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Listen to the Dues one with Drusci on Apple Podcast, Spotify, and
wherever you listen to podcasts. Hello everyone, and welcome to the latest episode
of Hardwood Knock. Because this is Adam Promwell here with my fantastic co host
Dan for Valley. Today we're going to be playing buy or Sell with some
takes on the Eastern Conference's fifteen teams. So Dan and I are going to
alternate as we go through these teams alphabetically and put forth a statement, whether
about an individual player, the team is a whole, future, trade,
aspirations, whatever the case may be, something where we feel it can justifiably
be bought or sold, and see where the other person stands and if debates
and sue, then debates and sue before we get into that though, how's
it going, Dan? I am doing well. This was a good exercise
because and from since we have a preview of what each other was doing.
If there was one instance where we each eight the low hanging fruit because we
had to, but we both pretty much tried to go off at least something
that was a little bit different than what the national narrative might be for each
team, and so that was like a fun thought exercise. Yeah, for
sure, I totally agree with that. There was some low hanging fruit picked
cough cough, Bradley Beal cough cough. But it is what it is.
How are you doing though? I'm doing pretty well. I was telling you
before we started to record that my brother and his wife had control of our
toddler for the morning and it was like the first time and probably six months
or so that my wife and I had free time where neither of us were
working, and it was so freeing. It's amazing. How like after you
turned twenty five or whatever it is, that free time is just so scant.
It's depressing. Every time my two year old doesn't take his nap,
I'm like, dude, what are you doing? Like enjoy that? Well?
At last? I wish I could take naps now, right. That's
my biggest mistakes as a young kid was wanting to grow up. What a
dumb ass? I know. It was like that. It's like how when
you're really young your parents don't know anything, and then you quickly realize sometimes
that they do know stuff, or like any authority figure in your life,
you know, like that mentality shifts so much. Yeah, I would do
I people and people need to find more free time for their stuff. There's
like a stigma. I know there are some people that are really good about
it, but there's a stigma about doing nothing or taking mental health days.
And it's okay. And I'm part of the problem because I feel if I'm
doing nothing, I'm wasting time. But like it's very bad at doing nothing.
Yes, I'm terrible at it, as as are you. The stuff
that you get done while having a child all never ceases to amaze me.
But we are endorsing our listeners to take some time for yourself. It's healthy,
you know. Listen to a podcast or two, like I've heard of
this good one called Hardwood Knox. Well it's mediocre, but yeah, that's
fair better than all of us are good at selling this podcast. Yeah it's
terrible, but look, and we're gonna get even worse as we go through
these teams with Buy Ourself. Are you ready to get started there? Let's
do it. Let's start with the Atlanta Hawks, where I'm gonna say that
the Atlanta Hawks are disappointing, primarily because the many injuries that have plagued this
roster, ranging from Danilo Gallinari to Rajon Rondo to Chris Duntnyka Kongwu to Clint
Capella, have prevented them from establishing continuity with so many new pieces. I'll
buy that, and it's I did call I did. Trey Young has been
one of the more disappointing players, at least until recently. When you looked
at what he was shooting from three, what he was shooting on his floaters,
It's okay to admit that. I don't think it's going to continue.
I think his job gets easier, and as you, I mean, look
to not have Gallinari or Bogdanovitch at the same time, the two players who
were most responsible in Fury for alleviating the ball handling work load on Trey Young.
I don't know what else you're necessarily supposed to point toward. Maybe the
dynamic between him and John Collins is a long term concern, but I think
insofar as they ever get close to full strength, my guests would be that
they'll be fine. Especially you know, Clinck Cappella has been playing really well
for them of late. This could be a situation where maybe they decided to
need to trade, but if they can get Bogdanovitch and Gallow healthy, you
know, I don't I don't really even know what to take away from this.
The Gallow contract or it's like this is going to be the tenth time
in thirteen years he doesn't play in the equivalent of seventy games. But it's
such a short term investment. They give you it as a two year deal
if they're willing to. I think he's guaranteed four or five million in the
third. I'm just not super alarmed with Atlanta right now. I think I'm
gonna slightly sell it. I think there are more overarching concerns here, Like
I'm not entirely convinced that Lloyd Pierce is the right coach for this team between
the locker room dysfunction and are the reported locker room dysfunction, I should say,
and it's just some of the lack of effort that we've seen mixed with
some weird rotations late in games, Like this team hasn't really blown out the
teams that it should given the level of talent on the roster, And it
just seems like Trey Young in particular, hasn't played with the confidence that he
had last year. The floaters haven't been falling, He's been taking a few
too many hero shots, almost like he's searching for something like it's not a
heat check so much as I hope I get hot check, and I don't
have real long term this team is definitely going to miss the playoff concerns,
but I think there's something more going on here than just the injuries. And
look, it does a real cost for conformed being What if Cleveland and New
York are actually just this much better than people thought, then you're all of
a sudden just not guaranteed to have this this spot in that you know,
play in Chase let alone a top six seed that would guarantee you a playoff
spot. Yeah. So I think we're like kind of on the same page
where it's like a mediocre buy and a mediocre sell here. Yeah, I
mean it's funny that I'm a little bit more optimistic on them than you.
I find that kind of hysterical. Moving on to Boston, I'm focusing on
Jalen Brown here, buy or sell Jalen Brown as a top twenty five player
in the NBA. Yeah, I'm gonna buy it. You know, I
was looking at your rankings for the top hundred players going into this season,
and you had Jalen Brown at thirty two coming off a bubble ranking. Where
are a pre bubble ranking where you had him at thirty And I'm looking at
these top twenty five names because it's always hard to like wrap your head around
those numbers. And so the guy's around twenty five, Jamal Murray at twenty
seven, Chris Middleton at twenty six, Kyle Lowry at twenty five, Donovan
Mitchell at twenty four, Rudy Gobert at twenty three. Yeah, I think
he's in that tier. The leap that he's made as a scorer, a
self sufficient score is a profound one. And when you couple that with the
advancement that he's continued to make as a distributor, as a game changing defender,
he's a complete player. You can put him in maybe a slight tier
below Jason Tatum at this point, like there's actually a conversation about who's the
better player on that team some nights. I think he's I think he's in
that top twenty five conversation if he's not locked into it. Yeah, I
buy it as well, which probably could have been given away by the fact
that I suggested it. He's just having like a monstrous season and he's cool
off a little bit, but he's still averaging twenty six point nine points three
point seven assists, shooting almost forty two percent from three. He's hitting fifty
six point eight percent of his pull up twos, and like that seems far
more sustainable than there's like eighty percent he was hitting before. There's his game
just seems more dynamic. It wasn't just the product Olo Kemba was gone.
There's a better feel for it there. He's been incredibly efficient on his drives.
He's shooting fifty nine point one percent on drives and that is among fifty
eight players who are taking at least four shots out of drives per game.
That is seventh best in the league. And so that's just I mean,
he's shooting better on drives than Janice right now. And look it's early,
so Jordan Clarkson and Tyler Hero are in that company as well, but it's
just super when you can do what he does. He's so plug and play
on offense, and now there's the dynamic where he doesn't feel just plug and
play anymore, coupled with what he does on defense. I it's a hard
buy for me. Yeah, I'm pretty confident in the buy there as well.
For the Brooklyn Nets. Since James Harden arrived via that mega blockbuster trade,
the Nets have beaten the Orlando Magic by seven points. They've beaten the
Milwaukee Bucks by two points in one of the best games of the season so
far. They've lost to the Cleveland Cavaliers and double over time when Colin Sexton
went off. Then they lost to the Cavaliers again. Then they beat the
Miami Heat by four points. A lot of mixed results. Are we buying
or selling the fit of the new big three in Brooklyn? I buy the
offensive fit. The one ball stuff was super low hanging fruit. And I
get some of the concern where it's, yeah, long term, one of
these guys has to be the third option, and who just knows how well
that's it's it's they wanted to play together. It's going to work on offense.
The concern for me would just be what does this team look like defensively
where they already had some problems. If you look at you know, go
baseline, not even just their defensive rebounding, but like, who are they
who do that you want to close with at center? Is it really DeAndre
Jordan who's just not moving that well? Do you go with a Kevin Durant
at the five and Jeff Green at the five? What does that due to
your defense? We seemly get pummel on the glass in those minutes. I
buy the idea that they're a good fit on offense. I sell this idea
that we don't need to be concerned about their defense because they're just going to
be so elite on offense. I think I'm going to sell it. Overall.
It feels to me like an issue of diminishing marginal returns here where these
guys are all so good, but they do take away from each other's games,
you know, ultimately, like can Kyrie Irving thrive as an off ball
threat? Sure? Can James Harden thrive? And as an off ball threat?
Absolutely can Kevin Durant. We know that that's the case. That's fine,
but just the fit with Harden and Kyrie in particular, like you're going
to have to alternate possessions on who's leading the charge, and you know what,
if you're not picking those spots right, especially with a first year head
coach in Steve Nash, like it feels a little bit too combustible for me.
