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Speaker 1: in West Virginia. YEA, all right, Welcome to Hoops Tonight,
Speaker 1: presented by Fan Duel here at the Volume live on
Speaker 1: AMP Happy Thursday. Everybody. If you are listening on the
Speaker 1: podcast feed or on YouTube, remember that you can catch
Speaker 1: these shows first live on AMP immediately after the early
Speaker 1: slated games. Don't forget to follow me on Twitter as well.
Speaker 1: That's where you can find the scheduling information for that
Speaker 1: stuff we're going to be talking about tonight, Dallas in
Speaker 1: Brooklyn and that epic overtime game that we just witnessed
Speaker 1: with the one hell of a flurry from Luca as
Speaker 1: a facilitator in overtime. And then I've got a lot
Speaker 1: of thoughts on the Philadelphia seventy six ers, who are
Speaker 1: off to a horrendous start this season, and I think
Speaker 1: it's time for a coaching change. So we're gonna get
Speaker 1: into some of the details there and why I think
Speaker 1: it might be the only pathway forward for the Sixers
Speaker 1: to improve. Um this is an unforgiving leak. Brooklyn yesterday
Speaker 1: puts together a solid half of effort against Milwaukee and
Speaker 1: then they just finally relent under the physical onslaught of
Speaker 1: the Bucks and they lose. And your reward for fighting
Speaker 1: and losing and improving in one night is that Luka
Speaker 1: don Chich comes to town, and you play hard, and
Speaker 1: you and you you compete on the glass and you
Speaker 1: make up some of the three point because the advantage
Speaker 1: for Dallas in this game was a three point line.
Speaker 1: But you get a lot of that back by running
Speaker 1: and transition and getting easy fast breakpoints to bolster your offense.
Speaker 1: You're up one ten to one oh six, and it's
Speaker 1: crunch time and now it's Luka don Chitch versus Katie
Speaker 1: and Kyrie, and they subbed out Spencer Dinwoody and went
Speaker 1: with Tim Hardaway Junior down the stretch. Now important important
Speaker 1: detail for both teams. Lineups for both teams are in
Speaker 1: a completely different place right now. The Mavericks know who
Speaker 1: they're best grouping is. You know, during the playoffs last
Speaker 1: year was Jalen Brunson in that spot, But for the
Speaker 1: most part it will be Spencer Dinwoody. They went with
Speaker 1: Tim Hardaway Jr. Because Tim Hardaway was shooting really well
Speaker 1: in a spot of role and he ended up hitting
Speaker 1: a massive shot in O T the first one that
Speaker 1: kind of the first picking pop that he hit. But
Speaker 1: it's all the same grouping. It's going to be Dorrian
Speaker 1: Phinney Smith, it's gonna be Reggie Bullock, it's gonna be
Speaker 1: Maxi Kleiba, It's gonna be Luca. They know what they
Speaker 1: are and they know what they're gonna do at the
Speaker 1: end of the game. The Nets are trying all sorts
Speaker 1: of stuff. They David Duke got there for a while.
Speaker 1: They had you know, they went with you to Watnab
Speaker 1: for a while. Out there. Therese are guys that probably
Speaker 1: aren't going to be playing when this team is fully healthy,
Speaker 1: so I will throw them that. But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day. It was too distinct archetypes of NBA
Speaker 1: star competing against each other in a crunch time environment,
Speaker 1: and it was my favorite type of star, the big
Speaker 1: point forward, the facilitating big wing that can punish his
Speaker 1: way to the rim and have some shot making, but
Speaker 1: his specialty is deciphering a defense and dissecting the defense
Speaker 1: versus two classic three level scores. And the Nets had
Speaker 1: a classic conundrum for how to handle Luca. They could
Speaker 1: either leave him on an island and make him a score,
Speaker 1: or they could send multiple bodies at him and they
Speaker 1: can test his ability to pass the basketball, and they
Speaker 1: did a little bit of both. Down the stretch at
Speaker 1: one ten, one oh six, Luca Luca immediately isolates. All
Speaker 1: night long, he was targeting the small Brooklyn guards. He
Speaker 1: went after Patty Mills a lot when when he was
Speaker 1: in the game, a ton of attacking Kyrie Irving. And
Speaker 1: there at the end when it was one ten, one
Speaker 1: oh six, he got back to back a driving layup
Speaker 1: and then a driving foul that he went to the
Speaker 1: free throw line to tie the game at one ten.
