What is krack alac in. Fellow thermonuclear affers, I am a very sweaty
and headache induced Dan Valley coming at you with my certified fantabulous co host Grant
Hughes. We have so much to talk about, but first I must remind
you implore you subscribe to us wherever you're consuming us YouTube. Hit that like
button, subscribe, comment, help the al Goo, love us back,
and subscribe to us on Apple and Spotify if you haven't already. Ratings and
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a long way in addition to those five star ratings. Follow us on the
socials. They are on your screen if you're watching. They can be in
the podcast description, or you can listen to me say that we're at Hardwood
Knox on Twitter and TikTok and at Hardwood Underscore Knox on Instagram. AM and
you know what if you don't follow Grant on Twitter at gt Underscore, Hughes
spelled exactly how it fucking sounds. Before we get into so much, just
so much to get to the question that everyone's dying for, that they've been
pining for, probably waited all weekend to hear the answer to Grant, how
the heck are you? I'm doing well. I'm curious mostly about why you're
so sweaty, because you don't look particularly sweaty. But if you're gonna point
that out off the top, I have to follow up on that. I
squeezed in the gym right, which is why I was three minutes late because
I was scrambling. I got the link to you in time, but I
was three minutes late today because I was scrambling coming back from the gym.
And so, like, today is one of those days where I don't know,
if you like, I have every fucking minute like planned out, and
so it's like after this, like y'all edit and produce this on the audio,
and then I have to go on to another podcast, and then we
have stuff do for br tonight, and then I have all this other side
works that I need to get done, that I need to edit a short
that we can post tomorrow on TikTok or whatever. So it's just one of
those days. And so I am very much just a dead sprint, and
I didn't have time to change or shower before we were on. So if
anyone can smell me, You're you're very You're very impressive. You're making me
feel very lazy because I have my day planned out too, But that just
sounds that sounds exhausting. So you have like a family and a job and
you go to the gym in the morning, so you make me feel lazy.
Yeah, and I did shower out of courtesy, so uh, you
know. But again, if you hadn't brought up the sweatiness, I wouldn't
have noted it. What I do notice it's not good streaming for those that
are watching. But I'm kind of a fidgetor This is the thing you learn
when you watch yourself enough, Like right now, I'm I'm rocking back and
forth as I say that, Are you a fidgetor I'm fidgety? This is
the thing you start to learn about yourself the older you get. And I
have to admit I'm an unabashed, uncontrolled fidgetor right I think I'm definitely a
fidgetor I can't sit still. But I'll notice if I watch back, my
eyes will dart all over my screen and the tabs and I'm trying to follow,
like if I'm posting like a promo on social media for this or I'm
trying to timestamp, and so I'm like, I hope it doesn't look like
I'm not paying attention to what Grant says. I'm just trying to like multitask
the finesse the ship out of this. Yeah. Yeah, Well, when
you've got every second of your day plan out, you've got to get a
few things done at once, so you know, good peak behind the curtain
though, kick this off. Good thing. There's nothing in the NBA we
really need to talk about today anything, And not to delay us further,
but for another peak behind the curtain, and they will be dropping soon.
We have merch yeah, yeah, seriously, on serious We've got there'll be
stickers and shirts and other sayings. Look at little previews right there, beautiful,
So those will go live eventually. We're just tweaking some stuff and I
tweeted out a preview of a bunch of the different shirt sayings we have,
so be on the lookout for those. And that's another way you could support
the show. Not really financially because we make negative dollars on that basically,
but just in terms of brand exposure. We do have a funny story.
I do want to very quickly, so when I got our first batch of
orders, they set me two of the wrong shirts. One of them said
all feelings are okay. I thought. I was like, oh, okay,
whatever, I got this shirt. What does that say? Grant that
says, first of all, great design on it. There's some scissors for
those of you who are not watching this, some scissors in the middle of
a multi colored circle, and it says vasectomies prevent abortions, which like,
factually true, I guess, But we're struggling with what side of the aisle
of this shirt comes. I ask you as soon as they and I was
like, is this like a super like like needed to go to someone in
like the bumble fuck Midwest? That it's just whatever? And it could it
could lean either way if it's on the look everyone knows politically this podcast us
I was trying to figure out, like you you noticed that it might just
be right down the middle. It's it's kind of like who's who's Who's got
a problem with this? It would be my question, and that I just
I don't know what the answer is. I should think it's a pro lifer
just because wouldn't they be against vasectomies. I don't really know how that works.
I don't know what their stance is on that it's a good shirt.
Also, I mean it's just a well, it's good, looks good.
I don't know the looks you would get wearing that again, probably about equal
depending. You know, everybody would double take, because that's a wild thing
to have on a shirt, first of all, but I don't know who
you're offending with it. The other thing is, I told you this,
and I know these shirts when anyone, if anyone orders them, we aggressively
skew towards larger sizes. I went up to a double I'm wearing a double
XL right now because I assume it's gonna shrink and I like to look I
just like to wear baggy close to the gym. And that's what I'm doing.
By the way, I'm wearing all this to the gym, and I
see people looking at it and reading it and they want to know what it
is. I'm just waiting for someone to ask me. But it's like a
child size, and so I'm like, that's a whole new level. I'm
all use your children as billboards for hardwood knocks. I know Grant already sent
me a picture. I think that was a mac right so with the shirt,
but are like you using your child to like promote your like whatever agenda
this is. I was very confused, but not basketball lay, but I
thought it was funny. I don't know what I'm gonna do with these shirts.
I think you gotta keep it. Just find like a niece or nephew
somewhere that I'm gonna wear the which is clearly like a like a youth female
shirt. I'm gonna wear the all feelings are okay, okay right here,
I'm gonna show up to the gym like that and we'll see if anyone to
ask me about about that one. No, it's just how you're feeling,
you know. That's by the way. That's why I was like, well,
it can't be a pro lifer because they wouldn't wear the feeling shirt right
like. So I was just so confused. There's just a lot to unpack.
Uh, And we're never gonna know because it's like if you send an
email to te public or and just say like, what's going on here,
the robot will answer you and say does not compute keep I'm eventually going to
email them be like hey, could I get the shirts that I actually order
that. Can I get more of these vest sectimy related Yeah, we'll have
those up in the Hardwood Knocks toy. Yeah. So let's talk about actual
Well we're actually not gonna tell about actual basketball to start. Let's get to
before we get to the Doc Rivers firing, Let's get to the John Morant
stuff he was seeing on IG with. I already forgot the guy's name,
but he was the one who was banned from NBA arenas for a year after
the whole laser pointer incident with the Indiana Pacers. He was on an IG
Live. John Morant flashed another gun. His friend had the self awareness to
like, no, this shouldn't be happening and duck the phone away. You
could argue, well, like why are they on IG live? And I
the Grizzlies promptly suspended him, which I actually don't know what that means when
there were limited from the playoffs already, like all team related activities, and
it's like is he out of the group? Text? How does this work?
So? Great? I mean, I don't have to go do our
charitable offseason endeavors like yet awesome. I don't have to show up for like
whatever. The equivalent of OTAs are cool, fine with me, and so
I have a few thoughts that I would just like to throw it to you.
Is one, this is like the least serious of them all. Are
you really doing this again to stream to a hunt? Did you see it?
There's like one hundred and twenty one people watching this? What is what
are you trying to do? It's one hundred and twenty one. I mean
more people have seen it now. I hate and if there's been and we've
seen it, there's like racial in just rhetoric, like when we come to
this discussion and I kind of hate how we talk about this sometimes and how
it's oversimplified and how people are just like, oh, he's done, it's
over, he's going the way of so and so that's really dismissive, I
mean, racist, just sort of unfair. However, I don't think we
need to twist ourselves into a pret zone and be like, well they were
in the car. He wasn't in like a public strip club, and it
wasn't like he necessarily cross state lines and he could have been I think everyone
was like, well, he was either in Tennessee or Alabama or something,
and they're they're open carry laws are different. And here is my issue.
Even if he wasn't doing I mean doing anything illegal. I purchased the gun
legally. He's in a state or whatever. You already got in trouble for
this once and clearly, given how swiftly the Grizzly suspended him, there needed
to have been a warning if you want to displace blame on part of the
organization for enabling him behind the scenes or so long, go right ahead.
