The Ringer NBA Show - The Buzz Is Back in Charlotte | Group Chat

Episode Date: January 12, 2021

We are joined by CBS Sports writer James Herbert to discuss the Hornets’ solid start to the season behind LaMelo Ball, Gordon Hayward, and wacky small-ball lineups. Later, the guys talk about CJ McCollum, Jerami Grant, and the NBA’s COVID-19 problem in another edition of Show and Take (46:00). Hosts: Justin Verrier, Rob Mahoney, and Jonathan Tjarks Guest: James Herbert Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to group chat, the ringer's weekly MBA group discussion where the only protocol is to stay cool. I am Justin Verrier and joining me today, Jonathan Sharks. Wow, you really pushed it with that one. I did. Rob Mahoney is also here. Hey, what's going on? And joining us, our special guest, he doesn't live in Charlotte, but I like to think of him as a Hornets officiato. He is James Herbert from CBS Sports.

What is up, my friend? What is happening? I thought we were doing a retrospective Charlotte Bobcats podcast. It's a classic Bobcast today. Is that the plan? I think so. You know, it's funny when I was thinking back on like when I start to like first know you, I think like the first experience was waiting to talk to Kimball Walker in Summer League

right after their like disastrous season, right? It was after the really bad one. Yeah. I mean, the Bobcats. Summer League experiences. I remember that. I remember MKG's first game. I believe you were there for that one. I don't think you were there with me when I waited like an hour and a half at a Mike Dunlap Summer League practice where I just ended up getting to watch the entire thing and just see the players just looking absolutely miserable just at how hard this guy was pushing him. I thought it was really cool. It ended up being kind of a disastrous sign of things to come. God, Mike Dunlap. I haven't heard that in a while. Those jerseys for atrocious. While we're going down Bobcats memory lane, my senior year of high school,

which was the 2006-2007 season, was the first year I got NBA League pass. And I decided the Charlotte Bobcats were pretty new. I think this was like their second or third season. I decided I was going to watch as many Bobcats game as possible. This was my plan. That team was horrendous. This is like the throws of the Gerald Wallace,

Emeka Okafor, Raymond Felton, Bobcats. I absorbed way too much Charlotte basketball. basketball and it's never left my mind. And now we're on to the Hornets. Now they're exciting. Again, a wish fulfilled from senior year, Rob. Rob had a thrilling social life in those days. Still, still do. Still, still do. Iron Mullins. All right. So as you guys could probably tell, we are going to talk and go on a very deep dive into the six and five fast-rising Charlotte Hornets here with James and then in the back

half of the podcast. Rob Barchs and myself, we're going to get into some show and take where we go around and talk about various things we want to bring to the conversation. First, let's take a quick break. So the buzz is back, baby. Hornets, now six and five after a triumphant victory over the mighty New York Knickerbockers, who in parentheses didn't have, I believe, four or five players, and we're coming off back to back. But still, here we are, what, two weeks, three weeks into the season, and the Hornets

are looking good. And I think more importantly, they're just really interesting. Like, I look at my League Pass style every night and I say to myself, ooh, the Hornets. And it's a good time. They just have all these ball movers. They have all these interesting pieces. They have lamello. They have Gordo with a mustache, which as someone who's currently rocking a mustache, like I can really just relate to, perhaps not other aspects of Gordon Hayward's life.

But this in particular. Perhaps. Definitely. Definitely. You are Gordon Hay. James, what is your feeling about the 2020-2020-2020-1 Charlotte Hornets? Are you excited about them? Do you believe in them?

Yes, and kind of. I'm excited about them. They're really fun as a league pass watch night to night. I just like the style. They're like leading the league in assist rate, and like it's not even close. And that makes sense to me just like when you watch them, they move the ball extremely well. They're a really unselfish team.

They're not a bunch of like, you know, high caliber, like one-on-one scores. So they're kind of like forced to play this way if they want to have a halfway decent offense. And then I think what has changed in the past few games, what has led to this winning streak is their defense is starting to get really interesting. It hasn't been, you know, against all of the best offenses in league, whatever. Like, but they didn't just like beat the Knicks. Like the Knicks could barely get.

the ball passed half court a lot of times. Like the Hornets play way more zone than any team in the NBA. They're playing all this pressure defense. You know, even a guy like Devante Graham, who is like known as a very bad defender, his sort of limitations for a size are always going to be there. Like he can go and like press you and get some steals and be sort of annoying. And then like Lamello and Terry Rozier are getting deflections out here all the time.

They're playing this small lineup with PJ Washington at center and Miles bridges of power forward. And that bench, like when Beambo is on the bench, like that is really where the Hornets are doing a lot of their damage. So they're a fun team. They're flying around. They're sharing the ball like crazy. Everybody knows, like, you can experience what you need of Lamello

just by like going on Twitter and watching his highlights night for night. But I think it's a much more rewarding experience to watch his highlights mixed in with some low lights and him just passing the ball between his legs for no reason and turning it over after he passes half court. and oh, here's like, he gets a cool offensive rebound and there's Bismack, Bionbo. Oh, he can't finish the alley-up. That sucks.

Like, you need to watch all 48 minutes of a Hornets game to truly, truly appreciate them. And lately, those games have actually been ending in Ws. Yeah, there's a real balance to the experience, right? It definitely has everything in it. Rob, what are you saying out there from your Charlotte Bobcats slash Hornets? Well, first of all, I was trying to think

of what the comparable dish is. to the Hornets, like you were saying how you dial up league pass, you're like, ooh, the Hornets are really intriguing tonight. I was trying to think of like, what's the appetizer on the menu that when you see it, you have to order it every time because that's kind of what the Hornets have been for me. Mazzarella sticks? There is, it's not mozzarella sticks.

But I think some of it is, they've really put an emphasis on and made it a teaching point to play as much random basketball as possible. Like, this is not a system-heavy team. They are read and react. They're a principal. They're like, you know, get our spacing right and they just kind of roll with it, which when you have two to three to sometimes four ball handlers on the court at the same time is a great way to play.

And it ends up being a great product. And so between that, the weird undersized stuff that James was addressing with the second unit and the zone and all that, it's really captivating. They're just good enough that they can be in games, but not always win, not always be super competitive. Like it's always in that zone of what you want on a night to night league pass kind of basis. So I think that they're early darlings in that respect, even though not a glamorous team, but maybe with Lamello, they can get a little bit of shine. Yeah, let's talk about that defense just a little bit there, Charks. How much is this just the construction of the roster where they have all these long athletes, surprisingly enough? and a lot of them seems like coming out of the draft,

which you wouldn't expect considering past history of Charlton Horace draft picks, or is it James Borrego, who's quietly just like kind of killing it as a coach. And I would put him right up there in the early first month of the season coach of the year rankings, if that is a thing. Yeah, I mean, I hate to say it, but it's Mitch Cupchak's revenge in some level.

