Speaker 1: The volume all right before Nick Wright stops by for
Speaker 1: our almost weekly chat. You know the drill. Game Time
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Speaker 1: the zone deals. Absolutely fantastic. Right, it's almost a weekly appearance.
Speaker 1: Nick Wright stops by. And one of the things I
Speaker 1: like about this that we can be kind of unrestrained.
Speaker 1: We can just there's no boundaries or borders to this.
Speaker 1: We can just talk about whatever we like. So we've
Speaker 1: broached this before. Where I tend to root for things
Speaker 1: that make my show more interesting. I'm not rooting for
Speaker 1: a specific team. I thought Nick's Celtics was better. Obviously
Speaker 1: the end did if you watch their coverage. I just
Speaker 1: think Indiana's a bad matchup New York's bigger Boulder. It
Speaker 1: matters like the Yankees and the Dodgers meeting for a world.
Speaker 2: Jalen Brunson is a cooler story than Tyrese Haliburt, you
Speaker 2: know what I mean, Even if they are, even if
Speaker 2: Halliburton at his best, is you know, an equivalent player
Speaker 2: to Brunson. I think Brunson's a tick better. The story
Speaker 2: for the Knicks is better. It just is the Villanova kids,
Speaker 2: It's all of it. It's a better story. And I
Speaker 2: think even Pacer fans understood, Like, let me think of
Speaker 2: a good example of this. I think when we were
Speaker 2: on the prespice of Brady Mahomes in the Super Bowl
Speaker 2: right then, I think even Bills fans understood, we're rooting
Speaker 2: for our team, but Brady trying to take down the
Speaker 2: guy who just won the Super bowls a better story,
Speaker 2: right you know, when the Raptors were trying to beat
Speaker 2: Lebron in the Conference finals and Lebron was trying to
Speaker 2: get back to play the Warriors again, Raptor fans know
Speaker 2: what they're rooting for, but they know what the better
Speaker 2: story is, what the more brings in the cash, no
Speaker 2: doubt about it.
Speaker 1: But no, like when Michigan and the Connors Stallion story,
Speaker 1: it was a better story that Michigan was now a
Speaker 1: national villain and they just keep meeting everybody. It was
Speaker 1: absolutely it was a much better story, and the ratings
Speaker 1: proved that people were fascinated. It's also a better story
Speaker 1: if the Celtics gag against the Pacers or lose to
Speaker 1: either Dallas or Minnesota. Because one of the things we
Speaker 1: like is the story arc. They're building, they're building, they're building,
Speaker 1: they're crushed and I think I think Boston is going
Speaker 1: to get to the finals, and I think it'll go
Speaker 1: six or seven. I think they're they're really They're very deep,
Speaker 1: They're well built. If poor Zingis is healthy, They've got
Speaker 1: a lot of elements. I think I would take both
Speaker 1: Dallas and Minnesota against them. But you have been you
Speaker 1: have been an antagonist to Boston. I haven't, but I've
Speaker 1: been more critical of Jason Tatum. Do you feel the
Speaker 1: ex I feel the exact same way on Tatum, but
Speaker 1: I felt this two years ago that he didn't. He
Speaker 1: often feels like he doesn't have that grab you by
Speaker 1: the throat gene, and I felt that two years ago
Speaker 1: when I watched him. I feel the same thing. Have
Speaker 1: you changed your opinion on Boston by.
