The Ringer NBA Show - The Disappointing Milwaukee Bucks and Beefing NBA Owners | Real Ones

Episode Date: April 4, 2024

Logan and Raja discuss the Milwaukee Bucks’ recent struggles, why their ceiling is still high despite a disappointing regular season, and whether or not the midseason coaching change was the right move (1:03). Next, they talk about the ongoing rivalry between Suns owner Mat Ishbia and Cavs owner Dan Gilbert and what their contentious relationship says about the competitive nature of NBA front offices (17:11). Finally, the guys close with their Real Ones of the Week (37:31). Email us questions for Mailbag Monday! [e-mail] The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming, please checkout ringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Hosts: Logan Murdock and Raja Bell Producer: Jonathan Kermah Production Assistant: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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New episodes starting March 28th. On Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Poppin. Real ones. Logan Murdoch here, Roger Bell there. We're here to talk about some panic in Milwaukee and a little ownership beef. Raja is typing feverishly

to get his rundown in. Let's start in Milwaukee, Roger. Where the Milwaukee Bucks just lost four of their last their fourth game in five outings against the Memphis Grizzlies. Just a disgraceful performance from Milwaukee. Jared Jackson Jr. had 35 points.

While Memphis does play hard, this is not something you want. And to make matters worse, Doc Rivers is expressing concern about Janice Adetakumbo's health. He has a left hamstring issue. We are 12 days out of, of the of the playing tournament, 12 days left in the season.

Milwaukee has been just a shell of itself. I think they're 47 and something. And second in the Eastern Conference, but that lead might be dwindling as well. Roger, we had such sky high expectations here. I think I picked the bucks to go to the finals this season. And I don't think that they're going to get. out of the first round now. I don't even know

if we're even, I think we're here in terms of like getting Jemmy to come here on Packwatch and just pack them up. When we, when you look at the Milwaukee Bucks at this time, you've been a former player, obviously. When you look at them around this time, do you have any sense of optimism

of where things can go considering how they played in the last few weeks and the injuries and where we are, how close we are to the postseason? Can they write the ship and just start trusting each other and figuring out at Calh? cohesive plan to win a title. Negative. The reality is

anytime you have a healthy, Janice, and I have to start by saying and qualify it with healthy, because hamstrings are tricky. You can get into a week-long hamstring and think you're supposed to be back, and now you're not, and it's lingering. And so the degree of strain he has and his hamstrings concerning. But

if he would be healthy, I'd just say, anytime you have Dame Lillard, and I know I've been singing this song, and I say it a lot, anytime you have Dame Lillard and Janus in a series, I'm going to give you a chance, but the chance would be slim because the answer to your question is I have no faith. They look uninspired. You know, the defensive slippage this year is just something that if you consider yourself

a championship team and you're in a championship window, I know there's been a little lack of continuity from a coaching perspective. And you've really got three messages over the course of the last year when you, you know, it was budded at the end of last season and then and then my man, AG, and now you got a, now you got Doc. So, like, there is an excuse to be made. really it's on you. Yeah.

It's on you as a player to go out there and put forth that type of effort and that type of energy and just compete on that end of the floor. People ask all the time when I go to speak at clinics or, you know, if I'm addressing a group of kids and they always ask me about defense because, you know, that's what I was more known for. Although I have to correct people, I could shoot it a little bit too. But, but they ask me about defense. Talk to a shit.

What is it? No, a little joke. I do that a lot. But what is it about defense? It's like, what do you have to do? Is it footwork? Is it, is it technique? Is it all that?

I'm like, no, it's fucking wanting to do it. It's just digging in and saying, I'm going to get this done. And so the Bucks, even though they've had multiple coaches and multiple probably defensive philosophies, I still think that's more of a player issue. Like, you know, and I probably said stuff to the contrary, but as the seasons unfolded and you just can't seem to get it to the level that you would need to be seriously considered a contender. I mean, they're still sitting at second and east, but to seriously be considered a contender, like, you've got to be better defensively than that. And so I don't think it gets fixed,

but their ceiling is so high with Janus and Dame, Logan, that, you know, you can never count them out. I just, I don't know, it's interesting because I, I'm with you. I understand in theory. And also, I'm looking at the Eastern Conference standards right now. Like, there's not a team that I would bet to beat them in a seven-game series aside from the Celtics and the heat at this point. Just I'm giving heat the institutional advantage because of what they did to him last year. And I just don't believe in more. On control? I think they got my control over Debo.

