The Mismatch - Lakers Defense Smothers Knicks, Steph the Rock Star, and Beware of the Bucks

Episode Date: March 7, 2025

Verno and Jacoby discuss the Lakers' thrilling OT win over the Knicks and how their defense was the true highlight of the game, not Luka and LeBron's performance (00:31). They also discuss the importance of Jimmy Butler’s impact for the Warriors outside the stat sheet and why Steve Kerr’s comparison to Andre Iguodala is valid (16:25). Next, the guys dive into their loves and loathes from the week that was (27:13). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Chris Vernon and David Jacoby Producers: Jessie Lopez and Tucker Tashjian Social: Keith Fujimoto Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the mismatch. I'm Chris Vernon and joining me to us every week from the ringer.com. It's Dave Jacoby-Cicobie. Happy to have to have to have a new point all last night watching the next game overtime. And? I don't know. Yeah. In the regulation, I was like, you know what? I'm good on this game.

They played well. It was fine. I heard they lost. Were you crushed? When Brunson went down, were you crushed? Oh. It was bad. it was it was actually a very encouraging forwards from the next to be honest with you

I felt really good about it throughout but then when brunsson go down we haven't heard any updates of high ankle sprain or how bad the strain sprain is or how many weeks or this or that but they've got a tough road trip ahead and anyone who's seen any of the nicks without jalen brunson in the game is point is points is hard to come by it's going to be a tough a few games without the young man. Usage rate is super high. And you know, like, look, last night, there's this sickness that ran through my daughter's school,

and I got laid out. And I told you, I'm going to get up tomorrow morning, and I'm going to watch this back. So I did. I watched it this morning. So this is fresh in my mind. And one of the things you notice, as you're watching the game back,

it's like, if the Knicks got something done, it was Brunson, Brunson, Brunson, Brunton, Every once in a while you'll see a Josh Hart miss or you'll see the OGM and O'Brien where he missed the two threes in a row. On the other end, it was like Gabe Vincent, it was Jackson Hayes knocking down free throws.

It was Austin Reeves. It was like, there was this myriad of players. And I thought that particularly stood out as we're thinking about the Lakers and kind of what they're becoming because we, how many times do we say we're not that far away

from watching playoff basketball, and there's going to be so much attention paid to those great players that these other guys are going to get these wide open shots, and so many times it's going to be dependent on what they do. Now, in fairness, there were also, like, just let's attack Cat, let's get Luca on Cat, and, you know, and then he hits the runner in the lane,

or I guess a step back, like kind of the elbow. hits the three. But on the other end, again, it was Brunson, Brunson, Brunson, Brunson, Brunson. And that's what you're talking about. It's like, okay, what are they going to do if they don't have this guy? Because the whole thing felt like try to get him switched on to Austin Reeves or whoever was the desired defender and then just him make a playoff of it.

I thought one of the biggest takeaways from watching last night's game was just how good the Lakers defense was. I thought that the Knicks play pretty good defense, too, but the Lakers defense is a completely different animal than it was a couple months ago. And Dorian Phidney Smith has a lot to do with that. It's not just fatigy, which I thought they came with a really good strategy. They're like, Josh Hart, Josh Hart, go ahead. We're going to leave you alone. We're going to leave you alone.

And we're going to load up on bruncing. And every time Kat had the ball, all, want to just shoot threes because they weren't going into the first half. And then every time he drove it just seemed like there was hands. poking the ball away. He never, never comfortable. And between Dore and Fannie Smith and strangely, Luca had a defensive game and the way LeBron's playing. And it just feels like this is a completely different defensive team

that I've seen from the Lakers in the past. And it felt like the strategy was really well done and the execution was really well done. My biggest takeaway from the after a huge game from LeBron and a huge game from Luca. And those others are very important. But this was a Luca and LeBron game. my biggest takeaway was this defense has leveled up to a point where they're true content. I really think so. Oh, because of them.

Yeah, yeah. And I didn't mean to gloss past that. They're both simultaneously incredible, which is big problems for the league, right? If you can get, you're right, if you can get both of them being great at the same time, then all those other guys can just play off of them. And obviously they're going to have to be able to make shots. but I just felt like so many times, it goes to that same thing, they were great,

and on the other side, Brunson was great, and so many times as you're watching it back, those other guys are stepping up for the Lakers. Those other guys were not routinely stepping up for the next, right? And you even said this earlier in this week, that so many times when you watch them, it's like, is Brunton going to stand on his head or not? And he did.

Right, he did. He did. He did. Right. He did it. It was phenomenal, but there was, I remember there's an overtime game against the Sixers. Reminding the Pacers where he literally took like every single Knicks shot for the last two minutes of regulation and every single possession was just just hit. Him in overtime.

And the whole point of bringing in cat and bringing in bridges was so that would not be the case. But yet here it is still the case. And last night he was fantastic until he switched his ankle. And we're going to see exactly what the Knicks looked like without him. And they look really, really. And I just feel like without, with them, you can't have someone on the floor that you can just leave alone, especially in a series. And Josh Hart needs to start hitting threes. You know, you just can't have just leave alone.

Well, and also, right, like you get the huge stop with, I think it was nine seconds left, come down, gave Vincent runs a double at him, damn near the half court line. Oh, yeah, yeah. And then the Knicks don't even get a shot off. He'll get a shot off. It's like, bro, like that was the, as soon as you brought that double, now he swings the ball to heart and heart doesn't even get a shot off. I mean, you, the idea that you don't get a shot off to win the game when you've gotten to stop to be able to get the shot off to win the game.

That's crazy. The only thing worse would be have Dice and Daniels pick your pocket and then throw it. How dare you? We're not talking about that game. That was last podcast. That was last podcast. But, you know, it is interesting. You brought up this earlier about the playoffs and sort of like the others and whatnot.

And I was actually going to pitch this to you for next pod, but the way the A, the Yop was defended by the lake, right? This whole like Bill Belichick, we're going to take away your number way, your number one, just see what else you can do. And the Lakers game was a blowout. It was a great defensive performance. JJ Reddick didn't sleep for months I heard. Blop, blah, blah, blah. And also teams have been doing this to SGA as well. And this is nothing new in the National Basketball Association.

But I really feel like we get near the playoffs. one thing that you and I should do as an exercise is just talk about the and third options of these contending teams and sort of do a power ranking. I think we should probably do that next week or the week after because that's really what it comes down to. Especially in like a Yolk it situation

or a Brunson situation where you just have these one guys they're going to have the ball that make everything work. And if you take them away, which smart teams will do, what is your plan B and D? And I think that becomes so important

when you get to these seven game series. And, you know, last night, they tried to take away Brunson, and they couldn't. The only thing took away was an ankle sprain. We'll see how bad it is. But they look good. Interestingly enough, to your point on the, you know, the heliocentric, like so a guy, one guy being so responsible for your offense. I was actually texting with Rosillo last night because I said, hey, man, said, I remember you did a show a couple of years ago. And this was, and it was, in part about the Westbrook thing and about Hardin and about.

like he went back and looked at like these extremely high usage rates and the lack of playoff success that those teams had had. If you've got a guy that is so responsible that it is great for the regular season, it's great for winning MVP's, but there is a lack of playoff success associated with it. And so I texted him last night. I was like, what did you look up? Like what was the number on the usage? And he actually said it was top 20 in usage. And so then I got into a conversation with him about this. And I was like, this is going to be a super fascinating year for that.

Because so many of the best players in the league, SGA, Brunson, et cetera, et cetera. So many of the guys that you can name are in the top 20 in the league in usage. Interestingly enough, yes who's not. Nicola Yokic. Yes, who's not. Steph Curry? Like these guys, these guys aren't in the top. 20 right now in usage rate in the NBA.

