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Speaker 1: All right, welcome to hoops tonight here at the Volume,
Speaker 1: Happy Thursday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having
Speaker 1: an incredible week. Quick show today, we're just gonna hit
Speaker 1: Wolves sixers from last night and the heater that Joel
Speaker 1: Embiid has been on, as well as some stuff about
Speaker 1: Tyrese Maxim the success that he's been having. Then we're
Speaker 1: gonna talk about the New York Knicks, who are playing
Speaker 1: some really good basketball as of late and have their
Speaker 1: two stars playing at a really high level, but some
Speaker 1: decisions to make with what's around the corner and with
Speaker 1: the injury to Mitchell Robinson. And then at the end
Speaker 1: of the show, we're gonna talk about the Los Angeles Lakers,
Speaker 1: who have been in a free fall since winning the
Speaker 1: n season tournament. You guys are the Joe pot we
Speaker 1: get started. Subscribe to our brand new YouTube channel would
Speaker 1: mean a lot to me if you guys would take
Speaker 1: a second to scroll down and hit that subscribe button.
Speaker 1: Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever get your podcast
Speaker 1: under Hoops Tonight. Follow me on Twitter at underscore Jason lt.
Speaker 1: So you guys don't miss any show announcements or the
Speaker 1: film threads that I do from time to time in
Speaker 1: the mornings, and the last but not least, keep dropping
Speaker 1: mail bag questions in the YouTube comments. We're gonna be
Speaker 1: doing an extensive mail bag intomorrow's show like we usually
Speaker 1: do on Friday. All right, let's talk some basketball. So
Speaker 1: Sixer is gonna big win. Come from behind in the
Speaker 1: fourth quarter to beat the Wolves last night comfortably. Joel
Speaker 1: em Beat has been on an absolute tear after scoring
Speaker 1: fifty last night. In his last eight games, he's gone
Speaker 1: for forty plus five times fifty twice, averaging forty one
Speaker 1: to thirteen, sixty two percent from the field, thirty eight
Speaker 1: percent from three, and ninety three percent at the line. Now,
Speaker 1: like so many people who have watched that game yesterday,
Speaker 1: a lot of trips to the foul line, a lot
Speaker 1: of mid range jump shots, and you know, it's one
Speaker 1: of those things where I think it's okay to have
Speaker 1: two completely separate takes on joelmb And what I mean
Speaker 1: by that is he's incredible. Him and Drew Hanlin have
Speaker 1: worked really hard to build out a super versatile skill
Speaker 1: set for Joel EMBII, and he's become a very well
Speaker 1: rounded score. Obviously, the mid range jump shot and that
Speaker 1: being deadly is the foundational piece, right. He's made sixty
Speaker 1: three mid range jumpers already this season. He's shooting forty
Speaker 1: seven point four percent on them. Last night he was
Speaker 1: eleven for fourteen on mid range jump shots against the Timberwolves.
Speaker 1: It's a good mix of both. It's isolation hesitation pull
Speaker 1: up jump shots, it's you know, face up jab step
Speaker 1: jump shots, and then it's jump shots that he takes
Speaker 1: off the catch and pick and roll when he kind
Speaker 1: of rolls to that you know, seventeen to fifteen foot
Speaker 1: mark right around the foul line. Right. He's also gotten
Speaker 1: really good at feeling body contact. It's an important concept
Speaker 1: we talk about, like feeling on your shoulder blades where
Speaker 1: the defender is so that you can spin off when
Speaker 1: you have your back to the basket. You had two
Speaker 1: dunks like that last night, spinning off of Nase, reed
Speaker 1: off of the right block, and then kind of off
Speaker 1: the left elbow when he was getting guarded by Kyle
Speaker 1: Anderson and saw a double team coming from the right side,
Speaker 1: very smartly spun to the left, got into the lane
Speaker 1: and threw down the dunk. He's also deadly in catch
Speaker 1: and shoot situations this year, specifically from three Joe l
Speaker 1: Embiid is shooting forty nine percent on catch and shoot
Speaker 1: threes this year. Think about how insane that is. He's
Speaker 1: also passing the ball better than ever. He's averaging six
Speaker 1: assists per game. To give you an idea, he in
Speaker 1: three three hundred and ninety four games for the Sixers
Speaker 1: before this season, did Or hit a seven assist mark
Speaker 1: twenty seven times in three hundred and ninety four games.
Speaker 1: He's already done it ten times this season, so it's
Speaker 1: clearly gone up a level as a passer. He's just
Speaker 1: become a remarkably difficult player to guard and very well
Speaker 1: might be the best regular season player in the NBA
Speaker 1: right now. I mean all of that that is the
Speaker 1: first take the second take is that watching him drives
Speaker 1: me absolutely crazy. The foul grifting is reprehensible at this point.
Speaker 1: And for the record, before I go any further here,
Speaker 1: this is not Joel Embiid's fault. Joel Embiid is a
Speaker 1: competitor who wants to win basketball games, and so he
Speaker 1: was doing whatever is necessary to win basketball games. That
Speaker 1: is what you should do. Famously, if you guys remember
Speaker 1: Greg Popovich used to say of the Spurs teams in
Speaker 1: the early two thousand, thousand, twenty tens, I should say,
Speaker 1: used to say, you think I want to be taking
Speaker 1: all these threes. No, that's not what he wants to do.
Speaker 1: It's just what you have to do, in his opinion
Speaker 1: at the time, for his personnel, in order to give
Speaker 1: yourself the best chance to win. As a simple factor
Speaker 1: of math, the point being, competitors do what they have
Speaker 1: to do to win. So I'm not upset with Joel
Speaker 1: Embiid about this. Everything I'm about to say is one
Speaker 1: thousand percent directed towards the NBA them giving too much
Speaker 1: wherewithal of freedom to the officials to determine the way
Speaker 1: basketball games flow, and the officials in particular not knowing
Speaker 1: how to properly manage a basketball game. You know, it's
Speaker 1: funny because like the watching this particular film, obviously, with Synergy,
Speaker 1: the film software that I use, they just pick a
Speaker 1: random broadcast and they use that to filter the footage,
Speaker 1: and this one happened to be the Minnesota broadcast. So
Speaker 1: watching the Minnesota broadcast from the early part of the game,
Speaker 1: you know, Joelnbid's doing that thing he always does where
Speaker 1: he like gets down into the defender and then like
Speaker 1: ducks his body, sticks his arms out and just rises
Speaker 1: up into a pull up jump shot and tries to
Speaker 1: take a shot, a complete non basketball play. For the record,
Speaker 1: never ever, ever, will you see in any pickup run
Speaker 1: anywhere around the country. I won't even see it really
Speaker 1: at the high school or college level because players aren't
Speaker 1: doing it, Refs aren't calling it. But you'll never see
Speaker 1: that shot. Why because what is the purpose of the
Speaker 1: pull up jump shot in basketball? The purpose of the
Speaker 1: pull up jump shot in basketball is a coverage beater. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm isolating the guy and he's given me too much space.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna hit a little step back to get a
Speaker 1: little bit more space, and I'm gonna rise up and
Speaker 1: take this jump shot or in the post. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: bump him with that left shoulder, knock him off, and
Speaker 1: turn over my right shoulder and take a shot because
Speaker 1: I've created separation between me and the defender. That's the
Speaker 1: Kawhi Leonard move right. I'm coming off of this ball
Speaker 1: screen and pick and roll. I've got the defender pinned
Speaker 1: on the pick drop coverage, biggest, too far back. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna rise up and take this pull up jump shot.
