The Ringer NBA Show - Bomani Jones on How Player Empowerment Has Shaped the NBA | Real Ones

Episode Date: February 17, 2022

Logan and Raja are joined this week by ESPN’s Bomani Jones and they get right to the shits. They talk about Bomani’s new sports show coming to HBO in March (2:00), the new situations in Brooklyn and Philly (10:00), and how player movement driven by player empowerment has shaped the NBA we see today (23:00). Hosts: Logan Murdock and Raja Bell Guest: Bomani Jones Associate Producers: Sasha Ashall and Mike Wargon Social: Jomi Adeniran Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Benefer is back. Brad and Jen are friends again, and Paris Hilton is somehow still making headlines. 20 years later, we're living in the world that the 2000s tabloids created. On this series, I'm going to tell you the story of a decade of American life through the trash we love to consume. From Spotify and the Ringer podcast network, I'm Claire Malone and this is just like us, the tabloids that changed America. Listen on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Robin, real one. Slogan Murdoch here. Rob's go there. Hey, Roger.

Hey, Roger. Guess what? Hey, Rob. What's that? What's that, Logan? Hey, Rob, check this out, bro. Hey, Rob, guess what? So we got a guess on the pod, Rob.

You want to know who the guest is, man? Tell me who the guest is, Logan. Tell him, tell him what the guess is. Yo, so we got somebody that's, you know, been, you know, been a legend in the game. We got, uh, from the evening Jones era to the Rand University era. He is now about to have a new show on HBO starting March called Game Theory. We go Bumani Jones in the program. Bumani, how you doing, Doc?

Dude, I'm good, man. What's going on with you? Man, just chilling. I was just like to pull the curtain back just a little bit on the prepod. Before we came on here, before we came on and record, Bumani just came just a light flex. I don't know where he is in the world right now, but he came in and he had just a very sprawling view of whatever city.

city escape he is in and the sun was beaming on him. Beams coming through the clouds. Just a silhouette of a person, right? Because the block, the light was blocking out. It was lightweight angelic. But Moni, what's this new life for you right now, dog? What got you acting like this, man? You got the, you got the clouds partying and shit when you come in.

What's life like right now? I was about to say, first of all, you like whatever city, you know what city this was when you saw, man. That New York City. right there behind me. And it wasn't an entirely intentional flex. This is my office and this is where my desk is set up. And so, you know, I brought the microphone up here and all of that. You know, so we're here, man.

No, life is good. We've been, for gang theory, we got the whole staff in right at the start of February. And so, you know, we've been in the office. And, you know, for me, I ain't been going into anybody's office. I honestly interacting with humans in any sort of. sort of group setting in two years, more or less. So we just here working on scripts, working on ideas, working on getting this thing ready. So when we get this out, that hopefully it'll be something that people can rock with.

You've been out in the streets. You've been doing like skits. What's the show going to look like, man? What can we expect? Well, the show's going to look like a lot, honestly. So if I were to start from like the ground, what are we trying to do? we are trying to take my ideas, whatever the idea happens to be, and bring it to life. So if you listen to any of the podcast that I've done or stuff like that, take whatever your

favorite take is that I have off of that. Okay. So now how do we build on that? So we've got an opinion, we got an idea, we got a thought process, whatever it is. How do we build that up? So when I do a podcast, whatever, that's really just me rattling that stuff off the top of my head and then going. Well, now we got a room of writers. So I give them this idea. I can give them an outline. So, I'm thinking this, that, and the third. Okay, so what do we do with that now? So they're not going in there starting from scratch, but like, yo, here's something for you to read. It's like, okay, I'm presenting you with these thoughts and these ideas. How do we make them better? How do we beef them up? And so the writers then go with that and we're doing our back and forwards on that to get a script title, whatever it is. Then on top of that, because it is a writer's room and we got comedy writers in, we've got, you know, one of the best columnists in sports journalism in helping us work on this stuff also. What else? can we do with it, right? Is there something that we can go out and shoot to make this thing land and to hit the point right, right? Can we come up with like a sketch or something like that or a field idea or whatever it is to make it land? If that's what it is, then cool, then we're going to go ahead

and do that. We're going to do topical stuff so that when we come on, when we come on during the week, we'll get you wrapped up on what you've been thinking about for the last few days, knock that stuff out. We're going to have interviews. Sometimes we're going to go out and chill with people in their natural habitat. Sometimes we're going to have some people come in here. It's going to be a range. The approach on guests and interviews for me is going to be informed by the time I spent doing highly questionable. Well, yeah, it was a sports show. But if somebody's got something cool to talk about, it doesn't really matter if their connection to sports can be tenuous at best if they're good, if they got something interesting and fascinating to talk about.

So that's what it's really going to be. For me, the work that I've done for the last 15, 20 years, if you followed it, we're going to put it together and have a different caliber of resources and not just talk about monetarily. but most of the stuff I've been doing for all this time has been from my brain to you without having a whole lot of people to do something with it on the in between. Now we've got a whole team of people to do something with it on the in between. Man, hey, listen, I don't know how interesting or good or any of the things that you describe someone needing to be.

I don't know how I am any of those. Having said that, if you need somebody to come up there and just like be a character, like personality and a sketch or some shit like that, you know where to find me. Logan's got the numbers. Let me know you here. We can find some way to figure that thing out, right? Like that's, like, but that's the thing for me on this is the what's possible.

