The Mismatch - The Clippers Fall to 0-2 Against the Jazz and the Bucks Beat the Nets. Plus: How Many Games can the Nuggets Win Against the Suns?

Episode Date: June 11, 2021

Late Thursday night, Verno & KOC talk about the Jazz taking care of business at home to go up 2-0 against the Clippers (0:42) and the Bucks winning a strange game against the Nets (21:27) Also, can the Hawks figure out a way to stop Joel Embiid (32:58) and how many games can the Nuggets take off of the Suns (49:45)? Hosts: Chris Vernon and Kevin O'Connor Producer: Carlos Chiriboga Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What If the Len Bias story hosted by Jordan Ritter-Kahn is the ringer's latest narrative podcast. You can find new episodes every Wednesday on the Book of Basketball 2.0 feed. Here's a quick trailer. You've heard his name, Lynn Bias, 1980s phenom, second pick in the NBA draft. And then, cocaine, tragedy, one of the most shocking deaths in sports history. 35 years later, Bias' legacy is still making an impact. From Spotify and The Ringer Podcast Network, this is What If, the Lynn Bias story. I'm Jordan Ritter-Con.

Welcome to The Mismatch. I'm Chris Vernon. Jordan meets he does every Friday from the ringer.com is Kevin O'Connor, A.K., Kevin O'Bomber, Kevin O'Champermer, Kevin O'Champton, Kevin O'Clymer, Kevin O'Clymouth, Kevin O'Blessarian, Kevin O'Blessarian, Kevin O'Ball, Bachelorne, Kevin O'Barre tonight. Oh, Go-Beer. With 20 rebounds, we just got done watching the Clippers and the Jazz. We did not watch it together, but we did watch it simultaneously. And the Jazz are able to get game number two. Did get a little dicey for them.

They got a huge lead. We got a all-timer first half performance out of Donovan Mitchell. Then in the third quarter, they're up by 21. Next thing you know, by the time you're in the fourth quarter, the Clippers have the lead. The zone. It worked. It worked. And, you know, as that game was going on, I really had a lot of deja vu when I'm trying to jot down notes and I'm trying to think about how we're going to talk about this game.

Kev, it, there is so much of the feeling that I have that I had after the Dallas games, meaning. Yeah. Another Friday show, too. Yeah, like, what is going on here? Like, what are you doing? Doris said the casualness of the clippers right after they had the consecutive turnovers. It is the casualness, obviously, the miscommunication and not letting, and letting Joe Ingalls just walk into a three when it's a seven-point game.

I mean, to make it 10, and the crowd is on top of you anyway. And here's the thing, Kev. Look, players got to play the game. Coach has got to coach the game. In the end, players decide it. But in my estimation, it is the coach's job to put said players in the best spot for success. I don't have to – look, I'm not going to shred tie lieu over every little thing that happens in that game. In the end, players have to make plays, all right?

and some of their players, including their best players like George, have to be better. But in terms of the position that he is putting that team in, to me, it is absolute nonsense. The reason you have these miscommunications down the stretch is because you do something different every game. You don't have your guys. That's, this is a overarching theme that has happened with them, which is who are your guys? And why do you abandon it completely? You start the game with Zubots, which was stupid anyway, but fine. You let Donovan Mitchell score 10 points in three minutes off this.

And then you finally sit it. It's like, all right, are you cooking? committed to that or not? Are you committed to Rondo, who you played 13 minutes or whatever he played, whatever minutes he played in the first game, you played him. And then zero tonight. He's got zero. Are you committed to Terrence man who you gave zero to tonight?

I guess he got one minute. A couple, couple of sessions. One minute. Yeah, yeah. So he's one minute, right? It's like, what are you and who do you want to play? You looked at this matchup, you had a game to analyze this, and then you came back in this second game,

and you still don't know who you are, and you can tell stuff like the Ingalls 3 happens because you're not, as they say, on a string defensively. The communication level isn't there. and there's not the group that you're used to playing with. I went and looked it up just to see because sometimes the numbers don't match your eyeballs. I'm well aware of that, right? But in this particular case, they do.

In the playoff so far, the lineup that started the game tonight, which was Jackson, Morris, Leonard George, and Zubots, right? so far in the playoffs that is their third most used uh lineup i believe they have scored at a pace of 94 points per 100 possessions they have given up 112 for a minus 18 net rating and you can call small sample size if you want but your eyes tell you what why why why are you doing that against this team especially when they've got a center that runs away from the basket and set great screens. He'll get you open.

And he gets Donovan Mitchell open who could just walk into threes. I mean, this is like base level stuff. And it's like, all right, are you committed to that? And he wasn't committed to that. What did Zubox play? He played less than 15 minutes tonight. It's like, I don't understand. That is the goofiest team because they have the players.

And maybe he'll figure it out as he did in the Dallas series, right? And isn't that just the thing, though, Chris, that for the Clippers last round, the first two games was a big mess. Didn't know. It was like he was throwing darts trying to figure out what worked. And then they stumbled upon something that was more effective. Maybe we'll see that again this series. Maybe we will.

However, I would say this, and this is a bad thing for the Clippers, the Utah Jazz are a much better team than the Dallas Mavericks. Luca is the best player on both of those teams. Luca is one of the best players in the league. but the depth and the quality of the jazz roster was really apparent in tonight's game. Like they were a tough problem to solve. You know, when this team gets firing on offense, I know they hit over 50% of their threes, 20 of 39 on the night.

It's not like they haven't done this before. They've done it a lot this season. They were the number one shooting team in the NBA this season. They led the NBA in transition threes. Like they are a dominant shooting team. And they can hit threes off the dribble. You mentioned that Ingalls 3 when he was left wide open. We saw Mitchell hit tons of.

of contested threes off the dribble throughout the entire season and in this game, six of 12 from three. This team is tough to stop and really tough to score against because because of Rudy Gobert and the player that he is in the defensive end of the floor, the deterrent that he is around the rim, that allows those wing defenders to stay close to home on pick and rolls, not have to help off as much. It allows Boyan Bogdanovich, who was absolutely sensational tonight. on defense against Kauai Leonard to just get underneath him, man, and bother him.

He had that play late in the game where he hit the ball away, caused the jump ball, Utah gets it. That's because of the protection that he has behind him in Gobert that enables those players on the perimeter to just be in the face of Paul George and Kauai Leonard. So for the clippers here, like you're throwing darts the first two games on the road. You're down to O. You're not totally out of it. Unfortunately, you're going back to Staples Center.

they're still going to have the cardboard cutouts. It wouldn't be until game six. The Clippers would have a full staple center, full capacity to have a true road game for Utah. So it's still going to be those cardboard cutouts when they go home for games three and four. But this jazz team, man, they're checking the boxes. Well, every single game. I agree with you completely. And as someone who covered a team that played that jazz team in the first round,

you wonder when they are not going to make every three they take seemingly? It's been like this all year. It's been like this all year. All year. And the question was, will it hold in the postseason? And so far, the results are, yes, it does hold in the postseason. And it has so far. I thought it was funny.

