The Zach Lowe Show - Beal to L.A., the Spurs' Future, and More With Mo Dakhil, Plus Sean Fennessey Returns for Mets Corner

Episode Date: July 17, 2025

Zach and Mo begin by discussing Bradley Beal joining the Clippers (1:28): L.A.’s new rotation and where this leaves Phoenix. Next, they talk Sixers (24:18), including Paul George’s latest injury news and Joel Embiid’s career retrospective. Then, mini-deep dives on two teams with two very different outlooks: the Spurs (38:27) and Pelicans (51:11). And lastly, it’s the return of Mets Corner with Sean Fennessey, (1:06:53) featuring the All-Star Game, David Wright, and mascots! Host: Zach Lowe Guests: Mo Dakhil and Sean Fennessey Producers: Jesse Aron, Jonathan Frias, and Brian H. Waters Get started today at HubSpot.com/AI Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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You guys know that watching basketball is my thing, obviously, but you know what else is? Collecting basketball memorabilia, and that's why you got to love eBay. It's like a never-ending merch store, vintage basketball cards, old school jerseys, one-off, fan-made artwork. On eBay, you can always find whatever your thing is. From our collectibles and vintage cars to designer fashion, it's all there. Millions of fines each with a story. eBay, things people love. All right, coming up on the Zach Lowe show, we got a loaded show today. There's a lot of stuff happening in NBA. Moa DeKiel, regular guest, former video coordinator from multiple NBA teams, just a guy who knows what's going on in the game is here to talk about

Bradley Beal to the Clippers. Why did the sons buy them out? What are the sons doing? Where are the sons going? We're going to talk about Paul George. Oh, just stuck in a little surgery news. All right. Things continue to go great for the Sixers.

Massive ESPN.com story about Joel M.B. We'll talk about some revelations in there. We'll hit restricted free agency again. I've been in Vegas all week, gathering up little morsels of intel on what's going to happen with Jonathan Camingo. What are the offers out there for Cam Thomas and Josh Giddy? And then we're going to deep dive.

We're continuing our random deep. deep dives into teams that are sort of just interesting whatever we're going to do on one ledger the spurs are they going to be better than people even think are they a potential mega leap team what's their rotation look like and then a team that was so qualified for the w tf team podcast that we just left them aside for their own segment it's pelicans time baby all coming up on the zach low show with mo tequila and then met's corner second edition with sean fantasy All-Star game is done. Second half of the season is starting.

I ask a lot of dumb questions. We talk about Mr. Met and other mascots. It's a great time coming up on the Zach Lowe Show. The Zach Lowe Show, live from Las Vegas, Nevada. I was in seven casinos in one day yesterday. It's time for me to leave, but we have a lot of NBA news to discuss. Motequil, how are you? I'm doing well.

I wasn't in as many casinos as you were yesterday, but I was in a few myself, and I'm ready to go. Seven is a lot. A lot of Ubers. Good times were had by all mischief, some mischief, not too much mischief. The big news yesterday, the Bradley Beal wave and stretch finally happened. Enough was chopped off for the sons to be able to legally wave and stretch Bradley Beale. Now they will have 19 million plus of dead money on their cap for five years, but they get under the tax

saving Matt Ishbia, untold millions, like 100 plus million of dollars just in the next season. And Bradley Beal signs a one plus one with the Los Angeles Clippers. This was expected. I had already talked about it. I'd already projected his role on the team. And the one plus one gives Beal the opportunity to reenter free agency a year from now and recoup the money he is giving back. Obviously, look, they've turned Norm Powell effectively into two players. Bradley Beale, who replaces Norm Powell almost, I mean, different styles of players, but similar in the big picture.

and John Collins, a very new style of player for the Clippers, a guy I can play the four and the five. Not sure how often he'll really be able to play the five. But with Brooke Lopez spacing the floor, he can be a rim runner. James Hardin, I think, was a big part of them getting John Collins. He wanted another rim runner. They got him a rim runner.

Look, man, this is where the Clippers are. They're a very good team. I think they did well this offseason. I don't know how you would project their rotation. They could do a number of different things, but I would just pencil in right now. A Hardin, Dunn, Derek Jones, Jr., Kauai Leonard, Evita Zubots, starting five. Sure, you could start Bradley Beal. You could start John Collins.

You could start both Bradley Beal and John Collins. I just think the Clippers default should be regular season. Let's keep to our defensive identity that we had with Dun and Derek Jones Jr. Let's minimize the amount of time Kauai has to really exert himself as a stopper. And if we get to the playoffs, and again, it proves untenable to play Dunn and Jones Jr. at the same time, we got a lot of different cards to play off the bench. I mean, look, they're going to stagger minutes with all of this. But I mean, their five-man bench unit is now Beal, Bogdan Bogdanovich, whatever he has left to give, Batum, Collins, Lopez. After that, everyone's a question mark. But that's a pretty strong top 10. What do you think of this team? I love it. I think, you know, they, as you said, they did really well. I think that the beauty of it, Zach, when you're talking about like the lineups,

that what they could possibly start is something they haven't had, is they are now going to have the ability to kind of have positional sort of versatility, right? Lineup versatility. They can go big now. They can go small. They can do so many different things in the way that they play. I think it's going to be really important for them.

And that's what I loved about the John Collins pickup. That's what I love about picking up the whole Bradley Beale replacing Norman Powell. I think it puts them in a good position where they get to play around a little bit more and work through a whole bunch of other things. I love what they've done this summer. The only caveat is I go, this is still a relatively old team. They got John Collins. They get a little bit younger, but they're still an old team. There's still going to be some questions.

Look, Norman Powell's not the perfect Powell replacement just because games played, you know, and there's going to be, you know, situations where Powell's going to miss a lot of games. And you're kind of have to sort of pencil. I'm excuse me, not Powell. Beal's going to miss a lot of games. And you kind of have to pencil some of that stuff in and be aware of like, this is something that's going to happen. And you have to understand that. But I think they're in a good position.

And I would almost say I'd start John Collins and put Kauai at the three. Like this is going to probably be something you want to do in the playoffs. I think you might as well try to get as many reps as possible as you can across the board with those guys. I'd bring Beal off the bench. I think having that firepower off the bench is a nice little boost for them. And I think that's the way I would kind of look at it if I were the clippers. That would be, that's the lineup. I wrote lineups, you know, kind of coming into this, preparing for the show.

And that's what I had. I think they should start Collins at the four, go with Zubotch at the five, and then just kind of play it out from there. And look, like I got into some playful arguments with our boss here, Bill Simmons, about John Collins. He does not share my John Collins optimism. him. I get it. He has sometimes been a spacey player on defense. Shooting has been up and down. I, too, feel when the floor is in motion and he has the ball, a little shaky. I get it. I just think

he's good. I think he's a good player. I think the three-point shooting is pretty real and pretty stable for him. He shot up very well in Utah last year. The rim running is, it's like, that's, you know, that's just plug and play for James Harden. That's easy. He's going to to get dunks rolling to the rim. He's become better defensively with a little versatility. Like, I'm not sure how much I trust him at the highest-sized, highest levels, but he's becoming okay to decent defender who could switch and do some things on the perimeter. So I wouldn't mind starting him.

And I think that fit is going to work. And I still go back to like, look, everybody laughs at the Hawks conference finals run from 2021 to sort of fake and whatever. One thing that wasn't fake in that run was John Collins accessed a level of grit and toughness that he had not shown previously in his career where he seemed most interested in like high flying highlights, scoring and all that. He defended pretty well, dug in on the glass got rebounds, cut for baskets. Like, did the dirty work stuff that if he can reaccess that part of his game, I think he fits really well for the clippers. And Beale, look, the Phoenix thing was a

disaster. Yeah. His effort level and just general sort of, there was just something like saggy and eh about how he looked in Phoenix. And that's all got to perk up now. Like all the bad feelings left behind. All the like, I am who I am in this league. I'm a starter. I'm a 25 plus point of game score. That's over.

You got to whatever role you get, and I agree with you, I would bring him off the bench. And I bet that's what they're planning to do. And I bet they've discussed this with Bradley Beal already. And he's making a salary now that is fitting of a bench player. Like, whatever the role is, you just. got to do it really hard. Like I, when he went to the Sons, I was like, one of the things I like about his fit there was in his last year with the Wizards, he set more ball screens that year than he had set like his entire career. Lean into that a little bit. If they're going to put

the smallest defender on you, be a screener, get switches, get mismatches. Dig in a little bit on defense. Like, dig the freak in on defense. And I think he will. And I like, he's still, I keep saying this like he's not like a chump he averaged 17 points a game last year on almost 50 40 90 shooting he's going to really norm powell had some amstring stuff at the end of last season did not play well in the playoffs i think this is going to be of a smooth fit for bradley beale i think this is a these are really good moves for the clippers yeah and i think when you look at the beale situation in phoenix i think one of the problems in phoenix was that they wanted him to kind of be a point card. And that's simply not how you want to play Bradley Beal. Like I don't think, yes, he can play

make, he could do all that stuff, but that wasn't his game. Like, that's not, you know, what I say, like, you need a point card. That's not who I go running to in terms of Bradley Beal. It's the guy that can kind of do it from time to time. And I think that whole situation sort of soured everybody. And he, you know, they almost felt it coming. And as he said, sagging, sagging is a good way of kind of describing it where it never felt like everybody was kind of fully committed to the plan and And the end of that series against Minnesota where they got waxed in a sweep and Bradley Beale just sort of like committed like three or four horrible turnovers in the last game. It was like it was almost like they quit in that series and just and then quit on the whole concept of their team going forward. Right.

And I think that's sort of the problems that you have. I think now, look, this is a situation and this is a more important thing. Bradley Beal picked the situation. He had other suitors out there. there are teams that would have been interested in signing him to the similar deal. The Bucks for sure. Absolutely. And this is a situation where you pick this.

You know now, like you have to commit now to being the guy they need you to be. This isn't about you. This isn't, you know, your ego or anything like that. And I think that's the thing. The numbers is the thing that everybody's kind of forgetting about. Being almost a 50, 40, 90 shooter, you know, is like that's who Bradley Beal is. Like that's somebody that you can expect to come in and drop in, you know, regularly around 15 points a night, 18 points. You know, there's going to be nights where he's going to erupt and have 30, you know, and I think that's something that's going to really help the Clippers across the world.

