The Ringer NBA Show - The Bucks Stop There, Pelicans Down for the Count, and Drake Is Still Weird | Heat Check

Episode Date: December 17, 2019

Instant Replay (03:24): News from around the league, including the end of the Bucks’ win streak, Dion Waiters's latest suspension, the excellent clapbacks from CJ McCollum, and more. The Main Event (18:32): Micah Peters stops in to talk to the gang about the absolute mess the Pelicans are in, and whether Zion and all the team's missing parts can even fix it. Good Call/Bad Call (30:11): Drake is being really weird again, gambling for 3-point shots, and we get Cubas mixed up.  Host: Jawn Gonzalez Guests: Haley O’Shaughnessy, Dan Devine, Micah Peters Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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responsibly, DrinkWorks Home Bar is currently available in California, New York, Florida, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Illinois with more states available for pre-sale today at DrinkWorks.com. And now, heat check. He's as hot as a boat torch. It's a heat check. You knew that was coming. It's heat check time. Welcome to Heat Check. I'm your host, John Gonzalez, joined as I am every week by our producer, Steve Alman.

Hello. Steve, I checked my math on this, if I'm right about that. this. I checked a calendar. I consulted it. Today is not Monday. It is not Monday. It is a Tuesday. It's a Tuesday. I don't really quite sure what to do here. We flipped. It's awfully bizarre. It's a Tuesday. We switched with KOC and Verno. The mismatch went on Monday. We were moved to Tuesday. Everything up is down. Down is up. Black is white. It's Topsy-turvy. We're going to try to figure it out. We're going to give our best effort. We want to thank all of you for listening. A reminder to please rate and review us. And don't forget about all the great NBA content on the ringer.com. We've got a group

up there ranking the top 25 players from the first 25 or so games of the year. That was Fawn Powell wrote a story about the Andrea Agadalitrae and how that could decide the race out west. Alan Siegel, Alan Siegel, who we don't talk about nearly enough on the NBA show and I have known for years, wrote a story about Kevin Garnett and how he landed in Uncut Gems. It might have a little uncut gem talk later on in the program.

Have you seen it? No, I have not. I'm going to be waiting for the holidays to do that. Ah, you're saving it. Uh-huh. I like this about you. I have also not seen it, although I'm excited to do so.

Coming up later in the show, our resident Pelicans fan, Micah Peters, joins us to discuss why nothing is going the way New Orleans hope this season. But first, let's review the latest headlines and news from around the league and bring on our regular contributors, Dan and Haley. Boom, Shackalaka.

He's heating up. He's on fire. All right, one of them is once again in studio with me. One of them is still way across the country and our NYCCHQ. It's Haycheck Coast to Coast with Haley and Dan. Haley, you're back. It's so much warmer here.

It's so much warmer here. It doesn't rain as much. It's warmer. It's much better. Dan, how are you farring in New York? Well, I mean, it's a little chilly now because I find out that it's a lot warmer away from sitting next to me. So, I mean, that's a little bit of a bummer for your boy. But in general, I'm doing all right.

Otherwise, handsome and ready to rock. We got all kinds of stuff to discuss. It's Tuesday. Normally we'd have a whole weekend of stuff. Instead, we're just going to go with what's happened since Monday, which was very recent. let's do that and review the headlines from around the league with NBA instant replay. All right, guys, so the Milwaukee box, I was expecting to discuss their continued streak. Instead, it snapped at 18 games.

They lost at home. I did not see this coming to the Mavericks without Luca in a wild game. The Mazz were pretty much in control until the fourth quarter, and it got tight at the end. But the Mavs are a very good team on the road. They're 10 and 2 on the road this season. And I would say that Chris Staps had probably his best game as a Mav so far. And they end up upending the Bucks and snapping their streak. Surprise, Taley?

Yes, extremely. I had convinced myself right before the game that the Bucks could make it to 33. Yeah, we were talking about this. I really thought that they could do it. Because their schedule was like not, they had some easy teams on the way. The teams that they did have to face that were tough. I thought they could beat. This one I wasn't even thinking about.

