The Ringer NBA Show - What Makes a Playoff Series Great? | The Answer

Episode Date: May 6, 2022

Chris and Seerat begin by sharing their excitement for the NBA playoffs and quickly delve into the Mavericks-Suns series with a focus on Luka Doncic and what Dallas can do to possibly turn the series around against Phoenix's formidable system. Next, they go over the key players in the Grizzlies-Warriors matchup and discuss why their games are must-watch affairs.(15:52) They then pivot to 76ers-Heat and debate whether Joel Embiid's possible return can turn the vibe around in Philadelphia heading into the upcoming home games.(28:04) Finally, they share their thoughts on the first two lopsided games in the Celtics-Bucks series and ponder what tactical moves those teams will make going forward against each other.(32:51) Hosts: Chris Ryan and Seerat Sohi Producer: Chris Sutton Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is Chris Vernon, and me and my buddy Kevin O'Connor, aka Kevin O Everything, host an NBA podcast called The Mismatch. They call it The Mismatch because I'm awesome and Kevin is a gigantic nerd. No, no, that's not why at all, Chris. They call it the Mismatch because I have a brain and you're a loudmouth bozo. Good grief. Anyway, listen to our amazing NBA podcast, The Mismatch. Or don't.

We really don't care. We're probably going to win a million awards either way. Chris, we do care. So don't say that. Please subscribe and listen to the mismatch only on Spotify. Did you really call me a bozo? Hello and welcome to the Ringer NBA show. It's The Answer. I'm Chris Ryan. I'm joined as always by Sir and Zoe. What's up, Siritt? Chris, how's it going? We finished the first act of the conference semifinals or the second round. Do you prefer second round or conference semifinals? I feel like some of these playoff series deserve to be called conference semifinals. Well, heat six or is the second round. Yeah.

Maverick Suns is the second round. Do you think if they called at the conference semifinals, Miami fans would show up before halftime? I think maybe they'd show up for a series that had a little bit more competitive. Yes, I set you up for that one. I kind of wanted to talk today a little bit about what is making two of these series definitively more electric than the other two because I think Memphis Golden State has the trappings.

I mean, it already is, I think, in the incredibly online NBA Twitter brain, a classic. Which was also, by the way, a two-game thing because they played kind of like at the end of the season as well. Yes. So they've had a mini-series before. First of all, it's got bad feelings. It's got like this Doin-Brooks suspension over the Gary Peyton foul. It's got Dremont narrating the entire series. It's got like the like, when is Clay going to be Clay?

It's when is Steph going to find his shot again? Should they just build the entire universe around Jordan Pool? And then on the flip side, it's like how far can Jago? And I think also like crowds play a part in that. I was making a joke about the Miami fans, but the Memphis crowd is like... There's six men. It's like the Cameron Crazies with more of a drinking problem. It's like a college basketball crowd.

That actually is like, no, we have cars and we have like a little bit of money to spend. So we're... Right. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, obviously, I think Boston, Milwaukee so far has been like huge heavyweight punches within the series itself, even though the games, each one was like a little lopsided. But neither team was like fully bent the knee.

In those games, like, they were still competitive, like, even when Milwaukee was getting trucked in game two, like, they still were like, well, we're not taking Janus out. Like, we're not going to pretend like this, this is over. And then those other two series, I mean, it's like, Phoenix just might be better than Dallas. And sometimes you get those, right? And then we can talk about Miami and Philly. But I kind of wanted to see what you thought. Like, why do you think there are some series that just seemed touched and others that seem forgotten? I think it's just a competitive difference. Like that, that, that Heat Sixers series actually, like, I think that would have been a classic if MB had played. But without him, you know, the Sixers just look a little bit overmatched. And they seem to just not really believe that they should be winning these games, honestly. Like they don't have enough without Embed. And I think like with the Mavericks, it's the exact same thing. Like we can kind of go down the line and talk about all the things that they could do differently, which, you know, they could. But at the same time, like they've run into an absolute juggernaut. Like the Suns won 64 games.

They're the number one seed. And the Mavericks, you know, they're improving. And I think we probably. direction. Yeah, I think we probably overrated them in the regular season because of how successful they were post-trade. But going back and looking at that trade, their defense actually dropped quite a bit after they traded Prisengis. And like, I think that's probably a major factor in what is ailing them at this particular moment. And it's also, man, like, just on a purely aesthetic level, it's a boring series. I think I would be a little bit like more pissed off if it was more competitive,

because then I'd actually have to like really dig into it and pay attention to every single like 24 second long possession that both these teams play. Luckily the suns are good enough that that at least isn't what's happening. That's like my main complaint, I think. It has nothing to do with like old school basketball versus like money ball nerds. It's really just like if the entire offense is driving kick and sometimes this happens with Boston and sometimes this happens with teams that are like obviously playing really well. But if the entire offense is just driving kick and like pass. up like barely contested like cool layups for a corner three with a guy who shoots 32% because maybe if he hits it it's got more value like that just starts to become like

almost watching people play pop a shot I think the we were going to talk a little bit about whether teams are like learning the wrong lessons you know going into these playoffs or coming out of these playoffs and whether like we're starting to see some bad habits develop in some some teams and I think Dallas might have a little bit of that even though like a great success story and Luca is Luca and like they really like figured their season out and like it seems like kid has like a really good direction like a really good momentum with this team like I do wonder a little bit whether that's happening with Dallas. I'm personally just very pissed off about the like the turn that Luca has made from Luca