Like, I'm excited for this pickup for them. I think this is something that really is going to be an interesting sort of move for them. But he has to commit. And like you said, this is the other thing, too. He wants to have a bigger contract next year. It's a one plus one. He wants to opt out next year. You got to prove it, man.

you've got to prove that you're the guy and that that Phoenix situation was more of an aberration. And I think that's got to be the thing that he's looking forward to coming into this season. All of this said, all of this said, it's all very nice for the Clippers. And they're set up, by the way, sneakily well set up for the future now. Even next summer, they could get max cap space because of the Hardin contract was a really interesting compromise where he gets a player option for 46 million. and that's his option, but it's guaranteed for only 13 million so the Clippers can get out of it if they see an opportunity. They're starting to get out of draft pick hell, although they owe Philly a couple draft assets from the Hardin Trade.

And then after that, after Kauai's deal expires, they're free and clear to do whatever they want. All this said, I don't think, I just, Oklahoma City is obviously better than they are. I think Denver is better than them. I think Houston's better than them. Minnesota has a higher floor than they do simply because of youth, health, and availability. And already then you're down to fifth in the West. Do I trust Kaua to stay healthy for an entire season? Absolutely not.

And you're just hoping that the missed games, that he's ready for the playoffs and can stay healthy in the playoffs, which has been rare as a clipper. Hardin, do I trust Hardin in a big game? I do not. And I don't see how anybody really could. I worry a little bit about what their defense looks like. If you take out one or both of Dunn and Jones, do they have enough? Does Batum, who's as heady a player as there is in the league, have enough?

Does John Collins level up on that end enough to be as versatile as they need him to be to not overburden Kauai? I think this is a really good team. I think they could do damage in the playoffs. They almost beat Denver in the first round. You could argue they should have beaten Denver in the first round. I think they lost any claim of should have. with the way they shit the bed in game seven. But, you know, there was the Aaron Gordon, Duncan, all that.

It's a good team. I just, those teams above them are just so good and have less injury risk, less age risk. Like, I think it's a good team. I just, I have a hard time seeing it in the finals or maybe the conference finals. I don't, I don't know. Yeah, that's the hard part with it. And that's, again, that's sort of the problem for a lot of teams in the West, right?

Like that's just how good the top of the West is going to be next year, you know, assuming everything goes according to plan for all of those teams. I think that's the challenge for the Clippers, you know, with what you're looking at. Like I don't expect Kauai to play a full season. You know, you can pencil him in for like 60 something games, you know, and a lot of that's going to be just kind of load management and keeping him fresh and things like that. And I think they're in a situation where I would say they just, they have a chance, right? Like there's there's the situation where like things can align up properly.

That's true. Like another team takes an injury. That's instead of the clippers taking injury, another team takes an injury. Yeah. And you know, you could kind of see how this sort of plays out where the and we're projecting way for it. But like playoff matchups kind of, you know, the way the seating sets up, it's like, oh, we don't have to play.

You know, we don't have to go through an Oklahoma City Denver thing to get to the finals. you know, it could kind of match up in a way where in the right situation, they'll be primed to where they want to go next. You know, despite losing, you know, in the first round last year, enforcing game seven and like you said, shitting the bed in game seven, they showed a lot of stuff in that series where you're like, okay, cool. And I trust Ty Lou is one of the best coaches in the NBA. I think Jeff Van Gundy has done a phenomenal job with their defense, you know,

as an assistant there and putting it all together. Like, I kind of just want to see what they're going to cook up. now going in the next season because like I know those guys are in the lab already. You know, we, we know Jeff's already on it. He's already kind of focused on what he's going to do and he's going to push these guys. And Ty's not going to let some of these guys sort of just skate in that situation. And hey, if John Collins isn't going to bring it defensively, they'll throw Batum in there. You know, I'm not against even from time.

If they want to go double big with Zhu and Lopez, I think that's going to work. You know, I think we're going to see a lot of interesting things from them. Interesting. Go Houston, Houston style. Yeah, just, you know, like with Lopez's ability to shoot the three ball, it kind of opens things up there. I think there's a lot of stuff that they can kind of cook up. I think there's a lot of different things they could do. And I think that for me, that's my favorite thing with the team is having multiple versions of yourself.

And I think that's something that I think I hope they experiment with a lot during the regular season. And I think, you know, we'll see how it lines up in the playoffs. But they put themselves in a position to have a chance. And I think that's the most important thing. Yeah, and we didn't, you know, I think, I mentioned those four teams. I think wolves is an argument, you know, are they as good as the wolves? I just think the wolves are a safer bet to win 50 games or 49. They have 49.

They only went 49 last year. And then you have Lakers and Warriors. I would probably think the clippers are maybe a hair better than those teams, but they're all kind of in the same bucket to me. On the other side of this, the Phoenix Suns, they save a lot of money, wonderful. they're now under the tax and set to be under one or both aprons next year, maybe unlocking a little bit more sort of team building flexibility. I believe they can unfreeze a frozen pick. And there were a lot of jokes running through the Vegas casinos and dinners and meetings

I had last night about like, I think they should want their pick to be frozen. They shouldn't trade any more picks. Don't trade any more picks. Keep it frozen. Keep it on ice. I just look at this team and I'm like, I don't know. I mean, I don't know. Like, I don't know what the, you know, Beal's gone.

I think they did about as well as they could for Durant by getting Booker. I'm not Booker. Booker. Jalen Green, Brooks. I meant Brooks, not Marshawn Brooks either, Dylan Brooks. And the pick that became Malawatch, I think that's about as good as they were going to do for KD. And you look at the team, and I, just for fun, I projected out a rotation for them. I started in my fake rotation.

I just went with Booker, Green, because I think they're just going to give him a shot to see, I don't think they're going to bring him off the bench. They're going to see what he can be as sort of a co-point guard. I don't know. Still, there's no point guard on this team. Those two Brooks. I put Ryan Dunn in the starting five because why not. And then Mark Williams.

And then off the bench, I can stagger Jalen Green so I can let him run the show. I got Grace and Allen, Royce O'Neill. Iigado kind of has to play the four now. And then Malawatch, Richier Fleming, could get in there. Both the Clippers and the sons have been rumored. Chris

Paul teams, we should have mentioned that, but the Clippers is like another guy. I mean, I look at that and I'm like, I mean, I don't know what is like, what is that? I mean, if, if Sacramento is worse than expected, if Dallas is worse and expected and Karee can't come back, if Portland is worse than expected, if the spurs are worse than expected, if the Warriors and the Lakers take injuries, if the Grizzlies are worse than it, but I just, I don't look at that. I mean, that is like, I don't see playoffs for that roster we just started. I have no idea how they're building a coherent defense out of it.

I don't know where they're going. And those, like, Grace and Allen and Royce O'Neill, those contracts run three years. They have player options for 27, 28, which is complicating, Mo. Phoenix has dabbled. They've dabbled. They've had discussions about Jonathan Kaminga. They are the latest team to sort of like, hey, if he's available for whatever. And they just, what are they trading for him that interests the Warriors, I think, is what they run into?

The Warriors don't want those types of contracts for Cominga. I don't know that those guys moved to needle, but they have registered interests. I just don't know what the money would be for Camiga and how they would even do it before you even get into base year compensation. I don't know. I mean, Sun's okay job digging out of the grave of that fake big three that they built. But Booker signs the extension. I already talked about that. I understand he's a legacy player.

You got to reward legacy players. He's not going to be like ancient. He's going to be 31, 32, 33, when those years kick in. I don't know, man. It's, it's, there's interesting stuff here. I just don't know where it's going and they don't control any of their picks until 2032. I mean, it's kind of bleak in that sense when you talk about like they don't own any of their picks till 2032, right? And like, that's what they're trying to unfreeze so that they can probably move picks down the road.

And I think that's kind of the, you know, when you look at it going like, I just don't know what the plan is. Like nothing frustrates me more than not fully understanding or seeing the vision that the. teams have. And this one just seems like one of those other teams that are somewhat rudderless. And it's kind of like, cool, we have Booker. We have our star. Awesome. We have absolutely no way to build around him. And you're right. Like the KD trade, that was the best they could do. I don't actually think like, that was actually even almost better than I thought they could have done. And I think that was, you know, a win for them in a large degree. The thing for me with the B.O. Wave and stretch and now it's $20 million dollars on your books for the next five years. And I know when

the cap goes up. It's a percentage, you know, it doesn't hurt as much. But $20 million can get you a player. It hurts, man. It just hurts. It's a 20 million dollar player that's never going to play, right? It's, you know, whatever, I forget what the annual salary is for, for Booker over the five years, but add 20 million to it each year because that's basically what it is because it's an empty vessel at this point. Like, it's never going to be able to get used. At least when Milwaukee did it, and there's always these comparisons, you saw Milwaukee go, like, we have. to do this so we can get Miles Turner, whatever anybody thinks of the signings and all that stuff, but at least it turned into a player, you know, in that degree. This isn't turning into a player.

This is turning into tax relief for an owner, you know, and eventually, you know, all the stuff that it releases in sort of what the CBA does crushing you when you're in these repeater tax, second apron for so long and all that stuff. But none of that helps them, not this year. It doesn't really help them next year. Like I don't see a situation where I look at that going, like, cool, they had to do this because, you know, two years from now they could be a team. Like, I just don't know where they're at. And then having watched, Mallow Watch here in Vegas, like, you know, I, he's, he's raw. Like, it's not like, like, like I like him.

I like the pick. You had to pick him at 10. I think he was, he's an interesting prospect, but he's raw. Like, it's going to take a while for that to develop. So unless that hits the accelerator on the development curve, like, that's going to be a while before you see a lot of fruit from that. So now there's a lot of stuff you're looking at. This team just has so many pieces that I also don't know how they fit together

and how they work together. Like I just have a lot of just questions with them. And I feel bad for Phoenix. I like Mark Williams too. I like I don't mind him at all. I like to bet on him. And they do have a pick coming in 2027, but it's a bad pick. It's the worst of Cleveland, Minnesota, Utah.

which they got in exchange for they traded their 2031 first run pick to Utah for unprotected for a bunch of little picks that they have used most of. Yeah, I like, I like Mark Williams, Moloatch will see. Dunn, Egadoro, like are either of those guys starters? I don't know. Dun maybe has a little bit of a chance. Obviously started last year, but I mean like starter, starter on a good team. Jalen Green, you know, I think they actually are going to see like everyone assumed,

including me that they would trade him post their first. ranch trade. I think they're going to give him a shot to see what he is and how he fits with Booker. All right. We'll see. Enough sons. I'll do a deep dive on them another day. By the way, I mentioned Kaminga. These four restricted free agents. Giddy, Camt Thomas, Kaminga, Grimes. I mean, they're just stuck. Like, I don't, I don't, there is not much movement. I don't think I've been talking to everyone in Vegas about it on any of their situations. If you ask me to ballpark, like, what those deals are going to look like. I would say giddy four years.

