The Ringer NBA Show - The Celtics Are Just Too Much for the Mavs. Plus, a Goodbye to Jerry West. | Group Chat

Episode Date: June 13, 2024

Justin, Rob, and Wos recap the Celtics going up 3-0 against the Mavericks in the NBA Finals. They discuss Luka fouling out late in the fourth quarter, the difference between Boston and Dallas’s bench contributions, and Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown overwhelming the Mavericks. After, they talk about the passing of Jerry West and his lasting legacy as a player, coach, and executive (56:14). Buy tickets to our live show in Los Angeles here! The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Hosts: Justin Verrier, Rob Mahoney, and Wosny Lambre Producer: Eduardo Ocampo Additional Production Supervision: Ben Cruz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, football fans, we know that the NFL offseason can seem long and dark, but the Ringer NFL show is here to shine a light on all the big training camp developments and front office news around the league. Join me, Shield Capadia, and a rotating cast of Ringer favorites that includes Noura Preciati, Stephen Ruiz, Austin, Gail, and Lindsay Joan throughout the summer months, and stay up to date on what your favorite team is cooking up for the 2024 season. subscribe to the Ringer NFL show on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast

and follow Ringer NFL on Instagram and TikTok and at Ringer NFL on X and YouTube. I am Justin Barrier joining me Big Was and taking his sweet time to get to the mic Rob Mahoney live from what, your parents' basement in Dallas? I mean more or less. Look, it takes a minute to get away from the arena

and especially here in Texas, you know, you got to saddle up, you got to clean the horseshoes, it's a whole ordeal. So I'm here. Is that not enough for you? Yeah, I've been jamming on that Celsius just to stay awake at the ass crack of dawn right now

and we're recording this podcast following game three. Was, fortunately enough, has come dressed to the nines for this one. So he's ready. I have a shirt with a collar on it. So, yes, I'm ready. Well, just for the fact check, Justin, what time is it Pacific time right now?

9.53. Yeah, that's real tough for you. I'm so sorry. Real podcast is no. You got to be willing to go take it to the limit, man. And the limits for us apparently are 11 p.m. The most washed thing I've ever heard. But we're at that age. You know, we're at the point where we have to accept our washness and just keep chugging along. 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.

You get me any time between those, I'm rare into gun. anything beyond that, that's a no. We have younger employees for that. Raring seems strong for you, but somewhere in that vein, sure. Well, I'll say this, the Celtics seemed raring to go

in the third quarter of this game when they were up 21 points. That's a transition, my friends. But this game, this game three in which the Celtics go up, ultimately three hours, seemed like the type of movie that had several different endings.

where the music swelled, we got the triumphant third quarter, everything looks amazing. Oh, my God, Banner 18, and then got a little dicey there toward the end. Rob, you were live on the scene in Dallas. What was that like experiencing right by the court? I mean, absolute madness for exactly the reasons you laid out. And I think you could take this game in all those different directions. You could take this as a Celtics triumph and the fact that even though they gave away, 21 point lead ultimately, they built it by playing really smooth and clean basketball.

And for the Mavs, like for them to go on basically a 10-0 run, I think it was in less than three minutes to get back into this game on top of the fact that they started so well, yet another triumph. And yet I can't help but feel that I will remember for the rest of my life the absolute hush in the building as 20,000 people waited for Mark Davis to tell them whether Luca had fouled out of this game or not. fucking insane that it came to that. But it really,

really did. I mean, it was bad, but I think if you're Luca Donchich, who's been basically all laying these cats to the freaking rim all game long, to pick that... All series long, we should say. All series long, exactly.

To pick that moment to find it in you to try to take a freaking charge just seemed odd and ridiculous to me. I thought, you know, it could have been a bang-bang play. I think if you're wearing Maverick's tinted glasses, you could be like, well, you know, Jalen ends up using his off-arm, man, it's a foul. Like, there's nothing wrong with that being called a foul on Luca there. And some of the other fouls he picked up were just, you know, boneheaded, dead-headed.

That's a thing, yeah. If we're being honest about it. The bang, bang play is one thing. But off the top of my head, he got an offensive foul for blatantly hooking Jalen Brown when he tried to attack baseline on a play. and he bumped Peyton Pritchard so many times in the back court on another sequence that he basically forced

the refs to call another foul on him. And so the sixth foul is going to get a lot of scrutiny. Luca post game said about as much as he was going to say without getting fined in terms of voicing his displeasure with the officiating. I don't really see that much to be upset with. That's really poor situational awareness

from the best player on the floor. And he may have cost his team a chance to actually win a very winnable game in the process. Yeah, this feels like a very crisp, Paulian cruel irony, where he was undone by some of the things that he technically tries to do throughout the game that he typically tries to do.

I try to work the margin, try to work the refs to the point of almost berating them at times, and it just kind of went back at them. I think the question is, if they had Luca in there, if he didn't pick up those six fouls, do you think the game goes the opposite way? I can't be too sure about that, especially when you consider what Luca's been given them on defense all series long.

I don't know that they weren't upgraded as a defensive unit by Luca hitting the bench, like, to be honest. I hear you, but in his place they put Tim Hardaway Jr. on the floor. Which was not ideal. So Tim Hardaway having his primary matchup be Jason Tatum, not great. Just not great. Again, we would have liked to see Luca close this thing out. and actually see him go down losing on the floor and having come up short

or actually having completed the comeback. But I think throughout the course of the game, it's hard for me to feel sympathy for the Mavericks who are, one, I think the matchup is just a poor one for them. They have a bad matchup. This is not an ideal matchup for them in terms of this is the first series where their guys, all of their guys, have to actually guard people in space.

Every other series, like Luca, Kyrie, everybody, they could funnel people into the paint, into their big men, and, you know, play a team, more team defense-oriented type of game. Whereas in this series, that just wasn't allowed, right? So they have a bad matchup, but I don't know, man, watching this, their level of execution and attention to detail just is not there. When I'm watching Jason Tatum on damn near two consecutive possessions at the end of the half, just get behind a defense.

Yeah. Like, you just don't get back on Jason Tatum at the end of a half for the championship, your season is on the line. Like, I'm sorry. I think their effort in this series has been greatly lacking. I think, look, even if they were executing at their highest level, they might probably still lose this series. But just to see them not be able to play at, you know, at their best, after watching them do things, make adjustments, make the smart play, make the hustle play, all playoffs long.

