Speaker 1: On this episode of This League, we talk about the
Speaker 1: train wreck that is the Atlanta Hawks, the most surprising
Speaker 1: reason that the New Orleans Pelicans are one of the
Speaker 1: most exciting teams in the league.
Speaker 2: And how they still might not make the playoffs.
Speaker 1: We also talk about James Harden's exciting return back to Houston,
Speaker 1: and we also work on answering a bunch well not
Speaker 1: really a bunch, just a couple of new Listener dms
Speaker 1: Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert about to get fined.
Speaker 2: Yes they are, Yes they are. And at a.
Speaker 1: Certain point, if you know that even making mention of
Speaker 1: how bad the refereeing is, we'll get your ass fined.
Speaker 1: You might as well skip the subtleties and just come
Speaker 1: out and say it right, No sense of beating around
Speaker 1: the bush.
Speaker 2: Might as well just say.
Speaker 1: That the game was stolen from you, which is exactly
Speaker 1: what Donovan Mitchell said in his presser after the loss
Speaker 1: to the Sixers in overtime.
Speaker 2: Let's hear what Donovan head say.
Speaker 3: It's screwed in a way by this. You know, like
Speaker 3: we won this game in my personal opinion, you know,
Speaker 3: but like I said, I'm gonna give them credit. They
Speaker 3: won whatever. Cool, but like this is it's a consistent thing,
Speaker 3: and you know, the question is can we can we
Speaker 3: do it? Can we sustain it?
Speaker 4: Are we th real?
Speaker 1: Number?
Speaker 5: One?
Speaker 3: Like, yeah, the hell we are. And it's getting it's
Speaker 3: getting ridiculous, KK that this is this is what's happening,
Speaker 3: you know what I mean? We have a whole second
Speaker 3: half of the season to go and get ready for.
Speaker 3: But like I'm sick of it, to be honest with that,
Speaker 3: we all are, you know, And I think this is
Speaker 3: something that just if it eats me, it eats at me. Man,
Speaker 3: And it's I don't, I don't y'all know what it is.
Speaker 3: We all know what it is. But it's it's really
Speaker 3: getting out of hand. It's really really really getting out
Speaker 3: of hand. And the lead needs to do something about
Speaker 3: this because I want to see the last two minute report.
Speaker 2: What is he referring to?
Speaker 1: I would say, atrocious, terrible, disgustingly bad calls.
Speaker 2: Marty, you who did the little crying face while you
Speaker 2: were listening to Donovan? You think he's being a bitch.
Speaker 4: No, no, no, don't put words in my mouth. I
Speaker 4: just I have a history with Donovan Mitchell. So like
Speaker 4: I'll always kind of do that with him, but there
Speaker 4: were some really in that game. Yet, No, I don't
Speaker 4: blame him at all for saying that.
Speaker 1: The first bad call was when Royce O'Neill went after
Speaker 1: a loose ball. This is in the fourth quarter, less
Speaker 1: than a minute left in the game. He seems to
Speaker 1: pass the ball to Donovan Mitchell before his foot touches
Speaker 1: out of bounce. He does in review he had not
Speaker 1: touched with his foot to the ground, but apparently, like
Speaker 1: some childhood fort game at a castle.
Speaker 2: If you make contact with the ref who is out
Speaker 2: of bounds, you are now out of bounce.
Speaker 1: So that was the first one that is absolutely unconscionable.
Speaker 2: So then obviously Sixers get the ball back.
Speaker 1: At this point, Utah's up three and Donovan would have
Speaker 1: either had a clear path foul or he would have
Speaker 1: made a layup right, so they would have gone up
Speaker 1: five with a minute left, But instead embiid hits the
Speaker 1: three overtime right.
Speaker 2: Momentum, all swinging in the Sixers way.
Speaker 1: Then in the last minute of ot Spider drove down
Speaker 1: the lane, spun around Ben Simmons. Ben Simmons had his
Speaker 1: arm and they called it a hooking fowl on Donovan Mitchell,
Speaker 1: an offensive foul. Wh it's really yo, let me just
Speaker 1: get my arm from underneath yours because you're hooked, you're
Speaker 1: holding on. But no foul on Donovan. Okay, Then that
Speaker 1: phantom call on Embiid Embiid gets rim checked. That one
Speaker 1: was really bad. There was no foul, and then and
Speaker 1: then they call a foul on who is it, Mike Conley?
Speaker 1: I think they called the foul on Mike Conley. And
Speaker 1: then either Donovan Mitchell said something or made contact with
Speaker 1: the ball with his foot and Embiid baited the ref
Speaker 1: and a calling a technical foul on Donovan, and now
Speaker 1: you get fucking free throws and the technical foul and
Speaker 1: then I don't know what happened for Donovan get the
Speaker 1: second technical, he gets ejected from the game. He kicks
Speaker 1: the water cooler into that guy.
Speaker 2: He's like, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: It went from the Jazz should have won that game
Speaker 1: easily to then they lose by nine in overtime.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then after the game, Rudy Gobert says things as well.
Speaker 2: This is what he said.
Speaker 1: Our guys are not able to get calls. Everybody in
Speaker 1: the fucking league gets we all.
Speaker 2: Know that we're the Utah Jazz.
Speaker 1: We all know that we're the Utah Jazz, and maybe
Speaker 1: some people don't want to see us go as far
Speaker 1: as we can go.
Speaker 2: But as disappointing.
Speaker 1: Three times in a row Mike Conley going to the
Speaker 1: rim and they're grabbing him.
Speaker 2: Right in front of the officials, and there's no calls.
Speaker 1: And on the other end, there are calls that are invisible,
Speaker 1: phantom calls that are being made. What Marty did I
Speaker 1: say about small market teams, This is a perfect example.
Speaker 1: We don't sorry, we don't want to see you win.
Speaker 1: We don't want nice things for you. The NBA wants
Speaker 1: the Lakers, they want the Clippers. They want the Phoenix
Speaker 1: Suns with pretty boy Booker. Okay, benefit or no, but
Speaker 1: they do want the Lakers and the Clippers in this right.
