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Speaker 1: Night here at the volume. Happy Tuesday, everybody. Hope all
Speaker 1: you guys are having a great week. Just gonna do
Speaker 1: a quick mail bag today before we get to Game
Speaker 1: four the Western Conference Finals tonight. We'll be going live
Speaker 1: on YouTube tonight after the final buzzer. Make sure you
Speaker 1: guys are there, got like twenty twenty five questions we're
Speaker 1: going to get to today. You guys know the drill
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Speaker 1: All right, let's talk some basketball. So the first question,
Speaker 1: what is your most interesting storyline from a likely MAVs Celtics. Obviously,
Speaker 1: the Celtics have officially secured their spot in the NBA Finals.
Speaker 1: The MAVs need one more win to do so. But
Speaker 1: as we've broken down at nauseum in the show, We're
Speaker 1: going to get into a little bit deeper today. I
Speaker 1: don't see a pathway for Minnesota to flip the script
Speaker 1: against Dallas. I think it's a terrible matchup for them,
Speaker 1: in addition to the fact that Luca is clearly a
Speaker 1: better player at this phase of his career than Anthony Edwards,
Speaker 1: and so I don't really see a path there. So
Speaker 1: I think the overwhelmingly likely scenario is that we're going
Speaker 1: to get the MAVs versus the Celtics in the NBA Finals,
Speaker 1: and so from there, I'm gonna kind of go a
Speaker 1: little bit deeper into a concept I talked a little
Speaker 1: bit about last night with Colin Coward. What I think
Speaker 1: is most interesting about this series is the complete difference
Speaker 1: in the two builds of these rosters. Right, Boston feels
Speaker 1: like more of a talent accumulation type of roster. Right,
Speaker 1: everyone plays positions that compliment each other really well. Right,
Speaker 1: Like Derek White's more of like a skill guard, right all, so,
Speaker 1: an excellent defensive player and a great athlete, but he's
Speaker 1: a guy that can you know, really run a lot
Speaker 1: of action. Excellent pull up three point shooter when they
Speaker 1: go to late game situations, it usually ends up being
Speaker 1: Tatum White two man game, right. But then Drew Hollidy
Speaker 1: kind of plays that athlete guard guards the other team's
Speaker 1: best guard kind of thing, right, And then you've got
Speaker 1: you know, your smaller forward, and then you've got your
Speaker 1: bigger forward and Jason Tatum, and then you've got that
Speaker 1: center position with a rim protector and Chris tops porzingis right.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, none of those guys are
Speaker 1: like role players, right. Every single one of them has
Speaker 1: at various points in their careers been playing in very
Speaker 1: large roles, even like Derek White, who's been a role
Speaker 1: player and a lot of teams, Like I would argue,
Speaker 1: at this point, he's become one of the primary decision
Speaker 1: makers for the Boston Celtics, right, And so that team
Speaker 1: is you know, as we mentioned in many of the
Speaker 1: recent episodes, all five of those guys that I just
Speaker 1: mentioned on the open market, if they were free agents
Speaker 1: right now, would command over thirty million dollars a year.
Speaker 1: So it's like a very talented, you know, conglomeration of players.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Then we get into Dallas and it's like you've got
Speaker 1: a player in Luca that I believe is better than
Speaker 1: Jason Tatum. I believe he's at least the second best
Speaker 1: player in the league, if not the best player in
Speaker 1: the league. Right, So, it's more of like a top
Speaker 1: heavy build where you have Luca and Kyrie and they
Speaker 1: take on basically the vast majority, They take on the
Speaker 1: entirety of the offensive decision making part of the offense.
Speaker 1: That puts everybody else in a play finishing role.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So, Derrek Jones Junior, it's ketch and shoot threes, driving closeouts.
Speaker 2: PJ.
Speaker 1: Washington, it's ketch and shoot threes, driving close outs, a
Speaker 1: little bit of work in the dunker spot, maybe the
Speaker 1: occasional duck in post up. Right, Derek Lively vertical spacing,
Speaker 1: Daniel Gafford vertical spacing. Every single guy on the team
Speaker 1: is playing in a play finishing role on the offensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor. Then you go over to the
Speaker 1: defense end of the floor, and every single one of
Speaker 1: those same guys has super focused and important defensive responsibilities.
Speaker 2: Right. PJ.
Speaker 1: Washington and Derek Jones Junior are guarding your best guard
Speaker 1: and forward.
Speaker 2: On the other team.
Speaker 1: Lively and Daniel Gafford are running deep drop coverage and
Speaker 1: protecting the ram and Kyrie and Lucar primarily off ball,
Speaker 1: although Kyrie's done a good amount of work on ball
Speaker 1: in this playoff run. Right, So it's like it's a
Speaker 1: lot of like guys having less talent being focused into
Speaker 1: very specific roles behind these two super talented offensive players
Speaker 1: versus Boston, where it's like kind of everyone has to
Speaker 1: do everything because everyone is a star, right, And so
Speaker 1: like I do find that to be super super fascinating
Speaker 1: going into that series, that to me is the most
Speaker 1: interesting storyline. Another kind of way to look at it
Speaker 1: is like Luca being potentially the best player in the
Speaker 1: series versus Boston clearly being the more talented team in
Speaker 1: the series, and so it's going to be an interesting
Speaker 1: kind of of you know, case study and whether or
Speaker 1: not the best player on in the series can elevate
Speaker 1: his team over more talent. Now again, but for the record,
Speaker 1: we've seen many times over the years that not be enough. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: I think Lebron James was clearly the best player in
Speaker 1: the world from twenty twelve to twenty twenty. I thought
Speaker 1: that that was clear, and yet there were several examples
Speaker 1: over that stretch where he did not win the NBA Championship,
Speaker 1: he won four of them. What is a nine year span,
Speaker 1: so we lost five of them, right, So like twenty fourteen,
Speaker 1: that Spurs team just had it cooking in so many
Speaker 1: different ways offensively and at Dwayne Wade's knee was kind
Speaker 1: of bothering and the team was kind of just getting
Speaker 1: a little bit fatigued, a little bit old, right, you know.
Speaker 1: Twenty fifteen, Kevin Love and Kyrie Irving get hurt. Right
Speaker 1: twenty seventeen. In twenty eighteen, Kevin Durant and Steph Curry,
Speaker 1: the second and third best players in the world, team
Speaker 1: up with each other and that ends up being enough
Speaker 1: to unseat him. Right, twenty nineteen, he has the groin injury. So,
Speaker 1: like you guys can see the point, Like there are
Speaker 1: many times in NBA history where the best player in
Speaker 1: the series does not win. I think just look back
Speaker 1: at the Denver series, knowing what we know about Anthony
Speaker 1: Edwards now and seeing that he doesn't have the matchup
Speaker 1: resiliency that someone like a Luka Doncic has. Now that
Speaker 1: we've seen that, we can state unequivocally that the best
Speaker 1: player in the series in the Denver Minnesota Series was
Speaker 1: Jokic and yet Denver lost, and so we're gonna see
Speaker 1: if Luca can reverse that trend going into the NBA Finals.
Speaker 1: Next question, does Dallas have what it takes to upset
Speaker 1: Boston in the finals. Absolutely, They're an elite defensive team, right.
