The Herd with Colin Cowherd - Hoops Tonight - Why Anthony Edwards is set to TAKE OVER the NBA, Timberwolves hot start + Mailbag

Episode Date: November 11, 2023

Jason Timpf deep dives on Anthony Edwards, Karl-Anthony Towns, and the Minnesota Timberwolves following their hot start to the 2023 NBA season. Is Anthony Edwards on track to become a Top-10 player in the NBA?(4:55) Later, Jason answers mailbag questions including whether the Boston Celtics can win the NBA Finals with Jayson Tatum as their star (26:50), if LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers are running the right offense for their team (30:15), if Jason still defends his prior takes on Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets (41:45), and what his top three Star Wars movies are! #volume #herdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. 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. 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 year, 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 year. 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. A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care what you're saying. Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football journey, or my career in sports media. Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifers Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard,

but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to the Clifford show on the IHeard radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok podcast network on TikTok. The volume. NBA fans, the weight is over.

Basketball is back. And Draf King's Sportsbook, an official sports betting partner of the NBA, is celebrating with an unbeatable offer. New customers can score $200 instantly in bonus bets for throwing down $5 on the NBA. Win or lose, it doesn't matter. You'll start the season with an instant dub.

And with Draft King's Parleys, everyone's got a shot at an even bigger basketball win. String together multiple bets from the same game or build your parlay across multiple games for a shot at making your payday even sweeter. Basketball's more fun when you're in on the action. Download the Draft King Sportsbook app now and use code hoops. That's H-O-O-P-S. New customers can get $200 in both. bonus bets instantly for betting just $5.

Only on Draft King's Sportsbook with code hoops. The crown is yours. Gambling problem, call 1-800 gambler or visit www.1-800 gambler.net. In New York, call 8778-Hope-N-Y or text Hope N-Y to 467-369. In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling. Call 888-78-9-7777, or visit ccpg. Please play responsibly on behalf of Boothill Casino and Resort in Kansas. Licensee partner Golden Nugget Lake Charles in Louisiana, 21 plus age varies by jurisdiction.

Void in Ontario, bonus bets expire 168 hours after issuance. See sportsbook.draftkings.com slash basketball terms for eligibility and deposit restrictions, terms, and responsible gaming resources. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight here at the Volume. Happy Friday, everybody. I hope all of you guys had an incredible week to this point. As promised from yesterday, we're going to be doing a deep dive on one of the most impressive teams here in the early going of the NBA season, the Minnesota Timberwolves,

who continue to notch impressive win after impressive win. The only team that has a victory against the two best teams in the league, in my opinion, through the early going, which is the Boston Celtics and the Denver Nuggets, taking care of business against both of them. So we're going to do a deep dive into the Minnesota Timberwolves. Then we're going to do a heavy mailbag at the United States. end of the show. I have 11 mailbag questions that will allow us to kind of bounce around the league and hit a bunch of different stuff and get to some of the questions that you guys wanted

answered. Do you guys know the joke before we get started? Subscribe to our brand new YouTube channel as we try to get this thing off the ground. It would mean a lot to me if you guys would take a second to scroll down and hit that subscribe button. And then don't forget if you live in the Los Angeles area and you have subscribed to the channel, screenshot, just something that shows that you've subscribed. Go to my Twitter feed. Find the tweet from the volume. that is talking about the giveaway. We're giving away tickets to a Blazers-Lakers game. I believe that takes place on Sunday night.

So you're going to want to get out and drop that screenshot soon so we can get that giveaway done. Don't forget about our podcast feed, wherever you get your podcast under hoops tonight. Social media, follow me on Twitter, TikTok, and Instagram. This is we're posting video content as well as show announcements. And last but not least, keep dropping mailbag questions in the comments on YouTube so we can keep hitting them at the end of these shows. All right, let's talk some basketball. So if you guys remember Timberwolves fans coming into this season,

I had a feeling that the Timberwolves were going to play extremely well. They were one of the most impressive teams, in my opinion, at the tail end of last year. And there was this recurring theme that kept happening. It was like, especially at the end of games, because that would be when Ant in particular was more defensively engaged. But you saw it through the whole game as well. But particularly at the end of games, you'd see Anthony Edwards and Jade McDaniels guard the other team's two best perimeter players and just make a life a living hell for them. And then they also have the benefit of being able to be very aggressive because of the

incredible backline that is anchored by Rudy Gobert. And that unique combination of perimeter defense with interior defense just makes it really difficult to score on them. Right. And then even when they go to their bench, it's like here comes Nikiel Alexander Walker and Kyle Anderson, guys that are lesser versions of Ant and Jaden, but guys that bring a similar one-two punch in terms of like a longer athlete that can guard on the perimeter and then a quick guard that can navigate screens and apply physical ball pressure, right? So like we saw that over the course of the tail end of last season. They were a huge pain in the ass for the Lakers in the playing game. Then they were a huge pain in the ass for the Denver Nuggets and a five-game gentleman suite,

but it was a five-game gentleman sweep that was very competitive where the Timberwolves, you know, had several key moments. There was a game they lost where they went on a big run towards the end and erased a big lead. Then obviously in game five, Anthony Edwards had a shot to tie it at the end. It was a competitive series, right? So my theory, coming out of that, I remember I put Ant at 15 in my player rankings, and my thought process was like, this dude is just right on the precipice of ascending to superstardom.

And then he went into the team USA camp and was clearly the best player on the team, better than players that a lot of people had previously assumed were better than Ant. and then he just immediately rose to the top of that pile, right? It's funny how that kind of that whole Team USA experience just kind of shined a bright light on like how good Ant already is. And then it was kind of a great example for all of the non-Lakers fans out there that Austin Reeves is actually a really good player that can play at the highest level, right? Like the Team USA camps always end up being a great way to kind of learn more about

what these players are capable of, right? So then we come into the season, and my thought process was pretty simple. they've kind of discovered this defensive formula with their perimeter defense and Rudy Gobert anchoring things on the back line. And Anthony Edwards is poised to become potentially a top 10 player in the NBA this year. And I simply thought that if they could combine an all-time great defense, or all-time's a strong word, but like a truly transcendently great defense with a top-10 player that can generate quality shots in the half court, it'll push them over the top, right? But what are you guys, those of you guys who did listen back then, you might

remember with Ant, there was a very specific thing that I was looking to see from him this year. And it was an improvement in his playmaking. Anthony Edwards has a great downhill rim pressuring presence, right? And that naturally just sucks the defense in. It's actually kind of comical how much defenses react to him because of his downhill athleticism and just how aggressive he is as a score. I'm going to be referencing a bunch of play. I'm going to be referencing a bunch of plays from the Timberwolves today. And I clipped all these plays and put them on my Twitter feed, put them in a thread, a thread of all these reads that Anthony Edwards makes.

