The Ringer NBA Show - The Spurs Are Pivoting to Boring Basketball | The Corner 3 (Ep. 346)

Episode Date: November 30, 2018

Gregg Popovich’s disdain for 3-point shots (1:36), Andrew Wiggins’s future in the league (15:52), and R.J. Barrett’s less-than-stellar start at Duke (24:14). Plus, is Luka Doncic “tall James Harden” or “fat Steph Curry” (29:00)? Hosts: Kevin O’Connor, Jonathan Tjarks, Danny Chau Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey guys, the latest edition to the Ringer podcast network is winging it with Vince Carter, Kent Baysmore, and Annie Finberg of the Atlanta Hawks. Vince and Ken are going off script to offer a behind-the-scenes look at what NBA players think and talk about when their minds aren't on the court, covering everything from sports, news, and pop culture. The first episode drops December 3, but you can subscribe now on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the Ringer NBA show. This is The Corner 3. I'm Kevin O'Connor and joining me here. in Los Angeles. It's Ringer Associate Editor. Danny Chow. It's a little damp out there. You know, first rain in a while? Oh my goodness.

It was raining really hard last night. I could hear it pouring against my window. Only third time raining since moving here. And from Dallas, Texas, it's ringer staff writer. Jonathan Charks. What's up, guys? Hey, shout out to our producer, Bobby. L.A. champion. Is that how it works now?

L.A. City champ. Count my rings, guys. Honestly, count my rings. I see one big one right on your next finger there, Bobby. For those who are not aware and why you're, would you be? I wouldn't you be. Yeah, the ringer intermural basketball team

won a league championship yesterday. Yeah, Bobby. We're not just blog boys all the time. Not like us over here at the corner three. None of us can hit a corner three. We're recording this at 2.12 p.m. on Thursday, November 29th, and you're hearing it on Friday morning. So that means we're not able to react to last night's games,

but that's okay. Let's talk about the spurs, guys. They're 10 and 10 on the season. They've been outscored by 2.2.3. per 100 possessions on the year with a 24th ranked defense and the 13th ranked offense. Greg Popovich made some interesting comments regarding the NBA's three-point happy style earlier this week to Bulls.com Sam Smith. Yeah, man, he's not a fan.

So I'm just going to read some select quotes. So here's what he has to say. You've got to have downhill players. You've got to have players who can penetrate and kick. You've got to have players who can switch. And you've got to have big men who can play little guys. These days there's such an emphasis on the three because it's proven to be analytically correct.

I hate it, but I always have. I've hated the three for 20 years. There's no basketball anymore. There's no beauty in it. It's pretty boring. But it is what it is, and you have to deal with it. You have to work with it. Spurs are taking fewer threes and more mid-range shots

than any team in the league. Jonathan, seems like the spurs aren't working with it, though. Yeah, I mean, to me, for as much as Pop wants to talk trash about the style of play, like their offense is okay. their problem is they don't guard anybody anymore, right? Like, if Pop wants to take all twos, maybe we should play guys who play defense. We were talking about before the podcast starts,

their best primord offender is like Dante Cunningham probably. Yeah, that's rough. I mean, you're basically listing guys like Dante Cunningham, DeMardo Rosen, who is definitely not it, Quincy Pondexter, Rudy Gay. And post-Aquille is Rudy Gay. This is a rough bunch. The Spurs are doing what they can on offense.

Like you said, John, they rank 13th, So they're not horrible. They're in the upper half of the league. They play at a slow pace. The third slowest time of possession in the league, according to Impre predictable. Run a lot of isolations and post-ups, which minimizes turnovers. They still have a little bit of a turnover issue. Every time there's a live ball turnover because their transition defense is horrific.

But they're so old and slow. Yeah, they're old and slow. I mean, they're playing an outdated style right now. And I feel like the initial meeting between Pop and Demar de Rosen probably went something like this. Pop was just like, what is your biggest fantasy in the NBA? And DeMarre's like, a league in which I don't have to shoot threes. And Papa's like, I got you. The dude is shooting like, I think one and a half threes per game and he's hitting them at 18.6%.

Like he's just basically completely reversed course from who he tried to become last year. When he was killing it, shooting the three at the beginning of last season before falling off. It's kind of funny because Damar is actually having an incredibly efficient shooting season this year. It's just, it's all coming from his pet spots. Yeah, I feel like Pops enabling his players. Yeah. Right? All these bad habits they have.

Like, Lamarcus is a guy I should be shooting threes. Like, why make your life so hard by posting up all the time? You can't tell me that Marcusol and Brooke Lopez are shooting threes and Lamarcus can't do it. That's just crazy to me. Lamarcus Alders is the guy that frustrates me most, right? He shot 35% from three is finally you're in Portland. He's a good shooter. He's a great, you know, mid-range shooter.

Extend your range a little bit. Suddenly, your shot is worth more points per shot than it is for mid-range. Like with him, I understand wanting to post up, right? I get it. But you can do both. It's the pick and pop plays. Yeah, you can do both. There's no reason a pick and pop to a mid-range jumper

when you're capable of shooting a three. Little things like that. When you're reading that, Danny, I just hear it sounds like a curmudgeon in my head. Right. You know, somebody's just petty about the way the league is playing nowadays. Like, the Spurs used to be ahead of the curve shooting trees. But now they're behind. Way behind.

