The Mismatch - Sabonis Appreciation, Bleak Lakers, Wemby’s Poor Shooting, and Why Booing Is Fun

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

Verno and Jacoby open up the show by discussing Tyrese Maxey’s injury (01:12) and the abundance of injuries that have already occurred in the league before diving into this week’s loved and loathed teams (10:23), players (35:20), and things (56:43).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 Producer: Jessie Lopez Social: Keith Fujimoto Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up everybody. It's Austin Rivers here and we are back for another season of OffGuard. Me and my guy, Pasha Giggy, are hitting your podcast feeds every Monday and Thursday talking everything hoops. Austin is bringing that 11-year NBA veteran perspective and of course keeping you guys entertained throughout the season. Make sure you tap into OffGard with Austin Rivers on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And don't forget to follow everything we've got going on social media. The OffGar podcast, Ringer NBA, and of course check us out on Ringer NBA's YouTube channel. Welcome to the mismatch. I'm Chris Vernon and joining me as he does every week from Theringer.com is Dave Jacoby. Jacoby!

What's happening, Vernon? It was Friday. Yeah, we didn't have that busy of a week in the NBA by virtue of election night being on Tuesday night. And there were no games that night. And so most teams just played a couple of games, but we certainly had enough to love and loathe the week that was. Before we get into everything that we loved and loathed throughout the week... A special loathe at the very top for the injuries that have hit us this week because good grief. We have had, you know, we're waiting C's, hopefully, everything's going to be fine as the weeks go on with two top picks a couple of years ago and John Morant and Zion Williamson. We know for sure we had already done last week where we lost Paulo.

This week, we got the news that Tyrese Maxie is going to be gone for. a long time. And while Embed, we finally have a date on his return. Maxi is going to be out for an extended amount of time. And as we've said many, many times with any of these soft tissue things, it's virtually never sooner than they say and almost always longer than they say. It's just very hard to trust. And so Maxie got some bad news. We also had Aaron Gordon get bad news. We get bad news. He's going to be out for an extended amount of time with Denver. AD got banged up this week. I went to a Memphis Lakers game that he was not available in,

and it gets pretty bleak when he's not in that lineup. And so here's hoping that as these weeks go on, we're not seeing one of these every week. We know that injuries can dictate the outcomes of not only, regular seasons, but certainly by the time we get to the playoffs, it's a war of attrition, but geez, Louise, it feels like we just started. We're just 10 games into this season, and we've got some big names already down for extended amounts of time, which is no, and these guys too, right? Everybody now is trying to hit the 65 games, and it puts those

in peril for some of these guys, for sure. I mean, we discussed the Palo one at length, which is the most devastating because he does so much for that magic. team. But when you look at the maxi injury and the Embed suspension and Paul George just coming back, you just have to wonder how many games are these three going to play together? Like it feels a little bit like the Brooklyn Big Three. It's like, when are we going to see all three of them on the court at once? Because when you have, like I always say like the odds, the one three, five, they've got a superstar at the one three and five. And I want to see them together. And it does make me think a little bit back to the Knicks postseason last year when everyone's saying, oh, Tibbs is playing in too many minutes.

and everybody gets hurt, but the injuries weren't exactly sort of like fatigue-based injuries, but you wonder if the workload that Maxie had to take on night after night, because PG and Embed weren't available, has something to do with this injury. You have to wonder that. It's fair. I mean, he was leading the league in minutes when this happened. And obviously, there's no night that he can just kind of set it up for everybody else. No.

He has to go big every single night. And so it's a lot of minutes and a lot of pressure on his plate. Clearly, he didn't have enough to be able to do it all by himself. And now you have to wonder, this is a team that we certainly looked at it at the beginning of the season. And we said, this is one of the ones that, okay, you can always have this caveat of if they're healthy. But we always at the beginning of the season assume health. And if we assume health, this is certainly our. on the short list of title contenders,

it now, you're in real peril of being way behind the eight ball, like they were last year. They were seven seed last year. And then you're having to play on the road. First, you're having to play your way in, and you might just catch a team on a heater on a given night.

Then once you get in, you're playing on the road the rest of the time, which is very, very difficult to do, very difficult to do. And that's if you're healthy by that time and your guys are able to play. Because here's the other thing we know, Jacoby. The beginning, it's all spaced out, which this has always seemed a little backwards to me, but whatever. It's all spaced out at the beginning.

Then we get to the playoffs and these guys are playing every other day. So it's like not only the games come one after another, it now puts that pressure. it's even more pressure to be able to stay healthy throughout a playoff run when you're playing more games in a short amount of time than you typically are. And so that was always going to be the question, but damn, man, they can't even make it to the

through the first month of the regular season. This was a question we thought we were going to be talking about in April and May. We're talking about it in November. Brutal. Remembering being saying that he wanted to be healthy for the playoffs and he was focused on championships and not individual awards and all of that. Well, man, like, is he even going to be ready after the suspension?

I assume so. And the other thing, Jacoby, he gave them because of their crazy record when he did play last year, he gave them breathing room even last year to be able to still just get in the mix and try to be as healthy as we can. This year that doesn't exist. Like they're going to need him in order to win games at all. Oh, yeah. At all.

I didn't expect to see this much Andre Drummond in my life. I did not. Neither did he, obviously. If you've seen Andre Drummond, he didn't expect this either. He should have gotten more money. Buddy. Funny. All right.

Things that we loved and load throughout this past. And be a week. Hold on, Verno, before we get to that, oh, there's something that we need to address. Do you know the player in the National Basketball Association

that has the highest true shooting percentage, 79.6 true shooting percentage. Zach Eady. Nope. Close. All he does is dunk. Jay Huff. Oh,

Jay Huff. The backup center. Huff Hive is here. For all of your Huff Huff Huff Huff. Huff dates come to the mismatch. We will give you Huff dates. But let me tell you, to have the highest true shooting percentage and to shoot from the outside like Huff does is pretty impressive.

It's pretty impressive. Small sample size, fair, but still, the highest true shooting percentage in the National Basketball Association, Jay Huff. Here's your Huff date. And big revenge for him against Los Angeles earlier this week, a team that discarded him, and now he has made a home. had 11 points in about two minutes, came in, knocked down three threes,

and then had a put back reverse dunk. Put back reverse. Oh, he only reversed dunks. What? He never dunks facing the basket. It's the craziest thing you've ever seen. Go watch his dunks. They're all reversed dugs.

It's the craziest thing. I feel like in the 90s, we saw a lot more reverse dunks in game action, and we just don't see it anymore. You don't see reverse dunks anymore. No, he like virtually only reverses. I would say 90% of his dunks this year are reverse dunks. He's the craziest player ever.

