The Ryen Russillo Podcast - NBA Offseason Story Lines to Watch Now, Warriors' Resurgence With Logan Murdock, and the NBA Rookie Scale With J. Kyle Mann

Episode Date: February 18, 2022

Russillo shares some story lines for the NBA offseason that you should be monitoring now (0:44). Then Ryen talks with The Ringer’s Logan Murdock about his new Ringer piece, "Curry, Calm, and Collected," Curry’s efforts to keep the Warriors’ franchise afloat while they got back on track, hoping for an electric playoff series between the Warriors and Suns, and more (15:48). Then Ryen is joined by The Ringer’s J. Kyle Mann to discuss his new piece, "The Rookie Scale: Early Concerns Over Cade Cunningham and Jalen Suggs Miss the Big Picture." They discuss Jonathan Kuminga, Herb Jones, Scottie Barnes, and more (40:22). Finally, Ryen, Kyle, and Ceruti discuss the unfolding of events known as the Frolic Room Super Bowl Heist before answering some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (1:08:59). Host: Ryen Russillo Guests: Logan Murdock and J. Kyle Mann Producers: Kyle Crichton and Steve Ceruti Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

loaded friday pod we're talking hoops we're talking a lot of it i'm going to give you top storylines to pay attention to that can shape the offseason in the nba we're going to talk with logan murdoch on steph's run with this Warriors group and some of the lessons learned. Some awesome kind of Durant story stuff in there too as well. J. Kyle Mann, this guy crushed it with taking a look at some rookie stuff. Eye test, data, conversation, checks all the box. We have a frolic room story that Kyle's going to take over before Life Advice, which we'll finish up with two hours. Enjoy. I want to start with some NBA storylines. It's not the top five, but they're important.

And these things and what could potentially happen, there's a lot of unknowns. So none of this is definitive, but I think it's at least interesting enough to say, well, what could possibly happen here? Let's start with LeBron. He's a half a point away from leading the league in scoring. He's at 29.1 points per game. Incredible night against Utah the other night. That was an unbelievable

win. His 29 a game is the highest he's had in 13 seasons. He's fourth in PER, and he's actually first in PER of any wing player. What he continues to do at 37 years old with this many minutes is incredible. He's going to pass Kareem for all-time scoring. He's

1,828 points away from that. I'd also like to remind people that are not only younger than me, but even my age, to not dump on Kareem for all time scoring. He's 1,828 points away from that. I'd also like to remind people that are not only younger than me, but even my age to not dump on Kareem. Kareem, and I used to do it, by the way, but I also started watching Kareem when he was like 34. So then when I would talk with older people, I remember even a conversation I was doing first take, we were talking about like top five players or whatever. I didn't have Kareem on the list.

And the producer looked at me like I was the biggest asshole in the room. I was like, wait, I'm a dick. I kind of regret it. I do regret it because this is somebody who came into the league and he had an MVP and a title in his second year. Remember, the rules were different then. I've seen some kind of...

LeBron can pass Kareem in scoring and we don't have to actually dump on Kareem in the process here. Kareem in scoring, and we don't have to actually dump on Kareem in the process here. Kareem entered the league at 22 years old. The rules were different. I mean, even the UCLA rules were ridiculous because he would have been the best player, but they didn't let freshmen play.

LeBron entered the league at 19. But if you say LeBron's going to pass Kareem in less games, I'll tell you this. I think most would agree. I'd rather enter the league and have the extra years between the ages of 19 and 22 than have the back-end extra seasons to this point from 39 to 41. I don't even

really know how that's debatable. But when LeBron does pass Kareem, I hope it's a big deal. We've all been desensitized to these historic accomplishments. Baseball has some issues with that, but football has absolutely exploded. What this era and what these final numbers end up being, and I don't think people are going to stop passing all of a sudden,

but at least in just straight-up scoring, even though we've had some fluctuation on how different decades have played out with pace and shot attempts and shot making and the threes and some of the free throw stuff, I hope when LeBron passes Kareem, it actually is considered a big deal. So what does this mean? This team is now a 9 deal. So, what does this mean? This team is now a 9-seed.

Alright? They're a 9-seed. They're not very good. Now, the AD thing is a huge problem. He just can't seem to stay on the court. Felt terrible about his ankle turn the other night, but apparently the x-rays were not as bad as people thought they would be. The Westbrook

part of this is a disaster. I cannot for the life of me, I mean, despite LeBron, you know, throughout his entire career, let's face it. I mean, we could point to, well, he shouldn't have wanted to play with this guy. It's kind of worked out. All right. LeBron's been pretty good at orchestrating and recruiting the right people to go ahead. And I'm not even like, nobody can do this by themselves.

You may not like the way he did it and all that stuff, but that's not really what this conversation is about. But the fact that LeBron, who's an incredibly smart basketball player, one of the smartest we've ever seen, that he would go, yeah, I want that Westbrook guy on my team at 44 million this year and 47 million next year. It just never makes any sense to me. All right. It doesn't make any sense.

And now with the 80 uncertainty, the reality is this a team that may not even survive the play in game. All right? Now I'm building towards something here. LeBron is 44 million next year. How funny is that, by the way? LeBron's actually going to make less than Westbrook does next season.

I wonder how intense this could get for LeBron chasing the final couple years and ultimately chasing a ring. He's not going to go quietly. And he's been a mercenary about it in the past. Like, yeah, this guy doesn't work. Get him out of here. Let's try this instead.

First of all, the problem is you have the Westbrook contract, but for one year, you could still get rid of it. You could. Somebody could take it into their cap space, give them some assets. The Lakers don't have a ton, but they could probably still make it work. And let's not ever underestimate the power of powerful agencies because a lot of the way business gets done in the NBA is because agents who have major juice like Clutch, they're able

to pull off some stuff that other agencies can't pull off. And they're going to try to pull off some stuff for their guy. I don't know what that is. I don't know if he's going to get the extension that I'm sure he wants, and then he'd figure out the rest of it later. Now, remember when they did the Kobe deal, right? The Lakers did that Kobe deal for three years and 83 million back in 2011, and most of us were like, almost all of us were like, what are they doing? And one of the big arguments was they did that for Kobe because it sent a message to the rest of the stars in the NBA that this is what the Lakers do with their stars. They take care of you, and in this case, overpay you and kind of complicate the rest of the roster. And so when that happened,

I remember, because there was no reasonable basketball explanation for like, why would you go ahead and max him out now on this kind of extension when it may make it harder to do some other things and the lakers would just say well this is we're different we are a star run franchise we treat our stars differently look location has much to do with this anything but it just makes me wonder i don't know if there would be an ad deal i don't know if it means LeBron, if he weren't going to get that kind of Kobe-type extension from the Lakers. There's some real questions that I would have about how

weird this Lakers deal could get in this offseason because LeBron's going to be going for it, right? I mean, Kobe wanted a ring really badly at the end. Doesn't mean you're going to get one. Remember all those conversations? Like, nobody's going to want to win more than this guy. Yeah, I get it, but it doesn't mean you just get to.

The other part of this, and as much as I love LeBron the player and I've enjoyed watching him as much as anybody throughout these two decades, basically, he is very protective and very crafting of his legacy. Sometimes it's even weird. If you watch him in a post-game presser, watch how he'll immediately

compliment himself in some way. Being the leader that I am, I'm able to do this and be like, hey, what happened tonight with the matchup? Well, since I have this intensity and you're like, okay, all right. And again, if you're a public figure since you were like 15 years old, it almost be weird to not be a little narcissistic. So I almost forgive him for this. but I could see LeBron, if it gets really complicated from a basketball standpoint, which it is right now, and we don't have a clear path to why it's automatically going to get better and he's going to be part of a group that's considered an absolute title contender right out of the jump, I could see him saying, well, you know what, I'm going to play with my son, which is what he's wanted to do for years. This isn't new news. People that bring it up like it's new. It's been going on for years.

Everybody knows that this is something that he wants to do. I could see him, if the basketball part isn't going to work out for him on a contender, which still seems impossible to think they're not at least going to get weird and try some aggressive things, he'll say, hey, I get to play with my son. That's bigger than titles. Guarantee that'll happen. Let's talk about the Utah Jazz. They're 36-22, and they're a four-seat.

Now, you're thinking, hey, weren't they better? Yeah, they were 28-10. They've won five of their last six. But they also are missing Gobert for a bunch of games. He missed 14. Mitchell missed 12. They got Dallas in the first round, if you look at the projections right now. They could beat Dallas.

Luka could go nuclear. Dallas would be interesting because Dwight Powell is like 25 minutes a game this month. Would they have Powell in or would they go five out? They love to run a lot of five out. Let Luka just kind of figure the whole thing out. And as we talked about earlier this week, I don't love high usage guy dominating every single offensive basketball decision. But Luka also went nuclear the previous two playoffs. And you look back at those series, again, series losses against the Clippers.

and you look back at those series, again, series losses against the Clippers, but I wonder if something weird could happen there with Utah where as great as Gobert is as a regular season player and certain nights in the playoffs, if you're making him chase around a Max Kleber, I'm asking the question. So if Utah were to lose in the first round and likely lose in the second round because of the matchup against Phoenix, who's just incredible,

would it get weird in Utah? Now, keeping track of who the next Mad Star is is one of my favorite things. We are constantly surprised all the time. We'll get to that again in a second here. But if you talk to anyone in the league, it is not news to go, I wonder what Donovan Mitchell will do if this gets weird. All right, that is a real conversation that happens. You've probably heard that before, so this certainly isn't me being the first time I've said it. I've even brought it up before. But hearing different things about Utah around the trade deadline, I wonder if it's another exit. Again, at this time, with the record-wise, it's not like they'd be the one seed losing to somebody inferior,

at least record-wise. And their record should have been better if they were a little bit healthier. But look, a lot of teams could say that. There is a feeling around the league it could look a lot different. I don't know if that means Quinn Snyder. I don't know. And I'm not like he'd be fired and to be blamed for this. But if they'd look at the group and say, it just hasn't really worked out, despite the fact it's been a nice, successful run

from a regular season standpoint, hey, we're a good team, we're sort of in contention, but we're not really. It's just something to pay attention to, whether it be a first-round loss or predictably a second-round loss. Losing to Phoenix is probably what they should do. They should probably lose to them,

but rumblings that maybe it could get really different over this summer. So there's always surprises, too. I mean, think about Harden. Not that it's weird that Harden forces his way out from Brooklyn because we just saw it in Houston. And the oddity of when you put that group together, Kyrie, Durant, and Harden, you go, you got 16 games.

One-six. 16 total games with those three players. And for a bunch of different reasons. Durant's been hurt. Kyrie's been in and out for his own reasons. And hopefully they figure this mandate out so that he can get back out there and play because all the arguments for it now just don't make any sense. And I think more people are kind of coming to that conclusion. But there's always a surprise. There's always a surprise, whether it's in dames, not a surprise if that were to happen. Bradley Beal wouldn't be

a surprise. I still always think he wanted the contract extension. He'd figure out the rest of it later. But there's a name right now that we don't know, that none of us with any kind of sources or just gossipy stuff, there's a name that will happen probably this summer that we don't even see coming. I don't know if Atlanta would try to do something different, and I don't mean someone there being mad

and asking out, but they're a tent seed and you wonder if Atlanta, if they were just to have a bad playoff run after feeling like they had turned a corner last season, would go, you know, maybe we package up a bunch of different pieces and try to add a bigger guy in our five as opposed to having all this depth that didn't work out this year. But Zion's

a name I keep landing on, even though it doesn't make any sense when it's a rookie contract guy looking for his rookie extension, which I'd likely see him still getting the max. And you'd think in a way Zion would actually want the max considering how hurdy he's been. And remember on this podcast, I think over two weeks ago, I had said, well, I don't know if he's out for the season or if he's back in two weeks. Cause I had heard, oh, he should be back in about two weeks. That was over two weeks ago. Yesterday, double checking.

