The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - LIVE: Game 4 Reactions: Wolves & Knicks Go Up 3-1, Tatum Hurt

Episode Date: May 13, 2025

Jason reacts live after the Minnesota Timberwolves take a commanding 3-1 lead over the Golden State Warriors as Anthony Edwards and Julius Randle have big performances to outlast Draymond Green and Jimmy Butler in Steph Curry’s absence. Then he discusses the New York Knicks getting a 3-1 lead over the Boston Celtics in a game where Jalen Brunson was spectacular but Jayson Tatum left with a late injury.    Follow the show on Playback for future “Aftershow” content: https://www.playback.tv/hoopstonight  #Volume #HerdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey guys, it's us. The Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what? We created our own podcast called, Hey Jonas.

We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it. But, you know, tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you.

you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. 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 ice. Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Winning on Clay is an art. The rallies are relentless. And at the French Open, only the toughest survive. I'd know. I competed there for decades. Join me, Renee Stubbs, on the Renee Stubbs tennis podcast for no-nonsense breakdowns of the biggest matches, the toughest players, and the moments that define Roland Garris. She can win.

She's an outsider to win the French fame. And she likes Clay. Listen, Lina Rubakina is arguably the best player in the world right now. And I actually can win on any service. Listen to the Renee Stubbs tennis podcast on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Capital One, founding partner of IHeart Women's Sports. Imagine an Olympics where doping is not only legal, but encouraged. It's the enhanced games.

Some call it grotesque. Others say it's unleashing human potential. Either way, the podcast's Superhuman documented it all, embedded in the games and with the athletes for a full year. Within probably 10 days, I'd put on 10 pounds. I was having trouble stopping the muscle growth. Listen to Superhuman on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The volume. The NBA 82 game grind is done.

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to your week. What a wild night in the NBA as the draft lottery, the draft lottery sends Cooper flag to the Dallas Mavericks, or at least presumably at this point, we'll talk about some of the possibilities there. San Antonio gets the second pick, putting them in the pole position in a Janus Santinacumpo trade. Then we get just an absolutely crazy Knicks Celtics game that comes down to the wire as the Knicks pull it out. But then suddenly at the end, we get the, what appears to be a devastating injury to Jason Tatum, which kind of put a bummer on everything. And then in the late slate, Anthony Edwards and Julius Randall put on another show against the Golden State Warriors.

We're going to talk briefly about the Timberwolves Warriors game. We're going to be spending most of the night on Celtics, Nix, the Tatum News, and the draft lottery. We're also, when we are done here tonight, we're heading over to playback for our usual after show where we take callers and take questions from the chat, watch film, stuff along those lines. head over to playback.tv slash hoops tonight, right when we finish here for the after show. You guys know the joke before we started. Subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel. So you don't miss any more of our videos.

Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason LT. So you guys don't miss show announcements. Don't forget about our podcast fee, wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if you leave a rating and a review on that front. We also have social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook where Jackson is doing great work. Make sure you guys follow us there. And then, last minute least, as we mentioned earlier, keep dropping mailbag questions in the YouTube comments. so we can hit them throughout the remainder of the postseason.

All right, let's talk some basketball. So the only hope for the Warriors to win this series was for their defense to stifle Anthony Edwards and Julius Randall long enough for Steph Curry to make a return. And Anthony Edwards and Julius Randall just left no chance of that being the case. Both of those guys were fantastic in these two games in Golden State. And in both games, Golden State threw a great punch and got scoring punch from some guys that have been inconsistent throughout the season.

They get the best play out of Jonathan Kaminga that we've seen in this postseason by far in his first kind of like long leash opportunity. The games are close in the second half both times, but in both games a little bit later in the fourth quarter in game three, more of a mid third quarter run in game four. But Anthony Edwards and Julius Randall are able to figure things out and get on a run and put the game away. Now, obviously it's more complicated than that. Not having Steph Curry on the floor has all sorts of trickle-down effects. Jackson and I were talking about this earlier. There's like a belief that you have to have.

And you could literally see when ants going on his scoring run, it just kind of sapped the belief out of that Warriors defense. And that's where it'd be nice if you had a guy on your team that could go on a scoring run to help you put the opponent in that sort of position. But the fact remains that against what I believe is, probably the second or third best defense in the NBA. It's Oklahoma City. It's Minnesota.

