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Speaker 1: net in West Virginia. All right, Welcome to Lakers Tonight,
Speaker 1: presented by fan Duel. Here on the volume, I am
Speaker 1: Jason Tim. Happy Tuesday, everybody. I hope you're all having
Speaker 1: a good start to your week. That was a good
Speaker 1: old fashioned butt kicking. And you know there there are
Speaker 1: a million things for us to get into in terms
Speaker 1: of how something like this could go this wrong. To me,
Speaker 1: the story, the overtop story for this type of butt
Speaker 1: kicking is the obvious difference in talent between the two teams.
Speaker 1: You know, I trust Lebron James and I trust Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis to hank height with any duo in the league.
Speaker 1: I personally think Lebron is still better than Janice at
Speaker 1: this point in his career. Some people disagree with me,
Speaker 1: but regardless the duo of Lebron James and Anthony Davis,
Speaker 1: you should feel comfortable with that matchup against any duo
Speaker 1: in the league, including Janice and Chris Middleton, or Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant and James Harden, or Steph Curry and Draymond Green,
Speaker 1: or any duo that you run into. That's how good
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis is. And obviously we all know how good
Speaker 1: Lebron James is. But you know what stood out to
Speaker 1: me so much as I was watching that game. As
Speaker 1: you go down the rest of the roster, there's a
Speaker 1: massive difference between the two teams. You know, you get
Speaker 1: to Drew Holiday, and Drew Holiday is many, many times
Speaker 1: better than Russell Westbrook. It's kind of insulting to even
Speaker 1: include Russell Westbrook's name in a conversation with Drew Holiday.
Speaker 1: That's how much of a chasm exists between those two guys.
Speaker 1: And then you look at the front court and you're
Speaker 1: looking at Bobby Portis and he's not even their starting center.
Speaker 1: He's a fill in for Brook Lopez because he's hurt,
Speaker 1: and he's significantly better than Dwight Howard or JaVale McGee
Speaker 1: or Carmelo Anthony or anybody else that the Lakers use
Speaker 1: to fill in those front court minutes. Then you start
Speaker 1: looking on the wing, and the Lakers have some interesting wings, right,
Speaker 1: Like Malik Monk has been a win for the front
Speaker 1: office this offseason, but he's kind of like a one
Speaker 1: way player. He gives away a lot of what he
Speaker 1: gets on the offensive end on the defensive end of
Speaker 1: the floor. And you know, and you've got these young,
Speaker 1: exciting players like Stanley Johnson and Austin Reeves, but the
Speaker 1: reality is is Pat Conaton and Grayson Allen, Dante DiVincenzo,
Speaker 1: those are better two way players. They're bigger and more athletic,
Speaker 1: and they can actually fulfill their responsibilities on the defensive end.
Speaker 1: They're good at doing what the Bucks need them to
Speaker 1: do on offense. I mean, Grayson Allen went on like
Speaker 1: a solo run there in the first half, or he's
Speaker 1: getting into the lane, making floaters, finishing around the basket.
Speaker 1: There's a huge difference in the talent level down the roster,
Speaker 1: and that's where the Russell Westbrook trade becomes such a disaster.
Speaker 1: And I'm not even talking about Russ as a player,
Speaker 1: but just the the talent that was lost as part
Speaker 1: of that deal, because the Lakers used to have those guys.
Speaker 1: They used to have, you know, k c p like
Speaker 1: a really good two way guard at the shooting guard position,
Speaker 1: great lock and trail defender, awesome attacking closeouts, hit a
Speaker 1: ton of big shots for the Lakers in the bubble,
Speaker 1: can hold his own in isolation possessions as a defender.
