The Ringer NBA Show - Jimmy Butler’s Practice Tirade and Lakers vs. Warriors Preseason Takeaways | Group Chat (Ep. 318)

Episode Date: October 11, 2018

The Ringer’s Chris Ryan and Justin Verrier are joined by Haley O’Shaughnessy and Paolo Uggetti to break down the explosive Timberwolves practice that owned NBA Twitter for a day (1:50). Then, they discuss what the Lakers’ pace of play in the offseason means for a 33-year-old LeBron James (30:55). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey guys, thanks for listening to the Ringer NBA show. We're about to get into this episode of group chat. But before we do, I just wanted to let you know about a couple of Ringer NBA related things. First of all, we have new Twitter feed at Ringer MBA. You can find great highlights, great banter, great memes, great observations all over there on the new Twitter feed at Ringer MBA. We also have a Facebook group, Facebook page. Is that what the kids call it? Facebook page, Facebook.com slash group slash ringer MBA.

You can go there and get into discussions with fellow. NBA fans and maybe even some Ringer staffers. Also, we have Ringer NBA Palooza, which is our our, I guess, annual video festival to kick off the NBA season. That's happening Tuesday, opening night of the NBA for a full day. We'll be offering you guys video programming. We'll have previews. We have some very funny videos. We have a lot of Bill stuff. And it all culminates with the Celtic Sixers game where Bill and a bunch of other people will be doing a watch-along, some special guests for that. Pretty excited for that. So be sure you're checking out the ringer all day long on Tuesday.

We'll have some great features. Jordan Conrad about Ennis Cantor today. We have some awesome features coming up. So keep it dialed into the ringer, man, no matter where you are. Basketball is very good. Anthony Davis will win the MVP this year. The Hawks trading Donchich was a smart move. What if the caps are better without LeBron?

Basketball is very good. And welcome to the Ringer NBA show. This is group chat. And these guys fucking need me. Talio Shawnessy. I didn't know where you were going on that. Justin Barrier. I never know what to say here.

Palo. What's up? How you doing, man? Good. How are you? I'm great. Thanks for joining us today. I know it was tough to carve it out of your busy schedule.

That's me. This is the All Jimmy Butler Everything podcast. We will talk a little bit else. We'll talk a little bit more about other teams. But right now, the Minnesota Timberwolves. Don't make promises you can't keep. Have made themselves. a complete and utter spectacle

on the eve of the season. I can't remember a team imploding this early into the cycle. They're not even in the season yet. And it is one of the most comical, dysfunctional, who's afraid of Virginia Woolf,

except it's who's afraid of Jimmy Butler. It's Jimmy and the Wolves. I will do a little recap of everything that happened yesterday. Do you need to sound effects? If you want to do any, like, like wind blowing or wolves howling. Shimes, perhaps.

Okay, so yesterday, Jimmy Butler, who has been away from the team, who has requested a trade, who had Tom Tibido, now in retrospect, this is very funny, had Tibido come to Los Angeles to be like, I do really want a trade. Right. There had been rumors last week when we recorded our podcast. We thought a deal with Miami was on the brink.

We thought it was about to get finalized. Well, it was. And it turned out that at the very last second, reportedly, Minnesota asked for a sweetener, whether it was take on Gorgie's contract, whatever it was. It was going to be for Josh Richardson and some other stuff. Bam was not a part of it, apparently. Little did I know when I was recording a podcast.

So we had a week, basically, of like we thought it was going to be a done deal. Jimmy's away from the team. The Timberwolves are getting ready. They don't look particularly good. Derek Rose is starting at shooting guard. Thursday, Wednesday rolls around. And Wednesday rolls around and it's reported that Jimmy Butler will be at practice that day in Minnesota. Jimmy Butler apparently shows up,

this is according to Chris Haynes at Yahoo. Butler showed up to practice late and subbed himself into a scrimmage on the third team to go against the starting group, according to League Sources. Quote, screaming from the top of his lungs, Butler uttered taunts at his teammates, including, they ain't shit, they soft, league sources said, thank you, league sources.

Most of the players knew the invectives were directed at Towns and Wiggins. That's Carl Anthony and Andrew. Thank you, sources. Haynes goes on, neither towns nor Wiggins confronted Butler at any point. Some players were motivated by Butler's theatrics, but others were distraught and speechless, most notably towns. When practice concluded, Butler stormed out of the facility and skipped stretching.

That's not a great idea when you were as injury prone as Jimmy. With the rest of his teammates. Wiggins did give Butler hand dab. You fucking clown for doing that. Before Butler's exit, Towns, this is the saddest thing I've ever read. Towns then gathered the players in a huddle and gave a message centered on everyone

keeping their emotions in check. That horse has left the barn. According to some of the players, the message felt empty. Look, I tweeted this yesterday, but was it as empty as his stats? God, Haley. It's a tweet so good,

it's okay for you to recycle it on this podcast. Thank you. Wolf's beatwriter, Darren Wolfson, wrote on Twitter, he texted with a player, and when I asked how Butler looked, the player responded, quote, I'm legally blind. Because there was a lot of like,

hey, I don't know what's happening. There was a moment where everybody was going to try and pretend like this didn't happen, it sounds like. So Anthony Tolliver, when he was asked after practice, was Butler there? He was like, he was there. Yeah. And Jeff Teague was like,

yeah, Jimmy, just being Jimmy. And this guy was like, I'm legally blind. I didn't say anything. And this was all within like what, probably an hour. This is like a 90-minute stretch. Well, it was reported that the players found out while they were still inside.

