The Ringer NBA Show - Tyrese Haliburton for Rookie of the Year? And Other Real or Fake Trends Across the NBA | Group Chat

Episode Date: December 30, 2020

We take a look at several teams' performances in the first week of the season and attempt to separate the real trends from the fake, starting with the Sacramento Kings’ 3-1 start. Later we look at the 1-3 Denver Nuggets (13:00), 0-4 Washington Wizards (22:00), 4-0 Orlando Magic (30:00), 3-1 Pacers (49:00), 0-3 Raptors (58:00), and Julius Randle’s MVP-candidate-level averages (64:00). Hosts: Justin Verrier, Jonathan Tjarks, and Rob Mahoney Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to group chat, the ringer's weekly NBA group discussion, where the jumper always translates. I am Justin Barrier joining me today, Jonathan Charks. What's up, guys? Rob Mahoney. Guys, if we've learned anything from the NBA this week, one of us is going to get blown out on this pod by 50 points. So best of luck out there today. I'm hoping it's not me. It's sharks. I'm pretty sure it's going to be Charks. Today we are going to bounce around the league because we're about a week into the,

2020, 2021 season. We're going to decide which teams who are doing well and which teams are not doing so well are real or not real. We'll talk about the Kings. We will talk about the Hawks. We'll talk about the Wizards. Talk about all of the really popular, really exciting teams in the NBA. First, I should mention that this is going to be our last podcast on a Wednesday. Next week, we are moving to Tuesday, same sort of time of the day, but one day earlier in your feed. Charks, are you excited? I mean, it's still 10 a.m. for me. I know you're disappointed.

You aren't getting that later in the day podcast. But I'm ready to roll morning. It's almost afternoon for me in Dallas. There you go. All right. We'll talk about all that just after this. Guys, the Sacramento Kings have won the NBA championship. Or at least that is what Twitter would lead you to believe

if you checked in last night when the Kings were polishing off their second win over the Denver Nuggets. The Kings are now three and one. I believe I saw a stat that that's the first time since 2014-15, which actually isn't that long ago, but it's probably the last time when they did this to us where they teased that they were perhaps a different organization. My question to you, Charks, are they different?

Are they real or are they just a pretender in this early going? I don't know if the Kings are real, but I think Tyree's Halliburton's real. he's really exciting. Let's talk about one of our favorite rookies. Yeah, that's your guy. So he has quickly become the rookie of the year favorite. I feel like that's fair to say. James Wiseman is doing a bunch of athletic things, but I don't know if he has the statistics and La Mello Ball, as we might talk about later, just like doesn't play most of the time, including during all of the important minutes for the Hornets.

Halliburton, on the other hand, just the Cajunay factor just is there. And last night was a prime example of that. the Steph Curry deep three pretty much to seal the winner at the very least just put them up enough to where gave him a comfortable lead late in the game against Denver.

Well, Charks, you scouted him a lot coming into the year. Are you surprised at what he's doing thus far? Not really. I think when you look at him, the joke during the draft was like he was the real ball brother.

Like he's really kind of plays more like Lonson than Lamello does. He was like the real third ball brother. Because he's cerebral. Well, like, so he's six, five. He can guard three positions. He can run point and he can play off the ball. And he makes, he's like always making good decisions with the ball.

He's a good help side defender. And it's like a player like that, you plug him into the lineup. He just makes guys better instantly. I mean, they're running a lot of like Deerran Fox, Halliburton lineups. And it's like, okay, Halliburton lets you play two point guards, but you're not giving up size. You're not giving up shooting ability. And that's just really, really rare.

to me, I would not be surprised. I don't know that his percentage will be this high. Right now he's shooting 50% from three. Which, by the way, like, what did you think of that jump shot? I mean, we'll talk about that, because it doesn't look like it'll translate, but it's translating. What's the bug that would prevent it from translating? I don't know, it looks great to me. It's kind of like a push, right?

And it's like almost like he's almost clicking his heels as he's doing it. It's weird, but I guess it's effective, so it doesn't matter. It's also slow. It seems like it's slow developing. The slow I could see. But, I mean, it seems reliable enough, which is the important thing. And if you're going to shoot from three feet

behind the three-point line and kill it, I guess you can afford to be a little slow. Yeah, there's a lot of moving parts to it, but he gets it off. It's all in one motion, but it's like, shh, go. I think it's fine because the rest of his game

is just so sound. Like, he's already out there playing like a veteran. And it's interesting because the Kings, like one of their issues last year is they had these things. three guards and it's like maybe they don't have like the right three guards in order to fill the check all the boxes they need but all of a sudden they're back in the same situation but haliburton i think has made a significant defense uh difference just because one he can defend whereas

uh bogey was a little bit more touch and go and you're asking one of him or buddy heel to be kind of your wing stopper and then two is just like he's just smart as hell he just seems to make all of the right plays and daren fox was pretty much said that after the game he's like we are confident in everything Tyrese Halliburton does, and it kind of didn't feel like lip service. I mean, that kind of fill the gaps guard is super valuable, especially if you have a

guy like Fox who can give you the intense speed, who's a good playmaker, who can be a more dynamic force, and you know, Halliburton to pick up stuff in the half court, connect possessions, reroute things that need rerouting. As you're saying, Justin, he's just so smooth. The polish that he already has is

really impressive, and I think part of the reason why, I don't see a reason to think that what the Kings are doing is unsustainable. I mean, if you look at the profile of their wins, it's not like they're drastically outperforming what you would expect them to be on either side of the ball. They're pretty much kind of an average team. It's just that's broken in terms of a 3-1 record. So, like, they're not going to have that record, but what they are in terms of, you know, their four factors, all the data, like that looks like a pretty reliable team, which is what I think the Kings can be now that they filled out the rotation, that they're

adding Hallibur, that they're getting Bagley back, hopefully for a full season. And that they're and they just look like a more complete team and one that's going to make incremental progress towards being a more reliable punch. I think the keyword that Rob used there is connecting. So usually he's playing off either Fox or Joseph. And these are the craziest numbers to me. This goes back to his college days.

So he's playing as a two guard and he's averaging 5.3 assists on 0.8 turnovers. That's just preposterous. That's almost 5 to 1. It's a complete opposite of a Kings player where the numbers would be reversed, usually in these situations. New front office, new team, new vision for Sacramento Kings basketball. But see, the key thing that I think Rob said was Marvin Bagley.

And I think that is the big question, because I think they have enough solid guys. Let's just assume Halliburton plays to this level or thereabouts for the rest of the season. Him, Fox, Buddy, that's like a solid back court. That's probably enough shooting. I'm a little iffy on where Fox is going to end up. I think he's shooting around 40% from three right now. And historically, we've kind of lulled ourselves to believe that he's a good shooter, but then the numbers never bear out.

I'm a little worried about what's going on in the front court because they pretty much went away from him late in that game. And I do wonder, like, if he doesn't step forward, do they have enough of a punch overall in order to really make a legitimate playoff run, not just like the 10, 9 seed, get into play in tournament, just like really make a run into the 7-8, maybe even the 6-seat. I mean, I saw that more as Rishon Holmes playing really well. And he's like, he's been really impressive. In all the ways you would expect Roshan Holmes to be impressive, the usual, you know, nose for the ball,

really good rim runner, obviously, good energy, good mobility for his size, that kind of stuff. So, I mean, if you have the option of saying, oh, do we want to roll with Bagley in this situation, do we want to roll with Holmes, do we want to, for whatever reason you could divine, and pull Hassan White's side off the bench and throw him into the fire in certain situations. He's playing well enough this year, off the bench. He's absolutely fine for that role in what they need him to be. But I think the fact that they have those choices is the power there.

