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Speaker 1: presented by Fandel Here at the volume. I am Jason
Speaker 1: Tim Pappy Wednesday, everybody. I hope you are all having
Speaker 1: a great start to your week. A loaded NBA slate tonight.
Speaker 1: And yes, we had a lot of stars missed the
Speaker 1: games for various reasons, but I still feel like we
Speaker 1: learned a lot. We're gonna get into a bunch of games.
Speaker 1: We're gonna get into Lakers sixers here at the start,
Speaker 1: and then we're gonna get into that game, that huge
Speaker 1: matchup between Katie and the Nets and the Grant in Memphis.
Speaker 1: After that, we're gonna get into the Jazz absolutely just
Speaker 1: folding in Boston against the Celtics. And then for those
Speaker 1: of you guys who stick around for the end, we
Speaker 1: are going to talk about the Phoenix Suns, a big
Speaker 1: road win on in Minnesota. We're gonna get to all
Speaker 1: of it. We're gonna start with the Lakers though, So
Speaker 1: obviously I was really looking forward to this game tonight
Speaker 1: because you know, obviously the Lakers are starting to build
Speaker 1: some positive momentum, right, you know, we get this big
Speaker 1: win on the road in Toronto, then yeah, you have
Speaker 1: this really disappointing loss in Washington, but they're in control
Speaker 1: for the vast majority of that game, and then they
Speaker 1: go win in Cleveland and look better than they have
Speaker 1: all season, even with Anthony Davis for large stretches, because
Speaker 1: they just have a kind of an identity figured out, right,
Speaker 1: Like they're they've kind of leaned into this five out
Speaker 1: identity for a few months now, but the effort was
Speaker 1: super inconsistent, and they didn't really have the offense figured
Speaker 1: out because they were playing all of these nonshooters. Well
Speaker 1: now they're playing all their young players, they're playing all
Speaker 1: their athletes, so they've got the five out identity, mixed
Speaker 1: with their best personnel, mixed with some effort in some belief,
Speaker 1: and as a result, we've been getting some good outcomes. Right,
Speaker 1: And so here we go to Philly at home on
Speaker 1: a Wednesday night in the Crypto dot Com arena. I
Speaker 1: thought it was a really good opportunity for the Lakers
Speaker 1: to get a big win, especially since Philly has some
Speaker 1: very specific weaknesses. They're a better are basketball team in
Speaker 1: the Lakers, but they have a weakness with their transition defense,
Speaker 1: which we'll talk about in a minute. And they have
Speaker 1: a low foot speed which will typically cause them to
Speaker 1: have issues against five out teams that really spread them out.
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, Lebron had to sit, and we're gonna get
Speaker 1: to that in a second because I'm gonna go positive
Speaker 1: on the whole Lebron sitting thing. But what you saw,
Speaker 1: which was really interesting is all of the things minus Lebron,
Speaker 1: everything that I just talked about, all of those things
Speaker 1: minus Lebron materialized tonight and as a result, you had
Speaker 1: a very competitive showing against that Philadelphia seventy sixers team.
Speaker 1: The Lakers played super fast up and down the floor.
Speaker 1: They played incredibly hard when they got into the half court.
Speaker 1: It was a lot of driving, kick five out basketball
Speaker 1: and attacking matchups with Carmelo and with Russ and with Malik.
Speaker 1: That is the best way for this team to maximize
Speaker 1: it's set of talent, and as a result, you saw
Speaker 1: a competitive game. Obviously, they just didn't have the horses
Speaker 1: to win a game like that, especially without Lebron. With
Speaker 1: this team already struggling on the size front, that was
Speaker 1: gonna be an issue. Obviously, the Lakers have to sharpen
Speaker 1: up a lot of things as well. We'll get a
Speaker 1: little bit deeper into some Laker stuff in a minute,
Speaker 1: but I did want to talk about the Sixers because
Speaker 1: something seems a little bit off with them, because, like
Speaker 1: we talked about in our power rankings just recently, they're
Speaker 1: starting to trend downward and some things are starting to
Speaker 1: not look right. James Harden is not looking anywhere near
Speaker 1: as good as he did in that first couple of games.
Speaker 1: And what you're seeing is those weaknesses that I described
Speaker 1: start to be start to show up in a in
Speaker 1: a rather ugly manner. Teams know how to attack this team. So,
Speaker 1: for instance, if you've got James Harden, who was actually
Speaker 1: a pretty good athlete, but he's lazy, right, Like, he's
Speaker 1: not dedicated to sprinting up and down the floor. In transition.
Speaker 1: You've got Joe lm Bead who's a very very good
Speaker 1: player and definitely cares about that kind of stuff, but
Speaker 1: he operates around the basket on offense, and he's slow
Speaker 1: footed in a straight line speed, so he can struggle
Speaker 1: in transition even you look further down the roster, like
Speaker 1: Danny Green. Danny Green is a great spot up shooter.
Speaker 1: He's great at defending bigger wings because he's got good
Speaker 1: size and strengthen. He's a great positional defender, but he's
Speaker 1: not a great sprinter, Like he's not gonna sprint up
Speaker 1: and down the floor and hang with teams that play
Speaker 1: with a ton of pace. Georgia Sneeing another one of
Speaker 1: those guys, great shooter shoot from three, got good size,
Speaker 1: he rebounds well, but if you get him in a
Speaker 1: track meet, he's gonna be probably one of the two
Speaker 1: or three slowest guys on the floor. And so what
Speaker 1: you're seeing is, you know, five five out basketball is
Speaker 1: like the half court version of transition. You have to
Speaker 1: cover the most space, and then transition is literally a
Speaker 1: foot race. So if you can get Philly in a
Speaker 1: position or they have to cover a ton of ground,
Speaker 1: they're going to struggle because they're just not a very
Speaker 1: fast team. And then in the half court, so for instance,
Speaker 1: if I got Joel Embiid and my defense is constructed
Speaker 1: around having Joel Embiid at the basket defending everything that
Speaker 1: comes my way, but I'm running a five out sist him. Now,
Speaker 1: Obviously when Dwight Howard's on the floor doesn't work this way.
