The Ringer NBA Show - Kevin Love's Extension, the Carmelo Trade 2.0, and the Lakers’ Meme Team | The Ringer NBA Show (Ep. 304)

Episode Date: July 24, 2018

The Ringer’s Chris Vernon and Kevin O’Connor react to Kevin Love signing a four-year extension with the Cleveland Cavaliers (0:10), discuss the ripple effects of the Carmelo Anthony trade (14:21), and debate the Los Angeles Lakers’ questionable offseason moves (31:40). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to The Ringer NBA show. I'm Chris Vernon. And joining me as he does every Tuesday from the Ringer.com is Kevin O'Connor, a.k.a. Kevin O'Connor, A.k.a. Kevin O'Conflict, A.k.a. Kevin O'Climber. Kevin. Verda, we got big news. We got big news, man.

Right as we are about to record, Adrian Worgianowski drops a Wojbomb reporting that Kevin Love is signing a 4. year, $120 million extension topping out his overall deal at five years, $145 million. So Kevin Love, though LeBron has left him, listen, I guess Cavalier's got to spend some money on somebody, and they spent it on Kevin Love, four years, $120 million for Kevin Love. Your immediate reaction is not sure. It's the best way to spend their money. That's for sure. I think as we saw, In the playoffs, Chris, we saw a little bit more of Minnesota Kevin Love running him off some screen actions, putting more of the offense through him. But like, it went away quickly because LeBron James is LeBron James and that's that. But now that LeBron's gone, maybe we will see a little bit more of this creative, playmaking, versatile Kevin Love that we saw back in Minnesota days like a modernized version of that player.

More post-ups, more usage, more creative actions on the perimeter. that's what I want to see. And if that's what Cleveland does with him, maybe it'll be worth it. However, it is a huge and risky commitment for a guy who turns 30 later this year and has had a handful of injuries that have either hampered him or in the past taking him out of larger chunks of the season. I think everyone agrees he is capable of much more than he showed in his time in Cleveland, that he's been underutilized.

He was. And it's very rare that we get to see this. Typically, if you move into the secondary or in his case, third role, where it's kind of like, you know, at one point you look up and Chris Bosch is standing in the corner for corner threes. Now, we saw him murder everybody when he was in Toronto. I mean, this guy is putting up, like you were saying, 25 and 12. And we never really saw Bosch go back to that, right? So now it is this opportunity. And does that guy still exist? The guy that's getting you a double double, every single night. I tend to think it is. And so I would imagine that Kevin Love will probably have a really big season. And I think we all know, like he was a role player.

And he is no longer a role player. He is clearly their centerpiece and their star going into next year. I wrote an article, I forget when it was, sometime during the playoffs, and it was like, well, here's some of the things

Minnesota does for Kevin Love. I mean, here's what Cleveland doesn't do for him. And it's as you said, he was effectively just a role player, right? Chris, I mean,

He was 12 shots a game for a guy who is an all-star these past two seasons and was previously just five years ago, with 26 and 12 guy. One of the better power forwards than the game, really the question moving forward for Cleveland will be, is that player somebody who leads to winning? In Minnesota, it didn't work. In Minnesota, they topped out as like a mid-30s win team with Kevin Love as their centerpiece. They went 40 and 42 in his final season. Is that what they are if Kevin Love was your best player? maybe, maybe not. Kevin Love in today's game,

maybe you can, instead of getting him six threes a game, it turns into eight threes a game. He's a very good three-point shooter who can be used off screens. Like, he's, people forget what he was used like in Minnesota with some of the actions they ran him through and the playmaking responsibility that he had. Maybe we see like a new or better modern version of him,

but I do wonder if there's a limit to his style because of his average at best defense. The fact is that I don't even have, think his post-ups are nearly as effective anymore. And then there's the durability. I'm not sure his at-room finishing numbers. I need to pull those up. I don't believe his at-rim finishing is even quite as strong as it perhaps may have been in the past.

Well, and the other difficult thing is it is always hard if your best guy is one that does not have the ball unless somebody throws it to him, right? I mean, we have seen this. There have been tons of teams that have had great power forwards that were limited when it came playoff time. Now, you could blame the whole roster around them. But whether it was Kevin Garnett and his time in Minnesota or Love's team, as we mentioned, they stunk, or it's the Paugasol, Memphis Grizzlies, or it was the Chris Bosch, Toronto,

Raptors, or you can go on and on. There's been a bunch of teams like that in the past where nowadays, if your best guy doesn't have the ball, you're really up against it. And so obviously, you know, it's going to be on Colin. Sexton to pass Kevin Love the ball. And yeah, I mean, you're going to be limited if Kevin Love is your best player on your team. But maybe, you know, within the next four years, they can find somebody better than Kevin Love to pair up with him. You're right.