Speaker 1: You looked at Kyle Kuzma, just this huge forward who
Speaker 1: towards the end of his Lakers tenure, had become a
Speaker 1: great defensive player and a great rebounder who also had
Speaker 1: the ability on not just on nights when a star
Speaker 1: was out to lean on him significantly offensively, but he
Speaker 1: could have huge scoring nights alongside Lebron and n a a
Speaker 1: D and then Alex Caruso, Like, we're looking at this
Speaker 1: Laker trade deadline and you're sitting there thinking, man, we
Speaker 1: would love to have a swing guard slash forward that's
Speaker 1: between six five and six eight who can guard everybody
Speaker 1: and can at least hold their own on the offensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor. That was Alex Caruso. That's what
Speaker 1: he brought to this team. And the unfortunate thing there is,
Speaker 1: you know, there's a debate there would you rather have
Speaker 1: quality role players or a superstar? We talked about that
Speaker 1: last night with James Harden and I was talking about
Speaker 1: how you have to cash those things in for James Harden.
Speaker 1: When we got to the two thousand nineteen offseason and
Speaker 1: you were thinking about, hey, do we want Kawhi Leonard
Speaker 1: or do we want all these role players? It was
Speaker 1: obvious that you wanted Kawhi Leonard because that's Kauai freaking Leonard, Like,
Speaker 1: obviously he's gonna be able to do so much on
Speaker 1: the court that it's going to justify what you're trading
Speaker 1: off in that deal. And this Russell Westbrook trade completely
Speaker 1: gutted this roster of talent. You know, the Alex Cruso
Speaker 1: thing is commonly portrayed is just a budget you know,
Speaker 1: non signing, like let him go to save money on
Speaker 1: the salary on the luxury tax. But as we know now,
Speaker 1: if you look at the totality of everything surrounding the
Speaker 1: Russell Westbrook trade, they brought in so much salary in
Speaker 1: the form of Russ's forty plus million dollar salary that
Speaker 1: that was a big part of why they had to
Speaker 1: let Alex Caruso go. And it's really unfortunate because now
Speaker 1: the task that lays in front of the Lakers is
Speaker 1: significantly more difficult. Can the Lakers win without as much
Speaker 1: talent as their opponent, Yeah, that happens in NBA history,
Speaker 1: but it requires that your stars are significantly better than
Speaker 1: what's on the other team. You cannot overcome that type
Speaker 1: of talent advantage unless your stars are just absolute world beaters.
Speaker 1: And now that's what they need to be, you know,
Speaker 1: regardless of what happens at this deadline, whether or not
Speaker 1: they can get a legitimate wing to put along the
Speaker 1: side of them, or multiple wings, no matter what we
Speaker 1: know now looking at this team juxtaposed with the teams
Speaker 1: towards the top, that Lebron and Anthony Davis are going
Speaker 1: to have to put on a performance for the Ages
Speaker 1: in order for this team to have any legitimate chance
Speaker 1: to win the title. And that's unfortunate because this was
Speaker 1: self inflicted. You know, here in a minute, we're gonna
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about why the Bucks are so
Speaker 1: much better, not just in terms of talent, just in
Speaker 1: what they do functionally as a basketball team, But a
Speaker 1: huge part of it is continuity. You know, the core
Speaker 1: pieces of the Bucks are still there from years ago,
Speaker 1: and so there's a culture that exists and that permeates
Speaker 1: down the roster to everybody, and even the new guys
Speaker 1: that come in kind of take on that culture. The
Speaker 1: Lakers won a championship in twenty and basically turned over
Speaker 1: the entire roster, you know, so much so that it
Speaker 1: doesn't even it's not even recognizable compared to the identity
Speaker 1: and the types of personalities and the types of competitive
Speaker 1: nature that was on that team. Think about how crazy
Speaker 1: that is that you could have a Lebron James and
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis team that is still Lebron James and Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis team, but just a year and a half removed
Speaker 1: and completely and utterly different. Because of how much you
Speaker 1: swapped out around them. And it's funny because there's a
Speaker 1: classics saying you don't fix something that isn't broke, and
Speaker 1: the Lakers fixed something that wasn't broke, and in the
Speaker 1: process trashed their best chance to make another run with
Speaker 1: Lebron James and Anthony Davis. It's really unfortunate. Now the
Speaker 1: question becomes, how do you move forward from here? Right
Speaker 1: because you don't want to have a defeatedst attitude, certainly
Speaker 1: not within the locker room. You can't just be like,
Speaker 1: well the Bucks are better, We're gonna lose all the
Speaker 1: Sons are better, we can't compete with them. My, we'll
Speaker 1: just call it. So I look at it from two fronts.
