The Ringer NBA Show - Lakers vs. Sixers Recap, Another Knicks Feud, Plus: Line ’Em Up—a Jon Tjarks Joint! | Group Chat

Episode Date: March 4, 2020

Our very own Chris Ryan recaps what he saw last night at the Lakers-Sixers game (1:45). Spike Lee addresses his feud with the Knicks and the infamous James Dolan (19:15). Plus: Line ’Em Up—a Jonathan Tjarks Joint, a new segment where Tjarks highlights the most pressing story lines in the league (28:30).  Host: Justin Verrier  Guests: Chris Ryan and Jonathan Tjarks Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up, guys, it's Kelly, and welcome to the Ringer Podcast Network. Recently, on the Winging It podcast, Vince Carter and Annie Finberg sat down with NBA all-star Kyle Lowry and recording artist for Timmy. This week, 2017, first overall pick Markell Fultz joins the show to talk about living up to expectations and working his way back from injury in the NBA. Make sure to check out Winging It on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Basketball is very good. The Raptors are the best team in the East. Jackson actually saved the Knicks. Mark L. Fultz will be an all-star next year.

Basketball is very good. Hello and welcome to the Ringer NBA show. This is the group chat. I am Justin Verrier. Joining me in the studio, my friend and yours, Chris Ryan. What's up, guys? And joining me on the phone back from his staycation with the mismatch. It's Jonathan Charks.

What's up, buddy? It's good to be back, y'all. Yeah, it's good to have you back, man. How was your little run there with Chris Vernon? Do you treat you well? Are you okay? I survived. I mean, you guys aren't Verno, but it'll have to prove for now.

Now that I'm back in the minor league, so I'll have to... It's true. Yeah. Don't worry about what you say here. No one's going to break it out on Twitter or anything like that. We're just cruising, man. Well, you know. Low stakes.

So in honor of Sharks's return here, we're going to do a little segment with him later in the podcast where he breaks down some lineup changes going on around the NBA. We're going to talk a little bit about the drama at Madison Square Garden, because why not? But first, let's start with the Lakers and the Sixers, Chris. They played last night. Yeah, and you were there. I was there. Reporting live from the scene.

I was there. What's the big takeaway from last night's game? I was there as a civilian, though. You know what I mean? So that allowed me to give one faint fist pump in the first quarter when the Sixers went up seven. You're a man of the people. I did not know that the Lakers, specifically Anthony Davis, would take being down seven

as a deep personal insult and set forth to... Silver Surfer, the Sixers, into oblivion for the next three quarters. The second quarter performance I saw from Davis, when he came back in, I think it was like, I don't know, like, I know when he scored was like around eight minutes left. So that 10 minute stretch is probably the best piece of individual basketball I've ever seen live in person in my life. Wow. Yeah.

I feel like this happens a lot when you come back from going to see basketball games, especially Anthony Davis. I think you did this last year when you saw him. Do you remember this? Yeah. And you're like, you're born again. Yeah. The wonders of basketball you have experienced life.

Well, because you realize his proportions and you realize, like, you know, I mean, we can go through his second quarter. So essentially what happened was, like, the Sixers were up seven at the end of the first quarter. I don't think the Lakers really knew what to do with their small ball lineup with Mike Scott playing center. And they were getting, they had some hot shooting from Glenn Robinson the third. Basically the new rockets, the Sixers lineup. But they looked pretty good and they looked really feisty. and then when Anthony Davis came back into the game, it was like he just lit Al Horford on fire.

And here's what he did after he checked back in. Put back dunk, pretty like a real hammer two. A corner three in Al Horford's face. A two-handed Aleoup flush out from a Rondo assist. A behind the back crossover dribble in traffic leading to a layup. A top of the arc three. A pump fake beyond the arc leading to an uncontested and actually terrifying dunk.

then a steal off of the Sixers point guard, I think it was Netto, leading to a coast-to-coast dunk, also played lockdown defense and, like, cheat up the crowd into a state of absolute pandemonium. Mm-hmm. Yeah, he's pretty good. Eight minutes. I know.

Eight minutes. Yeah. Just to set the scene for the whole game, the Lakers won this 120 to 107. No Ben Simmons, no Jewel and Bede, no Josh Richardson. Jake Milton didn't even show out. His coming out party lasted one game at the Staple Center. He wouldn't.

He had the jump flu. He didn't do. One of the jokes, it went to his head. But Charks, you wrote about this earlier in the season. You've been kind of keeping track of Davis this season two. Just about the changes in his game. Was this kind of a prime example of the type of player he's becoming before our eyes? Well, that's the thing is I really want to see Davis become the main guy.

I still feel like there's too much of the time where LeBrona has the ball in his hands. Dave is just kind of catching lobs and playing off the ball. But it feels like the ceiling for this team is if Anthony Davis is their best player. If he's the guy creating offense, creating shots for others. I mean, he's what, 26, LeBron's 35? At some point, I feel like the torch has to be passed. Yeah, I think that's LeBron's, that's always been his point of view, right? I think he was pretty active in recruiting guys this summer.

He told Kawhi pretty much the same thing I think he told AD, which is like, it's your team now. You're going to go out and do it. He was pretty effusive about AD last night, and this is LeBron speaking. This is a quote from ESPN's Dave McMinimimim, It's everything I expected him more. He's talking about the trade for Anthony Davis over the summer.