But I'm not here when we live in the capital of the world of just
gun violence, where you're just willy nilly waving a gun around, I'm just
not here for the excuses, especially when this happened already. And finally,
I don't want to hear there just young like argument. He's twenty three.
Do you know how fucking easy it is not to wave a gun around on
an ig live at the age of twenty three. There are dozens of other
players in the league doing it. Twenty three years old is old enough,
especially after you did it the first time, to know not like this is
not okay. And I'm who would have thought that his what thirty six hours
of therapy didn't prove to be a panacea. And my real last thought is
I worry we didn't see him use it this time. But like when they
turned to the mental health aspect of this, I will never doubt someone that
says it, but like, I don't want to see it used as a
shield either, because then it does diminish people who are actually not only dealing
with this but actively trying to improve their their situation, improve themselves, or
feel like actually seek treatment. And there's I hate the way we talk about
it. I've probably said some things that people hate they are just now and
I don't need to mean to stumble through it. But I'm just there's no
there's no caveats, there's no excuses here at this point, There's there's nothing
this was like, this is just an all time fuck up by by John
Morant here And I'm just so I don't even want to be talking about it.
It's really hard for me to not like think about it or talk about
it in ways that are not condescending or like paternal you know, because it
just feels so I the way the thing that resonates most with me is I
can like separate out almost all the particulars like that, you know, it's
you need to consider like it is a gun. You know, that's a
dangerous thing. He's obviously like messing around with Like that, I can separate
out and still like kind of gets to where I'm at on it, which
is like you did a thing that cost you a ton of money and got
you in a little bit of trouble, and clearly, you know, created
the possibility that were you to do it again, you would be in substantially,
like exponentially probably more trouble. And we could talk about I want to
ask you about the suspension that's coming probably from the league in a minute.
Like it's as simple as like you did a thing that you got caught doing
again, and you knew you were going to get in trouble and you did
the thing again. It's like, it's so hard for me to separate out
like the parental like angle of this, because it's just like this happens,
and like, again, this is such a dick thing to say. I
don't mean to compare him to a child. I've seen that said a lot,
and the maturity aspect of this is very real. I'm uncomfortable saying it,
but It's just as simple as like your kid does something, you punish
them for it, they do it again, so now you have to look
at now it's like you're just incredulous because everyone was clear on what the expectations
were and what the consequences for not meeting those expectations would be, and so
now you ramp up the consequences, and the question is how severe will it
be. So I'm kind of receptive to the I don't like it as an
excuse that he's twenty three thing, But I'm receptive to the immaturity argument because
clearly this is immature behavior in the specific sense that like you touched the stove
and it burned you, and then you went back like an idiot and touched
it again and put your hand on it for longer. It's like bad analogy,
but it's kind of just like, how do you not digest the lesson
of the thing you did wrong? And that's and so I would say that,
like the mental health stuff, I was cynical about that as an excuse
from the outset. Again, feel like an asshole being like skeptical cynical about
it. It just never rang true to me. And now I think it's
like, you can't go back to that, you can't play that card again.
I don't think, or at least not without doing like actual work to
address it, not spending two days or whatever it was like for pr reasons,
frankly is what I think it was like. That shouldn't be a hot
take. I think this was a damage control thing the first time Marank got
caught, and so now it's who knows what's gonna happen. But I just
it didn't do anything to dispel my cynicism, and I'm annoyed by how difficult
it is to talk about it without like having to discuss a grown adult like
he's a child, because he's just operating and making decisions like a child would.
So I just I'll just put it to you over under fifty game suspension.
Whoa, I'll go under. I didn't even want to play that game.
That's early, but I was to say it's gonna be longer than eight.
Here's this, it's if it's not. I want to make two things
clear. This is not irredeemable. I don't think John's over. He's one
of the brightest stars in the league. I don't think this says that he's
a terrible human being. No, I just think, like this is getting
out of control. My second one is if it's not I don't know what
the suspension should should be, but if it's not substantial, or if he
just doesn't get one, Adam Silver's a fucking coward, Like this is not
that's I mean, I don't I can't even elaborate on that, so just
you can go ahead like, no, here's the thing. So I think
if this were David cern like, you could name almost any punishment, Like
you could talk about a year suspension, because part of what happened the first
time around is like there was a face to face conversation in which Jah like
expressed contrition and claimed he was going to grow from this and understood why this
was a problem. Clearly none of that was followed through on, and so
I think I think if because Adam Silver must understand that if he doesn't come
down really hard, then he looks weak. Right. But the other thing
is like this is a problem for a league that for a very long time
had a reputation that it was trying to shed, which is like these guys
are thugs quote unquote, like that word was out there all the time,
and it was bullshit and it still is. But I think the league is
still really conscious of how are we presenting ourselves in terms of like how do
we market these stars? Like how do we how do we appeal to the
broadest possible fan base and anybody that's predisposed or wants to reach back to the
like all the Alan Iverson dialogue that was happening, and all that other stuff
that David Stern just like dropped the hammer on super hard. Remember the dress
code, Like that was a real thing that happened, right heavy handed,
like again like paternally like just probably racist. Also, all that shit,
all of it was designed to make sure the league was palatable, to make
sure that the image that players were putting out there was like maximumly marketable.
This is like a reach back to the problem the NBA thought it used to
have in terms of its marketability. So like I would not be surprised,
like fifties a crazy number, right, But when you combine the fact that
he did the exact same fucking thing again, like really soon after he did
it the first time, and said all the right things which were obviously bullshit,
and you've you've got that aspect. You've got Adam Silver feeling like he
has to send a message, and you've got the big business interests of like,
we can't have our most marketable young star who's got a signature shoe line
doing this, because that's just gonna make everyone who's predisposed to think this think
again that the league is just you know, all these you know, these
are immature millionaires with like bad reputations and they're all punks, and like,
I don't think that. I think that's the wrong thing to think. I
think, of course, I don't feel like we should need to say that,
but like, the optics are a big problem for a league that was
like laser focused on cleaning up this exact kind of thing not that long ago.
So that's a meandering way of saying, Like, I do think a
significant suspension is imminent. I don't know what it'll be, but fifty seemed
like a provocative number. I think Lance Robertson in the chat brings up a
nation point. It has to be a twenty to twenty five games suspension enough
to knock him out of any legitimate award. The biggest fuck you that it
could actually be would be, like you know what eighteen games, yeah,
sixty four and like you didn't and I know there's like exceptions, but you
would have to literally play in everything like there would just be that would be
the biggest fuck you. But you don't need to move on to the sixers,
but we have. I think this is a compliment the chat me tin
keekachevitch. I apologize for butchering the shit out of that. I often wonder
why so few of us are listening. Your content is often very good and
rarely not worth listening. I appreciate your guys' effort. We appreciate that Alexander
have a chevics. I'm so sorry. Guys. I think they have a
lot of larger pod following and that they're just transitioning to YouTube. That's basically
it. We do have a much larger We get way more downloads than we
do YouTube views. I can tell you that, but you could also tell
your friend if you would like to see our YouTube views go up and see
you guys get more popular. So I appreciate those sentiments. Do you want
to talk about the doc rivers firing? And I'm not really gonna give you
a choice. I'm just gonna say that you do. Can we start by
it was probably one of the least surprising moves. Now I want to get
into I want to get into the fallout, how surprise you are with this
happening. But did you see the odds on who is going to be the
next Sixers head coach? Yes? I did, as the best odds,
Yeah, throw them up there. JJ Reddick is number one at three to
one. And I just want to say that betting odds as a rule of
them or a reflection of what people are like actually investing in, not of
reality for the most part. And I want to know what type of brand
JJ Reddick has that people decided to flock to him. Monty Williams is second,
Nick Nurses three, Jay Right, Jay Wright. I thought it was
interesting, but probably just because of like the geography of it. Mike Budenholzer
and him are tied for fourth, followed by d' antoni at fifth, and
they mentioned already the reporting specifically said that d' antoni, Budenholzer, Nurse,
and Monnie Williams were all involved, and I think so was Sam Cassell,
who's at eighteen to one down. So Alan Irison, by the way,
lying five hundred to one if anyone's interested. So I mean that's worth that's
worth of dollar. Yeah, why not? I would love it if they
did that. Alan Irison is just coaching the sixth it's a gap year,
like James Harn's not there. Yea, Doctors clearly wasn't the reason that I
thought he'd probably his best season as a Sixers coach this year maybe, but
do you like it's hard to I guess I'll throw doing this. It's kind
of hard to argue against this decision though, right, Yeah, I mean
just from the bait, like you know, his ridiculous losing streak in game
sevens and all this stuff, and you know, you see Rashid Wallace talking
about this, this all comes out like now of course, or at least
gets amplified now talking about Doc doesn't adjust, talking about he puts too much
on the players. That's from Rashid Wallace, not my analysis. Necessarily,
his record is what it is. Then, James Harden just like giving the
most like dead fish handshake of an endorsement was his relationship that Yeah, Joel
Bead's comments were they needed, They needed the full context of what he said
where it was like maybe the answer still wasn't great, but like it was,
but like the James Harden stuff was not. Yeah, yeah no,
I guess, like yeah, pretty foreseeable for several reasons, because because Morey
didn't hire him. First of all, right, Maria showed up after doctor
was there and he was, So that's always like two years, three years,
doc for three more for less than that. I think maybe that's wrong,
but whenever that is the case, like if if the executive didn't hire
the coach, the coach is just on borrowed time. Like that's just like
how it works. The thing that that all this stuff makes me think of
because the other you know, Reddick at the top of that list is kind
of wild to me, and the Toronto interview was kind of wild. We
discussed that a little bit. But you see, all the most of the
other names, the ones that seem likely Nurse Buddenholzer, Monty Williams, all
these guys are just mostly going to swap places, and so it ties back
to the I forget who said it. I forgive me. This was on
Twitter. I saw and you see it happened fairly often when coaches get fired.