Speaker 2: Getting well, no, So my antagonistic nature towards Boston is
Speaker 2: there are thirty five year old sports fans who have
Speaker 2: seen him win one title. They're they're I mean, you
Speaker 2: know there are thirty I'm actually understanding that there are
Speaker 2: thirty eight year old sports fans who have seen him
Speaker 2: win one title, and they carry themselves with this aura
Speaker 2: of as if they are the Lakers and they're not
Speaker 2: like and again, and by the way, I'm not a
Speaker 2: Laker fan. People get mad at this. I am a
Speaker 2: Lebron James fan. He's my favorite athlete. Ever, my hometown
Speaker 2: does not have a sport, a NBA team, Lebron same
Speaker 2: high school. People ask me like, where do the Lebron
Speaker 2: stuff start, and the I don't know if I've told
Speaker 2: you this before or not. Lebron's same high school class
Speaker 2: as me. Basketball is my favorite sport. It was the
Speaker 2: I was, you know, I was obviously not some great athlete,
Speaker 2: but I played high school basketball. My senior year, my
Speaker 2: whole basketball team would come over to my house to
Speaker 2: watch Saint Vincent Saint Mary's when it was on TV
Speaker 2: because we thought it was so cool that guys our
Speaker 2: age were playing on ESPN national games. And then I
Speaker 2: just decided when I went to college, I was like,
Speaker 2: wherever he goes, that's gonna be my team. I don't
Speaker 2: have a team. I just love the league, and so
Speaker 2: I've kind of followed him throut. So I don't have
Speaker 2: some affinity to the Lakers, but the Lakers have been
Speaker 2: relevant and awesome and won championships every decade the NBA
Speaker 2: has existed. Their down decade is the nineteen nineties, which
Speaker 2: involved them coming off five titles in the eighties, getting
Speaker 2: to a finals in the early nineties, winning the title
Speaker 2: in ninety nine two thousand at the start of a
Speaker 2: three pat that's their down decade. The Celtics since the
Speaker 2: fall of the Berlin Wall have won one title. And
Speaker 2: so this idea that they are competing with the bulls
Speaker 2: in the Lakers, you're competing with the Raptors for the
Speaker 2: last two generations is who you're competing with. So that
Speaker 2: and they don't like to hear that. And there's a
Speaker 2: lot of Boston members of the media, and I would
Speaker 2: argue the single most influential member of basketball media is
Speaker 2: your friend Bill Simmons, you know, to this day and
Speaker 2: to his credit for what he's built, and he's obviously
Speaker 2: a huge Celtics guy. And so I just don't think
Speaker 2: they have the results to you know, measure with the
Speaker 2: way they carry themselves. Now, a point Simmons made that
Speaker 2: is correct is you look at this is Tatum. This
Speaker 2: is the Celtics sixth conference finals in the last eight years.
Speaker 2: The teams on that list, all of them won at
Speaker 2: least one and usually multiple championships. The teams that made
Speaker 2: five in eight years all except I think one one
Speaker 2: at least one and usually multiple championships. If you bang
Speaker 2: on this door this many times and this year don't
Speaker 2: come through, well there's a then you have to You're
Speaker 2: never going to have a more gilded road to the finals.
Speaker 2: You face Jimmy, you face a Heat team without Jimmy Butler.
Speaker 2: You then in round two face the Cavs team that
Speaker 2: doesn't have Jared Allen and then loses Donovan Mitchell. And
Speaker 2: in the conference finals you pay play a six seed
Speaker 2: Pacers team that that got through against an injured next team.
Speaker 2: So you're going to make the finals. In the finals,
Speaker 2: you face whomever's there. They're in they're all in their
Speaker 2: first finals except for Kyrie theoretically. But the team, the
Speaker 2: the organization, all of it. And if you don't win
Speaker 2: this championship, then you have to ask yourself this question,
Speaker 2: will we ever be better positioned? Is there any reason
Speaker 2: to believe it's going to be different if we don't
Speaker 2: make a significant change where you and I, I don't
Speaker 2: focus on the Tatum part as much because to me,
Speaker 2: Jason Tatum, they're not the same type of player at all.
Speaker 2: But Jason Tatum, to me is like Clyde Drexler, like awesome,
Speaker 2: really good. Can be the best player on a team
Speaker 2: that loses a championship, but if he is your number one,
Speaker 2: things really have to be perfect to win the title.
Speaker 2: And this year maybe they'll be perfect. But I will
Speaker 2: pick whoever wins the West. I will pick to win
Speaker 2: the champions.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I worry about Minnesota offensively. If Ant is off,
Speaker 1: and he'll in a seven game series, he'll be off
Speaker 1: a couple times. Offensively, you have to rely on Karl
Speaker 1: Anthony t Who's always been a little bit of a
Speaker 1: roller coaster emotionally, like he depends on the night. Boston's
Speaker 1: very good offensively. You know I've thought about this with Tatum,
Speaker 1: is that it used to be and it wasn't that
Speaker 1: long ago. Twenty twenty five years ago, a great basketball
Speaker 1: prodigy had a really hard high school basketball coach into
Speaker 1: a really hard college basketball coach, and then generally a
Speaker 1: fairly hard NBA coach. Now it's a different process. Now
Speaker 1: it is an AAU coach who's not really a coach,
Speaker 1: kind of a coach would like to be a coach,
Speaker 1: but the AAU job pays him better than his high
Speaker 1: school teaching. Job or whatever job he has, so he
Speaker 1: does it for some it's a side hustle and it's
Speaker 1: not about really coaching hard. It's about attracting the best
Speaker 1: players Detroit Metro, Atlanta Metro, whatever it is. You create
Speaker 1: this sort of little business, this micro business that attracts
Speaker 1: the best players, and then you don't go to college
Speaker 1: if you do it for one year and you can
Speaker 1: only coach so hard. You have them for a year, right,
Speaker 1: There's only so much you can ask, and then they
Speaker 1: go to the NBA and the players have more money
Speaker 1: and more power than ever, and you got to be
Speaker 1: careful you piss off the young star coaches that you're
Speaker 1: gonna become Frank Vogel very quickly. And so I think Tatum,
Speaker 1: although he's not that kind of personality, is very much
Speaker 1: modern basketball, super talented, AAU one year duke after the NBA,
Speaker 1: it's a pretty it's a pretty grooved basketball life. And
Speaker 1: he's earned it with his talent. Right, I'm not saying that,
Speaker 1: but there is a different world. Tatum's not hardened. He's
Speaker 1: not hard and that's okay. I've said this before. My
Speaker 1: kids will not have my struggle, and they're smarter than
Speaker 1: I am, but my struggle you know, as they I've
Speaker 1: used this before, Nick, I think I use this the
Speaker 1: other day with you. Hard time create soft people. Soft
Speaker 1: people create soft times, and eventually you need hard people again.