To me, that's the most disappointing part. It feels like to me, Boston took these guys' heart and their soul and took the fight out of them. That's what it looked like to me. I don't know about you guys. I want to tease that apart a little bit because I don't really have as much of a problem with the effort. What I see is something that you kind of see

as a secondary effect when teams are outmatched, when another team just has more talent, has more at their disposal, has more options. The frustration that comes with that is often that you lose the little things. Like you lose the little details of your game plan and the little bits of focus and the little, like, bits of execution that you need to actually win. And it makes a bad situation worse. And that's when you get these runaway rallies. That's part of why the Celtics basically have that against almost every team they play against. There will be a point in the game where Boston just runs off, you know, a 15 to 3 run.

blows open a game. It's really inevitable with their style of play and with how much talent they have. I think part of it is that. I think the other part of it, beyond Luca and whatever his complaints may be

about the officiating as far as the fouls that were called against him, I thought he spent basically half of this game playing to draw fouls and not playing to make shots. And the result of that often was him on the floor and the Celtics going five on four

the other way or some of these breakways or some of the plays where Tatum or Holiday, we're able to just get behind the entire Mavericks defense, it's because they're playing out manned because of the style and ultimately, what Lucas is trying to sell? And whether you think those are fouls or not, I honestly don't really care. They weren't called.

And this is the disadvantage that he sometimes put his team in. Yeah, I think if they had won just off the back of that 21-point Celtic tsunami, as Mike Breen coined it, I would have said that the Celtics just had too much for the Mavs. Ultimately, I think they still just happened to have too much for the Mavs down the stretch. It just happened in a way that you think would tilt the way in the Mavs favor, right? This was a one-point game with 337 to go.

That's without Luka. Luka was already out of the game. It was pretty much coming down to execution. And the Celtics, as a collective, just outmatched what Karee was capable of doing. Kari just wasn't nails down the stretch in the way that he probably had to be in order to vault over all of the different options that the Celtics had. I mean, PJ Washington, getting the foul in the back core on the screen, which was pretty questionable, but that's still something that kind of tilted things back the other way.

And so, like, the Celtics seemed like they were going to win in the way that we've seen them win so many times this regular season and even in the postseason by completely just overwhelming you with points, right? Working that three point advantage, et cetera. This time, I think they, yet again, just kind of like in game two, they just executed when it mattered most. Yeah, they just kind of kept plugging away. And I think that's what's impressive about this one from Boston's perspective.

And look, if you're a Celtics fan listening, I would understand your frustration if we're coming out of the gate talking about all these things that the Mavericks didn't do or the way they kind of gave this away. The reality is... But it's in comparison to what Boston is doing. Boston is executing their defensive assignments to a T on a lion's share of their possessions. Like, so in the first half, Sam Houser Maids makes those three. three threes. Two of those threes he just walked into. Like, it was, they weren't difficult mix.

One of them was somebody, you know, drove to the strong side and the guy helped one pass away. And you can say that's kind of a mental mistake. But at least it's like, all right, the guy, Gardenhauser was responding to an actual threat. Right. The shit, the one at the top of the key, he just caught it with nobody near him and fired. That's not going to get it done in the finals. Boston's not playing that kind of defense. I actually think you might be being too kind

even to the Mavs on that first one because we can roll back the tape. My memory of that play he hit from the corner was Luca basically playing the middle ground no man's land between the three point arc in the lane for basically no reason, as he sometimes does,

when his man is the same Hauser. And you got to stay glued to that. And those are the sorts of details that they absolutely lost in this game. And those are the sorts of details that Boston will beat you on if you do not have absolutely nailed down every second you're on the floor against them. Yeah, well, one of the things I did as we were waiting hours for Rob to go back to his house

was the John Hollinger column that ultimately ended up being quite predictive of where the finals would end up going. He wrote this during the Sloan conference when the Celtics played the Mavericks the last time post-deadline. And the thrust of it is just that, one, the Celtics overwhelming amount of three-pointers is, is just probably too tough to beat. There's just like they've taken what we know about three-pointers and taken it to the logical extreme to the point where they're putting out pretty much anyone out there can hit a three-point, including Xavier Tillman,

who we'll talk about later on. But the other part of this, which I wasn't really privy to, was it works more effectively nowadays, specifically because you see so many teams choose to sell out at the rim as opposed to deny the three-pointer, right? because you have to at this point choose one of them.

And so a team like the Pacers, who goes the other way, is actually a worse matchup for the Celtics than a team like the maps. We have seen throughout this postseason dominate the paint with their dual rim protectors and everything kind of filtering down from there. And so in a lot of ways, like the basic ideology of what the Celtics have built is in complete contrast to maybe the strengths of the Mavs that we've seen throughout the files. And so in a lot of ways, it kind of makes sense that this is where we are.

And when games down the stretch come down to this sort of thing, like, let's just have more of what the MAVs just can't stop. Yeah, it didn't feel like an accident that when the MAVs were finally able to get off some threes of their own, specifically for their role players, that's when they made runs in this game. When PJ Washington was finally getting and taking and making threes, okay, all of a sudden it's a game.

But until that happens, when it's Luca and Kyrie are the only people on Dallas's side that can even generate threes, Boston's path to those shots is just way too easy to compete with that. And I think that's what so daunting about them is not necessarily that they are ideologically wired to take more threes and other teams, although I do think that's generally true. The combination of the spacers that they put on the floor and the ball movement and the ethic of ball movement that they practice makes it so easy for them to get those shots. That's where they beat you as much as anything. And we're saying all of this on a night where Chrisaps,

where Zingis doesn't even play, where he's not even available, but they're able to make their spacing work with Al Horford and Xavier Tillman, and they just keep rolling. Yeah, and to me, the Mavericks, their struggles on offense is the story of the series. The inability to get Boston out of their base defense is what ultimately doomed them to not be able to score, right? And again, I think because there was times where Seacom, in the last round was just beating up

on his matchup. He was just getting the ball in the post and scoring, like, just bullying the guy that was guarded. There's none of that for Dallas. All of their creation is happening, starting from 30 feet out, and a guy has to do six, seven dribbles

when he ultimately gets to the lane or six, seven dribbles into a contested step-back jumper. Right? I think if they had somebody, like I said, if Derek Lively or Daniel Gafford were the kinds of people who could beat up Jason Tatum for guarding them

to be centers, to be like, yo, Tatum can't guard me. I'm a center. Jason Tatum is a freaking guard or a wing, whatever you want to call him. He shouldn't be able to guard me. They don't have that. So everything they have to create

has to happen at a distance. And Boston is one, they're staying super disciplined on the pick and roll where they're not conceding switches when it's a disadvantage on defense. Very rarely are you seeing like Derek White end up on Luca on a bunch of possessions.

Most of the times, Drew is just fighting over. Tatum's fighting over. Brown's fighting over. Now, if it's Tatum and Brown exchanging on the screen and it's like, all right, cool, we'll concede that switch because we still like this matchup. Again, that's to me, that's just execution. Them not conceding that, depending on the matchup.