So if you're following along at home, following along at home, you might want to go on Twitter and just kind of pull up those videos so you can see what I'm talking about. There's a screenshot in particular that I grabbed where Ant came off of a ball screen, going to his right hand, going to the right wing, and three pelicans followed him, including help out of the strong side corner from Brandon Ingram. And he ended up making an easy bounce pass to shake Milton in the corner that he missed the three. But the point there is is like, it's just drawing a lot of attention. And he's always drawn a lot of attention.

But like there's a difference in his approach this year compared to last year. It's actually funny, a complete and total accident. So I log into Synergy this morning and I click on the Timberwolves Pelicans game to watch it. It was something that I wanted to watch yesterday. I didn't get time to. I wanted to spend today as like a Timberwolves Day, right? So I pull it up and I'm watching and is just jacking up threes in the first few minutes. I think he got up like four threes in the first three or four minutes and they weren't great shots

and he wasn't looking to get his teammates involved at all. And then it dawned on me. I'm like, wait a second. See Jamie Collins out there. He has a collapsed lung. Trey Murphy's out there. And then it dawned on me. I'd accidentally clicked on the 2022-2020-23 Pelicans Timberwolves game that happened at the very end of last year.

And, like, Synergy lists the games by most recent. So I clicked on it because I thought it was the one from the other night, but it ended up being the one from last year. And I was like, oh, no wonder. Like, I've watched this game before. So I quickly back out of it and I go to the 2024 game and I get the right game. There we're completely different jerseys. Obviously, it's a totally different Pelican squad. They're dealing with a lot of injuries right now.

Zion Williamson's out too. Trady Murphy's out, C.J. McCom's out. So it's kind of a skeleton crew for the Pelicans. But so I start watching that game, and Ant is just picking the Pelicans apart with his passing through the first half. And it's like, it was an accidental juxtaposition of two different versions of the same player, literally just what, six or seven months apart, right? And that's the thing because like, Ant's scoring is off the chart's good. Twenty-eight points per game. That's a career high. Six point one rebounds per game. That's a career high. Six point one rebounds per game. a career high. 61% true shooting percentage. That's a career high. He's shooting outrageously well.

He's taken 67 pull-up jumpers so far this year and he's made 34 of them. That's insane. He is making pull-up jump shots at the same efficiency that Steph Curry did last year when Steph was the best player in the league at that specific shot. And Anthony Edwards pull-up jump shot this season has been worth 1.22 points per possession. That's insane. He's been good in catch and shoot situations as well, 54% in effective field goal percentage, 72% in the restricted area, which is out. outrageous, 3.3 makes per game, which is perfectly fine, especially when you factor in some of the spacing limitations of that roster, right? Oh, that's great.

But that was all stuff that we knew Anthony Edwards was capable of. I think the one thing that's been a real revelation in terms of the scoring side of things for Ant, for me, and I started to notice this with Team USA, mostly in the scrimmage clips, but you saw a little bit of it in the games as well. but Ant is kind of like become a very polished and nimble, good footwork, move, counter move type of score in the short to mid range. And ironically, as someone who's been compared to Michael Jordan over the years, he kind of has a lot of that MJ kind of scoring, like, versatility in that short to mid range. He had another play against the Pelicans in that game where he kind of did a reverse pivot into a pump bank and then stepped through and made a bank shot.

That was the classic MJ, was the fake fade away into the step through, right? And so, like, he's got a lot of that stuff, and that's been a surprise, but more or less, like, we've known that he's been a capable pull-up jump shooter. He's done in the playoffs the last two years. We've known he's a good downhill rim presence.

But the problem was, is, like, he just never really weaponized that downhill rim presence to generate quality looks for his teammates. Well, his assists are up this year to a career-high 5.3 assists per game. He has a career-high 1.4. 47 assist to turnover ratio. And he's been one of the best pick and roll players in the league.

And I want to zoom in on this pick and roll playmaking piece for a minute. So he's averaging 1.22 points per possession in pick and roll including passes. Now, that's outstanding. To give you an idea, out of the 35 players in the league to run at least 75 pick and roll so far this year, he ranks third inefficiency out of those 35 players. So he's been one of the very best and most efficient pick and roll shot creators in the league so far. this year. Now, to me, it comes down to he, when it comes to pick and roll, most young pick and roll ball handlers only see their two-man game, meaning like they're reading the screen defender and like,

if they have an opportunity to make the pocket pass, they'll throw the pocket pass. And then if the big is sagging back and they get enough separation, they'll take some kind of, you know, pull-up jump shot in the mid-range. But they really struggle to see anything outside of just their two-man. game, right? And one of the advances you'll see in a pick and roll shot creator is when they start to look past the screen defender and start to pay attention to the low man. Because the low man really is the key indicator of what's going to be open. Because again, like when it comes to working downhill, if you're too late to identify that the low man came over and you throw the pocket pass, the low man can kind of blow that play up, right? So like you have to hit the pocket pass in the sweet spot

where the low man is on his way to come tag the roller but isn't quite there yet. That way the pass can get through and the guy has enough time to kind of like make that decision to kick to the corner or identify that the low man is going to be too slow as he goes to the rim. So like it's a really delicate read because if the low man jumps the roll man, meaning he comes over quickly, then the pocket pass isn't there and you have to throw the skip pass over the top. And like in this particular game, the New Orleans Pelicans game, and I clicked a,