Speaker 1: But when when they're playing without Dwight Howard and they're
Speaker 1: playing five out with Lebron's at the five, or when
Speaker 1: you and Gabriel's at the five, or Carmelos at the five.
Speaker 1: Now Joel Embiid has to be in help side by
Speaker 1: leaving a shooter open on the perimeter so he can
Speaker 1: still protect the rim. But all it takes is one
Speaker 1: or two rotations before Joel Embiid has to close out
Speaker 1: to the perimeter. And when he has to close out
Speaker 1: to the perimeter, now there's nobody on the back side
Speaker 1: that has that same rim protecting presence that Joel Embiad has.
Speaker 1: This is the issue with one dimensional teams. When you
Speaker 1: play a certain style. When you can keep the game
Speaker 1: in your style, when you can play really slow, keep
Speaker 1: things in the half court, they're gonna be really tough
Speaker 1: to beat. Joel Embiad and James Harden draw a ton
Speaker 1: of fouls. All of the shortcomings that James Harden has
Speaker 1: as a postseason player, Joel Embiid counters a lot of that.
Speaker 1: They have a good amount of shooting, and then on
Speaker 1: the defensive end of the floor, and they have their
Speaker 1: defense set. They are very big and long and athletic
Speaker 1: right or they are a lot of they're not super athletic,
Speaker 1: but they're very long and all. So they can do
Speaker 1: a lot defensively in the half court. But if you
Speaker 1: can force them to change styles, that is where they
Speaker 1: can start to fall apart. If you make them play
Speaker 1: your style, fast track, meet up and down the floor,
Speaker 1: five out basketball, it plays directly into their weaknesses and
Speaker 1: they start to have issues. And we've seen a ton
Speaker 1: of that as of late, and it's something to keep
Speaker 1: an eye on. One of their Note on the Sixers.
Speaker 1: You know this thing and I've been talking about this
Speaker 1: for weeks with them, they are the most appalling team
Speaker 1: in the NBA to watch because it's not basketball a
Speaker 1: lot of the time. You know, when I say what
Speaker 1: what is basketball? I mean like playing the game the
Speaker 1: way that we all did from the time we were
Speaker 1: kids to the time that you're playing in your men's
Speaker 1: league or women's league or whatever it is you're doing now,
Speaker 1: whether you played in high school or college or not.
Speaker 1: Basketball is about putting the ball in the basket, within
Speaker 1: a within a five on five concept basketball. You would
Speaker 1: never see a guy at the gym, you know, do
Speaker 1: the kdie rip through to try to draw two free throws.
Speaker 1: That's not basketball, right, And what you saw what you
Speaker 1: see so often with this team, and it actually hurts
Speaker 1: them on a lot of occasions, especially since the refs,
Speaker 1: you know, are allegedly supposed to be paying closer attention
Speaker 1: to this sort of thing. But they go, they deviate
Speaker 1: from playing basketball, and they start to do their gimmick
Speaker 1: key bullshit, and it starts to hurt the team. There
Speaker 1: was a pivotal possession late I think it was early
Speaker 1: fourth quarter or James Harden's running transition and he's got
Speaker 1: Danny Green on his left side and Malik Monk's kind
Speaker 1: of closing out to James Harden at the top of
Speaker 1: the key. And when you Gabriel's back in transition defense,
Speaker 1: he did his job. He sprinted back to the rim
Speaker 1: because that's what he does, and he's super fast, great
Speaker 1: transition big. So when you Gabriels waiting under the basket,
Speaker 1: Malik monks on James Harden, Danny Green is standing completely
Speaker 1: unguarded right to his left on the wing. James Harden,
Speaker 1: if he's playing basketball, will just make a swing pass
Speaker 1: to Danny Green, who is one of the all time
Speaker 1: great three points. You're especially in transition, used to kill
Speaker 1: with that when he was with the Spurs. He did
Speaker 1: a lot with the Lakers as well, running to the
Speaker 1: corner great shooter instead of playing basketball and king that read.
Speaker 1: He drove into Malik tried to hook his arms when
Speaker 1: you and Gabriel's right there and help. He piles into
Speaker 1: when you in Gabriel's chest and just throws his arms
Speaker 1: arms up in the air and turns the ball over
Speaker 1: and in the process. I don't know, we don't know
Speaker 1: what it is yet. It's either a need a knee
Speaker 1: kind of deal, like like kneecap bruise, or like a
Speaker 1: bruise in his thigh. He's fine. He came back to
Speaker 1: playing the game, but he heard himself doing it. So
Speaker 1: not only did he turn the ball over, not only
Speaker 1: did he miss his wide open teammate, but he got
Speaker 1: himself hurt just by doing gimmicky bullshit instead of playing basketball.
Speaker 1: And that's gonna always be my biggest pet peeve with
Speaker 1: that team. There's a huge difference between guys who draw
Speaker 1: fouls because they play basketball so well that teams have
Speaker 1: to foul them and guys that do gimmicky stuff to
Speaker 1: try to draw fouls. That's the that's the huge difference.
