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Speaker 2: see dkang dot co slash audio. All right, welcome to
Speaker 2: hips tonight. You're at the volume. Happy Sunday, everybody. Hope
Speaker 2: all you guys are having a great weekend. Schedule is
Speaker 2: a little weird today because I'm going with calling Coward
Speaker 2: later tonight, so we are not covering pacers Calves in
Speaker 2: today's show. We're gonna be covering that tomorrow mornings. Keep
Speaker 2: an eye on the feed for that. In today's show,
Speaker 2: we're just hitting Denver versus OKC. I viewed this game
Speaker 2: and the game later this evening as games where whoever
Speaker 2: wins is most likely going to win the series. The
Speaker 2: Thunder could either tie it, take it back to OKC
Speaker 2: for a best of three with all the momentum, especially
Speaker 2: after having basically choked away two of the games, and
Speaker 2: be in a commanding position to win. Or Denver could
Speaker 2: go up three to one and put themselves in a
Speaker 2: position where it's extremely difficult to lose three games in
Speaker 2: a row, and same thing goes for Calves Pacers. Calves
Speaker 2: get a win tonight, it's two to two, going back
Speaker 2: to Cleveland, totally different series. Pacers get a win Tonight's
Speaker 2: three to one, feels like they're in control. And round
Speaker 2: one of these two big games today goes to the
Speaker 2: Oklahoma City thunder down eight in the early fourth quarter
Speaker 2: off of a Peyton Watson hook shot and they just
Speaker 2: methodically walk down the Denver Nuggets to get a huge
Speaker 2: win to save their season and send them back to
Speaker 2: oklahom City. You guys are the Joe before we get started.
Speaker 2: Subscribe to the Hoops and I YouTube channels. You don't
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Speaker 2: doing great work on our social media feeds Twitter, Instagram, Facebook,
Speaker 2: make sure you guys follow us there more content throughout
Speaker 2: the season, and then keep dropping mailbag questions into the
Speaker 2: YouTube comments. Since we only have one game today, we'll
Speaker 2: probably do a solid fifteen minutes or so of questions
Speaker 2: from the chat at the tail end of the show,
Speaker 2: So make sure you guys get your questions in there.
Speaker 2: And then when we finish up here today, we will
Speaker 2: be going over to watch playback for our typical after show.
Speaker 2: It's more informal. We take callers, we watch some film,
Speaker 2: we'll have some fun over there. Probably a little shorter
Speaker 2: because I gotta be ready for Collins. We'll probably only
Speaker 2: go for about a half hour today, but head over
Speaker 2: to Playback's playback dot tv slash Hoops tonight when we
Speaker 2: are done. You can also find that link in the
Speaker 2: description of this video. All right, let's talk some basketball.
Speaker 2: So this was a weird game in the sense that
Speaker 2: with Denver playing as much zone as they did, both
Speaker 2: Shay and j Dubb had really rough games, taking bad
Speaker 2: shots against the zone, forcing things early. The two of
Speaker 2: them I thought were pretty awful on offense throughout this game.
Speaker 2: Both of them made defensive plays at various points in
Speaker 2: the game, but I thought both of them really struggled
Speaker 2: against the zone. And so what I want to talk
Speaker 2: about here for a few minutes is specifically how Oklahoma
Speaker 2: City broke the zone, because that was basically how they
Speaker 2: won this game. In the late third quarter, they started
Speaker 2: to hit some of their catch and shoot threes against
Speaker 2: the zone. You could see that rhythm build and then
Speaker 2: suddenly they were a runaway freight train. In that fourth quarter,
Speaker 2: ended up scoring twenty nine points, their most productive offensive
Speaker 2: quarter of this particular game. And really, what a two
Speaker 2: three zone is designed to do is to break your rhythm.
Speaker 2: We talked about this concept after the Calves Pacers game,
Speaker 2: if you guys remember, because the Calves utilized a three
Speaker 2: two zone in that series, and three to two zone
Speaker 2: does a very good job of guarding the three point line.
Speaker 2: Has some vulnerabilities on the back line simply because there
Speaker 2: are two players that are responsible for both the paint
Speaker 2: and the corners and in many cases also coming up
Speaker 2: a little bit to the elbows. And so with that
Speaker 2: being the case, there's just not as much manpower accommodating
Speaker 2: the back line with the two three zone fundamentally different.
Speaker 2: You've got a guy who's just pretty much sitting back
Speaker 2: there in Nikola Jokic, and the four guys around them
Speaker 2: are you know, syncing in and jutting back out, but
Speaker 2: they're they're in a position where four guys are covering
Speaker 2: all that space on the three point line, and so
Speaker 2: there are open threes that are available against the zone.
