The Ringer NBA Show - Jabari Smith Jr. and RJ Barrett Put in Extra Work | Upside High

Episode Date: January 11, 2022

J. Kyle Mann and Jonathan Tjarks are back to discuss the young and exciting players of the NBA, beginning with the pedigree and story of Jabari Smith Jr. (01:42). They then take it to New York and RJ Barrett to assess where they see him in his development and where he is headed (21:28). Hosts: J. Kyle Mann and Jonathan Tjarks Producer: Steve Ahlman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Football is back and so is the Ringer NFL show. Coming at you five days a week with wall-to-wall coverage from recapping the Sunday games, giving a player perspective, deep dives, and previewing the coming slate. Check out the Ringer NFL show on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Basketball is very good and it is a beautiful day. Chilly Day in Kentucky, but it's a beautiful day to talk about basketball with. As per usual, my co-host, John Sharks. John, how you doing, buddy?

I'm good. It's definitely a beautiful day because you had no. article published on the ringer.com today. It was pretty cool. Written word, man, pin to paper. You know, I don't really, I don't really do a whole lot of those trying to do some more writing. Yeah, John's talking about, I did an extensive. I would say it was a pretty, it was a pretty painstaking deep dive on Jabari, Jabari Smith Jr. from Auburn. What's your basketball sort of intake been like? What have you been focused on? Are you gearing up for the draft? Are you pretty heavy NBA? Where are you right now? I mean, I'm always kind of a little of both. And

college basketball is definitely heating up as conference play gets going. But I try to keep my toes in the water in both camps as much as I can. Yeah. So Jabari Smith, Jr., I guess, today we're going to talk about a couple different players. We're going to be talking about Jabari first here, though. Jabari Smith, Jr., for the people who aren't familiar with him, he is, how would you describe just his, like, basic profile as a player? Charks. I talk about elevator pitches in this piece. The best players are sort of simple elevator pitches that are hard to deny. What would you say the simple elevator pitch is for Jabari Smith? I mean, I would say 610 peer shooter, I mean, reasonably athletic can handle the ball.

Like that basic skill set. A two-way player at his height with his shooting ability is always going to jump off the screen pretty fast, which is what he is. Kyle, you want to give like the big background on him? Just like where he goes to school? How has years gone? to the big piece for anyone who doesn't know too much about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I kind of have a tendency to go to the deep end first, but I think the elevator pitch is the focus right now. There are people that are circling around

and wanting to know more about these guys, especially the teams at the top of the lottery and things like that. But yeah, Jabari Cho, he's the son of a former NBA player. He's one of these second generation NBA players. His dad played for LSU back around like the turn of the millennium back for my real heads out there, real college hoops head fans,

Jefferson Pilot Days back in the day when they do these SEC broadcasts. This is way back. But he used to play in a front court with Strohmile Swift, actually, like one of the most famous legendary highlight machines. But his dad was more of a traditional five. And if you went back and watched, he could like face up and score some. And you and I've had, you had an interesting theory about like second generation NBA players, specifically like front court guys. Can you jog me, drop my memory on that, what your theory was? Yeah, I was thinking up because it's with Jabari and Chet Holmgren. Both their dads were seven-footers who played college basketball.

I think Chet's dad played for Minnesota in the 80s. Jabari said, like you just said, played for LSU in the 90s. And I think it was the same thing for both of them. They said, our careers only got so far because we were kind of put in this box as like more traditional bigs. So if our sons are going to play basketball, they're going to learn the whole game. And that's where I think the whole second generation pro thing is so important is because these sons of pros, the pros see where the game's going. The pros see the mistakes they made in their careers. And they're like, okay, if my son's going to do this, I'm going to put him in the best position to succeed. And so I think that's why you're seeing as time goes on more and more of these seven foot or six tens players have more perimeter skills in large part because their parents played pro basketball. I think pro basketball, I think pro. Pro basketball more than any other sport is going to be a family business because height is so important compared to any other sport. Yeah, and I think you and I had a long, we probably should have