I saw an article that said he'll be back after the All-Star break, and the same day, I saw an article saying could need second surgery, could be after the season. So here's the point. None of us really know, and it's all the thing we would agree on, all kind of bad. If I'm running the Pelicans, and as much as I loved watching

Zion last year, I think the value for the uncertainty of what his issues are, he would still bring you back something that at least you'd know exactly who you are. And I know it would suck for a Pelicans fan base that feels like, okay, you actually have this star. I mean, the Pelicans are sneaky, kind of okay now. They went from 3-16 to 23-36. So we're talking about a team that's basically been 500 now for 40 games. C.J. McCollum's been awesome for them, 28-6-5, 43% from three. I know it's just five games, but it's like, oh, yeah,

this guy actually is really good, isn't he? And Ingram's been pretty good. And there's actually a lot of young pieces on the roster. Herb Jones bringing Valanciunas you know Grant like there's some guys I even like Kyra Lewis a little bit hold out hope there's some guys they've done a good job Jackson Hayes has you know had his moments maybe he's a backup big but you know it's it's better than a whiff in the lottery so there are pieces here that I like and I wonder if you just go you know what we probably still do really well

value-wise the Zion trade because the other team would think, oh, he's going to be happier here and he's going to get his max extension is fine. Look, I know it's crazy. I love watching Zion too, but if you're the Pelicans, especially with just the uncertainty of where you're going to be at as a franchise, the vultures have been circling on this group for a while, meaning potentially wanted to move the team. If you traded Zion, and I hate even saying this out loud, but if you traded him, you'd at least know exactly who you are instead of waiting and kind of being held hostage

for somebody that doesn't seem super interested in being part of your franchise. So you'd add probably a really nice player or two and some picks. So you'd have assets and you would know exactly who you are and you could turn the page on what's been a pretty frustrating deal here.

I mean, they even brought in a different coach because he didn't like Stan, and then he still doesn't want to play. So, yes, he's hurt, and I'm not questioning that, but I think it's completely reasonable to go, there is a disconnect here for a guy that's supposed to save your franchise. Last two thoughts. The Knicks were a four seed last year, 41 and 31. They're now 12th. They're 25 and 34. They're three and a half games out of the playing game. Tom Thibodeau's in real trouble. And you're starting to see that happen

already. And why you would trade for Cam Reddish, who's the anti-Tibbs player, and if Tibbs barely play the guy when he first gets him, that doesn't make a ton of sense. Because really, when you traded for Cam Reddish, what you're trading for is somebody else's tab. Because now you have to make a financial decision on him. And finally, shout out to Joel Embiid. 42-14 last night against Milwaukee at Milwaukee.

Full Bucs squad, by the way. They had their big three guys. Phillies 35-23. And I go back and forth between Jokic and Embiid on the MVP. They had their big three guys. Phillies 35 and 23. I go back and forth between Jokic and Embiid on the MVP thing for a good chunk of this. You could argue that Embiid, because he's better defensively, gets the nod over Jokic.

As far as the seeding and stuff, they have similar records. Phillies 35 and 23. Denver's 33 and 25. Anyone that says it's one guy and nobody else isn't being fair about it. They're not being honest to you. They're trying to sell you a point that's just inaccurate.

It is close. It does change. This has been an incredible... If this were a horse race of MVPs, we would have had like seven or eight horses lead this thing where we think they're going to go ahead and win it. That's also why saying this guy's definitively MVP in December doesn't make a ton of sense. But there's one part for Embiid that may

actually hurt him, even though it helps the team, is that clearly when Harden comes in, Embiid's numbers are going to go down. So as important as Embiid has been, I love this guy. I love him. But it may end up getting Joker the MVP because Embiid's traditional stats

are going to take a bit of a hit here. If you're a Warriors fan, if you're a Curry fan, maybe just a basketball fan, maybe you don't like any of that stuff, I still would urge you to check out Curry, Calm and Collected, Logan Murdoch, The Ringer. This is awesome stuff. This is your backyard. What's up, man?

Thanks for joining us today. Man, what's going on? How you doing, bro? It's been a long time. It has. It has been a long time. I mean, we were just talking about the last time we saw each other. I was like, oh, how long ago was that?

So I know that you're kind of the Warriors guy, but it's also cool because this is where you're from. What was the motivation? When you were like, okay, well, I want to do another Curry article. I want to kind of do a where are the Warriors at? What was the reasoning behind putting this story together that does a really good job of kind of catching us up on this group? Yeah, I think with Steph in particular, I just wanted to do a story on Steph because, you know, when you're working on a beat day to day,

you don't really get enough time to, you know, when you're when when you're working on a beat day to day, you can't you don't really get enough time to, you know, talk to a person, really get to know a person on that on that level. And, you know, working at a place like The Ringer, you can really sink your teeth into a project. And I think at this point in Steph's career, I really just wanted to really wanted to encapsulate that, you know, it's it ain't all how it seems in his life right now. It's not all the glitz and everything. This dude's really going through shit right now. And I could see it on a day-in and day-out basis when I go to the arena. He's taking a lot on right now from a basketball standpoint, a family standpoint, from a life standpoint as a whole.

He's really going through a transitional period. That's something that I saw last season. I wasn't really around the team too much last season with COVID, but when I got into the arena, I started seeing Steph again and I started seeing just the differences in where he was and why. I wanted to get the why he was

playing as hard as he's playing right now. I think I got that answer. Yeah, that's a really good way of putting it because watching them this season, you know, even last season, I felt like more of a validation because I think the anti-Stef crew,

and look, I don't care who you are. There's pro and there's cons to all the guys. The anti-Stef crew, you know, I think was circling going, all right, let's see what happens with him. And that team was a mess. And then they're still in the playing game. I look at that as an accomplishment.

Others would just say, oh, whatever. They couldn't even really get in the playoffs. All right, fine. But then what he started doing the beginning of the season, still with no clay back, them figuring it out, still a lot of role players. I want to get to Draymond at some point, the clay thing here too. But then he had that stretch where he was 33% from three in January. So he's 38% from three this season. It's the only season he's had a full season where he's been under 40, which is insane in itself. But he's also bulked up. I think his drives the Hooper a little bit better. Then he's got the record chase where he's clearly forcing it.

And defenses were forcing, just stopping him from getting the record, which seemed kind of stupid that that was their main priority. But what happened over that time, Logan, where it almost feel like they needed a reset a bit to go, okay, look like we have this great record, but you're struggling. Like, what's the bigger picture thing here? Why are you struggling? What can we do to kind of get us or get ourselves back on the right path? how he did in the first couple of months of the season, you don't appreciate how much energy that takes, right?

So that means he was tired during that January stretch and really tired. He didn't really have much legs even at the end of January, and I think that's one of the answers, right? But the other thing is, I think he's, you know, and this is something that I kind of talked to him about, but this is something that I think. I think that he's trying to keep this franchise afloat while all these other things are happening on the court.

We're going to talk about Draymond and Clay for it, for instance, but he has a lot to prove on his own. And one of those things that during the run when Kevin was there, I'm sure we'll talk about Kevin at some point, Kevin got a lot of the brunt of looking at socials and looking at what's being said about him. Curry does the same thing. He just doesn't outwardly clap back. He'll try to do it very subliminally. And I think this is a subliminal way of trying to show, yo, man, I can lead a team

too. You guys forgot that I could lead a team too. And this is a perfect opportunity to lead that team and lead it and really prove how good I am. And I think that's what he's doing right now. And he's really proven it, especially even during his bad stretch, right? While he wasn't shooting well,

they did have important wins over Denver. They didn't win over Denver most recently, but they've beaten Denver. They've beaten Utah. They've't win over Denver most recently, but they've beaten Denver. They've beaten Utah. They've beaten the Suns during that stretch. They've beaten the team that they needed to beat. But I think that it's one of those things where this is the last few years he is really trying to set out that, hey, y'all forgot about me,

and this is who I am. Don't get it fucked up. You bring up the Durant stuff and I guess I'll say this. I think a lesser team crumbles after that. I think you'd start having guys go, you know what? Maybe I'm Klay Thompson. Maybe I want to try to be the number one guy. Maybe Steph's saying, you need to build this around me differently. What can we do? Part of that is a compliment to their personality, which I think is

their strength. I mean, they're great players, but their personality and their willingness to coexist, I think is as important as anything, even as important as their basketball skills, because I think different personalities, different setting, post-Durant leaving, then this team doesn't even exist. This is their second act or maybe third act however you want to phrase it but but they're going forward again with this group and i think other teams would be like now i kind of want to do my own thing now i have my rings and now i'm these other things are more important to me and they're just different so how how do you think that has helped them if you agree with me i don't know if you agree or disagree but how would you say that's positioned them in trying to figure out like okay what what can

we do to get back to where we were which may not even be obtainable anymore uh i think to your point about them not wanting to leave and you know that kind of strengthening their bond i think you're right i think because draymond and clay all had opportunities to leave and, you know, that kind of strengthened their bond. I think you're right. I think because Draymond and Klay all had opportunities to leave, you know, and in 2014, you know, if Draymond wants that Pistons offer when he's a restricted free agent, he could have gotten that, right? He could have done that. He could have gotten a bigger offer somewhere else, right? There have been plenty of times for them to leave. Or when Klay Thompson was flirting with

the Lakers for a little bit, you know? I mean, he probably wouldn't admit it, but, you know, when he was trying to secure the bag and go and say there were some stories about him, you know, Lakers are the first choice. We'll see what happens. But they've always come back, and they have always, you know, I think they've always come back to, I always, and I think that they've always come back to, I don't know how to say this, but they have come back to Steph's orbit all the time because they recognize Steph gives them the best chance to win at the level that they would want to win to.

And then, and more of over, they know the best chance to win is with each other because they, you know, no matter what is anybody else has said or anything like that, they have, they recognize that the best chance for them to win is with each other. No one knows Steph better on the floor than

Draymond does. No one knows Clay on the floor better than this Warriors team does. And I think that's why they're probably the most self-aware team I've ever been around. They just they do. They they believe in themselves, but more so they know that, hey, man, it starts and ends with us, and that's how it's going to be. It's a bit of a throwback mentality that we don't really see often in this league. How weird was the, to back it up again, now that maybe years later you get more access to this stuff, but was there anything more revealing, more enlightenment on the Durant decision and how they processed it after it actually happened i think at a point i will it was funny because my second year on the beat was when kevin was like about to leave so i think in hindsight i got a lot more and you know just

talking to people around that time i got a lot more clarity on why he left, but I think they were so, okay, it's two things. First off, they think that Kevin is always going to be a part of their family. You asked him up and down. They do believe that. That being said on that last season, they pretty much knew he was leaving. Everyone knew he was leaving from the beginning of the season. So it was one of those things. There was this time when they went to New York and when they went to New York

for early in the season, Madison Square Garden had a shoot around and Andre Goddard was like, welcome home to Kevin Durant. Like, like there was very, very obvious that he was going to leave. The coaches were openly talking about he's in during the postseason against the Clippers. They were talking about oh yeah we better we better cherish this moment kevin's leaving right he's probably going to new york right everybody

it was just it was kind of a foregone conclusion it was like okay he doesn't really want to be here he's still the homie but he's he's gonna go and i think that they had kind of um i think there was one of the parts in the piece where um steph talked about how he wasn't going to change his mind. He wasn't going to change. He didn't come to, let me, let me, let me paint the picture. So Steph is in Asia in June of 2019, and he is about to come back to the Bay, but he takes a pit stop in New York because he wants to see Kevin just to see him up for rehab. And the day he gets to New York happens to be the day that Kevin makes his decision to go to the Brooklyn Nets. And when that happens, he still goes to Kevin's apartment just to say goodbye, just to say, you know, you know, it was a great run and all these things. And he has a quote in the piece was like, oh, you're a grown ass man.

