The Ringer NBA Show - Can Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown Coexist in Boston? Plus: We Apologize to the Wizards. | Real Ones

Episode Date: November 8, 2021

Logan and Raja go deep on the Celtics, their current struggles, and the question of whether Jayson Tatum or Jaylen Brown should be the leader of the team (0:30). Then they apologize for dismissing the Wizards in the offseason (22:25) and Sasha Mack defends Kyle Kuzma (30:55). Hosts: Logan Murdock and Raja Bell Associate Producer: Sasha Ashall Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Top MMA voices, Ariel Hawani, Chuck Mindenhall, and Pizzie Carroll are live on the Spotify Greenroom app for every major MMA card with the Ringer MMA show. Hear the guys react to Wayans in real time and find out what they think of the fights the moment the final card ends. Plus, when breaking MMA news happens, they'll be live to talk to you about it. And if you miss the Green Room show, you can hear it as a podcast anytime on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. What's popping? Welcome Murdoch, bro. They're real ones. Raja, I got to get on your head real quick, bro.

I got a I got a roast shit out of you right now, bro. This is the, I've been holding on all my real ones out there for the last month or so. Raja, every single time he gets on this podcast, every time he gets on the Zoom link. This dude, it's always the, me and Sasha Mac get on the Zoom call, and we always just expect a text now of just like, hey, I'm going to be on there in a second. This fucking computer's fucking up. And this happened a month ago. That happened a month ago. Oh, my computer's messing up.

All right. So he gets one of his kids' iPads or something like that, or he gets his kid's laptop or something like that, right? Shout to all my little homies over there in Florida. Shout to all my little homies that are helping out Roger their father fucking get his shit together. But the reason why I'm roasting him is because every week he gets on this Zoom call, he says, fuck the shit. I'm going to go get me a little laptop. I'm tired of this shit.

I'm tired of this. I'm going to get me a laptop. And we're like, and he always makes a point to say before and then after the pod. And he says, I'm leaving right now. I'm going to go get a lap. I'm going to best by I'm going wherever I'm going. I'm going to get away a laptop right now. I'm getting one, right now.

And every week the next time, it's the same thing. It's Raja. Yeah, yeah, y'all, I'll be on there a second. Or it's simple, or it's kids' iPad or he's taking away his kids' electronics so he can do this podcast. Everybody we need you guys. First of all. No, no, no, no. Hold on.

Hold on. Hold on. No. We need hashtag get Raja a laptop or hashtag get Raja a computer because we need to get him online. What's up, Raja? What's going on? What, can you explain yourself? You're finished? I'm finished. I was just a little, I'm just themed. What's up? First of all, my children are in school. So no one is, no one is going without a laptop because

dad is using their laptop. Let's be clear. We're not taking anything out of a child's hand for this. Secondly, and all my people, if there's some listeners out there that have children, they would know. Every time I say that to you when I'm leaving this pod, I genuinely mean I'm about to go get this new laptop or desktop right to Best Buy. And in between me getting off of this pod and uploading it to Sasha Mac and getting in my car to go, life gets in the way, bro. And there's just shit to do, right? Like, my wife is like, hey, we need to do that.

Or, hey, you got to run over and pick up this kid. And I swear, every time I leave, I mean to do it. And I just gets in my way, though. So I haven't done it. And so you are correct. And I allow you your rant. But I'm not just, it's not just for effect. I really mean to go get it and then I just never get to it.

Also, this is something, I have made this rant with Roger's permission. I have given him room to breathe on this one. I have said that when he came up on his child's laptop today, I was like, I can't do it. We have to, the people have to know. The people have to know. I'm tired of keeping this from them. They have to know. So hashtag get Roger computer all on Twitter.

Everybody, you guys just check in bully Roger to get into computer or just, you know, just honestly, or I'm sure Roger will be fine with this. buy Roger computer. He'd be cool with that. He just bought him a MacBook and a whole Apple desktop. He'd be fine with that. Either way, let's get Roger computer.

There we go. I was raised not to look to give force in the mouth. Yeah, exactly. So we're good. We're good. So there was, what I do want to start this podcast off, on a serious note is last

episode, we talked about Sarver, we talked about the Sons, but we were trying to talk about the Celtics, and that's something that me and Rajah wanted to talk about, last week's pod, Raja bum rushed and was like, yo, we're going to talk about the Celtics. I don't care. I don't care how serious this pod is. We're going to talk about the Celtics.