Like stuff started leaking while they were still in the facility. And that upset them, me too. It upset Jimmy Butler as well, which is ironic. So while all this is happening at some point between deciding he's going to go to practice and attending practice or whatever, however this, that chronology is not as important as what I'm about to say, which is that at some point Jimmy Butler or his camp reached out to Rachel Nichols at ESPN

and was just like, why did you come to Minnesota for an interview? I feel like I have something to say. Great weather this time of the year. And so, some of them were cynical among us have speculated that this was all orchestrated and staged to provide the maximum platform, the loudest possible platform for Jimmy to reiterate the wolves are trash and he wants out.

I feel for him. He's trying everything. On sports center. So Rachel Nichols flies to Minnesota, does this interview. Jimmy Butler gives a great interview. Rachel asked him about how he's treating Carl Anthony Towns. Jimmy Butler said, am I being tough on him? Yeah, that's who I am.

I'm not the most talented player on the team. Who is the most talented player on our team? Cat. Who is the most God-gifted player on our team? Wiggs. I would like to know how you decide that. How do we decide who is the most talented and who is the most God-gifted? Just out of curiosity. Well, Jimmy has some strong opinion. Okay.

But like, did God tell Jimmy Butler that Wiggins was more talented? I think he's maybe trying to play both sides. If you're religious, you're like, okay, God-given talent to Wiggins. And then if you're not, then that's town. I don't have the proper sourcing to be sure about that. I've heard some things. You don't have the book of Andrew Wiggins brought down from you from the mountain? Maybe it has to do with King's.

Who plays the hardest? Me. I play hard. I put my body on the line every day in practice. Every day in games. That's my passion. Everybody leads in different ways. That's how I show I'm here for you.

We're not even done yet. No. Meanwhile, another major thing that seems to be stuck in Jimmy's craw is the idea that people are leaking stuff. That people are going, like, he'll be like, who said what I said in practice? And nobody will say anything. And he's just like, nobody's being honest. His main thing was like, we're not being truthful with each other. We're not being honest with each other.

Why can't we be honest with each other? It's not personal. Was it the right way to do it, Jimmy said? No. Great self-reflection. So it was a classic non-apology. was like, it wasn't the right way to do things, but it was awesome. It was like basically like I was Maximus from Gladiator and all these guys have to kiss the ring now. Is it fixable?

It could be. Do I think it is? No. Again, where, what's the difference? The difference is if I don't get traded, I will take take over this team. Yes, this is a hash of this crisis. But then I'm like, Jimmy, that's exactly what Tibido wants to hear. Yes. He wants more intensity. Right. So, so fuels him. Basically, here's where we're at. And we're going to get into this. I'm just sitting the table here. There's some speculation to Jimmy, obviously, for as much as he was like, I just got out there, the adrenaline

hit me, I haven't played basketball a long time. I'm a very emotional player. Yeah, apparently he was like super out of shape, which is hilarious. And still destroyed Carl Anthony Towns playing with literally three guys I've never heard of. James. Shout out to Jonathan Charks for being like, that guy's actually better than Anthony Collier.

Yes. There's some speculation that this is entirely staged that he knew, he called Rachel, said fly to Minnesota, there's going to be an interesting story for you when you get here, that the whole thing is basically to put the Timberwolves in a completely untenable situation, that they can't have him come back. He essentially comes back to this team and ruins their preseason. I mean, not that he already hadn't done that, but essentially targets a guy who they just paid $190 million, which apparently

bothers him. That was another thing that he was, he wanted to confront Kat about. was that essentially that it was like Jimmy asks for a trade. Carl signs his new deal. It's Carl's team now. Maybe that's what he's upset about. God only knows what he is upset about. Seems like he's upset about everything. But he's trying to leave.

It would have been Carl's team anyway. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. Guess what? It is Carl's team. Carl Towns has the ability to be the next Tim Duncan. That is, that if you were actually looking at this team and you were looking at who is what age, has suffered what injuries, is a good face for this.

franchise that needs a face of the franchise and is not going to hold this franchise hostage with this needs to be the coach. This is how we need to play. Here's how these players need to interact with me. Here's how I feel about this community. Jimmy Butler wants out of Minnesota. I feel like once you state that, you can keep him out and you can hold him for as much leverage as you want in terms of a trade, but you cannot bring him into the gym. This is what happens. Yeah, clearly Jimmy was making a point. It seems like it was this whole show. was for. It reminded me of when I'm editing a story and I'm like, we really need to show this, not just tell this. He really wanted to put a scene to what he had. And because ultimately what he

did was just underline his basic concerns for wanting to get out in the first place. Nothing is different as a result. It only just enhanced our understanding of the story that was already in existence. So did you guys see what the coaches said afterwards? Yes. And I saw what Jimmy said about the coaches afterwards. Well, okay, let's go over the coaches first. So, SVG talked to the Minnesota coaching staff, and they said, best practice of the season, loved the intensity. Yep. So what did he say back? Tibito said, I loved, like, basically said something a Woj that was like, he's such a competitor. I loved, like, what he brought to the table.

