What's up y'all is Drew Sky and I've teamed up with Mountain Dew to produce
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Podcast, Spotify, and wherever you listen to podcasts. Hello everyone,
and welcome to the latest episode of Hardwood Knocks. This is out. I'm
from well Here. It's my fantastic co host, Dan Valley. Dan,
how's it going tonight? I am doing all right? Just watch one hell
of a frizzy Spurs game. How about yourself? Yeah, I'm just glad
that the first quarter wasn't indicative of the quality of the game. It was
super exciting. Yeah, I was a little bit concerned that we were going
to get a clone after that. My one takeaway, at least especially in
the first half, part of the reason the impetus behind how the Spurs got
back in that Yako Peartle is a human or excuse me, Jake Puddle is
a human human Eclipse. Yeah, he's definitely a good defensive presence there.
I think one of my primary takeaways was that I regret being talked out of
including Dylan Brooks on my All herb Banos team, because that dude is just
relentless on the defensive end, and when he gets going as a scorer too,
Like it's not always efficient or pretty, but the energy he plays with
this so fun. I'm with you, and we're recording this right before the
start of Lakers Warriors, so I'm excited to finally get to all NBA and
all defensive teams. Though these are a lot more fun. I think there
are pretty clear cut ones on the first team I would say, but these
were a lot more fun to do and harder to do than the awards.
I think agree, which is kind of why we say that for a separate
podcast. But before we get going on those all NBA and all defensive teams,
I feel like I owe our listeners an update, and that is that
the only thing in my wife's office that I ruined was an old calculator and
a couple pieces of paper, but everything else was salvaged from the great drink
fiasco of last episode. Was she even mad? Not really, because I
didn't ruin a computer or anything actually important. And then when she listened to
the first minute and a half of the actual recording when it was live,
she just thought it was hilarious. I cut stuff out of that too,
because there was some stuff that I said that were incoherent towards the end because
I had no idea what I was not planning to talk to the children without
you, So it was edited a little bit too, so she didn't even
get the raw the raw footage. I mean, she stopped listening as soon
as you started talking, which I imagine many of our listeners do. I
did appreciate some of our listeners reaching out and complaining about our selection we had
the there was the discourse and the hardware Knox Twitter. Someone was very unhappy
that we had or maybe was it just me that had Haliburton over Edwards and
Rookie of the Year or do you have them too as well? Yeah,
they thought it was two numbers focused and I don't even I know I cited
like the vorp thing that's fun at the end, but not like we didn't
even use numbers necessarily justify his entire case. Yeah, I think I didn't
really respond to that one on Twitter, but I guess if I'm responding now,
like that kind of implied to me that Haliburton doesn't pass the eye test,
which is really strange because I think it's very obvious and it actually runs
counter to the numbers, which indicate that his team has been slightly worse with
him on the floor. But to me, it's been abundantly clear how much
better he makes everyone, And I do think that's you know, there's more
a lot of it Edwards stuff. It focuses too much on volume in my
opinion. I know his role overall was probably more difficult, but it's also
difficult to not have a creative license, you know, like what would Haliburton
have done if right Fox was injured for a huge chunk of the year,
like when Edwards had no town is there no devo for part of the season
exactly? And defense too, Like there wasn't even just a comparison to what
Haliburton did defensively compared to Edwards, and I actually think it's fine to pick
Edwards. I just don't think Haliburton is an egregious selection at number two,
nor do I. But that's probably the last we're going to talk about rookies
on this episode, because I don't believe that a single first year player is
on any of our All NBA or all defensive teams. Speak for yourself.
