Speaker 1: The volume. The NBA season is in full swing, and
Speaker 1: when I can't get enough of the action on the court,
Speaker 1: I spice things up by betting on DraftKings Sportsbook, an
Speaker 1: official partner of the NBA. Right now, new customers can
Speaker 1: bet five bucks and get two hundred instantly in bonus bets.
Speaker 1: I was looking at the lines for making the playoffs today,
Speaker 1: and you can get the Lakers at plus one point
Speaker 1: fifteen to make the playoffs, and the Warriors check this
Speaker 1: out at plus two oh five to make the playoffs.
Speaker 1: Download the DraftKings Sportsbook app with code hoops that's hoops.
Speaker 1: New customers can bet five bucks on the NBA and
Speaker 1: get two hundred instantly in bonus bets only on Draftking
Speaker 1: Sportsbook with code hoops that's hops. The Crown is yours.
Speaker 1: Gambling problem called one eight hundred gambler or visit www
Speaker 1: dot one eight hundred gambler dot net. In New York
Speaker 1: called eight seven seven eight hope and why, or text
Speaker 1: hope and Why to four six seven three six nine.
Speaker 1: In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling called eight
Speaker 1: eight eight seven eight nine seven seven seven seven or
Speaker 1: visit CCPG dot org. Please play responsibly on behalf of
Speaker 1: Boothill Casino and resort in Kansas. Twenty one plus age
Speaker 1: varies by jurisdiction void in Ontario. Bonus bets expire one
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty eight hours after issuance. See DKG dot
Speaker 1: com slash basketball for eligibility and deposit restrictions, terms and
Speaker 1: responsible gambling resources. All right, welcome to ho tonight here
Speaker 1: at the Volume. Happy Thursday, everybody. Hope all of you
Speaker 1: guys are having an incredible week. We just got a
Speaker 1: quick show today. We're gonna hit the Cleveland Cavaliers, who've
Speaker 1: won eleven of their last fourteen games and got a
Speaker 1: big win over the Milwaukee Bucks last night, albeit with
Speaker 1: out Jannis and Tenna Kumpo. And then at the tail
Speaker 1: end of the show, I finally got around to watching
Speaker 1: that Suns come back against the Kings, where Kevin Durant
Speaker 1: moved to the five, they went small, and they looked
Speaker 1: incredible on both ends of the floor as they came
Speaker 1: back to win after being down twenty two points in
Speaker 1: the fourth quarter. A lot of really interesting stuff there,
Speaker 1: and what I think could be an interesting lineup for
Speaker 1: the Suns to use kind of sparingly as a weapon
Speaker 1: down the line. I want to dig into that concept.
Speaker 1: Do you guys know the Joe Bob Get start and
Speaker 1: subscribe to our brand new YouTube channel. I mean a
Speaker 1: lot to me if you guys would take a second
Speaker 1: to scroll down and hit that subscribe button. Don't forget
Speaker 1: about our podcast feeds. If you're more into the podcast
Speaker 1: format of the show, you can find that wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcast under Hoops tonight follow me on Twitter
Speaker 1: at underscore Jason LT. So you guys don't miss any
Speaker 1: sho announcements, as well as the film threads that I
Speaker 1: do most mornings. I did film threads on both of
Speaker 1: these games that you can find on my Twitter feed
Speaker 1: at underscore Jason LT. And then, last but not least,
Speaker 1: keep dropping mailbag questions in the YouTube comments. I know
Speaker 1: we've kept pushing the mail bag back, but I talked
Speaker 1: to the team and the idea was is, if I'm
Speaker 1: going out of town for five days, we might as
Speaker 1: well run it while I'm out of town. So we're
Speaker 1: gonna be recording that tomorrow. So still one more day
Speaker 1: to get mail back questions in. I'm going to hit
Speaker 1: a ton of them, So keep dropping those mail back
Speaker 1: questions in the YouTube comments, all right, let's talk some basketball.