Jimmy Baller allegedly started screaming at Scott Leiden, the GM, Tib's handpicked GM, about how they can't win without him and they need him, even though he is asking for a trade. It's so conflicting. Then he told Rachel that Tom Tibido was somewhere locked in his office smiling because he loves confrontation

and he loves this kind of attitude and this kind of... Now, okay, this is one of those things, this is one of those stories where I think that your interpretation of it is largely going to be based on whether or not you've played sports and whether or not you've played professional sports,

that's fair enough. I think a lot of people will read this story and be like, I fucking love this. That's exactly what you want. Accountability. Guys bringing it in practice

and just showing everybody what it takes to win. Here's what I think, though. I think Jimmy Butler is the best player on a 500 team. I understand that Jimmy Butler is an effort merchant and Jimmy Butler plays really hard

and nobody believed in Jimmy Butler and nobody thought Jimmy Butler was like going to be who he is. But I think that Jimmy Butler is somewhat overselling Jimmy Butler right now. Jimmy Butler doesn't win championships. Jimmy Butler can't be the best player on a championship team. He can barely be the best player on a playoff team.

I disagree because I don't think he's overselling himself. He said he's not the most talented. He said he's not the most God gifted, which we all know are very different. He's just saying, you guys need me, which we obviously saw last year. Nobody is intense at all. Well, I mean, Wiggins and towns aren't intense without him. I don't think those things happen in a vacuum. I don't think Jimmy Butler is like, I'm an asshole, and none of these guys are playing hard.

Okay, but without him, who's playing hard? Tosh Gibson? I don't know. We didn't find out because we never got to see Towns and Wiggins be like, okay, this is our team now. Yeah, we did in 2017. With a bad, with bad coaching though, right? They had one year with Tibbs. That was still Tibbs.

So they were, all right, so like run that back. So when did? He had one year with 16, 17. Yes. 17, 18 is with Butler. Yes. Right. But that's the thing is like, can we even make the argument like, oh, it would be different now.

They're so grown up. I mean, towns looks like you're supposed to improve. getting used to the league every year, but they're not, like, substantially better players. It's also, like, the worst possible look for them, like, that, like, yesterday was the worst possible. Can you imagine? Like, we're talking about, okay, like, towns can be the franchise cornerstone and whatnot, but you obviously need, you're going to need players down the line to come and play with him.

Yeah. And how much did yesterday's, like, events ruin his, I mean, like, yeah, maybe I'm over-exaggerating a little bit, but at the same time, like, he's torpedoing the value of a guy that, They just committed like 40% of their captain. Both of them. Yeah, and Andrew Wiggins dapped him up. Yeah. Here's the thing.

He tapped out. I think Jimmy's right about all of this. I think the methods with which he's decided to yell it into the ether is complicated and just makes things worse ultimately. But I think everything that he's saying are things that we said last year about the Timberwolves. We all said that Andrew Wiggins needs to try more. Stephen Jackson is on Instagram or whatever the hell he's doing. smoking, whatever he was smoking, saying that exact same thing. And then Kat, like, yes, he has all this talent, but where is the production?

You saw the way, or reportedly, his teammates tuned out when he tried to express that they needed to rally around him and not Butler. And Butler was the guy who was supposed to galvanize the team and instill this in all of them, and that's why Tibbs got him. It's just, it all makes sense. But the fact that Butler has to scream it is the issue. The fact that nobody got the message is led him to this place. Yes, and the fact that Tom Tibido is letting it happen, even though this guy is like, I want out of here.

And even though the Timberwolves just gave the max to Carl Towns and be like, be our franchise. And then Tibado is like, by all means, practice, embarrass this kid, scream on him. And then have it leaked. And then go to Rachel Nichols and have a sports center segment where you're like, cats a joke. Then this is like a, then the T-Wolves are the joke. I was trying to do a winners and losers this entire situation. There are no winners. The only winner is Jimmy's agent.

I think Rachel Nichols is probably a winner. Sure. Yeah. I mean, the fact that we have something to talk about instead of just like random power rankings and predictions is great. Yes. But like everybody else involved is a joke. Right.

This is typical like when you look at who's the blame here, you always go to the top. It's the infrastructure. That's the issue. Tibbs is setting the agenda. He asked Butler to come in and to provide this for the team and he almost led in like this anarchist in there and as a result he's burned everything to the time. It's like gangsters using the Joker. Yes. Well the thing I wrote in the blog that I yesterday about it was also that this may, like, Thibbs may not be long for the wolves either. So like,

in his mind, it's completely think that's true. Yeah. So in his mind, it's like, why not, why not have Jimmy come in and like show what the real deal is here? You know what I'm saying? Like, maybe that's the thinking. And it's just the same criticism of Tibbs over and over again where he wants to do things that were successful in the past. And we've seen it more like on the court and more notably with the way that he's playing defense where he's still like Jeff T. came out yesterday and essentially was like we're the only team that isn't switching now. But here he kind of relies on toughness and grit and yelling and being fiery. When you see the teams across the league, the ones that are having significant amount of success are the ones that can really get along and have fun on the court. The Warriors have really championed this whole idea where it's like we don't have.

have to have just one alpha or whatever. We just pass it around. The ball moves. And this is just the example of how he's just like, it's filtering into everything that they're doing. It's coming from the top. And ultimately, Tibbs is the blame. I don't know why you would keep him around after this.

Well, you're right that he's embracing this kind of thing. And like, I think that's why he loved the idea of this practice. And when we were walking over here, I love this story because it's the kind of stories like you see on an old 30 for 30 or like my. Dad used to tell me about like when he used to watch the NBA. And, but it doesn't happen anymore for a reason. It's because we understand that that's not healthy for team dynamic or chemistry. And the only way it could have happened is in a way that feels very much like set up.

And you know what this is? Also is this is a crisis of identity because this is the Timberwolves hiring Tom Tibido because they were tired of missing the playoffs. And Tom Tibido getting Jimmy Butler because he wasn't getting through to Carl Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins. And Jimmy Butler coming in and being his. floor general and regulating and screaming at these guys. And it's the same thing that happened in Chicago, where there was a divide generationally between Rondo and Jimmy versus some of the younger kids. Yeah.