Speaker 2: But one of the things that can be a problem
Speaker 2: against the zone is when you just start taking the
Speaker 2: first decent looking three that you get your eyes on,
Speaker 2: and what happens there is it will disrupt the rhythm
Speaker 2: of your offense, and all of a sudden, your possessions
Speaker 2: are quick and they don't really have any flow to them,
Speaker 2: and a missed three can be kind of disheartening as
Speaker 2: you head back down the other way. And I thought
Speaker 2: Ja Billis did an awesome job kind of breaking this
Speaker 2: down on the broadcast. But one of the things that
Speaker 2: the Thunder started to do a much better job of
Speaker 2: in the late third quarter was just getting some natural
Speaker 2: rhythm within their two three zone attack, so essentially getting
Speaker 2: the ball from side to side. They would like screen
Speaker 2: the top, swing screen the top, drive into the gap,
Speaker 2: swing to the wing, then like backscreen for somebody, swing
Speaker 2: swing back to the opposite side of the floor. The
Speaker 2: ball was popping around and they were able to generate
Speaker 2: some natural rhythm from a zone possession that is typically
Speaker 2: not there the way you would see it in a
Speaker 2: man possession, and a man possession, you run the same
Speaker 2: actions you've been running all season. It's the same reads
Speaker 2: that you've been seeing all season. There are only three
Speaker 2: or four different types of coverages that you're gonna see,
Speaker 2: and you kind of know what to expect in all
Speaker 2: those situations. Against a zone, it's very different. You have
Speaker 2: to find a way to be comfortable. And this is
Speaker 2: where I have to shout out Oklahoma City's bench guys,
Speaker 2: because they desperately needed somebody to start knocking down shots
Speaker 2: there in that second half, and Aaron Wiggins in Kason
Speaker 2: Wallace in that late third quarter got the lid off
Speaker 2: of the rim, and that ended up being enough for
Speaker 2: the entire team to just kind of relax a little
Speaker 2: bit and start making some plays. Between Kason, Aaron Wiggins,
Speaker 2: and Alex Crusoe, those guys hit eight threes in fourteen attempts,
Speaker 2: and every single one of them was vitally important for
Speaker 2: this Thunder team. And then you know, as bad as
Speaker 2: Jade and Shae were for the majority of this game,
Speaker 2: they each made some big plays in that fourth quarter stretch.
Speaker 2: J Dub had a nice ball screen against the zone
Speaker 2: where he got into the middle of the paint and
Speaker 2: threw a lob to Hartenstein. That was the play where
Speaker 2: Payton Watson tried to block him and he got the
Speaker 2: and one. J Dubb had a nice driving layup off
Speaker 2: the left wing. Late Shay had a driving layup. There
Speaker 2: was a fun sequence where the lead was at three
Speaker 2: off of a thunder bucket. Mark Dagenal calls a time out.
Speaker 2: Comes out of the time out with a ton of
Speaker 2: backcourt ball pressure forces a five second out of bounds call.
Speaker 2: Ball goes back to OKC. They inbound to Shae, and
Speaker 2: Shae just goes right to his right shoulder, fade away
Speaker 2: and finally gets one to go over his right shoulder.
Speaker 2: That pushes the lead to five. And at that point,
Speaker 2: like the entire psychology, the game shifted so heavily towards OKC,
Speaker 2: it felt like it was beyond Denver's grasp. So for
Speaker 2: as bad as those guys were offensively, they did make
Speaker 2: a couple of big late in the game, and they
Speaker 2: needed every single one of them. But I want to
Speaker 2: highlight the defense because obviously, if you hold a team
Speaker 2: to eight points in the opening quarter, as we had
Speaker 2: the lowest scoring first quarter in NBA, playoff history, or
Speaker 2: at least tied for it, but then also holding them
Speaker 2: to eighteen in the fourth quarter after giving up that
Speaker 2: thirty three point third quarter. And there's several different elements
Speaker 2: that I want to zoom in on. First of all,
Speaker 2: Keason Wallace, I thought did an amazing job on Jamal
Speaker 2: Murray in the first half. In particular, he didn't get
Speaker 2: as much of an opportunity to work on him in
Speaker 2: the third quarter run when Denver's offense started to get going.
Speaker 2: But in that first half, he was downright disruptive to Jamal,
Speaker 2: especially in that first quarter as Oklahoma City built their
Speaker 2: initial lead, and then all like every opportunity that he had,
Speaker 2: he just did a little bit better job navigating screens.
Speaker 2: I thought Jamal was able to get a little bit
Speaker 2: more separation from Lou on some of those screening actions
Speaker 2: than he was from Kaison. Keison's just so good at
Speaker 2: navigating those screen situations. And then this is where I
Speaker 2: want to turn to Isaiah Hartens, because you know, there
Speaker 2: are many reasons why the Thunder went after Isaiah Hartenstein.
Speaker 2: He kind of landed into a specific gap in their
Speaker 2: payroll where their younger players weren't going to have to
Speaker 2: get paid for a few years, so they could afford
Speaker 2: to throw a bunch of money at a starting caliber
Speaker 2: NBA center that was going to cost a lot, but
Speaker 2: not have to worry about it handcuffing their ability to
Speaker 2: build a roster around their stars in the future. And
Speaker 2: the actual utility of Hartenstein was the ability to play
Speaker 2: a two big look with chet Holmgren at the four.
