The Ringer NBA Show - A Thanksgiving NBA Mailbag! | Group Chat

Episode Date: November 27, 2019

The ‘Group Chat’ crew answers questions from you, the listeners! Topics include: the biggest “pretender” team, help for Luka Doncic and the Dallas Mavericks, the 25-and-under power ranking, realistic midseason trades, and more. Host: Justin Verrier Guest: Jonathan Tjarks Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Pumpkin pie is overrated. Leftover. turkey is actually good. Mashed potatoes are better without gravy. Basketball is very good. Hello and welcome to the Ringer NBA show. This is the group chat. I am Justin Varyer and joining me on the line from Dallas. Jonathan Charks. What's up, Charks? Not really a group today, but we'll make do anyways. Yes, Chris Ryan is not with us. Unfortunately, a little bit of load management, almost literally because he was doing about six podcasts today before he takes off for the holiday break.

But we have Isaac Lee back on the controls. Yeah, yeah. And he has agreed to chime in more. But you know what it is, though, with Chris? The Sixers lost last night in kind of spectacular fashion, and so he's just getting out of here. He's dodging you charks. You're like his...

He just one of R.M. Bed slander. Yes, yes, exactly. So for today, we're going to do a mailbag, as we've done in the past, a little bit of a general NBA talk for your holiday journey. Unfortunately for you, there are no podcasts left on the Ringer MBA show this week because of the holiday. So you're stuck with me, Charks and Isaac. You cannot tune away.

Well, I guess they can, but please don't. We'll get us some spins. Please don't. For the fate of this one show, please don't. So we asked for your questions on the Ringer MBA show or the Ringer MBA Twitter account. We don't have a Ringer NBA show Twitter account, too, he is. No, it's not specific to this show, but, you know, go subscribe. Please do. Thank you for your questions and for telling us that we hate the Lakers and asking us why we hate the Lakers. I think that accounted for maybe four or five of the 50 or so questions that we got from this one.

And Raptors talk too. A lot of Raptors hate coming from us apparently. Right. And I guess I am to blame for both of those. So I apologize in advance. I do blame you for most of these things. You're usually the one behind it also. As you should. Although I do, I will say just briefly, I think the most off-putting thing about the Lakers, hate specifically, or just projecting onto us that we hate the Lakers, is that I care enough to hate the Lakers and that it would affect my opinion. Great spin. You like that one? Like, it actually is good for me if the Lakers are good, because then, like, maybe I will see a conference finals game in Los Angeles.

But I actually don't care that much. Are you, like, right off the bat, just ignoring the fact that there's another team in Los Angeles that could also make the conference finals, or are the kings? Oh, man, here we go with this again. No worry. We've talked with the Clippers. Let's not get on this path right now. Give them plenty of love.

There's but no anti-Clippers talk on this podcast. So let's go ahead with that. Any perceived slight I will take and I will expand and amplify into a large insult against my heart. Yeah, there's not enough these days. It's all good things. So you need to find the bad. Yeah, I'm really doing the pulling the Draymond Green straw man thing of just anything to get a chip on my shoulder. Yeah.

But we're not going to talk about the Lakers or at least directly, but we are going to talk, or at least this first question does involve the Raptors. Let's start here. It is from Davey W. Lucas. He asks, which team with a strong record right now is the biggest pretender? And in parentheses, he asks, if you say the Raptors, I swear to God, I will probably continue to consume all the Ringer NBA content available, but through gridded teeth. Which, not bad considering, you know?

Yeah, that's not much of a threat, really, honestly. These Canadians, they can't really talk tough. This is true. But Sharks, in response to his question specifically, which team who is doing well right now would you say is the biggest pretender? Okay, I was looking at the top seven or eight teams in the league. And what jumps out to me, and I feel like we've all pretty much established now,

like the best, the league really runs through the wing positions. It's all about having multiple, like, big 3&D supersized wings. And the team to me, I look at as like a really good team, but missing that piece is the huge. Utah Jazz. I look at the jazz and I say, man, if they're in the second round of the playoffs and they have to play the Lakers or the clippers and they've got Bogdanovich, Royce O'Neill, Joe Ingalls, I feel like that puts a ceiling on your team. They don't got the horses, I don't think. Throwing at the big boys. If you could identify the third fan base that we didn't want to upset because they're so passionate on Twitter, Charks, you found them. Oh, that's right. That's right. Well, I mean, I think they're very good, but to me, you're missing a piece that makes you a serious contender. Yeah, I think it's fair.

I think everyone came out of the offseason expecting the jazz to be the dark horse kind of finals contender. To the point where they were no longer the dark horse, they were very much in the conversation or at the forefront of the conversation. They have found very quickly that just importing Mike Conley just hasn't been as much of a plug-in-play as they expected.

Yeah, I think you're starting to see both he said this, I believe, and you're also seeing other people say this about him. Just the pick-and-roll combination he has with Rudy Gobert just hasn't worked as seamlessly, perhaps, because of the differences between Gassol and Gaubert. Does that seem fair to you? Yeah, I think Gassal, very, very underrated. The things he does is just, like, you look at Toronto

and how he makes everyone around him better, how he's so, like, to me, Gassal is one of the most underrated players in the league. Even when they traded for him last year, I wasn't, like, really buying the trade. But looking at it, now I feel like he really, he's helping Seacom be better. He's helping everyone be better in Toronto.

I think he's kind of like that hidden. He doesn't score a lot of points, but he does so many other things well, it makes everyone around him better. Yeah. I mean, on the flip side, the Jazz do have the best defense in the NBA once again. One thing I do think about in terms of just where the Jazz are now,

they are 11 and 5. They are a team that I feel like will be there. At the end of the season, we'll be first round, second round sort of team. Are our perceptions of how they're doing warped because we expected so much from them? Because last year when they slumped, I think there was a lot of talk about

them being a sleeping giants, the advanced statistics suggested they were way better than they were playing. They had injuries and ultimately turned it around in the second half for the second season in a row. But now they're doing well. They're not cratering. And yet here we are talking about them as a disappointment. Well, you're comparing to the LA teams, right?

If you're trying to compare them to the best teams in the league. They've been good now for long enough to where first second round, it's like, ah, whatever. Now you've been compared to that second, third, fourth round kind of team. And I don't think they made the upgrades. really getting that conversation.

Yeah, and I guess they put themselves in that position because they did go on a limb and sacrifice some future draft assets, including Grace and Allen, in order to take the next step. They went and got Conley. Honestly, that might not have been a huge sacrifice. No, but at the very least it was a recent draft pick. But yes, Scott Bogdanovich in there, Ed Davis, who's been hurt. So they did make upgrades with the assumption that they would be there in the upper crust. They haven't made it there thus far.

