Speaker 1: Indiana, Oka see just what every pundit and Adam Silver
Speaker 1: and all the casual fans were hoping for right the top,
Speaker 1: like the bottom five markets in the United States, the
Speaker 1: fan bases that are passionate but small and rabid, but
Speaker 1: doesn't exactly draw the sexiness that say a New York
Speaker 1: Knicks and an l a Lakers per se would draw.
Speaker 1: But you know what, I don't give a fuck because
Speaker 1: I'm a basketball fan and I want to see the
Speaker 1: best basketball I can. I think we got it. A
Speaker 1: couple of stories from around the league, and we also
Speaker 1: have a special interview with Robin Lumberg from Sports Illustrated.
Speaker 1: A lot happening. Drop that motherfucking beat that should be Rihanna.
Speaker 2: You're listening to the Hottest, the Hottest. It'd be a
Speaker 2: podcast out here. I said what I said, it's the check.
Speaker 1: Check to the Knicks. They get Game five right, and
Speaker 1: they're rolling, they're high. Everybody's like, ooh, the Pacers. The
Speaker 1: Pacers are the ones with all the pressure on them
Speaker 1: now because if they lose at home to the Knicks
Speaker 1: and they have to go back to MSG, YadA YadA, YadA.
Speaker 1: And I even said it myself. Listen, you don't want
Speaker 1: to go back for a game seven. That's what happened
Speaker 1: to Reggie Miller in the nineties. He also didn't enjoy that.
Speaker 1: So they're like, Okay, what's this going to be? Like,
Speaker 1: the Knicks have swag, Karl Anthony Towns has unlocked something.
Speaker 1: The Knicks defensively have figured out. The Pacers they thought,
Speaker 1: or maybe just the Pacers rice cold hard to know unclear, right,
Speaker 1: So then the Pacers go ahead and do what they
Speaker 1: do best, slowly, methodically, before you really know it, like
Speaker 1: a frog slowly boiling in hot water. You're down six,
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden it's impossible for you
Speaker 1: to win. You're down fifteen. You make a change in
Speaker 1: your rotation and they exploit it, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: this night night's sleep mask, no cracks, just great defense,
Speaker 1: timely shot making, and the team that was fifty to
Speaker 1: one to win it all now as a chance to
Speaker 1: make history as the longest shot in NBA history to
Speaker 1: win a championship, and they I think they believe they
Speaker 1: can win. I tell you what. I texted somebody from
Speaker 1: the Pacers organization in the front office and I said, Yo,
Speaker 1: I'm so happy for you. Congratulations, you get your flowers.
Speaker 1: Love you. This is amazing all this, You know, you'd
Speaker 1: think like, oh, trist thanks, appreciate you, blah blah blah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is incredible, incredible run right. No. All I got
Speaker 1: back in response was four more, four more. They think
Speaker 1: they can win this, they think they can get OKAC,
Speaker 1: and there are some reasons why they might not be wrong,
Speaker 1: and we'll get into those second. While a lot of
Speaker 1: people are up in arms about this matchup, I am stoked.
Speaker 1: I am over the moon. I think this could be
Speaker 1: one of the best basketball finals in a long time.
Speaker 1: We're gonna see a team that's never won a title
Speaker 1: win a title. That's pretty freaking cool. You have an
Speaker 1: OKC team that has been great for long stretches. They
Speaker 1: haven't been to a final since Kevin Durant and Russell
Speaker 1: Westbrook were there. They run twelve deep, they've got two bigs,
Speaker 1: they've got perimeter defense in spades. They've got timely shot making.
Speaker 1: But guess what, Indiana also plays great for long stretches.
Speaker 1: They also run very deep. They also can play physical,
Speaker 1: lockdown defense. They also have a guard who has the
Speaker 1: ability to change the dynamic and the game and put
Speaker 1: the historyonics on it, put the extras on it, like
Speaker 1: he did showing up for Game six in all black
Speaker 1: on black on black suit to say, listen, it's time
Speaker 1: for you to go to sleep. And that was actually
Speaker 1: quick side road hilarious because we had Ben Stiller getting
Speaker 1: on too social media and said he said, I'm glad
Speaker 1: he brought his Duffel bag so that he can come
Speaker 1: back to MSG something like that, travel back to MSG.
Speaker 1: This is I'm butchering this. And then Tyrese Halliburton responded
Speaker 1: after the game and he said, no, I brought a
Speaker 1: Duffel bag so I could pack your ass up. Oh,
Speaker 1: I could pack your ass up. Bars anyway. Pacers plus
Speaker 1: five hundred to win the series. Plus five hundred is crazy,
Speaker 1: very similar Oka see the last three OKC will be
Speaker 1: favorites for the fourth straight time. How do I think
Speaker 1: this series plays out? I just don't think Indiana's getting
Speaker 1: the respect that they deserve. I really don't. Nobody's been
Speaker 1: giving him a shot this entire road, this entire run.
Speaker 1: Even very smart basketball experts were like, I just don't
Speaker 1: think Indiana can get physical enough. I just don't think
Speaker 1: Indiana can beat this Cleveland Cavaliers team. The Cleveland Cavaliers series,
Speaker 1: I don't even remember. I was like fanost for the
Speaker 1: Cleveland Cavalier series. I forgot until the second recounting what
Speaker 1: was going on. I haven't even thought about the Cleveland
Speaker 1: series in weeks. It's it's just Milwaukee New York for me.
Speaker 1: That's how unbothered Indiana was with Cleveland. You've got Siakham,
Speaker 1: You've got Hallie, you've got Turner right, and you can
Speaker 1: sit those guys for long stretches of time and you're
Speaker 1: not gonna get blown out in the way that New
Speaker 1: York did when they sat out Brunson, when they sat
Speaker 1: when when Minnesota sits out Aunt Edwards. They are not
Speaker 1: reliant on their stars to score, to be even in
Speaker 1: the game, to be impactful, to be healthy in order
Speaker 1: for them to win game. By the way, what is
Speaker 1: Denver without jokis nothing? Because you got TJ McConnell doing
Speaker 1: his damn thing, you got Obi Toppin doing his damn thing.
Speaker 1: You got my man, Benedict Mathern. They've proven that they
Speaker 1: can handle big moments. Nothing is new to this team,
Speaker 1: and they're playing a team in the finals with even
Speaker 1: less experience. In the postseason than they have. Right, you
Speaker 1: might say, oh, okay see, okay see is like a juggernaut.
Speaker 1: Okay see has been proven, has has shown how gritty
Speaker 1: they were. I'm sorry last year when did okay see?
Speaker 1: Did they Did they go to the finals? No they
Speaker 1: did not. Did they go to the Western Conference Finals?
Speaker 1: No they did not. Did they take it to seven
Speaker 1: against the Dallas Mavericks, No they did not. They absolutely
Speaker 1: did not. And if you're an OKC fan, you gotta
Speaker 1: be happy with a few things. When the Denver Nuggets
Speaker 1: were up on Oka See multiple games down, they're down,
Speaker 1: their backs are against the wall. Baby, in the fourth quarter,
Speaker 1: the Thunder responded not once, but twice in two separate games,
Speaker 1: with barrages of threes from guys that you don't expect,
Speaker 1: like Jalen Williams, like lou Dort hitting three consecutive threes.
Speaker 1: If lou Dort doesn't hit those three consecutive threes when
Speaker 1: he was basically benched for a minute from Mark Dagnoll,
Speaker 1: no shade uh. Denver's in the finals, not okay see.
Speaker 1: So they have the ability to now pull themselves out
Speaker 1: of these holes, which I'm really happy to see because
Speaker 1: until you see it, you will not believe it. Right,
Speaker 1: coming off of a forty two point loss against Minnesota,
Speaker 1: they respond they are healthy. Pretty much, everyone is healthy.
Speaker 1: That's a good thing. If the thunder though, have an
Speaker 1: achilles heel, it's that they aren't that great. On the
Speaker 1: road against Memphis, they probably should have lost. Well, they
Speaker 1: definitely should have lost game three. They were down by
Speaker 1: a bajillion and they could have easily lost Game four
Speaker 1: if John Moran doesn't get hurt. Okay, so that's two
Speaker 1: of their road wins. They lost two of three games
Speaker 1: on the road to Denver, should have lost all three
Speaker 1: again LOUDRT madness. And we're one and one on the
Speaker 1: road against Minnesota. So although they're technically four and three,
Speaker 1: they could have easily lost all seven of those. That
Speaker 1: is something that Indiana is gonna keep in mind as
Speaker 1: they go to Okac for Game one and game two,
Speaker 1: because here's the thing, people, here's the thing. What they
Speaker 1: do against Cleveland boom boom bam. Right, things are scary
Speaker 1: already by the time you go to Indiana, Right, that's
Speaker 1: what it is. You're the fucking favorite, and you're like, yo,
Speaker 1: they just took two from us on the road. You serious,
Speaker 1: we gotta fight, in Claude, just get home court back. Yeah,
Speaker 1: get multiple games, just the home court. What is happening?
Speaker 1: Then they do it again against the Knicks. It is
Speaker 1: so difficult once you lose twice in a row your
Speaker 1: first games to be like, I don't know what we
Speaker 1: do now. I think Oklahoma City is more resilient than
Speaker 1: New York. I think they're more resilient than Cleveland. But
Speaker 1: don't fuck around and find out and go into an
Speaker 1: O two hole now when OKAC is rocking. Because Indiana
Speaker 1: is a very good road team, maybe a better road
Speaker 1: team than a home team. So that's something Indiana is
Speaker 1: going to be counting on. They are six and two
Speaker 1: also at home in these playoffs. OOI. And also let's
Speaker 1: give Kevin Pritchard, President of Basketball Operations, and Chad Buchanan
Speaker 1: GM and Herb Simon the owner because he's important. Just
Speaker 1: getting out of the way is all we want you
Speaker 1: to do, you know, create stability is all we want
Speaker 1: you to do. Your job as an owner is not hard.
Speaker 1: But somehow these owners stay fucking it up right, They
Speaker 1: just stay at getting in the way. They think they
Speaker 1: know more than the people who have just dedicated their
Speaker 1: entire lives to basketball. But hey, what do I know,
Speaker 1: I just talk on a microphone. So Chad Buchan and
Speaker 1: Kevin Pritchard deserve a lot of props for building this
Speaker 1: team and changing the culture pretty much overnight when they
Speaker 1: got Tyrese Haliburton. There's a long, fifteen thousand but jillion
Speaker 1: word article in the Player's Tribune that Miles Turner just
Speaker 1: put out that essentially states, as soon as Tyrese Haliburton
Speaker 1: got in the door, that franchise player lifted all ships.
