The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - Reaction to Peyton Watson trade from Nuggets to Cavaliers + Harden deal & Denver's future w/ Jokic

Episode Date: August 31, 2026

Jason reacts to the Cleveland Cavaliers pulling off a sign-and-trade to acquire Peyton Watson from the Denver Nuggets. He explains how Watson fits alongside Donovan Mitchell, James Harden's contract extension, how this looks for the Cavs, and more. Then he breaks down what this means for Nikola Jokic, the Nuggets, and what they need to do next before the NBA season tips off. #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human. There's no shortcut for saving time, but saving money is simple. Just combine your car and home insurance with Bel Air Direct and save. Get a quote at bellairdirect.com. I'm Munges Chategular, and I'm back with a new season of my podcast, Skyline Drive. This time I talked to scientists, biopunks, cremudgeons, blues owners, super seniors, and Goa's top cryotherapy lab to try to understand this obsession with living forever.

what it means for all of us. And I get into a bit of trouble along the way. I'd say probably start bone smashing. That doesn't work. To make it look more defined. They say it works. I don't know. Listen to Skyline Drive,

How to Live Forever on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. 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 one. 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 without us. Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Volume. The Hips tonight here at The Volume, happy Thursday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having a great end to your week. Got a quick show for you guys today. We finally got another piece of news from our NBA offseason is Peyton Watson. And that saga with him in Denver has finally come to a close.

He has been signed and traded to the Cleveland Cavaliers as part of a four-team deal. I want to break down that deal primarily from the perspective of the Cavs. And then a little bit about the Denver Nuggets and what they're facing as we head into the season. You guys know the joke before we get started to subscribe to the Hoops on YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos. We need about 6,000 more subs to get to our goal of 150,000. So it 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. That helps us a lot.

And then last but not least, if you want to get questions into our weekly mailbags, drop them in our full episodes on YouTube, right? Mailbag, colon, write your question. We'll get to them on Fridays throughout the remainder of the year. All right, let's talk some basketball. So the details of the 14 deal. The Cavs get Peyton Watson on a new four-year, $88 million deal. Cam Whitmore is part of the deal as well, but it looks like he's going to be waived and stretched. the Clippers are getting Max Drew's. The Nuggets are getting a 2031 Caves first round pick, a 232 Kings second round pick. A 2031 Caves pick is a decent pick, you know, considering they've got a lot invested on some win now type of players that could obviously go south over the course of the next several seasons.

But, you know, with Evan Mobley and Jalen Tyson and some of the young talent, there's always potential for that pick to not be very good. but I'd say that's a pretty solid first round pick. The Wizards got in on the deal. They're getting Trey Man as well as a 2027 Clippers, second round pick and some cash. Also, just before we started recording today, we found out that James Hardin has signed a three-year, $97 million deal with the Cavs,

making him the fourth player in NBA history to earn over a half billion dollars joining LeBron, KD, and Steph. Jackson and I were talking before we started recording about how that list is about to get a whole lot longer, That deal that Yokic is going to sign next year is going to be damn near a half billion dollars by itself. There's going to be some deals signed by some of these stars in the next few years that are going to be, you know, crazy, like five times what LeBron was making with the Miami Heat, for example, as we head into an air of the NBA making just a shit ton of money. And obviously a lot of that going to the players. So I want to talk, let's start with the Cavs side of this whole deal.

And they're never ending pursuit of a small forward that they want to slot between their bigs and their guards. The truth of the matter is, it's just really difficult to find a player who does all of the things they need from that three spot because of the way their roster is put together. Their guards can't defend and they run a two big lineup that can't really shoot. So ideally what you would need from that three spot is a play. player with size length and athleticism. Why? Because you have an old James Hardin and a small Donovan Mitchell is not as athletic as he needed to, as he used to be. So like, you're trying to

increase your aggregate size length and athleticism to support a Hardin Mitchell back court by having a player that has that size length and athleticism, right? Which by the way, Peyton Watson does have, which we'll talk about. But you specifically need one that can defend at the point of attack against several different types of ball hand. because ideally you want to have Evan Mobley as often as you can with his length around the rim. And you certainly don't want Donovan Mitchell and James Hardin on the ball if you can avoid it. And so theoretically, depending on whether or not you're playing the Knicks and you need to guard Jalen Brunson or you're playing the pistons and you need to guard Kate Cunningham,

you want to have a perimeter defender that has like some versatility in the types of guys that he can guard. Also scheme wise, like if you're going to take advantage of your length at the rim, the best way to keep your length at the rim is to chase guys over the top of screens, right? So ideally you want like a big, strong physical athlete that can guard someone like Cade, but they can also guard someone like Jalen Brunson, but that can chase over the top of screen so you can run some drop while also being a very skilled and versatile offensive player. Like Jared Allen, because he can't shoot and Evan Mobley is an extremely unreliable shooter, puts you in a situation where you kind of almost need to over index on skill in that.

