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Speaker 2: All right, welcome to hoops tonight. You're at the volume.
Speaker 2: Happy Sunday everybody. This NBA Finals Game two Instant Reaction
Speaker 2: is brought to you by Chase Freedom Unlimited.
Speaker 3: How do you cash back? All right?
Speaker 2: So the Celtics win Game two one oh five to
Speaker 2: ninety eight. Shoot poorly, but do enough have an excellent
Speaker 2: defensive performance As the role players and co star for
Speaker 2: the Dallas Mavericks continue to struggle.
Speaker 3: We've got Colin Coward here. We're gonna break it all down.
Speaker 2: Colin, how much of this to this point, do you
Speaker 2: view as the Celtics presenting just problems that Dallas can't solve,
Speaker 2: versus Dallas kind of having the finals yips and struggling
Speaker 2: a bit on the road.
Speaker 1: Well, Kyrie hasn't played. It'd be nice if he showed
Speaker 1: up for the finals. You know, Tatum will get more
Speaker 1: heat because he's in his athletic prime and we're kind
Speaker 1: of waiting for the moment from him, and Kyrie's had
Speaker 1: the shot and the title in the moment, but Kyrie
Speaker 1: hasn't delivered. But I mean when Porzingis and Tatum are
Speaker 1: really off their offensive games, they're shooting games and you
Speaker 1: kind of controlled the second half. Dallas again last game
Speaker 1: had a really nice run, had a nine to nothing
Speaker 1: run in this game. They are a streaky hot offense
Speaker 1: if Luca gets rolling. But I mean mostly outside of two,
Speaker 1: three or four minute right, I could take six minutes
Speaker 1: out of this series. It's lopsided, like it's not particularly close.
Speaker 1: I like the Celtics and six and I felt at
Speaker 1: the time, is they listen, they can just man up.
Speaker 1: Their biggest can be honest and they're just they're just
Speaker 1: two we all talk offense. They're too good defensively, they're
Speaker 1: just they got too many guys that can manu up.
Speaker 1: I mean, they got guys that didn't make All NBA
Speaker 1: that if they weren't on the Celtics, they didn't want
Speaker 1: three guys on the Celtics All NBA defense. So I
Speaker 1: think some of it is just Boston's got better dudes.
Speaker 1: And I think we all realize that Denver Boston were
Speaker 1: the best teams. But it happens Minnesota constructed to beat Denver.
Speaker 1: Denver led by twenty in that game in Game seven,
Speaker 1: or I think we'd have a really compelling six to
Speaker 1: seven game series.
Speaker 3: What I see is a.
Speaker 1: I mean, Tatum on Iso threes has been horrible and
Speaker 1: it has no effect on the outcome that is that's different.
Speaker 1: I mean Kyrie and no show. This is mostly a
Speaker 1: lopsided series. So there's just this this cushion Boston has
Speaker 1: that Dallas doesn't. That's what I see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I look at it mostly as problems that Boston presents.
Speaker 2: So there's gonna be a lot of talk about the shooting.
Speaker 2: And there's no doubt that Dallas is not playing well
Speaker 2: outside of Luca on the offensive end of the floor.
Speaker 2: And for the record, I don't think this is a sweep.
Speaker 2: I think Dallas will go home and get one. I
Speaker 2: think that they're due for a bunch of role players
Speaker 2: to break out. I think Kyrie has struggled a little
Speaker 2: bit with the Boston crowd just with all of the energies,
Speaker 2: the negative energy surrounding that situation. I think going home
Speaker 2: will be good for him. But the reality is is
Speaker 2: like Boston hasn't really gotten going offensively to the level
Speaker 2: that they're capable of, outside of a brief run in
Speaker 2: the first half of Game one, like even after that point,
Speaker 2: they cooled off substantially. Like you know, it's funny. I
Speaker 2: really look at it to a very basic problem for Dallas,
Speaker 2: which is they cannot contain the basketball. There's this so,
Speaker 2: as you know, I coach in the high school level,
Speaker 2: and when I'm doing the skill development with the kids,
Speaker 2: like king of the Court so they can practice on
Speaker 2: their games, and I use this like simple kind of
Speaker 2: idea to try to convince them to pass the ball more.