I would say the main thing is, when you look at the way the King's lineups are working, really like Harrison Barnes has always been a four. So he starts to the three, but he's going to go to the four. So that leaves one big man spot. Then you have homes, you have Bagley. Like Rob was saying, You have these rotation of big men to round your four good perimeter players.

And my guess is that's what Bagley is. He's a platoon five, can give you offense, has to grow as a defender. And for now, that's fine. I think probably the old regime was kind of, we've got to feature Bagley. We drafted him over Luca, right? Like, there's always this push. You've got to, like, justify our pick. But the new front office is like, hey, man, that's over.

We're trying to win right now. We're going to find the role that makes sense for you and for this team. and we're not going to maximize you over the team. So last year, the King signed Dwayne Deadman basically to feature Bagley. Because they're like, okay, if we have Bagley, we have to have a stretch five, who can protect the ribbon space to floor. And it makes sense logically, but it's also like, Dwayne Dedman's not very good, right?

So that's over. We're not going to build our team around Bagley. We're going to build a team on the guys who are good, and Bagley can kind of fit in where he fits in. Well, I think the upside with this is the better, Halliburton is, the more pressure you take off of Bagley, right? Because if Halliburton and Fox are kind of the crux of your

team and Bagley can be a great contributor on some nights and kind of fade into the background on other nights, I think that suits him for where he is developmentally, especially having so many of his earlier stunted by injury. We got to give him time to just get on the floor and figure out what kind of player he's going to be. Yeah,

I just look at the rotation and it just makes sense, right? Which hasn't been the case a lot of the times with the Kings. There would just be these weird parts where it's like, we have all of these centers, but we don't have the guard play to balance it out. We have all these guards, but we don't have any of the bigs. It is just crazy how Rashan Holmes was the answer to all of their issues in the front court, the guy who, I don't know if he signed for a minimum, but it was like a very minimal amount of money. And all of a sudden, he's the one that's really unlocking what they do

there. Like, Bielita is still around and like, he had one play where he just like completely bulled over Michael Porter Jr. And while maybe that's just what everybody does and maybe it's not as impressive as it sounds like that was a huge play for them. I mean, for the same reasons I bring up Bagley, I would bring up Fox, though. This seems like now that he has the contract extension, this should be a bit of a leap year. I was one who was a little bit, I found the instant max extension to be a bit curious. I know it's Sacramento and you have to pay guys to stick around. And so perhaps they didn't have as much of an option as I'd like to believe that they do.

on the other hand, he just hasn't been playing like a max guy. And I feel like this is a season where all of the, well, is Fox going to change the culture? Is he going to be their all-star there? Like, that actually has to come to bear. I think it is really as simple as if you're the Kings, you pay to keep your good players. And if you're the Kings, especially a new regime

coming into the front office, and you're very aware of how other franchises look at the Sacramento Kings, I think there are a lot of teams that would look at the situation, you know, say things don't go well with Fox. which is, I think, taking a big jump, I think he's a really promising player should be with them for a long time.

But if they don't, other teams are going to look at that and say, oh, well, he was with the Kings for the first part of his career. Maybe we can bring him in and change him, revert these parts of his game, make him better in these particular ways, put the right kinds of pieces around him. I think the new front office

is very much aware of that kind of perception and the idea that if they did need to move him potentially, there's going to be a market for Deer and Fox. I do think because he's the primary ball handler, he will get the credit for the team's success ultimately. Like, if they make a playoff run, he's going to be an all-star because he has the ball on his hands a lot. But Justin, to go back to your second,

I think he are, right? Like, if we're talking about this team in the context of the West, the front court still is an issue. I mean, we saw in that Denver game, Yokic was just bullying them for stretches of it. He's just so much bigger than those guys. They don't really have a two-way front court player who can space the floor and guard.

And if we're talking about them as more than like a fun playing team, that does seem like the ceiling. But for now, the King's got a fun team, and it's been a long time so we can say that. I guess on the other hand of the situation, we should probably talk about the Nuggets. So they are one and three. And it's probably at this point we should mention

that the Kings won one of these four games with a late buddy-heeled Hail Mary Tippin off of a Harrison Barnes, just getting stuffed in his face. Just incredible play. that is why they are three in one and not two and two. Same thing for the nuggets. They are one in three instead of two and two.

Perhaps we wouldn't be talking about them in crisis mode if they had won that game. But that's what we do early in the season. I actually don't mind it because some of the time these things actually bear out. That like the early season surprises the early season disappointments that's actually going to be the truth. And I think a lot of people don't give it as much credit as it should because of things like this. So let us have our fun. Let's talk about the Nuggets. They are one and three.

Are you worried? Is the Nuggets playing poorly, this poorly, real or not real, Rob? What do you think? I just like how you went through a whole journey there. Came out on the other side, brother. I mean, really, there's a whole arc of conversation that I missed out on. But I mean, who could have seen it coming that a team that lost Jeremy Grant and Tori Craig

would suddenly not be able to really guard anybody. I know. It's really catching us all by surprise. But, I mean, Yokic has been amazing, as good as you could possibly hope him to be. There's just going to be the open question all season as to what teams can they match up with defensively? Are they going to be good enough in rotation

with how much they're putting on guys like Michael Porter Jr., with how much they're relying on smaller guards to kind of stretch the rotation out? It's going to be tricky. And it's one of the reasons why I think I'm a little more skeptical on them as a playoff performer relative to where they were last year, even if some of these good young players take another step forward. There's just a lot to ask for on the other side of the ball. But offensively, they look really entertaining. They look really engaging. They're

hard to guard. And Yokic is hitting, I mean, he's already put together an assist reel that's going to rival what a lot of players put together over the course of the full season. He's been sensational. Yeah, they remind me a lot. I've been saying this for a while. They remind me a lot of the old dirt, Nash, Mavs teams, especially without Jeremy Grant. It's just like offense, offense, and they're just going to have to win game scoring. They're 29th in defense right now.

I think another thing, too, when you lose Grant and Craig, Millsap was always kind of the other defensive rock they had, and now he's 35. And it's just hard to ask a 35-year-old to carry your defense. So there's just not a lot of defensive players. That was the concern going into the season.

It's a concern now. But I do think they're going to score enough to where it'll be a good. in the regular season. I mean, they're just got so much talent they'll figure it out, I think, to some degree. The thing about those Dirk Nash Mavs, too, you know, they were, I think it was a sprained ankle away

of Dirk. You know, they were in the conference finals against the Spurs, but they were a team that notoriously other teams love to play against. Everyone loved coming to play the Mavs just because it was up and down. It was a fun night, but you can,

you know, if you're a good team, you can still get the best of them. I think that's kind of where the nuggets are right now. If we can even say they've played like a good team over these first couple of games, I think they have a lot of stuff to sort out. But with Yokic, too, I don't want to just gloss over. I mean, this is like MVP level play from him. As far as I'm concerned, he's pretty much in his own category,

as far as the rest of this conversation goes, just with the sophistication of the plays he's been making. I mean, there have been a couple cases already where he's thrown passes that are so quick and so accurate that he's completely fooled the camera crew. You know, like they're focusing on the clippers, sorting out their coverages. Oh, no, Will Barton's scoring under the basket. It's already said and done. So, I mean, he's been incredible.

The question with the Nuggets is, can the rest of the team catch up to what he's doing and ride that to any kind of substantive run? And I think they're going to have to move some pieces around. They signed Jemichael Green. It'll be nice to get him in the rotation. And then their second unit, they've been playing Monti Morris and how do you spell?

Is it Fekundo Campasno? I don't want to butcher his name. Sure. And, like, he's a great fun. He's like a fun Argentinian and like 511 point guard. But it's also like at some point, Can't just play fun offensive players. You probably don't need to play an entire team full of those guys.