specific position. I woke up this morning and I was listening to a video done by David Lee. It was an up-and-coming NBA content creator. It does amazing work. You guys got to check him out. I'm actually, I reached out to him. I'm trying to get him on the show. We'll probably have him on in like mid-late September as we start to ramp up for our season

preview stuff. But he made the point that basically the only guy in the league who can do all those things that the calves need from that position is OG Ananobe. And he's basically untouchable. and again, it's just such a rare skill set that, again, there might be one dude in the entire league who can do it. So the real problem here is the team construct. I agree with David that there just really isn't a player available that solves all of their needs. Even if they went looking for a guard, for example, like someone that's more of a point of attack guard that can get over the top of screens. One, your aggregate size and rebounding won't be the same because now you have a guard alongside Mitchell and Hardin, right?

to a guard that's really like good at the point of attack and skilled offensively. Let's say, let's take for example the perfect guy for this type of job like Casey Wallace, for example, that guy's going to get a shit ton of money on his next deal. And that skill set is extremely rare and very sought after. Not to mention if you were to get, let's say in this magical universe, you got Casein Wallace, all of a sudden you lose that versatility against bigger ball handlers. Is Kaysen going to be your primary point of attack defender when you're playing against Kate Cunningham? is he going to be your primary point of attack defender when you're going against, you know, like let's say that you're going against teams that have bigger ball handlers like

Jalen Brown or LeBron James, right? Like it's just one of those things where there's, it's really difficult to tow that line to find the right type of player for that position. As a matter of fact, like honestly, the Cavs best long term bet is that Jalen Tyson will develop into that type of player. But he has several things, including his point of attack defense and his overall offensive polish that he needs to improve to become that guy. And as is always the case, when you've got a new young player, it takes some time. It could take a few years for those sorts of things to sort them out. So the bottom line is your core lineup is built around two guards that don't defend and two bigs that can't shoot. So you're kind of stuck trying to like thread this needle

with the rest of the roster. And it's just not a very easy needle to thread. So step one is acknowledging your circumstance, which is that the perfect player for that spot, basically doesn't exist and certainly not in the marketplace that you're hunting, right? Once you acknowledge that reality, I actually like the idea of taking a chance on Watson.

Acknowledging that it's not perfect and that the situation itself dictates perfect, which doesn't exist. I like the idea of taking a chance on Watson for two reasons. One, it doubles down on a strength of the roster, which is that Peyton Watson is extremely long.

As a matter of fact, his career, he's averaging 1.8 blocks per 36 minutes. When teams have flaws, I used to deal with this with the Lakers. When a team has flaws, I'm generally of the belief that it makes sense to double down on a strength more than it makes sense to put a bad fix on their weaknesses. Take, for example, let me just take just to give you guys an idea of like my thought process as it pertained to the Lakers a few years back. Take like the 2024 Lakers and you're looking at

that team that like really lacked point of attack defenders. And one of the things that Darwin Ham did that I didn't agree with is he was like, well, let's put Cam Reddish out there because he's theoretically a point of attack defender. But the problem

was is Cam wasn't actually that good at it. And he was very bad on offense. And so even though like you look at the roster and you go, man, like, it makes sense to put a point of attack defender out there because they need one. But a bad point of attack defender is going to make for a worse basketball team than putting a good player that helps index towards a strength for the team. But what ended up happening is over the course of the season, Darvin Ham finally ends up landing on Rui

Hachamura at the three, which is imperfect. He's a power forward. He's redundant with LeBron James. Ain't the perfect set of circumstances. But, what ended up happening is they over-indexed on a strength of the roster. There's no shortcut for saving time, but saving money is simple. Just combine your car and home insurance with Bel Air Direct and save. Get a quote at bellair direct.com. Hey, this is Hayes-Davimport. 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 the script? What is the surprise woman who actually you think is the straight man is actually the one who's acting weird? Adam Scott. This entire time, you're. You've been expecting Adam Sandler to come to visit the show. I would never expect. I have. 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? Like, you'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. On the new podcast, Solita, we share the messy

reality of traveling alone as a woman. I can wait four hours for the next bus, or this random dude is offering me a ride on his motorcycle. I chose option B. I'm Julie Pinheiro, and I travel by myself because it's a rare space where I can say yes without asking anyone else first. I'm on a mission to reclaim the word solita, trading the pity for possibility. Every time I tried to be alone, I kept meeting people, and they were like, you smiled at us. Not a lot of people smile around here. It's when you're alone that you're most receptive to the world as it is, and not the lies you're sold about it. It can be a time where you push your limits, change your mind, or wake up to a new version of yourself.

