The Herd with Colin Cowherd - What's Wright - Best Of - Lakers-Wolves predictions, Luka Doncic will “light up” Gobert + Nick’s NBA Awards
Episode Date: April 19, 2025Nick Wright shares his predictions for LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers’ matchup with Anthony Edwards and the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round of the NBA Playoffs. Nick breaks do...wn why he expects Luka Doncic to “light up” Rudy Gobert and Minnesota once again. Later, Nick shares his NBA Awards for the 2024-2025 season including the Oklahoma City Thunder’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander vs. the Denver Nuggets’ Nikola Jokic for MVP as well as Nick’s All-NBA teams! #Volume #HerdSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Hey guys, it's us.
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It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast, Point Game, the playoffs.
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Welcome to the best of the week for What's Right with Nick Wright.
The best takes and moments from this week on the show.
Enjoy.
Lakers have the second best odds of the West to win the title right now at minus 1.95.
Anthony Edwards says he loves the position that the 10 rules.
Hold on.
Real quick.
Hold on.
The second best odds to win in the West to win the title minus 195 in round one.
round one.
You're fine.
Go ahead.
And yeah, so Anthony Edwards says he loves where the Timberwolves are at right now and saying,
I love the fact that everybody wants the Lakers to win.
That's how it's supposed to be.
They don't want the Timberwolves to win, and I get that.
What is the key to this series?
Well, the only chance that Timberwolves have is if Julius Randall for the first time in his career
plays well in the playoffs.
And we've never seen that happen. So I, I'm going to pull it up. I'm looking down if you're
watching on YouTube because I'm pulling up on my phone. Julius Randall's playoff career is truly
disastrous. And it's not overstated. It's not being unfair. It is what it is. It is in 2021, in the first
round against the Hawks. That's the famous Trey Young series. You see, oh, he was 18, 11, and 4. That's actually
good on 29% from the field. So his first playoff series ever, he was 29% from the field.
Then two years later, against Cleveland in round one, he was 14 and 6 a game. That was after.
an all-MBA season on 33% from the field.
And then, and they won that series.
And then the next round against Miami,
he was 18 and 10, which is much better,
on 41% from the field, which is,
okay.
In his playoff career is 28% from three.
And then last year,
obviously, he was hurt for the playoffs and it didn't really seem like Knicks fans were all that
bummed about it. And so he is yet to have a single great playoff series. And even if you go
to individual playoff games, you are hard pressed to find more than one good one. Game, game,
one last or two years ago against Miami he was really good he was 25 12 and 8 on 44% from the
field which is about as good as you can hope for from him but in his playoff career and he has
one other game against Miami where he was 20 and 9 on 61% but what's that joke everybody
likes to make he is shooting he's shooting tour dates or whatever
Like he's that thing 311 yeah so in his career in ascending order
He is in the playoffs from the field two for 15 three for 15 three for 14 six for
23 four for 15 three for 10 five for 16 seven for 20 seven for 19 eight for 21
And then five games, 40% from the field or better.
Eight for 20, eight for 18, four for nine.
And then the two good games, seven for 13 and eight for 13.
Go ahead and swing.
So that's a 15 game playoff sample size.
He's been good in two of them.
So he's got to be.
What are you laughing about that I'm being too mean?
No, no.
After you said that, I just, I whispered, go ahead and swing that rock, big dog.
I don't think.
Oh, yeah.
I didn't hear it.
Yeah.
So for real, though.
So that is, he's got to be good for them to have a chance.
And by the way, going to be tough because he's going to be guard on the other end.
He's going to be guarding LeBron James a lot.
Yeah.
So he is the absolute key.
Now, other than him, I am really interested in.
How much can Austin Reeves?
How much energy can Austin Reeves make Anthony Edwards expend on the defensive end?
Because I know there have been some thoughts that Ant is going to try to guard LeBron or Luca.
That's a terrible idea.
Ant's a very good defender, but he is simply too small for either one of those guys.