Speaker 2: I'll let them play King of the Court with the
Speaker 2: defender right on them, and they'll barely ever score. It'll
Speaker 2: be like one out of every ten times. And then
Speaker 2: I'll have him do it with the closeout, where like
Speaker 2: the kid has to start underneath the basket and throw
Speaker 2: the ball and then sprint out at the defender or
Speaker 2: at the offensive player, and they score like four or
Speaker 2: five times out of ten. They're like many many orders
Speaker 2: of magnitude better offensively. Now at the pro level, that's
Speaker 2: a smaller gap, but it's still a gap. And that's
Speaker 2: really the problem here is Boston can just easily get
Speaker 2: that first little bit of dribble penetration, and then what
Speaker 2: they're doing is they're throwing the ball to thirty million
Speaker 2: dollar players who are standing at the perimeter just waiting
Speaker 2: for a guy who's sprinting with his hair on fire
Speaker 2: to get out to close out. It's just unsustainable. And
Speaker 2: it's not just Luca. And by the way, Luca's getting
Speaker 2: hounded all over the place when he's on every possession.
Speaker 2: But it's not just Luca. There's a bunch of Dallas
Speaker 2: players that are struggling to contain the ball. They're going
Speaker 2: at Gafford and just going right around him every single time.
Speaker 2: They're taking smaller players into the post. It's a problem.
Speaker 2: They just they can't contain the basketball. And then Boston
Speaker 2: has so much offball talent, and then even there's nobody
Speaker 2: they can ignore to just park somebody in the paint,
Speaker 2: or to every time they double every time Luca just
Speaker 2: randomly decides to kind of double team the ball. They're
Speaker 2: just in rotation. Again, That to me is the fundamental issue.
Speaker 2: I do think Dallas will have better offensive nights as
Speaker 2: they move back to Dallas, as they move back home,
Speaker 2: but I just don't know how they solve the problem
Speaker 2: that they can't guard Boston well.
Speaker 1: And something else is let's focus on Tatum. So I've
Speaker 1: always said I feel like Tatum's in the top ten,
Speaker 1: somewhere about eight, but there is sort of that finishing
Speaker 1: element that it just doesn't feel like the all time greats.
Speaker 1: Prime example in this game, Jalen Brown, when they inched
Speaker 1: back closer late, Jalen Brown bursts past this guy, highly
Speaker 1: athletic move. He seals it a couple possessions earlier, Tatum
Speaker 1: just couldn't get it going. And you know my take
Speaker 1: on Tatum was he actually assisted well, he defended well,
Speaker 1: There's a lot of things he did well. But our
Speaker 1: lifetime Kareem Bird, Lebron, Steph Duncan, Michael, we need a
Speaker 1: basket He's not consistently that guy. Now again defensively, I
Speaker 1: mean rebounds, he fills the stat sheet. But again Boston
Speaker 1: won a title. It's Paul Pierce. It's kg like, we
Speaker 1: want our guys to get their points. And with Tatum,
Speaker 1: I just feel like we just and I've said this,
Speaker 1: I picked Brown to be the MVP of this series.
Speaker 1: I know what I get with Jalen Tatum. It depends
Speaker 1: on the matchup. It depends on his headspace, where is
Speaker 1: he at. Is he playing with confidence? It's not a
Speaker 1: knock on him, but Boston is built to overcome his
Speaker 1: really bad three point shooting series. They're built for it.
Speaker 1: They just got so many dudes. It's kind of becoming
Speaker 1: the series. I thought it would look like. I just
Speaker 1: thought Kyrie would be more available. But man, when you Boston,
Speaker 1: I'm watching Porzingis's limping. Tatum at one point was I
Speaker 1: have this written down here. He was eight for forty four,
Speaker 1: eighteen percent on ISO threes, So I mean he was
Speaker 1: just you know, is this yeah eight vers at forty four.
Speaker 1: It was eighteen percent And it has no impact outside today.
Speaker 1: I mean, forget the first game. It was a blowout.
Speaker 1: If you take out a nine to nothing Dallas run.
Speaker 1: It is a blowout. I mean, there wasn't a moment
Speaker 1: in the second half I thought, oh, Dallas is gonna
Speaker 1: come back. So also, Lively, he's a rookie, he's not
Speaker 1: playing great, So this happens. I think this not every finals.
Speaker 1: I mean, we saw San Antonio early Lebron team in Cleveland.
Speaker 1: You're like, like a like a game and a half in,
Speaker 1: You're like, yeah, this isn't gonna work. They got way
Speaker 1: more good players. I kind of feel like, I mean,
Speaker 1: Luca now is not at one hundred percent. I kind
Speaker 1: of feel like Dallas will steal Game three. But I
Speaker 1: think it may be a five game. That's what it
Speaker 1: feels like to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I this this screams five gamer to me too.
Speaker 2: I gave I gave them six because I figured they
Speaker 2: Boston has a tendency too in game two's after they
Speaker 2: win Game one convincingly to kind of let their foot
Speaker 2: off the.
