Speaker 1: M all right, welcome to the State of the Lakers.
Speaker 1: Hasn't a boy dads badio. Thank you guys for making
Speaker 1: some time on a Saturday. This is gonna be really quick,
Speaker 1: maybe ten fifteen minutes. My wife is out of town,
Speaker 1: had a little bit of extra free time. I had
Speaker 1: a couple of thoughts about a couple of NBA related
Speaker 1: topics that I wanted to touch on, so I figured
Speaker 1: we might as well hop on a space is really quick. Um,
Speaker 1: my goal is to hit on steps shooting this slump
Speaker 1: that he's been in for the vast majority of this season.
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about Grayson Allen
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, kind of how I feel about
Speaker 1: what makes him different from some of the other dirty plays,
Speaker 1: dirty players that we see around the league, and why
Speaker 1: I think he can be so problematic. And then at
Speaker 1: the end, I want to talk about Russ in this
Speaker 1: ridiculous little media tour that he's been doing over the
Speaker 1: last couple of days that I think is kind of
Speaker 1: tone deaf and uh, completely unaware of what Laker fans
Speaker 1: are actually looking for from him. So three quick topics.
Speaker 1: Like I said, ten fifteen minutes. I appreciate you guys
Speaker 1: coming to hang out. Let's go ahead and get started.
Speaker 1: So step shooting, as we know, he is below from
Speaker 1: three this year, and for basically the last basically half
Speaker 1: of their games games, he's shooting well below what we
Speaker 1: would expect um from a player of his caliber. His
Speaker 1: field goal percentage has been in the high thirties and
Speaker 1: his three point percentage has been in the low thirties
Speaker 1: for this stretch. And I, you know, I see Warriors
Speaker 1: fans in particular kind of working through it in a
Speaker 1: bunch of different ways, trying to blame stuff with rotations,
Speaker 1: trying to blame stuff with his shot selection, trying to
Speaker 1: blame stuff with you know, the way he's being utilized
Speaker 1: on and off the ball. And I remain just completely
Speaker 1: and utterly unconcerned. I can't think of anything that worries
Speaker 1: me less than whether or not Steff is going to
Speaker 1: start making shots at some point. Um. The reason why
Speaker 1: is because he looks great physically. This is the big
Speaker 1: thing that we look at here. You know, when I
Speaker 1: watch people get upset about Lebron having a rough game
Speaker 1: or poor shooting night, or failing to get his step
Speaker 1: on a guy, a lot of times, all I have
Speaker 1: to do is see one or two moves that he
Speaker 1: might make over the course of the game where I
Speaker 1: can say, oh, like his legs are still there. He's
Speaker 1: just having an off night forever for whatever the reason
Speaker 1: might be. Now, when it comes to when it comes
Speaker 1: to jump shooting in particular, it gets a lot more
Speaker 1: finicky because there's so much related to the mental side
Speaker 1: of the game. Like, for instance, step this year is
Speaker 1: shooting fifty six percent when he's tightly guarded, very tightly guarded.
Speaker 1: I should say, according to NBA dot Com, he's shooting
Speaker 1: forty when he's tightly guarded. He's actually been making the
Speaker 1: tougher you know, classic Steph Curry types of shot, and
Speaker 1: he's been missing the wide open ones. Is wide open.
Speaker 1: Three point percentage is five percent lower than it was
Speaker 1: last season. So it's one of those things where it's
Speaker 1: very flukey to me. I think a lot of it
Speaker 1: is confidence related, you know, Like I said, jump shooting
Speaker 1: is kind of like this. It can be one of
Speaker 1: those things where you know, gets in your head and
Speaker 1: you start to overthink things and you get you stopped
Speaker 1: stop thinking about your form, and you start thinking like
Speaker 1: you've got the yips, or you just don't have it tonight,
Speaker 1: or man, I just wish one of these would go down,
Speaker 1: and it just gets in your head and it can
Speaker 1: really be it can really be a problem. That's what's
Speaker 1: different between a jump shooting centric player and a player
Speaker 1: likes to get to the rim. They can typically impact
Speaker 1: the game no matter what, just by you know, pushing
Speaker 1: through that physical barrier of trying to put their head
Speaker 1: down and get to the rim. Now, to be clear,
Speaker 1: Steph has still had an amazing season. I think there's
Speaker 1: a case to be made that he still our m
Speaker 1: v P because of all of the attention that he
Speaker 1: drags all over the court. There is you know, if
Speaker 1: you look at the Warriors metric, the way that their
Speaker 1: teammates performed with step on the step on the floor
Speaker 1: is vastly better than the way they performed with Steph
Speaker 1: off the floor. So we have to be clear in
Speaker 1: understanding that Steph just because he's not shooting particularly well,
Speaker 1: doesn't mean he's having a bad season. He's been very
Speaker 1: good defensively, He's been very good in in big moments
Speaker 1: at the end of games. He had another big crunch
Speaker 1: time moment last night. I actually think that's gonna be
Speaker 1: the one that gets him going, because I do believe
Speaker 1: this is associated with his confidence. So again, I he
Speaker 1: looks great physically, the team looks great. I'm not even
Speaker 1: remotely concerned about step I think he's gonna be fine.