Obviously, that's why I wanted him here, which is great. When you get a generational talent like that and you've got an opportunity to get him, just try to do whatever you can to get him. He's been very active in trying to prop up Anthony Davis. And it feels like it's starting to work. Is that what it kind of seemed like? Well, I'll just say this, and we were chatting a little bit about this before the pod. This is maybe the most together LeBron team.

I think I've seen since peak heat, since the winning streak heat, since, and that second year when they won the title. Just in terms of like the entire team seems to get along and really like work together. And all roles are making sense. Like even Kuzma, who I think is basically just hanging on to a rotation spot at this point,

on certain nights at least, I think that they're like they go with different things with different matchups. But last night didn't play a ton. you look at the bench wall whoever is out there and they are completely engaged and they've got guys like Dudley and Quinn Cook

and even Dwight who has decided to become cheerleader and chief who are up on their feet the entire game pumping up the crowd and pumping up their teammates when LeBron hit this deep three from practically the logo

against the Sixers last night I think it was Dudley Howard or Javale and Howard did this whole thing where they ran out onto the floor after the break and play and pointed at the spot where LeBron had shot from

and were like doing this whole Sherlock Holmes like I can't believe it is this where it happened like thing and it was like I know that that kind of stuff is just like theater but there is a camaraderie to this team that I think is like observable

and there is a hierarchy to the team that is completely making sense we can talk about whether or not LeBron should be more deferential to Anthony Davis but everybody else on this team seems to know exactly what they are supposed to do and exactly whose team it is.

It reminds me a lot about the teams that LeBron had in his first run with Cleveland. There was like a momentum around LeBron as this kind of perfect teammate. The image that I remember is just LeBron taking the fake photos of his teammates as they were all posing on the sidelines. They did the whole Bucks wrestling thing,

pregame thing before the Bucks did. It was just everyone got along, everyone fell in line. I do wonder if your point about hierarchy is part of it. Like the entire league split off into big twos. And while I think a team like the clippers may be more talented, it just feels like the Lakers all work.

It's just like everyone, LeBron and AD is just as devastating one too, and then everyone fills in around it. And the reason why perhaps Kuzma doesn't fit that is, as we saw last night, he just wasn't drilling kickout three-point opportunities, which is what he really needs for. They need role players.

They don't need guys like Kuzma, who's probably more of like an energy score. I was calling him last night tomorrow. Crawford because he's tall, Jamal Crawford. Charks, what are you seeing from the Lakers these days? Well, you know what's funny you're talking about those old Cleveland teams, and there's something else that's similar about them too, is they fall apart when LeBron's not on the floor.

Yes. So, like, for the year, they're minus one. And that's what I'm talking about with Davis is the number that concerns me is Davis is only averaging 3.2 assists per game. So when LeBron's not on the floor, Davis is not creating shots for his teammates, really. Yeah. He's either going one-on-one or catching lobs.

And that's the whole on this team. That's why I're talking to Dion Waiters right now is because they don't have a backup point guard. Right, right. They need a guard who can create shots for other people because Rondo can't do it anymore. Yeah, I mean... And that to me is the big issue.

Yeah, a guy like Reggie Jackson, we'll see how much he plays a factor in the playoffs just because of the rotations. And he's playing a lot with Lou Williams, it seems like. So maybe he will. But he would have been a good addition for this team just because they need more ball handlers. What?

Do you agree? Oh yeah, I was shocked when to the Clippers. That said a lot to me right there. Like, his role on the Lakers would be playing like 25 minutes a night for the Lakers. Yeah, that was one of the classic, like, unknown friendships in the league that only gets brought up when a transaction happens. It's like, Reggie Jackson and was in Paul George's wedding. You didn't know about that? Yeah, right.

They like going to fishing together. It's like Alex Caruso is going to play for the heat because he and Jimmy Butler are just playing dominoes all summer. I will say it was kind of interesting to watch Rondo last night because he took like five threes. Because he sucks. Well, he made a few of them. But also, I was like, you're shooting to keep your rotations spot together. You know what I mean? Like, you're like, I'm not going to do.

Like, if my job is essentially to set up Anthony Davis, and I have to say, like, Rondo can still throw a really nice entry pass and really keep the ball moving. And can get after it defensively sometimes. I felt like he was like, I will take the three. I'm not too proud to, like, shoot this ball that might not make it to the rim. or at least it looks like that in mid-flight. But, like, you know, if Dion Waiters or who is the other person that they're kind of looking at.

J.R. Smith, baby. And J.R. Smith are out there. Those guys are not going to be afraid to shoot it. And while I think that they want, like, a backup ball handler, you know, and Caruso didn't play last night, I thought it was interesting to see how aggressive Rondo was being. Yeah, I mean, those shots are open for him. He's definitely going to have to make them in order to stay on the floor because Caruso is getting better at that. I think that's why you've seen, especially,

the push from online for him to close a lot of games along with LeBron because he does fill that role for them. Sharks, one thing you kind of always hit on about Davis was his ball handling. He's definitely kind of evolved as the years have gone on. Obviously, the story about him being a point guard when he was in high school has been played a million times by this point. But last night, you could definitely see that. He's been working on it.