So whether you're a solo travel veteran or you're too nervous to be. book your first trip. I hope you listen to Solita on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Which was offense. What they did have is they had Austin Reeves, they had LeBron James, Ruehachamirk could shoot the shit out

of the basketball. Obviously, Anthony Davis has a five out big. And what ended up happening is they actually ended up catching fire on offense over the tail end of the season and giving that really good Nuggets team a run for their money and obviously end up losing on a couple of Jamal Murray game

winners. But the point being, they instead of trying to put a bad band-aid over one of their flaws, they just double down on his strength. Why don't we just be super big and skilled? You know, Rui, LeBron and AD are really big and Bruy could shoot and LeBron shot the ball really well that season and we'll just over index towards offense, right? That's kind of the way I look at this. Like one of the strengths of this Cavs roster, again, assuming they need like this point of attack guy, but it doesn't really exist. And so it doesn't make sense to put, like a bad point of attack defender in that spot, but they're an extremely long front line. Evan Mowley has a 7-4 wingspan.

Jared Allen has a 7-6 wing span. Now you're adding to that at the small forward position, Peyton Watson, who has a 7-foot-1 wingspan. So what you're doing is, even though this team has flaws, you're doubling down on a strength, which is their length on the front line. say you're switching a lot. And I do think they'll attempt to run some drop with Watson. And I think they'll ask him to try to get overscreens sometimes.

And we'll see how that ends up looking. But I think this ends up mostly being a switching team. Yeah, they'll run some drop. Yeah, they'll run some zone. But I think this will be a switching team when push comes to shut. The best way to protect your weaker defenders in a switching scheme is to have tons of long arms behind them. That way you can go to your on-ball defenders and give them simple, rules. Okay, Hardin, when they pick on you, here's what you're going to do. You're going to send

him towards the baseline or you're going to send them towards his weak hand. And now we have three dudes with a combined 22 feet of wingspan behind you to shrink the floor and rotate. The calves are going to have an imperfect defense. They're going to have real vulnerabilities, like always, but they'll legitimately be awesome on the front line in terms of their length. It will be a strength of the defense. The second piece that I like about adding Peyton Watson is it's a talent play with some real upside. Similar to the Walker-Kessler deal, although this one didn't cost the calves as much. That one was two first-round picks and a bunch of swaps.

This is a first and a second. The story of whether or not it's worth it is up to Watson and his development. Payton Watson did show real offensive upside last year. He had a 17-game stretch where he averaged 23 points per game. Now, it wasn't like surgical shot creation or anything. Like he shot just 14 for 43 out of ISO. He ran 162 ball screens. It got 0.8, 9 points per possession.

That's not good. He wasn't like an on ball creator. But what he was is he was an advantage score, a very good advantage score, which by the way, alongside Nicole Yokic, ended up being a real value add to Denver. He shot the ball extremely well. He was 46% on catch and shoot 3s, 50% when he was, unguarded. Showed a lot of juice with the ball in the open floor, not just like run out

dunks, which he'll certainly help you with, but a lot of like grab and go sequences where he would hit multiple counters or like a full speed in and out, dribble and traffic that buckle the guy so he could get all the way to the basket. And he generated offense out of the advantages that existed in spot up situations and in transition. I think he'll immediately be able to help the cabs there. And James Hardin is, again, as I've said, in terms of regular season, just large sample offense, is just really good at creating advantages, which I think Peyton Watson will capitalize on.

The real question is, is there more there? Is there more there as an on-ball player? I think when people see that mid-season run from Watson, where he averaged 23 points per game for a month and a half, they think he was doing a ton of self-creation, but he just really wasn't. It was mostly out of advantage. He shot extremely poorly off the dribble,

and his self-creation possessions were inefficient. but he is a young player with a lot of natural skill, great physical tools. So if you could piece that together, you know, turn the catch and shoot shooting into a reliable off the dribble jump shot, add some higher level on ball creation. Now you're cooking with gas.

