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Speaker 2: All right, welcome to Hoops to Night. You're at the volume.
Speaker 1: Happy Friday, everybody. I hope all of you guys had
Speaker 1: an incredible week. We have a absolutely jam packed show today.
Speaker 1: I'm going to start with some follow up thoughts after
Speaker 1: looking into some numbers from last night's matchup between the
Speaker 1: Celtics and the Nuggets. After that, we're going to talk
Speaker 1: about the Dallas Mavericks getting a much needed win against
Speaker 1: the Miami Heat on the strength of their defense. Talk
Speaker 1: about that game from the perspective of both teams. After that,
Speaker 1: the Minnesota Timbrol's got a huge win on the road
Speaker 1: in Indiana. Absolutely monster night from Anthony Edward's first game
Speaker 1: without Karl Anthony Towns in the lineup. Some interesting stuff
Speaker 1: coming out of that side of things. At the end,
Speaker 1: I know I'm a little late to the party year,
Speaker 1: but I want to talk a little bit about the
Speaker 1: Lakers and their struggles against the Sacramento Kings and what
Speaker 1: I took away from that game that at the end
Speaker 1: of the show. In the show last night, I had
Speaker 1: a bunch of questions around the league, but a lot
Speaker 1: of follow up questions from that Nuggets Celtics game. So
Speaker 1: I'm going to hit that at the tail end of
Speaker 1: the show. You guys know the drop before we get started.
Speaker 1: Subscribe to the volumes YouTube channels, or to i should say,
Speaker 1: to the Hoops Tonight channel so you don't miss any
Speaker 1: more of our videos. Don't forget about our podcast feed
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcast under Hoops Tonight and also
Speaker 1: is super helpful if you leave a rating and a
Speaker 1: review on that front. Follow me on Twitter at underscore JSONLTS.
Speaker 1: You guys, don't miss any film threads that I do
Speaker 1: from time to time or show announcements, and then, last
Speaker 1: but not least, keep dropping mail back questions in the
Speaker 1: YouTube comments so we can keep hitting them throughout the
Speaker 1: rest of the season. All right, let's talk some basketball.
Speaker 1: So there was a moment at the end of the
Speaker 1: game We're staying Van Gundy last night went on this
Speaker 1: rant about how Boston's one of the best three point
Speaker 1: shooting teams in the league and how they are going
Speaker 1: to shoot better eventually and that this is super encouraging.
Speaker 1: Now here's the thing. I actually was encouraged on the
Speaker 1: Boston front last night. My major takeaway last night was
Speaker 1: that Denver solidified and proved that they deserve to be
Speaker 1: the favorite and that they would be the safest bet
Speaker 1: to win the title this season. But it also proved
Speaker 1: that Boston is capable of beating them. There is a
Speaker 1: pathway there that exists for Boston that doesn't exist for
Speaker 1: most of the teams in the NBA. So I did
Speaker 1: think there was a lot of reasons for optimism on
Speaker 1: the Boston front after last night's game. That said, I
Speaker 1: do not think it comes down to making shots. As
Speaker 1: a matter of fact, I remember, as I was watching
Speaker 1: the game, I was like, I kind of felt like
Speaker 1: it was a classic rock fight game.
Speaker 2: It felt like both.
Speaker 1: Teams didn't shoot particularly especially well on jump shots, and
Speaker 1: I didn't think that that played a significant role in
Speaker 1: the game. I just thought that Denver got better shots
Speaker 1: closer to the rim. And usually with the Synergy, the
Speaker 1: app that I use, I can watch film a lot
Speaker 1: the night of, but I can't really get into numbers
Speaker 1: until the following morning when their crews go in and
Speaker 1: they sort through all the play types and actually put
Speaker 1: all the data together, right. And so here's a couple
Speaker 1: of pieces of information from last night's game that I
Speaker 1: thought were interesting. Boston took forty five jump shots, Denver
Speaker 1: took thirty one. That's just a difference in their shot profile.
Speaker 1: They get a lot of shots close to the rim Boston.
Speaker 1: Boston got one point zero two to two points per
Speaker 1: jump shots, so a little over a point per shot.
Speaker 1: Denver got zero point seven to seven to four, So
Speaker 1: they did not shoot well compared to Boston. Both teams
Speaker 1: did eleven unguarded jump shots. According to Synergy, Boston got
Speaker 1: fifteen points on their eleven unguarded shots. Denver got six
Speaker 1: on their eleven unguarded shots over the course of the season.
Speaker 1: Boston's typically a little over one point three points per
Speaker 1: unguarded jump shot, Denver's usually a little over one point two.
Speaker 1: So Boston is a better unguarded jump shooting team than
Speaker 1: Denver is by a small margin. But Boston actually shot
Speaker 1: above their perceived average on those types of shots, and
Speaker 1: Denver actually shot substantially below. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: for the two games that these two teams played against
Speaker 1: each other, Boston shot really well on unguarded jump shots
Speaker 1: in their first matchup, and they took eighteen of them
Speaker 1: in Boston and scored thirty points on them unguarded. Again,
Speaker 1: that's not all the jump shots, it's just the ones
Speaker 1: that were high quality open jump shots. So in the
Speaker 1: two matchups between the two teams, Boston has scored one
Speaker 1: point five to five points per unguarded jumper, which is
Speaker 1: way above their season average, and Denver has scored zero
Speaker 1: point eight four points per unguarded jumper, which is way
Speaker 1: below their season average. So like that to me, is
Speaker 1: not to what you lean on. If you're Boston, you're
Speaker 1: not going to shoot better against You might have a
Speaker 1: game in Boston or a couple games in Boston in
Speaker 1: an NBA Finals series where you just get crazy hot,
Speaker 1: like we know Boston can, and they might win by
Speaker 1: ten fifteen points in those games, but more or less
Speaker 1: in the knockdown, drag out fist fights of games that
Speaker 1: these teams are going to generally engage in if they
Speaker 1: meet in the finals, Boston shot better than Denver did,
Speaker 1: so that to me isn't the swing factor there. Denver
Speaker 1: overcame their poor shooting because of their ability to consistently
Speaker 1: generate high quality shots around the rim, just like they
Speaker 1: did down the stretch with all those actions. The case
Speaker 1: for Boston is what Jalen Brown was able to do
Speaker 1: with Aaron Gordon, Because you know, it's interesting. I was
Speaker 1: talking with Adam Mars about this earlier today. I went
Speaker 1: on his show for about an hour and we talked
Speaker 1: about this game in a couple other games from last night.
Speaker 1: Make sure you guys check out the I think the
Speaker 1: YouTube channels called All In. It's the show that he
Speaker 1: does with Tim Legler, So go there if you guys
Speaker 1: want to see that. But I was talking with him
Speaker 1: about this earlier today. But like Aaron Gordon's an interesting
Speaker 1: defensive player because he's got the length to contest shots
Speaker 1: on the likes of Kevin Durant right, and he's got
Speaker 1: the strength to deal with the bully ball stuff that
Speaker 1: you see from guys like Jimmy Butler and Kawhi Leonard
Speaker 1: and Lebron James. But it's the speed and strength of
Speaker 1: Jylen Brown that allowed him to consistently beat him off
Speaker 1: the dribble and finish around the rim on him. I
Speaker 1: thought that was an interesting matchup. That was a huge
Speaker 1: silver lining for Boston. If Jason Tatum can meet that
Speaker 1: aggression and help inflict his physicality on the game, that's
Speaker 1: the path It's not We're going to make more shots.
Speaker 1: That's not the pathway to beating Denver. You outshot them
Speaker 1: in the two games and you lost both games. Denver
Speaker 1: is just as likely to have games where they shoot
Speaker 1: much better as you are. So to me, it most
Speaker 1: likely comes down to if Boston wins a series like this,
Speaker 1: it's taking advantage of their physical advantages on the perimeter.