Speaker 1: Gas and are weird at home. Boston's weird at home.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I don't actually think they've lost a road playoff game
Speaker 2: this year yet, which is going to be an interesting
Speaker 2: thing when they get going there. But like, yeah, I
Speaker 2: mean on the on the Dallas front, the to me,
Speaker 2: the the offensive issues go deeper than just guys struggling
Speaker 2: on the road too, Like Boston having put Jason Tatum
Speaker 2: on their center has completely janked up their offense because
Speaker 2: now there's just so much there's so many bodies in
Speaker 2: the paint. Derek Jones, Junior PJ. Washington don't know how
Speaker 2: to operate in those ball screens. Another big thing too,
Speaker 2: you talked about all the guys that can guard, like
Speaker 2: Al Horford switched on to Luca is A is a
Speaker 2: great matchup for Boston. They just live with that. They
Speaker 2: feel like he can guard there. So like they're just
Speaker 2: there's not a lot of great options for Dallas to
Speaker 2: get good opportunities for the role players so that they
Speaker 2: can get going. Now, Kyrie is the one guy where
Speaker 2: you're like, dude, you just got to do more. You've had,
Speaker 2: you know, six thirty point games in your NBA Finals career.
Speaker 3: You got to find a way to do more. Right.
Speaker 2: But like the other stuff, I really struggle with them
Speaker 2: finding a way to kind of find those openings. As
Speaker 2: far as the Superstar part goes with Boston, I find
Speaker 2: this super fascinating because this entire finals is very different
Speaker 2: from some of the finals we've seen in NBA history,
Speaker 2: where it's like Steph first Lebron or it's you know
Speaker 2: these guys, we see these big apex kind of stars,
Speaker 2: and like it's like weird seeing a team led by
Speaker 2: a Jason Tatum who's as kind of funky in as
Speaker 2: flawed as he is as a superstar. It's weird seeing
Speaker 2: Luca as the superstar of Dallas just getting hunted relentlessly
Speaker 2: on the on the defensive end of the floor. I
Speaker 2: think with Tatum, and really it all just starts with
Speaker 2: where you're beginning the conversation, Like if you're beginning the
Speaker 2: conversation with is Tatum a apex superstar with the top
Speaker 2: guys in the league, it's just no, you're just gonna
Speaker 2: run into all these issues.
Speaker 3: He doesn't.
Speaker 2: He's not good enough at kind of like confidently taking
Speaker 2: command of a basketball game. He has like no go
Speaker 2: to movie can go to that is like I'm going
Speaker 2: to get a bucket here half the time, Like he
Speaker 2: doesn't have any of that stuff. But once you put
Speaker 2: him down in the tier below that, you start to
Speaker 2: look at him more as like he's a multi tooled
Speaker 2: player who can do a bunch of different things to
Speaker 2: help him. His ability to hold up against Gafford on
Speaker 2: the glass and to switch out in pick and roll
Speaker 2: has been the major adjustment that has caused problems for
Speaker 2: Dallas offensively. And then, yeah, if you put on a
Speaker 2: team like this with five really good offensive players, if
Speaker 2: you put a ball hog out there, it might mess
Speaker 2: everything up. And he's not that guy. And so in
Speaker 2: a weird way, you talk about this all the time
Speaker 2: with the NFL, like if a GM is prioritizing offensive
Speaker 2: line player players and like skill players, they're telling you
Speaker 2: that they're worried about their quarterbacks ability to kind of
Speaker 2: make something from nothing, right, they're telling you what they
Speaker 2: think that That's what I look at with the Brad
Speaker 2: Stevens piece. Here he by going to get Porzingis and
Speaker 2: Drew Holliday. He told you what he thought about Jalen
Speaker 2: Brown and Ja That's right, these guys aren't good enough.
Speaker 2: I need to give them just an overwhelming amount of
Speaker 2: support in order for them to accentuate their strengths. And
Speaker 2: it's worked wonderfully in this season.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no GMS. When you can get rid of Tyreek
Speaker 1: Hill for Patrick Mahomes. They're telling you we can win
Speaker 1: a lot of games without the fastest player in the world,
Speaker 1: and I thought, you know, Porzingis was a bit of
Speaker 1: a steal, to be honest. We talked about this last time.
Speaker 1: The league. The league would not doesn't really want what
Speaker 1: Boston's doing. They don't want like five high end players
Speaker 1: on a single team, but they kind of stole them.
Speaker 1: And then you generate that trade with Drew Holliday, who's
Speaker 1: like a better version of Marcus Smart, especially on offense.
Speaker 3: He was good.
Speaker 1: He was really good today. So I think I think
Speaker 1: we're getting this series. We thought, I am happy Jalen
Speaker 1: Brown won the Eastern Conference, you know, finals player MVP,
Speaker 1: I think he'll win, has a good chance to win
Speaker 1: the finals MVP. And I think Jalen Brown And also,
Speaker 1: did you notice during the time he's doing a majority
Speaker 1: of the talking like he is, he's the leader.
