Speaker 1: The Volume. All right, welcome to Hoops Tonight here at
Speaker 1: the Volume. Happy Friday, everybody. I hope all of you
Speaker 1: guys had an incredible week. Our wrap up coverage to
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Speaker 1: over the ten most important traits that we should look
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Speaker 1: I sat down over the last couple of days to
Speaker 1: work on this particular video last year, if you guys remember,
Speaker 1: I think it was like something like the five biggest
Speaker 1: lessons I learned from that NBA season. And it's funny
Speaker 1: because as I was kind of making my list, it
Speaker 1: ended up being all these things that I expect or
Speaker 1: that I'm gonna be looking for as I'm trying to
Speaker 1: evaluate basketball teams in the future and their potential to
Speaker 1: win an NBA championship. And next thing, you know, my
Speaker 1: list got pretty long, and it kind of all had
Speaker 1: to do with that, so I kind of changed it
Speaker 1: on the fly, and so we're doing the ten most
Speaker 1: important traits to look for in championship teams. I think
Speaker 1: what'll be interesting about this particular list is we'll just
Speaker 1: come back to it every time we're taking a deep
Speaker 1: look at a particular team and their chances to win
Speaker 1: the title, We'll come back and look at this list
Speaker 1: because I think I think a lot of you guys
Speaker 1: are gonna agree with most of the items on this
Speaker 1: list as things that are kind of important for teams
Speaker 1: that have serious ambitions to win a title, and so
Speaker 1: it'll kind of like a checklist for us to evaluate
Speaker 1: teams in the future. So, without any further ado, let's
Speaker 1: start with number one. Size. An NBA championship team most
Speaker 1: likely will need size. Since twenty seventeen, every single champion
Speaker 1: aside from the twenty twenty two Warriors, was huge. Right.
Speaker 1: The twenty seventeen Warriors had Kevin Durant on the front
Speaker 1: line with Andre Gudala and Dremont Green. Andrea Gudala and
Speaker 1: Dremon Green are the tallest dudes in the world, but
Speaker 1: they're super big and strong, and then obviously Kevin Durant
Speaker 1: brings a ton of length to the table. Same group
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, that front line had Pascal
Speaker 1: Siakam and Kawhi Leonard and Serge Baka and Marc Gasolt.
Speaker 1: They were huge. The twenty twenty Lakers Anthony Davis and
Speaker 1: Lebron James sometimes at the three four alongside Dwight Howard,
Speaker 1: with guys like Kyle Kuzman, Danny Green and even and again,
Speaker 1: one of the themes here is it sized down the roster.
Speaker 1: Its not just size in the front court, it size
Speaker 1: down the roster. The twenty twenty one Bucks, another huge team,
Speaker 1: Brooke Lopez, Jianison, ten Koopo, Chris Middleton six ' eight,
Speaker 1: six ' eleven seven foot down the front line. Right
Speaker 1: we go to the twenty twenty twenty two Warriors. They're
Speaker 1: the outlier, but Steph is like the big outlier in
Speaker 1: NBA history as it pertains the size. If you're ranking
Speaker 1: the top fifteen players in NBA history, he's gonna be
Speaker 1: the only guy on that list that's less than six five.
Speaker 1: So Steph is going to consistently break the mold with
Speaker 1: these kinds of things. And that's why when we evaluate
Speaker 1: the Warriors, they probably have to be evaluated based on
Speaker 1: a different list than this, but they're the one outlier.
Speaker 1: And then we go right back to normalcy with the
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three Nuggets, who are massive down the line,
Speaker 1: with Nikolea Jokis, with Aaron Gordon, with Michael Porter Junior,
Speaker 1: with Contavious Colboll, Pope. Jamal Murray's even big compared to
Speaker 1: most point guards. Bruce Brown a bigger, stronger, better athlete
Speaker 1: than most of the backup bench guards that we have
Speaker 1: in the league. So the question is why does size
Speaker 1: matter so much? In the NBA as it pertains to
Speaker 1: winning championships. Like I said twenty seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one, twenty two to twenty three, that's six of
Speaker 1: the last seven champions that were massive down the roster
Speaker 1: in terms of their overall size. Well, first of balls rebounding. Famously,
Speaker 1: pat Riley once said, no rebounds, no rings. You have
Speaker 1: to finish out defensive possessions, which gives you an opportunity
Speaker 1: to spring fast break opportunities. Right, you also need to
Speaker 1: have size down the roster. Why is that the more
Speaker 1: jump shots that are taken in NBA games, the more
Speaker 1: long rebounds there are. When big guys are engaged in
Speaker 1: box outs underneath the basket, often the ball just comes
Speaker 1: carrying off to some random place and it's almost like
Speaker 1: a game of three flags up. If you ever played
Speaker 1: that when you were a kid, where someone would just
Speaker 1: throw the ball up in the air and then if
Speaker 1: you caught it three times, you got to go be
Speaker 1: the person who throws the ball, right, Like, that's kind
Speaker 1: of what contested rebound situations and long rebounds are. It's
Speaker 1: the ball's coming out. No one's really in position. It's
Speaker 1: just a bunch of guards and wings trying to fly
Speaker 1: in from the perimeter to grab contested rebounds, and so
Speaker 1: having that type of athleticism on the perimeter is a
Speaker 1: huge deal there. Size also helps with your paint finish
Speaker 1: on both ends of the floor, your ability to finish
Speaker 1: over defenders around the basket, and your ability to dissuade
Speaker 1: opponents from finishing around the basket, and the last, but
Speaker 1: not least, shooting over the top from the perimeter. When
Speaker 1: you've got a guy like Michael Porter Junior who's taking
Speaker 1: jump shots over Austin Reeves contesting in the corner, he
Speaker 1: just doesn't see him because of the size advantage that
Speaker 1: he has. So chances are, if we're looking at your
Speaker 1: team next year to win a championship, if they aren't huge,
Speaker 1: they probably aren't going to win the title unless they're
Speaker 1: fantastic in every other area of the game. Again, as
Speaker 1: we're looking at these lists, if you fill nine of
Speaker 1: these ten categories but you don't have the size, chances
Speaker 1: are you still have a good chance. So this is
Speaker 1: kind of gonna just be a checklist that we refer
Speaker 1: back to throughout the season next year. Number two Strength.