Speaker 2: They do not want the Mormon Utah Jazz.
Speaker 1: No coffee drinking, ski slope riding, homogeneous city in arena.
Speaker 1: They I mean, I don't want to say it, but
Speaker 1: that is exactly what Rudy Gobert is trying to say,
Speaker 1: is they don't want to see us win. And these
Speaker 1: are facts. I do not like to be a conspiracy theorist,
Speaker 1: but that's the that's the deal. Gobert confirmed that the
Speaker 1: league was out to get them because they're a small
Speaker 1: market franchise. He says, I don't want to say that,
Speaker 1: but I really believe it. After playing in this league
Speaker 1: for eight years, it's a little harder to be in
Speaker 1: a small market.
Speaker 2: That's one of the things that we've got to overcome.
Speaker 2: That's why I told the guys.
Speaker 1: When you're a small market, you've got to be better
Speaker 1: than just be better. You've got to be elite, and
Speaker 1: you've got to be in control and what you can control.
Speaker 1: And there are facts for this conspiracy theory, and Brad
Speaker 1: Botkin for CBS Last two Nights Ago wrote, if Mitchell
Speaker 1: does have a legit gripe with the officials, perhaps it
Speaker 1: stems from him or his teammates not getting calls in
Speaker 1: big moments. The Jazz take under two clutch free throws
Speaker 1: per game within five points with under five minutes to play,
Speaker 1: ranking dead last, and Mitchell has only taken nine clutch
Speaker 1: free throws all season, which ranks fortieth in the league,
Speaker 1: and no Utah player is in the top fifty. The
Speaker 1: Sixers show outshot Utah thirty five to nineteen from the line,
Speaker 1: which you would say, oh, well, maybe maybe that's just
Speaker 1: how it goes. No, because Utah normally is one of
Speaker 1: the best defensive teams in the league, and their opponents
Speaker 1: only get to the line the sixth fewest.
Speaker 2: Times out of any NBA team.
Speaker 1: So for the Philadelphia seventy six ers to outpace Utah
Speaker 1: thirty five to nineteen when normally they only get nineteen,
Speaker 1: their opponents only get nineteen free throws a game, double
Speaker 1: their average. What is going on? I mean, come on, now,
Speaker 1: come on now, This is like just you know statistics, right, Marty,
Speaker 1: they have the little bell curve, and then it's like
Speaker 1: outside one standard deviation is like this percon probability, and
Speaker 1: outside of this, this is two standard deviations outside of normal. Right,
Speaker 1: this is an impossible situation unless there's something nefarious at play,
Speaker 1: and I personally believe that there is something nefarious at
Speaker 1: play in Philadelphia.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's very.
Speaker 1: Clear emb did everything that he could to win his
Speaker 1: team the game, using his semantics and his histrionics and
Speaker 1: all kinds of dramatics that he likes to put on
Speaker 1: the game in order to win. And that's fine, he said,
Speaker 1: He said something on Twitter. Embiids basically admitted it Spider
Speaker 1: clap back because mb was like, yeah, going into the
Speaker 1: second half feeling good, and Donvan writes back, you a
Speaker 1: fool bruh. And then and then Embiid responds back with
Speaker 1: ha ha ha. Second time, I got you teed up
Speaker 1: lmaogg like, yeah, I did that. I personally got you ejected.
Speaker 4: I mean that one's never going away, no ever.
Speaker 2: Never going away. I love Joel Embiid.
Speaker 1: He's one of the funniest players, uh maybe in the NBA,
Speaker 1: most entertaining, obviously very skilled, but if you are playing
Speaker 1: against Joel Embiid, there.
Speaker 2: May be no more annoying.
Speaker 1: Person to go up against because he is so aggressively
Speaker 1: in your face about like just basically cheating his way
Speaker 1: into a win.
Speaker 2: And we'll say it after fact, like yeah, I cheated.
Speaker 4: Well, he did have that famous flop in like the backcourt.
Speaker 4: I think it was on Mitchell. Actually, I think that's true.
Speaker 2: That's what he's said second time. Second time.
Speaker 1: I think the only good news is the Jazz are
Speaker 1: to a point after all of this, at the.
Speaker 2: Halfway mark, you know you're not gonna get calls.
Speaker 1: It's just time to take the buzzsaw, keep the foot
Speaker 1: on the opponent's neck at all times, because if it
Speaker 1: comes down to the refs, you're gonna lose, which is
Speaker 1: gonna be pretty important to know come playoff time. And
Speaker 1: they're just not going to get those those whistles that
Speaker 1: a team like the Clippers or the Lakers will get.
Speaker 1: There are two types of great coaches.
Speaker 2: In the NBA.
Speaker 1: You can either be one of those Brad Stevens, X's
Speaker 1: and O's got my clipboard kind of nerds that can
Speaker 1: draw up the coolest little out of bounds play with
Speaker 1: five point two seconds left and.
Speaker 2: Like outscheme out, scheme out smart right. Or you can
Speaker 2: be like Doc Rivers.
Speaker 1: And I'm no shade to Doc Rivers as an Ex's
Speaker 1: and o's guy, but he's known as an ego manager.
Speaker 1: So X's and O's ego managers. The real great ones
Speaker 1: do both right right. What you can't be is bad
Speaker 1: at both of those things. You cannot be a head
Speaker 1: coach in the NBA and do both of those things
Speaker 1: quite terribly.
Speaker 2: That'll get you ass fired. That'll do that.
Speaker 1: Lloyd Pierce, Ah, Lloyd Pierce, he was really bad.
Speaker 2: It appears at.
Speaker 1: Both of those things, and predictably, Monday morning, after the
Speaker 1: pod dropped, swish, the guillotine came down for Lloyd Pierce's neck.
Speaker 2: Rip.
Speaker 1: To Lloyd Pierce, they even as fucked up. They even
Speaker 1: let him run Monday practice. They let him run practice.
Speaker 1: Come back to the hotel and we're like, hey, great practice.
Speaker 2: You're fucking out of here.
Speaker 4: You're done. Getting fired on the road is tough, tough.
