The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - Suns Death Lineup: The Kevin Durant role that makes Phoenix DANGEROUS
Episode Date: January 19, 2024Jason Timpf reacts to Damian Lillard and the Milwaukee Bucks getting blown out by Donovan Mitchell and the Cleveland Cavaliers (3:30). The Cavs defense held Milwaukee to just 95 points, and Jason expl...ains how the Cleveland defense has been so successful this season. Jason then dives deep into the Phoenix Suns roster as they are now healthy, and starting to figure out what their rotations should look like come playoff time. Having Kevin Durant play center gives the Suns so much flexibility on both ends of the floor, and has elevated their play as a team. Does this new lineup make the Suns a more dangerous NBA Finals contender? (18:00). #volume #Herd (Timestamps may vary based on advertisements)See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight here at the Volume.
Happy Thursday, everybody.
Hope all of you guys are having an incredible week.
We just got a quick show today.
We're going to hit the Cleveland Cavaliers who have won 11 of their last 14 games and got a big
win over the Milwaukee Bucks last night, albeit without Janice and Tenacompo.
And then at the tail end of the show, I finally got around to watching.
that Suns comeback against the Kings where Kevin Durant moved to the five.
They went small and they looked incredible on both ends of the floors.
They came back to win after being down 22 points in the fourth quarter.
A lot of really interesting stuff there.
And what I think could be an interesting lineup for the Suns to use kind of sparingly as a weapon down the line.
I want to dig into that concept.
Do you guys know before we get started?
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at underscore Jason LT, so you guys don't miss any show announcements as well as the film threads
that I do most mornings. I did film threads on both of these games that you can find on my
Twitter feed at underscore Jason LT. And then last but not least, keep dropping mailback questions
in the YouTube comments. I know we've kept pushing the mailbag back, but I talked to the team
and the idea was if I'm going out of town for five days, we might as well run it while I'm out of town.
So we're going to be recording that tomorrow. So still one more day.
to get mailback questions in.
I'm going to hit a ton of them.
So keep dropping those mailback questions in the YouTube comments.
All right, let's talk some basketball.
So obviously Janice was out,
but the Cavs blitzed the Bucks from the opening tip.
They were up 22 to 2.
And I want to focus in on the defensive end of the floor
because they, here's the thing,
even without Janus.
And obviously, Janus is an incredibly important player for the Bucs.
He's the one fast guy, really, in that starting lineup,
like truly, truly, like transcendently fast type of player, right?
and so it's obviously going to hurt for him to not be out there.
But there's enough offensive skill in that lineup for them to be decent, right?
Especially on the offensive end of the floor.
Like Dame is a transcendently great offensive player.
Chris Middleton is a good, very, very good offensive player.
Brooke Lopez is a big man who brings enough offensive versatility to make scoring a possibility.
Malik Beasley's been one of the best shooters in the league this year.
Andre Jackson Jr. was the one kind of like offensive weak point in that lineup.
but they literally could not generate a quality shot to save their lives to start this game.
So it came down to a bunch of specific matchup dynamic.
So first of all, Isaac Acoro was on Damian Lillard.
And he's one of the few players in the league that's big enough, or I should say bigger than Dame,
but also quick enough to stay in front of it.
And what they were doing is in any Brooke Lopez action,
they were hedging and recovering with Jared Allen,
and Isaac Acora would sprint and meet Dame at some point on his drives.
as Dame would try to beat the hedge with either a split or by dribbling around Jared Allen.
And Isaac Gacora forced a couple of turnovers that way.
There was a time where Dame just straight up tried to ISO Isaac Acora early in the game,
and he just chested him up, put his body in the way.
And Dame and Chris Middleton in particular were playing a lot of grift basketball.
They were kind of just dribbling into guys' chests and throwing junk up and trying to get fouls.