I would also pinpoint a team that's in that sort of range where they've been doing well, but not as well as perhaps we might have expected them to, and that's the Houston Rockets. They're 11 and 6, perhaps a little bit of recency bias because they're just coming off of three straight losses, but three straight losses against teams that they're going to need to beat, if not now, then in the playoffs with the Nuggets, the Clippers, and the Mavs. They're 3.1 in net rating, which is 12th in the NBA behind teams like the Sixers. and the jazz. We're picking Nits a little bit

because I do think the Rockets have solidified themselves as a team who should be in the top part of the NBA, but the very least, for me, there's just, I don't feel as comfortable about what they're doing

because a lot of it still seems like it's dependent on the Harden show. Did you watch any of those games? It was pretty fascinating. So, like, the Mavs game, they just threw doubles a harden the whole time.

I think we all were expecting this at some point. They're like, we're just not going to guard Russ anymore. The man cannot shoot. we're doubling Harden every time. And I feel like that was an interesting adjustment over the last couple of games.

Really, I think the Nuggets came started it. It's like, we're going to hard double, harden constantly because we don't believe the guys around him can make plays. Yeah, I mean, I looked up the numbers right before here, and it's still similar to what it has been all season and what we kind of expected, Harden and Russ are plus 6.3 in that rating.

Just Hardin on the floor without Russ is 10.2, and just Russ without Hardin, minus 16.6. minus 16. Golly. I know it was just quite that bad. It's not good. It's not good. And I think the thing that I'm most concerned about, in addition to that, is just the

roster is thin. We've talked about this before. Eric Gordon is still out. And Click Capella, who's like, come on and gotten like, what, 20 rebounds a night at this point, probably in part by playing with Ross and getting all of those missed shots. But he's questionable for an illness tonight. And that's obviously not something that we expect to linger for the whole season. But if Capella is not playing, if Gordon isn't playing, all of a sudden you look around

and you're like, who is here to support? They're playing Tyson Chandler a lot right now behind. He's like freaking 40, basically, at this point. Yeah, I mean, he was kind of a throw-in last year with the Lakers as they tried to salvage their season. I think we forget considering all the offensive fireworks with the Rockets that this team, when they were at their best, had the defense to counterbalance them,

all the switching, all the Jeff Bizzillick stuff. And I look in their 18th in defense, and that's just not going to be enough in order to balance things out. It just seems like they're falling back into this habit of just relying too much on outscoring teams. There's only so much of that you could do.

Well, Chris isn't here so we can kind of just talk about Russ more. Russ can start playing defense, man. You've got to stop jumping at steals, play sound positional defense. You're 31 now, I think. It's time to lock down and play serious basketball. You're not the man anymore.

You're one of the supporting cast. You've got a guard. You just have to. Yeah. I mean, he's trying harder, it seems. Kevin O'Connor made a point about this in one of his three pieces last week. He did a reality check series

and he asked a question about each team and he made the point basically that Russ isn't better and at this point we should probably stop expecting him to be better at the things that we've always wanted him to be better at including shooting. But he has been a better teammate so he has like conceded the Florida Hardin and kind of let him be the guy on the team.

On the other hand, I know that we're expecting too much but I look at just Russ's physicality and just like what he can do from just being an athlete in this kind of like bowling ball, like running down the court so fast, I'm just like, why can't he just be the ultimate hustle player? And it's just like, it never happens. And I think too sometimes, like you got to hustle smartly. You got to like not jump at steals. Like you can't just try harder. You've got to like think the game too. You've got to like try smarter. That's a great point. And the other thing too, I think they're really missing Eric Gordon. He's been bad this year. But last year, Eric Gordon was so big for

them, he guarded Dona Mitchell in the playoffs and almost shut him down in a couple games. Like, he's a guy, like, he's one of their best defenders, and he was one of their best shooters before he, like, couldn't make a thing for it hurt this year. I think he had, like, a knee injury. He's out for a while. That's a guy they have to get going. Because really, if Russ keeps playing like this, you might need Gordon to be the second guy behind Hardin when Hardin when Hardin comes out. Maybe Gordon should have the offense in his hands because Russ is not getting it done. Yeah, I mean, this is kind of the pitfall of having a top heavy team. And even though Eric Gordon isn't, I don't know, is he their fourth best player? Is he their fifth

best player? I don't know. But, you know, they need him, especially if Russ isn't going to provide the spacing and you're going to be playing Russ a lot. Whenever Russ and Hardin on the floor together, it's just that's going to be a negative space. And you just don't have Gordon to really kind of balance out the team. Yeah, and you're talking about a top heavy. They're playing Ben McLemore, yeah, he's starting. Yeah. I definitely expected McLemore to be like to step into the NBA and be the next Ray Allen. Do we remember this when he was getting that buzz? Yeah, I mean, he was the top 10 pick. I liked him coming out of Kansas. It just did not happen for him. And I don't know if like just getting into the King's system just completely just

torpedoes everyone, like just completely like sucks out his confidence or whatever it is. But if he cannot just hit open three pointers in the rocket system where they are just like in abundance, I just don't know what we can do with him. But yeah, they're down to like some guys that really shouldn't be playing heavy minutes for them. And so that's why I'm concerned. On the flip side, though, the other team, or one of the other teams in Texas, is having the complete opposite early start to the season? Let's talk Mavs. Never too much Mavs talk on the ringer. Let's talk Mavs. Charks flagged three questions before we started this, and one of them, of course. There was like 10 Mavs questions. People want to talk Luka, man. It's great.

Apparently, yes. So let's start with this one. We have a few of them we can get to that are all kind of related, but let's start with Luka and specifically. This is from D. E. Fern. If Luka D. Donchich continues to maintain his current. averages and form or slight drop, how many games do the MAVs need to win for him to generally win MVP? So basically, how many wins do the MAV's need for Donch to have a legitimate shot at MVP? I mean, it's tough. Like, if you're talking legitimate shot at MVP, the Bucks are going to win like, what, 60, 65 games probably? Yeah, 538 has them with 62 as their projection. What do they have the MAVs at right now? Have they changed it since the new windstreet? So I checked this Tuesday afternoon and they were at 50.

I think like for a second year player, there's going to be so much kind of resistance just from like a second year guy jumping the line a little bit. Probably like 55, 57. Like to me, MVP talk is a little, I'm not ready to go there yet. Because I just think he has to get like that 57 wins probably to be realistic, right?

If he's at 50 wins and Yon's at 62, he's not going to get the award. There's no way. Yeah. I think the thing that Yon, or Donchich, sorry, is going to be up against, is just that he is the newcomer. And I think regardless of how well he plays,

he's always going to have that little, like, that's going to be used against him. And so I wrote down 60. I think 60 is bulletproof. If you get to 60 wins, that's enough to basically, like, discount anyone trying to knock him for this being too early

or whatever it might be. Realistically, I think it's probably closer to something that, like, you know, what the Rockets got last year, which is 56. I think you do need to beat out the rocket specifically. Yeah, for sure. Hardin is going to be like the obvious comparison.