I've said this before, but in New Orleans, he would always do ball handling drills with the guards. And last night, was it more Al Horford not being able to keep up with him? Or was Davis just on another level being able to get around guys just driving downhill, basically? Yeah, Davis against whatever is left in Philadelphia wasn't much. He's always struggled against Joel Embed and just Horford back there. We can talk about that. Horford's, what, a 34-year-old small ball setter on a maximum contract?

Hmm. Hmm. It's kind of a concern. It's a little bit of a concern. It's funny. To be fair, I don't know if Bill Russell could have stopped Anthony Davis last night. You know what I mean? Like, that was one of those like you just try to mitigate the damage nights. But I think it is worth noting that Horford was signed specifically to be the other team Starstopper,

or at least the big ones, you know what I mean? To get after it with Yonis to, I mean, I don't know if they had an eye on him stopping AD in the finals. Right. But it was very. It was very clarifying. I think that Horford has been playing hurt for a while. I know that there probably is going to be an increasingly precipitous drop-off in his physical, his physicality as he gets older and older, and that contract is going to start looking worse and worse.

But he was having his leg worked on on the bench last night. There have been rumors that he's been a little bit banged up all year. I don't know. I mean, I blame Horford, but it's like he was really the last line of defense back there. He looks like a $100 million backup center at this point. And like the six years, Chris is nodding his head. Well, no, shaking his head. Last night was clarifying, man.

Last night was like, okay. I mean, it's like what? First of all, no Richardson, no Simmons, no Embed. So it's like, what are we really talking about? Sure. And if you want my silver lining playbook, it was a good experience for guys like Birx and Robinson because the Sixers will need them to feel confident in their shot

and in their playmaking in the playoffs. Like, they don't want them to be like, oh, where am I supposed to stand? Am I allowed to shoot, whatever? Like, so it was nice to see Glenn Robinson, like, take some threes, be aggressive. But I felt like it was like almost watching like a pre-Titans process team last night. Like before M.B. and Simmons wrote their rise. It was like almost like a road not taken team. It was like if you had just surrounded the stars you could get like Horford and Harris with like scrapyard guys.

and they had been stuck in the middle gears forever. Like if Doug Collins had never left the Sixers, I could imagine that being the Sixers team. Brought back a lot of fond memories of Tony Roten, just going after it. Well, no, I mean, it's like you're like, yeah. I mean, I just think that there was a lot of like running off the boards, running off rebounds, and they took nine more threes than they average last night.

So they clearly were just like, let's just see if we can shoot our way into a surprise win here. you know, the shake thing. I like it. I love it. You know, it feels very Flip Murray-esque to me. But, yeah, I mean. I love that Flip Murray has become shorthand for a guy who popped off and then we never heard from him again. Right.

Maybe Damning a faint praise there. Charks, is El Horford cooked? I think that's the first question I want to ask you. Well, he was, as Chris kind of, like, alluded to, he was brought in to unlock Ben Simmons. That's why they paid him $100 million, right? Was to be the stretch five for Simmons to play that one specific role. So without Simmons there, he just doesn't have much of a point. So, I mean, like he's not going to lead a team anymore.

He's getting older. Really, yeah, he depends on Simmons to create shots for him. And then he's based the floor for Simmons. That's his role. That's why he's there. And if Simmons isn't there, he's just not that valuable. Yeah. And I guess Brett Brown pretty much admitted that with his rotations

before all these injuries kind of struck putting Horford more in that second unit, playing him more with Ben, playing a fewer minutes alongside Joel and Bede. Charks, which of these young guys, as we look at kind of the new process guys kind of stepping up here, some of the cork-mases, the Militans, for you, who's the most interesting one of those who could maybe make a difference, maybe down the line here? I got to get well-up to my guy, Shake Milton. SMU legend. He's from, uh, Texas Forever, baby.

I got to see him play for like three years. Yeah, I mean, he's a really, really big shooter who played point guard in college. He has like a seven-foot wingspan. He was always like a 40% three-point shooter. And he's not a great athlete, but he's freaking huge. So that combination of skills, I think, could find him a role in the playoffs. Whereas Korkma's not going to be able to defend. Thiable is the shot there.

It's the combination of both, I think, gives Milton the edge. I also wonder, like, how much we're giving him credit just because he has a cool name. Oh, yeah. I always worry about guys like this. He was just Malik, which is his actual name. It's like Dave Milton. Yeah. The one thing that sticks out to me about last night, though, is did Tobias Harris play?

Yes. And he had a quiet 20 or 18 or whatever. That concerns me about as much as Horford because while Horford has legitimate injury concerns, he's getting older, you could really tag it to something physical. Tobias is just like every opportunity was there available for you and you did nothing. I think you're just seeing the fact that like he's the third option, even when he's the first option. If he's the first option, he's still going to score like a third option. Right. So I'm not going to get mad at Tobias Harris for just being exactly who Tobias Harris is.

I never thought, oh, if there's like a catastrophic event and Joel and B. and Ben Simmons are out at the same time, Tobias Harris will be able to go into L.A. and beat the Clippers and the Lakers single-handedly. Should have got paid a lot more money if that was the case. Right. So how are you feeling overall about your journey to see the young sixers? I'm fine. They basically, what's going to happen is they're going to get the sixth seed. And I'm going to have an incredibly uncomfortable first week of the NBA playoffs where my boss's team is playing against my team again. Yeah.