Speaker 1: The rising tide that Tyrese Haliburton is instills confidence to everybody,
Speaker 1: extract the things that those players do well and exploits
Speaker 1: those is a great playmaker, has that tenacity and that
Speaker 1: verve and that fucking swagger, and the front office trusts
Speaker 1: him to be a partner in decisions for the roster.
Speaker 1: He's not just a stud that can get you a
Speaker 1: double double. He can get you when he assists, he
Speaker 1: can get you thirty points, zero turnovers. No, he's the
Speaker 1: kind of guy that says, yeah, I don't think we
Speaker 1: should re sign so and so I don't think that
Speaker 1: guy's worth it at all. We can spend that money
Speaker 1: on so and so and so and so. So they
Speaker 1: went out and got the quietest star in all of basketball,
Speaker 1: Pascal Siakam, when they told me, hey, we just need
Speaker 1: one more piece, and they did, just need one more piece.
Speaker 1: And they just keep adding to the coffers, little draft
Speaker 1: picks like Ben Shephard out of Belmont looking like the
Speaker 1: Ai Jordan Poole killing it, Ben Mathing out of Arizona,
Speaker 1: just making sure that they're a very deep team, which changes. Actually,
Speaker 1: these teams like okay See in Indiana have shown the
Speaker 1: new model. We've gone through these iterations. Right, it's the
Speaker 1: Big two, it's the Big three. It's like these studs
Speaker 1: that rise everybody. You need stars, but you also need
Speaker 1: a couple of role players. Now it's like you need stars,
Speaker 1: you need one guy I didn't get your buckets down
Speaker 1: the stretch, but you need like ten dudes that you
Speaker 1: can play heavy minutes because knowing that puts less pressure
Speaker 1: and less strain and less mileage on your stars, so
Speaker 1: they're fresh when they need to perform in these crucial
Speaker 1: moments in the fourth quarter. So the deepest teams, so
Speaker 1: deep they'll put your ass to sleep. Teams, they're the
Speaker 1: ones that are really thriving, and that even includes the
Speaker 1: New York next to a degree. They had like eight
Speaker 1: guys that Tom Thibodau didn't always want to use, but
Speaker 1: when he used them, then jel Alright did his thing.
Speaker 1: Landry Shammitt did his thing. Winner of the Eastern Conference
Speaker 1: Larry Bird Trophy Award for MVP's passouse Yakam. By the way,
Speaker 1: he had thirty, thirty one and thirty nine in the
Speaker 1: Eastern Conference Files. Three of the six games he put
Speaker 1: up thirty or more. It's fucking credible. I also love
Speaker 1: that Tyrese Haliburton thought that his little choke moment was
Speaker 1: good enough for him to get the Eastern Conference File
Speaker 1: Eastern Conference Finals MVP, No, sirs, just sit your ass
Speaker 1: back there and give it to Pascal. They said, it's
Speaker 1: my it's my ship now, or what is this like,
Speaker 1: I'm the captain now? They did all those memes. Just
Speaker 1: an awesome matchup for so many reasons, not the least
Speaker 1: of which is the fact that they are two small
Speaker 1: markets that have never won a title. And for me,
Speaker 1: as a basketball fan, that's just really cool. We are
Speaker 1: headed towards our seventh champion in seven years. And Adam
Speaker 1: Silver's parody and that new CBA is here to stay,
Speaker 1: all right. Moving on a couple of notes from around
Speaker 1: the league. So, the Utah Jazz just made a higher
Speaker 1: their new president of operations. Who could it be? Trista
Speaker 1: Who did they go out and hand select the brain
Speaker 1: trust over there in Utah? Who is just the shining
Speaker 1: star of the NBA that they felt compelled they needed
Speaker 1: to bring in to set the tone in the culture
Speaker 1: operations Stan, It's it's who It's excuse me, Austin Ahe
Speaker 1: Austin Inge, the son of Danny Ainge, the former GM
Speaker 1: of the Boston Celtics, current CEO of the Utah Jazz.
Speaker 1: That Austin age that Danny's oh icy got it okay,
Speaker 1: and no shade right Austin's apparently because I don't know Austin.
Speaker 1: I know nothing really about Austin except for people say
Speaker 1: he's good at his job. Not here at a dispute
Speaker 1: or to correct or to even validate that, because I
Speaker 1: don't know. What I am here to say is that
Speaker 1: when news dropped from regular newsbreakers in the league, none
Speaker 1: of them reported that, Hey, Danny Ainge just hired his son.
Speaker 1: None of them even like mentioned that it was like,
Speaker 1: congratulations to Austin Ange, new president of basketball operations for
Speaker 1: the Utah Jazz. It's like people think Danny Ange is
Speaker 1: still in Boston. I think it's a pretty big story. Hey,
Speaker 1: dad hire son again again. Austin has been working for
Speaker 1: himself for the Celtics since twenty eleven, and he sees
Speaker 1: the riding on the wrow wall. Baby, got Tatum down
Speaker 1: with the torn Achilles, You got moves being made, new
Speaker 1: ownership group. Things are a changing, okay, And Austin said,
Speaker 1: I need to go where it is calm, stable, rebuilding
Speaker 1: waters right. And so I went back and forth on
Speaker 1: threads with another media person who thinks when I threaded this,
Speaker 1: I was clickbaiting when I said, oh, he works for
Speaker 1: his dad again, like classic American white boy dream, right,
Speaker 1: you get you just you fail or things don't look great,
Speaker 1: just fly back to the cool baby. And somebody was like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: he's responsible for X and Y and Z, and he's
Speaker 1: great at his job, you know what. You know what,
Speaker 1: I don't care about that. I don't care because the
Speaker 1: question is, is Austin Ange the head of basketball operations
Speaker 1: If he's not Danny Ainge's son, probably not, Probably not.
Speaker 1: He will rise and fall on his merits, and then
Speaker 1: if he falls, he will rise again on the nepotism.
Speaker 1: That's how that goes. Then this lady said, you know,
Speaker 1: he didn't always work for his dad, right, He worked
Speaker 1: from twenty one to twenty five for the Celtics after
Speaker 1: his dad left. Okay, so let's do the math here.
Speaker 1: Danny Ainge worked as an executive for the Celtics from
Speaker 1: two thousand and four to twenty twenty one. He hired
Speaker 1: his son in Boston in twenty and eleven, promoted him
Speaker 1: multiple times, including to the head coach and later GM
Speaker 1: of the main Red Clauser G League team, and now
Speaker 1: he has hired him in Utah for the top job
Speaker 1: next to his We're really talking about whether Austin Ange
Speaker 1: is good at jobs or his job or whatever. Many
Speaker 1: children of Importland, people in any field, become good at
Speaker 1: their jobs when they're hired by their parents. But let's
Speaker 1: not sweep it under the rug. Okay, let's not pretend
Speaker 1: that's not happening here and just be like, oh, so
Speaker 1: and so age Austin Age. It's not really telling the
Speaker 1: whole truth, is it it's not really saying, hey, like
Speaker 1: kid gets hired by his dad again. And I know
Speaker 1: these newsbreakers are terrified of saying anything untour because they're
Speaker 1: probably getting the news from Danny Aingel himself, and Danny
Speaker 1: Ange would be fucking pissed if he points out any nepotism.
Speaker 1: But a I have to because I don't know Danny Ainge.
Speaker 1: It's ludicrous to me that this is not part of
Speaker 1: the narrative. I'm sure Austin is smart. I'm sure he's
Speaker 1: worked his ass off. I'm sure he put in lots
Speaker 1: of bleary eyed one hundred hour weeks. I'm sure he
Speaker 1: did all the unglamorous stuff that you need to do.
Speaker 1: But I tell you what, it's a lot easier to
Speaker 1: know what the road is to greatness when you can
Speaker 1: just ring ring ring and call up the top guy
Speaker 1: whenever you want and have turkey with them on Thanksgiving
Speaker 1: and then see if there's coal in your stocking on
Speaker 1: Christmas and pick his brain about how to rise to
Speaker 1: the top. And no middle manager or executive is going
Speaker 1: to give a guy with the last name age hell
Speaker 1: at all. It just will not happen. You fuck up.
Speaker 1: It's like, hey, you don't. Maybe you should talk to
Speaker 1: your dad about this. So, yeah, nepotism played a role.
Speaker 1: He may even be a Hall of Fame or someday,
Speaker 1: I don't know. A lot of sons of NBA players
Speaker 1: and execs are really good. Also, by the way, Michael Malone,
Speaker 1: son of a coach, Eric uh Eric Adelman, David Adelman,
Speaker 1: Eric Adelman's son, also son of a coach, both former
Speaker 1: head coaches and a current coach of the Den Ruggets.
Speaker 1: And you can be very successful, but we still see
Speaker 1: the name and we know, hey, that's what happened. You
Speaker 1: just can't pretend like someone started didn't start on third base.
Speaker 1: We have to just like at least put it into
Speaker 1: the footnotes. Anyway, moving forward, a couple of small morsels
Speaker 1: of news before we get into our Robin Lundberg interview.
Speaker 1: Robin Lundberg, we have confirmation that the Milwaukee Bucks are
Speaker 1: kicking the tires on their lottery picks on lottery picks,
Speaker 1: which I think is pretty interesting considering that this team
Speaker 1: doesn't have a pick until the middle of the second round.
Speaker 1: The father of a probable top ten pick said that
Speaker 1: the Bucks called him and wanted to set up a meeting,
Speaker 1: which is really interesting because if you look at their roster,
Speaker 1: there's only one player who could command a top ten pick,
Speaker 1: and that is yannessh It's not Portland because we have
Speaker 1: the eleventh pick. So we know that. And today the
Speaker 1: rumors were flying that Toronto is open to going after
Speaker 1: Yannis Wo and Masai Yugieri. The GM of the Raptors
Speaker 1: is committed to going all out the season and BI
Speaker 1: was just the beginning, he said, BI was b I
Speaker 1: was just the beginning. Okay, b I insert that on
Speaker 1: James Ooh be it anyway, The Toronto Star reports that
Speaker 1: the interest is mutual, is it? Joannis wants to go
Speaker 1: to Toronto to that team that's drafting night. He wants
Speaker 1: to go there with b I okay, the other guy
Speaker 1: that loves to have the ball in his hand at
Speaker 1: all times. Okay, And Scotty Barnes, the other guy that
Speaker 1: loves to have the ball in his hands.
