The Ringer NBA Show - The Lakers Make In-Season Tourney History. Plus, Some Historic Losers. | Group Chat

Episode Date: December 10, 2023

Justin and Rob join to discuss the Lakers’ inaugural in-season tournament championship, highlight Anthony Davis’s dominant performance, and explore whether now is the right time for the Pacers to make a big trade (3:00). Later, they talk about the Spurs' and Pistons' historic losing streaks this season and explore what concerns them the most about both teams (50:08). Hosts: Justin Verrier and Rob Mahoney Producer: Jack Sanders Additional Production Supervision: Ben Cruz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What would you do if everyone said they heard your trailer a hundred times? You'd probably make a new one. I'm Justin Sales, the host of The Wedding Scammer, the ringer's first ever true crime pod. We've been hunting a con man for a few weeks now, and our hunt is coming to an end. Schemes, Heartbreak, How to Put On a Wire. We've covered all this and more, but there are still a few surprises left. Binge the Wedding Scammer wherever you get your podcasts. Justin Barrier and joining me live from the sphere projecting me up 90,000 feet in the air like

Mothra. It is Rob Mahoney. What's up, Rob? Look, you're more handsome than ever at this size and this scale, Justin, but I have to say, I can see every one of your pores. So we're going to need to talk skincare at some point. I actually do need a regimen. I've been told that. Yeah? Yeah. I'm just like pure soap to the face, nothing fancy. Uh, I actually went and got a facial with one of recent girlfriends, and they were like, yeah, you need to do some stuff. You need to work on yourself a little bit. But I think maybe we should embark on this together. Me, you, we can get Waz in on it, like a daily sunscreen. You know, just something very basic to ease us into this world. So we're now accepting sponsorships, I guess, for this new segment in which

we do skincare together. See, I can tell that you know at least more than I do because you reference the sunscreen there. You know what you're supposed to do. Does that make it worse that I'm not doing it either? You know, I know better. But the important thing is I think we can ease ourselves in collectively. It's just like, you know, having a workout buddy. Like the accountability of having someone show up with you is what's important. I don't do workout buddies either, but I also don't do workouts these days.

Do you do buddies? No, I don't do a lot of those either. Except for you, buddy. I'm always here for you, Justin. Thank you. But unfortunately, our friend Waz is not here for us today. I think Vegas got him. I don't know what got him, whether it was the tables or was COVID. It sounds like the latter. But we wish him well. It seems like he caught something going around. So we will be soldiering on. This is now an intimate conversation between Rob and I, no longer a group chat, just a just a one-on-one, two buddies talking hoops.

Yeah. I don't know how to feel about taking the group out of group chat. It's really a pretty important part of our dynamic. I think, you know, we can soldier on. If Austin Reeves can soldier on through illness to play in the NBA Cup championship and, frankly, dominate, I think we can do it too. It's true. So later in the podcast, we're going to get to some historic losers. But first, we need to talk about the historic winner that we witness on Saturday. Lakers are your in-season tournament champions. Let's start here, Rob.

did Anthony Davis put in the best performance in in-season tournament history on Saturday? Who could argue it? I guess Tyrese Halliburton would be in the mix if we actually wanted to interrogate that question, but no, what a night for AD. Well, even if we lump Halliburton's performances in previous tournament games into this,

I don't think we've seen anybody in any tournament game play as dominant in so many different ways. be as dominant in so many different ways as Anthony Davis was in this one, like the defense, the rebounding, the scoring individually were also great. Really incredible stuff from him. I have a hard time remembering a game in which he was holistically more dominant than that. I actually know the answer to that because when I saw your tweet, I started thinking through some of the performances and the one that jumped out to me

was the 59 points, 20 rebounds against the Detroit Pistons that I, my friend, had to jump on from my couch because I was not in Detroit. I was covering the Pelicans at that time. But AD goes off. I had to write the story, reaction story about it. I did find that story. And I have to say,

I covered my eyes before I read it. But I have to say, your boy turned one in. He had some deadline magic going. Yeah, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. But no, to that point,

I went to go see the game score, basketball references game score from the performance from AD last night, 41, 25, and 4. and unfortunately this game does not exist according to history because the in-season tournament finale doesn't even exist on basketball reference. So I can't tell you what the game score was, but 80's best performance according to game score was that 59 points, 20 rebounds, four assists one block in a regular season game against Detroit, February 21st, 20, I think 2016,

I believe. But I think that is a good comparison point because, this was just a regular season game against the Pistons, in which, if I remember correctly, they had to really, like, try. They AD needed all 59 in those points to beat a pretty lowly Pistons team. This was obviously on a much bigger scale. A much bigger scale, a much bigger stage. And I think that's what we're talking about in itself,

is this was, for all intents and purposes, kind of a playoff game or a playoff light game. Certainly a level of scheming, of attention, of scouting that's different from your, like average regular season matchup. And the fact that AD brought that kind of intensity and this kind of overall impact to a game that mattered,

certainly that registers more than whatever his game score was against the Pistons in February of 2016, Justin. I'm sorry. As they were cycling through like Norris Cole and Luke Babit and Omer Oshick as his primary teammates, yeah, it was a dark time. Obviously having LeBron James and even like a DeAngelo Russell is a little bit of a different circumstance.

but I would say that Anthony Davis had the look in this one. And now there were at times where the look lean more like something from Talk to Me, the horror film. I don't know if you've seen that one. I highly recommend it. He was channeling a dark spirit is what you're saying. He was in Congress with the Beast. Exactly.

Like you're used to the guttural screams from AD after he makes a big dunk or a big play, a big block. But there was one time where he was glowering at somebody as if they had just punched his mother and he was ready to just rip their absolute head off. And like, I don't know if I've ever seen that from most basketball players, let alone AD, but like, this is what you get from Davis when he's aggressive, when he's locked in. And to that point, I thought the, like, there's obviously a lot of stats from this game. They're going to jump off the page. I think the biggest one is that Miles Turner followed out in this game relatively early because AD was just attacking, attacking,

attacking, attacking, and got him out of the game as a result of that. Yeah. And how many fouls that AD draw in this game just by hitting the glass. He ruined the pacers in terms of rebounding so badly that they had to start grabbing and pushing and doing whatever they could just to keep him from getting offensive rebounds in particular. And that resulted

on a ton of free throws for AD and a ton of free throws for the Lakers because they got into the bonus so early as a result of that. So I really loved that AD he worked his ass off in this game, but he didn't work against the grain of what he does. He didn't try to be somebody he's not. And I think

that's very tempting for Biggs in this kind of matchup. You look at the Pacers, a team that can give up so many points in the paint on the right night. They can be very vulnerable on the glass on the right night. And as a big, you may think that, oh, this is my opportunity to bully them inside with like strict kind of post play. And he did some of that, especially against like smaller players and mismatches and things like that. But even from the beginning of this game, you could see the Lakers just rode the same

pick and roll with him and Delo, basically for the better. part of a quarter because it was working. And there was no need to overcom, like, overcomplicate it because AD was the biggest guy on the floor. And he beasted everybody who was smaller than him inside. He beat the Pacers down the floor in transition. He controlled the glasses we've been saying. And he absolutely wrecked pretty much every Pacer shot attempt that came within eight feet of the basket.

Yeah. How many times have we seen teams go into a matchup and say they're just going to pound it in down low against the Pacers? Then ultimately get lulled into a shootout just because the Pacers put so much strength. on the other team's offense to keep up with them. And the Lakers at a certain point, I think it took them until late in the third quarter to make a three-pointer, but they weren't even taking many to begin with.