Magic to Luca Math. I don't like it at all. It's become impossible to deny like everyone has been making like hard in comparison pretty much since he got into the league. But I've always been kind of against it because he has this like flourish and imaginativeness to his game. Just so everybody, the title of this podcast is, is Luca being hard and pilled? Yeah.

He's absolutely being hard and peeled. I think that's a perfect way to put it. It's kind of like been creeping up on us pretty much since his rookie year. In his second year, he obviously went and like, you know, his usage numbers went sky high because it was like, oh yeah. We know now that like he's automatically already a star. But I went back and dug into Dallas's offense. And the best offense they ever had was. his second year. And it was also when his usage rate was still quite high, but it was,

it's lowest. And all of those usage numbers have been creeping up pretty much like since then. And then now, if you look at this year's playoffs, like out of everybody that's in the top five in field goal attempts, he's the only one left in the playoffs. He's averaging 4.8 turnovers. And we talked about this a little while ago about heliocentric offenses, right? like about people who are basically the weather system of their offense and everything is revolving around them and everything has to come from them and continue but like this is interesting because like when we talked about it before I feel like it was like isn't this cool and now it's like are we sure this is good yeah yeah that's that is the context we put it in and I think one thing that

I've been saying like pretty much like throughout the entire MVP debate is that you don't really want to be the MVP right like that's not good for your playoff chances um and yeah like this is like he leads the playoffs and usage percentage. He accounts for 37% of their field goals and 44% of their assists and 50% of their turnovers when they're on the floor. Like it's just, it's way too much to put on one player. And the thing that is like kind of strange about it to me is that I think this,

this is probably what they were trying to get away from with the trade with Spencer Dinwiddie. But in the playoffs, they've just kind of gotten back to it whenever he's on the floor. like there's like this two versions of Dallas where he plays and then when he doesn't play and they kind of it's it's not like the lucas Dallas team is like you know whipping the ball all over the floor uh you know Spencer and and Jalen Brunson are kind of like they're two like pick and roll ISO players like they like having a ball in their hands and there's definitely something to building a team that way like we've talked about it with the sons we've talked about it with the

Warriors, like the guys that aren't your star should probably still have some stylistic similarities to your star so that they can fit in the system that you built around him. But I also think that we're kind of starting to see the negative of that with Dallas because like comparing the suns and the Mavericks, what the Mavericks lack is versatility and what they can do once that stops working. And I think it's going to be really interesting come like, you know, offseason time when it, when you figure out how much money you want to pay Jalen Brunson. Because like to me, the biggest difference, between those teams is just the fact that, like,

Luca doesn't have an actual genuine second star to play with. Because the sun's play in a very similar way. So this is really fascinating. I want to get super sidetracked by this because I do want to move through these other series. But I was thinking about this Jalen Brunson thing, too, because I saw it on my Bible hoopshype.com slash rumors. It's one of the better Bible.

It's really up there with some of the Testaments. But there was a rumor about, like, Jalen loves the vibes in Dallas. And now the needle is sort of more pointing towards him staying in Dallas rather than going to, like, the Knicks or the Pacers or something like that. And I agree with you. Like, on one hand, Dallas has had historically one of the funniest, like, slipping on a banana peel kind of free agency plans where they're like, we've cleared out all these cap space. And then like DeAndre Jordan hostage situation and like going for Dwight and like never getting the marquee free agent that they want. But your point is really well taken. Do they need somebody who is essentially like an alpha B next to Donchich? Because right now Brunson and Dinwiddie are like very, very capable. They were capable of winning, you know, winning. some games in the first round without Luca, but when Luca's not in the game, are those two guys enough to keep it going? The flip side of what you're saying, though, is this. There are lots of teams.