And if we're saying that this this trio is immediately capable of pushing the
nets to the top of the Eastern Conference or competing for a title right away,
like which I think is the only reasonable expectation given the capital invested in
this trio. I'm going to sell that right now. That's interesting. There's
I've actually been worried, like, if I'm too low on them, could
their defense be better than expected long term? Because they're their shot profile is
so good there they have the their less by check they were from killing the
last fifth in location effect the field goal percentage, they were like a you
know, the stuff at the rim. They've been allowing more looks there,
it feels like, but they don't allow a ton of threes. They're coaxing
teams and mid range jumpers, and so there's I feel like there's a chance
that maybe not just you, but me might be too low. And I'm
probably a little bit more optimistic it is, but I mean you touch on
good points where it's they're just going to be functional changes to how they play,
and it seems early on one we've really only seen the sample sizes larger
with two of them than three. I think they only played two games together
with all three of them if I'm correct, So it does seem Mike James
Harden is going to be kind of the point guard and he's been just passing
a ton and table setting. Is that gonna be viable over the longer haul
where you know, maybe he's not scoring as much when all three of them
are in the game. I'm I'm very interesting to see who gets the last
shot and these there's options there during crunch time, but I'm I want to
see them in more situations where tight games at the end, all three of
them around the court, and how the offense is run that way, because
I think you know, if you're hard and you're counting on him to run
point, his first instinct is going to be to try and create a bucket
in that specific situation. I would think the talent here is unbelievable as you
put more cohesive pieces around them in future seasons, rather than trying to adapt
the incumbents on the roster to the new triumvirate and charge. I have more
confidence in them next year than I do this year. So I think my
hot take here is that this isn't an Eastern Conference Finals team this year.
I don't know if that's a hot take. I think because you can name
Philly, Milwaukee, a fully healthy Miami, maybe Boston. Those were all
teams I could give them problems. I mean you could. Yeah, it's
just with the warrant injury. We don't know how Evert's gonna fit. That's
you know, there's they don't feel for a team that has three what does
Kyrie ringing his peak top fifteen three top fifteen guys. Yea, absolutely,
they feel beautible. Can I can I go on an on a side conversation
here before we jump to Charlotte. You know, I was talking with a
friend of the podcast, Jacob Born here last night, and we were talking
about Kyrie Irving's game and how it feels like it's one of the most esthetically
pleasing games in NBA history. Just the way that he dribbles, the way
that he finishes, the wrong footed finishes, everything that he does makes him
look like an absolute master of basketball. And I'm curious if there's anyone you
can think of where the ratio of aesthetic pleasantness to effectiveness has been more warped.
Could your mom Murray be up there? Maybe? Because like conversely,
Kevin Durant plays like the smoothest, easiest game I've ever seen, and it
one hundred percent translates to effectiveness. And like Kyrie's doesn't like as amazing as
he is, he can just put on an absolute show and you're like,
wow, they're they're ahead by two points. That's not to say he's not
a great basketball player, as you said, like a top fifteen guy.
I don't disagree with that, but like the beauty of his game leads you
to believe that he should be even better. I would totally agree with you
there. That's and some of it is like the effort on defense has been
it swung wildly over the past. It feels like a few years where was
he had the season in Boston where he tried really hard, but then the
second season not so much. Last year was whatever. This year, it
feels like he's been engaged at different points. But yeah, I mean that's
a that's an interesting theory that I haven't given enough thought of it to come
up put it with an alternative. But you may be right. Well,
I can think on it more. Are you ready for Charton, We'll revisit
that. Are you ready for Charlotte? I'm always ready for Charlotte. Buy
or sell. Miles Bridges is the most important player long term not named LaMelo
Ball to this team. I'm gonna sell it. Okay. I think that.
I think that he could be, and that there's a very real possibility
he's the second best player on his team for a long time. But I'm
gonna I'm gonna put Terry rose Year in that position because he's already been paid
because if if he is an absolute bust, which it does not look like
he's going to be based on this season's early returns, that's really crippling.
And you could say the same thing about Gordon Hayward, where he's been paid
so much money if he doesn't live up to that contract. Because Miles Bridges
has not had that MAX extension, I don't think that you can put him
up there because they could feasibly move on if he doesn't work out. The
thing is, I mean, Terror's here, has one more year left on
his deal and still go a long term. With that, I guess the
Gordon Hayward pick makes sense. I thought you might have pivoted to uh Gavante
Graham was gonna be a free agent this year. Is parked up a little
bit over his last few games. He couldn't really hit anything for a good
chunk of the season. But I exactly why I'm not picking him because you
know, oh no, he runs away like Grant Rollers step up. I
thought that was also going to be the name that came up, because I'm
selling because of Grant Roller. The other thing I thought maybe might come up
is that you could buy into the idea that whoever they take in the twenty
twenty one draft, even though they're winning a little bit more right now than
expected, that's going to be their most long term important player. But but
Bridges this year has just been really good overall. He's hitting his three.
I think he's shown that he's definitely more than just this power dunker. You'd
still like to see him make more of his like or there'll be less predictability
to his games, like can he do more than straight line driving? And
can he hit when he does? Can he hit those at a higher clip?
But he gives them a bunch of switchability on the defensive end. Maybe
not necessarily someone wants you want him covering bigs full time, but he can
definitely defend like basically two through five or three through five at this point,
and so I do feel like there's a little element of under appreciation to his
game. I'm going to buy loosely because I kind of want to pick whoever
they take in the twenty twenty one draft, but that just feels like we're
not even there yet. We don't know where their pick is going going to
be. Hayward, I feel like it's fair obviously, if they do invest
in DeVante Graham, there's a chance that it becomes him. We have not
talked about simply Washington either. That ship may have sailed for them. But
it's interesting that you can look at this team and come up with so many
different options for who their second most important player is over the long haul.
And I think it's also interesting that it's taken this little time to be like,
yeah, like, LaMelo Ball is definitely number one on that list.
It's impossible to watch even one LaMelo Ball game right now and not be like,
yeah, he gets it, unless you're James Brego who was mad about
his turnovers and then mad about his defensive effort. I'm just you've played DeVante
Graham for holding the superscar accountable, the superstar rookie accountable right off the bat.
It rings a little hollow harder on him, but yeah, it rings
a little hollow when you've played DeVante Graham so heavily while he's been going through
his own slump and he's going to actively hurt you on defense, and he
was shooting like negative eight percent around the basket at one point. So that's
where it rings a little hollow for me. I don't you know, if
they told me that he was going to come off the bench all year in
Charlotte, I might be okay with just because it does, in theory simplify
his role, which I don't think it's a bad thing for a rookie,
But those comments were I don't know that that caught me a little off.
I get it, but like, did that need to be if he said
it behind the scenes, I think it would have made like make the decision
to not really play him that much and then talk to him about it.
You didn't have to go to the media and light this kid up. Yeah,
that's fair to Chicago. Oh Chicago, I'm out of whack. Sorry,
you're trying to skip a couple of teams here. So yeah, with
Chicago, you know you can look at this roster and find a couple intriguing
names as as long term pieces between No Kobe White, as much as he
struggled at times the season, Zach Lavigne, who's on fire, Patrick Williams,
Laurie Marken, and Wendell Carter Junior. Though that ship seems to be
sailing a little bit. So my question is are you are you buying or
selling that Chicago has at least one centerpiece of a future contender on its roster
right now. Centerpiece doesn't have to mean like the number one guy, right
I think it does like like the top guy on a contender is on the
roster right now. You can win a title with one of these guys at
their peak. I'm gonna sell dach Lavine has been spectacular, but I don't
think and he's still young. This is his what is this his age twenty
five, twenty sixth season right now, and his playmaking is as age turns
twenty six in March. I just can't imagine him being even now, Like
the offensive splits with him are not great because I don't know how much he
actually uplifts his teammates. I think you have to want that player to be
Kobe White or Patrick Williams. I would argue Patrick Williams might have a better
chance because he's not going to influence the game as much on offense, even
if he is on defense. That's a tough one I'm gonna sell, but
I don't feel great about it. I just don't think Zach Lavine is going
to end up being the number one guy for a contender, and that's just
that's not even I think he's been spectacular this year. I want to make
that. I want to make that clear. I'm gonna tentatively buy here.
I think that Patrick Williams has enough potential to reach that stage, even though
we definitely haven't seen enough to assertively say that he will. But I do
think Lavigne can be We've been, we were really complimentary of him the last
episode we did together. Just the leap that he's made, which is really
more of a gradual climb to this level. I do think he's that good,
and I think he's young enough that he could fit the timeline of whatever
Chicago does next. He does not float everyone around him enough, but I
think that's at least partially due to the lack of continuity that they've had,
you know, shifting coaches and the lack of established talent around him. If
you're if you're putting a cohesive rotation around zach Lavine, I think he can
be that guy. In all caps. His teammates are shooting better than thirty
nine percent on threes off his passes. My whole thing is we'll get out
good he's been this year. Where is Chicago right now seven to nine,
twenty second in net rating per cleaning the glass? The offense is still seventeenth.
It's a hair better with him on the floor. I do believe.
I'll double check that to make sure that I'm not lying to you, guys.