recorded this conversation. We were in Vegas just sort of talking about, there has been sort of a shift and from talking to players, from talking to like different people around the game about like the evolution of the game. I kind of uncovered some of this in like the move series that I did that the second generation thing is basketball, basketball is an old sport, but it's not like super old. And like as as the game has sort of like spread across across the country, it's like interesting to watch these players who played in like the 70s, 80s have kids where like basketball has moved like pretty strictly indoors. It's just interesting to hear like NBA players from those time periods from like the 80s and 90s talk about having like heavy outdoor

experiences when they were playing. But then, you know, they have their career. They see what maybe a little bit of bitterness for some of these bigs who were told like you can't do this you can't do that and it's like no we're going to the game is changing like you were saying so uh jibari coming back around here coming i was going to say are you going to actually give them people the information instead of his digressions i am i just think this is all interesting color and texture here uh but for sure with with jabari he's it's funny to hear his dad talk about him because he's like he was he was trying to be like he was like, I don't want to say he's a square. He was basically just making it seem like he was much more of a like,

he called himself a knucklehead and said Jabari is like a very like focused hard worker. But he, he played, he's playing for Bruce Pearl now. Bruce Pearl is known as a guy who like really liberates players like in their shot selection. So he's, he's playing as a face up four. Would you say Auburn is, where would you put Auburn on the spectrum of like, how quality of choice was that for him? to pick Auburn as his school to develop. It's interesting.

I think he's going to end up being Bruce Pearl's best pro, most likely. Auburn's under Pearl's been a rising program for the last couple of years. Pearl runs a very modern offense. And you talk about it in your piece. I think for good and for bad, Pearl gives his players a lot of freedom. So Jabari does have the freedom to take a lot of shots, but it's not a very disciplined offense. And where that becomes important is because Jabari's guard.

also have a lot of freedom, and they aren't as talented as him, but that's not going to stop them from taking as many shots. And I think that's the give and take with playing for Bruce Pearl sometimes. For people who are wondering about, like, well, what's he play? Like, what's his, like, offensive profile? Like, Jabari's, like, primarily catch and shoot. Like, the two areas that he's operating in right now are,

he plays off the catch a lot. He shoots, like, I think his percentage just keeps going up. The other, he fouled out of their most, or had foul trouble in their game against Floyd. Florida recently, but he was really efficient in the minutes that he played. I think his percentage is up to like 45% from three on like five attempts per game. One of the profile like stats that I thought was interesting was I went through and I was just filtering over the last, you know, we have like advanced college stats back to like 2008 and I was just whittling it down like, okay, who is six,

nine or taller and has taken threes at volume like five or more game and shot over 45% from three while also being a plus defensive player and being good from the line. There have only been like a handful of players who have done that. And one of the ones that came up that's really interesting is Cam Johnson that I think is interesting.

In terms of like his quality as a shooter, like Cam Johnson is a pretty good relocating shooter. I'm curious to ask you from what you've seen of Jabari. You know, for his size, he can create his own shot from distance. You know, he's really fluid in transition pulling up for three. where do you see, do you see him as an elite shooter at the NBA level? It's a good question.

He's definitely, it's funny when you watch him because he's, it's one of those guys who's pretty much always open and that even when he's guys closing out on him, he can shoot over. He's six foot 10. And he's a six foot 10 really knocked down shooter. So he's always open. He's always hitting his shots at the college old from three. You know, Cam Johnson, I would say Cam's more of a three, four, right? I put Jabari more as a four or five.

So my comp for him has always been Richard Lewis, which you mentioned in your piece. And that's the kind of player I see him as. I think the implied thing about him going to the next level, now whether or not a number one pick is someone who fits this profile, that's another discussion. But I think the floor for him is pretty strong because, you know, if you talk,

if you're talking about a guy who is going to be a high level catch-and-shoot player, let's say, I mean, he could shoot in the 40% range. The NBA line's a different thing. The speed of the game is a different thing. But I expect him to be a very good shooter at the next level. I expect his like shooting versatility to expand. He can create his own shot in the elbow areas.

