The Ringer NBA Show - Cleveland's Very Bad Week, Trade Rumors, and Marveling at the Spurs | Group Chat (Ep. 198)

Episode Date: January 25, 2018

The Ringer's Chris Ryan and Justin Verrier are joined by Kevin O'Connor to talk about the Celtics snapping their four-game losing streak and Kyrie Irving stepping into the role of team spokesperson (2:40), Ben Simmons's developing talent (6:25), and the multitude of rumors circling the Cavs (11:55). Then, they speculate about the "best version" of the Blazers (30:05), Spurs (39:00), Bucks (44:00), and more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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The Raptors are the best team in the East. Phil Jackson actually saved the Knicks. Mark L. Fultz will be an all-star next year. Basketball is very good. Hello. Welcome to The Ringer NBA show. This is group chat. My name is Chris Ryan.

I am joined by Justin Verrier. Hello. And making, I think, is group chat debut. He seems excited about it. Kevin O'Connor. I watch you guys every week. He wrote a day. He watches every week. Yeah, it's like ER.

What's up, Kevin? Welcome to Los Angeles. Welcome to group chat. As always, this is our informal discussion of Los Angeles Ringer Office Denzians about the world of the NBA. And the thing is that today we could just do the same show we would have done yesterday and the same show we would have done on Tuesday, which is that the calves are in turmoil, that the calves are about to trade for George Hill, that the calves were going to try. and mix it up a little bit.

The trade deadline is approaching. So we're going to discuss where some of these teams that are like on the brink of are we good or not, what are they going to do? Are they the best version of themselves? We're going to play a game called the best version of me a little later. We want to go through a little bit of quote unquote news. Obviously, like the big thing is the All Star game and the All Star Reserves draft that's happening today by the time you hear this podcast, it will probably already either have occurred

or have been leaked by Wojj. I'm not sure which one happened. The conference call. Or Shams. Yeah, right. I have to tell you that after about 10 days of thinking about this, I'm officially done thinking about it. I love it. You do love it.

I'm still into it because I just want to see how the team shake out. I think they're going to be nothing like we expected. The draft itself I'm interested in, the actual guys getting upset about not being all-stars. I'm like, I watched the NBA to escape from my life not to be reminded of like petty disagreements and grievances. Yeah, well, at the same time, that's pretty much all we're interested in with NBA too. That's true. That's true. No, today we're only going to talk about the hawk set and pin down screens. What a hedge.

What a hedge. We got to get through a couple of pieces of news, though. Boston last night beat the Clippers ending their little mini swoon. Tumultuous. Yeah. What's the matter in Boston? With a team meeting, too. Yeah, well, that's what we want to talk about.

They lost four in a row. They beat the Clippers one, 13, 102, which is good because now they have to go play the Warriors. Al Horford out with the concussion, his third in two years. Not good. Not at all. Especially with how long the first one kept them out. Yeah, and they had a team meeting in between their two LA games. They lost the Lakers, they beat the Clippers.

And this was what Kyrie said about team meetings. Team meetings, it happens all the time. You could call every time we meet a team meeting. Okay. And throughout your professional career, there are going to be times when you're tested. And for us, it was things that we control and everyone being great at their role and us collectively coming together. Even better as a group, that's Coach Taylor, Kyrie Irving. Seems like it worked.

For some reason, this Boston team, it reminds me a lot of San Antonio, where I'm like, there is no sense, I don't ever get a sense of turmoil because of the management structure that they have there. Yes, this is very much bizarreo, Cleveland, is what they've established,

and especially with Kyrie going there. The metaphor kind of makes sense there. I do find Kyrie's quote to be very agreeable, simply because it does seem like we're at the point now where media is looking for these type of things, any sort of blip on the radar gets reported by a woe or shams.

Maybe that we're making too big of a deal out of it. Obviously, they didn't have Al Horford. And obviously, they kind of figure things out on the fly. I'm looking at them right now. It just seems like few minor tweaks is really all they really need. Jason Tatum took as many shots as Kyrie. I think that's more interesting going forward than anything they had, maybe chemistry-wise. Kev, it's interesting to see Kyrie as the spokesman.

This is sort of what he wanted, right? Like, it's interesting to see him be the guy who's like, I'm going to go to the media and I'm going to be the person who says nothing to see here, which is what you kind of want from your team leader, right? For sure. And I think Kyrie said something a couple weeks back or maybe a month or so back where he talked about setting the tone, right? Like setting an example.

And I took it personally, you know, as kind of like a thought like, well, they were back in Cleveland, the leader there doesn't set a tone defensively. You know, he's laxatatical on that end. And whereas Kyrie had his best defensive season of his career, setting that tone, setting that positive tone for the team. And I wonder if maybe that's something that he's tried to do this season, whereas in the past, he wasn't the guy who had to set that tone. He wasn't the guy who had to stand in front of the media and talk about team meetings

and all the problems happening. So that seems like he's embracing it. And he's doing a job with it. These West Coast trips are always a challenge. Teams who are relying on young players are going to get some inconsistent performances. And they don't have, I mean, we were screaming at each other about Al Horford's all-star credentials or at least his all-star starter credentials earlier in the week. but he's probably their most important player.

Sure. You know what I mean? They can get offense from a lot of different places. They can get offense from any given guy on a given night. He is the anchor of that entire team on both ends of the floor in a lot of ways. We bring up the Bulls a lot, especially I do, just because it seems pretty similar. It's almost like a more modern version.