I mean, I feel like I've heard your list. So where do you
want to start? Do you want to go with all defense and then all
MBA or do you want to do all MBA. Yeah, let's do all
defensive first. We had the same exact all defense team on the first team,
So how about you just speak for the two of us here. I
can do that. Yeah. So it kind of aligns pretty strongly with our
defensive Player of the Year ballots, where we had Rudy Gobert, who we
both believe is the obvious front runner for dpoy Draymond Green, Ben Simmons,
Joel mb and Jimmy Butler. It's justifying defensive selections is always a little bit
tricky because the metrics are very flawed as standalone entities, and they don't often
agree like they happen to, with Gobert just having an absolutely monstrous impact on
that end this season. But you just watch all these guys, and for
Draymond Green and Ben Simmons, it's the versatility and the way they're able to
orchestrate defenses from the perimeter while also operating on the interior. Jimmy Butler,
it's just the grit personified that he plays with. If he is fully engaged
and locked in on you, you're just not going to score. And then
with Himbid and Gobert, it's it's the rim protection. It's the ability to
just shut down the paint and create defensive systems around them because there's no need
to worry about that vital portion of half court defense. So all five of
these guys, like, I think their work just speaks for itself as long
as you've watched them play for what like three minutes this season, right,
And who if you throw health out the window, do you think I think
there's the school thought that specifically within Bad and maybe even Draymond Green, do
you view them as a more impactful defender than Rudy Gobert If everyone's playing every
single minute of every single game just based on what they're doing per minute,
I don't think so. It's probably it's closer, probably closest with Draymond Green
because of the impact that he has elevating the performance of his teammates. Like,
if you're picking out a guy who's coaching up his fellow running mates during
live action, it's Draymond Green. He's teaching, He's using moments to teach
without sacrificing his own play, And I think he elevates the entire scheme so
much because of that. But at this stage of his career, like he's
not going to give you that kind of effort and energy for thirty six minutes
a game, for every game of the season. I think that's totally fair.
I would. I think most people say it's closer with bead probably because
the way he can change the shot, probably more so than Draymond Green.
But looking at sheer responsibility, I think you could maybe make a case for
Green, but it's still go bear to me, it's just impossible to make
a case against him. Yeah, and I there are there are players from
our second team selections who are probably I would guess, challenging Butler for a
first team spot. I think he's the weakest entrant among this first quintet,
but like, no one's getting there. Yeah, I'm looking at myself.
There's there's no one that I would put above any of the five like that.
There wasn't even My first team came together very quickly. Right, Do
you agree that Butler was probably the weakest of the inclusions? Though I hate
saying that because there's a in total value. Maybe not if you want to
look at how much he played. Perhaps, but yeah, I mean,
I'm probably probably kind of with It's just wild. I feel I don't want
to denigrate Jimmy Butler because right the only denigration here is like, you are
the weakest of the five best defenders this season. I guess the best way
to put it is, he didn't make the top three of my defensive Player
of the Year ballot, but he essentially made my top five defensive player of
the year ballot, right exactly. He was an honorable mention. He was
at least one of the two weakest of this five. That's the best way
to spend this insult. It's not even an insult. But Jimmy Butler will
probably take this as motivation because I'm sure he listens hard with Knox and he
might start his workouts at like two thirty six instead of two forty. Am.
Wow, yeah you think that late? Yeah, that's true. I
don't know if he's been slacking quite like that this season. Who's on your
second team or did you want me to kick off the second team? I
can kick it off, that's fine. I mean, I think we differed
a lot more here. This was really hard to pick. So my selections
were Drew Holiday, Janni Santa To Kumbo Bam Auto Baio, Miles Turner,
and Clint Cappella. So I've just this ginorm jumbo size lineup since positions don't
matter for all defensive selections. But I'll have to give like so many shout
outs here because there were just a bajillion candidates for these five spots. So
I have written down apologies to Dejante, Murray, Batist, Table Lu Dork,
Mhillbridge, is og Onanobi, Dylan Brooks, Kawhi, Leonard, Paul
George Norland, stillwell, Fred VanVleet and t J. McConnell, and I
still left out people. There are still snubs from my ridiculously long list of
snubs. Yeah, I had I don't even Kawai was a snub of mine.
I felt very awkward leaving him off the second team he played. I
think there's at least one person, maybe two, that you could justify putting
him over. But I couldn't shake two of my inclusions, and they were
both in your honorable mentions. I couldn't. I think I was a little
bit more liberal with I didn't care about playing time as much during this during
this one, and I was really trying to look at, like more of
the stuff that's just stood out to me over the season. So I had
if you want me to go through my second team, you want to go
through yours first. No, I mean I already listened him out. I
would just say. The only place where I kind of veered away from that
minute's threshold was with Miles Turner, who had he played twenty more games,
would have been in the defensive Player of the Year conversation. Oh, I
don't know why I only heard you list off your honorable mentions, but but
I had Michail Bridges, Dejanta, Murray bam aut of, Baio, Drew
Holiday, and Janice attempt to Kimbo Jannie is probably the one that I think
you could make a case for to go on first team if you really wanted
to. Would be my guess. You know, I really thought about that
with both Drew and Bam Auto Baio, which is interesting because those are the
three we had in common. Yeah, and look, Drew, you know,
I'm mister Chris Middleton. The second best player on the Bucks this year
was Drew Holiday, and it might have been by a substantial margin because of
the breath of responsibility on the defensive end. Just dude, who can defend
any guard, any guard and then most wings and just just do it.