Speaker 1: I think a big part of it is going to
Speaker 1: be Luca attacking and pick and roll. I started to
Speaker 1: just barely look at some film. We're gonna do a
Speaker 1: lot of series preview content around this series because we're
Speaker 1: just gonna have a lot of time. Like, guys, if
Speaker 1: if Dallas wins tonight, which I think they probably will,
Speaker 1: but Minnesota's got a shot if Dallas wins tonight, we're
Speaker 1: looking at eight consecutive days, full days off before the
Speaker 1: NBA Finals. Like I was thinking, we'll probably go there's
Speaker 1: two Dallas Boston games. We may just do full breakdowns
Speaker 1: of both of those games. We might spend an entire
Speaker 1: show talking about the offense. We might bring on Chris Mannix,
Speaker 1: we might bring on those of you guys who were Dallas.
Speaker 1: If you guys have a specific like team, someone who
Speaker 1: covers the Mavericks really closely that you guys think is
Speaker 1: great at it, drop it in the comments I'll see
Speaker 1: if I can't reach out and get them on the show.
Speaker 1: We're gonna have a lot of fun previewing this series,
Speaker 1: and we're gonna get into all those details. But one
Speaker 1: of the things that I noticed in my initial kind
Speaker 1: of look at some film yesterday is Luca is too
Speaker 1: big for everybody on Boston pretty much except for Jason Tatum.
Speaker 1: And so I think a big thing is Boston's not
Speaker 1: gonna want to put Jason Tatum on Luca, especially not
Speaker 1: early in the series. I think Drew Holliday is gonna
Speaker 1: get that assignment a lot, right. I think Jalen Brown
Speaker 1: and Drew Holliday are gonna be the guys that see
Speaker 1: the majority of the time on him. And like, you know,
Speaker 1: first possession of the game in Boston, like Luca gets
Speaker 1: Drew Holliday on his hip and just methodically works him
Speaker 1: down into the lane, waits for chrisops Porzingis to recover
Speaker 1: to the role man, and then he just shoots an
Speaker 1: easy little floater over Drew Holliday and he turns around
Speaker 1: and makes the too small symbol, right, So, like I
Speaker 1: think that that's gonna be kind of like where this
Speaker 1: series hinges is can Luca really strangle the pace of
Speaker 1: the game and pick the Celtics defense apart in the
Speaker 1: half court because if you can and keep the game
Speaker 1: kind of slowed down in intense and high pressure, maybe
Speaker 1: on the other end of the floor, can your elite
Speaker 1: defense play Boston into some of their worst tendencies. Now,
Speaker 1: one of the things that's going to be interesting is
Speaker 1: Boston is very much a spread you out type of
Speaker 1: driving kick offense, which is very, very different than what
Speaker 1: Minnesota does, right, and like, you're not gonna have the
Speaker 1: luxury that you have in this series of having Daniel
Speaker 1: Gafford and Derek Lively just spark in the paint because
Speaker 1: Rudy Gobert is terrible at making anything other than a dunk.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna actually pull up this stat real quick. I
Speaker 1: tweeted it out yesterday, but I pulled this up on
Speaker 1: Synergy yesterday and I was like literally blown away. So,
Speaker 1: Rudy Gobert is this that is like legitimately insane. Let's see,
Speaker 1: Rudy Gobert is shooting sixteen for thirty five on layups
Speaker 1: in this playoff run and three for eleven on floaters
Speaker 1: in hook So like that's one of the things that
Speaker 1: allows Derek Lively and Daniel Gafford to just kind of
Speaker 1: roam off of Gobert and help in the lane is like,
Speaker 1: unless it's a clean dunk, Gobart's probably not gonna make it.
Speaker 1: And so that buys you that luxury. That's not what
Speaker 1: it's gonna be like with Al Horford and chrisops porzingis
Speaker 1: they're gonna be operating primarily from the three point line
Speaker 1: and it's gonna be a lot more about covering in space. Now,
Speaker 1: this is where we've found out that Maxi Kleba is
Speaker 1: coming back tonight. That's a big deal for Dallas, right,
Speaker 1: Like having Kleba back gives you the ability to put
Speaker 1: lineups out there with Kleba, PJ. Washington, and Derek Jones
Speaker 1: Junior all on the floor at the same time, and
Speaker 1: then you can you can put those guys on Tatum
Speaker 1: and Brown and Derek White and ask Kyrie to do
Speaker 1: a somewhat easier job of guarding someone like a Drew
Speaker 1: Holliday and ask Luca to maybe be the guy who's
Speaker 1: hedging and recovering on an on an Al Horford or
Speaker 1: something along those lines. Like they're they're gonna have options,
Speaker 1: more options by virtue of having Maxi Kleba back, but
Speaker 1: it's gonna be much more of a of a defend
Speaker 1: in space type of series, whereas this series is much
Speaker 1: more of a load up and pack the paint type
Speaker 1: of series.
Speaker 2: So it's going to be very, very different.
Speaker 1: But Dallas certainly has what it takes and it's all
Speaker 1: going to come down to Luca just completely dominating the series,
Speaker 1: and it's going to come down to physical perimeter containment
Speaker 1: from Dallas's perimeter defenders. And if they can do that
Speaker 1: in kind of play Boston into their worst tendencies, I
Speaker 1: think they've got a good chance. Who is the best
Speaker 1: lob thrower in NBA history and why is it? Luka
Speaker 1: Doncic I was thinking about this earlier. I think it's
Speaker 1: probably Luca as well. There are a lot of really
Speaker 1: good lob throwers that have seen over the years, like
Speaker 1: guys like Trey Young, guys like Chris Paul. Lebron was
Speaker 1: always good at he just never played with a vertical
Speaker 1: spacing threat until Anthony Davis, and he's been pretty good
Speaker 1: at connecting him with lobbs. But the problem with Lebron
Speaker 1: and Ad is they play very similar positions, so teams
Speaker 1: will typically switch those ball screens, and so lebron ad
Speaker 1: picking rolls out something you see a ton of unless
Speaker 1: you're playing against a drop coverage big, right, But I
Speaker 1: think it's clear Luca. One of the big things that
Speaker 1: I think makes him the best at it is he's tall,
Speaker 1: and like you got to think, so, what makes a
Speaker 1: lob open. A lob is open when the rim protector
Speaker 1: leaves the lob threat. Right, If the rim protector is
Speaker 1: leaving the lob threat, that means that a seven footer
Speaker 1: or some sort of large center type player is leaving
Speaker 1: that guy to pressure Luca, and so he's got to
Speaker 1: be able to get that pass over the tall player.
Speaker 1: I put in the film session yesterday. Do you guys
Speaker 1: remember that transition post up of Mike Conley where Luca
Speaker 1: spun baseline and threw the lob up to I think
Speaker 1: it was Gafford, it might have been Lively, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: But on that play, Gobert left him and double team
Speaker 1: Luca and came up arms up, and Luca just happened
Speaker 1: to get the pass up over the top of him,
Speaker 1: which is just a kind of like a benefit of
Speaker 1: him being as tall as he is. I've been saying
Speaker 1: this for a while, but I think Luca is the
Speaker 1: only current NBA player that can contend for goats status thoughts.
Speaker 1: So I was looking at I thought about this for
Speaker 1: a little while this morning because I kind of think
Speaker 1: of like three tiers of young players, Like the guys
Speaker 1: in that like age twenty seven to thirty range that
Speaker 1: are like kind of in the heart of their prime
Speaker 1: right now. There's like the guys that are in that
Speaker 1: like twenty five to twenty six, twenty four to twenty
Speaker 1: five to twenty six range. Those to me are the
Speaker 1: guys that are just entering into their prime. And then
Speaker 1: there's the guys that are in their early twenties that
Speaker 1: are like very clearly just like raw talent, that are
Speaker 1: still kind of getting into that phase. In the older tier,
Speaker 1: Jannis and Jokic, they both have a title, right but
Speaker 1: they both turn thirty next year. It's a one championship.
