The Zach Lowe Show - Contract Extensions Latest and Early Awards Predictions!

Episode Date: September 24, 2026

Zach is joined by Howard Beck to run through the latest news from around the NBA. They start by discussing the most likely outcomes for Jalen Duren and the Pistons. Then, they share their thoughts on Kawhi Leonard’s contract extension, before previewing what the contracts could look like for the Knicks’ stars. Finally, they close the show with some early award predictions.(0:00) Welcome to The Zach Lowe Show!(01:34) Howard Beck joins the show!(03:03) The Jalen Duren contract situation is getting spicy!(10:55) Duren is only 22 and his trajectory is still pointing up(21:50) Kawhi Leonard contract extension(30:03) Steph Curry latest(37:42) What’s going to happen with KAT?(48:00) Coach of the Year Award Picks(56:17) 6th Man of the Year Award PicksHost: Zach LoweGuest: Howard BeckProducers: Jonathan Frias, Billy Gil, and Mike WargonSocial: Keith Fujimoto and Michael SzokoliThe Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit https://fanduel.com/playwithaplan to learn more about the resources and helplines. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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On the Zach Lowe show, Howard Beck is here. He hasn't been here in a while and we have a lot of newsy stuff as we kind of bounce around the league as we approach training camp media days have already actually started and all of that stuff. Jalen Duren, still no deal. Weight clauses, $200 million, $210 million, $190 million, a sign and trade, qualifying offer? What the hell is going to happen here?

What are the actual possibilities? what should Detroit do? What should the Pistons do? Can you build a championship team around Jail Enduring, Assar Thompson? We talk about his contract extension and Cade Cunningham. And should that really be the measuring stick for whether you pay Jail and Duren $40 million or lose him or trade him? Just a very strange situation that I personally did not see unfolding this way. We'll talk about that. Asar Thompson. Carl Anthony Towns reported stalemate in his extension talks. We'll talk about the Knicks and the second apron. Steph Curry's. extensions, some rookie deal extensions.

Kawhi signed his two-year deal with the Raptors. We talk about how that deal might age and whether the Raptors are taking on more risk than maybe they're giving credit for. And then we pick some awards, coach of the year, six man of the year, and some reflections on Lawrence Tanter's time with

the Lakers and Nick Batum's career. That's all coming up on the Zach Lowe show. Welcome to the Zach Lowe Show. It's Thursday and look who it is. It's time to say the most hallow three words. in the history of niche basketball podcasting. What a Beck.

What's happening, Zach? How are you, sir? It's been a bit. I'm good. I'm good. We're going to go around the league. We have some newsy stuff to get to. There's not much going on in terms of like actual basketball training camp is still a bit

away. But we have some news and we're going to start in Detroit. A pivotal summer for the 60 win Detroit Pistons, the number one seat in the Eastern Conference. An unconvincing seven game victory over the Orlando Magic in round one. which may well have gone the other way, had the magic, A, not lost Franz Wagner, B, not shit the bed at home with the big lead in game six. Alas, they did lose Franz Wagner, and they did poop all over the bed, and then a seven-game loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Nonetheless, everything looking up for the Pistons heading into a pivotal summer that has gone

a little sideways, Mr. Beck. First, I believe, reported attempts by them to get a secondary ball handler using their cap-space, cap space that could vanish very quickly after this offseason were real. I think they tried very hard to get Austin Reeves. I think that got like, you know, if the Lakers had fumbled it a little bit longer, maybe that was open. Maybe they would have gotten Austin Reeves. They didn't.

And so now here we are. They have extended Asar Thompson at five years, $150-something million. And Jalen Duren still twists in the wind one week from today, unless the two sides agree to extend the deadline. there is an October 1st deadline for Jail Enduring to take the qualifying off for one year about $9 million, or it vanishes. This is getting spicy, Mr. Beck, with every day that ticks away till that October 1st deadline, with every report that gets leaked out most recently from the athletic that the Pistons,

for some reason, unbeknownst to me, tried to put a weight bonus, weight-related clause, maybe a bonus, maybe not into J.L. Endurance contract, even though Jail Endurin looks like a freaking Greek God statue. With everything that goes by, tick, tick, tick, the chances for this going not well for the Pistons or going into a different direction increased just a little bit. He could take the qualifying offer. I mean, that is the nuclear option for Jail Enduron

and just become an unrestricted free agent after next season. There are reports that he could sign a max with a couple of teams. And so that scenario amounts to about $200 million over five years. The Pistons, according to reports that I believe are accurate, are offering him about $200 million over five years. So the amount of money is roughly the same. Normally, Howard, I would say if the amount of money is the same, you don't, with no upside in risk in risking the qualifying offer, you shouldn't risk the qualifying offer and just take the

$200 million that's in front of you. if I had to predict, I would still predict that cooler heads will prevail and something like that will occur, but I'm getting a little less sure of myself. What do you think? I think that this is a classic case of what a player is, quote, unquote, worth, right,

by his stats, his production, his age, his skill set, what you project team could still evolve into. What he's worth, right? We talk about what a player's worth. It's an overpay. It's an underpay. This is about what he's worth versus what the market sort of dictates, right? Like, Jailendor, I don't think at this stage would we consider a star center, but he's their star center, right?

They won 60 games with him as a key piece. So he's super important to them. So in terms of market forces, in terms of leverage on the part of the agent, it's we're really important to you. You should pay him as much as we can possibly squeeze out of you and as close to the max as we can possibly get. even if you and I would sit here and everybody else around the league would sit here and say, well, he's not a max player as of yet. And who knows, maybe he'll get there. You mentioned this recently I think on the pod.

Cade loves him. That's important. That works in their favor. So there's this pressure to keep him. You know, you drafted him. Your fans, your team, your own players, everybody wants them there. And so it wouldn't be easy to replace besides. That's the thing.

If he signs the qualifying offer, the threat of him walking for nothing is real. because there are teams that have a need for a center or like Jill and Duren and we'll have max cap space without having to do very much work. I'll talk about them in a bit. But like that's a, that's a real thing. And that's a disaster for the Pistons that they probably cannot afford to have happened. Yeah. But the flip side of that is when you when you buckle to all those market forces and pressures that I just mentioned and you potentially overpay a guy again, what what is overpaid is I have the beholder sometimes and signs we don't know until a couple years into a deal. But you overpay a guy in this era, in the second apron, you fuck yourself.

And you've already got Cade on his max and Assar Thompson on a very nice deal. By nice, I mean, a costly deal. You combine the three of them, you know, once Durrin makes whatever it's going to be. And it's going to take up a massive amount of your cap in an era where you have no room for error. So I understand the Pistons wanting to be judicious here with this. I looked this up yesterday on SpotTrack. 40 million a year on average as an average salary, not year by year, would place an eighth in the NBA among centers behind Embed, Anthony Davis,

Yokic, Kat, Bam, Chet, and Sabonis. And right above Shengoon and Walker Kessler, among others, right in that range. And Gobert and Jared Allen, which I don't know, sounds about right, So, like, if he takes the deal, it's on the table. I think he's slotted right about where he should be. I don't know. Like, I just, Kay's making 50 million next season. Saar's making 26 million and then escalating into the 30s.

You combine that with 40 million or whatever it's going to be for Jalen Duran. Like, you're pretty locked in. So, again, like, on the one hand, you cannot afford to lose him and you can't screw this up. On the other hand, if you overpay him, you can really lock yourself in. and you know you can't account for future injuries or what if what if jalen durran never advances past what do we saw in the playoffs as a postseason performer and then you're really hurting and so i absolutely understand why the pistons are trying to hold the line here as valuable as he is to them let me be clear i think five years 200 million dollars is fair for jail and durin i think he should

take it um i think i would take it if i were him if i were his agent advising him i would say, hey, man, you can't be too emotional about this. And I'll talk about the reasons why he might be getting emotional about it. You just have to take this. And if I'm the Pistons, I say, hey, look, you're, you were not good in the playoffs. You were like flat out, not good. We couldn't rely on you in the playoffs. We know you're young. We're going to grow. And we think this is a fair offer considering that, yeah, you followed a third, you were 13th, all NBA. When the games got hard, it was hard for you. Now, one of the reasons it was hard for him. And I think this is the ultimate question here. I mentioned how the Pistons sniffed around Austin Reeves. I probably did more

did sniff around Austin Reeves. If they re-signed Jalen Duren at 40 million on average per year, so that would start probably like 35 million. It's about, let's say, 22% of the cap. You would have between Duren, Kade, and Assar Thompson. Assar Thompson's deal sounds huge. It's 16% of the cap. You would have about 70% of the salary cap, not 70% up to the luxury tax or the apron, is 70% up to the cap, the lowest level we talk about, tied up in three players. I actually think that's manageable. I think you can build out the team with 70% to those three players. It's not 70% to two players, which is what the Celtics were staring at.