Speaker 1: The first front is the trade deadline. Obviously, you have
Speaker 1: to find a way to slot guys better. Right now,
Speaker 1: the Lakers third best players probably Molik Monk or Russell Westbrook,
Speaker 1: depending on who you ask. You need to get somebody
Speaker 1: better than those guys into one of those slots so
Speaker 1: that you slot everybody down. You know, you want you
Speaker 1: want your role players to compete, be competing with the
Speaker 1: lesser role players on the other team, and the best
Speaker 1: way to do that is to bring in just two
Speaker 1: or three good NBA starter level wings that can come
Speaker 1: in and move guys down the roster. That may not
Speaker 1: even be possible. That's how dire this situation is. But
Speaker 1: that has to be the goal throughout the next week.
Speaker 1: Find some way to bring a little bit more talent
Speaker 1: in so that you don't have a situation like what
Speaker 1: you had tonight against the Bucks. The other half of
Speaker 1: it is just simply becoming better at basketball. And I'm
Speaker 1: not talking about skills or talent. I'm talking about the
Speaker 1: things that basket ball teams do to win games. So,
Speaker 1: for instance, Milwaukee, you watch them tonight. They flow in
Speaker 1: and out of their offense so easily. It just looks natural.
Speaker 1: It looks like they've been playing together forever. The actions
Speaker 1: that they run are all crisp and quick. They run
Speaker 1: them early in the shot clock. They don't find themselves
Speaker 1: in late clock situations where some guy has to isolates.
Speaker 1: Very organized. Then you look on the defensive end of
Speaker 1: the floor and they're always in the right spot. Their
Speaker 1: rotations are sharp. They were doing a lot of switching
Speaker 1: early in the game, which is super interesting because it's
Speaker 1: not something that this team used to do. But The
Speaker 1: Milwaukee Bucks are an extremely well run, extremely well coached
Speaker 1: basketball team that has amazing habits, that plays the right
Speaker 1: way on a night in and night out basis, they
Speaker 1: don't have effort issues. Then you look over at the
Speaker 1: Lakers and it's the exact opposite. They've struggled with effort
Speaker 1: throughout this entire season. To start the game again tonight
Speaker 1: after they got absolutely destroyed by the New York Knicks
Speaker 1: and transition and off to an eleven zero start again tonight,
Speaker 1: they weren't getting back in transition to start the game.
Speaker 1: That's just effort. That's guy's just not running. That's guy's
Speaker 1: just not communicating with each other about who their matchup
Speaker 1: is or where they're supposed to be on the floor.
Speaker 1: This is not a discipline team. They're running a switching
Speaker 1: scheme a lot with their guys, similar to what Milwaukee's doing,
Speaker 1: but it looks sloppy. They lose guys all the time.