He's a grown ass man. I'm not coming to convince him to stay after if he wants to leave, that's what it is. And that really encapsulates how the Warriors felt about Kevin leaving. It was like, okay, we knew you were gonna, we knew you had eyes other places. All right, bye, kind of thing. You know, obviously there was hurt in there,

but they're not gonna try to beg him to leave when he's openly been flirting with the idea of going to New York. Now, he denies a lot of that stuff of him openly flirting. I remember I've talked to some people around him and he was really pressed. Like, yo, man, you had this office space in new york you you left you took 35 ventures his company to new york mid-season what do you think about that he was like and then the people were like no that didn't mean anything we still wanted to stay we wanted to stay to the last very moment and i don't know the truth in that but i do know that from a warrior's point of view they were kind of out they knew that he was going to dip they knew that from a they point of view, they were kind of out. They knew that he was going to dip. They had an idea that he was going to dip from a very

early, early, early time. And they didn't want to convince him to stay. For why? If you don't want to go? If you don't want to stay here, then dip. And that was pretty much their argument about the whole process. So here we are. Klay's back. I think he looks like a guy who hasn't played in two years. And there are moments where it reminds us of who he's going to be because I'm not worried about it. But it wasn't just run back out on the court and we're seeing prime Clay and also these guys that have had shots. And I've just been so impressed uh logan with the people around

steph and just how these role players you know these these guys that may not even get a shot all of a sudden they're like real contributors you know a deep rotation that sort of just developed out of nowhere um but now all their roles change so what do you think of clay to this point i think clay is um still trying to get get his sea legs under him. I think that, you know, the Warriors' philosophy throughout this stretch between the time – I think it came on – Clay came back in early January. So from early January to the All-Star break, they basically took on the attitude of, Clay, just find your rhythm, bro.

We don't care if you take 16, 17 shots in 15 minutes. Just find your rhythm because we need it for the postseason. And that kind of messed up the Warriors offense for us, the Warriors as a whole for for a bit. You know, you probably didn't really help Steph's rhythm either. If you if you really want to look closely at it, because they were trying to integrate such a big part of their offense very quickly on the fly.

So that means Jordan Poole gets less shots. That means Kaminga messes up with his development just a little bit. You get a lot of things because in the way that they try to force-feed Steph to get that record, they're trying to force-feed Klay to get back into his rhythm. So it's been a bit of a balancing act, but I think it'll pay off in the long run if Klay can find

his rhythm. There is a real love with these guys, right? Because that's another thing when I talk about that personality where Van Gundy has said this before. It's like people want to win, but they want to win on their terms. And then when you do win, the terms can change on top of everything else. And they feel like the anti, even though they added Durant, so that's not entirely accurate, but this new version of the old version feels kind of like the anti-NBA movement in a way. And I feel like they take some pride in that. that yeah well just to cover they added durant so he could retire as a warrior now if you know they they wanted to i think this is everybody says they wanted no they i mean at the time at

the time well yes of course it didn't it didn't work out in hindsight but at the time they wanted to integrate him into what they did right they wanted him to just be a part of it and be one of those those guys but the thing is i think the love affair to original point the love affair that that group has with this this region really just comes from longevity right it comes from winning but also longevity you know these people people in the bay feel like they know steph like that's the homie you know they clay goes into the middle of east oakland at during like wild, during like at 10 at night just to go see homies, you know? And he doesn't get touched nowhere he goes.

There's so much respect. Draymond is a Bay Area legend in the same way, right? They feel like they're all of the community. And I think I was talking, we have Omani Jones on the podcast, on the Real Ones podcast yesterday. And he was talking about how these, these players, you talk about a Carmelo Anthony, you talk about even LeBron James, they don't really have a home because they've moved on so much,

trying to get the bigger bag, trying to get the best winning opportunity. And I think that exposes when that exposes the other side of when you're a player that stays, you get unconditional love forever. And I think that these, um, these warriors are going to have that in this region. And that's so valuable. That doesn't really happen anymore, especially in the age of free agency and power player empowerment, people don't stay and they don't really get to, um, they don really get to have the love affair with the city in the way that these guys do. And I think that that's going to be a big reason why this Warriors dynasty is going to be probably the best to ever come out of the Bay Area. Not because they were so good, which they were, but because they were in this community for a decade plus.

Give me something on Wiseman, because I actually do think him giving them something changes maybe I know that sounds ridiculous for a guy who's barely played in only a second year but when I think about Phoenix and I think about Looney as much as I like him him fouling out uh against Aiton that you know maybe there's a buyout somewhere there but I think Wiseman is sneaky kind of important for what they're hoping to do. We talked about this last time we saw each other, right? I think it was one of the first things we talked about was with Wiseman. Wiseman is starting five-on-five work on court. He's starting a scrimmage.

So they want to have him in the mix by about March, him and Draymond in the mix by about March, because Draymond is a great guy for young guys in terms of like getting them into the offense and making their lives easier they're just they're just probably just gonna throw a whole bunch of lobs to Wiseman not make it too difficult for him but in terms of how Wiseman will fit and what he will do in the for the postseason all they need from him is just to get rebounds and block shots, bro, and not foul out.

Because the one thing about this Warriors team, they're really good, have been really good in moments defensively, but they're just so small, man. They're not a big team. And there was talk about trading Wiseman for a big. I knew that was never going to happen. But if they can get somebody in a buyout, I knew that was never going to happen, but if they can get a buy, somebody in a bio, I don't know who that is. I thought maybe Tristan Thompson might've been a

good, good option, but he's going to Chicago. Um, but they are, they need a big of like Wiseman Wiseman. I don't know if you've seen him, but he is one of the, he's a very big human. I think he's like 7'1", 7'2", and he's every bit of that. If he can somehow just give them 15, 20 minutes of just great defense and rebounding, that will be huge for them in the postseason. And he is a big part of them. I think that's gotten lost in how the surprising start, but they do need a frontcourt.

Looney's been really good this season, but they need a true big in order to compete in the postseason. Yeah, I kind of feel stupid every time I'm saying it because it's like, okay, how much faith are you putting in somebody who barely played at Memphis, didn't play a lot last year, still hasn't played this year? Be like, oh, yeah, this will get us over the top against the Phoenix Suns who look, you know,

it's funny because I have two teams here at the top that I absolutely love watching play. I like all the players. This isn't like, I love Phoenix too, man. I love Phoenix. I just, I just, I just, I'm okay. I know we got all the rest. I love Phoenix. I'm just, and I know the ringer loves Phoenix because every podcast that I listen to, everyone is saying is hailing Phoenix as the ones. I'm just concerned about two things. One, their front court depth concerns me. Now, Aiden is really good. Aiden is also prone to fouling out. So that means what? You're going to put JaVale McGee, who I think can be good in spurts, but then you put JaVale McGee in postseason minutes, and you know the postseason is different, right?

And then Chris Paul's health. I'm really scared of that, right? Like I'm scared to every time he gets, his body just breaks down at a certain point in time and every time during the postseason. You saw that even last year in the finals. You've seen that throughout his career. I'm just concerned about those two things.

And if that doesn't – say if Aiden gets into foul trouble, man, that could cripple that run. And we'll see what happens, man. But there's so many question marks at the top of the Western Conference that is really going to be interesting. I really want to see the Warriors play the Western Conference that is really going to be interesting. I really want to see the Warriors play the Suns because it's going to be a seven-game series. It just is what it is.

Those teams are so good against each other. But I'm just concerned, I think, about – I know that it's the love fest for the Suns right now. I'm just like, I'm not quite there yet. I'm not quite there yet. But when you mention the frontcourt depth, you're right, but I compare it to how terrible it was last year and go, at least they have JaVale McGee.

I mean, I still, to this day, cannot fathom how a front office with a chance at winning a title couldn't go, hey, we need to add something else here instead of this. At least on a buyout market, right? To go, hey hey we have sharich as a backup five if we want to go stretch five it's like okay fine like maybe in a certain match if you have but how can you not find another big body centers are actually cheap you can throw a

second rounder at somebody for the deadline and then if you don't like jalen smith okay fine which clearly they didn't like him but they liked him enough to take him in the lottery which also was another story how much they screwed that up but i mean that's a that's a guy who's of what a tenth pick and they didn't even guarantee his his third year and i look i'll admit i kind of thought jalen was a talented guy coming out of maryland yeah and all right fine you don't want to play him you're playing these big but that's why i don't worry about it as much even though you're right once you get to bismack biombo when i watch it i go a lot of this has to do with chris paul having biombo look like he's good in his resurgence which i think is another scary thing for sons fans because you hear rumblings that they don't want

to pay eight and because it's like look how good mcgee biombo look we don't have to i'm like i'm like i don't even want to hear it i don't even want to i still can't believe they could actually be a title contending team and not bring back somebody like deandre eight so i'm glad we did a little phoenix stuff there let's circle it back then to steph because the piece felt like um hey here's where we're at here's what we're doing and it was cool how you recounted some of the stories from back in the day when he was uh davidson's head coach tweeting at him or excuse me texting him sleep in the streets which meant if you want to be a great shooter, you've got to be able to shoot until you're locked out of your house.

And then the Dallas part of it. He's there, they're retiring Dirk's jersey. He takes a picture of Dirk's jersey in the rafters. This had a feeling of like the last leg, the last push. And it's not this season. There's seasons to go here. But does Steph, no one ever appreciates it in the moment but is there anything that you've picked up from steph and him kind of seeing his

own you know final acts throughout this and realizing how important these next couple years are i mean i think he saw his basketball mortality a few years ago because he talked about how he didn't he talked openly talked about retirement you guys can look it up on google i don't have the direct quote but he was talking about retirement and not and playing and not something to the effect of not playing through his next deal and not and not going further than that right but i asked him about it and he was that that's where you get the quote at the end as long as my body will allow me to play and it's's the first time that I've been around Steph where he is talking about the end openly and talking about what it means.

I think one of the biggest things that, that he saw during his title run is he saw a lot of the guys that he looked up to retire. He saw Kobe Bryant retire. He saw Dwayne Wade retire. And a lot of, and Dirk Nowinski, he,

he made sure that, you know, he stayed around for that. And that was one of the first things because we talked on the phone the day after that. And he was just really all into, man, it would be great to stay with an organization for that long, for 21 years and be a part of an organization for that long. And I think that you kind of see that he's bringing himself back out into the community now. He's starting to, you know, really show how he feels both on the floor and helping guys out, but also, you know, trying to build his legacy in the Bay Area. That means going to Oakland, going to silicon valley and doing all these things similar to how

kobe did in his last few years you know where he's kind of just like oh no it's like we're cool we're cool we're cool and like he's really just uh putting his arms back around the community that you know he's played him for so long but there's definitely like a end of the road kind of mentality he does see that you know he's not there yet. He's obviously playing very well, too well to retire, but he is seeing, um, you know, guys like LeBron see it towards the end. He is seeing, um, you know, even Kevin, you know, he's, uh, more towards the end than he is the beginning. And so he's seeing that. I think that's what he's playing against. He's playing not against the defenders. He's playing against, uh, basketball. I think that's what he's playing against. He's playing not against the defenders.

