Speaker 1: The volume. The thrill and excitement of March Mania is here,
Speaker 1: and DraftKings Sportsbook, one of America's top rated sportsbook apps,
Speaker 1: is giving new customers a shot to turn five bucks
Speaker 1: into one hundred and fifty dollars instantly in bonus bets
Speaker 1: with any college basketball bet. Yukon is currently the favorite
Speaker 1: to win the title at plus five hundred. My favorite
Speaker 1: team hometown Tucson, Arizona Wildcats are currently plus thirteen hundred.
Speaker 1: Plenty of good bets to check out. Download the DraftKings
Speaker 1: Sportsbook app and use code hoops that's hoops. New customers
Speaker 1: can bet five bucks to get one hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: dollars instantly in bonus bets only at DraftKings Sportsbook with
Speaker 1: code hoops That's hops. The Crown is yours. Gambling problem
Speaker 1: called one eight hundred gambler or in West Virginia, visit
Speaker 1: www dot one eight hundred gambler dot net. In New
Speaker 1: York call eight seven seven eight hope and why, or
Speaker 1: text hope and Why to four six seven three six nine.
Speaker 1: In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling called eight
Speaker 1: eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven, or
Speaker 1: visit CCPG dot org. Please play responsibly on behalf of Boothill,
Speaker 1: Casino and resort in Kansas. Twenty one plus age varies
Speaker 1: by jurisdiction void in Ontario. Bonus bets expire one hundred
Speaker 1: and sixty eight hours after issuance. See dkg dot com
Speaker 1: slash b ball for eligibility and deposit restrictions, terms and
Speaker 1: responsible gaming resources. All right, open to hoops to night
Speaker 1: here at the volume. Happy Sunday, everybody hopeful. If you
Speaker 1: guys are having a great weekend, We're gonna be hitting
Speaker 1: two games from the Saturday Night slate. The Golden State
Speaker 1: Warriors got a much needed win for the standings on
Speaker 1: the road in Los Angeles against the Lakers, and then
Speaker 1: the New York Knicks go on the road to Sacramento
Speaker 1: and a super intense and physical rock fight of a
Speaker 1: game and get a big win over the Kings. We're
Speaker 1: gonna be breaking down both of those games from the
Speaker 1: perspective of both teams. Just you guys know, for the
Speaker 1: schedule for this week, We're going today and we're going
Speaker 1: every single day for the next seven days until next Sunday,
Speaker 1: when I leave for one last little trip. I'm going
Speaker 1: out of town with my wife to do some skiing
Speaker 1: in Lake Tahoe, a little rest before we get into
Speaker 1: the playoffs. As you guys know, when we get into
Speaker 1: the playoffs, we go live on YouTube after the final
Speaker 1: game every single night during the playoff run, so a
Speaker 1: little bit of a calm before the storm. So we're
Speaker 1: gonna have a crazy week this week, going every single day.
Speaker 1: Then we're gonna take a break from Sunday through Wednesday
Speaker 1: next week, and I'll be back on that following Thursday.
Speaker 1: You guys know the joke before we get started. Subscribe
Speaker 1: to our brand new YouTube channel. I mean a lot
Speaker 1: to me if you guys will take a second to
Speaker 1: scroll down and hit that subscribe button. Don't forget about
Speaker 1: our podcast feed wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight.
Speaker 1: It's also super helpful if you leave a rating and
Speaker 1: a review on the podcast feed. Don't forget about my
Speaker 1: Twitter feed out underscore JCNLT, where I put the film
Speaker 1: breakdowns from time to time, as well as show announcements
Speaker 1: in the last minute leaves. Keep dropping mail back questions
Speaker 1: in the YouTube comments. No mailbag in this episode, but
Speaker 1: we will be doing several of them over the course
Speaker 1: of the next week. All right, let's talk some basketball.
Speaker 1: So first quarter looked more or less like a lot
Speaker 1: of the Lakers games against the Warriors in the last
Speaker 1: couple of years, right, like the specifically just ad kind
Speaker 1: of sagging off of non shooters and causing some problems
Speaker 1: around the basket. Laker offense two has been cooking on
Speaker 1: all cylinders for a couple of months now, and they
Speaker 1: won that first quarter thirty six to thirty. Had good motion,
Speaker 1: good ball and player movement. Everything was looking good. Lebron
Speaker 1: came out laser focused. He his first six shots in
Speaker 1: this game, bouncing back after a rough game on the
Speaker 1: road in Sacramento. Anthony Davis in the first quarter alone
Speaker 1: goes for eight points, four rebounds, two assists, a steal,
Speaker 1: and a block with no turnovers, playing really, really well.
Speaker 1: But then he gets hit in the eye and it
Speaker 1: swells up on him and it has to leave the game.
Speaker 1: And from there, you know, it's funny. There was a
Speaker 1: comment from jj H was actually in the early third quarter,
Speaker 1: if I remember correctly, but he pointed out a truth,
Speaker 1: which is that, you know, Anthony Davis gives the Lakers
Speaker 1: a somewhat coherent defense. They've actually been a top fifteen
Speaker 1: half court defense most of the year and spent a
Speaker 1: good portion of the year in the top ten for
Speaker 1: half court defense. Their primary issues are what happens on
Speaker 1: the perimeter and in transition, which is why they can't
Speaker 1: reach the level that they've been in years past. But
Speaker 1: like Anthony Davis really is the guy that anchors everything
Speaker 1: for the Laker defense, and when he goes out, JJ
Speaker 1: Reddick pointed out, he's like not a whole lot else
Speaker 1: in terms of defensive personnel. Right, Like you've got Lebron James,
Speaker 1: who when he's engaged, can be a deeply impactful defensive player,
Speaker 1: but especially in a game like this where he has
Speaker 1: to do so much offensively, you can pretty much count
Speaker 1: on him to, you know, save and conserve energy on
Speaker 1: that end of the floor. They had a big defensive
Speaker 1: mistake late in this game where he lost Draamon Green
Speaker 1: on a fake dribble handoff to go to the basket,
Speaker 1: and it's because he has to save his legs, right,
Speaker 1: And then in general, he's thirty nine years old in
Speaker 1: a regular season game, like, you're not gonna get great defense,
Speaker 1: consistent defense out of him, right. The Angel Russell and
Speaker 1: Austin Reeves not great. You know, Ruy Hatcha Murray. He's
Speaker 1: a good low man and rebounder from time to time,
Speaker 1: but he's not a good perimeter defensive player. Max Christie
Speaker 1: is a good perimeter defensive player, but he's young, a
Speaker 1: little helter skelter doesn't get a ton of minutes that frequently.
