The Ringer NBA Show - NBA All-Star Reserves, Lakers Back on the Court. Plus: Matisse Thybulle, Snubbed? | The Mismatch

Episode Date: January 31, 2020

We run through the list of All-Star reserves and debate whether guys like Bradley Beal have a good case for feeling left out (2:33). Then, we talk about the emotion surrounding the Lakers return to the court following Kobe Bryant’s death (27:07), and finish by going over Kawhi’s latest knee trouble and the Rising Stars lineup announcements (30:00). Hosts: Chris Vernon and Kevin O’Connor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Brilliant Earth's exclusive, unique designs are brought to life by Master Jewelers, and they offer free shipping and returns on all orders. For a limited time, you can earn toward a future purchase when you buy now. Order today for delivery by Valentine's Day and receive complimentary diamond. and earrings with any engagement ring purchase. To see terms for this special offer and receive Brilliant Earth credit with your purchase, go to BrilliantEarth.com slash ringer NBA. Welcome to The Ringer NBA show.

I'm Chris Vernon and join me as he does every Friday from the Ringer.com. It's Kevin O'Connor, A.K. Kevin O'Bomber, A.K. Kevin O'Connor, A.K.K.O. Kavanaugh, Kavanaugh, what's going on this morning? Well, before we get to anything, two quick notes. I wanted to send a heartfelt thank you to all of you that have reached out to Kevin and I after the podcast on Tuesday. It's a podcast that surely we did not want to have to do considering the subject. And we did get rather personal talking about a lot of different things. And there were so many people that reached out over the course of the past three days.

I was rather overwhelmed. And so a gigantic thank you to all of you that listen and. you know, said such nice things because it's something that I think everybody that is a sports fan has been kind of coming to terms with since the tragic passing of Kobe Bryant and his daughter on Sunday. And so I just wanted to say that, you know, I'm not great about responding to as many people as I'd like to. And so I wanted to at least let everybody know that we read all of those and that certainly appreciate those listening and the kind words. Absolutely. Thank you, everybody so much. I still have to get to responding to some emails and messages, but thank you so much.

It means the world that in some way it made a positive impact to hear us talk about it because it just means as much to us to get that positive feedback and positive thoughts and vibes in return. So thank you. And second thing is the Super Bowl is coming up this weekend and we have many times taken over for Kevin Clark and Robert Mays, though no one has ever asked us to. on this particular show. By the way, their pod has been great this week from the Super Bowl.

If you're a nerd, the one with Warren Sharp is just unbelievable. I love it. Is Warren Sharp one of the smartest humans on planet Earth? For sure. Is he actually human?

He's so smart. And his mustache, we're talking about facial hair. He has a great mustache. Just saying. Kevin. That dude, all right,

listen to this. You ready for this? Now, this dude wrote a 45, page preview to the Super Bowl. I have never written 45 pages of anything in my life. I mean, maybe like in college, I was struggling.

I was doing like double spacing. You're trying to change fonts, anything. Like size 12.5 times do Roman? Unbelievable. This dude wrote a 45, I mean, you got to really, you got to love. the damn Super Bowl pull that off anyways

the pod with Warren's great there is a sports book that has opened eight minutes from my studio Kevin and just this week and I think I'm going to race over after everything's done today

and go check it out and see what they've got up for the game this weekend what would Kevin O'Connor tell me to put my money down on 49ers oh really you're

that Kyle Shahn offense Mina Kimes put out a great stat last week about how the chiefs, I don't remember off the top of my head, I've been busy with basketball in life, but chiefs don't do well against offenses that have a lot of motion pre-snap.

And Fort San Francisco uses more motion than anybody by far. You mean they struggle? You say they struggle against it? Yes, it's Kansas City's defense struggles against motion offenses. And that's what San Francisco does more than anybody else. It's just an interesting little tidbit to keep in mind when you sit down on Sunday

and with your buddies and you're with your family and you're watching the game. Just watching out for that how Kansas City's defense prepared and adapts over the course of the game against San Francisco's pre-stamp motion offense. And maybe if San Francisco has any new wrinkles in what they do. Mahomes just feels like one

of those that like if I bet against them I'd be like what am I doing? Why? Why am I betting on I get it to team sport? But it's Jimmy Garapolo and Patrick Mahomes are the two guys. Like you got to trust one of them, right? in the biggest spot. Yeah.

And I'll tell you this. Just real quick as an aside, I'm always the guy that like typically takes the defense is in these spots, right? Like whether it is Seattle, you know, or it was New England or it was that Denver team. Or, you know, I'll typically take the much superior defense, which is clearly the 49ers in this, right? But then, and the same thing goes in college. And then Clemson. and got absolutely blown out by LSU.