And so the idea is that so many times, and he had gone back to even like Kobe and Iverson and like, you know, one guy being so responsible for so much that you do. And that's not, look, history changes, right? There are things that it's not the end all be all. But it was very fascinating at the time and is virtually held true. You had Luca get to the finals last year with a very, high usage rate. Yet

what we have seen in the past, it has been very difficult for teams to win. And I think it stands to reason. When you get to the playoffs, now, all of that attention, right? One team is focused solely, not a night tonight thing, but one, a team

is solely focused on making one guy's life hell. That guy has been the engine for everything that has taken place with you and why you are so great. And so thus, as you were saying, you know, those other guys are the ones that end up truly deciding so much because when you've got a chance to get into a playoff series and build a defense built just to make the high usage guys life hell, then that puts a massive spotlight on everybody else. Because I'd like to do some sort of like power ranking of second options.

You know what I mean? because you think about the Celtics. It's like, well, Jaylen Brown. Sure. You know, it's your conference, finals MVP, finals MVP.

And you look at obviously the Lakers probably got the best second option in the history of the day. No question. And you also think about teams like the Thunder who obviously are, you know, the number one seed in the Western Conference. But I remember watching a game in the SGI, SGA did not play.

And I'm looking at J-Dub. And he looked a little concerned. He looked a little like, whoa, there's a lot for me to create every. possession down. And for me to sort of like get everybody into the spots and get everything going. And I think that becomes very, very important. And I think with the usage rate is not a perfect stat. It's a really, really good tool. But I would, I would, I would, God, he leads the league and hockey assist. You know what I mean? It's probably like he gets doubled. And he swings. And

that swing becomes another swing to a wide, to a wide open. Christian Brown or whatever. But, but isn't there a fair, isn't there a, isn't there a fair point of view that that that is exactly what you need for playoff basketball. That in the regular season, right? And as we know, everybody tries to make Yokic's life. He is number one on the whiteboard. And then whoever is number two is so far down if it's Murray or whoever you're thinking about, right?

And then you think about in, you know, even the year that they won the title and how many times we ended up talking about Bruce Brown or we talked about Jeff Green or we talked about Aaron Gordon or we talked about these other guys and their ability to step up and make it happen for those teams. One of the teams that I mentioned, interestingly enough, that was not, did not have a huge usage rate guy, is the Warriors and Steph Curry. And yet recently, post-Jimmy Butler trade, they have been fantastic. Everybody views them radically different than they did prior to the trade. And even recently, when teams have had them down,

they storm back in these games. It was just last week's podcast that we were talking about a third quarter run that they had put together against the Orlando Magic where it was like, dude, that felt like the, that felt like the old warriors with Shaw Livingston in that group, you know? And now Brooklyn had them,

Brooklyn had them down, what, at least 15, maybe more in this game. 22, I think, at one point. Well, not that. I went to the game on two. night against the Knicks. And a couple takeaways. Number one, as we discussed, the Knicks had a great strategy for Steph Curry.

I think if you didn't see the game here, Steph Curry had 28, hit some huge shots, put the game away. But he had eight points at halftime. And Bridges was doing a great job, just getting very physical with him off the ball, you know, the sort of stuff you see when you're at the game. And it was like a really, really, really good defensive performance for the Knicks. And as we talked about the last pod, and as you just mentioned the third quarter warriors, whatever happened at halftime, they came out.

And whatever Lee, the Knicks had went away very quickly. And just it was another one of those like, all it takes with Steph Curry is a seven or eight possession run. And the game can go from, you know, up four to down seven. You've already called two timeouts in those seven possessions. Like it's just devastating, absolutely devastating. And Jimmy Butler's impact feels more like vibes and confidence and leadership and sort of bravado than it is like he scored 30 points. Right. Because all he's doing is getting to the line 12 times a game.

That's basically all he's doing. I didn't shoot that much even, you know, but he's just giving space to Steph Curry and been someone who can calm everything down. if the other team's on a 6-0 run, get the ball to Jimmy, and he'll just get fouled. The whole thing will slow down and everyone will have a breath and it'll end whatever the other team is trying to do.

He's been really, really good for them. Also, yeah, also a reminder that he's just a great all-around basketball player, a willing passer. Like, he's not just a guy that's a, you throw it to him and the ball's never coming back out, right? This guy makes things go. And I thought it was fascinating.

The name that was brought up this week by Steve Kerr was Iguodala, who we know, no matter what you want to say, had a massively profound impact on that Warriors franchise and those great teams over the years, so much so that his jersey went up in the Raptors in Golden State this year. And so I thought that was fascinating that it was like that there were some similarities that were seen in kind of what he brought to the table for that team to what Jimmy's bringing to the table for this team. Because he's obviously taking a step back, right? He's not the guy every single night, you know, and once upon a time, Andre Aguadala was

the best player on the Philadelphia 76ers. I was about to say that exact same thing. I was about to say it's a good comp because Sixers Sigadala was the guy. It was 30 points a game, dunk contest, all star. He was the guy. He was the rising star for that franchise that you build around, much like Jimmy Butler has been for like seven franchises so far. But you, you know, you become a veteran.

You understand the game. The basketball IQ goes up. You understand your role. You've been around the league for 10 years. And then you come to the Warriors and you say, all right, Steph Curry is the guy. What can I do to get the most out of Steph? Where is Steph weak and where can I be strong to make that up? And a lot of that comes in the defensive end.

And Iigadala was huge for that team on the defensive end as well. And Jimmy will be as well. But like, I do want to say like, I see the Lakers as a championship contender. I do not see the Warriors at all as a championship contender. What? There's just too much Gis Santos, Quentin Post. Like, there's just too much.

Like, I understand they're injured and they're missing guys. They haven't even gotten Kaminga back. But, like, it's just, I mean, Santos is starting games and playing like 30 minutes a game. Like, I got it. I just don't see the depth. You've got to respect the playoff success of Curry, Dremont, and Jimmy. Those are three of. the best playoff performers you could have.

I see them as a tough out. You don't see them in the Western Conference finals. You don't. I could absolutely see the Warriors in the West finals. Absolutely. No, you would never pick it. Bro, you just said who, you want to do this list of two and three?

Mm-hmm. Where are you putting them? It ain't low. It's pretty low. What? You just said Jimmy doesn't score. and who's three, Draymond, buddy healed? We're going into the playoffs and there's a lot of teams.

You're ranking above. I want these two guys more than I want Jimmy Butler and Draymond Green. You are psycho. This sounds like a great tease for a podcast next week. I mean, that's crazy. See you on Tuesday. What? What, have you, have you, have you, do you go into a coma every playoff season?

I, what? This guy literally carried a team to the NBA. finals twice. Yes, yes he did. He's not a, and he's not like a shell of that. He's still great. When the lights come on, those guys have shown up over and over and over and over. And the level of trust that I have for them showing up when it comes playoff time is sky high. I would argue, I would argue that Jimmy Butler against, with the heat against the bucks, the first round was more impressive than him going toe to toe to with LeBron in the bubble.

Remember when he got hurt in the second round, didn't really play? But he was scoring 40 points a night. They tried to lobbing into Janus and he covered Janus underneath the basket. Like it was, he was absolutely fantastic. And I don't know. I don't know if he still has it in him.

We'll see. We'll do the list next week. This is obviously a Jimmy Butler opinion, right? It's a matter of whether you. You're never going to corner me to being like Jimmy Butler's not good in the playoffs. I mean, that's ridiculous. I'm not a fool. Okay.

We'll see where it stacks up. Would you rather have, look, would you rather have Jimmy Butler? We could save this for another show, but let's just real quickly. Let's go to the top few scenes. Would you rather have Jimmy Butler or Jalen Williams? Going into a playoffs? Probably Jimmy Butler. Would you rather have Jimmy Butler or Jamal Murray?

