Speaker 1: Hey, welcome in. I'm Doug dott LEEB and you are
Speaker 1: listening to All Ball, All Basketball padcast all the time.
Speaker 1: Last week a little bit different, we had Chris Beard
Speaker 1: on the Texas Tech head coach kind of telling us
Speaker 1: a story taking us to the progression of his career.
Speaker 1: And he's a great storyteller. We're gonna get back to
Speaker 1: more storytelling next week. Uh. This week, I think there
Speaker 1: are two big things to talk about. The first is
Speaker 1: the NBA schedule dropping. And it's always interesting to me
Speaker 1: on how um we seem. Sometimes you can be in
Speaker 1: denial over over different things, like you know, you can
Speaker 1: be in denial over, uh, why Duke is on national
Speaker 1: TV in college basketball so much? Or or maybe not
Speaker 1: just Duke, but Duke, Carolina, Kentucky, Kansas, Syracuse, Um, those
Speaker 1: are the schools that that rate. That's why they're on
Speaker 1: TV so much. UM and so it's it's not it
Speaker 1: doesn't work the other way around. It's not a not
Speaker 1: there on TV so much, that's why they rate. They rate,
Speaker 1: that's why they're on TV so much, period, end of
Speaker 1: the period stop so UM. I do think that sometimes
Speaker 1: people people question why are the Red Sox and Yankees
Speaker 1: always on TV because they rate. That's it. There's there's
Speaker 1: no other reason to it that more people will watch.
Speaker 1: And when you're in television and television program which I
Speaker 1: am not okay, I'm on the production side, but the
Speaker 1: programming side, the only thing they care about is what
Speaker 1: two teams can we put on TV that get the
Speaker 1: most eyeballs, That makes everybody more money. And so when
Speaker 1: you look at the NBA schedule, it's fascinating to see
Speaker 1: the Lakers schedule and maybe more than anything, how everyone
Speaker 1: else in the league reacts. I went through it on
Speaker 1: my radio show, The Doug Gotlip Show is daily three
Speaker 1: to six Eastern time UH twelve to three Pacific, Fox
Speaker 1: sport Trader dot Com, I Heart Radio app series x
Speaker 1: M A E three for the first two hours. You
Speaker 1: can also down load the podcast daily. I went through
Speaker 1: it and um, almost every team's website I went to wherever,
Speaker 1: almost every team's Twitter handle I went to. I would say,
Speaker 1: here the Grizzlies, here's the Memphis Grizzlies schedules, including two
Speaker 1: games with the Lakers. Find out when Lebron James comes
Speaker 1: to town. Like Lebron James is literally the biggest show
Speaker 1: on Earth now. Um, he is in Los Angeles. He
Speaker 1: is doing the Nike Who Labron James Nike Hoops Academy.
Speaker 1: He also had his first couple of workouts at the
Speaker 1: Lakers practic facility. But this is also a week to
Speaker 1: which week in which excuse me, uh, it was announced
Speaker 1: he's got a Netflix show, He's got an HBO show,
Speaker 1: a Showtime show, a CBS show. There's other shows as well.
Speaker 1: And I think the question for Lebron is not does
Speaker 1: he not love basketball? I think I don't think that's close.
Speaker 1: I think he loves basketball. I don't think I know
Speaker 1: he loves basket. But when you come to l A
Speaker 1: and you have, you can have everything. I look at
Speaker 1: it at last as at l A As. Have you
Speaker 1: ever been to a really nice restaurant. I'll give an example,
Speaker 1: restaurant called the Peninsula. There's Peninsula in New York, in
Speaker 1: LA in Chicago. I'm sure there's others, you know worldwide.
Speaker 1: It's very high enching. And a dear friend of mine,
Speaker 1: whenever he has time and it wants to have breakfast,
Speaker 1: invites me to breakfast at the Peninsula Hotel, which is
Speaker 1: right across the street actually from the Beverly Hills Hilton.
Speaker 1: So I want may like like a block and a
Speaker 1: half away from Beverly Hills Hilton centrally located not far
Speaker 1: from the Fox lot Um. It's a cool spot and
Speaker 1: it's kind of quiet, quaint, little outdoor area which some suns,
Speaker 1: some shade. It's great. I had breakfast there earlier this week.
Speaker 1: They actually have a buffet. But when you go to
Speaker 1: a really good buffet, or you gonna go to bad
Speaker 1: buffet um like, compare a we used to have Western
Speaker 1: Citizlan and Oklahma State, or a Golden Corral or a Sizzler.
Speaker 1: Compare that buffet to a buffet at a high end place.
Speaker 1: You go to a buffet at a high end place
Speaker 1: and they have a guy who makes incredible omelets, right
Speaker 1: if somebody else will make you any kind of juice.
Speaker 1: You don't just get coffee. You can get cappuccino, You
Speaker 1: can get a latte, you can get it with almond milk,
Speaker 1: with soy milk, or you can get regular coffee, any
Speaker 1: kind of tea you ef you want it, and then
Speaker 1: you go through the actual buffet and everything is magnificent.
Speaker 1: And what you end up doing is sometimes is you
Speaker 1: get so much stuff because you're used to you're trained
Speaker 1: to the whole. Like man, when we were basketball players
Speaker 1: and we go to Las Vegas and we'd stay at
Speaker 1: Circus Circus and we go through the buffet. You're just
Speaker 1: trying to fill up with a bunch stuff because the
Speaker 1: food wasn't that good, but you just got a bunch,
Speaker 1: so you're really full and you'd burn through it anyway,
Speaker 1: instead of just getting a great piece of avocado toasts
Speaker 1: and having a capit chino to where you feel like
Speaker 1: you're full but not full. Right, you feel really good
Speaker 1: and you really got to enjoy that avocado toast with
Speaker 1: the poach egged on top, just so instead you just
Speaker 1: had a smorgers board of stuff and you eat, you
Speaker 1: like it, and it's fine, but you don't really appreciate it,
Speaker 1: and it it loses its it loses the quality that
Speaker 1: you're actually getting in a place like the Peninsula Hotel
Speaker 1: or you know, the top end restaurant. That's what Lebron
Speaker 1: James was running the risk up here. Lebrons in l
Speaker 1: a and he can do anything he wants. You know,
Speaker 1: it's got two houses. He doesn't have to movie's redoing
Speaker 1: his house kids are going to be in private school,
Speaker 1: and there's lots of time in the day. You know,
Speaker 1: you practice for you work out for two two and
Speaker 1: a half hours a day, right, you come in, you
Speaker 1: get your body work done, you do your weight lifting,
Speaker 1: you do your stret your training, you know you're stretch.
