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Speaker 2: All right, welcome to hoops tonight. You're at the volume.
Speaker 1: Happy Tuesday, everybody, Oh ball, if you guys are having
Speaker 1: a great week. We have finally made it back to
Speaker 1: the NBA Cup. Weird floors, allegedly a different game ball,
Speaker 1: all sorts of weird st going on, but we are
Speaker 1: back to the tent pole in the middle of the
Speaker 1: season to make things a little different. Throughout the NBA
Speaker 1: regular season. Obviously lots of games to get to tonight,
Speaker 1: but we're going to focus on the two TNT games.
Speaker 1: The first game, Joel Embiid's return for the Philadelphia seventy
Speaker 1: six Ers looked good at times, look sloppy at times.
Speaker 1: Some stuff to get excited about if you're a Sixers fans.
Speaker 1: Some other stuff that's discouraging. The Knicks having one of
Speaker 1: their sharper defensive performances of the season as they get
Speaker 1: a big win, and then the Golden State Warriors and
Speaker 1: the nightcap fall down by seven late to the Dallas Mavericks.
Speaker 1: And another game that was wildly back and forth as
Speaker 1: the Golden State Warriors going another rundown. The stratch Steph
Speaker 1: Currage is absolutely amazing as they pull that one out.
Speaker 1: We're going to break down both games from the perspective
Speaker 1: of both teams. I also have kind of a bigger
Speaker 1: picture thought surrounding some of the change in the ways
Speaker 1: that teams like the Knicks and the Cavs have been
Speaker 1: playing offense. Jampack Show for you guys tonight. You guys
Speaker 1: know the drill before we get started. Subscribe to the
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Speaker 1: more of more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter
Speaker 1: at under score Jason lt so you guys don't miss
Speaker 1: show announcements. So forget about a podcast feed wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcast under Hoops tonight, and then keep dropping
Speaker 1: mail bag questions in the YouTube comments. We're gonna be
Speaker 1: doing a long mail bag on the Friday show. We're
Speaker 1: actually recording that on Thursday, so make sure you guys
Speaker 1: drop some questions in the YouTube comments. All right, let's
Speaker 1: talk some basketball. So this Warriors MAVs game had a
Speaker 1: really interesting flow to it.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: One of the things if if you're trying to nitpick
Speaker 1: the Golden State Warriors roster, which I actually think has
Speaker 1: been a I think we got to start having a
Speaker 1: serious conversation about Steve Kerr as the early favorite for
Speaker 1: Coach of the Year, and then maybe have a conversation
Speaker 1: about the job that the Warriors front office has done
Speaker 1: assembling this roster, because without a ton of top end
Speaker 1: talent like what you see around the rest of the league,
Speaker 1: they're having a ton of success by building a roster
Speaker 1: and a game plan on both ends of the floor
Speaker 1: around a very specific trait that is thriving in the
Speaker 1: modern MBA, and that is speed, speed and transition, speed,
Speaker 1: covering ground on offense, speed covering ground on defense, speed, getting.
Speaker 2: To loose balls.
Speaker 1: Everything that comes from just having waves in waves of speed.
Speaker 1: But if you had to nitpick the Warriors roster, the
Speaker 1: one thing is that they don't have another guy like
Speaker 1: Steph that you can reliably count on to get you
Speaker 1: an efficient twenty plus on any given night. And so
Speaker 1: this game was kind of interesting because there were stretches
Speaker 1: where the Warriors offense kind of bogged down a little bit,
Speaker 1: and then Luca and Kyrie and Clay, who were all
Speaker 1: fantastic tonight, kind of started to methodically out execute them
Speaker 1: in the half court. And you'd see Luca use a
Speaker 1: ball screen to get Andrew Wiggins in a trail position
Speaker 1: so he can just kind of work down the lane
Speaker 1: line and shoot some sort of bank shot.
Speaker 2: Off the glass or draw a foul or Kyrie.
Speaker 1: Kyrie's just having one of the most ridiculous shot making
Speaker 1: seasons that I've seen in a long time. His game
Speaker 1: against the Nuggets the other night was completely absurd, just
Speaker 1: the degree of difficulty in the shots that he was hitting.
Speaker 1: He's just on a crazy run He was incredible in
Speaker 1: the fourth quarter of this game as well, and then
Speaker 1: Luca kept burning more this moodie for helping too much
Speaker 1: into the lane on skip passes, and Klay Thompson is
Speaker 1: just benefiting off of the chaos, right, benefiting off of
Speaker 1: the additional bodies that get thrown towards Luca, benefiting on
Speaker 1: those skip passes, benefiting on transition chaos. He had a
Speaker 1: big three on the right wing in transition. So like
Speaker 1: as the Warriors offense would bog down, the MAVs would
Speaker 1: kind of chip away, chip away, and they go on
Speaker 1: their runs. But then as soon as the Warriors started
Speaker 1: to execute on offense and hit a couple shots, they'd
Speaker 1: set their defense and then they have all this speed
Speaker 1: and they have all these waves of athleticism and they
Speaker 1: can get into the ball. Andrew Wiggins again, like this
Speaker 1: is the type of player two that like six '
Speaker 1: eight rangey wing that typically has struggled with Luca. But
Speaker 1: the difference is Andrew's a bit bigger and stronger than
Speaker 1: people realize. He's bigger and stronger than say, like a
Speaker 1: Jaden McDaniels, for instance, and so on those bumps when
Speaker 1: he's bumping Luca, he's holding his ground a little better,
Speaker 1: He's knocking Luca off of his base a little bit more,
Speaker 1: and it just causes him to have a little bit
Speaker 1: more of an effect. And then Draymond Green is just
Speaker 1: this is the story of the tire Warriors roster, this
Speaker 1: ability to erase mistakes, right. I talk about their closeouts
Speaker 1: all the time. They fly around on the perimeter using
Speaker 1: their speed. But Draymond is one of the best players
Speaker 1: in the league at being two places at once, and
Speaker 1: he had two big stops on Daniel Gaffer down the
Speaker 1: stretch of this game where he was up higher in
Speaker 1: help and was able to recover to one of the
Speaker 1: better rim finishers in the league underneath the basket to
Speaker 1: get stops, and then they would get stops and then
Speaker 1: they would start going in transition. And that was kind
Speaker 1: of like the back and forth of this game. When
Speaker 1: the Warriors were scoring, they were setting their defense, they
Speaker 1: were getting stops, they were running in transition, and then
Speaker 1: every single time things kind of bogged down for them,
Speaker 1: the MAVs were able to kind of chisel away, and
Speaker 1: that's how you ended up with those wild, kind of
Speaker 1: oscillating leads throughout the game. I thought Steph was completely
Speaker 1: amazing in this game. He had a big run in
Speaker 1: the third quarter. It's the Steph Curry classic problem. Right like,
Speaker 1: he comes off the ball screen Derek Lively sitting too
Speaker 1: far back. He hits the pull up three comes off
Speaker 1: the same ball screen a couple possessions later. This time
Speaker 1: Lively shows super high, just floats the little pass over
Speaker 1: the top to trace Jackson Davis, and he rolls to
Speaker 1: the rim. The MAVs went on that big run in
Speaker 1: the middle late third, and then Steph again in the
Speaker 1: late third, made a couple of huge plays down the stretch.