You've got to have some balance on your team. I would expect PJ Dozier to play more to Michael Green. And you just kind of move things around a bit to get more balanced lineups out there. I feel like we do this every couple of years with these overseas point guards where it's like, oh, my God, the way that they pass the ball is just, it's so brilliant. This is basketball and it's most beautiful. Then it's just like, oh, yeah, they need to play defense. Or it's like, oh, yeah, like, Monti Morris does almost the same exact thing. why are they in Denver together?

This doesn't make any sense. Defense is eating vegetables, Justin. Sometimes you just got it. You want your ice cream. You don't want to worry about your carrots and celery. Are you saying Europeans don't eat vegetables? They don't play defense. You knew who loves vegetables, Mike Malone.

Because dear God, he took his first opportunity to just hammer them after this game last night. I am just so sick of hearing him talk about how they need to lock in on defense and yada, yada, yada. it's embarrassing, whatever. It's just like, I get it, but I'm kind of done with this whole routine. It's like you're an offensive team, just be an offensive team. And as long as you're going to prioritize Michael Porter Jr. as opposed to trading him for someone who could perhaps play defense for you guys. This is what you guys signed up for. If you want to play the young and the fun and the scoring route, you really need to play through this season, perhaps even another season, to get to the point where all of these dynamic offensive talents are able to play defense.

And until they do that, like, this is probably going to end up a bridge season, not necessarily the leap they were expecting based on their bubble play. I mean, isn't the counterpoint to that, like the Brooklyn Nets, who, again, these are all flukes of scheduling, but have looked really good defensively, and they're an offensive team. Like, I think if you're a Michael Malone, a lot of that is aspirational, right? It's like, I wish we could be this kind of team I'm describing that isn't making as many mistakes on defense as we are and will. But you've got to try. I mean, this is, this is Malone's.

coaching style for better or worse is lighting fires under guys in this particular way. I get that it may feel a little repetitive to hear that year after year, but it's also kind of worked for them. Yeah, the difference is that Carrie Irving is playing spectacular on the offensive end, whereas Jamal Murray is shooting like 40% from the floor and all of a sudden has turned back into a punk. And so like, if those guys play up to the potential offensively, then yeah, then it probably is less of a concern.

It's also like KD has a decade worth of experience and like can kind of just lock in and take way Jason Tatum what he wants to. Yeah, I mean, and it almost does feel like these Malone press conferences are actually just him and Michael Porter's text thread, then he's just sharing the whole country. Do you think he uses emojis? And if so, what is his top emoji? It's probably the dead emoji, right? I was thinking the barf.

Right. I guess one thing I'm curious, like Rob, out of the big three in Denver, out of Yokic, Murray, or Porter, who would you pick would be the best defensive player. When it's all said and done. Probably Yokic, just by size, I think. I think with Murray that he's big, big for his

position, but there's always going to be limitations in terms of point guard defense. Porter, I think, I mean, even for a young player, just has so far to go to even get to competence that you're asking a lot of him to become eventually a good defender. That's what I was thinking of watching

that King's game. I mean, Harry Barnes was just taking him to school, just do what his old man moves, getting wherever he wanted to go on the court. Ultimately, do we think that these concerns are real? What does real mean, Justin? What is reality within the construct of the Denver Nuggets? Not playing defense, I guess, would be who they are. I'd say that's real.

They're 29th right now. It's probably lower than they're going to end up being. But I think this is what they sign up for. I think this is the team and the obstacles they'll have to face. I would expect them to wind up in kind of like the low 20s. the kind of 20 to 24 range defensively and have an awesome offense. And that'll be good enough to be a pretty good

playoff team, but we'll see from there. Yeah, usually when your offense is like one or two and you're always not in, you're never in transition because you're always scoring. That'll boost your defense a little bit over the course this season. I also wonder if they're the type of team that can raise their level in the playoffs.

Like if we want to go back to the Nets comp, I do wonder if Kyrie and KD intentionally turned up the defensive intensity early on in order to get people off their backs so that they can just coast the rest of the season. But on the other hand, I do think that at the very least they show

that when they want to be engaged, they can be engaged, right? And that's really all that matters, especially in a season that's going to be a sprint. Like if you could just get to the playoffs and then take it to another level, I think it's going to be fine. Now to another team that does not play defense,

the Washington Wizards, who I would have to say is probably the most real of the bunch that we're going to get into. They are 0-4. Last night they lost to the Chicago Bulls who, going into the night, I thought were the worst team in the NBA.

Charks, what do you think? The Wizards is an O-N-Four bad team. Is that real or not real? I wrote about it before this season, and I really feel like it's playing out in terms of just the complete lack of a supporting cast around Westbrook and Beale, especially given Westbrook's limitations,

I mean, it's pretty obvious. If you're going to play Westbrook, a lot of, you've got to play defenders around him and guys who can space the floor for him. And they're literally playing lineups where they go Westbrook, Ishmith, Raul Netto. It's mind-boggling.

Like, if you could draw players who wouldn't fit with Westbrook, probably ball-dominant traditional point guards who can't shoot or defend behind the list. And they're playing two of them with them. It's just crazy. And they also did that with Beal. so it was not like something that Scott Brooks was just trying out.

It's very clear that he has an idea here and he's going to see it to the end. Well, some of that is understandable because as Charks was laying out, they kind of have two problems. One of them, Westbrook is such a specific fit. You have to basically build lineups around him for them to work. And they can work really well when you do. But on the other side, their supporting cast is very flawed, very limited. And so I can see a little bit of what Brooks is grabbing at there in terms of let's put more secondary ball handlers on the floor.

Let's get a little bit more that we can activate from the weak side action that we can get in terms of our secondary offense because it can get pretty dire out there sometimes if you don't. I mean, to anyone who wasn't watching, I encourage you to go back and look at the last play of the first half of the Wizards game last night in which Bradley Beale creates a pretty good opportunity for Troy Brown, a nice driving kick action. And Troy Brown just freezes against like Auto Porter Jr.'s kind of like nearby enough to potentially block it, but, uh, but isn't really going to block him. He's not, he's not really that kind of threat.

And the look on Bradley Beal's face afterwards as he's kind of like walking by various Bulls players, giving him the eyes, just kind of shaking his head to himself. Like it's, it's going to be a long early season for those guys. I do think some of this, though, is temporary. And some of that's just because, as you're mentioning with Westbrook, playing with him, coaching him. building lineups around him. I know Scott Brooks has some experience with that, but it really is just a totally different basketball language. And so once the wizards kind of recalibrate a little bit

in terms of how they're thinking about and approaching those things, how the players on the floor are adjusting to the fact that, you know, when the ball swings to them from Russ, what they can do with it and what the spacing on the floor looks like, I think they'll start to look a little bit, a little bit better and certainly just a little less sloppy than they did in this early going. The number that jumped out to me is that this is like shocking. So when Beal and Westbrook play together, they're plus 16.

Beal without Westbrook minus 18. And then let me get Westbrook without Beal here. Westbrook without Beal minus 30. There's just a lack of talent on this roster. I don't know that there's a way around that. Well, to be fair, they are dealing with some absences. Bertanz is still on this weird minute restriction where he's not playing, he's not starting one.

he's playing limited minutes. Hachamur is out with, I believe, pink eye, right? I think it's double pink eye, I think. Double pink eye? I believe. That's a lot of pink eye. Russ is going to miss games on back-to-backs. He missed one of the magic game.