Speaker 2: But I bet you if you got into the year
Speaker 2: of that front office, they would tell you it was
Speaker 2: mostly about the Jokich matchup. And here's the thing. We're
Speaker 2: going to talk about yokicch in a bigger picture context
Speaker 2: because I think Jokic is kind of fumbling the bag
Speaker 2: here a little bit. But Isaiah Hartenstein's doing a really
Speaker 2: good job. There's a couple of key things. Did you
Speaker 2: guys notice on some of those jab step sequences that
Speaker 2: Jokich is putting on him, he's not going for the
Speaker 2: jab step and he's sitting on that right shoulder, so
Speaker 2: basically he's opening up his stance and conceding the drive
Speaker 2: because he knows he has all sorts of help on
Speaker 2: the back line, and he's just getting his left foot
Speaker 2: almost like up where Jokic's right foot is to the
Speaker 2: point where he's just sitting on that right shoulder, so
Speaker 2: Jokic can't get the separation on his jab step to
Speaker 2: try to get a clean look from three. He's just
Speaker 2: driving to the left right into the teeth of the defense.
Speaker 2: And the other thing too, is like Jokic will go
Speaker 2: to his left hand with his short range shot making,
Speaker 2: but as Isaiah's riding that right shoulder all the way
Speaker 2: into the lane, it's having a substantial effect disrupting Yokic's
Speaker 2: short range shot making. He's having to power through Hartenstein
Speaker 2: with that right shoulder just to get to that little
Speaker 2: floater that hook shot somewhere in the lane and a
Speaker 2: hard and Stein's just doing a great jobs. It's again,
Speaker 2: part of it is Nikola Jokic and him just going
Speaker 2: through one of the most bizarre shooting slumps I've seen
Speaker 2: from him in a very long time. He's not even
Speaker 2: making free throws right now. But at the very least,
Speaker 2: Isaiah's doing the job of making life more difficult on
Speaker 2: Nikola Jokic and then all of the guys around that
Speaker 2: making plays. Alex Kruz I think is has been particularly
Speaker 2: important for them on the defensive rebounding. This was another
Speaker 2: thing that j Billis called out in the broadcast that
Speaker 2: I thought was really smart. Jay's doing a great job,
Speaker 2: by the way, coming over from college basketball, completely agenda
Speaker 2: free and just doing some high quality NBA analysis. But
Speaker 2: he was talking about Alex Cruso's tap out rebounds, and
Speaker 2: you know, when you get into these offensive rebounding situations,
Speaker 2: Jokic is like leaning on a person, and the upside
Speaker 2: of him leaning on a person is he can, you know,
Speaker 2: shove that person down and create a rebounding angle. But
Speaker 2: it makes it so that Jokic can't really jump, and
Speaker 2: so in those situations they call it crackdown rebound. It's
Speaker 2: super important for the guys on the outside to come
Speaker 2: flying in and to tap at the ball to prevent
Speaker 2: it from falling into the offensive rebounder's hands when he's
Speaker 2: got great position like that. I thought Alex Cruso had
Speaker 2: several of those sequences where he came flying in and
Speaker 2: knocked the ball away. He had like all these like
Speaker 2: just little tiny plays that made a huge difference, Like oh,
Speaker 2: big transition sequence, the Nuggets are on a run, Jamal
Speaker 2: Murray goes for behind the back drib just reaches in
Speaker 2: there and pokes it out or like did a similar
Speaker 2: thing to Russell Westbrook forcing a turnover earlier in the game.
Speaker 2: There's just a lot of like activity down the roster
Speaker 2: as they just kind of play Denver into a lot
Speaker 2: of their mistakes. Like the whole thing with Oklahoma City
Speaker 2: is like you guys see it. There was a possession
Speaker 2: where Aaron Gordon was dribbling up the right wing and
Speaker 2: he ended up drawing a foul. But like you could see,
Speaker 2: like whenever there's a big guy for Denver dribbling up
Speaker 2: the floor, you literally just see all the OKAC guards
Speaker 2: just swarm them because their whole style is predicated on
Speaker 2: just forcing you to make mistakes by rushing you and
Speaker 2: getting you to not be disciplined with your decision making
Speaker 2: and like you're protecting the ball and finding passing angles
Speaker 2: when you're just trying to get into your offense, Like, oh,
Speaker 2: you're sloppy here, we're gonna take the ball away. You're
Speaker 2: sloppy there, We're gonna cause a problem. Michael Porter Junior
Speaker 2: wide open on a baseline cut late and gets set
Speaker 2: up right in front of the basket. But he's just
Speaker 2: rushing because of how Oklahoma City's defense can speed you up.
Speaker 2: And I think like in a lot of ways, like
Speaker 2: we can talk all we want about Oklahoma City's offense,
Speaker 2: and I think most of the criticism of Oklahoma City's
Speaker 2: offense that you've seen throughout the year has been kind
Speaker 2: of proven correct in a lot of ways in this series.