Speaker 1: So those are just a couple of quick thoughts. We're
Speaker 1: gonna get more into Boston Denver at the end of
Speaker 1: the show when we get into our mailbag. All right,
Speaker 1: moving on to Dallas Miami. So this was a game
Speaker 1: that Dallas desperately needed coming off. I think they had
Speaker 1: lost five of their previous six games. The got off
Speaker 1: to a rough start. They Luca was really disengaged defensively early,
Speaker 1: was getting taken advantage of by Nicole jovich by in
Speaker 1: helping recover situations on rolls to the basket.
Speaker 2: He got back cut along the baseline for a layup.
Speaker 1: There was a play in transition defense where Luca was
Speaker 1: the guy back who's underneath the basket, and he let
Speaker 1: Bam sneak right behind him, and Jimmy threw a pass
Speaker 1: right over the top two because he just wasn't paying
Speaker 1: attention and gave up a layup and kind of trickled.
Speaker 2: Down the roster.
Speaker 1: They had a really bad defensive quarter and Duncan Robinson
Speaker 1: came out red hot. I think he hit four threes
Speaker 1: in the in the first quarter, and then Dallas was
Speaker 1: kind of cold. Luca was missing his step back jumps
Speaker 1: how to start the game. His kickout threes weren't going in,
Speaker 1: and so they dug themselves in a little bit of
Speaker 1: a hole there, right, and like at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, like getting humiliated sometimes is a great motivator.
Speaker 1: Like for six games before that game against Miami, Dallas
Speaker 1: had a defensive rating of one twenty seven point three.
Speaker 1: That was five points per one hundred possessions, worse than
Speaker 1: anyone else in the league over that span. That's a
Speaker 1: substantial problem right there. They were giving up I've talked
Speaker 1: about it on the show before, but a lot of
Speaker 1: overhelping and bad off ball defense leaving shooters open. They
Speaker 1: were giving up twenty three wide open threes per game,
Speaker 1: again according to NBA dot com, and a wide open
Speaker 1: three is a defender at least six feet away. They
Speaker 1: were giving up twenty three of those per game over
Speaker 1: that six game span, which was the third worst in
Speaker 1: the league over that span.
Speaker 2: In the first quarter, they had a one forty four.
Speaker 1: Defensive rating, and I think it just finally woke them
Speaker 1: up and they finally locked in. They had one of
Speaker 1: their best defensive quarters in the last few weeks in
Speaker 1: that second quarter against Miami's they got back into the game.
Speaker 1: They had a one to eleven defensive rating in the
Speaker 1: second half, which is perfectly fine. They dominated the glass
Speaker 1: in the second half. They grabbed eight of available defensive rebounds,
Speaker 1: which is awesome. The biggest play of the game was
Speaker 1: a rebound play. It was a miss three where Maxi
Speaker 1: Kleba kind of looped around the baseline and tapped it
Speaker 1: out and that got swung to Kyrie Irving in the
Speaker 1: left corner for a big three. I think it put
Speaker 1: him up one o nine, one oh four if I
Speaker 1: remember correctly. It was like the biggest shot of the
Speaker 1: game off of an offensive rebound. They dominated the game
Speaker 1: with their athleticism in the throughout the rest of the game.
Speaker 1: That is there that is one of their big advantages.
Speaker 2: Perimeter speed.
Speaker 1: They can contend on the perimeter defensively, and they've got guys.
Speaker 1: They've got athletes under the rim that can make plays.
Speaker 1: Huge defensive plays from Derek Lively on bam ade Bio
Speaker 1: under the rim late the Stone walled him twice. They
Speaker 1: were two of the biggest stops as they built that
Speaker 1: little bit of an advantage that they had and then
Speaker 1: a timely shot making not just from Luca and Kyrie,
Speaker 1: but also from Dante Exem Kyrie. We talked about the
Speaker 1: huge three off of the tap out from Maxi kleb
Speaker 1: but he also had a playoff of the right wing
Speaker 1: where he got bam Adebayo on the switch, hit him
Speaker 1: with a nasty hesitation, moved beating off the dribble, and
Speaker 1: then elevated for a tough floater over the top. And
Speaker 1: then Luca we talked about that step back three moving
Speaker 1: to his left a few weeks ago, another really nice
Speaker 1: drifting to the right. I should say step back to
Speaker 1: his right. I meant to say, but over his left shoulder.
Speaker 1: That's where I always get that confused. So like when
Speaker 1: you're doing a movement shot, when you're moving to your right,
Speaker 1: you're shooting over your left shoulder as you're trying to
Speaker 1: square up in mid air.
Speaker 2: And Luca made a.
Speaker 1: Pivoting over his left shoulder three as a rescue shot
Speaker 1: with about six minutes left that was unbelievable. Hit a
Speaker 1: ridiculous step back three over Jimmy Butler to put him
Speaker 1: up five late in the game. He actually made four
Speaker 1: step back threes in this game, which is big because
Speaker 1: he hasn't been shooting as well on his step back
Speaker 1: three as of late as he did to start the year.
Speaker 1: But the biggest sequence of the game was because Jason
Speaker 1: Kate went with a really interesting lineup down the stretch.
Speaker 1: He went with Maxi Kleba at the four next to
Speaker 1: Derek Lively, and then Dante Exam at the three instead
Speaker 1: of someone like a Josh Green right, and the mass
Speaker 1: started running these ball screen actions with Derek ly or
Speaker 1: with Dante Exum, and Xem was slipping out of him
Speaker 1: when they were blitzing Luca, and he slipped out to
Speaker 1: the left wing and knocked down a big three late
Speaker 1: in the shot clock. And then one of the biggest
Speaker 1: shots in the game, that little turnaround jump shot he
Speaker 1: hit in the lane, a really well defended possession, Luca
Speaker 1: draws a blitz, hits Dante Exem on the slip, they
Speaker 1: stonewall him at the rim. Everything else is shut down.
Speaker 1: This is that high level. I sometimes refer to it
Speaker 1: as high level close out attacking, but really it's like
Speaker 1: shot making from role players, right. It's like the ability
Speaker 1: to win a possession is really well defended, and you've
Speaker 1: been chased off the three point line, and the rim
Speaker 1: isn't there as an option, and there isn't an easy
Speaker 1: kickout pass for the next sequence, or maybe the shot
Speaker 1: clock is winding down and you need someone that can
Speaker 1: just take and make a difficult shot, and Dante Exem
Speaker 1: was able to pivot over his right shoulder and take
Speaker 1: a tough mid range pull up jump shot and make it,
Speaker 1: and it was a huge possession in the game as
Speaker 1: they got out of there with the win. I really
Speaker 1: liked that lineup late, not just because Xum is just
Speaker 1: a little bit more high level in terms of some
Speaker 1: of his shot making ability off the bounce than a
Speaker 1: guy like Josh Green, which I think was an advantage
Speaker 1: as they were blitzing Luca, but also just the size
Speaker 1: of that lineup between Live League and Cleva and Exhum
Speaker 1: in that front court, they made it more difficult for
Speaker 1: Jimmy Butler in particular to kind of bully his way
Speaker 1: to his spots. Timmy hit one step back jumper going
Speaker 1: to his right where he kind of a shouldered Maxi
Speaker 1: in the chest and got a little bit of separation
Speaker 1: and knocked down a shot. But they defended Jimmy Butler
Speaker 1: really well in this game. I liked the combination of
Speaker 1: Luca and Kyrie as your shot creators with a lot
Speaker 1: of size and defensive personnel off of them, especially when
Speaker 1: you rely so much on Luca and Kyrie tough shot
Speaker 1: making anyway, and I thought that was an interesting group
Speaker 1: to go with at the end of the game, got
Speaker 1: a lot of stops, got a big win down the
Speaker 1: stretch on the Miami front. Terry Rozier by far his
Speaker 1: best game since joining the Heat. He had twenty seven
Speaker 1: points and eleven assists, hit five threes, made a bunch
Speaker 1: of big plays in pick and roll at the end
Speaker 1: of the game. He's actually been pretty good in pick
Speaker 1: and roll in general since coming to Miami. Despite Terry
Speaker 1: Rozier shooting forty one percent from the field and thirty
Speaker 1: percent from three since coming to Miami, he's actually been
Speaker 1: a pretty good shot creator for them. He's run one
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy three pick and rolls in ISOs that
Speaker 1: have led to one hundred and eighty three points. It's
Speaker 1: one point zero six points per possession, which is pretty
Speaker 1: damn solid shot creation. That's all including passes, by the way,
Speaker 1: And again, like when you factor in the fact that
Speaker 1: he hasn't even really started hitting shots yet up until
Speaker 1: last night, that's super encouraging because that means that there's
Speaker 1: another level that he can get to on that side
Speaker 1: of the floor. And then I thought one of the
Speaker 1: biggest swing factors in this game was bam Adebayo. Again,
Speaker 1: this is something I've talked about all season. On the season,
Speaker 1: he is shooting below fifty percent on shots that are
Speaker 1: inside of five feet from the rim but aren't dunks,
Speaker 1: because he has like one hundred dunks this year. If
Speaker 1: you take the dunks out, the missus and the makes,
Speaker 1: and you just look at every shot he takes within
Speaker 1: five feet of the rim, he misses them more than
Speaker 1: half the time. He was just five to twelve in
Speaker 1: this game against Dallas in the paint three times late
Speaker 1: he got stonewalled at the rim and wasn't able to
Speaker 1: make a sort of push shot or hook shot over
Speaker 1: the top. That is a huge difference maker. Like we
Speaker 1: talked about that with Jokic all night last night. But
Speaker 1: like when you're a big man, having that little pop
Speaker 1: shot or floater or hook shot or you know, kind
Speaker 1: of like in traffic type of layup to go to
Speaker 1: is such a huge part of shot making for the
Speaker 1: center position. And that continues to be something that makes
Speaker 1: Miami easier to guard. If you just keep Bam from dunking,
Speaker 1: he'll probably miss, Like statistically, he's more likely to miss
Speaker 1: than he is to make, and it just allows teams
Speaker 1: to get away with things in a coverage element of
Speaker 1: defense that they shouldn't be able to get away with otherwise,
Speaker 1: and that's something to keep an eye on the BAM front.