Speaker 1: Jared Vanderbilt is a really good defender, but he's hurt. So, like,
Speaker 1: they just don't really have great defensive personnel. After Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis's out, they promptly gave up seventy two points in
Speaker 1: the second and third quarters combined. The Lakers tried blitzing
Speaker 1: with Jackson Hayes. That was basically the defensive strategy they
Speaker 1: went with to try to slow Golden State down and admit,
Speaker 1: the main rationale there is Jackson Hayes is not a
Speaker 1: good drop coverage big. He's he's a guy that like
Speaker 1: when he sits back in a coverage, he either is
Speaker 1: too passive and lets the guard get too comfortable or
Speaker 1: he gets too aggressive and he fouls a lot. And
Speaker 1: so you know, they one of the ways that the
Speaker 1: Lakers have counter Dad is just uses athleticism. So they'll
Speaker 1: blitz and try to make things happen from there, but
Speaker 1: then they just got absolutly eviscerated in the paint. They
Speaker 1: gave up sixty two points in the paint in this game.
Speaker 1: Steph by himself made nine field goals in the paint,
Speaker 1: did a lot of damage on Austin Reeves on curls,
Speaker 1: coming off of screens, slipping screens in backcuts. There's a
Speaker 1: big one late in the game where because like one
Speaker 1: of the things that the Lakers try to do with
Speaker 1: Steph as top locking, which what that means is position
Speaker 1: yourself between Steph and the screen so that he can't
Speaker 1: come off. And there was one in the fourth quarter
Speaker 1: where he kind of went and set a pin down
Speaker 1: and then he was getting ready to come off his
Speaker 1: own pin down to go up to the top of
Speaker 1: the key, but Austin was on his high side trying
Speaker 1: to deny him the screen, and Draymond Green had the
Speaker 1: ball in the post, and Steph literally just noticed that
Speaker 1: Austin was on his high side and there was nobody
Speaker 1: behind him, and Steph just slipped to the basket and
Speaker 1: Draymond hit him for an easy layup. And one of
Speaker 1: the consistent issues I saw in this game and it's
Speaker 1: something I'm going to talk about a lot, but like
Speaker 1: you know, when Steph is being the blender, that he
Speaker 1: can be off the ball running through all of these
Speaker 1: off ball screening actions and stuff, you have to find
Speaker 1: somewhere in the off the off the ball to help,
Speaker 1: right and like one of the big opportunities in this
Speaker 1: game because because Brandon Pazemski is not a super aggressive
Speaker 1: score because he's a ball movement guy, he's more of
Speaker 1: like a like kind of like a connective tissue type
Speaker 1: of piece, and because he hasn't shot the three exceptionally well,
Speaker 1: Delo was the guy who could be in position to
Speaker 1: help on so many of these and he just did
Speaker 1: absolutely nothing. I trimmed several examples of this and go
Speaker 1: onto my Twitter feed out underscore json LT and look
Speaker 1: in the replies, and you'll see where you're gonna see
Speaker 1: Austin Reeves just chasing like crazy, or Max Christy chasing
Speaker 1: like crazy, and then d Lo is just kind of
Speaker 1: standing upright, not doing anything to help and not not
Speaker 1: guarding Brandon Pazemski either, just kind of standing upright in
Speaker 1: the lane and not doing anything. So the Warriors pretty
Speaker 1: quickly took control of the game after Anthony Davis went down,
Speaker 1: Lebron did keep it close. Lebron had another great night.
Speaker 1: He at forty points, eight rebounds, ninetases. Could have been
Speaker 1: forty three to two if that three point shot in
Speaker 1: the corner if he didn't put his heel on the line.
Speaker 1: He was really picking on Tray Jackson Davison switches and
Speaker 1: having some success on that front. But the Lakers just
Speaker 1: tried to outscore Golden State and that their skill guards
Speaker 1: just weren't good enough, right, Like they didn't get a
Speaker 1: good enough type of offensive game to make that happen.
Speaker 1: Austin and Dil combined to go five for nineteen from three.
Speaker 1: I want to credit Brandon Pazemski and Andrew Wiggins on
Speaker 1: this one. I thought Andrew Wiggins, and he's a specific
Speaker 1: type of guy that can give de Lo some issues,
Speaker 1: But I thought Wiggins did an incredible job on D'Angelo
Speaker 1: Russell and forced him into some really yanky shots and
Speaker 1: some ugly misses. It wasn't Likedlo was out there missing
Speaker 1: a ton of clean looks, like he missed a couple
Speaker 1: of open catch and shoot looks. But like I thought,
Speaker 1: Andrew Wiggins just did an amazing job on de Lo
Speaker 1: and then Brandon Pazemski. I thought he did an amazing
Speaker 1: job on Reeves. Like you know the Lakers whenever Austin
Speaker 1: Reeves gets the ball and there's like six or seven
Speaker 1: seconds on the shot clock. He's a good ISO player.
Speaker 1: Coming into last night, he was up over a point
Speaker 1: per possession. And ISO's a guy that like has a
Speaker 1: good set of moves, encounters and can get to the
Speaker 1: foul line. So like he's a guy that they can
Speaker 1: trust to kind of just rescue a possession by playing
Speaker 1: one on one basketball, right, And a lot of those
Speaker 1: possessions last night ended with him kind of going to
Speaker 1: work on Brandon Pazziemski, and Pizemski did just a really
Speaker 1: really good job and individual defense on him forced him
Speaker 1: into some tough misses, some ugly misses. So really good
Speaker 1: perimeter defense from Pezenski, Pazzemski and Wiggins, And like I
Speaker 1: said so many times this season, I really think that's
Speaker 1: a strength of this Warriors roster. But the Laker the
Speaker 1: Warriors in general were really taking advantage of the Lakers
Speaker 1: back line defense. That's the piece that don't want to
Speaker 1: focus on here for a little bit. So primarily working
Speaker 1: looking at on the back line Jackson, Hayes, Rija Chama
Speaker 1: and Lebron James, but also Danzel Russell, like I talked
Speaker 1: about earlier, and essentially like when you bring a guy
Speaker 1: up to the level of the screen, he has a
Speaker 1: very specific job. He's got to make it difficult to
Speaker 1: make that over the top pass. I talk a lot about,
Speaker 1: like how Dame sometimes will throw swing passes out of blitz,
Speaker 1: out of blitz situations. Jalen Brunson did this several times
Speaker 1: last night against the Kings, and it was it's because
Speaker 1: in many cases, when that screen defender does a good
Speaker 1: job getting active hands and taking away the passing angles,
Speaker 1: even though the short roleman is open, it can be
Speaker 1: difficult to get the ball there. Now, Steph every once
Speaker 1: in a while will just make some like preposterous, really
Speaker 1: nice like kind of looping pass over the top against
Speaker 1: some good defense. But like the reality is is, like
Speaker 1: you have to make that really difficult. If you let
Speaker 1: them easily get that ball to the role man, you're
Speaker 1: in a tough spot because now it's four on three
Speaker 1: and Draymond's just so good in that situation. How many
Speaker 1: times in this game did you see Draymond catching the
Speaker 1: role and kaminga cut out of the weak side corner
Speaker 1: for a dunk or Andrew Wiggins cut out of the
Speaker 1: weak side corner for the dunk. It's that classic tic
Speaker 1: tac toe of the Warriors offense. Steph gets a blitz
Speaker 1: pass to Draymond on the roll, Draymond draws in the
Speaker 1: help defender from the weak side corner instead of standing
Speaker 1: there waiting for a three point shot. They cut along
Speaker 1: the baseline. The lob passes there and as long as
Speaker 1: it's timed perfectly, it's a bucket every single time. And
Speaker 1: they just did a ton of damage there. In general,
Speaker 1: like a lot of those low possessions would end up
Speaker 1: being someone like a D'Angelo Russell and he would step
Speaker 1: up in like trace Jackson Davis would just go through
Speaker 1: him into the basket and finish, or the back door
Speaker 1: cut would be wide open for a layof there's even
Speaker 1: a possession where to Tray Jackson Davis's credit, he caught
Speaker 1: in the dunker spot and Jackson A's recovered and he
Speaker 1: just bodied him and hit a little left handed hook
Speaker 1: over the top. Like as as Steph was doing his
Speaker 1: job of bringing that screen defender up to the level
Speaker 1: of the screen. In those four on three situations, the
Speaker 1: Lakers just did not get enough stops. And look, here's
Speaker 1: the thing. That's a precarious position for anybody, but like,
Speaker 1: you can't let him score every single time in those situations.
