The Ringer NBA Show - Title Pie at the All-Star Break | Group Chat

Episode Date: February 11, 2026

Justin, Rob, and J. Kyle Mann are back to update their title pie! They start by talking about how their view of the title race has changed since their quarter-season title pie. Then they get into the exercise and discuss the favorites, the contenders, and the dark-horse teams. (00:00) Intro (8:13) Title favorites (18:11) Title contenders (51:55) Dark-horse contenders Hosts: Justin Verrier, Rob Mahoney, and J. Kyle Mann Producers: Victoria Valencia, Isaiah Blakely, Jonathan Frias, and Stefano Sanchez Production Supervision: Ben Cruz and Conor Nevins Additional Production Support: John Richter and Chris Wohlers Social: Isaiah Blakely and Keith FujimotoThe Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to group chat. I am Justin Verrier and joining me, Rob Mahoney, J. Kyle Mann, All-Star weekend is upon us. And thus the activating is about to start. Rob, are you ready to activate? I'm never ready to activate. You seem activated, though. All-Star is not usually your event, but I'm getting a different kind of energy from you this year. Yes. I was afforded the opportunity to go to L.A. and do a minimal amount of work. And I was like, let's fucking go. Yeah, normally you hear from the old jaded journalist types, the capital jays, that Justin, I don't know if you fall into this category. You are kind of grizzled in a vet by now.

And the capital J. Yeah, and normally capital J. Jagoff, more like it, am I right? But no, I mean, usually you just hear people like, oh, Jesus Christ, they go into that like Nick Nolty big grudging voice. But yeah, you seem a little extra pep. What's your favorite event? What are you excited to go see? Rookie game, three-point shooting, basketball without borders. Name one, please.

First of all, I think if you've been to one, maybe two All-Star Weekends, I think you've become jaded because that event sucks. Like, just going to the All-Star weekend sucks because it's just a big old party or you go to a bunch of activations, which are, I guess, advertisements or meet-and-greet sort of things. I don't even really know how to describe them. And you know how much I hate both of these things. Yes. I just love how the first line item on All-Star sucks is it's a big party. Yeah, not parties. But, Rod, you like All-Star Weekend?

No, no, don't get me wrong. I'm ultimately in your camp. Like, I like it when the events are good. The problem with this year is the pools do not seem the most promising, though. I know your heart must swell, Justin, with the fact that Damian Lillard is going to compete in the three-point contest. That must mean something to you personally. But for the rest of us, I'm just hoping that there is some semblance of entertainment in literally anything that's going on this weekend. Yeah, I think it was a bad sign that they had to pull Damien Lillard literally off the injured list in order to defend his two-time three-point contest title.

There'll probably be something. Like, we always have such a low opinion of the dunk contest right now that at this point, you can only exceed those low expectations. So maybe there's something there. I think I'm going to go on Saturday, Rob. I think you might go on Saturday as well. Yeah. We're going to record a podcast after Sunday's game. So there's a little bit of curiosity there.

Honestly, I'm more curious to see what Adam Silver cooks up in the press conferences before the game because I think he has a lot to answer for these days. You want to hold him to account. Yeah, I'm going to put on my fedora and break out my notepad and be like, sir, what do you think about the tanking? I mean, we need answers, clearly. Honestly, lots of people do. And lots of people have been emailing us at ringer group chat at gmail.com with their potential tanking fixes. we might have to do like a full-on anti-tanking mailbag at some point because the solutions are many, they're plentiful, they're not all good,

but I appreciate the spirit. Really stirred a hornet's nest with that, not the Charlotte Hornets, since they're out of the lottery conversation in the tanking realm these days. But yeah, people had takes. People were very fired up about the tanking thing in a way that kind of spiked in an unusual way. So people are passionate about it, probably more than I expected, because I think, like I was telling you guys off air, I think maybe over time you just get a little bit of a resigned defeatist attitude about it

when nothing seems to work. But if the public is any indication, there is a real appetite to push towards solving this. Welcome to the resistance, brother. If there's one thing people love more than fake trades and photoshopping players into Lakers' jerseys, it is coming up with solutions out of fixed tanking or just the league in general. So I'm not surprised that you got the crush of emails over there.

there. Look, I'm just glad that you, I mean, you, Justin, of all people, had the fire in your belly, capital J, yourself. Thank you for dragging us along. Thank you for bringing our listeners into the resistance with you, because I think Kyle and I just needed to be galvanized, and you sufficiently galvanized us. Shagga, yeah, just the revolution over here of Justin. Rob, I'm more concerned about your like two-factor authentication on, how many Google emails are you bouncing between? Because you've got prestige. You're checking them all. I'm just kind of of like when you hop on to search, are you like making sure, you know, I know you don't want to incriminate any of your search histories and your other Gmail accounts? I'm just, it seems like

it's a circus over there. How are you managing all that? It's a bit of a circus, but, you know, these are the things we do for podcasting. These are the things we do for our listenership to make sure that they feel heard on such important matters as fighting tanking. Right. Well, speaking of feeling heard, you could hear us on two different days going forward here because we're moving our schedule post all-star break. Monday, Thursday is our new published schedule. We were doing Sunday, Wednesday. So not all that different depending on when the pod hit your feed, but so after Sunday's pod, that will be up on Monday. We'll go to Thursdays during the week. That's the new schedule. We're very excited for him because we get to do normal Monday morning

pods again. But yeah, just check that out. Any other business before we get into today's action? Not a single bit. Let's get to it. All right. So we did title pie a couple weeks ago. What was it? Around the quarter mark, you said? That was a long time ago. It was like November. Yeah, I looked in the notes. It was way back, actually. That was title pie was, yeah, between the 18th and the seventh episode. So late November. It's the last time we did it. Yeah. Some early pie. But now this feels like an appropriate time to dig in just because we had all the moves at the deadline. I don't know how many of them will actually affect the title race. I definitely want to get into that. But it feels like we know where the league is in terms of just like the players are all set, minus injuries. This is what we're going forward with. And so this is a good time to start the exercise.

I'll be honest. I don't know how you guys felt broadly, but I kind of discounted most teams in this race. I basically have a big two and then everybody else. Did you guys organize it similarly? I kind of have a big one. And then a lot of question marks and then a lot of shrugs and maybes. but I do think the bottom has kind of fallen out.

I think two things have happened. The odds have flattened slightly, just because the thunder are not on the torrid pace that they were when we last did this exercise in November. So you got to bring them down to Earth a little bit. And at the same time, some of the teams that I was saying, maybe hopefully if, if the Orlando Magic,

for example, get their shit together, maybe they could have even 1% of the title pie. I mean, those crumbs are just accounted for at this point. And there's really no reason to throw them their way given, And I say that magic is just a placeholder, but a lot of those teams that were, you know, maybe dependent on getting one move, getting one good month of basketball momentum behind them

in order to really prove themselves as contenders. And we just haven't seen that for a lot of the hopefuls. Yeah, that's an apt description, I think, because, you know, OKC, it was funny to think about the blistering just toward pace that they were on, that even though that has flattened, there's also been some sort of aligning factors for the teams that were buying to catch them

that have made it a little less, bleak in terms of the odds of that happening. But then what you said about the crumbs, I think that's a good descriptor too, where when I did this, my optimistic self just wanting to daydream and think about other teams having a chance, I had a bunch of crumbs. There were a lot of ones down there. And then I got looking at it and I was sitting there and I was like, you know what, I'm just going to dirt devil off the counter all these crumbs. There's no chance. Why do I even have them there? These points deserve need to go to other teams. And that's where I ended up. I have no crumbs. You don't even get a fucking morsel.

unless I can actually picture you hoisting that Lombardi or the Larry O'Brien trophy. I almost said Lombardi. I got the Super Bowl on the mind. Why don't we dig in here, though? I assume we all have the same team at number one, which is the Portland Trailblazers. Okay. They got Denny Avdia back. And I got to go.