You know, I really do think they got mind control over Debo. But I just feel like even with the lack of mental toughness, like I think they can be, they have enough to beat the magic, right? They have enough to beat the Knicks, right? I think in theory you can you can say that they have a they have the defense enough I think to be able to they should be in theory on paper be able to beat the Pacers should the Pacers get that seventh seat right like I think that that can happen to that you can talk myself into it. However like there have just been too many curious losses down the stretch from Milwaukee man like there's just been there's just been too many eggs laid they lost to the Washington. Wizards. Anytime you lose to Washington Wizards, that's just a barometer of just how much

you just, you stink, right? It's just I don't care what they do. But like, I think that one of the other things that I wanted to ask and maybe this is me getting in my Rajah Devil's Advocate bag, right? And I know Milwaukee will probably get it in my mentions

probably telling me I'm full of shit and I understand that. But I do have, like, is there an argument to be made that they could have stuck it out with Adrian Griffin considering all of what's going on right now. Or do you, because you're asking Doc Rivers to come mid-season. And I know this is a problem that dates back to the summer, right?

They probably shouldn't hire AJ or Griffin, but hear me out. They played with them through this. They've had a better record under AG. Now with Doc Rivers, he has to implement his new plan. They have to figure out how to trust him on the fly. Is there a case to be made that Adrian Griffin should, should have just stayed on to be the coach. I'm playing devil's advocate here, guys.

I'm really honestly asking a question. But do you think that there's an argument to be made for that? Because I just feel like the symmetry is just broken. I don't know how much more broken it could have been than where it is right now with the new coaching staff and no trust between anyone, I don't think. They can say whatever they want. We see what's on the court.

Let me go backwards real quick because you talked about the bucks potentially winning, you know, in any number of first round matchups. That's fine. but that's not like the context and the lens with which we look at the the bucks through. Like that's not that's not the standard that they've set. So like, and I'm sitting here telling you, I agree with you, but we're talking about championship. Well, you got Janice and Dan Lillard.

That is a championship level core. So that's the context that I'm talking about them in. Right. Now, as far as Griff goes, absolutely. You know, but hindsight's 2020. at the time, you probably misdiagnosed the problem if you were, you know, the executives there and even ownership to some degree. I'm telling you now, the problem is your roster. You lost some pieces, i.e. Grace and Allen, people are going to laugh at that, that were huge parts,

maybe not of the lion's share of scoring or anything like that, but they were integral parts, I should say, you know, into some of what you were doing last year. You lost a couple of those pieces. And so this year, you probably thought this was a coach issue. That's what I was sitting here telling you that it could be a coach issue with Adrian Griffin. Like that's what we talked about. And only after the season unfolds and you realize that regardless of message, you know, you still have these issues. Do you realize that it's not a coach thing?

It's a player thing. So the answer to your question is absolutely there's a case that Griff should have been, you know, given more of an opportunity to kind of steady the ship and figure out what he looked like in the playoffs and get a true sense of what he could do. Like, Doc Rivers' this side of it, right? Like, it's easy for an outsider to be like, yo, I can go fix this, you know, like, especially when it's going wrong. And then, like, what I guess the bigger thing is, like, from the front office, well, I think

it was two things. One, you know, they listened to Janus and we talk about how even in this player empowerment era, like, you need a little bit more balance. over the summer they listen to Janus and saying, I want this coach despite the fact that Janice didn't even really know bro like that. And then we go from there to it not going as well as everyone would hope.

And then we get to the end-season tournament. Doc Rivers is whispered sweet, nothing to the front office. Like, yo, I could, you know, as the season goes on, maybe I could fix this. It's easy for you to say that when you're not in the mix, right? it's easy for the front office to be like, oh, we can have an outsider to fix this

too much. How hard is it, Raja, you know, like, how hard is it to actually do that in practice, right? Like, I've never seen it done a coach mid-season change with the team with championship aspirations and it working, right? Like, I guess the calves are like the only exception to that rule, right? And they had, I think, more of a better leadership corps right now than what is being. exhibited with the Milwaukee buck. And I think that's the only thing that I've seen.

