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Speaker 1: to Hoops Tonight, presented by FanDuel here at the volume
Speaker 1: Happy Tuesday, everybody. I hope all of you guys are
Speaker 1: having a great week so far. Well, this isn't the
Speaker 1: first time that this has happened to us on the show,
Speaker 1: and it certainly won't be the last time. But basically,
Speaker 1: everything I said yesterday as it pertains to the Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant situation, is now completely irrelevant. There was some sort
Speaker 1: of clandestine meeting yesterday between the NETS ownership in front
Speaker 1: office and Rich Climate and Kevin Durant, and they've agreed
Speaker 1: to patch things up and to move forward as though
Speaker 1: nothing ever happened. This was something I always thought was
Speaker 1: a possibility. I just saw it as incredibly unlikely. So
Speaker 1: it's just truly bizarre to me. Um, you guys were
Speaker 1: gonna come at this from every different angle. We'ren look
Speaker 1: at it from the Nets angle, from the Kevin Durant angle,
Speaker 1: from the c b A angle, from the Lakers angle,
Speaker 1: since they just lost their biggest trade target from the summer.
Speaker 1: We're gonna get to all of it today. You guys,
Speaker 1: know the drill before we get, Before we get started.
Speaker 1: Subscribe to the Volume's YouTube channel so you don't miss
Speaker 1: any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at
Speaker 1: underscore Jason lt so you guys don't miss any show announcements.
Speaker 1: And if you miss this episode for whatever reason and
Speaker 1: you can't get back over to YouTube to finish it,
Speaker 1: don't forget that we do release these in audio form.
Speaker 1: Wherever you get your podcasts under Hoops tonight. And then
Speaker 1: last announcement, don't forget Tomorrow is our mail bag episode
Speaker 1: about the top twenty five players list that we were working.
Speaker 1: On my Twitter feed, you'll see a tweet asking for
Speaker 1: mail bad questions. You can drop questions about the list there. Also,
Speaker 1: I will be shouting out two or three of you
Speaker 1: guys who make the best case for why I was
Speaker 1: wrong about something. There's a player on that list that
Speaker 1: you disagree with, just right in one or two tweets,
Speaker 1: the basketball reason why you disagree, and the people that
Speaker 1: make the best case. I'm gonna shout you guys out
Speaker 1: on the show tomorrow, all right. So let's start with
Speaker 1: the Nets. They were at a crossroads here. They had
Speaker 1: a decision to make. And this is not a crossroads
Speaker 1: that is only relevant this summer. This is a crossroads
Speaker 1: they've really been facing ever since things started to go
Speaker 1: south with this partnership, and this partnership has really gone south.
Speaker 1: Katie missed the full season, obviously coming off the achilles tair.
Speaker 1: Kyrie only plays in twenty games. Also, due to injury,
Speaker 1: Katie hurts his hamstring, only plays in thirty five games.
Speaker 1: Kyrie takes two separate leaves of absence without telling Steve Nash,
Speaker 1: and then Kyrie and James Harden both break down in
Speaker 1: the playoffs and the Nets losing the second round. Katie
Speaker 1: hurts his knee, only plays in fifty five games, Kyrie
Speaker 1: refuses to vaccinate, only plays twenty nine games, and both
Speaker 1: struggle in the first round as they get swept by Boston.
Speaker 1: And then this summer, Kyrie threatens to leave and take
Speaker 1: the mid level exception to play for the Lakers, then
Speaker 1: Sudden recommits, and then Katie demands a trade, doubles down
Speaker 1: on that trade by denouncing the head coach in front office,
Speaker 1: and then decides to recommit to the team. That's all
Speaker 1: happened in three years, and so that presented Brooklyn with
Speaker 1: a decision. You can either continue this partnership or you
Speaker 1: can restart, and you have a ton of assets to
Speaker 1: do so. Kevin Durant would have fetched you the largest
Speaker 1: trade return in the history of the league. Kyrie irvings
Speaker 1: worth at least one first round pick, if not to
Speaker 1: the Lakers would have paid to for him. And then
Speaker 1: Ben Simmons is either a really interesting young prospect in
Speaker 1: a second phase of his career that could blossom into
Speaker 1: a foundational piece or someone you can also trade for
Speaker 1: a good amount of assets. So they had a blow
Speaker 1: it up button that they could have pressed to rebuild
Speaker 1: their way. I really thought they'd choose option two because
Speaker 1: of how chaotic Option one has been for them, So
Speaker 1: I'm genuinely surprised that they opted to go this route.