But yeah, I was wrong. Shout out to the Mavs bench. Dan, we were talking about this in Slack. What did you make of Chris Stapp's performance? Because I think he's been, I've watched probably an inordinate for me amount of Mavs basketball this year just because I wanted to see that pairing with Luca and Chris Stabs. But now with Luca out, I was especially interested to see what kind of effort we'd get from Chris Stass because it's been a second since he's had to sort of carry a team.

And I thought he looked the best he's looked in Dallas, although it was in Milwaukee. Yeah, it was an impressive performance on both ends of the floor. 26 points, 12 rebounds, a couple of blocks, four assists. I think the way it sort of works best for Chris Stapps at this point. We talked about this earlier in the season. Everything revolves around Luca when Luca's on the floor, right? And he's creating for anyone else, for everybody else when he's got the ball in his hands. And so Chris Staps winds up sort of spotting up and playing a complimentary role to give the offense space.

Now you've got Jalen Brunson who's going to sort of feed him the ball. He's going to look to create four Chris Staps as a professional. primary option. And so that's eight three-point attempts. That's a lot of sort of pump and go and opportunities to get him on the move toward the basket. And he looked really comfortable. He had some spring. There was one great sequence where he blocked a shot at the rim, ran the floor, had like a kind of a quick catch pump and go and dunked at the rim. So like he's getting a little more comfortable when he's in a more primary role. Whether that's going to work late in the season with Donchich back on the floor, I will see. But it was nice to see some sort of shades of the old

number one option, Chris Stapp's last night. He also had two crazy deep. three in the fourth quarter in crunch time that were like not quite from the the half-court area but much farther off the three-point line than I would have expected just insane shots and so good for him and also with Janus on him I mean he just pulled up and fired and also kind of baited Janus into taking similar deep threes late in the game where he was playing sagging super far off of off of Janus and like sort of daring him to take the shot and and and Yonis took the bait. And I know that you've been bullish on Janus' three-point shooting lately, Haley. But in those situations, I kind of want to see him not take those shots. Yes, I know it's

early in like December's a good time for that, but they wanted him the Mavs to take those shots. And he did and he missed them and they ended up losing the game. I don't care about that. It's December. Exactly what you said. He needs it. This is the time to do it. In his last seven games, Yannis is shooting 41% on over five attempts. Semi-grain of salt because a lot of the teams that they've played during that time are really bad defending the three. Cleveland, New Orleans, Memphis, New York, Detroit, and Orlando, yikes. But he is taking them and he is making them. This is the time to do it.

I want him to take those shots. In general, just not in crunch time when they're daring you. Dan, where are you on this? Because, like, there was multiple moments in that game where the Bucks, like, they did not play their best game. They were without Eric Blood. So your guy, Dante DiVincenzo was out there. Who, by the way, who did you say you liking them to?

Well, I'm trying to figure out who his game reminds me of. and the closest I've got right now is righty Delante West, like right-handed Delante West. I kind of like it. A big combo guard who can shoot it a little bit, plays defense, got a little wild streak to him. I kind of like it.

I mean, he was out there doing his Dante DiVinchezo thing, but they did not play their best game. And yet, they still had at the end of the game an opportunity to steal it from the Mavs on their own floor. And I thought, okay, like, you know, Yonis had an incredible game.

It's hard to ask for anything more from him. But I just feel like, yes, so you feel free to work on your three-point shooting up to, say, the last five minutes. And then I just need you to get to the rim and do your Giannis thing. Yeah, I think part of that is they were, he might have just been gassed down toward the end, frankly, because he was carrying so much of the offensive load. They were playing a lot of him at center. So that sort of five-out spacing where he's getting the ball up top and just going downhill at, you know, Maxi Kliebah or whoever, you know, whichever big man was defending him. and that was really effective,

but they needed to sort of trade some twos for threes at some point. So it's a shot he's going to have to get comfortable with. He seems to be getting more comfortable with it. And at a certain point, it's like all the battering ram at the rim because it's going to take something out of him too. So this is where I feel like you maybe saw the absence of Eric Bledso, another guy who can create off the dribble,

break down a defender and go. So it'll be interesting to watch how they adjust without Bledso in the lineup because Yannis is already doing so much. How much more can he do? Yannis might be the best comeback single-hanna guy in the league. Maybe like it's going to take him a bit, but he folds time in half going down the court. That brings so many more opportunities to catch up. He almost pulled it off at the end.