And you remember the Eagles, obviously you remember, the Eagles beat the Patriots. And I've just been thinking over the last couple of years, and this is the same and true across sports, is like, all right, are we now just in this offensive age where this feeling I had for so long, like the defenses can really win,

the defense wins championships, as we've said forever, right? That maybe that's not the case anymore. I don't know. Well, and that's why, you know, just to tie this to NBA real quickly, with the Patriots losing that Super Bowl against the Eagles, this is why you can't use Super Bowl or finals losses against a LeBron or Tom Brady. Because Tom Brady in that game against the Eagles had one of the greatest quarterback performances in history, period.

And he lost. Just like LeBron has had magnificent performances in the finals and he's lost as well. Well, it's unfair to use their record in those big games. I think this is going to be way high school. I do think that. Yeah, I do think so. So I hope it's good. I hope it's a great Super Bowl Sunday.

I don't have some kind of like massive rooting interest, so I love this. It's two awesome teams, and it's a great Super Bowl. Anyways, let's get to what's happened to the NBA. And the biggest news from yesterday was the NBA and its All-Star game and changing the format. It is in Chicago this year, and the teams are going to compete to win each of the first three quarters, all of which start with a score of zero-zero. zero and will be 12 minutes long. At the start of the fourth quarter, the game clock will be turned off and the final target score will be set.

The final target score will be determined by taking the leading team's total number through three quarters and adding 24 points. The 24, of course, representing the late Kobe Bryant's uniform number. Look, people complain about the All-Star game every single year and they're like, oh, it's an exhibition and who cares and whatever else. So I couldn't care less about them trying to change it and make it more interesting. And I'm fascinated to see if this does actually make it a lot more competitive and more interesting. Also, each quarter, the team that wins, donates to charity as well, correct?

Yes. Right. Like 100,000 after the first, for each of the first three quarters. And then whoever wins the game, it's 300,000 or something like that. Right. That's great. That's cool. I sort of, I'm cool with it.

I think adding the wrinkle at the end of the game, which is effectively the Elamending that we see in other variations of basketball with playing to a number, 2.24 points in the fourth quarter. That's kind of cool. I think it'll be nice to see NBA players playing within this type of system to see how it goes. And it's confusing at first when you read all that out. It kind of goes over your head. But if you sit down for 20 seconds and hear it explained, it's not too bad. It's just the score resets, but it still matters in entering the fourth quarter. Well, and do they care about the quarters now?

You know what I mean? Like, it stands to reason they might actually care if they win the quarter or not, you know? Therefore, creating more competition. Like, I don't have any problem with any of this. Like, you've seen in the NHL, they'll do the three-on-three thing during the All-Star. Why not? I mean, people complain about all of these All-Star games all the time, right? And I know the most tradition laden is baseball.

But if they said next year is the All Star game, strikeouts are worth two outs and home runs are worth two runs. Like, I'd be fine. I don't care. You know what I mean? Like anything to make it more fun. No, no. And I think it's going to be a fun experiment to see it because,

look, obviously doing it as a tribute to Kobe is great. But it's all, but it also for the NBA is a way to test how the ELAM ending works because it has had significant, success in the basketball tournament. It is something that has high approval ratings. It's been fun to watch for basketball fans.

People seem to like it. And Nick Elam himself, the guy who created this, he is super excited to see something like this, a variation of it in the NBA All-Star game. It's a step forward to maybe this becoming something that's more mainstream. Maybe it's something that down the line becomes something that people are interested in seeing happen in the gym. G League to see how it works there. And then maybe someday it happens in the NBA or not.

Maybe not. But it's just fun to see these type of experiments happen in exhibition games or G league games. Because then eventually maybe something is something that's incorporated at certain points of the season, like in a tournament or something like that. Who knows? You never go to G league games, do you? I've never been to a G league game. Okay.

I've been to, I go to them because it's not that far from where I live. And it's the Memphis hustle. But I've gone down there. and they've got different rules now. Like, I don't know how many people know this, but they try different stuff out there all the time. They use it as a lab. And this year, one of the crazy ones was if a guy goes up for like a,

like if a guy goes up for a shot, right, and he gets fouled. Oh, the free throw rule, right? Now it's time to go to the free throw line, and they all get one, one shot for two. That's it. You know what I mean? If you make it, you get two points. If you miss it, you get zero.

And that's it. There is no one point, you know? Absolutely. as a means to speed things up. I don't think that'll ever get adopted, honestly. In the ELEM. But it's interesting to watch. I don't either.