Speaker 1: Everything takes an hour. Then you get an hour maybe
Speaker 1: on the court, maybe a little bit longer, maybe a
Speaker 1: little bit less, depending and in the off season, that's
Speaker 1: that's pretty good. You don't need to do a ton.
Speaker 1: The most of those guys don't do a ton more So,
Speaker 1: now you have what do you have twenty hours left
Speaker 1: in your day? You sleep six to eight hours a night.
Speaker 1: Tonight you're working on um. Now you're working on fourteen
Speaker 1: hours potentially left in your day, fourteen hours at most
Speaker 1: and twelve hours maybe at least. You got twelve hours left.
Speaker 1: And even if you go out to dinner and you've
Speaker 1: got to lunch and you chew up an hour, that's
Speaker 1: a ton of time. And even if you spend time
Speaker 1: with your family, that's a ton of time. So it's
Speaker 1: not like this is gonna these are gonna be time suckers.
Speaker 1: To be a producer of a show, on CBS. It's
Speaker 1: a game show. To be a producer of of, you know,
Speaker 1: a baller's type of show. To be a producer of
Speaker 1: the documentary, you're the one that's gonna run where it's
Speaker 1: more than an athlete. These they don't individually take up time,
Speaker 1: but if you do end up having a full plate
Speaker 1: and you lose track of that avocado toast which used
Speaker 1: to be basketball. See he used to be in Cleveland,
Speaker 1: which you just throw a bunch of things on the
Speaker 1: plate because it makes everything tastes better. Now this is
Speaker 1: all high end stuff and as much as you could
Speaker 1: do a buffet, that's not the way to really enjoy
Speaker 1: a meal. Sit down, take your time, enjoy a meal.
Speaker 1: So I guess my only fear with Lebron is everybody
Speaker 1: their whole life has said I want to do l
Speaker 1: a and he has the power to do so. And
Speaker 1: every website you go to, every Twitter handle you go to,
Speaker 1: everyone in the NBA has fired up about the Lakers.
Speaker 1: Already a draw with Lebron, a draw come to town.
Speaker 1: Everyone the legal benefit from it. But what's fasting, what's
Speaker 1: gonna be fascinating to me is the pace in southern
Speaker 1: California is so much faster than anywhere else I've ever been.
Speaker 1: Maybe New York is the only other place, but l
Speaker 1: A is the paces crazy pass it. There are other
Speaker 1: time suckers, not just your kids and your wife, but travel.
Speaker 1: He's gonna live in Brentwood, and this time at the
Speaker 1: right time of day. What is it twenty minutes to
Speaker 1: the facility the wrong time of day? It's an hour.
Speaker 1: It's an hour. So I'll be faster to see though,
Speaker 1: if there's just too many things on his plate in
Speaker 1: year one because he's got a there's got to be
Speaker 1: some sort of meeting of the minds between his style
Speaker 1: and Luke Walton style. There has to be an evident
Speaker 1: what is it? I think it's like eleven of the
Speaker 1: first fourteen games cans playoff teams. They have the second,
Speaker 1: they travel the second most miles Portland's the most miles there,
Speaker 1: the second the Clippers of the third part of that
Speaker 1: is location based, but they're flying Oliver tim Buck two.
Speaker 1: They're everybody's biggest game, and he's got a lot on
Speaker 1: his plate. So am I do? I think? Do I
Speaker 1: totally agree with Charles Barkley with the idea that Lebron
Speaker 1: has gotta moved on from trying to be a great
Speaker 1: basketball player and is simply worried about being a mogul. No,
Speaker 1: but do I think he wants to be a mogile?
Speaker 1: I do. And the first year of making a transition
Speaker 1: to southern California, I've done it twice, and not even
Speaker 1: in l A. I'm in Orange County, which is much
Speaker 1: slower than Los Angeles. It's fast, it's fast, and it
Speaker 1: takes a while too. It takes a while to play
Speaker 1: catch up. Now he's a megastar, and I guess you
Speaker 1: could say this has been his entire professional life, has
Speaker 1: been going from one town car to the next, you know,
Speaker 1: and people pulling him in a million direction, different directions.
Speaker 1: But I would tell you, and most people in Los
Speaker 1: Angeles tell you, this place is different. The speed is different,
Speaker 1: the amount of poll is different, and it is a
Speaker 1: you have. You have a buffet to which you can do.
Speaker 1: You can go hiking, you can go skiing, you can
Speaker 1: go water skiing and go surfing. You can hang at
Speaker 1: the beach. You can go to a nice Hollywood dinner,
Speaker 1: you go to a Malibu dinner. You can go out
Speaker 1: with family and go with friends. You can go out
Speaker 1: with dignitaries. You can go out with celebrities. You have
Speaker 1: all these things. This is the highest and buffet you
Speaker 1: can find. But you might be smarter to just have
Speaker 1: a piece of avocado toast and a really good cup
Speaker 1: of coffee. I'm Doug Gottlieb. This is all ball. The
Speaker 1: other part that's interesting to me with the Lakers, a
Speaker 1: lot of people are calling out their roster rightfully, so
Speaker 1: there are some pieces that are head scratchers. Um. But
Speaker 1: I've explained in previous podcasts that this was not a
Speaker 1: blank slate. It was not as easy as hey, it's Lebron,
Speaker 1: let's go pick out some dream team of pieces. Guys
Speaker 1: have to be free agents, so there has to be
Speaker 1: able to be of a trade and made. In this case,
Speaker 1: you needed guys that were willing to sign a one
Speaker 1: year deal because they want to keep themselves flexible for
Speaker 1: next year's free agency bonanza, as well as maintaining all
Speaker 1: these young players. Here's the part that no one's talking
Speaker 1: about we'll talk about here is it's like the Duke
Speaker 1: basketball effect, or let's just call it the Lebron effect.