cliped a bunch of examples. And the Pelicans actually offered low man help out of both sides of the floor. They helped out the weak side and at a strong side at different points during this game. And Aunt just perpetually kept making the right read. It was like help out of the left corner on a right wing pick and roll, so a weak side corner low man help. This is the first clip in the thread that I put out there. He identifies that Brandon Ingram's coming over immediately and just rifles a pass

across the court that hits Mike Conley right in the shooting pocket as he knocks down a three. Then there's another one where he runs the pick-and-roll out of the left side of the floor, and as he's working towards his right, the low man comes out of the strong side corner, and he just whips it across his body like this, and it's a tougher pass, and Carl Towns had to kind of come over to grab it, and then. set his feet, but he was so damn open because he timed it perfectly as Jeremiah Robinson Earl was coming over that he was able to give Carl Towns enough time to set his feet,

knock down the shot, right? Then there was another one later on. This is in that same thread where he's working in pick and roll and he identifies that the low man hasn't come over yet but is about to, but he already sees the pocket pass. So instead of throwing the pass to the corner, which would have been an easy rotation, I think it was Jordan Hawkins in this case. He could Jordan Hawkins could have easily made the rotation. Instead, he throws the ball to go bare on the pocket pass and go bare then activates or, you know, kind of like grabs the attention of Jordan Hawkins and then he makes the kickout pass to the corner for somewhat. I think it was Jake Milton this time to knock down a three.

So like, again, these are like, it is getting really good now and looking past the two-man game and seeing the low man on either side of the floor and basically identifying where his passing reads are. And then it goes down to like just simple driving kick stuff. Like there was a play where he did a little kind of give and go action with, with Gobert at the top of the key where he pumped faked. And on the pump faked, Brandon Ingram left his shoes, just took a hard dribble into the basket. Jonas Fallichunis stepped over.

Boom, easy swing pass to the corner to Nas Reed for a wide open three. And so again, like what's really intense, like, I should say exciting, is the right expression. What's really exciting about that as it pertains to ant is like these are easy, easy, easy passes for him to make because he does such a good job of engaging the defense. A lot of the better pick and roll playmakers in the league, it's not about their ability to make the read or make the pass. It's about actually engaging the low man. And the only way you're going to engage the low man is if you're dangerous enough as a score and as a rim pressuring threat to actually

pull defenders towards, like in your direction, essentially your gravity, right? And so like, Ant has always had the gravity in terms of his ability to bring people over. It's even more dramatic now with his pull-up shooting and how accurate he's been. And when you add to that his ability to make the reads, it makes him a very dangerous player. Here's a crazy stat for you guys. There are in seven games so far this year, Anthony Edwards has four games with at least seven assists. It took him 26 games last year to not. four seven assist games.

That gives you an idea of just how far ahead of last year he is as a playmaker. He had two games this year where he had one assist that kind of pulled him down and they were early in the season. He's been passing the ball better as of late. I think that's a really strong indicator. And it looks like he's ascending to superstardom in her eyes, right before our eyes. I want to hit on a couple of other offensive players for Minnesota. Carl Towns not shooting the ball super well.

This year he's 12 for 36 on catch-and-shoot threes, but it's post-up. A slip attack has been a nice entry point for their offense. He's shooting 63% on hook shots so far this season, and a Carl Towns post up is good for 1.09 points per possession. Middle of the pack for his volume. 14 players in the league have run at least 30, and he's sixth place in efficiency. So that's kind of turned into a decent little entry point for their offense. Jaden McDaniels has been really good attacking with an advantage.

1.23 points per possession in spot-up situations. Obviously, he's hitting his catch and shoot three this year, but a big part of it is like he's got that like catch on the left wing, rip to his left, and then he'll shoot these like drifting pull-up jump shots that are pretty close to the rim, like in that 10 to 12-foot range. He banked in one against New Orleans the other day. He's shooting eight for 15 this year on pull-up jump shots. Mike Conley has 30 assists with one turnover. There are 67 players in the NBA so far this year that have at least 30 assists. and Conley has one turnover, second fewest turnovers on that list is Chris Paul with seven. So kind of a completely unique stretch of high-level playmaking while taking care of the basketball from Mike Conley.

And then the last guy I wanted to shout out was Nas Reid. It's been unbelievable attacking closeouts. He's actually been their third leading score coming off the bench. He's given them 15 points per game off the bench. And part of it's the catch-and-shoe jumper and he's shooting really well. He's 10 for 22 on catch-and-shoot jump shots when he's spotting up so far this year. but he's driving the closeouts really well. And he kind of like, he has a little bit of slow-mo in him in the sense that he just slows down and kind of meanders into the lane.

And he's so much bigger than whoever's guarding him that he's able to kind of just like get close and then shoot little push shots off the glass. He actually had a driving bank shot out of the right corner attacking a close-out in the first half against New Orleans. He is four for five from the field this year when he shoots driving out of a close-out. 15 points per game on 69% true shooting. Can't do much better off the bench than Nas Reid is doing. Again, on the defensive end, we did a deep dive into some of the defensive metrics last week, so I won't get into the metrics. They are number one in defensive rating and number one in half-court defense.

But they're just good at everything. They kind of have like different pick-and-roll coverages for Gobert and for Kat. So like with Carl Towns, he's sitting more in a deeper drop. With Carl Towns, he's sitting in a deeper drop. With Carl Towns, he's coming higher into the ball screen because he's obviously not much of a rim protector, so they're using him to kind of get rid of the basketball. And then what they'll do is Rudy Gobert is typically guarding a non-shooter. Well, essentially, come over as the low man and operate as that drop coverage big as the ball is

coming downhill in a pocket pass or anything like that. And then basically, as soon as the ball advances past Carl Towns, Carl Towns just sprints and rotates to Rudy Gobert's man. And that's been kind of working for them because it allows Carl Towns to basically force the ball handler to get rid of the ball. Rudy Gobert can kind of just contain that pocket pass action, and then Katz been really good about getting back into the play so that they don't give up an offensive rebound in the process. But it's just a steady diet of perimeter defense. It's Jaden and Ant to start the game. And then it's Nikiel Alexander Walker and Kyle Anderson coming off the bench and bringing that intensity.

