Speaker 1: The volume Lakers Tonight is presented by Fan Duel Sports Book.
Speaker 1: There's no better place to make every moment more than
Speaker 1: with Fan Duel. It's a great place to bet on
Speaker 1: the NBA. It's America's number one sports book, and you
Speaker 1: get winnings delivered in as quick as two hours. Plus.
Speaker 1: It's fun to combine multiple bets from the same game
Speaker 1: into a same game parlay. If you are new, just
Speaker 1: download Fan Duel sports Book app to get started. Now
Speaker 1: sign up with promo co Jason T so they know
Speaker 1: I sent you. Twenty one plus in president Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Indiana, Louisiana,
Speaker 1: Permitted parishes only, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Tennessee, Virginia
Speaker 1: or West Virginia. First online real money wager only. Refund
Speaker 1: issued as non withdrawalable site credit that expires in fourteen days.
Speaker 1: Restrictions apply. See terms at sports book dot fan duel
Speaker 1: dot com. Gambling problem called one eight hundred, next step
Speaker 1: or text next step to five three three four two
Speaker 1: in Arizona one a date eight seven eight nine seven
Speaker 1: seven seven seven or visit CCPG dot org slash chat.
Speaker 1: In Connecticut one eight hundred Gambler or visit FanDuel dot
Speaker 1: com slash RG in Colorado, Indiana, New Jersey, in Virginia
Speaker 1: one eight seven seven seven seven zero stop in Louisiana
Speaker 1: one eight hundred to seven zero seven one seven for
Speaker 1: confidential help. In Michigan one eight seven seven eight Hope
Speaker 1: and Why or text hope and Why to four six
Speaker 1: seven three six nine in New York. In Tennessee redline
Speaker 1: dial one eight hundred eight eight nine nine seven eight
Speaker 1: nine in Tennessee, visit www one eight dot one eight
Speaker 1: hundred gambler dot net. In West Virginia, we'll come to
Speaker 1: Lakers tonight you presented by FanDuel Here on the volume.
Speaker 1: I am Jason Tamp. Happy Tuesday, everybody. I hope you
Speaker 1: all had a great weekend. I am very happy to
Speaker 1: be back. I love skiing. It's my second favorite thing
Speaker 1: to do in the world, behind basketball, and I think
Speaker 1: Breckinridge might be my favorite place to do it. It's
Speaker 1: got the best combination of a cool little town to
Speaker 1: hang out with your friends when you're not skiing, and
Speaker 1: a great mountain that's got everything that you could want
Speaker 1: as a skier. And most importantly, they're both right next
Speaker 1: to each other so you don't have to travel from
Speaker 1: the town to the skier's order back or whatever. But
Speaker 1: you know, I had a good time. I'm excited to
Speaker 1: be back, and I came back to the house being
Speaker 1: on fire. And I'm talking about my house. I'm talking
Speaker 1: about the Lakers House. As this incredible saga of drama continues,
Speaker 1: the latest drama is a story from Mark Stein that
Speaker 1: appears to be yet the latest, yet another mouthpiece for
Speaker 1: one of the parties involved in all of this drama.
Speaker 1: We had a couple of very interesting quote and I'll
Speaker 1: read them to you guys really quickly. Here, Rob Polinka,
Speaker 1: this is from Mark Stein has the unwavering support of
Speaker 1: Lakers owner Genie Buss and is firmly entrenched as a
Speaker 1: pillar of the club's four pronged brain trust, alongside Bus
Speaker 1: and the power couple of Kurt and Linda Rambis end quote.
Speaker 1: Not only does that confirm the suspicions we discussed on
Speaker 1: the pod last week about the fact that Genie is
Speaker 1: leaning on Rob and on Kurt Rambis and on Magic
Speaker 1: Johnson as she navigates her way through this. That's a
Speaker 1: vote of confidence. That's her saying that she's on Rob's
Speaker 1: side in all of this, which I thought was really interesting.