It's not 90% to three players, which is something like the thunder are staring at, if not more, once Shay's super duper duper, big max contract kicks in. It's manageable. And I think you have two schools of thought on this. Number one, those three players are going to make for a difficult offense because two of them are complete non-shooters. And we saw what that meant for Cades scrunched up pick and roll game and Detroit's offense in general in the playoffs. And even though 70% is a pretty nice figure for those three players, three young players have accomplished what they've accomplished. It's still going to make it very hard for them, whether by signing, impossible by signing and hard by trade to acquire that second ball handler that they may need if Fassar Thompson.

does not turn into that player. And I think that contract for Assar Thompson is a bet on him whether growing as a ball handler, as a screener, as a handoff guy, turning into more of a true secondary third offensive option, ball handling option than he is now. And I don't know what you're supposed to do with that as the Pistons. There's no question it's an imperfect offensive structure. It could also be a great defensive architecture if Jalen Duren's game on defense catches up to what his game on offense was in the regular season at least. He's still only 22 years old. I feel like I've been saying Jill and Duren is still only 22 years old for 22 years.

He's still only 22 years old. He's younger than guys that just got drafted in the NBA draft. His trajectory on both ends of the floor should be very happy for the next several years. And if you're the Pistons, like trading him or losing him is a massive step back in the short term of your build. in a short term where you just won 60 games. And long term, I've said this before. Like, they've got to find somebody to replace Gill and Duren. Maybe the replacement is a better secondary ball handler next decade.

And then you make the center a placeholder position who makes the average salary, which I think Bill Simmons is kind of alluding to. And he says, I would just sign and trade Duren for whatever I could get in terms of picks and assets and stuff like that, reallocate the money to the two or the three or the four and not the five. But look, man, it's hard when you're Detroit. You don't just get to go to the grocery store and pick these players. I get the idea of airing on the conservative side,

especially if I can limit it to 70% of the cap for those three guys. I think that's fair for Jill and Duren. And I would take it if I were him. Yeah. It's tough. And I think we'll probably, I'll circle back to this point again with another item in a few minutes here. But to have to have these conversations with your players, especially a young player who has, you know, I would say exceeded expectations since the day of his draft

and has become a really important piece of, again, a 60-win team, a plausible contender, and you're having to explain to them in this era, look, we think the world of you. We would love to pay you more. We would love to pay you everything that you want to make. But this is not a matter of what we're willing to spend in terms of salary or even the luxury tax. This is what will be functional or not functional for our team going. forward. We want to win. We want to win championships with you and Kate and Asar. We want to contend year and year out for the rest of your career. And to do that, we need flexibility.

That's a really hard thing to tell a still 22 year old young player and his agent when they have shown a lot of value. And they're looking at the same comps that we were just alluding to and saying, well, you know, we think we're better than this guy. We think he's going to exceed this guy. But, you know, you're having, I think it's a harder conversation now than it was for the same GM or the people in those seats five, 10, 15, 20 years ago because things are just different now. The second apron has made it hard. You have to be careful about how you do this. As someone who values stylistic diversity around the league, I am rooting for this to work. I am rooting for Jill and Dern to go back to the Pistons, for Sarr Thompson to stay on the Pistons,

and for the Pistons to try to become a great team without the level of spacing that would seem commensurate to being a great playoff team. I get the challenges. No one has to tutor me on the spacing challenges. I like the pistons leaning into a, let's be an elite defensive team who beats the hell out of people on the glass, super physical on defense with Duren is the centerpiece of that and Assar Thompson on the wing guarding everyone,

deflecting every pass that comes within a 20 foot radius of him. And let's try to win a different way. And let's try to win a different way while Assar Thompson and Jail and Duren maybe don't become jump shooters, but be become rounded enough offensively that we can make it work. That's what I'm sort of rooting for as a fan of stylistic diversity. And I get the difficulty in getting there. Now, we have a week until this October 1st deadline.

There has not been a peep about any sign and trade negotiations from the Pistons in Jail and Duren with other teams since the summer started. From what I've heard, the Pistons have just flat out not even pretended to even engage in anything. like not even, we're not even taking the call, let alone even talking about it a little bit. I can, can you imagine, though, Howard, a scenario where it's five days from now. It's September 29th. No deal has been signed. And jail and Duren's agents are telling you, hey, man, in 36 hours, we're signing the qualifying offer. This is a real threat.

This isn't an empty threat. You maybe have thought it was an empty threat on September 23rd. It's not. It's September 29th. At that point, if you're the Pistons, you are really playing a dangerous game of chicken for another 36 hours because either the threat is empty and he signs the deal you want or it's not. He says, fuck it. I'm mad. I'm angry.

I know I have max deals elsewhere. I think I do. I'm signing the qualifying offer and leaving you for nothing. If you think that's a real possibility, there's a world in which sign and trade negotiations could start on September 28th or September 29th. And we have a big bombshell before the season even begins, before camp really even gets underway. I've always been skeptical of that because if you put $200 million in front of a player, they normally take it. But that's a reality. Now, here's the thing no one is talking about.

And the teams that have been bandied about are Milwaukee, Sacramento. I've heard some rumblings of Atlanta. I'm not 100% convinced that those rumblings are accurate. But the Hawks certainly have the need for size, draft assets to get things done, and contracts. they can bundle. Now, they also have a ton, speaking of a team that's built around guys with shaky jump shots, they have a ton of those guys. Some of them might get traded in a theoretical Jailen Duren deal, not Jalen Johnson, to be clear. Be that as it may. Another wrinkle to this is, I had forgotten this and was reminded by some experts today. There is a remnant of base year compensation that comes

into effect for sign and trade transactions of this ilk with Jailen Duren at this age in his career with a salary that would jump to the degree that it would jump, which is really complicating for a trade. Like, he would count, if I reading the CBA right, let's say he signs for $40 million in his first year. He would count outgoing trade value, half of that for the Pistons, incoming trade value, 100% of that for the team that gets him, meaning that team has to act as if they're trading for a $40 million player

and send money in different direct. They might have to get a third team or a fourth team. So it's very difficult, but this is where we are. I'm still betting my money on things, things get done. Cooler heads prevail. But every day that goes by, I get worried. I've said from the beginning, I'd be shocked if they didn't resolve this by Media Day. And I'd still be shocked.

I know we're getting awfully close. But I'd still be shocked. And I'll be just as shocked if he takes the qualifying offer. I do wonder, we haven't talked about this at all. And I don't know if it's been floated out there at all, if you've been poking around on this particular aspect. But like, could he just go short? You know, do the, I'll bet on myself, take like a two-year deal at whatever number

and put the pressure on them and on himself to revisit this in a couple of years. I don't know. It feels like they should be exploring every avenue to resolve this. I have to imagine that everyone is happier if he's still there, including Jail and Dern. So let's go through the teams real quickly because here's the point I keep making. You know, on the one hand, the Pistons won 60 games last year. It's not like they're a cute up-and-coming team. I don't care how many teams are tanking.

It's still hard to win 60 games in the NBA. Now, if you want to tell me in a normal year with in a year like this, no teams tanking or three teams tanking and not a third of the goddamn league, the Pistons are like a 54 win team, they got five or six free wins that wouldn't otherwise exist to them. Fine. They're still a really good team. I don't think you should take taking a step back from that level of winning as like just something

you take for granted in your journey to like winning bigger than that. That's still winning pretty big even if the playoffs were ugly. So you talk about Milwaukee. People throw around Miles Turner. I'm not trading Jalen Duren for Miles Turner and a couple of draft picks. Did anyone watch the finals two years ago or the entire season the Milwaukee Bucks just had? That's too depressing. For the Kings, it would be subonis as this like nice placeholder.

and I probably get a draft asset. Maybe I get two draft assets. So yeah, Sabonis lifts me up for a couple of years before he gets into his 30s. And then I've got to what, figure out how to pivot into another elite player. And this is what I keep saying of like,

it's easy to say get off of Duren, sign and trade him. It's the next move that you then have to absolutely nail in order to justify this move. If it were Atlanta, for instance, and again, I don't really believe Atlanta is involved, but let's just say that maybe they'd sniff around. It's a Kongwu. and because you need a center,

you let Isaiah Stewart walk or trade Isaiah Stewart rather to Memphis. It's Akangu and some other contracts and maybe a couple draft assets. Is that the big move that Atlanta is holding out to make? I'm not really sure it is. A Congo would be, would revolutionize the piston spacing

at the cost of some size and some defense. These are really tough questions. And I just want to defend J. Enduren. I just, I do, he's getting a lot of shit from Pistons fans who are like sick of him turning down these deals and all this. Just try to take.

take a deep breath and imagine all of this from his perspective. Number one, there was nothing close to an extension for him last year when he was extension eligible. The Pistons made it pretty clear to him, but not made it clear. It was just, it wasn't close. You feel like you have to go prove it. You then go make third team all NBA and prove it. And yeah, you're not asking for the max anymore, but you, you know, you feel pretty highly

about yourself. And yeah, the playoffs sucked, but I'm 22 years old. Still 22, Howard. And then as this is happening, Asar Thompson, who's a year behind me on the contract timetable, gets, let's ballpark $30 million a year. And I'm sitting here like, wow, my extension talks didn't get that far. I'm not even under contract.

I'm a restricted free agent. Like I understand why he's getting in his feelings, maybe a little bit as the kids say. But I still would take this deal if I were him. And I think if that's the offer, that's a fair offer. The Pistons have done enough to make a deal. but here we are. Yeah.

