The Ringer NBA Show - Regular-Season Awards Ballot | Group Chat

Episode Date: May 11, 2021

Justin and Rob are joined by The Ringer’s Wosny Lambre to discuss who they believe is the MVP of the 2021 season (02:00). Later, they make their picks for Rookie of the Year, Defensive Player of the Year, and more (38:00).  Hosts: Justin Verrier and Rob Mahoney Guest: Wosny Lambre Production Assistant: Jonathan Kermah Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, I'm Shay Serrano. And I'm Jinks. We're hosting a new podcast called No Skips. In it, we discuss the most iconic and unskippable albums in hip-hop history. New episodes drop on Thursdays, only on Spotify. Hello and welcome to Group Chat, the Rang's weekly NBA group discussion, where you don't know why I go out there in pod. That's why you, Rob Mahoney, are a straight, lame. I am Justin Verrier, joining me, Rob Mahoney.

Accurate. 100% accurate. It's true. I'm potting from, from, from, vacation right now, man. That's my love for the game for this content industry. So who's the lame one in this situation? It's definitely not our prestigious guest. That's why I am potting from vacation because this is a moment in history. They'll remember this. They'll go back to this when we reached the Hall of

Fame of Potting. This is the first pod with one Wozny Lambraid. Not our most recent hire because I think that was trumped within a day. But our second most reason higher, Wads, what's up, man? I'm chilling, man. I'm good. Thank you guys for welcoming me with such open arms. I feel, I'm not going to lie. I feel like a bad bitch right now. I can't front.

The love and the embrace that I've gotten just from signing with the ringer, it was like, you know when you watch the people, the ladies just post their wedding ring on Instagram? They don't say anything else. They just post the ring. And everybody goes crazy and all of that. That's what it felt like to sign with the. the ringer. It was like, wow, I made it. So I'm happy, but I do have to correct you.

Very early on in the pandemic, I did a group chat. It was me, you guys, Jarks was here. And yeah, I think I killed it too. But I'm back again on a more permanent basis, thank God. So salute to you guys. I'm excited about this. You weren't fully a bad bitch at that point. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Not yet. But right now right now. Right now. Right now. But right now, right now. I'm looking right, boy. I'm getting tummy tuck teas and all kinds of sponsorships are rolling in. I'm about to take a pick in a private jet and just say jet life.

Yeah, I'm about it. I'm in L.A. already, so I'm ready. Right. You just don't step on Rob's toes because that's generally his vibe, too. I usually rent like the fake private jet, though. I just want the picks. I just want me in the champagne bottle. I don't have the real private jet money.

I respect it. Content is king. So do whatever it takes to feed the content monster, Rob. But listen, if you ever, you know, if you ever want to go to Dubai, I got a couple of homies out there. I'm not a note. I think Waz, after this week, is going to be joining us a little bit more as we transition over to the playoffs. Play-in is next week. I think the word is we might be recording Wednesday night. So we're going to be covering the Wednesday games.

but we'll be sure to tweet out or announce the full schedule later on. But you'll be seeing more Waz on this show. We're happy to have him. But for today, we're going to go through one of my favorite events of the year, which is the MVP sixth man of the year, Most Improved Player Award ballots. Rob, this year you have one, right? Yeah, have a ballot, hoping you guys can help me button it up a little bit today.

You know, I've gotten my picks, but I want to water test these picks. I want all your criticisms. I want all the arguments. I want to hear what you guys are thinking. Because, you know, honestly, we're not going to learn a lot over the next week until the ballot deadline is official. But I think the most instructive part is just talking to people, talking to you guys, talking to people with teams, trying to figure out what everyone's thinking, kind of like some points of view that may just kind of like get lost in the ether of doing all this stuff. Yeah. It takes a community to raise an MVP.

It does. This is what you're saying. Well, that's another thing that I feel like I see a lot more of these days is everybody cautioning that there's still one more week of basketball. Like, I get that people take it really seriously, but like, is there much we're going to learn between now and next week that's really going to change outside of like maybe your third place for rookie of the year? I think if you change your ballot based on something you see on a court between now and the end of the season, you're just wildly overreacting to somebody's 40-point game against the Pils. or the Rockets or whatever. Like, there's, there's not much left to learn as far as the award races are concerned. There's just always more to think about.

Also, this isn't football where you play 16 games. This is a freaking 72 game season. If you're telling me the results of two to three games completely swayed how you looked at, you know, any individual award, you might need to be admitted somewhere. I don't know. Like, come on now. Like, that's just too small of a sandwich. of, again, 72 games were played.

It's over, guys. You know who you like. You don't have to act like, you, you know, you agonized over this. Like, oh, my goodness, am I going to put Janis fourth or am I going to put him fifth? He's not going to win. We're not going to do the LeBron thing where he complained that he didn't come close enough in second place last year. Not that he should have won, but that he didn't come close enough as a second

place person. We're not going to do that here. All that matters is who wins. And I think we all know who's going to win most of these awards. Yeah, that's true. There does seem to be a consensus forming around Nicola Yokic. To the point where it feels weird to even make the case for anybody else, can we all agree?

Let's start with MVP here. It's Yokic, Rob? Yeah. Yeah, 100%. For me, I mean, I was kind of trying to think about all these from as broad a lens as possible. Like, for MVP, it's what are the most important skill sets in the NBA right now, and who is the best at doing those things. Yokic is the best at the stuff that's the most important, which is he's hands down the single

best creator in the NBA right now. Best of generating offense in bulk. He finds good looks in crunch time. He's carrying talented lineups and bench lineups. It doesn't matter. He's great at all that stuff. And just at a higher level than pretty much anyone else. And that's not even, we're not even touching the games played kind of complication with all this. I think even, even all games being equal, Yokic would still be there at the top of the ballot. You know what's so crazy is that, and people are going to think I'm a sicko for saying this, but the last person who could dominate his one-on-one matchup and be this dominant at playmaking is peak LeBron, straight up and down.

Like, I don't care if you want to go KD, you want to go Steph, you want to go whoever. Yeah, those guys could dominate their one-on-one matchup as far as scoring opportunities, but they are nowhere near the playmaker that Yokic is right now. And the last guy you can think of doing that is LeBron at the top of his game. Like right now, like LeBron can still get buckets. I think in a playoff setting, you know, he's going to hunt the like smaller guy to sort of back him down into the basket. His post up is basically his most lethal move right now. But back when he was blowing by everybody and he got out muscle people at the rim and he was faster than, like, you know, yeah, that's what he was doing.

Yokic is the first guy who you cannot guard him with one guy, and if you send to, he's going to freaking murder you. He's also the only top-level guy who hasn't missed a game this season. And Rob and I have talked about this in Pod's past, so I'm curious what you think was, but it really has become kind of a war of attrition where it's just like the last guy's standing. Like, Embed has missed 19 games.

Steph has missed eight games. You know, it just goes down on the list. Yannis, the guy who rarely ever missed games, has missed 10 games this season. Where are you on just like how much a player plays it matters in this kind of race for you? I mean, you know why? And people are going to say it shouldn't matter for this reason. But like the fact that I can turn on my league pass on a day-to-day basis and not know who the hell is going to be on the court on a given night, that annoys me.

