Speaker 1: You're listening to The Hottest The Hottest. It be a
Speaker 1: podcast out here.
Speaker 2: I said what I said, it's the Heat Check. It's
Speaker 2: just on this episode of The Heat Check. It's Friday.
Speaker 2: I got you loaded up for the weekend.
Speaker 1: Baby.
Speaker 2: You know I'm fired up about something. I'm pretty much
Speaker 2: waking up in the morning fired up. So let's talk
Speaker 2: about the Houston Rockets aka adults email U Dopea's gout.
Speaker 2: I'm playing gritty right now. We gott getting the young
Speaker 2: players on the come up. And then we have a
Speaker 2: special interview with Keith Smith from Spoke Track, and we
Speaker 2: also have another good one with James ham Sage of
Speaker 2: Sacramento Kings, the Lifelong Insiders. He said he was like
Speaker 2: two hundred games below five hundred or something in his
Speaker 2: career with the Sacramento Kings. I think that's what he said.
Speaker 2: That's nuts, jam Pack show. Baby, let's get ready for
Speaker 2: the fucking weekend. Let's get into it. But you drop
Speaker 2: that beat the chigue, John, you don know what I'm
Speaker 2: fired up about. Let's talk about them. Let's let the
Speaker 2: world know. I know it's early, I really do, but
Speaker 2: the Houston Rockets, could they be good? Like is this
Speaker 2: a good team. Is this a playoff team? I think
Speaker 2: it's a playoff team. Let me tell you I sort
Speaker 2: of saw it coming, but didn't see it coming big time.
Speaker 2: Faith in emy Udoka. You know what time it is
Speaker 2: one of the uh and one of the uh. You
Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. From the looks of things, that's
Speaker 2: a callback to the shocker the e may threw up.
Speaker 2: From the looks of things, no one else saw it coming,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean. But this this man, E
Speaker 2: may Udoka did it in Boston, and he turned those
Speaker 2: young pups into straight dogs, turn those golden retriever palma doodles,
Speaker 2: those skits of doodles into straight Rottweilers. In their last
Speaker 2: four games, the Houston Rockets are four and zero with
Speaker 2: an average margin of victory of twenty one and a
Speaker 2: half points. Oh boy, oh boy, e may E may Udoka,
Speaker 2: You slide devil. It doesn't matter where you go. You
Speaker 2: just continue to make teams good. You make moves. He's
Speaker 2: made a lot of teams who passed on him look
Speaker 2: like idiots. Let's break it down. According to Brett Usher
Speaker 2: USh Hush.
Speaker 1: The Rockets are eighth in offensive rating, seventh in defensive rating,
Speaker 1: fifth in net rating, Daddies Home Home Forever.
Speaker 2: You know what time it is. You know what other
Speaker 2: teams are top eight in both offense and defense, Philadelphia
Speaker 2: and Boston. That's who. Wow, that's incredible. What is going on?
Speaker 2: This is the Houston Rockets we're talking about. Remember Steven Silas,
Speaker 2: you remember him. I don't know if you remember the
Speaker 2: moments that I remember where they'd put him up on
Speaker 2: that damn podium and he'd have to say, I don't know,
Speaker 2: I don't know why they're so bad. It's like I've
Speaker 2: got the same thing to say every day. They just
Speaker 2: don't listen. Them pups are peeing all over the house.
Speaker 2: Now with email Unoka, What were the Houston Rockets like
Speaker 2: under Steven Silas last year? You would be like that
Speaker 2: Eric Thomas motivational speech where it was like compete, compete.
Speaker 2: Many of you are acting like you are not competing.
Speaker 2: Act like you're playing basketball, act like you're playing football. Compete.
Speaker 2: I need effort. So they add Fred Van Compete, they
Speaker 2: add Dylan Brooks, villain the Dylan, and they have set
Speaker 2: the tone no soft poo poo around here. And we
Speaker 2: slanted those moves, didn't we boy oo. Yes, they are
Speaker 2: so overpaid forty million for a US six to one
Speaker 2: point guard with a bad back. Ew Dylan the villain
Speaker 2: as your key rotation plate piece. Ooh, and they're balling
Speaker 2: out though they really are. They're impacting winning, just not
Speaker 2: in the way that you think they are. For example,
Speaker 2: in the win against the Los Angeles Lakers, the team
Speaker 2: that went to the Western Conference Finals last year. You
Speaker 2: could make minimizing comments all you want about who was
Speaker 2: in the game and who wasn't, but the truth is
Speaker 2: Lebron was and this is a team that went to
Speaker 2: the Western Conference Finals. They outscored the Lake Show by
Speaker 2: six points or more every single quarter in a thirty
Speaker 2: four point route. An embarrassment, a curb stomping like you
Speaker 2: have never seen before. Er Dylan Brooks had five points
Speaker 2: in that game, Fred van Fleet had Fred van Compete
Speaker 2: had nine points. They were a combined plus forty six
Speaker 2: for the game. What does that tell you? Someone needs
Speaker 2: to let Cam Thomas know that you can do more
Speaker 2: on the basketball court to impact winning than just put
Speaker 2: the basketball inside the hoop. Their defense has been ridiculous.