Wade. Wade was up there too. Yeah. And some of the younger kids probably feeling the same way, which is like, I get yelled at a lot by this guy, but I can point out some stuff that I think is wrong with this guy's game too. Or maybe wrong with this guy's the way this guy handles his career or the way that this guy goes about his job on a daily basis. But nobody wants to hear that because Jimmy Butler is like,

Well, I'll break my leg playing for this team, and I play hard every night. And that it's just like, he basically uses his work ethic as like a brand. You know what I mean? Right. Right. So I think that this is a situation where the wolves thought that they were closer than they were. A lot of teams are better than the wolves. And rather than slowly bringing along towns and Wiggins with a coach who understands how to nurture young talent, honestly, you can see what's happened with Chicago since Jimmy and Wade and Rondo and Miratich have left,

Hoyberg's actually got like a pretty decent young nucleus and people have like some positivity about that team and guys like Zach Levine and guys like Chris Dunn who were wasted in Minnesota might be actually okay. So I don't know, I don't know. I mean, are the wolves going to win more than 40 games? Maybe not.

No, now with Jimmy. Or now without Jimmy, sorry. No, I mean, are the Bulls going to win more than 40 games with that team? Maybe not. But those 40 wins will feel really good because you'll be like, we're going in the right direction. I don't think you necessarily need them to win 40 games in too. Exactly.

Right. That's the thing. And they have like a runway to just kind of just buy their time and wait for either, you know, Lori to get to become like a top 20 NBA player, if you will. So, you know, it's like it's instituting patience. Like you said, an identity thing of where it's like the wolves are more about now, which, I mean, the Warriors guys. Well, I would push back.

I would just say that maybe the Bulls have something. But I think it is the tradeoff there where you're trading off hope for something that's different versus the tangible of what Jimmy can. bring. I think he can turn a team into a playoff team. We saw that. They were a top three seed last year before he went down. And with a team like Minnesota, you

understand the desperation they have simply because of the history that they've had there where they haven't made the playoffs since Kevin Garnett left. And so it is just yes, maybe in a vacuum the Bulls are doing things the right way in air quotes, but as we've seen the way that they've reached for Jabari Parker, it doesn't really always work out as cleanly as

yeah, but giving Jabari Parker a two-year deal is way different than giving Jimmy Butler a five-year deal. And then I also... And paying Jimmy Butler $40 million when he's definitely going to be playing on one leg or probably going to be playing on one leg. Yeah, but you know he's going to be hustling on that one leg.

He'll play defense, for sure. Tripping people. I think that he would have been totally fine to stay in Minnesota. Because this is the workings of something that you could see when he came to the team from far away as someone who could content. But then this is why he's

so frustrated is that nothing else was done by the guy who brought him in who he trusted to get them there. He signed Derek Rose at a time when they needed some shooting. He signed Lualdang this offseason. Wouldn't you be so frustrated that you have these two young guys, and that's already annoying because they're not playing as hard as they can, given their talent? But also, like, nothing's coming in from the top to help you either. But do we know that, like, Jimmy didn't like that they signed Derek Rose and-Wold-Den? I mean, I don't know. And also, I don't know, because he demanded it right after dang signed. Yeah.

And their whole offseason was giving Kat money and signing Anthony Tolliver. And as we've seen, like, he doesn't have a high opinion of Kat. And the way that, to Haley's point, it seems like he's just, he does things that are just in the past. It's almost like if Chris was like, let's double down on agate pages, you know? It's just, it doesn't work anymore. Yeah. I mean, I honestly, like, nothing would surprise me about this anymore. I mean, if I were, I think the funniest.

possible thing that would happen right now is if Carl Towns was like he can have this team trade me to Brooklyn he can have it if he wants this team if he doesn't think I work hard enough if the Timberwolves don't have my back to like create a work environment in which I can figure out how to like lead this team into the next season if these guys don't want to listen

to me and the coach doesn't believe in me trade me trade me I think Wiggins is definitely more likely to be that guy yeah yeah but like you said Wiggins dapped up brother Like Wiggins is like kind of like, oh, okay. Like if I were towns, I'd be like, this doesn't work. Something that's... I don't know when you can get traded after you sign one of these big deals or like what the...

It's usually like mid-December. Sure. Just be like holler at me in mid-December. Are you telling me that like half the, like, what, two-thirds of the league wouldn't be like, what do you want for towns right now? Yeah. Yeah. You don't think the Spurs would be like, what can we give you for towns? You don't think the Nets?

You don't think Riley would be like, forget Jimmy Butler. I want Carl Towns. Right. I'll fix Carl Towns. This is it. It is like, I don't even know, like, where else these guys go from here. Yeah. I mean, something that's interesting to me, not to zoom out too much, but is, like, in this kind of new stage of players demanding things and trades and getting out, you know, pre-agency and all of that, what do you do with these guys who are in this, like, top eight to top 20 range of superstars that have some power, but, like, you know what I'm saying?

Like, somebody like, Jimmy, you're not going to, like, throw away everything for just because they're keys requests. something as opposed to like somebody like kawai where it's different like you know what I'm saying like I think this new age of like player power and player agency is going to be more interesting to watch with those kind of in between guys that are not the top level superstars but are more toward the back in terms of them agitating for moves yeah I would say Kyrie falls in that yeah right but he got what sort of well he didn't get what he wanted but he got the best case scenario yeah yeah I mean with Jimmy is just the whole thing we were talking about before he's 29 and wants a max contract like I would be pushing for this as well just because I don't know what my future holds. I mean, he missed how many games last season. And we were talking about going into the offseason, whether or not he would rush to take an extension simply because we didn't know what his future was because of that injury.