See you later. No, the Thunder, number one, despite all the injuries of late. I guess the only big concern here is just when is Shea going to come back and where will they be in the standings as a result? And will they have their full compliment when the playoffs start? Yes. And I think one thing that has been kind of clarified since, again, we last did this a couple months ago is it now just seems like a very distinct possibility that J. Dub's hand

will not be right basically all season. And it's going to be something he's kind of playing through and working through all the time. That part is fine to me. Like it is a variable. It is something that the Thunder are going to have to navigate. I just think ultimately they have so much going on between the clearly elite defense, but also on offense, Shea being able to stretch

basically as far as he needs to, he's the single most unstoppable score in the league, plus everything you're getting from the AJ Mitchell's and the Aaron Wigginses and like those depth pieces that are good scores plus the three-point shooting, plus the activity and transition and what that gets you.

I just think that whatever questions you might have about J-dub or their offense or whatever perceived vulnerability we've seen in the Thunder over the last six weeks or so, just don't really pull them down from this top spot whatsoever. they might narrow their chances ever so slightly.

But, like, I went from 40% on the last title pie to 35% here. Still, to me, like, the overwhelming favorite to win. I'm still at 40, but it is interesting because, you know, last 10, they're 5 and 5 without Shea. Offensive efficiency has come down, three-point shooting, not moving the ball as much. I think in his absence, I think it's sort of painted an area where someone does need to step in, whether or not it's Jalen and with the compromised hand. I just think in terms of their penetration,

the initial attacking, like slot, whoever that is, I think that we've seen some of that stagnate in his absence. Granted, they have lost to, they haven't really had any, like, stinker losses other than the Pacers on the season. I mean, all the other teams that they've lost to are pretty competent, you know, playoff-level teams. So the other thing here is just, Shea's, you know, abdominal strain. I just kind of wanted, I'm not an expert.

on this by any by any stretch but i thought you were the ad man yeah it's funny to read it's a really wide range of outcomes here you'll hear you'll read something it'll be like oh two three weeks and then i read something where it was like if it's a depending on the type of strain it can be several months i know this held chris bosh out for quite a while didn't it in the playoffs if i'm not mistaken i forget which year that was um i don't know if shea comes back and he's like compromised at all or he aggravates that again how vulnerable do you guys think they are. I think this is my concern with the thunder overall, though, and this exercise really kind of lay that out for me, where it's like I don't really feel super bullish on the

thunder because I feel like there are more sore spots, forgive the pun, than ever before. I think, like, for the fact that Che, uh, Shet just like hasn't really kind of had the breakout game we hope for, even though nobody is around. Like the other game, he was still taking 10 shots when he was basically like sharing the ball with Isaiah Joe and Aaron Wiggins types. Uh, don't love that, especially for a guy that I think we all agreed should have made the All-Star team. But it's really about the lack of competition beyond the Thunder rather than I think the Thunder are just bulletproof. Because like after the second spot, for instance, on my list, I just didn't know where else to turn to because everyone seems to be kind of bunched together. And so on the one hand, maybe that's a

backdoor case for all these other teams. On the other hand, the case is still pretty strong for the Thunder. Just looking at them empirically, it's like the net rating pretty similar to last year, defensive rating similar to last year. There's still so much of a foundation that I feel like at the very least they get the nod, but I'm only at 30%. I actually came down pretty considerably because I do think the race is compacted right now. I do want to see where those slices went for you, JV, because you're right. Like if you look at the next Western Conference contenders, I would say there's been some

teams that have taken a step back over the last couple months. The Denver Nuggets in particular, I mean, just every person on that roster seems to have a soft tissue injury of some kind that they're either working their way back from or out with right now. And so whatever health concerns you have about Shea and the thunder, I would think double and triple in the case of the nuggets. And so the odds have to go somewhere. And if you're taking them away from the thunder, did you find that they went elsewhere in the West or did they level out to the east? Or where do you think that went? Yeah, I think that's probably where I differ from your guys because I still think that the nuggets are pretty much the clear cut number two with a bullet.

But like I have the Thunder at 30. I have the Nuggets at 24, despite the fact that both Watson and Aaron Gordon are out. And Gordon seems perpetually out. And I do wonder what that means for their defense. Right now, their defense has been atrocious. I think they've been 24th. Even with Yokic still back out there, he doesn't seem like he's moving particularly well. So there is a lot of like way more concerns with what the nuggets are doing.

I just feel like if they're reasonably healthy, they do have the counterpunch to a lot of the competition that they're going to face, including the thunder. Like I still think if you have enough guys, if Cam is playing, if Watson is playing, if Gordon gives you any minutes, I might favor the nuggets just outright in that series, not just like if certain guys aren't there or not for the Thunder. I mean, it's certainly the rematch we all want. And the nuggets are, to me, to me and by the numbers, like the best offense against elite defense. And that's like the quandary of playing OKC, right? It's like, how do you crack this pressure? How do you crack this front? How do you make up enough activity on the back line?

keep your spacing intact in order to run your stuff without getting completely shaken out of it. And Yokin certainly gives you the ability to do that when he's healthy, when he's playing his full allotment of minutes, when he's moving well. I just, I want to believe in Denver. And I think in terms of their play, they've given us lots of reasons to believe in them. It just seems so shaky in terms of health, and they haven't been able to have all their guys together for any significant stretch all season. Maybe that's a reason to believe in them more, to think that for as good as they've been, and they've still been quite good, that they'll be even better when they finally have their full allotment of players at their disposal. But I kind of need to see it at this point,

especially if we're going to be potentially taking down a team like the Thunder. Yeah, I think they're going to need to have some pretty, they're going to really need that continuity to click into place fast, because we're getting at the point to use the runway analogy again. where they're running out of runway for this to take off and reach that hype of playoff fluidity, like everything's hitting on all cylinders. And specifically in the defensive end of the floor, they're going to have to be at the top of their game to compete with OKC, I think, because, you know, is Gordon going to be back?

These hamstring things, we've been dealing with this forever. Brown, who you're depending on to be like a point of attack guy, an assignment guide, an irritant on defense. I think it's just going to put a lot of pressure on them to be exemplary on offense with not much wiggle room like in the playoffs. And I just, I worry about that. I flatten them to, they're at 20%. It would be a little higher. Obviously, I'm just, my skepticism is growing about that coming together. But then, I don't know, I'm kind of, I'm in this kind of tumultuous balance between I really, really do like their continuity. And I think that they know who they are.

And I think they could click into place faster than the average team, because they do have so much championship pedigree and Yokic clicks everything into place. It's just getting more worrisome by the minute. So over the course of the season, so not just like past six games with Yokish, not even past month since January 1st, whatever. This is a big old sample here, 24th in defense overall, which is pretty concerning. Gordon spec would be out about another month. And so if we're saying mid-March, you really only get like a week or so of competitive

basketball probably before teams start to hit the button one way or another. So you're right. Like it really is a forecast, though. I think this really is more of a discussion about like the rest of the field versus the nuggets because I had a hard time after number two coming up with the 13. So where did you guys land with nuggets in terms of percentages? So I had the nuggets at just 13% in terms of the title. They're number two? They're my number two, yeah.

Okay. What did you have, Kyle? 20. Okay. So thereabouts. Yeah. Yeah. But I think it's clear, as you said, Justin, that these are the top two.

true contenders in the West. Like they have solidified themselves by play, by potential. Anything else would be a somewhat surprising outcome in terms of a team actually making it through the Western Conference gauntlet. And I'm eager to get into those conversations and see how all that goes. But I just keep defaulting to the thunder. I just like, for as much as we want to explore these other possibilities, for as much as I would love to believe that the nuggets will be fully available and healthy and playing their best basketball, I just don't know that we're ever going to get there this season. just be the kind of curse year for them where it's start and stop the whole way.

And they're still really good because of the players they have. But ultimately, as Kyle mentioned, like, they just never quite get the full momentum of everything they were supposed to be. How many teams do we think actually has like, have legitimate, not even to the finals, have like legitimate multi-round gumption. I'm going to trademark that right now. Oh, yeah. Multi-round.

