Speaker 1: The volume NBA fans. The weight is over. Basketball is back.
Speaker 1: In DraftKings Sportsbook, an official sports betting partner of the NBA,
Speaker 1: is celebrating with an unbeatable offer. New customers can score
Speaker 1: two hundred dollars instantly in bonus bets for throwing down
Speaker 1: five dollars on the NBA. Win or lose, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: You'll start the season with an instant dub. And with
Speaker 1: DraftKings parlays, everyone's got a shot at an even bigger
Speaker 1: basketball win. Strain together multiple bets from the same game,
Speaker 1: or build your parlay across multiple games for a shot
Speaker 1: at making your payday even sweeter. Basketball is more fun
Speaker 1: when you're in on the action. Download the Draftking Sportsbook
Speaker 1: AP now and use code hoops. That's hops. New customers
Speaker 1: can get two hundred dollars in bonus bets instantly for
Speaker 1: betting just five dollars only on Draftking Sportsbook with code hoops.
Speaker 1: The crown is yours gambling problem called one eight hundred
Speaker 1: gambler or visit www dot one eight hundred gambler dot
Speaker 1: net in New York call eight seven seven eight hope
Speaker 1: and why or text hope and Why to four six
Speaker 1: seven three sixt nine in Connecticut. Help is available for
Speaker 1: problem gambling called eight eight eight seven eight nine seven
Speaker 1: seven seven seven or visit CCPG dot org. Please play
Speaker 1: responsibly on behalf of Boothill Casino and Resort in Kansas.
Speaker 1: License partner Golden Nugget, Lake Charles and Louisiana twenty one
Speaker 1: plus age varies by jurisdiction. Void in Ontario. Bonus bets
Speaker 1: expire one hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. See
Speaker 1: Sportsbook dot DraftKings dot com, slash Basketball terms for eligibility
Speaker 1: and deposit restrictions, terms and responsible gaming resources. All right,
Speaker 1: welcome to hoops tonight here at the Volume. Happy Thursday, everybody,
Speaker 1: hopefull If you guys are having a great NBA opening week.
Speaker 1: This is the second of three shows tonight for those
Speaker 1: are guys you missed it earlier, we hit two more
Speaker 1: of the league pass games from Wednesday night's slate. We
Speaker 1: hit the Zion Williamson return to the New Orleans Pelicans
Speaker 1: as they went into Memphis and beat the Grizzlies. And
Speaker 1: then we also hit the Cavs NETS game where Donovan
Speaker 1: Mitchell hit the game winners. If you're looking for those,
Speaker 1: you can find them a little bit further back on
Speaker 1: the feed. This video, we're hitting Bucks sixers from the
Speaker 1: perspective of both teams and that officiating fiasco in the
Speaker 1: fourth quarter. And then come back to the feeds later
Speaker 1: tonight we're gonna have a breakdown of Lakers suns as well.
Speaker 1: You guys are the job before we get started. This
Speaker 1: is our brand new YouTube channel. It would mean a
Speaker 1: lot to me if you guys would take a second
Speaker 1: to scroll down and hit that subscribe button as we
Speaker 1: try to get this channel off the ground. Don't forget
Speaker 1: about our podcast feed. Wherever you get your podcast under
Speaker 1: hoops tonight. Follow me on social media Twitter, TikTok, Instagram.
Speaker 1: That's where I'm posting video content, film breakdowns, and show
Speaker 1: announcements throughout the year and the last but out least,
Speaker 1: keep dropping mail back questions and the YouTube comments. We're
Speaker 1: gonna be hitting them at the tail end of shows
Speaker 1: throughout the season as well. All right, let's talk some basketballs.
Speaker 1: So you know, Damian Lillard came into camp. I thought
Speaker 1: a little bit out of shape. He was missing a
Speaker 1: lot of his pull up jump shots short on the
Speaker 1: front of the rim in preseason. Kind of did that
Speaker 1: again tonight until the end. I mean, even that three
Speaker 1: he hit out of pick and roll in the second quarter,
Speaker 1: he left short on the front of the rim, but
Speaker 1: it bounced in. And you know, it's hard to explain
Speaker 1: all of you guys who are heavy duty ball handlers,
Speaker 1: pull up shooters at whatever respective level you play, you
Speaker 1: know that ebb and flow between. Like when you're really
Speaker 1: in a groove and you're in basketball shape and you
Speaker 1: do all the things that you do and you're getting
Speaker 1: good lyft and you have a specific spot where you
Speaker 1: make shots. Usually it's off the back of the rim
Speaker 1: or some people primarily swish when they're locked in right.
Speaker 1: But then like when you have an injury or you
Speaker 1: go on vacation and you come back and you're just
Speaker 1: not quite the type of you know, in rhythm player
Speaker 1: that you're accustomed to being. And I think there's gonna
Speaker 1: be a little bit of a process there that's magnified
Speaker 1: by the fact that you know, he's trying to figure
Speaker 1: out where he fits in in this Bucks team. And
Speaker 1: I mean you could really see it in that first
Speaker 1: quarter and then get in that third quarter. Not enough
Speaker 1: dame way too much Giannis way too much other guys
Speaker 1: getting involved, and you could It's just it's one of
Speaker 1: those things where at the end of the day, especially
Speaker 1: when they get into half court situations, I think the
Speaker 1: more they kind of simplify their offensive hierarchy and lean
Speaker 1: on Damian Lillard, the better, you know. I mean, Jannis
Speaker 1: is at his best when he's in transition. That was
Speaker 1: one of the stories of this game is that he
Speaker 1: really struggled with Joel Embiid's rim protection in the half court,
Speaker 1: but then whenever he got out in transition, good things happen.