So I think you make a really good point. I just don't know what type of player you're getting him for how long. And it's funny, Charx mentioned this in our Slack the other day, but the team that should be trading for him, and probably the only team that should be trading for him is a team that's built to win next season like Houston, just simply because maybe you pay the tax of a couple, his year of like five or four where it's a bad contract, but right now you get

a player that can impact you. Other than that, like, I don't know why the nets give up anything. And you look at the package that's reportedly on the table from the heat, like it's Josh Richardson and not much else. Like, that's probably why. I still think he gets traded in the next couple of days, honestly. I think so. I think that this was, I think this is Tibbs's middle finger to Glenn Taylor.

He's just like, this is what you get for money. But why the next couple days if nothing's happened so far? what changes in the next couple days? Because they'd have to pay him to not play. I mean, they have to pay him to stay away. Do you guys really think that Jimmy Beller can sit out? That's the other thing. Right.

Do you think he can see a game and sit out? It sounds like he changes his mind a lot about that. I've been reading this stuff. I mean, over the course of the last couple weeks, he's been like, I want to be traded. Then there's like a feeling that he might be a pro and come to work anyway because he has a contract. And then there's like, well, you know,

is that really wise for them to do that? Is there any way in which this team wins games in the West? with their best player basically effectively giving up on the team if they'd give it back Jimmy? I don't know. The funny thing is I think Jimmy would give up on the team as a whole, but on a game-de-game basis would actually go out in 48 minutes. You know what I'm saying?

Like, go all out 48 minutes. To do what? To do what? Like, what is this team? I mean, it's just... I could totally see him doing the Kobe move of just only passing for an entire game, not taking an entire shot. Because this is essentially what is.

This is just like Kobe Redox. and late era Kobe Redux. This is about as bad as I've seen it for a team. This is a team that at any given moment could lose its its all-star player and its coach. And it's president. Yeah. Well, yeah, that's the other thing.

I think that's best-case scenario, though. That's best-case scenario. Yeah, that they fire tips kind of started over, get Jimmy out of there. Bring in like a pig and a young player. Well, that's the question. Like, let's say Jimmy gets traded ultimately. They bring on, let's say, a Josh Richardson. and what is the future of this team?

They go back down to we're the 10th seed. Yeah, but it's like what we talked about last week. Finally, they're open again. We have flexibility. They were going down on the wrong road. All of a sudden, they have this opportunity to take a U-turn. They get off of Gorgie. They send him to Miami.

That was apparently one of the stopping points is that later in the deal, they were like, can you also take Gorgie? Right. If they can get off Gorgie, if they could free up some money. But at the same time, you have two max contracts, the players who haven't lived up to it. And I think, like you said,

I think Towns eventually gets there. I am buying town stock simply because I think he's just been diminished by what Jimmy is saying about him and yes he has some issues but it reminds me so much of Anthony Davis when Anthony Davis had some injuries maybe he wasn't trying as hard on the defense event but the talent is so

there and like a few years ago we were saying towns like we would take towns over Davis like these things switch so quickly yeah but you're still committed to a lot of money there like how do you even get these other guys to join them simply because Minnesota isn't destination there are a lot

a question. It's basically the same questions they were facing before they traded Jimmy. Like what is our next? Trade for Jimmy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What is our next move? How do we go about it? And I don't know. They really need another reboot after they've rebooted, what, twice in the past two years. I'll tell you one thing. The market for Jimmy now, it's not radically different. But I was, it just, if you see, if you read all this stuff and Jimmy is obviously corroborated all this, like, all the rumors. Rachel was like, you know, here's all the reports out of practice. Is it true? And he's like most of it. She read the Woj tweets to him.

He's like, how does this guy know everything? You know what I mean? I was like, okay. I got to say, I wouldn't want him on the Sixers. Okay. I wouldn't want him like within 10 feet of the Sixers. Yeah, I don't think he'd. Would you want him on a young up-and-coming team?

Would you want him on the Bucks? Would you want him on the Bucks? Being like I don't like my buttonholzer's offense. I'm going to do my thing. I think if he had like-minded players. I don't know. I'd love to see him on the Bucks. I would love to see him on the Sixers.

But like, do you, after. watching this? Do I really want Jimmy Butler and Markel Fultz in the same locker room? Oh my God. Do I want Joel and Bede and Jimmy Butler in the same locker room? No. Yeah. And maybe he was making a big show of things simply because he thinks he fits the heat culture

so much and it was kind of like come get me. Like I am your type of guy. I am like we always talk about how the heat are so regimented. It's almost like militaristic in the way that they're just like they're process oriented. To me the whole thing was like, holy shit, this is a heat guy. This is a Pat Riley guy.

Got to imagine what the phone conversations were like between Jimmy and Pat and Tivs. So much intensity. All right. So really quickly, where do you think Jimmy Butler is playing by the All-Star after the deadline, the trade deadline? Probably in Miami. Yeah, Miami makes no sense. I want to like switch it up just to go into Miami.

I'll say Houston. I'm going to agree with you. Yeah. Why not? That'd be fun. Like, it's a Daryl Moore move, right? To just go in and like get the guy who's available and then figure it out later. And I know that the reports are that they don't want to give up PJ Tucker, which I understand in theory.