He's playing against basketball mortality, and that's something that he's really been cognizant of lately. At Logan M. Murdoch on Twitter, check out the piece up on The Ringer right now and also his podcast with Rajabell Real Ones. It's out twice a week. They have Amani on. We got to have you on, man.

Just hit me up. You know how to get in touch with me. Oh, okay. All right. I a week. They have Amani on. We got to have you on, man. Just hit me up. You know how to get in touch with me. Oh, okay. All right. I got you. I got you. I'll be happy to do it, man. All right.

Let's see. Let's see how this goes. I can't wait, man. I can't wait. Talk to you soon. Thanks so much for having me. J. Kyle Mann. Big ringer day today.

You can check out his piece the rookie scale just came out this week it is fantastic because it's not just about all the rookies I just know how locked in you are Kyle because like I said something nice about Jalen Green the other night and I immediately got a text from you being like are you good on Jalen Green I was like well I don't know I just I wanted to be nice because it hasn't been we'll get to him a little bit later you got a little defensive though I would say too I was I thought I bit off more than i could chew there i was like whoa not coming at you rissolo not trying to start anything with you no no i got because i haven't been i mean look it hasn't been the same for for jalen as it has been for some of the other rookies but i don't

want to derail the start of this whole thing i just want the audience to understand how much you watch and how into this you are in the draft and everything else. You were as locked in as it gets. You kind of went through the rookies here and you backed it up not only eye test with different stats and some of the second spectrum stuff that's great. Let's just start with the number one pick in Kate because when he was

in LA against the Clippers, I specifically was like, I want to go check him out in person and see how he moves because we both knew he had to do everything about Oklahoma State. He wasn't going to wow you with these slashes to the rim. He just knew how to play. He knew how to play on off the ball. So you liked his adaptability. You liked his defense. You liked all these

different things. But he can't hit a shot to start the season. I don't necessarily love how they sort of pretend he's not really the point guard and don't give him the offense. But there have been stretches where if you're telling me you don't like him, I'd well wait a minute now now you're kind of like it's one of those deals if you're anti-cade you have evidence and if you're pro-cade this year you have plenty of evidence how do you sit with where he's at as you almost finish up his first season

um well the main thing that i say in the piece is like the the context is so huge here because he's not a floor raising playerising player in the same way. There's some guys that they come in, obviously the LeBrons, like a Giannis, a Luka. They can come in and you just plug pieces into them and they're going to raise value of players who would have lower value otherwise. They're just that type of player. Cade is not like a ball-dominant, like you were saying. He's not going to like, you know every night he has this offense that's implied and you have to do something to stop it. And then he's going to flip that into like X amount of assists just from him having the ball.

He's not that type of player. So and then when you start thinking about and then let's say even if he was hypothetically that type of player and he was in a roster that was tailored to him that could finish could hit threes that's not the situation in detroit so what we have is a guy who was struggling to score at the beginning of the year like you were talking about coming off you know a high ankle injury if i'm not mistaken um just a little wobbly uh and he's just not he wasn't going to be that type of score. And the roster is just inefficient from top to bottom. He didn't even have a consistent lob threat. And the shooting was pretty bad around him. Killian's been pretty terrible around him.

And Sadiq, who we both like, he lit it up last year. He's regressed, even though I'm not writing off Sadiq Bae, but it's been disappointing considering what we saw from his rookie year, which I think you point out as well. Yeah, I mean, they've been very up and down. He just couldn't hit a shot. I think we got really excited about who Bae was, maybe elevated him a little above what he actually is going to be long-term. But yeah, Killian and him and Grant, I understand why they were you know why

there were conversations about moving him and things like that so um kate it's a long game with kate i think once the his malleability and adaptability like you were talking about those are like big positives uh for him for me you have a really good number though on the catch and shoot relocation threes attempted where if you look at like a jaw that's a low number right he's not going to be a catch and shoot guy as much as I think we like Shea Gilders

Alexander's talent and it's incredible how often he delivers on the drives like he has some of the highest drive rates I think of any player in the league he may be at the top I know at one point this season he was he's been out but he's not a catch and shoot guy it's like hey i'm just going to kind of do my thing luca trey young same deal where we look at cade and i think your comparison to lamello the thing that's really impressive about lamello is that even though he's this

ball dominant can control everything set up manipulate things with his eyes and his passing he will get rid of it quickly and let you get him into something and then he'll relocate. And that's kind of what the numbers tell us about what Cade has done, which is not the advertisement of a number one pick, right? Yeah, I think I kind of made this point that basketball kind of ebbs and flows. We know it's a copycat league. We know that like once something works, people start to chase that thing and they start to

think, you know, oh, we got to go get I bring up the heliocentric word. People became obsessed with it. Like I feel like the Harden thing there for a while and like the 2018 when he was putting up just the bonker stats, this idea that you could like ride one player. I feel like the whole NBA kind of chased that for a minute. And I feel like we've kind of drifted back towards this idea of going on and off ball rapidly which is kind of the steph thing um but like yeah i think you're absolutely right like it's honestly it's more fun to watch it's less i know those teams that as much as i love luca i mean people he's gonna have to adjust at some point there i think you were talking about

the other day that like um is there like a lower ceiling in the playoffs for that type of approach? Yeah, there is. Like every team that rides a player super hard like that has to make an adjustment at some point. And I think if you're more versatile and willing to go on and off the ball quickly, it's just a good starting point for your career because it's harder to come back. Like once you get that power,

it seems like players have a harder time letting go of it, you yeah and it also sucks to play with that it just does and basketball players are real people with emotions and feelings and how you are involved in the game of basketball like nobody likes to set screens and rebound all fucking night all right some guys actually still like every kid grew up wanting to actually score and i don don't care if you're a 30-year-old NBA vet to just watch. So as much as I love Luka and what he did again last night, and I constantly bring up how absurd the playoff series was his first time, and that he actually trumped that in the second year. Those Clippers, Mavericks, that's some of the best first-round stuff I've ever seen.

But there are plenty of nights when I'm going through the league pass thing going, you know, I probably don't need to watch it tonight. I know what they're going to do. I know what it's going to look like. The defense has been much better. I don't necessarily always need to watch five out. Iso heliocentric is the word you use. I was talking with a guy the other day and cause we were talking about that

open that I did on the usage rate thing. And the guy was like, you know what you said there, there's some maybe arguments for against it but ultimately it's just not very much fun to play with and i think teams that actually enjoy playing have a better chance of success all right all right let's uh let's move on to jalen sucks i don't know if saru's gonna want to chime in here maybe at the end of it uh the title for this part is jalen sucks okay so i'll just ask you is j Jalen Suggs okay? It's another thing. It's like you got to take in a lot of data to kind of see the whole here to make sure. Because if you just

look at it at the surface, I made this argument in the past. A lot of times we'll act like a guy is a failure. We're like, man, they really let us down based on these expectations. But I kind of feel like we need to put the onus. You know, we cover this. We're not getting paid by teams to cover this kind of thing. Our jobs aren't on the line in the way theirs are and being right and wrong, but I think that these guys tell us who they are, and we just kind of have to be careful with the expectations. Suggs, I think, maybe gave people the impression that he was going to be

like engine of an offense. There were some comparisons for him that were maybe a little unfair, but he came into the season pretty inefficient, couldn't hit a shot, wasn't finishing at the rim pretty inexplicably. Like he always was like a powerful downhill guy, get into guy's chest in the air, things like that.

Middle game was pretty good. But he hurt his, he hurt his, both of his thumbs over the course of the season. And I think we just have seen him, he had to reset after that time that he was out and just slow down. The comparison that I made is, and people forget, and I was talking to Rudy about this, that De'Aaron Fox, a lot of the numbers kind of line up. If you line up their counting stats, they're very similar.

But the point that I made was just speed. Like when Fox came into the league, he was just going way too fast all the time. And I pulled up this like, I don't know if you saw this insane thing that Second Spectrum tracks, the mechanical power acceleration thing. Did you see that?

I loved it. All right. So explain what it was to kind of explain how Fox maybe figured it out. Well, on that specific stat, I didn't know. I was like, what the hell does that even mean? So I just emailed one of their people, and he sends me back this PDF that basically looks like a calculus paper. And I was just like, okay, well, I need something plainer than this.

But basically what it means is younger athletic guards, and we've seen this like with Derek Rose, I feel like Ja didn't have this much problem as much because he had a lot more, I feel like he had better command of his gears earlier. Do you feel that like in terms of being like a game manager? Absolutely. I mean, look, it's great. You can go fast end to end,

but if you can't change your pace, like they'll, I've seen camps where they work on this. And I'm talking like high i'm not talking about like you know metro or something not that that wasn't a great high school camp but the it's cool if you can go as fast as possible but if you can't change your pace you know you should have like four or five different paces of your of your dribble and fox was just end to end you know wide. He's like the receiver that can only run go routes. Sometimes it's awesome, but it doesn't make you the complete player.

And it's pretty clear that the second spectrum stuff shows that Fox figured it out. I thought Ja always knew it immediately. Ja knew the start-stop, but he also figured out the angles at the rim better than Fox ever has. And it's also a thing with Mello that didn't show as much until he's with other NBA bodies where his start, stop, and then start again for somebody his size, I'd imagine those numbers are pretty crazy, but it's also very

controlled. It's controlled with him. Where Fox, it was just, hey, I'm so fucking fast. There's no way you're going to stay even with me. And sometimes it works. And when it does work, it's also something you feel like you can go to all the time even though it can become not only predictable um but it's sometimes it's just completely out of control especially earlier on even though i you know look i think you made another good point too let's not write off dearon fox as if he's terrible now um but it's just his his stock doesn't seem to be as

high league wise as it used to be or what the possibility was for him. Yeah, and I think one of the ultimate, to reference your guy that we quibbled about the other night, I mean, one of the ultimate all-time rookie PG seasons is Chris Paul. If you go and look at all the catch-all offensive metrics, Chris Paul came in and had phenomenal command of his gears from the get-go. And the point that I make that ties into this is that in development, problem solving in your life, your development is driven by your exposure to types of problem solving. I didn't know. This is why I still call my dad constantly to help me fix things in my house because I haven't had to do

these things. So this is developing later in my life. And for a guy like De'Aaron Fox, he's never had to get command of his gears. Chris Paul is a little bit smaller. He was an underrated athlete for his size, but he was a little smaller. So he kind of had to develop that vocabulary for how to get his shot off, how to make this pass and create this window. He was just ahead. I think that for Suggs, just taking it back to Suggs, it's going to take a little bit more time. I trust that he's going to get there because there are pluses

elsewhere for him that I think are going to keep him on the court. I think he could be a phenomenal on-ball defender at some point. The Suggs shot chart is horrifying. There's basically two areas of the court where he's not 10 percentage points below average his above the break three numbers are terrible uh and the two spots on the floor he's taken a total of 13 shots this season from so it's not like we have a massive

sample that he's a good right corner three-point shooter or just right of the rim, not at the rim. But with his defense, Kyle, first of all, I don't like writing off any rookie unless I was so convinced the guy stunk and then it's immediately backed it up the whole way through. Suggs was not going to be the focus of any offense. And the fact that Franz is so good proves that Franz should be more of an option offensively than Suggs is.

