's really not crazy I mean it's not obviously

resume Kobe Bryant's much better but like just ability it's not crazy they're within striking distance of each other sure you can have that I hope you sleep well at night the y'all you don't think it's crazy I don't think it's crazy I just think it's disrespectful I don't look at it yeah it's not disrespectful to say anybody is worse than Kevin Durant Kevin Durant is maybe a top five peak of all time it's certainly not disrespectful top five peak of all time of three-year peaks like when best scoring defenders playmakers like in terms of just your abilities like obviously team accomplishments all the things that go into all-time rankings I'm not saying Kevin Ranch to be you.

No, but even top five, I think is. Yeah, that's a lot. Maybe not top five. But whatever the number is, I haven't thought about this. Whatever the number is of like, top 12? Yeah, definitely. Sure. Yeah, you can have that.

But at this moment, time, I'm thinking about COVID. I mean, obviously Jordan, LeBron, Shaq. Steph. Yokich. Yokich. And that's five. And then where else we're going? Magic and Bird.

I think Katie's entering his conversations. Kareem. Okay, okay. Yeah. Okay, so that's nine. I think, yeah, I think Katie entries a convo around like 10 or so. Again, he can get 12.

He can get top 12. I just don't. I don't like this. I don't know. He said, maybe you're right. I don't like it, so I'll take. Yeah. Not a fan.

When lose or draw, whatever the outcome is your question, I don't like you for it. But I think they are very comfortable in terms of all. Don't ever comment again. maybe we can lean Kobe it's hard because the error difference in the efficiency but like I think KD would probably be the most efficient

score in the NBA in any era no it is I will say for KD to have a run especially at 21 to get four straight scoring titles that's kind of crazy and then do it again winning rings later in your career

when you're a much better defensive player and like more refined as a score like less volume but more efficient like I don't even know what his best error is as a three year run that's the hard part

I mean it's very it's the it's the Golden State run yeah but Like you said, also when he was 22, he was a scoring leader every year. It's like, that's also comparable. Yeah, it's crazy. It's close. Larry Bird wouldn't be as good of a player as he was back then if he played in today's game.

So obviously still be great, but do you think today's game is necessarily conducive to Larry's skills as a high post hub, you know, mid-range block, attacker off the dribble? Yeah, he'd eat. Because I think like you'd be able to use him in so many creative ways, especially as a passing as a hug. With all the motion today, too, all the cutters, his passing would be insane today. This is the worst take that we've seen so far. I think he'd be amazing today. He'd average 10 assists a game, I think. I think he'd go down as the best passing power,

best passing small forward of all time if you played today. Yeah, this is. He already might be that, but it would be consensus. Yeah, this is easily the worst take I see in all day. I don't see one single skill of Larry Bird not translating and not being, like, heightened, dramatically. But to be fair, he said isn't as great. He was like the best back then, so maybe he wouldn't be the best by far today.

But I don't think he would, he would translate very well today. He would be a top two player in my mind if you played today. peak Larry Bird he would be top too yeah it's hard I mean trying to like actually think about that like Janus and like how much things change over the years I don't know so maybe he wouldn't be the best play in the world so he's frying Janice

like if they if they had like a playoff series and Janus was like trying to guard him which he wouldn't because Janus don't yeah like he would he would get fried and in certain like one-on-one situations and I'm just saying like if if we're talking about like small forwards or like 6-10 tweeters, whatever, like guys who have the ball.

There's not a lot of guys who can stop Larry Bird. His scoring would still be as dominant. If you told him, hey, you can shoot more threes. He'd knock them down. His passing would be great. Like, he'd be just as good. He's averaging like eight and nine assists per game, too, in this era. Yeah, 30 and nine every year.

He'd be amazing today. Kevin Durant, what's on here twice? NBA players that played in the 60s or later don't deserve to be in the top 20. mad at the accolades. Are we done with the 60s no matter what? First of all, you wrote it incorrectly. Yeah, played in the 60s or later. Learn how to write. But like, no, you, the league is the league and you do have to put certain people in top 20s. Like, that's what history is about. Yeah, I think if you're like, if you're trying to do some weird objective thing where you're like,

who would win in the today's simulation, yeah, the players there are more talented. But I think that's a weird way to look at history. You have to look at what somebody did in their era, what they did against their competition, the only reality they played in. And you can apply some caveats. And we're not going to put Bill Russell number one overall or anything. But you do a self of respect to some extent. And, and like, I feel like everybody already does it. Like, if you really don't, don't want to do that, pick your guy from that era, have them as the representative.