Speaker 1: And it's one of those things where like you almost
Speaker 1: want to see this team slot in a way where
Speaker 1: Dame kind of functions as the primary ball handler, Jannis
Speaker 1: operates as basically a ball screen fulkrum and then a
Speaker 1: you know, obviously a mismatch attacker whenever he has an
Speaker 1: opportunity or when Dame's off the floor, you can go
Speaker 1: back into your traditional kind of yanis spearheaded offense, right
Speaker 1: and then from there you want guys playing off the
Speaker 1: ball and you want to lean into that action as
Speaker 1: much as possible. No different than the way the Nuggets
Speaker 1: lean into Jamal Murray and Nikole Jokic as as much
Speaker 1: as possible. Not not only do you want to do
Speaker 1: that in the big picture, but it also will help
Speaker 1: you the more you do it to build chemistry between
Speaker 1: those two. And I mean it was one of those
Speaker 1: things where you can kind of tell in that second
Speaker 1: quarter Dame started to get it going. Now, Nick Nurse
Speaker 1: is famously those are guys who followed the show for
Speaker 1: a while. We talk a lot about Nick Nurse and
Speaker 1: his overly aggressive defensive approach. Tons of ball pressure, tons
Speaker 1: of help. He's gapping, he's in play passing lanes, he's
Speaker 1: trying to force your primary ball handlers to get rid
Speaker 1: of the basketball. And one of the things that the
Speaker 1: Bucks did to counter that in that second quarter was
Speaker 1: just set the ball screen way further out, like thirty
Speaker 1: five feet forty feet away from the basket. It's kind
Speaker 1: of like the inverse of that concept we were talking
Speaker 1: about with Anthony Davison nikola Jokic yesterday. Remember I talked
Speaker 1: about how the closer you get to the rim, your
Speaker 1: angles are off. Imagine the defender is like a square,
Speaker 1: and imagine the basket over here, and your point is
Speaker 1: right here. With the square right the closer you already
Speaker 1: the basket, your driving lanes get kind of flattened out
Speaker 1: to the side. Right when you're further away from the basket,
Speaker 1: there's kind of like more angles for you to go
Speaker 1: around a player, right, And that's the thing Damian Lillard.
Speaker 1: When he beats somebody off the dribble thirty five feet
Speaker 1: from the basket, it doesn't matter how far you're playing
Speaker 1: off a shooter or anything like that. Everything is so
Speaker 1: spaced out at that point that it just gives you
Speaker 1: that much more time to get ahead of steam, to
Speaker 1: make decisions based on how help defenders are reacting. And
Speaker 1: he really got going downhill. And again, like even when
Speaker 1: he was missing his pull up three point shot in
Speaker 1: preseason and missing them early in this game, you know
Speaker 1: he was getting guarded as though he was making those shots, right,
Speaker 1: and so the perfect counter to that is to try
Speaker 1: to get going downhill. He definitely got going towards the
Speaker 1: rim in that second quarter, did hit a pull up
Speaker 1: three short off the front of the rim, but somehow
Speaker 1: still went in in that in that second quarter run right,
Speaker 1: so like gets going, starts to get into the flow.
Speaker 1: Then in that third quarter it kind of felt like
Speaker 1: Dame kind of got uninvolved from the offense again, and
Speaker 1: that's one of those things that I'd like to see
Speaker 1: in the big pictures them just leaning more on Dame now.
Speaker 1: Down the stretch of that game, it was a steady
Speaker 1: diet of Dame and that's exactly what it should be
Speaker 1: more frequently throughout the game. I don't think it's a
Speaker 1: coincidence that the big Bucks runs were that second quarter
Speaker 1: run Dame running the offense and that late fourth quarter
Speaker 1: run Dame running the offense. He's by far your best
Speaker 1: offensive player. He's the guy. He's the reason why you
Speaker 1: made that trade. You didn't make that trade to have
Speaker 1: him functionally operate as Drew Holliday on the offensive end
Speaker 1: of the floor. You brought him in because he's one
Speaker 1: of the best half court shot creators in the NBA,
Speaker 1: in the history of the NBA, and you need to
Speaker 1: lean on that more. And you saw some of the
Speaker 1: upside there right like they ran a horn set down
Speaker 1: the stretch. It was the play I want to say,
Speaker 1: it was the one after the kind of officiating fiasco
Speaker 1: before he got the when he got the three free throws.
Speaker 1: Was after that they run a horn set. Giannis sets
Speaker 1: the screen. PJ. Tucker's guarding Giannis. Why because PJ Tucker's
Speaker 1: a fire hydrant that can kind of contain Giannis's bully
Speaker 1: ball a little bit, right. So on the play, Damian
Speaker 1: Lillard comes off the screen and Giannis rolls hard to
Speaker 1: the front. But those of you guys want to see
Speaker 1: a video of this play, I put it on my
Speaker 1: Twitter feed talking about PJ. Tucker's staying glued to the roller.
Speaker 1: Now again, Yannis brings real role gravity to these situations.
Speaker 1: So again we talked about the two different ways you
Speaker 1: can guard it. Right, If you blit Stame, you give
Speaker 1: the ability for Yannis to work downhill in a four
Speaker 1: on three. If you don't blitz Dame, what's gonna happen?
Speaker 1: If Jannis rolls downhill and PJ. Tucker stays with Yannis
Speaker 1: and Kelly Ubre is in a trail position as he's
Speaker 1: chasing over the top of the screen, Dame's gonna be
Speaker 1: able to get downhill. So in this play, Dame drives
Speaker 1: down the left lane line he sees PJ. Tucker glued
Speaker 1: up to Jannis knows he has an opportunity at the rim.
Speaker 1: By the time PJ. Tucker realizes what's happening in turns
Speaker 1: to contest. It's way too late, and he lays it up.
Speaker 1: I want to say it was the very next possession,
Speaker 1: the ISO three against Kelly Ubre. That's that like top
Speaker 1: tier shot creation, that rescue possession stuff that I always
Speaker 1: talk about. That's the difference between a one to eleven
Speaker 1: offensive rating and a one to nineteen offensive rating. It's
Speaker 1: usually the three or four possessions of game, whether it's
Speaker 1: a late shot clock situation, a late quarter situation, or
Speaker 1: an end of game situation where the defense is locked in,
Speaker 1: nothing's open and you just need your guy to make
Speaker 1: a shot. And Dame hit a dribble combination step back
Speaker 1: three over Kelly Ubray. That was effectively the dagger. And
Speaker 1: again like that's the kind of stuff that you never
Speaker 1: had with this team in the past. Now, this was
Speaker 1: a really ugly game for the Bucks for the most part.