Speaker 1: Why is it that guys like Nicola Jokic, Lebron James
Speaker 1: Kawhi Leonard, and Jimmy Butler always go up a level
Speaker 1: in the playoffs. While we often see skinnier, thinner players
Speaker 1: struggle a bit, that's not the end all be all.
Speaker 1: There are thin players who succeed. Devin Booker is not
Speaker 1: the biggest strongest player in the world, and that dude
Speaker 1: shot the lights out this entire postseason. So it's not
Speaker 1: like a perfect rule. But for the most part, guys
Speaker 1: who are bigger and stronger seem to go up a
Speaker 1: level in the playoffs. Why is that you have to
Speaker 1: play through contact as the officials swallow their whistle and
Speaker 1: they allow more contact. You have to be able to
Speaker 1: thrive in those situations getting to spots. There are these
Speaker 1: spots on the floor where you're comfortable, where you can
Speaker 1: go to shots that you trust your ability to make.
Speaker 1: In order to get to those spots, you have to
Speaker 1: fight for position, either through setting your man up for
Speaker 1: a screen and then jolting to that spot, or fighting
Speaker 1: for position in the traditional kind of post up sense,
Speaker 1: regardless of whether that's on the wing or the elbow
Speaker 1: or at the block. You need to seal your defender
Speaker 1: and create a passing angle for your guard to get
Speaker 1: you the ball. And so the strength, the big physical
Speaker 1: strength to get to those spots matters. Fighting for easy
Speaker 1: shots closer to the rim. You've seen a lot in
Speaker 1: over the course of this season teams that rely heavily
Speaker 1: on pull up jump shooting as the bread and butter
Speaker 1: of their offense, they tend to struggle to generate quality
Speaker 1: shots over the course of the series. As high powered
Speaker 1: as that Suns offense was all season, they barely averaged
Speaker 1: one hundred and ten points per one hundred possessions against
Speaker 1: Denver because they struggled in the physicality of that matchup.
Speaker 1: One of my favorite examples of this is Bruce Brown
Speaker 1: versus D'Angelo Russell in the Western Conference Finals. Just every
Speaker 1: single time he caught Anthony Davis kind of out of position,
Speaker 1: usually because Jokics pinned him back in transition, he would
Speaker 1: just hit the Jets and D'Angelo Russell, even though he's
Speaker 1: a Actually, I think D'Angelo might even be an inch
Speaker 1: taller than Bruce Brown if I remember correctly. I think
Speaker 1: I could be wrong about this, but I think d
Speaker 1: low sixty five and I think Bruce is sixty four,
Speaker 1: but they're about the same size. Let's just call it that.
Speaker 1: But Bruce is so damn strong that he's just pushing
Speaker 1: through and just bullying a D'Angelo Russell to get to
Speaker 1: those spots. That kind of thing just matters at this level,
Speaker 1: fighting for position, getting two shots closer to the rim.
Speaker 1: Same thing goes on the defensive end, as guys are
Speaker 1: trying to beat you to spots. If you're the bigger,
Speaker 1: stronger athlete and they're allowing a lot of contact, that's
Speaker 1: gonna help you fight in those situations. So size and
Speaker 1: strength the two biggest ones that I looked at three
Speaker 1: top end ball handling. This was the Celtics conundrum coming
Speaker 1: out of last season. Oh, Jason Tatum, Jaylen Brown, not ready,
Speaker 1: Let's bring in Malcolm Brogden, you know. And again this
Speaker 1: I'm a big believer in just kind of learning as
Speaker 1: things go on. I was one of the many people
Speaker 1: who recommended that the Celtics make a trade for a
Speaker 1: guard after last season. Right, So I'm not over here
Speaker 1: sitting like I was precient with this kind of thing.