Speaker 1: The one thing I was gonna say, if I had
Speaker 1: to be really nitpicky with step is related to shot selection.
Speaker 1: And I've noticed this, especially over their last couple of games.
Speaker 1: You know, Steph is a gunner from three. He's one
Speaker 1: of the few guys in the league that being a
Speaker 1: gunner from three works for him. It's actually beneficial to
Speaker 1: the team in a lot of ways. That's where he
Speaker 1: gets his gravity from. However, step has been in the
Speaker 1: league for a long time now, you know, they're in
Speaker 1: two thousand sixteen and two thousand fifteen. So much of
Speaker 1: what he was doing was catching the league off guard,
Speaker 1: and his style of play was so unusual that he
Speaker 1: could have success, you know, basically based on defensive schemes,
Speaker 1: having no idea how to handle what he was bringing
Speaker 1: to the table. Now it's completely different. Over the course
Speaker 1: of the last six seven years, there's been a blueprint
Speaker 1: formed for how to guard Steph Curry. Now, for the record,
Speaker 1: there's a blueprint that exists for every superstar in the league.
Speaker 1: So I don't mean that as a negative. I just
Speaker 1: mean during that early phase of the Steph era, he
Speaker 1: there was no blueprint because he was so unusual. There
Speaker 1: was no one had seen anything like it, no one
Speaker 1: knew how to guard him. Well, now there's a blueprint.
Speaker 1: You rough him up off the ball. You're grabbing your
Speaker 1: hold so that as he's doing his off ball actions,
Speaker 1: you fatigue him and it makes it harder for him
Speaker 1: to move around. And essentially you get somebody on your
Speaker 1: team who's a ball hawk who does a good job
Speaker 1: of making sure that after Steph gives up the basket
Speaker 1: all he doesn't lose focus or get out of his stance,
Speaker 1: because that's when step is most dangerous. So now there
Speaker 1: are a handful of guys in the league that actually
Speaker 1: can do a decent job against him. So this is
Speaker 1: where Steph has to evolve with them, right, just like
Speaker 1: every other star that has has come through the league,
Speaker 1: especially as as they get older, you have to find
Speaker 1: a way to evolve faster than defenses have been. And
Speaker 1: so what I would like to see is to see
Speaker 1: step take a little bit more advantage of guys over
Speaker 1: playing him to the three point line and make a
Speaker 1: greater attempt to score in other spots on the floor.
Speaker 1: Steph is one of the best midrange shooters that we
Speaker 1: have in our league. It's a it's a shot that
Speaker 1: he has to learn to lean on more, especially when
Speaker 1: you've got guys risking position, getting out of position for
Speaker 1: the sake of chasing you off the three point line
Speaker 1: when there's an option there for you in the paint,
Speaker 1: and he's got an arsenal of these like scoop shots
Speaker 1: and floaters that when Steph is really clicking, that he
Speaker 1: can go to. So again, if I'm being nitpicky, I'd
Speaker 1: like to see Steph just embrace a little bit or
Speaker 1: of of of a very varying shot profile, take on
Speaker 1: a little bit more of some of the other spots
Speaker 1: on the floor rather than hunting those threes all of
Speaker 1: the time. I've seen his story too many times this year.
Speaker 1: You know, Warriors down three late and Steph comes down
Speaker 1: and he just jacks the three, and it's like sometimes
Speaker 1: they go in and sometimes they don't. You know, if
Speaker 1: he adds a little bit more versatility there, I think
Speaker 1: it will get him back into his confidence, which then
Speaker 1: will unleash that barrage of Step three pointers that we
Speaker 1: all know. But again, you look at the numbers, it's
Speaker 1: the wide open ones that he's missing. His body looks great,
Speaker 1: so it's just a typical shooting slump. I wouldn't overthink it.