I think since he's taken over, they've really, like, they're not like killing the league, but they're a professional operation. So they drafted the last three years, Miles Bridges, P.J. Washington, LaMello Ball. That's a pretty solid core of young talent. Those guys are all 6-6-6-7-6-8. I mean, not really Lamello, but the two can defend multiple positions. They all get steals. They're all pretty, they're reasonably intelligent players, good shooters. And you have that core of young talent. Plus, you have like your two 6-1 Spark Plug guards in Graham and Rozier.

And then Gordon Hayward, like, this is a talented team. And that to me is maybe the most encouraging thing. Like, they've got to figure out some of the rotations, some of the laptops aren't really working. But there's legitimate talent on this roster. Some of it in its prime. And I mean, really, Gordon Hayward, he looks like an all-star again. Yeah, that's probably the most encouraging part, right?

It's that there seems to be more here. Like, they perhaps are only, like, really grazing the surface of what their potential is because they do have a lot of young guys who really haven't tapped into all that they're doing. And I'd also think, like, as some of you guys alluded to, like, the lineups are really interesting. It seems like they're content on playing Bionbo and that starting lineup, which I got to say, Bionbo can't even be, like, good as a minimum contract, just stand there and be big guy, which is really sad for his legacy, I guess, in Charlotte as someone who was at one point. Well, he didn't start there as a potential free agent savior, but like at the very least, he became one in a way.

He was, wasn't he drafted there originally? And then kind of won a long tour of the NBA and then came back. He and Kemba came in together. That was, that was the dynamic duo. Right. What a duo was. But yeah, when they go small, they're just like really fascinating. And some of the numbers on them look really good.

In particular, the Rosier Graham Hayward Bridges, Washington lineup is 30 plus 35.8 in only 25 minutes. But like, that's not bad for an early going. sort of look. Well, let's talk about them going small because I think when we're talking about that, what we're really talking about is playing PJ Washington at center. And I admire the hell out of any franchise that looks at a six-seven shooter and says, oh, this guy should definitely be playing the five for us and those lineups turn out to be kind of great. And some of that, you know, he's not elite in terms of rim protection. This is again a six-seven shooter. But here are some of his peers by block rate so far. Joel Embed, Brooke Lopez, Jared Allen,

Serge Abaka. That's what we're talking about in terms of PJ Washington manning the middle of a zone with length all around him, with good instinctive players. It just kind of works. Yeah, and talking about like kind of how the pieces can fit together. So you're playing PJ at the five, miles at the four, very undersized, but very athletic. But then you've got Gordo at 6'8, Lamello at 6'8 on the perimeter. All of a sudden, you're rebounding really well. Lamello's actually leading the team in rebounding right now. That reminds me a piece to our last year about Luca and that when you have a guard who can rebound that well,

it kind of gives you a lot of options with your lineups. He rebounds well. Rozier rebounds well too. And that's one of the things. They can do a lot of interesting things because of that. Like nobody, you know, even go back to last year. Like people talking about like, can Devante and Terry Rozier be a long-term partnership in the back court?

I mean, maybe one of those guys will eventually be moved anyway just because you want to play Lamello more minutes and maybe none of these guys wants to just be the sixth man, the third guy, whatever. Like, we can get to that. But for now, it's working fine. And Rozier is long enough that he can, you know, compete with these two guards.

He is absolutely unafraid to go in and try to get rebounds over bigger guys. Some of his rebounds, he kind of, like, one of those guys, like rebounds like he dunks sort of, like he jumps really aggressively. He loves to go in there and then start the break. And then I think, like, they can run off of that,

but also I just love the way they've been playing with, like tempo, like in terms of their half-court pace. Like there was a while in that the most recent win over the hawks in that third quarter where they were just running the hawks off the floor, but it wasn't like they were wild. Like there was a play where Mello, you know, he had this drive where he like froze Clint Capella

basically with his eyes and got a wide open layup because Capella was anticipating he was going to drive in for the past. And then next time down the court, He goes in, he gets a defensive rebound on one end, he pushes it down. They run one action. It doesn't work. Malmello grabs the rebound. He pitches it out to bridges, shovels it over to Washington, and it's a corner three.

And it all just happened so, so fast. The Hawks just seemed to step slow the entire time. And that was kind of a moment where I was sitting there watching this Hornet team. I think I love this Hornets team. They were just, you know, it's the unselfishness that I mentioned earlier. But there's also a kind of confidence that they have. now that I think even, you know, I thought Barago did as good a job as he could getting this team look organized last year. And the young guys that he has, to the point that, you know, charts was making

about Cupchack, like, they are young, but they are smart. It is sort of like the grizzlies of last year. Like, I wrote a piece about Washington last year. And one of the things was, I mean, there's a guy that came and scored 27 points in his first game. And just from the jump, all his veteran teammates loved him. Marvin Williams, who back then, he was the six, seven former small forward playing. center. He was the guy mentoring PJ Washington. He was the guy raving about PJ Washington. And now Marvin Williams has stepped off in on the sunset. And PJ Washington is manning that undersized five spot and blocking shots like a young Covington. So it's that they're doing the same kind of stuff they were doing last year. But the talent has been upgraded in a major way. And when you were

talking about Gordon Hayward kind of coming in and organizing them, I think this is what that actually looks like on the court, like from a practical perspective, it means that when they're playing the random basketball, Rob was talking about you have a failsafe in Gordon Hayward that can just make something happen. Everybody knows where they're supposed to be. Everybody is happy to share the ball. And I think that more than anything,

like that kind of, you know, that convalescence of like the right roster and then the style that Briggs was already trying to implement, has really made them into a fun team that actually knows what it's doing too. Yeah, I have down that they are, the Kroger brand warriors. Just giving the length that they have,

the IQ that it seems that they have collectively, the shooting is still to come, and that's probably why there is a little bit of a ceiling there. I think that that's probably the next part there, if they had just like a knockdown guy to kind of complete some of that set there. But like on occasion, maybe like once every 10 games, Terry Ozier scores 40,

and then you have that. But it also reminds me of like a very Gordon Hayward type of team. We always talk about how teams tend to take on the identity of their best player. And this team really just like seems to go along with what he is, which is just like he's not a dominant score type, although he had like what, 28 in the first half of last night's game. But he's just cerebral. He's versatile. The ball moves when he's in there. He's a little bit bigger than you expect.

And you look around it. Like that's kind of the identity of this team. And so I guess this is a long way of saying Gordon Hayward, not a lot of. a loser, a free agency, but a huge winner. Well, I think he was on to something in terms of the situation in Boston, too, just because all the key guys for the Celtics were conceding

something by being there. And based on the way Jalen Brown has played so far this season, it looks like Hayward was kind of ahead of the curve in understanding how unsustainable teams that are that deep can be. Because at some point, everyone wants to do a little more, wants to handle the ball a bit more, wants some more creativity.