Because everybody from the 60s, it's like, yeah, Bill Russell, you, you cover everybody. You were the best at that time. You're the only one who can, who can cross this threshold. Yeah. And so he's in the top 60. But also, as we go along, every general. every 10 and 15 years, they're going to end up sliding their people higher to the front just because that's what you saw. That's what you grew up doing. So I do think it is important

if you are a historian of the game, student of the game, to put people, you know, that played before you, just go read a book or something. And then you can figure out what people were doing back then. Yeah. I think you can use critical thinking to apply context a little bit, but to write it off entirely. Yeah, read a fucking book. Incredibly too harsh. down chat gp t and go pick up a history book please prime damar to rosen would be just as good as you played in jordan's era now this is the worst take brother shut up yeah this is the worst take that gets commonly spewed a lot as being like fact and people were like yeah man that's jordan's just tomorrow today this is so stupid for so many reasons like i don't even want to shit on damar people

do not understand the nuances of why jordan was good they think he was just a midrange shooter or something like they think he was just like they imagine what old man cobi was that's jordan like for his whole career and he played so differently when he was younger what people don't understand even like whenever because obviously the cop is always like like Jordan and Kobe they're the same

there is a legitimate gap even with young Kobe in terms of athleticism massive gap between Michael Jordan and young Kobe like Kobe Kobe is great because he's not one of the craziest athletes

that you've ever seen obviously he's a good athlete he's an NBA player whatever but Michael Jordan is one of the best athletes to ever play in the league to have that and the technical skill that he had it's it's it's night and day

were to plop Demarta Rosen back in those Jordan teams I don't think they're winning a Clyde Redsler They're not winning a singular ring Not even maybe they come Maybe they make it to the Eastern Conference

Finals sure That's the yeah that's the Yeah that's the Yeah but yeah Those teams would not be one of the best I mean this would be a good team Because they still have Scotty Pippen Who'd have a larger role

And everybody else But yeah like Jordan is Can't even defend him. Exactly. Jordan is an amazing defender, one of the best offball players in a long time for his era, amazing cutter,

can run in transition, do all the small stuff that isn't just on ball, shoot mid-range shots. Yeah. And that's the last one. Actually, no, one more.

Oh, last one. If you go strictly off an eye test, Russell Westbrook would be in the goat conversation. No. And this guy also says eye test or look at statistics. Russell would be the goat.

No. So he just thinks Russ is the goat. No. I think a lot of people think this because triple double and I think this is such like a formative thing that you hit a certain age and you understand like how points your benz assists work

and you're like Oscar Roberts is the go Russ is the go nobody slapped his head up a little harm are you all right god then you go a couple more years

you miss him off then you go a couple more years and you realize like oh shit is not that simple there's a lot more nuanced than just point through mens assist that's funny so I understand it now this is such like a

2015 conversation for me person. I promise you, it's peak 2018 conversation for me. Because like when I was 12, like when I first found out about Walt Chamberlain stats, I was like, surely that's the best player of all time, right? Like, everyone goes to that phase and their development and that's what this rest conversation is.

Y'all gotta read, bro. The general takeover of this episode is read a book. But no, yeah, I mean, I get why people want to put him in like, it's not even just a goat thing. That's like an extreme. But people say like one that, a common thing I see in TikTok comments, again, TikTok comments, it's young people commenting it, is that Russ has one of the best peaks of all time. That's a commonly regurgitated narrative. No. And it's because point three bonds assist, averaging triple double, only two

people ever done it. So they think one of the two most impressive peaks of all time. And I get the sense, man. I understand why your brain goes there. You know, you know, you know why we think this and you know whose fault it is? Who? It's LeBron's fault. Wait, why? Because had LeBron did it first, then everybody would have discredited it. And then, and then like, Russ Russ would have came along and then we would have been like, man, we don't care about that. But LeBron left the door open. It's his fault. It's all, it's always LeBron.