Jaden McDaniels will spend a lot of time on LeBron and Luca
Julius Randall will spend some time on LeBron and Luca
Nasreed might try
Dante's not going to be able to do it
but point is Anthony Edwards
is going to end up matched up on Austin Reeves a fair amount
now I don't think the Lakers have anybody
who can slow down Anthony Edwards now oddly they did well against him in the
regular season, but I would just go ahead and pencil in Anthony Edwards for 30 again.
He's going to average 30 in this series. Just so be it. Can Austin make him have to defend enough
and run around enough that he is a little tired on the offensive end at the end of these games?
because you do remember that I, listen, I get it, you had to trade Luca Donchage because he's an out of shape alcoholic.
I understand Nico.
But it was Anthony Edwards, who might as well be chiseled out of granite, who said he was exhausted in the conference finals last year, not Luca.
And so now it's a lot of time off and it's round one and there's a lot of days between the games.
but how much energy can you make Ant expend on the defensive end?
And then the only other real, the only way for, in my opinion,
for the Timberwolves to have a real chance is if Lucas 3 is not falling.
Because if Lucas 3 is falling, then what you are going to see is LeBron really picking
and choosing his spots in the first three quarters of these games and then taking over in the
fourth something he has not had the luxury of doing much at all in his whole career but certainly
in his lakers career but you saw it in that lakers maves game where lebron you know hand off the joystick
for the first three quarters then best player on the court in the fourth quarter you've seen it
a few times this year. And so Julius Randall's got to be good for them to have a chance.
Nas Reid's going to be super important. And I haven't even mentioned Rudy Gobert because here's the
thing. I think Rudy's in a really rough spot here. It's not just that Luca has tortured him on
multiple continents. It's not just that Luca hit the biggest shot of his career over him. But it's also
that the Lakers want to play small.
His offensive limitations will allow them to play small
because they're not going to be able to just, you know,
dump the ball down to go bare and be like, hey,
you have Dorian Finney Smith or Rudy Hachamura on you.
Give us that sweet baby hook you've got.
That's not going to be a thing.
And defensively, we have seen
If you play five out,
Rudy really, really struggles.
And so I would guess that Ant is awesome,
and it doesn't matter all that much in this series.
And I said it to you guys on Tuesday, I'll say it again.
The Lakers minus a game and a half at plus 120,
I think is probably my favorite bet of this round of the playoffs.
All right, what else you have on this series?
Do you think this could be the start of a Luca ant rivalry?
So I'd love that.
And I do think that they have personalities that would mesh for a rivalry.
I do think that both of the.
these teams, you know, they shouldn't meet in the playoffs consistently moving forward.
I don't look at Ant yet as the caliber of player of Luca.
And I don't think that there is much of an argument.
What, Damase?
You don't see them as the same caliber of player?
I get like, Lucas like slightly better.
Yeah.
Yeah, I look at Luke as a guy I expect to win multiple MVP's.
There's only two other guys in the league in that caliber,
and they both already have multiple.
As far as prime guys, I mean, you know, in Janus and Yokic.
And I look at Ant as a guy who might win one.
You know what I mean?
So like I, if you set Luca career MVP's number at one and a half,
half, I would immediately say over. And if you set Ant's number of career MVP's at a half,
I would say I need, like, I got to really think about this. So that, you know, that's the,
and I think it's an almost impossibility that Luca never wins a league MVP. And I think it's a
coin flip of Ant does. So again, we're in the margins here. But yeah, I do look, like,
And I think a good evidence of that is if the Lakers had traded Anthony Edwards, Max Christie,
and a first round pick, I'm sorry, if the Lakers had traded Anthony Davis, Max Christie,
and a first round pick for Anthony Edwards, we wouldn't two months later still be like,
that's the dumbest shit I've ever seen in my life.
Is it because they want to move the team?
