The Zach Lowe Show - Luka and Wemby Injured! Awards and Western Conference Playoffs Impact.

Episode Date: April 7, 2026

Zach is joined by Rob Mahoney to discuss how Victor Wembanyama's and Luka Doncic’s injuries affect postseason awards and the Western Conference playoffs. Plus, they dissect what’s gone wrong in Chicago, dive into the Bucks-Giannis dysfunction, and compare their all-rookie teams. (0:00) Welcome to The Zach Lowe Show! (2:09) Rob Mahoney joins the show! (3:14) Victor Wembanyama leaves game with bruised rib (11:37) All-defense team picks (18:48) All-NBA team picks (38:21) No timetable for Luka’s return (43:27) How to navigate the Western Conference playoffs (54:22) Inside the Bucks and Giannis dysfunction (1:07:04) Chicago Bulls disarray continues (1:17:52) All-rookie teams Host: Zach Lowe Guest: Rob Mahoney Producers: Mike Wargon, Jonathan Frias, and Billy Gil Social: Keith Fujimoto #ULTRACourtside could get you closer to the game! https://michelobultra.com/courtside MICHELOB ULTRA®️ COURTSIDE ’25 to ’26. No Purchase Necessary. Open to US residents 21 plus. Begins on October 1, 2025 and ends on June 30, 2026 Multiple entry periods. See Official Rules at https://michelobultra.com/courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details. The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Mickelope Ultra. Playoff season is here. So what better way to get into the spirit of things that with a tournament of your own? Compete to see who can make the best tip. Test your basketball skills with the game of around the world. Even better if Mickelope Ultra is on the line, especially since they're giving fans a chance to win courtside tickets,

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And a lot of it is depressing and 65 game rule related. Victor Wembeyanma, bruised rib, left the game. last night, San Antonio Philly. He needs to play in one more game to be eligible for like every award imaginable. This is the most impactful awards injury, maybe in the history of the NBA. Knock on wood, hopefully he can sneak in and it's not anything more than a bruised rib. That typically is like a weak recovery. Luca is headed to Europe to try to speed up his recovery from calf issues to be ready for some point in the playoffs whenever that would be. Austin Reeves' timetable, a little more set in stone.

Luca may appeal his ineligibility for All-NB. We're like running out of people. There's a new Yannis story. You'll never believe it, but the honest situation is even messier than we've previously known. Rob Mahoney's going to talk about all that. We're going to debate in his all-MBA, all-Rookie, all-defense picks that he made on group chat

the other day. We're going to revise them in light of all of this spate of injuries. We're going to talk playoff seedings mania. Who wants the third seat in the West? Five to ten in the East is still a complete mess with a bunch of head-to-head matchups left to go. More awards talk, more playoff talk. It's all coming up on the Zach Lowe show with Rob Mahoney.

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Call 1-88-7-8-9-777, or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut. Welcome to the Zach Lowe Show. It's Tuesday morning. Holy crap, there's a lot going on in the NBA. Rob Mahoney is here to help us sort it out. How you doing, Rob? I'm doing great. My head is spinning.

I'm living in spreadsheets. I'm trying to determine what an eligible game even means these. days. You know, we're thriving, Jack. Or Zach. I like that you almost call me by the wrong name. Straight up. Out of the gate. What am I doing? Did you go Jack or Josh? I fumbled the consonant and jacked it.

So there's a thing and I don't know why or what where if my name, if someone calls me by the wrong name, 80% of the time it's Josh. And I have mentioned this to a few other Zachs in the world. And when I mentioned it to them, they were like, oh, my God, I feel seen. I feel understood. It's always Josh. There's something phonetically about those two names. Anyway, that's just an interesting concept for linguists out there listening to the podcast.

I think about it all the time. We had like four different ways to start this podcast. And then Victor Wenbighama left last night's game against the Sixers, yet another Spurs win with a rib contusion. He needs to play one more game. 20 minutes to be eligible for, let's see, MVP, defensive player of the year, first team all NBA, first team all defense, theoretically most improved player. Just throw that on there. Yeah. And like, good luck deciphering this because you get two games where you can play between 15 and 20 minutes in those count. Oh, by the way, you won't see this in his game log, but he played in the NBA Cup championship game. And that does count. So when you look up his stats, his stats aren't even right. And you have to add that. what the fuck are we doing with this 65 game rule? We have this slew of guys. Cade's gone.

Luca is going to appeal because he's going to finish it. Whatever. What is he? At 64 games and he missed two for the birth of his child. A third for suspension. We'll talk about that later. Anthony Edwards not eligible. I'm just running out of guys.

I'm running out of guys. And I don't like running out of guys. But this one, look, I was texting with our buddy, Jeff Stocks, who runs in street clothes last night. average return for a bruised rib four days a game or two. So if that's all it is, you better believe he's going to play 21 minutes in some game to get this. Now, he did warn me, Jeff did, that x-rays are really critical here because sometimes you don't see or feel like a fracture or even a minor one in your rib until you go under the x-ray. So today we'll probably learn more, knock on every piece of available material in your immediate vicinity.

But look, the awards implications here are massive. The title implications here are massive. If this does turn out to be a longer term thing, God help us. Like this would be the saddest. If this is a long-term injury, this plus Luca, I haven't felt this sad about anything since Jamal Murray tore his ACL in 2021. I think and the nuggets were absolutely rolling. And it was like clear that that was over.

But, you know, the Lakers, I just don't ever think like we're a finals, finals team, a scary team for sure. I just didn't think they could get to the finals. The spurs are a finals team. They're a 60 win team. This effectively locks them into the number two seed. There are three games behind the thunder. I don't see them going full speed with Wemby to get the number one seat and they'd need a lot of help. And, you know, the implications everywhere, but like, I'm going to be optimistic and assume that it is just a bruise rib that he does make himself awards eligible and these full go playoffs. And so like I'm going to leave the deeper, you're wearing a shirt that says existential dread.

I'm going to leave the existential championship implication to the side for a minute. Defensive player of the year, I have thought zero seconds about that award the entire season. He was probably going to win unanimously. And if he's not eligible, we're going from a situation where someone was going to win

unanimously to they can't even be on the ballot. And all the voters and non-voters like me are scrambling to be like, wait, what the full? Who's defensive player of the year now? Who would be defensive player? player of the year now. I would, I have my vote. Who would your vote be? I think my vote would probably be Chet. And I honestly

don't think I would have to comb that hard to get there. He's been so exceptional in terms of his room protection this season and obviously the Thunder defense has been so great. But just the idea that defensive player of the year would change hands this late in the game after, as you mentioned, like a pretty

much unanimous run by Wemby or a unanimous worthy run by Wemby to this point, not because of something that literally any player did, that Wemby did, that Chet did, that anybody did in terms of making actual basketball plays, but just that there might not be enough sufficient notches because of this kind of fluke injury at the last possible moment, it's just like the worst kind of plot twist. It reminds me, honestly, a lot of something that Joanne and I talk about a lot on prestige,

which is the difference between surprise and suspense, right? It's like if the last two months of the season are Wembe and Chet going back and forth, and we're constantly watching and evaluating, it's like, man, this is a tense battlefell. for a defensive player of the year. That's awesome. When it's just like, hey, guess what? There's a bomb under the seat and it just blew up. And now Chet Holmgren is the defensive player of the year.

Just distinctly less fun, I have to say. So I don't like the rule. I've never liked the rule. It should be noted that all the players unions belly aching about the rule, you can miss me with that as you had to sign off on it in collective bargaining. And you can tell it's collectively bargained because the rule has like, this is what counts as a game. And this is what counts as a season.

He's an ending injury and these are the exceptions. And here's the arbitration process that Luca may engage in, that Devin Booker may try to engage in because he has two sub 10 minute games that don't count. He's not eligible. And it's like clearly a million lawyers got in a room and made this rule and made it impossible to understand. So the union, you are, you're not blameless here. You signed off on this. You thought you were going to get some big concession.

You didn't, you got something. I don't remember what. But this is where we are. And all we got to do is like hope that this is that this is just a bruise. rib for Wemby. He did come back into the game and then got ruled out at half time. But I agree with you. I would pick Chet Holmgren. He's sort of like, I don't, I don't want to say JV. Wemby, because that's like not, that's not flattering. But he is the closest thing to Wembe that exists in that he is an Apex predator rim protector who is long enough and agile enough and that his defense does not

end there, that you feel him, not quite to the extent you feel Wembe, not quite the fear of that is all encompassing that you feel before the game even starts. When you take the ball out of bounds 94 feet away, you start planning your play or erasing plays from your playbook because Wembe is on the floor somewhere. But Chet roams around. He can switch. He's long.

He gets in your head in the same way. And their defense has been number one all season. There's something like I have it somewhere. There are plus nine per 100 possessions when he plays without Shea. And that's all defense. And if you go deeper than that, you're like, well, it's probably three point shooting luck. It's actually not. The opponent three point shooting numbers in those like Chet, no SGA minutes are pretty normal.

What's not normal is teams are shooting a laughable percentage at the rim because Chet Homgren is allowing 48% shooting on shots at the rim, which is absolutely absurd. And what's also happening in those minutes is the Thunder don't foul. That's another underrated skill of Chet Homeryd. So I would vote him too. You released your all defensive teams yesterday. Yes. I'm going to read your team. And your first team is Wembenyama, Gobert, Shet, Bam, Scotty Barnes.

Am I correct? That's correct. Second team is Asar Thompson, Derek White, Kaysen Wallace, O'GN and Obie, and Stefan Castle, which I just was so jealous of the Stefan Castle pick. I could not love that guy anymore. If I had a team that I cared about, I would want them to call the Spurs every day and just be like, we'll give you six first round.

I just want to watch this guy play. I don't even care if it's a bad trade. I just want to watch him play. And I would just feel great putting my team in his hands in a lot of different ways. Just someone who has that kind of competitive drive, who plays with that kind of physicality and energy. What is not to love about Castle at this point?

