The Right Time with Bomani Jones - Vinnie Goodwill on Kevin Durant-Rockets Concerns, Wemby-Thunder rivalry, Knicks NBA Finals or Bust? | 02.20

Episode Date: February 20, 2026

Bomani Jones is joined by ESPN's Vinnie Goodwill to break down all the second-half storylines for the NBA. First, they discuss the ALL-Star game's issues, which are fixable and which are not. Later, they break down the Western Conference race, whether the Rockets have issues beyond the Kevin Durant Files, the emerging Spurs-Thunder rivalry, and whether Anthony Edwards or Nikola Jokic can drag their teams to the NBA Finals. Finally, they discuss the potential insanity of Jayson Tatum returning to the Boston Celtics less than one year after his Achilles injury and whether it's Finals or bust for the New York Knicks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the right time, a wave original. My name is Beaumani Jones. Thanks for listening wherever you get your podcast. Thanks for watching us on YouTube. Subscribe, like, rate us, review us, give us five stars. You only give us four stars. I'm inclined to believe you are a hater. It is Vinny Goodwill Friday.

Vinny Goodwill check him out on ESPN. Boy, I'll first take this week. Holding it down. Saw you on there last week. Don't a little bit, man. Getting a little extra reps. You know what I mean? It's all-star break.

So people go on to Cancun, you know, they do the baseball thing. They, you know, call your boy in. I mean, you and Stephen A was out there trying to bully the homie David Dennis. You know what I'm saying? It looked bad. I mean, I'm saying it looked bad. He was just saying some crazy stuff. Well, what happened was he, I don't know what exactly he said that pissed Stephen A off.

Like, that doesn't happen very much. But Stephen A. was like, yo, you ain't go get very far in this segment, not answering the question. He wasn't talking about the segment. He was like, hey, you'll be here when I'm not. If you're going to be here when I'm here, you're going to answer my question. You know what it was? It was Max PTSD. That's all it was.

Yeah. Yeah, but I will say this. We got a good All-Star game. Yes. This go around. We got a good All-Star game largely because you got to do it out there. we'll be pitching people shit and that will make you be on your P's and Q's.

Like the best weak side shot blocker that basketball has ever seen. You can't have a big brother. I just a big brother. My big brother's 13 years older than me. No shot was ever safe. It didn't matter how far away he was, right? You have to be so dedicated.

Like that's the underrated part of the NBA, how quick you got to get them shots up because they're just, even the guys you think can't play defense. No, they can't. They can't. they was playing against you, you would think that they was Jason Voorhees too, right? You would think they all were.

But now the guy that's Jason Voorhees, two Jason Voorhees is out here. Oh, the all-star game is going to have to pick up because he'll pitch your shit to the front row. I mean, I remember I told you a long time ago, all takes was one maniac. And sometimes that maniac was Mike, sometimes that maniac was Kobe.

Now the maniac is Big Slim. And Big Slim, I firmly believe, at Edwards had no designs on playing hard in that All-Star game. He came out there with the hoop earring. When you coming out with a hoop earring, you ain't gotten those designs on playing hard. That hoop earring could get ripped out

like Lawrence Fishburn in that one movie. You know what I mean? Like you never know, right? Because Big Vic is out here pitching shit. You gotta be. One thing NBA players don't want to be is embarrassed by their peers. So if one guy is doing it,

then you know what? We all got a final. on this lie. And this lie is that we got to be competitive. And that's all it took. And I didn't care if the last game, Beau, was a blowout. The old dudes had played three straight games. They was going to be tired. We all got our money's worth Sunday afternoon. And I think, I don't think we were asking too much. And I think the players delivered. Like, they exceeded the expectations. Well, just act like this thing, like, act like you want to be there. Like, I don't think it needs to be game seven of the NBA finals. I think that people would settle for it looking like a charity game

from the 1980s, right? Like watching Isaiah Thomas lay on his back and do dribbling tricks. I think people would be okay with that. You know what I mean? Like just look like it's something, right? Just it doesn't matter really what the something is, but just look like it's something because what, look, this is what we got to come to understand about the All-Star game as the calendar for the NFL has changed. Like you go back and you look at it, they used to play the Super Bowl on like January 15th. It is gradually over the years moved back a full month as to where next year it's going to be the day before President's Day, where the NBA got moved off its corner and is going to have to play the All Star game on a different weekend. The Super Bowl is House and Valentine's Day, baby.

This is, you know, this is what it's going to do. But what happens for the NBA and why that week turns so negative is, this country addicted to football, man. And so they go from being all juiced up and all wired up about football. And then they're like, all right, football's over. Well, what's going on in basketball? Well, the All-Star game is this week. Oh, shit.

Are you serious? And then you get to the All-Star game. The dunk contest, right, they go, they put it out his misery many times. They go put it out his misery before they bring it back. But that ain't what we remember being. Then you get to the game and the cats ain't really out here playing. And you'll be like, yeah, well, the Pro Bowl is terrible too. and you're right. And when the pro bowl was terrible, by the way,

we said the pro bowl was terrible, and that's why they moved to flag football. The difference is the pro ball had an excuse for being terrible because nobody should be playing football just for the hell of it. You know what I mean? But for the NBA, the country is right here. They scratch it. They itching. They itching that football, right? I got to have it, but it's gone now.