They'll play that tweet that they always do around this time. And we're going to relitigate Jason Tatum. We're going to relitigate Fultz. We're going to talk about, you know, whether or not Brad Wanamaker would be the best player on the Sixers. Like all the things that I can't wait for it are going to happen. And then we'll be where we're at. And Kevin O'Connor's Jason Tatum feature, which we ran on Tuesday, there's something. Danny Ains where it basically outlines how

they brought Fulton for that second workout and immediately knew like nah. And so that's why they made the trade. It's just like it really detailed and put color to the Sixers anguish like in real time where it's like the Celtics saw this coming or maybe not this specifically but at the very

least they saw the red flags and they got away from it as quickly as possible. Yeah, I love that detail. When is Ambid coming back? Is there a timeline for that? I think he was only supposed to be out about a week or a real See, this is the really frustrating thing about the new. Re-evaluated after two weeks.

Yeah. Or Simmons was re-evalied after two weeks. And Embed, I think, was one. Yeah. I am much more optimistic that we will see Embed again this season than Simmons. Yeah. Is there like a world where Simmons just doesn't come back for the playoffs? For sure.

These back things are very troubling. Yes. Yeah, for sure. Especially because, like, we only heard kind of, was there any, like, word about him having a back issue before this. end up happening? It feels like it kind of just popped out of nowhere. Not to my knowledge. I'm being completely sincere.

That was the first I heard about him having a back problem. I don't think he's like, you know what? This is so funny. When you get really invested in a team and especially a player, you start like, I'm not his fucking chiropractor. I have no idea if his back

has been bothering him for a long time. I think that you could get on Brett's case for playing Simmons a lot of minutes. And I wish the team was better than they are so that they would be up 20 in fourth quarters and not have to play Ben Simmons in the fourth quarter the way Janus and Chris Middleton get to like read novels on the bench for most of these buck games. Right.

But look, you know, we don't want to turn this into a Sixers pod. God forbid. The cruel irony that we did not get a Sixers medical update about this back injury before it actually happened. Mm-hmm. So do you want to talk about another team that's in this right here? Let's talk about the Knicks. Let's talk about the Knicks here.

So you may have heard by now that they're in yet another feud. It took all of one day, I believe, into the Leon Rose era before James Dolan started a fight with another Knicks fan luminary, whatever you want to call it, a New York legend, let's just say. So I'm going to try to run down the specifics of the event and then we can take it from there because it's really hard to process. And even as I was going through it, I'm like, what is actually happening here? So here's what I have. A kind of kerfuffle broke out over Spike Lee allegedly. using the wrong entrance at MSG. Video of said kerfuffle.

I'm really just forcing this word into the situation. You should just say incident. Incidents? Yeah. Thank you for editing me. Well, I just say. No, no, it's a good edit. It's a good note, man.

Thanks. That video circulated Monday night. Spike then went on first take, as one does, to blast Dolan saying that he was done with the Knicks for the season. Just for the season. Which is like, first of all, like, what a threat? there. I just won't come back for like 10 more games of this terrible basketball team. But if Leon Rose trades for Bradley Beal and we get the number one pick, like I'm back.

Right, yeah, I'll be right there. And then he, so, and then this whole thing broke out where he says he didn't shake Jim Dolan's hand. And yet the Knicks claimed that he did. And so the Knicks, so after Spike goes on first take, the Nix released a statement as they often do in order to lashed back at people who were saying things about them. They called Spike's version laughable, in quotes. And they had two photos within the tweet that they sent out with this press release. One was of an entrance at MSG that said the entrance was for employees, media, and patrons with disabilities only. And then a very grainy photo of what appears to be Spike shaking Jim Dullen's hand at that game on the sidelines.

Yep. Did I get everything? I think so. Okay. Yeah. So that's where we are today. Chris, what do you make of this? I think that it's remarkable that the Nix have this ability to antagonize the exact wrong franchise icons and fans. It's like they get after it with the guys who are like, you know what I have time to do tomorrow?

Go on first take. It's not like, oh, I'm busy. You know, I got like I'm meeting tomorrow. and it's like, you know what, let's just like handle this behind closed doors. Like, no, you guys go after Charles Oakley and Spike Lee. You know, and Charles Oakley and Spike Lee are like, why, yes, first ESPN Booker. I am available to come down to the waterfront to go on first take this morning. I think that any time you get into a situation where one of the most acclaimed filmmakers of the last 40 years

is invoking his mother's grave to prove his, like, bona fides in a situation, you just, you got to get yourself into that scenario, you know. Even if you were the most forgiving person in the world, the one consistent factor in all these Nix controversies is Dolan. So I don't know really what changes if you bring in Leon Rose, if you bring in Sam Hinky and Billy Bean and Theo Epstein. Right, Brad Pitt. And Paul D. Podesta.

Yeah. Yeah, right. I mean, I don't really know what different culture changes can happen at this place. there's always just going to be this guy at the top who's like, but the thing is, that fucking guy is using the wrong door. And I am going to make a national sports story out of it. Right.

Charks, what's your take on this? It's one of those things that could only happen in New York because nobody would care if to happen anywhere else. It's a very good point. This is some coastal elite of shit right here. I mean, yeah, Spike Lee can go on first.