Speaker 3: He is the valpha ye.
Speaker 1: Way more of an alpha, And so I think, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's okay. Like I said, my concern about them
Speaker 1: coming into the series was are they too collaborative?
Speaker 3: But they're not.
Speaker 1: That was a question. It wasn't a referendum or a
Speaker 1: definitive statement. I'm like, are they too collaborative? Nah, it
Speaker 1: kind of works. I think Denver would have been a
Speaker 1: much tougher match, but that's the way the breaks work.
Speaker 1: And I said this before the finals. I said, Boston's
Speaker 1: too good not to win one, but they're too weird
Speaker 1: to be a dynasty. They lose at home, they don't
Speaker 1: have an alpha. I think my take is I would
Speaker 1: bet money that Denver comes back next year and wins,
Speaker 1: and I think Minnesota is going to rearrange the deck chairs.
Speaker 1: Boston We'll still be really, really good, but I don't
Speaker 1: think Boston's a three straight championship team. Also, eventually after
Speaker 1: next year, they may have to move off some pieces
Speaker 1: because of the maxis to Tatum and Brown. But I
Speaker 1: think we're seeing kind of what we thought. You know,
Speaker 1: the notes I have right here, Boston getting much better shots,
Speaker 1: Boston Tatum, it was a lot you know, porzingis Tatum
Speaker 1: not great offensively not an issue. Boston back to back
Speaker 1: three's biggest lead. You know. One of the things I
Speaker 1: also noticed is that Kyrie's not getting assists. The Mavericks
Speaker 1: aren't getting a ton of them, which usually tells you
Speaker 1: stagnant ball movement. You know, Luca was doing some clever stuff,
Speaker 1: but it's a nothing. I don't there's not a lot
Speaker 1: of continuity with Dallas's offense. I mean, you're the guy
Speaker 1: that coaches. To me, it just doesn't feel like there's
Speaker 1: any rhythm to a lot of their offensive possessions.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's by design, Like so again, in order
Speaker 2: for there to be so To give you an example
Speaker 2: in game one, the I haven't looked at the numbers
Speaker 2: from game two yet, but one of the things that
Speaker 2: you look at as an indicator of getting the defense
Speaker 2: in rotation, meaning like to get the defense in rotation,
Speaker 2: you need to engage a help defender. Because as soon
Speaker 2: as you engage a help defender, you've brought a second
Speaker 2: defender to the ball, which means off the ball you
Speaker 2: have four on three, right, that's where your advantage is now.
Speaker 2: From there, when you make a kickout pass, it's a
Speaker 2: spot up opportunity if they drive the close out or
Speaker 2: if they shoot a three. In game one, Boston generated
Speaker 2: thirty six spot up opportunities and Dallas generated twelve. And
Speaker 2: that is the main issue there is they're not getting
Speaker 2: Luca and Kyrie have not been good enough on an
Speaker 2: island as scorers to consistently bring multiple players to the ball,
Speaker 2: which will get those opportunities. For example, in Game one
Speaker 2: on ISOs, Dallas got just zero point five to four
Speaker 2: points per possession including passes. That's why would you send
Speaker 2: an extra defender. They're getting stops. To your point, their
Speaker 2: dudes are getting stops, and so like it's kind of
Speaker 2: like a trickle down effect. If you don't demonstrate the
Speaker 2: threat of actually bringing in that second defender, you're not
Speaker 2: going to get the opportunities to get the other guys going.
Speaker 2: In Game three, what has to happen for Dallas is
Speaker 2: Kyrie and Luca have to so deeply compromise the defense
Speaker 2: that they start to warp Boston in on them to
Speaker 2: generate those opportunities. And they just haven't been able to
Speaker 2: do that to this point. Like Boston's looking at those
Speaker 2: numbers from Luca twelve for twenty one, four for nine
Speaker 2: from three thirty two points. They don't care, like they
Speaker 2: they've been they've been shooting terribly and they've been winning
Speaker 2: this entire series. So like at the end, at the
Speaker 2: end of the day, like they're like Luca, we're making
Speaker 2: Luca work hard. Luca had eight turnovers tonight. So if
Speaker 2: you if you actually like piece it all together, the
Speaker 2: total number of possessions for him to take twenty one shots,
Speaker 2: to go four for eight from the foul line into
Speaker 2: and to turn the ball over eight times and only
Speaker 2: have thirty two points, Like that's a battle that Boston
Speaker 2: is like kind of winning, Like they're they're they're Dallas
Speaker 2: scored ninety eight points.
Speaker 3: They're not.