I tweeted out during the game, there was a point where it seemed like running, and hopefully you could follow this, Rob, because it's a college football analysis, or metaphor, but it was like a run-and-shoot team from the PAC-12 going up against an SEC team. What's the PAC-12? What's the PAC 12? Does that exist anymore?

I won't in a year or so. It's now the PAC 2, but that's a whole other thing. But against like an SEC team where the safeties from the SEC team are as big as a defensive lineman from the PAC 12 team. It's just there was such a physical advantage. And the Lakers took advantage of that. And I think what's interesting about that is I was flashing back to the story that I wrote from a couple years ago.

Nowvin Gentry had this quote that I think is really salient. he says that AD is not a real grinded out, bump in the low post kind of guy. But he can catch it in the post and square up, face a guy up, and you can get good results from that. That does not totally sound like the Anthony Davis that we have today. I think like we've talked about this in the past, the development of Davis's game from more wing type of player to what he is now, which is just a big athletic physical force. I thought this was kind of a complete performance of this new version of AD to the point where he's like, he's not taking threes anymore.

But my whole thrust of this story that I wrote a couple years ago is that AD had everything going, then he had the threes. He was just now starting to take them. It seemed like the dawn of a new era. He's reverted from that, but he's found a really excellent version of probably a less ambitious version of what he could have become. less ambitious but maybe more consistent in some ways given who he's been as a shooter and who like who he is as a player and I think that's okay. It's okay to be a little bit more of a bully

in a league where there's not a lot of bullies around if you really take stock of things and if you want to look at some of the teams that the Lakers have had the most success against over the years, say the Warriors in the playoffs last year, like AD's size and length and physicality were the reason that the Lakers were so good in that series. And absolutely controlled it. And it was the reason why they absolutely controlled this game against the Pacers. Because Indiana, they're bigs,

they have good bigs, they have good players. They're just not ready for a matchup like this. They're not ready for that kind of intensity, not only from AD, but from a fully engaged LeBron on both sides of the ball every minute he's on the floor. That's the kind of thing they haven't really encountered yet.

And it's the kind of challenge that's very exciting to see a team like Indiana go up against. But this is a reminder of what the Lakers do and can do and presumably will do when they get to the playoffs. They have this kind of performance in them. And for my money, we talked about the AD part of it. On a team level, I thought this was as impressive a defensive game

as I've seen from any team this season. Like the Pacers are a juggernaut offensively. And the Lakers pressured Tyrese Halliburton, got them out of their stuff, forced good Pacers role players into really uncomfortable positions and rushed them and challenged everything from the three-point line in to the point where some of those possessions, that Indiana was running off, especially later in the game and in the fourth quarter, they're just like spinning their wheels trying to get a shot up.

And this is a team that gets the ball across half court within two or three seconds. Yeah, so the Pacers have what is right now the best offense in NBA history. The Lakers managed to hold them to 109 points. And there was a real, like, chop off the head of the snake and everything else will just fall as a result of this. There was one point, they were blitzing Halliburton pretty much the entire game. But there was one point where Vando was guarding Halliburton. and 80 came with the Blitz to help.

And, like, you would think that Hal Burton had just, like, fallen into, like, a cave or something like that. He just could not see any sort of light. There was just so much size and length around him. And this is, like, the recipe that the Lakers not only have built in their most successful errors, I guess, or at least, like, little runs over the past couple years, but, like, this is how they will win if they will win this year. And so it was good to see that play out on, I didn't even know what to call this,

tournament stage, I guess, playoff a Jace sort of stage. This is exactly what LeBron was probably looking for when he was saying to get a test drive of some of these younger guys, some of the rest of his teammates who haven't been into high stakes, high leverage playoff games. You got to see what this team could do

when everything was clicking right. Yeah, and it's one thing for the guys we know can do that and who we've seen do it before, Anthony Davis among them, but to see Cam Reddish be big in this game, right? To see some of the newer Lakers who are, you know, even just like Max Christie coming in and giving decent minutes, reliable minutes where he's not making mistakes. He didn't light the world on fire, but he was solid for the minutes the Lakers needed him to be

solid. And then you had Austin Reeves who, again, it's worth saying again, especially since Waz isn't here to sing his praises, but I mean, he was cooking every pacer who tried to guard him. And in particular, Ben Matherin, it's the hymseason tournament, baby. It really is. I felt for Ben Matherin in that matchup because he was out of sorts, outwitted. He honestly looked like if you had put a blindfold on Ben Matherin and spun him around three or four times

and then taken off the blindfold and asked him to guard Austin Reeves off the dribble, he was just like falling all over himself trying to keep up with like the start and stop of Austin Reeves' off the dribble game. And it's tough under the best circumstances, but I don't think Ben Matherin was ready for all that. You know, I joked about it in a previous podcast

that Reeves just needed the spotlight of tournament play in order to galvanize him. I kind of wonder if it's true because this guy does look a little different. Now, the whistle was very quick in this game. Yes. Like, it was boring.

I would say too quick across the board. Like, I think it tilted in various directions at various times. The Pacers, I thought, got a lot of calls too. I would have preferred if they called this a little more like a playoff game, to be honest with you. Yeah.

And so Reeves being in, able to draw files, as I've said in the past, I think brings out a different side of him. There was one point where T.J. McConnell basically straight-jacketed him and he couldn't get away from him. But yeah, in that first half, Flew Game Reeves looked incredible. But ultimately, I think the MVP went to LeBron James and probably rightly so. Although, I'm curious what you think. So this was an MVP based on the entire tournament, correct? Or just the stage in Las Vegas? I think my interpretation, based on what I have seen, is that it's just the elimination rounds.

So that would include the quarterfinals before you get to Las Vegas, but not include group play. Okay. And so do you think LeBron justly won this award? Yeah. He's been amazing. What's the argument against Halliburton or Davis?

Or what are you thinking? I think the argument would be for Davis because of his finals performance. That for this one game, if this was the finals, and typically we give finals MVP for the finals, that it should have gone to Davis. But I mean, at this point,

that's just semantics. And it breaks down to like, what are we actually awarding? Yeah. I mean, Davis was unimpeachable in this game. So I'd certainly have no problem with him winning whatever it is that's available to win. But there's also a certain historical moment in the first ever NBA Cup going to

one of the NBA's most historic framework. franchises and the first ever MVP of that cup going to, even as Adam Silver called out in the trophy ceremony, I'm sorry, LeBron, we can't give you a franchise, but here's this other trophy for you. That was good. I appreciated that. I also appreciated the Indianapolis star writer who gave a vote to Tyrese Halliburton. Got to grease those skids, my friend. That's beat writer action happening in real time there. But yeah, I know. LeBron was incredible here. You could definitely tell that just his desire to win this probably got everybody else on board here.

It's always kind of a fool's error and trying to read into LeBron's motivations for things. I think people typically just default to some Machiavellian like pulling the strings sort of thing. But I think you could see various things at play here. Clearly he wanted to get his young teammates some money. Clearly he wanted to get his young teammates some playoff action to see probably whether or not they should.

or could stick with him throughout the rest of this season. But also, it seems like LeBron was very much aware that this tournament's success probably lived and died based on how he would perform. And he lived up to that moment. I think this is when, to your point about him not getting a franchise, I think this is LeBron as an NBA partner doing his bid and recognizing that the money for this one tournament performance isn't actually what matters. it's actually the bigger picture of selling this for a billion dollars

and getting the BRI, half of the BRI of it long term. Yeah, this was an ambassadorial role. And to be fair, I think Tyreys Halliburton played a pretty solid ambassadorial role in this too in terms of making the tournament something like competitive, something worth fighting for, something he wanted to win and that the Pacers wanted to win. That's why it was so thrilling to watch these two teams here at the end of the day, two teams that took the tournament really, really seriously.