Speaker 1: Mark Stein went on to say, this is an organization
Speaker 1: that has cut ties completely with Lakers icon Jerry West,
Speaker 1: who has a legit claim to the to be the
Speaker 1: greatest Laker ever. When you combine his playing achievements with
Speaker 1: his front office work, James and Agent, it's Paul. For
Speaker 1: all of the perceived control they wield, are still outsiders
Speaker 1: when it comes to the Lakers power dynamics. If West
Speaker 1: can be cut off, rest assured, Lebron can too, if
Speaker 1: he can no longer lift the Lakers out of mediocrity.
Speaker 1: End quote. Yet another very very pointed statement, basically saying, Hey, listen, buddy,
Speaker 1: if I'm choosing between the Lakers and you, I'm choosing
Speaker 1: the Lakers. That's the message that Genie is sending to
Speaker 1: Lebron there. And I think it's very interesting because, you know,
Speaker 1: as we've discussed a lot over the course of the
Speaker 1: last couple of weeks, this is an incredible disaster. I
Speaker 1: tweeted this morning, this is one of the worst examples
Speaker 1: of roster building in the history of the NBA. The
Speaker 1: stat that I used to demonstrate that is that this
Speaker 1: year's Lakers team with Lebron and Anthony Davis on the
Speaker 1: floor together by net rating, has underperformed relative to last
Speaker 1: year's Lakers team with Lebron and a D off the floor.
Speaker 1: So last year's Lakers no Lebron and a D better
Speaker 1: than this year's Lakers with Lebron in a D. Think
Speaker 1: about how difficult that would be to pull off. Think
Speaker 1: about how bad you have to be around those two
Speaker 1: for that to be the result. And like we've said,
Speaker 1: everyone's guilty. It requires dozens of things to go wrong
Speaker 1: for that to be the case, and everyone's to blame.
Speaker 1: Genie Busses to blame for constantly, constantly relying on what's
Speaker 1: familiar to her familiar to her instead of putting people
Speaker 1: in charge and seeking out people who are qualified for
Speaker 1: the job. She's also not as rich as other owners
Speaker 1: and certainly not as willing to spend, which for this
Speaker 1: particular Lakers team is a big problem. We went step
Speaker 1: by step through everything Rob Polinka has done wrong in
Speaker 1: the last couple of years to short change what this
Speaker 1: team was capable of, and then Lebron and Clutch they
Speaker 1: flat out missed on Russell Westbrook. They were the ones
Speaker 1: who pushed for him. It was a disaster before it happened,
Speaker 1: it was a disaster as it was happening. It's still
Speaker 1: a disaster now. Everybody knew that going in, They pushed
Speaker 1: for it. They are responsible for that. So everyone's guilty.
Speaker 1: And so what you're seeing now is a classic case
Speaker 1: of trying to control the narrative, which is one of
Speaker 1: the most important aspects to sports history. As stupid as
Speaker 1: that is, because for whatever reason, we allow the narrative
Speaker 1: to change the way we remember things in sports history.
Speaker 1: Lebron wants you to look back at this season as
Speaker 1: Genie and Rob's fault. Robin, Genie, I want you guys
Speaker 1: to look back at this season and think of it
Speaker 1: as Lebron and Clutch sports fault, and they are trying
Speaker 1: to control that, and it works. Look at the two
Speaker 1: thousand seventeen finals. You're probably in one of two camps.
Speaker 1: You either think Kevin Durant outplayed Lebron James head to head,
Speaker 1: or you think two basketball teams played each other. One
Speaker 1: team had way more talent, and the one team that
Speaker 1: had way more talent easily one. That's the way you
Speaker 1: would look at it, right if you watched those games,
Speaker 1: and you saw what happened. There was an attempt to
Speaker 1: establish a narrative that Kevin Durant Lebron were playing one
Speaker 1: on one in that series. And so if you buy
Speaker 1: into that, that's the way you remember the two thousand
Speaker 1: seventeen finals. That's how powerful these narratives can be. That's
Speaker 1: why Lebron's playing this game. That's why Rich Paul called
Speaker 1: Stephen A. Smith the other day to say, hey, go
Speaker 1: on first take and tell, tell, tell everybody that Rob
Speaker 1: Plinka was lying. That's why Genie Buss is going to
Speaker 1: Mark Stein and attempting to change the way that we
Speaker 1: view about the view this season. Now, the question becomes,
Speaker 1: is this all posh suring or we headed towards some
Speaker 1: kind of blow up here? Because I like to think
Speaker 1: that Lebron has no intention of leaving the Lakers. That's
Speaker 1: just what anybody's paying attention to this to the situation
Speaker 1: would tell you, right. Lebron loves it there. He loves
Speaker 1: being in l a, He loves being around all the
Speaker 1: other celebrities. He loves rolling up to Sierra Canyon games
Speaker 1: to watch his kids play and doing all of the
Speaker 1: things that he does when he shows up to those games.