And there's this big article locally today about, you know, he's so proud of his wife. And he said he had no game in college, but he saw her and she was six two. And finally they ended up talking. And they've been, and then two years later they got married. And now he's moved her all over the country, you know, with. this whole pursuit of, you know, the G League stuff and he's playing Summer League for Utah and then he's doing this and then he's doing that. And he's like, but I want to highlight her. And he's like, she's an amazing artist. And she has like this art website and guess what else she does? She does

custom shoes. So if you ever, if you ever see him, he wears, watch next time you see him come into a game, look at whatever shoes he's wearing. Because a lot of times. he'll wear she paints shoes and she's done them now yeah and like the words got out and she's done him for NBA players and stuff it was a cool article because I was like how cool is that he's why yeah I did not spend this level of detail on the Huff date how crazy is that he's the world's most interesting man he's they called the hoonicorn because he played it because he played in Virginia he only reversed dunks and shoots threes and his wife It's custom, like Air Force ones.

It's awesome. I love them. The whole thing is awesome. I love them. Now that we got the Huff data out of the way we can get into it. All right. You want to start or do you want me to? You start.

All right. We're going to go team first. Yep. Okay. I want to go ahead and set this aside real quickly and give my honor. I'm going to get the honorable mention out of the way. Okay. Because there's somebody that I was going to choose, which is the Phoenix Suns.

They've made me look. good at the beginning of the season with my prediction for them. Booker hasn't even gotten going at a high rate yet. And Duran has been off the chart. Beal has been very efficient so far of the six games that he's played. It looks like they've got a direct hit on Dunn, a guy that is already a viable, efficient rotation player for them. Defensive, defensive player.

Offensively, he hasn't exactly popped off the screen. but defensively he is, he's a stopper. And you know, where you have Beal, Booker, and Katie on your team, you're fine on offense. And the Tyos Jones thing has been exactly what I thought it would be. And so a lot of it, last year they were by far the worst fourth quarter team in the entire NBA. If you got them in a close game going into the fourth quarter, you were winning the game. And it seems like there's been a sea change with that. And they look very, very good.

So I did want to at least mention them because I'm going with Sacramento. So we covered it earlier. Yeah. We talked, and here's why. Because on Tuesday's show, I went out of my way, after this is the Miami game winner, I went out of my way to highlight Subonis. And I said, this guy might be the most underappreciated. You know, people ding him because I guess it's just not, it's not that exciting.

He's not a highlight factory by any means. Not at all. But then he backs me up. And I said, you go look at his game walk. guy is never bad. It's the craziest thing. He like never has these bad games. And so then I go on and what does he do, Jacoby? Now, he might have been, he should have been my player, but he couldn't get the player vote this week. So I'm making them my team. But it's on the back of Sabonis because he turns around after we do that show and has 17 points, 11 rebounds, 13 assists on 6 of 6 shooting and becomes the only player in NBA history to have a triple. double with no turnovers and no missed shots in a game.

Now, they started the season by, they lost by two to Minnesota and they lost by four to the Lakers. Great, great game. Their only other game that they've lost was the Drake Intimidation game as he was standing there in his oversized court code the night that they did the whole Vince Carter deal, right? That was like, but their losses are two, three, and four. And then this week, they had the game winner against Miami on the putback after

Hero got the stop against DeRosen at the end. And then got it back in blood against Toronto. And Subonis had that huge game. And so I think they're just one to pay attention to. They dropped those two early ones, but they were, they haven't played. nobody's run them out yet. Now, I may be, I may be jinksing them, but your losses are two, three, and four. And you've got a guy part of why they're consistently good every night is because they've got this guy that is consistently good every night.

And man, when you're watching them, like, close that gang even against Miami earlier in the week, it's like, geez, you got two better. You got two guys that are better options than what? 90% of the league to give the ball to at least. You want to talk about guys that can get their own shot. They got a little tweaking to do probably. Probably going to need a little more size. But I like that Sacramento team. And I think they're back to, you know, everybody was all part of that,

like the Beam team a couple years ago. Then I think people kind of got bored with them last year. But they're a consistently fun watch. And so I'm putting them in. Like, if I want to watch a fun basketball game, I like the way they play. And I like the players that they've got. A monk comes off the bench and can get on a heat or whatever.

Yeah, I mean, I like, I just like that team. And I think it's, they're for bang for the buck. I feel like I can tune them in and it's, and I'm going to enjoy it. You are. And they're in close games all the time. And the sub bonus performance was so impressive to me. To have, to not miss a shot, that happens, but to have 13 assists and zero turnovers. Crazy.

I mean, to be a big and have 13 assists. And this is regular for him. Like, he gets assists. He's a playmaker and he's a shot maker. And he, it's just, it's never fancy. It's never a highlight. John Morant's going to be the most popular, most viewed player on Twitter. And for good reason.

You won't see Sabonis on there. but you'll see the stateline. And to have no turnovers in 13 assists is just so impressive. It's, it's, they're, they're going to be a playoff team, and they're going to be a very tough out. And they've just sort of, it's broken bad for them the last couple of playoffs, which is that why I think people sort of discredit them and overlook them. But they're a very good team.

I mean, they just got done in by the, one of the greatest Curry performances ever. Yeah. And Fox's hand was all screwed up. by the time they got to that point. Yeah, that's a good point. But that was a great series, too. That was a fun series to watch that Warriors Kings a few years ago. So I'm glad you brought up the Curry performance.

If you were to tell me, my team that I love this week is, it's obvious. It's right there. It is the Golden State Warriors. And if you were to tell me that the Golden State Warriors would have the best record in the Western Conference, tied, obviously, at this point, and Curry would miss three games, and that they beat the Celtics, the way they beat the Celtics, and it wasn't just a Steph Curry thing. That is what's been so impressive to me about this start for the Warriors

is what they've done without Curry. And with Curry, he's not scoring 45 points. He's not scoring 35 points. This is a team effort, and their bench has been so impressive. Obviously, a lot has been covered about Steve Kerr playing 79 players a night, which is fine or whatever, but, like, what they're getting from page, what they're getting from slow-mo and what they get from Chavano. Chavano has been so important for them.

I mean, they're going to have to start Chivano at some point. Like, they absolutely do. But they have the second best defense in obviously rating and the third offense. Their offense is 120 points per 100 possessions. And it's not just Steph Curry standing on his head. And I think their defense is so good. And I hate to say it is because they don't have Chris Paul and Clay Thompson. They've got

young athletic defenders. And Lutie's been playing well as well. Like I've just been this is the team that has outplayed my expectations for them more than any other team so far this year. There's no question. They have outplayed expectations thus far

and you know they've even had some guys like they're going to get Melton back in the mix who's also an outstanding defender and can certainly give you some minutes off the bench. I mean they're playing all these guys. So many guys that are getting 15 minutes a game for them. And the defense has been the most impressive by far.

Really? The other thing is, you go back in time. I remember there was this baseball team years ago, and I brought on this baseball analyst on my show, and he was talking to me, and he was like, you know, I was like, why is this team good? I can't even remember who it was anymore. And he was like, they don't have anybody that sucks.

And it stuck with me. And then I started talking about it on this show. And I was like, you know, sometimes it can be so, so, how many guys do you have to play somebody that sucks? Do you? And not only do they not have anybody that sucks, they've got 13 that are good. Yeah. Like if you said, who sucks? There's no answer with the Warriors.

And so I have, I start to wonder, is this kind of like, Are we seeing the new money ball, right? In this age where guys are getting paid $50, $60, $80 million, right? And then you don't have any choice if you've got the mega superstars than to have some players that suck. And then you got to play them and then it costs you. Yeah. And it's like, all right. They decided not to pay Clay.