Speaker 1: I was wrong about this, But again, all I'm gonna
Speaker 1: try to do year in and year out, is try to
Speaker 1: learn based on what I noticed and hopefully not make
Speaker 1: that mistake in the future. We picked most of the
Speaker 1: series correct this year. I want to say they were
Speaker 1: like fifteen series or something like that, and we picked
Speaker 1: like eleven of them correctly. I'm not one hundred percent sure,
Speaker 1: but we got most of them right. But that's just
Speaker 1: probably luck first ball chances. Our next year, I'll have
Speaker 1: a significantly less successful playoff run picking series. But I
Speaker 1: still got a bunch of them wrong too. And so
Speaker 1: even though I hate predictions and I don't really care
Speaker 1: all that much about them, for the purposes of the show,
Speaker 1: I want to do the best that I possibly can,
Speaker 1: and the only way we're going to do that is
Speaker 1: by learning lessons as the years go by and hopefully
Speaker 1: not making the mistakes those mistakes in the future. Top
Speaker 1: End ball handling apparently matters a hell of a lot
Speaker 1: more than aggregate ball handling, because the Boston Celtics this year,
Speaker 1: even with Malcolm Brogden, although he was hurt, but even
Speaker 1: as you go back into previous rounds before he got hurt,
Speaker 1: the Celtics still had the same problem, which was no
Speaker 1: matter who they gave the ball to, that guy wasn't
Speaker 1: quite good enough at being that half court surgeon that
Speaker 1: they needed, you know, as we look like look Denver.
Speaker 1: As I said in our NBA Finals wrap up, they
Speaker 1: did not have to play any of the top eight
Speaker 1: records in the league. Why is that? Why didn't they
Speaker 1: have to play any of the top eight records in
Speaker 1: the leage? Well, Milwaukee lacked top end ball handling. Giannis
Speaker 1: still really struggles in the half court to create quality shots.
Speaker 1: So does Drew and Chris Right. Boston top end ball handling,
Speaker 1: Like they got into that series with Jimmy Butler, and
Speaker 1: Jimmy Butler was so much better than Jason Tatum and
Speaker 1: Jaylen Brown at consistently generating quality offense in the half court.
Speaker 1: They couldn't overcome that, even with the massive talent advantage Philly.
Speaker 1: They had that issue with Jason Tatum. So what does
Speaker 1: that tell you about their top end ball handlers. Obviously,
Speaker 1: James Harden and his decline, Joel Embiid's inability to handle
Speaker 1: double teams in the half court, their limitations in top
Speaker 1: end ball handling were the problem. Memphis, same thing. Their
Speaker 1: best guy to create his own shot down the tail
Speaker 1: end of the Lakers series was Desmond Baine, that's just
Speaker 1: not gonna cut it. Cleveland, same thing, Donovan Mitchell two
Speaker 1: tunnel vision, Darius Garland, not a good enough score Sacramento.
Speaker 1: They only had a one to nine point three offensive
Speaker 1: rating against Golden State. I thought Deer and Fox and
Speaker 1: Malik Monk had some real moments in that series, and
Speaker 1: they're good foundational guys, but they aren't good enough to
Speaker 1: overcome the limitations that they had in their front court scoring.
Speaker 1: So the top end ball handling down the line wasn't
Speaker 1: good enough. The eighth best record in the league the
Speaker 1: New York Knicks, they ended up losing because it was
Speaker 1: like Jalen Brunson and nobody else could create their own shot,
Speaker 1: and Jalen Brunson wasn't as good at it as Jimmy
Speaker 1: Butler was. So you guys get the point. This is
Speaker 1: still a Superstars league. In the NBA. There was that
Speaker 1: moment there in twenty twenty one where we're like, oh,
Speaker 1: look at the Phoenix Suns, like maybe, just maybe, you know,
Speaker 1: overall talent can eventually win. Nope, and it didn't work
Speaker 1: for Boston the last couple of years. Either your best
Speaker 1: guy has to be one of the very best guys
Speaker 1: to win a title. And that's just as we look back,
Speaker 1: Jokic Finals MVP, Steph Curry Finals MVP Giannis in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one, he did it. But as we look back,
Speaker 1: like it was against that Suns team that didn't really
Speaker 1: have a superstar, it was against that Atlanta Hawks team
Speaker 1: where it's like, yeah, he's better than Trey Young by
Speaker 1: a lot. The Brooklyn Nets fell apart because Kyrie and
Speaker 1: James Harden got hurt, so Kevin Rant a bunch of
Speaker 1: veteran minimum contract type of dudes. Like, it's a different,
Speaker 1: it's a different That was kind of a strange season.
Speaker 1: But even then, Giannis is the very best defensive player
Speaker 1: in basketball and average thirty five points per game in
Speaker 1: the final. So he's probably the worst guy out of
Speaker 1: all of these recent NBA Finals MVPs. And it's Giannis Tennekombo.
Speaker 1: So if he's the worst guy on that list, what
Speaker 1: does that tell you. We go back the previous year,
Speaker 1: it's the second greatest player of all time. It's Lebron James.
