Speaker 1: You're tuned into Heat Check with Triste Quick.
Speaker 2: On this episode of The Heat Check, I've got a
Speaker 2: special end of the year interview with Yes Keith Smith,
Speaker 2: the one and Only. I was joined by my BEDMGM
Speaker 2: co host Ryan Horvot and Nick Cashew. We recorded it
Speaker 2: on a recent episode last week of BETMGM Tonight. I
Speaker 2: love Keith so much. He's a real deal insider. He
Speaker 2: works for spoke Track. Had a ton of insight actually
Speaker 2: on the latest from the Knicks, the latest on the Hawks, Warriors,
Speaker 2: and more importantly right now teams that might be sellers
Speaker 2: at the trade deadline. A lot of fun. So drop
Speaker 2: me a favorite Nick and drop that generic ass beat.
Speaker 2: I got things started by asking Keith about the train
Speaker 2: wreck that has been the Chicago Bulls but has been
Speaker 2: absolutely insane and what he thinks is really their future.
Speaker 2: From there, Keith gets into the Warriors and whether he
Speaker 2: thinks they are going to be sellers at the deadline.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think there is the possibility the Bulls are
Speaker 1: gonna start looking at what they've got to do differently.
Speaker 1: This is unfortunate because a year ago or so this
Speaker 1: was one of the best teams in the league. They've
Speaker 1: gotten off to a great start. They were playing really well.
Speaker 1: Then Longo Ball got hurt and everything kind of went
Speaker 1: sideways on the Bulls and they just have not been
Speaker 1: the same team without him. They struggled towards the end
Speaker 1: of last year and they've opened this season very poorly.
Speaker 1: And you get a sense when you watch them it's
Speaker 1: not that Zach Lavine and DeMar derozen are playing selfishly,
Speaker 1: because they're not. But there's just a lot of your turn,
Speaker 1: my turn offense. There's not a lot of cohesion. Things
Speaker 1: don't really flow. Their challenge though, with moving on from
Speaker 1: pieces is they owe a pick to the Orlando Magic.
Speaker 1: It's only top four protected this season, so you can't
Speaker 1: really bottom things all the way out or you're just
Speaker 1: gonna hand a good tick to the Magic because that's
Speaker 1: not enough protections to feel great that if you land one, two, three,
Speaker 1: or four, then you're not gonna get bumped back in
Speaker 1: the lottery if the team moves up. So they've really
Speaker 1: got some tough decisions to make in Chicago.
Speaker 2: I'm really interested about how this has changed because last
Speaker 2: year around this time there were all these articles Keith
Speaker 2: about how much chemistry Damar and Zach Lavine had and
Speaker 2: how they are very unselfish players, and you know how
Speaker 2: you know Damar wanted to play off the ball and
Speaker 2: both of them were willing to sacrifice for each other.
Speaker 2: Is it as simple as that Lonzo Ball was the
Speaker 2: connecting tissue or is there something else that sort of
Speaker 2: changed that.
Speaker 1: I think it's a lot of Lonzo Ball being that guy.
Speaker 1: He was the guy who facilitated the offense. He gets
Speaker 1: very underrated having a point guard who make sure that
Speaker 1: everyone feels involved, to make sure everyone is getting their touches,
Speaker 1: get skuys the ball in the spots where they like
Speaker 1: it the most. And when you don't have that guy,
Speaker 1: that falls to the other players. Like I said, I
Speaker 1: don't think Derozen and Levine are by any meat selfish players.
Speaker 1: I just think their score first, guy. That's what they've
Speaker 1: done their entire careers. And when they don't have a
Speaker 1: point are there to organize and set things up. That
Speaker 1: makes it a little bit tricky on that, and I
Speaker 1: think that's what we're starting to see.
Speaker 2: I've been reading some reports. First and foremost Bob Myers
Speaker 2: obviously hasn't gotten his extension yet, but hearing some rumors that,
Speaker 2: given Steph's injury, that they might be willing to part
Speaker 2: with a bunch of these role players to try to
Speaker 2: get a star. Now, Steph's windows obviously very short, and
Speaker 2: it might be difficult for the Warriors even to get
Speaker 2: into the play in tournament given how bad the Warriors
Speaker 2: road record has been. You know, what do you think happens?