Speaker 1: He hit that bank shot, the driving bank shot along
Speaker 1: the right side, and then in transition, you know, when
Speaker 1: he starts dancing with the ball above the break, guys
Speaker 1: start staring at him and they lose sight of what's
Speaker 1: happening on the backside. He had that whip left handed
Speaker 1: fee to Jonathan Kaminga for a layup. Like every single
Speaker 1: time the MAVs went on one of their runs, Steph
Speaker 1: was able to stabilize them with this unbelievable, elite, top
Speaker 1: tier offense, and that, to me, is the most exciting
Speaker 1: piece of what we've seen over the course of the
Speaker 1: last week, Right, Like, if you go back to last
Speaker 1: season and some of the stuff that Steph was dealing
Speaker 1: with and the slump that he was in, and then
Speaker 1: you come into this offseason and some of the kind
Speaker 1: of it just kind of seemed like there was a
Speaker 1: pessimistic attitude surrounding the Warriors coming into the season. And
Speaker 1: I'm guilty of that as well. I'm not going to
Speaker 1: sit here and pretend like I wasn't. But like, we
Speaker 1: get into this season and all these things start to
Speaker 1: look good, right, they start to look deep. They start
Speaker 1: to look like, oh wait, we might have hit on
Speaker 1: this Buddy Healed signing. You know, the Antony Melton thing
Speaker 1: is working. Johnathan Kaminga is embracing events roll, everyone seems
Speaker 1: really bought into their roles. Oh man, we have thirteen
Speaker 1: players that can reasonably play in the rotation. And the
Speaker 1: one thing that was kind of the biggest question mark
Speaker 1: is they were succeeding in that first couple weeks of
Speaker 1: the season without really getting anything substantial out of Steph,
Speaker 1: not because of his fault. They were blowing out teams
Speaker 1: and then he got hurt, right, But the most exciting
Speaker 1: thing about this last week and a half or so
Speaker 1: is Steph went into Boston and outplayed Jason Tatum and
Speaker 1: looked like the best player on the floor. Steph goes
Speaker 1: into Oklahoma City and outplays shake Vis Alexander looks like
Speaker 1: the best player on the floor. Steph in this game
Speaker 1: once again, time and time again, whenever it looked like
Speaker 1: things were teetering for Golden State, he was able to
Speaker 1: leverage his top tier superstar capabilities to regain control of
Speaker 1: the situation. That is that final piece that you're looking
Speaker 1: for if you're a Warriors fan for real optimism, which
Speaker 1: is can Steph get back to that level? And he
Speaker 1: was unbelievable down the stretch of this game. I felt
Speaker 1: silly on Twitter. I was complaining because he had got
Speaker 1: Luca on a switch and he like toasted him off
Speaker 1: the dribble and made a little scoop shot, and then
Speaker 1: I was like, man, like, Luca just cannot guard this guy.
Speaker 1: Why are they continually trying to screen with Draymond to
Speaker 1: get I think it was lively back on to Steph
Speaker 1: when he's already got Luca on him, and then he
Speaker 1: ends up hitting a crazy step back three over the
Speaker 1: center as well. So it's like I guess there's just
Speaker 1: nothing you can do about it. But again, that's what
Speaker 1: sets Steph apart. You know that if you want to
Speaker 1: get into the big picture, like those offensive lolls, those
Speaker 1: are things that are going to be somewhat part of
Speaker 1: the deal when you've got a roster that doesn't necessarily
Speaker 1: have as much offensive firepower as you see around the
Speaker 1: rest of the league. But one of the things that
Speaker 1: I've always been a staunch believer in is like, even
Speaker 1: for the best offenses in the league, there are lolls lolls.
Speaker 1: You know, sometimes jump shots just don't go in. Sometimes
Speaker 1: you run quality offense and you throw a kickout pass
Speaker 1: to a good shooter who's in a catch and shoot
Speaker 1: situation and he misses. And then you go down the
Speaker 1: floor and you run a drop coverage and a guy
Speaker 1: comes off of a ball screen and hits a contested
Speaker 1: pull up three. Like, there's a certain amount of out
Speaker 1: of your control that takes place on the offensive end
Speaker 1: of the floor because of the make and miss element, right,
Speaker 1: But there's so much that you can control. And that's
Speaker 1: where the Warriors have been so especially sharp this year.
Speaker 1: They are so sharp in their attention to detail on
Speaker 1: the defensive end of the floor that even when they
Speaker 1: go through these struggles, it's like, yeah, the MAVs were
Speaker 1: going on runs, but they were going on runs through
Speaker 1: tough shot making. They were going on runs through the
Speaker 1: kinds of shots that the Warriors were trying to give
Speaker 1: up as part of their defensive scheme, And like that,
Speaker 1: to me is the really exciting part. And who knows
Speaker 1: what this all looks like in the big picture in
Speaker 1: terms of whether or not the Warriors make some sort
Speaker 1: of consolidation move to try to bring in additional firepower,
Speaker 1: or if maybe Andrew Wiggins continues to pop and John
Speaker 1: Kamika continues to pop and Buddy Heel continues to pop
Speaker 1: and they make an internal decision that they don't need
Speaker 1: to do that. But the most important piece was this
Speaker 1: team wasn't going anywhere without Steph Curry playing like a
Speaker 1: top tier superstar and three times against legitimate championship contending
Speaker 1: teams in the league, he looked like the best player
Speaker 1: on the floor, And that, to me is like the
Speaker 1: the the cherry on top of this wonderful start to
Speaker 1: the season for the Golden State Warriors.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 1: I think a couple other guys I wanted to shout
Speaker 1: out again, Draymond Green. I thought he defensively at the
Speaker 1: tail end of this game, just made some plays that
Speaker 1: he's one of the only people in the entire world
Speaker 1: that can make. He had ah the one with Daniel
Speaker 1: Gafford on the double pump. He had actually met him
Speaker 1: up high with the other hand and then Daniel brought
Speaker 1: it down and right when he exposed it, Draymond saw
Speaker 1: an opportunity to jump in there and swipe it away.
Speaker 1: Brandon Pitzemski he had a late third quarter run that
Speaker 1: I thought was pretty important. And again this was during
Speaker 1: a stretch of the game when when Dallas was starting
Speaker 1: to kind of gain some control, and he had a
Speaker 1: big three, like a little step back three in a
Speaker 1: ball screen. That's a huge shot in that situation. And
Speaker 1: then on the next possession, he got Derek Lively on
Speaker 1: a switch and beat him off the dribble and he
Speaker 1: just got a shot up on the glass. But when
Speaker 1: he got the shot up on the glass, Lively was
Speaker 1: chasing him and it allowed Kevon Looney to kind of
Speaker 1: fill the gap in behind him and get an offensive
Speaker 1: rebound put back. And so like those are those little things,
Speaker 1: just a little play here and there like oh buddy, Heal,
Speaker 1: just a nice little left to right crossover for a
Speaker 1: driving layup in crunch time like those, that's like found
Speaker 1: money in a game like this, especially for a team
Speaker 1: that relies so much on their defensive activity to try
Speaker 1: to drive their success.
Speaker 2: Again.
Speaker 1: I can't say enough about the job that Steve Kerr
Speaker 1: has done with this group. I can't say enough about,
Speaker 1: like how much this success for the Warriors has changed
Speaker 1: my outlook in terms of, like the way teams need
Speaker 1: to be building their rosters. You have to be fast.
