The Ringer NBA Show - Is This Anything? Late-Season Edition. | Group Chat

Episode Date: February 28, 2024

Justin, Rob, and Wos take a look at a handful of recent trends and discuss whether or not they're important to watch down the stretch of the regular season (6:35). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming, please checkout theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Justin Verrier, Rob Mahoney, and Wosny Lambre Producers: Isaiah Blakely and Chia Hao Tat Additional Production Supervision: Ben Cruz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There are a lot of quarterbacks in the NFL draft this year. My name is Ben Solac and I host the Ringer NFL Draft Show with Danny Kelly, Danny Hypatts, and Craig Horleck. We cover trades, free agency, and the draft, which is, yeah, obviously. We'll tell you about everything, which includes which quarterbacks are good, which quarterbacks are bad and which quarterbacks are just Kirk Cousins. That is the Ringer NFL Draft Show. Search the Ringer NFL Draft Show on Spotify. Hello and welcome to group chat. I am Justin Barrier, joining me to my right, Big Was, and joining us on the big screen, Rob Mahon.

Honey. Guys, I just want to say thank you first to everyone who reached out after I hit the buzzer beating game winner against the Dallas Fabrics last night. Yeah. I appreciate that. Huge moment for you. First buzz a beater of your career. Not the last. Let me tell you. How does it feel? It feels like a normal day. You know, I just move on to the next one. Next pod, up mentality. That's me. You're a real pro. We've always said that about you. Did you watch that game last night, Rob? Just like piecing together things in the aftermath. You know, obviously saw that shot.

Then I'm like, okay, how do we get here? And how do we, how do I see the full Max Drews explosion? Because I'm a good friend, Justin. I want to see you do well. Well, if you wanted to see me pantomime it here at this lovely desk in Spotify HQ, just let me know at any point here. But today's episode is going to be another edition of the hit, I don't know, bit. Is this anything?

The late season edition, which as we mentioned on the last time we did this, I think with Michael Pina, this is just a blatant rip-off of the Orlando Magic broadcast, which is a rip-off of a David Letterman sketch. And we're going by Hollywood rules here because we are in L.A., which is that, if anything, is too derivative, it's just an homage, right?

That's how they do it on the prestige podcast, right, Rob? Maybe so. But I think, to your point, if it's been ripped off twice, I think it's open season on that, at that point, right? I think so. Yeah, we'll have to check with the lawyers, but we'll get on it there. So I have a couple things on this dock here, but I want to start with something off the dock. And this one comes courtesy of a longtime listener.

I believe his name is Bob Mahoney. And it is a tweet from an Alex Medina in which it shows five gentlemen in a little circle here, one of which is our friend Biguas. And Steph Curry is also in this photo. keels back in a, I would say a 40 degree angle. Yeah. And the text here is this man at Big Was has us crying. Yeah.

And so I have to ask, Was, is this anything? No, it's not anything. It's, you know, All Star Weekend is like a trillion different events or whatever. And I had somehow got invited to Steph Curry's event because he's, apparently he's got a whiskey or bourbon that he, a bourbon brand that he's running. and in charge of or whatever, the founder of. And so they threw an event. We went, shoutouts to the gentleman's cut and the team over there.

And we introduced ourselves to Steph. I'd never met Steph before. And me and the homies introduced ourselves to Steph. We got to talking, like, he hung out with us for a solid 10 minutes. And I can't say I remember what joke I was making there. I really don't. By that time, it was, you know,

it was getting to beat him hours. So there was a decent amount of bourbon had been ingested. But, yeah, Steph was really nice. And as I told you guys at the All-Star game, when I said goodbye to him, I said I was proud of him for everything that he's done. As if I was his uncle who had known him since he were like four years old. I told him I was proud of him. But, yeah, Steph Curry, no surprise by his reputation, very gracious guy, really sweet guy, was just, you know, He was making his rounds to every single person in the room,

introducing himself, having conversations. It was just a cool little moment, you know, the type of thing that kind of only happens at All-Star Weekend. See, I would think you would have photographic memory for your bits, for your jokes. Like, you would know in that moment, put yourself back in that second and know exactly what kind of take you fired off. No, because for every single moment, Rob, there's a different bit, right?

Like, I might have been making some light-skinned joke or whatever. kind of joke in that moment, right? And so, like, you got to apply custom fit each bit to each audience. And I really, I got to ask Della and Medina. Shout-ups to the whole uninterrupted crew, because they're the ones that I went to that party with. I got to ask them what the hell it is I was saying, because I really, truly don't remember. Rob, what were you doing with the Mowers in Indiana?

Same thing? Probably sleeping. Yeah. Yeah, I don't think I would, no, the only night I went to sleep before 1 a.m. was Friday night. That's it. And that's because I wanted to get home before wing stop closed. And we had the show in the afternoon. So I was just like, yeah, I'm cutting my night short. I need to get this wing stop. I need to be fresh for the show. And that was it. Other than that, it was, hey, man, some pretty late nights in Indianapolis, guys. You were doing All-Star right, that's for sure. My experience was, I was talking to someone about playing, like, in a media pickup run. They're like, why didn't you come out? It was like, I didn't bring shoes, you know, I didn't really plan ahead.

And their question was, why didn't you go to literally any of the brand events in which they will give you a pair of basketball shoes to play in? And this, I'm just not, I'm not seeing the full board the way you are, wise. I'm not, I'm not activating the events the way you are. Listen, man, you guys have my number. If we all want to activate, we will activate. We love to activate. Was hung out with Staff Curry.

Rob did what seemed to be a fantasy, Final Fantasy podcast. I did. That's true. We all have different experiences. I was staying in Bloomington the entire time, so I was basically commuting back and forth, almost the entire time I was there, sludging through the snow. No, but we all had a good time in our own special ways.