Speaker 1: Entering into your thirties, they just would have to go
Speaker 1: on an absolutely crazy run over the next five years
Speaker 1: to enter into those conversations.
Speaker 2: So that feels pretty unlikely.
Speaker 1: Joel Embiid he doesn't have one yet, and he's gonna
Speaker 1: be thirty. I think he might actually already be thirty.
Speaker 1: But like Embiid is probably off of that, off of
Speaker 1: that you know, pathway right in Luca's tier, which is
Speaker 1: the kind of guys in that you know, twenty four
Speaker 1: to twenty five to twenty six age bracket. I put Luca, Shakekilojos, Alexander,
Speaker 1: Jason Tatum, and Devin Booker. Devin Booker just I don't
Speaker 1: I just don't think he has that upside. Jason Tatum,
Speaker 1: I think is a really good and maybe even a
Speaker 1: bit underrated basketball player, but I don't think that he's
Speaker 1: in the tier of players that can really like dominate
Speaker 1: the league for a half of a decade. Like like,
Speaker 1: I think he's the perfect fit for this super talented
Speaker 1: Boston roster, but I think if you swapped him with like,
Speaker 1: with a guy like Luca and put him in a
Speaker 1: role where he really had to run an offense by
Speaker 1: himself or with only one secondary shot creator for an
Speaker 1: eighty two game season, I just don't think he's the
Speaker 1: kind of guy that can really do that at.
Speaker 2: A super high level. Shaek yios.
Speaker 1: Alexander is damn good, but I don't think he's as
Speaker 1: good as Luca, So I think Luca is really the
Speaker 1: only guy in his tier that can do it. But
Speaker 1: in the next generation, I think there's two guys that
Speaker 1: can do it. I think Victor webbin Yama has that potential,
Speaker 1: and I think Anthony Edwards has that potential. But it's
Speaker 1: just completely raw potential with those two. So it's like
Speaker 1: there's a there's a huge, wide rue range of outcomes
Speaker 1: for them, and as you get older, those ranges of
Speaker 1: outcomes kind of zero in between where your current development
Speaker 1: is and what your potential upside is, right, And so yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that I think that Lucas certainly has that potential,
Speaker 1: but I also think that there are some guys in
Speaker 1: the younger generation that have that potential. What is it
Speaker 1: that separates go Baar in the eyes of voters from
Speaker 1: players like Ad Bam and Victor wemen Yama. I find
Speaker 1: it odd that media voters complained about him winning just
Speaker 1: to vote for him year after year. So voters, I've
Speaker 1: one of the big things that I learned after I
Speaker 1: got into this business. A good percentage of voters rely
Speaker 1: heavily on metrics, which is crazy to me, but it
Speaker 1: is what it is, and I've had one of those
Speaker 1: guys explain to me the reasoning and their whole thing
Speaker 1: is like the eye test is flawed, but numbers are unbiased,
Speaker 1: and that's a good way to look at it. I
Speaker 1: think that that's absurd personally, but that is the way
Speaker 1: that so many voters think.
Speaker 2: And there's just a lot of really good.
Speaker 1: Metrics that support Rudy Gobert being the best regular season defender,
Speaker 1: and even though defensive metrics in particular are very flawed,
Speaker 1: a lot of people kind of key in on that
Speaker 1: sort of thing. I think the second piece of it
Speaker 1: is people are just enamored with the fact that Gobert
Speaker 1: is like super engaged defensively all the time, which is
Speaker 1: completely ridiculous when you factor in the responsibilities that Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis has, that bam Adebayo has, that Victor Webmbinyama has
Speaker 1: a D and bam we're both like folkrum ball screeners
Speaker 1: in a five out offense all year, like they were
Speaker 1: guys that had to like consistently make decisions and set
Speaker 1: screens and roll hard to the rim, not in a
Speaker 1: way like Rudy Gobert where it's like maybe you'll catch
Speaker 1: and finish every once in a while, they were expected
Speaker 1: to score. They were expected to score consistently on the
Speaker 1: offensive end of the floor. And Victor webbin Yama obviously
Speaker 1: as well, is a guy that is a primary initiator
Speaker 1: for his team, and so like I can speak to
Speaker 1: this from personal experience. Like when I was in college.
Speaker 1: When I was in junior college, I was like one
Speaker 1: of the best scorers on my team. I was the
Speaker 1: guy that had the ball in my hands a ton.
Speaker 1: Then I went to Naia, and when I was there,
Speaker 1: I played alongside two All American guards. My role fundamentally
Speaker 1: changed from guy who had the ball in his hands
Speaker 1: to I stayed on the floor and like kept my
Speaker 1: spot in the lineup by basically devoting all of my
Speaker 1: energy towards guarding the other team's best player and trying
Speaker 1: to knock corner threes down right. So like in that
Speaker 1: every game I went in like all I cared about
Speaker 1: was defense, defense, defense, because that was how I kept
Speaker 1: my job while I was playing alongside really good offensive players.
Speaker 1: And so that's what Rudy Gobert does. Rudy Gobert goes
Speaker 1: into tonight's game, He's not thinking about anything on the
Speaker 1: offensive end. The only thing Rudy Gobert is thinking about
Speaker 1: tonight going into the game is how do I anchor
Speaker 1: this defense? Whereas Anthony Davis when he's going into Game
Speaker 1: five in Denver, he's thinking, man, I got to give
Speaker 1: him an efficient thirty tonight two, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And so like there's just a lot of pressure sure
Speaker 1: on those guys to do more. And I genuinely think
Speaker 1: all three of those guys and arguably Draymond as well,
Speaker 1: are better defensive players in a vacuum than Rudy Gobert.
Speaker 1: But because Rudy Gobert devotes all of his energy in
Speaker 1: that direction, he puts up these crazy metrics and all
Speaker 1: the voters just kind of glom onto that sort of
Speaker 1: thing and they run with it every single year. And
Speaker 1: so Rudy Gobert has four Defensive Player of the Year trophies,
Speaker 1: and I think he's probably somewhere around the fifth to
Speaker 1: seventh best defensive player in the world. And it is
Speaker 1: what it is. If the Timberwolves mostly Towns and Ant
Speaker 1: were playing like they were the first two rounds, would
Speaker 1: they be up three to zero or at least two
Speaker 1: to one. I mean, yeah, But think about why they're
Speaker 1: playing poorly. They're not playing poorly, like so many people
Speaker 1: want to point to this as like some sort of
Speaker 1: mental shortcoming, like, oh, you know, Carl Towns and Anthony
Speaker 1: Edwards just ran into this aura of Luka Doncic and
Speaker 1: then they just crumbled the pieces. No, Like they're playing
Speaker 1: a very different defense than they did in the first
Speaker 1: two rounds. They are completely incapable of getting into the paint.