Who has the better record of those two teams? Yeah, I mean, I think we are barreling toward a similar result to last year, where Janus, the Bucks are going to win a lot of games, and Janus is going to play particularly well. Middleton has been out, he doesn't have Brogden there, and so I think he is getting more opportunities. And just by sheer fact of taking more threes and making more threes, you'd expect at least the scoring numbers to take.

a little bit of a hike there. I think, and I think for Janus, that helps to have that, like, extra thing. Because you kind of have to have a new story every year. And now this year's story is he has a three-point shot. And I think, too, like, he's the anti-load management guy. Like, he plays all the time. Yeah, that's a great point. He's like in the prime of his career.

He runs run constantly. He's almost indestructible, it seems like. Has he ever been hurt before? I can't ever even hurt. I can't remember. Knock on wood, I guess. I don't think he's been to the point of, like, Carl Towns who missed, like, a couple games only because he was in a car accident.

But yeah, he's been really durable throughout his entire career. Yeah, and it's a good point. He's always going to have also the defensive argument. And on the flip side of that, Hardin will constantly be this just like unstoppable offensive force. He's also taking a step forward in like progressing the narrative.

He's flirting with 40 points a game as an average. And we talk about Will and all this other stuff. And so... I think too he's paid his dues. I believe in that a little bit. Lucas got time on MVP's. We don't need to jump the line, right? The backlash is brewing already. Let's not get too out of hand with this thing.

Yeah, I mean, listen, Luca has a legitimate shot. At this point, I would put him third because, yes, we could talk about it being too early or maybe like the Mavs schedule as Isaac Flagg for me. It has been a little cakey. At the same time, they have the best offense in the NBA and they are currently sitting at the top of the NBA in net rating.

Like, that's legit. You want to talk Mazz for a second, just? I think there's a couple things that are happening. People really aren't realizing nationally that I made a big difference for Dallas for the last couple weeks. Carlisle's kind of figured out that Luca's going to dribble the ball the whole game.

So if you have to dribble, it's not going to work because Luca has the ball. Like, no one's telling Luca to give him the ball up. That means he's finding guys who don't have to need the ball. So like, he's starting Tim Hardaway, Jr. And the funny thing is about Tim Hardaway, Jr. For as much grief as he gets,

that man is always ready to shoot, right? There's no warm up for THJ. If he catches the ball, it's going to go up. Whereas, like, De Lawn Wright, Seth Curry, Jalen Brunson, all those guys are really, they're like ball handlers. They don't really get in the rhythm with Luca, doming the ball like that. But with THJ, it's just catch and shoot, catch and shoot.

And that's the key for Lucas. You have to have catch and shoot guys around them. So they're playing THJ more, and they're using Porzengis more off the ball. Like they're kind of cutting back on his post-ups because they're saying, look, poor Zingas, you're best when Luca's getting you shots and you're getting up shots fast.

so we're not going to like post you have a million times and have you take a low percentage turnaround shot. It's cutting off the ball. It's Luca passed new quickly in shooting. And then like the team is being maximized. Then the bench guys, then the bench you've got like Curry, Wright, Brunson. They're killing teams too

because they have so many good point cards when Luke is not in the game. So I think that really adjustment Carlisle made in the last week and a half is what's pushed the Mavs to becoming a really good team this season. Yeah, I mean, we've talked about this too, that the fact that they swung and missed yet again in free agency, they didn't get a Kemba Walker,

another sort of superstar to pair with Porzingis and Luca Donchich, has worked out in their benefit. They just seem like a more complete team, and that's already paying off in terms of regular season record. They're currently fourth in the West at 11 and 5, and like I don't expect this to slow down, specifically because of what you're mentioning. They are deep.

If they have injuries, a guy like Brunson can step up and play more. I think the question then becomes, what are they in the playoffs? And do they have enough? And are some of these kind of ancillary guys who are filling in roles now, are they going to be enough against a top heavy team like the Lakers, like the Clippers?

See, to me, that's where it gets tough. I mean, it's the same conversation as the Jazz. Like the Mavs, their defense on the wing. Right now it's Dorian Finney Smith is really good. And it's Tim Hardaway Jr. Like, those guys aren't guarding your big wings in the playoff series.

Yeah. I kind of don't want T.S.J. anywhere near Luka. He's like kind of... He's killing it right now, though. He's been really good. Yeah, he suppress his inner THJ, but like, I do worry in a playoff series and the bright lights are on, all of a sudden he's taking more shots than he should.

I mean, it's tough because he's playing defense. Like, the Mavs are like asking him to guard like Bradley Beale and LeBron. Like, that right there tells you this team is married when a championship, but that's, like, your solution. Yeah, yeah. And I think this is a good segue to our next Mavs-related question, which is from Rino 77. what move should the Mavericks do to take them over the top and become a championship contender?

Do you have any thoughts? Yeah, I mean, it goes back to that Utah conversation again. Like, they need a 3-&D wing who's going to guard LeBron and Kauai, but everyone needs that. Like, those guys aren't available in trades. Yeah, I feel like if we were doing a segment on each team, we would end up like kind of just mentioning a 3D wing at some point, except for the Clippers.

Well, I feel like those guys are like centers like 30 years ago, where I was like, you had to have your big center to guard the post, and that was the franchise player. Now it's that 6-8-do-everything wing. Without that kind of player, it's just tough when they were in the playoffs. Yeah, I wrote down a couple, like, possible suggestions. One, which I think is actually kind of doable, especially if it's not a trade, it's more of a buyout. What about Andre Aguadala? I love him in Dallas.

I feel like, though, he's probably going to go to L.A. I don't think he wants to live in Dallas at his age, my guess. It's not a hot spot for someone like him. I don't, I mean, he's a Silicon Valley magnet now. We're not really good. It's true. Yeah, he needs to be closer to his tech connections. Yeah, no, it would have to probably come via trade.

And one of the big issues with the Mavs and with this question in general is, what do the Mavs really have in terms of assets? They have their 2021 first and their 2023 first due to the NICS, which means they can't trade any pick until I believe 2025. they can work a thing with swap rights, but outside of that, you're really dealing from the core. And in terms of younger assets

that teams would want, it's really, what, Jalen Brunson, maybe? It's really Jalen Brunson. And I, you know, I think he's pretty good, but he's been, like, in the backburn the last few weeks. He's kind of lost out with the way the team's been reshuffled. So he played, like, three minutes the other night.

Like, how are you going to be a trade piece playing three minutes a game? Right. And he doesn't have the pedigree of someone like who could, a second round pick, yeah. Yeah, I mean, Delon Wright is another guy, but as you mentioned,

he's a bigger piece of what they're doing now and not a great shooter. And I don't know, like, DeLon's going to be a big trade ship either, like, you know. True, true. Let me throw this out at you just on kind of, like, the lower level.