And even just seeing them celebrate the trophy, I actually really liked the little medal ceremony. I thought it was something unique that's kind of like bridging the difference between the NBA and the Olympics or the NBA and the FBA World Cup gave us a different kind of celebration. And then, yeah, like pop a few bottles of champagne,

celebrate this moment for what it is. Because it is historic. It is, you are the winners, the first winners of something that hopefully will go on to have a long NBA legacy. I think that's something that's pretty cool. think LeBron recognized that from the beginning that, yeah, he could stick his nose up at it and probably other stars would follow suit if he did, or he could imbue it with some kind of importance and maybe

some other stars would follow him in that too. Yeah. I wonder how he feels about Otani making $700 million on the same day that he was probably earning the NBA a billion dollars. Like, whatever LeBron makes, he's probably worth $10 million more, not only to his franchise, but the NBA. I mean, LeBron's doing fine. I'm not worried about LeBron's bottom line. He's got that space jam money. Oh, my gosh. Look, somebody paid him too much for Space Jam too.

But the NBA players, too, like especially stars, if we're all being honest here, their NBA contract is not their primary contract. Like, LeBron's contract is with Nike. That is his, that's where he gets his money. And he plays for the Lakers. So he's going to be all right. But an extra 500K in the pocket? Certainly doesn't hurt anything.

I saw that the two-way players even get a portion of the winnings. They don't get the full 500, but they get half. So the Lakers two-way players, none of which actually played in any of the in-season tournament games, I believe, earned $250,000 just by being a two-way player on the right team. I think they should get the full 500. What did they do? Literally by definition, they are actual raw. players, they are somewhere in between a rostered player and a G-League player.

I think they're on the roster. It's a designated spot on the roster for two-way players. I think you should get the full 500, but... That's better than Waz's contract, man. He only does half of these podcasts and still gets his full salary. But is there anything else from this one on the Lakers side? My big question coming out of this is the long-term takeaway for both sides of the... both of these teams.

Do you think you learned anything about the Lakers or does this change your perspective on how good the Lakers can be this season? I think it just clarified that they've still got this in them. That even with the ups and downs of the regular season and guys in and out of the lineup with injury and look, their offense is going to be what it is on some nights. It's not always going to be that successful.

And certainly we see that in terms of a three-point shooting, as you mentioned. They can just go very, very cold from the perimeter in ways that make them super reliant on all that interior play. maybe too reliant on that interior play at times. But defensively, they can crank up like this and they can key in on your team and take away what you do best. And that's not just AD and LeBron.

It's the perimeter pressure. It's having the length of your Jared Vanderbilt and your Cam Redishes on guards, chasing them over screens, making it difficult. We've seen it now against Halliburton. We saw it against Steph Curry in the playoffs. We've seen all the ways that the Lakers can kind of twist the screws on what you do.

And I think that's what makes them such a compelling playoff pick and playoff prospect. And I'm sure for a lot of people are going to be another kind of Western Conference Finals candidate. Yeah, I think on the good side, obviously the recipe for a LeBron James team for this Lakers team is very much clear. Whenever LeBron is in high leverage games, he can manipulate a game in the way like he could 10 years ago and still come out on top of there.

And so you've got to be buoyed by that. And obviously, the defense can just be destructive if given the right opponent first and foremost, but probably against most teams. It's a little bit easier just given the size disadvantage that the Pacers were at that I mentioned earlier. It did feel like a different type of team, different class of team for that reason, where in the West, you're going against Godzilla's and Gamras to your Mothra every single time. Gomorras, I think, right? Isn't it? I have no idea. You're the one who watched Godzilla minus one. I mean, look, Godzilla minus one was sick, but no other creatures in that one.

Really, the only other creature in Godzilla minus one is the collective pain of trauma. So go out and see that right now. You're really selling it. But yeah, on the flip side of it, though, I keep flashing back to, man, if they just had an upgrade on DeAngelo Russell and had more of a bulletproof ball handler

with some scoring shoes who could manage the LeBron sitting minutes. They would be on a whole other class. Russell was okay in this one. This is a pretty good dealo game. Which he managed to sit Bruce Brown's ass down and talk shit to him, which I actually-

I appreciated it because until they had brought up that dealo was talking shit to Brown, I didn't even realize Bruce Brown was playing in that game. He just completely faded in that one. And after all the junk he talked over the offseason, you know, I thought it was fair to give him a little back, especially considering how how shitty he played in this game. Absolutely. But if there was just somebody else there,

I constantly say, like, Russell is either doing too much or too little at any point, and that's more a function of his role on the team. They just need someone in that position to give them a little bit of juice. Reeves did the lion's share of it in the first half, but, like,

that game could have gone a different way at various points, in part because the Lakers weren't hitting a goddamn three, as I mentioned. I think there were 0 for 10 to start. the game from three and like the Pacers are the exact team who could have taken advantage of that. Obviously there's a lot of other teams in the West who can. So there's still that one shred of doubt that I have that wasn't dissipated even though the performance in the Lakers was so good. Yeah, that's one another area where the Lakers defense is really successful. If you look at the

Pacers three point shooting, 10 to 41 from three, clearly that's a below standard performance for the Pacers. But they're 10 of 41 from three because they really eliminated a lot of the easiest looks that Tyrese Halliburton gets from three by the way they played the pick and roll by trapping and pressuring Halliburton so much he could never just come around a screen and fire as if you were in a drop. And so he goes two for eight. Buddy healed, I thought had some makeable shots, but also had some rushed ones. And then as you see that kind of cascading down the rest of the lineup, then it's like, okay, is Aaron Neesmith going to hit his shots? Is Miles Turner going to hit his shots. Is Bruce Brown, who as you mentioned, was invisible to kind of just not good for most of

this game? Is he going to hit his shots? And that's where I thought it was kind of interesting to watch the Pacers was they so clearly needed another guy who could create in space, who could make something happen after Halliburton gave the ball up. It really kind of illuminated where they are for better and worse right now. Yeah, I was going to ask on the flip side of the Lakers, like, do we think any different of them, do you think any differently of the Pacers, now that they've had this dramatic run, but ultimately fell a bit short of that elite tier, probably, of team? I don't really see them any differently, do you?

At the very least, I see Tyrese Halliburton a little differently. I think he was on this trajectory. Where do we have him on our top 100? I think he's like 11th. And we had kind of a debate about whether or not he or Deerrin 5. should be ahead of each other. That like that tier of second stars like maybe Booker and Shea are on another level right now. Those are like the MVP candidate sort of guys. Halliburton's just below that with the Jamal Murray's and the Foxes and lower than that

of the Donovan Mitchells. I think this run really solidified that he is a guy. Like for me like there is no doubt at this point that you just put things around him and he's going to be able to do the best of it. I mean, I was looking up, the Steve Nash comp has been thrown around a lot here. I was looking at Steve Nash's MVP years. And like, because of the free flowing nature of the seven seconds or less offense, there was going to be turnovers in the same way like the Steph Curry Warriors turned it over despite being absolutely brilliant and exhilarating offensively.