Speaker 1: When they do get switched onto a bier guy, they
Speaker 1: don't try to get in front and box out. They
Speaker 1: just kind of stand behind the guy and watch him
Speaker 1: get an offensive rebound and put it back. All of
Speaker 1: those little details within the Lakers are broken. So the
Speaker 1: second part of this, aside from talent, Obviously, Rob Polinka
Speaker 1: has a job here. Rob Polinka's job is to try
Speaker 1: to bolster the talent on the roster. But for the Lake,
Speaker 1: for the for the guys in the locker room, they
Speaker 1: have to establish championship habits. And I can't believe I'm
Speaker 1: still saying this after fifty something games, but for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: that urgency just hasn't clicked with this group. Now. I
Speaker 1: have my theories about that. As I've said many times
Speaker 1: on the show before, I just don't think this concoction
Speaker 1: of players makes a ton of sense, not not in
Speaker 1: terms of their personalities, just in terms of what they
Speaker 1: do on the court. There's not the right mix for
Speaker 1: these guys to really buy into his scheme and try
Speaker 1: to execute it on a daily basis. But something has
Speaker 1: to be done on that front. Because the Lakers have
Speaker 1: fought injury problems all season. There have been issues with
Speaker 1: guys in and out of the lineups. You can it's
Speaker 1: hard to point at the standings and just say, oh,
Speaker 1: this team sucks. When Lebron's missed as many games as
Speaker 1: he has, Anthony Davis has missed as many games as
Speaker 1: he has. If I remember correctly, this is just the
Speaker 1: eighteen game this season that Lebron and Anthony Davis both played,
Speaker 1: So there's some excuses on that front. But now you
Speaker 1: have your guys, the excuses are gone. Obviously, you'd like
Speaker 1: to tune up a little bit with some talent, but
Speaker 1: more or less, this is the core. In the big moments,
Speaker 1: It's probably gonna be Lebron and a d Russ, Probably
Speaker 1: Malik Monk is gonna be out there. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: a Stanley Johnson or Trevor Rees or maybe one other wing.
Speaker 1: But this group of guys has to figure out how
Speaker 1: to develop those same habits that Milwaukee has, and it
Speaker 1: starts with a night like tonight, like you fight back.
Speaker 1: I've been sick of the fake comebacks with this Laker team.
Speaker 1: It's like that that stupid Russell Westbrook meme with the
Speaker 1: calendar that talks about how he's the worst player of
Speaker 1: all time, and then he's the best player of all time,
Speaker 1: and then it's the you know, the dead face at
Speaker 1: the end. That's kind of been the Lakers story for
Speaker 1: within games all season long, starting off horrible, then having
Speaker 1: this crazy fake come back, and then it all falling
Speaker 1: apart at the end, but at least in that comeback,
Speaker 1: the Lakers can have some semblance of something to cling to,
Speaker 1: as like, Hey, here are the habits that we have
Speaker 1: to build. This is the way we have to come
Speaker 1: out to start the next game. For instance. I don't
Speaker 1: think it's a coincidence that these stupid fake comebacks keep
Speaker 1: happening with the young guys. That always happened with Reeves,
Speaker 1: John sin In Monk Hey read read the room, Frank.
Speaker 1: Maybe that is your group that needs to start the
Speaker 1: game so that you can set that tone from the
Speaker 1: start and give your team that best chance to feel
Speaker 1: confident about themselves. The confidence was a huge issue tonight,
Speaker 1: Like like I pointed out earlier, the Bucks are not
Speaker 1: is That was the bucks very best punch. Now the
Speaker 1: Lakers best punch might not even be enough in any setting.
Speaker 1: We don't know that yet. Depth that definitely was not
Speaker 1: the Lakers best punch. They are not this bad compared
Speaker 1: to this team, but that's what they looked like tonight
Speaker 1: because the confidence wasn't there. Milwaukee came in playing extraordinarily confident,
Speaker 1: and everybody on the Lakers looked scared, except for maybe Lebron,
Speaker 1: James and Austin Reeves on the entire roster. And so
Speaker 1: you have to establish those habits and get in a
Speaker 1: good groove so that you approached those games and you're
Speaker 1: the confident team and maybe you can swing that pendulum
Speaker 1: in your favor so that you can throw your best
Speaker 1: punch and maybe they don't. Oh there's and you have
Speaker 1: a chance to get a win. That's how you can
Speaker 1: be the team that has more talent than you. So
Speaker 1: that's that needs to be the goal as we go
Speaker 1: down this game stretch. Guys are healthy, guys are in
Speaker 1: the lineup. Have to start building out those habits, have
Speaker 1: to start mastering whatever Frank's scheme is that he chooses
Speaker 1: to use with this group of players, which has changed
Speaker 1: half dozen times this year. But hey, now you've got
Speaker 1: all your guys, now is the time to figure it out.
