The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - Trades Lakers, Warriors, Celtics can make to LEVEL UP + Nuggets & Thunder weak spots | NBA Mailbag

Episode Date: January 10, 2026

Jason reacts to two games from Wednesday night's slate (Denver Nuggets beating the Boston Celtics and Golden State Warriors beating the Milwaukee Bucks) before answering mailbag questions on topics including how the Los Angeles Lakers offense looks with LeBron James vs. Luka Doncic, vulnerabilities of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the Oklahoma City Thunder, and trades teams can make to make them contenders. All lines presented by Hard Rock Bet.  #VolumeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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

We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it. But, you know, tired and sick. Tired and sick.

Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you. you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman

help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends

on the ice. Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano. It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast, Point Game, the playoffs. We're digging into the biggest surprises of the season. And I'm looking back on some of my greatest playoff moments.

If we didn't talk ever again, I was funny. You just understood. That's how personal it got. Wow. Then after that game seven, Marquis' keep coming to you. He's like, you know, I love you, dog. You know, it's all love. This was just playoffs.

This was just basketball. So listen to Point Game on the, iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Deanna Maria Riva, and on my new podcast, How Hard Can It Be? I call on my Gen X squad from Ohio to Hollywood as we navigate Midlife's most fantastic BS. Unfiltered conversations from night sweats to fupas to scheduling sex. Wait, what sex? Is it just me or does every woman my age want to look at Pinterest instead of having sex sometimes?

They say we can't polish a turn, but we're sure going to try. so let's get blunt with laughs, tears, or tears of laughter. Listen to How Hard Can It Be with Diana Maria Riva on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Volume. Welcome to Hips tonight here at The Volume Heavy Friday, everybody. Hope all of you guys have had an incredible week. It is Mailback Day.

We've got a lot of good stuff to get into from around the league. And as promised, we're recording this on Thursday. I wanted to give some quick thoughts on the Nugget Celtics game and the Bucks Warriors games from Wednesday night as well. We'll leave with that. Then we got about 10 mailbag questions from throughout the week. Very excited to get into it with you guys. You guys know the Joe before we get started, subscribe to our YouTube channel so you don't miss any more of our videos.

Like this video that helps us a lot. And if you want to get questions into our future mailbags in our full episodes on YouTube, any YouTube comments, right, mailbag with a colon, write your question. We'll get to them on Fridays throughout the rest of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball. So, again, as promised, quick thoughts on those couple other games from Wednesday. one of the things important about our recording cadence, it's very important to me that we get our videos out early in the day. With our daily kind of cadence,

you know, if you release a video in the afternoon, like we used to do a few years ago, you know, there's games that are tipping off at 4 o'clock Pacific time. And it's just the cadence of the league is so fast. It's very important that I get our reaction videos out early in the morning. And it just is tough when you've got a night,

like Wednesday night, where there's quite literally a half dozen awesome games. games and I can't get to all of them, but I wanted to get to a couple more of these. So I figured we'd push them into our mailbag show for Friday, especially with how weak the Thursday night slate was. So Nugget Celtics, we had talked about after the, right after the Yokich injury happened, that there was going to be a formula for the Nuggets to lean on if they wanted to win without Yokic. And I said it would be leaning heavily into defense. And then Jamal Murray essentially trying to bring you home in crunch time as long as you can keep games close. And so I expected

to David Adelman to lean heavily on more of his athletes, to go smaller, and to heavily emphasize in terms of his accountability, the defensive end of the floor, because that's something they can control during this stretch without Nicola. And again, once you get games close, Jamal Murray is an All-Star, maybe even an All-MBA candidate. He's the kind of guy who can pull you home in those sorts of instances.

And we saw a very good example of that in the win in Toronto, and then another one on Wednesday night in Boston against a red hot Boston Celtics offense. I cannot say enough about how good Zeke Naji has been in these couple of wins. He was one of the heroes in that big win in Philly when even Jamal Murray was out. He was a hero again last night. He gave them the ability to stay kind of, you know, big and physically imposing in their small ball looks, but also keeping their switchability. And that was really the story of the game against Boston. The Nuggets did a wonderful job of communicating and switching through Boston's actions, which prevented the easy catch and shoot threes that can come out of those

screening actions. So if you allow guys to work easily downhill in ball screens, you're going to have to help. That's going to create easy kickouts. If you don't switch guard, guard screens and three-man action out at the top of the key, guys are going to slip out and get wide open threes. And especially in that fourth quarter run, I thought they just did an amazing job taking away any of the easy catch and shoot looks that Boston can generate in their offense. And then a lot of really high quality one-on-one possessions against Jalen Brown. Jamal Murray held up a few times. You got like Peyton Watson stripping him on a steel. Zieg Najee coming over and blocking him at the rim. The Celtics did not get many quality looks in that fourth quarter. Again, that's a red-hot