Nash was at like 3.5 and 3.8 turnover's game. Halliburton's like at least one, maybe more below that. The fact that he's able to play at this pace to do. do what he does to dominate the ball and yet not turn it over is remarkable. I can't think of anything like that. And especially when you think about the way pace has changed over time in the NBA, the seven seconds or less sons are not fast by the standards of today's league. So the pace is dramatically higher than those sons teams we're playing at and Halliburton is playing such a clean game. It's really remarkable what he's able to do. And even in a game like this one,

Again, he's seeing constant pressure. In a lot of ways, the way the Lakers were treating Tyrese Halliburton is the same way you're describing him. This is a guy. This is one of the premier players in the NBA, and we're going to give him the defensive respect he deserves as a result of that. And he had three turnovers in this game, but he had 11 assists playing out of pressure,

playing as you mentioned earlier, passing out of like Vando AD double teams, incredible length on him. And we saw his jump passes put to a pretty different purpose in this one. Sometimes it's just like, this is the only way I can get a pass out over this kind of like defensive pressure right now. But I thought his reeds were good. And honestly, I thought he did a lot to free himself up to attack when he could. You saw a lot of cases, you know, he's being picked up full court by Jared Vanderbilt by like, you know, bigger wings, bigger players.

And he would kind of rev up to sprint into the inbound pass so that he could take off past those guys and get the Pacers into their offense. You saw some times off ball where they were able to get him going like on. quick catches and attacks. And he was really one of the only pacers who was successful going to the basket because he has such great touch off the glass. He's so good at working those angles. Everyone else was stifled pretty badly

by Anthony Davis in particular. And that's one area where they just struggle. Like Turner catching in the middle of the floor and trying to make something happen wasn't very successful. Bruce Brown catching in the middle of the floor, trying to make something happen off the dribble, wasn't very successful. And Indiana is a team that runs a lot of different screeners

for Hallibur, for this reason. Like, they're trying to triangulate. What is the successful matchup here? Who is the screener we need to use to get us rolling and get something going? Like, where's the matchup we can exploit? And in this game, there was no matchup to exploit because Halliburton was stymied that much. Well, how much of that is a result of maybe not having the type of outlet that a player of his

caliber probably needs when you're drawing so much of that attention, which is probably the bigger picture takeaway from this one game, if not. just the first 20 or so games from the Pacers. I think it's interesting that in the midst of all this hype for Halliburton and the Pacers deservedly so, we get the Woj reports about the Pacers are being aggressive out there looking for an upgrade. And I should mention first and foremost, I believe I read that on The Ringer.com from Rob Mahoney a couple weeks ago.

You did. First and foremost. So the Pacers are being pretty transparent about the fact that they would like to upgrade. And now we should say first and foremost, that the fact that they recognize that Halliburton is already that guy is something. They probably saw that earlier. I think you were up there during preseason, right? Yeah.

And so clearly they know what they have on their hands, but the fact that they are openly acknowledging that they probably need a number two, someone to run with him, I think is already salient because one of the questions I have for you coming out of this is like, is it the right time to do that sort of move? because on the one hand, they had this miraculous run where they had a lot of good vibes and it seems like everyone is really clicking

alongside each other. There's a real college atmosphere with this team that I think that you have to be fond of if you're a Pacers fan. On the other hand, are there limits to that? Did we see that in the Lakers game? And if anything, did this loss

almost give them more credence to the fact that they should go out and swing a big move? Yeah, I think this game did a lot of things in terms of bringing that sort of clarity. For one, I'm fascinated by the Pacers as really our first test case of the NBA Cup, because this is a team that's on course for a playoff spot, and they got a preview of what playoff competition looks like, what, four months, four to five months in advance,

and now they get a chance to kind of teach to the test, so to speak, in terms of their preparation. They know what Tyrese is going to see in terms of coverage from some of these really aggressive teams. Not everyone can pull it off like the Lakers did, but teams are going to try. and so you have those kinds of answers ahead of time and you get to kind of reverse engineer them and figure out how do we solve that? How do we solve this sort of coverage? And then the other part is the question you're asking,

which is do we have enough to solve that sort of coverage? Do we have enough in terms of the supporting cast here? And for me, what this game told me was there are certain players who aren't going to be enough. Like OG and Anobie is a frequent Pacers trade target. I don't think an OG and a nobi type player is enough. You need someone who's going to be pretty dynamic offensively in this role. And obviously you want size.

We're talking forwards and wings primarily. You want size. You want someone who can run and keep up with this pace. And you want a two-way player who's going to be a good defender for you. But if it's just that and it's not someone who can play this exact sort of role we're talking about, like can you be the outlet guy when Halliburton, gets trapped and make something productive happen with the ball, I don't know how much you're really moving the needle. And so I'm looking at, you know, there's a bunch of names that kind of fit

that description. Some of them are upcoming free agents and some of them not. Pascal Seaccom is obviously going to be in those conversations all season long because of his state with the Raptors. And also, it just seems like he'd be a great fit with the Pacers for a variety of reasons. But do you trade for him or do you wait and try to play the free agent market for him? You know, you've got Paul George who's conspicuously and constantly making positive comments about Indianapolis on his podcast. I wouldn't say like the Brown Cleveland levels. Tyrese Halliborne is a frequent guest on that podcast.

So there's a lot in the air right now. And I think it's clear to everybody involved that this version of the Pacers is very good and competitive, but there's something missing. They're going to need to continue to develop. They're going to need to continue to add. The question is when? Do you do it during this season?

you wait? I find that question to be so fascinating because I do think if you look back on a lot of teams as handling with star players, when to hit the button on that next move, that big splashy trade often dictates the long-term success for that. We see it with the MAVs. They go out and get Christophez Perzingis. They were a little too earlier. Maybe they didn't get the exact right guy and all of a sudden the Mavs have been in disarray for a couple of years now at the point where they basically had to settle for Kyrie Irving just to make sense

of the last couple years of Luca. And maybe Chris Depps was the right guy and maybe he was good enough and he got hurt at the exact wrong time because they had some really successful stretches with him and then he got hurt and then everything went off the rails. Like it's such a delicate balance in terms of the timing with all this stuff.

Well, I don't know if you saw Chris Theops the clips circulating from the JJ Reddick podcast where he was basically open about the fact that, like, one, he shouldn't have asked for a trade from the Knicks. And then also he was kind of lamenting that things went wrong with Luca. And now I also found his quote about Luca not getting as much of the ire from like Rick Carlisle, our guy with the Pacers now in the huddle. And I thought that was illuminating about star power

and how certain guys get preferential treatment and even other guys who are, in air quote, stars do not. I thought that was really like it crystallized the, distinction there. But clearly, like, he looks back on that and laments that because that could have been the moment, but he wasn't mature enough in order to make that work. And so, that's interesting with Halliburton, too, because, yeah, I almost look at the OG Seacum decision. It's almost like the Jackie Marilyn corollary that we've talked about in the past where it's like, what flavor? Have we? Do you... I definitely mentioned it. I don't know if this.

one quite fits because I don't know if they're the same type and just it has to be really perfect. But I don't think this is that. But I do think that sort of decision, if they had their druthers, whether they wanted a catch and shoot guy who was just like bulletproof defensively or a guy who could do a little bit more with the ball in his hands like Seacom, but maybe isn't as a reliable three-point shooter as you want as a kickout option for Halliburne. It's interesting because Seacom's a guy who's been in this league for a very long time, has. won a title in this league. OG obviously was part of the title team, but wasn't in the rotation because he was injured

during the playoffs. And he's going to come to this team with star proclivities and expectations. And I do wonder how that melds with a young, fun, spunky young team like the Pacers, where I'm not saying it's like a bad, if anything, it's a really great chemistry, it seems like there. But you're trying to glom on something to something that fits and doing that mid-season. even seems very difficult. And so, yeah, this is a really interesting discussion

that Kevin Purchard and the Pacers have on their hands here. I'm sure they're talking through daily at this point. For sure. And there's also the issue, too, of if you make a trade for a big-time player now, you're going to have to give up good players in that deal. Probably on the younger end of the spectrum, you would think Jaris Walker, who's not in the rotation, Ben Matherin could be in those discussions as a key piece.