Speaker 1: As I told you to start, if you go to
Speaker 1: anybody's Twitter handle, in the NBA, there will there will
Speaker 1: be a mention of when the date when Lebron comes
Speaker 1: to town. Because it's everybody's biggest game. It's Alabama football,
Speaker 1: Kentucky Duke basketball, it's everybody's biggest game. And for all
Speaker 1: those Lakers, the young ones that we all think can
Speaker 1: be good players, from brand Ingram to Kyle Kuzman to
Speaker 1: a Josh Hard to Alonzo Ball, how do those guys
Speaker 1: play in one, real NBA games that matter, in two,
Speaker 1: in real NBA games that matter against teams that are
Speaker 1: loaded for bear in the past, the past couple of years.
Speaker 1: It's it's not that people, It's not like the guys
Speaker 1: went out drinking the night before the Lakers came to town.
Speaker 1: But it's closer to the truth than they were getting
Speaker 1: in bed with their milk and cookies. Know, when le
Speaker 1: Bronze coming to town, you're not just playing on a
Speaker 1: team that's capable of making the playoffs in a much
Speaker 1: more talented conference in the Eastern Conference. You're doing so
Speaker 1: with Lebron James, who is everyone's biggest game. And how
Speaker 1: the young Lakers adjust to that is as in interesting
Speaker 1: is anything else things you can get away within any
Speaker 1: NBA game. You can't get away within the big games,
Speaker 1: and as it's shaping up, most every game early on
Speaker 1: the season is going to be a big game for
Speaker 1: the young Lakers because they're not only trying to prove
Speaker 1: to Lebron and to the staff that they can play
Speaker 1: at a high level. They gotta prove themselves. And when
Speaker 1: you don't see immediate success, and they may not because
Speaker 1: it's their first year together, when you don't seek occasional success,
Speaker 1: there is at least a possibility that you lose your
Speaker 1: that you lose your your mojo. Um, you lose your confidence,
Speaker 1: which is kind of your mojo. You lose your confidence,
Speaker 1: and you lose your confidence around Lebron James. He won't
Speaker 1: believe in you, he won't give you the ball, they
Speaker 1: won't play it. It's gonna be a really interesting to
Speaker 1: see how this Laker thing works out. All right, then,
Speaker 1: let's get into the changes in college basketball. Aaron Torres
Speaker 1: will be our guest to work for Fox Sports, written
Speaker 1: for the Athletic as well as other their sites. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm fascinated by the amount of immediate negativity. It's like
Speaker 1: you didn't even read through all the RULD change, Like
Speaker 1: now they still don't get it because Condoleeza Rice was
Speaker 1: on the was on the the commission board. All right.
Speaker 1: I didn't think that the Condoleeza Rice thing made sense.
Speaker 1: I would have liked more a you guys, but hey,
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, if what comes out
Speaker 1: of it is they tweaked the recruiting schedule a little bit.
Speaker 1: They change where you're gonna go see players some whatever.
Speaker 1: Guys can come back to school even after they've been
Speaker 1: drafted like that, Um, you can be wrapped by an
Speaker 1: agent while you're still in school and he can meet
Speaker 1: with you legally and buy your dinner and by your
Speaker 1: parents dinner and fly them up and give them travel
Speaker 1: just to have that dinner. Like the idea is to
Speaker 1: cut out agents that are of ill repute. That's the
Speaker 1: idea that the legal certified agents can act like legals
Speaker 1: certified ations. Do I think this makes sense? And yes?
Speaker 1: Do I think it fixes every problem? No? Does it
Speaker 1: create new problems? I can't say so as of yet.
Speaker 1: And I also don't love that everybody's operating on an
Speaker 1: assumption that the NBA is going to lower the age
Speaker 1: limit and let guys come straight out of high school
Speaker 1: I wasn't a good idea, then it's not a good
Speaker 1: idea now. But that's what's assumed, and that's why they
Speaker 1: created this a. If you have an elite players status,
Speaker 1: then you could have an agent in high school. What's
Speaker 1: an elite player? We don't know. We're not handling it.
Speaker 1: Let's pass it off to USA Basketball. Not a strong look,
Speaker 1: but I think you understand there. My point is the
Speaker 1: the n c A couldn't not do anything, but any
Speaker 1: sort of massive wholesale change changes too much, so as
Speaker 1: slow push towards a different sort of summer camp look,
Speaker 1: a slow push towards a different sort of way of
Speaker 1: viewing athletes, and how we cut out the shady oh Man.
Speaker 1: And meanwhile a relative change in the transfer rule, which
Speaker 1: I don't like but does create player movement. Also, there's
Speaker 1: the players can come back and they must be on
Speaker 1: full scholarship, but only if they stay two years in college.