I mean, he got a ridiculous hand one late in the game, but it didn't work out. So the streak stops. They've got the Lakers on Thursday. That'll be a fun game between two powerhouse teams. Other news from the Eastern Conference. The Miami Heat, they've had a good season. They did not have a good first half against the Grizzlies. They gave up 73 points to Memphis in the first half.

And then, like, I'm looking at this and I'm going, wow, that's just like an incredibly bad effort by then. They're going to get blown out in this game. Then they staged this second half comeback and almost pull it off. They ended up ultimately losing. But I think that the heat have been a really interesting story, not just in the Eastern Conference Haley, but in the league writ largest season. I did not expect this. And I'm still not sure what to make of them between Jimmy and Bam, who was the player of the week and has looked really good and cracked our top 25 players of the first 25 games came in at number 24. What do you make of the heat?

I mean, not all credit, but a lot of credit has to go to Jimmy and Bam. Bam is incredible. He defends one through five. He has such great court awareness. He gets between passes. He has great block timing and he has so much energy. And they want him to take the shot. Jimmy wants him to be the guy to take the big shot.

So I think a lot of this is just BAM stepping up. Dan, are you buying them long term this season? I mean, they have been a pleasant surprise. I think this is certainly, I expected it to be more of like a prolonged, protracted, Jimmy Butler-Hecheck season. And they look like a good team. Yeah, I thought that there was a version of this team that was maybe the third or fourth best team in the East because I kind of liked the way all the pieces fit together, especially on defense. I wasn't quite sure how the offensive, you know, totally, how things would shake out in terms of the order of operations on offense.

Obviously, Jimmy's the number one option, but you had Draggich there, you had Winslow there. You know, how are guys going to sort of slot into their roles? What are you going to get in the back court? And then all of a sudden we find out, you're getting Kendrick Nun and Tyler Hero and maybe not so much Dionne Waiters. there's the things have sort of slotted out into a pecking order that seems like it fits who the identity of the team is and on the defensive end. They've been able to be really effective kind of no matter who they've matched up with. I think Bam, out of Bayo is a big part of that. He's also been like a much better playmaker than I think a lot of people realized he was, you know, facilitating from the elbows, bringing the ball up the court, running the break.

Both Kevin O'Connor and I had written about that earlier in the season. There's a lot to like there. I expected good. I didn't expect like two or three. seat in the east and one of the best point differentials in the league. But I like what they have there. And I was why I would be really reluctant to break it up by swing and for the fences on a big trade.

As we know, we've sort of had some discussion about that. Our guy, DJ Foster wrote about the idea of them putting a package together for Drew Holiday, which would be fantastic. But also does it bust up the chemistry you've been building? I don't know. It's an interesting question to think about at this point. Yeah. And it puts them ahead of the curve too.

Like they've accelerated their timeline on this sort of like on the fly remodel that I think Patrick Riley was very. reluctant to say, oh, we're going to blow it up or rebuild or whatever. That's not something that he was ever interested in. And now they're sort of doing it on the fly and it's, and it's accelerated. But to Dan's point about chemistry, uh, it's just going great chemistry wise with one, Dion Waiters, who we mentioned, I, it feels like we talk about him every week on this show, uh, which is disproportionate relative to his playing time, which has been none suspended yet again, Haley, unfortunate because I really thought those two crazy kids were going to work at this time.

Uh, you wrote about it. Is it a time to do you wrote about it is a time to evacuate Waiters Island. Dion has never played more than 46 games for the heat in the season. If you haven't silently Irish exited Waiters Island, then, you know, it's already over. You're too faithful, too loyal. Godspeed to Dion. Moving along here, C.J. McCollum presents us, as you mentioned, Haley, on Twitter with our new I'm trying. Jennifer, he interacted with another Twitter critic responding to

somebody who came after him and said, what pick would the Blazers have if the season ended today to which C.J. McCollum responded. I'm not sure Arturo. We have four months left, not two weeks. You tell me. And then he goes out and what? Boom. Right in Arturo's face, they get a one point went over Phoenix. Haley, how do you feel about one C.J. McCollum consistently interacting with critical fans on Twitter? I love it. And he's using their government names, the names their mothers and fathers gave them. He's trying to work some sense into them. Also, he's not one of the nerds on Twitter calculating what pick they're going to get after every win or loss. This is not his job.