Speaker 3: And RJ.
Speaker 1: Barrett, the guy that loves to have the ball in
Speaker 1: his hands. Oh, I don't believe that for a second. Also, finally,
Speaker 1: the Phoenix Suns have narrowed their head coaching search down
Speaker 1: to one team and two coaches. Cleveland Cavaliers Zachlow said.
Speaker 1: The funniest thing, by the way, he said, the Sun
Speaker 1: search has basically been narrowing the list of candidates day
Speaker 1: by day with a tweet. The Sons are looking at
Speaker 1: eleven candidates. The Sons have reduced are listed to nine candidates.
Speaker 1: There are five men in the running for the Sun's job.
Speaker 1: Now there's two, and we finally know their names. Guess
Speaker 1: what that is? All I wanted from the Sacramento Kings.
Speaker 1: This is Zick. I know that the Sons are gonna
Speaker 1: fuck about, but at least I'm a part of the narrowing.
Speaker 1: You know. It's not like, oh, the Sons have hired
Speaker 1: so and so. It's like we've got eleven. We've now
Speaker 1: done the survivor thing. It's your time on the island
Speaker 1: has now come to a close. Like what's put your
Speaker 1: torch down? Unlike your torch, you know, damn it, whatever
Speaker 1: it is. Whatever, you know what I'm saying, dem your torch,
Speaker 1: he said, The tribe has spoken it's time for you
Speaker 1: to go. That's less exciting than I thought it was.
Speaker 1: I thought it was something about snuffing out your torch. Anyway,
Speaker 1: we're a part of it, Okay, And now I know
Speaker 1: it's started at eleven. There were eleven dudes, and now
Speaker 1: there's two and those two are Johnny Bryant and Jordan Ought.
Speaker 1: Do I know anything about them? No? Do I know
Speaker 1: they were a part of a team that just won
Speaker 1: sixty plus games? Yes? Do I know? They're also part
Speaker 1: of the team that just lost in the second round
Speaker 1: to the Indiana Pacers. Also, yes, they've already interviewed with
Speaker 1: Matt Ishpia, so I'm sure that'll go great. After the break,
Speaker 1: let's get nore in you with Robin Lundberg. It's a
Speaker 1: great one. Welcome to the show. We got Robin Lundberg. Man,
Speaker 1: it's been a minute. Robin. If you don't know him,
Speaker 1: what are you doing really with your life? He runs
Speaker 1: Robin Lundberg Media. He covers the NBA, covers the WNBA,
Speaker 1: doing the Lord's work for SI. He's on Serious XM,
Speaker 1: has his own podcast, and he is here to break
Speaker 1: down some of this NBA playoff madness. But also I
Speaker 1: want to get his thoughts on the WNBA season so
Speaker 1: far as well. And if you're listening or watching on video,
Speaker 1: Robin's got a brand new stash situation going on. I'm
Speaker 1: calling it the multiverse of madness looking like Benedett Cumberbatch,
Speaker 1: doctor Strange.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean you mentioned the WNBA. Every time I
Speaker 3: open Twitter or x and start seeing stuff about the WNBA,
Speaker 3: sometimes I feel like I've entered the multiverse madness as well.
Speaker 1: You know what, That's a great point, and we'll get
Speaker 1: to that, because I'm starting to feel like there are
Speaker 1: certain topics I just can't talk about it on social
Speaker 1: media anymore at all.
Speaker 3: Well it's wild because for some of them, there's no
Speaker 3: reason for that to be the case, right, Like it's
Speaker 3: just like it's having I've been doing this a long time.
Speaker 3: You mentioned, you know, I got a little gray in
Speaker 3: the beard now right, I'm Around the Horn just went
Speaker 3: off the air, Trista. That's where I got my start.
Speaker 3: Like really, wow, I was an intern on Around the Horn.
Speaker 3: I went and got Tony Reality's suit the first day
Speaker 3: he went on TV because Max Kellerman couldn't make it.
Speaker 3: I think it was a dental emergency that day. So
Speaker 3: like that was my foray into sports media. But I've
Speaker 3: never covered a.
Speaker 1: Top Where did you get the suit from his apartment
Speaker 1: in DC? You had to go from New York?
Speaker 3: No, No, this was all I was at University of
Speaker 3: Maryland and around the Horn and PTI were in adjoining
Speaker 3: offices in DC. I mean, in fact, I remember when
Speaker 3: I started, there was a competing intern who, I all
Speaker 3: is my competition at the time, who always wore a
Speaker 3: Champ Bailey Jersey. We called him Champ, and you know,
Speaker 3: I was sizing them up for a few days until
Speaker 3: one day I saw him go into the PTI office
Speaker 3: and interrupt their production meeting.
Speaker 1: To ask, oh, it's a rat for him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he asked Tony Kornheizer how to use the copy
Speaker 3: machine in the middle of the production meeting. So I
Speaker 3: was like, I'm in good shape here.
Speaker 1: What are the dues and don'ts of interning at ESPN?
Speaker 3: Well, the dues back then, I don't know, like I
Speaker 3: paid my dues right, I don't know if it's acceptable anymore,
Speaker 3: because I would say, like I would actually recommend doing
Speaker 3: what I did. I ingratiated myself because I got the
Speaker 3: Chipotle orders right, Like every day I would go get lunch.
Speaker 3: And this was when Chipotle was like new and not
Speaker 3: a big chain, and it got to the point where
Speaker 3: I realized what everybody wanted before they ordered it. So
Speaker 3: I would just go and get it and bring it back,
Speaker 3: and that, would you know, helped make me into you know,
Speaker 3: a good space. I mean even even when I started
Speaker 3: ESPN Radio. I remember the first day I got Stephen A.
Speaker 3: Smith's hot dog souer kraut, no ketchup, no mustard, you know,
Speaker 3: like getting the hot dog order right was the appropriate
Speaker 3: thing at that at the time. So, I mean, I
Speaker 3: think that the dues are show that you're willing to
Speaker 3: pay your dues, show that you're willing to be a
Speaker 3: go getter, and then generally the responsibility gets handed to you.
Speaker 3: And I'll always credit around the Horn for you know,
Speaker 3: it's kind of obnoxious because I'm sure you've seen it
Speaker 3: throughout your career, but when you're referred to as talent
Speaker 3: like you, I want to write it on my occupation
Speaker 3: at the doctor's note sometimes talent or I used to
Speaker 3: but you know, as a joke because I was also
Speaker 3: a producer. But I credit around the Horn for the
Speaker 3: producer mind that I've used throughout the rest of my
Speaker 3: career because I started working on slugging the rundown and
Speaker 3: picking the topics every day, and that helped me realize, Okay,
Speaker 3: here's what's what's cooking, here's what's interesting. And and I
Speaker 3: think at this point even you know, I would put
Speaker 3: my stinks in that regard up against anybody.
Speaker 1: Man Stephen A. Smith with the hot dog order. You know,
Speaker 1: he's not eating those hot dogs anymore. He slimmed way down.
Speaker 1: He's like got a trainer, he's doing MMA fighting him
Speaker 1: and Mark Zuckerberg, I think, or like trying to get
Speaker 1: slimmed down. Just a kind of an interesting juxtaposition thinking
Speaker 1: about Steven A. Smith. What was he like back then?
Speaker 3: Oh, Stephen was always cool, you know he was, but
Speaker 3: he was like, you know, one of those like cool
Speaker 3: as a cucumber, kind of like too cool for school sometimes.
Speaker 3: Always was cool to me. So don't don't get it
Speaker 3: to it. I mean I did lose a job because
Speaker 3: of him. Oh not not directly. It wasn't his fault.
Speaker 3: But you know, Ryan Ruco and I were doing the
Speaker 3: mid days on ESPN Radio and Steven A had left,
Speaker 3: if you recall to go I forg He did his
Speaker 3: own show somewhere and then he came back and they
Speaker 3: put him on at at nights and I remember, you know,
Speaker 3: we were in Indianapolis actually for the Super Bowl, and
Speaker 3: one of the execs came up to it and was like, hey,
Speaker 3: what do you guys think about doing nights? And we
Speaker 3: were like, wait, wait a second. What We just got
Speaker 3: moved to the Vin Dayes and you know, we had
Speaker 3: the least leverage and whatnot. So got blown out of
Speaker 3: that show. But Stephen was always cool to me. In fact,
Speaker 3: he complimented me for a monologue I did about the
Speaker 3: the Riley Cooper situation if you remember when, oh yeah,
Speaker 3: when that went down. So he was always cool. But
Speaker 3: that was an interesting dynamic because during those days the
Speaker 3: space was occupied by ABC Radio, which very conservative talk radio,
Speaker 3: and ESPN Radio. So on any given day, it was
Speaker 3: like Keith Oberman, Sean Hannity, don Imus Warnerwolf, Stephen A. Smith,
Speaker 3: Max Kellerman, Michael Kah, Michelle Beadle, so on and so forth,
Speaker 3: all in the same the same roof, under the same roof.
Speaker 1: Oh, you guys were all under the same in the
Speaker 1: same area.
Speaker 3: The same studio.
Speaker 1: Radio. You guys would be using the same like this
Speaker 1: this room that I'm in now, it would be don
Speaker 1: Imus would come in and then you would come in.
Speaker 3: There were a joining studios. There were like three or
Speaker 3: four separate studios. Because there was also a time where
Speaker 3: I was out of a job, but I was I
Speaker 3: was still working there, but I didn't have a job
Speaker 3: because I kept getting kicked off the air when I
Speaker 3: was doing Maxim Show as a like punishment. I was
Speaker 3: the one who got punished for some reason, like he
Speaker 3: never got called to the principal's office. I did. So
Speaker 3: there was a point in time where I was then
Speaker 3: assigned to like help Warner Wolf out, but Warner got
Speaker 3: in trouble for so something happened with Warner where he
Speaker 3: wasn't there. So then I just didn't even have anything
Speaker 3: to do. So I would go back into the back
Speaker 3: studio and record my own stuff. But yeah, all of
Speaker 3: it was you know, there was a studio here, studio there,
Speaker 3: studio there, but it was all the same floor. And
Speaker 3: you know, I would, you know, be sitting there eating
Speaker 3: lunch and Rush Limbaugh, you know, is booming through the
Speaker 3: speakers while I while I'm chowing down on I don't
Speaker 3: think I had a hot dog. But whatever it was
Speaker 3: underneath Madison Square Garden at the time, you know that
Speaker 3: was the right above Penn Station.