Like you would have legitimately.
you know, debates on each side like, okay, who got better? Like does it make sense? And I understand for
the way the Timberwolves are constructed, it wouldn't even make sense. But yeah, that's how I,
so and I, I really like him, but I think he needs to level up a tiny bit. Now, he's not as old as
Luca. You know what I mean? He hasn't been in the league quite as long. And so,
there is that. Go ahead. Do you, well, were you done with the,
with the first follow-up.
I was going to ask if you see JJ Redick stock rising
or how much you see it rising this off season.
Well, it depends on the playoff run.
I mean, if they get bounced in round one, it won't.
People will be like,
Darwin Ham made conference finals his first year.
But I think it's already pretty obvious
that JJ Redick has done an excellent job
as first year as Lakers head coach.
Now we'll see how he handles the playoffs.
I know there's some, in some circles,
is a belief that the Lakers have been kind of using a playoff style defense in the regular
season and to deal with their lack of size and that that might have been a mistake by JJ
because now they're not going to have an extra gear and more people have seen it so they can
prepare for it. I'm less concerned with that than others. But yeah, I think JJ has done an excellent
job. I think that there was a legitimate argument to include him on coach of the year ballots this
year. And so credit to JJ, who people know I historically not the biggest fan of as far as a media
presence, but he did a really good job. The NBA 82 game grind is done. And now the real fun begins.
The NBA playoffs are here and it's time for all the high stakes drama, clutch moments and
jaw-dropping plays.
Can't wait.
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Hey, it's us, the Jonas Brothers, and guess what?
We have some big news.
What's the news, name?
Huge news.
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.
Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there.
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.
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.
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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.
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The French Open is one of the toughest tests in tennis, and I know firsthand because I competed
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I'm Renee Stubbs, and on the Renee Stubbs Tennis podcast, I'm breaking down everything
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Listen, Lennar Rabakina is arguably the best player in the world right now
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So MVP to me is quite simple.
And I have been, sorry, Daniel.
really, I have found it unbelievable the number of people who have just decided all of the rules
that I laid the groundwork for last year no longer apply.
And so for me, the only question for MVP is the fifth spot.
One through four are pretty obvious.
Shea is the league MVP.
He's 33 a game on a 68 win team.
Joker should be the unanimous second place MVP guy.
He's 30 a game with a triple double carrying a team that is terrible defensively.
Some of that's on him and just fired their coach.
Janus is third, Tatum is fourth.
And if you want to say Tatum's third, Janus is fourth, that's fine.
I think what Janus has done, especially despite Dane being out, is remarkable.
But that's a debate.
and then for fifth place, it was a debate between the following.
Donovan, Cade, Edwards, and LeBron.
And I still want, well, I'll talk about all-MBAA first team
because my one through five of my MVP ballot is not my first team all-MBA.
And I'll explain that in a minute.
But my fifth place spot goes to LeBron.
And it goes to LeBron because despite the injury, he still played 70 games.
He seamlessly did what a lot of people thought he either wouldn't be willing to or able to, which is fit with Luca.
He care and people are recreating history that oh, the Lakers were headed for the play in before
the Luca trade. The Lakers were the four seed the day Luca made his debut with the team. They were
the they stayed even though Anthony Davis had gotten hurt. They were on a winning streak when
Luca first got to the team. Their only real losing this year happened surrounding LeBron's injury.
LeBron was a Swiss Army knife defensively once they got Luca and honestly once AD went down.
They are the three seed in a loaded Western Conference.
They were only Oklahoma City was better this year against the best 10 teams in basketball.
LeBron's been the through line of it all.
I have him as fifth place in MVP.
Now to the top of the ballot.
So here's why I find
These folks who are now saying they are going to vote for Joker
To be so disingenuous and what they simply should say is
He's my favorite player. He's the best player in the league so I'm voting for him
Last year, the numbers for Joker v. Luca were not close
I will remind you of them, okay?
Last year, Luca averaged 34, 9 and 9.
He won the scoring title on good efficiency.
He averaged 34 points, 9.2 rebounds, 9.8 assists.