I think we saw this to some extent with the end of Durant and Westbrook and Oklahoma, and I certainly saw it a lot with Philly with Embedon Simmons, where it's like, you can't actually build two full teams. So unless those stars are kind of facsimiles for one another, like this is what you're saying is like you can't have like benzimins and four shooters and joel and bade and four shooters but then sometimes play them all together you know like like you and so this is really like it's been wild watching dallas where you're like god this is so intoxicating in the regular season and they had some really amazing clutch wins coming down the stretch too but there's something about like phoenix is just kind of like why are you hitting yourself why you're hitting yourself why you're

hitting yourself they've run into this systemic team and it's like aiden's in foul trouble here James Javail. Javail gets in foul trouble. Here comes Bionbo. They just seem to have Mikhail Burgess out, Cam Johnson in. Like, there's these body types. There's these play style types. It's just, it's been a really interesting contrast in team building. Yeah. There's like, with the sons, Booker and Paul are different enough that if what Paul is trying to do isn't working, like you take away or he's just not hitting that short mid-range jumper and pick and roll in the fourth quarter, you can go to other things. Like the way that. Booker gets his points, like he can get his points that way. Like, everybody on that team has pretty

just been like, oh, so that's how you stake a picking role. Cool. Like, we'll, we'll start doing that too. But at the same time, like, you can get him moving off the screen. And the types of defenders that he thrives against, like, we're going to talk about Gary Payton later, but it's a perfect example. Gary Payton's a great Devin Booker defender, not a great Chris Paul defender. Like, that's, Chris Paul is probably the one guy in the NBA that, you know, like just like, we'll pull one over on a guy like Gary Payton, right? Just because that's what Chris Paul does against aggressive defenders. But being able to have that and have that work within the same system,

but have like some subtle differences so that you can adjust. And it's so like it's, I'm not saying that like, I'm not even trying to blame Dallas for, like, because this is hard. Yeah. Like the sun's keyed into something. Like laid the groundwork for this like with that, Michao Bridges Aiton draft. And then they got Chris Paul and Devin Booker ended up being like a,

it's going to end up being like a Hall of Famer. You know, that's hard. that's very hard. But I also think that the Mavericks aren't actually ridiculously far away from that either. If you look at this upcoming offseason, we don't get into this part too much. Like, I'm down to do like an offseason exploration on them like when that time comes. But we used to compare Devin Buecker and Zach Levine before Devin Boker got into a winning situation. And Brad Biel are two of like probably going to be like the major guys that are potentially available. Right. Right. And they would fit perfectly, I think, into a system that the Mavericks have that could, you know, potentially, you probably have to lose one of Spencer or Jalen in those situations. But they have a lot of sign and trade possibilities. That's like kind of the beauty of the KP trade is it gave them guys that are actually movable. But one of those guys, whether it's Spencer or Brunson, like can then fit into a more natural tertiary role that would allow them to thrive in the way that like a guy like McKeel Bridges is pretty much just hitting like Spencer or Brunson, like can then fit into a more natural tertiary role that would allow them to thrive in the way that like a guy like McKeel Bridges is pretty much just hitting,

like every like semi-contested or open shot that he gets because he's attacking on all this, you know, on these closeouts essentially. Like he's not doing too much of his own work. Yeah. You know? So they're close and they're very similar teams. It makes for a kind of a boring series because like, you know, they're both very methodical. But at the end of the game, it's like Luca's gassed and the sons can just target him

over and over again. But for the sons, it's like Paul and Booker are fresh legs. And they can stagger. And I mean, Luca missed time during the regular season for sure. and he's coming off that cap injury, but Dallas is not doing as good of a job wearing out anybody on Phoenix because it's like, who do you try to wear out? You know what I mean?

They're so deep as well. And like, you know, you brought up the Aiton point before, like, the guys that they bring in also just fit exactly into the role that the other guy was playing. It's like you take McKeough Bridges out and you put Cam Johns in it. You're not changing a lot when you do that. The playoffs are heating up and you can make every game feel like Game 7 on Fandall Sportsbook, an official partner of the NBA. Throughout the playoffs, all customers can place a no sweat, same game parlay each week.

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I just feel like home cooking is really going to come in handy for Clay back in the bay, and I see a bounce back game for him, and I see a victory for the Warriors. That was a very emotionally draining victory for Memphis, and I feel like they're going to probably want to make sure they get out of Golden State with a win, but maybe not game three. If you're new to Fandle, just download the Fandul Sportsbook app and sign up the promo code Ringer MBA. Once again, that's promo code Ringer NBA. And if you already have an account, you're all set to bet, no sweat. Either way, you'll get up to $20 in free bets if your same game parlay during the playoffs doesn't win.

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1-8009 with it in Indiana, 18777-7-7-0 stop in Louisiana. 1877 8-Hope-NY or text Hope NY to 467-369 in New York. Tennessee Red Line is 1-800-8-9-9-9-9-9. 7889, 1-800-522 4, 4,700 in Wyoming, or visit www.w.w.combler.net in West Virginia. Well, let's talk a little bit about Memphis because I think that it's fair to say that game three of Memphis Golden State is one of the great all-time, like, I don't have Saturday plans. Like, it is like across America, people be like, eh, you know what, can we actually move this? There's no Saturday plans around this. This thing has become like instant must-see TV.