Even their weaker perimeter defenders, guys like Shake Milton and Mike Conley are just competing and doing their job. they're doing a good job of leaving the right shooters open because again like a lot of people are saying oh teams aren't shooting well against the timber wolves and it's true the timber wolves have the league best opponent three point percentage to uh they're giving up i want to say like the 15th or 16th most threes in the league so they're pretty middle of the pack in terms of giving up threes but teams are shooting really low percentage on them and like again i tend to think that process is a part of it like it's always a little bit of both right like will teams shoot 31% against the timber wolves all year no but this is an example of what he elite defense can do in a small sample size. I do think that your physical point of attack defense throwing people out of rhythm helps. I do think that just in general, the length and athleticism you have in rotation and the effect that Jada McDaniels and Ant Edwards can have offering late contests as freak athletes the way that they are. I think that that stuff plays a role.

We've talked about this with the Lakers. It's like, do their guards need to make shots? Yeah. But I think it'll, what will actually help them make shots is if they get better quality shots, right? I do think these things are very intricately related, right? So perimeter defense, solid rotations, excellent rim protection. That's a recipe for one of the best defenses of this era.

And when you combine that with the ascendance, with the ascent to superstardom from Anthony Edwards and the solid contributions are getting around him, you have yourself a damn good basketball team. Again, like this early in the season to already have wins against Boston and Denver who have pretty much looked dominant against everybody else can't do much better. than that to start the year. All right, 11 mailbag questions before we get out of here today. So first one, you mentioned how you can't bet on the Celtics with Tatum as their number one option, which I agree with. What would be the path for a team like that who has a good enough supporting cast to win, but just don't seem like they ever will with their current number one guy?

Should Boston try and do what Toronto did with the Kauai trade and trade Tatum for someone who can actually lead them, pray for good circumstances, and push like the Mavs did with Dirk, or just accept that regardless of overall talent with Tatum as the number one championship won't be really feasible in the current era of basketball. So there are three teams right now that I look at that are kind of in the middle of this sort of predicament. And it's the Celtics, the Hawks, and the Sixers. The difference is, is like each team is kind of in a different situation.

Like, I genuinely believe Tatum will be good enough one day. So I have advocated that patience is the appropriate strategy for the Celtics. They should wait, see if Tatum develops. Trey Young, to me, it's pretty clear that he's not. Like, if Trey Young's the best player on your team, I just don't think you can win a championship. Trey Young's awesome. I made another incredibly high-level pass in pick and roll,

fading out of bounds last night, that hook pass to the corner to DeJante Murray, that basically ended up being the game winner last night against the magic. God knows I respect and believe in what Trey Young can do as a basketball player. But strictly within the context of the championship goal, I think if he's your best player, there's a limitation there. So as a franchise, you either need to accept that as long as he's there, that's not really an option and kind of adjust your expectations,

or try to go get one of those guys. Now, to be clear, like, when you really look down the league, like in NBA history, there's always one of those guys leading the way, right? You absolutely have to have that. guy. So again, to me, it's about the expectations of your franchise. If you're just trying to be good, then a guy like Trey Young's fine, and you can keep him forever, and you'll have some fun playoff runs, and you'll never get the trophy, right? But if you're the Boston Celtics, and that's clearly a failure for you, you need to make a decision about your star. But again, I think

Tatum's going to be that guy. I think there's enough information there just from what we've seen. He's eventually going to be that guy. Joel Embed is like, it's a question. My thing would be if he goes into the playoffs again this year, and he again has some sort of nagging injury, and he again seems to get stonewalled by a decent big forward defender in the playoffs, and again, he can't trust his jump shot, and again, his scoring craters into the low 20s,

as a franchise, you've got to ask yourself, like, do we want to be the next Houston Rockets that are really good, but every time we run into another one of the top-tier superstores, our James Harden, Joe, and Beed, whoever it is, ends up coming up short to a better player, right? And that's the thing. Like, I think the Sixers are right to keep trying. But if after this season it happens again, now you've got to look back and be like, man,

that's three consecutive seasons in the heart of Joe Allen Beatt's prime where he completely fell apart in the playoffs. And you'd have to have a conversation with yourself, right? Same thing goes with Trey Young. But as far as Jason Tatum goes, I think it's pretty clear that he's going to be one of those guys. Here's a Lakers question. Since four-out was working so well last season, why did they implement the five-out this season? Obviously, they don't have the personnel to run five-out, and it's shown just eight games in. Historically, the worst first quarter team through eight games, last in three-point percentage,

29th in made-th threes per game. So we talked a little bit about this at the end of the show yesterday. But again, a quick refresher for those who don't realize, like five-out offense is like what the Golden State Warriors run. And we talk about this a lot on this show when we talk about the Warriors. But basically, it's like a, it's a motion offense, a steady diet of wide pin downs, dribble handoffs, ball screens and everything mixed around like consistent motion from five players on the perimeter, right? And even when a defender or when an offensive player rolls to the rim or cuts to the rim, they immediately relocate back out to the perimeter. And the idea is

again, like if you look at the teams that run five out offense, teams like, you know, Sacramento and Golden State, or just a couple of examples, they have really high-level shot makers, and they have guards that are super quick that can get downhill and make kickout rates, right? So, like, you have Malik Monk and Deer and Fox who can consistently beat people off the dribble, and they're kicking out to guys like Kevin Herder

and a Keegan Murray who are excellent spot-up shooters, right? Although Kevin Herder's struggling to shoot this year. Then, in addition to that, like Keegan Murray and Kevin Herder are guys that like to come off of screens and dribble handoffs in rise and fire. So it works, right? For Golden State, it's a little different. It's less about the quickness of their guards, and it's more about just the outrageous shooting.

Like, Steph and Clay are just so damn good at shooting that they constantly can get slips to the rim for their other players as defenses overreact to them. And then even when it comes to dribble penetration, it's easier for them because they're such outstanding shooters. 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.