Speaker 1: Jannis Antenna Coopo draws a ton of fouls because he's
Speaker 1: just ripping through and going to the basket like he's
Speaker 1: not looking for the whistle. He's just going to the basket,
Speaker 1: and people are hitting him because they can't keep him
Speaker 1: in front. Katie, it's the same thing. Katie's just doing
Speaker 1: his thing, operating with this dribble, get into his spots,
Speaker 1: and guys get out of position and they have to
Speaker 1: hack or Katie's gonna rise up and make shots. That's
Speaker 1: a completely different type of foul drawing. What Kateie? What what?
Speaker 1: Joe Empiad and James Harden do is fake basketball. It
Speaker 1: disrupts the flow of their offense. It literally is. It
Speaker 1: goes against making normal basketball reads. And as we know,
Speaker 1: even though they can get foul calls in bunches during
Speaker 1: the regular season, we know that stuff just doesn't work
Speaker 1: in the playoffs. And so if they don't get over
Speaker 1: that and start to play real basketball, that's gonna be
Speaker 1: an issue, especially you know, so much of this now
Speaker 1: is gonna come down on their defense and James Harden
Speaker 1: controlling the basketball, because, like I said, they have to
Speaker 1: set the tone. They have to control the pace, and
Speaker 1: in order for them to do that, they have to
Speaker 1: get a ton of stops to keep to keep their
Speaker 1: defense set. And then on offense, they need James Harden
Speaker 1: to play slow and keep the ball in the half court.
Speaker 1: They have a formula. Their formula still works, and that formula,
Speaker 1: in conjunction with their talent, will give them a punch
Speaker 1: or chance to beat anybody. But if you ask me
Speaker 1: what's the most likely outcome, I think the most likely
Speaker 1: outcome is they run into some team that directly attacks
Speaker 1: their weaknesses, runs them off the floor with their foot speed,
Speaker 1: and James Harden and Joel Embiid go down doing their
Speaker 1: bs that they always do. So moving on to the Lakers,
Speaker 1: first of all, shout out to the Lakers for actually trying.
Speaker 1: This is the fourth game in a row where for
Speaker 1: the vast majority of the game they gave a really
Speaker 1: good effort, which obviously makes that Washington Wizards game so
Speaker 1: much more frustrating because what a blown opportunity that was.
Speaker 1: Like the Sixers game tonight, if Lebron plays Philly, probably
Speaker 1: comes a little bit more intense, and that game is
Speaker 1: still close. It's still is a tough one for them
Speaker 1: to win without Anthony Davis, but you damn well should
Speaker 1: have won that game at Washington. That was a huge
Speaker 1: missed opportunity. But overall, this team is trending in the
Speaker 1: right direction in a lot of different ways. There's a
Speaker 1: belief there, there's a scheme that makes sense. They have
Speaker 1: settled on, for the most part, what their rotation is
Speaker 1: going to be in terms of the gout, the primary
Speaker 1: guys that are gonna play alongside Lebron, A d and
Speaker 1: Russ in various shifts at various moments of the game.
Speaker 1: They're starting to kind of round into form in so
Speaker 1: many different ways. So I get why it can be
Speaker 1: frustrating to have Lebron and a Dan Street clothes. I
Speaker 1: get that, but I'm gonna go positive here. So obviously,
Speaker 1: the Lakers haven't played since Monday, so Lebron spent the
Speaker 1: night in Cleveland on Monday, so he didn't have to
Speaker 1: do rest on an airplane right that night. So he
Speaker 1: gets Tuesday completely off, he gets Wednesday completely off. The
Speaker 1: Lakers don't play Thursday, the Lakers don't play Friday, the
Speaker 1: Lakers don't play Saturday. So he gets this full week
Speaker 1: basically to rest that knee for what's gonna be an
Speaker 1: incredibly difficult playoff run if they have the juice to
Speaker 1: do it, if they if they have, if they get
Speaker 1: past Phoenix and make a run at this, it's gonna
Speaker 1: be incredibly grueling. They're gonna have to probably win a
Speaker 1: road playoff game single game elimination in New Orleans if
Speaker 1: they're very lucky that I'll be at home, but that's
Speaker 1: still a tough matchup, right then they're gonna have to
Speaker 1: go play whoever wins that other playing game to then
Speaker 1: have to play the Phoenix Suns. That's a grueling stretch
Speaker 1: of high level single elimination. And then and then uh,
Speaker 1: playoff basketball, So it's gonna be grueling. Giving Lebron some
Speaker 1: time off is smart in my opinion. Now, Anthony Davis.
Speaker 1: Today was exactly five weeks to the day since Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis got hurt, and we've heard all kinds of reports
Speaker 1: that he's doing a ton of on court work. He
Speaker 1: actually looks pretty good when I've seen him. So the
Speaker 1: way I look at this, Anthony Davis is probably coming
Speaker 1: back in the next two or three games. Lebron is
Speaker 1: getting six days off. The identity of the team is
Speaker 1: coming into form. The rotation is starting to get narrowed
Speaker 1: down to the right guys. Russ is playing better basketball
Speaker 1: than he has all season. He shot poor, like really
Speaker 1: poorly from the perimeter tonight, which I predicted. He shot
Speaker 1: like on jump shots in the previous three games. It
Speaker 1: was inevitable that that was gonna come down. He went
Speaker 1: two for ten tonight outside on jump shots. But outside
Speaker 1: of that specific thing, he finished around the rim great tonight.
Speaker 1: He applied a ton of rim pressure, still classic Russ stuff.
Speaker 1: He was really bad defensively in the fourth quarter or whatever.
Speaker 1: We can get into that another time. But Russ is
Speaker 1: playing better now then he has this entire season. So
Speaker 1: with all of that coming together, the scheme, the players,
Speaker 1: the stars, you can actually start to see a like
Speaker 1: an actual functional route that the Lakers can take. There's
Speaker 1: a path taking shape. It's a narrow path, it's gonna
Speaker 1: be a very difficult path, but there's a path taking shape.