I mean, this is just me, like, just throwing ideas out into the wind. I'll say giddy, like, four years, 90. And I'll tell you that Patrick Williams contract, which is five years, 90. I'll say, then I'll say giddy like four years, 95. 90 and a dollar. Like, he's not taking, he shouldn't take a dollar less than 90. Right. I don't think he's getting like the 30 million.

dollar thing that he wanted. I think it'll be, let's say, four years a hundred would be an even 25. I'll take a slight under on that. Cam Thomas, I'm going to say two years 24, maybe a player option on it. Just a blind guess. Comming got no clue. Grimes, I'll say two plus one at 17 a year or something like that. But there's, they're just like, these things are stuck. Other news item, Paul George apparently had surgery and we'll be ready for training camp. It's going awesome for the Sixers, who I talked about on Monday's show and did a whole projection for them in which I forgot to mention Justin Edwards, who I like and Jabari Walker, who I really like among their bench sort of question marks.

But man, oh man, the hits just keep on coming. You know, I did their starting five on that podcast. I think Edgecombe may actually have a better chance to start. and I had thought when I did that podcast over over I had penciled in Kelly Ubrey. McCain, I think will come off the bench if Grimes is re-signed, but they'll play all those guards together. They'll play PG at the four some, maybe a lot. They don't really have a four unless you really love Jabari Walker,

and I do, but maybe not that much. I like Watford. They've got some good backup, interesting backup fours. I love Watford, like way more than anybody should. He's just a fun player. I like watch you and play basketball. I don't know, man. And like, I know the East stinks, but Cleveland doesn't stink.

New York doesn't stink. Orlando doesn't stink. The Hawks don't stink. The Celtics will be competitive. The Bucks will be competitive. Like, I just, I don't know. And I don't know, man. I just don't see.

I already said it. Like, I just don't see. You can, we can sit here and hope for the miracles. Miracles are called miracles because they almost never happen. And I just don't, I just don't see where this team. I just feel like they're just in a holding pattern until the MB'd Paul George contract cycle out. Yeah, and that's a, that's a brutal place to be in that situation. Just a quick side note here at Summer League during one of the Hawks Summer League games,

somebody was cacaoing. And I almost was like, is Zach here? Like, it was, there was a moment there where somebody was going nuts. The cacall movement is going strong. The hawks are coming. They're excited. They got porzingis. They fleece the pelicans.

It's all happening for the Hawks. It's all good. But going back to Philly, which, you know, it's so frustrating to kind of just figure out by accident. They're almost a two-timeline team in a weird kind of way, right? With the injuries, with Paul George, with Embed, it's kind of like, and you've said this a bunch. And with the front office nailing a low first round pick for Maxie, a low first round pick for McCain, and stealing Grimes and a second round. pick from the Mavericks. Like, those are A plus level transactions. Like, they nailed it. Like, honestly, like, if you just, if you took away injury stuff, we would be talking about,

you know, like, this is amazing the way the front office has kind of put this whole team together. But when we look at the reality of it with the injuries, with Paul George, Paul George having another surgery, you know, the situation within B's health, like it's, it is kind of a two-timeline team. How much time do you devote to developing these younger guys? and making sure, you know, do we focus, and you've said this a bunch, like, it has to be Tyrese Maxie's timeline more than Joel Embed's. And, you know, how much do you kind of focus on all of that stuff? But at the same time, you have so much money and time and invested in Embed, like it's a difficult situation to be in and to thread that kind of needle. It's, they have talent on their roster, but we just don't know what we're going to get from Embedd. Are we going to get, you know, 30 games? Are we going to get 60 games? Like, we just don't know.

anything more than 65, I'd be shocked, you know, and I just think you have to kind of put him on that Kauai trajectory of load management-wise and sort of handling everything. And I just feel like they're in such a difficult position. I love McCain. You know, I loved watching. He was unbelievable. And then he tears his meniscus. You know, Maxie, you know, gets injured during the season and misses a bunch of time. You know, that allows Grimes. You know, he steps up in March, you know, how real is the Grimes thing, you know, and also how much of that? is a product of no Paul George, no Embed, you know, we needed him to kind of go out there. Like, what is he when he's going to be the fourth option? How does he handle that? How does he move

into that sort of area? You know, it's going to be a very difficult team to kind of manage. And I think it's a real difficult one for Nick Nurse to kind of coach because there's so many different things moving parts that like everybody kind of has a different deal in situation. How do you mold that into one thing where it's a cohesive force moving forward? forward. Paul George is 35 years old. You can say that these are cleanups, minor surgeries. He's had some shoulder stuff. Like none of it is super like connected across the same kinetic chain all the time. But knees are knees. Age is age. And the more of these things that befall him, the more likely it becomes that he's just never going to be an all-star caliber

player again. I'm not going to close the door on that completely because he was so good in his last couple years for the Clippers. But the timeline is what it is for him. And as far as Embed goes, ESPN wrote an incredible story about Embed yesterday. A reporter whose name I'm blanking on right now spent clearly a lot of time with Embed. It's the best window into his mindset that I can ever remember reading and how just he's dealt with a lot. He's dealt with a lot of issues mentally, physically dating to the start of his career where he could not play because of injury and what that did to him. And he finally kind of goes on record in this story about not always taking his rehab seriously,

ghosting the team. The relationship with the team in like 2015, 2016 is described in the story as, quote, toxic. And part of it was, I encourage people to read the story, but he talks about how he knew his foot wasn't healing correctly and he didn't think the team was listening to him. and how that changed his relationship with some of the people on the team. And most sort of pressingly, Mo, the stuff about the Knicks series two years ago where they lose in six games, and he was a ghost in the fourth quarter, didn't want the ball.

I talked a lot about it. We all knew he was coming back from injury, did not know he had Bell's palsy until the end of that series. But he talks about how injured he was in that series. Batum talks about looking at his knee on the record. Batum's on the record. I look at Joel Zina. I'm like, I don't know if this guy should be playing. And he played through it anyway.

And it's kind of alarming how injured he was and astonishing how well he could score while being so injured. And I just have reached a point with Embed where I just, everything I read about him is just making me sad because the player he became after he even won the MVP was the player that was that averaged more than a point a minute that put up 70 against the spurs, had regular 50. point games where it's like there's just no answer there's nothing he can't do he's explosive with finesse and touch and just again majestic majestic and it just seems now utterly implausible

that he will ever be able i mean again they've never even got to the conference finals right to get to the finals you're talking 20 something playoff games absolute highest level of competition highest level of intensity. Every other day, once you get past the first round, extended minutes for the best players, if they can do it. It just seems now to the point of total implausibility to me that Joel M. B., no matter what happens in the entire regular season, we'll be able to get through a run like that healthy.

And I just, I hope it happens. I love M. Bid. He's come on this podcast twice. He's absolutely unbelievable to watch. And if that is, if that proves correct, that that that. that's not a plausible thing. It's just a holding pattern. I don't know how else to put it.

And the second timeline is set up pretty well, and that's great. I just, you know, I don't know. It's brutal. And it's an unbelievable story. Yeah, I encourage everyone to go on ESPN and read that story. It was a really, it's long. You're going to have to set aside 45 minutes for it, half an hour.

It's an incredible window into his mentality and what he's been through. Right. and I'm going to butcher the author's name. I just looked it up while we were talking. It was Doten at Kinyoi. I'm sorry if I, if I've butchered your name. I apologize, but it was unbelievable. In-depth detail of just the amount of trust issues

that Embed sort of has had. And some of these cases rightfully so, right? Like he's telling the Sixers staff, my foot's not right, my foot's not right. And then, you know, them just thinking he's wrong. and then for it to come out, you know, that it's like, oh, you know, no, he has to have another surgery and miss a second year. I think that sort of created this situation for him to have a lack of trust, you know,

across the board. And he's very, he's almost very suspicious of new people. He's very, you know, not trusting. It keeps a tight circle. There's an anecdote in the story that I absolutely was jaw-dropping to me where he talks about leaving cash exposed in his apartment as people are coming in and out because there's, you know, there's staff members coming in, Sixers people, chefs, therapists, massage therapists, you know, all that kind of stuff, physical therapist.

And he's doing it by his own admission to see if any of the cash goes missing so that he knows who is not trustworthy in his life. I mean, that is like, that's some fucked up shit, man. Like that is high level. Like, just gotcha moments, you know, and sort of just trying to keep an eye on it. And him just saying, like, I don't necessarily confront the people. I just know that I can't trust them. And that's sort of, you know, the whole kind of imbid run is this is a matter of trying

to earn his trust. And it's not just, I think, when you earn his trust, you have to keep earning it across the way. Like there's almost, it seems, and this is something I'm taking from the story. and maybe I'm wrong, but it almost seems like you're one misstep with him and you're almost immediately out of the circle and there's no real wiggle room or gray area. Maybe that's the way it's supposed to be in that situation. But he's, there's a level of frustration for him in that ability of just feeling like alone and can't trust anybody. And at the same time, you know,

everybody kind of questioning his, uh, injuries constantly. I mean, I don't think people just fully understand, like, he had Bell's palsy and was playing NBA games. Like, not being able to move your face, close your, your, your, your, your eyelid is a weird thing. You know, I had a friend that went through it. And it's, it's insane. You can't sleep. It's a very awkward situation with all that.

And I think you're just doing that. Forget all the other stuff. But the amount of facial injuries he's had, like freak eight injuries, right? Getting an elbow in the face and, you know, a broken orbital. bone, you know, the Toronto series. I know it happened once before where I think he ran into Ben Simmons's shoulder and cracked it.

Like five facial injuries through his career, not just in the NBA, but across his whole playing career. Like these are the, like weird things happen to him to a degree. You know, and, and Zach, I was crushed with the story of the dog. Yeah, I don't want to give away too many details,

but there's a dog story in there too that will tug at your heartstrings. Go, go, go, go, it. It's worth it. But it was just impressive. The story's impressive. But I think the deal with Embed, it's just like, it's tough, man. And when you talk about the playoff intensity and can he do that for 20 games, we just watched a final series go seven. And that was brutal. We watched the first round series with the nuggets and the clippers. That was brutal. And that's with days off, but both of those teams were exhausted.

Denver OKC, another seven game series that was exhausting. You know, I just think, like, Even like Boston Orlando, the way Orlando just beats the hell out of you on defense. Like it has a five game series and the Celtics felt that one going forward. Like it's just hard. Yeah. It's the physical nature of the playoffs and it ramps up the intensity, all of that stuff, ramps up so much. Like you have to have doubts of can he do it.

There's no way not to. And the unfair part about all this is like we're going to have these doubts until he proves it. That means he has to make it through the season. Get to April. and then prove it in April, May, and possibly June that he could do it. He has to prove us wrong in that sense. Probably unfair to a degree that we don't give the benefit of the doubt, but that's just a way this works.

