The Ringer NBA Show - Five Questions That Will Decide the 2023 NBA Finals | Group Chat

Episode Date: May 31, 2023

Justin, Rob, and Wos kick things off by giving their final thoughts on how the Heat-Celtics Eastern Conference finals shook out (02:14), before gearing up for the NBA Finals and answering five questions that will decide who emerges victorious between the Denver Nuggets and the Miami Heat (19:49). The guys wrap up the show by reacting to the official news that Golden State Warriors president and general manager Bob Myers will step down from his position and discuss what it all means for the future of the Warriors (57:38). Hosts: Justin Verrier, Rob Mahoney, and Wosny Lambre Producer: Eduardo Ocampo Additional Production Support: Ben Cruz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey everyone, it's Ariel Hawani, and I wanted to let you know that each and every week, I'm part of a great program called The Ringer MMA Show. I hosted alongside two absolutely brilliant minds. Their names, Chuck Mindenhall and Pizzie Carroll, and every Thursday, a new episode drops where we preview the weekend in mixed martial arts and react to all the biggest news. Plus, after every UFC pay-per-view, we give you a post-fight show. So this is what you have to do. Just follow the Ringer M-M-M-A show on your Spotify app.

So you don't miss an episode. We'll talk to you then. Hello and welcome to group chat. I am Justin Barrier and joining me, two of the most pursued executives in modern North American professional sports history. Rob Mahoney, big wise. What's up, my GM brethren?

Waz, I'm just glad we can share this honor together. You know, it took us a lot to get here, but we're at the mountaintop, baby. Dude, I never knew I was the SVP of this pod. This is news to me. I'd never been an executive for the entirety of my life. But I guess I'm, you know, I'm in upper management of the podcast. So that's nice to know.

Thanks, Jess. Not only the podcast, but across all podcasts, across all podcast history, even. I don't know how someone would come up with that data point, but I have managed to do so. And thus, I could say so credibly. You know what's funny about that, making that statement, how it's not followed up. with Joe Laco is making a huge mistake and ruining his franchise. If it's true, it's just a statement about media and coverage of these kinds of news events these days.

Yeah. We'll get to that a little bit later, Bob Meyer stepping down in Golden State. We're going to get to five questions. Five, count them. Questions that will decide the 2023 NBA finals. I can't believe we're finally here. But first, gentlemen, I did want to get quick thoughts to see if there's anything you want to talk about in terms of wrapping up the Eastern Conference finals. It was a long journey.

Finally, the Heat won and Seven on what was that Monday. Rob, anything that you want to wrap up from the events before we dig into Heat and Nuggets? I guess just shout out to the Boston Celtics, you know, dying how they lived, streaky as hell, not taking defense very seriously until it was way too late and then getting caught, you know? Really the story of their season, the story of that team. I know we can dig into like what do they need to do structurally in terms of the roster or the coaching spot to change all those things. But fundamentally, man, they're just going to have to take this stuff more seriously than they did throughout this regular season and even throughout the beginning of some of these playoff series. I do want to give a shout out to heat culture.

I know that over the years, it's, it's drawn many an eye role in our industry from a lot of people when folks would big up, he culture. People ask, what is it? It's a culture of accountability. Obviously, we know what Riley and them do in training camp where it's like, yo, bro, you're fat, and you don't pass our conditioning test. It's a culture of hyper-competitiveness.

Anybody who knows anything about Eric Spolster, this dude is insanely competitive. And, dude, like, these guys, I think when you have that level, of commitment to those kinds of things, you can come into a series, undermanned, less talented, and beat the other team.

Like, you don't achieve these ends while being blasé and not having a culture of accountability and hyper-competitiveness. You don't do that without having that foundation and watching yesterday's game where it's just like, you know, I keep bringing up Duncan Robinson on our show because to me it's just emblematic of a lack of all of those things on the other side where like the guy is in the game to do one thing.

He's not going to run pick and rolls. He's not like he's not there. He's not going to break you down one on one. He's not going to post up. He's not going to work at the elbows and facilitate offense. He's going to do one thing. And that a team as talented as collectively athletic as the freaking Boston Celtics are, that they couldn't stop them,

that they couldn't stop Duncan Robinson from performing his one job function, they don't got no coacher. They don't got that heat coaching, y'all. Wait, is the one thing that Duncan Robinson does or did in the series make layups? Because he was like 80% in the restricted area somehow. He did make more twos than should have been expected.

But to me, again, that's still part of it to me. For sure. Like, the white boy you only can shoot threes, the only other thing he's doing to you, is beating you backdoor. You've never seen that before? Come on, y'all. Stop it.

Bigger moment for heat culture. Duncan Robinson taunting the garden crowd after hitting one of those backdoor layups. Udana's Haslam hoisting the conference championship trophy as if he himself had won it. I mean, look, I have a lot of respect for Udana's Haslam, but we know what's going on there.

Caleb Martin losing conference MVP 4 to 5 to the superstar of the team, Jimmy Butler, Or Haywood Highsmith ripping Jason Tatum and Halfcourt going coast to coast for a score. What is the signature moment, Justin, of Heat culture in this game seven, do you think? I mean, considering that we just came off of a historic one vote situation with succession, I have to say that the Caleb Martin vote seems to be pretty similar, where one of the eldest boys of the Miami Heat got kind of robbed there by one of his teammates. But no, I mean, Martin was absolutely just on fire.

60% from the floor, 49% from three. He was looking like Steph Curry for an entire series. And honestly, it's probably one of the bigger questions going into the finals. We'll get to there in a little bit. But like, I don't know if this guy's slowing down because he has it all post season. He's way, like, look, I know we've talked about it every way we can. This guy was way, way better than anyone thought, than the consensus of the league, than the understanding of what he could do in his game.

I think what makes it still so mystifying It's like this is a guy who when he drives Looks like he's about to fall over Right he's like almost horizontal Head to the rim I mean going all out Rob his shooting release has a hitch in it It has a hitch

And he's swishing these things He's swishing it But honestly do you think the hitch Kind of worked in his favor at a certain point It gave him just enough delay Where people started biting at it and then he could drive. I kind of wonder if maybe it played into his hands.

It's like a pitcher with like an off-time delivery where it just throws people off. I like this. He's the L. Duque of the NBA, yo. Exactly. I think Rusillo said at one point that one of the fallouts from the heat being so successful is that we can no longer make heat culture jokes. And I think that's true. That's the biggest loss here.