We'll say that. Absolutely. All right. Now on to the actual matters. hand here. So the first one I have up here. So we're going through some recent trends. We're going to determine whether or not this is actually anything or not. First one up. Miami wins fifth in a row last night against the Portland Trailblazers. Look a little dicey at half time there until DeAndre Aiton went out. But they are now fifth in the Western Conference, eight and two in February,

slowly climbing up as the zombie heat tend to do here. And so Rob, I ask you, is this win streak, is this recent success for Miami anything? Definitely. And I think for a lot of, of teams out there, you know, 10 games, even a solid month might be just that and we keep it moving. The heat are not one of those teams. We know that this core can be dangerous. We know that any sign of life is something we have to take seriously. And we know that Jimmy Butler being in a fallout boy's latest video is a pretty good omen for them, I think. Whoa. I didn't hear about this. Oh, emo Jimmy back in full effect. He's got a rhinestone cowboy thing going on. Wow. Look, how do you see that and not think this is a real contender?

Is this like the culmination of everything in your life right now? It's all been building to this moment. A lot of hair swooping, a lot of very tight black band t-shirts have led me right here, Justin, in front of you, begging you to take the Miami Heat seriously. So is this what Jimmy's doing when he's not playing games? Oh my God, dude. He's just been preparing for this role? No, but seriously, I looked it up the other day and he had missed 20 out of a play.

possible 58 games. Like, wow. You know, like, he's missed so much time. Obviously, the little suspension with the little skirmish, notwithstanding, that's whatever, but he's missed so much time. But when he's playing, he's chicken ass. So I don't know how you don't take what the heater doing seriously when you consider the way they're playing defense, which obviously is always going to be a hallmark of

this team. And if Jimmy Butler's healthy, reason. healthy, they can generate quality offense, right? Like, they're not going to, like, blow the doors off of people. But I think because the heat are not just a team, but they are a system. They're a program. Like, they bring consistency to every single thing that they do. And so, Jimmy being healthy, I think you got to take these guys seriously.

And, you know, let's face it, this team went to the finals last year, right? Yes, they're missing Max Truce, your brother. They're missing Gabe Vincent, but I think they've done a decent enough job of replacing some of those pieces, and I think they're prime for a run, man. Yeah, I think that jumped out to me last night against the Blazers,

which is how the ball just pings around with these guys. The amount of guys that they have that can dribble and pass, some of whom can actually shoot. I mean, a couple of them are a little shaky, but, like, the amount of just talent up and down the entire rotation at this point. It's like, it's one thing if Bam out of Bio

know, dribble drives and kicks it out to a shooter. We're kind of used to that at this point, even though it is wild to say for one of the best centers in the league. It's another thing to see Duncan Robinson now do that with confidence. He's doing that pretty regularly at this point. And then it's another thing on top of that to see Nikola Jovich, a guy that we didn't know anything about, might be the tallest guy on this damn roster, functionally plays point guard, I guess.

They just kind of just throw out titles for some of these guys, but not only get the ball moving, but then relocate and actually hit a shot there. It's just like every single guy here. is a little bit more very and versatile than I think that what they had last year. So if you're going to be encouraged that they could be even better than what they were last season,

I think it's that. Joe Krona should be punching the air right now, Rob. So much regret over not getting Yovic in the building. Well, can I ask you this question, though, because I do think this brings us back to the bigger picture conversation with the heat there. I do think, yeah, they are better

on the margins here. I do find myself wondering as I'm watching some of these games, they are seemingly relying on Jimmy doing the superstar shit in the way that he did last finals. On the one hand, you could say, well, this is what Jimmy Butler does at this point. On the other hand, you could say, well, if he can't do that, if he's hobbled like he was later in the postseason,

is Rosier really the guy that's going to step up and do that? I mean, they have more of these guys. I'm not sure they really close the gap in terms of, like, having a secondary star, Rob. Yeah, they still don't really have that. And you get flashes of it from, you know, Jaime Hakez in particular, Bam, will have great scoring nights. And I think it's had a pretty good season overall.

The thing is, though, they're getting back into that plug-in-play Miami Heat way, where guys are out of the lineup all the time, even, as you mentioned, was that suspension game. Jimmy's out against the Kings. And they just won that thing going away. And now, that's very Miami Heat shit. It's also very Sacramento King shit. They have lost to. Competition, yeah.

Oh, my God. They have lost to every team missing players this season. It's getting a little concerning. But seeing that from Miami is reassuring because they have made moves to kind of shore this thing up around the edges, especially at point. Getting Rozier, getting Dilan right,

those are really important moves for them relative to what they were and really what they weren't getting out of Kyle Lowry earlier this season. Yeah, I think the only problem for the heat is secondary scoring is not the kind of thing I think you can do by committee. Right? Like, when teams are rolling out

Kyrie Irving and Devin Booker And these are the secondary scores or Jalen Brown. And, you know, the heater like, it's Tyler Hero some nights. It's, you know, it's Jaime Hock has other nights. It's Bam out of bike. I don't know that you can, you know, have that role be filled by a platoon, if you will. And so, you know, I'm – But didn't they just do that and get to the finals?

I know, you know. I know. They kind of undercut any sort of, like, rational thinking, though. Because they're sitting here 19th on offense in this stretch where they're 8 and 2. And yet here we are talking about how good the ball movement looks on their offense, right? I think the other concern is also just size. Like their center rotation right now is Bam and Kevin Love. And that became an issue farther down the line in the playoffs last year,

especially against Nicola Yokic. I mean, the East is a little bit downsized at this point because Embed isn't there. I mean, maybe the calves and whatnot. I don't think a lot of the teams have the offensive juice plus the size in the way that you would be worried about if you're Miami. me, but I think farther down the road, it could be an issue. But defense is rock solid again second in this whole stretch that they've been on. Yeah, that's where I think the big growth has been, going from kind of a mediocre defense for a lot of this season to now we're back at Miami Heat standard elite defensive play. And it's getting in some disruptors.

