The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Haliburton’s Rise, LeBron’s Buy-In, the Pelicans' Zion Problem, and NBA Trade Market Restrictions With Brian Windhorst

Episode Date: December 8, 2023

Russillo opens the show by revealing his takeaways from the in-season tournament so far (1:00). Then, he’s joined by Brian Windhorst to discuss LeBron’s mindset, explain how complicated trades in the NBA can be, share what the Pelicans can do with Zion, and examine the Warriors' issues. (23:00). Finally, Ceruti and Kyle join the show to answer some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (70:00). The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please check out theringer.com/RG to find out more or listen to the end of the episode for additional details. Host: Ryen Russillo Guest: Brian Windhorst Producers: Steve Ceruti, Kyle Crichton, and Mike Wargon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

what's up leaving vegas with great memories we'll go over the semi-finals calaburn lebron zion brian windhorse talking all nba stuff the limited trade markets and he does some great LeBron storytelling as well as always. And then a big curry question at the end. And we've got life advice. The art world checks in. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. Winter is here, so be prepared and get almost anything delivered with Uber Eats. What do I mean by almost anything? Well, you can't get a ski slope, but dish soap, definitely doable. Sunshine, that's no. A bottle of wine, yeah. And a snow day, again, no. But blueberry muffins with the delicious crumb topping, total yes. Get almost, almost anything delivered with Uber Eats.

Order now. Alcohol and select markets. Product availability may vary by region. See app for details. Greetings from Las Vegas. It's the morning after the in-season tournament semi-finals i'll be in la in a couple hours so uh be good to get out of here but it's a good good trip so far and it's been about the basketball um and look the in-season tournament i was raving about it last week only because i couldn't believe the players have been this into it they deserve so much credit for taking it this seriously this soon. It was all kind of new when I first heard about it. I was like, wait, what's happening? And then once it was kind of explained to me, like, look, it's not going to be that disruptive.

They're pool games. And the pool games became more intense. Whether you go back to the Golden State Sacramento game, the Phoenix LA game earlier this week was incredible to even get the guys to Vegas, the Boston Pacers game with the Pacers kind of showing you a glimpse of what they were capable of and what they did in Milwaukee last night so you know everybody that organized and all that kind of stuff it just it's just been like a lot of fun to be around the first game was competitive obviously the second one wasn't I'll get to that one in a few minutes but the cool part about where our seats were you know we were we were a good spot and assuming Bill, Waz was in there too.

And because it was quiet in the arena for the first game, you could hear a lot of the player interaction. You could hear how the coaches were talking. You're kind of watching Rick Carlisle and you're like, all right, is he just kind of just waiting around to make his decision? There's just a bunch of observations that I want to get to. And I think the headline of it all is what Halliburton has become maybe this is his coming out party we know he's been on a tear we know he's already been really good but now he's kind of taking it to this next level of like

what's actually possible with the pacers what's possible with halliburton i mean the fact that he's even mentioned as an mvp guy you go like wait he's gonna be he's gonna be one of those guys you know is it is it a De'Aaron Fox in passing? Like, hey, you know who deserves some MVP credit, but ultimately translation means, yeah, but he's never going to win it. And never is not what I mean, but you understand the point. I don't know that you can rule out anything with Halliburton right now. Now the Pacers are 12-8.

They're three games behind the one seed. They're a game ahead of the nine seed because the East is just kind of – the league is so deep, man. There's just so many good teams. The last two games for Halliburton, so you go back to the Boston game where he had 26-13, 10 assists and zero turnovers. Then last night against Milwaukee, 27 points, 15 assists, seven boards, zero turnovers. He is on fire and he's always been a good three-point shooter, 41-41-40, and now 44% this year. And then you go back and check the college stuff because you're like,

where was it again? He's like, yeah, he's at 43%. And there's always a bit of like on the draft stuff where you can get caught up with the perimeter guys and being like, is this player going to be like, where's the athletic ceiling? Because we all love the Anthony Edwards and what you hear about the pre-draft testing and all this stuff. And then what you visually see where it's fierce, quick, powerful, and it's every, it's checking every single athletic box and Halliburton certainly as a sick athlete, but there's a smoothness to him. There's a setup to his game, the way he gets himself free. You know, the One thing with his shot early on, I was like, will he be able to get this thing off the dribble

the way a lot of other guys do with the way his shot form is? Because it's different. I think if you didn't know him, you'd watch him play a little bit, like, what's up with that guy's shot? Well, what's up with it is it goes in all the time. He is on a very short list of players now where Jokic is the first name you think of when you're watching somebody on offense and how they run their team. You're like, man,

I feel like they have a good chance every single offensive possession. Now, the game was competitive. The third quarter, a lot of stuff happened. That's kind of where I'm going to focus on it because Milwaukee went to zone and Adrian Griffin kept throwing up like the three. They were trying to figure out, I thought, a little too late of what to do with Beasley against Halliburton. Beasley just feels like a guy who constantly gets minutes on some decent to good teams where you're like, does he shoot it enough to be that guy? Because he's this bigger wing, is he actually any good on defense? And staying in front of Halliburton, it's not about his quickness.

It's about, well, he's quick too, and he's long and all these other things, and the steps are big. But he sets you up with these side-to-sides where even if you think you have good defensive positioning and then you're throwing in some kind of screen that you have to worry about, it just doesn't matter. And I don't think Halliburton wants to dribble the entire time, but if he has to, which happened a couple of times, it's going to happen when you have the ball that much, he's still working and figuring out the angle to just get you. And Beasley offered up no resistance whatsoever. And we know that Milwaukee probably has a defensive problem against a better team in the playoffs if they're going to be stuck with

Middleton having defend a quicker likely younger wing but Middleton's shot making especially seeing it in person too some stuff that he can do with his size and getting the ball out it's not like he's not going to be playing but you wonder if there's like a Beasley Andre Jackson Marshawn Beauchamp you know if there's some kind of deal there where you'll see more minutes from them because you just feel like they're just physically athletically like more available to you as a defender against some of these on ball guys and so Halliburton you know is just running things against this zone and I was sitting a couple seats down from his father and his father's screaming at Adrian Griffin saying Adrian stay in the zone stay in the zone stay in the zone. Stay in the zone. Stay in the zone.

Now, I'd have to go back and really dig in if I wanted to. I don't think I will with this game of how many positions were zoned, how many weren't. They stayed in zone a really long time. But Milwaukee won the third quarter. But it wasn't because they shut down the Pacers. The Pacers still had 28. But Milwaukee took a lead in this thing, lead going into the fourth,

by scoring 43 because everything that was working for them offensively. At the end of the third quarter, Bobby Portis just started kind of like yelling because he was right in front of us and looking back at the pacers, and he's saying, we coming, we coming, we coming. And then Halliburton's just like going, I'm not turning back to my bench yet. I'm looking right at you, the biggest smile. And he's like, we hooping, we hooping. And then I think Portis saidis said like then win the game win the game like i don't know he might not have said that because i don't know if that's a great

comeback uh and again he can he can't tell the future and know that they were going to go ahead and lose but then very early on i think like within seconds the first possession of the fourth quarter portis had the ball ripped away from so whatever it's a turnover but it was just kind of like a series of events but to watch Halliburton in person and the Pacers as they're getting back into this game and they're taking over in the fourth quarter the Pacers look like this mid-major that's that's playing through they're like in sweet 16 weekend and then they're they're making a run at the elite eight this team has so much fun now the body language stuff that bill and i were laughing about even last night as we were talking about it because he's like i know you hate when i become the body language doctor and i was like well look i just i don't know that there's many teams that are

winning that are having a bad time and i don't know many teams that are losing that are like man but they still are having they're having such a fun time losing by 20 that doesn't really happen but there is something that feels a little bit different than maybe some of the bench guys in an NBA game that feel forced to have to stand up every single time a bucket goes through to show like they're being good teammates there's this like college thing to to Halliburton and the way they've just bought into this dude and look this team isn't great by any means the offense is awesome and you know he'll have his moments i love math around the drives but you know mathren's still a little one-track minded with the whole deal knee smith has turned into this just full-blown energy guy but i'm not sure that he's going to make enough

shots that he would be somebody that's closing of closing five for a team that's going to be really good nemhart is is fun McConnell's of just a menace uh and then there's Miles Turner who if you go all the way back to him coming out of Texas you're like man that's a big this guy can really shoot it for a big guy like he's gonna he's gonna play in the league a long time then he starts putting up numbers and then it's like well what's this guy gonna be and I feel like in fairness Turner, the Sabonis overlap where Turner's even admitted, like he felt like he was out of position when Sabonis was there. He was glowing last night in the postgame stuff, talking about it. You know, not having Sabonis there has kind of unlocked him a bit, a little more free to roam because Sabonis was going to

have so much of the offense initiated through him because he's such a good passer. But Turner has gone from, you know, whatever we thought about him in the beginning and what he could be and then he wasn't really that and then when he was involved in all these different trade rumors it didn't seem like the market was all that great for him and now when I just watch him going because there was stuff they were doing against the zone where they'd run to one side and then there was just a cut on the other side of it and then Halliburton would feed it every single time so again I don't think the zone necessarily worked it was kind of funny watching Halliburton's dad yell about the whole time but Turner I got to come up with this list. This will be a