It's, you know, it's Boston. It's Golden State. Those are the four best defenses that I've watched to this point in the season. And Golden State obviously was the number one defense in the league over the final stretch of games there from the Jimmy Butler trade. This is a very, very good defense that Anthony Edwards and Julius Randall were able to score on. And this is the Anthony Edwards upside that I've been so excited about for so long. One of the things I've talked about with him is there's a certain unguardability with him that is different than the unguardability you see with Yokic or with Luca, where it's primarily

built on size. Ant has size. He's 6'6 and he's built like a truck. But he has this profound stop-start ability, which allows him to get from point A to point B, but to stop on a dime at point B and to get straight up and down into a shot. And you add to that the touch that he has built out over the last couple of years. I was speaking about this in the playoff run last year, stretching into the Team USA basketball stretch over the summer.

I'm a big believer in Anthony Edwards's jump shot. The form is crisp. He gets great rotation on the ball. He has great arc on the shot. Yes, he can still, you know, have his stretches where he cools off a little bit. But overall, I believe in him as a jump shooter. And when you piece all of that together, what it allows for is the ability. for him to get to any spot on the floor with his athleticism, but to have the shots necessary

to pay off any of those specific spots on the floor. Whether it's all the way to the rim for a dunk, whether it's a finish with either hand, he's finally starting to finish better around the basket over the course of the last couple of games. You can tell he's starting to figure out his angles in this particular matchup. The short-range shot making, the step-throughs and the floaters, he had a couple absurd little like lefty, righty floaters at various kind of finishing angles in this game settled into a nice easy mid-range jumper. I'd like to see him take that one a little bit more. And then he can take a three against a ball screen against a drop coverage.

He can take a three on a step back going to his left. He could take a three on a step back going to his right. He just has all of the shot making to tie that athleticism piece to the ability to actually finish plays and make shots. And, you know, one of the big differences, like, obviously Golden State's defense is trying to make him make higher difficulty reads. But, you know, in the way that these games kind of dictate, you have to as the star take some difficult shots over double teams.

Like I thought it was flat out bizarre in this game that we saw Jimmy Butler in a very similar type of situation where his team needed him to score only take nine shots. Like because again, in this sort of situation, when the defense is as good as it is and everyone's as locked in and as focused as they are, you need a guy who can take a step back three over a contested hand and make it. That's what Jason Tatum was doing tonight. That was what Jalen Brunson was doing tonight. So Donovan Mitchell's done a lot in the Indiana Pacer series.

That's what Steph Curry did to the Rockets. You need somebody that can overcome the circumstances of high-level defense with high-level shot making. And Anthony Edwards has now pieced together this overwhelming athletic frame that he's got with elite shot making from every spot on the floor and it's turned him into one of the great players in our game. I mean, this is, again, one of the best defenses in the league and he's lighting him up this last couple of games.

In his playoff career, obviously not including tonight, he's averaging 28.7 rebounds and five assists on 59% true shooting. 35 career playoff games before tonight. He's about to make his second consecutive conference finals. He's just 23 years old, still just barely scratching the surface of his potential. It has been so much fun watching him over the course of these last few seasons.

And there's a part of me that's sad, obviously. LeBron and Steph are my two favorite players and they're going home. And it's unfortunate in a lot of ways. I was really disappointed in the way the Lakers played. I did believe in this Golden State team. I actually think they would have won the series of Steph Curry was healthy.

But at the same time, as a basketball fan, if I had to see the reins get handed over, I liked the group. that's taken over and watching Anthony Edwards watching Jalen Brunson watching what Tatum did today before his injury you know what we've got coming on the periphery in terms of what Victor Wembeyanama can do Cooper flag coming into the league who already has shown that he has the potential to be one of the greats in our league like I feel like the league is just in a really good spot and I hate it had to be like this but at the same time I'm excited to watch these guys I'm excited

to see Anthony Edwards potentially versus Oklahoma City we'll talk about that in a minute the Julius Randall piece, 31 points tonight, 11 for 21 from the field. Coming into tonight, 22 points, 6 rebounds, 6 assists on 59% true shooting in the playoffs. I feel like he has vindicated himself and shown a light on the reality that he was just banged up and out of rhythm in a lot of his previous playoff runs. He is a big strong forward that can make shots and can pass, which is a very useful player in the NBA postseason. Obviously, he didn't get tested mentally as a.

