The Ringer NBA Show - Giannis Leads the Bucks to a 2-1 Series Lead | Weekends With Wos

Episode Date: May 8, 2022

Wos is joined by The Athletic’s Seth Partnow to discuss what the Bucks have done well in slowing down the Celtics offense, what the Celtics can do to try to even up the series, and more. Host: Wosny Lambre Guest: Seth Partnow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Available on Spotify. To another edition of weekends on the Ringer podcast Network, I'm Big Was, A.K.A. Wazney Lambray, and I'm joined by a very special and esteemed guest, formerly of the Milwaukee Bucks, now of the athletic. My man, the guy with the wettish jump shot in NBA media, Seth Partnow, was going on, brother. There's not video proof of mind like there is for

Lee Ellis, but I think it's accurate. Super accurate. This man has ranged out to 30 feet. I promise y'all, I'm not lying. I didn't know they had basketball courts in Alaska, yet here we are. Okay.

That's some serious trade and laying generation are going on right now, but okay. Shouts to Carlos Boozer. Man, I'm so happy that I was smart enough to ask you to come on the day after this Buck Celtics game because I know you're watching this series with a very keen eye as are the rest of us. And man, just a good old-fashioned Eastern Conference

Slauber knocker. That is the correct word. It's, you know, NBA playoffs started and the hockey game broke out. So, man, I saw this stat floating around the internet per cleaning the glass on first shot attempts. The Celtics were, had an 82 offensive rating, and the Bucks had a 76. that is insane half-court defense. Yeah, it's, I think we knew that about both these teams. I'm frankly a little surprised that the thing we thought coming into this series

was the advantage Boston would have on the wings with Chris Middleton out. And Milwaukee isn't out playing, isn't even really totally matching them, but they're blunting the advantage. I mean, West Matthews is playing Jason Tatum not to a draw, but again, he's not getting killed. And if you had told me before the series that it would swing on the fact that Wesley Matthews can guard Jason Tatum straight up, I would have asked you to have your head examined.

I do think that Boston and Tatum in particular are playing into this a little bit. there's there's their boston especially earlier in the year had the tendency to kind of you know flatten out the floor and you know almost played james hardness offense with tatum at the top and if it's just a situation like that where west matthews can kind of be physical and doesn't have to navigate screens and have to chase a guy around like he still he has that it's just if you if you're making him like you know run off screens chase you side to side um you know his mobility isn't what it was and so that would be be where Boston could get some advantage. But I think for whatever reason, Boston hasn't consistently done that when that's really been a characteristic of their offense for, you know, the last couple months of the season since they've been on their tremendous run. Yeah. And, you know, oftentimes when your half-court offense is sputtering in the way that Boston's

did. And, again, it's not like they're playing, you know, some, they're not playing the Hawks, right? Like, they're playing a team that has established, not just over the course of this year, over the course of about three, four years now, of defensive excellence and dominance, right? So you would expect that they might run into some trouble

in the half court, and you would just hope that Boston to goose their numbers and efficiency could get something done in transition, and they have just been horrific. especially yesterday, and it wasn't for lack of trying. They were getting out in transition. They just couldn't convert.

In fact, I'd say their poor offense is almost, I mean, you were just talking about, like, Milwaukee's struggle to put it mildly to score and a half court. But if you give up, Milwaukee had nine steals yesterday, like, you know, live ball turnovers are a pretty good way to get Milwaukee some easy shots.

And in a close game, you know, uh, turnovers and offensive rebound sort of, this is not a, you know, I, I,

I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, it's like, you know, it's,

it's, it's a shots on goal is sort of the, and the team that wins the shots on goal battle, because they're, they're, they're all low percentage, but you take more of them, more of them will go in.

And that's, that's a little bit where this is happening. Yeah. Yeah. And certainly in games one and three, game, game two, Boston was like,

made a lot of shots and played much better. But certainly in games one and three, it was very rock fightish. Of course, we're, you know, we're damn there 10 minutes into this and haven't mentioned, you know, the elephant in the room or the freak in the room. But Janice was just, he was incredible yesterday.

And which, you know, at this point, it's kind of what we expect out of the guy. The first two games, straight up, Boston did what they needed to do. They got stops, and specifically, he got his shots off in the restricted area and didn't convert. They were bothering him. The length was bothering him. His timing was a little off.

I was like, wow, like, Boston has done as good a job as I've ever seen somebody do, basically, in recent times, defending what Janice does so expertly, which is get buckets around the basket. but I just had a feeling like you can't count on keeping the biggest monster in the paint in the game out of there and stopping from converting. And I thought he reverted back to more Janus stuff where it says dude was 10 of 15 into restricted by my count. That's pretty damn good, Seth. I don't even think Boston defended him poorly.