The fact that Yolkich is there every single game killing people, every single game all season long, they lose their second best player. and the thing just keeps chugging along. They're still scoring at a dominant pace because of one freaking guy, you can't take that away from him. That being said, I think when he's been on the court, Joelle Embed has actually been the best player in the NBA this regular season, but he's missed so many games, right? Like, you can't, like, at the end of the day,

Yolkich actually put the work in. He did the work, so we have to pay him for it, right? Like, Joelle Embed, I'm sorry, you missed too many games. I think he would have probably been the MVP choice because, you know, if you guys remember midseason, people were doing a lot of hand-wringing about Yokic's like candidacy. People were like, I mean, really, are we going to give it to the doy freaking Eastern Bloc guy? I mean, really, are we doing this? And so I think Embed was sort of prime to take that spot. But, you know, he went down with an injury and Yokic continued to freaking dominate, you know.

Embed obviously was doing it on both ends of the floor where I think he's legitimately in the top three best defensive players in the NBA when he puts his mind to it and he's dominating offensively. You know, he's hitting mid-rangers. He's hitting his long rage. He's killing people in the polls. You know, so he's dominating all three levels. And again, anchors your defense in a way that obviously clearly Nicola Yokic does not. Right. And not that he's as, remember back in the days, he was completely horrific.

He's gone from horrific to he's fine. He does just enough that he's not completely killing you. And again, he's the most dominant force on offense that we have in the league. And that's not just even, you know, the conventional numbers, all of the freaking all-in-one metrics, any of that fancy schmancy stuff that my man Kevin Peltin touts every single day, he's killing in those categories, too. You can pick any one of those advanced metrics you want. It's Yokic across the board specifically on offense.

So, I mean, he's got to have it at this point. I guess my only counter to that is this season is such a mess. Like, it's so hard to learn anything from like even a large enough sample size. Like a 20-game sample is going to be corrupted by like this guy being absent. Like you were saying, like there's just so many absences here. So I do wonder if there's any year where we could maybe downplay how much a player plays and focus on like how good he was when he was available. Like this would be the year for that. On the other hand, Embed's missed 19 games.

So, like, I'm really stuck in this, like, push or pull of, like, how much I have to value that. Well, I would be shocked if Embedd doesn't come second in the voting. And to me, that already says we're doing that. We're already kind of looking at how many games he's missed, how much time he's missed and saying, you know what, this year that probably matters a little bit less to us, both by virtue of... Well, hold on. So how can we put Embed second and just discount, like, the game's miss thing? and then instead of putting him first.

Like we're factoring it in more for first than we are for second. So like shouldn't we use the same criteria for the entire top five ballot? See, I'm with you, JV. In the sense that, you know, the league office doesn't respect me enough yet to give me a ballot. I'm with the ringer now. They're probably going wise enough. But if I did have a ballot, my number two would not be MB. It would be Steph Curry.

I'm sorry. That team is fucking. horrible. Okay. The only reason they, the only reason they matter in even the slightest is because Steph Curry has been superhuman this season. And he's been on the court for the most part. I like, I don't see how you can look at what he's doing on the court and not understand that like Golden State would be Orlando level, but for the fact that this guy is killing people every night. He's putting the team on his back and just making it happen. Right. like, you know, early in the season, of course, the fans specifically on the internet,

yelling at Kerr, put the ball in Steph's hand, stop with the beautiful game, crap, let Steph operate. And when they finally did that, you see in 40 points, 50 points, whatever, night after night after night, you know, and all in service of what, guys, an eighth seed, which tells you like, this team is just bad. And they're going to be in the playoffs or at least at the very least a playing game because Steph Curry shouldered that load, man. I think he deserves to be recognized for that. It's not his fault Clay Thompson, you know, got injured for the second year in a row. It's not his fault that, you know, Dremont turned into a pumpkin from outside. It's not his fault that they devoted heavy minutes to a rookie big man who we know rookies stink year after year as far as their contributions on the court.

So to me, Steph is number two on my ballot. The imaginary one, Rob. I know you got a real one. Well, I think there are four guys who have to be on the ballot. It's Yokic. it's Embed, it's Steph, and it's Janus. How you want to sort those guys out is up to you. And then what you want to do with the fifth spot is kind of the big mystery box.

But yeah, no argument for me that Steph deserves as much praise as you can fit on, like, within the logic of your framework, of your ballot. He deserves it. Like that, he is his team's only good offensive player. You know, maybe, you know, honorable mention Jordan Poole, which says a lot. Yeah. The bench last night, by the way, for the Warriors was Juan Tiscano Anderson, Mark Mold. who may or may not be a pitcher for the Oakland A's and Jordan Poole. They played three players off the bench.

They won the game, which I guess is cool. But I think Jordan Clarkson was also doing a lot of damage for the jazz and that one probably as much as Steph. So yeah, it got brutal this year. Rob, do you have Embed second or Steph second? I have Embed second, Janice third, Steph fourth. And like the three and the four, I could see people go in a lot of different flipping those two guys.

For me, it's just the two-way play. And it's the fact that I think, you know, Janus has gotten outflanked in this MVP conversation because there's guys who are on teams with better records and there are guys who have just crazy production, which are the two hallmarks of what he did over the last two years. And in doing, in having that, like having him boxed in that way, I feel like we're just kind of missing the fact that he's still amazing

on a night-to-night basis dominant in ways that guys like Steph aren't. And I think the other thing about Janus too is every time his name comes up in these conversations we talk about the playoffs, we need to stop pretending this is a playoff award. Janus is a dominant regular season player that is literally the only thing that matters in voting for this. So I'm putting Janus over Steph,

even though knowing if I were in a playoff series, I would want to be rolling with Steph in that situation. Rob, I can only be a human being, okay? Unless you got the men in black joint to wave me and make me forget the last two playoffs, then I'm going to remember the last two playoffs, right? And if we're talking about an award that's supposed to be given to who's been the best in the NBA, I can't forget watching this guy dribble from 30 feet trying to create offense and completely stinking at it in crunch time playoff possessions.

Like I'm supposed to just forget that that happened. It's hard. I know what you're saying. You know, logically, I understand the idea of we're giving these guys the award for the work that they did. during this block of games. If he was dominant in those block of games, why the hell are we talking about the next group of games? That's irrelevant to this award.

You're right, logically. But, you know, like, I'm still a human being. Like, why do I go on my ex's Instagram page every now and again? And be like, man, why do I do that? I'm supposed to be moving on and doing the next part of my life. You're better than that, man. You treat yourself better. I got to stop.

I got to stop. I mean, the other thing with Janice is he's also worse than he was last year. And that's kind of hard to ignore. Like, it's an unfair thing to put against the two-time reigning MVP. Like, he's probably never going to get to those numbers again. But the fact that he's not as good, I think, is going to color however we perceive him. No, it definitely will. And that's why I'm not putting him first.

I'm not saying he should be the MVP. Right. I'm just saying, like, again, for me, Waz, I'm with you. Like, wiping that stuff from your mind is hard, like, contextualizing in a different ways as hard. because we're having a different conversation when we talk about MVP than we talk about who the best players are.

Like those are not the same conversation. I thought you were still talking about your ex. Let's just air it all out. Let's just get all the ex talk hour. Right. Can I throw another name out there for you? Yeah, please. Chris Paul.

Yeah. No. No? I have, I would have him forth. No. Probably ahead of Janus. Yeah. No.

The production is just not there. Chris Paul's not even on my ballot. Like, like, let's face you, like, this is the thing about that I think is really neat about Phoenix's season. And we're going to get into that later on in different awards. Like, Chris Paul and Devin Booker haven't really been dominant this year. Like, they've been good. They've played very well. Yeah, they're the second best team in the NBA, which is like, I think it's significant one.

And I also think that while Paul's numbers aren't going to jump off the page, they're probably not even as good as they were last year or even in, like, at his prime. But he, like, he controls that team. And he wants to when it comes down to crunch time, whatever, he grabs the game by the throw. And that is why they're as good as they are, which is why I would put him up here. Not in the top three or anything like that, but he would be on my ballot. He's not on my ballot because, look, at the end of the day, the production matters. Like, you can't put his production level on part with Luke or Dame Lillard. Like, you just can't.

