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Speaker 1: responsible gaming resources. All right, welcome to hoopsonight here at
Speaker 1: the Volume having Monday. Everybody, Oh ball, If you guys
Speaker 1: are having an incredible week, Well, we just got an
Speaker 1: absolutely unbelievable basketball game, and we're gonna be breaking down
Speaker 1: Lakers Nuggets as well as Nick Sixers. Man. I had
Speaker 1: to take a few minutes after that one just to
Speaker 1: kind of soak it all in. That was literally unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Before we even get into the show, I just want
Speaker 1: to say I am so happy for Nuggets fans because
Speaker 1: that is a truly special basketball team you have there,
Speaker 1: And as heart wrenching as that was for myself and
Speaker 1: for so many Lakers fans out there, I'm sure it
Speaker 1: was the exact opposite in a good way for all
Speaker 1: of you Nuggets fans. And again, like this is just
Speaker 1: the beginning too. I think this team is gonna be
Speaker 1: around for a long time, and I think they're gonna
Speaker 1: win a lot of basketball games in multiple championships, and
Speaker 1: so tonight is like one of those special kind of
Speaker 1: like checkpoints along the way in that journey. So I
Speaker 1: just want to say that I'm happy for you Nuggets
Speaker 1: fans because, like, man, what a special basketball team you
Speaker 1: guys are. The joefore we get started. Subscribe to a
Speaker 1: brand new YouTube channel so you don't miss any more
Speaker 1: of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at underscore jcnlt
Speaker 1: so you guys don't misshow announcements as well as the
Speaker 1: film threads that I do from time to time. Don't
Speaker 1: forget podcast feed wherever you get your podcast on our
Speaker 1: Hoops tonight. No, that's not least, keep dropping mail back
Speaker 1: questions in those YouTube comments so we can keep hitting
Speaker 1: them throughout the rest of this week. All right, Paul,
Speaker 1: my producer, has been telling me, you guys in the
Speaker 1: chat are bringing your a game with the trash talk.
Speaker 1: I love it. Keep it coming. We're gonna get into it.
Speaker 1: I want to start by just saluting all the players
Speaker 1: in this game, the stars in particular, because all four
Speaker 1: of them gave us just unbelievable nights. Lebron James at
Speaker 1: age thirty nine, you can tell he wants this so bad.
Speaker 1: Remember last year in the postseason, it was his inability
Speaker 1: to hit shots over the top that was a big
Speaker 1: factor in their late game execution struggles. And he went
Speaker 1: into the lab all summer long and he worked on
Speaker 1: his jump shot, and he came back and had the
Speaker 1: best jump shooting season of his career. And here in
Speaker 1: this environment when he desperately needed to make some shots,
Speaker 1: he hit three four actually massive jump shots in the
Speaker 1: fourth quarter, left it all out there on the floor,
Speaker 1: gave his everything on the defensive end of the floor.
Speaker 1: I had multiple big time swing plays down the stretch,
Speaker 1: and he got a loss out of it. And so
Speaker 1: you know, here's the thing. He's one of the all
Speaker 1: time greats. He's not going to be around much longer.
Speaker 1: And that fight that you just saw from that guy
Speaker 1: at thirty nine years old, that's the reason why he's
Speaker 1: had the success he's had in his career. It didn't
Speaker 1: happen on accident. It's because he's wired the way that
Speaker 1: he's wired. Anthony Davis, this is the guy who's gotten
Speaker 1: his ass kicked by Jokich at every single turn or
Speaker 1: for years now, and he went right at him in
Speaker 1: this game and had one of his best scoring games
Speaker 1: of his career. Actually forced the I should say in
Speaker 1: terms of efficiency, because he makes fourteen out of his
Speaker 1: first fifteen shots. He actually forced Denver to make an adjustment,
Speaker 1: which is something substantial adjustment, which is something they hadn't
Speaker 1: had to do for the most part over the course
Speaker 1: of these two series. To this point, I thought he
Speaker 1: was amazing up int till the end of the game
Speaker 1: when he got into some foul trouble Nikole Jokich again,
Speaker 1: ad going right at him all game. By the way
Speaker 1: that happens in the NBA. Sometimes a guy that you
Speaker 1: know that's not as good as you gets on a
Speaker 1: heater and makes a bunch of shots, and he was
Speaker 1: defended relatively well, just forcing Ad into his weakness, which
Speaker 1: is over the top shot making. That's something that for
Speaker 1: the most part over the last four years has been
Speaker 1: a weak point of his and he just stepped up
Speaker 1: and knocked down shots. That's that that you kind of
Speaker 1: just have to tip the cap. But you know what
Speaker 1: Jokic did, grabbed twenty something rebounds and down the stretch
Speaker 1: of the game, took Ad into his office there on
Speaker 1: the right block and gave him bucket after bucket as
Speaker 1: the Nuggets walked down the Lakers and then finally Jamal
Speaker 1: Murray struggled really for what the first seven quarters of
Speaker 1: this series. Shout out to Austin Reeves, a guy that
Speaker 1: you know, it's kind of gotten lost in the in
Speaker 1: the offensive surge from the Lakers over the course of
Speaker 1: the last like three four but Austin Reeves has been
Speaker 1: forced to take some high leverage point of attack assignments,
Speaker 1: and he's been really good for a couple of months now,
Speaker 1: and he did an amazing job on Jamal Murray over
Speaker 1: the course of the first three quarters of this game. Honestly,
Speaker 1: if there's something that you could kind of nitpick with
Speaker 1: the Lakers down the stretch, I thought they got a
Speaker 1: little cute in their coverages and probably should have left
Speaker 1: Austin on Austin on Jamal because Jamal was able to
Speaker 1: shake free from Lebron and Ad down the stretch for
Speaker 1: pull up jump shots. But Jamal Murray nightmare seven quarters,
Speaker 1: nightmare seven quarters, and he just completely takes over the
Speaker 1: game down the stretch in its massive shot after massive shot,
Speaker 1: all contested, all absolutely necessary for them to win the game.