I think Dilan Wright is really helpful in this way. He's a guy who, if you make him your stopper, you're going to be setting him up to fail. but if you let him play in a system with other good defenders, he's going to gum up space, he's going to jump lanes. He can be really awesome in that sort of role. And so you're getting a lot of those kinds of contributions, like a little Delon right here. Even a little Jovich is going a long way right now.

Like his defensive minutes have been solid. And to your point, Justin, he gives you a size that you're just not getting elsewhere on the roster. So not a perfect player, as you can tell from the fact that he either basically starts or is out of the rotation right now. I have no idea what his role is on this team, especially when everyone is healthy.

But you're getting a sense that when guys are coming back into the lineup for Miami, these little bits of defensive addition are starting to be cumulative. Like they're starting to all come together. And we say it all the time. Like a weakness only matters as so much as your opponent can exploit it, right? And what Eastern Conference team do we have confidence can exploit? I think the Knicks, they have a nice big man rotation in Hartenstein and Mitchell and Julius Randall. And those guys are really physical guys, right?

Like, they're going to try to beat you with their size. But I don't think anybody's like, oh, the Knicks are going to out physical the heat in a series. Well, if OG is healthy, is OG as big as damn? Yeah, no, that's fair. And that is a brand new component to the team that didn't exist last year. But again, if you go down, the Celtics who are killing everybody, nobody thinks they're going to out physical any team in the playoffs. Right? Like, this is a finesse team.

They're going to shoot the ball at you. not going to just, you know, sort of battering bruise you. And then, of course, Milwaukee, who I think like Brooke Lopez and Janus, these are legitimate physical guys that I don't know why we should have the confidence that by the time the playoffs come, their offense will round in such a well-oiled machine that they can exploit these kind of size weaknesses that other opponents might have. So I don't know that it'll even come up, is what I'm saying. I think the Knicks are the most compelling of those teams, in part not just because of the

physicality, but what they can do on the offensive glass. That's where I would be worried if I were in Miami's position. Old school Knicks Heat playoff series. They're at the 4-5 right now, so we might get that. Let's run it back. The Pat Riley Bowl, but this is a good segue into a related question here is a lot of these teams are jumbled up four through eight in the east here. The Knicks, Heat, Sixers, Magic Pacers.

That's where it looks like right now in the standings. They're about a game apart a little bit more. Rob, which of these teams are jumping out to you is the one you're the most confident in? Like, if we bring out the confidence meter yet again, as we tend to do when we run out of other sticks, which one do you feel most confident in going down the streets?

Is this meter one to five or one to ten? Whatever you want. Whatever the high end of the meter is, to me, is the Knicks. Their situation is so injury-driven, but when their guys are healthy, they're better than these other teams, at least in their current. I know we're thinking about the Sixers without Joelle.

That's a longer term injury we have to think about differently. The heat, I believe in what the shape of this is right now, but all of their offensive limitations that we've outlined are not really changing. They're just a good defensive team now in a way that they weren't earlier in the season. So I like all these teams. I just think the Knicks have proven themselves and they deserve some benefit of the doubt in ways that, you know, the magics and the Pacers and even the six, you know, especially the Sixers right now do not.

Yeah, I mean, for me, I put the Knicks in the, the heat pretty close to each other. And I give, I'm going to give the slight edge to the heat, because as you guys know, I'm obsessed with past performance and the team went to the freaking finals last year, right? And of course, I have the utmost confidence in Spow, who, like LeBron said, is worth every single penny. Jimmy Butler, being who he is, you know, the culture, all of that stuff matters. But the Knicks, man, what they're going to bring when they're fully healthy in terms of just an identity that is so clearly defined. And then of course they got the home crowd.

Like I just think the Nix are, they're definitely going to be a tough out. But the heat to me, like, you got to respect what they've already achieved. If the Nix are healthy, I would choose the Nix. I'm just not sure what's going on with Randall. We expect O.G. to be back here at some point. We heard Randall talking about, oh, this thing might be worse than we originally thought. And so that's not great. But I do think you guys made the point there, which is like the NIC's physicality is just like

intrinsic to who they are. And if anything, they've doubled down on that. and again with some of the moves that they made there. And what we saw last postseason was that he kind of bullied the teams that could be bullied, the Bucks first and foremost. I just don't think you're going to do that to the Knicks. And so they wouldn't have that sort of psychological, physical advantage over a team like the Knicks. So I would, I put the Knicks first and foremost.

But again, like, goddamn heat, man. They do this every freaking season. We count them out plus 0.7 point differential. And here they are just climb in, peeking at the right time yet again. Take that nerds. All right. Next one on the docket. This one comes via an ESPN report on the surging offense here.

Joe Dumars told Timbantemps and Kevin Peltin that the competition committee, which is a collection of coaches and whatnot who look over the rules and yada, yada, yeah. They are reviewing, in quote, whether the game has tilted too far toward offense. And this has kind of been a burbling story here for a couple weeks now. We've seen historic offenses pretty much like. a third of the league at this point is on track to break offensive rating records.

Wads, what do you think overall? We can get to like the fixes and potential fixes down the road here, but do you think there is a problem, first and foremost? Yes. I absolutely think there's a problem in the sense that everything is tilted towards the offense. There is nothing that the defense is allowed to do. So, you know, one example, Julius Randall and Janus are two of the biggest

Billy Club guys where they take their off arm and they just hit people with it when they're going to the basket. That at the minimum should be a foul on them, you know, like or no call on the defense. And oftentimes they're generating contact with their off arm either dislodging the guy. And if the guy gives some resistance, he's then getting the foul. Like, we need to get that out. I think some of the, when people, when the, when the ball handler, sort of forces the contact, a lot of the Shea stuff that you see a lot.