So they don't have their full complement of guys. So that's one thing. I guess my concern, though, is you would assume that this team would be pretty scintillating on offense regardless of who's out there. As long as Beal is out there, and especially when Russ and Beal play together, you'd expect this team to just be able to blitz opponents. Unfortunately, they are 23rd in offense for whatever early season statistics are worth. And their defense is bad, but if you're going to have both of those,

there's pretty clear that that's not going to work. And I guess the question is, is getting those guys back in the lineup enough? Or do we have confidence in Scott Brooks that he is going to be the guy to organize them in a way in order to overcome whatever is keeping the back thus far. Well, it's got to be both. I mean, when I think about this team,

I think Davos Bertans should play every single minute with Russell Westbrook. They should be completely tethered in the rotation because they help each other so much. There's really not a reason to separate them at all.

I would really overlap their minutes. And as we mentioned, you really shouldn't play Westbrook and Isch Smith together, much less Westbrook and Ishton, and Howl Neto. Like, that just doesn't make much sense. It seems like an easy one for him.

It does seem like some low-hanging fruit for sure. But, I mean, really it's going to come down to can they clean up their turnovers? Because Westbrook and Beal are scoring pretty well. They're creating pretty well. But the flow of the offense is so bad right now. And that was the one thing the Wizards did really well last season was they played pretty clean offensive basketball in terms of avoiding turnovers. Everything else kind of, you know, they were reliant on mid-range shots, which they still are in a different way with Westbrook. Their shot profile was what it was, but they could take care of it.

Right now, they are absolutely not doing that. that. Their defense is not good enough to sustain them. They're going to need some leg to stand on here. And you would hope that as they get Hachemura back, as Bretons can play more minutes, maybe they can strive for that sort of thing. See, my thought going into the season was they would probably make a trade similar to the one they made for Trevor Reza two years ago to get more of a veteran 3&D guy if they kind of feel like this is the year. And maybe for the best friend, they're losing so many games up top that they don't really have the option of kind of mortgaging their future. I What's their schedule look like the next couple of weeks?

Let me see. Well, I do have, I mean, who are they going to be? Like, I guess with the way they're playing now, they can lose anyone. It doesn't really matter. I don't know. This was supposed to be their easy part of their schedule where they have, I believe, the Bulls back to back, right? And they had the magic before this.

Yeah. This is where they should have racked up wins. And I think the question is, at what point does Beale get too frustrated to where this tips over into a trade-me situation? Like, maybe this is just projection, but you do wonder when the clock starts to So those glances at the very least that he's giving over to the Bulls, like maybe those are actually the come trade for me, Victor Oladipo style ones, like a couple weeks from now when things get particularly dire. He didn't talk to the media after this one. He's going to talk today while we're recording this, but that seemed a little bit pointed.

Davos Bertan suggested that they had like a pretty long spirited talk in the locker room. So which seems like really early to be doing these. I think we're literally a week into the season right now. But I don't know, this is like, if you have Russell Westbrook, they made such a big deal about like what a chemistry guy he was and like what sort of energy he brought to the team immediately and everyone was smiling in practice. Like this is where Russ really needs to like to prove himself in that way.

And he had, of course, as most leaders do, an Instagram post after the game where just all of them standing in the line with an MLK post, MLK quote affixed to it and my favorite part of it was Denny Avida had a reply to it in which he said fam always together. So perhaps he is actually going to step up in this regard. But you left out the most important part from our guy Denny which was he threw the wizards guy emoji on there which is crucial in these trying times. Right. He didn't use the zombie wizard emoji instead. So that's how you know things are going well. It's true.

I mean, if nothing else, all those kind of looks from Beal off to the camera off to other players and other teams are going to make for great B-roll for the day he eventually does request a trade. You know, when you get the ticker at the bottom, Bradley Buee requesting with his destinations, you got him shooting looks to opposing players.

It's going to fit in really well. Right. All right. One more before we take a quick break here. The Orlando Magic, the 4-0 Orlando Magic. they are seventh in the NBA right now in net rating fourth on offense

this is real is it not, Charks? Well, I think this goes back to what we were just talking about with the Kings and the Nuggets. Like when you play the Wizards twice, you should have some pretty good stats at the start of the season.

So I mean, Orlando's a well-coached veteran team. They know how to play together. They have an identity, and they just kind of made mince meat out of Washington. I think they played Chicago. I can't remember exactly, but they're not a heck's got a tough schedule. And I think what I look at, I'm talking about like real or not, is how are you winning games? And if you break down the numbers, their starting lineup isn't actually playing that well.

It's their second unit that's winning games. So that's like the Terrence Ross, Michael Carter Williams has been great as a second unit guy, Kemperch and Mo Bomba's place. And I don't know if that's like how sustainable that really is, like a great second unit and what your starting line is not winning. I mean, it's good, but I don't know what I'm thinking. thinking like this is real. So are you saying that Dwayne Bacon isn't the answer in the starting unit?

Because Steve Clifford certainly thinks he is. Leave Dwayne Bacon alone. He's played pretty well for them in that starting spot. It's just crazy because Clifford had a quote after this one being like, Bacon, he's the connector man. He's the one who's going to make it all fit, which he's not wrong in a sense because they do need him in order to play defense and do some of the little things in order to make that whole lineup work.

On the other hand, I don't think Dwayne Bacon's that guy. But who knows? I mean, I think Sharks is right, though, in terms of the bench really propping this thing up, we really feel like a Terrence Ross cold spell away from the House of Cards falling down a little bit. He's averaging 21 a game right now on 66% true shooting, bully for Terrence Ross and the magic.

But that kind of thing is not going to hold up. So then you're left with, you know, Vujavich has played really well so far. Markov Fultz, not shooting terribly well, but creating, driving, slashing very well, I think overall. there's a lot to be optimistic about. It's just that's a really high offensive benchmarks that they've been able to set for any team,

much less one that really is kind of the same roster we saw last year, but appreciably, I think objectively, kind of worse in some ways. Missing Jonathan Isaac, losing DJ Augustine, like these things hurt. Why would we expect the magic to actually? Yeah, why would we expect the magic to actually be the fourth best offense in the league? Well, let's talk about Terence Ross.

I think first off A, he's a very underrated player. I've always loved Terrence Ross. Right now he's averaging 21. points and point eight assists. And I really respect anyone who's just, he knows what he's supposed to do out there. Point eight is what you said? 20 to one points to assist.

I just respect anyone in place like that. That's just impressive. And I think, I've read a good article about this actually. Shout out to Josh Robbins and the athletic. And he was saying what Ross was doing this year, he's taking fewer threes because he felt like he kind of pigeons hold himself in Orlando for a while, is a catch and shoot guy. And he knows, okay, if I pump the three, get to the lane,

he's getting more free throws, getting to the rim more. He's becoming a more complete player. And I do think Terrence Ross is one of the best six men in the league. He's just a sixth man for an average team someone talks about him. But the guy's talent level is quite high. When he's on, he's on. There's no stop at him. 21 to 1 is definitely six man worthy.

