The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - LeBron James lifts Lakers past Ja Morant & Grizzlies in OT thriller

Episode Date: April 25, 2023

Jason Timpf reacts to LeBron James, Anthony Davis, and the Los Angeles Lakers' 117-111 overtime win over Ja Morant and the Memphis Grizzlies. Jason breaks down the game's top highlights including LeBron James' incredible game-tying shot at the end of regulation. Is Los Angeles peaking at the right time, or will their inconsistent efforts prove fatal to their NBA Finals hopes? #volume #herdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On The Look Back at it podcast. From 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84 was big to me.

I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. With our friends, fellow comedians, and favorite authors. Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s. 84 was a wild year. It was a wild year. I don't think there's a more important year for black people.

Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care what you're saying. Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey, or my career in sports media. Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifers Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard,

but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to the Clifford show on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. The Volume. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight here at The Volume.

Happy Monday, everybody. We are live on Amp. So if you're watching on YouTube or listening on the podcast feeds, don't forget that Amp is the very first place that you guys can get these shows. What an unbelievable. basketball game that we just watched between the Memphis Grizzlies and the Los Angeles Lakers. Desmond Bain and John Moran soundly outplay LeBron James and Anthony Davis and then somehow

LeBron James in Year 20 digs down and steals the game. I don't even know where to start. I've got tons of thoughts on this particular game. We're going to hit it from every single angle. You guys know the drill before we get started. Subscribe to the volumes YouTube channels so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason. LTE, so you guys don't miss any show announcements. And if for whatever reason you guys miss one of these shows and you can get back over to YouTube to finish, don't forget you can find them wherever you find your podcasts under hoops tonight. Last but not least, you guys have heard me talk about Game Time, the fastest growing ticketing app in the United States. If you're looking

to get out to an NBA game or an NHL playoff game or a baseball game, which is getting increasingly harder to find on television or even a concert or a comedy show, Game Time has amazing last-minute deals on tickets to all of these. So if you're looking to get out to see your favorite NBA team or NHL team playing the playoffs game time has you covered or if your favorite artist is touring around the country and coming nearby your town and you want to go see them in person game time has a deal for you no matter where you live get out and have some fun this week download game time app enter email and redeem code hoops for $20 off your first purchase terms apply again enter your email and the code hoops that's h oops for $20 off download game time today

last minute tickets, lowest price, guaranteed. All right, let's talk some basketball. So, you know, I talked a lot about rock fights over the course of the regular season. The rock fights happen a lot in the NBA playoffs. And it's a huge part of why I've always been such a big believer in the LeBron James and Anthony Davis core. And my skepticism surrounding the Lakers, and we're going to talk a lot about my skepticism surrounding the Lakers in the second half of this video. but my skepticism surrounds more this specific iteration of the LeBron James Anthony Davis duo

and some of the issues with this particular roster and with their particular kind of like their makeup and their basketball character. But at its core, LeBron James and Anthony Davis is my favorite duo that you could possibly have for these types of basketball games. And the reason why I think that's so dangerous is so many NBA games, especially in the playoffs, devolve into this type of. of basketball. There are games that are more free-flowing.

There are games where skill players dominate, and you will see games like that. And this Lakers team will lose games like that sometimes. As a matter of fact, there was one guy in this game that had all of his skill shots going. It was Desmond Bain, in big shock, he was like the best player on the floor for most of the night, right? Because in a game where nobody can make a wide open three

and so much contact was being allowed at the rim, those little short little 15-foot pull-up jump shots in the mid-range were kind of where things were opening up. And Desmond Bain was the only guy confidently stepping into jump shots tonight. And that's what made him so valuable in this particular game. But usually the tons of physicality wears on everyone's legs, takes everyone out of rhythm, and even really skilled players can struggle to put the ball in the basket. I think you saw that even among the many skilled players that play for both of these teams in this particular game. And here's the advantage.