But the idea that like it's really easy to look at a situation and
say this coach isn't working for whatever reason. Usually it's just the players have
stopped listening or don't believe that he's the best person to run the show or
whatever. It's really hard to decide who will make this work because there's so
many moving parts and there's so many variables. I mean, the Sixers number
one, like is James Harden going to be there or not? That talk
about a variable for the next coach, and like what kind of coach you
might want or not want depending on if he's there or not. But it's
just really easy to look at like the Sixers or the Suns. Like the
Suns is harder. I think Williams got a pretty raw deal, but it's
easy to say, like, well that didn't work, so this coach has
got to go. But then like it's not like the work is over now,
it's just like you've got to figure out who's gonna make this work,
and that you can just never know. You can never know. So that's
why the same guys are gonna just flop, you know, flip flop,
and Monty Williams will be one place and Buttonholzer will be somebody else. Somewhere
else, and you know they'll all have three year stints and then probably get
fired again. Like that's just that's how it'll work. I do think James
Harden's future is going to inform who they end up hiring. And I think
what's I don't know if the word is interesting here, but like they this
is not I think everyone's putting it is. It's going to end up being
in James Harden's court where if he wants to go back to Houston, and
that's what he wants to do, that's what he's going to do. But
like this, this is not a no brainer for the Sixers. His max
salary next year is forty six point nine million dollars. I'm not I mean,
yeah, if it was a two year deal or something, but you're
not maxing out James Harden for three and four years, now, are you?
No? Of course not. And I want to know. I'm wondering
if this is going to be a consequence of Rob Sheldon says in the chack
ottilieve Harden will be lobbying for d' antoni, wouldn't you? But does Harden
even stay? Yeah, I mean that's the question. I think d' Antoni
might factor in prominently if James Harden really loved playing for him, which by
all intense he did. But like we're talking about the six years, they
might not run into it this season. But like the Dubs, the Clippers,
we're talking about that second luxury tax apron. I'm wondering if another consequence
of that is we're going to see star players not get paid as handsomely as
deep into their careers. We're like a James Harden situation. Now, We're
like, if Philly has to start thinking about that a couple of years down
the line. You can't have James Harden on the books for fifty plus million
dollars because like you're gonna need the wiggle room to build elsewhere. I just
I this is a quick aside. What a terrible decision by the players union
to agree to that. Yes, so bad? Yeah, go ahead,
No, I was just gonna say it like it makes it. I mean,
it's it's bad for the players because it's so clearly a win for owners
who who want to basically have a hard cap, because this is how it's
going to function. And if anytime you have a hard cap, it just
means that the players are getting paid less money. So that's bad, right,
Like the penalties are so because so it used to be okay if you
had deep enough pockets too, and it's never okay. But you could pay
hard and fifty million dollars when he's like a twenty million dollar player, because
that just costs you extra money. Yeah, but now in addition to spending
all that extra money and having all the tax penalties. Everybody listens to this
podcast probably knows we've never really discussed the second apron, But like cost you
a bunch of roster building resources, Like your mid level's gone. Your trade
flexibility goes to like zero. You can't take in money or send it out,
you can't aggregate. You're gonna have your first round or kicked at the
end of the first round. Like all this shit happens, and you need
all that stuff when you're overpaying a guy by two and a half x.
So like that's it will So to your point, you're you're totally right,
Like you have to start thinking extra hard about well we can overpay for a
year in the back end will suck because whatever you know, Harden's gonna age
or whoever else you're talking about. But like it's just the calculus just has
to be different now because that one year where you're willing to overpay and just
eat, you know, we'll deal with the rest of it later. Like
that's not an option anymore for almost any team, no matter how rich the
owners are. Did your And by the way, some of the other punis
stuff where it's not only can you not trade your draft pick seven years out
in advance, so this year that'd be the twenty thirty pick, but if
you hit the second luxury attach apron, I think for two of three years
or two of four years or whatever, that pick just gets moved to the
end of the first round. This is just an I'm sorry, what a
concession by the players. You're fucking terrible. Did the end of the Celtic
Series change your impression of I don't want to say this Stuess at large,
but of Joel and beat at all And I don't mean to I feel like
this is a low hanging fruit in a sense, Joel Embiid is one of
that. He was a deserving m VP this year. We both had Yo
kich though I think right or did you ever be whatever? Like I think
an either or situation was fine, Like, there's always stuff with him in
the playoffs now, like his playoff numbers by and large or not great.
He's always dealing with an injury, and I think that needs to be part
of your team building calculus moving forward as well. Not that I don't think
Joel Embiid can be that. You can't win the title with Joel Emid is
your best player, but can you win the title when you have Joel Embid
is your best player and then James Harden is your second best player because of
what his playoff track record is now and it's just it is what it is.
James Harden had two all time great performances against the Sixers and then like
pretty much every other game sucked there. I think there was a normal game
sprinkled in there. Whatever. Yeah, I like that has to change your
calculus of how to flesh out the rest of the Sixers roster because right now
it's and look, they're a team because the aggregate stuff for that second luxury
tax ship Apron does not kick in I think until twenty four, twenty five.
That's why I think this is going to be a summer of like Bonker's
player movement at least we have the trade market because some of these teams are
going to be trying to be ultra aggressive. There. Your pathway is Maxie
pops into a better than an All Star type player, which it could happen,
or you're using Maxie to acquire someone else who gives you the cushion that
you don't currently have. So I'm just you have to credit the Celtics in
that series for their adjustments. The Ben Taylor did a great video for Thinking
Basketball about how they were just they insert RW three in the location more and
you have Al Horford just getting out of Harden's way. This brought up questions
though about, well, why can't Harden He's good at Ben Taylor for him,
but this way he's great at exploiting like stuff that he knows about,
but can he adjust in real time? So there's a level of the Celtics
definitely won this series, but I can't help them. Back my mind,
I'm like, even if you get James Harden on the submax or if it's
let's let's just say it's a two year max or something like, I just
don't feel as comfortable. And they were one win away from the Conference finals.
So I get that this might be a little too hot taky for some
people. I just don't feel great about this six Ers core moving forward.