Speaker 1: I feel pretty confident that step is gonna have a
Speaker 1: big time end of the season. I wouldn't be shocked
Speaker 1: if he ended up over by the end of the season.
Speaker 1: One last note on Steps something that's a little bit interesting, Uh,
Speaker 1: he in his last two postseason runs is underneath from three.
Speaker 1: That would be an indicator of serious decline. Now, obviously,
Speaker 1: in the two was a nineteen playoff run, he um
Speaker 1: was the focal point of the defense because of a
Speaker 1: couple of injuries, so that's a little bit different. But
Speaker 1: it'd be interesting to see this year what he shoots
Speaker 1: from three in the postseason. I think that'll be a
Speaker 1: good indicator of where he's seriously at in terms of
Speaker 1: any sort of alleged decline. Um. But let's let's move
Speaker 1: on to Grayson Allen for a second. So I was
Speaker 1: thinking a lot about you know, what makes Grayson Allen
Speaker 1: different from other players around the league that get people hurt,
Speaker 1: because we've seen a bunch of them. I've seen, you know.
Speaker 1: We we see that play like the Solomon Hill play
Speaker 1: on Lebron or Matthew Dellavedova in the two thousand fifteen playoffs,
Speaker 1: diving into Kyle Korver's legs, that sort of thing. There
Speaker 1: is an epidemic in the NBA of dangerous hustle. This
Speaker 1: is something that needs to be talked about. That's separate
Speaker 1: from the Grayson Allen issue. I don't think guys should
Speaker 1: It's I don't think I should be diving for loose
Speaker 1: balls when guys are running next to him. It's kind
Speaker 1: of similar to diving at a quarterback selex. Obviously, if
Speaker 1: you're a defensive end and an offensive lineman is pushing
Speaker 1: you down to the ground, sometimes you you have to dive, right,
Speaker 1: But the league basically decided, even though that's a natural
Speaker 1: football play, it's far more important for our quarterbacks to
Speaker 1: be healthy because that's what's best for the league. It's
Speaker 1: best for the league if our quarterbacks are on the field,
Speaker 1: that's when we get our best television product. And all
Speaker 1: of the thirty two teams agreed, and that's the way
Speaker 1: they chose to proceed. That's kind of the type of
Speaker 1: angle that I think the NBA needs to take. Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: we get it, it's a hustle play. You're going for
Speaker 1: a loose ball. But in my opinion, similar to the
Speaker 1: Kawhi Leonard play, where the the Zaza Petulia and Kawhi
Speaker 1: Leonard play where we decided we didn't want defenders coming
Speaker 1: up under jump shooters anymore, we have to do the
Speaker 1: same thing with all of these weird fake hustle plays
Speaker 1: where guys are diving on the floor in blowing guys
Speaker 1: knees out and blowing guys uh ankles out. We need
Speaker 1: to have a rule that if you die for a
Speaker 1: loose ball and there's a player where the ball is
Speaker 1: and you take out their legs, it needs to be
Speaker 1: some kind of flagrant, some sort of some sort of
Speaker 1: accountability there, because again, it's just more important for the
Speaker 1: sake of the league, for the health of the league,
Speaker 1: for the TV product, to have our basketball players actually
Speaker 1: available and able to play. But that's different. Like when
Speaker 1: I think of like other dirty players in the league,
Speaker 1: like Patrick Beverley is a good example. Patrick Beverley, Like
Speaker 1: when I think about dirty plays from him, they're typically
Speaker 1: related to hustle, so they might fall in that category
Speaker 1: that I'm talking about, like maybe it should be penalized
Speaker 1: with a flagrant or something like that. The stuff that
Speaker 1: Grayson Allen does is flat out dangerous and it's not hustle.
Speaker 1: It's just dirty. There's a huge difference between the two.