I understand that it's a talent thing. But if you are, you
like, is there anyone that's on the roster currently, then that's gonna work
with the iteration of the team that has Zach Lavine as it's number one option
and is contending Patrick Williams. But yeah, I mean, I think that's
all you can confidently say right now. Isn't Laurie Markten going to be back
on a new contract? Is Kobe White actually good? Like with those I'm
very they should trade Laurie much doubt about they should trade Larry market In right.
I don't know that they should be as from a team perspective, I
hope every player gets paid, but I don't know why they would give him
a ton of money. It doesn't seem to make sense for them. And
yeah, they're a hairbetter on offense plus point three points per possession with Leavin
on the floor. And I don't think at this point that's clearly not an
indictment of him. There's I never thought he I don't. I can't watch
him anymore and think empty stats. Guy, I don't know that I ever
put I thought there was something to it because his teams are just never substantially
uplifted when he's on the court, But just watching the way he's played this
season, like that just can't be it. I maybe I'm just having a
tough time because of what this team is doing right now, having a tough
time of vision, and they've been a lot better since the beginning of the
season. So some of these numbers are probably dragged down by how they looked
at the start of the year. I'm still I'm going to sell. I
don't feel great about it because I thought I was high enough on Zachovine,
but number one on a contender is a pretty lofty goal. And that's kind
of saying that he's going to get to be like a top fifteen guy or
a top twenty guy or something. And I don't know that he ever gets
to that level, but I do think it says a lot that it seems
like a reasonable question right now. Fair Sugar, Ray, Leonard, Roberto
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June sixth, only on Showtime. Cavaliers I have. I'm wondering if
this one caught you off guard when I told you it before we started.
Colin Sexton is better and is going to remain better than Jamal Murray. It
didn't catch me off guard. Just I think that those are our guys who
are definitely trending in opposite directions right now, and I'm actually gonna buy it.
I have concerns about Jamal Murray's inconsistency at this point. You know,
we were expecting that this could be the year that, coming off that remarkable
Bubble performance, that he showed that he could really thrive in the regular season
and elevate a team. And it really does fall on his shoulders that the
Nuggets are struggling to remain above five hundred with Nicola Yokis playing MVP caliber basketball
like that. That's a testament to how much Murray has struggled at times,
along with other pieces throughout the roster and the lack of availability from Michael Porter
Jr. Etc. Etc. But meanwhile, Sexton is just lighting it up
and beating good teams on his shoulders. He's showing that he can fill multiple
roles out of the backcourt, that he can be a number one score without
sacrificing efficiencily, without sacrificing any semblance of efficiency, that he can work cohesively
alongside Darius Garland and elevate the play of others around him. Like I'm buying
him as an offensive superstar. I'm buying this too. And there's Look,
there's the obviousness of it just when you look at his numbers this season,
but overall this year, there are a total of seven players who are shooting
better than fifty percent inside the arc, at least forty percent beyond the arc,
and averaging more than twenty five points per game. Kevin Durant, Colin
Sexton, CJ McCollum, Kyrie, Jalen Brown, Kauai and Joel Embiid.
And the thing that I will note is that he's coming off a season where
he was one of just a handful of players to do something similar. Last
year, he wasn't averaging twenty five points per game, but there were only
six players who attempted as many threes as him and then shot at least thirty
eight percent from three and fifty percent inside the arc while averaging over twenty points
per game. That was Middleton, Cat Dame, Brandon Ingram, Jalon Brown,
and of course Colin Sexton was there. Look Jalen Brown appearing twice too.
That's another argument in favor of him. This is not his offensive stardom
is not news. He's done the two things that have real or three things
really that have sold me. I don't know the viability of Darius Garland Collin
Sexton long term defensively, Then again, the personnel they now have around them
with Isaaca Cora, Larry Nance Junior and Jared All, maybe that doesn't matter.
I also think Colin Sexton has been better on defense this year, at
least on the ball. The second thing is I don't know if he's ever
the guy that you want to trust to create off the dribble, but he's
so efficient off the catch it doesn't matter. And just something to monitor is
he's shooting forty seven percent on a bunch of pull up two pointers this year,
and then fifty six point fifty two point six percent on two pull up
three point attempts per game. So again, I don't know that he's ever
going to be that traditional from scratch scorer. I don't know one that he
needs to be. And the indicators this season are fantastic for him, And
this might be the biggest one of all. His passing Since sort of the
end of last year, it has gotten better. And the thing that I
looked up for this is so last season he was averaging thirteen point nine drives
per game. He shot fine, it was forty seven point six percent.
He passed on thirty two point four percent of his drives for an assist rate
of six point seven. This year he is averaging sixteen point seven drives he
is playing. I think he's the last. He's averaging substantially more minutes,
but he's driving, so he's still attacking. He's shooting fifty two point one
percent on them, but he's passing on forty two percent of his drives with
an assist rate of ten. Sort up. The percentage of drives that you're
passing on is actually more difficult, I would argue, as the number of
drives increases, the fact that he's doing that. No, I don't think
you need to look at him as a point guard, because first of all,
he's not a point guard, and so as someone who's your two guard
till it's toward off guard, whatever you want to call him, he's he's
improved enough there where it's like, Okay, we were wondering whether the Cavs
had this long term cornerstone of the future. Will he be You're asking about
Zack Levine being the best player on a contender. I don't know if we
can ask that about Colin Sexton yet, but it's interesting enough to where it's
like, Damn Cleveland is Cleveland's future is a lot different based off what Colin
Sexton has done the past two years. I want to be clear, it's
not even just about this season. And he's had a level of consistency on
offense where, yeah, Jamal Murray is going to have those step backs and
there's just more to him there and I think that he'll you know, probably
have higher peaks. How long do those peaks last? And so there's just
been that level of consistency from Colin Sexton that we've never seen from Jamal Murray,
who arguably might be one of the most entertaining but albeit roller coaster rides
in the NBA. And I think it's important to note that when we ask
this question, we are splitting hairs. It's not like Colin Sexton is blowing
Jamal Murray out of the water. They're both all star talents. Like that's
the important thing here is that we're putting Colin Sexton into that same tier that
Jamal Murray has been occupying for a little while. Now. Yeah, I
just think that he needs to be viewed in like a which is by the
way, it's not to say that I was or either of us are out
in front of this. I rank him as the hundredth best player coming into
the season. I think we ended up at our panel Jamal murs I'm pretty
sure I tried to argue out of including him. I don't remember that,
but I don't doubt it. And we probably had Jamal Murray. I don't
know that I'm about He was probably in the thirties, early forties, and
so that's a huge discrepancy twenty seven because I think I didn't didn't I mention
that on the Boston section of this maybe of players going into the bubble,
he might have been it. There's no way he was. I would have
bumped him out of the top twenty seven real quick. So I that's a
huge gap to make up. But to say that he's going to be better
than him, that probably he says more about the recalibration of Jamal Murray maybe
than sex, and it says it. It's just a great deal about Paul.
I'm not trying to crap all over Jamal Murray. But Colin Sexton has
flown under the radar since last year. Like, this isn't just a this
season thing. The defense, Yeah, the passing took a little while later
into last season, but like that's even been more sustainable. So and if
he finishes the year putting up numbers like this twenty five while shooting so efficiently,
wow, just wow, right right, So moving on to the Detroit
Pistons, they are three and thirteen and at the time of recording, but
they're Pythagorean wins, which are based on points scored and allowed. They've underperformed.
They have played more like a six and ten team. Their net rating
shows the same thing, where they have a minus four point six net rating,
which isn't totally at the bottom of the NBA. So are they bad
enough that they don't need to make changes or are they going to make big
changes at the trade deadline? So my buy cell is that Detroit will be
stripped for parts at the deadline, specifically referring to Blake Griffin, Derrick Rose,
Mason Plumley, and Delon Right, I'm gonna sell just because maybe Derrick
Rose just because he's on an expiring contract, but they kind of need him
after they killing and Hayes injury because you only have Delan right, you are
relying a ton on Jeremy Grant. I don't know who's gonna want Blake Griffin's
contract at this point without getting a sweetener, So I don't I actually don't
think that they're going to end up gutting it. The spicier take would be,
why don't you try and capitalize on Jeremy Grant's trade value right now?
Because he's been basically the most effective isolation scorer in the league. I don't
know how long that could continue. What you do bring up an interesting point
about is Detroit, despite being too inten, is fourth in clutch minutes played,
and so there might be an element of, oh, could they just
get better as the year goes on? You been too inten in the clutch?
Just to be clear, yeah, two in ten in the clutch.
Sorry, they're two in ten in those minutes, but they've been the crunch
time in ten games, which is a twelve games, which is also a
league high. And the total minutes they've spent in the clutch of excuse me,
forty eight is fourth in the NBA as I stumbled through that, So
maybe it would behoove them to get rid of a Derek Rose, but like
they're not really or maybe a plumb Lee like those might be players that are
possibly helping them. I'd be a little bit surprised if they moved Alan Wright,
just because I think since he's under contract for next year, I believe,
and you don't really have another point guard option now because of the Killian
Hayes injury for the moment that it's just makes more sense to keep in him.
What are you gonna get for him? So I'm gonna sell it.
