Speaker 1: What is up, Fellasiko's I am Dan Valley coming at
Speaker 1: you with the one, the only, this certified, fantabulous mister
Speaker 1: Grant hues he's getting ready to leave us for a
Speaker 1: little bit for vacation, but has agreed to do the
Speaker 1: NBA most confusing team's draft. We know you're all excited
Speaker 1: for it. Coming at you a full twelve hours earlier, then,
Speaker 1: I accidentally scheduled this live show for so Apologies to
Speaker 1: anyone who was waiting for us to be going live
Speaker 1: at two o'clock Eastern time in the morning. That's not
Speaker 1: when we were planning on going live. It was around
Speaker 1: two o'clock in me in the afternoon. A lot of
Speaker 1: just missteps on my end, Grant, As you said, I
Speaker 1: should probably start getting some sleep, but my question to you,
Speaker 1: I'm not so in my sleep deprived state. I will
Speaker 1: not forget this. How the heck are you doing? We
Speaker 1: need to know the answer.
Speaker 2: I'm happy to be here. It feels like it's been
Speaker 2: a really long time. It because we didn't We haven't
Speaker 2: potted for a full week, is that correct? Is it
Speaker 2: more than that? It feels like almost two weeks. That's
Speaker 2: why it feels like a long time. I do feel
Speaker 2: like regular listeners would have immediately flagged the two am
Speaker 2: Eastern live stream start time and said that must be
Speaker 2: a mistake, because we're all well aware that that's several
Speaker 2: hours past my bedtime. There's no way I would appear
Speaker 2: on a live stream that's that late. If I did,
Speaker 2: it would be really unexciting because I would be unconscious.
Speaker 2: I would be asleep, which, you know, maybe that's something
Speaker 2: to put behind the paywall.
Speaker 1: I don't know how often we need to do a podcast,
Speaker 1: but how often are you up past eleven pm? Your time?
Speaker 2: No more than once a week, I would say, like that,
Speaker 2: and that's just how oft Well I could ask you
Speaker 2: the same question, but I know the answer. The time
Speaker 2: you were asleep before eleven pm? Oh like on purpose,
Speaker 2: not like you crashed out at four in the afternoon,
Speaker 2: And it doesn't care.
Speaker 1: Uh. Probably when I used to have a bedtime, I
Speaker 1: was probably being bottle fed at that point. I have
Speaker 1: no idea, if.
Speaker 2: You think about it, we really could we need to
Speaker 2: find a job where it's like a twenty four hour
Speaker 2: thing and we could just both hold the position and
Speaker 2: just work opposite twelve hours, you know, because I don't
Speaker 2: function outside of like normal working hours, and you only
Speaker 2: function outside of normal working hours, so there must be
Speaker 2: some way for us to exploit this. Should we do
Speaker 2: a twenty four hour live stream where it just we
Speaker 2: just tag in and tag out.
Speaker 1: Twelve hours of each year, we do it in like
Speaker 1: four hour increments. We need to You got me thinking, though,
Speaker 1: is we need to do if we get a thousand
Speaker 1: more Patreon members the next month, Grant, we'll do a pod,
Speaker 1: a live stream podcast after midnight his time. I'm doing
Speaker 1: it anyway.
Speaker 2: Yeah, easy light list for you.
Speaker 1: We'll have to see what type of state he's in?
Speaker 1: Is he like? What does he consume to stay up
Speaker 1: past midnight?
Speaker 2: I can't even imagine. I can't imagine. It wouldn't be pretty,
Speaker 2: it would Yeah, yeah, you know what, I'll commit to
Speaker 2: it though. A thousand more subscribers, I'm happy to I'm
Speaker 2: happy to debase myself by staying up late.
Speaker 1: I guess debase yourself, Grant, the most Confusing Teams draft.
Speaker 1: Ideally we'd be doing this when Lebron post Lebron James's
Speaker 1: next decision, which should be coming imminently, maybe while we're
Speaker 1: recording this podcast. Probably not, I think most people think
Speaker 1: it'll happen sometime after the World Cup final, but enough
Speaker 1: stuff has happened that we can sit here survey the
Speaker 1: lay of the land, and even when we're kind of
Speaker 1: baking in, this team clearly doesn't feel like it's finished. Uh,
Speaker 1: there are other teams that are just confusing me, ever,
Speaker 1: living heck out of me. So is there anything as
Speaker 1: you went about this before we start going through our
Speaker 1: picks that is there a certain set of criteria that
Speaker 1: stands out to you? Or is it are these if
Speaker 1: you're going through when you've built your big board? Was
Speaker 1: the prevailing theme? This is a team that I didn't
Speaker 1: think made sense leading into the off season and they're
Speaker 1: still confusing me. Or has a lot of this stuff
Speaker 1: been transaction driven over the off season?
