The Ringer NBA Show - Melo's Opt-in, Free-Agency Rumors, and Woj vs. ESPN | Heat Check (Ep. 294)

Episode Date: June 25, 2018

The Ringer’s John Gonzalez is joined by Chris Ryan and Danny Chau to discuss Carmelo Anthony opting into his contract with the Oklahoma City Thunder (02:40), free-agency rumors surrounding Kawhi Leonard and LeBron James (08:15), and their takeaways from the NBA draft (27:20). Then Bryan Curtis comes on to discuss Adrian Wojnarowski’s Twitter euphemisms (34:35) and LeBron’s media presence (45:25). You can buy new Ringer merch here. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's a heat check. You knew that was coming. It's heat check time. Welcome to the Heat Check podcast. I'm your host, John Gonzalez. You know, it's two weeks in a Rono. I go to say I'm joined, as always, by my producer, Isaac Lee. He wasn't here last week because the big boss man drafted him for his draft podcast.

And then this week, Isaac is in Orlando with binge mode. So he's basically parlayed his time on Heat Check into too much bigger podcasts. I can't really blame him, but in his stead, Evan is here. Evan, welcome. Hey, how's it going? You are the new Isaac. I am. Long-lived new Isaacs.

Old Isaac is dead to me. We've got all kinds of fun stuff on this show. We've also got all kinds of fun stuff on the ringer.com right now. Very interesting time in the NBA season. Jonathan Charks coming off the Mavericks draft. He's got a piece about the Mavericks Wonder Years now that Luca Donchish is in the fold. KOC did the three most intriguing teams from the draft. That's a fun one.

Justin Varyer with the 10 biggest questions of the free agency Bonanza. and I wrote a piece about the seemingly GM-less Philadelphia 76ers having a very interesting draft night, acquiring a pick with no real front office hierarchy, and I sort of investigated or interrogated the concept of how this affects them moving forward. So that should be interesting as well. So that's on the ringer.com right now. Check all that stuff out.

We've also got NBA desktop with Jason Concepcion, who's gallivanting about Orlando. We've got the Bill Simmons podcast, of course. We've got Ringer FC every weekday during the World Cup, which is ongoing, been a lot of fun. And in addition to those podcasts, we've also got some really fun merch. We've got a new NBA show shirt that says basketball is very good.

You can cop that at the ringer.com slash shop. I've got all kinds of merch there. I'm wearing a very nice ringer hat as we record this. Go and check out all that stuff. And then we'll talk some basketball. Later in the show, we're going to have Brian Curtis for the first time ever. Brian Curtis, who hosts the Press Box podcast with David Shoemaker and just wrote an excellent piece about LeBron James

and his relationship with the media. And also Woj, he wrote a piece about Woj on draft night, just basically sub-tweeting the entire NBA league office, which was really hilarious. So we'll get into that and some all-season storylines with him. But first, the draft is behind us. Free agency is rapidly approaching. There are many topics to discuss.

And to do that, we're going to bring in two of our favorites. Let's hit it. Boom, Shakalaka. He's heating up. He's on fire. All right, joining me in the studio from The Watch, from sources say, from group chat, fresh off hosting a three-hour ringer draft show. I don't even think he went home.

Chris Ryan is here. I feel replenished. He's replenished. And the best dressed man for the draft show, by a lot. I thought I was wearing the classic white man outfit of a blue shirt with jeans and sneakers. Oh, Danny. No, I just introduced you already. How many introductions do you get?

I thought it was a secondary compliment. He wants multiple introductions. The best dressed man on the draft class show. on our live video show, Danny Chow is here. You know, my mom was extremely upset that you guys buried me in the back with my suit. I was the only one there. You looked excellent in your reservoir dog suit,

and you were sitting next to me, so that also punted, because I was nowhere near dressed as well as you, so you looked excellent. We did all kinds of stuff that night. We're going to get into a little draft wrap up, maybe towards the end of the segment with you two guys. but there's off-season stuff to talk about. Nicola Jokic just signed his max-level contract, not surprising.

Not as excited about that contract as I am about Carmel O'Anthony. Also not surprising, but I just love that he did this. He tweeted out about a week ago a photo of him holding up a glass where a waiter was pouring wine into his glass and he looked very smug and satisfied. And the text to the tweet was mood, all critics can duck sick and then hashtag stay mellow

but the owl was a seven there was all kinds of things going on and not surprisingly he opted he did not opt out of his contract so the Oklahoma City Thunder will pay Carmelo Anthony $27.9 million next season

this is not what the Thunder want no but you know what it's I mean it was written in the stars that he was going to do this there was no written in a contract Yeah. This is not a shot surprise. They traded for him knowing that this was a possibility. In a weird development, Carmelo Anthony looked around at the free agent market and went.

I don't think I can get $27.9 million on the open market. I'm going to stay in Oklahoma City. Not shooting a career low 40.4% from the field? Yeah, career low in points, assists, steals, free throw attempts, free throw percentage, and field goal percentage. Obviously, this was going to happen. But as somebody who wants to see, other potential contenders or at least antagonists for the Warriors and also the Rockets emerge in the Western Conference. I don't think

having Carmelo Anthony who was on this super fat contract and is not going to be able to live up to it, opting to stay with the thunder, I don't think that helps them in any way whatsoever. It hamstrings them financially. It doesn't help them on the floor. He already said

he doesn't want to change his role and won't play any differently. This is no boido. I love that. I saw somewhere that someone was like, it makes sense that Carmelo is staying because the money goes far in Oklahoma City. As if Carmelo was like shopping at BJs and buying toilet paper in bulk.

He's like, I have $27 million. I could get, I can buy like so much Viva paper towels. This is great. It's like, come on, guys. Carmelo's got the net jet waiting for him at O.K.C. Airport every night. He could go wherever he wants. He's going to Costco and buying

the super-sized jars of peanut butter. It's going to be amazing. Again, I just want to stress this. This is the same thing with now we're having, there's some Blake regret, there's some Westbrook regret, there's some Wall regret with these deals. You sign the contracts. You knew who you were signing. I do not want to return to the late 90s in the early aughts where basketball punditry

turns into whining about people's contracts. Well, remember, I mean, like I Guadala got a contract in Philadelphia before he decamped and was sent off to Denver and then Golden State. and he caught all kinds of flack. And I never understood that because if you're him, of course you're taking that money. If you're Carmelo, of course you're not opting out. You're going to take that money.

