Speaker 1: On this episode of The Heat Check, I explain why
Speaker 1: is a Portland Trailwazer fan.
Speaker 2: We have basically put Damian Lillard.
Speaker 1: We've got golden handcuffs on him for the rest of
Speaker 1: his natural life. He's probably gonna get a gravestone in Portland.
Speaker 1: Why I'm so excited. I'm gonna explain to you all
Speaker 1: the thirty reasons why we're also gonna get into the
Speaker 1: new rule changes and the rule new ball, how that
Speaker 1: uh changes the complexion of the NBA, and why it's
Speaker 1: actually not so fun, and how it's affecting shooters league wide.
Speaker 2: So do me a favorite rock drop that motherfucking This
Speaker 2: is gonna be a long winded story.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna get to a point in a
Speaker 1: circuitous Man, let me just tell you about moving.
Speaker 2: Moving is I tell you what. It's unlike anything else.
Speaker 1: It's maybe they call it one of the most stressful
Speaker 1: events in your life. And there are things that it
Speaker 1: really just doesn't matter how much money you have that
Speaker 1: you have to do them yourself. Like I've tried to
Speaker 1: hire these things out. I'm willing to pay whatever, not whatever,
Speaker 1: but I'm willing to pay pretty much whatever. And they
Speaker 1: just they're just decisions that nobody but you can make.
Speaker 1: Like your eyeball is your brain. You know, stuff whether
Speaker 1: you need it, whether you don't, where it goes, et cetera.
Speaker 2: And that takes time, that takes energy. That is hard.
Speaker 1: And you have to figure out when to get the
Speaker 1: cable guy in and you can't just you have to
Speaker 1: figure out like you have to your eye line has
Speaker 1: to be where they set up the TV.
Speaker 2: Like all of it is is you.
Speaker 1: You know, even if Dame Lillard, even if you make
Speaker 1: forty million a year, some stuff you just have to
Speaker 1: do yourself.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: And even if you are Dame Lillard, you can hire
Speaker 1: some out right, But what if you're Dame Lollard's cousin.
Speaker 1: What if you're Dame Lillard's nephew, second cousin, second brother, whatever. Right,
Speaker 1: all of this to say, there are a few reasons.
Speaker 1: Based on a news story that has come to light
Speaker 1: by Chris Haynes, my guy, the only guy on the
Speaker 1: podcast I really referenced by name.
Speaker 2: All the other reporters just random reporters.
Speaker 1: He did an interview with Dame and now I know
Speaker 1: based on this, Dame is never leaving Portland. Never two
Speaker 1: days ago. There were a couple of things in this
Speaker 1: story that gave me tremendous solace. One Dame Lillard came
Speaker 1: out and told the world and told Chris Haynes, which
Speaker 1: then told the world that he met with Lebron James
Speaker 1: off season and Lebron James and Anthony Davis recruited him.
Speaker 2: To go to the Lakers. Whoa that is?
Speaker 1: That is a wrinkle, right, There are some things that
Speaker 1: if you're considering them, you don't come out to the
Speaker 1: world and say happened. If he's still thinking about joining
Speaker 1: a super team, then that never comes out, right, He said,
Speaker 1: that is not my thing. I sat with them and
Speaker 1: I realized this is not for me. I could see
Speaker 1: myself in La but not with Braun and not with
Speaker 1: ad Because once you decide to chase a ring, he said,
Speaker 1: you could be moved immediately if it things don't work out,
Speaker 1: you end up leaving the town or the city that
Speaker 1: drafted you, and then all of a sudden you're onto
Speaker 1: another team, and then on to another team, and on
Speaker 1: another team I don't know, like Chris Paul, or Russell
Speaker 1: Westbrook or Carmelo Right. So that gave me as a
Speaker 1: Portland Trailblazer fan quite a bit of peace, but not
Speaker 1: as much as this. This paragraph in the Haynes article
Speaker 1: gave me almost like I've got you your mind now,
Speaker 1: you know your mine forever now.
Speaker 2: This quote? All right?
Speaker 1: So it it turns out Lillard is from Oakland, right.