That is like the Jamal Crawford just like chalk outline right there. I would say the thing that is real for sure is Mark L. Fultz playing with confidence. And yeah, it'd be nice if he made a three-price. corner every now and then. I think he only has like two on the year or something really limited. But he's just like he's moving and he is just, he has this like air of confidence to him that he didn't have before. And I think that's, that's significant for them. And so while I don't think they're real to the point of a fourth best offense in the league, at the very least, they know who they are and it works. It just happens every year with Steve Clifford team where

he just like, he just grinds down on defense and they just get everything right. And they just get everything right. They don't turn the ball over a lot. And it just, it leads to winning basketball. And while I don't think that's much optimism for ever getting out of the basement of the East, like, this works. And so we'll see if any some of these younger guys who are playing more minutes, end up popping for them. I think worth pointing out, I can you talk about what the basement of the East is so we're talking about how their winning game with their second unit. And Cam Birch is a big part of that. And that's because Mo Bomba had COVID and kind of didn't play at the start of the season. And all of a sudden when he comes back, you're in that same spot you've been in, where it's like, how much

do you develop your number six pick versus how much that affects your encore winning when your bench was winning games for you? It's a really, really tough spot to be in. My guess is Steve Clifford would just bench bomb, but not play him. But that's just not really an option when you're kind of stuck in the middle like this. And that's coming to watch when he gets back is how they manage that. I mean, it's been like three years now. The bomb a birch thing has been a running trend in Orlando. Well, and that's where the Foltz project, I think, has really paid off. because that was a long-term investment that they made in trading for him with the idea being if we kind of slow burn his development,

can we build his confidence back up? Can we make him our future starting point guard? And he's made considerable strides towards becoming that to being really a long-term option there and a young player that they didn't have in their developmental wheelhouse because they're making these trade-offs with a Ken Birch and a Moe bomb, but because they're making these choices all across the roster otherwise, to prioritize winning now,

to prioritize playing certain guys. Like, that's the reality of day-to-day life. in the NBA and they were able to kind of squeeze one through the cracks because of Fultz's unique situation in Philadelphia and how disastrous it had been to get a guy who's pretty talented that they can kind of workshop here. Yeah, they quietly have something of a young core

that might not be great, but it's certainly interesting Fultz's front and center there, but they're also playing Chuma O'Keeke. Is that, am I pronouncing that right? Charks. I think it's O'Kiki, I think. O'Keekee, yeah, so he's playing minutes for them now after missing his rookie year, and then Cole Anthony. Have you watched Anthony at all.

Sharks, what do you think about him? I actually like his fit with Markell long term. So Cole's a scoring combo guard. So in these six three. So if you have Markell kind of guarding twos and running point, Cole can space for Markell be an extra offensive guy, guard point guards of running the offense. So in that sense, I could see it working.

He's playing okay at right now as a second unit point guard with Ross and Carter Williams. So that's kind of what Rob was saying, there's another guy. That's a guy that they're fine. nice middle ground of developing while still winning. And that's always good when you're a team in the spot. So we're saying that they're real as the best team in the Eastern Conference? I mean, as real as anything in this world is real, Justin. Who's even to say anymore?

What's real in this podcast? That's the real question. Here's the question. Who's more real, the kings or the magic? I think the kings are more real in terms of what they're doing being more representative of who they actually are versus the magic you're playing. Here's the way to look at it. The magic are currently better in every single one of the four factors on both sides of the ball than they were last year. Is that true or is that not true? I fail to find a way that that could be the case, given their personnel, given what they have, the mix of it. I just don't see this as being a team that's better in eight ways than it was a year ago. All right. On that note, we're going to take a quick break. When we come back, we're going to talk about more of these real or not real teams

and players. All right, from one dominant Eastern Conference team to another one, let's talk about the scorching, the scintillating Elena Hawks. They are 3 and 0. And I want to start with a stat here. Tray Young, as going into Tuesday nights game, is averaging more free throw attempts than the Toronto Raptors as a team. I got that stat from Reddit. But Reddit got that that from one just precocious young quaint, his name is Rob Mahoney. I did not see a credit on that factoid on Reddit, Rob.

Can you believe the theft, the intellectual property theft that's going on here? I mean, as someone who is really crunching the abacus over here to make that stat possible, I am furious, furious. All right, so the Hawks are playing well, perhaps another team that's got a little bit of a skisket. schedule bump, but they have had some significant adversity just to start here. It doesn't seem like most of their guys have been available.

Rajan Rondo missed a game or two. Clint Capella just like just doesn't play anymore. He just shows up once. He's back. He missed the first two and then he's back. But now he's still like questionable all the time. He's pretty much an apparition, I would say at this point. Their stud rookie hasn't played yet.

And so there's a long way of saying that they have had actual obstacles to overcome And yet, here they are just like blitzing teams left and right their second in the league in net rating. Rob, real or not real, the Atlanta Hawks. I would say real, but a little bit inflated just because of the same kinds of scheduling considerations we've been talking about throughout this whole pot. You know, when you play against Chicago, Memphis, and Detroit, your offense is going to look pretty good. Some of your defensive issues aren't going to look as bad as they might be. Ultimately, I think, though, this team has the profile to be one of the best offensive teams in the league. I mean, they're super deep and more fundamentally,

I mean, now that we've seen what they look like with Clint Capella back in the lineup, they're going to get some fish in a barrel open three-pointers. Like guys in really, really good shooters, guys like Bogdan Bogdanovich, guys like Gallo, guys like Kevin Hurder, are going to get wide open threes

because when we saw kind of our first glimpses of what the Trey Young, Clint Capella, pick, and roll will look like, it's very tough to guard. And more, I mean, more fundamentally, it's tough to guard because Trey Young has gotten so good at the, timing of his delivery in terms of when that third defender is kind of sneaking into the lane to

try to stop Clint Capella from getting a free dunk and you're just leaving wide open shooters on the perimeter. It's going to be one thing if that guy's Cam Reddish, but it's very much another thing if it's any of those three guys I laid out. So they're going to have some really good looks, I think, all season long. The pick and roll game is going to be really strong. And they have enough guys to kind of stagger people in and out of the lineup, even when, as you mentioned, they basically had two guys who were totally out of the rotation right now due to injury who could conceivably be in Anyaka and Kongwu and Chris Dunn as well. And then other guys who have missed multiple games due an injury with no real problem to their productivity.

So it's been really impressive so far. I will say I will not have any Cam Reddish slander on this pod, Rob. So just lay the ground rules. Is it slander to say you might not be as good a shooter as Bogdan Bogdanovich? We're only saying positive things about Cam Reddish. And that's what I wanted to talk about. That's what stood out to me in the first three games was that Reddish and Hunter are playing. better. And I think there's such a huge part of this team because they give them,

that gives them that gives them that length and athletic ability on the perimeter. And if they're knocking down shots, they don't have to be like world beaters, but, you know, they're year two now. And my big concern with them going into the season was like those two wings kind of get forced out of the rotation of all these newcomers. But Boggins coming off the bench, then they little came off the bench, which is very impressive for the Hawks to sell that to these veterans. And if those two guys are playing well, then I think, all the rest of the pieces fall into place. And then, like, you look at their team.

So here's our top eight players this year, most likely. Trey Young, Bogdanovich, Hunter, Reddish, Herder, Collins, Capella, Gallo. That's eight good players if Reddish and Hunter are playing well. That is really, that's a good rotation. Like, that top eight could, and Trey's obviously playing incredible. So to me, if Cam and DeAndre keep playing well,

this team could be really good right now. You forgot about Solomon Hill? Rajan Rondo Fernando that was four for eight from three Solomon Hill in a single game just crushing it

literally more threes than he ever made in New Orleans in this one night yeah I guess the question is at what point do Reddish and Hunter is just being the

catch and shoot guys enough for them like they're playing the role and I think that's that's been good for them they've just been like just completely scintillating on offense

I think it's like one 24, 122, 120, 120. Like, they're, they're just putting up points, regardless of who's been available. The question is, it's still a lot of guys. Like, the last game, yeah,

Copella played, but Gallo didn't. And Nathan Knight, our favorite two-way player, he's going to need some minutes here soon. So, I don't know. I don't know. Nathan Knight into too many guys' conversation, Dustin.

He was good. He was good. He was good. Lloyd Pierce loves him. I think it makes sense now. Like, if two or three guys a night are going to be injured, then yeah, things are going to be make a little bit more sense. I think it's going to be a different conversation when all these guys are available.

And Rajan Rondo is only playing like five minutes a night. What is he going to say about that? What do you guys think about Bogdow? Just briefly, what do you guys think about Bogie here? Because he's kind of the flip side of the King's conversation, right? I mean, I think the reason he works in Atlanta and has worked well so far is because Trey Young is, while still obviously the driver of that offense, given the ball up early, doing hit-ahead passes.