When he big boyed Aaron Gordon in the game of the year the other day? Just stop right there. A guard big boy. Aaron Gordon. And that's a real thing that happened in actual life. That's almost like a thing. That's almost like the basketball equivalent of when you and your friends in your 20s got drunk and someone dared you like, I dare you to go in the road and get hit by a car and just see what happens. Or like, we had one friend who was like, I'll bet you I can eat. This really happened. 40 deviled eggs and run around the house 20 times

and not puke. And we were like, sure, do that. I mean, that's what big boying Aaron Gordon is. Wait, hold on. You did the cool hand, Luke. You were just down there housing hard-boiled eggs? I did not do that. They were devil-eggs. I think deviled eggs are disgusting after one. One is great.

Two is, I still like it, but I sense something is wrong. Three is, this is not going to go well. That's what, and he was just like, you know what? I'll fucking do it. Aaron Gordon's there? How about this, Aaron Gordon? Unbelievable. Okay, here would be my first team.

I did this about three weeks ago. I've made some revision. Okay. My first team is Wembenyama, Chet, and Bam. We have that in common, those three in common. I have now moved to Sarr Thompson from off my ballot, like as the 11th guy, to first team all defense. I've been watching the Pistons even more closely without Cade Cunningham.

I mean, I've watched probably half their games for the season, but more, and he's just been extraordinary. I moved him to first team, and I have And Anobie on first team. And I demoted Gobert to second team. I've just watching the Timberwolves in the last month, and it's been up and down, and their defense has actually been quite good. They've had Ann Out, Jaden's out,

Nas missed a couple games. Like it's been a little bit of a train wreck. Mike Conley suddenly back in shooting threes. They had a great game there tonight. There's just been a few games where it feels like Rudy's level of engagement at the rim has not been at his peak level. To the point that Jim Peterson, their great color analyst in their last game,

I don't remember who they were playing. someone penetrated and made a floater and Rudy didn't challenge the shot. Now, you can defend it by saying he's boxing out. He's protecting against the lob. I don't remember who took the shot. And

Jim Peterson actually said, see, that's one of the shots that kind of gets under the skin of his teammates who are wondering, like, why didn't you challenge that shot? And I know Jim Pete and his connection to the team well enough that he's not saying that willy-nilly. Someone has funneled that to him, I'm guessing. And I

So, but I do have my second team is Scotty Barnes, who you had, Derek White, Rudy Gobert's second team, still there, Kason Wallace. And in the last spot where you had Castle, I had Amman Thompson before, he's out now barely. I had Jaded McDaniels before, he's out now barely. And I put Dyson Daniels in. Okay. I feel like Dyson Daniels is 95% as good defensively, 90% as good defensively as he was last year. And it's basically everything but the. insane steals numbers and the steals have come down a little bit.

I still feel like he's rock solid. He guards the best player in the other team every game. The Hawks have been the story of the second half of the season. So that would be my team with apologies to some of the aforementioned people. Can we parse a couple of differences of opinion? I guess just so we're here to do. I mean, I would love to start Scotty versus OG for first team because I love OG An Anobie. I will go to my deathbed defending OG Ananoby and talking about how much I would

love to have him as a part of basically any theoretical team. This season, and maybe this is just me clocking it on the wrong games, I feel like I've seen him get beat off the dribble a little more than I'm used to, get worked in some of these higher leverage matchups a little

more than I'm used to. And we're talking like the highest levels of defensive competition. And so he's still second team for me. But when I think about the season Scotty has had and the breadth of application that he has as a defender in terms of who he can guard and how how many plays he manages to get involved in.

The way teams seem to be like navigating around him, they are so scared of his disruption at this point. I feel like Scotty is doing a lot of the OG stuff better than OG is doing this season. And so when I was thinking about those two guys, I ended up going Barnes. I'm curious to hear your take on it. Well, I, okay, so you may be able to sway me on this because this is the one spot where I was wobbling. Because I agree with you, there's been a couple of games,

even recently where OG has not looked his air thwarted. tight to me as he did in the middle of the season. And Scotty, obviously, is a stocks monster. He's got over 100. He actually has exactly 112 steals and 112 blocks right now. And guards centers and point guards and everybody. OG is, I think, is about as versatile in the way that the Knicks use him. They have a little bit less flexibility because of what they have to do with Kat and Brunson

defensively. I think, look, and Scotty has played like 350 more minutes. So you may sway me. You may win this argument. And I may flip flop and put. Scottie and OG in first and second team, respectively. I just feel like OG's best moments on defense, he had been so destructive in terms of steals and challenges at the rim.

And I realize Scottie does the same things and just physicality and flying around getting deflections and blowing up pick and rolls that I feel like at his peak, he might have reached a little bit of a higher peak. But maybe you're right, maybe Scotty over Mormon that's been more consistently good. Raptors fans are going to like what I say about. Scottie Barnes later, but I could take it or leave it. So that's our argument. You have, we both have Bam first team.

Yep. I think that's well deserved. I'm tired of being like, oh, yeah, bam, I got to put him on second team because this guy had a million. So Bam is just A plus plus every single night. And that's all we get. Those are the only disagreements, really. Yeah, honestly, a lot of alignment.

I mean, it'll be interesting to see if Wemby isn't eligible what we end up doing defensive player of the year ballot wise. like Chet may be number one. I think, I mean, the gap between Wemby and Chet, to me, is smaller than the gap between Chet and whoever's next, whether you consider that to be Bam or Gobert or one of the Thompson's or Derek White or Scotty Barnes. And so, like, Chet feels really, really confidently number one for me.

After that, I feel like Scotty has a real case for me to, like, eke into that number three spot on the defensive player of the year ballot. That's part of the reason why, like, if I put OG there, I feel like I might get a little squeamish about it, but I feel okay putting Scotty there for some reason. I think that's fine. These are all fair arguments. You might be right about Scotty Barnes.

I might cave on that one as much as I love Andanobi. I would probably go Chet Assar Bam, one to three if Victor is not eligible. But I'm not prepared to live in that world. I don't want to live in that world where we have to redo the entire balloting process because of a rib bruising game. If it does get Assar Thompson some extra love, I'm not mad about that.

We were just talking about him on group chat in the context of who is the definitive stopper in the NBA right now. I think he's the answer. I mean, as far as the guy you least want sitting in front of you when you're trying to do anything with the ball, I just can't think of a more hellacious option

than Isar Thompson. Yeah, and he's, it was funny. I watched their game against Orlando, and I'm not going to read anything to that. It was a total mass unit for the Pistons. But, you know, he guarded Palo, he guarded Bain. He guards everybody.

And he's, I think, a little bit better like almost Peyton Watsonie and a little bit better trending down positionally towards guards and ball handlers. Because he just like straight takes the ball from people. He's got that. He's got the case and Wallace like, thanks. I'll just take it from you. Do you see the clip?

Who wasn't what? This was going around. It was not one of the games I watched when Casein Wallace stole a crossover dribble from someone while the ball was in the air. Like it was the ball didn't hit the floor and he just reached in and took it. And I was like, I don't know that I've ever. I'm not sure how. often that happens where it's like the ball wasn't in his hands, the dribbler's hands and it wasn't on the

floor. It was just mid-air in case and all-was-s, Jesus Christ, this guy. Okay, other injury news. Oh, wait, no, let's do all-NBA now. Let's do your all-NBA teams now because obviously Victor touches on this. And let's do them without Luca. Let's pretend Luca loses his appeal that's going to happen. Here were your first team all-N-Ba. So here's where we are. You and I think everyone have 30. If Luca's out and Cades out and Booker's out and Ants out and just add them all up and Wembe's in, we have 13 guys that are just flat out in.

And we can disagree over who belongs on what team, but these 13 guys are all NBA players right now. Yes. Your first team was SGA, Wembe, Yokic. We don't have to mention their names. Those they're in, if eligible. And you had Kauai Leonard. and Donovan Mitchell.

I had Victor Wembeiyama, Shea, Yokic, Donovan Mitchell, and Jalen Brown. I know the case against Jalen Brown. I've litigated it before. I understand the advanced stats will never spit out Jailen Brown. And you can, in Kauai Leonard head to head, has been a better player than Jailen Brown this season. I just think the minutes and the Celtics win totals would sway me to Jailen Brown. Reasonable Miami, he's played about 2,400 minutes in Kauai's at 9. 1900 something. Like, that's enough for me to give Jalen Brown the spot. Again, he's one of the 13.

You put him second. Yeah. I put him first. It doesn't really matter. Second, your second team was Jalen Brown, Jalen Brunson, Tyrese Maxie, Maxie, Maxie, Maxie, Kevin Durant, Jamal Murray. I have the same except Kauai, second team in you had Jailen Brown first team. So I had Kauai, Jamal Murray, Durant, Maxie, Brunson. Weavered a little bit on Brunson, but again, we're just running out of guys. And he's been outstanding the entire year and made another, I had another huge fourth quarter last night and just, did you see that at Nick's Hawks game? No. Unbelievable game. First of all, like, I think almost a proof of concept game for the Hawks, okay, even though they lost outstanding defensive performance, went toe to

toe with the Knicks team who really wanted to win the game. Both teams played kind of like playoff rotations, no Alvarado, no Diawara, no Kisper. And Nikiel Alexander Walker, I don't know if you, I don't think he quite got to 40, high 30s. Um, I just think he would be my most improved player. Yep. You don't want to reveal your choices because you're new done group chat. I think he cemented that award for me over Jalen Duren, over Ryan Rollins, over a super crowded field about standing candidates, Dennis Jenkins.

We can name 20. I just think his transformation from he's going to come off the bench and back up Tray Young to, hey, I might actually have made the All-Star team in the East if I had played like this in this much all season. I'm averaging 21 points a game. my defense hasn't slipped at all. I actually added him to my all NBA long list when I did my stats database last night.