Fortunately, we can make a lot of Boston Celtics jokes because there's just been so much fodder thrown into the ether and vomited away. into the ether from one Jalen Brown. I did want to have quickly as quickly as possible, the Jalen Brown conversation. If only because I feel like this has reached the level where it's talked about so much, it's almost become a joke and toxic to a certain extent

to even talk about it. It is essentially the new Ben Simmons or Embed sort of thing, the Jalen or Jason Tatum thing. I definitely think this is tilted pretty clearly to one way. I don't see the Celtics ever getting rid of Jason Tatum. But I do think like it's a fair conversation to have, no matter how many times we've had it before of whether or not like Jalen Brown's future

is with the Celtics, Rob. So did the result of this series, this postseason, do anything to change your basic outlook on Brown's future with Boston? Well, it changed a little bit of my evaluation of him personally, right? The whole idea of having someone like Jalen Brown is that in the games where Jason Tatum can't go

where he doesn't have it where, you know, hypothetically, he turns his ankle on the first play of the game, that you have another story. star to hand some responsibility off to and can succeed. And not only did Jalen Brown just flubb spectacularly in that regard. But he flubbed so badly that he then had to go on the postgame press conference and take full account. Like there was no shying away from how bad he was. There was no margin for error. There was no, there was no gray area or room to debate. He was awful in this game seven. And awful in a way where the Celtics needed him to be at least good at that exact

moment. This game was there if he was good and he wasn't even that. And so if he can't be that player, you have to really reconsider what the structure of your team looks like. That's kind of the existential question is, was this a fluke result of a high pressure game

and just whatever it was that happened in this game 7, Jalen Brown was not ready for it? Or is this kind of the reality of who he's going to be sometimes? And if so, then you start looking pretty hard at some of the possibilities to reshape your roster and figure out who that second star alongside Tatum could be.

Yeah, I mean, I was as disgusted by Jalen Brown's performance last night as anybody. The man took a heat check when he wasn't hot, which is just the rare. I was flabbergasted by that. However, when you sort of sober up and have some distance from, you know, a world-changing event that can be, you know, a stinker in a game seven, The other number two's type of guys around the league, just to throw a name out there,

who's come up a bunch of times on this show, like Zach Levine. Is Zach Levine better than Jalen Brown? He does different things. I think he would add a different element to what Boston is doing if they somehow were able to swap those two guys. But you don't think he's materially better than Jalen Brown, right?

I don't think that, I don't even know who else you drew holiday you know Middleton those guys are number twos ostensibly they are not better than Jalen Brown and somebody like Millerton is about to get paid about the same thing you got to pay Jason Brown I mean excuse me Jalen Brown and so as bad as he was yesterday I don't know how you do way better than him in a number two I think the answer for Tatum to be better too. Well, I wonder how you distinguish them, it makes sense,

where it's not necessarily better, but maybe it's better fitting. Like, I don't think they are going to find a better player than Jaylen Brown. Second team, all-N-B-A who might potentially make a Supermax contract. He's really good. He's a very good. He's a very good player. And we look around the league, how many two-way wings, I mean, Brown's defense has fallen off in recent years,

but like how many two-way superstar wings even are there? Like this is like a building block for every franchise that you want. I do wonder if the question now becomes, have we tried so much trying to do this like supplementary ball handler thing where it might be better for both Tatum and Brown to play with a rock solid, not maybe past first point guard, but an actual point guard, right? Like Damien Lillard is someone who has been tossed around as a potential name. I don't think that makes sense math-wise,

just because if you're blanching at paying Brown a Supermax, Lillard makes, I think, one of the biggest amounts in the NBA and NBA history. The guy I brought up, just thinking about this hypothetically, is I wonder if would it make sense to split up Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell and pair one of those guys with a Tatum? And thus, you almost like, you break up a potential defensive liability backcourt in Cleveland and you break up this wing situation in Boston who were saying could, greatly benefit from someone who doesn't turn the ball over eight times in a game.

I mean, I would obviously be interested in a Darius Garland situation, I guess fit-wise. However, you know, it's just not the type of move you make. A big wing guy clearly has one-on-one ability, clearly stretches, clearly can guard his position on most nights for a really tiny guard, even as, to me, Darius Garland is way more dynamic with the ball in his hand. He's one of the best playmakers in the NBA. Like, as far as pick and roll, ball handling and maneuvering and concepts, like, this guy is at the top of the league in those categories. It's just rare, man, that you trade a six-foot-seven dude who does all the things with

the ball in his hand that Brown does so you can bring a guy who's barely 5-11 in. I like as much as I love Garland, I just, you just can't really do that move in today's NBA. Donovan Mitchell, position wise, you know, and size wise, you would think that it would be a little bit more plausible. But if we're talking about passing a ball, I mean, dude, talk about not seeing the floor. Donovan Mitchell was at the top of that list. We saw him dealing with traps in that Nick series. That's not exactly the answer either if you're looking for playmaking for Boston. But this is what's so difficult about the Jalen Brown conversation is the incentives are as such

for a player like Jalen Brown. You want to prove that you're worth the big money, that you're worth the star salary, that you can do the things that stars do. His handle isn't there yet, as we've discussed many times. And yet, because the contract is on the line, it's not like he's going to scale his game down and just like play defense and spot up. And so he's stuck in this awkward middle ground where he's chasing after the thing that he rightly wants and probably deserves, but ultimately isn't quite ready to achieve it, at least in games like this one, in the highest pressure games, the highest stakes games imaginable. And so then he ends up in this space where he's just like chucking shots and missing them,

losing the ball when he tries to attack off the dribble. Jason, like, there aren't really guards or creators to play off of so much, except for Derek White in this game, what I thought was pretty awesome, you know, attacking out of pick and roll, and maybe that was kind of the answer that was there for Boston all along in some of these games. But I don't know what Jalen Brown's ultimate destiny should be, frankly. Like, I don't know what kind of player he needs to be, except to say you look on the opposite side of the floor. Bam and a bio did not have a great game.

Missed a lot of shots around the rim, had a bunch of turnovers, still had just like a massively larger impact than Jalen Brown did. As a defender, as a playmaker, doing the things that BAM does well. Even in a game where, again, it's not like Jimmy was awesome in this game either, so there wasn't like a primary to play off of in some demonstrative way. The ball was getting dumped to BAM and he was making stuff work. I don't know why Jalen Brown couldn't be that guy under these circumstances.

Ultimately, this just might end up being a money question anyway, because I do wonder if Brown isn't offered the Supermax contract, as he's now eligible to earn based on making all NBA. I wonder if the Celtics say no, then all of a sudden this situation resolves itself and that he might want to ask out anyway. So, I don't know, it gets really complex there. I do think the actual, like, the fit questions and what you do just structurally is one of the more fascinating ones we've seen in recent years.

I'm sorry, man. A bunch of Game 7 conference finals appearances. You're about to be up 3-1 on your home floor in the goddamn finals last year. They got enough to win the damn championship. This team is good enough on talent to beat people. We've just watched them play unfocused basketball

lack of toughness mental toughness not physical toughness. Mental toughness I'm not talking about oh they were chokers no they just could not stay on tasks they don't execute when things get hard they don't thrive in uncomfortable

situations maybe some people could say oh maybe this group collectively will never have it I would, if I were Boston, I would want to bet on the other side of that. I would want to bet on these guys who are still relatively young. Sure, they're not getting more athletic, but I do think they can become smarter, headier basketball players. I think you should be trying to bet on that.