defender in this series like he would have with step curry that was something that i was very interested to see in terms of a challenge for him to have to deal with but julius randall i've been so impressed by him in this entire postseason run looking forward for minnesota like we'll talk about golden state in a minute i don't think they should bring step curry back so i think old i think minnesota is going to close this out in game five um obviously we know what minnesota looks like versus Denver. We got bring side seats for that last year and that was an unbelievable series. But as I mentioned after yesterday's game, I think Denver blew their chance to beat Oklahoma City in the fourth quarter last night. Up by eight on that Peyton Watson hook shot, that was their chance. If there was an opportunity

for them to win that series, I feel like they let it slip. It's not over, but I would make Oklahoma City a substantial favorite at this point, just like Vegas has been doing for the entire damn series. But I think, I think Oklahoma City is going to win that series. And it makes for a very very very, interesting matchup. As you guys have seen with Denver, they've been able to play Oklahoma City into these slowdown half-court environments where they're just playing a lot of high ISO basketball. And, you know, Golden State was able to do similar things to Minnesota in the sense that obviously there's lots of different coverages we saw. We saw Zone in the series. We saw Jackson pointed out there's a, to me, a text message. They ran a box in one possession in that second

half at one point just having Jonathan Kaminga face guard Anthony Edwards off the ball while the other two guys sat in a two-two zone. But like there's a lot of weird stuff, but ultimately it's Anthony Edwards hitting shots over the top at the top of the key. Anthony Edwards is hitting shots out of closeouts off the weak side. That was a big thing they unlocked in the last two games is getting a little bit more off the ball into some catch and shoot situations and then him trying to slalom through bodies and get to the basket. Both of these defenses, Oklahoma City and Minnesota, will be able to stall each other out and get them trapped in the half court. But I tell you guys, I cannot wait to see Anthony Edwards versus potentially Shea Giles

as Alexander in a playoff series going toe to toe at the top of the key. I think that could be a really fun one. Again, it's not over. Denver certainly can beat Oklahoma City, but I think we're careening towards a Shea versus Ant face off in the conference finals, which I think would be a ton of fun. On the Golden State front, as I mentioned at the beginning of the series, I didn't see any purpose to bringing Steph back before game six because there's just too much of a risk for him re-injuring himself.

And even at this point, it's like, what are you going to do, bring it back in game five and win three games in a row against that physical Minnesota Timberwolves team and then roll up into a series against Oklahoma City? Like I said before this series that I thought Golden State would get smacked by Oklahoma City. So like I don't necessarily think that there's much in the way of a reward to make the risk worth it trying to like force step back out there into that sort of setting. And so I think that they most likely need to just leave

him and let him rest and prepare for next season. We've seen enough from this Warriors team in this playoff run, I think to justify the fact that they have, you know, a real chance next year that they should go for. I think we saw some of the realities of Jimmy Butler as an offensive player in this postseason run and that like some nights he has it, some nights he doesn't. He kind of has like a weird lack of aggression at times. And so I think they need to be targeting a pretty high level offensive player this offseason. I just, all roads to me just kind of keep running back to Cam Johnson as like the obvious fit. And we'll see what they end up doing. But all in all, like just like I said with the Lakers, it's really hard to put together a team on the fly at the trade deadline. And both teams did

the best they could. And both teams had some really impressive stretches. But ultimately, neither team was able to get to the level they need to get to and they just need to make the necessary pivots this offseason around their new Star Corps. You got Jimmy Butler now. You need to just anchor them with high level offense. The Lakers got Luca. They need to reconfigure their offense around Luca. That's the process as we had into the summer.

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Hey, it's us, the Jonas Brothers, and guess what? We have some big news. What's the news, new? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it.

We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. We're starting a trend. But this one's extra special. So how did we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Oh, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band.