It's just all over the place, man, right? Like what it is that we can do and what I think has been interesting for me to learn is me just being like, yo, so what about this? And I don't like, I don't know too much about this business and how things work, at least in this part of television, right? Like I know how to do like the stuff I've done for ESPN. This is a different animal, right? Not better or not worse necessarily. but definitely a different one. And it's wild to me that somebody can just come up with something.

And then they're like, oh, yeah, we can do that, right? And then a couple calls are made and we lining this up. We have a meeting with this set of people on the team or whatever it is. And then boom, next thing you know, something that just started as a what if is going turn into something that you're going to see. Yeah. But what you're doing, and game theory comes out next month, so you guys make sure you guys check that out.

What I'm really curious about is this is a late-night programming. And the way that late night has evolved in a way back, when, you know, back in the day, if you go a few decades ago, you see Johnny Carson, you see even now like that model with Jimmy Kimmel and all these things. But that model has now evolved. And now you see that what you're doing with, you know, Jesus and Merrill and things like that. What do you think, how do you think that the model of late night has evolved specifically in sports? And what do you plan to build on with that model? Well, I would say that it hasn't evolved in sports because nobody's figured out how to do this in sports. Like if there's anything that I would say is probably

the most challenging thing about this is we are trying to make a format work that as far as I can tell, nobody has been able to make work, right? Now, ours will be different than a lot of those shows that you listed for one major reason, which is there's not going to be a studio audience. And so part of doing a show that has a studio audience for late night, what you wind up with in large part is things that are done to set it up so that the people in the audience will laugh and tell the people at home that they are supposed to laugh, right? So it's a lot of, you know, set up, set up, set up punch lines, set up, set up, punch lines, like that same shuffle.

This isn't going to be that, right? Like, I think part of it is that with so many more avenues and outlets that people have to choose from and how many people are opting in, because so much of that stuff that people are doing formatically is not for people who opt in. It's for people who flip channels. and you hope that they'll stop and get a couple of chuckles and stick around for you. Most of this stuff now is for people, not who are just scanning and hoping to stop, but you've got to be invested.

You think about the way episodic television works right now. You just be able to just jump in on anything without knowing what was going on. You could jump in on season four at a Cosby show, right? You didn't necessarily miss anything. Now you jump in on season four, Game of Thrones. You don't know anything that's happened, you know, to get you to this place. People are going to have to buy in. And so that I think is the biggest difference, which then also allows you to take a few more chances,

because you're not trying to make content for people who kind of like you or for people who don't care about you. You're making content as much as anything else for people to love, not just to like, not just to tolerate, not just to watch because they're not doing anything else. Like, we want to get those too, and we're thinking about that as we come up with the show. But this is, I want to make a show that people who are into it can love. I just what's up. I want to switch gears a little bit to go to that. You're in New York right now, so I really wanted to get your opinion on this subject. Last time we talked, it was February. It was February 2021, I believe, and it was right before vaccines actually came out. And we're talking about

Kyrie Irving. We're talking about how he fit within the Brooklyn Nets universe. But now it's a bit different, right, where he doesn't take the vaccine. And there's this mandate that is in New York right now. And it seems like, you know, Eric Adams called it unfair, the mayor of New York. And Adam Silver is calling it unfair. Where are we at with vaccines in sports right now? Or specifically, let's go with the NBA. Where are we at right now with that, where you talk about a Kyrie with a mandate in place? And now it seems like we've kind of gone to the other side of it, whereas, you know, if you're unvaccinated, you know,

There seems like there's a bit of, and I don't know how to frame this, but it seems like there's been an evolution and how we see athletes see vaccinations now versus one before they came out. What have you seen with that? Well, I mean, I don't understand the logic of the New York City vaccine mandate, right? Like, I'm pretty sure that somebody could probably explain it to me in one sentence, but nobody has. I just don't know what it is. Like, I do get the idea, though, that if you live and work here, that the city has more room to flex on you than they do other people.

Now, this is where I think Adam Silver is messing up on that. He's like, oh, it doesn't make sense that Kyrie can't participate, but visiting players can. Well, guess what the solution to that is? Not letting visiting players participate. The solution to that is not to then say, okay, Kyrie, we treat you bad. The other guys, you know, can get out here. I think it's going to be interesting, and it seems like a long way away, but when the weather gets cold again, when we come back around, the next go around, because look, the rates in New York City now are really low.

So when Omicron was hitting, those rates were up in the 30s, you know, near the 40s in terms of positivity. Now they're coming in mid to low single digits. Like that's where we are now. Like this isn't, the city isn't like in the clutches of it like it was when Omicron was really running or like when this thing first hit a couple of years ago. It's not quite there. And so what I think you're going to see is a lot of. a relaxation of different mandates and different things that were set up. Now, what happens after you loosen those? Well, okay, that becomes a question and I don't necessarily know what the

answer is going to be. But I think that the summer's going to come around and people are going to think we got this thing beat in a way that I'm not certain that we will actually have it beaten. But I think for the sports leagues, the part that I think people need to talk about a little more, and I don't blame the players for not talking about it because they're conditioned to just be tough as hell and not ever show any measure of weakness. But just because you ain't testing positive don't mean you're not still feeling this thing, man. And it's a lot of cats and cats in the league who don't say it out loud about like still fighting

through that exhaustion, right? Still fighting through those headaches. So fighting through all that stuff. And so if I'm the league, I'm still taking the same attitude about this as I ever did because it's not just simply about whether this disease will kill you. But for the NBA, it's an uncomfortable discussion. But the truth is the player's bodies are the product. and this can have a real negative effect on the product.