Maybe them and you go back to the Lakers and like the 80s, but I don't see many examples of teams switching coaches midseason and going to the championship. It was not a first year head coach's job to take. So whoever made the call on that, I'm just going to say it again. This has nothing to do with Adrian Griffin as a coach. This is purely about any first year coach. That team is not in the window.

They're not in that window of time where we're, a guy can be learning on the job in that way. It just didn't make sense. So if Janice was a part of that and a big part of that, then you're sleeping in your bed now to some degree. We're talking about them like they're dead in the water, but I don't have another example of a coach getting in midstream. You could take a team.

I want to say the sons were like this when Terry Porter, I don't know their record, so I want to be fair to Terry Porter, but I think they let him go midway through a season. I think it was that next season maybe. There's a world in which if the entire, team is kind of galvanized on the same page and just don't love the message or the style. You weren't, I guess you were there. I wasn't there.

28 and 23 lost 5 of 8 going into the All-Star break. What were they after the break? Finish the season 46 and 36. How bad. Well, still, you know, still. It's not, I mean, it's not all the way proving my point, but I guess what I would. It's early in the morning, guys. Yeah, it's okay.

But look, that team I used because I have intimate knowledge of what was going on there, right? And so you had a bunch of guys that were all on the same page. For the most part, before I left, had played together for a long time. And it was just about what we were getting from the new coach. All of the terminology was different. The practices were different. The ratio of offense to defense was different. There was a lot that was going on that was different.

And so as a unit to a man, we were all kind of like a balking at that. There's a word in that world, you might bring in someone like an Adrian Griffin. And the next year they were great. They were really good again. Like you could bring someone in to take it back to what the players like. That world exists where things are okay. Right. And so if you're looking at it from someone in the Bucks front office, you know, again,

that's what I'm saying. You probably misdiagnosed it. You thought that it was a scenario. like that. This is Adrian Griffin. The players don't like what he's talking about. They don't want to play for him. He can't. X, Y, and Z, this is not me saying this. This is what I imagine was going on in the Bucks front office. And so you thought it was a Griff problem in a messaging problem, in a strategy problem. And so the answer to that would be, yeah, we got a group that's galvanized. We think that if we give them a new message, a new leader, a new, a new voice,

they'll, they'll be fine. And then when you got you got to start saying all of that stuff, like, yeah, we get, we need doc. We need to do this. Well, that doesn't help. But you don't know the answer. You don't know the end. You don't know the answer to the question until you get Doc and you play yourself out through the course of, you know, 82 in a playoffs. And it's not substantially better.

In fact, might be fractionally worse than it was with Griff. Then you're sitting there saying, well, shit, that wasn't a, that wasn't the scenario that we thought we had. And we made a move that did not need to be made. Let's fast forward to where we're at right now. And talk about Yom. his injury. Now, Doc, after the game, he said he was concerned about the health of Janice Adetakumbo, who played 32 minutes on the second out of a back-to-back after getting

a triple double and a loss to Washington on Tuesday. Honestly, and I'm not kidding. There were times in the middle of the third quarter. I wanted to take him out of the game. I thought he was running on fumes. As a coach, you have to make a judgment call sometimes. Medical makes the call. They kept saying he's okay. But I have eyes. I just didn't like the way he was moving. He kept asking to go back in, but I wish I would have just said no, honestly. This is where we're at, Roger. What do you do with Janus? We're 12 days out.

Well, more for the Milwaukee Bucks because they're not in the plan. So 12 days out to the regular season, you're going to have a week to charge, recharge, and get your stuff together. Right now, they are, the Milwaukee Bucks are a game and a half up on the Cavs in the Eastern Conference. Do you sit, Yonis Adidicumbo at this point? What do you do? Yeah, I said him.

It's a no-brainer for me. Does it matter how it affects your time in the standies? This is a matter. For me, no, because you're not going anywhere. You're not going anywhere with an unhealthy Janus. So you're just not. So getting him to whatever level he can get to of health before the playoffs should start would be my focus.