Speaker 1: Tatum is symptomatic of what I see with a lot
Speaker 1: of the young players in the mid twenties. He's just
Speaker 1: not hard, but it's really talented.
Speaker 2: So I don't so I the And maybe it's because
Speaker 2: you know, it's anecdotal to my uh experience I have
Speaker 2: know your feelings on AAU basketball are mirrored by a
Speaker 2: lot of people. I'm not one of them, because I
Speaker 2: the best coaches my son ever had was on the
Speaker 2: elite of the elite Houston AU circuit. That the guys
Speaker 2: that coached him at Basketball University in Houston, that coached
Speaker 2: Quinton Grimes, who used to be you know, was traded
Speaker 2: from the Knicks this year. They were teammates together, Uh,
Speaker 2: were the guys he learned the most from and all
Speaker 2: of it. And I also think that it is I
Speaker 2: I think that when I watch Tatum, what I see
Speaker 2: is a different criticism, which is I feel like Anthony
Speaker 2: Edwards gets the ball and by the way, he's from
Speaker 2: the exact same Aau everything right, gets the ball and
Speaker 2: has no idea what he's going to do on that possession,
Speaker 2: and he's like, I'm going to fucking read and react
Speaker 2: many I can. And I watch Tatum and I feel
Speaker 2: at times it's too strategic program it's like exactly programmed.
Speaker 2: And so it's like, and it's to his credit how
Speaker 2: much he's trained and drilled, but it's like, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: do this and then this and then step back. And
Speaker 2: I think that that can work against him. I think
Speaker 2: it is less read and react, do this, and more thoughtful.
Speaker 2: And I think that in the cauldron of some of
Speaker 2: these clutch moments, which is really the only place he
Speaker 2: has struggled, that hasn't worked for him. And so but again,
Speaker 2: I the NBA is just such a unique sport because
Speaker 2: and again we've talked about this before, but if if
Speaker 2: you don't have someone who is a guaranteed statue in
Speaker 2: front of the arena when they retire, you probably won't
Speaker 2: ever win a title. Like I mean, if you like,
Speaker 2: if you don't have the barrier for entry to winning
Speaker 2: a title. The last forty years, other than the four
Speaker 2: pistons is Dirk Novitzky, who's the sixth all time leading
Speaker 2: scorer in NBA history, an MVP, Like he's the worst
Speaker 2: guy to lead, you know, a champion, And so what
Speaker 2: is Dirk the nineteenth greatest player ever? It's just so
Speaker 2: fucking hard in this league. And so that's why, like
Speaker 2: I used Drexler intentionally, Drek. I got so annoyed when
Speaker 2: Dame left the Blazers and news articles like not opinion
Speaker 2: pieces like the news was like the greatest Blazer in history,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, did everyone hit their head? Like what
Speaker 2: are we talking about? Like, I mean, Bill Walton had
Speaker 2: the highest peak. But if you want to say he
Speaker 2: didn't play long enough, fine, but Clyde did. Clyde was
Speaker 2: there for a long damn time, went to two finals
Speaker 2: with him, did all of it. So Clyde I have
Speaker 2: mass respect for him. He's a great player. There was
Speaker 2: a five year run where he was maybe the fifth
Speaker 2: best player in the league, probably sixth.
Speaker 1: Seventh, eighth, played on the best college team that never
Speaker 1: won a title fi Slamajama.
Speaker 2: Yeah there you go. And how did Clyde win his title?