segment at some point. It's going to be the adjusted ceilings guys where whatever your ceiling was and then if it was disappointing and then now looking at it again and going, okay, this is who you are. And now that we're not pretending like Miles Turner is going to be making all these all-star teams and the way he plays with Halliburton he's going to be an adjusted ceiling guy for me now because I just I just like him more because there's not some crazy expectation that he's going to be like the face of a franchise or anything like that so a lot of fun uh two other quick things after the game when Halliburton hit the huge three that basically sealed it he went to the wrist tapped it dame time and he was looking back at you know the bucks and i was like is that is that not going to go over well but lillard was

asked about in the post game and he was pretty cool about it he didn't first of all i think lillard's always had a pretty you know reasonable personality on a lot of stuff when he's he's given us that access and he was like yeah because some people were kind of looking at it as like maybe a bit of a tribute but to watch like how hyped Halliburton is all the time when he would cross half court and kind of linger and keep looking at the bucks but he's got this big smile on his face I was like maybe this this might rub a couple people the wrong way but you know my rule is pretty. If you're as good as he is in doing everything he's doing and kind of turning this franchise around and having this run that he's had, like you can kind of do whatever you want if you're backing it up and he's doing that. There was also a moment too late where Neesmith had fouled somebody and it was pretty clear it

was a foul, but he immediately wanted to challenge. It was at the far end away from the Pacers. It was pretty clear it was a foul, but he immediately wanted to challenge. It was at the far end away from the Pacers. It was on the buck side. So he immediately is like looking back at the Pacers bench, giving the, hey, let's challenge it. Let's challenge it. Carlisle looks to his review guy to see if he wants to challenge it. Joaquin Phoenix would have been jealous of this assistant for the Pacers who gave Carlisle this thumbs down.

Like he just, he's sitting there and he looks at him like, no. Head down, not disgust with the player asking for the challenge, but direct, efficient to Rick Carlisle being like, thumbs down. It was hysterical to watch the whole thing. On the Bucs side of things, I'm not going to get freaked out about this. They were incredible against the Knicks. So we know what they're capable of. We know what they're capable of on offense.

And so far, look, they've been the number three offense this year. A big improvement before they were last year. Lillard's part of that as well because just Lillard's going to have stretches in any game. You're like, what are you doing with this guy? I mean, he's just that good. No one can stay in front of him. Watching it live, no one can stay in front of that guy. Even when you're crowding him, you're harass harassing him it looks like he's maybe having trouble getting

it across half court but then when you play him out like that that intently i should say with that much intensity he's just eventually going to get himself free and then he can pull up from anywhere on top of everything else but the yana stuff we know what he's going to do i mean janice is still probably on the short list of of the two players in the world for me. I know it's not always about, you know, the most aesthetic things because he's just such a force. But I will admit, this is kind of funny. I'll admit in watching it live and then, you know, also what we've watched kind of in the rough stretch in the beginning and some of those awful defensive games at Toronto game jumps out and look, there's been a bad, been a lot of bad defensive games. I don't know if I updated that number 22nd defense this year. And by the way, the Pacers are 28th in defense, but Milwaukee was fourth in defense last year, 22nd now, but you know, bud was criticized a lot because he was stubborn, right? He didn't want to do things that, you know, like, let's look at this. Miami winning that series last year and Giannis kind of being like, was Giannis going to defend Butler? And then Giannis asked about it and he was kind of like, yeah, you know, whatever. Kind of like, it looked like he was disappointed that he didn't get a chance against Jimmy Butler, but whatever they had done defensively for the most part had really worked. And I remember there was a Pelicans game that I've

already referenced, Antonio Daniels, NBA radio, Pelicans broadcast, the whole thing. There was this game where Valanciunas was hitting all of these threes. Brooke Lopez was playing in a certain way where Valanciunas was allowed to take all these shots brooke lopez is looking at bud being like look do you want me to stay in our rule here and bud's like yes just let valencianus continue to do this our goal is to have you closer to the paint be at the rim don't get caught up in this stuff you're there to defend zion basically so let valencianus do whatever you want and end up working out because valencianus didn't have the same second half. And so on the broadcast, Daniels was like, hey, Bud's not going to change. Like he's not going to do it. So you have this disastrous loss to Miami, despite the fact the guy won a title, despite

the fact that coming into this year after that Miami loss, you still put Milwaukee on the short list, especially if they get Lillard. Like Milwaukee's still on this contenders list. I'm not going to be ridiculous about it. But it made me wonder if like some of the stubborn stuff that Bud did was actually a little bit more by design than just being stubborn because Giannis is, he goes so hard and he had a couple moments where he was really mad last night about how the game was playing out. He just decided like, screw it, I'm just going. And it actually worked. There was a lot of knee Smith matchups there late where I

thought they should have gone to it a little bit more. He only took three shot attempts. He made all three in the fourth quarter. A couple free throws mixed in there but late. There just wasn't a lot of looks there for him. Giannis goes so incredibly hard, which I love about him, that when Bud was

playing him 31 minutes a game, I was like, maybe he's doing this to protect him. Maybe he's not having Giannis chase around these awesome perimeter on-ball scorers because he knows how hard this guy goes. And I'm going to tell you watching it, Giannis was exhausted. He came in and then was tired after he had been out because I think he just exerts so much energy with with how just intense he is so look it's not even something i'm convinced of it was just something i was thinking about being like yeah some of the stuff we looked at with bud and him being stubborn why doesn't he do this more with yannis or why does he play yannis more minutes because he was like 31 but

i think he's like 35 now which is the highest in like six years but it's not like it's dramatically different it's not like he's playing 38 and used to play 30. But I think there's a management to Giannis that can happen. Remember Jared Greenberg in the playoff game, how they were subbing Giannis immediately? And Greenberg had this great part of the broadcast where he's like, look, he gets so fired up in the beginning, they have to rest him early. And I thought, it's not really why Milwaukee lost, but I thought it diminished who they could be because he was just that spent. Now, speaking of energy, second game, LeBron, the shooting numbers for him right now are absurd. He's actually taking less shots.

And I'll admit, too, in the beginning of the year, I thought, oh, he's found ways to coast in games, unlike really anybody I've ever seen where the numbers are always incredible. Even if you're like, man, I think he only went hard for like two stretches and the guy still had 30 and 12, like this guy's nuts. And the Lakers are doing a really good job. I think of, of giving him offensive opportunities where if he's bringing it up, maybe he's looking for a shot, but he's not going to work off the screen. He's not going to reset the possession. He's not going to probe dribble around like crazy. Everything he's doing now is decisive where if I'm going to expend this much energy, it has to be with me knowing exactly what I'm doing almost before I'm doing it.

And they'll even do stuff where he's cutting from the opposite side of the ball into the lane and then catching it where either he can finish the layup he took a couple he took a couple absurd jumpers one went in one was like so tough i was like man but he's he's become incredibly efficient at managing his own energy within the game and you know you're not going to see him even though that phoenix game it felt like he was doing it uh in the regular season one early where that was like one of the games was like, I just wonder physically how he's going to look when we get into April and into May. Because it's great right now, but that's kind of the task because he turns 39 this month. But his management of himself within the game and some of the stuff they're doing where it's like, okay, if I'm making this move, I know this is actually going to be a shot attempt. Or if this is this drive, nobody's going to be able to do anything to me once I get momentum. So he's doing a great

job of that. I think the team is doing a good job letting him kind of get momentum on some of the catch stuff. So everybody feels like the Lakers are going to win this thing because it's just built up for it. But who knows? The Pacers are one thing. All right. Last couple of things here. The Zion side of it. Watching it live isn't great. And it was a constant piece of conversation. You'd run upstairs to grab a drink. You'd run by somebody in the bathroom. You would see somebody later in the hotel lobby. And the topic of conversation is like, dude, Zion in person? I can't believe how out of shape he is. lining because the other thing with LeBron is like, look, he's taken the lesser defensive assignment now for years, which is fine, but they started the game with LeBron on Zion. So I was like, whoa, I'm like, is it because they don't want to chasing Herb Jones around, but ultimately like with CJ back and Valanciunas getting catches, which isn't an option for LeBron defensively. And then Ingram, I figured it was going to be Herb Jones because they wouldn't

want to put him on Zion, but they were fine with it. They were totally fine with it. And he gets the charges against Zion. They played way off of Zion. I know what the numbers will be. Zion's going to have a huge outburst, just like he did after I did my thing where I was worried about him and he was like 11 to 12 from the floor. The numbers are still going to be there, but I don't know. It's like I went through all the numbers, like there's drive numbers where you're like, it's not that much worse than last year. If you look at his points per game on drives and number of drives, it's not that much worse than last year if you look at his points per game on drives and the number of drives.

It's almost identical to last season as it is right now. The net rating stuff for his career has gone from plus 5, plus 2, plus 7 last year in 29 games to a negative this year. The restricted area stuff that we already covered, there's not that big of a drop-off except the percentage of attempts. The numbers look significant. But when you're talking about like nine attempts versus 12 attempts, then the numbers can be totally like thrown off because, you know,

we're just talking percentages here, but I can, I, I can only tell you this watching it live was bad. It was worse than watching the bad Zion game in person looks way worse in person than it does on TV. And that's what it looked like. And, you know, you start digging into some of the, well, you know, what do they do? Cause you know, I would think David Griffin in the front office goes, look, if this doesn't turn around, you know, do we have like a real discussion? And that's where we on the outside can lose our minds about this stuff. Cause my immediate thing is then for who, for who, because it's very close to what the

Anthony Davis conversation was like with the Lakers. When the AD thing was bad, he was hurt all the time. They didn't know. It was like, are you going to give this guy a contract? How's this going to work out? It's like, okay, but for who? Especially knowing you still have to be competitive

with number 23 on your team. So the answer is usually, well, the best version of this player, whether it's AD or Zion, is far better than anything we're going to get back. So it doesn't really make any sense to even have it, but it's just going to be frustrating as an organization who knows they have this tremendous talent. Even if he's limited offensively, it still all worked and was incredibly efficient. But if he can't get himself back into shape and it doesn't look like he's taking this seriously, and with, I think, Ingram's ascension,

and the fact that they have Trey Murphy back, and Hawkins, who's isn't even playing because Murphy's back, and Dyson Daniels, who probably could use some more minutes, and Nance wasn't even playing last night because he was hurt. I've talked about the depth. I've talked about how much I like the talent. You know that if this continues, my closing point would just be, you have to figure how long can you wait on the guy to be the guy that he's shown he can be? Knowing that it's kind of like the franchise is always kind of stuck in the Zion mode.