For our season and for the player and for the investment in the player. Like I'm not, for any number of reasons, the answer is to get him rest. and get him healthy if he's injured. Now, if you just think he's running on fumes because you're at game 75 or 76 or 77, that's different, right? Like, we got to come up with some creative, you know, ways to lighten the load down the stretch and practice and recovery and things like that all have to be dialed in a little better,

probably. But if there is an injury, the answer is yes, you shut him down. You make sure he's healthy going in the playoffs. I would agree. Let's see what happens, man. But it's not looking good in Milwaukee. Say a quick break. We're going to talk about ownership beef?

We got billionaires beefing? What? All the time. Why? When you got so much money, I just don't get it. But whatever. I guess that's how you get it. Band is putting the ball in your court for the rest of the NBA season.

Because right now, new customers get $200 in bonus bets with any winning $5 bet. That's $200 if your bet wins. Let's take a look at the games tonight. Hmm. 76ers heat. I don't know, man. I think I'm going to take the over. Kings Knicks. Big game for the Kings.

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I wanted to talk about Matt Ishbia Beef with Dan Gilbert. that has to do with Michigan, has to do with competing mortgage firms. Ishbia, who is the CEO of and chairman of the United Wholesole Mortgage, and Dan Gilbert, who is the CEO and chairman of Rocket Mortgage, both based out of Michigan. I was reading, and I want to get your take on this, I was reading Baxter Holmes' great piece on ESP,

P.N talking about their beef leading up to last night's cavaliers, Sun's game in which the Suns beat the brakes off of the calves. But starts off talking about Baxter's P starts off talking about the first meeting between Ishbia and the Sun's staff where he had a PowerPoint presentation. Then he tells the group, whoever was in the room about himself, talk about how how he runs a mortgage company in Michigan. We're the largest mortgage company in Michigan. We built it from 12 people to 7,000.

Then he says, again, reiterates that we are the number one mortgage company in America. The number two mortgage company in America is a sponsor here, alluding to Rocket Mortgage. And that won't be lasting long, to which everybody in the room started laughing, Roger. And then shortly thereafter, he says, kick rocks, rocket mortgage. Take your $400, or nearly $500,000 a year, check with you on the way out. We don't need your sponsorship.

It's not welcome here, right? And this beef has been simmering for years since they were both in Michigan. Raja, I thought about you, one, because, you know, it's your son's, it's son's ownership, right? Like it's just, you know, there's a little bit of competitiveness that I think you might love and relate to, right? But on the other hand, I had to ask because you could peel the curtain back. How prevalent is this type of competitiveness amongst teams? How petty is the competitiveness amongst teams and team front offices with other teams and team front offices in the NBA? Because I feel like this is an ongoing thing.

I love this competitiveness because you know why? Why? Because it's stupid. It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make no sense. But it makes all the sense of the world because that's how you have a league like this where guys play a kid sport for millions, right? Like this is just, it has to exist in this world. But when you saw the story, what did you think?

And how did it open the curtain to how the league works? Well, there are a lot of layers to that. First of all, I don't know Matt Ishbia. I only know him through his endeavors to like bring us back around us, meaning like the alumni back around the suns and kind of have us in the building more and the efforts that they've made for me, quite frankly, over and over again to get me out to Phoenix. Which haven't worked, by the way.

They haven't worked for one reason or another, but not because I didn't want to be there. So he seems like a really good dude. By all accounts from the people I do know that know him personally, a really good guy. I know Dan Gilbert and Nate and Jeff, that ownership group in Cleveland. they were great to me when I was there, like awesome people. I would start by saying that they all, to be in the position that they're in, owners, that is, have to be hyper-competitive people. They have achieved things in their respective fields that you don't get to achieve unless you are a hyper-competitive person. So let's start with that.

some of them keep that hyper competitiveness away from their team. And that's not something that they necessarily wear on their sleeve every day as it relates to like other owners in the league. Like I never felt that when I was on a team. Like yeah, we fucking jazz. We don't we don't fucking like the nuggets. Like I never felt that like that wasn't something like the Miller family really operated in that. They didn't operate in that space. Cubes.