Speaker 1: And I really thought the Warriors took advantage of a
Speaker 1: weakness in the Lakers roster. When you remove Anthony Davis
Speaker 1: from the equation, the Anthony Davis is just so much
Speaker 1: better at pressuring and making those passes to the roll
Speaker 1: man more difficult. And then in general, the Lakers weak
Speaker 1: side defensive personnel just doesn't do a good enough job.
Speaker 1: And the Warriors really took advantage of that. Three shoutouts
Speaker 1: on the Warrior that I wanted to hit before we
Speaker 1: get out of here. Klay Thompson is the secondary score.
Speaker 1: Really had his movement three off the catch working. There
Speaker 1: were some ones too where he was in a phone
Speaker 1: booth where he was coming off and there was a
Speaker 1: hedge and he just found that little tiny bit of
Speaker 1: space and rose up. He was four for seven on
Speaker 1: threes that he took flying off of screening actions. Overall,
Speaker 1: he scored fourteen points in nine off screen possessions Tray
Speaker 1: Jackson Davis figuring out some of the specific details of
Speaker 1: the two man game. So one of the things that
Speaker 1: you guys may or may not have heard about as
Speaker 1: you follow other basketball content out there, something we haven't
Speaker 1: talked a ton about on this show is the idea
Speaker 1: of a gortat screen. So what a go tot screen
Speaker 1: is is essentially like, the big man will set a
Speaker 1: screen on the ball right, and as he sets a
Speaker 1: screen on the ball, the on ball defenders chasing over
Speaker 1: the top, and so there's a driving lane there right.
Speaker 1: So the ball handler now is working downhill the screen
Speaker 1: defender right, the guy defending the screener is trying to
Speaker 1: get back into the play to to guard the ball
Speaker 1: handler coming downhill. But what will happen in a lot
Speaker 1: of these cases is literally the big man that is
Speaker 1: the screener for a gor tot screen will actually position
Speaker 1: himself to box out the screen defender instead of rolling
Speaker 1: hard to the rim to try to make himself available
Speaker 1: for a dunk or finding a sweet spot in the
Speaker 1: middle to catch the ball for a finish. Instead, the
Speaker 1: one thing he'll focus on is just boxing that help
Speaker 1: defender out of the lane and So essentially, imagine Steph
Speaker 1: coming off of a ball screen and a Max Christie
Speaker 1: or an Austin Reeves trailing Steph over the top, and
Speaker 1: then essentially Tray Jackson Davis, instead of rolling to the rim,
Speaker 1: is just gonna get into Tray Jackson or excuse me,
Speaker 1: into Jackson Hayes's way, or get into ruy Hacha Mura's
Speaker 1: way and just kind of form a wall and now
Speaker 1: Steph just meanders into the lane for an easy layup.
Speaker 1: He had two examples of that that worked really well.
Speaker 1: There was one in the first half where he boxed
Speaker 1: Ruey out as Steph was driving and he got a
Speaker 1: lay up. And then there was a second a second
Speaker 1: one in the fourth quarter a ball screen with Chris Paul.
Speaker 1: So the way the action worked in this case, Max
Speaker 1: Christy was guarding Chris, and Chris had the ball in
Speaker 1: his right hand kind of on the left wing extended.
Speaker 1: So here comes Tray Jackson Davis to set the screen,
Speaker 1: and he sets it like he's gonna get Chris towards
Speaker 1: his right hand side, and so as a result of that,
Speaker 1: Max jumps up onto the high side to try to
Speaker 1: get over the screen. Trace quickly flips the angle turns
Speaker 1: around and screens the other side of Max, and Chris
Speaker 1: crosses over and goes left instead. Now that rescreening thing
Speaker 1: is a really important piece of screening angles because like
Speaker 1: a lot of times, they're really good on ball defenders
Speaker 1: that are quick, they will find a way to navigate
Speaker 1: the first screen. But when you've navigated the first screen,
Speaker 1: many times you're out of position to then quickly navigate
Speaker 1: another screen. And so as the screener, if you can
Speaker 1: quickly flip the angle on him, you can catch him
Speaker 1: out of position. So it starts with that. Now Max
Speaker 1: Christie is on the high side on the if you're
Speaker 1: facing the basket on the right side, Tray Jackson is
Speaker 1: screening and Chris Paul is driving towards the left, but
Speaker 1: he snakes back across to get back to his right
Speaker 1: hand side. Now Max Christie is going to try to
Speaker 1: recover back into the play, but Tray Jackson Davis is
Speaker 1: literally in his way, and Trace does this like really
Speaker 1: slow roll to the basket, and on the slow roll
Speaker 1: to the basket, he stays in Max's way for another
Speaker 1: like two or three steps, and that allowed Chris Paul
Speaker 1: to get a big opening at the right elbow tons
Speaker 1: of space and rose up and knocked it down. So
Speaker 1: between the gor Tot screen in the first half that
Speaker 1: got stephed, the wide open layup, the flipping screening angle
Speaker 1: thing on to get Chris Paul open, and then kind
Speaker 1: of dragging his role into Max Christie's way to create
Speaker 1: that opening. Those are just like higher level pick and
Speaker 1: roll concepts that are so vitally important to like finding
Speaker 1: openings against good defense. And that's the thing, Like, that's
Speaker 1: the one guy in that game for the Lakers that's
Speaker 1: a good defensive player. Is Max Christie the one guy that,
Speaker 1: like that's what he does. He's in the league because
Speaker 1: he does that well. And like, those are the kinds
Speaker 1: of guys where you have to be more diligent about
Speaker 1: the details to find openings. And I just thought it
Speaker 1: was really encouraging to see Trey Trace kind of showing
Speaker 1: some of that higher level stuff. And look, he struggled
Speaker 1: with Lebron on switches in this game, so do most
Speaker 1: centers in the NBA. I thought it was a good
Speaker 1: a good performance. And then Jonathan Kminga he had he's
Speaker 1: ripping off another streak of twenty point games. That's his
Speaker 1: fourth in a row. He had four assists with one turnover.