Speaker 2: Great question? I think. I think the first thing is
Speaker 2: that it used to be easier to point to a
Speaker 2: team and say this one doesn't make any sense because
Speaker 2: that was just shorthand for well, they're they're not going
Speaker 2: for a championship and they're not tanking, and so that's
Speaker 2: so like, what's the plan. You know, the Raptors have
Speaker 2: occupied that space for.
Speaker 1: A long time.
Speaker 2: The Bulls kind of and lived in it for they
Speaker 2: were like the poster team for that type of things.
Speaker 2: You know, any any team that was like in the
Speaker 2: play in mix or whatever, and it just didn't feel
Speaker 2: like they were going for one or extreme or the other.
Speaker 2: You'd say, like, well, that's confusing. Why would you try
Speaker 2: to say it's different now? It's different now with the
Speaker 2: way the lottery odds are, like, there's there's certainly not
Speaker 2: a payoff for being abjectly terrible on purpose, or at
Speaker 2: least your odds are are not as favorable. And so
Speaker 2: I really found myself trying to avoid just the teams
Speaker 2: that are kind of in the middle, or at least
Speaker 2: not choosing them for that reason alone. Like there needed
Speaker 2: to be to answer your question more precisely, like there
Speaker 2: needed to be roster stuff that that struck me as
Speaker 2: ill conceived or like just unfinished, or you couldn't really
Speaker 2: find the sense of or just the way management is operating.
Speaker 2: I've got a team that has some ownership issues that
Speaker 2: are confusing to me. I'm sure they're on your list too,
Speaker 2: stuff like that. You know, it's all the basics, but
Speaker 2: it can't and it can't just be well, they don't
Speaker 2: seem to have it can't only be well, this is
Speaker 2: like a team that's going to finish between thirty two
Speaker 2: and forty two wins, So what's the point Because you
Speaker 2: could get away with that before, but I think you
Speaker 2: need to look a little harder. Now what do you
Speaker 2: think do you? Does that resonate with you? That was
Speaker 2: that an issue as you were putting your list together too,
Speaker 2: of like, oh, this is kind of different than it
Speaker 2: used to.
Speaker 1: Be, right, and it's just so as like a spoiler,
Speaker 1: like the Chicago Bulls would not be high up on
Speaker 1: my big board. But what I did all also factor
Speaker 1: in is that a lot of this goes beyond just
Speaker 1: this coming season too. It's not about trying to figure out, okay,
Speaker 1: well we kind of understand what the Bulls are doing
Speaker 1: in the long term, or at least get like it's
Speaker 1: all right, new front office regime, so we understand what
Speaker 1: they're doing this year or what the overarching picture should be.
Speaker 1: Some of these teams you look at and a lot
Speaker 1: of it could be just awkward fit with players or
Speaker 1: on court stuff driven by all of that. But there
Speaker 1: are a couple of teams where it's not just what's
Speaker 1: the end goal this season, but what is the plan
Speaker 1: long term. They every team in theory all has the
Speaker 1: same endgame. But if you haven't acted like a team
Speaker 1: that's cobbled together any type of long term vision, and
Speaker 1: you're not clearly all in on winning next season, that's
Speaker 1: a I mean, it's a red flag or confuses the
Speaker 1: hell out of me. I call it more of a
Speaker 1: red flag than confusing. But it goes into the roster
Speaker 1: construction or the construction of a vision and the incoherence
Speaker 1: of it all.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd agree with that. I think if if I
Speaker 2: had to, if I divert from your methodology at all,
Speaker 2: it's that I did focus a little more on this
Speaker 2: upcoming season. But I do think if if something about
Speaker 2: your team is confusing in the short term, there's a
Speaker 2: really good chance that it's also like your big picture
Speaker 2: is kind of a mess too, because right, you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: because here we are three months from the start of
Speaker 2: the year, and if things are weird now, it's it's
Speaker 2: not like you're you know, this isn't a case where like,
Speaker 2: well I can see the vision of Team X. It's
Speaker 2: it's all confusing now, but like once things line up
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty eight, I get it. It's not. You know,
Speaker 2: usually it's it's kind of like systemically confused.
Speaker 1: Honestly, it's probably never been harder to measure a team's
Speaker 1: longer term viability or trajectory, even if they're an established contender.
Speaker 1: It's sort of use windows just feel as if they're
Speaker 1: built to open and shut one a whim.