No, I'm with you. I'm with you. He should take the offer. I hope he takes the offer. I hope the pistons are whole when things get rolling next week. I think they're going to win a lot of games if they bring J.L.

and Dern back. If they don't and they get a representative starting center, they'll probably still win a decent number of games and be less exciting and less coherent going forward with one big move in the bag. Like I keep hearing on other podcasts, they've got to find an elite secondary ball handler, like a true superstar, two-way shooting.

guard or small forward who can really carry the load and they tried to get austin rees and all that like okay who would you are they going to go trade for jason tatum tomorrow like you're talking about a universe of like four guys okay other contract news kawai leonard two year well i don't know what was it a hundred and twenty something million dollar extension with the raptors lane bring it up specifically uh with a player option in the it was a hundred and 15 15 with a player option in 28 29 this was a faded complete the minute the trade happened, which is why I wasn't super stoked to talk about it. He ended up taking a decent amount less than his max. It's almost Howard as if he might have made some extra income on the side in the last

few years that made it easier for him to take a little bit less than the max in Toronto. I don't really have a ton of reactions to this. I think the Raptors are going to be really good this season when a lot of games be a dangerous playoff team unless and until Kauai gets injured in the middle of the playoffs like he always does. I will say it makes RJ Barrett a very interesting expiring contract slash contract extension case right now because if you bring him back and you do some other stuff like bring Jamal shed back on a decent, you know, a deal like a little south of the mid-level exception starting next season,

you're right at the first apron with spots to fill. If you do that and then you re-sign Jacoby Walter the next season, you're right at the second apron and probably over it if Kauai picks up his player option, in which $59 million in a couple of years for a guy who's 35 or whatever, I have to project that he's going to pick it up. So I've got my eyes on R.J. Barrett going forward as something. Either we'll see what an extension number might come in,

a trade candidate, whatever. But that was my number one reaction. Like, not surprise, obviously. Yeah. It's funny. I was thinking about this. Like, this isn't, it's a vague echo of what they did in 2018 the first time they acquired Kauai, right?

Like the risk then was he might leave after a year, and he did. But the risk reward play was we could be a contender or a champion. Oh, wow, we won the championship, so it was worth it. This is a different version of it where he wants to be there, oddly, after walking away seven years ago, at an age and an injury history with, you know, where there's a different kind of risk now. So it's a short-term play with the loftiest of goals. That's the analogy to 2018. There's some risk, but massive upside here.

If you win a championship with him any time in the next two to three years, who cares what else you have to go through. You know you're not going to have to pay him on the side because Uncle Dennis has been banned from the NBA, and the scandal probably rules anything else out for Kauai Leonard. So you have more security this time around with him other than the specter, as always, of injuries. But he's also being reunited with Alex McKechnie. the VP of player care and other various things. Silver Fox, baby. The Silver Fox.

That was all due respect to other teams that have had Kauai later. His year with the Raptors was, I think, best year in terms of managing his health and the conditions that he's had with his knee, et cetera. So, like, I think he couldn't be in better hands than he is right now with Alex McKechny and the Raptors. So they'll manage him through this. And it's a three-year bet on his health and availability.

it's a three-year window to go for the title with Scotty Barnes, who's still only like 25, still developing, already, you know, busting into, you know, star to superstar status. You've got a good young roster, a team that was already starting to break through without really an elite offensive focal point that Scotty Barnes could become himself, right? And so now Scotty Barnes becomes, and I think,

I think a penis of this reason, like Scotty Barnes becomes Scotty Pippen now. It's like he's the, the secondary wing who also can play both ways at an elite level. And he has now the luxury of having Kauai Leonard next to him to take over a lot of crunch time minutes and crunch time opportunities to carry them at times. And when Kauai's not available, you already know you have a formula to win around Scotty Barnes.

I do think that's the challenge to an extent, right? You're going to have to toggle over the course of the season, knowing you're going to probably lose Kauai for 20 to 25 games overall, that you're going to have to have. the Kauai version or the Kauai and Scotty version and the just Scotty version. But they've already gotten established identity with almost the entirely the same group. So I'm not that concerned about it. And that, that, which an identity that looked totally fine in the playoffs when Brandon and Grum went out in that series against the Cavs, they didn't even have a manual quickly.

So you toss in quickly. You toss in year two CMB, Jacoby Walter with more confidence, like all of that. Like, I don't worry about those 20 to 25 games that Kauai is going to miss. I do worry about the simple fact that he has not. and I will keep repeating this, completed a second round playoff series since 2020. And it's awesome that he's reunited with Alex McHackney, who is a genius. It's great that he had his last and best healthy year in Toronto with Alex McKechnie overseeing his treatment.

That was in 2019. It's going to be 2007. I don't really care about what happened eight years ago. He's just injured all the time in the playoffs. Look, I want to be clear. this is a bet that I probably would have made if I were the Raptors because I have Brandon Ingram. And as I play this out, my other likely outcomes are letting Brandon Ingram walk for nothing, which isn't so enticing because, yeah, I get Capspace. But Capspace in Toronto in a world where no free agents are really changing teams via Capspace anymore is not that interesting.

I could also trade Brandon Ingram in some other kind of trade. But based on the trade that I made for Brandon Ingram, the trade New Orleans made for Brandon Ingram, that's not. going to get me that much interesting stuff. So here I get a distressed Kauai Leonard, who's a top eight NBA player when he's healthy and is obviously this is a unique set of circumstances by which I mean distressed. The opportunity cost is two first round draft picks, which are really valuable, like unprotected in 31 and 33, a swap that is this year and two seconds. A little bit of uncertainty with what RJ Barrett's future is with the team. I might have to lose RJ Barrett or trade him for you know, whatever I can get for him because of the finances.

I think the opportunity, I just don't, like, this is not risk-free. This could end not badly for Toronto, but it could end with those two picks, hurting a little bit more than you think, with a little bit less postseason winning in the next two to three years than you're hoping for with Kauai and with Barrett out the door for, and I'm not saying they're going to trade Arjibati, I have no idea, but let's say they do, they don't get as much for him as you think, as you hope. Like there's, there is more of, I think, a risk here than the elation in Toronto and having Kauai back would make you think. All that said, if that's the opportunity cost, I'm still willing to roll the dice and do it.

I just think there are dice here that that had not been talked about enough. Yeah, but you figure that stuff out later, right? And I think that was kind of the case with acquiring Kauai the first time and various other bets that we've seen around the league. Like, even Minnesota acquired Lamello Ball earlier this summer was basically, basically a, okay, we've lost our entire front court, aside from Rudy Gobert. We'll figure out the rest later. Now, figuring out the rest later turned into Jonathan Cumminga, I'm not sure how that's going to pan out long term. But like, you know, Janus to Miami, right? Well, we've lost all of our depth and a bunch of key players, but we'll figure out the rest later.

Get first get the superstar. And I think that more often than not, that's the right bet. And I'm, I'm, what you're, you're right on the downside or at least the risk and the assets given up, especially the unprotected picks, but this is absolutely worth it. So the only thing I will say is Kauai is 35. Janus is 31, fairly close to 32. Lamello is 25. Yonels, both of them also have significant injury histories. And in Janus's case, late season injury histories that are similar in terms of timing

to Kauai's. But I think, you know, just, I think Toronto's going to be really good. I'm excited for the Raptors. I think they're going to win a lot of regular season games and be super dangerous in the playoffs. If they're healthy, I understand why they're a dark horse. Hey, they could win the East candidate. I just can't get there because of Quad's injury history.

All right, real quick, Steph Curry spoke this week. I think Anthony Slater had it at ESPN, basically indicating not much going on with his contract extension talks. He's been eligible since late August to sign a max extension with the Warriors. And indicating kind of hinting, you know, like I got a lot of options. I could do the max. He didn't really say this out right. but there certainly was the implication.

Like there's a world in which he could take less to facilitate the signing of a free agent or something like that. And I'm just going to kind of wait and see and fill it out. And in the meantime, he's like, I expect us to win. I want to be a warrior for life. He's going to be a warrior for life. Just thought it was interesting that he maybe left the door open a little bit. What did you think about that?

I think that if I'm going to read between the lines on the things he said to slay, later about, you know, alluding to flexibility or whatever else or options and all this, I think what he's basically doing is leaving the door open, not for leaving, but for, I'm willing to take less if it means we can get some other great young talent in here next summer. Like, it seemed to me that was mostly point of that direction. Like, Stephanie been very not necessarily young, I don't think. Well, all right, any younger than him. That's a lot of people. That's 99% of the NBA.

Fair. He is never in all of his years there. And in every interview over the last couple of years, as he's going slowly, slowly toward the horizon, has he ever left open the door or even suggested remotely that he might want to leave or chase rings somewhere else? And he has the luxury of having four rings and doesn't have to chase rings. He can retire now and be perfectly fine.

He obviously wants to still win at a high level. He's been incredibly patient with the warriors throughout all the ups and downs the last couple of years. They did go out and get Jimmy Butler. Like I know everybody wants to like criticize. They didn't do anything. They went out and got like a top 15 to 20 player in Jimmy at the moment that they got him. And looked like world beaters for the first 35 games they had him.