What happens sometimes with playoff series is like the game happens and then you can feel it to flate over the course of like the days off. And with the Golden State Memphis series because of the Brooks suspension and the Peyton injury and everything else, it just gets like more and more tense. And so now it's like Kerr has already said he expects like the most intense Golden State crowd he's ever heard. And there was something about like, oh, like I can't remember which Giants player. But I think Buster Posey is having like his number retired or something down. like at the giant stadium that day. So it's kind of like this day long San Francisco sports day. To say that he expects the most intense Warriors crowd ever is saying quite a bit.

Warriors crowds can get into it. So like you got you have this like welcome to hell atmosphere coming in. You know, Brooks won't be there. But like Memphis will hear it from the Warriors fans. And it's going to be, I don't know, I want to say bloodbath, but I think metaphorically a bloodbath, you know, figuratively it will be a bloodbath even if it's not. What's making this series so great? I think it's the stylistic differences and the fact that both teams are really physical and

really talented and both know what they're doing too. They're both really smart. And I think there's just like this, this has been, we have been leading up to this moment for a while. We've basically been leading up to it since Dylan Brooks got really mad that Andre Aguadala didn't want to report to camp for the Grizzlies after being traded to them, which is a completely justifiable move on part of Andreagodala. but there's also this weird element happening, I think, where the Grizzlies don't stylistically

resemble the Warriors of 2015, but I think on a spiritual level, there's a similarity there where they are this young team that just kind of came out of nowhere. They play differently than most of the NBA. They actually play against a lot of the tenants that we now consider to be self-evident, right? They've started Stephen Adams for most of this season. and that's pretty much probably going to be done for the rest of playoffs. I'm curious to see if we see him in the Warriors series. I think we could.

They were the best offensive rebounding team in the NBA, or top two or three at least. I can't remember now. And they just assaulted the paint, whether it was, you know, Jaron and Adams and Clark and Tiltman or just obviously, Judge is leading the NBA and points in the paint while being like a skinny 6-1 guy.

They have the Warriors' arrogance. They do. They have that thing, and they piss other teams off. They've been acting in ways that I think just piss veterans off, and they've been getting away with it, too. We've talked about this before with, like, Desmond Bain and LeBron and, you know, like, Brooks getting into it with Booker, and now you've got them getting it into it with the Warriors,

who they had those two playing games against. I think the Warriors, like, they obviously really want to win any series, but I think they really want to beat the Grizzlies, and I think they have really wanted to beat the Grizzlies, but they haven't really been able to, like, they haven't been able to punk them, essentially. There's certainly not. And usually when you piss the warriors off like that, you get punked.

And we might see that in game three. Like we don't really know what's going to happen. And that's what makes it so exciting because on the other end of it, I'm like, okay, yeah, we could see that. We could see the Warriors go like, we'll get, like, let's get into the starting lineups a little bit because they're going to have to change them up. We could see them go like starting up the pool party lineup, right? And just trying to out shoot the Grizzlies and like getting off to like a 30 to 10 start.

And then that's the game. We could also see like Otto Porter in the starting lineup. He's been awesome for their rebounding. And then the series, all the things that I mentioned have all flipped. Like the Warriors are the team that's offensive rebounding. The Warriors are the team that's dominating the paint and the Grizzlies are the team that's shooting well from three. Which is just strange. And I think part of that is just the short break. I'm really curious to see how different everything looks now that both teams have had these three days off to be able to actually scout each other. The Warriors probably had a little bit more time, but they're probably waiting to see if it was like the wolves or the grizzlies. the Grizzlies just had no time at all. So I'm very curious to see how different things look and if these teams can kind of get back to what they are actually good at. But it also speaks to the fact that they know each other and they know how to take away the things that the other side is good at. Right.

Which is really like the makings of a good series to me. So I'm really curious about what's going to happen. There's still so many unknowns and there's just like there's big game players. Like for every Steph Curry 3 that feels like a haymaker that feels a net. that feels inevitable. Like, you know, it gets the crowd going because you know you have that guy on your side. Like, John Morant just comes back with another layup or just like spinning in the lane and just embarrassing Andrew Wiggins.

And then being able to do it again. Like, it is about as reliable a thing as like the Curry 3. And like at least I think that's what Grizzlies fans believe, right? I was thinking about the namesake of our podcast, Alan Iverson. Like that is, that was the AI problem, right? Like, you can't keep doing that. over and over again, usually, especially if your jaw size, like, historically, that hasn't really worked. So that's, like, the thing I would look at and say, like...

