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Speaker 1: Welcome to Hoops Tonight, presented by Fandel here at the volume.
Speaker 1: Happy Tuesday, everybody. I hope all of you guys are
Speaker 1: having a great week so far. Quick show today, We're
Speaker 1: only gonna go for about fifteen twenty minutes. I want
Speaker 1: to touch on the Nets Sixers game from last night,
Speaker 1: as well as the Lakers first appearance of this season.
Speaker 1: We also did have a hilarious mistake yesterday. I shouldn't
Speaker 1: say we I had a hilarious mistake yesterday. I watched
Speaker 1: like five preseason games in the morning for the purposes
Speaker 1: of the show, and I said the Warriors for last,
Speaker 1: and for all of them, I stopped watching typically around
Speaker 1: halftime or shortly after halftime, because most of the guys
Speaker 1: playing the last portion of the game aren't even rotation players,
Speaker 1: and when I'm trying to cover the whole league, I
Speaker 1: just don't have time to watch end of the bench guys.
Speaker 1: And so the Warriors were trailing big in the middle
Speaker 1: of the third quarter, and so when I was done
Speaker 1: watching film, I quick took a peek at the box score,
Speaker 1: and I must have got dyslexia or something, because Warriors
Speaker 1: and Wizards just melded into one for me, and I
Speaker 1: thought that the Wizards ended up winning that game. So
Speaker 1: I got the full roast job last night on YouTube.
Speaker 1: Shouts to Patrick, You were the one I thought was
Speaker 1: the funniest. You said something along the lines of like
Speaker 1: I've never seen somebody do a in depth breakdown of
Speaker 1: a basketball game that he doesn't know who won that
Speaker 1: legitimately made me laugh this morning, So you win the roast, Patrick. Uh.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make mistakes all the time on the show.
Speaker 1: It's just the nature of the business. I can promise
Speaker 1: you though, when it comes to real basketball games in
Speaker 1: the regular season in the playoffs, I will be aware
Speaker 1: of who actually won the game. But today we're talking
Speaker 1: net Sixers and Lakers. Uh. You guys know the drill
Speaker 1: before we get started. Subscribed to the Volumes YouTube channel
Speaker 1: so you don't miss any more of our videos. Follow
Speaker 1: me on Twitter at underscore Jason lt for show announcements.
Speaker 1: I also do my film breakdowns there. I did two
Speaker 1: more this morning, about four minutes on the net Sixers game,
Speaker 1: and then another two minutes on the Lakers game. I
Speaker 1: do voiceovers and I break down. It gives me the
Speaker 1: opportunity to actually put footage to the things that I
Speaker 1: talked about on the show, So you're gonna want to
Speaker 1: follow me there. I will frequently make references to plays
Speaker 1: there and then, last but not least, for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: you miss one of these shows and you can't get
Speaker 1: back over to YouTube to finish them. You can find
Speaker 1: them wherever you get your podcasts. Under Hoops tonight. So
Speaker 1: with the nets and the Sixers got ugly for the
Speaker 1: nets early on, but they played much better in the
Speaker 1: second quarter. A couple of things I wanted to hit on.
Speaker 1: First of all, tyrees Max. He came out gunning, and
Speaker 1: at first I was like, man, I can't even imagine
Speaker 1: the confidence it takes on your first offensive possession, like
Speaker 1: literally first off into possession of the game, to come
Speaker 1: down and kind of like a semi transition set off
Speaker 1: of a ball screen and just elevate into like a
Speaker 1: twenty seven foot pull up jump shot and knock it down.
Speaker 1: But he did, and then like two possessions later he
Speaker 1: dribbled up the left wing and took a pull up
Speaker 1: transition three. But hey, this is nothing new. You guys
Speaker 1: know how high I am on Tyrese Maxie. You guys
Speaker 1: know how hi I am on Tobias Harris. I find
Speaker 1: those two guys to be what makes me most excited
Speaker 1: about the Sixers, And this pull up shooting stuff is
Speaker 1: not new. Tyrese Maxie shot on five pull up jump
Speaker 1: shot attempts per game last year, including over from three
Speaker 1: He was just magnificent in this game, getting consistent rim pressure,
Speaker 1: drawing fouls against guys and switches and pick and roll.
Speaker 1: He was making floaters and drawing fouls and floaters. He
Speaker 1: was dropping off passes to Paul Reed at the basket.
Speaker 1: Just a really impressive game from Tyrese Maxie. One of
Speaker 1: my favorite young players in the league. Tobias Harris flashed
Speaker 1: everything you expect to see from him. He was scoring
Speaker 1: and post mismatches. He did so in a really nice
Speaker 1: spin move on Kyrie Irving on a switch that's in
Speaker 1: my video that I posted. All those Tyris Maxie clips
Speaker 1: that I talked about are posted in my video breakdown
Speaker 1: as well. Um he also did like a really nice
Speaker 1: You know, Tobias is he functions really well in this
Speaker 1: system because he can do all the basketball player things,
Speaker 1: like we think of him as like a big scoring forward,
Speaker 1: but he can do all of the off ball stuff too.
Speaker 1: And he had a really nice play where he came
Speaker 1: off of a wide pin down for a three point
Speaker 1: shot and Ben Simmons went underneath the pin down. And
Speaker 1: little hint for all shooters growing up, if you are
Speaker 1: coming off of an off ball screen, if the if
Speaker 1: the defender is trailing you, you want to curl around
Speaker 1: the screen for your shot. If the defender goes underneath
Speaker 1: the screen, you want to fake like you're gonna curl
Speaker 1: around the scott the screen and then back up because
Speaker 1: that's where you're opening is. Tobias had a really nice
Speaker 1: example of that that you guys will find in the film.
Speaker 1: But hey, Tobias Harris and Tyres Maxie as your third
Speaker 1: and fourth best player not a bad spot to be.
Speaker 1: And that's why I had the Sixers so high in
Speaker 1: my in my power rankings. Also some good stuff in
Speaker 1: Montrez Harrold in the second quarter, just manufacturing points on
Speaker 1: the offensive glass and in transition again I covered him
Speaker 1: with the Lakers. He's not a guy you want in
Speaker 1: your playoff rotation in a big way, but if he's
Speaker 1: a one shift player, like if he's playing one shift
Speaker 1: per half in the playoffs, and then if he can
Speaker 1: eat ending innings for you in the regular season, he
Speaker 1: does bring a lot of value. So obviously we wanted
Speaker 1: to know how Ben Simmons would look, and honestly, it
Speaker 1: went about exactly as I expect. He was really good
Speaker 1: and impactful on the defensive end of the floor. Um.
Speaker 1: On the offensive end, whenever he had the basketball, he
Speaker 1: did a really nice job of finding shooters like cut
Speaker 1: of I think like five clips together of him generating
Speaker 1: wide open three point shots Um that you guys can
Speaker 1: find in the video breakdown. He that's his natural gift
Speaker 1: and that's the best way he's going to impact this offense.
Speaker 1: He's like Bruce Brown with less shooting and scoring ability,
Speaker 1: but with more passing ability, and so he's gonna opened
Speaker 1: up a lot of things for them. And there are
Speaker 1: other shooters on the floor, but at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, he's still is not a threat to score
Speaker 1: the basketball. He's not even really looking to score. There's
Speaker 1: a post up he had on the left block where
Speaker 1: all of Philly's defenders stayed away and let him on
Speaker 1: an island. I believe he was attacking George's kneeing on
Speaker 1: this possession, and he took like a drifting fade away
Speaker 1: through the lane and bricked it pretty bad. Um. He
Speaker 1: missed a right handed hook shot in the lane too.
Speaker 1: He missed a couple of free throws. Obviously, the scoring
Speaker 1: stuff is still an issue, and if he doesn't figure
Speaker 1: that out, teams will find ways to attack him in
Speaker 1: the playoffs, So I should say attack that flaw in
Speaker 1: the playoffs by ignoring him. That's gonna be the thing
Speaker 1: to watch over the course of the season. But I
Speaker 1: never want to react too strongly to one preseason game.
Speaker 1: He probably has been working a lot on these things,
Speaker 1: and only time will tell if there's any legitimate improvement there.
Speaker 1: In the second quarter, the Nets really got going on
Speaker 1: both ends of the floor. First of all, in the
Speaker 1: first half and on defense, they were just completely disengaged.
Speaker 1: They were giving up wide open shots in transition because
Speaker 1: they weren't run back and communicating. They were over helping.
Speaker 1: One of the consistent email seeing both videos I released
Speaker 1: today is when you're there's you want to help out
Speaker 1: of specific spots on the floor. You always want to
Speaker 1: help out of the weak side of the floor, not
Speaker 1: the strong side of the floor. Why is that. It's
Speaker 1: because it's a longer pass, and because when you're making
Speaker 1: a longer pass across your body, Like if I'm driving
Speaker 1: to the left and I'm passing to the weak side
Speaker 1: corner on the right, I'm gonna go across my body.