What about Frankie Smokes? I've been saying for a while, we need Frankie, he'd be perfect in Dallas with that Team Murrow thing going. I'm all for that. I'm not a big smokes fan, but I feel like he needs out of the Knicks.

And I feel like the Mavs, if they could just become like the island where all of former Nix kind of rehabilitate their value or just like go to rest up and just like get back into society, I definitely would be for that. I mean, he's starting now in New York.

I mean, I don't know that he's doing much with it, but he's starting. They're giving a ton of minutes. We'll see how long that lasts. I would love it. I'd love Frankie Spokes though. That'd be great. But once again, what are he trading for him though?

Right? you would assume that this would have to be the Knicks just giving up on him I don't know do they need Brunson do they need a couple seconds what can we throw with the Knicks that they would just give up I would do Brunson for I don't know that ever play him but I think he actually helped them a lot

he's a legitimate distributor I also don't know if the Knicks can get over the PTSD of just like getting fleeced on the first deal they did with the Mavs so that always comes into a fact and according to the Knicks they are trying to at least maintain the perception of being competitive this season. For clarification purposes.

Very important. Charks, anybody else you see that could really make an impact on the Mavs this season? A couple of guys I was thinking of along those lines, two guys from Florida. I think Aaron Gordon, I've been saying for a while he's kind of got to be traded out of Orlando. I think he's exactly the kind of player they need. They get Aaron Gordon on this team. It's just how are you going to do that, right? Right.

I also don't see the trade they're going to make for Aaron Gordon. The other guy along those same lines is Justice Winslow. It kind of feels like he's out on the outside of Miami. It's Jenny Butler's team now. It's a Butler and Shooters. There's not really a role for Winslow on that team anymore. I love him in Dallas. But once again, the same thing.

What are he trading for him, really? Right. Charks has been trying to trade Aaron Gordon for what? Six years now? Something like that. Pretty much once I drafted him with Alfred Payton. This team doesn't know what they're doing. Get him out of there.

Were you, am I remembering this correctly? Were you the source of the C.J. McCollum, Aaron Gordon trade that led to C.J. McCollum calling out Bill? That was me. I love the idea. And honestly, I think to this day, it still makes a lot of sense. But, you know, if you look at the magic, at a certain point, they need to figure out the front court,

and it just feels like Gordon, who I think has been dinged up a little bit this season, just... He's been bad this year. He's still taking a step back. Yeah, but he makes a lot of sense on the Mavs team. It seems like you mentioned, their biggest weakness is on the perimeter, and it just seems like he would be the optimal,

just like defensive Swiss Army knife to pair with Luca and KP. You have Aaron Gordon kind of being the defensive juggernai. He could be the one who locks down that end, where you have Luca on the other end, and KP is still spotting up and providing the rim protection that he does. I do think, though, one question we should address is that, yes, the Mavericks don't have any clear-cut assets, but would they ever get to the point considering his slow start to the

season of trading Christop's Porzingis? Oh, that's quite a take, Justin, quite a take. I mean, it would be cutthroat, seeing that they just traded for him not even a year ago, and they just signed him to a max extension, but would they ever get to the point where they could do that? Would that ever make sense for them? I think it'd be more if he got to the point. If he was like, I want the ball sometimes. I don't like that.

Luca always dominates the ball. Because I think if he's going to be in Dallas, she has to accept that this is Lucas' team. And like, really for me, I really wouldn't mind Luke giving the ball up some, but that's just not going to happen. Like, that's over. That ship has sailed.

My man's got the ball. Everyone's got to deal with it. Right, which means he's probably going to be spotting up more and just hanging out around the rim on defense, than probably he wants to. Are you getting any, like, sort of vibe from him in Dallas? Is he going along and getting along? Or can you see, like, maybe that is wearing on him his role?

I think for now it's fine because, you know, the injury, they're winning games. They weren't winning games. They'd be a different story. It's just tough because he's in this box now where he said, I just want to win, you know. He gave that usual cliche answer. And now it's like, well, you want to win, bro. You're winning, but you're not playing the same kind of role. I've been thinking about it.

It's almost like with the old. and Chris Bosch, right, where they had to go from being the primary guy to being a stretch big. But those guys were like 27, 28 when it happened. He's 23. Right. He's in a little box right now.

Right. He's already made an all-star team. He's coming back from the injury and probably wants to show everybody what he can do. I think that we assumed, now that the NBA is kind of pivoting toward big twos,

that like these sorts of issues won't matter. You look at Paul George and Kauai and all of a sudden, George just comes back from injury and he steps in and he looks great. And when he plays with Kauai, it's everything we imagined. LeBron and AD, another partnership that's just gone off to a really good start. And even, you know, we just talked about Hardin and Westbrook, but in terms of chemistry, like, they seem fine. They always do their cool thing where

they sit on the sidelines and, like, sing to each other before games. K.P. and Luca were arranged marriage, and they're both younger, and they're both trying to prove themselves. That's the thing. It's the younger part. That's what worries me a little bit. I feel like, like with AD, 80 lost for what, like seven straight years? I think he was that much. I don't think it was that much, but yes, he went through a lot in New Orleans. It's a lot of humble pie. Younger guys, they've only had a few slices of humble pie, not the whole serving.

So that worries me a bit. I think younger guys have a hard time sacrificing because they want to get theirs first. And then, you know, when you're George and Kauai, you're like you're eight, you're nine, you've got your money, you're kind of take a step back and win. Yeah, and I mean, if you are a big two, that you're just, just kind of shines more of a spotlight on you if you are disgruntled if the partnership just doesn't work. A guy like Bosch. Justin. Yeah. You want to talk big two? Let's talk real big two in Dallas. Okay. Did you see KOC's article today about Luca and Janus? I did, yes. Why not be in the same team?

Luke would have got us 2021. Let's go. It took me a second to figure out where you're going for. I thought you were going to make like a cowboys reference and I was like, oh God, I haven't watched football in like five years. No, we're over that. That's a whole different conversation. But I'm saying, if, Janice wants to win a championship. Let's get him in Dallas. Team Euro, baby. God, can you imagine. Oh, I can imagine.

I can definitely imagine. Charx has been talking to me about this for like a year. So this is a new. But yeah, no, that'd be great. I also think every team that has cap space or just every team in general wants Janus as well and envisions a future with him. Yes, but how many of those teams have a 20-year-old MVP-level point guard who could pick and roll with Janus?

What a great transition to our next question, Charks. But before that, We're going to take a quick break to hear from our sponsors. Today's episode of the Ringer MBA show Group Chat is brought to you by the Google Assistant. This week's Friday night matchup should be very entertaining. Maybe I'll have you guys over to watch this game. Hey, Google, add chips and salsa to my shopping list. All right, I added chips and salsa.