Look, here's the bottom line. The description of what he played through in the Knicks series, combined with him essentially just not playing last year, like a very middle amount of games, that injury in Golden State in 23, 24, when Kaminga fell on his knee, feels more and more like the one that was the turning point, at least as of today. I hope it U turns back the other way.

But yeah, we'll see on the Sixers. The Paul George thing is like caught everybody in Vegas by surprise because it's like, wait, when did this happen? What happened? This episode is brought to by HubSpot. In the playoffs, extra possessions are everything. Sam goes for growing a business. And HubSpot's customer platform gives you more chances to win.

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I want to start with the Spurs. to review the Spurs, acquired Deer and Foxx's trade deadline for not much, have not extended him yet he's eligible for an extension on August 2nd. St. Luke Cornet is a backup center, traded Malachi Branham and Blake Wesley for Kelly Olinick. We'll see if that matters for either team. Kelly Linick just has not been healthy and available enough the last couple years. He adds an interesting theoretical dimension that can fit next to any of the Spurs big men. but we'll see.

And of course, they drafted Dylan Harper and Carter Bryant in the draft. I would project their starting five this way, Mr. Dekeel. Fox, Castle, reigning rookie of the year, Devin Vassell, I'm going to pencil in Harrison Barnes just for the spacing shooting and Wembe and Yama. That leaves me on the bench. I can obviously stagger. I think they should and will stagger Fox and Wembe, who only played five games together. By the way, we didn't really even get to see it.

But, you know, if you want to do a full five-man bench, you go Harper, Bryant, Keldon Johnson, Jeremy Sohan, who could start in the Harrison Barnspot? Maybe we'll see. And then Cornette, you throw Colin. Olinic can play the five or he can play with either of their fives. I expect to see all those licks. You got Champennies still. Julian Champani is there. I think they'll play some three, I think they'll play minutes with Castle, Harper, and Fox altogether. It's a really interesting team.

A little bit light on three-point shooting in that starting five. They need Vassel to really stay healthy and kind of put more of the people. pieces of his game together. His contract, which is quite a long one. Looms is a very interesting variable for them, as does Kelden Johnson, who's, I believe, an unrestricted free agent after this season. One, just financially, Johnson, Sohan, Vassell, loom is interesting trade pieces going forward for the Spurs, either to get more flexibility or more talent.

I think Vassell is the one they would like to hit the most because they just need an A-plus shooter on their team. I look at that, I zoom out of that rotation. I recall how incredible Wembe is and he's cleared to play. He told the French media this week that he's cleared to play and how quick the ascension could be for him. How little we saw a Fox with Wembenyama. Fox was underwhelming as a spur, but we didn't get to see much of it and then he had

injury issues too. I don't know what they're over under is. I didn't even check. It's too early. I would peg the Spurs as a, don't be surprised if they outperform expectations and there's a bigger leap as a team here than people expect. And they butt into that like Clippers, Warriors, Lakers conversation. I look at this team. I know they got some issues.

I know they're young. I know there's a lot of youth here. That makes me nervous. Like relying on Harper, Bryant, they don't have to rely on those guys a ton if they don't want to. I'm I'm bullish on the spurs outperforming expectations where do you fall no I'm actually in the same place as you are with them I did not rehearse this I had no idea I thought you might say oh Zach you're getting ahead of your skis you're always too optimistic about these young teams youth stinks etc etc no but I think it's an important thing where I think this is them saying we have to take a

a leap here like I think the organization themselves are tired of being a lottery team and are trying to kind of take that step forward with what they have. Obviously, the miracle of them getting the second pick, you know, the draft lottery was, was wild for them. I love Harper, by the way. I don't care that they've got to figure out how these ball dominance, so-so shooting guards all fit. Like, I just give me the talent, the length, the versatility. I just like, I don't know if the three of them will work. I don't know, whatever, but I love that they just made the talent play. And I think the The important aspect of it, too, though, is I think this team's going to be really good defensively, is my feel for it. I feel like Castle's a hawk on defense.

I think you're going to get a, I mean, Wembe, if he's healthy, having that. I love the cornet signing. I was like, cornet's good. And the contract, have you seen the contract? Yeah, it's partially guaranteed with team options on the back. It's crazy good contract. It's essentially a two-year deal fully guaranteed. And then after that, it becomes partials.

And I think that puts them in again, the flexial. flexibility that they've kind of created for themselves in that. But I think, when be a cornet could play together, you know, the, the theory of Olinic, if he's healthy and can be that guy, helps him with, with what they do. Yes, they're light on shooting, but I think they're going to be pretty solid defensively. I know Fox has to be better on the defensive end. We have to see how Harper is defensively with the way he kind of, once he starts getting an NBA games. But I think they're going to be a fun up and down team. And that's, is going to be the more important thing is they have to be a tempo team.

They're going to have to play fast because I think they have the guys to play fast. And playing fast doesn't necessarily mean just scoring a ton in transition, but getting the ball up to court quickly, getting into your sets with 20 seconds left on the clock. Like this is the thing I think teams need to take away from the Indiana Pacers playoff run was them being able to get into their offense quicker, opened up so many opportunities for them on offense, where it allows you to get into two different actions. You know, you run something, you don't get it the first time. You're able to flip the next action and not be so against the shot clock with that.

I think that's going to be a thing there. And I think one thing that everybody's kind of sleeping on, and I haven't heard a lot of people talking about, but Mitch Johnson having a full offseason to be the head coach and figure out a plan, like, listen, the guy was thrown into the fire right off the bat. you know, in November. And then it's kind of like figuring it out on the fly. You know, Brett Brown with them kind of helping him.

Matt Nielsen has a whole staff that I think is solid. And I think it's just having a whole offseason to put out your plan. And people don't understand how important the offseason is for coaching staffs. You know, and you have your whole, you know, you're recharge, but you're also planning and looking at things and kind of exploring things. and having conversations. Then in September, most teams go on, most coaching staffs go on a coaches retreat and literally sit in a conference room somewhere for, you know, a week

and start kind of talking rotations, lineups, what type of stuff we should run, how we should look defensively, and what do we need to do and how do we project guys and things like that. I think these are going to be all the things that are going to help this organization and this team, you know, as they transition, you know, into this. And I think they're going to be a really interesting team. I have them in that Lakers, Golden State, Clippers sort of area.

I could see them being a top 16 in the playoffs and not needing the play in. And like that's their, that's their, their goal should be trying to be that. But I think this is going to be the year where we finally get some postseason wemby. I mean, look, if I'm hanging my hat on three, if I'm a spurs optimist for next season only, Let's look next season in a vacuum. And I'm an optimist, which I obviously am currently. It's July 17th. We'll see, you know, there's still some dust to be settled.

I'm banking on three things. I'm banking on a lot of things, but boil it down to three. Number one, Wenbanyama is absolutely incredible. He's a top 10 player already. I don't even know how fast a development could happen and where he will rank after next season if he stays healthy. It's frightening. Number two, I think Fox is going to be hungry.

I think he wanted to go to San Antonio. I expect him to get a deal done this summer. So he'll feel secure and wanted. No mystery, no nothing. He's heard the noise about how he was maybe not quite as good as they expected when they got him in very limited minutes with Lombayama and all that. I think he's going to be hungry to prove that, you know, clutch play. I don't know if he was ever clutch player of the year, but he was in the running for that all that stuff. I think he was.

And I think number three. they are going to be a hard playing deep team every single game, which has a lot of value in the regular season over 82 games. Youth and effort can go a long way if you have enough talent. And then zooming further out than that, they are just loaded for bear with assets if and when they need to do something. They have extra stuff from Atlanta. They have a swap top one protected with Boston.

We'll see how that comes into play. They have a swap in 2030 with Dallas and or Minnesota. They have a 2031 swap with the freaking Kings. Any draft. And by the way, one of the talks of Vegas, we're going to get to another depressing team in a second is just like, what happened to the Kings? Just a complete disaster across the board. And they have a top, they have an unprotected swap with the Kings that they got for facilitating

the DeMar de Rosen trade from Chicago to Sacramento. And I think they were very smart to sort of moonwalk out of the Durant stuff this summer. I just think they concluded, we're going to be pretty good. I don't know that we're ready to win a title. He's 37 whatever years old, not the guy to cash in the assets. I think if the Janus thing ever happens, I have no idea. Obviously, he was happy with the Miles Turner thing. We'll see.

I think that's one they have a meeting for, even though the Janus Wembee fit. is maybe stylistically imperfect, but it's also just fucking incredible. And then, but they just are, they have cap flexibility. That's why I look at those. I mentioned Sohan Johnson Vassell as,

you know, if all those guys would come back on big contracts, it cramps them a little bit financially. But we'll see what I just, they're set up really, really well. And I think they're going to be good this year. And I just,

let's get a freaking full Wembenyama season. Like, let's, let's see what, let's see what he's got. Because I, my expectations, are impossibly high.

Yeah, and I think, you know, if you can get the full web end yama season, we're talking defensive player of the year type caliber stuff. I think we're talking about seeing stuff. He was, he's so fun to just watch. We're talking, he's on MVP ballots, like he's a top five MVP kind of player. He's so fun to watch in the sense of just every night there's something where it's just like, this dude shouldn't, like this is crazy. Like, you're sitting there in all over and over again.

And I love the point you make, though, about just. they have still so much they can do. Like the beauty of where they're at, and even with the contracts they're kind of given out, where it's only two-year and partials and they're setting themselves up nicely for the future, they can adjust if they need to. They can put themselves in situations

where they can be in any conversation. I'm not a big fan of them, maybe necessarily trading for Janus, but you're right in that every team's going to have a meeting. Zach, you guys at the ringer would have to have a meeting if Janus demands a trade. and figure out if you could trade for Janus. Like there's got to be,

like everybody's going to have a meeting for Janus in that situation and have that conversation of what can we do for that. But I think they are so set up nicely for the future. But I think this year has to be the start of, okay, we got to stop talking about them theoretically, what it looks like. You know,

they have to start getting the postseason experience. They have to start getting that stuff. I was not happy in the first two years of Wembe when everybody was like, They need to be trying to be contenders right now. I think you have to allow this to grow. But I think this is the growing up year. This is the year where there will be a lot of nights where I'm going to be like,

that's a growing up game. And that's a game where that's a grown up. That's growing up wins is what I kind of like to talk about. It. Growth wins are going to be the things I'm watching for for this team next year. And I think they're set up pretty nicely for that. I think this is going to be a really fun spurs year. Knock on wood if everybody could stay healthy.