Speaker 2: The flip side of that is, we're just lots of preamble,
Speaker 2: but we haven't talked in two weeks or whatever. I'm
Speaker 2: working on something ranking like trade ships, you know, and
Speaker 2: it's not it can't be like wemben Yama, but it's
Speaker 2: like the types of stuff you would use to acquire
Speaker 2: the next available superstar, right, So, like young players, or
Speaker 2: like draft picks and trying to rank draft picks, Like, okay,
Speaker 2: the Nuggets twenty thirty two, that's out there, you know
Speaker 2: that the Nets have. It's like, okay, that seems really choice,
Speaker 2: but that's so far away, Like the Nuggets could have
Speaker 2: gone through two competitive cycles by then, or even more
Speaker 2: than that. So does that mean like a twenty twenty
Speaker 2: eight pick is what you want? Or what about? So?
Speaker 2: I to your point, it's really hard to game out
Speaker 2: anything past a year or two at this point because
Speaker 2: just the way the lottery works, the way the aprons
Speaker 2: of affected team building, it's it's a you know what,
Speaker 2: confusing times we live in, confusing times, uncertain times.
Speaker 1: I'm with you there, and because I'm a kind and
Speaker 1: generous person, I will give you the first pick of
Speaker 1: the most confusing teams draft.
Speaker 2: So this was the first team that came to mind.
Speaker 2: It's the one that I tease a little bit. They
Speaker 2: have to be on your list. We've talked about them
Speaker 2: a little bit. I don't know if they justify the
Speaker 2: first pick, but first thought, best thought, the Portland Trail
Speaker 2: Blazers are a confusing basketball team to me.
Speaker 1: You know how well I know that we're in lockstep.
Speaker 1: Is John Moran in a Blazers jersey is the front
Speaker 1: and center of our YouTube thumb now for this episode.
Speaker 1: We didn't go into this knowing what each other's big
Speaker 1: boards were, but I knew they would be a team
Speaker 1: that were on both of our lists, and I thought
Speaker 1: they would go first.
Speaker 2: Overall, Okay, great, they have to be so this the
Speaker 2: Ja Morant of it all is part of it. I
Speaker 2: want to start though with there are a lot of
Speaker 2: things I like about this team, Like we both were
Speaker 2: Denny Avviapild. We think he's great, great contract. We like
Speaker 2: some of their young guards. We're never giving up on
Speaker 2: Scoot Donovan Klingen, Like there is a version of this
Speaker 2: team that has just built around young guys as an
Speaker 2: Ovidia that I think we like a lot, Like even
Speaker 2: some of their marginal moves like Brandon Carlson might be helpful,
Speaker 2: and like we're never giving up on young handsome and
Speaker 2: like what if Shade and Sharp becomes something, then maybe
Speaker 2: that deal turns out to be a pot. There's a
Speaker 2: lot to like, is all I'm saying, Like the defensive infrastructure,
Speaker 2: they're just a couple shooters away all that stuff. But
Speaker 2: starting from the very top with ownership, what is happening here?
Speaker 2: Like where will this? Is this a team that is
Speaker 2: now suddenly like a real threat to move because of
Speaker 2: what Tom Dundan has said about public funds and like
Speaker 2: basically telegraphing his feeling that hey, Portland, you're lucky I'm
Speaker 2: even here, Like that's a that's talk about red flags right,
Speaker 2: Like that is the ownership situation there kind of puts
Speaker 2: anything in place. So I don't know if confusing is
Speaker 2: even the right word. It's like ominous. You know, there's
Speaker 2: unstable concerning whatever you want to use, So start there,
Speaker 2: move down the list to Mike and nor is on
Speaker 2: like the least stable head coach contract we've ever seen.
Speaker 1: Just it's he's one instantly.
Speaker 2: Right, like what could go what could go wrong? Like
Speaker 2: surely there's no real reason why teams have forever avoided
Speaker 2: employing lame duck coaches, Like what you know? So there's that.
Speaker 2: Then you get to the roster. The jaw trade is crazy.
Speaker 2: We've talked about that plenty. He's kind of in the
Speaker 2: way of a lot of people. It creates a bunch
Speaker 2: of roster crunch issues. His effect on Danny Avdya feels
Speaker 2: like certainly negative, proved me wrong. I would love to
Speaker 2: be wrong, But that that doesn't Those two don't make
Speaker 2: a ton of sense together. This team hasn't added shooters,
Speaker 2: and they were twenty seventh and three point shooting accuracy
Speaker 2: last year despite getting up the fourth most in terms
Speaker 2: of share of their shots. Like, I don't, I don't
Speaker 2: know how you look at what happened last year and
Speaker 2: decide adding Jah Moran and not shooting is the solution.
Speaker 2: I We could go on, but like those are the
Speaker 2: sort of the pillars of like what I don't get
Speaker 2: about what's going on with Portland? Do you have anything
Speaker 2: to add to that? Would they have been your first pick? Yeah?