I ultimately think they have what it takes here in this core. When I watch Robert Williams just catch oops over people's heads and then have people scared to take shots in the paint on the other end. I'm like, bro, what am I missing here? What are we missing here? Maybe it's a new coach. You know, maybe it might be a marginal sort of glue guy that brings it all together in some kind of dot-connecting sort of way.

But man, like, how do you get this far, this deep over and over again and think, oh, we are just incapable of doing it? Yeah, I'm in the same place. there's different versions of running into a wall or hitting your ceiling as a team. The way Boston is doing it every time feels like they should be capable of more. This ain't the Al-Horford Hawks, Rob.

It is absolutely not. And to your point about, maybe it is just like a change of a role player or something like that, I mean, you have to have the Jalen Brown conversation and look at guys, you know, like Mitchell or Garland or whatever guards or even Biggs are available

if you want to kind of change the schematic of your team. but that's a last resort. I'm still looking to pay him first and foremost. I'm still looking to keep him as a part of the team. I'm looking at like, you know, do we trade, do we trade for as good as Rob Williams was? I'm trading Rob Williams before I'm trading Jalen Brown or Marcus Smart or any of these other pieces

that are non-essential personnel. Very good contributors, important to the identity of the team, but our identity right now isn't good enough. And so we have to kind of think about, if you are the Celtics, how do you move forward, how do you restructure around what this could be, to take advantage of all the talent that you do have.

Yeah, and there's already sunk cost, even if it's emotional costs or maybe bandwidth or whatever you want to say, because they've had this decision in front of them before, and they've chosen to keep those two guys together. Like, they didn't trade Jalen Brown for a Paul George for Kauai years back. And so to do so now when it's finally capable of winning an Eastern Conference finals or pushing a team like the Heat to a seventh game would be a little suspect. I do wonder how much the money factor of this is going to come into play, but I think you guys are right.

I think I would expect them to exhaust all options with those two guys, even if it means sacrificing a Grant Williams and restricted free agency this summer, or just like adding veterans to the bench for Joe Missoula rather than do a wholesale sort of overhaul. I mean, that's what you're seeing across the league, too, is guys, teams first trying to get a new coach in the door before they actually rip things to the studs and actually change anything significant. All right, why don't we pivot now to the finals? Because Denver has been waiting a very long time here. So break out the bongs, break out your favorite carabiners. It is now the Denver Nuggets time. You're on the NBA Finals platform. We have five questions we want to talk about that could decide the NBA finals.

This is a crunchy-ass podcast all of a sudden. I guess we got to get in the spirit. I'm about to head out to Denver anyway. What is the other thing that Denver had? Like, what are they known for in Denver besides weed? Yeah. Like the glorious mountain range is just outside the city. Okay, got you.

A chill downtown. IPAs. Okay. It's a big beer city. Okay. The DNVR bar. Shout out. Shouts to my man Adamares, man.

Yeah, it's like crunchy Boston is what I would say. Okay. That's an unfavorable and unfair comparison. Denver is a better city than Boston. I think that says more about your perception of Boston than it does have about Denver. Yeah, I think that's a take, man. I only been to Denver once and I was there for about 12 hours, so I can't pretend to be some expert.

But Boston's got some shit. Does it? Yeah, it's a lot more diverse than people realize because its reputation is sort of the white American male mecca. But there's legitimate diversity in the city. As far as the shit that I care about, which is food, and being able to get a drink past 10 p.m. Boston has that, bro.

Well, I can't speak to the getting a drink past 10 p.m. part of Denver. But look, we're going to explore the food scene. We'll report back. We'll see what's on offer out in Denver this week. I think it's hard to not like Denver. I'll say that. I've been there once for like a two-game stint, and it was pretty pleasurable.

But first we're going to start with our first question. Number one, how much does Jimmy Butler slash the Miami Heat have left? So, I mean, we talked about this in the past here, but just to underline this in the first three games of the Eastern Conference finals, Jimmy Butler, 46% from the floor. Looking good, looking spry. Unfortunately, last 4, 39% from the floor. And a lot of those games, it seemed like he was a little punch truck toward the end. And you could maybe argue for some other people on the team, Bamemadabio, had a pretty rough game. seven as Rob alluded to you. You have to wonder how much that was a factor of the long series.

But I do wonder, I mean, not only just fatigue wise, Rob, but maybe just like in terms of this spiritual, exciting, shocking run the Huron, like how much more do they have of this in their back pocket? Because Denver is going to be the type of challenge that they probably haven't faced all postseason. Yeah. Things like Will have emotional endurance too. you know, it's hard to get up for huge games against really good teams over and over and over. And Miami's had some incredibly upsets, incredible upsets just to get to this point. But this is going to be their toughest test yet. And a lot of it's going to fall on Jimmy Butler in a way that makes me pretty concerned about Miami's chances.

In part, I'm curious if you guys had this experience, watching the end of that Eastern Conference final, the last, really the last two games, but especially game seven, I'm watching the broadcast. Stan Van Gundy is saying over and over, you know, oh, Jimmy is so much more. aggressive tonight. He's not even pump faking the way he was pump faking in some of these previous games and like, you know, claiming up a little bit. I don't know what game that was that Stan was watching where Jimmy Butler was looking hyper aggressive. To me, he was like, get the ball in the post and look for any reason to not shoot it on a lot of these possessions, look for reasons not to attack Rob Williams or even Derek White or Marcus Smart in part because he was

getting blocked and stopped on some of those possessions. He's genuinely like trying to problem solve, but he was not being ultra-aggressive Jimmy Butler. And if he'd have a chance to beat a team like the Nuggets, he has to be that. He has to be the version of Jimmy that is death-glaring and shouting down Drew Holiday, and not the version

that's passing up shots against the Boston Celtics. Yeah, I thought in game seven, he looked better in the sense that he was finding just enough daylight to get a nice, decent shot off in his patented mid-range. I don't think he was

that incredible in the paint itself. But in mid-range, he was getting enough space and daylight to get a decent shot off. Game six, he just had no breathing room. He was just suffocated completely. And we talked about how he just got his shot swatted a bunch of times by guys. And when Derek White is swatting him, a guy who he had no problem creating separation against in the first two games, obviously he's just not having the same time. type of explosion and isn't playing with the same verve.