Like when they're initiating the contact, like, you know, diverting from their natural path to the basket to throw a shoulder into a guy, contact occurs, and then they shoot it, and the ref's like, oh, that's a foul. We got to get that out too. And then so, obviously those become free throws

and those become fouls, but then defenders, they respond to that, and they just sort of give these guys to ride away after a point, right? And I think those are the kind of things that can be shorn up where just like don't call it a foul.

Every single piece of contact doesn't have to be a foul on the defense and especially when guys are doing these unnatural movements to draw the contact. Guys on the defensive end need to be able to move their feet and guard. That's taught at every level of basketball.

If you move your feet and beat them to the spot, you'll be fine. Like that's good defense. And yet with the way the NBA is officiated, your right was, if the offense player initiates that contact, it's getting called every time.

And so then you're reinforcing these habits in young players who are coming into the league saying if you do that, if you don't just like, OLA and let this guy go by you, you're going to get pulled out of the game in the first quarter with two fouls. You're not going to get to play down the stretch of games because you're in foul trouble.

You're creating a system that encourages bad defense. And so that's the kind of thing we have to nip in the bud. So it sounds like you guys are looking at, I would say, more minor issues, not whole scale. We need to blow up the way we play. We need to warp the court, et cetera. Rob, would you say,

that this is more of a tweak than a full scale we need to change something significant. Well, I think you start that way. And if you're not getting the desired effect, then you start looking at the more significant action. But Adam Silver's NBA is pretty incrementalist for the most part.

I don't think we're changing the geography of the court in terms of the way the game is played overnight. It's going to be small little steps in terms of officiating, in terms of guidance and best practices. It's going to be those sorts of things before we start moving any lines around. Adam Silver obsessed with centrism.

Yeah, what do you think if he brought in grass into the basketball arena? He got rid of Hardwood and it was just played on like a soccer pitch. It's finally mode, though? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, anything with soccer, it feels like Silver is just ready to just insert into the game. But no, I think it's an interesting conversation.

I did a piece, God, it was like six years now, kind of about this topic where all. offense was surging. What can defense do against that? And so I do think on the one hand, this is the type of topic that every NBA player and coach and executive is ready to tee off on. They just want to gripe. As soon as you mentioned, are the defenders at a disadvantage? Yes, because of X, Y, Z. And all they really want to do is complaint. And so I'm sensitive to the fact that, like, this is the type of thing that might be overblown as a result of this. But I do think, if you looked at the history of the league, like, it is fascinating to see the smallest of tweaks

and how much they end up affecting the game here. And so on the one hand, if it's something minor like you guys are explaining, I'm all for that. But I do think if you start changing the literature in how the game is actually played, I do think there could be some unintended consequences. I'm worried about going too far in the other direction, ending up back with the pistons, just clobbering teams in like 80 to 85. So I don't think we'll ever get back to that because these guys are just way more skilled, right?

Like there's way more shooting and all of that stuff. I don't think NBA players have gotten this much better at making tough shots. I think the game has gotten to a place where they're able to generate more easier shots and looks because of the rules and because of how limited defenders are. Because even like, you know, and people started complaining about this three shot foul. I'm not the first person, but like the way we were just giving away these three shot files, which inevitably turns into what? don't even contend the threes in a league that that possesses the best shooting it's ever had, right? And so I think a lot of these things become compounded over time where people, again, learn the rules. Like if I get even close to this shooter, he's going to get a foul call to get three free points.

And then if I don't, this guy is a high-quality shooter and he's going to can it, right? We're back in the days, you didn't have to give a hard close out on Charles Oakley and Dale Davis. Like, it just wasn't the case, right? Like, now you do. But we need to give people the opportunity to actually make that hard close-out. So I accept that offenses are going to be way better than they were in 1999 when the Knicks beat the heat in five games in the first round, right? I accept that. Like, again, I reference that game because it's like something that's just core to my memory.

And the final score was 78-79. that's insane dude you know and so I just think these rules need to be tweaked to get let defenders defend but these highly skilled people have to make highly skilled plays to score that's that's all I'm saying we want to change the terms of engagement like on the ball right at the point of attack what are people allowed to do versus what what is being taken away about the rules. That's, I think, what we want to change more than anything. Anything more elaborate than that, you're changing the strategy of how the overall game is played, post-entry angles, the entire spacing apparatus of every offense if you start doing anything more dramatic

than that. So let's start small. Let's see what kind of gains can be made with that, and we'll go from there. Just another thing. These things just kind of creep in and aid and giving the offense these advantages like, for instance, the freaking carry rule that just does not exist anymore and makes it so that like their movement is better and easier because they could just carry the ball. Like, it's crazy, you know, and again, like, I think by itself, that carry rule is not a big deal, but taking in concert with all these other things that are just creeping again in the direction of the offense, always.

nothing ever creeps in the direction of the defense, then that's how we get games, you know, that end up into 150s in regulation. If you can carry the ball and the guy setting the screen can move on the screen and the court is space because everyone can shoot. Like, you will just never stop people from getting to the rim.

I guess devil's advocate is that a lot of these things come down to the subjective opinion of the refs in order to key in on it one and then enforce it. And so you could have points of emphasis. But as we see year and year and year, they do all this stuff over the first two months of the season and all of a sudden they dissipate later on. I do want to talk about the more extreme option here just for the sake of conversation because Kirk Goldsbury had this thing in his books brawball a few years ago that kind of made the rounds on Twitter the other day here where changing the court so that you practically take away the corner three, but you extend the top of the three point arc out. And that was something that when I did the story a few years ago, you constantly heard about there's just so much space to cover. it's an impossible task as a result of that.