And I thought they I thought they had like a really like between depth and
just personnel, but it's they still feel like they need one more really high
end player, or like they really need a smattering of super high end role
players like I'm talking three. So you've gotten to take a giant victory lap,
as Rob Sheldon said, indeed, with the largest scoring average drop by
in MVP in history from regular season to playoffs, he's talking about I want
to get to that. But you've gotten to take a victory lap on your
Nuggets title pick from since the preseason, and you deserved it because they look
amazing. I want to take a little victory lap because when we talked about
this series, as in a preview sense, I thought it would start with
the Celtics are gonna play double bigs and have Rob Williams guard PJ. Tucker
and roam off of him and ruin everything. The Celtics didn't do that until
Game six and it swung the series. So clearly I am a better coach
than Joe Missoula Because I thought that's what they do from the start, and
it absolutely worked. I just did like that was the thing that changed it
and swung the series in the Celtics favor, which like to to like dump
on myself a little bit, like that should have been the obvious thing,
because that's what made you so good last year and made your defense incredible and
got Robert Williams Defensive Player of the Year consideration and was got you to the
finals, and then the Celtics just didn't do that very much. So anyway,
just little little self congratulations because I thought that's no. But the other
thing so about indeed, I think you're right, this is like kind of
not a great time to be evaluating it or to jump to to sort of
I don't know, be definitive about the Sixers and their core and how viable
it is going forward, because you said it. They they they were really
close to making the conference finals and Embiid was clearly hampered, right, Like
I think, I don't think you can talk about anything that happened with the
Sixers without you know, somewhere in the top three in terms of what you
have to mention, is he played with the injury that l C L sprain
that probably had been the regular season, he'd be out for like two more
weeks after today, let alone like back you know, playing in this series.
So like that just makes it so like because if so, by that
logic, if you ran the whole thing back Doc, everybody and just embid
doesn't have that issue, there's a decent chance of sixers are in the conference
finals right now and they're the title favorites in not Boston. That's a totally
like possible scenario. The counter that is embiad is always hurt and his playoff
production always suffers, and so at some point you just have to say this
is the expectation. Now, that doesn't mean you necessarily change how you build
the roster, because every team is like just completely subject to how healthy it's
best player is. The problem is inb just over and Over is hamstrung somehow
by an injury in the playoffs and his production dwindles, and that's just where
we are. So I don't know what the answer is in terms of how
this changes the way they build the team, because you know they should just
say, well, let's put more shooting around the nbad hard and pick and
roll and just see how that works if everybody stays healthy, that's about as
good a chance as we can realistically have. I do think, like you
know, the Maxie piece of it, He's looked really good in some stretches.
I just wonder if his status as like a perma defensive target for the
other team is going to be an issue as like if you need him to
be better than an All Star. I think in terms of playoff impact,
that's gonna make it really difficult. Like he may very well make multiple Star
games during the regular season, and then unless he's better defensively, just he
just won't be as valuable in the playoffs. So the Maxi piece is interesting
to bias Harris. What do you do there? Is he movable? Like
if you're worried about the tax penalties, like holy shit, Like that's that
might be where you start, as Robertson says, maybe trade Harris for a
longer contract. Yeah, but I mean we just talked about how you know
punitive being over that second apron is you want Harris's money, you know,
maybe a little bit less money for a bunch more years, and then you
get into the repeater stuff that's that's brutal. So there are real challenges.
The injury complicates everything because I don't know that you can say this team wasn't
good enough. It just may not have been healthy enough at a particular position,
right, Like is that an oversimplification? Do you have? You know?
Like that's so unsatisfying because you want to just say, well, let's
tweak this and tinker here and do X, Y and z. But you
know, other than bringing Harden back at a number you can stomach, I'm
not sure what you do. The complexion of their off season changes a lot
differently. If you're able to view this through the lens of well, if
it beats healthy, this is fine. You're just at the point where you
can't say that right anymore. And I think, look, I don't know
how they make changes you as lance and mentioned, maybe trade Harris for a
larger contract where you Harrison making thirty nine point three million. That's not a
throwaway expiring contract. I don't think he's a terrible player, but that number
is just it's relative to the value he's providing leads with the Sixers. Isn't
even close to what he's worth. Yea, what are you attaching da him?
They can trade one first round pick this summer, they can trade one
first round pick. Harrison. One first round pick gets you what I mean,
like a bad contract, still a bad contract that runs longer, and
it's just like Harris one first round pick and Tyrese Maxe tyres Maxie gets you
what. I don't even know what the who the best players that you could
acquire with that, And so I think I know everyone got into the discussion,
will will be request to trade and I don't really want to get into
like that aspect. I do think the market for him might not be as
frothy as people think, just because of these injuries and because he's twenty nine
or whatever he is. But my question to you, and it's twofold one,
do you think James Harden is back in Philadelphia next season? Oh?
Man, you just have to yes or no. This one, I'm gonna
say. I'm gonna say yes. And that presupposes that the Houston stuff is
maybe just leverage, which I feel very uncomfortable with because it feels kind of
real. But I'm gonna say yes. I'm gonna say yes too, because
I just can't fathom that he would go back unless there's Look, we've seen
other teams just get multi stars at once, and the Houston Rockets could absolutely
do that. But I do think the fact that there was reporting from Monachellburn
that said Harden would want Rivers fired and they went that route. He has
a good relationship with Mari. I think he'll be back to now. My
question to you is is he back because the Sixers gave him a max of
three years or longer? Oh? Man, I don't know. Well,
because it's Marian, because they have this relationship, you might assume that there's
already an agreement in place, and it dates all the way back to him
taking less last offseason. I think I saw I'll say this, I think
he's back because he's going to get a three year max ish deal and because
they're probably saying, if you would like Mike D'Antoni to coach this team,
that we will make that happen. I think there's probably a couple of things
that are in the offering for him. So the final thing author there is
over under James Harden salary next year forty one million dollars, what do you
make this year thirty six nine? His max is forty six point nine million
next year, So we'll set the over under at forty one million dollars for
the first year of his next contract. I think it's over. I think
he's going over and don't you. I think it's under. I think maybe
it'll be like a four year deal. That's kind of like maybe average is
forty on the button something like that. Alan Davis has sixers want to run
it back with the same personnel, different coach. I'm gonna tell you right
now, they're not gonna win the title next season if they do that.
There's just it can't be the same personnel because you have to plan around what
Harden's going to be in the playoffs, which is sometimes really good, sometimes
preposterously bad, and then you just can't count on a B to be healthy.
You just you can't do it. He's gonna go through an entire regular
season. Maybe he's not as a YO. We had this. I can't
find a comment right now. Did Joel Embiid wear himself? Oh? From
Rob Sheldon? Did Joel Embid wear himself out being so obsessed with the MVP.
I mean maybe, like he dealt with stuff every single playoff, so
he wear himself out every regular season. Alexander says over but declining on the
James Harden number, that might be a good way to look at it too.
Sure, so if the average annual value is forty one million dollars,
would you take the under or over on that? Well? I think probably
still over, just because I don't think it's likely he's going to agree to
a deal that declines of value. The other thing we should note is because
of the over thirty eight rule, they can't offer him a fifth year.
The difference between what the Sixers can offer and what another team can offer on
a four year deal is actually pretty insignificant. So I guess if you're saying,
if you're of the mind that Harden's gonna leave, that's a pretty decent
piece of evidence that the Sixers can't really give him a lot more than another
team could. They can go, so they can go four years two hundred
and ten point one million, and another team go four years two hundred and
one point seven million. Yeah, that's a big deal. The difference would
come if the Sixers aren't willing to pay that and the Rockets are just like,
hey, here's your four year, two hundred and two million dollars max,
and the Sixers aren't willing to go anywhere near that. Yeah, No,
I think that's right. Is D'Antoni the next coach? Is that just
two? Is that that's too obvious of a solution. I kind of feel
like it's going to be Sam Cassell or Mike Budenholzer. Okay, all right,
interesting, it's gonna be D'Antoni. I think it's gonna be D'Antoni.
Well, you gotta stop running back the twenty eighteen rockets plus inbiad like at
some point, right, based on everything else that Moray has done since taking
over the team, like, it seems he's very much interested in running back
those rockets, seems because you've got PJ. Tucker. Who else is there?