That's them, like, attention to detail, getting it done. And again, like, Luca, I think, where he separates himself from a lot of guys that have the ball, it's like he can actually walk a guy down with a post-up and destroy him against the right matchup. He just hasn't been able to do that this entire series. Even when he is getting Derek White,

it's like Drew's getting in there mucking up the works. Dallas is just out of sorts on both ends of the floor. And I think, again, even when they did have advantages to press, like when Kyrie would get big Al on him. Like, you know, you would feel like, all right, that's something immediately attack, get an opening, swing, swing. They're not getting any of that going.

And so they've been dominated. Kyrie on Al didn't really result in anything. Kyrie attacking Xavier Tillman didn't really result in anything. Kyrie did get going in this game and he finally got comfortable in the series. I thought a big part of it was sort of figuring out that those matchups didn't work for him and the ones that did were Peyton Pritchard, Sam Houser,

even Drew Holiday, honestly, even just getting into his spots with a little bit more daylight, I thought played to his advantage a lot more in this game. Yeah, Kyrie was aggressive very early. Clearly was a conscious effort to get him going early and let things to filter down from there. But, like, honestly, I think this is where having Houser and Tillman come up so big off the bench really kind of tilted things

because those matchup advantages you expect to be in the Mavs' favor didn't really bar out to the point where it was like, Tillman was out there to start. And I was like, oh boy, what are we doing here? Because he hadn't played many good minutes. I'm actually curious why we got so much Cornette and not Tillman earlier in the playoffs. I don't know if you guys have any thoughts about that.

Joe Mazula actually alluded to something as to why he specifically went with Tillman. The way he explained it, and you can take this at face value or maybe not, depending on how you approach it, he said that the reason he went with Tillman was because he had played in the West so long, he trusted his familiarity against,

specifically that he had played against Luca more times and was more used to if he was going to be in switch situations against Luca, which is what the Celtics like, what's what they like to do with Tillman, that he trusted him to kind of know his personnel out there. That's what Joe Missoula said, which that was a really interesting way to look at it. Joe Missoula is at the point where whatever he says

could be brilliant or the craziest thing in the world. I don't know. What I do know, I'm out on Joe Mazula statements. I love it. Until next season. There just aren't enough people who are weird in the NBA anymore.

And Missoula is the weirdest motherfucker we've seen since like Prime J.R. Smith probably. See, I would disagree with that. I think there's lots of weird people in the league. They're just better at hiding it than they've ever been before. Maybe that's true.

Maybe for the best. Do you see what he said before the game? You were probably there for. The closer you think you are to beating someone, the closer you are to getting your ass kicked. Yeah. This is a prompt. This is a prompt from our colleagues here at Sohey, who was asking about this pregame,

talked about how he's been showing the team like UFC clips from some match in which some fighter got, I think, kicked in the nuts, if I'm remembering correctly. It's a whole thing. You should go listen to Joe Missoula's complete answer. But yes, his gist is that, which is the closer you are to beating somebody, the closer you are to getting your ass kicked, which is advice I think we can all live by. Sure. I guess so I guess, so I guess, so I guess the Celtics are closer than ever.

to getting their ass kicked, huh? I think that's how that works. The general principle, I think he was alluding to some fight where somebody was about to win a UFC match where they had their opponent a chokehold and they let up and the whole thing flipped in that moment.

I don't know that it applies to a 30 series, but it could apply to a 201. You're right. That's fair. Joe Missoula, I can't wait to join his jiu-jitsu class in the off-season. Just get a glimpse at what's going on behind the scenes. No, but I do think

Hauser, Tillman was, played big enough to those advantages really didn't bear out. And so you have to, I guess, give Missoula credit because there was a point where it's like, oh God,

Tillman's coming on. But then, like, you see that the Mavs matched some of those minutes with Kleber minutes. And I was like, well, is there really much of an advantage

with the Mavs bench that this is actually going to tilt the other way? I almost wonder if it's a lack of what the Mavs had to throw out there rather than what Tillman or even like a cornet

was going to give. But also, am I crazy for remembering, Remembering Luca and Kyrie playing better in one, or maybe they just didn't have to play in one-on-one that much, playing better in one-on-one against Jaden McDaniels and Anthony Edwards than Sam Hauser and Xavier Tillman. Is that crazy?

It feels like they played worse against those guys. They did. I don't know that it's any statement about anyone's defense involved, but sometimes those shots go and sometimes they don't. Well, does Luca's like lack of, mobility track in person as much as it does from afar. Because I also think we get into the point where it's like we base what we think about Lucas injuries on the results.

But he does this entire finals. It doesn't seem like he had whatever giddy up he had even in the West finals. I don't always seem in the mobility though. And clearly he's dealing with some kind of chest issue. There's been reporting through the series that he's had to get like shots to deal with the pain of that. I think that's a real thing for sure. Is that why he's getting ripped at half court all series long?

I wouldn't imagine so. And I think he is attacking pretty well. He's still getting to his spots. He's still getting to the basket. Still looks a hell of a lot like Luca Donchage. To me, it's more so what he's giving up defensively. It's the kind of foul baiting that we were talking about earlier. Those are the areas where I've been kind of frustrated as the wrong word,

but like confounded by his play. Like, look, if Luca was playing at a level where he's scoring hyper-efficiently when he's not, he's putting fouls on Tatum and Brown, they would have to play him differently. But he's just not, you know? And neither is Kyrie. Like, Kyrie's first free throws

were in the fourth quarter. And also, like, he doesn't feel like 100%, but he hasn't been the whole playoffs and has been good enough to beat some damn good defenses. So I'm not inclined to use that as some, oh, what if?

I don't want to hear. hear it, man. Like, at a certain point, you got to be scrappier. No excuses. Play like a champion. Like, to me, that's,

I don't want to hear none of the excuse making for these cats. They're getting punched in the mouth, bro, badly, bloody. I thought the worst

he's looked physically, all playoffs, was at the beginning of the OKC series. And then by a game or two later, he was just reckoned everybody. So I don't know

how to read Luca Dantzich's game-to-game health or status other than to say, as a creator, I thought he was pretty great in this game for the most part. There were those things I'm quibbling with, but ultimately he's still seeing the floor

like Luca Donches. He's still creating advantages in the way that he always does. Some of the threes aren't falling for him at this point, which is tough because as we're talking about earlier, the magicists don't have a lot of other ways to generate them other than him

and Kyrie creating them. But otherwise, I think he's doing a good enough job for stretches. It's just that by the end, he fouled out of this one, but he's also kind of running out of steam. I think he and Kyrie have to do so much one-on-one against good defenders,

you're seeing that kind of pay off in the end game. Yeah, I think it's most noticeable what I'm talking about is probably on the defensive end. How much is that injuries? How much is that just the fact that there's nowhere for him to hide in a way that he probably could earlier on in the playoffs? And it's funny after game two, I was watching the ESPN post game because, God forbid, I clearly don't have any self-respect.