Yeah. No, it's interesting. But also, it's funny. Me and Roger always talk about this. Just from a sheer perspective of being a teammate, it seems like Kyrie has not done that, you know, just for all he needs to do is. That's why James Hardin ain't there. That's what I'm saying.

This is the level, because I go back and forth on Hardin, on a lot of this stuff, right? But imagine. Say what you want about James Harden. That dude shows up to play games, and he shows up and plays lots of hard minutes in those games, right? Like, you can't, there's all kinds of criticisms to make of him. But if there's a game to play, he's going to play unless he's ready to go, and then he's going to come out there and act a donkey. Right?

But if it's time to play, it's time to play. That dude was walking up the floor playing point guard in the playoffs last year because that hamstring was so bad, and he was still out there. And you're telling him that this dude can't. get a shot, but you're going to let him play half the games. I totally see why he was furious. I totally see why that was the end. I absolutely think that in the end, if this all blows up and it seems to have,

Kevin Durant made a bad play, I think, by deciding that he was going to ride with Kyrie on this rather than riding with the either you all in or you all out program. I'll just, I'll say this, right? That was your show, baby. Say whatever. Now, people like to argue with me about Kyrie and his right. and what he stands for and why we shouldn't take the approach that we take,

at least the one I've taken about Kyrie. And I think they're missing the point. And the point with Kyrie is as a teammate, Logan, you just kind of said it. It's not about whether he's got the right and all of that. Like, we can argue all that shit. It's as a teammate. Everybody sacrifices to some degree on NBA teams

or in collective sports, team sports, for the greater good. And that's my beef. and it would have been my beef as a teammate. The same way I believe you're saying is kind of what James Hardin's ultimate beef was. Like, look, dog, like we've all given something up. We've all put ourselves in harm's way in one way or another. And he refused to do that for his brothers or for that organization.

And that's where I have the beef. Yeah, and that's where I think, dude, they're bringing Ben Simmons into this. And Ben, if we're being honest, the problem, Ben Simmons has two problems. in what's going on with him. One, people don't like him. And that contributes to problem number two, which is people don't believe him, right? Whether he's telling the truth or not about what the situation is, I don't want to try to guess. I just know how people get down and they look at it as, so the timing of this is just far too convenient and it sounds like you just want it out of here. Now, Simmons is telling us that these are two completely different things, right? It's,

I had a mental health struggle and I also wanted to leave here, which is totally possible, right? But that's a tough sell. Either way it goes, you drop in this, dude as he is and as people know about him into that locker room that is already apparently just all over the place. And keep it real, I barely know who's in it right now if Durant's hurt. If Durant's hurt and Kyrie ain't playing at home, they play a game in Brooklyn. And other than the dudes who used to be good, I don't know who play for that team anymore, right? And this is going to be Ben Simmons path to recovery. Good luck, Jack. I just don't get, I don't know if Brooklyn is an objectively better place for Ben Simmons than Philadelphia was. It's not. I don't see. I don't

see that considering what could go wrong. The nets were in the Bay Area a few weeks ago. And if you just, and I know Rogers has been around, if you looked at that locker room, it is downtrodden, it is sad. I have never seen a sadder locker room for an alleged contender in my life. It's really, really bad. And you put the Kyrie element into that. And then you expect Ben Sibitz to just be all right and just figure this out on the fly.

Like I don't, I don't see this working. What do you think, Bo? who has a better chance of combustion right now? Is it the Sixers or the Nets at this point? Because James Hardin also has his own problems, and we can go down that road as well. But who has the, what is the worst situation at this moment right now? Oh, it's definitely the Nets.

Because the thing about the Sixers is they just traded James Hardin for Seth Curry and Andre Drummond. Because they weren't playing Simmons. They weren't getting anything out of Simmons, right? Like, they just got that weight off of their shoulders. And to be fair to Hardin, I think he demonstrated, if nothing else, in Brooklyn, that he was willing to be adaptable. Right? Like, this is a dude that had, like, a 40 usage rating, you know, one of those last years in Houston and dialed it back to about 28 and took on this distributor role and they kairi operate off the ball and all of that stuff.