And that's the interesting thing is like he at least allows you to maintain some semblance of having a competitive team. Because the Cleveland roster is not great. But there's a little bit of talent on there. And maybe Kevin Love, you know, in his role can help them on. Maybe Colin Sexton's better as expected. On the other side of it, Chris, is maybe now you have Kevin Love, locked up long term, or if he is a dominant 26 and 12 player again for you, suddenly, as soon as you're eligible to trade him, maybe teams are looking at that new looking Kevin Lovin,

like, huh, we'd give up some pretty nice assets for this player. So Cleveland has him secured long term, and if he impresses and stays healthy, he could suddenly become quite an appealing asset for teams in need of a scoring forward who can play make and at least play average level defense. Yeah, and I don't have any problem with them locking up that asset because you've got to have, you got to have something unless you're just going to be playing to lose and playing for the draft. And that's the way you're going to be able to get really good players on your team.

I mean, he's clearly their best guy. And so locking him in, it's going to be tradable. It is, even if it's a big contract. It doesn't go until he's 35, 36, 37, at least. And, you know, you say, well, of course it doesn't. but we're seeing guys getting deals that it will go to the point where they're much older. And I actually think his game is going to age well. If he can withstand, you know, as long as he can stay uninjured,

I think his game's going to age well because he is not the athlete. His game is not dependent upon athleticism. And you see at the rate that he can knock down threes now, I think it's totally possible, Kevin Love, maybe he's not $30 million player. But even that, 30 million. going to look better in a couple of years, honestly. When you're seeing some of these guys that inevitably are not going to perform up to their

40 and 50 million dollar contracts, I don't know. I think his game's going to age well. I do. And I think he's going to be able to uninjured, and that's a caveat. But I think you'll be able to be certainly a very useful piece for a team for the next three, four years. And that's what he signed up for. Yeah.

And as you said about the cap going up, the projections on this deal on, like, calculating this mid-podcast just to see. Final year of that deal will be around $32 million, a little bit over that, maybe $32.5 million in the fourth year of that contract, or rather the fifth if you're including the current year that he'll be on the last season of his contract. But look, I mean, $32 million could be a lot of money, Chris. No matter how much the cap goes up for a guy who's turning 30 this summer, that could be a potential albatross if it goes sour

where injuries become a problem where back injuries and knee injuries and all that manifests in a more extreme way than it already has. It could go really bad, but the upside is certainly there. Cleveland secures a all-star level talent. It's as simple as that. I mean, Kevin Love is an all-star,

and we're about to see, we're going to see a brand-new version of him that's just like the old one, but maybe with a little bit more of a martyr and sprinkle. I'm excited to find out what he put forms like I wonder how much he can sustain it over a full season. It's exciting for Cleveland despite it being a risk. The main thing for me, Chris, is that they retain an All-Star that they can decide to keep or trade. It's really as simple as that. They can go in either direction over the next

four years now. So you like the deal. I could never figure you out. I thought you didn't like the deal. Well, yeah, before we were recording in the news first dropped, my initial reaction was a little bit more on the negative side, but sometimes that's what happens. And then reason enters the picture and you realize, hey, if this guy kills it, if he's like dropping 25 points a game, right, rebound on the hell out of the ball and like he's averaging five assists because they're running the offense through him more, what does that mean for you? It means, A, you have a really, really good player on your team. And it means B, you can keep that really good player and continue competing. or C, you can deal that guy for a lot of assets.

And C is really the one that is the big one, Chris. Yeah, because you look at the rest of that roster, and it's all the... Yes. It's like either what they tried to do mid-season when they made that trade, or it's all LeBron guys, right? Tristan Thompson, J.R. Smith.

Yeah. Hell, they got Channing Fryback. They did not realize they don't have LeBron anymore. Yeah, man. I mean, like, there's not a lot of youth on that team. that's going to be part of their future. Like, I love Jedy Osmond. Then you get Colin Sexton, Larry Nance, Zizich, Jordan Clarkson.