And then when you come back, it's a lesser version of an all-star game than it should be. that's why they can't afford to let it slack. Like if people had a couple of weeks to ease into it, like let's say it came out of football season and went into the NBA Cup, I think that would work. I think that would go.

Now, of course, you can't, right? Like the cup serves a different purpose. Right. But you coming off the football and then y'all out here trotting out some bullshit. No, man. And people look for a reason to kill the NBA anyway. Nah, it ain't going to work.

Well, that's the thing. And that was one of the points that David was trying to make, but he was trying to make it a much grander point than it was, you know, well, people don't want to, people want any excuse to talk about the NBA being these overpaid millionaires, da, da, da, da, da, da. True. But sometimes we just talking about ball. And we don't.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It just happened to meet. It just happened to meet right at the right time, pun intended. I think that's a good point. I also think, Bo, there are markers that come into the NBA season now. It's like opening night, opening week, like you get a couple of good matchups that that get you a little, you know, get you a little juice. Then you go back and then the NBA Cup happens in Vegas like a month and a half later.

And then it's Christmas Day. And then we all into the football. Because right from Christmas Day to Valentine's Day or whatever it is, you all in high stakes football. You went to the end of the regular season. You enter the wildcard. You enter the, you know, you're into the Super Bowl. you into everything else.

People dip in and out. And once it's time for All-Star, it's like, okay, the trade deadline, them past, let me dip back in there. All right, now the NBA, you got my attention. What you going to do with it? And what they've done with it has been nothing for the past X amount of years. And the one thing I do, because I think KD, despite all this other stuff, Katie is really good at creating the straw man.

And when he sat in front of us the other week and said, I've been watching these All-Star games to see this type of game seven intensity y'all been talking about. We ain't never asked but no game seven intensity. We don't want to see no game seven intensity because we know y'all got teams to go back too. We know as soon as the game starts to get out of hand, it's going to be one, two, three, Cancun, and we ain't even mad about that.

Go to Cancun. Get your break. Because in four or five days, the grind is coming right back. And then you start seeing the ramp up for the NBA. And to be honest, Bo, the ramp up, all this conversation about the All-Star game has obscured the fact that there's been some good basketball this season and there's going to be more good basketball in the final two months of the regular season before we get to the playoffs. I understand them saying, hey, man, enjoy what you got in front of you.

My thing is don't take away from what's in front of you. Yeah, and look, it's about to be a thing, guys. Like, the hoop is about to be for real. Like I saw something online. It was a clip of Dan Levitart was talking to Chuck Closterman about football. And I don't know what's happened to Dan since I left, but he's gone, he's gone analytic-minded in a way that doesn't add up to me. But he was saying basically the thing about the point he was making about football was

that he'd rather watch football in a dome because he wants to watch the game to find out who the better team is and that you get a better. metric of who the better team is if you are playing it under most optimal circumstances. And Kosterman, I think correctly made the point that we don't watch games to find out who the better team is. We watch them to see who's going to win, right? Like part of the charm of it is that sometimes the team that isn't the best wins. Sometimes it is about or being the best is about your ability to overcome a certain set of circumstances or sometimes those circumstances are whether sometimes those circumstances are bad matchups, right?

But a tournament is a gauntlet. It is not about evaluating the teams. It's about testing the teams. And who's going to come out on top in the end? Sometimes that's not going to be who's best. This NBA season feels like one of those where it's narrowed in the West just a little bit, right? Like we see that the Thunder are no longer just, just, I mean, early in the year, we thought they would go win 75 games.

I mean, it was a reasonable question that they were going to do that. Now there are only three games ahead of the Spurs, right? Like, I don't think the Spurs are going to catch them, but it would not be crazy. I think we generally believe that the Thunder is the best team in the NBA. There are metrics that indicate that they are by far the best team in the NBA. Some of this regression to the rest of the league has also been as a result. of injuries. But you and I both know they don't want to see the Spurs.

No. If it comes down to it. No. But we also know the Spurs might not want to see the Nuggets, right? This is a year where the matchups in the playoffs feel like they're going to matter a lot more than they have in previous years. And there are legitimately, I think, five teams that somehow could win the championship. It's fun. You hit on so much there.

so I'll start off where you landed in any given year. Like, let's just play a game real quick. I'll name a year and you tell me the teams that had a realistic chance of winning the championship that year, regardless of whether they won or not,

but you know what I'm saying? Just rock with me for us to take of this exercise. 1993. Three. Right? You're going to say sons. The sons, the Knicks, and the Bulls. Right.

1998 1998 I leaned three maybe four right and I'll give you in one more because this is a fun one for me 2005 oh 2005

I go to who did the Pistons play in the conference final day Miami that was the first year of Shaq that's right I go four so in any given year and we went three, four, five. And that wasn't, that was actually by accident, but it serves the point. Right.

