What is krak alacin fellow Thermonuclear A efforts. I am Dana Valley coming at
you with my certified fantabularist, certified fantabulus nis if we want to throw a
this on top of that, he's got certified fantabulousness in him in his DNA,
the Thermonuclear AF himself. Co host mister Grant Hughes. It is NBA
playoff time. As we are recording this. We have six of the eight
first round series set. We are going to preview off of our predictions on
all of them. We will have the final two out once they are settled.
The way we do this as we've done the past couple of years,
because that seems to be the most digestible and that's performed the best. We're
just gonna go back and forth about our biggest thoughts or two on these series
and we'll just go from there see where the conversation takes us. First and
foremost, though, mister Hughes, how the heck are you? I'm doing
very well. You're you're rare. Probably hasn't happened before. Bumble of certified
fantabulous reminded me that. So my daughter is playing flag football. There's girls
flag football now and she's in the league and she's the Huskies. Her team
is the Huskies, which are purple, and her uniform hadn't come yet,
and so what she does have that is very bright and eye catching the purple
is a shirt that says certified Fantabulous on it with the Hardwood Knocks drippy smiley
face that she has worn in front of I got to estimate hundreds of people
all so I just you know, nobody's asked what that is yet because it's
just a good looking shirt, and so nobody's like, I'd like to know
about that podcast because it doesn't say it's a podcast, but we are advertising
advertising hard elementary school like football. I still wear our sweatshirts and shirts all
the time at the gym, and I think I've only been asked. I
actually don't think i've been asked at all. I've told you I've been recognized
from like the YouTube, which is just funny, because like that's just nothing
amazing. How does that make you feel? Does it make you uncomfortable?
Yeah, I'm definitely awkward about it. I've only ever been recognized in person
for what I do like, it's fewer than five times. I think this
happened twice with YouTube. There was one time where I thought I was really
cool when we probably first started out, and I was at a family function
of my then girlfriend now my wife's family, and one of like her like
uncle's daughters sons knew who I was and like read my stuff on Bleacher Report
all the time, and so I'm in, like, I'm like twenty three
or twenty four, and I thought I was so cool. Oh yeah,
just if someone in the real world knows you felt like real high. Now
I'm like, please, don't anyone ever recognize me? And usually I assume
they're annoyed or disagreed or like just all the defense mechanisms go up immediately.
No one has ever caught well I guess he did, but no one's ever
com like the people. The two people that have recognized me at the gym,
they didn't compliment what we had to say. There's a kay saw you
on YouTube. You have a podcast. I saw you talking about. One
of them was the Knicks, And I was like, oh, they definitely
didn't like what I say. Yeah right, no, Well, hey,
that's good. It's good to be recognized. We're going to recognize some playoff
series today, and we're also going to recognize some favorites. Okay, some
favorites that are surprising favorites just in general. I know this is like a
broad topic, but did you have you seen, like which teams are actually
favored in some of these? So part of my process here is I don't
look at the betting odds for the playoff series because I don't want to be
impact by what those say. So I am not I still have not looked
at them. I had to file something about underdogs that like could make playoff
noise basically, and uh, let's just say I was surprised that who was
technically in terms of the betting markets considered an underdog in some of these and
who was not good? So you can clue as in as we go through
each series. Yeah, I'm gonna pull it up now, just on FANDUL,
just so I get them all squared away. But yeah, there at
least there's a couple that are like, oh, that's interesting. Well,
we did have something. I guess we can get to the we'll do news.
We want to do news at the end of this podcast. We want
to hit some news items. Now, what do we want to do.
Let's plan this live. Hmmm, I don't know. Let's do some news
and then we can get to the playoffs. That's what people are here for,
So we'll keep them on the hook for longer for the playoff content that
or they've already they've already tuned out. Yeah, So I think the first
biggest news item is that Johntay Porter has received a lifetime ban for betting on
NBA games and manipulating player props for games that he was involved in. The
full scope of details is just kind of wild. It's clear that they just
had him dead to rights on this. He apparently made, at least that
we know of, like a total profit of twenty one nine and sixty five
dollars I think is the exact number on three bet on Like certain he bet
on thirteen NBA games, none of which he played through an associate. Three
of those bets were parlays that included Porter picking Toronto or to lose. All
three bets lost, though it's unclear whether the raptor's leg succeeded or failed in
those Dan Feldman from dunk DN wrote that the bets apparently ranged from fifteen dollars
to twenty two thousand, totally fifty four grand, and the total payout was
like seventy six grand, so he made a profit of almost twenty two thousand,
and he came out of games due to and he gave confidential information about
his health to alls. It says, is just someone he knew to be
an NBA gambler basically. And the thing I'll say is it takes a special
kind of just this part ignorance to place an eighty thousand dollars parlay to win
one point one million dollars on John da Porter of all players hitting his unders
that was of course flagged and the money was not paid out. The reactions
to the lifetime ban have been interesting in the sense that a lot of people
and I did this on last week's podcast, where I said, I wish
the NBA kind of had the same definitive, like vocal energy. It wasn't
necessarily about the punishment that was coming. With Adam Silver calling it a cardinal
sin. I wish he would have had that energy when we're talking about,
you know, domestic violence or racism or issues of homophobia, and I've just
yet to you know, he went at Donald Sterling of course way back when
was that twenty eleven now or whatever? That was a while ago, but
so I still kind of feel that way. But then I kind of saw
a bunch of different comparisons being parallels to it that Johntay shouldn't have been banned
based off this. I'm just wondering what your initial thoughts are, or it's
not initial, because we talked about this, but now what your thoughts are
that we've received the official punishment, which is Johntay Porter will not be playing
in the NBA again. Yeah, I guess my first thought is not like
an original one. I think people were saying this like halfway jokingly before any
of it was like confirmed. It was like the idea being that this is
perfect for Adam Silver in the NBA to like use it as a message sending
opportunit unity because in the grand scheme of things, John say Porter like may
not have had an NBA career going forward at all, you know, or
at least it was going to be very fringy, just you know, based
on what he'd done to this point. So you can make an example of
this guy. You got him dead to rights, like you said, there's
no really, there's not really any argument to be made that like he didn't
do these things at least based on what's come out publicly. So you can
just do the lifetime ban and now, and by the way, like if
if you can, I think it's almost a good thing for the league,
or just sort of the idea of like monitoring gambling so that it doesn't become
a problem that affects games in a big way, Like if you could catch
on this easily to Johntay Porter making like relatively small bets or you know,
relatively small Johnte Porter related bets, like I think whatever sort of catches you
have in place are pretty solid. Like so if you're really worried about,
like, oh, some all NBA players going to take a dive in a
playoff series or something like, it makes me more confident that we're not going
to have that happen because it's like the sort of law enforcement aspect of this
whole thing like seems to work pretty well if you were able to catch him.
It catch like small time bets on a small time player that otherwise would
have been pretty easy to ignore, you would think. So that's one thing
and then just broadly, like, I take your point. I agree that
like it would be nice if there was sort of a feeling of like equitable
is not the right word, but like if things were deep sets an obligation
to say something. So I'm not even talking about the punishment because I almost
feel like it's unfair, yes, to compare the two, and as we
both talked about this before we record it, And also I would implore anyone
to go back and listen to I don't even know what episode it was,
like two or three episodes ago. I thought Grant had great thoughts on why
the league is reacting the way that it is. I don't look to my
sports leagues or companies to be arbors of morality. I also do think it's
fair to have the conversation about holding these leagues, these entities, these people
to higher stand. It's just such a complex conversation, and I think a
lot of the I do feel like not the it was performative, but like
there was a lot of just like self congratulatory stuff about like well I didn't
see this when my And again this is coming from someone this hypocritical who said
I wish that there would just be these same definitive stances taken by the League
when these issues of domestic violence or homophobia, racism, et cetera. And
not that the league didn't. I mean they had names, they had sayings
on the back of jerseys, right, they've taken their definitive stance against it.
But yeah, that's a great that's a great like counter example. I
just think, I think if you're looking for businesses in general to be like
sort of the top down arbiters of morality, I'm not saying you're doing this,
we're both saying, like it'd be nice if then that's the wrong way
that things like that tend to happen, the way that you would get the
League speaking in the same terms about other types of misconduct that like really are
like there are actual like victims involved in things like that, like just really
bad reprehensible behavior. Gambling's bad. It's different than the Miles Bridges situation.
It's unfair to compare the two just because, right, let's just use the
because Miles Bridge's name keeps coming up. There's a children's livelihoods are at stake
in that, not just even talking about the victim of the domestic violence,
but these things happening in front of children, So to draw parallels to this
guy, Jontay Porter. Yeah, the way that gets solved is if sponsors
have a big enough issue with it that it costs the NBA money, or
fans have a big enough issue with it, which would be really hard.
But you know, if enough people say, like, we're not supporting Team
X because they have player, why we're not supporting this league anymore? Like
it has to be bottom up rather than top down if you want, like
the league to take notice of stuff that. So that just seems to me
like the way it would have to go. Whereas gambling it is such a
weird like we're Yeah, I hate making the comparison because they're just like different
sets of problems. It is a common tear on what we value are willing
to overlook because I'm you kind of framed it this way and we're not.
I'm not ascribing this view to anyone. It's are you more? Is a
Is a fan more likely to tune out of the NBA because they think games
are being fixed or manipulated by players? Or are they more likely to tune
out because Miles Bridges is on the opposing team or on their favorite team.
It's always going to be the first one, like just because why am I
watching this if? If there's no actual competitive stakes that are real. I'm
not condoning that view, but that is why the league is where it's at
like that, And that's just And so yeah, I sucks starting one involved.
And I will say and I do feel like this might fly under the
radar a little bit at least outside the Denver market because the Nuggets are just
humming. But like, m'd be time to ask some questions about these Porter
kids. That's all. That's just Michael Porter is that we know about the
brother, and I don't want to make light of the you know, the
I don't know if it was the actual manslaughter, but someone who died while
he was driving under this is not Michael Porters's brother. I think it's Kobe.
I can't even remember what his name was. Then, Michael Porter Junior
has just sat a bunch of shit on podcasts. That is just five alarm
fire for me. So that might be another thing to take away from this.
No natural segue to this. The nets hire Jordy Fernandez, who's been
involved in coaching searches for like a really long time. Now what have you
made? And this is I want a hat tip dunked on for this.
But the Sean marks hiring his fourth definitive non interim coach in just eight years,
shout outs to the job security he apparently has. But what do you
make of this hire? And again it's hard to know too much about like
we know about Jordy Fernandez's success with the Canadian team and his track record.
But do you think this says anything specific about the Nets' direction or is that
still kind of shrouded in ambiguity, largely because do you know grant that they
don't control their own first round pick until twenty twenty eight. That's brand king
for you, isn't it. I had heard that. I would say it
tells you. What it tells you is that this is a different decision than
if they had hired my Budenholzer, for example, just to use like the
complete opposite end of the coaching experience spectrum. I don't know that it necessary.
I think a lot of people are saying, like, oh, that
means the rebuild is you know, they might like the draft pick situation.
I think is informs me more about what their direction may or may not be
than a coaching hire, just because like you know, you tend to think
like, oh, young coach, they're gonna bottom out, They're gonna,
you know, really trim this down. Like I don't that's not really like
the most sensible play, just because of the draft pick situation. So I
do think, if anything, it suggests to me that they're not necessarily like
win now when now, when now we're going to spend, we're going to
get back in the free agent market, we're gonna like that doesn't seem likely,
Whereas like if it had been button Holzer, I think you might have
been more apt to believe that. But yeah, I don't know. It
doesn't tell you a ton. It's just in contrast to the higher that it
could have been. It says a little bit. But the like the pick
stuff is really more sort of indicative of what they not just what they want
to do, but like what they can and can't do over the next what.
I guess it's only four or five years, so I'll I'm gonna throw
it to you this way, rank the likelihood that you think these three things
will happen. So they're different levels of extremes. The Nets trade McHale bridges
over the off season, they trade for de Jontay Murray over the off season.
They trade for Trey Young over the off season. I would say the
oh man, I don't know how likely I think any of those are.
I guess the scale of move if youn't want to use the players where I
mean mcale bridge is a very specific thing, but it's Jeantay Murray's kind of
the springe star that wouldn't cost all of their That feels like the most likely
course is what I was gonna I think that's right, and I think and
it's only it's partly because like it's just harder to get Trey Young probably,
or you have to pay more, or you whatever. I don't know what
I would rank is more likely between trading for Tray Young and trading away Bridges.
But the Murray one seems like the sort of the down the middle,
which is like the nets are sort of gonna have to be down the middle
for a while because you can't go extremely. I do think it's more likely
that McHale Bridges gets traded and they acquire like a Trey Young or maybe even
a Darius Garland or Donovan Mitchell and where maybe Mitchell's price tag is lower if
he ends up getting moved because he only has the year left on his deal.