We'll see if he bounces back after a horrific end to last season for him. There's a little bit of talent, but there's no centerpieces. So either Kevin Love will be that piece for you moving forward, even as he advances into his 30s, or he can turn into those players via trade. Which you know, again, when we're talking about it, it's not necessarily about, hey, signing up Kevin Love for this amount of money for this amount of time to play for you, but rather ensuring that you have that asset, because I think we both agree. Let's say within the next two or three years, there will be a team that thinks we might be

able to win a title if we make a deal for Kevin Love right now. Yeah. Right? He could flip things in a conference and especially in the East, right? if you added Kevin Love to one of these rosters, all of a sudden your team looks a little bit different. And so, I don't know, it's the asset. Is it likely that Kevin Love plays out the five years in Cleveland? No, it's not likely.

But is it likely you might be able to get good return by a team that thinks they have a shot at a title? For sure. Exactly. I look at what the Blake Gurfing deal did for the Clippers, right? They dumped an albatross contract, and they got back a pretty good 25, 26-year-old forward, and Tobias Harris, who finished off the best season of his career for the Clippers. Avery Bradley, who wasn't great, but he's still a really, really good defender who can shoot threes.

Then, of course, they also got a first round pick that ended up leading to Shea Gilges-Alexander, who they traded up one spot with the pick that they got for Blake. And they got a second round pick as well. That's kind of the model that I'm thinking of for the Cavaliers moving forward, is that Clippers type of model where, you know, you can trade Kevin Love as soon as you're eligible to before the trade deadline. you won't maybe you'll keep kevin love and you're happy but whether it's prior to the deadline or before the 2019 draft or even the 2020 drafts at some point you have the player secured and he can be a

centerpiece for you a guy to hopefully lure free agents to come to cleveland good luck or can be the guy that gets you a bundle of assets that help you set it up for a great bright future well and here's the top of my head i'm trying to think here obviously kawai's in the east right now Kevin Love might be one of the He's certainly one of the five to ten best players in that conference now. Everybody's gone, right? Janus is there, and then you take the Celtics and the Sixers.

Who else? I guess Brad Beal and Wall. I mean, but I think you could probably have an argument about that about Brad Beale and Wall. Would you rather have Kevin Love or those? I don't know. I'm saying it's at least an argument to me.

Yeah, I mean, he's definitely one of the better players. I mean, wherever we're going to rank him. I mean, he'd rank him, fifth, tenth, whatever. He's one of the better players in the conference, regardless of where you're going to slot him. For sure. And especially even now, I mean, I'm looking up and down at hell.

Dennis Schrooter was 25th in the league in scoring. I was just going down the scoring list, just as a reference point to try to find out when I got to Eastern Conference players. And I mean, on that list, if we're just talking scoring, Janice, Kyrie, Victor Oladipo, DeRosan's gone. M. B. Beal. Kemba Walker.

Blake. I'd take love ahead of Kemba. Okay. Well, I mean, now I'm down to Blake. I'd take love ahead of Blake, too. Chris Middleton, Dennis Schrooter. I mean, hell, even Tobias Harris is gone. Nobody left in the conference, for God's sakes.

Aaron Gordon and Kevin Love averaged the exact same amount, 17.6 points. I think Aaron Gordon can be better, but right now, Kevin Love, like projecting Minnesota Kevin Love, which we'll see. I mean, we don't know for sure. I mean, that player might not exist over 80 games anymore. But check this out. The next Eastern Conference name you get to is JJ Redick. So that should tell you.

Ring her podcast or JJ Redick. That's right. But I mean, that should tell you where you kind of are in the Eastern Conference. And Kevin Love is clearly one of the best players in that conference for sure. I mean, as he kind of should be. But he just hasn't been because of his role. And I'm excited to find out moving forward how he develops, Chris. It'll be fun.

I think they have any shot at the playoffs? I guess anybody in the East does. Yeah, why not? Yeah, right. Why not? All right, let's get to some of the other stories. Carmelo Anthony, and that trade happened since we last spoke, Kevin. I know you have already written about Dennis Schroeder.

Just to recap, Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City traded Carmelo Anthony to Atlanta Hawks. The Houston Rockets are the front runners, and it now has been reported that he is going to, sign there. Along with Anthony in his $27.9 million expiring contract, the Thunder sent a 222 protected first round pick to the Hawks for Dennis Schrooter and Mike Muscala. The 22 first rounder is protected one through 14 and becomes two second rounders, if not conveyed in the first year. And then it got a little weird. The Thunder then sent Muscala to the 76ers for Timothy Lulahou Cabrero and Philadelphia sent Justin Anderson to Atlanta.