If we could have a stamp and a stamp sound, Isaiah, that would be great. Officially approved multi-round gumption. I think, I mean, OKC and Denver, I think, have separated themselves in the fact that I've talked about this before, just that they know what they do and they know the counters to what they do well. I'm like, San Antonio, I don't really trust that they've developed all that stuff. Minnesota, maybe, you know, in the West, like, since they've done it before and their team is largely kind of what it's been. Past that, it's just hard to find teams with multi-round gumption to say it again. It's a great question. Why don't we take a quick break?

We'll get into just that. Yeah, I think the feel. is really spotty. Because you have a group of teams that seems to be on the rise for the most part. A lot of these are young teams that are really trying to aspire

to something new, a new level that we haven't seen before. But then you're like, oh, what about, what about this? What about that? You really do need to forecast more than you're really banking on anything else. I had the Spurs as my third team,

but I'll be honest, I was waffling practically up until we started this podcast. Yeah. If only because last night was just like the type of, a haymaker, like knock you on your ass performance from Victor Webbenyama, like that you just really just sticks in the back of your brain when you're doing something like this. He had 40 in 25 minutes, and I know it was against most of like the third stringers on the

Lakers because God forbid anyone on Lakers as a superstar plays in a game. I had some excuses about that. The Lakers had some heavy rotation players out there. Granted, they didn't have any bigs. They didn't have any defense. But I heard the excuses went a little far, but I don't know. You like those, Ronnie James? minutes? No, I'm not saying,

Brony. In the beginning of the game, there was some dudes who play a lot. It was just Wimby. They had nothing for him. But that's the thing with the spurs. I do feel like they could have the hot goalie theory going for them. Okay. Whemby is such a trump card that I could see them, despite the fact that they're way too young to

accomplish anything like this. And his history would say this is pretty much unparalleled. But if Wembe gets going, like who's to stop him, especially if the field is going to be littered with so many bodies in terms of injuries, like we've been saying. I think the answer is we've seen enough this season of good defenders and smart teams kind of just like nudge the spurs out of their offensive flow a little bit. Like the defense is going to be great.

Victor Webbenyama is the best defensive player in the world. He's always going to be changing the game on that side of things, their activity as a team, all of that. Like I fully believe in. For them, it's how much do you trust Deer and Fox? and Steph Castle and Dylan Harper to make quick but also evolving reads over the course of incredibly complicated playoff games

where, yeah, you go in with one scout with one game plan, but by the mid-first quarter, we are ripping it up and trying something completely different because the coverage isn't what will be expected. How much do we trust those guys to make those kinds of decisions on the fly in those moments? And I think over the course this season, it's been kind of a mixed back.

Like they've shown up, like it's not really a question of effort or focus or intensity or anything like that. It's just as guards, are you the kinds of playmakers who can crack these sorts of puzzles? And two of those guys are very, very young. And the third one is more of a scoring first player who even then only has a certain amount of playoff experience. If the spurs do have a vulnerability, to me, it's clearly there. What do we think they're going to be dared to do?

We know, like, this is a downhill team? Is it just as simple as they're going to be dared to make shots or they're going to be dared to make certain reads? Because if you look at the center of what is going to nudge the spurs to use your word, That's the thing that makes me the note. I have written down for every team that we're talking about here, like why they will, why they won't. One of the big why they won't things here is that, you know, we've seen that when teams have time to kind of load up,

and we haven't seen Winby in a seven-game series or however many games it ends up being multiple in a row where they're loading up and trying to stop him. And my question to you guys is just like, what do you think Harper, Castle, Fox, what are they going to be dared to do that maybe is shaky right now for the Spurs? I think it's the cross-court stuff. It's like leaving the weak side corner to double Wemby in the post or clog up the lane

and forcing those guys, especially on the move, to make a really difficult cross-court pass. And it's one thing if you're kind of expecting that to be there, but if you're smart on defense and active and you can kind of stunt and fake in terms of some of those rotations to keep someone like Steph Castle on their toes, I think it gets really tricky in the heat of the game. And I think one of the kind of like ripple effects of this is we've seen in some of these games, where the Spurs have had trouble kind of getting into their stuff, that that brings Victor Webbenyama further and further away from the basket. It's like if he's trying to get deep seals and getting double-teamed and not able to get the ball

and the shot clock winds down, the next possession he comes up and he's getting it at the three-point line. Like he's trying to tap into ways to be engaged as a score, but ultimately if he's getting pulled further and further from the basket because they aren't able to get the ball where it needs to go on a possession-to-possession basis, that's to the Spurs detriment. And that's where like all of this stuff just gets a little muddled, a little fast, than you would like, I think, for San Antonio. For me, it's a little bit more of the big boy shit, where when you have a front line

that's going to be more physical and imposing, like, what is the counter for the spurs? Because while they want to get downhill, if you wanted to match front court size, like a team like Detroit, for instance, probably could, the nuggets if they were at full strength. Like, is it to go more cornet-wembe? They don't really have a move that's like almost minted at this point. And so you're kind of hoping that your offense could just shoot your way. out of those situations, they just don't really have that in their bag consistently enough. Maybe Wembe just, like, overcomes all of that.

I think that really is the case for them for and against, where it's like he could just be the best player in the world. And those guys typically dictate playoff series in the way that is reductive, but ultimately ends up being true. But I don't know. When I started to do, like, more matchup dependent things, I was like, so is Dern just going to, like, play through Wemby's chest and just eviscerate him? Like, I don't know.

It just, there are a lot more ifs for me with the Spurs. some of these other teams. Yes. I think the shooting is a huge part of that too, where you're right, it's like if the spurs do get into a mode where they are dealing with that kind of physicality and need to stretch the floor and want to rely on some of their actual perimeter scoring, there's like a lot of good shooters on this team or like potentially good shooters on this team, but not a lot of great ones. And there's been some like encouraging signs if you really want to pull out the microscope, like Castle shooting in particular, I think has been slowly ticking up from beyond the arc over the course of the season, which is great for them.

But ultimately, there's still going to be a lot of catch-and-shoe opportunities for him and for Harper in particular. And even guys like Devin Vassell, who is a really good shooter in theory, but this year has been kind of weirdly up and down in terms of actually converting those opportunities. And so, yeah, you have Champany in the corner, and you have Harrison Barnes, who's going to be a little feast or famine on some of that stuff. But I just wish they had, like, the one dead-eye guy who felt a little more reliable.

It's just like a pure kickout option, a pure space for someone who's having a lot of gravity, pulling chunks of the defense away from Wemby. And they really don't have that. They have a lot of good players and a lot of theoretically good shooters, but nothing of that caliber, really. Yeah, I mean, Harper and Castle are still distinctly

in the prove-it zone. They're going to be because they don't have playoff experience, but I think that's going to be one of the first places that teams go. But then another thing, just to do some devil's advocate counter the other way here is, like, if you look at the other teams, we're talking about how they don't have the gumption for maybe to answer these questions. But then I'm like, aside from OKC in Denver, maybe Minnesota, I'm like, who do we think that who else?

You're playing who's there. You can't talk about it in an abstract sense. It's like they do have, it's all going to be about these matchups. And I'm like, is Houston so decided that they have one playoff series that they lost to the Warriors in their current configuration? And I don't like that didn't involve KD. I'm just like, who is it that we're sure is out there that that is above them in that sense that is more proven? Because really it's only OKC in Denver, I would assume. Do we trust Minnesota?

They've been so up and down. I know we'll talk about that. That's ultimately why I ended up with so much pie with Denver and Oklahoma City. The rest are kind of just like marginal, like tiny slices dependent on which way you want to turn to here. So I had the spurs at 12 as my number three team. Did you guys have the spurs at three? I have them as the third best team in the West, and I have them at 8% of the pie.

But I have a couple of Eastern Conference teams in the mix and slightly ahead of them. A couple. Wow. Kyle, where did you have the Spurs quickly? I have a couple East teams mingling with them in this range also, but I have them at third tied, tied with another team at third.

They have 7% of the pie for me. Okay. I just assume that if the Spurs get to the finals, that they would beat the East team because they would have clicked into place in the way that we were all hoping for. That's a great question. Would they,

a Piston Spurs final. Rematch, rematch of 05. What do we think? I was going through all the, all the matchups myself. Well, first of all,

are the Pistons going to have the full complement of players or will Isaiah Stewart have pivoted fully to MMA at that point? Who's to say? I was actually like, just quickly as an aside, him only getting seven games.