You're not going to get any more money on the free agent market. I just think from like a team building perspective, yes, you're right. Oklahoma City had to know that this was going to happen. But for the rest of us like basketball and want to see the Thunder like actually challenge in the West, this does not help them. Are we even sure he makes it to training camp?

You think it's going to be a buyout situation? I mean, the whole parallel here is Dwayne Wade was obviously bought out from his Bulls contract last season. So that's a very convenient parallel from a fellow banana boat brother. Yeah, I mean, as we've already established, he does not help the Thunder in the immediate future, in the long-term future, in any version of our reality. So, yeah, historically, the Thunder are thrifty, if not cheap. the whole reason why we are now watching James Harden on the Rockets is because the Thunder did not want to go into a luxury tax situation, right? If I remember correctly.

So the idea that they would accept Carmelo coming back and buy him out and have all this dead money lying around seems unlikely. I think if anything, the most interesting way to think about this, Carmelo stuff is as a Canary in the coal mine for other free agency moves. Does Carmelo staying in the Thunder mean that Paul George is more or less likely

to sign on one-on-one with this? them, which is what was rumored like about 10 days ago, is that he was considering doing a 30 million with a player option and readdress and going right back into everybody court me in 2019. So there are reports that LeBron's camp is increasingly skeptical that Paul George would be willing to leave Oklahoma City. And the word from Paul George's camp is that he's increasingly thinking about staying in Oklahoma City. Should he though? I mean, like, if you're, Paul George, you can get a little bit more money by staying put, but do you want to stay in Oklahoma City?

Is there a future for you there? Is that team, like, do you see a viable path where the Oklahoma City Thunder with Russell Westbrook, the way that he plays and the way that they're like currently built emerge as a Western Conference contender? Yes, with Andre Roberson. With that team that was really good for two weeks. I love how hard you ride for Andre Roverson. I'm just saying that they can make some, and they can, they will always try to be.

there. They'll try to be in the mix. And if they have to. And one thing that these stars are learning is that it actually benefits your career in terms of like people talking about you to keep your name in the free agency mix once every two and a half, three years. Because that way

you're always, what's going to happen with Paul George? You think Paul George after eight years or however long in Indiana is bored of having his name in the news now? Of course not. He wants to be talked about. He wants to be quartered. He wants to be wooed. I'm sure. he will press this a little bit.

He'll take his 30 from OKC. He doesn't want to be the first guy on the Lakers rebuild boat. He wants to make sure somebody else goes there first and then he'll go there second. He's not going to go back to an Indiana situation where he's struggling to make the eighth seed. I think with Robeson, this Thunder team is solid. So if we say that, and solid, I think, is right. I'm thinking about bigger upside. But let's just say that we forecast this out and you're right.

and he stays in Oklahoma City. What does that mean for LeBron then? Because for me, in my head, LeBron to L.A. makes a lot of sense because you could easily go, hey, Paul George, you obviously love Los Angeles. You've openly talked about how much. For how many years.

Right. So, like, if he's not going to go to L.A. with LeBron and they can't get Kauai to L.A., then is LeBron going to L.A.? Yeah, I mean, that's kind of the question here. It's basically purgatory for LeBron if the other two guys. You got to get at least one. Exactly.

You need at least one. And with Kauai, it's obviously a lot harder. It's more moving parts to acquire him. And I don't know if also Kauai has this injury that we still don't know if he's really healed from. We still don't know. This is an excellent transition, Danny Chow. I say this whenever he comes on. You should host this podcast.

Kauai Leonard, a lot of stuff still happening with him. Pop went out and had a summit with him here in California to say, see if he could convince him to stay. R.C. Buford said some nice things about him. He said, Kauai and his family meet a lot to our organization and to our community. While none of us would wish we are where we are, we are going to do what we can to build the best relationship, we can with him. We will explore all of our options, but the first one would be to keep Kauai as part of our

group. Do you buy a reconciliation? I think anything is possible, especially with the Spurs. I think that they are the one organization that has the luxury of keeping their powder dry. There's not going to be any pressure on them to resolve this situation before they need to. I always thought that this is going to be Lamarcus again, where they figured this out. But I think it's trending towards an exit in terms of at least the public perception of it. I don't think it's getting any better. I think the fact that Kauai Leonard has not made a public statement about this

just it means he's letting Chris Haynes talk for him. And especially with that, the whole not talking publicly was a point of contention with Bruce Bowen, former Spurs legend. Flamed him. Absolutely flamed him. So here's the quote from Bruce Bowen. First it was, well, he's talking about Kauai. First it was while I was misdiagnosed. Look here, you got $18 million this year and you think that they're trying to rush you.

You didn't play for the most part a full season this year and you're the go-to guy. You're the franchise. And you want to say that they didn't have your best interest at heart? Are you kidding me? Bruce Bowen had a lot more to say, I think it's interesting, as you mentioned, that Kauai hasn't said anything. On the one hand, I think that's kind of on brand for. him because he doesn't really talk a lot.

On the other, he frequently wants to be considered a superstar and be talked about in that same stratosphere. Well, people in his camp wanted to be consistent. Yeah, we don't even know if that's his true intention here. Yeah. Yeah. But they wanted to get paid like that. They wanted to be considered like that on the market.

They wanted to get a shoe deal like that. And yet, he is almost invisible all the time except for when he's on the court and he hasn't been in a while. Yeah. I think that the interesting thing here also is the... this idea that, this pre-agency idea that Bill has talked about, this idea that Kauai is going to somehow

try and call his shot while still under another team's control. And, you know, I just don't, I think that, that is where I think he's overplaying his hand. I think that there's a lot of stuff to be said about maybe not feeling comfortable with the medical process there. I think that you can make the argument. I can see his point where he's like, I feel like Pop and Tony killed me in the press

and basically challenged, or not I was actually hurt. And Manu. And Manu and see why he might get upset about that, or at least his reps might get upset about that. But the idea that he's going to be able to somehow talk Greg Popovich

and R.C. Buford into what would be the most the last big act of their respective professional careers to trade him to the Lakers is nuts. That's just not going to happen. I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. Let me play devil's advocate. here. If I am the spurs, and like obviously you'd want to hold on to Kauai and make this work. But as you said, it increasingly looks like it's an untenable situation with them and that eventually he's going to have to go. Yes, I guess you could force his hand and say, nope, you're coming back and you're playing and like, we're just going to all, like, grit our teeth and like try to be professionals. Or you go, look, we're going to lose him anyway. We've got to get something. And like, I think he does have leverage here. I think he does have leverage because he is going to walk one way or the other.