Celtics offense. They had an offensive rating north of 125 over the last few weeks. And the Nuggets pretty much kept them under control, especially down the stretch of that game. And then late in the game on offense, just surgical shot creation from Jal Mour, Jamal Murray, who again, like, he deserves consideration for all NBA with the level that he's been playing at this season. He's just been completely amazing. They kept running him off of these like double wide pin downs out of the right corner. And essentially he was dragging Boston's Biggs out to the perimeter, uh, as he was kind of coming off of that action. And so essentially if the big ended up meeting him on a switch on the other side of the screen, he would,

you know, like Luca Garza would show and Jamal Murray would just hit a quick little step back jumper on him. Or if they brought two to the ball, so they're chasing and they have Luca up there, he was just hitting Zeke Najee over and over again rolling to the basket. And Zeke did a wonderful job throughout this game of finishing around the rim or drawing fouls on those rolls off of Jamal Murray. And then a couple of big plays late or Boston. Naturally, what's the progression there if you're going to show on Jamal Murray at the level and you're going to tag the roller.

what's the next progression. It's the kickouts to the three point line. And a couple of big shots, Jaylen Pickett, hits a little one-jurable pull-up off of one of those sequences. And then Jamal makes a beautiful skip pass to the left corner where Peyton Watson hits a three that pushes the lead up to 13 and essentially closes the deal from there. Just a really, really impressive win for the Nuggets. Now three wins without Nicola Yokic. The Warriors game. Massive game for the Warriors half-court offense. They posted a 117 offensive rating in the half-court according to cleaning the glass in that. that, you know,

when against Milwaukee, I thought Steph did an awesome job of working the mid-range in this game, especially with the way Milwaukee was kind of chasing him aggressively over the top of screens and essentially funneling him into the middle of the floor.

They were spamming this play in the third quarter where they were basically running him off of a wide pin down out of the right corner and he just kept curling right into that kind of right elbow extended area and he'd hit a little floater bank shot. He'd hit a little jump shot. He'd, you know, draw a foul in that space. Did a ton of damage there.

A couple of their shooters are starting. starting to get going. Moses Moody and De Anthony Melton in particular, both got hot from three in this game. I also thought the offensive glass was a massive factor. They only got eight offensive rebounds, but they scored on damn near every single one of them. There was 22 to four second chance points advantage for Golden State. Little things like Steph missing a three off the top of the key kind of coming off of a ball screen and then offensive rebound kick out. There it is another look from the left wing. He knocks it down. Just turning misses into makes with their offensive rebounding. And then lastly, I thought Draymond got several key stops on an island

against Janus in the middle of the paint during that third quarter run. Draymond has been very good since his blow up with Steve Kerr, where he left the court. I think that's the kind of thing where confrontation can be good because it's how you hold people accountable. And I think Draymond needed a little bit of a wake-up call, especially just with how sloppy he had been. And I think that blow up with Steve Kerr actually helped get him back on track. He's been very good as of late. I think the Warriors are gaining some real momentum. Al Horford looked great again in the Wednesday night game. If they can just, just stop losing games in the final seconds in horrifying fashion. I think they have real opportunity

here to make a run in the second half of the season. All right, let's get into our mailbag. First question. This was an interesting one that I got the other day, and I think it's worth diving into. What's up, Jason, longtime fan of the show. Before the season, you said the Hawks would be a case study for your basketball philosophy and what their performance this year would either validate or invalidate your perspective. So my question is, has Atlanta season so far changed your mind Anyway, this is a two-part question, but I'm going to get to the first part first. So this is complicated because Atlanta season is really strange, because my belief in Atlanta stem from the idea that you would have this combination

of rim protection with Chris Sops Porzengis, a depth of athletes around Chris Sops that would make it so Chris Sops didn't have to come out to the perimeter, but that he could stay back and you'd have, you know, Dyson Daniels and to Kill Alexander Walker and Jalen Johnson and Zachary Rissachin, and all these athletes and all around him basically doing all the dirty work so that Trey Young can focus on setting the table as an advantage creator,

and Khrasborses could function as like a switchbeater slash rim protector. And there frankly have been a lot of things that have gone wrong. I think that you dig into the Porzingis piece. He hasn't been healthy. That fundamentally makes it so that you can't make as many mistakes on the perimeter

because you don't have the level of rim protection that you have on Khrasb's Porzschex is sitting back like that, right? Two, I don't think the wings have been as good defensively as they've needed to be, particularly Zachary Rissachay and Jalen Johnson. I think the two of them have been actually pretty disappointing on defense this year. And so when you have a less effective group of perimeter defenders and the lack of rim protection, that's been kind of doom for their defense.