But might as well take advantage of it while you can, you know? Yeah. While he's got his legs, like, it's pretty fun. The sort of overall vibe of what you just said is certainly a little, like, Memphis is cosmically blessed. This team knows no fear, et cetera, et cetera, like, board crashing, glass eating. This is, this is all happening. And they, they specific. specifically, like, seem to irritate Golden State. I agree with all of that. If you take, like, the emotion out of it,

is there a little bit, like, it's not really possible for the Warriors to shoot that badly from three again? And if Clay Thompson makes two more and Steph makes two more, this is not actually, this is actually two-oh warriors going into Golden State. You can say that on both sides, though, right? Hell, you could say that for the Sixers series.

I mean, you know, like... Sure, sure, sure. Yeah, it's right. We'll even say that for six years. Yeah. I think it's actually like, it's kind of perfectly put at one, one, one. Because when both teams say they could be two and oh, that means it's probably accurate that they're one and one, right?

But it's, yeah, to your point, it's a very close series. And the Grizzlies have been making some mistakes. And like, there's kind of two ways to look at it. Some of those mistakes are mistakes of inexperience, which we saw a lot in the Timberwolf series. Some of it, I think, is going to be cleaned up by the fact that they've now had a bunch of days to just watch and hone in on how Golden State plays. But there's been definitely miscommunication. I think we were talking about this series, kind of like looking at the Wolf series and saying,

wow, the Grizzies can't make these types of mistakes against an actual championship contender because they're not, like the other, the contender is not going to make the appropriate mistakes to then, you know, balance those out. I think what we forgot is that the warriors love making mistakes. Like, they love it. They love it. They just, they love unnecessary turnovers. Like, Clay Thompson loves quick shots.

Like, some of those clay shots, like, I look at and I'm like, okay, like, they got lucky with how much of them aren't going in for sure. It's bad shot selection, but it's also Clay Thompson. So it's like, I don't know. But across the board, we have not seen the barrage. Like, the classic Splash Brothers. backbreaking barrage of threes where even no matter whether you guard them 35 feet out whether you think you've got it like whether like they can't possibly make that one again and it's like it just

keeps going down and that's what has cracked people before it's like one like because if you look at step's numbers you're like that's pretty good game but they're never like the four in a row oh my god like he sucked the life out of the arena that like knife to the heart threes he missed a couple that would have made like maybe like three consecutive threes that could have done that. You can even see, you can see when you watch him, you're like, he knows that's not happening. Like he had that bank in from the top of the key and he was just like, fuck. Yeah, like it wasn't really, yeah. It's strange.

I think it's, it reminds me a lot of that Thunder series that they played in 2016 where he just, you know, he just wasn't able to get to that place. And I think the Thunder defense really bothered him. I think it might be a similar scenario where the Grizzlies just, they switch everything and they're really physical. Yeah. Or they have somebody like Bain coming off the screen who is just like, you can't really screen him. He's just that good coming off of them. Other than that, they're mostly switching and they're really physical.

And, you know, for the most part, I think, like, Clark has done a really great job on those switches. And I think Jerry Jackson, when he's not fouling, is always done a pretty good job on Curry. I think it might take the pool party lineup to have that level of explosion against his defense. Yeah, so I was going to say, like, who do you think starts? Do you think they just go with the pool lineup instead of Peyton for game three? I don't know. That's the other thing that's so enticing about this, right? Like, they have a stylistic decision to make.

Yeah. Because that lineup will give up offensive rebounds. It will give up paint points. It will be, you know, jaw going in and basically just getting whatever he wants, I think, against, you know, Jordan Poole. A lot more guys to target puts a lot more on Andrew Wiggins. It's really strange to watch a Warriors team, like the version of the Warriors team that sometimes they, throw out there when pool's not on the floor. It's strange to feel like this is a team that teams can sag off of.

You know, like, because like, they were basically daring Wiggins to beat them. And he didn't. Yeah. And I think those shots, also they got a little bit lucky on too. The reason I, like, now that I think about it that I don't like it, at least as a starting lineup, is that I think the Warriors win this series if they keep this, like, configuration of Desmond Bain's not getting into this game. and Dylan Brooks is suspended and you can't really do much about Jaron Jackson if he doesn't have foul trouble.

Like I can't really rely on him to do that consistently for a series, but one or two of these games, for sure. I like the idea of we're going to make Jock beat us because it might not really work in their favor early in this series. But by the time game six or seven rolls around, I think Jod's going to have some tired legs. And I think the worst thing in the world for the Warriors right now would be if they went with an offense first, starting lineup and all of a sudden everybody else starts going off and joe like they get away with winning a game where like jaw doesn't have to shoot 25 times that version of the of memphis going back to what we were saying about dallas and like the regular season versus the playoffs and like we ever really had to see the version of memphis that they managed to like stay afloat not even

stay afloat but like speedboat while jaw is out you know what i mean and this sort of like elite team during the regular season during the time that the jaw missed missed because of injury and so now it's become almost like the end of the game it was certainly heliocentric. Like the end of game two was like very much revolving around job. But yeah, we haven't really had to see that. You have to guard us straight up because there's not this like obvious point where everything is going to evolve from from our offense. It's a great series.