He can shoot off the dribble too. Pump fake one dribble, get a shot too like that. He's not a pure spot up shooter by any means. For sure. Yeah, he can spot up. But for me, the bridge to is this guy, we're talking about is this a high quality role player, like a winning role player, because he's not a wasteful player. He's also a pretty solid team defender. To me, the question is, can he cross this metaphorical bridge to being a

primary offensive load-carrying type player? And for me, the swing skills that are going to dictate whether or not that happens are his rim pressure, his handle, and his passing. Now, all those things, to me, work sort of in a unison. And if you look at, or in sort of a, like a Holy Trinity, I'll put it that way for you, John. So the flow... Yes, I love it. I love it. The flow between those three things, if you look at the guys at the NBA level who are that tall, who carry a big shot load, and their primary offensive, we'll say helio, like they are big, heavy load-carrying players that have playmaking and shooting and scoring at all three levels. Handel is absolutely pivotal. If you look at the... Even like somebody like Chris Middleton, who developed into it later,

Paul George. I posted some clips of Paul George. The shooting wasn't there immediately, but he could always really handle the ball, Kevin Durant. For me, that's like the crux, the core question about Jabari. Do you think since he's not a bad ball handler?

It's just can he navigate traffic and create for other people with his offense as sort of leverage? How confident are you about his ball handling? What have you seen? Because I'm curious to hear this from me. It's interesting because when you're as good a shooter as

Jabari. I think sometimes the shot, it can almost hurt you in a sense trying to develop the rest of your game because you can always, you're bailed out of a play, right? Like, Jabari doesn't have to put his head down and get to the rim. If he doesn't have the initial move, you can just pull up and shoot, right? So it's like, he can always press the abort button. If the possession is not going how he wants it to go, it's like, ah, F it, jump shot, right? So it's very, very, I think it's very hard when you are a guy who like jump shot primary first to develop the rest of your game. I think it's a lot of times

it's easier to go inside out than outside in. It's rarely, I think, do guys who primarily live by the jump shot at lower levels become primary rim players at the NBA level? And you talk about the metaphor, you got a good one in the piece. You drew some like, let me find it. You had like a little drawing.

Yeah, the moat. This is good. I like this. I like this little moat you drew. Yeah, I was imagining that like, you know, three level scoring and playmaking. I always just imagine that like you got to put pressure on the castle. You have to put pressure on the rim to be able to do that. I think Michael Porter Jr. is somebody that developmentally,

I feel like the tracks for these two guys are not terribly dissimilar. Like Jabari's not an unwilling passer. Like I said, he's not a wasteful player at all. His efficiencies are really high. He makes, you know, he's sort of like a two-handed pass. are a lot of the time. You don't see him making like skips. Now the flip side of this is like Auburn doesn't necessarily need him to do that. So I think we're kind of in a situation where we're not seeing it. So we're sort of speculating about whether it exists or not. You know, when he gets to the next level,

is he going to show those things? I don't know. But like right now, he's he's not always getting to the rim, but it does sort of remind me a little bit of MPJ. Do you see sort of the similarity there between? because MPJ has kind of had to slowly build up his passing repertoire. We haven't really seen Jabari and many picking roles. Oh, that was good. I like that. How you said that? Oh, did that one blow your mind?

Come on, repitoy. I mean, the MPJ is definitely interesting comparison. You're talking about two six foot 10 jump shooters with perimeter skills. I think the number you'll hear me talk about this all year. The number I'm looking at right now at Jabari is that he actually, shoots worse from two than he does from three. And in my mind, we talked about this before, I don't really think there are many players who can be primary options primarily as three-point shooters. To me, if you're a three-point shooter and you're not Steph or James Hardin or Dame,

then you've got to be, you're a secondary player because a three-point shooter spots up for someone else. He creates space for somebody else to get your twos. So to me, I look at Jabari. and he just screams out to me, this guy's a number two option. I think he's like a great number two option because he's a guy who can defend, doesn't need a ball in his hands a lot, can try the team to stop the ball.