Speaker 1: Why though, why do they have to do it this
Speaker 1: way right break?
Speaker 2: Like, couldn't you have just done it at the All
Speaker 2: Star break? It's just crazy. He knew.
Speaker 1: He knew because even last week he said to the
Speaker 1: Athletic Travis the Hawks GM is going to fire me
Speaker 1: one day, and when he'd done, I'm not even gonna
Speaker 1: be mad. That guy's damn near my best friend. That
Speaker 1: is basically a man who knows that he said that.
Speaker 2: He said that, Yes, that's not me. That was printed
Speaker 2: in the Athletic. I'm not even going to be mad.
Speaker 2: That's how you know you're dead man walking. That's that's
Speaker 2: how you know. I don't care how much hot water
Speaker 2: I am in.
Speaker 1: I will never admit there's a possibility of me being
Speaker 1: let go until I'm already let go, like Scott Brooks
Speaker 1: is doing it the perfect way, where Scott's like, I
Speaker 1: believe we're gonna be at a point where we get
Speaker 1: a deal done, like I think it's gonna happen, Like
Speaker 1: he's out here basically prognosticating an extension when he's the
Speaker 1: odds on favorite to be the next coach fired.
Speaker 2: That's how you do it.
Speaker 1: That's how you stay in the league, because then people
Speaker 1: are like, wait, hold on, you flip the narrative on
Speaker 1: its head. By all accounts, Lloyd Pierce was a valuable
Speaker 1: asset to the NBA in certain ways. He helped get
Speaker 1: the Arenas to be voting centers with Lebron.
Speaker 2: He was thoughtful. The other coaches love him. Rick Carlyle
Speaker 2: even like, I.
Speaker 1: Don't know if you saw it, but like after Lloyd
Speaker 1: Pierce was fired, Rick Carlile issued a statement that was
Speaker 1: like this is crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was like this. He literally said, this is crazy.
Speaker 1: But the problem is that only coaches seem to be
Speaker 1: the ones that like Lloyd Pierce, like his.
Speaker 2: Own, his own team, his own team.
Speaker 1: There's multiple articles written about his entire team not liking him.
Speaker 1: We know that the Hawks have been in a bad situation.
Speaker 1: They've had a tough year with injuries, fluid schedules, no crowds,
Speaker 1: back to backs, and so, yeah, you're Lloyd Pierce and
Speaker 1: you have been given like a rock and a carrot,
Speaker 1: and they're like, go make chicken noodle soup, Go make
Speaker 1: something out of this Michelin star And so he's had
Speaker 1: a bad he's had a bad goal of it. In
Speaker 1: terms of injuries, he's I think they've had the most
Speaker 1: second most injuries in the NBA, one hundred and forty
Speaker 1: three man games lost. Okay, that's obviously tough, but at
Speaker 1: this point you kind of have to be nice to
Speaker 1: your players if you know you're not gonna get him
Speaker 1: to win because everybody's basically sitting on the bench and
Speaker 1: they're injured. According to a deep dive in The Athletic
Speaker 1: he's has seemed to piss off every Hawks player individually
Speaker 1: and the team as a whole. Bro They said sometimes
Speaker 1: we come up to him and we ask him like, hey,
Speaker 1: can you change this, that or that, and he's like no, No.
Speaker 1: He's publicly sewering multiple members of his team, Trey Young,
Speaker 1: John Collins, Cam Reddish in the media, just shit talking
Speaker 1: them and then expecting them to go out and perform
Speaker 1: for him. Every single player that he has coached said
Speaker 1: that they don't feel heard when they go and talk
Speaker 1: to him in his office.
Speaker 2: That's not good. Yeah, hey, hey, we're opening to maybe.
Speaker 1: Play like a little bit more of a free flowing
Speaker 1: fourth quarter offense. Like things are kind of stagnant for us.
Speaker 1: We've given up eleven twelve fourth quarter leads.
Speaker 2: Like what do you.
Speaker 1: Think and he's like, nah, I think things are good
Speaker 1: just the way that they are. It is insane. So
Speaker 1: he said these things about his players. He said John
Speaker 1: Collins was selfish. He said Cam Reddish was overrated and
Speaker 1: not performing up to his expectations, and that Trey Young
Speaker 1: he doesn't like the way that Tray Young draws fouls.
Speaker 1: He doesn't like where Trey Young pulls up from And
Speaker 1: then when they approached him about it, he was like, no,
Speaker 1: that's not exactly what I meant.
Speaker 2: That's not what I said.
Speaker 1: Really, I didn't say you were selfish, John, I said
Speaker 1: you you want plays called for you, but I don't
Speaker 1: think you're good enough for us to call play specifically
Speaker 1: for you.
Speaker 2: Cam.
Speaker 1: I know you said you think I said that you
Speaker 1: were overrated, but really, I'm just saying that I thought
Speaker 1: you would be a lot better than.
Speaker 2: You are, Trey.
Speaker 1: I know you think that I'm saying that you're a chucker,
Speaker 1: but really I just think you need to take better shots.
Speaker 2: I mean that's all. I mean.
Speaker 1: It's exactly the same thing with just like nicer language
Speaker 1: around it. You can't be this way. You cannot be
Speaker 1: this way. I knew when I looked at this stat
Speaker 1: this is bad.
Speaker 2: This is bad. So I think that there was only two.
Speaker 1: Games that the Atlanta Hawks won in eleven, right, they
Speaker 1: were two and eleven, okay, and those two games were
Speaker 1: when Lloyd Pierce left the team because his wife had
Speaker 1: a baby.
Speaker 2: So when you when the only two.
Speaker 1: Games in an eleven twelve game stretch that you win,
Speaker 1: or when your head coach is nowhere near the team,
Speaker 1: I think it's time for him to be nowhere.
Speaker 2: Near the team.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean they were sure talking about that.
Speaker 2: They absolutely absolutely so.
Speaker 1: Cam Reddish has missed eight games due to injury, Gallinari
Speaker 1: ten games, Rondo sixteen games, Bogdanovic twenty five games, Chris
Speaker 1: Dunn the entire season on Yukka, their rookie number six pick.