I don't see an ending. However, maybe maybe like if you have a midseason tournament, for example, I could see a world in which the NBA midseason tournament has the ELA ending, which is effectively what you said, where you're playing to a number, and that's when ending ends the game. A shot always ends. the game. The time doesn't just run out. It removes the possibility

or limits the possibility of free throws in the final minutes, intentional following and all that. It can be super, super exciting. If anybody who's watched the TBT, the basketball tournament, it's fun. Yeah, oh, because if you made the number, and let's just say, just for the sake of an example,

I don't know it's low, but let's say you made the number 100, and a team was up, you know, 98 to 80, but then the other team, you know, next thing you know, it's 98-98, now all of a sudden, I mean, how much more drama is that, right? Because the team, you've gone on an 18-0 run and you've stopped this team every time when they've had a chance to win the game. Of course, I love it. I love it. It's more drama. Um, All-Stars were named last night. The All-Star Reserves, uh, were named last night. And, and this is, this is commonplace when this announcement takes place, um, immediately what I saw. So I, I wasn't right by my computer or my phone when the announcement was made. And then when I picked up my phone, the first name I saw like trending was Devin Booker. And I was like, huh?

And obviously I click on it. And it's like Devin Booker not named to the All Star team, right? The negative always sells more than the positive. It's not like a lot of people were saying, wow, Jason Tatum made it or Dumontes Simone. You know, congratulations to Chris Paul for having a bounceback season. It's all like, Rudy Goberry, you did it? Yeah, the trending things are like Booker, Beal, Bledsoe, you know, like, these are all the trending things. And so I click on it, I'm like, oh, they must have just announced them.

And so then I go and I see that they have announced them. And with those announcements, we already had three first time all stars that were announced last week in Luca Donchich, Trey Young, and Pascal Seaccombe. that's right. Now, as of last night, we add six more to that list. Sorry for mansplaining you there. Yeah. The new ones are Subonis, Tatum, out of bio. And then in the west, Donovan Mitchell, Rudy Gobert, and Brandon Ingram. And then you have some, you know, regular face. Jimmy Butler, Ben Simmons, Kyle Lowry, Chris Middleton, Sabonis, Tatum, Adabio in the east.

Were any of those surprising to you in the East Reserves? No, not really. I think I was a little surprised Subonis got named an All-Star. I am happy he did. But I would have expected one of the scorers to get named it over him, like Bradley Beale, or like even Malcolm Brogton, who is running the show without Victor Oladipo there. But I'm happy that a guy got rewarded, like Sabonis, who is putting up numbers, 18 points, 13 rebounds,

five assists, big time numbers for a big man, but he's also doing things beyond the box score with great positional defense, boxing out, setting strong screens, doing things that matter beyond the box score. It's cool to see that get rewarded, but I am a little bit of surprise

as a score and get it as is Bradley Beale's agent and Bradley Beale's girlfriend. Yeah, well, I thought that maybe, simply because, you know, he's missed you know, a good portion of games. He's played, well, not that many. 37 games. I thought maybe Lowry might not get it, but... Yes, that's another one, yeah. They have overperformed as compared to what everybody thought. Everybody thought that they lost Kauai and that they'll be a pretty good team,

but they're 34 and 14, Kevin. They're not pretty good. I mean, their record is truly unbelievable. Well, I think with Beal, I'm sure the coaches looked at him and they're like, yeah, the offensive production is ridiculous, 29, 6, but he's one of the worst defenders in basketball the season on the worst defense in basketball. So I think that was probably the reason why coaches went for a guy like Lowry, who is very important to Toronto's offense. He doesn't have the numbers, but he's integral to their offensive success and he's a top tier defensive player. Yeah, it's pretty wild because there are. two players number six and number eight in the top ten leading scorers in the NBA. And those are Bradley Beal, as you mentioned, at 28.7, Devin Booker at 27.1, and neither of them made it. Two top 10 scorers in the league that did not make the All-Star team this year.

And clearly, you know, if you want to say defense, I mean, I think it's team record was held against them and that these teams, right? Because it's like, okay, it's nice to have. stats, but what do your stats add up to? What do they mean? Right? Because it's a different world if you're on a winning team. When those stats contribute to winning, they should be viewed differently. I'm sorry, they just should. Once upon the time, Michael Carter Williams was like getting triple doubles all the time. They lost every damn night. Like, who cares? So what? And that's why in the Western Conference, I'm a little bit more surprised with somebody like Devin Booker not making granted phoenix right now is only 20 and 27 booker is easily one of the best scores and basketball

by the numbers but also just from watching him play with his ability to get to the basket and score efficiently and draw falls with his ability to hit floaters in the paint with his ability to pull up and generate offense at the end of the clock against great defenses from mid-range with his ability to hit threes off the dribble with his ability to hit threes off the catch and cut into all these things on the offensive end of the floor. And on top of that, he can pass. I'm surprised he didn't make it for his offensive contributions and the fact that he has been much, much better on the defensive end of the floor this season than he has been in the past. And those are the things he got knocked for for being a ball hog, for being a poor defender.