And if it's up to him to get in a better shape, take it seriously for the first time in his career, is the right bet that he's actually going to do that one day? Because I think those odds are getting lesser and lesser, which is really unfortunate for somebody I love watching play. Cash in on balling out this NBA season with FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook. Right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets with any winning $5 Moneyline bet. That's $150 if your team wins. Let's take a quick look at the lines.

I have bet literally every game, I feel like, since I've walked into the state borders. It's really nice just to be able to walk down the sportsbook, look at the lines. I'm on a first name basis with the people behind the counter now I'm uh I missed it man I used to love doing this stuff and so this trip I was like I'm just gonna bet a bunch of the games where am I at pretty much around 500 which is kind of my deal but let's get you a winner right now uh I'm gonna just do it it's the favorite and I don't like to do the favorites deal all the time, but being around the Lakers thing and seeing,

and it really comes off that Phoenix win to get to the semifinal, stomping the Pelicans where maybe that Pelican-Sacramento matchup, which I believe is a problem for the Kings, maybe baked into that number is them winning that as a dog against Sacramento and kind of handling that game after the first quarter. And then looking at the Pelicans line with the Lakers, it'd be like one and a half, two and a half. And then the Lakers just stomped them.

So yeah, I like the Lakers. It went from minus three and a half to minus four. And that is the play for the weekend. No Friday games. We're all about the Saturdays. If you've been thinking about joining FanDuel, there's no better time to join.

The app is easy to use and there's a wide range of ways to bet, including quick bets, live same-game parlays, the Parlay Hub, and more. So visit FanDuel.com slash Ryan, R-Y-E-N,

and turn dimes into dollars this season. FanDuel, official sportsbook partner of the NBA. First online real money wager. Only $5 pregame money line wager required. First online real money wager. Only $5 pregame money line wager required. First online real money wager. Only $10 first deposit required.

Bonus issued is non-withdrawable. Bonus bets expire seven days after receipt. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Very lucky on a Vegas morning to get the king of Vegas up this early. It's Brian Winhorst from ESPN, NBA legend. How are you, man? I think you got the wrong feed if you think I'm an NBA legend.

But yeah, I'm the kind of guy that gets up at 7 a.m. in Vegas. That's how I roll. I just want you to know that. Hey, look, I felt bad for my neighbors when I started taping this early. They were like, who's this guy? What's going on over there? Yeah, well, it's not as bad as when i was in phoenix um for the playoffs um this you know i was doing get up at 5 like 15 in the morning and um

this was last spring um it went minorly viral um but uh and i had one of those connecting rooms. It was like, there was a door there. And so I, I don't think I was talking that loud. Um, you know, I wasn't screaming, but you know, when you, you know, this, when you're on TV, you have to, they want a little bit more from you. And, um, after I did the first segment, um, I heard this woman scream, uh, through the door and I want to be clear, scream, shut the F up a couple of times. And so I did the next hit and I definitely lowered my voice. And the producers kind of got in my ear and they were like, hey, you really lowered your voice there. And I was just like, well, I'm trying to avoid an incident at this hotel. And I asked if they could say it on air, which I said they could because I wanted to explain why I wasn't talking loudly. And people thought it was hilarious. And I actually, even though it wasn't clear what hotel I was in, I got an email from the hotel.

what hotel I was in. I got an email from the hotel, like I had left, went to LA for the games three and four. And I got an email from the hotel saying, hey, we're sorry about that. We see you're coming back for game five. We'll put you in a room with nobody next to you. And they put me in the, when I came back, they put me in the exact same room and there was somebody next to me. So my compromise was that I would start doing it at, at the, during the nine o'clock hour at 6. A.M. To try to avoid,

um, fisticuffs. But, um, I was along with his story of saying, I know how you feel. Yeah. Right.

That's, uh, I actually side with her to be honest with you. Uh, five 45. I think she was right. Okay. I think it was five 15 brother.

Five 15. Yeah. Yeah. She was right. Uh, give me, uh, give brother. 5-15. Yeah, she was right. Give me the early impressions of what we've seen so far. We know it's going to be Lakers and Pacers. It feels like this Halliburton coming out party, which he's deserving of. But I think that's kind of where it starts.

Your thoughts? Yeah, you know, the Pacers, like their RPI would be really huge right now because they beat the Cavs, who, you know, they're not championship contender at the moment, but they're a quality team. They beat the Sixers in Philly. It was a weird thing, and this is just in the in-season tournament, where they played like on a Wednesday in Philly, and it didn't count for the in-season tournament. And then they played like two days later on a Friday, and it did count for the in-season tournament. They lost the first game, won the second game, but they won the game that was the in-season tournament game.

Then they won in Atlanta, which I think Atlanta was hot at the time. Then they beat the Celtics in the quarters. Then they beat the Bucs in the semis. That is a very impressive run to get to the in-season tournament final. And, you know, the lakers beat the suns twice and the suns you know um you know they're not a full power but they're a good team uh but you know the pacers just very impressive like totally have earned their way to this spot totally are relishing it um you know being uh around their locker room last night like it was they were just absolutely on

air because none of these guys have pretty much experienced anything like this i mean when ty when so they had post-game press conference with tyrese halliburton and miles turner and the room was overflowing i mean these are guys who are used to doing some you you know, when they're on the road, like they'll do a post-game press conference while there'll be two media members there, three sometimes. And they come into this and literally there's 150 and the room is overflowing. And Miles and Tyrese are doing a little comedy show up there. I know that's how Anthony Davis and LeBron roll like four times a night, four times a week at night. This is something they've never done before. So they are totally embracing it. So I, I, um, I love the fact that the Tyrese and the Pacers are gay. And as I got to know Tyrese and his family a little bit over the summer when, um, I covered team USA and

I was basically with them for a month straight, traveling the world. And his game, his aim is obviously awesome. His personality is spectacular. And he's sort of an ideal young star for so many different reasons. And so I'm glad that's happening. And then, so I don't know exactly what time it is,

but you know, Ryan, that these games were at a weird time on Thursday. So it was two o'clock local for the Pacers game. Then it was six o'clock local for the Lakers game. LeBron rolled in to that arena on the first bus. Now, I'm not with the Lakers on the road that often. I can't tell you how common that is. I know that in his calves and heat days,

the going to the first bus was sort of his indication of, I say the first bus. Do people know what I'm talking about? You think? Yeah. Look, I mean, when you're leaving the team hotel and you're going to the venue,

basically I always thought it was like first bus was like the loser cruiser. Like, you know, the cool guys went on the second bus and i was told when i traveled with the celtics only one time ever because i filled in for granny to do play by play a long time ago they were like make sure you're on the first bus i was like yeah is that. Is that fair? Do you think that's a fair assumption? Yeah. So the guys who basically don't play, like the two-way guys and the guys who are not in the rotation, they come over to the arena early because they get their work in with like a pregame workout. They go through development and then they'll play like three on three or whatever. They'll basically play their game before the game. And so they come over way early. So, and then typically the veterans and even the head coach comes over on the second bus. So, um, sometimes now, by the way, like there's even three buses

and when you're on the third bus, you know, you're a superstar status. It used to be when LeBron was with the Cavs and the heat when I was around him every day. And I could like really assess this when LeBron went into playoff mode, he would start coming on the first bus, like about April, you know, fifth or so, like 10, 15 days before the playoff started, he started maybe even a little earlier, maybe in late March, sometimes he would start coming over on the first bus. Cause he would start sort of his ramp up to the playoffs. Anyway, he shows up on the first bus bus i don't even think that some of the um the uh camera and stuff that were there to capture all the arrivals uh and like obviously this is a big arrival you know they set up a full red carpet they had the trophy there they had all

these special lights so they wanted to make this an event lebron wasn't into that, Ryan. He was wearing a plain white shirt. We've seen LeBron in $200,000 in jewelry and $20,000 suits show up at games, or at the very least, very high-end clothing. He was wearing a white shirt and jeans, no jewelry, and he was on the first bus. no jewelry. And he was on the first bus. And I was like, oh, bleep. I would never, ever, ever give anybody gambling advice, okay? Because I've been around long enough to know that the NBA is unpredictable. Having said that, yesterday, I was out on the court at like 1230, 1245 local. The court was absolutely frigid. It was freezing. It's one of the coldest courts I could ever remember. Boston always has a really cold court, but this was in Vegas. This court was freezing. The players were like wrapped up. They're blowing on their hand. They're rubbing

