The Ringer NBA Show - A Rockets, Sixers, and Jimmy Butler Love Triangle | Group Chat

Episode Date: June 26, 2019

The Houston Rockets are doing what they can to insert themselves into the sweepstakes for free agent Jimmy Butler—can the Sixers convince Butler to stay in Philadelphia? Plus, after a new Kevin Arnovitz report about league schedule changes, we re-enter into past discussions about whether the NBA needs to be proactive in changing their schedule format and adding a midseason or a play-in tournament. Hosts: Chris Ryan and Justin Verrier Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. This week on Theringer.com, our staff is ranking the 100 best moments in culture so far in 2019. This includes everything that happened in film, TV, celebrity news, meme-dom, and more. Cracking the top 100s so far are J-Lo and Aidrod's engagement, the rise of Lizzo, and the Cliff Wife phenomenon. Also, be sure to listen and subscribe to Ringer Dish, our new celebrity podcast and catch the latest episode covering their favorite moments from this year in pop culture. You can subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Basketball is very good. Kevon Looney is a max player. The Lakers should hire Ernie Grunfold. Kauai should sign with the Warriors. Basketball is very good. Hello and welcome to the Ringer NBA show.

This is group chat. My name is Chris Ryan. I am joined by the press boxes, Justin Verrier. Hello, friends. Oh, man. Got any Mayor Pete takes for me? No, I leave those on my other podcast. Folks have to listen to Verrier on the press box this week. It was awesome. It was a great cameo. I was shocked when I got in my car and your voice pops up Dr. Curtis. I was, I'm still expecting my invitation to the watch. I didn't see that one in my inbox these days. What do you, what's the TV show you're up on right now? What have I been watching? I've been watching euphoria. Okay. How's that making me feel? Conflicted?

What else have I been watching? I've been watching old Deadwoods if you want to flashback. Justin's been calling people hoopelheads recently. That's my new thing. Because of Deadwood. Today we have a lot of stuff to get through, a lot of free agency news. The rumors about Jimmy Butler being a trade target for the Rockets. KD opted out with the Warriors,

which was, I suppose, expected. This Kempas Celtics rumor that sort of popped up yesterday from Mark Stein. Justin and I are going to talk a little bit about other kind of mid-tier playoff teams that we think should take advantage of this uncertain time in the NBA and go all in on a move.

And then we'll wrap up by talking about Kevin Arnivitz's report today in ESPN about the NBA considering some changes to their schedule and to their competitive product, which is really interesting. So let's get up to the top to the thing that concerns, well, it concerns me the most. And that's the possibility that the rockets are looking at Jimmy Butler in a sign and trade deal with the Sixers. Now, this is written by Woge. It was written very carefully. It was basically like the Rockets would like to, it was a. essentially what happened with Chris Paul a couple years ago. The Rockets make their interest known. The player then goes to the team that he is currently or somewhat signed with Jimmy Butler's

under-restricted free agent, but he can get more money and more years from the Sixers. And he says, hey, I'm not going to come back, but you don't have to lose me for nothing. Trade me to the team I want to go to. It's an interesting trade for a lot of reasons. I think there's a lot of like naval gazing going on in the Sixers fan community right now about what this team should be, whether it should be team run it back, whether there should be one fewer of Harrison Butler or Reddick. And then this trade would be,

I think the return would be at least possibly, two of Gordon Capella or Tucker. I am personally really interested in Eric Gordon. I think he's like an upgrade over JJ Redick. I think it would be a fascinating addition to the team. I do think that that would require Harris to come back though, which is not a guarantee and not a certainty. and there hasn't been a lot of chatter about that.

What's your reaction to the story? From a Sixers perspective, it's interesting. It seems like if there's someone to flee, it's going to be Jimmy. He just seems like more of a flight risk. It just seems like Tobias. At the very least,

is probably more prone to be content. I don't know. Am I just projecting that onto Tobias because he's more of like a flatter personality, whereas Jimmy's a little more... I think the playoffs have changed people's perception of him on the team. I think during those first few,

months after the Clippers trade. People are like, damn, this guy's really good. He can play off the ball. He's content being a third or fourth option on the floor. He just wants to win. And then he kind of vanished during the playoffs. And I think people are a little bit more like, what are we doing here? Can he be, is he too expensive to be the fourth option on the floor?

Yeah. I think it makes some sense considering what we saw in the playoffs to perhaps exchange one of those guys for multiple guys, which is always that they exchange multiple guys for those guys. That's the problem. They just haven't struck a good balance in that. And that's usually where teams falter most is when they try to take a dollar and turn it into a couple dimes. I don't know what are there. Well, the Rockets and the Sixers are in really similar situations.

They're both teams that have kind of burned up a lot of their asset chests to acquire the roster that they have now. And are now in the kind of situation where only the other, like only this corresponding team can help them. You know, the Rockets gave up a lot for Chris Paul. They're pretty much committed to Paul for the next two, three years, right? Including a $44 million player option that Paul will be picking up. And so this is the team they've got, despite all of the controversy or, like, rumors of disharmoning in the locker room. This is the rockets, right? And the only way that they can get better is to get rid of the guys who have helped them get where they are,

like Tucker, Capella, and Gordon. Mori's always wanted a third star. I wrote about this today on The Ringer. I mean, when he traded for Paul the first time in 2017, he wanted Paul George right after that and just didn't get the deal done before Sam Pressy was able to with Oklahoma. But yeah, it's like the Sixers don't have a lot of cap room otherwise.