Jamal Murray. I don't mean that. It's just like, we can go one by one. We can go by one by one if you want to. We will. We'll do it next week. We'll do it next week. And you're going to find this isn't going to go your way

because when push comes to shove, you'd rather have Jimmy Butler. So, of course, they're a finals contender. Here's one of my takeaways from being at the Warriors game on Tuesday night. And I will say this, I'll make this brief. I have never been to a live Steph Curry basketball contest in Madison Square Guard in my life. Really? The tickets are always so expensive.

It's just, it's kind of like, it's kind of getting reservations for dinner on Valentine's Day. It's just kind of like, you know what, we'll go the next day. Like, I'll go to the other game when the hornets come to town or whatever because the tickets are so expensive. But I had the privilege to go. My buddy was out of town who has tickets. And one thing I was not prepared for, and I put this in the group chat, was just how many Steph Curry fans there are on the road.

It was like, there were more Steph Curry jerseys than any singular Nick. And there were at the end, when it was sort of like the game felt like sort of in hand for the warriors, the Warriors contingent was so loud. And I've never seen a road team be that popular in Madison Square Garden. I started thinking about just the popularity of Steph Curry, especially with like people under 20. It's wild.

Just how popular he is. Because you think of the great players of the past like Michael Jordan. When he went on the road, he was kind of like hated because he had beaten all the other teams in the playoffs before. So it wasn't like he was embraced and everyone had a Jordan jersey on a chanted MVP when he was the line on the road. And you think about LeBron, it was kind of similar.

It was like he was either with you or against you, but Steph Curry, whether it's his personality or his performance or the combination of both or these intangibles, the Junice, qua, whatever. He's so popular. There are so many Steph Curry jerseys when you go to a game. I was just kind of taken aback

at just how he has transcended the sort of team allegiance that you have that's now people are Steph Curry fans before they're Knicks fans they're Steph Curry fans before their Hawks fans

if you're in Atlanta and there's Steph Curry fans before they're Grizzies fans win Memphis and you've been to a million Steph Curry Memphis games you feel the same way, right? It's not, I mean it's not even close

in terms of people getting there early people lining up like Curry has Curry's like a rock star. You know what I mean? Yeah. Not like, you just don't see it with other players.

I would say that still to this day, if you were to do like Jersey count, I would say it's Curry won for sure by a very wide margin. And then I would say probably LeBron still, honestly, like in terms of, but the LeBron. Huge margin though. But they're older. The older fans are the ones wearing.

LeBron jerseys. The younger fans are not. And I would tell you, like, as someone who now has a 15-year-old, Curry was their guy. That's who they grew up with. They grew up with, they don't care about LeBron. A 15-year-old does not care about LeBron. And now the younger generation, it's interesting.

I was talking to a 10-year-old the other night, Tony Allen's son, no less. And he was saying he loves SGA. He loves him. He loves Edwards. He loves La Mello. Stefan Castle.

I found that those kids love Lamello. Rookies. Oh, yeah. Lamello Ball. They love Lamello Ball. They love Lamello Ball. If you're like under 18 years old, Lamello Ball might as well be Michael Jordan.

That's right. You might as well have two rings if you're under 15 years old. And also, let me mention this. I think you probably thought it stood out seeing Curry in somebody curry jerseys. This was just something that I thought of that I didn't bring up to you. I didn't think that you,

the Madison Square Garden, again, people could call me out on this and say, well, look around, right? Like, I didn't feel like jerseys were a huge deal there. I didn't find that people were wearing jerseys all over the arena, right? I think that's fair to say.

Like, a lot of places you go, there's, like, you go to Oklahoma, City back in the day. Every family of four, right? The dad had on Durant, the mom had on Westbrook, one of the kids had on a Stephen Adams and one of the other kids had on a Westbrook, right? Like, it's just a, and smaller markets are given to more jerseys, I think. But I say that I took my family about a year and a half, two years ago.

I went to Yankee Stadium. and I went because Otani and Trout were there at the same time that we were in town. And so we went to the game. It seemed like 97% of that crowd head on Aaron Judge jerseys. Yeah. And 100% had a Yankee cap. Either a shirt jersey or a jersey. So it's not just Jersey culture.

People in New York do wear jerseys. It's just not the Knicks. I felt like people like wear nice. close to the Knicks. Yeah, people wear, people wear like Knicks gear more than Nick's jerseys. It's also kind of cold outside of New York. So it's like, we can put a jersey on over your old E's. So it's like then you try it a little too hard if you're doing that.

That's right. I saw Davidson's Steph Curry jerseys. I saw every single iteration of the warrior Steph Curry jerseys. When he hit a three, the roar was almost as loud as when Brunson hit a three. I'm serious. I was pretty surprised to taking it back like that because MSG has never really been infiltrated in that way. like other arenas are susceptible to be.

Yeah. Other guys have had like many waves, right? And one of the things that, you know, last weekend, I saw the Knicks in person. And one of the things I've said to you and others in the past is, I have this tremendous respect for Knicks fans because they have not been good. They have not been to an East Finals in so many years. They haven't had this track record of success.

And then yet every single year, the last 20-something years that I've been going to the game, there's always Nick's fans. And those people are not jumping on any kind of bandwagon. There haven't been no bandwagon to jump on. Like they've always been there. Whereas, I remember the year after the Bucks won the title, you'd walk through the corridor and there's all these people like in Yannis and Bucksters. I'm like, there's no way.

Where you care about the Bucs. There's no way. There's no way you care about the Bucks, right? It's impossible. So I have a respect for there's always like there's a few franchises, the Lakers, the Celtics, the Knicks. I'll give you an interesting one, the Bulls. Bulls, you will always see people wearing Bulls gear when you go to the arena and they have been so bad for so long. But these are people that grew up, you know, watching on WGN, Jordan fans.

And they've just, they've stuck with their team. You know what I mean? Also kids of Jordan fans, too. Like if you're, if you're like, you know, 50 years old and you were like right there for the Jordan era and then you move to Memphis, your kid's going to be a Bulls fan. And that happens a lot. A lot of people are generational fans as well. But I was really taking about, I just wasn't ready for just how steffed out that New York City crowd was going to be. And then, you know, I guess it's like that everywhere.

But he's, he earned it. He's a rock. He earned it 40, 40 last night. And like, yeah, he, he's really, really impressive. Let's get to Love Loved. Team that I loved. It's going to surprise you a little bit because it's not like they've had some kind of massively winning week.

But it is the Portland Trailblazers. And I'm going to tell you why. Why is that? Portland caught a little wave where they beat these teams back to me. They beat Charlotte, then they beat Utah, then they beat Washington, that they beat Brooklyn. You know, and so they perk people's attention. It's like, hey, man, it seems like the Portland.

Trailblazers are winning pretty often, but then you go back and look and like, those are super rat teams, right? Like you're beating the worst of the war. You're beating lottery teams, right? So, okay, you're playing better than other lottery teams. And yet you see them like they're climbing up the standings. It's like, damn, bro, can they get to the play in? Well, so then it's like, okay, is it just that you're beating up these Charlottes and

Utahs of the world? They have to go to Cleveland on Sunday night. They lose in overtime against Cleveland. They turn around, they bash Philly in, and then they play against Boston last night, and they lose by 10. But they're very clearly, you look at any number, they're very clearly playing much better basketball. And I think this is noble, right? And the other thing that I'm going to say that the reason I love them is because you finally got to the point. Like, you're not out there and you're not watching Jeremy Grant, you're not watching DeAndre Aiton,

and you're not watching Rob Williams. Like you're not watching those veteran guys when we were sitting early in the season and be like, okay, what's the point here, right? Like what you're watching is guys get in these games. They're actually like making a push, trying to win games,

and then you get to see, like now evaluate these guys and say, all right, here's a piece. Here's something we really want to have as the core of this, whatever the next iteration is. And so you get all those reps for, to Mani Kamara. You get all those reps for Denny Avdia. You get all those reps for Donovan Klingin. You get all those reps for Shaden Sharp. You get all those reps for

Scoot Henderson, right? And you start to see like, hey, man, like this could actually turn into something, right? You augment this here, you augment this there, and you've got something going. But the fact that they are now, you know, whether it's because they want to or because they've been forced to, but you're getting these young guys in the lineup, and it's actually giving them great success. They've been playing much better defensively.