I think that Hardin's going to try to find a way to work around, you know, he ain't the dude on that team. The problem is, and this is the thing that I don't think enough people talk about, is James Hardin isn't finished, but it's trending in that direction. And so if you're James Hardin and you only shoot 33% from three point range, like, Roger, it can speak to this. If you spoke, shot 33% from three point range in your career in the late 2000s, you wouldn't still be in the league. Like, that's not a, that's not enough of a percentage to justify shooting seven threes a game, which is what James Hardin does. So if Hardin isn't hitting a zillion, it didn't hit more threes than he is there and he can't really get, buy people anymore, though he is getting to the free throw line again. I don't think that he's the answer for Philly, but I don't think they're going to be all mad

at each other. Logan, I want to touch on your Brooklyn thing, though. Like, when you caught them in fairness to that locker room, James, the riff that had developed between James Hardin and the rest of his teammates. Like, we had Shams on it. He talked about it. Like, it's been written about. I think you caught a locker room, like, with a level of just,

frustration about themselves that, that, you know, when you walked in, you interpreted it as just a down team. I think you could, you know, be addition by subtraction, not because James Hardin is a bad dude, but just because he was checked out and everyone knew he was checked out. And so therefore they were checked out, right? Like, so I think you caught a funky locker room at probably the deepest funk that they had been in. And secondly, I can't speak for Ben Simmons because that, you know, the whole mental health, you know, and, and, and, you know, you know, that card versus versus whether now you're, you know, you're able to kind of get back out there and play and you feel like you've healed mentally.

I'm not going to even touch on that. But just from a skill standpoint, from an on-the-court fit, he's going to be better in Brooklyn than he was in Philly. It's a better fit for him than Philly. Now, we could talk about, you know, the mental health, the instability in that locker room, all this shit that's been going on in Brooklyn. But on the court, it's going to be a better fit for him than it wasn't Philly. Well, you know what else is going to be better for him is,

I think Andrew Wiggins was in a similar place. And I can't believe what's happened with him in the last year and a half. It has been mind-blowing because I had totally, like, I was a holdout and then had totally written him off. But the difference between Andrew Wiggins and Golden State versus in Minnesota is in Minnesota, he was the number one overall pick. In Philadelphia, Ben Simmons was the number one over. You stop being whatever pick you were when you go to that next team, right? Now you're just a dude. And so now he is the number three dude.

Kyrie doesn't want to play point guard anymore, even though don't. forget he wanted to leave Cleveland so we could go to Boston and learn to be a point guard and the Maestro and all of that stuff. I ain't forgot about that, homie, right? I remember what that's what you wanted to do. And then he was like, oh, I won't be in charge no more. And so, but for Simmons, if he just is running to the rim, catching oops, being, you know, helping to distribute the ball off of that playing with Kevin Durant, the easiest great player

that's probably ever been for anybody to play with, then this can work out for him because we now slide down our expectations. but that first time you're scared to take a shot, dog. Philadelphia had your back because they were invested in him. Like the city never turned on him like you would have thought they would have turned on him under those circumstances. I felt like the fans and most of those people were just kind of, Ben, we're going to clap for you. It was a real 21st century kind of affair.

You come here doing that for the Nets. They're going to kill you and not because the city loves the Nets, but because the city doesn't love the Nets. So you're just going to become the new reason to laugh at him. And I just think that the lack of stability in that locker room, And I think that goes back to Kyrie. I'm really scared if this isn't going to work. I think this is going to be, it has the potential to be a disaster.

Man, how does, how do they find stability right now at this time where you do have Kevin Durant out? And when you do have Kyrie, when you don't know when he's going to play. He didn't play last night. And he can't, I think he's playing something like eight games for the rest of the season unless he gets backs. I don't, I don't, I don't see that working for that reason. But I don't know. Well, they found a solution, man, playing. They found a solution playing the Knicks.

But you're right. That is Steve's job. Like, at some point, like Steve Nash, and this isn't his fault, but we ain't had to think about him because there's been so much of this other stuff that's been going on and surrounding it. But man, this is what it is to coach an NBA team. When you're talking about all of this instability, and yeah, like there's been so much shit going on with Brooklyn, like that's when your leadership has to be really strong. Like Steve, that front office, his coaching staff that he's kind of put together for various reasons.

Like that's when they've all got to step up and steady. that shit and just let everybody know, like, you know, you reinforce what your culture is going to be. You reinforce kind of like, yo, this is the way we're doing things, guys. Like, we're weathering this storm. We're not worried. We're not worried about this shit. Yeah, we've had some turmoil. We're rolling into all-star break.

We're coming back. We're just what we expected to be at this time. We're just so many games out of where we expected to be at that time. But ain't nothing changed. Like, you know, that's when they do their job. Yeah. Like, that's, somebody got to do it, right? Because Sean Marks, this on you too.

And I give him credit for looking at it. hard and being like, okay, you can go. All right, time's up on this? Gotcha. We'll figure out how to make this move. Because otherwise, look, this whole Nets experiment is going to be, the whole Nets experiment is going to go down as one of the all-time great colossal disasters. If all they get out of this is one year of getting to the second round of the playoffs.

You know, the Lakers, good thing they had that 2020 season, because otherwise that would be number two, if not number one. What do you think that says about just the environment that we're in, right? with it. There's a player empowerment environment that we're in where guys just want to go to other teams and you don't really have that continuity. And then if your shit doesn't help, then it's a colossal failure. How do you feel about this movement now that we've had? How would history see it when it's all said and done? Just because you can do something, don't mean it is to be done. And I think that that's going to come down to be in the fundamental

lesson on this. I've talked to a few different people about this. And you know me, man. I'm here for the players getting as much power as they can, but you also have to know how to use it. And being a general manager isn't a very easy job. It's not. It's really, really hard. And trying to do it for yourself may not be the best move for you to make.