Speaker 2: But their defense is one of the greats. And you know,
Speaker 2: I was talking with Jackson before we got on on
Speaker 2: the live here, there was there was like a dynamic
Speaker 2: at play in Game one where it felt like Denver
Speaker 2: was physically dominating them. I've shared some clips in the
Speaker 2: film session of Jokics just like literally like a man
Speaker 2: amongst boys on the back line, just getting every single
Speaker 2: rebound that he wanted. And they did twenty one offensive
Speaker 2: rebounds in Game one to just thirteen for Oklahoma City.
Speaker 2: But as we go down the line after that Game two,
Speaker 2: Oklahoma City held up better. They held Denver to just
Speaker 2: thirteen offensive rebounds, and then in Game three and in
Speaker 2: Game four they actually out rebounded Denver on the offensive
Speaker 2: glass eighteen to five, and offensive rebounds in Game three
Speaker 2: and then once again today out rebounding Denver fifty five
Speaker 2: to forty nine overall, fifteen to twelve on the offensive glass.
Speaker 2: And I think there's several dynamics there because it's not
Speaker 2: it's ball pursuit. Because again we talked about those crackdown rebounds.
Speaker 2: There's a lot of opportunities where the ball's coming long
Speaker 2: off the rim and Okay, see's just faster to the ball,
Speaker 2: and then also just Okay sees pressure and they're athleticism.
Speaker 2: It wears you down. And for all to talk about
Speaker 2: Denver's home court advantage and the way it can wear
Speaker 2: people down like Oklahoma City's athleticism wears you down, and
Speaker 2: you can literally see Denver losing some of the physical
Speaker 2: battles that they typically win because they're just overwhelmed by
Speaker 2: the intensity and the physicality that Oklahoma City brings to
Speaker 2: the table on the Denver front. I want to kind
Speaker 2: of focus on Nikole Jokicic for a minute, because you know,
Speaker 2: we can nitpick certain things like Russell Westbrook had a
Speaker 2: really rough night tonight. He was minus twenty and twenty
Speaker 2: seven minutes. That's brutal. Two for nine from three, two
Speaker 2: for twelve overall, missed a airball a wide open three
Speaker 2: in the left corner that could have given them a
Speaker 2: lead late in the game. Just didn't bring that offensive
Speaker 2: pop that he brought earlier in the series. You could
Speaker 2: talk about, you know, Jamal Murray not being as reliable
Speaker 2: as a shot maker as you need. You can talk
Speaker 2: about Michael Porter Junior going one for seven Ohver five
Speaker 2: from three. I thought he missed a couple of key
Speaker 2: rebounds where he just was sloppy with the ball in
Speaker 2: case On Wallace would just come in and knocked the
Speaker 2: ball away from it. We talked about him smoking that
Speaker 2: wide open layup opportunity and transition. Here's the thing, though,
Speaker 2: when I look at those guys, they're not an advantageous
Speaker 2: situation against Oklahoma City. When we talk about Oklahoma City
Speaker 2: and their roster, they're flat out better than Denver. They're like,
Speaker 2: flat out better in terms of just talent than Denver.
Speaker 2: They are way more athletic. I don't like Jamal Murray's
Speaker 2: getting hounded by Alex Crusoe and Lou Dort the entire series.
Speaker 2: Like Russell Westbrook is not dealing with the same athletic
Speaker 2: advantages he has in other matchups. Michael Porter Junior in
Speaker 2: general has struggled against peak level athletes like I don't
Speaker 2: view those guys as capable of solving this problem. But
Speaker 2: I think Nikole Jokic is the best basketball player in
Speaker 2: the world, and I hold him to an extremely high
Speaker 2: standard as a result of that, and he does have
Speaker 2: favorable matchups. I think Isaiah Hardenstein's a good defender, and
Speaker 2: I think he's done a good job on Jokich. But
Speaker 2: he's still getting to all the same types of little
Speaker 2: bits of short range and long range shot making that
Speaker 2: he's had access to over the course of his entire
Speaker 2: prime here, and he's just missing everything. He's missing all
Speaker 2: of his threes, he's missing all of his mid range
Speaker 2: shot making. That little jab step mid range face up
Speaker 2: jump shot that Hartenstein's been given him all series. He
Speaker 2: just literally can't make it. He's not making any of
Speaker 2: his like somber shuffle shots or any of his turnarounds
Speaker 2: over either shoulder out of the post. He's even if
Speaker 2: he on floaters when he gets into that range here,
Speaker 2: he's missing layups right at the front of the rim.
Speaker 2: His shot making has been absolutely brutal. Seven for twenty
Speaker 2: two today he goes in Game three. In Game three's
Speaker 2: eight for twenty five and then I think he was
Speaker 2: six for sixteen in Game two, if I remember correctly,
Speaker 2: I'm pulling it up real quick. And then he goes
Speaker 2: six for sixteen in Game two. This is three games
Speaker 2: in a row where Yokic's shot making is just not there.