Speaker 1: He loves everything about Los Angeles. He loves being a Laker,
Speaker 1: he loves the history, he loves putting on that jersey,
Speaker 1: he loves playing in Staples Center. And when I was
Speaker 1: recording that video, when I was on the trip, that
Speaker 1: was where my brain first went. There's no way Lebron
Speaker 1: wants to leave. There's no way. But things are getting nastier,
Speaker 1: and that makes me wonder. It makes me wonder if
Speaker 1: this is heading to some sort of breakup. Because the
Speaker 1: truth of the matter is is I think Genie and
Speaker 1: Robber a little bit sick of Lebron and Clutch, and
Speaker 1: Lebron has made it very clear that he's sick of them.
Speaker 1: But I think what Lebron would prefer, it's just to
Speaker 1: regain the power in the situation. He's trying to a
Speaker 1: lot of this aside from the narrative, is him trying
Speaker 1: to take back power? You know, Lebron tried to manipulate
Speaker 1: the Lakers into making a bunch of trades at the
Speaker 1: deadline through the media. Yeah, it's straight up went to
Speaker 1: a press conference and said, we're not good enough to
Speaker 1: beat the Bucks, and we can't beat good enough to
Speaker 1: beat the Milwaukee Bucks as currently constructed. He sent very
Speaker 1: pointed messages and he got rejected, and that just doesn't
Speaker 1: happen a lot in Lebron's career, and I think he
Speaker 1: I think he immediately reactionary, in a very reactionary way,
Speaker 1: tried to take back control. And so the way that
Speaker 1: looks for Lebron is we get to this summer and
Speaker 1: the Lakers have some assets, right, they have Tailor, and
Speaker 1: they have these two first round picks. I think Lebron
Speaker 1: wants all those sent out to retool the roster around
Speaker 1: these guys and make another run at it. But it's
Speaker 1: now in question whether or not Rob and Genie would
Speaker 1: be willing to do so, and they wouldn't be the
Speaker 1: first to do so. In the summer of two thousand seventeen,
Speaker 1: after Kyrie demanded a trade, Lebron asked the entire Calves
Speaker 1: organization in the front office to trade that first round pick.
Speaker 1: The Colin set the Collin Sexton pick to try to
Speaker 1: bring in Paul George or some star to come play
Speaker 1: with it. And Dan Gilbert looked at him and said, okay, fine, resign,
Speaker 1: resign with me, and I'll do this trade. And Lebron
Speaker 1: said no because obviously he wanted to go to the
Speaker 1: Lakers and he didn't get what he wanted, and that
Speaker 1: could happen again this summer. Lebron is one year left
Speaker 1: on his contract after the Sea is in and he
Speaker 1: has no doesn't ever player option. I don't even think
Speaker 1: he has a no trade clause in that contract. In
Speaker 1: that contract, he doesn't have any real controller leverage here.
Speaker 1: Actually Robin Genie do, And so what I think, if
Speaker 1: there's one angle that Lebron needs to play here, it's
Speaker 1: the fact that this team can't win without him right now.
Speaker 1: They don't have They already mortgaged much of their future
Speaker 1: for Anthony Davis, and in the years leading up to this,
Speaker 1: they struggled. That's the angle Lebron needs to be playing.