You know what I mean? And they have to keep in mind that Ben will be coming up soon for an extension. And that bench is super thin. I was going through, like, who would be this sort of ideal starting five, given all of the components here? Is it run it back, which would be Simmons, Butler, Reddick, Harris, Embed, a very expensive team that lost in the second round two years in a row. Well, not the Butler Harris part, but you know what I mean. Would it be the Rockets trade, which would, I hypothetically, be then Simmons, Eric Gordon, Tobias Harris, Joel Embed, and Zeyer Smith or James Ennis or something like that.

It kind of seems like either team is going to be in that sort of predicament, whoever ends up with Jimmy. You're going to be a top heavy team. And it's leaning into perhaps a flawed one-two at the top. In Philly, you have the kind of clash between essentially two centers and Ben Simmons and Joel Embed. And then in Houston, you have a clash between two ball handlers and Houston, excuse me, in Hardin and Chris Paul. Yeah. So I don't know. I guess I'm more encouraged about a Sixers team that's top-heavy because I think you could look at it from the other perspective and that there were a couple of bounces away from beating the Raptors, the team that went to the finals and won it.

And then theoretically, the East and the NBA is way more open next season. So a couple more bounces the other way and the Sixers could just be on top this time. Yeah, I guess so what I'm trying to figure out and what I think a lot of Sixers fans are trying to figure out. And I bet a lot of league executives are trying to figure out because we're all waiting for the next generation of mildly disgruntled or available super talents to come onto the market is just going to be the norm going forward. I think the thing with Butler is I like him a lot as a player.

I do think he accelerates the Embed or Simmons conversation because I think he works better with Embed. And I don't think he particularly helps Simmons that much. And he's made efforts to align himself with Emmett. at least publicly, just in terms of in the locker. Yeah, to the extent that that stuff is like real. I just think that the Sixers are going to go as far as they go based on honestly whether or not Ben Simmons gets a jumper at all.

And I do like it if they do lose Jimmy to get some shooters in there because as we saw that's just like crucial to making that partnership work. And Butler, as we've seen, can hit shots, but he's not necessarily a plus three-point shooter. And that's the problem with trading of Landry Schammett. Those are the type of guys you need in order. and make that work. You need to make sacrifices around those guys

in order to bring out the best of them because it's already an awkward pairing. And Jimmy is the one that I just didn't love it from the start. Yeah. And as you saw in the playoffs, yes, he was the one to kind of take the reins and hit those shots. Yeah, identity-wise, he changed the chemistry of the team, I think.

It made them a little bit more hard-nosed. But if you're thinking long-term, wouldn't have been better if, like, Ben Simmons had some reps at manning that position? Sure. sure. I mean, that's possible. That's possible. And then you still have Covington and Sarge. But I think it's interesting. And if you still have

Covington Sarge, you might have been able to do some different things to acquire somebody like Harris because you wouldn't necessarily need to give up sham it and the picks. You know, it could have been I'm sure that Jerry West would have gotten exactly what he wanted out of Elton Brand, but it begs the question, what's the deal for Harris if the Butler deal never gets made?

You guys could have had T.J. Warren yourself. Oh, man. What a bright future that would be. That's true. No, I mean, the Rocket's situation is really interesting. Yeah, let's talk about them. You wrote about it today, and I thought you made a good point, just how it seems like the rockets are kind of riding the rails here. They're just like, they're gripping the wheel really tight in that their whole approach

has put them in a situation where they need something to happen now. Yeah, and that they have to go find someone who almost resembles them, another team in desperate streets. Yeah. You know, another team that entire streets today kind of needs to, I mean, both of these teams are among the best squads in their conference. So let's not get it twisted. But I'm just saying, like,

they're not going to find a lot of trade partners. Like, Daryl doesn't have the assets to go do a crazy, you know, complicated, multifaceted deal. He needs to get back a star. And he's always wanted one. But the days of when he had, like, a bunch of picks and a bunch of really useful guys like Montres Harrell or Lou or whoever on the bench to move are gone.

Like, he went all in for Paul and Hardin. He didn't get his third guy. You know, when James Hardin, was like, I know exactly what we need to do, and we'll get it figured out this summer. I don't think he was necessarily talking about trading Eric Gordon. Yeah, I guess it really comes down to, history would suggest, regardless of the Warriors being there or not, a team with the most top-heavy talent is going to win. Yeah. I do wonder if the playing field is just leveled. I mean, we saw the Raptors win with one star and a couple B-level guys and a good defense, and that proved

to be enough. I don't know. I guess I'm curious if that's, like, recreateable. And so Yes, all things would indicate that getting someone of Butler's talent would make a difference, but perhaps the issue is just kind of at the top here. I mean, we talked last week about maybe Hardin is the guy that they actually should be getting out of there. And walk back from like they should trade Harden. Maybe it's just a matter of they need to trade, change the way that they play a little bit. I mean, they're so committed. They're a team that's like almost inextricable from the way they play.

Their style of play is their identity. And I think that that was what led to a lot of the problems over the course of the season with Paul coming back from injury and just kind of being like, this isn't going to work. Like the four of us standing around while he dribbles or him standing around whenever he doesn't have the ball is not going to get us to where we want to go. And Paul might be kind of hard-nosed about the way he delivers that message, but I don't know necessarily that he's wrong. No, I guess on the other side, Hardin is correct in saying that Paul can't do what he used to do.

Yeah, but that's playground shit. Like, that's true, but like, maybe, I mean, maybe Chris Paul should be the coach and not the player, but you just being like, oh, Paul, you get blown by on defense every once in a while or like, you know, you can't beat your man off the dribble anymore. Well, like, then go play to why then, you know what I mean? Like, and talk shit. Yeah, there is this growing chasm, and I think we've talked about this before between regular season basketball and postseason basketball. It just feels larger than ever. And it's starting to look like Harden perhaps best represents that. a guy who could play 80 games in the regular season and break scoring records.