We'll talk about the bucks later, but they didn't really attack this game in any sort of
serious manners. A lot of stuff coming out of Milwaukee despite their record that's kind of weird,
and last night was definitely one of those games. But Isaac O'Cohor on Dame was the first major
matchup. The second matchup, and I thought the one that was arguably the most impactful during
this run was Dean Wade on Chris Middleton. First of all, same thing. When Chris Middleton was
attacking Dean Wade in isolation situations, Dean Wade was playing classic positional defense. He was
sliding his feet, taking the contact in the chest, keeping his arms up high so that he doesn't
called for a foul, and he's got good size. And so he's forcing Chris to take tough shots
over the top. And he was frustrating Chris as he was beating him to spots. And Chris was just trying
to throw junk up at the rim to try to get fouls. But the big thing that Dean Wade was doing
was his ability to switch. They were switching the Dame Middleton pick and roll and putting
Dean Wade on Dane. Dean Wade got to stop, sliding his feet on Dane. They were switching
any sort of pick and roll with Brooke Lopez. And Chris,
Chris Middleton. So then Dean Wade would just rotate on to Brooke Lopez and just kind of
battle. And they were doubling him out of that. There was a possession to Donovan Mitchell's
credit who's having a great defensive season. Dean Wade got Lopez on a switch. Lopez backed him
down on that left block. And Donovan Mitchell sprinted in, double teamed, got him to get
rid of the basketball. Pass went right. It was only one pass away. Easy kick out to Malik Beasley.
Donovan Mitchell is an elite athlete at the guard position, sprinted out like crazy and chased
Malik Beasley off the line and forced him into a dribble pull-up jump shot. But that ability of
Dean Wade to not be super easily scored on in a switch against a big or a guard was a really
useful tool for the Cavs during that defensive effort that really frustrated the Milwaukee
Bucks last night. And then they just were pushing in transition on every single stop. And Milwaukee's
transition defense is awful. They let teams get out in transition over 17 percent of their
possessions, which ranks dead last in the league according to cleaning the glass. But that's a good
game plan from Cleveland. They were just running it down their throat every single time. A lot of bad
floor balance from Milwaukee. There was a possession where at one point they had all five
offensive players below the charge circle. And big shock, it ended up leading to, I believe,
if I remember correctly, it was Max Trues getting a runout, a foul. But that was all it was. It was
just incredible defense from all five guys, completely bought in, frustrating the bucks, and then
sprinting it down the other.
end in transition.
And then a mix-in of some Donovan Mitchell's shot-making.
He hit this ridiculous step-back on Isaac Acorro where damn near made him fall down.
Or not on Isaac Accoor, excuse me, it was on Andre Jackson, Jr.
I don't know.
I'm mixing names up today.
But it was a step-back on Andre Jackson Jr.
made him nearly fall down that he knocked down.
He had a pull-up three and pick and roll over the screen.
He beat Malik Beasley in the mid-range with a pull-up jump shot.
It was just that bit of shot-making mixed in with running out for wide-open layups
and dunks, and then excellent defense, all of a sudden they're up 22 to 2, and the Bucks
quit and the game is over.
On the Bucks front, like, again, it kind of, it just was, it felt like one of those games where
they realized De Anas was out, and they went into the game with no real belief that they were
going to win.
And you could see it in a bunch of different areas.
Damon and Chris Middleton just dropping their shoulder into defender's chest and then
just trying to draw fouls by just throwing up weird shots.
Dame was drawing multiple defenders at the ball screen, but just swinging the ball out of it,
not really doing anything to try to compromise the defense in that situation.
And then they were jogging back in transition.
A lot of basic things too, like floor balance stuff where guys are, you know, it just was
an incredibly sloppy basketball from the Milwaukee box.
Again, it's one of those ones that you just kind of crumple up and throw out.
But again, like, Milwaukee's got a really good record.
But there's just some weirdness surrounding that team.
I'm not sure what it is.
but at the same time, I want to cut them the same slack that I've been cutting a lot of teams,
which is this is the NBA in January.
This is what it can be like sometimes.
You're right smack in the middle of things.
So you've been doing this for a long time, and you still have a really long way to go.
And I think that that can go a long way towards just kind of like causing wildly oscillating levels of effort from team night to night, right?
You get a Boston team that beats the Timberwolves and then gets their ass kicked by the Bucks.