A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care what you're saying. Yep, that's me, Clifford Taylor the 4th. You might have seen the skits, the reactions, my journey from basketball to college football, or my career in sports media. Well, somewhere along the way,

this platform became bigger than I ever imagined. And now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfiltered conversations with some of your favorite athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. One week, I'll take you behind the same.

scenes of the biggest moments in sports and entertainment, and the next we'll talk about life, mental health, purpose, and even music. The Clifford Show isn't just a podcast, it's a space for honest conversations, stories that don't always get told, and for people who are chasing something bigger. So if you've ever supported me or you're just chasing down a dream, this is right where you need to be. Listen to the Clifford Show on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on

TikTok. Do you remember when Diana Ross double-tapped 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? Well, you can find out on the Look Back at it podcast. I'm Sam Jett. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a here, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. Including a recent episode with Mark Lamont Hill 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 on day, but just so y'all know.

I mean, at this point, Mark, 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. Thank you 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. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get Your podcasts. The Lakers are in an awkward position where their guards on the wing that are playing. Let's just look at their one, two, three. So if we look at Reeves, Dilo, Torian Prince, Reeves is a good shotmaker, not a great shotmaker, and he's an average athlete that's not going to toast people off the dribble. Dilo, good shot maker, not great shot maker, decent athlete, or like an average athlete

that's going to struggle to beat people off the dribble. Torian Prince, he's a good offball player, good catch and shoot player. But when it comes to taking tougher shots off the move, he's only okay at it. He's good at it, but he's not great at it, right? And he's another guy who's not an outstanding athlete who can beat people off the dribble. So, like, part of the issue for me with the five-out approach for the Lakers is simply that they are not good enough at making tough contested shots or off the move off-the-dribble shots, and they're not good enough at beating people off the dribble to actually run that offense.

What they have that's really good is they have two back court pick and roll guys who, when they're given space to operate, are pretty solid throughout the course of the regular season at generating quality shots, meaning like they can get to a mid-range pull-up jump shot, they can hit the pocket pass, they can make kick-out reads on the weak side, right? They're both pretty good at that when they have space. And again, just imagine a cleared side pick and roll. So I've got a shooter in the corner wing, kind of like elbow extended to the top of the key,

and I'm running like a Reeves Anthony Davis pick and roll on the right side. There's just a ton of space to operate. And Austin's really shifty, and he's good at drawing fouls, and he's good at making shots when he's getting fouled. And when you get AD a pocket pass, when there's lots of space, he can have some success there. But when it's like a cluster fuck, for lack of a better term, of five out and you're running a ball screen or a dribble handoff and you've got guys just

equally spread out along the perimeter, all the space is underneath the basket. And what's hard about that is in order to take advantage of that, you have to be good at beating people off the dribble. And Austin Reeves and DeAngelo Russell are not straight line athletes. Even Anthony Davis is not a straight line athlete. And so, like, that's why they've been so good with LeBron James on the floor offensively is he's one of the guys that can kind of actually generate that rim pressure. So like, for me, it makes more sense with this team to spread the floor in a four-out concept.

So shooters in the corners, shooters on the wings, and then come run that pick and roll with Anthony Davis so that they have the entire side of the floor to work with, or maybe even clear the side entirely by moving that corner shooter over to the other side and let those guys work two-man game. Like, we've talked about this a lot. The idea of a brute force offense versus like a system offense, right? And to me, the five-out teams that succeed, they're teams that actually have. the talent to run that kind of system offense. But like, to me, the Lakers are very much a brute

force offense. They have a couple of guys who are really good as long as the circumstances favor them in terms of spacing, right? Like, LeBron James still to this day, if you let him post up, he's going to get a quality shot, right? Anthony Davis has been well over a point per possession and post up each of the last, postups each of the last two years. So like those two guys screen and enrolling to the rim in a spread floor, operating in a post-up situation in the spread floor, that's great. Even now imagine the off-ball situation.

DeAngelo Russell and Austin Reeves, excellent catch-and-shoot players. DeAngel Russell and Austin Reeves, average pull-up jump shooters. So, like, lean into them getting more catch-and-shoot opportunities by operating off the ball in a spread-floor pick-and-roll situation rather than doing this read-and-react five-out thing where none of them are particularly good at the things

you need to be good at in order to make that work. That's kind of where I'm at with the Lakers' offense at this point. We'll continue to kind of flush out that concept as we get further into the season. Next mailback question. I wanted to ask why core players tend to play a significant amount of minutes in the third and fourth quarter, even if their team is leading by a big margin, for example, 20 plus points. For example, I watched the Timberwolves, there's Pelicans today.

Anthony Edwards and Goberts still played the third and fourth and both ended up playing 32 minutes for the whole game. I feel it's a norm in the NBA, but why core players don't take more rest, even if a game is already decided. They usually do towards the tail end of the year. To me, this is related to the start of the year. I think most NBA teams right now are pushing minutes a little bit higher even when they don't necessarily need to

as a result of just trying to get guys into NBA season shape. Remember, we've seen a lot of guys, Julius Randall, Jalen Brunson, Damien Lillard, these are all guys that came into the season and now they're playing their way into shape. And when they're not practicing, they don't, literally have an opportunity to work on these things except for within games. And so I think that's why they're pushing their minutes right now. Next mailback questions from Malcolm. Hey Jason, what do you think of a Sarr Thompson's potential? He didn't get as much attention as a man

on overtime elite or in the draft. I think he can be a better version of a men. And I think he can be a, I think he can be a better version of Iguodala on the Warriors. What do you think? So I obviously haven't watched the Pistons as closely as I've watched some other teams. I've watched two games of them so far this year. And then I watched their preseason games because we scouted Asar over the preseason. We did a whole video on that. And then I scouted him this summer. To put it simply, he's not a very good basketball player right now just because he's so

limited on the offensive end as a shot maker and as a decision maker. There's still, like there was a random play at the end of the Bucks game where he just try to transition push at the end of the game and challenged a rim protector. And it's like, dude, calm down. Right. But when it comes to young players, you almost want to put the bad aside and just focus on the good because most of the bad stuff is just typical for all young basketball players and can be flushed out over time, right? He's averaging four offensive rebounds and two blocks

per game in just 32 minutes. I think he's probably the best perimeter defender prospect I personally have scouted in the last few years. Mind you, I haven't done this very long, but in the time that I've been doing this, I can't remember seeing a perimeter defender that showed a better combination of like lateral quickness, first and second jump ability, meaning to contest shots either under the basket or after being broken down off of a move, the ability to navigate screens, natural length. Like there was a play at the end of the Bucks game where Damien Lillard is on a freaking heater. Like he's just going. And he hits Asar Thompson with a hard dribble to his left stepback jump shot. Does like another one of those like slide steps like the hardened step back after he does the step

back gets all the way to the three point line. And ASAR blocked the damn shot. Asar blocked it. And like, there are some clips of him navigating screens or blocking perimeter players that are truly jarring for his position. So again, like, it's going to be what kind of person he becomes, player he becomes in the big picture will come down to his offensive development. But his perimeter defense potential is off the charts.