It's just like, on the one hand, it's a complete divorce. from what Stern would have done. I feel like he would have gotten 27 games or something. Probably. Extreme and we would all complain about that. Seven feels a little light on crime,

seeing that he like full on bull rushed a guy and like tried to get him into a headlock and just fucking hockey style slam him in the face. Not saying like that Miles Bridges doesn't deserve him. I was about to say maybe maybe a couple games got shaved off of that given the the counterpart involved. There's some this fucking guy energy with that. Seriously. Totally.

Yeah. Totally. But like seven and then it was like four and some other ones. I was like, let's fucking go. This is the answer to all the problems we're talking about with tanging. Let's just fight everybody. The one that shocked me was Jalen Duren, honestly, who again, instigated the entire thing by pushing Moussa in the face. And you can't just mush someone like that. You simply can't mush. You can't be mush and Mousa. You can't be doing that. He's not mushable ultimately. And I get Duren didn't do the hold me back like hard charging that Moussa was doing. so fair enough as far as that goes, but two games for Jalen Duren for effectively starting a brawl. Impressive. Palming Musa's head. That's all he got.

Stu is terrifying, though. Can you imagine that guy running at you? Also, Musa Diabate just like hellfire in his eyes. I have never seen someone, even in this sort of situation, just have to be held back repeatedly by like four separate guys

while your teammates try to talk you down and still have to, to be dragged into the tunnel. Like that guy was out for fucking blood. I know. I've never seen him like that. Obviously, he plays with some edge and some energy, but that's not really who Musa Tia Pate usually is.

But Dale and Duren certainly brought it out of him. I'm not trying to promote fighting, you know, with my son. I don't promote fighting at all. But we can get into that more at another date. But I think, I love this. I'm so excited about this because I just think, I think that like they're in the age range like in relation to each other where man this is going to be so fucking interesting for a long time because charlotte fans were riled up and and detroit fans had like a had a righteous sort

of defensive attitude about it i just um man this is going to be really fun just because the pistons have kind of climbed to that accomplished spot early and the hornets are you know rapidly ascending i i love this i really do i'm not going to lie i did see that all of you know as is customary for mba teams they sell a lot of the game worn jerseys you know, for profit or charity or whatever. I really thought about if we should put in a bid on Musa Diabate's game-worn fight jersey. But then I was led to believe maybe it wasn't actually the one he fought in, but just the one from the first half.

So if anyone has the location of Musa Diabate's actual bloodied game-worn fight jersey, I think it might need to be a group chat artifact of some kind. We might need to really invest in that thing. I think we could expense that. I really do. I don't know. We'll get confirmation. Wait, Rob is anti-Jurzies in most senses to the point where we really had to harang him in order to wear the Pacer's jerseys for the live show that time.

But you want a bloody to Mousetiavante jersey? You're not going to wear it, are you, Rob? I would wear it. Yeah, for the record, I'm not wearing this thing. I was going to say, you really jumped to the wearing part. But he doesn't get on. I'm an adult man. I'm an adult man.

Yeah, what are we talking about? It's going to be framed and we're going to hang it in the ringer offices. That's what's going to happen. I don't know. I think even under a frame, like, dried blood is kind of creepy. It's real like dexter-coded. I don't know. I don't know if I really want that. If a crime is committed, we'll surrender it to the police if need be. Yeah. Well, I have an actual question about this in regards to the Pistons in our hierarchy here.

On the one hand, I feel like this only really emphasizes their advantage, which is like they really do have chemistry to the point where they're willing to go out months in order to fight for their teammates. On the other hand, it does kind of underline the immaturity a little bit that they could be so distracted by wanting to punch someone else in the face that they really don't have eyes on the prize here. Where do you guys kind of fall on this in terms of like the actual title race? I mean, they certainly have their eyes on the prize. They're just riled up and into it. And give me the team that gives a shit over the ones who are like jogging through

the regular season any day of the week. Are you kidding me? Is it giving a shit though? Or is it more just like wanting to fight someone? I don't think this actually has any repercussions on the actual basketball. I mean, the pistons want to fight. They got some guys that are looking to, I enjoy the, like, camera cutaways of Ron Holland, just arguing incessantly with someone, like, he won't let anything go.

It's great. Beef stew, obviously, we know. It was interesting to see Duren to be the center of it, but there's big, like, up the chimney vibes, like from the Grizzlies. What was it, 03, I guess, when they were really, or was it 02? I guess it was 0.02, or 022, when, when they were. were kind of in the same mode. Similar trajectory points, right,

with the Pistons and the Grizzlies of that iteration? I think so. But the Pistons just have so much more to offer from a basketball perspective. Like, the Grizzlies were a good team and certainly a good regular season team, but there was always something where you were waiting for them to crack the half-court offense element of it.

Detroit has some of those same concerns. I just like, what Cade gives you as a passer, what the physicality ultimately nets out to for the Pistons, to me feels so much more significant. anywhere the Grizzlies ever got to. I think it's a twofold question. Do the Pistons worry about anyone in the East? Are they worried about anyone in the West?

And so in the East, I kind of see this more as a coin flip. No offense to the Pistons who might ultimately end up as the team with the best record in the NBA. I just don't see much of a distinction between them as an actual basketball team and not as a like a full-scale rugby team trying to beat you in the back alley sort of a team. Between them, the Cavs. And then I have a little bit more of a tier with the Knicks and the Celtics. But like, I could see any of those teams coming out the East right now. And I am pretty disappointed in the Pistons as we talked about the trade deadline.

Only really getting hurt or in there who isn't really even playing. He's only played 27 minutes at this point. And so that deal for Ivy looks more like getting off money than it is adding a rotation piece. I just, I can't stop myself from seeing what the cavaliers are doing with Hardin Man. They beat the nugget the other night. Jared Allen seems reactivated. is just like been a force even before Hardin got in there. And so I have the pistons at 8%.

I have the calves in a kind of a separate tier with a bunch of other teams at 6%. Okay. I have the pistons at 12%. And then I have the calves and I have the Knicks at 8 and the calves at 6. Okay. And that's before you get to the Spurs, right? Yeah.

So I also had the Spurs at 8. So basically I have my ranking is Thunder Nuggets, then Pistons, then Knicks and Spurs. tied is effectively like the next little sub tier there. So you have the Knicks even above the calves? I do have them above the calves. I mean, the calves, the model with Hardin is still so new. I think we're just figuring out exactly what to do with it.

The early signs have been incredibly encouraging and we'll get to them. But the Knicks have also kind of saved their season in a lot of respects. And I want to tip my head to that. Well, until last night. I mean, look, they're not without their faults. They're not without some serious stumbles here and there. but ultimately I feel much better about the Knicks today than if we had done another title pie three weeks ago.

Like they have corrected some of their problems. Their defense looks significantly better over the stretch of time. They just look like a more formidable basketball team, frankly. But they do not look like the Pistons. And I think Detroit has to have some kind of edge over New York in particular. If you want to make the argument for Cleveland

based on some of that mystery box factor, you know, the fact that James Hardin has stumbled in and immediately been like such a dynamic playmaker, but not taking anything away from Donovan Mitchell, open things up for their bigs and some of their supporting cast, but not taking them out of the flow of what they do. Like I'm receptive to that argument, but we've seen so much of the Knicks,

and we've seen so much of the Pistons. And the Pistons seem like pretty clearly and far in a way, a significantly more stable basketball team. Yeah. I mean, I guess I'll rattle off mine here. Like I said, I have San Antonio at 7. I have Detroit tied with them at seven and then Cleveland has stepped down at six.

Are we just rattling off the rest of our East teams here? Is that what we're doing? Mine's put, I don't have New York as high as you do. So, yeah, Detroit at seven, Cleveland at six. I may be overrating a little bit my optimism about the hardened thing and also just the back court depth. And then if Struce gets back, what's Struces' timetable, though? I haven't checked on that in a little while.