I mean like I hope it goes seven. I might start our autoporter. He's been really good for them. So you would start auto Porter at the five basically or like. Yeah. His rebounding has just been awesome. The thing isn't so much like personnel as much. as much as it's like they just cannot be this sloppy again.

Yeah, but their defense is thinning out though. Like when you talk about this starting lineup, it's like, man, like, no Igo Dala. No Peyton. Yeah, like you're going to start having to go into like the Damien Lee well. Might have to start like, you know, seeing what Camingo looks like in the playoffs. Well, I was going to ask, I'm not like the world's greatest warriors expert, but like I was really enjoying Moody down the second half of the season. Like, is Moody just out of the question for some reason?

I think so. It seems like it. I think if any, if they go to anybody, they would go to comminga right now. And I don't think that's a bad proposition at all. He looked good in game two, I thought. So the Philly Miami series is sad for me. We're recording this at 10 on Friday morning. So it's on Friday night's game.

And Bidus cleared concussion protocol. There's optimism around him playing in game three. I would say that the tone of most of the Sixers group chats that I am on was what could possibly go wrong. A lot of like real like belief. I have to formally apologize to you, by the way. Oh, sure. Hit me. Yeah.

Yeah. So last podcast. You know, I basically told you that you need to change your thought patterns in regards to the Sixers. You know, they won this series and, you know, you can just immediately go to, like, McHale Bridges and how they never drafted him. Then immediately we just find out that Embed is out. I truly want to believe that this is not the sort of Eastern Conference version of Phoenix Dallas, where it's just like they're just better than the Sixers.

You know, I think that there is a competitive series in there. There was a lot of, like, make or miss league, and we just missed our shots. And if those fall, we're all good coming out of the Sixers. And it's just like, I know, but you guys are not exactly the Splash Brothers. You know what I mean? Like, it's not, it's like Danny Green and George Nying and Corkmas and some of the people that they expect to fill it up from deep. It's not going to come from Hardin because Hardin's being triple covered. So especially without Embed, this is not going to happen.

And also Miami getting seemingly 400 second chances from Bamatabio being the kid who like is 16 playing in the 12-year-old league is not going to be a recipe for six or success. I think that they could definitely win one in Philly. I would imagine if Embedith is playing on Friday, my prediction would be that this is the night to do it. But do you see a path to victory for Philadelphia, even with like an 80% Embedded. Yeah, absolutely. Their expected shot quality is actually pretty high. I love to hear about this. Expected shot quality is the blanket under which I see. So yeah, if you want to be optimistic about it. There's definitely evidence. But like to me, the bottom line is just that once you now have Joel Embed in the series, like, it completely changes everything. Like, even it, just, just the fact

that he's there, because the Sixers have had just like no, no answer in terms of, like, a front course replacement for him. The fact that he can just sheerly stand there and play minutes makes a huge difference for them. Like, it just, all these questions that were asked, like, it takes a lot of heat off of Doc Rivers, so having to be having to find a way to be creative about this stuff because that just wasn't really feeling good. I'm glad that we're not going to get these DeAndre Jordan minutes anymore. I think frankly, Downer Jordan is probably happy that he's not going to be getting these minutes anymore. And then it just becomes a situation where it's like, well, the Heat won their first two games at home.

They did what they're supposed to do. Sure. And like, yeah, that digs Philly into a bit of a hole. But like we're talking about, you know, a guy who had like, you know, I think a top three usage in the regular season that they just lost. Like plugging him back in, he's an impossible matchup. on the heat side Bam and Deadman are probably two of the better guys that you want to have

in the league defending Embed especially if he's hurt and then like that Miami defense like if they need to double which I mean they probably will they'll probably find a way to do it the right way it's still an uphill battle for them no question but they now have the best player in the series if he plays and that changes everything and they have two home games

that's the other thing the doubling of beat you mentioned the like there was like I think a feeling when it was announced that Mbb would miss the first two games of the series that this was the point where like Hardin had to like earn his sort of keep and be like, okay, now Hardin, you do you turn this team into the rockets and score 35 and have 14 assists and everything is orchestrated through you and he basically triple covered him at times. And so I think that if M.B. does come back and does draw that kind of double team attention now is the time that I would actually be like

Harden now score 35 points. Like if you had a 35 point game in you, tonight is the night to do it. Yeah. You know, that's interesting. Like what we were talking about earlier about players that fit together but are also different. Yeah. That is something that hypothetically the Sixers should be able to do well with Hardin and MBEed. Like both slower-paced, thrive in isolation, but they figure out their pick and normal style. Like they will also be able to coexist well. And that is like, that is a dream, right? That is the dream. That is the dream. of like the hardened and bead pairing.