Speaker 1: I like that. The idea of encouraging guys to stay
Speaker 1: in school more or welcome them back even when they
Speaker 1: try and go out and get a job in the
Speaker 1: NBA are all good things. As far as the spring
Speaker 1: and summer calendar, I don't love it. I don't know
Speaker 1: why there is a need for regulation. I think you
Speaker 1: just do one open month, you know, And I think
Speaker 1: assistant coaches can be on the road all year. That's
Speaker 1: what their job is, to go out whenever. You know,
Speaker 1: if you're around a kid too much, the kid's gonna
Speaker 1: get creeped out by anyway. But this is the path
Speaker 1: they've chosen to go by. And I can't think of
Speaker 1: anyone rule which is so terrible, so awful, that it's
Speaker 1: going to completely change the support. I do think that
Speaker 1: takes place if guys come straight out of high school
Speaker 1: and go to pros. The reason is all of these
Speaker 1: basketball coaches, all these executives and in in at the
Speaker 1: n c A, who will tell you, hey, listen, the
Speaker 1: college baseball model. You know what happens. If you have
Speaker 1: the college baseball model and basketball, you have college baseball
Speaker 1: fun sport, grade sport, well coached, completely irrelevant. In the
Speaker 1: National Sports Blast, let's welcome to Aaron Torres, who um
Speaker 1: my colleague at Fox Sports Radio. Check out his radio
Speaker 1: show eight to ten Pacific time, Saturday nights on Fox
Speaker 1: Sports Radio. You can also read his work in The
Speaker 1: Athletic Fall on Twitter at Aaron I think it's Aaron
Speaker 1: underscore torres At. Aaron underscore Torres, a college football college
Speaker 1: basketball writer, wrote something called One and Fun just does
Speaker 1: a really good job. Plus he loves to cover the
Speaker 1: recruiting scene. And Aaron, I'm wondering your initial reaction when
Speaker 1: you saw what the n has decided to do with
Speaker 1: some of their new rules. Yeah, I think you know, Doug,
Speaker 1: My reaction was, frankly, very similar to I think everybody
Speaker 1: else here. It's the middle of the week, middle of
Speaker 1: the day, everybody's running around. You see these big, bold headlines.
Speaker 1: Players can now have agents, Undrafted players can return to college,
Speaker 1: and you think, oh my god, this is a landmark day.
Speaker 1: Everything has changed. Everything we knew no longer exists. And
Speaker 1: then you read the fine friend and you see that
Speaker 1: some of the rules really, frankly aren't all that they
Speaker 1: are kind of made out to be in that big headline. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, look, I do think there was some some
Speaker 1: important change as far as the recruiting calendar. I know
Speaker 1: that not everybody in college basketball is necessarily happy with it,
Speaker 1: and a lot of change, you know, an important change
Speaker 1: was made as far as kind of the enforcement process
Speaker 1: at the n C a level as far as the
Speaker 1: way that investigations are going to be done and what
Speaker 1: kind of information can be used. So it was an
Speaker 1: interesting day Wednesday. But I think I speak for a
Speaker 1: lot of people who cover college basketball when I say
Speaker 1: that the initial headlines, Uh, sir, they didn't live up
Speaker 1: to what you expected once you dug into him a
Speaker 1: little bit. You know, it's funny you mentioned the enforcement.
Speaker 1: They're outsourcing their enforcement, right, which is which is a
Speaker 1: great idea. Like of all the things people have crushed
Speaker 1: them for, the fact that they have a handed enforcement
Speaker 1: is something that leaves you open um, open to criticism.
Speaker 1: And look what's happened with the NFL with Roger Goodell
Speaker 1: being judge jury executioner, right, and if you appeal you
Speaker 1: you appeal to Roger Goodell. Like somehow this has gotten
Speaker 1: lost The people haven't pointed out even Mike de course
Speaker 1: you wrote a nice article. He didn't even point out
Speaker 1: that they are outsourcing most of the enforcement procedure and
Speaker 1: most of and some of the investigation part of enforcement.
Speaker 1: I think it's a really good thing, don't do you Yeah,
Speaker 1: I do. And you know, look, at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, I think what what people have to remember
Speaker 1: is that all of these rules, whether you like him,
Speaker 1: whether you don't like them, whether you agree with the
Speaker 1: n c A whether you don't, they were all put
Speaker 1: in place because the n c A felt like there
Speaker 1: were things that they needed to get under control. Uh,
Speaker 1: after everything that came out with the FBI process that
Speaker 1: you know last fall, and so say what you want
Speaker 1: about the other stuff. This is a direct reflection of
Speaker 1: what happened with the FBI, where you have all of
Speaker 1: these schools in all of this trouble. But it's frankly
Speaker 1: stuff that the n c A in the past, as
Speaker 1: of previous to Wednesday, they couldn't punished the school for us.
Speaker 1: So if you have an FBI wire tap or you
Speaker 1: have a you know, an FBI information that nobody else
Speaker 1: has access to, there's no way that the n c
Speaker 1: A is going to be able to get access to
Speaker 1: that information. And as of a week ago, we were
Speaker 1: asking can Arizona really be punished? Can usc really be punished?
Speaker 1: What about Louisville with Brian Bowen. Well, now all of
Speaker 1: that information is usable under the new n c A jurisdictions,
Speaker 1: So will it curb cheating? I mean, I think all
Speaker 1: of us that cover the sport know that if a
Speaker 1: guy wants to bend the rules or break the rules,
Speaker 1: he's gonna do it. But in theory, um, you know,
Speaker 1: it makes it a little bit harder. It makes it
Speaker 1: a little bit easier for the n c A to
Speaker 1: actually hand down punishment if you are caught. And oh,
Speaker 1: by the way, some of the new um you know,
Speaker 1: the new verbiage and in the n c A handbook
Speaker 1: about what can be punishable and how long the punishment
Speaker 1: can be has changed as well. So I think from
Speaker 1: that perspective, and I agree with you, Doug, I think
Speaker 1: it's gotten a lot lost in the shuffle. Is this
Speaker 1: idea that that the punishment process has changed, and again
Speaker 1: this is a reflection of what happened with the FBI,
Speaker 1: And in theory it should go it in theory, it uh.
Speaker 1: In theory, it should help Aaron Torres joining us. Okay,
Speaker 1: what about there is this growing assumption that the NBA
Speaker 1: is gonna change back to allowing players to go to
Speaker 1: the NBA Draft straight out of high school. That that's
Speaker 1: the big thing that I think people are are misreading
Speaker 1: or not reading the fine print is the the elite
Speaker 1: prospect thing through people for a loop. What's an elite prospect?