And won a playoff series and might have won the next one if not for Steph getting hurt. So like I like yes, it's true that Jimmy Butler is also in his mid 30s and is hurt right now. And we don't know what point he'll come back this season. But I think Steph has signaled throughout. I'm willing to still place a space in the warrior's ability to get a guy. And if the opportunity is there, like, I think what he's hitting at here is he can hold off on the extension because maybe the extension he takes will be less if it means they've got indications that they're getting somebody else. And he wants that. So I don't think there's any, there's nothing negative.

There's no negative signals or alarm bells or red flags or whatever coming from that interview. I think it's mostly positive. It did remind me of a pet peeve of mine, but we can get back to that. No, what's the pet peeve? That NBA Max does make no goddamn sense. Oh, yeah, well. I mean, do you get more as you get older? Yes.

When you, like every, Goldsbury had a great thing, a chart he put up this week on Instagram. I don't know if it was on the ringer.com as well. But basically that like the vast majority of NBA players are much younger and the vast majority of players who are at the highest production levels are younger. And yet we have this structure where the guys with 10 plus years,

of experience, get the biggest max, the 35% of the cap, and then that goes up because you get raises. Why do we have raises in the NBA? I don't understand it. I don't know. We don't need raises for guys who make 40, 50 million a year. So the max structure makes zero sense. You have advocated in the past act for, you know, and I think this was more to do with like if you drafted a player and as he gets up there in salary, have a situation that would apply to the Golden State Warriors and Steph Curry. Thanks in large part to David Kahn. Shout out, David Kong. I don't know why we had to drag you to this, but okay. Because why not? Because why not? There's never a bad time. But you've mentioned it in concert with the idea of you drafted a player.

I'm saying it just in terms of like any older player, especially if it's a guy who's already been with you for X number of years. You could do this where maybe you limit, like, have the salary for a guy who's over whatever, 33, 35, have a max for those guys or have a max that's applied to the cap at least. And if he's spent X number of years with you, you, and has a certain, you know, seniority or whatever that's accrued with that team, it could qualify him for this status where not all that counts toward the cap. Or maybe it should just be a lower max. That's a really hard thing to argue for us, the league.

It's a really hard thing for the Players Association to accept, and they probably wouldn't. But it makes ultimate sense. If all these other measures that have been instituted over the decades in the CBA are, and we can all say this, these are mostly measures to protect the owners of the GMs, from themselves. This would be another one, and I think probably a pretty necessary one. And the upside for the Players Association would be this, because 51% of BRI always goes to the players in total, the money would then be shifted downward toward the younger players who actually produce the most. And yes, Steph is still like a top 10, top 15 player in the NBA, wherever you want to rank

him. But in general, when you have this much tied up in Steph or, you know, Carl Anthony Towns who we're going to discuss, I think, and, you know, Janus, others, it gets harder and harder. We all want to, this is the bottom blank principle here. I should have led with this. We all want to see, Steph, LeBron, Kevin Durant, Kauai Leonard, any of the top stars of the last era who are aging up, who are getting close to the end. We want to see them on relevant teams. We want to see them to still be able to contend. And part of the reason that it's hard to is because of their own salaries. And especially in a second apron era, anyway, the maxes make no sense. The fact that we have to be able to.

have multiple maxes for various ages or years of service. And then on top of that, we have supermaxes. And the max changes based on which year you got your max. And then we have raises that complicate matters. It makes it that much harder to construct a decent roster around, guys. All right. End of brand. Okay.

A couple of things on this. Number one, I am not going to relitigate what opportunities the Warriors pursued and what they missed, what they might have missed, all that. I've done that in a million podcasts to pair of step with another star player. they did one with Jimmy Butler. Number two, I've heard some dribblings of positivity regarding a potential extension for Brandon Pajemski. We'll see those dribblings, those kinds of intel tend to change when the wind blows one way

or another. But I've said from the beginning, because they want to prioritize cap space if somebody becomes available, that I would bet on if Pajemski signs an extension. I'd bet on it being pretty close to his cap pulled, which is about $17 million. I've also heard some positive drivelings about Brandon Miller in a different market, but that's a different thing. And the last thing is, look, the Nuggets are going to laugh at this. Everyone in Denver is going to laugh at this.

I will be clear and say, I think Yokic is going to spend the rest of his career in Denver because that's what he said he wants to do. If you don't think teams like the Warriors are planning for the potential of Nicole Yokic leaving Denver and free agency, you are wrong. Teams are looking at it and saying, look, just in case, if it's a 1% chance, a 5% chance, a 10% chance, we have to be ready

because like it or not, he hasn't signed his extension yet. And he's reaching a point on the timetable where, like, players generally just haven't done that. They haven't demurred on signing an extension. They just take the money. He hasn't done it. That's the reality. I think he'll be a nugget. I think the nuggets will be pretty good this year, but a little below, obviously, the best

teams in the West. But I'm just saying, let's take a quick break and we'll talk about one other extension case before we have some fun. This episode is brought to you by DeZone. DeZone is the only place to watch every single NFL game, Europe's elite soccer and boxing's biggest nights. Catch exclusive NFL Sunday games and NFL Red Zone with Scott Hansen. Plus, for just $1 ad ultimate and watch four games at once using Multivue

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Let's stop looking away and get in the way of rising poverty. Your donations help the United Way fight poverty in thousands of ways, like providing food, shelter, and crisis prevention. Donate today at United Way GT. The other extension related news, much awaited. I've talked about Carlyanthian Town's strange situation for a while now, reporting all over the place from Ian Begley, from Samstraania, from Stefan Bondi, that there has been a little bit of a snag, a stall, a stalemate,

whatever S word you want to use in the contract extensions surrounding towns who has a player option next season for, I believe, $61 million that he can opt out of or the Knicks can opt him out of mutually and sign an extension. He's on a $57 million kind of expiring contract now. None of this is surprising. It's a tricky case on a tricky team that just won the title and has an owner who I actually don't think got enough shit for just coming out and saying,

hey, we're never going to go over the second apron, even though we just won the championship and we have a team that really works together, hard line in the sand, massive downgrade at backup center for Mitchell Robinson, who's probably not going to be a backup anymore, to Andre Drummond. Let's leave that aside.

I don't know what to tell you, man. I've been projecting the Knicks. I have a bunch of estimates on salaries for guys like Josh Hart, who's extension eligible, for OG Ann and Obie, who will be extension eligible after this season. And obviously for Brunson, who is due to super duper max that he did not take

when he did not wait long enough to take when he first had the opportunity to do so. And if the second apron really is a hard line in the sand, it's just going to be, the math is going to be tight in 2027, 28, and 2028, 29, tight, but doable if everybody other than Brunson takes a little bit of a haircut or a compromise. So like I just penciled in because you have to pencil in something, Howard, if you're projecting salaries on the team level. I just penciled in 27, 28. I penciled in, let's just say Kat's option number, 61 million, just for ease. Long term for him, I penciled in, let's say 55 million, 55 million a year. For Hart, who's on a $20 million deal and then has a $22 million team option next season, I penciled in, let's say they rip up the team option and extend them and it's $25 million a year.

For Annenobi, who has, where's Ananoi? 42 this year, 45, and then a player option for 48. I penciled in. Let's say he takes a little bit of a discount. Not saying it's true, but three years, 120, when his deal is up, $40 million a year. And then you do various things like no Deuce McBride, no Kolek, and whatever. You can maybe sneak under the second. You can definitely sneak under the second apron in 27, 28, maybe even in 28, 29, depending on where it falls and what you do with like Shamitz,

contract is half guaranteed and deal. Juarez is not guaranteed. It's Alvarado's is half guaranteed. But every dollar really matters. And that's why this negotiation was going to be, was going to be tough. I like, Kat was awesome in the playoffs.

He's been awesome his entire career, basically. I don't blame him for, you know, saying, hey, I want as close to the max as I can get. I don't think he's getting the max.

I don't know what the number is. I just penciled in 55 because I had to pencil in something. But I'm very curious to see how this goes, because I'm sure. the defending NBA champions with like a little bit of certainty and internal calm as they begin their title defense.

Yeah, this is tough. This is really tough. You know what? It's the irony is just other, you know, it's in another stratosphere here where for two decades, Jim Dolan did everything possible to absolutely torture the Knicks fan base

with one exception. Like he did everything else terribly. But the one thing you could never fault him for, the one thing, was that he would spend whatever it took. Now, spending whatever it took made them basically like a 35 win team most of the time and with all kinds of other crazy awful things going on. But nevertheless, you never had to worry about whether or not he would spend. And this includes during the entire luxury tax era and the more punitive tax and repeated

whatever. Like he has never been afraid to spend, but the second apron is a different thing. And I certainly understand, logically, whether you're an owner or a GM, that you don't want to hamstring yourself because the second apron takes away all these tools to build your roster or to massage your roster if you have an injury or a guy ages out or whatever. You need to replace somebody. It's hard. I get not wanting to be in it. But the one time you should be in it or be willing to be in it is if you've got a championship level team or in this case the actual defending fucking champions. Letting Mitchell Robinson walk, I think was a mistake. And drawing that line in the sand now, the thing I'm wondering about, and I'm giving Dolan like at least this

little bit of wiggle room. Was that just an edict for this summer, which cost the Mitchell Robinson, or is it in perpetuity? Because if it's in perpetuity, this team is going to be taken apart bit by bit, unless, as you just went through the math, unless OG Annanobi, Mikhail Bridges and Jalen Brunson and Josh Hart are all willing, and Crown Anthony Towns, are all willing to take less than they believe they're worth. Pat Riley always talked about the disease of more. You win and everybody wants more, more money, more shots, more attention, whatever. Like, that's always the one thing you worry about, not just with the Knicks, with any championship team.

