The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - NBA Player Rankings #13-11: Jaylen Brown, LeBron James, Kevin Durant

Episode Date: August 23, 2026

Jason ranks the next group of three players in his top-25 NBA players: Jaylen Brown (Philadelphia 76ers), Kevin Durant (Houston Rockets), and LeBron James (Sixers). #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Behind every night spent making the kids' lunches, there's a lot of suspense. Will they finally eat the veggies? Will the pastos survive the first bite? Will the lunchbox come home empty, half full, or come home at all?

And will you finish episode 8 before you're done slicing the cucumbers? Get Bell Pure Fiber Internet with Craved Netflix and Disney Plus from $94 a month. Price guaranteed for two years on Internet with a two-year term and auto pay credit. Visit bell.za for details and to check availability. Bell, connection is everything. I survived nine months in captivity, and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive what should have destroyed them. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are the survivor files. Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable, abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.

These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive. Listen to the Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, this is Hayes Davenport. And Sean Clements. We host the podcast, Hollywood Handbook. Each week, we talk to someone in show business and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time, and no one gets mad at their publicists for letting them do our show. We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman, Adam Scott, Danny McBride, Ben Stillard, and a lot of other big shots that wouldn't be where they are.

are without us. Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Nick Tuturo. You probably know me from NYPD Blue, the longest yard, or Spike Lease Black Klansman. And on my new podcast, delivering happiness with Nick Tatoro, I deliver pizza to a new guest. I've shared a slice with everyone from Seth Rollins. What are you doing?

My belt. To Bill Burr. I don't think I've ever met somebody so exactly out of their mind as I am. And now, we even have more great guests coming up, including. including the great John Tuturo. It's called Happiness, delivering happiness. And many, many more. Open your free high heart radio app.

Search Delivering Happiness with Nick Tutorough. And listen now. The Volume. Welcome to Hoops tonight here at the Volume. Happy Wednesday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having an incredible week so far. We are continuing our player rankings today. We have our last pack of three players.

Before we get into our top 10, we start going one at a time. Today we're hitting 13, 12, and 11. Three players that I have very close to. each other. Very difficult to rank. It's going to be fun to debate this with you guys. 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. We need about 6,000 more subs. Get to our goal of 150,000. So it'd mean a lot to us. If you guys would take a second to scroll down and hit that subscribe button. If you're already subscribed, like this video, sign up for post notifications. It helps us a lot.

And last but not least, if you want to get mailbag questions in our player rankings, mailbags, disagree with the ranking. Have a player that should be on the list that isn't, or vice versa, a player that you think should be higher than another player, whatever it might be. right in the comments underneath these full episodes right mailbag colon and make your case break it down let us know why you feel the way you feel we'll get to it into our debating player rankings mailbags on Fridays throughout the rest of the summer. All right, let's talk some basketball. Number 13, Kevin Durant, 78 games played last year. Katie's actually been one of our more reliable. It's actually funny looking back him and LeBron

both have this reputation of being like these older forwards that are are not reliable, but the two of them have been some of the most reliable guys in the league in terms of games played in the last few years. Kevin Durant, 78 games last year, 72 games per year over the last three seasons. Last season, he averaged 26.6 rebounds, five assists per game. His typical surgical efficiency, 64% true shooting. Incredible jump shooting, 1.13 points per jump shot last year, 42% on catch and shoot threes, 49% when he was unguarded. 39%. percent on pull-up threes. Break it down by distance. He was 54% inside of 17 feet. That was the fourth most efficient short-range two-point shooter in the NBA. We had 22 players who took at least

200 of those short-range jump shots inside of 17 feet. Only T.J. McConnell, Peyton Pritchard and Shea Gildes Alexander, were more efficient on that type of volume on those shots inside of 17 feet. third in the leak in total makes Kevin Durant inside a 17 feet. 49% on long twos, 41% on threes. That's break down of the jump shooting by distance. Good, not great shot creation season for KD, just under a point per possession and pick and roll, including passes, mainly pulled down by Houston's lack of jump shooting.