But in game seven, I thought he did just enough to get some clean looks off where Miami is where Boston had to play him honestly and even sometimes send that help. Yeah. Which I was, you know, I was very drunk off to Caleb Martin juice last night. And I was like, that was the MVP, but we got to be realistic. The guy that is creating offense, the guy that is like who Boston is tailoring their defense to stop is Jimmy Butler. Caleb Martin isn't, you know, coming down, bringing the ball up

and just straight up attacking the best defender on the team and killing people. He's, you know, he's scoring off of swings and, you know, he's getting his spot-ups on and I'm happy for his game. But Jimmy, he's the reason why they're in the finals. But, yeah, I think he showed enough in game seven. But the problem is he has to do games one and two, Jimmy. not game seven Jimmy of last night

or even the end of game six where he gets to the line three straight times that was huge and you know he makes three incredibly clutch free throws he needs to be that short of that it's going to be a long well it's going to be a short series

but it's going to be a long series for Jimmy if he's not able to summon that and you know where that part gets hard the free throw drawing part of Jimmy Butler's game gets hard the guy you don't want to see after playing three hard-fought series is Aaron Gordon. And I suspect we're going to see a lot of Aaron Gordon on Jimmy Butler. And if you go back and watch the Nugget Sun series, Gordon's game plan, scouting report-level discipline against Kevin Durant, I don't think he got caught on like one rip through the whole series.

Right. Aaron Gordon is great at staying down, keeping position, bodying up. For a guy who's a leaper, who's an explosive athlete, a very disciplined defense. And, you know, maybe Jimmy, like, that doesn't apply in all cases. Sometimes, like, particular cadences of players will trick even great defenders. Maybe that ends up being the case. But my expectation is that Aaron Gordon is going to play him pretty solidly, pretty competently, is going to stay down on all of Jimmy's attempts to get him off the floor.

And that's going to be really tough for him to work around. That's not a guy you can just body up or dig up a shoulder into and create space. Jimmy's going to have to really work for everything he gets. Well, is there anything in addition to Gordon that might be a guy. trip up the heat in ways that they haven't already this postseason. Like, I do think the broader question here is, when will the magic kind of run out for Miami? And, like, how much, was it just this magical run based on will and heat culture

versus them actually maybe outsmarting their opponent's spout, finding little wrinkles in order to exploit? Like, was, do you see anything from Denver's side that might slow down a Caleb Martin? It gave Vince and some of these guys that they've been relying on to provide the umph next to Jimmy. It sounds like Kenny's music to me was. I don't think this is a Kenny series in that way. I think Kenny is going to, he's going to match up on Caleb Martin.

I think this is Aaron Gordon's assignment. And the problem is for Miami is that the nuggets are going to dare them, dare Jimmy to beat him continuously one-on-one. Things flipped for Caleb Martin and Max Truce and all of those guys. after Jimmy embarrassed Grant Williams and the Celtics were like, yo, we can no longer do them one-on-one. And Jimmy had all of these high assist games after that.

He's drawing help one pass away, and he's passing a dudes who literally can't miss. Like Caleb Barton refused to miss. He shot 50% on threes. He shot 60% overall, right? But I don't think Denver is going to send help. Not in these super obvious ways. They might help.

Every now and again, but they might help off of a guy like BAM or something like that. But they're not going to send a lot of help. And I think if they can stay out of putting themselves in a help scramble, Miami's not going to score, man. They're just not. I think it flipped for them. It turned into something different after game two when Jimmy, you know, he's yelling at people. And he's like, why did you think this guy was the answer and all of that?

And Boston agreed with him was like, Grant Williams 101 is not the answer. but I think Denver is going to be like, you've got to show us repeatedly that you're going to just destroy Aaron Gordon in a way that makes it so we feel like it's more economical for our defense to allow Gabe Vincent to get more shots up.

And that's where it feels like the heater about to stumble into a different universe. The Eastern Conference Finals, even when Miami was making a fair number of its shots, still felt like a rock fight, still felt like a struggle for execution on every possession. flip to the other side,

and the Nuggets just wiped out the best defensive team in the playoffs. I think the heat are going to have their hands full in lots of different ways, but in part just the sheer firepower of what Denver can put out there, that is hard to keep up with, much less the fact that Denver might actually have

some plausible solutions defensively for what Miami is trying to do too. Yeah, let's flip to the other side of it, then, because the next question is Miami better equipped to match up with the Nuggets than any of Denver's previous opponents. And I do think the Lakers were probably the best defense on paper, and they had the size to match up with the Denver team that I think people might forget is actually quite big. Like Michael Porter Jr. is 610.

Oh, yeah. Aaron Gordon basically is a small ball center on a lot of different teams. They're going to start like three guys who are taller than bam. Exactly. And so it's almost the opposite. But the heat have better guard defenders where they could potentially slow down a Jamal Murray. Also, they probably play bigger than. a lot of the other guys that the Lakers maybe even relied on, especially on the perimeter.

So it's almost like the opposite proposition. Does Miami's like bench of perimeter defense, does that have more success again than a Lakers team that was built more through size, Waz with the definitive no right off the bat? Dude, their big man rotation at the moment is bam out of bio, Kevin Love at age 59, Cody Zeller at age 53. It's just it's not going to happen. Like the defending of what Denver does

is not, the heat are incapable of it. I'm sure you guys have seen the sort of BAM one-on-one matchups against Yokic. It's not pretty. Yokic uses and abuses him and that's not a BAM thing. That's an everybody thing.

Hell, even AD who's bigger than them taller, ranger, the Lakers had to get him the hell up off of Yokic. They're not going to be able to guard him with one guy. This Kevin Love thing is just not going to happen. And the thing about the Lakers, why I think they were a better defensive matchup, is that they could do the, they tried the thing where they could put these sort of thicker,

ranger, Bron, Rui, Vando, you know, try to basically put some mask in tape on the Yokich problem, right? That's not, the heat don't have those guys. And so it's going to be their big men. Like, Jimmy's not going to guard Yokic. You know, it's going to be their big men who get this job.

And if they, when they have to inevitably send two, because I know Spoh's going to be like, yo, Yokich instinct is not to go out and drop 50. Let's guard them with one. Let's stay home on the rest of the shooters and let's see what's happening. But the problem is, is the finals. And Yokic, I think he's smart enough to know

that he's probably going to have to get 40 a couple of games, and he's positioned to do so. I think Boston, with their big man depth, it's something different, where you could, you know, Grant Williams, a really stout guy, and then you could have Rob or even Horford roaming around and roving. All right, you could put some level of resistance with that big man rotation.

the names that I just said to you guys that's going to be tough that's going to be so tough but that's the question if that's not the answer what do you do and I kind of default to the idea that we're probably going to see

at least one opening salvo of let's see if Yokic wants to drop 45 to 55 points to win this game just to kind of test where his stomach is to start this series because if you're in Miami maybe you can steal a game that way. I kind of don't think that's going to happen,

but look at the alternatives. If you're not doing the one-on-one game with Yokic and hugging the shooters, you're going to trap one of the best passers in NBA history. Is that what we're going to do? We're going to send doubles his way. That's going to fail.