Speaker 1: That is what basketball says a pull up jump shot
Speaker 1: should be. So why in the world is Joel Embiid
Speaker 1: going into defenders and deliberately extending the basketball, making it
Speaker 1: available for contact, and then taking shots when that's objectively
Speaker 1: a bad basketball play. It's a lower percentage shot for him.
Speaker 1: If that call never got called, Joel Embiid would have
Speaker 1: to create separation before shots, which, by the way, he's
Speaker 1: great at. He's great at that too, But we're setting
Speaker 1: into the foul line more than a dozen times per
Speaker 1: game on shit like that. That's not a basketball play.
Speaker 1: That's objectively a bad basketball play that Joel Embiid, the competitor,
Speaker 1: does to increase his offensive output. It was crazy listening
Speaker 1: to the broadcast and hearing the Timberwolves guys just like
Speaker 1: as Embiid's work, because I mean, he was eleven for
Speaker 1: fourteen on mid ra in jump shots, so you can
Speaker 1: tell he was operating in that area a lot in
Speaker 1: this game. And that's fourteen shot attempts that registered in
Speaker 1: the box score. Think about all the ones that didn't
Speaker 1: count because he didn't make the shot. Right, He's operating
Speaker 1: almost exclusively out of that area. And you can hear
Speaker 1: the Wolves announcers like watch your hands, watch your hands.
Speaker 1: You can literally see the defenders and they're all like spazzing,
Speaker 1: and they're they're like terrified that they might if they
Speaker 1: contest the shot, they might send Joel Embiid to the
Speaker 1: foul line. And it just it's a it's bad on
Speaker 1: a bunch of different levels. One, it's objectively bad for
Speaker 1: the game of basketball. Why because it makes for a
Speaker 1: bad television product. I watch a lot of basketball, it's
Speaker 1: my job, and like, unquestionably watching these Sixers games as
Speaker 1: a chore that I find things that I love. I
Speaker 1: told you like some of em Beat's footwork in the
Speaker 1: post is always super impressive to me. The pivot moves
Speaker 1: we were talking about earlier feeling contact. We're going to
Speaker 1: talk about Tyrese Maxe in a minute, and some of
Speaker 1: the stuff that he's been doing lately that I really
Speaker 1: really like. There's a lot of things that I like
Speaker 1: in there, but it's being bisected and cut apart by
Speaker 1: this relentless foul drifting attack from Joel Embiid that makes
Speaker 1: it a bad television product. And then the second part
Speaker 1: of it is every year we get to April and
Speaker 1: suddenly the refs decide they don't want to reward that
Speaker 1: with free throws as much. They still occasionally do, but
Speaker 1: nowhere near as frequently. So the refs are telling you,
Speaker 1: we don't think this is basketball in April, May June,
Speaker 1: but they allow it to be basketball in October, November
Speaker 1: through the early portion of April, right. And so what
Speaker 1: ends up happening is it becomes part of the problem
Speaker 1: for Joel Embiid is that a big part of that
Speaker 1: his offensive approach just becomes useless when he gets to
Speaker 1: that point, which has consistently been a part of what
Speaker 1: causes his his effectiveness to decline. Even when MB gets
Speaker 1: to the foul line. In the playoffs, it's one he's
Speaker 1: physically aggressive towards the basket, but guys are allowed to
Speaker 1: press up on him more in the mid range. Suddenly
Speaker 1: his mid range jump shot percentage tanks like it did
Speaker 1: the last few post seasons, and then his offensive effectiveness
Speaker 1: goes down. So it's just objectively bad for everybody. It's
Speaker 1: bad for the fans, it's bad for the league, it's
Speaker 1: bad for Joel in the long run, and objectively, it
Speaker 1: just it drives me crazy to watch, drives me crazy.
Speaker 1: And again, not in Bead's fault. It's one one hundred
Speaker 1: percent the NBA's fault. Something I've been bitching a moment
Speaker 1: about all season because it's literally hurt in the game
Speaker 1: that I love and I like. There was a play
Speaker 1: where MB caught at the top of the key and
Speaker 1: nas Read's guarding him and and b just rips through
Speaker 1: the left and Nod slides his feet, takes the contact
Speaker 1: in the check and as Embiid runs into his chest,
Speaker 1: just throws up the ball, literally just throws up the
Speaker 1: ball gets rewarded with two free throws. Like I said,
Speaker 1: it's reprehensible, straight straight up bad for the league. And
Speaker 1: it's a bummer because Joel Embiid is playing some of
Speaker 1: the best basketball in the NBA right now. Like I said,
Speaker 1: he's arguably the best regular season player right now. He's
Speaker 1: my favorite for MVP right now. As I said in
Speaker 1: our MVP rankings on Sunday last week, it is not
Speaker 1: an anti Embid take. It is one thousand percent anti
Speaker 1: NBA tick now. In addition to Joel Embid bust and
Speaker 1: everybody's ass Tyres, Maxy's playing incredible. This is a tough
Speaker 1: matchup too. He's being guarded by Jada McDaniels for a
Speaker 1: good portion of this game. And you know, when you
Speaker 1: have Jada McDaniels on ball and Rudy Gober waiting for
Speaker 1: you in ball screens, it can be tough. It can
Speaker 1: be a tough challenge, right But what's crazy is, you
Speaker 1: know Max, he still had some plays against that. There
Speaker 1: was a play I clipped and put on my Twitter
Speaker 1: feed this morning where he, you know, sets up McDaniels
Speaker 1: for a screen, gets around to the left and go
Speaker 1: Baar steps up and he like straight up like Euro
Speaker 1: steps around him and finishes with the left handed scoop
Speaker 1: shot off the glass after getting into his body with
Speaker 1: his right shoulder. And I'm like, this is ridiculous, Like
Speaker 1: this is a superstar play that you're seeing right here.