Speaker 1: I I thought that they would want to get out
Speaker 1: of this business. For the record, k D is fine
Speaker 1: as a foundational piece. The dude loves basketball. He's never
Speaker 1: gonna leave you hanging on that front. That makes him
Speaker 1: a great foundational piece. His only concern really is his health,
Speaker 1: but in a vacuum that's not as big of a deal.
Speaker 1: He's been available for both post seasons since he came
Speaker 1: back right, and he played amazing in one and he
Speaker 1: played poorly in another. But I don't think he played
Speaker 1: poorly because his body failed him. I didn't think he
Speaker 1: played poorly because he was old. I think he played
Speaker 1: poorly because he didn't shoot well against one of the
Speaker 1: best defenses that I've ever seen. So the reality is
Speaker 1: is the KD foundational pieces fine. But when you combine
Speaker 1: him with Kyrie and his flakiness and his injury history.
Speaker 1: You can't have both of your core piece is be
Speaker 1: like that, that becomes the issue, and so I really
Speaker 1: thought the Nets would acknowledge that and move on, and
Speaker 1: they decided not to. It's very interesting as far as
Speaker 1: Kad goes, I looked at this, all is very human
Speaker 1: and authentic, which I actually will always support on this show.
Speaker 1: But it was reckless in the sense that he didn't
Speaker 1: have any concern for the consequences that would come if
Speaker 1: you went this route, or if he would bounce back.
Speaker 1: Wanting a better basketball situation, I won thousand percent support that.
Speaker 1: Wanting to change your mind when you learn that a
Speaker 1: decision you made is a poor decision, I also support that.
Speaker 1: But when you do those things, you have to be
Speaker 1: willing to take on the consequences that come from them.
Speaker 1: What Katie did was very human. He was unhappy with
Speaker 1: his basketball situation. Basketball is the most important thing in
Speaker 1: his life. He wanted a better basketball situation, so he
Speaker 1: demanded a trade, even though he had four years left
Speaker 1: on his deal. Now, I know people will say things like, hey,
Speaker 1: he doesn't have any leverage, he has four years left
Speaker 1: on his deal. I don't see it that way, I
Speaker 1: thought Katie's leverage was him not wanting to be there.
Speaker 1: Who who wants to be in business? So somebody who's
Speaker 1: not whose heart isn't in it? Like if we were
Speaker 1: business partners and I told you I don't like being
Speaker 1: your business partner, what are you gonna do? You're probably
Speaker 1: gonna be like, Okay, well, we need to figure out
Speaker 1: some way to end this relationship, because why would we
Speaker 1: continue to work together even though we don't like each other.
Speaker 1: It's like we're in a relationship. Like if your wife
Speaker 1: tells you, hey, I don't like you anymore, what are
Speaker 1: you gonna do? Stick it out? I mean, if you do,
Speaker 1: you you you deserve the unhappiness that follows. Right, So
Speaker 1: I thought Katie had leverage in him simply making it
Speaker 1: clear that he didn't want to be their business partner anymore. Obviously,
Speaker 1: the contract situation complicated at that leverage, but it's not
Speaker 1: like Katie was absolutely powerless here. So then he doesn't
Speaker 1: get traded, and he doubles down on it because he
Speaker 1: still wants to change his basketball situation, and as a result,
Speaker 1: he denounces his head coach in front office kind of publicly,
Speaker 1: not super publicly, but it's clear that he's the one
Speaker 1: who leaked to the report, so he intended for that
Speaker 1: information to get out. Then when the Nets didn't budget again,
Speaker 1: he relented on his decision. He decided, Oh, they really
Speaker 1: aren't going to trade me unless these teams give up
Speaker 1: the house. If they give up the house, my basketball
Speaker 1: situation isn't better. As it turns out, this is my
Speaker 1: best basketball situation. So again, the pathway is very authentic
Speaker 1: and genuine. I wanted something better. I realized something better
Speaker 1: wasn't out there, so now I'm coming back. That's all human.
Speaker 1: But if you do that, you have to live with.
Speaker 1: The consequence is if you tell your wife you want
Speaker 1: to break up for a little while and go be you,
Speaker 1: and then you say, never mind, that sucks, I want
Speaker 1: to come back. Your wife, it's not going to have
Speaker 1: the same level of respect for you that she had
Speaker 1: before you left. You and your wife are not going
Speaker 1: to have the same type of relationship you had before
Speaker 1: you left. Changing your mind is fine, Wanting something better
Speaker 1: is fine. It's human, but it has consequences. So here's
Speaker 1: where we're at. Everyone's saying the right things, and they
Speaker 1: will continue to say the right things. They'll say the
Speaker 1: right things in training camp. As a very well crafted
Speaker 1: statement there from Sean Mark's right, but everyone knows the reality.