And you can't trade him someplace, really, without getting some assurances that he would be at least considering that he'd sign where he ends up going. So I think he does have some leverage. I mean, what other teams are there? Let's talk about that. I mean, so there's the Lakers, there's the Clippers. Philly would potentially be out there. Philly has a deal for him. The deal Philly has if they were to give him the full boat, which I personally don't know if I'm in favor of.

I, Philly. What would you do if you were Philly? It's Dario and Covington and Fultz and the 2021 Unprotected. That's a hell of a package. And whatever else it takes to, but you basically give them a number one draft pick, another first round unprotected pick from Miami, and two incredible Spurs-ready role players. Would you do that?

Yeah, I'm sold. And I would do it for both teams. Yeah, I would do it for both teams. I think Brett Brown said it perfectly. you know, they're in the business of, you know, star hunting. As he said it, look, when Kauai's healthy, he's a top four, top three player. I, there's just no way around that. And you add that to the Sixers team, which is one of maybe the three most futuristic blueprints of the NBA.

That's a title contender perennially. Are you doing it both ways? Yeah. I think so, too. I mean, like, that's a lot. That's a lot. If I'm the Spurs, I think that that's probably enough to get it done for a guy who doesn't want to be there and is going to walk anyway. Yeah.

Like, you're hoping that shot Dr. Drew Hanlon fixes Fultz's shot. You already know what you're getting in Dario and... They can just... How about just Chip England fixes the shot? Yeah, yeah, that too, that too. And then they've got their own guys in the house. And then also that 20-21 unprotected, especially with the one-and-done rule being potentially done by that. Yeah, somebody pointed out on Twitter, as many people have said, like, Miami routinely picks outside of the top.

10. That doesn't only happen like once or twice since like 92 or something, some crazy like number like that. So that pick could be any number of things. But if people are like, let's draft high schoolers now, the value of a pick at 10 could be much greater than it is right now. I'm not sold though completely on. Yes, I like Miami as a franchise, you know, in a vacuum. But if I'm looking at what that team is right now and how much money they have allocated and like a lot of it's wrapped up in Hassan Whiteside and what are you going to do with him and like, is this really your team going forward? And it's Justice Winslow

finally going to develop into the guy you think he can be? I'm not so that like Miami is just going to continue to be like outside the lottery moving forward. Some point that that could change. There's a bunch of guys on Miami that I would love to see Greg Popovich get his hands on. I would love to see Waiters and White Side on the Spurs. I want all that.

They can put together another package. I think that that it's less appealing for San Antonio because Covington has such a good contract. Fultz has number one pick value. and then you get Dario who feels like he was made in the lab to play for the spurs. You guys are doing all the transitions for me. I have to do very little heavy lifting here on heat check.

I wrote a piece about the Sixers and I wanted to talk about this about how it's like the worst possible time for them to be looking for a general manager. And these are some of the issues that they have to deal with. And we saw what happened on Draft Night. I think I liked what happened on Draft Night.

I know that you like Zaire Smith, right? Yeah, I love Zaire Smith and I love that it feels like Bruce... Sorry, it feels like Brett Brown. Bruce Brown is a Miami prospect who got. I'll take him too. Yeah, who eventually made it to the distance. We don't know who's in the front office right now.

Yeah, it feels like Brett Brown has kind of taken in a lot of the hinkyisms through osmosis over the past half decade. Brett is a very smart guy. I like him a lot. I like what they did on draft night. I think that the degree of difficulty increases, and this is what Chris edited the piece. So credit to Chris here. But we were talking about just what happens as they move forward. right, because there's more variables, there's more complications.

If they really are going to go out and conduct an outside search, like everything they do in this free agent period, or if they decide to unplug Fultz and Dario and Robert Covington and that 2021 first round pick and ship it for Kauai, that shifts the perception of who you might go out and get, right? Because it's going to take away more options for you moving forward and it might lock you in financially in a window where right now you have a lot of flexibility. Yeah, and I think that that was going to be the case

no matter who became the GM. Whether or not it's ghost zombie GM, multi-headed Medusa GM, whoever, whatever we got right now with Eversley and Cripp Brown and Cohen and and Elton Brand. But if it was David Griffin,

all we would be talking about is LeBron. And if it was Gerson, all we would be talking about is how will Mori Ball hit the Sixers? And if it was Mike Zarin, you'd be talking about like how would Dealer Danny principles and would they be a Boston

Boston trade partner in some way since Boston has this surplus of young players and the Sixers. The Sixers is what they have to decide right now. And I think we got a very clear indication from Brett Brown where they're leaning is are they two years away from being two years away or are they going right now?

And they are going right now. They won 50 games. Brett Bat Brown is like, I've been coaching here for a long time. I'm not here to be five years away. We're not taking this slow anymore. I think a lot of the caution surrounding some of the players like Embed

maybe was more of a front office thing than a Brett Brown thing, personally think that. And I think that we're going to start seeing a slightly more aggressive team. I think that they want to go for it. I'm like emotionally preparing myself for them to put a lot of cards on the table and go for somebody big, whether it's let's make room for LeBron, whether it's let's make a run at Paul George

or let's trade the whole thing for Kauai. And I'm cool with that. I think the idea of what Brett has said, and he's been consistent about this from the, like right as soon as the season ended, He was like, we need more. We need another star. It's not about tomorrow. It's about right now because these kids can play right now.

I'm cool with all that. If you were deciding their front office fate, on the one hand, because they have this consortium, like this brain trust that has already gone through one critical period with the draft, and I was going to go through another with the off season where they've got to make decisions on either free agents or making a trade, would you just elevate somebody from within and keep getting Brett Brown's input? or would you go and look at your outside options? I mean, this is kind of tough because this is kind of what happened with the Cavs last year.