There was just a lot of, you know, like Grant Williams. think it's doing a pretty good job. Yeah. It's, but it's, you know, there was, there's a lot of banging.

A lot of, there's a lot of banging. There's a lot of banging. This is, this is, this is, you know, this is, you know,

maybe the best part of like 90s and early 2000s basketball we're getting from that. And that's enjoyable. But, but yeah, Boston's making it tough on him, but if he,

you know, you're one of the top two or three players in the game, you can, they can make it tough and you can still score. Yeah. So, yeah, I do, like, you know, not to be like, as, as is my, uh, my want to sort of,

uh, pump the brakes a little bit, I do wonder, depending on the length of Chris Middleton's absence, if Milwaukee can ask this of Janus for this and two more series. You know, that's like he was, he was like he had, like, he was gas. Yeah, like this is that, like, like, he didn't get, he didn't get into the 40s easily. He had to work for it. And you could tell he'd had to work for it. And, you know, maybe that, maybe that doesn't take cumulative effect this series. But, you know, presumably, like, if they see Miami next round, it's going to be a little more of the same.

And then whoever, yeah, whoever they play in the finals, you know. Yeah. If they get through that, like, you know, bang up against Draymond Green or DeAndre 8. And actually, like, Phoenix might even have the, as good as Phoenix is, they might have the, the fewest bodies to throw at him almost. Yeah, I don't, yeah, I'm not crazy about bin-smacked Bionbo and, and Javelle McGee's ability to, you know, do spot duty. Yeah, when Aitin inevitably picks up two quick files on Yonnes.

Like, and that, you know, that became a problem last year in the finals, but we're getting ahead of ourselves a little bit. So, Yonis comes out. Just a little. Just a little, yeah, just three rounds from now. Yeah. Um, Janice comes out and in the third quarter, he's basically dominant. He was a plus 14 in the quarter by himself.

Um, he just, you know, dominated. They get out to a really big lead. And it feels like Boston is dead in the water. They inevitably come back, take the lead. Um, I'm somebody who thought that Boston would win this series in about six or seven games. I just, I just thought they had more advantages to press. because of the Middleton injury, what do you think they could be doing more of going forward?

Because, again, this game was there for them to take it, even though they went down big in the second half. Oh, I, like, I'll freely admit that with the Middleton injury, I picked Boston in five. Like, I, you know, that's, um, and that's obviously. You disrespected Janice Antecoe, Seth. Say sorry, now.

No. What's disresay. Like, that's another rant for another time. But no, like two teams enter, one team's leaves. You're not disrespecting the team. Like, you got to pick one. It's not like, you know, I think they're both very good. One has all their guys the other doesn't.

Yes. Disrespectful to point that out. Okay, whatever. No, I think that, I think that so, like, I think some of it, like, Tatum almost, and I'm going to make a weird comparison because he's a much better player, I think. but there's a like tatum's almost carriage is a little too reminiscent of Carl Anthony Towns he seems a little like

too amped up wow okay yeah like like not to the extent of like towns where he like basically took him myself out of the play in game by like being so like I gotta go make something happen and run something but Tatum is like he's very like you know he's never he's never he's always been like gesticulative

but he's very like and just like kind like banging his head against the wall of West Matthews and not, you know, when he's been at his best, you know, over the net series, over the latter half of the season. He's taken what the defense is given. Yeah, he's been, he's been patient and surgical. And, you know, you have to give credit to Milwaukee for making that hard on him. But I think he is also falling into the trap of I'm going to run through this instead of I'm going to work around it and we'll go second side and get some good over there. Then the ball come back to me and now West is West Matthews is closing out on me.

and now, like, here I go. I do think that there's one name, like you said, we hadn't mentioned the elephant in the room. I thought you were going to go Brooke Lopez. That's, I think that is a, that's been so dominant in the freaking pain. Whenever they try to attack in there, it's like they're banging their head against a brick wall.

Like, he's been, like, so I remember we talked to, we talked to Zach Harper up here, and he was like, man, I'm a little bit worried about the bucks because their defense just hasn't been there this year. And it's like, yo, they haven't had Brooke Lopez. Their defense had back surgery. Brough, the second this fool comes back, they're back to just dominance again.