Speaker 1: The reality is your dirty laundry has been made public.
Speaker 1: Kyrie didn't get the long term deal he wants, and
Speaker 1: he's probably pissed about that. I believe that a lot
Speaker 1: of his good behavior in the last couple of months
Speaker 1: has been about trying to rehab his image for next
Speaker 1: summer to get a long term deal. Will the Nets
Speaker 1: suddenly give him the long term deal next summer they
Speaker 1: didn't give him this summer. Maybe I don't know, but
Speaker 1: let's not pretend like the leftover baggage from that negotiation
Speaker 1: doesn't still exist. Everybody in the world knows Kevin Durant
Speaker 1: doesn't believe in Steve Nash and he doesn't believe in
Speaker 1: Sean Marks. They that's that doesn't go away, and it's
Speaker 1: not like he has some massive change of heart. He's
Speaker 1: just decided to proceed anyway. So not only are we
Speaker 1: all aware of this, but the locker room is aware
Speaker 1: of this. The locker room knows Katie doesn't believe in
Speaker 1: the head coach or the GM. The locker room knows
Speaker 1: Kyrie doesn't like those guys. That's all just in the
Speaker 1: air now while they're trying to go about their basketball mission,
Speaker 1: think about Ben Simmons. Kyrie and Katie both trying to
Speaker 1: get out of this situation. Despite Ben Simmons being on
Speaker 1: the roster, tells Ben Simmons they don't want to play
Speaker 1: with him, or at least they didn't find that appealing
Speaker 1: enough to counter their issues from the previous seasons. Do
Speaker 1: you think that just goes away now they're gonna go
Speaker 1: to Ben Simmons and be like, hey, buddy, buddy, we're
Speaker 1: gonna do this together. Right, that's great and it might
Speaker 1: all work out, but all of this baggage still exists.
Speaker 1: Those things don't just go away because of one meeting
Speaker 1: in Los Angeles or a well worded statement. No matter
Speaker 1: how much Kyrie and Katie want us to believe that now,
Speaker 1: how does that matter? It might not matter at all.
Speaker 1: But an eight two game NBA season naturally has ups
Speaker 1: and downs. There's gonna be a two or three game
Speaker 1: losing streak in there. It will be injuries, there will
Speaker 1: be dispute, Sky's bumping shoulders arguments. Those things are hard
Speaker 1: to get through in any circumstance, it will be harder
Speaker 1: for this group to survive those ups and downs because
Speaker 1: every time they happen, that baggage will float back up
Speaker 1: to the surface. If something goes south with Nash this season,
Speaker 1: you bet your ask there's gonna be conversations behind the
Speaker 1: scenes with Katie going like I told you, I didn't
Speaker 1: like this guy. If there comes a point in the
Speaker 1: season where the group doesn't buy in, that's probably leftover baggage.
Speaker 1: And so again, as much as I support Kevin Durant
Speaker 1: in his authentic pursuit of a better basketball situation, he
Speaker 1: was reckless here. He did not properly factor in the
Speaker 1: downsides to his methods, and that again, that's another big
Speaker 1: reason why I thought this would end differently, why I
Speaker 1: was so confident that the deal would get done. I
Speaker 1: thought k D would understand that too much damage had
Speaker 1: been done to proceed as though nothing had happened. I
Speaker 1: thought Brooklyn would understand that this partnership has not worked
Speaker 1: out for them the way they needed it to. Both
Speaker 1: of them saw it differently. Now we're going to move forward.
Speaker 1: Looking at the basketball, it's a really interesting core. They're
Speaker 1: basically adding four wings that didn't play for them last year,
Speaker 1: and the wing was where they got destroyed last year.