Speaker 2: I was talking with Jackson before we went live. It
Speaker 2: actually reminds me this series, and the series isn't over, obviously,
Speaker 2: but it reminds me a lot of the Cleveland Golden
Speaker 2: State Series in twenty fifteen, where now it's different because
Speaker 2: for Cleveland it was because of injuries. For Oklahoma City,
Speaker 2: it's because they're just, you know, one of the more
Speaker 2: talented rosters in the league. But there's a clear talent gap,
Speaker 2: right But Lebron at that phase in his career. You know,
Speaker 2: I know Steph fans are inclined to disagree, but I
Speaker 2: thought Lebron was clearly the best player in the series.
Speaker 2: I think Jokich is clearly the best player in this series.
Speaker 2: And I thought it was gettible. When I go back
Speaker 2: and I think about twenty fifteen, I thought it was gettable.
Speaker 2: But the thing is is that that one season, that
Speaker 2: twenty fifteen season, was the one time in that stretch
Speaker 2: from like twenty twelve to twenty twenty when Lebron was
Speaker 2: the best player in the world, where he just couldn't shoot.
Speaker 2: That was the year Lebron couldn't shoot. And I feel like,
Speaker 2: if you literally just take twenty sixteen Lebron and put
Speaker 2: him in that series, they win the championship. But it
Speaker 2: was like kind of just a missed opportunity. Lebron is
Speaker 2: still the best player, and he's still you know, because
Speaker 2: Steph was struggling his ass off in that series too,
Speaker 2: But he's still the best player, and he's still making
Speaker 2: all these plays, and he's still doing all these good things,
Speaker 2: but just that little bit of shot making wasn't there,
Speaker 2: and it was just the difference between them closing that
Speaker 2: deal in them not closing that deal. And that's literally
Speaker 2: how I feel about Nicole Jokic in this series. Oklahoma
Speaker 2: City's better, They're substantially favored, they should be favored because
Speaker 2: of the talent advantage, but here we are, Oklahoma City's
Speaker 2: struggling a little bit under the pressure and intensity of
Speaker 2: the moment, just like Golden State did in that final series,
Speaker 2: and Nikole Jokic has the ability to snatch this series.
Speaker 2: It's sitting there right in front of him and he
Speaker 2: can't make a shot, and it's just weird. It's just
Speaker 2: weird to be in this kind of situation again where
Speaker 2: it just feels like you've got the best player in
Speaker 2: the world just kind of missing such a vitally important
Speaker 2: part of his game, and it kind of feels like
Speaker 2: the difference, Like I don't know about you, guys, I
Speaker 2: feel like the difference between Denver being up, not just
Speaker 2: up three to one, but having won easily in game
Speaker 2: three and Game four is just Jokic making shots and
Speaker 2: he can't make shots, and that's it. Like I've heard
Speaker 2: people talking about Shaye and Jadub and Shane jdab are
Speaker 2: bad today. Here's the thing, guys, I've I've never used
Speaker 2: the phrase shade shakeyos Alexander's best player in the world, don't.
Speaker 2: I don't think Shae's that level of player. I think
Speaker 2: Jokic is better than him. I hold him to a
Speaker 2: different standard. I view Jokic as a guy who's rapidly
Speaker 2: ascending the all time great players in NBA history list.
Speaker 2: I'm holding him to a different standard. And I feel
Speaker 2: like this was a series Denver could have won and
Speaker 2: Jokic's inability to make anything outside of the paint, or
Speaker 2: really anything outside of three feet in front of the
Speaker 2: basket has been such a huge difference in their ability
Speaker 2: to contend in these games. And now it feels really tough, like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, the athleticism is really starting to wear
Speaker 2: on Denver, and I just don't feel confident in their
Speaker 2: ability to go win a game again in Oklahoma City,
Speaker 2: especially when you really zoom out from this series, and
Speaker 2: it's felt, it's felt like Oklahoma City has been in
Speaker 2: control for the most part outside of these clutch situations.
Speaker 2: And here we were in another clutch situation tonight and
Speaker 2: Yokic couldn't make a shot, and Shay and j Dubb
Speaker 2: made shots, and of role players made shots, and here
Speaker 2: Oklahoma City is tying the series. So I think Oklahoma
Speaker 2: City should be a substantial favorite. Now, while we're taking questions,
Speaker 2: we'll look at DraftKings and see how the ads the
Speaker 2: odds have moved. But I would assume Oklahoma City is
Speaker 2: like minus five hundred to win the series or somewhere
Speaker 2: in that department. Now, let's do a good fifteen to
Speaker 2: twenty minutes of questions and then we'll head over to playback.
Speaker 3: Let's do it.
Speaker 1: Let's do it.
Speaker 3: First, question about Jokic has often to struck Yokitch's zero
Speaker 3: touch right now? Are you seeing anything that could explain that?
Speaker 3: Is he hurt? How does he just lose his touch,
Speaker 3: especially from such close arrange something you've talked about him
Speaker 3: and almost being up until this point sort of slump
Speaker 3: proof because of how many shots he gets so close.
Speaker 2: To By the way, Oklahoma City's minus five point fifty
Speaker 2: to win the series now and they're crazy according to DraftKings.
Speaker 3: Jeez.