I think they end up moving Derrick Rose would just and since that's the only
player I really see them moving, I don't know that I could buy into
the fact that they're going to strip it down. Yeah, I'm gonna sell
as well. I don't think that you can move Blake Griffin without attaching sweeteners.
I think Derrick Rose is too important. But they do need to move
something just because they're a little better than they want to be, even if
the record thus far doesn't indicate it. I think Mason Plumley is going to
be the lone significant name moved from Detroit at the deadline. That's interesting.
There are some teams that could use a wildly big. It'd be funny after
everyone dumping all over that contract that he ends up being moved for like even
if it's just like some positive value. He's been pretty solid so far this
year. He's been good. He's still a very good passer, and I
think he communicates well with his teams based off his teammates, based off the
gate pissing games I've seen this year, this one moving on to Indiana.
Unless you have anything to add on Detroit there, go for it. Miles
Turner will finish in the top two or three if you want to go that
deep of Defensive Player of the Year voting at the end of the season.
I want to make that clear, not where it stands right now. I
just I want to ask before we answer, what's making you ask this question.
So I got shipped on by Miles Turner himself. I doubt he paid
any mind to who wrote it, even though my name was in the tweet
that Bleacher Report put out, because I did predictions for the awards based off
what we've seen this season. Now, the one changed that I would have
made is maybe I should have just done a ladder. Because of the way
that Bleacher Report programmed the article and as writers, we don't we have control
over what we're writing about, but headlines are changed, which I don't.
That's editorial. That's totally fine with me. I should have done more of
a ladder where if the season were at ten today or right now, who's
leading, in which case I would have had Miles Turnarth Defensive Player of the
Year. I did not have him in my top three. I made it
clear to say that he was fourth. He has been an absolute monster.
I had Imbided Gobert and Anthony Davis ahead of him. Pacers fans were I
rate Miles Turner wasn't happy, but what do you accept expect the player to
say? The Pacers even quote treated Bleacher Reports article. My mentions were a
higher fire for probably less than twenty four hours. It wasn't too long.
And so I'm just curious where looking at the end of the season, like,
do you see what he's doing as sustainable to the point where he's going
to finish top two or three and defensive let alone win the award the top
in defensive player of the Year. I don't think that he will finish in
the top three. I think that there will be a justifiable case to have
him there. But the block rate that he's at right now is like unprecedented
in the modern day NBA, and I don't think that he or anyone else
is capable of sustaining that for a full season. And as good as the
Pacers have been with him on the floor, they're still not a great defensive
team overall. They have a middling defensive rating. They've been vulnerable and a
number of different ways to this point, and without playing for a top tier
defensive team, you generally struggle to garner the necessary votes. So will he
be one of the three most impactful defensive players? Sure? Are we sure
that he's going to finish the season in Indiana? No, there's just there's
too much uncertainty and too many indicators that are just a little bit veering away
from sustainability. And if you're not going to be on a top defensive team,
you need to lead the league in blocks by a wide margin to get
consideration, which he's doing so far. But I'm not sure he's going to
be able to sustain there. And look, that's part of it, as
people pointed out, because what's also tough is when you're doing the three player
predictions is you're more inclined to spend time on why you're picking them as opposed
to why you're not picking someone else. And so I mentioned that I don't
think the Pacers defense will hold at the elite level enough for Miles Turner to
win it even though the defensive and look I looked while I was doing it,
I looked up lineup data. There are two games that concerned me.
It was the Pacers game I think they lost to the k and it was
their game was a loss to the Suns maybe where they were their defense,
Yeah, their defensers wasn't great with Turner on the court. That being said,
if you break up splits of what the defenses looked like when he plays
without Oladipo, who's not there anymore, they're fine. When he plays out
Oladipo and Warren, who's also injured at the moment, it's great. So
he's very clearly in the discussion. But where teams finish wrong or right?
I was trying to make it predictive on who I think was going to win.
If the Pacers, they're twelfth in points allot per possession right now,
we're cleaning the glass. If they stay there, that's probably not high enough
for him to garner the praise. Maybe he's just so good that it doesn't
matter if his block rate sustains. The other thing is, I do you
know, and Kaylen Cooper Vindy corn Rows wrote a great article on this,
how the Pacers were really limiting three point efficiency without act actively like they're preventing
or they're preventing three point attempts without really hugging a three point line. They
rely on Miles Turner a lot to do that. As she broke down,
Please check out that article. Caitlyn Cooper Indy corn Rows go to a Twitter
feed at C two underscore Cooper. But they also like the ball containment I
think is gonna get iffier when you're subbing out eventual hopefully he's fine. Caros
Lavert is going to be in there. You're subbing out old depot for carros
Lavert and when Warren's healthy too. Yeah, and look he's been better defensively
than so maybe he actually helps them. And so that was the other thing
is like we're gonna see Miles turn to be really tested. He doesn't have
the sample for independent of old depot of this new team for me to say
like he would have changed whatever sort of impact there was on this roster,
and the other thing, I'll note it's not a problem, and I don't
I don't know that he would say after moving all the depot doesn't feel like
they're gonna make any moves. And he's averaging a career high thirty two point
five minutes per game. If the offense remains sort of average to below average
enough, when he's a bonus share of the floor, there are gonna be
some weird playing time decisions made. And are you going to gravitate towards perhaps
someone who's averaging more minutes, which I think happened. You know, if
he was at twenty nine five or twenty eight six like he was the past
two years, I don't expect him to drop down at that level. But
that's going to factor into this as well. And I do think if you
look at and talk about the other players, when you look at Joel and
bad feels like his pick and roll covers like a lot shiftier this year,
where it's not just you know, him being around the rim, it's him
coming out and doing things where teams are scared they won't even sometimes they won't
even bother driving or attempting like attempting floaters now is difficult with and beat on
the court, not just finishing at the rim, and then the other thing
that always gets lost with Anthony Davis, and I think he probably has the
strongest argument over a turner finish if you think that turner is gonna win.
His functionality is just never going to be accurately displayed by deflections, by rim
protection numbers, by even on offsplits, just because he's doing so much that
he's not going to have all the counting stats or even advanced metrics that love
him and some of the lineups he's tasked with anchoring. You know, let's
Kyle Kuzma has been a pretty good defender in the past couple of seasons.
Lebron has been. Not so much this year, I would say, but
just better defensively in LA the past, this season and last than people would
have expected. They have Wes Matthews, they don't have an elite wing defender
any Davis changes so much on the perimeter and a different to being around the
basket, and he can be everywhere at one simultaneously without compromising who he's actually
supposed to be. Guarding, and the fact of the matter is there's you
take the best defense in the league, and he makes them stingier when he's
on the court. This year, I think it's by less than a point
per one hundred possessions. I don't care. That's so tough to make the
best defense better, and I think Goberts don't underappreciate it, where people think,
oh, he's he's not matchup proof, and meanwhile, he leads the
league in short mid range blocks this year. That's not a defining factor.
But I think as of right now, it's a four player race, and
I would predict that Miles Turner is most likely to drop out of that.
If you want to get into the notion of will will embiid playing enough games,
that's fine. I'm I think it's a discussion. I'm going to sell
the idea that he finishes top two. I don't know what to do with
top three, because now you're getting into there could be a lot of coin
toss there, and there's a chance that I have in my top three to
finish the season. And I want to make this clear, I'm not shitting
on Miles Turner, who I think I've generally been higher on than the consensus.
It's just that he's been so good defensively this year that I'm I guess
I'm lower on him, or I just don't know that it will sustain.