Yeah. You look at, you know, David Griffin leaving and then... Dan Gilbert making the correct carry trade by all accounts. And like, Chaunty Billups was in the mix for a little bit, and he's like, wait, what do you need me to do? Oh, no, I'm good. Yeah. I'm good. I'm going to do some big three stuff instead or ESPN stuff.

It doesn't matter. Yeah, especially with everything that you just laid out with all of the different narratives that would have to play out no matter who was signed I think the pressure is a little too much for whoever would step in I think they do have to kind of look at things internally

that being said I think they are looking at things internally and I think that draft night was a pretty clear indication of like the new culture there that's a mercenary move man it is that is a and he Brett Brown

went out there, he said, this is my move. I love McAil Bridges. I love his mom. This was a really difficult decision, and it was a no-brainer. And that was like, oh, okay. And you want to know what? He loves Dario, and he loves Bobby Covington, and he probably loves Fultz, and all those other things.

He'd do it tomorrow. And that is, I think, maybe the most surprising part of everything that happened with this front office situation. aside from the Brenner Counts and Eric Jr. is that Brett Brown, who is very much a player's coach, like JJ was saying, aside from the $23 million that he got as the principal reason why he went to Philly,

that Brett was a big reason why. And all those guys that you just said that he loves, they love him back too, right? And that's why I was very hesitant and skeptical about Brett sort of marshalling this whole effort because I wondered if he could have that cold-blooded, calculated position. But even before the clandulation.

situation happened at the end of the season, Brett Brown was like there may be a contingent of our fan base that wants to do this organically. Yeah. And to them I say, I disagree. It's amazing. To them I say we need an all-star. We need another all-star. I still think that Brett should just be the coach and he should give input to the front office. Right. But in the interim, while they're figuring that out, and whether that's a front office that they go and get an external candidate or they promote internally, I like him having feedback. But the idea of Brett being able to pull those moves, like really, I was surprised, and he gets full marks for it. And you have been on the Ricky many times. You've been on the Ricky many times. I was surprised by the reaction,

by some of the fan base, not the hardcore rights to Ricky people, but some of the other, like, provincial Philadelphia people who said, I can't believe they did that to poor McHale and his mom. Like, that's such an old provincial, parochial Philadelphia reaction. I thought we were post that. Like, we're into the process now. We're supposed to be making smart moves all the time. You should go outside. It's a little bit contentious out there in the world right now. It turns out that people will disagree with pretty much anything that happens. I was like, I don't understand you get this extra asset that seems like perfectly processed. Yeah, I mean, look, I think that Sixers fans, this is the cool thing about being a Sixers fan

is that what used to be family business and you would only care if you lived within the tri-state area is now national talking points. And that's what's kind of fascinating about it. There are very few NBA franchises that have their business on Front Street. Like that's basically Philly, the Lakers, the Celtics, you know, the calves when LeBron is there, to some extent, the thunder just because we're also invested in the Westbrook soap opera. And a couple other teams, but nobody really like cares what the Pacers do. No offense to the Pacers. But it's not like we're like, oh my God, Miles Turner got cut this summer. You think it's going to all come together?

I mean, like, he'll either be good or give you won't. But like, this is why. He had me write 3500 words on the Pacers earlier these years. I mean in terms of like the interworking of the front office and like what they may or may not do. We're not talking about that with a lot of teams. All right, I want to wrap up with some draft talk. Oh, wait, can I ask you guys one question?

Yes, please. How good would a Ben Joel Kauai starting lineup be with player X and Y filling in and players, you know, A, B, and C on the bench? How hard would it be to rebuild a team if that was the case? I don't think it's too hard. Like, especially with Kauai, you add an element that the Sixers just didn't have, which was a go-to ISO. For the first quarter score.

Yeah. Right. And filling that around with 3D players is a lot easier than what they had to do last year. Yeah. Look, I think as currently comprised, they need more, right? I look at the, and not just against the Celtics, but if you have aspirations of getting out of these, you definitely need more. So if you're going to just plug in Kauai and extract some of those other guys, I think. think that is still more because Kauai is, when he's right, one of the best two-way players in the NBA,

he can also hit a three-pointer. This is excellent. This would be wonderful. I think what Steve Kerr said earlier when the NBA finals had just started when he talked about, like, their bench being a little wonky and who they were starting at the five depending on matchups and who was available health-wise. What he was really saying was, we have four amazing guys and the rest of the team doesn't matter. Yes. Three amazing guys is a great place to start. Sure. What if the fourth guy is LeBron? Chris, now you're talking to me here. I love this. Well, they made that.

They specifically got from 10 to 16 to save a million dollars. Yeah. They got rid of some of those second round picks, so they didn't have to spend money on that. They have created, they can probably pretty easily with a Jared Bayless favor, create Max Space. Right. So you make the trade for Kauai.

You sign LeBron. It's Joelle, Ben, LeBron, Kauai. Let's go for it. I'm in. I love all of that. That's the recipe. If you want to beat the Warriors, you want to beat the Rockets,

you want to beat the Celtics. That's the kind of team you have to put together. And that is the recipe. You need one guy to be able to guard each of the Warriors' cornerstone players. So you have Joel Embed,

Ben Simmons, Kauai, LeBron. You could put them on any combination of Draymond, KD, Clay, you know, Steph. This is NBA Reddit fanfic

and I'm here for all of it. Yeah, I hope you know if that happens, you and I both have to move back to Philadelphia. Listen, I already have the house. I'll kick the runners out and we're in. I'm hoping that that happens. I wasn't ready for that scenario. I've decided the most important thing is to really spend time with you.

You know what? I've missed you so much. We'll have dinners. It'll be wonderful. All right, draft takeaways quickly. Anything that you've been thinking about since the draft, Danny Chow, that maybe surprised you or that you think is regrettable, now that you've thought some more about it,

there are players that were taken that you didn't think were in some good spots. I was, I mean, and this is kind of a deep cut, but I was kind of surprised that Kada Bates drop out of Ohio State fell to 50. We originally had him in our mock draft at 20 to the wolves, and the wolves ended up getting him at 50. There may be some injury concerns. He did have a stress injury in his leg that took him out for. a good amount of the college season

about two years ago, but man, this guy's like a perfect 3-n-D guy, 7-3 wingspan can probably guard like three positions. You get him at 50? On a non-guaranteed deal with that second round pick? That's awesome. It's a steal.