So basically 349 and 10.
The league MVP was Nikola Yokic.
who averaged seven fewer points, 26.5,
three more rebounds, 12 and a half,
and one fewer assist, nine.
And it wasn't close.
Luca got four first place votes.
And the argument was purely,
well, Joker's team won 57 games.
Luca's team won 50.
And Luca was not very good,
though the team was fine defensively,
Luca was not very good defensively.
Those same people,
now this year are saying,
throw those rules out.
And even though Shea's team has won 68 games
and Joker's team won 50,
the same exact number Lucas team won last year.
I think Joker's gonna get it
because I've never seen an offensive scene.
season like this. And my question is, didn't you kind of see an offensive season like this last
year by a guy who got four first place votes? Again, Luca last year was 34, 9 and 10. Joker this year
is 30. Let me, yeah, 29.6, call it 30, 13 and 10. So four fewer points, four more rebounds. On a team
on the same amount of games.
And so that, now you might say, Nick, last year, weren't you a guy that was arguing for
Luca?
Wouldn't that then follow that this year you should be arguing for Joker?
100% if one of two things were true.
One, I had an actual vote and it was impacting it, so I must vote with consistency or two,
This is more importantly and really the reasoning.
I do feel like the previous winner, winners, but certainly the most recent year, continues to set the precedent for the voting public because it is an undefined award.
So last year, when a guy with 50 wins who's playing in the 4-5 game, who averaged 34, 9, and 10 got 4.
of 100 votes because we said best player on the best team with really good stats is going to run away with it
to then not give Shay when Shay is again it's like Shay's averaging 25 a game he's 33, 5 and 6 with
excellent defense on a 68 win team and the history of guys on teams who have won 68 plus
games, all of them, every team that has ever won 68 plus, step won MVP,
Jordan won MVP. The 69 win Lakers did not have the league MVP. Kareem won it in 72.
But that is because two Lakers split votes, Wilt and West finished third and second. That's why
the Lakers didn't have one. Who are the other ones? Dave Cowans on the,
the 68 wins Celtics won MVP.
Jordan won 69 games and shamefully didn't win it in 97s.
The voters got sick of giving it to and gave it to Carl Malone.
But it's just, folks need to just say, I like Joker the most.
So even though his coach got fired and his defense has been bad,
and even though last year it was about wins, this year it's about raw stats.
I'm just not going to lie.
I just think it's, I think Shay's the MVP.
Now to all NBA.
So again, I don't have an actual vote.
but and I know they changed the rules.
I want my all NBA first team at the very least to be two guards, two forwards, and a center.
And I want all of my all NBA teams to at least be credible teams you could roll out on a basketball court.
So even though I had LeBron as my fifth place in MVP voting, I do not have him as all NBA first team.
I gave that to Donovan.
So I want my two guards to be Shea and Donovan, my two forwards, Janice and Tate on my center joker.
Second team, all-MBA for me, was very simple.
My two guards are Stefan Ant.
Cade's technically a guard, but he's tall enough.
We can just put him in kind of that point forward spot.
He and LeBron are second team, and Alpern Shingoon, who was the best player on a Rockets team that was
the second seed. He is second team all NBA.
Third team all NBA with apologies to Tyrese Halliburton.
Halliburton had his spot stolen in game 82, DeMonsez, by James Hardin.
39 and 10 to lock up the five seed and stay out of the play in.
So it's Jalen Brunson, James Harden, Jalen Williams, as a forward because you
team wins 68 games. It's not just one guy. Carl Anthony Towns is the other forward and Evan
Mobley as the other center. Again, that team wants what, 64? They need someone other than just
Donovan. My defensive player of the year was not difficult for me. I think Draymond really hurt
himself at the end of the year. It is Evan Mobley. My sixth man of the, go ahead. The Mobley thing.
You have him as your defensive player of the year, but he's only in your third team, all NBA.