Speaker 1: That's a difficult pass. It's probably gonna be a looping pass.
Speaker 1: My guys can rotate out of that. But when you
Speaker 1: help out of the strong side, I'm already facing that way,
Speaker 1: I'm driving that way, I'm looking that way, and it's
Speaker 1: an easy push pass two shooters. And so there are
Speaker 1: a couple of examples in the film that I'll show you.
Speaker 1: There's a Royce O'Neil one. There's a Kevin Durant one.
Speaker 1: There was a Russell Westbrook one from from the Lakers game.
Speaker 1: When you're on the strong side of the floor, you
Speaker 1: want to stay close to the shooter. That's not the
Speaker 1: place to help from. You want to help out of
Speaker 1: the weak side corner. Make it a more difficult cross
Speaker 1: course cross court. PA asks you can rotate out of it.
Speaker 1: But the Nets defense in that first half way too
Speaker 1: much over helping way, really bad transition defense. They gave
Speaker 1: up a million points in the first quarter, but in
Speaker 1: that second quarter they played a lot more disciplined. There's
Speaker 1: a great example of help where um Patty Mills was
Speaker 1: compromised on the Tyrese Maxie drive and actually fell over.
Speaker 1: But in the play Tyrese had to spin back and
Speaker 1: right as he was spinning, Kyrie caught him off guard
Speaker 1: and forced to turn over. Those are examples of of
Speaker 1: being more smart with your help helping when you're defenders,
Speaker 1: when your offensive players really compromised, when when you know
Speaker 1: that the ball handler is not going to be able
Speaker 1: to make an easy pass out to your man. It's
Speaker 1: about it's kind of like a decision making process, and
Speaker 1: and their decision making with help just got much better
Speaker 1: in the second half. And then they started spamming. They
Speaker 1: got their offense going spamming a really interesting action where
Speaker 1: they'd have Ben Simmons in the opposite corner um and
Speaker 1: I believe it was Joe Harris in the left corner,
Speaker 1: and then they had Katie on the left wing, Kyrie
Speaker 1: on the right wing, and Uh Claxton in the middle
Speaker 1: of the floor. Well, and Katie would start on the block,
Speaker 1: but he would come off of a Claxton screen up
Speaker 1: to the left side of the floor. Then essentially what
Speaker 1: would happen is is Classic would go up and set
Speaker 1: a flare screen for Kyrie, and when he would set
Speaker 1: that flare screen, Uh Katie would like hit Kyrie with
Speaker 1: a skip pass, and on the first time they ran it,
Speaker 1: Uh Kyrie hit Claxton slipping to the rim for a dunk.
Speaker 1: And then the very next time they ran the exact
Speaker 1: same play and Kyrie got a wide open three, and
Speaker 1: then the very next time they ran it, and then
Speaker 1: they flew after the flare pass was taken away. Claxton
Speaker 1: just flowed into a pick and roll with Kadi and
Speaker 1: Katie was just putting passes right on target everywhere um
Speaker 1: hitting Kyrie on the flare, hitting the weak side corner
Speaker 1: on his skip pass when he drove down the lane
Speaker 1: in the pick and roll. Really impressive playmaking from Kad
Speaker 1: in that second quarter. They scored twenty points in less
Speaker 1: than five minutes after Katie checked into the game for
Speaker 1: his second shift there in the second quarter. And most importantly,
Speaker 1: the passes were on time and on target. This is
Speaker 1: a big theme with passing. You could see this with
Speaker 1: the Ben Simmons clips that I showed too. These NBA
Speaker 1: athletes are ridiculous and they close out at high rate
Speaker 1: of speed and they take away openings. If you don't
Speaker 1: hit guys on time and on target as shooters, they
Speaker 1: are not going to have an opportunity to get a
Speaker 1: shot off. But they did a really nice job, particularly
Speaker 1: Ben Simmons and k D and generating high quality shots
Speaker 1: again preseason basketball early on. Still a long way to go.
Speaker 1: Still want to see a lot of Ben Simmons to
Speaker 1: see what he's capable of. But this this this NETS
Speaker 1: team has a lot of talent and they're gonna figure
Speaker 1: some stuff out and they're going to be a good team. Um.
Speaker 1: Looking at the Lakers, the defense looks good. They're definitely
Speaker 1: prioritizing the paint at the expense of jumpers, but it's
Speaker 1: overall encouraging. There's a lot of aggression from the perimeter,
Speaker 1: a lot of uh Russ and Patrick Beverley being up
Speaker 1: into ball handlers and they're giving up driving lanes as
Speaker 1: a result. But that's okay when you've got all of
Speaker 1: the the size at the Acers have around the basket.
Speaker 1: They're chasing over the top of ball screens and and Russ,
Speaker 1: Kendrick Nunn and Pat in particular did a really nice
Speaker 1: job of even when they get caught on screens, they
Speaker 1: kept sprinting back into the play because again, if that
Speaker 1: ball handler takes three dribbles to get to his spot
Speaker 1: where he wants to pull up, and he's got separation
Speaker 1: from you coming off the screen, if you sprint back
Speaker 1: into the play while he's dribbling slowly into the lane,
Speaker 1: you have an opportunity to make up ground, and they
Speaker 1: did a really nice job there. The defense was definitely encouraging,
Speaker 1: specifically from the bigs. Didn't love what I saw from
Speaker 1: Damien Jones, didn't love what I saw from Thomas Bryant,
Speaker 1: but I did love what I saw from when You
Speaker 1: and Gabriel. He was everywhere in the second quarter. His
Speaker 1: length and athleticism pops off of the screen, had a
Speaker 1: bunch of big blocks, changed some shots around the rim.
Speaker 1: He was the one who had the block that ignited
Speaker 1: the fast break that led to the Patrick Beverley lob
Speaker 1: passed to want Uscano Anderson for the dunk. Just really, really,
Speaker 1: really encouraging stuff on the defensive end of the the floor.
Speaker 1: But that's what we expected. As I told you guys
Speaker 1: in the season preview, I see this as a top
Speaker 1: five defense and he's somewhere around the fifteen best offense.
Speaker 1: I think it's gonna be very different from what we've
Speaker 1: seen um from the Lakers last season. Russ had a
Speaker 1: really good game. He was really good with the ball
Speaker 1: in his hands, getting pressure to the rim. Deer and
Speaker 1: Fox is just too skinny to guard him. He was
Speaker 1: getting to the rim at will, he was consistently applying
Speaker 1: rim pressure and kicking out to shooters, and the Lakers
Speaker 1: were getting great stuff when he had the ball in
Speaker 1: his hands. Now, with Russ, with this kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: I'm always trying to differentiate between what it looks like
Speaker 1: against the Kings and what it looks like against a
Speaker 1: really good basketball team. And then also it's it's just
Speaker 1: the Russ is not going to have the ball in
Speaker 1: his hands that much. When this team really gets put together,
Speaker 1: it's gonna be a lot of Schroder, It's gonna be
Speaker 1: a lot of Lebron. We're talking about Lebron in a minute.
Speaker 1: Lebron almost totally took a backseat in this game. A
Speaker 1: ton of screening and diving to the basket, not a
Speaker 1: lot of basketball in his hands trying to make plays
Speaker 1: and make shots. So the reality is is when the
Speaker 1: team is at their best, Lebron is gonna have the ball.
Speaker 1: Dennis Schroeder is gonna have the ball, Kendrick Nun's gonna
Speaker 1: have the ball, Anthony Davis gonna have the ball. So
Speaker 1: I want to see more reps of what Russ looks
Speaker 1: like off the ball. I didn't even get enough of
Speaker 1: that last night to get a good feel for it.
Speaker 1: But when he had the ball in his hands, he
Speaker 1: played really well and he did his job on the
Speaker 1: defensive end of the floor. There were a couple of
Speaker 1: nit picky plays. I have them in the in the
Speaker 1: film Breakdown where he lost his man on a back
Speaker 1: door cut. You saw that clip that was going around
Speaker 1: all over the place this morning, and then there was
Speaker 1: that over help play that I was talking about. For
Speaker 1: the most part, though he's chasing over the top of
Speaker 1: the screens, he's getting into ball handlers. He was sliding
Speaker 1: his feet and competing getting on the glass. Russ played
Speaker 1: really well. Again. I don't hate Russ the way he
Speaker 1: plays sometimes it's really frustrating for me, But I have
Speaker 1: no personal vendetta against him, and when the guy plays well,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call it call it out. He played well
Speaker 1: last night, but it was against a bad team and
Speaker 1: he was heavily featured as a ball handler. So I'm
Speaker 1: curious to see as those dynamics change games when he
Speaker 1: has the ball less games when they're playing better defensive teams.