But I really wanted to, Raja and I are really passionate about what the Celtics are going through right now. And I really wanted to talk about what is going on within their organization right now. Now, they beat the Mavericks last night, which is a big one. But it still doesn't change the

fact of what we feel about the Celtics and what they're going through with Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum. and how they are working through some things and how they're working on through the offense. Now, I was at, I was talking to a scout recent. And I was just talking about, you know, you shoot the shit when you go to a game

and you just shoot the shit, and you talk to people about, you know, just the shit. And the Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum got brought up. And he, you know, it's probably revisiting his history. right but he was like i always told my fuck is that jalen was better than jason tatum and always did that right but it came into an interesting conversation where um jason and we both love jason tatum you know we both love both of these guys but how jason tatum may have been like you know a may have been a beneficiary of the school that he went to and jaylin not so much because you know

jaylon went to cow and you know he was able to get it was some good and bad like jaylin was expected to, Jalen was probably got a little bit more at least, whereas Jason was expected to contribute right away and he did against LeBron. And that has probably helped him out in the long run because he was able to do that so early in his career.

But what I want to ask you, Raja, is, is there really a difference in either one of their games? Like, why do we probably think that Jason is the overall is probably the better player if you look at it on paper? And he probably and Jalen will probably get overlooked. What is the

reason behind that. What do you see with that partnership? That's a good question. I think there is something to where Jason Tatum went to school. I think Jason Tatum was more polished when he came in than Jalen Brown. So he was more NBA ready. He could step out there and fans can see that. Like you can you can see the result. So your eyes are telling you, yeah, he's producing. He's a better player. I also thought Jalen Brown had a super high ceiling. I didn't know what that was, and I wasn't ready to say he was better than Jason Tatum. I'm still not, but I thought he might have a higher ceiling in terms of growth just because he wasn't as polished coming in, right? And so if you're taking two things that have an almost equal ceiling and one of them is already closer to it,

then the other has more room for growth. And so I think that's kind of where Jalen Brown was early, and Jason Tatum was just a little more polished and ready to go. And Jalen has continued to, you know, round out his game and get better and better. And he's closed that gap. And so now you're sitting there with Jason, you know, fractionally behind him and points scored per game. Jalen Brown is the better field goal percentage shooter and three-point shooter right now in this season. And that's a great problem to have. In theory, I got these two great wing players averaging 22 plus points per game earlier in

their careers. But things have to be worked out and roles have to be defined and, you know, people have to be on the same page and about the same things. And I'm not saying they're not, but, but if they're not, you know, you could wind up with some bumps in the road along the way. I do wonder, because I was just looking this up, I was just looking this up because I covered, I covered Jalen a little bit at his year at Cal. And I remember, you know, just a, really, really smart cerebral dude at a really, really smart cerebral college, right? And but before that, he was going to public schools, right? And I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with public schools. I'm a product of public schools. But you don't have as much resources as a private and

all these private institutions, right? So like, I looked at Jason. He went to a college prep school and went to Duke, which is all about basketball, right? You talk about Coach K and you talk about you know, everything that Duke stands for and then going to a college prep school. And I don't really know about it. I know he went to college prep school and at St. Louis, Jason did. And by and large, you would have more resources

at a private school than a public school. And I'm trying, and I'm wondering, does that play a part in this? And because you're able to go to a basketball factory like Duke, whereas Jalen went to a very, you know, Sasha Mac, you know, she knows about this. We went to Cal Berkeley is an institution of higher learning. That's what it is.

And I do wonder, does that play affect in your basketball development, whereas Jason was able to get success early on because he went to a school like that where that prioritizes basketball at all times, whereas, you know, Jalen went to a school that, I know this being in the Bay Area, that prioritized schooling over athletics. Do you, is there a difference there? in the way that they were brought up to whereas, like, Jason gets more, um, gets success earlier.

And, you know, Jalen kind of has to like, kind of like work his way into that. Yeah, I think that you, it definitely plays a role. Um, just because you don't, just because you go to a school that doesn't prioritize basketball like Duke doesn't mean that you can't come out and be phenomenal basketball player. I mean, Jalen, Jalen is a proof of that. They're super. I mean, there are a lot of NBA players that they go to Duke and they're proof. of it. But the point is, what you have at Duke that you might not have at a at a cow,

I can't speak for facilities. I haven't been in either one of their facilities. I can talk about, I can talk about like your your resources outside of the facilities in terms of alumni and the people that you get to play against in the summers and the pros that have gone through Duke that come back, you know, to impart wisdom on some of the freshmen and sophomores and the, the current student, you know, athletes at Duke. Like, those are real things, you know? When every day in your gym and Cameron in the summer, you're locking horns with, you know, former Dukies that are now pros, that doesn't exist at every college.