The Bucks kick the shit out of the Celtics and then go.
get their ass kicked by the calves, right?
Like it's just this weird dynamic where it's the oscillating effort that's primarily
dictating whether or not a team, you know, kind of comes out with the win on any given night
in this time of year.
So I want to cut the bucks some slack.
You just kind of crumple that one and throw away, but it definitely was a disappointing
effort.
Now, on the Cavs front, Evan Mowgli went down after the Orlando game, 18 games ago.
Then they quickly dropped three of their next four, and then Darius Garland goes out
the lineup. And then everybody in the league's like, hmm, this is interesting. Like, we're not sure
even if the Allen Mobley front court works in terms of the playoffs. It's just really difficult for
them to score and pick and roll in that situation. You have two small guards in that lineup. Now you
have Dary Scarlane and Evan Mobley out for a long time. The regular season to that point hadn't
been that impressive from Cleveland. And so you're like, hmm, like this kind of felt like a teetering
point. Like, it was a teetering point where it might be one of those things where now is the time to
kind of reconfigure, or are they going to kind of salvage these things? Nope, they salvaged things.
They went 11 and 3 over their next 14 games since Dary Scarlane went out, sixth in offense,
and third in defense. Most of their success comes off of similar stretches to what we saw last
night against Milwaukee. They defend like crazy, and they get out and run. As a matter of fact,
they're only 24th in the NBA and half-court offense. So they're not really great at scoring.
As a matter of fact, they're bad at scoring in the slow-down half-court environment. But
their seventh in fast break points per 100 possessions this season.
They get out and run and that bolsters them on the offensive end of the floor.
But most importantly, they don't just run for the sake of running.
There are a lot of teams that run out in transition and take bad shots.
Caves do not do that.
They run selectively when they see good opportunities for them to get great shots.
They run off their defense in particular.
They're not just playing with unnecessary pace, right?
They're at 1.17 points per transition possession.
that ranks eighth in terms of efficiency per possession among all NBA teams.
That's excellent.
Overall, cleaning the glass has this metric.
It's a cool metric.
They call it transition points added per 100 possessions.
It's just a way to kind of like singularly capture your volume of transition
and your efficiency into like one metric, right?
Because there are a lot of teams that run in transition a ton, but they don't necessarily
score.
And then there are selective teams that don't run as often, but when they do, they get layups
and dunks, right? And those are the teams that are more efficient, right? And then there's a
metric that cleaning the glass has that kind of combines all of that stuff. Well,
for the Cavs, they rank third in the league in that kind of combined metric, meaning they
are the third best transition offense in the NBA. So the question is, why is Cleveland's
defense so successful? And the reality is really simple. It's complete and total buy-in down
the lineup from everyone, including their star. Donovan Mitchell is flying around and
help and recover situations. Dean Wade, we talked about earlier, is competing in switches against
players bigger and smaller than him, and he's guarding wings well. Isaac Acoro, Max Truce,
are competing at the point of attack with physicality and relentless back pressure and just using
their quickness and size, right? Acoro specifically is one of those guys. He has his
offensive limitations, but he's just such a useful defensive player with his ability to guard
the quick guards in a league with his size that can become a problem.
problem, right? And then Jared Allen, he's capable of switching, he's capable of dropping, he's
capable of hedging, he's just a versatile defensive big. He kind of fits into that mold that I talk
about in terms of team construct where you want to have a defensive kind of fulcrum at the center
position that can defend in multiple coverages. Otherwise, you become very matchup dependent, right?
The defense is real, too, regardless of opponent. As a matter of fact, they allow just 112.12.4 points
per 100 possessions against the top 10 offenses in the league, which ranks number one in the
NBA.
Now, to be clear, they've been in an easier stretch of their schedule as of late, and things will
get tougher, but they're playing some really good basketball.
They're now going on the road to play four tough games.
They're at Atlanta, at Orlando, at Milwaukee twice.
Then they come home for the clippers.
And so we're going to find out really quickly how much of this is real for them, at least
in terms of this particular group, obviously, with Garland and Mobley still being,
or Garland and Mobley still being out.