Speaker 1: And that's very exciting. And that's why I wasn't too
Speaker 1: concerned about Lebron taking the night off tonight, even though
Speaker 1: I wanted to see him play. I think he's gonna
Speaker 1: I think Anthony Davis will be back soon. Lebron looks
Speaker 1: great physically, whatever this knee injury was. Obviously there's issues
Speaker 1: with swelling and fluid that come with the knee, but
Speaker 1: as you guys have noticed watching the game, uh these
Speaker 1: games over the course of the last couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: it looks like he's regaining a lot of his explosiveness.
Speaker 1: So whatever was going on with the knee, I and
Speaker 1: obviously we will probably learn a lot more about this
Speaker 1: knee issue when we get to the off season, just
Speaker 1: like he did with his ankle and with his groin,
Speaker 1: But he at least looks as explosive as he needs
Speaker 1: to in order to legitimately do what he needs to
Speaker 1: do to be, you know, playoff Lebron and to do
Speaker 1: everything that like because, like I said from from the
Speaker 1: All Star break, from the trade deadline, when they didn't
Speaker 1: make a deal, the only way this works now because
Speaker 1: they their margin for air massively shrunk when they screwed
Speaker 1: up the off season and butchered all their signings. The
Speaker 1: only way this works now is if Lebron and Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis go on a playoff run for the Ages. They
Speaker 1: need to look like the first and second best players
Speaker 1: in the world in order for this to work. But
Speaker 1: Lebron very much looks like that guy right now. And
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis literally was destroying everybody he was playing in
Speaker 1: the handful of games before he hurt his foot, because
Speaker 1: he looked lighter. He just looked he looked more confident,
Speaker 1: he was more mobile. Is his lift was better if
Speaker 1: he has that still when he comes back from this
Speaker 1: foot injury, and Lebron is still that guy, and Russ
Speaker 1: is a a slight net positive instead of a big
Speaker 1: net negative and they're playing their best players. Now we're
Speaker 1: talking about a team that legitimately has a chance. It's
Speaker 1: gonna be extremely difficult. They have the hardest path because
Speaker 1: they have to go through Phoenix in the plan, but
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Speaker 1: really really interesting and entertaining game tonight in Memphis. I
Speaker 1: was very disappointed that John Moran didn't play. But you know,
Speaker 1: there's this interesting phenomenon that happens in the NBA, and
Speaker 1: I think you saw it a little bit in that
Speaker 1: Minnesota Timberwolves Sons game in the early stretches of the game,
Speaker 1: when Minnesota was in control. When you have really the
Speaker 1: young teams that have a lot of athleticism and size,
Speaker 1: that are at home and that are motivated for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: they can be like a buzz saw that you're running into.
Speaker 1: You see this a lot in the NBA playoffs. Better
Speaker 1: team at home goes up two games to nothing. They're
Speaker 1: the better team, they're usually the older team, they're the
Speaker 1: higher seed, they have the veterans. Then they go on
Speaker 1: the road. It's like the Calves when they go on
Speaker 1: the road when they go on the road to Indie,
Speaker 1: or the Miami Heat with Lebron when they go on
Speaker 1: the road to Indie, uh and play Game three when
Speaker 1: they're up two games to none. That raucous environment, super
Speaker 1: motivated team, young athletic feeding on the energy of the crowd.
Speaker 1: It is literally a buzz saw. And I remember seeing
Speaker 1: once upon a time a stat from Vega as somebody
Speaker 1: was looking at Vegas results of this kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Underdogs game three down two oh at home. I think
Speaker 1: they win, like they covered the spread like six of
Speaker 1: the time. It's it's it's a there's data that backs
Speaker 1: this kind of thing up. Don't quote me on that
Speaker 1: specific number, but there is data that backs that kind
Speaker 1: of thing up. I think that's what happened at the
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Nets tonight. You have John Morant out, you had
Speaker 1: like all you have to do is look at the
Speaker 1: Memphis Grizzlies fans and the way they were acting on
Speaker 1: Twitter all day. They were so excited for this game.
Speaker 1: The the the arena was electric. They like we talked
Speaker 1: about in the show on Monday night, when you sub
Speaker 1: John Morant out, who is not a good defensive player,
Speaker 1: even though he's very important to that team, he's not
Speaker 1: a good defensive player, you put another athlete on the floor. Obviously,
Speaker 1: when Tyas Jones was out there, it's not great either.
Speaker 1: But when Thyas Jones was off the floor and they're playing,
Speaker 1: you know, they're basically letting Dylan Brooks are on the point.
Speaker 1: They are super super athletic. Now that even further makes
Speaker 1: that concept that I'm talking about more complicated, and you
Speaker 1: saw the basically the Nets run into the buzz saw,
Speaker 1: fall way behind. They gave up a million points in training.