Speaker 1: Go back to the previous year, it's Kawhi Leonard, this big,
Speaker 1: strong forward that can bully his way to spots and
Speaker 1: get whatever he wants. Kevin Durant. Kevin Durant, Lebron James
Speaker 1: should have been Steph Curry in twenty fifteen. You guys
Speaker 1: get the point. Superstars still rule the NBA. Your top
Speaker 1: end ball handling matter is way more than aggregate ball handling.
Speaker 1: Even really talented teams that don't have a great top
Speaker 1: ball handler can easily lose out to a well coached,
Speaker 1: good defensive team that competes and has a star that's
Speaker 1: gonna out execute your stars on the other end of
Speaker 1: the floor. So top end ball handling still matters. Number four,
Speaker 1: you have to have at least one elite unit on
Speaker 1: one end of the floor. Remember we used to have
Speaker 1: this top ten defense rule forever, right, so for decades,
Speaker 1: if you didn't have a top ten defensive rating in
Speaker 1: the regular season or a defending champion, which means you
Speaker 1: had a top ten defense the previous season, you don't
Speaker 1: get to win a title. Why is that the case.
Speaker 1: Why did that top ten defense rule hold true for
Speaker 1: so long. It's because defense is the most consistent thing
Speaker 1: in basketball. Jump shooting does have some variants. I think
Speaker 1: that it's overstated, especially by a lot of people that
Speaker 1: pay too much attention to shot quality and things like that.
Speaker 1: But there is some variety in basketball. Some days you
Speaker 1: don't feel quite as good. Sometimes the shots don't fall
Speaker 1: as well as they usually do. You can have up
Speaker 1: and down, You can have a naturally up and down
Speaker 1: nature to what you bring offensively, in fact most teams do.
Speaker 1: But defensively, if you bring the effort, focus, energy, and
Speaker 1: the attention to detail, that will be reliable for you
Speaker 1: every single night. Even like that twenty twenty one Bucks
Speaker 1: team that some limitations in the half court offensively, it
Speaker 1: just didn't matter because of how damn good they were defensively.
Speaker 1: The iconic moment of that entire playoff run was Giannis
Speaker 1: Lutenankuopo dissuading Devin Booker on a pull up shot and
Speaker 1: pick and roll, and then turning and sprinting and elevating
Speaker 1: and blocking DeAndre and at the rim. It was otherworldly
Speaker 1: defense that carried them through that particular playoff run. So
Speaker 1: it's the consistency of defense, the fact that it can
Speaker 1: be counted on on a daily basis that makes it
Speaker 1: so important. But then Denver broke that rule as the
Speaker 1: first team that was not a defending champion or a
Speaker 1: top ten defense to win the NBA Championship. But they
Speaker 1: were by far the best offense in the playoffs. They
Speaker 1: had a one to eighteen point two offensive rating that
Speaker 1: was even higher than their regular season offensive ratings, so
Speaker 1: their offense actually went up a level in the postseason.
Speaker 1: They had a one to twenty offensive rating. In clutch
Speaker 1: situations they had, they stole games in clutch situations. Like
Speaker 1: everyone remembers the Lakers series as a sweep, as they should,
Speaker 1: it was, but a lot of those games were close.
Speaker 1: I think three of the four were close, and the
Speaker 1: one that wasn't close, the Lakers had a big second
Speaker 1: half lead, right, So like coming back and winning games
Speaker 1: at the end with reliable offense was a huge thing
Speaker 1: for Denver. They were eight and four in games in
Speaker 1: this postseason that involved clutch situations. You guys might remember
Speaker 1: in Game four of that Lakers series ty game, Nikole
Speaker 1: Jokic in the left corner just bullies Anthony Davis to
Speaker 1: the basket for the would be game winner Miami in
Speaker 1: Game five as they closed out the trophy. I broke
Speaker 1: it down in our video after the game, but that
Speaker 1: Jokic post up against Caleb Martin against the switch for
Speaker 1: that easy layup to get the lead back after Jimmy
Speaker 1: made a fadeaway. After Bam scored, there was that Bruce
Speaker 1: Brown offensive rebound put back because Miami had to bracket
Speaker 1: Aaron Gordon on a box out. Like their offense had
Speaker 1: an inevitability to it and a consistency to it that
Speaker 1: mirrored the impact that we see from dominant defenses over
Speaker 1: the years. So I don't think you necessarily have to
Speaker 1: have the best defense anymore to win a title, but
Speaker 1: you either need to be unbelievably great on the defensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor or unbelievably great on the offensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor. You have to be dominant in
Speaker 1: one of those units to have a chance to win
Speaker 1: a champion a championship, and you won't find a team
Speaker 1: in recent NBA history that hoisted the trophy without one
Speaker 1: of those units being elite. Number five competitiveness. I always
Speaker 1: talk about this, are defining it as hating losing more
Speaker 1: than you love basketball. Basketball's fun. When you go play
Speaker 1: pick up, it's fun. When you go shoot around, it's fun.