They've had games, like especially without Trey Young, where they get up into the ball and they force a lot of turnovers and then they're just devastating in transition and they're doing a lot of work on the margins like that. And I think some of that has been some proof of concept. Like the fact that they're above 500 without Trey Young and with Chris Hops Porzingis being out as much as they've had as they've been is certainly something. It's not like super impressive, but it's something. And then the last piece of it, whenever Trey Young was available, they just as a team didn't defend. And Trey deserves some blame for that. But as a team, uh, they didn't defend. And so, you know, it's, it's tricky because I would argue that my back.

basketball philosophy, what you're referencing, specifically the idea of having a bunch of athletes that can dribble shoot and pass, that can get up into the ball, that can switch onto multiple positions, that can run the floor in transition and generate advantages before you get into half court situations. All those things I still believe in, I just think the Atlanta Hawks have been,

have had several things go against them. Chris Hops being hurt, that's a huge factor. Jalen Johnson and Zachary Rissachay, not being very good on defense. that's a big factor, right? And Trey Young being a combination of unhealthy and then when he has been healthy, the team not playing well,

it's just been an unfortunate mix of events. So like I think where I would, to your point, to your question, where I would have to like more seriously consider the basketball philosophy piece would be if Trey Young and Khrasop's Porzengis had played in most of the games and the team was still below 500.

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We have some big news. What's the news, huge news? We created our own podcast called, Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to a podcast.

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

Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy. Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel

and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel. Help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 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.

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When I've disagreed with you over the years, it usually comes down to the idea that I think you put too much value on the marginal advantage players have in surgical half-court execution and that you do so at the expense of general two-way versatility and impact. So the second question is, do you think there's any credence to the idea that you and or the general hoop community have undervalued two-way versatility? an impact. I have not changed my opinion on this at all. I think Nicole Yokic has clearly been head and shoulders better than the rest of the league and he's your textbook half court surgeon type of dude who has defensive limitations, but that finds a way to compete defensively within a scheme alongside other smart high IQ defenders. I think that for all of the talk we want to talk about with Luca and whether or not he can succeed at the highest, highest levels of the NBA, that's all fair. You know, what happened to him in the

2004 finals against Boston. That's a completely fair criticism of Luca Donchich. But the bottom line is they wake up today with a damn good record and like what the fifth best record in the NBA. And a big part of that is because of how good their half court offense has been, especially in crunch time. And Luca Donchich has been the driving force behind that. And so I think the the bigger point that you're making about let's take the half court execution piece and set it aside. do we value general two-way versatility and impact enough? I think that's a good question. I think that really comes down to more the team concept, though.

I think that if the ultimate, not to be too reductive here, but the ultimate goal of a basketball team is to score more points than your opponent, right? And so on our very basic level, like if you're built the way Oklahoma City is and you're going to get a shit ton of stops, I think you can have a team that's built less around refined offensive skill. If you have a team like the 2003 Denver Nuggets who's built around refined offensive skill, I think you can get away with a little bit less in terms of defensive personnel. Ultimately,

you're building a checklist. Like if you think of what happens on both ends of the floor as like a bunch of boxes you have to check, right? And the more boxes you check on both ends of the floor, the better team you are, right? And so if you have a player that can check a ton of boxes, that's certainly valuable, right? So like, let's just take a guy like Anthony Davis, for example. Like, he can check the rim protection box and the defensive rebounding box.

And then if you go to the offensive end of the floor, you can check an offensive rebounding box. He can check a ball screen threat box where he has the ability to do damage in the short role and as a vertical spacer, there's things he can check like that. But there's one giant box that he can't check. And that's like breaking down elite defense. When there's an elite defense in front of him, Anthony Davis ain't going to be the guy that breaks down that defense.

That's a pretty gaping flaw for a team that's trying to. trying to win a championship. When I'm building a roster and I have that guy, I have a guy that like this dude can break down elite defense at the highest level. Obviously, I feel like I can go around and find a guy that can get defensive rebounds. I can find a guy that can dunk a lob as he's rolling hard down the lane. I can find a guy that can protect the rim a little bit. I can find guys who can defend on the permit.