Speaker 1: I think they had twenty two fast break points that
Speaker 1: they gave up in the first half, and like eleven
Speaker 1: offensive rebounds, those are two stats that are irrevocably attached
Speaker 1: to effort and athleticism. If you're a bigger, stronger, faster
Speaker 1: team that's playing harder, they're gonna get a ship ton
Speaker 1: offensive rebounds and you're gonna run up and down the
Speaker 1: floor and get dunks. And that's what they did in
Speaker 1: that first half. Then the Nets settled down in the
Speaker 1: second half and got to what they were doing. Through
Speaker 1: the entire game, Katie and Kyrie were getting whatever shot
Speaker 1: they wanted, even without Seth Curry as a spacing threat,
Speaker 1: even playing a lot of minutes of Andre Drummond and
Speaker 1: Bruce Brown in the front court, which we're gonna get
Speaker 1: to in a minute, but they were just getting whatever
Speaker 1: they wanted. So I knew as soon as they kind
Speaker 1: of tightened up some of those details, as soon as
Speaker 1: they started getting back in transition, as soon as they
Speaker 1: started boxing out, they go on a run. And they
Speaker 1: did and the Nets. Actually, I think they went up
Speaker 1: one oh four, one of one. They kind of had
Speaker 1: control there for a minute, and then that buzz saw
Speaker 1: came back and their defense locked in. They got a
Speaker 1: bunch of stops and Desmond Bane made a bunch of
Speaker 1: threes to Anthony Melton made one. They made a bunch
Speaker 1: of threes in that fourth quarter run, and it was
Speaker 1: just too much for the Nets. I don't read too
Speaker 1: much into that. I'm still a huge believer in what
Speaker 1: they do. For a couple of specific reasons I wanted
Speaker 1: to dive in. First of all, we got the word
Speaker 1: today that basically for the rest of the season, Kyrie
Speaker 1: Irving's gonna play in every home game. So I told
Speaker 1: you guys that while I was worried about that, it
Speaker 1: didn't count them out. For me. I still believed in
Speaker 1: them as a threat. So that even that takes it
Speaker 1: to another level. With Kyrie's availability, He's playing some of
Speaker 1: the best basketball of his careers. Had over a hundred
Speaker 1: points in his last two games. Kyrie is clicking right now,
Speaker 1: so having him for every game is a huge asset.
Speaker 1: But what is so what is so fascinating to me
Speaker 1: about this team is the way they can get away
Speaker 1: with poor spacing. So we learned a lot about this
Speaker 1: over the course of the last few years with the Lakers.
Speaker 1: Right when you have guys like Dennis Schroeder or Russell
Speaker 1: Westbrook or Lebron James or Anthony Davis basket attackers, guys
Speaker 1: that their bread and butter is putting their head down
Speaker 1: and going to the rim. Maybe Anthony Davis doesn't deserve
Speaker 1: that credit, that's another conversation. But for those other guys
Speaker 1: they get and put their head down to the rim.
Speaker 1: Spacing is via totally important for those guys because spacing
Speaker 1: means driving lanes. Spacing means I just have to beat
Speaker 1: my guy off the dribble and maybe one help defender
Speaker 1: instead of driving into a thicket of bodies. But Kyrie
Speaker 1: Irving and Kevin Durant are uniquely equipped to handle tight
Speaker 1: space environments because of their polish in their ability to
Speaker 1: create shots off the dribble. So, for instance, if I
Speaker 1: made any slasher play basketball with Andre Drummond and Bruce
Speaker 1: Brown on the floor, they would have absolutely no luck
Speaker 1: getting to the basket. They would struggle with that throughout
Speaker 1: the game. It would be a problem for them, you know,
Speaker 1: especially like early Lebron before he became a jump shooter,
Speaker 1: he would have really struggled with something like that. But
Speaker 1: Katie and Kyrie, because they are at their most comfort
Speaker 1: beating one defender in a one on one situation to
Speaker 1: get to a ten to fifteen foot jump shot, they
Speaker 1: don't care how many bodies are under the basket. They
Speaker 1: will they go to the basket as a counter, they'll
Speaker 1: drive to the raim and try to finish a layup
Speaker 1: here and then as a counter to their bread and butter,
Speaker 1: which is operating in that mid range space. A great
Speaker 1: example of this was Kobe Bryant in the late two thousands.
Speaker 1: You know, with with Paugasol and Andrew buying him. You know,
Speaker 1: the Paugasol and Andrew buying him, they clogged things up
Speaker 1: in there, which is so good for the defensive end
Speaker 1: and for their offensive rebounding, their ability to control the paint.
Speaker 1: But Kobe's ability to functionally operate in that mid range
Speaker 1: space when there was no space to operate under the
Speaker 1: basket is why he was the perfect star for that team,
Speaker 1: and it's why that team was the best team in
Speaker 1: the league over that stretch. It's a very interesting concept
Speaker 1: that I've had to feel like because I've been concerned
Speaker 1: about that Andre Drummond Bruce Bound fit for a while.
Speaker 1: Whether or not that would become an issue now will
Speaker 1: be We'll see over time, because maybe when they get
Speaker 1: James Johnson in there, some of these other guys, let's
Speaker 1: say seth or he does get hurt. It'll be interesting
Speaker 1: to see if a better defensive team that's got a
Speaker 1: little bit more length and athleticism, if like a like
Speaker 1: a Milwaukee Bucks or a Miami Heat, if a team
Speaker 1: like that can find a way to make them pay more.
Speaker 1: But it's the ability, the luxury of keeping Bruce Brown
Speaker 1: and Andre Drummond on the floor. That's defense guys, that's rebounding,
Speaker 1: that's physicality that raises the physical profile of those lineups.
Speaker 1: That that makes it so that Katie and Kyrie don't
Speaker 1: have to carry as much of a load. I'm a big,
Speaker 1: big believer in what they've got going on. I I
Speaker 1: don't care that they lost tonight in Memphis. I still
Speaker 1: think their top tier contender absolutely very well could be
Speaker 1: the team holding the title. They're not my number one pick.
Speaker 1: I'm probably gonna go with Phoenix still, but Brooklyn I
Speaker 1: have them right there with Boston, like right underneath Phoenix.
Speaker 1: Really a couple quick notes on the Grizzlies. No, they're
Speaker 1: not better without John Morant. We went over this last night.
Speaker 1: It's great that they keep winning these games of fifteen
Speaker 1: and two now without John Rant. It's week schedule up
Speaker 1: until tonight. Tons of size and athleticism defense that will
Speaker 1: manufacture wins in the regular season. But the Nets are
Speaker 1: not a great defensive team. They actually had a really
Speaker 1: bad defensive night, even though they've been pretty good defensively overall.