But anyway, the major pieces are Carmelo Anthony getting moved, Dennis Schrooter ending up on the Oklahoma City Thunder and then the other players were kind of moved around. What do you make of it? I like the Schroeder edition for Oklahoma City, Chris. I realize I feel like I'm all alone in this. You and I might have discussed Truder before. He is somebody who he is like the face of the average point guard in the NBA. Like, I mean, he gets buckets, but he's inefficient.

But that was within his role in Atlanta. And I'm curious to see how he evolves in Oklahoma City because Truder has passing talent. He is a good passer when he wants to be. And I think he's a better decision maker than he may have appeared to be in Atlanta as well. But the fact is that he was enabled and pushed and empowered to be a go-to-scoring, present, scoring his, as you mentioned earlier, 19 points per game and very inefficient as well. Maybe in Oklahoma City,

things are a little bit different playing alongside Russell Westbrook where he could be used as a secondary playmaker on a team that's relied on the likes of Norris Cole and Raymond Felton over the past couple years. And DJ Augustine, like the big, big hit backup point guards, except not really. Dennis Schroeder is the best one out of all of them, by far. and maybe, just maybe, Chris, maybe.

There's a chance, a little bit of a chance. I'm very doubtful, but there's a chance that Schroeder is good enough for Russell Westbrook to play more off ball, to accept playing off ball and screening and cutting and spot up shooting, doing all these things that are going to improve his offensive efficiency. Maybe Schroeder is good enough. That's my hope. Wow. Do you take an edible before we did this podcast? You know, judging from judging.

Judging from the responses on Twitter to the article that went up yesterday on The Ringer about this topic, it seems everybody else thinks that too. Dude, I've written about this like five times since I was hired in August 2016. And this is the time where it's like now they actually have a guy who can create. It might not work. But if you're saying it's not going to work, it's because of Russell Westbrook, not because of Schroeder or Billy Dunman. That's my stance. There's always been, you know, Mother Teresa, for goodness sakes. When you brought up Reggie Jackson, I wanted to respond to you.

This guy, he is just like Reggie Jackson with the terrible attitude. Look, that was a bad tweet. I mean, can Dennis sure to be the new Reggie Jackson? I didn't mean the new Reggie Jackson in the sense that he's going to derail this situation and butt heads with Russell Westbrook. I mean an actual competent playmaker who's going to be good enough to allow Russ to play a little bit more off ball. I'll tell you this.

Hey, no, you know what? I didn't think insane, and this is why. I'm going to defend you a little bit on this, all right? You know how sometimes you were witness to something that ends up giving you a much higher opinion than you should have about a guy? And that was exactly the case with Reggie Jackson and myself. Years ago, the Grizzlies played the Oklahoma City Thunder in a great playoff series. Reggie Jackson absolutely flipped that series and won them a playoff game. And now, obviously, there were more talented players on that team, but he had 30-something, and I don't even know if the winner of the game had 90 points.

I mean, he almost scored half their frigging point. He was unstoppable. And so it's never gotten out of my head. I saw him in literally the highest stakes you can have, which is it's a live or die situation when you're playing in a tight playoff series. And in one of those games, he flipped. He flipped the game and he flipped the series. being able to come off the bench. And if you told me that there was a night where Dennis Schroeder dropped 27 in a playoff game,

that's not out of the realm of possibility. Not at all. At all, right? And so that's where when, as soon as you said that, that's what my mind went to. Now, obviously, he has never been the player in Detroit that he was that last time around at Oklahoma City. But I'm telling you, I mean, I could go look it up. I watched the kid drop 30-something and it was like, he was the best.

player on the floor that night. No way around it in a playoff game. And so I always have a, I always have a higher opinion of guys that do it when it matters most anyway. And he did. And so if Schroeder, you know, you get into a big playoff series and that kid for one night,

even if it's just one game like it was with Reggie Jackson. It wasn't the whole series. But even if it's for one night, he goes for 27. You may end up being in the West Finals or you may be able to play for a title because of it. It's funny because I pulled up the box. scores to that series. It was the 2014

playoffs over the first three games Rudy Jackson was horrible. He was three for 19, 15 total points over games one through three. And then game four, he went off 32 points on 11 of 16 and he helped Oklahoma City win a game, 92 to 89. It was 34 points,

34? How many did they score? 92. So 32 out of their 92 points. And it was a three point win for Oklahoma City. They were down 2-1 in the series and that started helped swing it the other way for them. Yeah, because if if you go up 3-1, they're dead to right. Kevin Durant in that game, only 5 for 21. Russell Westbrook, typical, only 6 of 24.