They're really moving the ball ahead in a way that lets guys like bogey make place that makes him more than just an accessory to the offense. And for that matter, empowers Cam Reddish and DeAndre Hunter to do some fun things in transition that may help to appease them if we're talking about kind of a long-term strategy here. Like give those guys some kind of creative freedom

and I think they'll be a little bit happier in the long run. So that's where I kind of like what the Hawks are building in terms of a cohesive whole. It's going to be a challenge to fit everybody in and get everyone the minutes that they won, especially some of these veteran guys. Like Rajan Rondo is accustomed to playing minutes, especially come playoff time if the Hawks get into the playoffs.

He's going to want to be involved and how you sell him on the idea that, oh, maybe we need to play this other guy a little more tonight. Maybe Kevin Herder is going to kind of run back up point for us for this stretch. That could be a thing. But ultimately, I really like what they're doing. And defensively, even, you know, they've shown some interest in switching a little bit,

which for a team that is very wing-heavy, has a lot of kind of rangey threes and fours. and Clint Capello is a good switch center by all accounts. I'm kind of interested in what they're doing there, even if I don't think it's going to be a top 10 defense per se, but they have enough range and optionality to kind of keep things interesting. I mean, yeah, kind of going off what you're saying,

I'm looking at the numbers right now. Bogdan's averaging 13 points a game off the bench and playing 29 minutes. I would not have thought a guy would take 18 million a year to be a backup on the Hawks and play like, because right now they have tray at 34 points, and then they have like six guys between 10 and 14 points. And if that can keep up,

and it's bogged in Gallo, really. Like, I've been very impressed with those guys kind of taking a role and not just demanding the ball. Because my sense was, if they're going to come to Atlanta and take a bunch of money, they're just going to want the ball out.

But they haven't played that way. They've really kind of played his role in a system. It's been very impressive to see. I think you tried to Lloyd Pierce, getting guys to buy in. That's drafted through the coach right there. Yeah, this is kind of the flip side of our earlier conversation about

what does the early season stuff actually mean here? I think it's good for a team like the Hawks to start to stack up wins because questions like this, those don't matter as much. Perhaps people aren't griping as much about playing time, their roles, etc. And we're not asking whether or not the Hawks are going to fire Lord Pierce at this point. We're saying, hey, is Trey Young an MVP candidate? Can you get into the conversation? Those type of things kind of tend to snowball.

And so I do wonder if they stack up a couple wins here. That's going to pay off in the long run. And as I'm looking at their schedule, it only gets easier going into the new year. So they have Brooklyn twice. We'll see who ends up playing with those you'd expect, considering what they did recently, that Kyrie and Katie might not play in both of those games. When they have Cleveland, who knows, maybe Cleveland is actually the surprise team here, New York, Charlotte, and Charlotte.

And so that's a nice runway here from the scheduling gods to get them kind of rolling. I think you're onto something there just in terms of if you're a coach, having that anchoring bias is a powerful thing to show like, oh, if we just get back to the way we play to start the season when everyone was buying into their roles, when everyone was doing what they were supposed to do, it's your proof of concept, kind of baked into these first couple games,

even if the competition level wasn't great, even if you've had guys out of the lineup, there's something you can show there, not just on film, but to say, look at the results of these games as well. I think if you're looking for a griper, I'm looking at John Collins. That's something to watch.

It's a guy who turned down an extension playing for a new contract. His minutes are down, his points are down, field goal attempts are down. And right, it's easier to buy into a role when you've got that big contract, right? When you're Danilo and Bogd you've got 80 million bucks in your back pocket.

John Collins is not. And that'd be something, if you were looking about like too many guys, that'd be the guy, I think, to watch for us to see how he feels about everything. Yeah, that was a curious one. That was like, what, 90 million, I think it was reported. And he just wanted to hold out

because he thought he was max worthy, which maybe on next year's market where there just aren't a lot of guys but on the other hand I don't know where to your point charts where the production is going to come from with so many people on the team and also like who needs a stretch

for center who doesn't play defense right now like what good team I mean the pistons don't have any money anymore they can overpay him in order to get him on the team I got a team for you actually somebody in the league floated this to me Dallas John Collins and KP

that actually kind of might make my work. Are they the same person just what John Collins just isn't stretched out longer? No? Just like physically like John Coles is an elite athlete

and catches lobs above the rim. KP is a catch and shoot three point guy. I don't know. Still can't play defense. KP can guard. If he's right by the basket. That's going to be his job and John Collins is a perimeter.

He's a fast guy. So you went John Collins roving the perimeter while KP is protecting the basket. I don't think that works. In John Collins' defense with how he's played so far, there's been a lot of weirdness with foul trouble and stuff like that, which I think only has made it easier to kind of sort through some of the rotation issues. So when John Collins is playing well enough and involved enough

and avoiding fouls well enough to play 30 minutes a night, how does that strain some of these other guys like a D'Andre Hunter who's filled in for them at the four a lot? And I think to kind of bring it around this whole real, not real conversation, just the tenor of this hawks conversation, you compare it to that wizard's conversation and that magic conversation. We're trying to come up with problems

about having too many talented players. The players are playing Netto and Isschmidt together. Different type of problem. So what you're saying is they don't need to expand, they actually need to contract the NBA. All right, here. Let's move on to a player that none of us have a debate over because he is incredible and just crushing the league.

That's Demada Sabonis, who all of a sudden is looking like skinny Nikola Yokic. The real skinny Yokic is playing in Indiana. 22 points, 11 rebound, 7 assists on 54, 46, 60 shooting. The last one is a little troublesome. But we'll see here. Charks, real or not real, your guy, Domas, as not only an All-Star, but a potential All-Star starter here.

I think we're kind of talking about coaching. This goes back to the new coach. Like, clearly, Nate Bjork, came in with the plan, he said, I'm going to make Sabonis the guy, which I respect. Like, he had a vision fully wanted his team to be, and we're seeing it now. He's just being used in a different way. I believe he's number two right now in touches in the league behind Yokic. So all of a sudden, we're seeing the Sabonis hub, and now the assists are going up because

he has a ball in his handsporn. He was really more of a score when he first came in the league. And it's pretty cool to see him change his game and see this new vision for the team kind of play out with him in Indiana. Yeah, that whole offense seems really wired to attack the rim right now in a way that suits Savonis really well. And the spacing has been great. The flow has been great.

I mean, his hair included in that regard. But he has every opportunity to not only eat, but to set the table for everybody. So, like, that's going to be the thing is, you know, we know he can be a massively productive score and rebounder. Is he still going to be a Yokic level, a sister, you know, coming deep into this season? I think he has a real chance to just given the way their offense operates right now.

Yeah, that starting unit just works. And especially now that Ola Depot is starting to look a little bit more like old school Ola Depot. And there was just one series where he attacked the rim. And then you could see that the Celtics defense over adjust to stopping him. And it left Malcolm Brogden wide open for three-pointer. And you have a 50, 40, 90 guy on the perimeter just like salivating for the catch and shoot there. It's just, there's a lot of solid guys going around here. T.J. Warren doesn't have to do as much as he did in the bubble.

which is disappointing for perhaps his statistic and all of his fans out there. But it's just, there's a lot of good, solid guys on this team and they go like, I don't know, nine deep in rotation where you have Aaron Holiday, other guys, it makes a lot of sense. I guess here's my question. Where are we on Miles Turner this week?