I get shot in New York. So you can just, you know, take a cab. but, you know, the Knicks people with some famous fan who's only famous because he's in New York, what's the difference, really? You don't think that if this happened to Tony Romo in Dallas that people would be up in arms right now? Well, the Mavs actually banned their, like, celebrity fan last year

for cussing out Patrick Beverly, but, like, the Mavs celebrity fan is a realtor in Dallas. No one cares. That's great. It's like the one in New Orleans is Morris Bart, this, like, lawyer who's on, like, billboards. He's basically the better call Saul of New Orleans. And at one point I tweeted like, yeah, Morris Bart is just hanging out with DeMarcus cousin.

Someone's like, don't say that about Morris Bart. He's a big contributor to the Pelicans franchise. I'm like, oh, God, give me a fucking break. Oh, my God. Do you want to hear the most unpopular opinion about this whole situation? Are you going to pivot to Dolan? I'm not going to take his side. Are you zagging?

I'm zacking, though. I think that celebrities shouldn't be favored. If there's a door you should be going through, go through the right door, man. We live in Bernie's country now. No, no, no. Are you going pro rules? Or are you going democratic socialism? I mean, why choose, my friend?

So, I definitely think that this is just a situation where, like, there's another part of this that we aren't hearing about. But I don't think it's necessarily favorable towards the Nix. Yeah, this is actually a pro-doors take, really? No, but I agree that. I find it hard to believe that Spike Lee all of a sudden started going through the wrong door. You don't know that? I want the specifics about his. door behavior first. I want

the investigation to be fully done before I criticize the Knicks for going forward. I think at most NBA stadiums, there is a fluidity of who can use what door based on a hierarchy of their relationship to star players, to ownership,

and to yeah, and just in general, like their relationship to the franchise. One would think, given his steadfast support of the New York Knicks over the decades, that Spike Lee had earned himself a special place in the door culture

of Madison Square Garden. What door did you use last night? I was going to say, yeah, was your door a staple center, Chris? As a paying person, like last night, I went through the same door as everybody else. Wow. Man, music exists. This is terrible.

But I did have a pretty good vantage point of the front row of the courtside Lakers situation. And you know, you see Mav, see Rich, see Katzenberg. You know what I mean? all the bigs. There's a lot of like, hey, I'm just going to step into the tunnel here for a second. Nobody's jumping those guys.

Nobody's saying, hey, can't do that. You know, like, there's an ecosystem there. I don't know what the ecosystem is at MSG. But if I had to guess, I don't think that last night, Spike Lee, or two nights ago, Spike Lee just went out of his mind and decided to use the different door. But maybe I'm wrong. I want to know more about the doors. So if you were there with Closterman, would you get that door, you think?

If I was there with Closterman, I think I would have been sitting. next to a Jason Kidd and Lionel Hopkins. Yeah, I mean, despite my pro-door stance here, my big question is just why. Like, why make this a thing? Like, you really didn't have to do much in order to completely avoid this, which seems to be the case with almost all of the more recent events at MSG.

Just, why do this? And they always seem to do it. On the other hand, let me play devil's advocate here. You're just, you're zagging yourself out. I'm zagging again. Who among us doesn't just, like, get mad and go on Twitter and just say things, you know? I don't.

This is why you're going through the right doors, my friend. We'll take a quick break there. Chris is going to leave us in order to talk about music with some other more popular people. But Charks and I will be back. With Mav and Rich. Yeah. But Charks and I will be back to talk about some lineups after this.

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That's Microsoft.com slash teams. All right. We're back. It's Charks and James. A V time, a little bit of alone time, which means we get to talk about some really deep cup nerdy stuff here. Charx, are you excited? With Chris gone, it's all us. No one's listening.

We're just having fun now. That's great. We need a name for this segment. So if anybody at home has a good one, we were trying to come up with good Charks puns. But I feel like we've used them all. So currently I have this down is line them up, John Charks' Joint. We'll go forward with that for the time being. But basically, Charks is doing these pieces for the way.

website where he looks at some of the bigger lineup adjustments going around on the league. And obviously, these things are becoming more and more important as we get to the playoffs, specifically for playoff teams, perhaps not as much for the Cavs, although, man, how are they going to get Darius Garland and Colin Sexton to work, man? I don't know. But so. Kevin Porter, baby. Yes, and Kevin Porter.

A ring your favorite. Go read his profile that Paul Getty did leading into the draft. Anyway, today, Charks, we're going to talk about the heat and the clippers. So let's start with the heat. heat first. The big question there is, where does Andre Iguodala, their new prize wing, fit into the rotation? He's been having some issues there, no? Yeah, they kind of started him out playing a lot, and his minutes have been gradually getting cut over the last two weeks. And on one hand, yes, he's 36, and he hasn't played in, you know,

six months or nine months. So it makes sense that he's a little rusty. But it does feel like there's some structural issues in Miami that are going to keep him from kind of, doing what we saw in Golden State. So, like, for all the excitement about Iguidal and the trade, he can't shoot threes, and he's playing with two guys who don't shoot threes either, and Bam and Jimmy. And that, to me, is like, that's a pretty big red flag.