Speaker 1: Twenty percent of these games, damn near is being played
Speaker 1: in transition. Everyone is spaced out. It's turning into drive
Speaker 1: and kick. It is about chasing guys off the three
Speaker 1: point line, covering ground in rotation, long rebounds coming off
Speaker 1: the back of the rim that are going eighteen nineteen
Speaker 1: feet from the basket, and they're turning into foot races
Speaker 1: to go get the basketball. It is constant activity, constant
Speaker 1: motion that is beating teams in the NBA right now,
Speaker 1: and this success that the Warriors are having should be
Speaker 1: incredibly informative to all of us about the direction that
Speaker 1: the game of basketball is going on. The MAVs front
Speaker 1: a couple of different things. There's a lot to be
Speaker 1: discouraged about with this start to the season, but there
Speaker 1: were a lot of different variables, right Derek Lively missed
Speaker 1: several games. PJ Washington missed several games. Luca I went
Speaker 1: over some stats yesterday. Luca is down statistically in every
Speaker 1: single category. Its points are down, rebounds are down, assists
Speaker 1: or down, steals are down, blocks are down. Field go
Speaker 1: percentage is down, three point percentages down, getting to the
Speaker 1: line less, he's getting making free throws less frequently. He's
Speaker 1: his pick and roll play making is down. His post
Speaker 1: up in ISO, points per possession are down. Like everything's
Speaker 1: down across the board, and that, to me is an
Speaker 1: encouraging thing if you're a Dallas fan. Because obviously, like
Speaker 1: Luca missed training camp, we're gonna talk about Joel Embiid
Speaker 1: here in a little bit. He didn't look like Joel
Speaker 1: Embiid today. You know why, because it's tough to get
Speaker 1: back up to the speed of playing NBA basketball. I
Speaker 1: thought tonight was the first game this season where Lucas
Speaker 1: started to look more like Luca, and I know that
Speaker 1: he wore down in that second half but in that
Speaker 1: first half in particular, you started to see him get
Speaker 1: a little more comfortable with that step back three, and
Speaker 1: then you started to see a lot of the stuff
Speaker 1: that we saw during the playoff run, the methodical body
Speaker 1: positioning stuff, getting defenders into trail position, working in that
Speaker 1: short to mid range. We got to see the element
Speaker 1: that we've all been looking for this entire season, which
Speaker 1: is like just what it looks like when Klay Thompson
Speaker 1: has to be accounted for. Again, like when you are
Speaker 1: defending Luca in ball screens and you have to put
Speaker 1: two on the ball or defend the action three on
Speaker 1: two if they position with their spacing properly so that
Speaker 1: the guy that's bagging the roller is coming off of
Speaker 1: Klay Thompson, which ended up being like Moses Moody down
Speaker 1: the stretch, there's going to be opportunities there for Clay
Speaker 1: and I thought he missed one another one where where
Speaker 1: I think it was Andrew Wiggins like threw a crazy
Speaker 1: close out at him late and he pump faked, and
Speaker 1: he got another good look there that goes in. It
Speaker 1: could be a very different game. And so like, even
Speaker 1: though there's a lot to be discouraged about to me,
Speaker 1: there's things that are trending in the right direction. Luca
Speaker 1: I thought today played one of his better games of
Speaker 1: the season in terms of just how he looked in
Speaker 1: control of the situation. And then Kyrie's playing just some
Speaker 1: of the best basketball of his career. I don't even
Speaker 1: know what to say about that. You could see the
Speaker 1: Klay Thompson fit being so natural. They had great stretches
Speaker 1: tonight of defense where they went on runs where they
Speaker 1: really strangled that Golden State offense. So there is positive
Speaker 1: there are positive trends that are taking place within this journey.
Speaker 1: And again, you can't play too much on the results, right,
Speaker 1: Like in terms of the big picture of the eighty
Speaker 1: two game regular season, you played a game well enough
Speaker 1: to be up seven with three four minutes left, right,
Speaker 1: and obviously you went cold down the stretch Steph Curry,
Speaker 1: Steph Curried you. That can happen, But there's some positive
Speaker 1: progress in that game that you can take into the
Speaker 1: next game. So big time win for the Golden State
Speaker 1: Warriors here to start the NBA Cup. We'll get a
Speaker 1: little bit further into both of these teams later in
Speaker 1: the week when we get into our film session. On Thursday,
Speaker 1: moving on to the Knicks and the Sixers, And before
Speaker 1: we get too much further into this game, I want
Speaker 1: to kind of dive into that big picture topic. I
Speaker 1: was talking about it as it pertains the offensive variety.
Speaker 1: So what I think is really fascinating is these two
Speaker 1: teams have changed the way they've played in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, the Knicks through changes in their roster and
Speaker 1: the Calves through a change in the head coaching job.
Speaker 1: Right So with the Calves, all of a sudden, we're
Speaker 1: seeing a lot more use out of Darius Garland. We're
Speaker 1: seeing a lot more usage out of Evan Evan Mobley
Speaker 1: doing a lot of work at the beginning of possessions
Speaker 1: to get the defense in rotation. And one of the
Speaker 1: things we're seeing is Donovan Mitchell's scoring volume is down
Speaker 1: substantially from where it was last year. Right now, the
Speaker 1: Knicks did it through a roster change, but by bringing
Speaker 1: in Michale Bridges, bringing Karl Anthony Towns, oh Jan Andobe
Speaker 1: at the tail end of last year, we've seen a
Speaker 1: Jalen Brunson scoring volume take a dip. Now, both players
Speaker 1: have maintained at their efficiency, but their volume has taken
Speaker 1: a dip. Interestingly enough, we even saw Jalen Brunson say
Speaker 1: that he doesn't think he's playing particularly well. And I
Speaker 1: understand that because there's obviously another level that he can
Speaker 1: get to, that he's capable of scoring more efficiently and
Speaker 1: at higher volume. But here's the thing. The Knicks and
Speaker 1: the Cavs are both top five offenses this year. Last
Speaker 1: year they were not. And this comes down to a
Speaker 1: concept that I've been harping on NonStop since the NBA
Speaker 1: Finals last year between the MAVs and the Celtics, which is, yes,
Speaker 1: there is a certain there's a certain machine that works
Speaker 1: when you lean into the individual greatness of one player, right,
Speaker 1: they get into great rhythm, they have unwavering confidence. You
Speaker 1: can spam actions and attack matchups, and you can get
Speaker 1: success out of that. But what happens is when you
Speaker 1: get into the playoffs, you have to win four playoffs
Speaker 1: series against typically four very different types of defenses, and
Speaker 1: your advantage is change from series to series. Same goes
Speaker 1: during the regular season. You're playing eighty two games, your
Speaker 1: advantages change from game to game, right, and in those situations,
Speaker 1: variety allows you to have a higher floor in all
Speaker 1: of those situations in addition.
Speaker 2: To a higher ceiling.
Speaker 1: Right, because guess what, like on one given night, it
Speaker 1: might be that, you know, Donovan Mitchell has a really
Speaker 1: tough guard on him, but Darius Garland has a lesser
Speaker 1: guard on him. Right, it might be a game where
Speaker 1: Jalen Brunson has a really tough guard on him, but
Speaker 1: Michale Bridges has a really favorable matchup. Teams run out
Speaker 1: of bodies tonight was a perfect example. In the Sixers game.
Speaker 1: There were large portions of the game where we had
Speaker 1: there were large portions of the game where we had
Speaker 1: Og and Obi being guarded by Gershan Yabuselli, and like
Speaker 1: that's a huge foot speed disadvantage. And we had three
Speaker 1: really big mistakes in the run that the Knicks went
Speaker 1: on when they went from being up two to up fourteen,
Speaker 1: where it was like Yabaseli misses a mid range jump
Speaker 1: shot around the elbow and it's like just kick ahead
Speaker 1: pass and Ogn and Obi's getting a dunk. And then
Speaker 1: here's Yabuselli closing out on Og at the top of
Speaker 1: the key and he just toasts him off the dribble.
Speaker 1: Now they're in rotation, they give up a wide open
Speaker 1: corner three or the one the baseline dunk that Og
Speaker 1: and Andobi had. All that was was literally gwershon Yabuselli
Speaker 1: like sitting in help swing pass. Og just ripped to
Speaker 1: the baseline, toasted him off the dribble and got a dunk.
Speaker 1: When you lean into the depth of talent on your roster,
Speaker 1: when you keep everybody involved, when you play equal opportunity.
Speaker 1: When you have that variety, you can do a better
Speaker 1: job of capitalizing on the weak points in the opponent's defense.
Speaker 1: It doesn't make sense to repeatedly go at Andrew Wiggins
Speaker 1: every single time down the floor. Ideally, you want to
Speaker 1: try to generate advantage situations for your best player, and
Speaker 1: the best way to do that is get the ball
Speaker 1: moving side to side to run multiple actions. Not to mention,
Speaker 1: the more actions and interchanges you run on any given possession,
Speaker 1: the more potential there is for a defense to make
Speaker 1: a mistake. Sometimes you'll get just a wide open layup
Speaker 1: or wide up and dunk or wide open shot just
Speaker 1: simply because the first guy did his job, the second
Speaker 1: guy did his job, the third guy did his job,
Speaker 1: and then the fourth guy was caught not paying attention.