Okay. But also, too, Dan, Haley doesn't not like to hear it's still early. But at what point, though, do you start to worry about the Portland Trailblazers one? Yes, they eked out a one point win over the Phoenix Suns. But, you know, you look at the calendar and we're into mid-December already. And then before you know it, after that, I looked at the calendar. January comes and then February and it gets late all of a sudden. So at what point, at what point are you worried about the Portland Trailblazers?

Well, I think first off, on the heels of you calling him Patrick Riley, the show of respect, for you to indicate that there's months travel and go like from December to January to February. It's dynamite work by Gons today in the hosting department. His full God-given name. That's right. I think that it's as bad as the Blazers were in the beginning of the season and as much as they sort of stabilized but still been shaky since Mello got there. They're a game and a half out of the seven seed right now.

You know, like, it's early, it's early, but, but they're a game and a half out of the seven seed. seed. There is, there is no reason to believe that a team that sort of gets locked in around Lillard and McCollum that now has a better idea of how to sort of complimentary offense, generate baskets around them with Mello there, still going to struggle on the defensive end, but there's a lot to like in terms of the way they can score the ball, like that they can't, you know, jump over Oklahoma City or Sacramento. They can't get into that, like, lower tier.

phase. I feel like there's no reason for them to panic at this point. They've been a second half team for the last few years. They start slow and then they pick up steam as you get through the wintertime. I feel like there's a reason for CJ to say to Arturo like chill out and take it easy and we'll see where we are in a couple months. Chill out, Arturo. I think that this is very selective by Dan Devine going, uh, that they're a game and a half out of the playoffs because they're also just one game ahead of Dan's Lodeth San Antonio Spurs. So, They're basically the same team, Dan. Well, you know, you got me there.

I have no comeback for that. No, I'm actually very, I'm hopeful that Portland will pull it off and go on a run here. That was NBA instant replay. Before we go to the main event, let's take a quick break for a word from our sponsors. With two-thirds of guys experiencing noticeable hair loss by age 35, most guys assume losing their hair as inevitable as they age. Some don't care. Some shave their heads. some embrace hats.

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too good. That would be an unpredictable outcome. We're going to talk about that in just a second with Peters, get a teammate who can help you navigate the unexpected. Talk to a state farm agent today about combining your home and auto insurance. And now, back to heat check. All right, joining us in this studio. He's a staff writer. He's killed it on the watchman coverage with Sean Yoh and our video team. He joins us to discuss his beloved and beleaguered pelicans. It's Michael Peters back on the program. A whole squad, no, back beef. What's going on, John? You're wearing shades inside the studio. I am wearing shades inside the studio because I got it like that. I'm kidding.

Future. I was not that I was supposed to take them off. No, I like it. I think it's a good look. Future's so bright. He's got to wear shades. Unlike the Pelicans, which brings us to the main event. Wow.

You cut me deep there. I'm not going to lie to you. Your Pelicans play Brooklyn this evening as we record this. After that, they've got four games on the road leading up to Christmas. They are six in 21, Micah. That puts them in Knicks, Hawks and Cavs Company. Only the Warriors have been worse. 538 preseason predicted that they'd go 40 and 42 and gave them the 33% chance to make the playoffs.

We did our preseason predictions where we were like, hey, this could be the year where the pelicans are going to take the leave. We're super excited about Zion. And instead, no Zion, and they have not looked good. Yeah, I was going to say, was this 40 win projection before or after his arthroscopic surgery? It was preseason. But so you were on the show preseason, and we talked about the Pelican. You were excited about them. You already forgot about you being on the program.

It's been so long since I was excited. That's why. So explain how you're feeling as a Pelicans fan. This has to be, I mean, the Zion thing especially has to be disappointing. I mean, it is, it's disappointing. It's not, the poverty of the English language is such that I can not describe to you how disappointing it is. I mean, like, you think that you're getting Zion and then you get, you know, six and 21. Yeah.