And this other guy said I put in the same slide, Russ is a top five point guard of all time. No. I mean, way better than Chris Paul, Jason Kidd. He's right below Curry Magic IT. Come on. That's the best. Like, if you're trying to create a standard or have like a benchmark for where you want to put Russ, that's the best argument that he has. I don't believe it's true.

But that's better than that than like go argument. Yeah, I guess. So, yeah. And again, I understand the Russ high peak thing. And I think, like, it's a great peak, obviously. Like, it is impressive no matter what to be this floor raiser that can do a lot of things. Like, yeah. I talk about points rebounds assist being like an outdated, like, really, like, negligent way to talk about the game.

But it doesn't mean nothing. So, like, it is a great peak. But, yeah, there's so much more nuance that goes into playing team basketball and actually contributing to winning. You can go ahead and say he's one of the best floor raisers of all time at, like, top 12-ish. I'm like, sure. We can't even say that. People gas that so much. At his position, let me say that.

At his position. Maybe, maybe. But even then, like, people gas so much take, without one year where the team barely made the playoffs. Like, it's a great, impressive year that's worthy, an MVP.

It's not one of the greatest floor raising seasons of all time. It's not like it's a prime yokech year where they were contending or, like, top three, you know, winning 50 games. The fans who were really in the weeds are not even talking about those years.

It's not about the year when he was able to drag the Wizards to the playoffs. Oh, that's even worse. Yeah. I don't start with that stupid ass run. of people commonly spew this is a common thing nasty work they'll take it next thing we're we're gonna do we're gonna play a game of keep four cut four with young cores so i got eight young cores for you list them off you tell me which four you want to keep which four you want to cut

all right first off the san antonio spurs we're keeping them any any young core with victor woman yama is a it's a young core i would like to be a part of it it'll be nice to move for that keep keep keep keep let's do it. You sure? I'm, this is the only, this is the best young core in the NBA because you, Wembe is there. Can I get a few more keeps? No. Los Angeles Lakers. Who are the young court? Not Luke anymore

because he's 26. Deltic connect, Ronnie James, Thoreau. God. No. No. Yeah, we're can we're cutting the Lakers. They're Orlando magic. We got to keep them. Yeah, I mean, listen, we.

we hate on franz and his shooting and palo and talk about all the developments they're still great like they're both going to be all-stars this year they still have two all-stars two all-star level players that's not easy to do and jalen sucks yeah jellon sucks is there too and he was drafted in 2021 so he's probably in his little he's a few years in college he's probably pushing 25 but i think he still counts all right well we're keeping them yeah keeping them for sure the Atlanta Hawks you have two keeps gone already we have to keep the Hawks they're one of the, their oldest one of their team is Chris Osperosinis, he's 30,

and then it's Triangu's 26. They got Risha Se, Dyson, Dyson, Jalen Johnson, and O Yaka Kongwu. That's a good Yonkawr, but you only have two spots left. You gotta keep him. It can go either way. You gotta.

You gotta, he gotta, he, I'm gonna let him. They reset their bar, bro. I'm gonna let him go. Last week, he's one that sold. That's all I'm saying. Okay. Got to keep him. And keep mine, I haven't written down.

I'm not cheating. I guess I can see it. Okay. Washington Wizards. I have planted my flag. I'm firmly wizards. Me, person, I would cut them right now. I understand.

You only have one keep spot left. I'm Wizards FC. I rock with them. If you do this, that means that we have to cut the next. I'm still trying to prove a point, so you got it wherever you want. Go ahead. Whatever I want. Go ahead.

You know what I know. We can go ahead. Be Wizards FC. Are you spending your last keep spot on the Wizards or not? You have one cut. We're going to be right now. We're not. We're going to cut the Wizards.

Okay, I'm going to say. Okay, Wizards are gone. The Brooklyn Nets. Fresh off of drafting three point guards and a point forward center. You cut the Wizards? Because you wanted to cut them. I did not want to cut the Wizards. You did want to cut them.

I said you could have it. Exactly. It's your fault. So this is the last one we have to keep him? No, no. Oh, okay. We're getting the nets then, too. Okay.

Now we're three and three. There's one spot left in both. Okay. Raptors. Very interesting. They have Scotty Barnes. They have Grady-Dick. I think the fact that you already have an All-Star,

it makes me feel good about keeping them. Only one spot lift and both, though. Yeah, I feel decent about keeping them because they do... They're good, young court. But is he going to put the thunder on here? Because we still have Chet and J-Doh. Oh, we would be cooked.