Well, I didn't feel that from Cube. to like a certain ownership group necessarily, but I could feel that from Q's because he was around the building. They had just lost to Sacramento when I got there. Everything that was up in our practice gym was like beating Sacramento. And Cubes is in there like working out on the treadmill, like getting in his good sweat when you're down there shooting and stuff. So you'd have conversations.

You know he wants to beat Sacramento. But it was never like a, it was never an owner to owner like, beef that I ever felt, but make no mistakes. Like I'll take it back to a charity golf event. I attended with the Cavs. Like this was a, we were at, uh, this really nice course just outside of Ohio. They played like tour events there. Um, and I went up to playing it.

And I was, I was playing a lot at the time. So, you know, this was like a par three closest to the pin, probably 20012 yards uphill. I striped the four iron like, it was a laser. That thing was like to like a foot. Oh, it was pure. And you, I rarely get that. You're Roger Woods in the motherfucker, huh? I'm not that good of a golfer.

And I'll get to the point. Jeff, who was part of the ownership group, saw me hit it. And like off of, they had something in the Bahamas a few weeks later. It was the World Hero Challenge, Tiger Woods event. And he was like, yo, you want to come playing that? And this wasn't because he liked me. Although I was cool with them. This was because he's hyper competitive.

And he was like, yo, he hits the shit out of the golf ball. I can add to my team. And I got a really cool trip out of it. I promptly went down there and played like shit. But they look at you side on in Atlanta. Like shit, though? Oh, I felt terrible. Oh, my God, I just let everybody down.

Because you were like, because you went there because he was like, fuck yeah, I'm going to the fucking Bahamas. Yeah. What? Say less. Yeah, dog. Say less. Sweet at Atlantis.

We're over at Bahamara, catied out on the range with pros. like, and I'm okay on the range. Like, I'm like, okay, I might. I might be all right. We got up on a tee with Jimmy Walker was the pro we played with. Yeah. Well, I trashed up. Just terrible.

Did they look at your side eye, bro? Because I would have looked at your ass side eye. Jeff played it very cool, but I could see the disappointment. It was oozing from his pores. And I only tell that story to say that you know those dudes are competitive as hell. Yeah. And they're competing at almost everything they're doing. Like they just, it's a hard, it's a hard switch to turn off.

Some of them do it better than others as it relates to like being around the team and projecting their competition amongst owners on the team. Well, it's just, it's interesting because it's a certain type of owner, right, that like the Matt Ispia class, right? Like the ones that, because you look back at Matt Ispia's history, he was a basketball fan, right? Like he got it, he had not even just a basketball fan. He's one of those guys he could have taken a job at Cleveland State on the basketball staff.

I've decided to join his father's mortgage company instead, right? Like, he's one of these guys. I think if you listen to his pot on Simmons, I think from like last year, he talks about like, this is his true passion. Everything that he has done is to get to this point and play basketball, right, or to be around the game. Similar to Mark Cuban. Mark Cuban was like, I fucking love basketball.

Like, I just got a bag from Yahoo. Let's fucking, just buy a fucking team. Let's do it. Let's go. Yeah. Right. Why the voice, though? Why the voice?

I'm trying to do a serious podcast here, Roger Bell. Anyways, these types of owners, right, are deep pocketed dudes with hell of bread that just want to win and do it by all accounts, right? When you get into the bag of that competitive drive and those types of ownership's,

like how different is that from the establishment, right? Like normal, like, if you think about, now I'm not going to say like the Boston substance because like their ownership group is also front row all the time. They might not be as seen as much as like you would think, but they are just as locked in. But I'm talking about the faces of like the fan billionaire owner. What is the differences between that and the establishment?

And how does that affect how a player like goes out? Because I know Matt Ishbia ain't making it a secret and behind closed doors, Doug A, okay, D, we want to kick their ass. It's kick their fucking ass. I know, you know, Cube was probably like, yeah, Raja, fuck Sacramento. We're going to Arco this week. Let's fucking kick their ass, right? Like, I'm sure it's like that, right? If you as an owner are living your raps to steal the Loganism, if you're living those raps,

meaning you're hyper competitive, you want us to win, the message is winning and all, of that. And you're also doing whatever you can to help us achieve that, whether that be, you know, the meal situations, the practice facility, the, you know, upgrades to the locker room or the recovery areas. And this is probably not a now situation because everyone's got all the bells and whistles now. But when I played, not everyone did. I was bordering like some teams getting on that. Like I always referenced Q's because Cube was the first one to like trick out a locker and be like, yo, we want you here in the building. So yeah, I put a PlayStation in the locker room,