Sorry. That was an unnecessary shot. Hey, no, but let me just go ahead and make your point a little more for you. That's what I mean. Like, Russell is so much better than 6th of 24. He is, but again, you are going to run into the team like they once did, that they just say, our only thing that we care to accomplish tonight, we are going to make Russell Westbrook's life hail. we are going to make Kevin Durant's life hell.

And at that moment, somebody's got to step up. And so, yeah, the name has changed from Durant to George. But you better believe that somebody, by the time it gets to that level of competition, there's going to be somebody that says we're going to make George and Westbrook's life hell. And that's where Schrooter can come in. Because you know, listen, you ain't getting a 20-something point night out of Roberson or Stephen Adams or any of those other guys. But you might out of Schroeder. Yeah, you could. I mean, Schroeder has had some huge games. I mean, like, he is an inefficient score, right? Statistically, he's very inefficient. But he's also had some high volume, high efficiency scoring games last season, too. His best game in the year was 41 points on 16 of 28 in a win for Atlanta against the Utah Jazz. He's had really, really impressive performances. And Rudy Gober was playing in that game, by the way, as well, just for the record. Yeah, he has upside to drop 25.

plus points for you that can help swing a game. And we'll see if that manifests for him in the playoffs. I think he's capable. Trudeau's a guy that I underrated a little bit when we talked about him during the season. I underrated him a little bit. And I think with him, I'm kind of reminded of the Victor Olipo conversation where last year, last year when that trade happened for Paul George, Victor Olivo, who I had ranked first in 2013.

I loved him as a prospect. I thought he had star potential after four seasons, three with Orlando, one with Oklahoma City. kind of gave up on him. I thought that he plateaued, and that's all there was to his game. And that was a mistake. When in actuality, he changed his body, changed his game, and reached a mood level with the Indiana Pacers.

And that's not going to happen with Schroeder and OKC because Russell Westbrook is the guy there. Paul George is the guy there. There's players that will and should have the ball ahead of him. However, I do think some of the knocks on him like decision making, poor defense, and efficiency. Those are things that were previously strengths in the evaluation prior to the draft. So maybe playing on one of the better defenses in basketball helps him turn into an effective defender. He showed signs of that earlier in his career. And maybe he's enabled to be more of a playmaker first instead of a passer first,

which was exactly the guy he was when he first entered the league. So maybe there's more to him. I really like this. I like the offseason that Oklahoma City has had. I think they have clearly made their team better than they were last year. You and I had already opined about Carmelo on Houston, and it is one of those hypotheticals. Well, if he would do this and he would do this, we know the player he's been his whole life. But if he would do this and if he would do this, like there is, like on some of these things,

when players are added to teams, we don't have to like say, if everything's different than it's always been, then it's going to, it could work out great. but it does feel like you have to do that with the Carmelo thing. Obviously, they lost some Kikogs in Areza and Bomb Mute. They lost some good players. The Capella thing is still kind of hanging out there. I was talking to Bobby Marks from ESPN not long ago. Bobby.

He said he would be worried if he was Houston and Capella just came back and took the qualifying offer. Oh, no kidding. I agree. Yeah, he thinks that's a real fear right now. that if the money's not there, that he'll just sign the qualifying offer and play out the year and then you're going to lose him, right?

Because now you've got hurt feelings. Yeah, I think with Capella, that's scary. It certainly is scary. I mean, he could easily just become unrestricted next summer. I mean, like, instead of taking a low ball offer, just decide, you know what, screw it. I'm going to pay it a little bit less now and then make up for it next summer

when I'm still one of the more impressive centers on the free agent market and I'm still young and I'm a little bit better entering this season. it is the ultimate risk to take a one-year deal like that, right? It is the ultimate risk because no matter what you're getting paid, you're getting paid life-changing money that's going to change your family and your grandkids forever. If you take a deal now in the eight-digit range over four years, that is life-changing money. However, I can understand taking that risk, especially if you feel like you're getting low-balled

and maybe you're a little bit offended too. It's going to be super fascinating. Isn't it Kevin with so many guys who have said, I'll just do it next off? season that we're going to look back and I you know who knows who's going to be the odd man out in all of this but there was certainly a lot of guys that I thought to myself hey you know what maybe you uh instead of taking your one year deal or whatever you might want to go ahead and lock it in because now you have a lot of guys that are planning on hey let's just do it next off season I mean when you're even talking about like last time we did a show we were talking about Jimmy Butler

in the last week, maybe it's Capella, who knows, or maybe they lock him in, but like Tobias Harris, right? Tobias Harris. He just turned down reportedly, yes. And it's like, all right, there's going to be a whole lot of guys jumping back into the mix next off season. And somebody is going to be the Nerlands Noel, for sure. Or the Isaiah Thomas, for that matter.