Those are easier to find than the dude who can break the defense down. Now, the last kind of thing I would say is to a guy like Jason Tatum. So coming into the season, I would have ranked him as the fifth best player in the NBA, if not for his injury. Ideally, if you have a player that can anchor a defense the way that Jason Tatum can, that can anchor defensive glass the way that Jason Tatum can, that also brings some ability to break the defense down as an offensive player on the other end of the floor, there's a ton of value there.

And I think that's a big part of why, like, Jason Tatum, despite, not necessarily being the most efficient, you know, half-court surgeon type of guy in the league, I was viewing him as a legitimate top-tier superstar in this league before his injury because of his all-around versatility. In short, it's all a aggregate combination of all of these abilities. I just still think fundamentally the hardest trait to find in the NBA is can you break down elite defense? And that's why I look at that as such a valuable trait. as Oklahoma City leaves corner shooters open, sometimes teams get really hot.

I know it's their identity, but I feel like when Jordan Goodwin makes eight corner threes, maybe it's time to change it up. It's happened multiple times the season and Dagnol sticks with the same scheme. So with Oklahoma City, and this is an important detail when you're looking at margin hunting,

for the most part, it's not just that specific margin in a vacuum that you're looking at. You're looking at how all of these things are intricately connected. So, for example, if you are, let's just take offensive rebounding, for example. It used to be that the interpretation was if you crash the offensive glass, you make yourself vulnerable in transition defense. But then as teams started to look at it in a more refined way, they're like, well,

if we crash the offensive glass from the corners and we just have them run to the elbows, just classic corner crash. when they run to the elbows, the long rebound is going to come off from a miss three, and they have a high opportunity to get it. If they don't get it, two things happen. One, those guys out of the corners are already running, so they can take that momentum.

Oh, we didn't get the ball, wheel back into transition defense. And two, if I crash to the elbow and I don't get the ball and on the primary point of attack defender, I can quick turn and pick up the basketball, meaning like, let's say the other team's big gets the ball, on a long rebound up around the elbow, and he dumps it to the point guard right around the block,

and you're right there at the elbow, didn't get the rebound, but you're right there to pick up the guard full court. And if you can pick up the guard and make him turn twice or make him pick up his dribble or something like that or make him throw another back court pass, that slows the team down enough that it doesn't hurt you in transition. And so what teams have essentially realized is,

yeah, if you offensive rebound, there are going to be times where, you know, a very unfortunate rebound comes off and your floor balance is bad and a team gets a layup in transition. But much of the time, you're either going to get the offensive rebound or you're already going to be in a, it kind of like inflicts a certain amount of, like injects a certain amount of verve already in your team to where they're running.

So they're kind of getting back better anyway. And three, we can apply ball pressure right away. So teams have basically figured out that the tradeoff of attacking the offensive glass is actually worth whatever small downside there is to transition defense. Similarly, Oklahoma City has tradeoffs in the way that they play defense. So again, think of it on a really basic level from the standpoint of the negative. So the negative is when they pick up with a ton of ball pressure and they play super physical and they attack the basketball, they commit a lot of fouls, right?

That's one of the things that they're going to do that's going to cause issues relative to most teams. They're going to foul. the second piece, they're better at that this year than they have been in recent years, but in other years they've had issues with fouling on the perimeter. The second piece of it is the open corner threes, right? So like if you're picking up the ball and you are attacking with ball pressure and any time a guy gets beat off the dribble, you're sending aggressive help. And every time they try to post up, you're sending double teams and it's just this

very forward aggressive attack, attack, attack, defense. you're going to commit some fouls and you're going to give up some corner threes. But the flip side of that is you're also going to get a good amount of opportunities to force turnovers. You're going to get a good amount of opportunities to get out and transition off of those turnovers. The Oklahoma City Thunder generate 25 points every single game off of turnovers. That's the most in the entire NBA by pretty wide margin. So the way they look at it is like, yeah, we're going to give up some open threes. Yeah, we're going to commit some fouls.

But in the aggregate, it unlocks this transition part of our offense, which takes me to the specific dynamic with Oklahoma City offensively. We've seen Oklahoma City at various points over the course of the last few years, and especially recently, but even in the playoffs last year, especially in the playoffs in 2024, if you guys remember, we have seen Oklahoma City go very cold in the half court on offense. So they want to drive as much of that transition avalanche type of attack as they can. And so it's all part of that tradeoff.