Speaker 1: So obviously Jiannis was out, but the Cavs blitzed the
Speaker 1: Bucks from the opening tip. They were up twenty two
Speaker 1: to two. And I want to focus in on the
Speaker 1: defensive end of the floor because they here's the thing,
Speaker 1: even without Giannis, And obviously Giannis is an incredibly important
Speaker 1: player for the Bucks. He's the one fast guy really
Speaker 1: in that starting lineup, like truly, truly, like transcendently fast
Speaker 1: type of player, right, And so he's gonna it's obviously
Speaker 1: gonna hurt for him to not be out there, but
Speaker 1: there's enough offensive skill in that lineup for them to
Speaker 1: be decent, right, especially on the offensive end of the floor.
Speaker 1: Like Dame is a transcendently great offensive player, Chris Middleton
Speaker 1: is a good, very very good offensive player. Brook Lopez
Speaker 1: is a is a big man who brings enough offensive
Speaker 1: versatility to make scoring a possibility. Malik Beasley's been one
Speaker 1: of the best shooters in the league this year. Andre
Speaker 1: Jackson Junior was the one kind of like offensive week
Speaker 1: point in that lineup. But they literally could not generate
Speaker 1: a quality shot to save their lives to start this game.
Speaker 1: So it came down to a bunch of specific matchup dynamics. So,
Speaker 1: first of all, Isaaca Coro was on Damian Lillard, and
Speaker 1: he's one of the few players in the league that's
Speaker 1: big enough or i should say bigger than Dame, but
Speaker 1: also quick enough to stay in front of him. And
Speaker 1: what they were doing is in any Brook Lopez action,
Speaker 1: they were hedging and recovering with Jared Allen and Isaacacorro
Speaker 1: would sprint and meet Dame at some point on his drives,
Speaker 1: as Dame would try to beat the hedge with either
Speaker 1: a split or by dribbling around. By dribbling around, Jared
Speaker 1: Allen and Isaac Correr forced a couple of turnovers that way.
Speaker 1: There was a time where Dame just straight up tried
Speaker 1: to iso Isaacacro early in the game and he just
Speaker 1: chested him up, put his body in the way. And
Speaker 1: Dame and Chris Middleton in particular were playing a lot
Speaker 1: of grift basketball. They were kind of just dribbling into
Speaker 1: guy's chests and throwing junk up and trying to get fouls.
Speaker 1: We'll talk about the Bucks later, but they didn't really
Speaker 1: attack this game in any sort of serious manners. A
Speaker 1: lot of stuff coming out of Milwaukee despite their record.
Speaker 1: That's kind of weird, and last night was definitely one
Speaker 1: of those games. But Isaac accoron Dame was the first
Speaker 1: major matchup, the second matchup, and I thought the one
Speaker 1: that was arguably the most impactful during this run was
Speaker 1: Dean Wade on Chris Middleton. First of all, same thing
Speaker 1: when Chris Middleton was attacking Dean Wade in isolation situations,
Speaker 1: Dean Wade was playing classic positional defense. He was sliding
Speaker 1: his feet, taking the contact in the chest, keeping his
Speaker 1: arms up high so that he doesn't get called for
Speaker 1: a foul. And he's got good size, and so he's
Speaker 1: forcing Chris to take tough shots over the top, and
Speaker 1: he was frustrating Chris as he was beating him to spots,
Speaker 1: and Chris was just trying to throw junk up at
Speaker 1: the rim to try to get fouls. But the big
Speaker 1: thing that Dean Wade was doing was his ability to switch.