And Isaiah Thomas, you know, it's $100 million probably, difference, possibly more. And so it's a big risk, as you said. And there's a lot of guys that are deciding to do it next year. Oh, anyway, the Rocket. Do you think there's any chance that are better than they were last year? Given the way to say, let's say they bring back Capella and they sign up Carmelo. No.

I think Carmelo Anthony, a lot of people are saying they shouldn't add mellow. Like, there was something yesterday about their Vegas odds go down if they had Carmelo Anthony. That's ridiculous. That's ridiculous. Carmelo Anthony, you know, for all his faults and how horrific he was last year in Oklahoma City, he at least provides them a little bit more upside. I mean, just because he was horrific last year, doesn't mean he will be this year. There's ability there.

It doesn't mean he'll get there, but at least gives him a chance of having a guy who can go off, just like we talked about Schrooter. At least Toronto got Kaua Lentered to sign up, and there was the photo op over the weekend. While all has been out there, he didn't want to play there, and who knows if he'll even show up. There he was with Maasai over the weekend in an awkward pitcher. Then you have Rachel Nichols yesterday on the jump. interview David Robinson, and David Robinson was talking basically about how strange the whole situation was and said that several times he reached out and he never heard back. So Quil Leonard didn't even call, he wouldn't even call on David Robinson back on the whole deal.

So at this point, it's water under the bridge. He is in Toronto and we'll assume he'll be there for training camp and he'll be able to play next year. And who knows what that year's going to go like and whether or not, you know, he's going to be in the George situation, which everybody who is deciding it's going to be a one-year rental or whatever else, he's already left a boatload of money on the table, Kev, because he could have signed the Supermax. And now you're going to leave 50 more million, you know, because that's the opportunity they'll have,

is to offer him that in Toronto. So who knows whether it's going to be short-term or long-term. But clearly, they're in the mix. It's Boston, Philly, and Toronto, right? Yeah, I love that. Do we talk about this last Tuesday? I forget when the deal happened. No, we didn't.

We didn't. This happened later in the week. I'm excited about that for Toronto. I think even just one year of Kauai and Leonard could be better than the two years plus one with the player option of Demarta Rosen. This increases your chances of winning the NBA finals in the 2018-19 season. It's really as simple as that. And if you, with a whole country behind you and improved culture in the locker room, and maybe you're more happy with the team doctors and strength and conditioning coaches and all that stuff up and down the line,

maybe you convince Kauai to stay. And if you don't, well, oh well, you got one year with one of the best players in basketball the last time we saw him and you increase your odds of winning the finals. And if not, guess what, you can pull the plug just like you've wanted to for a couple of years now. Do you think Kauai Leonard is the best player in the Eastern Conference? I mean, I don't know what player he is. I don't know who he is anymore. Who is Kauai?

Not to get all philosophical, but like who is Kauai? Is it the same guy? And we're getting the same Kauai Leonard from the last time we saw him healthy. If you got two seasons ago, Kauai, then no doubt. Like, it's not even close. You'd rather have him than Yonis. It's not even close. Like, it's not even, it's like, it's like not even a conversation.

If that's the Kauai Leonard, that comes back. Slow down on the not even a conversation. Okay. Come on. Okay, let me preface. Yonis average 27 points a game that is a great defender. Let me preface what I'm about to say here. I love Yannis.

I've loved him since the draft. I love him now as a player. He's maybe my favorite player in the league. to watch. But I think he's become a little bit overrated. What? And the reason why I'm saying that is because people talk like he's like this great playmaker, like Ben Simmons-esque, it's like, no, he's not. He's kind of topped out as an above-average playmaker. His shot became problematic for him in the playoffs and Boston just

sagged off with Chemiojolay. He needs to improve his jump shot. And until he does that, he will have a limitation in the playoffs that will hold him back from reaching his elite, elite, elite, Hall of Fame level potential. Yanis is fantastic, but Kauai, last time we saw him, was also, as you said, Chris, one of the best defenders in basketball, but he was also a significantly better offensive player than Yonis and he's 10th and Akumpo. Yeah, he just keeps getting better and he's 23, Kevin.