Like, I don't know that Cal Berkeley can say that. And so, steel sharp and steel in some respects. And so I think that those type of things would give you an advantage if you were, a player at Duke. You know, not for nothing, I'm going to segue just a little bit. Like, my son is at a football factory right now at American Heritage. And people always ask me, like, you know, he could be starting, you know, as an eighth grader at a small school and getting numbers.

And I'm like, yeah, but, you know, he plays against five stars in practice every day. Yeah. Those kids like Earl Little Jr. and Jacobi Spells and Marvin Smith Jr., those are five-star kids. They're going to end on his sideline on any given day. you've got Pat Sertane Jr. We've got Sony, Michelle, and you got guys like that

that are playing the NFL. Like those experiences and what that does for him, you can't quantify that. Now, I'm not saying that that's going to make him a great player, but it certainly doesn't hurt when you've got those kind of resources

around your facility and a Jason Tatum is playing against those guys in the summertime and stuff like that. So I also tend to think, and I didn't follow them as high school basketball players.

I think Jason Tatum was just a more polished high school player than Jalen. Jalen was more athletic, potential. Good, good player, but still a little raw. I remember watching him and covering the draft a little bit. And it was like, man, incredible upside in terms of an athlete and potential player, but still kind of raw. What he's done is what you hope all aspiring NBA players in any level do. He put his head down. He set himself goals. And he just grinded until he's starting to

see, you know, the work pay off. I remember, it's funny you said about your kid because I remember I remember your kid is on the other side of where I was at as a child playing football. And when I played, I played at Berkeley High. And it was a public school, but we prioritized the arts and shit. And those who just happened to have a good football coach. But then you juxtapose that with like a De La Salle. I'm sure you've heard of Dalai Sal. Yeah, sure.

And they're in the same, we played against them. They beat the shit out of us when we played it because they were a football factory. You go to that place to play football. And there's a different attitude when you go to a place to play football as opposed to going to a school because it's a good school. And it's also like even in life, like when you come to the ringer like shit, you got a, you got New York Times bestsellers when you, as a that's hosting a podcast and stuff like that. So it's a different expectation than just psychologically than when you're going to another place, right? And so I do feel that it's funny because like when I watch Jalen Brown's journey and I see what it is, you know who he reminds me of and I want to get your opinion on this? Jimmy Butler.

Maybe not maybe not a guy. Like I think Jalen got his success earlier on and he was able, he didn't go to school as much as Jimmy did and go through the things. But what I think when I think of a guy that, you know, when we saw Jalen Brown the first few years, it was like, oh, a super role player. I don't think that I'm saying anything out of pocket by even bringing that up. But, like, he was. Like, you know, he plays great defense and maybe he'll just be a really great, great role player for a long time. And so, but to see him do this now, you're like, oh, shit, now we got to pay attention to this dude. And I'm really curious to see how his career ends up.

What do you think about that? I said it. I don't know if I was on one of our pods or if it was at the last place I worked. But early on, I said, I wasn't sure. or whether Jason Tatum ultimately was going to be the better player than Jalen Brown. I still don't know. I'm not going to sit here and act like I can tell you. Jason is a boy.

He's nice. Absolutely. Yeah, that's not throwing any shade. Like, I just, they're both really, really good.

I think it's not a bad comp. It's not a bad cop. I think he's more explosive than Jimmy Butler athletically. But Jimmy just has that shit that, like you can't put your finger on. I mean, mindsets, though. I think like mindset.

And I'm with you on that. He looks like he's not taking no for an answer from anyone, you know? Like that's, you tell me I can't be a star in this league, no. You know, you're going to tell me this can't be my team, no. And that's where we get into, that's where we get into the conversation about the Celtics right now as a team. And from what I can see during games, it appears there is at least, the surface a little struggle for whose it is. And I hope I'm wrong because I'd love to see those two, you know,

but I don't have many examples of championships. I mean, even, like, let's use KD and Russ, because KD and Russ is a decent one, right? Katie and Russ is a decent one, like two superstars that play together, you know, for a while at kind of the same point in their careers, right? Yeah. But how'd that end? It's also funny because, like, when I think,

but we're going on a whole chance. And that might not be fair. A real one special. We're just doing a real one special. We're just going off on tangis. When I, like, when you think about it out of that Katie and Russ thing, who really won out of that, man? Who really won out of both of those people?