And your guys are short. You're not trapping with size and length. You're trapping with shorties. Trapping with shorties. Or are we going to run our patented Miami Heat Zone defense against the guy who was like tailor made to bust zones, that's not going to happen.

And it's a difference when Al Horford catch the ball in the middle of the zone at the foul line. And doesn't even look at the rim. Yes, he takes a floater from 14 feet away. Yokic is not doing it. And then even if he does, that's a shot. He's extremely good at making, right? It's just, I just think defensively,

he not going to win this series on defense. If they find a way to get buckets, and they're able to match these guys' baskets for basket, then they'll do it. If they're hot shooting continues, then they'll do it. But they are not, I repeat, not going to slow these guys down. No. I just want to find out what the Trapping with Shorty's offshoot podcast is,

maybe we should workshop that after the fact. Have you never heard of that strategy before? Was' lifestyle podcast. Weekends with Was. colon trapping with shorties. No, I mean, I agree with you guys. I think it's a tough proposition. If I were to play devil's advocate, I do wonder if the best approach is what you're suggesting is like seeing if

Yokic goes for 50 and then you shut off Jamal Murray who had been, who'd buoyed them in a lot of big situations in the Lakers series, for instance, if that is the way to have some success. They're going to have to figure out something for Murray. The trouble is, it's like my, my default expectations, we're going to see some challenges from the heat defense

for Yokic and Murray to win those one-on-one matchups. They're probably going to end up switching a lot of actions, which is hard to do against Yokic because now, you know, Gabe Vincent can't guard Jamal Murray. That's not a plausible thing you can do.

So you really have to get someone like a Jimmy Butler on Murray in the hopes that he might get switched on to Yogh, which is a bad matchup, just thinking that like maybe we can stand up here well enough. The trouble with that, not only that Murray and Yokic can both individually beat whoever it is that's guarding him in those situations,

Denver will just stop running it. Like if you put Gabe Vincent elsewhere, put him on KCP, they'll just run handoffs for KCP. You put Max Drews on Michael Porter Jr., they'll just run handoffs for Michael Porter Jr. These guys are getting wide open practice threes. And in particular, KCP, Michael Porter Jr., Jamal Murray, all hitting like 40% of their threes are better in these playoffs.

And it's because they're wide-ass open. off those handoffs, off those actions, off of all the attention that the Yokic draws in the middle. How do you get out of that if you're Miami? Like, it's such a bind trying to slow these guys down in any capacity without surrendering, either open looks to those guys or Duckins for Bruce Brown or Aaron Gordon or Jeff Green, whoever's coming inside. Look, I would just have to say, I didn't think the Lakers were going to guard those guys last series because, like I've been saying all year, Denver's got the best unit.

Their offense is the best unit in the NBA. but I did think the Lakers would be able to score and where they failed in crucial moments in game three and other parts of the series was their offense just couldn't muster anything AD couldn't get anything going in a one-on-one they couldn't get anything from putting Yolkich and pick and roll like their offense just was not there for them

I think if the heat they couldn't even LeBron couldn't even get a shot up to the rim to try to save game four like that's how on at the nudge were in that series. So if the heat are going to make this a thing, man, they got to score. They got to get Yolkitsch in foul trouble.

They got to make it hard on Denver's defense. They got to put Murray, just tag him. Screen the hell out of that dude with all of their off ball stuff. Jimmy's got to be able to punish some of the smaller guys attract switches. Like they have to, bam has to be willing to do stuff in transition and actually make fucking layup or a three-foot hook shot to save his freaking life, that'll be nice. Like, that's what they're going to need to win this series. It ain't going to be because they shut off Denver's water on office.

It's not going to happen, folks. That's a good transition to question three, though. So what are you most worried about if you're Michael Malone? And the one thing I have written down is if Spow and the Miami offense could take advantage of the non-yokage minutes in a way that we really haven't seen thus far in this posies in part because some of the matchups that the nuggets have drawn probably are suited to do so, that the sons were probably the best suited to do it, and they didn't have the depth in order to really go at those guys. But it really hasn't been exposed in a way I think a lot of people

expected. And so, Rob, do you think like maybe there's something with the heat's depth here that might be able to swing an advantage where we expected to show up for Denver opponents pretty much this entire post season? well, how do you mean? I worry about so many different places on Miami's death chart at this point. I think given all of the offensive firepower that has borne out with Miami, Lowry showing up in some of these bench minutes running the unit with Duncan Robinson being able to hit all these different threes.

Like can you steal a five to eight point advantage when Yokic is not on the floor by playing through those guys, basically. Yeah, I think if you're Michael Malone, what keeps you up at night is not necessarily Jimmy Butler or Bam, or even, you know, if Tyler Hero comes back in this series, like we know who those guys are, we know what they do.

It's the like inexplicable nature of the death by a thousand cuts thing that Miami has been making work all playoffs long, where you're getting, as you're saying, a little Lowry, a little Duncan Robinson, a little Max Truce, a little gay bins, these like random sequences and possessions and actions that are resulting in points for the heat

and beating some of the best teams in the regular season. The fact that you can't like point your finger and say like, this is exactly what Caleb Martin is doing so well means it's very hard to stop what Caleb Martin is doing so well. Like yes, he's an intuitive player. He's cutting well. He's spotting up. He knows how to playoff Jimmy's hitting tons and tons of shots.

But why is it happening and how do you stop it? I don't know that anyone in the league knows that right now. and even if you're an overwhelming favorite in the series, which I think Denver should be an overwhelming favorite, that's kind of a scary proposition, right? Like the bucks were overwhelming favorites once too. I'm sure the Celtics were going into that series. And those teams went home because they couldn't figure it out.

Now it's your job as the coach of the Nuggets and a job on every nugget on the floor to parse those things and figure out why and how they're happening and really hope that the magic runs out. Because I'm not sure anyone is going to have a really convincing explanation for why Gabe Vinson just outplayed. other team's guards and so many of these games.

Other than hashtag heat culture, as we hit up top. Yeah, to me, if I'm Mike Malone, I'm worried about Jimmy having a great one-on-one series because that's what changes everything. If Jimmy's able to draw help, that's when Miami's offense becomes viable. All of the off-ball stuff,

I mean, Duncan Robinson wasn't playing. He was glued to the bench. The NBA had collectively be like, yeah, we know how to deal with Duncan Robinson, okay? Like the stuff that this guy was able to, you know, sure up for them offensively, like the holes he was able to puncture in Boston, the looks he could generate, the space he was creating. I think Denver's going to be able to deal with that. What they won't be able to deal with is if Aaron Gordon can't guard Jimmy's just getting outmuscled. Because Jimmy's going to outmustle the rest of his.

I love Bruce Brown. I love KCP as players. Like these, especially their defensive games. They are too slight to deal with what Jimmy's going to do. You know, Christian Brown, another brother. He's a wise all-star. He's not guarding Jimmy Butler if Jimmy is right.