But also, you know, veteran guys who have salaries that you need to make that kind of deal work. So you're giving up good players if you make the trade, but you're also probably giving up good players if you wait. Because if you're relying on cap space, Buddy Heald is a free agent who's probably going to have to be let go in that instance. Obie Toppin is going to be restricted free agent. You might not quite be able to afford him, depending on where the money on a star level addition goes. And Bruce Brown has a massive team option. They're going to have to figure out what to do with. So there's going to be tradeoffs no matter where you look and where you start,

I'm kind of of the opinion that at this point in the process, unless there's a fit that is pretty much perfect, I wouldn't disrupt too much. I kind of want to see how the rest of these guys fill the space that's afforded to them. And the second you bring in someone, even someone like Siakum, who's a good team-oriented player who moves the ball, who can work in a system,

who could fit really well with this team, but say like Siakam's on your team and Ben Mathurin is still on your team, Matherin is now a little bit more stifled than he was before. You know, Toppins' development, if he's still on your team, is a little more stifled than it was before. So I kind of want to see this science experiment run its course a little bit more, even while acknowledging that they don't have enough. And I think that could be okay for this season. As long as they're competitive and they're fighting and they're in position for a playoff spot, like being a winning team at this stage in the process is enough. Yeah, it's so crazy, though, because like you mentioned, there are just a lot of ticking, not time.

time bomb to clocks because there are options. There are Miles Turner, I believe, only has one year after this one. Matherin's extension decision comes quicker than you'd expect. And so they're on a clock that's probably a lot better than like a Joel and B's size clock, a clock doing a Degeneration X crotch chop. But they certainly, like things come, it gets late early in the NBA. And I think this sort of situation really crystallizes that. just a free merch idea for the ringer.com,

but if we could get like a grandfather clock that has Joelle at the top of it and does the crotch shop on the hour, every hour, I would pay exorbitant amounts of money for it. So what do you think about Siakum, though? Like, if you were to look at the options on the table, we all know the names who are out there,

ostensibly Levine, DeRosen, etc., etc. Like, is Seacom the closest to what you would hope to fill that, that secondary slot in Nindi. Yeah, I think Siacom is the cleanest, easiest, most plausible fit of all the players you would talk about at this stage. But maybe another reason you wait is to see if there's a better fit that comes available, that it's one of the names that isn't on the market right now,

where a team shakes loose, a contender disappoints, and all of a sudden there's another forward who we could talk ourselves into. It's, again, very, very difficult at this stage in the process. That's why, like, I, unless the deal for Seacom is very favorable for the Pacers. And I think that's a possibility given his upcoming free agency, maybe less of a possibility given that it's the Toronto Raptors. And I don't know that we've seen a franchise be like stingier in terms of trading their own players, even with their free agency staring them down and demanding crazy, crazy prices and return.

At least that's what you hear. That's what's out there, both from other teams and other reporting that's out there. So that part doesn't seem super plausible to me, but if something happened and the Raptors made a philosophical turn and decided now is the time to trade Pascal Seacum and we were willing to accept a somewhat pacer's friendly deal to do it, then yes. But short of that, I kind of think you still wait.

Have I floated my luminary director theory to you at all about Maasai and the Raptors? I don't think so, no. I guess it's not really a theory so much as it is a metaphor, but like he reminds me now of like a Scorsese or some of these other high-level directors who have advanced to a certain point of their career where clearly they are still a master of their craft but they need someone to say no they need an editor but they're so this is such an editor take it's ridiculous just ridiculous I also watched recently the Irishman and like I actually came away loving that movie probably

more than I did in the first time. It's a very good movie. Then I was reminded in the first hour, you get zombie white walker, Robert De Niro, and it takes that long until Al Pacino even gets into the movie. I'm like, if someone had just said, like, do we need like half an hour of this guy just lumbering through as if he's a 30-year-old guy pretending to be with CGI? Like, maybe that would have been better, right? I feel like the Raptors and Maasai in particular is at that stage of his career where he's done so much good stuff. There's still guys up and down this roster who are success stories that any team would love to have. But he's become so pearl clutching of his vision for certain things that he's not realizing that what they need is a whole scale

of rebuild. They need to really cut from this thing and find the clear vision. I think what's interesting in Maasai's case is I agree he's got, look, some clear wins, a championship validated win on his resume. And even before he was in Toronto, did some very good work in Denver. Like this, he's been doing good work for a long time. But he,

he's not the Scorsese. You know what I mean? Like, it's like if he had a couple big early wins, you know, if he had just done taxi driver and raging bull, and then yada, yada,

yada, now he has more power than almost any executive in the league. I, I'm a fan of his work. I think Maasai is good at his job, but he has some big losses on his resume too. Like, he's waited too long in a lot of these cases, especially in the contemporary Raptors.

Like, this team should have been changed or, like, dissolved seasons ago at this point. See, you say that, though, but then there's Scotty Barnes. You're like, you count him out. He's had some fallow periods, but it's like, oh, Scotty Barnes, the Irishman, pretty good. Like, yeah, sure, I can quibble with certain things, but like Barnes over Suggs at that time was kind of a revelation. It was a swing. I think people were pretty surprised.

Even the draft Nix, who were all projecting Suggs to be the clear cut number, I think four guy in that draft, or what was it five? I can't remember. But like drafting Barnes over him turned out to be not only the right decision, but a kind of a massive franchise altering one. A huge franchise altering decision to be sure.

And yeah, I don't want this to be perceived. as me taking shots at the work Messiah's done. I just don't think... I'm saying I love Scorsesee too much, and that's why I'm a little miffed by this metaphor. But yeah, I just don't see how we got to the point where, to your original thesis, Messiah is a guy that no one can check,

that no one can say no to, that no one can nudge and say, like, is this really what we want to be doing right now? I think we went very quickly from a guy who makes some good transactions to here we are with the Toronto Ravis. in yet another year of just kind of spinning our wheels because we have a roster full of good guys who we can't bear to let go of.

Yep. All right. Let's tie the bow on the in-season tournament. Two thumbs up, right? Absolutely. Any other adjustments we want to make because we can't have an in-season tournament discussion without trying to tweak some version of this format.

Yeah. I think the only thing I go back and forth on is the where to host it and when in terms of like time of day win. Yeah. I think this particular in-season tournament final distorts that conversation a little bit. Because I know there's a lot of focus on Las Vegas being basically a Lakers home game in this occasion. But the Lakers are not going to be in this every year.

They're not going to be in the final. And if any other two teams are playing, I think it is a pretty fair neutral site. Yeah. It seemed like neither of us were actually there. it seemed like the Lakers fan really showed out and turned this into a practical home game for the Lakers. And so that was a little disappointing. I agree with you.