And I I constantly look at the impact he has on a possession to possession
basis when you look at his activity, when you look at how consistently he
just going up against opposing stars, and it never seems like he he wears
down. It doesn't feel like there's a switch that he needs to flip.
He's just always go, go, go, and it's it's always against the
most toughest, against the toughest, most toughest well assignments, and there's it
feels like there's no respite for him. I guess we'll get where. You
look at Janice and he did a lot more switching this year. I think
his overall assignment difficulty statistically when you look at partial possessions, was slightly harder.
But like Drew Holiday just doesn't have a break. He carries perhaps one
of the five or sixth biggest single player workloads in the NBA on the defensive
end. See, I'm still struggling to wrap my head around not having Yannis
on the first team because he is the reigning defensive Player of the Year and
yet like he might have gotten better this year on defense, but he still
doesn't feel like he's one of the five first teamers. And I wonder if
that's just another example of like how we're slightly fatigued on Janice's consistent excellence,
and you know, when you go over the first team, you probably could
be like, wait, playing time heavier and say Jannis can be in there
over and beat or Jimmy Butler. But yeah, it's it's tough to delineate
between some of those guys. I don't think Murray has gotten enough credit this
year though it's just one of the best on ball defenders in the NBA.
He actually started the playing game with the Grizzlies by getting a steal and then
for a steal and then from ran too Yeah, scoring and transition like that.
He could be a professional pickpocketer if he wanted to make millions of dollars,
probably make more money that he's making right now because of how Smoothie is
with it. I get that he doesn't have like the same scope as Drew
Holiday because he's not going to go up against those like bigger, heavier wings,
but he is just so tenacious on the ball, and I do I
don't know that it's gotten lost in this, but there's either a tendency to
think that maybe it's Derek White or that the Spurs just don't have that blue
ship cornerstone. It's very clearly dejan Day Murray, and that gets too much
into his offense when you have that larger discussion. But he's still fantastic on
defense and then Bridges. I think he graduated from being an underrated player this
year, but I still think everyone looks at him and says, oh,
he's this fantastic team defender, and I still think he does a lot of
really good one on one stuff and you look at him, just see some
of the assignments that he's had the shoulder. It definitely helps that he had
Jay crowder by a side for minutes this year, but he does a ton
of the heavy lifting through the Phoenix suns on that side the floor. He's
so smart to where I guess if you're going through these five, i'd probably
say the second best team to I mean, Jannis has to be up there
or even Bam. I don't, let's not get into that pecking letter.
But he's just he's the fact that he's an amazing team defender, and it's
just one of those guys where there's no such thing as gambling because everything is
so cold and calculated when he's away from the ball. Not that I don't
like watching defense, but mcal Bridges is someone that I can zero in on
on defense and never take my eyes off of. I don't hate of the
selections. I mean, there were two of the most prominent names on my
list of snubs there, and I just I wonder what it's like to be
de Jonte Murray and have to bend your arms at all times so your fingers
don't scrape the floor. That dude is just so long it is It's ridiculous
how easy it is for him. To impact passing lanes or poke the ball
away just because it's like he has two arms where a lot of players have
one. Did you give any consideration to Marcus Smart. Yeah, he was
like the first name off my list of snubs, and I considered adding him
back in, but ultimately I didn't want it to grow past a dozen,
so I had to make a cut somewhere. But I think like, and
it kind of ties into why Miles Turner and Clint Capello were my two second
team selections you didn't have. I didn't view Marcus Smart this year in particular
as like a scheme altering force, and that's kind of where I tended to
gravitate to, which is probably why my team is so center heavy here.
Miles Turner was the Pacers defense and Clint Capella was the unquestioned spark for the
second half defensive turnaround from the Hawks. Their rise coincided with him becoming such
a crucial part of that rotation and getting healthy and being fully impactful and proving
that he wasn't just some product of James Harden's greatness in Houston. So for
me, those two guys elevated the entire unit enough that I wanted to give
them more credit than guys who are probably quote unquote better defender, similar to
what I was saying on the previous episode about Ben Simmons and Rudy Gobert,
where the versatility in all around excellence of Simmons might make him a quote unquote
better defender, but he doesn't have as much of an impact. I get
the Capella one. If I were going to go with Miles Turner, I
think I would have probably been more inclined to like throw out the plank,
given how much time he missed towards the end of the year consecutively. I
would have found a way to shoot Horn and Ogan and Obi in there.