But like I was saying before, we actually switch the recorder on here. A rare thing that's happening in this stretch of games going through the holiday season is that they're actually going to be playing like not top 10 ranked offenses constantly, which is, you know, like a small reason to feel hopeful about some of this. More helpful than not. I mean, it's better than playing good teams. But aside from the Zion thing, like they have a lot of nice, young pieces. And I think Brandon Ingram has obviously looked good. But more recently, like with

Lonzo, they've been bringing off the bench. And if he's going to be the point guard of the future, let him be the point guard of the future. Like, what's, what do you think has gone wrong in your estimation with the palac and stuff on? Okay. So like, there's kind of like a similar parallel going on with like, say, a primarily team that had the blood the youth of season due to a transfer band called Chelsea. They basically like had to play the young players. And it was good and it was great and everybody was enjoying it. And then like it's kind of plateauing a little bit. And it's like, do you keep hitting on 19 or do you trade somebody and find, you know, like maybe some sort of continuity stability towards through the end of the season? Dan, to Michael's point about the

trades, there's been talk about maybe Drew Holiday be on the block. Would you move him? I think you'd need kind of a lot to do it. You know, obviously he's not the, you know, he's not somebody that's going to carry a franchise on his shoulders. He's not somebody that's going to elevate them to the playoffs on their own. But I think to give up on sort of the project of what David Griffin put together before you even see Drew and Zion together on the floor, I think you'd need a lot to do it. Yeah. Haley, with the Drew and Lonzo thing, like, again, you know, they go and they make this trade and it's supposed to be all these young guys. And I think like maybe, as Micah was saying,

at the beginning of the season without Zion, you're trying it out and you're looking at it and you're going, this is fun, this could work out. And then all of a sudden, maybe they've soured on it a little bit. I've always been a lot so hater. It's not for you. From the start, even before the draft,

I was like, I really don't know about this. I wasn't excited for their backcourt. That's your stance. That was, I mean, yes, on that alone. But he was just always so passive. And I thought it wouldn't matter next to Drew and especially with Zion. And, you know, all the transition.

dreams that they had. I will tell you their bright light is Brandon Ingram, and we should talk about that because that's very encouraging. Zaya will come back. Will he? God, I hope he comes back. So I want to, I just want to throw this up for...

Hey, don't you put that evil on the Pelicans. I don't mean he won't come back ever. Here's what I'm asking you now, given the way that the season is going, and the fact that, like, they're not, they're not accomplishing anything record-wise this season, right? Would you at least entertain a Sixers-esque redshirt tank.

You... I'm just throwing it out there. Get the hell out of my face. Listen, I mean, towards the bottom of the standings, you don't want to risk further injury, right? He could get in more shape. Maybe you maximize your ping pong balls. I'm just saying that there are...

We've seen this in the past. Nobody's on board with this. Everybody's laying out on me. I'm just going to say that if they do that, JJ Reddick's going to want to trade. Drew Holiday's. Like, look, I'm in my prime. This is starting to get really unfair.

And Derek Favors, who we should also say has missed a lot of time and could help them a lot, especially defensively, where they fucking suck right now, has not, I think he's played 11 games total. So they do have a little bit of potential, but those veterans are going to want to go. No, I mean, like, she said, yes. I mean, like, there's not really anything to add to that. I mean, like, I just have to be like, hurry up and wait with, uh. You just want him out there.

And if you want a couple more games and it. hurts you in the tanking race, you're okay with that. I really don't care. Yeah. Dan? Yeah. I think that the, it's, you know, when we look at sort of what's gone wrong, it's basically everything that isn't Brandon Ingram and like Kenridge Williams, like shout

to Kenny Hustle. He's been killing it in his role as a small forward on this team this year. But he's pretty much everything else hasn't gone the way they've hoped because none of the pieces have been together at the same time. Haley mentioned Derek Favors. He's supposed to be the center that fits next to Zion. and that sort of provides the rim protection and the spine of the defense and also the screen and roll big man to open up space. He hasn't been there for most of the season.

Also had a death in the family. So he's been like playing through some weird stuff for the last couple of weeks. You haven't been able to see what Zion looks like next to Ingram. So that's a big question going forward to. Ingram's been one of the best young sort of surprises of the season moving into that number one role. You're going to have to pay him this summer because he's a restricted free agent. So you need to see what he looks like next to Zion before you say we're going to have two. two number one options who basically play four and need the ball on their hands.