Speaker 1: They would have been my first pick. And I think
Speaker 1: the Tom Dundan stuff only just adds to the confusion
Speaker 1: because it's it's not even just the are they still
Speaker 1: gonna be here in five years or whatever it's is
Speaker 1: he actually will? They were linked to some of these
Speaker 1: bigger names, including John Morant, but that was a value
Speaker 1: playing a vacuum, But it's are they gonna be willing
Speaker 1: to pay Denny Avia next summer? Is a renegotiating extent
Speaker 1: or even when he's up for a new contract and
Speaker 1: hits restrict unrestricted free agency? Like, what are going to
Speaker 1: be their limits when it comes to investing in players?
Speaker 1: We've seen their limits when it comes to investing in
Speaker 1: what surrounds the players, and it's not great. It's not
Speaker 1: great so far. The guard glut I was just insane
Speaker 1: to me. Now, I don't see how you caught to
Speaker 1: trade Chris Murray wasn't a big part of what they're doing,
Speaker 1: but to trade like two wings who can help you
Speaker 1: on defense? For John Morant, who nukes your spacing and
Speaker 1: hurts your defense, and you're also gonna play him with
Speaker 1: Damian Lillard, is what their early speculation sounds like. I
Speaker 1: don't know what that's like. I don't know what that
Speaker 1: says about what these teams core lineups are gonna be,
Speaker 1: because then it's you get into well, then one of
Speaker 1: Tamani Kamara or Drew Holliday is gonna be kind of
Speaker 1: left out in the cold, or you're gonna be playing
Speaker 1: smaller a lot. But oh, it's kind of harder to
Speaker 1: play smaller now that Jeremy Grant isn't there. And you
Speaker 1: also did resign Robert Williams the third, so you would
Speaker 1: assume between young handsome Brandon Carlson r W three and
Speaker 1: Donovan Klingon that you want more of a traditional big
Speaker 1: man rotation anyway. I And then just like, what does
Speaker 1: John Morant look like on this team? Have you done
Speaker 1: him a disservice on the court? You know, we're saying
Speaker 1: that John Morant comes in and complicates a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: You've probably not put John Morant in his best on
Speaker 1: court situation just because you don't have the surrounding space
Speaker 1: and to capitalize on whatever he's able to provide in
Speaker 1: terms of rim pressure. I this it's just so interesting
Speaker 1: because they were one of the teams. I don't know
Speaker 1: if you could call him a feel good story. I
Speaker 1: thought Tiago's did great work after Chauncey Billups went through
Speaker 1: the whole indictment process, so like to kind of keep
Speaker 1: a stable baseline there. They were pretty strong defensively at
Speaker 1: points you saw just tons of growth from certain players.
Speaker 1: I like to go in this direction. I don't like
Speaker 1: the Jahn Morant was it just oh, he's so cheap,
Speaker 1: Like we're gonna roll the dice and hope it works out.
Speaker 1: The problem with that is, even if it works out,
Speaker 1: I don't really know what the ceiling of that kind
Speaker 1: of look like. What does the best case scenario of
Speaker 1: John Morant on this team look like? And finally, you
Speaker 1: mentioned Shandon Sharp and also Scoot Henderson. What's going on
Speaker 1: there and with Scoot specifically, is extension eligible and it's
Speaker 1: you could say, yeah, they definitely haven't seen enough to
Speaker 1: pay him, and I would agree unless the price is
Speaker 1: just so low. At the same time, you haven't built
Speaker 1: a team that makes it seem as if you're even
Speaker 1: invested in him in the slightest and you could make
Speaker 1: the same case for Shade and Sharp. And in addition
Speaker 1: to being part of why they feel confusing, is not
Speaker 1: just because we I look at what's in place and say, well,
Speaker 1: this is what they're clearly trying to move forward with
Speaker 1: this season. I look at it and say, there's no
Speaker 1: way that they can be done this offseason, right, is
Speaker 1: part of what my brain is saying. Yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: know whether that's true, but that's when you look at
Speaker 1: the roster. I think it's that's a reasonable conclusion to
Speaker 1: come to if you had no inside information on what
Speaker 1: the Blazers are planning.
Speaker 2: Well, it's a charitable conclusion too, because you're assuming you're
Speaker 2: looking at it and saying, well, like, no, sane you know,
Speaker 2: decision maker would would stop here, right because for all
Speaker 2: the reasons we just went through. Do you think we
Speaker 2: can't know this? But do you think that acquiring Jah
Speaker 2: Morant was done with the idea of this is just
Speaker 2: a pure asset play. This is a by low guy
Speaker 2: that maybe plays well for us and we can turn
Speaker 2: him into something like is that maybe the move that
Speaker 2: needs to be made for stuff to make more sense here.