their hands together, trying to get warm. It's a two o'clock start in a non-NBA venue. And I'm hearing like, this is the highest over under pregame over under in like 32 years and I'm like this game ain't going over like you know I would never tell anybody to bet that I was like there's no way this game is going to cross the highest over under in history and then I saw walk in with that mindset at like 3.15 for a six o'clock game, I was like, oh, oh, I see how this is going to be. So again, I would never tell anybody to do that. But when I saw those two things, I was like, okay. And so LeBron came out and wanted that game really bad. And the Pelicans, sometimes LeBron wants a lot of games really bad. He can't win them all, but the pelicans were not in position to deny him so sorry i filibustered there no it's good stuff because i wouldn't have known that most of the listeners none of us would have known that

unless they'd read it somewhere else but and when i watch lebron and i'll admit like in the beginning of the year like look eventually this is not going to look like lebron um it's it's obviously going a lot later than we ever thought it would it's just he's doing stuff we've never ever seen before with all this has been covered but there's a couple moments like in the beginning of the year I was like I wonder how it's going to look physically or how he's going to be talked about when it when the like there's there's moments where he feels like he's a little bit more diminished but what I've noticed with him and you know this better than anybody he's just so damn smart that like he's incredibly efficient and I spent a lot of time

on this at the beginning of today's pod of like if I'm going to exert myself then there has to be like a reward for it and I'm gonna I'm gonna pick and choose my spots and you know I've seen his fourth quarter against Phoenix earlier this year I was like wow he's just gonna go for it initiate everything offensively I don't think he needs to be that I don't know that he's capable of again this is a long haul of six plus months if they're going to get to where they want to get to. But to see him take over because he's making all of his threes in the first half and the game was a blowout, I've noticed from him how specific he is about his intentions when he has the basketball

because he's just not going to sit there and try to create for 36 minutes a night. And that's what I think is as impressive as just the numbers in this stratosphere of like, just things that have never been done. Yeah. I mean, I think all of us wonder if he can last because we've seen him repeatedly in his Lakers tenure break down. You know, I remember the first, you know, his first year with the Lakers, it was on Christmas Day, right? They were in first place, and he stretched for a ball on Christmas Day, tweaked his groin, and basically wasn't right the rest of the year. And we already saw him. He's been playing through like – I mean, who knows what he's playing through?

I mean, one thing I know about LeBron, sometimes he'll play through something for five months and you won't know. But we know that he's been dealing with this little shin thing that's been bothering him. He clearly looks good but he always pushes the envelope and so you wonder like is him playing like this um in november and december gonna come back and haunt him in uh february and march i don't know um but i know that he's feeling good i can tell you know one of the one of the numbers that you know pops off the page is his scoring in the paint and his shooting percentage in the restricted area have exploded this year. I felt like there were times last year, especially when he was dealing with that foot injury, he just didn't have the explosion to get the corner turned.

And when he got in there, he didn't have the explosion to get up and finish over everybody. That foot injury is obviously healed. And so you see the results in his pain attacks. His pain scoring is way up. His three-point shooting has been very good, some of the best of his career. The data on LeBron's three-point shooting is pretty deep. The sample size is pretty large that he is not a 40% three-point shooter, but he has been. And so, you know, I guess we'll see. I think what I like about what he's doing right now is he is basically setting the tone for the entire NBA that this in-season tournament matters. And he's kind of giving a gift, in all honesty, to the whole league.

Because him playing this way and reaching the tournament finals is potentially helping the NBA sell this thing. And forget about $500,000. He keeps bringing up the $ sell this thing. And I'm not forget about 500,000. He keeps bringing up the 500,000. They're trying to sell this thing for a billion dollars. You know, I don't know. I don't know if I would ever break up, but they're trying to sell this new property for a billion dollars. And if they sell it for a billion dollars, every NBA player is going to get a huge taste of that immediately, like in, you know, in the next two years, he might not even get to participate in it, but he gets it. And I remember even the first game that they played in the in-season tournament, um, as soon as the game was over, the game was on

ESPN and, um, he came to did, did the postgame interview with Lisa Salters on the court. And he's like, this is great. This is in-season tournament game. This was at the time, Ryan, where people were kind of like, I don't know if we care about this, but he set the tone that this matters. And the players who are smart, and I've noticed some other savvy players doing this, know that from a business standpoint, being able to sell this is important. And LeBron has absolutely set the tone that this matters. And the NBA, which already owes him a huge debt, should owe him another one for the way he's gone about this and the way he approached this and the way he approached, you know, look,

if the Lakers lose yesterday, they get the weekend off. You know, his son is going to be playing, it looks like his first game on Sunday. I'm sure LeBron could use the weekend off. You know, his son is going to be playing, it looks like his first game on Sunday. I'm sure LeBron could use the weekend off. Like if he had come into this game yesterday and just, you know, was like, whatever, I'll try to shoot some shots. And if they go in good, and if they don't, I'll just go back home. I wouldn't have blamed him, but totally opposite. And so for him to show this investment, knowing that it's a long season, knowing that the real goals for him are so many off, it's like, it's a huge gift to the NBA. And he's doing it to get financial reward. Don't get me wrong. I mean, he's incentivized to do it,

but that was one of the things I was thinking about watching him go at this yesterday. No, he deserves a lot of credit for it too. But I also think there's some legacy driven stuff there too. Like if he wins this and says, hey, this is super important, I won the first one, then we can do all that because they'll be the big campaign. They'll be the big campaign for surpassing Jordan with all this stuff. No one ever changes their mind on the topic, so I don't even need to get into it. I want to pivot to the other team though real quick. What do you think the Pelicans, maybe that's the wrong way I'm leading the witness a bit there because I don't know if you can share intel with us or if you have any or whatever. What do

you think the Pelicans are talking about right now with Zion Williamson's future? Well, their coaching staff is really working hard to try to get Zion and Brandon Ingram to invest in what they got going there. Because it's not really just a Zion. Zion gets all the attention because he was the number one draft pick and he's been injured so much and his conditioning was always an issue. But really it's the package deal of Zion and Brandon Ingram. Because Brandon Ingram is a max player for them who is up for a contract

extension in the offseason. And they really, their belief in all this is that the two of them together are the, you know, the cornerstone of this and everything that they've done, everyone that they've acquired and drafted has really been about those players. And, you know, I know like, you know, James Borrego, who's their, you know, Willie Green's lead assistant, they brought him in and he had like three or four of their job offers. Like a whole bunch of teams wanted him. He came in and like one of the things he's trying to do is get Ingram and Zion to like fully invest with each other,

you know, get this going and and pivot and learn to play with each other and learn to to support each other and their personalities it's it's a it's a it's a hard sell because ingram is a laid-back guy super mega talented but he's just a laid-back guy he's you know and but he's just a laid-back guy. You can certainly pull out times where you see him where he shows a killer instinct. It's not like it's not there. But on an average day, it's just not there. And the same thing with Zion. As talented as he is, he doesn't come out on that court wanting to kill you.

And they've had some moments and, you know, they've played a lot better recently. And they've, you know, there's been these moments where they've, you know, they had a big team meeting, you know, I think it was about a month ago now and they, and everybody called each other out. And, and after that, like, uh, Ingram and Zion started like spending time together after practice, working on sets and working on playing together and surprise, surprise, they started playing better on the court. So they were like, you know, they're trying to like, they're trying to move the ball ahead six inches at a time. And then, oh man, Trey Murphy's back healthy and Jose Alvarado's back healthy. And, you know,

they go into Sacramento and they win in that environment. And like, and then, you know, it's like, you know, they got it to, you know, to third and one, and then they, you know, it's like they got it to third and one, and then they take a personal foul because the interest and effort level of that performance that they had last night. It's Zion's lowest two scoring. I think it's his fewest shots he's taken in two games in his career and lowest points in two games in his career, the two NCAAs and tournament games um

i think the the whatever he and ingram had together were the lowest combination of points i think they had 26 points or something was the lowest they've ever had so here they are actually at a moment where they're building towards this and the two of them come out there like wet noodles. Zion especially. He just showed no thrust in this game. And I think probably if I was a Pelicans fan, the most disappointing thing for me would be the third quarter. I think the Lakers were up 12 or 13 or so at the half. So Lakers obviously were playing well. LeBron's hitting threes.

You're going to have a hard night ahead of you when LeBron's hitting that outside shot. Okay, so they get into halftime it's 12 points you know they can overcome it you know they they have been a team that um you know has been able to to to put up points and bunches at times so okay third quarter you are in an elimination game you are trying to you know make a pivot as a franchise you You're playing well. You believe in your team. You're healthy. The column's back. And you go out there in the third quarter. And in the first three minutes of the third quarter, maybe it was even two minutes, the Lakers absolutely took them and just put them down. And I think it was 43 to 17 in the third quarter, something like

that. And to see that, okay. So, you know, it's one thing to come into the game and be, you know, you're a little off again, you're in a non NBA venue at six o'clock start, but completely unacceptable showing in the third quarter that game, that third quarter was as disappointing, um, as something I've seen in the NBA this year from the, um, from the Pelicans. So, um, I definitely think that they have possibilities,

but it's hard to believe in it when they have an opportunity like that and they just let it slip through their fingers. And I covered the series two years ago when they played the Suns in the first round, Willie Green's first year. Zion was out. But they pushed the Suns to the limit. It was a six-game series. It was a one-versus-eight matchup. They'd won their way in on the play-in. I was in New Orleans for the three playoff games. The atmosphere there was amazing, terrific atmosphere. That particular season, I happened to be there for opening night

in New Orleans. And then I was there for the opening night was as dead of an opening night as I've ever seen. Zion was also not playing. And the building was, you know, half full at best. Zero excitement for a season. And then I was back there for the playoffs. And the building was, the roof was about to blow off. And they were so excited about the young team that they had. And they really had it going.