Like, both of those dudes, if you were to think about it. I mean, clearly you could say that Kevin won because he fucking got the titles and things like that. But like, who really won that? Well, that's a conversation for another day. But like, no, I mean, that's, yeah, that's another conversation. And I don't really mean, I just, I just mean it in terms of it's difficult sometimes for two players at the point in your career where you're still trying to make your mark. And the priority is still, I want to be the greatest because almost every player in the NBA of a certain level comes in and says, I want to be one of the greatest players of all time.

Only very few, and they're special too, that are saying, like, I'm just going to be a role player and I'm going to figure out my role. Those are special players. Like, you're living proof. Like, that is a great thing. That's not even this, yeah. It is, and you need them. And they're integral to the success of teams. Like, we've been over that before.

But your condition to think, like, yo, I need to be the best of all time. You figure that out, right? Like, you figure that out if you're a me, that you're going to be a supporting cast member in the production, right? Those guys all are conditioned to be like, I want to be one of the greatest of all time. It's what to make some special,

amongst other things, but certainly part of the recipe. And so when they're still at a point in their career where that's the priority or trying to figure out how close they can, can get to that. If they've got their peer with them, sometimes that can, you know, the two agendas can get in the way. And it's no one's fault. It's just the nature of, of a competitor or someone who has worked their whole life in pursuit of this greatness. Like, it's not to say anyone's

selfish or anything like that. It's just human nature. The question is, like, at what point do you guys figure out, hey, that's going to be in contradictory? to what we're trying to do as a team. Like, if that's going to be our agenda, it may wind up hurting what we're ultimately trying to do as a team. Now, that's an interesting point because both of these dudes,

at least right now, I can only speak to it from what I see from afar. But it seems like both of these dudes want to be the guy. I remember, like, when I said, like, I covered Jalen back in the day at Cal and I remember him just always saying,

like, I want to be the best. I want to be the best. He would fucking practice after every game at Hous Pavilion, because there was, if you ever know anything about Cal, they don't have a designated basketball, like, place where they, that's just their gym. You know how at Duke or all these big colleges,

like you just have a key card, go right in. Cal didn't have that, but he would practice and really just be like, I want to, I want to be the best. And I didn't, I didn't know if that was, and I just saw it in his eyes. I didn't know it was going to be like all this, but you see that. And then you see Jason Tatum, who was like,

bro, he was anointed as the next Celtics dude. the next Celtic, the next great Celtic. Where does this lead? Does somebody have to get traded? I think we talked about this before in the last episode, but I am bearing towards, if it goes this, and they can't find, like, cohesion, and I'm not saying they can't find, also Jalen Brown is out for one or two weeks with a hamstring. So we'll see how that plays into some things. But I don't know if this could last. These are two young kids. Can they, can they just like coexist? Like, what do we do? How does this work? Yeah, I think for now, you're not trading either one of those guys right now.

I mean, first of all, even if you were inclined to, I don't know that you can tell which one is the right one to trade right now. But I wouldn't think you would need to trade one of those. I will say that Jalen Brown being out for one to two weeks, I mean, while that just sucks, because you don't want to see any player hurt and you don't want to see them without them. For their chemistry and for figuring out what this iteration of the Celtics looks like, that's going to be tough, right? Because now you cast Jason Tatum right back in the role of, this is my show.

and then Jalen Brown comes back and he's like, well, no, I mean, I'm back. And so here we go. But I think, you know, it's going to ultimately determine probably, you know, Eme's fate with the Celtics and to some degree Brad Stevens' fate with the Celtics, whether or not they can get these two to a place where their talents are translating into wins. Because I want to be fair to them, I don't know that this is happening. This is just me watching and saying,

man, these are two great players that seem to like, it seems to be a sort of tug of war. They may be cool as hell, and there ain't nobody tripping off of that. Man, we look, you know, it could be really cool, a copacetic behind closed doors. I don't know.

But that's going to be the, you know, I think EMA is going to have to get in there and, you know, we're going to have to talk that out. We're going to have these tough conversations. The team is going to have to have tough conversations about sacrifice and about, you know,

about what ultimately we're, we're looking for out of this. And there's got to be a lot hashed out. And I think that'll, you know, determine to some degree whether or not people are there long term. I don't think you have to trade them, though. Yeah. No, I think the thing that both Jalen and Jason have going good for them is by and large,

and I can speak from experiences right now, but by and large, both two good dudes. Two good dudes, right? Like, they just want to win. It's more of just like the environment that it is. They both want to be the best. That's not a bad. thing to want, right, from out of your players. It just is what it is.