Speaker 1: Living at the rim, easy layups, high percentage shots, and
Speaker 1: then after that they started double teaming him and he
Speaker 1: picked them apart with the pass on the other end
Speaker 1: of the floor. You know, Kyrie, there was a play
Speaker 1: where drove to the left and Pump faked and Luca
Speaker 1: flew by him and he got a pretty solid look
Speaker 1: on the left wing. It was like a contested pull
Speaker 1: up you know, um jump shot on that short corner
Speaker 1: on the left, and Kyrie is gonna make that a
Speaker 1: lot of the time. But there's a lot more variants
Speaker 1: in the scoring archetype. If shots not falling, your shots
Speaker 1: not falling. You know, Kad had a pretty damn good
Speaker 1: look at three. They're a wide open three late fourth
Speaker 1: quarter that he missed. You know, there's some when you're
Speaker 1: when you're a pull up jump shooting score, you're gonna
Speaker 1: deal with some variants. But then when you look at Luca,
Speaker 1: it's like he's trying to get a wide open catch
Speaker 1: and shoot three for one of his best shooters and
Speaker 1: he's got a bunch of them, or he's taking one
Speaker 1: of your little guards and he's dog walking them down
Speaker 1: to the rim. And that's why I've always preferred that
Speaker 1: specific archetype. It's just, uh, this is a little bit safer,
Speaker 1: it's a little bit more reliable, your shot quality is
Speaker 1: going to be better, and in this particular game, it
Speaker 1: drove them from one ten one oh six to winning
Speaker 1: the game convincingly in overtime. So in ot you guys
Speaker 1: learned one of the difficulties of guarding pick and pop
Speaker 1: actions in the n b A. So when you're um,
Speaker 1: when you're dealing with a typical screen and dive like
Speaker 1: pick and roll type of offense, you put your big
Speaker 1: in a situation where he can at least have an
Speaker 1: opportunity to guard both players. Right, Like Luca comes over
Speaker 1: the top of the screen and he's coming downhill at you,
Speaker 1: you can back up and you can kind of have
Speaker 1: some hope of contesting Luca at the rim while also
Speaker 1: contesting the roller. But as soon as you throw a
Speaker 1: popping big or a popping guard or a popping wing
Speaker 1: in that screen action and he pops to the three
Speaker 1: point line, it is now impossible to run a traditional
Speaker 1: drop coverage. You basically have a small handful of options.
Speaker 1: You can either switch it, in which case you're giving
Speaker 1: Luca don Chech another opportunity to guard or to attack
Speaker 1: a smaller defensive player, or you can double team him
Speaker 1: or hedge right, and what they did there in overtime
Speaker 1: just time and time again. They did it once with
Speaker 1: Reggie Bullock, they did it once with Maxi Cliba, they
Speaker 1: did it once with Tim Hardaway Jr. Is On that
Speaker 1: pick and pop. They two bodies ran with Luca easy
Speaker 1: behind the back pass. All three looks top of the
Speaker 1: key completely wide open for good shooters and they're gonna
Speaker 1: go in and so that that's kind of the way
Speaker 1: that that dynamic, that's the that's kind of the way
Speaker 1: that that specific dynamic is incredibly difficult to guard. Luca
Speaker 1: is not a traditional like I'm just gonna go down
Speaker 1: and shoot every time type of score. He's a make
Speaker 1: the right play guy. If you guard him in single coverage,
Speaker 1: he's going to take you to the rim. If you're
Speaker 1: a smaller defender, he's going to hit you with dribble
Speaker 1: combinations for jump shots if you're a if you're a
Speaker 1: bigger def under, that's giving him too much space. And
Speaker 1: then as soon as you throw multiple bodies at him,
Speaker 1: he's going to pick you apart by making the right
Speaker 1: play every single time. That specifically, you know, we did that.