But at the end of the day, like if you have Jimmy Butler, Chris Paul, and James Hardin. And Mellow. Also, their owner went dangerously close to tampering by basically being like, we love to bring Jimmy Bueller home. Yeah. I mean, it was like some real soccer club owner stuff right there. Love it. Okay, we're going to take a quick break. We're going to come back, talk a little bit more about some other preseason stuff. Believe it or not, there was some and some of our feelings about the upcoming NBA season.

Hey, it's Bill Simmons. Wanted to tell you about some of the specialty podcasts on the Ringer podcast network, like Larry Wilmore's Black on the Air. Larry interviews a variety of guests that usually have to be pretty smart because Larry's a smart guy about politics, sports, culture, you name it. That's called Black on the Air. J.J. Reddick, he has his own podcast. We named it after him.

We thought that was a good idea. It's called the J.J. Reddick podcast. During the season, he's going to pull in not just. guest from the basketball world, but guests from outside of the basketball world as well. And also the Dave Chang Show. That's happening too. He is one of the best chefs in the

world. He has a podcast where he breaks down all the rigors of starting a restaurant of maintaining a restaurant, of chefs that are in his world, of celebrities that eat his food. It's a fantastic podcast. Check that out. And then finally, dual threat with Ryan Rissilo

every Tuesday night during football season, college football, football. Lots of takes, lots of thought out takes. I even appear on this show from time to tone. Dual Threat with Ryan Rousseau. So check all those out. You can subscribe to all of them wherever you get your podcasts. But most importantly, they are all on the Ringer

Podcast Network. All right, guys, we are back. Palo, Justin, Haley, Chris Ryan. It's a group chat podcast. And this is probably the last podcast we do about preseason. Thank God. I just want to ask real quick Thank Andrew Wiggins I should say

Out of us Who's the one with God-given talent? Yeah that's a great question Let's just really quickly do this Who here is the Jimmy Who's the who is the Whigs Who's Cat And who's Anthony Tolliver?

This is not going to go well I think I'm Taj Gibson I'm the glue guy of his podcast It wouldn't run without me I'm Todd Gibson I'm like I'm Tibbs or Jimmy here I have to be one of the aggressive ones You're Scott Leading

You're Scott Leading you're Scott Lane. Palo is he's Jeff Teague, he's just sitting there. You're Teague, yeah, you're Jeff Teague. You're having a good time. I'm probably, am I Jimmy? No, what? No.

Nobody should be. Do you want to be Jimmy? No, I think I just made that clear that I don't want to be Jimmy. Let's talk about other preseason stuff for other teams. I don't want to talk about the wolves anymore. They make me upset. The Lakers and the Warriors played last night. You would think it was an NBA finals game.

If you looked at NBA Twitter, this was in Vegas. I didn't understand where the three-point lines. was, but other than that, it seemed like a fun time. The team mobile court, what was up of that? Is that for college, or what did they have? I mean, I know that the Pact 12 tournament is there, but that's like not until March. I don't know what was going on there.

Is that where the B-Fight was? Is it... Yes. Is the WMBA line shorter? It might be. Isn't that where the AIS play? Yeah, that's where the Aces play. Okay.

Well, anyway, some fun stuff from this game. We got to see the running gun Lakers. They played against the Warriors. Draman was out. Boogie was out, obviously. The Lakers were essentially at full health. They had Lanzo back.

Give me some of your impressions from this game. The Lakers won. I'm watching right now. I'll tell you when I catch up. I actually have, yes. I actually have three numbers. Wow. I don't know if you guys know this. Stats are kind of important in the NBA.

Okay. The Lakers had 38 fast break points. The Warriors had 17. Wow. Which is like everything I've seen from the Lakers so far is summed up by that. Which is very fun, but like we said, before, oh my God, LeBron's 33. Okay.

Brandon Ingram got to the line 17 times. Classic Vegas refs. That is a quick risk. He need him to keep attacking the paint. But also, listen. I wonder what the over-under was on Brandon Ingram line trips. It literally didn't exist, trust me. She had.

He hit 15 of them. That's great. Last season, he shot 68.1%. He literally had more free throw attempts than anyone had shot attempts. I can't remember the last time I've ever seen that. The 90s. Keep my man in the pain. Dwayne Wade, yeah. Okay, and then the last number is first

the lob from LeBron to Lanzo. Lanzo said afterwards, he was like, this is the first time I've played on a team of LeBron. Because they haven't played to you. Oh, that's right. Wow. Okay. Beautiful. Thank you. Great stats. Thank you. Yeah, good job.

I think it was fun. Yeah, you're like our Lakers' correspondent. I don't know why, but I'll take it. No. So, the funny thing is like the fast break stuff and all that I'm so, so, so curious to see how it actually pays on in a regular season game where LeBron is not skipping out on the second half because every preseason game he has not played the second half. Right.

That's great. And so I think the Lakers should try to in some games this season. Not play LeBron in the second half. Why not? Because they'll lose. Well, okay. Maybe not playing the entire second half, but just give them like an entire quarter. I don't know.

Maybe like in a huge chunk of time. So you're thinking Brewers. style. You're like openers and enders. I mean, why not? If you want LeBron to go all out, if he really want to play this fast-paced style, and he clearly can't. He almost had a triple double in one half. He, and he had the buzzer-beater

three from 40 feet. Like, he looked really good in one half. He looked like very much in shape. Wait, hold on. You're advocating for LeBron plays the first half only. No, no, no. No. He said in sleep last night and, like, made this like, whiteboard, like, connected things and like, he came in this one. Is that why

you were late, Powell? No. I was like about like a minute. Okay, I'm just saying like, I'm curious to see how Luke staggers LeBron's minutes. And I'm wondering like what that looks like in the regular season in terms of like how many minutes per game is he going to play throughout the season and whether that's going to change over the course of the season? Because I want them to play fast. And also the idea here is that LeBron truly needs to be at his peak next season when they assume they presumably add another all star to this team. Right.