Speaker 1: So again, I just want to tip the cap to
Speaker 1: all four of those guys because we get that amazing product,
Speaker 1: that unbelievable basketball game that we saw because of the
Speaker 1: supreme competitive energy that you get from four of the
Speaker 1: very best players in this world. I think Jamal Murray
Speaker 1: is a top ten playoff player in the world. I
Speaker 1: think Lebron has been the third best player in the
Speaker 1: league since the All Star Break, behind Jokich and Luka Doncic.
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis showed you tonight how he's capable of playing
Speaker 1: like a top tier superstar when he's at his best,
Speaker 1: and Nikola Jokic is the bona fide, undisputed best player
Speaker 1: in the world, and we got to watch them all
Speaker 1: tonight have massive moments in a big time playoff game.
Speaker 1: That was just fun as a basketball fan. Again, Like
Speaker 1: it's crazy because I had to as I was invested
Speaker 1: in that as a fan watching right and and like
Speaker 1: down the stretch of that game, it's like it just feel.
Speaker 1: It just felt like Denver was coming, and they were coming,
Speaker 1: and the Lakers kept throwing the jab and trying to
Speaker 1: hold them off, and then they just couldn't get that
Speaker 1: one stop that they needed. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: the Nuggets scored on eight of their last nine possessions
Speaker 1: in this game, and with exception of that chaotic sequence
Speaker 1: where there was the transition kick ahead passage. By the way,
Speaker 1: this gets lost in the shuffle of all this, the
Speaker 1: Nuggets every single time the Lakers would make or miss
Speaker 1: a layup, but even after makes they were looking to
Speaker 1: push and Lebron gets downhill and he makes that layup
Speaker 1: to put the Lakers up three. They immediately get the
Speaker 1: ball in bounds and whip it down the floor, and
Speaker 1: it was kind of a dangerous sequence because Austin Ryes
Speaker 1: almost broke the play up, but Aaron Gordon saves it
Speaker 1: in bounds and swings it back to Michael Porter Junior.
Speaker 1: D Loo comes back into the play and gets a
Speaker 1: nice rearview can tested the last second, but just bottoms
Speaker 1: from Michael Porter Junior to tie the game. With exception
Speaker 1: of that shot, all of the other eight buckets that
Speaker 1: the Nuggets scored on their last nine possessions or Jokichen Murray,
Speaker 1: Jokic cooking Ad on the block and hitting easy shots
Speaker 1: off offensive rebounds, and he hit I think he hit
Speaker 1: a little jumper at the right elbow if I remember
Speaker 1: correctly as well, and then Jamal Murray just doing what
Speaker 1: he does again, like we get it gets lost in
Speaker 1: the shuffle of the Jokic storyline. But like as much
Speaker 1: as Jokich is this like deadly accurate shot maker around
Speaker 1: on the rim, and he is, like he's a high
Speaker 1: sixty percent guy when he gets within you know, seven
Speaker 1: eight feet from the rim. Jabal Murray shoots forty six
Speaker 1: percent on pull up jump shots this year. Not effective
Speaker 1: field goal percentage, not weighted for threes field goal percentage.
Speaker 1: Like he makes half of them. That's what he does.
Speaker 1: He makes half of them, and so that means, yeah,
Speaker 1: he might have stretching the game, and he had plenty
Speaker 1: of them over the first seven quarters where he misses
Speaker 1: three four in a row, but he's absolutely capable of
Speaker 1: going ahead and making three four in a row, and
Speaker 1: he made three or four in a row there at
Speaker 1: the end of the game. I thought Lebron and Ad
Speaker 1: got solid contests on the last two, but not as
Speaker 1: good as they could have gotten out that they were
Speaker 1: both super fatigued. And that's the problem. Like you know,
Speaker 1: and this is kind of to kind of tilted back
Speaker 1: towards the Lakers for a second, Like this is the
Speaker 1: problem with having a team where your core five players
Speaker 1: Ruey Austin and Di Loo can't engage physically on the
Speaker 1: level that KCP Aaron Gordon can't. Right, So the problem
Speaker 1: is Lebron and Ad, your two best players, are also
Speaker 1: your most physically imposing players. And so if you're gonna
Speaker 1: do something like slow down that massive Denver Nuggets front line,
Speaker 1: you need Lebron James and Anthony Davis to bring chaotic,
Speaker 1: unrelenting defensive energy. And they did. I want to shout
Speaker 1: those guys out. They did a really nice job in
Speaker 1: this game, and then they ran out of gas. And
Speaker 1: that's why AD went cold down the stretch. That's why
Speaker 1: Lebron could barely make a layup in that third quarter,
Speaker 1: and that's why down the stretch of the game, AD
Speaker 1: and Lebron were on their heels defensively against Jamal Murray.