Speaker 1: But one of the things that I wanted to highlight
Speaker 1: today specifically, and it's a concept that I talk about
Speaker 1: a lot on this show, is the offensive variability or
Speaker 1: versatility or you know, just like the different approaches that
Speaker 1: Tyree's Maxi has on offense which makes him harder to guard. So,
Speaker 1: for instance, what's you know, Tyre's Maxey's advantage against Jade McDaniels. Speed, Right,
Speaker 1: that's his biggest advantage. That's it. Jade McDaniels is fast too,
Speaker 1: and he has length, and so especially if you get
Speaker 1: into the habit of spamming actions against him, he's going
Speaker 1: to win that battle a lot of the time. In
Speaker 1: my opinion, Jade McDaniels is one of the top two
Speaker 1: or three perimeter defenders in basketball, right. But I want
Speaker 1: to emphasize movement shooting here for a second, and I
Speaker 1: want to highlight a specific play because this is something
Speaker 1: that Tyrese has been doing all season and killing teams with.
Speaker 1: So it's in the bench group, I think, and it
Speaker 1: was I want to say, early fourth quarter, and Tyresee
Speaker 1: is pushing in transition and he's trying to turn the
Speaker 1: corner on Tyres on Jaden McDaniels a cant has to
Speaker 1: turn and throw the ball back out to Paul Reid.
Speaker 1: As soon as Paul red catches it, Tyrese just kind
Speaker 1: of gives a little shove to Jayden and then sprints
Speaker 1: out to the three point line at the top of
Speaker 1: the key, takes an escape step like a long lunch
Speaker 1: step after he gets the dribble hand off from Paul
Speaker 1: Reid and rises up into a right left footwork to
Speaker 1: rise in fire off the catch jump shot nails it.
Speaker 1: And that's the thing that is an entirely different type
Speaker 1: of offensive attack than an off the dribble ball screen
Speaker 1: or an off the dribble ISO or one of the
Speaker 1: many different actions that they might run. Where Tyrese is
Speaker 1: in a set position with Jaden on him and trying
Speaker 1: to get separation via screen or whatever from the perimeter,
Speaker 1: his ability to be like, well, you stopped me on
Speaker 1: this strip, but I'm a great movement shooter too, so
Speaker 1: you better get ready to lock and trail because I'm
Speaker 1: coming right back off that screen to my left and
Speaker 1: he can do it to his right. You know, this
Speaker 1: is a consistent thing that they run. They'll have him
Speaker 1: come out of the corner and they'll run him off
Speaker 1: of like a double stagger dribble handoff, and he'll just
Speaker 1: rise in fire from the left wing, coming off of
Speaker 1: like a long arcing sprint. Like it's just a significant
Speaker 1: element of his offensive attack that prevents him from ever
Speaker 1: doing the same thing over and over again. And maintaining
Speaker 1: that variety and making sure that your attack has a different,
Speaker 1: like a different approach, not just so that you can
Speaker 1: make yourself harder regard for that individual defender, but so
Speaker 1: that you have a different thing you can use on
Speaker 1: every single defender. This is something I like I've told
Speaker 1: you guys this story a bunch of times on the show.
Speaker 1: But like I was a light bloomer, right, So, Like
Speaker 1: when I was playing in college, I was just an athlete,
Speaker 1: right So, like guard to the other team's best player,
Speaker 1: took some spot up shots, Like I had some scoring
Speaker 1: games when I was in JUCO, but Juco's lower level
Speaker 1: competition doesn't mean anything. And like, basically I was an
Speaker 1: athlete role player, and so as I got older, like
Speaker 1: I developed into a more skilled, perimeter oriented basketball player
Speaker 1: in my late twenties early thirties. It was a transformation later, right,
Speaker 1: because I was a late bloomer. I didn't play basketball
Speaker 1: when I was young. So what's interesting is I've encountered
Speaker 1: some of these things where it's like, okay, I became
Speaker 1: My core skill was that I could shoot, and especially
Speaker 1: as I got into my late twenties, I became a
Speaker 1: good shooter. In college, I was only an OK shooter.
Speaker 1: Became a good shooter when I was in my late twenties.
Speaker 1: And so I'm tall, you know, sixty six, got long arms,
Speaker 1: and I can move really well. So like guys, it
Speaker 1: got to the point where you just couldn't put a
Speaker 1: slower guy on me because if you did, I just
Speaker 1: I would just toast him off the dribble or give
Speaker 1: me too much space, and I would take those jump
Speaker 1: shots over the top. And I got really good at
Speaker 1: shooting pull up threes. So what everybody started doing is
Speaker 1: putting a smaller, quicker player on me and pressing up
Speaker 1: on me and doing that so that they could test
Speaker 1: my handle and make it so that yeah, even if
Speaker 1: I try to make this move, this dude's quicker because
Speaker 1: he's a you know, six ' two guard, and I'm
Speaker 1: this bigger wing player right, and so I had to
Speaker 1: add things like a back to the basket post game.
Speaker 1: And then another big thing I added was movement shooting.
Speaker 1: I worked relentlessly on the same left, right, right left
Speaker 1: footwork depending on which angle I was coming off of
Speaker 1: a screen, just so that I could walk into every
Speaker 1: game and be like, who are you guarding me with?
Speaker 1: Guarding me with a little guard. Okay, I'm gonna work
Speaker 1: out of the high post low post this game. You're
Speaker 1: guarding me with a big, a slow guy. Okay, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna work primarily off the dribble from the perimeter. You're
Speaker 1: guarding me with a wing that has similar athleticism to me. Okay,
Speaker 1: now I'm gonna need to use a combination of all
Speaker 1: three to try to keep the guy off balance. Right.
Speaker 1: It's a vital part, in my opinion, of reaching scoring resiliency.
Speaker 1: They're scoring, and then they're scoring resiliency. Scoring is like,
Speaker 1: on any given night, if the conditions are right, I
Speaker 1: can put up numbers. Scoring Resiliency is maintaining those numbers
Speaker 1: in varying conditions, and that to me is a big
Speaker 1: step forward going from not just from good role player
Speaker 1: that can score to star, but also by going from
Speaker 1: star to superstar. And it's one of the things that
Speaker 1: makes Tyrese Maxi such an enticing young prospect is like,
Speaker 1: he is a great movement shooter, he is a great
Speaker 1: spot up player, and he's becoming a great pick and
Speaker 1: roll score as well, and that variety will give him
Speaker 1: all of the resiliency that I'm talking about to be
Speaker 1: the best version of a score that he can be
Speaker 1: really good win for the Sixers. You know, it's funny
Speaker 1: they went on that stretch where they lost to a
Speaker 1: bunch of bad teams and beat a bunch of bad teams,
Speaker 1: excuse me, and then they lost to Chicago the other night.