But it's the money part that is front and center here right now. And, you know, Kat is an interesting personality. Like, I don't know how he's going to react to, you know, feeling like he got short shrift, if that's the case. You know, he's been really important to this team. He had a phenomenal finals for the most part. I mean, there were times last season, people have already forgotten, but there were times last season where it seemed like things weren't going so well,

where he wasn't really clicking with Mike Brown and his offense and all this and all the same old questions from coming up. But they won the freaking championship, and all these guys deserve to not only defend it, but to be together for as long as possible. So I don't know where this goes. But I think it's at least a little bit of a warning sign that they can't come to terms with him yet. and they have bigger hurdles to clear as this goes on.

I'm not shocked and I'm not worried. I mentioned I penciled in 55 as the average per year deal, just to pencil something in. Like, to be clear, his max, according to Bobby Marks, if he becomes a free agent after this season, would be four years, $276 million. That's almost $70 million a year, average value, which started about 62 or 63,

depending on where the cat comes in. So 55 is like, if you're ducking the second, second apron, that's a big, big difference. Heart, I told you, I penciled in 25. He's on a $21 million deal now. And then I said, I think he's the team option for like, what is it, 22.4. That's going to be an interesting one because if you talk to people around the league about Josh Hart, some people will say 25. And I've had these conversations. Some people would say 25. That's a lot for Josh Hart. He's kind of the fit starters. Three point shot comes and goes. People don't guard him. They put their centers on it messes up their spacing, blah, blah, blah.

Then you talk to people like, well, Sadiq Bay just signed for like 18 a year, and Najee Marshall signed for 18 a year. And yeah, some of those contracts in the 20 to 25 to 30 range become dicey. We've seen with Jalen Suggs and Christian Brown, et cetera. I don't know if I want to, you know, whatever, but like, yeah, Josh Hart'sworth more than the Sadiq Bays

and Najee Marshall, certainly his playmaking, his defense, his unique fit within this team. I think that's actually a fair number. Any final thoughts on the New York Knicks, who I will, I will probably pick to make the finals again because I'm a believer. I'm a believer. Howard Beck, I'm a believer in what I saw in a team that locked into the best version of itself and stayed there for a month straight as they decimated the league. They found the exact right, perfect balance of democratic, high-flying ball movement, pace. and then when it needed to be, it's the Jalen Brunson show down the stretch of games. They alternated beautifully between Brunson as the conductor and the guy who starts and ends possessions

and just some of those. And then they could flip into some of those ball movement possessions that look like the 2014 spurs. And then they could flip into, we're just going to push the ball down your throat with Josh Hart leading the break after rebounds. They just found the exact right balance of all of their identities combining it to one like meta identity. I'm a believer. I'm a believer. I'm a believer, but I'm also a realist with the idea that in this era of the NBA, nobody repeats. And so I just don't expect anybody to repeat anymore. So if I pick against them, it's not even going to be an indictment of the NICs.

It's more of just a, I don't expect continuity in this league anymore or the ability to repeat. It's hard. And, you know, I was looking this up the other day for a different show, but like Brunson, Bridges and Hart are all in the top seven in minutes over the last three seasons. And Brunson in particular has just carried such a heavy load for them. I do worry about just kind of the attrition factor here as well. But we'll see. Nothing will surprise me. Then they go back to the finals. That's a perfectly reasonable prediction. But there's a lot of good teams in the East. I will say they won the championship with minimal postseason stress. And in some cases, minimal postseason minute stress because so many of the games were blowouts in the

middle two rounds. None of them are old. They now have a lot of experience playing together. The bench is a little uncertain and obviously everyone is watching Deuce McBride's situation to see, does he get extended? Does he get traded? Is he going to be on this team for the financial stuff that we're talking about? There's the Drummond situation. But between Clarkson, Alvarado, Shamit, Diawara, Kolek, they got probably enough to get through the regular season and hopefully not overdo it because they know what they are. And even their floor as a regular season team given just like average health should be safe from any like uh-oh are we in danger of not being in the top four or five in the east and slipping into the play and as deep as the east is

i like the next uh let's do some other fun stuff uh i said part of our homework was to we're going to start picking awards i already had my most improved player picks uh with moat de keel a few weeks ago i haven't done any we're going to do two today we're going to do coach of the year and six man of the year. I want to start with Coach of the Year. I didn't ask you to make a full ballot. I just asked you to make a pick. I don't know what you did. I don't know how many people you considered. I considered just about every goddamn coach in the league because the award is so weird. Howard Beck, your prediction for the 2026, 2027 coach of the year. And some of you take us through your thought process of it. All right. So I had 11 guys that I narrowed it down to and there was like eight others that I considered.

Coach of the Year, we know how this goes. Usually it's going to be somebody whose team exceeded expectations, or if they had a team with less talent, we didn't really see it was going to pop. Degree of difficulty, if they had like a young roster, a challenging roster, egos, whatever, to manage, all that kind of stuff. Occasionally, it's the coach of a great talented team that's already established, and they actually match or exceed expectations, but usually it's exceeding expectations. The other thing I kind of looked up out of curiosity, it's pretty much minimum 46 wins, like more, and more likely high 40s to 50s. If you're anywhere below 46, very, very hard to do.

last one with 41 wins back in 99, 2000. So no matter how good of a job they do, you are disqualifying, Tuamos Isolo, Jordi Fernandez, other guys that you could- Doug Christie. All right, how it's settled down. It's not ridiculous here. Guys who, even if their teams are young and frisky and exceed their upside, are probably going to be below that level of wins.

Yeah, especially when we're predicting it. It's not even like predicting my own ballot. It's like this is just the reality of what the award is. Also, nobody ever repeats in this one, and you rarely even see a guy get it twice in a two, three or five year span. So no, no, no, Mozilla, no Atkinson, no Dagnol, no, no Mike Brown. So I have, you, you had assigned me to do three. I did.

Okay, so I forgot my own assignment. I actually already forgot who I picked for most improved player, to be completely honest with you. Do you want just my top one? We're going to go back. No, go three, go three, two, one. One, suspense. Build the suspense. All right.

Number three on the fictional way too early ballot. Eric Spolster of the Miami Heat. Never won it famously. Has never won it. And you're still hating on him, putting him on 30. You're a Spohater. That's fine. Own it.

Who's number two? He did share the Coaches Association inaugural version of their Coach of the Year award with Mike Dantone back in 2017. But he's never won the one voted on by the media. You want number two? Yes. At number two, from the Utah Jazz, Will Hardy. He's going to be a trendy pick.

He's going to be a trendy pick. I'm afraid that my top pick is actually going to be stupidly trendy, but it was so obvious that I just, I had to. Darko Ryakovich of the Toronto Raptors. No, not that obvious. Not that trendy. No, I'm upset because I also picked Dark Hariakovic, is my predicted coach of the year.

Here's what he has going against him. And Spall actually has the same thing going against him, is that if the Raptors exceed expectations, how much of the credit is given to Kauai Leonard as the new player edition slash Janus as the new player edition. But I also think the Raptors flew so under the radar last year. Yes. The casual fans and even casual voters were like,

oh wait, the Raptors are the playoffs? What, what, Jacoby Walter? Is his name? Who is? Jamal's? Sheed, shed, shed, it's pronounced shed, that if they won like 52 games this year, there would just be, everybody would get a lot of credit, including Darko O'Rakovich. And I can see them winning almost that amount of games, although 52 is going to be a lot this year, given the fact that the dregs of the league are going to be less dregsy because of the tanking rolls. I didn't even follow my own assignment to do a top three, but I'll do one now anyway.

First of all, I do think it's sad and an indictment on how this award. award is voted on that you just fast forwarded past and justifiably so given history like you disqualified kenny akinson who won the award two seasons ago you disqualified mark dagonal who won the award three seasons ago uh who may again sit atop the team with the best record in the purposes of the exercise disqualified doesn't mean i won't vote for them next april no howard be announced he will not be voting for mark dagonel uh for coach of the year like Mitch Johnson probably won't even be considered because the spurs are already too good. They already made the finals.

He was the top of my ballot last season. I voted for him number one. Anyway. Mike Brown, you mentioned he won it four seasons ago on a different team. By the way, only the Kings. Just another underrated subplot of Kings incompetence that I was reminded of when I was doing

this exercise is like in my head. I was like, it's not fair to like Mike Brown, Knicks win the championship. He didn't win coach of the year last year. Now they're champions. The way this award is voted on, They'd have to win like 75 games for him to win it this year.