Speaker 2: He got on a team with one of those top
Speaker 2: twenty guys Akama last one. Like it's just it's just
Speaker 2: Kevin Garnett, one of my favorite players. Ever, how did
Speaker 2: he he had he had won a playoff series one
Speaker 2: year of his whole career. He was it for a
Speaker 2: decade in Minnesota. How does he win his title? Well,
Speaker 2: he joins two other you know, Hall of famers and
Speaker 2: Paul Pierson, Ray Allen, and he's the best guy. So
Speaker 2: like I just I that's the that's always the problem
Speaker 2: with and it's why, for the record, I was skeptical
Speaker 2: of the Nuggets last year because I didn't think Jokic
Speaker 2: was gonna be in that pantheon. Now he clearly is.
Speaker 2: People are a little premature on the dynasty stuff with them,
Speaker 2: but he's in that group. I think Tatum, even Tatum's
Speaker 2: the only guy. And this is how everyone, even the
Speaker 2: Celtics fans that will get mad, they know I'm right
Speaker 2: on this because the Pacers can't win the title, so
Speaker 2: remove them for a moment. Celtics can win the title,
Speaker 2: the Wolves can win the title, the MAVs can win
Speaker 2: the title. If the Wolves win the title, topic on
Speaker 2: our shows will be is Anthony Edwards the best player
Speaker 2: in the league. I don't know if you'll say he
Speaker 2: is or not, but it will be a question. Certainly,
Speaker 2: if the MAVs win the title, is Luke an Ancic
Speaker 2: the best player in the league. If the Celtics win
Speaker 2: the title, nobody is saying Jason Tames the best player
Speaker 2: in the league. And that's just and so that tends
Speaker 2: to put a ceiling on what your team can be.
Speaker 2: So I don't think that's unfair.
Speaker 1: Ye, I think mature players tend to find their peak faster.
Speaker 1: They're more dedicated, they're more refined, they take the coaching,
Speaker 1: they have better self awareness. I think Tatum is a
Speaker 1: very refined, intelligent basketball player and found his ceiling much
Speaker 1: quicker than people realized. I found it two years ago.
Speaker 1: Now he adds elements to it. Lebron a very mature player.
Speaker 1: Dwayne Wade that the more mature, willing to be coached,
Speaker 1: kind of a grinder, plus the superstar Kobe, you find
Speaker 1: your peak faster. I think we keep waiting for Tatum
Speaker 1: to go to another level. I mean, Anthony Edwards mature, driven,
Speaker 1: self aware shit, He's a year away from the peak
Speaker 1: for about a six to seven year run. So I
Speaker 1: think immature players Zion can't get his diet right. If
Speaker 1: John Moran can't get his personal life right. Players that
Speaker 1: struggle with maturity and I could go, I could name many.
Speaker 1: They either don't find their ceiling or it just it
Speaker 1: may be brief. I think Tatum is what he is.
Speaker 1: I'm okay with it. He's a top ten player. But
Speaker 1: I feel I said it when he came into the league.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I kept saying he's the eighth best player
Speaker 1: in the league, and people would go crazy. I'm like,
Speaker 1: in my entire life, i mean, the eighth best player
Speaker 1: is often like Clyde Dretchler.
Speaker 2: Right, So that's that's the thing. So people get mad
Speaker 2: about it. But if we were to go I'm gonna
Speaker 2: try to do this on the fly, i won't be
Speaker 2: successful at it, but I'm gonna leave some people out.
Speaker 2: So again, but if if we just jumped ten years back,
Speaker 2: I'll use my I'll try to do this. I'm not
Speaker 2: even gonna you know what, I don't want to leave
Speaker 2: people out, but no, you know, I'm not gonna look
Speaker 2: anything up in twenty fourteen, if we were to say
Speaker 2: the best players in the league, Lebron was the best,
Speaker 2: Durant was the second best. The in that Kawhi wasn't
Speaker 2: quite there yet. Steph was getting there. So when you
Speaker 2: said the eighth best, you know, the eighth best player
Speaker 2: in the league in twenty fourteen was thereabouts Paul George,
Speaker 2: Paul George pre injury Indiana Pacers, Paul George. If we
Speaker 2: go ten years before that to two thousand and four,
Speaker 2: the eighth best player in the league would have probably
Speaker 2: been around King's Chris Weber, like you can get to
Speaker 2: the damn conference final, you know what I mean. That's
Speaker 2: a guy that is a great player, and that might
Speaker 2: be a little high for him. Maybe the eighth best
Speaker 2: player then was Jason Kidd coming off the back to
Speaker 2: back finals with the Nets something like that in nineteen
Speaker 2: ninety four. The eighth best player in the league, so
Speaker 2: right when Jordan was retiring was you know, it was
Speaker 2: probably around Scottie Pippen, Patrick Ewing. Those guys, those are
Speaker 2: Hall of Fame players that we all remember. Nineteen eighty
Speaker 2: four is probably Bernard King adjacent that area, maybe your
Speaker 2: guy Alex English. These are all legendary players we remember,
Speaker 2: and Naria one of them was a champion as the
Speaker 2: best team. Because it's so hard, because that's the league,
Speaker 2: the league it's really.