He certainly wanted that and got a great contract to go do it Charlotte, but it kind of suits everybody in the long run in terms of guys like Jalen and Marcus Smart being able to expand their games, Gordon getting back to kind of being an all-star level player for his own team. And as you said, Justin, as you laid out, bringing that team along in a way that really suits him, that he fits into so perfectly where he can be a part of so many actions where he can basically play point guard for possessions at a time, where he can play off the ball if he needs to, where he can catch full court passes from lamello ball into turnaround jumpers,

Not a bad way to make a living. Yeah, I mean, Hayward and Rozier kind of have like a Boston Survivors thing going on here in Charlotte. It's worked really well for them. And like everyone else, when I saw Hayward's contract, I mean, you obviously got to make a few jokes about that. It was pretty eye-popping. But I think, too, we forget sometimes the money in a lot of ways in the NBA, it's more of like a symbol of your value to the team and your place in the organization. Like when you're getting paid as much money as Hayward's being paid, like he knows, well, they're paying me, basically 40 million because they're cutting Batum to keep me to get me.

So I'm going to get the ball. I'm going to be the primary guy. It'll move around me a little bit. Whereas if he kind of takes a smaller, taking a smaller contract almost inevitably means a smaller role. So like one goes with the other almost. Yeah, I think it's interesting.

Like his role is not, you know, it's not the usage rate is not as high as it was in his last year in Utah. Like it has not been, oh, like that Gordon Hayward is like literally back in the exact, same way. But I think his game has tilted more in that direction than it was in Boston. There are still some nights where you see, you know, I mean, this is the guy, he had a 44 point game that I think followed it up with like maybe a 13 point game or an 18 point game earlier this

year. Like there is still some of that. And I think that is a luxury of like you are playing with Terry Rozier and Devante Graham and La Mello Ball is going to handle the ball a fair bit too. So he doesn't have to, you don't have the whole like team on his shoulders. But there is more room. for him to erupt. And it was only very occasionally with the Celtics, you saw him come out there and get one of his 30-point performances,

whereas last night, I mean, he had almost 30 in the first half. And that was just not something that they were used to in Boston. But I think what makes him such a nice fit is he just kind of enhances everybody else without taking much off the table. Like he didn't come in here and say,

well, this is just like absolutely my team. Like, he is a point-forwardy guy, but he is not, I wouldn't look at him. and say, oh, well, he is the quarterback of this team, and he is dominating every possession, because that's not how this team works. That's not really ever when he's been at his most comfortable.

I think even back, if you think about the jazz days, he would have welcomed having more playmaking next to him, probably because his job was pretty hard. So I think that it has been a successful partnership so far, and I also wanted to piggyback on something Justin said earlier about this shooting. like Devante Graham is shooting like 20% on pull-up threes and like 20% on two-point shots in general. And if last year's version of the Hornets got this version of Devante Graham, they would have been by far the worst team in the NBA because he was freaking awesome and they were still pretty bad. So I think we can talk about that and like whether that's like something you should be worried about or that could be kind of like, all right, well, if he like gets his act together and starts making some shots, which by.

by the way, the last few games have been a little bit better. And oh my goodness, he's actually gotten to the line a few times, which was never part of the Devante Graham experience. If he can build on this a little bit and get better, then maybe there's another kind of level this team can reach offensively. And those lineups, those small ball lineups with him in there are still good, even though he's been absolutely atrocious, which is like, there's room to grow here. Well, he's not a shooter right now, but defense has still treat him like one.

And that's such a key to the Hornets formula, which is other than Bismack Biombo, who, you know, I think can understandably be pilloried for not being able to catch passes, et cetera, et cetera. Every other rotation play. Small part of the game. A small, tiny part of a center's job. Every other rotation player is a shooter, or at least has the impression of a shooter.

Most of their percentages right now are pretty good. Devante Graham is the one kind of outlier there in terms of a guy who can shoot, but right now just isn't making them. Yeah, I would say Graham has kind of been, so I would look back at the numbers. Last year, Graham actually had more touches than Shrey Young and about the same amount of time of possession with the ball.

So that, I mean, that was obviously some unsustainable. And he's the guy who had to adjust the most and kind of this new way of doing things where it was never going to be at Avanti Graham show long term anyways. And my guess would be eventually that's the obvious move once you want to start lamello, is then you move lamello infragram. You kind of have Rozier guarding point guards

as a kind of offball player. Then you have Rozier, Lamello, Hayward, and then Graham kind of gets to be the sixth man where he gets to hold the ball a little more and kind of go back to do his doing last season. Can we have a short diversion into Terry Rozier for a second? Always. Please. Please.

He is dangerously close to becoming the perfect sort of Pat Beverly, George Hill, like the kind of guard you want alongside a superstar playmaking wing. And, you know, like Hayward is kind of almost that but not really, but I'm talking about the James Harden type players,

like that archetype. And I think so much of what he does is kind of the thankless defense where he pressures a guy full court in a way where he doesn't get credit for the steel but is really helpful. And then on top of that has just been kind of lights out from three for two years running

in a way that I was always expecting to fall off but just hasn't. I don't know how to comprehend who that guy is squared with, oh, you know, five times a game he's going to take just a terrible shot. And sometimes they'll make them and defenses will be totally exasperated by it,

but you're going to have to deal with the misses too. There was one I actually groaned last night, one of the runners that he took in the lane going right. But like in general, yeah, man, I mean, I wrote a story on Rose Year last year when it was just kind of like, wait, are we all noticing that he's like leading the league and catch and shoot three point percentage?

Like what is happening here? And now he's 46% on catch and shoot three. threes this year. So that appears sustainable. He has these ghost sideburns that like don't seem to like attach to anything going on up to the top of his head. So he's really taking everything

to the next level. I'm going to verge into outright slander here. So we're talking about Rose. Well, we're talking about Rosier and how he plays so well next to like superstar guards, wings. And it's like man, that kind of sounds like Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown. Like wouldn't he be

great in Boston guarding the ball spotting up off those guys and not demanding the offense like Kemba will do when he comes back? Just a thought. Well, it almost happened. Well, not only when he was originally with the Celtics, but there was rumor or talk about him going back to the Celtics, right? In like a sign and trade for Gordon Hayward.

But now they are kind of on this, the marooned in Charlotte together, putting together some version of like, like the JV version of what the Celtics used to be, right? Which is interesting. I think what you guys are talking about with just like how many ball handers they had. I think that's where I think we should probably have the Lamello conversation because there's a lot to talk about with Lamello, obviously.

But the thing that I've been most impressed with him about is that there are all these guys you would think would take away from what he's doing, but he's been so good in particular as kind of like an ancillary ball mover guy in transition, guy who just throw touchdowns from across the court, that like you have to play him and it all work. Like, the team doesn't seem geared around, like, prioritizing Lamello or empowering Lamello, if anything, like, they've been so good at just, like, spreading it around. But, like, he just fits. And I just, like, wonder what happens when he is, like, more of a guy and when he has more sense of, like, what to do on the court. Because there are times where he's just, like, incredibly, like, lucy-goose is the word that comes to mind here.

Or he'll just, like, throw up a three. Or he'll just, like, drive into the lane, but it doesn't seem like he has much of an idea of what he's doing. but who will find the trailers or the next pass. And I'm just like, this is a lot of just like feel and talent going on. So I can't wait to see like what he is a month or two months from now. His game, I mean, like we've been talked about with PJ Washington and Miles Bridges and some of the other young guys on the Hornets, is really endearing to players who know how to play basketball.