There's a lot to kind of figure out, which is why I feel like if you're going to, it's like, oh, like the producers or something like that. If it tanks, you're going to make your money back and it's already tanking. Why trade a ton to sort of make it go that way if it's already going that way and you still have the pieces to be able to figure out what you do next? The only argument I can see for that is as Haley was saying, if JJ wants to get moved, if Drew wants to push his way out, then you figure out what you got to do from there. but I feel like you've got to have something worth your while because those guys are under contract for multiple years.

If this year's a wash, you've got to rebuild for next year, and you've already got a plan in place. It seemed like it made sense before everything went shithouse. Haley, what do we make then if we've decided to not tank here for the Pelicans? They're going to try and they're going to get all the pieces together and they're going to see what they actually look like. What do we make of the job that Alvin Gentry has done so far? Because there's been rumblings. Like, is he the right guy for the – I'm not sure that it's fair for all the reasons that you guys have all. outline that they haven't seen all the pieces together and you can't really determine it with

injuries and not having Zion like what they're going to actually look like. But are you on board with Alvin Gentry as the right guy for this team? That's the question. Do you give him the chance once he has everything? Do you give him a fair shot once he has the team that he was promised over the summer? I don't know. He's been trying a million different lineups. It seems like none of them are really working. He did move Lonto to the bench, which I think was the right move. But I mean, before this, before Griffin came in and Griffin was like this, he's going to be my guy, I'm going to carry him over, I believe in him. He only made the playoffs one time in four years.

But granted, even back then they had lots of injury trouble. Things were just always going wrong for them. Then they had AD drama last year. So I really don't know what to think about this. I say give him a chance, especially if the season ends up being a wash. I don't, you're the only Pelicans fan. Not only that I know, but also that I've ever met. So I don't have a good sense.

I'm being serious. I don't have a good sense for how Pelicans are. I mean, like, I love New Orleans. Tell me if I'm wrong here. I don't have a good sense for, like, what Pelicans fans feel about, not just that team, but specifically Alvin Gentry. Like, is there like a feeling about Alvin? Because I'll tell you what everybody in Philadelphia thinks about Brett Brown.

He's coached all of the losses and none of the wins. Like, that's how they feel about him. How do they, how do people, how do you feel about Alvin Gentry? Yeah. You know, as, as you are well aware, I drop it on my Pelican fandom, like, once every, like, it's every other week. It's not sort of like weekend, like week out like it is for me with like my other teams. It's made to order for this show.

Yeah. However, like Alvin Gentry is, as Haley was saying, like, you know, run into a lot of misfortune as thus far. I mean, like he was inheriting a team that was like cobbled together from several of Del Demp's like past iterations of the team. like then, you know, once you finally get like some sort of semblance of forward momentum, like your biggest piece wants to leave. And then now you are trying to assimilate all these new players into your already established style and you lose, you know, like the next, you know, marquee player in the franchise to injury for half of the three quarters of the season.

Like it's just like there's a bunch of different things that are like unfortunate, but it's just like, you know, that doesn't really matter to. the material consequences of not being able to figure it out without Zion Williamson. Yeah, there's a lot of variables here. And I think, like, Dan, preseason, again, as we said, everybody is very bullish on this team and specifically the job that David Griffin has done. So long term here, and it is going to be a long term situation, which, again, as a tanking enthusiast is why I suggested it.

You all shot it down. Pooh-poohed the suggestion. Fine, I'll move on. But long-term here, how are you feeling about the prospects of, of what David Griffin is trying to put together. I still think it makes sense, and I still think you have Zion Williamson, until you know that that's not going to work,

until you know that this season is like the, you know, an omen of ill things to come, as opposed to a little, you know, speed bump before he becomes Ben Simmons or before he becomes Blake Griffin or before he comes, whatever, like, if you don't know that yet, then it seems like it's a bad idea to make decisions based on that being what the way things work.