Speaker 1: Lillard is from Oakland, California. The closest destination to play
Speaker 1: basketball outside of places that already have two Max stars
Speaker 1: and you can't have three outside of LA, outside of
Speaker 1: Golden State, outside of Sacramento, which no one is going
Speaker 1: to go to outside of Utah, is Portland.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So he's got tremendous family life. But he also has
Speaker 1: thirty family members who have moved from Oakland to Portland,
Speaker 1: Oregon to live in him with him somewhere nearby in
Speaker 1: some enclave. He has regular barbecues with like sixty people
Speaker 1: there in West Lynn, Oregon.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: And they wait for him in the family and friends
Speaker 1: section of the Modus Center, and they go to postgame dinners,
Speaker 1: and they roll Dame juniors roaming the halliday in the
Speaker 1: hallways of Modus Center.
Speaker 2: It's like he's at home. Right.
Speaker 1: So if Dame were decided were to decide to leave,
Speaker 1: what are those thirty people need to do.
Speaker 2: They would all need to move, wouldn't they.
Speaker 1: They would all need to uproot their life that they
Speaker 1: have built in the last ten years in the league
Speaker 1: that Dame's been there, and find a new house in
Speaker 1: a new neighborhood and new Infinity and FiOS and box
Speaker 1: it up and travel this and that, all thirty of them.
Speaker 1: That would disrupt an entire family units. And he knew
Speaker 1: that if he was going to leave that that would
Speaker 1: change a reliable family dynamic that he values. How do
Speaker 1: we know he values it because even he and his
Speaker 1: long term girlfriend Kayla, who they've had some ups and downs.
Speaker 2: I know that we all know that he put a
Speaker 2: ring on it. This summer, he put a ring on that.
Speaker 1: And now he's put a ring on his relationship again,
Speaker 1: reunited his vows with Portland. There's no way if Dame
Speaker 1: were to leave to Philadelphia, all thirty of those family
Speaker 1: members go to Philadelphia.
Speaker 2: No way. By the way, Philadelphia is a shithole.
Speaker 1: And if you're from the West Coast, and you also
Speaker 1: those thirty people want to be close to the other
Speaker 1: thirty people that are in Oakland, right, that whole little
Speaker 1: dynamic is very close knit. But also close together in
Speaker 1: terms of travel time. You're not gonna move six hours
Speaker 1: across the country, seven hours across the country, flight time
Speaker 1: to go to some shitty place with shitty food and
Speaker 1: shitty fan base.
Speaker 2: No chance.
Speaker 1: If it was just Dame, maybe Dame's wife and kids,
Speaker 1: maybe thirty thirty people, no chance, box their shit, find
Speaker 1: Xfinity fine files in a flash. What if then he
Speaker 1: gets moved to Houston. What if the moves to Oklahoma City,
Speaker 1: God forbid. That is not the vibe I knew right then.
Speaker 1: We've got him forever, folks.
Speaker 2: Not only, as he said publicly, he doesn't want to
Speaker 2: go to a super.
Speaker 1: Team, he also is not destroying that little community.
Speaker 2: He said.
Speaker 1: My family encouraged me not to make a decision based
Speaker 1: on them.
Speaker 2: Pause, and that's a lie.
Speaker 1: They they said we're gonna be fine, But I know
Speaker 1: that they said that to be un selfish. Yes, when
Speaker 1: I was thinking about potentially leaving, I was thinking, is
Speaker 1: it really worth it to chase what all these other
Speaker 1: people are telling me I have to do or have
Speaker 1: to have, or is it important just to do what
Speaker 1: means something to me. If there's anybody in this league
Speaker 1: that moves to the beat, of their own drum.
Speaker 2: It's me.
Speaker 1: And I think people look at it like, ah, he's
Speaker 1: just taking the money. He doesn't want to win. The
Speaker 1: media is so accustomed to rocking the boat and making
Speaker 1: people move how they want them to move, and that's
Speaker 1: not gonna happen with me. Basically, in this article, Dame said,
Speaker 1: I know what you fuckers do. You guys try to
Speaker 1: plant seas. Tell me I'm not gonna be a legend
Speaker 1: unless I win a ring. And I know that there's
Speaker 1: a possibility I might not win a ring if I
Speaker 1: stay in Portland. And what's the only way I can
Speaker 1: assure to win a ring? Oh, I have to join
Speaker 1: a super team. But that's against my ethos and my morals.
Speaker 1: But you're pushing me to do that.
Speaker 2: What do I do?
Speaker 1: Then you have a nervous breakdown, which you sort of have.
Speaker 1: He is ten toes down, you know what? He also said,
Speaker 1: I I am going and am willing to go down
Speaker 1: with the ship.