And that's super, super exciting. especially when you really factor in the team, right? And like, I don't know if it's going to be Jaden Ivy or Killian Hayes that flanks Kade Cunningham over the years. But if our Sarr Thompson can take primary point of attack assignments and do it well, you know, that's just a huge asset for your team to have. It allows you to, you know, kind of conserve some energy in your back court, so to speak. Which new coach do you think has had the best impact on their new team? I think this one's pretty obviously EMA Udoch. here in the early going as the Rockets have looked really good.

He had a, he's just an excellent motivator. That was the big story coming out of the Celtics when he was there. He just basically made them tough. He said after the Lakers game that he basically went up to Jalen Green and was like, hey dude, you were on the select team. Austin Reeves was on Team USA and like, why don't you go show that you're better than him, right? And like, is Austin Reeves better than Jalen Green? I'm not even going to answer that question.

But like he managed to piss off Jalen Green because he went out in that game and he kicked Austin's ass. And so again, he's just an excellent motivator. I think he's done a really good job kind of rebuilding the culture in Houston, and they look like a winner right now. Next question from Dalvin. Jason, this was funny.

This isn't really a question. It was just someone talking shit, but I wanted to address it. From Dalvin, Jason, while I love and appreciate your glowing praise of the best player in the league, Yokic, and the reigning champions, nuggets, I cannot help but remember all the instances

you shat on them in the last two years. Didn't lose me as a fan or subscriber, but I didn't forget and I didn't appreciate. So this is actually one of my biggest pet peeves, and don't take this personally, Dalvin. I'm just, this is something that's annoyed me for a while and I just want to kind of give my take on it. Why is it that anytime anybody doesn't heap praise on somebody, they're now shitting on them? Because I don't remember ever saying that I thought Yokic was a bad basketball player.

I don't remember saying that the Nuggets can't win the championship. I said two things consistently. As it pertains to Yokic himself, I always said, in the modern era, I'm concerned about centers, like plotting centers because of the way they can get spread out and the way they can struggle in transition. I ended up being wrong about that. But the best indicator of future performance is past performance, and we were literally seeing in every playoff run, every slow-footed center get played off the floor. It was happening every single playoff run.

Yokic is just so damn good he was able to overcome that. A couple of particular ways. One, he's an excellent transition player. So, like, literally he has, just by sheer force of habit and will, he sprints up and down the floor so well in transition that he never struggles there. In fact, he actually beats more athletic centers up and down the floor in transition, even looking at the defensive end and spreading him out. he's shown that he can be a good enough defender that it isn't a problem.

So again, like, I was making a, like all I said was, Yokic is a superstar. I just have other superstars above him because I lean towards perimeter players because of their playoff versatility. That's all I said. Then we move on to the Nuggets piece. What did I say? NBA history tells us that you do not win the championship

unless you are a top 10 defense, unless you're the defending champions. The Rockets in the mid-90s, the Lakers in the early 2000s, and then the Warriors in 2018. They were all defending champions, and they were the only three champions that weren't top-10 defenses. And again, the clear indicator there was they were top-10 defenses before. And in that following season, they were classic trying to repeat, you know, a little less motivated, a little less locked in. But then they got to the playoffs and then they re-locked in. right? So again, I'm going to repeat the same thing I just said. The best indicator of future

performance is past performance. I was making a prediction based on actual NBA historical data. Just because Yokic broke the mold for centers and the nuggets broke the mold for championship teams doesn't mean that I shit on the nuggets. That's just, that's completely ridiculous. If I shit on the nuggets, I would have said the nuggets suck they can't win. Never said, that. Going into the playoffs last year, I said, they can win. I'm just skeptical because of NBA history, right? When I had Yokic, when I had Yokic ranked below the other superstars, I literally had him and MB down there, and I said, it's just because of my philosophy, my overarching basketball philosophy, surrounding slower-footed centers as it pertains to, uh, to the perimeter-oriented stars at the top

of the league. Now I've, and like, and again, all, all I will promise to do, which is the truth, like, this is, this is the way that I make predictions. I take previous data and I use that to inform my, my, my, my predictions, right? But when new data comes in and the new data goes crosswise with what the old data was, I'm always willing to embrace that as a potential change. And that's the thing. Now I see. Now that Yokic has the trophy, I'm, I, I can like, see all of these specific reasons why he was able to kind of flip the mold, right? And again, you have to, you have to think of it really simply. Like, what about, what have I always said were my kind of rules, like with my player rankings? Like, get the trophy and I'll defend you

forever. But before you have the trophy, I'm always going to revert to the guys with the trophy. That's just my approach. You're either, you're either the guy who's trying to jump on the bandwagon as soon as possible, or you're the guy that gets on the bandwagon a little later. And I, I'd always rather be a guy who gets on the bandwagon a little later as a homage or respect towards the guys who've already done it. That, to me, is just my personal approach. Had nothing to do with disliking the nuggets. And again, like, I want to push back on that in general.

If I say something that is somewhat critical of your favorite team or player, it does not mean that I hate your favorite team or player and that I think they're incapable of achieving anything. I'm just putting basketball analysis out there. and my analysis always changes based on new information. If you have a good team out there and you guys start playing great basketball, I'm never going to overlook that because I hate your team. It's just not an emotion that I am capable of experiencing for whatever.

I love basketball so much that I pretty much find things that I love in every team. Like Dylan Brooks, I find to be mostly reprehensible, but I have so much appreciation for what he can do as a basketball player that I still kind of like him. You kind of get the point is what I'm talking about here. I mean, Hardening and Beat are great examples of that, too. Jason, when you describe Dylan Brooks, if I wasn't listening, all those points could be made about Dremont. If anything, Dylan never kicks someone in the nuts or in the stomach or punch a teammate.