Speaker 2: They're they're they're they're trying. It's like a bend but
Speaker 2: don't break kind of concept, like they're just we're gonna
Speaker 2: take our lumps. Luca's gonna hit some step back threes,
Speaker 2: He's gonna hit some tough shots. But if we stay
Speaker 2: home off the ball, well, we're doing well enough on
Speaker 2: a per possession basis that we don't need to overreact,
Speaker 2: and they're not getting enough from Kyrie. Now, maybe things
Speaker 2: will change in Game two if Kyrie can get going.
Speaker 2: But I still think it's gonna come down to the
Speaker 2: stars because there's nothing that Boston has to react to
Speaker 2: in terms of sending extra defenders that will get PJ.
Speaker 2: Washington wide open corner threes, or we'll get Derek Jones
Speaker 2: Junior wide open cuts off of the wing. Like I
Speaker 2: maintain that these are problems that I don't think that
Speaker 2: they can solve. I mean, so, what do you think?
Speaker 2: Do you think Dallas will come back in game three?
Speaker 2: Is that what you're looking at it?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Dallas wins game three, Boston wins the next two.
Speaker 1: And I think Porzingis is a little limpy and gimpy.
Speaker 1: I think the same thing. Luke is not a one
Speaker 1: hundred percent. But you know, if Porzingis again gives you
Speaker 1: twenty minutes ten each half, you know size length, it
Speaker 1: feels like it's over.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: There's two other topics I want to address won Dan Hurley.
Speaker 1: So I was told by a really good source today
Speaker 1: Lakers have offered him the job. Dan and his boys
Speaker 1: really liked it. They're kind of it's cool. You know,
Speaker 1: his wife's from Jersey, where that's a whole different ballgame.
Speaker 1: LA is very intimidating to people who don't live here.
Speaker 1: It's not a money issue. The finances being reported are
Speaker 1: a little I'm not sure if I believe him. I'll
Speaker 1: believe it when I see it. So I've heard various reports.
Speaker 1: One way too low, one feels too high. But I'm
Speaker 1: going to guess because the NBA runs through coaches much
Speaker 1: like the NFL. Sixty year seven a year and I
Speaker 1: told a friend, I said, I don't know if the
Speaker 1: Knicks would hire him, I said, but would it be
Speaker 1: shocking if next year, like this year, the Knicks fall
Speaker 1: apart in the playoffs. There's some complaining about how hard
Speaker 1: Tibbs coaches and the minutes he plays, and everybody goes,
Speaker 1: get the guy from Yukon. If he wins an international championship,
Speaker 1: that to me is a potentially better gig. Wife's happy,
Speaker 1: closer to home, easier conference. You've got a star, but
Speaker 1: it's not the burden of sort of Lebron at the
Speaker 1: end of his career or Anthony Davis, who maybe the
Speaker 1: best two in the league in a decade but doesn't
Speaker 1: always feel like a one offensively. So that's what I
Speaker 1: was told, is that Hurley will make a decision tomorrow.
Speaker 1: My gut is, I don't know why I feel this.
Speaker 1: He won't take the job, and my feeling is there's
Speaker 1: going to be better opportunities the Lakers job right now.
Speaker 1: The best part of it is the brand in college sports,
Speaker 1: like if George is available and they're down in the dumps,
Speaker 1: you take the job. Texas is available because I get
Speaker 1: twenty five players a year in football, right or basketball,
Speaker 1: the transfer portal, I can get twelve new guys.
Speaker 3: NBA is different.
Speaker 1: There's real limitations if you don't have a lot of
Speaker 1: draft picks, If unless you have expiring contracts, it's hard.
Speaker 1: You're not going to get rid of Lebron and Ad.
Speaker 1: You probably don't want to get rid of Austin Reeves.
Speaker 1: You know, what are you gonna get for a lot
Speaker 1: of these guys, these rotational guys. So I think it's
Speaker 1: one of those things where you know, in the NBA
Speaker 1: also makes you match contracts when you make trades. It's
Speaker 1: a hard league to make big trades. And so my
Speaker 1: gut feeling is Dan Hurley Tomorrow calls and says, I mean,
Speaker 1: ask yourself this when you know it, you know it
Speaker 1: he interviewed like forty eight hours ago, right, Like, it's
Speaker 1: like you kind of make the call, right, So I
Speaker 1: w'ch my gut feeling. How's it land for you?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: So I'm a literally like I'm still kind of feeling
Speaker 2: fifty to fifty Like it kind of felt to me
Speaker 2: when this whole saga started that it was a Monday call,
Speaker 2: Like it just seem yeah here because Dan Hurley is
Speaker 2: not in a position of desperation like he is. He's
Speaker 2: incredibly well established where he is. And also he knows
Speaker 2: the Lakers are gonna wait for him. So like, even
Speaker 2: if you said, hey, I need another week, like they'd
Speaker 2: wait another week before they turn around and hire you know,
Speaker 2: Brego or somebody like that. Right, So, like I get
Speaker 2: why they're waiting. I'm with you that I'm still kind
Speaker 2: of like I'm very cautious about getting too stoked about
Speaker 2: it your opinion though about potentially waiting for a better job.