Speaker 1: And again, this is a team build thing, Like the
Speaker 1: reality we can talk about this all we want. The
Speaker 1: Nuggets in crunch time and two games against the Lakers
Speaker 1: in the regular season had an offensive rating over one ninety. Okay,
Speaker 1: you gave up a bucket on eight of your last
Speaker 1: nine possessions. This is not like a You're close to
Speaker 1: being able to guard Denver's late game offense. No, you're
Speaker 1: fucking hopeless. You you cannot stop them. And and that
Speaker 1: is one hundred percent on the team building. That's on
Speaker 1: a Rob Polinka. They knew after last year's series that
Speaker 1: they did not have a starting caliber defender to throw
Speaker 1: on Jamal Murray. They knew they didn't have one. They
Speaker 1: knew it right after the Nuggets series. Oh shit, Dennis
Speaker 1: Charter's too small. That's not gonna work. They need somebody.
Speaker 1: They needed to go get a bigger guard, a guard
Speaker 1: who could defend but also stay on the floor offensively
Speaker 1: and be like a fuck. That's why I say, that's
Speaker 1: what I mean. Want to say starting caliber, Right, anybody
Speaker 1: who's a legitimate starter for a good NBA team has
Speaker 1: to be a two way player. Like if you're Aaron
Speaker 1: Gordon and you're not a great jump shooter, you have
Speaker 1: to be great at all of these other things offensively
Speaker 1: to be able to make that work, right, they didn't
Speaker 1: do it. And so when Pushkamp comes to shove at
Speaker 1: the end of every single one of these games, it's
Speaker 1: Jamal Murray that they can't handle. You know, with Jokich,
Speaker 1: they can shade him and they can send multiple defenders
Speaker 1: and they could do all those things, but they cannot
Speaker 1: handle Jamal Murray because they do not have a quality
Speaker 1: perimeter defender on the roster that can stay on the
Speaker 1: floor as a starter. So, like that's the thing. Like,
Speaker 1: if you the Nuggets are so good, they might score
Speaker 1: on six of their last nine possessions against most teams,
Speaker 1: the Nuggets are so good they might have a one
Speaker 1: thirty offensive rating against you when they're really locked in
Speaker 1: down the stretch. When you're giving up one hundred and
Speaker 1: ninety something points per one hundred possessions and crunch time
Speaker 1: against this team over two clutch time games in the
Speaker 1: regular season, and you give up a bucket on eight
Speaker 1: of your last nine possessions, that's not oh, we're playing
Speaker 1: really good defense and Denver's just hitting shots. No, they're
Speaker 1: barbecuing you. They're scoring every single time down the floor.
Speaker 1: You literally cannot get a stop, and so like, that's
Speaker 1: the thing, Like when I when I looked at all
Speaker 1: the teams after the Boston Denver tier, you know, dall Clippers,
Speaker 1: the Suns, the Lakers, the Wolves, the Thunder, all those teams,
Speaker 1: every single one of them has a gaping hole, not
Speaker 1: just a hole, but like a gaping hole somewhere on
Speaker 1: their roster, like a massive issue that they have to
Speaker 1: deal with. Denver doesn't have that, and Boston doesn't have that,
Speaker 1: and that's why they're so head and shoulders above the
Speaker 1: rest of the league. The Lakers problem is they do
Speaker 1: not have a starting quality perimeter defender on the roster.
Speaker 1: It burned them in the regular season, burned them right
Speaker 1: here now, and so you did everything you could. You
Speaker 1: took all the punches, and you played a great game,
Speaker 1: and you put yourself in a position to win, and
Speaker 1: then Denver walked you down and scored every single time
Speaker 1: down the floor. So like again, when this is all done,
Speaker 1: when the when the you know, I still I still
Speaker 1: think that the Lakers are going to get one in
Speaker 1: this series. Maybe I'm wrong, Maybe maybe Denver's just hell
Speaker 1: bent on sweeping these guys into oblivion, and maybe that's
Speaker 1: what will happen. But I think the Lakers will get
Speaker 1: one regardless when we get to the obitual are here
Speaker 1: because the Nuggets are going to win the series. By
Speaker 1: the way, I would have come on the show had
Speaker 1: the Lakers one game too, I would have come on
Speaker 1: the show and told you I still think Denver's gonna
Speaker 1: win the series. Yeah, I mean, all you had to
Speaker 1: do was watch that game to know that, like, the
Speaker 1: Lakers outshot them. They played the game of their lives
Speaker 1: and they and they were just barely clinging on for
Speaker 1: dear life. So like, I didn't see this as a
Speaker 1: series that was tilting towards the Lakers either way. I
Speaker 1: kind of looked at it vaguely similar to Lebron's game
Speaker 1: again in Game one against the Warriors in the twenty
Speaker 1: eighteen Finals, Like, yeah, it would have been a cool
Speaker 1: story for a few days if if you know, if
Speaker 1: jarr Smith doesn't forget that the game is tied and
Speaker 1: kicks the ball out to Lebron and Lebron hits a
Speaker 1: three at the top of the key, or George Hill
Speaker 1: makes that extra free throw or or whatever it is.
Speaker 1: The Lebron and that ISO against Steph at the top
Speaker 1: of the key. If you would have scored somehow there,
Speaker 1: they wouldn't that game. It would have been a cute story.
Speaker 1: You would have come out of them and like, man,
Speaker 1: what a battle. But the Warriors were just better. They
Speaker 1: were gonna win that series and five had that not happened.
Speaker 1: And that's kind of how I felt about this game.