And I really tried to find a way to shoot Horn, Ogan and Obi
in there. But then I got into the issue of, well, how
do you justify that if Turners not there just because of the playing game as
well, and then also the Bible was then in that discussion, and so
I ended up actually considering playing time more than I thought I was going to.
And I don't really regret how the second team turned out. But Anna
Obi was, for me personally, was the toughest cut to make here.
I think that was tible for me, but I get the arguments for a
lot of these guys. I feel like you have a guy who could defend
eight players at once, but can you do it for thirty five rants a
game would be the question. The playing time concern is a big one there
because it's not due to injuries. It's due to not being a prominent enough
part of the rotation. That was the primary argument for me not including him.
Do you want to is at it? Any other thoughts on All Defense?
Anyone else who was just super tough to leave off, or people who
are going to be expecting to see Andre Drummond didn't get any concer duration.
You know, I really thought about Damian Lillard this season, but I just
I couldn't do it. Someone's going to give Andrew Wiggins an All Defense vote
this year. It's going I'm not that he doesn't deserve it, but someone's
going to. That's going to be the one. I think that's the player
where it's like, oh, that's interesting. I haven't really thought about who
might get credit and doesn't deserve it. Just look at the defensive rebound category
and you'll probably find someone. Yeah that's fair. Now is the chance to
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That's Reliability Investment dot com. Do you want to take us through all MBA
first team? Yeah, so the first team, and we're gonna kind of
go through these a little bit quickly because we've talked about a lot of these
players at nauseum at this point. You know what I was going to say,
Should we do? You just want to go like center, center,
center, get through all three teams and go buy position instead of jumping around
teams. No, I don't. I don't think I do, just because
the positions are so strange this year. Like we have nicolea Yokich and Joel
Mbid both on the first team. They're both centers. I do not have
both of them on the first team. Well you should, No, you
should because Darryl Moorey is pissed right now. Do either of them defend forwards
enough? No? But they're listed there, So let's put the best players
on the on the best team, which is why I have Luka, Don
Chich, Damian Lillard, and Stephen Curry on this. Luka don statistically defend
small forwards is the position. It was power forward he defended most I know
tracking did. It's not perfect. If I was going to justify including anyone
who you know, Don Chich or an Embiide or Robert it had the data
had to line up and with done. Did I think his position estimate on
defense was two point nine or something that it averaged out to be so had
to be Ballingdeck's fantastic site. Yeah, so I think the only the only
place we disagree then is that I had him Bide instead of Damian Lillard.
And for me the really tough decision here. Steph was a lock and Beide
was a lock for me because I was just gonna take advantage of the positional
eligibility the NBA officially granted him for this, and Yokich was very obviously a
lock, as was Jannis, So for me it was done versus Damian Lillard
and it was an impossible choice. But ultimately, like Don's team has had
more success and he has been even more integral to that success somehow than Lillard
has been to Portland's. That's what the argument boiled down to for me is
don Chitch is responsible for everything that Dallas does on offense. His supporting cast
is not the same game that Portland's is, and yet Dallas is a better
team and it's because of how well Don chech has played. And we've talked
about it before, but I think it's it's been too easy to dismiss the
level at which he's played this year because it still feels like a relative disappointment
because he came into the season as the odds on MVP favorite. Dallas is
supposed to ascend into like the top three conversation in the West. It didn't
and he isn't going to win MVP. Therefore it's viewed as a disappointment even
though he's putting together a historically excellent season. So your first team then was
Stephen Curry, Luca don Chi, Joe Johannis Kitchens. Yeah, that's four
of those guys are just locks or the right the step Ye or Steph Janis
Yokich. Because I guess people the way they fux and fiddle with their bowts,
those are on Those are the just whatever your bout looks like, those
three are on it. I then had you have one of Game or Luca
is the like you have like those are the four guys. I had both,
and I think it also for me it was I don't know that I
felt like I needed to give Clint Cappella a band out, a bio third
team consideration for centers, it made more sense for me to pick up that
extra guard spot by going with Don chitch Here. And he was also top
five on my MVP ballot, and so this just felt right. So I
wonder if we have any different differences in the top ten then, because my
second team is Damian Lillard, who's on your first team, and vice versa
for you, because I know you'll have him beat on your second team.