Speaker 1: You know that's to be determined, Um, but it's if
Speaker 1: you read it, it's like, hey, look, if and when
Speaker 1: the NBA goes back to you can come straight out
Speaker 1: of high school, then the elite prospects can be represented
Speaker 1: by an agent, and then if you decide to go
Speaker 1: to college, well then you have to cease to have
Speaker 1: a relationship or a working relationship with with that agent. Um.
Speaker 1: What's your level of belief that they are in fact
Speaker 1: gonna do away with the one and done? Yeah, something
Speaker 1: you and I talked about a little bit earlier today, Doug. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, look, it seems like if you read the
Speaker 1: tea leaves, and I think only really Adam Silver and
Speaker 1: his closest confidence really have a great idea of what
Speaker 1: their plan is. But it seems like they keep moving
Speaker 1: this thing back. I mean, when when Adam Silver says
Speaker 1: there's growing sentiment that we want to change it, everyone thinks,
Speaker 1: oh my god, maybe it will be in effect as
Speaker 1: early as next year, twenty nineteen. Then you hear the
Speaker 1: earliest it would be as earlier this week. When all
Speaker 1: this stuff comes out, John Calipari says, hey, I've been
Speaker 1: hearing it won't happen until two And I you know,
Speaker 1: I think, I know you stand on this, dug, But
Speaker 1: I think the reality is while Adam Silver wants to
Speaker 1: win kind of the pr war as far as letting
Speaker 1: kids get to this league as early as they can
Speaker 1: make as much money as they can, I think that
Speaker 1: the people on the ground, the people with boots on
Speaker 1: the ground at the NBA level, the scouts, the front
Speaker 1: office execs, I think they don't want they I don't
Speaker 1: think they're interested in evaluating high school kids going to
Speaker 1: a gym where maybe there's only one guy on the
Speaker 1: court that not only has the professional future, but it
Speaker 1: has a college future. I don't think they want that.
Speaker 1: I think they want that extra year where a kid
Speaker 1: has to go to college, has to compete against older competition,
Speaker 1: has to compete against players his own age, his own
Speaker 1: skill set, his own strength, all of that stuff. And
Speaker 1: maybe I'm crazy, but but from everything I hear, and
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's probably much the same for you, I
Speaker 1: don't think most people in the NBA are really in
Speaker 1: a in a rush to change this rule the way
Speaker 1: that I think maybe the general public thinks that they
Speaker 1: might be. Yeah, I've I've always thought that Adam Silver
Speaker 1: is a little bit overreactive to to Twitter narrative. Right,
Speaker 1: Twitter said, right, Whereas like, look, the G League is
Speaker 1: getting better, it's an option for players straight out of
Speaker 1: high school, but the best option still remains go to
Speaker 1: one of these historic programs. I even like what the
Speaker 1: n c I did. Obviously, I think the best, the best,
Speaker 1: the thing that everybody likes, but we don't have maybe
Speaker 1: the best foresight and how it's gonna work out is
Speaker 1: that you can go to you know, declare for if
Speaker 1: you go through the process correctly, declare for the draft,
Speaker 1: don't get drafted, you can come back to school. Like
Speaker 1: I like that. Um, I would also point out I
Speaker 1: really like that. It's kind of always been a rule,
Speaker 1: but now it's kind of set in. Hey, if you
Speaker 1: stay for two years, anytime you come back, if you
Speaker 1: go to the pros, anytime you come back, you're automatically
Speaker 1: on full scholarship. Like I think that is awesome, Like
Speaker 1: creating more creating a reason to hang around and a
Speaker 1: way to come back even when you thought you weren't
Speaker 1: going to come back. Like, I think all that stuff
Speaker 1: is good. Now we do realize that guys that declare
Speaker 1: for the draft. Coach thinks he's gone. He recruits it
Speaker 1: up a player you got thirteen scholarships. What happens if
Speaker 1: you're over the limit? What happens to the players who?
Speaker 1: I mean? Like, look, if you decided to come back,
Speaker 1: is that player who's gonna play your position? Is he
Speaker 1: gonna leave like that? It's a little bit trickier than
Speaker 1: people think. But I do, actually, I do actually like
Speaker 1: that stuff. I just I don't really understand this push
Speaker 1: for the nun and done. I read Steve Kerrs article
Speaker 1: when he was working for Turner and he was saying, Hey,
Speaker 1: we need more time in college. It gives us a
Speaker 1: great because because they're they're they're more mature, they've had
Speaker 1: to answer to somebody, They've had to be around a team.
Speaker 1: This is a man's world. It's a professional, it's a job.
Speaker 1: They need some time away from however they grew up,
Speaker 1: to grow up on their own before they become a pro.
Speaker 1: I agree with that, but it feels like Adam Silver
Speaker 1: is going along with his Twitter narrative. No, I totally agree.
Speaker 1: I totally agree, and I think that there's so much
Speaker 1: value to college um and it's it's on the court,
Speaker 1: it's off the court. Um, even if we're talking strictly
Speaker 1: from a basketball perspective. First of all, by the way,
Speaker 1: every single guy that has been forced to go to
Speaker 1: college kind of quote unquote forced, I'm using quotation Mark
Speaker 1: has talked about how beneficial it was. Look Kevin Durant,
Speaker 1: for whatever he has become the social media pariah that
Speaker 1: he's become over the last year or two. Like I've
Speaker 1: heard him say, that year at Texas changed me as
Speaker 1: a person. I'm more mature. I you know, I entered
Speaker 1: the league, you know, with the more open mind. I
Speaker 1: had met people of Texas. I had interacted with people
Speaker 1: of Texas that I would have never interacted with if
Speaker 1: I hadn't spent that one year in college. It made
Speaker 1: me a better person. I've heard Anthony Davis say the same.
Speaker 1: But then you also look at them the court stuff,
Speaker 1: and I actually think these coaches, for all the criticism
Speaker 1: that they get, they do look pretty good job of
Speaker 1: taking that eighteen year old kid out of high school
Speaker 1: and prepackaging him and having them ready for the NBA.