Speaker 1: We did a whole video on this over the summer
Speaker 1: when we broke down the different archetypes of scores, and
Speaker 1: I have ranked the big point forward at number one
Speaker 1: on my list for that specific reason. I just genuinely
Speaker 1: believe you're gonna get higher level shot quality as a result.
Speaker 1: The Luca match up was a problem for for Brooklyn
Speaker 1: all night long. Like I said, early in the game,
Speaker 1: he started up by posting up the small guards, Kyrie
Speaker 1: Iriving and Patty Mills, getting it whatever he want. Um.
Speaker 1: Then there was that phase there in the second quarter
Speaker 1: where he's attacking you to want Nabby every single time
Speaker 1: down the floor, and he really struggled with Luca's ball
Speaker 1: fakes and he was committing a lot of fouls. Um.
Speaker 1: Then there was a stretch there in the third quarter
Speaker 1: where I don't know if he was just doing this
Speaker 1: for fun to try to prove a point, or if
Speaker 1: David Duke was legitimately giving him some issues, which David
Speaker 1: Duke I thought, actually did a pretty solid job on him,
Speaker 1: although he ended up bowling out in this game him.
Speaker 1: But he started attacking Ben Simmons like every trip down
Speaker 1: the floor, calling for Ben Simmons's man to come up
Speaker 1: and set his screen, get Ben on the switch and
Speaker 1: then he was walking him down to the rim every
Speaker 1: single time. I like and Luca, We've talked about this before.
Speaker 1: Luca just has a tendency to attack the other team's best,
Speaker 1: best defender or or things like that to get them
Speaker 1: out of help. But I also think he does it
Speaker 1: as a psychological type of deal. When he's scoring on
Speaker 1: Ben Simmons, and I think he got another bucket on
Speaker 1: him in ot if I remember correctly. When he's scoring
Speaker 1: on Ben Simmons, he's talking more ship, he's being more
Speaker 1: demonstrative about it. He's trying to take the life out
Speaker 1: of your team. You know. Lebron used to do this
Speaker 1: for ages in the in the Eastern Conference playoffs where
Speaker 1: he would want to he would go for the sweep
Speaker 1: and and try to humiliate you for this specific purpose
Speaker 1: of ending the series quickly, because he knows as soon
Speaker 1: as you mentally lose confident, it's and you lose your
Speaker 1: belief in your ability to win the game, it's over
Speaker 1: for you. A lot of you Toronto Raptors fans probably
Speaker 1: have a lot of PTSD from that. The one thing
Speaker 1: I watched out for with Luca this year that's a
Speaker 1: little concerning, and he had another monster night tonight, but
Speaker 1: I'd watch out for fatigue. His usage rate right now
Speaker 1: is up over forty coming into this game, and it
Speaker 1: probably was every bit as high tonight. Obviously a big
Speaker 1: part of that is Spencer Dinwoody's slotting up into that
Speaker 1: um uh, into that second role, and I'm not really
Speaker 1: having a third creator. My guess is that ends up
Speaker 1: being the thing that they target with the most aggression
Speaker 1: during the during the trade deadline or a time of
Speaker 1: the season or during the buy out market. You guys
Speaker 1: remember me, I I wanted them to get Dennis Schroeder
Speaker 1: at one point, um but with him not really having
Speaker 1: that third creator, his usage is through the roof this
Speaker 1: first time in his career. It's up over There's a
Speaker 1: little bit of a a ceiling with that as it
Speaker 1: pertains to fatigue. In the playoffs, We've just seen this
Speaker 1: time and time again. You run into a good team
Speaker 1: that has tons of perimeter defenders that can switch on
Speaker 1: and off of you and keep different looks, or you
Speaker 1: get a specific defender like you know. So for instance,
Speaker 1: in this game, Brooklyn was way too quick to give
Speaker 1: the switch. Basically, anytime Luca wanted a specific defender, he
Speaker 1: got it. Whereas, like you saw a, Golden State had
Speaker 1: a lot of success keeping Andrew Wiggins on Luca by
Speaker 1: Steve Kerr using, you know, kind of gimmicky things like
Speaker 1: putting Steph on a shooter that wasn't a good movement shooter.