I think they've threaded the needle really well. Now, obviously, they have gotten an incredible run of lottery luck between when Benyama, Castle, and Harper to thread that needle. And Brian, who we haven't talked about much, they're super excited about him as a contributor. I think they've thread the needle very well. And we'll see where they go from here. If they ever conclude, they need to get a third guy with third all-star guy guy with Fox and Wembe, or if Wemby is just so good, it doesn't matter. Okay, flip side, Moe. A lot of chortling around the league since the draft about the Pelicans and the trade they made to move up and get Derrick Queen at 13 surrendering an unprotected pick that is the best of New Orleans or Milwaukee in 2026 where the top of the draft is supposed to be loaded.

They will end up the Pelicans if I'm reading the draft stuff right and I checked with people with neither of those picks. The Bucks get the second best one of them. A lot of chortling. I do think it's a crazy trade. I've talked about it enough. It was time to actually look at like, all right, what is this team? What's the team on the court? Because they are highly, highly incentivized not to suck in a conference that is so loaded

that it's pretty easy to suck by accident. Are you ready to project the New Orleans Pelicans of 2025, 26? I'm ready to go. I'm ready to go, Zach. And this is the exact opposite of the Spurs in my view. I projected their starting lineup to look like this. Jordan Poole. Again, people have to remember DeJante Murray

tore his Achilles last year and is out for quite a while. It's Achilles, right? Not ACL? Was it ACL? I'm pretty sure it was Achilles. It was Achilles. I'll Google. Jordan Poole, Herb Jones, great contract extension, by the way.

If you're going to laugh at the Pelicans, you've got to give them credit, three years, 60-something player option in year three. It's not ideal, I don't think, but that's a good contract for a very good. good player. Jordan Poole, Herb Jones, Trey Murphy the 3rd, Zion Williamson, Eves Misi, I put as the starting

five. Bench got some guys. Fears, they just drafted. Hawkins hasn't quite been the shooter, shooter that they thought they were going to get, but sometimes looks like at Sidique Bay, they picked up in the pool trade.

Queen, obviously got to play Queen, got to play these rookies. And then Looney they signed. I'm not super sure why, but they did. And McAvich is a backup center. Like, those are all guys. I'm sure we'll see Queen and Zion together at the four and the five. I think the draft trade was so crazy that it immediately shoved the prior transaction with Washington

into the dustbin of history. I still don't really know why Jordan Poole is on their team and why they traded C.J. McCollum for Jordan Poole, who has one more year left on his contract and is, I don't know, maybe not quite as good as C.J. McCollum. I mean, CJ's older. and gets hurt sometimes, but I didn't really get that one. I look at that team. I don't know when Murray will come back, what condition he'll be in.

Obviously, no one ever, Zion, you just have to project, what's an optimistic projection? 50 games, 55 games. Yeah, optimistic. Optimistic, optimistic, a pessimistic projection is 10 games. I love Murphy, I love Jones. Rookies are generally bad in the NBA. rookie guards are especially generally bad in the NBA. Queen is a kind of a more heady polished type of rookie, but rookies are rookies.

I look at this team. Defense obviously is going to be a major question. That starting five is not going to be a good defensive lineup, despite having Herb Jones in it and a Swiss Army knife that he is. It's been an interesting talking point talking about that trade with people all week. Because you will find people who are like, it's not going to. to be as bad as you think. The mathematical likelihood is that the pick they end up giving up is like 11, 12, 13. And people say, remember, Zach, you comped on your podcast to when the King's salary dumped

a bunch of stuff to the Sixers all those years ago to sign Rondo and Bell and Elliott. It was like an absolutely ludicrous transaction. They dumped a swap or a pick or both on the Sixers. And everyone was like, oh, my God. the sky is falling, it ended up being like the 13th pick or something. People comped to the Suns trading Philadelphia, an unprotected Miami Heat pick to draft McHale Bridges or to get McHale Bridges in the draft. And that pick was a golden chip in the NBA at, oh, my God, what a great valuation by the Sixers,

a great bit of math. And I think Zaire Smith was on the other end of that trade. Ended up being, you know, middling first round pick. And I get that. I look at that Pelicans roster. I look at Zion's health history. And I'm like, man, like, yeah, I get how the bucks. I get how you can tell me like the bucks with Janus.

If he doesn't demand a trade and God forbid for the Pelicans that he does. But if he doesn't and he stays healthy, I get that their floor is really high because he's a top three to four player at worst in the NBA. I get it. His teams are going to win games. Let's say that that best case scenario happens for the bucks. That Pelicans team, man. it is not hard for them to end up as the 14th best team of the Western Conference.

Like it is not, there are not a lot of ifs that have to go the wrong way or the unlikely way for them to be just a straight up bad team in a conference where bad teams get the brains beaten out of them every game. And if you're 14th in the West, 13th, if Phoenix is really bad, whatever, I don't know. Only Utah is there on the bottom. Yeah. Like you're walking in I don't know, six best lottery odds that you're given up to the Hawks. And if anything happens to the bucks, the Hawks have this dream scenario of like, we got two shots at the lottery. Like, I just don't see it.

There's exciting players here. And Zion, when he's healthy, has been incredible up and, including that playing game against the Lakers. If I were a Pelicans fan, I would be absolutely terrified at how this season would go. It's a brutal season for the Pelicans. in that sense. Like when you trade that pick, you're under the expectation of like,

hey, we're going to try to win. But this isn't a roster that you look at that can win. Like, I think just by, even if they're fully healthy, like, I don't look at this team going like, okay,

they're going to be fighting for top six. Like, I don't look at them in the same way. I would look at the spurs with where they're set up. They have so many question marks across the board. I'm with you. I did not understand the pool trade.

You know, just the pure fact of paying pool an extra year. On top of it, if I feel like I want to go draft Jeremiah Fears, I would love to have C.J. McCollum to kind of sort of mentor him a little bit over the next, you know, couple seasons while we have C.J. I think that's the thing where I find it difficult. When you have pool, that's going to probably slow down fear's development because he's not going to get as many minutes in that sense. And I liked what I saw from Fears and Queen in the, And everybody, forgive me, it's summer league, so it's always tough.

But I caught a half of the Portland Pelicans game the other night. And I liked what I saw from Queen and Fears. But I also feel like, that ain't enough. That's a summer league game that's really inconsequential. You know, we have to see what it looks like in the NBA and what Zion going to be healthy. I like Misi, but really like when you look at that starting lineup, fully healthy, that's still not cracking a top 10 in the West. And I feel like that's the situation.

They need a cataclysm to happen to the older teams in the West. They just need everything to go wrong for the Warriors. The Lakers aren't. Their best player is not old. But they need a Grizzlies disaster. They just need a lot of stuff. I mean, the Kings are going to probably suffer a disaster, but that that's the Kings. hashtag Kangs.

They're just set up so poorly. And then to give this pick up and it be unprotected, you know, even if it's the 10th pick, even if it's the 11th pick, that's another opportunity for you to get better as a team. You know, and that's something that like you could have used, that pick would have had a whole lot more value almost at the deadline. You know, if you package it. with other things. I think it puts them in a different situation. And I just find themselves like,

again, you're in a situation you can't take because of your pick, but you're not good enough to be a playoff team. Like I look at them and I, this is one of those teams where I just don't understand what they're doing. I'm not, I know Poole had a good season in Washington last year. I know he was good. But I'm not like running around going like, that's a great pickup for them. The Dejante Murray, it was an Achilles tear late January. So at the earliest he's coming back what mid-season and even then that's a long time to get back in that as as like a shot season for him like I just I would always air on you know it's the next season when I when I maybe start to look like you know the old de Jante Murray who didn't really fit well in New Orleans to

begin with yeah and so you're just kind of like the whole team building aspect of the squad I just look at them I just like man like this thing is going nowhere and it's going nowhere quickly and I find themselves in a difficult position. And it's frustrating to watch. We don't know what we're going to get from Zion. Jones and Murphy are my two favorite players to watch on that team. Jose Alvarado coming in at the end because he always does something pesky and annoying. But again, even with Alvarado there, you know, like, is he going to get as many minutes with fears out there?

You can't play the two of them together. That's so small. You know, and it puts you in a difficult position. I just think they're in a very weird setup. and what they're going to be. And then they've then put themselves in a situation where it's going to set them back with this pick. The fact that Atlanta had to keep calling rumored, I guess, the story is going around. I think that may have been slightly exaggerated.

But I do something happened like that. Yeah, but like just the fact that it was, there's, everybody was shocked. It was unprotected. I was waiting when the trade came out going like eventually somebody's going to say, no, no, that picks top five protected or whatever. And the fact that it never came, I was just sitting there going like, what's going on? It's been a fun, an interesting thing that's been, I've talked about with a couple people this week is they really liked fears. I mean, obviously they loved Queen.

Like, the whole league knew that they were after Queen. They also loved fears. And an interesting counterfactual that's been presented to me was what if fears had been taken in the top six? Now, we don't know who among the Kinnip Bull, Trey Johnson, Ace Bailey group falls down in that scenario. But I've had a couple people say to me, like, I think they would have just taken Queen at 7. That's how much they liked them.

And they just thought they had to seize the fears pick. And I'm like, that would have just been better for them than what happened? Taking Queen at 7 and keeping the 23rd pick would have been better than what had happened. But, you know, well, it's just, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, It's hard to wrap your head around. It's just, I mean, and they don't even have a path to, like, cap major cap flexibility or cap room, at least, until the summer of 2028. Unless they have that Zion crazy non-guaranteed contract, unless they basically waive him, which is like not a great scenario. If that's where you are with Zion in a year and two years, you know, his deal kind of guarantees every summer as you go.

as Bobby Marx has reported a lot of. I, you know, and they get, like, Ingram was on the team. And, you know, Ingram is not everyone's cup of tea. Is he, does he aid you in high level winning? I don't know. I've always said about Ingram, when you look at the stats and you watch the games, there's something that's not translating from those stats to winning. And I think a lot of it is defense.

Some of it is playmaking. Some of it is shot selection. But he's still a good player who, by the way, people, I might be over indexing on six playoff games, but he, like, balled out against the sons and his one real shot in the playoffs. I'm not counting the Thunder series where he came back from injury in there wildly overmatched. And they didn't get, like, really anything for him. And I don't know, man.

It is. It is what he is. That Ingram trade, though, was, I think, a loss for both teams. When you look at the extension, the Raptors gave Ingram right after trade. for him too. So I think it's a tough one there. But I just, when I look at them, like, you're right, the Herb Jones extension, A plus. Like, that's a win. That's a win. That's a great extension. I thought that was awesome. But again, everything else after that, it's just disasters. And I don't know what they think they have in this team. Like, I don't know what they're, I would love to be a

fly on the wall of Troy Weaver and Joe Dumars's discussions of what they expect this team to be in it. I'd like to be a talking fly and be like, don't do it. Don't do it. But I just want to know what's it. Like that's the thing because like when I think about them, 14, 13, 13, maybe 12th in the, in the Western conference. Like I don't look at them as competing for a playing spot.