Speaker 1: Yannis struggled mightily with Joel Embiid's rim protection. Again, like,
Speaker 1: that's the thing with Giannis right now, And this is
Speaker 1: why you had to make the Dame trade. I talked
Speaker 1: a lot about after the Dame trade how it was
Speaker 1: an indicator of self awareness for the Bucks front office
Speaker 1: understanding that here we are in the year twenty twenty
Speaker 1: three and kind of like Ad in the Bubble in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty that Giannis playoff run in twenty twenty one
Speaker 1: with free throw shooting kind of looks like it was
Speaker 1: a little bit of a fluke, right. Since then, his
Speaker 1: jump shooting has declined, his free throw shooting has declined.
Speaker 1: Last year, he shot thirty percent on all field goal
Speaker 1: attempts outside of the restricted area. Like Yannis can't shoot
Speaker 1: outside of the paint. You know, he did make a
Speaker 1: big hook shot down the stretch of this game where
Speaker 1: I want to say it was against PJ. Tucker where
Speaker 1: he kind of bullied his way inside and he made
Speaker 1: that little push shot in the lane. That's the one
Speaker 1: I want to see him continue to work on because that,
Speaker 1: to me, should be his over the top shot that
Speaker 1: he goes to. But outside of that one shot, you're
Speaker 1: not really getting anything at the end of this game
Speaker 1: from Yannis in the half court in terms of shot creation.
Speaker 1: He just for what And you know, it's funny because
Speaker 1: with Joel Embiid, he I don't think Joel Embiid is
Speaker 1: a top tier defender. I don't think he's good enough
Speaker 1: on the perimeter, but his immense physical size kind of
Speaker 1: uniquely equips him to deal with the guys like Jannis
Speaker 1: and Nikole Jokic. Like that's what's wild. Like no one
Speaker 1: thinks Joel Embids as good a defender as Anthony Davis,
Speaker 1: but Yannis eats Anthony Davis up, and Nicole Jokic eats
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis up in a lot of cases because he's
Speaker 1: just too damn big, right, And the flip side there
Speaker 1: is like Embiid's just physically capable of absorbing those blows
Speaker 1: and standing his ground, and he gave Yannis a ton
Speaker 1: of trouble at the rim in this game. That's a
Speaker 1: game where you know, if they play the exact same
Speaker 1: way they played but Dame's not out there, they lose
Speaker 1: because Dame is what brings that top tier shot creation
Speaker 1: to the situation. But I mean, this is a super
Speaker 1: encouraging one because it was ugly, the rhythm seemed off
Speaker 1: for the most part. Dame didn't really even know when
Speaker 1: he was supposed to be aggressive outside of the end
Speaker 1: of the game, and he still did Dame shit at
Speaker 1: the end and you won. And so that's what's encouraging
Speaker 1: because over the course of the season that that continuity
Speaker 1: will improve, that hierarchy will be simplified. Those guys will
Speaker 1: know what they're supposed to do on both ends of
Speaker 1: the floor, and they'll look better. This is, for all
Speaker 1: intents and purposes, kind of a new basketball team. When
Speaker 1: you look at guys like Malik Beasley playing a significant role,
Speaker 1: who you know, wasn't all that impactful as a shooter tonight,
Speaker 1: but I thought he was pretty good defensively, if one
Speaker 1: of his better defensive games that I've seen him play.
Speaker 1: And obviously Damian Lillard brings an entirely different vibe to
Speaker 1: this team offensively, So first outing ugly definitely got some
Speaker 1: fortunate whistles in the fourth quarter. But a win is
Speaker 1: a win is a win. Now, I want to talk
Speaker 1: about the the Sixers for a second. I legit feel
Speaker 1: bad for them in this one. You guys know how
Speaker 1: I feel about officiating. I think pretending there's a conspiracy
Speaker 1: is a loser mentality. No one's targeting your favorite player,
Speaker 1: no one's targeting your favorite team. The officials take their
Speaker 1: job very seriously. Yes, of course there's bad apples among
Speaker 1: the officiating community. Guys who have taken it personally or
Speaker 1: that are too invested in them being part of the show.
Speaker 1: But for the most part, the body officials do the
Speaker 1: best they can with the rules that they have to
Speaker 1: kind of interpret those within the game. And usually when
Speaker 1: I see people complaining about officiating or specific types of calls,
Speaker 1: to me, it's more of a big picture issue for
Speaker 1: the entire league rather than targeting your individual team. That said,
Speaker 1: it is very possible for one game to randomly go
Speaker 1: horribly wrong for one team, and I thought this was
Speaker 1: one of those games. I thought there were several key
Speaker 1: calls down the stretch of this game that went directly
Speaker 1: against Philly. That dribble hand off with Kelly ubray or
Speaker 1: they called the offensive foul, Like all he did was
Speaker 1: do a dribble handoff and then keep running in the
Speaker 1: same direction he had been running. An offensive player is
Speaker 1: allowed to run. That's just two players running into each other.
Speaker 1: That's part of the game. When I see calls like that,
Speaker 1: I'm wondering if that official has ever played a basketball
Speaker 1: game in his life. Right down on the other end
Speaker 1: of the floor, Yannis clearly airballs a hook shot and
Speaker 1: then catches his own miss. That's a travel. You can't
Speaker 1: do that. That directly led to the Damian Lillard catch
Speaker 1: and shoot three on the left wing that changed the
Speaker 1: lead in the game. I thought the three point foul
Speaker 1: that Damian Lillard got when Kelly Eubray contested him kind
Speaker 1: of on his left side, that's a bad call. Like
Speaker 1: that's that is a foul, grifty bullshit call. I So
Speaker 1: like I again, the Sixers are not victims here in
Speaker 1: the big picture, but in any sort of one single
Speaker 1: game sample size, it's very possible for just a handful
Speaker 1: of random calls to go against you, And so that
Speaker 1: would be the silver lining if you're the Sixers, is
Speaker 1: like you basically had what I think they counted that d'
Speaker 1: Anthony Milton bank in three at the buzzer, So you
Speaker 1: lost by one, you know, and effectively were within one
Speaker 1: possession for the most part at the end late despite
Speaker 1: getting some rough calls, despite them also dealing with some
Speaker 1: issues in terms of their offensive organization throughout the game.