Speaker 1: Against a really good defensive team, a team like Boston,
Speaker 1: if you don't have a guy like John Morant, they
Speaker 1: can break the team down off the dribble at the
Speaker 1: start of possessions. Their offense is going to completely fault
Speaker 1: to pieces. So I I I like Memphis. It's their
Speaker 1: cool story. They need John Morant in order to have
Speaker 1: any chance, and I still have them like they're they're
Speaker 1: they're on level below the Boston's and the Brooklyn's and
Speaker 1: the teams that have like a real chance to win
Speaker 1: the title. Alright, moving on to the Jazz Celtics, so
Speaker 1: really quickly on this one. So the Celtics continue to
Speaker 1: just completely beat the ship out of everybody they're playing,
Speaker 1: including good teams they wanted to Denver and demolished. On
Speaker 1: the other night, they demolished the Jazz Tonight, I said.
Speaker 1: I mentioned a while back that when we did our
Speaker 1: first power rankings, I think it was like a month ago,
Speaker 1: and I talked about how the Celtics were playing so
Speaker 1: incredibly well, but that Jayson Tatum and Jalen Brown weren't
Speaker 1: making threes. They were both shooting like thirty from three
Speaker 1: over that span when they were doing so well, and
Speaker 1: so I was like, wait till they start making shots
Speaker 1: like this could get even crazier. Well, Tatum in the
Speaker 1: last three weeks of shooting damn near from three, and
Speaker 1: then tonight Jalen Brown was making them. Tatum and Brown
Speaker 1: tonight went eight for four from three. They lit the
Speaker 1: Jazz on fire. There was nothing they could do with them.
Speaker 1: But the most interesting subplot about that entire game to
Speaker 1: me was not only are the Celtics really good, but
Speaker 1: there their identity, their specific style of play, switching everything
Speaker 1: five out basketball directly attacks what the Jazz do well.
Speaker 1: Like we talked about earlier with Joel embiid Oh, I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna get into it again. In five out basketball,
Speaker 1: when you're driving and kicking, you can get a guy
Speaker 1: like Rudy Gobert out of the paint on a rotation
Speaker 1: or two, which generates space to get to the rim.
Speaker 1: That's the advantage of having Al Horford in the corner
Speaker 1: and Robert Williams setting the high ball screen. There's nobody
Speaker 1: under basket and that just opens things opens things up
Speaker 1: and makes Rudy Gobert cover in space. But most importantly,
Speaker 1: the Utah Jazz are a screen and roll offense. Almost
Speaker 1: everything they do offensively involves a high screen with Rudy
Speaker 1: Gobert and Mike Conley and Donovan Mitchell trying to create
Speaker 1: stuff off of that. The only guy they have that does,
Speaker 1: the only guys they have that do isolation are Jordan
Speaker 1: Clarkson and bog Boyan Bogdanovich, and they're just not very great.
Speaker 1: They're not very good basketball players. They're gonna play isolation
Speaker 1: basketball against really good scores. They're gonna lose those matchups
Speaker 1: on most nights. So when you switch these high ball
Speaker 1: screens that involved Conley and and Donovan Mitchell, it disrupts
Speaker 1: everything that they do. Offensively, and it kind of turns
Speaker 1: them into a It kind of turns them into a
Speaker 1: jump shooting team. You know, Donovan Mitchell's taking like eleven
Speaker 1: threes a game over this last couple of months. That's
Speaker 1: for for for their best score are you believe their
Speaker 1: best athlete, the guy that's supposed to be living at
Speaker 1: the rim, that's really dependent on jump shooting. Which kind
Speaker 1: of takes me to one kind of larger topic that
Speaker 1: I wanted to hit on that I think is relative
Speaker 1: to all of these teams and a lot of the
Speaker 1: things we've been talking about lately, because we have, you know,
Speaker 1: this up and coming class of centers, right, like we
Speaker 1: have Joel Embiid and we have Nicola Yoki's, two players
Speaker 1: that many folks think there are the best players in
Speaker 1: the league, this this revival of the centers. And then
Speaker 1: we have these really good guards, right We've got John Murray,
Speaker 1: We've got Donovan Mitchell. You know, we've got these up
Speaker 1: and coming guards in the league. But then we've got
Speaker 1: our wings. We've got our Janice Lebron and Kevin Durant,
Speaker 1: who have seemingly followed by the wayside in these conversations
Speaker 1: about who the best players in the league are. And
Speaker 1: what blows me away that people keep glancing over with
Speaker 1: this kind of thing is those guys, those big guys,
Speaker 1: those are those wings. They don't have weaknesses that you
Speaker 1: can directly attack. I can run on Oil Embiide and
Speaker 1: Nicola Yokich all day long. They're way too slow. I
Speaker 1: can put them in a five out system and make
Speaker 1: them rotate on the perimeter and massively limit their defensive effect.
Speaker 1: You're not gonna getting a track meet to beat Lebron,
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant and Joannice. They're gonna win the track meet.