not because they're spoiled babies that need a PlayStation in their locker room, but because if they don't have to go home to play PlayStation, they'll stay around here longer. And if they're around here longer, guess what they're going to wind up doing? Get in some more work in. And if they're in the building more and they're getting more work,

whether that's like work with a trainer or work in the weight room or work on their own game, that's only making him better, which is making us better. So if you're living those wraps as an owner, I think players really respect and feed off of that. I love to see owners there involve Mark Cuban and company and owners sitting front world, like really invested in the game and pulling for their team like that. It didn't bother me to have an owner that wasn't present and you never saw, but you didn't feel attached to the team in any real way.

like that's like a business transaction. You know, it's a transactional relationship versus like if you're around those owners and whatnot, like we know they're not their family, but it gives a more family vibe. Like we're all in this together type of feel. And I think players may play harder and care more at that point. I think the best ownership groups or the best teams, excuse me, usually have a family-like environment with their team in general, right? From the owners on down, like, I know what Golden State, you always see Lake of everywhere, right?

Or you also, his presence is always looming. Whenever they go to Utah, I remember there was a time when, during the 1920 season where it was just a random trip to Salt Lake. And this is a storytime because of that time of year. Yeah. So I remember this is one of my first times like going to Salt Lake on a work trip. and I kept hearing about this place called Valtors, right? I kept hearing about it. I was like, oh, man, let's go to Valtors, right?

And I went to Vultors that night, and it happened to be the same night, and I hate doing this. I really hate it. I actually, like, I hate when these scenarios happen. But I came to walk in, and the whole team had gotten the first, like, if you look at Vultors, there's, like, there's the entrance way, and you go to your right, and there's like a, an area where it's usually the restaurant, but they can cut it off for, like, private events. I look to my right, there's a private event,

and it is cut off, and it's the Warriors having a team dinner. And I'm like, I'm having two reactions. I'm like, fuck, man, I don't want to be here. And second thought is, oh, I'm going to eat this food. So I'm going to, well, I eat this food, it's a good-ass food. And then, but I see Joe Lacob is in the middle of the mix. He's in the middle, just like, chilling chop.

it up. And mind you, this is Salt Lake in the middle of a bad year. Like, why would an owner come through when, why would he come to Salt Lake on like a one, a game in and out? But he was there with the rest of the team, talking stuff, talking shop, how's your family doing? What's going on here? How you doing? What's that? So, and then I see that when I, like, Dallas came through the Bay in Sacramento the last week. Cuban was there the whole time. It felt like it was just, this was like, you know, you see Darrell Armstrong with, I don't know if you know this,

but Darrell Armstrong wears like the LL Cool J, one leg up on the sweats every time, no matter what. Okay. Like, they have hell,

yeah, it was just, that was an observation that I had, but like, and it was hilarious. And also respect, because you go keep that energy. But I saw,

right? Like, he knows he has the leg up. We ain't going nowhere. He ain't going nowhere. No way here. You know what I'm saying? We're going to read right here.

No matter how cold it is, this ankle goes show. But you see that like the family like atmosphere when the Dallas has come to town. When the New Orleans Pelicans come to town with Griff, you see the family like atmosphere. When the Celtics come to town, you see that. But the common denominator, the Miami Heat come to town. You see the Miami Heat culture. Those are the, like, people say that there's like, oh, if you meddle too much, that could be bad. No, that could be good for your franchise. That could be really good if the owner has the right intentions and it provides a family-like atmosphere because when you talk about Dallas and having the Playstations, I think about the European culture where they eat together. They play video games together. They become a family by doing that, right? That's literally how European basketball works. And when you bring that to the NBA and you bring that feeling,

you want to win for your guys. You want to win for them. You want to win for even, you know, the ownership group because they're in the church as with you when you see Mark Cuban out here getting the sweat in, you know, doing the stair climber for 45 minutes, right? You're all in this together. And, you know, you had that in Phoenix, right? I mean, if an ownership group is able to straddle the line between being present and

invested, therefore letting everyone know that they're in it with them on a daily basis, even though they've got probably other moneymakers and businesses that drive this one, they're going to be here, boots on the ground in an effort to win this championship that ultimately they get to hold up and say we won a championship. If they can straddle the line between that, but also not being a micro-manager of the team, because if you're around, then I think the next logical step for that is, well, I'm here, and you see this a lot with guys who have been super successful at other things, they think that just automatically translate to their sport, translates to their sport.