Speaker 1: This is a team that's used to James Harden setting
Speaker 1: them up for the most part over the course of
Speaker 1: the season in terms of just offensive organization, right, and
Speaker 1: you could tell like it's kind of similar to the
Speaker 1: Dame thing. Like Tyree s Maxey was a little too
Speaker 1: passive early in the game. When he started really looking
Speaker 1: to be aggressive, that's when the Sixers offense took over.
Speaker 1: When mb looked to be aggressive, that's when the Sixers
Speaker 1: offense took over. So like again, they have some stuff
Speaker 1: that they're sorting out to and they had lots of
Speaker 1: encouraging performances right like Joel Embiat's three point shot looks amazing.
Speaker 1: Tyres Maxie still way too damn fast. No one can
Speaker 1: keep him in front off the dribble. Kelly you Bray
Speaker 1: brought a lot of athleticism, point of attack, defense, and
Speaker 1: timely three point shooting to the table. Even Jadon Springer
Speaker 1: had a really interesting kind of perimeter defense sequence in
Speaker 1: that in that first half. So like a lot of
Speaker 1: encouraging stuff for this despite unfortunate circumstances. Again, a win
Speaker 1: is a win is a win. And you could tell
Speaker 1: that the Sixers kind of got down on themselves as
Speaker 1: the calls weren't going their way. But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, if I'm a Sixers fan or a
Speaker 1: Sixers player, I'm feeling pretty good about where we're at
Speaker 1: right now. Because Tyres looks ready. Joel Embiid outplayed Giannis
Speaker 1: in this game. I thought pretty soundly again that ability
Speaker 1: for Mbid to protect the rim against the freaky athletes
Speaker 1: in this league is a real weapon, and so there's
Speaker 1: a lot to be encouraged about for the Sixers. One
Speaker 1: other note, I wanted to hit on the Sixers really quick,
Speaker 1: a very similar thing to what I was talking about
Speaker 1: with Anthony Davis and Nicole Jokic and the transition battle.
Speaker 1: So in the half court, I'll be really curious to
Speaker 1: see the numbers when cleaning the glass updates in the morning.
Speaker 1: But like when Embiid was at the rim, in the
Speaker 1: half court, he had a ton of success slowing down
Speaker 1: the Yannis rim pressure and just in general stalling the
Speaker 1: Milwaukee Bucks half court offense. But there was a key
Speaker 1: play late that you guys might remember, where Embiid drove
Speaker 1: left on brook Lopez and threw up an incredibly difficult,
Speaker 1: kind of like floating bank shot on the left side
Speaker 1: of the rim against brook Lopez that he missed. And
Speaker 1: when he missed, the first thing he did is he
Speaker 1: looked over at the official and he stopped kind of
Speaker 1: in his tracks. Meanwhile, Jannis is barreling down the other
Speaker 1: way for an and one layup, right, And those are
Speaker 1: the kinds of things that now the Philadelphia seventy six
Speaker 1: are similar to the Los Angeles Lakers. They are a
Speaker 1: very good half court defense, but they suck guarding in transition.
Speaker 1: And this all comes down to the Anthony Davis and
Speaker 1: Joel Embid running the floor thing. And that's why like
Speaker 1: those kind of like perimeter based drives where they're slashing
Speaker 1: to the rim and throwing up difficult layups, both of
Speaker 1: them could stand to remove that from their game entirely
Speaker 1: because when they do that, they neither of them are
Speaker 1: particularly great at making those kind of foul grifty shots,
Speaker 1: and when they don't get the call, they're always out
Speaker 1: of position in transition defense. And for both of those teams,
Speaker 1: when they're not at the rim, their defense falls to pieces.
Speaker 1: And so that's just something for them to for both teams,
Speaker 1: but specifically we're talking about the Sixers here to work
Speaker 1: on that specific element of kind of like catering your
Speaker 1: shot selection around floor balance and making sure that embiads
Speaker 1: in a position to get back on defense is an
Speaker 1: important part of them polishing up their transition defense over
Speaker 1: the course of the season, but entertaining game. Bucks got
Speaker 1: the win. Again. When I was talking about the officiating,
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to take away from that. It's part
Speaker 1: of the deal. It's part of the game. Officiating is
Speaker 1: a variable, and if you want to make it so
Speaker 1: that officials cannot determine the outcome of games, you need
Speaker 1: to outplay the other team with enough margin for that
Speaker 1: kind of air. So congrats to the Bucks. Both teams though,
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff to be encouraged about, and a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff for them both to get better at.
Speaker 1: We haven't had Lebron James and Kevin Durant play each
Speaker 1: other in a meaningful basketball game since the twenty eighteen
Speaker 1: NBA Finals, right, Actually, I think it was Christmas Day.
Speaker 1: The following year, twenty nineteen, they played a regular season game.
Speaker 1: At least, that was the last time they played in
Speaker 1: the regular season. It's been a very long time. We
Speaker 1: had a little bit of a teaser with their preseason
Speaker 1: game last week, but both of them did not disappoint
Speaker 1: in this particular game. Kevin Durant thirty nine points, facing
Speaker 1: every single conceivable, ridiculous coverage from the Lakers. They're zoning
Speaker 1: him up on his post ups, meaning they're just having
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis just ignore his man and come over on
Speaker 1: the other side of the block to basically soft double.
Speaker 1: They're trapping him on ball screens, they're ball pressuring him,
Speaker 1: they're outright doubling him in a lot of cases. They
Speaker 1: just throw the kitchen sink at Kevin Durant, with Devin
Speaker 1: Booker and with Bradley Beal out, and yet he still
Speaker 1: puts up thirty nine points on fifty percent shooting, because
Speaker 1: he's the greatest scorer of all time in my opinion.