Speaker 1: It's like one of my favorite sports in the well
Speaker 1: is my favorite sport in the world. But one of
Speaker 1: the things that I think makes it such a popular
Speaker 1: sport around the world is we can all throw headphones
Speaker 1: on and go out to a park or go to
Speaker 1: La Fitness and you can shoot around by yourself and
Speaker 1: have a great time. Because basketball is fun. But basketball
Speaker 1: games they're they're nasty, and a lot of times, in
Speaker 1: order to avoid losing, you have to do some things
Speaker 1: that are not fun, like engaging in physical battles all
Speaker 1: over the floor, attention to detail, effort, focus, energy, those
Speaker 1: kinds of things. Right, So, how much fight does your
Speaker 1: basketball team have? How much are they willing to give
Speaker 1: an extra effort when they're exhausted? How could like that
Speaker 1: Laker team drove me insane with their inconsistent effort. One
Speaker 1: night they come in and mail it in, and then
Speaker 1: the next night they come in and dominate. I literally
Speaker 1: picked every single game of the Memphis series and the
Speaker 1: Golden State Series correctly because to the tune of what
Speaker 1: the games would look like, just because I was so
Speaker 1: familiar with the cadence of the way the Lakers brought effort.
Speaker 1: And I hated that about that team because they they
Speaker 1: were competitive, but they weren't competitive enough to bring that
Speaker 1: nastiness on a daily basis. That nastiness is what carries
Speaker 1: you in the rock fights. And I don't think it
Speaker 1: was a coincidence that the Nuggets and Heat, two of
Speaker 1: the most consistent effort teams in the playoffs, made it
Speaker 1: to the finals this year. The Nuggets ended up winning
Speaker 1: what like eight of their last nine games in the postseason.
Speaker 1: They didn't mail anything in, they didn't conserve energy. They
Speaker 1: came out every single night and wanted to murder you,
Speaker 1: and that's why they got the trophy. Same thing with
Speaker 1: the Miami Heat. Competitiveness is a prerequisite to winning in
Speaker 1: the late rounds of the NBA Playoffs. It's something we
Speaker 1: should look for in basketball teams moving forward. Number six Experience.
Speaker 1: Young players still don't win in the NBA playoffs. Michael
Speaker 1: Porter Junior was the only player under the age of
Speaker 1: twenty five to play over one hundred minutes in the
Speaker 1: NBA Finals this year, and guess what, he was the
Speaker 1: only guy who really struggled. He averaged under ten points
Speaker 1: a game on just thirty three percent shooting relative to
Speaker 1: his regular season performance. He was the guy who struggled
Speaker 1: the most. Why is that? What is it? I look
Speaker 1: at it kind of based around a cliche like, oh,
Speaker 1: young players don't know how to win. Older players know
Speaker 1: how to win. That's a cliche. But what does that mean? Well, like,
Speaker 1: what does it mean for a player to know how
Speaker 1: to win? And how does a player re that point?
Speaker 1: To me? I always refer to it on the show
Speaker 1: as scar tissue. As a young basketball player, you win
Speaker 1: and lose a lot of basketball games, right, but you
Speaker 1: haven't lost enough yet to really know why you lose, right,
Speaker 1: Like you're a twenty three year old. I'll give you,
Speaker 1: guys an example. I'm on a men's league team now
Speaker 1: that has a bunch of grown ass men, and we
Speaker 1: win the championship almost every single time, and we very
Speaker 1: very rarely lose games. But it's because we're a bunch
Speaker 1: of guys in our thirties who played in college and
Speaker 1: we just have a really good basketball experience that we
Speaker 1: lean back on. When I was a kid, when I
Speaker 1: was like in my early twenties, I would play in
Speaker 1: this same men's league with a bunch of other guys
Speaker 1: that were my age, young kids in their early twenties,
Speaker 1: and we get our ass kicked all the time, particularly
Speaker 1: by older teams and then we go over the sideline
Speaker 1: and we bitch moan about how many touches were getting
Speaker 1: and it's like, oh, you shot the ball too much,
Speaker 1: or you didn't pass the ball enough and all all
Speaker 1: this kind of shit, and it's like, well, actually, we
Speaker 1: probably lost because we weren't really connected enough defensively, didn't
Speaker 1: run back and transition, didn't make yeah, yeah, didn't make
Speaker 1: the extra pass when the guy was open, you know,
Speaker 1: didn't compete on the glass like uh, didn't know how
Speaker 1: to attack his zone defense when an old man team
Speaker 1: brings out his own defense. Like those were the actual
Speaker 1: reasons why we lost. But we're too stupid and young
Speaker 1: and immature to look in the mirror and accept those
Speaker 1: things as reasons why you lose. So what happens is,
Speaker 1: over the years, you build up scar tissue. You lose,
Speaker 1: and you lose, and you lose and you lose, and
Speaker 1: every time it fucking hurts and you just and you
Speaker 1: just take that to heart and you remember why, and
Speaker 1: eventually it clicks for you. Eventually it clicks, and then
Speaker 1: suddenly you start to realize like, oh, we won today.