People have wondering all season. It's just, I don't think there's a clear answer on it. Yeah. And then I have Boston at five in New York at four. I guess my trust in New York is still just sort of like rounding back into form. I could see it getting back up into that five, five, six reigns. I've just been a little pessimistic. I mean, is it, is Grand Theft Alvarado the thing that's sort of like driving the point home?

Or is it just general synergy on the next part that's saved this season, in your opinion? I think it's some synergy. I think Alvarado helps. But to me, that's more spelling what they were losing and Deuce McBride being out for a significant period of time. And you can see his pressure defense kind of amping them up in a, in a, in a, a positive way. Weirdly enough, I think it's more other things happening in the rotation. I think it's some of their level of defensive responsibility and kind of simplifying what they're doing defensively in a way that I think has helped a lot of people involved, especially

Kat Mitchell Robinson. But also, like, Landry Shamit has been really good for them lately and was just kind of like out of the rotation, or maybe he was dealing with some lingering injury, has come back and given them real minutes. There's just more parts of what they're doing that feel reliable. And they don't feel like they're at odds. They don't feel like they're pulling each other apart. Whereas that was kind of what led them down the rabbit hole into a, like, a weird tailspin and spiral that resulted in that player's only meeting, or maybe it wasn't a player's only meeting, depending on who you ask. They just felt like a team that was coming apart at the seams. And now they feel like one that's been stitched back together

a little bit. Is it the most like watertight? Absolutely not. But they're a little more cohesive than they were. I would have been more likely to agree with you had we not just witnessed what happened last night. Nine in one going into last night's game against the mighty Indiana Pacers playing guys you'd never heard of before scoring 20 points per game. And then all of a sudden they lose an overtime. And that really just hit home all of the issues you have with the Knicks where they feel like they have all the parts lined up, all the bench players finally clicking into place.

Alvarado at the very least feels like emotional ballast like that I think is important for a team that seems to you outside of Brunson really be searching for some sort of North Stars. the type of thing where it's like if your star player isn't like that sort of emotional leader that sets the tone. I think people are kind of always really more in their own lane. That really speaks me with this team. But the fact that Towns just like hasn't had a pretty steady month the entire season really concerns me. Even in the midst of this game, it was one for six from three at five turnovers. And it's just like if Towns isn't the town from last year even, then we're getting

into some really dicey situations. So I have them teared out practically in the same. line as the Celtics. I have Detroit at 8, Cleveland at 6, New York at 4 and Boston at 4, if only because I just don't trust the Knicks at this point. Yeah, I mean, I think it's totally reasonable to think that the West will win the day. Whoever makes

it out will probably be the definitive best team and will be a strong favor going into the finals. But just by like the probability of how that's all going to shake out, like one of these teams is going to make the NBA finals. And by the time they get there, who knows what's going to happen with the health of the nuggets or Shea's availability,

you know, it's like, there's just like a miss, again, like just a roll of the dice that could result in all of a sudden the Pistons or the Knicks or the Cavs, whoever survives, having a real chance. And so that's where I think, like, individually they don't have the most compelling cases if you want to stack up just like right now, who would you take pistons or thunder? I think everyone would take the thunder for the most part. But the realities of what it's going to take to make it through the West alive and what it's going to take to survive the East, I just don't think are very comparable things. And so I think not unlike last year, we may be in line for a more competitive final than we are expecting right now just by virtue of the differing paths

that will take these teams to that point. Let's say that the thunder and the Pistons get into a series together over, under two games. How many games do you think that the Pistons could get from Oklahoma City? Fully healthy. Everybody's healthy. Two?

I think two with a bullet. So I guess technically, so if the over under is two, then under? I would go under. I mean, if the answer is could, I think they could take three. I didn't think the Pacers could take three from the Thunder. This is what I'm saying. Like, I think that was expected to be like a five-game series and ended up a seven gamer that required Tyrese Halliburton having a catastrophic injury.

And even then, the Pacers were up at halftime in game seven. These teams are not invulnerable, even the thunder. Like, we're giving the thunder a huge slice of this pie, but they're not an unbeatable team. Like, they're going to have to prove it all over again on slightly different terms, and they're going to have to do it in ways that require them to out-fox the nuggets and outwork and figure out a way around Victor Webb and Yama. And it's going to take a lot out of them to get there.

Like, that's just the reality of playing in the West these days. It's interesting because I feel like the pacer is pressed on the thunder's disadvantages in the way that the pistons probably don't. I do think the pistons have the physicality in their favor, and thus could they rough up the thunder in a way that they could make it more of a mud fight in a way that I don't think the thunder particularly want to. But I just don't see if you're not going to be able to outshute the thunder and really kind of really just press on the fact that when they don't shoot well,

it kind of erupts into disarray. like where the Pistons advantage offensively comes because that's ultimately my biggest concern with them is just like they've been pretty middling overall and I don't really see a pathway for them to really hit a button and all of a sudden be better than that in the playoffs. If anything, I'm worried about guys like Duncan Robinson and Kevin Hurd are getting played off the floor

when the defense starts to ratchet up. And so on the flip side though, to almost argue against myself, I feel like the Thunder are going to ultimately be the type of team that wins four titles, but they always win in six and seven games because they do fuck around and the margin is like a little bit thinner than it should be for a team this dominant.

Well, is it fucking around though? Like, it's not that they're not playing up to the level of the game. They're just not the most consistent offense in the world. Prone to variance more than some other bulletproof contenders that we've seen in the past. I've reached the historic level of net ratings and records that they had. Sure. But so I guess to answer the ultimate question you ask, Kyle, maybe it actually is three, but I still don't feel any more certain about the.

pistons, even if it is three. Yeah. Oh, good, Kyle. I was just going to say in the broad sense, it's interesting that coming out of last year, the thing that we talked a lot about was how it seemed like the Pacers had pushed the buttons, like you said, in a way that stoked the growth that was going to cause, OKC to level up with some of their secondary and tertiary guys to make them enter into this phase that you often see with dynasties.

Like if you saw with, you know, like the Lakers in the early, you know, 2010s or the Warriors, or whatever in their run where you go from like, can we do it to you've leveled up, you've answered the questions, and now it's like, deny us, find a way to deny us. And I feel like the thunder,

because of injuries, because of just, you know, Chet has been good, but he hasn't quite really, I think, expanded totally in that way that we thought that he might.

And then now they have this unique kind of situation coming into these playoffs where it's like, you just kind of see this video game, like levels of bosses, kind of thing where they're going to have to answer the question with Wembe. I guess my overall point is just, it's interesting that in year two where we expect them to win, it's like the set of challenges are sort of different.

Like it doesn't feel as it doesn't feel as if they have graduated to that. Like we are undeniable. You better do something about it, right? Are you feeling the same way about it? No, I feel that way too. I think the single most like bankable disruptive force in the league right now is still OKC's defense. Like that is still the thing that I would bet on above anything else.

But other than that, and like you know Shea is going to give you pretty reliably between 28 and, I don't know, 70 points on a given night. I thought you were going to say arm bars per game. Well, that's the Pistons arm bars per game is off the chart. Arm bars for 48. Are you kidding me? I kid. OK, C. Don't DM me about that.

No, but I think other than that, there's just a lot that has to be decided on a game by game basis. And some of that is like just the reality of having a deeper team, that you don't always know exactly who's going to pop. And so there's a little more like finding it in the flow as far as is this more of an AJ Mitchell game. Is this more of a J. Dub game? Is this the kind of game where Isaiah Hartinstein's push shot is going to be like wildly important in terms of the flow of our offense? All those things are on the table. And it's like it's great to have those options. But then you have to navigate them.

And I think the thunder are still at the phase in terms of their decision making on the floor offensively where it's not seamless. Like they're not a machine on offense. They're just a team that has a lot of stuff at their disposal. And some days it happened to it and some days it's like, leaves you a little bit wanting. But the floor is so high because of the defense and because of Shea that I just don't worry about them. But that's not to say that other teams can't crack the code or catch them on the wrong week. And all of a sudden, O.K. is in dire straits.