Speaker 1: And then Jimmy just he's been.
Speaker 2: Playing really well.
Speaker 1: They got kind of a rare bad Jimmy Butler game
Speaker 1: in this one, but Jimmy's been playing super super well
Speaker 1: as of late. So there again, a lot of encouraging stuff,
Speaker 1: especially on the Terry Rozier front, but just a disappointing loss,
Speaker 1: especially against a MAVs team that's reeling a game that
Speaker 1: you got off to a big lead early, and I
Speaker 1: just was really disappointed in some of the shot making
Speaker 1: stuff from BAM late in the game. All right, moving
Speaker 1: on to Pacers Wolves, this was a huge and much
Speaker 1: needed win.
Speaker 2: For the Wolves. Four straight pull up jump shots at
Speaker 2: the end of the game.
Speaker 1: Mike Conley out of the left corner hits a jab
Speaker 1: step pull up three going to his right, and then
Speaker 1: Anthony Edwards hits a pull up three and pick and roll,
Speaker 1: and then a couple of tough pull up jump shots
Speaker 1: in ISO in the middle of the floor that I
Speaker 1: end up icing the game, some defensive mistakes kept it close.
Speaker 1: They lost Miles Turner on a kind of like a
Speaker 1: pin screen out of the right corner for three, and
Speaker 1: then Kyle Anderson fouled aaron Ne Smith out of the
Speaker 1: left corner that kept it close, but off of an
Speaker 1: ant miss free throw. One of the very best defensive
Speaker 1: plays I've ever seen that you know, Ant set after
Speaker 1: the game. He's jumped higher than he's ever jumped in
Speaker 1: his life. There is a level of desperation that you
Speaker 1: can get out of a block that you might not
Speaker 1: get out of a dunk in terms of jumping ability.
Speaker 1: Funny when I think back to the highest I've ever
Speaker 1: jumped in my life, the possession I think of is
Speaker 1: a defensive play in particular. I won't get into the details,
Speaker 1: but it's funny because I remember it was a big
Speaker 1: possession where like I had to just I just was
Speaker 1: jumping as high as I possibly could to try to
Speaker 1: make a play. Right, And obviously Ant is like that,
Speaker 1: but one of the best athletes in the in the
Speaker 1: history of basketball, so like for him, it just looks
Speaker 1: completely outrageous. Hits his head on the rim, hits his
Speaker 1: shoulder on the backboard. Every single time I open up
Speaker 1: my phone, I see a new angle of this Anthony
Speaker 1: Edwards block and it looks more ridiculous.
Speaker 2: Than the last one.
Speaker 1: Just an unbelievably ununbelievable play, and a win is a
Speaker 1: win is a win. But I want to zoom in
Speaker 1: on the KYLEI Anderson at the power forward spot thing
Speaker 1: because this was super concerning to me at the end
Speaker 1: of the game. So obviously, Carl Towns, Tormaniscus getting some surgery,
Speaker 1: gonna be out until the beginning of the Western Conference
Speaker 1: playoffs at a minimum, Big Bummer obviously off off of
Speaker 1: having one of the best seasons of his career, and
Speaker 1: just how good this Timberwolves team has been. But the
Speaker 1: question becomes, what do you what do you? Where do
Speaker 1: you go from here? How do you put together lineups?
Speaker 1: And Carl Towns has been your four in your best
Speaker 1: groups all year long. And let's first talk about how
Speaker 1: bad the Kyle Anderson experience was, because I thought it
Speaker 1: was just a complete and total disaster. On the defensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor, Tyres Saliburton was picking on him
Speaker 1: on switches. First one I watched, the one where Tyres
Speaker 1: made like the kind of scoop shot off the glass.
Speaker 1: I'm like, that's kind of well defended. It's a tough shot.
Speaker 1: Tyres is one of the best players in the league.
Speaker 1: Like that, that's tough. But then there was another switch
Speaker 1: a few possessions later where he got absolutely dusted and
Speaker 1: then Rudy Gobert had to foul him. Then they tried
Speaker 1: hedging and recovering with him, and he just lunged and
Speaker 1: reached in too hard and got himself way out of position,
Speaker 1: and then Siakam broke wide open on the slip Tyre's
Speaker 1: hit him and he ended up going up and dunking.
Speaker 1: I can't remember who it was that he dunked on.
Speaker 1: I think it might have been. It wasn't Gobert, I
Speaker 1: can't remember. I might have been Jade McDaniels that he done,
Speaker 1: or might have been Ant actually that he had dunked on.
Speaker 2: I just can't remember.
Speaker 1: But he slipped out of that hedge and recover and
Speaker 1: got a huge dunk. And then he was the guy
Speaker 1: who fouled Aaron Nesmith out of the left corner. So
Speaker 1: like that's the thing is like Kyle Anderson has some
Speaker 1: offensive limitations, So if you're gonna go to him at
Speaker 1: the power forward spot on as like a defensive option.
Speaker 1: He's got to be impactful defensively, and he just wasn't.
Speaker 1: He was getting picked on and making mistakes and that's
Speaker 1: just not gonna cut it. And then on the offensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor, you can kind of put two
Speaker 1: and two together, like here comes down in transition. I
Speaker 1: clipped this play and put on my Twitter feed. You
Speaker 1: guys can see it at Underscore JSNLT. But the ant's
Speaker 1: coming down the floor in transition trying to drive the basket.
Speaker 1: Kyle Anderson just kind of meanders into the dunker spot
Speaker 1: on the left side of the floor, and Rudy Gobert
Speaker 1: meanders into the dunker spot on the right side of
Speaker 1: the floor, and there's just a throng of bodies there
Speaker 1: and it's just there's no space to operate and he
Speaker 1: ends up in trouble. In some traffic, there was a
Speaker 1: possession where Indy threw a hard double at Anthony Edwards
Speaker 1: and it just was no advantage because nobody needs to
Speaker 1: guard Kyle Anderson and as long as you've got somebody
Speaker 1: underneath the rim, he's not gonna hurt you there, right,
Speaker 1: And like it just it just was a big problem
Speaker 1: on the offensive end of the floor, and then you
Speaker 1: weren't getting the benefit of the defensive end of things.