I know, I know. Yeah, I know. That's what I mean. I mean, like the Janus right now, like the last Janus we saw, projecting ahead with an improved jump shot, we're talking about a guy that could dominate the league for years to come. But I thought the question was talking about the past version of Kauai against the last Yonis we saw. The last Yonis we saw had games of 31 and 27 against Boston in that series.

Yeah, then he also had like a 7 of 17 in some average efficiency games as well. I mean, he's, he is growing. Yonis moving forward can be the best player in basketball. No doubt about it. I'm not arguing that. But you would admit that is the argument. If Kauai Leonard, I guess if you want to throw who, Kyrie? Kyrie's not.

Embed, Embeded. No, I think it's Janice. But it depends. I'm like, again, it's like with Kawhi, we don't know what version of Kawhi we're going to get. If it's the last version, if it's the 2016-17 version of Kawhi Leonard, they have the best player in the Eastern Conference unless Yiannais-Sense-in-A-Cupo becomes a, at least a average or slightly above-average three-point shooter than perhaps the bucks do. All right. Kevin O. Polinka, since the last time around. when we discussed all these goofy Laker moves.

You loved all the Laker moves. Defend Michael Beasley signing. Kevin O'Palinka. Why? Why Kevin O'Polinka? Because the last time we argued about it, you thought all those moves were just fine. You were just a Lakers hater.

You said all those moves are just fine. They're all one-year deal, man. I don't give a shit what they say about me on Reddit. I don't care. I don't care. Go ahead. Listen, if you attain a LeBron James, And then make these moves.

Yeah, because it's about next year. It's about the long term, Chris. We still forget about this already. I know. Yeah, let's just waste a year of LeBron's prime. That's smart. If I was building a team around LeBron James, this is literally the opposite of what I would do,

is adding a bunch of guys that can't shoot threes. Beasley dropped 30 plus points four times last season. He's a guy who can get it. He's a guy. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. So did Trey Bird. I mean, for goodness sakes, Kevin.

I wonder who the worst players are in the NBA that's dropped 30 points last season. I'm going to look this up. I don't know, but... Probably Michael Beasley, right? Michael Beasley. All right, KCP shoots 35% for a career from three. Michael Beasley shoot 35%.

It's all one year deals. One year. One year. DeRondon, 31%. One year deal. Lance Stevenson 30%. One year deal. Yeah, I'm aware.

Just go on. get Wayne Ellington and whoever. Just guys just stand around and banged threes down. Tim Hardaway scored 30 plus points five times. T.J. Warren, who I like five times. Michael Beasley, four times. Dwight Howard scored 30 points or more four times. This whole justifying making goofy moves by saying it doesn't matter anyway.

I'm not saying it doesn't matter because it does matter because they're all one-year deals. They're all one-year deals, Chris. So what? It does matter. How about sign players that would fit better? Who? Do me some options. Who? There was all kinds of guys that were free agents this past year. Yeah, and were they going to take one-year deals?

I don't know. Shit, Ray John Rondo, if you pay them $9 million, they would. Rajan Rondo was not horrible last year for the New Orleans Pelicans. I didn't say he was horrible. I know, but that's what I mean? So, like, what's the problem with it? It's about how they fit with LeBron? Yeah, we'll find out. How does Ray John Rondo fit with LeBron James?

It's like we just talked about it with Kauai and Janus. Yonis, if he improves his three-point jumper. Dennis Schroeder, if he adapts and plays one a playmaking role instead of a scoring role if Russell Westbrook accepts an off ball roll. You're Kevin O. If. If. If. If. If. If. You know. It's always if. No. How about just something I know is going to happen. Hey, this is a good fit? Yeah. What do you know it's going to happen? That they're all going to become free Asians next summer and they're going to have a ton of cap space to make bigger moves that set them up for a brand of future. Yeah, maybe they could get Paul George.

Well, Kauai Leonard resigns in Toronto that it's going to be two off seasons in a row. Unbelievable. Right? I mean, I seriously think they could sign anybody in L.A. and you would like it. I know you have to live there. No, it's not true. I hope they had Mario Chalmers tomorrow

so you can be like, oh, maybe they can rekindle what they had in Miami. No, if they sign these guys a multi-year deals, I'd be bashing them, but they didn't because they're one-year deals, Chris. They retain max cap space for next summer. You go out and you sign the Wayne Ellington's and the James N.