But when you get to the playoffs, that style is just a little, well, as the jazz didn't have a good run at it trying to kind of defend it. But as we saw as things go on, it requires a lot of energy and whatnot in order to execute. And it does require the refs and the whistles to be on your side. And if they're going to tighten those up, if you're not going to get, if you're not going to get as many calls as you were in the regular season, that is just not as effective. It goes to what you're saying. They're riding the rails a little bit. Yeah. And like if you're, if you're relying on whistles, if you're relying on stuff like that to go your way,

if you're relying on G-League guys, scrap heap guys to fill up meaningful rotation spots, especially if you trade for Butler. Because then you've got a team where three of your starting five guys are essentially accumulate, like, are 94 years of age for your three for Butler, Paul, and Hardin. Yeah. I don't know where you're going to fill out the rest of your starting lineup, much less your bench. And then you start to get into some real dicey territory of on-off numbers and those guys being healthy for the playoffs.

Because you essentially would have to say to Jimmy, Chris, and James, why don't you guys play 60 games this year and we'll enter the playoffs at like the 5 or 6 seed? Yeah. I mean, it took Hardin saving their season last. year for them to even get to the point where they were last year. And now everything worked out toward the end of last season, the last regular season, where it seems like they were just as good as they were the year before with Daniel House and some of these other guys playing those crucial roles. I am of the belief that if they just make some moves on the margin and they can

just get along, that they'll be fine. Yeah. That they were clearly the second best team in the West last year. They were clearly the second best team in the NBA the year before that. And that while I'm a little bit concerned about what Hardin will be in the playoffs, if you just kind of, if you just bolster what you already have, because it takes so much to change who you are fundamentally, that that might be enough in an environment where the Warriors aren't this big boss standing at the end for every single team. Woge is reporting with Zach as we're recording right now

that Houston is offering Clint Capella, Eric Gordon, and PJ Tucker individually to teams with space to absorb salary. Rockets are trying for best available first rounder for any of those three hoping to redirect the pick to Philly in pursuit of Jimmy Butler in a sign-in trade. Would that be an indication then that the Sixers think they're missing Butler and Harris and need to basically go into a mild rebuild around Embedon Simmons? It either means that the Sixers know they're losing Butler and they're going to be willing to take anything

and they're just probably more willing to take first rounders than some of the of these other guys. And perhaps Butler wants that fifth year. And Houston has said, hey, we'll give you the five years if you just come down there. Can they do that? They can do that, right? If they sign and trade, he can get the fifth year, which would be the advantage to striking a sign-in-trade deal with the Sixers as opposed to signing him outright.

Well, they can't even sign them outright. So, yeah, they have to. It could just be ultimately, like, the Rockets trying to do their best in order to show that they're willing to do everything to sign them. Though, on the other hand, it does make it really interesting if they don't strike a deal like this to welcome Clint Capella and PJ Tucker back into training camp this summer. So, I mean, this is the downs. This is the human cost, essentially, of constantly being involved in all these trade scenarios.

Well, I think crucially, there's no Sixers element to this rumor. Like, there's nothing like Sixers are considering. Sixers are looking for in return. Sixers have soured on the idea. Right. I just think that the wording of Woj's tweet, which is, you know, kind of reading a little into it is just like if the first rounder

is what they're looking for and not Gordon that to me suggests hey we made our run at it last year Harris is leaving Butler will leave we have to just get

we have to bring the aggregate age of this team back down to where Embedon Simmons are and not be overpaying veterans who are going to abandon us perhaps I mean

if that happens I think well Elton Brand would easily become the worst GM in basketball No comment. I didn't think this thing could get much worse from the Colangelo era, which was,

things were going pretty well up until, you know, you got let go, but I don't know if you've heard about that. Just right up until the second he let go. Well, I mean, they exceeded expectations that year. They brought on guys late in the season that helped them push into the playoffs.

Okay, now we're just adding to that. Philadelphia has been privately expressing confidence around the NBA that it can resign Butler and Tobias Harris, but Houston remains on case. I mean, I would assume on the case of selling Butler 76ers of the sign and trade scenario once free agency starts. So it could just be nothing. Right. Could just be.

It's saber rattling, right? It's like you should get freaked out a little bit, Philly. Like, hey, pick up the phone. Let's see what happens. Right? If Philly does lose both, is that the option? Is just to go back to two years and start over again? Mm-hmm.

What is the other option? I mean, what I'm curious about is the fact that they're like, we don't want Gordon and Tucker. because Gordon and Tucker, while wouldn't really solve everything for Philly, is not the worst... I hate the ultimate aggregate trade. I think I've said aggregate like six times. I hate the ultimate end result of all the trading

of Dario, Covington, sham it, all the picks for what wound up being nothing. Yeah. Or wound up being Gordon and Tucker. Yeah. But is it better than nothing? So what if they just end up keeping him? Harris and not Butler.

I ultimately think that's probably their best path going forward. Probably not. There won't be as good next season without Butler on that team because I don't know how you replace them. And if, in particular, if you're replacing him with first round picks. I think you hope that Harris as a third option or as even on some nights a second option

as a score grows into that rule. Yeah, he was kind of lost in the postseason. It does feel like he was kind of relegated to the Chris Bosch, stand in the corner and shoot it, the Kevin Love sort of thing. On the other hand, that's a lot of money tied up

in three players who are essentially four or fives. Yeah. I'm also assuming that Reddick is gone. So that might negate the need for a Gordon to come back, although I prefer Eric Gordon greatly to JJ Reddick. Yeah. Maybe that's what's best for them, for them to get a look at what they have long term. Yeah. Well, this will be fascinating going forward. Let's talk a little bit about some other teams.