And a lot of that was because of his role, as you and I have talked about before. But I'm surprised that wasn't rewarded. With that said, though, who are you taking it off? off in the West. I mean, you could, you could make an argument for him over Ingham or Paul or Gobert or Lillard, but I'm not sure the argument is so strong or over Westbrook, but I'm not sure it's such a strong argument that anybody's winning that. To me, I look at these teams of 12 players in each conference, and I'm thinking of myself, A, why do we still care about the conferences? But B, more so than that, why only 12 players? There's so many great players in the game. I feel like maybe it should just be more than 12.

Yeah, I mean, it's been 12 forever. And yet the league is expanded. I'm with you on the sense that you got to tell me somebody's undeserving, right? And do I look at this and say any of these guys are undeserving of being an all-star? No, of course I don't. Right. So it's just... I think two, three weeks ago, you could have said Russell Westbrook, but today with the way he's performed as of late, no. He's been awesome. Well, and here's the other thing. We talk about rewarding. winning, there is only one team that is 500 or above that doesn't have a player on these teams.

That is. That is the Memphis Grizzlies. John Moran. Josh shouldn't be over on the team over Booker, though. I mean, all I'm all I'm saying is you take John Morant off. John Moran,

they are three wins away from surpassing their Vegas win total. I'm not kidding. That's unbelievable. That's unbelievable. And this kid, he is in the top four in the NBA and fourth quarter scoring. And how many games do you watch that come down to the fourth quarter? Like 90% of them?

Moran's been awesome. And so when it's time to go, he goes. And if you want to tell me somebody that truly affects winning and losing every single night, I mean, again, his time will come and he'll make 10 in a row probably, barring injury. but he is, it is fascinating. The only team that has a 500 or above record that is not represented is them. And I believe the only guys that are on losing teams are Lillard and Ingram, right? Those are the only teams that have, yeah, the losing record.

I believe so. Well, and Trey Young, of course, right? Who by the way, went the absolute hell off last night. He had, what is a 25 and 10? in the first half or something like that. And for the game, too. Trey Young last night, 39 points, 18 assists.

Only four guys in NBA history have ever had 39 and 18. Oscar Robertson, Lenny Wilkins, Tiny Archibald, and Tim Hardaway. Oscar Robertson did it four times. The other three guys did it once. And Trey's the youngest of those guys to do it. It's remarkable what he's done.

And I'm happy that we talked about this last week. I'm happy that he got rewarded. with being an all-star. I mean, I know the defense is bad for him, but what he does for that Atlanta offense and what he's doing in as an individual player is truly, truly special what we've seen. Yeah, obviously Bradley Beale was the maddest of this,

or at least he was the most honest about his feelings towards it. And he said, his agent and girlfriends put out statements about it. And his trainer, Drew Cannon. Is that true? Drew Hanlon, if we're, yeah, I mean. Put out statements. Yeah, what, you didn't see the thing?

No, please read them to me. I didn't see this. All right. Put out a statement about him not making the All-Star team. I mean, he said last night that it was, you know, I saw where he said it was disrespectful. He said, I'm a little pissed off about it. I know how I am, so I was kind of expecting it.

Honestly, it's disrespectful, but the real ones know. I'll just keep competing. I'm going to try to get my team to the playoffs for sure. When do they play again? because God, I wouldn't want to be facing him. Guy might go for 75 points in this next game. I mean, because he's for real pissed about this whole thing. Mark Bartlestein, Bradley Bale's agents,

put out a long two-paragraph statement about Bradley Bale not being on the team, and I'm just going to skim through it, said, quote, it's unprecedented for a player to have the type of season that Brad is having to not be in the All-Star game. The Eastern Conference coaches have become robotic and thinking they just have to

reward players that are on the winningest teams. The players know in these coaches, if they're being honest, there's nobody in the Eastern Conference other than Yannis that they game plan for are harder than they game plan for Brad. That's the reality of it. Oh my goodness. What's because he's the only player on his team? Who else are you going to plan for?

Is Smith? I mean, Admiral to be fair. I mean, like, what are we talking about here? You got a game plan from my. my guy, Mo Wagner. Oh, yeah. And Davis Bertons, they plan for him because he shoots a million threes. Unfortunately, Moe's been missing time.