Speaker 2: We got him, folks. He is willing to die for us.
Speaker 1: He is willing to stay on this modus centered Titanic and.
Speaker 2: Go peeo, peo peo? Are you kidding me? My guy?
Speaker 1: Dame Willard also came out with a freestyle that said
Speaker 1: not joining a super team might be my Achilles heel,
Speaker 1: but I don't care, folks.
Speaker 2: Then he goes on to say, yes, I'm.
Speaker 1: Sure it would be great to play with Lebron and
Speaker 1: Ad and play in a big market, But as attractive
Speaker 1: as it sounded, and as fun as that might be,
Speaker 1: I don't feel that in my heart that's who I
Speaker 1: am or where I belong. And the one thing I
Speaker 1: must emphasize, he says, is this was not made out
Speaker 1: of comfort. I'm not afraid to go out of my
Speaker 1: comfort zone because I'm not. I'm going to live in
Speaker 1: Portland when I'm done playing, regardless, he is going.
Speaker 2: To stay in Portland for the rest of his days.
Speaker 1: My Lord Damian Lillard is gonna get a street in Oregon.
Speaker 2: In Portland, Oregon.
Speaker 1: We're gonna replace Caesar Chavez Road, which used to be
Speaker 1: Martin Luther King Junior, But because there's so much crime
Speaker 1: on MKA Junior Boulevard, they changed it to Caesar Chravis.
Speaker 1: Now they're gonna change it to Dame Lillard Boulevard. Because
Speaker 1: you know why, Dame Lillard is never fucking leaving Portland.
Speaker 2: We've got him forever. Portland fans look in the mirror
Speaker 2: and say this.
Speaker 1: We owe it to Dame to bring this man a ring.
Speaker 1: But you know what, if we don't, he is going
Speaker 1: to die. He's probably going to have a gravestone in Portland, Oregon.
Speaker 1: Let me just say this, The best news I could
Speaker 1: ever get as a Portland Trailblazer fan, knowing that we
Speaker 1: probably will never win a ring is knowing that Dame
Speaker 1: Willard will never leave us.
Speaker 2: Thank the Lord, baby Jesus. I guess, I guess that's
Speaker 2: just the bull.
Speaker 1: I guess the motion, the freedom of motion. The eighties
Speaker 1: and the nineties are largely considered to be the golden
Speaker 1: era of the NBA.
Speaker 2: Magic Bird Jordan, it's basically.
Speaker 1: The basketball equivalent of what your parents used to do
Speaker 1: or your grandparents used to do, where they're like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I used to walk to school in the snow with
Speaker 1: no shoes on, uphill both ways with a lunch pail
Speaker 1: box filled with potatoes.
Speaker 2: That's the NBA. That's the old heads in the NBA.
Speaker 1: Be like, listen, all these young guns, they don't know
Speaker 1: what it's like. They don't know what it's like to
Speaker 1: be assaulted when you go to the rim they do,
Speaker 1: they get a little slap on the hand and they
Speaker 1: go to the free throat line. I tell you what
Speaker 1: a slap in the slap in the hand was like
Speaker 1: a handshake. Back of my day, we only used.
Speaker 2: To get gas on Wednesdays. We used to line up
Speaker 2: around the block the Depression era.
Speaker 1: That's like the NBA players who we grew up loving.
Speaker 1: If you're my age, Shack and Penny and Charles Barkley,
Speaker 1: like Gow, these.
Speaker 2: Guys are so soft.
Speaker 1: Despite the guys today are in better shape, better condition,
Speaker 1: could jump higher, run faster, stronger. Earlier people believe that
Speaker 1: played in the nineties, those guys would not be able
Speaker 1: to let survive, let alone thrive in the nineties and
Speaker 1: the eighties. Why do they believe that, Well, because of
Speaker 1: something called the freedom of movement rule. Players in the
Speaker 1: NBA today have been given more freedom to move than
Speaker 1: they had in the eighties and nineties because oh, we
Speaker 1: wanted to.
Speaker 2: See more offense.
Speaker 1: We want We didn't want to see eighty seven ninety
Speaker 1: one games, so no hand checking shooters get a full
Speaker 1: landing area that extends multiple zip codes, full parking spaces
Speaker 1: for you to kick out and land wherever you want,
Speaker 1: and basically a guy has to come through and then
Speaker 1: move out of the way or you.
Speaker 2: Get a foul call. All of us.