We would be fried. Like, it's indefensible at that point. We can't do nothing about it. Yeah, we can't do nothing about it. So keep the Raptors? I think we have to keep the Raptors. I don't feel good about it. That's a tough one.

That can go either way for sure. If it's okay, see, or, yeah. Or like Houston. Or keeping them or cutting them. It sounds like we kind of want to cut them because we're prepared for the bullshit. Let's cut them. I'm cutting. Cutting the Raptors.

We said, fuck Canada. The last one is the 76ers. So you're keeping Vijay Edgecombe, Tyrese and McCain over them. Tyrese Maxis is the All-Star. Jeremy McCain, hey, man, he averaged like 15, 16 points. I was going to be working in the year. You got VJ. Oh, yeah.

No, I think I'd rather have the sixers, John, Corey. That's not bad. Grimes, too? I think you guys were the right choice. We're cooking. That's a close debate. Honestly, you could pick the Raptors.

But we got it. Yeah. We got it. That's a close debate. You could have picked the Raptors, but I don't think you should feel bad about picking the Sixers. Perfect.

Not at all. I feel good about that. I think you guys did well. Perfect. I think you guys won as you should. Okay. Now we're going to play a five levels game with Tim Duncan.

Oh shit. We're talking about how good he'd be in today's NBA. Okay. You pick him up, put him today. How would you compare to some of the best players in the world?

Let's talk about it. Level one, would Tim Duncan be better than Victor Woman Yama? Yeah. Shit. Damn, you said yes? Right now, yes. Yeah, yeah.

Wimby's not quite there yet. Peak Tim Duncan, yes. Wembe average like four blocks. And she's like eight three's a game. Enough words. Tim Duk is better. Level two, Jason Tatum. Yes, he's better.

Yeah. He's better than Jason. So much of what Jason Tatum does, people are like, he's winged Tim Duncan. Well, let's put the actual Tim Duncan. in here, he'd be even better. Exactly. Yeah, that's easy.

Again, Pete Tim Duncan is back-to-back league MVP. Yeah. And he said, now we're breaking the top five player in the world combos. Level three, Luca Donchich. Yes, he's better than him. The defense is crazy. I'm leaning towards TD for sure. Yeah, like, Luke is a better offensive player,

but there's no downside with Duncan. You're not worried about any side of the ball like you are at Lucas' defense at times. Oh, my goodness. The defense gap is way bigger. But Luca is a better offensive player. Tim Duncan would never get scolded by Brian Winhorter. It's not happening.

What a nasty moment. Yeah. Brian Wenthorst. Shane. Ryan, really? Oh, level four. Level four. Shea Gildes Alexander.

Close. Maybe the second best player in the world. Congratulations. Tim Duncan was the best player in the world. I'm taking Tim Duncan. I'm pretty easily taking T. You don't think there's any argument for like the changes of the game today. Maybe a lead guard like that's a little more valuable.

When I think about changes of the game, like, Tim is going to fucking eat. He would go crazy with all that spacing. He already played with, we already seen what he looked like. We said that doesn't matter who the player is, with all that spacing little crazy. I don't think Tim Duncan is actually going to be better with spacing.

I think he would, I think he would for sure. I mean, to the point everybody's a little better, but like I don't think he's more dominant than he was in 2010. I don't think he's a player that like, oh, he's going to be twice as good with spacing, you know?

No, but I do think like from a pure statistic standpoint, if you had, and like the Spurs had, you know, some shooting around them. But if you got like today's level, level shooters at every position, obviously stretch drive is hard, but whatever. But statistically, I do think his assist numbers would go up and you, you'd have at least like 23, 10, and 5 from him.

Yeah. And when I think I like spacing, so I think maybe six. Like, I don't imagine his points for game scoring up, skying up or whatever. But damn, bro, the megatrons are outside. This is crazy. but I do think in terms of the wild opportunities when it comes to whether it be the playmaking or I guess it really that's the main feat for sure for now at least yeah okay level five nikoliyokic no would Tim Duncan be the best player in the game today yes I said I don't know

I can't say no to that so fast I will I will say yes I think he I think he will be better I think if you can because the Nuggets have done a good job in terms of parent parent Yokic but he having a guard like Jamal Murray who can play off beside him. It's just New Day. It's Yolkits and Murray. It's Tim Duncan and Tony Parker. Like having his sidekick with him that has great chemistry, I'm rocking with that. We say Yolkich is better than Janus, despite the big defensive gap.