Speaker 1: You're not gonna make Lebron, Janice and and k D
Speaker 1: guard too much on the perimeter. They're gonna lock people
Speaker 1: up out there going to the guards. This is the
Speaker 1: This is the key. This has been one of my
Speaker 1: biggest issues with Steph, and I got in trouble saying
Speaker 1: this years ago. We won't get into it, but the
Speaker 1: thing with Steph is when you're a smaller guard, you
Speaker 1: can't rely on your physicality to create shots. So when
Speaker 1: you're switching defenses right and those screen and roll actions
Speaker 1: don't work, all of a sudden, you're looking at a
Speaker 1: guy eye to eye and you have to score. Now,
Speaker 1: what made Steph Curry so great is he could also
Speaker 1: do that to a certain extent, right, But all these
Speaker 1: other small guards like Donovan Mitchell and and you know,
Speaker 1: Jordan Clarkson and Mike Conley, like, if they're in an
Speaker 1: isolation situation against the set elite defense with all the
Speaker 1: wings and help and everything, they're gonna struggle to create
Speaker 1: their own shot because they're small. Whereas if I'm Lebron
Speaker 1: and it's the pivotal possession of the game and the
Speaker 1: crowd's going crazy and it's with three minutes left and
Speaker 1: there's eight seconds left on the shot clock, I'm fighting
Speaker 1: for a position at fifteen feet. I'm leaning on you
Speaker 1: with my two seventy pound frame. I'm catching the ball
Speaker 1: and I'm fading over either shoulder, and I know I'm
Speaker 1: getting that shot off. That's the advantage of that. These wings,
Speaker 1: these hyper versatile Swiss army knife wings that we have
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant, Janie and Lebron, they are the best players
Speaker 1: in the league. That archetype will always be the most
Speaker 1: functional archetype to succeed in any basketball environment. We got
Speaker 1: way too ahead of ourselves with these big guys, and
Speaker 1: we always get way to us ahead of ourselves with
Speaker 1: these little guards. Don't forget that the Wings are the
Speaker 1: guys that run the league. All right, Before we get
Speaker 1: out of here, I wanted to talk about the Sons
Speaker 1: and the Wolves. So another team that the Timberwolves played
Speaker 1: that was a uh, you know, top to your team, right,
Speaker 1: or whatever you wanna called playoff team. And like we
Speaker 1: talked about, every time they've played one of these teams,
Speaker 1: there's been a star missing, and once again tonight they
Speaker 1: get to play one of them without a star Chris
Speaker 1: Paul at home, and they lost. And they lost for
Speaker 1: a lot of the reasons that I have been hammering
Speaker 1: home about these two teams in particular, Like I told
Speaker 1: you guys, one of my biggest fears with Minnesota, I
Speaker 1: like Carl Anthony Towns is a huge matchup problem, even
Speaker 1: though he's not a great defensive player. They have so
Speaker 1: much athleticism on the wings with uh, they have so
Speaker 1: much athleticism on the wings now that it kind of
Speaker 1: covers for that. Everything in the front court for the
Speaker 1: Timberwolves I like a lot, but they have two volatile
Speaker 1: guards in the back court. They've got D'Angelo Russell, and
Speaker 1: they've got Anthony Edwards, who's young. The two of those
Speaker 1: guys tonight combined for twenty five points, seven rebounds, and
Speaker 1: eleven assists combined, and they went ten for twenty six
Speaker 1: from the field and three for thirteen from three. Those
Speaker 1: are the guys determining the outcome of most of these
Speaker 1: possessions for the Timberwolves. And I really like Anthony Edwards.
Speaker 1: I think he's gonna be a great player one day,
Speaker 1: but he's young. Young guards. Decision making is the number
Speaker 1: one thing young guards struggle with. They don't see the
Speaker 1: floor well enough yet. Anthony Edwards is way too reliant
Speaker 1: on his jump shot at this point in his career.
Speaker 1: That's something he's gonna learn as he gets older. And
Speaker 1: then D'Angel Russell, He's fine. D'Angel Russell's fine. He's just
Speaker 1: he's a what what what will we call him? A
Speaker 1: league average starting guard? Right? Like? He's fine. Like he's
Speaker 1: not gonna be the guy that's going to go toe
Speaker 1: to toe with Devin Booker. Hell no, certainly not Chris Paul.
Speaker 1: He's not gonna go toe to toe with Steph Curry.
Speaker 1: He's not gonna go toe to toe with John Moran.
Speaker 1: That backcourt is gonna be what inevitably spells the doom
Speaker 1: of this Minnesota Timberwolves team. And that's the part that
Speaker 1: they got to figure out. I don't know who they
Speaker 1: can go for, but that's gonna be the piece that
Speaker 1: they have to build out. Love the front court, love
Speaker 1: all the athleticism, love car Anthony Towns. They got to
Speaker 1: figure out the back court. And then with the sons.
Speaker 1: I keep telling you, guys, DeAndre Ayton and Mikhail Bridges
Speaker 1: are the future stars of this team. Well, DeAndre Ayton
Speaker 1: tonight thirty five and fourteen, he's averaging one point zero
Speaker 1: six points per possession on post ups, which is the
Speaker 1: same as Lebron this year. That's how good of a
Speaker 1: post player DeAndre Ayton has been in a small role. Well,
Speaker 1: he's not getting touches to build rhythm, and all he's
Speaker 1: allowed to do is should jump books, which has been awesome.
Speaker 1: That that like power dribble, little turning right hand jump book.
Speaker 1: He can make it out to like ten feet now too,
Speaker 1: It's crazy. He like there was this whole conversation earlier
Speaker 1: this season about whether or not Robert Sarvers should pay
Speaker 1: him the max. If they let him go, that is
Speaker 1: a catastrophic mistake. The future of this team is Devin Booker,
Speaker 1: Nicle Bridges, and DeAndre at you get rid of Chris
Speaker 1: Paul before you get rid of DeAndre Campaign was awesome
Speaker 1: again to night. Campaign is always awesome. Campaign is a
Speaker 1: really good backup guard to have to get dribble penetration
Speaker 1: and stuff. We talked about this a lot in previous podcast.