So burning him out at 38 points per game or 38 minutes per game. for 80 games this season doesn't make a ton of sense unless it's absolute, like they are around the third seed or second seed for some reason. Yeah, I do want to see the regular season product, not only because of what Apollo said, but also like when the games get tight, like I do wonder what this team is going to look like when they have to score in the half court. Yeah. So many teams play at pace nowadays and everyone's going to want to run.

Everyone says it every reason everyone wants to run. They're clearly making good on it so far. Yeah. Running is like the 15 pounds of money. also in football. It's just like we want to get out and run on teams. It's like, yes, of course you do. But there's problems with that. But at a certain point, you have to be able to

execute in the half court. And I do wonder if this is a little bit of smoking mirrors and I do wonder if these are the sort of guys that are going to be able to do so. You have LeBron, but who else is there? I don't really have a sense yet of what Luke's rotation is because he's been so playful with it. So,

after about three or four weeks in the regular season, assuming he gets this under control, what would you imagine is like the starting five and the three guys off the bench or four guys off the bench and in what order of those guys, you know? Yeah, I think Rondo will start to start the season because ideally you want Lanzo to take his spot

but I don't think Lanzo was like 100% even though he said last night he was 100%. Then he'll Baker Mayfielded a couple games in. Yeah, there you go, exactly. Also, Rondo will just be like I have a hamstring thing. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So, I mean, Rondo I think Josh Hart should start

at the two, but KCP's there. But Josh Hart's also guarding the four sometimes? Yeah, I mean, that's the thing. It's like, they're very fluid, if you will. And then, obviously, LeBron, Ingram, and Javelle, Javelle will be the starter. Okay. Can I just say that I think we're getting into the point with the Lakers where we're straying into some coaching bullshit. How so? Well, Josh Hardgarden the Four. So wait, just so everybody knows, Justin is making a reference to director bullshit, I think, which is when

directors of Marvel movies talk about how their, their Marvel movie is going to look a lot like all the president's men. That's like inside baseball, but inside slack. Yeah. Well, it's our podcast slack. It's an intertextual reference. But go ahead, Justin. Yeah, I'm really layered.

No, it just seems like I love the fact that they're trying a bunch of things. I love the fact that they're saying that they're going to push the positional boundaries to the point where a shooting guard, like a 6-4-5-6. 6-5 guard is essentially guarding, I don't even know, Anthony Tolliver. I don't know. Anthony Tolliver. Tell him exactly. He's just. He's in the mind right now.

But I think when it comes down to it, they're probably going to have to be a lot more conventional than they even realize or saying that they're going to be. There's going to be a lot of Javelle McGee at center. There's probably going to be more Kuzma at the four.

There's going to be more LeBron and Kuzma sets. So I don't know. I actually want to see what happens when you have Anthony Davis and Nicola Meritage going at you. And like, yeah, they're playing fast too, but they're actually fucking huge and you have to match up with that.

I just don't think Javail gets like more than 20. I mean, he literally doesn't play that more than 20 minutes a game. That's what I'm saying. Like in his career. Right, yeah. So I don't know you're going to have to play Cruzeman at the Five, which it seems like it's not going to go well.

And the whole thing about LeBron being resistant to playing small early in his career is because he didn't want the pounding. And like on the heat, the whole story was Shane Batti was the actually the person who was taking. The defensive power forward. Right. LeBron got all the credit for playing power forward. He did not actually guard the power forward.

which was the whole point of it. Right. So I do wonder, like, at 33, is he really going to, like, switch his mindset that much? Does he want to go guard go bear? Yeah, exactly. And everyone's switching more, which means that he will be matched up with those guys even more. And I wonder if, like, we're late in the season in February, teams are targeting him specifically to go against some of the bigger guys, matching him up in the post. Haley, you made a Baker-Mafeld joke, but it does feel like this Lakers team could get, like, at least early on, could be in some big 12.

type games. They're like, let's just have a 54-48 game and see what happens. They're going to be like, let's go 126, 118 and see who wins. Rather than we're going to grind it out and what we want is to hold an opposing team under 100. They may think that they're a defensive-minded team. I wonder when the, yeah, I wonder when that backlash is going to happen. To what they're trying to do, you mean? Well, specifically targeted to like their defense is terrible. Yeah. Because we already know the Lakers have their reputation. LeBron through the regular season's team. tend to have that reputation as of late. I mean, eventually you're like, this is why they're losing games.

Yeah, absolutely. So I wonder when that backlash is going to happen. It's funny because I think a lot of it, even with the defense, the switching and, you know, LeBron's burden, all that comes back to what you said last podcast, which is Ingram. And it's like kind of just depends on how he, like last night he was guarding KD a little bit. I mean, he was the primary defender on KD. So it really all, for as much as we can tinker with the lineup and what it's going to look like

and what it's going to be closing. Like, if Ingram doesn't take a big step, like the chain effect will be, will come to affect the Bronn, and the whole team is for a whole. Yeah, that's what I'm so excited about watching with this team to maybe backtrack a little bit of what I was saying before. Like, there's so much discussion about who's going to be the point guard next LeBron and, like, well, do Rondo and Lanzo fit with them

because they're more traditional ball handlers? I think the key is when you look at those good Cavs teams, they were really good simply because Kyrie was, in a traditional point guard. He was just a secondary creator that allowed LeBron to take plays off and Kyrie could just get his own bucket. And I think honestly the best point guard, if we're categorizing

Kyrie as a point guard, is probably Brendan Ingram. Simply because he is the best creator on this team. And to Haley's point, he's being aggressive, he's getting to the line. And I think when when LeBron in order to save LeBron for those key moments late in games, he's going to need to be able to dish it off to somebody and just

like kind of linger around the three point arc. So I do wonder if this is, Ingrams kind of time shine. God, they just don't have enough up top to do that, though. That's the other thing. Like, it's Ingram, and then it's a bunch of guys where you're like, well, what are we going to get on this night? Like, maybe we roll the dice with Beasley or Lance or whatever.