I don't know, but it just feels like there will be desperate enough
teams that might just bowling like Brooklyn over with an offer where it's like,
yeah, we're not getting any of our own picks back. It's not the
Rockets necessarily, but we're just getting so much stuff for this guy who's like
the thirty fifth best player in the NBA or whatever. He is right right
right the other quick I didn't throw this to you, but it's it's like
an on minor No, but we don't have spend too much time on Kevin
Young, the highest paid assistant. He's on the Suns. He's making it
think it was two million dollars he got this year and is viewed as the
offensive coordinator. He will be leaving at the end of this season to become
the coach of BYU, who apparently made a very aggressive push to the way
that woj or with shams that phrased it made it seem like this was a
very oh Monty Williams to Detroit scenario where Kevin Young didn't necessarily want to go
to the college game, but they just made the offer of so much money
and control that he didn't. My initial thoughts on it are just that Frank
vogel seat probably is a little cooler now because you when you have that guy
who was very well respected already in the organization. It's, oh, if
the playoffs don't go well, and he might still be on the hot seat
just because they can't change very much if the postseason goes poorly. But this
is almost good news for Frank Vogel's job security, was my first thought when
I actually saw it. Good for Kevin Young, get in the bag whatever.
My first actual thought was that about Vogul. Yeah, I mean,
I just would add it's a little well, I want to know the terms
of that offer, because it is because Kevin Young. You know, I
don't know how many assistants you'd rank ahead of him as most likely to get
like the next head coaching vacancy someplace, whether that's in Phoenix or elsewhere,
Like he's you know, Fernandez was Fernandez got one, but he was up
there with him, And then it's Kevin Young, and I'm not even sure
like Kenny Atkinson, I guess keeps coming up. But that's a very different
type of like he's had the job before, so yeah, i'd be I
hope we do. We probably won't find out what what BYU's given him orar
least you know nothing specific, but that's it. You don't see that a
lot where it's like this guy's in line, he's paid the paid dues,
is gonna get this next head coaching job, and like, I don't know,
I would put the over under it like one and a half years probably,
like and that might have been conservative. And now he's just going to
the college game. Doesn't happen that often. I wanted to ask you about
the Warriors, but the two other significant things And by the time you're listening
to this is this is going up Friday. Those playing games will be about
to happen. Zion Williamson not playing for the Pelicans with a hamstring injury,
that's a fucking bummer. He had one of the best games of his career
against the Lakers, uh, and then Jimmy Butler dealing with an MCL injury.
He's and his sounds, I mean, anything with Zion is serious,
but his sounds like he'll be out for a Whiles, even if the heat
won, is there just I don't want to again. This is like more
post mortem territory for both teams which are coming even if they make it out
of the play and it feels like it's this has to be and I'm gonna
I'm gonna go first on this. It has to feel like that New Orleans
is just this impacts their future way more than Jimmy Butler's injury impact play.
Because now we're at a point where we just might be in another year where
we've yet to see Zion in the playoffs, We've yet to see what this
group looks like in the postseason, and you officially can't play the oh like,
let's just see what happens card. We need to see what this group
does together when it matter, when the stakes are higher. Because I look
at this and the one of the things that springs to mind is we have
we've had this conversation many times where it's what makes the most sense in terms
of how to build out this team. And it's a round point. Zion
if his body through no fault of his own at this point, because he's
dropped weight, his conditioning has been fantastic. He's been playing his fucking ass
off for months at this point, if his body is still just that ticking
time momb and these absences or this danger is omni presently caked in, you
can't view Zion as the lifeline of your offense as the actual, like this
sustainable lifeline. And then you get into the conversation, well, brandon Ingram
who got benched in that playing game, uh first playing game. He's not.
He can be splendid sometimes, but he's not good enough to drive your
entire offense. And so as much as we want to talk about getting New
Orleans more shooting, getting New Orleans more diverse options in the front court next
to Zion, the conversation if they missed a playoff this year or if he
doesn't play in the postseason needs to become they need to just go out and
get a floor general, because like they can't go through these stretches where they
don't have their primary offensive engine or organizer. And that's Zion is again,
he's amazing, but this stuff just keeps happening. Yeah, it's I don't
know what to say about it other than it's kind They're in the same position
that they've been in for a long time, and like and that's because you
saw the same potential that we've all been seeing with Zion dominating a game,
and then you saw the downside, which is just the inability to stay healthy.
And it's a little different this time because, like you said, he
was in shape and whatever, but it's still like that frame doing that level
of athletic stuff is just like that's hard. Like I he's like, I'm
not a doctor, but I understand why ligaments and muscles like get like don't
hold up under those kind of loads. Right, So, like they're in
the same place they were, what like three years ago, where it's like
we have this awesome guy who has this capacity to do these amazing things,
but like we can't trust that he's going to be out there. So the
team building is like impossible or like really really complicated. You don't want to
be in the same place in terms of the macro issues you're facing as a
team. It's like three years down the road, and so like, I
just I think I think you're probably right. They gotta look at someone who
can just be less of a like a I don't know, just make the
swings not so violent where it's like we're incredible. Well, now the guy's
hurt and our team makes no sense anymore. You know, you need like
a stabilizing force. My spiciest take that I admit I need to think more
about though, but I have to done enough about it to say this on
the podcast where we have New Orleans Pelicans fans that I think about anger.
They need to be a Trey Young team if he becomes available, And that's
what this is tracking towards, because it's just if you think, can you
build the base year defense if you're gonna keep Herb Jones and Trey Murphy out
of that some or at least have two of Trey Murphy, Dyson Daniels,
and Herb Jones left coming out of that deal. Like you just you could
say whatever you want about Trey Young. He's tried harder on defense, He's
still bad on defense. The stuff behind the scenes. Do guys want to
play with him? We've seen Luca be less ball dominant, play faster this
year. We've seen Tree Young be slightly less ball dominant this year. You
might just need that steadying presence because he will. He is a better driver
of offensive success than Brandon Ingram is like just you you mentioned the word.
I think it was sustainability or steadiness. That's what he would give you.
And in fury him and Zion on offense will should work just fine. It's
just that he gives you that guy who And if you want to say,
like what about Darius Garland, He's kind of fringe for me when it comes
to running the offense there and seems less likely to shake loose, I would
argue, but like it can't be de Jontay Murray level. It's if we're
gonna talk about them getting I mean, sham At Dua has been was all
over this. He wanted them to go after and get Scoop and so like
that just might be the view they need to take, not go out and
trade for Scoot now, like the players aren't gonna do that anyway. But
that's like you have to to me, I think depending on how this postseason
shakes out or if he's able to come back, should they make the playoffs,
That's what this has become now to me, how do you make an
well, it's I don't know. I I'm visceral reaction is like I hate
the Tray Young Zion pairing. Wow, because if you're saying, and I
think we agree that, like the way for this team to work is point
Zion and then like, right now, I would say that if you have
a duality to like, if you have Trey Young, you can have a
duality to your identity that you can't have right now because of your other primary
playmaking options. Yeah, but if like the idea on building a team is
you want your best players to function well together so you can win the biggest
games against the toughest opponents. Like, that's a different thing than what I
said earlier of like someone to stabilize or give you kind of a baseline that
doesn't swing so wildly with whether Zion is healthy or not. Like Trey and
Zion in a playoff series, I'm just like, what's the other guy doing
when he doesn't have the ball? Now, if you get the kind of
Zion we saw recently, where like he's playing incredible defense, he's rebounding better,
he's doing all this other stuff, then problem solved. Like we can
work with that. But if you portray Young, that can't be a like
a thing that that happens. I'm just yeah, I don't know. I
would be fascinated. I would be very interested if that happened, just because
I would like to. I don't know it. It's hard for me to
imagine how how I think By the way, I want to make it clear,
even though I disagree, I think what you're saying is very reasonable.
So you would still just continue leading in to the point Zion as yours as
your points are. That's the thing. I'm very uncomfortable with that. So
all I'm doing is saying, Dan, that's a bad idea. I don't
like it, and offering no solutions. So that's our job. In a
nutshell solution, I don't have one. Like if it were me, I
I look at like what can I get for Ingram? What can I How
can can I make a consolidation trade? Because the depth of this team was
its strength, Like there are all these you know, all this stuff about
it, how the lineup data was the starting five got outscored and like you
throw Trey Murphy in there and sudden thing suddenly everything works great. The reserves
always like preserved or built leads, Like I don't know, some of that's
noisy. I've been thinking and reading a lot about line up data year over
year, and like even a full year's worth of like a pretty good sample
does not indicate what's going to happen the next year. See the Golden State
Warriors twenty three starting five versus twenty three twenty four if you want to transition.
But yeah, I don't know. It's it's a it's a conundrum,
like Zion is so good when he's right that you should build your team around
him, but then he's very infrequently healthy enough to make that a sustainable strategy.
So it's just like, what do you do? Maybe I'm also just
married to the Hawks, getting focusing on Hawks players because there so many Hawks
players I like. On the Pelicans, sure, yet kunglu Jalen john I
mean, I like Jalen Johnson anywhere. Yeah, but I doubt he would
shake loose. So there. I just feel like, if this is if
this is it for them this year, or if this is it for Zion
this year and you have to protect his long term health, one, it
sucks because he It just sucks and you could see it in his I felt
bad. I just felt and I always feel bad for injuries, So I
feel like, but it's just knowing what he's had to deal with, knowing
how he's I just I felt so bad. And I don't say any of
this to detegrate his value to the team, because he is that good to
wear. If he was just there and you guarantee he would be there,
you're set and you flesh out your team that way. I just think it's
become clear and we're at the point where I say, through no fault of
his own, that it can't that can't be the way that you're building out
this team anymore. Yeah, it's I mean, primarily anyway right now?
I agree, but like, but it may just be what they have to
do because the better options don't present themselves, Like that's a possibility to like
what can you imagine if they run it back? Essentially, Like we go
into next year and we just have a how easy are your Pelicans put?
Preseason? Like? Right? Ups, It's like everything I said before,
every single thing. It's just all the same highs are there, all the
same lows, all the same uncertainty. Well, I don't look herb Jones
is improving. So does he come back like kind of running these half court
picking rolls and he gets your point guard? Now, maybe that's that's the
that's him and Trey Murphy. That's who we'll spend all of our preseason inc
on instead of Zion. We could let's talk Warriors when we do the other
two playoff series to make that segment just a little bit more podcast year.
I guess, like, wow, what batter batter hosting for me tonight?
Uh uh, let's do this. You're gonna get to pick where we go
every single time? Which playoff series? Do you want to start with?
Twenty some it's into the playoffs? Well, he's going to do news.
That's all right. People are getting what was promised. It just took a
half hour. Okay, I want to start in the West, and I
want to make sure this is still the case, because this is one that
I was a little bit surprised. Yes, okay, we're gonna go Phoenix
Minnesota. This so obviously I've spoiled it. But the Suns are favored.
They are the lower seed, they are the betting favorite. Does that surprise
you? I guess it should be the first question. No, because I
think a lot of what people in our position are going to focus on is
sort of the clash of styles here where the Suns play at most one big
and four wing types, and they can get to a point where if they
want to go with thy as younger Kevin Durant, and everyone's gonna wonder well
they manipulate the Timberwolves' style. I'm more so coming at it from a perspective
of and maybe I'm getting too far into my thoughts here, but I actually
think that it's the Sons who might find themselves in need of adjusting more.
And I think what becomes more critical here as to why they would be favored
is one we've kind of just seen more like point guardy things from Bradley Beal
lately. In addition what Devin Booker is doing, they've been a little bit
more creative with Kevin, like getting Kevin Durant the ball where it's not so
vanilla all the time. The bigger thing for me is just Karl Anthony Towns.
What is he gonna look like? Because he did not look great.
Maybe the rest well before the start of it will help him. And then
what sort of I don't care. Their defense is going to be fine.
Minnesota's defense is terrific. Rudy Gobert is the defensive player of the year.
You can play with him in Nosrita you could play with him in Karl Anthony
Towns. They don't need to if they want. Yes, what I've liked
to have seen them been like, what do we look like? Kyle Anderson's
at the five? Like yeah? Or Nasried is the lone big more sure?
But like I don't think they need to adapt what they're doing defensively almost
at all. I mean, and the luxury is, well, we have
Jade McDaniels and it's you just go shut down Devin Booker and they have decided
so far, and Edwards spend a bunch of time on Kevin Durant. But
you can manipulate that if you want to make Bradley beal more of this priority.