Like he's the kind of rookie who slots into that so well. And that's what's always been so weird about the lamella ball discourse, which to me, described a very different player than the one that was on film. He certainly had weird shot selection and stuff like that, but talking about Lamello by forcing long threes is kind of like judging Damien Lillard

by his shot selection in the All-Star game or something. Very clearly those were not compatible basketball context to what he was going to experience in the NBA. But then you see his instincts. Then you see how he moves off the ball to jump passing lanes. Then you see, and at the risk of giving a take that is dangerously on brand for me,

maybe the most exciting rebounder in the NBA in terms of... There's this moment of suspense where an opposing big is pulling down a rebound and Lamello's on the opposite side of the lane and just kind of like snakes behind him to poke it loose. Like, he just knows how to play.

Put that on a quote card, my friend. That is spicy. Mellow Ball. Most exciting young rebounder in the NBA. Pull it out. Pull it out. Let's give credit where it's due. but he's going to figure out some of the exactly how to position him stuff,

when to gamble, all that stuff's going to come in time. But from day one, he just has a great sense of how to get involved in place. He has no business being involved in. Yeah, and you even see the smarts. Like, I'm not saying that La Mello Ball is a good defender as a rookie. He is, he is not that. But you see the smarts on the defensive end just in terms of his anticipation. He gets steals.

He gets a ton of deflections. Like, it's a little bit like his brother. And it's funny because I think one of the, if you were low on the mellow as a prospect, and if you were watching, particularly like before he went to the NBL, like you would kind of say, all right, like, yeah, he's sort of like Lonzo, but like without the winning stuff. Like he does a lot of the flashy stuff, a cool passing, but he's not necessarily going to, you know, be a productive, like normal basketball player in a team context. And I think you started to see that change when he went to Australia.

and now, I mean, even from the preseason to now, the amount of, like, ill-advised pull-up threes has decreased dramatically from Lamello Ball. And I think that's interesting in terms of what their plan was for him. When they drafted him, I just sort of assumed that either Rozier or Graham or maybe both was going to be shipped out of there immediately so we could all watch the Lamello show.

And there is a version of Lamello's rookie season that we could have seen that was the Lamello show where everything revolved direct. on him where he had a ton of freedom and it was all about him making plays and getting highlights and also, by the way, turning it over a million times a game and taking whatever shots that he wants. And I think part of the reason why you go and you get somebody like Gordon Hayward, part of the reason you bring lamello ball off the bench to begin his career, even though he's clearly a special player and probably the most talented player on the roster, is you want to get him integrated

into a team setting. You want to try to hold him accountable. You want to try to bring him along sort of slowly. He is begging for more minutes. He clearly deserves it. He should probably be in the starting five before the end of this season. But I really respect the way that they've handled this. And this has not been the like I am just like mainlining lamello ball outlet passes

like 48 minutes a game. But those outlet passes happen every game. And we're still seeing the fun stuff while seeing him be a functional. dare I say winning basketball player? I would say the thing to I'm watching with Lamello is like that three point percentage because I think that really allows him to

always kind of threaten the defense because the one thing we haven't seen too much is him scoring around the basket efficiently. Like Justin was saying earlier, sometimes he kind of goes into the lane and I was like, well I'm six foot, I can probably score and he can't really. And as long as he's knocking down threes, he can threaten the defense off the ball.

He doesn't have to have the ball in his hands to be effective. But if that three-point shot goes away, then all of a sudden his efficiency is really going down. He's not really kind of being an aggressive score. So like that to me is kind of the key for his whole game right now. Is like, can he keep knocking down? Not even like the pull-up three, but he's always ball handlers. Sometimes the ball comes to him and he makes that spot up three. If he can make that and obviously his shot looks a little funky, as long as that's going, I think everybody else kind of falls in the place. Yeah, it's funny how part of the ball legacy is just that you have this janky shot that is just going to follow you throughout your

entire career and you're going to have to overcome. It's like the story of the balls was there like the deep three-pointers, the way they shoot and how LeVar is telling everyone, no, you can't change their mechanic. This is how they're going to be. And it turns out that was actually the worst part of their game because who they are are these like cerebral ball handlers, ball movers, the type of players, as I think Rob mentioned before, like the guys you want to play with. like the guys that just make everything easier. And to James' earlier point, like, I think Lamello thus far has looked like almost the ideal version of Lanzo.

He has those like, as I mentioned, kind of those like innate qualities that just make him an easy ball handler, an easy basketball player. But then he has, he's like a step ahead of him, especially on the three-point shot. Like if his success continues, like he's already like light years ahead of where Lanzo was. Because at this point of Lanzo's career we were talking about just like, the shot, like, is he ever going to be able to fix it? Yada, yada, yada. And then he's also just way longer. There's a point

in the game last night where he was just like, he put his hand down and like the ball just like, he just hit the ball because he was just so long and it started a break and he hit one of the Martins, whichever one plays now. And it's just like, he

has more natural, I guess just physical gifts. And so he's, I would argue that he is just like a better Lonzo. which is a pretty damn good basketball player. Well, the shooting was a great idea because it basically was terrific marketing for guys who are

like guard versions of Sean Marion. It got us excited about players who are going to do all this intangible shit. So, I mean, credit to LeVar. Four steps ahead. Lamar was back around and then getting the other way. I had everybody else.

I don't know if you guys saw the shot he hit from mid-range against Kevin Hurter the other day. It was like a dirk shot, like a turnaround and herder had no idea it was going on, and he just swished it. And like Lamello was completely on balance the entire time. I just assumed he was going to airball it wildly when he started to take it. And then it was just like, wait a minute, like that was perfect. And that's a weird thing about Lamella's, like even now.

Like his percentages are one thing. Like his catch and shoot percentage is good on a small sample size. His three point percentage looks fine. But some of his misses are awful, and his feet are too close together. He's not balanced, whatever. And then other times, like, when he is just balanced and strong and he holds that follow through and it's just like, wait, like, this is nice. So I think there was kind of a conversation coming in that was like, is Lamello just a bad

shooter or does he have bad shot selection, but he's a good shooter? And I lean to the latter and that he is a good shooter with bad shot selection, but he's not always a good shooter because he doesn't have that consistency on his form. And I think that's just something that we'll see more and more. But I do think it's interesting seeing like in these games recently,

like when he does get hot, then his confidence kind of goes to another level and his game changes. He's always a confident player just in terms of his approach. But I mean, we saw him in the Hawks game like Beast, Tray Young just taking him down to the block

and in one-on-one situation. We saw him, drive to the hoop and take contact from Clint Capella and finish over him, which is like not what we're seeing from him most of the time, right? And I think the same is true with his three-point shooting. I believe the other day, one team actually blitzed him, like, coming out of a pick and roll to just make him get rid of it. You would think that, like, he is not nearly good enough kind of off-the-bounce three-point