And so that's why it's like, brother, look, I love what Chris Paul did this season. I was actually very bullish on the Sons before the season. and so I'm glad that they made me look smart for having been so successful this year. So I'm grateful for that, Chris Paul. But you have not been anywhere near the level of productive as Luca and Dame Lillard. And they play your position. They're the lead ball handler, the table setter, initiator for their teams. And they've just done it at a much higher level than Chris Paul has.

And again, I respect what he's done, the level of professionalism and effort level that this team plays with on a night-to-night basis. Obviously, I think he's a part of that. But come on, man. Come on, Dame and Luca have been way better than him this year. Yeah, he's not on my ballot either. But I think if you're going to make the case for Chris Paul, what you're making the case for is organizational level impact.

Right? Like, there are guys who show up and they're good basketball players. Luca Donchich is a great basketball player. He does give the Mavericks a direction in the sense that he's a franchise talent, and you can build around him, Chris Paul reoriented everything the sons were doing. I mean, to bring in basically a logistical genius on the court who can produce at a high level, who can put everything in place, that is tremendously valuable.

And so I think in the intangible part of this conversation, he's off the charts. The question as a voter is, can you square that with, as well as is saying, the production just isn't there on the level of these other candidates. Chris Paul's an amazing player. It's just we're talking about the most productive players in the league. Yeah, I would just say that if he needed to score more, he would. If he needed to like really get down in the dirt and like do these things. But he's trying to empower.

Would he drop 28 a game though, JV? He could. Efficiently? Yeah. Oh, definitely. Efficiently. I mean, he's just as efficient as he was his first year in Houston. And I think if he was younger, I do think there's some ageism here where it's like,

oh, he's older. He's just taking care of the bookers, yada, y'all. I think people would be applauding him way more. I do think, like, he picks and chooses how he plays the game. And I think in this case, he needs to just, like, give Devin Booker the ball, like, try to get DeAndre eight in the ball in positions where he can score, even though DeAndre Aten, half the time will probably drop it or just, like, try to do a pull-up jumper from the free throw line extended.

But that is why I think, like, he needs to be in this conversation. But, Rob, you don't have him fifth. Who do you have? I feel like I'm gonna I'm my anger was with this one given where he went with Embed and missing games I have LeBron 5th and it was it was kind of an adventure

to get there but what really did it for me is for me for me Embedd is clear cut number two he's been so good when he's on the court I don't I'm not valuing the miss games as much as some other voters might and Embed has played 89 minutes more than LeBron has and so when I'm looking at that

And I'm square in the fact that, you know, I basically have a choice now. Do I pick LeBron or do I pick, you know, LeBron Light in Luca Donchich? Or do I pick Dame Lillard who, you know, has carried a season? But I don't think anybody's out here saying he had more of an impact on the game than LeBron did. So between the crazy production from LeBron and the games he did play, the fact that I think he, you know, probably would be a more realistic all-defense candidate if he had played a full season. Like, LeBron was really dialed in on that side of the ball in ways that. that the dames and the Lukas are just not. He was just too good to omit for me.

You know, I think the only thing that's going to get in the way of his case is the minutes. And for me, he and Embedit are so close that if we're going to put him beat it too, LeBron has to be on the ballot somewhere. You know, early in the season, super early, I was basically paying attention to like three teams, the Sons, the Lakers, and Zion. Notice I ain't say Zion's team. And, you know, the fascinating thing,

about the Lakers, if you guys remember, they were playing this game with the league of like, we're going to do as little as possible to win. Like, absolutely, Memphis, without Jha and Jaron Jackson, we're not doing anything until there's six minutes left in this game. And we're going to pull it out by four, and we're going to still get the W in the win column. But watching them do, like, sort of toy with the league

and watching, like, in big possessions, Braun and AD just be like, we're just going to run pick and roll. we're just going to run pick and roll. I'm either going to pop or I'm going to roll and you guys are going to have absolutely no way to deal with this and we're going to beat people that way. It was fascinating, right? And watching LeBron table set the whole time because AD got out the blocks really slow.

It was LeBron that was there doing all of that work. And so, you know, I think LeBron was playing extremely well and controlling the game, you know, as well as he ever has, right, from as far as like, impet. impact and imprint on a night-to-night basis. But like, come on, man. Come on, man. He missed too many games for this, man. And, again, he was not, he was not as dominant as Embedde.

Embed was, like, dominant in all of his games. LeBron was, like, very freaking good, right? Like, he was very good. I kind of feel like 80's little revival here has almost made the case for LeBron even stronger because it's a reminder of like how fucking good these guys are if they are just fully healthy. It's just like if these guys were both playing on the court, they'd be the number one seed.

And we'd all be talking about like what a like easy route to the finals they had. Yada, yada, yada. I agree. But, you know, I would never, you know, people who've known my work for a little bit now knows I'll never argue with LeBron praise. But I just, me personally, you know, because of the missed games, I wouldn't have him.

Because again, I don't. think he's been like, you know, it's not like he's playing at 2010, 2010, 2009 level LeBron, and he missed, you know, 25, 30% of the season. Because that's a guy who's like, all time great season, all time level production. And I, he missed a bunch of games, but he's like all time. Like, this is just like, on the scale of MVP award winners, this LeBron season would have been at the bottom scale of MVP winners. Not quite Derek Rose.

Sure. So if not LeBron, then who? I'm Dame Lillard. And he combines the Chris Paul stuff that you're talking about when it comes organizationally, like lose all of these players. And like, no, it's fine. Dame's still here. Right.

And this team, like, this team is not that good. And for them to lose people like Nurkj and CJ for large chunks of the season and still end up where they're at in the standings, that's a testament to Dame, not only just his production, but what he means. as a leader, keeping the group together, just being that guy. Like, I always tell people, Dame is a model NBA superstar. Like, in every single sense of the word, he's an exciting player, he's consistent, he says all the right things, he cares about all the right things.

Like, he is your model superstar, and I think he's done that this season. So it's like, yeah, it's all that Chris Paul stuff you're talking about bringing some seriousness to the organization plus incredible production. So I got to put Dame number five on the best. ballot. Yeah. Just fewer wins than Chris Paul. Sorry.

Do we want to have the Rudy Gobert conversation now? Here's my take on the Rudy Gobert for MVP ballot consideration. His value is on the defensive end, which is why he will win defensive player of the year. Like, I get it. The jazz are good and you have this impulse to want to congratulate someone for that success. One individual pick them out. And I do think it's wild that we tend to pick Mitchell just because he is this dynamic score. He fits the mold of what we want from like a star player.

But there is an award for defensive excellence is defensive player of the year. I don't care that like he rolls hard to the rim, which opens stuff up for other players. It's like, that's cool. You will win defensive player for the year for what you do well. Rob, we don't give MVP for screen assists, okay? Not yet at least. Not until the jazz Twitter people come for us. What were you going to say, Rob?

I was wondering that, like, is the role that Gobert plays just completely incompatible with winning MVP? Or at least being on the bout. Like, could you even conceptualize a player who does more or less what he does who could be an MVP candidate? Every big man before 2000? Like, that's it, right? I don't think that's a fair comparison considering he's the anchor of one of the best defenses in the league. No, he would have to be Joel Embed in order. to be considered for this, which he's not offensively.

Like, again, he's more valuable on defense. And I know it makes people sound smart to say, well, there's two sides of the game. Half the game is on defense. You have to play defense. Defense is important in defense. And like, yeah. Why are you blowing up my spot right now? Why are you doing that?