Speaker 1: So that's gonna be something they're gonna need to figure out,
Speaker 1: because my best guess is it's got to be matchup related.
Speaker 1: Like it might be one of those things where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: this team is smaller, more perimeter oriented, let's go with
Speaker 1: Nikkeil Alexander Walker and just goes small and and now
Speaker 1: I've got Jaden McDaniels in, Nikkeil Alexander Walker and ant
Speaker 1: out there, and I can really defend on the perimeter,
Speaker 1: right or against a more bruising team that doesn't have
Speaker 1: as much perimeter speed, you know, now, like against the Lakers,
Speaker 1: for instance, maybe it's better to go with nas Reed
Speaker 1: in the Sunday night. I think it's on Sunday, but
Speaker 1: in the in the game on Sunday or the next
Speaker 1: game that they have against the Lakers in a Crypto
Speaker 1: dot com arena, that might be a game where you
Speaker 1: go with nas Reid at the power forward spot. But like,
Speaker 1: you gotta go with either speed and quickness or shooting.
Speaker 1: I don't think you can go with the guy and
Speaker 1: Kyle who's not good enough at either right and so
Speaker 1: and so that that's gonna be something that they're gonna
Speaker 1: have to figure out as the as the season progresses.
Speaker 1: And then finally, like once again and again, we can
Speaker 1: blame Kyle Anderson all we want for this, but this
Speaker 1: has been an issue all season. They won the game
Speaker 1: because they made four straight pull up jump shots. Mike
Speaker 1: Conley made one out of left corner and made a
Speaker 1: pull up three and pick and roll, and he made
Speaker 1: two tough step back jump shots in the lane. Like
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, that's really what it
Speaker 1: depends on for Minnesota, which is why their late game
Speaker 1: offense is so concerning. It really comes down to cant
Speaker 1: Ant and Mike Conley make tough pull up jump shots
Speaker 1: because of the fact that Rudy Gobert is not good
Speaker 1: enough at either beating switches or catching and finishing around
Speaker 1: the rim in traffic to make teams pay for helping.
Speaker 1: You know, Jada McDaniels is not a guy you have
Speaker 1: to guard super closely. Now that Carl Towns is in
Speaker 1: the group, it's even harder to do this because you're
Speaker 1: gonna have someone out there that, in all likelihood that's
Speaker 1: a little bit less of a threat from the three
Speaker 1: point line. And so this has been an issue all
Speaker 1: season for Minnesota, and again, like last night, it worked
Speaker 1: because the shots went in. But like it's a lot
Speaker 1: to ask for Anthony Edwards to make tough pull up
Speaker 1: jump shots time and time again, you know it, it
Speaker 1: can work in a one game sample. But again, like
Speaker 1: among the high volume pull up shooters in the league,
Speaker 1: Anthony Edwards falls more in line with the Jason Tatum types,
Speaker 1: which guys that take a lot of them that aren't
Speaker 1: efficient then compared to the guys that are super efficient,
Speaker 1: you know, the James Hardens and the Jalen Williams and
Speaker 1: the Steph Curries and those kinds of guys. Right, He's
Speaker 1: just not on that level as a pull up shooter.
Speaker 1: And so that's where it gets a little bit concerning,
Speaker 1: all right, moving on to Lakers Kings. This was a
Speaker 1: game that happened on Wednesday night. I was texting with
Speaker 1: Sam Vessini after Lakers thunder, and I told you, guys,
Speaker 1: I was having like a little bit of fun at
Speaker 1: his expense because I think there's like at least a
Speaker 1: coin flip chance that the Lakers don't even get out
Speaker 1: of the play in tournament, let alone make noise in
Speaker 1: the playoffs. They're not a team I believe in anymore
Speaker 1: ever since they didn't make a trade at the deadline.
Speaker 1: That said, like, that match up, specifically against the Thunder
Speaker 1: is one I've always liked for the Lakers, And so
Speaker 1: I texted Sam and I was having some fun at
Speaker 1: his expense, and you know, haven't taken a little victory lap.
Speaker 1: But I texted him right after that and I was like,
Speaker 1: but I think. I was like, I'm nearly one hundred
Speaker 1: percent sure they're going to get smashed by the Kings
Speaker 1: and that their defense is going to get absolutely shredded.
Speaker 1: And the reason for that is something that I've talked
Speaker 1: about a lot on the show. I talked about it
Speaker 1: after the Warriors Bucks game. Matchups. Matchups, to me, are
Speaker 1: the main determining factor for wins and losses for basically
Speaker 1: every team outside of that Boston and Denver teer. Once
Speaker 1: you get below those two, every single team you run
Speaker 1: into has a certain strength and a certain weakness and
Speaker 1: multiple strengths and multiple weaknesses, and really it just depends
Speaker 1: on how those strengths and weaknesses kind of link with
Speaker 1: their opponent, right, and like that's the thing, Like, there's
Speaker 1: a reason why the Lakers have had success against the Thunder,
Speaker 1: There's a reason why the Lakers have had success against
Speaker 1: the Clippers. There's a reason why the Lakers have had
Speaker 1: success against the Suns this season. It's because in those
Speaker 1: particular matchups, those are teams that have guys that have
Speaker 1: shifty approach to offense and take a lot of pull
Speaker 1: up jump shots. And the Lakers do have a lot
Speaker 1: of length, they don't have a lot of perimeter speed.
Speaker 1: But Austin is a guy that he's not short by
Speaker 1: any stretch of the imagination. Dangela Russell's not short by
Speaker 1: any stretch of the imagination.
Speaker 2: They're just slower.
Speaker 1: Turian Prince is not short, he's just slower, right, And
Speaker 1: so against those types of matchups, they can slide their
Speaker 1: feet and be disciplined and offer a late contest and
Speaker 1: get teams to miss. And then on the other end
Speaker 1: of the floor, because those teams aren't overly fast, they
Speaker 1: can have some success scoring the basketball. Here's the problem
Speaker 1: with Sacramento. Sacramento is not a shifty shot making team.
Speaker 1: They have speed guards. It is it is like we're
Speaker 1: coming at you like this all game long, and like
Speaker 1: I was impressed that the Lakers even jumped out to
Speaker 1: the lead, that they jumped out out too. But then
Speaker 1: like as soon as that, right around the end of
Speaker 1: the first quarter and heading into that second quarter run,
Speaker 1: they brought in Tourian Prince and put him on Malik Monk,
Speaker 1: and then they started running action where basically like a
Speaker 1: version of Spain pick and roll where they'd have like
Speaker 1: Deer and Fox come off a ball screen and then
Speaker 1: they'd have Malik Monk backscreen for the big man is
Speaker 1: Alex Landez, He's rolling to the basket, and they were
Speaker 1: just putting the Lakers in the blender. Jackson hayeses on
Speaker 1: the floor in this group and they kind of got
Speaker 1: into a rhythm a little bit, and then from there,
Speaker 1: Malik Monk and Deer and Fox are both playing with confidence.
Speaker 1: And when they're playing with confidence, they see tissue paper.
Speaker 2: When they see Austin.
Speaker 1: Reeves, they see tissue paper, when they see D'Angelo Russell,
Speaker 1: they see tissue paper when they see torn I prints
Speaker 1: on the perimeter. And then what happens, because like the
Speaker 1: Kings are an interesting team in the sense that like
Speaker 1: they we think of them as like a high powered
Speaker 1: offense who's going to outscore people, and that was kind
Speaker 1: of what they were in the regular season last year.
Speaker 1: But really when you look to their success in the
Speaker 1: postseason last year when they won games against Golden State
Speaker 1: and this year, they win when they win with defense.
Speaker 1: Like when you look at their opponent point totals, it's
Speaker 1: when they keep teams below that threshold. I think it's
Speaker 1: like a one hundred and fifteen points or whatever. When
Speaker 1: they hold teams down, their win percentage is gigantically better
Speaker 1: than what it is when they give up large scoring games.