Speaker 2: So you know, Jackson, I'm sure you'll agree with me
Speaker 2: on this. But like any of you guys out there
Speaker 2: that play a good amount of basketball, know that, like
Speaker 2: shooting is a fickle thing in general, you can pretty
Speaker 2: much even the greatest shooters of all time, you can
Speaker 2: go into their game logs and you can find three
Speaker 2: four game long stretches where they can't make a shot.
Speaker 2: And the reason why is because it's like the best
Speaker 2: shooters in the world miss more than half of their shots.
Speaker 2: So if you're gonna miss more than half your shots,
Speaker 2: it's like you can do everything right and it's probably
Speaker 2: not gonna go in. And so that ends up leading
Speaker 2: to like kind of a mental dynamic. The big one
Speaker 2: I'm seeing is Yokich is long on everything, Like everything's
Speaker 2: all off the heel of the rim, and so his
Speaker 2: touch is just off right now. I think he's in
Speaker 2: his head about it. It gets to the point where,
Speaker 2: like when I saw him missing those free throws and
Speaker 2: like literally missing like his easy little like touch shots
Speaker 2: right three four, five feet in front of the rim.
Speaker 2: To me, I just think he's got like I think
Speaker 2: it's like in Yip's territory, Like he just has lost
Speaker 2: confidence in his ability to knock down shots and it's
Speaker 2: become a huge problem.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's really bizarre to watch. I can't. I
Speaker 3: mean the free throws, it's everything. He really cannot all
Speaker 3: three levels. He is struggling to make shots, and I
Speaker 3: have not I cannot remember seeing the time that he's
Speaker 3: struggled so consistently. It's very bizarre to watch.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm gonna try to I'm gonna try to slash
Speaker 2: Synergy's updated to shot making numbers, and I'll let you
Speaker 2: guys know once I see him.
Speaker 3: All right. Next question, do you feel like Sga and
Speaker 3: Jokic are dropping their best in the world status. I
Speaker 3: feel like, considering how they're both struggling to score so
Speaker 3: much right now, that Yiannis has a real argument at
Speaker 3: the moment.
Speaker 2: Janna hasn't won a playoff series since twenty twenty two,
Speaker 2: so I don't think anyone's gonna be moving honest up
Speaker 2: up the list. Here's the thing. I still think Jokic
Speaker 2: has been very good in this series in every way
Speaker 2: other than shot making, He's He's been a little bit
Speaker 2: sloppy with the basketball. He's had some turnovers, but he
Speaker 2: wasn't as bad today as he was in Game three.
Speaker 2: In Game two, But like Jokic actually has played phenomenally
Speaker 2: well defensively in this series. I want to give him
Speaker 2: some credit for that. I to me, there isn't a
Speaker 2: There isn't a player out there who's clearly playing at
Speaker 2: a level higher than what I've seen Jokic be at
Speaker 2: in the past. It's just Jokic right now is underachieving
Speaker 2: to his relative ceiling. But I think I don't know
Speaker 2: about you, Jackson. I still think he's the best player
Speaker 2: in the world, don't you.
Speaker 3: I do too. And I also think that maybe I'm
Speaker 3: giving too much leeway to the superstar, but there's a
Speaker 3: lot of supersiars. Yeah, that's a good point because the
Speaker 3: physical the physicality in the playoffs is I think pretty
Speaker 3: inarguably a level up from the past years of the playoffs,
Speaker 3: obviously from the regular season, and I think even definitely
Speaker 3: compared to the last couple of years of the playoffs.
Speaker 3: Which isn't an excuse to let say all they can
Speaker 3: just play bad, but it's it's fair to point out
Speaker 3: that Tatum is shooting poorly, Sga is shooting poorly, yok
Speaker 3: is shooting poorly. Steph has had some good games, he's
Speaker 3: also had some really bad shooting performances. A lot of
Speaker 3: stars are shooting the ball poorly.
Speaker 2: Well, And the thing that's specifically frustrating about it with
Speaker 2: Yokich is, like we've talked about this specific concept before.
Speaker 2: Like I one of the reasons why I've gravitated towards bigger,
Speaker 2: stronger power players in the postseason over the years is
Speaker 2: because of the fact that they have a certain resilience
Speaker 2: in rock fights. But the problem is is, like Yokich's superpower,
Speaker 2: which is the ability to like oh, I can battle
Speaker 2: to close to the rim, where variance isn't an issue.
Speaker 2: He's shooting it, like he's literally not making anything right
Speaker 2: at the front of the rim. So like it's it's
Speaker 2: I don't necessarily it's it's really hard for me to
Speaker 2: process this because it's just so unusual compared to the
Speaker 2: rest of his career. But like this is supposed to
Speaker 2: be the one type of basketball that Jokic is impervious to,
Speaker 2: unlike the other stars in the league. And so that's
Speaker 2: where it's discouraging. Like even Giannis over the years has
Speaker 2: struggled as like a half court surgeon in rock fight environments,
Speaker 2: but like Jokic hasn't, and like this is just the
Speaker 2: first substantial stretch where he has. And so I want
Speaker 2: to again, I want to give Okay seek credit. They're
Speaker 2: doing a great job swarming him. Hartenstein's doing a good job.