Speaker 1: For the NBA a year later. Um, you know, look,
Speaker 1: you've been in these facilities I've been in these facilities.
Speaker 1: I'm sure, Uh you know a lot of media people
Speaker 1: that are talking about this feel the same way. Is
Speaker 1: that you go to what you c l A. You
Speaker 1: go to in Arizona. They have a couple of meals
Speaker 1: prepared for them every day. They're working with world class
Speaker 1: strength and conditioning coaches. They are they are basically it
Speaker 1: really is almost a junior NBA. And the way that frankly,
Speaker 1: even though being in the G League get professional, it's
Speaker 1: not the same Riding a bus in odd in Utah
Speaker 1: is not the same as flying charter from Durham, North
Speaker 1: Carolina to wherever the heck duke is playing their next game.
Speaker 1: And so I'm with you, and I think the thing
Speaker 1: you bring up about Adam Silver replying to the Twitter narrative,
Speaker 1: I totally agree. And I think we're seeing this because look,
Speaker 1: you know, I can think back to when this FBI
Speaker 1: thing happened. I can think back to when he went
Speaker 1: on with our buddy Colin Calhood a year ago and
Speaker 1: said that he was ready to make this change. Oh,
Speaker 1: I watched the Ben Simmons documentary and these kids are
Speaker 1: not this is this rule is not having the effect
Speaker 1: that it was supposed to get all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: here we are one you know where where you removed
Speaker 1: from the FBI stuff, and it seems like they're keeps
Speaker 1: being this push to move it back, move it back,
Speaker 1: move it back. And I think it's a reflection of
Speaker 1: like I said, the people that actually have to make
Speaker 1: these decisions, the people whose jobs are on the line
Speaker 1: as GMS coaches, front office people. They don't want to
Speaker 1: be dropping a seventeen year old on on high school,
Speaker 1: even if it's only one year Duke or Arizona in
Speaker 1: North Carolina. There really is a benefit to it in
Speaker 1: the evaluation process, no question, Yeah, no question. I mean, um,
Speaker 1: you and I have talked and you broughtup treyvon Duval
Speaker 1: where where you know, if you go back to high school,
Speaker 1: he's a he's probably a top pick. But now we
Speaker 1: saw him for a year, we understand that, in addition
Speaker 1: to his inability to shoot, he didn't really run a
Speaker 1: team or create shots for others the way that a
Speaker 1: guy like that should. And he's gonna have to fight
Speaker 1: his way here with the Bucks with a with a
Speaker 1: two way, two way contract. He is technically a professional,
Speaker 1: but not nearly what he would have been had he
Speaker 1: not been exposed a bit of Duke for the most part,
Speaker 1: though we helped. It helps build guys brands. They gotta
Speaker 1: show up on time. They got to balance stuff with school,
Speaker 1: which is like it's it's like real life, only it's not,
Speaker 1: and provides him a grade safe in it. You and I,
Speaker 1: You and I cam leately agree on on that one. Um,
Speaker 1: All right, well, one last thing before before we bid,
Speaker 1: before we bid ad um the Duke incoming class the
Speaker 1: Kentucky incoming class. UM. Comparing contrast the two For people
Speaker 1: who haven't who don't understand, just these are two loaded
Speaker 1: classes that I have to play right away. Compare contrast
Speaker 1: the two. Yeah, it's weird because, Um, first of all,
Speaker 1: I think the top of Duke's class is unquestionably better.
Speaker 1: They have arguably the three best players in this class.
Speaker 1: R J. Barrett, Kim Reddish and Zion Williamson. Who's the
Speaker 1: player that everybody knows, whether you're a college basketball fan,
Speaker 1: high school basketball fan, or not. But to be perfectly honest, man,
Speaker 1: you know, I've seen all those guys that are all
Speaker 1: kind of wings. None of them really shoot the ball
Speaker 1: that well. And I'm really curious as to how all
Speaker 1: of those guys work together. Unquestionably, those three are probably
Speaker 1: the three most talented players, I mean into college basketball
Speaker 1: this year. I really have doubts that it's gonna work
Speaker 1: together even the same way. That was that for you
Speaker 1: saying no, I was gonna say even with even with
Speaker 1: was it Tyler Jones, tyas Jones's brother as a point guard?
Speaker 1: Doesn't that doesn't that help mitigate some of those issues?
Speaker 1: It does? It does, But I you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I just I think back, and I know I know
Speaker 1: what your argument would be is that two years ago,
Speaker 1: when they had Grayson now and Luke Tannard and Jayson Tatum,
Speaker 1: they didn't have that traditional point guard like Track Jones.
Speaker 1: I get that argument. I just don't know. It's just
Speaker 1: I don't want to do the whole cliche one ball
Speaker 1: a bunch of guys thing. I just don't know how
Speaker 1: it works Outlook, Coach k Has and his recruiting pitch,
Speaker 1: I think, quite frankly, was hey, look man, I had Lebron,
Speaker 1: Katie and Carmelo on the same team at one point.
Speaker 1: We figured out a way to make it work. Yeah,
Speaker 1: But I mean, like that's that's that you had so
Speaker 1: much better play. Like, look, I do think, well, here,
Speaker 1: here's here's the thing. Like I think, I think the
Speaker 1: Trade Jones thing makes it work. It's it's interesting. So
Speaker 1: the Nike Basketball Academy has taken place in Thousand Oaks.
Speaker 1: I talked to NBA assistant GM last night and he's like, man,
Speaker 1: those college games were so bad. And I was like,
Speaker 1: why do you think they were so bad? And he's like,
Speaker 1: because there's no point guard. It's like when you have
Speaker 1: no point guard, you have all wings. It just it
Speaker 1: doesn't work. And I was like, exactly, so what you're describing,
Speaker 1: which I I get. You know, you got r J. Barrett,
Speaker 1: Camraddish and design, but you know you put Zion at
Speaker 1: the four and you put a real point guard out there,
Speaker 1: couldn't it then work? It could? Yeah, I mean the
Speaker 1: problem is that outside of r J. Barrett, none of
Speaker 1: them are very good shooters either. So that to me
Speaker 1: is I just I don't know if it could work.