Speaker 1: For those of you guys who are just joining us.
Speaker 1: This is Lakers Tonight, presented by Fan Duel here on
Speaker 1: the volume. We were just talking a little bit about,
Speaker 1: you know, the talent differential between these teams. The one
Speaker 1: other thing I wanted to hit on from this specific
Speaker 1: game was the interesting reality of the Anthony Davis conundrum.
Speaker 1: You know, Janice takes this matchup super personally, and I
Speaker 1: think we can all guess why. After the Bubble, Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis was claimed by my including myself, to be better
Speaker 1: than Janice. Now, part of the reason why that opinion
Speaker 1: looks so ludicrous in retrospect has to do with Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis's decline more than it does with the opinion itself.
Speaker 1: In the Bubble, guys, Janice looked helpless getting gentlemen swept
Speaker 1: by the Miami Heat the only game they wanted that series.
Speaker 1: Jhannae sat and watched with his brand ankle. That's how
Speaker 1: bad he looked in that series. And in the same
Speaker 1: playoff run, Anthony Davis dusted everybody. Okay, you had one
Speaker 1: of the most dominant defensive playoff runs that we've ever
Speaker 1: seen and then shot like Kevin Durant out of the
Speaker 1: high post. So that's why that was said. Now in retrospect,
Speaker 1: it looks really foolish. Now we know in retrospect like
Speaker 1: a lot of that had to do with Lebron James,
Speaker 1: A lot of that had to do with some uncharacteristic
Speaker 1: hot shooting, and Janice has gotten much better since that
Speaker 1: that's the real reason why that is the way that
Speaker 1: it is. But for whatever reason, Janice takes this matchup
Speaker 1: super personally, and every time he looks eye to eye
Speaker 1: with Anthony Davis, he tries to end him. And I
Speaker 1: think there's an interesting dilemma there because Anthony Davis has
Speaker 1: some limitations in these types of matchups. It really dawned
Speaker 1: on me in the Miami Heat series in the Bubble
Speaker 1: in so Portlands, Houston, and Denver, the three teams that
Speaker 1: the Lakers played on their way to the championship, all
Speaker 1: three of those teams were limited in the front court
Speaker 1: defensively right like it's Nurkics. The Rockets didn't even play
Speaker 1: a center. And then Nicola Yokich, although he's turned himself
Speaker 1: into a decent drop coverage big at this point in
Speaker 1: his career in the Bubble, he's not that great of
Speaker 1: a defensive player and he certainly doesn't hang well with
Speaker 1: with Anthony Davis on an island guarding him in isolation.
Speaker 1: So he thrived in those settings. But then he ran
Speaker 1: into Bama to Bio, and then he ran into an
Speaker 1: extremely athletic Miami Heat team and almost immediately in that series,
Speaker 1: those post up touches that he was getting, we're only
Speaker 1: resulting in jump shots. He wasn't able to get a
Speaker 1: step on Bam or any of the other wings that
Speaker 1: Miami put on Anthony Davis. And I paid close attention
Speaker 1: to Anthony Davis in that series, and most of his
Speaker 1: success around the rim came as a rollman or as
Speaker 1: an offensive rebounder. And it's just the unfortunate reality of
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis's physical limitations. And I know that sounds crazy
Speaker 1: to say, because the dude is freakishly tall and way
Speaker 1: more mobile than most bigs, and that's why he's one
Speaker 1: of the best defensive players in the league. But the
Speaker 1: reality is, if you have a quick, strong forward sitting
Speaker 1: right in front of Anthony Davis that can slide his feet,
Speaker 1: he's not really quick with that first step, and so
Speaker 1: as a result, when those big athletic forwards really man
Speaker 1: up on him, he can't do anything but take a
Speaker 1: jump shot. He doesn't have that ability to get around them,
Speaker 1: which is why he never became a perimeter initiator for
Speaker 1: a big who dribbles as well as he does. What
Speaker 1: makes Janice so much better or than Anthony Davis is
Speaker 1: he is capable of being a perimeter initiator. What makes
Speaker 1: Johanna is capable of being a perimeter initiator is that
Speaker 1: he can dribble and shoot like Anthony Davis can, but
Speaker 1: he also has an incredibly quick first step, so he
Speaker 1: can stare a guy face to face and do a
Speaker 1: quick move and get by him, which is something that
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis has always struggled with unless he's going up
Speaker 1: against a plotting, slow footed center. Now, Joanna says a
Speaker 1: million other things that make him better. He's got an
Speaker 1: incredible motor. He came out and attacked this game from
Speaker 1: the start, like just truly tried to end Anthony Davis.