In any given year, you may have just four. And it's not always the four teams that make the conference finals because sometimes somebody can get knocked out earlier for whatever reason, like 1994 Seattle looked like the best team in the league, except they ran into the worst matchup of all time with the Denver Nuggets. Take that away. Or you get caught in a tricky two, three. Right. You get caught in one of those weird situations in the second round.

and that could be Denver and San Antonio in the second round this year. That could be Boston and New York in the second round this year. In any given year there's only going to be four teams. This year that feels like five. And that's if you include Detroit amongst the five. I have a hard time doing that.

Only because, Bo, you can't name a team, only the 95 Orlando Magic that goes from not winning the playoff series to getting all the way to the NBA finals without a six. significant personnel acquisition in the offseason, i.e. LeBron James going from Miami to Cleveland, Cleveland, Cleveland, or Kevin Garnett going from Minnesota to Boston. Like, their storylines, I say that to say, the storylines are so rich. The basketball is going to be really, really, really good in the last two months of the season. And even if you look at the Eastern Conference, quietly, Bo, the Eastern Conference has the ability to be superior.

in a lot of ways that we don't think about. And to your point about attrition, or you didn't say the word attrition, but I'm just going to add everything up and say that you said attrition, what people take away from 82 games is, and why I don't think that the league should go away from 82 games is this is a test of attrition.

How well can you withstand the potholes, the bumps, the bruises that go through this season and then get to April and then have enough stamina and experience and maybe a little bit of youth to get to June. It's not just about June. It's about everything that it takes to get there. And we make the mistake sometimes through conversation of only focusing on who's going to get to June as opposed to, man, this is really compelling on the way to June. You never forget about June, but it's the compelling basketball that happens on the way there, whether it's Minnesota and what Ant is doing quietly player development.

story, right? If Yokech is going to be MVP, again, if we come to respect Oklahoma City a lot more because of the struggle that they're going to go through this season. Like, it's so much richness there. And I'm not being like an NBA shield here. I'm just saying that we've only focused on a narrow way of talking about the NBA, whether it's the All-Star, whether it's low management, whether it's the nonsense, that sometimes we miss the basketball. And even though I hate the rules and everything else, the basketball has been good and it's going to get better. So let's start with the West, then go back to the East, right? Forget about championship just for a second.

Let's just think about teams that can make the Western Conference Finals. I think there are five of them that can make the Western Conference Finals. Thunder, Spurs, Nuggets, Rockets, and the Timberwolves. Now, all of this kind of depends on the way that the seating shakes out. you will notice the one team I said no one is the Lakers. I just don't. I think J.J. Reddick has a low key argument for coach of the year for this team having 33 wins, given everything that they are in a zero point differential. Right, right, right. They are a 50-50 team in terms of the points, right?

Anthony Edwards has shown us, and Minnesota has shown us you don't want to see them in the playoffs. No. Not necessarily they're going to go to the championship, but they're going to give you a run. I mean, it's easy to figure they've been to the conference finals twice in a row. And in such a way where in a different time, we would be saying, all right, well, it's not down for you guys to go. But this is an era of more NBA parity. So I guess we view it just a little bit more fairly. But we've seen enough to know Denver don't really want to see them in the first round if it comes to that. I think Denver would much rather see the Lakers in the first round if it comes. I think just about everybody over there would like to see the Lakers in the

first round if they got to see somebody. No, I will I will quibble with you on one. I think Houston would probably rather see Minnesota than the Lakers. Only because the Lakers are really good at winning close games, the Rockets are not. And despite there being what I believe to be a significant gap between how good the Rockets are and how good the Lakers are, if the equalizer is how you perform in closed games and the playoffs, that's where it gets sticky. And I was curious if you were going to name the Rockets for that very reason. They don't have a point guard.

They are 12 and 15 in clutch games and clutches to find this within five points in the last five minutes. But they can overwhelm you defensively. Right. And that's the weird part about all this. And that's the weird part about this whole parody discussion is that every team, even the thunder to some degree, every team is flawed. Every team has a flaw that can get you knocked out of a playoff series if the wrong matchup comes and hits you. In Minnesota, to your point, they don't really necessarily. have a point guard either, even though they got Mike Conley back, he's older. You're not going to

depend on him to be that 40-minute, you know, a night guy. Can Anthony Edwards do it again? What giants, what giant is he going to knock out? Think of the giants he's knocked out already. He sent Kevin Durant home. He sent Nicole Yolkich home. He sent a hobbled Stephen Curry home. I can't even really say that because Steph only played one game in one game that they lost. He sent LeBron home. He sent virtually everybody home that they have put in front of him, including Luca Donch's last year with the Lakers. Who's going to be the next guy that he sends home? Because he ain't going out in the first round.

I think that kid has a different sort of approach to himself that we think of him as being so playful and unsurious that the basketball is like, wait a minute, when they get time, nut cutting time, he's defending LeBron, or he's taking the Jamal Murray matchup, or he's doing stuff on both ends of the floor, while carrying Carl Towns, Rudy goes.

and Julius Randall across the finish line. Hell yeah, I'd be tired getting to the conference finals too. Get that man to ring for getting up to second round. They've asked you this about the rocket since you brought them up. Get off my Dickerson says that they are sorry-ass team. I just felt like they didn't have a point guard. Yeah, I just felt like they didn't have a point guard. Like, what do you think about them top to bottom?