And to be two years on now, or a season and a half on, and them really not being any closer is definitely disappointing all the way around. I watched Minnesota hold off the Spurs. It was kind of a valiant effort there, and I kind of look at some similarities there because my rule always with these trades, I don't believe last night's game being like they have to trade him

but i just feel like him figuring out is the wrong side of the bet uh and i hope that's not the case maybe he gets back into shape maybe he figures you know maybe maybe it all works out here but it's just feeling like it's less than like like less and less likely that that's the safer bet but then you look at like towns of minnesota and you know for a while there it was like oh you know they're probably gonna have to move off of him but then they do the gobert trade the idea they're just gonna be bigger than people they get off the angelo russell finally they bring in a point guard that like kind of understands things with conley and then ant takes off and depending on how it goes for them in the playoffs we know depending on which day you want to look at

the standings you feel like minnesota is up there with everybody even if it's you know this this looming yokich thing is just in the way of everybody in the west but whenever we think about like oh well they have to get him out of there it's like yeah but whatever we're getting back for him isn't necessarily a solution uh and and maybe the newer version of him or a figured out zion or the healthy anthony davis, that's still way better than anything that would ever happen. Whenever you look at a Minnesota, do you feel like this is patience paying off for them still too early? Or Towns, which I thought he'd be as reluctant as anybody because I think he's kind of like first team all delusional. But him handing the keys over or Ant just ripping those keys from him.

And granted, you know, Ant wasn't great the other night against San Antonio. He was coming back from the injury after that tough fall. I just think there's always these lessons in patience, whereas there's other franchises that just don't really want to be like, hey, this might not be working, but if we trade something and it goes even worse, then we're even more likely to criticism, and then maybe we don't even have jobs anymore. There's a bunch of different motivations at work for when teams do or don't want to do anything.

But I always kind of default to like, most of the time they just don't do it because they're always afraid of like the return isn't going to be better if this guy figures it out somewhere else, which is clearly the challenge for Griffin and Zion as well. Yes. And I think that's absolutely the correct way to go. You know, I would, Yes. And I think that's absolutely the correct way to go. You know, I would, if I had a talent like Zion, I would absolutely exacerbate myself trying every single thing that I knew and would search for. And that's what they're doing. Like I said, they're like right now and, you know, they're like just super duper trying to get Zion and Ingram together. And like, we may get to the spring and it, you know, cause, cause at the, at the end of the day, those two guys both need to have the ball. I mean, one of the reasons they've been playing better in this last month after that team meeting was because they've let Zion play more point guard and he's, he's had the ball in his hands more. He's been more engaged. Well, the

thing about it is, you know, Ingram needs a ball in his hands too. Ingram likes to have his ball in his hands. So they've also got McCollum. So they've got to figure out a way to make everybody happy and do that. But like, this is what I've always said about Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum and other, you know, sort of pairings like that. Like you don't break something like that up until you absolutely are forced to, because you can't make it work. You exhaust yourself. You take years. You try everything you can. You search the earth for ways to make it work because especially in a place like New Orleans, free agency isn't really an option for them. Yeah, absolutely. This might be the most important part of any of these discussions, so keep going. Yeah, exactly.

When you're building a team, this is extremely basic, but there's only three ways to get players. You sign them, you draft them, you trade for them. It's very hard to sign players in New Orleans. That's why you look at the Pacers and you look at the way that team was built. That team was built through the draft and trade. They're a're a team that's you know i think they've got the lowest payroll uh in the league you know they potentially especially if bruce brown opts out of his contract they're potentially going to have a huge bunch of salary cap space next year but they can't operate going forward like they're going to be able to re-sign paul george you know it would

be amazing for them if they got a wing player like Paul George. If they were Miami or the Lakers or the Warriors and they had this team and they had $30 or $40, $50 million in cap space coming up, you could say, oh, maybe they can go get Paul George. The Pelicans can't operate like that. They can't just say, we're going to move off Zion and we'll try again in the market. So you have to do that. And Minnesota is in the same boat. Minnesota, they made the Gobert trade because they were convinced that Towns and Edwards were good enough that that trade would take them to the next level. It's taken them a while to figure it out. They're headed towards a financial cliff that I'm not sure that they can withstand. I don't know what's in everybody's bank account with their ownership, so I can't make an

assumption. But they're headed towards a financial cliff that's a different set of challenges. But when you can only build through trade and the draft you make different sets of decisions and new orleans has to do that so you know new orleans could trade zion for five first round picks um and not get a player half as good at him with any of those five picks that's just the reality of it how funny is it when you have the information about like you know i don't even come close to the level of information that you go through but every now and then you know if i'm't even come close to the level of information that you go through, but every now and then, you know, if I'm talking to somebody, it'll be like, well, man, you know, you think they would move for him and be like, dude, there's no market for that guy. And it's like, whoa, wait a minute. You know, like, Hey, this guy scores all this points. And this guy's, I think Zach Levine's

a good example of that. Woj reported recently, like, yeah, there's just not a massive market for him because he's expensive. He's had some injury stuff. He's incredibly talented, but you're never quite sure like what is the fit. And I just think there's a lot of times those of us in the outside, whether it's fans or less plugged in media, we would be blown away by the actual market for some of the players that we spend months talking about potentially moving. Yeah. So there's so much nuance in this and it's very difficult because, you know, fans tend to sort of look at things in 140 characters. So like in the case of Bradley Beal, Bradley Beal, his trade market was very, very limited because whoever traded for him had to inherit his contract. You know, we were not

looking at Bradley Beal, the player versus another, we were not looking at Bradley Beal, the player, versus another player. You're looking at Bradley Beal with the contract. That's the thing with, like, with James Harden's, you know, trade market when, like, he was in Brooklyn. You weren't just trading for James Harden. You were trading for James Harden, who was going to be arriving wherever he was being traded.

He obviously wanted to be in Philly, but wherever he was going to be traded, he was arriving there as who he was, plus his demand for a max contract, which ended up getting Philly in getting crossroads, because that's why that went crossroads, because Harden wanted the max. And so when you look at Zach Levine, you're not looking at Zach Levine, the player, you're looking at Zach Levine with that contract, which is I think $187 million left on it. And here's what you have to understand. With the new rules now, okay, if you're a team that's in the aprons, either the first apron or the second apron, you're highly compromised with how you can trade players. So, like, the big thing is that after this year, if you're in the second apron, you can't aggregate players in a trade.

So, what I mean by that is you can't take, like, three players making $10 million and trade it for a player making $30 million. That's taken away from you. So if we get into next year and there's four teams in the second apron, let's say. Let's just for the sake of our sake say there's four teams. That means if you're – let's just say you're the Minnesota Timberwolves, okay? And you come to the reality in a year that you need to trade Carl Towns only because you can't afford him. That's going to be the thing. Okay, now you're going to trade Carl Townves. Okay. And you come to the reality in a year that you need to trade Carl Towns only because you can't afford him. That's going to be the thing. Okay. Now you're going to trade Carl Towns. Okay. He makes a $48 million next year. Okay. Here's our market for Carl Towns.

Let's go. Well, right off the bat, I got four teams that can't trade for him because the only way they could trade for him is, is if they give you a player that makes at least $48 million back because they can't combine players. So already we're now down to 25 team trade market, or actually 24 because you're yourself for a team. Okay. So now let's say you want to trade a player and you want to get back first round draft picks. Let's say the Bulls are like, okay, we need to trade Zach Levine and we need to get draft picks back we got to start this rebuilding ryan there's like six or seven teams that can't even barely trade a first round draft pick right now because they've all traded all their picks and they're like encumbered to the teeth and so like oh well um all right well then

i can't do a deal with those seven teams. So now you're like down. Okay, now I'm negotiating. Okay, now I'm trading Zach Levine. Okay, now I'm down to, now I can only do a deal with 17 teams. How many of those teams actually like Zach Levine? Okay, maybe there's three. Okay, now I got three.

Let's have a nice little bidding war with these three teams. And then those teams are like wait a minute if i trade for zach levine and he his knee gives out or whatever i got the same problem you do i now have to try to trade him again in a year uh i'm not going to give you value for zach levine he's a problem and i'm going to treat him like a distressed asset you're going to sell him to me for pennies on the dollar. And nowhere near here are we ever talking about the player Zach Levine. That market isn't narrowing because people don't like Zach Levine as a player or a person or a passer or a shooter or a defender or whatever. That's just the dynamics of the narrowing of the market that we're in right now because of all the picks that have been traded in recent years as teams go all in and the new set of rules. so the reason that bradley beale went for second round draft

picks and an expiring contract and chris paul is because nobody wanted that no trade clause nobody wanted that and so um that's the reality of it is that the, the, the, you know, the, the trade, um, the trade market is, is, you know, the, the new rules are in the CBA are designed to prevent teams from gathering multiple max players together. So if you've got a player in a max contact that you're trying to trade, it gets very, very difficult. And that's if the player is even super desirable. So yeah, we're, we're going to be in

for a time where it's not as fun to go on the trade machine because you can find a trade that will work but none of the teams that actually where the trade will work actually is in position to actually make that trade that was awesome uh i have two final things that i want to ask you about is maxi becoming this version of Maxi the worst news ever for the people? And I love this word. I should say the teams that were monitoring the Embiid situation. Because just as an aside, the idea that any front office is like, Monday, hey, what do you want to do? I don't know. What do you want to do? I don't know. You want to get lunch and then just hang out? Okay, cool. And then Tuesday they show up and be like,

Hey, you know what? Let's monitor the Embiid situation from this day forth. Let's, let's start to monitor it today. Um, so again, that's my own little aside rant, but it's a great word. It's a great term. It's fun. It's an awesome click thing. And I click on them too. So, you know, whatever, But the reality of Maxie becoming this, does that change the Embiid sweepstakes if there even was one? Yeah. As far as like developments and transaction business, I think Maxie being this good is one of the biggest thing that's happened in the NBA this year. Because, you know, Embiid, you know, gave that interview. I can't remember if it was on, it was on some podcast, but even Embiid gave that interview in August when the Harden situation was smoldering.