But to me, that screams more, he's my second best player and not my first best player. And I think to go back to the handle question, part of it too is he's not a great athlete. Like sometimes like with a six foot 10 guy who's athletic, oh, like you kind of assume if he's athletic, he's also a player.

athlete, but he's not. He's not a great. I wouldn't say he's like an elite above the rim defender, crazy finish in the lane, going to like guard point guard and chase him around the floor. Like he can hold his own for a guy his size, but I would not put him in that category. And so if you don't have the elite athleticism,

you don't have an elite handle, but you're an elite shooter. To me, that screams like a Richard Lewis. What was Richard Lewis? He was a great second option. And I'll take y'all behind the curtain. a bit. So when Kyle sent me this piece last night, the headline on his Google Doc was catchy Jabari Smith headline. Come on. How dare you? I was letting Justin do it. I was letting

Justin handle the headline. And that's why like, then you see Justin's headline today, it's very cagey. It's why Jabari Smith might be the best prospect. And then the other, the other headline is, could Jabari Smith overtake Paolo and Chet? And those are the rule of thumb for headlines is if you asked if the question if the question is being asked in the headline the answer is probably no well i think that this is a this is an interesting discussion that we're going to be this is going to be the big dominant thing coming up to the draft is we talked about chet last week jabari and paolo to me to me i think it's more of a it's a palo and chet versus jabari conversation because to me the question is you know year to year i think that we always think about

the number one pick has to fit this profile. Like the number one pick is this type of guy. But that's not realistic because we're not measuring Jabari against Zion or Luca or Luke at Ingo number one. They're just talking about like number ones of the past. We're measuring against the guys that are there. And if the players, to me the core question is, you know, Paolo, I think is probably the most talented player in the draft, top to bottom, I would say.

I'm not going to agree with you on that. You don't think so? Who do you think is? No. Chet. Chet, but that's a different conversation a little bit. Right. Talent, I think, is sort of a murky word. But I think that, like, Chet, if you think about, like, the upsides of Chet and Paolo, they're so interesting. And I think what it's going to come down to is how much are you willing to bet on Chet or Paolo to reach their ceilings versus the certainty that I feel about Jabari?

Because I feel pretty certain about Jabari in a way that applies to winning basketball. that I'm closer to it with Chet than I am on Palo. But what do you think about that question? Do you think that that's, is that a fair characteristic of the way this is going to go in terms of the discussion of those top three guys? Yes, I think also, you mentioned this in your piece, but there's definitely a hipster element too,

where a lot of times when two guys have all the auction in the room and it becomes like an A or B, then someone always wants to go, what about player C? And there's definitely like that element too, where it's everyone kind of, when two guys get picked apart at the top, a lot of times that third player kind of comes in behind them

and is like, oh, well, no one's talking about this, so I'll talk about this guy. I definitely think Jabari's gotten that kind of under the radar push over the last month or so. I'm looking at his schedule right now. So Auburn didn't schedule very tough. That's also a Bruce Pearl tactic. And there's not like,

I would say, If you want to watch Jabari, the big game to watch the rest of the season will be against your boys, Kyle. That's probably as tough as challenge yet as Kentucky, right, in terms of NBA athlete. Yeah, I'd say so. Kentucky's got a couple guys that could throw at him. I mean, Keon Brooks is a player who I don't know if he's going to come out this year, but interesting athlete. He's probably, he's a little more athletic, I'd say, maybe a little bouncier than, but I don't think that he's as flexible or like rangy as Jabari. And then Jacob Toppen is another long athlete that's going to be interesting.