Well, how much of the confidence going into the season was born from Jdub just stepping up in all of the moments you would hope that he stepped up in? And now if he's going to be playing with an arm behind, behind his back, all of a sudden, you're like, hey, Chet, let's like try to be a superstar. Let's, like, aspire to take 15 shots a game and actually step into that void. If he had those moments and he still has about two months in order to do that, I would feel much more confident in them. But if you're just playing one superstar and a bunch of role players, high level as they might be, like, that's more of a coin flip than you would like for a team that has historical

indicators. It's fair. Also, there's the fact the part of this that teams are. teams and their players are pretty ruthless about not to go back and quote the Michael Jordan, like, never tell me that. What was that thing where he played one-on-one? He was like, which knee got repaired? And he was like, this one. He's like, you shouldn't have told me that. There's also the knowledge of last playoffs. People didn't know about Jalen's hand. That wasn't, that now they tell us after the fact. And going into this playoffs, these playoffs, people will know.

So, I mean, there's that. So that's a factor. But, yeah, I was going to say, like, did we kind of shortchange Houston in terms of discussion about, like, there, Yeah, we're going to get to them, I think. Let's take another break and then we'll go through the remainder of the West. All right, so we kind of diagnosed the East for the most part. But I have the West kind of intertwined in between some of these more middling percentage pies we have here. Which West team, let's start here. Do you guys have after the Spurs?

I think for me it's definitively the Wolves. Definitively, okay? I think so. I just think there's well let's say are the only other candidate the Rockets are there any other teams we're considering here

those are the only two teams left that I have pie for yeah same I know the wolves are in a really weird way right now in particular and look they have some atrocious losses like really really awful stuff that you never want to see from a contending team

but we know who they are when they're right and that's a team that can survive and has survived multiple playoff rounds on consecutive occasions, gotten to back-to-back Western Conference finals, you can't take that stuff away from them.

And so there's something that's just like a little less hypothetical about them, even with all of their weird losses and lulls this season, even from the fact that they're still figuring out kind of what their best combinations

of players are on a nightly basis. And Julius Randall in particular has just had such like an odd season, just absolutely indispensable to what they do. And yet there are also some games where in the second half, I'm like, what planet are you on? Like I don't intend.

entirely no, but they're one of the best teams in the league against top opponents, even still, even with everything going on. This is who they are. They play up to quality competition. And I just really trust them to do that again. And so if I'm left to choose between the team that has done it and proven it, and we know exactly what they're capable of, versus a Houston offense that I just have less faith in than ever to execute in the half court, I'm going to take the one that feels a little more known at this point.

it's so tough to have any sort of confidence in a team where one of your best players is regularly calling you out for like not giving a shit. And now on the one hand, it just feels like Rudy does this every two months or so. And you can almost hear the collective eye rolling happening as he's doing so. But he's not wrong because they fuck around and find out way too much for a team that has so much talent. I mean, you just look at just the resume and also the assemblage of talent. Like they have the both sides of the ball sort of balance that I think we're hoping for with some of these contenders that like the spurs don't have that offensively. Even the Nuggets don't have it defensively. They have the size.

And now with I-O back in there, you could see the transition game just pop and they were already a top 10 transition team. Like watching him fucking in one game just like move the ball immediately down the court and just like in a blink of an eye. Like he and he must be like up there with Fox and some of the fastest guys in the league at this point. And it just gives them the extra pop that you were hoping for that perhaps papers over some of the sort of internal stuff that they've been dealing with. Having said that, like, are we sure when this podcast comes up and they play? I think the Blazers tonight, are they not going to lose by 20? Not because the Blazers are so formative, but just because like this happens for them. They're just untrustworthy, but also probably the most appealing team on the board.

Yeah, it's a weird combination because they're when they are sloppy and they're sloppy quite often, it's just a disaster scenario. Like, you just see a team imploding in real time as a result of even just like their inability to kind of get into their offense at some point. Like everything I said about Dylan Harper and Steph Castle, Deeran Fox, like not being able to make the reads. This is a team that just struggles to like, can you make a pass to enter into your offense? Like, can you do the most basic possible shit in order to be a competitive team? And some days they really, really just do not have it for some reason. Yeah. Randall can be a little bit of a catalyst in that direction.

And that's why I was laughing when you said that about him having a weird year. It's like he just has been this way. I've said this before, but I mean, he was that way when he was here at Kentucky. He was like he had this weird season and it was like the chemistry on the team was weird. You were like, why can't they do anything? And then they got near the spring near the tournament. It was like, oh, this guy's like the best player in the country. And they just locked into place and went on a run.

That has been the experience with him year after year. And I think the wolves just had. Would they lose to that year, by the way? I don't fucking remember Justin, okay? I don't replay that. I didn't have people over to my house and sit in silence after that game was over. That didn't happen. I just have it on a constant roof in my house.

Yeah, right. But anyway, God damn it, Justin. No, I mean, they have these wins that they sort of can drift with, I think, in terms of like, who's the catalyst in the culture? Because Ann is so easy, lucky, he's just kind of going with the flow. Rudy gets annoyed with things, and he'll say something. something in the press. I thought Chris Finch's response to that was pretty funny. I'd pay money to hear whatever they said behind the scene. But it makes you wonder, I don't know, like bands go through this sometimes where like bands that have been through the wars and they've recorded some albums

and they like they're trying to get creatively charged up. You collaborate with somebody. Like, I don't know, I always think of like the Billy Preston with the Beatles thing. That was before they broke up. But like I-O comes in and he is just an inherently like he doesn't know any other way. He plays hard. He plays fast. It makes you wonder if they'll kind of like, Like they're definitely an oh shit team where it's like they have to kind of see the, they have to kind of see the barricade up up ahead of them to be like, all right, we need to like steer the car here and like going in the right direction.

I kind of think that they will, but you're right. Like they're that it doesn't make any sense to put them below Houston because they have proven it time and time again. And I don't want to deprive them of that because they have. Well, I think it hits on an interesting question, which is if this is a weird year, shouldn't like the weirdest team on the board be taken more.

seriously than usual. So the hornets or who? Do you have the hornets? As much as I would have loved to give them some crumbs, even I couldn't do it. Not even a 0.2% crumb? Maybe we'll make an amendment, you know. Just a fun crumb. One fun molecule.

It's like the little leftover piece of dough for the pie crust that you just like threw on the pan. It's like, fuck it. I'll just eat this as like a little pie crust chip when it comes out of the oven. That's the hornets. A little seasoning on it crunches. A pie crust chip? Oh, yeah.

Are you just throwing away scraps of dough? What are you doing? Yeah. Why? I just did like a Patrick Warburn. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, first of all, I'm like, I got to say, I am of the persuasion where I'm like cookie cuttering that thing into some little shape for decor on top of the pie for sure.

So nothing is going to waste over here. But also the scraps, like, that's perfectly good pie dough. Why are we throwing away pie dough? Susie Homemaker over here. Look, guilty is charged. You follow this guy's Instagram. I'm like, where are you? What's going on?

Are you at Nobu? Are you at home? I don't like, who's to say, really? Do they know you at Nobu yet? No, it's honestly not my vibe over there. Oh, not yet. Rob said he goes out to nice restaurants on Super Bowl Sunday. I think that tells you everything you need to know about him.

A man of distinguished taste. I actually kind of really like that idea, especially considering how bad the Super Bowl was. You're telling me, it was time. spent watching this year Super Bowl? It was not, but I did make nachos and nachos and nachos fucking rip. No argument there. They do rip. Man, I'm a sucker for some nachos and loaded too. I'm a,

I'll destroy them. I have to be controversial takes on this pod. Notches good. I have to be restrained. I'm just like, even if we're in a nice restaurant, they're like short rib nachos, but chicken, but grilled cheese. I'm just like, let's do this. Short rib nachos. Any kind of nachos.