Speaker 1: We that you don't see that type of aggression out
Speaker 1: of Anthony Davis very often. He's a little bit more
Speaker 1: of a mild mannered guy, tends to kind of go
Speaker 1: with the energy of the team rather than kind of
Speaker 1: generating his own energy. That's another big part of what
Speaker 1: Janice brings to the table. And it's funny because as
Speaker 1: Johannis has developed and as Anthony Davis has declined in
Speaker 1: recent years as a jump shooter, you and with just
Speaker 1: his motor and just what he brings on a night
Speaker 1: night to Night basis. Now there's a comically large gap
Speaker 1: between those two guys, and it is kind of insulting
Speaker 1: to even consider Anthony Davis as one of Janice's peers.
Speaker 1: But that's you know, that's that's something that's gonna be
Speaker 1: a problem in any matchup because in that Miami Heat series,
Speaker 1: that's part of the reason why Ron had such a
Speaker 1: good series and that I think he averaged thirty on shooting.
Speaker 1: They relied on him a ton in that series. Because
Speaker 1: Miami did such a good job of shutting Anthony Davis down,
Speaker 1: that limitation doesn't go away. That's going to continue to
Speaker 1: be the case. What Anthony Davis almost becomes, He's still
Speaker 1: very good. I want to be clear, I'm not trying
Speaker 1: to say that he's, you know, in addict, like completely
Speaker 1: incapable of impacting the game. What I'm saying is he
Speaker 1: becomes more of like a Rudy Gobert with a pretty
Speaker 1: decent jump shot. Is basically what Anthony Davis becomes in
Speaker 1: those settings. Dominant offensive rebounder, dominant defensive player. He can
Speaker 1: screen and roll to the rim and finish above the
Speaker 1: in but he just doesn't have as much just a
Speaker 1: lot of his polish gets neutralized by having those big,
Speaker 1: strong athletic forwards that can slide their feet and stay
Speaker 1: in front of him. That's a limitation there. So that
Speaker 1: puts a lot more on Lebron. Now you end up
Speaker 1: in that kind of playoff series, you're depending on a
Speaker 1: thirty seven year old Lebron to be unbelievably amazing as
Speaker 1: that perimeter initiator. But again, uh much props to Janice.