And he was like, yep, I got to do what I got to do to win, uh, whether it's in Philly or somewhere else. I can't remember exactly how he said it, but I remember him saying it's whether it's in Philly or somewhere else. So that's a shot across the bow. Um, and definitely had to be taken into consideration. You know, Giannis gives that interview to the New York Times, sort of a drive-by on the Bucs, you know, saying, you know, some stuff along the same lines. And the Bucs immediately go scrambling and trade for Dame Lillard.

So it was clearly something that they needed to to pay attention to and if you're a team out there if you're one of these you know handful of teams that might be interested and you hear that and that absolutely affects your strategy and then you're thinking and so you're thinking okay well they're going to have to train james harden for pieces and parts and um you know milwaukee and boston have loaded up philly looks like they're going to be a distant third. Like they're, you know, they're primed to potentially, you know, slide in, you know, maybe even down to fourth or fifth. And so you're thinking, man, like this could be a thing.

And then Giannis signs the extension and at least ostensibly takes himself off the market, at least in the short term. I don't think Giannis is going anywhere in the short term. I still don't necessarily think that that he's committed to Milwaukee forever, but that's the reality of modern star players. You have a superstar player in the NBA now. You're going, maybe not, you're always going year to year, but you're going basically 18-month cycles, whether your player is happy or not. But certainly when Giannis signs that extension, if you're a team like the Knicks or the Heat, you know, who's, you know, the Nets who are playing, trying to play that game,

who are dreaming of that next big, you know, name on the market, you're kind of bummed. That's why I said that the Lillard trade was like a triple gut punch to the Miami Heat because not only did they not get him, Milwaukee gets him and then extends Giannis. And then the third punch is that Boston ends up with Drew Holiday, a guy they were also interested in. So Miami gets shoved down the list and Giannis extends. So that makes Embiid like go to front and center. You're like now looking at Embiid as like of the megastar players who possibly could relocate imbeed goes to the center of the target

and then what happens maxi comes out and starts playing like a top 10 player in the league and they're putting up numbers like basically their numbers that they're putting up on a night-to-night basis are akin to the numbers that Steph and Durant were putting up in like 17, 18, 19, when they were basically two MVPs still in their primes. I called it MVP redundancy. Those are the types of, I'm not saying that Maxine and Beat are that level, but the numbers that they're putting up night to night are comparable to the numbers that Durant and Curry are putting up. And so you haven't heard anybody say anything about Embiid being anything but totally committed

to Philadelphia. And why would you? They are playing great. He is totally being taken care of. Maxie is a joy to play with. He's a different type of player in some ways in Harden, but he plays with energy and a lightness and a smile and with a speed.

It's a completely different experience. And so we'll see whether or not that works long-term, but how could you not play with Tyrese Maxie and say, oh man, this is awesome. And then by the way, the 76ers are in position to have major salary cap space. They are a market where they could sign a free agent. And because of the hardened trade, they have extra pieces to acquire other things. So not only are the Sixers playing great right now with a potential, you know, borderline first team all NBA player right now with Embiid, they have the ability

upwardly mobile to even improve their roster. So Embiid is totally, and of the storylines in the NBA beyond who's winning, that's a huge development. And, you know, again, 18 months, we'll see where Maxie is and we'll see where in beat is but for now the 76ers have been given a stay and daryl morey for whatever you want to say about him he has been able to maneuver it and his team is in a great spot and they're going to compete to win the title this year last thing um it's too early it's too aggressive to say the warriors are done and if you were to say, okay, we'll define done, and it would be competing for a championship, right?

If the playoffs had shaked a little differently last year, I thought the Lakers were a brutal matchup for them, whatever. But maybe it's a Western Cup, but they're not being Denver. Clay, it continues to be a struggle. Wiggins doesn't come in ready. And it looks more like Minnesota Wiggins than NBA Finals. Wiggins doesn't come in ready and looks more like Minnesota Wiggins than NBA finals hero Wiggins. The youth part of it hasn't really worked. Draymond has, you know, there's been the Draymond issues where there's injury and now the suspension. So it feels like maybe this

run is over. Um, you know, that's not a, you know, I just don't like to be dismissive. Like things happen, things change, but I don't know where their, their fix is coming. I agree. Yeah. Right. Or do wait, you know, which part do you agree? It feels dismissive or you don't know where the fix is coming. I agree. I I'm not, I'm not, I am, I'm if, um, if I'm going to be wrong, I'm going to be wrong, uh, betting on them too long. I'm not actually betting, but, um, if I'm going to be wrong, I would rather be late. I'm not going to retire them too early. That's just what I decided. So I'm sorry. Go ahead. No, because it's kind of part of it. Because if you feel that way, then the second part of this would be, this is going to be stupid to you, but I'm going to do

it anyway. Would another NBA player with, there's not many that have the resume of Curry, but let's just say in that stratosphere, would most NBA players with that kind of all-time resume start looking around and start asking questions when he turns 36 next March? I think if they were star players who'd moved around before. um i think if they were they were star players who'd moved around before um yeah i mean i think if like if it was if it was lebron because lebron well he changed teams at 35 i think he was um or maybe 34 um uh but you know the thing there's about curry um that are kind of different um one is that he has so much joy when he plays like it's it's very hard to i mean it exists but it's very hard to find moments where you see curry frustrated curry has an absolute blast um you know the reason that star players get frustrated and want to move is they haven't won, they get unhappy, they're brooding. It very rarely happens out of the blue. You see it coming for months, if not years. That's not Curry's MO. Curry is dancing around, having fun. Like Curry doesn't worry about like, he's not,

he's not worried about where the team's going to be in May right now. I mean, he knows it's important that they have to move in a direction, but like he doesn't, you know, he has such a refreshing attitude. Like, you know, LeBron is always computing, like what's going on now and what it means today, tomorrow, next week, next month, next decade. You know, he's always thinking like that. That's just not how Curry's wired. And so like, you really can't compare him. the institutional history that those guys have together. You know, LeBron, not that it always has to be compared to LeBron, but he's the guy who's changed teams more than anything.

LeBron changes his teammates. You know, his teammates are constantly moving. So if you're a star who's constantly having your team rebuild to round, I mean, even Giannis, he's now basically cycled through some of his teammates with this trade, which he obviously heavily supported. Curry, you know, his core teammates have been there forever. And so, like, that's not who he is. You know, their institution is let's keep it together. I don't think that they're wired to operate that way.

I also think a big thing, and this goes for anybody in the NBA right now, there's no team out, there's no 97, 98 bulls out there. There's no 2000, you know, 18 warriors out there. I realize that the Nuggets, when they're at their peak power, that they are extremely challenging and the Jokic is very, you know, formidable. But as I watch them play, and maybe they'll get there, you don't look at the Nugget and say, oh my, oh my God, they're impenetrable. So if you're a team, especially in the Western Conference, especially in the Western Conference, sell me on the true difference between... Obviously, the Timberwolves are looking great,

but you don't look at the Timberwolves and say, oh my God, we could never beat them in a seven-game series. That's not dismissive. You've got to earn more than 20 games of this for me to be like, how do you beat them? I feel that way. Look, with Przingis' health part of it, as great as Boston looks and what that starting five games of this for me to be like no how do you how do you beat them you know and i feel that way look with przingis's health part of it as great as boston looks and what that starting five and the net point like all that stuff i'm like yeah i don't know that pacer's game at the end looked

real familiar you know so there's there is not some immovable object i don't think in the way of anything other than just if yokich you know you know, makes every possession efficient, which he's fully capable of. Exactly. So I think that's the thing, like the warriors aren't, they're not looking great, but they're not like, oh my God, the mountain that we must climb is, you know, immovable. So, um, I, I, I am interested in if, you know, because this is a topic that gets people frustrated, but people looked at the Chris Paul trade like it was like some massive pivot strategy move for the Warriors. Like, we got to go out and get another guard and, you know, we're going to change the way we play. It was a salary dump. I mean, it wasn't 100% pure John Collins to the jazz for a second round pick salary dump. Obviously, they believed that Chris

would bring them some redeeming qualities and could help them with their second year and stuff like that. But the reason they did the trade was to get off Jordan Poole's salary so that they could pay Wiggins and they could pay Draymond and in theory pay Klay. That's why they did the trade. They did it for an expiring contract. Okay. couple of young players on their roster that i think other teams value and they don't seem to like kuminga and moses moody just don't get the run that maybe they would get elsewhere would they consider using chris paul as an expiring contract in a trade and there's all kinds of things that come along with that because their spending is 200 million

dollars including tax and their planning was to was to get that money off of the books even if they were to bring chris paul back it wouldn't be a 30 some million would be to get that money off the books and um you know part of what he's doing there is to clean their books a little bit. Would they consider going and doing that? And, you know, I had that question the day they made the trade. It's not like I feel that that's a thing that's been necessitated. I think they're going to try like hell to get out of the second apron with letting Paul fall off the books and then trying to negotiate down with Clay, negotiate a pay cut with Clay. But I think if you're looking at extreme possibilities of what could happen, I don't think it's irresponsible to say, is there a Chris Paul trade that could happen with the asset being the same thing that he is, which is an expiring contract. I don't know who that would be for right now. I don't have a list. Here's my six trades. But the reason that I think that you at least wonder about that is because, again, you look at the Western Conference and you don't lay awake at night saying, oh my God, how are we going to beat the Kings four out of seven? How are we going to beat the Suns four out of seven?