Speaker 1: And this is another one of my prevailing basketball theories,
Speaker 1: which is when you play a bunch of bad teams
Speaker 1: in a row, you form bad habits. In the Chicago
Speaker 1: Bulls have been playing some damn good basketball, an excellent
Speaker 1: point of attack defense out of Alex Cruso and Javon Carter,
Speaker 1: and you know, Kobe White's playing extremely well. Demarta Rozen
Speaker 1: is starting to get it going, and it's like the
Speaker 1: Bulls are just good right now. So you are playing
Speaker 1: bad team night after night after night for like two
Speaker 1: weeks and then suddenly a really good team comes to town.
Speaker 1: You're accustomed to a certain level of intensity, a certain
Speaker 1: level of focus, certain level of overall effort, right, and
Speaker 1: then this good team comes to town, and sometimes there
Speaker 1: can be an adjustment period there. And so to bounce
Speaker 1: back from what was not a predictable loss to Chicago
Speaker 1: but an understandable loss to Chicago with a big win
Speaker 1: over the team that I think has been playing the
Speaker 1: best basketball in the Western Conference in Minnesota, good win
Speaker 1: for the Sixers on the Wolves front. Really hard to
Speaker 1: beat the Sixers in Philly when Embid's getting that type
Speaker 1: of whistle, when he's got his mid range jumper going,
Speaker 1: like I said, eleven for fourteen from the mid range,
Speaker 1: it just made it really really difficult to guard them. Right.
Speaker 1: Overall though, the Wolves are playing really good basketball, and
Speaker 1: I love the formula they're building. Yes, they struggled with Embiid,
Speaker 1: but they've been shutting teams water off, particularly perimeter stars
Speaker 1: around the league. I was watching Wolve's heat the other
Speaker 1: day and Anthony Edwards and Jade McDaniels just like completely
Speaker 1: locked up Jimmy Butler down the stretch of that game,
Speaker 1: and Rudy Gobay head Bam and jail forcing him into
Speaker 1: these really tough pull up jump shots. There's this play
Speaker 1: where Bam finally gets like super physically aggressive because he's
Speaker 1: sicker Rudy Gobert and like rips through to the left
Speaker 1: and like bumps him with that left shoulder and shoves
Speaker 1: go bear off and tries to step through and get
Speaker 1: into the lane for Gobart recovered and swatted his ass
Speaker 1: into like a fast break opportunity for Anthony Edwards to
Speaker 1: go up and dunk with two hands. They are really
Speaker 1: good at pushing in transition selectively, not as much as
Speaker 1: I'd like. I'd like to see them push a little
Speaker 1: bit more because they're a mediocre half court offense. But
Speaker 1: they have been the fourth best team in the league
Speaker 1: this year at converting transition possessions into points according to
Speaker 1: Cleaning the Glass, at one point three to three points
Speaker 1: per transition possession. As of right now, they're the only
Speaker 1: team in the league holding teams below one hundred and
Speaker 1: ten points per one hundred possessions. They're at one oh
Speaker 1: seven point five. My only concern right now with the
Speaker 1: Wolves really is their half court offense, where they're sixteenth
Speaker 1: and as I've said throughout the season, they're ceiling will
Speaker 1: entirely come down to Anthony Edwards half court shot creation.
Speaker 1: In my opinion, he's just gonna have to be a
Speaker 1: guy that can win rock fights by generating quality shots,
Speaker 1: and for whatever it's worth, he's been pretty good at
Speaker 1: that in the previous two postseasons. I wanted to talk
Speaker 1: about the New York Knicks for a little bit, and
Speaker 1: then we're gonna talk about the Lakers. So the Knicks
Speaker 1: blew out the nets in Brooklyn last night and then
Speaker 1: two days after, two days earlier, I should say, they
Speaker 1: went into LA and beat the Lakers. Two. They took
Speaker 1: a couple of tough losses earlier this month on the
Speaker 1: road in Milwaukee and Boston. Those are really tough games
Speaker 1: to win, and those are the two best teams in
Speaker 1: the conference, right But outside of those two games, so
Speaker 1: in the nineteen games, outside of their last in their
Speaker 1: last twenty one, outside of the two games that they
Speaker 1: played against Boston and Milwaukee, they're fourteen to five and
Speaker 1: their fourth in offense overall. Since November fourth, that's a
Speaker 1: significant chunk of time. That's the majority of the season
Speaker 1: to this point. In that span. Both Randall and Brunson
Speaker 1: are averaging twenty five points per game, Jalen Brunson twenty
Speaker 1: five to four and six on sixty two central shooting
Speaker 1: and Julius Randall in twenty five nine and five on
Speaker 1: sixty percent true shooting. Now, the defense has fallen apart
Speaker 1: since Mitchell Robinson got hurt and we found out last
Speaker 1: night he's gonna be out for the season. We're gonna
Speaker 1: talk about that in a minute. But the Knicks are
Speaker 1: giving up one hundred and twenty points per one hundred
Speaker 1: possessions over their last six games. Big part there is
Speaker 1: the lack of rim protection. Again, Isaiah Hartenstein is a
Speaker 1: really good player who fits really well with this unit.
Speaker 1: Both Julius Randall and Jalen Brunson have a unique ability
Speaker 1: to engage help defenders, and like Randall just by bullying
Speaker 1: fours and drawing the rim protector in, Jalen Brunson pulling
Speaker 1: the rim protector out in his drop coverage when he
Speaker 1: needs to contest Brunson's floaters and mid range jump shots
Speaker 1: and stuff. And every time they do that, it just
Speaker 1: ends up with hart and Stein either with a smaller
Speaker 1: player pinned on him underneath the basket or just by himself,
Speaker 1: and he had another five offensive rebounds last night. He's
Speaker 1: just killing teams on the glass. Harden sign's great, but
Speaker 1: obviously when you have some small perimeter personnel outside of
Speaker 1: Julius Randall and you don't have rim protection, it's just
Speaker 1: hard to go. And so that's something that we've been
Speaker 1: seeing now. Obviously, like I talked about last week, the
Speaker 1: Cleveland Cavaliers are one of the teams that could potentially
Speaker 1: be looking to make some decision now. They've been playing
Speaker 1: some decent basketball as of late. But as I've been
Speaker 1: talking about Donovan Mitchell, it very well could be comes
Speaker 1: available as a trade target this year. And that was
Speaker 1: one of the guys that the Knicks were originally after,
Speaker 1: and I wouldn't be surprised if they look to go
Speaker 1: that route again. And so we have two Knicks fans
Speaker 1: on my team here at Hoops Tonight. Shout out to you,
Speaker 1: Paul Farrington and Josh Rodriguez. They are both instrumental to
Speaker 1: the day to day stuff with this show and they're
Speaker 1: both Knicks fans. And I was asking them about whether
Speaker 1: or not they would want Donovan Mitchell, and it was
Speaker 1: split down the middle, one of the guys wanted and
Speaker 1: one of the other guys not so much. And I
Speaker 1: find this to be an interesting example of team building
Speaker 1: that I wanted to talk to so I talk about
Speaker 1: so one of the things that we've talked about. I
Speaker 1: should say one of the things that Knicks fans have
Speaker 1: been talking a lot about is man like they just
Speaker 1: don't have any shock creation beyond Jalen Brunson, and it
Speaker 1: just turns into that one man show and things fall apart.