But is there enough there for you to still, like, hold out hope? Because I don't know if you write guys off their rookie year. I just don't like doing it. And we've also seen more development stories in the league with some of the top players than I think we've ever seen in NBA history over the last decade. Yeah, I mean, I don't want to write anybody off. I mean, there are data trends

that aren't great for guys if you're past a certain... This is something I've covered a lot in my writing and my videos is that if you're under a certain amount, year two is the telling thing. If he can't get his head above water in terms of giving the sort of balance between what you give, what you give up. If you can't get at least your head close to above water at that point, you're still really struggling. That's probably a worse sign. So I think year two, the beginning, that first half of year two is probably more telling, I think, than the rookie year.

I just think he's so intangible. And also, I think some of the numbers are going to be really thrown off by his bad start. That's something to consider too. I'm not one of these people that like, I don't know. I feel like whenever I write something, there's always those people that are going to be like, after the all-star break, after the all-star break, it's like, okay, cool. Well, the league changes after the all-star break. People start thinking about different things, playing guys, resting guys, giving them a shot. Like the numbers can be a little deceiving. Like shooting is what it is at some point.

I don't know about the shooting with him. That's the biggest thing. I do expect his middle game and his finishing to get better because he just has been sped up. That's what it all kind of comes back to. And if you're sped up, you know, if your mind is eaten up with like, I might lose the ball here in the middle of the floor, you're make poor decisions that's just the way it is and i expect that to

kind of even out sir do you want to take a bite here yeah i mean kyle and i were texting last night i think everything he wrote was fair i think the fox comparisons are terrifying um and again not that fox is terrible like you guys talked about but you know we thought he would be better the only thing i would say about Suggs... Fox, by the way, Fox is too low. Now it's too much anti-Fox. Okay. Go ahead.

It is, but I would just say I always like the Drew Holiday comp for him more just because I just think he brings these intangible stuff. I think he could be a guy who, yeah, maybe it's not your one or two option on a really good team, but he just brings winning plays, the defensive things. He's disruptive that way. And I'm willing to sort of like let him grow into whatever offensive role he's going to play on his team. And as I texted Kyle last night, a lot of this is helped by the fact

that Franz looks like he could be the guy. So they almost flip-flopped, you know, everybody that sucks is the guy, Franz is like the role player. It actually flip-flopped. And so I think it's kind of okay. If both of them weren't, if Franz wasn't looking the way that he looked-flopped. I think it's kind of okay. If Franz wasn't looking the way that he looked now,

I think people would be a little bit more concerned. I am patient with Suggs, but for me, it's more about the intangible stuff and him long-term. All right. Okay. I'm going to talk Kaminga. You and I completely agreed, and I didn't know that we agreed about Kaminga watching not just the G League stuff, which felt aimless. I don't know if that was your word. I think I i said aimless yeah it was it was a perfect word because when

you watch it you're like oh that's cool and you're like wait is he out there like oh what the hell is he doing and then because it was so unsatisfying i went back and watched the new york rent stuff and i was like okay you know he's a big guy he brings up the the ball. And Kaminga has been so impressive. But then I think, okay, what if Kaminga, and this is where we can transition to my guy now. I love that Jalen Green is my guy because I was positive about him. That's how it works, man.

That if Kaminga were in Houston, he'd probably just be dribbling a ton and taking some bad shots. And he would have probably better overall numbers because he'd play just be dribbling a ton and taking some bad shots. And he would have probably better overall numbers because he'd play more minutes. He'd be left to do what he wants. I know people are getting frustrated with Silas there, but I mean,

think about that guy, like the gig he thought he got everybody immediately wants out, you know, coaches. I know they can't really help themselves, but want to win. Trust me. I'll make my point here in a second,

but there's, there's a little bit too much Eric Gordon, Kevin Porter j porter jr wants to get his stuff i like tate i like some of the other role players christopher martin um wood is always going to be looking for his they probably should have tried to trade him but as i'd heard about wood wood's the kind of guy that as soon as he leaves the team no one cares it's like all right he's gone uh they've got schruder now um and yet i think there's going to be a lot of jalen green heavy ice i just iso initiate the offense jalen green which is also code for like this is how we're going to tank at the very end on top of everything else so i think jane is going

to put up even better numbers and the shooting is jump from like 20 from three 40 three all right the reason i bring up this point is that i could see Kaminga with a bad basketball team, a typical lottery team, doing those exact same things, and I would still go, I don't know what the hell this guy's going to be. And that's where I'm open-minded, wondering what you're agreeing. Kaminga with Golden State has been impressive.

It's beyond my expectations because he is, either he was always this smart, and we just never saw it because he didn't have to do it because physically he didn't have to do any of these things or the process of his his mentorship or whatever you want to phrase it at the nba levels of working with probably the best group you could and going here's what you're going to do here here's what you're doing there you also mentioned what he's playing 30 of his minutes at center he's being asked to do things that i never saw him do in any of the other stuff and he's all doing it of his minutes at center. He's being asked to do things that I never saw him do

in any of the other stuff, and he's all doing it so well so that I wonder if Kaminga ends up, despite not putting up the awesome numbers that some rookies get to put up, that his foundation is so far ahead of other rookies because he's playing for a team where all the minutes matter, all your decisions on the court matter, constant ball movement.

The catch-and- and shoot stuff is probably not as good as as maybe you're thinking as you're listening to this because that's actually in line with probably what we thought of him as a prospect but him with the golden state training wheels on gets me so excited about a player that has figured out a lot of stuff that no one's even thought about for other rookies yeah and one of the things it comes back to, which is better? Which is better? Is it better for you to be in a situation where you're just like doing the on the job training of being the lead player? Or is it better for you to build that foundation and take the time? A good example of this is like, what would Anthony Simons have been like on a team where he had like been enabled

to do things like this? Like he played behind two guys that were sort of, he was understudy for guys who play a similar play type to him. But we've seen that now that he, he was just brought along at sort of a more leisurely pace than like a Jalen green. Green is just out there throwing paint on the canvas and, you know, doing his thing.

Um, but like for Kuminga specifically, I made the point that i think it's like the perfect developmental situation for him because yeah like you were saying like when when you would watch him uh in high school he just kind of seemed like he was fucking around a lot out there like he he didn't really he wasn't challenged i don't know if it was a situation where we know he switched high schools a lot i'm not as quick to like say that that's like a character that doesn't mean shit to me anymore.

It used to be a thing back years ago where you're like, oh, three high schools. Now, I don't even think about it. I'm sorry. I just don't. So, I agree with you. Go ahead. Yeah. But what we've seen is he's in a situation with accountability.

I think that Draymond's talked about how Kuminga is learning to work. That's one of the things, which is which is a thing, you know, some guys don't come in. And I think you talked about foundation for Kuminga. We knew the variance was, was wide with him. Like that was always my thing. I'd be like, yeah, I mean, he could end up being like a fucking all-star or he also could be like, um, I I've, I've made some like just joking comps and charts.

And I've talked about like Jeff green was somebody like a higher end kind of version of a Jeff Green-esque kind of a player. But these guys can fall between the cracks in the NBA and become sort of, you know, journeymen without a home because they can't fit into a scheme because they have their own agenda. You know, for this or that reason, Bagley's kind of going through that right now. He's in sort of a free fall in terms of like where his career is going and has a chance to sort of stabilize it. But Kaminga's in a good spot. I think something I say in the article is that they just put him in these situations where he's at center, where he'll get these centers out on an island and he's just attacking them when they're not set. And people just aren't equipped to do that. It's a similar thing to Zion.

He's not the same type of athlete, but he's just nuclear blasting these guys who are out of position and ill-equipped to guard him because he's so big and powerful and strong. Who's the other guy that you love out of this class? I know you're a big Herb Jones guy. He was included in this. I'll just let you go in any direction you want to on this one.

I like a lot of guys in this class, man. I kind of like did a zoom out moment when I was thinking about the top 10. Agree or disagree with this? I think that there are like, there are two or three guys that could be like elite defenders in this class. I think in the top 10, there are like seven of the 10 could become like, plus, above average defenders. It seemed like there's a lot of defensive talent in this class, maybe more than any top ten in recent memory.

Yeah, look, Trey Mann went fucking crazy the other night. Yeah. It's funny about Trey, and I'm not talking about his defense, but he looks big in college, and then sometimes you're like about his defense, but he looks big in college, and then sometimes you're like, and he still kind of looks big in the NBA.

You're like, man, he's a big guard. I've done a giddy love fest here numerous times. Zyra Williams, who at Stanford, showed you glimpses of why he was such a big deal at a high school, but it just never seemed to work out. It'd be all the stuff right up until you had to make the shot or, you know,

out in transition and it looked amazing. And then it kind of didn't happen. And I felt like he's given Memphis, you know, a really good team, decent minutes at times. I think I tried to talk you into Zaire at one point and you were like, nah, not coming along. No, I didn't. I was, I'm sorry.

I just, I was like, it's everything, but what you need it to be, you know, it was kind of the opposite of, of a guy with like a terrible golf swing who then is just firing darts all the time. He was the guy with the great golf swing. And you're like, how come he's always, you know, he's always in the rough. That's kind of what it felt like. I didn't expect to do a golf analogy.

Yeah. He's in a good spot to similar coming, I thinka, I think, for him, for his needs. Yeah, but to answer your question, yeah, Herb Jones. Herb Jones, people should go check him out. He's like, toolsy is like a cliche word, but he's just a guy who has a really high motor, high like middle motor. He's like about 6'7"-ish.

Actually, I'm not sure on his height, but he is like over 7' seven uh ish actually i'm not sure on his height but he is like it's over seven foot wingspan can guard multiple positions it's hilarious to watch him like switch from like an on-ball score to a scoring big within one sequence there's one that i included where he's pestering anthony edwards and he just on a dime switches and guards cat and you can tell cat gets really pissed off because he does that thing. The thing I like about Herb is like when he senses that player,

and you'll see like really, like our test used to be really good at this. Anytime like the guy with the ball retreats a little bit and they kind of back up, he's like, I'm not just going to stand here. I'm going to advance into your territory. And he is just,

and some guys, I was talking to a friend last night about this, that like defense a lot of the time is just like focus. It just can be, you know, physical tools aside and like Herb is just

constantly dialed in with whatever defensive job he's put in. He's a really impressive defender and I think he's going to be good for a while. I know. I just feel like

there's other guys we get to, but, and then we just be recapping all this stuff. So, uh, this was really good, man. I,

I appreciate it. Even though I feel like we should have done a little Scotty Barnes stuff because Scotty Barnes is a lot like the fit theory because I was so worried when I watched him

and did, you know, my version of my own prep for the draft. I was like, I gotta love this guy. I go, but if he goes to the wrong

fucking team and they stick him in the corner and they're like, I gotta love this guy. I go, but if he goes to the wrong fucking team and they stick him in the corner and they're like, be a three and D guy, like Herb Jones is hitting threes and he's switching. So it's working. And then when you start seeing like, oh, let's pay attention to the closing groups. I'm like, man, Herb Jones is like one of their guys.