Sorry, Rob. But the fact of the matter is, the bottom line is it's harder to get whack offensive players to be competent than it is to get whack defensive players to be competent. It's just the fact of the matter. Defense is less valuable than offense. It just is. Sorry, guys. Sorry to break the news to you.

Hard scrabble, hard nose. Floor burns people. Sorry. Defense is less valuable. You see it year after year in the playoffs where teams and guys that you thought were completely incompetent on D, find it within themselves in the context of a playoff series to be adequate at it.

Like you see it every single season. You see that from Tony Allen on offense. I'm sorry. That never happens. And that's why offense is a lot more important. And look, I love what Rudy does for the team. I think, you know, if I was somebody talking to a young big, I would be pointing at Rudy Gobert. I'd be like, yo, you probably not going to get to the Joelle and B level.

But, yo, man, if you work your ass off, you can be Rudy. Set hard screens, roll hard to the best. basket every time, execute your defensive assignment every single time, that shit will get you paid. Andre Drummond needs to go to Rudy Gobert school. Exactly. Just like people used to go and work out with Elijah on. Freaking Jalil Oker for, why you think he's a bust? Because he don't believe in the Rudy Gobert principles, right?

Like, if those type of cats would have had the mindset of a Rudy Gobert, the level of player they would have been in this league is, you know, is insane to even think about, right? But so with that being said, this is a big boy award. You're not a big boy, Rudy. Sorry. So two big picture questions here. So first, we mentioned LeBron briefly, but I think he probably might slide off of a lot of ballots, especially depending on how many games he plays here down the stretch. That would mean neither LeBron nor any of the Nets players might make the top five in a lot of ballots.

Does that feel right to you, Rob, considering especially because we just had the top 25 awards last week. week in which we put LeBron and Kevin Durant both in the top five. Yeah, I mean, depending on how you're valuing the game's played part of it makes total sense. There is something kind of interesting. I'll put it that way about narrative being LeBron's undoing this season. I think just the momentum of his case totally petered out when he got hurt. You know, I think that's what's going to hold him back. More than anything else, more than the totals or the games played,

I think it's just the perception that he is not in this race anymore. And a lot of voters are going to say Dame or Luca or whoever, you know, again, lots of good candidates to fill that spot. But I don't see LeBron actually cracking the top five of the total voting. Yeah. And, you know, we said, I said my piece about LeBron and why I don't think he should be in that top five. And, you know, again, I am with that narrative of you didn't put the work in as far as like actual hours clocked into the job. So, you know, you don't get to reap the rewards of that. Although, you know, y'all brought up KD.

I actually think Hardin is the one with the MVP case from Brooklyn because he's the glue that ties it all together, the straw that stirs the drink. Can you not think of any more cliches? He's the one who makes it happen. Like the fact that Kyrie Irvin came out and said, yo, James is our point guard. Like, that to me that says everything about the respect and the buy-in that he has from the other two superstars. and just everybody understanding that James is the one that's going to make this cohesive and an offense that makes sense. That isn't just my turn, your turn, XYZ.

And he has been the best version of himself in his career in Brooklyn, straight up and down. The second a defender freaking moves his foot an inch into the lane, that ball is getting flung to the freaking three-point shooter. And if you give him an inch, he's taking you to the rack. And of course, he's always got the step back. to go to. He's just been, he's been amazing. He's been a revelation. But of course, you know, he

did basically mail it in in Houston to start the season, which we frowned upon as basketball purists and hard hat people. And he's missed a lot of games. So, you know, that hurts his candidacy as far as MVP, but I don't think he's ever played better

in his life. Yeah, I'm a little disappointed that he missed so many games down the stretch here, because it would have made people have to reconcile the huge Houston stuff. Like before he went out, it was very much a three horse race between Hardin and Bede and Yokic. And I think you saw a lot of people basically putting Hardin at the top of that list there, but with the caveat that they couldn't really stand by the Houston stuff, I think it really would have been a really interesting conversation. Unfortunately, he hasn't played

in a long time here. 22 missed games is what I have down for him. My second question here, kind of related to this. So Yokish clearly the runaway favorite, probably going to win it, unless something really weird happens here. Are we going to look back on this and say that the Yokish MVP was a little weird? Like it stands out because we do this a lot now where we say, oh, LeBron should have won 20 MVP awards. Michael Jordan should have won all these different MVP awards. Is this one we're going to look back on and say, this stands out in history? It probably should have went with someone else who is more historically in the context of history more dominant. Yeah, who would that be? Like, who is the, like, unless you're voting for LeBron or Steph, who is the historically

dominant candidate here? I think it would be Steph and Embed. Steph and B would be the two ones that jump out. Steph probably more so, especially because of what was laid out, just how he carried a pretty much nothing team too relevant to the playing game. But to me, that disrespects the dominance with which Yokic plays and is going to play. He's going to be dominant for a while. maybe I mean he's great and I like I don't want to shortchange like what he could do in the future

but it's also possible that he goes back to what he was last year which is a perfectly excellent all-star player but not to the level of MVP conversation I mean he might miss more games like he he was healthy this year we just said that like a lot of his candidacy is based on health and being available what if he misses 20 games next year we're talking about him more like okay like oh he's great but he's just not there enough well what I mean is that when he's on the court, I just think he's going to dominate. And basically all he's done is hunt his shot more this year. That's like he's been the incredible playmaker.

All this year he added was like, no, I'm going to, I'm going to play like I'm Shaq. I'm going to be a scorer this year. The way he's upped his three-point field goal attempts, which makes it like, look, even if you got a guy who's big enough to, you know, bang with him down low, right, to sort of give him resistance. Can you go play with me outside on the pick and pop game? I don't think you can, bro. And if you are somebody who's nimble enough to cover him out to three, and again,

he's taking like six or six plus three's a game now, you can't do nothing with me down low. Like, I just think he presents so many problems for every single defense because, like, I'm now taking my shot. I'm now taking every single pick and pop three. I'm doing my Sondboard shuffle. When you try to do your little switch, how dare you put a guy that's less than 300 pounds on me? I'm burying this kid.

Like, he's just unstoppable. And then, of course, when you send your double team, as has been said at nauseam, his playmaking is at the level of Braun, Hardin, Larry Bird, you name it. He's up there as a playmaker. It's just like, I don't see how he stops being this dominant and unstoppable offensively going forward, right?

I think with Derek Rose, not just because he got hurt. It's just like in the moment, like, was he really that dominant offensive player? Like, he was a dope player, but he wasn't like some freaking, he wasn't KD in 2014. You know, I think Derek Rose, we can look back or even, you know, Steve Nash when people try to say what they want to say. But I don't think that's going to be the case for Yokic. I think he's just going to kill people for the foreseeable future. Yeah, Rose was wrong in the moment. Like at the moment those ballots were cast, that was wrong.

LeBron should have won that award. Yokic is right. Like this is the correct decision based on this regular season. And anything beyond that, to me, is way too presumptive. Like, our job is not to judge history. Our job is to judge what happened. And what happened was Yokic was the best player in the NBA this season. Yeah, I guess if you look at the winners of MVP,

it is very much a list of the players who define basketball in those errors that they played in. it is theft, it is Hardin, it is Durant. I just wonder if Yokic tends to fall into a lesser category, the more of the Dame Lillard category. And I think a big part of this is final success, winning titles. Like the players who win MVP typically win one or more titles. And I do wonder if like, I mean, I guess Westbrook and Hardin would be the flip side of this. But I do wonder if Yokish falls into that lesser category and we look back on this and it looks a little strange in comparison to some of those other guys.