But I also had I'm just kidding, go ahead, sorry, just this
look of shock and terror, like we're gonna we're gonna publish this. Shall
we start over? My second team is Damian Lillard, Chris Paul Kawhi,
Leonard, Jimmy Butler, and Rudy Gobert. We differed by one player,
so I had Joel Embiid Jimmy Butler, Kawhi Leonard, Chris Paul, and
Devin Booker is the one that I think is going to surprise people. Look,
this dude average over twenty five points for US this game. That was
with seating a lot of the offensive control the CP three. The Suns destroyed
opponents when he was on the floor without CP three. I do think he
was definitely more engaged defensively, but I would fall well short of saying that
he was a good or even close to average defender. I think when you
look at other considerations, and some of them are going to be considered on
the third team, he had the edge in the minutes that he was going
to end up playing or just sheer games and staying healthy over a Donovan Mitchell
over if you were going to consider Deanon Fox, Kyrie Irving. And the
thing that really swayed me is Chris Paul was going to be an All NBA
lock for me. And I couldn't get around the fact that I think Devin
Booker is more valuable to the Sun's overall the number of double teams, the
frequency with which he draws double teams, I'll say, the percent of his
possessions slightly higher than CP three. His decision making out of them, it's
incredible. I would say it's better than you know, you look at some
of the guys with similar assist numbers like Adjason, Tatum and him, I
think were identical in the assist they average per game. And that's not to
shill over just Tatum, who is absolutely fantastic going to drop fifty burgers in
the playing game. Let's see if he does it against the nets. But
the decision making from book they don't play defense, that is true. It
seems smarter from Booker and just more complicated still, and there's just a level
of him creating shots that and I say this whole time that just otherwise wouldn't
exist if he wasn't on the floor. I know he had his crunch time
struggles, and a Tatum and a Chris Paul all they outperformed him in those
situations. I I just I watch him. I see the attention that he
draws even away from the ball because he's a fantastic cutter, and I thought
they should have got him moving in more of those situations. I think because
of how much they sort of split him and Chris Paul up. This year.
That's probably why it didn't happen as much so the burden that he's carrying
there and this is just like, you know, shooting above fifty percent on
twos. He was above fifty four percent this year, I believe, and
scoring this much, passing this much. This has been a thing for like
three or four years now. This is not new, and I don't consists
he doesn't have to be part of that because I'm looking at just this season.
But it's almost amazing to me that he's done churned out these type of
numbers, and it's because the Suns haven't been good. He didn't really ever
garner consideration. This year probably provided a window of opportunity, though, just
in the sense that Kyrie Irving played more. Could you really justify picking Devin
Booker or Chris Paul over Kyrie? I I don't know, but I think
Devin Booker maybe second team will be ambitious to some people, but when I
look at my third team guards, it doesn't feel like it to me at
least. That's probably the one of mine that I think is going to rankle
people and catch them off guard. But people who listen to this podcast know
how strongly I feel about Devin Booker's value to Phoenix. I think Devin Booker
would have been on my fifth team. How do we extended it? Which
I really don't even mean as an insult because ultimately, like the way my
ballot was structured, I'll go ahead and spoil it now. I have Damian
Lillard and Chris Paul as my second team guards. I have James Harden and
Russell Westbrook as my third team, and my honorable mentions were Kyrie Irving and
Bradley Beale. And I think Booker is just a hair below that tier for
me, which is fine, Like that's still a really lofty level. And
I don't hate the argument at all that you're making for the second team selection.
In a lot of ways, I think that Devin Booker might become the
next generation Demarta Rozen, where there's a little bit of a discrepancy between the
advanced numbers and the eye test. In Derozen's case, it was that his
teams didn't often succeed with him on the floor because his playing style wasn't necessarily
cohesive with those around him. With Booker, it's that he doesn't create enough
disruptive defensive possessions to measure out as even remotely good. On the defensive end.
He turns the ball over a little bit too frequently, and he's not
that accurate from the three point arc. But what that all overlooks is the
ridiculous difficulty of his role. You can't those numbers just aren't accounting for the
defensive pressure that he receives on a nightly basis, the tough shots that he's
asked to make over outstretched arms from late shot clock situations, and in these
bailout possessions that drive down the numbers. It doesn't show how much he's improved
as a distributor who gets a lot of secondary assists because he draws so much
defensive attention. He's way better than the numbers indicate. So your your second
team guards were Dame and Chris Paul. Your current team was what again,
was James Harden and Russell Westbrook. I'm curious as to I get the Russell
Westbrook thing because he came on so late in the well. I won't say
so late, but he was a force of nature for a good joke of
the year, right why? And I'm gonna do so. My third team
guards are Reavy Beal, which is funny. It's funny that we're opposites,
Kyrie Irving and Radley Beal, so we just flip popped the teammates. I
literally have Russell Westbrook parentheses shouts to Kyrie and Beal. The I have Russell
Westbrook was put on my fourth team. I have a fourth team list here.