Speaker 2: Or they bought a switch or a guy overhelps, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, like like the Klay Thompson three that they
Speaker 1: gave up in crunch time on the skip pass, Moses
Speaker 1: Moody was too far in the lane. It was a
Speaker 1: defensive mistake, right like that, Like you, the more action
Speaker 1: you run, the more interchange, the more side to side,
Speaker 1: the more opportunity for mistakes, the more variety, the more
Speaker 1: equal opportunity, the more opportunity for you to capitalize on
Speaker 1: different mismatches. I don't think it's a coincidence that Donovan
Speaker 1: Mitchell and Jalen Brunson's scoring volume are both down, but
Speaker 1: the Knicks and the Cavs are both scoring at a
Speaker 1: much more effective rate overall as a team this season.
Speaker 1: I think that's a really fascinating concept on the Knicks front.
Speaker 1: For this particular game, it was kind of cool to
Speaker 1: see them start winning on the margins again. Like they've
Speaker 1: been such an elite offense to start this year. Karl
Speaker 1: Anthony Towns has been so good. We're going to talk
Speaker 1: about him in a little bit more detail here in
Speaker 1: a second, but like part of what made the Knicks
Speaker 1: great last year was they won on the margins. They
Speaker 1: could go on defensive runs. They had a great defensive
Speaker 1: game tonight. They haven't had many of those this season.
Speaker 1: There's been a handful. They did it to the Pacers
Speaker 1: earlier this year, Like they have moments, but they haven't
Speaker 1: been as consistently good defensively as they need to be.
Speaker 1: Tonight was a really strong defensive performance for them. They
Speaker 1: dominating the offensive glass has always been a substantial part
Speaker 1: of their identity, and like I think they only I
Speaker 1: think they the Sixers and Knicks relatively even on the
Speaker 1: offensive glass. But in the first half, the Knicks did
Speaker 1: a bunch of damage on the offensive glass. I think
Speaker 1: that's seven offensive rebounds just in the first half. The
Speaker 1: pushing in transition, and part of this is like a
Speaker 1: weakness of Philly, which we'll talk about in a minute,
Speaker 1: but the Nicks scored twenty eight points in transition in
Speaker 1: this game, compared to only eleven for Philly. And so again,
Speaker 1: like this is where there's the half court battle, which
Speaker 1: is going to come down a lot to the roster.
Speaker 1: It's gonna come down a lot to execution and those
Speaker 1: kinds of details. But on the margins, you increase your
Speaker 1: chances of winning by building margin in the small areas
Speaker 1: on the ancillary parts of the game, winning the possession battle,
Speaker 1: winning the battle in transition again, like leveraging those things
Speaker 1: like we talked about earlier that are not dependent on
Speaker 1: shot results, that are things that you can consistently rely
Speaker 1: on on a night in night out basis Karl Anthony
Speaker 1: Towns Front. You know, it's fascinating because there's like some
Speaker 1: real basic stuff he does that makes things a lot easier,
Speaker 1: like with his shooting ability, Like he's trailing the play
Speaker 1: in transition, and centers just have a instinctual behavior which
Speaker 1: is when they run back and transition defense, they don't
Speaker 1: think about the three point line. They think about the
Speaker 1: paint right and Kat, you know, burned Embiid tonight on
Speaker 1: a transition three where he just ran up the floor
Speaker 1: and Embiid's first few steps took him into the well
Speaker 1: inside the arc and Cat just kind of was trailing
Speaker 1: the play and he knocked it down. There's popping in
Speaker 1: ball screens, which has been a huge part of the
Speaker 1: Knicks offense to start this year. There was a really
Speaker 1: interesting strategy we saw from Nick Nurse tonight where he
Speaker 1: actually just had Joel Embiid stay home on Cat on
Speaker 1: ball screens and then they offered help, you know how
Speaker 1: like usually they run a drop coverage right where the
Speaker 1: ball handler comes off the screen and it's the big
Speaker 1: man that's waiting to kind of corral things. They were
Speaker 1: just having embiid as they put sometimes and offering help
Speaker 1: off the ball, which then of course got them into
Speaker 1: rotation and then the Knicks were able to drive and
Speaker 1: kick on them. But that's the problem that Karl Anthony towns.
Speaker 1: That's the offensive ceiling that can come from having spacing
Speaker 1: from the five position. And so there's a lot of
Speaker 1: great that Kat does right with the shooting and the
Speaker 1: driving closeouts and all that stuff that we just talked about.
Speaker 1: But the other thing I wanted to touch base on
Speaker 1: was this action that we've been seeing all the way
Speaker 1: around the league, and I think it's actually a really
Speaker 1: smart example of just like how teams kind of copy
Speaker 1: each other and you see kind of like different concepts
Speaker 1: grow a bigger.
Speaker 2: Foothold around the league.
Speaker 1: But this thing that we're seeing where these teams are
Speaker 1: putting their centers at the top of the key with
Speaker 1: the ball and then having guards cutting off of them,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of opportunity to get open shots like that,
Speaker 1: and the Knicks are doing it too, where they're just
Speaker 1: putting Kat at the top of the key, and it's like,
Speaker 1: let's just have you know, Deuce McBride run over and
Speaker 1: set a screen for bruntson and then have Brunson just
Speaker 1: sprint off of Kat's shoulder, and then as brunts and sprints,
Speaker 1: just have Cat kind of pivot into the defender's space
Speaker 1: and just flow to pass over the top and he
Speaker 1: can get a catch and now he's got dribble penetration
Speaker 1: the defenses in rotation. It kind of goes to the
Speaker 1: stuff we were talking about earlier, like teams just make mistakes,
Speaker 1: Like it's a simple set of reeds that comes out
Speaker 1: of that.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: If Kat's at the top of the key and Brunson
Speaker 1: is chasing or cutting off of him, if the guard
Speaker 1: goes under the pick, then Kat just pitches the ball
Speaker 1: to Brunson and he shoots a wide open three. If
Speaker 1: the guard chases over the pick and Kat throws the
Speaker 1: pass over the top, now you basically have no choice
Speaker 1: but to either help out of one of the corners,
Speaker 1: which is going to leave a wide open kickout pass
Speaker 1: to the corner, or you're leaving that one on one
Speaker 1: with Brunson with the defender trailing him, and he's just
Speaker 1: so good at either finishing or doing you know what
Speaker 1: he did to Embiid. I thought it was hilarious on
Speaker 1: the play when Embiid got the crowd going and then
Speaker 1: Brunson just toasted him off the dribble and then got
Speaker 1: him with the grift. Those two, it was kind of
Speaker 1: funny to watch their little back and forth because they're
Speaker 1: two of the biggest grifters in the league. And I've
Speaker 1: said this on the show before. I don't have a
Speaker 1: problem with the players grifting. To me, that's a problem
Speaker 1: with the league. You got to take that up with
Speaker 1: the league. They're just competitors that are trying to take
Speaker 1: advantage of every single advantage they can get to try
Speaker 1: to win games. Moving on to the six ers for
Speaker 1: a second, you know, the Joel Andbiid looked exactly how
Speaker 1: I expected him to look like. He looks sloppy, he
Speaker 1: looked out of rhythm. It looked like the game was
Speaker 1: moving really fast for him. I thought stan Van Gundhi
Speaker 1: did a really nice job on the broadcast of breaking
Speaker 1: down how like, no matter how much you play behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, no matter how much you no matter how
Speaker 1: much you uh run on the track or run on
Speaker 1: the treadmill or do conditioning work behind the scenes, there's
Speaker 1: nothing that can actually replicate a basketball game, and there's
Speaker 1: nothing that can actually replicate urgency. Like I kind of
Speaker 1: felt it a little bit tonight in the NBA Cup,
Speaker 1: and I felt it a lot in opening week when
Speaker 1: teams are playing their first like one to two games,
Speaker 1: like when there's real intensity and teams are kind of
Speaker 1: like viewing the game as more valuable than a typical
Speaker 1: regular season night, and you see that intensity come out.