Speaker 1: Overall miss twenty games. Even Trey Young has missed a
Speaker 1: couple of games. DeAndre Hunter, DeAndre Hunter missed multiple games,
Speaker 1: like I said, one hundred and forty three man games,
Speaker 1: lost second in the NBA. So did he get a
Speaker 1: bad break? Did he have basically nothing to work with?
Speaker 2: Yes? That is true.
Speaker 1: Was he a bad coach and a bad ego manager?
Speaker 1: Did his entire team not like being coached by him? So?
Speaker 2: Yes? Somebody asked they.
Speaker 1: Did like a random anonymous poll, which coach in the league.
Speaker 2: Would you not like to be coached by? And there were.
Speaker 1: Atlanta Hawks players who said, can I choose the coach
Speaker 1: that's coaching me?
Speaker 2: I didn't make this out. This is not a joke.
Speaker 2: This is real. So those two things are not mutually exclusive,
Speaker 2: are they.
Speaker 1: You can have a shit situation and also be bad
Speaker 1: at your job, and at that point you can't go
Speaker 1: out in the beginning of the year and say.
Speaker 2: We're gonna make the playoffs. That's what he did.
Speaker 1: Folks set expectations in an outrageous manner for the owner
Speaker 1: to then say.
Speaker 2: What's up.
Speaker 4: What's up?
Speaker 1: You guys have lost thirteen out of fifteen. You told me,
Speaker 1: you told me you were gonna make the playoffs.
Speaker 2: You gotta go. And now we've got Nate McMillan's ass
Speaker 2: Nate McMillan.
Speaker 1: Walk the ball up to half court. That's what we
Speaker 1: have for the rest of the year. With this quote
Speaker 1: quote high flying offense. The good news is Nate McMillan,
Speaker 1: his entire career, has said listen, I want to run
Speaker 1: a fast paced offense. It's not me, it's really the
Speaker 1: players that I have.
Speaker 2: I know that I had.
Speaker 1: Brandon Roy and LaMarcus Aldridge, but it was just them.
Speaker 1: I wanted to push the pace.
Speaker 2: I know that I was one of the.
Speaker 1: Slowest offenses in Indiana as a head coach, but it
Speaker 1: was them.
Speaker 2: I know I had Victor Oladipo, it was them.
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I like Lloyd Peerce. Maybe he was the wrong guy
Speaker 1: to coach young players. I mean, maybe he's the kind
Speaker 1: of guy that could be like a skills development assistant
Speaker 1: to hold players accountable, like I don't know Ben Simmons.
Speaker 1: Maybe he would fit to be Ben simmons shooting accountability partner.
Speaker 1: Because Lloyd Pierce doesn't appear to have much carrot in him.
Speaker 2: It's just all shit talking.
Speaker 1: It's all stick stick stick let's just say that I've
Speaker 1: got lots to say about Nate McMillan as a new
Speaker 1: head coach, so much that that's gonna be a segment
Speaker 1: on Monday, so I've got to dig deep onto whether
Speaker 1: he's actually going to make it long term, and also
Speaker 1: what some other coaching candidates will look like. But the
Speaker 1: good news is that the Hawks at the halfway point,
Speaker 1: because the East is sort of big trash, they're only
Speaker 1: three and a half games out of the four seed,
Speaker 1: and all without all that drama in the locker room
Speaker 1: and fourth quarter collapses, this team could have actually been
Speaker 1: right there. If they would have won six out of
Speaker 1: those twelve, they'd be three in the East right now.
Speaker 2: Isn't that crazy?
Speaker 4: That is? Yeah, I mean the East is so jammed
Speaker 4: up right now.
Speaker 1: It's so weird, Like they legitimately just blew multiple fourth
Speaker 1: quarter leads, like they're up double ditchits and they just
Speaker 1: it just dissolves out of nowhere. And I think Lloyd
Speaker 1: Pierce was a big reason for that. So hopefully they're
Speaker 1: able to salvage the season. I was very excited about
Speaker 1: them in like week one or two because they were.
Speaker 2: I mean, they're fast paced, they're fun.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're four and one, hot, hot, hot, sexy, scoring
Speaker 1: like one hundred and thirty points per game, and then
Speaker 1: they just fell off a cliff. So hopefully they can
Speaker 1: fulfill Lloyd Pierce's proclamation before the season was started, and
Speaker 1: hopefully this is a playoff team that would be very,
Speaker 1: very fun. Pelicans might be one of the most exciting
Speaker 1: teams to watch right now, and I think they before
Speaker 1: the start of the month, they were in the middle
Speaker 1: of the offensive ratings and since then they are the
Speaker 1: number one offense in basketball. What stan Van Gundy did
Speaker 1: with Zion is actually pretty incredible, and what that did
Speaker 1: for the offense is also sort of interesting. He turned
Speaker 1: Zion a power forward into a point forward. And the
Speaker 1: funny thing is because you would think like Zion's pretty big,
Speaker 1: pretty clunky, like not very smooth player, but he can
Speaker 1: handle the rock.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah.
Speaker 1: He has good court vision, good awareness, can pass the
Speaker 1: ball so quick, crossover change directions super fast. So when
Speaker 1: Zion's up there by the free throw line, he can
Speaker 1: see everything and get downhill really fast. And what that
Speaker 1: has done is then opened up the offense for Lonzo
Speaker 1: Ball or he doesn't need to facilitate he doesn't need
Speaker 1: to play mix, so he's playing better. Brandon Ingram is
Speaker 1: also getting downhill and there's more space on the floor.
Speaker 1: And even though all of them, Eric Bledsoe, brandon Ingram,
Speaker 1: Zion Loonzo, Josh Hart, all of them are tacking the rim.
Speaker 1: They are one of the least three point shooting teams
Speaker 1: right now in a league where three point shooting is king,
Speaker 1: and they're the number one offense in basketball. That is
Speaker 1: that is sort of stunning, uh, And I think that
Speaker 1: is a part of what stan Van Gundy was trying
Speaker 1: to do. And you talk about the defense, the reason
Speaker 1: for that defense falling off of a cliff Drew Holliday.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, he I mean, that's yeah, unfathomable loss.