I was like, I'm running out of guys. Let me throw this guy in the mix. Anyway, especially, I mean, when the keel, if you're putting up the numbers he's putting up offensively, and as you said, not only has he not lost a step on defense, there are nights where he gets the premier assignments over Dyson Daniels in a way that honestly

kind of makes it hard to parse both of them for all defense. They've both been so good, but they do kind of weigh against each other in certain ways, I think, in terms of just the splash they've been able to make, Nikiel's unbelievable. And I think the critical part for me is he's hit like every part

of the ascendance in a way where you can see the complete game really coming together. And my only hope is that he doesn't eventually hit like the Dejante Murray threshold where he becomes a good enough offensive player that he suddenly forgets that he should or how to play defense anymore.

It's always kind of sad for me when that happens. But Nikiel seems so motivated and so hyper-focused on even that stuff that I kind of think this is just who he's going to be. I think the way the Hawks play, and you can sense like Quinn Snyder watches them is like, this is always what I wanted. This is my, this is my fever dream. Just random pick and roll combinations, super high pace. Nobody dominates the ball, not even Jalen Johnson. I think that pushes Nikiel Alexander Walker toward the best possible version of himself and not the area you're talking about to wit. A couple weeks, a couple days ago, I looked up his pick and rolls for the season because I was like, man,

he's how is he getting to 21 points a game? I know he's taking more threes. He's hunting threes off movement, off the dribble in ways he hasn't before. But he's got to have leveraged his on ball skills a little bit more. I think he's running 15 pick and rolls for 100 possessions, which is right in line with his per possession number in Minnesota, in other parts of his career, early in New Orleans, et cetera. By the way, Portland and Utah just both gave up on him. Should be noted that both of them had him and dumped him for nothing. And so it speaks to like he's just finding his within the flow of this funky, inverted big men running pick and rolls with guards,

screening for them kind of offense. And the Hawks are so interesting because they play these lineups like, Cominga, Jalen Johnson, Dyson, Dyson Daniels, that should have no business working. There's just not enough shooting on the floor. And it hasn't been great. Like the last time I checked the Kaminga, Jail and Johnson on the floor together, numbers are not good.

but they just move and cut and screen and slip until something good happens. My head when I watch them, they have three lead ball handlers that I really trust. CJ McCollum, Nikiel, and J.L. & Johnson. When they go to lineups when only one of them is on the floor, I get a little nervous about the offense. And I wonder if that's a playoff thing where like we're just going to keep two of them on the floor. And by the way, one thing I was thinking with the Hawks last night,

it's hard to hide a bad perimeter defender against the Hawks. Jalen Brunson had to guard C.J. McCollum for a lot of that game because Kat was guarding Dyson and Daniels. There's a lot of teams. If you put your centers on Dyson and Daniels, you're out of places to hide your weaker perimeter defender. And that's just like a hard. It's why Charlotte is so hard to play against. There's just no place to hide a Jalen Brunson against Charlotte. I mean, that's the virtue of that kind of blend. too, right? It's not only that there's no quarter for bad defenders, but as you're saying, it gives you such a great way to replicate the effects of spacing, even when you don't actually

have spacing. And when you have guys like Nikiel, like, I think one of my favorite parts about his game is when you have that kind of flow offensively, you either need to be somebody who makes really quick decisions with the ball or have kind of the off speed game where then you can drive from the second side and still keep defenses guessing. He's kind of both at the same time, where he's so fast and so athletic, but he also has a weird cadence to his game. And often, to be honest, those are my favorite kind of players in the world.

So thrilled about all of McKeel's success. He fits the spirit of most improved player to me the best of all the candidates. And I realize that's an amorphous thing to say and you should be hardcore analytical choices. But this is an amorphous. It's the amorphous award. And you have some candidates who are like Jalen Duren,

fourth year in the league, top whatever pick. He should still be improving, right? Like, that's what we expect. that's why no one ever votes for second year players, but somehow third year players are the perfect sweet spot. Then you have the Danis Jenkins, Colin Gillespie, Ryan Rollins, guys who go from like not playing at all to, oh my God, they're good.

They almost feel like rookie-ish to me and their total lack of experience before. Nikiel Alexander Walker feels just like late bloomer. Just nerd in high school, had some acne, didn't go to the prom, got left behind, didn't party with his friends, went to college, kind of came out. out of his shell a little bit, still a little shy. Then like mid to late 20s, moved to Los Angeles and just got better clothes.

Girls loved him. And that's why he's going to win my most improved. Does that make, you know, there's this article in The Athletic this week about how, you know, Nikiel's rise. And one of the quotes that jumped from it was this quote from Nikiel about how Quinn Snyder believed in him, like believed in this for him when he didn't even necessarily see it for himself.

In your parallel, does that make Quinn Snyder like the manic pixie dream girl who has reformed Nikiel Alexander? under's life, like Walker's life as he moved out to the coast. Or like, like, DeGener for Coolidge character and Legally Blonde, maybe, given the age difference, like some sort of mentor of the Reese Witherspoon of Nickdale. Okay, wow. It's a beautiful thing.

I bet people are surprised that I have seen Legally Blonde and Legally Blonde. What was the sequel called? It's got some bad subtitle, like Legally Blonde back in the box, back in the jury box or something. What the fuck were we talking about? keel, the Hawks. Believe it or not, we were talking about all NBA. And this is, I know, but I had another, this is the alley we've gone down.

I had another Hawks point to making, oh, that game last night was like a significant game. The Knicks are like kind of almost locked into the two seed. Would TBD if the Cavs want to have anything to do with that, the three seed rather? The Knicks are locked into three seed. The Cavs for Celtics locked into two. And the Hawks like had a chance to really put a stranglehold on five. And now the door is a little bit open for other teams. Anyway, so we agree on the first 10th.

The three that we agree, given all the people who are ineligible, have to be all NBA third team. Are Jalen Duren, Jalen Johnson, and Shett Holmgren has now elevated into this place. There's a great, like, you want to put Duren on second team for Tyrese Maxie or Jalen Brunson? I wouldn't argue too hard. He's been unbelievable. And they are, the pistons are, plus nine and a half points per hundred possessions in the minutes Duren plays without Cade, which has obviously escalated in the last month. There's some shooting luck involved in that, but like that guy has been outstanding on both

ends of the floor. I'm just not quite ready to put him in like he was one of the 10 best eligible players in the NBA this season. It feels a little, just a little soon for that. But he's an all NBA lock, period. Then the last two spots become a little dicey. You, I believe, went with Carl Anthony Towns. and James Hardin.

Two guys where if two months ago you had said they were going to make all NBA, people would have like aggregated it and it would have been like, Rob Mahoney has lost his mind and has horrible taste in players. Has he watched Cat fall over or not? You know what they might still, Zach?

There's still that opportunity out there. And I'm here to tell you, Rob Mahoney, that I'm taking it to the end, okay? And I'm hoping that Luca gets one of these spots, but we're going to talk about Luca in a second. I also put Carly down on their team all NBA and then

as I'm scrounging around for the last spot I'm like well let me see let me see here Denny Obdia 24 7 and 7 Blazers kind of DioA without him he's going to just make it to 65 games

fingers crossed don't jinx him on that bam out of bio just going to put up a 2010 season now 83 points probably propped up his scoring average by a point. Rock solid defense, heat are 10 points better with him on the floor per 100. I just would like my big man to shoot a little better than 50% on twos. That's all.

Evan Mobley, I don't know what Evan Mobley did to everybody other than not become a super duper star. 18 points, nine rebounds, four assists, 55% shooting, 63% on twos, elite defense. Team is plus seven and a half when he plays without Donovan Mitchell. Totally forgotten. I'm going to throw another name into the mix. for you. Lamello ball. Let's fucking go, Zach.

20 points a game, seven assists, 40% from the field, 37% on threes, takes a million threes. 46% on twos is not awesome. And he has not played a lot of minutes because they've watched his minutes a lot this year.

I think that is probably the strike against him. But it's time to put Lamello's name in the conversation. They are plus seven and a half per hundred when he plays without con canipal and plus like a million when he's the only one of him and Brandon Miller. Yeah. On the floor. Brandon Miller not going to be eligible.

He's going to fall one game short in case you were curious. And I think he's a better candidate than Con Cinnipple by a hair. You could argue that? I think it's Lamello. I'm not going to argue it. And frankly, I'm really glad you brought him up for this because I feel like in the ongoing crowning of Con Cinepple that is happening across NBA media, that is certainly we're very guilty of on this particular network.

You could say he's riding shotgun alongside the NBA media ecosystem. You know, he is. but in this case, in my twisting of our real-life metaphor that we're kind of trudging through, lamello is the one in the driver's seat. And often like- Oh, boy, don't do that. I mean, look, that's very long.

Because when he's in a driver's seat, watch out. Do your errands, schedule your errands in Charlotte around the Hornets practice, shoot around, and game schedule. That's all I'm saying. I'm not going to pretend he's not a mendous to everyone on the road. But as far as who he is as a basketball player

and who he has as a hornet, I think we talk about him as if he's this like rogue agent making crazy decisions in the fly, which he kind of is, but he's also their most bankable quality, not just from a marketing perspective, but in terms of the on-court product,

what is driving the offense of the Charlotte Hornets, it still is lamella ball. And he's been putting into a weird box in a different place and being talked about and thought about differently. And I'm just kind of tired of it based off the season he's had, which I think has been pretty exceptional. He belongs in the all-NBA discussion.

I think the minutes is the biggest obstacle, and shooting 46% on twos leaves me a little wanting, although I do think he's made a greater commitment, particularly in the last six months, to try to get to the rim more. You try to finish a little more simply at the rim instead of turning everything into like a wild-up and under lefty scoop shot of some kind.