But so anyway, why did you pick James Harden over Kyrie? Kyrie
ended up playing more minutes than Harden this year, and I think you have
to throw Harden's first eight games you do, because his the Houston tenure doesn't
help him at all. Yeah, it definitely doesn't. It does quite the
opposite where it still holds him back. But what he was able to do
in the one thousand, six hundred and nine minutes that he played for both
teams combined still superseded what Kyrie Irving did in his one eight hundred and eighty
six minutes. I mean, it's easy to hate on Harden's playing style because
it's a little bit abrasive to watch. It kind of exploits the rule book,
albeit in legal fashion, and then you throw in the disaster that was
his Houston Rockets tenure during this twenty twenty one season, and I think it's
easy to overlook just how ridiculously effective he is as an offensive basketball player.
With the nets, He's still averaged twenty four point six points, eight point
five rebounds, ten point nine assists. He shot forty seven point one percent
from the field, thirty six point six percent from from the from three point
land, and eighty five point six percent from the line on huge volume.
From both of those latter two categories, He's He's an offenssive force. He
completely warps what defenses can do in a way that Kyrie Irving doesn't because Irving
is a one on one maestro who's going to show off the ball handling wizardry
and break down any matchup. But he is not a scheme altering force because
you're still looking to guard him in those one on one situations with a little
bit of help. You have to completely game plan for James Harden in a
way that you don't necessarily have to for Irving. So to me, even
with all those negatives working against him and the limitations in the playing time department,
he's just such an impactful player that I could not leave him off.
Kyrie's efficiency, I guess was just too much for me. You're looking at
some of who Ever's twenty seven point six assists fifty six point one percent on
twos, and these are not like gimme twos that he's given. He finishes
from all over the place. I feel like he almost makes some of his
layups more difficult on purpose, forty point two percent on threes. His shot
difficulty is still exceedingly hard, and I get Hardon is clearly Hardon is the
better player, He's the better passer. I'm not gonna compare their scoring numbers
because Harden made and I think this was a huge decision, and maybe that's
part of his NBA case. Aike decided that he was going to be the
one that would power the point guard position when there were when it wasn't just
him alone, but when they're i'll say multiple stars on the court, because
we saw so little of all three stars on the court. But Kyrie Irving
was just as valuable to me in those limited star minutes where when you look
at how the Nets were playing offensively when he was the the only star,
they didn't offensive rating of one twenty without durand or hardened on the floor.
And then you had Kyrie, the defense was clearly a problem. But adding
all that to the fact that I viewed the playing time gap as a bigger
one than it actually is because I threw out those eight games in Houston.
For James Harden, it was too tough for him to overcome. In my
book, I think look guards were impossible for me here. I think there
were. There are definitely snubs where I'm looking at forwards and I don't I
really don't feel like there were snubs for center. If you're gonna get out
of like bend out of shape about Bam or Compella not being on here,
I don't, you know. I wish the NBA would get rid of positions
for this. I'm just a little bit surprised. I get I could see
almost the Russell Westbrook versus bal comparison because of how much Westbrook powers the offense,
even sometimes to a detriment. He watched him shoot the Wizards out of
the playing game versus Celtics, and it's not like be able to spectacular that
game either. But he's just more has a ton more responsibility than Bradley Beal's
a playmaker. I think that Kyrie's is at least more comparable to Hardens.
And look again, the efficiency was just absolutely off the charts. And he
had I call it a fifty forty ninety season with twos. I mean he
had it anyway, but he had a you know, a fifty six forty
ninety two season when looking at his two like, that's just that's wild to
me. It is fun that it was Hardened verse Kyrie and Westbrook verst Beal
in both cases for those guards spots, and for me, it felt like
a crime to leave Beal off. That was the really tough snub for me.
Ultimately, his shots were still through the roof for me. But I'm
curious, System, what was your reasoning for putting Russ above him? You
know, you said that Russ shot them out of the play in game,
and you're right, But without Russ there wouldn't have been a play in game.
That's ultimately what it comes down to. It's more than just Westbrook versus
Beal. It's Westbrook empowering the Wizards to believe they could make it that far
despite the horrible start to the season and the injuries they had already suffered.