That's not always the case. So now you're around the team. And because you can reach out and touch it and tweak it because you see it every day, your inclination because you've been so successful at everything else is to do that. And that can become meddlesome and can can really, you know, be some people and some teams unraveling. I don't have it. I think it's all personality driven between that owner, the, you know, his president or his GM or whatever the hierarchy structure is in your organization,

however they've handled that, the relationship that they have, like the back and forth, they're lines that can get crossed with anyone that if you don't understand that line and you cross it, you've done irreparable damage. So I think knowing, you know, being around your people and knowing them is critical too. But the best ones have that good balance of I'm around. I know everybody. They know me. I'm accessible. They know how I invested I am in this. yet. I trust the people that I put in place to kind of do their job, and I'm an observer when this thing starts rolling. I don't want to drive the bus necessarily on game day. I'm on the bus. Do you know what I mean? Because I trust that the bus driver is going to do his job. And I think

those are the ones that get it right the most. Well, I always wanted to know this part, though, Raja. Like, there's always still a balance of, there's always a balance of, yeah, we're cool. I'm in the ownership field or I'm in the front office, but like, I still can cut you, right? Like I still can, you know, still trade you. I'm beginning to think, though, like now people are starting to realize more that it's a business, not to say that they never did before. But like I feel like the front office people now have to do a better job of saying, hey, you're such and such team for life.

But this is the end of your tenure here for now. But you'll always be welcome back, not necessarily as a player, but just as a person that built this organization. I feel like owners are doing a better job of that right now. Let me speak from experience with Ishbio. Their ownership group and the people that he has within the building have clearly made it a priority to get some of us former sons involved with the current sons, the current ownership group,

the fan base in a way that the old leadership had no interest in. Or if they did, I didn't know about it. It didn't trickle down to my level of player, if that makes sense. that, you know, Steve was always going to be a fan favorite and will always be welcome back in Phoenix. And they'll roll him out, you know, for things like that. Same with the Marian tricks. But my level of player was never really contact, not really, was never point blank period contacted in any way, shape, or form to kind of come back and celebrate with someone on their night or something like that. Ishby and his group, Ciala, shout out Ciala out there in Phoenix.

They do a great job with that. It's clearly a priority for them. And you can feel that. Now, I'm not walking around those halls every day. I'm not in that building. So I don't know if that permeates through the building and that's a feel and a culture that they've created. But for someone like me, you know, to the point that you just made, yeah, it's pretty cool. Like, it's pretty cool to be reminded that, you know, for a brief moment in time, you were part of something cool that people appreciated.

I don't have a lot of connection to the NBA. Like, I don't live that life anymore. People, you know, people often say to me like, damn, dude, like, you played in the NBA. for 12, 13 years. Like, you don't, like, but I don't really have a connection. I don't roll like that anymore. So to get pulled back into it to remind me sometimes or even to show my kids like, yeah, look, dad, they want dad to come back out.

That's a cool thing. It means something to me. In generations past, like, I don't really know how they did it, Logan, honestly. Like, I was playing. It wasn't, it wasn't my time to be brought back. I wasn't paying attention. I had my own shit. I was wrapped up in my own little bullshit world.

So I wasn't really paying attention to how many times. we were bringing grades back and stuff like that or, you know, former players. So I don't know that they do it any better, but I know Ishbia is making an effort to do it better than the last ownership group did. That's what said, man. I think we're almost running at a time. So we'll talk about, you know, the playing tournament next week. Well, real quick, little housekeeping. It's going to be Howard and Rajabelle next week. I'm going to go on a very rare in-season vacation. Can't wait. Yeah, can't wait. So just all that. but they'll talk about the plan at some point.