But other than that, look, it's Luca. Yeah. That's all I can think about. I thought, you know, I think going into this draft, we thought there was going to be a lot more movement, a lot more trades and a lot more volatility. But what this draft was really nice about, I really enjoyed this draft for was I was going into this draft. I was like, the top of this draft was bad teams and they're going to be bad teams next

year and none of this matters. And I, I lost myself into the romance of this draft because now Phoenix and Dallas are at the top of my league pass rankings. Yeah. And so, and I'm kind of curious about Atlanta. I mean, I'm just got, I'm kind of curious, like, you guys are going to try and make the, the friggin bargain bin warriors. This is great. I'm really excited to see even the first 10 games, and then they'll get wiped off the face of the earth. But I'm very excited to see these teams that I was just kind of like, let me know next time they draft. And with Phoenix especially, I'm like, that's a competitive little team you just put together.

With all their draft picks, they've really created a full outline of what a modern NBA team looks like. From every single position, every single skill set, it makes a lot of sense whether or not it comes together on the court. You can never know, but it looks interesting at least. And Dallas automatically just becomes like must-see TV. I'm super excited to watch Dallas. I'm less excited to watch, and this is the last one for you guys,

but I just wanted to bring it up because Mo Baba went to Orlando. I like him. I like him as a human. I think he's going to be a good player. Definitely a John Hammond player. I think he's right. And I think that from what I understand, Orlando did the most work on him and was very interested in him and was surprised that he fell fine.

great. The fit with the guys that they already have, they still need to move some guys out. They still have Vucevich. They've got two more years of Bionbo. They're constantly drafting big dudes that they don't know what to do with. It's a new administration.

I'm hopeful because of that. I just hope that they clear some of those other guys out so he can actually get on the floor and develop. John, go ahead. Pop quiz. Yes. Can you guess the average wingspan of the three guys they brought in from the draft?

Oh, this is great. Is it seven feet? it's 7-5 Oh wow Every So Bamba obviously Scues that a lot But each of their other two guys

Have seven two and seven three wingspans And they're like twos and threes They do not have a single playmaker on their roster They don't have any point guards No And they have no shot makers So in two years they're going to be Really interesting

Like when they get Like three guards and two wings That can shoot a little bit They'll be really interesting I mean they bring Gordon back They probably should Why not two years from now

the Orlando Magic and Kevin Clark story he's very excited about that Isaac Bomba and Gordon is like a weird fun front line there's nobody there to throw them out somebody tossed on the ball I mean it's look it's Steve Clifford he was a stand-band

Gundy disciple classic build a wall form of wall defense the magic have enough arms to like build a wall around America don't tell Donald Trump yeah don't tell him yeah

Yeah, keep that to us. All right, so make sure that you read all about the wall building. Danny Chowell have all kinds of pieces coming up. You're writing. You edit stuff. You're everywhere. Is draft class still happening? Draft class was amazing.

Congratulations. Congratulations on draft class. If there's not more draft class, he'll be on group chat and on heat check. Do you have sources say this week, Chris Ryan? No, I got to do the watch. It's a TV season. You can't miss Chris Ryan. He's everywhere.

If it's not sources say, it'll be something else. You'll listen to him, you'll read him. He'll be editing me. To both of you, gentlemen, thank you. All right, before we bring in Brian Curtis, we're going to take a quick break for a word from our sponsors. Heechek is brought to you by Sonos. With Sonos, you can control music with your voice.

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I'm very excited about our next guest from the world-renowned press box podcast, the best media writer in the game. For the first time ever on Heat Check, making this, I think, the biggest crossover event since what? Adventures Infinity War. Really? Brian Curtis is here. For me, this is like the three Michelin-starred restaurant of Ringer podcast. The Pressbox is like the food truck that's parked over on the side of the road. Really is. I see that truck parked on the side of the road. I pull over.

I get everything on the menu. It's an excellent podcast. Everybody should be listening to the press box with one David Shoemaker. We love that. But you also write about a million media related things for us. And you did. You killed two stories last week that I was very excited to read. It's all a blur.

It was wonderful. I want to start with the most recent one, Woge at the NBA draft. And Woj deciding that, you know what? Fuck that. I'm going to do exactly what they told me not to do. And I'm going to tip the picks in a very woge way. It was incredible, isn't it? And I was always kind of uninterested in him tipping the picks from Yahoo because it was just like one of these things I thought Twitter got excited about, but regular people didn't exactly get excited about.

But when it became kind of an insurrection against his bosses at ESPN, then I was like, whoa. So the NBA made this pronouncement ahead of the draft where they said our partners, we talked to our partners, ESPN being their principal partner. And they've been informed that they should not tip these picks. Yes. And we have been told, in return, the league, that they will not tip these picks. And I guess technically he didn't tip the picks. But what happened was for a little backstory, Mark Stein and Shams at the New York Times and also Yahoo pre-draft, kind of each broke a little bit of news. And immediately Woge went Wodge nuclear and was using these euphemisms to announce the picks ahead of time.

Right. Stein, who was formerly of ESPN, who was handcuffed to ESPN, now free at the New York Times to tip anything he. he wants, presumably. Yeah, and the first thing Woh's did it was this extremely informed mock draft before the draft started, which seemed to really skirt the definition of tipping the picks. Like, what if I just tipped them like two hours before the draft started? What if I just told you what the first six picks are going to be? Does that count? Is that a violation of the rules?

And by the way, we should add Woj's own bosses at ESPN. We're telling the New York Times the morning of the draft, we're not going to be tipping the picks. So this was just something that came down from the league. this was something that came down directly from ESPN. We're not going to take the starch out of our telecast of the draft by tipping the picks. And then he was like, you know, he first started out right, and they are lasering in on.

Yeah. They are considering they are highly motivated to select. Like he was doing these great euphemisms. The euphemisms were, he started the, like at first they were, I was like, okay, that's interesting. And then they were really funny. And then I'm like, he's got to run out of these. I don't know what he's going to do.

So here are some of them. He had locked on, tantalized by, unlikely to resist, are focused on, have no plans to pass on. And my personal favorite, because it was so goddamn bizarre, has a laser on. Like at some point he was like, I don't know. I'm running out of shit to say here. How do you think that it went over with the league? Do you think that the league was mad? What kind of blowback?