brother. Yeah, yeah. I think that another thing with like the getting picked apart, you know, we talked about how he's being used, Jabari isn't being put in positions in like positions to like make himself his warts show even. You know what I mean? You know what I mean? Like we talk about like rookies going to situations where they're, they're enabled in bad ways that make them inefficient. Jabari is like in a very controlled kind of environment that is like keeping cleanliness in sort of his efficiencies and things like. that. I could very well see Jabbar going number one. I am skeptical about the superstar upside like we've talked about because the handle and things like that. I don't think it's a case of him. I talk about like the flexibility of some of those big athletes, like off the bounce, like

even Pascal Seaccombe like in the open court. You just see him like get low and accelerate with the ball. I think it's more of a hands and handle issue for Jabbar because if you look on the defensive end, he gets down in a stance pretty well, and it's pretty flexible. But I just don't know that I don't know how far we're going to get in terms of that. Another one is Danny Granger. I mentioned Tobias is another guy with like a similar profile. Like we talked about, Tobias has like bigger, broader shoulders. Jabari's an interesting player.

I've heard some people compare him to Jaron Jackson Jr. What do you think about that one? No, Jaron was way more of a shot blocker. He's bigger too. The one thing that is kind of a bummer, too, is Jabari doesn't play much five in college. He plays with this guy named Walker Kessler, who is quite a character in his own right, but we don't need to get into that right now. Walker is fun to watch.

He went to Auburn because he wanted to shoot threes from what I understand. Yeah, he left UNC, and then he's like a 7-foot-one guy. But, yeah, I mean, I think Jabari's a really interesting player. He'll be fun to watch the rest of the year. me personally, I'd highly doubt. I think he'll be in the top five for sure. And I could see him going number one. I personally wouldn't do it myself.

That's kind of where I landed. I feel, I'm, this is going to be an up and down process, but man, I have come around to Chet. I feel myself. I was hoping I could be on Chet Island. I know you're disappointed. I'm liking the idea of Chet more and more anyway. But, you know, we're going to be talking

about this a ton more. It's going to be exciting to watch this unfold as the season goes on. And we'll talk about Paolo Boncherro. We'll get into him pretty soon. I'm actually working, just started working on a piece about that. And yeah, I can't wait. I really can't. This three-horse race is really fascinating. Next, we're going to be talking about a third-year player from the New York Knicks that's left-handed. I think you know who it is. But before we do that, we're going to take a break. R.J. Barrett, I think that you could have, through powers of deduction, figured out who I was talking about with that one. R.J. Barrett of the New York Knicks. Charks, you and I have had some conversations over the past two or three years about R.J. Barrett. Where do you, I think that we kind of had some guarded, you know, just cautiousness about him. You know, I think we were careful with him about, for this or that reason.

and where do you see him in his development right now? He's had a little bit of a dip in his efficiencies. What's going on with RJ Barrett in terms of where he's headed? Like, is he on track to be like a superstar? How would you assess RJ's situation right now developmentally? Well, I mean, I think, first off, last year, I would say he exceeded most expectations. He was a big part of the next kind of unexpected rise

to the middle, the east. Average. Rise to the middle. And I think if you were a Knicks fan, well, you know, they were rising. You got to go from the bottom to the middle. It's by definition of rise. The phrase is made me like, the rise to the middle. Hey, Knicks fans, they have much to get excited about.

So I can get why they were pumped. And, you know, he had a great season. He shot 40% from three. He was their second leading score on a number, I guess it was the number four seat. I can't remember exactly how it shook out on the end. And I think there was definitely an expectation among Knicks fans, if not wider NBA people, that he would continue building on that and that he would become an all-star this season. And obviously that hasn't quite happened. The Knicks have regressed in a lot of ways.

And I think the big question with RJ first off is, would you say him tailing off is, isn't part of why the Knicks have regressed? Or has he kind of been caught with the rest of the sink and chips? The Nick regression has been sort of, it's an odd cocktail of things. I think one of the main things, for me, the question is, yeah, like, how culpable is he in this? And, like, it's an environment versus individual thing. Because if you look at the, if you look at his efficiencies across the board, like last year, he was fantastic from the corners. He was 43.4% from the right corner and 42.1 from the left corner. Those are numbers that I don't know that I ever would have believed coming out of college.

