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Speaker 1: The volume. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight. You're at

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Speaker 1: the volume. Happy Tuesday, everybody. I hope all of you

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Speaker 1: guys have had an incredible week with the Lakers keep

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Speaker 1: their winning ways going as they improved to thirteen and

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Speaker 1: four with a game where they struggled a little bit

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Speaker 1: guarding James Harden, but they pull away late for a

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Speaker 1: comfortable double figure win one thirty five to one eighteen

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Speaker 1: over the Clippers. It's the only thing we're hitting today,

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Speaker 1: just going to cover that Lakers win over the Clippers.

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Speaker 1: You guys know the joke before we get started. Subscribe

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Speaker 1: to Hoops Tonight YouTube channel so you don't miss any

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Speaker 1: more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore

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Speaker 1: jsn LTS. You guys don't miss show announcements. Don't forget

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Speaker 1: about our podcast few wherever you get your podcast under

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Speaker 1: Hoops Tonight, and it's always super helpful if you leave

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Speaker 1: a rating and a review on that front. Jackson's doing

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Speaker 1: incredible work on our social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram,

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Speaker 1: Facebook and TikTok. Make sure you guys follow us there

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Speaker 1: for more content throughout the season. Last, but not least, no

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Speaker 1: this week, we will be having a mailbag next Friday.

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Speaker 1: So if you want to get your questions in for

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Speaker 1: that mailbag, you can drop them in this episode or

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Speaker 1: any of our other full episodes on YouTube, and we'll

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Speaker 1: get to them in our Friday mail bags throughout the

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Speaker 1: remainder of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball again.

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Speaker 1: Not going to go too long tonight, just like ten

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Speaker 1: twelve minutes or so on the game, just to give

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Speaker 1: my quick breakdown. Again, we were live on playback. We're

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Speaker 1: doing two playback streams every single week. We will have

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Speaker 1: another one on Friday night for the Dallas Mavericks on

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Speaker 1: the road against the Los Angeles Lakers. Again, you can

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Speaker 1: follow us on YouTube for that, but you can also

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Speaker 1: head over to playback playback dot tv slash o hoops tonight.

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Speaker 1: We can have a game on the screen. It's easier

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Speaker 1: for me to take callers there. I can still get

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Speaker 1: questions from the chat from YouTube, but if you want

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Speaker 1: to actually come up on the stream as a caller,

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Speaker 1: we got to come over to playback, So make sure

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Speaker 1: you guys head over there again playback dot tv slash

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Speaker 1: oops tonight. So this game followed kind of a similar

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Speaker 1: flow to many of the Lakers games. That we've seen

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Speaker 1: this year. I've been kind of intrigued by this concept

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Speaker 1: of the Lakers net rating compared to some of the

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Speaker 1: other teams around the league. And you know, for a

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Speaker 1: team that's thirteen and four, you'd expect them to be

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Speaker 1: near the top of the league in net rating, but

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Speaker 1: they haven't been. They've been in middle of the pack

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Speaker 1: type of the type of net rating team. And one

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Speaker 1: of the reasons for that is that they do not

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Speaker 1: come out with a ton of intensity and play super passionate,

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Speaker 1: energetic defense to start games. It seems to kind of

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Speaker 1: ease their way into games. They try to outscore you.

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Speaker 1: And this has very much been a team that has

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Speaker 1: played timely defense. This has very much been a team

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Speaker 1: that has been about having a brief stretch at the

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Speaker 1: end of a game where they tighten the screws and

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Speaker 1: they make the plays that they need to make and

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Speaker 1: they get out of there with the win. And that

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Speaker 1: has shown in those net rating numbers. So for instance,

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Speaker 1: and again these numbers do not reflect what has happened

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Speaker 1: in these numbers do not reflect previous before tonight, So

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Speaker 1: anything from tonight's game is not in there. But before tonight,

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Speaker 1: the Lakers again middle of the pack net rating team

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Speaker 1: for full games, but in the second half, outscoring teams

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Speaker 1: by five points per one hundred possessions, which ranks seventh

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Speaker 1: in the NBA, and the fourth quarter outscoring teams by

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Speaker 1: seven points per one hundred possessions, which ranks sixth in

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Speaker 1: the NBA. And in clutch situations, where the Lakers are

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Speaker 1: now six to zero, obviously not counting tonight, not a

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Speaker 1: clutch game in this particular instance, but in the six