Speaker 2: And how real? I guess is this sort of new
Speaker 2: fear moving around the Warriors organization.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think they're very much reading the league right
Speaker 1: now and saying, hey, the West is jam packed and
Speaker 1: it's tight, but we're not part of that top group
Speaker 1: right now. And I think they know we may not
Speaker 1: get into that top or group. But they've been in
Speaker 1: the Playing Tournament. They were there a couple of years
Speaker 1: ago and they got knocked out. I think they know
Speaker 1: they have a bad game, two games in the playing Tournament,
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, your season's over and you're not
Speaker 1: going to defend your championship in the playoffs. So I
Speaker 1: think they'd like to do what they can to try
Speaker 1: to get there. And I think part of that is
Speaker 1: going to come down to now making a decision. They
Speaker 1: have trumpeted and told everybody wants to listen of Hey,
Speaker 1: we had our gap years when Steph was out and
Speaker 1: we got those great draft picks, and we ended up
Speaker 1: in a slab where now we landed our guys who
Speaker 1: are going to be our bridge players, and we're going
Speaker 1: to go from our core of Curry, Green and Thompson
Speaker 1: into this Jordan Poole, James Wiseman, Jonathan Comminger group that's
Speaker 1: going to lead us forward. And that's how we're going
Speaker 1: to stretch this into a two decade long window of contention.
Speaker 1: And I think they're starting to realize James wisen is
Speaker 1: not going to be that guy. He just isn't for them.
Speaker 1: He may eventually bloss him into being a really good player.
Speaker 1: He's very young. Young centers often take a while to
Speaker 1: figure it out in the NBA, but I think the
Speaker 1: pressure on him in Golden State is too much. And
Speaker 1: when you sit down and look at it, a twelve
Speaker 1: million dollars salary, which is what he's sitting on, that's
Speaker 1: a nice piece of salary, man, to go get you
Speaker 1: a player. Their bench has been awful this season for
Speaker 1: the most part, so they need to do something, and
Speaker 1: I think they're going to start to give up on
Speaker 1: that whole idea of we've got our second group behind
Speaker 1: our core, and they may break that up no.
Speaker 2: More two timelines. One of the most disappointing teams probably
Speaker 2: in the NBA this year, has been the Miami Heat.
Speaker 2: Keith gives a fascinating look at their future and let's
Speaker 2: just say it's not very good.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think Miami has turned it around because they've
Speaker 1: mostly gotten healthy, They've gotten some of the guys back
Speaker 1: that have missed some time. But when you look at
Speaker 1: that roster, it's very flawed. They have a whole bunch
Speaker 1: of guards, a couple of wings and one big man
Speaker 1: and Bam out of Bayo, and they don't have much else.
Speaker 1: And I think if they could find a way to
Speaker 1: go get another forward with some side that could come
Speaker 1: in and play alongside Butler Lowry and Bam and Tyler
Speaker 1: Hero and those groups, they'd feel pretty good about that.
Speaker 1: But the challenge is they don't really have tradable contracts.
Speaker 1: Robinson has fallen way off the mask. He's not even
Speaker 1: part of their rotations on most nights anymore. He only
Speaker 1: really gets in there when guys are hurt. He's out
Speaker 1: of the rotation by the end of last season, and
Speaker 1: they've got payroll concerns moving forward to they they gave
Speaker 1: hero a big deal. You've got Bam on his deal,
Speaker 1: Butler on his deal, Lowry on his deal, and you've
Speaker 1: got Tyler Heroes new contract kicking in. So they're in
Speaker 1: a spot where they're going to have to really figure
Speaker 1: that out. And you got to pay Max Shruce if
Speaker 1: you want to keep him around on next offseason. So
Speaker 1: it's tough for Miami to see how they're going to
Speaker 1: get their way out of it. But it's a good
Speaker 1: smart front office there. They may it wouldn't surprise me
Speaker 1: if they do something to rebalance that roster a little bit.
Speaker 2: In this clip, Keith gives his take on two teams
Speaker 2: going in opposite directions, explaining why the New York Knicks
Speaker 2: are the hottest team in the NBA and why the
Speaker 2: Hawks are in absolute turmoil and what it might mean
Speaker 2: for coach Nate McMillan.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're getting back to being that team they were
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago when they were one of
Speaker 1: the surprises of the league and they made it to
Speaker 1: the playoffs. That playoff series did not go well for them,
Speaker 1: and they really said, all right, we need more offense
Speaker 1: because we're not there. But what they did was they
Speaker 1: traded what made them special, which was being such a
Speaker 1: good defensive team, by adding a couple of guys in there,
Speaker 1: like Evan Fournier into their group that just weren't quite
Speaker 1: ready for what they needed to be defensively and wasn't
Speaker 1: enough of the list on the offensive end. So what's
Speaker 1: happened now this season after some struggles, hope in the year.
Speaker 1: I think Tom Thibodeau basically I'm assuming with the front offices.
Speaker 1: Blessing said, I'm getting rid of the guys who don't defend.