It's a problem. I need to make some short rib nachos next week. There we go. All right. So we hit the wolves. Do we need to talk about the rockets? Or does everyone just feel the same flatness as I do? I think we need to talk about them a little bit just because,

look, the defense is still great. They ultimately still have one of the best shot makers in the world. And there's still like a good offensive rebounding team. It's just I wish that everything didn't have to be so difficult and that they didn't have to gut out so many like long, drawn out possessions. in order to just make ends meet,

but it really feels like they do. And we're over a long enough stretch now where since January 1st, they have the 23rd ranked offense in the NBA. It's just kind of becoming who they are. They are a team that struggles to get into their stuff, that struggles to navigate any kind of pressure defensively and rely so much on Duran and Chengon to bail them out.

And then after that, rely so much on getting any kind of second chance opportunities or dominating the possession battle in order to win. I think history tells us that's just like not good enough in the playoffs. That that's not going to be reliable and bankable enough in the way that you needed to be

four times out of seven series after series after series. Yeah, I mean, it's just kind of basic like art of war stuff. They go look for your supply line first. That's what happens in the playoffs. And did you guys watch... Is that what you do in war?

You go after the supply lines? You like a Catan general over here? I mean, it is what you do. Age of Empire. You guys would play that game back in the day. Are you not up on blockades, Justin, what do you do it? What the fuck are you talking about?

Wait, when you're trying to murder another population, you go after their supplies? Yeah. Starve them out. I mean, and then they're more vulnerable, yeah. Guess who's more vulnerable? The people have no food and no, like, I guess in those days, gunpowder. You know, it's just like, you've got to take away the supplies. When the apocalypse inevitably goes down, guys, you have just, this was our campaign race here.

Justin is not apt and fit to lead. Come follow me and rob. and we'll lead you to victory. You're going to starve with Justin. I'm just practicing peace and love always. Have fun with that as you get murdered, Justin. No, I mean, did you guys watch the Hornets? Speaking the Hornets, did you guys watch the Hornets Rockets game?

I thought that that was a great indicator of what's going. We're taxing our guy, KD, too much. I'm an all-time KD defender, but it's, I mean, he's out there trying to make. He's a tough shot maker, but this is like the Olympics of tough shot making that he's being asked to do on a consistent basis. And I mean, the Hornets in particular were really giving them a hard time. But if they're not going to have that opportunity to win, to sort of seizing that possession battle that happens on the glass,

which was a huge advantage for them, it's just like they don't have enough points of entry into their offense. It's not multifaceted enough. You're loading up on KD. There's nothing easy for him. Reed has been good, but he's in orbit of things like that. He hasn't proven yet that he can be a source of offense and decision-making in a way,

especially in a playoff series. So I just feel like they're going to be overtax. And another thing, too, I think that's important is we need to recalibrate expectations. Like we do that with the Lakers sometimes with the timelines and things, but the Rockets, they lost Fredman Bleat. They've been kind of like repurposing this year.

It's been a little bit of a pivot. So I guess it shouldn't be surprising that we're here, but I just, I have a hard time seeing them go multiple rounds. They're putting KD in the worst possible spot, and we've seen this time and time again, where they need him to do too much as opposed to asking him to do too much when necessary. And that is when

he tends to just kind of stay in his lane, do what he can, but it doesn't really filter out into everybody and galvanize them in a way that as a collective allows them to overcome sort of the disadvantages, which is why he was so great in Oklahoma City and Golden State, but not in some of his more recent

destinations. I just losing Adams and Van Vleet were the type of like connectors to make the style of play that they wanted really shine. And you've seen not only the team struggle, but Adoka in particular struggle to adapt to what is clearly a new environment to where like he seems just so rigid in the way he does things, which is great for a team when they don't have any sort of identity or just any sort of perspective on how to win games, which is what the Rockets were when he stepped into

that job. And now that like they kind of have the foundation for that, you almost want him to be a little bit more exploratory. And he feels a little bit too dug in in order to dig out like. a really successful season considering where they are. He's not an exploratory coach. It's just not the way he devises offense. It's not the way he runs a rotation.

It's like he's not in the business of giving chances to things. It's more locking in on what the soul of a team is and should be and like drilling it, drilling it, drilling it, drilling it, drilling it. And that can be really successful to a point, but you also see the limitations of it. Like this is a team that could use a lot of offensive ingenuity. Like if you have non-traditional point guards and you're going to run so much of your offense through someone like Shangoon, you need to diversify those entry points

because as Kyle said, like the players are not going to be the ones doing it. The mechanism needs to do it. And the rockets don't have that sophisticated a half-court offense. And so then you end up in this place where, as we've been saying, Kevin Durain is asked to do a ton.

The shooting is like kind of there, but isn't always there because the spacing is so cluttered that the passing isn't clean and the flow of the offense just goes off the rail so quickly. And even for a team that has a lot of guys that we like, you look up and you're just like,

wow, this is really depending on Dorian, Finney Smith, and Clint Capella to do a lot. Like, they are just now really critical members of this team with Adams and Van Fleet. Like, obviously Van Fleet's been out the whole way, but the compounding effects of losing two guys who would have been critical to your rotation. And now all of a sudden, you're running a short rotation with those guys in critical roles. And I just get a little more nervous by the day in terms of the rockets. I was really hoping they would make a move at the deadline. They didn't at least one to like add to the rotation in any means.

meaningful way. And so now we're left with exhausting the same formula that has just been like sputtering for the last month plus. And I don't see any reason to think that's going to change. It's very, very tipsy in what you're describing with E-May. And then, but the other thing too, though, man, is you're talking about some kind of scheme-driven solution to what you're going to do. At best in the playoffs, that is like a Scooby-Doo NASDAQ mask where in the playoffs, they pull it off. They're like, yes, you're actually who we thought you were. So I don't. even know at the end of the day. The players, the personnel is the thing that needs to be there.

And I'm just not confident that it is. But Kyle, I'm not even asking for playoff success. I'm just asking for us to be tricked. Like, could we be sitting here in February thinking like, oh, man, look at all this elaborate action that will definitely work in April and May. They don't even have that. Like, there's really not even an argument that this team is going to be good enough offensively unless you just really want to take the most possible zoomed-out crudest

full-season metrics that still say Houston. is a good to decent offense. And I just think there's been so much, like, recent evidence to the contrary that I don't know how you would fully buy that. As we're talking tricks up our sleeve, let's talk about the Celtics just quickly here, because they were the last team I had with Pye. We didn't talk about them in the East Race, but they have the biggest growth potential of any of these.

If you really want to buy low on a stock, they're really the one. Tatum, as we're recording this Wednesday, early morning on the Pacific Coast, Tatum is doing five on five drills in the G league, which is something, which means like I would expect him to be back after the All-Star break. Seems reasonable at this point. Do you guys feel like you're waiting to see how he plays? Or I don't know.

Like, because part of me like almost wants to just immediately put them with the top contenders, especially in the East, because if he is like anything approximating what he was last year, like this can get good pretty quickly and they're already third in the east right now. Yeah, so I have them tied with the calves at 6%. I like that. And that is, like, you're right, those are kind of the two growth elements here.

I think the hardened trade is probably the single move at the deadline or in the lead up to it that had the biggest impact on the actual title race, right? That is a player who has dramatically changed that team's trajectory and style of play. And in the case of Jason Tatum coming back, there's just no way to, know what he's going to be capable of and what kind of role he's going to occupy for them. And frankly, anyone who tells you they do know is lying to you. Like Jason Tatum is coming back from a huge major injury and long-term rehab. And I love that he's getting five-on-five time.

I love that we've been talking about him coming back. There's just no way to know what he's going to be. And so you have a Celtics team that I would say has probably more of a regular season profile as constructed. Like there's definitely a magic to what they've been doing. but it feels like the kind of magic that leads to 82 game overperformance, and then when you get into the playoffs, you see some of the flaws come to bear

in terms of the rotation that they're trying to manage. Jason Tatum theoretically fixes a lot of that stuff and just shores up the roster and shores of the rotation in such a significant way if everything clicks into place, I think they have to have a non-trivial percentage of the pie here. The possibility is real and on the board, and the opportunity in the east is so clearly in front of them that you have to give them at least 5%,

and so I ticked it up to 6. Dr. Robbie over here, just diagnosing what's going on with Tatum. I'm trying. I like it. That's bold. I think you're right. I almost feel like I was a little too squeamish

because I don't know what's going on, but I think if you want to be ahead of the game, it's like a pretty good possibility that they end up, I don't know, making the conference finals even. Yeah. There's a lot of tricky things to balance, too, because the thing that sort of pushed them to this third place,

I mean, like it or not, Anthony Simons played a role in that. And then you remove him from it and you add you add Vucevich. And then I think a big thing that maybe is being overlooked here is if Tatum is going to come back, I mean, a big part of Tatum's value is just his two-way, you know, acumen. And I think is he going to be able to come back and be at that level if he is. I'm just a little, it is very wait and see for me. I was going to ask you all about like, I still lean towards Cleveland over them.