Speaker 2: Obviously moving him would make more sense, But like, do
Speaker 2: you think think that was the logic behind it, or
Speaker 2: do you think the Blazers looked at him and said,
Speaker 2: this is a guy that we can imagine being a
Speaker 2: core piece, like because John Moran is not a supporting player, right,
Speaker 2: Like that's one of the issues with him, is like
Speaker 2: he does not have a skill set that lends itself
Speaker 2: to being a skill set matched with sort of an
Speaker 2: ego or like a willingness to accept that type of
Speaker 2: role to be like a smaller time piece. It's like,
Speaker 2: if you have him on the team and he's playing
Speaker 2: like he's kind of in the middle of everything. So
Speaker 2: do you think which which of the two seems more
Speaker 2: likely to you as far as they're justification for adding him.
Speaker 1: It has to be the former, because if you're saying
Speaker 1: the latter, what have you seen over the past three
Speaker 1: years that would make you think one that player has
Speaker 1: appeared at any point during that time or two this
Speaker 1: is someone who because he was so reliant on his
Speaker 1: athleticism and he's he is a really good passer, but
Speaker 1: because so much of his game was rooted in athleticism.
Speaker 1: Even if you rehabilitate his value. What does that window
Speaker 1: look like or does what we say at the top
Speaker 1: apply here to where these these windows are opening and
Speaker 1: shutting so quickly that even if it is for two years,
Speaker 1: But it's just I don't know, especially with the way
Speaker 1: his contract is. He is two years left, and so
Speaker 1: you kind of need to make a decision on him
Speaker 1: after this season the way the extension game works. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so I think it's where do you land on. I
Speaker 1: think it's kind of just stab in the dark. They
Speaker 1: viewed it as opportunism, and this was you know, if
Speaker 1: the alternative was Jalen Brown might have been a better
Speaker 1: fit or a higher end acquisition. He also, even though
Speaker 1: we criticized or were I guess we were more on
Speaker 1: the Sixers' side of that deal, he would have cost
Speaker 1: substantially more than what they gave up for jaw Rant,
Speaker 1: Like they didn't give up any draft equity for.
Speaker 2: Him, right, I mean I lean more towards just the
Speaker 2: like the first the form, like the asset play, the
Speaker 2: potential upside measured against the low cost of adding him.
Speaker 2: Partly because like if you let's take the alternative, uh,
Speaker 2: if you thought that, you know what somewhere in here
Speaker 2: there's a core of jaw Denny Avdia and Donovan Klingen,
Speaker 2: Like we can. We can, especially if Clingon develops as
Speaker 2: a shooter, like I guess, But like I just don't
Speaker 2: see the Avdya jaw fit because I don't want to
Speaker 2: take the ball out of Avdya's hands. I want shooting
Speaker 2: around him and he gets to run the off. I
Speaker 2: just I believe that that's a more effective more effective
Speaker 2: maybe not Like if the the highest ceiling version of
Speaker 2: the Blazers is John Morant looks like he did five
Speaker 2: years ago and and he's like your your top ten
Speaker 2: MVP candidate. You build the whole thing around him with
Speaker 2: shooting in defense, Like sure, I would concede that's probably
Speaker 2: better than Avidya could make the team maybe, But I
Speaker 2: just don't. They're not they're not acting. They didn't just
Speaker 2: go out and find every shooter on the market, right
Speaker 2: they they Because if you really thought that, like we're
Speaker 2: gonna build a team around this guy or even just
Speaker 2: him and Obdia, you just go find shooting. So to me,
Speaker 2: it's just this is all it costs to get a
Speaker 2: guy that like there's a five percent chance he could
Speaker 2: be an All NBA player again, Like, I guess you
Speaker 2: just pay that right, and that's that leads to confusing
Speaker 2: teams because you're just like, well, we'll take him, but
Speaker 2: he doesn't make any sense in any way for us,
Speaker 2: and so that's how you end up the first pick.
Speaker 1: We spend enough time on that, But what does we
Speaker 1: oh we were wrong about the Blazers look like? Like what
Speaker 1: has happened in you? Like? Because I think with some
Speaker 1: of these teams you could at least envision X happens
Speaker 1: and that's where we could be. It doesn't feel likely,
Speaker 1: but X happens, and it feels like we could be wrong.
Speaker 1: I keep trying to sit here and figure out, well,
Speaker 1: what are we missing? Because you can say all that
Speaker 1: stuff is fine about the value play on John Morant, okay, great,
Speaker 1: doesn't necessarily make him just because you think there's a
Speaker 1: five percent chance of be an All NBA player again
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that you've set up the ecosystem or the like,
Speaker 1: have the supporting cast to make that happen. So the
Speaker 1: theory of this roster right now feels jagged for sure.
Speaker 2: I think I think the one way that it does
Speaker 2: make sense, and this is not a positive, but it
Speaker 2: could be something that teams maybe should think about more.