Speaker 1: Really hard to now add in European's best players, European players,
Speaker 1: the rest of those guys. Alex English wasn't facing twenty
Speaker 1: four European players, six elite. So look at Jason Tatum
Speaker 1: and I think he is the seventh and eighth best
Speaker 1: player and he's facing this barrage, this this large influx
Speaker 1: the great skilled Europeans often biggs which have such control
Speaker 1: of a game. These are not you know, the European
Speaker 1: point guard is not changing the world. The European bigs
Speaker 1: are and because.
Speaker 2: They're because a lot of them are point centers or
Speaker 2: point forwards. I mean they have the size of the
Speaker 2: big man, but they have the ball, and Luke and
Speaker 2: Jokic have the ball in their hand the whole game.
Speaker 2: Wimby wants to play on on the perimeter. Guy's seventy five.
Speaker 2: Giannis is kind of a point forward type. I know
Speaker 2: that he's he's African via Grease, but yeah, the international player,
Speaker 2: there's the international guys used to be are Vetus and
Speaker 2: Vlade where it's like they're they can pass, they're skilled,
Speaker 2: but they're not handling the ball. And you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, it's obviously changed dramatic.
Speaker 1: You know it's funny. Byron Scott stopped by my show
Speaker 1: today and I went, I don't tend to do old
Speaker 1: school stuff. I'm not interested in baseball old school. I
Speaker 1: never talked Hugh McIlhaney in the NFL. I'm not really.
Speaker 1: You know a lot of these guys in my age,
Speaker 1: in my generation that talk NBA. They just can't let
Speaker 1: old NBA go. But old NBA was fascinating and it
Speaker 1: was great from Doctor j On in the seventies, the
Speaker 1: Lakers with Wilt West Goodrich. I really do think NBA
Speaker 1: basketball in the seventies was forming. And then I said,
Speaker 1: like James Brown and Elvis Presley did this to music,
Speaker 1: there was a juice, there was an it like there
Speaker 1: was a lot of talented musicians, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I was like, the hell is that? And the showtime
Speaker 1: Lakers And I love the NBA in the seventies and
Speaker 1: remember well, I mean, I can go starting lineups for
Speaker 1: all the best teams. And then there was the you know,
Speaker 1: the Byron Scott's and the Magics and the Kareems and
Speaker 1: the worthy they were the Laker teams. And I do
Speaker 1: think it's a special time in the NBA, and it
Speaker 1: was propelled by David Stern, but the NBA really got
Speaker 1: its legs. They were the first. It Like, when I
Speaker 1: created the volume, I always told my guys, Barstool is something,
Speaker 1: Ringer is something. Until we become something, you're just a
Speaker 1: company with really good employees. We have to become something,
Speaker 1: and then we transition to a lot of these. Immediately
Speaker 1: the game ends, we're doing live YouTube, so we're doing
Speaker 1: something at a high level that's very productive for us.
Speaker 1: We're sort of becoming something known for something. The Lakers
Speaker 1: were like, oh, it's not just a bunch of talented
Speaker 1: basketball players.
Speaker 2: The hell is this.
Speaker 1: It's fast, it's flashy, it's fun hockey. It's fun. And
Speaker 1: the one thing about European players is they very respectful.
Speaker 1: They come into this country, they're not distracted. It's all basketball.
Speaker 1: They want to go home when the season ends. And
Speaker 1: I don't see it as a criticism, but a reality
Speaker 1: of international play is that if you don't have this aunt.
Speaker 1: Edwards is such a perfect domestic player. He's just like
Speaker 1: and then this is my team, this is my place.
Speaker 1: I am and I love it. But I feel like
Speaker 1: he's on a little bit of an island in the
Speaker 1: NBA where he's old school trash talker, but new school
Speaker 1: fun and easy to root for. And I do worry
Speaker 1: that sometimes the international players it's almost out of respect they.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, except for the I mean, except for Loca,
Speaker 2: who's just not really respect anybody. And I mean he's
Speaker 2: maybe my favorite guy. So I think the NBA needs
Speaker 2: aunt sort, do I because I it is. It might
Speaker 2: be an uncomfortable reality, but it is the reality that
Speaker 2: part of the appeal of the NBA is it feels
Speaker 2: urban and tough and gritty, and guys are dunking on
Speaker 2: you and telling you about it. Yes, that is a
Speaker 2: part of the league. As much as big hits can
Speaker 2: be a part of football, and even as much as
Speaker 2: they try to legislate it out, it gets people going.