They've got, you know, Drayman's not making $100 billion. Obviously, you've got the one guy. And it's not like, look, they're going to be luxury team and they've got to still pay out a lot of money. But the way they built it rather than is it better to have one super awesome guy or sometimes it might be five. It might be six guys that you could have instead, right? Yeah. Would you rather have Paul George or the entire Golden State bench? Right?

Like that's the choices now. Probably the goal state bench. these are the choices that are being made. It's something they keep a tabs on. A stat I love is assist per game. They've got third an assist per game. They're shooting 40% from three. And I got obsessed with this Chavano thing.

So I did a little research. I saw an interview with Chavano. Buddy Hill's name is Chavano. So I'm calling him Chavano from here and out. I saw an interview with his mom. Jackie Swan, her name is. I love his mom so much. She was in the kitchen doing the interview.

And I know whatever. she cooks is good. Do you know Chavano's siblings' names? I'm going to tell you what Chavano's siblings' names are. Please. Jackie was just getting started with Chavano. Chavez, Pepper, Janaya, Kervin, Vesey, Ney, and Coco. I mean, what a family. That's amazing. I respect it. I respect it. I love it so much. I mean, Curvin, I've never heard of anyone named curvin before. Chavano and curvin and pepper. Pepper and Neyne. I love it so much. I love the Healed family so much. I'm all in on Chivano this year. I respect it. You know, years ago, there was this player at a, I used to do this bit where it was the college football players, like all

name team. And there was a guy that played at Cincinnati, and his name was Silverberry Mujan. Right? And I was like, Silverberry. Silverberry. And they were like, yeah. And his brother's on the team too. And I was like, oh, I can't wait. What's his brother's name? Kevin.

So I respect this. I respect Buddy Heald's family. She just went all out with all of them. All of them. I was like, I was like, you know, imagine being Kevin Mu?

I'd be like, hey, there's my brother, Silverberry. Silverberry. Yeah. Silverberry and Kevin. My wife is pregnant, so Silverberry's going on the list.

There you go. Silverberry Jacoby. Silverberry Jacoby. It's going on the list. I like pepper. Pepper is good. Curvin I love. And V-E-Z-Y-V-Z-Y V-Z-E.

This is great names. On a quick side note, how did you do your kids' names? How much say did you have in kids' names? It's a collaborative effort. Collaborative effort. It was. Yeah. But we have a Margo.

We have a Margo, right? and my wife is named Joey, but it's really joie. It's like French. Oh, she's not French, but whatever. So Margo was, not at all, she's Jamaican. But it was Margo was M-A-R-G-E-A-U-X. And the nurse at the hospital, the nurse at the hospital was like, oh, and here's Margeo-O-O-Rex. From Baton Rouge.

Yeah, yeah. You did the Louisiana? Mar-Gi-Ox. And then I went to my wife and I was like, listen, you can have the OT. but we got to kill this E-A-U-X stuff. She was on drugs at the point, so she was like, fine, whatever. Oh, you won? I won. I didn't win. I never win, but it was a compromise.

You switched. You got it, you were really going to go with G-E-O. You saved that girl. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because no one would ever spell that that way. No, for the rest of life. Yeah, yeah, exactly. She would just have a misspelled name forever.

All right, fair enough. team we loathed what do you got I'm going balls what's the point yeah what the hell's the point what's the point it's a great way to start

what's the point what are we doing what are we doing like usually if you suck at least you got a rookie I can watch they finally put Bozellis in this week

yeah they finally did and then he I mean you know of course they're getting trucked but he's got it's a couple three it's three threes he gets you 13 and nine um and then you know played a little bit earlier in the week but i mean like we finally got to see him a couple of times so it's like at least if you're

going to be bad let me see your rookie so that i could check that out but it's like this collection of players and then the damnedest thing which um watching them uh the other night was how is at your bench like i don't understand we were just lauding the warriors for their bench. And as I'm watching them the other night, it's like, bro, Taylin Horton Tucker, Bozellis, Dalen Terry, Jalen Smith, Julian Phillips. I'm like, how is this your bow?

You don't even have, you're not good. And then that these are the five guys that come off the bench. Just I don't, there's some of these teams that just suck. And you understand. It's like Ace Bailey, Cooper Flats. And like, I don't, I don't get it. I don't get it. What are you?

What are we doing? What are we doing? Are we trying to lose? Are we not trying to wait? Are we going to be good? Are we going to be bad? What are we doing? We put it on a show.

We play in young people. We're developing people. Like, what are we doing? Who are we building around? Who are you building around the Bulls? Like, if you look at a team like, like, the Hornets, you're like, all right, we're building around La Mello, Brandon Miller. We've got, we've got, like, a future.

Even we talked about the Nets earlier this week. They've got a ton of picks. Like, all right, they're going to bring in some rookies. But like, who are the Bulls building around? You know what it reminds me of? It reminds me of like in a couple of years if we get a team in Las Vegas and then they were just like, all right, you can protect X number of players on your team. And this is like, it reminds me of an expansion. Everyone's fourth best player.

Yeah. Yeah. And it doesn't make any sense for them all to be together. But it's like, hey, you know what, Kobe White's good. And Nicola Vlozvich is good. and, you know, Pat Williams can play and kind of like Josh Giddy and it's like, but none of it makes sense together.

Yeah, on other teams, they're like the, they start, but they're like the fifth option. Do you know why I have a problem with Kobe White? I love his game. I love the leaf that he took last year. Do you don't have a problem with him? Staying with the name theme today. Do you know what his first name is?

Do you know what his first name is? Silverberry. You're right. How'd you know? Kobe White's first name is Jacoby. No. And he goes by Kobe. I just feel like as a Jacoby, I just feel like that's, that's blasphemous.

Do you know any- Take out the first syllable? Do you know any other Jacobes? No. No. Right? There's one in the NFL, right? Yeah, I think so. He's still around.

Jacobi, he was on the Patriots, right? Well, Jacoby Perci. Oh, yeah, Jacob Percet, of course, yeah. I always root for Jacoby's, big Jacoby fan. Not many, though. A very rare name that I think you should stick with, and obviously you feel like he's a traitor. He's a traitor to the day.

Yes, exactly. I just feel like if your name is Jacoby, you don't go by Jacobi, like, whatever you're even doing. So I can never root for him. Team that I load this week, and I really want to talk to you about this. I'm not going to get on my soapbox on this one. I want to talk to you about this.

Los Angeles Lakers. Oh, you loath them? I love them. It was the Pistons loss. was excusable on the road Ivy hits a big shots your guy it was like okay but then I expected them

to get on the plane and go to Memphis and absolutely dominate the Grizzlies like I really thought this was going to be a get-right game for them I understand that the Anthony Davis wasn't available that's fine but I really thought they would dominate the Grizzlies I expected that to happen and you were in the

building. The second they announced no AD. I get it, but they didn't, they did, there was no fight. There was no energy. There was no effort. There was no nothing. They didn't go on a run. The Grizzlies, I bet they, I don't even have to like look up, look at the logs.