Speaker 1: That was he came in with a mission to end
Speaker 1: the Los Angeles Lakers tonight and he very much pulled
Speaker 1: that off, at least in whatever metaphorical sense that you
Speaker 1: can think. So the next question becomes who needs to
Speaker 1: make a move more? Who's more desperate a team like
Speaker 1: the Brooklyn Nets in their situation or a team like
Speaker 1: the Lakers, who obviously have a very different circumstance but
Speaker 1: of equally floundering. Both teams are in the play in
Speaker 1: Now both teams are They were literally coming into the
Speaker 1: season the two favorites to win the championship, and their
Speaker 1: way below where they were expected to be. And I
Speaker 1: think this answer is very obviously the Lakers. The Lakers
Speaker 1: have a clear talent disadvantage and a lot of these
Speaker 1: matchups down the roster, and they absolutely must bolster the
Speaker 1: middle of their roster to have any chance to compete
Speaker 1: with any of these teams. When I look at Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: they're they have health issues, but generally speaking, if Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant comes back at some time before the playoffs, if
Speaker 1: Joe Harris can come back at some time before the playoffs,
Speaker 1: and if Kyrie Irving can even just play in road games,
Speaker 1: we already know what that formula looks like, and we
Speaker 1: know that formula works in a playoff setting. They got
Speaker 1: a lot of wins last year and we're on their
Speaker 1: way to winning the title before the Kyrie Irving ankle
Speaker 1: injury and before the James Hardened hamstring injury. So the
Speaker 1: answer is very clearly the Lakers. They are the most
Speaker 1: desperate team here. They are the team that has no
Speaker 1: choice but to try to improve, and they also don't
Speaker 1: have the long window that the Nets have. Kevin Durant's younger.
Speaker 1: You know, James Harden is younger, Kyrie Irving is younger,
Speaker 1: Lebron is thirty seven years old, Anthony Davis is injury prone.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of issues there that shortened that window.
Speaker 1: The Lakers are absolutely the more desperate team between those two.
Speaker 1: Thanks again for coming to hang out, guys. This is
Speaker 1: Lakers Tonight, presented by FanDuel here at the volume. The
Speaker 1: last thing I wanted to hit before we got out
Speaker 1: of here tonight was this, uh the trades that happened today,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to start with the c J McCollum trade.
Speaker 1: So I've always been a huge fantasy Jim McCollum in
Speaker 1: his game. I think his skill set, that three levels
Speaker 1: scoring from the perimeter, that real three level scoring, that
Speaker 1: ability to create your own shot against the top tier
Speaker 1: defenders is easily the most valuable skill that you could
Speaker 1: get from the guard position right there. Now, everyone points
Speaker 1: to Portland's and how much they've struggled, and they use
Speaker 1: that as the lens with which to basically minimize what
Speaker 1: c Jim McCollum has done in his career. And don't
Speaker 1: get me wrong, c J McCollum has limit patians, Like,
Speaker 1: if you're depending on him to be one of the
Speaker 1: talent focal points of your roster, then sure his shortcomings
Speaker 1: become more meaningful. But Portland's never supplied damon c J
Speaker 1: with the type of front court defensive talent that they
Speaker 1: needed in order for those two guys to stay purely
Speaker 1: focused on what they do best, which would be one
Speaker 1: of the best offensive backcourts in the league. And that's
Speaker 1: why that group never really reached their potential. I Obviously
Speaker 1: New Orleans has the same problem, but in theory, brandon
Speaker 1: Ingram is very capable of being a good defensive player,
Speaker 1: and if they could just find some kind of front
Speaker 1: court talent to put along those guys that can defend,
Speaker 1: that's when you start to get really excited because one
Speaker 1: of Zion's shortcomings, as good as he is as a
Speaker 1: wrecking ball around the basket, creating his own shot, is
Speaker 1: just like with your honest when you really pack the
Speaker 1: paint and you make things difficult and you take away
Speaker 1: the easy stuff, some of his skill limitations start to
Speaker 1: show up. And that's where having a guy like Brandon
Speaker 1: Ingram and a guy like CJ. McCollum gets super exciting
Speaker 1: in the sense that you have that surgical approach that's
Speaker 1: very different than the sledgehammer approach that Ian Williamson comes with.