Alper and Shengoon, kind of written off in this discussion, has finished the season strong, 20 and a half points a game, nine boards, six dimes, should not be slept on six times from a big man. He's up to 55% on twos. So that's like come up.

It was hovering around 50 for a little while. Unless I'm looking at it. I'll check that in a second. But that's the last time I checked it. And they've played well when he plays without KD. Hardin has a great case. 24 a game, eight times. 41% is not great.

47% on twos is not great. But he makes up for it with free throws and passing. Cabs have been great with him on the floor. And I'm here to tell you when Carl Anthony Towns, and Scotty Barnes I just the all around game his scoring has really dipped in the last month as the Raptors have just kind of been

hovering around 500 for a long stretch now and kind of just losing their grip on the sixth seed and being in danger of being in the play in but you talk about his defense and his passing and given this field he gets the last spot for me now if if Luca is in he's out

yeah if Victor is out, I got to move Kauai to first team. I got to move during the second team. And then I got to pick someone else for a third team. And I'm just not ready to do that yet. There's time yet. Hopefully it won't come down to that. Hopefully at least one of Victor or Luca will be eligible.

Luca wasn't on my list to begin with. I'm just operating under the assumption he's not eligible until I'm told otherwise. If I have to replace Wemby on my list, I would also go with Scotty Barnes for the last remaining spot. And I think all defense-wise, if you have to replace Wembe, that's where I'm probably bumping up Evan Mobley to make second team, which I agree with you. He's had a really good season,

just kind of burdened by expectation and framing more than anything else. But Scotty's a great third-team choice. I'm in love with his defense. I'm really impressed with how he's kind of found himself in the flow of what they're doing offensively, which is not easy for any player, especially on that team in particular, where you can feel the fits and starts of the ball movement

they're trying to make possible and the tension with Brandon Ingram's whole deal, to be honest with you. And like Scotty Barnes trying to find his place and all that has been one of the consistent bright spots of ultimately a kind of middling Raptor season. What's? And I ask myself and you this question at the same time. Why is it not just any obdia? What are we like 24, 7 and 7, the team is over 500.

They're jostling with the clippers for the all important eighth seed. Yep. Is it just that the team isn't? good enough and we want to look at teams that have won a little bit more. Is it like, is it that he is so free throw dependent that it's a little, I mean, but so is Shea.

It's like, it's true. He is shooting only 31% on threes, but 54% on twos like defensively is pretty solid. Are we, are we scooting past him? No pun intended too quickly? We might be scooting a little fast.

I would say in particular just if his last month, month and a half had gone differently, if you had kind of inverted his season where he was rising by the end instead of falling by the end because, in part because of this back injury and the lingering effects of it, he might feel like a shoe in. And maybe that's something we need to interrogate a little more. I think it's a totally fair point. All right. Let's take a break and we'll talk more about the top of the league. Luca Donchich, Austin Reeves, the Lakers, and what the hell happens now. The Zach Lowe show is brought to you by Fanduel.

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Slash chat in Connecticut. This episode is brought to you by Mickelob Ultra, the official beer of the NBA. Part of why we all love watching the game is the superior talent on the court. Spurs Pistons, Wembenyama getting knocked all over the floor, Cades, hip-checking him, Paul Reed's elbowing him, jail and Derns going right at him. And he just gets up and gives it back and has six of the most spectacular blocks you will ever see a player have, including one of the best I've ever seen on Cade Cunningham at the rim, leading the Spurs to a statement win on the road. That's why we watch the NBA to see guys like that do things like that.

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2026, multiple entry period. See official rules at michlobaltro.com slash courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes, and details. Okay, before we talk about the Lakers, I just want to clarify something important from the first segment of the podcast. The Legally Blonde sequel is called Legally Blonde 2, Red, White, and Blonde. Of course. I mean, I just... Nothing but respect for my president, Zach.

Okay. Luca Donchich and Austin Reeves both got injured after my last podcast, so I haven't talked much about them. Luca, calf strain, typical recovery time, four to six weeks. Austin Reeves, oblique, four to six weeks. Luca is flying to Europe and is flowing to Europe for some. sort of injection related treatment to speed up the healing process. There is no timetable.

Like there is no, I've asked around to Lucas people, to Lakers people about like, if this works, what is like can he play in the first round? Can he play in the middle of the first round? There's no timetable like that. There's no, there's nothing said in stone. They're just going to see what happens. The implications, let's start with the team implications because the Lakers go from very scary third seed to now Denver's actually in third and the Lakers are probably the Lakers without

Luca and Reeves are like indisputably now the Western Conference team that everybody wants to play in the first round and if they are to fall they have Oklahoma City tonight Jalen Williams is not playing Warriors sons jazz and they have the tiebreaker over Denver if they fall to four and Denver's remaining games are Memphis, Oklahoma City, San Antonio. We'll see how those two teams, the last two actually try. And Oklahoma City, if they really wanted to, could try to get Denver into the third seed by beating the Lakers tonight. Now, they're sitting J-Dub, so they're playing at semi-honest, and then laying down against the Nuggets and helping the Nuggets win. And that would set up Oklahoma City perfectly because it would put Lakers, Houston, and the four or five side of the bracket,

and it would set up what is an absolute nightmare for the nuggets. Like as much as incredible as Yolkich has been, as magical as this Jamal Murray season has been, as amazing as Aaron Gordon has looked since his return, as like Cam Johnsony as Cam Johnson has finally looked for the last six weeks of the season, even put in a Peyton Watson return to full health at some point, to go through Minnesota at six, if that's what it ends up being. And there are three games out of Houston, tiebreaker, TBD,

one head-to-head game. They have to go Minnesota, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, just to get to the finals. That's fucking wild. Given how Minnesota has played them pretty well over the past three seasons combined,

that's 3-1 Denver this season, that is, that just may be too halacious or rotas to finals for the Nuggets. It just might be too hard. But anyway, the Lakers, it's not fun to say,

without those two guys, they're two best players. Like, the Rockets would be absolutely delighted to play them in the first round. it would probably like all of a sudden be like, hey, we're in the second round of the playoffs. Maybe this whole team is actually working well.

Yeah. It's tough to see this become of the Lakers. After we were waiting for something to click for them all season, and as you said, they finally hit that level. And now they are just like blood in the water of the shark den of the Western Conference. I wish that there were some other option. I wish that there were even a path to hope that Luca or Austin could rush back and be effective. What makes me hesitant to even believe that there's even that is not only these particular

injuries, which both soft tissue, both very difficult to recover from quickly. The timelines are what they are for a reason. There are also two specific injuries that hit those exact guys right where they live in play. And the idea of Luca Donchage having a hamstring injury, one of our great start and stop staccato drivers, I don't know how you do that without a hamstring. And for Austin Reed, someone who's like so good at driving and twisting and contorting his way into scoring attempts, having an oblique injury, not just painful to get hit in those spots, but like really limits your mobility and your flexibility and trying to do the exact

things that Austin Reeves does well. So they feel pretty doomed at this point. And they feel like kind of a like a free space on the playoff bracket, which is not where I was hoping to be going in to say the least. No, if they were the third seed playing Minnesota the way they were playing, that went from a series that was like a month and a half ago. I would have been 730 Minnesota. Then it was like 64 now. It's like kind of coin toss. Like Luca is that good in playing that scary upbrand to basketball on both ends of the floor. And he's playing like that. I don't think they can win three playoff series in the West,

considering the gauntlet we just talked about Denver having to potentially go through. But one or even two is like not out of bounds. If Luca is playing like that consistently every single game. Well, especially for the Minnesota matchup, like he's still in Rudy Gober's nightmares after the shot he hit over the wolves with the math. So like, that is a guy. If I were the wolves, I would want absolutely no part of.

And it looks like they're going to be fortunate enough. to not have to worry about it. They're going to be fortunate enough to play the Nuggets in the first round of the playoffs? It's not ideal. Well, do you want to talk about the Nuggets Pass some more? Because, like, how... I don't know that they have, like, a lot of wiggle room.

Obviously, they could get creative and brazen in terms of trying to manipulate the standings if they want to. But I feel like you got to... It's really dangerous trying to drop because of what it means in terms of getting on that OKC side of the bracket. Yeah, I talked about this with Bill on Sunday.

that path that they are staring at now at three is so scary that I almost wondered would they try to sort of step back their way into four and just get the rockets in the first round that's a series they should win we agree they should win that series I think they might sweep that series if they got it okay so you hate the rockets that's fine aggregate that it's clearly an easier matchup for them than the timber wolves assuming ant comes back at full health. He's been sick. He's been dealing with some knee soreness. I assume he's going to come back and they'll been Jada McDaniels as TBD. Like without Jada McDaniels,

the Wolves are a very different team. So maybe that's kind of what the Nuggets are betting on two is we're not going to see the full strength, Timberwolves, the way we normally would. But I talked about this with Bill and his conclusion was, I just want to avoid Oklahoma City for as long as possible.

I don't, and I'm not convinced, I mean, look, there's only so much that the basketball gods are going to allow you to do without punishing you at some point. I'm not convinced that's right, but at some point you're going to have to play Oklahoma City. But like that road is so daunting that I actually might consider. I'd like to just win a first round series and get into like, let's go to Oklahoma City as fresh as possible. And maybe they also wait longer for Peyton Watson to get back.

I think it's a fair question, though, that four versus three thing. It depends a little, like Minnesota is still not totally out on the five seed. They pretty much have to go undefeated the rest of the season. at Indiana, okay, chalk it up. At Orlando, if you can't beat the magic on the road, even when the magic have something to play for,

that's a big game for both teams. Fine, you should be the six seed. At Houston, we'll decide the tiebreaker, I believe, between the two teams. It's one, one head to head. And at home against the pelicans. Four and O is on the table. And one of them would swing the tiebreaker

if I'm reading the tiebreaker stuff right. And if they do that, and Houston has at Suns, home to Philly, that Minnesota game, and then concludes with Memphis, there's a small chance Minnesota can flip up to five, which changes this entire equation. And maybe if you're Denver, you just say, this is why we just play it out semi-honestly.