I feel like he might say the same thing about Tim Duncan if it was today. Because we're not spawning in Tim Duncan with Greg Popovich and the whole team with the Spurs. Like, he'd be a great player still, like one of the best in the world. But I don't think he'd be rattling off five straight championships or anything. So, like, I think the narrative might still go towards Yokic. I will say, Yonis could, Yonis has been disqualified from a lot of these conversations because we haven't seen them in the playoffs for the last two years.

So you think he was in the playoffs, who'd say he's better than Yokic? It's tough, man. I don't think it would. I do. I do think so. I think that if Yonis was, if Yonis hadn't missed two years in the playoffs,

it would be debate at least. Yeah. And it wouldn't be as static. So if you want to say Yokic, cool. But I do think that Tim Duncan would have obviously a very, very real conversation and it wouldn't be as dismissed as it is right now. Yeah, I think me personally, I'm going to lean Yolkits.

This would be such a hard debate in real life. This would be incredibly close. Yeah, it's close. It doesn't feel good at all. You know what? I'll refrain my vote. You'll let us know the tiebreaker. Because I don't want to give an opinion.

Okay. Next thing we're going to do. We're going to play NBA eight questions. You guys have eight questions. I think of the player I'm thinking of. The lowest amount I've ever done. You guys have to really, really be precious about. about these questions and treat them with thought and care,

think of the player I'm thinking of. Curiosity is currency. How are we going to use our questions? I have my first question. I got it. Please ease it wisely. Go. Is this a top 30 player of all time?

No. Okay. Does this player play today? He does play today. That was a better first question. Okay. Even though top 30, he could pay it as you. That's not bad.

That combination questions helps. So non-legent in the game today. we got to narrow it down to a conference to a side yeah i need i need to know you got to use all the cheese in this i do the most grandious questions for sure does this because i've got got on this before in the upcoming season okay will this player be in the eastern conference nope he'll be in the west he'll be in the west he got tricked last he's not the christos spursing your shit got you he's not a top 30 player of all time i lose sleep over that i wake up in the middle of the night Damn. His jersey is red. FACA. Semantics. Damn.

So he is top. Okay, he is in the Western Conference. Western Conference player, not a top 30 player of all time. Not a top 30 player of all time. That's three questions. Okay. If you think about it, so you can knock out, you can not, there's several teams where, like, kind of go, like, you can kind of knock out the, actually, no, you can't do that. You can knock out, like, James Hardin, LeBron. Can you? Boy, he's saying because they're top 30 players of all the time.

Oh, okay, got to, got to, got to. So no, I forget, did we put Luke in top 30? I can't remember if we assigned him there. But do, do, okay, so do we want to do the thing where, do we want to ask if they made the playoffs last year? Division. Or, um, I think division will get to. You can waste a lot of questions on divisions.

Yeah, that's too nitty and gritty. We could either do, um, did they make the playoffs last year or. I think that's the one I want to ask Okay That'll help eliminate several teams Last season Do do Did they make the playoffs last year?

They did make the playoffs last year All right cool When we asked that One through eight playoffs They made the playoffs last year They were in the playoffs You don't worry about some magic They made the playoffs last year

Okay got you Okay so that's four questions up Yep four Okay Halfway through Not a top 30 player Of all time I feel like we got to ask

if it's either do you want to go starter or like big wing like try to figure out the position that's the next thing that we need to do um yeah four questions okay so we give so if we have to go front court or back court let's do either one doesn't matter okay is this player a back court back court no okay so forward so he's not back court no so forward not a point guard or shooting guard so forward the centers for the centers okay so that that does that does help not a point guard or i'll say this is a tricky player for like where he where i put him positionally but he's not a so he's a wing guard so he's a wing but he's not a point guard or shooting guard so okay so i guess and this is not a it is a question

but like i guess for clarification on that when we rank them like yeah wasn't on point wasn't on our point guard or shooting guard list okay okay cool yeah so he's bigger guy and you made five questions So who are the teams who made the house last year? I'm getting nervous now. You got two more things you got to figure out. He started to breathe hard. He's nervous. Yeah.