I mean, do you have anything to say about Duran opting out? Not much, only that it kind of undercutting. cuts this idea that he would be concerned most about security. Like maybe he would stray more toward the five-year max, but it does sound like based on reporting that he's going to have max offers regardless. Everyone's going to offer him whatever contract he wants. So it's ultimately just going to come down to where he wants to play.

Yeah, absolutely. I think, I mean, we have been hearing, as many have been hearing this week, that the KD. Kyrie pair-up in Brooklyn is not dead just because of Durant's injury. what do you think of this idea of Brooklyn emerging as like a prime free agent destination for two generational players? I mean, I get it. I mean, we were talking. Yeah, I was talking about this with you a few weeks ago.

The nets are the blank slate. Yeah, they're also like the blank seats in the arena. Does that matter though? I don't know. I mean, I think it does when it's like when you're actually playing. I mean, I get it. Like, I get a lot of the attraction. I've lived in Brooklyn for 10 years.

It's a great place to live. I'm just saying I am surprised that they have gone from this careful, considered approach where they were kind of growing along this arc. And I understand they open up the two slots. They obviously have some intel that they are players for these guys. If not these guys, perhaps a butler, perhaps a Harris, perhaps whoever else. But it is fascinating to me that they are the destination for these two specific talents. Yeah, I mean, it's definitely some siren songs.

stuff where they could walk away from this offseason with absolutely nothing. It could just be bringing back DeAngelo Russell and perhaps rolling over the cap for another year. On the other hand, when you have an opportunity to get two of the best players in the league, like, I guess you got to shoot your shot. And in terms of just like fandom, I guess Miami's fans just weren't much of anything until the big three he kind of went there. I just heard like all the levittard phone calls.

I mean, I don't know what the crowds were looking like when Ronnie Cycly was like tearing it up. They're pretty good. Were there? I think so. If I remember correctly, I just used to love those Miami teams because it was like,

I was so much more in touch with college basketball back then. So it would just be like, they would just be really interesting. Like Billy Owens would be on like the heat and stuff. I don't know. Billy Owens was on the heat, wasn't he?

It's everything you would want in New York, Brooklyn is without all the baggage of an ownership that tends to get involved a little bit more than you would like. Uh-huh. Tends to loom over things, tends to make some pretty, Wait, are you saying Josh Harris gets too involved? And the guys who run the Nets don't?

I guess they haven't. I was going to say the Nix. Oh, the Nix, yeah. So if you want to be in New York and there was a report today, I forgot from whom, that KD is making these decisions from a bunker in New York. So I don't know if it's a bunker. We always just assume that these guys are locked away in a safe room. Yeah.

But it's actually probably they're at like catch. Yeah. At dinner just talking about this. He's in some lovely, lovely, like, apartment. somewhere. Right. That he's like already bought like the apartments above, below and to the left and right of and is renovating. He's playing smash bros on N64 with a couple of his homies.

Um, okay. So while Kyrie and KD consider Brooklyn, there's also the Steiny Mo rumor yesterday about Kemba and the possibility of the Celtics being a suitor for him. I love it. As the chief Kemba cars. So let me ask you this just to start off with. Is home Boston for you? as a Connecticut?

No. Because I would have been just as excited if he went to New York and played an M.S. I mean, his home is literally New York. So casting Boston as home is a little bit of a stretch. Yeah, shout out to Bill

yesterday for casting Boston as home. And there was a point, especially after Boston College, denied Yukon from the ACC, where Yukon was like, oh, we're New York's team. Yeah, yeah. New York.

Amongus doesn't remember that. Yeah, Bobby knows about that. You don't have to talk. You have to talk about me. Let me ask you this, though. I think it's great that the Boston deep state media is getting involved here and linking Kemba and the Celtics. If Kemba is going to turn down the money from Charlotte,

is Boston the right landing spot? I guess it depends on how much he wants to do the Kauai and kind of be his own guy, have his own team. I do think there's still a lot, as Jonathan Charks wrote about on the ringer today, left in Boston to kind of work with. It's not just like a barren waistline. Yeah, for sure.

Two top three picks who last year brought this team to the game seven in the Eastern Conference finals. Now, they don't have Horford. They don't have some of those veterans around them. They literally don't have a starting center. They would, at this point, Time Lord is at the top of the depth chart.

Time Lord's time. They did mention that he's been around a lot, working out. Oh, yeah. Well, I don't know where else he'd go. Angus' first draft thing was just like, I just want to say Robert Williams is really good. I guess they need to account for him because he was constantly absent and late and just

nobody knew where he was. I don't know. I'm just, I think there's reasons to hope that there could be something made out of what they have. I think Charks made a very good point that he advocated for Nikola Vucevich, a player I don't particularly love, but I appreciate the idea that spacing around some of those guys and kind of leaning into Tatum Brown as your one, too,

and those, and complimenting them and making sure that they have the right environment to grow in is probably the best approach. Because I do think we're sleeping on the fact that Gordon Hayward could a year out from his injury. Yeah, I mean, this would follow. If you take out the kind of hang-ups Hayward seemed to have, because by all accounts was crushing it in practice, but then we'd get out on the floor and there would just be some hiccups.

Yep. If you take into account like the Paul George recovery arc of, you know, it was a year of ups and downs. And then the next year, when he got back, he was kind of getting back towards, where he had been before his really bad leg break. If Hayward gets back to where he was in Utah, you know, that's a different equation.