Speaker 2: It's crazy.
Speaker 1: So The Athletic did an article about this changing offense,
Speaker 1: and essentially the Pelicans now are running something that's old
Speaker 1: school but still operating in a league where everybody else
Speaker 1: is shooting threes. So even though this offense is scoring
Speaker 1: just as much, if not a little bit more than
Speaker 1: they did last year, the way that they're doing it
Speaker 1: is totally different.
Speaker 2: The Pels last.
Speaker 1: Year were number nine in the NBA in three point
Speaker 1: shot frequency and five and three pointers made per game,
Speaker 1: mostly because of Drew Holliday and mostly because of the
Speaker 1: Alvin Gentry system right this year, in a more traditional
Speaker 1: offense that favors penetration over threes.
Speaker 2: They're number twenty four in the.
Speaker 1: NBA in three point frequency and number twenty three in
Speaker 1: threes made. And yet they're scoring more points now than
Speaker 1: they did last year one hundred and fifteen point nine
Speaker 1: versus one hundred and fifteen point eight. They were number
Speaker 1: four in the league in overall scoring then and they're
Speaker 1: number five now with a totally different, retooled offensive scheme
Speaker 1: and largely similar I mean pretty much similar roster outside
Speaker 1: of losing Drew Holliday and getting.
Speaker 2: Uh Eric Bledsoe.
Speaker 1: So what that shows me is that there's more than
Speaker 1: one way, as they say, to skin a cat, and maybe,
Speaker 1: just maybe we don't have to see all perimeter play
Speaker 1: all the time. Because they played the Jazz last Monday,
Speaker 1: and guess what Jazz made. Jazz is like number one
Speaker 1: three point shooting team. They made seventeen threes, Pelicans made seven.
Speaker 1: Pelicans won one twenty seven, one twenty four. The Pelicans
Speaker 1: became the first team to score seventy points in the
Speaker 1: paint against the Jazz in a quarter of a century. Hoof,
Speaker 1: that is insane to be able to beat the Jazz
Speaker 1: in that manner when they are shooting lights out from
Speaker 1: everywhere and you're playing bullyball against the defensive player of
Speaker 1: the Year candidate and Rudy Golbert Like, what does that
Speaker 1: tell you? Yeah?
Speaker 4: And they were up that entire game. The Jazz made
Speaker 4: a run at the very year they did. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So stan Van Gundy, even though he's old school, I
Speaker 1: don't really like him, it's working.
Speaker 2: His philosophy is working.
Speaker 1: Limit turnovers, forget offensive rebounding, push the pace.
Speaker 2: The big man's the key to the offense.
Speaker 1: You move the ball quickly and above all else, get
Speaker 1: to the fucking rack.
Speaker 2: Get to the rack.
Speaker 1: And with Zion like it makes sense he can get
Speaker 1: downhill at any time you give him any little bit
Speaker 1: of momentum, which is why it makes sense that he's
Speaker 1: away from the basket, right. You can't get a ton
Speaker 1: of momentum three feet from there. You have to be
Speaker 1: up by the free throw line in order to get downhill, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So he changed the offense in New Orleans and it
Speaker 1: is working. The problem is the defense like you said,
Speaker 1: is not working. They're fun, they're young, they're winning, but
Speaker 1: they also lose a lot of games because they give
Speaker 1: up a shitload of points. They actually give up more
Speaker 1: points than they score. So that's a problem, I would say,
Speaker 1: and I would say that the reason why, if you
Speaker 1: look at it, is because stan Van Gundy does not
Speaker 1: prioritize offensive rebounds. He basically says, when you shoot, just
Speaker 1: run back, just run back, No get another possession for yourself,
Speaker 1: No whine the clock down. Like it's almost like he's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we're not gonna run the ball in football, like you
Speaker 1: know how teams are, like, we're going to eliminate your
Speaker 1: offense by just controlling time of possession.
Speaker 2: Stan Van Gundy doesn't care about that. He's just like,
Speaker 2: get up and down.
Speaker 1: He's likes this weird hybrid of Mike dan Toni and
Speaker 1: old school basketball. I don't understand that philosophy whatsoever, because
Speaker 1: you could argue right that offensive rebounds are a form
Speaker 1: of defense, right, Yeah, you're preventing a team from getting
Speaker 1: back and getting out. In transition, in the last twenty games,
Speaker 1: the Pelicans have simultaneously produced the league's best offense and
Speaker 1: the worst defense. That is not a recipe for long
Speaker 1: term success. And the West is tight. The team is
Speaker 1: still under five hundred. They're playing better, but after the
Speaker 1: All Star break, have you taken a look at the schedule? No,
Speaker 1: it's daunting. They probably will be like an eleven seed.
Speaker 1: It's not gonna get much easier. Wednesday night was a
Speaker 1: perfect example of the Pells problem. In a nutshell, they
Speaker 1: came off that great Jazz win and then they just
Speaker 1: get smoked by the Bulls. Brandon Ingram admitted that they
Speaker 1: just do this repeatedly. We play great against good teams
Speaker 1: and we play like shit against bad ones.
Speaker 2: That's a problem.
Speaker 1: They enter a stretch of games that they should probably
Speaker 1: beat opponents and they probably won't. So my fear that
Speaker 1: this is going to be the best team in basketball
Speaker 1: that does not make the playoffs. And if they were
Speaker 1: in the East, as we have said, even a team
Speaker 1: like the Atlanta Hawks can be a three seed, four seed,
Speaker 1: five seed, So tough stretch for the Pelicans to make
Speaker 1: a run. They're gonna have to replace the Warriors, Grizzlies,
Speaker 1: and Mavericks. Do you think that's gonna happen?
Speaker 2: Marty?
Speaker 4: I wouldn't bet on it wouldn't bet on it.