This is why I talk about, you know, when we talk about metrics and, you know, we're going to talk a lot about that again today because we have spoiler alert, Jalen Brown's on the list today. and we're going to have, you know, this idea of trying to synthesize basketball down into a single number is something that I've always disagreed with because I just think there's too many moving parts. But you guys will see me use data, but I always talk about even the data that I use as refined as it can be like, okay, we're talking about point per possession here, this type of shot in this particular situation,

or that type of shot in that type of situation or this value add, that value add, whatever it might be. even when it's refined, it doesn't properly account for all of the factors because there's just too many moving parts. This is why basketball is more art than science. Like, it is harder to run a pick and roll surrounded by Houston's jump shooting than it is by Charlotte's jump shooting. So even this kind of refined play type data is flawed in its own way because it can struggle to account for that surrounding talent. If we take Kevin to rant and we drop him into Charlotte and have him run pick and roll, all season. He's going to have a more efficient season than he did last year in, in Houston where he was less than a point per possession. Houston started the year pretty

well shooting the ball. They like, they kind of came out gangbusters from three, but then they crashed back to reality hard and they ended up finishing the season 19th in efficiency converting spot up possessions, which again, anytime you load up on the roll man or dig down and nail help on KD and he throws that kickout pass, that's a spot up possession. and your ability to convert those into points is what kind of determines whether or not those defenders are going to want to stay home versus crowding the action

when you're trying to run your ball screen. Yet a solid, not great one-on-one season, 1.02 points per possession on 668 one-on-ones. Katie's shooting in ISO was super impressive, 48% overall, 44% on 52 ISO-3s. Only very briefly appeared in the postseason for one game and game two of that series against the Lakers which turned into a repeat of some of the issues

that plagued KD at times in the regular season, especially against the Lakers and their matchups there. But that was dealing with doubles and traps. We talked a little bit about this last week, if you guys remember, I should say on Monday, this week if you guys remember, regarding Kauai Leonard.

JJ Redick, to his credit, did a really good job of kind of like mixing up when and where the doubles would come from. It wasn't an easy scheme to solve, but KD similarly to Kauai, It just really struggled with setting things up and making that kill pass, the pass that beats the double, rather than the past that gets rid of the basketball. In the playoffs in particular, it was super jarring to watch because in the same game, the Rockets actually attempted to double the ball out of LeBron's hands quite a bit in the second half of that game. And he was rifling cross-court skip passes to Rui Hachamura for open threes or hitting Jackson Hayes on cuts for and ones.

because LeBron was just facing similar coverages, not to the same extent, because it doesn't work. You do it against LeBron. It's like you're playing directly into his hands and you do it against the Kauai's, the KDs. There's a certain like, this is the best way for us to deal with this problem. And as a result, KD, you know, he's super efficient. I can't remember exactly what his shooting numbers were. It was like 12 or 17 or something like that. It had a lot of points, but he had nine turnovers in that game.

And it was juxtaposed with the LeBron who looked very comfortable getting whatever he wanted for his team in that game. Kevin Durant and Kauai Leonard are both very similar players to me, even like when they were in their primes. But similarly today, and they're both still among the best scores in the league, even if they both don't quite have that top end pop that they had when they were in their late 20s, early 30s. They're both still very good on defense. I think Kevin Durant is underrated on defense still, to this day, in my opinion. He definitely should have been better than he was. there's a potential thing there. Like he, his pathway to reaching the levels of accomplishment in NBA history that he

should have reached came down to the defensive end of the floor. But that's more of a conversation around potential. It doesn't mean he wasn't good. He's so long with his arms that he's extremely difficult to deal with on an island and I saw. I remember watching a game a few, a few years back where Luca, when he was in Dallas, was trying to pick on KD and Phoenix. And he just couldn't score on it because KD's last.

was such a problem. It's just he has the ability to give ground. So driving isn't really an option. But then he can just take one step forward and lift that long ass arm up and you're going to have a hell of a time shooting over the top of him. It makes him a very dynamic on ball defender. He was the best high volume ISO defender in the entire NBA last year. Out of all the players regarded at least 75 ISOs, he was number one in opponent efficiency. Zero point seven one points per possession allowed in 78 isos. And that's the list. If you go back year over year,

he is consistently in the top 15, top 20, in the entire league in ISO defense, almost always below 0.8 points per possession allowed because of that length, his ability to give ground, but then also offer great contests on pull-up jump shots. And he's still a pretty useful off-ball defender for the same reason because of that length.

Although last year, he did take a small step back there, 0.9 blocks per game. That was the third lowest mark of his entire career. The only like real technical weakness, obviously, Katie has like an effort weakness on defense that's kind of played him throughout his career. But the only real like technique weakness that Kevin Durant has on the defensive side of the ball is screen navigation. We saw LeBron, if you guys remember in that game to take advantage of that by getting Kevin Durant on him and then putting Kevin Durant in a ball screen with Shane Goon. But again, that's like he just, he's too slow footed.

and too easy to knock off of his path with the screen. But so he allowed LeBron to come off of the screen clean way too often, at which point LeBron just was playing two on one against Shangoon with Aiton on the roll, and he just picked them apart. And then it turned into switches. And then LeBron started cooking Shangun and switches, and then came the double teams and so on and so forth. But the point is Kevin Durant, that's an issue that's just as much about Alper and Shangun

as it is about KD. To me, especially in a switching scheme where KD can either be off ball in hell, or on ball in ISO rather than in a ball screen, Kevin Durant is still one of the more impactful perimeter defenders and wing defenders like all around kind of Swiss Army knife forwards that we have in the league. Kauai certainly has a better defensive reputation than Kevin Durant, but I still view KD as a big plus on that side of the ball.