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Speaker 1: clutch games they've played this year, they're outscoring teams by

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Speaker 1: thirty points per one hundred possessions, which is the third

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Speaker 1: best net rating in the league. So a lot of

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Speaker 1: the pathway for the Lakers has been They've been kind

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Speaker 1: of a maddening, frustrating type of defense to watch, but

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Speaker 1: then consistently throughout this early part of the season, late

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Speaker 1: third quarter, they start to tighten the screws. Lucas starts

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Speaker 1: to up his aggression towards the basket. Then they go

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Speaker 1: into that fourth quarter unit it's Lebron and Austin, they

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Speaker 1: tighten the screws on defense, and they've been able to

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Speaker 1: maintain control of games, and that game tonight against the

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Speaker 1: Clippers followed a very similar low really really struggled to

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Speaker 1: guard James Harden tonight. We talked about a couple of

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Speaker 1: specific things that the Lakers would be dealing with with

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Speaker 1: this matchup matchup with the Clippers before the game started

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Speaker 1: on playback, if you guys remember, for instance, DeAndre Ayton

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Speaker 1: being out, I talked about the Lakers needing to handle

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Speaker 1: if it's the Zubots on the offensive glass for a

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Speaker 1: couple different problems that could present. So for starters, just

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Speaker 1: having Jackson on an island versus a guy like Zubots,

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Speaker 1: that's a problem, right, Like he's giving up a lot

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Speaker 1: of muscle mass there that's really difficult for him to handle.

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Speaker 1: But also if you're gonna be switching, if you're going

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Speaker 1: to allow James Harden to pull Jackson out in a

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Speaker 1: switch or something along those lines, that could cause problems

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Speaker 1: for Zubots on the back line battling against smaller defenders

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Speaker 1: all game long. The Lakers scrapped with Zoo and they

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Speaker 1: kept him off the offensive glass. They allowed just seven

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Speaker 1: offensive rebounds in the game. A lot of really good

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Speaker 1: work there. First of all, not as much switching with

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Speaker 1: Jackson as you would think. And then anytime that Zoo

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Speaker 1: had inside position, they were bodying in with somebody and

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Speaker 1: come and swarming in from around the ball to just

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Speaker 1: to kind of like gang rebound those situations, to convert

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Speaker 1: those defensive stops into opportunities to go the other way

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Speaker 1: and play. But the flip side of that was gonna

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Speaker 1: be how are they gonna guard James Harden right And

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Speaker 1: we talked about it before the show. I thought that

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Speaker 1: they were gonna heavily emphasize funneling James Harden to his

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Speaker 1: right hand and trying to help off of him, and

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Speaker 1: it didn't go well like at all for the first

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Speaker 1: two and a half quarters. On the handful of possessions

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Speaker 1: where they did a good job funneling James Harden to

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Speaker 1: his right hand, the Clippers did a really nice job

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Speaker 1: moving the ball through that and all of the Clippers'

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Speaker 1: role players were making them play and making them pay

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Speaker 1: for it. John Collins hitting open catch and shoot threes

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Speaker 1: out of the corner. Chris Dunn hit a couple of

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Speaker 1: threes in the first half. Nick Buttoom hit a couple

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Speaker 1: of threes. Chris Dunn did damage as a cutter in

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Speaker 1: those situations. They weren't having too hard of a time

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Speaker 1: scoring out of the possessions where James Harden dribbled to

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Speaker 1: his right and then way too many times they let

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Speaker 1: James and get to his left hand, getting into that

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Speaker 1: little easy finish off the rim. But James Harden is

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Speaker 1: in such a groove right now that if you let

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Speaker 1: him get to his left hand, it's a layup, like

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Speaker 1: every single time. And for the record, I don't want

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Speaker 1: to be too critical of the Lakers defense here, James

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Speaker 1: Harden has been frying the entire MBA for like three

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Speaker 1: weeks now. For eight games coming in, he was averaging

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Speaker 1: over thirty three points per game on sky high efficiency,

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Speaker 1: shooting damn near forty percent from three on like eleven

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Speaker 1: three point attempts per game. James Harden has been on

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Speaker 1: a vintage heater, and so he was going to be

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Speaker 1: a difficult challenge under any circumstances. But he was certainly

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Speaker 1: giving the Lakers problem scoring and then on the possessions

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Speaker 1: where they did appropriately funnel him, he was making every