My point is just that what does this offense looks like? Phoenix is
not this banner defensive team. But if you can't make them, Minnesota is
gonna be at it as best them in Cleveland might be another example of this,
just based off the personnel's one you get two to the ball, that's
when their offense is going to be at its best. But can you make
them If Carl Anthony Towns is not Carl Anthony Towns, can you adequately make
Phoenix pay for throwing the kitchen sink at an Anti Edwards end. If you
can't, what does that do to Anthony Edwards's decision making? Because where he's
most dangerous and he can just blast through traffic, we've seen him just kind
of I don't like phrasing it this way, but will his way to the
basket or to some offense. But they're also kind of at his best where
he's just getting rid of the ball quicker and making those like snap decisions on
you off his live dribbles. But if he's not I don't want to say
trusting his teammates, but if his teammates aren't providing that lift of decision making
once he's or shot making, once he's getting rid of the ball, how
does that then impact his thought process? And so I kind of understand this
is my very long winded way of saying it does not surprise me Phoenix is
favored because I do think that the dynamism that Carl Anthony Towns provides on offense
for the Timberwolves unlocks so much much and is so damn important that you can
look at Phoenix right now because of his Karl Anthony talent injury, because of
some of the weird stretches the timer Wolves offense has been through with and even
without him, but also with him, you can just say, wow,
Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, and Bradley Beal are on that team. I
think so I was a little surprised at first just because and this time I
guess this is this ties into like the arguments you would make in favor of
Minnesota are all like big sample regular season things, best defense in the league,
higher seed, like defensive player of the year, Anthony on the team
looks like a player, you know, Anthony Edwards. If if Anthony Enrews
was the breakout superstar of this postseason, you'd say, like, yeah,
okay, that checks out like that seems like it was trending that way.
But you mentioned you hit on a lot of this, and there's a couple
of numbers I just want to sort of put out there. Obviously, the
part of the reason the Suns are favored is because they beat the Wolves all
three times they played them, and they eat them pretty handily. It was
like a fifteen point per game margin. Rudy Gobert in eighty six minutes across
three games minus sixty eight plus minus when Rudy Gobert is on the floor against
Phoenix this year, Like that's that's a small sample by definition, but you're
talking three games. You're talking and I think when you look at what Phoenix
does well, and we talk about this every postseason, they're just their best
three scorers want to pull up and shoot mid rangers against deep drops, and
that is what the Wolves tend to do. So it's like the shots the
Wolves are designed to concede are the ones Phoenix wants and the ones Phoenix is
good at. You can look at all the mid range frequency and accuracy numbers.
Phoenix is elite. The Wolves allow a lot of mid rangers because they
just that's the math says you should against most teams. Phoenix is not most
teams. So that's part of the reason that the Suns did so well during
the year, And I think why they're set up to score and then you
just think of like what is like Edwards hasn't been good against the Suns either,
and that's because they love to send two at him and make somebodyel's score.
And to your point, if Towns can't do that, like where's the
offense come from? That's been the issue all year in Minnesota. So we're
agreeing, I think. I mean, I'll just say, do you are
we are we picking series? Do you want to just get to that?
I you know, we're just we're making to be the wrap up. If
that's considered the wrap up on is there any other question? I'm just wondering.
So theoretically, and I'm not saying they should overhaul what they're doing defensively,
but Minnesota does kind of have the card to play where if they need
to be more aggressive at getting Phoenix off of their spots, you could play
the well Nikkeil Alexander Walker instead of Mike Conley card, because then all of
a sudden, it's Edwards and Jaden McDaniels and Gnaw and Ruby Gobert and that's
just so much excuse me pressure. And so if you pull that lever,
I mean like you could, even if you really wanted to know, Galaxy
bring it and say, well, nas Red is flying around the perimeter as
well, so sub him in for Karl Anthony Towns if need be. I
just I get what you're saying. I mean, the numbers can't lie on
that, and so I understand why they were a tough matchup. I just
feel like maybe I'm over compensating because it feels like people aren't giving the Wolves
enough credit for the different types of moves that they can make within themselves to
try and counteract some of this stuff, or at least if the offense isn't
humming met okay, we're gonna lean all the way into maybe we're playing even
more aggressive defensively. It does get harder for them, though, Like even
with the bodies you have, is like if Bradney Beal is on in addition
to Devin Booker and Kevin Durant, then you're just kind of like your personnel
is stretched wayfer thin and that does get difficult. Yeah. No, I'm
glad you mentioned the lineup tweaks that the Wolves can make, which a lot
of teams can't. To throw three really good perimeter defenders at Phoenix's guys and
just like maybe go Bear still drops, but maybe those guys athleticism talking about
non Edwards and McDaniels make those mid rangers harder. I haven't looked at closely
enough at the data to see how often those groups played against Phoenix during the
RAG season. I would hope not at all, because if they did and
the numbers were still that bad, then like then man, it looks rough
for Minnesota. But I just think I'm so hesitant still to be dismissive of
like the full regular season that Minnesota had, right, like they just it
was a better year. They were elite at something, which Phoenix wasn't.
Like the Wolves are elite defensively. Phoenix was like okay at some stuff and
you know, pretty good at others. But there's just no other than just
like star power on offense, Like I don't that's not like you know,
that's it's not a statistic, it's just, yeah, the Sons have three
guys that could win you a game on their own, I guess offensively.
So yeah, I think it's a fascinating matchup. I think the stylistic differences
are incredible. I think like the narratives that could come out of this series,
as like annoying as they can be, are are many and interesting,
Like it could be another referendum on Rudy Gobert, like postseason like non viability.
We could hear that come up again. It might actually be true this
time because it sort of hasn't been for like just the idea of like,
well the cat go bear thing, it'll just dredge up the hole. We
got to break this thing up. We're spending too much on two bigs.
It doesn't work in the playoffs. There's all these things that could come out
of this. Yeah, I don't know. I think I've exhausted my Oh,
just to give you the Edwards numbers, fourteen point three points on thirty
one percent shooting across his games against the Suns this year, like not good,
and a lot of that's because he's getting blitzed by a Sun's defense that
I think understands rightly that like, if you get it out of his hands,
your odds of having a good defensive possession are pretty darn high. Against
the Minnesota offense, that just like grinds to a halt. Sometimes, I
was gonna ask, very quickly, do you think there's like everyone's focused on,
Okay, well, what Phoenix might force Minnesota to do or how they
can exploit the way Phoenix plays. Isn't there an alternate reality where this is
a overwhelming stress test for the way that Phoenix plays, Like what if morgages
have to check around the basket and you're not doing enough to stop the wolves
out, Like, do you have to downsize even further? You're pulling the
Drew Eubanks card. Is Kevin Duran at the five? Is that daddy is
young? And is it just they're so I don't want to say like tiny,
because Kevin Duran is pretty big, but that Minnesota style actually ends up
kind of overwhelming the way that Phoenix wants to places over the course of a
series. Totally. Yeah, that's so. Like, Uh, I guess
what I would say is I understand why Phoenix is favored. I wouldn't like,
I'm not gonna be comfortable. I think this is a long series.
How about that? I think I don't think we're gonna see one or the
other of these teams just like solve it from game one and the other team
not have like a lever to pull to extend the series to six or seven.
And my final question is who winds up playing more crunch time minutes in
this series? Nas reed Erkat, Well, Kat's gonna foul out. Uh
So, I guess I'll go to naz Reid. What is your pick?
I reluctantly am going suns in six. You have to pick six because that
means they're gonna win the decisive game at home. If it goes to seven,
obviously you'd take the home team there and that'd be Minnesota. I'm just
really persuaded by the regular season numbers, by the unique problems that Phoenix's offense
presents, the Wolves defense, and the hesitance I have in trusting Minnesota's offense,
that those are kind of the three pillars of the thinking for me,
I'm gonna go Minnesota in seven. My uncertainty with what Karl Anthony Towns is
gonna look like, and to what extent can we trust the Wolves offense,
I honestly think that would be their undoing more so than I mean, I
don't want to take away anything from what Phoenix's offensive pinnacle can be, but
I think that if this series does tilt towards Phoenix, it's going to say
more about Minnesota's offense than Phoenix's defense versus Phoenix's offense versus their defense. If
that makes any sense. No, I think I agree with that. I
think that might be the number one thing is just can the Wolves score consistently?
Because they just they didn't all year. That just was the issue.
But yeah, I mean that I did not know the staggering numbers that you
threw out for this, so that's I don't know. I had Wolves in
seven. I'm gonna stick with it because I think the Wolves are just really
fucking good. Right, Okay, let's do let's do the other interesting West
one here. This is the four or five. This is Clippers Dallas.
So just as your as your time stamping here. The Clippers took two out
of three here, but none of those meetings came after Christmas. Uh.
Luca average thirty four a game. Not that weird, that's what he does,
shot thirty two percent from three. Kyrie only played in a couple of
these games, average twenty six on really good shooting, made half his threes.
Kawhi was not very good at all, actually, just under twenty two
a game in these series. Paul George played in two of them sixteen and
a half points a game. And this is the Clippers winning a couple of
these. So I think for me, the most interesting angle, uh is
ironically, I mean, it's kawhis Why healthy is he not? Like he's
got this knee issue that he's not doing five on five yet? Like if
Kawhi is not there then this is not an interesting series anymore. So let's
assume he is just for the you know, to make this a halfway interesting
discussion. I think the Zubot's angle is really interesting to me because Dallas is
gonna play. I would assume Lively Er Gafford for most of the game because
they've had so much success with you know, dive guys that can catch lobs
and can block shots and just bring athleticism. He keeps Zubots on the floor.
He's been really good against Dallas. The Clippers were significantly better with him
on than off all season long, plus four point seven with him, plus
one point nine without Against Dallas, They're plus ten point five with Zubot's minus
six without small samples, Zubots seems to really matter, and I think he's
key to the best version of the Clippers, and they're gonna be able.
I think unless Dallas goes really small to keep him on the floor for as
long as he can play, So that is an advantage for the Clippers.
We can talk about all of the other reasons h why Dallas has other advantages,
but that's my main thing I think I'm focused on, is like,
you're not stopping Luca Kawi is healthy, You're probably not stopping Kawhi. So
I'm looking just more at like this other, this other big piece that the
Clippers have that I think will be able to have an impact in this series,
where against different types of teams, maybe zoobots would not be as big
of a factor. It's it's interesting in the series that has Kyrie Ring and
Luca doncis that the defenses feel like they're gonna define it. And just because
the Clippers defense has been really, really bad of late, their transition has
been ass all year. They are twenty third in points allowed per possession overall
since the trade deadline, while Dallas, by the way, since since the
trade inline seventh in points allowed per possession, and they're not getting like when
you dig into the opponent shot data, it's okay, there's some weirdness here,
but it's not a huge amount of weirdness. And I think a lot
of that's been okay. You have the you know, not just Daniel Gafford
has helped them more than I thought he was going to. PJ. Washington
has been doing a lot of the same stuff he wasn't Charlotte, but just
doing it well, and like that's that's a huge thing. They're like trucking
opponents when PJ. Washington, Luka Dancic, and Kyrie Erring are on the
court. And the thing that I'm interested this gets into the Clippers defense is
they're just gonna play drop when Zubats is on the court. Is this a
series then, where, especially because it's just the Clippers theoretical or actual small
lineups don't really intimidate me that much. Where you do try that, it
hasn't happened a ton, But well, Maxi Kliba and PJ. Washington are
front court and that's been I looked this up before we started. That's been
on the court for like three hundred possessions without or a little bit under without
another big, like because they did have the PJ. Washington Cliba and there's
been some Lively Gaffer sprinkled in there, but they're like a plus thirty points
per one hundred possessions. When you have Clebland Washington as basically your front court
with no other big on the floor, this feels like a series where that
might get super interesting because that does then play Zobots off the court. But
then it's well, do we want to play Zubots off the court. You
mentioned that he's been really good against Dallas. Like just the idea of if
the Clippers are just going to play and drop and they just don't have the
raw athleticism to navigate get excuse me, I can't, I really fucking can't
talk during this podcast rant. They just don't have that like raw explosion or
athleticism, especially within some of their core lineups to navigate screens as well.
It does feel like that could eventually come back to bite themselves. Do you
want to take them away from there their core lineup? Is that a stupid
question? I'm honestly asking well and just bigger picture though too, Like I
would say that if you can think of another team that came on stronger down
the stretch and sort of found itself than Dallas, I'd love to hear.
Like I think the MAVs more than almost any other team, Like, oh,
post trade deadline, we got we remade the roster. We like the
look of this, We're suddenly defending where athletic, we're big, Like,
wouldn't you be surprised? Like I think I take your point like that is
something. Going smaller is something you would normally consider, but for Dallas specifically,
that really kind of found it. Do you go away from what worked
so well like during this this late run where you looked like a legit contender,
you know, like that's a bold decision to go away from that.