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21 plus and present in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, or Indiana. Site credit is non-withdrawable and expire seven days after receipt, terms and restrictions apply. Gambling problem. Call 1-8. or in West Virginia, visit www.1-800 gambler.net or in Indiana, call 1-8009 with it. And now back to group chat. All right, we're back. Charks, Isaac, and Justin are here. We're talking about some of your questions that you sent into us. We were just talking about the Mavs before the break, which leads to our next question pretty seamlessly here from OI underscore Wall. Ranking of, well, I'll just put in a phrase the question because it's actually more of a statement. Which players under 25 are the best to build with.

He mentions Embed and Seacom, but I think the conversation charks probably starts with the guy we were just talking about, Luca Donchich. Yeah, how old is Janus now? Is he out of this age range? He's the same age as me, so he's 24. Oh, my God.

I didn't realize he was 24. That's insane. Yeah, he came to look like 18 or something. Wow. So he is almost 25. He's going to turn 25 in December 6th. Is that amazing? consider him because of that.

Okay, so I guess let's start the conversation there. Would you rather have Luca or Yanis? I mean, I gotta say Yanis still. Like, they do play defense. Yes. Yeah, I do think I would go that as well. But I would have to say that both are one-two. It's a pretty clear cut one, sharks.

Yonis won, Luca, too. If we're starting a team tomorrow, too, this isn't like factoring in current contracts because then it gets a little dicey. Let's go to three, because I think that's pretty clear at this point. Okay. Cam Reddish, he's your three.

Cat? How about cat? Oh, cat. I forgot about cat. There's so many young guys in this league. I know it's great. I automatically went to Zion. Yokic is 24?

Yokic is also 24, yes. Isn't that crazy? I think it's like a passing of a torch happening in the league right now. There's so many good young players. Yeah. Would you rather have towns or Dantzsch because of the defensive things

that we talked about earlier? It isn't like cats, some elite defender, though. Yeah. He's just big. He's a large man. Yeah, I love cat. I'm a cat guy. But I think I would go Janus Luca Cat, one, two, three.

The question is Zion. What does Zion fall into this? Charks, don't you own a cat too? Yeah, I mean, I have a cat. Everyone has cats, right? That's not. It's a very separate question from whether he supports Carl Anthony Town. Shout out Feisty.

Feisty. That's a good name. I've been looking for a dog for a couple months, so it's on the word. That's been, it's like a year now. That's not even going to happen. I find that, didn't that ship sale? Listen, the dog market is probably more competitive than the rental market in Los Angeles. I have gone to several places where I see a cute dog on Instagram. I'm like, got to get this dog.

Perfect for me. Like, my apartment only wants it to be 35 pounds or under, so it's, like, restrictive. And so I finally find the right ones. And then all of a sudden I go there. And they're literally like, there have been times where people have been carrying them out as I get there. It's an emotional journey for me and I haven't been handling it well. See, that's the first problem is you're on Instagram. Like, go out in the real world, go to a pound.

Like, stop going online for things, Justin. That's your problem. Okay, boomer. Yeah, I guess I'm approaching this too much as a millennial. No, it's brutal out there. So if anybody has some suggestions, I saw J.R. Smith on one of these Instagram accounts is fostering dogs. Maybe he can help me out.

But yeah, need a dog. So please help. Yes, but you're a cat guy. But you wouldn't pick him over Donchich. That's where we said. I guess the question is Zion. I feel like Zion could be in that Yanis range. I think that's his ceiling as that kind of player.

So, I mean, what he did in the preseason was incredible. Yeah, but I mean, we talked about injuries in Janus not being a guy who will miss games. Even like Donchich, we talk about his lack of athleticism or the fact that he was a little bit overweight in his rookie season. He hasn't missed a ton of games. He played 72 as a rookie and he's already played in what, all 16 this season? That is true. One thing I've noticed I've gotten older, like I play basketball, I don't jump, so I'm never hurt. Like, if you don't jump, you really can't get hurt, honestly. So you're saying you and Luca have the same game?

I'm more of a Kyle Anderson kind of player. That's like to compare myself. Oh, wow. What was Taylor Jenkins? You did a feature on him recently, the Memphis Grizzlies coach, because he used to play. He's more of like a Taj Gibson kind of guy. He was like a little dirty work, high post, 18-foot jump shot kind of player. These are very specific comps, and I like it. How about Siakum? Where is he on these list these days? Yeah, so I think there is a clear tier where it's Janus, Luca, Towns, Zion. I wonder where Yokic is.

I think he's a cut below Williamson just because of recently just some of the weight issues and the fact that I do wonder about is conditioning long term? And just like if you don't go into this season where your team was primed to, like, compete for the number one seat in the West. and also like he seemed like a pretty clear-cut MVP candidate. I'm a little concerned about him. So I might put him in the cheer below Zion. And I think that's when you're talking about Embed, C. Akum,

and I might even throw in Ben Simmons. I hate to be the ringer employee here, but where's Jason Tatum in all of this? Because he's looking really good recently. Charks, that's your guy. I can't even take credit for him. I was really hard on him earlier for the draft. He's good, but to me, him and Jalen Brown are pretty close.

I'm not sure Tatum is better than Brown, honestly. I think the two-way potential of Jason Tatum, because we're just thinking about a player to build around, right? And you look at Tatum and you look at a player like Ben Simmons. Ben Simmons, you can see the ceiling. If he develops a jump shot that might raise the ceiling, but not too much. Jason Tatum, his ceiling is, I don't know, Paul George.

See, I don't know about that. See, you say that, to me, Tatum is going to start passing the ball for I think of him and that kind of player. I think he's at right now, well, 2.5 assists. So that's a career high for him. Let's get that number up before I talking about. That's what I think Siakum, to me, is getting up there. Like, what can Siakum not do on the court these days?

He's guarding multiple positions. He's scoring at will. He's passing. He's defending. He's shooting. To me, he's becoming a legit. Yeah, he's trolling Embed, right? Yeah.

Oh, Justin, is he the best Cameroonian player in the NBA, Pascal Seacum? So this is a tough one. We're coming off a matchup last night where Siakum did win that battle. Seacom managed to shut down the Sixers late in that game, scored a big bucket. He shut down a late possession from the Sixers and then took an outlet pass and dunked it as time expires to really punctuate the win and also gave,

I assume it was Embed, but also the Sixers in general, the Game of Thrones Night King like What's Up Now sort of pose? I don't know what you'd call it specifically. And meanwhile, Embeded had zero points. and he was zero from 11 from the floor. So I don't know, in that matchup, yes, Siakum was best, although I don't know if it's just like their draft positions and how much that colors it,

but I still think Embed, considering just like what a force he is as a rim protector, I might skew in Bede. I don't feel comfortable, like completely confident in that, though. I just feel like with Ambid and Simmons, I think at this point they're really holding each other back. Yeah, that tier is really interesting to me. I would rank it Simmons and B. Seaccom. And like you, you definitely don't have to convince me

about the fact that Simmons and Embed need to break up. I think that is for the best for both of them. I think I am still buying Simmons in the theoretical, just like him getting his own team and a team built around him. I still wonder whether or not he can't be the guy we all expected him to be. Justin, you know Chris isn't here.