Game three in the playoffs is a hard time to like, you know, hope that it all comes together. But it's such a big W having him back. It changes the tenor of the series completely, right? Like I think before these first two games, we were talking about this being a seven-game series that like no one really knew what would happen. Right.

I'm not completely back in that place yet, but I'm definitely more enticed. Let's wrap up by talking about this Boston Milwaukee series, which continues Saturday, 1230 Pacific. I like to prioritize the Pacific time when I'm announcing times.

This is bare knuckle. I'm not sure what the state of Marcus Smart is. That was like a really weird like Ewing theory situation in game two where like they lose a defensive player of the year and play better defense.

I have no comment on that. On the defensive player of the year part or about them playing better defense. Are you just concerned about your employment status? It's just not the conversation I want to get into today. Okay. You're protected. Don't worry about it. We just got your back.

This is a, like, we are allowed to criticize the Celtics if we want to. Are we allowed to? Like, yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Everyone listening. We are allowed to. We don't have to talk about the defensive player of the year debate. That's like four conversations ago. I understand that one probably less than I understand MVP.

So let's talk about this series though, which I think whenever you get definitive victories in each game going in the different direction, you know, for one team. wins decidedly, one team wins decidedly. It really has that feel of this will be long. This is going to get weird. There's going to be when they get close, I still want to see the Celtics and the Bucks play like an intensely close game, right? Like, what are your initial thoughts on these first two games that we saw in Boston? I think it makes complete sense that these games would be so lopsided because I think the Bucks whole thing is just like, miss shot, you like we make you miss shots and then we run.

Right. And it can kind of put them in this either a positive feedback loop, which was what happened in game one, where Boston is missing shots. And the Bucks defense, like I think from like the six minute mark of that game, pretty much just turned it on and decided that, hey, oh yeah, we do actually have to defend this team. And then from there it was like, we're going to just pummel you, right? And then game two is the exact opposite of that where you have them hitting their shots. you have Jalen Brown just hitting like contested threes.

And then from there like, you know, the Bucks are taking the ball out of the rim and they're playing. I think it's more dramatic in this series because then they're going up against the Celtics half court defense, which nobody wants to do. Like that is a formula for disaster for anybody, let alone like a Bucks team that doesn't have Chris Middleton. It reminded me of the piece Rob Mahoney wrote for the Ringer last year on Chris Middleton basically being like a cheat code for the Bucks. like the mid-range king that, you know, the exact type of shot that they kind of allow you to take because it is so available in the playoffs,

he kind of can emerge as somebody who breaks other defenses. And that is something that they've definitely, like they're going to miss that in this series because the best way to beat the Celtics is actually just to hit tough shots. Unless you have Janus, then you can potentially try to barrel through them, right? It's a version of what is going on with the Grizzlies and Jha, except that Janus is 6-11.

so it might be a little bit more sustainable and I worry about it less. I feel like Janus is entering like the shack zone of like I guess you could call that a foul if you wanted to. Like every time. Yeah. Is it at all stoppable? No. Yeah. You know, like so basically he's unstoppable unless legislated against. Yeah, unless you're Grant Williams. What does Grant Williams do that no one else does though? Man, like I don't think it fits a thing that nobody else does, right? I think on some level it is the fact that, you know, Grant Williams. up until this point has spent so much time

in his first few years in the league being in foul with trouble that he wasn't going to get an assignment like Janus. So Janice is dealing with him for the first time too. And I think if you look at his progressive numbers, like let's say against Horford even, right? Like he finds a way to figure out a guy like Horford, right? And I think as the series progresses, he'll figure out more against Grant Williams.

But in that game, too, like Grant Williams is really strong. He's really smart and he moves his feet really well. And he was actually one of the players that I profiled in that Draymond generation piece. I did a while back. And he's been doing this since high school. He's been like this 6-7 guy with like a 6-9 wingspan. So pretty much like it's not like he has a huge wingspan advantage

who is just able to read angles really well, like pays attention to the scouting report, watch his film and watch his tendencies. And actually kind of like plays defense in a way that tries to dictate what you do as opposed to reacting, which is very Draymond-esque. but, you know, he did this against Bamat Abio, who was, like, Dwight Howard in high school. He did it against Harry Giles, who was also, like, you know, like, if not for the injuries

and all the stuff that happened to him, like, we could be, he's a guy we could be talking about a lot right now. Like, he's, he's a really good defender, and he's been guarding guys like Janus and being overmatched against him for a long time, and it seems like he, like, he really enjoys it, too. Like, he, like, kind of just nod and be like, hell yeah, like after it, and he just talks a lot, and he's like he's a good communicator on defense and like he's not really afraid to get into like into jalen and jason and stuff either he definitely makes up for the energy and i don't know if i would say charisma but like the the attitude gap that might have been there in smarts absence

you know what i mean like there is like a pugnacious element to like how he plays that i think jalen and jason definitely have become i mean jaylon was already a really formidable defender He's like better than Jalen now. He's so good at defense. But I don't think of those dudes as like Bulldogs. You know, the way that I think of smart and now kind of Williams in that way. Like I don't feel like there's not like they don't play defense almost like emotionally. And sometimes that's good.