The other similarity between KD and Kauai is they both have struggled to impact the game on offense if they aren't able to play against a traditional coverage. or if they can't get advantage situations off of something that one of their point guards are a different shot creator on the team can generate, like a spot up situation. Kauai and Kadi are both excellent catch and shoot players, for example. And when I say this, I want to be clear, and this is an important detail for all of our player rankings topics. When I'm being nitpicky with these guys, it has to do with the, you know, the competition, right?

Like I say Kadi and Kauai struggle to impact the game on offense if they aren't able to play one-on-one or two-on-two or get clean catch and shoot looks. But that's relative to the top-tier superstars in the NBA. I'm talking about them juxtaposed with a Luca or with the Shea or with the Jalen Brunson or, you know, we can go on and on with like the top five or six offensive players in the NBA. That's where Kadi and Kauai struggle to kind of measure up with those higher-level offensive engines. This kind of goes back to all those debates we've had over the years about the difference between

a score and an offensive engine. If I needed one bucket to save the world, I'm not sure there's a player in the history of the league I'd take over Kevin Durant. And we saw that exact scenario take place in the Serbia game. If you guys remember, we had this amazing game, right? Like the Serbians come out insanely hot to start the game and Steph Curry keeps them close, just hitting a ton of threes in the first half. It still ends up being an issue, though, is the the Serbians play really well in the third quarter and they're up double figures going into the fourth. in that fourth quarter we get all these crazy contributions right like devon booker hits a massive a three that kind of caps off a run for team USA in that stretch uh you know joel and bid hits several mid-range jump shots that helps kind of stymie some of the offensive rebounding issues that

they were having with serbia on the other end of the floor lebron james is guarding nikola yokitch and has two beautiful transition attack driving layups and stepf curry ends up hitting a huge three off of the left wing coming off of a pin screen. And then he gets a transition layup and everybody's contributing. But Serbia is still lingering and lingering and lingering. And all of a sudden, it's a two point game. There's what, it was either just under a minute left or just over a minute left. I think it was just under a minute left. And all those guys were like, shit, we need a bucket. Let's just go to, let's go to KD. And Katie got the ball. He waved off the ball screen. He just wanted to stay on an island. And he went to that left to right cross

over and he pulled up and knocked down a shot that basically iced the semi-final game. And again, if they missed there and Serbia goes down and scores, it's a tie game or maybe they hit a three that gives them the lead. Like, it was a huge possession. Point being, like, all of these players are on, like all of the best players in the world for Team USA are on the floor and they're all contributing in their own unique ways. And it kind of synthesizes down to this single moment where they needed a bucket. And Kevin Durant was the guy. And again, he might literally be the best in the world ever. at that specific thing.

But the top offensive players in the league are just a full tier better than that KD Kauai group at creating offense in a large sample for a whole basketball team. Even when KD and Kauai were at their absolute peaks, this was the reason why I never really considered them as candidates for best player in the world.

Ironically, those three champions in a row, 2017, 18, 19, KD on the Warriors, Kawhi with the Raptors, they're the perfect example of this dynamic. If you already have a complete basketball team, including a point guard that can run an offense, including all the defensive infrastructure, look at how good those Raptor teams were

in everything other than, oh yeah, we have Demard de Rosen as our best player. You know, the Warriors won 73 games the year before Kevin Durant joined, right? So you had these complete basketball teams. And then you drop in a player that is the quintessential tip of the spear. Get us to a close game with two or three minutes left where all of a sudden all the large sample stuff doesn't matter anymore and it becomes a small sample game. They are two

of the very best in NBA history at that specific dynamic. But for both of those guys, after they left those situations, they wanted to be the same. spear. Not the tip of the spear, but the spear itself. We saw that with Kauai, with the clippers, and we saw that with Kevin Durant, with the Nets, and then again with the suns and now with the rockets. And it turns out that's a very different challenge than just being the tip of the spear. And so, like when I'm talking about that archetype, I want to be clear too, because I don't want to sit here and pretend like that archetype doesn't matter because it does. You know, even I was watching, we're recording this on Monday. I was watching. I was watching.

watching that that game last night, yesterday between the fever and the dream. And it's like, you know, Caitlin Clark's playing extremely well. Her averages are like off the charts over the course of her last, you know,

10 games or so. And the fever are really starting to play some good basketball. And, Caitlin, down the stretch of that game, you know, she drew one foul kind of coming downhill on a ball screen down the right lane line.