Speaker 1: And I understand that when you look at what happened
Speaker 1: last year in the postseason, which was Jalen Brunson was
Speaker 1: incredible and damn near got you to the Conference finals.
Speaker 1: Literally had a chance to win Game six in Miami.
Speaker 1: Was this close where you would have gone home and
Speaker 1: had a good opportunity to win that series, right, But
Speaker 1: Julius Randall was terrible, and because he was terrible, they
Speaker 1: had no second option and then Ni's lost. But I'm
Speaker 1: a firm believer that Julius Randall is actually the kind
Speaker 1: of player who should do well in the playoffs. The
Speaker 1: problem is he's very much a rhythm player, and he
Speaker 1: was hurt last year. He messed up his ankle right
Speaker 1: before the postseason. And like again when I say rhythm player,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of guys out there. You ever
Speaker 1: see that guy. I have a friend like this, a
Speaker 1: guy this, This guy like could go twelve years of
Speaker 1: that touching a basketball and then I could put him
Speaker 1: in a gym and he'd shoot the ball well. And
Speaker 1: like legitimately he never plays. And when he does go
Speaker 1: play for whatever reason, or if we him and I
Speaker 1: go shooting around or something, he just still has his
Speaker 1: touch and stuff because he played a lot when he
Speaker 1: was younger. He just has very natural rhythm. Kevin Durants,
Speaker 1: A guy like this, like Kevin Durant could go without
Speaker 1: touching a basketball or without playing in an NBA game
Speaker 1: for two months and then step on the floor and
Speaker 1: more or less look like the KD that we know. Right,
Speaker 1: Rhythm players like they kind of have to get their
Speaker 1: stuff going right, Like I very much am not. I
Speaker 1: very much am a rhythm player. Like That's why I'm
Speaker 1: super hyper diligent on my my shooting workouts every day,
Speaker 1: because if I go four days without doing my shooting workouts,
Speaker 1: my shot in my handle will fall apart. Like I
Speaker 1: am very much a rhythm player. I have to be
Speaker 1: super diligent about my work in order to be a
Speaker 1: good basketball player, and I think Julius Randall kind of
Speaker 1: falls into that category. Like he just he needs to
Speaker 1: be playing, you know, twenty games in a row or
Speaker 1: so for him to kind of get into his groove
Speaker 1: and be the idealized version of himself, which is what
Speaker 1: he's doing right now. He's been healthy and he's been
Speaker 1: playing really well as a result. But like, I don't
Speaker 1: necessarily think that's the issue. They were literally you get
Speaker 1: anything out of Rando last year. You're in the conference finals,
Speaker 1: and like obviously you know, is this NIXT team capable
Speaker 1: of reaching the Boston Milwaukee level. Probably not unless they
Speaker 1: make a trade, Right, But I'm just not necessarily sure
Speaker 1: Donovan Mitchell is the guy that I'd go after. First
Speaker 1: of all, I think he's just kind of redundant. I
Speaker 1: think he's the same type of player as Jalen Brunson,
Speaker 1: is a pick and roll scorer who can pass, but
Speaker 1: is more of like a heliocentric pick and roll score. Right,
Speaker 1: as I've talked about a lot on this show, I
Speaker 1: look at like this ideal like archetype of a basketball team, right,
Speaker 1: you gotta have a skill guard, point of attack guard,
Speaker 1: tall lanky wing, strong power wing, athletic center that can switch.
Speaker 1: We were talking about Minnesota earlier. Minnesota fits that mold
Speaker 1: literally perfectly. It's like Mike Conley's your skill guard, answer
Speaker 1: athletic point of attack guard. Jay McDaniel's your tall, slender forward.
Speaker 1: Carl Towns is your big, strong forward. Rudy Gobert's your
Speaker 1: athletic center that can switch and drop right. And I
Speaker 1: don't why would you make the same mistake the Cavs
Speaker 1: made and put another two small guards together that are redundant, right.
Speaker 1: I like the idea of having Jalen Brunson be the
Speaker 1: skill guard next to a point of attack elite a
Speaker 1: guard like off ball guard. To me, that's where r. J.
Speaker 1: Barrett should be. What they need is they need a
Speaker 1: really good three, right. Julius Randall is your power forward
Speaker 1: that can attack matchups, and then ideally when you're healthy,
Speaker 1: it's Mitchell Robinson and Mitchell Robinson being hurt might be
Speaker 1: one of the best things that can happen to this
Speaker 1: team because it might stop them from doing something stupid
Speaker 1: like going after Donovan Mitchell. In my opinion, you patiently
Speaker 1: wait to see who you can put it that three,
Speaker 1: because if I have Brunson Barrett with Randall Robinson in
Speaker 1: a really good three that is an elite shooter and
Speaker 1: that can guard multiple positions on the perimeter, now we're
Speaker 1: talking about a team that actually has a chance to
Speaker 1: go beat a team like Boston or Milwaukee in the playoffs.
Speaker 1: And so I think, like you know, Donovan Mitchell is
Speaker 1: going to be a guy that can help some teams.
Speaker 1: I just am not sure that New York is the
Speaker 1: team that he can specifically help. I've seen, you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of people talking about them waiting on Embiid
Speaker 1: potentially that's another one that I would be I would
Speaker 1: think is smart, Like if you could upgrade Mitchell Robinson
Speaker 1: into Joel Embiid, you can get away with a lesser
Speaker 1: player at the three, maybe a veteran minimum type of guy. Right.
Speaker 1: But it's those two positions, the five in the three
Speaker 1: that I'd be looking to upgrade, not the two. It's
Speaker 1: certainly not with a guy who more or less is
Speaker 1: a one, which is what you already have in Jayalen Brunson.
Speaker 1: And as you guys know, I think I think Jaylen
Speaker 1: Brunston is just better than Donovan Mitchell. I basically said that.