And I keep kind of asking myself, why? Why do I keep believing in Hardin? I'm like, it's very Lucy, Lucy Charlie football thing. And I'm like, if Hardin came back and they got to the finals and then they somehow miraculously, I have him at 6%.

Would that be the biggest legacy rehabilitation ever if Harden somehow orchestrated that? Because I'm trying to think of like guys in his, Bill always says call him alone. I'm just trying to think of other stars, Chris Weber, these guys who are very, very prolific. nobody get you know hall of famers would that be would that be the biggest i don't think it kind of marks to mind but that's a different situation

just the shit and the bad factor of it though i don't know if it would even would that be enough to sort of rectify all that i mean the pieces would be written the takes would be made it would probably by us on this podcast i was going to say would you be writing them i i well maybe not writing them but speaking them into existence on this podcast that's for sure i i think the everything with Hardin is so weird because obviously he has this outsized reputation as a, as a playoff choker, right? As someone who does not show up in the biggest possible games. But you know what he does do is he gets you to the biggest possible games?

Like, we talk about him as if he's just like a first round flame out every single time. This stint with the Clippers has not gone very successfully in part because of their health. But otherwise, most teams he's on, like at least get to the second round or sometimes get to the conference finals and then or bump up against historically great. competition like Golden State and then all of a sudden can't like can't quite get over the hump of that. He's flawed. He clearly has like the individual games where you really need him to show up and he does not. Like that's inarguable. But the overall playoff body of work is still pretty good. And the calves are in need of a team, a need of a player, frankly, who's going to get them a little

bit deeper, a little bit further. And that's where you hope the synergy with Donovan Mitchell pays off where Hardin gets you to the point and then Donovan Mitchell takes the moment. And then And if that handoff can be successful, and that's something where Mitchell isn't so taxed by the process of getting there like he was with past Cavs teams, I think you can see a vision of this formula really working for them. I feel like it's the type of thing, the longer we go away from his playing days will kind of fade into obscurity if he does ultimately win one. Like right now, if you won one, it would be like he won one, but he fucking choked like X, Y, Z times and like we'll go through all of that. but over time it will flip to where it's like, oh, he did this, but ultimately he won an MVP, he kind of changed the game in certain ways, and he won a title. I do think it was funny watching back like the last dance of some of the documentary boom that's been happening over the couple of years

and how much people were fucking the worst chokers in history until they won one. And then ultimately became the game's biggest winners, like it happened to Jordan, happened to Kobe. And obviously, this is a completely different situation because the body of work of choking is pretty prolific at this point with Hardin, but I do think, like, at the very least, it will be turned on his head if he won one. And this might be his best and perhaps his best last chance in order to do so, because I find myself in the same way that you're thinking, Kyle, where it's like the ball is popping immediately. The chemistry is there. People seem activated in the ways that they haven't been. Mobily isn't playing. Maybe that, like, almost overcomplicate situation where right now it's like

Hardin, Allen, pick and roll big, pick and roll ball handler, everything kind of fits. But at the same time, if Mobley just kind of slots in and becomes the defensive destructor guy that, like, he has been. And that is the, like, the expectation for him, it kind of works out because I do feel like this is their like magic bullet season right now. Because that second Abraham, I believe they jumped over in order to make all these deals. Things are going to get more and more complicated next year. I do wonder if the calves are going to pay the bill for this team going forward. And so things are kind of aligning in a weird way for the calves in a way that I probably wouldn't have expected even when they made that trade originally. Yeah.

And for them to be at this point, given the way we were talking about them a month or two ago, it's just been, like they started to kind of get their season back together on their own, and then this move just catalyzes everything that they had working for them. It's kind of dirt. Dirk kind of went through it a little bit. I mean, I don't know if the same level, yeah,

I'm just like the years and then he had that one run. I'm just thinking it's not on the level of like a Mitch Richmond Lakers thing where it's like you're just really trying to get one. he would be instrumental in it. I do kind of wonder if the defensive thing at the point, you know, the perimeter defensive thing, if that ass is going to get whooped a little bit in the playoffs. We'll see.

We'll see. Will that ass get whooped in the playoffs? I mean, this could be a full recurring segment for us. I had that down is my next question here. Will that ass get whooped? So I think that's all the pie for Kyle and I. Rob, do you want to go through your morsels? I did have, I gave out one crumb.

Okay. So these are the teams that I took pie away from in various increments. The Lakers, to me, are off the board. If LeBron James says this is not a championship team, I'm inclined to believe him. That was tough. The Toronto Raptors, who I think have acclimated themselves as like a real deal playoff team, but just don't have the high-end potential that you really need to get in this conversation. the heat and the magic I gave like crumbs of crumbs last time and both of them are just not here.

I couldn't help myself though from giving a 1% crumb to the Philadelphia 76ers. I figured that's where you're going. I did hover. The cursor hovered for me. It was a hovering cursor. I didn't do it. A classic hovering cursor situation. I just think Joelle's been too good, like too dominant, frankly.

And Maxie's been too consistently great to not at least think about them in this conversation. Plus, zoom out a little further, and that's starting five without Paul George with Dominic Barlow in there has just been one of the best higher usage lineups in the NBA overall this season. If you're looking for a team that has a chance to overperform, if you're looking for a team that, like, yeah, the season-long metrics say one thing, but this latest stretch with Joelle and B'd in full form, say another one entirely, this is the place you look.

Like, this is a team that's changing and transforming right in front of our eyes. And there are nights where they'll really convince you, And I think if they were in the West, there just probably wouldn't be enough wiggle room for them to make a real run. But in the East, I'm open to the possibility that they could at least upset somebody. And if that happens, why not? I considered it for all the reasons that you're laying out. Unfortunately, they just played here in Portland, a game where I built my week around that schedule. And unfortunately, Embed did not suit up, which was really cool.

Love the NBA. Watching the bottom fall out on the roster when he's not around, and Barlow didn't play as well. So you should mention that. Like, it gets pretty dire pretty quickly. It's real like save us Marjohn Bochamp like immediately, which is not a good place to be in. And so like if Embed doesn't play a game in a playoff series, this thing can cook pretty quick.

Yeah. They're completely reliant on him being healthy and being active and being just this good, which is to say over the last 15, 20 games, he's been, I think, the most prolific score in the entire league. So this is kind of what they need from him to make the rest of the rotation. work. And then hopefully you get Paul George back from his suspension and are able to incorporate him in a relatively

seamless way. But you're right. The rest of the rotation is not great. Like you're hanging a lot on Embed, you're hanging a lot on Maxi, you're hanging a lot on VJ Edgecombe to like really pop in the moments you need him to pop. And then other than that, even us like Diehard Trenton Watford defenders can't sit here with a straight face and say that he is

going to save the world on the nights where Embedde doesn't play. It's just not feasible for them. legions of Watford believers. I hope that's true. I wish beyond wish that that's true, but it doesn't seem to be based on the trend in Watford newsletter that I run. All right. That's the pie.

Was it yummy for you guys? Why are you doing that? Yeah, I need to take a shower now. Why are you doing that? All right. That'll do it for today's episode. We'll be back Monday morning. So get your schedules ready.

Adjust your iPhone alerts to make sure that you're up at the crack of dawn to watch us on Netflix Monday morning. Thank you to Isaiah Blakely. Thank you to Ben Cruz. Thank you to Jonathan Frius for filling in on production. We'll talk to you next time.