Speaker 1: The Lakers literally threw the punch of their lives and
Speaker 1: did everything they could and it still wasn't enough. And
Speaker 1: so again, like I just want to I like, there
Speaker 1: is a certain there is a certain inevitability that happens
Speaker 1: with Denver. And I've talked about this quite a bit,
Speaker 1: but I think when we really start to sift through this,
Speaker 1: they literally could not stop Denver. Ever in these clutch
Speaker 1: time situations. They're getting damn near two points of possession
Speaker 1: against the Lakers in the clutch over a large sample size.
Speaker 1: Now that you're not close, the Lakers are not close
Speaker 1: to beating Denver. They are there is a chasm between
Speaker 1: these two teams, and by the way, I think there's
Speaker 1: a chasm between Denver and every team in the West.
Speaker 1: So that's why I told you guys during the season.
Speaker 1: Unless Denver suffers an injury to one of their five starters.
Speaker 1: I personally would be surprised if they didn't win the conference,
Speaker 1: and honestly if they didn't win the title. That's how
Speaker 1: I feel about this Denver team. So to kind of
Speaker 1: bring it back to what I said at the top
Speaker 1: of the show, just like, I'm really happy for you
Speaker 1: Denver fans because you guys got yourselves a real special
Speaker 1: one here, not just the team, but the player. I
Speaker 1: said this with Colin last night. I don't Nikola Jokic
Speaker 1: is playing on the offensive end at a higher level
Speaker 1: than any player that I've personally ever watched to play basketball.
Speaker 1: That's what he's at right now. He had a relatively
Speaker 1: bad game and then he walked down the best defensive
Speaker 1: player in the world at the end of the game
Speaker 1: and gave him easy buckets. Not just buckets, easy buckets.
Speaker 1: This is a special group, major issue at the end
Speaker 1: of the game. I again, bad calls happen, and I
Speaker 1: think complaining about bad calls is stupid and I think
Speaker 1: it's a loser mentality. But when I thought there was
Speaker 1: a questionable call at the end of the game where
Speaker 1: Lebron kind of bumped Jamal Murray a little bit on
Speaker 1: a drive and I thought Darvin ham with he had
Speaker 1: two timeouts left and it was a penalty. It was
Speaker 1: a it was a foul in the penalty that would
Speaker 1: have sent Jamal Murray to the line, and he just
Speaker 1: saved it, just didn't use it. I don't understand what
Speaker 1: he was saving it for. You had two timeouts left,
Speaker 1: so even if you use it and it gets it
Speaker 1: doesn't get overturned, you still have your other time out left.
Speaker 1: And and literally those free throws tied the game. And
Speaker 1: if you go back through the game, there was a
Speaker 1: ton of contact that was getting allowed. On every drive.
Speaker 1: Ad is fouling Nicole Jokic on every post up, Christian
Speaker 1: Brown and Jamal Murray are fouling Lebron and every single iso.
Speaker 1: Ad is getting fouled by Aaron Gordon on his last
Speaker 1: couple of post ups. Like everyone's fouling everybody. And when
Speaker 1: they go to these the challenge board and it's like
Speaker 1: it's like marginal contact, this marginal contact out. There was
Speaker 1: a play where d Lo got literally raked across the
Speaker 1: face and it was overturned on a challenge. So, like
Speaker 1: the point is, the refs were allowing a certain amount
Speaker 1: of physicality, So that was more or less, in the
Speaker 1: scope of the game, a bad call. So Darvin, that's
Speaker 1: his job there. Everyone else is doing their job, right,
Speaker 1: Lebron's doing his job, eighty's doing their job. They're all
Speaker 1: fighting and scratching and clawing to try to win the game.
Speaker 1: And Darvin sitting on the sideline with his hands in
Speaker 1: his pockets not challenging a pivotal call in the game.
Speaker 1: I thought that was bizarre. Also a little side note there,
Speaker 1: the Nuggets had a seventeen to thirteen free throw advantage,
Speaker 1: so to just kind of tie it all together, the
Speaker 1: Lakers had a nineteen to six free throw advantage in
Speaker 1: Game one in Denver one, and then in this game,
Speaker 1: Denver had a seventeen to thirteen free throw advantage and
Speaker 1: got a crucial call down the stretch. So hopefully we
Speaker 1: can just put that stupid ass the league is trying
Speaker 1: to give the Lakers an abnormal free throw differential so
Speaker 1: that they could try to win the That was one
Speaker 1: of the dumbest things I've ever seen, And hopefully after
Speaker 1: tonight we can finally put that to rest. Which, by
Speaker 1: the way, as I mentioned on the show the other day,
Speaker 1: this current Lakers team free throw differential doesn't even crack
Speaker 1: the top forty for highest free throw differential teams since
Speaker 1: the So there's literally nothing exceptional about the Lakers free
Speaker 1: throw differential except for the fact that they're the Lakers.
Speaker 1: And that was really dumb and I'm hoping after tonight
Speaker 1: we can finally put that to rest Denver second half front.
Speaker 1: So the Lakers, one of the big ways they were
Speaker 1: getting going in this game, especially in the third quarter,
Speaker 1: was through Lebron ad pick and roll. So one of
Speaker 1: the reasons why I talked about how I expected the
Speaker 1: Lakers to be able to score in this series is
Speaker 1: there are baked in coverage advantages against Denvers that the
Speaker 1: Lakers struggle with against other teams. So for instance, when
Speaker 1: they play against switching teams like the Clippers. For instance,
Speaker 1: when teams do a lot of switching against the Lakers,
Speaker 1: they get super stagnant and they struggle to score. And
Speaker 1: one of the main reasons why is like, when you're
Speaker 1: playing switching teams, you really have to play with force,
Speaker 1: and it requires Lebron and Ad to beat mismatches. Why
Speaker 1: because Austin and Di Loo are not guys that can
Speaker 1: beat people off the dribble. Rui's not really a guy
Speaker 1: that can beat someone off the dribble. He has to
Speaker 1: get like a really good guard matchup for it to work.