Speaker 1: Last year. I was like, I was, That's why I
Speaker 1: picked the Knicks to beat the Cavs. I was like,
Speaker 1: I think Brunson's gonna outplay Mitchell, and he did. So
Speaker 1: I just don't think that's the route they need to go.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk Lakers for a few minutes and
Speaker 1: then we'll get out of here. So what is wrong
Speaker 1: with the Lakers? They are one in four in their
Speaker 1: five games since the n season Tournament win, and they've
Speaker 1: looked bad, like really bad. And so the question is
Speaker 1: why have they looked bad? And I want to look
Speaker 1: at it from two fronts. So there's a big picture
Speaker 1: element and then there's some individual players that I want
Speaker 1: to hit on in the big picture. This team, as
Speaker 1: I've talked about so much, their weapon is their defense.
Speaker 1: They're an elite defense in my opinion, when they are engaged,
Speaker 1: they are the best defense in the NBA, anchored by
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis when he's engaged, best defensive player in the
Speaker 1: world in my opinion, comfortably Lebron James when he's engaged,
Speaker 1: very very good low man help defender because he just
Speaker 1: has a ton of IQ in the athleticism to make
Speaker 1: plays right when they have their wings slotted properly. Cam
Speaker 1: Reddish when he's playing like we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: Redish here in a minute, because he hasn't been playing well.
Speaker 1: Reddish at the point of tech, good weapon, Torrian Prince
Speaker 1: as a secondary point of attack of defender, good option right,
Speaker 1: and then you know Austin Reeves typically is you're one there.
Speaker 1: Austin just kind of does his job right. I think
Speaker 1: they're the best defense in the league when they're engaged.
Speaker 1: Minnesota gives them a run for their money. But I
Speaker 1: just don't think Rudy Gobert is as good as Anthony Davis.
Speaker 1: But that team who won with defense, the same team
Speaker 1: that stopped the Pacers after the Bucks and Celtics could not,
Speaker 1: that team is giving up one hundred and twenty points
Speaker 1: per one hundred possessions in the five games since the
Speaker 1: nd season tournament. That's bad. They're not a bad defense,
Speaker 1: and they are playing bad defense. So that's a big
Speaker 1: part of it. Now, the question is why why are
Speaker 1: they playing bad defense? Really, it just comes down to
Speaker 1: the schedule. You gotta think of it like this. By
Speaker 1: the end of December, the Lakers will have played twelve
Speaker 1: of their last nineteen games on the road, and in
Speaker 1: the middle of that was a stretch where they had
Speaker 1: to go to Vegas and play playoff games. Basically for
Speaker 1: a week, played three playoff games, one at home and
Speaker 1: two in Vegas. And so I think, honestly, there's just
Speaker 1: a little worn down. I think some of it's a
Speaker 1: letdown too. Like think of it like this, like, what
Speaker 1: does the N Season Tournament win? Is it a trophy
Speaker 1: like the Larry O'Brien. No, But what it is is
Speaker 1: a strong indicator that in big, meaningful basketball games, the
Speaker 1: Lakers are really damn good at that because of their
Speaker 1: physical nature and their defense and their ability to win
Speaker 1: rock fights and the level Lebron's playing at right now
Speaker 1: or at least before this stretch after the tournament, And
Speaker 1: when you combine that with like everything we know about
Speaker 1: the Lakers last year in the postseason, that N Season
Speaker 1: Tournament win was like a legitimization of them as a
Speaker 1: bona fide championship contender. The problem is you have to
Speaker 1: turn around and play Dallas a couple nights later, right,
Speaker 1: and like that's where things can kind of go off
Speaker 1: the rails. Is it becomes from a motivational standpoint when
Speaker 1: you just kind of legitimized yourself and now you've got
Speaker 1: to go play these low, low intensity, low importance games.
Speaker 1: They let their foot off the gas in a lot
Speaker 1: of ways. And then you combine that with tough schedule,
Speaker 1: right quality opponents, a lot of them on the road. Like, guys,
Speaker 1: the Chicago Bulls are playing really well lately. I want
Speaker 1: to say, they're like seven and three in their last
Speaker 1: ten games. They just went in and beat the Sixers
Speaker 1: the other night, and like, they gotta go on the
Speaker 1: road to Minnesota tonight. They're gonna lose. Lebron's out. Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis should rest tonight. I hope he does. They're gonna
Speaker 1: lose that game. Then on Saturday they gotta go to
Speaker 1: Oklahoma City. There's a decent chance they lose that game too.
Speaker 1: But then they'll come home in January. It gets tough
Speaker 1: at the end of December two, they're home for the
Speaker 1: Celtics and then they have two more road games. But
Speaker 1: in January things will slow down. Hopefully they can recapture that.
Speaker 1: But again, we got to look at the Lakers in
Speaker 1: the big picture. I think they've been one of the best,
Speaker 1: one of the worst, I should say effort and energy
Speaker 1: teams in the league this year. If you take out
Speaker 1: the seven in season tournament games, so the four pool
Speaker 1: play games, three single elimination games, basically all seven of
Speaker 1: those were really good start to finish Laker performances outside
Speaker 1: of that, because I think this team's won fifteen games.
Speaker 1: They're other eight wins the vast majority of those have
Speaker 1: been uneven efforts where they've come out slow, bs their
Speaker 1: way through two and a half quarters and then suddenly
Speaker 1: engage themselves and come back and win late. That was literally, like,
Speaker 1: that's how they beat the Suns the first time. That's
Speaker 1: how they beat the Clippers the first time. That's how
Speaker 1: they beat the Magic the first time. That's what they do.
Speaker 1: That's what they do. So like, I'm not shocked anymore
Speaker 1: when I look at the scoreboard and they're down by
Speaker 1: thirteen points in the first half against the Bulls. It's
Speaker 1: been somewhat their identity. You know, when a team that
Speaker 1: has to win through hard work because their best talent
Speaker 1: is their defensive potential. When that team doesn't play hard,
Speaker 1: they will get crushed. Those are the big picture elements.
Speaker 1: Now there's some individual players, because what ends up happening
Speaker 1: in a lot of these cases when a team is struggling,
Speaker 1: it usually involves a bunch of specific players struggling. Now,
Speaker 1: on the offensive end, their core three are playing great.
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis thirty two points per game on sixty one
Speaker 1: or thirty one points per game on sixty one percent
Speaker 1: the last five games, Lebron twenty seven nine to eleven
Speaker 1: on forty eight percent, Austin Reeves twenty points and six
Speaker 1: assists on fifty one percent from the field, forty six
Speaker 1: percent from three to ninety two percent from the line.