They're definitely a little bit more dynamic, definitely younger than that Derek Rose Bulls team. Yeah, yeah. But everything really starts with the defense. They're still number one on defense overall this season. And as long as Al Horford isn't concussed and is peck. are just sterling. Yeah. And his eyes.

Sparkling. Very nice eyes. Yeah. I think everything works well. I think, like I said before, it is interesting to see some of the young guys how they're going to develop over this next end, even though Gordon Hayward, I don't know if you guys saw, taking some jump shots from viewpoint land. Yeah.

Well, most of us do. Gordon Hayward on one leg, having not played a minute of meaningful basketball this year, it looks better than Mark L. Fultz right now. Speaking of Mark Hill Fultz, speaking of him, so he could always come back. Yeah, that's true. Ben Simmons. I have it written down here, Ben Simmons is God. 19.17 boards,

14 assists last night against the Bulls. I like watching games when, especially on a player's ascendance in their first few years of the season where you catch them in a game and you're like, oh, you're the best guy on the floor.

Best guy on the floor on both teams. That happened a lot with Janus in his second season where you started watching him. You're like, oh man, this guy's going to be really special. Ben, it's like, I can't believe he's not in his fifth year. The way he sees the game, game. The lack of emotion, I think, and the sort of sometimes personality vacancy that happens with him is like a knock that maybe sometimes makes him not a lovable player. But I don't know

if I've ever been more impressed with a rookie in recent years. Just watching him control a game like this. His instincts are just elite already, right? And I mean, there was a play at the end of last night's game. I think it was his last points that he scored where he grabbed an offensive rebound at the top of the key. And as he's grabbing the offensive board, he's going into a spin move behind the back as it's happening because he's able to feel the defense and read the defense when everything's going crazy. I mean, his ability to read the floor and see the floor and pass open teammates is really in

the upper percentile of NBA players and he's only 21 years old already. Yeah, one of the things I think we were most struck by when he first started when he started the season and he kind of took off was that issue really didn't seem to be a problem. Yeah. that he was able to use his body and be kind of more crafty, more physical to overcome that. I think he hit a bit of a wall later on in the season. Right, because it started to become an issue. Like three months in, it was the most basketball he's ever played.

Right. Yeah. Right. Yeah. This is about the time when, like, a college season would end. Yeah. It seems like he's hitting another, getting a second wind or whatnot. I mean, one thing I had been thinking about, which I think is interesting, is, do you think

we would appreciate him more if he didn't make such an effort to label himself a point guard? Like, if he was more of LeBron and he almost, like, messaged himself. as a forward. Sure. Do you think that we would say like, oh my God. Okay, so the flip side of that is would his shooting be even more agree? Would this lack of shooting be even more egregious in this 2018 NBA? Can you be a three who can't even, doesn't even attempt three-pointers?

Honestly, I'm at the point. When I hear the words point guard, power forward, I just hear white noise. It just, it doesn't mean anything, you know, today's positionless game. I mean, with his shooting, I think it's a problem no matter what position you play, and less like you are specifically or, you know, a rebounding, defensive-oriented center. And even then it could potentially be an issue depending on the team.

It is a problem. Let's interrogate that a little bit. Who are we talking about? We have Ben playing on the Sixers. You've got Janus on the Bucks and you've got LeBron on the Cavs. Who are some other teams that are basically doing away with positions, letting someone unconventional run their offense? Can you think of any?

Because I wonder what. Blake, to a certain extent. But Milos, I mean, I think they're at their best when Milos is kind of in there, kind of moving the ball. It is a rarity still. There's a lot of teams that, I mean, you could look at Boston as well. You know, Kyrie's the point guard, right? But at the same time, Al Horford brings the ball up a lot.

They allow virtually anybody who gets the offensive board. The Warriors, Draymond Green. Right. You know, I mean, he's more the point guard than Stefan Curry, right? That's where for me, it's like positions. I mean, I don't know if there's a better way to label players to put them like into categories, but the way it's done now, there are no positions. Well, I guess the thing we're saying here is with LeBron

and LeBron couldn't really shoot when he first got into the league either, but I think what you're talking about is, are we, do we let the fact that he's like, aren't I great as a point guard, impact the way we view Ben? Right, right. You know, rather than if he was a small forward who couldn't shoot but could pass his ass off,

would he be evaluated differently? Right, because I was just looking at his numbers the other day when we were going over All-Star stuff, and you look at his shooting percentage, his shot percentage and his profile almost looks like a center because he shoots poorly from free throw, but he shoots above 50% from the floor. I wonder if we viewed him through a different lens, if we'd almost appreciate it. If he was more, if there was no Joel Embed and he played nominal five,

would we say, oh my God, look at this center who's just able to create. Would he be more Yokic-esque? Yeah, I mean, I think that there's a couple. That's a good point. I think that we were talking a little bit before the podcast about what's going to happen with him, assuming the Sixers make it into the playoffs. Do you think that this, his, you know, he's shooting 50% effective field goal percenters essentially, but he's only shooting 56% from the line.

So do we start seeing more hackaben? Do we start seeing guys sag even more off of pick and rolls with him? What is, what is the late season Ben Simmons look like? I think for Ben Simmons, it's going to be a wake-up call. Like, oh, dang, I do have to add a jump shot. Otherwise, in the games that actually matter, you're going to be limited. When it turns into a half-court game, when you're not able to get those easy transition chances when defenses are really locked in and game planning for you. Jonas and Serge Abaka are a way for you in the lane for four games in a row or whatever yet.