Do you think ESPN got? Because obviously, Woj is as untouchable. in this game as we could possibly have as a media member. So he's sort of insulated from any potential blowback, but clearly, like, the league could not have been happy about that. So I think that the answer to question, what you just said is all about power, right? At the end of the day, this isn't about, did you follow the letter of the policy at ESPN or something from the league we wanted you to do?

This is about how powerful are you, right? And ESPN made a decision that wages are the guy of our NBA coverage. Maybe the single force of our NBA coverage with all these people kind of arrayed around him and underneath them. And, you know, to me, it's one of those things where it's like, come on now. Come on now, Adrian. But I don't know. And he did it anyway. I don't think it doesn't think at the end of the day it really matters. It's like, what are you going to do? You're locked into this guy for big money for a long time. And he's, you know, clearly wants to be the dominant insider among insiders at the draft. By the way, we should also note, Woj not known as either a yuckster or a wordsmith.

No. So these tweets were pretty out of character. This is high comedy for him. Yeah. This is him doing schick. This is shit. Which is very, you're right, very out of character. But I want to, I want to interrogate like the idea of the power because I think part of it is tethered to his contract.

Right. Like he, they cleared out Mark Stein and a bunch of people that bring in Woage. So he could do exactly this, right? And if, if nothing else, Woj's magic tricks about knowing the news before the news happens, like that's his brand. That's the number one thing. in terms of value that he brings to previously Yahoo and now to ESPN. So, like, trying to get him not to do that was like, that was never going to happen. But I think aside from just the money component of it, I had a general manager one time

described Woge to me as the 31st general manager in the NBA because he's plugged in and, like, that's the kind of, like, information is power. And he has more of it than anybody. Is he like the, I think about this all the time. Is he the most powerful media member across sports? Then if anybody within their own league? Yeah, I would say that even more than maybe that Schaefter has in the NFL, right? It would be comparable, right?

Schefter's the, yeah, he's the one that you'd compare him to. But when you had that moment during the draft where it was the Hawks and the Bucks, right? Yeah. Where the Hawks were thinking about trading up two spots to the Bucks pick and Wode said, oh, no, the Bucks are going to take this guy. So all of a sudden the Bucks, you know, couldn't say, oh, well, you know, you have to trade up two spots. for us because your guy might not be there. And the Hawks were like, oh, well, we already know who's going to pick. We just read Twitter. Yeah. And so, I mean, I don't know that that happens

in other sports in exactly the same way. I mean, the thing is, these are the dumbest scoops, right? And I say that as a compliment to Woe's, right? His big scoops this off season are, what are the Lakers going to do, right? Where is LeBron going to, you know, stuff like that, not who is somebody going to pick in two minutes, right? This is a relatively low-level scoop. It's a low-level scoop. So it has to really hit a different sort of sort of side of information where a team is looking at it and saying, we're going to use Woj's intel, which he has thrown up on Twitter to do something during the draft, rather than just this decision is going to happen in two minutes.

I think you're right. Like him being able to tip picks a couple of minutes ahead of time is low level scupage. However, it speaks to like how plugged in he is for all of these things, like how he knows where all the bodies are buried because everybody tells, first they killed the person and then they inform Woj where the plots are. I'll give you, for instance, when I lived and worked primarily in Philadelphia, I had a story about Jalea Locoford running a foul of, there was an incident in a nightclub where a gun had been pulled on him,

and I had it before anybody else. And I went to the Sixers, and I asked them for comment. And their reaction was, first, okay, yeah, we knew about this. Second, do you mind if we tell Woge first? This was actually somebody in the organization who I said, well, yeah, I do mind. And I'm going to put that thing up before you can make the phone call. So you want to give me a reaction here. But I always thought about that as everybody in the league is terrified of not giving the information to Woge first

because he has made it clear that he will get the information first and he will be that guy. And you'll go through him or you won't go through anybody at all. Oh, totally. And I think when you look at the draft thing, it's muscle flexing. Right. I can do this. Yeah. Right. I mean, the advantage to readers is, let us say minimal.

But like to the rest of the world and the message it sends the rest of the world is like, look, I can do this. No one else, you know, those other guys who don't have the handcuffs that ESPN is allegedly placed on me, they can't, they can't do it as well as I can. So watch this. What I always wonder this, though, right? Like, what is the motivation? I get that because all of us have relationships and we talk to people in the league. And certain people will, like, you know, give you information. But what is the motivation for the entire league to identify Woj and to make sure that Woj

gets fed first? Like, what kind of leverage does Woge have in that situation? Because there's only so much damage he could really do. So what are, like, why? Well, I think with insiders, typically, it's that they have information that you want, right? Right. So Woge may know something that would help. Yeah, or just, it's intel trading, you know.

And then there's, you know, the poison pen, right? which he's had at various times. He has. So the, you know, the team is making a calculation of, you know, do we, maybe if we help this guy out, he won't be so hard on us. Now, whether that actually happens with him, I have no idea because I don't, you know, not privy to the billion conversations he apparently has on a daily basis. But, yeah, I mean, that, to me, are the two things that motivate with insiders. I think the other thing that's fascinating about him is at the end of the day, he's much bigger as a character than any of these stories, right? Yes.

I mean, we can look at all these stories. To me, I always compared him very weirdly, but I think appropriate. appropriately to Nikki Fink. Remember when she was just ruling Hollywood? And then you'd look at the story to be some mid-level executive paramount. Like, I don't even know who this is. I've never heard of this person.

And the story at the end of the day is not that important. But it's the character of Nikki and Woj going against the league, right? Like, I'm, I don't care what anybody says. I'm bringing you the news. I don't care what my employer says. I don't care what the NBA says. That's what's intriguing about it, right? It's this guy kind of like, you know.

The character is absolutely true. And, you know, ESPN is not absolved of this because they got very meta post-fact. So in theory, they should have been like, we're the employer, we're going to wrap you on the knuckles, whatever. They didn't. They actually went the other way. On O'TL, they talked about Woage, tipping picks. Jeremy Schap was talking about Woge with Kate Fagan in that group and like getting into the conversation about one of their own guys circumventing the league rules and doing exactly what your employer told them not to. And then on top of that,

Woge went on with Scott Van Pelt and talked about it. It's amazing. Like, it blew my mind. Oh, yeah. And I was watching mostly ESPN2's show when I was watching television during the draft. The little jump panel they convened. And they were like, oh, well, look at my phone here. Woz just told us what the 13th pick is.