I was always skeptical about the big thing about RJ is like the shooting and the dribble shooting. The catch and shoot has improved a whole lot. Like he's looked good. If he has his feet under him and he has, he's balanced when he goes up. He had sort of similar odd load up issues that like Jabari's a way better shooter. But RJ like whenever he would dribble pull up, he would, he would like airball or hit the backboard sometimes when he was in college. He was very inconsistent. For me, I feel like Randall, it's a conflation of things.

Randall's part of it. I do think that Randall's, the Knicks are, I've been sort of polling the Knicks fans that are in my orbit. They see, the attitude about Randall is comedic, honestly, because I feel like they are like, well, they're just resigned. They're like, well, this is what it is. You know, we know he's not like an efficient primary. We had to pay him.

This is kind of the way this is going. Just some numbers. I think that RJ did benefit a lot from like the Randall double double team machine that was going on last year. This year, he's isoing a little bit less, but his points per catch or points for chance are down. He's not passing out of double teams as much. They're not generating as much offense out of his double teams.

What do you think has changed talking about the Randall component of this? What has changed about the Randall thing? Has he just come back to Earth as a shooter and that's what it is? Or are teams playing him differently? What's going on? I think he's definitely come back to Earth as a shooter. I don't know about you being a Kentucky fan, but I never really believed in Julius

as like a Dirk-level mid-range shooter, which is what he was for large parts of last season. And it does kind of feel like without fans in the arenas, he might have been the biggest beneficiary of kind of those clean shooting environments. Because Julius, you know, he's always been a guy who takes tough shots, and he just made them at a really crazy rate last season.

That's come back to Earth a bit. And then I think with RJ, where you really had to start, I mean, he's had a very up and down season. And I think there's a really good example of kind of the pros and cons of the RJ experience was in this last week. So on Thursday, they played the Celtics twice in the last two, their three games. RJ didn't really play well in either game, but he had like the great buzzer beating three-pointer to win the game on Thursday. But when you saw those two games, like it was like to me, unmissed, like on, you couldn't miss it. RJ's matched up with Tatum and Brown, and he's just not on their level.

The matchup was just very, very tough for him. Because RJ's always been a guy who loves to bully smaller players. That was his trademark in high school and in college and for Team Canada. And Twitter's best in the NBA, too, is just play downhill bully ball, use his frame, because he's about 6-6-220, use his frame to bully smaller players. But that don't work against Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum. They're bigger than him and they're faster than him. And he couldn't get around them.

He couldn't go through them. And they could create separation from really easily. And there just wasn't much he could do. And I think with RJ, he's not like, RJ is a perfect example of how thin the margins are at the very, very, very top. Right. We're talking about Arjo, if he's going to become an all star, but like Tatum and Brown, those guys are all stars because they're so big. They're so skilled. and they're very fast, especially Brown,

I wouldn't say RJ can be with them in any of those categories. He's a guy who depends on bullying smaller players. He's never had great touch either around the basket, even going back to college, right? Not a great shooter. That was the other thing, too, last year. RJ shot 40% from 3 and 75% from the line. And that right there should have been a red flag

because it should be, if you're shooting 40% from 3, you should be at 80, 85% from the line. because the line is the more revealing indicator of your underlying touch. And this year, the free throw shooting came down, so did the threes. And so to bring that back around, RJ gets plays really bad against the Celtics. Then he plays the Spurs on Monday night. And the Spurs don't have Devin Vassell, Derek White, Kelton Johnson, all out on COVID. So now who's RJ's facing?

He's facing Lonnie Walker, like a 6-4 combo guard, and Josh Primo, who's a 19-year-old rookie. And in that game, RJ is just killing those boys. He ended up having 31 points on 20 shots, four assists. And when RJ has the physical advantage, he knows how to take advantage of it. It's just, in a lot of nights, he doesn't. And I don't know that he has a great plan B when he doesn't have that physical advantage. Yeah, I think there are a lot of things at work. There's a positive and negative spin there.