shooter to warrant that kind of attention, but he has made some of them. And once he starts to make a few, then defenses kind of react. to him in a way that, I mean, it's unfair to keep bringing this back to Lonzo, who's a player who I like, but in a way that, like, frankly, we do not see teams treating Lonzo that way, like, ever. I think also, this is going back to the theory I've had for a long time in terms of some of Lonzo and Lamello. I really do believe, like, when you have two brothers and they're both NBA caliber

athletes and the younger brother becomes the bigger player, like, size-wise, that kind of, like, mold of player is, like, always really good. because normally NBA players, when they're growing up, they're always bigger and faster than everyone, right? They kind of just win on their athletic ability. But when you're the younger brother, that's off the table. You've kind of got to play up. You learn more skills to your game to kind of take advantage of,

it really takes a play against your older brother, right? I think you see a lot in the NBA where the younger brothers are often better players. But then when the younger brother becomes bigger too, then he's like, I have all these skills, plus now I'm freaking huge. I think that like I love To me like when I hear oh the player has an older brother I'm like that's something to watch right there Guys younger players are always really good prospects

This is the Nasus Antedicumbos lament right here I was gonna say I think we just figured out that Cody Martin Is like a couple centimeters and a couple of minutes Ahead of Caleb Martin at this point I guess that's that's funny too right Because there's a pair of twins on this you don't even talked about Right who play like the eighth ninth men there's there's twins Yes

How boring do these guys have to be or how mediocre do their games have to be that this is like the easiest 10 minute video clip of every Hornets game that they play. I mean, they don't play much on national TV, so maybe this is what's actually holding them back. But you never, but

even despite that, you never hear about them. And I still, to this day, cannot differentiate between the two. And like, even in the box score, they don't even help you because they both show up as C. Martin. I'm just like, which one? This is way too difficult. And it's 10 and 11 too

Their numbers are right next to each other Caleb had a huge dunk the other day And the announcer exclaimed excitedly That it was his first dunk of the season And I was like, are you sure? How can you be sure? Nobody knows how many times you know. Yeah, I think the Lamelle thing is interesting though

Because not only him, but the two other really interesting draft prospects that everyone was really excited about coming in and Edwards and Wiseman, none of them are really interesting. really getting the like the rope in order to be the guy right now, which is unique. I can't remember a top three where all of them are going through the same experience. And it definitely seems to be helping Wiseman and Lamello just being part of a team concept

and being part of a team that's like sort of winning at the very least playing the right style and whatnot. And seeing how that affects them versus the more traditional path of take the ball, play through your alums, be the Russell Westbrook and set, you know, league records for turnovers, and then eventually you'll just learn from that. I'm curious how this has it effect on them.

I haven't watched Edwards much, but I don't know. Do you guys see this having any effect long term? Are you already starting to see effects from this? Well, Charks, that was kind of the word on this year's class, right? This was a little bit more

of a project group, a longer term potential group, than guys were going to step Yeah, no one was like, we got to give Anthony Edwards 25 shots immediately at the NBA. So it's worked out well for all these guys to kind of have smaller roles coming into the league. I would almost compare Lamello more to like a Tyrese Halliburton

just in terms of like how ready he seems to be to affect games already and do so with the ball in his hands and make his teammates better in ways. I think the other guy is like the situation is more impacting them like James Weissman is extremely fortunate that he has Draymond Green to throw him lobs off of the short role after Stephen Curry gets trapped by like four guys at the same time I don't know that Anthony Edwards is really having

like his sort of shot attempts being dictated that way and being given those easy opportunities so in a way he is given more latitude than the other guys to kind of create because he sort of has to and when he is given latitude to create, what do you get? You get a bunch of bad pull-up twos. And then occasionally you get this beautiful drive to the rim, which is what we want them to do every time and whatever.

So, like, I think there, the three guys of the top are uniquely kind of playing supporting roles. But I do think Lamello's role is one that comes with a little bit more responsibility than the other guys. And in that way, like, I've just honestly been so impressed by his intelligence. and like that is why I kind of connect him more to Halliburton in my mind. Well, that was always the joke in the draft was he was the third ball brother, Hallibur. Everyone was always saying. Yeah.

Yeah. This has been a really deep cut joke. Um, Charks, just based on what we already seen from some of these rookies, have you changed any of your opinions on these guys? Is there anyone who's like, has Lamello, like, shocked you in ways that you didn't expect? Or is one just like rising above some of the guys you previously had ranked? I'm not really. I would say the big thing.

I mean, this is not even really shocking just because we didn't want to watch Wiseman last year, really. So just like he had more kind of, he's had a more offensive game than I kind of thought he'd have right away in terms of the ability to shoot threes. He's had a couple coast to coast off the dribble. His size is obviously pretty impressive. I would say that's from the biggest thing for me watching this is just,

oh, Weissons really got some offensive game, which when he played like three games in college, you really couldn't even see it. Okay, just to wrap up, Hornets here. So what do we think about them going forward? So their schedule has been, if we're being honest, a little on the soft side,

not to take anything away from the New York Knickerbockers. They played, I don't really know what to make of the Hawks at this point. At one point it seemed like they were good wins now. I don't know, really. They play the Sixers when they were at full strength. They lost both of those games. So it's a little mixed

bag here. I mean, they beat the Nets, Mavs, and Pelicans. Those are decent wins. They're not like beating up on the wolves and the Rizzlies, you know. Yeah, but then they lost to like the calves on opening night and then they got beat by the Thunder, which at that point, I was already in on the Hornets experience. I was watching both of those games, but then I was very frustrated to learn that perhaps they weren't going to be the team that they are now, but here we are. But James, what do you think their ceiling is? This season, I don't think the ceiling is crazy high. Like coming into the year, I would have thought,

like, they'll be in the mix for the play-in tournament. And I still think that is one likely outcome, is that they are either in it or they just miss it. But I would probably raise it a little bit based on what I have seen so far. Their bench is like plus two net rating, which I thought like, I mean, even I look at the roster now. I do not consider this a deep roster whatsoever. It's just the guys that they're playing. The second unit they're actually using has found a rhythm. If they can keep that up and the starting lineup can get their act together because the starting

lineup. And mind you, this is a starting lineup with Bionbo in place of Zeller, who got. got hurt in the first game of the season. So it is somewhat understandable. The starting lineup, the numbers look really bad. But if the starting lineup can get this act together a little bit, and the bench can keep being this strong, and teams don't just start to figure out this zone

and start making a bunch more threes, because they are giving up a ton of threes. They're giving up a lot of shots at the room, too. Like, there is a statistical case for this being sort of Bulls gold. Like, having watched it, though, like, I think they can keep improving a little bit, I think they can kind of build on this. So, like, I would say the ceiling is raised to, like, it wouldn't totally shock me if they

ended up, you know, in that plane, but, like, as a seven or eight rather than as, you know, a nine or ten or whatever. They certainly look like a more, an even more, like, professional and organized and, like, kind of intelligent, unselfish team than I would have anticipated. I think it's almost been sort of the best case scenario for what, like, a slothier. lightly grown-up version of this team that is serious about taking a step forward would look like. It's important