Speaker 1: All of Minnesota's paint finishes have come off the ball,
Speaker 1: either through cleanups around the rim, put backs, or attacking
Speaker 1: closeouts on the weekside. Carltown's in Anthony Edwards are not
Speaker 1: consistently getting into the lane because of elite perimeter athleticism
Speaker 1: and elite vertical athleticism under the rim for Dallas, and
Speaker 1: so again, like they're not playing well, but there's a
Speaker 1: basketball reason for that, Like we got to get out
Speaker 1: of this hole, like, oh, they crumbled under the pressure. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: Like there's generally speaking, if the basketball conditions are favorable,
Speaker 1: a player is gonna play well, and if basketball conditions
Speaker 1: are not favorable, they're not going to play well. And again,
Speaker 1: it's exposed a couple of weaknesses as we've gone over
Speaker 1: in this series. I've consistently said Carl Anthony Towns is
Speaker 1: a guy that if you can flatten out his drives
Speaker 1: and shut off the lane from him, he's an inconsistent
Speaker 1: over the top shooter, and so you will turn him
Speaker 1: into a make or miss guy, and he's been missing
Speaker 1: in this series. That's something that can happen with Karl
Speaker 1: Anthony Towns. Anthony Edwards his flies, he's all one speed
Speaker 1: right now, and so he's got to learn against these
Speaker 1: super packed in defenses how to be more methodical to
Speaker 1: manipulate help defenders, which is going to take him a
Speaker 1: few more years of experience. There's two of these. I'm
Speaker 1: so relieved that Jason is leaning Boston. Would have crushed
Speaker 1: my soul for him to give us his curse. The
Speaker 1: second one, Please don't pick the MAVs to win, Jason,
Speaker 1: don't do it. First of all, I literally picked the
Speaker 1: MAVs to win against the Clippers. I picked the MAVs
Speaker 1: to win against the thunder when they were an underdog.
Speaker 1: So was I cursing the MAVs. Then, in my pre
Speaker 1: playoffs contender rankings, I had Denver one, Boston to Dallas three.
Speaker 1: So like I obviously was a huge believer in Dallas
Speaker 1: all along, I picked against them in this specific series
Speaker 1: in a razor thin margin. And then I also laid
Speaker 1: out in the series preview all the different reasons that
Speaker 1: Dallas could win, including Jada McDaniels might be too skinny
Speaker 1: for Luca, including Dallas has real rim protection that might
Speaker 1: cause problems for Anthony Edwards and Karl Anthony Towns. In
Speaker 1: the lane, I also mentioned like I thought Luca's knee
Speaker 1: might be in rough shape and it might cause some problems.
Speaker 1: It clearly has not been an issue. So like, first
Speaker 1: of all, I haven't cursed your team. Second of all,
Speaker 1: I've been consistently on the Dallas bandwagon for the most
Speaker 1: part over the course of the latter portion of the year,
Speaker 1: So I really don't know where all that sentiment comes from.
Speaker 1: Why don't teams target Luca? Why didn't they put him
Speaker 1: in pick and roll? So, first of all, there's a
Speaker 1: reason why the Wolves can't because Luca has been targeted
Speaker 1: on occasion in this series, and he's ended up on
Speaker 1: an island against you know, Luca, or against Anthony Edwards
Speaker 1: or against Carl Anthony Towns. The reason why the Wolves
Speaker 1: are struggling with it is think about it like this.
Speaker 1: If it has Derek Jones Junior on him and he
Speaker 1: brings Luca into the screen, gets a switch at that point,
Speaker 1: where's Gobert if it's an ISO. If it's an ISO,
Speaker 1: go Beart's sitting underneath the basket in the dunker spot, right,
Speaker 1: and who's guarding him Derek Leivelier Daniel Gaffer Right. So
Speaker 1: Luca's defensive job becomes very simple. Just press up on
Speaker 1: Ant and make him drive, and if he drives, he's
Speaker 1: just gonna drive into all of this damn traffic underneath
Speaker 1: the rim. Dallas has also been helping heavily off of
Speaker 1: Jade McDaniels all serious. So it's not that they're not
Speaker 1: trying to target Luca, it's just it doesn't solve the
Speaker 1: fundamental problem, which is Ant can get by his man.
Speaker 1: That's not the issue. Even Derek Jeonge Jr. And can
Speaker 1: get by him. It's the totality of the team defense
Speaker 1: on the way they're packing the paint, and with Gobaert
Speaker 1: and McDaniels being left open, how they're incapable of consistently
Speaker 1: making them pay for doing that. But Boston is very,
Speaker 1: very big on matchup attacking. Up until the point where
Speaker 1: Tyres Aliburton left the series, the vast majority of action
Speaker 1: they were running was targeting Tyros Aliburton either on the
Speaker 1: ball through pick and roll or off the ball through
Speaker 1: inverted pick and roll where he was hedging and recovering.
Speaker 1: Boston was going at him every single time down the floor. Also,
Speaker 1: Boston can get centers out of the paint because they
Speaker 1: have shooting bigs, so they can like legitimately play five
Speaker 1: out all the time, right, And so from that perspective,
Speaker 1: I do think Luca will get targeted a lot more
Speaker 1: consistently in the Boston series, and it will come down to,
Speaker 1: you know, is is Dallas willing to hedge and recover
Speaker 1: or are they just gonna have to double team m
Speaker 1: out of those situations or is Luca just gonna slide
Speaker 1: his feet and do it. Well, we're gonna find out
Speaker 1: in that next round. Every Luca play description as you saying,
Speaker 1: watch how Luca bumps Jayden to create separation, or watch
Speaker 1: how Luca hits him so hard he goes flying, or
Speaker 1: Luca gives him a little off arm creating separation, or
Speaker 1: watch Luca bump Jaden with the drop step here, with
Speaker 1: each being followed by Lucas step back. This action is
Speaker 1: never called an offensive foul. How can anyone guard this
Speaker 1: type of play effectively? Basketball is a contact sport. I
Speaker 1: hate to break it to you. That's just what it is.
Speaker 1: It's not like every single basketball Not only is basketball
Speaker 1: contact sport, it becomes more and more of a contact
Speaker 1: sport the later you get into the playoffs. And that's
Speaker 1: just not even that's not even just a NBA thing.
Speaker 1: That's at every life, whether it's high school, when you
Speaker 1: get into the playoffs, it gets more physical. Whether it's
Speaker 1: an NCAA tournament game, it gets like that, whether it's
Speaker 1: a money tournament where there's money on the line and
Speaker 1: guys are playing like it, just anytime the intensity in
Speaker 1: stakes rise, it becomes a contact sport. And so that's
Speaker 1: why if you look back through NBA history, it's usually
Speaker 1: the big strong guys who end up playing the best.
Speaker 1: It ends up being the Lucas, it ends up being
Speaker 1: the jokic As, it ends up being the Lebron james As,
Speaker 1: it ends up being the Giannises in this league, right,
Speaker 1: the big strong guys who have the most success. Why
Speaker 1: are you so convinced that Ant will just learn to
Speaker 1: be a smart player and game controller. He will improve,
Speaker 1: of course, but he has an enormous gap to close
Speaker 1: with guys like Luka or Jokis. I'm sure he will
Speaker 1: be a brilliant player for years to come, but I
Speaker 1: do not really see the signs of him being a
Speaker 1: great decision maker consistently. I have the impression that Wemby
Speaker 1: is more likely to have that type of impact, and
Speaker 1: he is in his and he is in his way
Speaker 1: also a freak of nature like Ant. So if anyone
Speaker 1: is going to be an outstanding force in the league
Speaker 1: other than Luca or Jokic, it's going to be Wemby,
Speaker 1: not Ant.
Speaker 2: Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: Wenby's a very different type of player Ant, but he
Speaker 1: also has that type of potential. I absolutely think that
Speaker 1: Wemby could be.
Speaker 2: Better than it.
Speaker 1: He should be better than it, right, Like, he's got
Speaker 1: the best set of physical tools ever in the history
Speaker 1: of NBA prospects.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So, like, Wemby's kind of like a different thing as
Speaker 1: far as ANTC goes. He's twenty two years old, guys,
Speaker 1: He's twenty two years old. Michael Jordan and Lebron James
Speaker 1: didn't win their first titles until they were twenty seven.