Speaker 1: Well you remember then when don Imus got into trouble
Speaker 1: with his commentary about women's hoops and that that pretty
Speaker 1: much ended his career if I remember, right, Is that
Speaker 1: is that as close as you've seen in your career
Speaker 1: as like the tension that we're seeing now or is
Speaker 1: it totally different?
Speaker 3: You know, it's funny because, like you know, Barack Obama
Speaker 3: used to be a controversy when he wore a tan suit, right,
Speaker 3: like that was the stuff they were railing about. You
Speaker 3: know what I mean? I guess it would you would
Speaker 3: say it would be close if what we're seeing now
Speaker 3: wasn't so crazy, Like don Imus, you can say whatever
Speaker 3: you want about what he said and have the reaction
Speaker 3: to what he said. But he said the thing, yeah,
Speaker 3: like he said I think it was about Vivian Stringer
Speaker 3: and Rutgerty.
Speaker 1: Yes it was yeah at.
Speaker 3: The time, and those words came out of his mouth
Speaker 3: so like, and they were words.
Speaker 1: That and all the reactions that came from those words
Speaker 1: were appropriate given that those words were being said.
Speaker 3: Yes exactly, versus nowadays you might say, hey, that was
Speaker 3: a good three point shot, or your field goal percentage
Speaker 3: you can stand to be better. It's like, what.
Speaker 1: That is what kind of feels crazy? Right? Now in
Speaker 1: the w is is that they've turned someone's turned. I
Speaker 1: don't think it's a systemic thing. I don't think that
Speaker 1: there's like a like a body, like somebody like some
Speaker 1: sort of Marvel evil villain turning Angel Reese into like
Speaker 1: the Green Goblin and larking to like captain America. But
Speaker 1: that's kind of where we're at, where there's like they're
Speaker 1: now symbols for things. They're almost symbols for, like just
Speaker 1: where you fall in race relations in America, even if
Speaker 1: you don't, you are opting out I trist To Creek,
Speaker 1: you Robin Lumberg, I'm opting out of that. I'm only
Speaker 1: speaking about them on the basketball floor. But it's like
Speaker 1: whatever words you choose are interpreted under that lens.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's also imaginary though too, Like so you know
Speaker 3: it's imaginary because if you go to a game, you
Speaker 3: don't hear that, right, Like the people who are filling
Speaker 3: out the arena and buying all the tickets are not
Speaker 3: people participating in that discourse. Same goes for the record
Speaker 3: setting ratings and all that, and the people who are
Speaker 3: hype watching the games. I think what really happened was
Speaker 3: that social media is its own thing, and you have
Speaker 3: to learn that. You know, Twitter is not real life,
Speaker 3: which I've learned over the years, But a lot of
Speaker 3: media outlets take things that are said on social media
Speaker 3: and then boost them as if they are the popular opinion,
Speaker 3: and then others who realize that they can take advantage
Speaker 3: of it for engagement wind up boosting it. People that
Speaker 3: have never seen Caitlin Clark play or have never seen
Speaker 3: Angel Rey's place. You get like these two different dynamics
Speaker 3: where on one side, you're like, you only like her
Speaker 3: because she's white, and that's her popularity, and you're crapping
Speaker 3: on the you know, the rest of the league, but
Speaker 3: you need to before you watch a game, tell me
Speaker 3: the roster of the Comets from nineteen ninety seven. Versus
Speaker 3: the other side is like, they hate her because she's
Speaker 3: straight and white and the lesbians and like and you
Speaker 3: just blah blah blah blah. And people because they see
Speaker 3: it so much and they hear it so much, they
Speaker 3: think that's indicative of the reality where I talk to
Speaker 3: a lot of fans and engage with a lot of
Speaker 3: fans every single day. I was just in Indianapolis back
Speaker 3: to back weekends, and that's not what it's like when
Speaker 3: you're covering the game, watching the game, actually vibing with
Speaker 3: the game, or what actually led to any of this
Speaker 3: popularity stuff, Because if you watch Caitlin Clark play basketball,
Speaker 3: she's unbelievably good at basketball. Like and you know, I
Speaker 3: was the lebron James Stan you know, in the the
Speaker 3: the way that uh, the you know, Twitter verse would
Speaker 3: describe you for the longest time. But it you know,
Speaker 3: it wasn't because of anything but that I was like, Oh,
Speaker 3: this guy's really good at basketball, and I know I'm
Speaker 3: getting to follow his entire career.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and when you were in Indye, how many fans
Speaker 1: that were fans of the Fever are only fans of Caitlin?
Speaker 1: Do you think? Because I went to a bar, a
Speaker 1: sports bar called the sports Bra in Portland and all
Speaker 1: women's sports bar, and I sat next to a woman
Speaker 1: who literally the entire her entire premise of watching the
Speaker 1: WNBA is Caitlin. She knows nothing other than players that
Speaker 1: are around Caitlin rivals, teammates, and that's it. And I'm
Speaker 1: curious how often you think that translates into the arena.
Speaker 3: Uh you know, well, I think it's a yeah, I mean,
Speaker 3: I think it's a significant portion. But then they've become
Speaker 3: fans of the Fever and become fans of the WNBA.
Speaker 3: In fact, I would say, like the Caitlin Clark, then
Speaker 3: Fever fans are now fans at large, oftentimes of the
Speaker 3: rest of the league because they they you know, they
Speaker 3: watched the first game, and Dja Carryington Zen are up
Speaker 3: there like who's this, you know, and then the Angel
Speaker 3: Rees obviously has their connection. But then Asia Wilson's the
Speaker 3: m v P and the Feast of Collier is doing
Speaker 3: what she's doing with the Lynx and so on and
Speaker 3: so forth. So yes, I think unlike I've never seen
Speaker 3: one player draw as much attention to a league or sport.
Speaker 3: Maybe the best comparison people use is Tiger Woods, right
Speaker 3: where a lot of people came into golf because of
Speaker 3: Tiger Woods. So I don't really see it as a
Speaker 3: bad thing. I mean that happens in sports all the time.
Speaker 3: You have stan culture around various players and whatever. It's
Speaker 3: only a bad thing when when the discourse is hijacked
Speaker 3: or when people do it in a way that's that's
Speaker 3: disrespectful or whatnot. But I think there, I mean, you
Speaker 3: wouldn't be able to necessarily tell the difference because they're
Speaker 3: cheering on the whole team. I mean, they're they're cheering
Speaker 3: when a Leah Boston is brought into the starting lineup,
Speaker 3: and Kelsey Mitchell and the Lexi hul and so on
Speaker 3: and so forth. But I've seen it over the past,
Speaker 3: you know, year or so where yeah, a lot of
Speaker 3: people came in and they were just Caitlin Clark fans
Speaker 3: or Iowa fans, and then they became Indiana Fever fans,
Speaker 3: and then they became whether you want to call them
Speaker 3: fans or not, but certainly viewers, spectators, observers, consumers of
Speaker 3: the WNBA at large. It's kind of the rising tide
Speaker 3: lifts all boats thing. And you know, you look at
Speaker 3: the finals last year, right, you know, finals were up higher.
Speaker 3: People always act like it's with Clark or without Clark,
Speaker 3: rather than in conjunction with Clark. To me, I would
Speaker 3: say it's in conjunction with Clark, where yes, the Clark
Speaker 3: and Fever games are going to do better than other games,
Speaker 3: but the other games are doing better than they used
Speaker 3: to too, And you cannot tell me those two things
Speaker 3: are not related. And it might even go onto the
Speaker 3: women's side on NCAA as well, which where you keep
Speaker 3: seeing this trend. The trend is anything involving Clark is
Speaker 3: higher than anything else. Anything not involving Clark is much
Speaker 3: lower than anything involving Clark, but anything not involving Clark
Speaker 3: is much higher than it was before Clark showed up
Speaker 3: on the scene.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like a like I say, it's like before Jesus,
Speaker 1: you know, like the like the the before Christ after
Speaker 1: death is That's what That's what I see online. I
Speaker 1: do think what's really interesting as I was talking to
Speaker 1: a former WNBA player the other day and I called
Speaker 1: Caitlin Clark the Golden Goose and and they said there
Speaker 1: can be multiple golden Gooses. And I thought that was
Speaker 1: really interesting because it shows that there's almost like a
Speaker 1: I won't call it a willful ignorance, but I will
Speaker 1: call it a resistance even within players to give her
Speaker 1: the Tiger Woods treatment. I don't remember because I was
Speaker 1: too young. I think we're around the same age. How
Speaker 1: much Phil Mickelson and the rest of the golfers were like, no,
Speaker 1: Tiger Woods is not golf. The PGA Tour is bigger
Speaker 1: than Tiger Woods in one player. But it feels like
Speaker 1: there is a very strong resistance aggressive even to say, no,
Speaker 1: there's there's a lot of factors that are influencing the
Speaker 1: rise of the WNBA, and that may be true, but
Speaker 1: maybe ninety five percent of that is Kaitlin Clark or
Speaker 1: or whatever.
Speaker 3: No, that's definitely accurate. I've even been asked to not
Speaker 3: ask questions about Kitlin Clark or bring Kitlin Clark up
Speaker 3: in certain interviews or topic matter, which I wouldn't do
Speaker 3: if it wasn't germane to the conversation, like, I'm not
Speaker 3: just gonna be like, hey, what do you think about
Speaker 3: Kaitlin Clark when it has nothing to do with anything,
Speaker 3: but it was. It's relevant in a lot of conversations,
Speaker 3: and that, to me is a symptom of what you
Speaker 3: were just describing. And I've definitely seen it. It's interesting,
Speaker 3: you know. I think part of it was there was
Speaker 3: a little resentment. There's a little resentment around her popularity,
Speaker 3: but also a little resentment where because at the time
Speaker 3: there was a lot of noise of everybody only cares
Speaker 3: about the league because of Caitlin Clark, and it was
Speaker 3: trashed before that, and no one wants to hear that.