I bet the Grizzlies didn't even call a time out the entire game. I swear to God, they didn't call a single time out. Well, they didn't, their coach wasn't even there. He was, uh, Taylor Jenkins was dealing with a death in the family, thoughts with him. But so they had, uh, Tumas is their new assistant who is the European Wonderkin and he was coaching the team so I don't think you know what I don't know if they did take a time out or not but they announced it that you know right before the game

that there was going to be no Anthony Davis and there was going to be no Rui Hachamura and buddy it gets bleak without them you say no fight whatever what was weird about this one was that was the most expensive effort and most like, most fight to, like, throw a team on his back that I've seen in person from LeBron in a non-playoff game in a long, long time. Like usually he just kind of goes through the motions. If the game's close, then I'll try to turn up in the fourth. But it is, he has been kind of in this mode many times when I've seen him in the regular

season, which is, what is the least I can do and still win this game? Which is understandable. He's in his 22nd year in the league, right? But if you watch it, you watch it. And it's like, hey, I'll guard the shitty guy they're putting in the corner. Let's let me stand over here. This dude was engaged. This guy was talking.

This guy was trying to bully ball every single player on the roster. This guy was talking back and forth with Morant and they were going at it. and he just didn't have anybody come along for the ride with him. It was weird. And obviously, Reddick, you know, trashed Delo after the game. And, you know, after he didn't go back to him, he said, reverted back to the habits and we've talked about this. You know, there's no, you know, the level of compete. I think was the choice he, the word he used.

If you look at it from a franchise standpoint, Deelow is a player that you could potentially put into a trade. to bring somebody in, they'll help. And that's not helping his trade value. And one of the things about this team that I was looking at their roster and I was watching that game, and I said, who on this, who on this roster, A.D. aside, can get you a stop. Who can get you a stop? Name a player.

Name a player in the roster that'll get you a stop. He cleans up everything. I mean, he is, not only is he leading the NBA in scoring, I feel like he's the biggest defensive deterrent there is. outside of possibly a Wembenyama. But I think guys will go at Wembe, and they will go at Gobert. Maybe they might be even more likely to go at them, right?

This is a guy that switches out on everybody on the perimeter. And again, I'm not here to be smirk to other guys. I'm just saying that's how great I think Davis is as a two-way player right now, and he's truly at peak of powers. Because he's strong as an ox now, too, right? So you can see guys. try to take somebody off the dribble, look up, and be like, okay, kick out. Right, I'm not going.

I'm not going for this. In the absence of him, boy, it gets bleak, Jacoby. It sure does. Without him, they go from being a really good team that could compete with anybody with him, to awful. Very quickly. And so they've got the Sixers tonight, the Raptors, and then the Grizzlies again. And I think these are three games. I mean, in theory, those should be wins.

With no maxi, with the Raptors being the Raptors, and the Grizzlies at home, those should be three wins, and I think they'd be lucky to get two of them. In the absence of AD, they're going to be lucky to get wins. One, honestly. So that's the team that I load. And I just feel like, you know, it was just a week ago, we were excited about their start.

You know, they beat the Bull, they beat the Wolves, they beat the Suns, they beat the Kings, your Kings. And then, you know, they lost to the Suns, It's all AD contingent. It really is. Because otherwise you can, I mean, I saw maybe the worst of Dalton Connect. That was crazy. He was so bad, Jacoby, so bad.

Everybody aside from LeBron was bad. Everybody. Oh, yeah, Reeves couldn't hit a three. You know, Russell wasn't trying. It was just, yeah. It was a mess. Hey, hey, I knew one thing, though, when I went to that game. Would you know?

I said, if I get to see Yuki Kawamura versus Brony James, this game either went unbelievably well or horribly bad. Is there a more lovable player in the National Basketball Association than Yuki? No. There isn't. There just isn't. It's not even close. They got to start them.

You would, if you walked up on him, you wouldn't believe. it. That's how little he is. Really? Yes. Shocking. It's shocking. Love Yuki. King of Japan, bro. The mismatch is brought to you by Fandul. Make your first NBA bet a swish with Fandul.

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Oh, yeah. I got disassociate myself from your takes. Yeah, yeah. Fair, it's fair. But I'm not letting you disassociate from this one. Apologize to Russell Westbrook. Oh, God. Apologize.

I will not. I will not. 50 points in two games. 16 of 25 from the field. The beacon of. of efficiency. 12 rebounds, 12 assists

takes down the undefeated Oklahoma City Thunder. Four of nine from three, his best Chavano healed impression. It was something. West is on fire.

Russell Westbrook has been putting a starting line. They are three at all with Westbrook as a starter. And while everybody was dumping on him, saying he should go to China, saying he was done, saying Yokic is a boob for wanting him. Look, I take my opportunities when I get him. I understand I might not get this opportunity again. But for right now, this is a day. This is a day. And Russell Westbrook

deserves respect and adulation. I don't think. you'll get too many opportunities. But did you see the possession? I think it was Dort was covering him. And just left him all alone on the right wing for three. Just all alone. Russell Westbrook looked right at him, rose up, swish. And one of the big stories about the Nuggets,

especially when they were struggling, was the non-yokic minutes. And Westbrook was brought in to kind of spell that. Early on the season didn't look like it was working, but it worked against the thunder. It worked. and there's a little chemistry between those two, too. A little Yokic-Westberg chemistry.

He ain't done yet. I am firmly in the, you will not have an opportunity to do this again for the rest of the season camp. This is an anomaly. Enjoy it, enjoy it. This is your day. I took my opportunity to do the Hornets a couple weeks ago.

Again, I'm taking my chances when I can. The player that I loved. And again, this is a little bit chalk. it's one of the stories of the season. It makes you wonder if things went differently last year where this team and this player would be in our minds and it's Darius Garland for the undefeated Cavs.

Because remember two years ago? It was All-Star trajectory. And then last year was just, you know, we all know what happened. But, yeah, he just wasn't right. But he has played so well. And with him and Mitchell together, they had a lot of trouble in the non-Mitchell minutes last season.

This year, with Garland Inn and Mitchell out, they're plus 13.9 net. The Atkinson diet, Jacoby. The Atkinson diet looks so good on Garland, who famously lost a bunch of weight because his jaw was broken. He had to drink all of his meals. Through the wire. Yes.

Garland has, it does make me, I kind of like, sometimes when a player has a season like they had last year, you sort of forget about them. And they lose value in your mind. And then Garland is reminding me where he was before last season. And him and Mitchell together, I mean, are they the best back court in the league? It's impossible to argue against them right now.

Yeah. I mean, I just love what I've seen from Garland and Mitchell. And it gives Mitchell an opportunity. Because remember the playoffs, Mitchell had to score 45 a game for them to get a win? You know what I mean? Like Mitchell just had to absolutely stand on his head for them to get a win. And now it feels like Garland can share the load with Mitchell and makes both of them better. Well, kudos to their management, right?

Because you had a whole chorus of people saying, yo, these guys are all really good, but there's too much overlap. There's too much overlap, right? You can't have Mitchell and Garland. And you can't have Allen and Mowgli. And they said, you know what? How about this? We like having a lot of talent.