Speaker 2: Let's just be straight. I want Dan Hurley to go
Speaker 2: to the Lakers because I root for the Lakers, but
Speaker 2: like the that's not the best job. And here's the
Speaker 2: reason why, Like this is a this is an ownership
Speaker 2: group that has demonstrated a considerable amount of incompetence over
Speaker 2: the last ten years or so.
Speaker 3: Like they don't have a lot of money.
Speaker 2: They let Alex Crusoe walk simply because of money. And
Speaker 2: you know how much the Lakers could have used Alex
Speaker 2: Crusoe over the course of the last couple of years,
Speaker 2: Like letting Julius Randa walk for nothing, letting Brook Lopez
Speaker 2: walk for nothing, the whole Magic Johnson fiasco, like the
Speaker 2: disrespect of Tylou during their negotiation to not treating him
Speaker 2: like a championship coach in the summer of twenty eighteen.
Speaker 2: There's like all of this stuff over the last half
Speaker 2: dozen years that would lead you to believe that, Like,
Speaker 2: it's a little bit of a volatile situation. So I
Speaker 2: want him to go there, But you'd be a fool
Speaker 2: if you if you weren't actually looking around behind the
Speaker 2: scenes and making phone calls. I guarantee you Dan Hurley
Speaker 2: has heard the ugly stuff, and I'm sure that he's
Speaker 2: had some uh, I'm sure he's had some reticence there
Speaker 2: that said, like you said, he gets stoked with his
Speaker 2: boys when he goes on the visit because it's the
Speaker 2: Los Angeles Lakers. Man, It's it's it's just there's something,
Speaker 2: there's a cool factor there, right, I think I think
Speaker 2: even just extending it to the scope of NBA history,
Speaker 2: like when they tell the story of Lebron James's career,
Speaker 2: what if you were the guy who coached him for
Speaker 2: the last couple of years, what if you made a
Speaker 2: deep playoff runt or if you had have God forbid,
Speaker 2: you won a title or something like that. Like there's
Speaker 2: a there's a level of basketball immortality that I think
Speaker 2: Dan Hurley could be factoring in here as well.
Speaker 1: So the other story is the Caitlin Clark didn't make
Speaker 1: the Olympics and uh, which which is funny because people
Speaker 1: get you know, the Olympic teams are interesting. When you
Speaker 1: get to the bottom or the back end of an
Speaker 1: Olympic roster, it gets political. I mean, you know, Devin
Speaker 1: Booker made this year's team, Kyrie Irving and Jalen Brown didn't.
Speaker 1: And I think most gms would take those guys. Kyrie
Speaker 1: is the most talented, Jalen's the most versatile. Booker can
Speaker 1: hit shots, and he made it. Steve Kerr's the coach.
Speaker 1: You know, Phoenix is in the West. I mean, who
Speaker 1: knows why. I mean, sometimes the guys you want to
Speaker 1: you want to coach a guy, you want to create
Speaker 1: a relationship with a guy, like we all know that
Speaker 1: Laytoner made it. Michael didn't one Isaiah on the team.
Speaker 1: It got political, so Christian later made the team.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: Diana Tarassi right now for the women's team is not
Speaker 1: as good as Kaitlyn Clark statistically, but she's been there before.
Speaker 1: She's a she's just kind of the glue of the league.
Speaker 1: And at the end, there's better players in the league
Speaker 1: than her, including Kaitlin Clark, and they put her on.
Speaker 1: But here's my bigger takeaway that if you were a player,
Speaker 1: a woman's player for the Olympic team, wouldn't you want
Speaker 1: Caitlin Clark on the team because it'll double the TV
Speaker 1: ratings The average sports fan. Sports fan doesn't know this.
Speaker 1: Our women's basketball team has won seven straight goals. They
Speaker 1: don't lose games like they're like the dream team. Every
Speaker 1: single Olympics, I think they've won like eight of nine
Speaker 1: to nine of ten. They're completely our most dominant team,
Speaker 1: and most people don't know that because they don't watch.
Speaker 1: They get about six to seven million viewers, they get
Speaker 1: fourteen or more with Caitlin Clark. And my takeaway is
Speaker 1: when Connor McGregor came to the UFC, you wanted to
Speaker 1: be on the undercard because people saw you, including Monster
Speaker 1: Energy Drinks or you know, Pens Oil. Whoever, when Tiger
Speaker 1: got on the tour, you wanted to be in a foursome,
Speaker 1: you know, you'd get a sponsor. If I was on
Speaker 1: that team, I'd be like, yeah, put her on the team, eyeballs.