So this will be interesting to look at at the halfway mark after taking a
look at it during the quarter pole. I apologize to that ramp, but
I didn't have a form to really defend myself. Twitter is not the place
for nuance, so may I mostly ignored people getting mad. I did not
ignore people getting mad that I called Trey Young disappointing this year so far,
and something I wrote I was like, Okay, he's still a great passer
and I think he's going to be fine, but like, let's not pretend
that Trey Young has an underachieved relative to what Trey Young is. So what
I heard from all of this is that you're admitting that you only left out
Miles Turner to be a provocateur, and you got the exact reaction you were
hoping from not writing something you believe in, right, Like, the reason
writers aren't rich is because we generally don't do that. Like, like if
you're talking TV talking heads, writers aren't generally a persona. Maybe I guess
what is that the out dick coverage or whatever it is with Schmey Pravis or
whatever his name is, Like, there's the but if you're writing for people
at ESPN who are writing, they're not trying to the writers themselves are not
trying to be provocateurs, like I went's assuming this. Those are for the
TV shows, the discussions on there maybe podcasts. I'm hoping at this point
Bill Simmons is playing a cricketure of a human being. Though, I mean,
you don't get paid per click and all that, Like, no,
that's the other thing. I don't get paid. I don't get paid per
click everybody. So I just I, yeah, that was the funniest thing
where it's like, you guys only cover big market teams, and I want
people to know I picked within that article, I picked Nate Bjorkin to win
Coach of the Year. That's the other thing that was hysterical is that,
no, I don't not saying that if you still disagree with me, I'm
all for I had some conversations with people who were you know, had legitimate
points, and I think that we can disagree without it being an insult and
I'm fine with Miles Turner saying this was disrespectful because what else is the player
supposed to say? And he's been really if the season endsed today, he's
probably top two in defensive players that year. At worst, I still think
there's a chance Davis wins it. The only thing I have to add here
is, like, you know, when the Pacers twitter account quote tweeted that,
and when Myles Turner quote tweeted that, like, they didn't specify what
they were upset about. So I'm just going to assume that there's raving dysfunction
in Indiana and they just hate the idea that their coach could be Coach of
the year. Like That's That's how I'm interpreting this. Like Miles Turner,
he just doesn't like his coach, That's what it must be. He's mad
that we didn't pick Nate McMillan as coach of the year in Atlanta because Lloyd
Garris is gonna get fired. The final thing I'll note, and you've seen
me at my most vulnerable moments when it comes to work, and I don't
want who cares. I'm like, white male, the predominant demographic in this
industry, do not feel bad for me. The thing that I'm normally teflon
when it's reader comments or people on Twitter. The thing that still kind of
sucks is when I have mutual follows, like we follow each other. I've
talked to people and they're just shitting all over the article without one having read
it because they're just tweeting. And I get the game. I get that
why it's tweeted out the way it is with graphics. I get it,
and I'm fine with it. But that's the one thing that's still just a
little bit weird for me, bordering on not hurtful, but like that is
the thing that stuck with me a little bit with seeing people that I follow
and they follow me and they're just crapping all over it with clearly not having
read it. And even if they disagreed, it was fine, but it
was just it was so easily dismissed by mutual files that I was like,
oh, all right, And that still happens. It happens with NBA one
hundred every year. But that's the thing that I need to get better at
being Pethlon for now before we move on to Miami. This is just a
great time for our psa that you know, to make Dan feel better,
you should rate, review, and subscribe to Hardwood Knocks on wherever you're listening
to these podcasts, give him a follow at dan fa Valley, and then
be nice to him. Yeah, you don't need to be nice to me,
that's fine, but yeah, I definitely subscribe to this podcast. Juice
those numbers up. Let's go. So the Miami Heat. I want to
dive a little bit into the weeds on this one just because I think there's
such an interesting team where they're coming off an NBA Finals appearance. Not much
about this roster is that different. They're six and nine. If the playoffs
ended or if the playoff field was set Sunday afternoon, they would not be
even in the play in game in the Eastern Conference. So one thing I
want to focus on here is they're rebounding. They're twenty third, and total
rebounding percentage they're twenty ninth, and offensive rebounding percentage, they're twenty second and
defensive rebounding percentage. Is that alone a flaw that can keep this team from
the contender tier. I sell that idea that the rebounding alone would keep them
out of it because I don't think I would have to look at this,
but I don't think they were this rebounding juggernaut last year either, And I
think bigger concerns would be Tyler Hero has been finishing well when he's healthy,
but what does the Tyler Hero point guard experiment do? Do you have enough
shot creators? How rely are you on Gore? On Dragic? Bam Adebayo
has been just he's hitting his jumpers now too, which is terrifying if you're
the rest of the league. The four spot I think ends up being an
issue. Mo Harkless hasn't really and I think he's in. He's out with
a thigh injury at the moment, but like he hasn't played a ton.
And that was the guy who basically replaced Jay Crowder and was always going to
do that. They've been I've seen more of kaizy Akpala and Precious to Chew
and I thought I was going to and maybe that's not a bad thing,
but I think if you look at their power forward rotation, that would be
the thing that would or the guy who plays next to bam in the front
court. Let's put it that way. Since I don't want to pigeonhole people
to positions. That's going to be their biggest issue moving forward to me,
and I will buy the idea that they will fall outside of that what do
we want to call it the contender click, like the top four or five
contenders? I would buy that that idea. We should note right now though,
that they are just decimated between injuries and health and safety protocols. Avery
Bradley and Jimmy Butler are in the health and safety protocols. Tyler heroes dealing
with a neck injury, Harkless thigh injury, Myers Leonard's shoulders injury, and
Chris Silva has a hip injury. So they're just they are banged up right
now and maybe they get better there and the fact that they had a shorter
off season. But maybe you could sell it on do we make this about
depth instead of rebounding? Whereas do they have the the sort of pieces to
navigate this year and still be fresh for the finals? Are they slow playing
it now because they'll they'll tick moving forward. Something feels off here and the
fact maybe as they get healthier with band playing like this, this will all
be overly manufactured concern I wouldn't have them. I will buy the idea that
they are not in that primary contender's circle. I'm gonna buy that they're not
in the primary contenders circle and that this is the reason. I do think
like some of it is interconnected, Like the lack of depth does bleed into
this area because there's only so many areas that you can exert energy in when
you're playing with a skeleton crew, which they've had to do on a number
of occasions. But this was a really good rebounding team last year. They
finished the regular season fifth in the league and total rebounding percentage. They were
not good on the offensive class on the offensive lasts, mostly by design,
but they did not allow second chance opportunities. Only the Philadelphia seventy six ers
and Milwaukee Bucks were better at grabbing defensive rebounds last year, which is a
stark difference from being twenty second and defensive rebounding percentage this year. I think,
both because of the personnel and because of the lack of available personnel,
this is where it's really manifesting itself. So I do think that that is
the primary concern right now. Yeah, I did not realize they were second
in defensive rebound This is Perkley in the glass. I didn't realize they were
in the top three or defensive rebounding last year, So that's my mistake.
They did not using NBA dot com to be clear on those they dropped off
in the playoffs, and so maybe that's what I'm remembering. But even then,
that's way I'm looking at the numbers there. That's way off of what
my perception was. So I find again I find it tough to believe that
that would be the sole reason. But we are kind of on the same
page where it's unless they do something in the like by the trade deadline,
I don't I don't know that they're going to be in that four or five
contender loop. I thought about making my question like whether they're going to acquire
at least two rotation pieces at the trade deadline, but I decided that was
a little too easy. I don't know that I would, but I don't
actually if you want buy or sell the heat making a major move of the
deadline, I don't know what I would actually pick about that, to be
honest with you, so so much has changed with Yannis off the market,
like they all their moves were get around towards maintaining cap flexibility for next off
season, and the move is, if you want a star, it's Bradley
Beal and I just don't know. It depends on how Washington would feel about
Tyler. Hero is the centerpiece of that. I'd probably sell it, but
who knows. We are onto the bucks though I have And I think this
is more relevant now because last year, when there were so many injuries,
you could easily call I had him as a when the season wrapped up,
I think I had him as a top twelve player in the player rankings.
Chris Middleton buy or sell top twenty player in the NBA. I think that's
an easy pie for me. Would be as high ast top fifteen. I
think it gets tough when you're looking at how well Paul George has played Kevin
Durant. Those are players that weren't healthy last year. Hopefully conn Ify Towns
comes back from COVID and he's been a monster this season. Top twenty seems
ambitious enough. And yeah, I think just having like Katie available and staff
available and all of that changes it a little bit, and I would probably
be more likely to have him towards twenty than towards fifteen. As small a
gap as that is, but we're still talking about a guy who is averaging
twenty one point nine point six point two rebounds five point seven assists. He's
joining the fifty ninety club yet again. He is just an unbelievably dynamic and
versatile score and remains a perfect compliment to Jannis onto the Kombo. So yeah,
I mean, like, I didn't think that you were too high when
you had him going into the bubble. I think is like the number ten
player in the league, and caught a little flak for that, Like that
seemed like kind of reasonable based on where he's playing, and it's kind of
similar this year where he's not glamorous. He's never going to have the kind
of star power enjoyed by other players of his caliber, but he is that
good. Yeah, and look, people point to Kenny's It shouldn't be an
issue of Kenny be a number two on the title could tender like he's he's
been one for starters and there's been if he playoffs, like you know,
he turns into the best player in the league against that series in Boston a
few years ago, but then he stumbles I think when they played the Raptors
in twenty nineteen maybe if I'm remembering correctly, and then last year against the
Heat, like they lose that series after Ghannest, but like Chris Middleton was
really like keeping them in games that points. Look, he's seventy third.
He's in the seventy third percent tile of isolation efficiency this year and that's basically
par for the course. He was in the seventy fourth percent high last year,
so that's not new. He's hitting forty seven percent of his catch and
shoot threes. He's sitting forty four point four percent of his pull up threes,
and that's not even No. I don't expect it to remain there,
but he was at I think close to forty percent last year on that number.
This guy is really good and there's no have we seen he was at
thirty seven point two percent on pull up threes last year. In case anybody
wanted to this is just a really good basketball player. He can score at
every level, even though his game can stall out before the rim. I
think get times, you know, if you want to quibble about if we've
seen too much of him in crunch time situations this year, for Milwaukee where
last night I checked, he was like his usage in crunch time was like
pretty freaking high. I'll double check that does him talking now, But yeah,
you can probably quibble over that. He's yeah, he's just averaging the
most shots for them in crunch time at the moment. He's also he's also
slashing sixty forty one hundred in crunch time. That's four games for a total
of basically twenty minutes. But that's still just like the thing with him,
and this does not make him better than Yannis. I just want to make
that clear. Is he's he's an overall six of ten in the clutch this
year, Like those are pretty good numbers. He's just he's less of a
liability on the primer. I don't know, like teams aren't going to care
about Yannis dribbling into a pull up three. They're not going to care about
Janie's mid range game. For what you need in crunch time, there could
be situations in the half court where like you don't have a ton of this
momentum, like it might just make more sense of the ball on Chris Middleton's
hands. Yannis is so good. I just want to make that clear.