Speaker 1: If he can still be as impactful as he was
Speaker 1: last night. Lebron obviously didn't shoot well, But like we
Speaker 1: were talking about with the Warriors in their first preseason game,
Speaker 1: I just don't care about shot making in the preseason.
Speaker 1: Everyone's building their conditioning, everyone's getting their legs underneath them.
Speaker 1: It's to be expected that you would struggle in that setting.
Speaker 1: Defense is where I was concerned um for starters in
Speaker 1: the first his first shift, his effort was good, but
Speaker 1: you could tell his legs weren't there, his quickness. He
Speaker 1: was struggling keeping keeping ball handlers in front. He got
Speaker 1: beat on a couple of closeouts. Harrison Barnes was getting
Speaker 1: dribble penetration on him. It just again I associate that
Speaker 1: with him getting his legs underneath him. But at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, like this is kind of the
Speaker 1: Lebron process at this point. I remember I tweeted it
Speaker 1: out this morning. One of the things that happens with
Speaker 1: Lebron is early in the season he tends to look slow,
Speaker 1: especially as he's gotten older, he tends to look slow.
Speaker 1: He looks a little broken down. Last year in the
Speaker 1: in the preseason, he shot sixty four percent in the
Speaker 1: restricted area, and everyone was concerned that he couldn't make
Speaker 1: make layups anymore. Then we got to the regular season
Speaker 1: and he was one of the most efficient rim scorers
Speaker 1: in the entire league and scored there almost as much
Speaker 1: as Janice did. So I I always want to wait
Speaker 1: a couple of months before I start judging Lebron's physicality,
Speaker 1: but he definitely looked to touch slow last night, particularly
Speaker 1: on the defensive end and finishing around the rim. Also,
Speaker 1: he just like he was really taking a back seat
Speaker 1: as an initiator last night, and he's the best initiator
Speaker 1: on the team. At a certain point, these guys need
Speaker 1: to learn how to play when he has the basketball
Speaker 1: in his hands a lot, because for this team to
Speaker 1: reach their ultimate ceiling, he has to have the basketball
Speaker 1: in his hands a lot. I think it's a selflessness
Speaker 1: thing from Lebron. He's trying to get Russ going, He's
Speaker 1: trying to get Kendrick Nun going. He's trying to help
Speaker 1: the team get into their sets and run their stuff.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, this is a
Speaker 1: Lebron basketball team. This is a team that's going to
Speaker 1: have to have the basketball in his hands a lot.
Speaker 1: And then in the in the mid second quarter, he
Speaker 1: let go of the rope defensively and just trying, and
Speaker 1: there were some ugly possessions in there where he was
Speaker 1: getting beat for rebounds and and just standing around while
Speaker 1: stuff was taking place, just given minimal effort. I had
Speaker 1: an example of that clip a clip that is an
Speaker 1: example of that in the video breakdown as well. My
Speaker 1: thing with that is, I know what Lebron is capable
Speaker 1: of when he's in shape and when he's trying on
Speaker 1: the defensive end of the floor, and when he does so,
Speaker 1: it trickles down and the rest of the team plays hard,
Speaker 1: and they're a very good defensive team. He does not
Speaker 1: have the luxury of taking defensive possessions off. Not on
Speaker 1: this roster. They're not gonna be good enough offensively. They're
Speaker 1: not gonna score enough to make up for being anything
Speaker 1: less than a top five defense. So I hope to
Speaker 1: see again it's preseason, he's the one guy that you're like, Okay,
Speaker 1: it's preseason. I get it, you're in your twentieth season.
Speaker 1: But when we get to October eighteen, I hope to
Speaker 1: see consistent defensive effort from Lebron from the from the
Speaker 1: opening tip of this season throughout the eighty two games.
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis looked amazing. He knocked down two spot up shots. Uh. Again,
Speaker 1: with how little shooting this roster has, the Lakers are
Speaker 1: just absolutely going to need Anthony Davis to make shots.
Speaker 1: I think he went two for four from three in
Speaker 1: this game. Two of them that he made were on
Speaker 1: catching shoots, and then he was the same amazing defensive
Speaker 1: self that he always is, truly imposing around the basket.
Speaker 1: Last note for the Lakers, Kendrick Nunn Um, it was
Speaker 1: just refreshing to see a real ball handler that could
Speaker 1: shoot out there. Again, Malik Monk, it's more of a
Speaker 1: score um and so give you some of that off
Speaker 1: the dribble dynamic, but he didn't pass the ball well
Speaker 1: enough for it to really matter. Kendrick Nunn is the
Speaker 1: guy that can run, pick and roll and shoot off
Speaker 1: the dribble, which forces the guards to chase over the top,
Speaker 1: which opens up things and pick and roll that haven't
Speaker 1: been there for the Lakers over the last few years.
Speaker 1: There's a play this is one of the first couple
Speaker 1: of possessions of the game, where Anthony Davis and Kendrick
Speaker 1: Nunn ran a pick and roll on the left side
Speaker 1: of the floor and they had the side cleared and
Speaker 1: on it. Herder had to chase Nune over the top
Speaker 1: of the screen and as a result, pocket pass was
Speaker 1: open to a D. When he hit a D on
Speaker 1: the pocket pass, hurt her and the big both ran
Speaker 1: to Anthony Davis. Kendrick Nunn popped to three point line.
Speaker 1: A D made a really nice pass to Kendrick Nunn
Speaker 1: in the corner and he knocked down at three. And
Speaker 1: when I saw that, I was like, that's the kind
Speaker 1: of stuff that Kendrick Nunn opens up for this offense
Speaker 1: that they just haven't had in recent years. Um, but yeah,
Speaker 1: all at all. I would take it again. It's early.
Speaker 1: Everyone's sloppy at this point, so you can't get two nitpicky.
Speaker 1: But I thought Russ looked as good as you could
Speaker 1: have hoped in that type of situation. Anthony Davis looked
Speaker 1: about as good as you could have hoped in that situation.
Speaker 1: Lebron didn't look good, but we he's Lebron. He's the
Speaker 1: last guy you need to worry about on this roster.
Speaker 1: Kendrick Nunn looks good and the defense looked good. So today,
Speaker 1: even though I'm not about to say the Lakers are
Speaker 1: are like a top tier contender or anything. They definitely
Speaker 1: looked better than I expected them to look at this point,
Speaker 1: and we want to definitely keep an eye on them
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Speaker 1: And on that note, let's talk some basketball. So the
Speaker 1: Lakers report, basically, the gist of it is is that
Speaker 1: the Lakers almost made a deal with the Pacers right
Speaker 1: before training camp, the one that we thought of, which
Speaker 1: was Russ plus first plus first for Buddy Healed and
Speaker 1: for Miles Turner. A couple other notes that I thought
Speaker 1: were very interesting. From the first of all, they had
Speaker 1: lots of meetings about it. They decided not to do it,
Speaker 1: but they still are potentially considering trades in the next
Speaker 1: few months if it doesn't go well, you know, the
Speaker 1: whole deal. But there were two notes in particular that
Speaker 1: stood out to me from that report. First of all,
Speaker 1: uh Rob Polinka, Genie Buss, and Kurt Rambis are considered
Speaker 1: like the brain trust of the Lakers when it comes
Speaker 1: to basketball decisions. But in the article they did mention
Speaker 1: that they are now factoring in the opinions of Jesse
Speaker 1: and Joey Bus when they're considering these trade options. That
Speaker 1: was encouraging to me on some level because I think
Speaker 1: those are the two smartest basketball minds in that front office.
Speaker 1: Kurt Rambay this is just completely disconnected from the modern NBA.
Speaker 1: So his advice I'm really concerned about. Obviously, Jenie Buss
Speaker 1: is not a basketball person. And then Rob Polinka. All
Speaker 1: we all we have to go on is his decisions
Speaker 1: over the years, and his decisions are once again more
Speaker 1: indicative of of him being kind of like a figurehead,
Speaker 1: a personality manager, a a sales person more than he
Speaker 1: is the X his nose guy, you know. And that's
Speaker 1: always been one of my biggest concerns with the Lakers
Speaker 1: front office, is their decision making people are not basketball people,
Speaker 1: you know. And then we have their scouting department, which
Speaker 1: is led by Jesse and Joey Buss, and the two
Speaker 1: of them have a track record of finding really high
Speaker 1: quality NBA players on the fringes of the draft and
Speaker 1: the free agency market, right like Austin Reaves, right, who's
Speaker 1: turned into a pretty solid NBA player, A guy that
Speaker 1: I think will be their fifth starter this year under
Speaker 1: the current iteration of the roster. I say fifth starter,
Speaker 1: I I that doesn't necessarily mean starting line up. It
Speaker 1: just means like the fifth guy that they'll have in
Speaker 1: key lineups, particularly closing games. Um. But they found Austin Reeves,
Speaker 1: they found Kyle Kuzma, they found Taylor Horton Tucker. That
Speaker 1: they have a track record of finding quality NBA players
Speaker 1: on the fringes of the draft. That is indicative of
Speaker 1: the fact that they understand the basketball. They understand what
Speaker 1: works in the modern NBA. Obviously, I haven't had the
Speaker 1: luxury of getting to chat basketball with Rob or chat
Speaker 1: basketball with Jesse or Joey. All we can go on
Speaker 1: is their decision making, and Rob Polinka has a very
Speaker 1: questionable track record with decision making. Jesse and Joey do not,
Speaker 1: So I like the idea of having them more involved
Speaker 1: in decision making, although it was not enough to sway them. Apparently,
Speaker 1: they did mention in the article that they want universal approval.