You don't have to say that. No, I know, but... Get your sland, out now while you can while your boss is gone. Let's just get it out. Yeah, I mean, I think it's also interesting to throw in Brandon Ingram, a guy who's not... He's been killing it.

I know, and so I know the mismatch talked about this the other day, whether or not Ingram was better than Simmons, but I do think you have to loop him in, especially in conjunction with, like, Tatum. Would you rather have Ingram right now, or would you rather have Tatum? Ooh. I think Ingram's a better on the ball, but Tatum is better in a secondary role.

You know, does that make sense? Yeah. Like if I was building a team as a point guard rather than Ingram, but Tadden really makes can play off the ball a lot better, which is important as you're seeing that off ball ability too. Yeah, I wonder with Ingram what happens when Zion gets back. It's obviously a small sample and it was in preseason, but it just didn't seem like Ingram was comfortable in an offense built around Zion

and a world constructed around Zion. And so I am curious about how well he'll transition to the second chair because I watch some of those Pelicans games these days, and a lot of their success, and it has been moderate thus far, it does feel like it comes from Ingram just kind of being the guy and just, like, taking the shot

and coming down the court and just, like, spying up and three. Yeah, I mean, really, because, like, Lonzo's back on the bench now. Like, they're starting Reddick again. And it feels like, yeah, it's kind of made the pecking order a little's clear.

It's like Ingram, Drew, and then shooters, and then a role man. We'll see what Zion. The whole thing changes. Yeah, and I don't think it's a coincidence that, like, Drew has been better with JJ on the floor and vice versa.

That lineup just makes more sense to me and putting a guy like Kenny Hustle at the floor who could do a little bit of everything. Wait, who's Kenny? Are you calling, is that Kennerich Williams? Yeah, man. You're not hip to the new... Kenny Hustle, I like that.

That's a good nickname. Yeah, he's good. TCU's finest, Kenner Williams. Yeah, like, I think they ended up waving your guy, Christian Wood in order to keep Kenny Hustle going into this season. I mean, Kenny Hustle's out playing like all these like first round picks,

Alexander Walker, Josh Hart. This is your guy, Kenny Hustle. He's really playing well. Yeah, and I think this is a good thing for the Pelicans overall because they've needed to just find the team from their like 11 deep roster of just good players and good young players for the most part. And you're starting to see just decisions being made.

And so I do wonder going from that what will happen in the trade market. One last question before we kind of transition back to trades. I think the young point guard tier is also interesting in this under 25 discussion. I don't know if you caught any of Jah Morant against the Lakers on Saturday, I believe it was, but he has just been a revelation.

I know I've been high on him, and anyone who's listening to the podcast knows that from the get-go, but he just has this effect on the entire game that I just was not expecting. Yeah, he's really playing well. The one thing with Jah, he's kind of an all-or-nothing guy, right?

In Memphis, there's nobody else needs the ball. It's all John Moran all the time. So somewhere else, where to play off someone else, that'd be, I think, very difficult for me, because I'm really a shooter right now. Yes,

and so this is a good segue to my question about this tier. So among the young point guards, who would you rather have Jaumaran, Trey Young, or Shea Gildjus Alexander? Ooh.

She's my guy. I knew you're going to say him. Shea's top 10 in that under 25. I think Shea and Trey, I would take them both over Jha right now because of the shooting. I think She's got defense in shooting. Trey's got the shooting, whereas Jha, I think without either,

is kind of a step behind them. Yeah, I think I would say that if we were talking about right this second, if I needed to win a game tomorrow, I would pick Trey just because of where he is and the fact, like what all of his shooting can do and the fact that he could put up 40 pretty much every night. I think long term, though, I want Shea. I think Shea's like the playoff guy, like that kind of player.

He's a point card who can guard threes and fours. his size. He can guard your bigger wings and he's a point guard. Yeah, he just doesn't have any holes in his game, which I always wonder, the clippers are great and they're better off for it to try to make this leap and go for it right now, but I do wonder the alternate

reality where Kauai is playing next to Shea and Shea kind of becomes his new Pascal. Oh, I like that. That's interesting. Yeah. Isaac, how do you feel about that? I miss my guy, Shay. Really coming in from the draft, he really had very few holes,

and he filled whichever holes he had really, really quickly. If you ask me right now, who would I take? I would take Trey, but long term, I agree with you, Justin. I would take Shea. And, yeah, the bizarre world, alternate reality of Kauai and Shay playing together, Shea could probably play the three. He could because he can guard smaller players, but he also has a size and the length to guard big players.

Chris Paul and Dennis Schroeder in Oklahoma City sometimes. They're playing like three point guard lineups. It would be cool if Shea learned from Kauai, especially on the defensive side, the way that Kauai is really measured with the gambols that he takes. All of those smarts. Like, Shea's already a really smart player. If he learned even more of basketball IQ,

that's a scary player. Isaac, as a Clippers fan was like, if this team doesn't want a championship, the last team seemed to remember more fondly as like the hipster clippers team Isaac loves this question Here's the thing I can't even fathom

winning a championship Like that's just not It's just not something that I like I can even reach in my mind So I would have to get there first Or like get to the finals Get out of the second round first Before I even contemplate any hypothetical like that

That's my hedge Isaac is still trying to figure out What it means to be happy aren't we all though yeah I mean it is an interesting hypothetical the clippers have been playing well

but the one thing that kind of is like in the back of your mind especially as Kauai keeps missing these games and talk about load management and all of a sudden Paul George has looked great but hey does he have shoulders anymore it's just like this is a new ones Justin

catch up for now for now wait until he needs to get a tune up but like this is a two-year window and they do need to maximize it. They're doing well thus far, but obviously Shea and Kauai opened the window for a longer term rather than Kauai and Paul. Speaking of big trades,

let's talk about some that can happen mid-season. For our next question, Paul Schulberg asks, what single trade would have the biggest impact on the entire league this season? And I'm assuming he doesn't mean something like LeBron for Chris Paul, actual ones that can happen. Charks, do you have any examples?

I've got a trade I want to see happen. This is not going to happen. But Chris is not here. I'm going to trade Ben Simmons. What do you think about this one? Ben Simmons for Jamal Murray and Malik Beasley. I think it makes both teams better. I think I'm picking up the phone.

If you're Philly, it gives you two shooters. Jamal Murray runs picking up Joel and Bede really well. That could be a good combination. Beasley can defend and shoot. Your team makes a lot more sense. And if you're Denver, Simmons and Yokch, think is a better fit than Simmons and Embed. You can plan for us in the whole game.