He could be more of a point forward. But I do think one of the issues... That's interesting. Then why have Kemba then? Why spend the money on Kemba? Kemba can play off the ball. Or do you think that they just feel like they need to get a W here? Kemba can't play off the ball, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, no, I think it's probably more of that. But I do think they could be complimentary, where it's like Gordon plays more off the ball when Kemba's playing and then runs the second union is more of a point. point guard. I don't know. I think it would give them more options and would allow them to remain competitive in the East where we're just saying, like, what do we know about the East at this point? I think that we know fair amount about the East, though. I think that the East is going to look a lot like way it looked last year, and it's going to be the same kind of dogfight.

And if I'm Milwaukee, I'd just bring everybody back and pay for it. But that's going to cost a pretty penny. Like, even if they do bring that back, it's probably just this one year, because all of a sudden the luxury tax concerns start to creep up and that's a market that hasn't in recent years. And you don't. And you piss off, Yon. honest, then you, then the bill comes due for you. Then, then you have to, like, account for that. I think what's going to end up happening is, yes, it's probably the best approach to just roll back what they had before. But I think every team is going to want all the players that, that, like, led them to that team. Lopez is going to get paid. Malcolm

Brogden, pretty much every team. Sounds like Middleton will get a max offer. Middleton will probably get Max. Just all of those guys. Eric Bledso got paid. Every team needs those of guys. You can talk somebody into taking Bloodsoe at some certain point if this doesn't work out. Maybe. I wouldn't want them. Yeah, but I'm saying if you have to have a fire sales for some reason, or if the chemistry goes wrong,

or if for some reason you're just like, obviously this isn't working, so we have to, like, I'm sure you could buy fine takers for Brogden, Bledso, Middleton, you know,

those guys are really effective. But if Kauai isn't there, if some of those Sixers guys leaves, at the very least, that gives you an opportunity if you're the Celtics. Yeah. I don't know. It just,

it would be more fun for them to be competitive next year. Okay, so let's talk about who else can be competitive. next year because we are in a world where teams that we had sort of earmarked as perpetual five seeds as nice job guys try again next year as you know love the program love the continuity love the passion but you're just not on the warriors rockets Toronto level now all of a sudden their realities are a little bit different because I think that they're all saying like hey, why not us?

If it's Toronto, why not us? And that's obviously what's going on in Utah's head as they made that move from Mike Conley. So Justin and I wanted to talk a little bit about who we think would be the next Utah. What a great award to get if you're a city. To get the next Salt Lake City. But who do we think maybe

is sitting there likes their team and is one move away from loving their team? You had a good one. Okay, so this probably won't happen but I think Detroit would be maybe wise to try it is Portland trades Anthony Simmons

the Harkless and Bazmore expiring deals and two firsts for Blake Griffin so Portland would essentially put themselves in we are all in with McCollum Lillard and Griffin you know and I don't know how that works basketball wise I think it's super interesting to think about Griffin as

like this really dynamic Playmaker who can playoff like up towards the nail and like at the top of the key and you got like Lillard and Hardin. You essentially have like a superpowered offensive Dremont who maybe obviously isn't as good as defense defensively but athletically and driving driving up the floor could be and he could shoot his ass off. I don't think you're going to miss much from losing Harkless and Baysmore. Anthony Simmons, they're doing a nice job like pumping him up in the media right now. There's a lot of like Anthony Simmons is like looks incredible right now. He's the new Roddy Bobois. Yeah. Do you think Detroit would bite on that just to be like, hey, look, like this isn't going to happen. Let's just completely tear it down. I know those firsts from Portland are likely never going to be better than 20. Yeah. At the way the rate things are going. But it's better than nothing. You could package a bunch of the first together and try and move up. You could just open up a ton of cap space. I know Detroit's not a big free agency destination. But do you think Detroit has like the foresight to say, hey, let's just rebuild on this?

sometime in the very near future they're going to have to take a look in the mirror and decide they need to blow it up. I just don't know when that is at this point. Blake Griffin coming off in all NBA season, I just don't know, especially considering all the issues that they have filling seats. Yeah, no new gym.

In that arena, like, when they'll be willing to do so. I don't love the pairing between Griffin and Drummond, but Blake's really all they have right now. They're stuck with Reggie Jackson. They're doing some good stuff on the fringes, getting, like, taking some flyers on some shooters. the guy that they drafted, a lot of people

have a lot of good things to say about him. Seku. Oh, yeah. Boy. So I like it from Portland's point of view. Yeah. I'm not sure.

Most of the Portland trades we've tried to like kick around over the last year or two have always involved McCollum. Ten years. Yeah. Of McCollum. Yes.

Yes. That McCollum is the guy who the only person that, you know, you break up that back court, you go out and you try to get somebody else to pair with Lillard. But if you're Portland

and you get to the Western Conference finals, without Nurkich, you're thinking, why do we have to break up our team? Right. You know? If the Warriors are the only ones that could stop them before, because if teams are going to be more on par with the Denver's of the world, they've shown that they could at the very least hang with those sorts of teams. If Griffin is too ambitious, the one guy I think is really interesting is Kevin Love.

Right. Because I think they're more apt, the Cavs, to trade Love, considering how long his deal extends. There were reports at the time that they signed that deal specifically to trade him, and he just doesn't fit with their timeline anymore. They're still like two or three years away from getting off the contracts that they gave up in order to fill off the LeBron team. So they're still paying the tax for that title, essentially. And so they're probably looking for just future assets and for someone to take on the contract. I don't mind. If I'm Cleveland, I don't care about Capspace. Nobody's going to sign with me as a free agent anyway. No, but you could,

they were a free agency destination when they had LeBron. But right now, if I'm them, I'm looking to trade love to somebody with a much better higher value draft asset than what Portland can offer them. I guess the question is, could you trade Kevin Love to any other situation? Because I think he's the type of player that you're really going to have to struggle to fit in. Bill was talking to Stein about this yesterday, about how Love perhaps in today's NBA is probably more of a five. Or at the very least, you need to pair him with the proper sort of four who's going to be able to cover him. I think it's possible considering Nurkich if he comes back healthy, which I hope he does, because he was really good last year, especially on the defensive end.