Speaker 1: So instead of putting him on on Reggie Bullock it
Speaker 1: was a good movement shooter, he put him on Dorian
Speaker 1: Phinney Smith, who was more of a stand still shooter.
Speaker 1: So now when they run picking pops with Dorian Phinney Smith,
Speaker 1: you're not in as much danger, and Steph can hedge
Speaker 1: and recover and not have to give up the switch.
Speaker 1: They Golden State worked really hard and smart to keep
Speaker 1: Luca from attacking it's weaker defenders, right, and so then
Speaker 1: over the course of a series, Lucas now talking attacking
Speaker 1: Andrew Wiggins every time down and it just really wears
Speaker 1: on him. That's gonna be a thing that he's gonna
Speaker 1: have to deal with in at least one playoff series
Speaker 1: this year, if not multiple, So they're gonna have to
Speaker 1: find a way to try to ease up his usage
Speaker 1: at some point. Now. One thing that's helping is Spencer Dinwood.
Speaker 1: He has been really good to start the season. Um,
Speaker 1: not a fantastic game from him, but he made some
Speaker 1: plays in the fourth quarter. I did think it was
Speaker 1: interesting that they went away from him in crunch time,
Speaker 1: but I thought that was mainly I thought that mainly
Speaker 1: had to do with Tim Hardaway Jr. In a spot
Speaker 1: up role and Luca just had it going so well.
Speaker 1: But Dinwi this year, coming into tonight, was averaging eighteen
Speaker 1: points per game, which is the second highest mark of
Speaker 1: his career, on sixty percent true shooting, which is the
Speaker 1: highest mark of his career. Specifically, where he's been so
Speaker 1: much better is at the rim. He's making three shots
Speaker 1: in the restricted area per game on sixty two two
Speaker 1: percent shooting uh compared to last year in the playoffs.
Speaker 1: That was the biggest thing that I was critical of
Speaker 1: Spencer Dinwoody with was his ability to finish at the rim.
Speaker 1: He was only making one layup in the restricted area
Speaker 1: per game last year in the playoffs and only making
Speaker 1: them at fifty. I think a big part of that, too,
Speaker 1: is just the spacing that's so much better now that
Speaker 1: they're only playing JaVale McGee for a couple of shifts
Speaker 1: a game, and there's just a lot of Christian Wood
Speaker 1: and Mexically about there and just real true five out
Speaker 1: lineups that give him lots of space. But din what
Speaker 1: he's looking good slotted up as that second creator their defense.
Speaker 1: Dallas's defense is not quite where it was last year yet. Um.
Speaker 1: They really struggled to contain Kyrie Irving off the dribble tonight.
Speaker 1: But all in all, you've gotta be feeling pretty good
Speaker 1: about where you're at with Dallas right now, and you
Speaker 1: like I mean, I think Janice, especially after last night,
Speaker 1: is still the best player in the world. But if
Speaker 1: I had to pick a guy who and again I'm
Speaker 1: I'm not. I'm not gonna go away from my list
Speaker 1: from this summer, but the player that's been most impressive
Speaker 1: early outside, to be honest to me, has been Luca.