It's going to be a problem for him in the playoffs. I think he's an unbelievable player. But which speaks to how great he could potentially be if he does eventually become, even just an average shooter. Like you said, LeBron was a below average shooter early in his career. Janus is a below average shooter now. If he can even just get to that level, think about what it does for his game. Never mind if he becomes good. He just needs to be average, below average, and that opens things up for him.

You've written about shooting mechanics before. Do you see any evidence that Benzeman could ever be a threat? He shoots with the wrong hands. Yes, that's right. That was the setup for the spike. Ringer NBA podcast would not be complete without talking at least 20% of the time about the Cavs. And why not? I mean, they keep giving a storyline.

So we are waiting for this George Hill's trade that could go through while we're recording or before this goes up. it was supposedly on the one yard line Wind Horse was on Zach Lowe yesterday and said a couple of things that didn't get foregrounded a lot which was like why hasn't it gone through yet and they're doing their due diligence and Hill has had a lot of chronic some injuries like toe injury I think

and I think the last thing the Cavs need is another guy who immediately comes in and needs to be rehabbed so we're waiting for that trade to happen And we also just got news that Tailu is going to drop Jay Crowder from the starting lineup and replace them with Tristan Thompson. So that's going to happen. I guess to give them some defensive fortitude in the first unit. I'm not really sure what that answer is, which kind of also brings us to another piece of Cavs news, albeit pretty rumor mongering,

is that Stephen A. Smith said that Dan Gilbert is looking to sell the Cavs. Sure. Not a good sign if you're LeBron James. Or is it? Yeah. Is the pathway to LeBron buying the calves the way to keep LeBron in Cleveland? I love this theory because this is basically kind of the foundation of my LeBron to the Knicks kind of fever dream. Right.

Is that sell at least a little part of it to LeBron's crew. And then from there, he can kind of eventually go into his retirement with a piece of the scene. It reminds me of a story that last summer, for some reason, just flew way under the radar. Dan Patrick said that LeBron tried to get Dan Gilbert to switch ownership with Detroit Pristons. That was a story nobody really talked about because it was during the finals that Dan Patrick said this on the air. And he cited someone with firsthand knowledge of it.

And if that's true, you know, if LeBron pushed for Dan Gilbert to sell switch teams with the Pistons, maybe there's something to this. Yeah. Maybe Dan Gilbert is open to it or something like that. But at the same time, you're going to sell, like it has to be with LeBron and the team. Otherwise, if he leaves, you're not going to get the same amount of money for the team.

It's the ultimate chess move in some ways because if Dan Gilbert has a Cleveland team and by all accounts, like, it was in that Cleveland casino right near the queue and relies heavily on high attendance at the queue and like people coming to see LeBron and all that stuff. if LeBron leaves and the team creators, theoretically that would also have a bad impact on some of his other assets as a businessman. If LeBron stays, everything's good. But what LeBron now has is the leverage to say,

well, you have to sweeten the pot beyond just a contract because clearly this isn't going right in Cleveland, but I think that there is something to watch there about, I do think LeBron is thinking about the third act of his career. I think LeBron is thinking about post-basketball now. And being the owner of the Cavs would certainly be quite the last chapter for him and all the guys he grew up with in Akron and that crew of guys like Rich and Maverick to take over an NBA team in their home state would be an incredible story. Right. And that's why the Lakers are rumored,

right? Because he has so many business interests in L.A. I do think it's interesting. I've been a little critical of LeBron, of CEO LeBron, and kind of how that's affected maybe some of the moves the tabs amaze on the moves that he has made. I can see it from his side now, where Dan Gilbert, classic rich white male is basically like, well, I'm going to get out of here before my asset tax. Yeah, exactly. And maybe he even keeps the casino and LeBron takes, let's say LeBron theoretically takes

over, he would make even more money. And what you said about, you know, LeBron thinking about ownership, that is the plan. Yeah. That is the plan. Like, it's not just rumor that is the plan for LeBron. Like, he wants to go into ownership. KD's over here like, yeah, I would like one too, please. in December I thought LeBron was going on the MVP

and I thought he was going to resign with Cleveland for another two-year deal. It just looked like he was really engaged. It looked like he had, he looked highly motivated. The prospect of Isaiah coming back seemed to be like, and then we're going to get Isaiah back and we're going to really make a run at this thing. And we still have this Brooklyn pick and Kevin Love was playing well, obviously enough to, well enough to make the All-Star team. And just in the last three weeks,

and especially in that San Antonio game, he just looks completely switched off and disengaged. Now, that's not something, maybe that's something a two-week vacation in Miami could fix. I have no idea. But it just seems like you can never really count on the future with him because you just never know what the status of the team is, where the state of his, where his head is at.

Yeah. He's completely flipped the dynamics where it seems like not only in the off-season, not only in the personnel moves that you make, you have to kind of piece him more than anything, but even in the regular season, as you were saying, It almost feels like he wants a roster constructed specifically for him to take off certain days. But it has to be kind of crazy because he keeps, it's not like he has been denied that, right? Like on Wendy, on the Zach Lopod, Windhorst was like LeBron is mad because LeBron feels like he should be playing on a team with Eric Bledsoe and Paul George.

That those trades were available, that Kyrie for Eric Bledsoe is available and that some trade for Paul George, whether it was the Phoenix pick for Kyrie that wound up being Josh Jackson or just straight up trading Kevin Love to the Pacers for Paul George, that that was on the table and that Gilbert messed it up by either getting rid of Griffin or not being able to complete the deal himself. But, you know, LeBron gets what LeBron wants at the end of the day. Duane Wade is on the caps. You know what I mean?