That's all I'm saying. He's definitely deserving. I'm not going to say that he isn't, but I do wonder contextually if this is like going to matter, Domino. But you know what? I mean, I've already gone off on my MVP as a regular season award rant,

so I'm going to just point you back to that. But the reason I know it is is because they made a totally different award for what you're talking about. It's called Finals MVP. They hand that out every year. Somebody else can win that if Yokish doesn't make the finals or win the finals.

So I just don't see any problem with giving him his due for what this, award is actually governing. Sure. All right. On that note, we're going to take a quick break. When we come back, we're going to talk about the other five, six, seven, 20 awards here. All right.

Now let's move on to Rookie of the Year. Rob, who do you have first on your list here? It's Lamello. I don't want to belabor the point. Like, to me, it's more about who, like, how do you want to stack up two and three? Because Lamello, I kind of made a choice this year and in previous years that I'm not going to hold playing for a shit team against, A rookie, it's not their choice where they ended up.

They don't have a control over that context. All they can do is the best with what they've got. But I am going to give a guy a bump if he's a rookie who's giving something to a playoff-level team. Like Lamello is not just putting up numbers, not just among the leaders and rookies in all the kind of box score stats. But he's doing it for a team that matters, for a team that's in the race, that's in the hunt, that's playing games of import. I don't think you can really compare what he's doing to what the rest of the rookie class is doing, frankly. Yeah, he's on another level. This is, to me, this reminds me of Joe Ellen Bede and Brogden.

Right. Like, not to say that Anthony Edwards is going to have the career of a Brogden, but when it comes to production as rookies, like who's actually been basically a winning player for the most part, not like some overwhelmingly winning player, but he's been a value add for his team as opposed to basically every other rookie in NBA history. And that's, you could go down the line, Kobe, Carmelo, whoever you want.

Like, some of the best players the league has ever seen, they stunk as rookies. And for Lamello to come in after playing in freaking Australia against kangaroos, and basically being a damn good NBA player out the gate, you can't, there's no reason to even discuss the number one slot. Now, number two, I think it's interesting because Anthony Edwards, was so horrific. He was garbage to start the season. And then lately he's come on, right? And has been, has shown improvement.

And I think he's benefited from DeAngelo Russell and Carl Towns actually being on the court with him, making his job much easier, giving him his spots to pick so much more clear. So, you know, I think that's interesting. But Halliburton has done it all season. You know, and I think he's done it at a higher level. in the aggregate.

And so to me, Halliburton is number two. But Edwards, he's shown me some things, man. He's shown me some things to make me believe, like, this guy can one day be a 30 point per game type of guy, right?

Like, one day be a guy you can't keep off the line that, you know, he's exciting as a prospect for what his potential could be. And that's nice. But you haven't produced at the level that Tyrese Halliburton

has throughout the course of the season. Yeah. Edwards is kind of the conventional pick here. I think like in years past, I wonder if he would have had more of a case for number one, because he also has these big moments. He has two 42 points scoring games. I look this up. Only six other rookies did that since 2000. And they're all just like all-star players, future MVP's and whatnot. And so I do wonder if that would have had more of a sway here. But I do think we are in an error here where we appreciate more of the subtleties of someone like Tyrese Hallibur. And that's why I wonder, Rob,

you specifically, are you willing to put Halliburton above Edwards? You know, I am predisposed to being a Tyrese Halliburton voter. Like, that is right in my strike zone. That is exactly the kind of player I respond to. And I found myself being swayed by Edwards for the number two spot. And to me, it was a little bit of solid versus spectacular. And the upswing of what Edwards has been able to do, I think has been so impressive. But, was, you're right.

Like the first half of the season, he shot 37% for the first half of the season. And it was, it somehow was even worse than that number. Rob, I'm not the smartest guy, but 30s, that's not good, is it? It's not looking great. It's not looking great. But the monster numbers of late, the way he's been able to, as Waz said, when he had more of a functional team around him, start to put it together, start to show some of what he can be, I like his kind of late-breaking case here. I know, I don't like it to supplant.

LeMello, that doesn't make sense to me. No. But as the number two spot, I think he's there and is giving you something in terms of star power and star potential in a way that Halliburton just isn't for as much as I like his game. And I think if you're a Wolves fan, what you should really, really, really be excited about is Carl Towns being one of the greatest big men shooters ever. His pick and pop game opens so much up for somebody as explosive as Edwards. is, right? Like it, it like gives him, it expands the room within he can operate because defenders have to be deathly afraid of what Carl Towns can do out to like 25 feet. And so when you have a guy

that's that explosive with the ball in his hands and somebody that deadly from three, that puts the defense in all kinds of binds and ties them into knots and they're complimentary of each other. That's what I'm trying to say. Like, you're two big guys that you need to be great in order for this team to take a step are actually complimentary of each other. And so I think you should be excited about that as Wool's fans. But yeah, you don't get to just take this award just because it's a nice story. Well, let me ask you this. Five years down the road, who is better? Edwards or Halliburn? Me, I'm taking Edwards. I'm a sucker for guys who can get to the rack at will. Like, to me, that's a skill in the NBA. That's the rarest of all the skills, right? Like, to be able to

consistently beat NBA level talent and athleticism. Beat that anytime it's in front of you. Have the ball and be like, you can't do anything with me. I'm getting to my spot no matter what. I think Edwards has that potential. And so I'm always going to go with that level of explosion, athleticism, upside, because that's the rarest of gifts in the league. Just being able to punish anybody no matter what the matchup is, right?

Like you switch it big out to me, he's toast. Your best wing defender. If I got some space on me, I'm getting to my spot. So I got to take Edwards on that one. The reason he gets second place on my ballot is if you would ask me that question a couple months ago, I would have said Halliburton. And it's the difference in the way Edwards is starting to put his game together, the way he's starting to process the action.

Like, he's still so new to basketball in the grand scheme of things. I'm not ruling anything out with him. And playing with towns, as Watt says, not only great for their fit, but really buys him a lot of time to figure out the jumper, to figure out if he can be a shooter in the NBA. He's going to have time to kind of tease that stuff out because their games do interlock in that way. So I think I would take Edwards long term.

And we all think ball long term over any of these guys, right? Yeah, I just think the combination of the size, the fact that his jump shot is basically already competent and can only get better from here, he's going to grow into his body. And so, like, you know, the thing about LeBron and Luca and Hardin is that not only of the incredible, as far as vision, they're so huge. They can see everything.

And I think Ball has that as well. It's like he has the playmaking, but his size allows for so much more than it would if he were a 6-2 guy, right? So you add that. And plus on the other end, All he has to do is move his feet. If he gets even grows into his body a little bit, the size, the length is going to make him a competent defensive player.

So it's like the shot is already there. The playmaking is already there. He's only going to get bigger. You can't argue against that. Yeah. I was watching the Pelicans in the Hornets game on Sunday. And while the Pelicans at this point are pretty much rolling out like Luke Babette and Norris Cole. It's embarrassing.

Lamello was the best player on the court in crunch time when it came down in the wire. And like, Rozier had kind of taken over that game. He had 40 points or so, but the ball was in Lamelle's hands on the offensive end when they really needed it. And, like, he was on the court at the same time as Lanzo, and he was already better enough. I wouldn't say significantly better, but he's already better than Lanzo, I would say. And I think that's pretty remarkable considering what we assumed from Lamell coming into this league, just all those shooting issues he was going to have. People were worried about his personality, yada, yada, yada.