Speaker 3: And the players were excellent before that, they're excellent now
Speaker 3: and maybe because of this event, there can be multiple
Speaker 3: Golden Gooses where Page Beckers is popular and Juju Watkins
Speaker 3: is popular when she comes in and so on and
Speaker 3: so forth. Where you know, that was the Nexus event,
Speaker 3: the Supernova event, the you know, what does a jay
Speaker 3: Z say on the blueprint? A Michael, Magic and Bird
Speaker 3: all rolled in one, you know, And that's kind of
Speaker 3: what Caitlyn Clark was, right, Michael, Magic and Bird all
Speaker 3: rolled in one where Magic and Bird walked or ran
Speaker 3: so Michael Jordan could fly and it was all be
Speaker 3: like Mike commercials at that time, like I remember it
Speaker 3: as a little kid and space jam and everything else,
Speaker 3: which is probably the closest thing. We've also seen the
Speaker 3: Tiger Woods, which exploded the NBA's popularity, because before that
Speaker 3: it was on tape delay before Magic and Bird. So yeah,
Speaker 3: there is some sort of resistance. I don't know what
Speaker 3: it is exactly, but I to me, it always comes
Speaker 3: back to her. You know, people make it about race
Speaker 3: or sexuality. I think it's really about popularity, and I
Speaker 3: think that is why you get some of that. But
Speaker 3: I hope that it eases over time. And I do
Speaker 3: think because of that, you see more like let's just
Speaker 3: take Asia Wilson for example. It's not as if Asia
Speaker 3: Wilson became a better basketball player. You know, well, she
Speaker 3: did work on her game, you know, prove like everybody else.
Speaker 3: But it's not like she became a wildly better basketball
Speaker 3: player from two years ago to last year. But so
Speaker 3: many more people know and are aware of who Asia
Speaker 3: Wilson is or one of Kitlin Clark's teammates. A lot
Speaker 3: of people like to say, like, you know, she gets
Speaker 3: all the credit. How much more of a household name
Speaker 3: or at least a well known name is Kelsey Mitchell
Speaker 3: than she was prior to Caitlin Clark. And those are
Speaker 3: some of the things that you get that are the
Speaker 3: positives of that ripple effect. And yeah, you don't want
Speaker 3: your league to be dependent on one player for the
Speaker 3: rest of eternity. I mean, of course not, but I
Speaker 3: do think you know, she You're not wrong. There's no
Speaker 3: statistical backing or factual backing that makes your golden goose
Speaker 3: label wrong. And because of that golden goose, maybe golden
Speaker 3: geese can can be hacked.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's a really that's a really interesting point.
Speaker 1: Did you speaking of Asia Wilson And I wasn't thinking
Speaker 1: about bringing this up until you just mentioned her Caitlin
Speaker 1: Clark shoe contract came up, we found out she was
Speaker 1: gonna have a Nike signature shoe, and then Asia Wilson
Speaker 1: tweeted about something her not having a shoe even though
Speaker 1: she was in the midst of releasing one. And now
Speaker 1: we've had like five shoe releases from Asia Wilson in
Speaker 1: the month of May. We've had Malie Obama direct her
Speaker 1: shoe commercial and we haven't heard not one, not one
Speaker 1: whisper about what's going on with the Caitlin Clark's shoe
Speaker 1: or even support of Caitlyn Clark from Nike. Kind of weird.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it is a little weird. It's definitely been brought up.
Speaker 3: You know, you would hope like if there was an
Speaker 3: issue like she would raise it, her people would raise it.
Speaker 3: I don't know how long it takes from inception to production,
Speaker 3: you know, to retail for a signature shoe, but it
Speaker 3: does make you go hmm, right, especially when you talk
Speaker 3: about she's coming, you know, well, the plus side for
Speaker 3: them is and this is the real thing is all
Speaker 3: you gotta do is drop a link. It doesn't need
Speaker 3: any promotion or anything. As soon as it happened, that's
Speaker 3: that's the testament to what she's built and who she
Speaker 3: is and maybe why they got a bargain. But it
Speaker 3: does feel odd, especially in light of the whole Asia
Speaker 3: Wilson thing when when the Clark Nike deal was announced,
Speaker 3: because I don't think that helped the entire discourse that
Speaker 3: we're talking about now, especially given that her shoe was
Speaker 3: already in the works. And by the way, congratulations that
Speaker 3: her shoe. I want everybody like as many shoes as
Speaker 3: I want, as many scholars shoes, many sign draft, as
Speaker 3: many people to get paid as possible. Like, It's not
Speaker 3: like everybody in the NBA doesn't have a shoe. And
Speaker 3: it's also not like, you know, certain players aren't more
Speaker 3: popular for very they you know, are the jokices selling
Speaker 3: like the Anthony Edwards? No, but who's a better player?
Speaker 3: Does yok even have a shoe? I don't know. Did
Speaker 3: Tim Duncan have a shoe? I guess he did, but
Speaker 3: it wasn't moving like AI's joints, and Tim Duncan was
Speaker 3: a better player than Ai.
Speaker 1: Facts facts, Who you high on in this w NBA season,
Speaker 1: Because for me, the team that stuck out in terms
Speaker 1: of expectations versus what we've actually seen. There's a few
Speaker 1: of them. Obviously, the Mercury are quite good compared to
Speaker 1: what we thought maybe, but the Washington Mystics are fun
Speaker 1: as fuck, Like, they're very fast, they have this running
Speaker 1: gun offense. Sonya Sittron and Kiki Eriafin both look like
Speaker 1: they could be Rookie of the Year candidates. Who for
Speaker 1: you is like, wow, that this is a lot better
Speaker 1: team than I expected.
Speaker 3: Well, I think you named one of them, and if
Speaker 3: Georgia Amore was healthy, that'd be even different. But both
Speaker 3: the Citron and Erie Eurie Fend in particular have been
Speaker 3: better than I thought at the pro level than what
Speaker 3: I had seen in college. I'd say Atlanta. You know,
Speaker 3: I was a little skeptical on Jones and Griner working
Speaker 3: together from a spacing, but man, that's a lot of
Speaker 3: size in the front court that other teams can't deal with.
Speaker 3: And when you add in Gray and Howard and Pow
Speaker 3: Pow and a lot of the talent that they have there,
Speaker 3: I think Atlanta is going to be in the mix.
Speaker 3: And I wouldn't have necessarily said that in the preseason
Speaker 3: because if I'm sizing up the contenders, obviously a lot
Speaker 3: of it hinges on Clark's health, but clearly New York, Minnesota,
Speaker 3: Indiana if Clark is healthy, and then Atlanta has been
Speaker 3: the next most impressive team. I think that that's who
Speaker 3: I had slug into the top four.
Speaker 1: And in the disappointing space, you didn't mention the Las
Speaker 1: Vegas Aces, who I think are fourth or tied for second,
Speaker 1: but fourth in the odds in terms of winning title.
Speaker 1: I also am down on them. Sounds like you are
Speaker 1: as well, what do you what are you seeing? That
Speaker 1: makes you? Meh?
Speaker 3: Twofold one. They lost a lot of their depth, right,
Speaker 3: so they're they're really front loaded. And secondly, Kelsey Plum's
Speaker 3: a heck of a player. You know, she's better than
Speaker 3: Juel Lloyd is and so that was a one to
Speaker 3: one swap in a sense, and they got the worst
Speaker 3: end of that swap, I believe, and maybe Kelsey Plum
Speaker 3: didn't get quite enough credit for what she actually did
Speaker 3: for the team. You know, a really really good shot
Speaker 3: creator and score and then you know there's a little
Speaker 3: bit of attrition that comes. You see that with every
Speaker 3: team that's gone back to back or made extended runs.
Speaker 3: And you know, I just saw Jackie Young talking about
Speaker 3: how her knee was hurting her last year after the
Speaker 3: Olympics and everything, and I'm a big fan of Jackie
Speaker 3: Young's game. And then on top of that, Chelsea Gray,
Speaker 3: you know, and exactly a spring chicken either, Like, so,
Speaker 3: you know, you go through a lot of that. A
Speaker 3: tris so you lose bench, you go through attrition, and
Speaker 3: you lose you know, one of your best players.
Speaker 1: If not Father Time starts to hit.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I think it's a combination of those things.
Speaker 1: How bad is Dallas going to be? Because I think
Speaker 1: last year, right around this time, we were like, wow,
Speaker 1: the fever are disgusting, Like this team is awful. None
Speaker 1: of Caitlyn's teammates can catch any of her passes. You know,
Speaker 1: we need to get rid of this coach, which ended
Speaker 1: up happening obviously now Stephanie White's the head coach. But
Speaker 1: then they sort of found their rhythm. The players Kelsey,
Speaker 1: Mitchell and and Caitlin and Aaliyah all started to gel.
Speaker 1: Lexi Hull found her way and I don't. I don't
Speaker 1: know if I feel the same way about Dallas. I
Speaker 1: would hope that Erique and Page can figure out a
Speaker 1: way to make it work. What are you seeing from them?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, first of all, I don't know if you know,
Speaker 3: but right before we started recording, Paigebackers went into concussion protocol.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, No, I didn't see that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so she's going to be out at least two games. Page.
Speaker 3: You know, also like she's not getting to the rimiton,
Speaker 3: she's not shooting a lot of threes. She's you know, generally,
Speaker 3: and I like Paige, don't get me wrong, but when
Speaker 3: when the keyword everybody always used, I've never heard a
Speaker 3: great player described.
Speaker 1: As a efficient I knew you were going to say, like,
Speaker 1: you know, never heard that for like a truly great,
Speaker 1: all time great player.
Speaker 3: And then they've got some players who I just you know,
Speaker 3: have tunnel vision. DJA is trying to do too much
Speaker 3: on offense. Melissa Smith was a liability for the Fever
Speaker 3: last year, and and she's in their starting lineup. And
Speaker 3: then the jury's out on the coach. You know, I
Speaker 3: just keep picturing him like unrolling and eating granola.
Speaker 1: Yeah he's Yeah, he's he does look a little Darbnham esque.