is and like these kind of role player guys staying around and when LeBron inevitably controls the ball he's going to control the ball. We'll see. I mean, of course he's going to control the ball, but there's been the talk about him wanting to play a little bit more of an off ball roll. We'll see if that happens. And if it does happen, it doesn't

mean it'll work. It doesn't. You're right. These guys are a weird fit. I'm not saying like, oh my God, a roster with Javille McGee, Michael Beasley, LeBron James, Rajan Rano, Contavius, Caldwell, Pope. How great is this? I'm not saying that. When people can joke that they think this team is being put together for LeBron's reality series,

and that's not that outlandish? I think this is secretly Space Jam, too. It's all going to be recorded. It's the meme squad instead of the Tune Squad. It should have brought Dwight Howard back then. Let's call it the meme team. I think that's what people have been calling it on Twitter. The meme team.

It really is. It really is the meme. LeBron and the meme team. How can you not be excited for this from that perspective? excited. How can you not be excited for that, Chris? The meme team. Dude, Rondo, Beasley, Stevenson, McGee. Even my guy, Mo Wagner could be a meme with his emotions on the court. If you were going to compile like literally the goofiest group of guys you could, you literally just named them. Exactly. It's going to be fun. And guess what? They're all on one year deals and the Lakers can retain a max slot for the 2019 summer when a a plethora of free Asians like Kyle Leonard, Clay Thompson, Kevin Durant, Jimmy Butler, and so on and so forth.

I know you say that any Boston feeling has gone completely dormant from you. But here's my Kevin O. Conspiracy Theory. What? Deep down you know that this is going to be a debacle, a wasted year with LeBron. Oh my gosh. And that somewhere

in the depths of your heart, you're like, thank God. They got LeBron, but they're still not going to do anything. They've still got LeBron and they ain't going to do nothing with him. No. Great move. Because I'm looking at the big picture, Chris. And the big picture is what we're harping on.

We're arguing in circles here that it's about retaining flexibility moving forward, which will allow you to sign a marquee free agent if the opportunity is available. And you allow that opportunity to be available by signing these one-year deals. And some of these guys are going to be gone. Some of them could perhaps be keepers. Maybe you decide you want to keep Rondo moving. forward. Maybe you decide Beasley within a role playing alongside LeBron

James provides you that upside, that variance to come off the bench and drop 25. Or maybe you're not okay with that. And maybe you just let those guys walk. We'll find out over the season. All right. Well, for God's sakes, they owe it to all of us to bring back Swaggy P at least at this point. Oh, they've got to

bring back Swaggy P. If they don't bring back Nick Young, the soft season is a failure for the Los Angeles Lakers. All right. Last thing, I do want to mention an homage from both us who are huge dirt fans. After he signed his deal yesterday, he will play the most seasons with one team that anyone has ever played with.

And just for a reference point with him playing his 21st season with one team, that now, as of last week, once the Kauai thing happened, Steph Curry has been with his team. He is the only remaining 2009 drafted players still with his team. So players just simply do not stay with their teams anymore. saw a tweet from Bobby Corolla yesterday, and it said, in reference to this, to break that record, Manu Genoblee would have to play until he is 46 with the San Antonio Spurs. Think about this. Steph Curry would have to stay a warrior until 2030, 31.

Luca Donchich would have to play in Dallas until 2038. Man. I mean, when you think about it in those terms, my God, I contend we will never see this again, ever. We will never see a player play for one franchise for 21 years. Hell, we can't see a guy play for a franchise for 10 anymore, it doesn't seem. Now that Collison's gone. We'll see it someday.

It was Collison and Haslam. Well, think about this. Once you get past Collison and Haslam, you know who the next three are? Russell Westbrook, Markersoll, Mike Conley. Those are the three with their teams, longest tenured. it's just impossible nowadays. It'll happen someday. Someday.

No way. It will never happen again. First of all, you got to play 21 years. Yeah. That really puts things into perspective. That's a great tweet by Bobby. Yeah. Right?

I mean, it feels like Steph's been with Golden State forever because he has been. He was drafted in 2009. Yeah. What year did I say on him? 2000. 30, 31. That's remarkable. 20, 31.

That is remarkable. Just a mere thought of Luca Donchich, you know, his final season with the Dallas Mavericks. It's the 2038-39 season. Boy, it'll be great if basketball is still existing and thriving in 2038-39. 20-38-39. Incredible. Kevin, it is always a pleasure.

I will talk to you next week. Looking forward to it, Chris. Thanks to everybody for listening to another edition of the Ringer NBA show. If you dig what you're here and go subscribe. Give us a rating and review on iTunes. We will talk to you next week.