And yesterday, like you just mentioned, was very, you know, illustrative of that. Yeah, I think that there's a, there's a micro point about how, like, important Brooke Lopez is to the Bucks defense. I think a couple years ago, the year that Janice won defensive player of the year, I didn't have a vote. But if I had one, I would have voted for Brooke Lopez

for a defensive player of the year. And I think that, and I think you're seeing why, but also I think he is indicative of how, you know, the trend across the league of teams starting to play bigger. And it's, they have kind of this space eating, like center who can, who can man the paint. And then an athletic four who can kind of run around, destroy everything.

Cleveland had a great success with that this year. during the regular season, Memphis, and they've kind of completely gotten away from it for, you know, understandable reasons, though, I think it's legitimate that Stephen Adams can't chase Steph Curry around. It's, I mean, but you're sort of seeing like, you know, you're seeing, like,

there's part of the reason, like, Jaron Jackson's always in foul trouble is he fouls 50% more often when he's playing without Stephen Adams, when he's playing the five. Like, that's, you know, that's demonstrable this year. I wouldn't crunch the numbers. It's like 3.9 per 36 with Stephen Adams and 5.4 without. Yeah, that's a material difference.

Yeah, and for a, you know, and for a guy who's spent some important time on the bench. But I think that what the point is is that like anchor big is it's kind of something we've moved away from a little bit. And I think it may be the job requirements are different than they used to be, where it could it just be like, you know, Roy Herbert or Kendrick Perkins or ever like these these guys are are much more mobile like it's a that's a that feels like a weird thing to describe about brooke lopez but his like small space agility and his ability to um you know uh my colleague our friend eric name wrote a great article about a month ago i guess where or last year sorry the one this year was drew alliday where last year where he like like interviewed uh brook and put it over video of brook talking about like his knowledge of the rules

and how he could position himself and what's coming and where he's got to be and stuff like that. And so even if he's not like as physically fast, his reading of the game and his mental speed allows him to make up for that. And then just, you know, being big and in the way is pretty good. He's so huge.

Yeah. And, you know, this is some of my favorite stuff because people don't remember this, but early on in Brooks, Brooklyn tenure, his defense was a fucking complaint. Like, people were like, bro, this guy kind of stinks at defense. And he made himself into one of the best guys in the league to the point where you're like, no, like he's played defensive player of the year caliber defense.

And we always forget, like in the playoffs, you know, people are trying to get those advantages. And the best shots are the shots closest to the basket. It's LMU learned this shit the first day you pick up a basketball at six years old. right? And if you have a guy who was making those shots extremely difficult, not just to make, but to get off in the first place, you know, that's of, you know, incredible value in the postseason. Yeah, and that allows, you know, part of the reason, like, we've been giving West Matthews his due and he deserves every bit of it.

But part of the reason he, you know, he can take the risk of being, like, you know, up and under a guy who's quicker than him is he knows, all right, I got, I got, I got the seven footer behind me. And behind him, we got the other guy. So, you know, there's plenty of help, you know, the times where I do get beat. So I'm just going to push up as much as I can. And he's not getting that pull-up off. Yeah, this isn't Utah where guys are just like, no, let me just not have any resistance.

And literally the only other good defensive player on this team is Rudy. It's like, no, there's two defensive player of the year caliber guys behind Drew fucking holiday. Okay. Like, it's a problem. It's a problem. And I think you're seeing that in Boston, like these numbers are sort of speaking for themselves. Jason Tatum, four for 19, obviously on its face is horrible. But like Seth mentioned, when you're watching the game, this shit is difficult.

Like, he's not getting easy shots, right? Like, this isn't coming within the flow of their offense. And it's like, oh, they ran some action to spring Tatum free. And he's getting something up. Like, he is working for everything. He's on the ball. He's initiating pick and roll. He's doing so much freaking work.

Some of these shots were good looks that just, you know, didn't go down. But a lot of them were of high difficulty. Again, like, I think people look to Jalen Brown because basically the thought was, like, when his matchup isn't Drew Holiday, these should be guys like Grayson Allen and Conninton and even West Matthews that the guy should be able to take advantage of. and he hasn't really been able to, you know, cook as much as we thought, you know, outside of game two. However, Al Horford, my God, this guy is incredible. Remember when we thought he was watched?

Genius. Yeah, exactly. I was like, oh, God, Brad Stevens doing the Doc River shit. Oh, let me go get all of my older players bring them back because I know him and I love him. And, you know, I feel comfortable and I feel safe. safe when I'm in these guys' hands. And I was like, I don't know about this Horford thing, man. Like, I think there was a reason you guys could go out and get him.