Gobert did the walk-off interview with Scott Van Pelt. You probably missed it because we were loading up to do this. But I did miss it. It's the last thing I heard before I went. And Van Pelt was talking about whipping the ball out. And he's like, is there anybody? on your team that you don't feel confident to throw in the ball to

and knocking down a three. Is there anybody that doesn't shoot threes? And he said, just me. Yeah. And he said, but I'm going to break that out at some point. If Go bear or pull,

I mean, hell, Janus tried to. You might as well. It's all eight of them. Yeah. I'm not sure Quinn Snyder will let Rudy do that. Like a boot and Holster does with Janus. Yeah. If Quinn Snyder has a blade in his pants, it would not surprise me.

All right. This guy constantly looks totally on edge. He scares me to death. I want to comment on the... Your guy in Memphis, Taylor Jenkins was an assistant for Quinn Snyder. I know. Back when it used to be the D-League. Not the same personalities.

No. Different guys. Different guys. Heck of a coach, Quinn Snyder. Yeah. Let me say, regarding what you mentioned about going back home to L.A. and the cardboard cutouts, they have one Looney fan, and that is their owner. He's always there for it. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. But beyond that, I noticed this tonight. And I thought in both games, I thought it was extremely noticeable how amazing the crowds were in Milwaukee. and in Utah.

Yes. You know, now these are smaller markets. Many times smaller markets are going to have the rowdiest of crowds, like the most excited. But I also think what you're finding around the NBA when you're watching some of these games is people in many cases, this is the first thing that people have done since, you know, they've been inside for a friggin year. And now in many cases, the first time they've been around thousands of people

enjoying something and it adds something more. I felt this way when I was at those playoff games in the first round, that it was a heightened experience because we didn't get it last year and because we haven't done anything fun for a year. And so- Hey man, don't tell that. I've played a lot of Call-O-Duty Warzone. I've had a lot of fun.

I mean, with others. And so I do think that that is, that's a big deal. can see these waves that these teams get on and you saw it with Milwaukee and you saw it with Utah tonight where the crowd really I thought could play a role in this and that's a massive disadvantage when you're going back to L.A. to play in front of cardboard cutouts. It just is because I do think that it is in some ways impacting these games and I also just want to mention, I thought the announcers in this last game, I want to give a shout out to Mark Jones and Doris Burke.

They were fantastic. All night. Fantastic. Like, Doris was constantly spitting knowledge. Constantly. Like just bar after bar. Look, stuff I didn't know. Not only was she giving opinions on things, but she would just throw out stuff like, I don't

know. Royce O'Neill spent more time guarding all stars this year or like whatever it was, the third or fourth most minutes on all. And I'm like, how do you even look that up? Like, I do this for a living. I don't even know. Is that where you look it up? You can find out.

I don't know. I don't know if that's where she got it from. It was an odd. It was an odd stand. The ball index has a great stat about that. It was an odd stead of how many minutes he had logged against guarding the opposing teams, basically their best player. And I was like, well, I'll be damned.

But she was great all night. And Mark Jones, he was hyped up, man. Bringing energy. And he had some good stories throughout. Maybe it's in the arena thing or whatever. And the other thing is you're on that group text with us with Simmons and Rosillo and all these guys. Sometimes when we're talking during the games. And was it Simmons?

I think it was Simmons that brought up a couple weeks ago. He ran a trivia question during what are the games? And he said, how old do you think Mark Jones is? and then he said he turned 60 this year and I can't get that out of my head Mark Jones seems so young and hip to me he's about to be 60 years old this year November 16th 1961

I mean you want to talk about off age is just a number Chris I didn't man you're 80 I know I'm 80 this guy is going to be 60 years old I was like no way I went and looked it up myself. Actually, your first interview was Red Hourback.

That's right. That was actually one of my first was, you're going to laugh your ass off. He's been dead for a long time. He's John Wooden. Really? Yeah. John Wooden.

Yeah. You know my first interview? This was crazy. It wasn't my first. Go ahead. Take a guess. Just throw out a player's name. Your first interview.

It's a former Celtics player. I say it Thomas. Kelly Olinick. Is that right? Yeah. All right. First one they let me get. I'm going to tell you a quick story.

We always get, look, you and I both get a million media questions about stuff, especially from kids, you know, coming up, trying to get the business or whatever. But I'm going to tell you a funny story real quick because it is basketball related. The actual first interview that I did. All right. And the wooden thing was after I had gotten on the radio and had a show. I see. Okay.

And he had what happened. That was a wild occurrence. He had a book that was coming out. We called the publisher and they booked him on the show. I couldn't believe it. And it was like, it was still one of the greatest memories of my life. I was very young. But anyways, the first time I'm working at this radio station, this guy, this program director, who was awful, by the way.

He never had anything nice to say me about anything. And so he says, hey, I want you to go, you're going to go down to Old Miss, University of Mississippi. He's like, I want you, I want you to go cover their basketball team. and I was like, yeah, okay, all right, I'm down. And I was like, what do I do? And he's like, just take a recorder and he's like, and ask a question after the game and, you know, get the audio and then bring it back and we're going to put it in the system tomorrow.

Fine, easy enough. So I got my little tape recorder, whatever, and I went down there. And I went and watched Old Miss play against Oklahoma. All right? Oklahoma had a guy named Hollis Price. They had a really good team. And Oklahoma is coached by Kelvin Sampson. and at the end of the game,

crowd, it's a real tiny arena in the SEC. It was a dump. They called it the tad pad. And crowd just got on top. And like Oklahoma just starts turning the ball over. They're a young team. Turn the ball over, whatever. And Ole Miss ends up getting the win.

So now it comes after the game and I've got my question like ready to go. You're shaking. Are you nervous? Oh, God. Yes, I am terrified. Are you reciting your. question over and over in your head thinking how should I say it? How should I say this word? A hundred percent, Kevin. This is like a simple question. Look, I could close my eyes and go back to

exactly where I was standing, exactly where I was, the whole scenario. I've got the tape recorder and I hold it up. Kelvin Samson's about to take questions and I asked, I mean, I had thought of this question for so long and I was like, all right, I'm just not going to ask something stupid. all right and I said Coach do you think that the the crowd here tonight affected your young team

down the stretch what was it right you're like oh wow finally Calvin Samson he looks right back at me and he goes I don't know what do you think and I was like oh shit

oh my god bro I was like, yeah? And he was like, all right, then. And that was it. And I left and I like, I had like tears in my house. I get in my car and I'm going to drive back to Memphis like an hour to half. And I am just, I'm like, I hate media. I hate media.

I was like, who would ever want to do this? This is the worst and all this stuff. And sure enough, now things. did get easier as time went on. This is crazy because I don't know if I've ever told anybody this. The next week I went to a Memphis Red Birds, a AAA baseball game, and there was one of the best prospects in all of baseball was a guy named Travis Lee. He ended up playing in the majors for a long time.

Travis Lee. Yeah, Travis Lee. He would never remember this either. I went into the locker room and I interviewed Travis Lee. That was the next guy. I was going to take a stab at. And Travis Lee was the absolute nicest guy ever to me. And restored my faith in humanity.