Speaker 1: They said, it was to allow us to see the
Speaker 1: full breadth and the depth of the creativity and athleticism
Speaker 1: on display that these NBA players have in their quivers.
Speaker 2: But truthfully, it's for money.
Speaker 1: You know, it's so that it's more watchable and that
Speaker 1: the NBA can be more profitable.
Speaker 2: And it has been right. But economists would.
Speaker 1: Point out a little econ lesson for folks is there
Speaker 1: are certain things called unintended consequences. Right, you make a
Speaker 1: decision and then things happened that you didn't exactly see coming,
Speaker 1: and that happened in this freedom.
Speaker 2: Of movement rule.
Speaker 1: The unintended consequences of the freedom of movement rule were
Speaker 1: this one.
Speaker 2: All contact now favors the offense.
Speaker 1: So offensive players start initiating contact on purpose knowing that
Speaker 1: the refs are gonna call the foul on the defender
Speaker 1: because they get the benefit of the doubt, not the defender.
Speaker 1: They get to the free throw line quicker to the
Speaker 1: bonus quicker. Defenders that are defensive oriented players get in
Speaker 1: foul trouble earlier, so they either get fouled out or
Speaker 1: they back the fuck up and play more passive defense.
Speaker 1: They give them more room, which allows you to get
Speaker 1: more open shots, allowing points to go up and up
Speaker 1: and up. But not only did that happen, you also
Speaker 1: get guys like Trey Young and James Harden and Steph
Speaker 1: Curry exploit these rules, take advantage of these rules, take
Speaker 1: advantage of the system, start gaming the system, manipulating it
Speaker 1: like uh, you know, inside trading kind of a thing,
Speaker 1: like a manipulative investor. So scoring went up every year
Speaker 1: for seven straight years. We saw record free throw attempts.
Speaker 1: We also say out of the game that we love
Speaker 1: and this freedom of movement, this free flowing offense, that
Speaker 1: that was what it was intended to do, become stagnant
Speaker 1: on the other side because players just started throwing their
Speaker 1: bodies into their defenders, and instead of seeing motion, we
Speaker 1: started seeing free throws. Only nobody gives a fuck about
Speaker 1: just watching these specimen be at the free throw line
Speaker 1: all day.
Speaker 2: That's not what we want.
Speaker 1: So then the NBA is like, Okay, we gotta step in,
Speaker 1: we gotta do something about this. Enter this last offseason,
Speaker 1: the Competition Committee decided probably three years too late, truthfully,
Speaker 1: that this is at a fucking hand, Like Trey Young,
Speaker 1: you can't run and stop short like you do on
Speaker 1: the road, and it would be like if you as
Speaker 1: a speedy sports car literally are speeding up and you're
Speaker 1: in a race and you slow the fuck down, you
Speaker 1: put on your brakes, the other car hits you and
Speaker 1: they're like, yo, is your fault that you ran into
Speaker 1: this Frari. It's like, well, you should have saw that
Speaker 1: they were gonna stop. No, that's bullshit, right. They knew
Speaker 1: this needed to be eliminated, these non basketball moves because
Speaker 1: that's not a basketball move.
Speaker 2: We've seen it.
Speaker 1: Steve Nash said, what Trey Jung's doing is not basketball,
Speaker 1: even though Harden is doing the same thing.
Speaker 2: It's just kind of funny, kind of ironic.
Speaker 1: So they're like, okay, we gotta unvail a plan to
Speaker 1: eliminate these rules stemming from this player launching themselves into
Speaker 1: a defender.
Speaker 2: This guy.
Speaker 1: Monty mccletchen, of the NBA VP of Referee Development said this.
Speaker 1: The reason behind it was, we want to balance out
Speaker 1: the ability of a defensive player to compete with passion
Speaker 1: with an offensive player who can also compete with passion.
Speaker 1: What a wild, non scientific explanation behind it. And when
Speaker 1: we find that balance, good competition is the result. They
Speaker 1: don't want to favor either side too much, right eighties
Speaker 1: nineties too much defense, Uh, favored two tens too much offense.
Speaker 2: And now star players are fucked. They are so mad.