These guys, like the veteran team, this is the team that he wants to play with. He doesn't want to play with kids. He doesn't want to play with guys he doesn't like or doesn't know. And this is where we're at. He always gets what he wants. He got Thompson paid, he got J.R. Smith paid. And it's interesting now, like with what Windhorst said yesterday,

everything that's been reported about LeBron's thoughts, you know, about what he's going to do, points in the direction of either leaving or going to make the ultimate chest move and, like, ask for a piece of ownership or something like that. You know, before the season, Chris Haynes had the report that LeBron won't waive his no trade clause, which kind of puts it in Cleveland, like when people were saying, oh, well, should they trade them? Right. And it's like, no, that was silly. And then Mav Carter went on Rich Eisen, and he said there, oh, yeah, LeBron, it's only about winning, right?

That's the only thing he cares about is winning. But then all the stuff lately with going for George Hill, needing more, you know, a prominent player in the Cavaliers locker room, you know, saying that they need more than yesterday being, you know, saying unhappy that ain't got Georgia but. So all of it points in the same direction. Right. And I find that fascinating, how LeBron is a master at kind of setting the narrative.

I think, I don't know if it's for his own interest, but it sets it in a way where it sets up the next step for him, whatever it is. I think it would be really great at the first. prominent player turned out to be Kyle Corver this whole time. Well, it does sound like from reports today, there was a thing in the New York Daily News that one of the major instigators against Love, the person who was most keyed in on this idea that Kevin Love bounced from the Oklahoma game because he was sick and just left the

arena and then missed practice next day was Isaiah Thomas. Which is crushing. Because I showed you the photo the other day when they were like 10 years old hanging out in Seattle. Just like, just good friends, better enemies. It is also, you and I were talking about this. I really like Isaiah Thomas's game, but Isaiah Thomas

has had a couple of burn bridges and teams past. Whether Isaiah is saying they didn't treat me right or the team being like, we're not too sad to see Isaiah go. Everybody was like, how did Sacramento trade this guy, how to Phoenix trade this guy when he was on Boston? I don't know. I mean, a guy who's clearly playing at like 60%

is a terrible defender, and the team is pretty much nosedive since you got back in the lineup. I wouldn't necessarily be like, Kevin Love's not allowed to have the flu. Are you saying that a guy that hangs out routinely with Floyd Mayweather might have some compromising behaviors? I think with Isaiah, I mean, I don't know if I totally buy, I mean, that it was just him.

Sure, sure. I buy everything else that's saying it was everybody pointing to figure out everybody else. You know, maybe Isaiah and love what the two main culprits people were talking about, right? But this is the thing with these veteran teams, and when you get guys who are sort of, not ring chasing, but if you've got Derek Rose and you got like all the guys are old in the last three to five years of their career and are essentially only interested in a ring and aren't interested in doing all the stuff

that we talk so much about in the NBA, which is like this culture setting and planning for the future, bringing in young guys developing a Cavs Way. There is no Cavs Way. There is no Cavs Way. There is LeBron and whether or not all the guys in that room are getting along with LeBron.

It is interesting, though, because I think all of the moves that they made this offseason were bad. And it's not only that LeBron and his guys that he brought in some of his friends haven't worked out. Twainwades looked good at times but also the Brooklyn pick trade that was a complete mis-evaluation not only for Jay Crowder

and not only... Didn't see Dinwiddie coming. But like, don't you have a projection model that shows that the Nets might be like pretty decent next year? Yeah. Well, everybody this summer when... Wait, who has a projection model? Well, Dan Gilbert.

Driffon might have. Yeah, exactly. And Kobe Altman probably doesn't. So, I mean, like, when they made that trade, there was no GM. Yeah. Everybody this summer, like when we, like me and Bill on the potter, like, then that's could be solid.

They could be solid. Everybody's like, oh, no, it's, you know, they're going to be horrible. It's like, no, they don't need a tank. But, dude, and even in the NBA circles, like, guys were like Kenny Atkinson is that guy. Exactly. I owe my career. Like, people were freaking out about Kenny Ackinson, and they play basketball in a way that's going to give them a chance. And they were going for it.

They have no reason to bottom out. That puts them above, like, at least six teams. And they have that huge nobody believes in this thing. We want to take a quick. break to hear from our sponsors. We're going to come back and talk a little bit more about the Cavs on a tactical level in a game we call the best version of me. We'll be right back at a sec. Today's episode of The Ringer NBA show is brought to you by Hotel Tonight. Fun fact, unlike flights or other travel, hotel rates actually get cheaper at the last minute. In fact,

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a New Jersey state chartered commercial bank restrictions apply for details. Visit upstart.com slash NBA show. Okay, guys, I want to play a little game. There's no winner in this game. It's just a conversation. But I want to play a game called The Best Version of Me. We've been talking a lot over on Ringer FC

and writing pieces on the Ringer this year about how Manchester City is driven everybody insane in the Premier League. They basically won the league before Christmas they had it sewn up and all these rich teams managed by huge managers have started to basically crack up because they're like the pressure of I we weren't good enough this year and we already know it and we have all this runway to look at it has made everybody a little bit nuts and I think that there's a little bit of that happening in the NBA right now where the warriors are so far and away better I mean

Rockets fans chill out but like the warriors are the class of the league and have been for the last few years that teams that are like in any other era we might have a shot, and we don't now. You know, we don't as long as Steph, Katie, and Draymond are playing at this level. So what is the best version of these teams? Because the best, you know, obviously their goals are to win the finals. But what I'm really curious about is what should Cleveland really realistically be expecting from the guys they have assembled or from the guys that they want to bring in? So I just want to ask a few questions about this.