But Bob Myers went down the row of everybody asking who their finals MVP. is at this point, which is a totally reasonable question to be asking midway through a series. And everyone gave their answers, Drew, Jalen Brown, etc. And he's like, it's Brad Stevens, which was like the most cornball answer you can give, especially as a former GM.

But I have to say, like, to get back to the overall point, like, I do think they just kind of have so much overall two-way talent the Celtics do that, like, at this point, it kind of is baked into the construction where we are in the series. Unless you really want to say that Jalen Brown has just

so nails late in this game if you want to have that conversation. It's not Brad Stevens. He's not the MVP of the finals, guys. I would say that it's probably Jalen Brown, because he has done, like, just put the team on his back on some pretty

clutch processions. That last shot where he's up faking like five times gets it off at 19 feet and splashes it. Like, that basically iced the damn game. So it was probably Jalen Brown. Again, I don't want to like stick out some corner of Jason Tatum defense, but like, I think he's been pretty freaking good, even when the shots aren't falling. And again,

I would remind people how horrible these drives went against Golden State in 2022. Like, the difference, like, in kind of the quality is, it's mind-blowing, honestly. And I think Tatum has has been a huge factor in why they've dominated this series. But sure, I got no problem giving it to Brown. I'm not giving it to Drew Holiday because he cleans up the scraps. I'm not doing that.

Yeah, I think Jalen Brown is the natural choice at this point. But I thought Jason Tatum played a really good game that also, I'm sure, will be absolutely toxic for the Jason Tatum discourse because he took within that good game, took a lot of really bad threes, just like sidestep bullshit that he did not need to take, that were needlessly difficult

considering all the talent you have on the floor. And that's, I think, the larger point of the Celtics and really where the Mavericks find themselves, which to me, when you play against a team like Boston that is this loaded with talent, top to bottom talent, not like super team type construction, but just a good, deep team with lots of guys who can play. The MAVs have to overcome that

every time they take the floor against them. And that's why you see Jason Kids searching and trying to play 11 guys in the first half to see if anything can work. You know, you get single-digit kind of trial runs for Hardy, for Exum, for Maxi-Cleba, as you mentioned, Justin. Tim Hardaway ended up playing more minutes than he has in a month because Dallas is just like, let's see if we can get something.

They wanted someone at the end of the game who could actually hit a shot theoretically, even though Tim Hardaway didn't literally hit a shot in this game. He still hasn't in the finals, right? No. The other big problem here that a lot of this stuff is kind of pointing to and around is Derek Jones is kind of killing the Mavs when he's on the floor on offense. The Celtics don't guard him. And the fact that there's no real replacement for that slot is why you see Dallas twisting in the wind, trying to figure out like, who can we even put on the floor to play together?

So you'll have to freak. What happened? No, the lights, some extra lighting just came on in here. Did you have a bright idea? Yeah. Well, you'll have to forgive me for, I guess, circling back to the toxic Jason Tatum discourse. No, we must.

Honestly, I feel like I would rather put on like the B helmet from Wicker Man, you know, then fucking get into this. But it's just like so stark and weird because he had an awesome start to this game.

And honestly, his aggression down the stretch, pretty damn good. He had that play where he drove it down and Tim Hardaway just kind of fell over. I don't know if he was trying to take a charge or what happened, but Brown cleaned up the miss.

then he had that post up late there. But the three-pointer being just so god-awful, when he's taking those sidesteps late in those crunch time possessions, I'm like, I would honestly rather have Al Horford take this shot because I have just no faith in where he is. He's four for 13 in this game overall in the playoffs. He's 37 for 127. It's 29% from three.

And this was a guy who's a good shooter. And I know that we've talked about this before him, but I'm just like, what happened? Like, how did we get to this? this point where he's doing all this other stuff, but like, he can't just make a goddamn shot off the dribble. I think when nobody's ever creating your chances for you and it's you and you, like, attracting the defensive attention, it's going to have a sag on your percentages.

And sometimes it's just like, look, the defense is set up in such a way where it's just like, all right, I just got to go at this guy and try to create something. and he's taking some bad shots. Like, I can't do this with a guy who's up 3-0 in the finals. No. I'm sorry. Hold on. We're not banging on Tatum.

We're just talking about something that's, like, weird about a player's game. He's taking bad shots. These are hard shots. And I think it's in his makeup that he thinks he's one of the tough shot makers in the NBA. I think he's wrong. But he hasn't been convinced of that truth. And I don't know that Boston would be made better by doing something else. I think they're like, are we to think that their offense should be way better than what it is?

Offense is pretty sick. I don't know what the, I don't know what the conclusion of Tatum missing all these shots is supposed to be. Yeah, again, I don't think it's necessarily that they're lacking those shots. What I'm saying is he was at one point a 40% three-point shooter on pretty decent follow. and it's just completely like dissipated from his game almost like he's in back to the future and like like history is just being rewritten and like he's just losing parts of his game right uh i'll give you this theory what he has this weird form where he almost like funny hops into it it's almost like he does a lot of movement with the ball on the way up too and he's like he's like he's like a carp coming out of the water where it's like the head kind of like the feet just like Bob, for the listeners at home, I'm doing something here on the mic.

Justin is, listen to his home. Justin is Chip England now, by the way. He's a shot doctor. Yeah. Well, that's the craziest part about this, I think, is that every other part of his game is almost programmatic. It's so drilled. He's very much the Drew Hanlon master class, right?

Where he's been doing that since high school and everything is very on the money, right? It's almost like to a metronome. Yeah, super clean. the fact that this is like kind of almost developing a little hitch. It's not like Yips territory, but it's like it's just weird. I just want to talk about this thing being weird. I really don't think

it's that weird. I think it really is the difference in this season. 48% 49% of his three-point attempts were assisted. A couple years ago, that number was like 65. 55% of his three-point attempts were assisted. The Kyrie effect is what you're saying.

I'm not saying it's the Kyrie effect. I'm kidding. Some of it is like, When you don't have Chris Epps for Zingis, Derek White handles the ball less. And then you're not getting kickout threes. Everything is created by either Jason Tatum or Jalen Brown as the primary initiator. And he's taking hard shots because...

My thing is, when you watch these shots, do you think they should be going in? Because I don't. No. When he's doing that sidestep from 27 feet, and he's launching it with a guy that's right next to him is giving a great contest, I don't think those should be going in.

Yeah, you could see it from a mile away to load up. Them things be clanking, too. We say all of this, and Jason Tatum is not a tough shot maker on the level of the toughest shot makers of the superstar class. He just doesn't really hit those shots at the rate that those guys do. But he's one of the better tough shot makers on this team. And so when those moments come, it's going to be for the most part he or Jalen Brown or Drew Holiday doing something reckless. that usually ends up taking those shots. Some of those moments used to end up with Marcus Smart.