Speaker 1: You find any other option before you get rid of
Speaker 1: DeAndre Ayton, he and he gives you the best option
Speaker 1: to hang with the big he's especially with the Yokiches
Speaker 1: and the Embides out there and the honest is out there,
Speaker 1: you need to have somebody like that that can hang
Speaker 1: with these bigger bodies. I think it would be absolutely
Speaker 1: insane if they let Deandreton go. I think he's a
Speaker 1: star in the making. He's he's so good that it's
Speaker 1: not that stupid that the Sons didn't take Luca instead.
Speaker 1: That's how good Deandreton has been. He's averaging over twenty
Speaker 1: points since the Chris I think he's averaging right around
Speaker 1: twenty points since the Chris Paul injury on like sixty
Speaker 1: percent shooting. That's just outrageous numbers alongside all of the
Speaker 1: talent that's on that roster. The Phoenix Suns top the bottom,
Speaker 1: are by far the most talented team in the league.
Speaker 1: And they have a guy who can create shots for
Speaker 1: the shots first teammates and a guy who create shots
Speaker 1: firms self. That's why I think they're the favorites right now.
Speaker 1: One last note before we get out of here on
Speaker 1: Devin Booker, and just kind of applies to John Morant
Speaker 1: as well. But once again, we had a statement. I gosh,
Speaker 1: I think it was Isaiah Thomas. I think it was
Speaker 1: Isaiah Thomas, can't remember. Somebody, somebody famous, some NBA player
Speaker 1: said something about how Devin Booker should be in the
Speaker 1: m v P conversation. And then Devin Booker quoted the
Speaker 1: tweet and said, like, yeah, but they changed the criteria
Speaker 1: for based on your name, and I wanted to talk
Speaker 1: about that, but just a minute, because it's something that
Speaker 1: bothers me. You know, everybody's got different criteria for m
Speaker 1: v P, that's clear. But there are a couple of
Speaker 1: things that we've all kind of agreed on, you know,
Speaker 1: like one, we care about team record. We want to
Speaker 1: have the best player on the best team in the league, right,
Speaker 1: and then two, we want, you know, the guy who's
Speaker 1: the most valuable. What happens when that guys off the floor?
Speaker 1: How does it impact how reliant is the team on
Speaker 1: that guy. That's part of it. But the last part,
Speaker 1: and it's always been something that I thought is important,
Speaker 1: is the guy's gotta be one of the best players
Speaker 1: in the league. Like the guy's gotta be in the
Speaker 1: conversation for best player in the league. Those are the
Speaker 1: criteria for the m v P in my opinion, And
Speaker 1: Devin Booker and John Moran are having unbelievable seasons. I
Speaker 1: do not want to undercut that to any extent. You
Speaker 1: guys have heard me say I think John Moran is
Speaker 1: better than Russell Westbrook ever was. That's how high I
Speaker 1: revere that guy. I think John Moran is better than
Speaker 1: Derrick Rose, uh, John Wall, Russell Westbrook, any of those guys.
Speaker 1: He's the evolutionary next step in that in that type
Speaker 1: of archetype of hyper athletic point guard. I love John Moran.
Speaker 1: He's not a top tier superstar. I really like Devin
Speaker 1: and Booker one of the most polished scorers we have
Speaker 1: in the league. I've said on the show, he was
Speaker 1: one of the few bright spots ins when Chris Paul
Speaker 1: was fading, when DeAndre Aton was struggling with foul trouble,
Speaker 1: when they were getting run rough shot over by by
Speaker 1: by Johannis Antenna Coopo, when all that was crumbling around
Speaker 1: them in the four losses, there was this guy on Phoenix,
Speaker 1: Devin Booker, who's showing some flashes of all time great
Speaker 1: scoring over an unbelievable defensive player and Drew Holiday. That's
Speaker 1: how much I revere those guys. But they're closer to
Speaker 1: the tenth player in the league, tenth best player in
Speaker 1: the league, than they are to the first best player
Speaker 1: in the league, which to me automatically disqualifies them from
Speaker 1: m v P guys. Let's be honest, why are the
Speaker 1: Phoenix Suns in the Memphis Grizzly so good? Is it
Speaker 1: because Devin Booker and John Moran are m vps or
Speaker 1: is it because those two teams are incredibly talented. It's
Speaker 1: because they're incredibly talented. The Memphis Grizzlies are unbelievably athletic
Speaker 1: and big job. Jaren Jackson Jr. Literally looks like the
Speaker 1: next version of Anthony Davis on some nights, you know,
Speaker 1: Desmond Bains having kind of like a weird Clay Thompson
Speaker 1: mixed with Shawn Marion slashing defending type of season. He's awesome,
Speaker 1: you know. And then Phoenix, I literally just said, is
Speaker 1: the most talented team in the entire NBA. So it's
Speaker 1: awesome that John Rand Devin Book are playing well. But
Speaker 1: those teams are not winning because those guys are m vps.
Speaker 1: Those teams are winning because they're incredibly talented. There are
Speaker 1: much much better m VP candidates out there who are
Speaker 1: on teams with really good records, who are also immensely
Speaker 1: valuable to the product that the team is putting on
Speaker 1: the floor, and are comfortably in the conversation for best
Speaker 1: player in the world. Those are the guys that should
Speaker 1: be considered at this point. I love Devin Book or
Speaker 1: John Morant, just this ain't your year, guys, and that's
Speaker 1: it's okay. Maybe one day, if you get better, maybe
Speaker 1: one day on a on a in a different situation,
Speaker 1: you can have that consideration. But I I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: lose any sleep over those two guys not being in
Speaker 1: the m v P conversation. Alright, guys, that is all
Speaker 1: I have for tonight. I sincerely appreciate you guys taking
Speaker 1: the time to come hang out. We have a few
Speaker 1: nights off here. We will be back on Sunday. As always,
Speaker 1: I appreciate your support and I'll see you in a
Speaker 1: few days. The volume