Speaker 2: But I think a good chunk of this is just
Speaker 2: jokicch is just playing well below his capability.
Speaker 3: Yeah, speaking of playing below's capability, another question SGA with
Speaker 3: another bad shooting game in the playoffs, can we hold
Speaker 3: him to the same standard that we hold players like
Speaker 3: Jason Tatum to.
Speaker 2: I here's the thing with with Shay, Like, once again,
Speaker 2: like I you know, I have my feelings about who
Speaker 2: Shay is and what he's capable of. But Shay to
Speaker 2: me is kind of still in this like phase of
Speaker 2: player ranking where I don't it's all theoretically because it
Speaker 2: hasn't come to fruition in the playoff stage. But like
Speaker 2: the this is absolutely fair, and we've I mean we've
Speaker 2: been I don't know about you. Like Jackson, we've been
Speaker 2: criticizing him through this entire series. I feel like he's
Speaker 2: pretty consistently at the end of these games kind of
Speaker 2: resulted to high ISOs. I thought he made some better
Speaker 2: plays against the zone in the final fifteen minutes or
Speaker 2: so of this game. The big thing that he's running
Speaker 2: into is like there'll be these sequences where like Denver
Speaker 2: will get going and they'll hit a couple shots in
Speaker 2: a row, and he'll just come down and take a
Speaker 2: contested fifteen footer and it'll brick, and then it'll be
Speaker 2: like it'll just feel like a punch to the gut
Speaker 2: for Okayse's offense. And then in that late third quarter stretch,
Speaker 2: like he straight up like for like seven straight minutes
Speaker 2: of game clocks just like wouldn't shoot, Like he just
Speaker 2: he just was dribbling the ball at the floor and
Speaker 2: just throwing swing passes. And so it's like, Okay, the
Speaker 2: no one's saying that you shouldn't shoot at all against
Speaker 2: the zone. We're just saying that you need to function
Speaker 2: as like the thing that gets the zone moving. And
Speaker 2: so once once him and Jay Dubb started actually looking
Speaker 2: to get the ball into the middle of the floor
Speaker 2: to pass instead of get the ball into the middle
Speaker 2: of the floor to shoot, they started to have the
Speaker 2: ball pop around some more and have some of those
Speaker 2: better sequences. But the other thing, too, is like, you
Speaker 2: want to let the series play out, like there's a
Speaker 2: you know, they still got to win two more games
Speaker 2: and we'll see how Shaye looks at that point, and
Speaker 2: there's more series in the future for them. But this
Speaker 2: is the first playoff run in Shaye's entire career where
Speaker 2: they are legitimately the championship favorites and all the pressure
Speaker 2: is on them, and so far through the seven games
Speaker 2: or eight games, he hasn't been very good. But there's
Speaker 2: still plenty of basketball left for him to figure it out.
Speaker 2: And here they are there two two, they still have
Speaker 2: a very good chance to win the series. And so similarly,
Speaker 2: with Jason Tatum, like he deserves criticism for the way
Speaker 2: that he played during the two games as they drop
Speaker 2: down oh two, but the opportunity is still in front
Speaker 2: of him to cl out of this, and all we're
Speaker 2: gonna do is just cover it game to game. Shay's
Speaker 2: been pretty bad. I thought he was pretty bad again tonight.
Speaker 2: I thought he made a couple of huge plays late
Speaker 2: in this game, which we're gonna credit when it happens,
Speaker 2: and if he breaks out and starts playing amazing, we'll
Speaker 2: then start discussing it in that context. But we're all
Speaker 2: just taking this game to game or we're writing this
Speaker 2: story as goes.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's sort of the nature. The challenging nature of
Speaker 3: the playoffs is how easy it is to overreact from
Speaker 3: game to game. Basis like, you're so right that this
Speaker 3: series feels like one that is going to go seven.
Speaker 3: It certainly, I mean it's guaranteed to go six. It
Speaker 3: feels like it's going to go seven, which means we
Speaker 3: are barely over half half of the games played. So
Speaker 3: one of these two stars who's been struggling, Yoka your Sgay,
Speaker 3: maybe we end up with, you know, four consecutive rock
Speaker 3: fights to end the series. It's possible, but I would
Speaker 3: assume that one of the two superstars is going to
Speaker 3: elevate their play and start making some shots, and we'll
Speaker 3: be we'll have to rewrite the way where whichever guy
Speaker 3: it ends up being, we're gonna have to rewrite the
Speaker 3: story in real time.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Like it's the My whole thing is, like just
Speaker 2: be consistent with it. Like I think where we go
Speaker 2: go into some dangerous territories when you criticize a guy
Speaker 2: when he sucks and then don't bring it up at
Speaker 2: all when he plays well or vice versa, and like
Speaker 2: that's the thing, Like I I have routinely come on
Speaker 2: the show and said that I personally have never watched
Speaker 2: an offensive basketball player that generates offense easier than Nicoliokich,
Speaker 2: Like I I think he's the best offensive player I've
Speaker 2: ever watched. He's stunk it up the last three games
Speaker 2: and it's been a problem. Like Denver scored eighty seven
Speaker 2: points today, Like that's not good enough for a guy
Speaker 2: that I considered to be the best offensive player that
Speaker 2: I've ever seen. And so like that, that's really my
Speaker 2: whole thing that I'll try to do is just try
Speaker 2: to be as consistent as possible and try very hard
Speaker 2: to not let you know my personal biases get in
Speaker 2: the way, even though they naturally will to a certain extent.