Before Jonas Brothers was... This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about. Talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad,

Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. 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. The French Open is one of the toughest tests in tennis, and I know firsthand because I competed there myself. I'm Renee Stubbs, and on the Renee Stubbs Tennis podcast,

I'm breaking down everything happening at Roland Garris. Every match, every upset, and what it really takes to win on Clay. Jen she went. I mean, she went down at three to Rabakina, but I'm delighted. She's an outsider to win the French for me. And she likes Clay. Listen, Lennar Rabakina is arguably the best player in the world right now,

and I actually can win on any surface. Because if she's serving, well, good luck. Consider this your court side seat to the French Open. Listen to the Renee Stubbs tennis podcast on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Capital One, founding partner of IHeart Women's Sports. Imagine an Olympics where doping is not only legal but encouraged. It's the enhanced games. Some call it grotesque.

Others say it's unleashing human potential. Either way, the podcast's Superhuman documented it all, embedded in the games and with the athletes for a full year. Within probably 10 days I'd put on 10 pounds, I was having trouble stopping the muscle growth. Listen to Superhuman on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, let's move on to Celtics Nix. I want to separate what happened in the game tonight from Tatum's injury. Tatum's injury is just a huge bummer, and it opens up a whole can of worms in terms of the Celtics for both their immediate future and their long-term future.

And most importantly, it's just sad. Like when I saw Tatum getting rolled out in the wheelchair in the tunnel and he had his head in his hands, like you could just tell how heartbroken he is. And I, you know, Tatum can be a frustrating player sometimes and he showed some of his like floor, so to speak, in this postseason in game one and game two. But Tatum to me, it was so impressive, the vast majority of this season. And I thought for the first time really played at a top tier superstar level. for extended stretches, and you could just tell how much this means to him, and it just was a huge bummer to see him go down. So I want to hold that for later because the Knicks beat the Celtics Fair and Square

tonight to take a 3-1 lead. That game was over before the Tatum injury. And Nick fans deserve to celebrate their team tonight, and I want to take the next few minutes to do that before we kind of circle back to the Celtics and Tatum stuff later in the show. Tonight I thought the Knicks did an excellent job of executing their defensive game plan. on the Celtics. One of the things I've consistently harped on in this series is the willingness of Tom Tibido

to run different kinds of drop coverage with Kat or hedge and recover sequences with Brunson that gave Boston easy reads to get the Knicks into rotation. And they were able to get really clean catch-and-shoot looks out of that. I talked about how they needed to switch, understanding that they could bait the Celtics into playing ISO ball instead of moving the ball around. And tonight was the best they've done executing that game plan in this. series in that second half in particular. By the way, it takes a great deal of patience to run that game plan. You have to see the bigger picture of the game because we did see Jalen Brown drive to the

basket and get layups on Kat. We did see Jalen Brown hit a step back three over the top of Kat. We saw Tatum go on multiple red hot ISO shooting runs. The difference in the game for the first two and a half quarters was a stretch in the late first quarter where Tatum hit like four or five shots in a row that were all contested off the dribble jump shots. In the second half, in that mid third quarter, he had another big shooting run as he kind of went bar for bar with Jalen Brunson there for a little while. You have to be patient and understand the bigger picture of the game with your game plan to know that sometimes it's going to beat you. No different than when you do run drop coverage against the player that you're not as worried about

burning you in those coverages. Sometimes you have to sit there and watch them make a pull-up three against the drop or a floater against the drop and realize that even though you're losing that battle, maybe you're not losing the war as long as the other elements of your game plan come to fruition. The Celtics, even though Tatum had those offensive slur, like flurries like he had, the Celtics had very little in the way of offensive rhythm as a team in the second half of that game. In the second half, Jason Tatum had 22 points, but no other Celtic was in rhythm. No other Celtic had double figures in that second half.

Four different Knicks were in rhythm in that second half. Four different Knicks had over 10 points in that second half. As a team in the second half, the Celtics got just 0.89 points per possession in the half court. Boston in the fourth quarter generated just one unguarded catch and shoot jump shot. As a team, they locked just 15 assists, which was their second lowest total of the entire season. So the game plan worked. It baited the Celtics into ISO ball. It cooked their rhythm.

No one else had anything going but Jason Tatum while the Knicks had everything going and they were able to pull away. I thought the second key factor. in the game was the weirdness of that early fourth quarter stretch. So we have Brunson going blow for blow with Jason Tatum in the late third quarter. Like just a really fun shit. This was like a really fun game. MSG was on fire. Tatum was unbelievable.