that we keep those expectations pretty modest because we've been gushing about the hornets like half an hour now. What we're talking about is a team that is overcoming its limitations. That's what makes them fun to watch. That doesn't mean the limitations don't exist. So I think James

is spot on in terms of playing group, maybe slide above. That's kind of the range we're talking about here. When does Zeller come back? because that will be pretty big to get kind of more competent play in their center position. Well, the question isn't when he comes back, but then when is he going to leave again with injury? Like, that's kind of the crux of their center problems,

whether it's Zeller, whether it's Beambo, and like they found a nice stopgap here at PJ Washington filling that role. But if they're going to get better long term, they have to get better center play, period. And it really is a testament to the way the Hornets have been able to move the ball, that Bismack, Beambo is now throwing backdoor passes to cutters and stuff. stuff like that. Like he's like tripled his assist numbers all of a sudden, which is, you know,

bully for him. But you're going to have to find a real workable option there if you're going to be, you know, a good kind of consistent playoff contender. Yeah, this seems like they're having the season, the Wizards or the Hawks wish they would be having right now. Like the Hawks have been transcended at, at times, especially when they were playing the Brooklyn Nets. But like, you know, they've definitely fallen off a little bit.

It seems like there's just like a consistency with the Hornets right now where they know who they are already and they're playing to that. my concern is a little bit more in the future because yes they have all these young players and they seem like they all have pretty bright futures ahead of them depending which Martin is your favorite but I do think at one point the Hayward contract plus the Btum

Shretch is going to catch up to the best of the type of move that hamstrings them going forward in order to just create a baseline of competency now and so I feel like this team is like one or two players away as we guys have talked about, but they would have had a lot more cap space next summer if they didn't make that move in order to stretch Petitou, maybe they just like, I don't know, found the money somewhere else and just like got his money off the books. Zeller is coming off next year. So there was this kind of like clean, fresh start that they could

have had and they could have potentially just overpaid someone else to come and be like maybe another guy next to Hayward and Lamello. And all of a sudden this is way more appealing. So they do have that to really contend with. On the other hand, they have done a good job drafting guys. And I wonder if they just are picking from the middle of the first round again next year. Are they not going to find the next PJ Washington, the next Miles Bridges, etc., which reminds me, Charks. We haven't talked once about Miles Bridges.

Do you want to just take like a minute to just gush about your guy? He's great. I think the big thing for him last year, he was starting at the three with Washington at the four. And that really wasn't the best fit for his game. It kind of stretched him as a ball handler as a playmaker. And now he's kind of playing in these small-knits as a four. And then you're saying, oh, even though he's 6-6, he's such a great athlete, he's so strong, it doesn't really matter.

He can rebound. He's not being asked to create too much. He's more of a finisher. That's kind of his game. And like you're saying, Justin, the biggest thing I think for the Hornets, it is this Mitch Cup check. It is drafting well, because if you're Charlotte, you're not getting big friends,

unless you're paying them like Gordon-Haword. and you look at their drafts before Cupcheck got here, and it's like Malik Monk, Frank Kaminsky, Noah Vonle, Michael Kiddlest, and when you're a small market team that drafts poorly, like you're going to be really bad. Just forget about it. And the biggest thing for them going forward,

they had their lottery pick, they got Lamello. Now you just keep drafting good players around from the middle of the first round, and that's kind of their path going forward. That's a tough thing, is like they got PJ number 12. Like that was a really, really good pick. It is hard to do that every time.

And like the cost of us having so much fun watching the Hornets and talking about the Hornets now is that there is this other reality where it is the Lamello show and it's kind of a mess. And then, oh, by the way, he has Cade Cunningham next to him next season. And then you feel incredible about their future. And like it just looks like there's absolutely no way that that is the reality for this team now. And that was a conscious decision they made when they went and got Gordon Hayward. Yep, that's true. But for now, we will enjoy the up-and-coming Charlotte Hornets.

We will watch them closely in particular to find out which Martin is the better one, but also all the other good stuff we talked about. All right, James, thank you so much for joining us today and talking about your favorite team. Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. I'm surprised you didn't lobby for them to sign Jeff Adrian to be their new. backup center. Yeah, Jeffrey is getting in some weird stuff.

If you ever follow Jeff Adrian, former Yukon legend, Bobcats legend, Bobcats legend, professional tough guy rebounder. He's just like, he's just a weird guy now. I'll leave it at that.

All right, thanks, James. Thank you. All right. We'll be right back after this to do some show and take. All right, we're back. We're going to do a little quick show and take, which is quickly becoming a group chat,

staple, if there are any, where each of us brings something to the table that we want to talk about. We should mention that we were recording Tuesday morning specific time. It's almost 9 o'clock right now. And so there are a couple of things burbling. There is a board of governors meeting happening at some point today to talk about the COVID stuff, which we'll get into a little bit here. And also, it seems like the NBA is investigating Kyrie Irving for potentially partying or something when he's on this weird absence from the Nets in which he hasn't really explained why he's there. I think they're saying personal reasons.

So that's all to say, that is the context with which we're having this discussion. But Rob, take it away with your show and take. Guys, CJ McCollum is on some Steph Curry shit. Like, 28 points a game right now, 5 to 1 assist a turnover ratio, shooting 11 threes a night. And the style is a little different from peak Steph,

but when you look kind of side by side on 2016 Steph versus what CJ is doing now, the biggest difference is that Steph shot like two more free throws a game. But otherwise, that's kind of the level of play we're talking about for a guy we just kind of considered was going to be the Blazers second best player, was going to kind of do the same things he's always done. You know, we've talked a lot about Portland and how they were going to improve really this season, whether they were a fundamentally different team than the team they were in the bubble.

I don't think we talked about whether a guy who's 29 years old was going to just dramatically shift his game to start taking tons of threes and apparently making every one of them. So CJ is the new Damien Lillard is what you're suggesting? Well, I think there's kind of a funny thing

with him too where it's kind of an open secret in the league that CJ is like the informal video instructor of so many of the league's smaller guards. Like he's the guy that, every small guard watches to figure out how they're going to play, what they're going to do, what moves they can add to their game.

Because he has a really compact handle. He's got a great floater. He had all this stuff. If he's doing this stuff too, I think he puts him in a class where you're talking about, oh, maybe we can't emulate that guy as much as we thought we could. Maybe he's a different sort of player and in a different category than this, like, oh, he's kind of a cute mid-major story who really made something of his limited athletic gifts. I think for his size

is basically like the smallest player who can really create a shot anytime he wants to. Yeah and kind of going off what you're saying about like the prototype and then you look at him playing out it's like yeah, why wasn't he taking more threes?

Because he's always kind of been like this mid-range killer which has been great for him, but he is so small. It's like if you've got that in your bag, just launch him. I mean, and that's the thing too. You're just saying like,

oh yeah, more and more guys are weaponizing the three to go back to your stuff thing It's like, yeah, when you're a six-two off-ball guard, you should just be, and you can make three this clip. There's no reason not to do it. And when you're doing it, it makes everything else work. And, you know, Portland's starting two pretty limited forwards in Covington and Jones.