Speaker 1: Why did we win? Oh? We won because we were
Speaker 1: doing these little things right every player. By the time
Speaker 1: they each their mid to late twenties, especially when they're
Speaker 1: playing basketball as much as professionals do, they do learn
Speaker 1: and they start to understand what it takes to consistently
Speaker 1: win basketball games, and so they have they approach games
Speaker 1: with an attention to detail. When I go up and
Speaker 1: I play in a basketball game now and again, it's
Speaker 1: it's just a stupid men's league, right, But you guys
Speaker 1: know how crazy I am about basketball, So of course
Speaker 1: I take it seriously every time I approach the game
Speaker 1: with this like incredible attention to detail, as it pertains
Speaker 1: of the little things that win. When I was twenty
Speaker 1: two and I'd go up to the gym or nineteen
Speaker 1: and I'd go up to the gym for one of
Speaker 1: those men's league games, it's like, I hope I score
Speaker 1: thirty seven tonight. God, I hope I get some cool dunks.
Speaker 1: You know, Like you're just You're just an idiot. It's
Speaker 1: no different than anything else in life outside of sports.
Speaker 1: When you're a young kid, you're an idiot and you
Speaker 1: don't realize it, and then suddenly you reach the point
Speaker 1: where you learn and you look back and you're like, ugh,
Speaker 1: like why was I thinking that way? Why was I
Speaker 1: doing things that way? Kids just struggle with that particular concept,
Speaker 1: And so I don't think it's a coincidence that we
Speaker 1: see teams that like the Memphis Grizzlies, for instance, that
Speaker 1: win a bunch of regular season games just on the
Speaker 1: strength of their talent and their athleticism, and then they
Speaker 1: consistently get into these slow down playoff series against veteran
Speaker 1: teams and just get beat in the margins. And they'll
Speaker 1: still have these crazy games, like these blowout wins like
Speaker 1: they had in Game five against Golden State last year,
Speaker 1: like they had in Game five against the Lakers this year,
Speaker 1: but then they can't replicate that. They don't they don't
Speaker 1: realize why they won. They don't they don't know how
Speaker 1: to attach the correct reasoning to their result and learn
Speaker 1: that moving forward. That's why I call it scar tissue.
Speaker 1: The pain of loss leads to scar tissue that helps
Speaker 1: you do the things you need to do to win.
Speaker 1: And so when we see teams that have a bunch
Speaker 1: of young players in the rotation win a lot of
Speaker 1: regular season games, we should probably realize that that means
Speaker 1: they can't not win an NBA championship. In all likelihood. Again,
Speaker 1: I don't think there's an arbitrary cutoff. I don't think
Speaker 1: it's just because Michael Porter Junior hasn't turned twenty five yet.
Speaker 1: But I don't think it's a coincidence that he was
Speaker 1: the youngest real rotation player in the series and the
Speaker 1: guy who struggled the most. There is no specific cutoff date.
Speaker 1: I just think as a team, you need to have
Speaker 1: experience and you need to not be relying on too
Speaker 1: many young players in your rotation. Okay, to have a
Speaker 1: couple of them, we've seen that. We saw the Lakers
Speaker 1: have a lot of success with Austin Reeves and Ruy
Speaker 1: Hatchamura although they're both twenty four. You know, we saw
Speaker 1: the Warriors last year with Jordan Poole getting big minutes
Speaker 1: like it can happen. But the overall nature of the team,
Speaker 1: the character of the team needs to be a grown
Speaker 1: up and experienced basketball team. Number seven, you need to
Speaker 1: have above average role players. I'm just gonna list some teams,
Speaker 1: some recent NBA champions and pay attention really quickly to
Speaker 1: which of these guys was on a veteran minimum contract
Speaker 1: in which of them was not Nuggets, KCP not on
Speaker 1: a veteran minimum, Michael Porter Junior not on a veteran minimum,
Speaker 1: Aaron Gordon not on a veteran minimum, Bruce Brown on
Speaker 1: a mid level exception. Okay, so their core role players,
Speaker 1: none of them were just cheap dudes you pick up
Speaker 1: for free on that that don't have any impact on
Speaker 1: your cap space. The Warriors eight really good players, Steph Clay,
Speaker 1: Jordan Poole, Andrew Wiggins, Raymond Green, Cavon Looney, Gary Payton
Speaker 1: the second and out of Porter Junior. I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: Gary Payton the second out of Porter Junior, were the
Speaker 1: only two veteran minimums in that group. Kevon Looney makes
Speaker 1: a decent amount of money. Obviously, you're a core four
Speaker 1: guys for the Warriors make a lot of money. It's
Speaker 1: important to have very good role players behind your stars.