The issue with, entry is, has it become, you know, has the fact that he hasn't been able to put together something sort of stable on defense, been able to, you know, stop the bleeding enough and figure out some kind of answer out of the mismatch pieces that he's got? Does that then put him in that category of maybe he's not the problem, but maybe he's not the solution we need? Or is there, like, a sort of bad blood about the way that he's been handling things? If it's not that point publicly, if it's not to that point within the organization, it seems like it's early to sort of do it, even as there's been a lot of disappointing play over the, for the Pelicans over the last

couple months. Mike, a last word on the Pelicans here before we move on. When the season is over, because you've had a lot of years where being a Pelicans fan has not been easy. At the end, do you think that you'll feel mostly optimistic going forward? Like, the season's over and maybe, hopefully, right? You said hopefully Zion comes back. I'm expected to feel overwhelmed by the time of the season is over.

Better than you feel now. Yes. I don't want to be overwhelmed. I don't want to be overwhelmed. I just want to be welled. Properly welled. Yeah. I want to be properly wound.

I'm rooting for you, buddy. was the main event with Micah Peters. You want to stick around? We're going to play a little good call back call. No, I think I got to. I'm kidding. He's going to stay. He's going to stay.

It's going to be a lot of fun. Let's play good call back call. What a bold call here. All right. So one of our favorite segments here to close out the show, a couple of things that popped up on my radar. I basically just pull all these things from Haley's Twitter feed. Haley, you were mentioning this.

Drake has a collection of high school jerseys. Most recently he went out and got Brani's jersey, LeBron's son, the Sierra Canyon thing. And you said that this was very strange. I already know we're going to land on this. But good call or bad call on Drake's ever-expanding collection of high school player jerseys. Brony is a high school freshman. This is so weird. And it's his high school jumpsuit.

That's just like something that people wear in high school. Only high schoolers ever wear that. This is very creepy. Drake also has a suspicious history communicating. with people who are a bit too young, extremely bad call. I'm here to protect the youth. Bad call. How do you feel about high school jersey, Drake?

Now, when I saw Boogie Cousins' Rattler's jersey in the... See, that one kind of almost sold me. I was just like, all right, that's kind of tight. But then I saw the brawny, like, you know, mirror selfie in the high school track suit. And I was just like, that's weird, man. You get it. I'm going to say bad call. So that's a bad call from you.

But in retrospect, like the LeBron one, right? Like, like, there's a, no, no, no, no. Okay, there's a, the thing is that, like, Boogie Cousins was already an All-Star and a 611.4 by the time he was wearing that Rettler's jersey. Like, LeBron was already the biggest player on the planet by the time he had that Irish jersey. Brony is a freshman in high school. They're also throwbacks. Those are throwbacks. That's what makes them okay.

Exactly. Dan, the timing here obviously matters to these two. Good caller, bad call. on Drake prematurely copying Brani's jersey. Yeah, I feel like this is something you need to, like, if you get it now, you got to dead stock it for a few years until he's like, you know, able to vote or something like that. Exactly. Steve, our resident has so many high school jersey enthusiasts.

Where do you fall on this? I mean, where the fuck should I really even start? Bad call. It's weird. Bad call all around, sweep it up. All right. Back to Miami. we talked about in Miami earlier in the show.

Bam and Jimmy have a bet, Haley. Bam owes Jimmy $500 for every game. He doesn't take a three. And Jimmy owes Bam $500 for every game that Bam does take a three. Good call, bad call on them gambling their way into more three point attempts. Extremely good call. I'm actually keeping track of how much money each other owes on Twitter because I have a betting problem. And also, I just love encouragement.

Also, why in the hell hasn't Brett Brown done this? He should be offering thousands. I mean, any kind of incentive that they could get Ben Simmons to shoot the corner three, I'd be on board with it. Micah Peters, gambling for three-pointers. Good call. I love all of J.B. Butler's negative coaching tactics. He tried it with Ben Simmons last year.

Didn't work. Dan Devine. I'm going to say bad call because I just see this eventually getting to the point where it's like thousands and thousands in the pot and somebody's getting punched in the face. Yeah, I wonder if this is going to... Why would that be a bad thing? That's also a good point. Micah, we just spent a whole bunch of time talking about how the heat are like one of the pleasant surprises of the season and maybe this is like there.

Oh, you mean just because it's like, oh, it's so fun to watch Jimmy Butler and Tyler Harrow like be friends on Instagram. And it's just kind of like no. Like it would be so much better for all of us that are not invested in whether or not this team does well for this to bowl over into a fist fight over like thousands of dollars owed over missed or made three pointers. You know what? I don't have the courage of my convictions on this one. Shoot the fair one, guys. It's a good call. Good call, everybody.