Like I look at Portland differently as a team that's going to should compete for a plane. Portland should be better than New Orleans. No contests. Not even close, right? Like when you talked about, it has to be cataclysmic across several teams to have multiple, you know, disaster seasons for them to even be thinking playing. And again, when you do that, now you're in the situation of like, okay, we're in the lottery. And we've just saw teams jump in the lottery over and over again.

Like you're just putting yourself in this weird position. I'm worried about the future of the Pelicans. By the way, Portland's an episode for another day because they're a really interesting team. Yang has looked good in Vegas. And the more I talk to people, and this is not revisionist history, the more I'm very, very confident. He was going to get taken in the first round somewhere by somebody, whether it was a team that was in the first round or a team that was looking at getting into the first round. But that's an episode for the day. Monte Kiel, what do we got?

We got the double dribble podcast with Jared Dubin, my buddy. you're still on Twitch doing the Twitch stuff. What else can we promote? I have a couple articles up on Bleacher Report. One, the five teams, I think, that improved the most this offseason. And on the flip side, the five teams, I think they got worse in the offseason. So I think there's a, the way you could look at it is, you know, go check those things out, the two articles.

And then I'm coming back, Zach, with a whole bunch of videos. I'm going to be making videos next. season. I've kind of, I've focused a bunch on Twitch, but now we're coming back. We're going to be doing more. I'm going to do more YouTube, TikToks, whatnot. And of course, check out the double dribble podcast with Jared. We're having a lot of fun. Moe de Kiel, I say it every time, former video coordinator for the Spurs and the Clippers. If you want to know what's happening in the game, which you should want to know if you're a basketball fan, Mo is one of the guys you got to follow. Thank you, Mo. Now it is time for everyone's favorite segment. Met's Corner with Sean

fantasy. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Ever get hit with a plan out of nowhere and need something ASAP? Maybe it's an impromptu basketball game, a last minute trip with the crew, spontaneous date. That's when Prime's same day delivery comes in. Get whatever you need. Delivered to you fast so you can say yes to the moment. Same day delivery. It's on Prime. Visit Amazon.com slash Prime to find millions of items delivered fast. Available in select areas. Terms apply. This episode is brought to you by Adobe Firefly, the all-in-one creative studio with AI-powered image and video generation. Built for today's creative process, Firefly helps you generate, edit, and experiment fast. Because the asks aren't getting smaller. And the timelines?

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surface now.com. It's time for segment two of Mets Corner. Sean Fennessee can we steal the Meet the Mets theme song? Would they give us the IP for that? We need something to introduce Mets Corner. I'll sing it right now if you want. Go for it, please. Meet the Mets.

Greet the Mets. Come on down and see the Mets. That's as much singing as you're getting for me for the rest of this segment that was very good. And in fact, it confirmed that I would have gotten some of the lyrics wrong had I even tried. Is it down or?

out. Come on out and see the Mets. Come on down. I don't know. I can't remember. Is there at some point where it goes east, side, west, okay. Okay. So, All-Star break is ongoing ending. Mets are a half game out of the Phillies for first place. Would we qualify this as a successful first 90 games or whatever it is? Yeah, I think given the fact that three-fifths of their rotation was more or less unavailable through a big bulk of the first half and the fact that the offense has been in the bottom five with runners and scoring, because position. Yeah, being half game out of first place with the trade deadline looming. I feel pretty good. How do you feel? So dumb baseball questions, which is the theme of this segment,

three-fifths of the rotation. Who are the three and how big is, are they using a six-man rotation at full at full strength? Who are the three? Mania, Montes, and who else? Well, Mania, Montes and Kodai Senga all missed time. Plus, during that period where they were having incredible starting pitching, Griffin Canning got hurt, Tyler McGill got hurt, Tyler McGill got hurt. Paul Blackburn got hurt. Those three guys I just mentioned seemingly are not coming back this year. Maybe Tyler McGill will, but it doesn't seem like the other guys are going to be back. So when you add up the missed time for literally every single non-David-Peterson and Clayholm

starter, I don't know. It's amazing they survived. I was, I had a lot of questions about the starting rotation before the season even started. The fact that we're here with this rotation and all the injury problems that they've had, things are going great. Do we go six-man rotation? Is that what happens now in baseball? Well, the Mets do the last few years because of Kodai Senga's unusual routine, which they sort of poured it over from Japan because the six man is more common in Japan. The time off is more common in Japan. So in order to get him as right as possible,

they try to have one or two swing starters in their rotation at all times. What they'll do now, they've got, now they've got Senga and Manaya and Montas and Peterson and Holmes all healthy. Who would be the sixth? I don't yet know. I think that might be answered in the next couple weeks. I got to say, having done no research on how many people make the All-Star team, who the other candidates were for the All-Star team, like the exact opposite of how I make my NBA All-Star teams, I was very happy that Peterson made it.

And do you know why I was very happy that Peterson made it, Sean Fennessey? Why? Get off my freaking lawn. You know what he does? He pitches deep into games. He's pitching in the seventh inning sometimes, even the eighth inning. And they took him out one game against the Orioles in the eighth after he allowed one hit and the whole freaking team fell apart.

Ryan Stannick, I understand he's, I guess, a popular met. I guess he's popular. I've had enough. I've had enough. Wow. This has turned into WFAN. What happened? This was the Zach Lowe show.

Get a haircut. Get a haircut and get some people out, Ryan Stannick. No, we're not the Yankees. We don't tell people to cut their hair. Ryan Stannick is unreliable. There's just no other way to put it. He's unreliable. He does throw 99 miles an hour.

And when he strikes a guy out to end an inning and screams to this guy, I do get excited. And I think his show passion is. Watch of that. I'd like to see more of that. He just, it's a coin flip with him. 50% of the time, he's the most electrifying set-up guy in the league. The other 50% of the time, he should be sent straight to the dump. Speaking of F-A-N, have you yet seen Frances's eight-minute rant about the Superman movie? Of course I have. It's been sent to me by roughly 100 people. I grew up, obsessed with Mike and the mad dog. I still love Mike to this day. Can't say I agree with the single thing he said about Superman, but I appreciated that he put the time in to watch it. I was really excited for the Superman movie. I just liked that he wears his old school ideals on his sleeve. Like, I just want Lois Lane to be a damsel in distress.

Okay, like can we just have Superman saving Lois Lane? That's all I want. Stay in the kitchen, Lois Lane. What are you doing? Okay. So successful season, six man rotate. Tell me about Maniah and Montas. What do I need to know about, particularly Manaya, who I just have not seen?

I mean, I know he came out of the bullpen and took a loss, but pitched quite well the other day, three innings. what are my expectations for Shaw Manaya? Well, a big thing happened last year, which is that he was sort of the Clay Holmes of 2024 for the Mets in that there was an expectation of a little bit of a risk. He'd been coming off of a year in which he had served as a reliever for the Giants for the first time in his career. And it was confusing the idea of giving him the guaranteed money that they gave him.

But he about a quarter of the way through the season changed his mechanics and started trying to pitch exactly like Chris Sale, who was now on the Braves, was on the White Sox for many years, one of the best pitchers in the last 15 years in major leagues.

So he changed his arm angle and this sort of three-quarter delivery, this almost sidearm delivery that, that Sale uses. Mania started using last year that led to him being one of the single best pitchers

in the National League in the second half of 2024. One of the big reasons why they went on this magical run is he was so darn great. He seemed to tire at the end of last year a little bit in the playoffs.

The beginning of this year, there were a lot of high hopes. He re-signs a three-year, $75 million-dollar contract. fans were very happy to have him back. He's also a great, kind of very likable character. And then he got an oblique strain and he had missed time all the way up until that three innings that we saw on pitch.

He is, you know, he's a guy in his early 30s who relies on a combination of three or four pitches. He is an unlikely ace or number two, I would say, given his career profile. But when he is on, he is nasty. So I'm really hopeful. Now, the problem is that he and Codai sang. are kind of the same pitcher. They're both kind of like when he is on, he is nasty.

If they're off, it can get a little messy, a little quickly. So I'm relieved to have him back. I like rooting for him. He's a big rally cap guy. He's very like with the team. Yeah, he's really like got a lot of personality. So I'm really happy to see him pitch and see how he slots into this team.

If I were a baseball player, like I would be, I would be that guy on the team. I would be doing like the hot foots from the 86 meds. Like there's just so much downtime. Like if I were a relief pitcher, our bullpen would be a party. Just we would have a lot of rituals. We'd be doing crazy stuff all the time. That's what I love.

The downtime is what makes baseball baseball. Okay, now I'm rooting for him. I'm excited. All-Star. Pete Alonzo hit a home run. You alerted me to this. I did not watch the All-Star game. And Edward Diaz blew a save.

I've already said I trust Edwin Diaz already more than any closer the Mets have had in my life. And I'm glad he got the blown save out of the way. And you told me it was not his fault. I didn't see the highlights. So Edwin Diaz did come into the game in the bottom of the ninth in an All-Star game to close it out. But he came in, I think with runners on, I think maybe the base is loaded or runners on first and second. And he was relieving Ranger Suarez, the very talented Philadelphia Phillies pitcher who is not a reliever. I don't know why Edwin Diaz did not start that inning.

He probably should have. But when he came in, he got an out and then he gave up an infield hit. And the infield hit, which we all know, you know, they're real hits, but they feel kind of bogus. They don't feel like they really are the pitcher's fault. So he gave up an infield hit and that led to a run scoring, which then led to the blown save because he allowed that run to score. But that was the only hit he gave up. That was the only damage

that was done. And that led to a tie game. Now, that's significant because if they had, if he had closed out the game there or if Ranger Suarez had closed out the game, I think Pete Alonzo's probably your All-Star game MVP because he hit a three-run home run. Because Edwin Diaz blew that game, and really, Ranger

Suarez blew that game, we went to a swing off. and they'd never done that before in the Major League Baseball All-Star game. Pete Alonzo was going to participate in the swing-off. However, Kyle Schwaber, who hit in front of him in the swing-off on the Philadelphia Phillies, went three-for-three in that swing-off, thus eliminating the need for Pete to hit it all, which meant that Kyle Schwabber instantaneously became the All-Star MVP, and Pete was left waiting in the batters box.

What is a swing-off? I don't really know. I mean, it's basically like a mini-home run derby to determine. It's sort of like if they did a free throw contest to end the NBA All-Star game, you know, is like, or three-point contest maybe more appropriately. But there was just like live BP and guys got to try to hit home runs. So we've already changed the rules for regular season extra endings where you start with a runner at second. It's just too much work to do that in the All-Star game for the 10th, 11th inning.