That might not be the way for you to flex your power. Because let me tell you who clearly did not have control of his front office. Michael Jordan. And it is maybe the best thing that ever happened to him. Because otherwise, it had just been a squad of his partner. and dudes that went to UNC, right, that wouldn't have necessarily been any good. I've said this about LeBron, and LeBron's tricky because LeBron has made his moves post-Miammy for non-basketball reasons, right?

Went back to Cleveland because he wanted to be back home and all of that. Went to the Lakers because he wanted to be in L.A. But he also bet all two organizations that are run by Bumps, right? These are two poorly run organizations. The Lakers, not nearly like the calves, but it's, still they have the track record, but when you hear people talk about the Lakers and they're like, oh, it's a family business. That's a nice way of saying they cheap, right? Jerry Buss was out here flying Southwest till the day he died. Like, this is, you know, like that's the kind of place he

decided to go to. And he has control of that roster. Every indication seems to be he has control of that roster. Somebody else probably should have had control of that roster. And so when we look at LeBron after it's all over with the Michael Jordan comparison, he is now won four championships, right? He'll never get to the six. all that, you know, not being as good as Michael Jordan is not an insult. But the best chance of getting to the six would have been staying in Miami because Pat Riley is the person that would have been most likely to figure out a way to keep this thing rolling.

He bet instead on himself as a player and himself on the guys that you maybe could wind up getting in. And so I look at Durant and the decision to go play for the Nets and all of these things, is that what's best for your career? Is that depending on what it is that you want? Is that what is best? And I think that we're going to look at a few guys. and just be like, did you really make the right play for yourself just because you could make this other play that was a flex?

Well, I think in this era, we see a lot of guys that, you know, we always bring the AAU thing into it. But I think you see a lot. No, we do. But I think that as a consequence to that the AAU culture, we always look to see, oh, that the grass is greener over there. It might be a little bit better. Like Kevin is a great example of that.

Oh, man, I can go back east. It'll be so much better than Golden State. to be so much better. I can, you know, run my own team. I can do all these things. And you're seeing the other side of that now. And you see, that's why James Harding can get traded two or three times in a, in a 18-month span. But is it good for the league ultimately, though, Bo?

No. No, it's absolutely not good for the league, right? Like, whether it's good for the players or not or whether they should have the right to do these things is a completely different discussion. Is it good for the league? No. Like, think about this. There are no, like, team robberies in the NBA right now. For whatever reason, like, there's a lot.

There's no, like, oh, these two teams, I just got to watch them because, you know, they don't like each other, da, da, da, da, you know, all those things that come with familiarity and continuity and everything else. And the AAU point, I think, needs to be spelled out more because I do think that that's, that greatly informs a lot of what we're talking about in that, and all this is just changing high schools every year and stuff like that. These cats ain't got no loyalty to any institution or to any team that they play for because they've never stuck around on a team long enough to have the loyalty to it. They go to college for one year, maybe two or something like that. And so the idea of staying in a place for the long as in what you do. Every place you go is a place to get a leg up for the next place that you wind up going. Like Hardin is actually an anomaly in this because he stayed in Houston for so long. He kept, like, he never went to free agency.

He kept signing extensions as soon as they will put them in front of them, you know, to line up that money. And so it would be better for the league if somebody stayed on a team for 17 years, right? It's great for the league that Yannis has decided that he wants to stay with the Bucks. And what you hope for is that, like, it would be so good for the NBA if the Bulls really were able to keep this going and had like a great series against the bucks. You know, they're 90 miles apart or whatever. And they had a slug fest seven game series. And then that comes back into next year and their teams are basically the same.

And you get, you get that feeling out of it. Because right now we get a lot of good basketball, but it ain't a feeling that's associated to it. And so, yeah, yeah, I think if they could get themselves to a place where dudes just want to stay. somewhere because they want to stay somewhere. Yeah, I mean, it may be corny, but that's what people like, man. That's what people are into. Listen, I always maintain.

You ain't going to have to worry about it for too long, because there's only so much of that shit they're going to take before the next collective bargain agreement comes up. And all of that is on the table again. So they do what you do now, have fun. Because they're going to swing that balance of power back somehow. They're going to have to get, the max salary just didn't do what they thought it would do, right?

like the salaries got so high that it's kind of impossible to money with him. These dudes are so rich that Ben Simmons said you can keep $20 million. I ain't playing. And he's like 25. And he's like 25. He has already stacked up so much bread from playing basketball that he's like, no, y'all can have it. I don't need it.

And that's what messed it up. When those dudes from Miami, we went to Miami and we're like, oh yeah, we'll take a little bit less money. What's the big deal? That's $15 million. I already got X amount of money. Then the owners were like, damn, what are we supposed to do here? Because we still have it set up where you can pay them more.

You just can't, you know, the other guys can still pay a whole lot. And now these guys are just going all over the place. Now, of course, the owners have this option. And this is what I just don't think they've played up enough. Make it to where these dudes love it so much that they don't want to leave. Russell Westbrook signed two extensions in Oklahoma City. Two. Like those are the guys that I feel like we forget about.

Milwaukee did what it took to get Janus to come back. If you were in one of them places that black people don't want to live, because it ain't about market size. It's about do black people want to live here, right? If you one of them places that black people don't want to live in, you're just going to have to treat them extra good. Extra, like how Utah don't have the dopest locker room in the league, I'll never understand.