So if I'm Mike Malone, I'm worried about seeing the Jimmy that I saw against the Bucks, the Jimmy that I saw before the ankle sprained against the Knicks, the Jimmy of the first two games of the Eastern Conference Finals. That's what keeps me up at night. It gave Vincent, you know, pull-ups and all of that in the face of guys off the dribble. I'm not, I'm not losing sleep off of that. You say that until it's all that's running through your head and your nightmares, you know?

I do wonder also Jimmy with two to three days of rest now, whereas in the conference finals, you only had the one day in between if he is able to get into his cryout, chamber and get those things looking right. I know. I know. Jimmy's a grown man. He's up there. Like, I understand why he can't do this every single night after just one rest day.

Can I throw out one other potential Michael Malone concern? Sure. And this is really potential because it's something we haven't seen but for, I think, one or two games in these entire playoffs. What happens if Jamal Murray stops hitting? And he's been on a heater. One of the best

performers of the postseason is absolutely a critical reason why the nuggets are here. But the balance of their offense shifts pretty dramatically when he isn't hitting a lot of that pull-up mid-range stuff and a lot of really tough conversions going toward and around the rim. We'll have to see what happens to them if he just has like an awful shooting night. And he's had awful shooting halves, had bad shooting quarters. We really just haven't seen any kind of prolonged slump from Jamal Murray. And maybe we never will. Maybe he's going to write it all the way to the title. But I am curious to see what happens to their offense if that just goes off off the kilter just a little bit.

If they start to get a little wobbly when Jamal isn't the flamethrower we've seen to this point. Yep, I think that makes sense. The other point I wanted to make just quickly here, rest versus Rust, a tried and true NBA final stroke here. I just thought this one nugget from Kevin Pelton

is really interesting, but the teams with five or more games of rest than their opponents, 10 and 6 in game one. However, the teams with home corner advantage, 8 and 1 in game 1. So. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't worry about Rust with a team with this much continuity as Denver. Like, these aren't strangers. They're not quote unquote catching lightning in a bottle. This is, they've been doing this for years. I just like how it's both a rest versus Rust question and does home court advantage matter? And does Denver's home court advantage specifically matter? All just rolled. We're just layering kairons on top of kairons.

at the bottom of our screen here. It's amazing stuff. Just want to check all the boxes at once, pretty much. I appreciate you. Well, relatedly, then, we have to talk about question number four, which is the possibility of Tyler Hero, surprise returning in the middle of the conference final. So it sounds like, by all accounts, probably more of a mid-finals return for our friend in the bucket hat.

Chris Haynes reported that game three is what is being targeted. Was, do you think hero returning changes anything in terms of your outlook for the series? Yeah, I think it gives them more offense, and I've already said, they're going to need offense to win. They're not going to win this on defense, so I think it helps them in regards to making them harder to guard. Absolutely. And if you can make it so that Denver is making, you know, defensive-focused decisions, thereby making their own offense worse, then that's obviously in their advantage. So I think it helps their offense.

Do I think he swings the series? Absolutely not. He's just not enough. He's not enough of the things he's good at, unfortunately, to really make a dent in it. I do think one smaller area where he could make a difference if he comes back is the Nuggets defense has been pretty good

at hard closing out to the shooters they need to respect over the course of these playoffs. Bruce Brown and KCP in particular, flying out to contest threes. the heat when they have to put the ball on the floor in those situations it's a bit of a toss-up like sometimes a max trucer Gabe vincent is able to get where they need to go sometimes Duncan's able to get all the way to the rim but hero is really the guy who you would look at to say okay if you do get that hard close out when the ball swings your way put the ball on the floor get us into a

pick and roll hit the mid-range pull up whatever it is you have to do a by any means necessary kind of score that they just don't really have outside of jimmy right now so maybe that will be at least a factor, but a factor enough to beat the Denver Nuggets, I don't count on it. Yeah, I think it just emboldens like some of the advantages the heat have had to our surprise this postseason before. Like, how have they won? It's largely a lot of three-point shooters around Jimmy Butler. I think at this point, we could say that the three-point shooting success that they've had this postseason, which they are the best three-point shooting team by percentage in the playoffs, like I would expect that to carry over. They have good shooters. I don't think we should expect

what happened in the regular season to be the case anymore. And it's also the improbability factor that Rob you kind of outlined before. It's like, what is Spow going to do here? What is he going to do there? Is Hero going to play? Is Hayward Highsmith's going to play 15 minutes? Is he going to play 30 minutes? And I do think that adds to it. Now, to the other side of that argument, I do think like one of the big advantages they've had is like the zone, for instance, and being able to toss that out from here and there. And as you guys outlined, that's not going to be the case. And so if you're just like chopping off a lot of of the like throw the wrench at them sort of moves that the heat have had throughout this postseason. I do think it's tough, but Hero gives them another like one of those that they could potentially

throw out there. It doesn't hurt, you know? There's been a lot of, you know, Ewing theory kind of chatter about Tyler Hero and would they be going on this run had he been a part of the mix from the beginning? I think it's an interesting conversation, but he adds something to their team that they don't have, that they do need. He just isn't enough for this kind of matchup. that's really no fault of his.

The nuggets are really freaking good. So, Waz, if Hero isn't your X factor for this series, do you have one that you're like, oh, this guy, I'm really taking note of and seeing what he could do in this? I must sound like a broken record, but it's Aaron Gordon. He has the most important job in the series

out for Denver outside of Yokic. Yokic is going to be, he's going to be why Miami's defense has to bend to his will and opens everything up for the rest of those guys, the shooters and the cutters. But if Aaron Gordon can do a credible job on Jimmy Butler, this series is done. It's over. They're not going to score enough points.

There's not going to be enough openings. There's nobody else who can create in the one-on-one for Miami in any credible fashion as much as we've lauded praises on the likes of Caleb Martin, Gay Vincent, Max Truce, and even, you know, late period, Kyle Lowry, right? Nobody else is going to create in the one-on-one. So to me, the X-Factor, if you will, is Aaron Gordon. If, you know, you can get Jimmy to shoot five free throws a game and he's shooting in the low 40s, your job is done.

It's over. You know, this series is not going to be competitive in my mind. And so to me, he's Denver's X-Factor. I think Michael Porter Jr. is one to watch, too. in part for what we outlined up top, which is there just is not a member of the normal playing rotation for the heat, who is as tall as him,

who can actually contest his shot, which means he's going to have a lot of interesting matchups, smaller defenders trying to hide against him, and if he can hit shots over the top of them, consistently all series, it's going to be a real problem for the way that heat try to shrink the floor defensively. Like, that is what their game is predicated on.