Now, on the one hand, this does probably maybe force you to cover more space because if guys are hitting deeper threes, then you're just guarding farther out into the midcourt. But on the other hand, it takes away the corners. You would presumably see more postplay or more varied postplay as a result of this. So do you guys have any interest in seeing something like this instituted? Considering that I think a lot of what we're seeing now in the All-Star game kind of like brought this to the forefront more than anything, guys are just generally. from deeper than ever before.

See, I don't think you would see more varied postplay. I think if anything, the development, if that was the spacing and the alignment of the court, you would have shooters, as you alluded to, Justin, spacing out further and further, standing up, and it's going to turn into a one-on-one drive from the top of the floor. But in terms of, like, helping in the post,

I don't know, I worry about those sorts of ripple effects. I understand that, like, it could open up space, more theoretically, but we're seeing a lot of research right now that three-point shooting in the NBA is kind of hitting its point of diminishing returns, like enough iffy to slightly below-average shooters are shooting that the spacing isn't that real. And so I think what would happen is guys who are, you know, career 33.5% three-point shooters are going to be spotting up four feet behind the line and someone's not going to be guarding them and they're going to be taking a lot of those shots.

And that's going to be kind of what a lot of NBA offense becomes, if that's the spacing of the court. Yeah, I'm not interested in warping the court, honestly. I think that might be a step too far for me. Just because I don't think that's the actual problem. I don't think it's that corner threes are too close. I really don't think that. I think the threes that are being generated is because people have to overhelp on these drives.

Because people cannot guard a dude one-on-one. You can't put your hand. You can't do this. You can't touch the guy's waist while he's trying to score above you from three feet away. And for the listener, Waz just battered me in the arm there. I just hit him with a forearm. A forearm shiver. The Billy Club came out.

Rick Flair style. Yeah, no, I just don't see the warping of the court as necessary. I think these three-point looks that are generated a downstream of other problems. Yeah, one thing I am worried about, and maybe this is too soon, is what the next. evolution of three-point shooters looks like. Like right now, we're at the point where we're ushering in Biggs who have come in, having shot the three pretty regularly, if not in college and in high school, then in AAU before that.

Like, I do wonder if we're just going to get better and better at that and thus things drift farther and farther out there. And so maybe I'm thinking too far ahead, but that I think is something that we need to worry about down the road there. Bet the NBA with a no sweat same game parlay from Fandul every Thursday with TNT Thursdays. It doesn't matter if you're new to Fandul or already have an account. You'll get bonus bets back if your same game parley doesn't win on any NBA on TNT game.

NBA same game parlays are the perfect way to combine your bets for a chance to score a bigger payday. So we're looking at Wednesday night's slate in the NBA, and we're looking at specifically the last game between the Lakers and Clippers at Crypto.com while they are co-tenance clippers moving to the Intuit Dome, the beautiful Intuit Dome next year. And so I like the Lakers actually in this one getting three and a half points. I believe they are in air quotes on the road in their own arena. So let's go with the Lakers. LeBron James loves to make history.

Why not win this game in the last opportunity as roommates with the Clippers? And I also like DeAngelo Russell, 20 plus points in this one. That's about what he's averaging over the past few games here. That's at plus 120. So lock that in for your parlay. However, you want to play, just head to fendool.com slash ringer NBA to bet the NBA with the no sweat, same game parlay with TNT Thursdays.

That's Fandul.com slash ringer MBA. Make every moment more with Fanduel, an official sports betting partner of the NBA. Must be 21 plus and present in select states. Gambling problem, call 1,800 gambler or visit the ringer.com slash RG. Minimum three-leg parlay required. Refund issued as non-letrable bonus bets that expire seven days after receipt. Max refund $5 unless otherwise specified restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.Fanduel.com.

All right. Shall we move on to another uplift? tale, which is that as we record this on February 28th, the Wizards and the Pistons both have the same exact record, 9 and 49. And it gets worse for our friends in D.C. So after the losing straight, 28 straight losses for the Pistons. So that was December 30th. So from December 31st on, the Wizards are 3 and 24. The Pistons 6 and 20. So the Pistons actually have double the amount of wins. That should be seven and 19 too, but alas, there's an officiated conspiracy to deny this valiant young team

its rightful win against the Knicks. They're coming on. Let me tell you. And I find myself honestly gravitating to watching Pistons games these days, if only because a lot of teams are just like fixed assets at this point. Like the Pistons are trying different things. You get to see Cade with some actual shooters. Although, God damn, Monty Williams,

going back to the starting lineup with Beefstoo and Duren in the front court with minimal spacing. But they're rising above it. regardless. Cade looking good, y'all. Cade does look good. He's looking good. And so they're very watchable.

And the Spurs who are also very bad, like the Wembe experience makes that very watchable. But the Wizards, they break me a little bit every time I watch them. That's not a thing. So are the Wizards worse than the Pistons? 100%. They're very bad.

And like, especially right now, like, Bala Kula Bolli's out too. So it's like, what am I even watching? Like this is much more Corey Kispert than I bargained for, like checking in on this random Wizards game. I can't say I'm enjoying it. I can't imagine Jordan Poole newly minted reserve of the Washington Wizards is enjoying it much either. Their best player is Kyle Kuzma, who I love. I love Cal Kuzma.

He can do no wrong in my eyes, to quote another maniac. But he's not a wing player. He's not a ball handler. He's like he can do those things in spot minutes. But, like, they don't have a dribbler of the basketball. They don't have a playmaker, an initiator. They don't have. They have Tyos Jones.