Daniel House? I think, And if if this is what happens,
you will just see the hardeningbiad pick and roll, which ridiculously effective all year
and ever since they've been together, surrounded by more shooters, Like that's just
that's just what it's going to be. And so maybe the move is to
just make this into the twenty seventeen rockets. You trade Maxie for like two
guys that are forty percent three point shooters or something like. I don't know,
maybe they just want to run it back and just one last ride with
hard and Mbid pick and rolls a million times a game with three shooters on
the floor. I guess my question is is this is why I wouldn't trade
Maxie. Is do you trust and Beid and Hardened to hold up enough and
play in the playoffs to where you're just saying, well, yeah, we
can trade Maxie just for complimentary playing. Look, max is super complimentary,
but if you're you would skew more towards We want three D guys who aren't
going to create with the ball in their hands. Maybe they can't even attack
in open space like Maxie can. And I just don't think they can just
do that. And so it's almost like I've even if you could get zach
Lavine for MAXI and a first and Tobias Harris, would you do it?
I don't know. I mean, I I just think it's a long OsO
play. It's a lot, that's I just maybe it's a long odds play
no matter what. But we know Moury is obsessed with like how do we
increase our championship equity by seven tenths of a percent? And like, yeah,
it's really unlikely that Embied and Harden can hold up for a full season
in playoffs playing that hypothetical you know style, But like your championship odds and
under any circumstances are pretty slim. So like, yeah, you priced in
the chance that this won't work because of injury, but maybe even that is
still a better you know, it has a better championship equity, you know,
percentage than I don't know, doing whatever else running it back or keeping
Maxie you who know. First of all, what we do know is that
Morey has been thinking about, like how do we how do we add a
couple percentages to our equity? Like since before the playoffs started, Like that's
all they ever do there. He probably has like eight moves, eight moves
mapped out that we haven't even thought about. And I will say, we
want teams to go for it, so I'm not saying they shouldn't pay hard,
and they kind of have to, but I will say, just running
it back feels like Foe going all in. Where's just nice? You know,
you need to make I think some sort of material change outside of the
coach is where I'm at. Do you want to talk about a topic that's
going to be super dated because Game one is in a few hours. But
the Lakers Nuggets series, which I think we're both just enthralled by and kind
of annoyed that we have a deadline for something else related to the lottery that
happens during the middle of it. If anyone wants to be behind the curtain,
what are your overarching about that? Where's Jamie see watching? How what
are your over your biggest overarching thought heading into this series? I think the
most interesting aspect of it to me is how different this will be for both
teams. Again, like that's always the most fun thing for me is you
know, when the Warriors went from the Kings to the Lakers, it was
just like it was almost a different sport, And I think that's gonna be
kind of the same way for this series. I really just want to see
tell me, tell me what you think about this. Yokich is the playoff
MVP, right? I think that's you know, it's been Butler, it's
been seen an MVP, but that's neither here. He's right, So,
but like I would argue that I think Anthony Davis, because of what he
does on both ends, is like not that far from Yokich in terms of
like current postseason value or impact. I think in the Warrior series, Davis
was just he was the guy that changed the whole series throughout it. Just
where is he? How do we scheme around him? How do we get
him away from whatever we want to do on defense? And then how do
we keep him off the offensive glass? How do we guard him? Like
he's just was the guy in that series, which is wild in a series
that involves Steph Curry because usually he's the guy. I think it was in
fact Davis that required the most like attention during that series, and his team
won the series, So that's a factor. So I'm fascinated to see what
Davis can do in the Yokich matchup, and you know, how much is
he gonna guard him? My assumption would be, like the vast majority of
the time, what do the Nuggets do to like the Warriors did, to
try to make Davis be less of a factor than he is, you know,
to make him to minimize the extent to which he is a factor,
which means like pulling him away from the basket, involving him in a bunch
of other actions, like how do we tire him out? How do we
keep him away from what we're trying to do? How do we go away
from him? On the other end, I just think it's going to be
really interesting to see Yokich tested, you know, by I think probably the
guy that i'd put maybe second now among postseason players in terms of impact.
Just it was hard to watch that Warrior series and not come away from that
think thinking anything, but like, this guy is just like such a such
a problem and he's not even shooting jumpers like the twenty twenty version, but
he just his defensive impact is so massive and his offensive impact is like ridiculously
great, but like secondary, which just speaks to how much of a difference
he's made defensively. Can he and Lebron hold up? We've asked it every
series, Like, I just think that matchup, which is like, of
course we're going to start with Yokis versus Davis as like the most interesting thing.
But that's like I don't know what else to do other than start there,
because everything else you talk about tactically, personnel wise, matchup wise kind
of spirals out of that, I feel like, because that's the real meat
of the series. So I thought I had a novel thought and I should
know better. And then I listened while I was at the gym, Humble
Brag at the gym. I listened to the Thinking Basketball preview on this series.
I listened to the Dunker Spot, and I listened to Zach low segment
on it, and they all asked the same question. I was, how
much of this matchup do we actually see? And my thought was, A
d is so good defensively that you can put him on Yo Kitchen. I
think he could do a bunch of other stuff. But like if you put
him on Yo Kitchen the post or if he has to guard Yo Kis from
the outside, and Yokich decides, Hey, I'm not gonna work from the
outside, and like I'm just gonna try and cut up the Lakers defense from
here. It does pull him away from all the other stuff that he's able
to do, and like maybe they won't spam picking rolls because they just want
David's locked onto Nicola Yokich. And so I kind of wondered, well,
do you have Davis help off, like guard Aaron Gordon or somebody and then
do all the other stuff that he's doing and try and get away with,
you know, do you try Jared Vanderbilt he normally defends like advantage creators,
But you try Jared Vanderbilt? Do you try Lebron on Yo Kitch? And
then on the flip side, I was like, if you're Yo Kitch,
I think there are ways. If they're gonna just stash a D like at
the top of the key, give him the ball, Yokich can defend that
fine. But if they're gonna get a D the ball in motion, like
getting him going downhill and he can either go right into Yo Kitch catch and
go that way or he's behind Yo Kitch, I'd worry about Yokich getting into
foul trouble. And if you're the Nuggets, do you try and avoid that
by pulling him off? Davis? And so I I'm like, maybe we
just won't see his head to have matchup as much as we think. And
I'm like, I bet you no one's talking about that. Everyone's fucking talking
about that. So no, real quick, real quick. I just my
response to that is because I think you're right. I think my assumption that
well they'll just match up the whole series is maybe over simplified. But like,
if not, Davis, I think Yokich will just put Vanderbilt in the
basket over and over and over, and you're gonna have to send doubles.
And when you double Yokich, you've just conceded defeat because he's gonna find an
open shooter. And if you like, I don't know what else you do
if it's not Davis, because I think the way that this series ends the
quickest is Yokich dominates in the lane, which is where Davis is supposed to
prevent you from dominating. So like if the Lakers concede, Yokis getting post
ups, getting depositioned, just bullying smaller guy, that's like you're just playing
from behind a little bit. So that's why I take your point. I
think we'll see a lot of moving pieces matchup wise, but I think the
Nuggets would be ecstatic if Davis spent a bunch of time elsewhere and other than
yokis well. And then also if you're the Lakers, the trickle down effect
is if you don't have Davis or I was excuse me for the Nuggets,
if you don't have Yokich on Davis. Also, so you have KCP on
Lebron at that point, Claire Aaron Gordon until that creates all the type of
issues. But you mentioned Jared Vanderbilt. I'm wondering if this is a Jared
Vanderbilt series always a question, is it, or do you just scw smaller
with what we're gonna play a whole bunch of like Dennis Shrewder, Austin Reeves
and Deangel Russell together just to make it harder on the Nuggets to because look,
if they're able to stash anybody on Vanderbilt, like the the identity of
their entire defense is just able to remain intact, which is, hey,
we're gonna mostly play ultra aggressive like at the level of the screen, and
then we're gonna trust everyone behind yo kis to just make these scrambling rotations and
help and make all the right decisions, which they've done to their credit.