Steve. I haven't seen uncut gems yet, but I'm pretty sure it's going to work out pretty well for Adam Sandler. And I'm going to say this is a good call as well. It's going to work out just fine. I would love locker room strife with Jimmy Butler. Gambling, though, as we've seen in the NBA, hopefully it doesn't turn into like a Gilbert Arena situation.

I'm going good call, though, because anytime that there's a potential for strife, I'm on board with it. Speaking of uncut gems, nice transition by you, Steve. according to Bill Orham from the athletic, Rajan Rondo was supposed to appear with Kevin Garnett in Uncut Gems but missed his 6 a.m. flight. Here's a quote from Rondo. It was my first big role to,

I missed the flight and I was like, shit, I don't want to take a private jet for about $95,000. Fucked up my debut. Haley, good call or bad call on not paying the 95K for the private jet. I remember his flop in 2018 against the Wolves. Incredibly good actor.

His gems are uncut, Bad call. Should have paid the money. Micah Peters. Pay that money? He's got that money lying around, man. You can pay him the $95,000 to get on the jet via a motion picture. Get in the movie.

Yeah. Bad call should have done it. Dan Devine. Bad call to not pay it. I actually wound up having to write about that series as part of our uncut gems, I don't know, portfolio of content. And Rondo was awesome in that series. He was like won that series in Game 7.

It would be an opportunity for him to kind of like, live back to when he was like the man on those Celtic scenes before his injuries. I feel like if you've got the 95,000 stunt and remember your glory days, bad call, Rondo. Steve, as somebody who makes Rondo money as our producer, good call or bad call, I'm not paying the 95K. I mean, that's like a day's worth of work for you. Oh, no, that's, what do you think I'm making this show alone? Yeah, no, it's extremely bad call. I go good call.

95K. I mean, I'm just a lowly writer. I don't know. I think Rondo made the right call on that. last one, Dan, you're out on this because you're involved, so you're biased. So I'm on Twitter. So I'm on Twitter and I believe it was Tim Cato, right, Dan? Tim Cato from the athletic.

Tim Cato was crowdsourcing a potential Mavericks pod and asking people on Twitter what he should call it, should they launch it? And Dan helpfully suggested the following. Cuba potting Jr. Cuban potting. I'm sorry, let me do this again. What? Let me do this again. How dare you? want to keep this so bad.

I wish you just leave it. Leave it. Leave the whole thing. Cuban Potting Jr. I got to get it right. Haley O'Shaughnessy, good call or bad call to Dan's suggestion here. I support Dan in all things.

Good call. Micah Peters. I'm only going to be able to think about the team's, the daily veil vontage of like, where they were just like Cuban Gini Jr. brought up on charges and it's like the picture of him running around the Bronx. on the set of like the

American crime story and his tidy white is with a pistol. This is all good. That's what I'm going to be able to think about. So good call, clearly a good call from Micah. Steve Cuban potting, Jr. Good call, best gaff. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

If only I had delivered it properly. Dan, I want to just let you know. I am in full support of all things, double D, Dan Devine. You can do no wrong in my eyes. no, this is a good call from you. Your dad humor hits me in a sweet spot. I loved it.

I will say my favorite one, outside of Take That With You, which is a nice Dirk-Newski reference that I feel like is good for a portable podcast. Our friend Trey Kirby from now, it was at No Dunks, Inc. Formerly the starters from the basketball Jones, his was Mark Tank. And I thought that was pretty good. Also very, very good. That was a good call, bad call, some of it better than others. We also want to, before we wrap up the show here, we just want to say.

say that the NBA issued a statement on former NBA commissioner, David Stern, who's experiencing some health problems and is getting what they're calling excellent care right now. So our thoughts and prayers go out to him. And thank all of you for listening to the show. Thank you, Michael Peters for being here. Thank you, Haley O'Shaughnessy, as always. Dan Devine, new Isaac, Steve Alman. Please rate and review us.

I'm never going to let that go. Please rate and review us, if you don't mind, read all of our content on the ringer.com. listen to the Ringer NBA show and the Ringer podcast network. Heat Check will be back next week on its regular Monday schedule, everybody. Thanks for listening. Bye.