Speaker 1: The best thing that the Pelicans have going for them
Speaker 1: is that everyone down to the eleven seed has a
Speaker 1: chance to get in. So the Pelicans, even as an eleven,
Speaker 1: can still sneak into the eight, which you could say
Speaker 1: the pandemic.
Speaker 2: Wo James Harden came back to Houston.
Speaker 1: And as we probably predicted, it was a blowout, comfortable,
Speaker 1: nearly twenty point win. Not a lot to talk about
Speaker 1: in that game except for my six unit win. That
Speaker 1: was like the lock of the Nights. Oh yeah, hell yeah,
Speaker 1: yea nets minus ten and a half just hammered. But
Speaker 1: the thing that I want to talk about was all
Speaker 1: of the chatter prior to the game, fanfare from James
Speaker 1: to Kyrie to like you said, Marty the fucking owner
Speaker 1: of the Houston Rockets himself had some things to say
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 2: Let's play what Kyrie said.
Speaker 5: Play everybody at home, enjoy the game. There will be
Speaker 5: no tension and no shit talking going on on the
Speaker 5: court or about James and my presence or anybody else's presence.
Speaker 5: So we're coming to Houston to enjoy the game of
Speaker 5: basketball and play it at a high level. On behalf
Speaker 5: of James and the rest of the guys because we
Speaker 5: know it's a s a special night.
Speaker 1: Regardless, you know, everybody at home, there will be no tension,
Speaker 1: no shit talking, not in my presence or anyone else's
Speaker 1: presence about James. That was some bodyguard shit right there.
Speaker 1: No one is gonna be talking shit about James. He
Speaker 1: also said earlier, we've all been through this, We've seen
Speaker 1: it all, we've.
Speaker 2: Done it all.
Speaker 1: So I thought to myself, Kyrie and Kevin Durant are
Speaker 1: the perfect players to be James Harden's teammates when he's
Speaker 1: going back to the city that he created bad blood in.
Speaker 1: Kyrie created some bad blood in Cleveland. Yeah, created some
Speaker 1: bad blood in Boston, and then Kevin Durant bad blood
Speaker 1: and okay see, and I'd say somewhat bad blood in Oakland.
Speaker 2: Pop fans were disappointed.
Speaker 1: They know what it's like to come back to an
Speaker 1: arena in it to be filled with booze. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: and James Harden for sure got some booze. But then
Speaker 1: Tilman for Titta was like, hey, there's not gonna be
Speaker 1: any tension here. In fact, we love James Harden so much.
Speaker 1: We are at some undefined point in the future. Not
Speaker 1: sure when going to be retiring James Harden's number number thirteen,
Speaker 1: No idea when that's coming, but that's coming down the pike.
Speaker 1: James Harden will always be a rocket in our estimation.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, James for your service.
Speaker 2: We love you. Let's just sweep.
Speaker 1: Everything under the rock in terms of how you left.
Speaker 1: And then James Harden is.
Speaker 2: Like, Yep, I love Houston. Houston is my home. It's
Speaker 2: always gonna be my home.
Speaker 1: I want to change thousands of lies because the city
Speaker 1: of Houston has done so much more for me than
Speaker 1: you could even know it to me. Felt like before
Speaker 1: the game, holy shit, things must be tense because everybody
Speaker 1: is talking about let's just cool the temperature down, and James.
Speaker 2: Harden says that Houston is his home.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if you know this, Marty, but
Speaker 1: James Harden even opened up a restaurant recently in Houston
Speaker 1: called thirteen, after his jersey number.
Speaker 4: I did not know this.
Speaker 1: James Harden, in the middle of a pandemic, has opened
Speaker 1: up a two hundred and fifty person restaurant. Head chef
Speaker 1: former NFL running back. Cannot make this shit up. You
Speaker 1: cannot make this shit up the food selection high end
Speaker 1: strip club, chic fried lobster tail on top of mac
Speaker 1: and cheese, one hundred and twenty five dollars, thirty two
Speaker 1: hours dry rub Tomahawk's steak with pineapple butter on top.
Speaker 1: I mean, no shit like if James, if this is
Speaker 1: James Harden's kind of food, no wonder he's putting on
Speaker 1: twenty yeah in the offseason. If he's not running and
Speaker 1: playing eighty two games in this season.
Speaker 2: I mean, he's just getting fat. That's just what he's doing, just.
Speaker 4: Eating his dick off.
Speaker 1: But just eating his dick off exactly. Are you excited
Speaker 1: about that menu? Is that the kind of menu you.
Speaker 2: Would be into?
Speaker 4: The lobster mac? Maybe, but uh, I don't know about
Speaker 4: the tomahawk steak.
Speaker 2: Gotta be a champagne room in the back.
Speaker 4: No oops.
Speaker 1: Yeah, back to the story though. I just thought that
Speaker 1: that was an interesting little tidbit. I was, I was
Speaker 1: doing some research so the nets wipe the floor with Houston,
Speaker 1: and as I.
Speaker 2: Was, I'm getting to a point.
Speaker 1: As I was watching this game, I thought to myself,
Speaker 1: like you said, there's not much to be encouraged about.
Speaker 1: This team is big trash without Christian Wood. They are awful,
Speaker 1: like just losing to everyone. The easiest bet in sports
Speaker 1: right now is betting against the Houston Rockets.
Speaker 2: Just responsibly put a lot of money on that.
Speaker 1: They are so trash that after losing their their coach
Speaker 1: is so trash.
Speaker 2: He is so defeated.
Speaker 1: Even when he's trying to rile them up, it's still tepid,
Speaker 1: just answering questions like why you guys suck?
Speaker 2: Why can you guys not compete? Why do you guys
Speaker 2: not try play.
Speaker 3: The clipt getting defense and everything? How do you how
Speaker 3: do you correct that in such a short amount of time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's all.
Speaker 6: It's all of us looking in the mirror and deciding
Speaker 6: that we're not gonna take it anymore. We're not gonna
Speaker 6: allow this anymore. We're not going to succumb to the pressure,
Speaker 6: to the adversity, to the disappointment that has been building
Speaker 6: for a long time.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, this guy, this guy, even after a twelve.