Yeah, and when you think about it, when you think about, you know, all of those YouTube montages that, have propped up in the past six, seven, eight years with them doing these passing clinics. It's all about having enough spacing so that there's one guy who can drive into the lane

and kick it out and then the ball just kind of swings around the horn. That can still exist in today's game. I don't really necessarily know where Pop is coming from in terms of it being boring. I feel like what he's saying, like what he's trying to say is like he feels like every team plays the same style now.

I think that's where he's going with it. Like everyone's playing spread pick and roll. Everyone's taking threes. Which to me is dumb. That's like saying everybody wants to dunk. Like, yeah, it's a basic part of basketball. I obviously want to do that. But there's still variety within that, within that overall construct.

Absolutely. I think we talked about this on this podcast. The difference in styles between Milwaukee and Houston, right? They have essentially the same shot selection. They get a lot of threes. They ignore mid-range jumpers. They try to get to the room and draw a lot of files. But they play drastically differently.

Houston is that team where it's pick and roll, pick-and-roll, isolation, drive and kick out for threes, then attack a closeout, try to get a layup, all layups and threes. But Milwaukee does a whole bunch of different things in their offense. They use the post. They do use pick and roll.

They move the ball from side to side. I think the results with teams going for threes is similar, but the playing style are still different. Teams still use different ways to get buckets. It's still about personnel. And maybe the real problem here is that the first personnel just isn't quite up to pop standards. Is it, though?

I mean, they still lead the NBA in three-point percentage. They have players on their team who can shoot threes. Brenn Forbes has a knockdown flamethrower jump shot, only shoots five threes a game. He's somebody who I think he'd be shooting more threes. There's no reason for him not to shoot more threes. Everyone on their roster would shoot more threes somewhere else. Davos Bertans is a guy, another guy who could definitely probably shoot around 36, 38 percent,

given the opportunity. Patty Mills should be shooting more threes. Bertons, like you said, even Rudy Gay this season. shooting only 2.6 3s per game at 46.7%. Part of the reason they're shooting the ball so well from 3 is because they're pick and choosing for more open 3-point opportunities, instead of just firing them away like some teams do. But I feel like they could just help themselves.

I do. Here's my question for y'all. So I hear that quote, I think about Pop being 70 years old. I think about the league changing under his feet. He could coach Team USA whenever he wants. Is he going to retire soon? It's something to me.

Like, he's done with this, it feels like. their report that he, last season, that he only had two years left, correct? I think his Woj might have reported that, if I remember. Oh, wow, really? I don't recall that, but I just figured, like, with how everything unfolded last season with the quadrama and just everything kind of feeling. Yeah, feeling for him and within the organization. Exactly.

I just felt like this was actually going to be, you know, the year that he retired. I was actually really surprised that he came back to give this another go. I think he felt like he had to because of all this stuff, Kauai stuff, and he's like, I'll get this team back to where it's going, but they're going nowhere, so what's the point, right?

This team would be better to your first point, John, that if they didn't lose their best defender. I mean, that changed everything for them. Look at the Grizzlies. You can play like unanalytic basketball if you guard someone. But if you're not, like this purse right now, they got to win shootouts,

but they don't shoot threes. So how is that going to work? Right. It doesn't work. It just doesn't. And that's where I just don't feel like this team is being put in the best position to win right now.

Post-ups are dead, mid-range jumpers are dead, drives are in, threes are in, cuttings in. The NBA, it's evolved, right? And the spurs have stopped evolving. They're one of the teams that really pushed the envelope. And now they're not. And I think it's too bad that Popovich doesn't like threes, but the rules are the rules. And right now, it just doesn't seem like he's maximizing his team's chances of winning by running an offense that's just outdated.

And it's funny because this quote, he's obviously not just talking about his own team. He's talking about league-wide. Yes. And that's something that I've actually been looking at for the past couple days. On basketball reference, you can actually check league-wide averages. And one thing that jumped out to me is, you know, this season we're talking all about pace and all about threes. So the league as a whole is shooting 35% from three this season, which is actually down 1.2 percentage points from last season. And that doesn't sound like a lot, but it actually, I mean, it adds up.

So basically what this season is equivalent to is 2014-15, which is the first year that the Warriors won their championship with Steph. And ever since that season, the league has increased its accuracy from three by four-tenths of a percentage point. And now it's all the way back. And I wonder if it's a matter of just having more players willing to take these threes. Like you have more players who are available and will. willing to take them. Worse shooters now shooting trees. You basically have a huge talent pool that are just like,

okay, yeah, we're just going to let it fly. And that could be part of it. So last season, the league as a whole shot 32.5% from three off the dribble. This year it's 32.9%. S subtle difference. You know, slight increase, though. What's different is the spot up three-point shooting. Last season was 37.4% to 35.9% this season.

Could be small sample size. You're totally at like 15,000 threes or whatever compared to 50,000, right? It could even out over the course of the season. But I do think there is something, too. It's just worse players shooting more threes because of the value of the shot. Yeah, and I think, too, is worth pointing out, like, the value of the shot, it's just the space it creates. Like, what I think is happening a lot, too, is like the league, every player, the players now are faster and longer than ever before. So space is more constricted.

Taking shots from out there is valuable by stretching the defense out. even beyond the analytics of it. It's just a stretching, the space that it creates. So you make it or not, it doesn't even really matter as long as the defense honors it. I think that's also the part that it's overlooked sometimes with the numbers, right? Like you can look at a guy like a Rajan Rondo type, the number that he shoots, I believe over the past couple seasons,

around 35, 36% from three. But that doesn't show everything. Teams don't necessarily respect his three. I think you need to be a guy, like you said, Charks, that does effectively space the floor. Because some guys still don't get defended, even if they shoot an okay percentage. They just don't earn that respect.