We can't even, we can't do that. We got to just have this fake thing. I can't pretend to be an expert in the extra innings history in the MLB All-Star game. But I do understand the idea of not wanting guys to get. hurt. So not wanting to play like a 14 inning game. So, you know, what do you do there? Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you what else grinds my gears here. This, this every team's got to have an All-Star thing. How long have they been doing that? A long time and I hate it. I think it's so stupid. This is how out of touch I am. I, I'm like, I checked out around the time they tried to do the thing where

the winner of the All-Star game gets home field in the World Series. Wasn't that a thing at one point? I think it's a little thing. No way. They kept that. so. I think so. I could be wrong. I think that's still the case. I think the NL will have home field advantage. Okay. So if that's true, people can yell on me online. Yeah, people, maybe our producers can look that up, but like, if that's true, that's crazy. Um, like crazy. And I don't, I don't, no, that's not still correct. Jesse says. Our producer Jesse says that's no longer in the case. Great job major league baseball correcting an obviously dumb thing. When did they change it? They probably changed it nine years ago and I just didn't know. When, so and this, this, every team's got to have an all-star thing is,

has been long in the making. At least five years, maybe even close to 10 years, they've been doing it this way. Now, obviously the reason for it is because the voting bases in smaller markets means that a lot of bigger stars in smaller markets are not going to get voted in necessarily.

You've also obviously got the case where big groupings of the best players are on big market teams, such as the Mets. So for example, this year, Juan Soto did not make the All-Star team. And he's apparently has a large financial, bonus and was uncouth enough to mention that he would like to have gotten his large financial bonus. And this was the thing that people were mad about him mentioning somehow, like the hot takes

were flying, I guess. Yeah. I mean, I think that's a component of the fact that the contract he signed in the offseason was so extraordinarily large and historic that people are like, can you stop talking about money? You have more money than anyone will ever need. However, him being quote unquote snubbed is complete nonsense. I mean, it is ridiculous. He is so obviously one of the best hitters in baseball. and also secondarily, but maybe more importantly, one of the biggest stars in baseball. So the idea of not sending him in favor of, like, Kyle Stowers, who's a good player,

but who is not even having as good of a season as Juan Soto is just to check a box for a player to be there. And he's on what team? Kyle Stowers, I believe, is on the Marlins now, traded in the off season. And the Marlins still do the thing where they try to win like once every five years and then they try to lose the rest of the time

and they stink and nobody goes to the games. That's like still the Marlins, arc. That is still their arc. Correct. Some things don't change. Oh, speaking of Kyle Schwerber, like, the Phillies Mets rivalry was not really a thing

when I was a hardcore Mets fan. The Phillies, I, like, I rooted for the 93 Phillies. Was it 93 when they made the World Series with John Cruck and Lenny Dykstra? Like, I liked the Darren Dalton, all the long hair. Joe Carter year. Yeah. Whatever year that was, I rooted for them. And the Braves were always the big

NL rivalry. Cardinals when I was a kid. Philly's were sort of like, I almost felt like, I kind of like that team right down, right down the highway. Philly's a cool city, like the colors, like the phonetic. Is this not like a blood feud after the playoffs last year? Do we hate each other now? Well, I think it really all changed during the, well, it's correlated to a couple of things. One is that the Jimmy Rollins Chase Sutley era of that team, I think if they weren't blood rivals, they were a more successful team than the Mets in that time because they did go on to win a world series. Jimmy Rallens famously won an MVP that is one of them more contested MVP in National

League history. Statistically speaking, because there were other players who you could say had better years. One of them was David Wright that year, who was a Met. And we'll come up again in this conversation, I'm sure. And the other thing is that Utley has really become like a villain. You know, he've quite infamously injured Ruben Tahada in a significant game some years ago. and is just despised by me and many other Mets fans. So those teams, I think, were the seed of a rivalry that has now been percolating in the last few years

that culminated, I think, in last year's NLDS matchup, where the Mets beat the Phillies, even though the Phillies were the winners of the NL East that season. So, you know, Philly is a tough town. Oh, yeah. And New York is a tough town. and it's ironic for me because literally three of my five closest friends are from Philadelphia. And so we basically did not speak to one another during the Mets Philly series. We didn't talk shit.

Love it. But we literally did not communicate. These are people I see every other day. And that's interesting. But, you know, baseball is important. That was, I assume, CR is one of those people. C.R. is one of those people. That was my life during the Subway series surrounded by Yankee fans.

is like I just I can't especially when the Mets went down to O and it was like the writing was on the wall. And I just like I don't I don't want to hear anything from you. Like give me like a month grace period before you bring this up. I didn't I didn't rub in the NLDS victory into those guys faces for what it's worth. I feel actually quite good about that because I'm not a very good. I'm kind of a sore winner. But in this case I felt a dash of maturity. Now I'm sure I will hear from them from them when they listen to this podcast and say that's not true.

You were a dick. but I tried to be considerate. Now, I do, as an NBA mascot aficionado, I should be more educated about baseball brethren. In fact, one of my, I used to go to a lot of Oakland A's games for reasons I won't get into here. And one of them was Stomper, the Elephant's birthday party. And so there were a lot of mascots there.

So I got to know Lucille, the seal from the San Francisco Giants and some other mascots. But I would venture to say, consensus, Mr. Met and the Philly Fanatic, to the top five mascots in Major League Baseball, or do people hate on Mr. Met? Is he considered corny? I love Mr. Met.

I like that Mrs. Met is now heavily involved. She's a peer. But I don't know the other mascots. Well, Mr. Met was in the news recently. I don't know if you saw this. Oh, boy. It's never good when a mascots in the news. Well, there was a Lumineers concert at City Field.

You familiar with the Lumineers? I am. I know people who attended that concert. They sing a kind of peppy folk music. Not my favorite kind of music. and I think that the lead singer attempted to throw a tambourine to Mr. Met during this concert who was attending because of course it was at City Field

and Mr. Met wiped out in a very public fashion. Okay, it's fine. This was captured on video and he was roundly laughed at in a Lowell Met's fashion. So yeah, I think Mr. Met is like the subject of many a meme which does make him more famous. I think he's an okay mascot. I'm not sure about the, I don't know, the physiognomy, really, how that works when your head is a baseball?

What is he really is something that's never really been answered for me? Is he a baseball-headed human? Is he an anthropomorphized baseball that grew appendages? How does the like relationship with Mrs. Met work? I think there's a lot of unexplored lore in Mr. Met. The fanatic additionally, what's, what is he? What's that? It doesn't matter.

He's amazing. He's a top mascot in all of sports. Okay. He's now has a cut. I guess Gritty is his cousin. I don't know if canon. I don't know if that's canon. Someone told me that they're cousins.

So now I need to really research the mask. I like Mr. Met. I find him charming. I like Mrs. Met. Okay. David Wright. So David Wright's career coincides almost exactly with the era where I just lost touch with the Mets and wrote that piece with Grantland about, you know, the heartbreak of

seeing them in the World Series and not being in it. even what is the year they lose to the Cardinals is that 2005 beltrane strikes out looking or no oh six something around there i watched that game but i was like i don't even know who's on the team anymore i'm aware obviously that david wright is a many-time all-star third baseman filling a position that was kind of infamously a revolving door between howard johnson and david right uh it is david right weekend this weekend at city field i may go to the game on sunday with my family so he's getting his retired and they're celebrating him. You wrote a piece for Grantland about when he re-signed for a massive contract at like age 32 and promptly he had like one all-star year after that and then fell

off the map very quickly as you portended in that piece. What is his place in Met's history? How do we feel about him now all these years later as he's getting, he seems to just be universally beloved? What does he symbolize for the Mets? Like what do you feeling as we hit this weekend? I think for a long stretch of time, he was the embodiment of decency and homegrown greatness, which the Mets from the 90s into the 2000s just did not have a ton of experience with. They were, you know, kind of a laughing stock of a franchise at that time. And then he, along with Jose Reyes, became the embodiment of a very brief but exciting little window of competitiveness in 05, 06, 07, 08. 07 and 08 ended terribly, but he was steadfastly

above average too great through that period of time. Always just seemed like a really decent kind of guy. Kind of represented, I think, what you want from most athletes, sort of like, forthright with the media, always available, always accountable, played really hard. He wasn't like the greatest athlete in the world, and I would say was ultimately an average third baseman, but a very good hitter, you know, a guy with like a career 380 on base percentage. And I think what he ultimately represents is sort of the Mets's Don Mattingly.

Don Mattingly was a great player for the Yankees, not a Hall of Famer, you know, just shy in some ways, in part because he had a bad back. And so he did not get to kind of play through his mid-30s the way that so many Hall of Famers get to and to kind of compile the stats to reach the milestones that necessitate getting into the hall. And D-Ride is like the same guy. You know, he really has this precipitous drop-off where he plays 112 games in 13, 134 games in 14, and then 38 and 37 in the following seasons. And then he's basically done. And so by 34 years old, he's done with baseball. To that point, his counting stats are pretty darn good. He basically hit 250 home runs and had 1,000 RBIs and, you know, he had an 870 OPS. Like, he's on track to be a Hall of Fame third

basement. If he gets to like 400 home runs and 1,500 RBI is pretty easy to see him get there. he never quite got there but I think he was just a very likable guy and obviously like a genuine leader and so I think it's really nice this has been a kind of a signature move of the Cohen era of ownership where they're acknowledging

their past in a way that shows how proud the team is of its players which is something that the will ponds were terrible at but you know Doc Gooden and Darrell Strawberry you know entering the ring of honor last year and now David getting this is all very exciting it is a very relevant thing

to discuss though because we do have our own David Wright on the Mets right now. Pete Alonso is our David Wright right now and he's the same age that Wright was when Wright signed that contract that I wrote about in 12 and what I wrote about was that this is really hard to watch a player that you have seen, I have seen him since he became a professional play baseball and loved watching him play and watched him contribute to teams

that have just not quite gotten over the hump the same way that David Wright's team never quite got over the hump. And now he's going to be a free agent coming off of his best season, much as Wright was coming off of a stretch of seasons where he got that contract. And you look at it and you're like a not super athletic 30, 31 year old who wants a hundred plus million dollar guaranteed contract entering his mid-30s. This seems like a bad idea.

And yet it's basically like was the David Wright contract a good idea is an interesting question because it wasn't so far as we're going to have this day on. Sunday where we're going to celebrate this great time in Mets fandom. And that would not have happened if he had left and signed with the Astros. But, you know, that contract was an albatross around the Wilpon's neck for six years where he played a grand total of like one and a half seasons. So it's a, it's a pickle and it's interesting that it is resonating at this time where they're retiring his number and, you know, saluting him as a captain just as we are about

to have the same experience with Pete. Does that make sense? Yeah, no. And I thought even about Soto because, you know, 15 years, I know he's got a an opt-out or is there a mutual opt-out after five years or something like that. But, you know, I remember the pool host contract and how instantaneously he was like, oh, he's going to be making how much when he's 40-something years old. But again, I'm a neophyte here. So no salary cap at baseball. Luxury tax, yes, right? So, and Cohen is like bomber baseball, basically.