And, you know, on a night where it's great for them to get those reps and you sit there and go, you know what, Shaden Sharp may be something different than what we have projected him to be. And Donovan Klingan may be something bigger than what we projected him to be. And maybe the Scoot-Henderson thing is not over. Maybe you just got to give a guy time, you know, to figure things out. And Tumani Kumar has been obviously a massive revelation. I love him.

And everybody loves him. And honestly, you sat there and went like, what is the Denny Obdiya stuff about? Well, the Denny obvious stuff is about that he's like, he's really good. He's had like a really good season for them. And so I want to heap some praise on them and call them a team that I love because it's one thing to be. beat up on those bad teams, but you go in there and you take Cleveland to overtime. There ain't that many teams that have come out with a win.

And they had every chance to do it. And then it's not like they got beat by 1,000 by that Boston team when they played against them. And so I, that was Wednesday night for the record. I'm always so anti-tanking. I just hate it. I hate it for the product.

I hate it for the impact that it has on your players. Like I just, I hate tanking. And so when I see a team like this that is nobly playing it out while also developing their players and getting a good read on them, I'm always going to be the one to praise them. And I think it's good karma. I think you can end up getting a good pick because of that. Yeah. I think that Chauncey's done a good job of getting them to compete and to play.

And I don't think that they have designs on winning a first round playoff thing, getting to the playing or whatever. They're just trying to play well. they're playing hard, they're playing defense, and it just seems like they're trying in a way that other teams in their position haven't in the past at this time of year. And I just want to say, like, I have an irrational love for Tumani Kumar.

Like, I irrationally believe in that person because I think that he'll be a real impact player. And just to ask you a follow-up on this team, because this is something I ask myself when I watch them. Yep. It's like, all right, you're like, if you look at like the Hornets, right? you're like they've got lamello ball

and they've got to build a team around the mellow ball to be successful. They need to use his strengths and what complements him and what works. And then when I look at the blazers, I'm kind of like all those players that you mentioned. But all of them don't seem like the guy. You know,

when you're talking about clinging and Kamara and scoot and Shaden Sharp is it just feels like who do you keep and who, do you give an extension to? I just don't think you're making decisions yet. And you don't know how this stuff's going to play out, right? How many times have we talked about, you know, great players in the league and that if you would have evaluated him their first four or five years?

The hardest thing in the world to do is to be patient. But even the aforementioned Steph Curry, if we would evaluated him through year four, and I told you this is going to be the guy that gets more cheers in Madison Square Garden. He's one of the greatest players. You would have laughed me off the earth. We've talked at length this year about Cade Cunningham. If I would have told people like, Kate Cunningham could be the best player on a team that, you know,

is fighting for maybe even be able to get a top five seed. You'd be like, what are you? What? Like, no. And so I'm not telling you that there's one of them there. I'm saying time will tell if one of them is there. We may look up and Shaden Sharp considered one of the, best shooting guards in the NBA.

Or Tammani Kamara's one of the best three and D guys in the NBA. Or Scoot Henderson has turned a completely different leap. Or Donovan Klingan is the guy who's grabbing getting you 15 points of 15

rebounds and five blocks every single night. Like I think that stuff is all still to come. I just have this great respect. The difference between, and I saw the Hornet, right? And I'm like, bro, run a play. Like, you still have to compete.

What do we do? That's at the core, when you say you hate tagging, that's what is, that's worth celebrating about the Blazers is they're putting the shoelaces on and they're trying to win the game as hard as they can. And that's from the assistant coaches to the guys that don't get in the game. Like, they're, they're really competing in a way. And they have their, their arms distance away from the 10 seed, but like, it's the suns and the Mavericks in the way.

Right. You know, it's possible. They're motivated to play to get into that plan. And let's see, let's get these guys some playing experience. I think that would be great. They're worth celebrating this team. Team you love, team that I love is, this is like a team that I feel has been overlooked and disrespected. This is a team that I would not want to play in the first or second round of the playoffs whatsoever.

They've won four straight now. They beat the nuggets, the Mavericks, the Hawks, and the Mavericks. again, but they've won eight of nine. Okay? And I'm talking about the Milwaukee Bucks. I feel collectively as people that pay a lot of attention to the National Basketball Association that they have just kind of been wildly overlooked because I thought they made some really interesting moves that didn't make headlines around the trade deadline.

Obviously, swapping out Kuzma for Middleton has, so basically, basically, basically, basically, what they've done is they've added Kuzma, Kevin Porter Jr., and Sims, right? None of that is going to be headline news, but they've, one of the problems with this team is they looked old and slow and they couldn't defend. For the first two months of the season,

it was like, they're too old, they're too slow, and they have no one that can defend. So you start putting Derry Bird in there, you start getting Jackson Jr. in there, and now that you've got Sims to spell Lopez, and then you've got Kevin Porter, Jr., to do whatever he does, have some energy.

Kuzmas is a little bit longer, a little more active defensively than Middleton, is they've made their defense much better. And Lillard had 34 points on 11 from 15. Janus is averaging 31, 12, and 6. Like, between the improved defense and just the fact that we talk about second options in the playoffs, well, guess what they've got?

Janus is number one, who it is, we know what he is. And you got Dame Liller, who scored 34 on 15 shots last night. And you can also name, again, when we're talking about trust, you can name multiple playoff moments. You know this is a guy that can raise his level. Absolutely.

I think the improved defense has gotten me sort of like looking at them, as someone who cares about the Knicks, being like, I hope that's not a first round series right there. I really hope that's not a first round series. And also I think that they can, they can drag you down into the mud. When we have seen them prepare, obviously we go back to what of my most regrettable tweet ever about Oklahoma City. But in fairness, they got those guys wildly uncomfortable when they played in that NBA

Cup this year. And so those little brother to them. And guys cared greatly about winning that thing. and you saw them, and I do think that that is a, it is a reasonable way to look at them and say, you know what, the one chance we had where stakes got really high and guys had a lot of money on the line and they really cared, this team was really able to lock in.

And that does stay with me as a team that was able to lock in. If it stood like it does now, and they played against Indiana and got past Indiana, got a little revenge for Yonis getting hurt last. year and then face Cleveland. What a series. Oh, oh, Verno, great tease. Guess what?

Guess what I'm doing Saturday night? Cleveland bucks. Saturday night. And that's going to be a big one. That's a big one right there. Because another thing that people forget is Bobby Porter's didn't get hurt, right? We all know what happened, some sort of mix up, whatever. He's suspended for 25 games.

But he's not coming back from injury. He's coming back from a suspension. And you can imagine putting out. Kuzma, Bordas, Janice, Lopez, and Dame. It's like everyone's huge except for Dame. It's like, it's just like they've got lengthened athleticism and an improved defense that makes me believe in them in a way where I'm kind of looking at them. I'm like, if anyone's going to upset the apple cart of this Cabs Celtics collision course,

it feels more like the Bucks than the Knicks. I just wouldn't be shocked if the Cavs found themselves in a game seven against this team or the Celtics. What NBA history tells us is that generally, you have to have one of the top five, 10 players at Long. You have to have one of the best 10 players in the league, right? We know they have one of the best five players in the league. Yeah. You always have a chance if you've got one of those guys. If you've got Yokic, if you've got Janus, if you've got Luca, if you've got a chance.