Specifically, it's going to come down to a couple, it's going to come down to,
can they get enough stops to get out and transition often enough to bolster their
half-court offense?
And then in the half-quarter, they're going to get enough shot-making from guys like
Donovan Mitchell, right?
Like, that's going to be what's going to carry them against these better opponents,
because what's going to happen is specifically teams like Orlando has really big perimeter
offensive players are going to try to attack the smaller Cleveland perimeter defenders, right?
The clippers are going to space them out and test some of their other perimeter defensive players.
And if they don't get as many stops, they're not going to be able to run as much,
which is going to put a strain on their half-court offense.
And they're at Milwaukee twice, and Milwaukee's going to want revenge.
So those are going to be some tough games.
If they can go three and five, three and two in those five games, that would be a huge win
for this Cleveland Cavaliers team.
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,
wherever you get your podcasts.
A win is a win.
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Do you remember when Diana Ross
double-tap Little Kim's boobs
at the VMAs?
Or when Kanye said
that George Bush
didn't like black people.
I know what you're thinking.
What the hell does George Bush
got to do with Little Kim?
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I'm Sam Jett.
And I'm Alex English.
Each episode, we pick it here,
unpack what went down,
and try to make sense
of how we survived it.
Including a recent episode,
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waxing all about crack in the 80s.
To be clear, 84 is big to me
not just because of crack.
I'm down to talk about crack all day,
but just so you all know.
I mean, at this point,
this is the second episode
where we've discussed crack,
so I'm starting to see that there's a through line.
We also have AIDS on the table right now, so...
Thank you for finishing that sentence.
Yes, I don't think there's a more important year
for black people.
Really?
Yeah, for me, it's one of the most important years
for black people in American history.
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All right, moving on to the Sons with KD at the 5.
And so they were down 22 with, you know, something like seven or eight minutes left, if I remember correctly.
And I just kind of cataloged every single possession or the majority of the possessions as the Sons came back to win.
And you could find that again in that thread on my Twitter feed at underscore Jason LT.
But, you know, my main takeaway from watching that group will,
makes it all work, because they're pretty small, right?
Like, you've got Kevin Durant, but after that, it's like Eric Gordon, you know, he's not
necessarily the tallest guy in the world.
You know, Grayson Allen, not necessarily the tallest guy in the world.
Bradley Beal, not necessarily the tallest guy in the world.
And Devin Booker is, the second tallest guy in the lineup at 6-6 or 6-5 or whatever he is, right?
So, like, it's a small lineup.
But the reason why it works is all about Kevin Durant.
He's just an unbelievably incredible defender when he's locked in like that.
It's actually insane.
Like, he can guard Sabonis straight up.
Sabonis was trying to bully him, couldn't move him off his spot.
He can guard Deer and Fox straight up, locked him up in an ISO late in the game.
He can switch.
He can drop.
He had a block on Malik Monk in drop coverage.
That was one of the things that was successful against Sacramento is they were doing a lot of switching,
but then randomly they wouldn't.
And when they wouldn't, they were forcing turnovers and forcing mistakes from Sacramento.
There was a play where, like, they switched a bunch of dribble handoffs in a row,
and then suddenly Devin Booker was like, nope, I'm going to shoot the gap on this one,
and he forced a illegal screen off of Harrison Barnes who was moving when he knocked him over.
Kevin Durant would like switch, switch, switch, and then suddenly he would drop.
And when he would drop, it would like catch Sacramento off guard.
He was doing a really nice job of kind of throwing off their rhythm.
Also, just not switching for the sake of switching, but switching when guys would get screened was a big thing that was helping.
And then lastly, Kevin Durant's an outstanding low-man help defender.
There was a play where I want to say Eric Gordon,
got driven by by Malik Monk along the right side on the wing,
and I have this play clipped.
And Kevin Durant identified.
I talk how often about how help defenders have a complicated decision
because if you just help all the time,
you make these easy kickout reads.
So you have to make a decision based on how compromised the on-ball defender is.
Is he completely compromised?
Then you've got to go help,
because it's better to give up a catch-and-shoot three on the weak side
than a wide-open lay-up.