Speaker 2: Is because, as we've said, there just seem to be
Speaker 2: a lot of players that are kind of in each
Speaker 2: other's way. Here if forty of the roster is hurt
Speaker 2: basically all season, right, because then it's like if Scoot
Speaker 2: Scoots had plenty of injury problems, Dame was coming off
Speaker 2: the Achille who knows right, Robert Williams is not a
Speaker 2: reliable guy from a health perspective, Drew Holidays Old Like
Speaker 2: suddenly you're not sitting there thinking like how are we
Speaker 2: going to possibly play Scoot and Shade and Sharp Andrew
Speaker 2: Holliday and Dame Lollard and John Moran and like how
Speaker 2: does that all work? With Obdy and eating the ball?
Speaker 2: It's like, well, if four of those guys are hurt
Speaker 2: on any given night, suddenly the rotation makes a little
Speaker 2: more sense, just because it's like it's clearer who should
Speaker 2: play because you you just play your better players and
Speaker 2: you figure it like that element of it can make
Speaker 2: more sense. The overall build, which again is short on
Speaker 2: shooting and kind of lighter on forwards, and that whole
Speaker 2: thing that I don't know what the best. Like how
Speaker 2: you look at that and say, well, it could work
Speaker 2: out if this like there's just it's a weirdly built roster.
Speaker 2: The only positive is like it could just because of injuries,
Speaker 2: there wouldn't be quite as much overlap as there seems.
Speaker 2: There's definitely going to be Right now.
Speaker 1: What is up, fellowsikos, You're listening to this episode right
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Speaker 2: again as always for listening and for watching.
Speaker 1: And now back to the show with the second pick
Speaker 1: in the most confusing NBA Teams Draft to select the
Speaker 1: Washington Wizards. I there's the Trey Young contract, which you
Speaker 1: know we want to talk about the Bucks coming to
Speaker 1: terms of Gary Trent Junior a year or two ago.
Speaker 1: It feels like this Trey Young deal was agreed upon
Speaker 1: as part of his trade to Washington to where he
Speaker 1: gets the four years, two hundred the max that he
Speaker 1: could the four year max basically he could have gotten
Speaker 1: from another team of four years and two hundred and
Speaker 1: twelve point nine million dollars after declining his player option
Speaker 1: given the market. That just doesn't make sense to me
Speaker 1: in a vacuum from a pure value perspective, I thought
Speaker 1: we were gonna reach a point. What do I keep
Speaker 1: saying every summer is when are we gonna reach a
Speaker 1: point where actual negotiations are happening with perceived stars? And
Speaker 1: what happens Victor Wamanyama takes a fifty million dollar discount
Speaker 1: like before, there's negotiation happening on Trey Young to the
Speaker 1: next contract. Wild to me, what still is confusing about this?
Speaker 1: And you could look at some of the other moves.
Speaker 1: By the way, good friend Chris Middleton, he's back. I
Speaker 1: would have probably preferred them to like lean more towards
Speaker 1: just a pure shooter. When you're looking at who else
Speaker 1: is on this roster, their big man rotation is now okay,
Speaker 1: getting off the Jaden Hardy contract fine. Getting DeAndre eighton
Speaker 1: eight million dollars backup five also fine. You have Alex
Speaker 1: hard and Anthony Davis, and you needed to give up
Speaker 1: second round picks to make it happen. The other thing is,
Speaker 1: when you're looking at investing in Trey Young at this level,
Speaker 1: you just drafted Aj Debantsa, who I think needs to
Speaker 1: be on the ball more often than Darren Peterson. This
Speaker 1: is the only viable alternative at this point. Maybe I'll
Speaker 1: prove wrong. Summer League is not a good gauge of that,
Speaker 1: just because all of these guys are going to be
Speaker 1: on the ball a ton. That being said, like Cam
Speaker 1: Boozer is a better shooter than Aj Debantsa is. Right now,
Speaker 1: when you're looking at like the three point stuff, do
Speaker 1: you trust Trey Young? There's something to be said about No,
Speaker 1: AJ doesn't need to be the number one option. He
Speaker 1: probably shouldn't be the number one option. He can be
Speaker 1: uplifted by funneling that usage towards someone else where, then
Speaker 1: he's gonna get a lot of the secondary looks. Is
Speaker 1: Trey Young the type of player that can function differently
Speaker 1: because when you look at the percentage of his team's
Speaker 1: on ball possessions he has used when on the floor.
Speaker 1: Since entering the league, he has never ranked lower than
Speaker 1: seventh in the entire league grant and he's only ranked
Speaker 1: outside the top five once when he was seventh, and
Speaker 1: I think that was this past year. By the way,
Speaker 1: Like what now you're adding Anthony Davis, it will presumably
Speaker 1: endo them mas Anty David still going to be there.
Speaker 1: He didn't get any He's he he's going to be
Speaker 1: extension eligible? Are you giving him one?
