Speaker 1: Welcome to this league on't you rule of twenty four
Speaker 1: hour NBA.
Speaker 2: News This news you, Chris Haynes.
Speaker 3: It's time, work's time, It's so time.
Speaker 1: This League Uncut is underway and on fire. This should
Speaker 1: be a good one. Everyone. Welcome in to another monology
Speaker 1: edition of this League Uncut. Second one of these we've
Speaker 1: done during the holiday season. Chris Haynes and I on
Speaker 1: the Move were on the run in different directions, but
Speaker 1: it was such a newsy Saturday in the NBA on
Speaker 1: the second to last day of the calendar year, we
Speaker 1: had to check in with you because, of course, we
Speaker 1: witnessed a quite significant trade. Ogannaobi goes to the Knicks
Speaker 1: along with Precious Atchua and Malachi Flynn in exchange for RJ.
Speaker 1: Barrett Emmanuel Quickly, a twenty twenty four second round pick
Speaker 1: from Detroit that figures to land right at number thirty
Speaker 1: one in the draft, just outside the first round. Imagine
Speaker 1: that New York and Toronto pausing their legal battles just
Speaker 1: long enough to swing the second significant in season trade
Speaker 1: we've seen, following the James Harden blockbuster that sent him
Speaker 1: from Philadelphia to clipper Land on Halloween Saturday night, also
Speaker 1: delivered the Detroit Pistons first win in twenty nine games
Speaker 1: twenty nine against the visiting Raptors, who were depleted by
Speaker 1: the trade earlier in the day, and as predicted as
Speaker 1: guaranteed by R Chris Haynes on the most recent addition
Speaker 1: of this league uncut last week.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna go out on the limb. I normally don't
Speaker 3: do it. I normally don't do this, but I'm gonna
Speaker 3: go out on a limb. Detroit is winning its.
Speaker 2: Next game against the Toronto Raptors.
Speaker 3: Against the Toronto Raptors at home.
Speaker 2: The twelve and eighteen Toronto Raptors who just pummeled Washington.
Speaker 2: Chris Haynes, Do I have this right? Chris Haynes is
Speaker 2: guarantee that the Pistons will win at home against the
Speaker 2: Toronto Raptors.
Speaker 3: I'm going to say right now, there's urgency within the
Speaker 3: locker room of the Detroit Pistons, and I think they're
Speaker 3: going to try to ride the momentum that they had
Speaker 3: and making this game a close game against the Boston
Speaker 3: Celtis and get that next game against the Raptors.
Speaker 1: Instinct tells me. Unfortunately, I'm not sure he's ever gonna
Speaker 1: let us here the end of that one. Was it
Speaker 1: really the boldest prediction, but you saw he's he's loving it.
Speaker 1: Use of Nurkics chimed in about it, So yeah, we
Speaker 1: haven't heard the last of mister Haynes calling is shot there.
Speaker 1: All of that was happening, though easy to miss. That's
Speaker 1: Lebron James birthday December thirtieth, the oldest player in the
Speaker 1: NBA for the first time in his career, Lebron James
Speaker 1: turns thirty nine, and of course, the loudest Lebron related
Speaker 1: headlines on his birthday. They all dealt with the potential
Speaker 1: game tying three that he drained in Minnesota controversially ruled
Speaker 1: a two on Sunday, the final day of twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: The league came out in its last two minute report
Speaker 1: and validated that call, saying that the evidence wasn't conclusive
Speaker 1: enough to change it. So that's what people are mostly
Speaker 1: talking about after that narrow Lakers loss at West Leading Minnesota.
Speaker 1: But for me, it's become an annual thing on my
Speaker 1: sub stack. When December thirty arrives, I write a piece
Speaker 1: about Lebron's birthday because of all the stuff, the amazing
Speaker 1: stuff he's doing at the age of nearly forty it
Speaker 1: is remarkable, and it, to me deserves it merits a
Speaker 1: yearly update. The hockey fans among us surely won't forget
Speaker 1: that Gordie Howe played in an NHL game at the
Speaker 1: age of fifty two. You feel pretty safe saying that
Speaker 1: Lebron James won't match that pretty safe. Notice in the
Speaker 1: sentence the use of won't rather than can't. That's because
Speaker 1: ruling it out completely, it feels especially unwise to take
Speaker 1: that course. Given what we're seeing from Lebron here in
Speaker 1: his twenty first season, I think you'd still have to
Speaker 1: rank him among the top ten to fifteen ish players
Speaker 1: in the league. He's still a top ten player on
Speaker 1: a lot of nights. Okay. Does he have thirteen more
Speaker 1: years of NBA basketball in him to match Gordy Howe?