Speaker 1: That's five years, five more playoff runs. Like, think about
Speaker 1: how long ago five years was. Five years ago Kwhi
Speaker 1: Leonard was playing for the Toronto Raptors. Five years ago,
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant was still wearing a Golden State Warriors jersey. Okay, Like,
Speaker 1: that's how far we have to get for Aunt to
Speaker 1: be able to win a title on the same schedule
Speaker 1: as the lebron James Michael Jordan's tier of guys at
Speaker 1: the top of the league in NBA history, right, So, Like,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't overthink that. And most importantly, I've seen encouraging
Speaker 1: signs having that disastrous first half in Game seven and
Speaker 1: then figuring out how to be deeply impactful in the
Speaker 1: second half. That was a huge, huge sign of adaptability
Speaker 1: from Ant, even in this series. I know every Mavericks
Speaker 1: fan is just convinced it was because of Lively. I
Speaker 1: thoroughly disagree. In terms of his overall approach. He was
Speaker 1: much smarter in the second half of Game three. No,
Speaker 1: it's not gonna be enough to turn the series around,
Speaker 1: but he is adaptable, he is learning, and he is
Speaker 1: rapidly improving. Give this dude five more offseasons, five more
Speaker 1: eighty two game grinds, five more playoff runs. He's gonna
Speaker 1: be so damn good. Guys, He's gonna be so damn good.
Speaker 1: It looked like he might be ahead of schedule. Turns
Speaker 1: out still needs some more time. But that doesn't mean
Speaker 1: we need to pretend the dude is incapable of reaching
Speaker 1: where he wants to get to need the Boston Verse
Speaker 1: MAVs breakdown. Like I said, obviously, we're gonna wait until
Speaker 1: after the MAVs series ends, but we will do many,
Speaker 1: many layers of series preview content for this matchup, a
Speaker 1: ton of film, probably gonna have some guests on as well.
Speaker 1: We're gonna have lots to get into over the course
Speaker 1: of the coming week. How has Ant's potential changed zero
Speaker 1: after the series? You just said in this video that
Speaker 1: he will need considerably more time to reach the peak,
Speaker 1: So that's considerably less rings for him. He potentially could
Speaker 1: have started winning championships starting this season, but now it'll
Speaker 1: take him a couple more years to get his first.
Speaker 1: The potential does change, No, it doesn't. Lebron James and
Speaker 1: Michael Jordan didn't win their first until twenty seven and
Speaker 1: they've combined to win ten. He was on pace to
Speaker 1: be way ahead of schedule. It looks like he's a
Speaker 1: little bit He's got a ways to go. But guys,
Speaker 1: he's twenty two. He barely can order a beer. Okay, Jason,
Speaker 1: I love the channel and have improved my understanding of
Speaker 1: basketball measurably thanks to your logical and insightful breakdowns of
Speaker 1: the game. I used the logic you taught me to
Speaker 1: predict that the MAVs have many advantages in this matchup
Speaker 1: and that should put them as considerable favorite, despite what
Speaker 1: the overall narratives were surrounding the series. Looking back on
Speaker 1: your coverage, I believe you have the basketball like Q
Speaker 1: and experience to have gone against the majority of your
Speaker 1: peers and predicted the shape of this matchup before game one,
Speaker 1: but you allowed yourself to be moved by more narrative
Speaker 1: based statements such as Edwards is playing like a top
Speaker 1: five player in the league, or that either Denver or
Speaker 1: Mini could easily beat Dallas or Oklahoma City. Do you
Speaker 1: think this is a fair assessment and that if you
Speaker 1: followed your own processes more strictly, you could have predicted
Speaker 1: this series more accurately. So, first of all, I really
Speaker 1: do try to look at the basketball before going into
Speaker 1: the series. If you guys, go go back and listen
Speaker 1: to the series preview and you'll hear a lot of
Speaker 1: the same shit that's happened in the series. I specifically
Speaker 1: brought up McDaniels might not be able to guard Luca.
Speaker 1: I specifically brought up that the rim protection might be
Speaker 1: an issue for Anthony Edwards and Carl Anthony Towns. I
Speaker 1: specifically brought up that Derek Jones Junior was a freaky
Speaker 1: athlete that might be able to have some more success
Speaker 1: keeping Anthony Edwards in front off of the dribble. I
Speaker 1: looked at all those advantages. I think where I specifically
Speaker 1: made a mistake was I knew Dallas's rim protection would
Speaker 1: be different than Denver. I just thought ant would have
Speaker 1: more success against it. So, like, honestly, like it's this
Speaker 1: series should be a little closer than it is. It
Speaker 1: shouldn't be a sweep. Dallas isn't four to zero better
Speaker 1: than Minnesota. But Anthony Everards is having a really really
Speaker 1: rough series, which can happen sometimes for young basketball players
Speaker 1: when they run into a tough matchup, and so again,
Speaker 1: like the way I look at it, like I was wrong,
Speaker 1: but I had it close. Go look at in the preview,
Speaker 1: I've specifically said, like, this can go either way. Dallas
Speaker 1: certainly can win. I'm picking Minnesota. I thought Minnesota's defense
Speaker 1: would have a little bit more impact on Luca, and
Speaker 1: I thought Anthony Edwards would have a little bit more
Speaker 1: success attacking in the half court against this team. It
Speaker 1: went a different way. I was wrong. It happens. I
Speaker 1: don't know what else to say. But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, guys, like like I guys, Minnesota beat Denver.
Speaker 1: Minnesota beat Denver. Denver and Anthony Edwards went toe to
Speaker 1: toe with the best player in the world and like
Speaker 1: played more or less at his level over the course
Speaker 1: of a seven game series. Like Dallas flipped the script.
Speaker 1: Good on them, tip the cap. But like, let's not
Speaker 1: sit here and pretend like Minnesota was a bunch of
Speaker 1: bums and we all foolishly picked bums over because of
Speaker 1: narratives over the Dallas Mavericks. That's not the way that
Speaker 1: I see it. First you were on Denver, then Minnesota,
Speaker 1: now Dallas. Do you have pick integrity? A couple things
Speaker 1: I hate this part of the job, but it's something
Speaker 1: that we have to do.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: There is no such thing as like a basketball analyst
Speaker 1: out there. If there is one, show me who year
Speaker 1: in year out, just picks every single series correctly. It's
Speaker 1: not a thing. I remember when we were talking with
Speaker 1: When I was talking with Ethan Strauss on his podcast,
Speaker 1: he said something that I thought was fascinating. He goes,
Speaker 1: humans on a deep level are are are addicted to variants,
Speaker 1: And what he meant by that was like, we want
Speaker 1: to go into a situation and not know what's going
Speaker 1: to happen, right, And he was referring to it with
Speaker 1: JJ Redick wanting to get back into coaching, and essentially,
Speaker 1: the way I interpreted that and what I thought was
Speaker 1: super fascinating is like, that's what makes sports fun to watch, guys,
Speaker 1: is we don't know what's gonna happen. If we knew
Speaker 1: every single game clearly who was going to win, no
Speaker 1: one would watch. Where's the fun in that? Like, at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, Like, that's what we love
Speaker 1: about sports is you tune in for Game seven Denver
Speaker 1: Minnesota and it's like, man, what's gonna happen tonight? Is
Speaker 1: Denver going to flex their championship muscles and get this
Speaker 1: thing done? Or is Minnesota, on the strength of this
Speaker 1: twenty two year old kid in a great defense, gonna
Speaker 1: beat these guys. And you're like, grab your popcorn, man,
Speaker 1: get pop an ice cold beer. Let's watch what happens.