So I think it'll be fine, but it's interesting to see it during this time and really just talk about this because it also where the Celtics are right now, right? Because they drafted it almost too well with this, right? You know, you got a Marcus Smart who's a really good player in his role, who's a leader on the team. You got Jason Tatum, who has the potential to be one of the all-time greats. You have Jason Tatum who was down all of a sudden like, yo, no, fuck that. I have the opportunity to be one of the all-time greats.

And it's just what makes, what I see in this, what makes NBA players special is what also can make it not work out. So I think that's what you're seeing in Boston. There's just so many unknowns that nobody can really answer right now. Yeah, it'll be, I mean, it'll ultimately, I imagine, work itself out there's a lot of talent there. I think the other part that I didn't touch on was just a duplication of skill sets. You know, you have two guys that are trying to get it the same way. and that sometimes can make it even more difficult to coexist, you know?

We're also seeing that on a bigger level, like with Kauai Leonard and Paul George. One of them is injured, but you know, you see how hard it is to still try to coexist between two players with similar skill sets. Let's take a quick break. And you know what? I put my foot in my mouth earlier this season. I'll tell you what happened. And we are back. Raja, in the beginning of the season, I had zero failure.

faith, absolutely zero faith in the Washington Wizards. The Washington almost hornets. I mean, oops. The Washington almost bullets. My bad. And, you know, I didn't remember we even put a campaign. We did a whole podcast episode basically telling Bradley Bill, you need to leave. You need to get up out of there.

You need to go to Golden State. You need to go anywhere else. You need to go to Portland. You need to go wherever they will have you. You need to go to the Knicks, wherever. You need to go somewhere else. You need a new star. Now the Wizards are 7 and 3

We were like, yo, Kyle Kuzma ain't going to help you player You know, KCP ain't going to help you player Montres' hell ain't going to help you player That's not a championship roster Listen, man At least momentarily, I still don't think it's a championship roster But they're good. That's a good team. It's a good basketball team. Roger, was I wrong?

Where was I wrong in this one? Do I need to put my foot into my mouth? Do I need to like just reevaluate how I look at the game? or what's going on right now? Or is it just too early? It's 10 games. That should just be chill. I think we should chill because it's 10 games. But, but, sir, allow me to double down on the apology.

Washington. Oh, wow. Wow. I apologize. Bradley Beal, to some degree saying that a championship wasn't going to be attainable in Washington had to probably be a reflection on him as a player, even though I didn't mean it that way. And so I apologize to you as well. Right? Because while on paper, you don't seem to have a, like, a hellified cast of characters.

I like Montres Harold, Spencer Dinwiddie, Kyle Kizma, KCP, like good players, but certainly doesn't have a Batman, a Robin to his Batman. They're sitting at seven and three. And so I apologize. My bad. I also would say, like I said, to start, it's 10 games in. It's early. I was trying to figure out because I haven't seen him play much. Again, I'm looking at the stats. Nothing's really popping off the page at me in terms of points.

Montrez is almost 18 a game. Spencer Dinwidie's doing his thing, 16. Kyle, I mean, 14 a game with like eight or nine boards. Like decent numbers. Nothing's staggering. You know, and even Bradley Beals down at 24 games. He's a 30 a game last year. So I'm, you know, what's going on?

Nothing's popping off the page. But they're defending. They're scrapping. You know, and they're doing things like that. And Wes Unsell Jr., A shout out. Like, something's working. And so I got to give love and I apologize.

So here's the thing, though, man. Like, and I wanted to go straight to schedule, but I can't even do that. They beat, they beat Toronto, who is six and five. They beat fucking, they went in to Boston and beat Boston. Beat Atlanta. Yep. Fucking Memphis and Milwaukee. They beat Milwaukee last night.

Like, dude, I got to, listen, tip it of the cap. I got a tip of the cap. But I still don't think that they're, I'm a double down in the fact I don't think they're a championship team. I think that they have really good regular season players. I think they have really good regular season players. I do. I think that Kyle Kuzma is a, you know, we, you know how we've talked about Kyle Kuzma on the Lakers. We know about this.