Speaker 2: Does?
Speaker 1: I don't think the eight and acquisition signals that, oh,
Speaker 1: we want to we're more likely to trade Anthony Davis.
Speaker 1: If anything, it signals do we want to play a
Speaker 1: lot of Alex Sar with another big type lineups? And
Speaker 1: if that is a default, what does that mean for
Speaker 1: a wing rotation that's fairly stacked at this point? When
Speaker 1: you look at debantsa when you look at having Keishon,
Speaker 1: George Black, Kulabaly still being there. Oh, Cam Whitmore's still
Speaker 1: on this team. So it was justin Champenny and we
Speaker 1: just brought back Chris Middleton. I am so confused by
Speaker 1: this shruster. Not in a way where I'm necessarily down
Speaker 1: on it, but I also just find myself looking what
Speaker 1: Trey Johnson was able to do in Summer League, and
Speaker 1: I kind of find myself wondering, well, how does he
Speaker 1: work into all of this? And if he works into
Speaker 1: all this, what does that mean for Bob Carrington. There's
Speaker 1: this roster is all over the place, even when you're
Speaker 1: looking at like just we probably get too caught up
Speaker 1: in timelines, but like, on the one hand, you have
Speaker 1: Anthony Davis and Trey Young taking up sixty plus percent
Speaker 1: of your cap, and on the other hand, you have
Speaker 1: the number one overall pick from this draft. You have
Speaker 1: Keishaan George who before he missed time last year, who's
Speaker 1: having a breakout campaign. You have alexar who's drafted number
Speaker 1: two overall two years ago. Is what is even with
Speaker 1: the idea of Okay lottery reformation, this team's been rebuilding
Speaker 1: for a minute now. They want to make a jump.
Speaker 1: I don't even understand what type of jump they're trying
Speaker 1: to make. Is it to just be in the the
Speaker 1: middle at this point? Did they internally just because they
Speaker 1: do have some of the name power, they have not
Speaker 1: necessarily transacted like a team that is desperate to be
Speaker 1: in the top six in the East per se. But
Speaker 1: you did just give Trey Young a quasi max and
Speaker 1: you have Trey Young and Anthony Davis just hashtag on
Speaker 1: this team. So I don't know honestly what the wizards
Speaker 1: Is short term game is, and you could even long
Speaker 1: term I still think right there are some clear core
Speaker 1: pieces in place, But do they view Trey Young and
Speaker 1: AD as one of those pieces? I honestly, Trey Young
Speaker 1: certainly seems like they might.
Speaker 2: Well, if he's not, i'd sure like to know what
Speaker 2: they would have paid him. Isn't this this is kind
Speaker 2: of a wild sort of like turn about because I
Speaker 2: think we both were probably I don't know what the
Speaker 2: breakdown was, but we both liked the Young trade and
Speaker 2: the Davis trade to varying. He's like, I wouldn't say,
Speaker 2: don't let me put words in your mouth, but like
Speaker 2: in both cases, I was kind of like I think
Speaker 2: if that's the cost, you just do it. By the way,
Speaker 2: a lot more trades happening these days where that's the
Speaker 2: justification of it with so which maybe suggests that like
Speaker 2: that shouldn't be the cost. But were you there at
Speaker 2: like with with both Trey and Davis when they made
Speaker 2: those trades. It's like, yeah, man, I guess like that's
Speaker 2: just an asset you take for the for the price.
Speaker 1: Which is why didn't we just say that when we
Speaker 1: were talking about John Morant with the Blazers.
Speaker 2: Well that's why I kind of asked, like, I'm coming
Speaker 2: around to that perspective, but we went through I like, well, actually,
Speaker 2: this is just it's actively damaging maybe in a lot
Speaker 2: of ways.
Speaker 1: No, you're not putting words in my mouth. I went
Speaker 1: back and forth with more on this at the time
Speaker 1: where I was like, no, these trades make sense as
Speaker 1: an opportunity, Like as a matter of opportunity. It's oh,
Speaker 1: if they go turn around and give them these massive deals,
Speaker 1: that's when you have questions and what did they do?
Speaker 2: Guess what they got some questions? Yeah, I so the
Speaker 2: trading extension spun me all the way back around to
Speaker 2: this before. But like, this is just the same organization
Speaker 2: that gave Bradley Beal that contract, and this is just
Speaker 2: like this is this just feels like so right on
Speaker 2: brand for a team that we really thought was doing
Speaker 2: things a little more sensibly. So I would echo everything
Speaker 2: you said. I this in a lot of ways, this
Speaker 2: is more confused. This team is more confusing than Portland.