Speaker 1: They did not have guys on the wing that did
Speaker 1: the dirty work for them. They're bringing in Joe Harris
Speaker 1: from the ankle injury, Ben Simmons from the James Harden trade,
Speaker 1: t J Warren a free agent signing, and Royce O'Neil
Speaker 1: a trade from the Utah Jazz. That makes them a
Speaker 1: lot more interesting. The idea of Ben Simmons and k
Speaker 1: D when they're engaged on defense will be very problem
Speaker 1: attic for teams. They do have plenty of shooting and
Speaker 1: their two best stars are immune to spacing concerns, so
Speaker 1: offense should come easy to them. Their immune to spacing
Speaker 1: concerns because they can shoot over the top. We talked
Speaker 1: about this in depth and yesterday's show when we talked
Speaker 1: about superstar archetypes. So everything looks good on the surface
Speaker 1: of the basketball situation. Here's the one uh issue that
Speaker 1: I have, not an issue, but fear that I have
Speaker 1: for this group health. Their best five player lineup will
Speaker 1: probably be Kyrie Irving, Joe Harris, t J. Warren, Kevin Durant,
Speaker 1: Ben Simmons. Those five guys combined to play ninety eight
Speaker 1: games last year. It's less than twenty per player, less
Speaker 1: than a fourth of the season. Now, we're gonna do
Speaker 1: a much deeper dive into this team at a basketball
Speaker 1: level when we do our season previews, which are going
Speaker 1: to start in September, late September, early October. But I
Speaker 1: just wanted to kind of briefly touch on that. It
Speaker 1: is an interesting core health will be the biggest problem
Speaker 1: for them though. CBA negotiations, that's the next thing that
Speaker 1: everyone's talking about. Patrick Beverley specifically tweeted about it today.
Speaker 1: He's not wrong, and this is something we've talked about
Speaker 1: on the show before. It's not good to have drama
Speaker 1: like this in the NBA. I think it turns fans off.
Speaker 1: Also a human interaction. If you're a book Brooklyn Nets fan,
Speaker 1: how do you feel about KD right now? I mean,
Speaker 1: you're obviously happy to have him back, but you're a
Speaker 1: little like if if you were supporting in before, you're
Speaker 1: probably somewhere below that now because of this debacle and
Speaker 1: so many of these ending the player leaving which spurns
Speaker 1: the fan bases even further. So it certainly is an issue,
Speaker 1: and it would be better for the health of the
Speaker 1: league if there was a little bit less player move
Speaker 1: not even necessary player movement, a little bit less this
Speaker 1: type of player movement. I just don't know how you
Speaker 1: stop it. The players want this mobility because they feel
Speaker 1: like the owners have the ability to break contracts in
Speaker 1: a way that they don't, not breaking the contract in
Speaker 1: terms of payment, but breaking the contract in terms of
Speaker 1: shipping them off to different parts of the country. Owners
Speaker 1: have that flexibility. They don't, that's the way they see it.
Speaker 1: So they see these as evening the playing field. So
Speaker 1: I don't see a universe where the players relent on
Speaker 1: that front. Why would they give ground in what they
Speaker 1: see as a pursuit for equality in power in the league.
Speaker 1: So I know, I don't I don't even know a legitimate,
Speaker 1: um legislative way in the league for them to solve
Speaker 1: this problem. I mean, you could try play paying your
Speaker 1: hometown players preposterously more to the point where would be
Speaker 1: devastating financially to leave. But even then I don't see
Speaker 1: what would stop them from requesting trades. I don't see
Speaker 1: an easy fix here. So the reality is that we
Speaker 1: might have to just kind of come to terms with
Speaker 1: this and accept it as an evening of power between
Speaker 1: the dynamic between the owners and the players. And yes,
Speaker 1: I believe it's bad for the league. It's just the
Speaker 1: reality of the situation. Last, but not least, the Lakers
Speaker 1: Kyrie Irving's off the table. Now. There are a bunch
Speaker 1: of different trades that have been thrown out there, Utah
Speaker 1: Jazz Boy and Magdanovitch, Patrick Beverley type of package, Charlotte
Speaker 1: Hornets with like Gordon Hayward and Terry Rosie or something
Speaker 1: along those lines. And then the Buddy Healed Miles Turner trade.
Speaker 1: I favor the Buddy Heeld Miles Turner trade. I don't
Speaker 1: think the Lakers are nearly good enough on the wing
Speaker 1: to play small. I think they're gonna have to lean
Speaker 1: into playing big. That means a d at the four.
Speaker 1: That means having a guy like Myles Turner there is
Speaker 1: actually more useful to them than he would be in
Speaker 1: other systems. I think that's the best option for them.
Speaker 1: Bottom line, don't make the decision the nets are making.
Speaker 1: Don't try to trudge ahead in a toxic situation. Don't
Speaker 1: pretend you can fix things by just putting one ft
Speaker 1: in front of the other. This thing with Russell Westbrook
Speaker 1: is not salvageable. A move needs to be made, and
Speaker 1: I hope they make that move soon. All Right, that's
Speaker 1: all I have for today. Guys, don't forget go onto
Speaker 1: my Twitter feed and drop any mail, bad questions for
Speaker 1: tomorrow's episode as well as your cases for what you
Speaker 1: disagree with me in my list. As always, I appreciate
Speaker 1: your guys support and I'll see tomorrow the volume