But I think it's a great role to just have him with less pressure, bro. And like, I didn't appreciate how much. pressure Lakers have on them, right? Every single possession. I'm in like two Lakers group chats. Grow. Every possession, and I'm included in this, every possession is just very just real. But here, you know, Amatra's Harrell was also in that mix. He doesn't have to deal with that. He's fucking averaging 18 a game doing his thing. I'm looking at Kyle Kuzma rebound had a 17 rebound game, dude. It's nine and a half boards. They're rebounded. Bro. It's a good story. Now, is it going to lead to what?

Brad, what I've, like, everything I see about Bradleyville, just his actions right now, great basketball player wants to win a title, but I think he wants to win a title as the guy. And that's okay, right? It's fine. I don't, like, because if he gets traded, he's not going to be the guy, no matter what. No matter how good, even if he's better than the guy. He's the only person I think I remember just being the guy after getting signing, signed to another organization was LeBron, right?

Where he was that with Dwayne way, like even Kevin Durant. wasn't considered the guy in the Bay Area when he was with the Warriors, right? And he's Kevin Durant. He's one of the best of all time. He should have been. He was the best player on the team. He was. You see my face?

What's you look? No, no. You're right. For those who can't hear this face, I'm making, give me the suck teeth noise, whatever. No, hey, I'm talking about, no, no, no. I'm talking about how he's perceived. Kevin Durant was the best player on that team. And I've said that.

I've said that by and large every single time. I'm talking about how he is received in the Bay Area. I got you. And I love Steph. You feel me. Steph, but come on, yo. We love Steph. Steph loves you. Steph loves you.

Yeah, I got mad love for stuff. But I'm saying it's hard. It's hard to go into another person's place where it's like, it's like going to somebody's house and saying it's my house. Absolutely. And not for nothing. To your point, even when LeBron came to Miami. It was an adjustment, right?

It wasn't LeBron's right away. This was Wade County. It's still Way County. It's still Way County. Right. Now, LeBron actually, you know, LeBron wound up taking. it over and doing what he did. But I mean, there was a lot of pushback. But when he left, though, it's still way, look, you, you and you in, you in Florida right now,

it's still Wade County, ain't it? Yeah, that's like I got mind control over Depot. Exactly. He comes around. I'll be quiet. It's when he leaves. It's way County. It's way County. But like, Udana's Haslam, too. Let's sell my whole, all my respect to Miami and all Miami botting is down there. It's, you know, it's like, you still got to go a couple tears before you get to like LeBron's thing of Miami there. Like, let's keep it a buck. This is true. This is true. But with Bradley Beal, I think that, you know, he got a few more years, I believe, to where he's just going to be like,

I want to win a title on my terms, but then it's going to go into I want to win a title. Yeah, and yes, I mean, clearly. And we're seeing that also, like with Dame, too. Like, Dame, I'm seeing stuff happening in Portland. I'm like, oh, hey, you might want to rethink this player. You might want to rethink what's going on right now. As far as the Wizards are concerned,

I think, you know, Bradley's desire to win a championship as the guy and do it in Washington, you've started laying the foundation for that. Now it's early. Again, I'll just say it's early. And I don't believe this roster to win a championship. But if you guys have a really productive season, you know, you're in the middle of the pack in terms of playoff teams. You know, it's a great basketball area, you know, that D.C. see, you know, Maryland, Virginia area up there.

Like, it's a phenomenal town. Sleepy, sleepy, low-key, one of my favorite, like, places to visit, like, as an NBA stay in that Georgetown area. Oh, yeah. Yeah. But anyway, you've laid the foundation as a team to maybe attract what you would need to get over that hump into the title conversation, which is other stars. DC is such a fun city, too, bro.

Like, I'm just trying to figure out like, why both people want to go to D.C.? man. Well, because it's been dysfunctioned. Like, it's been... Is that why? Because I feel like if they were functioning, like people would want to go there, it's nice. There may be other things, but I mean, certainly, you know, players look around and say, oh, that's, no, that's kind of messy. DC is just a cool-ass city in general, though, right?

You go to D.C., you feel the vibe? Like, it's just... Absolutely. Absolutely. So, I mean, I guess what I'm saying is if you, if you, you know, if you play this out and you guys wind up being middle of the pack, Eastern Conference team, playoff team, I don't know, you win a round, maybe you don't, But if it's solid and the coaching staff seems to be the one that needs to be in place, and you've got a skeleton frame, like you've got a good roster.

The bones are there. You're going to need to bring another piece in, but you've started laying the foundation for that. Yeah, I like this team. I think that they might be middle of the pack. They still, you know, they might just go into the playing game, but if they make it to the offs, like, we're good. It don't even matter. Yeah, we're straight.