Now, funny enough, it was maybe, I don't know, a couple years ago, my producer in Memphis, Rosa, books Kelvin Sampson for the show. Memphis is going to play Houston. Books him. And I told Kelvin Sampson, I said, I am here in large part because I survived this moment. And I told him he had absolutely no recollection of it. And he was like, but Chris, I am sorry.

You apologize? It was like the redemption 20 years later or whatever, right? For Kelvin Sampson. But sure enough, yeah, I got barked at pretty badly. Anyways, back to this game. That's awesome. What we had with the Clippers and the jazz is- I don't miss those fears, Chris, that's for sure.

I'm asking questions. I don't miss those. No, it is so daunting. Yeah, it is. It really is. It really is. If somebody's going to, like, really jump on you, and I've had a lot,

I've had a lot of coaches jump on me, man. You can imagine with my personality. You know what I mean? They think I'm up to something, or they think I'm, like, trying to call, now. Oh, yeah, of course. You know, especially when I was young. For sure. You know?

Yeah. And, and I, but I, I've had a lot of good media coaches, honestly. I mean, obviously the basketball coach here was Cal Perry for a hundred years and he was flippant to all get out. Sure. I'm sure Ty Lou would love to answer a question from you. Ty Lou from all accounts is like everybody I know that knows him is a great guy. Like everybody loves him. You know, it's always, and it's so hard. hard because it's kind of like the, it's kind of like the Terry Stats thing when we went through it a couple weeks ago. Like I know Terry Stats didn't do a good job, right? I know it was probably time to move on. Neil L. Shea doesn't think so either. But everybody I know that knows Terry Stats

love, like swears by the guy. He's like the nicest guy of the world. And I feel that way regarding Ty Lou. Everybody I know that knows Ty Lou, they love this guy. He's like, evidently like the nicest guy, mega charming, the whole thing, right? And so it's hard sometimes, you know, because I watch this and I'm like, you know, he has, he does some bozo-esque things, as I said, in the Dallas series. But here we are again. And it's like, I don't understand. I don't understand how you can look at the games.

And I don't understand how you can look at the numbers that are attributed to some of these different lineups. and say, this is my best mode of operation. I went and looked up, like the Terrence man stuff is great. They're lineups with Terrence in them. He's really good. I mean, I look forward to game three. I mean, I'm going to withhold judgment about the series. I picked the Jazz that win in six before.

I'm staying with that. But it might go quicker than expected. We'll see. Yeah, I mean, if you're playing in front of cardboard cutouts, the early game, what a piece of crap that was. Holy mackerel. That was just. Pretty odd game.

No, that was just bad basketball. It really was. It was a weird game, man. I tell you this, Kev. I have never, ever had higher expectations for a series that has disappointed me more than this series. It's been terrible. It really has. It's been two runouts.

And then tonight, neither. It wasn't great defense like that these teams were playing. You're sitting there and you're watching it. And I chronicled on Twitter at one point I tweeted out. I mean, there was like, this is game on the line stuff. And they went, Janice, Brick 3, Lopez, Airballed 3, P.J. Tucker, wide open, brick 3. Then it was Middleton, contested 13 foot baseline jumper. And I'm like, what?

They're playing Blake Griffin. And that's it. That's the only big guy they have. Like I just bitched about this in our Tuesday show. If you want to be big, be big. They play big guys and they act small. And the Janus, I know you tweeted out about the Janus 8.3. Like, what the hell is going on here?

It's just like bizarre world stuff. And, you know, they had some good stuff. You know, if you, you will sign up for Kevin Durant scoring 30. if it's on 28 shots, and Kyrie scoring 22, if it's on 22 shots. And, you know, they only put Brooklyn on the line eight times tonight, which is a big win. I mean, there was some good stuff. But that game was not a good basketball game. And Milwaukee was lucky to come out.

Big, big time. They were very fortunate to come out and not be down 3-0 at this point. And, you know, you're back in it. You know, you're back in it. You get an opportunity with another game. home game here for game four to even it up and then who knows with a three game series the rest of the way i still look at this buck's team and i think you know the one take good what let me say this first the great takeaway for bucks fans is this drew holiday 46 minutes chris middleton

44 minutes janetton de cumpo 43 minutes bud played his best players over 40 minutes which is a huge win for bucks fans everywhere who root for this team and and only see these guys on the court for 35, 36 minutes. So that's a really, really, really good thing. And even though Yannis took eight three-pointers, which is whack and should not be allowed, the coaching staff needs to say, like, chill out here, stop taking these. This can't happen. Attack the rim.

Even though Blake Griffin had some great possessions against Yannis on those drives, for the most part, good things happen when Yannis attacks the basket. He can score, draw falls, get kickout opportunities. But that's the bad thing that happens. That's the bad thing that happens. What they say? He's like seven for 35 in the playoffs. It's something terrible.

Like from free throws. Like that is one bad. That is the one bad outcome. When he gets fouled, he can't make him. And he got the stupid penalty again tonight. The clock. Second violation.

How do they not call that every time? I actually agreed with Jeff Van Gundy's thoughts during the game. It's like you don't call it all season long. And then it comes to the playoffs. and suddenly start calling it. It doesn't make sense. Like either change the rule or police of the entire season.

Well, and you saw in that last game, Brooklyn was having fun with it and the NBA made him stop. They were doing, they were like, all right, if you're not going to let us have, like the yonet, they started doing the countdown. Yeah.

The fans did, like the, you know, 10, nine, eight, you know what I mean? Like counting it down with the honest. And they like tried to put an end of that. And it was like, all right, so what, are you just deciding you're not going to call this anymore?

It's pretty weird. And then you fast forward to this. game and they call it again. Yeah, they call it once and then he's over 10 seconds every time anyway, and it's just you don't call it again. I mean, it's a weird rule to begin with. Maybe they should change it. But in fairness, what the F takes so long? You miss them all anyway. I mean, it's about routine. It's a routine that doesn't work is what I'm saying. It's a routine that doesn't work. Like, speed it up and maybe you'll make some of them. Change it up here. But yeah, that was a just a very weird game. The poor shooting, six for 31 from Milwaukee from three.

eight for 32 for the nets from three point range. Joe Harris, a one for 11 stinker of a performance for him. And it's weird because Bruce Brown, that final minute, had the two shots that he took that he should not have taken. But he's like the one of the only reasons they were in the game to begin with. He played really good defense all game, had that stretch earlier in the game when he hit like three or four floaters over Brooke Lopez in a row. he played good defense, made smart passes, and then just in the last minute,

had some big-time mistakes that changed the way we talked about his performance. But, you know, it certainly took some of the heat off of Joe Harris with his one for seven from three, one for 11 from the field. The Nets, you know, I still think they're going to win the series. My perspective doesn't change there. But you can't rule out Milwaukee figuring some stuff out with their size. And especially because you saw down that stretch when it mattered most. KD got to the elbow twice in a row.

It's unstoppable. And then, I mean, unbelievable defense by PJ Tucker on the three that Durant hit. I mean, that was one of those moments where it's like, there is nothing you can do. Nothing. He got over that screen and was still, I mean, no airspace. And if he can make that, then that's a tip your cap stuff. but, I mean, P.J. Tucker was fighting. He was fighting for it. And points were hard to come by, obviously, yeah, the Brown, he's not going to sleep real well tonight because you got to get that.