I think to me, and this is old school basketball sensibility. right if you don't have a point guard and you can't protect the realm how good are you right alperin shingoon for being mini yokic and everything else he's not that he's not that guy he is a level of talent that you can build around but when your coach is calling you out when i may you doca is calling you out and saying man we've been having problems with shingoon on defense for the whole year i think i don't think they're a sorry-ass team i think that was a big a heavy-handed by whoever said that, right? I mean, get off my Dickerson said

that the Hornets basically would be better if they had Kevin Durant. Then, excuse me, get off my Dickerson said the Hornets would be better if Get Off My Dickerson played for the Hornets than the Rockets are if Get Off My Dickerson

played for the Rock. I would, I don't know if I completely agree with that because I don't know if Lamello Ball is a serious point guard at this stage. And considering some of the stuff that I've seen like, you know, Miles Bridges and some of these other guys engaged. I don't know how they were going to really fare when it comes down to, you know, playoff situations. I do believe in Eme, as, excuse me, as a playoff coach. I believe in a man

Thompson because I think when all this is over, he's going to be the last man standing, you know, unless they go get Janus or something this offseason. Like, I think, I think they have stuff. They are just not complete. And I think, get off my Dickerson knows what, complete teams look like because maybe get off my dickerson has played on a couple of complete teams perhaps and the crazy part is get off my dickerson that's played on complete teams that did not even make the NBA finals yeah yeah that that is that is a fair theory to have about get off my digerson that that is what informs um his uproarious commentary is that right there uh the rest of the West to me is Denver, I think we feel as a complete team that we just haven't seen play together that much.

But with all the time, Yokic missed and they still are where they are, I don't, you know, somebody finally played to all-star level by the time the all-star game had come around. The prospect, like the Spurs have to really want the Rockets to catch Denver. Because I don't think the, I don't think the Rockets really want no parts of the Spurs. But I also don't think the Spurs want to play their Nuggets. I don't think the Spurs want to play the Nuggett. I think the weird thing is they, whoever plays probably wants the Lakers to sit in that four or five, probably wants the Lakers to get out of the first round so you don't have to see

whatever it is, right? You're like, oh yeah, we can handle the Lakers. They don't get defense. They don't get size. LeBron is old, whatever it is. Like you're rooting for an upset so you don't come away from the second round with scars. And I think if you're the Denver Nuggets, you are praying that. that Aaron Gordon is healthy and that Yolkidge is healthy.

And that Jamal Murray, who's been remarkably durable this year, does not wear down. Like the one complaint that you might have had about Jamal Murray two years ago when they got knocked out by Denver was that, man, he looked tired by the end of that series. And because he stepped up and played at an all-star level in the games that Yokic has missed, in addition to, you know, Peyton Watson and some of these guys that you won't know their names until you see them in the playoffs. Like, that's the beautiful thing about the NBA sometimes is, oh, yeah, we know about Yokic and Jamal Murray and you know,

that, da, da, da, da, you're like, wait a minute. Michael Porter Jr. don't play for them no more. Cam Johnson, I'm not seeing him before. Like, it's one of those things where you're going to get introduced to new guys. And I think, like you said, Bo, to me, they are the most complete team in basketball, top to bottom, because you have the shooting, you have the secondary playmaking, you have some rim protection that's not Nicola Yokic. Like, and they have the heartbreak of losing last year.

to a team in Oklahoma City that they very well could have and should have beaten had they had health. And now you're asking them to have health if Aaron Gordon comes back from this recent injury and it's able to be fresh and then can make it through the playoffs. The West is going to be super fascinating at the top.

The East is going to be fascinating top to bottom. So I don't think Yolkich is going to be able to play enough games to get into the award running. And I just like to note for everybody that has this huge problem now of the 65 game limit that people absolutely rooted for when they brought it around because they thought it'll be get guys to play more games. The truth is the MVP always plays more than 65 games. Like on that level, that rule typically enforces itself. Walton was the only one.

Yokic was the only one, right? But let me tell you something, man, for whatever the advanced numbers are worth, Yolkich is low-key having quite possibly like the greatest NBA season that anybody has ever seen. It is unreal how good he is. Like in all the things that you pointed to about what makes the Duggets good, it's just gone to the point that, you know, you have to say out loud. They have the best player in the world. Yeah.

Look, we did one of these, you know, Tim Bontems does one of these straw poll MVP things at every, you know, quartermark of the season. And I was looking and I was like, who else? It's like Stevie won during the 70s. Who's going to win the Grammy this year? Does Stevie want to put an album out? Yes. Then he gets, you know, album of the year.

That's where we are with Yokic. And add to the fact, both since he's come back, he hasn't even looked like himself, like completely, like the touch hasn't come all the way back, which you couldn't expect when you missed that much, you know, basketball over a concentrated period of time. And yet the numbers are still insane. The fact that he's like, yeah,

I can lead the league and assist and rebounding. Like, wait a minute. This is like white wilt. Like, except he's not doing this as a challenge. He's doing this as a function of how he plays. And the question once again becomes, will he be able to hold up to the rigors? He looked worn down in that game seven against O KC last year.