They could give up fewer corner threes. They could commit fewer fouls. But then they wouldn't get out in transition as much and they'd have to play more in the half court, which is not how they want to play offensively. And so that's essentially the tradeoff for them. Now, to the point you're making about the Jordan Goodwin game, I think it just comes down to in a playoff series,

if there is a clear, so like, let's say that, let's say they run into a team like Denver, and Denver just takes really good care of the basketball, never turns it over for whatever reason. And they're just moving it methodically through your defense and hitting corner three, corner three, corner three, Cam Johnson, Aaron Gordon,

Cam Johnson, Aaron Gordon over and over and over again, then yeah, you might have to tweet, week it and be like, we need to see Nicole Yokic score one-on-one against Isaiah Hartenstein a few more times. We need to see Jamal Murray score one-on-one against a big or against one of our smaller guards more times. They might have to make an adjustment in a series if it gets to that point. But in the large sample of the regular season, I think they want to lean on getting out in transition as much as possible. We'd love to hear your thoughts on what trade the Celtics should look for. Zubots is apparently not an asset that Clippers are willing to

give up, and I've heard mixed things about the availability of Gafford, Claxton. I think all of these guys could be a great fit, but obviously not sure with the package the other teams would be looking for in return. Anthony Simons definitely carries some value, and he could definitely be packaged with picks and some bench guys like Hauser or Shireman. Ideally, in any of these trades, I would like to see the C's keep Hugo Gonzalez and Jordan Walsh, but not sure how realistic that is, what are your thoughts? So I actually, because I'm about to record here in about 20 minutes with a group of Lakers guys, and we're going to be talking about the specific dynamic of the center position because DeAndreaten got his ass kicked by Victor Wiman Yama in the game

on Wednesday night. And so I've seen him just too often get his butt kicked by the higher level centers around the league. And I just don't think he's the guy for Luke a long term. So I've been looking around at the centers. And so I was like, who are the guys that could like realistically start at center around the league that are also somewhat realistically available for trade? And the list that I came up with was DeMontasabonis, Walker Kessler, Nikola Vucevich, Nick Claxton, Daniel Gafford and Robert Williams. Now, where it gets tricky for the Celtics is you've got to think about the salaries.

With Tatum on a max, with Jalen Brown on a max, and you're going to have to pay, you know, like you want to keep Derek White in a situation. You know, he makes a lot of money. You got a lot of money tied up in your perimeter guys. So ideally, you want to try to find a center that gives you a useful look,

but that also is a guy that you could theoretically have for a couple years without spending too much. money. And that's where it gets interesting because like, you look at a guy like Walker Kessler, you trade from him. You're going to have to extend him that could provide a money crunch for a team like the Celtics, right? Like Nick Claxton is a guy that financially is not going to be cheaper, not going to be cheap to keep around long term. That's where I start to look at like, okay, what about a Daniel Gafford? What about a Nikola Vucevich? Right. Like, you've seen how Luca Garza has given some, you know, kind of a unique look to the Celtics at the center position as a

guy who can space the floor a little bit, you know, you already have Nimi Keda. And Kada is actually pretty good, but Kada is a little one-dimensional. He's more of like a drop coverage big, a guy who does some ceiling inside and finishing vertical spacing, that kind of stuff. So what if you had two different looks? You had this Nimi Kada, drop coverage, vertical spacing, rim protection look, and then you traded for a guy like Vucevich and you kept him around at a discounted deal. Like you go to Vooch and you go, hey, dude, you've made a good amount of money in your career, getting pretty old. What if you stick around with us for, you know, two years on this, like, really heavily discounted deal. And it's like Keda Vucevich, the two different

looks that the Celtics go with that center. And one of the things with Vooch is he gives you, like, a legitimate post-up threat. Like, he can pick and pop and hit pick and pop threes and space the floor as a center. But he's also like a big physical dude down low. They could do some rebounding and can do a bunch of damage in the post. And so I think he'd be an interesting kind of way to look. Robert Williams, it's the health issue. Daniel Gafford, there's a little bit of a money issue with him too, where I think he's, you know, potentially going to want a longer term deal where he's making, you know, 10, 15 million a year. There's something to be said about finding somebody that gives you the best combination of production relative to the salary under the situation that the Celtics are in.

And that's why I was thinking the guy like Busevich would be just kind of an interesting option for them to consider as a kind of like a two different looks alongside Nemekeeda. Today's show is brought to you by presenting sponsor Hard Rock Bet, the official sportsbook partner of the Miami Heat and the Orlando Magic. When it's cold outside, that's when you know the hardwood is heating up. Between the NBA and college, there's basketball on every night. And every night is a shot to build the same game parlay and score a major bucket on Hard Rock Bet.

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So how do we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Well, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band. Before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this.

We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey, Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it.