Speaker 1: And obviously it's only been a handful of games, so
Speaker 1: I'm not moving my list around, but lucas off to
Speaker 1: a damn good start for the Nets. A couple of
Speaker 1: things I wanted to quickly hit on Kyrie. He had
Speaker 1: a rough opening night, but he's been awesome ever since.
Speaker 1: He's uhum averaging I think over thirty three thirty four
Speaker 1: points a game in the four games since. Really hit
Speaker 1: the gas there in that fourth quarter, attacking the basket,
Speaker 1: made some big shots. That's gotta that's gotta make you
Speaker 1: feel good if you're the Nets, especially since you have
Speaker 1: a lot of reinforcements on the way. Ben Simmons, you know,
Speaker 1: he's one of the big narratives surrounding the team this year,
Speaker 1: but I actually think he's been pretty good. This is
Speaker 1: not Russell Westbrook where he's killing you on offense and
Speaker 1: then not giving you much on defense. Tonight was a
Speaker 1: little bit of a rough night, but he you could
Speaker 1: tell he tweaked his back in last night's game and
Speaker 1: he just wasn't quite moving as well. Textbook signs of
Speaker 1: the dock issue, like you're too upright, you're not squatting
Speaker 1: down in a defensive stance, and you just look stiff
Speaker 1: and you're not moving well. Ben Ben looked like he
Speaker 1: was struggling with that tonight. But throughout this season he's
Speaker 1: been really, really good defensively, and he doesn't need to
Speaker 1: score more than ten points per game. He just needs
Speaker 1: to be a Draymond type of threat. When you're rolling
Speaker 1: to the rim, you've got to be able to score.
Speaker 1: You've got to be able to occasionally make yourself appear
Speaker 1: like a threat when you're wide open. That's literally all
Speaker 1: you need to do, especially when you're playing again playing
Speaker 1: with great perimeter shooting. What makes Draymond work is Steph
Speaker 1: and Clay and Jordan Poole are all operating from the perimeter. Similarly,
Speaker 1: for Ben, Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant specialized in hitting
Speaker 1: jump shots over the top of the defense, so spacing
Speaker 1: is just less of a concern. I think a lot
Speaker 1: of the talk, Look, I'm disappointed in where he's at
Speaker 1: offensively in his career. I think we all are. I
Speaker 1: think that goes without saying. It's it's completely inexcusable after
Speaker 1: this many years to be becoming worse and worse on
Speaker 1: the offensive end of the floor. I'm a hundred percent
Speaker 1: it with you guys there. But the Nets knew that
Speaker 1: coming into the season. That's not what they need him
Speaker 1: to do. They just need him to be an impact
Speaker 1: player Defensively, He's rebounding pretty close to his career average
Speaker 1: about seven rebounds per thirty six minutes about his career
Speaker 1: averages eight and a half. So with him not being
Speaker 1: quite where he was athletically as he's coming back from
Speaker 1: his back thing. I think that's fine. I think I
Speaker 1: think Ben Simmons is gonna be fine. I'm just not
Speaker 1: worried about it because Kyrie Irving last night had a
Speaker 1: postgame quote where he basically said, like, hey, we're just
Speaker 1: he hasn't played in two years. We're giving him a
Speaker 1: lot of positive affirmation. He's gonna figure it out. Agree
Speaker 1: if you're if you're, if you're the Nets, your issues
Speaker 1: are team wide as it pertains to commitment to defense, details, physicality,
Speaker 1: those sorts of things. It's not a Ben Simmons issue.
Speaker 1: Um One last bright spot for Brooklyn. You got off
Speaker 1: to a bad start this year. You lost back to
Speaker 1: back games. Their next five games are against the Pacers,
Speaker 1: the Pacers, the Bulls, the Wizards, and the Hornets. They're
Speaker 1: gonna probably go four in one or better in those games.