So there you go. Everybody seems to be in on the joke here. And it's not a bad joke, by the way. I mean, to me, it's sort of delightful. And, you know. It made the draft. more interesting because I don't care if they tip the picks or not. You know, like, we're going to know, but how he did it.

Kudos to Oge. Kudos to you. It was a very interesting story. You also wrote another one last week about LeBron that I wanted to talk to you about. And it's about how LeBron interacts with the media and how he sort of reshaped his image post decision 1.0 where he had to play the heel for a second and that wasn't, I don't think he was quite ready for that. And since then, he's rehabbed everything and gotten back in good with, uh,

the Cleveland media, the national media. I saw it a lot this year. I wrote a lot of Cleveland pieces, and it was very interesting to me to see that interaction. And you talk to some of those guys about that. Yeah, it's Joe Varden and Jason Lloyd, Dave McMedeman,

who LeBron calls my three wives. Yes. A term I predict will not last much longer because it's got to get it's into dicey territory. But yeah, I mean, one interesting thing about reporting that story that was interesting is we often think of these superstars, I think, correctly, as bigger than the team, right?

LeBron is at some level just bigger than the Cleveland Cavaliers, right? He does what he wants. But teams have... He's the woge of the Cleveland Cavalers. He's the mojo, EPA superstars. But teams have a real impact on the way these guys deal with the media. We've seen this is Kevin Durant, right? Kevin Durant in OKC, a famously press averse franchise, he was kind of surly, kind of combative.

He goes to Golden State and all of a sudden he's, you know, a pretty easy interview, I think, by the standards of guys at his level, right? Because Golden State just says, come on in, talk to our superiors. superstars, no problem. LeBron was the same way. A little bit hard to get in Cleveland, hurt by the decision. But then the Miami heat say, no, no, no, you talk to the media every day. You don't get to skip out the post practice availability. You're going to talk to them every day. So he gets all these reps, as we say, right? Plus, he's making the finals every year. So he just has more press conferences than people. And then all of a sudden you sort of morph into this guy who's, I think, on balance, probably press friendly. I think that's probably fair to call, you know, even during the finals, and you were at some of these, I'm sure.

all those post-game press conferences, he's getting killed and embarrassed. And other than the Mark Schwartz thing, he was a pretty great interview. He was fantastic. And you told a great, you had a great anecdote in there about the Mark Shorts thing. And I was, I saw all of these up close and watched the ball unfold. And I thought that like there are times when yes, LeBron can be a little prickly and decide that like this is dumb. I don't want to deal with this. And he told Mark Shorts to be better. And he picked up his little suitcase and his short pants suit and he walked out. But as you. As you. you mentioned and as Windhorst noted at the end, the main takeaway from that exchange on Do Better was, we're going to do this again tomorrow. Yeah. So despite this sort of testy exchange, let's do it again. We get another shot at this. And he was. Yeah.

And he gave this amazing one between games three and four, which is probably his best press conference of the season, right? Where he knew the series was over. Now we can talk about like, and then he had that whole thing about like, I want guys that aren't just good at basketball, but think the game the way I do. He was leaving breadcrumbs right for decision 3.0 in that press conference and sort of sort of subtweeting maybe the Cleveland Cavaliers. Yeah, sure. The game of basketball, especially in game one with Jared Smith, right?

But he was great. And even after game four, he was great. I thought that he this year, so before the playoffs, I wrote several Cavalier stories that wrote quite a few during the playoffs, I thought all season long because it was such a weird year for the Cavs from before the trade deadline where they had all that drama with Isaiah. Thomas and they didn't know how he fit. And Drake and Jay Crowder wasn't on board with everything. And then post-trade deadline when those guys went out and they brought in these young guys and they weren't available and there were a lot of injury issues, LeBron was start to finish this year, shockingly candid.

Like maybe this has been what we were always building to. But ask a question, get an answer more times than not about the billboards that went up and him being quartered by other teams and having to incorporate all these new pieces and things not working out and in flat out saying, I don't know what we have right before the playoffs. I thought all year long that was, this is the LeBron we've always wanted. Like the LeBron that was promised of we get to see what he's actually thinking. Yeah, and I think part of that is just being 30, you know, post-30, right? Yeah.

He's also got the legacy secure, right? If Bronn retired tomorrow, he'd be the player he wanted. Of course he wants more rings. Of course he wants all that stuff. But like, I just think there's a certain. It was funny. I found this old piece by Bob Ryan and wrote about Larry Bird. And Larry, when he got to, like, age 31, went from being kind of difficult and kind of prickly to all of a sudden great and going, hey, boys, what do you need today?

And I think LeBron has had that similar quality, too. I think the maturation and, like, yeah, you get into these 33 and you start to figure out, like, this is a massive platform. I have the biggest one of anybody, and I can use it to, you know, there was the day of the press conference in between, I believe it was three and four when the Eagles decided that they weren't going to the White House. and he was the first person to talk about it. Oh, he just preemptively declared, by the way, none of us are, none of us on either team are going. And it was something I hadn't really, I hadn't thought about it. Like, of course, those two teams aren't going. But what he was really saying was probably nobody in the NBA is going, ever, until this is a new White House.

And he was the first person to make the declaration. And you go, oh, right, of course. And if also that was also like the take charge, like, I got this. Yeah. Guys, we're not going to, you don't have to worry about the quote. I'm just going to preemptively declare we're not. None of us. even got this other team are going.

I got this right now. He thinks about the story. And the same way that he thinks the game, he thinks the storylines. I totally believe that. I heard that from so many people. And I kept saying, what does that practically mean? And they would tell me stories about it just the way he is in the locker room. It was like, I don't think he can't hear every interview that his teammates again,

but they said he's very aware. Like if Brian Curtis walked in the locker room, he didn't know who I was. He would know. He would know. He knows press box. He listens to press box. He would. But if I were talking to Kevin Love for like,

He would just be like, he would be aware of that happening. Now, he may not care at the end of the day, but he'd be like, I wonder what that guy's up to. I wonder who that is. I wonder what that guy's up to. There was another, just so many wonderful anecdotes in that story. But in the LeBron piece, you had another one where Winhorse was sort of kind of listening to a different interview. But what he was really doing was trying to see if LeBron was limping. Yeah, that was after game three.