Speaker 1: Probably not. However, could we go to Lebron into playing
Speaker 1: long enough to supplant Nat Hickey? The same Nat Hickey
Speaker 1: who appeared in two games as player coach for the
Speaker 1: Providence Steamrollers way back in nineteen forty eight at the
Speaker 1: age of nearly forty six. If enough of us make
Speaker 1: noise about that record being out of reach for Lebron.
Speaker 1: Could we nudge him into playing until he ends up
Speaker 1: as the oldest player in NBA history. Perhaps, I'd say
Speaker 1: it's conceivable. I've also been writing and saying for months
Speaker 1: now that Lebron, and again, no matter where you want
Speaker 1: to put him vis A VI Michael Jordan and Kareem
Speaker 1: Abdul Jabbar in the traditional goat debate, on this scorecard,
Speaker 1: Lebron has already sewn up longevity goat status and now
Speaker 1: he's just patting his lead in that division. Remember, Lebron
Speaker 1: is reportedly pumping one million dollars annually into his body
Speaker 1: maintenance regiment, and you'd have to say it's paying off
Speaker 1: if that continues. Does anyone really see Lebron stopping before
Speaker 1: the age of forty, No, He's going past age forty
Speaker 1: Based on all the available hints and signals he's been
Speaker 1: given us, I think if there's any force that is
Speaker 1: likely to lure him into retirement in the near future,
Speaker 1: something would have to happen on the expansion front, because
Speaker 1: we know he's been very vocal about wanting to move
Speaker 1: into NBA ownership when he's done playing. Something would have
Speaker 1: to happen there that demands an immediate response. That's, to me,
Speaker 1: the only thing that would get Lebron James off the
Speaker 1: floor anytime soon. And when I've watched him play this
Speaker 1: season in person, I've had that pleasure three times. I
Speaker 1: can't say that I've really been sitting there worrying too
Speaker 1: much about the possibility that we're running low on the
Speaker 1: opportunities to see him in person. I don't want to
Speaker 1: get too caught up into buying this whole marketing campaign
Speaker 1: against Father Time. And of course, Lebron said recently, I'm
Speaker 1: sure you remember the quote. It was one of the
Speaker 1: most circulated NBA quotes of twenty twenty three if the
Speaker 1: line about trying to give him one loss referring to
Speaker 1: Father Time. I don't want to get too wrapped up
Speaker 1: in all that. But the end does not feel near,
Speaker 1: not yet. Regular readers and listeners have heard me say
Speaker 1: often that I consider myself very fortunate to have been
Speaker 1: sent by ESPN to Sacramento for the very first NBA
Speaker 1: game Lebron played in October two thousand and three, and
Speaker 1: given what he's doing now decades later, decades, Yes, with
Speaker 1: an s you have to marvel at what he's still
Speaker 1: doing in purple and gold. Even if it is true
Speaker 1: that he's been more vulnerable to injury as a Laker
Speaker 1: than he ever was before, and as I'm recording this,
Speaker 1: I can make that statement, but you also have to
Speaker 1: note Lebron played in thirty of the lakers first thirty
Speaker 1: three games this season, and he was dealing with a
Speaker 1: less than pristine right foot throughout last season's playoffs. Well,
Speaker 1: he's come back from that in uber efficient fashion. That's
Speaker 1: the way you'd have to describe his last days as
Speaker 1: a thirty eight year old. Entering Sunday's play, James was
Speaker 1: shooting fifty three point six percent from the floor, which
Speaker 1: is his highest reading since his final season in Cleveland
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen eighteen. At forty point nine percent from
Speaker 1: deep entering Sunday's play, that would represent a career high figure.