Speaker 1: They want all five of those people to be on
Speaker 1: both on board before they make a deal. Um. The
Speaker 1: only other thing that I thought thought was really interesting
Speaker 1: in that report is they said Lebron was among those
Speaker 1: who are supportive of keeping Russ and I'm and I'm
Speaker 1: not are basic that he's been you know, supportive behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, and that he's not putting pressure on them
Speaker 1: to make a trade. That's not a big surprise to
Speaker 1: me because Lebron's Lebron's credibility was on the line there.
Speaker 1: He's the guy who basically recommended this deal, pushed heavily
Speaker 1: for this deal. He's the guy that's always wanted the
Speaker 1: back up playmaker. He was the one who wanted Russ,
Speaker 1: So I'm not surprised that he'd be one of the
Speaker 1: last people to be the one who admits that it
Speaker 1: didn't work out. Um, the reality of the situation is
Speaker 1: the Laker. The Lakers are banking on Russ to become
Speaker 1: what they need him to be, not what he actually is,
Speaker 1: not what we have evidence of. He's in his fifteen season.
Speaker 1: It's not exactly like we're going on small amounts of information.
Speaker 1: They're banking on him changing in his fifth fifteen season.
Speaker 1: My dad used to always tell me when I was
Speaker 1: growing up, Um, that the best indicator of future performance
Speaker 1: is past performance. What does that mean? That means that
Speaker 1: obviously people can change, and we should hope for people
Speaker 1: to change, especially in our personal friends and family network,
Speaker 1: right like we should be rooting for people to make changes,
Speaker 1: you know, especially when you're dealing with people that have
Speaker 1: larger issues. But the reality is is that the best
Speaker 1: indicator of future performance is past performance. So it's one
Speaker 1: thing to hope for those types of changes, but when
Speaker 1: you're planning, you should plan on what they were. That's
Speaker 1: the most likely scenario. And so I don't like the
Speaker 1: idea of planning the Lakers future based on Russ changing
Speaker 1: because it's just not likely at this point in his career.
Speaker 1: And again that we're going to find out quickly. We
Speaker 1: might find out tonight and when when we watch him
Speaker 1: play in this preseason game, we're gonna find out quickly
Speaker 1: how serious Russ is about changing the I wanted to
Speaker 1: give you guys a really quick checklist of things to
Speaker 1: watch for in tonight's game. One his shot selection. As
Speaker 1: we mentioned last year, in terms of high volume ball creators,
Speaker 1: he was one of the least efficient in the league.
Speaker 1: One of the ways to pair that back is to
Speaker 1: pair back his shot selection take shots that he actually
Speaker 1: can shoot at a high percentage off ball offense, So
Speaker 1: making spot up three's screening away for teammates screening on
Speaker 1: the basketball, cutting without the basketball and crashing the offensive
Speaker 1: glass and then off ball defense, he has a tendency
Speaker 1: to ignore his man, to recklessly help or to chase rebounds.
Speaker 1: Watch him keeping tabs on shooters, offering smart help, not
Speaker 1: getting out of position unless he needs to, and then
Speaker 1: boxing out or checking to see where his man is
Speaker 1: before he crashes the glass so he doesn't get out
Speaker 1: of position. Those are things that I want you guys
Speaker 1: to watch for in tonight's game. But now I don't
Speaker 1: want to go too much further on the Lakers thing
Speaker 1: because we've hashed it out before. But yeah, Lebron's clearly
Speaker 1: in the pro RUSS camp. It's good that they're factoring
Speaker 1: in Jesse and Joey. Those are the two smart basketball
Speaker 1: minds in that front office. And it's a whole bunch
Speaker 1: of maybees and this is the group of basketball players
Speaker 1: that they're going to work with this year, and we're
Speaker 1: gonna find out pretty quickly what they're capable of. Lots
Speaker 1: of positive energy coming out of Lakers camp, but that's
Speaker 1: training camp. There was positive energy coming out of last
Speaker 1: year's camp. So um, before we move into these preseason games,
Speaker 1: and because this is gonna be related to the Laker
Speaker 1: thing we just talked about. I care about preseason um,
Speaker 1: not just because I'm a basketball nut job, but also
Speaker 1: because I really do think it's indicative of your team's personality,
Speaker 1: you know, like, um, look at you guys. An example,
Speaker 1: t J McConnell came through the University of Arizona, and
Speaker 1: I've always been a psychopath on the basketball court, Like
Speaker 1: I just care about every game. I hate losing, and
Speaker 1: I'm crazy enough to devote huge portions of my life
Speaker 1: to it, even though I'm not a professional basketball player.
Speaker 1: I relate to I relate to basketball psychopaths. And I
Speaker 1: remember when I was playing at the rec center back
Speaker 1: at the University of Arizona, when t J McConnell would
Speaker 1: come through and we'd play. We'd be in these pickup games,
Speaker 1: and a lot of the guys who came through the
Speaker 1: uve A, they go up there and they just kind
Speaker 1: of mess around and they kind of act too cool
Speaker 1: for school. But then I'd see t J McConnell up
Speaker 1: there just being a psychopath and like just caring about
Speaker 1: winning pickup games against random students at the University of Arizona,
Speaker 1: and him and I went added a bunch of times,
Speaker 1: and and like I remember just sitting there thinking, like,
Speaker 1: I like, I like this guy because he's just a
Speaker 1: psychopath and he doesn't see a basketball game that he
Speaker 1: doesn't care about. And that's kind of the way I
Speaker 1: feel about preseason basketball. It's indicative of how serious you
Speaker 1: are as a team, because the reality is is every
Speaker 1: time you play preseason basketball, that's an opportunity to get better.
Speaker 1: It's an opportunity to get reps. It's an opportunity to
Speaker 1: see how you stack up against other teams around the league.
Speaker 1: It's an opportunity to establish habits, to demonstrate what your
Speaker 1: intentions are on a night in, a night out basis
Speaker 1: throughout the regular season. I don't think it's a coincidence
Speaker 1: that the Lakers beat everyone's ass in the preseason and
Speaker 1: then started twenty four and three in the regular season.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's a coincidence that the Lakers went
Speaker 1: winless last year in the preseason and then immediately came
Speaker 1: out the gates sucking, because that's what happens that you're
Speaker 1: what you're seeing is what that team is made up
Speaker 1: made up of psychologically. How much do they care about
Speaker 1: defending in a preseason game, because if they don't defend
Speaker 1: in a preseason game, they're probably not going to defend
Speaker 1: against the Oklahoma City Thunder in mid November, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. Like, at a certain point, you're learning
Speaker 1: about the psychology of these locker rooms. So that's why
Speaker 1: I care about preseason. Again, that doesn't necessarily mean wins
Speaker 1: and losses, but it does mean what you see with
Speaker 1: those groupings. Your core lineup groupings should be performing well
Speaker 1: in preseason or they're not going to perform well in
Speaker 1: the regular season. If they perform poorly in preseason, they
Speaker 1: are setting a bad Uh. They're setting a bad uh
Speaker 1: kind of like precedent, a bad set of habits for
Speaker 1: the way they're gonna play once they start playing meaningful basketball. Um.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna start with the Warriors. UM. Only I
Speaker 1: spent a couple of minutes on them today because we
Speaker 1: did a whole video on them the other day and
Speaker 1: they just played the exact same team. Uh. They jumped
Speaker 1: out to an eight point lead against the Wizards and
Speaker 1: then kind of relaxed and they ended up losing the game,
Speaker 1: fell down big in their early second half. Um, they
Speaker 1: did have fourteen points in their first four and a
Speaker 1: half minutes in their offense looked really, really good. So
Speaker 1: I wanted to kind of go play by play through
Speaker 1: their first fourteen points to kind demonstrate the beauty of
Speaker 1: Warriors basketball. So in the first play of the game,
Speaker 1: they ran one of their four out one in actions,
Speaker 1: and on the play, Jordan Pool back screened for Draymond Green,
Speaker 1: and Draymond Green looped around the baseline and got a
Speaker 1: dribble hand off um. Right after Pool backscreen for Draymond Green,
Speaker 1: he went up and back screened for Steph Curry. Stephen
Speaker 1: Jordan Pool's man's uh. They kind of were confused. They
Speaker 1: decided to switch. Then Steph just cuts and curls off
Speaker 1: the screen to the basket, and his defender chases right
Speaker 1: as that second defender came. Then Jordan Pool just went
Speaker 1: right off of that second defender as he was chasing Steph,
Speaker 1: and right there waiting was Kevin Looney setting another screen.