Speaker 1: Like that's what we love about sports. And then guess
Speaker 1: what we turn it on and it's like, holy shit,
Speaker 1: Denver's up twenty. Oh my gosh, they haven't scored in
Speaker 1: like five minutes. Now Minnesota's back in the game. Uh
Speaker 1: oh Nasried's making shots. It's oh my gosh, Minnesota's gonna win.
Speaker 1: That's why we love sports. That's why we love it.
Speaker 1: I said this on a mail bag like a week ago.
Speaker 1: There's nothing that has surprised me more since getting into
Speaker 1: this industry than how obsessed people are with like my
Speaker 1: ability to successfully predict playoff series, which is like completely absurd.
Speaker 1: It's completely absurd. Secondly, I was on Denver because they
Speaker 1: have the best player in the world and they have
Speaker 1: a damn good basketball team. They barely lost in a
Speaker 1: series where they led by twenty in.
Speaker 2: The fourth quarter.
Speaker 1: Dallas was third on my list of championship contenders this year.
Speaker 1: I picked them over Minnesota to start the playoff runt right. Obviously,
Speaker 1: I became very optimistic on Minnesota after they beat Denver. Also,
Speaker 1: I picked Dallas to win in the first round. I
Speaker 1: picked Dallas to win in this second round. There's no
Speaker 1: such thing as picking. Honestly, whoever wrote that question, I
Speaker 1: want another mail bag answer. What do you mean by
Speaker 1: pick integrity? What does that damn mean? I just don't understand, Like,
Speaker 1: help me understand what you're expecting in terms of picks.
Speaker 1: It's it's so confounding to me in retrospect. Do you
Speaker 1: think that the fact that Minnesota took all seven games
Speaker 1: to beat Denver was an indication that they were not ready?
Speaker 1: They went up two oh and honestly, I think it
Speaker 1: should have ended in five or six. Mex The matchup
Speaker 1: was literally perfect form Minnesota. I'm curious to see what
Speaker 1: you think about this. I don't think it needs to
Speaker 1: be overthought. I thought, honestly, just Denver is a championship
Speaker 1: caliber team that flexed their muscles and was able to
Speaker 1: kind of regain control of the situation.
Speaker 2: But at the very last.
Speaker 1: Minute, Minnesota kind of dug their heels in and they
Speaker 1: were able to kind of drag it back, but again, guys,
Speaker 1: like they were up twenty in the second half of
Speaker 1: Game seven. Some of this is just the weirdness of sports, right.
Speaker 1: Would you consider doing offseason film breakdowns with some of
Speaker 1: the all time great players, Specifically, they're moves that change
Speaker 1: the game allaw the iverson cut Love the Channel. You've
Speaker 1: helped me on my journey to love the game of
Speaker 1: basketball again with your great analysis.
Speaker 2: Thank you. First of all, I bitch and moan a
Speaker 2: lot about.
Speaker 1: The people in my comments that are complaining constantly, but
Speaker 1: the overwhelming majority of you guys are positive, and I
Speaker 1: want to make sure that I let you guys know
Speaker 1: that I'm aware of that, and I'm super thankful for it,
Speaker 1: and I appreciate all of you guys' support in the
Speaker 1: kind words along the way. As far as the off season,
Speaker 1: this is our first off season having film, and I'm
Speaker 1: really excited to see what we do. When we do
Speaker 1: player rankings, gonna include film, When we do all time rankings,
Speaker 1: gonna include film. When we do series season previews, we're
Speaker 1: gonna include film. So like draft stuff, we're gonna be
Speaker 1: able to do film this year. So like I'm excited
Speaker 1: to see what we do. We'll probably after the finals
Speaker 1: do some sort of like strategy meeting internally to kind
Speaker 1: of come up with some ideas. But we're gonna do
Speaker 1: a lot of stuff with film this summer. Jason mailback
Speaker 1: question for you, what do you think is the hardest
Speaker 1: part regarding prepping for these reaction videos you make or
Speaker 1: even going into a series were's so evenly matched between
Speaker 1: both sides. Huge fan of the show, so reaction videos easily.
Speaker 1: The hardest part is the close game. So you can
Speaker 1: imagine I'm writing notes watching the game. I'm writing down
Speaker 1: all the interesting tactical stuff that I'm seeing, right, but
Speaker 1: let's say it's one hundred to one hundred and four
Speaker 1: minutes left. Everything about the narrative of the show and
Speaker 1: the flow of the show hinges on who wins the game.
Speaker 1: And often I feel like a certain team's gonna win,
Speaker 1: or I write a bunch of notes about one specific side,
Speaker 1: and then you have a massive comeback, like a twenty
Speaker 1: point comeback in the second half of game seven, and
Speaker 1: suddenly the entire show flips over. And so instant reaction
Speaker 1: shows are kind of interesting and unique challenge in the
Speaker 1: sense that like it's just you never know what you're
Speaker 1: gonna have to say because things can change so quickly
Speaker 1: over a few minutes at the end. As far as
Speaker 1: like series previews, like the hardest part is like I
Speaker 1: go through the film and I see, oh, this team
Speaker 1: has this advantage, this team has that advantage, this team
Speaker 1: has this advantage, this team has that advantage, and it's
Speaker 1: really difficult to predict something that's wildly unpredictable. The vast
Speaker 1: majority of the series, in this playoff run, we're but
Speaker 1: between relatively evenly matched teams that could have gone either way.
Speaker 1: Even just look at thunder MAVs. If PJ Washington, Let's
Speaker 1: say that Shay gets a clean block on PJ. Washington
Speaker 1: on that corner three and they win, and they go
Speaker 1: home and they win game seven, the entire NB Finals
Speaker 1: could be different like that we would at Thunder Minnesota
Speaker 1: in the second round, in the third round. So like, again,
Speaker 1: all of this stuff hangs by a thread, and so
Speaker 1: many things could have gone differently, and so like that's
Speaker 1: the hard part. And like, honestly, when it comes to
Speaker 1: doing series previews, like like half the battle is like
Speaker 1: no matter what I pick.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna end up getting slandered for it at the
Speaker 2: end of the day.
Speaker 1: Anyway, do you think Lucas hit his ceiling as an
Speaker 1: overall player or does he have areas to improve? I
Speaker 1: think obviously with Luca it's it's mostly gonna be about
Speaker 1: physical fitness. I think he's obviously a good athlete. I'm
Speaker 1: not trying to sit here and pretend like he doesn't
Speaker 1: take care of his body at all. But there certainly
Speaker 1: is another level he can get to on that front,
Speaker 1: and I wonder if you will ever get to that
Speaker 1: in his career, because if he does, that could have
Speaker 1: locked an entirely different level in terms of him both
Speaker 1: defense and in terms of his conditioning level over the
Speaker 1: course of games, which is already really good. How do
Speaker 1: you see the matchup between the Nuggets and the Maps.
Speaker 1: Barkley had a short comment that Denver would have beaten
Speaker 1: Dallas if they had managed to go through Minnesota. I
Speaker 1: probably would have picked Denver to beat Dallas had they
Speaker 1: met in the conference finals. It's really as simple Denver.