Have some respect. The assist to turnover ratio. How dare you? Always strong. 17 assists against the Warriors last night. This is how you know, it's bad for the Wizards. It's that they are now starting Marvin Bagley at center who wasn't good enough to really get rotation minutes or actually was good enough to get rotation minutes into.

Detroit, but then they cast them aside in order to open up cap space down the road. Can we, yeah, can we talk about Marvin Bagley for a second? Because this is really the through line of this whole conversation. The Pistons traded Marvin Bagley with two second round picks and Isaiah Livers for Gallo and Mike Muscala. They already waived Gallo, the Pistons did. They're about to wave Mike Muscala. So that means Detroit gave up two seconds, Isaiah Livers, and a bunch of bioccal.

and a bunch of buyout money just to not pay Marvin Bagley the $12.5 million from a contract they gave him. Yeah. And now he's starting for the Wizards. Well, they needed to open up cap space. You know?

I guess. All the heavy hitters want to go to Detroit. And by the way, shouts to Trey. He is a capable steward of an offense. He's a caretaker. Yeah. He's a game manager.

He's not a threat with the ball. Okay. And like, they don't have any threat. Like, it's nuts. And as much as Cade, you know, he was the turnover machine for large stretches of his career to start. But, like, when he has the ball, it's like, oh, this is a real guy who's a threat to do something, who's a threat to drive it, who's a threat to hit the open man right away.

Like, he's a threat. Like, the Wizards just, Jordan Poole, like, that was his role. It was like, oh, we got some juice on the ball with Jordan Poole, who's constantly. Check already looks horrendous, man. It's really crazy. Yeah, he's coming off the bench now. I have to say in a bench roll against other team's reserves, not bad, but that's probably not what you want for the guy.

And that's another thing I want to say about the Jordan Pool deal is it's just crazy how things change so quickly. So when he signed his deal, he got that deal, Simon's got that deal, Hero got that deal. And around the time, because they all got like pretty much the same deal. And around that time, everybody assumed that Jordan Poole was the one that made kind of the most sense. Like, he was the one most worthy of that deal. And I would say he's the third of those three now in terms of reputation, which is just crazy. He's probably one of the worst players in the NBA.

I actually don't think it's much of a debate. No. But it is great to see Cade kind of show up here. I think that was probably the biggest concern, even amidst the midst. all those losses that they didn't have a path forward, that the guy they drafted number one overall, but the three ball is coming around here, and you're starting to see as they add more spacing,

because Fantecchio, big tech is in there, closing out some of those games and seeing... Let him start. Yeah, I have no idea. Bring it back into the starting lineup. Why is the Sarr Thompson in there, especially we're going to play two bigs? It makes no fucking sense, but...

Well, I think your priority should be, we got to play a Sart Thompson big minutes. Sure. And there was a stretch in January where he wasn't playing that much that was very confusing. He's now back into a big, minute role, which is, I think, really important for them developmentally speaking.

And huge news. His three-point shooting this month, we're out of the teens, baby. Hell yeah, we're into, I believe, the 20%. What a time. But yeah, I think Kate is starting to look more like a guy. The three ball is falling. We'll see. But I think the rest of the season is going to be approved it to see if he can be that.

But I think the funniest thing about all of this is that even in this stretch that we talked about, so since December 31st, by net reading, these teams aren't even in the two worst teams in the league. Number one with a bullet, the Portland Trailblazers, minus 14.1. And number 29 in the league, unfortunately, are Charlotte Hornets, who looked like they were coming back. They basically imported the end of the Thunder's bench, the point where they signed Poku off of waivers just the other day.

The last two games have been horrid, and they are now back down there, minus 10.3 net rating. So it goes Blazers, Hornets, Wizards up from the bottom, Piston 25th. So I would say overall, though, Rob, this is really a heyday for awful basketball that we haven't seen in maybe, what, five or so years at least? A lot of very bad basketball. And I've been trying to figure out if it says anything about the league that there's so many teams that are so bad at once.

I don't know what the unifying theory is there. I don't know if some of these teams are so far behind and they're looking at even the play in and saying like we can't even compete with those teams. Why would we even try for that? And therefore we're slum in it. But I don't know. It seems like the Hornets, they tried to win games.

They even did win some games. Maybe too many games over this last couple weeks. But they just can't compete with the level of losing that's going on with the Wizards, for example. I'm not too alarmed by it. It's like, okay, there's like five to six teams that are just completely joke of teams right now where any team that's like eighth or better in the play in, if they play these guys, they should expect to blow their doors off.

But, you know, it's getting to be that a certain point of time in the season. These guys are professionals, but how can you convince everybody on the Wizards besides their paycheck that, like, what they're doing is meaningful on a night-to-night basis. And I think that affects the actual play that you see out on the floor. Like, these guys are human beings. Like, they understand what they're doing. Doesn't matter. And it has no consequence, right? And they're playing in these empty-ass gyms. I mean, it's really nasty out there for some of these teams. But again, at least the thing that you can say about, at least the Blazers, they've got a really super young core.