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Speaker 1: read and the Clippers were making him pay. And so

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Speaker 1: one of the things we saw down the stretch of

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Speaker 1: this game as the Lakers started to take control, as

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Speaker 1: the Lakers were like, screw it, let's just start blitzing him,

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Speaker 1: and they started just essentially getting the ball out of

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Speaker 1: James Harden's hands, did a really nice job rotating out

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Speaker 1: of it. The units when James Harden was off the

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Speaker 1: floor did not score well. Kawhi Leonard, obviously still coming

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Speaker 1: back from an injury, didn't look like he had much

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Speaker 1: from his legs, hit a couple of his like pattented

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Speaker 1: little middies and hit like a wide open transition three

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Speaker 1: on the left wing, but for the most part was

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Speaker 1: like leaving things short. Struggling to see double teams. The

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Speaker 1: Lakers were throwing a lot of doubles, especially with Lebron

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Speaker 1: in the first half. Just as soon as Kawhi would

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Speaker 1: turn his back, Lebron would throw a double team, and

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Speaker 1: so a lot of it fell on James Harden. So

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Speaker 1: when the Lakers were able to get the ball out

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Speaker 1: of James Harden's hands to end the game and successfully

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Speaker 1: rotate out of it, that allowed them to get the

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Speaker 1: stops that they need. And again, after giving up sixty

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Speaker 1: six points in the first half, they gave up just

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Speaker 1: fifty two in the second half. This has been a

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Speaker 1: Laker defense that has been about timely defense, getting stops

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Speaker 1: in the stretches of the game when they need to

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Speaker 1: take control. And then one of the consistent trends that

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Speaker 1: I've seen, like Luca's been settling for a lot of

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Speaker 1: tough step back threes this year, and by the way,

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Speaker 1: we did see a lot of positive regression on that

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Speaker 1: front tonight. I think he was evan for twelve from three.

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Speaker 1: He had come into the series, come into this particular

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Speaker 1: game shooting just twenty nine point nine percent on those

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Speaker 1: step back threes off of the dribble. He had not

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Speaker 1: been good with them, and so getting that positive regression

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Speaker 1: tonight that was a good sign if him starting to

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Speaker 1: get back to his normal percentages there seven for twelve

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Speaker 1: from three tonight. But ultimately in that third quarter, as

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Speaker 1: the Clippers actually briefly took the lead a few times,

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Speaker 1: Lucas started to go cold. And so when the three

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Speaker 1: is not going, does he have the ability to bully

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Speaker 1: his way closer to the basket for easier shots. Well,

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Speaker 1: one of the consistent trends we've seen through the early

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Speaker 1: part of the season here is when Luca needs to

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Speaker 1: as things get tighter towards the end of games, he's

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Speaker 1: been able to drop his shoulder, get more penetration, get

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Speaker 1: closer to the basket, gets an and one gets a

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Speaker 1: short easy floater, gets all the way into the charge circle,

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Speaker 1: draws two defenders, drops it off to Marcus Smart for

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Speaker 1: a layup. Nice little flurry from Luka Doncic at the

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Speaker 1: end end of the third quarter that started the run

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Speaker 1: twenty one plus and physically present in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana,

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Speaker 1: New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, or Virginia to play. Terms and

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Speaker 1: conditions apply. Concerned about gambling in Florida called one eight

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Speaker 1: three three play wise in Indiana, if you or someone

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Speaker 1: you know has a gambling problem and wants help. Call

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Speaker 1: one eight hundred and nine with it gambling problem called

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Speaker 1: one eight hundred gambler in Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey, Ohio,

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Speaker 1: Tennessee or Virginia. And then this is the dynamic you

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Speaker 1: struggle with with the Lakers. It's like, Okay, you weather

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Speaker 1: the storm with Luca. Here comes the Lebron Austin unit,

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Speaker 1: which has literally been one one of the best units

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Speaker 1: in the NBA over the last couple of years. Lebron

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Speaker 1: and Austin check in to start the fourth quarter. Lakers

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Speaker 1: still defending really well. They start, they start to get going.

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Speaker 1: Austin attacking the basket with a ton of force tonight,

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Speaker 1: did a ton of damage in his drives. Lebron hits

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Speaker 1: a little mid range jumper off of a Jackson Hayes

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Speaker 1: ball screen off the left side. He hit two mid

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Speaker 1: range jumpers off of that specific action in the second half.