But she struggles to get separation against the best defenders in the W. And, you know, she really can only shoot pull-ups going to her left, and she's a little bit physically thin with a high center of gravity that you can bump off of her line. So she's a remarkably valuable offensive engine. I mean, she's arguably the best offensive engine in the NBA right now,

or WMBA right now in terms of like just generating offense for her team with all of the chaos she creates running around the floor. But when it comes into those like smaller sample size, like get separation against the better defenders, like that's what makes Olivia Miles so exciting. as Olivia Miles can do, like, she's nearly as good as an offensive engine, and she has the athletic traits to get separation from the best defenders in the W. But, like, you see that.

I saw that with Tyrese Halliburton over the last few years. Even Steph Curry in his prime is at his absolute best. He just wasn't quite as good at, like, getting away from the best defenders and small sample sizes as some of those guys are. So I want to be clear, the KDs, the Kauai's. We're going to talk about Jalen Brown today. They are still very, very important. I just personally value them a touch lower than the people,

the players that are more offensive engine archetype that generate offense for the entire team over larger samples. As for why do I have KD over Kauai right now at 13 instead of 14? I just think he's a safer bet to be available for his team throughout the season, which is obviously going to be a difference maker with the criteria that we use for this list. Behind every night spent making the kids lunches, there's a lot of suspense. Will they finally eat the veggies? Will the pesto survive the first bite?

Will the lunchbox come home empty, half full, or come home at all? And will you finish episode 8 before you're done slicing the cucumbers? Get Bell Pure Fiber Internet with Craved Netflix and Disney Plus from $94 a month. Price guaranteed for two years on internet with a two-year term and auto pay credit. Visit bell.com for details and to check availability. Bell, connection is everything. When I was 14 years old, I was kidnapped and held captive for nine months. I survived, and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive what should

have destroyed them. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are the survivor files. I just remember this low, taunting voice next to my ear saying, shut up, don't say anything. Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable. I knew if he woke up, without a doubt, he was going to hurt me. I started feeling that there was someone at the end of my bed and I just started screaming. They are abducted, stalked,

controlled and nearly silenced. But these aren't stories about what's taken from them. There's stories about what it takes to make it out alive. Listen to the Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you

get your podcasts. Hey, this is Hayes, Davenport. And Sean Clements. We host the podcast Hollywood Handbook on the Big Money Players Network. Our show is extremely accessible to first time listeners. Each week we talk to someone in show business, aka the biz, and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time and no one gets mad at their publicists for letting them do our show. We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman. Not that great. Actually, can you help me shape this? How about we flip it on his head, right? How about we flip this around?

What is the surprise woman? Actually, you think it's the straight man is actually the one who's acting weird. Adam Scott, this entire time you've been expecting Adam Sandler to come to visit the show. I would never expect. I would never set expectations for something like that to happen. If the universe allows for something like that to happen, I'm open to it. I'm always going to accept. You know, Danny McBride, fine.

Yeah, it's all this fragile masculinity. Exuding. I could smell it walking down the hallway, to be honest with you. I was like, I was like, is that weed? Nope, it's fragile masculinity. Ben Stiller, no. Because a lot of times, out of context, people don't get it or even know what a circle is. You know what I mean?

They're like, oh, they're like, oh, what's a state. Everyone's so dumb. And fake. Right, fake and also not interested. or just like, oh, I've got my life. I don't care about your life. And a lot of other big shots that wouldn't be where they are without us. Oh, and by the way, Will Ferrell told us personally he loves the show

and he wants to be a guest on every episode, but he's just so busy. Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, moving on to number 12, Jalen Brown. Most impressive season of his career thus far. 71 games played. Career high 29 points per game. career high seven rebounds per game, career high five assists for game, career high 3.6 turnovers per game, not too much of a surprise under the circumstance

with the increase in usage. Lots of award consideration made the All-Star team, second team, all-MBA, sixth and MVP voting. And then I don't know where Jalen just turns into this punching bag for the entire basketball community. It was like fans, media. Even, I mean, I'd argue the league at large as we talked about his trade value and how kind of bizarre that was over the course of this summer, right? But like, I thought he was somewhat of an undeserving punching bag, but we're going to save that for after we go through the numbers. So the shooting 0.97 points per jump shot, 35% on catch and shoot threes, 44% when he was unguarded. He has kind of this like long, drawn out release. So when he's got all day, that's