We're straight. Absolutely. Now, I want to bring in, I want to bring our Matt Hooper in. Now, this Matt Hooper has been really on the Kyle Coosma way for a long, a very fucking long time. And she has been defending Kyle Coosma for a long time, for a long time, Roger. Yeah. Long as time. Like get somebody who defends you the way this guest is defending Kyle Coosma, real talk.

Yeah, yes. Just get, you need someone that loves you the way this. This Matt Hooper loves Coosma. We got Sasha Mac in the motherfucking building. Sasha Mac, Kyle Coosma, Kyle Coosma right now, he's playing his ass off. And we're seeing him in a less toxic environment, it seems like. It just seems like he's not.

What have you seen from Kyle Coosma now? And what have we not seen this whole time from Kyle Coosma that we're seeing now? What's been the change? The change. I just have a rant. I don't, okay. You have to answer all these questions.

Just say the same. No, just say the shit. I'm not here for none of that bullshit. Go ahead. Rantz. Sasser Mac. Been holding this in for a long time.

I just think it's funny that every season with the Lakers, first of all, which is every season for him. It's just hate. It's just hate. All we have is hate. He's an easy target for whatever reason

because he wears a fur coat or whatever. You liked it when Magic did it, but when Kyle Kuzma, does it. You hate it. So I'm just saying there's hate, there's been hate, there's always been hate. People don't like the way he dresses. They say he's trash. He can't play defense. That he's, I don't know, what else? They just hate him. They call him all kinds of names on Twitter. They call him all kinds of names everywhere. Anytime there's anything about

Kyle Kuzma on the internet, you look in the comments. Go take a look in those comments. That's one of the most toxic waste areas of the internet. if you look on any comments section or replies of anything about Kyle Kuzma, you're going to find some homophobic comments. You're going to just find absolute, just toxic mess in those replies. For whatever reason, he really triggers NBA fans. He just triggers them. And I don't know what it is because I think that he is just super confident in himself

and the way that he knows he wants to dress. He knows what he likes. Bring the blonde hair back, please. Bring the blonde hair back. Bring it back. The blonde curls. We need it. We need it.

I just thought it. I just think it was so funny that like Lakers fans and everybody else were like, ha, ha. I'm like, Kyle Coos was going to the Wizards and the Wizards are going to be so trash because he's trash. And then now it's like they're doing pretty well. And he's actually like a decent, halfway decent player.

You know the Lakers could have used right now? Who could the Lakers could use right now, Sasha Mac? Who could the Lakers use right now? KCP. And Kyle Kuzma. Basically people they train it away. Really we need KCP.

All right. I really miss KCP. But no, Cal Kuzma is averaging 14 points, nine and a half rebounds, and two assists in the NBA, in a stacked and loaded Eastern Conference. There's no argument any longer

that he is a trash player. I don't want to see it. I don't want to hear it. Nobody ever said he was a star. Okay. Nobody ever said he was a star. I think he got a lot of hate because he was the only player that didn't get traded for Anthony Davis. And a lot of people were like, well, we want a brand of Aroom.

And it was like, well, the reason Brandon Aroom got traded is because he was the best player. And we were getting Anthony Davis back. So everybody just needs to get over that. And they just stopped making fun of Kyle Kuzma for having good fashion sense. I don't understand it. It seems like jealousy. It just seems like a lot of jealousy. It gives a model girlfriend.

I see that people are upset about this. I see it. So just accept the L. Calcizma's good. He's not going to be bad. He's good at defense now. Just get over it. That's my advice.

All right. Fair. Thanks, the worst thing that happened to Kyle Kuzma was that year when he came out, people projected him. It wasn't his fault. They projected him to be better than he

than he was ready to be consistently. Right? Does that make sense? Like, not even saying, like, he just, he was young. He wasn't ready to carry and play at that level all the time. And people wanted him to be, I don't know, whatever they wanted him to be right now. And he was on a terrible team. And so he was able to just go out and get 40.

It goes to my point. I make this point, no, real talk. People ask me this all the time about players on bad team scoring points. And my point is someone has to score the fucking points. So even on bad teams, someone is going to score a bunch of points. That doesn't mean that that player is a max player. It's just somebody got to score him damn points.