Anyways, let's get to a little segment we like to call Real One of the Week, where we just point out a person, entity, an organization that won the week. Me and Roger are currently looking at our real ones of the weeks and trying to figure out who was who. You know what? You know what I'm going to do?

I'm going to go with the NFL. I'm going to go. I'm probably going to take Rogers and I don't care. I'm going to go with Stefan Diggs. Oh, you know, live your Worth King. Show your Worth King. go over there in Houston and show them what it is with C.J. Stroud.

If they said they was hating on you, I'm riding with you. You was rocking. Let's get it. Congratulations on the move. They really, they really putting dirt on Stefan Diggs's name right now. And he's one of the best receivers out. And I'm just, I'm about to just go full of on. Let's go. Let's get it.

C.J. Stroud and Texas are going all in, too, by the way. Yeah, they're going to be scary, dog. At least on paper, that's that they got something cooking, man. Yo, yo, they said, hey, we know Mahomes is in this conference. Bring it. Let's go. We got CJ Stroud.

I'm like, okay, all right, let's get it. Yeah, they got something cooking. Let's see. I like that real one of the week. Shout out. I'm going to give one to the NC State men's basketball program. Oh, let's get it. I mean, they were sitting there going into the conference ACC tournament in a basically a playoff situation,

a play in situation, ran the table in that bad way and needed to even get into the NCAA tournament and have just been incredible throughout the tournament and find themselves in the final four. One of my friends, Danny Cannell's nephew,

Ben Middlebrooks, who I've known since he was in high school, he went to Westminster Academy down here in Fort Lauderdale, is on the team. He's a junior forward. There are other big DJ Burns, big happy fella

Zbo-ish has been an incredible darling of the NCAA tournament and I just think it's a really cool story I texted my boy Danny the other day and just told him how much my family and I are enjoying watching his family on this ride and seeing Ben

live this dream and so I just want to give a shout out to them man I know they've been everybody's darling so this ain't nothing new but shout out to coach was dead coach was fired coach was fired Logan going into this playing scenario And no one gave them any chance to even, you know, make it out of the ACC tournament.

So like pulling everybody. So let's tie this all the way back to the first segment when you ask me about the Milwaukee Bucks. Can it be done? Yeah, it can be done. You watch an NC State do it right now. From worse, pull from worst positions at the start. So it can be done. And NC State is doing it right now.

So shout out. Real one. Let's get it. Roger, who you got in the women's tournament? Who got a woman's final four to win at all? That's a tough one. You know, I'd like to see, I mean, I pull for Caitlin Clark. She's a fun watch, like a really fun watch.

I was sitting there watching the whole game the other night. Shout out to Angel Reese. I'd like to see, I'd like to see Paige Beckers and Gino R.M. I get another one. Did you see it, bro? The way they beat USC, bro. And the way that they, I don't know, man. This is probably, if Gino wins is probably his best act yet, honestly.

right because nobody thought that he was even going to make it to the final four so are you going to you're picking ukine you're going to just say fuck it pick you con yeah i like which is crazy because they're there they're men i you know what i would here's what i'd say i'd like to see them get it south carolina i think's gonna win the championship yep okay that was my pick too that was my pick too don staley philadelphia let's get it i just say they're so above and beyond the best team in the field bro like they're gonna win they're good and i sold us to sue they're gonna be the new yukon how about that hey sue yeah so Sue, the rain is over. It's time for South Carolina. Last for me. Don't let him do that, Sue. Yeah, they're tough. Dawn's a boss. She's a G.

It would be dope, though, because I got Yukon's men winning it. It'd be pretty cool if Yukon swept it, but I think it's going to be South Carolina, Yukon. So you got Yukon men and South Carolina women? Yeah. I'm going to be honest with you.

I've only watched like a half of the men's tournament. I only watched, but it was Yukon. It was Yukon versus San Diego State. And Yukon did the thing. So, you can. But yeah, I think we're on the line in here, which I don't like very much, but we're here. Now, the big fellow from Purdue, the big fellow from Purdue, man, like, he's a problem. It's going to be interesting.

Yeah, I'll take your word for it. So, yeah, I'll see you guys. I'll see you guys at a few. Have fun with Howard and Roger next week. Talk soon. All the shits. Bye. Must be 21 plus and present in select states.

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