where his skill kind of comes in and he can knock shots down. But his like kind of sloppy form and just in terms of how inconsistent he is with this catch and shoot release, like he'll rush it when he's guarded, but then he's like really slow when he's open. That inconsistency leads to him not shooting the ball well when he's facing a good closeout. 35% on pull-up threes, which is actually pretty solid. So much of pull-up shooting from three comes down to your leg strength. Like, go shoot a bunch of 25-footers when you're standing still. And then go shoot a bunch of 25-footers when you have to do like some sort of footwork before, like a handling move before. You'll find out pretty quick. It's actually kind of hard to get the ball to the rib. And

Jalen Brown, him being an apex athlete, that's a very good. a real asset for him in those like ISO3 situations. I was kind of, I thought that number was fascinating. Like 35% on pull up threes on the volume at which he was taking him is actually a pretty impressive number for a shooter that we regard like Jalen Brown. And that's just a reminder of how athletic he is and what an asset that is when you're trying to create a shot for yourself. Break it down by distance, 46% inside of 17 feet, 42% on long twos. This is the main thing pulling down his efficiency right now in jump shots. Like he just took so many of these two point jump shots, like 553 jump shots that were

twos. And yet he was getting 0.93 points per shot attempt. You only have to shoot 31% from three and you're more efficient than Jalen Brown was for mid-range last year. So that's the main thing pulling him down. But once again, let's acknowledge the difference between small sample and large sample. 46% on short twos is not nothing.

Still a valuable tool. If you need one bucket on one possession, and you have a shot you can make about half the time. But over any sort of large sample, his inefficiency on those two's is going to hurt him. 42% on 79 floaters. Similar lack of efficiency for short range scoring. 60% at the rim got there eight times a game,

which is great. That was top 10 in the entire NBA and volume in terms of the number of times he got to the rim. Play type data. The fascinating thing with the play type data with Jalen is the difference between how efficient he was as a pick and roll player versus as a one-on-one player. This is why I've referred to him over the course of the summer as an on an island basketball player. When he can just focus on scoring the basketball and then making simple reads against doubles, he's very comfortable and in a lane that kind of accentuates his strengths. As soon as you ask him to process all of the moving parts of a ball screen, that's where it can get a line.

little bit tricky for him. 0.99 points per possession and 778 possessions of pick and roll. That was 17th out of 22 players to run at least 750 pick and rolls. And speaking of like the surrounding talent piece, that's a Celtics team that has strong pick and roll like infrastructure. Like that's one of those ones where like he should have been more efficient than he was considering the talent he was surrounded with. The main thing pulling down Jalen and pick and roll was actually his turnover rate. When he passed out of pick and roll, he commas. He commas. committed a turnover or it led to a turnover almost 20% of the time. That was one of the highest rates in the league.

The only players that had higher turnover rates in pick and roll were Anthony Edwards, Russell Westbrook, Jeremiah Fears, Austin Reeves, Brandon Williams, and Jalen Johnson. And I was digging through some of the film this morning. And the main thing that blitzes were tough, like he would struggle against blitzes. A lot of times, like, he would come off of the screen and be genuinely surprised that like the other defender was there. and he would catch him off guard. He'd either like just dig in and take the ball from him or he'd suddenly have to retreat to throw a pass

and he'd turn it over. The other one he would struggle with is like sometimes he would turn the corner on a pick and roll against the drop and he would fail to see one of the other defenders on the floor digging down and taking the ball away from him. He can kind of get a little bit head down as he's getting downhill and ball screens.

And so he had just a high turnover rate. When the defense coalesced around Jalen Brown and pick and roll, it resulted in a turnover one out of five times. That was the main thing that was pulling down efficiency there. But his one-on-one numbers were super impressive. He personally shot 47% in one-on-ones, 36% on ISO-3s, 48% in terms of the, so like I talked about this with Yokic. Like, score percentage is a stat that is used to measure how often when I give you the ball in this situation do I get points out of it as a coach? Like if I'm calling this play, I know I'm going to get a point.

this, I'm going to score at least this percentage of the time when we have the ball. A Jalen Brown ISO resulted in points 48% of the time, even with all the turnovers, even with all the misses. A Jalen Brown post up resulted in points 50% of the time, even with all the turnovers, even with all the miss jump shots. Those are really impressive numbers. 1.08 points per ISO and 535 attempts in the regular season. And if you look at the high volume ISO guys, Luca and Shea are outliers. Like their numbers are just ridiculous.