Speaker 1: You stick in your foot out and tripping a guy
Speaker 1: that has nothing to do with you trying to make
Speaker 1: a basketball play that happens to be dangerous and getting
Speaker 1: someone hurt, that's you just being a prick. That's you
Speaker 1: just being a jerk who's trying to hurt somebody at
Speaker 1: then like a child, unable to control your urges to
Speaker 1: lash out when you get beat off the dribble. There's
Speaker 1: it's it's absolutely inexcusable, and I there's absolutely no place
Speaker 1: for it in basketball. And the same thing goes with
Speaker 1: two basketball players that I want to use as an
Speaker 1: example of what I'm talking about, Taylan Horton Tucker last
Speaker 1: night against Orlando. On a play when Jalen Suggs took
Speaker 1: off to go to the basket, Taylor Horton Tucker went
Speaker 1: with two hands towards the ball to try to make
Speaker 1: a play. He got both hands on the basketball during
Speaker 1: the process. He got some wrist as well, and he
Speaker 1: his momentum was at an angle that it was unfortunate,
Speaker 1: and it pulled Jalen Suggs to the ground and it
Speaker 1: ended up being a dangerous play and Jalen Suggs ended
Speaker 1: up getting hurt. Now there's a blame pie there that
Speaker 1: all three players are involved, because Jalen Suggs had no
Speaker 1: business trying to take off right there. He had no angle,
Speaker 1: there was no advantage. It was just an extremely dangerous
Speaker 1: move on his part. Taylan obviously pulling the ball down
Speaker 1: that's dangerous as well. There's an angle to where Lebron
Speaker 1: kind of has hands up in there, kind of pushing
Speaker 1: Jalen in the chest. That's all dangerous, But they're all
Speaker 1: basketball plays. What Grayson Allen did was not a basketball play.
Speaker 1: He wasn't looking, he didn't know what was happening. He
Speaker 1: knew he had Alex Cruise up by the arms. He
Speaker 1: knew that by pulling him it was gonna be uh,
Speaker 1: something super dangerous and the worst case in the weapon.
Speaker 1: And now a player who deserves consideration for the All
Speaker 1: Defense Team is gonna miss two months of basketball because
Speaker 1: Grayson Allen couldn't control himself again and got somebody hurt.
Speaker 1: I think Grayson Allen deserves a significantly long suspension, something
Speaker 1: that sends this very important message. Yeah, we might be
Speaker 1: able to hustle, to legislate dangerous hustle out of the league,
Speaker 1: but this business with Grayson Allen doing this jan ky
Speaker 1: dirty stuff has to get out. The only way it's
Speaker 1: gonna happen is if they levy a heavy suspension on him.
Speaker 1: There needs to be a point if Grayson Allen is
Speaker 1: going to stay in the league, there needs to be
Speaker 1: a point where he actually starts to encounter these situations
Speaker 1: and it's dada just sticking his foot out or doing
Speaker 1: something stupid. He finally thinks about a consequence for once
Speaker 1: and he stops doing it. It needs to be done
Speaker 1: before somebody gets seriously, seriously hurt, and maybe it's worse
Speaker 1: than a couple of months. Alright, really quickly, before we
Speaker 1: get out of here. I wanted to hit on this
Speaker 1: Russell Westbrook thing. So after the catastrophe against the Indiana
Speaker 1: Pacers the other night, we had the story from Davig
Speaker 1: Mediment about Russ walking off the floor essentially, and then
Speaker 1: DeAndre Jordan's kind of trying to shepherd him back to
Speaker 1: the bench. And then we heard that he skipped on
Speaker 1: the media session, but not only did he skip on
Speaker 1: the media session, he skipped the postgame meeting with the team.
Speaker 1: Like he ran back to the locker room. It took
Speaker 1: a quick shower and ran out of there. And so
Speaker 1: then Russ goes on the offensive, right, he tells, uh,
Speaker 1: he I think he did the interview with Adrian Morzanowski
Speaker 1: and he does this lengthy story about all the how
Speaker 1: difficult this has been and how he's just working through
Speaker 1: it and how all he wants to do is win
Speaker 1: and he's gonna do whatever it takes to to make
Speaker 1: sure he fits into that role. And you know, everyone's like, oh,
Speaker 1: Russ is saying all the right things, And I thought
Speaker 1: the same thing. I'm like playing Russ is saying all
Speaker 1: the right things. But they said all the right things
Speaker 1: in that story before the season when Anthony Davis, Lebron
Speaker 1: and Russ met up and talked about what this would
Speaker 1: look like, and during that that time, Russ said all
Speaker 1: the right things about what he would have to do
Speaker 1: to fit with Lebron and Anthony Davis. That was all
Speaker 1: said before. This is all This is a classic talk
Speaker 1: is cheap type of situation. I just no one's interested,
Speaker 1: and you're saying you have to do all the right things.
Speaker 1: Just go out and do all the right things for us,
Speaker 1: Like the Laker fan base. If there's one thing about
Speaker 1: the Laker fan base, they're gonna be real with you, man, like,
Speaker 1: if you play really well, if you do all the
Speaker 1: little things well, if you do what's necessary to fit
Speaker 1: into this team, the fan base will embrace you again.