Now most of them are ending up with Tatum. That's progress. A certain kind. I also think it doesn't help that Brown simultaneously has modulated his game in a way that there has never been a better version of Jalen Brown. The way that he just almost channels his aggression

and only breaks it out when necessary is such a stark contrast, probably even to the last time we're at the finals where especially last season, it almost felt like he went too extreme into the volume score version of Brown. We should stop and just say that Brown is one of the greatest development success

in recent history. When he came into the league, he was just an athlete, everyone's like he's a genius because he's from Cal Berkeley who played, like, made his bones on defense and had to earn his minutes.

And he became one of the best scorers. in the NBA under the shadow of another guy that played similarly to him. But it felt like by the time last season struck, and this was kind of around the same time he was having issues with just the organization, all the trade requests, and then like the kind of other stuff

that sprung up around that. But it almost feels like whatever happened over the off season, he just found like the best version of the two guys where he was like awesome defensively. He was kick-ass defensively all season long and he's been amazing defensively, especially in this series,

just hounding Luca up and down the court. Like we're talking about, you know, Luca may be looking slow. Try getting past, trying to get past Jalen Brown. Every minute of every game. It's going to wear the shit out of you.

I thought he was robbed, not making the all-MBA team. He was on my third team. And just the more I watch them, the more I just appreciate just the breadth of his contributions. And more the fact that he's like, he's only doing what he needs to do.

And so to get back to Tatum, it's almost like he is stepping up in the, right moments and kind of doing that Jalen Brown thing where he takes the game by the throw. And compared to Tatum, who's missing the threes in some of those situations, it just looks worse. But I also think, like, we have to give it up for Brown for just like kind of being the best version of himself. But this is why they work.

It's not super elegant all the time. And there are going to be, there are a lot of games where one of Tatum or Brown looks a little bit off kilter. But by virtue of having both of them, you're diversifying your offense. You're putting different styles of creator on the floor. yes, they're both wings, but they attack mismatches in very different ways. They have very different skill sets, ultimately. That's like the crux of Boston's offense.

All of these threes, all this ball movement, all of the advantages that their talent provides come from those two guys. And so it's very tempting after a game like this for us to sit here and nitpick Jason Tatum's three-point attempts, which are bad shots. But in the first quarter, a first quarter that it looked like the Celtics were going to get run off the floor. it ended with them down by one point, and it ended with them down by one point because of Jason Tatum.

And he has those moments in basically every game, those stretches where he is in his own way, the stabilizing force that in the fourth quarter in this one, Jalen Brown turned out to be. And there is a tandem aspect to what they do and a baton passing between them that over all of these years and all of these trials, and they've lost plenty together.

They've gotten deep into the playoffs and lost repeatedly and had to learn a lot of hard lessons. But I think they've come to it. a place of a really solid mutual understanding that when you get to these tough moments, it never feels like one of them is trying to force their will on the game. It feels like Brown is going to get his moment.

Tatum is going to get his moment. There's going to be stretches where they are passing beautifully and it's going to be a wide open spot up for Horford or Drew or Derek White or whoever it is just by virtue of how this team plays. And that's why the Celtics are one-one away from the championship. It's because of the way that all of that stuff coalesces. Yeah.

I would disagree slightly. I think Brown just has had more late game moments than Tatum, but I overall agree with you. And I almost wonder if a lot of the Tatum discourse does spur from the fact that these guys round each other out in a way that isn't typical even of two-star kind of setups. Like look at Kyrie and Luca. It's a much more traditional Luca and then Kyrie playing off of that, where there's just much more to process with Brown and Tatum that it almost like warps your

mind and makes you think about how your two best players should interact and should compliment each other. There's a little bit of that. I think that Tatum discourse, honestly, is solely based off of his first playoff as a rookie where he was pretty good. I think they were, didn't they go to the conference championship or something? And he was kicking Rodney Hood's ass up and down the court and shit. And like, everybody thought this meant he was on the way to being Jordan.

And like, because it's like, oh, he's 19. He did this in the playoffs. It's so young. And like, wow, like, usually guys this young, they struggle mightily and he, like, was successful. And, like, so this is going to mean, like, by the time he's 24, it's going to be, like, crazy. And people just assumed off of that that he would be, you know, obviously he's going to go to the Hall of Fame by the time his career is always got that kind of trajectory. But people thought he was going to be this MVP, perennial MVP kind of candidate, Kobe, you know, LeBron, that sort of wing, perennial, elite MVP type of guy, put the team on his back, do everything kind of player.

Turns out he's not exactly that. And I think that's what all the discourse is because people just thought that or wanted that for him. And it hasn't happened. But like, my God, man, like, this is pretty damn good what it is. You know? Yeah. I do think a lot of it is a lot of people wanting him to be a top five guy and almost

not being able to wrap their mind around the fact that he's a top 10 guy and they're still getting to this peak, right? I will say the one thing that I do think is I don't, I'm not sure that that player isn't in him ultimately, not to do the whole Tatum thing, but still 26 years old. And it's not like he hasn't had a lot of those big old moments more recently. I mean, Milwaukee Game 6. That player's not against the Nets. Like he's had big games like this.

It's not in them. I wouldn't, I wouldn't put it past him. That's what I'm saying. Like if he's just hitting, so let's say he hit a more reasonable percentage of his three is this postseason. Is he that guy? And so I think that's part of it where it's like, well, one, I think guys are developing later in their careers than probably in years past.

I think just because of all the skills training and whatnot, you see guys just kind of add stuff to their bag. And in particular, like type A, just guys who think they're in the Kobe mold like Jason Tatum to where it's just like LeBron got the post. up game late in his career. He's developed a three-point shot in the way that we never thought that he ever would. Like guys are adding things later, I think, at this point. But that's a whole

other discussion. But I also think, like, it's not that hard to see Tatum getting there. He's just making more threes, which he's done previous in his career, which is kind of like my reason for interjecting. Justin. What is so crazy about that? Justin. Like, and LeBron is a bad

example because he's probably the... I'm not comparing him to LeBron. I'm saying there's people who... I'm just saying. Like, would you reasonably Would you expect the Mavericks to do as good or better if you replace Luca with Tatum? Like, it wouldn't, like,

I don't even think that would be a question. Nobody would, like, he would have nowhere to go with his moves. The court would be congested in- I know, but like, like, you, the context matters a lot for Jason Tatum. That's the kind of player

that he is. He's not a contextless player. I just, like, even, like, LeBron is this kind of guy, right? And I'm just saying, like, in 2016, where it's, like, Tristan Thompson and Richard Jefferson and Kevin Love, who's getting benched for Richard Jefferson, and, like, these are the kinds of guys who are rounding,

J.R. Swish, these are the guys who are rounding out the roster that beat a team that won 73 games, right? Like, that will never be something. Tatum can do. So in our top five in our player rankings, like Shea, for instance, is number four, right? Kwai Leonard is number six. Obviously, Kauai has reached higher peaks,

but like Tatum's kind of in that mold where you put the right team around even Kauai. Like, even Kauai needs help, especially these days. Yeah, no, everybody needs help. Just suit us. Like, I still think it's in them. I guess this is my overall point. I just think Jason Tatum is an awesome player.