Just the energy with which he plays every single night is contagious, and that
to me is something that isn't going to be captured in the numbers, which
might still favor west Brook, but it pushed him ahead. Where as good
as Beal is and as good as his leadership traits are, he did not
inspire that team to the same level that Westbrook's unrelenting motor did. It's funny
because I'm not sure that I think it's a definite discussion, but I wouldn't
have had Russ as my alternative to Bradley behel Er Kyrie and so what you
have I'll get into that when we get the audiable mentions. Who did you
have as your third team forwards? My third team forwards were Lebron James and
Julius Randall, And it was really hard to leave off Zion Williamson. Oh
you know, I had Paul George's the next forward up for me. He
was tough. He was after Zion for me. Yeah, but you can
take just walking stick because we have the same two players here. And I
think I'll briefly say, if you want to leave Lebron off because he missed
twenty six games with the total with that ankle injury, I kind of get
it, but he was for me. I don't think it was a Sea
premonial award. When he was in the MVP race, he was legitimately in
consideration for that award when he went down, and he was so good this
year, even on defense, that I don't know how you don't he would
have. I thought it was going to be before we ended up missing so
much time. After the Angklan, she was like, oh, there's no
way he gets bumped off of first, And I was like, you know
what, but there's no way he gets bumped off of second. I had
trouble knocking him down to third, but you almost had to because he missed
like thirty three percent of it, more than thirty three percent of the season.
Yeah, I totally get it if you do want to leave Lebron off.
And I really really hate using the Look how bad the team was in
his absence, you know, like the classic case being like the Indianapolis Colts
when Andrew Luck retired and suddenly it was like, can we give MVP to
a retired player? I just I hate that argument, But look at how
bad the Lakers were without Lebron James. Yeah, I I that's the that's
the argument is their half court offense is still entirely I mean their offense and
they're half court offense, though falls off a cliff. It becomes drippy,
droopy mush when he does not on the court. That's a nod towards something
maybe maybe people who are listening Whilso or No. But yeah, I couldn't
leave him. I couldn't. I felt weird leading him off second and I
thought about putting him over Kauai. But you look at just a playing time
discrepancyne It's like, you can't do that. It's Kali. Yeah. Julius
Randall, We've talked about his most improved player case a lot. We've said
that we think he should be in the MVP discussion potentially as a top five
candidate, certainly not to actually win the award, but on the ballot.
Nonetheless, if you've watched those baseline fall away jumpers that he's made, and
how he sparked kind of a moribund New York offense, the defensive improvement,
the improvement as a passer, the energy, the culture change that he's sparked,
how do you leave him off? Zion Williamson has been such an exciting
player he is the Pelicans already at this point. Paul George just a phenomenal
season when he was healthy. You know, I've called him one of the
more underrated players in the league now because his playoff reputation somehow supersedes the level
he plays at. He's amazing. But Julius Randall totally reinvigorated a down to
the dumps franchise, carried it to a top four seed in the Eastern Conference,
played at a near MVP level. You can't leave him off, no,
and it's there was just this material change in his game, making smarter,
more difficult passes. And the other thing for me too, he made
more step back threes this year that he did in his previous I think six
seasons combined seventeen to forty one on step back threes. I know he's taking
the baseline jumpers. Those are different play data shots player, excuse me,
tracking data shots seventeen of forty one, which is on step back threes.
That's wild. I was surprised when I've looked that only fifty three percent of
his made baskets came unassistant. Doesn't that surprise you because it feels like it
feels like it should be way higher. It feels like it should be more
like one hundred and five percent. But his level of importance to the Knicks
offense is just through the roof. And when it came to I don't necessarily
think he's more important to the Knicks on offense than Zion is the Pelicans,
but I do think he can do more things as both a passer and the
scope of his shots just because Zion he doesn't need. I'm not saying he
needs more variants in his game, and we've talked about there's more directionality to
it than just going straight towards the rim. Still, there's just a wider
there's there's more in his arsenal to do. And then with Paul George,
for me, it just came down to Julius Randall was responsible for more of
the offensive share to New York than Paul George wasn't you know. And look,
Paul George, it was tough to He was so good this year,
so incredibly good, and I can't believe he became such a meme. I
remember when he signed this extension and people were just like shocked that they gave
him that much, and it was like, I know, He's had some
bad playoff stretches, but Paul George in the regular season, even leave it
at that, is a top fifteen to twenty player hands down. I think
you're selling him short when you say it that way. He didn't make All
NBA, so it can't be selling can't be selling him too short, right,
That's fair. But I guess when I do those player rankings, it's
taking more than just the single season into account. There's it's projection and hindsight
when you're doing overall player rankings. Though, I would say Paul George is
definitively a top twenty players, but also Paul George probably makes the top fifteen.