You've got to be flexible in the playoffs, like every option is on the
table. But man like I would be surprised. I would I think you
would need to see the Clippers like go a way smaller and just oh,
Gafford and Lively can't can't handle this, which seemed like I don't know if
Dallas would have to like lose a game in a convincing way. I think
before they went away from like having certainly Gaffered in the first unit and Lively
after that, maybe Lively as a like becomes a rookie all of a sudden
again like we can't trust him defensively, Like he becomes the rookie he should
have been all year. It was better than that. That's where skin I
mean, injuries probably played a part in this as well. But they almost
made the active decision at the trade deadline, which was we're gonna get Gafford,
so that Derek likely remains effective because his role is going to be scaled
down. True, yeah, right, No, I think I mean which
defense? So do you think that the MAVs becoming an awesome defense is more
real than the Clippers becoming a horrendous defense? Yes, and so I'm gonna
they just don't. I said, which is more real? You said,
yes, you have to pick. Oh. Oh, I think it's dallas
Is defense is more is more real than the Clipper Okay, like Dallas's defense
to me, and part of this is and maybe I'm looking at it through
the lens of this series too, but just like the Clippers in transition all
year, their commitment to getting back is waxed and waned and they just don't
have you know, if you're gonna they just don't. I mentioned the athleticism
explosion. They just don't have that ability to get back and make up the
difference. And then it also just gets really tough. I mentioned this screen
navigation, like, Okay, Kawhi can still be Kawhi, and same with
PG and Terrence Man's okay, but he's not a great defender. And then
you're gonna have these like there's been a drop off from Russell Westbrook defensively over
the past, like whatever it's been. And then you have James Harden,
who's probably gonna play I would assume a bunch of minutes or so it And
then I look at Dallas and specifically through the lens of this series, the
way that Kawhi gets his points. Now, it's just like who on this
team And even with what James Harden is doing and how reluctant it feels like
he is to take like shots inside the arc, basically they're almost set up
to defend this team perfectly because you have PJ. Washington, who's just super
what is the word strong? And so it's like if Kawhi isn't gonna try
and get by you, and you don't have to worry about James Harden having
that kind of speed anymore, who is the player that is punishing there any
of their individual matchups, right, Because you'd normally say, well, let's
let's get Luca involved in every defensive possession we can, let's try to wear
him down, but like the mass have been hiding him all year if they
know how to do it, and like to your point, I don't know
that you have the guy that's gonna like really punish Luca or Kyrie for that
matter, Whereas you've got Harden on the other side, you've got Kawhi that
like maybe isn't gonna be in the best physical condition, Like you don't go
at Kawhi. But it's like, I think some of the things we'd normally
worry about with Dallas's defenders, you actually can worry about, like more realistically
with the Clippers defenders. Do you have anything else on this one or should
we because it's just that you defend the like are you kinda like because it's
and this one gets interesting where Dallas is. So they have Derek Jones Junior,
they have Dante Axim and they have Tim Hardaway Junior. And that feels
like if we're rounding out the fifth member of these baseline lineups, it feels
like those three are going to be the top candidates. Maybe you see some
Josh Green sprinkled in with Luca, Kyrie, PJ. Washington and then Big
X. I'm wondering if the Clippers want to let's say they want to just
be able to switch the Luka Doncriche pick and roll, if does that factor
in the Dallas's line decision making where oh, if they want to try and
have Zubots playoff of an exemmer Derek Jones Junior or Tim Hardaway Junior is being
super streaky that night, that's something they could try. So, like,
I'm wondering if that influence is enough. I missed my other long winded way
of saying I feel very confident in the MAVs for this series, and it's
very unsettling, not that I have disrespect for that, but just harkening back
to that Clipper stretch for like like thirty games or whatever, there was like
are they the best team in the West. Yeah, I mean they were.
They were for like thirty games. That's not nothing, But yeah,
I mean in the other like you mentioned it at the top, like if
Kawhi Leonard is not the best player in this series then and like, and
that's a high bar considering who is involved in this series. The Clippers,
I don't think have a realistic chance. And so if he's like not even
going to help at all player in the series, and they have a realistic
chance, but the fact that we can't necessarily guarantee that because of the knee
stuff is just right. Yeah, that's what That's what I'm saying, Like
we've we've we've done a good job of acting like there are more to consider
in this series than the one thing that really matters, which is is Kauwhi
going to be on the floor unhealthy and like look like all nba Kawhi.
That's that's all this is, Like we're not going to do this for every
series, but because there is an injury and because it is Kauhi, because
we have seen Kauwhi be the best player in a series over and over until
he gets hurt, Like that's the most like that's the dispositive issue for this
series, I think, or at least like no, because you know what,
the MAVs could still beat the Clippers of Kauai is like really good and
healthy, Like that's on the table. But if he's not, That's what
I was going to ask you. Let's say Kawhi is Kauhi are very close
to it? The Kauhi we've seed this season. How does that actually influence
the what becomes your biggest concern then for the MAVs in terms of influencing this
series? Yeah, well I then it just goes back to all the stuff
we talked about all the lineup changes, you know, like how do you
And I'm just it almost comes down to it feels like James Harden or Paul
George needs to figure out a way to beat the Mavericks then, because I
still feel like having PJ Washington, even having Maxi Kleiba, like going up
against this version of even the peak version of Kawhi and the way he likes
to score. It doesn't require the same type of defender to at least say,
go on, Kawhi, we don't actually need to send you a ton
of help. And then so does that fall to and even they do,
then it's gonna fall to Paul George and James Harden anyway. And I know
Harden's had some good first round series, which this is, but I I
don't know. I'm I'm just unsettled by how much my feelings have plunged on
the Clippers, which makes me think that I have So I have Dallas in
six, So I also have Dallas in six. But this could just be
a sweep if is not, you know, don't you think, I mean,
like, because yeah, if he's not Hell, if he doesn't play
obviously, then like what are we even talking about. But if he's if
he's just you know, is somehow limited. I just I don't. I
mean it's priced into the six. I guess, like the other thing that's
not being talked about, James r. Did not exactly close out the regular
season a banner stretch himself. So if you're getting that version of James Harden
coupled with a hobbled, reduced or no Kawhi Leonard at all, Paul George
might as well you are New York Nick. Congratulations, Paul George, come
on down. Yeah, no, I acually we landed in the same place
there. Should we finish out the West before we moved to the East.
Do you have a strong preference? I this is your show, all right,
let's do Denver Lakers. I'm not sure what all to say about this.
Anyone listening to us, I'm sure is aware that the Nuggets have one
to eighth straight, that Jamal Murray went bananas in the series they played against
the Lakers last year. The Lakers have well here, I'll just jump right
to my like one thing, because I mean, we can't spend that long
in the series. I don't think we will surprise ourselves. Gabe Vincent is
like insanely important to this series because when you look at like, what are
they gonna do? What do the Lakers do with Jamal Murray? Like D'Angelo
Russell, that's someone else we can talk about. Uh can't guard him.
Austin Reeves can't guard him. Your Toryan Prince can't guard anybody. Like if
anyone is gonna chane Waal Murray, it's gonna be Gay Vincent from like what
he did last year. And I'm wildly uncomfortable saying, like Gabe Vincent,
he's up for it, he's healthy, he's ready, Like I love Gay
Vincent. We talked about Gay Vincent many times. I always say good things.
I mean, he's the like, he's the guy. Because if he
can't guard Jamal Murray, they don't have a body to do that. Uh,
Darvin Ham rejects everything you just said it because the answer is Torrian Prince
always or Cam Reddish. That's gonna be man. The Cam Reddish card is
going to be played at some point in Lakers is gonna be probably pissed.
So yeah, it's this is very clearly going to be if the Nuggets don't
win this series. My first reaction would be like, well, who kidnapped
Nicole Jokic? Right? Yeah? And did Johntay Someone asked Johntay Porter if
he had money on this series and was trying to influence it. So my
I'm trying to look at it through. I'm just what could what is your
actual concerns for Denver in this series? And I have I was trying to
figure out some as an exercise to go through this. I have like a
couple and so it's are you gonna get enough offensive involvement and effectiveness and even
volume just from the like the I call it that like the fifth member of
the unit. But it's not where it's okay if Aaron Gordon is gonna play
the fivers just be on the court at all. If we know what he
could do as a playmaker, but is it gonna be willing to, you
know, take those drives to take some of those threes? What about Christian
Brown? We know what he could do as a cutter, Like are you
gonna get enough shooting and activity on offense from him? And even Peyton Watson
because those are guys that you're gonna lean on and if you don't, that
does mess with some of the stuff you're doing, and then like kind of
the other thing is And I'm not trying to feed into the the Lakers always
get the calls machine. But Lebron James is catching shoot three pointers really opened
up his driving game this season, the pull up three pointers not falling,
so like maybe the Nuggets won't care about sitting on him a little bit.
But like, if you get into foul trouble, like if Aaron Gordon or
Jokic get into foul trouble because of defending or going up against contesting Lebron James
or even Anthony Davis, that's just something where it's, oh, okay,
if what if there's a game where those two dudes are in foul trouble at
the same time, and it's, oh my god, is this a Zeke
najy Night all of a sudden? This is a DeAndre Jordan Knight all of
a sudden. That's yeah, But that's in the grand scheme of things we're
talking about. That's a game. If that happens where both of them are
in foul trouble, I can bet Nuggets Twitter will be live with conspiracy theories.
No, I think that's right. Yeah, it's interesting. You have
to almost look at like you can't just think about the context of this series,
like what are the nitpickiest problems the Nuggets have. It's like, well,
I mean they might have to play DeAndre Jordan like that, that would
be bad for this series. But it's like none of it is specific to
the matchup, and it's just like it's hard. It's hard. We're like,
there's not the Nuggets are gonna win the series. I think they'll win
it easily. I think everyone thinks that. I guess. Like so,
of the four games that the Nuggets won in the playoffs last year against the
Lakers, three of them were within six points, like six point margins and
so, and the general tenor of most of those games were it's pretty close.
The Lakers are competing, like they have the size, like they're one
of the rare teams with the size to bother the Nuggets, and then the
Nuggets would just win the games and crunch time because they'd go to the Murray
Jokic two man game, and that would just be like the Lakers have no
answer because nobody does, and that's how the games get won. So it's
like, on the one hand, you'd say, well, they held the
Lakers were close, like clutch games are subject to like the vagaries of luck,
and we you know, clutch record doesn't carry over from one year to
the next. So the fact that the games were in the clutch at all
means that like, yeah, they've lost eight straight, but like they're in
it. They have a shot. You know, they had a shot for
forty three minutes or whatever of the game. But then it's like if the
Nuggets just consistently flip the switch against a playoff opponent and just win games late
because they can, like that cuts the other way. So I don't know,
if you're looking for rays of hope, the fact that some of the
games were close like qualifies as one, but also it might just also completely
like negate any chance the Lakers have, because when the Nuggets get serious the
game's over, they're probably smarter basketball minds than us, who can find the
thinnest of functional silver linings. Here. One of the things I keep coming
back to, though, is even if certain things break right for the Lakers,
I can't reconcile this idea that you just need anthy is to guard Nakole
Jokic and then it's gonna be trolled when he's not averaging thirty five points a
game on the offensive end, the mental and physical toll it takes to just
be the primary guy in Jokic then have to cover up or try to for
all this other stuff where it's the Nuggets are like news flash, I bet
you the Nuggets are. I don't have the date on this, but they
probably rank in the top three, if not the top one of both off
ball screen set and then just cuts per game. And it's just like,
who on the Lakers are you trying? I mean, okay, Lebron sometimes
and Austin Reeves is not a terrible defender, and you mentioned Kate Vincent is
just like this is there are too many like it's not even buttons to push.
The Nuggets are gonna push all these differs buttons. But it's just the
talent and the balance just far exceeds what the Lakers have. And the only
thing I'll be here for, like any takes on the grand scheme of the
Lakers after this, with Lebron getting older, having the player option, what
I really don't want to see unless he just gets I mean, he's banged
up now, but he's always banged up unless he just sucks something off of
at both ends. I would like us to keep Anthony Davis' performance in perspective,
and I would like that to do this with anyone who basically is tasked
with defending Nikola Jokics and then needs to be the second best or third even
like the third best offense player on his own team. But the Anthony Davis
discourse about disappearing. I understand, he's the superstar. You need to wear
all these different hats. But just like my brain bet like twisting to a
pretzel trying to think about even one or two things Nicole Jokic could do.