In an environment where it's a fist fight and everything is allowed. And if you go to the basket and you take some contact and you miss a layup and you fall on the ground, they're running the other way while you're complaining to the refs. And there was a lot of that from John Morant tonight. There was a lot of that from Anthony Davis tonight. There was a lot of that from everybody on both teams tonight. There was a lot of falling down and complaining when nothing was getting called, and the reality was that's just the kind of game it was.

And having guys that are built like a truck that can finish through contact around the rim becomes immensely valuable in this setting. And to LeBron's credit, because LeBron was being kind of hesitant. He was being guarded by Xavier Tillman down the stretch of this game, and I kept thinking to myself like, man, he's got to be able to beat Xavier Tillman off the dribble. but he kept calling for action to get John Morant into the screen. And like Rui Hachamura would set the screen and Rui would roll to the basket and Jha would do what a lot of teams do when they don't want to switch their weaker defender

onto another team's best player. They will hedge and recover. So Jah would like kind of hedge out on LeBron that would kind of temporarily dissuade LeBron from taking that quick three. And then Xavier Tilman would just kind of wait there at the three-point line. And Rui Hachamura is rolling to the basket, but he's not open because everything's congested in the basket because nobody can make a three in the damn game. And so I kept thinking to myself like these John Moran, these ghost screens with Rihachamura aren't doing anything.

Like he's got to eventually just beat Xavier Tillman off the dribble. And there it was last possession down to six seconds left. LeBron James dug way deep in his reservoir and beat Xavier Tillman off the dribble and elevated as high as he possible. could over a rapidly approaching Jaron Jackson Jr. and somehow finished over the top. And then he did it two additional times and overtime. But like all of these are ugly. They're going into traffic. Guys like riding his hip and he's throwing an off arm. The other guy's hitting him with his hands. He's getting hacked on the way. Like everyone's getting fouled. It's just go put the ball in the basket by any means necessary. It almost devolves into like

American gladiator. I remember when my brothers and I were, we all played sports in college. We're all athletes. We're all bigger guys. We used to like throw a laundry basket on the ottoman in the living room and like have a balled up sock and you're like tackling each other to get and put the balled up sock in the laundry basket when you're a kid just trying to find something to occupy yourself. Or I've talked about pool basketball and how violent that can be. Like that's what these games devolved down into. And LeBron's 270 pounds. in 6'9 and is used to finishing through contact. So suddenly, what happened down the stretch of this game?

After Desmond Bain was so skilled and knocking down all these shots. And big shout out to DeAngelo Russell, who I thought had a really rough night on both ends of the floor, but he had three, massive threes down the stretch of this game that completely erased the damage that Desmond Bain had been doing and gave the Lakers the fighting chance before he fouled out of the game. But what happened from there? then Desmond Bain went cold.

John Moran, who kind of got going at various points in the game, went cold. So now Desmond Bain is cold, John Morant's cold, LeBron James is cold, Anthony Davis is cold, nobody knows what to do. In that environment, LeBron ascended and became the best player on the floor. In a night where for 46 minutes or so, Desmond Bain and John Morant were the two best players on the floor. In the last two minutes or last few possessions and then all of over, overtime, all of a sudden Anthony Davis and LeBron James became the best players on the floor.

I was a little critical of them earlier in the game because I didn't think LeBron and AD were bringing enough athletic effort. There was a huge play down the stretch of the game where Desmond Bain hit a three to put Memphis up seven. And if you remember on that play, Xavier Tillman crashed out of the corner on LeBron. LeBron didn't box him out. And then Jared Jackson was in a battle with Anthony Davis for rebounding position and Anthony Davis just kind of let him go around him. And Jaron Jackson and get an offensive rebound, kick out to Desmond Bain, pump fake, Austin Reeves by, knocks down the three. A couple possessions later, though,

LeBron and AD finally engaged themselves. DeAngelo Russell rims out a three from the top of the key. LeBron comes flying in and taps it back out, because guess what? He's still one of the best athletes on the floor. Ends up in DeAngel Russell's hands again, another wide open three, misses it again. Now Anthony Davis comes flying in and grabs the offensive rebound

and goes up and draws a foul on, Xavier Tillman. As soon as LeBron and AD started to match Memphis's effort and physicality, they ascended and became the best players on the floor in a rock fight. Now, this game became monumentally important for the Lakers. They're not going to face a team as physical as this team, probably the rest of their time in the Western Conference. They might find something like that out of the east.