Yeah, so that happens sometimes where in hell, there have been years,
defensive player of the year didn't even make any all-MBA team.
I don't think Marcus Smart made an all-N-B-A team when he won it.
I don't think, I don't know if Tony Allen.
Did Tony Allen ever win defense player of the year?
I don't remember, but that happened sometimes.
But I think he's the defensive player of the year.
Sixth man of the year is Malik Beasley, just an absolute flamethrower off the bench.
And I guess somewhat controversial.
most improved.
I think it's a Vita Zubats.
I almost had Zubots on
as my all-N-B-on-my-N-B-A team.
He jumped his scoring
by 50% over his career.
He's been great defensively.
Clivers have been excellent.
He's been huge.
I think he's the most improved player,
even though he's old,
and it usually doesn't go to old guys.
Clutch player of the year is LeBron.
LeBron's the only player in the league
with 400, 100, 100, and the fourth.
LeBron's fourth quarter plus minus and the Lakers record in the fourth quarter and his
assisted turnover ratio is better than either of the previous clutch player of year winners and step
and aunt and I understand Jalen Brunson's clutch numbers are going to probably make Jalen Brunson
win this award that is in part because they do not have clutch numbers for defense in the clutch
where Jalen was lacking obviously because of his size. I think LeBron's clutch player
of the year. Rookie of the year is very, very simple.
Stefan Castle is going to be close to unanimous.
Well, Risa Shale gets some votes.
And I think coach of the year, De Manzay is Ime Udoca, getting this Rockets team to the
two seed when Jalen Green's a nice player.
Eamon Thompson's going to be an awesome player, but he's very young.
I think I'ma Udoca deserves coach of the year.
So those are my ballots.
my full NBA awards.
All right.
It makes sense to everybody.
Lakers locked up the three seed and now they are facing Ant in Minnesota and
round one.
Luke obviously took care of business but against them last year.
He averaged 32,
39 and 8.
How do you think these teams stack up against each other?
Are you a little worried there?
No, this is the ideal bracket for the Lakers.
Okay.
So like listen everything's hard in the West and everyone wanted Memphis but once it was clear Memphis wasn't gonna climb out of the play in part of it
Then this was the best you could have hoped for like you want to play the Nuggets right now? I don't
Jamal Murray's back Joker is Joker you want to play the clippers right now? Holy shit
That team looks unbelievable
The warriors because of staff are always dangerous.
So again, the best possible path for the Lakers, in my opinion, was having the thunder,
nuggets, and clippers on the other side of the bracket.
And they do.
They are, they might.
by the way, also if the Warriors lose tonight, they'll, if the Warriors lose tonight,
the Lakers rode to the conference finals is Timberwolves and then either Rockets Grizzlies.
And even if the Warriors win tonight, then it's Timberwolves and either Rockets, uh, Golden State.
And so Ant might average 32 a game in this series.
The Lakers do not have anyone that can guard Anthony Edwards, but that's fine.
Here are the other things that are going to happen.
I don't know how you can credibly play Rudy Gobert
the amount of minutes you probably want to play him.
Luca just told us a week ago.
He was like, what moment from the Mavs video
got you choked up the most?
And it wasn't when they drafted him.
It wasn't, you know, one of his crazy buzzer beaters.
It wasn't the 70 point game.
game, it was hitting the step back over Gobert in the conference finals, then cursing him out
in Slovenian. Luca has tortured Rudy Gobert on multiple continents. In the Olympic, Slovenia
against France, he's done it. When Gobert was a jazz, he did it. When Gobert was a Timberwolf,
he did it. So that is a rough spot for the Timberwolves to start with. You then add that the Lakers
are getting, they no longer have to deal with playoff DeAngelo Russell, which is a disaster,
and instead get to go against playoff Julius Randall, which is a different type of disaster.
That's nice.