How's the Utah locker room, Roger? How's the Utah locker room? speak. I can't speak for what it looks like now at all. I will just say, Bumani, I was I was trumpeting that same tune the last time I put on a uniform. Like, hey, guys, we're going to have to do a little better out here. But again, the whole organization has changed. So I don't know, Logan, but I'm with Bumani on that. You know who the first person was to get that, though? It was Mark Cuban when he bought the Mavericks. Logan, you may not be old enough to remember this, but the Mavericks were the worst in every way.

way they were the worst i once watched a dude from the mavericks file out in five minutes they were the worst and then cuban came and was like first thing we need to do fix up this locker room gets some real comfortable seats here make the bench nice all of this stuff like if you up against it in that way then that's just what you got to do you got to make this fly and it's not like the old days where you have places like san antonio and phoenix that were really attractive to like older dudes These cats are so good as they get older now They don't see themselves as older dudes They're not like, yo, I ought to go down there to penis

Get my joints right. No, no, no, no. No, it's funny because in Golden State They got in the visitors locker room, they got a cold tub, hot tub, besides table, all the stuff. Like, the way locker rooms look better than most home locker rooms. It's interesting because I think from the ownership perspective is, yo, those are not just away players.

Those are potential free ages. Those are future free ages. of what those are. So we got to treat them right. And, Roger, you think about this. Like, I ask you about this because it's been my, you know, the handle I've got for talking the guys in the league and I don't think this comes up enough. Y'all talk about what teams do and do not know how to handle business, right? Like, and that stuff matters.

Like, like free agency and football, I know this comes up. Some teams don't, some teams don't book your flight right. Some teams got you stuck on this window seat. When you know damn well, you told them you won't at the aisle, right? Like, it's little stuff like that, but it stacks up. It's details. Like, it really is. It's details, man.

When you're in a place that's buttoned up, like you talked about cues, that was the first place I had been where I didn't have to ask that shit was already there. Like, you know, I didn't have to ask for a vegetarian meal because they knew. I don't know how they knew, but they knew I was vegetarian. So the nutritionist was already there asking me what she could have on the flight for me, gave me a menu of shit to have. Like, I had never, what? I usually get on to eat a PBJ and a bag of chips.

But, like, you know, they were detailed. And yeah, that people, yes, people are going to speak on behalf of that. And on the flip side, if your shit is raggedy, it is going to be known around the league that is raggedy. So everybody needs to step it up. Like, that's just the way I look at it. If you want to make it happen, like with Utah, I'll never forget this. Did you ever see this interview after Gordon Hayward decided to go to Boston, right? And it was an interview with whoever to play by playman was.

And he spit that reel. He was like, look, down here, well, we. we're saying is if we can't get a white American star to sign a free agent deal, what chance do we have? And that's real talk, right? Like the man just had to come out and say it. It's like, yo, now, of course, like, Gordon Hayward went to the, like, ancestral homeland of the white NBA player. So, like, anyway, they was, they was up, they was up against something daunting when it came there. But for them, like, with Rudy and with, like, they did a better chance with the guys from overseas because a lot of the stuff all the same to them by and large.

But with Rudy and with Donovan, man, you're just going to need to treat them really well for them to be like, I just can't imagine going nowhere else. But they don't want to do that. They just want these dudes to feel like, we got you so you can't go nowhere. That ain't going to work. Yeah, the days of you owe us or you owe the club or, oh, that's a rap. Those days are gone. It's an interesting balance because right now the team, because you brought this up, Beau,

but the teams that are in the bigger markets that would normally, always get the free agent meeting. Talk about the Knicks and the Lakers. They're not good organizations. They're not good organizations in their building. You know, you take away LeBron and things like that. So what is the alternative? Who are the, like, what are the new teams that are emerging?

Is that I don't know, I guess Golden State is one of them. I don't, Miami are starting to emerge. Who is going to be the next few teams you think that are going to be the players that are non-traditional and non-traditional markets that. Well, I guess Golden State counts, but see, bringing up Golden State gets to the point where I feel like we have miscategorized this discussion and made it about market size, right? It's not necessarily, yeah. The Bay is the fifth largest market.

Boss is the top ten market. Philadelphia is the top ten market. Chicago's the top five market. People don't want to go play necessarily for those teams. People talk about Miami being a big market. Miami's not a big market at all, right? Like, it's just Miami. People like it, and they got a well-run organization.

Katzby lined up and signed up. signing up to go get their body fat tested every week, right? To practice in a gym that has beautiful views of Biscayne Bay that they covered up because Pat Riley don't want nobody going soft. And they still go down there and they go do it. And so I think we're going to see like in a couple of years it's going to be like Milwaukee, for example, right? If they keep this thing going and they do it right, is that going to be a place that people

actually like want to go to? Because the truth is, man, the city you play in. you ain't going to be there that much. You know, like, you know, you can go hold it down for a little while and, you know, see how you can make this work. The Clippers became one of those places. Like, we forget how terrible they were and nobody would ever want to go there. And then the Clippers got their shit together and worked it out and became that place.

Fertita is messing up what I've always thought was the biggest potential jug or not, which is Houston. Man, B, A, players, love Houston. Better or worse. Love, love. I mean, I'm from Houston. I don't see the worst. Like, I totally get what it is about Houston that they love, but they love, love, love Houston. That should be free agent destination number one for most of them dudes.