That is funny how that works. I remember watching Aaron Gordon, like, a year and a half ago when he first tried shooting threes. And it was like, it didn't even matter that he was making them because teams didn't care. It's almost like psychological for some of this, for the defense. Even though the percentage did drop slightly so far this season, Danny, teams are still shooting more threes. Absolutely.

I mean, that's not stopping. It doesn't seem like it's going to stop anytime soon. And I think for Popovich's comments, I disagree with their style of play now. I don't think they're shooting enough threes. I think they're playing an archaic style. by today's standards. Which, by the way, let's talk about boring,

man, the spurs are not very fun to watch. I'll put it that way. Look in the mirror. They're boring. It's so funny because Popovich talks about all these things that you need to have in today's league to survive.

You know, downhill players, guys who can penetrate and kick. That sounds great. Yeah. I don't know what's the problem here. And that's the thing, right? Like, so they're playing this style and I, whatever.

But to his points, if every team starts shooting over 40% of their shots from three, does that suddenly start getting a little bland? See, I don't think so. I feel like if you look at the league right now in the Western Conference, I think it's made it more even, the games.

Like the space that it creates. Like, in the West right now, you have 14 teams who are around, at least around 500. I think that's better for the league, is it not? Yeah. There was a report about, you know, how all the national broadcasts

that have really done well in the ratings have all been either Lakers or Warriors games, with the exception of the first game of the regular season of Philly and Boston. But I'm pretty sure local broadcasts have risen quite a bit in ratings

just because all these teams are watchable. They're like compulsively watchable. And they make, you know, the parody of the game this season has been, you know, step in the right direction.

It's fantastic. And I agree. I think we talked about this a couple weeks ago, but like if you've removed Golden State from the equation, there's a lot of teams across the league where it's like,

oh, if Golden State didn't exist, there's a lot of teams you could look at it and be like, oh, they could win the championship this year. Right. They have a chance, right? I think the competition in the league is stronger right now. But I do wonder, though, if it gets to the point where if every team is playing like the Rockets,

even playing like the Bucks, if that does get a little bland. See, I don't know because I wonder. It's like saying, oh, every team is trying to get like as many dunks as possible. Like, it's just a feature of the game now. And I think within that, I don't know, like to me, it's just part of the game now. It's like saying every animal team wants to pass the ball. Like, obviously. Why, every team's passing the ball now.

it's so boring. Right? Yeah, I don't know. Well, it's like a fundamental part of the game is passing. I'm saying shooting for basketball is the same thing. I mean, not until three-point line was installed. I think that's Popovich's main point here. Yeah, and I mean, it's the same thing that goes with, you know, the NFL right now.

It used to be a running league. Now it's a passing league. Use a run to open up the pass. Now it's really using the pass open up the run. Right. And, you know, there's always the talk about basketball being a cyclical thing. But I don't necessarily know how it really goes back to post-oriented, back to the basket type basketball. There needs to be a Shaq type of player.

I think that's, and that's only one individual player that would be actually doing that. Because on the other end of the floor, if Shaq were pulled from the pass and put in today's league, he would still be forced to defend the opposing center on the perimeter. And I think, too, if you look at, like, young Shaq could move really well. Like, I feel like Young Shaq were from an old Shaq, honestly. and probably it had to be young Shaq would stay in the league. Like, Shaq gained like 200 pounds in the NBA. Like, if he came into the league night,

he probably had to keep his weight down. Yeah, and he gained that weight to, like, insulate himself from all those fowls because he's backing down. But I'm pretty sure. Watch a bunch of guys wrestling in the paint. Yeah, and this, I think Shaq in the modern league would be a downhill player.

He would be a face-up downhill player who would, you know, try and... Yeah, have you all seen those, like, YouTube highlights of, like, LSU, Shaq? It's pretty incredible. Oh, yeah. Like, how fast he was. man. That to me, and this is where I tend to fall right here. The three-port shooting

I love it. I love the passing. I love the spacing. Seeing Shaq play downhill pick and roll with four shooters on the floor, rolling down the floor with his ability to lob down. You'd be breaking rims every other night. Oh my goodness. That would be outstanding to watch. And maybe we'll get a little taste of that with Zion, a different type of flavor, which is a big explosive athlete. It always goes back

to Zion. Always goes back to Zion. On Wednesday night, the wolves beat the spurs, 128 to 89. And the Timberwolves, since trading Jimmy Butler, they have been outstanding. What happened to them, charts? I mean, I think it's a bunch of different things. The biggest thing to me is, like, the team makes more sense now.

Like, they gave all Jimmy's shots. They moved around to the rest of the team. They have more defensive players. They spaced the floor better. And then Carl Towns, too, is just playing with more energy. Like, Kat's keeping that same energy now going forward. And that's the big thing. Their best players found himself again.

Covington has really played a huge part. in kind of reshaping what this team could look like. I mean, I feel like Covington is basically built to play for Tom Tibido. He's long, big, strong, does not care about, you know, taking on whatever assignment. He'll play 48 minutes a night. Yeah, absolutely. Ever since he's joined the team, the wolves are top five in forcing turnovers. He's number one in deflections in the league.

It just makes a lot of sense. He can roam off ball and cover for a lot of the mistakes. that, you know, talented Wiggins are still making. Bed Falk had a great article on cleaning the glass about Covington. Just looking at all the little things that he does, right?