Speaker 1: And then Lebron James, not to be outdone, takes over
Speaker 1: the game late in the fourth quarter, basically takes the
Speaker 1: keys of the offense as things were falling apart, and
Speaker 1: makes a bunch of key plays down the stretch as
Speaker 1: the Lakers get the win. So I want to dive
Speaker 1: into first Lebron taking control of the offense. Now, there's
Speaker 1: a very specific reason why I feel like he needed to,
Speaker 1: and we're gonna get to that in a minute. But
Speaker 1: about halfway through the fourth quarter, Lebron essentially just takes
Speaker 1: over most of the primary decision making. Right around the
Speaker 1: time Dangel Russell left the game and they brought Reeves
Speaker 1: back into the game. And then immediately Lebron James basically
Speaker 1: does two things. He starts force feeding Ad in the
Speaker 1: post whenever he sees him get a clean look where
Speaker 1: he's got good position and they aren't doubling or three
Speaker 1: quarter front thing or anything like that. Right so you
Speaker 1: saw him feed that, Make that feed to Eric Gordon.
Speaker 1: There's a couple baseline feeds as well. He's feeding Ad
Speaker 1: when he has those post ups. Then secondly, whenever he
Speaker 1: doesn't see an opportunity to get the ball to Ad
Speaker 1: in the post, he's calling Anthony Davis up to set
Speaker 1: a screen so that he can bring Usef Nurkic into
Speaker 1: pick and roll. Now usif Nurkic is a player that
Speaker 1: the Sun's brought in for two reasons. One Deandreyton was
Speaker 1: a malcontent and they had to get him out. He
Speaker 1: wanted to go. They didn't like him anymore, had to go,
Speaker 1: even though he's probably a better player, right useif Nurkic
Speaker 1: is also a better passer in the short role, they
Speaker 1: want for all the times that the Sons are going
Speaker 1: to get two defenders on the ball, they want someone
Speaker 1: who can make decisions in the four on threes in
Speaker 1: the back line. However, Yusif Nurkic is not a good
Speaker 1: rim protector, not a good drop coverage big, and someone
Speaker 1: that Lebron James basically sees food when he's attacking him
Speaker 1: in pick. Now. It started on the right side when
Speaker 1: Lebron actually split the pick and roll Eric Gordon's guarding him.
Speaker 1: He gets the ball screen from Adi and splits the
Speaker 1: action and then goes and makes the layup on the
Speaker 1: right side. But then he hits it two additional times
Speaker 1: in the final two minutes where he attacks Nurkic in
Speaker 1: pick and roll and gets downhill and makes easy layups.
Speaker 1: Lebron is huge, like six foot nine, really long wing
Speaker 1: span two hundred and seventy pounds or whatever the hell
Speaker 1: he is, and so like, as long as he gets
Speaker 1: enough of an angle and he's not going against real
Speaker 1: length that he can struggle with at this phase in
Speaker 1: his career, he's gonna be one of the best rim
Speaker 1: finishers in the NBA. He I haven't seen the numbers
Speaker 1: from this particular game, but he was nine to ten
Speaker 1: from the rim at the rim against the Nuggets. He's
Speaker 1: still one of the very best rim finishers in the
Speaker 1: league when he doesn't see really imposing rim protection. And
Speaker 1: so again there's two different ways to look at that.
Speaker 1: The first side is the Sun's side, essentially like, this
Speaker 1: is what happens when you are a team that desperately
Speaker 1: needs defense and you're investing in a who can't protect
Speaker 1: the rim. But the other side of that is this
Speaker 1: is what smart decision making looks like. We talked about
Speaker 1: this in one of our shows in the last couple
Speaker 1: of days, and I can't even remember which one we
Speaker 1: talked about. The Oh, it was the Mavericks one. We
Speaker 1: were talking about Luca and Kyrie. When you get to
Speaker 1: the end of games, it's a decision making sport. It's
Speaker 1: all about like identifying where your best advantages are, making
Speaker 1: the right reads from there, and then your talent carrying
Speaker 1: you over the top. At the end of games, physicality
Speaker 1: increases and the whistle gets swallowed. They're gonna probably switch
Speaker 1: most actions. Obviously you can't switch nur kitchen pick and roll,
Speaker 1: but they're gonna do a lot more switching and your
Speaker 1: off ball stuff, so you're not gonna get as easy
Speaker 1: looks there. It just in general is gonna get harder
Speaker 1: to do anything, and so you have to have a
Speaker 1: really smart basketball mind running the show for you that
Speaker 1: can identify where the weak point is and then attack
Speaker 1: that weak point consistently. For instance, like the Suns down
Speaker 1: the stretch kept trying to get Austin Reeves onto Kevin
Speaker 1: Durant in isolation situations. Now the Lakers Counterdap by basically
Speaker 1: just doubling and trapping him every single time. Right. But again,
Speaker 1: like Kd's identifying, this is my weak point, Osiris is
Speaker 1: probably my best chance to score. I'm trying to attack there, right,
Speaker 1: That's what Lebron's doing. On the other end. Nurkic is
Speaker 1: my weak point. I gotta get Nurkic into this action
Speaker 1: so that I can get downhill and make easy things
Speaker 1: happen at the rim for the Lakers. Now, what's interesting
Speaker 1: is we completely changed the whole narrative surrounding the minutes restriction.
Speaker 1: I'm looking up the minutes right now because I can't
Speaker 1: remember exactly, but he only played like, what twenty nine
Speaker 1: minutes in the Nuggets game tonight. He plays thirty five minutes,
Speaker 1: And you know it's funny. Ryan, the lead producer of
Speaker 1: the show shout out to Ryan. He just had his
Speaker 1: first kid, He just became a dad. Ryan said that
Speaker 1: he was shocked, utterly shocked that Lebron's minute restriction only
Speaker 1: lasted one day. And you know what's funny is is like,
Speaker 1: I genuinely believe they want to do that, and I
Speaker 1: also believe that as much as Lebron enjoys playing that
Speaker 1: he would be on with that. I've actually advocated after
Speaker 1: the Tuesday game. I think it'd be good for Lebron
Speaker 1: because Lebron has a tendency when you play him thirty five,
Speaker 1: thirty six minutes a night, to have extended stretches where
Speaker 1: he kind of coasts through games, and that's just not
Speaker 1: good that can now, honestly, like Lebron at this phase
Speaker 1: in his career, when he's not engaged, can actually sometimes
Speaker 1: hurt his team a little bit with when he's when
Speaker 1: he's being lazy. And so I kind of like the
Speaker 1: idea of playing basically four seven minute shifts, or I
Speaker 1: guess they actually kind of break it up so he
Speaker 1: plays three shifts a half, but call that, you know,
Speaker 1: three five minute shifts, three four minute shifts a half.