Sometimes it's good not to actually get carried away. I mean, this is what happens with Dylan Brooks and Dremont Green and Marcus Smart is that like they play on an edge and sometimes fall off. But it's kind of, it's, I think it's been good for Boston to have some replacement for smart being out. Yeah, for sure. he has a very similar I think Grant Williams and Time Lord on the floor together have like a very similar relationship to like Jaron Jackson and Xavier Tillman

or Jaron Jackson and Brandon Clark too where like there's just a lot of versatility when those guys play together and they can make up for each other's mistakes and they both communicate really well and it like it allows them to just be like this Swiss Army knife down low where you can just throw multiple different looks at Yannis depending on what type of night he's having too

so I think that's something we could see down the line in the series as well where you kind of like you know as if you're Adoka you're kind of looking at, like, okay, what kind of night is he on his having? Is he, like, is he hitting the midi a lot? Okay, like, it might be a Horford Time Lord night. Or is you going to try to barrel his way to the paint? Then it's going to be a Grant Williams type of night. That's like the challenge with Boston, right? Or, like, you know, I think we might even see some Tatum as well, right? That's kind of the challenge that you face with Boston. I just look at Boston's offense from game two and, like, the clear difference between game one and game two. And, like, there's tactical stuff that they definitely did differently. I think they were attacking the middle a lot more.

but it's kind of shaping up to be a classic buck series where I'm not really necessarily sure that they will adjust to that stuff as much as they will just go into the next game being like, yeah, I don't know if Jalen Brown's going to hit contested threes on the road in like a pivotal game three or game four in the playoffs. Like I don't know if I have all that amount of faith. So as long as, you know, the math works out, we should be pretty good. because so I know you hate, I mean, I know you love and hate shot quality.

No, I like it. Yeah, sure. I love shot quality. Yeah. Sure, sure, sure. The Celtics have the worst shot quality of any team left in the playoffs. Really? And yeah, yeah, according to shot quality.com. It's a very handily named website. It is, yeah. And, you know, the second spectrum numbers are a little bit different, but they mostly kind of hold that up.

And they've been shooting above their heads more than any time. team except for the suns. And they are also dead last in the playoffs and points that they get in the paint. 22%. That's really bad. And if I'm the Bucks, I'm looking at like the game plan that I have where that's, that's exactly what the Bucks try to do, right? I don't know. I'm kind of just writing this out. Yeah. I mean, it's, it feels like weirdly, it's easier to analyze the Warriors Memphis

series when it's like this frenetic and close. and because you can say if this happens than this and if this happens than that. Whereas with the Bucks Celtic series, the fighters have gone back to their corners and I have no idea how they're going to come back out in the next round.

I don't really know what Boston's going to look like in Milwaukee. I think that they've had the benefit a little bit of having the home court throughout the playoffs so far. Obviously that would end if Miami and Boston advance. But it's been fascinating

to kind of like watch Boston have to like take a punch in the first in that first game and come back. So it's it's, it's, I was really impressed with them in the second game. But yeah, it'll be like amazing to see them on the road maybe some slightly more like, um, hostile, hostile reception and, and, and I think that that counts for something. Like these game one versus two swings, right? Like, you almost have to recalibrate because watching that, watching that game too, it was like, okay, the Celtics are back. And then a couple of days passed and you're like, wait, the bucks got home like they stole one yeah they did their job exactly all those teams are like we split so we're good you know what i mean i think it's more like Dallas and philly who should be like a little bit nervous a lot of basketball this weekend we'll be back next week thanks to chris sutton for producing us uh everybody we have got like the void is tonight waz is on the weekend Ryan and Bill will go Sunday night so there's tons of ringer NBA podcast to listen to sir you did a Spotify live earlier this week right I did with Logan we're reviewing the boring

series. We're trying to hop on and do those like kind of pregames. If, uh, if you're, if you're kind of paying attention, you'll see on Twitter or you'll get a notification that we're, we're doing these pregame. So pop by. Ask us questions. Troll us. Talk about shot value. Thanks again to Chris for producing. We'll talk to you guys next week.