And then if I have the responsibility you having to cover up for all these
other like you know, defensive, I don't know. I don't want to
use the word liabilities, which is god that are just I feel like the
Nuggets are gonna put the Lakers half court defense into a meat grinder. And
even if you think, let's just say Anthony Davis plays like the second best
best defensive player in the world, which is fully capable of doing, that's
gonna make life really tough on Jokic, and the Nuggets are still gonna win
five anyway. Like that's that's just the amount of weapons and the like the
the creativity and invention that they have on the offensive end. Davis could get
his ass kicked by Jokic up and down the court in a four game sweep,
and we could emerge from this series still one convinced that Anthony Davis is
the absolute best option to guard Nikola Jokic. Like it just so happens that
Tim bam right. Well, no, I just mean, like that just
speaks to there isn't anyone like the best option, the unlock everything about defending
Nicole, the best option in the league, which Davis may or may not
be, I think he's in the conversation, is still very likely to just
get smashed. And like that's not a knock on Davis, that is a
that is just a feather in Yokic, just cap there's no one that can
defend him because because if Davis can't do it, no one can't. And
Davis can't do it, So like what do you want? Like I have
him in five too. I don't even know why I went five. I
just like playing the way he is is, I think you get a d
LO game you will have a Lebron game, you will have an Anthony Davis
game. And I just feel like the Lakers are better equipped to take one
game from the Nuggets this year than they were last year. Is that like
they best line up like the rubyach More, Austin Reeves, d Lo.
There's just going to be a night where I think that they haven't and maybe
you get some shooting variants from Michael Porter Junior hesitants from Aaron Gordon. If
there are any Nuggets fans in the comment section, I hope they cause haters
for picking the Nuggets in Vibe instead of before we mentioned d Loo, Like,
lest we forget played off the floor in the series last year, couldn't
could like just couldn't stay on the floor, signed to a contract designed to
be traded, had a really good year by his standards, Like will it
be different? What will it be any different? Because I can't, Which
is why, because we're just so far a field from this playoff series.
The people that think the Lakers shouldn't if if they can't have the ability to
get them, shouldn't be in on Trey Young or Donovan Mitchell because D'anelo Russell's
playing it's dudes and dudets. We've seen this motherfucking movie before where he's just
gonna make you believe and then he's gonna regress back into turbulence. If you
have an opportunity to get one of those guys, I don't care. The
Lakers offense was. I think they were seventh point score, pro possession or
whatever out of the trade deadline or All Star break or after the break for
that, after the break, that's great, your defense was asked during that
time, by the way. Yeah, so I'm I'm just and kudos Todilo
for playing this well. And it might it might help him decline his player
option and get paid from someone, and that's someone is probably gonna be the
Lakers at this point. But it's I do think this might be a root
awakening for that type of belief in D'Angelo Russell, where it's what he could
theoretically get played off the floor again in this series. Yeah, that,
I mean that should be the expectation. I honestly don't think that you can
afford to do that, because then your offense is just gonna creater and whereas
you don't have any hope of stopping the Nuggets. I just don't. I
don't think you do. You do have a hope of scoring on them towards
that you can get them uncomfortable if you get out in transition, which Lebron
will still fucking freight train at almost forty years old. That guy's incredible.
Yeah, all right, very one of Lebron James takes here. I don't
have any more Lebron takes. All right, Let's go to the Eastern Conference
where we have another Would you like to guess who the underdog is? This
is the New York Knicks versus the Philadelphia seventy six ers. You are too
unbelievable, second seeded New York Knicks against the number seven Philadelphia seventy six ers.
Who's favored? I'm just gonna guess the Sixers are at this. But
just the way that you framed it, yeah, I know, it's it
kind of takes the drama out of it when I belabored two versus seven and
then ask that question, A yeah, I mean I kind of get it
just because so I have two questions main questions with this series. How do
the Knicks defend Joelle Embiid? And it's just I'm assuming They're not gonna leave
Isaiah Hartenstein all alone. But are you playing like Josh hart going after him?
We've seen og defend Embiid in the past, not as a member of
the Knicks, at least extensively, I don't think. But then also the
bigger thing for me is I'm assuming the anti Mountain won't play, and if
he does, we'll probably have like a back brace on or something. Who
knows what you're getting. But like the Knicks offense is it's such in fury
a disadvantage in the half court going up against the Joelle Embiid team because he
can really just erase the space in which that Jalen Brunson wants to operate.
And so if you're able to throw. I mean, did you watch like
Kyle Lowry's defense during that playing game against I know it was the heat,
but just like dudes out there defending his butt off, that was that was
some raptors Kyle Lowry. All of a sudden, I love Kyle Lowry.
I know people don't like some of them, like the gimmick y charges he
takes. I love Kyle. I would follow Kyle Lowry into hell. So
and so I'm just like, so you don't have Julius Randall, that shock
creation is gone, and now there's I know, Buyen bar Davitch was coming
on and apparently playing with this risk injury like now that he had the they
called it like a scoping. That's just making me wild one I would we
we already questioned, well, how much his tim's actually gonna play him.
It was just just gonna look and it's the starting five's just played forty seven
minutes. But like that was I thought. I called him the X factor
for the Knicks because we thought at the time Julie Randa wasn't gonna be back.
He's not back, and like you need it's not just the spacing,
which, by the way, the Knicks were third after the trade deadline in
or All Star Break. I keep forgetting my splits in three point a temper
rade that is great and speaks to the human volcano that is Dante Devincenzo.
But just like and I know you don't want to take Josh Hart off the
floor, but he was. And I love the term that you've used,
like their skeleton key when looking at it, saying they need someone else to
can generate their own shot from different levels, and no, he's not gonna
get all the way in the basket as like kind of a mid range scorer
who can score in different capacities and also just stretch defenses way for thin.
The wrist stuff just has me wildly uneasy now to where it's okay, well,
who becomes that guy aside from Jalen Brunson, and the answers are Dante
DiVincenzo, and then who's the I'm legitimately asking here after a DV who is
the third best option to carry that role? And I think predominantly the answer
is going to be Josh Hart. I feel like it's just a case for
Deuce McBride at this point. I don't want to see Alc Burks in this
series. That's the I don't want to see him at all. Well that
yeah, I mean you're if your question is like, what do you do
with embiid if you're the Knicks. My the thing I was focused on is
just like, because there's a lot of variables with with the Sixers, right
like Embiid did not, i mean put up some numbers against Miami and the
playing game and and ultimately was good enough, looked heavy, looked slow,
looked tired, like that's going to be a minute before he's you know,
all the way back if that happens at all. So yeah, there's questions
there that the one thing I just can't get over with get over on the
other side of it is like if you make Jalen Brunson get off the ball,
like this is just your point packaged another way, Like what do the
Knicks do on offense? If you get the ball out of it? Like
what other So few teams relied on one guy to like make stuff happen on
offense like the Knicks did with Brunson. Like it's it's the same question where's
it coming from? Like how do you score? If you, as the
Sixers, can blitz Brunson, can force him into tough shots, make him
work, like just get it out of his hands. That's like a handoffs
is what like what do we do? How are you going to score?
Like I love the high three point volume. I think it favors the Knicks
if you turn this into like a high variant series where you know you might
go eleven of like forty one from three to one game, but you might
go like nineteen for thirty eight in another one and you win that game,
and that's how you stay in the series. It's just I don't know how
else the Knicks can reliably score. But like it used to be if you
could count on Mitchell Robinson maybe to get a bunch of offensive rebounds and spray
out for threes, like that was such a calling card. But he's not
quite the same. And I think, just like buy and Large, you'd
rather have Hartenstein on the floor for all the other stuff he does over Robinson,
so that like sort of supplementary offensive generation is not there, I guess
if you're not playing Robinson that much. So yeah, I just I struggle
to see how the Knicks score. If you can make Brunson get off the
ball, I think what helps is that it will be hard. I would
assume, unless you're gonna put Joel Embiid in compromising positions, it will be
harder to get Brunton off the ball than if Deanthony Melton was healthy. Because
it's how how effective can Kyle Lowry be for how many minutes per game over
the course of an entire series. And then it's kind of like, all
right, you have Nicholas Betom and if again, like I said, if
Melton's not gonna play, it's if it's just a body thing. Then yeah,
you have Kellery Red Junior's mobile, but he's not a good defender.
Tobias Harris can turn it on sometimes defensively, so I but so that makes
you feel a little bit more comfortable. And then the bigger thing for me,
though, is we're talking about how do you defend Joel Embiid. I
went through a roller course of emotions. Did you watch? I know you
watched, But so it was like the second or third or maybe fifth possession
of the game, Joel Embiid just attacking downhill against Miami. It was wide
open space, but the like, just the way he got off the line,
I was like, oh, coming out of a niscus injury, only
six games back or whatever it's been, that that's pretty good. And then
it just proceeds to like kind of lay an egg the rest of the half,
right Joel, andbe's not Joel Embiid, And so that could help the
Knicks. And so if you frame it this way, what's the better team
the Knicks with their lack of secondary offensive weaponry let's call it, or the
Sixers with a windowed down, diluted version of Joel Embiid, and I think
it's the Knicks, which is why I'm gonna say Knicks and seven. This
feels like a very Ebb and Flow series where there's just gonna be everything's gonna
unfold and miniature, where one game may look completely different to compare to the
next, and there's never just this these pattern or trends or something or someone
necessarily that you can bank on. Yeah, I mean, I so I'm
going, uh, sixers in six and that's only because I guess I have
more faith that Embiid might be like playing himself into shape or might look a
little better than he did against Miami, which, by the way, Miami
played a bunch of weird zone and like just gave him a bunch of different
looks that I don't know if the Knicks are gonna do. So what we
know is the Sixers. To your point, the Sixers without Embid were like
eleven and eighteen, and I think they're like thirty one and eight with him,
So it's like they're in the middle somewhere because they have Embid, but
they sort of don't really have EMBID. And I'm just skewing a little more
towards like you know, they have they have him side of the spectrum than
the like him being out there and being hobbled is not the same as just
not being there at all. So I think they're not like they're not a
thirty one and eight team. They're not that good. They're not the team
that was like second in the East until he got hurt. But they're also
not the like seven games under five hundred, like no chance to do anything
team. It's gonna be a long series either way. I think you're totally
right, Like there will be games where oh shit, like Brunson gospot ball
five, like Kelly you Bray had seven steals, or like Hartenstein had eleven
assists because he kept hitting Devincenzo on a short roll in the court, like
all kinds of you know, could go all kinds of different ways. I
think, so this it cuts both ways, So two different takes is even
a like lesser version of Joel Embiid might be okay against the Knicks because I
don't think that they will defend him the way the Heat did or other teams
might, and they'll just be if they have to. If he has to
turn into a jump shooter. They'll give him the space to do that,
and that's like he can do that, like kill you that way. But
the other thing is for the knickses, excuse me for the Knicks' behalf.
I do kind of feel like we're under selling how inventive is too strong of
a word. But like Timms is not known for getting giving a lot of
offensive runway, there's just been more creativity there when you look at the way
that Dante DiVincenzo or Josh hart or uh Oh Jana no we can get moving
off the ball, or the way that they're using Isaiah Hartenstein where it's no
a right, like you're not getting a ton of elbow touches, but like
we're still gonna give you the ball and you can make plays happen. So
I think that bodes well for either side, which will I have it being
a long series, the I'm ultimately I think I'm ultimately a little bit more
unsettled by the idea of just mb not being embiid to where we know that
the Knicks can overcome being with Some fans might argue that they're better off without
Julius Randall because of his playoff track record. Uh, and just that this
I don't think against a different team. If this were Cleveland, if this
were Orlando, I'd actually be I'd just be way more concerned about how their
offense is going to function. Should Jalen Brunton be forced to get rid of
the ball, because I don't know that this Philly team without the Anthony Melton
has the like primary defensive talent to do that enough. I mean, I
picked the sixers, but like, I think at some point we need to
just acknowledge, like the Knicks didn't fake their way to the number two seed
despite all the stuff they went through and all the injuries and all the different
lineup. They you know, traded a good chunk of the roster that og
was there and awesome and then out and then back. And I think they're
twenty and three with Anonobi in the lineup. That every single thing you see
is like the player with the first twenty three games with this team, he
is the highest plus minus whatever the thing? All right, go ahead,
No, I'm just gonna say, I'm I don't want to. I'm belaboring
my own point. I'm playing devil's after my own point is it might actually
be not easier. But like, if Josh Hart is not really attacking downhill
quick enough, we're getting up threes and he's going to be the one that's
in the lineup and the sixers are just leaving him alone, then that's just
gonna be And it doesn't have to be a good defender. You'll be able
to get the ball of Jelling Brunson. The series has so many just weird
layers to it. Yeah. Yeah, I was just gonna say, like,
at some point, and I'm not doing this, we got to give
the Knicks credit for like figuring it out over the course of the year and
ending up this high like that that should suggest that they can figure this out
against the hobbled embiid. But of course I'm not giving them that credit.