And by the way, the inbound pass sucked so bad that that should get beat up, right? I mean, they're inbound of the ball. You should be able to end up bound the ball without everybody falling all over themselves trying to save it from out of bounds. It was all scrambled mess after that. Yeah. You can't really run your play when at the. the beginning, it all becomes a scrambled mess where you're just trying to save the ball from going out of bounds. Now you're all discombobulated and you're just like, you don't know, clock, score, where everybody is on the court. I mean, it all gets screwed up. As soon as that

inbounds pass goes awry. But, and I got to give, look, I got to give Chris Middleton his props. I slammed them after those first two games. He was miserable. He's had a lot of downplayoff moments over the course of the last couple of years. But he showed up huge for this one. The rebound thing was huge too. What do you grab? 15, I think, 15 rebounds out of him. And he had the 35 points.

I can't get it out of my head. Bill and Rosillo were talking about this topic. I guess it was on whatever, their Monday pod or Sunday that they do. And when they got to the middle of the subject, it's all of it. about since I heard the talk about this because they couldn't figure out what quarterback to compare them to, but the Middleton thing and how it's so much like, like an Alex Smith or somebody like that, where it's, if you, if you have an opinion on Alex Smith or you had an opinion on Alex Smith, that if you just wait around, you're going to end up, you're going to get your

moments to be right and you're going to get your moments to be wrong. And so you'll watch Monday Night Football. And, to throw for 365 yards and four touchdowns. You'd be like, I told you Alex Smith was awesome. And then the next week you'll play against the Bears and he's got 136 yards and two picks. Again, it's like, I told you Alex Smith sucked. And I really can't get that out of my head

with the Middleton thing because it's like, he does have this. Like these 35 and 15s, which are just gargantuan numbers in a must-win situation. And then he had the games like game two where they're getting beat by a thousand and he can't hit anything. And so I don't know what to make of it all.

I do know this. They got nothing out of their bench. Nothing. Where they get four out of Portis, none out of Forbes. And then two out of Conantin. I mean. They got a great defensive play

from the NASA Santa de Coupo. Yeah. did have a good block. I think he played like one possession. Yeah. But not, I mean, that's not sustainable. And we talked about losing DeVincenzo. It's a big one. It's big. It's big for them and it's big for that depth. But I don't think I'm going to let it play out and see what game four is. I mean, you know, maybe they did find something defensively, even if they didn't offensively. Maybe they found something defensively. And just with the extreme amount of minutes

those guys are going to play, they're going to be able to keep Brooklyn in a much more reasonable range to be able to you know, play with, score with. Yeah. I'll tell you this. I think the defense, it's possible and then offensively with Middleton.

In game one, they ran 21 pick and rolls with Middleton. In game two, they ran 18. And then in game 3, 27. Running the offense through Middleton, even though sometimes it didn't look great. They had a couple of turnovers with the Yana setting screens that didn't work out. For the most part, I think this is a formula for success moving forward for the Milwaukee Bucks to run more offense through Chris Middleton. I believe it will lead to more potent results. So we'll see if this trends upward

for them. And the Brooklyn defense is not good. We have a large sample size that, and, and Milwaukee has just played so poorly during this series that they haven't really put pressure on their defense. I mean, again, if you're going to let Janice and Brooke and PJ Tucker all just spread out around the three point line and shoot threes, it's like you are playing right into their hands because they can play small for their offense and you're not making them pay for it. And so the lack of going to the basket, they should be murdering them in paint points. Murdering them.

And it's confounding, to say the least. But they got away with the win and you never know. The crowd was great. I didn't think they played well either. Obviously, the three point percentage has been abysmal. They got game four and tied it up. It wouldn't shock me. I mean, I'm holding out hope that that series can get good.

because it's been a massive letdown so far. I hope so. Let's move to the other side in the east, which is Philly and Atlanta. And we wondered, did Philly find something in the second half of that game one, which was they weren't going to let Danny Green

get torched by Trey Young. They were going to use Thibel. They were going to use Simmons. And that was going to be what they did against Trey Young and it worked out for them in game two. They got out to that huge lead

and then that lead disintegrated because of Herder and Gallinari no less. And then they were able to pull away in the fourth quarter. They got a crazy Shake Milton performance

and you know I think we talk about what is sustainable what can be replicated well, Joel M. B. being amazing is pretty much par for the course, right? We're seeing they have nothing

that they can throw at him. They're throwing Capella at him, and Capella can't do anything with him. And he looks, he's playing with a chip on his shoulder right now. Do you notice that? Embedit is. Yeah.

Yeah. Like he's a little more animated and angry than he has been in the past. He's playing like he's hungry. Yeah. Like, You saw the one where Capella caught the lob and dunked on his head. They came down the other way.

He called for the ball. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He bulldozed him into the 10th row and then dunked on the whole team. It was like some Shaq stuff. And I was like, golly. And then he pushed Gallaudari from behind. He was just getting testy. And I don't know.

It's a little bit of a different M.Bed, I thought, in that. I mean, M. Embed's always been emotional. Yeah. But I like seeing the nasty. Yeah. Nasty and a playoff setting, especially against this Hawks team that comes with that grit

and that energy and that toughness as well. He's matching it and really raising the level of it. Yep. Yeah. And you just did, you just did the video on Trey for this week. Trey has been otherworldly in these playoffs. He has,

for a guy that's going through it for his first time. And now, he's not on the better team in this series. You know, we need to make that clear. And so there's going to be real challenges and the Sixers were the best defensive team, right? So, I mean, this is a whole other world, high pressure. And you are going to be going up against two of the best perimeter defenders that we have on the planet, possibly the two best, really, in Simmons and Thibald.

And that's what you're charged with dealing with. you did that video and some of those plays and some of the breakdowns that you did it's just it shows he just can carve up a defense you know what is the what's the counter punch is there a counter punch that you think Atlanta can throw to this. Oh, with Ben Simmons and Matisse Stivel. You know, it's funny because I'm not sure there is a counter punch against these guys. No. Like they're just such high-level defensive players. They're elite defensive players. I do look forward to seeing if we do see Atlanta switch up their lineups. You mentioned how Capella is getting beat up a little bit by Embed, which is no knock on Capella, a great defensive player, but Ambide does that to everybody. It's just who Embed is. I wonder if we'll see Atlanta try a little bit of small ball

with John Collins at the five or even Gallant Ari at the five if they want to go really small, and just go full out spacing, spread it out, you know, force the Sixers to switch all screens. I'm curious to see if we'll see a wrinkle like that, and maybe that can help spring Tray loose or get him some easier matchups after a switch, because in the way in which they are currently constructed, I'm not so sure that a lot will change in terms of the matchups that you get on Trey Young. Well, and so, you know, you just have to go to work on those guys, watch the film and find some weak spots. And there's not many of them for Ben Simmons and Ortiz