I do think he's been significantly better than any of the rookie this year. All right, want to move on? I want to do, let's do a defensive player of the year here. Rob, you already started making the case for Rudy Gobert. So since he's your MVP, do you want to make the case for him for defensive player of the year? Yeah, I mean, I think this one is fairly open and shut. Again, if you're evaluating within a regular season context, Gobert is just the most impactful defender in the NBA period.

We can talk about what you can do against him in the playoffs, what you can do against the jazz. That stuff's not as important to me for this award. And I think what he gives you in terms of defending on an island where the jazz can trust him to play center field, to play the rim, allows their whole system to work. It allows all the guys to guard the three-point line more aggressively. It's the key to what they do. And so the balance that gives you in terms of that level of rim protection to me is the

most important thing. any of these candidates can give you. And not for nothing, he's finishing possessions one way or another too, where one of the things he has that other candidates don't, he's second in the league in defensive rebounding. Not a sexy thing, but if we're talking about what the most important

defensive players are doing for you, I don't want to gloss over that. Yeah, Ben Simmons, sit this one out, brother. You're not on the level of defense as Rudy Gobert. I, although I'll say this, I love the idea of Ben, Simmons campaigning for a defensive player of the year award in the sense that he takes pride in it and he realized a huge part of his contribution to his team's winning efforts is what he does

on that end of the floor. So I think that's awesome. I love that. That being said, you got no business in this conversation, bro. Rudy Gobert clearly the best defensive player in the league this regular season. It's funny because, like, is he even going to be that in the playoffs? But again, Rob, I know we're talking about regular season. So he deserves it hands down.

But I do want to take a moment to give some props to my man Miles Turner. Because for the life of me, I could not understand why teams were not going after this guy last offseason. I just can't, I don't get it. He's an incredible defender. And I know the shot hasn't fallen this season, but he's a pretty good floor spacer as well. Like the idea that teams wouldn't be falling over themselves to get this guy in their building. I just don't understand that. And this season, you know, Rudy Gobert, second in defensive percentage around the rim as far as shot contests.

Number one is Miles Turner. You wouldn't even know this because he gets no freaking pub. He gets no freaking love out there, man. Miles Turner stuck in Siberian, the paces with this on the freaking hamster wheel. a freaking seventh seed after seventh seed. I'd like to see him get in a real situation. Like, you know, I'm not, listen, it's the ringer. We don't get to diss Danny Angel over here.

But the idea that the Celtics wouldn't have went after this guy. Was, you're fitting right into this podcast, man. I'm with you. Rob is chief pacer over here. I've been talking about this for a while. Like, I don't get it. I think people just overreacted to the playoffs and he looks a little soft and whatnot. But I've always said, like, wouldn't he just be the perfect guy to stick next to Zion or some of these stretch bigs?

You want to protect at the rim, but you also want to space the floor for him so they could just, like, do whatever they can in the paint. Also, Miles Turner is somebody I think about a lot when evaluating these young bigs because he's somebody who was so freaking trash defensively when he got into the league and then made himself into an all-defense level type of guy. Right? Like, it's so cool to watch players evolve that way. And, you know, again, I know defense isn't sexy, but, like, offensively, he doesn't take anything off the table for you, right? Like, you can say, well, they can leave them open all game? Can they?

All he has to do is get to, like, 35% from three. And you can't leave that guy open, and he's never been that far from that type of guy. And so I want to give Miles. I know he's missed a bunch of games down the stretch here, but he's been a phenomenal defender this season and he's been that for a while. This is a great tee up though, because if there's any spot on my ballot that is just question marks right now, it's the third place defensive player of the year spot. So I'm looking at Turner.

I'm looking at Capella. I'm looking at Abaya. I'm looking at Embedde. And frankly, I'm looking at Draymond Green, who was making a case for himself last night a little bit too. What would you guys do with that spot? Well, making a case for himself with his play or by saying that he should be in the defensive player of your conversation.

Literally both. Jemann is still to me the best defender of his generation. When he's tuned in and geared up, he's still the best defender in the NBA right now. 100%. But at the same time, he realizes that he's playing on a team that's fighting for the eighth seed and depending on the whims of Juan Tuscano Anderson's jump shot to win games on a night-to-night basis. And so he's not dialing it up every single night, the way we might have seen him do back in 2016 right um so that's just the reality like he the production

hasn't been there on defense from him and it's just a matter of effort which again at his age already got the contract i don't i don't blame him for handling things this way uh but yeah to me he's still the best defender in the league when he's locked in he's he's he's all over the place he's guarding people in the post he's guarding people out on the perimeter being switchy Help defense is ridiculous. His instincts are just second to none as far as like understanding what every single offensive possession

is like trying to accomplish. That being said, no, he's not number three. Definitely I would put miles over him. I would put Embed over him 100%. It's disappointing that Anthony Davis once again is in these conversations because boy, man, have you watched him the past like two, three games?

I feel like he's had at least three blocks of three-pointers just because of his activity. It's just like that shows you just like how of a destructive force he could be on defense. It's like if I have to play him in the play end game, man, I am just like worried because he's so good on that end. When I think about AD, first of all, I think about game six of the finals where he, it was, it was ridiculous what he was doing. It was just unfair. I'm like, yo, this is insane what he's doing. He's locking people up at the three point line, like, just straight up getting in a stance and, like, you can't dribble past me. And then if you do try to dribble toward it, your shit is getting swallowed and eaten up.

He's guarding every single inch of the floor. That's both on and off the ball as help defender. It's crazy. Like, he can do the drop coverage if you want. He can switch out on the little guys if you want. He can meet guys at the level if you want. He can meet guys at the level if you want. want like there's nothing this guy can't do defensively but again i paid attention to no team more

than the lakers when this season started when he was actually playing ad did not play a lick of defense bro sure do anything yeah it goes back to just like best player of the world versus MVP and for for defensive best player of the world i still think it's him uh let's move on most improved here which was you want to take the reins here because your guy in New York seems like a shoeing. He's a shoeing for the ward and part of me feels like he has improved a lot.

He had a nine month off season. So that's got to take coming to a car. We got to give him credit for doing the right thing, but you had nine months. You didn't play in the bubble. You had nine months to do this. And again, I love the story. Obviously, you know,

born and raised native New Yorker everybody in my life who I'm close to are Nick fans I love to see my family and my close friends happy for once you know they get to celebrate a competent team so I understand why Julius Randall deserves this award or is going

to win this award but the two people who really deserve it are Yokeachin and Bede because to be as great as they already were and to get greater that's harder right and that's more meaningful That step between, you know, All-Star, like, Perennial All-Star and MVP, you know, it's the difference between Tony Parker and Tim Duncan.

You know what I'm saying? Like, it's a big freaking deal to go from where they were to where they're at right now. So to me, those two are the most deserving of the awards, but we don't give this award to those type of players, even though, again, You hear it all the time, right? Like the difference between going from 17 wins to 36 wins is not the same as going from 50 wins to 65. That's just the level of difference that is just, it's everything. It means everything to make that jump from good to elite because that's who wins the championship every year. Elite wins every year, not good.

And so Julius Randall is going to get the award. he's added so much to his game from the ball handling to the playmaking to the jump shooting like yes when you take all of those components he's added so much individually but when it comes to impact

like the most improve is yo get your freaking MB give me a break here this case is really swaying me it's really speaking to me I'm such a sucker for the superstar elevating his game conversation I think like those two guys may end up on my back

I'm still kind of really struggling with these last two spots. Randall, I think, has to be number one just because to me, his improvement just totally defies logic. Like, it is completely inexplicable to me. The best way I can describe who Julius Randall is this season is what would happen if a player just stopped making all the bad mistakes they had made their entire career and started making every jumper they had missed. Like, I don't have a way to explain that other than to say he's somehow dramatically better,

versus if you would have told me last season, oh, by the way, Joelle and B's going to be a front runner for MVP next year. I said, okay, I can see how that would work. And same thing with Yogych. Like, that is within my realm of understanding of what the world could be.