I think you're right. I mean, he's like, he's, and in matchups where he can, absolutely. He should, he should bully the mismatches that he gets. Those are positive things. I think the takeaway here, though, is that, like, there is some environment versus individual stuff going on. Now, a lot of players, this isn't like a struck by lightning, Doc Brown, great Scott revelation here. This is like, you know, players. Kyle, everything you say is a struck by lightning.

Don't give yourself, give yourself some credit. That's sweet of you, charts. Thank you. I think that, like, players are going to look a lot, a lot of players are going to look better with better players. I was wondering, I have written down here, there might be some Wiggins effect going on here where we have like inefficient player. Wiggins also is a different level athlete, you know, at this point. Yeah, but I mean, like environment, I kind of, it comes back to this thing we've talked about a lot with RJ where it's like, okay, is he going to be like a primary score kind of in the same vein? Like that's what we always talk about with superstars.

How many all stars are there that aren't like at least secondary offensive options? We don't, maybe that is a criticism of what we think an All-Star is or the idea of what an All-Star is. That's another discussion. But in terms, we were talking to each other about what is RJ's best skill? Because we're like, okay, inconsistent shooter. We kind of just like drone on and like talk about these negatives or like quasi-negatives. What do you think his best skill is? What is he trading on other than the physicality at this level?

Because if you're 6-6 and you're just trading on physicality, you're not going to make it. He has something else to offer. What is that? is it being utilized correctly, is the question. So what do you think? Well, I think his best skill is actually his passing, because he's got a good handle. I think he has a pretty good feel for the game,

and I think he can make all the right plays. He has games that will have, you know, five, six, seven assists pretty comfortably. It's just, it's just weird thing where I think his mentality and his skill set, there's a disconnect. Whereas I think even going back to his time at Duke, it was like, you've got Zion.

Williamson, who can basically score it well, if you would just feed him the ball and set him up, y'all would probably win a national title. But instead, you were trying to go point for point with Zion and see, I'm the top dog. And I think it held back Duke all season that year. And I just think, if I look at RJ, he's never shot better than 46% from two

in his three years in the NBA. I would not say he's a great shooter. I think he's a good defender. He competes hard. But I think there are a couple of physical limitations talking about, I don't see him as like an elite all-defense level player. It's a good rebounder. Actually, I think rebound is a pretty good skill for a guard because it was frame.

But to me, and you look at RJ, like he's never been a big steel, a high steel guy, never been a high block guy. That's kind of showing the lack of explosiveness. I really do think it's passing. If RJ would just move the ball, I could see him being a, a really, really good passer in the right setting. And then if he's a primary pass-first player, I think it creates easier shots for him,

as opposed to forcing up shots and then passing when he's doubled. Yeah, like the Knicks last night, I just think that there really is some, you sent me the interesting impact metric about like, because I was just getting really frustrated watching Randall play. Yeah, you definitely buried the lead with your anti-randall commentary. There's much more off the pod, but that doesn't matter. Well, I'm going to say, I just don't think, I think that they played some smaller lineups the last night against the Spurs.

Like we said, they're picking on, they were picking on a depleted Spurs team. But like those, Emmanuel Quigley, R.J., Quinton, O.B. Top and plug any other big here of Taj, Toggins. But there were times where the ball was humming with him out there as sort of that connective playmaker. I don't know that he's like a primary, like, you know, picks the defense apart with his offense and his playmaking balance. but he does strike, he's always struck me as more of that type of player, somebody who is supporting good offense, make open threes, but move the ball. And he was like just destroying them in pick and roll last night. Some of that was like Lonnie fell asleep like eight different times in picking rolls.