That just gets a lot easier when you're able to leave Jared Vanderbilt wide open
in the corner, as opposed to Okay, well, if that's a Reeves
or a Russell or a Shrewder, like they're gonna be able to attack or
you just trust them to knock down threes more. I think if Vanderbilt is
able to play significantly in this series. It's a pretty big indictment of Denver's
defense because what you said should be what happens. We see it over and
over. The deeper you get in the playoffs, if you have a guy
that you don't have to guard beyond the three point line, that isn't like
a pick and roll ball handler or a rim rolling big like, that guy
just gets played off the floor. And if Denver cannot succeed defensively with Vanderbilt
on the floor on offense, for the Lakers, like, that's a real
problem because they should be able to cheat to have advantages to send extra help
off of him, and then the other end it like if he can stay
on the floor, Not only is that bad news that does that mean Denver's
defense is failing despite an advantage. It also means Denver is gonna have a
way harder time scoring. I do think Denver's offense is so good that they're
going to score and the Lakers have the best remaining playoff defense. But like,
if Vanderbilt can play a lot, I think that's a bad sign for
the Nuggets, right because it should shouldn't be able to get away with it,
right, or it just might mean, which would still be a bad
time that he's Oh, he's shooting like nine from the corners every game,
and that's also an issue. The other thing I did want to mention with
this series is I think because that we might see some more matchup reconfiguration than
most people are talking about. There are going to be moments where Lebron is
going to have smaller guys on what It won't be Aaron Gordon, let's just
say, and they need him like we saw it more. They went to
him in the post against the Warriors. I think there was like five post
ups per game against the Warriors. But like his drives, and part of
this is his foot. We know he's playing on that bad right foot.
He went from averaging like over ten plus drives for thirty six minutes to basically
he's averaging like seven for thirty six minutes. Right now, the Lakers are
gonna need him, I think, to be more aggressive, especially if they're
going to put if Dever winds up putting smaller players on him. If it's
if your whole thing is like Aaron Gordon's gonna be locked into Lebron, and
Lebron is not a decoy, but like he's gonna like Aaron Gor's just out
of everything else. Okay, and then like that's sort of a small victory
there. But if the Nuggets feel comfortable enough, like oh, we'll throw
Bruce Brown or KCP or even Michael Porter Junior on him for stretches because we
don't think he has that burst and we're more worried about we have these sturdy
guards. It's in KCP and Bruce Brown and Michael Porter Jr. Is like
he's big and long, he's not like maybe super strong. I think this
needs to be and I say this knowing Lebron's averaging twenty five and five and
just shot like fifty six percent on twos and he caught fire from three.
He is at like thirty nine percent over the final five games of the series.
This needs to me the in my opinion, needs to very much be
a Lebron James offensive series. And I feel like the Lakers have relied on
Okay, we're a lot deeper at guard with Reeves and Delo and Shrewder than
I think anyone ever credited them. But there's also been Okay, we'll watch
more as it going during this and like part of that is we're taking what
the defense can get us. I don't think they're going to be able to
rely on that inconsistency of depth in the sense like they've always had enough,
but it never feels like it's the same guy, if that makes any sense.
When you get Annie Walker and you write that, you know, is
this like he darted in scheming in his head and knows all this, or
is he just look at the Lakers and like, we have so many guys
who you know, can play, but we're just so imperfect that I'm just
gonna try things. Or is he actually not so oh work, these are
our weaknesses. So I'm just I'm pushing the right buttons that no one else
is thinking about. Yeah, I had a thing on Lebron too. I
think you're totally right, Like, not only does this need to kind of
be a Lebron aggressive series just because the Lakers are gonna need to keep pace
scoring wise, It's gonna be difficult, especially in the half court, but
like it needs to be. I don't know how you necessarily accomplish this,
because Denver has been working on avoiding these situations all season. Can you coax
you know, when Yoki comes up to the level of the screen, which
I think he will more often than not. If Lebron is the beallhindler,
can you coax a switch or two, or maybe Lebron gets to drive downhill
at Yokich, Maybe can like that. That's something you're gonna want to hunt
again. The Nuggets will drop a lot, they'll do different stuff in the
pick and roll, but I think you want to look at that. The
other main thing is, like the Lakers during the season second most, second
most percentage of their points in the restriction area of any team in the league.
So like they score a ton at the basket, that's just a huge
strength of theirs, right the shaky three point shooting teams suspect like Lebron's been
cold. You mentioned that all this stuff, if this turns into a three
point shooting series, I think that's bad news for the Lakers. They need
to get stuff at the basket. And in conjunction with the Lakers loving to
just pilot points inside. Denver second worst in terms of opponent accuracy in the
restricted area seventy one percent. Been a problem all year. It's not all
on Yoki. Some of it's schematics during the postseason. I don't know if,
but have they played a team that's tested that week point, I would
argue they probably haven't. Yeah, So that's the recipe for the Lakers succeeding
because they must find ways to score in the half court. That's that's been
their half court offense has sucked in the playoffs. They will depend on transition
offense. Right. The problem is the Nuggets don't run as much as the
Lakers do in the playoffs, but their points per possession and transition is better
than the Lakers. So if you up tempo this game, maybe you tire
Yokich out. But if if I'm Denver, I'm good with that. His
arms might get a little red, but he'll be good, right, His
arms will be read his perfect Maybe some shoulder tightness from outlet passes. But
so if the Lakers want to run, Davis and Lebron get tired like and
the Nuggets are just better at that on a per play basis anyway, So
the Lakers have to score in the half court, they have to score at
the basket, and that's gonna fall on Lebron more than almost anybody else.
So it's not just the Lebron James series. It's a Lebron James has a
score, has to make a bunch of layups basically in the half court for
the Lakers to score enough to keep up, and they look the whole and
I know he deviated from a little bit and last year, like they can't
have like the odd numbered even numbered a D games either. I think what's
critical as good as he's been, even at times on offense, Like I
mentioned this before, you need to get him the ball moving. I will
say these two teams do not despite what the Nuggets personnel might suggest that they're
able to having Michael Porter junior Jamal Murray. These are the looking at the
semi finals alone last and second to last in three point a tenth three,
so like they're not relying on a ton of threes. But if it has
become a perimeter based series, I do think that favors the Nuggets. What
I also do not think helps the Lakers is they are at they're not their
most dangerous, but like two of the fundamental elements of their offense are we
are going to get to the foul line and we are going to get out
in transition, the Nuggets do not foul. So you know what, if
it's maybe they're allowing parades to the rim, that might change it might foul
there. But if they're not sending the Lakers the foul line, their offense
is going to be good no matter what. They're gonna get their defense set.
So the Lakers probably aren't going to be in transition as much. And
so I think you could reasonably go into this, and this might be an
oversimplification, and just say, well, I think that Denver just by default
is going to disrupt not because they're doing anything wild defensively, schematically or superfectively,
but they're going to disrupt two of the core tenants of the Lakers offense,
which is, oh, okay, that's awkward. And then you kind
of have to deal with the counter to that. It's we already think this
might not be a Vando series, Like is this gonna have to be a
Malie Beasley series for the Lakers because they're gonna need that three point volume of
that out in the half court. He's just disappeared from real minutes. And
I think the idea of Malik Beasley is absolutely important to this team. It's
just I don't I'm not saying that he's an X factor. I just feel
like there are more problems that the Nuggets are going to cause for the Lakers
then vice versa, which is probably a spoil alert as to where my pick
is going. But anyone who listens to this podcast knew where that pick was
going anyway, right. I think the only other aspect I wanted to talk
to you about before we get to the pick, unless you have something else,
is how much does Max Christy play? Yeah? Just just enough?