Where they put Alex Caruso on him. I'm not saying, like, he should feel as insulted by them putting Alex Caruso on him, as he should feel insulted by them. putting Chet Hongren on him. Yeah, everybody seems to be insulted by the idea putting Chet Honger on him. Like that's the thing with the Spurs. The idea of a Victor Yokic matchup, look,

thing is good as... No, no, no. The idea of a Victor Chet playoff series. Well, hold on, hold on. We got time. We got time. Okay, okay, okay. The Victor Yokin situation is how that goes in the postseason

just because Yokch is so much bigger. Yeah, yeah, yeah. heavy wise than he is. Like that one, that's why I think the spurs are not really the matchup that they want. The reasons, I mean, the nuggets aren't the matchup that the spurs won. The spurs and the thunder, the question we all had last year about the thunder, if they was just a little bit too thin, right, a little lighten the ass to get it done. If that is the description you have, Victor is like, yeah, let's play them.

I think that could be a lot of fun, guys. What do you think? Yeah, I think we should do that. I think I saw some numbers that say Yolka is averaging like 36 and 12, against Vic. Everybody got a Cryptonite dog. Vic can be Jason Boyhe. He said, it don't matter. That's Freddie Cougar over there. You know what I mean? Like, it does not matter. It does not matter. Like, I tend to believe that from a matchup standpoint, Vic is like the only like super tall. I'm saying super talk. I got Luke

Cornette over there. But what Denver, what San Antonio does is we got gar penetration. and we're going to break you down, and then whether it's pitch out to the Harrison Barnes of the world or we get it up top to Vic, like that may not bother Denver as much, right? It bothers Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City is not used to getting broken down at the point of attack all the time.

Denver is, I mean, Oklahoma City is not used to you being able to throw multiple defenders at Shea Gilders Alexander and have enough to go at Jalen Williams at the same time. and having this big terra dacto at the rim, which means, hey, y'all, everybody stay down. Don't jump. Don't fall for the pump fake. Send them to me.

And that's the one place you don't want to go. So, yeah, when you talk about these matchups, man, it's all, it all depends on who gets to that two, three. Because you may, you may want to get the top seat this year, but I don't think Oklahoma City is relinquishing that. Yeah. And then, I mean, the idea that the thunder, could look like the future.

And then nothing really changed except Victor got a year older. That was the only thing that really changed. Victor got a year older. Then it's like, oh, wait, there's somebody else here. Like I saw the numbers, ESPN says there's a 70% chance to Thunder win the West,

a 9% chance for the Spurs. And I think it was a 9% chance for the Nuggets. I'm like, that nine for the Spurs feels low. Low, low, low. Once again, I go like to the Detroit thing. San Antonio didn't even make the playoffs yet. That feels like such a massive jump. Like, I don't think we give enough to how much stamina is required to get through a

playoff series, let alone three, when you've never done it before. When you've never done it before and all of a sudden you're expected to go through the gauntlet of they can beat Oklahoma City, right? Let's say they do. tell me how much they're going to have left after that series. That's true. Tell me what, what, if that's, that's going to be their NBA finals. Like, we beat, we beat them, we beat those dudes.

We are built to beat those dudes. We don't like those dudes. We can't stand them dudes. Fuck them as a staff, record label, and as a crew, right? That's how they feel. Then you got to gear up for Houston or Denver or Minnesota, who's going to be sitting there waiting with their own scars, but with their own. own experience, like experience can never be overrated in these playoffs, especially this year's

NBA playoffs. You got to have some pain. And I don't think San Antonio has had any level of pain yet, man. Yeah. And I think, but I do think the thunder, those nice guys need to find it somewhere because their trick bag. They like Drake against the Spurs in that Drake don't hate them dudes as much. He just like, like Drake did not hate Kendrick the way them dudes hate back. No, so he's Jay Cole then. Well, no, well, Jay Cole just opted out. This is not an option here. Like, I don't think that Drake didn't have a problem with Kendrick.

It just wasn't the same, right? Victor and the rest of those guys hate the thunder so much. And I just don't know if you're not that type, how you dial it up? I hate the way that you walk the way that you talk. They hate everything the Oklahoma City stands for. I don't know where it comes from. And Victor, yes, you do. Well, it's very clear where it comes from.

Victor hates Chet. And what seems clear is that Victor is contagious in that way, right? Victor said, I hate Chet, and that means they all hate Chet. And that means they got to hate everybody else because the mother cats is riding with Chet. that's how it happened. He's that guy. I don't feel like we've had that guy in a while who's just like, all right, we hate them now.

All right, dog. We hate them. Yeah, who's going to challenge them and say we're not? Who going to challenge Bix in the locker room and say, no, but it's not even about challenging. It's about I now feel exactly the same way that you do. Yeah, yeah. No, I'm just saying, who's going to say that we don't? Who's going to say, and who's going to say, and forget about who says it.

It's not about don't. Now we all do. They're not pretending to hate them now. Now they all do. He said that's what it's about to be. Yeah, somehow it just became ingrained in them. And Shay. Spree the core, baby.

Yeah, this is it. This is it. And this is the crazy thing that we've been kind of waiting on with Oklahoma City. Like, to some degree, Golden State was hated in like a different kind of way. Because how dare y'all be so good and then go get Kevin Durant, right? all right, you shift the competitive balance in the league, and then that became a thing. Oklahoma City ain't really hateable.