Speaker 1: So the Laker offense can really get stagged against switching defense.
Speaker 1: Is it, by the way, that's happening against Denver in
Speaker 1: this series in the minutes when Yokic is off the floor, right,
Speaker 1: But they have guys that are really good at navigating
Speaker 1: screening actions when teams are in traditional coverages, and so
Speaker 1: in this series, like you saw at the start of
Speaker 1: this game, Austin reeves a ton of stuff on the
Speaker 1: ball to make Jamal Murray guard right, and Jamal's chasing
Speaker 1: over the top of screens. So Austin's getting into the
Speaker 1: lane that's a baked in driving lane. If it's a switch,
Speaker 1: Austin has to beat someone off the dribble. If it's
Speaker 1: a ball screen, Austin all he has to do is
Speaker 1: set his man up for the screen and then he
Speaker 1: can get over the top and get downhill right. So
Speaker 1: like in general, the Laker the lebron Ad pick and roll.
Speaker 1: Most teams switch the lebron Ad pick and roll right,
Speaker 1: not the Nuggets they have Joki, John Ad. They have
Speaker 1: Gordon on Lebron, they chase over the top. That allows
Speaker 1: the Laker, the Lebron to get downhill, pull in Jokic
Speaker 1: make those pocket passes to at so Ad. So in general,
Speaker 1: the Lakers were able to kind of take advantage of
Speaker 1: some baked in coverage advantages with Denver right, but there
Speaker 1: is an adjustment. So they're in that middle of that
Speaker 1: third quarter, Mike Malone calls the time out. They come
Speaker 1: out and they change the matchups and so again I
Speaker 1: want to put some of this credit to Ad as well,
Speaker 1: because it wasn't just the ball screens. AD was also
Speaker 1: doing some damage to yokch in the post. So they
Speaker 1: put Aaron Gordon on Anthony Davis, they put Jokic on Ruey,
Speaker 1: and they move KCP to Lebron And that helps in
Speaker 1: a bunch of different ways. It gives Ad a different
Speaker 1: look in the post. The main difference was ball pressure.
Speaker 1: Jokic was basically playing on his heels and allowing Ad
Speaker 1: to shoot over the top shots and he was making them.
Speaker 1: Gordon was pressuring like you could see AD's in his
Speaker 1: triple threat, Jokic or Gordon swiping down at the ball,
Speaker 1: getting up on him. So now Ady's capable of beating
Speaker 1: Gordon in the post too, but it's a different look, right,
Speaker 1: And Gordon's big enough that Ad is not just gonna
Speaker 1: be able to rip through him easily. Right, So that's
Speaker 1: a heece of defensive versatility with Aaron Gordon. He can
Speaker 1: guard a D and be the low man, or he
Speaker 1: can guard Ruey and be the low man. Right. So
Speaker 1: like those are advantages there, right, Jokic moves to Ruey
Speaker 1: KCP on Lebron. I thought KCP did a solid job
Speaker 1: on Lebron at the end of this game. He actually
Speaker 1: stripped him in a post up off the left block. Now,
Speaker 1: Lebron hit some shots because Lebron's Lebron, and he obviously
Speaker 1: is one of the greatest players of all time, and
Speaker 1: he's gonna win some battles no matter what you do.
Speaker 1: But this is why I always talk about defensive versatility
Speaker 1: during the regular season. It's not so much about your
Speaker 1: baseline coverage. Your baseline coverage is what carries you for
Speaker 1: the eighty two. Your baseline coverage is literally just a
Speaker 1: Your baseline coverage is literally just something that carries you.
Speaker 1: It's an innings eater, right. Utah Jazz used to have
Speaker 1: some really good defenses around Rudy Gobert that they could
Speaker 1: eat innings with over the eighty two. But then as
Speaker 1: soon as they ran into teams that could pull Rudy
Speaker 1: Gobert away from the rim, it exposed all of the
Speaker 1: weaker defensive personnel around it. Defensive versatility is okay, your
Speaker 1: base coverage doesn't work anymore. Do you have personnel that
Speaker 1: can do something different? And they do. Anthony Davis didn't
Speaker 1: just start bullying Aaron Gordon because Aaron Gordon can guard
Speaker 1: bigger post scorers, right. KCP didn't just get ripped up
Speaker 1: by Lebron because he can guard bigger forward defenders right,
Speaker 1: or bigger forward offensive players. Right. That's why I talk
Speaker 1: so much about offensive versatility. And so basically the Lakers
Speaker 1: countered that by bringing Ruey up into ball screens instead,
Speaker 1: and now as a result, it left Aaron Gordon as
Speaker 1: the low man. So one of the problems with the
Speaker 1: lebron Ada pick and roll when Yo Kicch and Gordon
Speaker 1: were guarding them. If Gordon's on the ball and Yo
Speaker 1: Kicch is on Lebron in a drop, who's on the
Speaker 1: back line? Do you remember when Ad got those back
Speaker 1: to back and ones to start the third quarter. Who
Speaker 1: is the back line, Jamal Murray. When you move KCP
Speaker 1: to the ball and you put Aaron Gordon on a
Speaker 1: d a guy who made some jumpers in the first
Speaker 1: half but didn't make any in the in this and half,
Speaker 1: and so he kind of Gordon was able to help
Speaker 1: off of him. Now Gordon's on the back line, and
Speaker 1: so then what started happening, What was made layups turned
Speaker 1: into miss layups. Now there were some really easy missed
Speaker 1: ones there. Ruey missed a dunk right under the rim.