Like a Luca ISO last year was worth 1.2 points per possession, which like a 120 offensive rating in ISO is fucking bad shit. Shea wasn't far behind him. He was at like 1.18. But then there's a big drop off. And once you get past that big drop off, Jamal Murray was third. Jalen Brown was fourth.

Fourth place out of 24 players in the NBA to attempt at least 250 ISOs. The main thing, and we talked about this a lot over the course of the last season, Jailing got really comfortable working around the elbows. They would kind of set up their spacing in a way where he would have the middle of the floor to himself. He'd have shooters in the corners that he could throw to if the double came. Whatever elbow he was on, he'd have a shooter on the opposite wing that he could look for. And it turned into like just him working at a triple threat and live dribble right there at the elbows.

Very physically aggressive. We talked about that all season. Like he did not just settle. He was frequently using those shoulders in that athletic. to plow through that defender and get closer to the basket, and then just making very simple reads when the double teams came at the middle of the floor. And like, again, he did this against some of the best defenders this season. Like, it didn't matter if it was an apex perimeter defender,

if it was a mismatch, Jalen Brown looked really comfortable there in the middle of the floor just because of his athleticism combined with the way his game is kind of catered to those one-on-one situations. Well, let's get to this punching bag part. So Jalen caught a ton of shit last year, which is crazy considering he had the best season of his career and was instrumental in floating the ship through a ton of roster turnover there in Boston. Reached a fever pitch after the playoff series loss, which I thought was a little unfair. Like, he experienced a slight drop off in scoring volume and efficiency, but nothing too crazy. Like he went from 57% true shooting to 55% true shooting. It went from 29 points a game to what, 26 and a half or whatever it was points per game.

So like a very modest drop-off. And again, like, this was a playoff run where, like, Yokic experienced a huge playoff drop. Sheikos Alexander experienced a huge playoff drop. Like, like, the league has become, and we're going to hit this in the mailbag later this week. But, like, the league has become so physical in the playoffs that, like, most of the stars are experiencing some kind of drop-off. So, like, I feel like picking on Jalen Brown for that's a little ridiculous. And when you factor in, again, the reason why they lost that series, I didn't leave that series feeling like Jaylen Brown was the reason they lost. I left that series thinking Joel and Bede was the

reason they lost. And it was on both ends of the floor. Obviously, they couldn't guard Joel on the other end, but Joel was sitting at the rim and it cut Jalen Brown's rim attempts down. He went from about eight rim attempts to game to about six in the postseason. And a lot of that had to do with the fact that Joe and B just parked right underneath the basket when Jalen Brown's going to those elbow isos. And when the on ball defender, you know, there's a lot of people talking I'm like, oh, you know, Paul George outplayed Jalen Brown in that series. I just thoroughly disagree with that because Jalen, just Paul George did not have the same job that Jalen Brown had in that series. It's not a, it's not a fair characterization, right? And, but like,

again, there, like, there were a lot of really good defensive reps for Paul George against Jalen Brown. But if you dig into it, it's like, man, if the spacing is a little better, maybe Jalen's allowed or able to use his physical strength a little bit more against Paul and get closer to the rim. Like, it's more complicated than it appeared on the surface, even though I think Paul did a good job. And so, like, I didn't leave that series feeling like Jalen Brown was the reason they lost. But for some reason, after that series, Jalen's reputation was lower than ever. And again, it wasn't just fans in media. It was like teams didn't want them in the trade market. And again, some of the criticism was warranted. Like, Jalen's flawed as a basketball player. He isn't on an

island score. He struggles to generate offense for a five-man unit. General inefficiency even related to the other top scores in the league. Like you look at Kauai and KD, they're just more efficient at specifically scoring the basketball. He can struggle with his offball defense at times. Certainly didn't do himself any favors with the way he acted after that series with the stream and the complaining about the flopping and this was my favorite year ever and all the different things

that made that situation a little bit worse than it needed to be. But I think the masses, including the league itself, started to miss the forest for the trees. with Jalen a little bit. One of the reasons why I don't like using catch-alls and why I'm very picky about analytics, even the ones that are refined, is the fact that basketball is more art than science.

There are too many moving parts. There was this idea that the Celtics were just better without Jalen last year would stem from the on-off numbers and they weren't great, like the Celtics were six points better per 100 possessions with him off versus on last year. But I'm of the opinion that if you would have taken Jalen Brown off the Celtics, at best they would have been a play-in team, and it's possible that they would have missed the playoffs. It's very different to play 10 games without Jalen Brown or to play segments of

games against bench lineups without Jalen Brown than it is to play 82 games with Peyton Pritchard as your number one option, or to play 82 games with Derek White as your number one option, to have all of your starting groups where like instead of Lou Dort guarding Jalen or instead of Alex Crusoe guarding Jalen, he's guarding Peyton Pritchard or he's guarding Derek White.