Yeah. You got chance. And I think that Yonis is just like a whole. ho-hum third in the MVP race. Ho-hum, another year. That's a big deal. That's my team I love this week. Team that I load this week, I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this because you

know it's the team that I went to all five of their home games. And that was the Memphis Grizzlies who went one and four over said stretch. Three absolute heartbreakers. We covered on Tuesday how it was like downright historic. after I went Monday night and watched them play against the Atlanta Hawks and they lost at the buzzer. They lost at the buzzer against the Knicks. They lost at the buzzer against the Spurs. They lost at the buzzer against the Hawks.

And then they got ran out by Oklahoma City the other night. This is on Wednesday night. That's Wednesday night. First half looked good, Verno. Yeah, it was fine. First half didn't look bad. Well, all the while, in the first minute of the game against Atlanta, Jerry Jackson Jr., goes down with an ankle injury.

And so it's like when it rains, it pours. And then John Moran, after the game, said, you know, they asked them, how did it feel to be back out there? Because he had missed both the Spurs and Atlanta. And his answer was terrible. I shouldn't have played. He said, I shouldn't have played. And so now it's like, okay, is this shoulder thing going to be something like that's just

not going to be able to make him? himself because everybody is well aware he has not been himself this year and so you wondered after he said that it's like he's been out they lost these heartbreakers Sharon Jackson

Jr. goes down you feel this pressure to come back you're playing the thunder and you should and you feel like you shouldn't have come back but you did come back because you don't want everybody to say oh you're soft

oh, why are you sitting out, oh, whatever. And so you did come back and then frustrated about that. And so there's just been a tremendous amount of frustration. Now, it's interesting. On Tuesday, I told you that, you know, there's times in your life where things are all going bad. And then you look over and you see somebody else going through something actually terrible. And you go, you know what? Things ain't that bad.

And I mentioned that is me with the Grizzlies when I look over and see that. Dallas. Those two teams actually play tonight. So if there was a team to face, when you, when you're down on your luck, when you think everything's not going your way, all you have to do is look across the court tonight. You're like, well, at least, you know, probably no John, no Jaron. That's going to be a tough win. That's not, that's going to be tough. I know. Oh. God, God, the Grizzlies, this is bad. Well, look, we're going to get to it. This is bad.

They had not lost three games in a row all season. Now, that is really hard to do in the NBA. And now they've lost four. It is. Yeah. It's hard. They're looking at that seven spot, man. I mean, listen.

How dare you? It's, they're looking at that seven spot. If John doesn't play and Jaron doesn't play, they've got the Golden State Warriors coming. No, no, no. There's four winnables. Okay. We'll see.

And Jared Jackson Jr. was bouncing around on the sideline. I don't think that that's going to be like very rarely. He's not in a boot. Like there's a level of ankle sprains, as you know. And of course, everybody with the Knicks will be waiting. We're about to learn. We're baited breath. At the time you hear this pod.

No, sometimes they're terrible. Sometimes they're terrible and sometimes, you know, they're ice and rest. And you're going to be able to get back there sooner than you think because, I mean, hell, every time I tune on the rockets, I'm like, bro, I thought Fred Van Fleet twist his ankle. He's. That was like January, bro. So there is a level to this stuff when it comes to the ankle springs for sure. So the team that I load this week is going to be difficult for the two of us. because it feels like just yesterday.

It's probably just around early December maybe, maybe around Thanksgiving. And we were playing a song, loving it. Executive producer Jesse's going to tee it up for us. God, we were so excited. That sucks. The defense was the worst news was number one. I know.

And then everyone got an oblique injury, and they're still winning without Franz and Palo. And this team has just fallen off a cliff. It's kind of inexplicable at this point. But they lost to the Cavs and the Warriors. All right. Good teams. Then they lost to the Raptors twice.

The Raptors were ahead by like 17 and took out all their starters. In an effort to lose the game, the magic ended up losing anyway. last night, similar situation, they're playing the Bulls. This game, by the way, if there's any, any game that needs to be sent to the league for review reform, it is this one. Because there's this ball, obviously off of Josh Giddy. They look at the thing for an hour and a half, and then they don't even say it's off job I cannot even understand what they were looking at.

And then there's another review 10 seconds later. It was disgusting. And how long did it take? It took forever. Forever. Hey, do you know. They got it wrong. You know my longtime producer here at Memphis, Rozer.

Yeah, Rosa, he heard me on the mismatch talking about the clock. Got a lot of response on the clock. The clown knows all of the different things that I brought up. Brilliant, brilliant ideas. About the reviews. All of them. He threw a stopwatch on one of the reviews in Memphis, Oklahoma City the other night. 245.

Oh, this was even worse. They went to commercial and came back. and these guys are still looking at the screen. And then, you know, sometimes the screen goes black. It's just, like, replay review. So now they're just sitting there talking on headphones, waiting for somebody in New Jersey to look at their screen. Like, they're looking at something different.

I hate the reviews. But this is, let's just talk about the magic for a second, right? They are last in the league at three-point percentage, 30.7%. Second to last are the Wizards at 33. So they're like a full two percentage points worse than the last in the league. However, they're 17th in three-point attempt rate, which is like the percentage of threes you take. So you're middle of the pack in the percentage of threes that you take, but you're dead last by a mile in the percentage that you make. They're 27th in the league in field goal percentage.

And how does this translate? Do you what teams are doing? They're being like, France, what are you good at? Driving? Cool. We're just going to pack the paint. Paulo, what do you get? Sort of operating from the mid-range and like, you know,

reading the defense and maybe shooting a turnaround or finding somebody open. Go ahead. Find somebody open. Like it's not, it's like an open secret that they can't shoot. And there's nothing, they have no counter to it. Here's the issue, Jacoby.

Everybody knew last year. We watched them play the Cleveland Cavaliers when it got the playoff time. Now, if you have the Discovery Channel or whatever they put that game on. But they couldn't shoot last year. It was a need. You've got these guys that can play make. You've got these guys that can handle the ball. Who are the guys that it opens it up for? I'm Palo. Palo can drive on anybody in the world. He is a monster and then the kickout and who can

knock it down. And you see some of these teams that address said need, right? One of the reasons, as we've talked about Cunningham in the past, right? We'll get Tobias. They go get Malik Beasley. They go get Tim Hardaway Jr. These aren't a who's who. It has a profound effect just because, A, they have to be honored out there. And B, if they're wide ass open, they can make them. They don't have anybody they can make them.

And they knew that. KCP's supposed to be the guy. He's just not hitting them. Oh, come on. Palo gave him a wide open corner three in a huge spot last night. I didn't even, no one even thought it was going in. Nobody. You could see everybody.

just runs to the rim to try to get a rebound. Right. I just think there's going to be big changes. I don't know if it's the coach. I don't know if it's one of their big two. Oh, they'll for sure blame the coach. They've got to do something. They got to do something.

Because you can't miss the most threes in the league and then take the 17th most threes in the league. Doesn't make sense. No, you have a personnel issue with that, but they will blame the coach. He's always the person. You can't. It's waking.

It's easy. Yeah, that's the easy thing. Player that I loved this week, well, it goes without saying because I witnessed him in person on Wednesday night. First time I saw me did not have the greatest game of the world, but my God, did I get the MVP version of SGA on Wednesday night? He was so good.

I mean, just everything is so smooth, getting to all of his spots while also simultaneously making his teammates better. And they went 50, 40, 90 for the game as a team against Memphis the other night. I didn't know that.