Speaker 1: They were switching the Dame Middleton pick and roll and
Speaker 1: putting Dane Wade on Dame. Dean Wade got to stop
Speaker 1: sliding his feet on Dame. They were switching any sort
Speaker 1: of pick and roll with great with Brook Lopez and
Speaker 1: Chris Middleton. So then Dean Wade would just rotate onto
Speaker 1: Brook Lopez and just kind of battle and they were
Speaker 1: doubling him out of that there was a possession. To
Speaker 1: Donovan Mitchell's credit, who's having a great defensive season, Dean
Speaker 1: Wade got Lopez on a switch. Lopez backed him down
Speaker 1: on that left block, and Donovan Mitchell sprinted in double
Speaker 1: teamed got him to get rid of the basketball. Pass
Speaker 1: went right. It was only one pass away, easy kickout
Speaker 1: to Malik Beasley. Donovan Mitchell is an elite athlete at
Speaker 1: the guard position. Sprinted out like crazy and chased Malik
Speaker 1: Beasley off the line and forced him into a dribble,
Speaker 1: pull up jump shot. But that ability of Dean Wade
Speaker 1: to not be super easily scored on in a switch
Speaker 1: against a big or a guard was a really useful
Speaker 1: tool for the Calves during that defensive effort. That really
Speaker 1: frustrated the Milwaukee Bucks last night. And then they just
Speaker 1: were pushing in transition on every single stop. And Milwaukee's
Speaker 1: transition defense is awful. They let teams get out in
Speaker 1: transition over seventeen percent of their possessions, which ranks dead
Speaker 1: last in the league. According to Cleaning the Glass. But
Speaker 1: that's a good game plan from Cleveland, they were just
Speaker 1: running down their throat every single time. A lot of
Speaker 1: bad floor balance from Milwaukee. There was a possession where
Speaker 1: at one point they had all five offensive players below
Speaker 1: the charge circle and big shot. It ended up leading
Speaker 1: to I believe, if I remember correctly, it was Max
Speaker 1: Strus getting a runout a foul, but that was all
Speaker 1: it was. It was just incredible defense from all five guys,
Speaker 1: completely bought in, frustrating the Bucks and then sprinting it
Speaker 1: down the other end in transition, and then a mix
Speaker 1: in of some Donovan Mitchell shot making. Hit this ridiculous
Speaker 1: step back on Isaac Accoro where he damn near made
Speaker 1: him fall down, or not on Isaac Correr, excuse me,
Speaker 1: it was on Andre Jackson Junior. I don't know I'm
Speaker 1: mixing names up today, but it was a step back
Speaker 1: on Andre Jackson Jr. Made him nearly fall down that
Speaker 1: he knocked down. He had to pull up three and
Speaker 1: pick and roll over the screen. He beat ma League
Speaker 1: Beasley in the mid range with a pull up jump shot.
Speaker 1: It was just that bit of shot making mixed in
Speaker 1: with running out for wide open layups and dunk and
Speaker 1: then excellent defense. All of a sudden they're up twenty
Speaker 1: two to two and the Bucks quit and the game
Speaker 1: is over on the Bucks front. Like again, I it
Speaker 1: kind of it just was. It felt like one of
Speaker 1: those games where they realized Dannis was out and they
Speaker 1: went into the game with no real belief that they
Speaker 1: were going to win. And you could see it in
Speaker 1: a bunch of different areas Dame and Chris Middleton just
Speaker 1: dropping their shoulder into defender's chests and then just trying
Speaker 1: to draw fouls by just throwing up weird shots, like
Speaker 1: Dame was drawing multiple defenders at the ball screen but
Speaker 1: just swinging the ball out of it, not really doing
Speaker 1: anything to try to compromise the defense in that situation.
Speaker 1: And then they were jogging back in transition. A lot
Speaker 1: of basic things too, like floor balance stuff, where guys
Speaker 1: are you know, it just it just was an incredibly
Speaker 1: sloppy a basketball from the Milwaukee Bucks. Again, it's one
Speaker 1: of those ones that you just kind of crumple up
Speaker 1: and throw out. But again, like Milwaukee's got a really
Speaker 1: good record, but there's just some weirdness surrounding that team.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure what it is. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: I want to cut them the same slack that I've
Speaker 1: been cutting a lot of teams, which is, this is
Speaker 1: the NBA in January, this is what it can be like.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you're right smack in the middle of things. So
Speaker 1: you've been doing this for a long time, and you
Speaker 1: still have a really long way to go, And I
Speaker 1: think that that can go a long way towards just
Speaker 1: kind of like causing wildly oscillating levels of effort from
Speaker 1: team night to night. Right, you get a Boston team
Speaker 1: that beats the Timberwolves and then gets their ass kicked
Speaker 1: by the Bucks. The Bucks kick the shit out of
Speaker 1: the Celtics and then go get their ass kicked by
Speaker 1: the Calves. Right Like, it's just this weird dynamic where
Speaker 1: it's the oscillating effort that's primarily dictating whether or not
Speaker 1: a team, you know, kind of comes out with the
Speaker 1: with a win on any given night in this time
Speaker 1: of year. So I want to cut the Bucks some slack.