Like, this is crazy. And with Barnes, thank God for Nick Nurse. Like, thank God for him. And I know the shooting is fluctuated. And I know, you know, he came right out of the jump after not making his shots, but at least that I see it's not this downward trend with him. He's back up. He's shooting threes decent

again this month and he can just do so many different things. Toronto's starting to figure it out a little bit. These are real minutes. These minutes mean something and he's such a smart player and he himself can adapt. I love that he landed in Toronto because I knew, okay, perfect. Nurse is going to know how to amplify the things that he does in Toronto because I knew, okay, perfect. Nurse is going to know how to amplify the things that he does, where I think another coach would go, hey,

just defend. Now we can switch you through with the top if we want, but you're not going to bring the ball up. You're not going to be initiating it off. I just think there would have been a lot of NBA coaches that wouldn't have realized the special talents of Barnes. Yeah. And I actually am a little more confident on him. He's similar to Herb in that I think if you put him in any basketball team on the planet, he would just find ways to be valuable. He's just like one of those, he has all kinds of intangible kind of things that he can do. He's a pretty good short roll passer. My Kentucky accent almost came out there, short roll. Kasser, my Kentucky accent almost came out in a short roll. But, I mean, he can guard one through five, super long arms, super strong. I love Scottie. I was really high on him.

And I think the fact that that sort of like line there where the consensus was like, oh, Jalen Suggs seems like the implied guy here. Toronto, I mean, I know we're optimistic about Suggs collectively here, but, you know, Toronto kind of saw something there, I mean, I know we're optimistic about Suggs collectively here, but Toronto kind of saw something there, I think. It made a good call for what they need. You can check out Jay Coman's piece up on The Ringer right now, Rookie Scale, and also his podcast. They did a piece. This is Upside High, by the way, with Sharks.

They did the Marvinvin bagley stuff anthony simon's going off so that is out subscribe to that one as well we don't have to do a ton of marvin bagley stuff because it's like oh wait he actually can only do these things and that's why you know i remember doing the duke part on him i go the hope is that he becomes this kind of perimeter stretch four maybe even stretch five all these things know, adds a little bit more to his game because it's been really easy for him to finish at the rim in college. And that's why he's putting up some of these numbers. He needs to expand this stuff, but you can

understand what you're doing when you're drafting. I'm hoping he's going to do this. He's done none of them. And I think that's kind of the Marvin Bagley story. That was the swing thing for me. I thought that was going to come true. Like I would watch him. Yeah, I was like, I see it. I think it's going to have I was like, you know,, and I was like, I see it. I think it's going to happen. I was like, within the people I know, I was higher on him than most.

I thought that was going to happen. I understood what the hope was and all of that. And then I remember also thinking, if none of those things happen, this is going to be bad. But you expect guys to develop. Because you're right. He was showing these little flashes. There was a little bit. But then, I don't know. Maybe you're at sacramento you're not asking doing those things

you're not developing them you're not comfortable in game with that kind of stuff and and that's where your own development can be stunted or maybe none of those things were ever going to happen if you're still if you're still holding on a bagley stock you're still blaming sacramento i like the detroit's giving him more of a chance i was watching it the other night with him and i'm like it kind of looks like the same guy with more minutes. That's probably what... I don't know that he's going to change. I don't know. It's the question,

do people change? He seems pretty strong-headed in the way that he wants to play. I kind of feel like he's going to be... Like I said, I was afraid that that could happen to Kaminga. I think that he's just going to be like,

you know, bounce from team to team kind of thing. Be that on like a yearly basis. Yeah, he's actually i guess he's at the same minute but he's only played two games so we'll see we'll see what happens uh thanks a lot man appreciate it thanks for having me you want details bye 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. Before we get to life advice, I know that our listeners really seem to appreciate any Kyle content slash Frolic Room updates. So this kind of is a big stool, all that. Kyle calls me frantically this week going, you have to hear what happened. And we said, we'll save it for the pod. So Kyle, set it up. I know you have pages and notes like it's your own monologue. So let's see how this goes.

Okay. This is what I've decided. I think it's going to be the frolic room, super bowl heist. I think that's basically what we're going to call it. It's just kind of encompasses everything. So let me just start from page one here. I wrote it all down cause I didn't want anything to get lost or mixed up or misconstrued. So frolic rooms, a couple, we'll start a couple months ago.

It was a regular in the bar. Um, we spoke a couple of times. He's a regular in the bar. We spoke a couple times. He's like, you know, in the middle of the day, there's not too many people there. You're generally going to end up talking to somebody at some point. So turns out he's from New York.

I talk about how I want to move back there, how I like it there, all this stuff, whatever. So we've just known each other now for a couple months now. So Super Bowl approaches. I find out I'm going to the Super Bowl. Shout out, Bill. And I tell one of my bartender buddies, like, no shit, I'm going to

actually a couple of our buddies are going. I was like, how, no offense. How are you going to the Superbowl? And so he's like, he's like, Oh dude, this guy in here, you know, him, he he's bringing us. I was like, what do you mean? He's bringing you. He's like, yeah, there's like 10 of us so far going. It's unbelievable. So, um, I, I talked to this guy. I'm like, what do you mean he's bringing you? He's like, yeah, there's like 10 of us so far going. It's unbelievable. So I talked to this guy. I'm like, hey, are you bringing these guys to the Super Bowl? I was like, I don't want to go. I just, you know, I'm going to. And he's like, oh, yeah. He tells me that he sells all the ads for SoFi Stadium, all the ads around town, billboards, and then everything that you see that's an advertisement inside the stadium. He says Kroenke is his guy.

He says he was supposed to go to Rams-Cardinals, the playoff game, but he got COVID the day of. And he couldn't go, and he said he returned the tickets. And the COO of the Rams said to him that, you know what, as a makeup for this, you can have most of a box at the Super Bowl, is what he says. Wait.

So because the Arizona game didn't work out, a regular season game against the Cardinals? No, that should have been the first playoff matchup, right? Oh, the first playoff game. That should have been the first playoff game. Because the playoff game not working out was like, hey, I'll just get you in in a suite to the Super Bowl. I mean, I know.

I know how it sounds. Most of the box. Most of us have had... Most of. That's incredible. You get some space in the box. He's like, the box fits like 30, but I get 20 or 17, whatever, give or take.

He tells me I can come up and see him anytime in the box. Just give him a call the day of. He says, now that we're getting closer, I've seen him every day leading up to it, pretty much, that I go there to the Super Bowl. And he's like, are you ready, bud? Just give me a call when you're in there, bud. I'll get you in.

He says that he's got about 15 people meeting at the Frolic Room on Super Bowl Sunday at noon. And he's going to rent four black SUVs that's going to do the car service and bring them into the fucking under the stadium garage like they're a WWE superstar. I was like, what are you going to do for parking? He's like, oh, we're going under the stadium, buddy. Come on. I mean, I'm going to get somebody's going to meet me down there and bring us up. It's going to be perfect. All right. Time out real quick,

though. So this guy's just hanging out in the middle of the day yes and he's he's cronky's guy he's saying he's the right hand guy to the owner of the rams and he would he would also what he would take phone calls and leave the bar because he said he was talking to his boss so i'm getting there yeah so basically but he would always and also he would always like have somewhere to go he'd stop in for two hours and then he'd be like all right i gotta go and then he'd come back so i don't know maybe he's willing to did anybody actually know this guy though like like i mean who knows months weeks like who i don't know i don't get it he's a regular okay he's a regular i'm just i'm i'm asking like another simple follow-up here he would just

drink during the day at the frolic room yeah but he was like let me just stop in here and throw a few back but i'm busy and i got stuff to do i don't know it's a big it's a big town it's a big rich town and maybe the guy has a pension for shitty bars i mean i could see myself doing that too if i had all the money in the world i don't know if you want to say that out loud if you had a super important job like this isn't roger sterling i imagine his name roger sterling okay all right go ahead yeah that is roger sterling i imagine name roger sterling okay all right go ahead yeah that is roger sterling um so he says basically i'm there on saturday he's like tomorrow we're meeting here at 12 we're gonna get we're gonna roll out the the suvs and get us down there and we're gonna be there and there's

party before and a party after welcome to the box all day blah blah blah so uh the morning the so i get there now bill wanted to go early beat the traffic the morning of i text my picture i'm like hey where you at buddy no answer i call him no answer then he texts me my sister died in a car crash in napa this morning that's terrible news terrible news terrible news so i was like oh i'm he's like i'm not going i was like oh i'm so sorry condolences whatever um so that i i talked to a couple of my buddies that i knew work i didn't know the I was like, oh, he's like, I'm not going. I was like, oh, I'm so sorry. Condolences. Whatever. So then I talked to a couple of my buddies that I knew work. I didn't know the whole group of 15 people that were supposedly going to the Super Bowl,

but I knew that they were probably going to be at Frolic Room. So I just asked, I just hit my boy. I was like, wow, crazy turn of events, huh? And he was like, can you do me a favor? Can you go to the box office if you can make it there and see if there are any tickets in his in this guy's name we just we just want to you know we're all we're all uh we're all pissed uh at the situation not at him yet at this point um but one of the guys actually who was supposed to go was had an opportunity to set up the halftime show but he just he declined to go like he was like it was like a crew guy you know like a union

job yeah and he declined to go because he thought he's gonna be watching from a box in the super bowl so you know people took a canceled their plans to do this so now there's 15 people at frolic room furiously researching this guy and car crashes in napa this morning and just you know there's 15 google machines going at the bar so they apparently. And they're all like pre-gaming, I imagine, waiting for the SUVs to come pick them up. No doubt. No doubt. So then this guy was, you know,

he was always taking phone calls and like showing like, oh, look who's calling me. And so he had sent one of the bartenders who was going a screenshot of an email from the CEO of the Rams. So they look, they pull that up. Hey, remember when he sent you that? They call the numbers on it. The numbers go nowhere. A guy, William, picks up, not David Demoff or whatever the guy's name is. So now they've called both the numbers. So they're like,

oh, okay, this is wrong. So this guy doctored an email. He doctored an email that he then sent around to people. The numbers on the thing don't go anywhere. There's no car crashes that they can find. So word gets around that this group isn't going. My bartenders are pretty popular on the block and the bars surrounding. I think it's probably a tight-knit family. So they find out

that these guys aren't going and that this kind of fishy situation's going on. And they're like, wait a second. That guy's in my bar right now down the street and he sends him a picture of the guy no way pool table that like two blocks away maybe that's how he grieves maybe that's how he grieves you would think he'd be on a plane to nap but i get that stuff sorted but who knows um okay i got so so now that they've they've've, they've, um, in their research,

they find some articles about this guy. And there's two articles that I'm drawing from in this part of my notes. One is, we're not going to say his name, right? I'm not going to say it. There's two articles. There's one in the New York post in 2001 and in 1999.

And basically, uh, the headline of one of them was New York grifter at it again, scamming away or something. And we're like, oh, wow. And so here's the quick timeline of this guy. New York in 1987, there's a New York Times Magazine story about new art collectors. He's a new breed of art collectors. The next year in 1988, he pleaded guilty to defrauding $10 million and settled with the SEC.

He basically was taking money from people. He bought art, cars, homes. According to this thing, some of the victims include the Rockefeller family, Bill Cosby, and the Sultan of Brunei in his Ponzi scheme. And now he's taking out guys at the Frolic Room. I mean, this was 88. This is only 1988. We haven't gotten to the whole thing yet. So he bought a bunch of stuff with the money that basically turned into assets. Two days after that settlement, he was charged by federal prosecutors, defrauding investors of almost $15 million. That basically ends up, he gets sentenced

to eight years. He served five and he's back out in the mid nineties. This is the part that is actually pretty strange and, and kind of matters right now. Yeah. So he meets a producer. He meets a producer in New York city in the mid nineties, a theater producer. Um, he says before he went to prison, he met a KGB agent in Europe that wanted to give him two and a half million dollars to set up a theater and film production company. And he says that he wanted to fund an off-Broadway play. So this producer's like, wow, sounds good. And rents a theater, hires a cast and director.