This is the concept of slotting. Jalen Brown by eating up usage, by eating up defensive game plans, made everything. Did he do the best job there that you possibly could compare to the best offensive engines in the NBA? No. But that's like, That is a job that is widely regarded as the most important job in all of team sports.

Even quarterbacks in the NFL aren't as valuable as they used to be as the offenses that becomes so much more like quick with how quickly they get rid of the basketball and how it's more about route combinations and short range passing and all these different things. Like you look at the NBA, the best player on the floor in five on five basketball has more impact on his team winning than any other player. in any team sport. That is a tough job. And now imagine you're doing it for an entire season with Peyton Pritchard in that job or with Derek White in that job. I think Mike Gansy and Bob Myers played this perfectly. They identified a distressed asset that was, you know, again, all the reasons

why Jaylon Brown was a distressed asset were real reasons, but they were exaggerated compared to what was really happening. And they saw a value opportunity. And they jumped on it. He certainly has things he can improve on. He needs to become a better catch and shoot player. He needs to have a more consistent release, probably quicker, especially when he's open so that he can shoot better when he's guarded. His off ball defense has to improve. His overall commitment to defense, he needs to have a bounce back season this year as an on ball defender. He's got to get better at making quick decisions and playing in the flow with other basketball players on the floor with him. but he's one of the very few apex athletes in the league,

who is also a legitimate shot creator, which gives him the ability to comfortably get wherever he wants to get on the floor, regardless of the type of defender on him. And I think that that's extremely valuable. Number 11, last one for today. O'Brien James. 60 games played, kind of a weird season. He misses the first 14 games of the season with the sciatica thing,

but then he plays in 60 of the final 68 games. and is the only Lakers start to be physically able to play when the playoff start. It's weird. If you look at his last three seasons, he has that sciatica stretch, but he's overwhelmingly valuable outside of that. Again, 70 games, each of the previous two seasons, 60 of the final 68 this year was able to play in all the playoff games. LeBron's actually been sneaky, one of the more reliable players in the league,

especially among veterans in the NBA. Averages last year, big drop-off. Again, this was the year, and you're going to see it when we get to the play-type data. This was the year where LeBron really didn't get it nearly as much on ball touches as he did in the rest of his career. 21.6 rebound, seven assists, 59% jump shoot, or 59% true shooting, excuse me. Brutal jump shooting season. No way around it. 0.89 points per shot. 33% on catch and shoot threes. 32% when he was unguarded. 31% on pull-up threes. We break it down by distance. 42% on twos inside of 17 feet. 38% on long twos. 32% on all.

three's. This is something that we've talked about throughout last season and at various points in LeBron's career. There are several seasons in his career just kind of mixed in where he had bad jump shooting seasons. The three that come to mind for me are the 2015 Cavs season where I've said this before. Like I think they probably win the title that year if LeBron has his jump shot. Like that was the main thing that was just lacking as he was dragging the injured husk of the calves to within two wins of a championship. If LeBron would have had his jump shot, I think they probably win it that year. Had a brutal jump shooting season. The 2023 Lakers, the year that they lost to Denver in the Western Conference Finals, similarly, LeBron has a better jump shooting season that year. Because remember,

all those Nuggets games were close. If LeBron is a better jump shooting season, I think they have a better chance to at least compete for a championship that year. And then obviously this last season. but around that he has a his historically bounced back really well from those seasons. The 2024 season, for example, after 2023, was one of the very best jump shooting seasons

of LeBron's career. He knocked down nearly 45% of his catch and shoot threes that season. Similarly, I expect LeBron to have a really nice bounce back jump shooting season this year. That's just something I'm projecting forward. I don't think he's going to be like some sort of like

Kevin Durant, you know, 1.15 points per jump shot kind of guy, but I think he'll get from that 0.89 up to about a point, maybe 1.05 points per jump shot, like in that range. LeBron will bounce back. He's historically has, especially on catching shoots. Like, LeBron had before this year, had multiple years in a row where he was a great catch and shoot player. And he was just awful on catch and shoot threes last year. So like, I do think he'll bounce back there. Play type data, by far the lowest volume season for him in his career. Just 301 picking rolls. That was

less than half. You're in about 650. The pre-type. previous year. And in that previous year, Luca was there for the final third of it. Austin Reeves was there all year. Like, just fundamentally different usage, not just in the amount, but also in the profile. Like, his numbers were actually surprisingly fine. Like, if you factor in that he didn't have the ball mat,

much and his jumper was unreliable, still getting 0.98 points per pick and roll in that low volume, like still a solid pick and roll player, 0.98 points per one-on-one, including passes. That was the main way that the Lakers used him on ball when they did. But then suddenly he gets thrust into this primary on ball role in the playoffs for for two rounds and goes up a level out of nowhere.