But he's been a damn godsend this playoffs, especially against the bucks. No, I mean, he gives, you know, they, you've talked about Grant Williams doing it. Like him and, him and Grant Williams are the two guys who have been able to at least, like, bother. Manage. Yes. Yeah. Like Robert Williams doesn't have the quickness and probably plays a little too straight up and down. and like whenever he gets on like it's it he and he's just way too big for for for for

Tatum and and and and so but like that and then on the other end like this is sort of one of the things and going back to when he was in Boston the first time like when we when we played them in the playoffs and that was when I was with the bucks we played them in the playoffs there was a little bit of all right well this is going to be our coverage and we're going to make Al Horford have to shoot it every time like I mean we know how Horford can shoot it but he doesn't He doesn't want to. He's like Marcus Saul in that way. Yeah.

And he has been at least, I think he's sort of, okay, well, we're not getting everything else we want, but this shot is open, so I'm going to let it fly. And that was a big part of like, he was, he was great in the fourth quarter yesterday. That was a huge, like, he was, he was the second best player on the floor for long stretches that game. And so that's been, you know, that's been one of the really, like, interesting things about the series. And this again, why you think both these teams are good is like Boston has six guys that can step up at any given time. And they just haven't had enough of them in two of the three games. Look, I pick Boston before the series. I still think they're in pretty good position.

They get this game four. They'll have two more home games. I think if they could get game four, they're still going to win this series. But essentially, and I hate being sports media more. must win game guy, but game four is must win. I just like, I don't think they can count on making jump shots three games in a row if they need to win three games in a row. And that's, you know, that's, you know, like if there is a flaw to this team, it's they are, you know, they've got a couple of guys who can shoot feet set. But they don't have, you know, they don't have a, they don't have a, they don't have a Seth Curry.

You know, they don't have just that guy, that wing guy who is, you know, high volume knockdown. that you can break a team out of that that sort of that that very crunched in defense that Milwaukee that very physical and crunched in defense that Milwaukee is playing they did I mean in game two they did a great job moving the ball quickly side to side but I think Milwaukee did a better job containing in game three also yeah and you know Marcus smart who's an important player for them just hasn't gotten it going yesterday was a bit of a nightmare for him um I guess we got to talk about that last, those last few plays. I think it's obvious that was a shooting foul.

Everybody agrees with that. Even on the, on the, I'm so happy they did the purposely missed a free throw. I think that's the chance you should be taking in that scenario. It ends up working. And he got filed again. I can't call that. You can't call that. Exactly.

And also, Marcus Smart is the boy who cried Wolf. I'm sorry. I love that the refs don't give that fool the benefit of the day. That's just me. This isn't an antique Boston thing. I just think the fucking, the acting and the tomfoolery and trickeration that these guys are doing to the refs, the job is hard enough.

I want to see the refs start going, look, man, if this shit ain't obvious that somebody like Marcus Smart or Chris Paul or James Hardin got hit, I'm not calling that shit. And I think on the last play, I'm happy that they swallowed their whistles. I mean, I don't, you don't want to, both fan bases judging from like my Twitter mentions,

we're not happy with the refereeing. And I think, I frankly think with some justification. I thought it was, I thought it was, I didn't think it was lopsided. I thought it was uneven. Just in,

like, in the space of a couple minutes, like, Jalen Brown, like, gets a pretty soft foul call where he kind of lost the ball and Druryalli may have tapped him on the arm.

And then, like, two trips later, Yonis hammers him. And there's like, and there's a lot of that just both ways, where the inconsistency and the amount of contact, that was a foul. So that was a, I don't think it ultimately, other than, you know, maybe Marcus Smart should have had three three three throws.

Okay, Marcus Smart should have had three free throws to tie. But I thought it, like, was, it was balanced just, like, inconsistent and frustrating. But it's a hard job. And as I was talking to Mo DeKille about this, and he made the point, like, I would hate to refihanis game. It's like, it's the equivalent of Shaq. Yeah. Because there's just so much contact. So, and here's the thing about Janus, too.

It's like he does get brutalized. But, man, the boy, does he do a lot of work with that off, that off arm. My God, dude. So, like, to me, he's drawing even on that because he does clubs people in the fucking chest with his big ass forearm. And I'm just like, bro, what are people's, what the hell is Robert Williams supposed to do when he's just being freaking assaulted on damn near every drive. Like, it's ridiculous what's happening.

So I'm completely fine with how that's being called. Like, Janice, he's dishing it out. He's getting it. I think those are basically at the end. You're getting an even distribution. I still think Boston ultimately, man, like, if they can be better than an 82 or 76 rating in the half court, they can win this series.