Speaker 1: In the same way that Denver has the personnel to
Speaker 1: guard Anthony Edwards, they really don't have the personnel to
Speaker 1: deal with Jokic. They would have to double and swarm
Speaker 1: him the entire series, which would have led to a
Speaker 1: ton of open looks. The other part of it, too
Speaker 1: is Dallas. Denver is more capable of handling Dallas's loaded
Speaker 1: up defense with their ability to move the ball side
Speaker 1: to side. They play more five out and I think
Speaker 1: they would have just generated a lot more quality looks. Also,
Speaker 1: Da Denver has a player that's big and strong enough
Speaker 1: to kind of sort of hang with Luca and Aaron Gordon,
Speaker 1: which is something that Minnesota does not, and that's just
Speaker 1: fundamentally different, Like Luca wouldn't be able to put Aaron
Speaker 1: Gordon in jail on those ball screens and manipulate Aaron
Speaker 1: Gordon the.
Speaker 2: Way he does.
Speaker 1: Jaden McDaniels that said, Dallas certainly could have beat Denis.
Speaker 1: I would have probably picked Denver on like a sixty
Speaker 1: to forty basis, which means I would have given Dallas
Speaker 1: like a forty percent chance to win the series, which
Speaker 1: means I certainly think it could have gone that route.
Speaker 1: I just would feel like it would be more likely
Speaker 1: that Denver would have won. This was an interesting comment,
Speaker 1: not really a question, but a comment that I got
Speaker 1: Luca versus Jokich is interesting. Obviously, Jokich has certain advantages
Speaker 1: with his size, but I believe Luca also has a
Speaker 1: few advantages by virtue of him being a perimeter player
Speaker 1: and a great ball handler. For example, the best closers
Speaker 1: usually tend to be guards, and Luca is probably the
Speaker 1: best closer in the league today. On the Nuggets, too,
Speaker 1: Murray is typically the one closing games more often than not.
Speaker 1: Also because he is a perimeter player, I believe he
Speaker 1: is able to control the pace of the game more
Speaker 1: so than Jokic. Having said all that, if there was
Speaker 1: one shot to be taken, I'd run Jokic post up
Speaker 1: over any other play in the league. There's just a
Speaker 1: feeling of inevitability with Yokich that isn't there with anyone else.
Speaker 1: When it's all said and done, I do expect Luca
Speaker 1: to end up higher in all time ranking, simply because
Speaker 1: he's younger by four to five years. Also, to be
Speaker 1: fair to him, he's been a superstar basically from day
Speaker 1: one of his NBA career. That part at the end
Speaker 1: I agree with like Luca probably has a better chance
Speaker 1: of ending up higher all time just simply because he
Speaker 1: got started younger. Right, I disagree in the sense that
Speaker 1: I do think Jokic can strangle the posts of the
Speaker 1: pace of the game. I do think Jokic can operate
Speaker 1: as a closer. He chooses to go through Jamal Murray
Speaker 1: often just because of matchups, and it's also just Jokic
Speaker 1: is one of those guys too that like he doesn't
Speaker 1: give a fuck who makes or takes the shot. He
Speaker 1: just wants to win. But Yokic is certainly capable of
Speaker 1: operating as a closer. I actually think Jokic and Luca
Speaker 1: are very similar. They are two offensive engines who consistently
Speaker 1: generate quality shots through the team, either by scoring on
Speaker 1: an island, and they're pretty much unguardable. There's only a
Speaker 1: handful of guys in the league that can guard both guys,
Speaker 1: and then the consistent making of good reads when they
Speaker 1: draw double teams.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: I think if there's one thing that Luka has kind
Speaker 1: of gained ground on Jokich on as of late is
Speaker 1: the jump shot. Just Yokis didn't shoot the ball well
Speaker 1: this year and Luca's shooting it much better, and that
Speaker 1: ended up being a problem, especially in the Minnesota series,
Speaker 1: when Yokic couldn't hit pick and pop threes. But I
Speaker 1: think that they're both remarkably similar. The only real difference
Speaker 1: is they play different positions. Yokich operates more in the
Speaker 1: flow of the game as a five out guy versus
Speaker 1: Luca being like a four out you know, heliocentric type
Speaker 1: of guy. As someone in what I would consider to
Speaker 1: be the new age of sports media, what is it
Speaker 1: going to take to get away from the clickbait headlines
Speaker 1: that currently dominate old slash traditional media. I understand that
Speaker 1: the Celtics have had a far easier road than the Wolves,
Speaker 1: but but the Anton Tatum narratives are so bizarre to me.
Speaker 1: So again, guys, this is I. I don't like watching
Speaker 1: shows that have overly you know, critical clickbaity type of
Speaker 1: subject matter, right, but I don't have to watch them
Speaker 1: like this is the beautiful thing about the new age
Speaker 1: of sports media. Whatever it is you're into listening to,
Speaker 1: you can find and so like my thing is like there,
Speaker 1: those things will continue to exist as long as people
Speaker 1: watch them, and people still.
Speaker 2: Do like I like I.
Speaker 1: I still to this day see you know, ESPN clips
Speaker 1: with relatively clickbaity topics that perform extremely well and so
Speaker 1: like people still like that kind of content. It's like,
Speaker 1: if you're not into that, go listen to something different,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. One other thing that I
Speaker 1: wanted to hit here. I get criticized a lot for
Speaker 1: like my thumbnails and my titles. I don't write the
Speaker 1: thumbnails or the titles, guys, Just to make that clear.
Speaker 1: I record the show and I submit it and then
Speaker 1: my team does the rest. And so like again, like
Speaker 1: it's there's a certain business element that we have to
Speaker 1: be realistic of. Like if it get if a click
Speaker 1: baity headline gets you guys to click, but then you
Speaker 1: like my show for being what my show is, then
Speaker 1: I'm gonna take that as a win. Even if there
Speaker 1: was a little grifty thing we had to do off
Speaker 1: the top to get you to come through the door, right.
Speaker 1: But like, once we get the door swing, it's really
Speaker 1: about whether or not you like the show, right. But again, like,
Speaker 1: if you guys don't like the stuff that's out there,
Speaker 1: all you have to do is not watch it, you know,
Speaker 1: Like I don't think it's really that complicated. Damn after
Speaker 1: hearing all those stats, how does Minnesota even keep it close?
Speaker 2: Turnovers?
Speaker 1: I know, Games one and two dollars shot pour from three,
Speaker 1: but still in game, should Dallas not push it, protect
Speaker 1: the ball and just run half court sets every possession
Speaker 1: since they're so much better at it. The main thing
Speaker 1: that's kept it close to second chance points. The Timberwolves
Speaker 1: have been much better at converting offensive rebounds into points.
Speaker 1: They're up thirty nine to twenty five and second chance
Speaker 1: points in the series. That has closed the gap on
Speaker 1: some of the half court execution stuff. I'm having an
Speaker 1: argument with my friends and I said Tatum has to
Speaker 1: be the one to guard Luca in the finals.
Speaker 2: Do you agree? Yes?
Speaker 1: I think that's where the series is eventually going. So
Speaker 1: if Luca's picking on matchups and just barbecuing all of
Speaker 1: your smaller perimeter defenders, the only thing you can do
Speaker 1: is put Tatum on him. Now, how does that work
Speaker 1: in different coverages? So what that would mean is in
Speaker 1: ball screens, you have Tatum on Luca and you chase
Speaker 1: over the top and that way, when Luca tries to
Speaker 1: put Tatum in jail, Tatum's big and strong and long
Speaker 1: enough to actually bother Luca there in a way that
Speaker 1: a guy like Jada McDaniels can't. Right from there, Luca
Speaker 1: will probably start trying to run guard guard screens to
Speaker 1: try to get to try to get Tatum switched off
Speaker 1: of him. From there you run hedge and recover and
Speaker 1: you rotate. But I think that would be the goal
Speaker 1: because that's the best way to get the ball out
Speaker 1: of Luca's hands and actually make other people try to score.