Like I saw a lot of people talking about, you know, like, oh, the Cavs have tried this with DeAndre Hunter. And I see that when you're talking about like the idea of, like a power forward kind of mask. as a small forward type of deal. I just think Jaden's, I just think, excuse me,

I think Peyton Watson's just a better basketball player than DeAndre Hunter. I think he's a much better defensive player, much more of a defensive playmaker. And then I think he just has considerably better open floor athleticism, first step quickness. Like, I just think, I just think Watson's better. So, like, for all of the talk about, like, you know,

what type of players should be playing at the three, Watson's just a really good player with a lot of upside. And that to me is one of the moves here. Like if you can't find the perfect guy, and again, like, I don't even think that was out there. I was talking about even when LeBron was a free agent, like, I think this roster is so flawed that even if you would have signed LeBron, I wouldn't have felt that good about this team. But I respect them for being aggressive and trying to make the most of what they have by going after a guy in Peyton Watson that doubles. down on a roster strength, which is the length of their front line, and has potential upside in terms of his talent as a two-way scoring wing. On the Denver side, okay, you got some picks now. You had a decent first round pick

from the Cavs and a second round pick. What are you going to do with them? And I, you know, I kind of have a similar feeling about this team to what I was talking about with the Cavs, or excuse me, the Cavs and that Lakers team. from 2024. The roster's flawed. You, your power forward is, in Aaron Gordon is prone to injuries now at this point. Yokic can't really protect the rim unless he has a power forward next to him. You're not very athletic on the perimeter. Jamal Murray seems to be a little physically overwhelmed when he gets to the postseason.

Christian Brown had a really bad season. Actually, like for all to talk about Christian Brown in his contract, I actually think he's going to have a much better season this year. will he be worth the contract that remains to be seen but i do think christian brown will have a better season but the point is is like denver's roster is flawed you're not going to fix denver and turn them into a san antonio okayc level western conference contender in one move so the truth is they're better off trying to make a talent play so i don't think they need to jump on it right now i mean if the right deal comes available right now that's that's one thing but sometime between now and the

February trade deadline. When a talent play becomes available for them, Denver has to jump on them with those picks. There is no justification, especially given Aaron Gordon's injury history, to allow a talented young power forward like Peyton Watson to walk. There's no justification to do that unless you plan on using those picks to anchor the team. Why? Because you have Nicola Freaking Yokic on your team. And he's still at worst a top three player in the NBA. You can argue him as high as number one. And you owe it to him and to the Denver fans to try to capitalize on that era.

The last thing you want to do is pull a golden state. Be like, well, you know, this is how we're going to repeat. build the team when Yokic is gone. And then you end up being mediocre to bad in the short term. And guess what, draft picks don't actually equate rebuilding a championship team, as we've seen time and time and time and time and time again over NBA history. You need tons and tons of cracks at it. We've seen with San Antonio at OKC, you need a tank for years to accumulate the assets you

need to actually make those types of improvements through the draft. like this is a win now era of Denver Nuggets basketball around an all-time great player still at the peak of his powers those picks need to be with another team when we get to February and they need to bring in some sort of talent most likely at the forward position.

Again, like I don't think you can justify letting Watson walk. I don't think you can sell that to your fans unless you take the picks you got back from him and you try to improve the roster. And again, you better hope you're getting a better player back than Peyton Watson when that time comes. All right, guys, it's all I have for today. As always, it's sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting us and supporting the show. We'll be back on Friday with our mailbag.

I'll see you guys then. I'm Munga Chitigler, and I'm back with a new season of my podcast, Skyline Drive. This time I talked to scientists, biopunks, curmudgins, blues owners, super seniors, and Goa's top cryotherapy lab to try to understand this obsession with living forever and what it means for all of us. And I get into a bit of trouble along the way. I'd say probably start bone smashing. That doesn't work.

To make it look more defined. They say it works. I don't know. Listen to Skyline Drive, How to Live Forever, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. 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 without us. Listen to Hollywood Handbook on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

On the new podcast Solita, we share the messy reality of traveling alone as a woman. I can wait four hours for the next bus or this random dude is offering me a ride on his motorcycle. I chose option B. I'm Julie Pinero. I travel by myself because it's a rare space where I can say yes without asking anyone else first. I'm on a mission to reclaim the word Solita, trading the pity for possibility.

Listen to Solita on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.