Speaker 2: It it it it's difficult.
Speaker 1: The game gets tough, right, It moves very very fast,
Speaker 1: and so for Joel and b to step into a
Speaker 1: game when he hasn't been playing, and it's a particularly
Speaker 1: intense type of game in the in the n Season
Speaker 1: Tournament again, a Knicks team that's off to a disappointing
Speaker 1: start that really wants to win that game, not just
Speaker 1: for the n Season Tournament but for their own regular
Speaker 1: season outlook right like it was intense. He looked a
Speaker 1: little out of shape, he looked a little out of rhythm.
Speaker 1: That to me was to be expected. I'm not paying
Speaker 1: too much attention to that. Paul George, for instance, is
Speaker 1: in the same boat, but he's just further along, right,
Speaker 1: first few games, like that the game where he hijacked
Speaker 1: the late possessions and took the step back three at
Speaker 1: the top of the key, when Tyre s Maxy was going,
Speaker 1: like he was not shooting the ball well in that
Speaker 1: stretch right in that first game. In his first few
Speaker 1: games tonight, you could see like starting to get his
Speaker 1: legs underneath them a little bit, starting to get more
Speaker 1: lyft on his three point shots, starting to look more
Speaker 1: comfortable from the perimeter, right, Like it's a rhythm thing.
Speaker 1: You're building momentum over the course of the season. But
Speaker 1: I'm I'm finding it. I'm finding it hard to be
Speaker 1: too critical of the Sixers because of the way their
Speaker 1: roster is built. The roster is built around three stars.
Speaker 1: They don't have any other players on the roster that
Speaker 1: make more than ten million dollars a year, right, And Like,
Speaker 1: what that tells you is in the in the market
Speaker 1: of these players and what they are worth, you have
Speaker 1: a lot of guys that are going to be flawed
Speaker 1: because they are tail end of the roster players that
Speaker 1: you're signing at heavily discounted deals because you have three
Speaker 1: MAX players right, when you do it this way, when
Speaker 1: you do it through free agency, and when you sign
Speaker 1: a player outright, like the way they did with Paul George,
Speaker 1: there's a certain amount of limitation that's going to come
Speaker 1: with that. I thought the big thing that stood out
Speaker 1: tonight is like when Tyrese Maxey is out the on
Speaker 1: ball guard play for the Sixers falls off of a cliff. Right,
Speaker 1: it's Jared McCain, who we're going to talk about it,
Speaker 1: who's shown a lot of exciting stuff over the last
Speaker 1: couple of games. But then after that, it's like there's
Speaker 1: Kyle Lowry, who's certainly on the tail end of his
Speaker 1: journey in the NBA, a lot of like Jeff Doughton
Speaker 1: on the ball tonight, and it's like I'm watching this
Speaker 1: and I'm like, this is a big, intense NBA game.
Speaker 1: We're on one side. All the action is being run
Speaker 1: by Jalen Brunson and McHale Bridges and og Nobi and
Speaker 1: Karl Anthony Towns and Duce McBride and these like pretty
Speaker 1: high level players. And then there's Jeff Doughton who's running
Speaker 1: the offense for the Sixers for significant stretches of the game, right,
Speaker 1: But like that's to be expected because when your roster's
Speaker 1: built around three stars and any of the stars are out,
Speaker 1: you're going to struggle because the players have their flies
Speaker 1: like they have athletes, Right, This is a team that
Speaker 1: has athletes like Kelly Ubra is an athlete, Caleb Martin
Speaker 1: is an athlete, but they are discounted athletes because they
Speaker 1: can't shoot right and they have their offensive limitations. Right,
Speaker 1: there are other players on the team that can shoot
Speaker 1: the ball but have different limitations, like where Shawn Yabaseli
Speaker 1: right and yabasel He's actually been pretty good for the
Speaker 1: most part this season. The Sixers have actually been way
Speaker 1: better with him on the floor versus off But he
Speaker 1: is an offensive minded big who can really struggle in
Speaker 1: space defensively, right, So, like on a night like tonight
Speaker 1: where he goes one for seven from the field with
Speaker 1: zero system three turnovers, then his limitations on the defensive
Speaker 1: end and in transition rise to the surface in a
Speaker 1: way that they don't when he's hitting shots. But that's
Speaker 1: the thing, Like when you're shopping in that market, you're
Speaker 1: gonna get a lot of one way players, right, Guys
Speaker 1: that are really good at some things but then have
Speaker 1: some substantial weaknesses in others. The big thing that stands
Speaker 1: out to me is like overall between Drummond, who's looking
Speaker 1: kind of big, Joel Embiid, who has we talked about,
Speaker 1: who's just getting back into things and he's out of shape,
Speaker 1: the Gershon Yabuseli piece that we just talked about. Some
Speaker 1: of the guards too, like they're kind of slow, and
Speaker 1: that manifests in poor transition defense. Cleaning the Glass has
Speaker 1: a catch all transition stat that they use. It's called
Speaker 1: defensive Transition points added per one hundred possessions, and it
Speaker 1: kind of just combines the transition frequency in the transition
Speaker 1: efficiency of your transition defense. Right, Cleaning the Glass has
Speaker 1: them as the fifth worst transition defense in the league
Speaker 1: here in the early part of the season. What's crazy
Speaker 1: about that is they've almost always been a bad transition
Speaker 1: defense with Joel Embiid, and they were like that without
Speaker 1: Joel Embiid to start the year. And so that to
Speaker 1: me is probably the biggest weakness of this particular roster
Speaker 1: is you can run on them. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: teams in the league that are like that, and those
Speaker 1: teams when they leverage, when they play hard and they
Speaker 1: execute well, especially at home, when they're feeding on the
Speaker 1: home crowd, they can keep things under control athletically and
Speaker 1: then their superior gifts show. But when they lose control
Speaker 1: of that kind of athletic battle, that's when they can
Speaker 1: get run off the floor and it can get ugly
Speaker 1: for them pretty quick. But in terms of like a
Speaker 1: silver lining, again, there's an advantage to this type of build, right,
Speaker 1: So when you build a roster around three stars and
Speaker 1: they're all healthy and they're on the floor together, then
Speaker 1: you have the ability to craft really small and achievable
Speaker 1: roles for.
Speaker 2: Your role players.
Speaker 1: Then suddenly these veteran minimum guys can come in and
Speaker 1: they can thrive. So the key is, and I know
Speaker 1: this is what we've been saying all season. I was
Speaker 1: actually pretty high on the Sixers coming in. I think
Speaker 1: I had him at six in my contender rankings coming
Speaker 1: into the season. And the reason why is like, when
Speaker 1: they're healthy, it's like if they're in rhythm, and it's
Speaker 1: like we got Joel Embiie, you know, a perennial MVP candidate,
Speaker 1: Tyrese Maxey, who I had dranked, is what the twenty third,
Speaker 1: twenty fourth best player, and I think I had him
Speaker 1: twenty first. Actually I have him in the top twenty
Speaker 1: five players in the NBA. I'm a huge Tyrese Maxi fan.
Speaker 1: And then Paul George as your third best player. You
Speaker 1: can't really do much better than that, right, and so's
Speaker 1: there is a version of this that works. It just
Speaker 1: requires them all being healthy on the floor together, playing
Speaker 1: to their individual ceilings so that you can craft these
Speaker 1: small and achievable roles. One last note on the sixers.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about Jared McCain for a second.