Like, they're hateable from the standpoint of, man, you don't like the ethics. You don't like how necessarily how Shaby moving around and everything else and how they do things. But you can't hate them from like a basketball standpoint. Not really. These dudes hate them. No, you can, well, you can hate, you can hate Ludoort.

You can, no, no, no. You can hate, you can hate, you can hate, you can hate Lourt. You can hate Ler. door. You can hate the foul merchant, merchantile exchange that they run over there. I mean, they got a heavy dork proportion

over there. Like, it's a, there's, there's, there's room for it. And hey, man, Spurs. Spurs got a lot of, like, dreadlocks that, like, I know it ain't real dreadlocks. You know what I'm saying? Like, they ain't no extensions going on over there.

Like, it's a lot of cats over there you don't want no problems with. But hey, coming up next, we're going to talk about what's going on in the East. And my one question, I will ask Vinny that I will have a crazy look on my face when I ask. Ever wanted to go to the NBA finals? Well, now's your chance, courtesy of FanDuel.

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Hope is here. Visit gambling help line ma.org or call 800-327-50 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts or call 18778-Hope-N-Y or text Hope N-Y in New York. All right, we're back with Vinny Goodwill of ESPN. And my question is very simple because I can't believe we're bringing this up. The subject's really about to bring Jason Tatum back. I feel like I'm crazy. I feel like I'm the only person that is crazy here and thinking, why is he coming back? Unless he thinks this is part of the Jason Tatum story that's going to make him face of the league or something like that, like he thinks this is the next quotable thing that he's going to do in his Truman show, in his Truman show career, I don't get it.

You are in year one of an extension that is, I think, $300 plus million, which means in this luxury tax apron world, you got two, three hundred million dollar players locked up for the next X amount of years if you choose to keep them. The template for Achille Injuries Returns is Kevin Durant at 588 days. That was almost the equivalent of what, a season and a half, because he missed the 1920 season and early part of 2021 when he had COVID. And he came back to looking like Kevin Durant.

I know the difference is Jason Tatum is younger than Katie was by a few years and had fewer playoff miles on his body, believe it or not, despite. And they apparently got him on the operating table faster than is ordinarily the case. Yeah, they got him the next day. I think the same thing happened with Dominique Wilkins. Dominic Wilkins, when he tore his Achilles, he got on the table the very next day. By the way, was the gold standard. Right.

And he came back the next year and was averaging 30 until, you know, they traded him. Right? But I don't see the benefit of Jason Tatum for Danny fucking Manning, who didn't even come back to next season. Sorry, sorry, you were talking about, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Look, yo Dominique Wilkins day is my Barry Sanders day.

I'm sure you're, look, look, July. But they didn't tell Barry to leave. Yes, they did. Yes, they did. when you bring in boss Ross and you bring in Scott Mitchell replace him for a Charlie batch in the second round of the next year

yeah you tell him Barry to go that's you quiet quit on your running back you quiet quit on him you told him to go I'm just saying they didn't trade Barry Sanders for Lorenzo White but anyway let's just let's just keep going you got me pissed off today you did it to me first

now let's go My point. My point is I don't see the advantage of bringing in Jason Tatum and then telling him, hey, Tatum, you're only going to play 18 to 22 minutes this season. You think Jason Tatum, who likes being the number one option, wants to go on Jalen Brown's team and play 18 to 22 minutes and be a really good rebounder, a really good spot-up shooter, a really good floor spacer? I think he could be good at that if he's 80%.

But I think he's working really hard to come back and be Jason Tatum again. And I just don't know if the reward is worth the cost. Number one, shout out to Jalen Brown. Remember when we said he couldn't dribble? He does not look like that guy anymore. Like, Missoula is probably coach of the year just because if Jason Tatum is what we say Jason Tatum is, then it is absurd that they are as good as they are. and Jalen Brown has been playing MVP caliber basketball,

where I guess he'll play enough games. Well, he'll wind up getting it. But he has been excellent this year. It doesn't seem worth the risk to me to play Tatum. I don't know what they're Dr. C. I don't know what's going on. I don't know any of those things. But it doesn't at all seem worth it to even try to do this.

But it feels like they're going to. And if they do, you're right. it can get weird and it can get awkward because the idea of we're just going to start Jason Tatum into a seventh man who does seventh man things. That doesn't seem to make any sense. The other thing is these guys are human beings and we have, and as you brought it up, we've treated this like Jason Tatum at the very least was 1A

and Brown was 1B, right? Or you could put it almost like Jason Tatum 1.75, Brown 1.25. Right, right, right. You know, we're 1 and 2 add up to 3. maybe that was the case. Jala Brown is like, I am a number one. And we see teams that have multiple number one options, rarely with as much skill overlap. And as these two guys have, you know, it had been one way for a long time. Now it looks like another way. How they figure

that out will be really interesting if they make this decision that they're going to bring him back this year, which I would not. You think it's one way. it's the other way. That's the, that's the, and here's the thing. Is Joe Missoula going to have that conversation with Jason Tatum and tell him, hey, Jay, I know you've been working your ass off since you've had this injury. And, and you have the revenge in your mind of wanting to play the Knicks again and everything. Remember, the Celtics look like a juggernaut ready to repeat until they ran into the Knicks and blew those first two games and then blue, you know, blue game. or whatever it was, you know, that, that series.