Speaker 2: And now we know what a clean hit is and
Speaker 2: we love it, all of it. And I can appreciate
Speaker 2: the skill and beauty of what Jokic and Luca can do,
Speaker 2: and I do Luca is one of my favorite players.
Speaker 2: But of all the international guys, the guy other than
Speaker 2: Luca who I love the most is the honest because
Speaker 2: at least he has the raw wow athleticism that I
Speaker 2: you know that I love about the American players typically,
Speaker 2: but Gianness isn't gonna be a trash talker and he's
Speaker 2: not gonna have the edge to him that some American
Speaker 2: guys have. It's just it's just not who he personally is.
Speaker 2: And by the way, it's not even like a financial thing.
Speaker 2: It's not like, oh, these guys came from tougher environments.
Speaker 2: A lot of the international guys came from the toughest
Speaker 2: environment imaginable. It's just it's just different culturally. Uh So,
Speaker 2: I think Anthony Edwards being great is the best thing
Speaker 2: possible for the league, and I think that he it's
Speaker 2: a big burden for him and it's a large weight
Speaker 2: on his shoulders. But it's also you know what I
Speaker 2: can't get out of my head when I watch Aunt
Speaker 2: at least a little bit, is man, I feel like
Speaker 2: Josh screwed this up.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because Jaw had a huge head start and there.
Speaker 1: But Jaw's a flawed player. So Jah weighs one hundred
Speaker 1: and seventy four pounds, that part's true. It's no, no, no, never.
Speaker 1: I said from the beginning, this is not sustainable. He
Speaker 1: is significantly thinner than Derrick Rose. So when you have
Speaker 1: a mediocre jumper, a thin frame, no handcheck, can get
Speaker 1: past anybody, you are going into the redwoods. And I
Speaker 1: said a jaw, I said, I love watching him play.
Speaker 1: He is spectacular. One hundred and seventy eight pounds in
Speaker 1: this league is not sustainable. It is not It is
Speaker 1: not a coincidence, and is ripped. Michael was wiry strong.
Speaker 1: A majority of the great players, Durant's an outlier. Lebron
Speaker 1: have been physically assertive and structurally formative, plant and formidable.
Speaker 2: Yes, Durant is an absolute outlier. And this is something
Speaker 2: that I forget. I think I said it, maybe to you.
Speaker 2: Maybe I forget I said it at some point. I
Speaker 2: it is I can't get fully on board with any
Speaker 2: NBA player that isn't already an A PLUS player if
Speaker 2: they are not in great shape. I think it's why
Speaker 2: I was so late on Jokic Luka. It feels like it.
Speaker 2: Maybe I give him a pass because I'm partial to him,
Speaker 2: because I like him so much. But I'll give you
Speaker 2: Austin Reeves, D'Angelo Russell, two guys. I will not believe
Speaker 2: you care as much as you're supposed to. When your
Speaker 2: arms look like that. I know that sounds shitty, but
Speaker 2: you're not a baseball player. This is it. Absolutely it
Speaker 2: speaks to me on how much you want it and
Speaker 2: how much you care. I don't again, I don't need
Speaker 2: you to be bulky, but there is. Like you said
Speaker 2: about young Jordan was wiry, strong, and then as he
Speaker 2: got older and lost a little athleticism, balked up a bit.
Speaker 2: Kobe was always cut. Every every legendary player that you
Speaker 2: can think of was had. Sometimes they had a layer
Speaker 2: like Shack, a layer of fat over the muscle, but
Speaker 2: were incredibly strong, except for Durant. And Durant has an
Speaker 2: old quote about this that really was like a window
Speaker 2: into how we views things, which he was somebody asked
Speaker 2: him something about Lebron and he was like, yeah, He's like,
Speaker 2: I mean, Lebron's working out and I'm working all my game.
Speaker 2: And it wasn't a shot. It was just an acknowledgement,
Speaker 2: like Lebron is in the gym lifting weights and I'm
Speaker 2: at the gym shooting jumpers. And I also looked at
Speaker 2: it as yeah, but what you don't see is be cut.
Speaker 2: That does mean Lebron will never catch you as a
Speaker 2: jump shooter. Never, It'll never happen. But Lebron's going to
Speaker 2: finish as scoring more and making more jumpers because of
Speaker 2: his availability and longevity and all of it. Now again,
Speaker 2: Durant is one of the greatest players ever and has
Speaker 2: just kind of made it. You know it made it work.
Speaker 2: But I your your point on joh is correct. Is
Speaker 2: from a longevity perspective. The point I was making is
Speaker 2: for however long that window was, he squandered a year
Speaker 2: and a half of it for nonsense, you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, for nothing when we were dying for because
Speaker 2: the other this is another reason why. Because Steph, as
Speaker 2: great as step is and step by the way, another guy,
Speaker 2: Steph is ripped. Step is not big, But you can't
Speaker 2: say STEP's not putting.