Things that look easy, look simple, but how he just, he does them at an elite level, whether it's something like you said, rotating over to help a rolling big man, then coming back to a close out on a three-point shooter. Little things like that, Covington has been excellent at.

And, you know, in the past of Philadelphia, he's been inconsistent at times on defense. Always an inconsistent shooter. But when he's bringing it like he is now, the defensive end before. He's a game changer for them. Did you also say their defensive numbers? I didn't realize it was this drastic.

Yeah. That's incredible. They're at 99.8. That's the best in the league, right, over the last nine games? I think it's close with them and the Thunder. But yeah. I mean, they have plenty of guys who can score the ball, too. So if they're going to play good defense,

they're going to be a legit team. Yeah. He was a plus 44 in that Spurs game in a game that they won by 39. That's ridiculous. That's hard to believe. Yeah. It's hard to do.

Right now up and down their roster. I have a lot of depth as well. someone like Josh Akogi. Josh Akogi was playing really well before the trade and suddenly he's the 11th guy in the rotation, right? And I think he's somebody that's disappointed that he's not playing, but he can't play. Right.

Because they've added two good players for one, Sarich and Covington, and someone like Derek Rose has just forced himself to stay in the rotation with the exseason that he's having. He's hitting basically all of his threes. Pretty much, yeah. Shooting 48.6% on the year from three. I made a slight tweak to his mechanics

with Bronner-Baconahan this summer that's worked magnificently well for him. I mean, I thought before the year when Tom Tibido said something along the lines of, you know, when Derek Rose is healthy, he's still one of the best players in the league. I thought it was a joke. Tibbs wasn't necessarily. Tibbs wasn't out of all of us, came. He wasn't, but the one guy who is still a big, big disappointment for their team is Andrew Wiggins.

In that game, he shot three for 15 against the spurs, not shooting the ball well from three at all this season. Still not defending well. Still doesn't know how to rebound. Still doesn't know how to do much of anything. and yet he's going to be getting paid. 150. Yeah. No.

Yeah, I'm working on a piece on him, and it's really hard to imagine a worst start for a perimeter player. So I did some digging on the basketball reference player finder, and here's what I found. Oh, no. Wiggins is having one of the worst two-point shooting seasons in the three-point era, and one of the worst in the past 50 years. So basically, all of the worst shooting numbers,

from two-point range are from, you know, the 50s and 60s. The latest it would be, would be like 1972. After that, it's D. Brown who played in a lockout shorten season. It's Brandon Jennings, who was a rookie,

and then it's Andrew Wiggins. Oh, golly. I know if it was that bad. That's the thing. Like, Brandon Jennings was 140 pounds soaking wet as a rookie. So it makes sense that he couldn't finish around contact.

But in the Spurs game, the first two plays that Tibbs ran for the game, and I think in the first like 30 seconds of the game, were both for Wiggins, and they were both cuts, and they were both for him to finish inside, he missed both of them. And like after that, you could just see, like, his confidence is just fading. And it's really sad to see. It is sad to see. It's a guy who was a highly recruited high school prospect who was good at Kansas.

Not great. I mean, I think, would you guys agree that he was solid at Kansas? It's not great. Sure. Absolutely. I mean, he definitely did enough to show teams. Still, yeah, exactly. Still be the number one pick.

But what's happened in his five NBA seasons is, I don't want to say I'm shocked because I always had concerns about Wiggins. I remember Dean DeMachus from Dean on draft. Shout out, Dean was the most critical draft person out there of Andrew Wiggins. I think he had Wiggins ranked like eighth in the 2014th draft.

And I always had concern about Wiggins. I think I had a ranked third that year behind Parker and Embed. but never expect this. I thought he'd be a better player. I thought his defense would have panned out. I thought he would have developed more since his rookie year. He still doesn't have much of a game besides that nice little spin move that he...

He's in year five right now. And year five has generally been, if not for all players, it's been an inflection point for a lot of the wings that we consider to be, you know, guys who were incremental growers. Like, Damar de Rosen became the Damar de Rosen we know in year five. Gordon Hayward became more of a go-to score in year five. With Wiggins, it's like,

he hasn't really shown any substantive improvement over his five years. He's having the worst season of his career in year five. Well, I mean, to be fair, the three-point shot,

I think just like, we had three-calibre expectations for him. He's six-eight and he shoots threes. There's some value in that, right? Is there? I mean, he's making them. He'd make five degrees a game. That's usually.

I mean, I'd make, take five. He's not, though. 35%, that's decent enough. It's kind of game. Yeah, it's just really strange watching him these days because he's kind of a ghost. He's just kind of lingering around. And when he's taking a lot of these threes, it's basically he's supposed to be this release valve when the shot clock is running down and no one really wants to take the shot.

And so the ball gets in his hands and he has like two seconds left and he's hoisting it. Is there any hope for Andrew Wiggins? If you're coach Tom Thibodeau for the Minnesota Timberwolves, what are you doing with him to try to get him going? I mean, I'm doing exactly what he did at the beginning of that spurs. game. You're trying to run plays from early so that he can get his confidence back up. Because right now he's like, even his dunks are joyless. Like that was the one redeeming factor for him for so many years. Like he had highlight real dunks. And now he won't even, you know, explode anymore.

I mean, I think really, though, it's the opposite way. I'd probably just start benching him in the fourth quarter. Like, I feel like Wiggins' minutes have always been given to him. He's never to earn his playing time, right? And this team is deep now. They got this guy that Kogi who's playing hard every night, right? who's competing. They got Covington.