Speaker 1: Is so he's had a couple of good games in
Speaker 1: a row now, and the big thing that stands out
Speaker 1: to me is he's got a strong low center of gravity,
Speaker 1: and so when he's constantly running around, guys actually have
Speaker 1: a hard time bumping him off of his line, which
Speaker 1: allows him to get real dribble penetration. And he's constant motion,
Speaker 1: really attacking downhill in these ball screens, and he's kind
Speaker 1: of snaking along the baseline and making kickout reads. He's
Speaker 1: got a natural gift for identifying where relocation opportunities are,
Speaker 1: so He's always moving around and getting himself open. Shots
Speaker 1: like this to me is like half the battle of
Speaker 1: being a shooter. Battle number one is knocked down the
Speaker 1: damn shot, but battle number two is getting yourself open
Speaker 1: against good defenses, and most of that comes down to
Speaker 1: perpetual motion. And like Jared McCain just brings perpetual motion
Speaker 1: to the guard spot with aggressive shooting. And again, just
Speaker 1: like a good strong base, he competed on the defensive
Speaker 1: end tonight as well. I was impressed watching Jared McCain
Speaker 1: here in the early going this season. They're gonna need
Speaker 1: a lot out of him over this stretch that Tyrese
Speaker 1: Maxi is out, all right, So guys, we're gonna do
Speaker 1: a couple of mail back questions here for about ten minutes.
Speaker 1: So if you got any drop him in the chat. Paul's
Speaker 1: texting him to me. We'll get to some questions and
Speaker 1: we'll get out of here for the night. If the
Speaker 1: playoffs started today, how many players are you taking over
Speaker 1: Steph Curry? That is a very good question. I think
Speaker 1: I would take Jokics for sure. I think he's on
Speaker 1: a I think he's on just like one of the
Speaker 1: special tears in NBA history, Luca, I think I'd take
Speaker 1: over him. Luca is better than he's shown in the
Speaker 1: early going this season. He missed training camp. That's gonna
Speaker 1: take him a little while to get going. Giannis is
Speaker 1: playing some crazy good basketball this year too. I think
Speaker 1: I think i'd probably put him at five. I think
Speaker 1: that the top tier that that Shay Giannis, Luka Jokic
Speaker 1: tier is pretty is pretty great.
Speaker 2: The thing.
Speaker 1: The thing with Steph is like at this point in
Speaker 1: his career, he's just not quite as he's not quite
Speaker 1: as athletically capable as he was when he was younger.
Speaker 1: But to me, like, it's not it's it's irrelevant to
Speaker 1: me because can Steph at least get to that level
Speaker 1: in a way where if we were in a series
Speaker 1: and STEP's the best player for your team and Luca
Speaker 1: is the best player for the other team, do I
Speaker 1: think it's going to be some gigantic gap that the
Speaker 1: Warriors can't overcome. No, But that's where I keep talking about,
Speaker 1: Like in terms of the upside in cooling assets and
Speaker 1: making a consolidation trade is like you don't want to
Speaker 1: bring a knife to a gunfight. You don't want to
Speaker 1: find yourself in a series where you're down three to
Speaker 1: two after five games and Steph's averaging thirty three and
Speaker 1: no one else on the Warriors is averaging more than twelve,
Speaker 1: and Kyrie's averaging twenty five, Clays averaging twenty and Luca's
Speaker 1: averaging twenty seven. Like, you don't want to find yourself
Speaker 1: in a situation where Steph has the responsibility of creating
Speaker 1: every big bucket in every big moment in a series.
Speaker 1: And like, again, it was I want to be clear
Speaker 1: about the twenty twenty two season. There's a couple different things.
Speaker 1: Steph was younger and a little more athletic back then.
Speaker 1: That was the best season of Andrew Wiggins's career. But
Speaker 1: another big part of it, guys, was twenty twenty two
Speaker 1: was a little bit of a gap year around the league.
Speaker 1: There wasn't a lot of like there was the Boston
Speaker 1: Celtics were not the Boston Celtics that we think of
Speaker 1: them ass right, Like if you look through the Western
Speaker 1: Conference that year, there was a lot of good teams,
Speaker 1: but there were like there wasn't like great teams like
Speaker 1: some of the teams that we have at the top
Speaker 1: of the West this year. That's not to take anything
Speaker 1: away from the championship. It's just this this year has
Speaker 1: one of the deepest fields of really great teams that
Speaker 1: I've seen in a long time, and so it's a
Speaker 1: lot to ask for Steph to kind of go at
Speaker 1: that sort of thing solo for four rounds against teams
Speaker 1: that are gonna have multiple, you know, high level shot
Speaker 1: creators that could that they that they can rely on.
Speaker 1: That's the specific reason why I've been harping on that.
Speaker 1: But again, you know, wait till February and you see
Speaker 1: what happens. Because there is development here with Jonathan Kaminga.
Speaker 1: We don't know what version of Wiggans we're gonna get
Speaker 1: in the large sample. We don't know what John We
Speaker 1: don't know what Buddy Healed can do over the course
Speaker 1: of the large sample either, And so like just we'll
Speaker 1: give it some time and then when you get to
Speaker 1: February you make a call at that point. But like
Speaker 1: to me, I would like to see Steph flanked by
Speaker 1: an efficient, consistent twenty plus point per game.
Speaker 2: Score, preferably in the front court.
Speaker 1: And when you look at everything else that this team
Speaker 1: has going for it, I think at that point it's
Speaker 1: it's worth the investment.
Speaker 2: All right, let's see here.
Speaker 1: Next question, are you more or less confident in the
Speaker 1: Celtics winning the East than at the start of the season. So,
Speaker 1: you know, it's interesting the I came into the year.
Speaker 1: I did a recording about an hour with Carter Rodriguez
Speaker 1: from the Chase Down podcast earlier today. That's airing first
Speaker 1: thing tomorrow morning, so you guys will see it. But
Speaker 1: I was talking with him about how going into the year,
Speaker 1: I saw this like clear top four in the East, right,
Speaker 1: you know, Boston, you know, New York, and then Milwaukee
Speaker 1: and Philly, right and now after that, like I kind
Speaker 1: of view Cleveland as the clear number two, although the
Speaker 1: Knicks to me, are a team that's still a work
Speaker 1: in progress and who knows what they'll look like in
Speaker 1: a few months. But like I can't, I can't decide
Speaker 1: yet how I feel about Cleveland in the large sample,
Speaker 1: because like, part of what's made Cleveland's so good is
Speaker 1: Darius Garland and Evan Mobley are just playing a lot
Speaker 1: better than they did last year. And it's been twelve games,
Speaker 1: and so like, if we're forty five games into this
Speaker 1: thing and the Calves still look like the Calves and they're,
Speaker 1: you know, hanging with the Celtics at the top of
Speaker 1: the league, and Evan Mobley and Darius Garland are still hooping,
Speaker 1: then we need to recalibrate whether are not like that
Speaker 1: roster is just a lot better than we originally anticipated.
Speaker 1: Right then it can get a little bit more difficult.
Speaker 1: But like right now, it's like I feel more or
Speaker 1: less the same because Philly and Milwaukee have fallen off
Speaker 1: a map, but Cleveland's kind of retaken that one of
Speaker 1: those spots, and the Knicks to me, are still like
Speaker 1: a team that's figuring things out and could still be interesting.
Speaker 1: For the record, the Celtics, I am not worried about
Speaker 1: them at all. There's nothing I've seen from them that
Speaker 1: has changed my opinion about them. Like, here's a crazy
Speaker 1: stat for you. The Celtics are yet to win a
Speaker 1: single game this year against a team that is over
Speaker 1: five hundred and I could care less. To me, there's
Speaker 1: still just a rock solid championship favorite. Like it just
Speaker 1: that I would need to see so much more to
Speaker 1: change my mind. But I haven't seen anything that's made
Speaker 1: me feel more or less confident, to be honest, because
Speaker 1: of the rise of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Who is your
Speaker 1: top dark horse contender? I I would say Golden State.