Yeah, I mean, because any significant lineup, he's going to have to play with both of them. Like, they're going to be at the end of games, obviously. They're two best players. Right, right. So if those are two best players at the end of games, can Iguidol play? And, yeah, there were a couple of games against Atlanta and Minnesota,

where they blew massive leads at the end of games. And they've only played 26 minutes together, those three guys, and they're minus 51. Yikes. And you can say small sample size, which is obviously a small sample size, but it was a big enough sample size that Spolstra stopped doing it. He said, enough of this,

and he's really cut Iguidal's minutes to play him with the second unit. Right. And so we're talking about the heat when they just came off of perhaps the biggest win in the season, and perhaps the buck's biggest loss of the season, they absolutely shall lack them in that game. But there is a pretty big disparity between when they're playing Andre Guadala more and playing him less in his first seven games with the heat following that trade involving the Grizzlies.

The heat were two and five. The last three, they are three and O. And that coincides sharks with them pretty much just not playing him as much over his first seven, Andre Guadala. He played 20 minutes over the last three he played 13 and a half. So there's, in your perspective, there's a correlation there. Yeah, and it's kind of funny. We all talked about Iguodala, but Jay Crowder's been the guy who's been playing a ton. He's playing almost 30 minutes a game in Miami, almost twice as many as Iggy.

Because he can shoot threes. Right. Yeah, so I guess the big question here is, do the heat have this season the right combination of guys in order to play Iguodala in those key moments? It just doesn't seem like. You go back to Golden State. So Iggy was playing with Clay and Steph and KD And he didn't only have to do too much on offense

And he didn't and he wasn't being guarded back then, right? Like he was always a guy you left open But those guys shot so well it didn't really matter But now if you're leaving Iguadala open And you're playing him with Jimmy and Bam There's just no room on the court. Right. And as we've seen as the months kind of go by here In the heat's surprise season and their exciting start

Kind of gives way to something a little bit more mixed I'd say is fair the defense has really been an issue. Rob Mahoney wrote about it on Monday. Yeah, that was an article, yeah. Yeah, right before the Bucks game. Right before perhaps one of their best defensive performances of the season, which, like, we have had the worst luck this week,

including, like, didn't you write about Janus right after that game as well? Yeah, I read the article about how awesome he was. And he has, like, the worst game of the season before. So just bad editorial timing there. We'll take the L on that one. I blame you. You are the editor, Justin, so we'll blame you for that. Well, Matt is now your editor. editor, so we'll blame Matt Dollinger.

That's how we get around this. We blame somebody else. That's the- But your pointing is always good. That's the key at the ringer. Yes. But I think the defense is going to be a concern, and I think in part just because of the type of guys they have there.

Like, Duncan Robinson is a big part of this team. He's starting for them and playing significant minutes, and yet he's really good as a shooter and providing spacing for the guys. But is he a significant defender? Are you going to be able to trust him late in games? and like Tyler Hero hasn't been in the lineup. He's been hurt lately, but he's another guy's shooter,

probably not an accomplished defender. And you'd hope that a guy like Iguodala, you'd get him be able to throw him in the mix there and you'd take pressure off of guys like Jimmy Butler. Butler, who's doing a lot in both ends, would be able to focus on offense where he's been a significant factor, especially holding the ball for the heat.

But in this scenario, it doesn't seem like they're going to be able to rely on Iguidala. And so does it really just come down to Jay Crowder basically being what they expected Iguodala to be? You wonder, it's funny. So we always talk about how Joelle and Ben, they don't space the floor well enough to play with each other. But Jimmy stops shooting threes on Miami.

Him and Bam shoot fewer threes than M.B. does this season. Wait, so is the take you're trying out here that Jimmy and Bam are the new Joe and Ben? I just think there's some structural issues when your two best players never shoot threes. Wow. Because what happens is, is that means your other three spots in the lineup all have to be great shooters, right?

If you're not getting spacing from two of the five spots. But then the problem is, okay, if you're getting great shooting from the other three spots, what are the odds you can find three great three indie players, right? It's just like, yeah, if you had Clay Thompson and Robert Covington and Danny Green, it'd be fine. But for the most part, most elite shooters aren't great defensive players. So you kind of have to walk a really narrow window. And what the heat had been doing most of the season is they're playing bad defenders in those spots

and they're playing a lot of like gimmick defenses. I think they played the most zone in the league. I'm pretty sure. And that's because they're playing so many bad defenders they're trying to hide them out. You're trying to hide Tyler Hero, hide Duncan Robinson. And if you're, and it's just, that's going to be harder and harder,

like, lane to draw in the playoffs, I feel like. So are we at the point now in the NBA where you can only really have one non-shooter or one poor shooter on the floor? Has it gotten to that point? point? It feels like. I mean, really, it's almost

the point you can only have zero non-shooters where things are going. Yeah. But yeah, you can have one guy who gets at the rim. So if you have two guys, you're already kind of really close. Right.

And that's why we've seen Russell Westbrook kind of take off in Houston these days when he is functionally the non-shooters slash center however you want to designate him. But, I mean, if you're going to find a silver lining,

that Bucks game is probably the prime example of it. Bam, in particular, seem to do a great job against Janus. And at some point, you would think if the heat want to get out of the east, if that is indeed like a possibility this year,

they'll have to beat the bucks. Did you learn anything from that game specifically that perhaps could carry on and perhaps solve this issue? Yeah, that was a very impressive win. And they did a great job of crowding Janus. Ban did it a great job. But also, Milwaukee shot 7 of 34 from 3 in that game.