And the thing about the conversation of, what would happen if you put him on Mavericks was, I think the Celtics are a worst team if you replace Jason Tatum with Luca Donchich, weirdly. Luca Donchich is an unbelievable playmaker. Maybe the best pure creator that the league has seen in a long time. I don't know. See, here's the thing.

I think replacing, this is what Tatum does. He allows their entire defensive philosophy to work in terms of the variability of what they run, the scheme. They are a much more limited defensive team if you make that swap. Yes. He also plays every single freaking game. One of the most durable superstars in the league. In fact, you should go to the ringer.com, read Michael's Michael Pina's story about Jason

Tatum as like a model superstar. And I think he makes a great case for why Tatum is kind of unique in this class. He's not the talent that Luca is. But he brings a lot to the table with his versatility. that Luca would dramatically change. And there's a reason for this, right? The Celtics are built to accommodate what Tatum can and can't do.

The MAVs are built to accommodate what Luca can and can't do. So swapping them is not going to do anybody justice here. But I think what we miss with Tatum is all of the ways he gives his teammates cover in a really subtle way. And that's the kind of thing that doesn't pop in the way

that a Luca triple double pops or a Kyrie pull-up pops. It's just going to be a quieter kind of stardom for him, and that may result in, ultimately, him kind of topping out as the sixth to tenth best player in the NBA, and there's no shame in that when it comes with a fucking ring. Yeah.

And I just think this team is closer to, you know, like 04 Pistons, where, like, you know, the sum is greater than the whole. Like, these guys are very complimentary. Like, I think... The O4 Pistons took more than five three-pointers a game? No, but, you know, whatever. I just think none of those guys individually, even though they kicked the shit out of Kobe and Shaq, they destroyed these guys.

A series that probably shouldn't even went five if we're being honest. But individually, it's not like any one of them is like, oh, we want to see them kill somebody one-on-one and be better at superstar status. It's just, it was a very well-crafted put-together team. and whether you want to say Sheed or Chauncey was the best guy, sure. But like, it's bigger than that. Like, the team is just great for the way they come together and coalesce. Like, you know, and if people want to be like, yo, Tatum on a championship, he's better than Luca, go ahead.

I don't even care. I'm about over the Tatum thing because it's gotten to the point where I'm defending this kid. And, like, that is just absurd. You've gone so far on the left end of the spectrum, you came out the right end. insane. You finally started paying a mortgage and you're just talking about taxes now. There you go.

Justin, I do have an answer to your question. So in the close-out game, the 04 Pistons attempted 14 three-point attempts in that game against the Lakers. The Celtics for contrast tonight, 463s, 17 makes. How many did the Pistons make of those 14?

They made two. Five. Wow. Two of 14. Yeah, the Celtics. Bring that shit back. Bring it back. You need it. One of them was from Nemito Kerr, by the way.

Shout out to Memito Kerr. Wow. What a time. The great Turks ever. Yeah. One of the great Turks. Just the great Turks in history? That's his period.

Do you want to do that on Sunday's pod? Greatest Turks and Nemean history? The greatest Ottoman rulers? Yeah. We got to rush in. Let's go. Asch has to be up there. Turkaloo.

Yeah, he do. That's literally all the, all the Turks that I remember. Yeah, pretty much. No, but going forward in this, I guess if we're talking Luca in proximity to Tatum here, I do wonder if what we're in for once the Syria ultimately concludes is a little bit of the Luca backlash.

It comes for you very quickly because, Rob, I don't know if you caught this in your travels there, but Brian Winhorse fucking late into Luca. Just like he was doing a hit for Scott Fentpel, and he was just, you know, typical whatever from, from court's side. And he's like, by the way, Luka is losing this shit for them. Because he was basically saying Luca blaming everything on the officials at the end there about the follow.

It's unbecoming, man. It's unbecoming of a guy of his stature. Like, you take it on the chin, play better, man. There's no excuses. We can't do the excuses. Or if you're going to do it, you better do it cheapishly like LeBron with that damn wristband after the finals. Like, you better do it in a way that you got plausible deniability. Yeah, you got plausible deniability that you're not actually making excuses.

Because to come out and be like, oh, the refs saying giving it to me, that's bullshit. That's Bush League. That's horseshit. I'm sorry. I don't want to hear that. I'm glad when he killed him. Especially at this point in the playoffs and in that game with the way he fouled out, that's Lucas' responsibility to stay on the floor.

Get out of here. And, like, just some of the effort play. Like, come on, man. He's been so good at taking responsibility. Like up until this point, it's such a tough place. We're not letting them off the hook, man. Like, Luca, we get it. You got your team to the finals.

A herculean effort all playoffs long. You probably got a messed up leg. We get it. You're giving it your all. But at the same time, when you stink it up, I don't want to hear the excuse. I'm tired of excuses for these cats. I'm guessing what's going to happen is he's going to come back tomorrow

or in a couple days and say, you know what? it was the heat of the moment. I was frustrated and try to take accountability for it because Justin, I agree with you. I think he's generally done a good job of that in these playoffs. Him and Kyrie both when they haven't played well or even sometimes when they've played well, but the team has come up short for whatever reason, have put a lot of that responsibility on them and on their backs and been accountable for the things that they are and aren't doing, which is what makes this one kind of a bummer because he did have things he could have done better. And it's pretty easy to sit on that press conference stage and admit that.

and he chose not to and decided to talk about the refs instead. I thought you were going to say he's going to come back after the off season and have like vegan diet just absolutely ripped. I do doing crunches on the beach. No. I do not. I don't know that I believe that's going to happen. But look, he's this good as is.

I don't really, he'd do whatever he wants as far as that goes. I just want him to be on the floor to close a potential like crucial NBA finals game. I would say I think we are at that point though, where it's like, I know Luca does. much. I do think he's at the point where it's like, yeah, now it's a little time to focus on, you know, getting in like late stage LeBron move. Let's get healthy. Let's put a little more effort on defense. And honestly, considering all of the picks that they've expended, just like getting this

team together, there aren't really many other options. Like maybe they could do things on the margin to switch things up. But their pathway to winning this finals as opposed to perhaps going out in four here, I think is Luke up being a little bit better defender. It's more like on the margins, not trying to really ding him, but like those little things I think you're going to matter more because there really aren't many options. Everything you're saying is true.

And yet if Kyrie had been better in games one and two, maybe that doesn't matter. If the Mavs support and cast is, I would say, overall, 15% more talented than it currently is. Maybe the series looks dramatically different.

I'm not to, that's not to say Lucas shouldn't do those things. Clearly he should take his job seriously and the Mavs will be better off if he does. But there are pathways to DALs being really good for a really long time, even if he doesn't take it that seriously because he is that incredibly talented.