All of these teams are flawed and all of them can construct a case, like even the Mavericks, they can construct a case of how they could make a run. So because of that, I'm definitely not throwing dirt on them and I'm definitely wondering how they might address their situation going forward.

You know, he's not awake at night in Vegas. Brian Windhorst gets the info, gets to bed early, gives a test the next morning. Thanks, man. I really appreciate it. No problem, man. Anytime. You want details? Fine. I drive a Ferrari 355 Cabriolet. What's up? I have a ridiculous house in the South Fork. I have every toy you could possibly imagine. And best of all, kids, I am liquid.

So, now you know what's possible. Let me tell you what's required. Life Advice is brought to you by Modelo, the mark of a fighter. Modelo is a crisp golden lager brewed for football fans who treat supporting their team as a way of life, who support with an unshakable passion even when the odds are against them. And there's nothing that screams fighting spirit louder than college football fans. Modelo celebrates that passion inside every fighter.

Modelo, the official beer sponsor of the college football playoff. What is up, Steve? What is up, Kyle? Yo, Kyle's back. Back in in l.a guess who's back back in l.a yeah how long were you gone like 10 days flies huh a lot of poughkeepsie went to philly i could take it or leave it philly you could take or leave oh controversial what about big well you know sunday i went out to watch the pats chargers game and i mean i know that wasn't on the top of everybody's fucking list but i mean i went to like four bars three

of them that considered themselves sports bars never even heard of sunday ticket the last one i went to they were like well we have youtube tv and i was like i'm not gonna argue with you i think you have it but i mean every time i called i'm like do you guys do you guys get all the games they're like yeah i come in there and it's just a bunch of dudes in Eagles jerseys waiting for the four o'clock game. And they don't even understand what I'm saying. So, I mean, I barely, I almost missed the first quarter, which I mean, wasn't the worst thing in the world because that was a terrible game.

I think for your overall health, you probably, you probably didn't need to watch that game. But I mean, I was just, that's what I really started to sour on Philly. Northern Liberties, maybe it was just that district. They're not, they don't know. They're're just like we just kind of get what's on fox and cbs i'm like then why do you have six tvs in here whatever um shout out to the garage because no one in philly wants to watch any other team i know it's true okay i'm i'm sorry it that's kind of on you you were in philly nobody moves to philly from anywhere else? Dude, I just... You want to go in the Southie being like,

hey, can you put on the Browns game? Well, for power ranking games that day, too. It was the worst one, but they didn't have anything other than the Lions game. That was kind of it. Lions football. Okay. All right.

Let's get to a couple emails here. Help, does my wife's art suck? Unfortunately, we can't share the visual on this one. Lions football. Okay. All right. Let's get to a couple of emails here. Help. Does my wife's art suck? Unfortunately, we can't share the visual on this one. He did include some of her artwork. Huge fan. Six, four, two Oh five, 34 years old. Basketball comp is Danny Granger.

I actually met my wife in a co-ed basketball league. I was on the wing. She was our point guard. Girl can hoop. We won our league chip that season and the rest is history. People are saying chip a lot more lately. I haven't noticed, but I trust you. Yeah.

Fast forward 11 years. This makes me think he's a great husband that he played in a co-ed basketball league. Maybe that makes me sound like a Neanderthal, but I just... I played in one at ESPN. Basketball? Yeah, they had co-ed basketball there.

Yeah, that girl from Duke at ball. She used to play with us all the time. Wasn't on my team. No, that was before. That was like early, early Rosillo hotel days in Bristol. Anyway, third person. My wife has recently taken a painting as a hobby. They've been married 11 years here. Hectic careers. She finds it calming and helps relieve her work stress. I'm all for it. I think it's great she has a hobby and that she's passionate about it and helps navigate the day-to-day grind. This guy does sound like a good husband. The issue I have is she wants to hang all of her

art around our house. At first, one or two paintings were cool with me. The art is not great, but she's a self-aware amateur she loves it i can see how much joy it brings her to display her work the thing is we now have about eight to ten hanging around the house with more coming every couple weeks she's even started removing other decor around the house to put up her art we're planning a big holiday party in 10 days with friends family and co-workers from both sides attending i'm worried people will think it's weird to have all this amateur art on the walls and this will cause some embarrassment.

I know I'm probably the one who would feel embarrassed, not her, which I'm not proud of, dot, dot, dot. I think we get where your head's at. I've attached some of her artwork so you can see for yourself. Am I overreacting? Is the art actually better than I think? If not, how I'd navigate this without hurting her feelings.

I would prefer to take it down before the party, but I don't know how to do it without crushing her i need your help as objective viewers okay um i should have done this ahead of time but let's uh let's do it now i gotta send this art to the dudes oh thanks so um yeah i could have done this before why is sari's email not pre-loading here yeah i could have done this before why is saruti's email not pre-loading here this isn't good kyle i'm sending it to you now can you forward to uh saruti this is live man middleman i'm a i'm a known guy i don't really get art uh i just don't get it i don't know what makes good hour all of our art makes the whole thing bad art well then i've like art people just say art is just like people laundering money too which makes sense to me like oh yeah this painting's worth two million

dollars cool like just because you said it was or is it actually good it's like three lines in like two different colors i don't i don't get it so what about like attainable art what about like a 200 thing i don't know like that's probably not money laundering right that's probably just some guy really hoping somebody buys this thing right maybe maybe but i'm just i'm just saying i'm not so what goes on your wall nothing or you're just maddie handles it all maddie mostly handles the decor yeah we're big like posters people wherever we go we buy those kind of like cool vintage posters we try to hang those up so i don't know we're basic it is what it is yeah like after the madman episode with burke cooper's rothko i was like yeah i dig it and

then it was like are you you know you're almost like when you don't know anything about art you're like am i digging it because i'm supposed to or do i like it but i do kind of like some of that stuff that looks really simple that other people would say like i can't believe that's worth that much it's all just red and it's then he used less red there and you're all fucking idiots uh yeah no one no one's ever claimed that this is the pod that you come to for art evaluation which is fine uh if it never happens for us uh college you get them yeah i think one of these would be great in like a bathroom or something you know and like and not not in like a mean way it's just like oh look at that it's uh you know maybe like a nice light

colored bathroom that first one you sent me so i mean i could see if there's eight of these i think you'd be like what are we preparing for the, you know, the preschool art fair? Not preschool. That was me. It's actually, it's better than I could do for sure. I don't know. It's just like landscapes.

Yeah. You know what this looks like? Bathroom photos. It looks like, no, it looks like photos in like a, like a coffee shop that have been there for like three years and they have a price tag on them and no one ever wants to buy them.

Yeah. It's not bad art. Like it's good. She good she's you know i kind of like the tree one that's what i like i don't really want any of those hanging in my actual house like they just i'm sorry we need to share the art this sucks for the listener but i wanted i'm actually glad this is the way it worked out for you to discover it because you're just like, oh, the tree one's pretty good. They're landscapes. I think someone would say this is kind of the oppressionist genre. There's one where there's a sun.

There's a sun in there. I'll be honest. It's not well done. It's not well done. The sun looks like the eye of Sauron a little bit. The perspective is off on the sun, but that's all right. Yeah, the sun, though, I right yeah the sun though i think that's that that could be just a a specific heavy fog day where that sun is coming in i think that's a user error you think that's a user hair on that one i think it's used um so then the the other

one's a farm but it's just an incredible perspective from like behind a field, a meadow. I think the fourth one's actually kind of good. I like the fourth one. The fourth one's my favorite one. The clouds are a little drippy in there. I'm sure somebody who was a real artist would be like, yeah, these are kind of like entry level. Hey, I just started taking art classes or I had three pints at this place. These actually, these are not like when you paint and you get drinks that first night.

These are way beyond that. paint and you get drinks that first night. These are way beyond that. So let's not do that. It's like looking at nature if you had like 2080 vision. That's what these are. Do you want to expand on that at all? No, it's all blurry. It's just blurry landscape.

There's no detail in any of them. I think there's some true, but I think after I've watched guys paint trees paint trees i'm like i think i could paint a tree by the end of the week like i think a lot of it's just brush technique here's the problem is the first picture uh the first one that he shares with us um you can see that it's on this plastic shelf tray that's just installed into the wall that's next to another picture. So it sounds like she's hanging them all up, which is a bummer.

I think you encourage her to be like, hey, you should try to sell these. And then when it flops real hard, you don't have to give her the bad news. That's way worse. That's some of the worst advice you've ever given on the show. No one's going to buy these, dude. What are you talking about?

That's what I'm saying. So that when no one buys them, she maybe gets the hint and you don't have to tell her that her art sucks. It just sucks. We should sell these, but don't put them up in our house. You sound like me.

You sound like the guy who's never been married. I can't believe that. Do you know how bad that would be? Because then she's devastated that nobody wanted it. And then you go, hey, look, the market's just not there for you.