They're going to be bigger and stronger than Golden State at every position. They're going to be bigger and stronger than Sacramento Meno at every position. They'll probably be bigger and stronger. They will be bigger and stronger than Phoenix at every position, and they're going to have some advantages against Denver. But in this particular matchup, physicality rules the day, and it was so important for them to end this series quickly.

Memphis has a really good chance to win game five, and they should feel good about their chances, especially if they play with a similar effort that they played with tonight. But getting it to 3-1 gives you a guaranteed close-out game in game six. So massive win for the Lakers. And if you want on a bright side of things, like I will say that in an environment like this, where you get Rui Hachamura's first so-so game of the series,

LeBron James struggling in a bunch of specific shot-making areas, Anthony Davis with like one of the worst games I've ever seen him play, certainly in the playoffs up until the final few minutes. to win that game, that to me is an indicator of some of the strengths of this roster overall. Because one of the things that this particular group has is depth, which is something they did not have in the past. And they could not weather bad LeBron games and bad Anthony Davis games. But in a night where Austin Reeves kind of struggled to make rim decisions,

he made a couple of plays at the end. And I think you finished with 20-something points. got enough out of Austin Reeves. They got enough out of DeAngelo Russell. Even Rui, for as much as he struggled in certain phases of the game, I thought he grabbed a couple of massively important contested defensive rebounds down the stretch of this game. But I mean, like, you got a really bad game at a Dennis? He was just throwing the ball away.

Like, like, there, a lot of things did not go the Lakers way in this game and they won. But I do, I do want to, like, pull. point out some of the realities of the way I view this team in the grand scheme of things. Because I got a lot of Laker fans on my case today because with Colin Coward yesterday, I basically just said like, hey, like, their inconsistent effort has the potential to get them beat. And again, like, we're not just talking about Lakers Grizzlies. It's, there are 30 NBA teams.

One gets the trophy. There are 20 that make the postseason. One gets the trophy. There are 16 that are guaranteed to have to be beaten four times. out of seven. One gets the trophy. There are a lot of teams with lots of talent. Like, we can talk about the good with the Lakers, like, LeBron James and Anthony Davis. They've got skilled players around them. They've got two different forwards that they can go to that have kind of different archetypes that can help in different ways. They've got three really good guards where like any two of them

kind of make an interesting kind of combination. They've got some shooting and some other guys that can do some things off the bench. They've got lots of players. But guess what? So do the Celtics. so do the Bucks, so are the Sixers, so do the Warriors. The Warriors of Steph Curry and Clay Thompson and Draymond-on-Green and Andrew Wiggins and Jordan Poole. Sacramento Kings have a lot of good, a lot of, all of these teams have good players. And so it becomes like tiny, tiny margins that we're talking about here. Like look at this game in particular. The Lakers, I expect Memphis to win game five.

I think that they're playing at a level in the last couple quarters. that I don't know if the Lakers are going to be able to match that on the road. That might actually be the first game that I say bet a large scoring margin since the Lakers have a tendency to lay down sometimes. But like the Lakers are going to have a chance to close them down and close them out in game six. That goes differently. LeBron misses that layup.