Speaker 1: I think like when I look at the rosters around
Speaker 1: the league, and you know how much I'm harping on,
Speaker 1: who are the fast teams out there? The teams that
Speaker 1: have just tons and tons of speed on the perimeter,
Speaker 1: It's like teams like Oklahoma City, teams like Boston, and
Speaker 1: then there's like after that, there's a lot of good teams,
Speaker 1: but they have different strengths and weaknesses and they don't
Speaker 1: match up super well specifically with what Boston and Oklahoma
Speaker 1: City do. And so like what excites me about Golden
Speaker 1: State is what you saw in the game in Boston.
Speaker 1: They have the ability to cover ground in a way
Speaker 1: that is a very nice counter to what Boston does,
Speaker 1: and they're driving kick situations. And I just have seen
Speaker 1: Steph Curry now back to back to back, outplay, Luca outplay,
Speaker 1: Shay outplay, Jason Tatum head to head. He just has
Speaker 1: that alpha dog ability to kind of pull these games
Speaker 1: over the top. When their defense and their speed and
Speaker 1: Steve Kerr and everything that makes the Warriors the Warriors
Speaker 1: keeps them close in these games. So in terms of
Speaker 1: dark horse contenders, like a team that is not on
Speaker 1: my contender list, and by the way, my contender list
Speaker 1: right now, I was only too deep. It's Oklahoma City
Speaker 1: in Boston right now. But like in terms of a
Speaker 1: team that's not on that tier, that would be like
Speaker 1: a dark horse team to look out for. I'd look
Speaker 1: out for the Warriors, and they have a trade to
Speaker 1: make too, and that's what makes them so interesting. Like,
Speaker 1: for instance, like I was higher on the coming into
Speaker 1: the season, I was higher on the Lakers than I
Speaker 1: was on the Warriors.
Speaker 2: And I'm substantially.
Speaker 1: Lower on the Lakers now than I was, even though
Speaker 1: they're six and four and I think they'll go seven
Speaker 1: and four tomorrow night against the Grizzlies, even though they're
Speaker 1: off to a good start this year, I'm lower on
Speaker 1: them because I think they're slow and so like it
Speaker 1: would take a pretty substantial trade influence, like with an
Speaker 1: influx of speed for me to really change the way
Speaker 1: that I feel about the Lakers. Do you believe in
Speaker 1: the Lakers or Warriors more to go in a postseason? Well,
Speaker 1: there you go, that's perfect. I just accidentally answered that question.
Speaker 1: Right now, it's the Warriors, it's the speed. To me,
Speaker 1: I can't harp on that enough. I'm sure you guys
Speaker 1: who have been listening to my show over the last
Speaker 1: week could probably stick of me saying it. But it's
Speaker 1: just something that I feel very strongly about. Do you
Speaker 1: think the Bucks trade if it gets substantially worse. Yes,
Speaker 1: But I mean they had a good bounce back game
Speaker 1: against the Raptors tonight. They play a really light schedule
Speaker 1: over their next ten games. There's like a pretty decent
Speaker 1: chance that they're back over five hundred literally before we
Speaker 1: get to the thirty game mark, just because of how
Speaker 1: weak the schedule is in the Eastern Conference. So, like,
Speaker 1: I think it's too early for that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: But let's be clear, Like if they find themselves dead
Speaker 1: to rights halfway through the season, I think you'd be
Speaker 1: foolish not to consider blowing it up because they're not close.
Speaker 1: So if you're not close and Yannis is like in
Speaker 1: his thirties now and entering into a different phase. Paul
Speaker 1: just sent me a question, says Jason de like teams' speed,
Speaker 1: but like with the Yiannis thing, Like if you get
Speaker 1: to that point and you're not close and Yannis is
Speaker 1: in his thirties and he's moving to a different phase,
Speaker 1: and Dame is in his mid thirties and he's moving
Speaker 1: into a different phase. At a certain point, it's like,
Speaker 1: unless you feel like you can quickly turn around and
Speaker 1: build a contender around Giannis by just absolutely nailing like
Speaker 1: a Dame trade or something like, I mean, maybe that's
Speaker 1: what you do. You probably look at trading Dame first,
Speaker 1: and you just see if you can't get like, see
Speaker 1: what your offers look like. And you're probably gonna have
Speaker 1: two different types offers, right, You're gonna have like like
Speaker 1: young player draft pick offers, and then you're gonna have
Speaker 1: like good current player offers with like multiple high level
Speaker 1: role players from a team that can actually spare role players. Right,
Speaker 1: But like you have to make that decision based on
Speaker 1: what kind offers are available, and if there's an offer
Speaker 1: for Dame that you think can tweak things and get
Speaker 1: you back into contention with you, honest, you go for
Speaker 1: it like that. But I think, yeah, at that point,
Speaker 1: the more likely scenarios that they end up looking at
Speaker 1: a complete blow up. But I think it's way too
Speaker 1: soon for that. We've seen just too many examples of it.
Speaker 1: The Lakers started two and ten two and ten guys,
Speaker 1: with Lebron and ad playing most of the games. They
Speaker 1: started two and ten in the twenty twenty two to
Speaker 1: twenty three season, and they made it to the Western
Speaker 1: Conference finals. So like it is, especially with how dreadfully
Speaker 1: weak the Eastern conferences at the bottom and how many
Speaker 1: easy opponents they have on a night in, night out basis,
Speaker 1: I think it's way too early to write off the Bucks.
Speaker 1: I agree the Warriors can use a consolidation trade, but
Speaker 1: can they do it without Wiggins contract. He's one of
Speaker 1: our most valuable defensive players, and I think they need
Speaker 1: him to go all the way?
Speaker 2: I one hundred percent agree.
Speaker 1: I think I think like if you are getting, if
Speaker 1: you're trading Wiggins, it needs to be a for a
Speaker 1: player that can.
Speaker 2: Start at his position.
Speaker 1: Right, So, like let's say, for instance, you were to
Speaker 1: make a deal for someone like a let's say Brandon Ingram.
Speaker 1: And I'm not even saying that's who they should go for.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying, let's say that's who it is. It
Speaker 1: would have to be someone like that, because to me,
Speaker 1: Wiggins when he gets lots of opportunity and he's with
Speaker 1: the starters and he's engaged in a high level point
Speaker 1: of attack role and he's being aggressive, Like that's when
Speaker 1: it works. He can be a lot like more inconsistent
Speaker 1: if you move him to the bench and it turns
Speaker 1: into like a inconsistent role and his touches are different
Speaker 1: and that sort of thing. So like, like to me,
Speaker 1: I agree, if you're making a trade for a guard,
Speaker 1: or you're making a trade for a big, or your
Speaker 1: making a trade for a four, I would not include
Speaker 1: Wikens because I think he's just a rock solid starter
Speaker 1: and I think those are rare enough around the league
Speaker 1: that you shouldn't just give him away for no particular reason.
Speaker 1: But if you have the opportunity to bring in someone
Speaker 1: that plays his position, I think it makes some sense.
Speaker 1: Let's see will the league take harsher steps against load management.
Speaker 1: I think they already have talked about that, like with
Speaker 1: their injury reporting and like guys sitting out national TV
Speaker 1: games and the fines and stuff that are.
Speaker 2: Associated with it.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of guys are just actually getting
Speaker 1: hurt to start this year, and some of that is,
Speaker 1: you know, I've seen a lot of takes like I've
Speaker 1: seen people be like, oh, it's because there's just so
Speaker 1: much more speed, and it's all the ground coverage, and
Speaker 1: you're closing out to the three point line and sprinting
Speaker 1: back to the paint and closing out to the three
Speaker 1: point line again, And this is the reason why that
Speaker 1: people are getting hurt. And my thing is like, it's
Speaker 1: just too soon to know why people are getting hurt.