Speaker 1: A really smart play in the first half where he's
Speaker 1: posting up Spencer Dinwiddie. I've talked a lot about how
Speaker 1: teams are starting to throw late help after he puts
Speaker 1: the ball on the ground to his left hand side,
Speaker 1: and there was just an example of that in this
Speaker 1: game where posting Dinwoody makes a move towards the middle.
Speaker 1: Jackson Hayes hard helps on his left hand side and
Speaker 1: he just makes the drop off pass to the guy
Speaker 1: in the dunker spot. Easy stuff that is that is
Speaker 1: going to make the game easier for Jonathan KAMINGA long run.
Speaker 1: Last twenty nine games for Jonathan kaminga twenty one points
Speaker 1: per game, six rebounds, and three assists on fifty five
Speaker 1: percent from the field, forty one percent from three, and
Speaker 1: seventy nine percent from the line. Think about how crazy
Speaker 1: that is. Twenty nine games, so literally like over a
Speaker 1: third of the season, right or yeah? Right? Am I
Speaker 1: right about that? Yeah? Over the third of the season
Speaker 1: and then over twenty one points per game, legitimate defensive rebounding,
Speaker 1: three assists with only I think two I think he's
Speaker 1: it's I want to say he's got about a one
Speaker 1: point five assist to turn over ratio in that in
Speaker 1: that span. I should have put it in my notes,
Speaker 1: but I did it. But and he's also shooting really
Speaker 1: efficiently from from the various spots on the four rain
Speaker 1: needs to work, so really really encouraging stretch from Jonathan
Speaker 1: kaminga that it like, regardless of what happens with the
Speaker 1: Warriors this year, that that to me is is like
Speaker 1: just something you take into the future as a massive
Speaker 1: success from this particular campaign on the Lakers front. When
Speaker 1: Ad goes down, they basically just have no shot to
Speaker 1: beat any serious team unless they shoot the lights off,
Speaker 1: shoot the lights out, and they just didn't in this
Speaker 1: particular game. I Uh, one of the things, I have
Speaker 1: two other things that I wanted to quickly hit one.
Speaker 1: I thought this was a game that kind of demonstrated
Speaker 1: some of the ugly side of what comes with the
Speaker 1: D'Angelo Russell experience, not just this game, but the three
Speaker 1: of their last four games, so the two losses to
Speaker 1: Sacramento and then this game, like just struggling to be
Speaker 1: a productive and effective offensive player against length and athleticism
Speaker 1: on the perimeter that applies real ball pressure and how
Speaker 1: that can kind of get under his skin a little bit,
Speaker 1: and then secondly, just not doing enough off the ball
Speaker 1: defensively to make it so that he is a positive
Speaker 1: in the net, meaning like his offensive production supersedes whatever
Speaker 1: downsides come in other areas of the game, Like just
Speaker 1: way too much standing around. It just is not acceptable
Speaker 1: for a guy that like has had struggles in the
Speaker 1: playoffs and you're trying to get to a point where
Speaker 1: he's a usable player in that setting, and it's like,
Speaker 1: those are the kinds of things that kind of rear
Speaker 1: their ugly head with him. And again, it's only a
Speaker 1: four game stretch, and he was really good for months
Speaker 1: before that, So I don't want to like like hyper
Speaker 1: focus on the negative here, but this last stretch of
Speaker 1: games from Dlo has felt a little bit like a backslide,
Speaker 1: so to speak. And so I hope that Dlo can
Speaker 1: kind of snap out of it, because, like, the Lakers
Speaker 1: just desperately need him to be the offensive player he
Speaker 1: was over the last couple of months while also being
Speaker 1: a usable defensive player, which we know he's capable of being.
Speaker 1: I've seen games this year where Dlo has been a
Speaker 1: useful off ball defensive player and it's it's just a
Speaker 1: matter of commitment at this point. Lastly, the Lakers, you know,
Speaker 1: this is the kind of thing that happens. I don't
Speaker 1: know what happens if Ad doesn't get hurt. I would
Speaker 1: imagine the Lakers probably win that game sixty percent of
Speaker 1: the time if AD's healthy, right, at least, if not more.
Speaker 1: The Lakers are a good home team. They played well
Speaker 1: when Ad was on the floor in the same ways
Speaker 1: that they typically do. That's not to say the Warriors
Speaker 1: couldn't win that game. They certainly could. I'm not trying
Speaker 1: to be like, oh, Ady got hurt, the Lakers should
Speaker 1: have won. I'm just saying like, yeah, you're right, you
Speaker 1: probably win that game if Ad is healthy. But he
Speaker 1: didn't get he didn't finish the game. He hurt his eye.
Speaker 1: And sometimes in the eighty two game season, your star
Speaker 1: gets hurt and you just lose. And normally that would
Speaker 1: be something you could live with over the course of
Speaker 1: an eighty two game season, But the Lakers tricked off
Speaker 1: their margin for error this year. That three to ten
Speaker 1: stretch after the n season tournament win removed their ability
Speaker 1: to be able to withstand that sort of thing. Yesterday,
Speaker 1: Ady gets hit in the eye, misses the rest of
Speaker 1: the game. They drop a game to the Warriors. Now
Speaker 1: it's a catastrophe. You've dropped down to the ten seed,
Speaker 1: and you absolutely have to beat the Warriors. I'm not
Speaker 1: even sure if that will help them get the There's
Speaker 1: a matchup with the Warriors in April. I'm not even
Speaker 1: sure if that would be enough for them to get
Speaker 1: the tiebreaker because I'm not sure what the other details
Speaker 1: of the tiebreaker are. But you're now down to one
Speaker 1: and two against the Warriors, which could end up hurting
Speaker 1: you in the tiebreaker situation. If you win this game
Speaker 1: and you win in April, you win the tiebreaker. Right,
Speaker 1: you've removed that from the equation. It's a huge like,
Speaker 1: it's a huge catastrophe for the Lakers, the situation that
Speaker 1: they're in. Whereas, let's just take a look at a
Speaker 1: couple of games on their schedule if they would have
Speaker 1: gone differently, how different it would have looked. Like, I
Speaker 1: think they've lost at least a half dozen games this
Speaker 1: year that they had no business losing. But let's just
Speaker 1: look at a couple of specifics. They lost to the
Speaker 1: Spurs the week after winning the Ncason Tournament. The Spurs
Speaker 1: were on an eighteen game losing streak. Guys, they had
Speaker 1: lost eighteen games in a row, and they beat the
Speaker 1: Lakers literally a week after they beat less than a
Speaker 1: week after they beat the Pacers to win the ncas
Speaker 1: And Tournament. After kicking the shit out of the Pelicans
Speaker 1: and beating the Suns, they were playing excellent basketball, and
Speaker 1: then they just relaxed. They lost to a Dallas Mavericks
Speaker 1: team that was completely injury riddled. I'll accept that one,
Speaker 1: but the one to the Spurs, like that's completely unacceptable.