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Speaker 1: Lebron really nice scoring tonight, and I really good to

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Speaker 1: see that Lebron still has some real scoring pop. Lebron

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Speaker 1: and Austin provide that little bit of scoring. You see

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Speaker 1: that two man connectedness with them. Lebron hits Austin on

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Speaker 1: a beautiful back cut along the baseline in a really

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Speaker 1: tight window for another layup. They blow the game out

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Speaker 1: to like fifteen seventeen. Then when Luca comes back in,

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Speaker 1: now you're dealing with Luca. Now Austin's standing off the

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Speaker 1: ball in the corner. And this is probably the most

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Speaker 1: encouraging thing from this entire game out of all the

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Speaker 1: different things that went the Lakers way. The Lakers ended

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Speaker 1: up going to that bread pick and roll with Luca

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Speaker 1: and Jackson off the top down the stretch in that

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Speaker 1: middle stretch of the fourth quarter, and Austin Reeves was

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Speaker 1: consistently situated in that right corner. And we talked about

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Speaker 1: this a lot in the show on Monday, But one

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Speaker 1: of my concerns with the Lakers to this point in

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Speaker 1: the season has been, you know, for all to talk

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Speaker 1: about their shooting woes, like, I'm not sure that there

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Speaker 1: they have a lot of guys that we would consider

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Speaker 1: to be knockdown shooters. A lot of these guys are

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Speaker 1: streaky shooters that are very rhythm based, that can go

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Speaker 1: cold right, and so it's one of those things where

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Speaker 1: like a lot of these sequences are ending in the

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Speaker 1: hands of a guy like Austin on the wing or

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Speaker 1: ending in the hands of a guy like Gabe Vincent

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Speaker 1: or a Marcus Smarter, sometimes even Luca, And if you

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Speaker 1: look at their rotation, it's really Lebron and Ruey that

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Speaker 1: are like the reliable, you know, stereotypical catch and shoot

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Speaker 1: guys that you would expect to consistently knock down those

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Speaker 1: shots at a high clip. And so I have my

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Speaker 1: eye on specifically with the starters, Luca and Austin's catch

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Speaker 1: and shoot because bench guys are bench guys are going

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Speaker 1: to be in and out of the lineup. It's not

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Speaker 1: that big of a deal. But ultimately for this team

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Speaker 1: to achieve the level of unguardability that they need to

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Speaker 1: achieve to compete for a championship, they need every single

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Speaker 1: sequence to end in the hands of a player who

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Speaker 1: is going to consistently make you pay. Do I think

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Speaker 1: they're bigs, whether it's DeAndre Ayten or Jackson Hayes, are

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Speaker 1: going to finish vertical spacing reps, Yes, they do. Especially

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Speaker 1: DeAndre Ayton is a healthier or a Deandreyten when he's healthy,

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Speaker 1: is a much better threat against switching schemes too, because

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Speaker 1: he can do damage on the offensive glass and he

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Speaker 1: can catch and hit a short, little hook shot in

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Speaker 1: the lane, right, But you need every single sequence. If

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Speaker 1: it ends in a catch and shoot for a Lebron,

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Speaker 1: that's going to go in, right You. If you have

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Speaker 1: a catch and shoot for Rue, you feel like it's

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Speaker 1: going to go in, but you need it to feel

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Speaker 1: the same for an Austin catch and shoot, or the

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Speaker 1: same for an Austin or for a Luca catch and shoot. Right.

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Speaker 1: We talked a lot about that in the Monday show. Well,

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Speaker 1: Luca was facing some pretty aggressive coverages in that middle

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Speaker 1: fourth quarter. He got blitzed once. There was an at

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Speaker 1: the level coverage, and in those seats, one says they

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Speaker 1: consistently got the ball to Austin in the weak side corner.

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Speaker 1: One on a Luca skip a very beautiful skip pass

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Speaker 1: from Luca in another one on a feed to Jackson

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Speaker 1: in the short roll on a blitz who then fed

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Speaker 1: it to Austin. In both cases, Austin's man came over

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Speaker 1: to tag the roller. Austin had an opportunity to tack

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Speaker 1: out the corner. He knocks down the catch and shoot three.

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Speaker 1: On the first one, he drives the clothes out on

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Speaker 1: the second one and hits a little short bang shot.