Speaker 1: I almost like the idea of him doing that sort
Speaker 1: of thing and then like just playing really freaking hard
Speaker 1: for those five minute shifts, because he can be deeply
Speaker 1: impactful still at this phase in his career when he's
Speaker 1: engaged in focused and actually giving his shit on both
Speaker 1: ends of the floor. But the reality is is they're
Speaker 1: never going to actually be able to do that until
Speaker 1: they can be a functional basketball team when he's not
Speaker 1: on the floor. Now, as we know, they were a
Speaker 1: functional basketball team when he wasn't on the floor. Towards
Speaker 1: the tail end of last season. We saw that a
Speaker 1: post deadline when Lebron missed a bunch of time, and
Speaker 1: we saw that in the playoffs. But so far this year,
Speaker 1: through two games, the Lakers are plus twenty nine when
Speaker 1: Lebron James is on the floor in minus thirty six
Speaker 1: when he's off the floor, And so that dynamic needs
Speaker 1: to be fixed in some way, shape or form, or
Speaker 1: they're never going to be able to really cut Lebron's
Speaker 1: minutes down to twenty eight per game. Now, the question
Speaker 1: is why are the Lakers struggling so much with Lebron
Speaker 1: James off the floor so far through two games. I
Speaker 1: think it comes down to a couple of different things.
Speaker 1: There's basically two main things that I want to hit here.
Speaker 1: One is one that we've talked about at length already
Speaker 1: in two separate videos on the show, which is the
Speaker 1: convoluted nature of the ball handling situation, which is like
Speaker 1: way too much Gabe Vincent, way too much D'Angelo Russell,
Speaker 1: nowhere near enough Austin Reeves, Lebron, James Anthony Davis, the
Speaker 1: three players who are actually the best players on your team.
Speaker 1: And so as you kind of lean more on inferior players,
Speaker 1: it hurts you in two ways. The inferior players are
Speaker 1: going to make inferior plays, and then your three main
Speaker 1: players are going to be out of rhythm. And that's
Speaker 1: kind of like the tradeoff that happens there. And so
Speaker 1: as I would like to see the Lakers in the
Speaker 1: long run simplify that order of operations, lean more on
Speaker 1: Austin and Lebron as their primary ball handlers, lean more
Speaker 1: on Anthony Davis in the post, try to find ways
Speaker 1: to keep those guys in rhythm and then kind of
Speaker 1: put Gay, Vincent and Dangelo Russell where they can still
Speaker 1: be deeply impactful, which is off the ball. Now. The
Speaker 1: second big problem is and the reason why when even
Speaker 1: this applies to Austin as well, although I think Austin
Speaker 1: is better at it than both d Lo and Gabe.
Speaker 1: But Dlo and Gabe are both skill guards. Neither of
Speaker 1: them are above at even average NBA athletes. They're both
Speaker 1: below average NBA athletes. Austin is also a below average
Speaker 1: NBA athlete, but he's shifty and actually good at beating
Speaker 1: people off the dribble and getting downhill pressure, and so
Speaker 1: he's a little bit better in that regard. But when
Speaker 1: you have the ball running through Gabe in D'Angelo Russell,
Speaker 1: they're not really beating people off the dribble with a
Speaker 1: lot of pace and downhill force, and so what happens
Speaker 1: is they're not getting the defense into rotation because they're
Speaker 1: not actually collapsing the defense. If they're not actually collapsing
Speaker 1: the defense, then you're not getting high quality kickout opportunities
Speaker 1: for your skilled players. If you're not getting high quality
Speaker 1: kickout opportunities for your skilled players, now they're attacking against
Speaker 1: a set defense. If they're attacking against a set defense,
Speaker 1: then their athleticisms shortcomings rise to the surface. As you
Speaker 1: see guys like Jordan Goodwin and Eric Gordon and Joshakogi
Speaker 1: hold them in place on the perimeter as they struggle
Speaker 1: to generate quality looks. No big secret that in the
Speaker 1: fourth quarter when they started running everything through Lebron in
Speaker 1: Austin and Ad in the late fourth quarter, that was
Speaker 1: when they started to get real downhill pressure. That was
Speaker 1: when they started to get higher quality looks. Right, and
Speaker 1: again you start to imagine a better basketball team. It's
Speaker 1: one of those things where if it's not Nurkic, it's
Speaker 1: higher quality defensive players, it'll be a little more complicated. Right.
Speaker 1: Lebron's not just gonna be able to drive down the
Speaker 1: lane for layups, but he's gonna be able to drive
Speaker 1: down the lane and generate high quality close out opportunities.
Speaker 1: And that's the thing. Like Dangela Russell is capable of
Speaker 1: being a very good off ball player, so is Gabe Vincent.
Speaker 1: So I'd like to see them simplify the order of operations,
Speaker 1: get the ball in the hands of their better players
Speaker 1: more frequently. And then that second part, that's a roster deficiency.
Speaker 1: It's a problem that only Lebron, James and Anthony Davis
Speaker 1: can consistently generate rim pressure and Austin Reeves right now
Speaker 1: is your best guard at generating rim pressure, and he's
Speaker 1: getting the fewest on ball touches of all your guards.
Speaker 1: This is where the absence of Dennis Schroeder becomes an issue.