I got six. We differed on well, we were together on Lakers Nuggets,
and we were together on Clippers MAVs, but we differed on three of
the five series we've done. So two of the yeah, yeah, no,
Phoenix Minnesota were different, although not that different because like we're both going
so or seven. Uh, I think this, so the last two actually,
I don't know what you're I don't have a sense of where you're going
with these let's do Bucks Pacers? So fucked this one? Uh? The
Bucks as I want to double check because I think we've had Oh my god,
the Pacers are favored in this series. Now it's close minus one thirty
two. The Bucks are plus one oh six. I'm really surprised to see
that when I put this together, I don't know yesterday it was Bucks minus
one twenty Wow. Man, Yeah, it's just Yannis story. Is Yannis
good Yan is important? It's a shame that what so the cat injury is
not on this level because he's been back, but it's like the Kauhi injury,
the Yannis injury em beads health Like it's a bummer that we have,
like the what that's the most important thing in this series? Like, oh,
well, who's gonna play drop? It's like no, it's is this
guy going to be healthy or not? And with the honest it sounds like
not so good? Right? What did WOJ say? They're preparing to be
without him at least for game one. I don't know what the timeline is
or if you've seen one, but uh, it's just it changes everything.
And I can understand why the Pacers are favored. So should we discuss this
as if Giannis is gonna play? Or do you have like thoughts you could
give me that are not specific to whether he does or doesn't play. There's
some stuff, you know, we can talk about, transition stuff. I
don't know. I'm just look at it. I don't actually know how to
cover this one without knowing whether Jannis is gonna play. I do think so.
I was listening to Samson I feel like Caitlin Cooper of basketball, she
wrote, and Samson Folk had been collaborating together for the series, which,
by the way I listened to there was an hour plus preview of this series,
and I was I want to make it clear that there's a compliment listening
and taking everything they say. It makes me never want to invite them on
the show again because I'm just so far like I can't do what they're doing
justice and I feel like they're just talking to a wall or basic a hole,
blog boy, a hole at that point. So good. I'd recommend
if anyone hasn't checked it out, go check it out right now. It's
on YouTube, or go subscribe to the best Ball, she wrote Patreon.
They covered it as Yiannis will play at some point. And I think that's
the way to look at this series is whether we think, Okay, will
Yannis be this or that I would be I mean, maybe if he's slated
to miss the first two games, then all of a sudden, oh hey
and he has up too. Oh, that's when you make the call.
But there's just too much at stake here, and he's not the type of
player. I'm not saying he should play through and risk further injury, but
I would expect him to play at some point this series. I don't know
where you're at with that. I just have no idea. It seems it's
the type of thing where I gotta believe it's gonna be almost impossible to like,
if you put it up to him, he would probably play Game one,
you know, like that kind of thing. But like, this is
also the type of thing where if it were in the regular season, don't
you think this would be like three weeks, no problem, Like you just
wouldn't. It wouldn't even be close. So we're again gonna deal with like
a hobbled version of him, and so the Bucks become easier to defend either
way in theory, right, it's either you have a half hobbled version of
Yannis or no Jannice at all. And the point that they made, and
I was very curious to see how they had thought on this, or at
least Caitlin had made that they were going to see a lot of Aaron nee
Smith on Jannis to begin with, and not leave that to like maybe Siakam
coming in is the help. And so the fact that now if you don't
now for Sudde're just looking at this and it's Bobby Portis on the court instead
of Jannis or Jake Crowder on the court instead of Yannis. And by the
way, Indy quietly I mean not quietly, I'm sure in the Ani market
just ticking up defensively with Pascal Siakam. And when you look at just the
data of having Halle Nie Smith, Siakam and turn around the court together,
those four guys a plus nine point eight net rating, defensive rating in the
ninety second percentile, offensive rating in the seventy nine percentile, and just that
gets you know, whether it's Andrew Nemhar that's gonna be there, they have
a lot of different defensive options at their disposal, especially if Giannis isn't playing
because you look at that, and between Nemhar just being able to guard I'm
just gonna say all eighty positions in existence, but Aaron E. Smith being
able to guard up and handing that physicality, Siakam's ability to like he's not
quite a wing, but he sized like a wing. He can defend some
wings, we can defend some bigs, and he could really disrupt if he's
playing away from the ball. And then just Miles Turner still being mostly Miles
Turner. That's just four ridiculously good defensive players and we haven't gotten TJ.
McConnell will give you ball pressure and is as we've said, the best isolation
score in the history of basketball now. And then just even Jaris Walker.
I don't know what type of role he plays in this series, but he's
shown the ability to really move around positionally and have like this disruptive and even
I would say even keeled defensive performance. I just I'm gonna throw this to
you. Jannis will play Game two and beyond. I still have a feeling
that it's just Pacers in five. I'm looking at this team and there's been
moments when they've played without Giannis where Dame looks like Dame and the fact that,
like, I think the most off thing about Damian Lillard's game this year
has been his jumper and his high quality like looks, and you would expect
that to normalize at some point, right, And so that's almost a good
sign. And we've seen some good moments from Bobby Porter stepping up and then
certain again lineups without Yannis in them, but just Chris Middleton on defense this
year. Their defensive options in general, Patrick Beverly doesn't move me. I
think Molie Beasley's played better on that end of the floor. Their transition defense
is better under Doc. Are they gonna be ready for this version of the
Pacers where even when they've slowed things down with Pascal Siakam, they're still fucking
blur? I just I that's extreme. If Giannis is playing game, I
don't know if I'm going Pacers in five. My pick is Pacers in five.
This just feels like a things fall apart moment for Milwaukee. Yeah,
this so I feel like I'm gonna change my pick now. I just want
to get I want to talk out a couple more and I intimidate, did
you have like bucks and seven or something? That's like d Dan just predict
a gentleman's no. So I don't want to tell you what I had.
I'll tell you eventually a couple of things. If you're looking for, I'll
give you like rays of hope for each side. So like, if Yannis
doesn't play, obviously, that's like that's fatal. The Bucks will not win
the series. But you would say, like, well, the dam Giannis
chemistry or lack of it, and just the two man stuff that never materialized,
that was a real storyline all year. Maybe that was never gonna work.
You know, what we know has worked pretty well is Dame running spamming
high pick and pop or pick and roll with shooters around the floor, just
being like the guy like with limited co stars that just catch and shoot or
catch and drive or whatever, and just like he's the driver of everything.
That's like that's his whole career. That's like that's what Portland did with him
and Nurkic and like the limited guys around him other than McCollum, that's a
little different. Maybe Middleton is your McCollum in this scenario. So like it's
not a totally uncomfortable way for Dame to play and for the the Bucks to
look, this is a disaster scenario if Jannis isn't out there, but it's
like a way for them to say, like, we got a shot doing
this because we have a guy in Dame who has made a career, a
Hall of Fame career out of playing the way we're gonna have to play now.
So like that's that's semi hopeful. Uh. For the Pacers though,
Like even with so Pacers has just been better, like since the All Star
Break and with this revamped team, they're plus six point three. Forget the
lineup specific stuff, their net is plus six point three since the break.
The Bucks are like two point plus two point five Hallie not being Halle and
part of that. I know people ascribed it to injuries, but we've mentioned
this on this podcast. I think someone mentioned it to me, Like we
haven't mentioned on this podcast. I remember who it was. No, it's
also because they've had to move him off the ball a lot more, which
he's probably beneficial in the long run, but that type of mid season adjustment
exploration is going to come to the learning curve, so to have. I
didn't know their net rating was that high post All Star Break. My god,
and the defense hasn't been that good. But but I think the data
you put out, which is more lineup specific, matters more because they're just
going to play their better defensive lineups, so they're twenty third. I think
on doesn't matter. So while you're like getting hopeful about, oh, Dame
could do this, like, it's just that. So the Pacers are one
of the worst teams at giving up points in the paint in the league,
and it's like, oh, yan, this is even talked about during the
play in tournament or the in season tournaments, like Giannis is the best paint
scorer on planet Earth and the Pacers can't defend the paint. Therefore, this
the Bucks are just going to destroy them because Yannis will have twenty five dunks
and they can't do anything about it. No one on the Bucks besides Giannis
scores in the paint like ever, so if you remove him, the PACER's
biggest defensive weakness is just like it doesn't matter anymore because the Bucks just will
not score at the basket. They just don't have someone else that does that
besides Giannis. So like, yeah, it'll be great if Dame is playing
pick and pop over and over with brook Lopez, like it just won't matter
because they'll never make layups or dunks. So like I would wonder if that
provides a stress test in the sense of, well, then Damian Lillard,
who already probably like the lane will be open and we've seen him get into
the paint during those moments without Yannis. But even coming back to someone,
what would be their best non Yannest unit in this lineup? And before you
even answer, I'm gonna say that you probably have Bobby Porters and brook Lopez
in it, and I don't know what that does pure transition defense in that
scenario. And so if you're gonna pull one of them, it's like what
kind of happens there? Now you're going up against his front line of Siakam
and Turner, which can play really fast, but you've now given up.
I mean, are you turned into Danil gallin Ar in this series? That's
that's certainly not going to happen. So the Yannis factor looms, But I
think that the Pacers are gonna win this even if he plays in large part
because I really do think the Bucks they've improved at points, but like they've
just never fully co least, and whether that's because of injuries or if the
roster's just it's not as fitting as it seems. I mean, like I
was off on them once we get to the thing that we got wrong about
every team. I predicted they were gonna have a top five offense end defense.
Boy was they had neither, by the way for those Cubans scoring home.
So I'm just struggling to if Yannis plays and is Yannis, there's definitely
how do you defend him? You mentioned their weaknesses in the paint, and
it's okay, you have Nie Smith or let's Sayakam on him, and you're
gonna throw other people at him. But I don't know this Bucks defense,
even though it's improved under Doc Rivers, I don't think I don't think it
has enough to slow down this this PACER's offense and the variable ways that they
can now play with Pascal Siakam, because it's they have all these different gears
where it's from warp speed to like if you need to slow it down in
the half court even without Buddy Heal and now like you just have a ton
of options. Do you want to guess maybe you know this it's one of
those stats that keeps coming up. What the Bucks record was when they fired
Adrian Griffin eleven, yeah, thirty and thirteen and then the five hundred under
Doc right like seventeen and eighteen or something like that. Yep. And just
so like to n credit, he has cleaned up a lot of the transition
stuff, but just they don't have the personnel, especially without Gianness, I
would argue to be an elite defensive team. So I'm gonna go again caveat
kind of like you gave. If Yannis plays Game one and he's like anything
close to Giannis, I think the Bucks win this. I'll say I'll just
go Bucks in seven, but I'm gonna go Pacers in six because it just
seems like Yiannis is not gonna play at least and then we'll be limited.
I'm going Pacers in five. It just feels like disasters even ready and even
just I'm just like kind of thinking, like, what is happening to brook
Lopez in the lineups? Are like Bobby port Is like, where are you
hiding brook Lopez? Like or not hiding because Brook like what are you doing
to keep Brook Lopez in his sweet spot? On the sweet spots on the
defensive end here, Like and Turner are just like, that's more of one
of the nightmarish front courts for him to go after, right, because Miles
Turner can stretch the floor Pasto Siakam can stretch the floor himself, but just
has this odd ball dynamic to where it's just he can score at every level.
Now, Like just has all these different counters and so I can't come
up And that's just wild. I picked the Bucks that come out of the
East this year, so it just weren't what we thought they were gonna be.
That's that's all it is. All right, let go to look hyper
foolish at the end of this, but we'll say, well that's always a
possibility. Uh, Calves Magic the four or five in the East. Calves
are fit well, relatively heavy favorites here minus two oh five. So,
uh, just couple of preamble things here split the season series two and two.
They haven't played since February twenty second. This, I guess, feels
like a pretty defensive oriented series, but that also might just be because Orlando
kind of only has one dimension in that's defense. But certainly the Calves have
been defined by their defense over these last couple of years. Do you have
anything that's like I have. I have one thing I think and it's fairly
basic that like just stands out to me. But what's your question or what's
what's going to swing this for you? That's interesting, like in terms of
I can give your mind if you want, Yeah, go ahead, Just
how does Orlando score? I mean, it's just that that's it, Like
that's been the question all year. And I don't know if you can win
a playoff series just with awesome defense, which the Magic have. So here's
what's interesting is that my count my question is almost counter is to is Cleveland
more vulnerable defensively than we think? Just because that's the same question kind of
so that well, because it's like, are they conducive to maybe letting Orlando
scores? Jared Allen hasn't necessarily looked right? And then the other big thing
here, and I don't think people understand how important Dean Wade has been to
the Calves. Looking at the level of assignments that he guards dealing with his
knee injury, I guess I'll report that he's not expected to play in Game
one. And then you do have Isasaca Coro still, but he's someone who
is just like you want him to defend the guards not necessarily need to scale
up. And then it's okay, Evan Mobley is Evan Mobley. We know
that, but look at the bodies like just the the like even Franz Wagner
super strong, like Palo Banko against Evan Mobley's frame. That's not I'm not
gonna say it's a capslock mismatch for Palo bank Caro, but that's he could
move Evan Mobley around. I have some numbers for you before you go any
farther on the Bank Carrol. Well, my, my, my, eating
my about to eat some crow. No, I think you're I think you're
generally right. However, uh, mobilely guarded Bank Carro. Uh. They
only met in two of the four meetings because Mobley was hurt so much,
which in those meetings they're split one on one with BN Caro being guarded by
Mobiley. This is like just under forty one possessions by how NBA dot Com
records it seven points on three of thirteen shooting with no free throw attempts,
So like that's noisy and it's a small sample, but Mobilely guarded ban Caro
really really well, And that more than any other stat to me was just
like I was confirmation biased because I came into it, like I think,
if it comes down to it, Cleveland has a better chance of scoring against
a good defense than the Magic do and if benk Caro is not going to
be able to score, look, look like thirteen shots, that's nothing.