Speaker 1: You just kind of crumple that one and throw away.
Speaker 1: But it definitely was a disappointing effort. Now on the
Speaker 1: Caves front, Evan Mobley went down after the Orlando game
Speaker 1: eighteen games ago. Then they quickly dropped three of their
Speaker 1: next four and then Darius Garland goes out of the lineup,
Speaker 1: and then everybody in the league's like, hmm, this is interesting, Like,
Speaker 1: I'm sure even if the Allen Mobleye front court works
Speaker 1: in terms of the playoffs, it's just really difficult for
Speaker 1: them to score and pick and roll in that situation.
Speaker 1: You have two small guards in that lineup. Now you
Speaker 1: have Darius Garland and Evan Mobley out for a long time.
Speaker 1: The regular season to that point hadn't been that impressive
Speaker 1: from Cleveland, and so you're like, hm, like this kind
Speaker 1: of felt like a teetering point, Like it was a
Speaker 1: teetering point where it might be one of those things
Speaker 1: where now is the time to kind of reconfigure or
Speaker 1: are they gonna kind of salvage these things. Nope, they
Speaker 1: salvaged things. They went eleven and three over their next
Speaker 1: fourteen games since Darius Garland went out sixth in offense
Speaker 1: and third in defense. Most of their success comes off
Speaker 1: of similar stretches to what we saw last night against Milwaukee.
Speaker 1: They defend like crazy and they get out in run.
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, they're only twenty fourth in
Speaker 1: the NBA and half court offense, so they're not really
Speaker 1: great at scoring. As a matter of fact, they're bad
Speaker 1: at scoring in the slow down half court environment, but
Speaker 1: there're seventh in fast break points per one hundred possessions
Speaker 1: of this season. They get out and run, and that
Speaker 1: bolsters them on the offensive end of the floor. Most importantly,
Speaker 1: they don't just run for the sake of running. There
Speaker 1: are a lot of teams that run out and transition
Speaker 1: and take bad shots. The Calves do not do that.
Speaker 1: They run selectively when they see good opportunities for them
Speaker 1: to get great shots. They run off their defense in particular,
Speaker 1: they're not just just playing with unnecessary pace. Right, They're
Speaker 1: at one point one to seven points per transition possession.
Speaker 1: That ranks eighth in terms of efficiency per possession among
Speaker 1: all NBA teams. That's excellent overall, Cleaning the glass. Hayes
Speaker 1: this metric, it's a cool metric. They call it transition
Speaker 1: points added per one hundred possessions. It's just a way
Speaker 1: to kind of like singularly capture your volume of transition
Speaker 1: and your efficiency into like one metric. Right, Because there
Speaker 1: are a lot of teams that run in transition a ton,
Speaker 1: but they don't necessarily score. And then there are selective
Speaker 1: teams that run a lot or don't run as often,
Speaker 1: but when they do, they get layups and dunks, right,
Speaker 1: and those are the teams that are more efficient. Right.
Speaker 1: And then there's a metric that cleaning the glass eyes
Speaker 1: that kind of combines all of that stuff. Well, for
Speaker 1: the Cavs, they rank third in the league in that
Speaker 1: kind of combined metric, meaning they are the third best
Speaker 1: transition offense in the NBA. So the question is why
Speaker 1: is Cleveland's defense so successful? And the reality is really simple.