Speaker 1: Players are livid, Dame, Steph Harden, Trey, all of them, chucking,
Speaker 1: all of them brick city, right, just tough, tough, tough
Speaker 1: players who relied on the line, going to line like
Speaker 1: ten to fifteen times a game, like James Harden, have
Speaker 1: seen their attempts as a result, right like unders are hitting,
Speaker 1: They're decreasing like fifty percent in some cases. And now
Speaker 1: start are having to adjust and they are rugs, shrug,
Speaker 1: street Baby Trey, Dame Booker, PG all off to uncharacteristically
Speaker 1: slow starts. Remember I say the other day, what the
Speaker 1: fuck is up with Dame? Yeah, he can't literally launch
Speaker 1: his body into people anymore and become logo Lillard. Guys
Speaker 1: can just get up into his body, and then you know,
Speaker 1: free throw attempts way down, points, way down. Scoring Now,
Speaker 1: as a result of this rule change is at its
Speaker 1: lowest level on average since twenty fourteen. Who it's been
Speaker 1: seven years since we've seen points score this low. But
Speaker 1: the good news for folks, I guess it might be good,
Speaker 1: might be bad that the NBA might not even be
Speaker 1: done tweaking the rules.
Speaker 2: As it concerns transition.
Speaker 1: They're now I didn't even know this was a They
Speaker 1: had an actual word for it. They're called take fouls.
Speaker 1: The free you know, the clear path foul, They're called
Speaker 1: take fouls. So the Competition Committee encouraged the League office
Speaker 1: to now develop a new rule change that would basically
Speaker 1: eliminate this going forward, all of this for freedom of
Speaker 1: movement that made the game so exciting without allowing the
Speaker 1: thuggery of the bad boy Pistons.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's gonna be a really interesting thing to watch.
Speaker 1: I think from a betting perspective, you're gonna need to
Speaker 1: take the unders on all of those little chuckers. Take
Speaker 1: the unders on Dame, Take the unders on Harden.
Speaker 2: I got burned on that.
Speaker 1: Take the unders on Trey, Take the unders on Steph.
Speaker 1: And for other players like DeMar Derosian and Rashaan Holmes,
Speaker 1: guys who can actually play through contact because they are
Speaker 1: built ready to play in the eighties and nineties, the
Speaker 1: rule changes are actually allowing them to thrive and for others,
Speaker 1: like I said, like Dame, like Trey, like Harden Sink
Speaker 1: or swim Baby, because these rule changes, I hate to say,
Speaker 1: are here to stay city bitch Rag rag City, Bitch
Speaker 1: rag City, bitch rack rack City, Bitch rack City, bitch
Speaker 1: rack Rex. Remember how hard it was for players to
Speaker 1: adjust to FEBA, Like I don't think I saw I
Speaker 1: don't think I saw Dame make a three pointer in
Speaker 1: the Olympics until like the gold medal game, like Chason
Speaker 1: Tatum was like these guys looked awful, right, Obviously, we
Speaker 1: like we just talked about, these rule changes in FOEBA
Speaker 1: are very similar to these new rule changes.
Speaker 2: That was one reason.
Speaker 1: Another reason, though, was the ball the ball article after article,
Speaker 1: what's up with these new spongy balls, these weird colored,
Speaker 1: weird seam balls. Right, So imagine if you took FOEBA rules,
Speaker 1: which we're now seeing some of them, at least as
Speaker 1: it relates to foul calls, and then you added a
Speaker 1: foeb ball, janky ass feb ball, and forced it upon
Speaker 1: the NBA. You would fucking hate to see that. Except
Speaker 1: for that is what's happening right now. That is where
Speaker 1: we're at. New rules, new ball, brick city, bitch back,
Speaker 1: brick city, bitch ten.
Speaker 2: And let's face it.
Speaker 1: The first part of the NBA season has seen great
Speaker 1: shooters like Dame Trey do nothing but clink, and you
Speaker 1: can't really figure out why is it? The ball is
Speaker 1: the rule changes, I don't know Offenses. Offense is down
Speaker 1: five points per game on average this year, the lowest total,
Speaker 1: Like I said earlier since twenty fourteen.
Speaker 2: The Harden rule is a part of it.
Speaker 1: These guys have gone from shooting ten free throws a
Speaker 1: game to five free throws a game.
Speaker 2: I'm sure that's a part of it.
Speaker 1: But I did say last year the basketball is going
Speaker 1: to be a problem trying to play.
Speaker 2: I like the Wilson ball.