Just a ridiculous game. And then we go into this early fourth quarter stretch. And I thought Tom Tibido was going to pull a JJ Reddick for a minute. I was like, oh, he's going to play his starters all 24 minutes in the second half. because he stuck with his core five for the entire third quarter. But no, he goes to Deuce McBride in the early fourth quarter and gives Brunson a quick rest. Simultaneously, Jalen Brown is in foul trouble. And he's usually the guy that leads that early fourth quarter stretch.

But no, he's out of the game. So Jason Tatum has to stay in. So as a result, the Celtics more or less kept playing the same way. The Knicks, that gave McHale Bridges a chance to start running action. and he got into the mid-range and he caught a rhythm. And we talked, man, what was the big game that the Knicks won earlier this year where McHale hit all those mid-range shots at the end? I can't remember which one it was.

It was a national TV game, and he hit like six or seven mid-range jump shots in the fourth quarter to pull away. I literally can't remember which game it was. But after that game, if you guys remember, I came on and I talked about the concept of mid-range rhythm. and how mid-range rhythm is different than three-point rhythm in the sense that you know you can get hot as a three-point shooter and you might go you know you might hit four out of seven or something like that

you'll see obviously step curry and clay Thompson go crazy hot and hit six seven threes in a row but like in the mid-range is where you really can catch a rhythm to where every single shot goes in because it's a shorter shot there's more margin for error and so you catch the same type of shooting rhythm that you get behind the three-point line but on a higher percentage shot. And Mikhail caught some rhythm in that early fourth quarter. And so then when Bridges came back, we had ourselves a really close game.

Because again, Jason Tatum was going blow for blow with these guys, hit two massive threes in the middle of that fourth quarter stretch. All of a sudden, it's 99-98 on a Jason Tatum three with seven minutes left. And from that point forward, the Knicks scored on 10 of their next 12 possessions against that Celtics, defense that was given them all sorts of problems earlier in the game. McHale Bridges, O'G.Nan and Jalen Brunson all had multiple made baskets in that run. They had great rhythm.

The ball was when the ball was getting skipped across the court, O'G Annanobie was in great rhythm to shoot a three against a closeout. McHale Bridges driving across the lane against the closeout, hitting another one of those tough right shoulder fades. They were starting the possession with Brunson, but when the initial action broke down, they were able to move the ball elsewhere and get other guys involved

and everyone was in a rhythm. The Knicks played some special basketball in that second half. And for the third time in this series, they came back from a lead of at least 14 in the second half to win. Now again, the series isn't over. Boston certainly has a chance.

But for the first time, it feels like the Knicks are in real striking distance of the finals. Now, again, the Celtics are a five-point favorite on Wednesday without Jason Tatum. I would not be surprised at all if the Celtics won that game.

This could drag out a little bit. The Celtics have a lot of talent. They can disperse usage from Tatum to other players. I'm not mistaken, they've already won a playoff game in this playoff run without Jason Tatum. So this could certainly go the distance, but I would be really surprised if Boston beat the Knicks

three straight times without Jason Tatum, which means that the Knicks will very likely be in the conference finals, likely against Indiana, although that series is not over either. I was talking with Colin Coward tonight. That video is already up.

We've recorded it right after Celtics Knicks, so you guys can find that on his YouTube channel. But Colin was talking about how things are kind of like opening up for the Knicks now. And yes, in the sense that I mentioned this morning if they won today, it still would be roughly a coin flip chance

for them to beat the Celtics if they're healthy with Jason Tatum. But there's also another layer to this, which is the Indiana Pacers are really fucking good. And they are in a hell of a zone on both ends of the flow right now. They just chewed up and spit out a Cleveland Cavaliers team last night

that, again, won 64 games this season. And yeah, they're a little banged up, but they are faster than the Knicks. They don't have slow-footed bigs. And they cut them to pieces. And so the Knicks were two and one in the season series against Indiana. I have no idea who I'm going to pick at this point. But I immediately started to think about Carl Anthony Towns defending in space against the Indiana Pacers.

And I started to just get like a little worried about how that could go. And so even though this appears to be breaking in a way for the Knicks to make it to the conference finals, I think that that's a serious challenge waiting for them in the next round potentially with Indiana. And I mean, Knicks fans know that from personal experience, although they were way more banged up with what happened in the Pacer series last year.