Speaker 1: So to me, it's as if it's being established that
Speaker 1: the players didn't really want her. And my take is,
Speaker 1: I think the agents of the other players are probably like, what.
Speaker 3: Are you doing my forward?
Speaker 1: Who's going to be a rotational player in the Olympics
Speaker 1: gonna have fourteen million people. Those are the kind of
Speaker 1: players that benefit the stars always make their endorsements. So
Speaker 1: that was my first take is that don't make this
Speaker 1: Caitlin against the women. I think most of the women
Speaker 1: in the league know, even Angel Reese knows, you know,
Speaker 1: rising tide lifts all boats. I am surprised, however, that NBC,
Speaker 1: who pays all the money for the Olympics, right, that's
Speaker 1: how Olympics generate their revenues. The TV partner didn't get
Speaker 1: on the phone and go, hey, could you do us
Speaker 1: as solid you know, well, well write you check that part.
Speaker 1: If I was NBC, I would be like, guys, we're
Speaker 1: TV partners, We're paying all the bills. That was my
Speaker 1: takeaway that NBC should be pissed, And I actually think
Speaker 1: she'd be good for the other girls even if she
Speaker 1: didn't play. What was your initial thought.
Speaker 2: I saw your tweet and I thought that was the
Speaker 2: perfect takeaway. Like from a financial perspective, it just made
Speaker 2: so much sense to have her on board, even like
Speaker 2: from a competitive standpoint, like if I was the girls
Speaker 2: on the team, I'd be like, yeah, I want to
Speaker 2: kick her button practice every day, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And that before we go any further. That's been the
Speaker 2: most frustrating thing for me watching the entire Caitlan Clark
Speaker 2: saga over the past month and a half. Like what's
Speaker 2: happening to her is something that has happened to every
Speaker 2: talented young player that's entered a.
Speaker 3: Professional basketball league.
Speaker 2: Ever, Let's pretend you play in the WNBA and all
Speaker 2: you do when you turn on your TV or when
Speaker 2: you look at your phone is hear about how amazing
Speaker 2: Caitlin Clark is.
Speaker 3: You don't think you want.
Speaker 2: To test your abilities against her, Like this has happened
Speaker 2: at the NBA level constantly. We've all seen when Patrick
Speaker 2: Beverley like straight up tried to punk Lonzo Ball on
Speaker 2: national television because Lonzo Ball had all that hype coming in,
Speaker 2: like there's nothing exceptional happening to Caitlin Clark, and she
Speaker 2: doesn't think there's anything exceptional. She knows like the same
Speaker 2: thing happened to her when she first went into college.
Speaker 2: People try to step up to it to people try
Speaker 2: to pick her up full court, people try to be physical.
Speaker 2: This is so normal and it's being made into now.
Speaker 2: The political side of things has grabbed a hold of
Speaker 2: this and it's gone completely off the rails, which which
Speaker 2: is crazy to watch. Like a Caitlin Clark is a
Speaker 2: competitor who is going into the most talented and by
Speaker 2: the way, this league doesn't have very many teams, which
Speaker 2: means it is completely stacked with talent. So like it's
Speaker 2: just a really difficult spot that she's in, and she's
Speaker 2: in her team has some limitations and all that kind
Speaker 2: of stuff as far as the Team USA thing goes,
Speaker 2: Like she's there's the basketball case. It's on the fence right,
Speaker 2: Like you could argue if you were making a list
Speaker 2: of just the twelve best women's basketball players in the world,
Speaker 2: she's on the fence and probably should be left off.
Speaker 2: But to your point, throughout every single national like it's
Speaker 2: like Anthony Davis being on the on the redeem team,
Speaker 2: right or the team in twenty twelve, right, Like sometimes
Speaker 2: you just bring the super young talented kid along. Yeah, energy,
Speaker 2: and and like there's no there's no reason not to
Speaker 2: bring her. And I don't buy the excuse. The excuse
Speaker 2: that's like, oh, when she doesn't get playing time, her
Speaker 2: fan base will be ravenous, Okay, by all means, then
Speaker 2: leave her off the roster.
Speaker 3: That'll go just as well.
Speaker 2: Like like it like I didn't understand the whole, the
Speaker 2: whole kind of backlash there, because again, she should have
Speaker 2: been included, but there was a reasonable case for her
Speaker 2: not to be included. I loved her response today, how
Speaker 2: she's like something to strive for. Hopefully twelve it's four
Speaker 2: years from now. Hopefully they they they include me. But yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, I just I just wish people understood the
Speaker 2: basic competitive dynamics that are taking place, because it's really
Speaker 2: nothing special that's going on there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's just I mean, we know the Olympics,
Speaker 1: you know, this is something else to remember about sports.