This version of Julius Randall, I still have no idea how this is possible. Yeah, I mean, the award ultimately becomes whose improvement was the most surprising. And it's a different conversation, but like, that's historically what it has been. But I would say that even though the Knicks aren't as successful as an Embed or Yokic or their teams.

Like, Randall's jump is just as significant as those guys. He was a player who we were just saying, like, was just playing out the string that the Knicks were just putting him on that team in order to put up big stats on a bad team and, like, maybe get some people to come to MSG who they didn't want to throw out ultimately. It's just he, he's a completely different player. Like, he's actually kicking, he's driving and kicking it out to other shooters. Like, he was not doing that, like, a couple of years.

years ago. But my question is, do you think that this improvement will last? Because I do wonder if so much of his jump is shooting, are we totally sure that's going to continue on into further seasons? And does that matter for you when you consider this award, Rob? What do you think? I mean, the logic says no, but what about what's happening is logical. Like, I don't, I don't know that we can apply that framework to what Randall is doing. So at this point, frankly, I'll buy it. I'll buy it. This is just who he is,

that he's going to be a guy who's making mid-range jumpers at this kind of rate that's reading the floor the way he is. I think there's enough kind of underlying substantive stuff that even if the percentages

drop off a little bit, he's still a much better player than the player he was. He's still just making better decisions. That's kind of what is anchoring how good he is. And that he can contribute to a playoff level defense

while he's at it. Like, that's a good player. Yeah, to me, I think this is pretty real. I think a different question for me is, does this scale? Does Julius Randall a good player on a really dope team? Not just a bunch of guys on a try-hard Thibode team. We've seen this before. The Bulls without D. Rose, where freaking Nate Robinson is anchoring their offense

and their scrappy playoff out and all of that type of stuff. Have we seen this movie before? My question with Randall is like, on a real team, does he do this still? And I have my questions about that. But, you know, as far as can he do this consistently on this type of level of team? Like if you, you know, if you ship them to Indiana, could he do this? I think so. You know what I'm saying?

But like, would he be able to do this on, say, Denver? I don't know. right? But would he be able to scale this production on a real team? I don't know. That's where I have my own questions about what Julius Randall is doing this season. It's a good question because the two other guys you kind of hear in this most improved race are Jeremy Grant and Christian Wood, right? There seems to be a general consensus if you're not going to go for the guys in the MVP race. Those three guys are the names you tend to hear. Which of those three guys, though, do you think you would put your faith in going forward?

Who would you believe in as your go-to guy or even just like a building block for a future team? I mean, call me risk averse, but I've seen Jerry and Grant do it already. He did it on Denver last year. He was that other sort of guy, like, all right, we have a fourth guy who can do a little bit of stuff on the ball. He's guarding LeBron.

He's doing, he's making. corner threes. He's even making a couple of wide open, only when they're wide open, above the break type of three. So to me, it's Jerry and Grant. Because again, I've seen him do it on a team that went to the conference finals. And people want to, people want to, here's the thing about what happened last year with Denver and the Clippers. They actually won those games, whether people want to accept it or not, just because it happened in Orlando, whatever. They actually won those games. And then the last time Denver played that team, when they were healthy, they kicked their asses up and down the court for 48 minutes.

Like straight up, I'm better than you, Clippers. I'm not scared of you. I know you can't stop me. Like, we're a better team than you, right? And so I think Jerry and Grant was a big part of making that happen for them last postseason against the Clippers. And he showed some flashes against the Lakers in that conference finals. So, like, to me, is Jerry and Grant.

Because, again, I've seen it with my own two eyes. You know, shouts to my. man, Stu Gads, do it in the playoffs, then do it again the next year. Yeah. I don't think anybody's seen Jerry and Grant do this, but I think they've seen Jeremy Grand. Oh, Jeremy, sorry. You know, I just, it's like five of them.

My bad. Jerry and Grant are a lot of grants. Jerry and Grant is doing this exact same thing in the Greek League right now. He's just tearing it up. That's true. All right, let's take one more break. And we come back. We're going to do our last two awards.

All right. Next up, six man of the year. year, I'll be honest, I hate this award. I don't think it should be even on the ballot. I don't understand why we do this. In particular, this year, where I feel like all of the injuries that have been piling up means that there's like three guys, four guys who are actually six men who don't play starters minutes for a significant amount of time this season. I just think we need to abolish this, but like, it's probably going to go to Jordan Clarkson because he scores a lot of points, and I guess this is what the recipient of this war historically has been.

Rob, can you find any reason to give it to someone other than Clarkson? Oh, yeah. I'm not voting for Jordan Clarkson. Okay, good. So who do you have? Well, I agree with you on the award first in general. Like, this is, I get the idea of wanting to reward sacrifice to make it feel less like sacrifice. I get what the NBA is kind of going for with that. It's a very like saute your vegetables and bacon fat kind of mentality that I can get behind. But yeah, we probably need to get rid of six-man.

I don't know what it's meaning is supposed to be in terms of what this award signifies. And some of that has to do with what you're saying. Like, it goes to the Jordan Clarkson's of the world. For me, Joe Ingalls is the guy. Joe Ingalls gives you a lot of what we think of as the creation that Jordan Clarkson gives you. Engels has 27 starts right now.

I'll just point that out. So he started about a third of his games and all of a sudden, like, I guess he's still a six-man. Anyway, Waz. To answer your question, JV, they made up this award because so much ego goes into who starts and who doesn't. And the award was a way for, you know, them to be like, guys, you see, you can still be important even when you're not in the starting five. It's just ego freaking placating. That's it.

This is why I can't get behind this award. There's no substance to it. It's just a matter of making people feel good for coming off the bench when all. All you need to feel good is your paycheck. Right. I feel like this award was created by like Larry Brown or someone from like that era of basketball. And it's just it's just a total bygone sort of thing. All right.

Last one here. Coach of the year. This one I've had a lot of difficulty with just because you can go in a lot of different directions here. You can go with the team that's had the most success or you can go with the coach that maybe has had the most gusto with some of the play calls or maybe the one that's just like brought out enough of bad team. I mean, shout something. the next year. Rob, who do you have top of your ballot here? I went with Monty Williams

and for me it was he's kind of undergone a multi-year project to help a franchise that everyone was laughing at to reinvent itself. And, you know, the son's being legit this season has a lot to do with Chris Paul. There's a reason he's in the MVP conversation too.

But Chris Paul being a son has a lot to do with Monty Williams and the work he was doing before CP even showed up. So I think we're seeing the dividend you know they're really seeing the result of all that process right now of the work he was doing with the young guys last year of developing that team this year of working with chris and managing it getting them to be at a place where i don't think anybody really expected them to be in terms of at the top of the standings Was, who do you have? It's Moni. Like I mentioned earlier in the pod,

I don't think Chris Paul or Devin Booker have been like incredible this season. They've been solid. And the fact that those guys haven't been world beaters and the way they play on offense specifically with the level of cohesion and the consistent effort on a night-to-night basis, like that's Moni. Right? Like they're playing their butts off for money. And the fact that he could get this group to play competent defense when your big

men rotation is Sarage and Aiton, he's a, hey, man, he's coaching him up over there. So to me, he deserves coached a year. Tibbs is a close second for sure because maybe it's just because we all think the Knicks players suck. And maybe we're just wrong about that. And, you know, our expectations need to be reset about the talent level of the players. but it's hard not to look at Tibbs when we came into the season being like, that's a trash team.