And so it's going to be really interesting. I'm really curious to see what ends up happening, but that could be definitely a different series than we were expecting. We were all expecting Cavs Celtics in the conference finals, and it looks like we might get Indiana versus New York, but that could be an interesting series in and of itself. Boston.

First of all, I feel terrible for Tatum, as we mentioned earlier. I know we don't know what the injury is, but we all know what it looked like. And if it is what it looked like, it fundamentally alters the future of the Celtics franchise. Tatum's only 27 years old. I have no doubt that he'll make a full recovery and be an all-MBA player again in this league. But there are age realities with this roster. Horford is 38 years old. Drew Holliday is 34 years old.

Christop Sporzingis is about to turn 30, but he's a very old, very injured 30. There's very little chance that that group is championship capable or even really still all on the roster by the time Tatum recovers. Now, obviously, Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum are still a very strong foundation. But I think the Celtics need to seriously consider a fire sale with their role players this summer. I would begin to look at next year, like the Warriors year in 2020, after Clay Thompson

tore his ACL and after Kevin Durand tore his Achilles. I would be looking to flip any useful role player that you can for as much opportunity to bring assets in so that you can then pivot around Tatum and Brown two years from now. The only guy that I would negotiate especially staunchly with is Derek White, because he's young enough and still just such a proven useful role player in this league. But everyone else, if you let them age out, you just lose any value that they have. And so I would look to move Drew Holiday. I would look to move Chris Sop's Porzengis.

I would look to move any of those guys with the opportunity to bring in stuff that allows you to rebuild around Tatum and Brown in the future. Then you can use next year as an opportunity to continue to explore different. players that fit the mold of what the Celtics role players need to be. Guys that can defend, shoot, pass, rebound, drive closeouts, all of that stuff. You have an opportunity to pivot here. And again, like, this is the thing. When you really zoom out, again, I think the Celtics could have won this series still. But the Knicks up 3-1 is very different than the Knicks-Up 2-0.

They just got to get you once in three tries. I would have made the Knicks a hair over a coin flip favorite to beat you at that point. So chances are you were heading into this summer without another championship anyway, potentially cutting costs, and then running a team out there next year that probably isn't as good in a league where Oklahoma City gets better, where San Antonio could potentially have Janus, where the Rockets could potentially have KD,

where the thunder are a year better. like it just this could this was already kind of looking like a shorter window and so with that being the case obviously the tatum injury is terrible news but it allows you a year's worth of time where the wins and losses don't matter and so you can use that year to do everything you need to do to make it so that you're positioned well to contend with tatum again on the other side of that window and again guys we literally have seen that this work. The Warriors won a title in 2022 with an older version of Steph and an older version of Draymond. They weren't as talented as the previous iterations of the team, but Steph was better than ever because he was smarter than ever. And they had a roster that was just perfectly curated around their skill set. They caught, they caught like a flash in a pan and they were able to go win a title. So again, this is not a death sentence for. the Jason Tatum era in Boston, but it is a death sentence for this specific iteration of the

roster. And with that being the case, they need to make the associated pivot this summer. It's just crazy to me. I was literally, when I was making my notes here, I just can't believe that we went from the Celtics looking like championship favorite, in my opinion, to we're staring down the barrel of a full rebuild this summer, just a wild night in the NBA. And we haven't even got to the craziest thing that happened in the NBA tonight, which is the draft lottery. So up front, if you're looking for me to say that the league rigged the lottery, I'm just never going to be that guy. I'm sure you can find plenty of that type of content out there, especially in the next few days, but you're not going to get it from me. The league literally uses one of the big four accounting firms

to audit the draft lottery, specifically so that they can guarantee its legitimacy to the NBA board of governors. Like, people pay real dollars and cents to buy these franchises. Like, the Celtics just sold. The Utah Jazz just sold. The Phoenix Suns just sold. They need to be able to sell competitive legitimacy. And that's why they audit the draft lottery.

You're not going to hear the conspiracy theories for me. Go elsewhere if you want that sort of thing. That's it. If you do believe that the league rigs the draft lottery, today is the day to make that case because Dallas gets Cooper, lag after losing Luca Donchich and San Antonio gets the second pick which puts them on the doorstep of a trade for Janus and Tenacumpo. First, let's talk Dallas.