Right? Like, if the other team is not shooting threes, then you can pack the paint on them, and it doesn't matter. but what are the odds in a series where Miami's going to shoot 49% from three and Milwaukee's going to shoot 20% from three when Milwaukee has way better shooters than Miami as a whole. Right, and that's the whole thing with Milwaukee, right?

If you just like, if they get cold from three or the other team gets hot from three, they could lose one game, but how do you do that four times? Yeah, the thing in that game that stood out to me is the guys you leave open from Milwaukee, it's really it's Bledsoe and Brooke Lopez. that was what showed out to me watching that was Lopez has not shot three as well at all this year.

I think he's like 29%. Yeah, it's been bad. That last year might have kind of been a little bit of an outlier. And if I'm playing Milwaukee, I'm leaving him wide open. I'm leaving Eric Blood so wide open. And I'm saying you guys can choose as much as you want. I'm packing the pain on the on Yannis. And what I want to see from the bucks is whether they make those adjustments.

It feels like button holder doesn't really make adjustments. That's always been the knock on him. And if like his best players aren't performing, will he take them off in the end of the game? I don't know. Yeah, we'll see about the bucks. But for the heat going forward, what's the solution here to their Igo Dahl problems?

Is it just to keep limiting his minutes and hope that he just kind of rounds out into the player he used to be? I wouldn't mind seeing Jimmy take some threes. There's no reason that he stopped taking him. Right. He used to be a decent enough shooter. He's never been a great shooter,

but he's taking fewer threes this season he has like in four or five years. And there's no reason he has to be like the Mar de Rosen, right? Like, if Jimmy wants to win a championship, open it up, man, take some shots. Those are shots going to be there for you. You need to take them. Because they can probably play Jay Crowder more.

They're going to have to hope Kendrick Duncan play defense. They're not playing Solomon Hill at all. Which is probably a good idea. But that's probably not going to change now. Yeah. You've got to go to New York in Memphis. I mean, I think you got to hope that Butler and Iguodala can piece together enough three-point shooting, right?

They're both streaky shooters who don't take a lot of threes. But can they get to like, I don't know, three or four or five in a big playoff game between the two of them. Right. Yeah, and the thing with Iguado is they do have some time kind of to figure this out if they don't really figure it out for this season. They signed him as part of that trade with Memphis to a two-year extension on top of this season where they're going to pay him $15 million in each of those years. The second year is a team option. You expect them considering the high hopes they have in free agency for that summer to decline that. But yeah, you're right. I mean, Jimmy Butler is shooting, as I'm looking at this, 25% from

three is shooting only to a game, basically, which is the fewest he's had since. like his third year in the league. So we'll keep tracking that with the heat, but let's turn the page to the West here now. The Clippers are, they've had a little bit of a panic, I guess, you would say, or at the very least,

we've had a little bit of panic about the Clippers where it didn't seem like they were playing up to our expectations, a few losses here and there, Paul George, it and on the lineup, yada, yada, yada. And then all of a sudden, they've reeled off significant wins of late.

They've looked as good as we've expected them to. Zach Cram wrote for The Ringer on Monday basically just calm down about the Clippers because when they do play all of their guys, when they're healthy when Paul George and Quaillaner played, they're as amazing as we think they are. But Charks, you're specifically looking at their second unit,

which is kind of how they rose the prominence last year without a star. For you, is the Clippers bench back? Yeah, we talked about Reggie Jackson earlier, and he's now the third or fourth best player on their bench, which is pretty insane, considering he was a starting point. guard last season on a playoff team, right? When you're like, he wasn't great, but when you're talking about a backup point guard,

it's like, man, Reddy Jackson's your backup point guard. So like their second unit now is Reddy Jackson, Lou Williams, Landry Shamit, Jamet, Jamit, Jamichael Green, Montres, Harrell. That is ridiculous for a bench, which is absolutely absurd. You have two of the best bench players in the league, a former starting point guard, and then two, three, and D guys is your ninth and tenth men. And so they haven't played much together yet, but in a four. 48 minutes so far, they're plus 40.

And obviously, once again, small sample size, but look at the names of those players in that list. Like, those are all really good players who fit together perfectly. There's no reason to think that won't keep going forward being successful, much than regular season. Yeah, I think the fear with Reggie Jackson was just that he would be Detroit Reggie Jackson or late era Oklahoma City Reggie Jackson, where he would just kind of take shots and want to be the guy.

It does seem like, for whatever reason, maybe he's playing with his best friend, Paul George, or if he's just like recognizing where he is at this point in his career where he best fits and he's really just done a really great job weaving his way into that situation. The point where like I didn't think he and Lou Williams would be able to play together, but they have played a good amount together. I do wonder like, is Reggie Jackson like going to be a playoff contributor? I was thinking of him more as just a guy who would get them through the regular season,

but it kind of seems like they can run this team like almost 10 deep into the playoffs. he's just so big. You forget that he's a six-three guy. I think he's like a seven-foot wing span. He's freaking huge. And he's on his best behavior because he wants a new contract. He's not going to rock the boat in the Clippers.

He's going to play it in a smaller role. And he does have experience from his time when OKC not being a starter. So he knows how to come into games. He has the size to guard multiple positions. And it just gives the Clippers so many options. And like even beyond like this full second unit, they just have so many different ones.

ways they can attack you right now. They can find your weak spot. They can play nine or ten guys and without losing much on either side of the ball. And that's like they're really, you see them against the nuggets where they just blew them off the floor? Yeah. It was like, I think last Friday. It was, that was kind of a statement of intent.