Speaker 2: They combined for eight rebounds and eleven assists. Brooks has
Speaker 2: been all defensive team levels since he got to Houston.
Speaker 2: He's kind of been all defense since he was even
Speaker 2: in Memphis, even when he played for the Oregon quack
Speaker 2: Quack Ducks and Fred Van Fleet. Fred van Compete has
Speaker 2: been the veteran presence that they have always needed but lacked.
Speaker 2: He don't play no games either, Fred van Fleet. He
Speaker 2: was so mad at Scottie Barnes last year. He's like,
Speaker 2: get me the fuck out of this place where they
Speaker 2: eat poutine for breakfast. They are a team that never quits.
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how much they're up,
Speaker 2: how much they're down. They are a team that quit
Speaker 2: a lot in the third quarter last year. They just
Speaker 2: let go of the rope. Not with Fred Van Compete
Speaker 2: on the team, No, sir, And guess what the kids
Speaker 2: are following suit As a result, they buy in what
Speaker 2: emi Udoka has to say, buy in to what Emai
Speaker 2: Udoka is preaching. Before they fucked up the Kings, before
Speaker 2: they embarrassed the Lakers. Jalen Green right now playing off ball,
Speaker 2: averaging twenty points per game on forty six percent shooting
Speaker 2: and forty five percent from three. Are you serious? Jabari
Speaker 2: I have no confidence Smith under Steven Silas is now
Speaker 2: averaging fourteen and seven on fifty percent from the field
Speaker 2: and forty percent from the three Alpah and Shangoon, who
Speaker 2: many of us didn't know whether he was going to
Speaker 2: be left out of the rotation. Maybe he's the odd
Speaker 2: man out because he doesn't play any defense. He man
Speaker 2: handled Demonisabonis, by the way, another All NBA player twice,
Speaker 2: Shan Goon is averaging eighteen eight and six on sixty
Speaker 2: percent from the field. And then we got Uncle Jeff,
Speaker 2: Uncle Jeff Green. He's another veteran presence. He's making some
Speaker 2: culture changes in the group. Aaron Holliday played well, Jayshaun
Speaker 2: Tait looks good. They did lose Aman Thompson to injury,
Speaker 2: and you thought maybe that would be some sort of
Speaker 2: a downgrade, but it's not. Cam Whitmore got sent down
Speaker 2: to the G League. But I don't know why. It
Speaker 2: doesn't seem to matter either. This team is solid, even
Speaker 2: if they seem a bit thin. These young boys can
Speaker 2: run and run and run. You want to talk about
Speaker 2: a big three. Brooks, Fred van Fleet, and Shanngoon have
Speaker 2: a net rating of twenty four point three that is
Speaker 2: second in the NBA, behind Kawhi PG in Westbrook, which
Speaker 2: is kind of crazy, and ahead of Tatum Brown and
Speaker 2: Porzingis who. What amazes me, though, is how emi Udoka
Speaker 2: continues to motivate the young Bucks. According to the reports,
Speaker 2: he reminded Jalen Green that, hey, you got passed over
Speaker 2: last year for this man, Austin Reeves. Austin Reeves got
Speaker 2: to go to the Philippines, where your family is from,
Speaker 2: and you play on the raspy ass Team USA Select Team.
Speaker 2: You better let that boy know what time it is.
Speaker 2: Cook that motherfucker cook him, let him know. Team USA
Speaker 2: was super impressed with Jalen, called him dynamic, very confident,
Speaker 2: very impressive, but still left him off that team, didn't
Speaker 2: He still left him off that team. Green has some
Speaker 2: dog in him as well, because he did not forgive
Speaker 2: and forget that slight he murdered Reeves. He became the
Speaker 2: first Rockets player to score twenty eight points in fewer
Speaker 2: than twenty two minutes since John Block. Who is He
Speaker 2: had twenty nine points in twenty one minutes for the
Speaker 2: San Diego Rockets in nineteen seventy. Guess what, Guess what?
Speaker 2: Guess what? Austin Reeves had seven points. Yeah, boy E
Speaker 2: may pick him up. Let him know. Is this Rockets
Speaker 2: team a playoff team or a playing team? After finishing last, last,
Speaker 2: and second to last and three straight years, I wasn't sure,
Speaker 2: but with em Udoka at the helm, if I'm a
Speaker 2: team like the Grizzlies, I am very worried about getting
Speaker 2: the boot out of the standings For a team like
Speaker 2: the Rockets that are coming for that ass every single night.
Speaker 2: Be worried, Memphis, be worried.