Speaker 1: We're gonna take those guys out of the rotation. Evan Fournier,
Speaker 1: Derek grows, cam rettis, They're all gonna be out of
Speaker 1: the rotation. I'm gonna go with guys who will get
Speaker 1: after it and defend and hope, you know, hey, we
Speaker 1: can win a whole bunch of games one hundred and
Speaker 1: ninety eight and that'll be who will be. That's who
Speaker 1: we are, and that's probably the best we can hope
Speaker 1: for right now, and that's starting to work. They're really
Speaker 1: playing great defense and they're doing just enough on offense.
Speaker 1: To have really turned their season around.
Speaker 2: Jeez, what do you make of the rumors that they're
Speaker 2: strict in between Trey Young and Nate McMillan. There was
Speaker 2: obviously some things that got leaked out into the media,
Speaker 2: but also there were, you know, rumblings that that was
Speaker 2: one of the reasons that Lloyd Pierce was fired from
Speaker 2: Atlanta is that he and Traye didn't see eye to eye.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it feels like the old poomi wance, shame on
Speaker 1: me foromy twice, shame on you kind kind of situation,
Speaker 1: or maybe I might have that backwards, but whatever the
Speaker 1: quote is, it feels like we've been fooled twice now
Speaker 1: where well, once you one coach, all right, fine, a
Speaker 1: coach and a player may not get along. Get into
Speaker 1: that second coach that's starting to be all right, who
Speaker 1: who is this really on here? Is this on the
Speaker 1: coach or is this on the player? And I think
Speaker 1: in the case of Trey Young and Nate McMillan, you
Speaker 1: have a point guard in Trey Young, star player feels like, hey,
Speaker 1: I should be the guy here. It should kind of,
Speaker 1: you know, really kind of go my way. And then
Speaker 1: he's got Nate McMillan, who is a long time NBA
Speaker 1: player himself. He was also a point guard, a little
Speaker 1: bit headstrong. He ran into into some of the stuff
Speaker 1: in his prior stops with players a little bit before,
Speaker 1: and I think they they've run into a tough spot.
Speaker 1: And then I think the team's not winning at the
Speaker 1: level they want to be. They thought that de Jontay
Speaker 1: Murray trade was really going to give them this identity
Speaker 1: of a right we can defend, we can play multiple
Speaker 1: different kinds of lineups. We've got two guys who can
Speaker 1: attack on the ball now, and it just hasn't come
Speaker 1: to fruition. They floated around five hundred all year. And
Speaker 1: that's the people, you know, kind of you know, looking
Speaker 1: for what is the answer here? And I think when
Speaker 1: we get in those situations, the easy answer always is
Speaker 1: we'll blame it on the coach and put it all
Speaker 1: on him. And I think Trey Young maybe bought into
Speaker 1: that a little bit too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, follow up on that. Do you think that the
Speaker 2: original hire for Nate McMillan was the was the right
Speaker 2: move or the fact that he had all that success
Speaker 2: as an interim coach kind of forced management to make
Speaker 2: that decision. And then secondarily, do you think John Collins
Speaker 2: finally does get moved.
Speaker 1: Yeah, as far as the Nate McMillan park goes, I
Speaker 1: think you hit the nail on the head. I think
Speaker 1: it was a situation where you're going to finish out
Speaker 1: the year and then it was wow, he really turned
Speaker 1: things around, or the players turned around, but whatever it was,
Speaker 1: Nate McMillan was there when it and around, and it's
Speaker 1: hard to then say thanks for that, we're gonna move
Speaker 1: in a different direction coach wise. They made it all
Speaker 1: the way to the East Finals that year, in a
Speaker 1: little bit of a weird season in the Eastern Conference,
Speaker 1: but they were still there, and I think what we're
Speaker 1: looking at then was all right, you can't move on
Speaker 1: from now. You gotta give him that chance, and they
Speaker 1: get kind of back into a corner. As for John Collins,
Speaker 1: he feels like they kind of knew. I hesitate they
Speaker 1: knew because Miles Turner and trade rumors are still flowing
Speaker 1: out there. But he's just another version of Miles Turner
Speaker 1: where we hear trade rumors every single year of this
Speaker 1: guy's career and then he never goes anywhere. But I
Speaker 1: do think there is a chance, because that one seems
Speaker 1: the Turner stuff is always seems like more teams approaching
Speaker 1: the Facers because they like Turner. This one seems like
Speaker 1: the Hawks and John Collins very much want to separate
Speaker 1: and go their separate way.