Maybe this is just a perfect storm situation where the Lakers ended up in there. I also think like, you know, it's a much closer journey for the likes of the kings, you know, or the warriors. So there are a lot of teams in proximity there that probably have more of an advantage. And so for that reason.

Where do you want to put it on the moon? Like, it's going to be close to somebody. No, I get that. So I think my suggestion would be to just move it every year, almost like the Super Bowl goes between a couple different arenas. I assume the reason why they picked Las Vegas is because the logistics of it are so easy. They obviously do that for Summer League. So they probably have the process built in in order to host something as big as this

with multiple teams all descending upon one location there. And I also think, like, during the middle of the season, you don't want it to be traveling to, for instance, France or something like really extravagant to really blow this thing out. But I was thinking, like, maybe like a Mexico city would be fun for next year, a place where the NBA is trying to get a foothold. Obviously, they have a G-League team there now. They have, Adam Silver has been open about, like, safety concerns there. So maybe that's a reason not to do that. But like, let's move it around a little. Let's get every part of the country something. Let's go to Canada or something and, like, give them the, you know, the reason. And, like,

give them the opportunity to host this. It would be fun if there was a different locale every time. I wonder if you get too close to All-Star territory at that point. Maybe. I think Mexico City, based on the NBA's track record there and hosting games, is probably too much of a logistical production for an event of this size. There have been successful games there and successful crowds. The crowds have been really good.

Like, there was a Hawks game earlier there this season that I thought was an amazing neutral site crowd for a game like that. So I like that precedent, but I wonder about the logistical concerns. And if you're putting it anywhere in the U.S., you're going to be close to some market or another. And I wonder, too, if we get an expansion team in Las Vegas, do you then have to move it?

Or is it just okay that it's kind of one of these teams? Like, you know, they're not going to move summer league, regardless of if there's a Las Vegas like NBA team or not. But the NBA Cup is a slightly different thing and a slightly different concern. I wonder maybe if it starts moving around or some other location solution at that point.

What about an aircraft carrier like they do for the NCAA? Just put them on a boat. Kind of like that. Well, actually, have you ever played basketball on a boat before? No. You have? Don't like a yacht.

Not a yacht. I would love a yacht with a basketball court. I've tried to play basketball on a moving cruise ship. would not recommend it. The wind draft it becomes a very ugly game becomes a very interior game which appeals to the pickup

big man in me but not so much the person who would like to finish a game of basketball. Are you a cruise guy? No. Not certainly not at this stage but I've been on a cruise before.

I can't do it. I've never been on one and it honestly sounds like my hell. Like being trapped. What is it that you're bumping against? One, like the fact that it probably is what started COVID with someone on like a carnival cruise. Just being trapped with other humans who are not only going to get me sick, but like try to talk to me is like is my absolute hell. The number of people who just think it's an okay and acceptable thing to just create cruise or vacation friendships with complete strangers you don't know, don't do this.

Don't talk to me out in the world like that. Like, I find to have a couple one-off conversations, but like, we are not making plans together, people. Like, it's just not happening. But yeah, look, don't go on a cruise. That would be my ultimate advice. But if you do go on a cruise, don't attempt to play basketball. Yeah.

Just do it alongside the Lakers and the Pacers as they are playing for the NBA Cup. That's our advice. How do you do that? well maybe we could turn this into a whole like event you know it's like go on the cruise with the teams you know it's a it's a whole experiential thing like like how they're doing with like various emo bands and stuff at this point you know it's like go on go on a cruise with newfound glory or whatever is that a thing well it was a thing i don't i think post-covid maybe not as much of a thing but it was it was out there we used to be a proper country is what you're saying i think so all right let's uh let's uh let's uh

Let's pivot now from some historic winners to some absolutely historic losers. So I believe the last time we did a full-blown segment about the Detroit Pistons was the first Sunday podcast we did. I think there were two and one. Not a lot has changed. Not a lot has changed. Looking back on it, I do wonder if we were giving too much credit to a team that was stretching out a player by the nickname Beef Stew. you know, it wasn't like Greece Lightning or like Hawkeye

Marksman. It was a guy named Beef Stew who was being forced into a catch and shoot situation because they had to play so many big men because they have so many goddamn big men on this roster. Hawkeye Marksman sounds like the name a seven-year-old would give their action figure

of like a generic store brand superhero. I salute you for that. So the Pistons are two and 20 now. They have now lost 19 straight games. It is the longest streak in franchise history in one season. The longest recent streak skid in NBA history is 21 games by the Houston Rockas just in the 2021 season. The longest skid ever is 26 games by the Philadelphia 76ers during the process and the thick of the process, 13, 14 season. So we're not that far away from this being

one of the worst teams. The Spurs, who are also going to talk about 16 straight losses, so they have some company here. But I think that the darkest place to be in the NBA is bad while trying to be good. And the pistons signaled by a lot of different ways, chief among them trading for Boyan Bogdanovich and not retrading him to recoup some assets from them, that they kind of wanted to make sense of what they have. And yet, here they are trying their best and losing 19 straight. This is pretty, pretty dark, pretty quickly. The thing, too, is I thought it was already pretty dark last season.

But this might be worse, where Cade Cunningham is actually playing. The roster has a lot of theoretical talent, and it's just loss after loss after loss. And not only are they on a historic pace in terms of the streak that you're talking about, but right now they're on pace for the worst record in NBA history. We have the, you know, the 72, 73-6ers are the worst. record in a full season, 9 and 73. Then you've got the post-lockout Bobcats, who in a shortened season, 7 and 59, but 2 and 20 Detroit Pistons, it's miserable.

I know this isn't technically, statistically, the most miserable offense in the league, but it is the most miserable offense in the league. They're an absolute chore to watch, and it's brutal. Yeah, I think theoretical talent is where this discussion. should center on because that Bobcats team also had some recent high draft picks. I believe it was like Augustine. It was Campbell Walker before he learned how to shoot. It was Gerald Henderson.

So like they had picked high and they had aggregated ostensible prospects. And I worry that the pistons might have fallen into the same trap here. Like they have a lot of young guys that they're playing through. And young guys make mistakes. We say this all the time. And so you're going to lose games. So on the one hand, you could say, like, eh, they were kind of destined to be bad, is the fact that they've lost so many in a row

just exacerbating a problem that we were all expecting. On the other hand, I think everyone expected a leap from Cape Cunningham. And frankly, I think everyone expected some of their recent prospects to be halfway decent. I think Asar Thompson has been very good as is kind of junked up, Swiss Army Knife, athletic dynamo, even though he's been relegated to the bench in the midst of all of this. but like, God, just Killian Hayes, Jaden Ivy, a guy I was never high on and I don't really know what his pathway to good basketball is,

if only because he is a ball dominant, athletic guard who can't shoot. And I'm trying to think of anyone who has succeeded in that role who isn't a number one offense who's going to be driving the offense. And so like... Well, a productive pathway for Ivy also depends on Monty Williams being willing to play Jaden Ivy. it's, that doesn't help.