Speaker 1: Jordan Pool curl curled around that and got a wide
Speaker 1: open three. And I was just sitting there thinking, like,
Speaker 1: man like, imagine getting all hyped up for a preseason
Speaker 1: game in Japan in front of a pack stadium. You're
Speaker 1: getting ready to go out there and play hard and
Speaker 1: show what you can do, and then you just immediately
Speaker 1: get thrown in the blender. And after after trying to
Speaker 1: navigate three different screening actions, you end up running into
Speaker 1: a wall Kevon Looney and giving up a wide open three.
Speaker 1: Very next possession, they ran a transition pick and roll
Speaker 1: with Steph kind of like as they were going up
Speaker 1: the floor, H Stephan, Draymond and both bodies went with Steph.
Speaker 1: Steph dropped it off the Draymond. They ran a four
Speaker 1: and four on three and Andrew Wiggins got fouled. A
Speaker 1: couple of possessions are very next possession, Draymond hits a
Speaker 1: three off of an Andrew Wiggins post up. Always good
Speaker 1: to see Draymond Green hitting threes. It's like one of
Speaker 1: the It's like the every team has like a thing,
Speaker 1: like if the Boston Celtics are actually driving and kicking,
Speaker 1: they become unbeatable, you know the Warriors. When Draymond Green's
Speaker 1: making threes, they become unbeatable. A couple of possessions later,
Speaker 1: there was a transition play where Draymond Green was leading
Speaker 1: the break and it was a really interesting action from
Speaker 1: Jordan Pool and Andrew Wiggins. So Jordan Pool Andrew Wiggins
Speaker 1: are running up the left side of the floor, and
Speaker 1: what typically happens when you don't have floor balance in
Speaker 1: transition is one guy will run through and then the
Speaker 1: other guy will stay in the corner. So Jordan Pool
Speaker 1: runs through, and Kyle Kuzma's guarding Andrew Wiggins, and he's
Speaker 1: expecting Andrew Wiggins to stay on that side floor balance,
Speaker 1: but instead Andrew Wiggins just cuts and follows Jordan Pool
Speaker 1: and Kuzma is completely caught with his pants down. Draymond
Speaker 1: Green throws a perfect bounce pass in transition and Wiggins
Speaker 1: gets a layup. A couple of possessions later, they ran
Speaker 1: a their classic Warriors split cut uh split cut action. Basically,
Speaker 1: all that is they throw it into the post. Usually
Speaker 1: it's Straymon, sometimes it's Weigands. On this play it was Wiggins,
Speaker 1: and then as soon as Wiggins caught the ball in
Speaker 1: the post, Looney, who was one pass away, just cross
Speaker 1: screens for staff. They've called split cut, some people call
Speaker 1: them post splits. It's really just semantics. I don't care
Speaker 1: as much about semantics with play calling because every team
Speaker 1: calls things different. Like the Lakers run a drop coverage
Speaker 1: and uh Darvin Hamm calls its center field. It doesn't
Speaker 1: mean like everybody just has their own nomenclature for what
Speaker 1: these things are. But the Warriors they refer to it
Speaker 1: as their split cuts or their post split actions or
Speaker 1: whatever it is. But essentially all it is is you
Speaker 1: make a post entry and then immediately the guy who
Speaker 1: makes the post entry sets a screen away and then
Speaker 1: from there it's usually a shooter coming off of that,
Speaker 1: and then the screener will dive. That's typically how split
Speaker 1: cut actions work. On that play, Wiggins gets the ball
Speaker 1: on the post, Looney just sets a basic cross screen
Speaker 1: for Staff gets a good screen, Steff catches and nails
Speaker 1: a wide open three. And then on the last play
Speaker 1: before of that run to get them to fourteen to six,
Speaker 1: there was a basic five outset. Looney has the ball
Speaker 1: on the left wing, Wiggins is in the corner. He
Speaker 1: runs up with his left hand to do a dribble
Speaker 1: handoff for Wiggins, and Wiggins just cuts back door and
Speaker 1: Luney hits him on the bounce for an and one
Speaker 1: um that went into a time out. So like the
Speaker 1: thing is, like we talked about earlier, that five out
Speaker 1: set keeps things open for cuts and for slipping out
Speaker 1: of rolls and short rolls and things along those lines.
Speaker 1: So what's beautiful about that is that dribble handoff Wiggins
Speaker 1: cutting back door probably doesn't result in a basket in
Speaker 1: a four out one inset or in a three out
Speaker 1: two in set, but because it's in a five outset,
Speaker 1: there's just no help there and it just kind of
Speaker 1: makes it makes everything that they do so much harder
Speaker 1: to guard. Again, anybody you missed that, we did a
Speaker 1: whole like forty minutes on Warriors offense. Why what their
Speaker 1: five outsets look like, how they use them to get
Speaker 1: open threes and um uh, the cuts and rolls to
Speaker 1: the basket. You're gonna want to check that out. It's
Speaker 1: just a little bit further back in our feed. So
Speaker 1: obviously they ended up losing that game. Things got sloppy.
Speaker 1: Who cares, it's the preseason, but early on we saw
Speaker 1: some classic Warriors offense. Their continuity is going to have
Speaker 1: them humming on all cylinders going into this season. Moving
Speaker 1: on to the Celtics and the Hornets utterly destructive performance
Speaker 1: from Boston, they looked really, really good. Um. First of all,
Speaker 1: Jalen Brown the score. I think he had twenty four
Speaker 1: points in twenty four minutes. I think he was like
Speaker 1: eight for eleven from the field or something like that.
Speaker 1: I talked about this a lot when we were doing
Speaker 1: our Celtics breakdown. He's the pure scorer on the roster.
Speaker 1: I view, Jayson Tatum is more of like a a
Speaker 1: playmaking forward, you know, like a classic point forward kind
Speaker 1: of guy. Uh, all of the metrics, isolation, post ups,
Speaker 1: dribble handoff, coming off screen stuff like that. Jalen Brown
Speaker 1: was the better play finisher. He's better at putting the
Speaker 1: ball in the basket right now then Jayson Tatum is.
Speaker 1: Jason Tatum is just a much better passer, and he's
Speaker 1: more consistent with getting dribble penetration and making the right
Speaker 1: reads out of it. Jalen Brown is still kind of
Speaker 1: a mess as a passer, but Jalen looked dominant again
Speaker 1: in that game against the Hornets. A couple of things
Speaker 1: that I that stood out to me um particularly that
Speaker 1: helps him have a success with the basketball. First of all,
Speaker 1: quick decisions. Jalen Brown doesn't mess around with the ball
Speaker 1: like he is very aggressive, but he's quick with his decisions.
Speaker 1: What that means is it makes him predictable. You know
Speaker 1: a lot of ball hogs or guys that are gunners,
Speaker 1: guys that are scores, they disrupt the flow of the
Speaker 1: offense because they're indecisive. You know, they catch, they'll jab
Speaker 1: step four times and then they'll shoot, or they'll dribble
Speaker 1: thirty times before they go into their into their move
Speaker 1: or whatever. In those moments, things get stagnant, everyone's standing around.
Speaker 1: What I appreciate about Jalen is he's aggressive, but he's quick, decisive,
Speaker 1: and predictable, so it makes easy for his teammates around
Speaker 1: him to play off of his aggression. And then lastly,
Speaker 1: he's the I was working on closeouts with my high
Speaker 1: school kids this morning and one of the big things
Speaker 1: I kept telling him is, like shoot the three like
Speaker 1: you don't. Yes, it's a drill to work on isolation skill. Yes,
Speaker 1: it's a drill to work on putting the basketball on
Speaker 1: the floor and beating people to spot, like beating people
Speaker 1: to spots with contact and getting to the rim. But
Speaker 1: the reality is if you don't demonstrate the ability to
Speaker 1: shoot the shot, they're gonna close out short on you.
Speaker 1: And as soon as they start closing out short. Then
Speaker 1: it just makes your job ten times harder when you're
Speaker 1: trying to beat them off the dribble. And so I
Speaker 1: was just encouraging my kids, like on the catch, shoot
Speaker 1: it every time when you're open, force them to close
Speaker 1: out hard on you. Then you can start attacking the rim.