Speaker 2: Finally, we get into some trade deadline talk. Keith tries
Speaker 2: to figure out who possibly might be the big sellers
Speaker 2: out on the market this year. Give it a listen.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, Jay Crowder's gonna
Speaker 1: get traded because the Suns aren't going to let guy
Speaker 1: go beyond the trade deadline. Then they'll definitely move him
Speaker 1: at some point. It may be John Collins, because there's
Speaker 1: there are teams who aren't necessarily contenders that are interested
Speaker 1: in Collins, with teams that are kind of in the
Speaker 1: spot where they're maybe a year or two away from
Speaker 1: figuring out what they are, that might jump on Collins.
Speaker 1: I know we've heard him mentioned to the Utah Jazz.
Speaker 1: I know Danny Gage liked him and made a couple
Speaker 1: of different runs at him when he was running the Celtics.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think we could see Collins get moved,
Speaker 1: and then there'll be some player that none of us
Speaker 1: are really thinking about now that between now and a
Speaker 1: month and a half, when the trade deadline comes up,
Speaker 1: after we get past the holiday period, when some guy's
Speaker 1: gonna look around and think, yeah, this is not going
Speaker 1: the way I want it to be. He's going to
Speaker 1: let it know be known he wants to go, and
Speaker 1: then then that's where it'll move. And I think what
Speaker 1: we may also see because this is a very weak
Speaker 1: free agent class, So this coming summer, you're going to
Speaker 1: see some teams basically get a jump on their offseason
Speaker 1: by saying we'll go get the guy. We'll have them
Speaker 1: for the rest of this year to really see what
Speaker 1: he is, figure it out, figure out how he fits
Speaker 1: with whatever we have left over, and that'll be kind
Speaker 1: of our big acquisition just on a few months earlier. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the challenge for there to be a very good, busy
Speaker 1: trade deadline is you have to have sellers. And the
Speaker 1: issue right now is some of the bad teams are
Speaker 1: naturally bad. They're just young and bad. Houston, Detroit, Charlotte
Speaker 1: to some extent, Orlando, who's put them playing better lately,
Speaker 1: but they're still not a very good team. Oklahoma City
Speaker 1: if they eventually fall off. Those teams are bad but
Speaker 1: they're bad with young players, so they don't have a
Speaker 1: ton that they're going to start selling off and moving.
Speaker 1: They've got a couple that are indeed. But what we
Speaker 1: may see is you may see some team that's kind
Speaker 1: of sitting on the borderline and then we could really
Speaker 1: make a plan and run, or we might be a
Speaker 1: playing team that's not really where we want to go,
Speaker 1: and they may say, all right, hey, if we can
Speaker 1: get this great package in return from one of our players,
Speaker 1: let's move this. Now. What I think we may see
Speaker 1: kind of happen here is the early movers. If someone
Speaker 1: makes the trade in early to mid January, a few
Speaker 1: weeks out from the trade deadline, or even a month out,
Speaker 1: that may be something we see happen here. And that
Speaker 1: does happen on occasion when the league is bunched up.
Speaker 1: But I was talking to folks around the league. Ten
Speaker 1: different teams tell me, Yeah, we have a chance to
Speaker 1: win the title if we get into the playoffs and
Speaker 1: we're healthy. And that's crazy. We're never at that many teams,
Speaker 1: even Neil this far into the season, it will usually
Speaker 1: down to seventy teams at most. That kind of feel
Speaker 1: like in him right now, everybody feels like, hey, we
Speaker 1: have a real shot at.
Speaker 2: This last question about thirty seconds, Keith, I want to
Speaker 2: know there's obviously a lot of information and rumors about
Speaker 2: All Stars. Do you think that Dearn Fox is an
Speaker 2: All Star this year?
Speaker 1: I think he has a chance. He won't get voted in,
Speaker 1: so that's just an impossible popularity contest for him to win.
Speaker 1: But if the Kings keep winning, it's either going to
Speaker 1: be him or Demonstas Sabonis who gets recognized for that.
Speaker 1: So it's gonna be one of the two of them. Now,
Speaker 1: I think there's a chance that'll be Fox. See, I
Speaker 1: don't think it'll be both. They don't think they're gonna
Speaker 1: win at quite a high enough level, and I don't
Speaker 1: know that that they'll win. So what will probably come
Speaker 1: down to is what does the guardline look like? What
Speaker 1: does the big man line look like? Who doesn't get
Speaker 1: voted in? Where do they have to kind of fudge
Speaker 1: a position to get a guy in that maybe should
Speaker 1: be in there anyway? Now, it ain't trying to go
Speaker 1: that way, especially if there's like a weird quote like
Speaker 1: Clashier or Andrew Wiggins.
Speaker 2: Kevloaded, that's all that we have for the bonus episode
Speaker 2: of The Heat Check. Check back tomorrow for an all
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