Speaker 1: I like the Wilson Evolution ball, but I grew up
Speaker 1: on the Wilson Evolution ball because truthfully, my poor ass
Speaker 1: couldn't afford a real leather basketball, So the spongy, sort
Speaker 1: of composite element of the evolution was sort of like
Speaker 1: great indoor balls versus some rubber, weird Nike ball that
Speaker 1: I use on double rims and metal nets and shit, Like,
Speaker 1: I'm not a basketball player, right, Like, I'm not an
Speaker 1: NBA basketball player. I'm not used to Spaulding, and now
Speaker 1: these guys are having to adjust.
Speaker 2: Let's refresh what I said.
Speaker 1: Spalding has been an official basketball of the NBA since
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty four. I mean that was Michael Jordan's rookie year.
Speaker 1: The ball has been the same since Michael Jordan's rookie year.
Speaker 1: Three generations of stars have only known that type of ball.
Speaker 1: And this year, for some fucking weird reason, Adam Silver
Speaker 1: doing new things. He's instituting new rules just because he
Speaker 1: just wants to do it. He's like, ah, you know,
Speaker 1: like like playing tournament, all the guys put on the
Speaker 1: same like exact minute, just like European soccer.
Speaker 2: We're gonna like have them not be able to know
Speaker 2: who's in who's out.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be awesome. Like EPL is so cool, Let's
Speaker 1: do EPL things. That's what he's doing now, Okay, Like
Speaker 1: we're gonna do a mid season tournament just like the EPL.
Speaker 1: We're gonna institute some new balls. So he int to
Speaker 1: deal this offseason with Wilson for the seventy fifth anniversary,
Speaker 1: Like not a great time. To start changing things up
Speaker 1: when we're talking about lists and however, when is stacking
Speaker 1: up and these new rule changes. But okay, put a
Speaker 1: new ball into the mix too, So what's the problem
Speaker 1: with that. Well, Paul George has is one of the players,
Speaker 1: is one of the greater shooters in the NBA, and
Speaker 1: he has a massive problem.
Speaker 2: This is what he says in a postgame pressure PG.
Speaker 1: He said he did not want to use the Wilson
Speaker 1: ball as an excuse of why no one's making shots. Oh,
Speaker 1: the Calves did hold the clips to seventy nine points
Speaker 1: in that game.
Speaker 2: But he basically said, yeah, hey, this ball fucking sucks.
Speaker 1: Like this ball, no one likes this ball. Uh, this
Speaker 1: is the ball. The Wilson is a different basketball, he said.
Speaker 1: It doesn't have the same touch, doesn't have the same
Speaker 1: softness that the Spalding ball has had. Wait wait, so
Speaker 1: so the ball is a different touch, has a different softness,
Speaker 1: comes off the rim, different, comes off the floor different.
Speaker 2: But we're just gonna like.
Speaker 1: Add that and the rule change into the mix and
Speaker 1: like not expect things to change.
Speaker 2: This is a rough Row moment. Thks Row scoomy Row.
Speaker 1: Spalding balls are made from full grain hoar ween leather,
Speaker 1: which makes them yeah, I know this.
Speaker 2: We're gonna get a little bit into the details of
Speaker 2: this little.
Speaker 1: Nerding nerdy shit horween leather, which makes them almost impossible
Speaker 1: to break in unless you're playing eighty two games a year. Like,
Speaker 1: they are awful when you first get them, but they
Speaker 1: are buttersoft once they're broken in, like a nice leather jacket.
Speaker 2: You know, like you need ten years. They are using
Speaker 2: balls probably still from nineteen eighty four. They're probably using.
Speaker 1: Those same balls because that's how long it takes to
Speaker 1: break them in. Players though love broken in leather, of course,
Speaker 1: of course they do. On the other hand, Wilson balls,
Speaker 1: like I said, are cheaper traditionally manufactured with Evo microfiber
Speaker 1: composite materials to provide a consistent feel from day one.
Speaker 1: We are in science class, folks. This makes Wilson balls tacky.
Speaker 1: So they have like a good grip due to wicking
Speaker 1: away the outer layer, which is a great ball from
Speaker 1: they wear out faster.
Speaker 2: Let's just end they're spongier.
Speaker 1: They're just like a weird spalding balls are like very
Speaker 1: firm and then they sort of soften. Then the Wilson
Speaker 1: balls are always soft, but kind of spongy. There's this
Speaker 1: is the reason that Kevin Durant tweeted this out.
Speaker 2: When they announced the change.