Speaker 1: It could work. But the other thing with Duke, they
Speaker 1: have no real depth, They have no returning experience like
Speaker 1: last year with Grace and Now and at least Grace
Speaker 1: now And was a fourth year guy. This year. I
Speaker 1: mean four, you know, four freshmen that are gonna be
Speaker 1: asked to carry that load from day one. Look, you know, look,
Speaker 1: I think it's going to be Duke is gonna be
Speaker 1: what they've been the last couple of years, where I
Speaker 1: don't know that I would pick them. I don't know
Speaker 1: that I picked them over Virginia or North Carolina that
Speaker 1: both returned a bunch of players in the A c
Speaker 1: C in the regular season. But when you get to
Speaker 1: the tournament and you throw that ball up, you know,
Speaker 1: it's about having to use a duck Gottli totermam. It's
Speaker 1: about having dudes, you know, and they are gonna have dudes.
Speaker 1: So uh, you know, that is the gifts and the
Speaker 1: curse of college basketball is that sometimes the regular season
Speaker 1: isn't as important as we wanted to be. So look,
Speaker 1: if you're telling me, would I be surprised if they
Speaker 1: win the national championship next year? Absolutely not. I just
Speaker 1: think it's one of those deals that that I do
Speaker 1: think there's gonna be some speed bumps along the way,
Speaker 1: maybe even more than people would expect with the recruiting
Speaker 1: class like that. What about Kentucky's recruiting class? Uh? Different
Speaker 1: group of guys. You know, the the cool thing about
Speaker 1: Kentucky is they're playing these nationally televised games in the
Speaker 1: Bahamas as we speak here, uh in the middle of August,
Speaker 1: and you're getting a feel for for who those guys
Speaker 1: are and what they're capable of. I don't think any
Speaker 1: of them has the long term potential of of what
Speaker 1: the Duke guys do. I think the good thing for
Speaker 1: Kentucky is they actually have some vets. I mean, look
Speaker 1: re Travins Grant transfer from from Stanford fifth year senior
Speaker 1: to Time Pact twelve All Conference pick PJ. Washington. I
Speaker 1: think he probably would have been drafted if he stayed
Speaker 1: in the draft this past season. Um comes back as
Speaker 1: a sophomore. Nick Richards looks unbelievable, which is something I
Speaker 1: never thought i'd say. Um, but I don't think any
Speaker 1: of the freshmen are as good. I will say this though,
Speaker 1: I don't know how much you've got to watch the
Speaker 1: first couple of games here, Doug. They got a kid,
Speaker 1: Tyler Hero from Wisconsin. I mean I saw him like
Speaker 1: three months ago at the Nike Hoops Summit. I didn't
Speaker 1: think he was gonna be like this. He's been by
Speaker 1: far the best players, and I think it's gonna be interesting.
Speaker 1: I think Kentucky's got more depth, more experience, but those
Speaker 1: front end guys that Duke certainly are pretty darned good
Speaker 1: and hero remember what was gonna go to was going
Speaker 1: to go to Wisconsin and change his mind and ends
Speaker 1: up going to Kentucky. And and he is uh very
Speaker 1: athletic uh and and he can look he can shoot
Speaker 1: and score or something that they that they've missed. I
Speaker 1: will be I'm intrigued to see, um, I'm intrigued to
Speaker 1: see if he'll guardeny buddy, and I'm intrigued to see,
Speaker 1: like if his shot selection is really good once they
Speaker 1: get to real basketball games. But he does give, he
Speaker 1: does give them. You know, a white kid was some
Speaker 1: swagger that's absolutely completely unafraid. And he does appear to
Speaker 1: have a much more refined perimeter game than some others
Speaker 1: and something that Kentucky hasn't had in a couple of years.
Speaker 1: And that actually, at some point we'll get into this
Speaker 1: once we get coach to college basketball season. I like
Speaker 1: some of what Wisconsin brings back. Someone was injured last
Speaker 1: year and someone was really young. But I do wonder
Speaker 1: with with Marquette now getting in state recruits, with Kentucky
Speaker 1: stealing away hero with Minnesota keeping kids home, Like how long?
Speaker 1: How sustainable the Wisconsin thing is because this is you know,
Speaker 1: they built a fence up and then they were able
Speaker 1: to get it, go into Minnesota and and get kids
Speaker 1: during bows regime, um, and and occasionally getting kids out
Speaker 1: of Chicago. I mean, like, look, Frank Kaminsky was going
Speaker 1: to go to Northwestern if not for the fact that,
Speaker 1: um what's his name, what's the former Northwestern coach? Why
Speaker 1: am I forgetting? Uh? Yeah, Bill Carmony No showed on
Speaker 1: his campus visit. He they brought him into Bill Carmony's
Speaker 1: office and he wasn't there. He was he you know,
Speaker 1: he was like out like playing golf, like he was
Speaker 1: just not a not a recruiter. Yeah, no, So that's
Speaker 1: I mean, he wanted I think his mom went there
Speaker 1: like he wanted to go Northwestern. The point was he
Speaker 1: used to be all getting in Chicago, used to be
Speaker 1: all getting in Minnesota. You spill bill of fence around
Speaker 1: around all the kids in Wisconsin. Now, look, maybe they
Speaker 1: can because the Wisconsin they can red shirt guys and
Speaker 1: they can bring guys along slowly and they got such
Speaker 1: an incredible program. Maybe it works anyway, but no one's
Speaker 1: ever done without players. And when your recruiting basses shrinking
Speaker 1: up because of the challenges of Richard Patino and Kentucky
Speaker 1: and Marquette, wo Joe is doing a great job. And
Speaker 1: I do think Chris Collins is a good job in
Speaker 1: Northwestern I think that changes things. But that may be
Speaker 1: a discussion for another day. Um Uh I look, I
Speaker 1: I think that the your perspective of the n c
Speaker 1: A thing is is is pretty much right on. And
Speaker 1: the other thing is that nothing they would have done
Speaker 1: would have been received with open arms. Right, But if
Speaker 1: we if we if we simply said, hey, they made
Speaker 1: it easier for kids to come back after being drafted.