Speaker 1: Not not a lot of not a lot of changes
Speaker 1: and like adjustments. And I think the thing that fans
Speaker 1: are upset about is he's like, oh, it's a you know,
Speaker 1: everybody has equal leadership. We need everyone to fill in
Speaker 1: and everybody's our number one player. And it's like no, bro, no,
Speaker 1: like that's not the case. We need you to settle
Speaker 1: up this hierarchy. Arique is a bona fide star and
Speaker 1: a dog not efficient. Nobody has ever claimed that she's efficient.
Speaker 1: And then you got a Page who's waiting in the wings,
Speaker 1: and all she needs is to know, hey, we need
Speaker 1: you to take over these games. Don't defer to Erique.
Speaker 1: And he's just like, oh, well they'll sort it out.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, I mean, has there ever been a bigger
Speaker 3: change from Gino Wriema to that? Right? Like God, right,
Speaker 3: Gino would throw Page under the bus right after the game,
Speaker 3: like yeah, she wasn't aggressive enough. You know, I considered,
Speaker 3: you know, he never hesitated to do that versus now,
Speaker 3: Like I think the exact quote from last night was
Speaker 3: they were vibing. That's what he said. The guards were
Speaker 3: vibing out there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like all the way to an l vibing to
Speaker 1: in l the Sky finally get a win. They are
Speaker 1: off to a very slow start. I am very excited
Speaker 1: to see Camilla Cardoso get more touches. She could be
Speaker 1: pretty dominant. When you watch the Sky, what are you seeing?
Speaker 1: And it already kind of feels like they're setting up
Speaker 1: to try to get Olivia Miles in the draft next year.
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, they could really use perimeter playmaking and shock
Speaker 3: creation and all that. I mean, Courtney Vanderslute one of
Speaker 3: the all time great players, but obviously a little long
Speaker 3: in the tooth there. They made the trade, and some
Speaker 3: of those trades are gonna look questionable because of the
Speaker 3: future draft capital they surrendered. I mean, the Lynks have
Speaker 3: the Sky's pick in the next upcoming draft, and they
Speaker 3: gave up a swap in twenty twenty seven, so they
Speaker 3: don't really have direct control over their pick in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty six or twenty twenty seven, so they're gonna need
Speaker 3: a lot from Ariel Atkins. And they lost obviously Kennedy
Speaker 3: Carter and Marina Maybray is an underrated loss, I mean,
Speaker 3: in that trade that happened in mid season. But I
Speaker 3: think the biggest dilemma for them is the fit between
Speaker 3: Cardoso and Reese. Reese is a better passer than she.
Speaker 3: She gets credit for a pretty hig Q high IQ
Speaker 3: player out there. But I mean she's shooting I'm gonna say,
Speaker 3: thirty three percent from the floor on the season, thirty
Speaker 3: one percent somewhere in the thirty one thirty two.
Speaker 1: And she's not spacing the floor.
Speaker 3: Robin, Yes, no, she's not spacing the floor, and neither
Speaker 3: is Camilla, right like, so that to me, I just
Speaker 3: don't know exactly. I mean, you can make it work
Speaker 3: here and there, like Reese dumps it into her or
Speaker 3: you know, gets a rebound and dishes it off to her.
Speaker 3: But just on a possession by possession basis, are you
Speaker 3: getting enough spacing and enough room to operate when one
Speaker 3: of your players you're wanting to feed and the other
Speaker 3: player or neither of them are a threat from the
Speaker 3: outside and the other player is not, you know, it's
Speaker 3: shooting thirty percent from within five feet.
Speaker 1: What do you think about these links? You think they
Speaker 1: have enough to beat the fever. I thought, I mean,
Speaker 1: not the fever, to beat the liberty. Excuse me, because
Speaker 1: I thought that they probably should have won game five. Anyway,
Speaker 1: I felt like the refs were calling some Shenanigans. Didn't
Speaker 1: look like Stewie got fouled and it looked like she traveled.
Speaker 1: I was in the building for that one. But boyle boy,
Speaker 1: Natasha Cloud looks like a real upgrade over Salute, like
Speaker 1: a really really big upgrade.
Speaker 3: Oh for sure. And you know, like that Liberty have
Speaker 3: some you know, I think Leoni Phoebitch was a slept
Speaker 3: on thing last year. And still John Culte Jones might
Speaker 3: not get enough credit. You know, you're telling me who's
Speaker 3: the best player on the Liberty. I'd actually probably say
Speaker 3: John qult Jones is the best player on the Liberty.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that that that game five, I was there too,
Speaker 3: and I remember like I raced to the postgame press
Speaker 3: conference to get a seat for Cheryl Reef because I
Speaker 3: knew something was coming. And then she said they stole
Speaker 3: that shit from us. It was like, oh, that was
Speaker 3: even better than I thought. But yeah, the links are Look,
Speaker 3: they're writ in that mix. They can shoot, they're unselfish.
Speaker 3: McBride just got back. Collier is clearly with Clark going down,
Speaker 3: I think clearly the MVP favor now, So I would
Speaker 3: put them right in that mix, you know, a coin
Speaker 3: flip kind of deal.
Speaker 1: All right, So last question on the W, what do
Speaker 1: you think happens with this collective bargaining agreement? Because I
Speaker 1: spoke with David Berry, who's an economist covers a lot
Speaker 1: of women's sports from that realm. He seems to think
Speaker 1: that the W couldn't survive a lockout. But it feels
Speaker 1: like a lot of W players are threatening one. They've
Speaker 1: let everyone know that they're prepared to sit out, especially
Speaker 1: now with unrivaled in the top players being able to
Speaker 1: make a lot of money there. What do you think
Speaker 1: happens there?
Speaker 3: Well, you would hope. Look, they definitely should be getting
Speaker 3: more money. I mean, there's just a much bigger media
Speaker 3: rights deal that came in, right, So just on the
Speaker 3: surface of that, they should be getting more money. You
Speaker 3: don't want them to get a little too big for
Speaker 3: the britches either, though, you know, and this goes back
Speaker 3: to what we talked about at the beginning, because all
Speaker 3: of this, let's not get it twisted, right, Like, none
Speaker 3: of this would even be in the zeitgeist if it
Speaker 3: wasn't for Caitlin Clark arriving on the scene, and that
Speaker 3: the bargaining power and the leverage that that brings off
Speaker 3: of the last year, but before that, the NBA subsidized
Speaker 3: and still subsidizes the WNBA, so you also have to
Speaker 3: have realistic expectations. So I just would think, Yeah, you
Speaker 3: want to negotiate, bargain as hard as you can, get
Speaker 3: as much as you can, and I hope they get
Speaker 3: a lot more. I mean that the salaries are not
Speaker 3: high and the league is going higher, so they definitely
Speaker 3: deserve a lot more. But at the same time, don't
Speaker 3: be delusional about it, don't you know, don't get off
Speaker 3: over your skis, because you've got to realize that the
Speaker 3: time to strike is now, and if you halt that
Speaker 3: right now, you might not ever get the momentum back.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's move over to the NBA. We don't know
Speaker 1: as of this recording what's going to happen in Game
Speaker 1: six between the Knicks and the Pacers, so we'll just
Speaker 1: keep the actual prediction element out of it. But what
Speaker 1: I think is fascinating is Tyree's Halliburton as just a
Speaker 1: guy as a player, how much GMS and coaches love
Speaker 1: him and how much his peers absolutely can't stand him.
Speaker 1: He voted most overrated by his peers and yet clearly
Speaker 1: showing that he's one of them once. Why do you
Speaker 1: think Tyree Halliburton is so hated by his peers when
Speaker 1: I feel like fans, even just general casual fans also
Speaker 1: love him.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, he doesn't do any of that stuff
Speaker 3: that that generally like wows you to the point where like,
Speaker 3: you know, when you're like, you go, what's Tyrese Haliburton's bag,
Speaker 3: You're not sitting there like it's the one legged fade
Speaker 3: away or it's you know, a dream shake, or it's
Speaker 3: even you know, anything specific. He's not posterizing people, so
Speaker 3: he doesn't have and and players sometimes I think lean
Speaker 3: toward like Carmelo Anthony, I feel like was always rated
Speaker 3: more highly by his peers than he was by the
Speaker 3: media and the maybe the you know, the truth is
Speaker 3: always somewhere in the middle a little bit. So I
Speaker 3: think it's a little bit of a lack of that obviously,
Speaker 3: you know, they just kind of arrived on the scene
Speaker 3: for the first time in the national realm where they're
Speaker 3: getting that much attention. But yeah, otherwise I'm not really
Speaker 3: sure what it would be as far as you know,
Speaker 3: he's an unselfish player, clearly and clearly, you know, the
Speaker 3: Pacers have exceeded what anybody thought they were gonna be.
Speaker 3: But they were almost a commentary on where the league
Speaker 3: is now because we're it's it's two sides of the
Speaker 3: same coin, right, because the NBA is we're always hearing
Speaker 3: like who's the next face of the NBA and searching
Speaker 3: for the next face because there hasn't been the natural
Speaker 3: heir to the lebron James Steph Curry era and there's
Speaker 3: people like Edwards, is it this, so and so, is
Speaker 3: it sgah, who could it be? But at the same time,
Speaker 3: we're also in an era where I think the top
Speaker 3: of your roster is less important than the bottom of
Speaker 3: the roster.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: You know, it used to be like you could say, oh,
Speaker 3: we're gonna get a big three and then we're gonna
Speaker 3: go cook. Now every team that gets a big three
Speaker 3: goes nose dive straight into the you know, the play
Speaker 3: in or something like that, because you need the Nie
Speaker 3: Smith's of the world and all those guys to come through.
Speaker 3: So I feel like Halliburton is sort of symbolic of
Speaker 3: that because he's the only guy on that you kind
Speaker 3: of view a way on the pace, maybe Seakham to
Speaker 3: a degree, but then it's the rest of the team
Speaker 3: and he plays that way too. So he just doesn't
Speaker 3: fit some of those prototypical you know, superstar star of
Speaker 3: the team, face of the franchise kind of old because
Speaker 3: he's he's playing it the way that you win it.
Speaker 1: And he talks hell of shit he does.
Speaker 3: Yeah, not too. I mean he did a choke him
Speaker 3: all right, Like people aren't gonna like that when you
Speaker 3: do it, you know, if we're seeing him do that
Speaker 3: for all of us to see what's he doing on
Speaker 3: the court, you know Pops Pop's thing, you know, like
Speaker 3: gotta be some of it rubbed off on Tyrenes.