Okay. We have the thunder, the rockets, the Lakers, the Clippers, the Clippers, the Clippers, the Nuggets, the Timberwolves. Who's the seven seed? Who's the Rock. Oh, the Warriors. And then the eighth seed was the Grizzlies. Yep. Oh, shit.

Okay. Two questions left, then you got to guess. Fuck. So two descriptors, and then you guess. So he's a big. bigger guy, bigger guy as well. Okay, we can either nail down teams or try to nail down position. Because if we nail down teams, then we can go and ask if they were in the top half of the bracket,

if they had home court advantage in the first round. And then that would give us four teams. Let's do that. I like that. I like that thought process. Did this player, were they on a top four seed in the West last year? They were. Okay.

So Rockets. That's six questions up. Okay, so two questions. You show you have one more descriptor. Then you got to guess. Okay, so out of the, out of the, because, okay, wait, game seven was, I can remember, did the Nuggets have home court advantage last year? No, they didn't. They played their first two games in, um, in L.A.

Okay, so. So it's a top four Western Conference team. Okay, cool. Now, mind you, so I think that the only thing that we can do because, so the obviously like the thunder moved on to the, to the second round and the nuggets moved are. Nuggets to the four seed. And the Nuggets moved on. Yeah. The Rockets and the Lakers did not.

So if we asked if they move on, then we can, then we can, then we have two teams. You don't want to. Two teams from each one. We can either pick teams or nail down like a player. I'm fine with the teams. I'm fine with the team. Or is there a question that we can ask to nail down the player? That's not where I would go with it, but you guys do you.

You have one question left before you got to guess. Okay. Do you want to, how will we need it on the player? How could we do that? You guys don't know how good the player is. Kind of a heart. Yeah. We got to ask either like starter or.

Okay, let's do that before we. Well, this is the last question before we have to take our guess. Yeah. What's the most valuable information you can gleam? I think I got to know how good the guy is. So we have to go starter. Yeah. Or if they're an all-star.

Let's do the, if he was an all-star. Was this player an all-star last year? He was an all-star last year. That's what I would have done. That was the right question. Top four. So you know it's a non-point guard shooting. Guard, All-Star on a playoff team in the West.

One question left. Who are we going with? Which means we have. J-Dub. Shangoon. Sangun. Sengun. Lebron.

Lebron. Yokic. There's Yolkich. Okay. Is that it? Did you guys ask me for the top four seed? Yeah. Oh, you did.

Okay. Yeah. That's it. That's it. That's the bull. Okay. So we, 25% chance. Take your guess. Take your guess. Okay. LeBron. LeBron, Sangu, Yokic, and, uh, and Jadob. Which one of my most likely to pick of those four?

Okay. So who would I not pick? Who are you rolling out? I don't think he would pick LeBron because it's too easy. J.D.b feels a little bit hipster. What's a question that could we have no more question? What's a question that we could use to eliminate all these guys that someone has accomplished? No, that's the thing. We don't have any more questions.

Like, we're on the eighth question. We have to guess right now. Yeah, you do. Yeah, yeah. But also, we have to guess right now. We have to guess right now. That's all, that's the same thing. So pick your fore and just ask.

Fuck, man. Who are you leaning towards? I'm leaning towards Sangu. Fuck, man. I'm leaning towards J-Dobb. You know what? I don't even care. Jesus take the wheel.

Oh, fuck, man. We'll go J-Dove. Fuck that. It's a LeBron. Is that your final guess? Yes. It was J-Dob. Damn.

You were. We're so close. You glazer, he had to go LeBron last second. He never let me down. He never let me down. And he still hasn't let me down. It should have been LeBron.

It was J. Doug. You were so close. It was almost surgical. I'm not, I don't feel bad about that, though. You should feel bad? I don't feel bad about that. Damn.

Last thing we're going to do, let's get out of you. One more segment we're going to do pretty quick. I'm going to name you guys a series of young NBA players. Young stars, young players are trying to become stars, just different types of players. You let me know one thing you want to see them improve on over the off season. Okay, let's do it.