Our weekly Miles Turner check-in. Is he good? He's doing what they need him to do. He's playing ball, you know, like he's, guarding really well. His defense has been really good. I think he's doing the stuff that if you're looking for signs of like attitude problems or chemistry problems, he's not doing any of that stuff. Like he's feeding Sabonis in the post. He's doing the handoffs. He's doing all the kind of the thankless floor spacing type things that you want a Miles Turner to do. So as to whether he's deep, you know, in the depths of his

soul, is he really satisfied with this situation? I suspect not. But he's doing what they need to do. That list of NBA players and frankly people in general is pretty short. But he's doing enough of the day-to-day at a really high level to get them where they need to go. And I think, you know, kind of going back to what we were saying earlier with schedule. So they played the Knicks, they played the Bulls, and they played Boston twice. And Boston is pretty clearly figuring themselves out still. Brad Stevens is running out this incredible Daniel Tice, Tristan Thompson, Twin Towers look. The genius, Brad Stevens.

starting two centers. That's the move here. It's going back to Twin Towers, actually. I mean, it's way more, it's not even like zagging. It's like, I don't even know, zogging. Like, it's like a complete galaxy range.

We're going to play two non-spacing undersized bigs together. Yeah, and it's not like something that he's trying out and he's going to go away from. He's like, he keeps doing it. I thought it was just like a one game. Like, these guys just have two bigs, the Milwaukee Bucks, starting Brooke Lopez, starting Janus.

Like, we need the size. in the heft off front. Nope. He's just doing it. He had Tristan on Kevin Durant in one of those games. Like for a significant stretch of time. He's like, all right, Tristan, you should have to guard KD. It's just the lineup we got out there.

Yeah, we had analyzed that decision in the offseason to give Tristan Thompson $9 million a year. We didn't realize he was going to be the perimeter stopper for the Boston Celtics. So in that sentence, maybe it is a good contract. Well, you mean to tell me that Tristan Thompson isn't your go-to replacement for Kemba Walker when he's out of the lineup. Like, that's not what you would do. No, that would be Peyton Pritchard, actually, as we saw in this Indiana Pacers game.

Here we go. I mean, where's Peyton Pritchard on your early MVP ladder, do you think? Definitely behind Trey, but I probably have him above Subonis at this point, right? He's the realist for sure, Peyton Pritchard. We're talking about real, not real. Someone told me that someone called him 8 Mile. I think it was Jason Dayton, which is pretty cool. I love it.

I thought NBA nicknames were dead, but Jason Tatum's bringing him back, I guess. Yeah. Charks, you wanted to talk about Jalen Brown because he is another of these guys who might be real or not real. Yeah, I mean, I think he's really getting, you're saying without Hayward, without Kemba, he's doing a bigger role. I believe he's averaging career highs and points and assists. Yeah, I mean, then Jalen Brown's just a guy who's gotten better every year, and it's just cool to see. I think right now he's getting born Tatum in both categories. He's just a guy who adds him to his game every single season.

And now I think that's a natural progression for him is, especially when Tatum's out, it's like, okay, Jalen Brown can always score. Now he's learning the past of all the other guys and just taking. He's still so young. I think he has to be real because when I watch the Celtics, he's still, and even more so than he was previously, such a sneaky, oh, it's the third quarter and he has 20 points kind of guy. Like, there's nothing he's doing that feels fluky.

There's nothing he's doing that feels out of pocket. playing within himself, playing really hard as usual, dynamic, athletic. He's Jalen Brown. He's a really good player and he keeps taking steps forward. I think he has a really good chance to be a first time all-star this year, so we'll see if that pans out for him. Yeah, it kind of has to be because when you look at the Celtic step chart these days, there's just a lot of...

Huh? And the fact that Peyton Pritcher is playing significant win-ins and probably swung that game for them last night against the Pacers. like it's looking a little bit more thin and a little bit more dire than you'd like him to be. I know it's early, but they've played the teams that they're going to have to really prove themselves against.

Like, Pacers are a team that are probably going to be around where they are in the standing, the bucks early in the season. I don't know. It just, what they've gone to in the past just doesn't seem to be there. Like, they're 26th on defense, which is a little concerning for me,

because you would expect, regardless of where you are on the season, regardless of who they're facing off against a Brad Stephen team is going to play defense. And I don't think it's, you could attribute that specifically to the Twin Towers look that they're going with. It's just, I don't know, it's just a little, it's a little wonky, which is not something you would typically say of a Brad Stephen's theme these days.

What's where to Charks's point? I think they just need time, time to level out, time to figure out their rotation. There's, this is a team that should have continuity, but losing Kemba is a pretty huge piece in terms of figure out, you know, the way all this is going to shake out. And Payton Pritchard for as commendable as his efforts have been in the looper against, you know, T.J. McConnell and the Pacers, you know, that's just not the answer. So you're going to need, you're going to need more substantive rotation change, I think, to level things out.

I mean, this to me is a team. Like, this is a deadline team. Like, they've got all their picks. They've got that massive exception. Like, they've got to finally make a trade. I think they will at the deadline. I think my question is just, like, what is that trade? Like, is it Blake Griffin? Are you going to take a chance at that he could play half a season? Right now he's been touch and go. Like, he had one good game and, like, most of the other games, I'm just like, he just doesn't look like he can move. He has rigum artist already.

And, like, where are the assets in order to get the impact guy that they need? They have all these young guys, most of whom don't play except for Pritchard or are hurt, like, Romeo Lantford. And so you're really looking if you want to have a significant upgrade. If you want, like, a James Harden, Bradley Biel type, you're probably getting rid of Jalen Brown. And so... See, I don't think they need that.

I think, like, if Tatum and Brown are your best two players, that's a really good team, they just seem like a five, six, seven guys. And they've got picks for that. And they got this exception, right? I think they just need to add like two or three more starting caliber rotation players. And those guys are easier to find when you have your, I think like Rob was saying earlier, to me, Taden Brown will probably make the next, I don't know, five All-Star teams, most likely. Like, these are two perennial all-stars, too much more positions the game. It makes I throw out their team around those guys. Not enough guys, the corollary, the contrast to too many guys? Definitely.

All right. Another team that perhaps doesn't have enough guys right now, that is the Toronto Raptors. They are 0 and 3. They have the last ranked offense in the NBA, which is pretty troublesome. I think the conversation

probably starts with Siakum here, unfortunately. I know we talked about this last week, but really our concerns have kind of come to bear. Eric Carine and the Athletic had a really interesting piece about this coming out of last night's game. in which he was basically saying that we should probably be celebrating Lowry's brilliance more than Seacum's struggles. But on the other hand, long term, it doesn't seem like relying on a guy who's 34 and going into a contract year is something you can count on as much as the guy who's starting his four-year deal, who you're expecting to take a leap forward after losing guys like Gasol and Sergei Baca.

it just seems like he doesn't have enough around him in order to mask some of his deficiencies and they're asking him to be more of that frontline guy and so far he really hasn't shown he could step into that role. What do you guys think? The more I've seen Pascal in kind of the post-scouting report era on him

since the leak has really kind of cracked down on what he does well, the more it seems to me that the problem is his ball handling and he's just not an effect, he doesn't have a tight enough handle to be a really effective one-on-one point. player right now. So if that can, if he can refine that part of his game, and again, that's more of an off-season type thing. That's more of a multi-year project. As for where he is right now,

I just don't see him being that guy. I think there's such clear limitations, such a clear ceiling as to if you're in a late game situation and need Pascal to create offense for you, you're just, you're hitting, you're hitting the wall so frequently that it would worry me. But I think with the Raptors, as you laid out, Justin, they are the worst offense in the league so far. I don't think they are that. And so, you know, really we're talking about Pascal Seaccom's going to be who he is, but can Norm Powell shoot better than 17% from the field? Can Fred Van Fleet hit some more shots? Can some of these, can the cohesive pieces of the Raptors blend together in the way that they always seem to do? That's kind of what I would be banking on in terms of this, this not

being so real as it seems right now. I know, I know it hurts for the Toronto slash Tampa Raptors in terms of what their offenses look like, but there's a, you know, brighter days ahead. Yeah, I look at this team, what I think I was surprised by when I was kind of looking at the roster for the season, I figured they would go smaller a lot more. And I think that would probably help Siakum playing more at the five. I mean, he's big enough to do it in the way the league is now. They really haven't done that. I think it's like I looked at it last night. They'd played like five minutes without either Boucher, Len, or Baines.