The Hebel. I actually kind of think of it like I do with the old Curry situation. Right. When you could when when when you could grind that thing down and you could make them play half court basketball, it was your best chance because now you can keep a guy chasing him everywhere trying to stay attached to him. It's when they get stops and that Warriors team was so great defensively that they did get those stops and now they got Draymond or Iguodala or whoever catching it off the board and they would just take off and now you're in space and now you're cross-matching and it's hellacious. I kind of feel like Tray's chance at being unbelievable again is that. It's actually weirdly the Atlanta defense which is can you get a

enough stops and get out in space because if you're going to have to play half-core basketball against that crap, I mean, good, you can't. You can't. You're not going to put up a huge number when you're, especially because you got to have the ball at the time. Like with a curry, he didn't have to have the ball all the time. He could just run around everywhere. That's the thing, Chris. That, like I hit that note late in the video, right? The next step for Tray Young is becoming more effective away from the ball. It doesn't have to. It doesn't have. have the ball on his hands when he's not running pick and roll when he's not bringing it up the floor when he's not isolating right but when he's off the ball if tray young can translate his

shooting off the dribble from logo range from right at the three point line and to be able to race around the screen and shoot off the catch or to relocate off ball and like come off a little rub screen and get himself open if tray can do that it adds a whole new dimension about the way in which you need to defend him and to me you know when i look at this hawks roster you got Bogdanovich. You got a guy who can handle the ball. You got Gallinari who can handle the ball a little bit for you. You have others on this team.

Even Lou Williams, for that matter, coming off the bench. You got guys who can handle Kevin Herder, a secondary ball handler. And the real solution could be that, you know, attack with one of those secondary guys, Bogdanovich or Herder, and get Trey open. But I don't think Trey's at that level yet. He doesn't have that innate ability to move off of screens and get himself open yet. and like I hope that's a training priority for him

watches a lot of film and realizes oh I don't need to always have the ball on my hands to be an elite player I can raise my game by giving up the ball like it's going to be the same conversation with Luca you know we talked about it with Dallas like well if you bring in more talent he's going to have to move off the ball same thing with Tray Young

they have brought on more talent and they will continue to try to that's the next step for Tray Young and I think the series makes that very apparent as the second half of the season went on. They did let Bogdanovich handle it more. You know what I mean? Especially in that time that Trey was out. When Trey was out, they let Bogdanovich handle it more. But not when they're together quite as much, which is not when they're together quite as much. And you know, it was crazy when I was

watching the video that you did, you showed how they, uh, the stack play, which is so good, the, the, the two screens that prize open Capella for the lob, right? Yeah. But if you go back and watch that video that you put up, I don't know if you noticed this. So, I'm watching that, and the thing that stood out to me as I'm watching it is that both times, you're calling out, as you're describing the play that they run, you're calling out the two screens, and in both, and all of them, it was Hunter. And I thought to myself, they miss this guy. They do miss them.

They miss this guy. I, you know, I got it. I saw him at the beginning of the season, and I'm like, boy, this is a different dude. and he just got ravaged by injury this year. He tried to come back. And he was outstanding against Randall. I mean, great, great. Like the kind of guy that you can just throw on somebody and say,

go get me a stop. Like he's got a chance to be a really good player in this league. And, of course, the news came out today. He's done no matter what for the rest of the playoffs, no matter what happens with Atlanta. But that's a big loss for them. You know, when you get to the highest stakes, you got to have all your best players available to you.

And he is certainly one of them. And even just sneaky stuff like that, right? Setting the screen that doesn't let a guy get by you, right? He's a well, he's a very skilled basketball player who you can tell has been very well taught. bought in, it's not surprising. Fundamentals. Yeah, play for Tony Bennett.

I mean, good grief. You better know the fundamentals because you're only going to score 44 points a game or whatever. I know they scored a lot more with him and the Jerome team. But, you know, he's, that guy knows how to play basketball. He really does. High IQ, intelligent. Yeah, it's a shame that he's not there. They miss him a lot on both ends of the court.

Yeah. But Red Velvet's having his moment too. I love Red Velvet as his nickname so much. It's appropriate, isn't it? Well, it's just been, it's been one of my big problems. Like with, I told you, like, wrestling. I'll turn on wrestling now, and I know you don't care about it. But like, if you turn on wrestling now, you watch, like,

there was a championship match a couple months ago on one of those pay-per-views. And it was Drew McIntyre versus Bobby Lashley. and I resent so greatly guys just having regular names. That is so stupid. Like I want, I want you to be the fiend.

I want you to be Hillbilly Jim or junkyard dog or whatever, right? Triple H. Yeah, right. Triple H, whatever it may be. Came. Perfect.

All of them, right? I want the Undertaker, somebody, right? Don't just be a guy's name. And to me, it elevates. you to a different level because you're just Kevin Herder, the redhead with a side part. Like, who cares?

Right. Cool. He knocks down some shots. But if you're red velvet. Yeah. I mean, it could have worked for what's his name? What was the guy on the Kings? He flamed out.

Sosa. Soskistio. Oh, Sastasio. Yeah. Nxtauscus. They tried. It's the only reason I remember him. See?

Nick Stowskis could have just come and gone, but I will never forget him, even if he flamed out because he was Saus Castillo. Let me tell you something real quick before we move on to the other series, The Suns thing. When I was looking up all those numbers regarding the clippers and their lineups, I ended up coming across other lineups that have been used the most during this postseason. Listen to this. and this is where I was like, holy mackerel. Ben Simmons, Seth Curry,

Danny Green, Tobias Harris, Joel Embed. That's your standard starting five, right? And that's what they started last game, right? It was Simmons Curry, Tobias Green, and Embed, right? So it's their starting five. In this postseason, they are plus

39 net. Their net rating is plus 39. That's amazing. What the hell? That's amazing.

I know it was like when I was scrolling to Kev I'm like, hold on now. And I went and looked at the minutes because it's like, you know, you see, it was most used lineups, right? So like the most used lineup is that son's starting lineup right with paul crowder booker bridges and aton they're a plus 19 and point

eight that's that's extreme right and then you have like denvers which is compazo and rivers along with gordon yokech and porter they're minus nine right so far and obviously look some of the numbers are going to get smashed because of last night but when i was scrolling through those and just trying to find out you know what what lineups have worked and of the lineups that have been used the most by these teams. How is it failed? That's a freaky number, bro. And I just pulled it up.

I see the lineup has a 144 offensive rating. How? And I'll tell you what. We talk about Embed one of the guys, I don't think we hit enough on the Tuesday night show, was Seth Curry. Yes. Seth Curry in these playoffs is averaging 17.3 points on 45.5% from three,

12 total attempts per game. And, you know, just to compare that to the regular season, He was averaging 12.5 points on 9.7 shots per game. So up about two shots and then up five points per game. I mean, I'm watching this guy and it's like, huh. I mean, I wonder if he's just going to keep doing this in the future. Like, why not have him shoot 12 or 13 shots every single night? Oh, hey, it worked with the other curry, brother.

It worked with the other curry, right? I don't tell Daryl. You see where he got fined for a tweet? Oh, yeah, yeah. Tampering. Twitter fingers. Those Twitter fingers are going to get you in trouble, brother. That was about like bring the other one here, right?

About bring the other curry. Yeah. No, it was, yeah, come here or join him. Join him or something. I think it's so simple. Would he get $75,000 for that? Yeah. That's wild.