He had, I mean, 41 and 8 assists, 10 of 10 from the line, 14 of 25 from the field. And so, you know, there are times where, you know, when it was like, you know, when Russell Westbrook won his MVP or when James Harden won his MVP

or you could go through all the great players, Nicola Yochich, whoever, over the years. And then like these years are capsules in time where they were the best player and they were awarded as such at the end of the year. Me seeing it in person with that level of effectiveness on Wednesday night, you know, you can watch it on TV all the time.

know he's leading the league by two or three points in scoring. We talked about how if he never played a fourth quarter, he'd be fourth in the league in scoring at 27 points per game. But when everybody knows that you're the guy and obviously he had a 50 in the game before that, I mean, you're talking, the guy's almost scored 100 points of the last two games. I mean, and then he hit a logo three. Like, it just felt like, okay, this feels right. I'm watching the MVP.

This guy is on another level, on an absolute another level. I mean, geez, he is astonishingly awesome. And it's something to behold in person because he's not a highlight factory. And then you look up and you're like, bro, he's got 18? Like, how? I don't even remember him scoring the 18. It's crazy. He is brilliant, brilliant.

absolutely and i just want to give a shout for that game uh j will the other j williams in that yeah was i mean i think he was four for four from three he looked good he looks really good that was impressive they can get that kind of stuff out of him that'll be huge for them um the player that i love it's sort of like the bucks it's like this is just someone i want to shine a light on who's not getting a lot of love and we only have a couple of months to shine a light on this fella it's josh giddy Oh. He was great. He was great last night.

But again, I'm not watching a ton of Bulls games. You know, it was just a close game going down on the end. So it was like, oh, let me check this. There wasn't a lot of other great action on. I was like, let me just check out this game. Let me just see what's going on here. You're killing time before Nick's Lakers. Yeah, yeah, got to stay awake.

I had a diet Mountain Dew. Got to stay awake, you know. And the last seven games, Giddy's averaging 21.9 points, 11.1 rebounds and 8.9 assists. Seven games is not a small sample size. like he feels competent and under control and just sort of like what you want from a point guard. He plays defense. He's got size. And then I'm looking at, because I don't even playing well lately.

And in the end of February, this is out, this is sort of like five game run, not the last five games, but five of the last seven, this five game run. Because he was shipped out of Oklahoma City because he couldn't hit threes. And we've all seen the footage of people just leaving him butt naked alone. He had a five-game run. This is where he shot from three. Three for four from three. The next game, four for six from three. Next game three for five from three.

Next game three for three from three. Next game four for four from three. Like he's low-key been on fire. And I think that take-way-up last night. He wants that new contract, bro. That's the thing. The takeaway from last night's going to be Kobe White had 44 and the Bulls won and what's going on with the magic.

But in the background, Josh Giddy is proven that he can choose. You can play a defense, he can get you assist. He gets you more rebounds than you think he does, and he's been an extremely productive player. That's the player I love this week. I did not see that one coming. No. You're not going to be able to talk about Josh Goody soon.

So you better give him his flowers now because we won't be talking about the Bulls much longer. Oh, and yeah, so, yeah, I guess he is going to be up, right? Yeah. He's going to be up. Made it for him. Yeah, he's going to be up for that. He's going to be up for, he's going to be restricted free agent after that year.

So, I mean, we're getting to, after Oklahoma City decided he was the one that wasn't going to get paid and moved off of him. Now, yeah, he's got a contract coming on the way, maybe an extension. It's like Kobe's White or Josh Giddy is an interesting conversation. One of the things I want to mention to is, uh, I wanted to have him. as my player that I loved, but I've left on the table. Look, I've already covered how you go watch Zion Williamson now and the guy's got to. Bro, he's got the friggin' vein running down his art. I don't think people realize how in shape this guy has gotten.

And he has averaged over his last 16 games 27 minutes per game. But in those minutes... He's on a restriction. He's killing it. In 27 minutes per game, he's averaging 26 minutes. seven and five. So wait a second. Wait a second.

Earlier this season. Bro, and that dunk on the Lakers? God. Chris Vernon said, I'm out on Zion Williamson. I'm out. In New Orleans. He never dropped me back in. In New Orleans. He has been playing so well recently, and all of these numbers are on a

minute's restriction. Amazing. And they're not winning games, but he's getting rebounds. He's getting assists. He was miced up. This is the sound you want to hear when you're miced up. He was miked up in their game against the pockets. Yep. Right.

And they show him saying this, they never show this kind of stuff. He's talking about Dylan Brooks. He's like, he cannot cover me. Every time I'm going right by him, it's easy. And he meant it and he did it.

And they never show that kind of stuff. No, he's, you know, it's funny. ESPN and TNT, they put the Pelicans on so many times in his first couple of years

to terrible results because he was never playing. Now he is like must see TV. And he's, And nobody's watching. And nobody's watching. It's like it's not happening, except for the highlights. But he's, he's giving them reason.

Because I was thinking you should trade Zion if you're the Pelicans. But he's giving them reason. He's giving them just like he always does. Giving them just enough reason. They pull me back in. He always pulls you back in. Win healthy. Player that I load this week, I mean, this is the easiest thing ever.

For those that have not seen it, it was all over Instagram, was all over Twitter. It was all over any social media. The Terry Rosier low like. this week. And then that, bro, you can't have your name associated with gambling and then have these kind of low-life.

I thought the same thing. Every, every comment was like, okay, the feds have their case. Like, it was like, dude,

it was, the turnovers are, it really is like throwing the ball to the other team. It is like rolling it. One time you just rolled the ball away from, himself. I was like, what is this? Are you bowling? You can't have like that out there that like, hey man, does this guy shave points? Is this guy close? And then like you couldn't make a video. You couldn't have better low light to show. In fact, if you showed these low lights and then you

said, hey man, this is the guy that got tangled up in this. Like I should have to squint to be like, man, I don't know. I don't know. Like, if you showed somebody this, it's like too obvious. That's how it feels. It would be if I told you like, hey, man, this is the guy.

He was being investigated by the fence. You'd be like, that's ridiculous. It's entirely too obvious. Like, you can't just throw the ball to the other team. And he just kept doing it. And I was like, dude, this is. and the comments under are obviously beyond hysterical. I am making absolutely no accusations of Terry Rozier.

Of course. Yeah. I think he probably just thinks. And that was the Cavs game, right? Was the Cavs game? But, I want to say. But, dude, you can't have that on video. You can't have it on video.

You mean that bad for everybody to make the joke. No. It is bad. The feds have their case. and they were they were beating the caps like they had the the game like in hand bro he's like airball in threes front rimming him dribbling off his foot messy literally throwing it to the other team and you're watching it be like what is he doing what's seriously is it's like is you're starting to realize just how important Tyler hero is to that team it's like oh cherry rosier's like

oh wait I'm the guy now I'm supposed to I'm supposed to do what now It was pretty bad. Player you love. Player that I loathed, it's just so frustrated. Do you remember when like Bill Belichick took like a lacrosse player, was it Chris Hogan and made him like a slot receiver after they had like Wes Welker and Julian Edelman? It just felt like Bill Belichick was just getting like grocery store clerks and

turning them into like touchdown catching receivers in the NFL. That's exactly what the Celtics are doing. The player I loathe is Baylor's shirt. Shireman. This dude, last night, first we had Sam Bauer, Peyton Pritchard, Luke Cornyett, and now we got another dude Baylor Shireman. It just feels like the Celtics are taking mediocre white dudes and turning him into All-Stars. No, no. Just overnight. Look, this is such a big market thing, though. Look, Baylor Shireman was a great college basketball player for five years. If he was such a great

college basketball player, then why wasn't he? drafted. NIL, bro. He came back and probably got paid last year. Baylor Shireman was a really good college basketball player. He's older than Anthony Edwards by like a year. Oh, there's a bunch of these guys that are like that. He was in his NBA career, he was four for 24 going into last night's game. Last night's game, he had 15 points, three threes, and he was talking shit to the Sixers bench.