It's a little weird because trading Luca for Anthony Davis pushed their timeline into a win now position. It doesn't make sense to have an old injured Kyrie and an old injured AD on the roster with an 18-year-old forward that has superstar potential. Now, the basketball fan and me would love to see Cooper Flagg and Anthony Davis play together. I just imagine Cooper Flagg at the three, Anthony Davis at the four, Derek lively at the five, just an absurdly big front line. You can imagine a scenario where they then trade PJ Washington and Daniel Gafford for more ball handling. They anchor that awesome three, four, five, and they're just a

really fun basketball team. But I think Nico Harrison probably needs to pick a lane here. And that would mean either trading Cooper Flag to a team that is in a different timeline. So for instance, calling the Celtics up and offering Cooper Flag in a package for Jalen Brown, or calling up the Atlanta Hawks and going for Trey Young, or calling up the Sixers and going for Tyrese Maxie, or calling up the Sons and going for Devin Booker, something along those lines. or they need to consider trading Anthony Davis and just pivot towards a full rebuild with Cooper Flag.

As for which option I prefer, it entirely depends on what the trade packages look like. Depends on who you can get. Like if you can get Devin Booker for almost nothing, like that to me would be a deal that would be worth at least considering because Devin Booker alongside Anthony Davis with Derek lively and all that depth and all that athletic they have would be an interesting team.

But it all just depends on on which direction you want to go and which options are available. But like if you want to build around Cooper Flag, you bet you're better off putting him in a situation where you can fail and he can make mistakes and learn how to play basketball at his own pace and surround him with the pieces

he needs for long-term contention, in which case Anthony Davis is one of your best options that you have available. And then there's a whole bunch of really cool options for Anthony Davis. I saw someone tweet out, what if Anthony Davis ended up in Golden State? I was like, that would be absolutely insane.

There's all sorts of crazy stuff that could happen. I have a feeling we are going to see an absolutely wild summer of player movement in the NBA. Then the last piece of this that we'll get to before we get out of here tonight. The second pick going to San Antonio. You can see everything taking shape, right? The dame injury made it so that a Janus trade is a near certainty.

the thunder might literally be too good as like if they got yonis i think that would just be boring for the league and for everyone kevin durant is a more natural basketball fit in houston where they can't shoot than he is in san antonio like where he's skinny next to victor wembiama i think like yonis actually makes more sense in san antonio and so now san antonio can add the prospect of drafting dylan harper to their trove of assets that they can offer milwaukee Dylan Harper is an outstanding big guard prospect that started to dig into his footage a little bit today. I usually don't dig into the draft until after the finals,

so we won't go any further into Dylan Harper. But the people I talk to that I trust say Dylan's awesome and that he's kind of like a shoe-in number two overall pick this year. And you can call up Milwaukee now and you can offer a package that doesn't have to include a Stefan Castle because it's got that number two pick involved. you can build a package around, you know, Dylan, like Dylan Harper as the number two pick,

Devin Vassell for salary filler, you know, either Harrison Barnes or Kelden Johnson, something along those lines, additional picks, filler, whatever you need to do, Milwaukee could then completely refill their draft pick trove and get two really intriguing young guards to reinvigorate their fans and to launch a rebuild. While the spurs on the other end of that could field a lineup next season, season with Deere and Fox, Stefan Castle, Janice and Tenacompo, and Victor Wembeyanjama,

which would be insane in the Western Conference. I think there's a lot of natural fit between Janus and Victor. Janus over the years has not been as good of a pick and roll defender as he has been a low man defender. So you can imagine a universe where Victor's guarding pick and roll. Janus is guarding as the low man. I like having Janus as a big physically imposing forward next to the thinner Victor Wembenyama.

Victor's really developing into a great catch-and-shoot player and a player that it likes to operate beyond the three point lines. So clear space, it inverts the spacing. There's all sorts of advantages to the two of them partnering together. I think they would be a super interesting team out in the Western Conference. We'll continue to dive into these concepts over the course of the coming weeks as we get more information. But man, we are headed for one hell of a summer in the NBA on the heels of what was a crazy trade deadline. All right, guys, that's all we have for right now.

Again, we're going to head over to playback to take some callers and some questions from you guys will hang out for another 45 minutes there tonight. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me and supporting the show. Again, playback. dot TV slash hoops tonight. I'll see you guys in just a few minutes. What's up, guys? As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting hoops tonight.

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