Plus 39. All right. Net rating for their starting lineup, which includes Seth Curry, Danny Green. along with Simmons and Harrison Ambide. And that is just a absolutely crazy number. And the Seth Curry thing, look, I didn't like it, but I didn't expect it to become a robbery. That is a robbery.

When you, when you move, after you just got done watching Dowell, you don't think Luca could have used Seth Curry? Had it been really nice to have. Would have been really nice. Because Josh Richardson was getting zero minutes. Zero. And you just said, Cuddy's averaging 17 on the team that's got a chance at the title.

And starting all seven games so far averaging 29.6 minutes. On a team that is, he's part of a starting lineup that's plus 39 for God's sake. He's a shooting guard on it. Playing next to a guy that doesn't shoot. And like the logic made sense on paper. Richardson, like Curry got picked on defensively against the clippers a handful of possessions.

You wanted more size, you wanted more defense. It just didn't work out. It just didn't work out. And sometimes that's the way trades goes, even when it makes sense in your head at the time, it doesn't work out. And for the Sixers team, Curry right now, just absolutely unbelievable.

And if that continues, that's going to be a huge boost to their chances next round if they move on against either Brooklyn or Milwaukee. Well, and Philly is one of those teams that it's hard. I know that starting lineup is unbelievable, but, I mean, they got out scored 32. zip in the first half of that game in bench scoring. Like, that

can be a thing. And it wouldn't shock me if Atlanta catches a game at home, honestly. And this ends up two to two. It wouldn't. If they split in Atlanta, because, yes, it appears that Phillies figured something out, but Atlanta's got a

real advantage with the bench thing. Like, they needed every bit of that Shake Milton BS. And I say BS. Shake is, obviously capable of that. But I mean, that one he hit at the end of the third quarter to go along with all the shots he was making.

That was crazy. So I don't know. They have not gotten the bench production that you would think. And Atlanta might be able to run out on them with the bench. Let's move over to the last series that we need to cover today. Oh, God. The background has changed. I just changed my Zoom background.

DeAndre Aitin and David Booker. Okay. Look, Denver, we talked about this on Tuesday. I hate it for them. It is what it is. They don't have enough. When you get to this- Don't have Jamal Murray.

Yeah, and when you get to this stage, you can't have Capazzo and Austin Rivers and Monty Morris and these guys going up against what is an outstanding basketball team with guys seemingly every. night playing at their absolute peak. And it's one night it's been Devin Booker. And another night it's been Aiton. Another night it's been Bridges.

But then for the first couple of games of this series, this Chris Paul thing is just... I mean, this is ridiculous, Kevin. Dude, he's in control of the game, the entire game. The whole game. And you know what... You know what has run through my mind? I'm going to run this by you real quick.

because we're not going to do a ton of analysis on Suns, Denver. I hate it. Mike Malone hates it even worse, obviously. Did you see that? Michael Malone. Well, I mean, that is his preference. Well, did you hear him last night? They quit.

I was like, I was like, say bums. Say bums. Call him bums. Because he was just unloading about everything. He gets pretty emotional sometimes. They're embarrassing, humiliated, they quit, they suck. He just, he gets so mad about them.

And I'm like, bro, you're starting compazo. No offense, but you're starting compo against Chris Paul. What do you expect? I guess he'd say, I expect my team to fight. Like, all right, they can fight all they want. And also like, they're not, they might be fighting and everything, but they also are hurt. Like, forget about the Jamal Murray thing for a second. Michael Porter tweaked his back in game two.

And he did not look like himself in game three on either end of the floor. And Will Barton, he didn't. And Will Barton, you know, he's trying to gut it out. Just got back. Yeah, exactly. He's trying. He's grinding because they need it against this son's team. Like, would it surprise you, like on the scale of 1 to 10,

how much would it surprise you if the Nuggets take two games back in Denver and tie it? Oh, God. Are you serious? I'm just asking a question. Yes. I will be absolutely flea. Lord. How?

I think they can win one. Like you would have to have just unreal Yokic performances. And it could. Ait and files out in the third quarter. That type of deal would have to happen. And you got the home crowd. I mean, you never. Look, you get the Celtics got one.

Yeah, it can happen. They could get one. But getting two, I don't know about their chances in doing that. This Phoenix team, like we talked about with Utah earlier, and we're going to be talking about probably for weeks to come. This Utah team and the Phoenix team are for real. Like they got the one and two seats for good reason. The son's team.

The sons here are getting better. That's because of Chris Paul and their young guys. I'm going to let you feel a little bit. We'll end on this because I'm going to let you feel a little bit better about this sun's thing. Let me just throw this out there, okay? This has been in my mind for a long time. And a lot of it started a couple of years ago when I heard about this or a red of

about it. I can't remember how it got into my mind the first time. But then last year, there was this interview that was done with LeBron James after he won. And he was talking about being 35 years old, putting up the numbers that he did, and how it compared to, how would this LeBron do against the 27-year-old LeBron, which is the first time he was in the finals. He averaged like 30 a game in the finals for Miami. And he said, uh, LeBron now would kill that LeBron. And I think about this a lot when I watched Chris Paul have 15 assists and no turnovers. And it's just that this institutional knowledge that there's really nothing you can

throw at these guys as they have gotten so many reps that they haven't seen before. But there is, you know, as a massive music fan, there has always been the 27 thing, right? So many artists died at that age of 27. Well, oddly, in the NBA, they don't die, but they win their first titles when they're 27 or older. There are some rare exceptions over the years, right, where Duncan won at like 23 when he was on that great Spurs team, Magic and Kobe. They were young, but they had veteran teams and other superstars around them. And I say this because LeBron said the 35-year-old LeBron. would dominate the 27-year-old LeBron.

Listen to this. So sometimes when we're watching these playoffs and our expectations are very high, and this may apply to Yonis also. Just understand that in the history of the NBA, guys don't do this until they are, and I'm talking about win the whole thing, 27 or older.

The best player on the team is almost always. ways. And that includes Isaiah Thomas, Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Steph Curry, Shack, Durant, Moses Malone, Wiltscham, Halijian, Dirt Novitzky, Kevin Garnett, Dr. J, Oscar Robertson, Jerry West. I mean, you can go on and on and on. And there's tons of them. And it's like, when you think of this through the prism of, look, if this guy does it, he's doing something that has not been done before. So when you think Trey Young, or you think Luca Dantz, or you think Janice, when you think Donovan Mitchell, if Donovan Mitchell is the best guy

on a title team, he'll be the outlier because these guys don't do it. And is it game catches up with that athleticism? Is it the institutional knowledge that you gain? Is it because you get a little bit older? You start taking care of your body more. Some guys by that time have families, whatever it may be. But even the greatest players, LeBron, Jordan, Curry, I just listed off all those guys. They're all 27 or older. Okay, so now let's take a step back. Who does that apply to? It applies to Chris Paul. I mean, I suppose it would apply to Kawhi, right? If they could get back in it. It doesn't really apply in Utah, because Donovan's their best player. He would be the best player on a on a title team. I don't think Embedd is 20. Oh, he is 27.