So one skill set that you want to see them better at next year that, you know, if they're in the gym today, what they should be working on, which you expect they'll be working on. Okay. Amend Thompson. Shooting. That's the most obvious thing. Outside of three-point shooting, what's something you want?

Of course, he needs to evolve us three, but outside of that. His handle. That's exactly what I was in the same. There were a lot of times last year where you saw his handle get loose. You saw him lose the ball. If you can watch two Kyrie highlight mistakes, you can get to where because then that means that even if the shooting still takes time, which it probably will,

being able to, one, handle the ball and actually be a point guard, that is massive for the rock. Yeah, that's 100% the answer. If he can have a little more control of his handle to be able to attack space and people will sag off him, that'll make it to be a point shot.

It doesn't matter nearly as much. Okay. Victor Wenbanyama. Hmm. Interesting one, because he does still have his flaws needs to improve on. Honestly, I would say,

high post. High post offense. I feel like... Do you have a move? you can go to. I feel like, no, because he's,

he's clearly has already been working on, on the three. You know that he can be dominant, down, down low. It's this in-between game where I feel like even, even as a,

as a passer and as a hub, being at the high post, maybe doing like some, some yokech stuff where you can play and have cutters play off of you, be an offensive threat from there. I would say learning that area.

But is, is it, is it that he doesn't have that skill set just said, or he hasn't optimized it based off play side. Either way, you have guards who aren't, who aren't like great, great shooters. Like, DeR Fox should be playing off of you cutting. Stefan Castle can do that.

Dylan Harper can do that. Okay. I think just figuring out ways that you can be on the floor and have everything a revolver on you, that would be amazing for it. And he also needs to have high post scoring. He needs to have a go-to move that he can beat people in isolation with.

Right now he's really play finish independent. Scoo Henderson. The shooting came along. Honestly, defense. I want to see him continue to get really dominant defensively. If he can shoot threes and I don't think he's going to be

the on ball star ever, but if he can shoot threes and be like Eric Bledsoe with a three and be a dominant blow-up screen type of defender, that's what I want to see. Eric Bledso with the three

is disgusting. Exactly. That's nasty. So yeah, I want to see him like get on some Jalen Suggs timing where he can be a dominant on ball defender

and be a passable lead pole playmaker. You know what? He needs to, whatever Drew Holiday is working on. You need to work on. Be with him. Screen navigation, just be a menace defending on ball.

Hang your hat on something. Yeah, you do every Drew, Drew Holliday. Yep. Because at that's the point, just be Caruso. Be an on ball 3&D defender. Chet Holmgren. Squats. Squats, weight room.

Squats, RDLs, hipter us, anything with hip flexion. Go ahead. Get the body right. All I care about is he comes into the season physically himself. He was way faster as a rookie, way more spring in a step. I want to see him be at his best physical shape you can post hip break. and everything else to come along with it he'll be better on ball

better as defender better as a finisher it'll all look better if his body's right please shoot more yeah yeah yeah please no more 19% palo bankero processing yeah the playmaking speed

but I don't but if we're saying in in the gym work on work on certain passes out of the the picking roll if you are yeah if you're gonna have the ball in your hands you have to be able to

to create out of the out of the picking roll and able to make crazy, crazy passes or certain passes against different looks, it's going to open things up for you as a score, especially allowing him to get downhill. I would say his passing can, it can work in an inverse way for you. I think the key thing to that is just also doing more while also doing less. Yeah, right now. Jibling so much and you can make advanced passes, you know? He's a really good, he has really good passing accuracy right now. He can whizz that ball down the floor. He's Anthony Richardson. He can chuck a shit really hard. He can throw out of

throw a ball really hard, like right now. He can make a pass, but he needs to work on identifying the passing reads faster. So there's tons of pick and roll reps, tons of weak side post reps, and just be able to know where the help defense is coming from. Yeah. Yeah. Next up, Bronny James. What do you want to see him get better at to enter the rotation next year? I think aggressiveness in scoring. Yeah, last year. There's also a handle to some extent. Yeah, exactly. I agree with that. Those two definitely go hand in hand. I think he'll raise his ceiling a bar higher, several bars higher, if he was to be. able to either get to his spots more or be more of a consistent shooter because he's already

like proven to be a fine defender yeah the two-point shot is coming along hopefully defense comes along being able to have the handle to aggressively get to the rim and be able to attack close-out that's the number one thing I'd say get get get a floater get get yeah same type of thing yeah yeah let's let's get an in-between game to where even because I I feel like every time I watch I watch a highlight tape of Ronnie he's doing his move he's getting to the mid range can we get two three feet closer yeah rather than you you take in like an 18 foot jumper off the, off the dribble.