Speaker 1: Not to mention part of the reason why brandon Ingram
Speaker 1: has struggled so much defensively is his offensive role has
Speaker 1: been so large since he left l A. He had
Speaker 1: a great defensive season in two thousand nineteen before the
Speaker 1: Lakers traded him, but it was because he was alongside
Speaker 1: Lebron James. It was because he had a smaller offensive
Speaker 1: role and he could devote resources in that direction. C
Speaker 1: J McCollum helps with that. Poor New Orleans has been
Speaker 1: playing with young guards all season. Getting a savvy veteran
Speaker 1: guard that can come in and take the keys to
Speaker 1: the offense for extended stretches gives brandon Ingram the ability
Speaker 1: to devote his resources to the defensive end, have more
Speaker 1: possessions where he's a spot up player instead of an initiator.
Speaker 1: It's just better for him in general. I'm very high
Speaker 1: on Brandon Ingram, and I always have been, so I
Speaker 1: like to see J. McCollum move as a really good
Speaker 1: move in the direction of the Pelicans building a viable
Speaker 1: contending team around Zion. They just have to find some
Speaker 1: defensive talent to bolster things in the front court, and
Speaker 1: then lastly, really quickly on this Indiana Pacers trade. So
Speaker 1: the the obvious overreaction from Twitter today is that the
Speaker 1: Kings are a total dumpster fire. They got rid of
Speaker 1: Tyley's how Tyrese Haliburton, why didn't they send off Deer
Speaker 1: and Fox? They're just a team in mediocrity. What are
Speaker 1: they doing now? In general, I think people have outrageous
Speaker 1: expectations for what these small market teams can do. Hey,
Speaker 1: guess what, guys. They don't have the ability to do
Speaker 1: the to make the signings and to make the trades
Speaker 1: that some of these bigger markets can do. They're limited
Speaker 1: in what they can do. And the reality is is
Speaker 1: the King's got the best player in the trade. Demonisa
Speaker 1: Bonis would say what you want to say about him.
Speaker 1: He's not my favorite player, but he is certainly a
Speaker 1: lot better than anybody they sent out. And what always
Speaker 1: happens in these kinds of setting is there's like this
Speaker 1: weird hipster crowd that kind of gathers around one player
Speaker 1: and elevates him to something bigger than what he is.
Speaker 1: I like Tyrese Halliburton's game. He's fine. He's not a
Speaker 1: franchise cornerstone. I'm sorry, Like I I don't think that's
Speaker 1: an insult, it's just a reality. He's a decent two
Speaker 1: guard in the NBA who shoots the ball well, play
Speaker 1: makes really well, low turnovers. He's a solid two guard.
Speaker 1: He was not a franchise cornerstone. If I'm a Sacramento fan,
Speaker 1: I can look at this now and I can go, hey,
Speaker 1: I got Dear and Fox, I got Demonest Sabonis, and
Speaker 1: most importantly, I stirred things up. Like I talked about
Speaker 1: earlier with the Lakers, this basketball chemistry thing is a
Speaker 1: real thing that ability to for just an assortment of players.
Speaker 1: It's the it's the concept of the sum versus the parts, right,
Speaker 1: and in this case, just swapping out a bunch of
Speaker 1: bodies and bringing in new guys, you roll the dice
Speaker 1: a little bit and you give yourself a chance to
Speaker 1: have a better group that fits better. And so from
Speaker 1: that same point, for both teams, whether I'm looking at
Speaker 1: this a Sacramento or Indiana, these were two bad teams
Speaker 1: that both have showed flashes of potential in recent years
Speaker 1: that never really materialized, and they're just smartly understanding there
Speaker 1: at the end of that window and they needed to
Speaker 1: mix something up. So I didn't have a problem with
Speaker 1: it from both sides. Alright, guys, that's all we have
Speaker 1: for tonight. We're gonna be off tomorrow night, although the
Speaker 1: Lakers will be playing on the road in Houston. We
Speaker 1: will have a show immediately after the trade deadline on Thursday,
Speaker 1: so hang tight for that and if anything really crazy happens,
Speaker 1: we're gonna try our best to drop whatever we're doing
Speaker 1: and get something out. As always, I appreciate your guys
Speaker 1: support and I will see you in a couple of days.
Speaker 1: The Volume