Speaker 1: It's complete and total buy in down the lineup from everyone,
Speaker 1: including their star. Donovan Mitchell is flying around and helping
Speaker 1: recover situations. Dean Wade we talked about earlier, is competing
Speaker 1: in switches against players bigger and smaller than him, and
Speaker 1: he's guarding wingswell. Isaacacorro and Max Struz are competing at
Speaker 1: the point of attack with physicality and relentless back pressure
Speaker 1: and just using their quickness and size. Right a Cooro
Speaker 1: specifically is one of those guys. He has his offensive limitations,
Speaker 1: but he's just such a useful defensive player. With his
Speaker 1: ability to guard the quick guards in the league. With
Speaker 1: his size, that can become a problem. Right. And then
Speaker 1: Jared Allen, He's capable of switching, he's capable of dropping,
Speaker 1: he's capable of hedging. He's just a versatile defensive big.
Speaker 1: He kind of fits into that mold that I talk
Speaker 1: about in terms of team construct where you want to
Speaker 1: have a defensive kind of folk rum at the center
Speaker 1: position that can defend in multiple coverages, otherwise you become
Speaker 1: very matchup dependent. Right. The defense is real too, regardless
Speaker 1: of opponent. As a matter of fact, they allow just
Speaker 1: one hundred and twelve points one hundred and twelve point
Speaker 1: four points per one hundred possessions against the top ten
Speaker 1: offenses in the league, which ranks number one in the NBA. Now,
Speaker 1: to be clear, they've been in an easier stretch of
Speaker 1: their schedule as of late, and things will get tougher,
Speaker 1: but they're playing some really good basketball. They're now going
Speaker 1: on the road to play four tough games. They're at Atlanta,
Speaker 1: at Orlando, at Milwaukee twice. Then they come home for
Speaker 1: the Clippers, and so we're gonna find out really quickly
Speaker 1: how much of this is real for them. At least
Speaker 1: in terms of this particular group. Obviously, with Garland and
Speaker 1: Moblei Garland and Mobley still being out, specifically, it's gonna
Speaker 1: come down to a couple. It's gonna come down, dude.
Speaker 1: Can they get enough stops to get out and transition
Speaker 1: often enough to their half court offense, and then in
Speaker 1: the half quarter they're gonna get enough shot making from
Speaker 1: guys like Donovan Mitchell right like that that's gonna be
Speaker 1: what's gonna carry them against these better opponents. Because what's
Speaker 1: gonna happen is, specifically, teams like Orlando has really big
Speaker 1: perimeter offensive players are gonna try to attack the smaller
Speaker 1: Cleveland perimeter defenders. Right the Clippers are gonna space them
Speaker 1: out and test some of their other perimeter defensive players.
Speaker 1: And if they don't get as many stops, they're not
Speaker 1: gonna be able to run as much, which is going
Speaker 1: to put a strain on their half court offense. And
Speaker 1: they're at Milwaukee twice, and Milwaukee's gonna want revenge, So
Speaker 1: those are gonna be some tough games. They can go
Speaker 1: three and five or three and two in those five games,
Speaker 1: that would be a huge win for this Cleveland Cavaliers
Speaker 1: team all right, moving on to the Suns with KD
Speaker 1: at the five, and so they were down twenty two
Speaker 1: with you know, some like seven or eight minutes left
Speaker 1: if I remember correctly, and I just kind of cataloged
Speaker 1: every single possession or the majority of the possession as
Speaker 1: the Sons came back to win. And you could find
Speaker 1: that again in that thread on my Twitter feed at
Speaker 1: underscore JSNLT. But you know, my main takeaway from watching
Speaker 1: that group, well, makes it all work because they're pretty small, right,
Speaker 1: Like you've got Kevin Durant, but after that, it's like
Speaker 1: Eric Gordon, you know, he's not necessarily the tallest guy
Speaker 1: in the world. You know, Grayson Allen not necessarily the
Speaker 1: tallest guy in the world, Bradley Beald not necessarily the
Speaker 1: tallest guy in the world. And Devin Booker is the
Speaker 1: second tallest guy in the lineup at sixty six or
Speaker 1: six y five or whatever he is, right, So, like
Speaker 1: it's a small lineup, but the reason why it works
Speaker 1: is all about Kevin Durant. He's just an unbelievably incredible defender.