Speaker 1: As much as we talk about Dennis Schroder in his shortcomings,
Speaker 1: because he wasn't as good off the ball and obviously
Speaker 1: as good as he was as a ball pressure guard,
Speaker 1: he was also a little bit undersized and that could
Speaker 1: cause problems. What Dennis Shruder could do is beat people
Speaker 1: off the dribble and get the defense into rotation, which
Speaker 1: could get the Laker offense moving. And so again, like
Speaker 1: you know, we've talked a lot about potential D'Angelo Russell
Speaker 1: trades over the course of the seas. This is why
Speaker 1: I've pitched things like, hey, packaged D'anngela Russell with Ruby
Speaker 1: hatcha Mura at the deadline for some sort of higher
Speaker 1: level athlete on the perimeter that can slash and generate
Speaker 1: real rim pressure and guard and knock down threes. The
Speaker 1: reason why I've talked about that is simply because right
Speaker 1: now you have a redundancy. You have three skill guards,
Speaker 1: Austin Reeves, d Angela Russell and Gabe Vincent Austin is
Speaker 1: effectively the same type of player as d Lo, just
Speaker 1: a better version of him. So it doesn't make sense
Speaker 1: to have your backcourt with two kind of redundant similar players.
Speaker 1: It might be fine over the course of the regular season,
Speaker 1: but you're gonna run into bad matchups whenever they run
Speaker 1: into super athletic guards KCP and Jamal Murray. Jamal Murray's
Speaker 1: not super athletic, but he's super strong, KCP is a
Speaker 1: freak athlete, Jordan Goodwin and Josha Kogi. When they run
Speaker 1: into those types of matchups, they're gonna have a lot
Speaker 1: of problems. Now Again, like I was, even if this
Speaker 1: Lakers had lost this game, I wouldn't have been like, oh,
Speaker 1: they're gonna miss the play. I still think this team's
Speaker 1: gonna win fifty games. They just have too much talent,
Speaker 1: but they do have that specific weakness and bad court athleticism,
Speaker 1: and as often as they run into athletic backcourts, they're
Speaker 1: gonna have problems, especially when those guys are running the show.
Speaker 1: And so I would look at it as like a
Speaker 1: consolidation type of move. At the deadline, I would look
Speaker 1: to move D'Angelo Russell with Ruey Hachamura, to bring in
Speaker 1: some more athleticism in the backcourt, to bring in somebody
Speaker 1: who can do some more slashing, to help get the
Speaker 1: defense in rotation more often so that they can get
Speaker 1: higher quality looks for their skilled players. And again, like,
Speaker 1: it's not a now problem, it's a February problem. But
Speaker 1: this is why you have to look at that as
Speaker 1: an option for the record. This isn't something that I'm
Speaker 1: like conceiving out of thin air. I would imagine if
Speaker 1: you talk to all the parties involved, D'Angelo Russell's agent,
Speaker 1: Rob Polenka, you know, Lebron, James, Darvin Ham all that
Speaker 1: they all probably know that this is kind of like
Speaker 1: a temporary sort of situation. It was the best way
Speaker 1: to get D'Angelo Russell the money that he wanted, and
Speaker 1: it's gonna end with him inevitably getting moved when they
Speaker 1: get to the deadline. But at the bottom line is
Speaker 1: until they sort all those problems out and get to
Speaker 1: the point where they can be functional the way they
Speaker 1: were without Lebron at the end of the at the
Speaker 1: end of last season, they're never gonna be able to
Speaker 1: cut his minutes last year. It was outstanding defense, hillacious
Speaker 1: defense combined with Dennis Schroeder's rim pressure with Austin Reeves
Speaker 1: is the perfect complimentary guard, and Anthony Davis playing at
Speaker 1: an MVP level down the stretch of the season. That's
Speaker 1: how they won games without Lebron, and right now they're
Speaker 1: not capable of replicating that when Lebron's off the floor.
Speaker 1: They're gonna have to figure that out if they're gonna
Speaker 1: keep his minutes down. I was really impressed by the
Speaker 1: Laker defense they allowed. You can kind of see how
Speaker 1: the flow of this game went. They went up seven
Speaker 1: to zero to start the game, came out guns blazing
Speaker 1: right then they immediately relax. Suns jump them the rest
Speaker 1: of the first quarter. They go up double figures. Right
Speaker 1: then the Lakers lock in. In the second quarter, they fight,
Speaker 1: They only allowed twenty two points. They make it a game.
Speaker 1: It's fifty two to forty eight at halftime. Right then
Speaker 1: they come out in the third quarter and they start
Speaker 1: bullshitting again. The Suns build a big lead. Then you
Speaker 1: go into that fourth quarter, desperation kicks in and suddenly
Speaker 1: the Lakers allow eleven points, which is what they should
Speaker 1: have been doing all game when you really factor in
Speaker 1: the fact that Kevin Durant was the only player on
Speaker 1: the Suns that was capable of really consistently getting to
Speaker 1: his spots and making plays. A lot of the other
Speaker 1: guys that were succeeding it was hustle related. It was
Speaker 1: either like Eric Gordon or Joshakogi or Jordan Goodwin just
Speaker 1: bullying the smaller, less athletic Laker guards. Or it was
Speaker 1: like crashing the offensive glass when guys weren't playing hard,
Speaker 1: getting out in transition, all of that kind of stuff, right,
Speaker 1: and so again, like they were capable of strangling the
Speaker 1: Sun's offense really at any point they wanted to, but
Speaker 1: they were bullshitting too often. But I was impressed by
Speaker 1: the amount of effort they put in that fourth quarter
Speaker 1: to put them away. I thought Christian Wood playing in
Speaker 1: the closing lineup was super interesting. He Again, what did
Speaker 1: I say after the Christian Wood signing. I agree, he's
Speaker 1: a bad defensive player. That's pretty much proven over the
Speaker 1: course of his NBA career. Right, However, if you look
Speaker 1: at the highlights, what is the first thing I do?
Speaker 1: Every single time a team signs a player. It's not
Speaker 1: just the Lakers it's everybody. I start scouting them, and
Speaker 1: I watched hundreds of possessions of Christian Wood defending in
Speaker 1: pick and roll, and there were a lot of ugly
Speaker 1: ones in there, but you know what else, there was
Speaker 1: a lot of really good ones. You know why, because
Speaker 1: Christian Wood has really good physical tools and he's actually
Speaker 1: capable of being an impact defensive player when he's in shape,
Speaker 1: when he's engaged, when he's focused right, And so you
Speaker 1: kind of saw that by giving him a really dedicated job, like, hey, Chase,
Speaker 1: Kevin dran around on these screens. As soon as the
Speaker 1: ball screen comes, we're going to like offer immediate, strong,
Speaker 1: hard help or even double in some cases. So just
Speaker 1: use your length to bother him. At that point. It
Speaker 1: was an easy job and Christian Wood excelled at it.