He's just he's so good, but we've seen that he can be almost solvable
in those situations where defense is tightened up in the half court. I don't
mean this to say that Chris Middleton is more valuable to the Bucks or anything,
but I feel like he's sort of been because of how video gaming Yannis's
numbers are and because of how the Bucks have popped out that we're not putting
we're not assigning enough blame to the aggregate picture here, which is just Jannie's
struggles looking at what he shot at the free throw line situations. Mike Brudenholzer,
we need to talk about this isn't a Chris Middleton isn't a number two.
It's that the Bucks are flawed because of many reasons there happened to this
point. I will say, and I don't think Chris Middleton is close.
Maybe he's like I don't think he's one of the top three reasons why this
team has not or maybe will not win a title with this corps. I
think an interesting way to put it is that Jannie guarantees that this team is
a title contender, but it's not winning a title without Pete Chris Middleton.
I would agree, and I just don't. Look. Here's the other thing
is like, if you give I'm just gonna be honest. If you exchange
Chris Middleton with Bradley Beal, are the Bucks appreciably better? I guess maybe.
I'm not sure because of Middleton's defensive ability too, and they they're probably
comparable passers at this point, like they're just looking at the numbers. So
I would put him in the Bradley Beale tier where it's like, you know,
Bradley Beal, I think he'll inherently have more fluence over the offense because
he is number one option at least while Westbrook's not there and so and if
the Wizards get to play games obviously, but with Middleton, it's like,
I think he's closer to like the Bradley Beale level where it's could they maybe
Bradley Bill probablys a better chance of making all MBA in a given season,
So brahaps you still put him above there, But he's closer to that type
of star territory than people traditionally credit him. Yeah, I'm with you.
I'd be more. I think I still have Beal ahead of him in personal
rankings even if Bill wouldn't necessarily be as strong a fit on this specific Milwaukee
roster, but I would still have Middleton and like that that you know,
you mentioned Kyrie Irving earlier as a potential top fifteen guy, Like I think
that Middleton is largely in that same bucket, just in very different esthetic ways.
And the thing that we're never going to get to see, but like
Bradley Beale is shown that having him doesn't amount to a playoff Berth even when
the minutes with the Bucks they're slaughtering people. When Middleton plays without Giannis like
that, the lineups there matter and that's not his full time role. So
we're probably never going to get that taste for Middleton. I don't think we
need to declare that he's a viable number two on a contender. I'm with
you. So moving on to the New York Nicks, I'm going to recycle
a question from the Chicago Bowls section of this this episode, and that is,
does New York currently have a centerpiece of a future contender on its roster?
Right now? We can We can look anywhere from RJ. Barrett to
Emmanuel quickly. I think I'm obligated to mention Frank Neil Keena because of you,
Obi Top and Mitchell Robinson, Like, are any of those guys potential
number ones and a title team? No, there's an look that's not say.
I think Knicks fans will, if they listen to this podcast, will
be angry because they believe that the media is super low on r J.
R J has had a pretty good year and the fact that he's worked himself
out of a rut because he was kind of down there for a while after
a pretty good start of the year. That matters a great deal. But
there needs to be I just don't offensively, I don't know that it's it's
tenable for him to be. You know, he might be able to put
up numbers, and he can be an engine of an offense, and he
can be maybe his in between game will start hitting better. I just I
don't see it when I watch him. I just don't. I don't see
even when he has these really good games, I'm not sure that I see
it. I don't think Mitchell Robinson can never be that guy Julius Randall is.
The numbers are fun, but he's not going to be that player.
If you're asking about their twenty twenty one pick. I mean maybe, but
they're they're so good at the moment that they're twenty twenty one pick. They
isn't going to be as consequential as I think as any everyone thought. It
almost feels like they're working their way into like Orlando Magic trajectory where it's like
they might be a little too good to escape the mediocrity treadmill for a while,
Like if I don't, I don't think that this is an unsustainable performance
from this team, like being a play in contender in the Eastern Conference.
I to be clear, I actually originally had this question be about RJ.
Barrett because I think he's the most intriguing option, and Dan talked me down
from that. Well, he's the would I think is of right now?
Who else would you put as that unless you're so high on manual? Quickly,
I guess yeah, Or I mean Mitchell Robinson kind of in like a
Rudy Gobert vane where like he could eventually be so impactful defense that he could
be a non traditional number one on a title team. But yeah, I
mean I think it's got to be Barrett, And yeah, yeah, I'm
with you. I'm gonna sell the idea that one is currently on the roster,
even if I'm not yet ready to back down from my idea that that
R. J. Barrett is going to be one of the most improved players
in the NBA by the end of the season. I think that, as
you said, working his way out of that rut showed a lot. I
think if you told me that, I'm just like, I mean, he's
not like this exceptional finisher at the rim yet his in between game is there.
But you know, shooting forty something percent on mid rangers is I don't
know what that is. If you could tell me he's going to develop into
like a really good finisher at the rim and shoot Lee gaverage on off the
dribble jumpers, maybe I'll change my mind. Because he has some positional size
on defense he can get just looking at it. He's a pretty good passer
on offense. And then like you know, for if you're gonna play him
at the two, they're just so big that he's gonna win positional rebounds there.
Like he's been doing the thing that all I thought you were going to
ask out their defense, to be honest with you, just because of where
they're at this season. As we're recording this, and this is per cleanly
glass and it tries to filter out the noise by filtering out garbage time.
The mixer fourth in points allowed per one hundred possessions. The thing that just
gets me is they are twenty ninth in shot location affect the field goal percentage
expectation. And that's because they're twenty eighth in the frequency with which opponents attempt
shots at the rim, and they're twenty sixth in the frequency with which opponents
attempt shots from the three point line. And it's like, that's not great,
and I would have sold their defense hard. Yeah, I grant to
use. Another friend of the podcast has written about this a number of times,
the Bleach Report, about how you know, they're allowing so many wide
open threes and they just aren't falling, And that's not something a defense typically
has control over. Even if you're maximizing who's taking those wide open threes,
like they're still NBA players taking wide open threes. Teams are shooting in the
regress, teams are shooting thirty point one percent on above the bridge threes against
them. That's not going to continue. I might be able to buy their
sixth and rim protection. I might be able to buy that just because of
the activity of new Lands Noel and Mitchell Robinson, and because their lineups are
so big that even when you have like really bad defenders. And I don't
know if this is a make culpup, but Julius Randold has been probably playing
the best defense of his career. For what it's worth anybody, but it's
fully bought it. They're so big that containing the ball just might be easier
at almost every position, I mean even at manual quickly for a guard,
what is he six four or something like that, So and having r J
B the two at six seven, I could buy into their rim protection even
though there's a ton of volume there. The three point shooting makes me uneasy.
But it does feel like Zach always said this, there feels like a
rhyme or reason to what they're doing. And that's more than you could say
about the past like twelve iterations of this team. So I would buy this
defense is like a top half unit. I wouldn't buy it as a top
five, maybe not even a top ten unit, which is still a stark
improvement from where they were last. Yet the other thing, too is like
we need the context of this season where it's just like they could still end
up being top five, but like that doesn't mean that they're actually a top
five defense because of you know, teams that they've played, strength of schedules
are going to be wonky for every team who's missing during those games. I
haven't taken a deep enough look at their schedule, but I've seen a good
deal of their games, and they are excellent at turning these deep on defense.
They can turn games into slogs, and so that's credit to them.
There. They are. They are fun. I will say that, I
just don't know if it's the type of substantive fun that you can buy into
long term. And that's not me trying to shoot on them, that's just
how I feel. Orlando, you know, I struggled with this one because
I didn't want to say buy or sell. The magic should blow it up.
We both would buy that, and we've talked about on a previous pod.
I'm talking about Aaron Gordon. His value around the league seems to be
all over the place. I'm gonna say that they can get a top eight
buy or sell the idea that they can get a top eight team pick for
for Aaron Gordon top a team, top twenty. I'm trying to be super
specific because lottery is so tough, so I'm gonna say top eighteen. I'm
gonna sell it. I think that there's there's just as as intriguing as the
idea of Aaron Gordon remains. We've been talking about the idea of Aaron Gordon
rather than Aaron Gordon the player for what feels like a decade now. I
think it's actually getting close to a decade now. And between that and the
league wide knowledge that Orlando is just kind of stuck as this middling team in
the East, there's not really much of an incentive to like give in to
their lack of leverage here, So I don't I don't think that anything more
than a back end first round pick would be coming if the Magic even choose
to shop him. Yeah, I'm gonna buy. I think he's still underrated
defensively, that we just don't talk enough about it for what he's able to
do. That the passing stuff from him is real. You don't necessarily want
him operating off the dribble too much, but he's at least turned into Oh
he can dribble into picking rolls, and he can facilitate from standstill positions for
his team. The three ball is falling at a good enough clip this year.