Speaker 1: And that's the kind of the interesting thing with the
Speaker 1: Jalen Brown stuff is he's so aggressive as a pull
Speaker 1: up shooter right now, both off the dribble and jab
Speaker 1: steps like get out of triple threat, that guys have
Speaker 1: to press up on him. And now the guys are
Speaker 1: pressing up on into that extent he's getting conser instant,
Speaker 1: drible penetration because he's a big, strong athlete with a
Speaker 1: low center of gravity and he's just you know, I
Speaker 1: I'm really surprised that Brooklyn didn't want to take that
Speaker 1: deal um to get jailing, because he would have been
Speaker 1: such an awesome center piece, especially attached to draft picks.
Speaker 1: But hey, maybe Boston's better off in the long run.
Speaker 1: Tatum had a somewhat rough night, but who cares. It's
Speaker 1: a preseason. Like I said, I'm more I'm not concerned
Speaker 1: about result. I'm not concerned about the shots Uh, the
Speaker 1: shot result like guys not shooting well when they're trying
Speaker 1: to get their legs underneath him. What I care about
Speaker 1: most in the preseason is our guys playing hard. Um,
Speaker 1: are they running their scheme right? Like? Do they look
Speaker 1: like a team that cares? Do they look like a
Speaker 1: team that's bought into their coach? Do they look like
Speaker 1: a team that's on a mission, or do they look
Speaker 1: like a team that's just coasting and floating through. Tatum
Speaker 1: was out there defending, playing hard. He just didn't shoot well,
Speaker 1: and I think he had three assists with five turnovers,
Speaker 1: which is obviously not great for him. Malcolm brock him
Speaker 1: it was the main reason why I wanted to watch
Speaker 1: this particular game. I wanted to get a feel for
Speaker 1: what he looks like in a Boston jersey. His first
Speaker 1: shift part, picularly up to the end of the first quarter,
Speaker 1: was pretty rough, a lot of overpassing. Um. It's really
Speaker 1: tough in general to integrate a good ball handler into
Speaker 1: an existing basketball team that really already knows how to
Speaker 1: play in Generally, you just don't You don't want to
Speaker 1: step on each other's toes. So like there's some force
Speaker 1: feeding him. But then he's also like force feeding others.
Speaker 1: And the reality is is like what they need for
Speaker 1: him is to be aggressive with the basketball until the
Speaker 1: team collapse on it collapses on him, and then look
Speaker 1: to make plays. And in that first stretch going into
Speaker 1: the end of the first quarter, he was a little
Speaker 1: bit sloppy, some overpassing, wasn't looking for his own shot enough.
Speaker 1: But man, in that second quarter. Um, to start the
Speaker 1: second quarter, they went with a bench lineup, and I'm
Speaker 1: pretty sure Smart, Tatum and Brown were all out at
Speaker 1: this point. It might have been Brown was out there too,
Speaker 1: but they featured brogged in primarily with the basketball to
Speaker 1: start the second quarter, and almost immediately you could see
Speaker 1: what he brings to the table, consistent dribble penetration. He's
Speaker 1: really good at painting the defender on his backside on
Speaker 1: ball screens and then methodically working his way down the
Speaker 1: lane to get dribble penetration off of ball screens. And
Speaker 1: then he was just spraying out to shooters all day long.
Speaker 1: He's already got really good chemistry with Grant Williams. Um
Speaker 1: they had a couple of picking uh. They had a
Speaker 1: picking pop three and then they had another driving kick three. Um.
Speaker 1: Just in general, you could see the fit there with
Speaker 1: Brogden as like a legit uh shot creator, not just
Speaker 1: with the bench lineup, but that's gonna work really well
Speaker 1: with the starters as well. I thought it was confusing
Speaker 1: that they started Derek White and brought Malcolm Malcolm Brogden
Speaker 1: off the bench. I'm assuming it's for staggering purposes and
Speaker 1: they're gonna want to have him with the bench lineups.
Speaker 1: But at the end of the day, Brogden is just
Speaker 1: a better player than Derek White, and he's got to
Speaker 1: be with them as much as possible. So I'm curious
Speaker 1: to see how that dynamic goes over the course of
Speaker 1: the season. One last note with Brogden his transition passing,
Speaker 1: he was grabbing the ball and pushing with pace and
Speaker 1: making plays to get easy shots in transition. I think
Speaker 1: that's gonna be a good fit with that Boston team,
Speaker 1: which I think could stand a run of a bit
Speaker 1: more with how athletic they are. Quick note on the
Speaker 1: Hornets again, I just started covering the league as a
Speaker 1: whole um last year in February, so I've watched LaMelo
Speaker 1: ball probably as much as the average basketball fan has.
Speaker 1: Here the average big time basketball fan, Like, I've watched
Speaker 1: him a few dozen times, but I don't know enough
Speaker 1: about him to have a strong opinion. And I'm really
Speaker 1: excited this year to watch a lot more of him
Speaker 1: to get a stronger opinion, and just to learn about
Speaker 1: him on a night and night out basis. In the NBA.
Speaker 1: Last year, by the time I started covering the league,
Speaker 1: the Hornets were already kind of out of the picture,
Speaker 1: so I just wasn't watching him that much. Um. The
Speaker 1: reality there, there's there are things that I like and
Speaker 1: there are things that are dislike. Up front, um natural
Speaker 1: feel as a passer when you get him in the
Speaker 1: open floor, and that's usually in transition or if when
Speaker 1: they set that really high ball screen almost starting away
Speaker 1: from the basket so he can get downhill. When he's
Speaker 1: in the open floor and he's making plays, the passing
Speaker 1: is it's it's it's really impressive. And he has the
Speaker 1: ability to beat beat bigs on switches with quick dribble
Speaker 1: moves to the right. He's got the ability to knock
Speaker 1: down pull up jump shots. But there's the shot selection
Speaker 1: sometimes is truly puzzling, Like he'll take obviously when he
Speaker 1: was in high school, he took wild shots, but now
Speaker 1: there's still a little bit of that there and adding
Speaker 1: unnecessary difficulty. There was a play where he was coming
Speaker 1: off a pick and roll on the left side of
Speaker 1: the floor, defender gets caught on the screen. He's got
Speaker 1: a ton of separation and he's coming down to like
Speaker 1: eighteen feet on the left wing, the biggest in drop.
Speaker 1: He's way far back, and instead of like getting balanced
Speaker 1: and raising up to uh to like take a nice
Speaker 1: up and down pull up jump shot, he just took
Speaker 1: a drifting, floating eighteen footer or where his legs were
Speaker 1: kicked out and I know he kicks his feet out
Speaker 1: a little bit naturally, but his whole upright body was
Speaker 1: moving from right to left on the shot. And I'm
Speaker 1: just sitting there thinking, like that's just unnecessary difficulty, Like
Speaker 1: that is a twenty percent shot probably, but if he
Speaker 1: goes straight up and down, it's probably a thirty seven
Speaker 1: thirty eight percent shot. And random pull ups in transition
Speaker 1: the like, Like he's he's such a gifted passer that
Speaker 1: looks for his teammates often, but then he goes through
Speaker 1: these random stretches where he gets kind of tunnel vision
Speaker 1: and he doesn't take great shots, um, and then on
Speaker 1: the defensive end of the floor, it's just it's just
Speaker 1: a nightmare. Um. He's so upright and finn that the
Speaker 1: big wings just have their way with him. Jalen Brown
Speaker 1: had a dunk where he caught the ball literally looked
Speaker 1: at LaMelo face to face and just drove right around him.
Speaker 1: There was a little bit of contact, but Jalen just
Speaker 1: ripped through him because he's too thin and went up
Speaker 1: and and throw a nasty one handed dunk down. Uh.
Speaker 1: A lot to be desired on the defensive end, a
Speaker 1: lot to be desired with shot selection. Lots of good
Speaker 1: too as a shot creator, especially in the high pick
Speaker 1: and roll. I I I have really mixed feelings about
Speaker 1: him right now, not a strong opinion. Like I said,
Speaker 1: I want to see more of him before I have
Speaker 1: a strong opinion. But that was an ugly one to watch.
Speaker 1: I think he went five for nineteen overall. Moving on
Speaker 1: to the Sun. So they lose to the Adelaide thirty six.
Speaker 1: There's kind of reminiscent of that Thunder team that lost.