Speaker 1: When he's locked in like that, it's actually insane, Like
Speaker 1: he can guard Sabonis straight up Sabonus was trying to
Speaker 1: bully him, couldn't move him off the spot. He can
Speaker 1: guard deer and Fox straight up locked him up in
Speaker 1: an ISO late in the game. He can switch, he
Speaker 1: can drop. He had a block on Malik Monk and
Speaker 1: drop coverage. That was one of the things that was
Speaker 1: successful against Sacramento is they were doing a lot of switching,
Speaker 1: but then randomly they wouldn't, and when they wouldn't, they
Speaker 1: were forcing turnovers and forcing mistakes from Zacramento. There's a
Speaker 1: play where like they switched a bunch of dribble handoffs
Speaker 1: in a row and then suddenly Devin Booker was like, nope,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna shoot the gap on this one, and he
Speaker 1: forced an illegal screen off of Harrison Barnes who was
Speaker 1: moving when he knocked him over. Kevin Durant would like switch, switch, switch,
Speaker 1: and then suddenly he would drop, and when he would drop,
Speaker 1: it like catch Sacramento off guard. He's doing a really
Speaker 1: nice job of kind of throwing off their rhythm. Also,
Speaker 1: just not switching for the sake of switching, but switching
Speaker 1: when guys would get screened was a big thing that
Speaker 1: was helping. And then Lastly, Kevin Durant's an outstanding low
Speaker 1: man help defender. There was a play where I want
Speaker 1: to say, Eric Gordon got driven by by Malik Monk
Speaker 1: along the right side on the wing, and I have
Speaker 1: this play clipped and Kevin Durant identified. I talk often
Speaker 1: about how help defenders have a complicated decision because if
Speaker 1: you just help all the time, you make these easy
Speaker 1: kickout raads. So you have to make a decision based
Speaker 1: on how compromised the on ball defender is. Is he
Speaker 1: completely compromised, then you gotta go help, because it's better
Speaker 1: to give up a catch and shoot three on the
Speaker 1: weak side then a wide open layup, because a catch
Speaker 1: and shoot three on the weak side might for a
Speaker 1: really good shooter like Grayson Allen's one of the best
Speaker 1: catching shoot guys in the league. Catching shoot three for
Speaker 1: him is worth one point four points per possession. But
Speaker 1: guess how much a driving layup is worth. If the
Speaker 1: defender is compromised, probably gonna make it at least nine
Speaker 1: out of ten times. Right. There will be the occasional
Speaker 1: play where the offensive players two sped up and he
Speaker 1: shoots the layup over the front of the rim, or
Speaker 1: something like that right, but nine out of ten is
Speaker 1: one point eight points per possession, so it's a very
Speaker 1: important decision that Kevin Durant has to make there to
Speaker 1: either help or to stay home. And on this possession,
Speaker 1: he realized that Eric Gordon was pushing him underneath the basket,
Speaker 1: and so he kind of stayed back to watch out
Speaker 1: for that corner pass. Malik Monk at the last second
Speaker 1: decided to jump back, and Grayson Allen had done a
Speaker 1: really had done a really nice impromptu switch onto Demonisa
Speaker 1: Bonus and kind of fronted him in the post and
Speaker 1: he was in position to help and knock that ball
Speaker 1: away as Malik Monk went up underneath the basket. It
Speaker 1: was a really nice low man possession from Kevin Durant,
Speaker 1: who can also clean up the defensive glass there, who
Speaker 1: can also block shots when the defender is compromise, who
Speaker 1: can also do things like even when open offensive players
Speaker 1: are there, he can block passing angles. There was a
Speaker 1: play where Darren Fox got downhill and Grayson Allen and
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant kind of like trapped him and Kevin Herder
Speaker 1: kind of cut right in front of the rim and
Speaker 1: he was wide open, but there was no passing angle
Speaker 1: there because Kevin Durant is basically has him swallowed up,
Speaker 1: which allowed Eric Gordon to stay home on the weak