Speaker 1: They have not outscored teams very well, but they have
Speaker 1: been able to when they really lock in get stops.
Speaker 1: They again it's I talked about this last night with
Speaker 1: Jylen Brown about like discovering your superpower that extends to
Speaker 1: the team level as well. Understand what your superpower is
Speaker 1: as a team. And for for Sacramento, it's speed on
Speaker 1: the offensive end. We discovered last year. It's not Kevin
Speaker 1: Herder and Keegan Murray coming off of ball screens. It's
Speaker 1: not the bonus bowllying his way of the basket. It's
Speaker 1: no one can keep Malik Monk and Deer and Fox
Speaker 1: in front off the dribble, that is their superpower. And
Speaker 1: then on the defensive end of the floor, they have
Speaker 1: a ton of speed. And like when you add in
Speaker 1: when you add in Keon and you add in Davion Mitchell, like,
Speaker 1: they they have speed at the guard spot on the
Speaker 1: defensive end, five guys deep and so like. And what's
Speaker 1: crazy is like you could see it because they had
Speaker 1: a really bad defensive quarter to start in the first quarter,
Speaker 1: and then when Fox and Monk got going, like you
Speaker 1: could tell it energized the team and they started defending.
Speaker 1: They held the Lakers to twenty points in that second quarter,
Speaker 1: and it was like a runaway freight train, one of
Speaker 1: the craziest runs I've ever seen to go from being
Speaker 1: down eighteen or whatever to basically blowing out the Lakers
Speaker 1: like it was like a reverse blowout. It was. It
Speaker 1: was completely insane. But again, this is why I talk
Speaker 1: about matchups so much, the reason why I wanted the
Speaker 1: Lakers to go out and get guard athleticism, which was
Speaker 1: the number one thing I talked about after the Denver
Speaker 1: Nuggets series last year. They need someone at the guard
Speaker 1: spot that is athletic, enough but not too small to
Speaker 1: deal with the likes of like a Jamal Murray, a big,
Speaker 1: strong athlete. It's why I wanted Bruce Brown this summer.
Speaker 1: It's why I said at the deadline, I'd rather have
Speaker 1: Bruce Brown than de Jonte Murray. That specific archetype is
Speaker 1: a specific type of player that the Lakers just do
Speaker 1: not have. And so because of that, it was like,
Speaker 1: that's the thing. The Lakers went to the Western Conference
Speaker 1: Finals last year as currently constructed, more or less obviously
Speaker 1: without Dennis Schroeder and with some other role players in
Speaker 1: the group. They beat the Warriors relatively easily. They beat
Speaker 1: the Grizzlies relatively easily, right like, they won in the
Speaker 1: same exact fashion throughout, never lost a game at home
Speaker 1: in those two series. The reason why is because those
Speaker 1: teams were not able to capitalize on the weaknesses that
Speaker 1: the Lakers have, right and so as we go into
Speaker 1: as we go into the Denver matchup, they run into
Speaker 1: a team that you desperately need size and athleticism at
Speaker 1: the guard position to defend in those Jokich Murray actions.
Speaker 1: It was a huge problem. And it was one thing
Speaker 1: against the Grizzlies when the Grizzlies don't shoot enough, shoot
Speaker 1: the ball well enough off the ball, and they were
Speaker 1: able to just completely pack the paint. It was one
Speaker 1: thing against the Warriors when everybody not named Stent Stephan
Speaker 1: went cold and they were able to just pack the
Speaker 1: paint and throw the kitchen sink at Steph. But as
Speaker 1: soon as they ran into a team that brought real
Speaker 1: shot creation, the guard spot with Jamal Murray obviously, the
Speaker 1: two man game with Jokic and the off ball spacing
Speaker 1: to punish them for helping it exposed their inability to
Speaker 1: guard actions one on one and two on two. That
Speaker 1: is why I've preached about that NonStop. I've never been
Speaker 1: I've never been of the belief that the Lakers can't
Speaker 1: beat certain teams is currently constructed. It's like I talked
Speaker 1: about with the Thunder. I've just that's a matchup that
Speaker 1: works really well for the Lakers. They are a shifty,
Speaker 1: shot making perimeter group, and they're too small on the
Speaker 1: interior and they're too inexperienced. The Lakers would eat those
Speaker 1: guys up in a playoff series in my opinion. But
Speaker 1: these really fast teams that also have the spacing off
Speaker 1: the ball can cause problems for them, and we haven't
Speaker 1: even got to the center position. Sabonis kicked Anthony Davis's
Speaker 1: ass in that game. Anthony Davis has consistently struggled against
Speaker 1: the big, bruising centers, guys like Sabonis, guys like Zubac,
Speaker 1: guys like Nurkic, guys like Jokic. Because he's got a
Speaker 1: high center of gravity, they can shove him off of
Speaker 1: his spot. Sabonis was finishing through Anthony Davis at will.
Speaker 1: He was bullying him, bullying him on the offensive glass.
Speaker 1: It was a huge problem in that game. That is
Speaker 1: so the Kings just in general are really bad matchup
Speaker 1: for the Lakers because the bonus is a bad matchup
Speaker 1: for ad in their guards, Like the Lakers guards are
Speaker 1: just absolutely hopeless to guard them.
Speaker 2: And like that's the thing.
Speaker 1: Like I saw a lot of Lakers fans focusing on
Speaker 1: Darvin Ham and lineups, and don't get me wrong, I've
Speaker 1: been one of the guys complaining about that all year.
Speaker 1: Do not agree with everything that Darvinham did in this game.
Speaker 1: I would have had a lot more Max Christy Torrian
Speaker 1: Prince on Malik Monk is something I never in a
Speaker 1: million years would have done, but like, like it doesn't
Speaker 1: really matter. They don't have the personnel. You could have
Speaker 1: thrown your best punch in that game and you still
Speaker 1: would have gotten your butt kicked. I mean, I shouldn't
Speaker 1: say your best play is but your best tactical punch,
Speaker 1: because from a personnel standpoint, the Kings just have significant
Speaker 1: advantages over the Lakers. And that's what that's the group
Speaker 1: that the Lakers fall into. Now, everything's gonna be about
Speaker 1: matchups for them. Whatever tiny sliver of a hope they
Speaker 1: have is gonna be about catching the right types of
Speaker 1: teams along the way. If they end up in a
Speaker 1: playing game on the road in Sacramento, I would be
Speaker 1: stunned if.
Speaker 2: They won, you know.
Speaker 1: But like if they ended up on the road in
Speaker 1: a single elimination game to get in against the Pelicans
Speaker 1: shifty shot making perimeter guys in bad back line defense,
Speaker 1: I would pick the Lakers ten times out of ten
Speaker 1: to win that game.
Speaker 2: Right, matchups are gonna be huge.
Speaker 1: I shouldn't say ten out of ten because obviously if
Speaker 1: a games in New Orleans, they could just get hot
Speaker 1: and beat you. But seven or eight times out of ten,
Speaker 1: I like the Lakers in that matchup. Matchups are gonna
Speaker 1: be everything for this particular Lakers team, and I thought
Speaker 1: that that King's game was a perfect example of that.
Speaker 1: Going into the Bucks game tonight, it's gonna be interesting
Speaker 1: because obviously that Dame matchup is a little bit tough
Speaker 1: on the perimeter, but they don't have the depth of
Speaker 1: shot creation on the perimeter that a team like Sacramento
Speaker 1: had with Malik Monk and Deer and Fox, and so
Speaker 1: I think they might be able to piece together a
Speaker 1: better group for that matchup. And obviously they have the
Speaker 1: interior presence to kind of hang with Johannison brook Lopez.
Speaker 1: So that's gonna be really interesting one against the bucksley tonight.
Speaker 1: But again, matchups are going to be everything for this
Speaker 1: Lakers team. All right, moving on to the mailbag and
Speaker 1: then we'll get out of here for the day. First question,
Speaker 1: you should collab with Adam Montas from DMVR. You two
Speaker 1: are so knowledgeable about the game of basketball. First of all,
Speaker 1: thanks for the kind words about myself and also for
Speaker 1: Adam as well. I really really enjoyed working with Adam today.