Speaker 1: They lost to the Miami Heat at home without Jimmy
Speaker 1: Butler in a game that the Lakers came completely lifeless
Speaker 1: out of the locker room. And then they lost to
Speaker 1: that terrible Grizzlies team that was eleven and twenty three
Speaker 1: going into the game. Flip just those three games. Forget
Speaker 1: about everything else. Flip just those three games. And now
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis gets a corneil abrasion and misses the rest
Speaker 1: of the game, and you drop a game and you're
Speaker 1: still thirty nine and twenty nine and a half game
Speaker 1: out of the sixth seed. That's your situation. If you
Speaker 1: just don't trick off those games in the middle of
Speaker 1: the year. Add a couple more now, they lost at
Speaker 1: home to the Brooklyn Nets and a game that they
Speaker 1: jumped them early and then just quit in the second half.
Speaker 1: Lost to the Brooklyn Nets, inexcusable at home. Then they
Speaker 1: got their ass kicked, and back to back games against
Speaker 1: the Rockets and Hawks in games they didn't play hard.
Speaker 1: They gave up two hundred and seventy three points in
Speaker 1: the two games. Those are the games right before they
Speaker 1: went in and beat Boston without Lebron James and Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis in a game they did bring holacious effort from
Speaker 1: start to finish. So just take those three games. Win
Speaker 1: those three. Then if ad gets poked in the eye
Speaker 1: and you drop a game to Golden State, you're still
Speaker 1: the five seed. You're the five seed. That's what this is.
Speaker 1: That's what this has meant like, cause here's the thing, Like,
Speaker 1: the Lakers are not a top tier championship contender. They
Speaker 1: did not address their biggest weakness at the deadline or
Speaker 1: over the summer, and so they do not have the
Speaker 1: matchup versatility they need to win four playoff rounds. Like
Speaker 1: I don't think they're in that tier they can. It's
Speaker 1: just like such an incredible long shot, right, And it's
Speaker 1: because they didn't address their biggest weakness. But they are
Speaker 1: a good NBA team, But because for extended stretches of
Speaker 1: the season they just came out and played bad basketball
Speaker 1: against teams they had no business losing to, they are
Speaker 1: in a horrible predicament in the play in Tournament when
Speaker 1: they should be. What this team actually is is a
Speaker 1: middle of the West type of team. They should be
Speaker 1: in that four to five range. That's how good they are.
Speaker 1: When you look at the talent on their roster, they
Speaker 1: should be in that four to five range. That's the
Speaker 1: quality of that basketball team. But they are instead down
Speaker 1: in the play in Tournament at thirty six and thirty
Speaker 1: two and will likely have to win two road games
Speaker 1: to even get a chance to play a team for
Speaker 1: a best of seven. One last stat to drive this
Speaker 1: point home. I saw this two days ago from Alex Regla,
Speaker 1: a guy does an amazing job covering the Lakers Frespian Nation.
Speaker 1: I highly recommend you guys check him out. He tweeted
Speaker 1: this out the other day and I thought it was
Speaker 1: super interesting. The Lakers are sixteen and twelve against teams
Speaker 1: that are in the top ten in point differential. In
Speaker 1: those games, they have the sixth best net rating in
Speaker 1: the league. So when it comes to the Lakers playing
Speaker 1: against really good teams, they are one of the very
Speaker 1: best teams in the league. Sixteen wins, comfortably above five
Speaker 1: hundred six best net rating in the league. And that's
Speaker 1: despite their personal limitations. That's despite the fact that they
Speaker 1: don't have a guard or wing that is a starting
Speaker 1: caliber player, that is a plus offensive player and a
Speaker 1: plus defensive player. They do not have one on the roster,
Speaker 1: and they're still sixteen and twelve against the top ten
Speaker 1: teams in the league by point differential, against the middle
Speaker 1: ten teams, against teams eleven through twenty in point differential,
Speaker 1: they are five and fifteen after last night's lost to
Speaker 1: the Warriors, five and fifteen, and they have the sixth
Speaker 1: worst net rating out of that group. What does that
Speaker 1: tell you? That's what I've been preaching all year with
Speaker 1: this team, like, are they Boston or Denver? No, they
Speaker 1: needed a trade and they needed a lot of things
Speaker 1: to go right this year to ever get into that tier.
Speaker 1: They were unable to crack into that tier. But are
Speaker 1: they the ten seed in the West. Are they that bad?
Speaker 1: They shouldn't be. And it all comes down to three things.
Speaker 1: Those personnel limitations I talked about, two complete coaching incompetence
Speaker 1: from Darbnham, and then three a consistent lack of effort
Speaker 1: and focus. I talk all about the time about basketball character,
Speaker 1: the willingness to do the things that you have to
Speaker 1: do to get to the trophy. It is from day
Speaker 1: one of training camp, throughout all of preseason, to every
Speaker 1: stretch of the season, from the slow points in January
Speaker 1: to the busy points around the deadline or right after
Speaker 1: the start of the season in October, to the race
Speaker 1: at the end of the season to jockey around for
Speaker 1: position in the standings. You have to hit these checkpoints
Speaker 1: in terms of effort and focus and energy in the
Speaker 1: paying your dues. You have to pay in blood, sweat
Speaker 1: and tears to get to the Larry O'Brien Trophy. It
Speaker 1: is not easy. You don't get to chill. It's a
Speaker 1: big part of why I'm starting to get off the
Speaker 1: Clippers set. The Clippers went from being a team that
Speaker 1: would looked like a dominant two way basketball team. Now
Speaker 1: they haven't played defense in several months, and now they
Speaker 1: look pretty mediocre. That's a big one for me. They're
Speaker 1: skipping a checkpoint. That checkpoint is you have to keep
Speaker 1: your foot on the gap. Yes, and when there are
Speaker 1: tiny points in the season when you start to lose
Speaker 1: your focus and a couple things don't go your way.
Speaker 1: The good teams, the teams that hoist hilario'brian, those teams
Speaker 1: end up quickly digging out of those holes. I remember
Speaker 1: even the twenty twenty Lakers because obviously they covered that
Speaker 1: team very closely. They lost four games in a row
Speaker 1: around Christmas. They started, I want to say, they started
Speaker 1: twenty four and three, so they started like crazy good, right,
Speaker 1: they lost four games in a row. Like I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to sit here and pretend like bad stretches don't happen.
Speaker 1: Of course they do. But for the really good teams,
Speaker 1: you don't have extended bad stretches. You don't have a
Speaker 1: three and ten stretch. You can't get away with it.
Speaker 1: And again to pointing back to basketball character, a team
Speaker 1: with good basketball character doesn't do that. A team with
Speaker 1: good basketball character doesn't have you know, forty percent of
Speaker 1: the nights over the course of the eighty two game
Speaker 1: regular season where they just come out lifeless. That to
Speaker 1: me is showing an unwillingness to do the work, because
Speaker 1: there is work from day one of training camp to
Speaker 1: the point where you hoist that trophy. It sucks like
Speaker 1: that there. I'm a huge believer that that that is
Speaker 1: a prerequisite to getting to the trophy. You have to
Speaker 1: attack the regular season from start to finish. All right,
Speaker 1: I'm done venting about the Lakers, moving on to Nick
Speaker 1: Kings super fun physical game. A lot of guys had
Speaker 1: nightmare shooting nights. And this is super typical. This is
Speaker 1: something I talk about a lot on the show Rock Fight.