And those guys just, to me, like, that's just not a great center lineup. Aaron Baines looks a little old out there. Boucher is so skinny. I would just go smaller. I think that's something, they always kind of had surge and Mark. Those guys let them play big while still spacing the floor.

It was kind of the best of both worlds. And I think they got to have to trade off a little bit, play smaller, play faster. I think that'll get their guys going a little more in offense. That's the move to me. Maybe they need Nate Bjorkren back to kind of whisper.

The real, maybe Nate Bjorkren's the real, he's the real genius here. I don't know. Yeah, they need a couple more box of ones that throw out there. I love that Chris Bouchet is the type of player who can score 22 points and look like the second coming of, I don't know, Nicola Yokish or something, and then the next game he plays five minutes. It's just like that's the type of guy he is.

But I mean, they were playing the Sixers. And like, if you don't have the half to go up against Embed and then Tony Bradley, like, it's just like, I don't know what you're going to do out there at the center position. That's the thing. Like, their schedule has really worked against them in terms of playing some of their smaller, more dynamic lineups between playing the Sixers and also playing the Pelicans who are enormous. So I get why they've played as big as they have so far. I think we'll see them toy with some different ideas given an extended term. Yeah, I mean, they played the Spurs, which was a close game that they lost in the waning minutes. Same thing with the Sixers last night.

So it is a schedule thing to a large degree. But like, you know, this team is thinner than it is in the past. And it's just like, get back to this Yakum point. I mean, there was just so much like institutional knowledge baked into the Casal Serja Baca front line. And like it seems like they're playing that way. where it's just like the margin for error is a lot thinner than it was in the past because you could just rely on those guys to just kind of like figure it out because they're so smart they have so much time together and it's more just like exposing siacum and basically

saying like you got to win this for us buddy or maybe cow lowry can just like take 30 charges in the last quarter and then that will do it and like he'll just like finagle his way into a win but there's just like there's only so much you could do with the lowry part of that before the siacum part becomes a concern i guess i guess i not if we're speculating a bit, do you guys see the Raptors as a possible Harden Beal team? I would. Sure.

I don't see what the ceiling is on Seacom at this point. Like, can he be an all-star starting type of player, lead your offense type of player? Because that's what they need him to be. They're kind of like paying him to be that at this point, and it just feels like a stretch too far in order to really thrust that upon him. Who is the better fit, though?

Hardin. Because if you think, like, would Siakam be the guy that goes out in the trade? Would he be kind of like your... Well, I don't know. These days, I mean, it would probably be him or an obi, right? Perhaps both, depending on who they're going after? If you trade both, then you're really thin, right? That's the question.

That's the hard with all these superstar trades. It's so hard to find that team that has the pieces to trade for these guys. And then when they get their stills and that piece of those guys to be happy, that that medium is really hard to find. What also doesn't help that the Raptors are such kind of a guard, a perimeter heavy team right now in terms of their front court being gutted and we're talking about them

potentially trading some of their best front court players for other good guards. You're kind of stacking good on good in that regard. But I mean, it comes down to if we are going to credit the Raptors winning the championship to their collective intelligence of Lowry and Gasol and Abaka and Van Fleet

and Danny Green and Kauai and all these guys mind melding defensively, it's going to hurt when a lot of those guys leave. And they haven't really replace them other than some developmental project guys like a Chris Boucher who's coming up through the ranks but they haven't really brought in a lot of new talent to replace

those guys so at some point they're going to have to do that whether that's Hardin or Beale or whoever the next star is but they've got moves to make speaking of next stars let's talk about Julius Randall really quickly so our guy is averaging 23 points 10 rebounds 6 assists shooting 69

percent from 3 He had a triple double against my Cleveland Cavaliers last night. The list of like recent triple doubles for the Knicks in franchise history is incredible. I can't remember this like every name, but it was Randall, Alfred Payton,

Mario Hazonia. It was really good. So our question is, is MVP Julius Randall real or not real? I mean, you can't argue with the results. And here's the thing. Like, Long term is it good for this team for Julius Randall to be good?

I guess you can do the Marcus Morris style flip them at the trade deadline and get another asset. But at what point are they going to lean into their young guys who are supposed to be their young core and stop messing around with the Randalls and they'llford Payton's and all these other guys and actually like invest in Mitchell Robinson as opposed to like Erlins Noel. It's just like I keep hearing about how they're building toward the future. And yet it seems year after year now they're building toward just retread veterans who, might have resale value, which is like something, but not like what they probably need. Yeah. And, you know, the Marcus Morris trade was great. And it got them a manual quickly, who might be a decent rotation player.

But it's not a way to really change your fortunes. And kind of go off what you're saying. Right now, Julius is fifth in the league in touches. And he played 43 minutes last night. And when you're kind of like thinking the worst case scenario with Tibbs, it's probably riding your veterans all the time to win five more games in a bad season. and not getting... Because if Julius is going,

how's RJ going to get going? I mean, when Obie Toppin gets back, what's his role of Julius is playing that in my? It's just... It's kind of concerning, for sure. With guys like Julius Randall, really productive players on, I think,

what are going to be bad teams, I think a lot about the way that NBA talent evaluators look at the G League, right? Like, when NBA teams are looking at the G League, they're not looking at the guy who's putting up monster numbers.

They're looking at the guy who's going to fill a role. And if you're a contender, I don't know what you would see about MVP level Julius Randall, fifth in the league in touches, and think, oh, that's the guy we want coming off our bench to complement

everything we have going on here. When the entire universe of the Nix is oriented around Julius Randall dribble drives and apparently an unstoppable fadeaway jumper, like, I guess I just have a hard time getting to the point where I see teams are like really lining up

to trade for him. I mean, when you're 4-4-4 from 3, man, he's got to keep feeding that hot hand. Let it fly. I think the most surprising part is if I had to pick the guy that I would assume Tibbs would yell at just immediately. It would have been Julius Randall. Like he is the complete opposite of everything you'd expect a Tibbs player to be. But here we are.

And he is the focal point of a two-and-two team. And one of the pleasant surprises of the early going. It's been pleasant. I mean, I certainly wasn't expecting him to be like the best player on the floor in a game against the bucks this season. I am surprised there are a lot of teams here now who have these young cores like the Knicks who just aren't playing their young guys and are just sticking with the veterans

the Pistons are a team like this, the Hornets, as I mentioned before. There's this weird thing going on here where a lot of teams are favoring their veterans and I think they really need to bring the controls back from their coaches. Well, it's week one. Sometimes these things suss themselves out by a month or two into the sea.

You got to kind of put up a certain face for your veteran guys and then you slowly fade into playing the Isaiah stewards of the world a little bit more. Well, to give a peek behind the curtain, the reason Justin is so upset is he'd been prepping Cavs talk for hours. I know.

He thought he'd have a four-no-caths team would go for like 20 minutes. He's been breaking down Darius Garland film, and then Julius Radles comes in and blows up his whole podcast, and now you're seeing the end result here. Justin's a big sex land guy. I have multiple Cavs takes, but we will get to those.

another time. That is a good point to stop here. We will be back next week on a Tuesday. The club isn't going up on a Wednesday anymore. Until then, have a happy new year. We will see you next week.