Speaker 1: So you're like, the the Eastern Conference has a lot
Speaker 1: of easier night tonight matchups at the bottom of the
Speaker 1: conference compared to the West. You've got plenty of talent.
Speaker 1: Brooklyn's got lots of time to figure this out, all right.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about Philly for a minute. So they
Speaker 1: lost in Toronto last night, more of the same issues
Speaker 1: that I've been talking about all year. They were actually
Speaker 1: better in the half court last night than Toronto was.
Speaker 1: They had a one hundred nine offensive rating in the
Speaker 1: half court compared to Toronto at one hundred and three.
Speaker 1: They just got destroyed in transition again. They gave up
Speaker 1: twenty nine fast breakpoints. They gave up twenty one points
Speaker 1: off of turnovers. They have right now the second best
Speaker 1: half court offense in the league according to Cleaning the Glass.
Speaker 1: So their offense is in great shape right now. It's
Speaker 1: everything else that's killing them there twenty six and defensive rating.
Speaker 1: They're dead last in transition defense according to Cleaning the Glass.
Speaker 1: They're giving up a most one point six points per
Speaker 1: transition possession. Think about that, two points would be a layup,
Speaker 1: so they're almost averaging giving up a layup on every
Speaker 1: single transition possession. They're the only team in the NBA
Speaker 1: giving up over twenty fast break points per one possessions.
Speaker 1: And a lot of it is on Joel Embiad and
Speaker 1: his antics around the rim, just trying to flop and
Speaker 1: draw fouls, not running the floor. Well, you know this
Speaker 1: this specifically big big guys that aren't willing to run
Speaker 1: are are the biggest culprit of destroying a team in
Speaker 1: transition defense. I did a whole video on this because
Speaker 1: of Anthony Davis last night getting destroyed by Nicola Yokis
Speaker 1: just by sprinting up and down the floor in transition.
Speaker 1: You find it on my Twitter feed at Underscore. Jason
Speaker 1: lt I put together a about a three and a
Speaker 1: half minute clip just showing all of the different ways
Speaker 1: that Anthony Davis jogging down the floor and transition killed
Speaker 1: the Lakers in a winnable game. And you're getting a
Speaker 1: lot of the same stuff out of Joel Embiad right now.
Speaker 1: That's a huge part of how Nicola Yokich is separating
Speaker 1: himself from the field. He's separating himself just by confronting
Speaker 1: one of the biggest weaknesses that comes with being what
Speaker 1: he is, a big, slow big. He's making a concerted
Speaker 1: effort on every single rebound on both ends of the
Speaker 1: floor of sprinting the other way. And by doing that,
Speaker 1: not only is he taking advantage of the other slow
Speaker 1: footed bigs around the league, but he's avoiding his own
Speaker 1: weakness when he plays against faster teams. The guards are
Speaker 1: also not doing like specifically James Harden and Tyrese Maxie
Speaker 1: in these in these transition situations are just kind of
Speaker 1: swatting down at the ball. No one's really willing to
Speaker 1: put their body on the line to cut off a
Speaker 1: ball handler. But it's not just transition. They're also twenty
Speaker 1: one and half court defense according to cleaning the glass
Speaker 1: there and rebounding percentage, so they're not rebounding well. They're
Speaker 1: allowing the second most three pointers made per game in
Speaker 1: the league, despite opponents shooting just thirty five from three,
Speaker 1: so it's not like teams are lighting them on fire
Speaker 1: with shooting percentage. And then opponents are shooting sevent in
Speaker 1: the restricted area against this Joe lmbiid lad Philadelphia defense,
Speaker 1: which is the second highest in the league. Now, a
Speaker 1: lot of that is being, you know, affected by transition layups.
Speaker 1: But the point is they're not guarding the room well either.
Speaker 1: They're basically not doing anything well outside is scoring the basketball,
Speaker 1: and you can see it on tape. You can see
Speaker 1: guys not running back, you can see guys not stopping
Speaker 1: the ball and transition, you can see guys not rotating well.