Because a catch-and-shoot-three on the weak side might,
for a really good shooter.
Like, Grayson Allen's one of the best catch-and-shoe guys in the league.
Catch-and-shoot three for him is worth 1.4 points per possession.
But guess how much a driving layup is worth if the defender is compromised?
Probably going to make it at least nine out of ten times, right?
There'll be the occasional play where the offensive player is too sped up
and he shoots the layup over the front of the rim or something like that, right?
But nine out of ten is 1.8 points per possession.
So it's a very important decision that Kevin Durant has to make there to either help
or to stay home.
And on this possession,
he realized that Eric Gordon was pushing him
underneath the basket.
And so we kind of stayed back
to watch out for that corner pass.
Malik Monk, at the last second,
decided to jump back.
And Grace and Allen had done a really nice impromptu switch
onto De Manusabonis and kind of fronted him
in the post, and he was in position to help
and knocked that ball away as Malik Monk went up
underneath the basket.
It was a really nice low-man possession
from Kevin Durant, who can also clean up
the defensive glass.
there, who can also block shots when the defender is compromised, who can also do things like
even when open offensive players are there, he can block passing angles. There's a play where
Deer and Fox got downhill and Grayson Allen and Kevin Durant kind of like trapped him, and
Kevin Herder kind of cut right in front of the rim, and he was wide open, but there was no
passing angle there because Kevin Durant basically has him swallowed up, which allowed
Eric Gordon to stay home on the weak side and get a steal as Deer and Fox tried to force a skip pass
to the right corner.
The point is, Kevin Durant,
and his ability to guard quick guards,
guard bigs, guard and drop coverage,
you know, switch,
garden, help and recover situations,
clean up the defensive glass,
all of that capability
makes a lineup like that function
in a way that it just wouldn't
for anybody else, right?
And so that's where Kevin Durant is being basically,
for lack of a better word,
a superstar can clean up and patch up
holes that a lineup would otherwise create.
From there,
it's all about,
speed and skill. Again, we're talking about four players in Eric Gordon, Bradley Beale,
Grayson Allen, and Devin Booker who were all fast, who can all dribble, who can all shoot,
who could all pass. Eric Gordon, to his credit, spent some time on Demona Sabonis, and Sabonis had
no interest in attacking him. And then in all those offball actions, really sharp communication
from Bradley Beale, Devin Booker and Grayson Allen. There were several, there were some complicated
interchanges like triple switches where like three people were involved in the action, and all three
of them just kind of ended up in the right place through communication and through effort.
Grayson Allen in particular was outstanding in help defense. He had a couple of
turnovers he forced on De Manus Sabonis, like digging down when he would turn his head as he
was trying to bully Kevin Durant. I talked about the big block that he had on Malik Monk.
And then I talked about Devin Booker and how he caused a couple of turnovers with impromptu non-switches
when they were switching interchanges and Devin Booker would just go like, nope, not switching this
one. And it would just throw the Sacramento Kings out of, out of, there were, there was a
a play where Malik Monk just threw the ball out of bounds.
And then I talked about the Harrison Barnes illegal screen on the dribble handoff.
But it was just down the lineup, a hellacious effort, a ton of speed,
and then Kevin Durant tying it all together.
And then on offense, they were running hard in transition.
Bradley Beale and Kevin Durant got run out dunks during that stretch.
And then, like I said, everyone can dribble shoot and pass at a high level.
And so Kevin Durant or Devin Booker,
Kevin Durant would like get an ISO and drive on a guy and the Deer and Fox would double team.
or Devin Booker would run a ball screen and draw two defenders in the ball screen.
And then from there, they would just play driving kick basketball with the other four guys,
except for all of them can dribble shoot and pass.
And so it'd be like, oh, shit, you just ran at Eric Gordon and he threw the extra pass to Grayson Allen on the wing and he knocks down the three.
Oh shit, you had Grayson Allen, you close out.
He makes the extra pass to Eric Gordon.
Another guy close out.
Now all of a sudden, Grayson Allen's open again, and the ball goes back to Grayson Allen.