I'll run through a couple other preseason timelines, none of which are as interesting as the Lakers. I would just like to ask, if you guys watch any bucks preseason? No highlights, maybe. I'd be honest. But you have, though. I have. I have.

I'm pretty excited about this team. I'm pretty excited about the possibilities of this team. And I think that, you know, it kind of ties into what we were talking about. talking about before about what kind of environment do you want to create for a budding superstar? And buddy, well, pun intended. Quite. Nice. Yeah.

Janice was talking recently. There's been a bunch of Yonis stuff in the last couple of days. Kevin wrote something for our site about him. He's been talking about how like Bud's just like, I don't, I need you to shoot it. Like, it's part of the offense. And I don't want you to think about it. I don't want you to worry about it. I need you to be a three-point shooter.

And you need to at least be a threat from behind the arc. And he's like, that to me, to know that they are depending on my shooting is the challenge almost that I need to become a better shooter. You know, and I think everybody, I think he was obviously aware that like his shooting was the sort of Achilles heel in his game. But it's fascinating to watch them make this right decision to, and to try and sort of build around this idea of what's the optimal basketball environment? for this guy. What should we do with this guy? If we spread this floor and have him standing at the top of the key, like, what's possible here? And this is the exact opposite of what they're doing with towns in Minnesota. So it's not so much that I'm like, you can draw so many conclusions from watching Milwaukee versus Brooklyn and preseason, although they're quite obviously like

installing parts of Bud's offense and it looks pretty cool. As much as it's like, that's how you run someone's career and not how Minnesota is doing it. Yeah. I mean, the decisions they're making now, with Janice are essentially going to dictate whether or not he stays there long term. Yes. Like he still has however many years he has on his contract, I believe two or three or something. But these things add up. Like the moves you're making three years from now ultimately ripple into the future. I mean, it's the same thing with the Sam Hinky.

Like, yeah, a win to get one more second rounder isn't going to like do much for you in the present. But you build all those second rounders and eventually you get a first rounder or you do whatever with them. And it reminds me a lot to harken back to the peasant. Elgin's again, it's like bringing in Alvin Gentry for Anthony Davis. Like, yeah, people thought like, well, he can maybe shoot threes, but Alvin really got in there and was like, you're shooting every time you can.

Not only because of the gravity it creates on the court, but long term, we need you to be able to hit those shots. And you've seen him develop, like, and it's crazy to see him now simply because, like, before Alvin got there, he was picking and popping, he was rolling hard to the rim. He was more of a traditional big man. He was more Janus-esque, to be honest. And now he's basically, like, he's dribbling. Like, he's bringing it down the court.

Like, he looks more like Brandon Ingram in certain situations. So it's just, it's fascinating to watch because this decision with Bud is ultimately going to decide what Janus will be in the NBA. Absolutely. It's such a good foil to, especially in the East, to the Celtics and the Sixers, where more have a bunch of guys, you know, to have one team that's going to build around one guy and let him just go to work and build the entire, like you said, team around him. Like, that's going to be so much fun to watch. Everyone was also going to look so much better around him. Yeah. And like you said earlier when Yannis said that that inspired him or it made him realize that he had to shoot threes, Yonis loved Jason Kidd.

He was upset that he got fired. Can you imagine this relationship with Buddy's going to think he's got? I'm sure that there are guys who in Minnesota who are like, I love tips. Who? I don't know. Who? Well, I don't surprise. Derek Rose for paying him? Yeah.

He's got a contingent of Chicago guys there who are probably like, this is how it works. Yeah. You grind and you grind and you grind and you grind and if you repeat. repeat and repeat, it works. It eventually starts working. It doesn't work. That's why they didn't win in 2011. It doesn't work. If that's really what they think, they're all just in as much denial as he is. Yeah, but to Chris's point, you are kind of giving over your entire career in the hands of someone that you really don't have much of a decision over. Like, Yannis probably had input

over Bud, but like ultimately he's going to dictate a lot of his future. Yeah. Yonis kind of has to be beholden to whatever he thinks he sees for him. And it's really funny that we're doing this on the same day as Jimmy, because, honest, is completely like the opposite. I know. He's like, everything is amazing. I've never had a smoothie before. I love Jason Kit. He was so good for me. We'll wrap it up there. We'll be

back next Thursday. I just want to like remind you guys. We have Ringer NBA Paloosa happening on Tuesday. It's a full day of video programming that culminates with a watch along with Bill Simmons and some special guests on Tuesday for the Sixers Celtics game. So we have a ton

of stuff there. We have a ton of stuff in our NBA preview on the site. You should also be checking out the NBA show all week long with Gons. Chris Inverno, obviously sources say we'll be back next week with that. Group chat and many, many, many other great shows. So until next week, thank you for listening. Basketball is very good. Basketball is very good.