He is 27 on the dot, didn't he? Check that. Embedde, uh, turned 27 on March 16. Holy hell. Hmm. I mean, obviously it doesn't apply in Atlanta. And then the other one in the east. Duran. Yeah. So, of course, right? They're all over 27.

Yeah. Yep. But he'd be their best player, right? It's an interesting thing. In the West. It takes time. A lot of, for most players, it takes time. It's not just about the player oftentimes.

It's about building the right roster around them. And that can take years if it ever happens at all. And for this Chris Paul, you know, team that he has here with Phoenix, he's played with some great rosters. I'm not sure he's played with a team with the amount of smart basketball players on the court at the same time as him. Like these, it's not just like the Lob City Clippers at times was Chris Paul running the show. He ran every pick and roll. He would throw the lobs.

He'd throw kickouts for threes. He'd score himself. It was very Chris Paul centric. These sons teams don't feel like that. They move the ball around. and they make quick decisions. Monty Williams calls it a 0.5 offense. The way in which they move the ball as a unit is very beautiful,

you know, game-esque. It's like Spursian in that sense, right? And Chris Paul's never been in a situation like this, almost besides like the OKC team, which also had great ball movement. The Sun's team, though, is just on another level. Every player they put out there on the court is smart. They have a high IQ.

They have the ability to read the floor and diagnose situations quickly. and Chris Paul being the best one maybe in the league at doing that. I mean, some of the passes that he makes, like if the help defender and a pick and roll comes over, he immediately throws a dart to the corner three and like there's no time because they're still like rotating in to the paint to prevent a lob to D'Andrean as he's throwing the pass out to the three-pointer shot. It's like obscene what he's able to do to defenses. And that is about all the years of experiences that you're talking about, Chris. And this Phoenix team has a real shot. They really do.

They really do. just he understands everything that is going on in the game he knows there are players on the court that don't know how many files they have that he does he knows how many how much times on that clock he knows how far away they are from the bonus you watch him he knows everything that is going on with that game and every play if you play pick up with chris paul he's your scorekeeper and you know what it's crazy you jog my memory when you were talking about that clippers thing because i had to go back during quarantine we did this whole whole video series on different playoff matchups and obviously the Grizzlies played against them

many years in the playoffs. The best of those Clippers teams, because I just had to go back and watch all these games, are the ones, it's actually oddly, it's like Vinnie Del Negrow was the coach at that time. And it was like, they're bringing off like a young Bledsoe and Nick Young and Kenyon Martin and Reggie Evans and they, and Coran Butler. Like they had like, they had like, Like they had some dogs on that team and they had some like high flyers on that team. And then some of those late Clipper dock teams, they're a rough watch. They started in the playoffs Chauncey Billups at two in a game. It was like Chauncey Billups and Karam Butler and like, I mean, it was it was rough stuff.

Lamar Odom came off the bench for them and it was like post post prime. Yeah, this is not Lamar. Of course. It's not Lakers. The names you're throwing out. Like if there's younger listeners, I mean, like, it wasn't so-and-so a great player. It's like, no, this is post-prime. No, these guys are, though.

They're near the end. Couldn't move. You know. What was he, a year from coaching? He played one more year in Detroit, I think, after his last year with the Clippers, if I remember correctly. I think that so. But anyways, yeah.

Chris has been around for a long time. It just made me think about it, right? When LeBron said that last year, now you're watching this guy and you're like, how is Chris Paul at 36? dominating a game. He dominated that game last night. And looking nowhere near the end. No. No.

I mean, how many years does he have left? Playing at a high level, right? Might be as many as he wants, as many as he can stay healthy for. He's special. They have a chance for sure. Their lineup, I just told you, their lineup has been crazy.

And I know, I know they got game two, but they need to get Conley back in Utah. will. I'm talking as they go on. Even if they get past this round and you're playing Phoenix, you need Conley for that. You do. And so... I'm with you. You know, and

hopefully you can. He's got the hamstring thing. I'll tell you what, man. Like, I know people talk about ratings and all that. We've hit this a little bit, but if you got friends who like basketball and who aren't watching right now, tell them to watch a Phoenix game or

Utah game. Like the way these teams play, it's just so freaking fun to watch. I hope you to do. But don't tell them to watch bucks nets. Damn. I resent that series so much. I really do. I get so excited every time they're about to play.

And I'm like, this is terrible. I mean, like, understandably so. That's the series I would assume has the highest ratings. I honestly don't care that much about ratings. I think ratings are very overrated. I think we live in a digital age. There's better metrics to measure interest. That's where I am.

but understandably so Nets Bucks probably has the best ratings because of the level of talent of both of those rosters but if like you have friends that that's the only series they care to watch

tell them to check out some of the other ones because there's some great basketball being played right now and the son's team might be the funnest to watch for me I love watching them play if that's the only thing they've watched

they're not basketball figures anymore they're watching baseball now they're like the hell I'm going to watch some baseball Maybe these guys will give up some bombs now that they're not doctoring up the ball. Just tell your friends. Tell your friends to check out Phoenix, Utah. And we do just need to add this as a note because Shams broke this news today about the calendar.

We did get confirmation that after this is all said and done with this summer and everything, next season is the exact NBA calendar that we had basically. at 2019. So it'll be back to normal. It'll start. October 19th. Yeah. And it's going to end in

middle of June. Yep. Yep. April 16th end of season, June 23rd, NBA draft. It's right back on track. It just felt good to see something like... So much for December start to the season.

Yeah, I know. It's not happening. It's just a scheduled back to normal. It's going to be hard for all these NBA teams to pull this off for sure. I mean, just especially with all like the, the fiscal year and everything that has to take place with it.

It'll be a catastrophe. Free agency, Summer League, all that crap. Everything's, you know, pushed together. But they're going to make it work and things will be back to normal

for next NBA season, which will be a very, very welcome return to say the least. Hopefully we get some good games to talk about for Tuesday. We've had a couple. We had a couple good ones. Yeah. Yeah.

So, again, like we'll be doing our show on Tuesday, night. Tuesday night will be our next show, not Monday night. So Tuesday night, we look like we have Phoenix Nuggets and then Nets bucks. Should be fun. Those are some. Wait, those are the two? It's a game five if necessary for Denver Phoenix. And then it's a game five, which we will have for Milwaukee, Brooklyn. That's Tuesday night. So we'll be talking about those games and the others going on. All right, you call it. Do we get to talk about a game five in Phoenix? It takes Denver.

Yes, I think Yokic will carry Denver to one win. Get a hot shooting performance maybe from the rest of the team. They'll take one. They got to take one at home when you have the MVP in your roster. I think so, too. They got to get one. But Phoenix looks really awesome. No, they do.

They're playing great when it matters most, to say the least. And you might be early. You might have to change that logo behind you. It says 2022. Yes, it does. Isn't that funny? I made that. It would be the 20-1.

I made it during the bubble. You did. It's the worst-looking Photoshop. I threw Devin Booker on DeAndre Aiton on LeBron and Dwayne Wade from the heat for the heat picture and change some other stuff around. So it was 22 NBA champions on the T-shirt for the Phoenix Suns. Oh, did you photoshopped the 2022 also? Yeah, I Photoshopped that.