He's gonna take one hundred in this series. But it's just like that just
confirmed my overarching idea of like I don't really love either of these teams offensively,
but I think like Mobile and Garland both had decent success offensively against you
know, we think Jalen Suggs is the best defensive guard in the league,
and then Mobley did pretty well on on Banko. So I'm just like,
then, then where are the Like is Franz Wagner gonna remember aut it threes?
Like maybe that's what it comes down to you that let's say Mobile does
make like difficult on Manko, it's if you don't have a Dean Wade,
what is your best option to throw at franz Wagner defense. Still, look,
the shooting has been all over the place. But like he when he
gets moving like that's still like a bigger, stronger body. Yeah, I
know. I think. I think the same issue with the kids, Like
I guess it's a coro. I guess it's you try struce like it's so
whoever's on Wagner is gonna like be on their heels the whole game. I
think. I think that's that's a definite I do, and so I don't.
I'm not trying to minimize Cleveland's like defensive ceiling in this. I ultimately
wonder is Orlando going to have to change the like the rate at which it
plays on offense, because I do think Dean Wade or no Dean Wade,
if you just let Cleveland's defense get set, you're making things so easier on
them. And so what are you going to be able to do off these
live ball rebounds or turnovers? We do like Orlando does run after they're going
to force turnover specifically, but like it's not with the frequency that you think
it would. And they're a team like you look at they were during the
regular season. They were twenty fifth in transition frequency and twenty eighth in transition
frequency off of live rebounds. Do you have the gear to play faster than
that to ensure that Cleveland's defense isn't getting set, because that feels like your
most effective way to score here. I mean, I guess just between Carol
and Franz Wagner, you could try and force some switches and like punished mismatches
against the smaller guards or wings, but like you're still gonna have Evan Mobley
and or Jared Allen on the lower levels at that point. Conversely, though,
just the struggles that Darius Garland has gone through and close the season on
a higher note, don Mian Mitchell has rest now played a little better to
close, even though it's just a really rough end of the stretch for him.
Yeah, there's we're not doing X factors. We already did X factors
for every team on that one podcast. But Jamie Bickerstaff feels like a like
one of the bigger coaching X factors of the postseason because I've been I'd give
him in more leeway than Kavs fans. But he's felt at his best when
they're shorthanded this season because it forced him to play this team, especially in
higher leverage moments, a very specific way. And now that their full strength,
we have seen him pick and choose between much bigs are on the court,
whether it's Mobley or Allen. Is that something I guess politically that you're
still able to do in the playoffs and the game is on the line,
and it's well Evan Mobley's on the bench or Jared Allen's on, Like,
can you like, does he have the it's not even just the cloud.
I'm sure he has the organizational cloud to do like do you just have the
the gall the guts to do it? And so that's kind of a wild
card here. I ultimately just and I spoil my pick, like Cleveland has
the higher offensive ceiling by a light year, even if and I've said this
so many times, or if you watch Orlando, like there's Jamal Mosley's done
a good job of generating spacing for this team. Defenses just don't fucking care.
And the Caves aren't gonna be any different. Yeah, I don't know
who they can pay, Like I trust Jalen Suggs is shooting and a Baald
decision making now, but just like you're gonna need I guess a lot of
Paul Anthony and like a lot of Jalen Suggs and like the and Franz Vonner
to obviously progress to a higher mean on the you know the out on his
outside clip. I think Orlando's a really good team in their defense. This
this is definitely the candidate for the Ugliest Series, right, like kind of
what the Nix and Caves were last year during the second round, I was
no, I was gonna say, like the way Orlando wins this is it
just they pull the Caves down to their level, and like I mean that
as a compliment, is they just make it a total rock fight. Are
just unbelievable, like even better than they were during the year on defense and
Cleveland. You know, Donovan Mitchell, like nineteen and a half points,
you mentioned it, like the rest will help him, but like he's not
been good since the All Star break and it's just the need the nose.
Like's gonna get hit in the face at least twice. Sure guarantee if you
don't, like, yeah, at some point in this by the second quarter,
he will have gotten hit in the face. It's a given. So
like I just there's definitely like I'm picking I'm picking Calves in seven. So
obviously the Magic have a great chance in this series because it's going to go
go the duration. But the Magics just don't generate enough points from three that's
gonna allot. They're dead last in the league in percentage of points scored on
threes, so like, and you're not making that up. If you have
a glaring thing like that, the Calves can just pack it in and say
have at it. And the Magic, I don't think the Magic would be
lucky, just to be totally straightforward about it. To make enough threes to
score enough to win the series. Not impossible obviously, but it's just the
Cavs have more options to score enough to win and the Magic just like it's
hard to find ways they're gonna be able to Dona Mitchell just a playoff kill.
And I think even if they don't want to get away from their core
four, Evan Mobley has taken more threes now until that's something to kind of
just hang your hat on. And it's I ultimately think that the Cavs offense
doesn't need to be at its peak to beat this Magic team. So I
have Kavs and six. Actually I don't know if I'm catering to the too
much inexperience, but you just look at I really feel like the only way
for the Magic to outgame the Cavaliers offensively is just Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell
both have off series. Because if even one of those dudes is just himself
or what we know them to be, that to me gives Cleveland a decided
leg up. Yeah, it's enough. And that's again we're assuming the Calves
are going to play really good defense. But it's not that hard to play
really good defense against a bad offense. Like that's that's part of it too.
We are onto stat pen and there will be guess a player. But
first, Grant, I have some playoff themed quizzes, questions. What have
you? They are? Are you ready? Or you? Are you inframe?
Are you buckled up? I've never I've never sat straighter. All right,
I've got a bunch here for you. So here we go. Grant.
Which NBA player has more NBA Playoff games with at least forty points?
Lebron James or Michael Jordan. Michael Jordan correct, thirty eight to twenty nine.
Kobe Bryant or Kevin Durant Kobe incorrect. Durant hasn't beat fourteen to thirteen
Okay, Shaquille O'Neil or Kareem abdul Jabbar forty point playoff gainst. I'll say
Shaq that is correct twelve to nine. Luka doncch or James Harden Luca that
is incorrect. Should went with Longevity Harden eleven to eight. Oh Steph Curry
or Dwayne Wade Curry correct eight to seven. Giannis A Teta Kumbo or Hakeema
LaJuan Jan incorrect. Takima LaJuan had eleven to Yana is eight Wow Kawhi Leonard
or Russell Westbrook. I'll say Russ that is correct seven to five. Jimmy
Butler or Dirk Novitzky Hmmm, Let's go Jimmy. That is correct eight to
seven. Larry Bird or Magic Johnson Bird correct five to four. Devin Booker
or Jamal Murray Oh Murray incorrect, Devin Booker seven to five. Oh So
confident, Kyrie Irving or Donovan Mitchell Mitchell correct four to three. Anthony Davis
or Nicole Jokic Davis incorrect Jokic four to three. Paul Pierce or Jason Tatum
Tatum that is correct four to three. Jalen Brunton or Timmy Duncan, what
a combo. I feel obligated to say, Tim Duncan, that is correct?
Four to two, Charles Barkley or Damian Lillard Barkley correct five Before that
was that block? I have a couple couple more here for you shorter blocks,
though, I think I hit like sixty there. That's I'm satisfied with
that. Yeah, that was pretty good. I thought you were gonna be
on a roll at one point, but then you botched the Devin Booker,
Jamal Murray one not for sure. All I think about is fifty spots from
Jamal Murray, him and Mitchell. I'll never forget that Utah Denver series.
Well, speaking of fifty spots, grant which NBA player has not had a
fifty point game in the playoffs. Kevin Durant, James Harden, Jason Tatum
or Russell Westbrook. I'm gonna go Russell Westbrook. That is incorrect. The
answer is James Harden never had fifty. Okay, which NBA player has not
had a fifty point game in the NBA playoffs? Giannis Atta, Kupo,
Luka, doncic Lebron James or Nikola Jokic, man I want to say,
like all of them, I'll say Jokic, that is incorrect. The answer
is Luka Doncic never had fifty. I'm gonna go over on this one.
I can feel it well. This is the last one, Okay? Which
NBA player has not had a fifty point game in the NBA playoffs Jimmy Butler,
Steph Curry, Kyrie Irving or Damian Lillard. I will say, Kyrie
Irving, that is correct. Yes, you did not get swept. Nice
job by you. Stemnroff disaster came. Here's an interesting one though. Four
active NBA players have multiple fifty point games in the NBA playoffs. Who are
they? I will give you three guesses or three strikes. Let me rephrase
that four active players have scored fifty points in an NBA playoff game at least
twice. Who are they? I will give you three strikes? All right,
I'm gonna say Steph has done it. Incorrect. Strike one. That's
not a good start, Dan, that's the worst way you can start with
a strike. Does Donovan Mitchell have two? That Donna Mitchell is one?
Okay? Do you have more than two? Or you don't have the numbers?
Spoiler all these players have two? Okay, okay, I gotta I
think Jamal Murray has two correct to a four so far, So there's I
got two more active players. Tatum, Tatum have more than one? Oh,
you're on a roll. That's three. Oh man, we've established that
Harden never had one. God damn. Who else has gotten multiple fifties that's
still active. I'll just say, I'll say Lebron that is incorrect? Strike
two? I thought I was done there, So this is I'm really spinning
now. Who else has had fifty more than once? I'm not going to
ask you for him, but I feel like I'm missing somebody really obvious.
I'll just say, I'll say Jokic that is incorrect. It is Damian Lillard.
Oh, I wasn't gonna get there. I wasn't gonna get there.
Really I thought he would. I'm not saying that you should have gotten it.
That was a tough one, I thought. But KUDROSI for not guessing
Kevin Durant, I thought that might have been one you just gravitated towards.
You didn't guess Luca, But you also knew the previous questions that he didn't
have multiple fifty point games, Mitchell, I think, Mitchell, I wash.
I don't know why I said, did Steph first? Maybe because I
knew he had won last year and I just thought he may because you constantly
disrespect Steph and these exercises by picking against him, right, I had,
I had to throw him out there first as just the show of good faith.
Okay, So one more block here? Which NBA player has more triple
doubles in the NBA playoffs? Only Lebron James or Magic Johnson. I'll say,
oh, short player, I'll say Lebron. That is incorrect, thirty
to twenty eight for Magic, damn it. Nicole Jokich or Russell Westbrook jokicch
correct sixteen to twelve. The gap there was bigger than I expected, to
be honest. Tim Duncan or Kevin Garnett, that's a weird one. I'll
say Duncan just more playoff games? Correct? He have four triple doubles to
Garnett's three. I didn't think these dudes had that many cripple doubles in the
playoffs. I'm not gonna lie Steph Curry or Kevin Durant. Hmm. I'll
take Steph. I can't disrespect him anymore. Good thing too, that is
correct. Three to two. Charles Barkley or Chris Paul. Who I'll go.
I'll go Barkley correct. Four to three, Luka Doncicch or James Harden.
Luca, that is incorrect, James Harden four to three, Draymond Green
or Oscar Robertson. I'll send Dre just because he's got to have played way
more playoff games. Ten to eight in favor of Draymond. You are correct,
And I have to know we've got a lot of comments that I keep
saying Oscar Robinson. I'm sure I've made that mistake at some point. I
think it's just my nasally voicets we all like, I know, it's Oscar
Robertson, thank you, And that might even say like Robinson there, Michael
Jordan or Scottie Pippen. Ooh, playoff triple doubles. I mean it still
has to be Jordan, right, No, Scottie Pippen four to two,
it's good for him. Mary Bird or Fat Leaver. Yes he's back.
Oh, I will say Larry Bird, sorry, Fat yeah. Ten to
three. Just had to throw a Fat Lever. I really wish it'd have
been Fat Leaver, Rogn Rondo or John Stockton. Oh, I'll say Rondo.
Correct, it's not even close. Ten to one. Very sneaky by
you. You have some Guessa players for me, No, those were some
pretty good ones. I thought those are good. Man. The people will
complain that they're too close the answers, but we're doing a playoff sample size.