I think there's too many moving parts right now. We'll have to kind of check in later in the week to see if any of these options are even viable, as far as the manipulation goes. I think in terms of the like, do you go for the four-five, theoretically the rockets with the thunder side of the bracket, or do you take this halacious path?

I kind of err towards the halacious path as difficult and daunting as it seems. In part, I would say, for one thing, the nuggets are good enough and close enough. They should be thinking about this in terms of championship path. I think they can and will beat the majority of their first round opponents,

including Minnesota, which this is not quite the same Wolves team that beat the nuggets. And in particular, the size difference in shifting from Kat to Randall, I think, is a meaningful thing. overall. And just something in the last six weeks has always been off.

It's been a long, rattle slump, then an ant injuries slash illness, then like, you know, Jada McDaniel's hurt. It's just, there's just too much off right now.

Yes, the side eyes that go bare. Like, there's just so much happening internally within the team with the wolves that I would feel okay going into that matchup

and find the nuggets. And I just think the thunder are so good. You save that off as long as humanly possible. And you hope for even just like a tweak in the matchup

that could help and tilt things in your favor. A slight injury, a guy out of rhythm, a difficult preceding series where they really have to work for it where they don't expect to. And I think this game, ultimately like the physicality advantage that the Nuggets have with the Spurs too, I would feel okay about that going into a series and a matchup like that if I was Denver.

It's not ever something you feel confident about given how good the Spurs are and have been. But I do think the Nuggets could have their number. And I think they could teach them some things in a run like this one. I think that's the key point. Number one, I've always been of the school of thought that I want to avoid the best team for as long as possible. And just give me the chance that someone on that team tweaks an ankle.

Now, I also extend the possibility to someone on my team tweaks an ankle. But, you know, I got to take some chances. In this case, Peyton Watson gets more recovery time before facing Oklahoma City. And I think they will need him to beat the two best teams in the West. And if you believe, and I think the Nuggets have reason to believe, like, hey, the spurs on paper are almost as good as the thunder. They're a 60 plus win juggernaut. Like we should in theory think of them almost like the thunder,

but they're not champions and we've beaten them twice in a row. They haven't been comfortable wins. They've been very stressful. And they have this alien who runs around and does stuff to mess up our offense. But Yolkech has been pretty fucking dominant in those games. I wouldn't say he feels comfortable against Wembenyama because, you know, nobody does and Wembenyama big boyed him on a couple of blocks like oh the ball didn't even get out of your hand sorry three time MVP I just treated you like Billy Madison treats a fifth grader but he's been pretty goddamn dominant and the rest of the team is is kind of clicking right now like even Brown Christian Brown had a good game they're still figuring out like do we play Balanchunus do we not play Valen Tunis all that stuff but I think I think you're right to identify the spurs as a team that the Nuggets like we we feel

we don't feel great because it's not great, but we're not treating that as like we have to avoid them. Right. Can we talk about Luca for a bit? Absolutely. So he's at 64 games. He's going to finish at 64 games. You may have heard that you have to get to 65 games.

He missed two games to be in Slovenia for the birth of his daughter. Based on that, his agency, Bill Duffy, etc., are going to appeal. to the arbitration process, whatever it is. This is all that. It's always great when prestigious NBA honors come down to legal processes. It's always a great sign.

Let's get in a conference room and hash this out with a judge, like an agreed upon judge or panel of judges. God knows I don't even know what the hell of the thing is. Zach, I don't know what you're talking about. I know we're talking about the merits of all these awards. I love talking about extraordinary circumstances. It's my favorite thing in the entire world.

Should we just read from the CBA? Imagine if I did an Andy Kaufman thing where I just like, I'm going to read four pages of CBA language now. And my initial reaction was, I fucking hope they appeal. I hope they win. Because like two games for the birth of your daughter

feels like extraordinary circumstances. Like that feels like kind of what the, it feels like it should fall under that. And I also want to test the NBA. I want the NBA's lawyers to have to get in a room and be like, you know what? Adam Silver stood up at the Board of Governors meeting when Kate Cunningham got a collapse

lung and said the 65 game rule is working as intended. I'm not sure one player's case should really be a demerit against the rule. Stars are playing more. Kind of. I don't know. Okay. And it's working. I want to see them go in that room and be like,

oh, you know what? I'm not sure we should bend the rule for another player because the rule in general is working. You wanted to see the birth of your daughter? Oh, wow. What a great parent, you are Luca Donchich. Judge. Objection.

Objection to parenthood. Objection to fatherhood. We stand by our 65-game rule. We don't want Luca eligible. I want them to have to publicly make that argument. And then a little birdie inside my head was like, well, look, isn't this kind of what the rule is supposed to do? Like, if you, no, no, no, no.

Just play it out with me. If you miss some games due to injury and you miss one game because you were suspended for accumulating too many technical fouls, when we kind of rescinded one already and gave you a chance to get off scot-free, then your margin for anything happening in life shrinks to zero. And this is kind of what happens. I think that's an argument that the league could make without feeling completely ashamed of itself. Where would you fall? Is arbitrator, we might as well appoint you. Judge Rob Mahoney.

how would you rule in this case? Thank you for this hallowed responsibility. I mean, I would rule to make him eligible because it's fucking bullshit that he's not, but the rule is also fucking bullshit. I think where I have a problem is, I don't know, in the grand scheme of human life, a collapsed lung might be even more extraordinary circumstances

than the birth of a child. Like if we're just like probabilistically, I understand within the realm of basketball injury, these things do happen sometimes. So you're representing Kate Cunningham, too. You're calling Kate Cunningham to the stand. Who fell on him in that game and call that guy to the stand too? It's a great question.

We need to get some more eyewitness accounts of everything. If Luca had a doula, called a doula to the stand, call the OBGYN to the stand. Let's have a real trial here. I just think all these guys should be eligible. Because ultimately, there are no circumstances in which, if this rule did not exist,

you and I would be sitting here saying, Luka Donchid should not be first team all-N-B-A based off the season he's had. And I understand how the rule came to be. I understand a lot of us even kind of talking ourselves into it based on what the state of the league was at that point. But to say we've gone off the rails doesn't even cover the half of it. Like this rule has spun out into a totally different thing where the shape of all NBA, the shape of the MVP ballot, the shape of defensive player of the year now is in jeopardy, all because of a technicality that doesn't really solve much of anything.

I agree with you if our judge and jury in this case, I would rule Luca eligible. I would trigger the extraordinary circumstances clause of the very exciting CBA portion about the 65 game rule. And I would vote for Luca to be eligible. And I hope he is eligible. He deserves to be. And this has been my beef with the rule all along. It's why my very first reaction to it was, can you at least give me flexibility on third team? If you're going to be unyielding on first and second team and all these other awards,

By the way, why is 65 games doesn't apply for six men of the year, but it does apply for most improved player? Why? What's the logic behind that? Why does it even apply for? I just, it doesn't, anyway, because let me be a voter with a brain and say, hey, yeah, let's just say Luca played 58 games. Yeah, Luca in 58 games, if all I can do is put them on third team all NBA, because that's as strict as you can be. Let me put them on third team all NBA instead of going through. this list of like Scotty Barnes, Denny Obdia. Like, what are we doing? Like, just look at Donchich.

Okay. Let's switch gear. Speaking of injuries, Shams Sharania dropped another huge Janus dysfunction Bucks story. This has been playing out in the media now for a couple weeks. Janus wants to play, says he's healthy enough to play. The Bucks have not medically cleared him to play. The NBA is investigating this, which means talking to Bucks officials, talking to Yannis,

talking to his agent, talking to Bucks doctors, like what the hell is going? on. They have found, among other things, that the Bucks apparently asked him to participate in a three-on-three, workout, scrimmage, something, and Yannis declined, which the Bucks are citing his evidence that he's being disingenuous. And on and on we go to another summer where there's another reckoning. And I'll just read from the Shams story. It's, this is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's why Antecumpo reiterated to the Bucks for a few months before the February 5th trade deadline that he was prepared to be moved. He declined to publicize a trade request, but he made it clear to all parties involved behind the scenes that he felt both sides needed to move on immediately as the franchise

was not in position to compete. Quote, Janus has wanted to handle this professionally by being very upfront with the team. One source with direct knowledge of the situation said, I wonder which side of this that source is on. This could have been a happy resolution, but instead might end up being a nasty breakup. This is so dumb that is reached this point. I don't even understand what's happening anymore. That's how dumb it is.

First of all, he declined to publicize a trade request. He made it clear to all parties involved that he felt both sides needed to move on immediately. Just the strangulation of the English language continues to reach epic levels. Janus misread this so completely. It feels like he's trying to wage a perception war that he had already won and he didn't need to wage it at all.

And battle number one was this impossible limbo he's trying to do of, I never actually requested a trade, but my people are going to continue to leaking that I, to continue to leak that I told the bucks that it's time to move on. but I never publicly requested a trade. If he had just publicly requested a trade and said, hey, I gave it my all, we gave it our all, we had a tremendous run. It's clearly reached its end.

I want to compete for a title in my Twilight, my mid-30s, whatever. No one is begrudging that. No. There may be like a 5% of Bucks fans who are pissed. That's it. No one's begrudging it. Similarly, I don't know what the fight he's doing now with this. I want to play.

What point is he trying to prove? he's been injured five times this year, including repetitive calf injuries. There is no rational team anywhere in the world in any circumstance similar to the Bucks that would play this player for six meaningless games at the end of the season. And it's not about tanking. It's a little bit about tanking because they get the lesser of, what is it, their pick or the Pelicans pick. It's all about if we have to trade this guy and he pops in Achilles in the game 80s,

when we're 11 games back and Doc Rivers is giving bizarre speeches in the locker room about how he's done this and that with previous teams and Kyle Kuzma's tuning him out and this is happening, whatever. It's an organizational catastrophe and they can't afford it. He surely knows that.