So we'll see how this goes. I think some guys have to learn those lessons hard. And to the Celtics model, sometimes that takes getting to the finals and losing, getting this close and having it taken away from you. I missed the type of media we would have where we would all spend an entire offseason crushing Luca, killing him for his final performance,

killing him all. off season, coming into the season, be like, this guy has a lot to prove. This guy blew it in the biggest moment. This guy needs to get better. Bring that media back. Make NBA media great again, folks. All right. This is one of the best basketball players in the world.

Michael Finley should have taken that beer away from him. Michael Finley should have poured that beer on the top of his head. That's right. After winning the Western Conference. We're even thinking you could drink after that win. He should have killed him. Let's get back to killing guys. Matter of fact, matter of fact, what we should be doing,

we should take the tact that WNBA players are taking with Caitlin Clark. We're NBA players. Let's just do that. Let's just smash them, kill them until they do something. Earn it the hard way. That's right. So other than just complete abstinence and sobriety, Isn't anything the Mavs have left here in order to maybe win a game or two?

Be serious. Be serious. I got to ask the question. Be serious. No, no. They got nothing. They got Mubbkees. They got Bub kiss. They got bubkiss.

They got nothing for Boston's offense. They got nothing to solve their defense. They got nothing. Tim Hardaway, Jr., getting these minutes as an indictment of what they've been able to do, period. Yeah. I think the trouble with this is they have been close in these last two games. and the fact that they haven't been able to win them is damning. Because if

you win either of those, the series changes dramatically. It's a nice series. Chris Stabs. First of all, can we give it up for the Boston Celtics talking about that man is day-to-day with an injury that's a six-weeks recovery, six to eight weeks? Clap it up for them. Well, haven't the Mavs also been listing Luca as questionable,

even though there's absolutely no way he's not going to play? Chicanery. Chicanery. It's just like, it seems like a little bit of, of both sides at this point. Also, Chris Stabs, would I like to see you die on the court. Just saying. I, on the other hand,

don't want anyone to die. I'm not wishing any player in this series to die. It would have been cool to see. Luca isn't going to be LeBron levels unless he's willing to engage in human sacrifice. That's where we're in. Maxi Kleber, what's he really doing? Now we're getting to the real columnist take.

Maybe we should do this for the live show. going down the vicious venomous columnist rabbit hole until we emerge with human sacrifice. We're going to need something because I don't think we're going to have much final action to talk about. Please. A sap.

He has some time on his hands. Rob, anything else from this game three, live in attendance? I saw the 2011 Mavs congregating. I want to talk about this. I don't know if you all saw the context of the 2011 Mavs congregating,

which is they had a suite and in the suite, you know, you got DER, you got Jason Terry. You got Tyson Chandler, who still works with the Mavs, Sean Marion, J.J. Brewer, Corey Brewer,

Karan Butler. Brian Cardinal was there. Great. They got the trophy. Everybody's celebrating you're back in the finals. Hell yeah. Beloved Maverick,

Brian Cardinal. Of course, this is the occasion to trot those guys out to bring the team back together. The strangest part about it, and I have to say, maybe the strangest bit of SpanCon, I have seen all playoffs.

They put those guys on the Jumbotron, and then they say, now the champions will lead us all in the Chili's baby back ribs jingle. Nah, that's crazy. Nah. That must have to be the craziest check. These guys won a championship. And Corey Brewer is up there like doing the baby back, baby back baby.

That's insane. What are we doing? How did we do that in 2011? Did they used to hit Chili's on the road in 2011? Like, because you know, member NBA players used to be obsessed with Cheesecake Factory? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Was Chili's one of those stops?

Listen, there's a Chili's 2 in the Dallas-Fort Worth American Terminal and I used to always have to go buy it. So maybe that was their spot. And when I say Chili's 2 and not the number 2, it's the word to, it's T-O-R. Chilies as well. I remember seeing the behind-the-scenes video

of those dudes record, the actual dudes recording this. I watched that on YouTube. Very evocative because we're now watching Was on one of Spotify's beautiful microphones just like crooning into it. The visual is really working for me. I'm not here to disparage Chili so much

as why are we doing this to the world champion Dallas Mavericks. That's nuts. I also saw like Steve Nash was courtside and maybe Dirk as well sitting next to life. Once a Mav. Always a Mav, guys. Come on. Everybody knows that.

Dirk seemed to like have to split his allegiances where he just got a lot to do. Why isn't Brian Cardinal in court side? If I'm a Mab's player and I see Cardinal there, I'm like, I'm going to give extra effort on this loose ball. Just saying, I mean, I don't think anyone is doing that, but they might recognize Steve Nash in a way they don't Brian Cardinal. But yeah, I think it was like an Emmett Smith,

Dirk, Steve Nash kind of combo over there. Power to him, man. Why not? Take it an NBA Finals game. The NBA Finals are here in Fandals giving you the chance to win alongside the champions, because right now new customers get $200 and bonus bets with a winning $5 bet. That's $200 to use on same game parolets, live bets, and so much more.

So game four in Dallas, Celtics are up 3-0 now. I hate to do this to Dallas, but I think it's Boston plus one even in game four for the four games week. I kind of thought this would go at least five so I could see Luca Donchich, after following out in game three,

kind of coming back with a vengeance and winning this one, at least to get one. on the home floor. But I don't know. It seems like there's a lot going for the Celtics at this point. So give me the Celtics plus one in-game floor to close it out. And there's no better place to bet all the finals action than America's number one sportsbook.

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bonus issued as non-wadrabo bonus betts, which expire seven days after receipt, restrictions apply, see terms at sportsbook.fandul.com. Before we get out of here, I think we do have to talk about Jerry West, who unfortunately passed away today. Pretty disappointing, just in general,

but also just considering how close it was also to Bill Wallen, who we eulogized a couple days ago on this podcast. It's funny because we talked, fairly recently about the Hall of Fame inductions. And in that, we talked a little glibly about West and some of these other guys getting in, West for the third time,

or at least for like his third contributions. I think we talked about it more about, you know, it's kind of weird that the Hall of Fame does this, chops up all the different contributions for different guys. Like, why do we have to do this? But I do think it's in a weird way, circling back to it now.