He's at over thirty five percent overall, and he is hitting on his
catch and shoot looks forty four point seven percent. If you if you're a
team, and I guess I probably should have come up with a list of
teams that I could see, you know, giving up what would be higher
value first for him, And I don't necessarily know. I guess who springs
to mind, but like, you know what, if Charlotte was like,
hey, we're going for the play in this season, we're just light on
bigs anyway, I don't know what the money becomes for them. But he
would be a great fit there in line ups where you could play a lot
of five there just behind Cody Zeller, but also you have Myles Bridges.
He's valuable, so he could play with him and Cody Zeller at the same
time. I think he would be a and this isn't gonna be a top
Bowl I guess maybe technically could be. And look some of these picks that
would be traded for him and be into the future. So is it.
I guess the notion should be buy or sell the idea that Orlando gets more
than just a throwaway first round pick for Aaron Gordon, because I can't think
I'm still selling it. I'm gonna buy it, Like if you're Denver,
like, he would be such a good fit in Denver, if you're if
you're a Golden State, like, such a good and such a good fit
there, I would think, because you imagine him and Draymond Green defensively,
maybe even play them with James Wiseman talk about playing big like that could do
things defensively, and if you simplify his offensive role, if you're a team
like I don't think. I think if you look at him and say,
hey, we want him to finish plays in transition, catch lobs, maybe
more of a screener. On the other end, will we let him,
you know, maybe try some face ups, I'm sure, but we want
him to space the floor more off catch and shoots. And then you know,
do you give him a ceremonial you know, face two, face up,
the three face up touches or possessions I should say per game more from
whatever he wants to do in the post. Maybe I think there are teams
that could should talk themselves and do it, and look, he's only twenty
five. I would do it. And look another team, they've been aroon
goredon Miami this year. Not sure how much he helps. They're rebounding per
se. But when you're talking about people, they've been running out at the
four this year. That's just someone to imagine him next to Bam And look,
Bam is kind of spacing the floor this year, so maybe that would
work. He'd be a great fit in Minnesota. I just don't know.
Minnesota's like they're so bad this year that it's what do you give up at
him? Like? How much of that makes sense? So I can come
up with teams. I think you get more at a low end first for
him, and if you if you don't have to give up more than that,
he should be on someone else's team already. Is just how I would
frame that. All right, one word answer here, Aaron Gordon will be
on the Orlando Magic past the trade deadline. No, I already predicted he
wouldn't be, So that's I'm going to stand by it. Okay, So
let's move on to the seventy six ers. This is one where I just
I don't know where you're going to go. And my statement is that the
supporting cast performance is going to be sustainable. This is the seventy six Ers
are twelve and twelve and five at the time they're recording this. Joel and
Beata is unquestionably a MVP candidate, but they've also been getting so many contributions
from the non stars on this team, if it's even fair to call some
of them non stars, like Tobias Harris, who is having what's probably the
best year of his career, averaging nineteen point four points, shooting fifty forty
ninety, Seth Curry when he's been available, shooting fifty six percent from three.
Danny Green makes the team better. He's on the court. Shake Milton
has been a revelation off the bench, Tyrese Maxley has shown flashes. But
are we buying this supporting cast being good enough to make the seventy six ers
as good as their record appears? Yeah, I'm there. There's I think
when you look at the supporting cast performances, I don't know if you see
anyone playing noticeably above their head where it's you know, a healthy Seth Curry
probably from shooting like fifty six percent from three all year. But at the
same time, he's a really good shooter and his shots are more simplified Tyrese
Max. He's probably the one that you could point to and be like,
hey, can they give him real minutes in the playoffs? But he does
look like a three level score. It's very feisty on the ball when he's
defending. But just because he's a rookie, like maybe you just don't trust
that, I mean, shake Milton Is. He hinted at some of this
stuff last year. For them, the player you should probably be concerned about.
It's just Ben Simmons on offense is and putting up these gargantuan numbers.
He's still really good on defense, So I'll buy that their supporting cast can
be this good. I don't look at anyone player and say of their supporting
cast of the non Simmons, non embied tier that they couldn't do this.
And Harris just having more space to operate and his role has been simplified under
Doc Rivers, it almost makes sense that he's in the fifty forty. He's
in the fifty five ninety club right now. To buy as Harris. Yeah,
I'm with you. I'm gonna buy it as well, and I think
it's a pretty strong buy for me. It felt it feels like a validation
of the preseason takes. It like, hey, Daryl Morey actually put the
right kind of pieces around that Ben Simmons Joe LMB pairing. They have wing
defenders, they have guys who can space the court, they have players who
can actually create their own shots and shots for others coming off the bench.
And because they have so many good pieces, players are allowed to focus more
on what they're doing well. I mean, like Matisse Tyble is never over
extended on offense in those fourteen point nine minutes he's playing per game, which
allows him to focus on being a game changing defender. I think my only
complaint is that Mike Scott is probably playing a little bit too much. I'd
prefer to see more of like Isaiah Joe or firk On cork Mas, just
someone else who does more at the four. But yeah, I mean,
like I don't I don't think that even as Tobias Harris and Seth Curry inevitably
see their shooting percentages come back to earth a little bit, we're probably gonna
see Danny Green hit more shots, and it feels like everything is just going
to balance it out. And this seventy six ers team is a team we're
gonna be talking about deep into the postseason this year. Currently the best record
in the East. I guess the one thing that could shake up their supporting
cast would be if they make that major move. How does that change the
dynamic for them? I don't know that they're even if they they're gonna make
a move because Daryn Moorey's in charge of this team, there's gonna be a
move made at the deadline. I don't know that it's gonna be massive enough
to really just be seismic. I don't think they're gonna give up Ben Simmons
or Bradley Beal like that. I mean, I have no basis for saying
this other than pure speculation, Like we don't have the sources required to make
this claim. But I feel like Daryl Morey, it's going to want to
prove that he, unlike his predecessors in Philadelphia, can win with Joel ebeatn
Ben Simmons. It's a it's a test of competence and that he he wants
to win with those incumbents by putting the right pieces around them and showing that,
hey, he can go out and win in a style that's different from
doing everything possible to acquire the most stars. The only thing I'll say about
that is it does seem like he was willing to trade Ben Siffets for James
Harden. And I don't know that that's that's different, right, Like we're
talking about a guy who's finished top three and MVP voting for roughly the last
thirty years. I'm not a three time reigning scoring champ. Like I think
that's different. Yeah, I'm not saying I personally would not have done it,
But I'm not saying that it's you know, the stance that you would
have is completely valid. I'm just saying I don't know that if he did
adopt that stance that you were just talking about, I would call it a
fresh adoption, would just before point. Yeah, I think it's it's new
because like, of course he was going to go try to get James Harden,
because he's Smarten, who wasn't going to go try to get James Harden
for their team. But I don't think that he's just going to to want
to get that second tier star like a Bradley Beal, just because that option
is available to him. The Toronto Raptors were remocked up on the sixers the
right bolt, buying that there's a boarding cast to be stainable. The Toronto
Raptors, this is probably me swing. This was the low hanging fruit for
me. Pascal siak buy or sell. Pascal Siakam is going to be fine?
Can you define fine for me? Pascal Siakam is still going to be
a top twenty five player by the end of the season. I'll sell that.
Okay, Yeah, I think had you said he's going to be an
All Star caliber player, that's where I think. I'm more on the fence
where I think he's going to be one of those guys who, you know,
we're talking about him as an injury addition to the All Star roster because
he's capable of making the team but doesn't really have that solidified case. It
feels to me like he was a little bit solved last year, whereas the
Raptors asked him to do more in the playoffs and teams adjusted to him,
and you know, the spins to nowhere as you've put it, just there
there are. There are just too many flaws in his game for him to
be that all around player that Toronto wants him to be. I think we
were just a little too quick with the star proclamations here, and that's fine,
Like he's still a very valuable second or third best player on a contender,
but the Raptors are currently asking him to be the best one, and
that's that's just not going to work. See, and so I buy that
he is going We had them when we rank them, and you were part
of this. I don't know what he I forgot. Would he ended up
being an nbamath he was nineteen for burs NBA predicting this year, I don't.
I don't think he's going to finish that high spoiler alert and there I
do agree with a lot of the stuff that you said, but because Toronto
is still trying to overextend him, Like this is just year two of his
being the offensive system and they're basically still trying to push that. And I
don't think you know other teams. He still has Kyle Lowry, so it's
not like he doesn't have any help. But like Fred van Fleet is not
the best shot creator. He's a good shot maker. When he isn't creating
for himself, there's just a ton of pressure on him when you're looking at
the person now, that's going to make it harder. He's still he's getting
to the rim less than he ever has, which is down from a career
low and getting to the rim last year. He still kind of has some
nice touch around there. There needs to be like when he is attacking,
like he can't bail out as much of his drives and the turnovers in traffic
for him, they just still feel like they're they're such an issue and his
decision making needs to be better there. He still only has a twelve nine
turnover rate in general, which is not super high. But when you're looking
at yeah, I mean he's you know, throwing weird passes that don't make
any like there's there's clearly problems there. When defenses are able to like just
throw bodies at him, he doesn't really seem to know how to react,
whether it's to settle for this mid ranger or like we've put it the spins
to nowhere, the spins just directly into the defense. Not going to be
the best guy at drawing fouls, it seems like people kind of know like
what's going to happen there, and that's aspect of his game is probably suffered
a little bit. I'm just they're still trying to work through him so much.