Speaker 2: Game I think at this point it's eleven games.
Speaker 1: Even after an eleven game losing streak where you're just
Speaker 1: getting your teeth kicked in on a night to night basis,
Speaker 1: he's like, it's just a matter of deciding that you
Speaker 1: don't want to take it anymore. He's like, we're not
Speaker 1: gonna take it.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 1: But even with like less energy than that, I don't
Speaker 1: I am not inspired by Steven Silas in the least.
Speaker 4: He hit some serious Earl Watson vibes.
Speaker 2: He has big Earl. You know all about Earl Watson.
Speaker 4: So when we were tanking, it's a very similar feeling
Speaker 4: to that, where there's just nothing positive happening in the
Speaker 4: coach just has to go and yeah, he.
Speaker 1: Has to stand out there like a wet rag and
Speaker 1: just explain himself in the most I don't know what's
Speaker 1: going on?
Speaker 2: What else do you want from me? These guys can't
Speaker 2: play basketball?
Speaker 1: And I have to say, looking back on it, James
Speaker 1: Harden was one hundred percent right to get the fuck
Speaker 1: out of there.
Speaker 2: This team is bad. He might have been he might
Speaker 2: have been too patient.
Speaker 4: As possible.
Speaker 2: Yeah, eight games might have been too long. Man.
Speaker 1: When James Harden said this roster wasn't close, boy, he
Speaker 1: said we don't have enough pieces to compete for a championship,
Speaker 1: and everybody was like.
Speaker 2: Oh, how could you say that?
Speaker 1: Look at him, Look at them, look at them. They
Speaker 1: are not close to a championship. They are not close
Speaker 1: to a playoff spot, folks. This is a lottery team.
Speaker 1: My god, was he not kidding. Let's look at some numbers.
Speaker 1: Since Christian Wood went down in February, the Rockets have
Speaker 1: lost twelve straight games by an average of twenty points,
Speaker 1: including five twenty point losses. They lost to Memphis by
Speaker 1: forty nine. Memphis, they lost. You just lost to the
Speaker 1: Memphis Grizzlies by fifty.
Speaker 2: This team is legit awful.
Speaker 1: Nothing to be excited about, nothing to take pleasure in.
Speaker 1: The only thing that I could have possibly been excited
Speaker 1: about this matchup as if DeMarcus Cousins was still on
Speaker 1: the team, because you know, something exciting would have happened.
Speaker 1: I tuned in thinking that maybe there'd be something, and
Speaker 1: it was just a dog walk, Just a dog walk,
Speaker 1: no wonder. James Harden put on that fat suit, broke
Speaker 1: quarantine mistraining camp to send the message, folks, this is
Speaker 1: red alert, red alert read I do not want I
Speaker 1: want to be here, and then had to say it
Speaker 1: out loud. Listen, I've send you every signal that you
Speaker 1: could possibly have without saying it to your face.
Speaker 2: I don't wanna fucking be here anymore, Get me out,
Speaker 2: Get out, Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: If he wouldn't have had that explosive presser, he could
Speaker 1: still be there right now, Marty, Can you imagine how
Speaker 1: miserable James Harden would have been right the second, knowing
Speaker 1: what he could be capable of putting up MVP numbers,
Speaker 1: averaging more assists than he has in his career average,
Speaker 1: just setting up his teammates, looking like the most gentle,
Speaker 1: generous point guard.
Speaker 2: We've ever seen in history.
Speaker 1: And no, he could have been sitting in Houston eating
Speaker 1: fried lobster with pineapple butter and fucking mac and cheese,
Speaker 1: just getting fatter and fatter and fatter like Mike Myers
Speaker 1: and Austin Powers, just getting gross.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's turning into fat bastard out there.
Speaker 1: That would have been James Harden if we wouldn't have
Speaker 1: let him escape to Brooklyn. Thank god hard and dogged them.
Speaker 1: Thank God he made it messy. Thank God he did
Speaker 1: everything he could do to save himself so that he
Speaker 1: could go and win. So we've have some questions, only
Speaker 1: a couple, because I think we're running a little bit behind.
Speaker 4: Okay, first up, we have what team should I invest
Speaker 4: my fandom into, grew up on the Bulls in the
Speaker 4: nineties and faded on them as a favorite. Sense, you know,
Speaker 4: I like.
Speaker 1: This question a lot. It depends on I would say,
Speaker 1: what kind of person you are. I think being a fan,
Speaker 1: it's sort of perfect your fan base, my fan base
Speaker 1: based on I think who we are. So if you
Speaker 1: are a glitz and glam person, if you are someone
Speaker 1: who likes to stunt on them a little bit, walk
Speaker 1: into a room with your team colors and everybody knows
Speaker 1: you got banners. It's purple and gold. Baby, it's the
Speaker 1: La Lakers. Lakers have got to be it. And you
Speaker 1: know that once COVID is over and you got a
Speaker 1: little vaccine Johnson and Johnson in your blood, Staples Center
Speaker 1: is the place to v baby.
Speaker 2: Sit in court side if you can afford the tickets.
Speaker 1: Everything's all like, you know, that's crazy, the way that
Speaker 1: the Staples is.
Speaker 2: It's like the court is lit up, but everything else
Speaker 2: is dark.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And you go into the like little candy room
Speaker 1: and there's like everything imaginable inside of there, and they've
Speaker 1: got their lobster and truffle butter and steak and.
Speaker 4: Wait, what's the candy room.
Speaker 1: There's like a full candy room in the back when
Speaker 1: you go in. If you sit in there, like the
Speaker 1: VIP area, it's crazy. It's crazy. There's like the whole
Speaker 1: back wall inside this back room under the tunnel, like
Speaker 1: where they.
Speaker 2: Have the VIPs get food. Is like a candy factory.
Speaker 1: It's like sour patch, like licorice ropes. There's every lemonheads,
Speaker 1: everything you can imagine in like little jars with little scoopers,
Speaker 1: and you have cups. They have these huge like soda
Speaker 1: cups and you just fill the cups filled with candy.