Speaker 1: It's probably been helped somewhat by the fact that Lebron
Speaker 1: is taking five and a half threes per game this
Speaker 1: season compared to nearly seven threes last season, but still
Speaker 1: forty point nine percent from deep would be his all
Speaker 1: time best if he can stay at that level, and overall,
Speaker 1: Lebron averaging twenty five point one points, seven point five rebounds,
Speaker 1: seven point four assists. Come on, man, none of that
Speaker 1: should be happening at age thirty nine. But it is
Speaker 1: the part we can't see and that we can't really know,
Speaker 1: is how much the lakers middling seventeen and sixteen record
Speaker 1: entering Sunday's play is weighing on him. And as I'm
Speaker 1: recording this, the Lakers just announced that Lebron, both with
Speaker 1: an illness and a left knee contusion, is indeed playing
Speaker 1: tonight on New Year's Eve in New Orleans. So make
Speaker 1: that thirty one of thirty four games this season that
Speaker 1: Lebron James is in the lineup for the Lakers. But yeah,
Speaker 1: they're seventeen and sixteen entering the New Orleans game. They
Speaker 1: are scuffling in the play in zone. Again, they were
Speaker 1: literally in the Timberwolve zip code when Lebron celebrated number
Speaker 1: thirty nine. But the Lakers to this point just do
Speaker 1: not appear to be on the same level as Minnesota
Speaker 1: or surging Oklahoma City, let alone the defending champions from
Speaker 1: Denver and over in the East Boston, Milwaukee, Philly. You'd
Speaker 1: put all those teams ahead of the Lakers in the
Speaker 1: championship hunt too. Now, on their day, they can still
Speaker 1: play the most withering team defense you'll see anywhere. But
Speaker 1: the offensive shortcomings, the lack of shooting, the group around
Speaker 1: James and Anthony Davis, and the holes that the Lakers
Speaker 1: still have well chronicled. And then you still have very
Speaker 1: real and tangible doubts about Lebron at thirty nine and
Speaker 1: AD at twenty nine. Can those guys physically deal with
Speaker 1: a two month playoff run different proposition to the way
Speaker 1: they mode through seven games in the n Season Tournament
Speaker 1: to win the IST and set Lebron James up to
Speaker 1: be named the first most valuable player in in season
Speaker 1: tournament history. I know you're gonna ask me about trades.
Speaker 1: What might the Lakers do before the February eighth trade deadline? Well,
Speaker 1: their recent preference has been shorter term deals whenever possible
Speaker 1: around Lebron and Ad. So to me, that continues to
Speaker 1: suggest that a trade for Chicago Zach Levine. I think
Speaker 1: it's more unlikely than likely, because Levine would be a
Speaker 1: two hundred and fifteen million dollar third option in LA
Speaker 1: if that's the birthday gift that James was hoping for
Speaker 1: or if he's merely hoping that Levine ships to the
Speaker 1: West coast closer to the February eighth trade deadline, my
Speaker 1: instinct is he's gonna wind up being disappointed. We certainly
Speaker 1: have to concede, though, that things can change fast. A
Speaker 1: year ago, at this time, when Lebron was celebrating his
Speaker 1: thirty eighth birthday, the Lakers season it seemed utterly unsalvagable.
Speaker 1: Then the Lakers end up making multiple trades in January
Speaker 1: and February. They regrouped and then unexpectedly reached the Western
Speaker 1: Conference Finals. On another front, Lebron clearly faces some competition now,
Speaker 1: some very stern competition, capable of bumping him from Hollywood's
Speaker 1: leading man status among athletes, because seven hundred million dollar
Speaker 1: man sho he O Tani just signed with the Dodgers.
Speaker 1: But trust me, King James isn't going away, not yet.
Speaker 1: I suppose you can argue that he can't be singularly
Speaker 1: dominant like he once was, where you could seemingly put
Speaker 1: any random forsome beside him and he could get that
Speaker 1: group to the NBA Finals. But look, he's the only
Speaker 1: thirty nine year old you will fight on today's NBA map,
Speaker 1: and he's proving more fade resistant than anyone his age
Speaker 1: is supposed to be. All right, everyone, that's gonna do
Speaker 1: it for this solo edition of This League Uncut. We
Speaker 1: certainly hope all your holiday celebrations were warm, wonderful. Chris
Speaker 1: and I wish you a prosperous twenty twenty four. Hopefully,
Speaker 1: very soon we'll be back together for a new edition
Speaker 1: of This League Uncut, presumably an episode filled with trade talk.
Speaker 1: The next show will be our first show of the
Speaker 1: new year, as we dribble toward our one year anniversary
Speaker 1: in just a matter of weeks. Now, Please remember, as always,
Speaker 1: if you have it already, rate, review, and subscribe to
Speaker 1: This League Uncut via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you get
Speaker 1: your podcasts from Chris, from producer Ryan, and from yours.
Speaker 1: Truly Happy new year, everyone, and that'll do it for us,
Speaker 1: See you next time.
Speaker 3: This League and Cutter is an iHeartRadio production
Speaker 2: Chris Haines and Mark Stein