Moe's out. So, yes, they got a game plan for three guys. This is all I would have said. If I'm Mark Bartolstein, if I'm any agent, if I'm anybody, right? This is what I say. I say, look, now, we called Elias. All right, this guy averages 28.7 points per game. And the only player to ever average that many points entering an All-Star break

and not be an All-Star was World Be Free in 1978. Like, what the hell is going on here? In the last 40 years, if you average 28.7 points per game, you're on the damn All-Star team. And he's third in the Easter conference at scoring. Like, come on, man. Like, and I would actually, if you told me that, then I'd be like, you know what, fair's fair. I mean, if we're going back to world, be free, this is pretty effed up.

You know, here's a simple solution. Make the All-Star team 15 guys for each conference or 30 total in the league. The top 30 guys make the game or make it the top 25, whatever number you want to do, but add a couple spots. It's simple as that. And then you remove the possibility of there being egregious snubs like this. And yes, there might be years where a guy makes it that they shouldn't. but whatever man

I do think Bradley Beal deserves to be an all-star he does deserve to be an all-star but there's other guys that I also don't cry about it because his team sucks and sorry but they do and I don't want to hear that he be you know there it's you know

he's paying for staying because that you know then that that that bothers me because then it's like right then it's like oh we'll see what happened to Brad Beal he stayed with his home team, you know, he stayed, you know, he stayed loyal, whatever you want to say, instead of just jumping ship and joining a super team and whatever, and look what happened to him. It's like, you know, man, like, he knew he was coming back to a losing team, though.

It's not like they made some kind of grand commitment when Brad Beale made his decision for him to know, to believe that they were going to compete this year. Like, he knew that. He knew that. It's not like the, it's not like the organization has, like, done him wrong in this year. He knew this was a rebuild. And he decided to sign up and be a part of it, you know? And I

do, I don't like that it cost him. But I don't know. Just add a couple spots. That's my proposed solution. Add a couple spots. That's fine. We are going to have for the first time

in a long time, five days after the death of Kobe Bryant, we will see the Lakers back in action. It's going to be an ESPN game. They're playing against the Portland Trailblazers tonight. And this is going to be, I mean, I can't fathom something being more emotionally charged than this. And what takes place tonight, it will be like no other game that we have seen and certainly no other Laker game that anyone has ever seen. And they will have tributes inevitably that go on tonight.

and then, right? Like that's all, you know, that's going to be part of the, you know, the game tonight. And that's a hard game to play, right? That is a hard game to play. And I would imagine that there will not be a dry eye for anybody in that entire arena and for most people that are watching on television. It's going to be an amazing night. And I think for any basketball fan, particularly Lakers fans, I mean, any photo or video

you've seen from outside Staples Center right now. It's just beautiful, really. It's beautiful to see all the flowers that were brought out there, the bubbleheads of Kobe Bryant, the balloons, you know, everything that's out there remembering Kobe Bryant's life and the eight others, including his daughter, that passed away on that Sunday. It's a beautiful scene outside of Staples Center,

and I can't imagine what it's going to be like inside that building tonight. Yeah. We have two guys also that are both a part of the Laker organization and the two biggest guys that are part of that organization right now. LeBron James and Anthony Davis, did you see both got Kobe tattoos? I did not. Yeah. Wow. Both of them got Kobe Bryant tattoos heading into tonight's game.

And in this time off that they've had the last couple of days. And so this is going to be rather unbelievable. That organization has really been through it. They've been talking to, you know, there's been the stories about people that have been, you know, that's somebody that was like a coworker for them for over 20 years. And grief counseling going on,

et cetera, et cetera over the course of the past, over the course of the past week. Just honestly, Kev, like nothing we have ever seen. Um, and I'll be,

I'll be interested to watch. it tonight to say the least. For sure. Is Kauai Leonard hurt? Oh, he was supposed to play last night until not long before the game when he got pulled out with lower back tightness. Very interesting. For the first time in a while, it seemed like the clippers were going to be healthy.

And then they go out and have one of their worst losses of the season without Kawhi Leonard playing, losing to the Kings. Ooh. Yeah. And you see, like, you know, he's Ed, he's had the knee thing, right? And so you never, again, I don't want to make any assumptions on this. But, I mean, he's had this knee problem.

They've obviously been taking it easy with him over the course of this year. But then when he's supposed to play and then he doesn't last night because, and it's a back thing, you just want, you know, obviously look, with him, I never know what to think. Like a lot of guys, I don't even think twice about it. I'm like, oh, yeah, he'll be fine. You know what I mean? He'll rest up and he'll come back. But, I mean, everything was so bizarre during a season that the guy missed, you know?