Speaker 1: side and get his steal as Daron Fox tried to
Speaker 1: force his skip pass to the right corner. The point
Speaker 1: is Kevin Durant and his ability to guard quick guards,
Speaker 1: guard biggs, garden, drop coverage, you know, switch garden, help
Speaker 1: and recover situations, clean up the defensive glass. All of
Speaker 1: that capability makes a lineup like that function in a
Speaker 1: way that it just wouldn't for anybody else, right, And
Speaker 1: so that's where Kevin Durant is being basically, for lack
Speaker 1: of a better word, a superstar can clean up and
Speaker 1: patch up holes that a lineup would otherwise create. From there,
Speaker 1: it's all about speed and skill. Again, we're talking about
Speaker 1: four players in Eric Gordon, Bradley Beal, Grayson Allen, and
Speaker 1: Devin Booker, who are all fast, who can all dribble,
Speaker 1: who can all shoot, who can all pass air. Gordon
Speaker 1: did his credit spend some time on Demonasabonis and Sabonis
Speaker 1: had no interest in attacking him, and then in all
Speaker 1: those off ball actions, really sharp communication from Bradley Bial
Speaker 1: Devin Booker and Grayson Allen. There were several there were
Speaker 1: some complicated interchanges like triple switches where like three people
Speaker 1: were involved in the action and all three of them
Speaker 1: just kind of ended up in the right place through
Speaker 1: communication and through effort. Grayson Allen in particular was outstanding
Speaker 1: and help defense. He had a couple of turnovers he
Speaker 1: forced on Demona Sabonis, like digging down when he would
Speaker 1: turn his head as he was trying to bully Kevin Durant.
Speaker 1: I talked about the big block that he had on
Speaker 1: the leak Monk, and then I talked about Devin Booker
Speaker 1: and how he cost a couple of turnovers with impromptu
Speaker 1: non switches when they were switching interchanges and the Devin
Speaker 1: Booker would just go like, Nope, not switching this one,
Speaker 1: and it would just throw the Sacramento Kings out of
Speaker 1: out of There was a play where Malik Monk just
Speaker 1: threw the ball out of bounds. And then I talked
Speaker 1: about the Harrison Barnes illegal screen on the dribble handoff.
Speaker 1: But it was just down the line up a hillacious effort,
Speaker 1: a ton of speed and then Kevin Durant tying it
Speaker 1: all together. And then on offense. They were running hard
Speaker 1: in transition. Bradley Beal and Kevin Durant got run out
Speaker 1: dunks during that stretch. And then, like I said, everyone
Speaker 1: can dribble shooting pass at a high level, and so
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant or Devin Booker, Kevin Durant would like get
Speaker 1: an ISO and drive on a guy and then Darren
Speaker 1: Fox would double team, or Devin Booker would run a
Speaker 1: ball screen and draw two defenders in the ball screen,
Speaker 1: and then from there they would just play driving kick
Speaker 1: basketball with the other four guys, except for all of
Speaker 1: them can dribble shooting pass, and so it'd be like,
Speaker 1: oh shit, you just ran at Eric Gordon, and he
Speaker 1: threw the extra pass to Grayson Allen on the wing
Speaker 1: and he knocks down the three. Oh shit, you Grayson Allen,
Speaker 1: you close out. He makes the extra pass to a
Speaker 1: Eric Gordon, another guy closed out. Now all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: Grayson Allen's open again and the ball goes back to
Speaker 1: Grayson Allen. He makes it. Kevin Durant was getting open
Speaker 1: threes as well. They got wide open on the majority
Speaker 1: of those possessions down the stretch, even someones that they missed.
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant missed a wide open three on the right
Speaker 1: wing when they were in their zone that the Kings
Speaker 1: ran a few times down the stretch. So it just
Speaker 1: again like it discombobulated Sacramento on both ends of the
Speaker 1: floor because it's a non traditional way to play basketball.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, that's what I
Speaker 1: see that lineup being used as. Is it tenable long term?