Speaker 1: He tweeted out, oh hell no, when Shams broke the news,
Speaker 1: how do we know that he likes that Spalding ball. Well,
Speaker 1: he shot forty five percent from three with the Spalding
Speaker 1: this year through eight games, He's shooting thirty seven percent
Speaker 1: from three with the Wilson.
Speaker 2: That is not just a slight difference.
Speaker 1: That is a what we would call a statistical and
Speaker 1: not like three standard deviations out in terms of oh yeah,
Speaker 1: this is a fucking problem.
Speaker 2: We might need to go back to this Spalding ball asap.
Speaker 1: Rocky Wilson says they tried to emulate the Spaulding ball.
Speaker 1: It's a lie. They said that they utilize the same leather,
Speaker 1: but it's not the same.
Speaker 2: It is not the same.
Speaker 1: Multiple people have said that the Wilson grooves are longer,
Speaker 1: supposedly for a firmer grip. But how do we know
Speaker 1: that it's a problem. Well, Sham's reported this. NBA and
Speaker 1: Formed teams today that the Competition Committee is unanimously supportive
Speaker 1: of the league's new rules. Officiating non basketball moves and
Speaker 1: the new Wilson game ball was also discussed, with the
Speaker 1: league and players working directly with Wilson to adjust as appropriate,
Speaker 1: which means this ball is fucked up, right. We all
Speaker 1: know what you see. We're seeing it.
Speaker 2: We know that it's not the non basketball moves. It's
Speaker 2: the ball. You don't discuss a ball unless there's something wrong, right,
Speaker 2: unless it's a problem. Devin Booker is clunking away and
Speaker 2: he is a bucket. He's shooting twenty eight percent right
Speaker 2: now from three and said, the Wilson ball feels different
Speaker 2: ball to ball.
Speaker 1: Uh, oh no, that's not what listen. You can't have
Speaker 1: the balls not be consistent from court to court. This
Speaker 1: isn't fucking high school here. This isn't the random Like, oh,
Speaker 1: We're gonna go up the Rutger today and use you know,
Speaker 1: Tommy's ball for game one and JoJo's ball for game
Speaker 1: two and three, and then I'll bring my own ball,
Speaker 1: Like whoever wins the game gets to bring their own ball.
Speaker 1: The game is fucked up.
Speaker 2: Something, something's going on here. The current NBA.
Speaker 1: Three point percentage right now is thirty four point two percent.
Speaker 1: That is the lowest sense nineteen ninety eight, nineteen ninety nine,
Speaker 1: the whole league as a whole is shooting forty four percent,
Speaker 1: which is the lowest sense two thousand and four.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's not the ball, right, it's not wink wink,
Speaker 2: wink wink.
Speaker 1: I don't care what the NBA is trying to pedal.
Speaker 1: They need to fix this fucking fast, and they just
Speaker 1: put whatever they use in five Serve Forum to make
Speaker 1: opponents airball threes all day into NBA arenas. I don't
Speaker 1: think that that's what it is. I don't think it's
Speaker 1: just like some anomaly in the humidity of the arena.
Speaker 2: It is the ball. It is the ball, and it's
Speaker 2: probably the rule change.
Speaker 1: It's probably some combination of both until you figure out
Speaker 1: they need to get rid of one of these things
Speaker 1: and then figure out what's happening.
Speaker 2: I assume that if the Wilson probably paid them a
Speaker 2: lot of money, right they did.
Speaker 1: They're not gonna be able to go back to Spalding.
Speaker 1: But they should really just do. They should just hire
Speaker 1: Spaulding and then put the name Wilson on it. That's
Speaker 1: really what they should do. It's gonna be brick City
Speaker 1: for sure until Dame and Beal and Trey get used
Speaker 1: to it, and the harsh truth is that it's worse
Speaker 1: for the.
Speaker 2: Game when they have it in.
Speaker 1: That's all the time that we have for the heat check.
Speaker 1: We back Monday evening. Please do not miss it. Do
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Speaker 2: Us a rating. We need ratings.
Speaker 1: Listen, there are people for my old job still giving
Speaker 1: me bad ratings on Spotify and Apple.
Speaker 2: They're just trolls, So.
Speaker 1: Give me a five star to boost this thing up.
Speaker 1: All right, We'll see you Monday, pot give my Monday Panto.
Speaker 2: Get it in the morning like Alonzo run Ring, got
Speaker 2: cheese like a nutcho feeling I know as bitch wear Pancho,
Speaker 2: and Pancho got my seat back next daring that I
Speaker 2: don't get that