It's like, okay, we're not going to be able to totally shut down Nicole Yokic, but maybe we can crowd the paint enough so he's at least not getting to his best spots. Porter is going to challenge that theory. And I think on the other side of the ball, too, can be a very interesting test case for Michael Porter in the like rep versus tape discussion

because I think there are going to be points in the series where Jimmy Butler's eyes are going to get wide, thinking he can attack Michael Porter Jr. And we'll see if he can. But over the course of this season, of the course of these playoffs, Porter's been pretty solid defensively, pretty good, using his length much more effectively

than he used to, better position than he used to be. He's not a guy, you can pick on in quite the same way he was. And if the heat think of him that way, I think they're going to get caught sometimes. And Porter's just going to earn himself more and more minutes and more and more opportunities if he can hold up in those kinds of matchups. I didn't have this question down because we're going to have a lot of time to talk about

various things with the finals and finals adjacent stuff. But if the nuggets win the finals, Porter gets his ring, what are the odds on him being the disease of more guy? Like, is it off the board? Like, is he automatically going to ask for a trade because he wants to go somewhere else? Because, like, my general POV on him is that he is doing all the role player stuff that he probably has bristled that before and good on him. It's really working.

But it just seems like he's not as, like, happy with it. And he's almost like trying to manufacture, like, media in order to make it seem. Like, he's, like, he's doing a little too much media recently. And on the one hand, you had a week or two off, right? And so, like, do whatever you want. play Bachi ball, like, you know, hang out with your family. God bless. On the other hand, I'm just like,

he's one person I'm watching. I'm like, I kind of don't believe you that you're buying in as much as you say you're buying in. But he's buying in. It's on the floor. Just, just what's a ripple effect question. Cynicism. I understand I understand where you're going with this,

but to that I would say, bye, bye, the door is there. Michael Porter is not what's driving the success of this team. And in fact, if somebody wanted to send some real goodies of guys who can credibly play both sides of the floor all the time and don't need their asses padded for doing so, because a team thinks that Michael Porter, Jr., somehow some franchise level type of guy, have had it. I would lose absolutely no sleep whatsoever if I was Denver and Michael Porter. started huffing and puffing like, fool, please. You barely

even play around here. What are you talking about? Was, you fell for it. The Nuggets fans and staff and Michael Malone have been clamoring for their team to be covered like the Lakers. This is what happens. Guys like Justin are like, what if the third or fourth best player on your team once out, even though you've shown

every indication, you'll play ball all season long? So you're saying you're buying Michael Porter Jr., perfect citizen Denver role player for the entirety of his career now. I'm not saying he'll do her for the entirety of his career. I'm saying he's done it.

And until he tells us otherwise and that he wants out, I'm willing to take him at his play. Take it at his play. The disease of, like the quote unquote disease of more candidate on this team is Bruce Brown. Just because he makes like $6.8 million, the Nuggets are not going to be able to afford to keep him in all likelihood unless he takes a significant pay cut

relative to what he could get on the open market, they might lose Bruce Brown, no matter what happens in this series, and that's a reality. But look, Porter has been a good citizen. I don't begrudge him for that. I don't look at him as saying, like, is something wrong under the hood

despite the fact that he's doing everything the team asks him to do? A lot of guys in this team have fallen, like Aaron Gordon has fallen perfectly into his role. KCP has fallen perfectly into his role. There is something contagious about that. And maybe Porter just needed to be a part of it for a long enough time

and found his way in it. See, I'm just one step ahead. You know, that's why I'm in the front office of this pod. You guys are out there on the floor making things happen, you know? That's why we're just highly coveted candidates for the front office, but you've got the job. Yeah, exactly. All right, who wins? How many games?

Nuggets in five. Wow. Wow. Nuggets and five. I mean... I have that, too, by the way. I wanted to say Nuggets in 5, but I honestly have too much respect for heat culture. I think they're not going to lay down.

They're going to make this very hard on the Nuggets. They're not going to have lapses of focus and intensity, and they're not going to blow assignments. They're going to be, they're going to execute extremely well. So I got Nuggets in 6, but that's literally just respect for Spow and the culture. Because on paper, this is damn near a sweep if we're being real here. But Miami, like, bro, how did the bucks not beat them in five? Okay?

Great question. How did the Celtics not just straight up beat these guys into submission with their size and talent? Yep. They somehow emerged from both of those series. And at times, looking freaking dominant. I don't see why I should think, why I shouldn't see those results, considering the regular season teams those guys were in their past postseason successes from both of those teams. The way Miami looked against them, you have to think not only are they their equal, they're better.

And we wouldn't pick the Bucks or the Celtics to lose in four or five games. So I'm not going to do that to the heat. However, Denver is the team of destiny. They're the team of the moment. They are going to win the championship. Justin Varyer. Thank you. I'm picking Denver too.

Are you allowed to pick Denver though? Could I not just like give an opinion on a series? There's like such a weird thing happening now where like if you if you pick wrong in a series and let's just let's be frank about this. Predictions are bullshit to begin with. This is like the least useful content than any of us can produce. That if you get this wrong like then you have to like go on an apology to. in order to like repent for it.

I'm just like, no, we've gone way too far down the rabbit. No, no, no. It's not the prediction. It's just in March and April when they were basically like, all right, we're clearly the number one seat in the West.

Like, we're good and they sort of took their foot off the pedal. You were questioning if this was a good team, much less a championship worthy, level elite team with an all-time player on it. That's what we're talking about. Just we're not talking about you.

be getting an off series prediction wrong. You were questioning the fabric of the integrity of this team. And so we're going to make you pay for you. Make it to the finals. That's what I said. Look, Waz and I have been invited. They can't even look at the wives in the eyes.

Yeah. In the event Denver wins, Waz and I have been invited to be co-grand marshals of the celebratory parade. We may or may not allow you to be on our float. That's all I'm saying at this point at time. That's it, Justin. That's it. It's okay.

No micro breweries for you. I don't even like IPAs, okay? Wow. Wow. That beard says otherwise. It's true. Okay, before we go here, we had to hit some news that we kind of reference off the top. Bob Myers has officially stepped down as Grand Puba in Golden State.

Goat Myers to ESPN. It's just time. Was, are you surprised at all at this point? like an inevitability considering how long this had been rumored? I thought a lot of the buzzing around Myers' potential departure was just posturing when I first heard it. And I started reaching out to people in the bay who were around the team and would know obviously better than I, like sort of getting a feel for what that was. And everybody was like, no, this shit is real. And some people got.

got the sense that Bob Myers doesn't have the ultimate respect of Joe Lacob. In the sense that I think, I think they're saying that Lakers makes it seem like Bob Myers isn't the best GM in the NBA. And so why the hell would he pay him like one? Like he is, right? Why should I pay a guy to be the highest paid executive in the league if I don't think he's the best executive in the league? And so if you don't have the ultimate respect of your employer,

employer. Sometimes the answer is to be like, fuck you, I'll go do it somewhere else, where people do have respect and they do value what I bring to the table. And then of course, you can't discount the Roman Roy's working for the organization, right?