Yeah, what's like the ETA? Like the middle of next season, end of next season? It's probably not going to be the start of the next season. But if he does come back, I think he's the type of kind of in the paint force who can cover up for some of those mistakes. And I do wonder if you could work out a five-for situation where Zach Collins is the rim protector, but he could still stretch out so you could play five out. Now they would struggle on the perimeter. But I think that's the.

type of floor raising sort of proposition or ceiling raising as well, where you kind of have to take that chance at a certain point. If you're going to be the next Utah, you kind of have to swing for it because it does feel like things are wide open more so than ever before. Yeah, I mean, Portland, I think weirdly like Oklahoma is the other side of this coin where they are now up at the ceiling of what the owners are probably willing to pay this team. And so the only way that they can change their chemistry is probably to really to get rid of Adams and to get rid of somebody who's a fan favorite

who is really instrumental to the identity of that team. I don't know what the market for Stephen Adams would be. There's a couple of places I think would love to have him in almost like bring Marcus Saul in and make us competitive every night kind of way. But man, like

it's so interesting how perception impacts reality and like the perception of Portland as this team on the rise almost makes the have gives them more leverage out there rather than somebody like Oklahoma who also has two top 12 NBA players and a really good one in Stephen Adams

and is like, but they're screwed somehow. Yeah, Adams is an interesting one because he is more of a traditional center so I wonder if the market is going to be a little more tepid for a guy like him, a guy who still has two years at about 26 and 27 million on it, which is not like nothing.

Right. So he will probably be tougher to change I guess it really comes down to how much luxury attacks the Thunder can stumbing. Because it is going to get up there. They're already at $147 million before they do anything this summer. They still have guys like Patrick Patterson on their books. Then a shooter's deal is all of a sudden looking a little bit more like a negative than it doesn't outweigh some of the production he has on the court.

And yet they still don't have shooters. I think this is the perfect team that if they just roll things back and kind of supplement what they have with the right sort of guy, the opportunity is there. It's just they need so much shooting and I just don't know how they're going to get it because I think they probably only have the taxpayer mid-level.

I'd have to look at it, but they probably don't even have that. And Presti's been hunting for this player for his entire tenure in Oklahoma. He's been hunting for like the guy who can knock down shots that are open because his stars attract so much attention. Yeah. What about you, man?

Do you have like another team that you think is in the mix to gun for that to make a leap to the top of their conference? So I think Portland is the obvious one. I think that's the best one, just considering where they are and like the type of the breadth of talents that they have on that roster.

So I stole your idea. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks. I appreciate that. No, I think Denver is an interesting team. Okay. Because as we mentioned,

they're kind of, they're in that tier of teams that are good, have proven themselves, but there's still that one or two guys away from really being elite, a team that you feel confident about going into a playoff series each and every time. they really have something here with this Millsap contract where he has a team option

so they could kind of just wipe him away from the books or perhaps try to re-sign him to a more team-friendly deal and perhaps do something in order to kind of fill out what the rest of they have. The problem is trying to find the right guy for them. So they have Jamal Murray, they have Gary Harris, both of whom are good, did some good things in the playoffs. I think the issue there is like, are they good enough? So Bradley Beale probably among the next group of stars who could theoretically ask it. I don't know if you know this though. John Wall is walking now. Oh, really?

So, you know, that's also breaking news. And wearing sunglasses indoors. Yes. Yeah, Beal would be, I think Bill would be one of the first guys you start thinking about in this regard. I think for as much as I dislike even contemplating it,

like people bring up Janus. Ben Simmons. Yeah, Ben. It's hard to kind of like tease it out. So I guess towns would be would be one of these guys in a year or two. I guess it would just depend on if it is a Beal, if we're saying

that's the next guy up, is he worth more than both Murray and Harris? So would you trade both, do you mean? It probably takes some combination. I guess the one thing the Nuggets have going for them is they have this potential superstar of Healthy in Michael Porter Jr.

Right. And we'll see. He's supposed to play in Summer League. And if he ends up being this offensive star, you don't need as many of these offense first guys on the roster. Jamal Murray all of a sudden becomes a little bit more expendable. Do you bring those set back no matter what? I wouldn't say no matter what,

I think they definitely need someone like him. Like it almost feels like Tobias Harris if they just want to sign someone in free agency. They'd probably have to strike a sign-in-trade deal because I think they could only open up like $17. million if they get off of Millsaps deal. He just feels like... Paris for Yolkich, who says no.

The world. Actually, I guess that would be kind of problematic with that. Yokic and Embed on the same team would probably break the NBA. A lot of a lot of big ball going on there. I think they are in a situation where they could, if they want to really play for this next season, swing for the fences on something like this. Before we get out of here,

let's talk a little bit about this Arnavitz report, about the proposed structural changes to the NBA season. So Kevin Arnivitz has a report up on ESPN. He said that on June 17th, there was a conference call on which a committee of team executives from business ops and from the team side had a brainstorming session to sort of address the prospect of shortening the regular season schedule and adding a mid-season cup,

kind of like soccer-style cup, and or a play-in tournament for the playoffs. obviously the Cups would incentivize fandom in franchises that are not particularly competitive and I think that that unfortunately for the NBA comprises a large swath of the league usually the major hurdles to this

but obviously the lost gate receipts if you shorten the season it would be figuring out all the logistics involved I mean even something as big as the NBA is still subject to things like rodeo is coming to town and the Grammys coming to town coming to town and stuff like that. So there would obviously be a gate receipt issue. There would also be an issue with local sports networks who rely on NBA teams to fill

up hours 82 times a year at a minimum. And yeah, so I think that there would be a lot of hurdles, but this is the NBA trying to be proactive and not turn into baseball. Because I think at the end of this season, we had a very long regular season in which we were all like, well, this is sort of all a fake. complete until we get to the playoffs. And then the playoffs were its own marathon of nine weeks of attrition where we lost several quintessential NBA stars to injury.