And it feels like, I said this right away three weeks ago, it feels like he's trying to make the bucks look like the bad guy by holding him out. And he just didn't need to do any of this. He looked like a good guy the entire time. The whole situation is completely absurd. that we now have NBA investigators looking into medical records theoretically anyway and seeing who's healthy and who's not and was there a three-ons-scrut marriage, was there not? It's absolutely absurd. The Bucks are totally justified and not playing him.

Yannis probably understands that. His agent probably understands that they're trying to use that, I think, as a cudgel to make the Bucks look bad. The whole situation is completely ridiculous. It's ridiculous, and both sides are heavily to blame. Like the Bucks have bungled this entire situation, too. I don't want to excuse them. of responsibility in this. They held on too tightly to something that should have been resolved a long time ago,

have forced themselves into a difficult corner as a result, talk themselves in and out of various deal permutations along the way. It's been a whole mess. But Janus's refusal to be the bad guy in particular, I think has been just a horrible miscalculation

of what it means to be a superstar. And specifically, he had all of this goodwill, and I think the fear to lose it, just erased the possibility in his mess. mind that having all that goodwill means you get to ask for the thing. Like having all of that built up trust and respect and relationship with the city of Milwaukee,

that's what allows you when the time comes to say, you know what, we've had a great run. I've loved playing here. But I do want to compete in the way you outlined. And he deserves that and it warrants it. I just think you can tell in the way that he's operated. And this is, this is me putting thoughts in Janus's head. But I think it's consistent with everything he's done.

It's very clearly important to him to be like of a place to believe. long to a city. And I think there are a lot of stars who have looked around and seen Kevin Durant and James Harden, these guys who have been MVP's and now are like men without countries. And for some people, that matters.

And I think Janus is one of these players for whom that clearly matters. But the way it's played out, I think it's respectable to try to be professional about your job and show up and continue to try to play. I understand it from a certain perspective. But the way he's gone about all this

doesn't feel like being professional. it feels like being too-faced about the entire situation, about channeling behind closed doors for what you really want and then coming out and saying, I am a buck, I'm trying to play for this team of pushing for the trade and then going on Twitter and posting like the fucking wolf of Wall Street, I'm staying memes.

Like, you can't have it all of these ways at once, no matter how desperately you try. And I can empathize with, I think based on his public comments and what I've heard about him for years and years, there's a big part of him that wants to be Dirk Novitsky and Kobe Bryant

and a one team guy for his city and that's totally admirable this is a city that took him in it's a city that nurtured him when his father passed away suddenly they've signed both his brothers it's his home

I get that completely so just if that's what you want you just have to do that then you just have to be like a one team guy and he clearly wants that and to contend that bridge has been burned for a long time. Now, this team was dead on arrival coming in. And to your point about the bucks, they did hold on too long. Yep. And that's last summer, summer before, whenever you want to say it.

They did this disaster, wave and stretch dame son Miles Turner, who I nominated with Bill as he was going to skip in his awards, fake awards thing, least valuable player of the year. And in his mind, the least valuable player of the year was just kind of like worst player or like biggest, most an audacious tank commander. And I was like, I thought about it as super highly paid player that's supposed to help you win, that you've sacrificed a ton of flexibility for. And I nominated Miles Turner as least valuable player of the year.

I can't remember a single thing Miles Turner did the entire season. I mean, he made a lot of threes. He shot 38% on threes. I just don't remember anything that happened that was relevant. And he's averaging 11 points, 10 points a game, something like that. And between his salary and dames, like that's a max, slot effectively that he's taking up. For a team that does not control its first round pick until 2031 going forward, which

is a disaster in and of itself. And why we've always talked about is there's some way to triangulate this eventual trade where they recoup some of their own picks. And that's why Portland is looming over here, not necessarily maybe as a Janus destination, although Bill brought that up the other day. But just as they can we facilitate something because we have some of the Milwaukee draft equity, I just think this situation is completely ridiculous on all levels. the bucks clearly were like half in, half out, should we trade them?

Should we not? Shams has details in there about how they wouldn't return calls for like days at a time. I've heard the same thing. I had one team describe it to me. One team that was in it till the end describe it to me as even though we kind of thought we were in it, they never gave us a specific list of items that would get the deal done. Like that's when you know this person told me that a deal is doable. When you get like this is the price point that we're,

we'll execute it at and they never did that. And it's like, so I don't know, what are you doing? You're going to come back in the off season. Maybe the offers will be better. Maybe the Knicks flame out. Maybe the Rockets flame out. Whatever it is. I don't know how the Knicks can build a better offer.

But I just, the whole thing is sort of, it's really bizarre to me. Like, every one of these stories that comes out, the union's releasing a press release, the league's releasing a press release. The Janus is talking about he's using breakfast metaphors and he's using marriage metaphors. Like, the whole thing is just completely bizarre. And wholly avoidable. I'm really curious in kind of the grand scheme of history when we, you know, 20 years from now look back on this,

how people think about it. Because I realize with enough time, even Vince Carter can go back to Toronto and get, you know, the video treatment and the tears and have an emotional moment. Like, people do tend to forget and things get softened over time. This isn't a PR disaster for Janus yet, but it's left everybody in such a bad spot and it's getting uglier and uglier. And frankly,

I hope the lesson in this for everybody operating in the league is the longer you wait, the uglier it gets. And with a player like Janice, I completely get the instinct to want to exhaust all possible options before you have to trade a player like that. But sometimes you have to get ahead of it. And you can't say that there weren't signs periodically, regularly, every single step of the way for now like two and a half straight years. I do think as nightmarish as this seems now,

And the Shams story is clearly just like, you know, there's anonymous quotes about it being so toxic, about, you know, and about Doc Rivers rubbing some players the wrong way about. I've never heard that before. Kyle Kuzma, Ryan Rollins and Kevin Porter Jr., sort of reacting together to the coaching staff, insinuating that the two young guards had been playing a little bit selfishly and all of this mess. I do think, and they're going to be a mess, right, because they don't control their draft picks and they're going to be. and they're going to be bad if and when Janus leaves. Of course. So it's going to be messy. And I think Doc Rivers' future is in question.

I said last week, he's not going to walk away from the money. He's got a year left of big money, so they're either going to fire him and pay him, or he's not going to walk away. And I think John Horst's future has to be put in question as well as the GM. But I do think there's a way for this all to calm down and for it to end normally and amicably. and that's no noise for a while.

Whatever happens in the playoffs happen, the bucks make a trade, or maybe they extend them. It seems like it's totally impossible that they would do that. I can't handle it if they do it. They trade him. And as sort of unrobust as some of the offers were going to be, for Giannis compared to five picks for McHale Bridges

and all these blockbuster trades that you want to comp it to, they're going to get real stuff for him, because there are going to be multiple teams interested. And, you know, just like even the reported offer that Shams talked about of Hero, Kallel Ware and a bunch of picks and swaps, that's like something. And they're going to get some good stuff for him. He's going to go out. And so, like, the fans will be like, well, at least we got this for Yannis.

And he'll go somewhere where he can win. And I think it'll all be fine. And everyone will give good press conferences. Okay. Any final thoughts on this before we take one last break? Just along those lines. I do think they're going to get back real things for him. but for the state of the bucks right now

and how untenable this feels as far as rolling into another season goes, I think we're at the point where closure might outweigh optimal value. Like you just have to move on. Speaking of, and also like fresh slate may mean fresh late across the board organizationally because you're clearly going into a new era

once you trade yannis because there's just not a lot in the cupboard right now. We don't need to go back and look at the draft misses and the trades and this and that. All right. Speaking of closure, we'll take one more break. We'll do two more quick topics. This episode is brought to by eBay. You guys know that watching basketball is my thing, obviously, but you know what else is?

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Or hey, takeouts on me. And if you really love them, pick Panda Express for delicious, authentically cooked American Chinese cuisine, whether it's game night or date night. Nothing says, I love you, like orange chicken, honey walnut trim, Kung Pao chicken, and black pepper sirloin steak. Have you eaten yet? Order now or is it a Panda Express near you? We're out of here. All right. Speaking of closure, the Chicago Bulls who still exists, they're still in the NBA. They have a roster full of players. They participate in games every NBA night.

Fired their front office of Arturis Karnasovas and Mark Eversley. Michael Rinesdorf released a statement about, you know, we got to move forward. And they have $60 million in cap space. They control all of their picks. They have a semi-real, semi-fake first coming from the Blazers, which if you go way back and trace it, it's origins. It's a lottery protected pick. That is the only thing of value that they got when they traded Lowry Markin, another sell low move. This has been nothing short of a disaster.

It's more than a disaster. It is, they have become the laughing stock of the NBA, the most depressing franchise outside of Sacramento. More depressing in a lot of ways because they're the Chicago Bulls. They are a worldwide mega brand. They are the Allen Parsons project blaring to starting introductions. They are legendary and iconic. They have recently actually had good teams, whereas the Kings had like a blip of a good team

in the last 20 years, and that's gone. I talked with Bill about, do you think Delanta Sabonis just cries before going to bed every night? Wouldn't you? I imagine that I was like, I could see his wife being like, Domas, are you watching YouTube videos again

of you lighting the beam from three? Stop, just stop. Come to bed, Domas. I just, just the original sin of all of this, and I've used that phrase many times before, was the Vuccovich trade, which I hated the moment it happened,

two first round picks, one of which became Franz Wagner, could have been any number of good players. And Wendell Carter Jr., who, speaking of selling low on Lowry Marketing, they sold low on the other half of their young big man pairing, because Wendell Carter Jr., from minute one in Orlando, outplayed Nicola Vucovich, just alone, outplayed him.