Speaker 1: You can see guys aren't competing on the glass. I
Speaker 1: have a friend espahar Any that covers the Toronto Raptors.
Speaker 1: You can find him on Twitter. He did a video
Speaker 1: breakdown last night that talked about all of the uh
Speaker 1: we all of the sloppy defensive rotations that you're seeing
Speaker 1: from Philly. Like. There was a play where uh Niang
Speaker 1: was guarding the guy in the week side corner and
Speaker 1: Daniel House was guarding the guy in the weak side
Speaker 1: wing and Nieing had to go over to help on
Speaker 1: a drive and so Daniel House like signals to Kneeang
Speaker 1: like points at him to go help, and he drops
Speaker 1: to the corner and the Kneeang just stays in the corner.
Speaker 1: So now both of them are guarding the corner shooter
Speaker 1: and then they kick it to the wing for a
Speaker 1: wide open three. That's just sloppiness. That's just not communicating,
Speaker 1: that's just not paying attention to the details. So when
Speaker 1: I'm looking at all of that, it's gonna push me
Speaker 1: towards doc rivers. The Sixers don't have a roster issue.
Speaker 1: Joel Embiid mostly looks like Joel Embiid, although he's working
Speaker 1: his way back into shape, but he's not as bad
Speaker 1: as he was in the first two games. James Harden
Speaker 1: might not be back yet, but he looks certainly looks
Speaker 1: a hell of a lot better than he did last year.
Speaker 1: Tyrese Maxie is averaging a career high twenty points per
Speaker 1: game on fifty seven pcent true shooting. Tobias Harris is
Speaker 1: shooting over from three for the first time since he
Speaker 1: joined the Philadelphia has seventy sixers. A lot of stuff
Speaker 1: is looking good in terms of talent for the Sixers,
Speaker 1: it's they're not sharp in the details, which is always
Speaker 1: going to point me towards the coach. Now. I've never
Speaker 1: been high on Doc Rivers. I think he's been riding
Speaker 1: on a lot of reputation from the two thousand eight
Speaker 1: Celtics title. He's I find him to be stubborn um
Speaker 1: Last year in the playoffs, I insisted that when they
Speaker 1: went down to Miami without Joel Embiid, that they needed
Speaker 1: to not play DeAndre Jordan's He's one of the worst
Speaker 1: rotation players, if not the worst rotation player in the
Speaker 1: entire NBA. And then they went down and played DeAndre
Speaker 1: Jordan for thirty one minutes against the Heat in Game
Speaker 1: one and two, and they were minus thirty one in
Speaker 1: those minutes, which literally cost them those two games because
Speaker 1: they were positive without him. And then you went home
Speaker 1: and you won two games with Joel Embiid. If you
Speaker 1: just didn't play the worst NBA player in the league,
Speaker 1: maybe you steal one of those games and now you
Speaker 1: have an opportunity to win that series. He did a
Speaker 1: similar thing with Montrez Harrold in the bubble against the
Speaker 1: Denver Nuggets, even though everyone watching the games knew that
Speaker 1: that specific matchup, Yokis was having his way with the
Speaker 1: doctor Doc Rivers. Is just he's he's he's stubborn, he's
Speaker 1: very he's very much a player's coach. When he gets
Speaker 1: a guy that he likes, he'll ignore evidence in favor
Speaker 1: of playing him. And then the truth is the Sixers
Speaker 1: just aren't sharp in the details. Like we said. If
Speaker 1: you're not if you're not a good transition defense, that
Speaker 1: means you're not running back and communicating. If you're not
Speaker 1: rotating well, it means you're not communicating and putting in
Speaker 1: extra efforts. If you're not rebounding well, it means you're
Speaker 1: not boxing out and you're not crashing the glass. If
Speaker 1: you're not doing those things. It's because you're not being
Speaker 1: coached to do them, or you're coaching them and the
Speaker 1: players just simply aren't listening to you. Either way, there's
Speaker 1: one way out of that, and that's a coaching change.