It is kind of like pretty apropos of like all the different ways that West has contributed to this game. I've been thinking about this today, just in light of the news, how I've been doing some more historical-looking things for the site over the past few years. And as you're going through history,

you just keep seeing Jerry West in some of the major inflection points of NBA history where it's like, oh, when Kobe and Shaq came together, like, there's Jerry West talking about, like, not wanting to throw himself off the balcony just in case, like, he didn't land Shaq, right? And then there's like, obviously, he's playing days. And then when you're like looking at the LeBron lottery,

and he's on the dais for the Memphis Grizzlies as the representative, who ultimately did not get that number one pick. And there's almost like this Forrest Gump effect with Jerry West, where it's almost like he is present for so many different generations and chapters of the most important moments in NBA history. I think it just speaks to his overall contributions. Just like a guy who's just been omnipresent in the league, that clearly we didn't have.

have him as a player. We knew him probably more as the executive and the coach. But like, he's just been honestly omnipresent in the way that like Walton almost was as well. And those guys are kind of pretty different characters. But like Wes was typically more behind the scenes a little bit more contentious. Walton was a little bit more, uh, just like a ray of sunshine. But it is crazy just because he's just like such woven into the fabric of what the NBA is outside of even just being the logo. Right. He's just like, he's just, been part of the NBA for as long as I can remember. So obviously a sad day.

Yeah, literally woven into the fabric in that way. I think that whole idea of a contributor to the game is kind of like built for someone like West. It's not just like a coach who came with some novel concepts or these figures who have been kind of around along enough that we put them in the Hall of Fame. As you're saying, Justin, like, Jerry West is significant in every single capacity he has ever worked in in the league and been around these monstrous teams, these incredible turning points and himself had just an amazing career that in retrospect feels even more improbable

given everything he fought through in terms of addiction, given the kind of personality he was, like just the league's foremost motherfucker that has ever played. And that is something that I think he had to deal with in his own way, but also is kind of deeply admirable and worth celebrating within a competitive context, like who he is and his drive to not just, win but beat everybody led him to all these historic points. And that a person like that, a person who had so much to kind of figure out about themselves along the way, that had so much to figure out about themselves as a star and a teammate, much less a coach and an executive, that that guy would become the logo, the literal logo of the league, like a literal icon for the

sport is not just improbable, but it's something that has just turned out to be shockingly beautiful for the state of basketball and where the NBA is now. So, Jerry West is just an absolute titan in this sport who's going to be missed in every single respect, including the fact that just on a boots on the ground level is one of these people in the league who, despite the profanities, just has an almost universal approval rating for this reason.

People love getting cursed the fuck out by Jerry West, when he is the person who's taking them seriously, when he's the person who has their back, who's urging them to be better in the way that he always urged himself to be better. Yeah, it's just hard to, like put his career into the proper context, you know, on a podcast, honestly, because he's just done so much. As a player, this guy wasn't just like some good player.

This guy was legitimately one of the best players to ever play his position. Dominated his era as a player. Ended up only winning the one championship, which, you know, back then that wasn't like a mark on your career as a great player. Oh, guy only haven't had one. And, like, you know, God was extremely successful as a player. Bonafide, first ballot with a bullet, Hall of Famer as a player, then basically, you know, constructs or has a very big hand in constructing that Lakers

dynasty from the 80s, which people don't remember now, but this team went to nine finals and won five of them in the freaking 80s. That's insane. That's insane level of production. and then he puts together another dynasty, he puts together the Shaq and Kobe Lakers. Like, it's, you know, he went out and got the pick for Kobe. He went out and signed Shaq.

Obviously, you don't got to be a genius to know you need to sign Shaq. But, like, the Kobe thing took legitimate foresight and vision. Of course, he moves on for the Lakers. You know, he has his time in Memphis. He builds them into a winner back when, like, they hadn't won anything since they had been a friend, Excuse me, an expansion team. And Jerry West helped build that.

People, again, this guy was part of the Golden State Warriors brain trust. I know he probably gets a little bit too much credit for this, but they were going to trade Clay Thompson for Kevin Love that once fateful summer. And Jerry West and Steve Kerr was like, hell no, we got something special with this backcourt. And like those guys made history for that, you know, ended up back with the clippers. And I think, like, people who talk to him, man, I'm talking about as late as like 2018, 2019, 2020,

was like, this dude's mind for the game was sharp. And this was not a guy who's like, oh, this is what we did back in the day. So, no, like, he understood all of the nuances and the ins and outs of the modern game. And he could track a player and be like, this is why he's going to be effective at what we're trying to do. You know, this is, this guy. died at 86, y'all. So we're talking about an 80-year-old man

who still had an incredible mind for the game, right? And so, man, he's just a legend in all of those regards. And of course, as Rob said, the character, but just what he's put down on paper, what you can look at as far as his CV, man. It's incredible career, unmatched, man. And probably, again, probably the single greatest executive in the history of the sport.

Like, that's a fact. That adaptability is what gave him so many lives in basketball, that willingness to continue to keep learning. And I want to say this. The Los Angeles Lakers put out a statement today about Jerry West's death. There was four sentences long. And it was just the coldest, most attached thing I've ever read in one of these situations because of, you know, obviously there's some drama around the ways in which he did or did not work with the team.

And in particular, the way he did work with the Clippers. this is inexcusable. This is one of the greatest Lakers to ever live and someone who contributed not only to the game but your organization in such a fundamental way. You could not tell the history of the Lakers without Jerry West, and he deserves better than that.

So I just want to say something to that, right? Because I'm somebody who often laments the direction the league is going in terms of all these goddamn hedge fund, private equity, IB, quaint motherfuckers, who everything is about cold, hard, efficiency,

and it's just this machine-like existence in something in sports that's supposed to be a lot more emotional, quite frankly, as far as I'm concerned, right? And irrational. The flip side of that, like the Lakers is a mom-and-pop organization and it has a personal touch.

And the Jerry West and Jeannie Busting got really personal and really ugly, and that's what happened. If this was a more corporatized operation, like people would just know you cannot do this for image, for how it looks, just for like, we want to hug the Jerry West legacy.

We don't want to shun it. I think in a corporate setting, like it would have just been known to be way more PR about handling this and been way more effusive in the guy's death. But because this shit is personal, it got personal and sad to see. Yeah, I don't know what order they came out in.

I only saw the Jeannie Bus Instagram thing. that got circulated. I thought that was fairly touching. So I'm not sure what the difference was, which one sparked the other one? I thought that one was kind, so just to get the full picture there. But yeah,

I know West still being part of the league, even as recently as this season, like helping architect the clippers, obviously being in the faithful discussions that ended up with the Warriors, not trading Clay Thompson for Kevin Love. He was obviously billed as a big part of that. So someone who was a big part,

of the league for a very long time, and someone who will be missed very much as a result of that. Why don't we wrap it there? We'll be back on Sunday when there may or may not be NBA finals games still to talk about. We'll talk to you then. Thank you to Eddie Ocampo on production for filling in,

and thank you to Benjamin Cruz. We'll see you next time. Must be 21 plus and 18 plus in D.C. In present in select states, Fandul is offering online sports wagering in Kansas under an agreement with Kansas Star Casino LLC. Gambling problem, call 1,800 gambler or visit fandul.com slash RG in Colorado, D.C., Iowa, Michigan, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and Vermont.

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