At times, can be super exciting. The Hornets, I mean, La Mello Ball still can't play. You can't get on the court. Brandon Miller though. Brandon Miller can really play. He's the real do, right? So it's just the Wizards that are completely hopeless. And we haven't gotten into the March and April stretch yet where one of these teams is randomly going to go 500 over 12 games or so

and they're going to juice their place in the standings more than they should, but that's going to happen for at least one of these teams. If the Wizards go 500, they're going to double the win total. It could be an exciting month. Yeah, I think if we were just take a step back, we don't support this, but this is actually strategically not the worst move. I know the draft

is billed as not having all these superstars coming up in the next one, but like if the league is top heavy, and as we've seen it's particularly in the West, like some of these conferences are going 10 deep. Even the East is looking pretty fierce at this point. It actually long term probably is in the benefit of some of these teams to bottom out in order to

get better down the road, not time themselves trying to scratch into the play and race. When the team like the Pacers is just like kind of just taken off here, I will say, though, I think ultimately we are in line for maybe the worst bottom of the league that we've seen in a very long time here. So dating back to 0203, there have been three other years in which three teams have had under 20 wins. It's 0405, 08,09, and 1415, which gave way to the Carl Anthony Town's Jaliel O'Kaffour draft, if you remember. currently the Pistons wizard Spurs are on track to finish under 20 wins

and significantly under 20 wins. The Pistons have a 15.5 win percentage as do the Wizards. The Spurs, who we haven't really talked about much, 18.6 here. So this might be as dreadful as it can get here. I don't know if you guys have seen Wemby. As good as Wemby has been, he's just kind of doing shit. He's just like almost at practice, like just seeing what he can do on a basketball court. Well, that's what this season should be for them.

I don't really have a problem with any of these teams losing a lot. I think it's just a matter of this being the first time we've seen this level of almost like race to the bottom level losing since the lottery odds were flattened for the top three. That's what's jarring. It's like there's really not a lot of incentive for the pistons to be worse than the Wizards to be worse than the Spurs. All three of those teams are going to do just fine by the lottery odds at this point. The Spurs have one of the hardest remaining schedules. it just doesn't really matter that much. They're going to lose a lot, regardless of who they play.

So that's what I'm trying to figure out. It's like, how is that happening? Why is that happening? This also could be the unintended effects of everybody tanking for Wembe and then having to set up their next move. Whereas with the spurs, they just didn't make one. And it's taken the pistons to completely bottom out in order to be forced to go out and get helpful shooters like a Fentecchio

and whatnot, whereas like the Wizards, also started the tank process too late here. So, yeah, I don't know. It's bad, but I don't think it's a long-term term. I don't think it's a long-term thing. And also three teams in each conference that are absolutely, you know, zeroes. Like, it's not the end of the world.

It's fine. No. Yeah. Last one on the docket here. So, Trey Young goes out with a torn ligament in his left. Did you see his hospital picks? With Dremon? It was like, I don't know if you guys ever saw the pics of Tupac

after he got shot. It was very simple. similar, Tray Young was looking like Tupac and quoting Bible verses. So, yeah, shouts to him for recovering from a pinky injury. And his dad was in the hospital room. Dressed in like Warriors Blue, I have to say. And he looked enough like Draymond. They're like, why is Draymond visiting Tray Young in the hospital?

And Clutch we trust, baby. There you go. Now? So since this injury, he's out at least four weeks, probably we'll stretch to the rest of the season. Let's be honest. The Hawks are 2 and 0, though. Ewing theory Okay

All right We had to do it Rob Are you surprised To see the hawks Just take off Who do they beat The magic and the jazz

Those are two pretty Quality Magic and good Honestly Yeah The magic without Palo Okay And the jazz

Although I did Have not had it Together lately I looked at Recently Powell Bancaro's True Shooting Percentage

Pretty similar to like A Cam Thomas Kyle Kuzma So there's a conversation like maybe not this year, but next year about like what Paulo Bencaro is actually doing out there. Anyway.

He wasn't on my all-star ballad. Just saying, look, the season is a lost one. All lies on Atlanta this off-season because they tried, Lord knows they tried. They didn't move, you know, Trey or Dejante.

Obviously, they brought the new coach in there to be influential. So I think it's going to be really fascinating to see what they do in the offseason, though. Yeah, I just can't expect that this is who the Hawks are. They're going to lose a lot. And Yaka Kongu's out right now, too. Could be out for a couple weeks or could be out more if they decide that he should be out more, or it's beneficial for him to be out more.

They're going to lose. I think what's exciting is can you get some of these young guys in positions to stretch what they do? Can we see even more of Jalen Johnson and creative roles, seeing an empowered kind of like bogey who's been let loose a little bit that's a fun thing to see can we get some Kobe Buffkin minutes who's seeing like his first real

playing time of the season like that's something that the Hawks need to be doing right now sounds like a fake player Kobe Buffkin he's a first round pig he's like a fringe lottery pick I know but sounds like a guy that you draft in year 12 of your dynasty Rupert Well I think Quinn Snyder

needed to be convinced that he was not a real player because he was implying like West Matthews and Trent Forer I think is the name of their two-way guy who's been playing over him for a lot of this season. I simply might have played Kobe Buffkin a little bit more. And I'm happy to see him get some court time. I will say this is just another spotlight on our guy, Jalen Johnson. Rob, the prophet Mahoney brought to us before the season started what a prospect this guy is.

And I just, I marvel every time I watch this guy. He's basically what people wanted John Collins to be. Yes. Because he plays with such force. like when the NFL I talk about running backs that kind of fall forward because there's so much momentum because they're so big and physical that they gain in a few extra yards

like people just bounce off of Johnson going at the rim and I love him just on the short roll and everything like that but also just like has the touch that you would like basically they force Collins to have at a certain point because you couldn't play center anymore just like hits enough three balls he's going to do that at volume but also the passing like just six and a half assists over the past few games

like this guy's a player, if not like a potential all-star down the road here. And so I don't know if it's Trey who's going to be his partner there or if it's going to be Murray. There's probably going to be a choice this offseason. But I do think a guard plus him is a pathway to the future. It's a pathway. And I think what's exciting about Johnson is there is a size of opponent of wing or forward who would be guarding him who just can't do a thing about a guy who's that big and that athletic and that fluid. And you saw that against the jazz. He was just getting anywhere he wanted in terms of into the lane, collapsing the defense, spraying

out, he's a good passer. That's a really exciting kind of player to pair with either whatever the platonic ideal of Treor de Jantia is. Like, whatever you think the best case version of either of those players are, Johnson can fit with them. And he can fit in a lot of different versions of this team going forward, where we've seen, you know,