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Speaker 1: He had another one later on where he scored on

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Speaker 1: a back cut just cutting along the baseline end up

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Speaker 1: getting a wide open layup. Jackson had another short role

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Speaker 1: read off of a full court pressure sequence where he

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Speaker 1: hits Ruy Hatchamura for a lob along the baseline as

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Speaker 1: he gets a dunk. By the way, shout out to

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Speaker 1: Jackson Hayes. His connective passing there in the middle of

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Speaker 1: the floor has been a revelation to start this season.

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Speaker 1: When he catches in those four on threes, he is

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Speaker 1: consistently making the right read. That improvement as well as

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Speaker 1: him just getting a little bit stronger in a little

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Speaker 1: better at defending with verticality without fouling, has been a

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Speaker 1: big step for this Lakers team getting a better production

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Speaker 1: out of their center rotation. And then you add Mexic

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Speaker 1: Leiba and the work that he's done in the last

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Speaker 1: week or so, Lakers looked like they had a better,

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Speaker 1: much much much better center rotation than they did last year.

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Speaker 1: But essentially that was the path of the game and

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Speaker 1: they ended up blowing it open. So they start to

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Speaker 1: defend well, they find a coverage that works Okay, we're

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Speaker 1: blitzing James Harden. That's working. On the other end. Late

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Speaker 1: third quarter, Luca brings real rim pressure, much more aggression

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Speaker 1: towards the basket. You go into the third quarter, obviously

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Speaker 1: at that point James Harden's out of the game. Briefly,

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Speaker 1: it's a Luca Austin unit. Luca and Austin. Excuse me,

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Speaker 1: a Lebron and Austin unit. Lebron and Austin bring the

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Speaker 1: scoring pop. They blow the game open. Here comes Luca back. Now,

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Speaker 1: it's about your ability to score out of the action

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Speaker 1: when all three of your stars on the floor, which

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Speaker 1: they were consistently able to do down the stretch of

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Speaker 1: the game. Really really impressive game for the Lakers offense.

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Speaker 1: They hang one hundred and thirty five points on a

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Speaker 1: pretty bad Clippers defense. I'm going to bring up a stat.

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Speaker 1: This was for my buddy law Murray who covers the Clippers.

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Speaker 1: The La Clippers have a lot of one hundred and twenty

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Speaker 1: plus points ten times the season in eighteen games. They

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Speaker 1: did not give up their tenth game of one hundred

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Speaker 1: and twenty plus points last season until March eleventh, the

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Speaker 1: sixty fifth game of the season. So the Clippers obviously

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Speaker 1: having some major issues on defense. I had a question

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Speaker 1: in the chat, someone asked me, is there one thing

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Speaker 1: that you could say that explains why the Clippers have

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Speaker 1: struggled so much to start the season. It's their defense.

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Speaker 1: It's that simple. They've gone to become a bottom five

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Speaker 1: defense in the NBA, when last season they had a

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Speaker 1: very similar formula. Right like James Harden, the offensive engine

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Speaker 1: floor of floor Razer Zubots is the two man game

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Speaker 1: partner athletes around them that can play with an advantage

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Speaker 1: and that can defend. The difference is last year they

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Speaker 1: were defending while James Harden was providing that offensive floor.

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Speaker 1: This year they're not, and that has been the big

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Speaker 1: drop off for them. A couple other quick notes. Lebron's

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Speaker 1: scoring again, and perhaps the most encouraging thing is he

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Speaker 1: was better on defense in the second half his first

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Speaker 1: three halves of his first I should say five halves

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Speaker 1: of defense and the Lakers Jersey were not good. Just

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Speaker 1: looked like the game was moving a little too fast

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Speaker 1: for him. He was consistently getting caught out of position,

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Speaker 1: had a couple of brutal mistakes down the stretch of

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Speaker 1: the second Jazz game that almost caught them, that cost

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Speaker 1: them the game. Much much better defensive half in the

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Speaker 1: second half from Lebron. He won some one on ones

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Speaker 1: with James Harden. He was flying around in helpside rotations,

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Speaker 1: forcing some misses. The Lakers as a team forced a

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Speaker 1: couple of Zubats misses on catches right underneath the basket

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Speaker 1: late in the game. There were an example of that

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Speaker 1: swarming to overcome the size of disadvantage that I was

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Speaker 1: talking about. And again, the defensive rebounding was a revelation

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Speaker 1: all night. But Lebron's a big part of that. And