So, you know, maybe not quite, I don't know how rich he is. He's extremely rich. can we not just sort of eat a cost in exchange for emotional satisfaction? If the cost is just money and not team building, or is the tax so punitive that it will indeed affect team building, even if your owner is a mega billionaire? It's a really good question. I'm not the world's number one expert on this, but I can highlight a couple of things that clarify sort of like what baseball's second apron is. So the tax has multi-tiered the same way that the NBA does.

And once you get over a certain threshold, you're essentially paying 90 cents against every dollar that you spent, which is extremely punitive. Yeah, no one's paying that. Steve Cohen has paid it and is trying to avoid paying it in perpetuity. So in addition to that, one thing that happens that is pretty dramatic is if you spend at a certain threshold over a period of time, your draft pick drops from the number that you would have normally picked out.

I think last year the Mets would have picked roughly at 24, or this year rather, and instead they picked at 34. So you lose 10 spots in your draft. The same thing happens in basketball. You go down to the, you go down to, if you's over the second apron, I can't remember exactly how many times in X amount of years, your pick gets first, it gets frozen so you can't trade it.

And then you get moved down to 30th, no matter where you are 30th. Oh, interesting. I didn't know. Has anyone suffered that penalty yet? No one has gotten moved yet. Some teams are on track to get moved. A number of picks have been frozen, but you can unfreeze them if you get out of the second apron going forward.

You get control of your pick again to trade it. Oh, that's so interesting. I, you know, the Mets, I think, have, this is two years in a row now. Their pick has dropped down. Now, on the one hand, that's not such a big deal because they can spend so much on free agents. On the other hand, David Stern's their general manager, historically likes to build through the draft. So how do you build through the draft when you're constantly,

picking 35 and 40, it's pretty hard to do. Plus, in baseball, you get a bonus pool where you only have a certain amount of money you can spend on the draft. And sometimes you have what's called paying over slot, which means you pay a guy more than the position that they're drafted in. But if you have a limited number of funds, it's harder to pay over slot to get premium for a guy who is, quote, unquote, slipping in the draft due to his price. So the way that the draft is gamed, and I can't believe I still remember how all this works.

Wow, that was impressive. The way that the draft operates is extremely unusual relative to the NBA and the NFL. So spending a lot of money means you have to maneuver. So if you have Juan Soto signed to this deal and then you sign Pete Alonzo to a long-term deal. And then let's say Edwin Diaz opts out at the end of this season because he has an opt-out. I don't think they would ever resign him to an enormous $100 million contract. But let's just say that they did. All of a sudden, they're kind of in the baseball cap hell for three or four years.

And I don't think Steve Cohen wants to do that. And I know David Stearns doesn't want to do that. Wait a second. I'm at risk of losing the only Mets closer I've ever. trusted in my lifetime right away. Like this could just be a fling for me and it's over. It didn't play, but I don't think it's going to happen. Oh, my God.

Careful for what you wish for. You might get too terrible Edwin Diaz years if he opts in. Yeah, well, look, my expectations are not high anyway for that's closers. Are you feeling good? Are you feeling like you're making a good choice by signing up for the rest of this season? There's like, it's actually been good for my soul. Like, I feel better across. It helps send my daughters into it a lot.

But it just feels, I think these, I think just personally, Ron Adams, who is like the dean of NBA assistant coach, he's been with the Warriors forever. I've known him for a long time. And he once told me like six, seven, eight years ago, he was like, Zach, just one word of advice. Just don't get two NBA tunnel vision in your life. have other interests, read the New Yorker all the time, read books about Middle East history,

like exercise every part of your brain. And I took that to heart. And at the same time, the job becomes so all-consuming that I didn't do a good enough job following that advice. And that's both. And I still read every New Yorker. And I do have, I read books like actual books, but not enough. And not definitely not enough what Eddie SPN, when it just became a hamster wheel,

that I could not get off of. You have a kid, too. I feel like the kid, when you have young kids, that changes that too. Yeah, of course. You lose a lot of time. You gain a wonderful thing, but you lose a lot of sort of leisure time. But I think having something to be emotionally invested in versus just like, oh, we have our TV shows that we sit and watch at the end of the day. But having something, an outlet for like a pure happy or not even just happy because it could be sad too, but like a more pure emotional experience has actually been like mentally.

healthy for me. When lose, like, you know, they blow the lead to the Orioles and I get pissed and I'm mad at Ryan Stanick and all that. Like it feels kind of good, bizarrely. I know exactly what you mean. I am, I have the same potential issue of tunnel vision with for a long time it was with work and now it's increasingly with movies too because it's such a big part of what I do. But I'm fond of saying that horror movies are still something that I really care about because they really get me to feel something deeply. Like they drive a kind of primal emotion that is a little bit harder for me to access at the stage of my life. And sports does the same thing. So my version of the Mets is just watching sports. Watching the Mets is my version of that already. I'm a little bit more

of a psycho fan than you are as you took some time off. But I, even when I'm mad or sad, I kind of like that I'm still getting deep into those feelings. So I relate. Well, just like in the last month, they had a horrible stretch where they lost 13 to 16. Then they beat the Yankees two out of three. And like I just, I hate the Yankees with every ounce of my soul and always will. And any series you take from them, I feel very good. And one of those games, McNeil, who I really like, by the way, McNeil, hits a game winning home run like the bottom of the eighth. And then they have the Orioles come back where they're down six to two in the eighth

and their best players come through with big hit after big hit. And I just forgot how it's a dumb regular season game like game 87 of 162. It just feels awesome. Like when you see the best guys come through in the best ways in a big come. back. It just felt so good. Okay, last question. What do we need it to trade that line? Give me like a couple names that I need to do like baseball reference searches on or what

do we need? What do we got to get? What do we have? Are we like the Clippers where we're out all our first round picks or the sons like, Clippers actually are not out all their first round picks, but the sons are. Are we like, is that a thing in baseball where you just have nothing left to trade? The Mets have a lot to trade right now. The Mets, I think according to, I want to say it was baseball prospectus have four of the

top 50 prospects in all of baseball right now and their fifth highest prospect is 51. So, man, let's go. That's a lot. Now, this has happened to crazy. Like, let's let's keep some of these guys. This is the challenge though. This is the challenge specifically is that the timing of this team is a little bit off. Because Pete Alonzo, Francisco Lindor, Brandon Nimho, Jeff McNeil, Juan Soto are in their prime.

Those guys are third, well, Soto's 26, but those guys are 30, 31, 32. They're having good seasons. They're ready to win now. The pitching is pretty good. Not great. They do not have a Zach Wheeler. They do not have a top of the rotation ace who can win you two games in a five-game series. So you could say we would love to get one of those guys.

Those guys are never available. The bullpen is extremely leaky, as I'm sure you've learned. This is a very, they have to get two bullpen arms. That is no doubt happening. They probably could use another bat because Jesse Winker just got hurt again. So you've got Winker and Starling Marte, both basically primary DHS on the IR right now. So what do you do? What do you do?

Do you trade away? You can't trade away Jonah Tong and Nolan McLean and Brandon Sprode. These are the three most exciting pitching prospects the Mets have had maybe since the 2015 era of Matt Harvey and Noah Cindergarde and ultimately Jacob de Grom. But if you don't trade those guys, you're not going to get high-end talent. I think David Stearns is great a skill is acquiring on the edges, is acquiring guys who are undervalued and who maybe don't have the clear counting stats

that we would be excited about as fans, but that do things that teams need. So yeah, you could look at the center field prospects that are out there, the Luis Robert juniors, the Cedric Mullins is, who are having like down years relative to their skills and say try to grab those guys with one kind of B-tier prospect.

Or you could say, let's stick with Tyrone Taylor. Let's hope Jose Siri comes back to play center field. And definitely not trade Carson Benj, the outfield prospect that they drafted last year, who's just cutting it up in AA right now. And it's probably going to be a starter on the Mets in 2027. What do you do?

I know, this is why they have those jobs and I don't. You know, there are there are, is the big question. So I don't know who any of these players are. I know I read about Jonah Tong yesterday because I subscribed to a Mets substack. And I was like, oh, this guy sounds really exciting. So he's that exciting. I don't want to trade any of these exciting guys.

I'm willing to go get a couple of bullpen guys, fringe upgrades. Like, I want sustainable greatness. And if one of those guys or two of those guys pops into like an all-star, I would feel deeper. Particularly, you just meant like, I don't know how playoff baseball is now with the number of endings that starters pitch. But I, you know, in my peak fandom, you couldn't, it was very hard to win the World Series without like the Diamondbacks won the World Series with. two starting pitchers pitching basically like almost every meaningful inning. I mean, I'm exaggerated,

but Schilling and Johnson just like single-handedly won a World Series for the Diamondbacks. And, you know, you'd have guys like, all right, we're going to start, this guy's going to start one, four and seven. Like,

that's half the series, basically. It doesn't really happen like that anymore. I cite Zach Wheeler because he's really kind of one of the last real white hat, blazing gun type, Randy Johnson-esque figures in the sport. he'll throw eight innings of three hit ball in a playoff game and you just kind of got to hope you can get to the closer.

But there's not a lot of guys like that. So it's more of a crapshoot. I mean, the Dodgers won the World Series throwing bullpen games. I mean, they had so many injuries to their starters last year and they still managed to find a way. Now, the thing that they had was a plethora of arms. There are guys who at the start of the season were 10th, 11th, 12th on the depth chart were throwing meaningful innings for them and succeeding. So that's, I think stockpiling is an approach that the Mets may take. They may try to take on a lot of arms.

They've already cycled through, I think, more pitchers this season than they did all of last season because of the injuries that they've had. Stearns is constantly sifting through sand for diamonds in the rough. And I think that's what he'll be doing this trade deadline too. Sean Fennessee, thank you for joining another Mets Corner. This is the most fun I've had doing podcasts in a long time. It's just, it's so much fun. Thank you for indulging me, educating me, and we'll see how the second half of the season starts. Buckle up, I guess.

You're indulging me, Zach. Thank you. Let's go Mets. Let's do it. All right, that's it. For the Zach Lowe show, thanks to Mo, thanks to Sean, let's go Mets. Thanks to Jesse, Jonathan, and Brian making all of this work behind the scenes and lighting up to social channels. We'll be back next week on Monday as planned, barring news.

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