Speaker 1: None of us actually know, we're all just kind of
Speaker 1: pontificating and so like to me, I think it's also
Speaker 1: possible that in a ten to twelve game sample that
Speaker 1: it's just noise.
Speaker 2: So who the hell knows what's going on on that front.
Speaker 1: But as far as load management goes, the league is
Speaker 1: already taking some steps, and I think they'll wait to
Speaker 1: see a couple of years to see how that goes
Speaker 1: before they make any changes. But truth of the matter is,
Speaker 1: I don't think you're going to see any sort of
Speaker 1: shift in how often players play unless they shorten the
Speaker 1: season and they're just not going to Let's see last question.
Speaker 1: Do you think the Warriors would make a trade for
Speaker 1: LaMelo Bom looks like he would be the perfect second option,
Speaker 1: So I wouldn't go for a guard. The main reason
Speaker 1: why is, like, to me, specifically, if Steph is your
Speaker 1: skill guard. This is like our number those of you
Speaker 1: guys who have been listening to the show for a while.
Speaker 1: I have like a kind of a concept of a
Speaker 1: typical team build, and that is like, I want a
Speaker 1: skill guard, a guard who is excellent at running action.
Speaker 1: Then I want an athletic guard, a guard that's excellent
Speaker 1: at the point of attack defensively, can run his lane
Speaker 1: and transition, and typically on offense at least can shoot
Speaker 1: and drive a close out. For the sake of this experiment,
Speaker 1: imagine like a contavious Colbo Pope as like an exam
Speaker 1: sample of that type of player.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Then I want a skinny, perimeter oriented forward. Then I
Speaker 1: want a bigger, stronger forward that plays more of like
Speaker 1: a it's not a second big man, but he's like
Speaker 1: he's like a big athletic forward, but he functions more
Speaker 1: in like kind of paint athleticism strength areas as opposed
Speaker 1: to like foot speed, quickness on the perimeter type of thing.
Speaker 1: And then I want a center that can guard in
Speaker 1: multiple different ways. I want him to be able to drop,
Speaker 1: and I want him to be able to switch and
Speaker 1: at least be able to screen and make decisions as
Speaker 1: a passer at the top of the key and roll
Speaker 1: hard to the basket and finish above the rim. Right,
Speaker 1: Like that to me is liker your stereotypical team build.
Speaker 1: And obviously there's so many unicorns in the league that
Speaker 1: there are all these different builds and there's a lot
Speaker 1: of different ways to do it. But that to me
Speaker 1: is like just a baseline kind of view of how
Speaker 1: I how I personally view that type of team construct.
Speaker 1: So Steph is your skill guard, then I wouldn't put
Speaker 1: another kind of like loose. I'm just gonna use the
Speaker 1: word loose with LaMelo in the sense that like he's
Speaker 1: at a phase of his career where like there's all
Speaker 1: of this crazy high level basketball coming out of him,
Speaker 1: but he still can be very sloppy and inattentive on
Speaker 1: the details, right, Like you want you want bulldog athletes
Speaker 1: next to Steph. And that's what's making this Warriors team work, right,
Speaker 1: is like they have Steph out there, they have Buddy
Speaker 1: Healed out there, but the guards that are out there,
Speaker 1: they're they're bulldog guards. It's the Anthony Mountain, It's Gary Payton,
Speaker 1: the second, it's Brandon Pajemski, they have bulldog guards that
Speaker 1: do the dirty work at a super high level. And
Speaker 1: so like I look more at the forward position, and
Speaker 1: again you have to you have to make that call
Speaker 1: when you get closer to that point. It also depends
Speaker 1: on who's available. But there's a lot of There are
Speaker 1: a lot of potential forwards that could be available this year,
Speaker 1: guys like Jeremy Grant, Guys like Brandon Ingram that could
Speaker 1: be available at the tail end of this trade cycle
Speaker 1: that you could be looking at. And to me, those
Speaker 1: make the most sense because that kind of slots into
Speaker 1: a position group where you get more inconsistent play, right,
Speaker 1: Like the backcourt concept works with Steph and Buddy in
Speaker 1: all the speed, right, but like the frontcour dynamic, it's like,
Speaker 1: you know, you know Moses Moody, some nicey's good, some
Speaker 1: nights he's not. You know Jonathan Aminge, some nights he's good,
Speaker 1: some night, some nice he's not. There's a lot of
Speaker 1: inconsistency in the forward core, and that to me is
Speaker 1: like a spot where a scoring forward I think slots
Speaker 1: really well. The other thing, too, is like I've always
Speaker 1: liked it when your two best players play very different
Speaker 1: positions and draw two different types of defenders, because that
Speaker 1: makes you more dangerous in screening actions. Right, Like one
Speaker 1: of the downsides of the Lebron James Anthony Davis build
Speaker 1: with the Lakers is a lot of teams can switch
Speaker 1: that action. The Lakers have always been very vulnerable to
Speaker 1: teams that can switch. That's what they did them in
Speaker 1: against the Detroit Pistons the other night.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So, like when you have Stephan a forward, you open
Speaker 1: up two different types of actions, right, You open up
Speaker 1: like the let's just screen and get a switch, and
Speaker 1: now we're attacking a matchup, right, which is like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I've got Steph with a bigger forward that he can
Speaker 1: beat off the dribble or now big scoring forward as
Speaker 1: a quick guard who has been guarding Steph on him,
Speaker 1: and we can go to attack in the post. But
Speaker 1: the other thing, too, is like there's a lot of
Speaker 1: teams that will try to not give up those switches,
Speaker 1: and that's where you can get the defense in rotation
Speaker 1: with basic screening actions. So imagine you have a scoring
Speaker 1: forward and Steph is setting a ball screen for him, Like,
Speaker 1: are you gonna hedge off of Steph? Because if you
Speaker 1: hedge off of Steph he's slipping out of that and
Speaker 1: he's gonna get a wide open catch and shoot three
Speaker 1: every time. Well, if you stay attached to Steph and
Speaker 1: he sets a screen, then you're forward. As long as
Speaker 1: Steph sets a good screen, the Ford's gonna get downhill.
Speaker 1: We've already seen a lot of this. How often do
Speaker 1: the Warriors run that inverted ball screen action where they
Speaker 1: have Steph screen for Andrew Wiggins and the same sort
Speaker 1: of thing happens where Andrew tends to get downhill in
Speaker 1: those situations, right, Like, that's where you can get those
Speaker 1: sorts of easy advantages at the beginning of possessions, right,
Speaker 1: and so like that's kind of why and envision more
Speaker 1: of a scoring forward than a scoring guard is the
Speaker 1: type of guy that the Warriors.
Speaker 2: Would go after.
Speaker 1: All right, guys, that is always all I have for tonight.
Speaker 1: As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting me
Speaker 1: and supporting the show. Tomorrow, we'll probably have this mail
Speaker 1: bag breakout as a video, but we also have the
Speaker 1: deep dive on the Cleveland Cavaliers coming out, and then
Speaker 1: we're going to be back on Thursday morning with a
Speaker 1: bunch of game reaction and film we haven't done a
Speaker 1: timp's tape episode yet this week, we're definitely going to
Speaker 1: do one on Thursday.
Speaker 2: Don't forget.
Speaker 1: I'm also recording a mail bag on Thursday that's going
Speaker 1: to run in on Friday. So make sure you keep
Speaker 1: dropping mailbag questions in those YouTube comments and we'll get
Speaker 1: to them then.
Speaker 2: All right. I appreciate you, guys, and we will see
Speaker 2: you tomorrow.
Speaker 1: The volume.
Speaker 2: What's Up guys?
Speaker 1: As always, I appreciate you for listening to and supporting
Speaker 1: OOPS tonight. It would actually be really helpful for us
Speaker 1: if you guys would take a second and leave a
Speaker 1: rating and a review. As always, I appreciate you guys
Speaker 1: supporting us, but if you could take a minute to
Speaker 1: do that, I'd really appreciate it.