Like they're moving Tristan to the starting lineup. Kevin, what does that do for their... What's the difference in the way Cleveland was playing basketball earlier in the season to wait, they could be playing basketball now if they move Tristan into the starting line? I think on paper, at least. I mean, we'll see how Tristan Thompson still, you know, gets back from that calf injury he had early in the season.

But on paper, it should help their interior defense. I mean, it's just a revolving door. But the thing is, is sometimes your best room protection is on the perimeter, not in the interior. So Thompson could help even if he gets back to 100%, but that still doesn't change the problems on the problem. perimeter because if you're allowing that penetration inside, that's going to give you issues even if you have Rudy Gobert back there. Right. And I assume they made this change going into the season,

because they don't want Kevin Love chasing around some of those stretch fours. I wonder how long this is going to last because of this. It almost strikes me as a move to kind of like reclaim the glory of the year that they beat the Warriors in the finals. Yeah. Like we really mucked it up. We had Tristan in there kind of grabbing every rebound, Love played fine on defense enough to win us that series. And it's kind of a reach here, especially because they don't have Isaiah playing the Kyrie role, because he's just not where Kari is. Maybe Thompson's more comfortable in that

starting role, too. I mean, ideally any guy can come off the bench and, you know, four minutes left in the game and get hot, you know, and feel good. But some guys, like Thompson, maybe he's better starting, right? Whereas Jay Crowder has some experience coming off the bench. But even, you know, Jay could be negatively affected too. Yeah, I was going to ask you, you're someone

who saw Jay a lot in Boston, and you've mentioned before that he's a sensitive soul, right? Yeah, he likes a start. I mean, I I mean, it's not often you hear a player come out and complain when, you know, fans cheer for, you know, an opposing player. It was just an odd thing for him individually to come out and that's when they cheered for Gordon Hayward. Justin, I take your point about trying to get back to this imaginary that's Cavs basketball, you know, and play bully ball and have it be LeBron with big guys down low and everything.

But when they played their best this season, albeit against lesser competition in that December run that they had, it was with Kevin Love at the 5 and it was with no Isaiah Thomas. And I mean, you know, Isaiah, the seal is broken. They can't put him back on the bench now. But I do think that there's an argument to be made

to bring Isaiah off the bench as a spark plug offensive player. Whether or not that goes down well with Isaiah, who's also in a contract year, he's losing money every game as it goes now. So I can't get worse, right? We talked to Kevin and I just briefly, but like what is Isaiah?

day as next contract going to look like. Is he going to be a veteran minimum guy going forward simply because of the hip injury? I would push back slightly on your point about just the team being better with Kevin Love with the 5. I think they were at their best when LeBron was playing insane. When he was shooting threes better than he ever had, when he was shooting free throws better than he ever had. And so I might suggest that their best version is to get rid of most of these guys. Trade Kevin Love, trade everything that you have and try to build an entirely new team around LeBron. Yeah. So get DeAndre Jordan. Maybe try to to swing a trade with Kevin love to get some spare pieces, maybe like an Aaron Gordon, maybe some guys from the Pistons,

bring in George Hill and effectively put three, four new guys in that starting lineup. And then if he leaves, just starting a new. It would be unprecedented for a team to have this kind of overhaul. The Sixers did that, like, Van Horn from Mutumbo trade in 01. All mid-season. Yeah, the Pistons brought him Wallace in 2004 and essentially won the title with his rival, right? I don't remember anything where a team would trade like three-fits of their starting lineup. So if you got rid of... I mean, honestly, it sounds like to me, if they can get anything for Isaiah Thomas right now,

they should investigate that. Because his return to the starting lineup and his return his arrival as a vocal member of this team does not seem to have had a positive effect. What are you going to get, though? I mean, he had no value this summer. None. He might be just expiring.

What is he... Exactly. And that does have value. Right. With the way the nature of the cap now flattening out, perhaps there is value. then his cap number is still only seven right so that's not going to get you it's not like it's a 17 million dollar expiring we're going to bring in you know star player you still need a package him with up pieces and it's a shame that we're talking about Isaiah like like yeah you know just one year ago think about the conversation with him like whoa MVP candidate even though he really

wasn't you know the fact is we still finish fifth one of the teams that's been mentioned a little bit in rumors as a partner with cleveland for trades uh whether it would be Kevin love going out or whether it would just be that Channing Fry, Amon Shumper, nothing burger that they keep saying. It seems to be like worth, worth anything right now. For boogie. Is Portland.

Now, Zach and Brian had talked a lot about, like, whether or not a love I'm coming home move could be made here. I would not do Cleveland the favor of trading them, C.J. McCollum. You know, like, that was, they were trying to work out a love and McCollum and get swapped deal in somewhere in there. But Portland's a really interesting team. Last week, apparently, Damien Lillard had a meeting with Paul Allen, the team owner to sort of reaffirm, quote-unquote, his commitment to the team, but also ask about the direction and let it be known that he was still pissed off that they got rid of Wolbarton. Because it was like the exact kind of player that they need to have.