Why I can't we count on him improving incrementally as the season goes on.
Maybe the biggest mistake was just expecting that that leap like he had been
showing, and the signs were on the wall last year because his efficiency kind
of dropped. But this role that they're trying to groom him into it is
so huge. It is so massive that it's not just this like tiny aspect
of branching out. They're basically trying to make him an offensive system unto himself.
And you can even see it with some of the touches and crunch time
he's had this year too. I don't know. Maybe this season is the
more ambitious part that I'm trying to buy or sell, but I think he
ends up being fine, and if he's not, I still wouldn't be worried
going into next season. Like it feels. Maybe it's the personnel thing offensively
around him, and maybe I'm just so far off base there, but I
remain a firm believer in Pascal Siakam. I think it's for me, it's
more of a condemnation of the Toronto Raptors than Pascal Siakam, where it's like
they expected too much, too soon of him and then built the roster accordingly,
and it's biting them now. Well, they're just they're tasking them with
too much, especially in crunch time, and it just doesn't quite make sense.
And also, to clarify your point from earlier in Crystal Basketball at NBA
math going into the season, we had him ranked to twenty one. He
was directly ahead of Chris Paul and Trey Young, and he was directly behind
Rudy Gobert and Paul George. He was the second to the last of the
All NBA candidates. Okay, yeah, so pretty close there with where we
ended up at BR two. I don't clearly he's not going to be at
that level. I still view him as this top twenty five ish player that
we're looking at the long term. I think I'm looking more like top thirty
five ish. There needs to be great. He needs more offensive variants off
the dribble, or at least variants in his decision making, or just whatever.
You want to call it, and I think he's potentially get there.
I'm also wondering if it did Toronto, like do we know that they weren't
prepared for this? And maybe I mean the fact that he missed the game
for disciplinary reasons, which when you're playing Terrence Davis at all, it is
just a questionable decision at best as an organization, but or as raptors.
Twitter likes to put it redacted. Oh I like that redacted when you're playing
redacted at all. So there definitely does. Yeah, I guess you're right.
There's definitely a level of unexpectancy here where they probably thought he was going
to be better. But I don't know, just based off what they did
to the roster over the off season, where you lose a Vaka, you
lose Marc Gasol, unless you thought, like like I guess I did that
an and nobody was going to turn into this all star basically they so maybe
that like that's the expectations have fallen. Eltright would be clear about that too.
Is I think fred van Fleet has I don't think his contract is bad.
I think he's really good. He would have he has a chance to
be a ceremonial All Star this year. I don't know that he's just improved
a bunch on offense. He's still hitting the same shots, still struggling to
finish at the rim, not great at hitting these pull up jumpers. So
the same sort of flaws are still there. He's just still a really good
player. There's a lot of I think there are a lot of things that
they that have not gone to plan or that they didn't hit on, and
Pascal siakam struggles, while being one of them, are also a symptom of
sort of those those other problems on the team. That seems fair. So
if that was, if that was the low hanging fruit, then my fruit
here is so low hanging that it's growing up from the ground in the form
of a boo. Dug it up because it went rotten and then someone buried
it and he dug it up. Buy or sell? Bradley Beale has gone
from Washington before the trade deadline. This is so tough. He should I
buy the idea that he should stop the question. I'm gonna sell because it's
it's the Wizards, and there there might be this I don't I call it
a trace, but maybe it's just like this huge impetus of stubbornness because they
gave up a first for Russell Westbrook and if he gets healthy, they gets
still pass themselves into making noise in the East. This feels like a situation
where they could also look at it and say, well, are they offers
for Bradley? We are going to get any worse over the summer, and
when he has a full season left as opposed to a season and a half,
probably not. So I'm gonna sell I'm right there with you for the
exact same reasons. It all comes down to Westbrook being there. As long
as he's there. Actually, because they gave up that first round pick to
acquire him, there has to be optimism in DC, even if there shouldn't
be. They also paid Thomas Burton's too, where it's like we have to
see at least the first season of this whole thing through. Yeah, but
I mean, like with Thomas Bryant hurt and no really usable replacement for him,
they shouldn't. They should absolutely trade him for whatever they can get before
the deadlock. If you had to pick the team to just go get him,
just pay the cost that it is, which team would that be Miami.
I guess they would be the team. I just question whether they have
the and look, Brian Renhorse of VESPN wrote about how there's just a shortage
of now first round picks that could be traded. I think he over exaggerated
a little bit, because there are things that teams could do, like remove
protections on ones that they alway so they can trade deeper in the future.
But we talked about how what the Pelicans got for Drew and even Davis and
what wow this is. James Harden commanded from Houston that the value of Rady
Bill is gonna be through the roof. Maybe it's actually lower. Just if
there is the scarcity of first round picks, the trade Miami would be the
one. If I'm just not convinced on their their assets. If we're forgetting
about realism, I'll put the Toronto Raptors out there, just because everything that
we just said about Pascal Siakam is partially, if not fully fixed. If
you have Bradley Bielder, would you give up Pascal Siakam for Bradley bald I
mean, yeah, probably. I think that the ceiling is significantly higher.
He's still under contract for another year. You can sell him as the centerpiece
of an organization that is antithetical to everything that Washington has done recently. So
yeah, I think I think that I would. But ideally you're acquiring him
without giving up Siakam and just throwing them every pick that you can muster,
and you know, maybe you're giving up oge On and Obie or some other
piece, because that deal Siakam pairing would be super ideal. Yes, it
would. And actually to your point about that, so you would give up
og for Beal? Yeah? And would you give up what I've thought about
and I thought about, Well, I go back and forth on that one,
because then you're gonna like have van Fleet and Beal. I guess that's
a yeah, that's probably fine. I guess what you could do if you're
the Raptors though, and the fact that the Knicks have so much cap space
would make this feasible, is you can move moving in those poison pill extensions
because og and and Nobi to the Raptors, he's only worth whatever he's making
this season and outgoing trade money, but to inbound for the Wizards, it's
the average of all his salaries and including those extension years. The Knicks have
cap space, so you can figure out a way to get Norman Powell to
the Knicks or something and move if you knew og and Fred van Fleet as
the baseline, and then maybe there has to be picks or something in there.
I would totally do that if I were If I were the Raptors,
the team I was gonna pick is if they don't have to move Ben Simmons,
If it's all the picks and you're using Maxie and you have a te
Siebel Philly would be as long as we're just dreaming there, that would be
the team. I don't know that I would move Ben Simmons for him.
It does make sense, and you know, functionally for a lot of things,
and I think he's a better fit with Joel and Bid that James Harden
would have been. But that would be the team I would immediately look at.
And there are less realistic ones, like imagine if you could get him
to Dallas. But it's just like unless Washington wants Christops Porzingias, who i'd
move A heartbeat for Bradley Bell. I want to make that clear. I
don't know. Heartbeat maybe even quicker than that. I'm glad that you didn't
say the Suns because I don't want to have that argument again. They're not
the team I would pick. I think they could if DeAndre At was on
the table, but they have to go somebody. Salley thought him the last
team I'll mention, and this might support your buy yourself from before. You
want a best player on a contender material in Chicago, you put Bradley Bill
there and the party changes. And I don't know that you could use Zach
Lavine as the baseline if you were making other packages, but if you made
it strictly young players and salary filler, I don't know what your defense looks
like with Levine and Bill, but those two could do some damage. I'll
give you a hint. It doesn't look good. So I will say this
about Lavine still bad on defense, but I think they've sort of decided like,
Okay, fuck it, we're still gonna throw them at these basically start
like player types and relative to like that assignment, like you could be bad
defending star players, and it's it's more okay to be bad, if that
makes any sense. No, it's totally fair, that viable and fair.
That does it for us. It's weren't way longer than I thought it would
have. We'll have to live up to the eight seventy five minutes when we
go to the Western Conference. My indie one took us off the rails.
We spent like, probably ten or fifteen minutes on the pacers. Please,
we spent ten or fifteen minutes, all right. I spent ten or fifteen
minutes without taking a breath, just on the pacers, and I hate Usually
that's reserved for Frank Ni Lakinick takes. I have no frank Nuclear takes other
than I'm gonna be heartbroken if the Knicks end up letting him walk and restricted
free agency, which means I'm gonna need to be prepared to be heartbroken.
Guys, gals, everybody, please rate, review, and subscribe to us
on iTunes wherever you're getting your podcasts. Still helps us out a ton Until
next time. We want to hope that you enjoyed this discussion, this rambling,
whatever you want to called it. And two, I leave you with
the shout out to the one the only still really good even if he doesn't
finish Top three and Defensive Player of the Year voting at the end of the
season. Miles Turner, Sugar Ray Leonard, Roberto Duran, Marvelous, Marvin
Hagler, and Thomas Hearns. Legends whose four way rivalry define one of the
greatest errors in boxing history, relive their decade of dominance in the new Showtime
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