Another podcast from some SNL, late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smigel 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 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. Last night, a blown call changed a game. This morning, the internet lost its mind. Highlights are trending, opinions are flying, and nobody's telling you exactly what happened. That's where Sports Slice comes in. I'm Timbo. Every episode, we're cutting through the noise,

breaking down the plays, the controversies, and the stories behind the headlines. We go straight to the source, the athletes themselves. their locker room stories, their reactions, the stuff nobody gets to hear. The laughs, the drama, the triumphs, the moments that never make the highlight real. From viral moments to historic games, from buzzer beaters to controversial calls, we break it down, give you context, and ask the questions everybody wants answered. Sports Slice brings you closer to the action with stories told by the people who live them.

Listen to Sports Slice on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more, follow Timbo Slices Life 12 and the TikTok podcast. network on TikTok. How much of good defense is physical gifts? How much of it is effort? How much of it is knowledge? Could someone with very limited physical gifts become a good defender if he has good knowledge and hustle?

Appreciate your show. You and your team clearly work your butts off to create such polished content. Thank you. Thank you so much for the kind words. And thanks for shouting out the team. Jackson's literally just amazing. I just think he's the best in the world at what he does. So we talked about this concept within the idea of a team.

but I would argue that the largest chunk of defense is the execution piece, meaning like always being in the right spot, having good instincts. Like there have been a lot of guys over the years that have been good perimeter defenders relative to their actual talent because they're good at anticipating. They can look at a guy and they can like kind of identify where his center of gravity is and they can kind of see where his body's shifting or like they can pick up on physical cues or maybe they watch a lot of film and they're just good at scouting like little tips on you know, the way that a perimeter player kind of tips off what he's going to do.

And then it's just anticipation, right? Like, it's all about angle. So, like, if I'm defending a player who's faster than me, but if I take the right angle and I anticipate which way he's going, I can beat him to a spot, right? So, like, there is a very much an anticipatory positioning element to defense. Now, I would argue that you can't be terrible at either. So, like, if you're incredibly slow or if you're incredibly small,

it's really difficult to overcome that no matter how disciplined you are. But let's say you're a mediocre athlete, like a mediocre size and speed guard, a mediocre size and speed forward, or a mediocre size and speed center. Let me just take like Jake La Ravia, for example, a guy that I root for on the Lakers. He's not exceptionally big for a forward.

You know, he's like six, seven, right? And he's strong, but he's not like jacked or anything. And like he's mobile, but he's not like super fast or anything. like he's a little too small to be like a traditional power forward and a little too slow to be like a traditional small forward in terms of just his athletic profile, right? But he's been one of the most useful defenders for the Lakers this year. Why? Because he has the kind of like bare minimum set of physical gifts you need. Like he's got enough size and mobility to be at least somewhat useful in terms of the traits he's working with. He's a high effort guy. That's the third piece of this that we haven't even talked about yet. Like you got to be someone that has motor. You got to play. really hard on that end of the floor. And then the third piece of it is he's got the positioning and anticipation

elements down. And so he's just very good at kind of being in the right spot, following the defensive game plan, scouting the guy that he's guarding, and anticipating which direction he's going. He's been especially good this year guarding some of the like bigger forwards that look to attack off the dribble. But yeah, it's definitely a combination of all of those things. But physical, you kind of have to have all three. Like if you have great physical gifts and you've got the anticipation and positioning, but you got a shit motor and you don't play hard, that's a problem, right? Like, that's some of the issue that we've seen with LeBron over the last

few years. And it's just because he doesn't want to play hard for an 82 game regular season, right? But like he certainly can, he certainly understands the game playing and he can anticipate like crazy. And he's got still at his age, some pretty good physical gifts. But it's just, like when LeBron's effort drops off, he drops off. But when the effort's there, you know, we saw LeBron look like an all defense guy in the middle of the season last year, right? Or like, if you have the motor and you have the anticipation in the in the game plan piece but you're just super tiny or you're super slow that's going to be a problem and then you know we've seen it with guys like carl anthony towns like i don't think carl anthony towns is necessarily lazy he's got decent

physical gifts he's like he's a competitive dude he just the anticipation and positioning piece of it is like absolute garbage with him and it's a huge problem so you can't be dreadfully weak in any area but you don't necessarily have to be strong in all three areas Hi, Jason, big fan of your form of content and your wisdom around the NBA. You suggested a mega trade of Michael Porter Jr. and Nick Claxton to help catapult the Warriors to becoming more competitive. Within this suggestion, are you saying that Claxton would help the Warriors more than Draymond? Especially the mega trade you mentioned is swapping Claxton for Draymond. Can the Warriors still be title contenders if they just traded for MPJ and kept