If you're saying things with a straight face about Dylan but pretend to ignore what Dremont has been doing for years, that's a lack of integrity. Not that I expected it from you, who's a LeBron, Dremont will skip over the expletive. But still, it's painful to listen to delusion and agenda. So this is not the first person who said this. And just to put it simply, they're not the same. Draymond is really physical. He fouls a lot.

He does occasionally commit hard fouls. Here's what I've never seen Draymond do. I have never seen Draymond attack a defenseless player going up for a layup in transition by clotheslining him over the neck and breaking his freaking elbow. I've never seen Draymond do that. Here's another thing I've never seen Draymond do. I have never seen Draymond Green on the ground deliberately do a dramatic barrel roll into another player's legs and nearly hurt the player's ankle and knee.

Dylan Brooks did that to Donovan Mitchell. Dylan Brooks engages in deeply dangerous behaviors that can injure basketball players. That is not the same as being like overly physical. Because I would agree, Draymond's overly physical. He's also very emotional. and I literally came out after he punched. He works from our damn company, and I came out after he punched Jordan Poole

and said it was bad leadership. Straight up came out and said that I was very critical of Draymond Green after the punch. Okay, so like, again, like, this is not, this does not take a lot of critical thinking here. Find the, if I'm wrong, if there is some clip of Draymond Green deliberately doing something that could severely injure a player,

send it to me. And then I will come up here and I'll apologize. But as far as I'm concerned, there is a line. And the line is like, there are a lot of players in the NBA that play a physical brand of basketball that grab and pull jerseys and hit guys and do all these different things. But they're not hurting people. There's a difference. The difference is the hurting.

And like Dylan Brooks on multiple occasions has done deliberate things that had the potential. hurt. I remember watching that Donovan Mitchell play, and I'm like, oh my God, he did that on purpose. He literally did a full barrel roll multiple times into Donovan Mitchell's legs. And thankfully, Donovan didn't get hurt. So again, like, let's cut the shit here and let's draw a clear line in the sand between a physical basketball player and a guy who actually made attempts to hurt people in the past. And actually, like, he actually removed Gary Payton from the playoffs. Actually removed him. And he, like, saw him, like, saw him.

And was like, yeah, I'm going to close line this dude in the head in the middle of a playoff game. Like, that's the kind of person he is. And I have a huge problem with it. I don't know what else to tell you. All right. Next mailback question. What do you think other than getting Lonzo back could the Bulls do to make the team better? Is there a trade that can be made?

Like Levine for OG and an OB or DeMar? or, excuse me, Levine for O'J. Anobi or DeMarre for Austin Reeves. So I lean towards a full rebuild for the Chicago Bulls. And the main reason is this. They don't have a single player on the roster who projects to even maybe be a true superstar in the future. Do I like Patrick Williams?

Yeah, good player, not a superstar. Do I like Zach Levine? Yeah, very good player. Not a superstar. Demarta Rosen is literally in his 30s. Like, he is what he is at this point, you know? And like, they have some interesting young players, like Kobe White's interesting.

Iyo Dissoum was interesting. Like Alex Crusoe is one of the best role players in the league in my opinion, but they simply do not have a single player on the roster that even projects to maybe be a superstar. So like at some point you've got to kind of identify that. And before you say like, oh, it's a small market. We don't have the ability to get those types of players. That's not true either. Oklahoma City, small market.

They have Shay on Shae Gilges Alexander, projects to be a bona fide superstar. Minnesota Timberwolves of Anthony Edwards projects to be a bona fide superstar. Sacramento has Deer and Fox. At least might be a bona fide superstar, right? Cleveland is Donovan Mitchell. At least might be a bona fide superstar. Denver has Yokic, best player in the world. Milwaukee is Janice, second best player in the world.

Memphis Grizzlies have John Morant. Projects to be a bona fide superstar. So again, like these are all small markets that have that guy. So if you don't have one of those guys, everything you do needs to be geared around getting one of those guys. Now, has a Chicago ever done? demonstrated a, you know, Miami Heat-esque, or, you know, the Lakers have been good at this over the years, too, but like finding star level players are very, very, very good players in the margin?

No, Chicago is not one of those teams. So, like, to me, you really need to be making all your moves geared around trying to find who that guy is. So I would be just trying to bring in as much draft capital as possible. So I lean full rebuild for Chicago. That's what makes the most sense to me. If you had to do a soft rebuild, rebuild around Levine. Flip DeRosen, flip Vucevic, get dominant defensive front court personnel and see if Levine can kind of push you enough offensively over the top.

But whatever their current strategy is, I simply don't understand. All right, we have three more mailback questions. Do you think GMs should willingly – one more note on the Bulls thing. Once you do find one of those guys, that's when you start trying to build the roster around. the margins, right? And it's about what that player's strengths and weaknesses are. So you've got to find out who your guy is. And then what is your guy good at and bad at? What does he need around him? It's like Luca. They know they need shooting around Luca and they need good role man around Luca. So that's the kind of player that they target, right? Like that that's just what makes the most

sense, right? If you're Anthony Davis, what have the Lakers tried to do? Give him a bunch of pick and roll ball handlers because they know Anthony Davis can't run his own offense. So like you have to identify strengths and weaknesses based around your star. All right. This question is kind of related to that. Do you think GMs should willingly give up more talent in return for players who are less talented or have less potential, but fit their team better instead of seeking the best talent potential when making moves?

For example, Jordan Poole is definitely more talented than Chris Paul at this stage of his career. The trade seems to have paid off, but the Warriors definitely gave up way more talent than they received. Again, depends on the window. So like the Warriors are in a very tight championship window based on Steph Curry being 35 years old, right? That's why it makes sense for them to give up long-term potential for a player who might fit them better right now, right? But it just depends. And you've got to make that decision based on, like for instance, if you're the Thunder, your window's way longer.

So it would be terrible to like, let's say that the Thunder went and like, I don't know, found some way to piece salaries together. and they were like, we want to upgrade, you know, Jalen Williams into a veteran forward that can play next to Chet. And so they trade for Jeremy Grant. That'd be stupid because the Thunder have a much wider timeline. And like, there's a version of this two years from now where Jalen Williams is better than Jeremy Grant, you know, it might not even take that long for him to get there because Jalen Williams is really good.