Poor guy. He's not going to win. Oh, he won coach in the year for the Kings and they fired his ass. What a stupid team. Stupid ass team. J.B. Bickerstaff has come close multiple years. The Pistons are probably like too good now. Like if they won 60 games,

they're like, oh, the Pistons just did what they do again or 58 games. So I came down to Darko Ryakovich, Eric Spolstra, I wanted to put Esolo in there because I'm kind of high on the Grizzlies, but they're not going to win enough games. And I guess if you've forced me to pick a third one, I would pick, I think I might say JJ Redick, because I think the Lakers are going to win a lot of games this year. They've totally revamped their team. He tends to squeeze like a functional defense out of parts that don't look like they should add up to a functional defense. He's got some interesting rotation questions to answer in terms of like, who starts a power forward,

what's the bench rotation, is Cam Carr ready for minutes? off the bench, who's the backup five, how does that all work? So I would say him, I'm just going to say some other names just to say them, okay? Yeah. Oh, another guy whose team has probably been too good, Emeo Doka's window to win this award probably closed. Like, oh, so what the Rockets 150, whatever games, that's what they did. He and JJ were both on my longer list.

Will Hardy, you mentioned. Quinn Snyder, my pick last year, jinxed him and the Hawks for the first 55 games in the seasons. I'm staying away from him. Charles Lee, I think the Hornets will be a little bit worse in terms of wins this year, but they're set up long term to go like gangbusters. And that last year was kind of the Charles Lee year. Musula won it last year. Nick Nurse, if I had, if I just feel like the Sixers are going to be weird. And that doesn't mean I don't think they're going to be good.

They're going to be a playoff team and maybe a damn good playoff team. And if they are, if they win 50 to 55 games, I think he's going to be right at the top of the list. I just think the injuries and the lineup uncertainty, which should actually argue in his favor for like cobbling it all together. It's just going to be funky. Sean Sweeney, new coach factor. I don't think the magic are going to win like that many more games or look that different, but perhaps I'm wrong. Rick Carlisle, retroactive credit for the Pacers finals run if the Pacers turn into an elite team again. Jordan Ott almost won it last year. I just see Phoenix kind of being the same. Chris Finch just never gets enough love for this.

Ty Lou charity votes, like pity votes, like, hey, here's some pity votes for you in this situation. And also pity votes. Mike Anori, like, hey, we'd like you to get a multi-year contract, like an adult coach, like a growing up coach in the growing up league. Those are my other names. I will go with Darko Rakovich as well. Let's take another break.

And then we'll do a tough award to project Howard Beck, because part of picking sixth man of the year is figuring out if certain players that you'd like to pick are actually going to be eligible for six men of the year or end up starting too many games to be eligible. There's some tricky cases that we'll do that when we come back. Calculating route to avoid seeing poverty. Turn left to bypass the unhoused youth sleeping on the street. Then keep right to skip by the lines of people waiting for food. Steer clear of the crowded shelter turning people away, then take the next exit. Let's stop looking away and get in the way of rising poverty. Your donations help the United Way fight poverty in thousands of ways,

like providing food, shelter, and crisis prevention. Donate today at United WayGT.org. Where some see heroes and others see egos, Bloomberg sees the era of billionaire athletes. While others follow the noise, we follow the money. Learn more at Bloomberg.com. Okay, your homework, which I actually remember and did myself for six men of the year, was much like I do for Most Improved.

Pick a chalky six man of the year candidate that you would pick to win and pick an under the radar six man of the year candidate that like if four different variables flipped right, you could actually see them being in the proverbial conversation, which usually means you finish like eighth, but you're in the conversation. I have a couple candidates for that too, but I will. let you lead with your chalky six minute of your pick. My chalky pick, you know, it's funny because I did not look up like the odds or anything, and I have to imagine he's very high in these. He's going to, I would imagine a popular pick, but DeMar de Rosen, now of the Denver Nuggets, feels like a very

chalky pick to me. Nuggets are going to be almost, I don't want to say a top four team in the West automatically because they've lost some stuff and the West is tough. But they're like a 50-win team as long as Yokic is Yokic. That makes DeMard de Rosen at least relevant, because the one, one rule I do after six man, you have to be on a good team. Like, you can't be on a bad team. If you're a bad team, being a great six man is irrelevant. They're going to be a good team, good to great team. He's presumably coming off the bench for the first time, full time in his career. 18th year in the league, he's a pro's pro. I think it's an easy transition for him. He can basically back up four positions. He can handle the ball as a kind of de facto point something. We like sixth men who can

score traditionally. He can still score. 18 points a game last season for a godawful team. Still elite in the mid range. Very good passer and playmaker. This is weird. His effective field goal percentage the last seven years is actually higher than it was in his first 10. He's gotten better with age and he's durable as hell. So I think Demartre Rosen is almost an easy pick for six man of the year at this stage. Do you consider yourself a pros, pro, Howard? Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. Like, like, like, Marr, I am a veteran who is far closer to the end of the beginning. I, okay, with the gray's to show for it.

Good for you. I'm not often shocked on my own podcast these days anymore, Howard Beck. But this pick legitimately shocked me. Really? I don't even have Demar DeRosen's name written down on my long list of any type of candidate for this award. And you're right. that when he wins it that i i would be blown away and he did average 18 points a game 22 the year before that 24 the year before that he's never come off the bench really in his career ever in his career i mean he has like as a rookie he came off the bench 12 times whatever um and actually

i'm looking at it none since then every single appearance since his rookie year is the start so i and he's going to be on a good team i should have had him on the list i just he hasn't played on a good team in quite a while. I'm really worried about his defensive limitations, obviously, his age and how he fits with Jamal Murray. So I did not even have him. By the way, I'm looking at my bookshelf because I never talked about it. I wanted to have him on. He wrote quite a good book about his life and his career, DeRosen did, called Above the Noise, highly recommended to fans of his. Interviewed him about it on the Real On the Real Ons Pod a couple years ago when it came out. I see. I'm too late to do the book, the book tour. Demar, if you want to do like a bump your sales up

two years later, book tour appearance, I'm around. That's a good pick. That's a good pick. I'm going to go way chalkier than that. I'm going to go with Dylan Harper because I just think Dylan Harper is incredible. I think he is still penciled in as a reserve as long as Dier and Fox is there. I think everyone's just going to have to be okay with that, including people like me who would like to see Dylan Harper unleashed for like 38 minutes a game to see how many points and he would score and how many of ridiculous moves he would pull off. I will go with Dylan Harper.

Would you like to hear some other names that I considered in the chalky category? Yeah, but can I, can I, a quick question on your Dylan Harper pick because I considered him heavily. We had this discussion on, I'm trying to remember if it was the pod we did with Jason Concepcion or the one with Tyler Parker, which hasn't dropped yet. But we joked about the spurs are going to have to have the speech, the, you know, the, the Mono Genobli speech where they put a big thing up on the wall and they show his photo and his career stats and whatever and all the rings and the championships to try to convince Dylan Harper to be patient and do this. are they flipping this around and making that speech to D.R. and Fox where they decide, no, no, Dylan Harper's got to be the starter now. And so I steered away from the Spurs because I actually couldn't decide. I mean, I think D.E.R. Fox is probably starting. But I actually think there's an interesting conversation there from now until the moment when they eventually

flip, whenever that happens, whether it's this season or a year from now. And so I kind of struggle with that one a little bit and I put it to the side. There certainly is an interesting conversation. I considered it and picked Dylan Harper anyway. It's certainly possible that he ends up being ineligible. I just, I'm going with inertia and Deeran Fox's stance. The other, I mean, this is going to, if he does come off the bench for a majority of his appearances and is considered a six man, this could be like an absolutely loaded field of six men, even with Nas Reid graduating out and into his starting rule. AJ Mitchell is the other obvious one, assuming again, that Kays and Wallace is the starter there along with J. Dub, the two centers and Shay.

Who knows what could happen? Like one injury and all of a sudden, AJ Mitchell starts and never gives up the position again. Peyton Pritchard is mostly being around, when you read people projecting Boston's rotation, pencilling him in as a starter. And I get that because they need secondary ball handling around Tatum and with Paul George. George being less of that kind of player as the ages. Derek White's still around. I can see a world where Peyton Pritchard comes off the bench again for a good part of the season. I don't know what's going to happen there.

I owed to Sumnu is just a stud off the bench. Again, could start if the comminga experiment goes bad. Drew Holiday is just Drew Holiday. Awesome basketball player currently slated to come off the bench. I'd put him at the top of a list of a bunch of candidates with the Blazers, including Time Lord. I think Tim Hardaway, Jr., who had a case last year, is going. going to be a force off the bench for Miami. Dennis Jenkins for Detroit, still in need of a secondary ball handler.

That's him. He was awesome last year. And I think, again, another case of are they going to start at some point and are they going to start too many games, totally different kind of candidate, just look out for Colin Murray Boyles. Like, I just can't tell you how excited I am for Colin Murray Boyles in year two. I've already mentioned that wouldn't shock me if the Raptor, you know, but I'm going to shock me if the Raptors have a come to Jesus moment about is he actually our starting center? Are we going to

lean into like total switchability and a little bit of small ball? And that lineups with him and Scottie and no Pertil actually rebounded quite well. That's the number one. I think rebounding and rib protection is what you worry about, not playing Pertil. But I would go Dylan Harper. Okay. That's my list of chalk, you guys. Who is your under the radar wild just for fun six man to your candidate? I mean, you mentioned a couple of them. Um, I ruled out AJ Mitchell because I'm not sure if, like, is there six-man AJ Mitchell? Is it, is it, is it, is it like, there's a lot, like, that's still such a deep bench that I feel like they take votes away from each other. I think when you consider minutes and how they protect Caruso that way and just, I just think A.J.