And so he was just a victim of, to your point, being on a bad team and the only success. Like, we see this on bad teams a lot. We talk ourselves into dudes and then we make them these unfair things about their judgment call. You know why Kyle Kutzman wasn't scoring 20 points a game on this team? Because he had LeBron James and AD to pass a two. Okay? Yeah. All right.

leave him alone. All right, I'm sorry. I just, you know, I feel you, Sasha. Like, I was just like, you know, kind of miss Kyle Kuzman. Like, you know what I mean? This is ambitious. He kind of looks out of place like, you know, like aesthetically. On the, on the Wizards, that's it.

He just looks out of place. I was like, what the fuck? He lives good in every jersey, good for him. I just think that for me, it's, I, half of me, like, wishes that he was going to go to, like, O.K. or something so that I could watch him get 40 again, because he does have. has like a really fun style

like on the court. He just he's just stylish. He likes to do ridiculous things. Like one thing I think, Raja that contributed to like everybody projecting him higher like and to be a better player is that he can make really, really tough shots. Like he'll

make basket and just like, like everybody goes nuts and it gets crazy because he's like on one foot falling backwards. Like one, you know, like doing crazy stuff and he can make that. and you just don't want that to be the shot. You know?

It's a tough shot maker. Stop taking those because they don't want that to be the shot, obviously. That's like Dion. It's like Dion Waiters. They make hell of tough shots, which would lead you to maybe speculate, oh, shit, if he can make that shot, he'll make a lot of shots every night when they're not that shot.

And sometimes it just doesn't pan out like that. And that's why, like, I think it's been tough. I think it's been tough for him because now he was on a Lakers team where like he accepted his role. and then he still got a bunch of hate from everybody. And it's like, isn't that what you're supposed to do? Is just accept your role? Like, he actually did that.

Like, Dion Weird is the whole thing about Deion We just that he didn't do that. That's not his personality. Kyle Kuzma, like, he literally did that. He did the thing you're supposed to do. He accepted his role and he worked on his defense. He worked on the fundamentals. He did everything right and still get mega fucking hate on the internet. Yeah.

I don't get it. I think that is that what we're talking about? As I were going to say, is that, like, the internet is just, okay, I don't want to go too far. Stay out of your, stay out of your mentions, bro. You can find anybody saying anything about anyone or anything on the internet. So, you know, like- You're triggering. Thank you, Sasha. You're triggering me right now.

Thank you so much, Sasha. Okay. Tal-Kuzma. Thank you so much, Sasha, man. All right. So tonight, let's get into some tonight's games. I am going to all my sacraments. Real On my Macramino real ones. I see you out there, bro.

I will be at the King's Son's game tonight, Roger. Uh-oh. That should be fun. I'm really excited to see this King's team up close because we both don't know what the fuck to expect from them. Yeah, I don't have a good beat on that. I'm going to find out. We're going to find out.

You're going to have to let me know. I'm going to watch two teams tonight that we have no idea what the fuck they're going to be in a week, two months, whatever. Do you like those? games, how do you feel about those games when you have no idea what to think about either one of these teams? Yeah, typically, I'm going to keep it a buck. Like, they interest me, but it's hard for me to, it's hard for me to stay interested, like, much past a quarter sometimes in games like that. Does that make sense? Yeah, sure. I don't, like, I mean, because I don't know that those storylines, like, I don't

want to invest so much in something that's not going to be there at the end. You know, like, I just talk about it for like a week and then it's going to go away. You know, so, like, if, I'm watching games the night, like I'm looking at it. I like, you know, Brooklyn and Chicago, those are two teams I'm going to be talking about. Like, those are teams we'll be talking about. The Brooklyn, I mean, the Knicks and the Sixers, two teams are talking about. You know what I'm saying? So, like, I probably watch those.

Charlotte L.A. Charlotte Lakers, man. Yeah, word, right, right, right. You know what? You can feel me. I feel the vibes. But you also said, as Sasha Mack also pointed out, you did say that you pointed out, the Kings would be sneaky good this year, and now you're not invested. So all our Macramento fans, all our Sacramento fans, hashtag, what the fuck, Roger? No, I can't.

Wait, wait. That's some bullshit. Like, I could say they're going to be sneaky good. That don't mean I want to be tuned in every night to lodge. And we're five and five and eight, baby. Let us live. Well, we're good. We're good, man.

The fact that the kings are five and five. Shout out to the kings, man, just for even getting there, baby. All right, man. We have some real ones. I was briefly at the Warriors Rockets, very briefly, very briefly. We've got some real ones fans there Like hey real ones So if anybody want to say

Any of our sack fans Want to say what's up man I'll hollered me I'll see y'all tonight man But that was another edition Of real ones Make sure you check us out Every Mondays and Thursdays

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