But if CJ and Dan are going to take every three and make it, it almost doesn't matter. Yeah. I guess this is where I should step in as my role is cynic here. And that while it is nice to see CJ finally, like, kind of step out of Dame Shadow here, because he has this weird career where I think in other situations, if he was on the magic, if he was getting more opportunities, he probably would be a multi-time all-star at this point, especially if he was playing in the East. And we wrote about this last year, just about like the NBA marriage, right?

This concept and Dame and CJ kind of embody that. But like they do play a similar type of game. They play a lot of their minutes together. And there's always been this question that while it's successful, like what would CJ be like if he didn't have Dame around there? And I think to get to just more broader point about the Blazers, what would the Blazers be like if they had someone else there? Charks has been at the forefront of the CJ for Aaron Gordon trade for years now.

I think it's literally years. And that brings us to the discussion of yes, Dame and CJ look great, CJ in particular, but like do they have the other stuff in order to make this team as good as like we thought or some thought around the offseason when they made a couple of these moves to improve what seemed like to improve the defense. No, it's a totally fair concern with the Blazers more broadly. But think about the parameters of a trade idea like that now.

About Aaron Gordon for C. Yeah, now it's been ridiculous. Exactly. And I think that's kind of what we're talking about here, is C.J putting himself in a different class of player, if some of this stuff sustains. We're 10 games into the season. Like, let's not go crazy with this.

but between great play, great marketing. I don't know if you guys saw, but C.J. McCollum is now comparing himself to a shark, which is just great. Every week is shark week in Portland right now. It's working out well for C.J. Figures out ways to eat. Sharks just go hunt.

Don't worry about things. That's great. Chum it up. Got to chum it up. That is a veteran journalist right there, my friend. That's great pros. All right, sharks. You want to do yours?

It kind of ties in with C.J. a little bit. I was going to say, speaking of C. Journalism major, so it all comes together. And I guess another guy I think worth giving a shout out is someone who everyone kind of thought was crazy. I mean, we all saw, like, Gordon Hayward, okay, kind of made sense. He wants to be an all-star again. He wants that bigger role.

But when Jeremy Grant took his $60 million to be a lead guy in Detroit and leave, you know, a great young team in Denver, I mean, we all, we all had fun about that. we all thought, I don't think anyone in the NBA besides Jeremy Grant and Troy Weaver, the Pistons GM, thought he would average 25 points, six boards on 40% shooting while shooting seven threes a game. I mean, this probably isn't totally sustainable, but Jeremy Grant can really play. And you kind of got to respect the guy who's like, y'all don't even understand how good I am. I'm about to show you, and he's showing us. Well, there's kind of this thing that everyone says in the NBA. Like, if you just,

gave guys the opportunity they could put up numbers, right? It's that whole thing of like, well, if I had my own team, I could do X, Y, and Z. You definitely have to credit Grant for going out and doing it. The flip side of that is like the repercussions on like the actual team. And as of now, the Detroit Pistons are 2 and 8, which is tied for the worst record in the league. So I think there's like a correlation there that's really an escape. I don't know. I mean, there's not a lot of talent on this roster.

Grant's doing his thing very efficiently. It isn't like he's holding these guys back, I would say. Yeah, we're going to have to pivot pretty quickly from Jeremy Grant isn't a number one option to Jeremy Grant doesn't have enough help, I think. And some of that's like, you know, he is a top score on a bad team, inarguable, but he doesn't play like that guy. He's not a ball stopper.

Really, this whole experiment, although he is creating a little bit more off the dribble, doing some of that kind of star level stuff, it's really an experiment in what would it look like if a team was just looking for Jeremy Grant all the time. If all the guards were kind of traced to him, to his cuts, to his movements, to his roles, like looking for him at the three-point line,

getting him the ball as much as they can. And this is the way that's turned out so far. Yeah. And so to Rob's point about just the roster around him, have you guys watched Blake Griffin lately? It is not pretty. Zach Cram wrote about this on the website today, on Tuesday, and basically he looks untradable for one if he was ever hoping to get out of there.

And just like, I don't know really what he is even to this Detroit team because definitely the lack of athleticism is there. I think we all expected that considering having two surgeries on the same knee. But he has come a long ways as a shooter and he definitely can be that for this team. But there are times where like he won't even step inside the three point arc. Like he'll run a screen and he'll just immediately pop to the arc and like, not move or he will have the ball in his hands. And I was remembering that I was thinking about specifically against the Celtics when he had

someone like Tristan Thompson, like just a big who probably couldn't move with him back in his more athletic days. And like he was scared even to attack him. It's like he's treating inside the three point arc like it's lava. And the defense was never going to be a plus for him. And there are literally teams running plays at him. The Celtics won a game by isolating him. on Jason Tatum

Tatum makes one quick move and all of a sudden Blake Griffin is on the floor it's like it's actually painful to watch and I guess that's a long way of saying like if the Pistons were hoping if Blake was hoping if other contenders

were hoping that he would be some sort of savior for some of these teams like as a way out as a tradable guy like I just don't think that's going to happen well maybe that's the secret tax of doing this with Jeremy Grant which is when you feature him in that way when you're you know they're not a great fit

together in terms of if you want Blake to be any kind of interior player what that could look like. You're kind of turning the guy you need to move eventually into a three-point specialist. Not the best showcase of what he potentially could do even if he still can do that stuff anymore. It does make you wonder if, yeah, if that just might be baked into the cake regardless. And you stay untradle, but Russell Westbrook's still out there. I mean, there's always a trade you could make. Yeah, I don't know who's worse. Like Russ at times looks like he can be a contributor.

I guess. The very least he gets triple doubles, which are fun to talk about. But no, that is a fair point about the back court in Detroit. Also, great running subplot of this season. I don't know if you guys have seen any of the Wizards, like post-game shows, but Jason Smith, former wizard, is on them.

Every time Russell Westbrook gets a triple double, even in a loss, it's like his talking point that, oh, on the bright side, at least Russell Westbrook got a triple double. It's great viewing. I would highly recommend seeking it out. All right. Let me get into mine here, which is a bit of a pivot in terms of tone at the very least. It's interesting because I think before yesterday, and I think honestly you can credit the Hornets for this. But like I'm having a lot of fun talking about basketball now. But over the weekend, it just felt like such a bummer. Just considering all of the COVID stuff that's going around in NBA right now. It seems like we have what, four, maybe five teams who are dealing with this. at this point, contact tracing is still happening.