Speaker 1: The Bucks Drew Holliday, Chris Middleton, Jonnason Tannan Koopo obviously
Speaker 1: as their big three, but then they had Brook Lopez
Speaker 1: and PJ. Tucker, Pat Connitton and Bobby Portis. The Lakers
Speaker 1: Lebron James and Anthony Davis, but they had Kentavious Kobell
Speaker 1: Pope as Nuggets fans know, Danny Green, a guy who's
Speaker 1: making fifteen million a year, Alex Crusoe as a dude
Speaker 1: they picked up undrafted, But Kyle Kuzma is the guy
Speaker 1: that costs money, Rayjion Rondo, Dwight Howard like. There are
Speaker 1: only a handful of veteran minimum contracts in that group.
Speaker 1: I think out of all the players I listed, I
Speaker 1: think there were like five. So when you see your
Speaker 1: team talking about, like, hey, let's get a third star
Speaker 1: and let's round out the roster with veteran minimums, okay,
Speaker 1: feel free to try that if you want. But none
Speaker 1: of the recent NBA champions won that way. They won
Speaker 1: that way with a couple of really expensive players on
Speaker 1: the top and then a bunch of mid level salaries
Speaker 1: and maybe one or two veteran minimum contracts. The vast
Speaker 1: majority of these teams have really good players down the roster.
Speaker 1: You need really good basketball players behind your stars to
Speaker 1: win an NBA championship. Number eight coaching. Coaching played a
Speaker 1: huge role in these playoffs. Obviously, we talked a lot
Speaker 1: about Eric Spolstra making opposing stars uncomfortable his really smart
Speaker 1: spacing concepts, clearing the side for Jimmy Butler so that
Speaker 1: he had really good confidence as he was kind of
Speaker 1: going to work off the dribble. He was the first
Speaker 1: guy I saw sixes fully used zone in large doses
Speaker 1: in the NBA playoffs. I thought Mike Malone did some
Speaker 1: really work good work throughout the playoffs, although he didn't
Speaker 1: need to make many adjustments just on account of the
Speaker 1: fact that their team was so damn good. But remember
Speaker 1: when Lebron was cooking them with ghost screens with Austin
Speaker 1: Reeves to attack Jamal Murray and then he switched over
Speaker 1: Toamal Murray on too Dennis Schroeder so that it wouldn't
Speaker 1: be on a movement shooter so they he wouldn't be
Speaker 1: able to run that same action. Or when Eric Spolscher
Speaker 1: was denying the high post in their zone sets and
Speaker 1: so they just moved Jokic down to the short corner
Speaker 1: and either had him flash high or stay down and
Speaker 1: try to drive the zone. Darvin Ham for Steve Kerr
Speaker 1: was a really interesting playoff series earlier in the playoffs
Speaker 1: where they were making all those adjustments around Steph Curry
Speaker 1: and Anthony Davis, trying to pull Anthony Davis away from
Speaker 1: the rim or contain Steph Curry in pick and roll.
Speaker 1: I thought both of those guys did really good work
Speaker 1: throughout the playoffs, and then we saw the opposite of that.
Speaker 1: We saw Mike Budenholzer just letting Jimmy attack through Holiday
Speaker 1: on an Island without double teams. We saw Joe Miszula
Speaker 1: refusing to ignore PJ. Tucker in the sixer series until
Speaker 1: Game six, So you got to see the best of
Speaker 1: both worlds in this particular playoff run. I think you
Speaker 1: need to have a head coach that can make the
Speaker 1: opposing team uncomfortable and find ways to avoid the same
Speaker 1: thing happening to your team, which leads perfectly into number
Speaker 1: nine versatility. You've got to give your coach ammunition for adjustments.
Speaker 1: You have to be able to play multiple ways. We
Speaker 1: saw Cleveland lose. The Cleveland Cavaliers dominate all season and
Speaker 1: then lose because they were incapable of creating a shot
Speaker 1: out of anything other than high pick and roll. And
Speaker 1: so as soon as Tom Thibodeau found out that he
Speaker 1: could kind of leave those weak side corner shooters and
Speaker 1: just kind of defend the pick and roll three down two,
Speaker 1: Cleveland's offense just died in the first round. We saw
Speaker 1: Boston have similar issues against Miami as they struggled to
Speaker 1: find different ways to attack. When Jason Tatum and Jaylen
Speaker 1: Brown were struggling on the defensive end. We saw Joel Embiid,
Speaker 1: the great rim protector that he was all season, really
Speaker 1: struggle as soon as Boston pulled him away from the
Speaker 1: rim because he wasn't capable of defending in that content.
Speaker 1: Teams are going to force you away from your bread
Speaker 1: and butter, and you need to be comfortable switching gears
Speaker 1: to a different tactic and having success with that tactic.