Speaker 1: Do you like that? Yes? I do. They changed recruiting calendar,
Speaker 1: all right. I'm like, look, it's changed a million times over.
Speaker 1: I don't think they perfected it. I'm not sure it
Speaker 1: needed to be changed. Whatever, that's something they felt like
Speaker 1: they were compelled to do. I think they created greater
Speaker 1: access to legal access to agents for players while they're
Speaker 1: in school for more information and an easier way for
Speaker 1: them to come back to school. And they took away
Speaker 1: some of their enforcement powers and enforcement duties. Like I
Speaker 1: actually kind of think they did a decent job. They
Speaker 1: do a great job. They completely fixed the system, No,
Speaker 1: but we also agree, you and I would agree the
Speaker 1: system wasn't totally broken. That was more perception than reality,
Speaker 1: and so by not completely having an upheaval of a
Speaker 1: system that most people believe wasn't completely broken. I don't
Speaker 1: think they did a terrible job. No, how much you
Speaker 1: I'm with you, And like I said earlier, obviously you
Speaker 1: see those big sweeping headlines and you don't see all
Speaker 1: the caveats in between. But look, my kind of big
Speaker 1: picture takeaway is you gotta start somewhere, right and so
Speaker 1: like if so, we haven't even talked about the recruiting stuff,
Speaker 1: and frankly, I think the average fan it would probably
Speaker 1: bore them two tears. But like at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, they've They've changed a couple of the events
Speaker 1: over the course of the season. I think coaches aren't
Speaker 1: crazy about it, but again it's it's part of it
Speaker 1: is about public perception. But too, they made this edict
Speaker 1: they want to get sneaker money out of or try
Speaker 1: to limit the sneaker influence in in high school athletics
Speaker 1: and in recruiting, and so they changed the schedule a
Speaker 1: little bit. Everyone there's, oh, this is the worst thing ever,
Speaker 1: And like, look, like you said, I don't think it's perfect.
Speaker 1: But you know, the more that I peel back this stuff,
Speaker 1: the more that I kind of realized, like, sometimes you
Speaker 1: just gotta start somewhere, And like you said, like it
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be perfect, Like we don't have to
Speaker 1: have all the answers today, and even if we did,
Speaker 1: no matter what you do, people are still gonna be
Speaker 1: upset about it. And so I used kind of the
Speaker 1: recruiting example just as an example of is it the
Speaker 1: perfect answer? No, does it piss a lot of people off? Yes?
Speaker 1: But did it do the purpose that it was intended,
Speaker 1: which is sort of kind of take away a little
Speaker 1: bit of the power of the sneaker companies without completely
Speaker 1: redoing the whole structure of the system. It did. And
Speaker 1: so to me, I'm with you, is is And you know,
Speaker 1: this is something that people who follow my work, people
Speaker 1: who know me. I think the n c A in
Speaker 1: general gets a pretty bad rap. I think it's a
Speaker 1: vast majority of kids that come through college athletics male female, uh,
Speaker 1: non revenue revenue, Like they got it pretty good. Like
Speaker 1: if you're you know, if you if you're an athlete
Speaker 1: at a Big ten school, like you're living a pretty
Speaker 1: good life even though there's uh, you know, maybe five
Speaker 1: kids on campus that are going to be able to
Speaker 1: make a living doing whatever uh it is that they
Speaker 1: play as a sport. And I'm with you, is like,
Speaker 1: we don't have to have all the answers today, but
Speaker 1: it was clear that they wanted to make change. They
Speaker 1: put condo leads or rights in charge of this commission.
Speaker 1: And and yeah, like I was the guy banging the
Speaker 1: druma on Wednesday, what is all this? But the more
Speaker 1: that I peel it back, it's like, dude, sometimes you
Speaker 1: just gotta start somewhere and and and this is what
Speaker 1: it is. And it's going to continue to be tweaked
Speaker 1: over the coming years. And I'm guessing that it probably
Speaker 1: isn't the same a few years from now that it
Speaker 1: is now. But it's okay. Like I said, you gotta
Speaker 1: starts somewhere, right, Nothing is forever. And you know, first
Speaker 1: first part to fixing a problem is admitting there is
Speaker 1: a problem. I don't know how big the problem is.
Speaker 1: But they admit there's a problem, trying to fix it
Speaker 1: and it doesn't work. Like these rules are not set
Speaker 1: in stone. These are not the the tablets came come
Speaker 1: down from Mount Sinai. They're written in paper. Their amendments,
Speaker 1: they can be amended. Aaron, great stuff is always appreciate
Speaker 1: your spirit and joining us so much here. Can't wait
Speaker 1: to hear your radio show, which is eight o'clock at
Speaker 1: night on the Pacific Coast time on Saturday night at
Speaker 1: eleven o'clock at night on the East Coast time. You
Speaker 1: can also listen to it at Fox Sports Radio dot
Speaker 1: com run Serious XM channel three. Aaron Torres, Aaron, thanks
Speaker 1: so much, appreciate does all right? That's been all ball.
Speaker 1: I'm Doug Gottlieb. Hope you enjoyed. I encourage you to
Speaker 1: listen to my radio show three to six Eastern time,
Speaker 1: noon to three Pacific. You listen on Fox Sports Trader,
Speaker 1: the I Heart Radio app for Serious XM channel eight
Speaker 1: three in the meantime. Subscribe, download and rate us. Don't
Speaker 1: forget to rate us. I appreciate you listening. We'll get
Speaker 1: back to more storytelling next week.