Now it's 2-2 on the road in game 5 in Memphis where they're probably going to be a slight favorite. Now all of a sudden you lose that game. Now your back is against the wall. All these playoff series are defined by the tiniest of margins, and the margins get tinier the further you get along when you start to play against better teams. And so, like, little things like,

I thought the Laker effort for the most part was good tonight. There were a handful of bad stretches. There was a bad stretch in the middle of the fourth quarter, and there was a bad stretch at the end of the second quarter when they blew that 13 or 15-point leader or whatever, and Memphis got it back to two before the half. But, like, that stretch before the end of the half? that to me is what changed the entire game.

Desmond Bain started being super aggressive, really started trying to put his head down and go to the rim. And he gained his confidence in that late second quarter run, including hitting that three right for the end of the half. The Lakers relaxing a little bit, bought a player in Desmond Bain, who has been pretty consistently bad in his playoff career, got him into rhythm,

and then he had confidence. Confidence is a real thing. A couple of specific adjustments, you know, especially on the Laker front. Speaking of confidence, one of the big reasons why I think Anthony Davis is having such a bad series offensively is he's playing extended stretches of the game

with Jared Vanderbilt on the floor, especially with the starting lineup when Memphis is huge. I tweeted out a picture, I tweeted out a picture with the like kind of line score off the ESPN app, and you'll see two flat stretches. There's like a flat laker stretch at the beginning and then a lot of scoring and then a flat

laker stretch at the end in the first half. And those two flat stretches are the Jared Vanderbilt stretches. Because when Jared Vanderbilt is on the floor, they put Xavier Tillman on Anthony Davis, and they put Jaron Jackson on Jared Vanderbilt, and they just ignore Jared Vanderbilt, and it gives them the ability to hawk them. And again, like, okay, Jared made two threes. That's great. Here's the problem.

That's six points. Okay. every other possession he's not being guarded. So if it's dramatically affecting the Lakers' offensive production in all of the other possessions, too, that six points is not enough to make up for it. I've been talking for a while about how the major adjustment I expect Darvinham to eventually make, and I don't know when he's going to make it, but it's to put Rui Hachamura in the starting lineup.

He's a better player than Jared Vanderbilt right now. And I mean, Dennis Schroeder at least gives you an option, and another guy that you can put on at John Morant so you don't necessarily have to have Ruey, or you don't necessarily have to have Jared in that position. But it's just a big part of starting the game like that is going to naturally get Anthony Davis more space, which is going to naturally get him in a better rhythm.

Like what ends up happening is you go these long stretches without touching the ball, and then the handful of times you do, you're getting swarmed, and so you turn it over and you miss a shot. You don't feel great about yourself. Look at the difference in just the way John Morant and Desmond Bain played from the beginning of the game when they didn't feel comfortable and they didn't feel confident versus when they got their rhythm and then suddenly they're just confidently working to their spots.

I believe it'd go a long way, just simply moving Rui Hachamura into the starting lineup. But this series is not over. One of the biggest reasons why I've been hesitant to consider the Lakers a legitimate, legitimate championship contender is that effort piece, they just don't get it. This Memphis team in particular, you have to play 48 minutes of good basketball to beat them. They will not lay down. You could play 30 good minutes, and then as soon as you relax, they will just drive the ball to the basket relentlessly and run it down your throat and transition, and suddenly you're going to find yourself in a seven or eight point game. And that is going to even

go up a level when they play against better teams. One of the thing I wanted to talk about just in general was the Darwin Ham situation. I noticed this with every team around the league. They're very quick to be critical of coaches. And I believe it stems from just the passion of fanhood, you know, so I want to cut people some slack. But I've typically been very hesitant to be critical of coaches. And one of the main reasons why is, like, to me, like, it's so easy to Monday morning quarterback this stuff, and coaches have really tough decisions.