Speaker 1: I can't even remember who it was, but they lost
Speaker 1: to some EuroLeague team a few years back. Um, Obviously,
Speaker 1: motivational advantage plays a big role here. It's hard to
Speaker 1: get up for these kinds of games. Um, Adelaide's their
Speaker 1: biggest game of the year, Like them winning that game
Speaker 1: will matter as much to them, probably or close to
Speaker 1: them when to them winning an NBH an NBL championship. Right, Um,
Speaker 1: But the reality is is, like like we were talking
Speaker 1: about earlier with that t J McConnell story, like you
Speaker 1: just find out about the psychology these teams in these settings,
Speaker 1: because yeah, they were at a big motivational advantage, the
Speaker 1: Adelaide thirty sixers were, But all these preseason games are
Speaker 1: not exactly motivational events. You're not super stoked to go
Speaker 1: out and play in front of a third full arena,
Speaker 1: you know, in a game that doesn't mean anything, I
Speaker 1: get it. But you find out a lot about the
Speaker 1: chemistry these teams. This is a team that we were
Speaker 1: concerned about their motivation. We were concerned about what was
Speaker 1: going on between the years in the locker room, right,
Speaker 1: And they couldn't get up to play hard for this team,
Speaker 1: and obviously they ended up blowing the game, giving up
Speaker 1: a hundred and thirty something points in the process. The
Speaker 1: main thing that set out to me on film, and
Speaker 1: I did a whole video breakdown on this. You can
Speaker 1: find it on my Twitter feed. Again at Underscore, Jason
Speaker 1: lt I did like a two minute video breaking down
Speaker 1: DeAndre Aten. But from the opening tip, he just didn't care.
Speaker 1: And again look at the box score, I think he
Speaker 1: had like twenty two points dominant offensive performance, Like he
Speaker 1: still has like magnets or vacuums for hands and catches
Speaker 1: everything around the rim and finishes it every single time.
Speaker 1: He's every bit as good offensively he's always would hope
Speaker 1: for him to be. But on defense, he's just doing
Speaker 1: the bare minimum. You know. Like this is before we
Speaker 1: get into the details. The main concept I wanted to
Speaker 1: get out here is the difference between doing the bare
Speaker 1: minimum and getting the job done. Yeah, in your scheme,
Speaker 1: it might be your job to help here, or to
Speaker 1: show here, or to hedge here, or to chase this
Speaker 1: guy or whatever the whatever your detail is in the scheme,
Speaker 1: but you either do it well enough to get the
Speaker 1: stop or you don't. And most defensive schemes, when ran right,
Speaker 1: will work. But like the the the the amount of
Speaker 1: effort that Aton was putting in to his role was
Speaker 1: just simply not good enough. Opening possession of the game,
Speaker 1: Devin Booker gets caught on a back screen from from
Speaker 1: DeAndre Ayton's man. What are you supposed to do when
Speaker 1: you are the big and your big sets a back
Speaker 1: screen and and the guy gets loose to the rim,
Speaker 1: that's your responsibility. The thirty sixers ended up blowing it
Speaker 1: with a bad lob pass, but Aton was completely out
Speaker 1: of position and offered no help on the play. It
Speaker 1: was wide open at the rim. Like very next possession,
Speaker 1: he's kind of like over helping on a on a
Speaker 1: pick and pick and roll drop coverage. Booker's got the
Speaker 1: guard completely contained, like just completely under control, and Aidan's
Speaker 1: just kind of floating around behind him. Meanwhile, his man
Speaker 1: is popped to the elbow and they drop it off
Speaker 1: and he gets a wide open fifty footer. That guy
Speaker 1: ends up getting going and gets going from three. A
Speaker 1: couple possessions later, he's over helping on a curl once again,
Speaker 1: just sinking into the paint because that's the easy thing
Speaker 1: for the big to do. His guy pops out of
Speaker 1: the three point line, knocks down at three. There's another
Speaker 1: possession where in transition he ends up getting switched onto
Speaker 1: or in a screening action. He ends up getting switched
Speaker 1: onto one of their guards, and DeAndre just doesn't even
Speaker 1: go out past the three point line. He's literally just
Speaker 1: standing about ten twelve feet away, arms up, just like
Speaker 1: just offering a cursory, you know, presence there, and the
Speaker 1: guard just shoots the wide open three and nails it.
Speaker 1: It was number twelve, the left handed, left handed kid.
Speaker 1: He gets going now, next possession, he races down and
Speaker 1: shoots like a wild transition three, and Michail bridges his
Speaker 1: face and makes it. And the reason why he makes
Speaker 1: that is he gets his rhythm when Atan's not guarding
Speaker 1: him on the previous possession Like these, the rhythm is
Speaker 1: a delicate thing. When you lose to a team that
Speaker 1: shoots you out of the arena, it usually starts with
Speaker 1: you not defending well at the beginning of the game.
Speaker 1: And then the big, the big glaring one was that
Speaker 1: the it was I think it was late second quarter,
Speaker 1: our mid second quarter, but Devin Booker takes a tough
Speaker 1: like step back transition three and it was bad shot.
Speaker 1: Don't get me wrong, but he's Devin a Booker and
Speaker 1: and he needs to have a green light and he
Speaker 1: needs to have the freedom to take difficult shots. And
Speaker 1: Aton doesn't like the shot, so he turns around and
Speaker 1: literally walks for like five steps as the team is
Speaker 1: running the other way. Then he kind of gets going
Speaker 1: into a jog and in the process Mikhail Bridges has
Speaker 1: to pick up his man, the big. So then they
Speaker 1: the thirty sixers immediately run a pick and roll. They
Speaker 1: switch it now Chris Paul's on the big. They dump
Speaker 1: it down into the block and Chris Paul fouls him
Speaker 1: as he's going up for a layup. And once again
Speaker 1: that's a mismatch that was given because Eton wasn't trying.
Speaker 1: He was walking up the floor in transition. It was
Speaker 1: just like it was like the most embarrassing twenty two
Speaker 1: point performance I've seen in a long time, because he
Speaker 1: just his body language is bad, his defense was atrocious,
Speaker 1: and it allowed a lower level professional team from a
Speaker 1: league in Australia to beat an NBA team, which is
Speaker 1: inexcusable under any circumstances. It's just something to watch here
Speaker 1: in the early part of the season. You know, um,
Speaker 1: like this is a team, like I said, that's got
Speaker 1: some baggage from the summer. When when the losses pile
Speaker 1: up is when the baggage rears its ugly head. Now,
Speaker 1: I think this team is talented enough to win their
Speaker 1: way through this, but if they do start to lose,
Speaker 1: and once again, this is just a preseason game. If
Speaker 1: they do start to lose, it could be a problem
Speaker 1: in the long run. But congrats to the Adelaide thirty
Speaker 1: six or is just a really cool moment for them. Um,
Speaker 1: the basketball God's definitely levied a judgment on the effort
Speaker 1: level from the Sun's. The other thing, too, is just
Speaker 1: the gap between basketball talent from different levels is it's
Speaker 1: it's kind of both. It's like people don't realize how
Speaker 1: good NBA players are. Like people see me a six
Speaker 1: six wing with six ten wings band that can get
Speaker 1: his head by the room and shoot and dribble and stuff,
Speaker 1: and they think like, oh, he uh, he must to
Speaker 1: be a near NBA player. It's like no, no no, no,
Speaker 1: Like if I went to an NBA training camp tomorrow,
Speaker 1: I get my ass handed to me, Like these guys
Speaker 1: are insanely good. But at the same time, like if
Speaker 1: I was playing in a game and the team wasn't
Speaker 1: respecting me and they let me get comfortable like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I could get going, I can make some shots. And
Speaker 1: that's kind of the That's kind of the way I
Speaker 1: look at it is like if you go up against
Speaker 1: an NBL team, if you go up against a cb
Speaker 1: A team, if you go up against the EuroLeague team
Speaker 1: and you don't bring effort. These are good basketball players,
Speaker 1: Like they will beat you. They will beat you if
Speaker 1: you if you do not take them seriously and respect them,
Speaker 1: and they found out the hard way. UM. Lastly, Raptors Jazz.
Speaker 1: Quick note of the Jazz. They have a deep repertoire
Speaker 1: of good basketball players. I think they ended up starting
Speaker 1: Leak Beasley, Mike Conley, Lori, marking in Jared Vanderbilt, and
Speaker 1: I can't remember who the fifth guy was, but then
Speaker 1: they ended up bringing like Collin Sexton in off of
Speaker 1: the bench. They they have a lot of good basketball players.
Speaker 1: So I wonder how much they're gonna be willing to
Speaker 1: be a team that under five hundred but competitive before
Speaker 1: they decide that it might be time to start selling
Speaker 1: those guys off um in pursuit of picks, although they
Speaker 1: did end up getting eight picks this summer, so maybe
Speaker 1: they don't need them. UM. Looking at the Raptors. It
Speaker 1: was kind of funny to watch them on offense. We
Speaker 1: didn't do a season preview for them because they were
Speaker 1: kind of in the middle of the pack and um
Speaker 1: I generally I'm lower on the Raptors than most people,
Speaker 1: just because of the lack of ball handling and shooting,
Speaker 1: which we're gonna get to um. But they are an
Speaker 1: interesting team. We just didn't have time to get to
Speaker 1: them in the season previews. They are relentless with matchup attacking.