They have good players. If he doesn't want to try and compete, just bench him. Anakogi's a better defender than Andrew Wiggins. I mean, I wouldn't stun me if he was more effective than Wiggins in terms of plus minus

and stuff like that. I'm just saying, he's a $150 million man who looked into the eyes of Glenn Taylor who was like, Wiggins, I need you to improve. See,

he's so look into the eyes business, man. I don't know where that became the thing. You mentioned his scoring is three-point shooting. He takes five shots a game and it's 35% charge. Like, that's fine, right?

like, it's okay for a two, three like he is. The problem is is that he just doesn't defend consistently. That's the thing is he has to compete on defense. And I think that comes to playing time. Like if you don't try on defense, you're not going to play. And that's purely an effort thing is him competing on defense. I don't know. I'm not giving up on Wiggins, but

it's not good. Andrew Wiggins. Well, the team is winning anyway, so it's like it's okay. Yeah, it's really fine. I mean, they won by 39 points with him having like one of the worst games. And I mean, just by him being so big and fast and shooting decently, like, if you ignore the contract, I think sometimes about these players, like the money is the money. It's already been spent.

It's a guaranteed contract. So whatever at this point. Put it this way. How does he fit a team? Wiggins, that Bulls game, 0 for 12, one rebound, one assist in 29 minutes. And they still won.

Last week. They still won. No, they're still one. But it's just, it's disappointing that something like Okogi is, you know, stuck behind $150 million, zero.

And Andrew Wiggins. It sucks. He's going to get more minutes, man. Okie's going to find, he's the Tibbs player too. He'll get in there. He's a rookie,

but he'll get in there. Yeah, Tibbs likes him. Well, Andrew Wiggins is struggling so far the season for the Timberwolves to move on from one Canadian prospect that was highly ranked out of high school to another. RJ Barrett from Duke, who you wrote about this week on the Ringer.com charts. RJ is somebody who coming into the season like Wiggins at Kansas had eye expectations to be the clear number one pick, a two-way player, a versatile player, but he's disappointed so far early on, hasn't he charts?

Yeah, I mean, I think with him, at least he does compete hard. I mean, he'll compete. Wiggins doesn't always do that. To me with RJ, it's like he just hasn't realized that he's not the best player on his team. And it's obvious to everyone else. Maybe not him and coach Kerry, though he don't realize it. And so to me, it's an interesting thing to see him. Will he accept being Zion's number two? Right.

Because, like, in the NBA, he might be the best part of his team either. He can't go to Atlanta as football at Trey Young's hands, right? So wherever he goes in the NBA, he has to play off somebody else. So right now, the numbers that shock me was like, his usage rate is like 37. And that's hired in Tatum, Jabari, Ingram, Bagley, all these top five picks, and none of them shot as much as RJ, and none of them had got like Zion in this team either. So to me...

Not even close. Yeah, we'll just see how RJ adjust to not being the best player on his own team. I think that'll be only interesting to watch over the course this season. Yeah, it kind of feels like he, over the first eight games or so, kind of felt like he saw that the biggest criticism of his game was that, oh, we don't really know if he can shoot. And so he took that and he kind of went and like over-corrected it. It's like, I'm going to shoot.

7 3 is a game. You can't tell me nothing. I'm going to shoot every time I touch the ball almost. It's crazy to watch sometimes. Like, Zion's moving the ball. Then RJ, oh, forget it. It's going up. You mentioned how will he accept being the second guy?

My question would be, does Coach K view him as the second guy? At the end of that Kentsaga game, R.J. close that game. Nobody else really touched the ball. I think Zion's last touch in that game was like 155 left in the second half. RJ dominated the ball at the end of the clock, did not pass the ball. Oh, and 5? Those were some feeble-looking shots he was throwing up to.

I think Hachimura blocked him like twice. It was not a good look for him. You know, like Jay Billis keeps comparing R.J. Barrett to James Hardin on the broadcasts. And I just, I don't see it at all. Like James Hardin in college was a player who wasn't what he is today. You know, James Hardin's shot off the dribble wasn't as potent as it is now. He actually tried hard on defense in college. He was more of a slasher, but he was a much better finisher than on the rim.

So a much more creative ball handler. better score, period. With RJ, I just don't see that at all. Is there a comp that comes to mind for you, Danny, based off his performance so far this season? Not necessarily the guy that we know he can be from USA play, but what you've seen from him so far. I mean, there's always going to be that comparison to Hardin

just because he's a left-handed, right-hand ball-dominant player. But the way he kind of barrels into the lane kind of reminds me of another Duke Great. I don't know if Great is overselling it, but Corey McGettie. That's a deep cut. I like it. That's a real deep cut.

I think with James Hardin, it's, like, I know a lot of people get annoyed by him drawing follows at the rim, but it's kind of dance a little bit. I like seeing him do it personally. It wasn't that way with Corey McGettie. He was much more of a bull. Yeah, in the China shop, you know. No doubt about it. And, you know, with RJ Barrett, like we mentioned like Wiggins,

disappointing a little bit, you know, not meeting expectations. but RJ's a dog. Like that dude, balls. He can play as hard. Right? That's never going to be a question with him. Never will be. I would hope moving forward this season,