So he's got that in his mind. And you can't tell a player to not continue to rehab with the goal of getting back. You can't keep putting that battery in his back and saying, you know what, Jay? When you get back, we're going to be at full strength just to get him to continue to do that and then pull the rug out from under him and say, you know what, Jason, you can come back if you want to, but this ain't going to be what it was. like the mental part of that stuff in addition to the mental part of how that team has become accustomed to playing without him right it's similar template they're going to shoot a lot of threes

they lean into all of that and then they're giving the ball to jalen brown and saying jalen brown take us home now that shifts a little bit and you have to recalibrate yourself and i don't think in this eastern conference bow you have the time to be able to mess around in the first round of a playoff series, even if they get the second seed, right? If they get the second seed, what happens if they're playing Philadelphia in the first round? Or the third seat, and they're playing Philly in the first round.

And Embed is reasonably healthy. And Paul George is back. And you got Maxie and Edgecom. You don't have the space to give somebody else the grace to work themselves into it because you're going to be in a dog fight. Right. Look, it's some wild stakes.

in the East when you think about this, right? If I were the Sixers, I would assume that this is the last healthy and bead year that you're going to have if this even is a healthy and bead year, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's start there. The Pistons, you raise an interesting point. They're on top, but they've never won a playoff series.

Like, they actually have like the widest birth, I think that we would say, the longest runaway, almost easier to give themselves the certain measure of grace. Right. Right. If they don't get it done, but okay. Then you got the Celtics who apparently think this is important enough to bring Jason Tatum back. Okay.

The Cavs who made this James Hardin trade that all I know is that the last game of the year, James Hardin is going to be terrible. But in the meantime, they're going to be pretty good, right? And so like, but you know what their stakes are by the fact that they made the decision to do that. And then there's the Knicks who got to the conference finals last year, fired their coach, hired a good one, but I feel like the things that are shaky about the next this year would have been shaky no matter who the coach was, right? It's the honeymoon year for towns had passed and now people are looking around and realizing what we try to tell them that the things, that the things about him that are not to like are things that they particularly were really not going to like. And now you're starting to hear the people talk about this. They talk about the offensive fouls more.

they talk about, you know, his absent-mindedness on defense, all those things that, by the way, were also happening last year. They just hadn't gotten sick of that shit yet. And now it's here. Like, Mike Brown, who I think is a much better coach than he ever gets credit for, he's coached for his job, right? That's a great question.

I mean, they fired, I mean, you know, I talk about this all the time. They fired Timbertoe largely because they wanted to, but also because they thought they should have gone to the finals. Yeah, yeah, I still think they were to fire Tibino even when they went to the finals. it would have been a harder sell. But that's still a part. I agree. Like I said, because they wanted to,

but I hear more, there's more chatter and more complaining about Mike Brown this year than we had ever heard about Thibito, Tibido in all those years. And the crazy thing is, you know what it is?

Because now we've mythologized Thibodeo to the point where even Stephen A said it the other day when I was on first take it. I just didn't have the opportunity to correct them when he said, well, you know, defensively, the Knicks were better under Tibido.

No, they weren't. Like, this has been profile-wise a very similar team. They're better offensively. They're a better three-point shooting team which could wind up being a great equalizer when all this is said and done.

But they haven't been, like Tibbs hasn't coached like a top 10 defense in a long time. And so much of that, you could attribute to personnel. But to your point about Carl Townsend, yeah. But hold on right fast on that.

Yeah. He is not as consistent a basketball personality as people want to say. Even when you go back to the Bulls, There were some years the offense was great and the defense was bad. Some years the defense was great and the offense was bad. It's not as simple as just you get tips, you're going to get defense and no offense. No, the only thing you're going to get is tips going to play his dudes.

That's it. Tim's going to play his six. And the best offensive player is going to get a lot of shots and a lot of usage and you're going to build your offense around the skills of that number one guy as opposed to here is my very rigid offensive philosophy. That's the one thing I will always give tips. Offensively, he is not going to be out here like, hey, man, we got to run, jump, and shoot threes.

He's like, okay, best offensive player. What do you do best? All right, cool, we're going to do that. Like, that's what I'll give him. With towns, it's important to remember, y'all. He found out about the Yonah stuff just like we did. And they can do math. They know for Yonis to come here, I got to go.

Or somebody gets to go who make a lot of money. add to the fact that Carl did not get his extension before the start of the season. Why do you think that is? Why do you think Carl thinks that is? Oh, so they don't want to have my long-term money on the books just in case they go and try to get Yonis this off-season. That's a human emotion that I don't think that we necessarily calculate and add to the fact you're playing in New York City where you are never going to get the grace that Jalen Brown gets. Jalen Brown can be a traffic cone on defense.