So let's take these down. You could just say artists subjective. People don't get it. When you're way better, these are going to be important. People are going to want these when you're awesome. What if you say,

if he has a garage and he's like, you know what I think we do? A little notebook here. Get the easel out. We'll get the tarps down. And this becomes your workshop and we just keep did you say that i'm sorry no no it was what i was gonna say i didn't say it but i was thinking if there's a room that we could just we could have the the art room that'd be great just a crafts corner

something like that uh that'd be good i was serenity by jan just a candle room right uh the office references are just perfect on the show um the other thing i was thinking well there's a pam one coming so you know go ahead art school um i thought maybe you could like become like a hgtv person in the next month like really hard it's like i'm really into like redecorating right now you guys sit down you watch a couple a couple of things. It's like a good couple show. If you can stomach it, I think, you know, any of those HGTV and you're like, I'm really into minimalism right now. You know, we don't really have open spaces, but I kind of like to clear the walls a little bit. Just put a, maybe like, maybe you can just be like, be really passionate about redesigning the house.

And then that's the way it comes. You'd be like, you know, new year coming up. I'd really like to get a fresh start up i really like to get a fresh start and why don't we just start now why don't we just start now we'll take a bunch of stuff off the walls you know maybe we'll head to marshall see if there's any you know any subtle fit any subtle tchotchkes we can put on the coffee table so you just have a whole home rebrand and that just gets washed away yeah you could encourage her to give them the gifts to family members see how they react to it it's coming up yeah yeah you know encourage her to give them the gifts to family members see how they react to it coming up yeah you know that's a great i see you just redeemed yourself start yeah start handing them out start handing them out as gifts i think it is a little weird though that she would just want to hang them all up and then he's got this christmas party coming i think he just i think that's the night you get into the brown water and you start slowly sipping whiskey the

entire time watching all your friends and relatives just admire all the art right a lot of yeah a lot of those a lot of although if you're aggressive if you're aggressive on on the brown stuff then maybe maybe not comes out yeah right you're trying to be like i don't get it i don't see it and then you put up honestly right by the end of the night you're putting up a poster ken griffey jr in your fucking kitchen to like counter her decor it's the same poly girl yeah i just i really don't i don't know that there's a win here for you man because she's obviously you know what you do this is the best advice i think i can give you although i like i like where siri redeemed

himself it's probably a phase it's probably a phase. It's probably a phase and you're just going to have to ride it out. It might be a couple years. And then she's going to look around and go, I don't know. Yeah, or maybe you just start throwing out like restoration hardware and crate and barrel catalogs

and just have them on everywhere, bathroom, coffee table. And she's like, oh yeah, right. That's right. That's what a room is supposed to look like. Yeah. Okay. Parents with no social cues here we go 25 years old reporting in 511 190 former member of the 1000 pound club he did 225 on the bench 405 squat 404 95 deadlift 1000 pound club that's that's the club 1200 club looks down on the thousand pound club but uh you say sorry sorry

1200 pounders i know we have some advice uh on we've done some gym etiquette stuff before some advice on parenting someone else's kids i would like to propose a dilemma that combines the two i live in a newer apartment community with amenities such as a nice complex gym the gym is very aesthetically pleasing but only has one of each piece of equipment important for the story yes this is so it's not like a gym gym it's the complex gym and it's smaller in almost two years of this yeah in two years of this setup I've yet to experience anything like what I'm about to describe tonight a father brought his two children under the age of 12 along for a workout so two kids under 12. Not only that, as a family, they packed along a speaker to blast music in a language I've never heard. Okay, so they're foreign. The children

proceeded to jump on each piece of equipment, bounce on the exercise ball, swing on the cable machine, play hide and seek. Every 10 minutes or so, the father would yell in whatever language and the children would then scream, cry cry this exchange went on for over an hour all while i had headphones in with nothing playing as i try to pick my spot and make eye contact for an angry head shake the questions i have are one especially as a 25 year old am i entitled to tell someone else how to parent it's going to be no 99.9 of the time just just so you know we'll leave that point one does the language barrier give them more leeway yeah probably uh number three how many more times does this need to happen for me to put in some

kind of formal complaint uh and then he says four am i totally off base so to review if we go one entitled a parent other kids almost always know like almost always know i mean unless the kids jumping off of something and you say it was a time right there was a time what do you have a story no just there was a time when you could and it's just like you know be like you tell them what happened and your parents would be like well what did you do it's not like it's not like who was it it's gonna be like well why were you fucking up i'm sure it was you that's the way it used to be. Then the language thing is a whole nother challenge. How many more times?

I don't know. One more time. You know, it's cool. I think it's like guys, especially like early on, you're like, oh, I don't know if I want to be like everyday HR guy, right? You know, apartment complex, grocery store. Mikey finally complained at Ralph's. Like, what the fuck?

And then when he asked if he's totally off base he's he's not that sucks especially if this is going to be your gym I mean that's brutal and by the way like the language barrier somebody being from another country like it definitely adds a layer you know it's another it's like moving up a level in a video game it's like okay this now this conflict involves somebody who's not going to want to, like, there's just going to be a lot of problems with you guys getting on the same page. But he knows, he knows. I'm always amazed when I see like different, you know, people from different parts of the country and how much they all want to hang out. That's what always blows my mind about like different cultures.

Like, wait, all of you are going like what what the fuck is that maybe it's better maybe it means they're closer you know i've just i just i don't know i just it's something something that i've never really uh never really thought of until i kind of see just how people can be different about things doesn't mean anybody's right or wrong whatever uh but you can't do this you can't you can't continue to let this happen. I mean, unless you just, you know, unless you just try to go around his hours, you know, like how often is it going to happen? If you're both five o'clock guys and these kids are getting in their cardio at five,

then you're going to have to either change up your routine. Maybe it happens one more time. You say something because, you know, can you, can you look at him? Is he giving you anything back? Is he giving you any kind of

lean or read that he's accepting of maybe give him a look yeah give him a look and just be like you know i gave a guy look the other day the guy was working out uh at the hotel gym there was very few benches it was really really busy and he was doing lat raises with dumbbells while his ear pods water bottle and towel rested on an available bench. You just go. So that's what was that a shelf, man. They've got four shelves in this gym,

right, right in front of the dumbbells. So what do you think guys? I, I mean, from my time at gold's gym, you can't have anybody under the age of like 14 in the main gym like I worked in the kid zone that was my

domain I made sure those kids had a great time parents love me but like it's a safety thing you can't have kids under 14 in the gym this dude said under 12 and he said they're scream crying I'm assuming they're probably closer to 8-10 so I mean you could probably I would say if you're going to complain maybe pick one complaint don't be like these people suck because they you know, they come in

and they bless, you know, some music and you say family. Yeah. Okay, this family. Sorry. But this group. Anyway, I think you could just say like, listen, there's there might even be a sign like you might not even seen it. But there might be like nobody under the age of 12. You know, who knows? So like that could be your I would pick one complaint though if you were going to do a complaint don't don't like hammer this this family with a bunch of things but if you can get the kids out of there maybe it'd be easier for one day to come up to the dude just be like hey do you mind like not blasting music or or don't and it'll be better because there's not two kids taking up you know space and it sounds like a small and not well-equipped room so there might even be a rule about just you can't have kids in this thing

because it's dangerous and it's probably an insurance thing right i mean yeah you're not going to tell people how to parent their kids and i i would just i just i think the passive aggressive looks and just make sure that like on every step of the way like he knows is there anybody else in there too that can kind of like tag team with you on this you're not the only person who's doing who's being the asshole like i would wonder if there there anybody else in there too that can kind of tag team with you on this? You're not the only person who's being the asshole. I would just wonder if there's somebody else in there who could also give some looks or some just general negative vibes to this person so they get the hint.

But yeah, I feel like usually I don't know. I don't know if it's like a European thing. Sometimes Europeans don't give a shit about this stuff so you might just be shit out of luck. I don't know what kind of, you know, what you said they're for and I don't know where they're from, but you kind of might be shit out of luck here. Yeah.

Like whenever I go to Europe and I'll be like, you're just going to just eat outside and smoke cigarettes and drink Aperol Spritz. And there's a fucking kid, child seat and then another four year old. And it's like creeping up on the last call. Like what is going on here? No rules, man. There's no rules in Europe. I don't know. Sometimes I think they've got it more figured out.

You know, maybe we're up to, maybe my dad, although my dad, one time after a, a Yukon Huskies game, his buddy wanted to go in to Chuck's Steakhouse and like get a couple of drinks. And my dad didn't drink.

So it wasn't that he wanted to do that. So he felt like it was sort of like guide code. He had to go with him, which meant it was me of like guide code he had to go with him which meant it was me like at nine years old in the civic center lobby just bored out of my fucking mind and i remember i just walked right into chuck's like a bar i just walked in was like dude can we go anyway all right that's life advice life advice has been brought to you by modelo this season you deserve the mark of a fighter that fighting spirit is something you can taste in every refreshing sip of modelo rewarding the passionate and the dedicated with a rich authentic lager that

celebrates perseverance modelo official beer sponsor of the college football playoff shop delivery or pickup options near you at ordermodelo.com. Drink responsibly. Beer imported by Crown Imports, Chicago, Illinois. Thank you to Saruti, to Kyle, to Wargon on the pod. Apologies again about the live pod not working out for very obvious reasons. So we missed one this week, but we will be back on Monday recap in another week in the NFL and the in-season tournament champ.

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