And even this year, Doc Rivers has gotten fined for saying that the guy felt great, you know? And so I never know what to take at face value with that, right? Do you, so with the Clippers, right, they're a good team, a very good team. For sure. And they have a chance to be a sensational. team in the playoffs and do something special and make a finals run. That goes without saying. However, how weird is it that last year when Kauai misses games with Toronto, they still perform in an elite level. But without Kauai this year, anytime he doesn't play, they have

struggled the Clippers have. And one of the big reasons why is that Lou Williams' Montres-Herald duo has not been as deadly as it was last season. Those guys were all. awesome last year, one of the best duos in the league. Lou Will and Harold coming off the bench or finishing games for that matter was an amazing combination, but this year just doesn't have the same potency that seems like their

offense has a bit less dynamic actions off ball as well. There just seems to be we've hit this before with the chemistry aspect, but something is just off with them and they haven't been able to perform at a high level when Kauai's been out

and they haven't even been able to be what you expect them to be with the Lou Will Herald Pick and Roll, even when those guys are healthy, it's just something seems wrong with the way these guys are mixing together. Whether it's chemistry or coaching or whatever or all of it, I don't know, but something's wrong here. I would just tell you that the amount of minutes,

the lack of the amount of minutes that they have played together as a unit is just astonishing, astonishing, considering that there's not an immense amount of time missed for an injury, like a block of time where a guy was out for like, you know, 30 games or something, right? Like there just haven't been that many games that they have played together. There's not that many minutes that they have logged on the court. You remember it was just a week ago that we were talking about this. And I said that there was that Brian Winhorst article.

that had mentioned that at that point, and this is less than a week ago, Kauai Leonard and Paul George have played in the same game 18 times. It's insane. I mean, of course they have chemistry. You know what I mean? How are you supposed to get? They've never played together.

It's not like this is like a returning team, right? It'd be different to Ben Simmons and Joel Embed have only been in the starting lineup together 18 times, right? Well, like, we've got a long track record of them logging games and then even playoff games together. But in this case, these guys were thrown together for this season. And we're talking about, you know, they've played 40 high 40s amounts of games at this point. And they got what, maybe 20, maybe half of them ever, that they've been on the same court. And that's both a reason for optimism but also a reason for concern.

and optimism in the sense that like, yeah, these guys, of course, they're not clicking because they haven't had games together. They haven't had enough practices together. And that matters. But the negative aspect is just that, that come April, how much experience are they going to have to have and how healthy can these guys actually be? Because there's not been much reason for optimism that Kauai will be able to stay healthy through a long playoff front. That's a fascinating thing about these, these duos, trios, whatever you want to call them, all coming together. because some of these teams, as we talked about, they've got the advantage of bringing back the majority of their guys, right?

You've seen that. The two top teams in the East brought back their guys, the Bucks and the Raptors. And I know the Raptors lost Kauai, but those other guys that are long in the minutes, by and large, are used to playing with each other. And then you see these other teams. It took a little bit for the Pacers, you know, to find their stride.

And it took a little bit for Miami. to find their stride. And it's taking, you know, it's just taking a little bit longer, I think. The Clipper thing is extending longer than, and it will just extend longer because a lot of those teams, they played their first 20 games together as a unit. You're still seeing this Houston thing try to get figured out. I mean, James Hardin was amazing and Russell Westbrook sucked. And now Russell Westbrook has been amazing.

And James Harden just had his worst month in three years. So, right? How can we get them both really good at the same time as something that team's trying to figure out? And they've played 47 games, you know? I mean, it just, it takes a little while to figure stuff out. And we say all that. And the Clippers are in, you know, third place tied with the Nuggets and are four games back from the Lakers. Yeah, exactly.

And so despite that, but we both know you watch them. And I think we thought, and there certainly have been moments where they are absolutely devastating. But on a regular basis, if you flip them on, you don't go, geez, man, that team is, I mean, I wouldn't want to play them. You know? Yeah. Yep. There are nights that they do, and they look devastating. But there's a lot of nights where, you know, you wonder.

And so I think that's why we're 47 games into the season. 48 in their case and you watch it and especially if you watch an away game. I mean, they're 14 and 10 away from home, which is not a great record. Take in, for instance, you know, the Lakers are 20 and 5. So it doesn't matter where you're watching them. They pretty well always look good. Zion Williamson versus John Morant gets to take place tonight. Yes.

In New Orleans. neither of them are represented on the All-Star team. I would assume that both of them are going to be in the Rising Stars Challenge. I guess we'll find out regarding what happens with the Rising Stars rosters, which are going to be announced here very shortly. But what you're going to find is these two guys who are going to be one and two and rookie of the year probably if Zion plays the rest of the season out and has these crazy numbers have not been on the same court with each other.