So maybe that's a bad example. But the point is, is like, your timeline dictates how much your urgency, how much urgency you have and your urgency dictates how much long-term potential you'd be willing to give up. Hey Jason, big fan, can you talk about the Celtics and how they seem to be using Drew Holiday to start the season? This is now the third time that they've used him. They've started him out guarding a bigger star. It started guarding Julius Randall the whole game. Then against the wolves, he straight up started on Carl Towns. And then yesterday against the Sixers, they started hitting him on Embed for several possessions. Haven't really heard anybody talk about it in detail at all,

but I find it super interesting that they're playing like they would mark a smart. who, although both elite defenders are both different kinds of defenders with different strengths. So we did talk about Drew Holiday guarding Embed and yesterday's show, but we can dive into it a little bit more in depth. Because what sticks out to you the most about those three names that you said? So I have Embed, who is a power post player. I have Julius Randall, who more or less is a wing that, or is power forward, but operates kind of more from the wing, but is more or less a power player.

And then Carl Towns, who's a power player. But what else is interesting about all three of them? All three of them are bad passers. Joel Embed notoriously struggles to deal with double teams. Carl Towns has more turnovers than assists this year. Julius Randall, same kind of thing, a little bit of a tunnel vision guy that kind of barrels his way downhill. So the reason why it works in these matchups is they're already expecting to send help.

So Drew is a great disruptor. He's good at fronting the post. He's good at attacking the basketball, attacking your base and attacking your shooting pocket. He's not trying to bother these guys up top. He's trying to bother them down low, right? And so if you're already planning on sending help, because of the fact that there's literally a much easier time rotating on the back end because these guys aren't great passers,

might as well have your primary defender be a guy that can disrupt down low, who can front the post, who can disrupt the shooting pocket, because he's going to, even if they manage to get up around Drew down low, they're going to come up into that help defender who's probably going to be a bigger player, because everybody else on the floor is bigger than Drew Holiday, right? So, like, that is the interesting element to it. I would be really curious to see if they could do it against better passing big.

So, like, when we see the Celtics play the Nuggets, I'd be really curious to see if they try Drew Holiday on Yokic. My guess is they won't because they'll probably try to end up putting Porzingis on him, right? But for that simple purpose of, like, they're going to try to be able to rotate quickly on the back end because he's a great passer. So I think it's an interesting combination of taking advantage of the fact that these guys aren't good passers and Drew's ability to disrupt them down low as they try to power their way to the basket. All right, last mailback question.

I just listened to your most recent Star Wars podcast about Luke Skywalker and the Imperial Remnant. It led to a topic about you guys and Wembe ranking ranking and your surprising take on Rogue One. My mailback question is, what's your Star Wars movies ranking? So this was on my Star Wars podcast. It's not really a Star Wars podcast. It's an everything podcast, but we also cover Star Wars. It's called Two Sun's podcast. It's, you can see the little logo thing right here.

But we do videos about once a week on YouTube and on the podcast feed, and we just talk about everything. Right now, we're going through some Star Wars books, but we'll be covering the basically every major movie release slash, you know, like Game of Thrones or House of the Dragon, I should say. you know, the Last of Us, Star Wars, we're big Star Wars fans, we do a lot of Star Wars stuff. We basically do everything, Star Wars, in terms of like the extended, the extended universe. So anyway, we were talking about how Victor Wenimahma is also a diehard Star Wars fan, who also completely disowns the sequel trilogy, just like I do, and just like my buddy Luke does. And he ranked his favorite Star Wars movies, and I'm going to give you the exact same three.

So Wembe said his three favorite were Revenge of the Sith, Attack of the Clones, and Empire Strikes. back. And I literally agree perfectly. The reason why I love Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith is like, in my opinion, the coolest Star Wars story in the entire lore is what's called the Sith Grand Plan, which starts with Darth Bain a thousand years before Palpatine and basically goes all the way through all these Sith Lords and it goes to Darth Plagueis, who is Darth Sidious is a Palpatine's master, and it culminates in Order 66, right, and then basically overthrowing the Republic, right? But it actually is like an incredibly intricate plan, very well thought out by George Lucas or conceptualized by George Lucas, and Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the

Sith are really fun to go back and rewatch and just look at all the little bits and pieces of manipulation that Palpatine is using to kind of like overthrow everything. So those two movies, I've always loved for that reason. Empire Strikes Back is just a, is just, it's, it basically takes what was, because a new hope was very much like a very rudimentary movie. There's not a whole lot that happens in it, right? They, uh, Luke finds Hans Solo and Obi-One and they leave. They go to the Death Star.

They, uh, they escape the Death Star with the, uh, with Leia. Then they go to Yavin and then they have the battle for, they, they blow up the death. That's literally the movie. very, very basic, right? Empire Strikes Back, introduces the emperor, introduces Yoda, dives into like Jedi lore. It's very dark and disturbing. There's twists and turns. There's tragedy in it. It's just, it's to me is like the peak of, of Star Wars content. So, um, uh, good question though. And again, if you're looking for basically me talking about anything that's not basketball, that's the place to, to check out the show. Right now, again, we're doing

some books so it's less frequent and a little more slow, but we will get a lot busier as time goes along. All right, guys, that is all I have for today. We are actually going to be coming back later tonight to break down the Friday night slate of games after Lakers' Sun. So I will see you guys later this evening. 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 me. 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.

A win is a win. A win is a win. I don't care which I'm saying. Yep, that's me. Clifford Taylor the Fourth. You might have seen the skits, my basketball and college football. journey or my career in sports media.

Well, now I'm bringing all of that excitement to my brand new podcast, The Clifford Show. This is a place for raw, unfilled conversations with athletes, creators, and voices that not only deserve to be heard, but celebrated. So let's get to it. Listen to The Clifford show on the IHeard Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast.

And for more behind the scenes, follow at Clifford and at TikTok Podcast Network on TikTok. On the Look Back at a podcast. For 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84 is big to me. I'm Sam Jay And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year,

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 year. 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