Kaye Cunningham. All day. All day. This is all I need. I need you to have the ball, right? Working on whatever shot you want. Have you a trainer. Five second timer.

Five, four, three, two, one. Run it back. Five, four, three, two, one. Clutch situation. If we can get Cade off of Paul George ball game type of time in, and he's knocking down clutch shots, oh, we're good. Ball security, too, not turning. not turning it over quite as much

and being a little more secure with it it. It kind of comes to the territory of his style of play is that he puts a ball in danger a lot and you can live with it to some extent but I think he's never going to have the quickest first step to be like necessarily a top of the line efficient score so if he can be like a mega ball security guy

and like unlock that Chris Paul Jean where it's 10 assists and like minimal turnovers that's kind of how you make up for that lack of scoring efficiency. I think how some that goes along that umbrella is being a good separator from your defender and that just goes along with your handle. Yeah, and I think it'll always kind of, that'll never be a strength for him,

I don't think, because he's not the fastest guy in the world. So he kind of really has to win with strength, which really needs you. She don't have to be the fastest. He's the best separator in the game, though. Yeah, but he's also like the best ever at that. So I think Cade will never be amazing to that extent.

He'll have to win with like strength and like tough looks, which is fine. So I think making up for it being like the best playmaker you can will be like the next path to a jump for me. Lamello ball. Some ankle implants. Can we get some robo legs? That's all I was going to say.

Can he have some leg? flexibility insure you know you know what it sure is yeah that milk yeah that pedia like yeah like somebody sure peter sure insure you know something to strengthen up them bones anything anything man i guess no more basketball on concrete none of that it's hard man it's hard jonathan comminga thank you um i mean if we're we're not saying shooting um meditation There I was going to say there. Let's find a way to get you just in the right head space for next season to where you can understand and be able to adapt to the ups and downs, the ebbs and flows of either your role

or the season. The moment we can get his resting heart rate below 72, he's dominant. Offball defense. Right now, he's a terrible team defender. Off ball gives up way too many cuts. It doesn't rotate quite as quick as he should. He has athletic tools to be a impactful defender, especially off ball. And that's part of why Steve Kerr doesn't give him the role he wants is because he can't

rely on him to close games defensively. You do that, you'll get more touches, I guarantee it. He'll give you the ball on the high touch if you go out there and lock shit up defensively. He could at least be a good rebounder, a great rebound. Be the best rebound on your team. You can do that. So get in the lab with Jason Tatum and learn how to rotate under the rim. The best wing defenders you can find that are good rim protectors.

Stefan Castle. Really just shooting. It's super simple. No one player that we named so far needs to be a better shooter more than him because There's definitely a possibility. There's a scenario where you are edged out of the Spurs Young Corps because of you have the biggest learning hole in your shot. Yeah, especially like off ball shooting,

like being able to relocate off the screens, being able to move around, obviously catch and shoot from the corner, all the versatile ways of being a good off ball player. When they got Fox in there and they have another young star guard now in there, you're going to have to be able to thrive off ball. Yeah. He's already a good cutter.

So if he can get really versatile as an offball shooter, that's how he stays like a starter long term. Yeah. Trey Murphy. like palo passing reads go out there run a million pick and rolls all somewhere you're going to have more on-ball capabilities i guarantee it the playmaking needs come around i yeah i was going to say defense from you personally that that's what i'm in a stance all all summer long getting the stamina up being able to be high level

offense touches while having energy for defense yeah forget the gym run hills yeah run bear minimum be just more aware off ball too yeah and then to me that's a stamina thing because he needs to have like the ability physically to be able to maintain intensity on both sides. That's difficult as fuck. Find out whatever Janus does to maintain that energy on both sides in his prime.

Get on that. And that's the last thing I got. And that's the end of this episode. If people are still here, what should they comment? Read a book. That's what it is. Read a book.

That is the theme of this episode. And we'll see y'all next week. Let us know what you read this week. You better have read a book. That's a good quiz.