They are fellow South Carolinians once upon a time played on the same AAU team. Imagine that. It sucks because because of the Knicks quasi, I don't even want to say brawl, like this shutting match, this weaning melee that takes place. the melee of the weenies it takes place and Jaron Jackson and Marco Guderich for the Grizzlies

have been suspended for the game tonight and you know Jackson would have gotten time on Zion when Zion gets down on the block and so that that stinks right that you don't get the full experience

but I'm sure that there are a lot of people that are hardcore NBA fans that are going to want to flip that one on because these two rookies have absolutely delivered on being nightly highlights. So this is a question I like asking myself before I watch each Pelicans

game. Who stops or who's the guy defending Zion? So Jaron Jackson's out. Who is it that you're putting on Zion? I bet they'll put Crowder. Crowder. I'd imagine. Crowder. Okay. All right. Crowder's going to get just destroyed. It's going to be fun to watch.

And by the way, NBA with this suspension, I mean, it's just absolute bullshit. And I'm not saying this is a homer. look, Alfred Payton went and shoved Jay Crowder into a row of empty seats at Madison Square Garden, by the way. The front row seats were completely empty, so it was an easy shove. And so he shoves him. And then you have Marcus Morris shoving John Morant and you have less whatever.

And Jaron Jackson, who is like not even close to where this melee goes, you know, he's down behind the goal, like, about to celebrate the Jay Crowder three. And that's why he's so far down. he ends up getting suspended the same amount as Alfred Payton. Like if you're doing this whole like the bench thing and don't leave the bench or whatever, like what is the spirit of the rule here? Because you're getting, you're levying out these fines. But for Jaron Jackson to get the same penalty as Alfred Payton is just bananas. And like, and Jay Crowder was like involved in the thing and he's not suspended or anything.

but I just, I don't know. I know they have this hard, fast rule about leaving the bench. But like, I do think involvement should matter. And I also think, what are you trying to detour here? Because those guys weren't going to leave the bench to go fight. They were going to leave the bench to break it up, you know, to try to stop things from happening. And that's the shame of it all.

The guys that instigate the actual fracas get off the same as the guys that didn't do anything. you know and I don't know what you're what behavior you're deterring there you know if the penalties are the same and that's why that's why it's bothersome and also I wanted to see Jenner Jackson play against Zion you know instead we'll see how Brandon Clark does

who should be on the rising stars team in my opinion but we'll see about that Brandon Clark will be on the rising stars team because they'll no look you remember how they do it with the world thing Oh yeah, that's right. Yeah, so he's going to, he'll be Canada. He doesn't really, he's a weird one because he doesn't,

he was born in Canada, but he doesn't really, he kind of, he tells everybody's from Arizona. He would never tell you he's from Canada. Interesting. Right. Yeah. Well, I mean, he doesn't have any memories from Canada. You know what I'm saying?

He doesn't have any kind of like, you know, like some of these guys like a RJ Baird or Tristan Thompson or whatever. I mean, they grew up in Canada. They've got Canadian pride, as it were. I don't, I don't sense. that. Speaking of the rising stars, I have to mention this. Chris Haynes from Yahoo tweeted out.

Philadelphia 76ers, Matisse Thibel was not voted by the assistant coaches to participate in the rising stars game. Here's Kevin O'Connor from the ringer. Makes no sense. Matisse Thibel is already one of the NBA's best defenders and coaches didn't put him in the freaking rising stars game. Come on! Not to mention he's 36% from three and plays team basketball.

Thibel should be rewarded, exclamation mark. It's just the rising stars, but this is dumb. It is dumb. You already got a thousand likes on this piece of crap tweet. It is dumb. This is an overreaction. No, it's. Yes, it is.

How's this an overreaction? Because you put an exclamation point in it. How is this an overreaction? The exclamation point. The rising stars, as we. speak were just announced the u.s team miles bridges wendell carter devonte graham tyler hero jaron jaron jennrick nun eric paskell p joshington zion william wiliamson trey young well couldn't thibble look are will uh carter ain't gonna play he's hurt

and trey young's not gonna play so why do you even put him on the damn team okay then just put Thibel there. I put him on the damn team. I hope they name somebody besides Thibel for that spot. And then the world team, Michaela Alexander Walker, DeAndre, and R.J. Barrett, Brandon Clark, Luca Dantrich, Shegildes-Alexander, Rui Hachamora,

Svee McIluke, Josh Okoge, Mo Wagner, baby, yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah. Mo Wagner. Mo Wagner. Wait, who is the guy you said from Detroit? right?

Sveh. Svea Mikhailu. He's been awesome. Awesome for the Pistons. That's not even a name. That's just letters. No. What?

It's letters. Come on. SVI? Just, I'm not even, I'm not even to respond to that. No, hold on. You need to respond.