You got to give credit. Hey, Bill Simmons. Like, where do these guys come from? Before the draft, Bill Simmons called it out that that's the guy he wants with their pick in the first round. So he had to be going crazy. He wanted Baylor Shireman. He's like, this guy fits. I just want, Joe Mazzula is like probably the craziest coach in the NBA.

Just put out Bauer, Pritchard, Cornett, Shireman, and KP just to see what it looks like. I just want to see what it looks like. We didn't even mention Pritchard. My God. Oh, Pritcher, like, what a game. him and Derek White. I was going to make him the player that I love this week, but it's just like, I mean, God,

God. He is he most approved? I don't pay attention to like the most improved awards. No, he's six minutes of the year. He's going to run away with him. Sixth of the year. Yeah, and I should probably be most approved too. And I posted it the other night.

I mean, that was maybe the craziest trivia question ever, which was that Derek White and Peyton Pritchard became the first Boston Celtics. ever score 40. How is that possible? How did Bernie McHale never do that? How did Antoine Walker and Paul Pierce not do it? Like when they were, it's just, it's pretty shocking. And they've had Kyrie and they've had Kemba. They've had all kinds of guys that could have done. They have all kinds of tundoms that could have done it over the history

of the Celtics. That is just bizarre. Not the least of which are of course, Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown. You would have figured a game. They did it. Both of them. And also one more thing about Shireman. High school quarterback, senior year, 3,942 yards, 59 touchdowns. Oh, my God. And a state championship. Is that true? Yeah.

How tall is he? Wikipedia. How tall is he? 6-3, I'm guessing. No. Baylor Shireman? No. Yeah.

No way. Look it up. I am. He's probably listed at 6.5 and he's really 6.4. Listed at 6.6. Yeah. He's listed at 6.6. He's quarterback size.

He's a big kid. Yeah. Good for him. Anyway, he's the player I load because I just feel like the Celtics, just like, they just grab a white guy and all of a sudden he's hitting threes. Thing that I loved. Steph Curry and Grandma Kitty. So for those of you that are unaware, do you know about this? I did not, I saw it on the rundown,

I did not look it up because I wanted you to tell me for the first time on the podcast. So you need to watch this later today. There's a girl who's grandma, she went over to her house and then she filmed this. It's impromptu. You're right, it's not like a setup or something.

She filmed her grandma talking about, like she pulled out her phone. Once the grandma tells her, she said, I've got a Steph Curry notebook. And there's this grandma, grandma kitty, and she's in her living room like grandma would be. And she grabs her spiral notebook and she writes down everything.

She chronicles what Steph Curry has done when his next game is. They play Washington at 8.30 coming up. I've got that league pass. She watches every Steph Curry game and she absolutely loves Steph Curry and writes his chronicles it in a notebook, something that she really cares about. And she loves him. She loves him because she had read,

there was a magazine that she had, and she held up the magazine. And she said, I love him, and I started a love it. I read this article. And he said, I hope I inspire people around the world to just be themselves,

be humble and be grateful for all the blessings in your life. She emphasized the quote that said, that quote, and said, this is why I like him so. And so she had this article that she had loved him. So the thing goes viral on TikTok. I mean, it's the most heartwarming thing ever. It's this old lady who's got this notebook that she has where she writes down every game, what he did in the games, everything. And Curry sees it. He sees the TikTok video. And they reach out to Grandma Kitty. And he says, he posts, we'd love to have you and bring your book. And then he said, you don't have to watch on League Pass.

You could come watch in person. And they rolled her in, they put her on the front row. And Curry and her had this moment where he thanked her, gave her a warrior's grandma Kitty jersey. I mean, it is the most heartwarming thing. I mean, it is the most heartwarming thing. I mean, people can go look this up. It's unbelievable.

And the two met before the game. And he gave, she gave him a big hug. And he gave her a signed jersey with Grandma Kitty written on the back. Is he the most likable superstar in all of sports? It's not even close. I mean, it's like, I can't think of someone else whose cue score is so high, whose reputation is so flawless. It's unbelievable.

It's like, I'm looking for something wrong with Steph Kerr. I would love for him to just to have a slip up and make a mistake or something. Oh, wait, this is Thursday night. So this was the next. She saw the night night. It was Brooklyn. So it was Brooklyn. Oh, wow.

Yeah. So Grandma Kitty's here in New York. Yeah. Oh, God. You got to look it up. You got to look it up on TikTok. It's great. You know what?

I think we were wrong. I think we were wrong. We need to amend this podcast. We were talking about how Steph Curry has really captured the hearts and minds of the young generation. Maybe he's also captured the hearts and minds of the seniors, too. He's got Grandma Kitty. He's got everybody. Grandma Kitty.

Everybody loves him because she read that article and now watches every single one of his games and writes it down. It is so sweet because the granddaughter is the one that takes the video. And she's like, what do you have Grandma? And she's like, this is my Steph Curry notebook. And she's got to write down everything that he's done. She loves Steph Curry, loves him. I love Grandma Kitty so much. I know.

I got to leave this up later. It's great. God, that's the thing I love. Just to piggyback down that. The thing I love is like Grandma Kitty. It's nostalgic. And it is Saturday night Lakers Celtics game.

You know, someone who grew up in Massachusetts, I grew up a Celtics fan. I grew up a Larry Bird fan. So I was there for all of the bird magic stuff. And just watching the purple and gold and the green and white go head to head on a national TV game with Luca, LeBron, hopefully Tatum and Brown,

like just, just the colors, the pageantry, the history, the combined championships, the two teams peaking, both of them having championship aspirations, the defending champs, the brand new superstar, the storyline, the hype, the crowd, the world is going to stop. No plan Saturday night. We're watching this game. I am so excited for it. And just the idea that this is happening again, it feels a little bit like the finals.

between them where it's just like, it just feels bigger. It does. The Celtics and the Lakers. And that's not just because I grew up a Celtics fan. Across the board in the NBA, when you have the purple and gold against the green and white, it's just bigger and better. We got national TV game. The Super Bowl's over.

And it's the NBA saying these are the two biggest superstars in the West and one of the best teams in the East. And it's just the exact type of basketball game that I love to clear my schedule. tell my wife she's even though she's nine months pregnant she's putting the kids to bed because i will turn the volume up to 11 and i will have a diet coke and i will watch the shit out of this basketball game i'm going to say didn't you mention earlier that there's cabs bucks as well yeah i mean it's a big day lit it'll be lit big day yeah really good big day for the eastern conference top of the eastern conference yeah really good all right thing that i load this week i mean

this goes without saying. Draymond Green accusing Cat of ducking Jimmy Butler when it turns out Cat was at a funeral. I mean, this is obviously terrible. It's a terrible thing to do and say you heard this. I heard that cats just ducking him, right?

People are saying or something. Jimmy said that. Jimmy said that. He said I heard, right? Jimmy said, you heard from Jimmy. And then goes on this podcast and says it. which, look, we've all had regrettable things that we have said or whatever in the past, or maybe stories that we've passed along that we shouldn't, right?

Of course. How you deal with that in that moment tells me what I need to know about you. And I know that Draymond has been effusive in his praise in the new media. Well, if this is the new media, allow me to give one quick lesson. when it comes out that this guy was at a funeral because someone close to him and his girlfriend passed, you just have to apologize. That's it.

People will accept it. And they will say, hey, man, I did not know that that's what he was going through. I feel terrible that I said he was duck and Jimmy, especially now hearing what I've heard. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I feel bad and I feel badly that I put that out there, especially given the circumstances. Instead, he goes to the podium, is asked about it, and he's like, yeah, that's what I heard. Like, I'm sorry, you know, I mean, you know, it's always hard when people die in your life and having to go to funerals or whatever, but like that is what I heard.