R.J. Barrett, just takes off the blinders. Go back to passing the ball. Like, he is a good passer. Yeah, and I think that's something that's in his DNA. And I think that it's going to be... Passing isn't his DNA. Yeah, I think it's going to be something

that's a little bit easier for him to make that adjustment than a guy like Wiggins who didn't really have that in his game who doesn't know how to do it. Anything besides shoot from mid-range? Correct. And so with Barrett, you're really just having him take off those biners

and kind of, you know, it's a whole new world. Let's see some coaching from Coach Kay. I'd like to see. Maybe you could coach some of your players. Yeah, that would be great, right? Like, it really is annoying. I understand Duke never runs a lot of pick and roll, but from a scouting perspective,

I would love to see Zion Williamson scream at the top of the key with R.J. Barrett handling the ball and front some high pick and roll, baby, with RJ rumbling down the lane with Zion by his side lob dunks for days, open opportunities for RJ near the rim and we don't really see that too much at all. Also for the Harden Comp, there's a Harden Comp out there

but that's an RJ Barrett. That's a tease for the next segment. That is a tease for the next segment, John. The kids are all right. He has Luca! My guy! Halla Luca! Halla Luca. Beautiful Isaac Lee with the writing of Jason Gallagher.

Check out our song, Halla Luca on the Ringers YouTube channel. Beautiful. Sing it, Danny. Sing it. All right. We're good. Anyway, so Luca Dantritch, he is doing everything. I don't think I've, I can recall seeing a rookie, like, aside from a LeBron that just

checks so many boxes. Luca Dantra's gotten in better shape over the course of the season. His defense has gotten better. The two knocks I'm hitting early on. But his offense right now at 19 years old, I don't feel silly saying right now he's already one of the most skilled players in the league. Not one of the best, but one of the best, but one of the skills. for the top 25 players in the league for the first month.

I'm putting him in there. I don't care. Yeah, and to be clear, this list is based solely on this season. Yeah, off this first month this season. But yeah, there's legitimate talks of him being in the discussion for the All-Star game. You know, I mean, where would you slot him? Is he a guard or is he a forward? I hate positions. Right, right?

Just a wing. I don't know. Yeah, I know. What is he? Yeah, he's one of those. So, would competition be more? difficult as a guarder or a forward. I haven't thought about that.

Yeah, because if you think about it, like, Steph, Westbrook, injury concerns might cancel each other out, probably won't, but I don't know. It could be pretty interesting. I mean, it'll come out with the Mouselow enough games. It's a team award for the All-Star game, really. It's true. In the West, like, you also have LeBron. Davis would count as a forward, I believe, with voting.

Paul George. I mean, I could see the coaches put in, like, the Rosen over him because it reward the veteran, like humble the rookie. I could see Luca making it. The fact that he's in the conversation is actually quite stunning. Considering most expectations for his rookie season, I think most had modest expectations. I mean, I was expecting maybe 12, 13 points per game.

Right. Not 19. Not step back threes from the corner. Not step back threes from 40 feet out. No, no kidding. Little things like that are surprising to me with his game. The rest of it, I mean, anybody who watched him dominate the second best league in the world,

Spanish basketball league, would it be stunned by, I think, as passing or is rebounding or its feel, little things like that. But the scoring ability, that to me has stuck out the most. I think one of the funnier things I saw on last night's NBA Slack was Charks just putting out a great question. Is Luca more tall Hardin or Fat Steff? Well, I was watching the game, the Rockets game last night.

I'm like, man, what can he do Hardin? He's got all the Hardin's game. Like, he's just a little taller version of it. He's got the whole, even he has that P3 thing with a deceleration. Yeah. So, Luca has been working out at P3, you know, a sports science company for the past three, four years. And they've really been monitoring him. And the whole, you know, thing that James Hardin is all world at, the thing that he's better than basically anyone is decelerating, the speed of deceleration.

And Luca has that. He's in the 92nd percentile among all NBA players that Pee's. three is tested. Funny thing is in that game against the Rockets, he had a play to open up the second half. I believe it was Dallas's first possession. It was a transition possession where he dribbled the ball up the left wing and just stopped on a dime right in front of James Ennis,

who looked like he was ready to contest a three. Then Luca just kept going to the rim, scored, you know, I think it was off the wrong foot, right, right hand lay up, drew an N1 file. Little things like that are where, you know, all the conversation about, oh, he's not a great athlete, he's not an elite athlete, you know, how is he going to be able to get by guys?

it's like he can get by guys from decelerating, right? Just like James Harden, using little fake passes. And just really like powerful steps. Yes. Long steps, powerful steps. And his footwork, as we see in those stepback threes, is elite. I mean, he is elite in so many categories already at 19 years old. And his skill is only going to get better over time.

And that's what turns out to me. It's like if you look at, okay, Lucas, he's right now he's been an elite shooter, elite passer, elite handles. And if you have all three of those things in combination, you're a smart player. Like, athletic ability isn't the BLN doll. It becomes a thinking man's game at that point, right? Like, Steph and Hardin aren't like the best athletes in the world. They're two of the top five best players

because they have that combination of skills. They take like 10, 12, 3s a game or whatever. So to me, Lucas 6'8 and doing the same stuff. He's got that combination. They can score it, shoot it, and pass it. And if you can do all three things, man, basketball's pretty simple game at that point. So is he more tall, hard, and our fat stuff, though?

I went with Tallarden, I think. Because we're going to get him in shape. We're getting him in the shape. This is happening. Is he a four-year process? Cut out the junk food? He's going to get in shape. See, that's the thing, though.

Okay, so... Rob Mahoney from Sports Illustrated, a dear friend... Shut up to Rob. Yeah, someone who I credit for getting me into this business, actually, wrote an awesome profile of Luca on Thursday, and he mentioned, this is a great little tidbit.