Speaker 1: The work times was in maybe the best shape in
Speaker 1: the league for a ten year period.
Speaker 2: Correct, Like those guys that care they are ripped and
Speaker 2: but as great as Steph was, there is a part
Speaker 2: of watching NBA basketball where you want to see people flying.
Speaker 2: You just do. It's like a cool part of it,
Speaker 2: Like you just want to see someone that looks like
Speaker 2: for a moment they're flying. And Steph being the face
Speaker 2: of the league or co face along with bron is
Speaker 2: never going to give you that.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: What he gives you is something different, reforms the gravity
Speaker 2: on the court. But I think the viewing public miss,
Speaker 2: you know, a thirst for that, which is why Aunt
Speaker 2: has been so immediately embraced you. I mean, you saw
Speaker 2: eight and a half million people watched the Nuggets Timberwolves
Speaker 2: Round two game, like that is an un because people
Speaker 2: are into him, They're into it.
Speaker 1: You know. I was getting into this with Jason Timpa
Speaker 1: the other day, is that the NBA will always be
Speaker 1: fine because and I'll give an example, hockey has been
Speaker 1: international forever, at least Canadian international, Baseball in the last
Speaker 1: twenty years, increasingly international, NBA last ten to twelve, increasing
Speaker 1: the international. So the NFL not only has the scarcity advantage,
Speaker 1: but it has a domestic employeed advantage. Everybody comes from
Speaker 1: Ohio State, Michigan, Alabama, Washington, Oregon. You washed them in college.
Speaker 1: It's a big advantage. But I said, when the NBA
Speaker 1: is going to sign this massive contract Basketball and NBC,
Speaker 1: according to all the reports, NBC is going to lose
Speaker 1: billion dollars a year in it. I mean, it's just
Speaker 1: not a good deal for NBC. But the difference in
Speaker 1: the NBA haters has always been is that the NBA
Speaker 1: has something. So let's just take the NFL and separate it.
Speaker 1: And let's take hockey and separated. That's never going to
Speaker 1: be too popular. Most of us don't play a don't
Speaker 1: skate the NFL one game a week, we gamble, we bet.
Speaker 1: Let's just do baseball and basketball, and those two camps
Speaker 1: are often very separate. Baseball guy looks down at basketball.
Speaker 1: Basketball guy thinks baseball is born. And something happened in
Speaker 1: the last couple of weeks that needs to be noted.
Speaker 1: Major League Baseball signed a deal with fing Roku for
Speaker 1: thirty million dollars. That was the deal. The NBA is
Speaker 1: going to sign multiple billion dollar partners. And here's the
Speaker 1: advantage and why the NBA will always get its money
Speaker 1: in the marketplace and baseball increasingly. ESPN's moving off at
Speaker 1: Fox isn't in love with it like a lot of
Speaker 1: NBC's not CBS bailed years ago. Is that in the NBA,
Speaker 1: the star plays forty minutes and has the ball every possession.
Speaker 1: I watched the Dodgers last night. I kept waiting for
Speaker 1: the best players to bat if Otani's are and they've.
Speaker 2: Got more great players than any team in the league.
Speaker 1: If Otani's daching, Bryce Harper's dhing, I'll get five minutes
Speaker 1: of them in a three hour, nine minute game. I
Speaker 1: get in the NFL and basketball, the star always on
Speaker 1: the floor, always taking shots, and that for all the
Speaker 1: NBA critics. And there's nothing against base. But Glenn Jacobs
Speaker 1: was at ESPN told me this year's ago. He goes, Colin,
Speaker 1: you don't put a star in right field, at least
Speaker 1: put him at first base. I want to see Bryce
Speaker 1: s Parker's face.
Speaker 2: All game.
Speaker 1: Don't put him in right field. Just put that guy
Speaker 1: who's not athletic or whatever at first base. Don't dh him,
Speaker 1: don't do right field. And I'm sitting there watching the
Speaker 1: Dodgers last night. They scored six runs in the third
Speaker 1: inning when I turned it on, and I still felt like,
Speaker 1: I just want to get to the stars. Can you
Speaker 1: give me the stars. There's one hundred and sixty two
Speaker 1: games I'm watching Minnesota Denver, and all I'm getting is
Speaker 1: Yokis and Aunt and Murray and Jokic and ant and order.
Speaker 1: And so I say this to all the NBA people.
Speaker 1: It may not be a good deal for NBC or
Speaker 1: ESPN or Amazon, but the NBA is always going to
Speaker 1: get its money. It's a star drift. It's like international soccer.