So I don't leave any detail. you don't leave any detail unturned except for the fact that Devin Booker's heads on a black guy not a light skin black guy I'm talking about I don't leave any I don't leave anything unturned but that 2020 is pretty good there right

it is that was pretty good it actually looks natural it looks great I did a good job on that not on the heads though I was too lazy for Chris I got a right going to record videos and podcasts with you twice a week. I don't have time to do all these photoshop. You are a busy guy.

And you got to play your war zone career. Of course. And you got to watch a bachelor. I mean, you got a lot of stuff going on. I mean, it's 2 a.m. air on the East Coast.

Do I want to go to sleep or do I want to play war zone? Always the question every night. What's the latest you stayed up playing war zone? Don't lie to me. I mean, I think the last year during the NBA off season, I probably had a night play until 4.30 or something like that. Look at you.

But maybe only one or two. Like we like this isn't when I was like in high school or college playing Halo 3. We used to have there used to be nights where my dad would be getting up for work at like 5.45 a.m. And I would be just going to bed. There were nights like that. Back in the day and high school playing Halo 3 and modern warfare, modern warfare 2. Where I'd be going to bed as my dad is waking up for work. And did you have school?

No, no, not for it. I would never do that on a school night, like a weekend or summer or something like that. That was a good kid. I was a good student. I mean, I tried hard at least. Well, what kind of GPA you graduate with? Don't lie to me. In high school?

Yeah. In high school, I think that's a 2.7. Get your ass out of here. Two point. I was a good student. No, you weren't. What's that a B? Minus?

No, it's not. It's a C. What are you? I was a good student. In college, in college, I had a 3.7 for my major. But I think I had a, I think I had a three, don't delidiate. And then I'll tell you, I think I also had like a 2.7 for everything else. Is that right?

But a 3.7 from my majors, yeah. I had a psychology major and a communications major. My parent, my parents. I was a good student for the stuff that matter. There's a lot of stuff they teach you in school that, like, who cares? I'm with you. Just being honest. I was not, I was not the, uh,

I school was always a means for me to get to do what I wanted to do. Yeah. But I did take that seriously because I wanted to do the other stuff. And so, what was your GPA? They, my parents, it's a true story. My parents were like the things that like I wanted to do. It was always I had to have a B average. And by the way, 2.7 is a B minus.

Just to clarify. We're not a C. B minus. Google says it's a bit. B minus. Nah, then that's a problem with society now. They get it, let anybody think they got a B.

That's ridiculous. A B is a three because that's what my parents made me have. 3.0 or no go they used to say, right? So I couldn't do anything that I wanted to be able to do unless I maintained a 3.0. And I was the kid that would say, so a C is worth two, a B is worth three, and an A is worth four. That's how you get to your GPA. So if I knew I was going to get two A's, I could get two C's and the other thing. I just needed it to be a B average. And so I, what a big brain you have. No, always have. They told me and I, I graduated with a 3.0. Wow. Right on the button. But I always did

exactly what I had to do. It was just a means. I mean, yeah. I could have gotten a 4.0. I'm my freaking genius. You listen to me every week. Listen to me. I'm a genius. You say it was a means. Like, what did you want in high school? Did you already know what you wanted to be? No. No, you didn't. It was just about getting through it. Getting that diploma moving on a college and figuring out. No, no means to get to where I want to go, meaning I wanted to play. Oh. I wanted to play. I wanted to play sports. I wanted to be outside with my friends. I wanted to go and do. I wanted to, uh, I wanted to be able to get, uh, like an old car when I turned 16.

I wanted to, like the things that I wanted, you know. And so. What kind of old car did you get? It was a Chevy Blazer. Hmm. I got in a wreck the first night. Oh my God. It's true story.

You serious? First night I got my license. Yeah. I did. What year was in that car? Great student though. But no, I graduated with 3.0. That's true.

Three point out. Yeah. Huh. I did better in college. I cared more. about college and doing good in the classes. But yeah, I just, I just didn't. I wanted to.

Even though I got the 3.7, I cared less. 2.7. You said I was a good student. My sophomore year was really bad. Like, I'm pretty sure I had above a three every other year, except for my sophomore year. My sophomore year, if I'm her correctly, I got like a lot of Cs and maybe even a D or something like that.

It was a bad year for me. Oh, is that right? I was not happy that year. But freshman junior, senior year, I'm pretty sure I had good grades each time. Well, there you go. Now, ladies and gentlemen, you've learned more about us at the end of our podcast. If you have made it to this point in the podcast, I would say probably all of you, I haven't looked at all of the analytics, but I would say 90% of you that are listening to

this probably had a better GPA than both of us. So I don't know what that means. but I'm just telling you mine. Mine was just a fuck. It gets you to college. It gets you to college. That's what it means. Yeah. Well, actually, I was actually, I was talking to, I was talking to Zach Lowe and he told me he graduated with a 2.0.

So. Yeah, there you go. Meadzilch. Sorry. It's just kidding. I think he went to like an Ivy League school. All right. Did he tell us that on our show?

We talked about that, right? I think, yeah. Oh, by the way, shout out to him and Kevin Ardivitz. because I was listening to the pod today, and they shouted me out about something regarding Ben Simmons. Two smarties. They're chopping it up. I mean,

you're the third big brain. It should bring you in. I just want to make it clear. My GPA was only because I didn't care. Not because I wasn't smarter than you. Yeah. Not you. I'm saying everyone.

Of course. Yes. You would have been a 4.0. Well, listen, you could have been the valedictorian if you wanted to be. Could have been. But she didn't care about that. You wanted to. That wasn't the means you wanted.

Could have been. I think my mom was second. She, like, still is mad to this day. Really? Wow. Yeah. She was second. Yeah.

Oh, God. One last quick story. I went to my parents high school. I went to go walk through the halls. And in my parents' high school, they have these posters of every graduating class. Okay. So, like, flip through the posters. and you see like the graduated class

and then it'll say the person and it will say like everything that they were involved in whatever and so I flipped to my mom's graduating year and I flipped over it and my mom's and it's like I mean it's like Kevin it's like a page it was like class president salutatory and you know science club

basketball team like all the like a million things right and I was like oh my God I was like my mom was like miss everything and I flipped over my parents were high school sweetheart they've been married 60 something years now that's amazing yeah but uh I flipped open on on that no it's actually 50 52 years they've been married I'm sorry 52 years but I I flipped I flipped so my my parents went to the grass of them hit 50 they went to the same high school

I flipped open, I found my dad, Bill Vernon. I found it. Bro, it said golf team. Golf team. It was it. So only thing he did in high school ever. Ever. He didn't do anything.

He didn't have any accolades, no nothing. And my mom had like a thousand things under the day. I'm like, how did you get her? How? How? How did you get here? You did nothing. You know what I mean?

But so I think now I just say I got my mom's brain I think I hope. Chris Vernon. Anyway. Vernadamus. Verna Damasus. Vernodamus.

Yeah, she passed out the Vernodomis brain. She did. All right. Hopefully we have a great weekend of basketball and we got some games to talk about that are worthwhile of talking about on Tuesday. Everybody have a great weekend. Thanks for listening to us again.

Kev, I'll talk to you on Tuesday. I'm looking forward. I would have a great weekend, everybody.