And then all of a sudden, this thing just doesn't happen. And so the producer's out $50,000. And there's a quote. There's a real quote here. It says, the bizarre thing was there was no gain for him in this. So that's in the mid-90s. In 1999, there's a story about he's hanging out at a bar,

Houston's on 54th Street in Manhattan. And he was like using an alias, paying for everything in cash. And he's like buddying up to the bartenders and he's having them. He's like saying he's a stock guy and he's got all these tips. And he's kind of right about a couple things because it's it's like, it's in the financial district, the TV's on always

showing this stuff. So he's like, right about a couple of things. And then he's saying he's getting a gift IPO from Morgan Stanley. He's getting a bunch of gift IPOs. This is after like hanging around there for a while. So a few of the staff members gave them all the money they could because you know, it's like family money, whatever. So in June of 2000, he was charged with second degree larceny and scheming to defraud 15 people ranging from 2000 to 70,000. I couldn't find any info on the outcome, but the last thing there was was that thing. So that's all my notes. After this guy said he was going to bring everyone to the Super Bowl, nobody paid him any money.

He basically just kind of alienated everyone at this bar. And then we find out all this crazy shit about him. And like, I mean, I really don't know what to say after this. Basically, we're just wondering if he's going to show up. Some of the guys think he is going to show up. Others say he's never going to show his face again. But he was just seen on the block yesterday. I was just there yesterday.

And now every time somebody sees them in this little network of bartenders, they're sending the guys who were supposed to go to the Super Bowl pictures of him. And he's been in contact with a couple of them saying like, oh, you know, just sorting everything out in Napa. I should be back tomorrow. And then literally four hours later, somebody sending a picture of this guy in the block. So I really don't know what's gonna happen i don't understand why he did it he nobody paid him for the car service or threw in

for anything or no one paid anything so honestly the frolic room got off light here and yeah a couple couple guys had their sunday ruined couple could have made money for super bowl one guy could have went to the super bowl but didn't another guy had tickets turned him down because he was with this group no he was he was gonna be working for the halftime show but i imagine you're not when you're not doing that you know so but there's a couple people that kind of you know we're off work and some people like well i wouldn't i wouldn't have come to the frolic room today that's actually not what i want to do i would have been doing something else i don't know who that person would be but that's what i've heard so we just really don't know what's going on they've now ran a background check. Somebody ran a background check on him and,

and found out who his sister was. And there was a call place. The sister's alive. So we don't, that's great news. That is great. That was the one part where you're like, well,

I guess if she's really dead, this is awful, but she's not. So everybody's, everybody's good. The guy's constantly lying about where he is and who he is and where he works and what he owns. Um,

but so we'll see if he shows up. I think everyone's kind of playing along with him. Like, you know, wow, please, like, when you come back, just come on in. We'll hang out. I don't know what's going to happen to him if he walks back into that bar. You need to stay out of it. I am. You're right.

I mean, I've seen the punching videos, so I'm afraid. What's his story? Like, what size is he? How old is he now? He's a little guy. He's a little guy, white hair. I'd say he's probably pushing 60, but, you know, maybe 50. Maybe he's just an old 45.

I don't know. I bet he shows up. I mean, they're all like, hey, man, you know, where can we send flowers? And he's like, oh, don't do it. It's a waste. They're all kind of keeping him on the hook here. Oh, man. My one guy says if he walks in here, I'm going to serve him.

Like, I'm not going to do anything. But I don't know. The other guy maybe wants to curb stop him. I don't know what's going to happen. What a strange, strange story. So, Kyle, if he had offered, like, if you didn't have tickets to the Super Bowl, would you have been involved in this? No doubt.

I would have been fine once I figured out that we're just going to sit a frolic room but most people like i'm just here's the thing red immediate red flag random guy who's drinking in the middle of the day says he's you know knows the big timers and the rams has works for him yeah works for sofi does all the ads for sofi he gets most of a box and he invites a bunch of random people from a bar like he doesn't invite friends family whatever like immediate red flag it is a red flag yeah as you as you look back on it it's like oh that's weird that's weird but you know the thing that you read in these two articles that i sent you guys is people were like he was so smooth and he was so good and

i would like hang up the phone after asking about something and be like why did i ever doubt this guy and so i guess he just kind of had that thing where he was like like a little part where he was talking about selling the ads for sofa i was like oh that's weird in old stadiums i imagine you know it's per per money per put put a board up and he's like but i was like hell when stuff you know switches around digitally and like how do you he's like all right basically it's it's uh we sell them in two minute blocks and we sell uh 8-second ads. And he just, bang, that's not his job. He never had to sell ads for a stadium, as far as I know. But he still

was like, oh, this is what we do. He knows just enough to get you in. And it rolls off the tongue. Yeah, it rolls off the tongue. You're like, oh, yeah, this guy's a real deal. He likes to sit around in shitty bars. All right. I can see it. Maybe he should get this job. Maybe he'd be good at it i don't know dude

i have no crazy thing though is like i know like i'm not trying to like rationalize con men but why like why like he didn't get any money from any attention he just people up yeah the money attention like what's what's the law like now like i guess he can go back to the bar and you guys play it cool i don't know he gets to feel like a big shot everybody's like oh this is great and he he walks in he has his version of power or whatever it is that all these people think that he's important now granted previously this it was about money um but at least in this case like he's thinking this is great like i go to my spot everybody likes me i'm going to do everybody this huge favor i just what was it like the day of when people were there pre-gaming drinking

beers? When did it kick in that no one was going to the Superbowl and the cars were not showing up? I think it was probably around like 11 ish. I'm not really sure. I wasn't there. Um, I went yesterday just to ask and he was just like, I mean, pretty soon it was just 15 people searching the corners of the internet for stuff about this guy's stuff about a Napa crash stuff about whatever, um, calling numbers on the doctoredored emails it was like all that info that they got they had gotten in probably 30 40 minutes of 15 people lined up at the bar when nobody else is there like three hours before the Super Bowl so nobody's really hanging out at Frolic Room it's just these guys who are there Frolic Room's born identity. Just a bunch of people just hacking away. There's this HQ over here.

All right, we got to move, folks. We got to move. I need updates. Who's got anything on the sister? Who's got anything on the sister? I want cameras up. Norway. Oslo.

Exactly. Keep us posted on that. Thanks. I think tomorrow's the day he's supposed to be officially back from Napa. So we'll see if he shows up this weekend. I'm out. I'm out going to New York for a week, so we'll see if he shows up this weekend. I'm out. I'm out going to New York for a week, but we'll see. Do you have his number? I do have his number.

He texted me the morning that his sister died when I was already at the studio. Well, that was thoughtful. Well, I said condolences. Man. I can't wait for next week's podcast. I know you're off, but you may have to come back on once we have more information on this.

I'll call in. All right. Life advice. Life advice. RR at gmail.com. We've had a lot of people chiming in with their famous people encounters. And for the most part, they're all very complimentary to the famous person. all very complimentary to the famous person so i i mean i guess i could read some of these but i i don't i don't know that i you know i i appreciate the emails this one's pretty good let's just do

this one all right 62175 uh you asked for celebrity interactions we're not actually asking for celebrity interactions i don't think but i i'm going to read this one because i thought it was really cool and the celebrity sounds awesome after this. In 2009, my cousin and I were flying from Boston to LA. Had a layover in Newark. I was 14, cousin 18. Our journey to the LAX gate, my cousin spotted Reginald Noble.

Reggie Noble. That's Redman. Walking in front of us. We were kind of thrown off because not a single person came up to him. But we pursued and ended up dapping him up and told him Muddy Waters was dope. I had no idea what that was at 14, but I agreed with my cousin. Very dope. The interaction lasted about five minutes.

We kept moving. Also, he's tall as shit. I was the same height back then. I remember looking up at him. About 20 minutes later, he sought us out and asked us to watch his bags while we waited in line at Panda Express. Incredible, incredible stat. Obviously, we said yes.

He grabs his food. He talked to my cousin, an aspiring rapper, at the time for nearly 45 minutes. That would have been great if I teed it up and said for nearly 45 seconds. He talked about the industry while I stared at both of them in a bit of shock. I think I said zero words.

I may have talked about the upcoming blackout two album and how I liked the single AO. Um, and I'm pretty sure he was humoring me. He was awesome though. Exactly. How did you expect red man to be loud, funny,

but incredibly kind and authentic. He took my cousin's album, gave us his phone number and told us to call him when we landed in LA. We left a voicemail or two to no avail as we expected, but it was still absolutely wild. God, he gave you the number and everything that he didn't. Are we sure this was him? Yeah. Wait, was this guy?

Yeah. Does this guy have Super Bowl tickets? Yeah. My cousin and I agree all these years later, the fact we didn't ask for a picture. Asked for a picture in the first interaction is what prompted the second interaction. Would you agree, Ryan? Also, would appreciate it. We'reassila segment on the Celtics turnaround. By the way, the Celts, really incredible run here defensively, what they're doing.

I'll admit in the beginning of the win streak, I was like, they're facing every team without their best players. But this is a nice little turnaround. Is it real? I mean, the 538 projections had the Celtics as the best percentage chance to win the NBA championship. I think that's a bit lofty. We've pointed out some 538 projections in the past. You're like, what the hell does that

mean? But yeah, shout out Celts. Alright, so back to this. I don't know if it was the picture or not. Maybe he liked you guys. Maybe he wanted somebody to watch his bags and he trusted you guys to watch his bags because you would come up earlier and tell him how awesome he was. So that could have been part of it too. But the fact that he spent 45 minutes with

you is incredible. And I will repeat this as I've repeated it before. The Wade Boggs story. I don't know that Simmons loved it on pod, but when I hung out with Wade Boggs, he was way more uncomfortable when no one was talking to him than when people were talking to him. So sometimes a talking to him so sometimes a

public figure actually enjoys people giving them a ton of attention and it wasn't this isn't even a knock on wade boggs was actually cool but it was just him and i off to the side because again we were both working at espn the next day we'd met on the plane we were talking he was coming on my show i was like hey we're both stuck in the same hotel do you want to go across the street and have a beer and we did it um i would say that like it was it was it was this eye-opening experience for me because i go he likes the attention and not a knock on it but that could have been the case here so there are plenty of famous people that fucking love being famous and they like having everybody come up to them they like so you know more often than

not a lot of people don't want to be bothered but some people some people maybe he just liked you guys but i do think he just liked you guys. But I do think he probably wanted you to watch his bags and you were going to steal his shit. Okay. Pick up basketball. Do I play too hard on defense? A lot of pickup stuff. That's all right.

It's a good lane for us. 5, 10, 170. I moved to a new city last summer to work remotely while my wife is finishing her doctorate. Hey, all right. I used to play pickup basketball weekly back at home. Started to find a group in the new city. After a long break, I got invited to play at my wife's school by a friend. The friend didn't show up, so I was a complete stranger

in the group of 10. Overall, we played several full court games and had a great time. However, I'm worried about something. Uh-oh. Here's the background. I played varsity basketball all four years in high school. Wow. Varsity as a freshman at 5'10", 170? Either you went to school in

bumfuck, Holland, Vermont, or you're fucking awesome. So we don't know. I was pretty good on offense and our best defender. I was always assigned the other team's best player for the most part did a great job. After a few drinks, I might say something along the lines of I could have played college at a small school

if it weren't for an ankle injury or something dumb like that. Yeah. But that's okay. A lot of guys say it. During the aforementioned pickup game, I was clearly doing a lot more on defense than most guys around me. Don't get me wrong. I wasn't picking up guys full court, slapping my hands on the court or face guarding them as soon as they crossed that court. So he's saying he wasn't doing any of those things.