Now we're going to find, maybe get a different set of eyes on them. We'll get us a, we'll get a different coach. And we're going to see, let's see if this guy can maximize these guys. Let's see what he can do with them. And right now, the reviews are unbelievable. Unbelievable. That's a hard part to get them all simultaneously. That was always the question.

Can you get the best of them if they're on the same teams? Right? Like, you could probably get the best to Jared Allen if he's on a, if he's not standing next to Evan Mobley and vice versa. And the same thing goes with, uh, with Garland and, uh,

and Mitchell. And at least there was some level of conviction because they resigned all of them. They resigned all of them. They gave them all contracts. And that, and it got dark at the end of last season. The whole story like, Mobley never wanted them to draft him anyway.

And, and Donovan Mitchell's going to be, uh, you know, uh, you know, uh, out. And Darrys Garland, hey, wouldn't he be a good fit with Wimba?

You remember all that was taking place? Of course. What are they going to do? Are they going to pay, you know, Jared Allen? And so they gave all those guys their money and just decided, all right, now let's see if we can figure this out. And so far, geez, Louise, is it working? They've got the Warriors tonight.

And I'll be watching that game. Oh, that'd be great. I'm not even going to be jumping around. I'll be watching that game. And one thing I love about Garland is, like, you get a lot of John Morant in your life. And when John finishes, he finishes at the rim. You know, he's not shooting a ton of three. he's not shooting a ton of pull-ups.

He's finishing at the rim. Garland has a floater. He's just decided, he's like, I'm not going to challenge the Biggs. I'm going to get by my man, and I'm going to shoot a, like a Tony Parker-esque floater, and he finishes with it consistently,

and I love it. I love it. You know who he reminds me of sometimes when I'm watching him, probably the most? It's Kyrie. Oh, that's a lot of praise for Garland. No, he does.

That's who he reminds me of. I'm serious. because he's got he gets this flare up and he gets this like you can see when the same way and this all I'm saying the same way Kyrie starts like you can see like oh it's almost like the guy dribbling up but I don't know if we're watching the game the other night but he did almost like the the you know where you everybody does it where he pushed the ball out and the back spin down whatever yeah yeah yeah yeah Chris Paul did it all time of picking rolls Like I'm playing at the park or something

But he was just doing it his dri-but. You can see them kind of get their confidence up Where it feels like everything's going to be going their way And I'm just going to start breaking off everybody. All right. So now I'm with you. I wasn't with you because I was talking about his floater. I was like he doesn't have the finishing package that Kyrie does

Because no, no, no, no one does. But it's the avalanche feel. Yes. He's sort of avalanche knee of it where it's like, oh, we got one bucket. And then now I feel a little confident. Now he's got a little bit of a little pep in his step. And then he looks like the guy at the park. And then it's an avalanche where he's just like,

Oh, Garland's having one of those games. He had that game against the Knicks where it's just an absolute avalanche where it starts with one little pebble, hits another pebble, starts to build a little bit. Pebble turns into a rock. Rockersers into a bolder. Next thing you know, in an avalanche, he's scored 39 on you and you lose by 20. Darius Garland is, my God. The player I loathed, Jason Tatum.

What? No, loathe. It's loathe. It's the one you don't like this week. Do you understand the assignment? I totally understand the assignment. Jason Tatum. I can't be more annoyed with him doing the I don't care act.

I really can't. I can't. The whole crowd is booing. We've all been looking forward to this. Steve Kerr is public enemy number one. They won the gold medal and all anybody talked about was little Jason not getting to play. That's all anybody talked about throughout the entire damn Olympics. The topic, they would beat the crap out of someone, and everybody was talking about Jason Tatum not playing.

So I went through this all summer. This is what's going on. Finally the moment. Bro, he's going to try to drive 75 on this dude. You're not going to play me in the Olympics? You can disrespect me in the Olympics? Not only do they get beat. It's not like he had a bad game, but then he's like, reverect.

No, it wasn't even on. This is the exact quote. It wasn't on my mind. Oh, come on. Just another Wednesday. Another game, another opportunity to come in and try to be the best player I can be. Another day I can just try to get away. I mean, the uncontrollable vomit that I had.

As someone who does hold grudges and can be super petty. This annoys me to know. Because I don't believe it. He even then went on it. It was like this really long quote. And he ended up getting like real self-reflective. And he even then threw in this bizarre F word to try to make it. Yeah, I'll read it to you.

That's part of my job. That's what I've been dealing with my entire career. People want me to be louder. People want me to be mean or whatever. One thing about Jason. I mean, Oh, God. No, he didn't do that. No, he didn't do that. Yes, he did. No, he didn't. One thing about Jason, I'm going to keep reading that until you just died.

I can't take it. One thing about Jason is like, I'm always going to do what the fuck I want to do. One thing about Jason, I'm always going to do what the F I want to do and approach things the way I want to approach it and what I feel is sincere to who I am as a person. I mean, anybody can go look up. won the title and he was so sincere to self as a person, he imitated KG. He imitated. He imitated, he imitated staff. He imitate. He literally, I forgot about that.

He cosplayed everybody in the world. There's nobody less authentic. There's nobody. He cosplayed every title winner ever. I forgot about that. And it's like, Oh, if there's one thing you know about Jason, it's I myself. There's nobody more authentic than me.

I don't give an F what anybody says. In fact, I'm the beacon of authenticity. And it's like, are you serious? I'm surprised when he won the title. He didn't say, how about them cowboys? And it's like, everybody cared. Everybody cared. that you didn't play.

And so now when everybody asks you about you not play, like, like Joe Missoula like flew to France to make sure you were okay. Like stop acting. Like this wasn't a big deal. Like this wasn't what everybody in the world talked about all summer was that, yeah, cool. The United States won the gold medal.

But geez, you, T, it didn't. Please. Can you believe Steve Kurt? And then your whole crowd was like on your side, booing the hell out of him. And he's like, just another Wednesday for me. Just another Wednesday night. Boo. I boo you. Boo. For no. For sure not another Wednesday. It was literally something I had circled. And one thing, you know, the one thing I hate. as a fan. It always drives me crazy when I feel like I care more than you, the guy I'm rooting for, right? Every year I go to preseason basketball and I leave at halftime because I said, I've been doing this for 20 years and every time I forget, they don't care about the outcome. So why do I care about the outcome? I'm not even watching this crap. And if I feel like it hurt me, more or it, you know, than it did you when you lose.

That's just being a demented fan. I get it. It's stupid that I care so much. But that's what fandom is. And then for this all to happen and then the message is basically, yeah, I don't really care about that. Bro, you for sure care about it. Stop.

And then you tell me you don't care about it. And that's authenticity. piss on my head and tell me it's raining. Ferno, you really landed that plane. It's a great job by you. I'm impressed. I'm just proud to be a bystander for that. Great job by you.

I want to make myself very clear about the player that I loat this week. Be careful. I think that this player is going to be a multiple MVP winner. I think this player will one day be considered the best basketball player on the planet. But I could not be more frustrated. I could not be more disgusted at watching Victor Luz Banjama play basketball this season.