It's so weird at this point. Like, I know Jayne Ivy is not going to solve all this team's problems, but with where you are, you should be playing him either because he's talented and more talented than the guys you're playing over him, or you should be playing him because he's important, and his development is important. And the fact that Jayon Ivy isn't even like a real sixth man for this team

is mystifying. Like, he's not even the guy you bring in off the bench so he can have more space to himself to explore and figure out what he can do. He's just like a random wing that they barely prioritize at all. Yeah, and that's where I'm wondering is the situation so dire

that Williams is now getting pressure to play guys who are, in theory, more suited to be, at least not making mistakes, rather than playing through the mistakes of an Ivy and some of these other guys and actually being worse because you want to get them the reps. This is where the situation,

gets dicey because you're not doing the things that will help you long term and you're clearly not doing the things that are helping you in the short term either. Yeah. Who are the guys on this team that are not making mistakes? Like who are the veteran guys you could trust if you're Monty Williams? Because maybe

the most obvious name on that list is Alec Berks. But let me tell you, nobody has fallen off a freaking cliff harder than Alec Berks over the course of this season. Like he's missing everything, making bad decisions with the ball. There's just no reason you should be playing him over guys like Ivy or even Marcus Sasser, frankly.

Yeah, Sasser did not get in until late in the other night's game. So, yeah, I mean, Boyon even seems out of sorts. It seemed like he got rushed back. He's been pretty good at least. Yeah. But he just doesn't have any sort of chemistry or just like working muscle memory with Cade and some of these other guys. And you could see it on the court there where I believe they were up in their game

on Friday against the magic and all. a sudden third quarter comes in. It seems like most teams these days, especially young teams, just fall apart in those third quarters. And so I'm just looking around. We'll talk more about that with our other streaking bad team right now, who is a third quarter disaster. But yeah, the pistons

are not covering themselves in glory in the second halfs either. So I would say the one thing, if I'm going to pinpoint one thing to be most concerned about here, is Detroit made a very clear decision to take risks on second draft guys like James Wiseman, like Marvin Bagley, as opposed to taking

picks and just aggregating cap space to take on picks and the way that like a team like the Thunder has. And now Troy Weaver comes from the Thunder system, but clearly he has zagged to where he is taking instead of the future draft picks, having so many guys on the roster that you could have lottery tickets for and clearly tried to unearth what was left of the high prospects of Wiseman and Bagley. And so that hasn't worked. First and foremost, those guys, I don't think, are keepers,

but you also don't have other intriguing young guys. So I'm looking up and down this roster, and yeah, they're high draft picks. But other than that, there really isn't the depth of talent that even like the Rockets, for instance, have this season where they pretty much had to jettison, what was it, three recent,

low first round picks just to assign some of these veteran players that they have now because they just were stumbling over themselves with first round picks. The pistons don't really have that and their top picks haven't really hit. And so I'm a little worried that they might not be as close to flipping this even that you might think for a team that has drafted so high over the recent years. Oh yeah. They're not a team that feels like they're on the brink of anything. They're just out there every night staring into the void. And even though Tom Gore's in particular, the governor of the Pistons, seemed pretty insistent before the season that this was a team that was ready to take a step,

that was ready to move forward. That's clearly not the case. And not only that, I don't know that leadership changes are coming here. I don't know that there's going to be any heads rolling as a result of all this losing. And I think that there's plenty of blame to go around on a lot of different fronts. front office coaching. I mean, clearly on the part of the players who make just so many mistakes, just so many young player mistakes,

and not in an adorable play your way through them way, in a way that is crippling games against the Memphis Grizzlies. You know, like last week, I think this is the rock bottom was the Memphis Grizzlies lost, where Memphis was out six rotation players. Desmond Bain scored 49 points. Jalen Duren went down with an ankle. which I think might be his third ankle injury of the season.

He's been playing through for a team that is going nowhere. And they lost to Memphis. And it's like, you're not going to have like a more red carpeted chance to break your streak than that. And you couldn't even pull that much off. But part of their problem really is that this isn't a team that can ride a hot shooting night to a win. Because they don't have hot shooters. They don't have any kind of shooters. Before Bojan came back,

I genuinely think Isaiah Stewart was their best three-point shooter, like their best and most consistent three-point shooting option. That is a problem. So how are you supposed to win these games against better teams, more talented teams, more seasoned teams,

when you can't even be writing like, oh, this is the night where all of our shots fell. There's no space, there's no shooting, there's no flow to the offense. The players do not fit together in the ways that, like, frankly, I thought this would be at least a fun team to watch this season. I didn't think they were going to make the playoffs,

but I thought they'd be fun and you'd see the start of something, but we're not seeing that at all. Where are you on Kade on the DefCon watch? Are you worried? Are you very concerned? I think if he was going to be one of

the 10 best players in the league someday, we would have more reason to see that trajectory as of now. And if he was going to be an absolute disaster, we would have more reasons to think that than we do now. So I think his most likely outcome is as the second or third guy, as a good facilitator, as a good playmaker,

but one who needs a lot of help and maybe more help than we anticipated. It's tough. Take him over Mowbly. Took him over Barns. Took him over Jalen Green, which I think they're actually fine with. But I always expected Cade to be the type of guy who would be orchestrating. He would be at his best.

when he was surrounded by a lot of talent, probably in the same way that a team like the Thunder has excelled, he would be the one calling the shots, moving guys around, and hopefully be able to supplement that with some outside shooting and some driving it into the pain and whatnot. So on the one hand, this is the worst possible situation for a player like him,

but I think you're right. I think number one status is very much in question. If you don't have that sort of tent pole, I think things get way more complex. Because who is that guy? Do we need to draft another guy? Does Cade really function as a two or three off of that guy? And if his shot isn't falling as it hasn't in the past,

like, do we worry about whether or not he could downshift to that? It really becomes murky. Yeah, he's a really good facilitating passer. I think playing off of other potential stars or other high-level prospects who eventually the pistons bring in. But as a spot shooter, as a cutter, as a screener, like, he's not really doing any of those things at a high level. not really where his game is, but that's not to say it couldn't be. It's not to say he couldn't

grow in those directions, just as he could grow as an on-ball creator. He could grow to be more dynamic in terms of running an offense. It's just this group of players that's surrounding him isn't it and isn't enough. And maybe if you gave him the ideal supporting cast, he could do something with it. But the reality of this Pistons team is that Cade could be having an awesome season right now. And they would still be very, very bad because the pieces do not fit together. Well, that probably brings us to the San Antonio Spurs, who Victor Weniamah, having obviously a rookie season that's full of mistakes. And I think a lot of people have taken a lot of glee of vaulting chat above him and some rookie ranking. Doing this without Waz just feels wrong.

I know, I know. He'll have plenty of opportunities, I'm sure. But misery loves company and the Spurs have also lost 16 straight games, ties the longest streak in franchise history, actually have a worst point differential than the Detroit Pistons. A team we're talking about could be one of the worst in recent NBA history, if not all of NBA history. Are you more concerned, less concerned with the Spurs experience this year? It's a great question. Here's where I'm at.

I know I mentioned the third quarter performance for the Spurs earlier. Have you happened to see their like metrics in third quarters this year? I haven't, no. So here's what's been happening. The Spurs are actually in a lot of these games. And by halftime, they're right in it or they're up in a lot of these games. In the third quarter, the Spurs have a net rating of minus 27.8 points per possessions. They're getting run off the floor in the third quarter, which to me says one of two things.