Speaker 1: It's my favorite thing about being at Staple Center. It
Speaker 1: happens with the Clipper game and the Laker game. It
Speaker 1: is fucking lit.
Speaker 4: Sounds phenomenal lit.
Speaker 1: So the Lakers have gotta be that no sexier team
Speaker 1: in basketball. They've got Lebron James, Anthony Davis. The kind
Speaker 1: of person that adopts the La Lakers is probably already
Speaker 1: a Yankee fan anyway. So if you don't and you
Speaker 1: already like the Bulls, so you already like excellence, that's
Speaker 1: a good team for you.
Speaker 2: This kind of fan is.
Speaker 1: Just here for the candy room and postseason games, parades
Speaker 1: and good vibes.
Speaker 2: If you're a basketball purist, I would say, you know,
Speaker 2: if you like the x's.
Speaker 1: And no's, if maybe basketball is new to you, you
Speaker 1: just want to like, I don't know, just get back
Speaker 1: to the way that things used to be. San Antonio Spurs,
Speaker 1: long standing coach in the league, main star for two decades,
Speaker 1: was nicknamed the Big Fundamental. Their jersey colors aren't even colors,
Speaker 1: they're just shades, yeah.
Speaker 2: Black and silver. If you don't like, if you like
Speaker 2: a lot of pick.
Speaker 1: And rolls, just monochrome, generic shit, I would say you
Speaker 1: could be a San Antonio Spurs fan.
Speaker 2: You're a simple man.
Speaker 1: You just want to enjoy good, old fashioned, fundamental basketball.
Speaker 2: That's it.
Speaker 1: If you have a penchant for disappointment, gotta be a
Speaker 1: Milwaukee Bucks fan.
Speaker 2: No team has been so hyped up for.
Speaker 1: The last three years and as constantly disappointed as much
Speaker 1: as the Bucks number one seed and bounced out of
Speaker 1: the first You have an athlete that signed the Super
Speaker 1: Max and is probably gonna request a trade in twenty
Speaker 1: four months. There are sadomascots out there, Marty. They do exist.
Speaker 1: And if you're listening nineties Bucks fan or nineties Bulls fan,
Speaker 1: I would say being the Bucks fan is for you, rinse, repeat, suffer.
Speaker 4: Okay, next up we have do the Nuggets make a
Speaker 4: deep run this year?
Speaker 1: Nuggets have one good game against the team that I
Speaker 1: just said is going to probably lose in the first round.
Speaker 2: Everybody is sucking. Let me stop.
Speaker 1: Everybody is hyping the Bucks up so fucking much that
Speaker 1: anytime anyone beats the Bucks they're a contender. Let me
Speaker 1: just say this out loud, very clearly. The Bucks are
Speaker 1: not a contender. They will not contend for a championship
Speaker 1: this year, or next year or the year after that.
Speaker 1: As long as those boys are in Brooklyn, and the
Speaker 1: East has a few teams that I think match up
Speaker 1: better with them, they are not going to contend. If
Speaker 1: you beat the Bucks, that does not make you a
Speaker 1: contender because they are not a contender.
Speaker 4: I'd agree with that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Okay, the Nuggets are up and down. They beat
Speaker 1: the Bucks, they beat the Lakers, they beat the Suns,
Speaker 1: they beat the Blazers.
Speaker 4: One of those Sons victories, the two minute reports showed
Speaker 4: they shouldn't have just.
Speaker 2: Correct, just want to mention correct. They did win that game.
Speaker 1: They've beaten great teams and they've also lost, kind of
Speaker 1: like the Pelicans lost to some shitty ones as well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, uh huh.
Speaker 1: They lost to the Kings, They've lost to the Hawks,
Speaker 1: They've lost to the Wizards. I mean, they may be
Speaker 1: eight and four with their last twelve with wins against
Speaker 1: the Lakers, Bucks, and Blazers, but I am not sold.
Speaker 1: They are seventh in the West, and Yokic has been phenomenal.
Speaker 2: But my point is if.
Speaker 1: In the last ten games, Yokic is averaging third and
Speaker 1: Jamal Murray is averaging thirty and you have gone only
Speaker 1: six and four during that time period, you have a
Speaker 1: massive problem on your hands. You can't have two people
Speaker 1: on your team average thirty and then say, well, in
Speaker 1: order for us to win, we need some big time
Speaker 1: minutes from PJ Dozer. No, the Nuggets will not make
Speaker 1: a deep run. They will not make a deep run.
Speaker 1: I tell you what. The Nuggets can play some defense,
Speaker 1: and they can hold teams to the Bucks to like
Speaker 1: in the mid nineties in terms of points, but against offenses,
Speaker 1: even though Atlanta we know is big trash and Washington
Speaker 1: is who knows they can score and good backcourts are
Speaker 1: gonna give them trouble. And the problem with the West
Speaker 1: is that there's a lot of good backcourts that are
Speaker 1: gonna give them a lot of trouble. I do not
Speaker 1: see the Nuggets going anywhere close to where they went
Speaker 1: last year. I do not see the Nuggets as a
Speaker 1: real team. And that's it. I mean, it's just it's
Speaker 1: just that simple. That's the whole like prisoner of the
Speaker 1: moment recency bias. Like they beat one good team that
Speaker 1: everybody falsely believes as a contender, and then it's like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, can the Nuggets make a deep run?
Speaker 2: No, what do you think? You agree?
Speaker 1: Uh?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean they may win a series. That's that's
Speaker 4: the cap though. There's no way they're going back to
Speaker 4: the West Finals.
Speaker 1: This is what I think will happen. They will be
Speaker 1: the eight seed, they will have to play a play
Speaker 1: in game. Oh it's not and they will lose that
Speaker 1: playoff play in game.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I get yeah.
Speaker 1: So I don't even think they don't. I don't even
Speaker 1: think they go to the first round. That is what
Speaker 1: I think. That's how low I am on the Nuggets.
Speaker 1: And I love Jamal Murray and I love Jokic. That's
Speaker 1: all the time that we have for this League. Please subscribe,
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Speaker 1: I think, thanks for listening.