Probably. I'm concerned about the Nuggets because the Lakers defense is really good,
Like we haven't we haven't said enough about how good their defense has looked,
especially with Davis in the game. I think, you know, Yogas is
gonna play a ton that's just because it's the playoffs, and the deeper you
go, the more of that needs to be the case. I think if
the Lakers can just dominate, like hold the Nuggets to just preposterously low level
of offensive efficiency when Yokis is not in the game, I think that's something
I'm looking for ways like tipping my hand too here, pickwise, looking for
ways for it, like what does it look like if the Lakers are successful
and I think a lot of that has to do with the Nuggets just almost
literally don't score without Yokis on the floor, which is not that hard to
imagine, because the Lakers defense bottled up Steph Curry for the most part,
like they've just the defense is good, it's great, Like that's just what
it is. Everybody's playing hard, even though they're kind of small, and
you know when they play, especially the three guard looks with Shrewder and even
de Low and reeves like it's working. So that's one way I could see
the Lakers having success. Do you have any other you know, we've talked
about Lebron scoring at the rim, We've talked about, you know, a
couple other things before we get to pick. How else do the Lakers sort
of create advantages or exploit advantages? Have we have? We covered the bases
because well, I think I think the one you touched upon right now might
people most critical. It's just like when you kind of look at those non
Yokich minutes, which I assume we'll just be aligned, like they'll be the
non ad minutes aligned with the non minutes. Maybe LA's willing to play Davis
more than Denver's willing to play Yokich. That's not in a comment on Yokich
is conditioning. I just think we could see, you know, like the
Lakers kind of Oh, Lebron James is thirty eight, Like we're just gonna
play Anthony Day with forty eight minutes. But the lineups you mentioned, both
these teams playing small Lebron against the Nuggets going small like with Jeff Green and
Aaron Gordon as their day facto centers. That could be huge because the Lakers
have been better without Lebron James on the court during the playoffs. I don't
I don't think. I don't I don't think that that's going to you know
that that's not indictment on Lebron, but I'm saying like that might flip this
series. And the thing that I'm wondering is if you're the Nuggets, and
I get why they do what they do where they don't want to stagger Murray
and Yokis too much. I understand that, Like when we have the Murray
non Yokis minutes, why don't we see I know you're concerned about the defense.
I'd like to see MPJ and Murray more in those stints together and it
might come at the expensive defense, But if the Lakers are also going to
be playing small, why can't you kind of roll the dice on that to
kind of just see, well, Kenry score better with yo Kich. And
look, they've had pockets during the playoffs where they've done well without Yokich.
But during the final I think it was four games of that Phoenix series,
like they were a minus twenty four with Yokich off the court, and like
now, in thirty six minutes with the Yokatro off the court, they were
outscored by twenty four points. They were minus three without Yokich in the game
where they just embarrassed the fuck out of the Phoenix in Game six. So
I'm looking to see if that's where the Lakers can really create an advantage is
during those nono Yokich minutes, because having Lebron without a D, thank you
serie. Having Lebron without a D is so much different than having Jamal Murray
on zone without yo Kitch. Yeah, I think that's right. Do you
want to make a pick, feel like, I know my pick is Nuggets
in six partly out of obligation, because I think I picked them the win
of Thie out the preseason. I will say this is the third strade series
I'm picking against the Lakers in wildly uncomfortable about it, but I just I
look at this team and the Nuggets and I'm just like, they have it.
They have everything they need this year. And the Lakers, I think
you can very much pick out and say they like, they're really good,
they're better than expected. But this is just this all feels like unsustainable and
I feel like they haven't run into the Golden State Warriors with this great team
in theory, but I just feel like they haven't run into an elite team
just yet. And I think the Nuggets are going to be able to expose
them more than any of these other teams because they are such a steady fucking
force when it comes to we're not going to foul, and our offense is
gonna be so good that we're gonna get our defense set. And as I
mentioned before, I really think that that's going to derail two of the core
tenants of Los Angeles's success. Yeah, I don't have a ton to add
to that. I think I think that interplay the Nuggets offense scoring just you
know, as much as it wants and setting the defense and forcing the Lakers
to play a pretty you know, a pretty bad brand of half court offensive
basketball swings it. I'm going Nuggets in seven, and that's mainly because I
think Davis has the ability to almost make as big an impact as Yokich does,
and and with that being potentially in a best case scenario, I think
Davis could be close to Yokich's level, will not outplay him, and then
that leaves Lebron versus Murray MPJ like the rest of the Nuggets supporting cast,
which I think is probably better on the top end but not quite as deep.
I don't know, seven feels okay to me. I just think ultimately,
the Lakers haven't faced an offense this good in the playoffs yet, and
I think maybe the fact that the Warriors weren't quite as good as maybe,
like you said, they're theoretically this great team, I'm not sure we're we
can be certain that the Lakers defense is as good as a numbers say,
and I do think the offense is probably about as bad as the numbers say.
I wanted to and I feel like I kind of danced around asking you
this before. Do you think that AD's defensive impact becomes muted at all if
he is saddled with that primary Yokich assignment. I think that's why that's so
much of what That's also another way that you could disrupt the Lakers. It
is just by not like because when you look at y davers a Warrior series
specifically, where it's like he's coming up to like he's gonna drop back or
he's gonna but also close out or like vice versa, and I just if
you're locked into Yokich, I just don't know that he's able to guard the
perimeter and protect the basket all at once. Yeah, I think there's that's
a great point. I think it would be difficult for because of the personnel
differences, for him to have as big of an impact. But I do
think he's someone that Yokich is gonna have, Like if it is Yokis that
has to guard him, like man, that's a load, right, Like
that, his mobility, his athleticism, if you get pick and rolls working
where he's Davis is one of the best role men ever. Like, I
think they just don't use them like that all the time, which is can
you find ways to do that? I think I guess what I mean to
say is Davis has the capacity to almost equal Yokich's impact, or maybe equal
it if everything breaks absolutely right. And so that's why I think it's a
long series. It could just be the Nuggets are unstoppable offensively and the Lakers
run out of juice. Because we've been at least I've been questioning whether Davis
and Lebron can hold up every series they played so far, so maybe this
is the one where they don't. And it is a short series. But
I think you got to handle the Lakers a little bit. That you made
it this far. I think you're you're still you've got what it takes to
at least make this very interesting based on where you know, six and seven
games, right, that's that's pretty solid for a team, for a playing
team, and started two and ten or whatever it was. Celtics Heat.
What is your biggest overarching thought reading into this series, which I will say
the Heat or a compelling story. I find a series infinitely less fascinating than
the one we just discuss. Doesn't it feel like the Heat just don't like
the not that like they they're going to turn back into a pumpkin but doesn't
it feel like they just don't quite have enough against a team that is one
it's best players healthy, Unlike you know, well I'm picking Nets, I
guess doesn't feel like the Celtics have quite as many flaws on either end to
exploit. It doesn't feel like the Celtics are gonna be like overwhelmed with defensive
intensity. It feels like the Celtics can attack more things than say the Knicks
could, or it just I don't know, but look, have we We've
expressed disbelief in the heat since the play in so like that gives me pause.
I just so before we were way jumping the gun. I'm interested to
see again. Does the double big lineup for Boston persist? Like, is
this something you're going to start the series with? Who does Robert Williams quote
unquote guard which means like who does he ignore most of the time to clog
up the lane? Do you even need to do that if you're Boston?
So that's the defensive side for the Celtics offensively, is this just gonna be
a series where you know, it's extremely high variance, There's gonna be blowouts
both ways, just based on who makes a bunch of threes and who doesn't,
because that's part of the reason it's less interesting to me is because I
could just see it being a maker myths series. But yeah, I don't
know that those are my two things on either end. I don't have nearly
as much to say about this as I do about the Western Conference. Shout
out to Rob Sheldon for being up at two thirty am their time and listening
to us. Yeah, the dual big stuff is interesting because I kind of
feel like, while we did mention that that that's what one, they should
have made that shift earlier in the Philly series because it kind of feel like
the opposite here, I guess, because I guess you could view it this
way. If you play RW three, do you like the idea of,
Okay, well that means Miami's probably gonna play Kevin lovemore. Or do you
like the idea of, well, we're gonna go small and then they'll play
Caleb Martin a bunch of If they decided to play Kevin Love, it'll be
easier to mismatch the hell out of that series. I think for the heat
sake, even if Boston's playing big, I might just consider going with like
Caleb Martin Moore because when you look at how many like weak points Miami might
have to exploit or I mean weak points in the sense like these are small
Gabe Vincent max Strus who's not small, but Kyle Lowry like these smaller guys
or outright defensive liabilities. And then you're starting to look at Boston's perimeter players
and you're like, oh, Gaylon Brown and Jason Tatum and Derek White and
Malcolm Brogdon, holy shit. And so this feels like this feels like the
Heat need to play small no matter what. But I do feel like it's
Boston who's probably gonna dictorate ditt dictate the terms of engagement, I combined dictate
in terms there dictate the style of play, just because I don't know if
the Heat like how and like you kind of run out of bodies too if
if Boston goes big for long stretches, like you kind of have to.