You're not allowed to do that. It's initials. It's initial. Are there a lot of people named Sveed that I'm aware of or something? And no, that's short for his full name. Which is what? I don't know. I just don't miss speed.

I dare you to. And you've cramped on me for my pronunciations for you. Go ahead and try to say it. My pronunciations, I mispronounce words for a long time. I mispronounced advantageous as advantages. I used to always say disadvantages instead of disadvantage. Or advantageous. I get it right now. I mispronounce words too.

And I also mispronounce names. You know what? Everybody mispronounces Luca Donchich. Looka don'tchich. That's the way it should be pronounced. Don'tchich. Don'tchich. All right, look, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to one up you on a Rising Stars tweet.

That's what I need to do. No, not about Svi. This is what I'm going to do. So I'm going to say, yeah, are you ready? I'm going to have a more controversial one than yours. Should I do this? I'm going to put up. Yeah, just, yeah, but you can do it.

You can do it. You're right. It might be more controversial. Feel free, but it doesn't change the fact that it's bull that thigh bolt didn't make the rising stars team. Okay. Well, here mine out. Hear mine out. Look, I'm workshopping this right now, right?

Okay. DeAndre Aiton on the Rising Stars team. That's dumb. Great message to send NBA, do drugs and come out ahead. Oh, my God. Come on. I know it's just the Rising Stars game, but this is dumb. He didn't do drugs.

He used masking agents. Great message to send to the kids NBA. Find somebody else that doesn't bend the rules, exclamation mark. You ready? Yeah. Sure. I would not press send on that. You wouldn't?

I mean, it's, he should be on the team. Well, I mean, I guess, look, I guess I'm just going to have a conversation with my son. Ash, I'm an editor. My son says, why did he only, was he injured? Why does he only play 20 games? And I say, son, sit down. And then I have to explain to him, much like I had to about, you know, Mark McGuire when he asked me. Oh, come on.

About the home run record. Sad day. Sad, sad, sad day. Kevin, I hope you have a great weekend. Enjoy all the games this weekend. And I will talk to you on Tuesday. Matisse Stival should be on the rides on the stars team. Will you stop?

Look, we got to stop with this stuff. Look, I am the king of defending the defenders. Okay. Wait, were you ever fighting for Tony Allen to be an All-Star? I used to root for Tony Allen. But did you ever? He was on some of my favorite Celtics teams growing up. All of a sudden,

I used to love Tony Allen. I could also love Tony Allen. Even though he spent the latter half of his career in Memphis, he came from Boston in 2004. I understand. I watched him grow up. But I'm saying, were you saying the guy should never be an all-star?

I saw him tear his ACL and come back and still be a stellar young player, a stellar defensive player. And I was sad when he left. All I'm saying is, all I'm saying, Kev is where you sit in there fighting for the guy to be an all-star because he was the best defender in the league. No, but this isn't an all-star. This is a rising star. I understand. The difference. But he's also a rising star that shoots 38% from the field and averages

it's five points a game. Come on. Come on, man. No, you come on. It's five points a game. Yeah. He's one of the best defenders in basketball. And he shoots 37% from three. He plays his role and make smart decisions. We just talked about how it's nice to see Sabonis get rewarded. Granted, he's putting a much bigger numbers, but Fibbles You're just doing that because you've shit on Ben Simmons so much.

You need to do something to get the Philly fans. Yeah, you need the Philly fans back on your side. Yeah, you do. Before the season, you're like, you know what? I'm tired of these Philly fans just constantly shitting on me all the time. I'm going to, I'm going to cape for a guy that averages four points

of game. Before the season, Before the season, I said Thibel was going to immediately be one of the best defenders in basketball. And I was right. The fact is is that Thibble is getting screwed here. And yes, it's just the Rising Stars game. Who cares? He'll get votes for all defensive team

and he might not make it because he's only playing 20 minutes. But the fact is that he is widely respected as one of the best defenders in the game as a rookie. And that's great to see because that's rare, to your point, to see guys like Tony Allen, to see guys like Matisse Thibel, be rewarded and be recognized for their elite defense. So it's cool, in my opinion, to have a guy in the league

like this. It's great. I'm excited about Thival and to see how he develops over time. I'm stoked. I'm pumped and jacked about Thialville, Chris. I love him. I knew you would be. I love them. All right. Have a great weekend. Enjoy the Super Bowl. Kevin's on the 49ers. He did not convince me, though. Have a good one, everybody. All right. Thank you to Bobby Wagner for producing in another episode. If you dig what you're hearing, go give us a rating and review on iTunes, five stars, five stars.

It really helps. We will talk to you next week.