Speaker 1: After the miss dunk, AD missed a completely uncontested put
Speaker 1: back layup. That was weird. There was a lot of
Speaker 1: weird shooting in this game, Like in the third quarter,
Speaker 1: the Nuggets missed a bunch of good looks from jump
Speaker 1: shot range and the Lakers missed like a half dozen
Speaker 1: layups around the rim. But some of that was defensive
Speaker 1: effort from the Lakers making things more difficult for the Nuggets,
Speaker 1: and Aaron Gordon on the back line making things more
Speaker 1: difficult for the Lakers, Right, But I thought that was
Speaker 1: a really interesting adjustment and it showed just the versatility
Speaker 1: that Denver has defensively that they were able to switch
Speaker 1: up their look and slow down the Laker offense. And again,
Speaker 1: I thought putting Gordon on the back line as opposed
Speaker 1: to on the ball kind of unlocked all of that. Also,
Speaker 1: like Ruyachimura rolling to the basket just not the same
Speaker 1: as Anthony Davis and Ruey the first game. I won't
Speaker 1: blame him because he had to guard it Jokic so much.
Speaker 1: Ruey was just asleep this game. I don't know what
Speaker 1: was going on with him. He missed in the first half,
Speaker 1: he missed a couple of point blank layups. He just
Speaker 1: in general just didn't seem very focused in this particular
Speaker 1: game for whatever reason. And that's something that he's gonna
Speaker 1: have to fix when they get back to LA. But yeah,
Speaker 1: like I thought, putting him in the situation where he
Speaker 1: was the role man and Gordon as the low man,
Speaker 1: I thought, really changed the outlook of that game. And
Speaker 1: then from there that was what turned the twenty point
Speaker 1: lead into a ten point lead, right. And then some
Speaker 1: of it was bad execution too. Like I talked about
Speaker 1: with the Lakers, it's not about forty six minutes of execution.
Speaker 1: It's about forty eight minutes of execution. Just ask Sixers fans.
Speaker 1: They did a really good job keeping New York off
Speaker 1: the offensive glass for forty seven and a half minutes,
Speaker 1: and then they let go of the rope for thirty
Speaker 1: seconds at the end of the game when they were tired,
Speaker 1: and it cost him a playoff game. That can happen,
Speaker 1: and so kind of on the Lakers side of it here,
Speaker 1: like there was a stretch there. Do you remember Delo's
Speaker 1: ridiculous lob pass to Anthony Davis that was promptly followed
Speaker 1: by Torrian Prince randomly going Kevin Durant on the left
Speaker 1: wing and clanging a jumper that was with plenty of
Speaker 1: time on the shot clock. Spencer Dinwoodie just randomly in
Speaker 1: transition against Peyton Watson, who's one of the best athletic
Speaker 1: rim protector defenders that Denver has, Spencer just goes, screw it,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna drive and shoot. Here these are critical execution
Speaker 1: errors like and again, you can't get into crunch time
Speaker 1: with Denver because you can't guard Denver. They score on you.
Speaker 1: They don't score on you half the time, they score
Speaker 1: on you every time in crunch time. So you got
Speaker 1: to keep your lead. The game was lost when they
Speaker 1: allowed it to get from twenty to ten there in
Speaker 1: the middle of the end of that third quarter. And
Speaker 1: there were some execution errors in there. Obviously I want
Speaker 1: to credit Denver for the adjustment as well, but the
Speaker 1: Lakers had some execution errors. And again against Denver, what
Speaker 1: do they do? What does Denver do? Denver never lets
Speaker 1: go of the rope, and so when you do, they
Speaker 1: immediately gain ground and they can put you into some trouble.
Speaker 1: There got into a crunch time situation that couldn't get stops,
Speaker 1: and that was it. Looking forward, Like I said, I
Speaker 1: didn't see this series tilting towards the Lakers even if
Speaker 1: they had one tonight. But that's gonna be really bad,
Speaker 1: really difficult to bounce back from. I still think the
Speaker 1: Lakers are gonna get one. I'll go. I'll go with
Speaker 1: Game three. The one thing that could be interesting is
Speaker 1: if the Nuggets stick with that adjustment and keep Gordon
Speaker 1: on Ad and you'll get John Rui. That could cause
Speaker 1: them some problems because anytime Ad is in a spot
Speaker 1: up role, he's just not as good as a spot
Speaker 1: up player as Ruey is, and Ruey's not as good
Speaker 1: of a role man as Ad is. So that adjustment
Speaker 1: just kind of puts them into some into a predicament, right,
Speaker 1: And I don't know the Lakers. There's some things they
Speaker 1: could do. They could try to run screening actions like
Speaker 1: a ram screen. It would be an interesting one. So
Speaker 1: a RAMS screen is a downscreen for a ball screener
Speaker 1: when he comes up to the level. So basically, imagine
Speaker 1: Ad standing under the basket guarded by Gordon. You have
Speaker 1: Ruy run down and make sure he hits Aaron Gordon.