He mentioned that Donchich now has had a taste of Central Texas barbecue. Oh. And he went to Pecan Lodge, which is... Pecan Lodge, shout out. It's a great barbecue spot. Probably, yeah, Dallas's most well-known barbecue spot. For sure. For sure.

That could be the start of something beautiful or it could be something... Or it can be the start of something really dangerous. So we'll see. We'll see if it's not that stuff. I won't completely bet against that. You know, my first time ever having brisket was when I went down to Houston

for a rocket store a couple of seasons. First time ever having... Oh, my God. Pizkis. You only brisket in Boston? Are you kidding me? Look, man, I've had a lot of basic food in my life. Too much chowder, man.

Brisket, fantastic. Lucas should also try some brisket as well. Or don't. No, he should definitely live it up. And it's part of the culture. He's acculturating himself to doubt. And you look at Hardin, man. Hardin not exactly in great shape all the time.

It's okay. Whatever. To be fair, though, to that point, if James Hardin were an elite shape in elite conditioning, maybe his playoff performance went a dip. and maybe they actually get the June. So are we going to be concerned about a rookie wall with

with Donchich? Well, that's something to watch for. Yeah. I think so. Well, I mean, he did play, well, like 80 games last year, right? It isn't like, rookie wall because the college he's played 40 games. So he's played 80 games before.

Yeah. Lucas is fantastic. He can do no wrong. To me, it's more about, like, I wrote an article about this on Tuesday. It's more about where do the Mavs go from here building around Luca? If you've got this tall James Hardin,

how do you make him the best possible version? himself. If that's really the question now, like we know Luca's awesome. It's now it's about the rest of his guys around him. Right now, he's averaging 4.2 assists per game. Charks,

I would love to see him handle the ball a little bit more. Is that possible with their current roster constructs? That's the thing, man. That's really the question is because you've got a lottery pick and Dennis Smith at point guard. And then your bench, you've got Berea and Harris, and they've been killing it all season.

JJ Berrae has been like, they've been wrecking fools. Even their plus minds, it's all the mouse bench. So it's a tough spot where like Luca makes everyone better, but the best, version of Luca, you probably don't have Dennis Smith there, and the MAVs need Dennis Smith to be good at some point. So that's really the question for this team right now, is can Dennis

become worth taking Luca off the ball? Does Dennis Smith become a trade asset, you think? Not right now. I mean, I think he could be eventually, but certainly not right now. So once your approach moving forward, if you're hired tonight is Dallas Mavericks General Manager, I mean, I think the girl, I want to build like a better version of Houston. I want like three and D guys. Of course, it's easier said than done, but like I want as many. Like, you look at the Rockets, right? They made Hardin great because Hardin right now he has a 36 usage rate. And his guy just long athletes all around him at last year.

Mbamute, Arisa, all those guys. I want as many guys as possible who can defend and as many who can shoot threes as possible. I mean, that's basic stuff, but Luke is so great. I don't think you need much more than that. Right. And I think we saw a little bit of that when Dennis Smith was out for a couple games.

Yeah, the Celtics game. Yeah, so you had Donchich at the one, and then you had three or four just big three-and-D Burley guys. guys, Doreen, Finney Smith. Vinnie Smith's been good this year. Barnes, all those guys. And then you have a rim runner. And I think that's kind of just the blueprint.

It's pretty basic, actually. Kind of like Pop has said, right? Drive and kick, three-point shooters surrounding your guard. Downhill guys? Downhill, yeah. I mean, if you have a great player, don't overthink this. Don't overthink it. Let's throw an outlet pass to the weekend and look at a team that has had difficulties

building around their superstar. And that's the New Orleans Pelicans. They have an insanely difficult schedule coming up this next month. And through the new year, the worst team they're going to be facing is the Miami Heat. They face them twice. Over this next month, they have a back-to-back against the Hornets and the Clippers, a back-to-back on the road against the Pistons and the Celtics. How many are in the dreaded smoothie king center, that fearsome home environment?

That's a real question. Well, they do have a road trip against the Bucks, the Lakers, kings, and Mavericks. And they do have a handful of home games against your Dallas Mavericks, Charks, against Oklahoma City, twice against Dallas, I believe. Later in the month of Houston, maybe they have. It's Houston. Maybe Houston is fixed by then. I think this next month for the Pelicans,

it could get rough for them. I do. Right now, they're 11-11 on the season. They've sputtered as of late, lost four of their last five, beat Washington on Wednesday night. They don't have a point card. They don't have a point card.

That, to me, is the underlying issue of this whole team right now. We've pretty much established after last year that Drew Holiday has a perfect role on this team, and it's not kind of babysitting. No. Pretty much.

Drew Holliday is at his best off the ball, attacking, slashing, with secondary playmaking. Not the primary guy because that adds another additional Ross responsibility for him on the offensive end, which I think also could hurt his defense because the amount of effort and responsibility that he has.

I mean, yeah, losing Alfred Payton shouldn't affect the team as much as affected in New Orleans. That's really what it comes back to to me. Like, Alfred had a bounce. You was having to bounce back a year, I guess, but come on. Is there any update on him? He broke his, he broke his finger. He's out at least until January.