Speaker 1: So they're getting scoring from their core guys, and Anthony
Speaker 1: Davis has more or less been the great defensive player
Speaker 1: that we've come to expect, although he's clearly been laboring
Speaker 1: a little bit with his ankle injury, right, But everyone
Speaker 1: else is struggling, and even among those core guys, Lebron
Speaker 1: completely let go of the defensive rope since the end
Speaker 1: season tournament. Dominant lowman against the Pacers, dominant lowman against
Speaker 1: the Pelicans, could give a shit the last week and
Speaker 1: a half, you know what I mean. And that's a
Speaker 1: fundamental part of defense. We talked about the low man, right,
Speaker 1: but there's a bunch of individual players that are struggling. Right.
Speaker 1: Cam Ruddish. Early in the season, when he was playing well,
Speaker 1: it was dedicated effort at at the point of attack,
Speaker 1: with fo focus on the game plan, with super selective offense.
Speaker 1: He was just taking wide open corner threes and that
Speaker 1: was about it. Cam Reddish has really struggled in the
Speaker 1: last five games. He's way loose on defense compared to
Speaker 1: where he was earlier, a lot of gambling, a lot
Speaker 1: of like stunting and getting out of position. Really really
Speaker 1: struggled with Jalen Brunson the other night. Cam's not playing
Speaker 1: very good on defense. Then on offense he's gone back
Speaker 1: to a lot of what he did in the past,
Speaker 1: which is like taking early clock pull up a threes
Speaker 1: in transition above the break and driving into traffic and
Speaker 1: trying to do too much just in general a quick trigger.
Speaker 1: And so now Cam Reddish has gone from an impactful
Speaker 1: three and D guy or D and three guy to
Speaker 1: something below that. Right, Torrian Prince has been shooting the
Speaker 1: ball better, but he's struggling on the defensive end of
Speaker 1: the floor and he's not doing anything to help on
Speaker 1: the class. D'Angelo Russell is like completely checked out mentally,
Speaker 1: thirty four percent from the field, twenty two percent from
Speaker 1: three since the n Season tournament ended, and he's just
Speaker 1: floating through games on the defensive end of the floor.
Speaker 1: Jared Vanderbilt looks like he's still hurt. He's not moving well.
Speaker 1: And then again, and this is an important part of
Speaker 1: this is the rotation piece. But Ruey doesn't look like
Speaker 1: he fits in right now. Now. One of the things
Speaker 1: I want to say is Jared Vanderbilt and Ruyachimura, they're
Speaker 1: combining in the last five games to play thirty eight
Speaker 1: minutes per game. Torrian Prince by himself is playing thirty
Speaker 1: six minutes per game. And I think a big like
Speaker 1: Torrian Prince is a guy that used to come off
Speaker 1: the bench and play in a limited role, and Darvin
Speaker 1: Ham is leaned into him as a high minutes starter,
Speaker 1: which is like, of course, his point of attack, defense
Speaker 1: is gonna struggle. Of course, he's gonna struggle on the
Speaker 1: defensive glass. Of course he's gonna have games like he
Speaker 1: did against the Knicks where he goes three for thirteen
Speaker 1: from three. He's not accustomed to this. Workload to just
Speaker 1: go look at his minutes totals in the last three
Speaker 1: years before the Lakers and now later in his career
Speaker 1: when he's an older player and less athletic, Darvin Ham's
Speaker 1: leading on him in huge minutes and it's just not
Speaker 1: necessary when you have other options there. That's the one
Speaker 1: big tactical thing that sticks out to me here. It's
Speaker 1: just a lot of Cam Reddishatorian prints when you have
Speaker 1: other options like Jared Vanderbilt, like Max Christy, like ruiy Hachimura,
Speaker 1: that you can slot into those positions. And I do
Speaker 1: think that balancing that out more could help everybody. But
Speaker 1: all those guys are playing poorly. Again, like when you
Speaker 1: have three of your starters, Cam Redistorium, Prince and Dangelo
Speaker 1: Russell playing poorly, that's gonna lead to some bad basketball.
Speaker 1: And again, why are these guys playing poorly? I think
Speaker 1: they're a little worn down. A lot of road games,
Speaker 1: weird four three, you know, playoff style games mixed in
Speaker 1: a little bit of a letdown after you win the
Speaker 1: damn thing. No chance to just go home and get
Speaker 1: into a routine. Look at their January schedule, their January schedules.
Speaker 1: It enlightens up a lot of games at home, a
Speaker 1: lot of easier opponents. That's when I think you'll see
Speaker 1: the Lakers kind of click in and start to regain
Speaker 1: some ground in the regular season standings. But I will
Speaker 1: admit one thing, like I was never down, no matter
Speaker 1: how poorly things got at the beginning of the season
Speaker 1: or in this last week and a half, I've never
Speaker 1: been down on the Lakers championship potential. If anything, I'm
Speaker 1: higher on it because Lebron looks better and I think
Speaker 1: they're positioned for a trade, and we'll talk about the
Speaker 1: trade here in a minute. But like, I'm just not
Speaker 1: off of that boat. I was wrong about one thing though.
Speaker 1: I said in the offseason that I thought the Lakers
Speaker 1: would win fifty games and just in general win a
Speaker 1: lot of regular season games because they just have a
Speaker 1: lot of talent and they'll just be able to get
Speaker 1: through the regular season riding that talent night in a
Speaker 1: night out. And I thought they'd be able to weather
Speaker 1: injuries to Len and Anthony Davis, which haven't happened yet. Really,
Speaker 1: I was wrong about that in the sense that they
Speaker 1: have not been a consistently engaged team, and like, just
Speaker 1: go look at the NBA standings, look through and look
Speaker 1: at how many teams are good. There's like nineteen good
Speaker 1: teams and then there's like ten or eleven bad teams.
Speaker 1: And so as a result of that, on the night
Speaker 1: out nature of the NBA, if you don't bring solid
Speaker 1: effort and energy and focus, you get your butt kicked.
Speaker 1: It's just how it goes. And so honestly, like I
Speaker 1: view this as like a forty five win team now,
Speaker 1: a team that just kind of hovers around five hundred
Speaker 1: and then at the end of the season will end up,
Speaker 1: you know, five to six seven games above five hundred.
Speaker 1: And that's just simply from the standpoint of effort. This
Speaker 1: is a team that they're low man. Lebron James barely
Speaker 1: tries on defense, you know, in any game that unless
Speaker 1: it has some sort of degree of importance, and which
Speaker 1: by the way, doesn't matter for the postseason. Lebron is
Speaker 1: consistently a guy that can make plays on that end
Speaker 1: when he gets there. But in the context of the
Speaker 1: regular season it's an issue and they're just not. They
Speaker 1: just have too many guys playing poorly right now. Last piece,
Speaker 1: I said before the season that I expected ruy Hachamura
Speaker 1: and d'angela Russell to get traded, but that D'Angelo Russell
Speaker 1: in particular was the safest bet in the NBA to
Speaker 1: get traded. And I said specifically, because those are two
Speaker 1: of your top five players, the top five players in
Speaker 1: the Lakers or Lebron, James, Anthony Davis, Austin Reeves, Ruyachamura,
Speaker 1: Dangel Russell, those are your top five guys. Except for
Speaker 1: Lebron and Ruey play the same position. Delo and Austin
Speaker 1: more or less play the same position, skill guard, right,
Speaker 1: And as we've talked about, if you have skill guard
Speaker 1: skill guard, your defense falls apart. It has to be
Speaker 1: skill guard, point of attack defender that can shoot the
Speaker 1: ball right that that that's what your backcourt has to be.