We talked a little bit about this when we did the live show after Spurs Cavs, I think. Portland's a really interesting case where they had so many interesting pieces for a couple of years. and I was like, what's Portland going to do with all these interesting guys? Like all these stretchy, interesting dudes they've drafted and have developed and they play in this cool offense by Terry Stotz. And now they have a bunch of guys who are just like, okay. It turns out that those guys were just okay. And that Ed Davis and Aminu and all these dudes are just okay

and that Myers-Lennard is not really okay at all. And what are they going to do? They basically have three good players. They have Nurkich, Lillard, and McCollum. Yeah, they're basically a poor man's version of Boston. Yeah. Where it's like, Olshe has set himself up as this kind of traitor Neil. Right.

much like Danny Ains, just always in asset accumulation mode. And he went as far as bringing a lot of guys back on a lot of bad contracts under the assumption that he could eventually trade them. Now it just so happens that the cap spike, it looks way worse in retrospect. And now they're stuck in the middle here. And now you're starting to hear rumors about, hey, what if Neil L. Shea goes before this past off season goes to the Lakers GM? What if he goes back to the Clippers and does that? And I know you start to see what happens when you play for the game. the middle.

Yeah. And this is the problem, not only in the NBA as a whole, but in this era where the worries are so. So do you think Olshey's idea was I'm going to have all these guys who are valuable in today's NBA, rangy shooters, at least like they track as people who could be taught. Like a Vonley type. Yeah, exactly. And then when it's time, when Paul George comes up, when one of these guys is available,

I'm the guy who can say, here, I'll send you a quarter of my roster, you know, for for a star player. I'm available. What assets? Was that the plan? I don't know. I mean, I don't know. Or did they think Ed Davis and Aminu were going to get them to the top part of the rest of the Congress?

Perhaps like you're hoping those guys make some, you know, they develop some. I mean, in terms of Damien Lillard, it's interesting. He mentions Will Barton, you know, because they paid a Will Barton comparable in Evan Turner, $17 million annually. Yes. And Evan Turner, maybe not better than Will Barton. I mean, depending on the type of player you want, Will Barton is certainly a better scorer, right? And Evan Turner has not come close to meeting expectations in Portland,

especially for the money. So it's like he had to do something. He had to add some guys, but some of those guys he added and paid turns out to be mistakes. Well, yeah, I don't think he made a bad move per se. I think if you were looking at the GM handbook, they would say, don't lose an asset for nothing. Get guys on good contracts. Those are the guys you can always trade. Aminu is a good contract. I love that signing. Ed Davis is a fine player on a good contract. But it just so happens that one, he did some of those moves during the cap spike. And the other one is just like, I don't know if any of these guys really ascended while under Terry Stotz's kind of overview. And so because of that, we say all that, they worked the wolves last night at home

and the third quarter where they scored, I believe, 43 points, Damian Liller called it their best quarter in two years. And I watched that third quarter. And I watched it also against the third quarter that they had played a few weeks before in Minnesota against the same team. And it was like a college football game. It was like one of those things where you see a team playing at home and you're like, this team could win the finals. And then you see them play in Minnesota and you're like, oh, these guys like are probably a lottery team, right? And the complete, the difference really was that offense was generating so much energy running downhill at home. I felt like everything that all the threes, all the movement had so much more momentum at, at the Rose Garden or whatever they call that place, but like in Portland, then they did on the road. And I wonder for you, Kevin, when you watch Portland, who have become more known for their defense this year

than that, that thick Terry Stott's playbook that's supposed to have so many cool plays, what do you think that they can hope for with this roster that they have? What's the best version of them? You know, that's a tough part with them, right? You know, Mark Stein speculated that they'll split up Lillard and McCollum. And, you know, that's something, you know,

we talked about last year on the ringer.com where it's like, what is your upside with that bat court, right? They're not good defensively with those guys, but at the same time they've been better. A backward that they're paying almost $60 million. It's tempting to stick with that. But at the same time, like you talk about McCollum versus Love, I'm not doing that on Portland.

I'm not because Love isn't helping your defense either. If you're trading McCollum, I think it needs to be for a guy who better complements Damien Lillard in terms of defense but also contributing offensively. I don't think a McCollum for Love trade gets them any better. It might even get them worse because, as you mentioned, the firepower that they had in that third quarter is remarkable. I think trading one of those guys might be what it takes to get them to the next level.

But the question is, is really what's out there for it? It's hard to find a trade for McCollum. Like, it sucks, but what about McCollum for Tobias Harris and Avery Bradley? With the assumption that you re-sign Avery? I don't know. I don't know if it puts them any closer to what they're going for there. And isn't Tobias Harris, like, aren't you surprised that he isn't already on the Blazers

given like, oh, yeah, maybe Tobias Harris? They didn't get mellow, so they might as well get diet mellow. Yeah, right. And Avery's still a small guard, right? I mean, he's a great defender, but he's still small. I mean, if you can find a wing who's versatile, you know, long, able to defend up the forwards and wings and guards, then that's what you're looking for, but those guys are hard to find. It's just interesting with a team like that and a lot of teams kind of in the middle here,

you're almost asking them to just pull up the guts of who they are. It's what you were just saying about Cleveland. Yeah, it's really... This is the thing that I'm talking about. It's like, are we losing it a little bit? Because our concept of competing is distorted so much by the warriors. and to some extent the Rockets, and to some extent, Cleveland itself. Sure.

You were like, oh, yeah, let's just rip up this awesome backcourt. You know where the mistake might have been made when they traded 15 and 20 for 10, and they took Zach Collins, rather than Mitchell, you know, rather than even Bam, Adabio, who some teams did like in that range, Bam. I heard Charlotte was looking at him before the Dwight Howard trade, so he could have gone 11, bam. So maybe at 10. Maybe that was just like, if Charlotte's looking at this guy, we should run in the other direction.