He makes it.
Kevin Durant was getting open threes as well.
They got wide open threes on the majority of those possessions down the stretch.
Even some ones that they missed, Kevin Durant missed a wide open three on the right wing
when they were in their zone that the Kings ran a few times down the stretch.
So it just, again, like it discombobulated Sacramento on both ends of the floor
because it's a non-traditional way to play basketball.
But at the end of the day, that's what I see that lineup being used as.
Is it tenable long term?
Of course not.
You're not going to be able to play Kevin Durant at the five big picture for massive minutes.
It's too fatiguing.
It's too much to ask.
So how do you use a lineup like that?
You use it as a death lineup.
Okay, this team's bothering us with size and they're up five in the early second quarter.
Let's throw out the death lineup and let's regain control the game.
Let's throw a giant wrench in things and retake control of the game.
Okay, it's a close game late.
And, you know, based on this particular matchup, we like the ability to go small.
You go small in that situation.
That's the way the death lineup is used or was used by the Warriors.
They didn't start games with it.
It was literally something that they brought out selectively to regain control of the rhythm of a game or to close a game.
And that's kind of what I see that lineup as for the game.
the sons. And there were some issues. Like there was a play where Keegan Murray got an offensive
rebound over Eric Gordon just because he's bigger, right? There was a play where Deere and
Fox got an offensive rebound over Grayson Allen just because he's a better athlete, right? Like,
they're going to have some limitations, but this is one of the concepts that I talk about a lot
on this show. Lean into your strengths. Don't try to be what other teams are if you're not as good
as them at that. Don't try to be Denver because Denver, because then
is better at being Denver than you are.
Be the best version of what your team's strengths are.
The Phoenix Suns are not physically imposing.
The Phoenix Suns are not going to bully teams,
but they probably have one of the most skilled five-man groupings
that you can put together in the NBA.
So, that's a great look for them to have.
While you're busy doing your thing,
we're going to lean into our strengths
and try to regain control the game that way.
That's why I really, really like that lineup.
By the way, 25 possessions so far this year with Kevin Durant, Devin Booker,
Grayson, Allen, Bradley Beale, and Eric Gordon.
They are plus 64.5 points per 100 possessions in those 25 possessions.
Just unbelievably dominant.
Thought it was really, really interesting.
It's going to hinge on a defensive effort, especially from Kevin Durant,
but I love that as a wrench for them to be able to throw for certain stretches of games.
All right, guys, that is all I have for today.
We'll be back tomorrow.
I've got a bunch of stuff.
We're going to do a mailbag.
I'm going to do some mid-season award stuff.
It's going to be basically just a bunch of like kind of middle-of-the-year content
as I'm in Breckenridge.
And then we'll be back on Wednesday next week with game breakdowns.
And then I'm in town.
I think my wife and I might go on.
We usually go skiing for her birthday.
So maybe in late March, I might hop out of town for like a really short trip,
like a two or three-day trip.
But other than that, I plan on being in town until after the NBA finals.
And so it's just going to get into that, to the rhythm of that grind from there.
I will see you guys on Wednesday.
Well, I should say I'll see you tomorrow.
And then we'll take a little break
and then I'll be back on Wednesday from there.
I appreciate you guys.
I will see you tomorrow.
The volume.
Another podcast from some SNL, late night comedy guy,
not quite.
Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends.
Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman
help make you funnier.
This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day
and head writer Streeter Seidel
help an a cappella band
with their between songs banter.
Where does your group perform?
We do some retirement homes.
Those people are starving for banter.
Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends
on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
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 it,
on 10 pounds. I was having trouble
stopping the muscle growth.
Listen to Superhuman on the I-Hard
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
On the Look Back at it podcast.
From 1979, that was a big moment for me.
84 was big to me.
I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English.
Each episode, we pick a hear,
unpack what went down, and try to make sense
of how we survived it. With our friends,
fellow comedians, and favorite authors.
Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s.
84 was a wild...
It was a wild year.
I don't think there's a more important year for black people.
Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
This is an IHeart podcast.
Guaranteed human.