He was just like standing straight up at different points. I was like, Lonnie, what are you doing? But last night, like you said, 31 points, 12 for 20, 3 for 4 from 3 and 4 assists. I just think that some of that is going to have to even out because the Knicks are still just a really hard offensive team to watch. One of the stats I threw at you was Randall has taken the sixth most heavily contested mid-range jumpers this season, and he's shooting 29% on those shots. And he's passing less at a double. So you can just kind of see where the offensive falloff has been. Randall is just sort of like wants to continue to be this primary option guy.

I've got something for you, actually. Go ahead. What do you think about this? I've always kind of thought that RJ is like a smaller Julius Randall. Like, there are similar players in a lot of ways. If he was left-handed, would you say that, though? If he wasn't left-handed? Maybe not, but like they're both lefties.

They're streaky shooters. Good pass from they want to be. Forced a lot of tough shots. Compete really hard. They're both Tibbs, quote-unquote, Tibbs players, solid defenders. Don't have great length. Don't have great, uh, explosiveness either. But kind of below the rim.

very powerfully built. Pet your head down, get to the rim kind of players. I actually think RJ's feel is a lot better than Randalls. I know I made a video about Randall and his explosion. A lot of that was shooting driven. Randall's always been able to pass the ball. But I think you're right, like a key thing about, and there's been a shift.

I mean, he was, RJ was frustrating in college. He was frustrating in his like appetite for shots with Zion and things like that. But like if you watched him last night, he wasn't like hogging the ball. He's been better than I thought it would be in the NBA, yeah. He does move the ball pretty well when he wants to. So, and for the Knicks, they've had some, like, inconsistency with, like, personnel.

I honestly, and this isn't me as like a Kentucky guy saying this, but I don't understand why quickly he doesn't start. Like, if you watch those lineups when he comes in, like, their offense just comes to life when quickly comes on to the floor. He just, the kinetic sort of quality to it. But I just say, Randall and RJ, it makes me wonder, do you think that RJ is going to, like, resurface after his like rookie time. Do you think he'll stay in New York or is he the type of like gamer that's going to

want to go somewhere that suits his game better? Because I still think in years one through three, he has not been optimized in a way that has been good for his game. That's just kind of my opinion on that. I've always thought he might make most sense as an undersized four with shooting around him. Like he could be in the Julius Randall role essentially. I think he could hold up inside as a defender.

tough enough, he's smart enough. And then you play him with a quickly, let him be the guy that makes the four on three pass. That's something to be very interesting. But my guess is, like, New York has some pretty interesting young guys like you talked about. Quickly's been great. Obie Toppen's

been better in year two. Quentin Grimes, when he's played it, been pretty interesting. They've drafted really well, but it does ultimately feel like they need a number one guy if it's not going to be Julius. And I mean, heck, they might be better off just not, you know,

getting in the range for the top picks in this year's draft if it works out that way. Because it does already feel like they've hit their ceiling with Julius is their best guy. So it's going to be interesting to watch the Knicks. Just as this season unfolds and winds down or winds up for them, we'll see how it plays out with RJ, with all their personnel stuff. Hope the Knicks fans can at least have a semi-tolerable existence for once, right? But you can check out my Jabari piece on The Ringer.com. Charks said his Draymond piece is going to be going up on Thursday.

I'm sure that's going to be fantastic. Love Draymond. Next week, we were talking about John Morant. John Moran is an interesting guy. I know we do this cliche thing with like New York. We're just like, oh, can you imagine such and such in the garden? Can you imagine John Morant if he had ended up with the Knicks, like what he would be like in the garden? Yeah, I mean, so much does business is luck, right?

The Knicks got lucky to be three, but they'd have been a lot. lucky to be two in that draft, no question. Right, right. So keep an eye out for that. And next week, speaking of John Morant, I believe we're going to be doing some just Memphis deep dive in. Memphis, one of the really interesting younger teams, they have been for a while here.

So we're going to be circling back and talking about a lot of meat on the moan there with their young players. But we will be back next week to talk about all that young players and such. And we'll catch you next time. Good to see you, John. Yeah, as always. Thank you.