Jalen Brown can be, Jalen Brunson, excuse me, can be terrible on defense. And we will never say the same things about him that we say about Carl Times. The New York Knicks are the one team this season. I want people to hear this when I say this. The New York Knicks are the one team in the NBA

that has to get to the NBA finals this year. Not even Oklahoma City has to get to the NBA final. Oklahoma City getting knocked out in the second round and we can come with reasons why that happened. The New York Knicks get knocked down in the second round. There will be pitchforks on 33rd and 8th, right? Pitchforks. I tell you, you lose to James Hardin and

Cleveland, you lose to those dudes, you got a problem. If you get pumped by Detroit, you've got a bigger problem. You lose to Joel and Bede and the mismatch 76ers. Problem. You lose to the Celtics with the island of misfit toys, Jason Tatum, and Jalen Brown? You've got problems. They have to get, they are built to get to the NBA finals. But Bo, when's the last time? You saw a team depending on one rim protector who is injury prone, not really good point of attack defense. And secondary scoring, that can be shaky because you got a bunch of guys

doing things that they shouldn't be doing because Jalen Brunton controls so much of the offense. They got a lot, they are built to do it, but they have so many more questions, more questions than any other team. Like I think Detroit, the questions are simple. Do you have experience and you don't have a secondary score next to Kay Cunningham who can get his own shot? If Detroit doesn't get there, you can reasonably deduct. Okay, they'll be fine because they're going to be here year after year. They've got the youth. They've got the cap space. They can make some flexibility moves. They can get a second guy to see where they go from there. The Knicks don't have those questions that they can improve other than, man, we better hope you honest decides to come here and not somewhere

else. Yeah, and look, their two best players, you mentioned it, their two best players can't guard. And they can't guard at the two most

important places to be able to guard of top at the rim. And then you put McKell Bridges up there. You put McKell Bridges at the point of attack and that ain't that much better.

Yeah. Yeah, they are, and that's wild to say, though, because that's an all-defense guy, not that long ago. I think sometimes rep,

mutations do a lot. And or I'll say this, when you go from being an all defense guy to being a score, it's really tough to going back to being that all defense guy. It's really, really tough to start knuckling down and doing those little things when you see what gets you paid. No, you're right. I also will say this about the Knicks. I'm sure they can tell, but much like the Oklahoma City Thunder,

hope you really understand how much those other guys hate you. And in this case, those other guys are the Detroit Pistons. They hate them. The best thing that happened to the Detroit Pistons was losing three games on their home floor last year. One that they gave away, one that they felt was snatched from them, and another one that they kind of just blew, right?

So now they're looking at the Knicks like, why everybody so high on y'all? Y'all ain't live? And what's the argument against that? When the last time we saw the Knicks and the Pistons play, they didn't have Jalen Duren. and they still whooped on them by 37. And Assar Thompson, who is apparently the worst twin,

but might be the best defensive player in the league, locked up Jalen Brunson to the tune of 4 for 20. He made Jalen Brunson go with full Starks on a Monday afternoon. Like, this is, this, I'm salivating for the potential of a Detroit Knicks playoff series while also recognizing my personal life will be made hell because everybody would think, man, you just rooting for Detroit because you're from there. Never mind that when I was living, the Detroit people say,

man, you hate the pistons, man, why you bagging on them so much? I hate everybody. You do, except Isaiah. You don't hate Isaiah. No, I don't. That's my guy. Tell you, man, you, man, Lester Spence. I think Spence still working at Johns Hopkins.

The first time I met Spitz. I was talking something about the greatest point guys of all time. And he just looked at me. He wrote Detroit. What about Isaiah? Like, y'all demand to know about Isaiah. Because it's this school of people who think that he belongs in this hodgepodge of John Stockton and Gary Payton and Jason Kidd and, you know, all, not saying they ain't great players, but all those dudes or Chris Paul as opposed to, hey, man, his only peer is that 6-9 dude. Yeah.

That's it. Y'all still funny. y'all still like you know what he is he's barry he's y'all's barry bonds i hear that everybody else hates him oh well not us but see there's an acknowledgment though that buried bonds might be the greatest hitter we've ever seen right like you can make all the arguments against bonds for whatever the reasons are but people will still say you know before he ever did anything he was 4040 and he won MVP three times like there's still that acknowledgement for people who don't don't give Zeke his propers.

It's not even the acknowledgement. Well, you know, he did be Mike Bird and Magic. They don't even say that. They say it like it's a postscript. They say it like it don't mean shit. So when you say that when it matters and all you go to is man, well, Zeke Petty. Well, wait, Magic Petty?

Michael King Petty. Yes, he is. Y'all love the Petty. But when Zeke is ruthless, all of a sudden, it's a problem. Nah, man, we ain't taking that hypocrisy. I will not take that hypocrisy. I think people should be qualified.

Detroit versus everybody. How did you get me there? How did you get me going full that one dude in that interview with Mike Wallace when he told him to be quiet? Yeah, man. You said I like to do Bruce Bowen. Like I always knew you was going to get back to that. It never fails. It never fails.

Check my bad out at ESPA covering the NBA. Brother, I appreciate you. All love, bro. Appreciate you, mine. All right. And ladies and gentlemen, thanks much for joining us here on the right. time. We do this four times a week. Ryan Brumley, handed everything behind the scenes. Thank you, sir. Hit the voice mail line. 3, 2, 3, 3, 5, 9, 6, 7, 6, 7, 6, 7, 7. Remember, follow the right time.

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