Either this is a young team that doesn't really know how to finish yet. And maybe we'll even get better at that over that. the course of this season, we'll be better at responding in second halves and continuing efforts and playing with a lead. Or

does it say that teams just aren't trying very hard against the spurs because they're not taking them very seriously. And once the spurs get a little bit of a lead and they have any inclination

to turn it on, they just swat these guys away. And I kind of find myself leaning in that direction if I'm being honest where you can see as teams get in these games, and yes,

I'm sure there's like an acclamation to Victor Webbenyama specifically. He's such a unique player. You kind of need to see him to figure out how you're going to play with and against him. But then you see the rest of the team and you're like,

wait, these guys aren't running basically anything functional on offense. There's a lot we can disrupt here. Even their defense, there's a lot we can exploit. Look at all these matchups. We can work over. I think once you see it,

if you're a veteran team, if you're a more talented playoff or even like quasi-playoff level team, you can just kind of take care of the players that San Antonio is rolling out there right now. You know, this isn't to the level of a Grand Rapids, Vipers taking 93s a game level of experiment.

That's the Rio Grande Valley Vipers. I'm sorry. Not even the right state. I'm sorry to all Texans. I'm sorry to the Viper Legends who may or may not still be in the league. But I would say Pop basically running an experiment with his starting unit is one of the most wild decisions I've seen in a very long time.

I think I would be more concerned about them if they weren't so self-aware about the fact that they're just letting some of their main guys do whatever the fuck they want. And Pop has changed up the lineup in recent days, put Victor at center, took Collins out of the starting lineup. He tried to demote Sohan. and Sohan comes back in this game. I think it's telling that despite all of those changes, we still don't get a fucking point guard with the starting lineup.

No. Yeah, of all the people who have been subbed into the starting lineup, Trey Jones is not one of them. Really the only actual point card on the roster. To the point that do you know who Greg Popovich opted to start when he did demote Jeremy Sohan? Was it Brandon? He did start Malachi Brandon the following game.

But initially against the Timberwolf, Sohan comes out of the starting lineup, finally. People have been begging for this all season. I've been a little slower on that front, although now, look, I get it. Put in Chetty Osmond as the starter. Bench Jeremy Sohan, start Chetty Osmond. Cavs legend.

At some point, I think you just have to respect the bit that Pop is doing here. You just have to respect his commitment to the fact that for whatever reason, this is how he wants to manage this team, despite the fact that the data is what it is with Trey Jones on the floor, they just gave Trey Jones a contract extension over the summer and yet don't want to play him. I don't know what to do.

Do you think Trey Jones will start a game this season? And if so, when do you think it will be? I think when it gets so bad that the NBA makes a phone call and they say, Can you clean this up? Well, I mean, it happened with the Sixers. And let's be honest, is this any better than the Sixers playing? through G-League guys, like a Tony Rowan and all those other legends

from the process era, like, is basically saying that Jeremy Sohan and Devin Vassell and Victor Webenyama are going to handle the ball when they're clearly very far away from that being a main part of their game. And treating

this as an experiment, is that much worse than what the Sixers did with a bunch of shit players? I would say no. I think some franchises at the ownership level are just a little more susceptible to the suggestion that like,

hey, you should hire a Calangelo to run your team than others are. And I think if the Spurs got a call from Adam Silver insisting that they run their team in a particular way, I can't imagine Greg Popovich taking too kindly

to the suggestion that the NBA should tell him how to run this team. And he's entitled to that, but I can't say he's running the team very well right now. Yeah. And listen,

I'll say the same thing said about the Pistons about the Spurs. Like, this actually might be in their best interest to do this. Like Vassell and Sohan and Wemby having these reps, like doing things they typically wouldn't, will probably help them long term. So in a way,

I guess I feel better about the Spurs being losers and the Pistons because I see the vision. And now, ultimately, maybe this comes down to the fact that they have Wembe and the Pistons did not get Wemby. And so that clarifies things, that helps things for your franchise in ways that's like,

it's impossible to count the ways. But at the same time, it's worse in a way because you should be better. You could be better if you just did one to two to three regular things in order to help this team that Pop is clearly saying no to. Yeah, they clearly need a lot more than what they've got. And it's, I agree that I'm a little more optimistic about them

because of Webin Yamah, because there's such, like, such clear positional need and fit issues in San Antonio's roster that could be kind of theoretically easily resolved. That said, I've been pretty disappointed in Devin Vassell and Kelton Johnson's seasons. Like, their opportunities here as spotlight creators, as guys who are put in positions to explore and experiment

and do a lot with the ball, they've left me pretty cold, to be honest with you. And you can look at a lot of possessions and say, like, why didn't they get Victor Webiniamma the ball here? Why didn't they pass it to him here? Why didn't they go over the top? Why didn't they make an effort to post him again after he gave the ball up?

And that's a game we play with a lot of young players who we want to see reach the fullest extent of their talents. But I think there's a lot of cases with Vassell and with Keldon Johnson where that's pretty valid. Where it's like, why are these guys taking the shots that they are? And why are they not more successful doing it? Like Devin Vassell is a guy who I think is a pretty good pick and roll player and just hasn't really moved the needle very much

in terms of like that kind of creation for San Antonio at all this season. Yeah, I just think Fasel is completely not in the right spot. I think he's going to be a tertiary ball handler who's probably best suited running off of screens and being a little bit more JJ Reddick than some of those other guys. And whatever else with the ball is going to be a bonus when you desperately need it. And so for that reason, the fact that he's even hitting a goddamn shot is a light year is better than whatever is happening in Detroit. Like I see the talent with the spurs.

even Sohan who, like, I don't know how he fits with Wembenyama specifically, but that guy has so much grit to his game and has so much subtlety in like a, almost like a Nouveau Dennis Rodman sense. Obviously the hair makes the comp easy, but like the fact that he has so much skill to him despite being a junket up, like mix it up down low sort of guy. I think that's like encouraging. But I don't know. It's tough watching these games, man.

I just, I don't know how much longer. they can get away with this. Well, yeah, I guess that's kind of the question. It's like, when do these streaks end for these respective teams? Because I think at some point in January, they play each other. So one of them will have won a game by, I think it was mid-January. The date escapes me. But otherwise, like, for the Piston specifically, I'm eyeing.

They play the jazz in a few weeks. And if I'm, if I'm Detroit now, I might just start the scouting process for Utah now. Because in between then, they play Indiana, Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Atlanta. Those are pretty tough games for a team like the Detroit Pistons of this season. So maybe look ahead a little bit, maybe get the scouting report out there, you know? County George, like, you know, what are his tendencies? What can we take away? Like, that's where we're at with the Detroit Pistons is like, let's scout out a team we play 11 days from now

and hope for the best that that might actually be the win we can get. no more masterpieces of dog shit okay these two teams are masterpieces of dog shit at present shout out to

Will Hardy like already the quote of the season masterpiece of dog shit really it was the pregnant pause after masterpiece of dog shit

that was very like what's the name of like the insult comic dog on Conan Ryan you know I'm talking about triumph the con of yeah triumph the insult comic very much that vibe

was like it was a master of dog shit. For me to poop on. There you go. Yeah, very much a podcast sort of moment where you're reaching for a word. Like I literally just did.

And then it comes out. And it's just dog shit. All right. Why don't we wrap it there? Rob, thank you for joining me on this intimate conversation and this journey. It was my absolute pleasure. Thank you. We miss our guy, Waz. We wish in the best. hopefully speedy recovery from all that ails him. But, you know, we got to pay the bills around here.

We got to put out some pods. We got to punch some tickets. We got to talk about the worst teams in the league. It's what we do here. It's true. Thank you to Jack Sanders on production. Thank you to Ben Cruz. We'll be back on Wednesday when, my friend, it is trade season officially.

We'll be back then. We'll see you.