Speaker 1: The angle Lebron needs to be playing is you can't
Speaker 1: win unless you have me, And we can't win with
Speaker 1: the first and a twenty one year old guard who's
Speaker 1: way behind in his development relative to what the Lakers
Speaker 1: need from him in this moment. So I think the
Speaker 1: most likely scenario is that Lebron leverages that and attempts
Speaker 1: to get Robin Genie to put all the chips in
Speaker 1: the middle to cash in, because that what are we
Speaker 1: even trying to do here if we're not trying to
Speaker 1: win a championship, especially if you're the Los Angeles Lakers.
Speaker 1: You don't get participation trophies with the Lakers. Not when
Speaker 1: there's seventeen banners on the wall. This is an entirely
Speaker 1: different standard that they're operating under, and so clinging to assets,
Speaker 1: having one foot in the moment and one foot in
Speaker 1: the future, that's not the way to do it. That's
Speaker 1: going to piss off a lot of Laker fans. That's
Speaker 1: not up to the standard of the franchise. And I
Speaker 1: don't know what the pathway out of this is because
Speaker 1: the truth of the matter is is Genie, as you
Speaker 1: can tell from this mark Stein story, she's son knowing.
Speaker 1: She's obstinate, she's stubborn, she's very, very under the impression
Speaker 1: that they are in the right here, and so is Lebron.
Speaker 1: So we're coming to a head, you know. And Lebron
Speaker 1: can make comments like I might go back to Cleveland
Speaker 1: one day, not for sure, but maybe I will. You know,
Speaker 1: he can say that kind of stuff all he wants.
Speaker 1: I'm not even sure. Clearly, move on him if Lebron
Speaker 1: wanted to go back to Cleveland, he would have to
Speaker 1: take on a different approach than he has with his
Speaker 1: Lakers team. The Lebron process is chaotic. We've talked a
Speaker 1: lot about that over the years on this spot. When
Speaker 1: he when he shows up, you win, You're gonna get
Speaker 1: a championship. But the process is unbelieve. You're gonna send
Speaker 1: out a bunch of assets, You're gonna mortgage the future.
Speaker 1: There's gonna be drama, there's gonna be conflict, there's gonna
Speaker 1: be passive aggressiveness. That's all part of the journey. And
Speaker 1: we're at that part of the journey right now with
Speaker 1: the Lakers, and obviously, because they're not winning, it doesn't
Speaker 1: seem like it's worth it. The Calves have a nice
Speaker 1: organic core that they've built with really good young players,
Speaker 1: and make no mistake, if they got Lebron, they'd be
Speaker 1: a bona fide championship contender. If you could put Darius
Speaker 1: Garland next to Lebron James with that incredible Alan Mobile
Speaker 1: front court, they would be extremely difficult to beat, especially
Speaker 1: if they got some veteran role players in there, especially
Speaker 1: with Kevin Love coming off the bench. But what what
Speaker 1: What in the world makes you think if you're a
Speaker 1: Cass fan, that you want to take on that Lebron
Speaker 1: chaos when everything with the team is going so smoothly
Speaker 1: right now. So that's the one angle with this, that
Speaker 1: Lebron has gotta be careful with your thirty seven. Now,
Speaker 1: you're gonna be thirty eight next season. The Lakers are
Speaker 1: willing to put up with you. I'm not sure that
Speaker 1: some of these other young cores that you see out
Speaker 1: there are willing to put up with you. So that's
Speaker 1: the that's the other side of this that gets interesting.
Speaker 1: My prediction is that Lebron stays in l A. My
Speaker 1: prediction is that they ship off all the assets this
Speaker 1: summer and that they try to retool around Lebron in
Speaker 1: a d next year. But there's some bad blood in
Speaker 1: the water, and if that continues, if this bad blood
Speaker 1: gets worse, it can burn a bridge. Jerry West is
Speaker 1: a hero to Laker fans for what he did in
Speaker 1: his career. They're not even on speaking terms with Genie
Speaker 1: Buss now. Lebron is a little more high profile right now,
Speaker 1: so maybe that makes it a little more complicated from
Speaker 1: Genie's perspective. But I wouldn't be shocked. That story from
Speaker 1: with Mark sign is very pointed and very intentional. It's
Speaker 1: clear that they're not happy with the way things are
Speaker 1: going well. See, Like I said, I predict that they
Speaker 1: send out the assets, but I wouldn't be surprised by anything.