Speaker 1: And this is not just this year. They weren't sharpen
Speaker 1: the in those details last year. So you gotta look
Speaker 1: at you gotta look at the situation here. You can't
Speaker 1: trade James Harden. That would make you worse. You can't
Speaker 1: trade Joel Embiid that would make you worse. There's no
Speaker 1: real significant personnel weakness. You've got good amitter defenders on
Speaker 1: the roster. You've got a forward in James Harden that
Speaker 1: can create from the perimeter. You've got the ultimate mismatch
Speaker 1: and Joel Embiid. You've got tons of guys that can
Speaker 1: hit shots. You have one of the most exciting young
Speaker 1: guards in the league, and Tyrese Maxie. It's not like, oh,
Speaker 1: there's if we just got this player, everything would be fine. No,
Speaker 1: you need the guys in the locker room to start
Speaker 1: doing the damn things you need to do to win
Speaker 1: basketball games. And so the only way to do that
Speaker 1: is a change of leadership. And then you know, We've
Speaker 1: talked a lot about this, but guys get burnt out,
Speaker 1: and you know, I saw the Lakers tune out Frank
Speaker 1: Vogel last year and then this year. I mean, Anthony
Speaker 1: Davison Lebron have been a nightmare in transition, but they've
Speaker 1: both been very good in half court defense. So just
Speaker 1: a change of scenery, just a different guy in the
Speaker 1: locker room. Frank Vogel was a great defensive coach, but
Speaker 1: just a different guy in the locker room. A different
Speaker 1: voice is resonating with Lebron, James and Anthony Davis, and
Speaker 1: they're actually competing on the d its event, at least
Speaker 1: in the half court. That's kind of what you hope for.
Speaker 1: Get a different voice in that locker room, and all
Speaker 1: it takes is just getting your very good basketball players
Speaker 1: to buy in on that end of the floor. Are
Speaker 1: they ever gonna be a top five defense? I don't
Speaker 1: think so, because you have James Harden entire reas Maxie
Speaker 1: on the floor at the same time, and the two
Speaker 1: of them just aren't very good defensive players, the two
Speaker 1: of the worst defensive guards in the league. But when
Speaker 1: you have Joel and b Devias Harrison, P J. Tucker,
Speaker 1: you sure as hell can be a hell of a
Speaker 1: lot better than you are now. And at this point,
Speaker 1: like I had, the I had, the six was at
Speaker 1: fifth in my power rankings, and that's because I see
Speaker 1: them as just as talented as the top teams in
Speaker 1: the top teams in the league. I have specifically said
Speaker 1: that I think their top four is arguably the most
Speaker 1: talented top four in the league. So there is urgency
Speaker 1: here that they need to take advantage of. And the
Speaker 1: only way that I think they can get out of
Speaker 1: it at this point is to consider a coaching change.
Speaker 1: It's it's been a long time coming. They probably should
Speaker 1: have done it this last or and if they wait
Speaker 1: much longer, they might dig themselves in a hole that's
Speaker 1: really difficult to dig out of. All right, guys, that
Speaker 1: is all I have for tonight. A couple of details.
Speaker 1: Tomorrow morning, we're gonna be covering the Golden State Warriors
Speaker 1: game against the Miami Heat. Tonight. I also want to
Speaker 1: hit on a couple of teams that we haven't hit
Speaker 1: on yet. So those are you guys who are listening,
Speaker 1: Get into YouTube comments and tell me about some specific
Speaker 1: teams that you guys are interested in hearing about and
Speaker 1: if I get a bunch of repeats, I'll put them
Speaker 1: on my list for tomorrow. And then after that we
Speaker 1: have the weekend off and we'll be back on Monday.
Speaker 1: As always, I sincerely appreciate your guys support and I'll
Speaker 1: see you guys then. The volume