I cannot. I am disgusted by it every single time. You're not disgusted. I am. I really am. I've talked about it before. It's, it's, it's, it's, the guy is legitimate.

seven foot six. And and he shoots three point shots. He's shooting 22% from three. This is his three point numbers this season. One for eight, two for five. That was a great game for him. One for five.

O for three. Four for 13. One for seven. Two for nine. One for six. Two for six. Forty five percent of the shots that he takes. are three-point shots, and he's shooting 22%.

So I did a little more research. Last year, the average distance of his shots was 13 feet. This year, 16 feet. Last year, the percentage of shots that he took that were three-point attempts, 33%. This year, 45%. Why is Victor Wimbunyama, shooting so many threes and missing so many threes.

And they're not catch and shoot threes. They're not even in the flow of the offense. He just pulls up. And I hope that Popovich gets back together and gets right. But I really felt like under the guidance of Greg Popovich and Chris Paul, this would be the year where he finds his way, he finds his place, he finds his role, he finds his game. He doesn't have a go-to move.

he doesn't have a package. All he does is pull up threes and rim runs. And I'm not asking them, they don't have to post him up like he's a chemo-lajuan, but he has so much potential. To watch him play this way is very frustrating for me as someone who wants to see this unicorn be a unicorn.

And right now I'm just watching a miss three. and take bad shots. I feel like this is another year where I have been reminded that in many cases we were trained for so many years

to believe in like the second year leap and what's happening more often than not is that because guys now that are drafted very highly are getting in the lineup quickly that what you are seeing

is that they're playing a lot of minutes that first year and that first year they get to take the league by storm and nobody knows anything about them and that second year there's the book on them already now we've got a scouting report on you and this is when you have to figure it out and so and then the third year is when these guys really start popping off i really am starting to believe this that now the guys that are getting minutes that we get so excited as rookies that a lot of times when they come back that next year it's like all these teams now have the scouting report they all have we've got a full year of scouting on you and now now you've got to figure out okay like i i say this as someone who watched morant take the league by storm

and win rookie of the year and then guess what happened the next year when um i'll try to give the example. The next year when somebody with a, instead of you played the Philadelphia 76ers, like now Kyle Lowry or Tyrese, they're not guarding you anymore. Kelly Ubre's guarding you now,

right? You're going to go play Minnesota. You don't get to face Mike Connolly anymore. Anthony Edwards is guarding you now, right? And so they say, okay, here's the guy that now, because you're not really on that chalkboard in the same way. And then the second year, it's like, okay, here's what we're going to. And he's got

figuring out to do. But I do think that that's why we see sometimes a little bit of a downtick. And the great ones will figure it out. But you got to figure it out. I think by that second year, it's like, take away this, take away this, take away this. Now what are you going to do? And what he's doing is obviously settling. Settily. All right, Bruno. Let me ask you a question then. why does he have two games with 10 rebounds? He gets two games with 10 rebounds. He gets six rebounds, like routinely. Yeah.

How is that possible? I would say the rebound numbers for many of these guys are not, especially the ones that play outside. So a lot of times you're far away from the basket on offense, so you're not getting nearly. Offense, fine, yeah. You're not catching that many offense. He shouldn't be.

And so many, like, You look at the guys that are, like, getting a ton of rebounds. It's generally now these drop coverage guys. It's the Go Bears. It's the drumins. It's the subonuses. It's the guys that are always just right around the basket. Now, you could argue you should just have him standing right around the basket all the time.

That's what he's good at. Yeah, I got you. But there's a lot of them that don't, that don't rebound nearly as much as you would think, you know. Do you see the, do you see the Jeremy Grant stuff with Women with Yammi yesterday? I did not. So it's a out of balance play on the baseline. And before it's inbounded, Jeremy Grant pushes him and he flops like a soccer player, falls in the ground. Oh, no.

I did not see that. Gets the foul call. You hated him. And then he does it again. Uh-oh. In the same play, gets a little push from Jeremy Grant and falls on the ground. It's, I'm just, again, I'm not saying that Victor Wimbunyama is a bad basketball player. I'm not saying that he's not going to be one of the first of the ground.

the best players we've ever witnessed. You called him Luz Binyam. But he's not contributing to winning. I have not seen him in the fourth quarter say, I got this, this season, once. And look, and I got to be fair.

The beginning of the season, we're saying, is this the year? He takes that leap to being. He's in the MVP conversation. Top five, top 10 player in the league. What does he look like? What does he look like to do now? In the MVP voted, where?

Is he 100? 200? Seriously. He's behind Jay Huff. Yeah, he is. So wherever you got him, you got to put him right around Yuki. Yuki, Yuki, Yuki, Yviyama. It frustrates me.

Do something, Victor. Don't get pushed over. Thing we love, thing we load this week. The thing I loved, I loved. I love Paul George getting booed at him calling. Oh, wait. I'm just going to say booing. So there's two booing.

Oh, I like this. You call an audible on yourself. Yeah. So you got Paul George and him calling it stupid that he was getting booed. I mean, you know, it's stupid. The booze, I didn't get it. I still don't get it when I go to indie. And then you have Trey Young who's getting booed by the remaining Knicks fans,

and he tells them to get their ass home. after the Knicks game. I hope these New York fans find their way to the exit real, real quick. Boo. Take y'all ass home. I'm so pro booing. I loved the booing. Again, this is what made me angry at Tatum.

The booing at Steve Kerr. Love it. The booing at Paul George and then him calling it stupid. I love it. I love Verneau being pro booing. Oh, I love it. I think it's. funny. And I think that him, this is, this is what, this is supposed to do if you're a fan.

So they booed Paul George. And he's like, this is stupid. I wanted to be here, whatever. And they're like, yeah, they don't like you anymore. And frankly, I think Paul George gets booed everywhere. He has pulled off this unbelievable, like, Hall of Fame career where Indiana booed him, Oklahoma City booed him. The Clippers food. He's like all-time booed. Interesting. All-time booed. You know, like, even, like,

Houston fans still love James Hardin. Right? They still love him, and they'll always love him. Nobody loves Paul George. Nobody. It's always weird. Nobody loves him. Brandon Miller was like Paul George is the greatest player of all time.

Like, the younger generation loves Paul George. I know. very strange phenomenon that I can't relate to. He's smooth. He's 610. You know, I always thought it was weird at a guy that didn't win at a super high level. And frankly, has never given me much of an inclination that he cares deeply whether he wins or loses. You know what I mean?

Like, he's just kind of a, I like guys that are feisty. I like guys that care. And then him getting booed and then him saying it's stupid. I mean, it's the, to me, that was sports perfection. Perfection. Yes, a guy. Brewing Paul George's sports perfection. No, and then his reaction, which is that stupid.

I wanted to be here. I mean, why are you booing me? But that's the point. That's the point. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you wanted to be here. Boo! Boo!

You remind me of how bad this is gone. You remind me of the position that we're in. That's what you're a constant reminder of us being the friggin clippers. And when I see you, you remind me that we're the clippers. And boo, boo, boo, boo, boo. They need to boo Kauai. You're booing Paul George. You're going to cheer Kauai when he gets there?