Speaker 3: Next question, we'll take a couple more. How does Jalen
Speaker 3: Williams get out of his slump? It feels like when
Speaker 3: he's playing his best, nobody in the West can compete
Speaker 3: with the Thunder. I don't even know if he's on
Speaker 3: that big of a slump. He had a pretty decent
Speaker 3: game last ye Yeah he was.
Speaker 2: He was amazing in Game three outside of overtime, really,
Speaker 2: and I don't even blame him for going off the
Speaker 2: rails and regulation because Shay just kind of looked him
Speaker 2: off and co opted those final couple possessions. But like
Speaker 2: as far as as far as today goes like it
Speaker 2: was like a steady die at a zone, let me
Speaker 2: actually pull up the numbers. I bet you, I bet you.
Speaker 2: They ran zone fifty possessions today. But it just zone
Speaker 2: is It is such a different responsibility to zone shifts,
Speaker 2: the responsibility almost entirely to catch and shoot playing a
Speaker 2: players and not they ran forty five possessions of zone today,
Speaker 2: forty five possessions and Denver got or Oklahoma City got
Speaker 2: just zero point seven to eight points per possession. But
Speaker 2: it really just comes down to, like those those guys
Speaker 2: at the point of attack, just getting the ball moving,
Speaker 2: whereas in man demand situations it's very much about like
Speaker 2: setting people up for like play finishing situations and looking
Speaker 2: to score. But like, if you try to score on
Speaker 2: the ball against the zone, you're gonna have problems. But okay, see,
Speaker 2: to their credit ten possessions of zone in the fourth quarter,
Speaker 2: they did get one point per possession in the fourth quarter,
Speaker 2: so they did slowly start to figure it out over
Speaker 2: the course of the game.
Speaker 3: Let's do one more one more question and then we'll
Speaker 3: go play back. Prenthese is not just about okay, see,
Speaker 3: what is the best scheme throughout the NBA that you
Speaker 3: have seen at guarding Jokic in his career? And if
Speaker 3: and if you had to make a plan for a
Speaker 3: single their game, a game seven against Nikola Jokic, how
Speaker 3: would you try?
Speaker 2: And so I think Okohama City has shown a really
Speaker 2: strong example of how a too big look can work.
Speaker 2: And if Denver were to have won this series, which
Speaker 2: I don't think they will anymore, I think Minnesota would
Speaker 2: have similar capability to do this, and they've shown it
Speaker 2: over the years. But the problem is is when you
Speaker 2: put a smaller forward, So like let's talk like with
Speaker 2: the Lakers series, it was always Ruby Hachimura someone like that, Right,
Speaker 2: If you put a Ruby Hachimura on Nikola Jokic and
Speaker 2: you have Anthony Davis behind him, you have the rim
Speaker 2: protection piece. But it's just so easy for Jokic to
Speaker 2: get to his short range shot making against Ruey because
Speaker 2: he's so much bigger than Ruey, and so what he
Speaker 2: can do is he can just kind of bump Ruy
Speaker 2: and get to like little short seven foot shots over
Speaker 2: both shoulders and he's gonna make them sixty five percent
Speaker 2: of the time. The uniqueness of the Chet Hartenstein partnership
Speaker 2: is Chet provides the vertical length that you get from
Speaker 2: a center on the back line, but Isaiah Hartenstein provides
Speaker 2: the trunky like strength that you get from a center,
Speaker 2: And so it's basically like a literal two center. Look
Speaker 2: where instead of it being Ruy that's funneling you into
Speaker 2: Anthony Davis, it's Isaiah Hartenstein playing Jokic's right hand, so
Speaker 2: basically forcing him to drive. So Jokic can't even get
Speaker 2: to higher quality short range looks, and they're funneling him
Speaker 2: into Chet who's got the length on the back line.
Speaker 2: And so I think they just kind of uniquely have
Speaker 2: the personnel to put a big, strong player on Jokic
Speaker 2: that is not you know, six' nine but is rather seven,
Speaker 2: feet but then also having real length behind, him and
Speaker 2: then they're swarming and closing out really. Well BUT i
Speaker 2: still Think jokic should be able to solve This hartenstein
Speaker 2: problem and he needs to just do a better, job
Speaker 2: and most of it just comes down to his jump
Speaker 2: shots not going in at. All, NOW i do think
Speaker 2: that's like the that is specifically different is Just hartenstein
Speaker 2: being so big but also having a center behind. Him all, right,
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