Yeah, yeah. I think you'll throw, at the end of the day, I think Memphis still throw in that soon, too. What about Atlanta, though? What about Atlanta though? Atlanta has a picture. I've never understood why they haven't ever been able to really make that catch. But I'm telling you, man. It's right there.

But this is the thing I think about Atlanta with regard to this discussion, because the Hawks haven't had a real star since Neke. And Trey Young is like a step in that direction, but it still ain't the same, right? Like, it's not what it was when Dominique was there. If they ever get that guy, like, if they had gotten Zion, not hurt or whatever it was,

that arena has the chance to become what the forum used to be. Because there's so many stars in Atlanta right now. They're shooting so many movies in Atlanta right now. Like, if a Zion caliber dude got there, like what Zion could be at the best of Zion? John went like ended up in Atlanta. Another guy that would be like a guy you got to see.

A guy you want people to see you see. It is no telling what that arena could ultimately turn into if they ever just get that guy. And they just haven't gotten that guy. You're from born in Houston, raised in Atlanta, right? Other way. Other way. Okay. How did that hawks run field to you last year?

Were you into it? Because I know your Braves won and I know that that was an exciting time. How was the hawk? Yeah, the Braves brought a lot out of me because that's the first thing I ever love. I stopped rooting for the Hawks on February 24th, 1993. When somebody woke up with the bright-ass idea of, it's the best team we've ever had, we should trade Dominique.

Oh, okay. It was like, okay, clearly you don't care about me. You don't care about you. You don't care about nothing, right? Like, why should I care about people who so clearly do not even care about themselves? It was fun for me to watch, really, honestly, as somebody who lives in New York and was happy for Knicks fans

that they had something to be happy about. And I love a good villain, right? Like a good in this arena star and that's what Trey was in there. And then I look up and the Hawks got some players and it was just kind of like, oh, okay, good for y'all. You know what they've been doing ever since then? Being the fucking Hawks.

That's what they've done. They went right back to just, then Hawks went back to being the Hawks. The Knicks went right back to being the Knicks. It's interesting because that series is really fun because, you know, I love the, I love the relationship between New York and Atlanta, right? Because that's where, you know, Biggie tried to get a house down there. And, like, there's the, you know, Atlanta, there's no swag in America like Atlanta swag, bro. Like, y'all don't give a fuck about shit.

So when you guys go out of town, when people from Atlanta go out of town, specifically New York, there's just a big, the chest sticks out. And it was fun to see Atlanta. It used to go the other way. That's what's so wild about the most insulting thing in New York. Because I went to college in Atlanta in 97. And you had to hate the New Yorkers because they was just so arrogant about it and just coming down. How was it when New Yorkers went to Clark? How was it when they came down and brought their Tims and just with their arrogance?

What was that like? After they chilled out a bit, it wasn't so bad. I learned to hate them in a week and a half when they first got there. Because, like, I got to school, and I grew up in Houston, and I was, like, listen to Wu-Tang and all that stuff. It ain't nobody doing that with you in Houston. And so I get there, and I'm like, all right, so the cats from New York, they're probably going to be on some of the same stuff than I am. I was a radical Southerner after a week, man, after they called us country and everything. And, you know, a couple of them had to learn some lessons the hard way from some locals about just how, like, how far that New York cred really went.

And the answer was not as far as you think, homie. But that's back when New York was the center of everything, right? Like, I could get why it was that they was acting like that. but I don't think they come down there behaving like that no more. Like they're the ones trying to catch the way even now. Yeah. It was funny. You could see that with the Hawks' Knicks series.

That had the potential to become a rivalry. It seemed like that. Two good teams on the Ascension. I don't know, man. I don't know where we are in the NBA. I think we might have gone to. It's hard for me to say with the player empowerment. It thinks we've gone too far because I do miss those.

I do miss those types of series where you could, where you build familiarity with between, both teams, but now it seems like we're just trying to rip teams apart to build them back up, and it's so fast now. You don't really get the chance to like these teams. Yeah, well, this is what I think about a lot of these guys. And I don't blame you if after seven years you look up at your team and you say, we ain't never going to win nothing and you decide to go somewhere else. You know what I mean? Like, I get it. But there is a value to, so let's take the Grizzlies, for example. A guy like Zach Randolph or Mark Gassal or Tony Allen

or Mike Conley. If they play for the Lakers, their numbers don't go to the rafters. You go to the rafters with the Lakers if you were in the Hall of Fame. Them Tony Allen, however, they had his picture up in the airport on the Welcome to Memphis sign.

There's something to be said for having a city that loves you, right? There's something to be said for having home. Like, think about the way we talked about Zach Randolph before he went to Memphis. And he became a beloved figure because they loved him there. And that's what I think for a lot of these cats, I look at him.