You know, sometimes it's got to be hard to be the Carls and the Franks and the jerrys of the world's when you got the, you know, when you got the offspring of the guy who signs the checks working in the organization

and influential. Okay. These positions. These are slanderous comparisons. Okay, maybe I didn't need to say Roman. Maybe it could have been a Kendall. Well, you know, if you think that's better. But yeah, the nepotism part of it

fucking matters. It does matter. Like, it matters that these guys are snipping around my shit while I'm a grown-ass man, put work in here. And you only have this job because, yo, daddy, owns the team. Like,

that's professionally, I can understand why that would trap a guy as accomplished and confident in what he does as Bob Myers is. So it makes sense that he stepped down. But I also think if you're late, I'm like, yo, fam, I'm not paying you 17 mil or 15 mil, whatever it was to GM this team. I'm good.

I understand it from all angles. But it's really the multi-component part of that, I think, for Myers, right? You have this elephant in the room with other members of the, front office who are now being elevated, who are related to the owner. There is that contract part you mentioned. There's also the part that there's this funny thing with being the executive of a team where people often get into that business or want to do it because

they like building things. They want to put the roster together. The work of keeping the roster together and keeping everyone happy and keeping everyone paid and dealing with, look, the Warriors are a dynastic team with big expectations as long as Steph Curry is there. That part's not so fun necessarily. And so if your job is not fun, it's not paying you well, and you're watching your flank for the owner's son, it's coming up behind you, I can understand why you might want to go work, not even just another job, but reportedly, at least some of the speculation that's out there, especially from people covering the team, Tim Kawakami was on that note for the athletic today about the fact that Myers just might go work in another industry, just might go work in tech

for a little while, go might work some kind of cushy CEO job outside of basketball. We'll see where he ends up, but I can't say I blame him for not wanting another go-around on this particular carousel. I mean, what have we been saying about the CBA for the past couple weeks now? Like, the teams that pay as much as the Warriors are going to be significantly penalized and is going to be significantly harder for them to figure out their roster from here. Like, you might as well call this new punitive tax on the second apron, like the Warriors' tax, in the way that certain players get tagged with names to certain CBA adjustments. And so to me, this strikes me as getting out before, like, the cops come sort of deal.

Like, it's very much Darryl Morey getting out of Houston to spend time with his family just to pick up shop in Philly when a better opportunity comes. It's like the mafia. It's like being part of the mafia before the RICO predicate had been instituted. It's like, we're at the start of something. Whoever comes in after Myers is going to be the Tony Soprano. I got in right after they closed the door sort of vibe. Well, it's also interesting to see who was going to be the first person out the door, really, for this version of the Warriors,

between Myers and Kerr and Draymond and Clay and Steph. You know, that's the core version of that team and the core architects and the people who run that team. To see Myers be the first to go, I'm a little surprised, even after all the speculation all season. You know, I'm, maybe a lot of that is owed to the fact that the Warriors won last season, so they were able to keep everything else together, and they didn't have to really stare down any existential questions, but they certainly have some existential questions now as to what the future of this team will look like and who is going to be a part of it.

And we know now that the Bob will not. Can we get a local perspective on this follow-up? Ben Cruz, do you want to weigh in here? Ben Cruz, tell the people how you feel, man. Yeah, I mean, it's heartbreaking just from a band. standpoint because, you know, we were all just waiting for that first domino to fall with the core of his team. And, you know, I think for the majority of the year, we all thought it was going to be Draymond because what happened at the beginning of the season. And then once this

news leaks at the beginning of the season that Bob wasn't locked in for the foreseeable future or even next year, you realized it was more than less. likely going to be him. And, you know, I've seen a lot of pictures of Bob celebrating over the last couple of days and, you know, maybe I'm just in my feelings. But with him being the first one, this could really just mean the beginning of the end of the whole thing, right? Because he has really good relationships with Dremond, with Steph. What are the ripple effects? of him leaving on them. I mean, it'll be interesting to see now,

you know, especially with this off season. And one of the, one of the things I found hilarious during the president yesterday was, was him and Lekob not being able to agree on who exactly is running the draft. So we're just off to a rocking start here in the post Bob Myers era.

I'm surprised that this is such an emotional impact. Like, I didn't realize that the fan base was so connected to Bob in the way that they would be Steph or even like a Sean Livingston. Well, I think it's because, you know, while he didn't draft Steph, he drafted Draymond and Clay, right? He was the executive responsible for the formation

of the core of this team. And so anyone who has their fingerprints on moves that's substantial, not to mention, the biggest free agent coup of, what, the basketball century and getting Durant there? He's a front-facing dude, right? Like, he's not R.C. He's not Pat Riley.

He's up there crying at the podium when KD. tears his freaking Achilles. Like, that's not what most executives are doing. So it makes sense that fans feel connected to the guy. He's front-facing. And that's the thing. I know there is a, you know, NBA General Manager cosplay thing that happens among NBA fans,

among NBA Twitter, you know, people really empathizing with and putting themselves in the shoes, of like, how do we run this team? How do we build this team? That can be a little like cold and calculated. It can be a little fantasy basketball. I think to Bob Myers' credit, part of the reason he is thought of in this way, in a much a warmer and a much fuzzier way, is he is a very, like, human presence in running that team. He is that guy who is crying on the podium. He is the person who is connecting on an interpersonal level in a way that he doesn't have the cold

remove of some of those other executives, even executives who have done wonderful jobs. He just has done that job a little bit differently and in a way that has put him front and center and has put him as an emotional piece of that team, like it or not. Yeah, that's probably the biggest obstacle for the Dunleavy's in the Kirk wakeups of the world too.

It's like, does Draymond not respect those guys as much as he did Bob and our issues now much more complicated to wade through because he's not there? Also, I would just say just as a small footnote, I think Myers is one of the first like agents turned GMs in a strong wave of those.

We see that pretty frequently around the NBA now. He was definitely one of the first and one of the best. And so it does feel like maybe like a closing of the chapter or like someone who started off an era like finally stepping down. But it's worth note in there. Ben, do you need any other sort of emotional sendoffs here? Do you feel closure? If you have any comforting words, you know,

that'd be nice, but if you just want to pile on, I'm also open to that, I guess, whatever. I'm like Kendall Roy at this point. You can't hurt me more than... You're staring out into the bay sitting on the bench. We see you, Ben. We're here for you, buddy. Mike Dunleavy Jr., just looming over your shoulder. Yeah.

All right, let's wrap it there. We're going to be back this weekend to talk about going into game two of the finals and everything else going on. in the NBA. So look out for the next pod Saturday night into Sunday morning sometime around then. Thank you to Benjamin Cruz for popping on pod and also filling in a production. Thank you to Eduardo Campo for stitching all of us together. We'll be back this weekend. See you.