Jimmy Butler laughing at Zach Collins on the bench the other day Charlotte liked Mitchell too and that was from before the draft They liked Mitchell But I think Monk when he fell This type of thing Well can't pass up on Monk

Need a high volume shooting Shooting Guard That's going well for them Yeah right Okay so currently Portland are They are seventh in the west They've won six out of their last 10 They have a positive point differential

But do you see this a team that could get up to fifth, or is the top five teams, the Thunder, the Wolves, the Spurs, the Rockets, and Warriors, are they starting to separate themselves a little bit for you? Separating themselves? Yeah, I mean, I think those teams are on another level, those top five. You think the Pelicans can get in there.

Six right now. Six right now. They're kicking ass. They have two of the best 10 players in the freaking league. They are, this is like the... All-Star starters? Yeah, and they are the... They're like... I love that they, they, like, this is the best that we could do. We could get these two guys. and we signed a bunch of dudes that they want to play with

because that's like, you know, Jemir and Rondo or whoever else. A bunch of Kentucky guys. Yeah, and they are busting ass every night. And like sometimes DeMarcus gives up and sometimes like brow gets hurt and sometimes they just get worked. But man, like on any given night, they are in any given night team. Like at any given night,

that Pelicans could be almost anyone. And last night was a perfect example because they pretty much hung around with Charlotte. The team that we just talked about is not having much of anything. and they almost lost that game. It came down to the wire. They just need to be a little bit better than they've been before, and that's going to make the difference

between being a bottom seat and being maybe like a four or five seed. Isn't it amazing how close they are yet, how far they are? Yeah, you know? Always. You can say about them for the past four years. It's something else.

In that little zone there, that three, I can't say seven, but that three to six zone is the spot where I feel like we're going to get an upset in the playoffs. An upset, like a lower seed could be. So whether it's just the third, thunder beat the wolves or the wolves beat the thunder depending on who's where but the pelicans and the spurs

and i wanted to talk about the spurs now because the spurs are in a real weird like you know you watch them against cleveland they just that's just like the san antonio business card man like they just with with bertans and murray starting for the first time in his career and joffrey and all these guys and they're still whipping the ball around and they're still running their stuff and they're still defending they're the number one defense defensive rating at last time i checked nba.com And yet, no star player, Kauai Leonard, out, indefinitely grumblings about some problems there, but I think that that's a little bit overblown.

And what is this season for the Spurs? Is this a season of transition secretly, of getting guys like Murray ready to play ball? I think it turned into that when Kauai didn't play. I think it's the rise of Big Bert here. He's really kind of come on. Sick. Yes, he's very good.

That's the thinking man's marketing right there. Right, and Dejante's the type of guy. I can't remember them ever having. He's a young American dynamic kind of athlete point guard. And I feel like that could be a game changer for them, especially with Tony Parker kind of going out to pasture. When they drafted him, I was in the middle of recording a video at TD Garden at the NBA draft party that night.

Like it was announced on the big screen as we were recording. I remember looking up while recording the video hearing the Jean-Dé Mori, drafted by the Spurs. And I was both at the same time surprised and also unsurprised in the sense that he's not their type of player. and yet the fact is he's exactly the type of guy who slipped the 30th

who some projected as a lottery player who the Spurs could take his weaknesses and turn him into strengths and that's exactly what they're starting to do Yeah they basically put him in bubble wrap first season. He went in the perfect situation for his game I mean some of the weaknesses he had at Washington

inefficient scoring unable to score from outside poor decision making you know inconsistent effort those aren't issues as much now We haven't seen it The Spurs haven't had an athlete at point guard like him in a long time and watching him D up LeBron at various points in that Cavs game,

I was just like, this is incredible. Like, they have, if they do get Kauai back at something like 100%, like that's a scary team. Yeah. I remember watching him early on in the season, his rebounding numbers were just off the charts for a point card. It's like, how does this even happen? And it's also interesting watching some of their older guys.

He was grabbing boards over Kevin Love. Like he grabbed that one off the free throw off of the front of them. It's very long. Yeah. Yeah. And it's crazy watching it come out of the line up. Yeah. I just love watching some of their older guys come in and out of the lineup and just kill it.

Like, in the third quarter, and they were playing Memphis, and I don't know what Marcosol is doing these days. He's barely even trying, but he had like an almost triple double in the third quarter. I was like, what is going on here? And it's the dependability of guys like Powell and knowing you can get 23 to 26 points a night from Lamarcus, that allows them to play, to be risky with some of their other personnel decisions because they have that baseline of performance from their veterans.

And if they get the kind of night they got from Tony Parker against Cleveland going forward, like that's a real thing. For sure. And I think with Parker coming off the bench, it's an interesting little wrinkle for that team. You know, you're maybe extending his career a little bit by putting him off the bench, you know, having him come out against bench guys. I think that's the formula for that moving forward. And it'll be interesting to see with Parker what happens moving forward. I mean, I know like we're talking about this season, what's the best version of these teams. But I'm always thinking forward with the summer decisions to come for better or for worse. And with Parker, it'll be interesting seeing him in that bench on how he develops and how much.

Murray gets empowered as a starter alongside their best players. The spurs are always interesting to me in comparison to the Pelicans, not only because I'm always thinking about the Pelicans, but some of their principles come from that system. Del Demp famously was in the front office there. You could see how they just don't need everything all the time, and they're able to just kind of take the best of certain guys, whereas the Pelicans, the big worry is they're always on the throttle,

always playing for that season, and I think you see it with some of the minutes they're big guys to play. And to convince Boogie to stay. and convince AD not to demand a trade and all that stuff. There's like a real like the franchise future is on the line here. Right. The minutes between Holiday, Anthony Davis, cousins are all high up there. You wonder if that's going to have an effect in a playoff series.