Right. You can boo Paul George, but you love Kauai Leonard. Huh. Huh. Yeah, I love it, though. I'm, yes, the more booing, the better. We got booed. The Trey Young thing, the relationship between Nick's fans and Trey Young

is such a mutually beneficial relationship. I love it. because the Knicks have, they've got a target for their hatred. Like, everybody hates Trey Young in New York City. It's wonderful. And Trey Young plays into it. Trey Young loves being the villain. I don't think.

I don't think that this is a plausible scenario for any other guy that is playing at home. that game was in Atlanta. But the Knicks fans, in Miami, Atlanta, Miami Atlanta pulled a bunch of ex-New Yorkers. So there's always going to be a loud, a loud Knicks contention. The idea that you on a post game are responding to fans of another team that are like,

booed to hell is amazing to me. They all wax, too. Like, you got waxed by the hawk, and you're still there as a Knicks fan booing Trey Young after the games. What are you doing? Can we mention real quickly? Because you and I, this is a horror. Over oversight.

Horrible oversight. What? We made a mistake? Yeah, because... I blame Jesse the producer. Whatever you're about to say, I blame Jesse. No, he doesn't know. We were texting about this the other night.

And then we've gone this far into the show and did not mention that the number one pick popped off. You were texting me the whole night about Risa Shea. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And we didn't put him in anything. He's not in here at all. I got it.

But, I mean, that was a moment where he had 30 plus. And it was like, hold on now. Wait a second. Is this a number one pick? Because we, no one was excited about this year's draft. Literally it was like, can we find a rotation player in the lottery? That's what people were saying going into the draft. And no one was excited about Saar.

No one's excited about Risa Shea. Ryshe looked like a number one pick in that game. He looked like, he looked like a number one pick. He was playing with confidence. He was hitting threes. He was cutting. He was driving. He was assisting.

He was assisting. He was. playing defense. I was just shocked more than anything. I was like this, look at this. This is like his eighth game in the league. Killing it. 30, 30 plus early is, yeah, 30 plus early is quick. He looked good.

He looked good. And you know what? Victor Luzbenyama could never. I'm going to see, uh, I'm going to see Sarr in person tonight. So I'll be able to tell you about Sarned. Get excited. I mean, I mean, I'm up to, look, I'm planning I'll leave in my house early just so I don't have to fight them.

You want to see SARS warm up? No. Steph Curry. All right. The thing that you loved. Thing that I loved, one of the thing that honorable mentioned here is I've always been a lamello ball guy. I love La Mello Ball, right?

But I just want to say this. When you're watching Lamello Ball, ask yourself this question, does anyone in the history of the National Basketball Association dribble between their legs more than Lamello Ball? Just keep that in mind. Little homework for all the mismatch listeners. When you're watching the Hornets, just watch how often, just the quantity of times that he dribbles between his legs every possession. It's wild.

You think it's unnecessary. It's just his natural default setting. He's constantly dribbling between his legs, and I love it. But that's not what I love. I love, and I have some notes, I love NBA Crunch Time. Oh. NBA crunch time. See, you've told the story before about you and your son,

and your son's got his phone out, and he's cruising around the league, and he'll tell you if there's a close game or something's happening, and then you go tune into that one, and that's a great, it's a very touching story. It's a great bonding moment between you and your son. That's great. Guess what?

My son doesn't give a shit about NBA basketball. So I don't have, like, a little assistant sitting next to me telling me that, you know, the bucks and the raptors are going to overtime, I don't have that. But if you have League Pass, when they have nights like they had on Monday and Wednesday, when they're basically every team in the league played, they have NBA Crunch Time, which is their answer to Red Zone. Yep.

And it- Pop around. It's because the thing is, is we all got rid of our cable subscriptions. We pay more now. But even just to change a game with the League Pass app on your TV, it takes like three clicks to get where you're going. So you lose like 10 seconds. It doesn't sound like a lot, but I lost a significant amount of the Thunder,

the Thunder Nuggets game. I lost, because I was watching another game that was close at the end. And I got to choose who's broadcast. Exactly. Yeah. So it's like it takes too many clicks. But Crunch Time will just,

they just whip around all of the games. And they had that stagger start night on Monday. It was fantastic. Crunch Time is an absolutely great product. But I do have some notes. Well, here's the deal. Amazon needs to steal this because we don't know the future of NBA TV. So make this a prime thing or make this, right?

Something that's accessible to everybody and where they're bouncing around, you know, every night. Every night. Because it's not every night. I was lucky enough to be invited by one of our colleagues. A gentleman goes by the Monaco or the Podfather to a Knicks game last year. And it was in a suite because he's fancy. And some of the people that worked at the NBA entertainment were there. And I may or may not have a cost of them all night long.

And I may or may not have hard pitched myself as the host of Crunch Time moving forward. And I've gotten no follow-up calls, none. No follow-up emails. No, my agent didn't hear anything. Just crickets. Just crickets ever since that night. I might have been a little too aggressive. I think you probably were.

A little too aggressive. Yeah. But I love the product. I love Crunch Time. I love it. Because, again, like, I missed the Caruso foul on. Yokic because I was watching

there's another game there's ending at the exact same time going down to the wire and just to switch games on the app it does take you like 10 seconds and three clicks

and I've got bad Wi-Fi at my house so sometimes get the spinning wheel a little basketball wheel and crunch time you just stay right there they go quad box they go two box

they go in and out of the broadcast really well I absolutely love NBA crunch time they should have it every single night I think there's some rights issues with the regional sports

networks and we don't have to get too nerdy about like media or whatever but I think that the future of whip around NBA nightly show is how I will be watching basketball going forward. I think that's the future of sort of broadcasting and lead pass. I love it.

The thing that I loathe, outside of all the injuries this week, we just add this. So we have a way of always like, hey, here's all this cool stuff. We got a lot of praise for doing our positive pod earlier in the week because it's always negative, negative, negative, everything, right? It's like, okay, NBA season just started. Yeah, it stinks that we have these injuries. But look at this cool story that is the Cavs. Look at this cool story that is the Warriors. Look at this cool story that is Westbrook in the starting lineup now in Denver.

And they've won a couple. And like, look at what's going on in Oklahoma City and on and on and on. Right, right. And then so I'm always like, that's always what I'm keeping up with. And it's like the seasons just started whatever. And then, you know, you scroll through and it's like then earlier this week, this is the thing I loathe. becomes this big headline on all the NBA sites and all the new sites that I check.

Steph Curry to meet with Adam Silver on All-Star Game. And I'm like, stop. Stop. Stop. This comes from stupid. Stop. Haliburton talking to Barack Obama. And Barack Obama is like, you guys need to try in this All-Star game.

And then here we are. Well, and the All-Star game is in Golden State. So it's like now here's Steph Curry. Oh yeah, I want to make sure it's great too. Like now that we're in, so nobody, I guess he wasn't able to meet with Lori Marketing last year to make sure the Utah one was cool. Right? It's like, oh, now we're in Steph Curry's town. Now we need to really, hey, you guys all made an absolute mockery of this thing last year.

But now Steph Curry and Adam Silver are going to. going to have a meeting of the minds. It's had a... This season just started. It's all exciting. And then here it is. It's like, hey, let us remind you how shitty All-Star Weekend was. It was bad last year.