Those two guys can pass off each other. Yokes can play in the high post more than Embed can. And then Simmons can be the guy who defends your LeBron's and Kauais. I think both teams are better a team with this trade. And you don't think that Simmons and Yokic would clash a little bit, just in terms of just both wanting the ball and wanting to orchestrate the offense? Best, I think Yokic can kind of move the ball without needing it too much. She's so unselfish.

She can play out of the high post and make us the high post. 100 passes. And Simmons can pass to him too. Ambide is more of a guy needs a ball and Yokic does, I think. Right? Ambid wants the ball in the low block.

What is Simmons useful for and that scenario? Nothing. Right. Yokish plays the three point line, like that high post. I do like the idea of Murray on the Sixers,

if only because he's the type of player you would probably prefer around Embed, but I still come back to the fact that I would rather to lead into a team built around Simmons than Embed,

especially considering all the inter- You would trade Mbd before you trade Simmons. I think so, especially now that you have Al Horford there. Oh my gosh, I don't even think about that. Where would you trade Mb to? What's the Mb trade? K.P for NB'd?

Wow. Wow. That would be a crazy trade. Oh, my God. It's a tough one. Like, which team needs a center, specifically one that just has a habit of breaking down? I mean, the heat are like at the forefront of that conversation. just because they're probably looking for any sort of

player that raises their ceiling. The Celtics, another team. How about this? How about if you train the Golden State for Draymond and DeAngelo? Ooh. Kind of mess. Try to change their team up a little bit. I like the idea.

I think it might cause some similar issues where Draymond and Simmons on the floor, that's again, two non-shooters. I guess that's true. So DeAngelo Russell, on that pick. That'll be a top five

pick next year. So the team would be Simmons, Richardson, Russell, Tobias, Horford?

Yeah. That's a tough one. What about the Celtics? They obviously have a need in the front court. They have all these young wings. I don't know if the Sixers can bring themselves to trade.

They couldn't trade and be in their own division. That would just be insane. Like, they couldn't do that. I don't know. How much is that? matter now?

I think it matters in the conference. Horford went to free agency. He wasn't traded. Yeah. I don't know. I do think that in B. would be the ideal person to move, but he would be harder. I imagine that Simmons has more trade value, if only because he's locked

up on his next contract and also... And he's healthy, yeah. I bet there are a ton of teams that scouted him in the draft and still see the player that could have been rather than the one that's kind of been forced into this secondary tertiary. role in Philadelphia. I mean, just trading

Embed is just so mind-blowing to even think about. It's hard to imagine where he'd even be. Yeah, I mean, I do think that makes sense. Are there any other guys that you could see? Miles Turner is a favorite of yours. Do you think he would be the type of guy who could get swung before the trade deadline? I think Indiana's going to move from eventually.

They're going to try to. I think it's pretty clear. Sabonis is their guy now. I think ultimately you can only have one big man. You can't have two. So the thing I like to see with Turner, I've been saying for a while, I love to see him in New Orleans.

I think he's the guy with Zion. That makes the most sense. That makes a lot of sense. Yeah, they tried out the favors experiment. I don't know if it worked all that well in preseason. Favor's has been hurt like everybody else on the Pelicans. Yeah, I think they thought they had new trainers, Justin. What happened with that?

They do. They have the Sun's trainers. There must just be something in the air. My gosh. There's literally a curse down there or something. It's crazy. Yeah. I mean, I can't imagine Burbank Street is helping,

especially with Zion and some of his weight concerns, concerns and air quotes. No, but I think that makes sense. You want to pair them with a shooter. Turner has been taking a lot more three-pointers. He still provides some rim protection. You could mix and match them.

That makes a lot of sense. I do wonder, though, who would be the right guy going back to the Pacers? Because it seems like at this point, Brandon Ingram, I'm not trading for a center, you know? No.

Why not just move with Drew Holiday? give them a holiday reunion up there. I guess there's too many guards, though. It's a lot of guards, and you would put all three holidays on one team. I'm very much here for that. That'd be pretty cool, though. That'd be really cool. Especially for this Thanksgiving edition of the mailbag.

It definitely fits the theme. Who else would be good down there? I mean, Reddick is a guy that you could potentially move, but we just said, like, what a good fit he is there. I wouldn't mind moving on from Lonzo or Hart or some of these other Lakers players, but again, do that. But they already have the best backcourt of the NBA in Indiana, right? They don't need more cards.

Right. You can't block Brogden. That's number one on... Absolutely not. That's what this plot is all about. Absolutely not. But no, I like the idea. I think Turner would be good there.

The specific trades that the person who asked this question were Porzingis for C.J. McCollum, so he's on the bandwagon of trading K.P. in Dallas. And Marcus Smart for Miles Turner. That's an interesting Turner destination. I think, though, I was going to talk about last week. Now that Time Lords really come along. They don't even make any trades for centers. We got that locked up in Boston.

You know, I've been thinking about this ever since then. Has Time Lord come on? Is he even playing like 10 minutes a game? Ennis Canter's taking his minutes, like a real criminal. Get him out of there. Charks' dream scenario involves Robert Williams being the franchise player for the Boston Celtics. Now, I think that makes some sense.

You heard Sub bonus being connected to the Celtics, earlier in the season. I think KOC was riding that bandwagon. But all of a sudden just seems like Sabonis just gets along with everybody, including your guy Malcolm Brogden. Yeah, I think too with that, that was a trade where they were saying

Jalen Brown versus Sabonis. But Jalen Brown's like, England, they're playing so well now they're not tradable. Like, Jalen Brown's elevated himself to where you're not trading him for anyone, really. Not special for a big man. Right, right. Can I propose another big man to the Celtics trade?

Of course. How about André Drummond for Gordon Hayward? that would be a risky move. It doesn't look great on paper, but I can see that working out in a weird way where you get a rebounding center, a rim-running guy to pair with all the wings and Kemba Walker.

To me, though, I just don't want to pay a center $30 million unless they're like a top-five center. Because you can, like, Boston's getting good minutes from Daniel Thais, Time Lord, Grand Williams. Like, it's just too much money for a center unless he's like, you better be like a bead, Yolkich, Go-Bare. If I'm going to pay you $30 million at center.

I guess the calculation there is Gordon Hayward is also making $30 million for the next two years and you have Tatum and Brown on your team. You know, like how much do you actually need Hayward when you actually really need a big man? But I think with Hayward, what they've done this year is smart where he's like become the distributor for that team. So he's the distributor and then Brown and time of the scores. So that I think has actually worked. Bernard and I thought we all thought it would come into the season. Yeah, I mean, it really becomes an interesting discussion about like where you distribute like positionally.

like positionally where you distribute your money. I think Drummond is interesting. He's obviously having a huge rebounding season. He flurred with a 20 rebound average for a little bit while Laker Fern was off the court. I do think the Celtics are the type of team that I would want to see him on, not only to bring all Yukon players back to New England. Nice.