Speaker 1: And what you're seeing right now is D'Angel Russell's playing
Speaker 1: really poorly and starting to kind of hate his role
Speaker 1: on this team in a lot of ways, which is,
Speaker 1: you're the guy who starts the game, but we don't
Speaker 1: want you running the offense, and Austin's gonna come in
Speaker 1: and take the reins from you and end up closing
Speaker 1: the game anyway. Not D'Angelo Russell's fault, not Darvin Ham's fault.
Speaker 1: That is a roster in balance that has been abundantly
Speaker 1: clear since the Nuggets series last year, right, and then
Speaker 1: Ruey Hachimura. You know, like, I don't think it's a
Speaker 1: coincidence that in that Spurs game Lebron didn't play last week,
Speaker 1: he looked good because he does the same stuff Lebron does.
Speaker 1: He is the same lesser He's a lesser version of
Speaker 1: the same player, a big matchup attacking forward who needs
Speaker 1: to play as a low man defensively. And so when
Speaker 1: you have both of them together and one of them's
Speaker 1: playing thirty six minutes, there's just not a ton of
Speaker 1: opportunity for Ruey Hachimura. And like last year in the
Speaker 1: postseason when he was great, they were playing him a
Speaker 1: lot at the three next to Lebron and Ad and
Speaker 1: he was playing with good players and getting a lot
Speaker 1: of catch and shoot opportunities, which he was making. Now
Speaker 1: he's pretty consistently playing in bench groups without their best players.
Speaker 1: They're tossing in the in the block and asking him
Speaker 1: to initiate offense, which is not his strength, and then
Speaker 1: his defense is suffering as a result of that. You know,
Speaker 1: it's funny because like I'm a huge Ruie fan. I
Speaker 1: think he's a good playoff player too, but there's a
Speaker 1: redundancy here, and that's where it becomes a problem. I
Speaker 1: don't know necessarily that Rui will get moved. That will
Speaker 1: basically depend on the target. But Danzel the russell will
Speaker 1: almost certainly get moved because of that imbalance. And then
Speaker 1: we look at the two inside guys. If we agree
Speaker 1: that the big picture version of this team is Austin
Speaker 1: is your skill guard, Ada is the primary rim protector,
Speaker 1: Lebron is the low man. It's the two and the
Speaker 1: three that will round out that lineup, and that five,
Speaker 1: whatever that five ends up being, will determine the fate
Speaker 1: of this team. Cam Reddish, it was a cool story
Speaker 1: when he played really well for a couple of weeks.
Speaker 1: He will have other stretches this season where he plays
Speaker 1: really well for a couple of weeks, and then I'll
Speaker 1: have other stretches like the last couple of weeks where
Speaker 1: he's loose, in, undisciplined and his hacked craters. That's gonna
Speaker 1: be the experience of writing a young flawed player at
Speaker 1: the two. Torrian Prince very good bench wing, and when
Speaker 1: he's coming off the bench for you and playing twenty
Speaker 1: something minutes a night, He's gonna be a really useful
Speaker 1: player for you. Good catch and shoot player, decent point
Speaker 1: of attack defender against lower level perimeter talent. But when
Speaker 1: you slought him as a starter and he's guarding a
Speaker 1: lot of the higher level perimeter talent, you can run
Speaker 1: into some issues there. And so I keep pointing to
Speaker 1: the same situation. You have to find a way to
Speaker 1: turn your two players that are redundancies that you can't
Speaker 1: play in Ruy and Dilo into upgrades at the two
Speaker 1: and three between Austin Lebron and Ad. And again it
Speaker 1: depends on the player. I wouldn't do it for anybody,
Speaker 1: but you know, if you can, if you can call
Speaker 1: the bulls and somehow get you know, Caruso Ford lo
Speaker 1: in a first in other South, you gotta do that.
Speaker 1: If you can call the Brooklyn Nets and be like, hey,
Speaker 1: ruey Hotchramura, You guys don't really have a big forward.
Speaker 1: You guys have a bunch of skinny forwards. You have
Speaker 1: Dorian Finney Smith and Michal Bridges and Cam Johnson. They're
Speaker 1: all more or less skinny fords. You don't really have
Speaker 1: a big forward that can attack smaller players in the post.
Speaker 1: Why don't we try a swap there, you know, then
Speaker 1: then you can run Dorian Finney Smith and Alex Cruso
Speaker 1: at the two three. Now you're talking about a lineup
Speaker 1: that can win the championship. But right now, that's that's
Speaker 1: why I keep them at the bottom of that tier.
Speaker 1: Like they the regular season stuff mostly effort, mostly effort focused.
Speaker 1: This is an older team in terms of their stars.
Speaker 1: That's gonna be something that's gonna lead to problems there.
Speaker 1: But when he comes to the postseason, it's the weakness
Speaker 1: at the two and three that concerns me the most.
Speaker 1: But do keep an eye on. I expect the Lakers
Speaker 1: to struggle through the end of the year, and I
Speaker 1: wouldn't surprised if we get to January they're below five hundred,
Speaker 1: and then I expect them to win a bunch of
Speaker 1: games in January because their schedule lightens up at the
Speaker 1: and they're at home for the most part. So I
Speaker 1: think by the time we get to the deadline, they'll be,
Speaker 1: you know somewhere three four or five games above five hundred,
Speaker 1: and if they nail those trades, they can go on
Speaker 1: a little run post deadline, end up closer to fifty
Speaker 1: wins and have a better chance. But my guess they'll
Speaker 1: I have no idea what's gonna happen to the deadline,
Speaker 1: but at this point, I think the safer bet is
Speaker 1: for them to be a middle of the pack Western
Speaker 1: Conference team who finishes with forty something to wins and
Speaker 1: just adjust your expectations, Laker fans, adjust your expectations. This
Speaker 1: is not a team that is interested in overly engaging
Speaker 1: themselves over the course of the regular season. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: that is all I have for today. We have one
Speaker 1: more show tomorrow. We're gonna do some instant reactions to
Speaker 1: some games and our MVP check in and a mailbag,
Speaker 1: so keep dropping mail back questions. I will see you guys.
Speaker 1: Then the volume