And also with cousins, like, yeah, let's say they convince him to come back. Now you're paying almost three guys max. And that's just going to screw you in other ways. And I wonder what happens next season when they try to put guys around them. The guys like Darius Miller who might come up, maybe you don't find him this time around and you're back into the drags of the West again. I just think the example of the Spurs really set. And like this is, you know, it's old news because they've done it the entire century.

But they're just ability to integrate younger players within, you know, their veteran core. This is the difference between San Antonio and Burr-Tans, Anderson, Murray, you know, Forbes, Paul. I mean, their ability to integrate all these young guys and let them develop. Think about every guy that you see pop up on another team that's not as good as he was on the Spurs. Deadmans, Joseph, Simmons. good players. They've had very few free agents who leave the spurs and end up better in a new situation.

I want to wrap up, but let's just quickly talk about Milwaukee, who was the other, like 10 years ago earlier this week when Jason Kidd got fired was the big deal. They're 24 and 22. They're basically hanging on to the playoffs by their fingernails. They have apparently decided to go with, is Jim Punti? Joe. Joe Punty.

As their coach. for the rest of the season. I don't know what they're going to do here. They have the top five NBA player. They should probably be pushing up towards where Toronto and Washington and Cleveland and Boston are. And instead, we were wondering

if they're going to make the playoffs at all. Is there a... Are they doing a shadow tank here by not getting a new coach yet? Like, what's going on? It's a bizarre move. And like, we don't know what's going on behind the scenes

with all the personal dynamics, even though it sounds like Janus's agent called literally every... reporter after that all went out. But it is interesting there. Like if you're going to make a criticism of that move, like why do you do that when you're in the playoff? Why do you do that when Janus is in kind of the MVP discussion,

why he's entering his peak, he's probably going to win. He won the most improved last year, so he can't win it again. But it just, it's a very bizarre timing, and it just speaks to maybe some of the dysfunction at the top of the ownership level because they're like trading when someone gets to make the final call. I think with Milwaukee had a conversation before the beginning of last season with an NBA executive, and he said Milwaukee reminded him of the early days of Cleveland, where LeBron got too great too soon.

So they didn't have the ability to be a, you know, bottom level team to get another high-end prospect in the draft, or at least, you know, a high-end contributing player. And Milwaukee, the same thing. Yannas got too good too soon for them to add that other guy. Yes, they have Jabari Parker. Yes, they got Malcolm Brogden in the second round. Yes, they have Chris Middleton. But they still need that other star player.

But they don't have them and they don't really have a way to get him. either, which is why they had a go for a guy like Eric Bloodso. You don't think Blitzos is that guy? I know, not at all. I mean, he's an inefficient half-court scored. I mean, you need another star next to Yannis. And Jabari Parker could be that guy, maybe, but even then, he hasn't shown that he can stay on the floor. Yeah,

the last attempt at it was reaching for Thon. And maybe he becomes something, but it doesn't look like he's turning into much the season. That was a gamble worth taking. Sure. You know, I think, you know, Thon Maker, I wasn't a big fan of him. I was shocked that they took him there, but at the same time, you can't knock him for that when you look at what else was on the

board at that time. He's a high upside player at 10. So given the talent on hand, what is the best version of Milwaukee this season? That's a good question. I mean, they've been kind of talked about in the discussion for Kemba Walker. I don't know if he makes much sense there. It sounds like you're really committing to a core there that I wouldn't necessarily. That's panic. Yeah. That's a panic. Especially with Bloodsoe, a free agent this

off season. You're going to have a backcourt of Kemba and Bloodsoe going forward. That's pretty tiny. I think their upside can be, I mean, maybe they won't reach this seed, but I think if Parker gets the full strength by the playoffs, they could be, like, of a three, four seed quality team. Didn't they have such trouble the last time they had to integrate Parker

back into the rotation? And it's like, he just, he's a weird mid-range scorer who holds the ball and I don't know. I mean, I, they they, they, they, I think they had something going earlier in the season and then obviously the internal strife kind of got to them. It's just such a bold,

weird move. I mean, I, by all it, all accounts, like, kid was problematic there, but it's, it's a big, big deal to do that. Yeah, to wrap this back into the cabs, it sounds like Parker might be in a similar situation with Kevin Love where he is a dynamic offensive player, he provides some stretch,

but I wonder what you could do with them on defense. You're effectively saying, we need Janus to be a 1-5 all the time, and I just don't know if that's what you want to put on it. It's unfair to expect that from any player, especially over an 82 game season, maybe in the playoffs,

you want them to turn it on like that, but, you know, right now they're just kind of hanging on, like you said, Chris, and Parker's not going to help them defensively at all. I mean, he's a poor defender, He's a low effort. Well, maybe some of the schemes, like, just taking out some of the crazy blitzes that kid ran. Yeah, for sure.

We'll help them out a little bit. More and more conservative would probably help them on that end. But at the same time, I mean, they still have personnel changes to be made, and they don't have a lot of flexibility to do it. Okay. All right. We're going to wrap it up there. Thanks for listening to group chat. We'll be back next Thursday.

Make sure you're listening to all the Ringer NBA shows. Kevin is routinely weekly on Tuesdays with Kevin Chris Vernon. And we'll be back in your ears sooner than later. Basketball is very good. Basketball is very good.