Like, bro, you don't get to stand by what you heard when what you heard was wrong. That's interesting. You don't get to stand by what you heard when what you heard, What's wrong? That's a good point because it's not, to me, it's not him saying in the first place because he doesn't, he doesn't know the scenarios.

It's not what you do. It's how you do it. And when you make that mistake, because you don't know why Kat wasn't there, it's a little mysterious. It's called quote unquote personal reasons. Who knows what that is. But when it does come out, and again, I can't confirm this. And apparently it was a friend of his girlfriend that passed away and he had to go, I don't

know the details. And so I can't confirm that. But that is what I've heard. And when you hear that in your Draymond Green and you've said what you're, said it's it's very easy just to apologize and say i didn't other circumstances when i said that i apologize to cat and i wish the best for him and his loved ones that's easy it also it's easy again because it doesn't matter what you heard if what you heard was wrong right i mean i can say oh uh jane daniels ain't playing against the cowboys this week because he's scared of michael parsons

and then they say daniels has got a torn calf well like you know what i mean Yes. It's wrong, bro. Like, it's not that he's scared to jail, that he's scared to Michael Parsons. Like, this guy's actually, like, hurt. Like, there's a real reason why he's not there. And so once that becomes applicable,

then you've got to come out. You can't just say that's what I heard. That's not. Here's old media talking to new media. Just because you heard something doesn't mean that you're allowed to spread it if it's wrong. Oh, God. I have to share something. Unless you want people.

to roll their eyes and be like, bro, what's wrong with you? I totally forgot about this. I have to share something with you. My mom, this is a quote on, because you call yourself new media. Here's a quote from a text from my mom. I love you, mom. She doesn't listen to the pod. Quote, how are you doing?

I see you are still doing the food news podcast and have a regular online sports conversation with a young guy on Instagram. Yeah. Yeah. Victoria Dowling loves a little Chris Vernon. Yeah, that's you. You're a young guy on Instagram. Young guy on Instagram.

I love that. Young guy on Instagram, young media. The final thing that I love this week, and this is, I just couldn't believe this is real. This is like one of those NBA Cental things where you're like, is this real, but I've confirmed that this is real. This is a quote from Jeannie Bus. We all know who that is.

Quote. I can't say. I think this is real. real. Quote, Anthony Davis was complaining about where he was being played and he wasn't happy. So I think this was a positive for both teams. They got what they were looking for. We got what we were looking for.

Gd. Bus, are you trying to tell me that you traded Anthony Davis for Luca Dodgers because Anthony Davis was complaining about playing center? Like that had anything to do with it? You're really trying to tell me. that you're doing Anthony Davis a favor by trading him to the Mavericks for Luca Donchich that you think that both sides ended up happy?

If you're a Mavs fan and you read this, you're like, oh, you think we got what we were looking for? Do you think we were looking for this? We were looking for this? We were looking for Luca to be dropping triple doubles in the purple and gold. We're looking for Quentin Grimes to be scoring 40 points for the Sixers.

We're looking for Kyrie. a timeline to come back like next December. That's what we're looking for. A tank so we can keep our pick again with no future. Do you think that's what the, that's a mutually beneficial trade that you're doing Anthony Davis a favor? This to me, I swear this is a real quote. I was shocked by this.

If you're Jeannie Bus and and you, you got Luca Donchitz for 20 cents on the dollar, just keep your mouth shut and watch the games. You know what I mean? Because you're not making it any better for anybody involved. I'll tell you this. I can't imagine how everybody at the Lakers facility is just bouncing around every single day, how every time they get into the office,

they just start laughing hysterically to themselves. I mean, just knowing they have solidified a franchise for 10 years. Like, you just never get to do that. Like, you know you're going to be good forever. Right. Let me, let me, let's, let's, that's the feeling. It's just, they've just got to be euphoric every single day. Do you hear Brian Anderson, who I love, by the way, I love Brian Anderson on TNT?

He was calling the Knicks, uh, uh, Lakers game last night. And at one point in the fourth quarter overtime, he like, in a, in a moment of downtime, he's like, I still can't believe Luke Dodgers. Everybody feels like that. And he's like, yeah. And I was like, bro, you really just said what everybody else is thinking as we're watching this. Like how is happening? If you're Anthony Davis and you see this quote from Jeannie Bust, you're like, what, Jeannie?

What? Like, I wanted you to get Vucevic. I don't want to get traded to the Mavericks so I could play next to Hurt Lively and Hurt Gafford. That wasn't the plan. So here's my question for you to finish the pod because I started feeling this this week. Kyrie Irman goes down, lively's not coming back. Gabbard's hurt. Anthony Davis is hurt.

You're looking at this roster that they're rolling out. They have no ball handling. They have no centers. They have no chance. Don't do this. They're completely just fall apart. Don't do this. Look, literally last week, I did this about Fox.

I'm doing this. And then Fox hit a game winner. You know Memphis is played Dallas tonight. No. Stop. Stop talking about how bad they are. That's not what I'm doing. I promise people I would not talk about how bad whoever the next opponent was.

It's not what I'm doing. It's not what I'm doing. Stand down. Just like Anthony Davis told former president Barack Obama is there was a part of me that was like. Anthony Edwards, not Anthony Edwards. Anthony Edwards. Anthony Davis did not say that. Anthony Davis told Jeannie Bussey wanted to play center. There was a part of me like in my heart, I was like,

I feel really bad for Nico Harrison. And I'm not saying Nico Harrison should have made the trade. But this wasn't the plan. Like the plan was the trade for Anthony Davis, have a great defense, had this long. long team, maybe win a playoff round and then make some tweaks in the offseason and have a plan moving forward that does involve Lucas Dundges. Because right now, everything has completely gone to shit. It's not his fault, Anthony Davis got hurt.

It's not his fault that Kyrie Irvin got hurt. He'll bad for him. And now everybody hates him. They were chanting Fire Nico at like a hockey game yesterday. You want to bet, you want to make a bet right now? Let's make a bet right now. Within three years, Nico Harrison works for the Lakers. No chance.

Yep. No chance. Yep. No chance. If Nico Harrison cash the check with a Laker logo on it, that's what I say. I don't believe it. Then you know what?

Maybe there is a script and everything is ranked. If Nico Harrison cashes a check with a Laker logo on it, that is, that is going, you're going full tin hat, conspiracy theory on this one. I love it. It's going to be like what John Cena kick Cody Rhodes after the Rock told him to. I thought that was Travis Scott. I didn't see it. Travis Scott jumped in at the end.

Okay, good, good, good, good, good. Travis Scott. I feel bad for Nico Harrison. What do you want me to say? I feel bad for him. In fact, it was one of the sensations last night where I'm watching Luca Dodgers get the switch onto Carl Towns and hit these step back threes and then go down the other way and Jalen Brunson's getting and ones and is yelling and high-fiving with Spike Lee

and all that crap. And I'm like, this guy got rid of both of them. Both of them. Both of them. They were both maps. This is crazy. Quinn drives at 40. Luca and Jaila Brunson are like going tit for tat in this huge high profile game.

Two of the best 10 players in the world. this season and you had both of them. I feel bad for him. I feel bad for him. I feel bad for him. Did he dig this grave? Yes. He's lying in it.

But the Kyrie injury and the AD injury, it's just tough. He's just like at some point, he's got to, he's got to be like, man, this was not. This, this, this, this, there's a couple of these things, like the Luca trade, I actively participated in, but these injuries I did not. And this three to four year window that he put out there. closed closed absolutely closed all right well they're going to beat the grislies you have that to look forward to you you you son of a bitch all right thank you to our executive producer jessie lopez as always you're going to go bet on the chrisons spencer dinwiddie uh we'll talk to you next week