I believe four games were postponed and could be even more. First of all, like the health of the players and everyone involved in the NBA is first and former. That is the most great concern here. There's clearly something going on where the NBA has to get a hold of this. And it seems like they're having meetings to that end. There was some meeting with the Players Association that happened Monday that ESPN reported, where they were just reexamining things. And then, as I mentioned, at the top of the segment, there's a board of governor.

meaning where there could be something a little bit more substantial that they come to in order to kind of get a hold of this or try to do something with this. But kind of the one thing that I've been thinking about is just like, what a bummer this all is. There's just this unmistakable shadow or Paul like really looming over the league where like you're just, I think my girlfriend said it best where like you would go to basketball just as an escape from what we're all dealing with in the world. And if you look at the screen right now, everybody's wearing masks and all the, I mean, that was the case in the bubble. Like, there was a very weird environment, but this one seems a little bit more threatening. There definitely seems to be a little bit more like that. There's

more of a presence that, like, there's something just like, I don't know, bad going on here. And it's really unmistakable and unavoidable. And it's really like just, it's creeping into how I watch the game and like just my overall enjoyment of the game, which is really disappointing and something that like I kind of expected going to the season. But even now to be faced with it, it's really disappointing. Well, there are all kinds of different ways that the real world kind of seeps into sports, entertainment, what have you. You know, there's the version we saw in the bubble, which is players responding to social justice issues, a very righteous, urgent kind of anger and response from them, which I think was essential. And then there's this, which is,

we're all kind of fighting this same pandemic at the same time. Different groups of people are taking it more seriously than others. The NBA has these protocols, which in some ways are very strict and stringent, but in some ways seem very loose in terms of, you know, what players are doing off the court in their personal time, what, you know, the potential guests that players are interacting with on the road, things like that. It's hard to navigate for the league, admittedly. perfect way to sew all this stuff up. And some of it is going to come down to merging what's safe with what players will agree to.

And those are two very different considerations. But I think one thing that's kind of jumped out to me over these last few days is the phrase, out of an abundance of caution, which I've seen pop up out of coaches' mouths. I've seen pop up in press releases. It very much seems like an NBA talking point, and it has big, everything is fine energy

in terms of trying to quell, oh, no, we're putting these guys in contract. contact tracing. Oh, we're taking these guys out of the mix so they're not infecting anyone else. They have high risk of exposure. To me, it just ends up red flags. And this whole situation has me pretty nervous about where the NBA is vis-a-vis the pandemic. But they're going to have to do some soul-searching in these meetings with the board of governors among the union. It's a tough time. Yeah, I just don't really see any other option. I mean, like, let's put it all on the table, right? Okay, there is a pandemic that's not going.

going away. Maybe the vaccine will be this summer. Well, who knows? You really, there's only three options. Either you're going to cancel the season, which is not really an option. You're going to go into a bubble, which the players have pretty firmly said is not really an option either. They've made that pretty clear in terms of what they view. And right, it's their decision on what they want to do. And number three is like, we're going to muddle through. Games are going to get suspended. Guys are going to get COVID. And like that sucks. But like Justin was saying, like, there's just no other way around it. I mean, NFL, MLB, college sports,

they've all dealt with it. It hasn't been ideal, but their seasons happened. I kind of like something that happened here. I mean, we're going to have games. They only seen half the schedule for this very reason. Like, this was all, to me, notice as a surprise as all. This is all baked into the cake going into the season. This is just what was going to happen no matter what.

But I think the middle path there was something different to begin with, which was play 40 games, play 50 games, set up that you're going to play a shortened regular season and then go into a playoff bubble. Like there were permutations that I think made more sense than what we have now that just weren't as stressful in terms of travel and all the considerations that teams have to go through. Yeah, I think the league probably deserves the benefit of the doubt, or at least some

benefit of the doubt, considering the success that they had with the bubble. I think a lot of people were suggesting going into that whole experiment, like what a farce this was. They're putting people in harm's way. And it turns out, I think, and I thought this at the time to, and I thought this at the time to, I definitely think about it in retrospect. I think a lot of people, while well-intentioned and well-meaning and looking out for the safety of people, including the players, who are going to be involved in that, were probably operating from a place where they didn't have the full picture. They were less informed than the people making those decisions.

And maybe that's on the NBA to a certain extent by not informing the public of like everything that they're going to do and just like really making it clear that like these things could work based on the science, yada, yada, yada, yad. the flip side of that is that maybe there are things in place. Maybe like, so for instance, there was a Wall Street Journal piece the other day. Ben Cohen and someone else wrote it just about how there's discussions about or at least experts in viruses were suggesting. Like one of the things that they could do is give the vaccine to LeBron James,

could give it to NBA players in order to tell people that the vaccine is okay because I think there is some hesitancy from some people to take it because of a distrust. in particular among the black population. I think it was like something like 14% trust of black people polled, trust the vaccine. And so like that could be something that could be coming that we're just like not talking about, but the NBA has priced into their discussion. The flip side of that, though, is that people are getting sick now. And that is very scary.

Like Jason Tain and one of the shining stars of this league has COVID. That's like like it's just, it boggues the mind to start. So like even while they're trying to figure things out, they're putting people in harm's way. And I think that is the significant difference between the bubble experiment and now and the thing that's making this a little bit more dire than perhaps like it was going into the bubble when there were tests happening. But a lot of it was just like guys trying to get back into the market. So I guess that's a long-witted way of saying. It's just like something needs to happen as a result of this recent flare-up because I also don't know like when it ends. Like this could be the start of something, not the end of something, which is really scary to think about. Well, I mean, that goes into like the bigger discussion. Or this whole country is having where you're talking about, yes, you're putting folks in harm's way by they're going out and getting COVID. But, you know, you're putting folks in harm's away when you're canceling games and cutting jobs. You're putting folks in harm's away when you're making them stay inside, losing social contacts, you know, mental illness is melting.

It's just rising around the country too. Like there's just no easy answer. And it's like, I think sometimes we kind of forget that that there's always tradeoffs in the world. especially when there's a pandemic going on. They're just going to be a trade-off, and everyone's just going to have to decide what you're going to sacrifice because you're not going to get a win-win scenario.

It's just not getting the cards right now, unfortunately. Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, that's definitely what Silver would tell you, like whenever he's asked about this on the record, I'll always say, well, like, there are a lot of jobs on the line here, and one thing we should probably mention is, like, the players opted to do this.

I think, like, one of the things I was talking about just like an absence of information, I wish more people would ask players about this situation because it seems like they wanted to go through with this and like by all accounts, maybe things have changed now that we've seen this rash of an outbreak. But like it seems like they wanted to get their money out of this. And I think that's an important part of this. Like if they want to keep going forward, then like, I mean, I guess that's the right as long as they're like trying to do what's best. It's a really messy situation. But I guess we'll figure out more here by the end of the day on Tuesday.

and kind of go from there. It seems like we're in a day-to-day situation, but it doesn't sound like right now, as of 9 a.m. on Tuesday, they're planning on stopping. But I guess we'll see. I think that's a good place to stop for today. I should have mentioned during our Lamello discussion

that tomorrow, Charks debuts on a new Ringer MBA podcast, Ringer MBA University, teaming up with KOC and Jay Kyle Mann to talk about young kids. players across the league and maybe some some draft prospects. So make sure to check that out. For us, we will be back next Tuesday. Until then, we'll talk to it.