Speaker 1: They've got these huge forwards right like o Ganna nob
Speaker 1: and Scottie Barnes and um In Pascal Siakam and on
Speaker 1: a lot of possessions, it's just like give the ball
Speaker 1: to one of them and they just play bullyball, you know,
Speaker 1: live dribble from the perimeter, turned their back to the basket,
Speaker 1: back them down, back them down, back them down, wait
Speaker 1: till the defense collapses, and then spray out to shoot
Speaker 1: her right. Um. But the but it gets a little bit,
Speaker 1: it gets a little bit rudimentary because they don't shoot
Speaker 1: the ball well enough. Things collapse around them, they get
Speaker 1: caught in traffic, they turn the basketball over. They can
Speaker 1: be a little sloppy on the offensive, end of the floor. Again,
Speaker 1: I don't think they have nearly enough shooting and ball
Speaker 1: handling to truly contend compared to the best teams in
Speaker 1: the league, but they do have some of the most
Speaker 1: physically imposing five man groupings in the league. There was
Speaker 1: one line up in particular that Raptors fans were getting
Speaker 1: really excited about in that game O g and a Nobi,
Speaker 1: Pascal Sam, Chris Bouche, Pressius Chua and Scottie Barnes. And
Speaker 1: they played quite a bit there. I believe it was
Speaker 1: it was either end of the first or start of
Speaker 1: the second quarter, and they actually didn't do that well.
Speaker 1: And a big part of it was they had really
Speaker 1: bad off ball defense. And I did a whole video
Speaker 1: on this again, so you can find it on my
Speaker 1: Twitter feed, kind of breaking down these concepts. But like
Speaker 1: the whole point of that type of lineup is if
Speaker 1: you switch everything, they don't have a good option to attack.
Speaker 1: It's like, Okay, maybe I can get some drible penetration
Speaker 1: on Chris Bouche, but he's so long an athletic he's
Speaker 1: gonna be able to gain some ground, right, you know,
Speaker 1: Or like maybe you think you have a decent chance
Speaker 1: against o g and and Obi because he's only six
Speaker 1: ft seven or whatever if you're a taller player. But
Speaker 1: the truth is there's no good option, and so what
Speaker 1: you're supposed to do in that defensive scheme is switch
Speaker 1: everything and bait them into playing. Is so, And if
Speaker 1: they make some tough shots over contests, or if they
Speaker 1: occasionally beat to the dribble as your big forward is
Speaker 1: coming and slapping the backboard and he barely makes a layup,
Speaker 1: it's like, applause, nice shot, run back on defense. We'll
Speaker 1: see if you can do that next time, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. But instead, what they were doing is
Speaker 1: they were doing the classic Nick Nurse thing where they're
Speaker 1: overhelping everywhere. There was a play where Bouche had Conly
Speaker 1: completely corralled on a drive and like, Condy has no advantage,
Speaker 1: but he's kind of getting downhill, but Bouchet is still
Speaker 1: between him in the rim and uh Pascal Siakom just
Speaker 1: blatantly abandons his man to step up and help, and
Speaker 1: his man cuts back door and Condy drops it off
Speaker 1: and they draw foul. There's another one where Scottie Barnes
Speaker 1: had Jordan Clarkson on his hip and Clarkson gets just
Speaker 1: a little bit of a step and he's going to
Speaker 1: the rim, and you know what, he would have got
Speaker 1: a layup off like he would have gotten there to
Speaker 1: the rim, but Scotty Barnes is gonna block that into oblivion.
Speaker 1: He's a better athlete and he's going step for step
Speaker 1: with him. That's going to end poorly for Jordan Clarkson.
Speaker 1: But no, instead, I think it was Precious steps up.
Speaker 1: After Precious steps up, there's uh, the ball gets kicked
Speaker 1: out and the Raptors don't get matched up, and then
Speaker 1: someone finally closes out and there's a wide open man
Speaker 1: right under the basket for a layup. It's like it
Speaker 1: could have been Scotty Barnes blocking Jordan Clarkson off the
Speaker 1: glass and then going the other way on the break,
Speaker 1: but instead it's a layup because you overhelped. And then
Speaker 1: there was one last play where I can't remember who
Speaker 1: it was it was guarding the ball, but once again
Speaker 1: ball was under control, Precious gets cut back door on
Speaker 1: because he's not paying attention off ball, and they end
Speaker 1: up getting a wide open layup. So the thing is
Speaker 1: is like that lineup should be devastating defensively, But the
Speaker 1: whole purpose of that lineup is to bait you into
Speaker 1: playing one on one basketball. You don't to over help
Speaker 1: with that group. You want to encourage them to think
Speaker 1: that they can isolate because in the long run that
Speaker 1: will work out for you. A couple other positive notes. Uh,
Speaker 1: Scotty Barnes looked pretty good on the ball again attacking mismatches.
Speaker 1: He got a foul call attacking um Kelly Olynik in
Speaker 1: a in an ISO. He had a really nasty post
Speaker 1: up fade away over his left shoulder over Jared Vanderbilt.
Speaker 1: Then he had like a miss dunk right at the
Speaker 1: end of the first quarter that kind of reminded me
Speaker 1: of Lebron dunking on Um use of Ner Kitchen that
Speaker 1: Portland game back in two thousand eighteen where he kind
Speaker 1: of curled around. This one was more in transition. Lebrons
Speaker 1: was more of behalf court type of deal. But they
Speaker 1: ran a set where they get inbound the ball to
Speaker 1: uh Scotty in the backcourt so that he can get
Speaker 1: ahead of steam and as he curled around the ball
Speaker 1: screen like there were people in the lane. But it's
Speaker 1: Scotty Barnes with the head of Steam. They had absolutely
Speaker 1: no hope of stopping him, you know, missing the dunk
Speaker 1: off the front rim um, but it was but he
Speaker 1: was right there and it was a good play. I
Speaker 1: just would like to see them continue to do stuff
Speaker 1: like that. Get Scotty with the head his team, whether
Speaker 1: that's semi transition or running your pick and rolls further
Speaker 1: out towards half court. Just anything to get him ahead
Speaker 1: of Steam because he's almost impossible when he gets there,
Speaker 1: impossible to handle when he gets there. Um, he was
Speaker 1: moving the ball well. He had a nice little pick
Speaker 1: and pop pass the precious for three. He ended up
Speaker 1: uh scoring eight points, having five rebounds, and three assists
Speaker 1: in eighteen minutes. So extrapolated out to a thirty six
Speaker 1: minute game, that's sixteen, ten and six. That's a really good,
Speaker 1: well rounded game. Um, and the last positive thing precious
Speaker 1: to Chewa. I. I started to come around on this
Speaker 1: towards the end of the year last year, but I
Speaker 1: really like what he's doing attacking closeouts. He demonstrated a
Speaker 1: little bit of movement shooting with his pick and pop
Speaker 1: shot with Scotty Barnes getting his feet set quickly after
Speaker 1: screening and popping hard to the three point line, and
Speaker 1: then he had a nasty dunk on the left wing
Speaker 1: where he caught the ball defender closed out and he
Speaker 1: just ripped through and extended out in front and turned
Speaker 1: the basketball over on the rim um. They're really interesting team. Again,
Speaker 1: I'm not as high on them as Raptors fans are.
Speaker 1: I'm really high on them for the future, but right
Speaker 1: now they need somebody to really develop into a good
Speaker 1: creator with the basketball, and hopefully it's Scotty, but I
Speaker 1: think he's a few years away. I think Scotty Barnes
Speaker 1: is like a is going to be an All NBA player,
Speaker 1: Like that's how good I think he's going to be.
Speaker 1: But he I'd be keeping an eye on his on
Speaker 1: ball creation and and just in general. With the Raptors,
Speaker 1: I haven't seen enough to make me take them seriously
Speaker 1: as a threat. All right, guys, that is all I
Speaker 1: have for today. We would be back tomorrow with some more,
Speaker 1: um a preseason breakdown, as well as some gambling content,
Speaker 1: some you know, season over unders and things along those lines.
Speaker 1: I also saw the NBA g M Survey. The annual
Speaker 1: GM survey came out yesterday. Excuse me. Today, we'll do
Speaker 1: some stuff about that as well. I think it's really
Speaker 1: interesting to see how my ideology is lined up with
Speaker 1: the general managers around the league. See where we disagree,
Speaker 1: see where we agree. Things along those lines, all right.
Speaker 1: As always, I appreciate you guys support, and we will
Speaker 1: see you next time. And the bad and the volume