Speaker 1: Basketball games like a lot of times like that can
Speaker 1: cause teams to fall apart in their skill areas of
Speaker 1: their game. And mainly the idea behind that is is
Speaker 1: like you become accustomed in your shooting workouts and everything
Speaker 1: to a certain muscle memory that that you go to
Speaker 1: when you're going into your skill skill shots and skill
Speaker 1: footwork and dribble combinations and all that kind of stuff. Right,
Speaker 1: So what happens is is like in a really physical game,
Speaker 1: there's a level of fatigue and like a kind of
Speaker 1: like a pain, like a like you kind of get
Speaker 1: beat up a little bit, like everything hurts from like
Speaker 1: you bumping shoulders and knees and hips and every like that,
Speaker 1: and all of a sudden you've got like sixteen bruises
Speaker 1: and bumps and stuff from the game. But all of
Speaker 1: that takes place, and then all of a sudden, you
Speaker 1: find yourself in a catch and shoot situation or a
Speaker 1: pull up jump shot situation, and it just doesn't feel
Speaker 1: the same physically because you're exhausted, because you're fatigued, because
Speaker 1: you're beat up. Right, And so Josh Hart goes two
Speaker 1: for seven in this game. Oh Jannobi goes one for eight,
Speaker 1: Dante Devencenzo goes one for sixteen, Dearon Fox goes five
Speaker 1: for nineteen, Keegan Murray goes three for twelve. Aarizon Bars
Speaker 1: goes five for thirteen. The nick shot forty three percent
Speaker 1: from the field, and one the Kings shot just thirty
Speaker 1: five percent from the field. Now, first of all, before
Speaker 1: we go any further, I love this new brand of
Speaker 1: officiating we're seeing from the NBA for three primary reasons. One,
Speaker 1: it gives the defense as a fighting chance. NBA offenses
Speaker 1: had literally become too hard to guard without allowing some
Speaker 1: sort of physicality. When you give them the amount of
Speaker 1: skill and athleticism that NBA teams have and give them
Speaker 1: so much freedom of movement, it's a lost cause and
Speaker 1: no one's gonna be able to get stopped. So it
Speaker 1: just gives the defensive fighting chance. Second of all, it
Speaker 1: will really help us with evaluating playoff teams because this
Speaker 1: looks more like playoff basketball, and so it'll just help
Speaker 1: us to sort through the nonsense. Again, I love playoff officiating.
Speaker 1: We all do. That's what we want it to be. Like,
Speaker 1: why are we ever allowing a regular season to just
Speaker 1: be different basketball? That should just never be the case.
Speaker 1: And every single year it was freedom of movement and
Speaker 1: tons of scoring and free throws, and then we get
Speaker 1: to the postseason and the game fundamentally changes and that
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense. It makes more sense for it
Speaker 1: to be the same throughout. So to me, it'll help
Speaker 1: us evaluate, but in general, it's just better for the
Speaker 1: league to have a consistency of play style. And then
Speaker 1: three deep down, this is what the players want. It's funny.
Speaker 1: I've been in in like probably a few dozen different
Speaker 1: like men's league things that I've played in in my life,
Speaker 1: since I got done playing in college, and no matter
Speaker 1: where I have been, whether I was in Charlotte, whether
Speaker 1: I was in Phoenix, whether I was in Tucson, I
Speaker 1: remember several times where like multiple players have gone up
Speaker 1: to the officials at certain points in the game or
Speaker 1: before the game had been like hey, like we'd prefer
Speaker 1: it if you guys don't call that much and just
Speaker 1: let us play. Like that's what players want. Basketball players
Speaker 1: want freedom, like freedom to play without the whistle. That's
Speaker 1: what they want. If they had to choose, if players
Speaker 1: had to choose between everything's a foul by the book
Speaker 1: or like discretion and if it's blatant, call it, but
Speaker 1: like keep the flow of the game, every single basketball
Speaker 1: player will choose the latter. That's what they want. It's
Speaker 1: it's a better television product, it's more fun. There's gonna
Speaker 1: be some complaining, Like I've seen a lot of guys
Speaker 1: in the last couple of weeks like driving and missing
Speaker 1: layups and complaining that that's a natural part of it.
Speaker 1: And as a competitor, you want points, so like I
Speaker 1: get it for your team because that's your job, right,
Speaker 1: But like, deep down, this is what the players want.
Speaker 1: It'll help us evaluate the teams better. And it's just
Speaker 1: it gives the defense as a fighting chance more balanced
Speaker 1: to the equation. That's it. The Knicks are just better
Speaker 1: at rockfight basketball than Sacramento is, even without Julius Randall
Speaker 1: and Mitchell Robinson. Their guards are stocky in physical whereas
Speaker 1: the King's guards are more speed oriented. Right, and there
Speaker 1: was not much available at the rim in this game
Speaker 1: because both teams were aggressively helping and digging down and
Speaker 1: just packing the paint. There were one hundred and seventy
Speaker 1: one field goal attempts in this game. Only thirty three
Speaker 1: of them were in the restricted area, and only nineteen
Speaker 1: of those thirty three went in. We had fourteen misses
Speaker 1: in the restricted area. In this game, it became about
Speaker 1: jump shooting, but specifically jump shooting while being tired and
Speaker 1: beat up, which again is a fundamentally different type of
Speaker 1: jump shooting type of game, and the Knicks are just
Speaker 1: better built for that sort of thing. The Knicks took
Speaker 1: fifty five jump shots and got zero point eighty six
Speaker 1: points per shot. The Kings took fifty and they got
Speaker 1: zero point seven to six points per shot. That really
Speaker 1: was the difference of the game. Saw that in the
Speaker 1: pull up shooting two like the two main creators, right,
Speaker 1: Jalen Brunson eight for fifteen on pull up jump shots,
Speaker 1: four for seven on pull up threes. Darren Fox two
Speaker 1: for twelve on pull up jump shots, one for six
Speaker 1: on pull up threes. Huge difference in this game. By
Speaker 1: the way, that's a season long trin. Jalen Brunson's a
Speaker 1: better pull up shooter than Daron Fox has been forever,
Speaker 1: and Darren Fox has taken a leap this year. Best
Speaker 1: pull up shooting a season of his career. Not as
Speaker 1: good as Jalen Brunson, right, Like, that's what you kind
Speaker 1: of expect in that situation. Oh, Jannobi brings a certain physicality.
Speaker 1: Isaiah Hartenstein is a big guy that I wanted to
Speaker 1: spend some time on today. Only had seven points in
Speaker 1: this game, but he had four blocks in his steal,
Speaker 1: fourteen rebounds, including four offensive rebounds, and I thought he
Speaker 1: was a substantially better defensive player in this game than Sabonis.