It seems like that's attainable, said. It does. So this is, this is a, you know, I don't want to say it's a benefit that Middleton is out, but one thing it is doing is like, okay, Drew Holiday and Yonis, each took 30-something shots. It's a must. Has to happen. But so, okay, that's the offense. All of you other guys, you're playing defense.

Yeah. And that, and that sort of is, um, uh, is a must happen. allowing, okay, well, then this is, you know, I'm not, I'm not worried about getting, you know, West Matthews, not worried about getting, you know, spot up three and doing the bow and arrow. He's just like, all right, I'm, you know, I'm on offense and I'm still thinking about the next time I'm going to smack Jason Tatum in the chest. Yes. So we could just wrap this up.

What do you think Boston can do aside from just make a couple of shots? I don't know that there's anything that they can do rotationally. I've seen some shit out there. People saying Derek White might need some more run. I don't know. I mean, like, at a certain point, like... I think they can... I think they can set some screens higher up the floor

because Boston, Milwaukee's ball pressure is so extreme that maybe they can kind of get that sort of half-court fast break thing going. Get rolling downhill, yeah. Yeah, either, like, you know, set a screen in the... The old Miami-Heat LeBron joint where they would set the screen like five feet away from the three-point line so that this dude could get ahead of steam. I think Jason Tatum needs...

Yeah, definitely need some of that. at. Or even in the back court. Just like something to get like something moving towards the basket with a little more speed. I like I got to give I got to give tremendous credit to the Bucks coaching staff because you look before the game. It's like where are advantages coming from? And they looked and they're like, okay, Boston's really good. But you know what they don't have? They don't actually have a lot of team like straight line speed. So we can get up into them. And it like it won't hurt us as much because like the only guy who's really like a person. burner is not is is uh jalen brown and he's not the surest ball handler under pressure so it's it's not like you know you pressure up on tray or something like that and it's like well he's gone and then

we yeah um but they boston doesn't have that so i think that that's um i think that that was a good identification of where they might be able to have an advantage by by milwaukee's coaching stuff because it's been very clear in every game like they are picking up at the opposite free throw line whenever possible. And, you know, that also, if you're not asking, you know, West Matthews and Pat Conantin and Grayson Allen and Javon Carter, when he's in the game to do anything on offense but stand in the corner, they can do that.

They can pressure 94 feet. So I think this is, you know, it's, there's a good job of making the best of what they have, certainly. So I want to get you on the record. You're picking the bucks to go to the conference finals. You flip-flopping on your pick? I mean, three games have happened. So it's like, you know, even if you've got good information.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I mean, the difference between needing to win, you know, this is, you know, this is, you know, three is greater than two. And Boston needs to win three games and Milwaukee only needs to win two. And so even if even to the degree that I thought before the series that as available, Boston might have had a better team better roster, they're not that much, they're not a full game better over over. over four games. So that's that, you know, obviously it's, it's advantage Milwaukee. But again, game four, that, that swings back pretty hard the other way. Like, it's game four is going to be, like, you know.

Yeah. It's a must, it's kind of a must win for both teams, frankly. Yeah. I love the way you put that. I really still, I just have to believe Boston can play better. They can play, like, closer to their form after they went down by damn 16 points. I really do think they're going to ultimately pull it out, but it's going to be hard.

And this is what we love about the postseason, watching these young guys figure this shit out, figure out a way to win this damn knife fight. I really think Boston is going to ultimately be able to do it. I just think, like, they just have the clear, if not decisive, talent advantage. And I'm always going to think talent is going to win out overall. So, yeah, I really do think boss is going to find a way to get game four. They're going to have the two home games in their back pocket and ultimately get to the third round. But it's going to be, yeah, it's basically Godi versus Mickey Ward.

Just think of any just boxing match with the two guys are winning on each other. It's going to be no rematch. No. So, Seth, man, let's get you out of here. Tell the people they could find you in your incredible work, man. You can find me on Twitter at Seth Part now. You can listen to me on NERDESHEW wrote every week, but this week since I'm in Spain on the Athletic NBA show. Read me a couple times a month at The Athletic.

And by my book, The Midrange Theory, audiobook just came out. I'm working on the updated, you know, the introduction to the updated paperback edition now, and that'll be out in the fall. But if you can't wait, paperback and e-readers version still available, anywhere books are sold online. I love it. Yeah, go get the mid-range theory. You jokers are listening to podcasts. Y'all can get the audio book.

Jesus Christ. Thank you, man. Thank you for coming on and doing this. I know you're not even in the country and you're doing your thing. So thank you for taking the time. We'll see you guys next week. I'll see you guys on Wednesday on group chat with Justin Vary and Rob Mahoney. We're out of here.

Peace. Thank you.