If we're throwing positions out of the out of the window, I think,
I think to me, Paul, I view Paul George Moore as a
top ten to fifteen player than fifteen to twenty. Maybe we're just splitting hairs.
I'm probably with you. I'm just looking at who would be you know
a lot of the guards, maybe specifically this year, would you bounce in
favor of him? Yeah, that would be that would be the third team
guards, the third team center for me, because I took the low hanging
fruit the NBA offered. That's right. So you're a third team center is
Bam Autobio with a shout to Clint Capella. I have Rudy Gobert. It
had to be Bam if you were going to structure your ballot the way they
did it. And I have Rudy Gobert because I didn't put two centers on
one team, so he I think Rudy Gobert, by the way, has
a case over Joel Embiid just based off the minutes he played this year.
But Joel Embid is just so dominant on offense. Even though Rudy Gobert is
good on offense, Joel Embiad is just dominant. I think I still have
I don't. I'm not sure it's that close. Like if we're talking about
Embiad as a potential runner up in the Defensive Player of the Year race and
then his offense is just gonna blow Rudy Gobert's offense out of the water.
Underrated as it may be, well, that's the reasoning. But I'm saying
if you're I'm independent of those discussions, if we were talking about just because
those are colored by the fact that we had those discussions, right, But
like, if you're looking at this, I think you could. It wouldn't
shock me if we see Himbid make third team and Golbert makes the second teams.
I don't agree with it. I'm just saying could be close. I'm
gonna be totally shocked, especially since he's foward eligible. So let me run
through my final rankings really quickly. I'm gonna go buy positions now that we've
wrapped it up. My first team guards were Steph and Dame. My second
team guards were Devin Booker and Chris Paul. My third team guards were Kyrie
and Bradley Beal. My first team forwards were Luca, don Chich and Janis.
My second team forwards were Kawhi and Jimmy Butler. My third team forwards
were Lebron and Julius Randall. My first team center was my second team center
was Embid, and my third team center was Rudy Gilbert. All right.
My first team guards were Steph and Luca. Second team guards Dame and CP
three third team guards James Harden and Russell Westbrook. First team forwards with heavy
air quotes Jannis and Joel Embid. Second team forwards Kawhi and Jimmy Butler.
Third team forwards Lebron and Julius Randall. Remove the air quotes now, first
team center is Yoka, Second team is Gobert, Third team is out of
Bio and then my honorable mention team, my fourth team, whatever you want
to call it, would be Kyrie Irving, Bradley Beale, Zion Williamson,
Paul George, and Clint Capella. So I would have had Bam, Zion
and Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and then I had Trey Young. That
was the toughest guard cut for me. I don't think he's gotten enough.
Thank you. I appreciate that he's really good. I know the floater wasn't
falling for large part of the year, but he's just still a He's a
mind fuck when you watch him playoffers. If you're a defender, I just
don't know what you're supposed to do against him. Still, so oh,
I mean, you don't have to tell me twice. But for me,
the reasoning is that the Hawks rise did not coincide with availability from Trey Young.
It coincided with Bogdanovitch getting healthier, It coincided with Clint Cappella getting healthier.
How look at the coaching change. Look the actual toughest cut here for
me, By the way, Jason tam I didn't know what to do with
when you're looking at the fourth team cuts, he was the one that I
had lived. I didn't make a fifth team, but then I had,
next to Zion and Paul George, I have Jason Tatum wts. I think
it's just like playing game doesn't count, but he was. Any who wants
to make that argument, there's just it feels like there's a limitation on his
shot selection, where it's he can do all the things people want him to
do, but he doesn't always get to the rim. He can bail out
on his drives too often. And where you look at Devin Booker and Chris
Paul, they're so deliberate with the mid range jumpers they're taking. He just
feel more haphazard and I just don't, you know, splitting hairs again.
But that's why Tatum. But I just felt like he deserved a will mention
some form because he was spectacular this year. I'm glad you mentioned that.
I think that about does it for us, though correct, they're rare under
an hour episode. We tried to make it in under thirty five minutes,
but it's us, so whatever. Guys, please remember a rate. Guys,
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shout out to the one the only first Team All NBA forward, forward Joel
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