Speaker 1: Of course not. You're not gonna be able to play
Speaker 1: Kevin Durant at the five big picture for massive minutes.
Speaker 1: It's too fatiguing, it's too much to ask. So how
Speaker 1: do you use a lineup like that? You use it
Speaker 1: as a death lineup. Okay, this team's bothering us with
Speaker 1: size and they're up five in the early second quarter.
Speaker 1: Let's throw out the death lineup and let's regain control
Speaker 1: of the game. Let's throw giant wrenching things and retake
Speaker 1: control of the game. Okay, it's a close game late,
Speaker 1: and you know, based on this particular matchup, we like
Speaker 1: the ability to go small. You go small in that situation.
Speaker 1: That's the way the death lineup is used, or was
Speaker 1: used by the Warriors, and what they didn't start games
Speaker 1: with it. It was literally something that they brought out
Speaker 1: selectively to regain control of the rhythm of a game
Speaker 1: or to close the game. And that's kind of what
Speaker 1: I see that lineup. As for the Suns, and there
Speaker 1: were some issues, like there was a player Keegan Murray
Speaker 1: got an offensive rebound over over Eric Gordon just because
Speaker 1: he's bigger. Right, there was a player deer and Fox
Speaker 1: got an offensive rebound over Grayson Allen just because he's
Speaker 1: a better athlete, right, Like, They're gonna have some limitations,
Speaker 1: But this is one of the concepts that I talk
Speaker 1: about a lot on this show. Lean into your strengths.
Speaker 1: Don't try to be what other teams are if you're
Speaker 1: not as good as them at that. Don't try to
Speaker 1: be Denver because Denver's better at being Denver than you are.
Speaker 1: Be the best version of what your team's strengths are.
Speaker 1: The Phoenix Suns are not physically imposing. The Phoenix Suns
Speaker 1: are not going to bully teams, but they probably have
Speaker 1: one of the most skilled five man groupings that you
Speaker 1: can put together in the NBA. So that's a great
Speaker 1: look for them to have. While you're busy doing your thing,
Speaker 1: We're going to lean into our strengths and try to
Speaker 1: regain control of the game that way. That's why I
Speaker 1: really really like that lineup. By the way, twenty five
Speaker 1: possessions so far this year with Kevin Durant, Devin Booker,
Speaker 1: Grayson Allen, Bradley Beal, and Eric Gordon, they are plus
Speaker 1: sixty four point five points per one hundred possessions in
Speaker 1: those twenty five possessions, just unbelievably dominant. Thought it was
Speaker 1: really really interesting. It's gonna hinge on a defensive effort,
Speaker 1: especially from Kevin Durant, but I love that as a
Speaker 1: wrench for them to be able to throw for certain
Speaker 1: stretches of games. All right, guys, that is all I
Speaker 1: have for today. We'll be back tomorrow. I've got a
Speaker 1: bunch of stuff. We're gonna do a mailbag, We're gonna
Speaker 1: do some mid season awards stuff. It's gonna be basically
Speaker 1: just a bunch of like kind of middle of the
Speaker 1: year content as I'm in Breckenridge, and then we'll be
Speaker 1: back on Wednesday next week with game breakdowns, and then
Speaker 1: I'm in town. I think my wife and I might
Speaker 1: go on We usually go skiing for her birthday, so
Speaker 1: maybe in late March. I might hop out of town
Speaker 1: for like a really short trip, like a two or
Speaker 1: three day trip, but other than that, I plan on
Speaker 1: being in town until after the NBA Finals, And so
Speaker 1: it's just gonna get into that, to the rhythm of
Speaker 1: that grind. From there, I will see you guys on Wednesday.
Speaker 1: Well I should say i'll see you tomorrow and then
Speaker 1: we'll take a little break and then I'll be back
Speaker 1: on Wednesday. From there, I appreciate you guys. I will
Speaker 1: see you tomorrow. The volume