Speaker 1: He did the like three thing that that Jalen Brunson does,
Speaker 1: and I don't you know, over his face he did
Speaker 1: the Dame time, he did the bye bye to Milwaukee.
Speaker 1: His dad gotten into Jannie's face, which I don't know
Speaker 1: what John Halliburton was thinking, because jannest is just not
Speaker 1: one of those ones you want to mess around with.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's just that, maybe it's just his his stealing
Speaker 1: of iconic athlete moments at the time where it puts
Speaker 1: salt in the wounds. I love Tyrese Halbert, I love
Speaker 1: Jalen Brunson as well. Probably my favorite player though Robin
Speaker 1: for the last or one of them. The last four
Speaker 1: years has been the ascension of Shay and I felt
Speaker 1: like he could be an MVP long before anyone was
Speaker 1: wanting to give him that level of respect. Do you
Speaker 1: think he's the kind of player that wins multiple MVPs
Speaker 1: or is this it for him?
Speaker 3: I mean, look, there is a real thing as voter
Speaker 3: fatigue where we've seen that come into play, so I
Speaker 3: think he would have to just go bananas to win
Speaker 3: one again in the short term, but he's certainly capable
Speaker 3: of it. But he's also got this like free throw
Speaker 3: stigma following him a little bit, which eventually I mean
Speaker 3: when Doris Burke on the broadcast is saying, that's why
Speaker 3: they call him the free throw merchant, you know, it's
Speaker 3: like gotten into the general conversation a little bit, which
Speaker 3: then gets into influencing voters and influencing out there.
Speaker 1: It is it mbidi free thom merchants. Okay, so Embiid
Speaker 1: won an MVP. He's a free throw merchant, but no
Speaker 1: one really called him that no one called Dame that
Speaker 1: he didn't win an MVP. Of course, Harden is the
Speaker 1: one that we use, but it's said in this disparaging way.
Speaker 1: I am curious whether those on the air are using
Speaker 1: what they see on the internet and and like that's
Speaker 1: becoming a part of their commentary because it's almost like, well,
Speaker 1: every great score technically has been a free throw merchant,
Speaker 1: Kobe Bryant, Lebron, James Luca, They're all looking for fouls.
Speaker 1: So it's a little interesting that this is the title
Speaker 1: that's stuck for Shay, but it hasn't stuck for some
Speaker 1: of the other great scores.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean you kind of brought it full circle there,
Speaker 3: a little bit to what I was talking about earlier,
Speaker 3: where you know, the major networks program off social media,
Speaker 3: so they're like, look at me, I'm part of NBA Twitter.
Speaker 3: I'm saying free throw merchant, you know. Like so there
Speaker 3: is that aspect. What bothers me though, where I would
Speaker 3: go to the free throw. What bothers me is when
Speaker 3: players attempt to draw the foul rather than attempting to score.
Speaker 3: It's one thing when you're attempting to score and you
Speaker 3: get fouled within the process of attempting to score. It's
Speaker 3: another thing when you're manipulating the defenders and trying to
Speaker 3: manipulate the rest to draw fouls. And that's not a
Speaker 3: Shay Gildes Alexander problem. That's been i think a problem
Speaker 3: throughout the league in recent years, with Joel Embiid flopping
Speaker 3: to the floor and with James Harden trying to get
Speaker 3: his arm up under people to draw the foul and
Speaker 3: stuff like that. It Harden in particular, I think one
Speaker 3: of the reads. Two of the reasons I think he
Speaker 3: struggled in the playoffs and has the playoff failure narrative
Speaker 3: other than failing in the playoffs is he doesn't play
Speaker 3: very well off the ball, so he's not moving very much,
Speaker 3: not getting open, not you know, running around, curling, coming
Speaker 3: off you know, the and shooting. And he's also sometimes
Speaker 3: looking to draw the foul rather than looking to score.
Speaker 3: And when you don't get bailed out in that situation,
Speaker 3: it hurts you. But yeah, to your point, it might
Speaker 3: not be fair for Shay to be labeled that as
Speaker 3: he's winning an MVP and a's sending to the NBA
Speaker 3: Finals when he's hardly.
Speaker 1: The first Yeah, Okay, so I do want to ask
Speaker 1: you this before we go. Is the West as good
Speaker 1: as we thought it was? And is the East as
Speaker 1: bad as we thought it was? Here's the reason I
Speaker 1: ask we Okay, see sailed to the finals, and the
Speaker 1: two best teams in the East aren't. Neither one are
Speaker 1: going to the finals, and neither one made it to
Speaker 1: the Eastern Conference finals. And it looks like the team
Speaker 1: that just went to the Western Conference Finals for the
Speaker 1: second time in a row, the Minnesota Timberwolves, are going
Speaker 1: to get measurably worse and they're not good enough now.
Speaker 1: They're probably going to lose Nikaile Alexander Walker and may
Speaker 1: maybe either Nasried or Julius Randall some version of that
Speaker 1: is going away. And outside of the Timberwolves an aging
Speaker 1: Nuggets team, I don't really know who stops this OKC team.
Speaker 1: And I look at the East and I say, I
Speaker 1: could see New York going to the finals next year.
Speaker 1: I could see Cleveland figuring it out. I could see
Speaker 1: Boston two years. You know, Boston's gonna have a bad year,
Speaker 1: but maybe Tatum comes back in March and Boston makes
Speaker 1: a run.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I mean, I don't think there's much difference
Speaker 3: at all. Yeah, I mean, look, Boston was perhaps the favorite.
Speaker 3: Now they were going to lose I think whether Tatum
Speaker 3: got hurt or not because of the way that that
Speaker 3: series it went. But Indiana now is likely going to
Speaker 3: beat the team I forgot. We can't do the predictions.
Speaker 3: Indiana at one point in the series was up three
Speaker 3: to one the New York Knicks. So you see, like
Speaker 3: those two teams are pretty evenly matched. In fact, if
Speaker 3: the Knicks hadn't, I think it, you know, Game one
Speaker 3: was the real issue for them. What I really think
Speaker 3: it is, Trista is the stars, the most famous players
Speaker 3: are in the West, and that's not exactly I just
Speaker 3: talked about how I don't think that's how championships are won.
Speaker 3: And in the new CBA it's it's even tougher. But
Speaker 3: if you're just like, like, who are the most famous?
Speaker 3: Lebron and Steph are still the two most famous players.
Speaker 3: Durant is probably next. Luca's right in that mix. Anthony
Speaker 3: Edwards is the guy everybody's trying to annoint their.
Speaker 1: You know, j is the guy who say the jaw.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So it's not necessarily the teams are any better,
Speaker 3: but the the individual stars are more famous versus the
Speaker 3: guys like Halliburton and Brunson. Who are you know? Brunson
Speaker 3: has never dubbed a star. He had to make himself star.
Speaker 3: Halliburton same thing, like has made himself into a star
Speaker 3: rather than these guys who carry the the you know
Speaker 3: face that that goes on the billboard.
Speaker 1: So awesome stuff. Love the w NBA talk. Can't wait
Speaker 1: to have you on next, especially once these finals are set.
Speaker 1: Maybe we can talk a little like current current events
Speaker 1: in the W or in the in the NBA, no
Speaker 1: doubt about it.
Speaker 3: You said we were gonna talk rap before when we
Speaker 3: were going back and forth, you got any quick uh
Speaker 3: you know, hip hop take to throw at me? A
Speaker 3: question to throw at me?
Speaker 1: Oh, hip hop take to throw at you? Yes, let's
Speaker 1: let's talk top five most underrated rappers? Oh, underrated underrated
Speaker 1: rappers you can say in your lifetime?
Speaker 3: Okay, underrated rappers?
Speaker 1: Black thought, black thought. I'll give you one big L,
Speaker 1: big L.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, big L. Definitely a beast. See it's hard
Speaker 3: to like what what quantifies or inspected deck?
Speaker 1: Inspected deck. You're a Wu Tang guy. I feel like
Speaker 1: Wu Tang is one of the most overrated rap groups.
Speaker 3: Oh in Ortal Enemies.
Speaker 1: Now, yeah, you're a New York guy. Nobody's like, hey,
Speaker 1: let me throw on some Wu Tang, Like, hey, serie
Speaker 1: play just unless it's cream. Nobody's doing that.
Speaker 3: It comes on. I played liquid swords, all right, you're.
Speaker 1: One of those one of those like you're you're a
Speaker 1: hipster New Yorker like conscious rap guy, so you probably
Speaker 1: are like the most most deaf tribe called quest all
Speaker 1: all of that. You're like, oh yeah, ghost Face is
Speaker 1: so underrated that one owul albody remembers Rizza the jizz.
Speaker 1: You're like, so were you a big like Asian culture
Speaker 1: samurai guy when you were growing up?
Speaker 3: No, I found all that from Wu Tang and then
Speaker 3: and then like my you know when I I remember
Speaker 3: people talking about how Times Square used to to play
Speaker 3: all the Kung Flu flicks. But no, it wasn't it
Speaker 3: wasn't from that. All of my mafioso like learnings came
Speaker 3: from rap too. I don't bob movies and they all
Speaker 3: that stuff came from the the I just like I
Speaker 3: like bars. I like you know, you said, tribe call requests.
Speaker 3: I like beats rhymes in life. So liquid Swords and
Speaker 3: thirty six Chambers some of my favorite albums, but the
Speaker 3: three I can tell you the three greatest rappers of
Speaker 3: all time. And I don't think this can be argued
Speaker 3: in my opinion at this point. Jay Z Kendrick lamar
Speaker 3: Eminem to me when you take across impact ability catalog.
Speaker 1: And I can't argue because neither jay Z. Yes, I
Speaker 1: think jay Z goes on everyone's list, but Eminem's virtually unlistenable.
Speaker 3: I can see where. Look, I don't think a lot
Speaker 3: of Eminem stuff is the kind of thing like where
Speaker 3: you're like I got the aux in a you know,
Speaker 3: I'm yea necessarily, but as far as like impact, sales ability,
Speaker 3: like you put Eminem on a track, you know, all
Speaker 3: of those things, even going back to eight or the
Speaker 3: Marshall Mathers LP. I remember the Marshall Mathers LPI like
Speaker 3: you couldn't find.