And then just they had the wonderful team for half a season with Lonzo and DeRosen and Levine. And that fell apart. And I'm not sure how real that ever was. And then every trade they made to get off of those guys, the pattern was another team gets the good stuff. So they trade a first round pick to get them R DeRosen, plus some other stuff from the Spurs to the Spurs. And then when they finally sign and trade DeRosen to the Kings, it's the San Antonio freaking Spurs who get the actual value. in the trade because they get the king's pick swap in 2031 for absorbing Harrison Barnes, who has been better than Nicole and Mitch and maybe even then DeMorosen in the context of

what drives winning on a good team. It's arguable. Yeah. That trade that trade. They trade for Zach Levine, take it for what, you know, take forward it's worth. They trade Jimmy Butler, get Zach Levine. They extend Zach Levine for a million, gazillion dollars. They trade him to Sacramento and the Deeran Fox three team trade.

And again, it's other teams getting the good stuff in the trade, notably the king. He's got draft picks. The Bulls did get Kevin Herder and Tray Jones has been good. They trade Kevin Herder for Jaden Ivy. That situation has gone sideways. That might have actually been the last straw. Patrick Williams over Devin Vassell, Tyrese, Calibor. And also the next picks in that draft were Akoro, Toppin, and Killian Hayes.

So just be careful using that as just a sledgehammer over the front office. What is a sledgehammer is the five-year $90 million dollar contract. That's the one. he was a candidate for my least valuable player in the league because I just don't even know he just exists now. He's like a shade floating around the court, take an open three once every six minutes,

just does nothing and he's making $90 million over five years. We don't need to get into it. They sold low on everybody. Two of their success stories as a front office are Kobe White and I would assume new. And they were like, you know what? We're not interested in paying you guys. We're just going to trade you for whatever we can get.

And congratulations Charlotte and Minnesota. You've gotten two quality players who may be on your teams going forward. Just they have no direction, know anything. They have Matas Tuzales. Thank God they have Matas Muzzi. Seriously. They did. I should mention in that Deeran Fox pick,

the one good thing they did get was control of their first round pick last year. Hooray, hooray. And even giddy, I was like a, I didn't think that was a good trade for the Bulls, but I didn't think it was as bad as the consensus was. because Giddy was going to come and put up numbers and maybe be interesting.

He's been fine. He's had a bad last six weeks of the season. Is he ever going to be a top 35 player in the NBA? I don't know. Now he's paid appropriately given that status. And so it's time. It was time. This is a pivotal off season with all that cap space.

I would have had no faith in how they were going to use it. And here's the thing. If they're serious about being to Chicago Bulls again, you know, if you talk to Arturis and Eversley today, they would probably say, honestly, we were doing the bidding of an ownership group that doesn't care that just wants to make money, that is happy to be in the play in tournament every year.

And so we aimed our transactions at that. If this team wants to get serious, ownership has to spend money, but more than that, they have to let someone come in and do whatever the hell they want, including just any direction you want to go. I talked to maybe six, six months a year ago, I talked to a front office free agent who, let's just say,

would have his pick of any job, most jobs if they came open. And he said to me, what would you do if you were me? Like what job intrigues you? And I said, whoever saves the Chicago Bulls will be a legend in the NBA forever. Because in Chicago, I mean, you'll, you won't pay for a shot of Mallort for the rest of your life. Guess who still does it? Tom Thibito, and he hasn't coached the team in like 10 years. And, because it's the bulls and they become so moribund and so nothing and so just completely forgotten in the NBA ecosystem. And he said to me, that sounds great in theory. Like I don't trust the ownership. And so that's where we, I don't really have anything else to say. It's just I can't believe we're here

and it starts at the Vucovich trade. I didn't like that trade and it was way worse than I thought it was going to be. Well, but even in that framing, treating the Vooch trade as the original sin, I think misses the motivating factor, right? It's like the drive to be. in that mediocre play-in zone at all costs slash not really care about building a sustainable foundation of a team if that means giving up some ticket revenue in a season or two. And all of the concerns about the Bulls bottoming out are so weird to me because that is a fan base that does show up.

That's a fan base that despite all of this continues to care about this team. And they've been given every reason not to. Like they're adults a lot of the time. I mean, there's kids involved too, but like they can handle a season or two of bottoming out, tanking however you want to think about it, that's what it takes to ultimately build something

that feels sustainable. But instead, this particular front office spent six years untangling the mediocrity they built themselves into. And I say that because they were propping it up every step of the way, just reaching and striving for the play in

and hoping they got the eighth seed. And this is where you end up. It sours everyone on the experience. You look around at the roster. nothing sustainable. Yet another case, I mean, speaking of teams holding on too long, of just waiting and waiting and waiting around every valuable player on the roster to the point that when you do trade them,

it's for two second round picks instead of what could have been a first or could have been an interesting player. Anthony Simons, who has played, like, did he do one memorable thing for the Bulls before he got injured? And he's expiring contract. So all these, like, Colin Sexton, he's been productive for the Bulls. To what end? Yes.

He's not going to be on the team next year. To what end? And I think of all the moves you outlined, drafting Pat Williams is bad but maybe defensible at 4. You can talk yourself into the outline of that player. Giving him the $90 million deal

with a player option, I want to make it very clear because you don't want to run the risk. I forgot about that. I mean, when you get the chance to get Pat Williams a player option, you have to do it. I mean, it is a, that extension is a misunderstanding of the player. It is a complete misread of the market.

And it is doubling down on your own bad mistakes in a way that I think is representative of the flaw in the process here, which is, yeah, maybe you're getting a top-down edict where you have to compete in a particular way or you're not allowed to do this or that. Like it is an ownership problem in Chicago. It's also an execution problem.

And the way this team has been run for six years, it's just like not acceptable by NBA standards. Well, look, and they're going to try to interview, whoever they interview, if they want the best people, the best people are going to go in there and ask the questions of, are you going to spend money or you're going to let me do whatever I want to do? Because if the answer is to either one of those is not, they're not going to get the best people.

I will say to your, like, in all this hoopla about tanking right now, it should be noted that trying to win and even aiming for 45 wins is not on its face unadmirable. It's kind of actually admirable because you can actually get to 45 wins and if you are smart and well run,

you can get from there to 50-something wins with one or two moves. The problem is the bulls aimed in the wrong places, and then when it was clear that they had aimed in the wrong places, they didn't quite know, even if you wanted to stay at 40 wins or 45 wins, they didn't know how to execute that while remaining interesting and on an upward trajectory.

And now it's left them tanking too late. They are tanking, and they're in the ninth slot in the lottery, and they're hoping for a Cooper flag, Derek Rose-style lottery gods miracle. Like it's not trying to be in the middle is not on its face. It's certainly not the most under the current incentive system, the most like highest bang for the buck strategy.

But there are what we've seen teams sort of hang around, hang around, hang around, make a couple moves. And suddenly you're like the Raptors in the, in Kyle Lowry and DeMarie and DeMar de Rosen. And you're actually pretty good and kind of fun. They just didn't execute the first or the middle moves very well. Well, also I think what they did to get to the middle, like the idea of winning those kinds of like middle seeds or middle spots,

dignity, I think is predicated on, oh, we're doing this, but the players we have are young and up and coming. And when given the chance to have that breakthrough, they're going to be ready for it. Trading for Damar, trading for Vouch, trading for Zach Levine in its way, those are not moves made with like, oh, there is a vision of upside here. It's like, we are desperately propping up a collapsing house. And the second you try to move anything around to actually construct something, it's all going to fall apart. So I just think it was a flawed design even by those standards. Last topic, all rookie teams, which you have

released your all rookie teams, and we'll compare notes on this. Because it's actually kind of getting interesting. This is more interesting than usual. I'm usually just scrounging for spots nine and ten, the last two spots on the second team. Your first team, we'll just call them the big four

because they're in. Con, DJ, Flag, Harper, and Ace Bailey, which he has to be on one of the all rookie teams. You put him first team, completely respectable. Your second team is Maxime Renan Ode, Cedric Howard, Derek Queen,

Ryan Calkbrenner, and Colin Murray-Boyles, which I really liked. I said this when I did this a couple weeks ago. He's going to be one of the 10 best rookies from this class and is playing winning basketball right now for the Raptors. He's just at like 1,100

minutes and second team all working, fine, 1100 minutes, who cares? Put it right. I don't know if you would make my team, but he's making a late push for one of those slots. I would go this way. And this is a change from what I did, a slight change.

I have the big four. I still have Renault clinging to the last spot on the first team. I get that the Kings are horrible. I get to his defense is wanting, let's say. He's just been so wildly efficient offensively that I don't feel

like I don't feel like it's fake. It's not fake numbers on a tanking team. But if I think, you're going to make an argument for Ace Bailey. I think that may be the only argument I would consider now is Ace Bailey. I think so. I mean, obviously there was a point in the season when Sedger Coward or Derek Queen would have made sense.

But that was exactly the debate that I was having with myself of what to do with that last spot. And I think Rayno is a good one. Not only are his numbers not fake, he's like the truest structural thing that the Kings have right now as far as like, how do you run offense? How do you execute possessions? Like getting him the ball and whether it's running handoffs or in the post or whatever that looks like on a given possession.

I feel pretty good about that in a way I don't feel good about almost anything else the Kings are doing. And I've talked a lot about Ace Bailey already. I've really enjoyed his rookie season. We can agree to disagree. Those are the last two for first team. You put Ace, I put Rayno. I could flip-flop tomorrow.

Right now, second team, Ace Bailey, which we agree on. I mean, you have him first. I have, whatever. Derek Queen, Cedricer Coward, who would have been fifth on my all-rokee, my fifth first team guy midway through this. He's just missed too many games. but he's got to be here. And then your last two spots,

you went CMB and Kalkbrenner. I've had Kalkbrenner penciled in all year. He's starting to lose minutes to the Grant Williams at center lineups, which strikes me as a Hornets like, we're starting to get serious now. And we trust Musa, and we do trust you, Ryan Kalkbrenner, you do what you do very well.