Speaker 1: It's one of those weird games where like, if you
Speaker 1: look at the box score, Sabonis gets his twenty point
Speaker 1: double double and obviously like it looks like Sibonis was
Speaker 1: the better player. I thought Isaiah Hartenstein like flat out
Speaker 1: outplayed Sabonis in this game. First of all, held Sabonis two,
Speaker 1: just one for five from the field with four turnovers
Speaker 1: in the second half. Had some huge offensive plays at
Speaker 1: the end of the game that curl to that curl
Speaker 1: to Jalen Brunson where he got the and one. I
Speaker 1: put that clip on Twitter, and then he just there's
Speaker 1: big play late where Kings got it to four and
Speaker 1: Hartenstein just drove right through Sabonis's chest and got all
Speaker 1: the way to the rim and made an and one
Speaker 1: layup to put the Knicks back up seven. Like thought,
Speaker 1: I thought he was awesome in this particular game. Held
Speaker 1: up much better defensively in pick and roll too, and
Speaker 1: that's the key, because the Knicks on the other end
Speaker 1: were really torching Sabonis. They got one point three points
Speaker 1: per pick and roll for the entire game, including passes
Speaker 1: that's like off the charts good, that's a one to
Speaker 1: thirty offensive rating, and ball screens. They were torching Sabonis,
Speaker 1: hitting pull ups against him and drop coverage. Obviously Brunson,
Speaker 1: who we've talked a lot about, but even Alec Burks
Speaker 1: got him twice in the fourth quarter, once with a
Speaker 1: floater and once with a pull up jumper, where Sabonis
Speaker 1: was just hanging too far back and not doing enough
Speaker 1: to bother the ball handler. On the other end, Hart
Speaker 1: and segn was just better, had some huge defensive plays
Speaker 1: down the stretch. Held the Knicks as a team held
Speaker 1: Sacramento to zero point nine to six points per ball
Speaker 1: screen and zero point four points per handoff, which is
Speaker 1: obviously a huge part of the King's offense. So like,
Speaker 1: they just did a much better job guarding screening actions
Speaker 1: than the Knicks did. And I want to before we
Speaker 1: put all of it on Sabonis. In Hertenstein, it was
Speaker 1: more diligent work from the guards too. Like, this was
Speaker 1: a good defensive performance from both teams. To be clear,
Speaker 1: all you have to do is look at the box score.
Speaker 1: But the Knicks did make fewer mistakes. There were some
Speaker 1: big late game mistakes from the King's guards defensively. There's
Speaker 1: a big one late where the Kings were up by
Speaker 1: four in the fourth quarter and Boy and Bogdanovitch came
Speaker 1: off of like a pin down and knocked down a three,
Speaker 1: and it was just bad defense from Dearreon Fox. Darren
Speaker 1: Fox was guarding Miles McBride and Malik Monk was guarding
Speaker 1: boy and Bogdanovich, and literally McBride just goes and sets
Speaker 1: a basic little pin screen for Bogdanovich. Bogdanovic comes off
Speaker 1: to the top of the key, Darren Fox is literally
Speaker 1: just standing just standing like right around the foul line,
Speaker 1: not even in a defensive stance. And so when McBride's
Speaker 1: in trail position and kind of gets hit on the
Speaker 1: screen a little bit, the uh, excuse me, When Malik
Speaker 1: Monk is in trail position and kind of gets hit
Speaker 1: on the screen a little bit, boy and mcgdanovitch just
Speaker 1: breaks wide open and knocks down the shot, and it's
Speaker 1: like that's a key mistake in the game. Like that
Speaker 1: the like like cause again in that group, with that
Speaker 1: bench group, especially when it's got Alec Berkson and Boyd mcgdanovic,
Speaker 1: and to Alec Burks and Boyn mcdonovitch's credit, they made
Speaker 1: some plays in that fourth quarter stretch that each had
Speaker 1: a little scoring burst that they went on that helped
Speaker 1: kind of keep things afloat, But like they a lot
Speaker 1: of it was defensive breakdowns. So bonus and drop like
Speaker 1: sitting too far low on that guard guard screening action
Speaker 1: by Darren Fox. Then the late game possession, so there
Speaker 1: was a sequence late where the Kings played really good
Speaker 1: defense on a series of scoring So this was after
Speaker 1: the Knicks one up seven, they got a bunch of
Speaker 1: stops in a row against Jalen Brunson. They were running
Speaker 1: guard guard screens to try to get Kean Ellis, switched
Speaker 1: off of Jalen Brunson to try to get Malik Monk,
Speaker 1: and then occasionally they'd bring Hartenstein in to try to
Speaker 1: get him to go out some bonus where they'd run
Speaker 1: more of a drop. But basically Brunson was operating at
Speaker 1: the top of the key and they were running these
Speaker 1: screening actions. They defended all of them really well, except
Speaker 1: for one, the one where Kean Ellis was going like
Speaker 1: this looking around and Jalen Brunson just waited for him
Speaker 1: to turn his head and then he went off the
Speaker 1: dribble and like I get it, Like Kean Ellis, they
Speaker 1: had been screening him from both sides and so he's
Speaker 1: really just trying to get ahead of whatever that action
Speaker 1: is coming from. But like the ball is the number
Speaker 1: one priority in that situation. So it's like you do
Speaker 1: a really good job most of the game, but just
Speaker 1: some critical mistakes defensively, And like that, by the way,
Speaker 1: is kind of a theme for the Kinks this year.
Speaker 1: They're a team that, as I've talked about all season,
Speaker 1: they're a team that is capable of being very good defensively,
Speaker 1: but it's not their habit, it's not their identity, and
Speaker 1: so too often they slip back into their worst tendencies.
Speaker 1: Biggest sequence of the game it was actually before this play.
Speaker 1: It was eighty four to eighty two, and Nick's got
Speaker 1: the ball and Jalen Brunson curls off of an Isaiah
Speaker 1: Hartenstein dribble handoff and fakes the handoff, and then on
Speaker 1: the back cut there's a tiny, tiny window and Hartenstein
Speaker 1: throws this beautiful bounce pass that hits Brunton instride. He
Speaker 1: gets an and one. They go down to the other
Speaker 1: end and there's a ball screen action for Harrison Barnes
Speaker 1: and Hartenstein blocks him at the rim. So two massive
Speaker 1: plays from Hartenstein. They go down to the other end.
Speaker 1: The Kings play good defense, switch a guard guard screen,
Speaker 1: they get a great contest on a Brunson pull up
Speaker 1: three and he misses it. But right after that Demonas
Speaker 1: Sabonis gets the rebound and throws the ball way too
Speaker 1: far up the floor to Keon. Allison turns it over,
Speaker 1: Nicks bring the ball in bounds. And this is the
Speaker 1: really weird play. Most of the second half on Brunson
Speaker 1: ball screens, they'd been blitzing with Sabonis and it was working.
Speaker 1: Sabonis was applying good ball pressure with his hands, Brunson
Speaker 1: wasn't able to get the ball to the pocket. So
Speaker 1: who's having to throw swing passes. I was actually talking
Speaker 1: about this earlier, like when you apply really good pressure
Speaker 1: and blitzes, the pocket pass isn't open because that they
Speaker 1: just can't get to pass through. And so they were
Speaker 1: forcing Brunson to make swing passes and they were rotating
Speaker 1: out of it pretty well. The blitz was working, and
Speaker 1: then randomly, on this play, Sabonis just sits way back
Speaker 1: in a drop coverage and Brunson just walks right into
Speaker 1: a pull up three and knocks it down. Huge sequence
Speaker 1: in the game, it's a two point game. Hartenstein makes
Speaker 1: a couple of big plays on both ends of the floor.