I didn't even remember that. I forgot about that. Yes. But also they seem like the type of organization where they could really just like bring out the best in him. So I think it makes sense from that regard. but like you said, Sharks, I do think Hayward

has been pretty good when he has been healthy this season, specifically. Do you want to hear the saddest drum rumor I saw on the internet the other day? I was like, this is real...

It was like, the Charlotte Hornets really won Andre Drummond. I was like, oh my gosh. Oh, no. That's just depressing all the way around for everyone.

Yeah, I mean, like, Drummond has a player option this summer and I think just given the dearth of money available, given all the extensions that have been signed, I think somebody's going to max him.

So if you are going to trade for him, you presume that you're going to have to max them in addition to that. I think it is cruel, though, Isaac, to send all of the sad, injured stretch fours to Detroit. They have already enough issues in their lives. I can't imagine Blake Riff from playing with Gordon Hayward. Yeah, that would... Yeah, I didn't really think about it this on the Detroit side.

I just thought, you know, we got to get a big man on that Celtics roster. They would do that. They would move drumming for Hayward, I think. Well, just because it's not working, right? Like nothing's really working. They need to do something. Change something. Yeah, Charks, your contention is Griffin should be the ball handling five on Detroit, right? Yeah, I mean, maybe in Portland.

They need to do something. This team is not working for sure. Yeah, I do think it would be interesting to see Drummond moved. I just want to see him and change the scenery. He's been in that organization for so long, and he's kind of been doing what he's, like, what everyone expects them to do. It's just also simultaneously, like, what he does is just not as very, valuable as it used to considering the context of the league.

All right, this Detroit talk is a good transition to our last one that we'll do here. This is from Thea Goldwaldham. I probably butcher that. They ask, who are your favorite players on the least watchable teams? I'm going to actually start with Detroit, I think, just considering where they are just built to win now and yet just languishing behind the Wizards, even. they're currently 6 and 11 they are in 10th place

in the Eastern Conference at the time of recording this I still have hope that Blake Griffin in the right situation would be great I think he's a modern player and perhaps this is just like my Lob City showing just considering I watch a lot of those games up close

but I want to see guys like Blake playing in prime time not getting the NBA TV series when they do just squeak into the playoffs so I still like watching him and I still have hope that we can free him this season. Charks, what's your pick?

Okay, I'm going to give a shout out to my guy, Jonathan Isaac. Orlando's been brutal to watch this year. Really, I was high on him this year, but he was Jonathan Isaac. He's been, though, he's been great. So he's in year three. He's averaging three blocks a game while playing on the perimeter, and he's shooting a career high 38% from three. He's averaging in double figures and points.

I think he had a chance to be a really, really special player. he's an incredible defensive player already. I think he's growing a lot every game. To me, he's one of like the real hidden stories this year on a team that's underperformed. I think Isaac is like really kind of coming on this season. This actually gets back to a question I was going to ask during the segment

about 25 and under guys. If you were to redraft the 2017 draft or at least like which guy you would start a team with, would you pick Tatum, Fox, Mitchell, or Isaac? I mean, I should pick Tatum, but that's no fun. I'd pick Isaac. That's my guy.

That's great. Also, let's get OG in there too. Talk about big 3-and-D wings. OG is killing it this year. Right. Good thing. We had a Christian Wood reference earlier. Good thing we got an OG in and Noggy one in here right before the buzzer.

All right, from one Isaac to another, Isaac Lee. Yeah. Who's your pick? I'm going to go with Bogdan Bogdanovich on the Kings. Oh, he's great. That's pronunciation. It's not even that good. Can you say it again?

Bogdan Bogdanovich. Yeah. But that's just how you say it. That's a pro right. That's a pro right. I mean, I've heard some Eastern Europeans online say that it's kind of like John Johnson over in Serbia. That's great. Yeah, because it's apparently a really common name.

But Bogie, he has struggled a little bit recently due to injury, but he's, man, the Cajone's on this guy. Oh, my goodness. He is so fun to watch. He really has that irrational confidence. And it's working. Like, he's shooting, I believe, 39% from 3 this year. And he's distributing more. he's averaging almost five assists

on a Sacramento King's team that's really been disappointing. He's been a bright spot for sure despite his recent struggles, as I just mentioned. My only caveat is this. Nothing irash about his confidence. He's amazing. He's a rash of confidence.

He really is amazing. Last year, when the Kings were actually fun to watch, I remember thinking like, man, Deeran Fox is good, Buddy Heald is good, Marvin Bagley, great for a rookie. But it's bogey that's really heart of the team.

I love... That's what I'm saying. I love guys like that. Yeah, it's been a bummer to see Fox go down, but I have like this kind of mini resurgent we have from Bogdan. It just seems like he's the type of guy where you really can't have a Fox like competing for the ball. He really wants to just take all of the most important shots.

Charks, you recently had a piece on the ringer talking about the buck specifically, and there's a little bit of rumblings of them having their eye on Bogie, right? Yeah, I think he makes... He's the perfect guy to replace... Brogden because both those guys have that rare ability where they can be elite shooters off the ball and be really good point guards on the ball. It's that versatility.

And that's what he has that the other kings don't have, right? Dierrin Fox can't play off the ball. Buddy healed, not a point guard. Bogdanovich does both. He can play either role really well. Yeah, and he's an interesting figure just like in the league at large because he's another guy, as we mentioned earlier, with Andre Drummond, who is up for free agency this summer.

He will be a restricted free agent, I believe. He did not get an extension, unlike Buddy Heald, who got paid right before the season, but he was a guy that the Kings were reportedly in conversations with. So I think he's an interesting swing piece, especially if you look at the King's just immediate future, all of a sudden, a lot of these guys are starting to come up to get paid. And while they do have matching rights on a guy like Bogie, like, are they going to favor the long term? It seems like the sort of thing, the Kings more than anyone would do, they would just let him walk and just like prioritized Harry Giles,

I don't even know. That was such a king's move. Yeah, actually they can't do Harry Giles because I think they just renounced his rights coming up. Yeah, the problem is like they paid D.Aren at the one. They paid Buddy at the two. They paid Barnes at the three. They're going to play Bagelowicz at the four.

Like, there's no one to put Bigonovich long term. They kind of box themselves out. Yes, he is resigned to being your sixth man, energy guy off the bench. And it's just, I want to see Bogie Unleashed. That's my holiday witch. for the NBA. All right, we're going to wrap it up right there. Thank you for joining us on this pre- Thanksgiving edition,

or you're probably listening to this on your way to your relatives right now. So for Charks, for Isaac, for Chris, as he works on, his load management, we will see you again next week. Basketball is very good. Basketball is very good.