Speaker 1: I was talking to a friend about this. The NFL
Speaker 1: decides we're going to give Netflix Christmas, you know, the
Speaker 1: main you know, not everybody loved that. Not the other
Speaker 1: networks loved it. But Christmas is big and everybody's home.
Speaker 1: We're going to get a streaming giant Christmas. Those are
Speaker 1: good games. They've never had Wednesday games before. They last
Speaker 1: year they went to Peacock. What a shock. They put
Speaker 1: Patrick Mahomes on Peacock. They wanted another streaming giant to
Speaker 1: do well because those are ascending businesses. Amazon got its
Speaker 1: best schedule so very clearly in the last year, the
Speaker 1: NFL has said, yeah, we're going to streaming. It's a business.
Speaker 1: FIFA is a business. I mean, the Olympics held a
Speaker 1: Summer Olympics in Soshi. Never been there, but you know,
Speaker 1: when you think of Sydney and Barcelona, you don't think
Speaker 1: of Soshi as a summer retreat. So it's like people
Speaker 1: tend to get very precious, especially people who cover a sport,
Speaker 1: you know, like I know it. I've covered this for years. Yeah,
Speaker 1: too close to the forest, like baseball writers and not
Speaker 1: all certainly, but those that argued against the pitchclock, well,
Speaker 1: baseball's infinitely more watchable. Attendance is up again this year.
Speaker 1: TV rating her up the games now if you get
Speaker 1: good pitching, they're two and a half hour games. They
Speaker 1: fly by. It's a much better television product, and the
Speaker 1: baseball writers push back in it. It's like sometimes I'm
Speaker 1: seeing a lot of these almost with this religious veracity,
Speaker 1: this kind of like I know this sport, it's business.
Speaker 1: All this stuff. The NFL schedule, Jason, you don't think
Speaker 1: they put Aaron Rodgers worried about his health. They got
Speaker 1: him all over September games in October to a point
Speaker 1: where it's competitively unfair. He's got short weeks, night games,
Speaker 1: they got mahomes playing every day but Tuesday. Like, we
Speaker 1: understand this stuff. Money greases, it lubricates all of it.
Speaker 3: So I just thought, guys, this is what are.
Speaker 1: We doing here? You want more people to watch the Olympics.
Speaker 1: Caitlin Clark's television gold. And I also, I'll say that
Speaker 1: beyond the fact that you know, she's probably not one
Speaker 1: of the twelve best players, I do think in this
Speaker 1: three ball era you could certainly make an argument she's
Speaker 1: not like just the defensive big You can always throw
Speaker 1: a three point shooter on the back end of any
Speaker 1: team in the world and be like, yeah, whatever, Like
Speaker 1: her game kind of fits. Being the last person to
Speaker 1: make an Olympic roster or frankly, make any roster if
Speaker 1: you just got a guy that can shoot.
Speaker 3: So I.
Speaker 1: Her response was really good. I'll say it again. We're
Speaker 1: freaking out more than she is, Like she's she's kind
Speaker 1: of I would say this, she's built for all this stuff.
Speaker 1: She's really been good about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, to take it further, she's been so far in
Speaker 2: a way, the best college basketball player for at least
Speaker 2: the last two years, if not longer. She's probably as
Speaker 2: a competitor, loving like the challenge every day, waking up
Speaker 2: like I need to figure out this league, and like
Speaker 2: to have a big moment like she did in the
Speaker 2: last in the last game where she goes for what
Speaker 2: thirty eight and seven or whatever. Yeah, by the way,
Speaker 2: putting over twenty thousand people in an arena for two
Speaker 2: really bad teams at the bottom of the WNBA stand
Speaker 2: things which to your point, like like, I don't know
Speaker 2: why if you were a player on the team USA team,
Speaker 2: why you wouldn't want Caitlyn on the the on the
Speaker 2: on the roster just so that you get more exposure
Speaker 2: while you're playing overseas. But it is what it is.
Speaker 2: I I'm with you. She's she's handling it like a champ.
Speaker 2: I just I hate it because she's being kind of weaponized,
Speaker 2: even especially on the political side of that. She's being
Speaker 2: weaponized and used to make points that don't even make sense.
Speaker 2: Like I I'm just glad that she's been the column
Speaker 2: in the storm because she's been put in a really
Speaker 2: tough situation. All right, guys, that is all we have
Speaker 2: for tonight. This NBA Finals Game two Instant Reaction was
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Speaker 2: we'll have our film session in the morning and then
Speaker 2: Colin I will be back for Game three on Wednesday.
Speaker 3: We will see you guys then the volume.
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