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Speaker 1: I thought he was excellent in that second half defensively,

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Speaker 1: but also twenty five points, nine for fifteen from the field,

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Speaker 1: two for five from three, six rebounds and six assists,

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Speaker 1: plus eighteen and thirty two minutes, got a steal, got

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Speaker 1: a block, had an offensive rebound, like twenty five, six

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Speaker 1: and six on super high efficiency. With the like with

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Speaker 1: the work that he was doing on the glass and

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Speaker 1: the work that he was doing defensively in that second half,

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Speaker 1: that's a really nice game from Lebron James. If Lebron

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Speaker 1: can get to the point where he's routinely hanging out

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Speaker 1: around that twenty five, six and six kind of range.

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Speaker 1: That's where we're starting to talk about a guy that's

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Speaker 1: in the conversation for All NBA. He won't get All

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Speaker 1: NBA this year because he won't play enough games, but

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Speaker 1: it's more just in terms of the level that he's reaching.

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Speaker 1: And we you know, we had someone ask us in

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Speaker 1: the chat, like, what will the Lakers have to do

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Speaker 1: in order to justify making a super aggressive win now

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Speaker 1: type of trade? You know, to me, Lebron is the

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Speaker 1: hallmark of that. If you get to late January early

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Speaker 1: February and Lebron doesn't look like he's near that level,

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Speaker 1: then you have to start taking the long view. But

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Speaker 1: if Lebron continues to trend upwards and by the time

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Speaker 1: we get to late January, still healthy and he's playing

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Speaker 1: at a super high level, now, it becomes a much

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Speaker 1: more complicated conversation because it's like, when is the next

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Speaker 1: time you're going to get an All NBA level talent

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Speaker 1: alongside Luca in this team construct. At that point, it

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Speaker 1: becomes much more complicated. It becomes much more of a

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Speaker 1: a a of a decision for this Lakers' front office

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Speaker 1: in terms of whether or not they want to make

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Speaker 1: a more aggressive win now type of move. That's where

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Speaker 1: you have to start considering the Andrew Wiggins type of

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Speaker 1: contract that is like a little bit bigger in his

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Speaker 1: early thirties, a little bit more complicated of a decision,

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Speaker 1: but somebody that you might have to consider if Lebron

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Speaker 1: clearly looks like he's playing at that level when he

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Speaker 1: gets to that point. The positive aggression from three in

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Speaker 1: general from the Lakers, they ended up shooting thirteen for

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Speaker 1: twenty nine tonight. That's forty five percent. Obviously a strong indicator.

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Speaker 1: But I do think they're going to be pretty streaky.

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Speaker 1: I think the key guys again, like when you look

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Speaker 1: at their actual shot diet, so many of their threes

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Speaker 1: are Luca tough stepbacks. So like Luca improving on his

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Speaker 1: step back three in Austin improving on his catch and

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Speaker 1: shoot three. Those are going to be the two main

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Speaker 1: kind of swing factors for the Lakers and their jump shooting,

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Speaker 1: if they're gonna get up into that more in that

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Speaker 1: middle of the pack range as a shooting team, as

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Speaker 1: we know they're capable of getting to. All right, guys,

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Speaker 1: That's all I have for tonight, As always, a sincerely

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Speaker 1: appreciate you guys for supporting us and supporting the show. Again,

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Speaker 1: I hope this is all we have for our Wednesday,

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Speaker 1: so if you guys have a I guess it's technically

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Speaker 1: Wednesday here in Denver too so, but again, as always,

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Speaker 1: a sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting us. I hope

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Speaker 1: you enjoy the holiday. I pre recorded a show with

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Speaker 1: the Nerd Sash guys covering contender rankings, so just like

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Speaker 1: kind of an update on how I feel about the

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Speaker 1: top the top two tiers of contenders, Carson and Logan

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Speaker 1: were awesome. We got into some debates, got into some

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Speaker 1: good stuff there. So make sure you guys meet us

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Speaker 1: over on the YouTube channel on Friday and then our

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Speaker 1: next playback stream Friday night, Dallas at LA gonna be

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Speaker 1: a fun one. The Lakers have a chain to go

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Speaker 1: four to oh in the play in tournament or in

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Speaker 1: the in season tournament with a chance to compete for

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Speaker 1: the inn Season Tournament championship. Should be a fun one.

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Speaker 1: I will see you guys then