Mitchell is way better than Jared McCain or is, we'll do more than Jared McCain. I think I get your point, but I just think Caruso never plays enough to really get consideration. Yeah. kicked around a bunch of others. I mentioned Dennis Jenkins was on my deeper list. I ultimately, when you set under the radar, I try to follow your instructions, but you know, I sometimes get a little overly creative here. Well, my radar is broken, Howard. My radar, people would look at my radar system and be like, you have issues with what you consider under your radar.

Maybe my radar covers so much that nothing is under it or it's just malfunctioning. I hope I don't knock you out of your chair with this one. Because any team with LeBron James on it is, I think, A, going to win a lot of games and B, get a lot of attention. Is it crazy to think there's a Contavius Caldwell Pope revival in Philadelphia? Oh, I thought you were going to say Anthony Simons. He would be my pick of Sixers, bench players, just because I think he'll score and handle it a lot more. I thought about him. I even thought about Dean Wade, but I went with Contavius called Will Pope.

I'm not going to do the jingle. Jingle needs about a six-month waiting period before I do it again. My issue with Simons or anybody on the Sixers is I just think even with Embed sitting out this game, LeBron sitting out that game, they just have Maxie and Jalen Brown are such Iron Man like on ball forces that play like every game that if, you know, one of those guys, Embed or LeBron is also playing. I just don't know how many stats are going to be available and then you throw an edgecom who's also an Ironman. I just don't know how many numbers are going to be available. I'm going to get real wild with you for my pick. Well, do you want to say any other nominees for this? The other one I was going to mention, if you had just knocked KCP off the deck and said,

no, give me something better. I was going to actually go with Colin Murray Boyles, who you've already mentioned. But he was my other, like, I don't know how far off the radar he is. Man, he's going to smash your fucking radar against the backboard. Yeah, no, he's awesome. I love him. If he doesn't end up becoming the starter, I think he's a great candidate for this. I'm going to go wild.

My pick for under the radar six man of the year candidate is Sam Merrill. And I picked Sam Merrill because I don't even know how many points the average last year. It probably was not very enough to be in consideration for this award. I'm going to guess like 8.7 or something. No, 13 a game last year. 13. 42% on threes on seven per game or like, 10 per 36 minutes, whatever it is.

Just shoots a shit ton of threes. Completely changes the whole look and feel of the Cavaliers whenever he enters the game. They're a little bit thin on the bench. It's like him. And I think Jalen Tyson is another guy I considered actually for this award. Sometimes I forget that, you know, we'll see if Malik Thomas gives them any minutes.

I kind of like Proctor and Craig Porter Jr., but Kenny Atkinson doesn't seem like him like. Sometimes I forget Mario Hizonia is involved again. I'm just delighted. as an adjacent Croatian to have Mario Hizonia back in my life. But I just think Sam Merrill is going to get a lot of playing time. He meshes super well with Donovan Mitchell, but pretty much anybody because he's just a roving shooter.

And there, I could see the Watson plus two bigs combo being a little shaky offensively for a good chunk of the season. And Kenny Atkinson just hitting the Sam Merrill Lucinar spacing button really hard. And like wake up like, oh, Sam Merrill is that. averaging 15 a game and the calves are plus 12 per 100 possessions with him on the floor under the radar candidate. My other candidates for this were Jalen Tyson. Trey Jones, the Bulls won't be good enough.

Stephen Adams probably won't play enough, but boy, does he revolutionize the Rockets? Colin Gillespie, unless he starts over Jalen Green at some point. You know, Memphis just probably has too many guys. But I think everyone has just kind of forgotten that Jeremy Grant is, on the Grizzlies. And whatever you think of Jeremy Grant and his apparent allergy to rebounding and his kind of step back in defense since his peak in Denver, the guy can score. He scores like 20 a game. He shoots three as well. I don't know if he's, I have no idea if he's going to come off the bench or start for the Grizzlies. I have been penciled in as a backup. He's an interesting

name. And my other sneaky under the radar one that I almost picked was Neemius Keda, who was the most improved player candidate for the Celtics last year. And I think we'll probably slide in as Mitchell Robinson's backup. I like the idea of starting Mitchell Robinson, A, because he's better than Neme Keta and B, you miss out on the Hackamich strategy that way because they won't be in the bonus as much with him on the floor. So those are my, what do you think of my candidates? Like those. There were a couple others I thought you might mention.

Reed Shepard? I thought the Rockets have him, probably Ysin, a couple other guys, Stephen Adams. I just think Adams is the most impactful. of those guys. But yeah, I mean, Reed Shepard could get back in this conversation for sure. You're high on the Lakers. What about Colin Sexton? I just don't think he'll school.

I just, he's a sort of central casting six man in the year guy. I'm just between Reeves and Luca, someone out there is going to be above him in the ball handling hierarchy a lot. But yeah, he's a good candidate too. I'm surprised you didn't mention your guy,

Pellie Larson. Or Bobby Portis. Like the Miami guys, I couldn't quite figure out. I threw both of them on the longer list. I mentioned Tim Hardaway Jr. I think of all their bench guys. He's going to be more of a classic sixth man of the year candidate than Pella Larson, who I love. And I'm still not sure I love that deal, but I like him as a player.

And then Terrence Shannon was the other one I had thrown down. The Wolves bench, I just other. But see, you can only have one guy. You can't have two guys. It's not seventh man of the year. So I had I. I know. And I just qualified everybody else.

But what if it's a Jaden McDaniels at the four? because they don't trust Cominga and I was a starter. That was the way I was kind of looking at them. Very possible. I like, I'm excited for Terrence Chan, Jr., so I respect that. Okay, a couple other pieces of business before we leave. The Lakers announced today that they're legendary, incredible public address announcer, iconic, iconic voice, Lawrence Tanter, has passed away.

I, like, I don't think minimalism has ever been. more welcome and more effective in NBA artistry than Lawrence Tanter made it for the Lakers. Somehow the minimalist baritone meshed with the Hollywood glitziest franchise in the NBA perfectly. His voice always said to me, first of all, it's classic and it sounds great. And I don't have to do any more to make the Lakers look good and sound good because my voice is awesome. and the rest of the work is being done for me. I'm not going to be a big part of the show. I'm just going to talk like I talk,

and that's actually going to mesh perfectly. And it did. And I don't even know, I don't know how they, I mean, obviously it's a PA announcer that will replace him, but the whole look and sound of the game and the starting intros is going to take a lot to get used to. You covered the Lakers for a long time. You probably know Lawrence much better than I do.

Any thoughts, memories? Truly sad about this one. we knew he wasn't in good health. And when I saw the news this morning, it's like I wasn't surprised. This felt like it was coming, but still, it's just still, it hit hard. Just like, just a wonderful dude, just a great guy to be around. And every time I've been back there since I left LA 20 something years ago, he's one of the first people I would seek out in the Chick-Huron press room to just go say hello to and get a nice warm hello. There aren't that many people left organizationally. It's basically like him and Jeannie Bus at this stage, maybe a few security cards at what used to be called Staples Center.

You said it. Like he was, I feel like I would describe him as a PA announcer as like old school in the best way possible. He wasn't a shouter. He wasn't a cheerleader. It wasn't a, he had no look at me signature call. It wasn't about him. He just did the job. And the reason you noticed him at all is because he was distinctive and original without trying to be.

Right. And some of that is just the natural God-given baritone that he has and the way he deployed it. He was also, if folks don't know this, he was a DJ on jazz radio, which like, duh, of course he was. Like, with that voice and that delivery, how could he be anything other than the guy delivering like smooth jazz, you know, that 7 in the morning or something, right? Like, it just, he made it seem effortless. There is a somewhat signature called in his Laker Girls call, which everybody always gravitates toward because it's almost humorous. But what I loved about him was that you could tell the tenor of the game

by the tenor of LT's voice. So he didn't have to shout and he didn't have to like, you know, deride the opposition as some PA guys, modern PA guys sometimes do with it. There's a little sneer in there sometimes. But he would do this. If Kobe has scored several in a row, it's going to be, you know, the first time it's like Kobe Bryant. And the next time might be Kobe Bryant. Like you can hear like, oh my God, he's on a run just by the way he would deliver each successive call.

And then the flip side of this is when he did have to deal with the opposition being on a role. Jay Adonda and I joke about this one all the time because I'll never forget this. It was my early years on the Laker B. The Jazz are just kicking the shit out of them and Crom alone's going off. And the first time he scores, it might be. Carl Malone. And then the second time he scores, it's Carl Malone. And then by like the fifth basket in a row or in a short span, it's Carl Malone.