Speaker 1: That is a talent thing. You need to have the
Speaker 1: requisite talent to be able to play multiple ways. Like
Speaker 1: Denver's offense is a great example of this. They can
Speaker 1: run through Yokicchen the post if you run drop coverage
Speaker 1: and you stay glued to the role man. Jamal Murray
Speaker 1: can kill you with pull up shooting. If you play
Speaker 1: up onto that pull up jump shot, you're opening up
Speaker 1: the pocket pass and Nicole Jokich is going to kill
Speaker 1: you if you switch it. They can just go down
Speaker 1: to Yokicchen the post or Jamal Murray can work out
Speaker 1: of ISO if they put a great defender on Jamal Murray,
Speaker 1: that's causing problems. You could switch and start running action
Speaker 1: for Michael Porter Junior and for Contavious Callwell, Pope, they
Speaker 1: can go to Aaron Gordon when they move a smaller
Speaker 1: defender over to Aaron Gordon. He dominated in the post
Speaker 1: in this playoff run. They just had so many different
Speaker 1: ways they could play offensively. It literally made them unguardable. Last,
Speaker 1: but not least, continuity. Each of the four NBA finalists
Speaker 1: from the last two years, the Celtics, the Warriors and
Speaker 1: the Heat and the Nuggets involved groups of core players
Speaker 1: who have been playing together for years. Why does continuity matter?
Speaker 1: I believe that talent is flattening out across the league
Speaker 1: just by virtue of there being so much talent, and
Speaker 1: then also with the new CBA that's just gonna get
Speaker 1: more and more dramatic as the years go by, You're
Speaker 1: gonna see more and more talent parody across the league.
Speaker 1: And what is going to be the separating factor, in
Speaker 1: my opinion, basketball teams that know how to play together well.
Speaker 1: There is a rhythm and flow to basketball, like we
Speaker 1: always talk about, and that rhythm and flow with basketball
Speaker 1: becomes instinctual to players that have been playing together for
Speaker 1: years and years and years. It's the reds become consistent.
Speaker 1: You find out where guys like to cut, where guys
Speaker 1: like to relocate on the three point line when you
Speaker 1: run two man game. Jamal Murray and Nikola Jokic have
Speaker 1: literally run thousands of ball screens and dribble handoffs and
Speaker 1: inverted ball screens. Those dudes just they've done it so
Speaker 1: many times they don't need the It's just second nature
Speaker 1: to them at this point. And the same thing goes
Speaker 1: on the defensive end of the floor. As you learn
Speaker 1: how to have a similar kind of expectation for your
Speaker 1: teammates on the defensive end of the floor. Continuity is
Speaker 1: beginning to take over in the NBA, and it'll be
Speaker 1: really interesting to see in this particular offseason how many
Speaker 1: teams like really shake things up versus try to bring
Speaker 1: all the same guys back. As someone who roots for
Speaker 1: the Lakers, I'm hoping they kind of just bring everybody
Speaker 1: back and then, yeah, like if you have an opportunity
Speaker 1: to flip, like if D'Angelo Russell comes back for twenty
Speaker 1: million and Ruey Hatchamura comes back for fifteen, and yeah,
Speaker 1: you can flip two guys for a really good guard
Speaker 1: or a really good star like yeah, maybe, but like dude,
Speaker 1: bring your players back and just hope they learn how
Speaker 1: to play better basketball together again. Most of these series
Speaker 1: are defined are decided by smaller margins than we think.
Speaker 1: If you really look back at it, the margins are
Speaker 1: usually pretty tight. Playoff series are decided by tiny, tiny gaps.
Speaker 1: I mean, Philly, Philly was up big and had a
Speaker 1: really good chance to win in Game six against Boston.
Speaker 1: They lost that series. You don't think those guys are
Speaker 1: haunted by some of those moments. You don't think Golden
Speaker 1: State looks back to Game four against the Lakers. You
Speaker 1: don't think the Memphis Grizzlies look back at Game four
Speaker 1: against the Lakers as a missed opportunity. Playoff series are
Speaker 1: defined by the tightest of margins, and continuity is another
Speaker 1: great way to gain an advantage. So recapping really quick
Speaker 1: size and strength, top end ball handling an elite unit
Speaker 1: either on the defensive end or the offensive end, competitiveness, experience,
Speaker 1: above average role players, coaching, versatility, and continuity. Those are
Speaker 1: the ten things that we are going to use every
Speaker 1: time next year when we're starting to examine a team
Speaker 1: and their ability to win an NBA championship, just as
Speaker 1: a kind of like a baseline for us. Based Again,
Speaker 1: like I always say, the best indicator of future performance
Speaker 1: is past performance. That's how we learn from the past
Speaker 1: and help to better predict the future. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: that is all I have for today. I am hopping
Speaker 1: on a plane and going up to Bozeman and hanging
Speaker 1: out up in Montana for the next five days. I
Speaker 1: will be back late on Wednesday, so we're not doing
Speaker 1: anything that night. I will have my stuff with me
Speaker 1: in case of catastrophe. Knowing my luck, I'll probably land
Speaker 1: in Bozeman and Lebron James will ask for a trade
Speaker 1: or something stupid like that. Chances are, but if nothing happens,
Speaker 1: I plan on taking the whole stretch off. We will
Speaker 1: be coming back on Thursday to cover the NBA Draft
Speaker 1: with the Nerd sessh guys and with Colin Coward. As always,
Speaker 1: I sincerely appreciate you, guys, and I'm going to enjoy
Speaker 1: this break and I'll see you guys next week. The
Speaker 1: volume