Speaker 1: Is like if you have it so that you can't
Speaker 1: attack and straight Iso. Because one of the things that
Speaker 1: Dallas would do is if they're blitzing ball screens against Minnesota,
Speaker 1: Luca will just attack Jayda McDaniel's one on one because
Speaker 1: he feels comfortable. He won't be able to do that
Speaker 1: as easily with Tatum, So I think Tatum on Luca
Speaker 1: is probably their best strategy in the long run. Also,
Speaker 1: Boston has enough offensive talent that if you went to
Speaker 1: Tatum and said, hey, I need you to devote eighty
Speaker 1: percent of your energy to guarding Luka Doncic, Boston would
Speaker 1: be fine because they have enough offensive talent on the
Speaker 1: other end to make up for it.
Speaker 2: All Right, we have four more.
Speaker 1: It looks like, hey, Jason, in your opinion, what has
Speaker 1: made the Luca Kyrie backcourt work so well compared to
Speaker 1: other teams that have tried using two star guards, like
Speaker 1: Atlanta and Cleveland, It's really this simple. Atlanta and was
Speaker 1: Trey Young and Dejonte Murray. Cleveland was Donovan Mitchell and
Speaker 1: Darius Garland. Dallas has Luka Doncic, who might be the
Speaker 1: best player in the world. And Kyrie Irving, who's better
Speaker 1: as a number two than Garland or de john Taim Murray.
Speaker 1: I don't think we need to overthink it. They just
Speaker 1: they're the stars are actually just really really good, and
Speaker 1: they've got really good role players doing all the dirty
Speaker 1: work for them. Didn't you say that ant Man is
Speaker 1: clearly better than Tatum. So I had a mail back
Speaker 1: question that said where someone said who would you take
Speaker 1: right now, Tatum or and I said I would take
Speaker 1: I would take Aunt right now, no questions.
Speaker 2: And here's the thing.
Speaker 1: When I that was just a quick response to a
Speaker 1: mail back question, the way I really feel about it
Speaker 1: is that I do think that ant Man is going
Speaker 1: to be better than Tatum sooner than later. I if
Speaker 1: I was a GM, I'd rather have ant Man on
Speaker 1: my team than Jason Tatum. But right now, right now
Speaker 1: for a playoff series, I think Tatum is better, And
Speaker 1: I said that in our player rankings when we did
Speaker 1: the top five, like a week and a half, two
Speaker 1: weeks ago, I had Jokic one Luka two.
Speaker 2: Did I did we remove Yokic?
Speaker 1: No? No, yeah, yeah it was Jokic one, Luka two. I
Speaker 1: had Tatum three, Anthony Edwards four. So like that's how
Speaker 1: I feel. But I do think that I would be
Speaker 1: stunned if eighteen months from now if it wasn't at
Speaker 1: Tatum's level, and if thirty six months from now he
Speaker 1: wasn't just clearly better.
Speaker 2: Two more.
Speaker 1: I used to enjoy your pod with Raj and then
Speaker 1: one day it seemed like it was discontinued. Can you
Speaker 1: elaborate on what happened there exactly? I know you explained
Speaker 1: some of the overall journey recently, but I really liked
Speaker 1: State of the Lakers. So it's really as simple. State
Speaker 1: of Lakers was only half the podcast. It started as
Speaker 1: Jason The Jason tim Podcast, then it became State of
Speaker 1: the Lakers. But half of the show was me doing
Speaker 1: instant reaction shows with Roger at night. The other half
Speaker 1: of the show is me by myself covering the rest
Speaker 1: of the league. Roger and I had very different goals.
Speaker 1: My goal was to cover the NBA at large. Roger's
Speaker 1: goal is to be a credentialed reporter that covers the
Speaker 1: Los Angeles Lakers. When the volume reached out to me,
Speaker 1: they wanted me to cover the league as a as
Speaker 1: a solo guy like I was already doing for the
Speaker 1: other half of the state of the Lakers. So that's
Speaker 1: really all it was. They were essentially just trying to
Speaker 1: build a new show around what the Jason timf podcast
Speaker 1: was before I started working with Raj. But Roger and
Speaker 1: I had different goals. Roger doesn't want to cover the
Speaker 1: entire league and wants to cover the Lakers, and that's what
Speaker 1: he's doing right now. But I loved working with Raj,
Speaker 1: and I think he's one of the best people that
Speaker 1: covers the Lakers. Does great work. I think he's working.
Speaker 1: I think he's doing a show right now with an
Speaker 1: A Kilawala, and they do a great They do a
Speaker 1: great job. Seems like Luca jumped Giannis for you and
Speaker 1: the best player in the world rankings. How and why?
Speaker 1: Very simple? I just I think the most important skill
Speaker 1: that a basketball player can have is the ability to
Speaker 1: consistently generate quality shots, first team in the half court,
Speaker 1: and I think Luca's awesome at it, potentially the best
Speaker 1: player in the world at it. And for Giannis, I
Speaker 1: think that's actually been one of the major issues that
Speaker 1: has plagued him over the years. Like, yes, he got hurt,
Speaker 1: but when push came to shove against Miami last year,
Speaker 1: he couldn't get a shot at like, he couldn't make
Speaker 1: a quality shot over the top of bam, Like he
Speaker 1: can't even get like a left shoulder hook right. Going
Speaker 1: back to the twenty twenty two season, like his I
Speaker 1: actually thought he was really good in that series against Boston,
Speaker 1: but still there's some limitations in terms of his ability
Speaker 1: to get shots off over the top when he can't
Speaker 1: just penetrate into the paint. And then obviously before that,
Speaker 1: before the twenty twenty one season when they won the title,
Speaker 1: that was consistently what was his issue in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: In twenty twenty twenty twenty one in particular, two like
Speaker 1: a genuine championship. Don't take anything away from it, but
Speaker 1: it was a weird season and he played some limited
Speaker 1: competition along the way, and I do think that that
Speaker 1: was one of the things that allowed Giannis to overcome
Speaker 1: that specific weakness of his second part of the question,
Speaker 1: the Wolves exposed how bad Yokich is a is a
Speaker 1: rim protector. How has that shaped your view on him
Speaker 1: relative to Giannis and other great bigs in NBA history.
Speaker 1: So the thing with with Jokich is he demonstrated last
Speaker 1: year that he could defend the rim well enough against
Speaker 1: like really good competition too, against Lebron and Ad against
Speaker 1: Bam and Jimmy, against Kadie and Devin Booker. Like, he
Speaker 1: demonstrated that he could do that at last year. I
Speaker 1: think in a lot of ways, Minnesota just drove him
Speaker 1: into the ground with their overwhelming physicality, and I think
Speaker 1: he got tired and I think he fell apart there.
Speaker 1: So obviously there are some things that he has to
Speaker 1: improve on in that regard. But I still think, to
Speaker 1: put it simply, if I had to build a team
Speaker 1: that could win a championship, I feel it could be
Speaker 1: easier to build one around Yokic than Yannis simply because
Speaker 1: it's gonna be easy for me to get defensive personnel
Speaker 1: that can thrive offensively off of what Jokic does than
Speaker 1: vice versa. All right, guys, that's all I have for
Speaker 1: today is always. I sincerely appreciate you guys for supporting
Speaker 1: the show. We're gonna be back tonight live on YouTube
Speaker 1: after the final buzzer Game four between the Wolves and
Speaker 1: the mass I will see you guys then. H