Thank God. But if a guy tried to drive on me, he wasn't getting very far. And I deflected a ton of passes, which brings up another question. How do I know if I overdid it? The other guys were running up and down and hustling a decent bit. But I could not tell if there was an understanding of the guys relaxing on defense or just out there to have a relaxing game.

One of my teammates asked me to switch on to the other team's best guy because he was letting us up from deep. And the shooter was clearly pissed that I was trying more and didn't seem interested in saying goodbye after. In summary, how do you calibrate the effort in pickup games? I have a hard time turning it off because the pickup games back home are always really intense.

And guys who let you hear it for slacking on D are not chasing down rebounds. All right. By the way, where he's from is actually a pretty big town. So he must be a pretty good player. Good handle. I'm not Catholic school. Right. High energy.

Here's the deal. If you're good enough to be varsity all four years in high school, then you should understand as soon as you're... That's the great thing about basketball. I mean, kind of any sport if you've played it. But you watch somebody with a bat in your hands, you're like, okay, no. Or, whoa, all right.

Basketball's three dribbles. You go, nope. This guy didn't play. And if you played in, okay, no, or whoa, all right. Basketball's three dribbles. You go, nope, this guy didn't play. And if you played in high school, you should know. You should be able to answer your own question. I remember I used to play at the Celtics facility because it was convenient for me, but it was a separate gym. Celtics had their own facility in Waltham, Mass., and then there was a full-blown New York Sports Club.

It was Boston Sports Club. And I just loved basketball like I didn't care I just wanted to get shots up especially back then man and there was an older lunch group and the guys were really really old all right and I'm in my 20s and they play like half court and I would say do you mind if I just kind of run around and I just knew like again the age was a little bit easier of a read I think I got hit in the head well I actually know this happened but I got hit in the head once and I got sort of pissed for like two possessions just started like going ape shit and there was a guy that was part of the group that I think was 60 and he was a psychiatrist yeah he was a psychiatrist and he just looked at me was like okay Ryan he's like you know calm down we know you know you can do whatever you want if you want to.

We appreciate the way you play with us. But, and I always felt like when he was looking at me, he was trying to figure out what my deal was. I actually really liked that guy. It was nice. But I just always kind of got like the psychiatrist vibe when he was looking in my eyes. I think he loved the dead, but he also kind of looked like Jerry Garcia. So maybe he never mentioned the dead.

And I just made that connection because of the way he looked really nice guy, really good group. But I knew, Hey, you're not made that connection because of the way he looked. Really nice guy. Really good group. But I knew, hey, you're not fucking killing people boxing out here. All right. Take it easy on the Barkley Olympics game stuff here. So if you're a guy that's played, you should be able to figure out. Now, the defensive thing. Yeah.

In a pickup game like this, if it's a friendly game and you're going you know full-on lockdown defense it's kind of fucking annoying um but if this was intense if the other thing that i think saves you here though is if you had a teammate that was like hey switch on to this guy he's lighting us up then these guys are kind of taking it seriously so yeah don't pick up people fucking full court and pick up games okay um definitely don't slap the court but uh you should be able to figure this one out. And I look, I get it as much as anybody not being able to turn it off, being too competitive, all that kind of stuff. All right. I get it.

But if it's a casual game and it's their game, right? This isn't your game. This is their game. And nobody knows you. And you're trying to be prime Gary Payton. It's probably going to annoy some people. But the fact they asked you to switch maybe may save you here a little bit. So Rudy, I know like the ESPN games like this.

We had some guys that just were ridiculous, right? Well, this makes me want to rank at a feature episode like the top five worst guys in pickup hoops because i think the guy who's good and who's like you know probably better than everyone else bringing the ball up doing most of the scoring shooting a bunch of threes when that guy gets annoyed when somebody plays good defense on him because they think like that they're overstepping their bounds like that i actually hate that guy and i used to have there's this guy at the y that we used to play with who didn't play like anywhere big he was like a decent high school player but he would get mad when guys would like actually try to DM up

and yeah sure like other dudes weren't playing as hard defense on like the random guys that were this guy but there's a point because you're the best player on the court so I actually think this guy's probably fine you know just because the one guy who was you know kind of lighting everybody up got mad doesn't mean that you were out of bounds by playing good defense and the guy telling you to switch over to that guy

is your perfect indication for why that's true so you know I again don't like go chase down block and knock some guy to the floor and start like you know like slapping the floor and all the stuff that you said but it's okay to play good defense on a guy that's that's lighting you up on offense so I don't think that's a problem at all the ESPN

stuff I remember there was a guy I'll never I'll never forget this showed up full duane way jersey like jersey shorts wanted to bring the ball up and he was exactly this guy he got mad because like people were like actually trying to defend him and that's just the he i know it's not the worst guy to pick up hoops but in my head i just cannot stand that dude right but the guy you're talking about too was maybe one of the single most disliked you know what i'm talking about yeah i know exactly who you're talking about.

Full Dwayne Wade jersey. You know if a guy shows up wearing a jersey as a grown-ass man, not even just the jersey, but the shorts too, that he sucks. I don't know him at all. I didn't know him personally. I heard he was a decent player. I know everything I need to know about him just by looking at him. I thought he was a decent player though. He was okay. He was fine. He was fine. He was shorter, but yeah.

I don't think he played anywhere. There's a weird basketball thing where if you're really good, you try to show how good you are by not trying, and you're like, hey, I'm not going to take this seriously. I remember some of the guys from the UVM team came to play at our house because at that point, we were just friends with everybody. I mean, it was kind of the cool thing about Vermont. You're around.

Everybody got through their younger alpha shit. And believe it or not, most of us all really liked each other towards the end. I mean, there's a couple guys that weren't going to like me. But a bunch of the guys from the team came down. And I mean, look, it was a reminder how different it was from being pretty good in pickup games and then D1 guys with their size playing with you. But I remember being super annoyed with one of the guys and he was big he was a lot bigger than me and he was really good player and he he wasn't like taking it seriously he's sort of fucking around a little bit and i

was like i want to see how how big the gap is and i just remember being like are you gonna play are you gonna just pretend that this is so beneath you that when you fuck up or if i score like it it doesn't mean anything like this is more insulting than saying you won't play with us yeah and luckily we you know it wasn't like an argument or a fight about it but i was like if we're playing then let's play but you guys came here to hang out so we're playing or not playing like this this bullshit like i'm above this thing and that's always been part of the basketball deal that's a big basketball that's that's like the brawn not entering the dunk contest right because he has nothing but everything to lose essentially

right this guy he's the best player in the court like yeah he could play hard against you but if you get him everyone's gonna be like oh riscilla got that guy and there's no win there for him so i get it it is a shitty move but i do get it. When I used to have to check Donnie Marshall in our pickup games when I was in Connecticut and the reason we did Celtics games together, we became friends and he's 6'6

and he's athletic as shit and he can run like crazy and he barely scored in the NBA and then he plays in this pickup game with us when he's 10 years removed from even playing and he can do anything he want yeah do you know how you know how hard i fucking tried against him i mean i but he was like no i'm good he's like i want to get a workout he's like you try as hard as you want you're not nothing is going to work out for you but i go ahead he's like i want you to play this hard because at least somebody's you know he's because he would just be like hey rossillo you got me he's like just try you know just try because he's like, I want you to play this hard because at least somebody's, you know, he's because he would just be like, hey, so you got me.

He's like, just try, you know, just try. Because he's like, I know you're dumb enough to pretend you think you're going to stop me where other guys aren't going to bother. So I think when it's not your game and I get not turning it off. I know I've repeated this, but when it's not your game game you got especially trying to meet new people man yeah that's like you gotta you gotta figure out a way you know sometimes you could do something where you say to yourself i'm gonna try to do these different things in a pickup game although i say that to myself sometimes i suck now by the way god i'm fucking awful um i i'll be like hey you know what i'm gonna do this i'm gonna little of this today. And then two seconds into the game, it's like,

yeah, that's not happening. So whatever. But if you're joining a random game with people you don't know, the number one thing you can do, especially, I mean, at least on your own team, to win everybody over and have them like you is just to play good defense. So I think this guy

actually, and so you pissed off the other team. Who cares? Your own team was pumped about about it and clearly they cared about the game so the best thing you can do at a random pickup game that you don't that you don't know anyone at is to try hard and play good defense and don't want the ball a ton i agree did so i'm on this guy's side defense is all i have on a basketball court that's all i have that's all it's all i'll get i'll get rattled as i go for a layup I'll miss the I'll miss the three every time but god damn it I will try to stay in front of you I don't know I I feel like we're figuring something out I hate to do this to my guy roots but it sounds like roots is

kind of a a thigh ball type out there where you're trying to bring the end of the game I at the why because listen I was I when I never played in high school um I thought I was pretty good, but I was always sure I could handle like a shoot a little bit. But I was always sure I wasn't like super athletic. But at the Y, like, you know, I thought I was pretty good. But like, yeah, like part of my thing was like I played hard, man, like we would play hard. And like, what are we doing here? Like, why would we come here to get a run in if we're not going to actually try hard? And I wasn't the guy who's bringing the ball up, shoot a ton of threes and take it to the hoop like I can in certain situations.

But like, I'm going to play good defense on you. was guys the why they used to get pissed at me about it but they were like they were dudes that you don't even want to hang out with so I kind of knew that I was in the right anyway and they were just mad because I was playing good defense on them and I wasn't giving them open threes I love that by the way I don't know I got all right but some games are different there there are games not the why these are these are games the why we're guys there to play competitively the southington why yeah no yeah those are competitive games yeah i used to play in those before we even met so i would go over and play in that lunch game and that was a competitive game i mean most gyms most gyms that have anybody waiting it has to be competitive because there's a guy waiting for the losing team to go and the winning team's trying to

stay on right any gym you know I'm not like the guy being aggressive at like the 55-year-old guy with two knee braces on. Like, if you're a good athlete and like you're in your 20s or whatever and, you know, in somewhat your prime,

I'm going to play hard. Like, I don't know. What do you want me to do? And I don't think I was, I was like dirty. This wasn't like a, I'm not like a Grayson Allen situation. I was just playing hard.

Tripping. Yeah. Yeah, I played in the Jewish men's league. You did not have to be Jewish to play in it. It was Hartford. And I remember I went up for a rebound and a guy put his hands around my wrist and yanked my arm down as I went up. I mean, he could have fucking dislocated my shoulder.

I don't do that shit. And I turned. I was like, what the fuck do you think you're doing? And the guy's like, we're playing ball, right? And I went, all right. Like, now I'm definitely going to fuck you up at some point when you're not going to see it. You're going to be going up to box me out. The worst guy was the guy that, like, would really chase down hard on a breakaway layup.

Because then you could hurt somebody doing that. That guy sucks. Don't be that guy. But if you're trying to stay in front of a guy, maybe a little hand-shacking, there's nothing wrong with that. Totally. All right, this has gone on long enough. Sorry. Yep.

I have another life advice. We went so long today that I promise I'll make it up to you next week because that pickup one went way longer than I thought it would. And then we also have the Frolic Room scandal, so just a lot of moving parts. So we'll talk to you next week.

Brian Russillo Podcast. Thanks to Kyle and Steve. Ringer, Spotify. Please subscribe. you