Speaker 1: If he hits Aaron Gordon and Ad sprints up to
Speaker 1: the ball screen, chances are Jokich will follow him. That's
Speaker 1: an action that you can run to try to get
Speaker 1: a switch. It's no different than Jalen Brunson running a
Speaker 1: guard guard screen to get tyres Maxy on him before
Speaker 1: he flows into the ball screen. Like, those are little
Speaker 1: intricacies you can use to try to fight against these adjustments.
Speaker 1: I think that's something that they will do again. We
Speaker 1: saw a little bit of Lebron on Jamal Murray tonight.
Speaker 1: I think that could work better in a game where
Speaker 1: the Lakers role players carry them and Lebron has the energy.
Speaker 1: But in a night like tonight, and if Game three
Speaker 1: ends up being like this where Lebron and ad really
Speaker 1: have to engage themselves physically to keep the game close,
Speaker 1: I think you stick with Austin just because it doesn't
Speaker 1: matter if Lebron's capable, if he's too tired, right, and
Speaker 1: so I think that I think that's something that they'll
Speaker 1: look at. But there's not really a fix. Denver's better
Speaker 1: than you. That's just the reality. It's just unfortunate because again,
Speaker 1: like I said, I thought the I thought the Lakers,
Speaker 1: specifically Lebron, a D d Lo, there were some guys
Speaker 1: for the Lakers that really left it all out there tonight,
Speaker 1: and they played well enough to win. But Denver's Denver,
Speaker 1: and so it was a loss instead. So it is
Speaker 1: what it is. Again, I'm gonna I'm gonna go Denver
Speaker 1: and five. At this point. Any hope of Denver and
Speaker 1: six I think fell apart with them losing tonight's game.
Speaker 1: It's just it's just really difficult to bounce back from that.
Speaker 1: But man, what a basketball game. Moving on to Nick Sixers,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm not gonna spend too much time on
Speaker 1: this one just because we've been going for a while already,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna spend more time on this series during
Speaker 1: the during the week the rest of the week. But
Speaker 1: as we talked about in our series preview, the Sixers
Speaker 1: I have more talent in the half court, right, and
Speaker 1: so one of the things we talked about is like,
Speaker 1: if they can just hold up better and the physical
Speaker 1: areas of the game. I don't have the numbers right
Speaker 1: in front of me because it's in a different note,
Speaker 1: but they outscored the Knicks in the half court by
Speaker 1: twenty two points per one hundred posessions in Game one,
Speaker 1: and then they lost second chance points in fast break
Speaker 1: points by something crazy like thirty five points or something
Speaker 1: like that. They got absolutely blitzed, right, so they needed
Speaker 1: to hold up better. They did. They won the fast
Speaker 1: breakpoints battle, I think fourteen to ten. They held up
Speaker 1: much better on the glass. They gave up twelve offensive
Speaker 1: rebounds and got ten of their own, so they held
Speaker 1: up better, right. But that final sequence, again, like I thought,
Speaker 1: the critical error there was they rushed their inbound and
Speaker 1: Tyres was kind of running along the baseline and had
Speaker 1: guys in pursuit. That's a difficult play no matter what.
Speaker 1: And again you gotta understand the predicament, so like in
Speaker 1: the same way that Darvin Ham needs to be able
Speaker 1: to read the situation and go, hey, this game's a
Speaker 1: blood path, so if I challenge this, it might get overturned. Earlier,
Speaker 1: Mike Malone challenged d Lo getting slapped across the face
Speaker 1: on a layup attempt, clearly on video, and it got overturned.
Speaker 1: So maybe I should challenge this one too. That's reading
Speaker 1: the situation. Nick Nurse should have looked at the situation
Speaker 1: and been like, holy shit, this game has been super physical.
Speaker 1: Everyone's getting away with everything. I probably should call a
Speaker 1: time out here to make sure we get a clean catch. No,
Speaker 1: he didn't. He tried to call a time out after
Speaker 1: the ball got inbounded. If I remember correctly, there's some
Speaker 1: footage going around. I think he called the timeout. He
Speaker 1: tried to call a time out right when Tyre's caught it,
Speaker 1: and then I think he tried to call it again
Speaker 1: when Tyrese was on the ground, and that, you know,
Speaker 1: here's the thing. Probably should have been accounted for by
Speaker 1: the refs. But as soon as that chaos is happening,
Speaker 1: everyone's caught up in the chaos, including the refs. So like,
Speaker 1: the reality is they should never have thrown that inbound pass.
Speaker 1: They should never have thrown that inbound pass. They should
Speaker 1: have identified that that was a high risk situation and
Speaker 1: called a timeout before the ball even got inbound. And
Speaker 1: I haven't seen the replay yet, So if I if
Speaker 1: Nick Nurse did end up calling it before the inbounds
Speaker 1: pass was thrown that brown, then maybe that's something different.
Speaker 1: But from what I could tell, it looked like the
Speaker 1: timeout call was after the inbound I have to go
Speaker 1: back and look at it. But again, like that's that's
Speaker 1: just about as catastrophic a loss as you'll see too.