And it's almost like this somebody, like it be subtle, the subtext there is like, somebody please guard this motherfucker. Like somebody do something like this guy. And it was so subtle, but it's there. And I love the way he did it. I love the way he carried himself. and just an all-ground, great human being. I said this on social media earlier,

just class act from start to finish. He will be missed, and I will never forget the time that for whatever reason, the Lakers did not provide him transportation to a preseason game in Bakersfield, which is several hours from Los Angeles. And so he hitched a ride with me in my tiny little Honda Civic hatchback.

LT is like, I don't know, six, six, six, six, seven. He's a big, he's a tall dude. Him folding himself into the passenger seat of my little Honda Civic SI hatchback was something. I can't remember what we talked about on that very long drive back and forth, but love that I got to spend time around him back in the day. So rest in peace, L.T. I also have a Honda Civic. Good car.

Good car. On Lawrence Tanter. You know, his voice is cool in that smooth, like, almost like Billy D. Williams. kind of way that you just either have it or you don't. We don't. He does. And I think he had such a self-awareness of the Lakers are cool. And the Lakers as a basketball team during showtime, as the Laker girl team, as Jerry Buss up in the club with all the celebrities and the women, are cool in very loud and overt ways. And Lawrence Tanner knew he was cool in a very subtle, sonorous way. And that's all the cool that the Lakers needed because they,

had the overt glitzy kind of cool. He gave them the other kind of cool. And look, I'm not naming names. Some of these PAA announcers today, their call of a home three-pointer is like 15 seconds long and still going while like the other team comes and scores the basket. Just like it's it doesn't, it's the second quarter of a game in December. Like let's chill out a little bit.

By the way, one of my career highlights was when NBA today with Malikin Andrews debuted, the very first episode was me, Chenet. Perk and RJ and Malika, obviously. And one of the gimmicks they had for the first episode, we were considered the core of the team. It's not worked out for one member of that core. I've got to remember which one is not there anymore. But one of the gimmicks they had was they got Lawrence Tanter

to come in studio that day and introduce us like the starting five. So it was like from the University of Arizona at 6-7, this guy played whatever years in the NBA, Richard, and then they got to me. and of course I'm 5-11 in three-quarters and did not play in the NBA. So we had to come up with things to say about me. But having Lawrence Tanter introduce me, all-time career highlight. That is amazing. Can I give you one more quick anecdote from Adande because he posted this on Instagram earlier.

Yes. So Adande was doing a radio interview. I think he was when he was doing something for NPR. And so he interviewed LT about, LT, about, you know, the job and all the years. And so he's, Adonde writes, I started by asking him how he would announce, he would announce his own name. He wouldn't do it. Quote, that's a little too self-indulging, he said. I'm not worthy of that kind of acumen. I mean, like, that's, like, that's LT. Like, he was so happy in his role and understood his role. And, like, even for the sake of a radio interview,

where it's like, oh, how would you announce your own name? Like, he's just not going to do it. It's about the players. It's about the team. It's about the Lakers. It was never look at me. I, you know, I don't, Chusky at the Garden, by the way. Great. All-timer. And the way he announced it, his thing is basket, who scored the basket, and what's the score of the game? And he does it so fast. Like Carmelo Anthony, Nick 76, 74. Right. And he does have a little bit more flourish, maybe, you know, the Carmelo Anthony. Like, there's a flourish there. But again, it's not about him. And he's not trying to

rile the crowd or anything else. Like, too many of these PA guys, I think have become cheerleaders and it's a different version and I sound like a fucking grumpy old man so be it um i just always appreciate the way that l team and mike waltchuski have done the job and you know it's too much to ask for anybody else to try to replicate that now in the era that we're in and i i certainly do not envy whoever the lakers have tabbed and i don't even know i'm sure it's out there somewhere but i don't even know who they've tapped to replace him but um mike of some big shoes. Mike, of course, does some voice work for the Hoop Collective podcast, which makes me very jealous because I know Mike is the listener of this show too, and he's an

awesome, awesome dude. And like amazing at his job. And I'm glad you brought up his name because also, yeah, similarly like, we're not the show. And our voices are awesome and they do the work for us. Last thing, I want to shout out Nick Batum, who in a very moving nine minute video this week announced his retirement from basketball and announced his retirement on the same day. to the day that his father passed away while playing basketball at a game that Nick Batum was at as a kid. And he picked a day very intentionally. He's been on this podcast before, played for a bunch of teams. I think people we mostly know him as a blazer, but he went to Charlotte and bounced around a little bit after that, Philly, Clippers, et cetera.

All like an awesome, awesome role player and just a super beloved teammate. always great to see Nick on the road and you would always catch up and say hello and a couple other notes. When Chris Ryan and I did our draft last year of favorite teams to not make the NBA finals, I think it was the 14-15 Blazers were on my list, a team that just sort of magically coalesced into more than some of its parts before West Matthews towards Achilles. Nick Batume was like an apex glue guy at that point in his career. point number two.

Did you see a court of gold on Netflix to doc about the 2024 Olympics? No, I still have not watched it. Highly, highly recommended. And one of the absolute best moments of it is they're in the locker room with team. There's an episode devoted to the French team. Obviously, Wembe is the highlight of that. But they're in the locker room with the French team at half time of the game. I don't remember which one it was and they're not playing well.

And Nick Batum is the veteran leader of the team, a team that I think he probably, if you asked him, like what team that you played on means the most to you as a team. I think he would say the French national team. You see a side of him in this documentary that you just have not seen at any point in the NBA where he is lighting up the team. Not in like a, he's just sitting at his locker, kind of raising his voice and telling it like it is that they're playing like crap.

And then he did, it's like, whoa, Nick Batum is getting serious. Number three, Howard Beck, Nick Patum famously, one of the only players in NBA history where they five by five game five points five assists five rebounds five blocks and five steals all in the same game he had 11 points five rebounds 10 assists five blocks and five steals in a 2012 game against the new orleans hornets Howard back trivia time I'm putting you on the spot in recorded statistical history remember the NBA did not track blocks and maybe not even steals until like after bill in the 70s at some point they start tracking it so no bill russell no wilt etc so in that recorded

history. There have been 24 5 by 5 games. Nick Batum has won. There is one player with six, by far the all-time lead in 5-by-5 games. Howard Beckwell, give you three guesses. Can you guess who that player is? My first guess would be Andre Carolinko. He is second all-time with three five-by-five games. The number of guys who could actually get, I mean, the five blocks, five steals part of it. In fact, I'm looking at it now. I think of these 24 games, and again, like even part of Karim's career is not covered here, I think there are only three guys on the list with more than one.

Kerolenko, this player that I'm trying to get you to guess who has six, and then one other player has two. Is it Akim Alajuan? Akeem Olajuwon, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, six, five by five games, the all-time lead. The other player with the one with two is probably going to break this record because it's Victor Wembe Dama already has two.

The most unlikely one, I got to go back and watch this game. Jamal Tinsley had five blocks and six steals as a pacer for in a doubt's double overtime. And in fact, of these 24 games, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven have gone into overtime.

Three of those have gone into double overtime. But still, how is Jamal Tinsley getting six blocks in a game. That's a bizarre one, but Nick Batum has one and Wembeiyama has two. And congratulations, you win. Nothing for getting Hakeem Olaudey one on the second guest. Does Kevin Durant ever done it? Kevin Durant.

I'll just do. Kareem won, Batum one, Marcus Camby one. Derek Coleman got up for five blocks once. Anthony Davis just won. Vlad de Vosch one. Dr. J has one. George Gervin. Draymond, Green, only one.

George Johnson won. Yusuf Nurkich relatively recently got one. Nerkich. 2019. The Admiral has won Tinsley and then two for Wimbunyama. Wow. I bet Wembewemidiyama is going to crack double figures in this. Yeah.

All right, Howard Beck, what do we got coming up from you? You wrote a piece about ownership and the soul of the NBA recently. What else have we got coming? We do have a new Real Ones pod up now with special cameo from the one and only Jason Concepcion, joining Logan and me to talk about hot takes. We all had one hot take for every team in the NBA. That's the first part of our kind of pre-pre-pre-training camp preview. And we've got more coming.

I think it's a two-parter with Tyler Parker in which we went best and worst-case scenarios for all 30 teams. So those are a lot of fun. So those are both coming on the Ringer MBA show channel. So like what's the worst case scenario for the Kings? That was tough. That was like the best case scenario like, four. 13th in the West and worst case 15th in the West. So you're being serious.

Like Tyler Parker is a hilarious guy. Like I could see worst case scenario like relegation or something. Oh, and 82. But you guys kept it serious. We're like, no, worst case scenarios, they're 15th. Mostly. We may have gone off the rails here and there. But yeah, some of those were harder to discern than others.

And I'll have some more stuff coming at the ringer.com sometime in the next couple of weeks. Howard Beck, thank you. You are our pros, pro. We will see you next time. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Zach. All right, that's it. For today's edition of The Zach Lowe Show,

and for us this week, we'll be back next week. As usual, thanks to Howard Beck for his time. Thanks, as always to Mike, Billy, and Jonathan on production. They're the best. Thanks to you all for listening to and or watching the Zach Lowe Show. We'll be back next week. 21 or over and President Select States for Kansas

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