Horrendous. I was there. It was bad. I was there. Horrendous. Oh, no. I'm sorry. I missed last year.

What was last year? I went Salt Lake City. Chicago. I'm, no. Chicago wasn't last year because I went to that one, too. Oh, that's two years. ago. Where was last year? It was Indiana. It was Indiana. That's where it was. Because they were going to do the home of basketball and all this stuff, right? And so anyway, yeah, I missed last year.

I missed Indiana, but two years ago was Salt Lake City. Anyways, I, I don't understand. Like, I'm not ready to talk about what we need to do about the All-Star game. Like, Adam Silver is always like, we need more focus on the game, you know, not just transactions, not just stuff that happens off the court, you know,

he wishes people talked about the games and the stuff going on with the teams more. And we constantly have to get sidetracked and sometimes it's like totally preventable. Like now we got this story about like, hey, what are they going to do for the All Star game? And then now we get this whole round of,

What should they do about the All-Star game? Should they do it this way? Should they do it this way? Should they increase the payout? What would get guys to give a shit? And it's like, oh my God. We just started. Not yet.

I don't care. I don't care. I'm done. I'm done with caring about them caring about the All-Star game. Because the guy stood up in front of everybody and said, please care this year. And then they just flung feces at his head. He's like sitting in the state. stands next to every TV exec in the world.

And they just collectively through feces at his head. And so now I'm supposed to care like, hey, what are they going to do to fix the All-Star game? You know what? You know what? Bruno, I don't have a fix for the All-Star game. I don't have it. What are we going to do? We're like, what are we going to do?

It's also at the end of a long weekend. The answer is care. Unless LeBron and Steph and all these guys, care, none of the young guys are going to care. If LeBron cares and if Steph cares, when Kobe, you know, was gone and those guys started filtering out that age of the last guys that actually cared, then this group doesn't care. And unless you can make the young guys on the team will always follow suit. So unless you want to tell me these guys are going to care.

And you can't give them more money. Hell, they make $100 billion. Yeah, yeah, that's not doing it. Yeah. So anyway, I didn't even want to talk about this because that's how much I loathe the fact that it's already come back up. So here's one thing I loathe. I'm a LeBron James fan. I've been a LeBron James fan for a long time.

I like LeBron James. Boob. Great basketball player. My LeBron James story is when I was working on the SB Awards in the year 2001, I want to say. I was a guy who put together like the clip reels, the highlight reels for the nomination packages. And what was it called? Breakthrough athlete, one of the LeBron James was nominated. So I had to go get all the highlights for LeBron James.

I didn't watch the games when he was in high school. So I had to watch the games and pick the highlights. And I was like, God, this guy's really good at basketball. It was the no look passes. It was just like, I was like, this guy is going to be good. Love LeBron James. The thing I load this week is, again, I'm going back to the podcast. positive negative thing is everybody shitting on Bronny James and Bronny James's experience.

It just feels to me like everyone's piling on. Guess what? He's not that good at basketball. Guess what? He probably shouldn't have been drafted where he was drafted. Guess what? He probably should be in the G League. He probably shouldn't be on the Lakers. And he's going to go back to the G League now just as we predicted. But what I load this week is the piling on and everyone just talk about what Brony James isn't all the time, instead of letting him be a 19-year-old basketball player, developing his skills, and maybe one day being a rotational NBA player. That's what I load this week. And I'm so excited to not talk about Brony James for months while he scores six points

a game for the South Bay Lakers. He is going to be the only South Bay Laker to pull up in a Rolls-Royce Phantom. Yes, yes. I like Bronny James. I don't think he's great at basketball, but I think he could develop into something. And I just hate the way that people just use it as an opportunity to pile on. He's just a kid. You think it's gone too far?

It's gone too far. I'm guilty of it myself. I make fun of Brian and James myself. Because when you watch and play an NBA game, it looks like somebody pulled somebody out of the stance. It really does. Did Rich Paul call you? No. Said, hey, man, let up.

No, no. You're like, not only will I let up, I'm going to go on the mismatch and tell everybody else to let up. Now, can you get me those adele tickets? Yeah. A brief, brief, Rich Paul story. And he came on a show that I was on, and it was remote. So, like, it isn't his fault. It was remote, so he's just, like, in a room by himself.

And we would ask him a question. And I was on a half an hour show at the time. Ask him one question, and he would go for nine minutes. And you can't really interrupt him because it's remote. And then we asked him a second question. He goes for 10 minutes. And I don't know what it was. It was just like, I think it's just alone in a room.

He's just like, opining. You just cut straight to break. It was like a TED talk. It wasn't live. So we had to edit it down. But at the time, I was just like, I'm like, is he still talking? Like, I could have taken a nap. I like, I wish you guys would have been live.

The best is what they have to. You watch this when they do the banning cast and they'll ask somebody a question. And then like the big broadcasts are going to break in the back. They're like, oh, hey, hey, hey, we'll be right back. We'll be right back. They still haven't figured that out. Be like, oh, okay, hey, hold that phone, Bill, and they just go straight. I'm surprised.

I'm surprised you watch the Manning cast. I love it. Really? Oh, not like. Love. Oh, so I, so I, oh, the first half of the games, they have Belichick. Let me tell you something. I think it is the best.

The best. It is exact, I would give anything. The NBA tried something like. this. Yeah, they did. Jamal Crawford. But if you could ever find, you know, something like, Chris Paul would be amazing at this because he just, the way he, he views a basketball

game the same way Peyton Manning views a football game, right? But their level of critique paired with their level of passion, paired with his level of frustration on the decisions that teams are making offensively and defensively. And then explaining, like, they have pulled off the, they are in my living room. I'm getting to watch football with them. Interesting. Oh, I think it's, I think it's great. Do you know what the Manningast is to me?

Pistachio ice cream. No, absolutely. Let me explain to you why. No. Pistachio ice cream is good. However, it's always next to cookies and cream. It's next to Rocky Road. It's just, it's a good on its own.

Bro. But there's just a better opportunity. There's a better option next to it. I would rather watch the broadcast than watch Peyton and Eli Manning talk about the broadcast. If you don't shut your Colin Coward ass up. It's pistachio ice cream.

That is the most Colin Coward taste. It's pistachio ice cream. You know, cookies and cream is next to it. It's right there. Did you ever work with him? Were you the one feeding him all those years? No. No.

I did work with. Colin Coward, though. Shout to Colin. That's what I'm saying. Did you work with him? You were like, you know what? Here's the analogy for today. Right?

It'll be like, you know. Let me tell you why Matt Stafford is a goldfish. Right. Reliable. I want a piranha. I want a piranha. There you go. There you go.

I want a piranha. Pistachio ice cream. I couldn't disagree more. Well, you're wrong. You're wrong. Manning cast forever. I love it. All right.

It's good doing it for today's show. Thanks to our executive producer Jesse Lopez. As always, Jacoby. I'll talk to you next week. Peace. Must be 21 and over in present in select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas Star Casino or 18 over and present in D.C. Got a gambling problem? Call 1-800 gambler or visit RG-Help.com.

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