You finish around the rim and you protect the room on defense. But we're, Grant Williams has been so good. Let's try to go smallball a little bit. And there's been a couple of games where his second half minutes have been very, very limited. So I actually swapped him out against my soul because he's been doing meaningful stuff on an actual good team. Jeremiah Fears has always been on my second team. So I kept him in.

I think he's done enough real basketball stuff on a competitive team for the last couple months. A lot of points, a lot of assists, shooting percentage not so bad. And I'm putting Will Riley. on my second team all rookie ahead of Ryan Calkbrenner. People are not watching the Wizards. You should not watch the Wizard. It is a hazard to your mental health.

But now, and he's had a couple of games where he's put up like 12 points in the last two minutes of garbage time games. So take that for what it's worth. The stuff he's doing is like legit. He's been efficient. He's 6-8 or 6-9. He has like a herky-jurkey,

hesitation, spinning, dribbling, handle thing that is very, very hard for other teams to grasp. He's a good passer. Loves little wraparound pass to his big man on the pick and roll, can make some pretty decent pick and roll reads, can shoot over smaller guys. Defensively, look, he's not good.

No, rookies are really good. He has the tools to be good. I think this lasts like six weeks to two months. I think he actually deserves an all rookie spot. And as much as it hurts me to demote Calkbrenner and CMB to off my second team, I want Ace, Riley, Queen, Coward Fierce. I like the Will Riley Pick for many reasons.

one in the CMB mold when you look back at this rookie class, he's going to be one of the standouts among them. And I'm not sure where he's going to net out in the grand scheme of things. He is a really talented creator. I don't know that he's going to top out at being any kind of star necessarily,

but I mean, we were talking about the future of the Wizards on group chat. And I think he's going to have a real role for the team next year, the Trey Young Anthony Davis version of the Wizards, in particular because the herky jerky style, the spot-up shooting. I think he kind of makes sense

with what they need from supporting role players in a way that, to be honest, even Balakula-Bali doesn't sometimes. He struggles to kind of fit in, even as he's kind of hitting more shots than he was earlier in the season.

I'm just super high on Will Riley. I think he has a shake to him that is really hard to replicate and is just clearly valuable to any team that is looking to create mostly from the second side, but honestly, I'm open to being stretched into other capacities too.

46% shooting overall, 34% on threes, which considering he's taking a lot of, like, pretty adventurous off the dribble threes because who else is going to do it? 53.5% on twos, like, that's decent shooting efficiency

for a young guy in this environment. So I don't, I feel bad for Ryan Culkbrunner. I'm sorry. Like, he's had a great rookie. See on James. There's other guys. Yep.

But those would be my all rookie picks. Rookie of the year is getting a little frothy. You are going to reveal your picks on group chat later this. week. I'm going to give it a little settle because like the 40 point and 50 point games, they're feeding him a little bit, Cooper flag to try to win to try to come from behind like a like a like the guy who runs the two mile race and he's like the finishing kick is just catching up. But it's also been efficient and he's doing tons of heavy lifting in a way that

Kinniple doesn't quite have to do. I had almost slammed the door. shut. I'm just, I'm going to keep it a jar and think a little bit more deeply about it, because I think it's an open race now. I know that Kinnipple people don't want to hear that. I don't know, but I don't want to spoil your pick. Group chat. When is your next episode? We're going to be talking about on Thursday, all the rest of the individual awards. So finalizing defensive player of the year, finalizing MVP, I guess as much as we can finalize, not knowing who's going to be eligible for those things, but rookie of the year among them. This one is tough. I think, look, the Khan, Coup, and, you know, maybe Will Riley,

and third race as we're trying to make sense of it. Look, I'm not ruling it out at this point. The theoretical and philosophical debate about role this year, I find to be just utterly fascinating as far as what Cooper is asked to do versus what Khan is asked to do. I find both candidates to be wildly worthy of this particular honor, but in slightly different ways that kind of, I think reflects a little bit of what you value as a basketball thinker in mind and punitive.

it potentially, but also just what is realistic for these guys in these particular spots. Yeah, I actually, Cooper's been so good in the last three weeks that I need to, I need to sit with it a little bit more in the last week of the season. And saying all that,

he's not going to make my rookie the year ballot because you only get three and his minutes are not up to where VJ is. Dylan Harper has a chance to be, I mean, I think Cooper clearly has the upside to be the best player in this class. if you told me Dylan Harper were actually five years from now the best player in this class, I would not be that shocked.

And I would probably put his upside second among all these guys. Like just last night he comes off the bench seven of 11, three of four from three or something like that. Just every game is like 17 efficient points, five assists, just three is coming up. Like that dude is scary good. And he's not even going to make the rookie year. He'll make some ballots. But I just think VJs play like a thousand more minutes in him and played quite well. That dude is scary.

also just much better defensively than I kind of expected him to be and even from the first couple weeks of the season than I thought he was. He's come a long way even within the course of the season. I want to one thing on MVP. I know you're not going to reveal your pick.

Michael Pina wrote his column touting Yokic's MVP. It's a good column. Yokic has definitely made a strong case. I think he's probably left Wembe at this point given the minutes gap between them for number two on my fake ballot. I'm still pretty comfortable.

And he leads in like P.E. and, you know, Vorp and whatever other advanced stat you want to go with, as he always does. I was waiting for the schmorphs. You know, you can't forget the schmorphs. He's a great schmorp guy.

I've always said that about him, a great schmorp guy. No one has to sell Yokic. I just, I'm still pretty comfortable going with Shea. Because this, this, we, again, I don't need to sell you on, She's shooting efficiency, scoring, efficiency,

playmaking is not Yokch level, nobody is, but he's a good play. maker. Defensively, there's a pretty big chasm between the two of them, although Yokic's rebounding, I think, is a little bit underrated. But he just hasn't been even up to his usual level, I think, defensively, and Shea has. And the advanced stats for all the Vorps and Shorps I talked about, like, they're pretty close, estimated plus minus, which is a stat I use on dunks and threes, which is very reliable. Other NBA teams use it. Shea's been

number one the entire year. You can find other stats. It's close enough that to me, last year, it was an 18 win gap. It's not going to be that big this year. It's like an 11 win gap right now. That's still a lot of goddamn wins. And I just think, you know, at some point, whatever they finish with, 65 wins, like, it's, I feel, I feel, I feel, I feel,

pretty good with Shea winning MVP again. But you can't go wrong with these four guys. They're all incredible. There's going to be a handful of guys who are having bonkers historical seasons who are not going to win MVP. And we just need to make our peace with that. Like, these are going to look like historical collaborations, and that's going to be fine.

The hairs that we're going to have to parse to, like, figure out how to, like, make sense of those advantages. Like, the defense, I think, is a part of it that's fascinating. If Luca is eligible for this stuff, it's obviously held against him to a point, but he's been improved. Wembe, if he is the unanimous defensive player of the year, like, how you're waiting offense versus defense, which is not 50-50, but, like, a significant enough part of the game where it should give him a nice buoy in terms of the race.

And I got to say as Shea's defense goes, like I think this is his best defensive season by a significant margin in a way that probably hasn't been discussed enough over the course of the year. But to me, is reaching the point where it is a legitimate, like, propelling force in the argument for him. It's not just the shot making. It's not just the creation. It's not just what he allows in terms of his teammates' roles.

He is a legit, like maybe even all defense consideration worthy defender right now. And if that's not kind of breaking some ties, I honestly don't know what will. It's a wonderful race. All four of them are worthy. The Wembe minutes have always been like why I never let like there was people flirting with the he's the MVP. I never quite got there.

On Yokach, another just thought I had watching the Nuggets last night and in a lot of previous games. A lot has been made of his turnovers going up since he's came back from injury. He's had some like weird. on Yokechi turnovers. I do wonder, like he had six last night in that overtime game against Portland.

The team only had like 12 or 11. And I do wonder if there's like something in the, I'm just test driving this take, as Bill would say. Like his turnovers maybe almost spare other people from committing turnovers. Like there's a certain number of turnovers that your team is going to commit no matter what. His share of them has grown.

I wouldn't say that turnover has been like a, giant problem for the Nuggets, so I haven't checked their turnover rate in the last like two, three weeks. But I do wonder, is he's creating so many advantages with his other passes that go right and sparing other people too much heavy lifting that. I wonder if there's something to that. That's all. I think there absolutely is. At the same time, I do feel like he's been for as dominant as he's played a little more harried in some situations than I'm used to seeing from him. And that's holding his own standard against him. So maybe that's not fair in itself. I want to circle back to the Wemby Minutes thing though

because I've been trying to make sense of this too and I think one thing I'm having trouble with is if it only takes a guy 29 minutes to be dominant and his team to win 60 games should it matter that he plays less. It's a great, it's a great. I guess in theory he could play three more minutes a game. He could have been available for a few more nights here and there

to where he's not borderline for the awards races. But he's been about, as good as you could be in those minutes that he's played. And the spurs have been an incredible team all season. And part of me thinks that that's enough. It's interesting that it just takes that amount of minutes. And they're like plus 650 or something with him on the floor and a slight minus, I think, for the season with him off the floor.

Yeah, I mean, it's like, you know, Shea has whatever, two, three hundred minute advantage over him and doesn't play fourth quarters of a million games because they're so good. But, but, like, he still plays that many minutes. That's an interesting way to look at it. All right, Rob Mahoney, you're going to reveal all these choices to the world with Justin Vary and Kyle Mann on group chat on Thursday. That's a must listen. I can't. I will be listening with suspense. Thank you for your time. And thank you for all of your insight today on the Zach Lowe show. Thanks for having me, Zach. I appreciate it. All right, that's it for today's episode of the Zach Lowe show. We'll be back later this week,

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