They're not going to do anything. And they've been so successful to the point where, you know, they're in the middle of, you know, the playoff picture like 4-5C type of stuff. That's impressive. But I think what Moni's done is more impressive. Just the level, the fact that these guys are the second best record in the NBA, nobody saw that coming this season. And I think he's coached them up for sure.

That's a great point about the offense. I mean, both sides of the ball, though, to Waz's point, there are no effort questions. There are no execution questions. The only question is, do they have enough to match up with some of the best players and best teams in the NBA? That is a tremendous place he's put them in. How do we feel about Steve Nash for this award? I mean, Rob and I have talked about him a little bit. I do think, like, one, his just his spirit and, like, his approach to this Nets team where he's been willing to try things in a way that, like, I don't know if I could think of any other coach since,

Dan Tony maybe just willing to throw shit against the wall and like really just like experiment with every part of his roster try guys who are at the end of the bench just as much as some of the more established guys. And also like they've been good. They didn't dip when all of these stars went out. I mean, the roster behind the three guys is a little bit better than most of the super teams were probably we were used to. But I do think like he plugged a lot of holes and made sure this team has been as good in the win columns as they probably can be in the play. playoffs. I do think that is almost as difficult as some of what of these other guys have done of taking a bad team and turning them into a

successful team. I would like to read for you guys the top five nets in terms of minutes played this season. Joe Harris. Joe Harris, Kyrie, Jeff Green, Bruce Brown, Landry-Shammett. That is the second place team in the Eastern Conference. I like Steve Nash is number two on my ballot. I think he's handled Brooklyn circumstances about as well as any coach could and done the most with this regular season that they could, given that, you know, as Waz was talking about earlier with Hardin, when they made the Hardin trade, that stabilized their season.

And then they lost him. And they had to completely restabilize again after they had reoriented their whole team around him to manage all of that and still be this good in terms of the standings. I think he's done an awesome job. Right. Yeah, I'm a fan of his egoless approach to coaching. Y'all mentioned Larry Brown earlier. he's the anti-Larry Brown, right?

And that's what this team actually needs. And by that, I mean, there's no abrasiveness. There's no, this is how the game needs to be played. It's like, oh, y'all want to start your boy? You want to start Lamarcus or Blake is center? You want to start your boy? Even though Claston's been out playing all of them? No, let's do it.

Let's do it. Watch it crashing burn and be like, see, guys, this is why Claxton's going to get the minutes. Right? Like, just that approach. And again, the stuff that's been thrown at him with this huge, trade, you know, in the middle of the season, all of the injuries to KD, Kyrie, well, Kyrie not even injured, just taking PTO in sick days just when he wants to, and Hardin, like managing all of that and the egos and to manage to have this team play so freaking well.

He deserves a lot of credit. It actually, this team in a lot of ways reminds me of the 2010-11 Miami Heat in the sense that they have their three guys and the roster is sort of ill-fitting around them. I think the three guys work just fine and they're super talented, but I don't think that that's going to be able to get them off over the hump ultimately in the postseason. And, you know, Nash likes bolstra is not going to get any love or credit for any success that this team has. But I think in the long run, like when you watch Steve Nash's processes, he's clearly got great process. you know, and that's what I think is going to bode well for him as a coach going forward.

And I think like the heat in their first season, they're not going to have enough to get it done. But next year, oh, Lord, have mercy. It's going to be tough. It's going to be tough for teams with the Nets next year. I mean, and like that heat team, like they also had a bunch of big man that they could have just cycled through and just put them in the five position. But he didn't do that, right? Like, we haven't heard a peep about D'Andre Jordan being relegated to the bench roll or whatever. Like in last year, that was like the biggest storyline for the Nets.

And ultimately it sounded like got Kenny Atkinson fired. So the fact that he was managing that situation, that's a big part of it. Like increasingly in the NBA is managing your star players and just managing situations. And it does feel like Nash has been successful at that. Yeah. So if I've got Moni number one, Nash number two, for three, I'm kind of torn between Tibbs and Quinn Snyder. What do you, what do you guys think of that spot? I mean, I'm with Tibbs

I'm going with Tibbs for the simple fact that Oh, Quinn Snyder don't get a twisty He has to be put together an amazing structure in a system But to me, all this happened this year is that Bogies played And Mike Connolly feels more comfortable in the system Like, there's kind of all that happened. I don't think Snyder, who I think is one of the best coaches

in the league, by the way, has done anything different than what he's already done. I think his guys have just played better. Like, you know, Conley has developed a chemistry with Rudy in pick and roll, right? Like, he's figured out the spots to choose and all of that kind of stuff.

And so, you know, I'm going to have to go with tips because, again, like, Nerlin's Noel and, like, what are we doing out here? Like, you know, like Bullock and it's like, how is this happening this way? You know, quickly, who's a rookie? It's just like, to me, it just seems

way more improbable that the Knicks are doing what they're doing than what Utah is doing. Because, you know, I'm not going to lie. I was super, super bullish on Utah last year. I thought they were going to do last year what they're doing this year. And so, you know, shout to Utah for making me look smart one year later. But still, I expected them to do this, honestly. I really did. A lot of people out here making you look smart, was.

Hey, man. Hey, I got to give the credit where it's due, Rob. I would go with Tibbs as well. Two other names I would throw out there, though. James Borago, just with what the Hornets have been able to do the season. And Nate McMillan, because we have the rare instance where he had the same exact team, where we had the same exact team with a different coach. So we have that sample of them.

And now the Hawks were more injured then, so that has to be factored in here. But now we have that same team, and they've been way more successful. You don't hear the griping about Trey Young. Like I said before, just managing situations. wins definitely helps in that regard, but I do feel like Nate, as you wrote Rob a couple weeks ago, has been able to make sense of that team in a way

that they really weren't under Lloyd Pierce. He's been great. I think it had been a case where Lloyd was fired like eight games into the season or something, Nate would probably be right here with anybody. It's just such a small sample to judge coach of the year based off of. But I do want to circle back to Quinn for a second because I think if you're going to make the case for Quinn Snyder,

it's taking, he was a system coach, a guy who had built a system, we always criticized those types of coaches from those systems not being flexible enough, and he pushed their three-point volume up and up and up to a level that's made them a special team. I think that's notable. And the other thing, too, like to flash back, this was a team with two feuding stars. Like they were not happy with each other.

There was real risk of the jazz completely imploding, and the fact that it's all good vibes in Utah these days, or at least it seems so from the outside. You know, that's in part on Donovan and Rudy that's in part on that locker room and all those guys coming together. But Quinn Snyder keeping that team together a little bit, I think is an important part of his case too.

Yep. All right. Let's wrap it there. Thank you to Woz for joining us. You'll be seeing more of him lately. You're not seeing. You'll be listening to him more of us because we don't get breakouts on this podcast. I mean, I think this is up there with one of the greatest pilot episodes of all time.

This is right there with the lost pilot. Who else had a good pilot? Did Sinefeld? Signfeld pilots? I think Sopranos had a decent... The pilot of Sopranos is actually really weird in retrospect. It almost plays as slapstick comedy at time. It's very strange.

But this was a great pilot, y'all. You got to find your tone, you know? That's always the struggle. But we're going to be up there with the Friday night lights of the world soon enough. Sure. All right. Thank you to Jonathan Kerma on production. Shouts to Jonathan Charks.

get well soon, my friend. We will be back next week and we will be talking about playoff basketball. Until then, we'll see it.