And at the end, we had this remarkable endpoint. But even last night, you know, on yesterday's Bill Pod, Bill and Stein were talking about, like, well, there's like a little bit of an asterisk as hatch because like the Warriors had catastrophic injuries. So maybe it's a response to that. maybe it's just a response to the changing behaviors of people who watch things. What do you think of the idea of shortening the season, and do you think it has any viability, any chance of passing?

I hope it happens. I think everyone that consumes the NBA is in agreement that the season goes on way too long. This season in particular felt like the back half the post-all-star break was just more of a slog than ever before. I think that's because we're so far ahead of the news cycle now. This could just be a content problem. I think there is a bubble thing to it, but yeah, I think you're also right. Yeah, but we're always looking toward the thing that's going to happen next.

And after the All-Star break, it's just the playoffs. And so those last like two months or so definitely felt like filler. And I would be curious to look at some of the ticket sales, some of the ratings in that time specifically. In conjunction with all that, the ratings, regular season ratings did slump a little bit. And I think in particular in the East Coast, hours because LeBron James was on later. Was on later. Right. Also, I think it's hard because they can dial up the Christmas hype.

They can say it's a rematch of the finals. But you know what, man? There's a chance that Kauai or LeBron or Janice or Kyrie or whoever might sit that night. And that's fine. Like, I think it's fine to have like complete management over your own body like that. I just think it's a reality that they do not have the ability to event, regular season games the way the NFL does. Yeah, and while I think the mid-season tournament, as we talked about a few weeks ago, would just

be exhilarating. It would be a really fun event to kind of watch and would really break things up. I think load management is just another issue that they're going to have to factor in because are these guys not going to want to play postseason basketball in the middle of the season and then play post-season basketball again. Well, presumably I think that it would introduce an entirely different kind of basketball than the kind we ever see in the NBA, which would be knockout. And you only ever get that in game seven and most game sevens are rock fights.

But this would be, hey, if the Sons want to play their starters against the Raptors B team in the first round, the Raptors have to accept getting knocked out of the cup. That's essentially what happens in England soccer.

It's like if Liverpool wants to play their kids against, you know, Darby's full first team and Darby is like a league below Liverpool. Okay, thank you. Then that's just, just a consequence Liverpool's out of the cup. If Liverpool takes the cup seriously and ends the

season and wins the domestic trophy, the league, and maybe the Champions League, they get to consider one of the best teams of all time. That's what, you know, Manchester City just won a domestic treble in England. And even though they didn't win the Champions League, many people are like, well, that's about as good as you can play soccer. Yeah, I guess the issue there is just you have to sell NBA players and then an audience on the fact that these cups matter. I don't think it would be as hard as we think. I mean, I completely think that you're going to have to lop off a bunch of regular season games, but I think that those guys would be like, this is pretty cool to be a part of this. And I think it would just be, if you could figure out the incentives and the way the contracts

work around it, I don't know, those dudes look like psyched to be in game three of a first round series that's going to be a gentleman's sweep. No, I come back to it probably needs, the incentive structure needs to be there for the players themselves. It's just, I don't know if you could sell them on, if the NBA title is how they've been measuring their careers for so long that this thing in the middle is kind of now a part of that. We talk about this in terms of changing perhaps just the style of all-MBA voting or all-star team voting where it's like maybe you go positionless and like guys kind of push back on that. LeBron notably did that a few years ago. And they've they've experimented and I love the fact that Adam Silver is so. progressive on a lot of these things.

And while the Kevin Durant and Clay Thompson injuries provided him a window to continue these discussions, they were talking about this with Mark. He was talking about this with Mark Stein beforehand. But as we've seen with kind of All-Star Weekend, they've tried some stuff. And while I appreciate the spirit of it, it didn't really do much of a difference. We talked about the All-Star game this year, how even the draft that they have kind of fizzled out. We wanted them to show it on TV.

They showed it on TV. And it was fine. Sure. Yeah, but that's a stunt. This would be more sports. And I think, look, like the NBA is now, not unlike the Rockets, like they are a product of their own innovation, right? And now they have to figure out,

we have an attention-strapped fan base. We are offering a multiplicity of experiences every night. But you have to, like, find it. You have to flip around. You have to have league pass. You have to like, be like, okay, I'm going to go check this. I'm going to go check that. Ooh, I saw on Twitter that this guy's heating up and I'm going to go to there.