Speaker 1: It was super easy to talk basketball, was super super
Speaker 1: smart guy, had a ton of fun, went for an
Speaker 1: hour talked about basically a lot of the same games
Speaker 1: that we talked about today.
Speaker 2: But you can.
Speaker 1: Find that on the All NBA Podcast YouTube feed, so
Speaker 1: go check that out. Next question, if the MVP race,
Speaker 1: If the MVP is a race, Tatum somehow is running
Speaker 1: in the opposite direction. So this was just a funny comment,
Speaker 1: but I wanted to use it to just kind of
Speaker 1: talk about the MVP race because I saw there was
Speaker 1: I didn't talk about this over the last couple of
Speaker 1: weeks just simply because I didn't think it was interesting enough.
Speaker 1: But you know, if this comment kind of gave me
Speaker 1: an excuse to talk about it for a second. I
Speaker 1: never considered Tatum legitimately for him, and the main reason
Speaker 1: why is because, like to me, if you're not actually
Speaker 1: in that top tier of superstars in the league, you
Speaker 1: just don't qualify for the MVP conversation. And like that's
Speaker 1: the thing. Like Tatum is the best player on the
Speaker 1: best regular season team in the league. But there's a
Speaker 1: couple of pieces of context. One he's playing for, in
Speaker 1: my opinion, the most talented starting five in the league. Two,
Speaker 1: Boston is playing in an Eastern conference that is really
Speaker 1: weak at the bottom and has a lot of opportunities
Speaker 1: to just rake up, like to rack up like massive
Speaker 1: wins that inflate stats and inflate advanced metrics. For instance,
Speaker 1: I'm sure you guys saw this stat after the game
Speaker 1: after last night. Boston is thirty three and seven against
Speaker 1: the Eastern Conference. They are fifteen and seven against the
Speaker 1: Western Conference because the Western Conference top to bottom just
Speaker 1: has significantly more talent down the East top is very talented,
Speaker 1: but the bottom of the East has a lot of
Speaker 1: like you know, automatic wins, so to speak.
Speaker 2: And I think.
Speaker 1: That's reflected league wide in records between Eastern Conference in
Speaker 1: Western Conference teams. But like I never, to me, the
Speaker 1: standings reflect more just how much better Boston is than
Speaker 1: the rest of the East. And then as far as
Speaker 1: the MVP race goes like he's the best player on
Speaker 1: the team, but he's not as good as Yoka, she's
Speaker 1: not as good as Luca, he's not as good as Giannis,
Speaker 1: and those guys are just doing more with less, and
Speaker 1: so for me, like I never really realistically considered Tatum
Speaker 1: for that MVP spot. Next question, Hi, Jason loved the
Speaker 1: content from Australia watching the Luka Kyrie pairing Cook defenses
Speaker 1: is great viewing, but it also got me wondering about
Speaker 1: the future of pairing two star guards as building blocks.
Speaker 1: We've seen Fox and Halliburton thrive separately, questions about the
Speaker 1: Trey Murray and Mitchell Garland combo as a long term solution,
Speaker 1: and even a young potential superstar duo like Cad and
Speaker 1: Ivy raise the issue whether they can thrive together down
Speaker 1: the line, if you were coaching two young star guards
Speaker 1: in the making, what skills would you prioritize them to
Speaker 1: focus on to maximize their own team success? And what
Speaker 1: potential red flags would you look out for should they
Speaker 1: success that would suggest they're better off on separate team.
Speaker 1: Having followed you for a bit, I'll guess pull up
Speaker 1: shooting is right there. Thanks for these shows, always learning
Speaker 1: something new every episode. Thanks for supporting the show. Here's
Speaker 1: the thing, as it comes down to the two guards thing,
Speaker 1: it really just comes down to, like, if you're the
Speaker 1: expression like you are who you can guard like, you
Speaker 1: can have two star guards as long as they're different archetypes.
Speaker 1: So for instance, like if you have a skill guard,
Speaker 1: let's say that you had Steph Curry, but let's say
Speaker 1: You're two was like prime Dwayne Wade, who's like one
Speaker 1: of the best defensive players in the league and a
Speaker 1: real downhill athlete. That I think is a pairing of
Speaker 1: star guards that would work because they have a lack
Speaker 1: of redundancy. They don't step on each other's toes. They
Speaker 1: bring different things to the table. That is a defensive
Speaker 1: backcourt that can fly. Does that make sense? So, like
Speaker 1: in general, when I'm looking at any star duo, I
Speaker 1: want one of them to be really good at different
Speaker 1: stuff than the other guy. Take Jamal Murray and to
Speaker 1: Kola Jokis for example, Like Jamal Murray is this perimeter
Speaker 1: shot making piece and Nicole Jokich is this physical imposition
Speaker 1: around the rim piece and playmaking piece. Right, they perfectly
Speaker 1: compliment each other. If you wanted a star next to Jokic,
Speaker 1: it would ideally be a guy that can run two
Speaker 1: man game with him and hit tough over the top
Speaker 1: pull up jump shots.
Speaker 2: It makes perfect sense. Think Kyrie Irving and Lebron.
Speaker 1: James Lebron was the bullyball, mismatch attacking forward that brought
Speaker 1: all the athleticism and defensive tools to the table. Kyrie
Speaker 1: Irving was the guy Lebron is the guy who loves
Speaker 1: to rest while he's playing. Kyrie Irving was the guy
Speaker 1: they could throw the basketball too, and he could go
Speaker 1: stand on the left wing, maybe shoot a catch and
Speaker 1: shoot three now and then. But Kyrie Irving can just
Speaker 1: run the offense for a brief stretch and be that
Speaker 1: skill guard right Like that to me is the big
Speaker 1: piece is you want to have a lack of redundancy.
Speaker 1: So for instance, like let's take Deer and Fox and
Speaker 1: Tyree saliburn. I do think that could have worked in
Speaker 1: the long run, but it would have required Deer and
Speaker 1: Fox to basically become one of the best two way
Speaker 1: guards in the league to really focus on the defensive
Speaker 1: end of the floor. But like, there's no doubt that
Speaker 1: that that could have worked in the long run because
Speaker 1: I view Tyreese as the skill guard and Dearon Fox
Speaker 1: to me is like the athlete guard in that in
Speaker 1: that pairing. It just would it Just Dearon Fox has
Speaker 1: always been a little bit of an inconsistent defensive player,
Speaker 1: although I think he's capable of being an awesome defensive player.
Speaker 1: Next question, Lol, I'm not letting MPJ shoot, but I
Speaker 1: get your point. You close out late and make him
Speaker 1: drive so that he can finish, but he doesn't handle
Speaker 1: well again. I h This was in reference to a
Speaker 1: point I made at the end of last night's show
Speaker 1: about how I would guard if I was Boston. Basically,
Speaker 1: I said I wouldn't want to live with Jokicchen and
Speaker 1: Gordon hitting shots right around the rim. I would want
Speaker 1: to bring help either from the baseline, but then bring
Speaker 1: that weak side corner guy to get inside position on
Speaker 1: Gordon and boxing mountain, force Ciokich to make a skip pass,
Speaker 1: or I double from the front side to Forciokich to
Speaker 1: make kickouts to the perimeter. But the main point there
Speaker 1: is like, yeah, I don't want I don't want MPG
Speaker 1: to shoot, but like MPJ. You know, I've talked about
Speaker 1: the difference between shot value and the large sample size
Speaker 1: versushot value in the individual possession. So, for instance, an
Speaker 1: MPG catching shoot three, Just to make the math easy,
Speaker 1: if Mpj's wide open, let's just say he makes fifty
Speaker 1: percent of them, right, that's one point five points per shot.