Speaker 1: You turn it on and if Rinaldo's playing, you know
Speaker 1: where he is a pitch the whole.
Speaker 2: The whole time, the whole time. So can I give you?
Speaker 2: I so you this weekend, I was, as you know,
Speaker 2: I was in LA and I played in this poker
Speaker 2: tournament and that they put the table that I was
Speaker 2: at on you like, they made it the feature table
Speaker 2: for a couple hours, so we were miked up. People
Speaker 2: could say our whole cards or whatever, and I was
Speaker 2: just talking and I talked about one of my long
Speaker 2: standing boxing ideas and but it was miked up and
Speaker 2: on YouTube and it was something I haven't really talked
Speaker 2: about much publicly, and people responded really well to it.
Speaker 2: But you know, that's a few thousand people watching a
Speaker 2: poker stream. So I'm gonna say it to you because
Speaker 2: you love the UFC. I am more of a I'm
Speaker 2: a theoretical boxing fan, meaning I love what boxing can be,
Speaker 2: but not what it currently is. So my I believe
Speaker 2: billion dollar idea and you know enough wealthy people, you
Speaker 2: can maybe make this happen at some point. Does I
Speaker 2: just want a small little piece because I think people
Speaker 2: I think people love UFC for a lot of reasons,
Speaker 2: but one of the reasons is the consistency of it. Yes,
Speaker 2: we have a card a month. There is that, we
Speaker 2: know what is coming. There is you know, if you
Speaker 2: are a champion, you have to fight, and you know
Speaker 2: there's there's that. So if you got private equity or something,
Speaker 2: somebody or a conglomerate to buy the top twenty boxers
Speaker 2: in every weight class, buy them out of their deals.
Speaker 2: You are all free agents. You don't have a deal
Speaker 2: with Showtime. You don't have a deal with this. We're
Speaker 2: buying you all out and we are creating the International
Speaker 2: Boxing League. And here is how it works. There are
Speaker 2: five weight classes. There are twenty fighters per weight class.
Speaker 2: And if you will have a minor league to try
Speaker 2: to get up there, whatever it is, you all get
Speaker 2: a salary, call it a million bucks a year guaranteed.
Speaker 2: But our best fighters whatever it can make one hundred
Speaker 2: million in a year. Whatever it is. And here's how
Speaker 2: it works. You are in this league. You fight three
Speaker 2: times a year, every the January pay per view, the
Speaker 2: middleweight titles on the line, the heavyweight five is boxing,
Speaker 2: the six and the one of you, the number one
Speaker 2: contender's boxing, the twelve whatever it is. We have standings,
Speaker 2: and by the way, we don't have three judges because
Speaker 2: we're not idiots. We have seven judges like figure skating,
Speaker 2: and the best score and the worst score aren't going
Speaker 2: to count to avoid corruption. And every single month there
Speaker 2: is an event, a major event that you gotta buy,
Speaker 2: and every week there are the other events to make
Speaker 2: sure everyone's fighting. They're three or four fights a year,
Speaker 2: and there are five weight classes and five champions and
Speaker 2: everyone will know who it is. I think within five
Speaker 2: years that could become one of the four biggest sports
Speaker 2: in America because people love fighting for it is as
Speaker 2: tail is old, as human beings existing. For something about people.
Speaker 2: We want to watch two grown men hit each other,
Speaker 2: we do. And if there was a real consistency and
Speaker 2: continuity and to guarantee that the best people are going
Speaker 2: to fight, I think boxing could make a huge comeback.
Speaker 2: And all they have to do is crib off the
Speaker 2: UFC's notes because there is an element of the UFC
Speaker 2: that for some there's a barrier for entry to which
Speaker 2: is I don't understand the grappling and the submissions. That's
Speaker 2: just not as simple. Anybody can walk into a bar,
Speaker 2: see a boxing match and know what's happening. That guy's
Speaker 2: trying to knock that guy out, and I still think
Speaker 2: it's there, and it's so frustrating to me that it's
Speaker 2: been let to die on the vine because there is
Speaker 2: still nothing, nothing that feels as big as a huge
Speaker 2: boxing Oh yeah, there is nothing.
Speaker 1: The volume. Thanks for listening to part one of the
Speaker 1: conversation with Nick. Don't forget the check back for part two.
Speaker 2: Hey everyone, it's Jason Tipp, host of Hoops Tonight. Make
Speaker 2: sure you check us out live after games on the
Speaker 2: Hoops Tonight YouTube channel as we provide instant reaction and
Speaker 2: analysis of all the big NBA playoff games. Again, that's
Speaker 2: the Hoops Tonight YouTube channel and wherever you get your podcasts.