DeAndre Hunter in there with him, we've seen Sadiq Bay in there with him. All of it kind of works. He really is a great piece to have at this stage of construction where you need to have your options open if you're Atlanta. You need to have a lot of different paths forward, but all of them can include him. The stabilizer. Yes. But I think we do have to have the question was, which is like, if you had to make the choice, if it seems like we're heading in that direction, are you building

forward with Murray or Trey? Tray's obviously the more dynamic offensive player, but, you know, he's the pricklier sort. He's had problems dealing with other guys, like getting the ball and whatnot. Like, are you trading one or the other? Is there one that you would lean toward? I'm moving away from both. I'm getting off of both and starting to rebuild. Like, I'm looking at guards in the draft this year, perhaps a Brownie James or something. And I'm, I'm, he's available. I'm getting rid of both and just starting over. I got my Jalen Johnson. I have a front court piece that I really love. I even like a Congo. I still have a soft spot for a Congo. I just think you can get some real stuff for these guys coming in. Perhaps you even trade them for

other young guys instead of just mainly draft picks or whatever. But I would move on from those cats than both. Because it's just what's the proof that these guys are going to be part of something substantial in Atlanta? And Trey in particular, I just think he's been treated like the boy prince since he got there. And it just hasn't worked out. And so you can't come in and say, Trey, you got to be somebody completely different. And the franchise has been kissing your ass the entire.

time you've been there. So I think he needs a new start. And I think Atlanta should just move on. It hasn't worked. There's no other way to put it. What do you think, Rob? One of the other. I would still pick Trey. I get all the concerns. I get all of the limitations of his game. I just don't think Atlanta has the appetite for that that kind of tear down. That sort of patience. Really tough thing to swallow after the sorts of seasons they've had the last two years. So I would still invest in Trey and Johnson as your guys. I would see what options are available for Murray. I want to find a bigger role for Bogdanovich

if he wants to be a part of this team going forward. That's kind of the core that I would eye along with the Kangwu and then see how you can round or out around that. But it's telling that any of these scenarios, I don't feel great about it. Atlanta's, they've really dug themselves into a hole by investing in this backcourt. And whatever trade they could make to get out of it

is not going to be seamless. It's not going to be perfect. They might get a good young player, but one who also has their own questions coming out of their own rebuilding situation that didn't quite work. So there's just no great solutions here. By the way, I want to commend Atlanta for even trying, right?

They built a team. They caught lightning in a bottle. You know, they advanced pretty far in the playoffs before they thought that they could. And then, you know, at a certain point, that kind of got scaling. And they said, yeah, let's double down. Let's trade for Dejante Murray.

Like, that took guts to do. But it hasn't worked. You know, like at a certain point, like I admire the guts. But also you just have to admit that, yeah, we tried a thing. It didn't work out. And we need to go on a new direction. Have I floated my theory that the player empowerment era just completely made the next generation of young stars coming into the league just like kind of they gave them too much power too soon? Because if you look at like Zion, Luca, Trey Young, like there's a lot of off the core.

trying to wield power too soon sort of issues. And now I will say having been there for the formative days for Anthony Davis, there were times where his father was going around saying some wild shit in the bowels of that arena. And so like this is kind of a tried and true just formula. Before that it was LeBron James probably wielding too much power in Cleveland. So it might just be a small market thing. But I will say like those guys kind of went over their skis a little too soon here. And now we're at the point where it's like, oh, my team isn't ready for it.

It's because you fucking, like, you're with Buka in particular, like, maybe you ask for too much too soon. Just throwing it out there. Can you blame them? No. So maybe it's as much about the environment, too, about giving those guys too much. That's what I would say. I would say a lot of these teams, you know, when New Orleans finally sacked up and was just like, yo, Zion, we're done, like, letting you push us around.

We're putting you on a trade block. We're signing you to an extension that's extremely incentive-laden. Like, they finally showed some guts. Like, it's just teams had to show some good because not everybody's as good as LeBron and KB. Like, even if they're your franchise guy, not all franchise players are built equally. And so this idea that you can't identify the fact that, yes,

although Trey Young might be the best player on your team, you do not need to treat him the way the Lakers treated Kobe. I mean, like, this shit seems so obvious to me. You know what I mean? I can't wait for the Brunny James Jalen Johnson pick and roll That's gonna be fun It's gonna be sweet Too sweet

All right, that's it for us We'll be back on Sunday No Rob on Sunday And so Woz and I Planning something special We'll figure it out here What do you think about doing a live show from Jumbos The Clown Room?

I don't know what that is It's a strip club Oh wow Okay So we'll get back to you on that Until then I think of Isaiah Blakelyand production Thinking of Ben Cruz

We'll see you then. Must be 21 plus and present in select states. FanDuel is offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino LLC. Gambling problem, call 1-800 gambler or visit Fandul.com slash RG in Colorado, Iowa, Kentucky, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Tennessee, Vermont, and Virginia. Call 1-800 next step or text next step to 533-42 in Arizona. 1-88-88-9-7-7-7 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut, 1-8009 with it in Indiana, 1-800-522-470-4-7-00 or visit KSgamblinghelp.com in Kansas,

18777-7-0 stop in Louisiana, visit MD-Gamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Visit 1-800 gambler.net in West Virginia or call 1-800-5-22-4-7-00 in Wyoming. Hope is here. handling helpline, MA.org, or call 800-32750 for 24-7 support in Massachusetts, or call 18778 Hope NY, or text Hope, NY in New York.