Speaker 1: That's a really high percentage shot, right. I would have
Speaker 1: to shoot seventy five percent at the rim to be
Speaker 1: on or on a hook shot or something on any
Speaker 1: other type of shot to be as efficient as Michael
Speaker 1: Porter junior on a catch and shoot three, right, But
Speaker 1: on the individual possession, it's only a fifty percent shot.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: The statistic means nothing to the individual, both in life
Speaker 1: and in basketball in my opinion, Like the statistic is
Speaker 1: is what happens in the big picture. But on that
Speaker 1: individual possession, you have the you have you there. You're
Speaker 1: down to the field goal percentage at that point.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: So for instance, if yo catch, let's say YO get
Speaker 1: shoot sixty five percent on hook shots. That's a lower
Speaker 1: percentage shot by points per possession. I shouldn't say lower percentage.
Speaker 1: It's a lower value shot by points per possession than
Speaker 1: a Michael Porter junior wide open catch and shoot three.
Speaker 1: But on the individual possession, the Micael Porter shot he's
Speaker 1: gonna miss half the time, whereas the Yoka shot around
Speaker 1: the basket, he's gonna miss it one out of three times.
Speaker 1: And probably if you get him to miss, you brought
Speaker 1: baseline help and Aaron Gordon's gonna get an extra possession
Speaker 1: about half.
Speaker 2: Of those times.
Speaker 1: So like the individual possession, that around the rim stuff
Speaker 1: is so much more valuable than the big picture stuff
Speaker 1: when it comes down to the three point shots. So
Speaker 1: what I was saying is obviously leaving a Michael Porter
Speaker 1: Junior or a KCP wide open is not a good option.
Speaker 1: But here's the thing. We know Porzingis can't guard Yoki's
Speaker 1: one on one. We know the baseline help leaves Aaron
Speaker 1: Gordon opening underneath the basket. Those are super high percentage shots.
Speaker 1: So to me, it's more of a lesser than two
Speaker 1: a lesser of two evils kind of thing. Thanks, question,
Speaker 1: how would you rank this version of the Nuggets among
Speaker 1: the championship winning teams of the last ten to fifteen years.
Speaker 1: As you have said, Denver is built in year perfect
Speaker 1: roster around Jokic, who is by far the best player
Speaker 1: in the world today. However, at what point does accumulating
Speaker 1: elite talent just outpower everything else. For instance, as good
Speaker 1: as the Nuggets are, most people wouldn't give them much
Speaker 1: of a chance against the Warriors of twenty seventeen eighteen,
Speaker 1: who sacrificed roster depth to bring in Kitty. So I
Speaker 1: do think the Nuggets are on the same tier. I
Speaker 1: shouldn't say I'm the same tier. Like, let me put
Speaker 1: it this way, the only two teams of the last
Speaker 1: fifteen years that are better than Denver are the Miami
Speaker 1: Heat team that repeated and the KDI Steph Warriors that repeated.
Speaker 1: Those are the only two teams that are on their level, right,
Speaker 1: Denver's not. I don't think they deserve to be put
Speaker 1: on that level because it's hard to win two championships
Speaker 1: in a row. And here's the thing. I think the Nuggets.
Speaker 1: I'm way higher on them than I was to start
Speaker 1: the season. I told you I'd be surprised that they
Speaker 1: didn't win the title.
Speaker 2: They were healthy.
Speaker 1: But it's still like a coin flip, right, because like
Speaker 1: Boston has a much easier path out of the Eastern Conference,
Speaker 1: Denver could be in for some bloodbaths out West. Boston
Speaker 1: does have a lot of talent and some room for improvement.
Speaker 1: Like Denver doesn't have as much room for improvement between
Speaker 1: now and June as Boston does. Boston can figure some
Speaker 1: shit out and get better. So like that's that's my point.
Speaker 1: I'm picking Denver. I think Denver is the safe bet,
Speaker 1: but there's there's always it's really difficult to win NBA championship,
Speaker 1: So like I don't want to jump the gun, and
Speaker 1: I don't think I'd ever put them above the twenty
Speaker 1: seventeen twenty eighteen Warriors, because like, they literally were just
Speaker 1: so so much better than everybody. To give you an idea,
Speaker 1: going into the twenty eighteen season, off of the twenty
Speaker 1: seventeen championship, when they won fifteen straight playoff games, the
Speaker 1: Warriors had negative odds to win the title in preseason,
Speaker 1: meaning if you bet one hundred dollars to pick the
Speaker 1: Warriors to win the title in twenty eighteen and they won,
Speaker 1: you would get less than one hundred dollars in winnings.
Speaker 1: That's how That's how dominant that Golden Stag team won
Speaker 1: Denver before last night's game. I haven't looked at the
Speaker 1: odds since before last night's game, even as good as
Speaker 1: they've looked this year are they were plus four point
Speaker 1: fifty to win the title on DraftKings. So that just
Speaker 1: goes to show you the difference in just the level
Speaker 1: of talent that that team had, But it was more
Speaker 1: because of like they had two of the top three
Speaker 1: players in the league, and they had Klay Thompson, who
Speaker 1: was an awesome defensive player and the second best shooter
Speaker 1: of all time, and they and Andre Gudala, who's the
Speaker 1: best wing defender in the league at that time, and
Speaker 1: they had Draymond Green, who was arguably the best defensive
Speaker 1: player overall in the league at that time. So like
Speaker 1: there's kind of another level there. However, there will be
Speaker 1: an interesting conversation to have about this team and the
Speaker 1: twenty twelve twenty thirteen Miami Heat teams if Denver can
Speaker 1: win the title this year. And I'm inclined to pick
Speaker 1: Denver in that specific matchup because Miami just because of
Speaker 1: Dwayne Wade's decline, because Chris Bosh got hurt in the
Speaker 1: twenty twelve run. Like, I've seen a lot of talk
Speaker 1: about there's so much talk about the the use a you,
Speaker 1: Donnis Haslam, and Norris Cole coming out talking about Lebron
Speaker 1: in the Heat, And it's so funny to me because
Speaker 1: it's just it's just something I think people are writing
Speaker 1: some revisionist history on on a bunch of different fronts.
Speaker 1: First of all, I think that when Lebron, like I
Speaker 1: saw Jeff t quote something about how like everyone thought
Speaker 1: that shit was weak when Lebron went to Miami for
Speaker 1: the record at the time, it kind of was like
Speaker 1: what Lebron did going to Miami was supposed to be
Speaker 1: more or less like what KD did going to the Warriors.
Speaker 1: What saved Lebron's ass was he got humiliated the first year,
Speaker 1: which made him a better basketball player, and so he
Speaker 1: went up a crazy level.
Speaker 2: Two.
Speaker 1: Chris Bosh got hurt in the twenty twelve postseason, which
Speaker 1: made them have to play. It made Lebron play desperate
Speaker 1: basketball to beat Indiana and then desperate basketball to beat
Speaker 1: Boston right and then three. Dwayne Wade rapidly declined after
Speaker 1: the twenty eleven finals. Was never the same player. He
Speaker 1: was a top tier superstar in twenty eleven, like a
Speaker 1: second tier superstar in twenty twelve twenty thirteen, and like
Speaker 1: a third tier superstar in twenty fourteen. And so as
Speaker 1: a result, Lebron's intended dominant team turned into just another
Speaker 1: one of the best teams in the league, which forced
Speaker 1: Lebron to play heroic basketball to win two championships. So
Speaker 1: now when we look back at the Miami Heat runs,
Speaker 1: we look at it as like, man, that was some
Speaker 1: unbelievable basketball from Lebron. However, Kevin Durant went to the
Speaker 1: Golden State Warriors. They stayed healthy, they absolutely murdered everybody,
Speaker 1: and so everyone looks at it differently because it we
Speaker 1: never had to see KD play desperate. We never had
Speaker 1: to see KD like, holy shit, like we're down three
Speaker 1: to two on the road here, we gotta make this happen.
Speaker 1: Holy shit Game seven against Indiana, Holy shit Game seven
Speaker 1: against San Antonio, Like we never saw that because Golden
Speaker 1: State was just so much better than everybody.
Speaker 2: Lebron intended for that.