Speaker 1: Sabonis makes a couple of critical mistakes and suddenly it's
Speaker 1: a seven point game. Also another example of how I
Speaker 1: thought Hartenstein out played Sabonus despite the box score numbers,
Speaker 1: Like just when it came to the big moments of
Speaker 1: the game, the big swing possessions, it was Hartenstein making
Speaker 1: plays and Sabonis making mistakes. That's why I was calling
Speaker 1: that specifically out. Anyway, that run put the Knicks up seven,
Speaker 1: and then they were able to with stand a handful
Speaker 1: of additional shots like Malik Monket a big three in
Speaker 1: the corner that kind of got it close. Biggest takeaways
Speaker 1: from the game, though, shot making and these kinds of
Speaker 1: games is just different. And Darren Fox has become a
Speaker 1: good shot maker, but his advantage is speed, and I
Speaker 1: thought he got a little bit carried away with trying
Speaker 1: to match Jalen Brunson with pull up shooting when Brunson's
Speaker 1: just better than him at that. And so that takes
Speaker 1: me to my second biggest takeaway, which was Fox's shot selection,
Speaker 1: Like he took some really tough pull up twos early
Speaker 1: in the clock when he clearly didn't have that shot
Speaker 1: working for him in this particular game, Like again he
Speaker 1: was two for twelve. I pull up jumpers in this game,
Speaker 1: So like early clock pull up twos that are heavily contested,
Speaker 1: they just don't make sense unless you already are in rhythm,
Speaker 1: which he was not at this point. So the two
Speaker 1: in particular that I wanted to highlight there was a
Speaker 1: spinning jumper on Alec Burks. He had a clear side
Speaker 1: io on the right side of the floor, but tons
Speaker 1: of time, and he just goes into this wild spinning
Speaker 1: jump shot that Alec Burks defends perfectly. And I'm looking
Speaker 1: down and there's fourteen seconds on the shot clock, and
Speaker 1: it's like, why are you taking such a difficult, low
Speaker 1: value pull up two when you haven't been making it
Speaker 1: tonight with fourteen on the shot clock, Like, work for
Speaker 1: something easier first, and then take that if it gets
Speaker 1: into a late clock situation. Later on in the game,
Speaker 1: he takes a step back twenty foot jump shot against
Speaker 1: Jalen Brunson with eighteen seconds on the shot clock, once
Speaker 1: again not in rhythm. Haven't made any attempts to try
Speaker 1: to find something easier already a really tough shot off
Speaker 1: of a dribble combination and some tough footwork. Brunson's right
Speaker 1: there wasn't even great separation and literally you just you
Speaker 1: just took the ball six seconds earlier. And so some
Speaker 1: of that is like it's hard to win games when
Speaker 1: your best player is getting so soundly out executed by
Speaker 1: his counterpart in Jalen Brunson. And that was something that
Speaker 1: really stood up, stood out off the screen yesterday. There
Speaker 1: was a play early in the fourth quarter too, where
Speaker 1: the Kings had no numbers in transition. It was a
Speaker 1: three on five break and Darren Fox drove right into
Speaker 1: boy On mcdonovitch at the rim and just threw up
Speaker 1: a left handed layup that literally missed by several feet.
Speaker 1: It wasn't even close, and it's like it was just
Speaker 1: a tough decision making game from Darren Fox. And honestly, like,
Speaker 1: when I look at Darren Fox this season, and there's
Speaker 1: so much good in terms of his improvement as a
Speaker 1: jump shooter and his confidence in his jump shot, But
Speaker 1: that next step for him is like really identifying what
Speaker 1: the low hanging fruit is for him and capitalizing on
Speaker 1: that stuff to increase his efficiency in treating more of
Speaker 1: this tough shot making thing as a counter rescue possessions.
Speaker 1: When I'm in rhythm kind of thing rather than just
Speaker 1: like a regular part of his shot diet, if that
Speaker 1: makes sense. And then two last two final takeaways, Isaiah
Speaker 1: Hartenstein is just a really good basketball player. And like,
Speaker 1: obviously you want Mitchell Robinson back, but even if they
Speaker 1: just get Julius Randall back and Mitchell Robinson's not able
Speaker 1: to come back, like that is still a deeply talented
Speaker 1: and deeply physically imposing frontline. And I'm really excited to
Speaker 1: see what the Knicks can do in a postseason series.
Speaker 1: And then lastly, like I mentioned earlier, the Kings being
Speaker 1: capable of defending, but it not being their habit. One
Speaker 1: of the reasons why I harp on habits is like
Speaker 1: when games get close late and when the shit hits
Speaker 1: the fan, like when things start to not go right
Speaker 1: for you, you tend to fall back on your habits. Your
Speaker 1: habits are what carry you in those situations. Right. It's
Speaker 1: kind of like if you're if you run into a
Speaker 1: stretch in your personal life, where like you just have
Speaker 1: a ton of stuff going on, like busy calendar with work,
Speaker 1: busy social calendar, and maybe one or two outside circumstances
Speaker 1: that have thrown a ranch into everything. If you are,
Speaker 1: in your daily habits a very efficient time manager. You
Speaker 1: will get through it because you just have these habits
Speaker 1: where it's like, Okay, the shit's hitting the fanel around me,
Speaker 1: but I'm just gonna put my head down and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna work and I'm going to come out on the
Speaker 1: other side of this. Right. But if all that shit
Speaker 1: happens and you have bad time management and efficiency habits,
Speaker 1: that could be what breaks you in a lot of ways, right,
Speaker 1: And like that's kind of the way I feel about
Speaker 1: basketball too. Like when you are the kind of person
Speaker 1: where it is your habit to do these little things well,
Speaker 1: then in a big possession late or in a situation
Speaker 1: where a couple things have gone wrong, your habit will
Speaker 1: be to continue to do those things and it will
Speaker 1: help you regain control of the situation. It is not
Speaker 1: a habit for deer and Fox to be in all
Speaker 1: dee defensive minded player. It is something he can do.
Speaker 1: If I trimmed a dozen clips, I could show you
Speaker 1: a highlight film that shows that Dearon Fox is an
Speaker 1: all defense caliber defender, but in a critical fourth quarter
Speaker 1: possession he can fall asleep. And like that, that, to
Speaker 1: me is is not just a Fox problem. It's a
Speaker 1: down the roster problem for the Kings. They are capable
Speaker 1: of it, but it is not in their identity. It
Speaker 1: is not a habit for them, and so they have
Speaker 1: a tendency to slip back into some of their worst
Speaker 1: tendencies when the shit hits the fan, and I thought
Speaker 1: that game against the Knicks was a big example of that.
Speaker 1: All right, guys, that is all I have for today.
Speaker 1: We'll be back tomorrow. We've got a jam packed Sunday slate,
Speaker 1: so we got a lot of fun games to break
Speaker 1: down tomorrow as well as power rankings. I will see
Speaker 1: you guys then the volume