I believe so. If I remember correctly, he's out through the rest of the month. Yeah, and that's rough because the, I mean, the Pelicans, through the rest of 2018, I think they have 17 games and 10 of them are on the road. And they are two and nine on the road. They're not good. This might sound bleak, but the Pelicans started Tim Frazier last night. I think that kind of helped the team a lot.

like Tim Frazier at point card pushed Drew back to the two because they play so fast they gotta have point cards out there and all their guards aren't points right they got Ian Clark Frank Jackson so even just a guy like Fraser

like a replacement a point card could make them a better team I think that's what you gotta go for two years ago Tim Frazier logged a triple double so you know let's yeah yeah Tim Frazier

I love Tim Frazier former D League MVP before the NBA renamed the D League the G League because that's the thing to me is you've got Drew Holiday you got Atuan Moore Nick Meritich, Davis, Randall,

you've got a good team. If you just have a guy give you average point card play, you'll be okay. And can he give that? I don't know. I don't know. From Tim Frazier.

We've seen him for four or five years now, and I haven't seen much average play from Tim Frazier. I've seen a lot of below average to poor play from Tim Frazier. I mean, he's better than Ian Clark and Frank Jackson probably,

maybe? He's definitely a better caretaker. I think the past couple years he'd been backing up wall, right? Yeah, and the year before he was with New Orleans, like you mentioned. Yeah. I mean,

I think they still have a lot of time. I'm not giving up on them yet, but this will be an interesting stretch for sure. Yeah, I mean, I think with New Orleans, they're in a spot now where if this month goes sour, you're about a month away from the trade deadline. Look, Pelicans are not trading Anthony Davis this year. It's just not happening.

Like, it's just not. But I think that conversation would start if this month goes really poorly for them. Where it's like, what do you do? The conversation's going to start because I think that their front office, from what I've heard, they are unwilling to put future picks in the table.

table. I've heard that goes back about a year now that they're just not willing to put future draft picks on the table. They're willing to deal this year's pick, but not future picks. We saw that with the Jimmy Butler discussion. They were willing to offer this year's, but they weren't able to put a 20-22 pick on the table. I think that shows to me that the front office and ownership at least has an awareness of a potential future without AD on it, which is smart. You have to think long term because. But couldn't they protect those picks? What about like a top 10 protection or something? I don't know. That would protect you for Davis. Absolutely. I mean, kind of similar to what Cleveland did a couple years back in the

Corrid trade with a top 10 protection and David Griffin, I remember he said it Sloan at the time. He's like, you know, we put those protections on there in the event LeBron leaves, in the event Kyrie leaves, in the event Kevin Love's gone. I mean, with players of that magnitude, you always have to have contingency plans and you always have to be aware of that. It's a no-brainer. I think they should probably

dangle those for front picks. I don't know. I'm not sure it's worth it, though. I think that still hinders your future flexibility, though. I mean, I know you have to do everything you can to keep AD, but if you you feel like it's just not going to happen. If you feel like come June, he's going to demand a trade, and you're going to have to agree to something,

either on draft night or first week of free agency, maybe you're better off just retaining your flexibility instead of getting those future picks wrapped up with top 10 protections. I respect that because I feel like if I was in New Orleans, I'd say realistically, if 80 leaves, we're all getting fired, and we're going to move into Seattle anyways. So let's just say heck with it and go forward now. So I respect them for not doing that.

Well, that's where I think the call would come from ownership in that case, where less so than that. front office with Del Des. And who's even owning the team now, right? Because Benson died. It's all in the air right now, it seems like, over there. They're in a rough spot. Game of the weekend, though, is the Darren Nuggets

versus the Portland Trailblazers on Friday night. Yeah, I think these are two teams who've gotten, like, they've gotten good press all year. They've been top of the West. But at the same time, they're only like one game out of eighth place. These are two teams have got to make the playoffs this year. They've got young star in their prime, all stars. And I think this is a big game for both of them

to kind of establish themselves one of the top four teams in the West and not being one of the teams that's fighting for a playoff spot the end of the season. Yeah, and I feel like they've been pretty much inextricably linked over the past two years just because of the trade, yeah. Yeah, since the trade. The weird thing about the Blazer season

is that for me, just looking at the numbers with Lillard, before his 10 for 15 from 3 explosion on Wednesday, he was actually shooting pretty poorly from 3. He was only shooting 33.5 before the 10 for 15 performance, which boosted him up about like... 36.5% right now. It's ridiculous.

But yeah, I guess it's still early. And I mean, the Blazers are just kind of built for this. They're built for the regular season. They're built to, you know, capitalize on just how good Damien Lillard can be on a night-to-night basis. Yeah, and you've got a fun clash of styles, too, with like, Yokic and the pick and roll against Damon and CJ. And that's always seen with Yokich. Like, against a guard who can shoot three is what's you going to do? Can they get him in space?

That'll be an interesting kind of bigger picture look. for both these teams. And obviously with Denver's defense after their ferocious start on that end of the floor, it has declined recently. They all knew it would happen. Of course. Yeah, I'm pretty sure internally they did as well. And Yokic, you know, he's still not a great defender, but I think he's been better over all

the season at least positionally. And he still rebounds the hell out of the ball, which is always an overlooked aspect of defense. It's the- It's the very end of the defense-punctuates. It's over. Now you have the ball. I'm looking forward to that game on Friday night. But that's all we have time for today, guys. Danny, John, looking forward to next Friday.

Absolutely. As always. And thank you for listening to The Corner 3. Please give us a five-star rating on iTunes. Tell your friends and family about the show. You'd make us super, super happy if you do. Special shout out to Bobby Wagner. Ringer, basketball champion.

Yeah, go Bobby. For producing this podcast. And thank you to my good friend Elon for listening to the show. We'll be back again next Friday. Peace. Hey, guys. How's it going? I'm Annie Finberg.

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