Speaker 1: At this point. I wanted to move on to the
Speaker 1: Phoenix Suns for a minute. So Chris Paul has a
Speaker 1: right right thumb evulsion fracture. If I'm saying that properly,
Speaker 1: he's gonna be out sixt eight weeks. It's not necessarily
Speaker 1: the end of the world. Hand injuries in particular are
Speaker 1: easier to rehab from in terms of the timetable, because
Speaker 1: you can do more to maintain your conditioning while you're out.
Speaker 1: It's not like a leg injury where you literally can't
Speaker 1: run for six d eight weeks. Like Chris Paul is
Speaker 1: gonna be able to stay in shape. He's gonna be
Speaker 1: able to do basically everything other than shoot a basketball
Speaker 1: for a little while, and then there will be some
Speaker 1: ramp up in that department. But Chris Paul is gonna
Speaker 1: be fine. I'm not worried about that in particular. Now,
Speaker 1: there are two different ways to look at this in
Speaker 1: terms of the Sun's prospects. How are they going to
Speaker 1: do for the rest of regular season and what does
Speaker 1: this mean for the playoffs. In the regular season, They're
Speaker 1: gonna be fine. There's seven games up on the number
Speaker 1: two overall seed in the lost column. Seven games. That
Speaker 1: is a huge cushion. This season with Chris Paul off
Speaker 1: the floor, the Suns are plus four point two points
Speaker 1: per one possessions. That's in dominant basketball team. That plus
Speaker 1: four point two net rating would rank seventh in the
Speaker 1: league right now. Basically without Chris Paul, the Sons are
Speaker 1: just as dominant as the Cleveland Cavaliers are right now.
Speaker 1: The Calves currently sit at plus four point two for
Speaker 1: the season. They're gonna be fine. And I've said this
Speaker 1: a lot, but the reason why they have so much
Speaker 1: success is this is the deepest talent from top to
Speaker 1: bottom that I've ever seen on an NBA roster. They
Speaker 1: don't have the top end talent. No one's gonna compete with,
Speaker 1: like a two thousand seventeen Warriors. If you've got Kevin Durant,
Speaker 1: Clay Thompson, Steph Curry, and Draymond Green on the floor,
Speaker 1: that's just a level of top end talent that no
Speaker 1: team can ever keep up with. But in terms of
Speaker 1: the toll the whole roster from top to bottom, I
Speaker 1: have never seen a team with this many good players
Speaker 1: on it, and they've only done things to improve and
Speaker 1: to plug in holes. They had issues with an undersized
Speaker 1: guard coming off the bench in Campaign and that caused
Speaker 1: problems for them in switching situations. So they got Alfred Payton,
Speaker 1: a bigger, stronger, more athletic guard, to give them a
Speaker 1: different option in that scenario they ended up against against
Speaker 1: a team that was attacking Campaign. They had tons of
Speaker 1: issues with DeAndre Ayton getting in foul trouble or every
Speaker 1: time he went to the bench for arrest. The Frank
Speaker 1: Kamitsky and Dario Sarge would get destroyed by the bench
Speaker 1: bigs that they would face elsewhere in the league, especially honest.
Speaker 1: So they got JaVale McGee and they got Bismack Bionmbo.
Speaker 1: They've completely solved that problem. They're deep, they have an
Speaker 1: incredible amount of talented role players. It's like the opposite
Speaker 1: of what we see with the Lakers. The guys who
Speaker 1: aren't the stars are just that team by itself might
Speaker 1: be a playoff team. That's how good they are. My
Speaker 1: favorite player on that team right now is Michael Bridges
Speaker 1: are one of my friends. Jackson Frank on Twitter did
Speaker 1: a profile on him today talking about his offensive development.