Speaker 1: They'll stop demanding that you get traded, they'll stop tweeting
Speaker 1: out every bad play you make. If you actually tip
Speaker 1: this scales to where what you do good outweighs what
Speaker 1: you do bad, your impression around the team, You're impression
Speaker 1: around the fan base will change, and it will Frank
Speaker 1: will start playing any more. There's so much good that
Speaker 1: comes from that. Just focus what's going on the court.
Speaker 1: And then we get this ridiculous story today in ESPN
Speaker 1: talking about how Russ got back on track against the
Speaker 1: Orlando Magic, and it's just so like tone deaf to me, like,
Speaker 1: come on, man, like we we you do you really
Speaker 1: think that you're going, you know whatever, it was like
Speaker 1: seven for fifteen or whatever it was against the Orlando
Speaker 1: Magic and having some success getting to the rim against
Speaker 1: that absolute dogshit defense, that that's gonna be what turns
Speaker 1: everything around. Like, come on, man, like have some standards,
Speaker 1: have some understanding, like don't be so tone death, be
Speaker 1: aware of what people are asking for from you. We
Speaker 1: play the Miami Heat tomorrow. The Miami Heat have one
Speaker 1: of the best defenses in the league. They're one of
Speaker 1: the best, most well co to his teams in the league,
Speaker 1: well coached teams in the league. Eric Spoelstra is going
Speaker 1: to have a game plan that is going to be
Speaker 1: geared towards exposing all of Russell Westbrok's weaknesses. And what's
Speaker 1: really going to happen in that game is russ is
Speaker 1: gonna have an opportunity to show us what he really
Speaker 1: means when he says what he said to Adrian W.
Speaker 1: Dronowski the other day. Is he going to go into
Speaker 1: that game and do his defensive job on every single possession.
Speaker 1: Is he going to go into that game and never
Speaker 1: get lost off ball? Is he gonna go into that
Speaker 1: game and stop hunting rebounds but rather hunt his box
Speaker 1: out which is more important to the team concept. Is
Speaker 1: he on the offensive end going to make the right
Speaker 1: read to take away what or to directly attack with
Speaker 1: Miami is game planning to take away from you? Or
Speaker 1: is it gonna look like it's looked against every other
Speaker 1: good team this year, where it's fast and loose. For
Speaker 1: every good defensive play, there's a bad defensive play or
Speaker 1: bad jump shot selection getting into the lane and picking
Speaker 1: up your dribble and getting yourself in a bad position.
Speaker 1: Those that's what we're really watching. Russ. We don't care
Speaker 1: what you did against the Orlando Magic. We don't care
Speaker 1: what you say to Adrian Warzanowski. You have a good stretching.
Speaker 1: You have a stretch of games here coming up against
Speaker 1: really good teams. If you go into this stretch of
Speaker 1: games and you do your job on defense every single
Speaker 1: possession or the vast majority of the possessions, and on offense,
Speaker 1: you play within the five out concept, just like Malik
Speaker 1: Monk is, just like Stanley Johnson is, just like all
Speaker 1: these guys are. Just do your job on both ends
Speaker 1: of the floor. I promise you, Lak your fans will
Speaker 1: be thrilled to have you on the team, like your
Speaker 1: fans will be thrilled to think about what this next
Speaker 1: two years would be like. The only reason they're not
Speaker 1: the only reason I'm saying trade you. The only reason
Speaker 1: all these guys are saying trade you is because you're
Speaker 1: not paying attention to that stuff, and you're far more
Speaker 1: wrapped up in the old RUSS instead of embracing what
Speaker 1: the new RUSS needs to be. So no more of
Speaker 1: these stories, no more of these weird puff pieces and
Speaker 1: quotes coming out. Just go out and play basketball, Russ.
Speaker 1: If you go out and you play well, everything is
Speaker 1: going to turn around for you. It's really that simple.
Speaker 1: Al Right, guys, that's all I have for today. This
Speaker 1: is gonna be on our Twitter feed or excuse me,
Speaker 1: our podcast feed here in about fifteen twenty minutes and
Speaker 1: Rod roges out of town. So Venet was kind enough
Speaker 1: to offer to join. So Venet is gonna be joining
Speaker 1: me for the post game show tomorrow, the final right
Speaker 1: after the final buzzer. I believe it is a three
Speaker 1: pm Pacific Standard time. Tip. We appreciate your support as always,
Speaker 1: and I'll see you guys tomorrow