Like, all right, we've got all our players now. And now we're just going to rock teams. Yeah, it does feel like whenever the clippers do want to make a point, they can. And a lot of that revolves around Paul George being healthy and engaged. There had been some whispers just in the back. ground just about how, you know, they shelled out their entire future for Paul George. And while the injuries, there's nothing you could really do about that, he just, like, hasn't played that much. There are certain times where he perhaps wasn't being, wasn't as engaged. But I think all of the

issues that the clippers had are all pretty fixable. They're all, if we're categorizing, like, problems based on a scale, they're probably the better problems you could have here, where it's just like, be more interested in what's happening and just like, pray for health. And so, it's been really encouraging to see what they've been able to do. Talking about like a statement game. I remember there was a game in Dallas earlier this season where the Mavs run a big hot streak. The Clippers come into town.

And then it was like, oh, we'll put Kauai on Luca. Don't put Paul George on Luca. Don't put Beverly on Luca. I was like, oh, my gosh. Luca didn't know what to hit him. Right. Just like three guys that could defensively. You can play on both ends of the floor.

This team is really coming together, it seems like. Yeah. And I think the good thing is they also have options. And so trying to piece together perhaps their best lineup, I don't know, where do you stand on this? Because I think there are two schools of thoughts where it's good to have versatility in your roster, the Clippers perhaps have the best versatility in the league,

just considering the amount of wings they have, and the guys, specifically big wings who can guard bigger guys. But I think there are some people who might say, well, you need your set five, you need to know who are your five guys in crunch time. For you, where do you fall? I'd say I'm more in the first camp. You look at Toronto last year.

They were always moving things around with nurse. When you get to the latter ends of the playoff, it's just all about finding the best matchups. And with the Clippers, however you want to play, they can play. If they end up playing the Rockets in the first round, they could play Marcus Morris at the 5. They're the one team that if the Rockets can't really go small against and have a huge advantage because they can go small at any difficulty.

And then if they play the Nuggets, they can play Zubach, they can play bigger. I think that versatility is huge. And you've seen Doc Rivers in the past. The one thing Doc does pretty well is he manages egos, he controls the locker room. And he's a pretty good matchup coach in the playoffs. And that's the kind of thing I think can be just huge down the road.

Right. So most likely you'll probably see those three wings in most crunch time scenarios, George, Kauai, Morris. Is that fair? Or would you probably not see Morris and maybe more Beverly? I think you would see Morris just because of how big he is. Like now you have three, six-foot-seven guys

so you can flat guard multiple positions and space the floor and attack you off the dribble. Really it's more about like with Doc, like Ken Morris, can they get Morris to not take too many bad shots? It's same with Reggie Jackson, because he's going from being the first option to being like the fourth or fifth option. And that's what we're saying about like,

these are good problems to have. The Lakers are like, can we find a way to get Alex Crusoe, more shots? can we get our like eighth man to play like a third option whereas the clippers are trying to like can we make our fifth option who was a star somewhere else be in a smaller role that's not a bad situation to have I think my guess would be Joe Morris, Kauai, George

probably Harrell in most situations so that gives you four six, seven guys you can guard multiple positions then you can either play Lou Williams for scoring Beverly for defense sham it for size Jackson for kind of a combination of those they just have a lot of options

Right. I do love that they've been able to take Detroit guys specifically and basically rehab their careers. First, it was Tobias Harris. He'd played well for Detroit, but wasn't on like All-Star level until he got to the Clippers that season. But now Reggie Jackson, Marcus Morris even had a couple of coffee, two seasons, I believe, with Detroit in which he became the LeBron Stopper based on a sample size of like two games. But it is funny how guys go into that system play more of a fourth or fifth role. and all of a sudden, they're just much better at what they do. As you're looking at the landscape, though, because the biggest question with the Clippers is, where do they stand kind of the elite tier of the NBA and the hierarchy because this team is built for the title, among the teams that they could face on that road, which is the one that gives you the most pause,

which is the team that's probably the worst matchup for them? I don't think there's one that is, like, the worst matchup. That's what makes them so dangerous, is they can play so many styles. There's not, like, one Achilles heel. To me, if you're going to, to beat the Clippers, you're going to need somebody to be better than Kauai. And when I look across the league, I only see one player who could do that.

And that's Yannis. I thought at the beginning of the season, it was going to end up being Kauai versus Yonis in the finals. And I'm still kind of leaning that way, is Kauai got Yonis last year. Can Yonis get Kauai this year? Because in terms of lineups and playing smaller, Milwaukee can match up with them. And then it comes down to your best player versus your best players. and then like in the West,

who's going to be better than Kauai in a playoff series at this point? It's hard for me to believe LeBronas anymore. Or then you go to like the Rockets, right? So with the Rockets,

Kauai and Paul George can guard Hardin and Westbrook but Hardin Westbrook can't guard them. And to me, that gives you such an edge in a playoff series when your best players

are that versatile. Yeah, but what if they get to the NBA finals and someone has to guard shake Milton? What do they do then? Love it. All right.

That's a good place to stop here. Texas Forever, baby. We will be back next week, probably with Chris and Charks in Toe. Until then, we will talk to you later. Basketball is very good. Basketball is very good.