Like Carmelo, for example, Carmelo doesn't belong to anybody. Carmelo doesn't have, like, a franchise. Like, I think Denver will eventually retire his number, but the next ain't going to retire his number. He ain't never going to have that place. And I think there's a real value and a financial value down the line, you know, at some point, of having that place. And maybe these guys make so much money now that it doesn't even matter anymore, you know? But, like, you young people look at Clyde Frazier, and they probably wonder why it is that we talk about him like that,

because he means something in New York and he's always going to mean something in New York to the end. Yeah, there's something, look, I've always said one of my biggest regrets and it wasn't because I necessarily had the choice. I was more of a journeyman, but I would have liked to have been associated with a team

as a career, whether that had been in Phoenix for a longer stretch or whether I had stayed in Utah and ran that for six or seven years, just because, you know, there's love. That's a city that owned, like, they take pride in the fact that, you were one of theirs. You know, there's something to be said for that.

But I do think you hit a point. Like, financially, you know, the, the, the, the, the, the, even the Carl Malones and people like that would stay in Utah. They were real financial benefits for doing that once they were done playing. But they weren't making what these cats are making. They weren't making that shit. No, would you write, though, never forget. Wow.

I feel so old when I talk about these things and I look up and realize how long ago they happened. So the Wizards traded, Chris Weber, to Sacramento for Mitch Richman. Now, the kings are sorry now, and the kings were sorry then about like they sorry now, but then Chris Weber came and everything changed, right? Like, it's been going on so long now to have I to remind people that Sacramento used to be good rather than they used to be sorry.

So they traded Chris Weber, and he did that year there. And basically what they told Chris Weber was, it's a 30-minute flight to L.A., and they money whipped them. They, they, they, they, is when you were still able to go way over the cap, to sign your own players. They money whipped him, and he stayed, and it's the most glorious era that that franchise has ever had. This close to winning the West,

this close to winning a championship, all of that stuff, because they just paid him too much for him to leave and then told him how to leave intermittently so that he can still play there. They're going to have to go back to giving teams these options. Now, of course, for Sacramento, this wouldn't be a problem because they don't get good players.

They would never have a Chris Weber that they could money whip, apparently. I have no idea the last time they had a legitimately good player in Sacramento. I mean, you stop and think about it. Like, Deerrin Fox is the one that we've talked about. The last good player they've had, honestly, that was good to bring them to the playoffs. We're on our test.

That's what I'm saying. Like, good where you stretch it out. Exactly. It's the last time. Before we get you out of here, we want to have a little segment we like to call ruin of the week where we talk about somebody that won the weak person, entity, and organization. I'm going to go first.

I'm going to go with Aaron Donald, Super Bowl champion, Aaron Donald, who might, That might be the last we see of him. So I just want to give him his flowers, man. Room of the Week, Aaron Donald, Super Bowl champ. Roy, who's your real one of the week? That boy's going to be back. This one's personal to me, man. I'm giving a shout out to my young buck.

It's my nephew, Jordan Durkak. He's up at Spire Institute. I'm going to give a little co-shot out to all 201 high school graduating athletes that got caught up in that bullshit of everyone getting their year back and the scholarships all being bottlenecked and no one was able to get a scholarship to go away to school. So my young is up at Spire averaging 20, nine and six, six, five,

200, just going ham on his post-grad year. So shout out, real one of the week, Jordan Durkak. I'm going my real one of the week. I'm not going nearly as theoretical because I forgot I needed to prep this. But I am going to go with the guy who somehow is at once, the most underrated player in the NBA

and the reigning MVP. You see, my man, Yogh, take that to the lane against Golden State, kiss that double, kick it out, hit that three to walk up out of there. What more does my man have to do? It took a while for me to come around on it too, right? There's a cognitive dissonance that's going to all here. I just don't know how much colder Yokic has to be before we just all like,

yo, man, this is the real deal right here? No, he's cold. I saw that in person last man. Oh, no. You're looking like a Yokic holdout. Are you a holdout? No, no, no, no. Okay, just checking.

No. No. Fully on board with that one. I'm here to find everybody, man. You know, he gets the real one just because Marcus, whichever Morris it was, that play too much. Yeah. Hey, if I wasn't a believer in the skill set, I was sold on that one. Don't know.

I just watch, every time I watch Yowicz, I'm just like, how did you see that? How did you do that? How is, and one thing I'll never understand is how did you just become a good defensive player after not being one? Yeah, that I don't know. But the rest of the shit, the stuff that you're. talking about how those are gifts. You don't, you don't, you don't work that. That's a gift.

You, you see things that other people don't see. And just hitting everything. And he got it in like, oh, I need to get 40 tonight, you say, huh? Okay, guess I'm going to come out here. And that's the difference is the cat that can say, I hear we need 40. Yeah. And also on the low has great comedic timing, too. This is also very funny, dude.

Thanks again, Beaumont. You can catch him on HBO. You can catch him on ESPN on the roll. right time podcast. Make sure you check out his, make sure check out his show Game Theory, which drops in March. We are here every Monday and Thursday on Real On Real Ones, but in the meantime, make sure you check out our other program. Make sure you check out Upside High with Jonathan Charks.

Make sure you check out, let's keep the propaganda going, Raja. Let's keep it going, man. Let's take out R2C2 with who, Raja Bell. Belio Legend, the crest-eye clown, C, C, Sabathia. Keep it going. Make sure you check out Black Girl's Song. book with who, Rajabelle? It's the home girl. Town legend, Danielle Smith.

Yes, sir. Make sure you also check out. The answer. Make sure you check out group chat as well. We'll see you next week. Howl.