Draymond would a starting five of Curry, Mountain, Butler, Michael Porter Jr., and Green, be a title contender. Thank you. Love your content. couple things. So one, the reason why I kind of like talked about structuring it that way is Michael Porter Jr. just has a really large salary. And so by having Draymond in there, it just kind of makes it easier to feasibly piece the rest of it together. That said, like getting just MPJ would still be a huge win for the Warriors. The reason why I was looking at Claxton specifically is I find him to be both a good fit defensively within the Warriors scheme because the Warriors do a bunch of different schemes defensively and they do do a decent amount of switching with their bigs. And then the second piece of

it is I've seen as a matchup thing, teams like San Antonio and Oklahoma City, the two top teams in the Western Conference, I've seen both of them struggle with rim protection at times. And so it's one of those things where even though Dremont's a very good defensive player, what he doesn't necessarily provide is that vertical rim protection. And so I just thought Nick Claxton would provide an element to the Warriors defense that they basically haven't had since, like, Andrew Bogot was healthy. So I just thought it was worth considering as an option. But to your point, if they just got Michael Porter Jr., I'd still.

view that is a huge boost for the Warriors. Three more. I was on Twitter and someone suggested that the Lakers offense is smoother when LeBron is running it as he looks to create Ben's score as opposed to Luca as more heliocentric an approach. What are your thoughts on this and which approach do you think is better for the Lakers offense? So this is a general idea that I just disagree with. The idea that like you have to play one way to win or that multiple ball handlers can't play together well, like I don't think that LeBron is

style. I don't think LeBron's style is better than Lucas necessarily based on what happened in the last few weeks. I just thought Luca wasn't playing well. Like, Luca's been every bit as heliocentric in that game against the Spurs or the second half against the Pelicans or the second half against Grizzlies on Sunday. He's been every bit as heliocentric as he was in all the other games. He just wouldn't turn the ball over. I want to cut Luca slack for the turnovers and mysteries specifically against the spurs because without Luca or without LeBron and Austin available, he basically had no choice but to bump usage way up. And that means he had to say yes a lot more to situations that he might otherwise say no. Meaning like, oh, high risk pass. When LeBron and Austin are healthy, you move it around

and let one of them attack. But when no one else can do shit with the basketball, like he almost has to take that high risk pass. Similarly, bad threes. When Louca, when LeBron and Austin are out there, don't take the bad three. Move the ball around if you get cut off off the dribble. But when LeBron and Austin are out, he kind of has to take the bad three. Right. So like, I'm not too critical of the turnovers and the missed shots in that particular Spurs game. But overall, I thought Lucas shot creation was ridiculous in that Spurs game and in the second half of the Pelicans game and in the second half of the Grizzlies game, even though he was heliocentric.

And so I don't think Luca needs to play more like LeBron. I just think Luca needs to play like the best version of Luca. And LeBron needs to keep playing like the best version of LeBron. I actually had a little bit of a debate with my buddy DeMond. He pitched this idea that when Austin comes back, maybe Luca or LeBron should stay kind of as the second option. That kind of clashes with my core basketball belief. I generally believe you can have three guys all kind of working in unison as long as they're all trusting each other.

And I think all three of them can put up massive point totals. I don't think you're confined to having two ball handlers, especially when you got guys like LeBron and Austin who can run action together and they can both be involved, even though maybe Austin has the ball for five minutes or LeBron has the ball for five minutes. Jason, I've always been a huge Yokic fan and still think he's clearly the best player in the league. But does a performance like the win over Philly missing four or five starters, plus what we're seeing from MPJ this year off the Nuggets, make you ever so slightly think that maybe we are marginally overrating Yokch's impact and have been underplaying his teammates? I don't necessarily think so, but I'm interested to hear your thoughts. It's as simple as diminishing returns thing, why a player like MPJ has been broken out since leaving. So the MPJ thing is complicated to me. I never thought MPJ was a bad player.

I just thought MPJ was a four and the Nuggets already had a starting four. And as the league had tilted in recent seasons to more speed on the perimeter, I don't think you can play a Michael Porter Jr. Aaron Gordon, Nicole Yokich front line against a team like Oklahoma City. I think you're too slow. So I think shifting from Michael Porter Jr. to Cam was more just trading a starting four for a starting three. It was a roster balancing, starting lineup balancing type of move for them. I thoroughly expected Michael Porter Jr. to go into Brooklyn and put up scoring numbers this year. maybe not quite to this extent, but I'd always thought that he was a guy that could go get buckets.