Speaker 1: A car that was a great I saw I heard
Speaker 1: someone outside of my coworking space yesterday or two days
Speaker 1: ago playing the Marshall Mathers LP and I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five, like all right, my.
Speaker 3: Mom asking to borrow that when I was in high school.
Speaker 3: And then Kendrick. I've never seen you know, I was
Speaker 3: always a fan of Kendrick, but I don't know if
Speaker 3: I ever seen a rapper have the kind of year
Speaker 3: that Kendrick just had.
Speaker 1: The last twelve months for Kendrick have put him in
Speaker 1: terms of impacts, like he ended, He ended essentially one
Speaker 1: of the greatest entertainer's career. He put Yeah, he's yeah,
Speaker 1: he's ned Stark, Like Drake is ned Stark out there
Speaker 1: and Kendrick is Jeoffrey and he's walking up. He's like
Speaker 1: you see that guy, Like that's the guy I fucking
Speaker 1: killed and put on a stick and he's got birds
Speaker 1: all over him. So yeah, But I would say like
Speaker 1: outside of this last album, Kendrick has a lot of
Speaker 1: like that. To Pimp a Butterfly album was just I
Speaker 1: don't I mean, what are we doing here. We're just
Speaker 1: making music to just experiment. I don't want you experimenting
Speaker 1: with my ears, Okay, Like this jazz hip hop thing,
Speaker 1: it was just too much. I love the turn the
Speaker 1: TV on. Like this new sound that we're getting from
Speaker 1: Kendrick is like what we wanted the not like us beats,
Speaker 1: Like this is what West because I'm West Coaster what
Speaker 1: West Coast hip hop feels like the let's bring the
Speaker 1: vibe up. And I think West Coast is all about
Speaker 1: like the sunshine and the drop tops and the ladies
Speaker 1: and the beach and the barbecues, and hip hop's like
Speaker 1: hip hop on the East Coast. Like I'm on the train, it's.
Speaker 3: Called the fuck.
Speaker 1: I'm struggling. I gotta go up this walk up ten
Speaker 1: floors and someone's trying to have me on Seventh Avenue
Speaker 1: and I got the crackhead out and that's like very
Speaker 1: much two different worlds. And to me, my personality is
Speaker 1: always loved the East cost hip hop. But when it's
Speaker 1: nice out, I start to circulate over to the girls
Speaker 1: in the in the drop tops and the barbecue.
Speaker 3: Your turn up, Trista, Yeah, I got you. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean it's like it's Snoop, It's snooping Dre, it's
Speaker 1: crying two thousand and one, it's doggy style, it's you know,
Speaker 1: West Coast. You know, it's it's Mac even Mac ten.
Speaker 1: It's just the like the it's Nate Doll and Warren
Speaker 1: g and like that's Mike.
Speaker 3: You can do it.
Speaker 1: But yeah, exactly, no, exactly, And you're like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's driving music. You guys don't have driving music because
Speaker 1: you're not driving.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, that's true. I mean though, like that's one
Speaker 3: of the reasons I would argue jay Z is clearly
Speaker 3: the best because he can do the stuff you were
Speaker 3: just talking about, and he can do the stuff where
Speaker 3: you know, the Ferrari to Jaguars swishing for a lanes,
Speaker 3: take great money and a thing, right, like, you know,
Speaker 3: that's that's whole. He's got every bag.
Speaker 1: He does, he is, he's for me, is up there.
Speaker 1: I think we're just getting so old that people don't
Speaker 1: want to put Biggie and Poc on their top three anymore,
Speaker 1: and not just is disgusting to me, He's just disgusting.
Speaker 3: My thing with Pac has a lot of emotion, and
Speaker 3: that brought it out, But I never I wasn't a
Speaker 3: big fan of like his raps necessarily and Biggie. The
Speaker 3: same thing goes for Pock.
Speaker 1: This is small catalog, small catalog.
Speaker 3: Small catalog, so event you know, like, yes, they're great catalogs,
Speaker 3: but when you can only have.
Speaker 1: Two thousand and four when we were making this list,
Speaker 1: their catalog wasn't nearly as relevant. Yeah, I think you
Speaker 1: got to put J Cole on the list.
Speaker 3: J Cole, Yeah, I think he took a little bit
Speaker 3: of a hit in the Kendrick thing, and I get
Speaker 3: the whole like, you know, boring kind of but I
Speaker 3: like J Cole. I have no problem with you.
Speaker 1: Born Center is I think my favorite modern rap album.
Speaker 3: That's a hot take, but I would agree that it
Speaker 3: is arguably his best album.
Speaker 1: So he crushed Magna Karta crushed it.
Speaker 3: Magne Karta sucks though, Like relatives to the jay Z album,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 1: He really did fall. I mean you have to almost
Speaker 1: stop jay Z's catalog at the Black album.
Speaker 3: No, no, that I disagree. American Gangster is awesome.
Speaker 1: That's a decent one.
Speaker 3: I think is his best.
Speaker 1: Yeah, four forty four is good, and.
Speaker 3: Three has You can say what you want about Blueprint three,
Speaker 3: but it has like legendary epic bangers that you know,
Speaker 3: Empire state of Mind and run this Town and onto
Speaker 3: the next one or all on that that same record.
Speaker 1: Yeah. There, it's just such an It's like this version
Speaker 1: of what we see from Kendrick Lamar where it's like
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna you guys want commercial ship putting out
Speaker 1: some commercial shits. See see how you guys feel about it.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's a classic album. I still
Speaker 1: think reasonable doubt this is his best album I see.
Speaker 3: I like. I like Volume one a whole lot. I
Speaker 3: like the Blueprint. I like four forty four, but four
Speaker 3: forty four is probably my favorite, you know, I guess
Speaker 3: for I always put it like four forty four made
Speaker 3: adult me feel like how Blueprint made college me feel.
Speaker 1: Hmm. What's the best concert you've ever been to? Best
Speaker 1: hip hop concert?
Speaker 3: I just went to the GNX show by myself. It
Speaker 3: met life. That was fun.
Speaker 1: Was that fun?
Speaker 3: Yeah? It was fun. But the best one I think.
Speaker 3: I if I it would be the jay it would
Speaker 3: be a j show at it was called All Points
Speaker 3: West Festival just because of the whole the whole setup
Speaker 3: to it, Like the Beastie Boys were supposed to headline
Speaker 3: and they dropped out unfortunately, because this is when MCA
Speaker 3: got cancer, and that day, like it was like torrential
Speaker 3: downpour and mud and all this. We didn't know if
Speaker 3: the concert was even gonna happen. And then you had
Speaker 3: this crowd that wasn't there for a jay Z concert,
Speaker 3: right like, and they were there for a Beastie Boy,
Speaker 3: and it just whole different crowd. And he opened with
Speaker 3: a full on cover of No Sleep Till Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: Oh that's sick.
Speaker 3: I had the whole crowd in the palm of his
Speaker 3: hands the rest of the time. So I would say
Speaker 3: it was that one I saw.
Speaker 1: There's two for me. I saw my first concert ever
Speaker 1: was the No Way Out tour. So it was Little Kim,
Speaker 1: it was it was Diddy, it was Mace, it was
Speaker 1: Black Rob, it was one twelve, it was the Locks.
Speaker 1: Who else was there? It was Usher. It was just
Speaker 1: an insane tour for me at like twelve years old.
Speaker 1: And then I saw jay Z and Beyonce on the
Speaker 1: Run and it was at the Hollywood Bowl. No, I
Speaker 1: think it was at the Hollywood Bowl. Maybe it was.
Speaker 1: I forget. It was in LA And when he came
Speaker 1: out and you could clear they it was clear they
Speaker 1: didn't they were not fucking with each other at that moment.
Speaker 1: They were broken up. It was a stop. It wasn't
Speaker 1: supposed to be, but it ended up being the last
Speaker 1: stop on their tour because she got sick or they
Speaker 1: whatever happened, you know, And he came out to song
Speaker 1: cry and it was she was standing on one end
Speaker 1: of the stage sitting like sitting down. They put turn
Speaker 1: it all black and then turned the spotlight on him
Speaker 1: and he was sitting down and it was like maybe August,
Speaker 1: and it started to rain right when he came out.
Speaker 1: I can't see it coming down my eyes, but I
Speaker 1: gotta let the song cry. And I got and I
Speaker 1: was in the second row, got tickets like the same day,
Speaker 1: last second, got goosebumps and I was like, oh wow,
Speaker 1: this is this is like as spiritual as you can get. There.
Speaker 3: You go there, you go start. Sorry, I didn't mean
Speaker 3: to like, you know, do it.
Speaker 1: No, this is awesome and extended take over the show,
Speaker 1: Robin whenever you want. I'll let you. Just co host
Speaker 1: Robin Lundberg. Find him everywhere serious ex m SI. He's
Speaker 1: been He's been putting on for the w NBA for
Speaker 1: a really long time before it got popular. Me and
Speaker 1: you have been in these in these trenches pre COVID
Speaker 1: so broke down some w NBA, broke down some NBA,
Speaker 1: and broke down some rap. If you have anything to
Speaker 1: plug Robin, now's your time, you know, just.
Speaker 3: Follow me on on at Robin Lundberg the YouTube channel
Speaker 3: over there too. Robin Lamberg over on YouTube as well,
Speaker 3: and then Yeah Women's Fast Break Indiana Fever on SI.
Speaker 1: Awesome stuff from Robin. I'll see you soon. Let's chop
Speaker 1: it up again. That's all the time that we have
Speaker 1: for this episode of the Heat Check. Come back Friday.
Speaker 1: Many thanks to Robin Lundberg for coming on. Check out
Speaker 1: the feed for past episodes that drop unexpectedly, like canceling
Speaker 1: the main event in the UFC in Vegas, dude to
Speaker 1: with seizure that was crazy? Do you never forget to
Speaker 1: follow the Heat Check all playoffs long off finals long
Speaker 1: that's where we are. That means download, subscribe, how your.
Speaker 4: Friends, even the ones that you haven't talked to in years,
Speaker 4: and and follow us at this heat Check on TikTok at,
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Speaker 1: Thank y'all for listening. Maybe we'll do a full breakdown
Speaker 1: of this finals before Friday's episode, maybe on Thursday if
Speaker 1: time permitted. Thank you and why thank you for everyone
Speaker 1: for listening, and we'll see you next time.