Speaker 1: Michael Bridges is averaging nineteen points in his last eleven
Speaker 1: games on seventy true shooting. I noticed this in the
Speaker 1: playoff series last year against the Lakers. I noticed like
Speaker 1: he was playing a role on that team, really kind
Speaker 1: of confining his game to fit into what the Suns
Speaker 1: needed him to do. But I kept seeing these little
Speaker 1: flashes in that series where I'm like, there's a really
Speaker 1: talented score like under the surface there that's waiting to
Speaker 1: come out when given the opportunity. And we're starting to
Speaker 1: see that. He's almost like Kevin Durant with his ability
Speaker 1: to make these little one handed, like floating jump shots
Speaker 1: in the lane, especially as he's coming off of screens,
Speaker 1: and it just makes him really really difficult defend because
Speaker 1: how tall he is and how long his arms are.
Speaker 1: That's a that is a gitimate all Star level prospect
Speaker 1: that is not even one of their top two players.
Speaker 1: That's the type of talent that's on this team. That's
Speaker 1: why there plus four point two per one possessions without
Speaker 1: CP three. That's why they have a seven game lead
Speaker 1: on the number two overall seat. And I don't even
Speaker 1: get to Camp Johnson or j Crowder and their arsenal
Speaker 1: of wings that can shoot. This is an incredibly talented
Speaker 1: basketball team. So they're gonna be fine without Chris Paul.
Speaker 1: But this is the latest reminder of Chris Paul's fragility.
Speaker 1: He is throughout his career showing a propensity to get hurt,
Speaker 1: like he did with the Rockets in two thousand eighteen
Speaker 1: that costs them the Warriors series, like he did in
Speaker 1: two thousands sixteen in that first round series against the Blazers.
Speaker 1: He has shown a propensity to break down under a workload.
Speaker 1: And so even though this was just a Haynd injury,
Speaker 1: it's just a fluke. But it if something like this
Speaker 1: happens in the playoffs, he turns an ankle, he pulls
Speaker 1: a hamstring, that does significantly change the math for this
Speaker 1: Son's team. The reason why is because, like I always
Speaker 1: tell you, guys, they are very specific things that championship
Speaker 1: contenders always have. They always have high level defense, they
Speaker 1: always have defensive versatility, They always have a guy that
Speaker 1: can create their own shot, like an isolation score, like
Speaker 1: Devin Booker is for the Suns. But most importantly, they
Speaker 1: always have a guy who's a very talented, high end playmaker,
Speaker 1: a guy who can make reads, a guy who can
Speaker 1: interpret the defensive scheming of the opponent and be one
Speaker 1: step ahead of him. It's like the chess match of
Speaker 1: a playoff series. Chris Paul is a very very important
Speaker 1: part of the Son's ability to win a chess match
Speaker 1: against the top tier teams in the league, and if
Speaker 1: he does break down, if he does get hurt, it
Speaker 1: severely limits them in that specific scenario. You can be
Speaker 1: a dominant team, you can have an incredible depth of talent,
Speaker 1: You can be plus four point two per one hundred
Speaker 1: possessions without Chris Paul in the regular season, but then
Speaker 1: run into a matchup where teams just schemes really well
Speaker 1: around Devin Booker and around Deandretan, and you just don't
Speaker 1: have a counter for it. Having that really high level
Speaker 1: basketball like you, that high end playmaker, gives you the
Speaker 1: ability to be one step ahead of the adjustments that
Speaker 1: the opponents are making. So point being the Sons are
Speaker 1: gonna be fine. This Chris Paul injury does not disrupt
Speaker 1: their ability to win the championship. But he's the most
Speaker 1: important piece and if he does go down in some
Speaker 1: capacity that affects them in a playoff series, it could
Speaker 1: cost them and they could lose. They are beatable without
Speaker 1: Chris Paul. They might beat able with Chris Paul, but
Speaker 1: they're definitely beatle beatable without Chris Paul. So that's the
Speaker 1: thing they're gonna have to watch out for, is Chris
Speaker 1: Paul's body breaking down. All right, that's all I have
Speaker 1: for you guys today. We will be back for a
Speaker 1: Thursday night show when the NBA re kicks up after
Speaker 1: the All Star break. I appreciate you guys support as always,
Speaker 1: and we will see you on Thursday. The volume