Funny enough, still couldn't make a catch and shoot three to save his life. But he did find his pull-up jump shot in the playoff run. He was nine for 19 on off the dribble threes. That was something that really carried him in the Houston series, if you guys remember, a lot of big pull-up threes in that series. Went up to 1.04 points per possession in one-on-ones in the postseason,

which is really good. generated points on 52% of his post-ups in the playoffs on 75 reps. This is crazy stat. LeBron was second in points generated out of post-ups in the entire playoff field despite playing in just two rounds. By the way, you want to know who is number one on that list? Joel Embed. So by far the two most productive playoff post-up players in that playoff field

who both only play two rounds are going to be on the same team next year. It's going to be very different, difficult, physical. front line to deal with there in Philly when they're healthy. I thought he was excellent defensively in the playoffs as well. This is another crazy stat. The Lakers were minus 12 per 100 possessions with LeBron off the floor in the playoffs, and yet they managed to win around. I thought, you know, we talked about this during the playoff run.

I thought he was easily one of the top 10 players in the playoffs last year. The only guys that you can definitively say were better than LeBron in the playoffs last year were Jalen Brunson, Cade Cunningham, Shagullingham, Shagullis Alexander, and Victor Wimbignyama. he's in that next group of players right after that in terms of playoff productivity, in terms of just who brought the most value to their team on both ends of the floor on that stage. And that's what makes him kind of a weird fit on a list like this. He's 42 years old. In the regular season, his effort can waxen wane.

He's not the same level of offensive engine that he was when he was in his prime. Although I do think that we're going to get a better regular season out of LeBron this year. I think he's very mentally re-engaged by this. Philly thing. I haven't seen this active of a offseason from him in a while. Now, obviously Syatica played a role last year, but LeBron just seems kind of reinvigorated by the youthful exuberance and talent of that Philly roster. So I think like among old man, LeBron, regular seasons, we're going to probably get a pretty good regular season out of LeBron next year. But still, even with age 42 coming this year, he's one of the most dependably versatile playoff

players in the entire NBA, a guy who can create shots in a variety of different ways using his size strength and his playmaking talent. And then a Swiss Army knife on the margins of basketball in terms of his ability to rebound, his ability to play in transition, his ability to defend multiple positions, like a great defensive postseason there from LeBron in those two rounds. And then again, in the context of the Sixers, you got to factor in some of the other stuff, too. Like he's going to bring legit value in the form of his leadership and experience for a team that

otherwise looked like a group of misfit parts. Like, call it what you want. When Jaylon Brown got traded to the Sixers, you didn't think. they were a championship contender. You're like, oh, yeah, probably a smart move for them to jump on Jalen when no one else wanted him for whatever reason, like good on them, but you weren't

taking them seriously as a championship contender with Tyrese, Jalen Brown, and Joe Alambide. It was LeBron James entering into that situation, him bringing his leadership, him bringing his experience, him bringing his versatility. Everything we know about him as a playoff player in the league, the way he can help

offball Tyrese Maxie, the way that he can comfortably play alongside Joel and Bid like we saw with Team USA. Everyone started to take the Sixers seriously as a championship contender the moment LeBron James signed. And that to me is the biggest kind of indicator of what he brings to basketball teams and why I think he's been underrated in this late phase of his career as he's been playing on some flawed rosters in L.A.

I think he's going to go in. I think he's going to help him a lot. I think he's going to have a better regular season than people think. And I still think he's one of the 10 best playoff players in the NBA, which drops him in at number 11. in this year's player rankings. All right, guys, it's all I have for today. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys

for supporting us and supporting the show. We will be back on Friday with our mailbag kind of breaking down some of the debate surrounding where these players are ranked, and then we'll get out of here for the weekend. We'll see you guys then. I survived nine months in captivity, and I've spent my life exploring

how other people survive what should have destroyed them. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are the Survivor Files. Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable, abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced. These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive. Listen to the Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, this is Hayes Davenport.

And Sean Clements. We host the podcast, Hollywood Handbook. Each week, we talk to someone in show business and try to help them with their careers and see what they have to offer us. Everyone has a good time, and no one gets mad at their publishing. us for letting them do our show. We've had a lot of great guests like Sarah Sherman, Adam Scott, Danny McBride, Ben Stillard,

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