Speaker 1: To be the case in my and then it never
Speaker 1: it didn't break out that way, and so he had
Speaker 1: to be great. So that's kind of unrelated to what
Speaker 1: I was saying, But I just wanted to get that
Speaker 1: off my chest after the the comments that were flying
Speaker 1: out around those heatles.
Speaker 2: But that's it.
Speaker 1: I will be curious to see where we ranked Denver
Speaker 1: in the big picture after if they do win the
Speaker 1: title this year, because I think that I'd be inclined
Speaker 1: to put them above those Miami Heat teams, not that
Speaker 1: he like. I think Jokic and Lebron in that at
Speaker 1: that era in a similar tier in terms of a ceiling.
Speaker 1: But I thought that that Miami Heat team wasn't as
Speaker 1: good top to bottom as this Denver team was, and
Speaker 1: so I'd probably picked Denver over them, but they got
Speaker 1: to close the deal. They gotta win another title this year.
Speaker 1: Three more questions than we're out of here. Hey, Jason,
Speaker 1: love the show, Keep up the great work. I was
Speaker 1: wondering what you think the issue is with Boston's bad habits.
Speaker 1: Is it a coach or a lack of IQ. Feels
Speaker 1: like they've had the move or less. They've had more
Speaker 1: or less the same issues under three different coaches. Granted
Speaker 1: lots of personnel changes and player growth, but still feels
Speaker 1: like the same glaring issues throughout. So Joe Mazoula in particular,
Speaker 1: I actually talked about this a lot with Adamatters today,
Speaker 1: but to me, the freedom has almost gone too far.
Speaker 1: So when you have five really good shot creators on
Speaker 1: the same floor together, it gets a little tough because
Speaker 1: there's not a clear hierarchy. So like for Denver, for instance,
Speaker 1: everything runs through Murray and Jokic late, even those like
Speaker 1: early second quarter early fourth quarter stretches, it's like Murray's
Speaker 1: just dribbling the air out of the basketball looking for
Speaker 1: his own shot.
Speaker 2: The whole time.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of equal opportunity with Boston, they kind
Speaker 1: of just play basketball, and so as a result that
Speaker 1: continues into crunch time. It's like those two possessions that
Speaker 1: Drew Holliday took over, Like Drew Holliday took those two
Speaker 1: rand like there's another question we had our last one.
Speaker 1: I don't like the fact that Jason compares Drew taking
Speaker 1: those last shots for the Celtics to KCP taking such
Speaker 1: shots for the Nuggets, saying the Nuggets would never do that,
Speaker 1: and they are more deliberate. In my opinion, KCP and
Speaker 1: Drew Holliday are nowhere near the same players. And the
Speaker 1: fact that the Celtics have so much talent in their
Speaker 1: five main unit, I think their offense has to be
Speaker 1: free flowing so they can maximize each player one hundred
Speaker 1: percent agree throughout, like certain chunks of the game, right
Speaker 1: like outside of your starting groups late second quarter, early
Speaker 1: or excuse me, late first quarter, early second quarter, late
Speaker 1: third quarter, early fourth quarter. You want to be free flowing.
Speaker 1: You want everybody playing your game. However, you run the
Speaker 1: risk when you play equal opportunity basketball of either everybody
Speaker 1: being in a rhythm or nobody being in a rhythm
Speaker 1: and that is part of what makes Boston so hot
Speaker 1: and cold. And yeah, they've been mostly hot against the
Speaker 1: Eastern Conference, but like that's what makes them so hot
Speaker 1: and cold is they have these stretches where all of
Speaker 1: them go out of rhythm because there isn't a clear hierarchy.
Speaker 1: So like, to me an easy solution there is. I
Speaker 1: would have pet actions for your best players that I'd
Speaker 1: run at the end of the games. If that's Tatum
Speaker 1: Porzingis pick and roll, that's Derek White Porzingi's pick and roll,
Speaker 1: if it's Jalen Brown Tatum, two man game, whatever it
Speaker 1: is that you decide to do. I don't think you
Speaker 1: could do that because Teas would probably just switch it.
Speaker 2: But like you got to.
Speaker 1: Find some sort of like hierarchy that you go to
Speaker 1: in big moments because it makes it more likely that
Speaker 1: those players will be in rhythm in those moments, because
Speaker 1: it's like Tatum after the game, Like I totally disagreed
Speaker 1: with that comment from Tatum about how he wanted to
Speaker 1: kind of like you didn't want to hijack the game.
Speaker 2: No, no, no no.
Speaker 1: If Jalen Brown is bringing it to that level, you
Speaker 1: got to meet him there. You got to meet him there.
Speaker 1: Jallen Brown's not shooting the ball every possession down the floor.
Speaker 1: Just because he's hot. Doesn't mean you can't be involved.
Speaker 1: But to me, like, that's where having a clear hierarchy
Speaker 1: does make sense. You're right, Drew Holliday is not the
Speaker 1: same type of player as KCP and like, he is
Speaker 1: a guy that can create a shot off the bounce
Speaker 1: at a higher level, but he's not as good as
Speaker 1: at creating a shot off the bounce as Jason Tatum
Speaker 1: or Jaylen Brown.
Speaker 2: Or Derek White.
Speaker 1: So when you do that, even if he does make
Speaker 1: the shot, you're were like, and he did. By the way,
Speaker 1: he made two big ones at the end of the
Speaker 1: game and it worked out Like that's playing the results
Speaker 1: in my opinion. But being more deliberate about running pet
Speaker 1: actions for the same players in big moments at the
Speaker 1: beginning of games and at the end of games I
Speaker 1: think would go a long way. So it's kind of
Speaker 1: getting them to have more consistent rhythm in those environments.
Speaker 1: Last question, with Kat's injury, how do you think Minnesota
Speaker 1: should structure their rotation. They went with Kyle Anderson, but
Speaker 1: that is a spacing nightmare for me. I would start
Speaker 1: and close with Nasried and then try to keep one
Speaker 1: of him or go bear on at all time. So I
Speaker 1: talked about this a little bit in the Timberwolve segment
Speaker 1: that we did, so in case you missed that if
Speaker 1: you're just watching the mail bag episode Timberwolves fans, we
Speaker 1: did a whole breakdown. But I would do it matchup.
Speaker 1: Related would not go with Kyle Anderson, though I thought
Speaker 1: that was a disaster on both ends of the floor.
Speaker 1: I don't think he's good enough defensively or offensively to
Speaker 1: make up for it. Kind of was disappointed because Kyle
Speaker 1: Anderson is a guy that is capable of being very
Speaker 1: good defensively, but he just hasn't been good enough. But
Speaker 1: I would just base it on the matchup. I think
Speaker 1: there's versions of this against smaller teams where you could
Speaker 1: go with Nikile Alexander Walker and go with like aunt
Speaker 1: con Lee naw and Jada McDaniels alongside Gobert and just
Speaker 1: defend the hell out of the basketball at least you
Speaker 1: you know, because Nikail is just a better offensive player
Speaker 1: than Kyle Anderson off the ball, and he can defend
Speaker 1: in space. But then they're going to be matchup that
Speaker 1: are too big and you need to go bigger. The
Speaker 1: Lakers game that's coming up on Sunday's actually a good
Speaker 1: example of this. I would go to Nasri because at
Speaker 1: least you had the physical imposition. He's kind of like
Speaker 1: actually a reasonable facsimile of Carltown's, although he's not as
Speaker 1: good because he could shoot the three and he can
Speaker 1: attack close outs. So like that would be what I
Speaker 1: would do. I'd base it on the matchups, but the
Speaker 1: reality is is like it is flawed options now that
Speaker 1: Carltown's is out of the picture, which is unfortunate. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: that is all I have for today and for the
Speaker 1: rest of the weekend. As always, I sincerely appreciate you guys.
Speaker 1: Tons of good games Friday, Saturday, Sunday, but we're gonna
Speaker 1: take those days off. On Monday, we will be breaking
Speaker 1: down the big games from the weekend as well as
Speaker 1: power rankings.
Speaker 2: I will see you guys then
Speaker 1: The volume