And sometimes it's like, it's like, well, why aren't you playing this guy off the bench or why aren't you playing that guy off the bench? And it's like, well, the gap between that guy and the guy we're talking about is usually pretty small and like, he probably has some strength that the coach is seeing that he fits into the rotation to that specific spot. And every fan base hates their rotation. And so I'm typically very slow to jump onto that train. But I want to be critical of Darvin Hand tonight because Rui Hachamura has been your third best player in this series. Lakers called a timeout with seven and a half minutes left in the third quarter because Memphis was on a run. There had been 29 and a half minutes of gameplay,

or 28 and a half minutes of gameplay. And in that 28 and a half minutes, Jared Vanderbilt had played 20. Troy Brown Jr. had played 12. And Rui Hachamura had played eight minutes out of 29 minutes. He's one of your three best players in this series. That's self-sabotage. You're keeping one of your best players on the bench. And like, I was just genuinely confused.

by that. The way he's been rotating the guards has been confusing to me too. Just these super long shifts for guys who are struggling. When the whole advantage of having four guards that can play, and Malik Beasley, Austin Reeves, DeAngelo Russell, and Dennis Schroeder is like, you can kind of play them based on who's playing well. Okay, Delo doesn't have it tonight. Dennis is a starting level guard that can play 35 minutes. Let's go with him.

Okay, Dennis doesn't have it tonight. DeAngelo Russell. is a starting level guard to can play 35 minutes. Let's lean on him heavily. Okay, Austin doesn't have it tonight. You guys get the point. And then lastly,

just the inability to adjust on the fly and slow down runs with a timeout. There were a lot of my Bucks fans who are critical of Mike Boodenholzer as they blew their late 12-point lead against the Miami Heat. And by the way, we are going to break that game down tomorrow. But the whole run, he just didn't call a timeout.

And same thing down the stretch of the first half in this game. I think the Lakers were up 48 to 33 or something like that. And Memphis is going on a run, and Darwin Hamps is sitting there with his hands in his pockets. Like, call a time out. Identify what the issue is. Discuss with your players what's going on. Do something, and if for no reason,

other than to just disrupt the rhythm of the team that is scoring on you every time down the floor. Make them go sit down and cool off for a minute. Again, I'm not the kind of guy that's typically very critical of coaches, but tonight I thought it was like 15% those handful of possessions where there are a handful of stretches where the Lakers let their foot off the gas, like 40% Anthony Davis just really having a bad game. And then the rest of it, the 45% remaining, Darvin Ham I thought was responsible for a big chunk of the predicament that they were in. Play your best players. play complimentary players.

Jaron Jackson, Taylor Jenkins is deliberately subbing Jaron Jackson out of the game early so that when Anthony Davis goes to the bench, he can bring Jaron Jackson back in to play like six or seven consecutive minutes against the Lakers bench. And they happen to fare well against him in this game, but in the other three games they've been getting destroyed in those minutes. It's a simple adjustment. Taylor Jenkins is like, okay, Darvin Ham is just going to stick with his scheduled rotation, so I might as well play Jared Jackson against them.

And Darvinham will not make that adjustment. So, I mean, Laker fans have been complaining about that all season. I've had many Laker fans, even some that I'm very close with, say, I don't believe in this team because of Darvin Ham. And I've been like, eh, you're fine. Tonight was the first night where I was like, whoa, he's doing some, like, serious damage here. and it's something that again like when the margins get tighter that can be a problem um like i said earlier we're going to break down uh heat bucks at some point uh tomorrow or wednesday um keep an eye on my

twitter feed as i let you guys know the rest of the schedule but that's all we have for tonight as always i sincerely appreciate your guys as support and we'll see you guys later this week The volume. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast. or wherever you get your podcasts. A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care what you're saying.

Yep, that's me. Clivert Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey, or my career in sports media. Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Cliford Show. This is a place for raw,

unfills of conversations with athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to the Clivert Show on the I-Hard Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok.

On The Look Back at a podcast. From 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84 was big to me. I'm Sam Jay. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. With our friends, fellow comedians, and favorite authors.

Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s. 84 was a wild year. It was a wild year. I don't think there's a more important year for, black people. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast.

Guaranteed human.