Speaker 1: It's it's so funny because the Lakers got out done
Speaker 1: in Game two, but man, like, you do everything right
Speaker 1: and you're literally up by five in the final minute
Speaker 1: and offensive rebounds just once again, just inability to control
Speaker 1: the offensive glass giving multiple opportunities. Jalen Brunson gets an
Speaker 1: extra shot in the corner. Then Dante DiVincenzo gets two
Speaker 1: looks at the top of the key and Dante had
Speaker 1: it going that game, big bounce back game from Dante,
Speaker 1: and he hit the game would ended up being the
Speaker 1: game winner. One last note on this one. It's not
Speaker 1: really gonna be a Brunson series in my opinion, Like
Speaker 1: like the way that the Sixers are kind of loading up,
Speaker 1: like the poor shooting Brunson numbers are, they're not a coincidence,
Speaker 1: They're not just bad luck. Like the Sixers are throwing
Speaker 1: the kitchen sink at him. They have lanky defenders on
Speaker 1: him all the time, even when he has got Tyree
Speaker 1: s Maxie on him. Tyres Maxie's done a great job
Speaker 1: with back pressure and Joel embiad is anchoring things around
Speaker 1: the rim. This is not going to be a super
Speaker 1: high percentage efficient Brunson series. He might have a game
Speaker 1: or two or he shoots over fifty percent because he's
Speaker 1: a superstar in my opinion, and he's capable of that,
Speaker 1: but this is really going to be the pendulum is
Speaker 1: going to be dirty work. Brunson has just had a
Speaker 1: huge disadvantage personnel wise as a shot creator compared to
Speaker 1: where Tyrese Maxi and Joel Embiid are. And you saw
Speaker 1: that down the stretch of that game. Who got better
Speaker 1: shots down the end the Sixers did, with exception of
Speaker 1: those offensive rebound jumpers that the Knicks got late. So
Speaker 1: that dynamic is not going to change this game. This
Speaker 1: series will continue to oscillate back and forth on the
Speaker 1: dirty work, the offensive glass, and the transition sequence. I
Speaker 1: believe that the Sixers are going to blow the Knicks
Speaker 1: out in game three. I would not be surprised at
Speaker 1: all if they tied up this series. This series is
Speaker 1: not over that set. It is really difficult to beat
Speaker 1: a team four times out of seven without home court advantage,
Speaker 1: let alone five. And you beat the Knicks tonight for
Speaker 1: forty seven and a half minutes and they came back
Speaker 1: and got you on a crazy sequence at the end
Speaker 1: of the game. So now you basically have to beat
Speaker 1: them five times out of seven. That is not going
Speaker 1: to be easy. But go home. You're the more talented team.
Speaker 1: You're at home. You're desperate beat them up in game three.
Speaker 1: Game four will be close. If m beating MAXI can
Speaker 1: close the deal and if they can control those things
Speaker 1: on the margins too to two series, then you get
Speaker 1: your rematch in New York to try to undo what
Speaker 1: happened in this particular game. But I mean, that's gonna
Speaker 1: be really tough to balance back from no matter how
Speaker 1: you slice it. That's a really really tough set of circumstances.
Speaker 1: I want to shout Tyris Maxi in this game again.
Speaker 1: I've always been a big Tyres mac fan. I've told
Speaker 1: you guys this before, but I ran into him in Vegas.
Speaker 1: And I've seen forty NBA players hanging out in Vegas,
Speaker 1: and he was the only guy I saw working out. Now,
Speaker 1: to be clear, I'm sure most of those players were
Speaker 1: working out while they're in Vegas, but just when I
Speaker 1: saw him, it just was just it was just cool
Speaker 1: because I was like, Man, this guy's here, but he's
Speaker 1: he's like this business trip. I'm hanging out, gonna have
Speaker 1: some fun, but it's a business trip. And I just
Speaker 1: have always been a fan of Tyres Maxzin in general.
Speaker 1: I think he's got a really fun game and came
Speaker 1: out this game super hot, by the way, playing through
Speaker 1: flu like symptoms. Came out super hot, and he got
Speaker 1: ice cold there in that third quarter stretch, and he
Speaker 1: couldn't hit a jumper to save his life, and obviously
Speaker 1: Joel Embiid was super fatigued there down the stretch of
Speaker 1: the game. But I thought, I thought max he was
Speaker 1: magnificent down the stretch of this game, and I thought
Speaker 1: that you know, for this being his first opportunity to
Speaker 1: be kind of the tip of the spear in an
Speaker 1: NBA playoff environment for a team with real expectations, he's
Speaker 1: showing us that he can do this. He can do
Speaker 1: this at a really high level. I think he's a
Speaker 1: legitimate number two. And he just went into MSG and
Speaker 1: hit a big shot after big shot down the stretch
Speaker 1: and gave his team a really good chance to win.
Speaker 1: And honestly, like I don't blame him for that final sequence.
Speaker 1: That's on the coach in my opinion, that that ball
Speaker 1: should never have been inbounded, that should never have made
Speaker 1: its way to Tyris Maxi under the circumstances again, and
Speaker 1: this is something everyone's got to adjust, including the coaching stabs.
Speaker 1: They got to adjust and understand that this is brutally
Speaker 1: physical basketball that we're seeing in most of these games.
Speaker 1: And you got to understand that if you allow like
Speaker 1: congested environments to take place, guys might get fouled and
Speaker 1: it just might not get called. And you have to
Speaker 1: account for that in your game planning. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: that is all I have for tonight. As always, I
Speaker 1: sincerely appreciate you for supporting the show probably going to
Speaker 1: take the daytime tomorrow off, but we will be back
Speaker 1: later in the evening for an instant reaction video after
Speaker 1: the final game of the night. I will see you
Speaker 1: guys then. Thanks for rocking with me, See you tomorrow.
Speaker 1: The volume