And LeBron caught him checking him out to see if he was limping because he knew exactly what he was looking for. Totally. He said, you're trying to see if I'm. limping, aren't you? And Winhorse just kind of shakes his head yes. And LeBron's as if I'd let you see that. Meaning like, I knew when I walked to the shower and you had one eye on me, I wasn't going to limp because of this. And then, of course, as Windhorst told me later, LeBron's hand was actually hurt, which one horse did not know. So he's actually looking for the wrong thing. It's crazy that, I mean, he's not just the king of basketball. He is very much like the sovereign

of storylines. And he's thinking about all these things, which is why I wonder how much that will influence his decision. He has until Friday to pick up his player option or if he's going to opt out and become a free agent. But if he is going to become a free agent, there's the basketball component. Where do I go and build a super team? What teams have the assets available? Can I convince Paul George to go to L.A. with me? Or could they get Kauai? Or do I go to the Sixers and team up with Ben Simmons and Joel Embed, which Chris Ryan right before you came on brought up? And I think that's a genius idea. But beyond just the basketball, There's the storyline component.

Like when I was at the finals, I was talking to some other writers about it and somebody had mentioned Miami. And the general consensus was, no, he already did that. Like he already did that story. He already came home once and it was to Cleveland and he won a championship. Going back to Miami doesn't get him anything. Going to L.A. And joining the Lakers, that's interesting.

Or teaming up in Philly or doing half a banana boat in Houston. These are all storylines that I think he might want to sell. You're right, though. It does have a certain narrative quality. all those other things. Cleveland just feels like a repeat. Like we've already done that, right? And we've already seen how far you can get with this, you know, bad team around you.

But no, I think that's right. And I think he probably does think about that stuff. Also, you know, owning uninterrupted and having a media company of his own, you know, narrative is like the worst word in the world, right? And now because we just get bombarded with it so much. But, no, I absolutely believe he thinks of that kind of stuff. And also the thing is he gave a really interesting interview to Rachel Nichols Nichols of being his season when he sort of said, like, look,

Kevin Durant, Paul George, all these guys that left home to go somewhere else, left quote unquote home, meaning the home they were conscripted to play in. They didn't have, it's over now. Decision 1.0 got all those demons out, right? Now you can do this. It's okay. And teams, and I think he's very aware of that, too. That nobody at the end of the day is really going to get mad at if it leaves Cleveland. No, there would be very few.

Somebody will burn a jersey because somebody will want to do that. Yeah. But this is not going to be like some, you know, angry hurt reaction like it was last time. I mean, it'll be fine. You got to clear out the closet sometimes. You take a match. It's much quicker. I wonder, though, about with LeBron and, like, the way decision 1.0 and 2.01, there was just a story by Woj

and Ramona that said that LeBron has decided he doesn't want any elaborate pitch meetings. He doesn't want a production this time. Okay. Part of me goes, makes sense. He learned from all this. Like, he's going to just choose his situation anyway. On the other hand, to the storyline part, as much as LeBron's, he goes, he learned. LeBron doesn't want to have that stuff front and center.

He does, however, like to be front and center. He always comes up with stuff to be the main topic of conversation in the NBA. That was part of the show, right? LeBron goes to your city and comes in and gets a meeting. I don't know if at the end of the day, like on round three, that he has realized that has just become irritating to people and that you're just going to piss off the other five. You know, you're going to piss off Philly and Houston and, you know, if you wind up not going to those places. So there's maybe that part of it.

I'm always somebody thought, I don't think there was any moral distinction between decision one and decision two. Decision two was just written by Lee Jenkins. Right. So it just sounded better. Yeah. I mean, it just, it's like he, but again, that was part of his new thing. He hired a new media advisor, Adam Mendelsohn. And clearly the thing was, how do I do this in such a way that people on Twitter and, you know, out in the universe will like it versus get mad at me and get mad at Jim Gray and the whole thing they did the first time.

Well, not not having Jim Gray is a good start in terms of. of not getting, people are not getting mad at you. That production was just, I mean, going back, look at that. It's amazing. It's really amazing. All right. So, last one for you, storyline-wise for LeBron. Where do you want to see him go? Ooh, just in terms of, like, pure, like, give me, just entertainment. Feed the Ringer content machine. Like, we're plugging quarters into the Ringer machine here. It's hard to think, I mean, I sort of think it's a draw between L.A. and something like Philly Houston. Yeah. I do. I think. L.A. would just be, L. L.A. first of

be a new team because he'd have two or three amazing teammates, right? Yeah. But Philly would just be incredible. I feel like we're very Eastern Conference here at the Ringer. Yeah. So we would just take all the Eastern Conference angst that we already have and just dial it up to 11, right? If we went to Philly. Either of these would be great scenarios for me personally. Here's what, to pull back the curtain a little bit, when people ask me who I root for, I root for me. So storyline wise, if he's in L.A., that's in my backyard. And if it's in Philly, guess what, mom, I'm coming home, get dinner. ready. It would be wonderful. What else do you have working on that we can plug? You've got the press box coming up. Yeah, good press box coming up. We're going to talk about, I know it's incredible. We're going to talk

about some stuff Trump did. Over the course of the last week, the media and the border and immigration and all that stuff, which is a heartrending story and also a fascinating media story. Make sure to check that out as my favorite podcast at the ringer. You guys kill it every single week. And also, you'll be writing other things and we'll be reading you and listening to you and it's wonderful. With any luck. All of those things. So thank you to Brian Curtis.

I want to thank Chris Ryan as well. Danny Chow was here. Evan for filling in for Isaac who is just off gallivanting in Orlando. Make sure that you check out Verno and KOC on the Ringer NBA show on Tuesday. We've got group chat coming up. We've got Bill Simmons is everywhere.

Ringer FC. The Ringer Podcast Network, tons of content. You want to listen to all of it. And we will be back next week on He-Chek. Thanks for listening, gang. Bye.