They don't have Darwin Ham with his hands in his pockets, drawing up on the whiteboard, contest without fouling.
they've got JJ who's been up for 39 straight hours figuring out how to blitz Anthony Edwards
all that's good you also have a series that because Luca is going to want to make Rudy
gobert cry LeBron's going to be able to sit back the first three quarters like he did in that
Mavs game so again I think it is
a hard-fought five games for the Lakers, maybe six.
I will tell you guys my favorite round one bet.
Shout out to my friends at Draft Kings.
By the way, we should, I would like to, can Draft Kings,
can we start getting some boosts or something?
I just, if there's something I really like, I don't know.
This is plus 120.
Maybe they can throw my face on it and make it plus 125.
for what's right listeners, but the Lakers minus a game and a half in the series, meaning is
plus 120.
So the Lakers for the series is minus 200.
So question is, do you think the Lakers are going to win the series?
Yes.
Okay.
You bet them at minus 200.
You win if they win in four, five, six or seven.
Or you can get them at minus.
a game and a half at plus 120 and you win if they win the series in four or five or six so yes you cost
yourself if it's a seven game lakers win but i think it's going to be seven games because i think
luca's going to light this team on fire and i think that uh listen nas reed's going to be a problem
you got you credit where it's due jaden mcdaniels is an excellent defensive player but
They got, we saw Luca with a worst supporting cast beat this team in five to go to the finals
last year. Now, Ant said I got tired, which was odd and Ant won't be tired this time. But you also
have LeBron with eight days off coming into it. I on the LeBron side are like obviously not
trying to speak this since the existence, but are you worried at all about his groin? So I know
that was kind of acting up last week. I saw it. Yeah. So it looked like he kind of tweaked it in the
game against Houston game 81. He didn't seem too concerned. And this is also why,
you know, having eight days off is going to be so incredibly useful and helpful. So no, I'm not,
obviously, if he truly reaggravates his groin, if he has to miss time, then that would be a
problem. But this is where I remind you guys of one of the single most remarkable stats
in basketball history, which is LeBron James, teams have played in 287 playoff games,
DeMonsei in his career.
208, so teams LeBron has been on have played in 287 playoff games.
Of those 287, LeBron James has played in 287.
he has never missed a single playoff game in his career.
So yes, fingers crossed, knock on wood, whatever you got to do.
But also that number is so bananas.
It's pretty crazy.
It's three and a half full seasons.
Yeah.
He's played he's, this will be his 55th career playoff series.
55 series.
He's 41 and 13 in his.
career and playoff series. And so, yeah, I mean, I, you hope, obviously he's got to stay healthy.
He's done a good job of that through his career. One more question before we move on to some other
stuff. So if Minnesota ends up winning this series and Ant shows out, is he move closer to
become in the face? So, yes, I, Aunt needs to tighten up his off court life, but he's got everything.
thing else. And if he were to out duel LeBron and Luca in what is going to be the highest rated
round one series, yeah, that will. But I kind of look at Ant. Here's the optimistic look of
Ant. He's on the Luca trajectory. Luca made an early conference finals run. The next year,
the team made a big trade and then took a bit of a step back for luca was kairi they end up missing
the playoffs for aunt they trade car on anthony towns you know they end up down at the six line
probably bouncing around one and the next year for luka they made the finals so that it's not
like aunt is behind schedule at all but yes this would scott this would
winning this round one series would do more for aunt's notoriety and face of the league stuff
than winning the round two series they did last year against denver as great as denver is probably
be super important with this year like if you won this one if they beat the lakers and then they just
lost in round two correct no no no you beat the lakers everyone's then going to expect you to beat the
rockets or the warriors or the grizzlies that that part's definitely true
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It's our favorite time of the year on our podcast, Point Game, the playoffs.
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If we didn't talk ever again, I was part of you.
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This week on Crimless, Rory and I welcome a very special guest.
When I did podcasts, I wear my sleep masks.
I like what this is going.
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That's right, the incredibly talented and hilarious Will Ferrell on an episode dedicated to crimes committed by people named Will Ferrell.
You're good for 300 crimes?
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