If you want to play big, it has to be loved and at a
bio, you're not going love and Cody Zeller in those minutes, and then
you don't really have anyone else who's just big that you could like your seven
is not gonna be dusted off for this series, so I think Boston could
look at it as well. We get to dictate the terms of engagement and
that's what we'll we'll go with. I don't know that I'm concerned enough about
the Heat's offense if I'm Boston to deviate from what they were doing all season
under Missoula, which is I want to play I want to play five out.
I want to have all of art, you know. I want to
have Hal Horford plus for these wing players that can handle the ball. So
I think that's the style they'll lean into and look Robert Williams a third change
the series a bunch. I just don't know. He had some really bad
moments in that series as well too, where he just looked super slow where
guys are getting by him. I don't know. Do the Heat have the
ball handling juice to make that happen. It'll just come down to, you
know, leaving Kevin Love or Max Strus or even Duncan Robinson is just different
than leaving PJ who doesn't want to shoot right, and that could create some
problems for Boston. But I will also say shout out to rom eighty one
eighties the first time I caught a hardwood Knox pod live. Just be sure
to download the audio version still Rome, Thank you very much. Yeah,
and just plug look stickers. Everybody doesn't so the heat. For all the
credit they received. They shot forty five percent against the Bucks. They then
turned around and shot thirty one percent on threes against the Knicks, And they
were our thirty point six percent against the Knicks, and then they were at
thirty one percent on their wide open triples during the final three games and the
biggest defenders there. I think I have the notes for this somewhere. Yeah,
Caleb Martin two of six, Kevin Loved one of seven, gi Vincent,
oh of seven. During that stretch, you need your role players to
hit those wide open threes and so that maybe there is a pathway to Boston,
saying, all right, like if Kevin Love was just gonna not shoot
well from three anyway, like we could do whatever the fuck we want.
So I think the barometer for this series is going to be how many how
well is Miami supporting cast? And I'm looking at true specifically Gabe, Vincent,
Kevin Love, and even Kitla Martin. How well are those four and
I guess Duncan Robinson too. How are those four or five guys shooting from
three? Because that might really determine how Boston wants or needs or prefers to
play in this matchup. That's what I mean. That's why it's kind of
less interesting because it's a maker miss ultimately at the bottom, it's a maker
miss analysis for the Heat and the Celtics. But like, I just think
of it in terms of options. So if we you know, we can
talk. We have talked about, well, how will the Celtics go to
Biggs to start or will they not? You know, well, it could
work either way. Like they could be totally fine having Robert Williams start on
Kevin Love, assuming the Heats start Kevin Love and saying like, if you
want to shoot, this is the Pja Tucker argument all over again. If
you would like to shoot again, Loves a different level of shooter than Tucker.
If you want to shoot ten threes a game, and if you make
seven of them, we lose, and if you make three of them,
we win. Talking from the Celtics perspective, yeah, we could do that,
or we could just switch everything because like what matchup are you concerned about
I mean, Butler on anybody's a problem. But you know, but beyond
that, like I guess I'm okay with literally any of the Celtics starting five
defenders or like assuming Robert Williams is not on the floor guarding anyone on the
heat, if you flip it, there are real matchup problems that the Celtics
can just hunt. Pat do not have options. I don't think in terms
of like who are we gonna pick on, whereas the Celtics definitely do.
And a lot of that has to do with size and just you know Max
strus well maybe he'll hold up and maybe he'll at a bunch of threes and
maybe X, Y and Z will happen. The problem with the heat for
me is like, okay, well their adjustments are going to be they'll just
do more heat stuff and like try harder and just conjure, you know,
wins out of like grit and a zone defense that Spolster comes up with on
the flight, Like it's hard to imagine the heat, like oh, there's
the button they can push, whereas the Celtics are just like sitting at a
control panel with all these levers to pull, all these different, you know,
they just have so many more options, And I think maybe that's the
simplest way to break down a playoff series is who's who's got the most like
viable you know, strategic or personnel tweaks to make when things go sideways and
the heat just like don't have any I will say do you worry about because
I was gonna say what vulnerabilities are you actually worried about? With Boston and
it feels like they're going against the heat zone could create problems for them because
there's variants to how they play and they end up shooting really well from three
overall in the Philly series, but like they can get topsy turvy from mid
range and they're they're bad at consistently getting to the rim without RW three on
the floor. And then if you put that up against a zone, like
you trust them to bust up that zone and if they're not able to,
you're not gonna see there. Okay, rim volume might not be a big
part of what they're doing. But then if Miami's able to limit the fouls,
and we've seen what happens when Boston kind of devolves into the your turn,
my turn stuff with Jaylen Brown or Jason Tatum, even Marcus Smart,
and like, those are the situations where if they don't get into their early
offense, they're liable to make a bad pass or they're just able to dribble
the ball into turnovers and the heat will eat them alive if that's what happens.
And so I think they're very they're good enough shooting teams where I think
the variance in their three point shooting is overstated, but when you look at
like how upside down things can get from the mid range for them and how
difficult they can be for them to get to the basket in general, is
right, Like, well, playing r W three with Al Horford does that
help or hurt their ability to bust up the zone? I guess having r
W three the rim pressure would in theory help, but like it also makes
you a little easier to defend because you are taking away one of the shooters.
And look, if Al Horford is going to shoot the way he did
for much of that Philly series, that's going to open up a bunch of
defensive options for Miami as well. And so those are my concerns for Boston
where I agree with everything you said, it just feels like they have more
options on the table, and not just more offens lot more options. But
the two things I worry about is will there be variants against Miami Zone?
And then the thing and you alluded to this. I just like, what
are the heat fucking doing right? Like? I just can't just shake this
feeling like is they're just some sort of supernatural phenomena going on in Miami where
I don't want to boil it down to this. It's not a they want
it more or they're gonna play harder, But she's like, are they going
to figure out a way to do this? Because what the fuck are they
doing here in the first place? Based on what we just saw in the
regular season and they don't have Tyler Hero or Victual oldiep I want to tell
hey, Kyle, Every's gonna come off the bench and just be really fucking
good for most of the playoffs. It's just and Duncan Robinson's back in the
rotation, and look, Duncan Robinson is dribbling. I just can't. I
can't wrap my head around what's happening. Yeah, I think there's like a
self preservative instinct when it comes to the heat now in terms like from our
perspective of like clearly we're not understanding something or there's something that we have not
been able to put a put a finger on other than like they will just
maybe they do want it more like at some point we'll learn how to quantify
that, Like maybe they will. Maybe they are just capable of playing harder.
I don't know, because we've you know, we're kind of out of
other explanations obviously, Like they're extremely well coached, their best players are very
experienced in highly competitive games. Uh, they're very very willing to adjust,
adapt, try different stuff defensively, and the effort level never wanes. So
yeah, you know they're just is that sort of scary thing about the heat
or picking against the heat, which I don't have anything else really to say
on this series, so I could spoil it and say, like I am,
in fact picking against the Heat in the series in six, I think
Boston wins in six. That's a weird number to pick for the team with
home court advantage, but I just have to give the Heat the nod of
I think they're gonna the Celtics will have a game where you, like you
talked about their offense just looks like they've never like played together before, and
it's a horrible home games to the first few rounds. Is that like they've
lost it home? That's happened. So I think it's I think it's Celtics
and six. But man, if he'd just come out and win game one
because they want it more and we finally get a metric to prove that.
I'm gonna be pretty nervous. You want it more, metric, These hustle
stacks don't do it for us. No, I'm with you. I have
Celtics and six as well. I fully this is the third trade series.
I'm picking against the Heat, so I'm fully expecting to be wrong about one
of the Lakers or Heat. Did you want to take us out of here?
I think that's a good Okay. I was like just ready for the
next Chris paltrade. Yeah, everybody, thanks for listening. We had pretty
awesome comment engagement this time around. Thanks for watching. If this was your
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all Thanks everybody,