It's like we're just winnowing it down the number of games so much that
the gaps are you know, unless you I mean, rondovers is stocked and
I thought you were gonna get right away. So I'm surprised that you thought
about it because the ten to one was just funny. And you know,
I can't stand John Stockton as a human being, but right, right,
right, No, I just you know, I think once I was gonna
default to the more modern player anyway. I don't know why, uh,
just generally, but yeah, I believe stock would you say, uh,
Jordan only had two playoff triple doubles because pipenhead, that's crazy. I can't
believe it's also, yeah, get it together. Also like they're more fun
if they're really close, because it makes it kind of basically like when I'm
wrong on a really close one, I don't feel as bad, so so
I appreciate it. You would have pretty stocked then you would have felt like
ass on the right. Yeah, that's ridiculous. A ten to one margin,
forget it. You've also tried to convince me that the margins are smaller
than they are sometimes. One of the last ones we did way back when
that I've finished cutting up the twenty five and ten thing, there was like
a gap of thirty five games. You're like, well, it's like that's
like fairly close for their career. It's like it's in the neighborhood. It's
like a half season's worth of games. Like it's it's fine, all right.
I have a couple guests of players from Austin here. I'm not sure
if I have some from some other people. Have to check, all right.
Clue number one. Dan. I am a two time block champion and
racked up a career total of seventeen hundred and fifty nine blocks, which is
currently in the top thirty all time, top thirty of all time two time
block champion. Helps more. I don't know I've been two time blockchampion.
She feel like I should just name someone who I know is a block champion?
What is it? What? All time in blocks? Uh? Currently
top thirty and this is total blocks. There's a per game. Well,
the way the question is phrase which gives his career total of seventeen fifty nine.
It's how I tried a bid time. I'd say it's However, you
would say, like, oh, he was the scoring champer of the block
champ, so I assume it means the average. But I bet that's like
led the league in blocks, or you know whatever led the league in scoring.
You wouldn't say the guy that had the most total points. I don't
think new Bowl. No good guess though, you have to try the guests
on the first one, just on the off chance you get it, all
right, Clue number two. Despite my two time league leading block seasons,
my career also included nine seasons of averaging less than one and a half blocks
per game. What so like someone playing in a I mean less than one
and a half one and a half, Like, if it's one point four,
that's still a shit ton of blocks. Also fair sean Bred. Nope,
let's see, all right, you're ready for the next clue. You
want to throw some more names Clue three. I was also a three time
All Defensive team member and an NBA champion. Ooh, three time All Defense
NBA champion. So it's not Ben Wallace because wasn't he like a ninety time
All Defensive player. Four for Ben Wallace, that's a little bit fewer than
ninety good. Championship thing has thrown me off now, becas I'm trying to
think of like title winning bigs. I know two time block champion. Well,
I was gonna give you. I was going to give you a subtle
clue, but I'm going to refrain. David Robinson, Nope, you want
the next one. You might get it on this next clue. I participated
in the twenty twelve Olympics and won a silver medal. Was Anthony Davis on
that team? It is? I don't know, and it is not Anthony
Davis won a silver medal in twenty twelve. Oh, that's just gonna make
this infinitely harder for me. So I won't guess Dwight Howard or DeAndre Jordan
who in twenty twelve that was a minute ago. Yeah, I guess.
Give me the next clue, all right, Uh, Clue five. I
was drafted in two thousand and nine, along with seven players who made an
All Star team from that class, one being my teammate. Unfortunately, I
was never able to do so myself make an All Star team despite my defensive
dominance. That's okay, though, I still managed to rake in over one
hundred and forty million in career earnings. I'm gonna fucking kick myself when I
can't get this. There's no chance you don't get this in the next two
clues or maybe three. You got three more. Two thousand and nine Andrew
Bogie No good guess though two thousand and nine won a silver medal, never
made an All Star team. Was on a team with someone from the two
thousand and nine draft class that made an All Star team. Uh, yes,
I don't know who that is though, trying to think who that is.
Oh well, dude, I'm not sure I know who that is.
Yeah, I keep going, holy shit, all right, who's six.
I have built up a pretty solid second career in the entertainment industry, with
a whopping five hundred k plus subscribers to my YouTube channel as a chef Serge
Abaca Surge of Baca. Oh god it, I didn't know he won a
silver medal. I think he was on Spain or something like. Do you
remember when he was considered the unicorn because he could hit set threes and block
shots and he could shoot like he shot like one point six per game,
and it was, yeah, this guy, he's the But he was also
playing power forward, like they just didn't use him at center. We weren't
quite there yet with the with like had Serge Ibaka. Serge Ibaka was like
seven years too early. If you got Serge Ibaka as a rookie like now,
like he would just be he would be the New Orleans Pelicans ideal center.
Like that's he would would stop talking about Miles Turner forever. It would
just be dribbling and stuff more too. Yeah, yeah, probably, Yeah,
you'd have way more diverse skill sets. Do you have one for me?
Or should I give you this one that I think I know the answer
to? What don't I give? Oh? Is that one from Austin?
Yeah, I'm gonna look it up real quick. I'm like ninety nine percent
sure Austin give us the players when you give us the guests of players,
I mean, I know mine from Austin, but I'm wondering if I should
go find one from Mike now, so we don't like. Uh yeah,
let me bring up Mike's document here. I actually do not as of right
now. I'm gonna double check. Actually, I don't know if you're gonna
have to get into a mind of a cycle path this week. Let me
just yeah, wow, be Rich does not like you anymore. I don't
blame him, to be honest. Okay, ready from Mike, I'm ready.
Who won? I was selected outside the lottery by the Bucks in nineteen
ninety five out of the University of Ohio and then was traded on draft day
to Portland. Hmm, Bucks to Portland ninety five. I could not name
a single player from the University of Ohio. You're not gonna get this one,
No, not at all. I never would have gotten this one.
Maybe you might. You're better with history than I am. So maybe I
don't mean to I don't mean to. No. I like it, like
I like being set up this way. If I fail, it's no one's
disappointed. Uh Bucks to Portland ninety five. I'm just gonna say, oh,
that's way too late for him. One shot. I killed this.
I know I have to have to give a name just because it would be
so awesome. Bucks to Portland ninety five. Who the fuck even is on
Portland in the mid nineties. All the guys I can think of were like
way too old, but they were there in the eighties that were still good
in the nineties. I have no idea this guy didn't play for them until
later in his career. I'll just say, della shrimp no, okay,
clue too. I was an anomaly at the time in that I was an
undersized power forward at six six and two hundred and fifty pounds. Bucks to
Portland, small power forward. It's not this isn't who it is but Clarence
Weatherspoon no good, yes though I like that CLU three. I played in
Portland until nineteen ninety eight, when the team's absurd collection of traditional bigs left
me out of the rotation. I was traded with Alvin Williams for Damon Stotdommeier
and Walt Williams. So he's in goes Portland to Toronto. Who's like a
little stocky power forward? Like do you just not know this guy's name?
Is it that up score? Like I'm sorry, no, you'll I know
the name, but it's sort of just like I just I wouldn't have gotten
it, So I was assigning that feeling to you as well. Yeah it's
not Gary Trent, because oh my god, is Gary Trent? Let me
know? Holy GARYR. I should have let you you obviously were talking about
senior. So Klue four. I played the rest of the season with the
Raptors before spending three years each with the Wolves and the MAVs. And that's
literally all Wikipedia has for me, my none year NBA career summed up in
two paragraphs, which is insulting. My son was drafted in twenty eighteen by
the Blazers, making us one of the few father son duos who have played
for the same franchise. The similarities didn't stop there this Clu six, as
he was also traded forty one games into a season from Portland Toronto in his
third season, the exact same circumstances as I had Clue seven. I'm probably
better known for being on the sidelines of Raptors games nowadays wearing outlandish puffy jackets.
Oh that I might have that I might have gotten. I didn't read
that clue. He had a fun fact though this should have been a clue
somehow like the last one. All of Gary Trent Junior's sons have names based
on his own name, Gary Trent, the second Gary Trent Junior Gary Trent
because Garyson spells out Gary Son, Rayton, and Graydon. I feel like
that's a form of child abuse, like you get good for you. That
was a not a one shot kill, but that was a really good That
was good by you, great showing. I would have gotten it, I
think by the Wolves MAVs question, because I or I only associate him with
the Wolves for some reason. I don't know why. Okay, cool,
all right, I'm fairly sure I have the correct person for Austin's second.
I guess the player. Are you ready? Yes, Clue number one.
I was a lottery pick in twenty fourteen. Go just me our lottery pick
in twenty and fourteen, because it's from Austin. This guy played for the
Pacers. Okay, Uh, that's too late for Danny Granger. I just
need to take it. Yes, I just don't kind of think of just
Pacers during that era. Yeah, just give me the next clue. All
right, this isn't going to help you. I have played for six different
teams. Okay, the next clue will help you. Clue three. I
am a career forty one percent shooter from deep, with my best season coming
in twenty seventeen with forty nine percent from three forty nine. Let's see,
I want to make sure that's right. Okay, I have to give a
small correction. This player shot forty nine point four percent with a team to
which he was traded mid season, so his full season stats for twenty seventeen
eighteen are forty two point six percent. This, of course, is all
assuming that I have the correct player, which I think I do. Really
funny if you didn't, No, I got because he did shoot forty one
percent for his career and he was a lottery pick in fourteen. Uh but
yeah, so forty nine point four percent. I'll just I'll give you forty
nine point four percent in twenty six games for the MAVs in twenty seventeen eighteen,
thirty eight point seven percent for the Knicks in fifty five games in seventeen
eighteen. Holy shit, Oh Tim Harway Junior. Uh No, damn good
guess though? Got the Knicks MAVs overlap there? I wonder if they were
traded together. Is that lineup right, I can't remember. Uh oh,
sorry, I didn't even finish that clue. Despite my sharpshooting abilities that I'm
solely known for, I have never competed in the All Star Weekend three point
contest. That's the end of Clue three. Oh my god, I feel
like I should know this one. The Knicks in the MAVs is something I
need to get hung up On twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, he was traded
from the MAVs to the Knicks. I think it's the other way. I
think it's to MAVs from the Knicks to the MAVs in twenty seventeen, twenty
eighteen from the Knicks. Do you know that? No, no, way,
too late, terrible? Yes, my god, yeah no, keep
going, all right? Clue number four. In twenty fourteen, I led
the country in scoring at twenty six point seven points per game and went on
to become the NCAA National Player of the Year. So he took you back
to college here. Yeah, I know nothing about college, so please carry
on, all right. Clue five, I am ranked good news more college
clues. Uh. Clue five, I am ranked seventh all time and score
scoring an NCAA history currently and was ranked fifth all time during the year I
left for the NBA. Oh, I feel like that's probably something I should
know. I'm just still thinking about the Knicks Mavericks link and I hope I'm
not misleading you by saying it was Knicks to MAVs. But just looking at
his basketball reference page, the Knicks are first and the and the MAVs are
second. I assume that suggests who we played for, you know, first
versus second. Traded from the Knicks to the MAVs. Who's someone that might
seems like they're relatively good that the Knises gave up on. That doesn't really
narrow the field that much. Oh, this is going to frustrate the hell
out of me. Keep going, all right, Clue six, I was
coached in college by my father. Clue seven, I am playing for my
current team for the second time in my career. Awesome. If I don't
know the player is, I would know what that means. Oh this is
I would say. I would say, if you'll accept a small hand,
that you do need to remember who this clue is from when you consider this.
This guy is playing for this this team for the second time. Okay,
I literally can't think of anybody on the Indiana Pacers roster right now.
That's like the level of just that's how the deep into thee. I am
not one hundred percent sure that I remembered that this guy is on the Pacers.
So that's how much that helps you. Damn you didn't remember he was
on the Pacers. Well, I'll give you another clue, because you only
do have one more, and it's not going to help you because the clue
is I went to Creighton. Maybe that does help you. Oh, dougmy
Dermott, you got it. I good, Okay. I didn't have to
help you, and that was good. That was a disaster. Take us
out of here, please get us out of here. Thanks, thanks for
listening, Thanks for contributing your clues. Thanks for making Dan sweat with so
many college related related clues. Just bring them on. Do some McDonald's All
America clues. Let's just make it even harder going forward. If you have
not done so already, please remember rate, review, subscribe, tell your
friends, tell your enemies, join our discord link to do that. As
in the YouTube and podcast description, buyer merch same place for all that stuff.
I think that's going to cover it, looking forward to all the playoffs
stand looking forward to more podcasts, probably more frequently. I don't want to
make any promises, but yeah, so that'll be good. Thanks everybody.
Shout out Frank Melaquina. Apologies chair it Own. This time about as compass
and as outpoint, mister