Speaker 1: And what was interesting is I think he was only
Speaker 1: like two for seven or two for nine from the field.
Speaker 1: He didn't have a good offensive game, but he did
Speaker 1: his job defensively and he secured a bunch of huge
Speaker 1: contested rebounds. That's one of his individual gifts. He's good
Speaker 1: at high pointing the ball and he's a very long
Speaker 1: athletic player, and so when he goes for you know,
Speaker 1: contested rebounds. He's capable of out jumping everybody. But I
Speaker 1: thought he played a huge role in that defensive flurry
Speaker 1: for the Lakers in the fourth because when you put
Speaker 1: him out there with Gabe, Vincent and Austin and Lebron
Speaker 1: and Ad, they're kind of a huge team, and like
Speaker 1: Gabe gives you that traditional kind of ball pressure guard look,
Speaker 1: and then you have three dudes that are six nine
Speaker 1: or taller and really athletic, and you're gonna get a
Speaker 1: lot of You're gonna make a lot of defensive players
Speaker 1: and get a lot of defensive rebounds. In that situation,
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis kind of on the back burner tonight was
Speaker 1: freaking unbelievable. Thirty points, thirteen rebounds, three blocks, and three steals.
Speaker 1: How about that six stocks in this game? I thought
Speaker 1: he was unbelievably good defensively in that fourth quarter, just
Speaker 1: flying around, grabbing contested rebounds, guarded KD on a bunch
Speaker 1: of key possessions. Watching those Kdad one on one face
Speaker 1: offs are actually pretty wild because it's like it's like
Speaker 1: you're watching two NBA two K created players playing in
Speaker 1: the post against each other. I thought Anthony Davis was fantastic. Again,
Speaker 1: Usually you don't look at the box score with ad
Speaker 1: because his defensive impact goes so far beyond that. But
Speaker 1: when you get that defensive impact in the thirty thirteen
Speaker 1: with three blocks and three steals, that's an MVP level
Speaker 1: performance out of Anthony Davis as well. I wanted to
Speaker 1: shout I just wanted to make sure that we gave
Speaker 1: him his shout out because just because Lebron took over
Speaker 1: at the end of the game, again, in the big
Speaker 1: picture of what's happening down the stretch there, Anthony Davis
Speaker 1: is still controlling the game defensively. On the Sun's front,
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant is literally amazing. I've just completely blown away
Speaker 1: by him. Like, how many players could you put in
Speaker 1: a situation like that with that group of role players
Speaker 1: and have a realistic chance to defeat a team as
Speaker 1: good as the Lakers are on the road. I mean,
Speaker 1: even though the Lakers didn't play particularly well in this
Speaker 1: game for the most part, I still thought it was
Speaker 1: an incredibly impressive performance. Really, the only knock was the
Speaker 1: eight turnovers, but I thought he ran out of gas
Speaker 1: and you could tell just towards the end of the
Speaker 1: game like he's just he's having to create every single
Speaker 1: possession for them, and he's still, in spite of all
Speaker 1: of that, had them with the one had a free
Speaker 1: throw to potentially give them a one point lead late,
Speaker 1: which he missed. I thought he was incredible. Again, the
Speaker 1: Nurkic on defense piece is something they're gonna have to
Speaker 1: keep an eye on when you have him operating in
Speaker 1: drop coverage. Guys are just gonna see food. They're not
Speaker 1: gonna see him as someone who really bothers them at
Speaker 1: the rim. And so yeah, like Lebron at this phase
Speaker 1: in his career is still capable, but there are even
Speaker 1: there are several better pick and roll ball handlers that
Speaker 1: they're gonna face at various points over the course of
Speaker 1: the season, especially guys that can beat people off the dribble.
Speaker 1: And I'm pretty concerned about Nurkic anchoring a defense even
Speaker 1: with Frank Vogel at the helm. But I want to
Speaker 1: shout out I want to shout out the Suns in
Speaker 1: general for just how good they look at this point
Speaker 1: in the season. In specific areas they've hit on some
Speaker 1: betteran minimum signings. I thought Jordan Goodwin, it was fantastic
Speaker 1: tonight when you kind of pair him with Joshakogi at
Speaker 1: every single phase of the game, you just have this
Speaker 1: kind of bulldog, small but a short, somewhat short wing
Speaker 1: that's just freakishly strong, that is more athletic than most
Speaker 1: of the other guards that they're going to play, that
Speaker 1: can apply physical ball pressure, which is such an important
Speaker 1: element of any Frank Vogel at defense in general, I've
Speaker 1: just been impressed with their overall commitment and competitiveness and
Speaker 1: they're just gonna win a lot of damn games when
Speaker 1: they get their group together and healthy. Obviously, that's the question.
Speaker 1: Devin Booker's experiencing pain in the middle of his foot.
Speaker 1: That's always concerning. Stress injuries can be a problem, so
Speaker 1: you have to manage that with rest, which can cause
Speaker 1: problems with the rhythm and kind of continuity of your
Speaker 1: roster as well. And Bradley Beal's dealing with back issues.
Speaker 1: Those are never fun right. So again, like there's some
Speaker 1: question marks surrounding the team, but the main question marks
Speaker 1: at this point for me are injuries and the rim
Speaker 1: protection of use of Nurkic. I actually do think with
Speaker 1: Frank Vogel and what they have in athletes surrounding their core.
Speaker 1: They are capable of defending at a high enough level.
Speaker 1: They just might have to consider making some sort of
Speaker 1: move at the deadline for a better rim protector to
Speaker 1: put alongside these guys. All right, that's all I have
Speaker 1: for tonight. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys supporting
Speaker 1: the show. Nothing going on during the day tomorrow. I
Speaker 1: will be breaking down the Friday Night slate on Saturday morning, though,
Speaker 1: so keep an eye on the feeds. On Saturday. The
Speaker 1: volume