I generally hate this specific idea that, like, in order for a player to be recognized as successful, the team has to suck without him, you'll notice when I would talk about Yokic as the best player in the world, or when I would talk about Yokic as the best offensive player ever, I never mentioned his on-off. That's not really the angle I go with. Basketball's a team sport. No one wins a championship unless they're not. have excellent supporting talent, whether it's a great head coach or a great secondary star or an awesome depth of role player talent. And we've seen it every which way over the course of the years, different constructs of teams. But this idea that superstars going to win titles by their own is

just flat out stupid. It's just never how it works. Yokic was the best player in the world last year. He was overwhelmed by Oklahoma City in the second round. LeBron was the best player in the world by a mile in 2018. He didn't even stand a chance in the finals against Golden State. Like, there is this is a team sport ultimately now the nuggets having success without nicola yokitch this year i think it comes down to fundamentally this team being on a fucking mission like this nuggets team wants to win the title and there is a level of commitment from the top down of the roster from day one of training camp that has allowed this team to sustain success in various different looks whether it's when they were healthy at the beginning of the year to gordon and christian brown being out

to now. Yokich being out, they have just found a way over and over again. There have been a lot of key guys that have stepped up. Jalen Pickett has been awesome stepping up with the injuries. Peyton Watson has been awesome stepping up with the injuries. Look at Zeke Najee these last couple of games. So like, I just think it's a testament to the type of team this Denver Nuggets team is and it should be a big part of why people believe in them as a threat to win the championship this year. All right. Lastly, Timberwolves fan here. I'm curious what you think about Julius Randall's bully ball and the sustainability of it come playoff time. I'm obviously interested in whether or this team as presently constructed can win a championship.

I tend to lean towards no, a factor that I think doesn't really get talked about as much as the way Randall's scores. I know he did his thing against the old man, Lakers with no centers and the Stephalas Warriors last year, but it seems like once the T-Wolves inevitably meet a team that can match their physicality, Randall's scoring is bound to fall apart. So I actually think Julius Randall's ability as a big forward to attack size mismatches and do a good mix of scoring and playmaking is a huge playoff asset. my main concern with Randall is more like what happened in the bad games.

So if you look at the Oklahoma City games, he had a couple of games where he put up numbers. But then he had a couple of games where it almost looked like he quit. It almost looked like when things weren't going his way, he like completely disengaged. Stop being aggressive. Stop focusing on the details. My issues with Randall are not necessarily his style. It's just his mentality. I would like to see Julius Randall like on the nights where maybe he has a couple of turnovers earlier or he misses a couple of shots early or he finds himself in the middle of the second quarter

with doing everything and he's two for nine, you know, with six points. Like, I'd prefer to see those nights end in him doing everything in his power to try to find a way to win the damn game rather than pouting and standing around at the three point line and shooting catch and shoot threes two or three times the rest of the night. He had a couple of these games against OKC where I felt like he kind of like mentally gave in to the circumstances. That's really the main thing that I'd like to see him work on. I'm actually really high on the timber wolves. I think Anthony Edwards is the best version of himself that he's ever been.

I think the supporting offensive talent with the rise of Julius Randall, excuse me, the rise of Jada McDaniels, Rudy Galberry being a better offensive player than he's been in recent years. And they have shown the defensive ceiling, especially in these last few weeks. I am, if the Timberwolves can keep this up over the next, over the next, you know, three weeks or so, I'm going to put them in my top tier of contenders in our next contender rankings.

All right, guys, it's all I have for today. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for support. us and supporting the show. I hope all of you guys have a wonderful weekend and I'll see you guys on the Monday. Hey guys, it's us and the Jonas brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick and guess what? We created our own podcast called Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast. Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to us. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it. But, you know, tired and sick. Tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the I-heart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your

podcasts. Hey, I'm Deanna Maria Riva, and on my new podcast, How Hard Can It Be? I call on my Gen X squad from Ohio to Hollywood as we navigate Midlife's most fantastic BS. Unfiltered conversations from night sweats to fupas, to scheduling sex. Wait, what

sex? Is it just me, or does every woman, my age, want to look at Pinterest instead of having sex sometimes? They say we can't polish a turn, but we're sure going to try. So let's get blunt with laughs, tears, or tears of laughter. Listen to How Hard Can It Be with Deanna Maria Riva on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas.

And I'm C.J. Toledano. It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast point game, the playoffs. We're digging into the biggest surprises of the season. And I'm looking back on some of my greatest playoff moments. If we didn't talk ever again, I was crying. You just understood. That's how personal it got. Wow. Then after that game seven, Marquis keep coming to him. He's like, you know I love. you, dog. You know, it's all love. This was just playoffs. This was just basketball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.