Or I could just look at Twitter, not actually you have to watch the games at all. And I certainly don't have to go. And you have the reality that there's this explosion of interest when the season starts. Then there's a dip and football kind of takes over for a while. It pops back up again around Christmas when the games get really, you know, like all the marquee matchups happen. It kind of rolls through the new year and into the All-Star game. And then after the All-Star game, half the League tanks and half the league tanks and half the league is kind of getting ready for the playoffs by like managing the minutes of the guys

who they're going to be relying on. That's not an effective delivery system for basketball. I personally think, I think I've said this before, I think that the NBA season should be two college basketball seasons. I think it should be 60 games, 59 games, whatever it is to make it work. And you add in some extra stuff there to make it happen. I also think the first round should absolutely be best of five games. If you can't win a best of five game first round series, then you're not, you don't deserve to be the champion. It's not that complicated. I 100% agree with everything that you're saying. And I think that Adam Silver is probably thinking 10 to 15 years out. Or at least the next TV deal. Right. Exactly. Because I think we're going to get into a situation pretty quickly, probably quicker than most probably realize where the next people buying, the next companies buying the rights are some of these streaming services.

Amazon. Amazon. Apple, some of these other bigger tech companies. I guess the problem is. And they don't think about things the way that the regional sports networks think about them. Right. They aren't like, hey, I mean, they obviously want to fill up hours and hours of content and keep you on the service for as long as possible. That's the goal. But they're not like, hey, it has to be 82 because I've built my entire business model around three times a week. People are tuning in from 730 to 11 to watch this. Right.

So the league is addressing an issue from the wide angle where viewership approaches are changing, especially now that that Reddit live stream has been taken down at the page. RIP to piracy. It's tough. Rested piracy. And perhaps that will just spur them to fix league pass so I could watch LA games in the LA market. Yeah, I know.

It was a big thing. But the NBA teams are just looking at it from the local perspective. And a team like the Lakers is making millions of dollars off of this local cable package. And so it's going to come to a head at a certain point. But the issue they're going to face in these discussions is that why would, an owner give up like all of the money that they're bringing in from them right now

when they don't have to when the problem isn't right in front of their faces. Right, right. Because it is, we are going to get to a point where if it does go to the tech companies and the local cable packages aren't as,

as pricey, then the gates are probably going to matter more and they're going to be wondering where all this money is coming from. But that's not now. Yeah, but if they need to goose the gates, if they need to goose attendance, asking people to be a part of something

that's never happened before might work. Asking people to be like, hey, we'll reduce prices. Maybe we cut prices a little bit for these because who knows what's going to happen. But come see the first commissioners cup game

at the FISAver arena. I'd go to that. I would go check that out. If I was a guy who was just like, yeah, this would be pretty neat. You know, this will be pretty like, what if Phoenix wins tonight? That would be so hilarious

of Phoenix beats Golden State today. It's a bummer that the G League isn't where they probably want it to be five to ten years from now because this is the perfect thing to experiment with the G League. Well, and it might be. If the age thing goes away in college, or rather the age requirement for the draft drops,

you could see it maybe panning out that way. Yeah, right now, they do try a lot of different things. That's really where they hold a lot of their experiments. But I just don't think anybody's going to be watching the G League in general, and I don't think a mid-season, they don't watch the post-season in the G-League. You're not going to watch a mid-season term in the G-League,

so I don't know if it's a real pilot opportunity. But it's a fascinating conversation. I hope the season is shorter. I just don't want it to drift towards baseball. You know, I loved baseball growing up. But that was one of like four things I was interested in in the world. And I just don't think that there are a lot of people out there like that anymore.

And if you can't, I mean, if you're micro-obsessed with a baseball team, you care about what happens in a four-game homestand. but if you're just like I'm a baseball fan like how do you tell what matters you would probably know better than us Bobby you're a bigger baseball fan but do you see what I'm talking about about that drift towards like

I mean why are we so excited about talking about free agency and not basketball it's because like this is something that everybody can care about. I think the only thing I follow with non-Mets baseball stuff is pitching matchups and because I care deeply about the craft of pitching but I don't imagine that like the general

fan does care about that really And I guess to some extent, like LeBron versus Janice is like the same thing for the NBA as like Verlander versus Kirshah or something. But you already get that with league pass. Yeah. See, that's interesting. I wonder if we only care about the fact that there are so many games

because we feel incentivized to capture all the kind of ebbs and flows of the league. Whereas a team can really kind of do it from an on-demand sort of perspective where it's like, oh, I want to watch the Suns on this. Tuesday, but I don't want to watch them for another two months. They can pick and choose which games they're watching. Right. So does it really matter that there are 82 games? It doesn't, but wouldn't you be more interested in watching the Suns if there were 59 games?

And if they put together and Monty Williams managed to somehow get them above 500 and they were chasing a playoff birth or they were in the semifinals of a cup or... That's a good point. Every night somehow was more important rather than, does anybody even know what happened on Wednesday? no. Like the Timberwolves won, the Timberwolves lost, like, who cares? There'd be more outlier situations. In the Premier League and in the NFL, if you lose a game, it's the conversation for a week. If you lose a game in the NBA, most of your fans are kind of like,

ah, that sucks. That's annoying. I remember having this conversation with Arnavus like a decade ago, that there's something about of college football Saturday. Yeah. But there's so much going on and every game matters, that that's what you really want to recreate with basketball. It's just so tough to balance with all the other factors. And for a league that's used to spending seven, months or however many months it is on the regular season. Yeah, I just think if you want to have the best players playing, if, like, if that 65-70 games is about what you want them at, then, like, you should bring the regular season down to that. Yeah, I don't know.

Okay. We could probably sit here for hours talking about this, but we'll wrap it up here. Group chat today, corner three Friday morning. We will be, I would imagine there will be heat check Sunday night after the, after the free agency starts ruling in on Sunday when the moratorium lifts at 3 p.m. Pacific, 6 p.m. Eastern. should be a really, really fascinating weekend. We'll probably get a lot of more woge bombs and Stein salms and stuff like that as the weekend goes along. For Justin, this is Chris.

Thanks for listening to the Ringer NBA show. Basketball is very good. Basketball is very good.