Speaker 2: It's just that like it's not quite at every level
Speaker 2: because the Dundon and the Morant pieces are just so
Speaker 2: like just confounding. But let's be looking. Let's let's try
Speaker 2: to give the Wizards the benefit of the doubt. I
Speaker 2: can't do it with the young extension. That's never gonna
Speaker 2: make sense. But like maybe there's some element of we
Speaker 2: got all these young guys, if any of them are
Speaker 2: any good, they'll be good enough to prove it in
Speaker 2: suboptimal circumstances. Look what Cooper Flag did in Dallas last year,
Speaker 2: Like you know, he kind of the role wasn't great.
Speaker 2: There weren't like a ton of veterans that like we're
Speaker 2: eating into his time and if anything, like he had
Speaker 2: to play it difficult role because they didn't have good alternatives.
Speaker 2: But if you just throw Debanza and Sar and Keishan
Speaker 2: George and Trey Johnson and you neglected to mention my
Speaker 2: guy Will Riley in the mix, and like just toss
Speaker 2: them all in there with Anthony Davis and like something
Speaker 2: emerges and it becomes clear organically, like who belongs and
Speaker 2: who doesn't and who fits whatever timeline you're on. That
Speaker 2: feels more like just that doesn't feel like a plan
Speaker 2: to me, Like that just feels like we cobble. We've
Speaker 2: thrown together guys all across the age bracket and we'll
Speaker 2: get what we get. And like, sure, in a world
Speaker 2: where being absolutely terrible doesn't pay, you might find something
Speaker 2: that gets you on the most optimistic end of things
Speaker 2: out above the plane or something. I don't think that's
Speaker 2: happening the East is crazy, but like you don't get
Speaker 2: to if things work out here, it will feel more
Speaker 2: like happenstance than an organized sort of effort to get
Speaker 2: this team to wherever it's trying to go. I feel
Speaker 2: like the Debanza pick provided them cover to go to
Speaker 2: Trey Young and say, hey, whatever we agreed to, like
Speaker 2: we didn't contemplate we were gonna have this potentially generational guy.
Speaker 2: We're kind of going in a different direction, here's twenty
Speaker 2: five million a year with like a team option on
Speaker 2: the third. Godspeed if you can go beat this somewhere else,
Speaker 2: Like circumstances changed, you understand, and if he walks, he walks,
Speaker 2: it didn't cost you anything to get him like that,
Speaker 2: the doubling down whether it was being I do you
Speaker 2: believe that the reporting that like the Wizards were afraid
Speaker 2: somebody else was gonna put you like That's just the.
Speaker 1: Only team I could think of is because they traded
Speaker 1: for Julius Randle was the Nets would they have preferred to?
Speaker 1: But if they guards right, who went off in the
Speaker 1: summer League and then they drafted Mikel Brown Junior, So
Speaker 1: I think that would have possibily would have come off
Speaker 1: the table. I don't see another team that this. This
Speaker 1: is just like the Bucks had suitors for Gary Trent
Speaker 1: Junior and sign in trades potentially at this four year,
Speaker 1: sixty four million dollar number.
Speaker 2: This, so then you're what you said initially was right,
Speaker 2: is this was agreed to at the time of the trade, which.
Speaker 1: Oh, you don't see that happen where one player gets
Speaker 1: salary dumped only to turn around and then sign a
Speaker 1: near ax deal. With them.
Speaker 2: The market just told you what he was worth, and
Speaker 2: it wasn't fifty million dollars a year. It was dead.
Speaker 2: It was basically dead Corey Kispert's contract and dead money,
Speaker 2: which six and one half done the other Like if.
Speaker 1: You McCollum won the Hawks a playoff game, he really did,
Speaker 1: he really did.
Speaker 2: I might like this team better if CJ. McCollum were
Speaker 2: on it instead of Tree Young, certainly at his new contract. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it doesn't make a ton of sense. Yeah, Phil Barksdale
Speaker 2: feel like Washington went on a shopping spree on Facebook
Speaker 2: marketplace a little bit, a little bit.
Speaker 1: The one difference I will say between them and Portland is,
Speaker 1: at least in theory Trey Young and Anthony Davish Phil
Speaker 1: needs where was they didn't have a floor general of
Speaker 1: the future and if you wanted Alex Are to play
Speaker 1: alongside a more physical big man done in Portland, it's
Speaker 1: I don't know what I think job Rant exacerbates the
Speaker 1: problems they were supposed to address. When you're looking at
Speaker 1: the shooting, that's damning with fame praise for Washington, but
Speaker 1: but it's also different because I do look at this
Speaker 1: roster and it's not even Portland. I'm pretty sure is
Speaker 1: going to be disappointing just because of the makeup of
Speaker 1: the team with washing Art. Yeah, I can't fathom what
Speaker 1: this team divisions itself being enough to know whether they're
Speaker 1: going to be disappointing or exceed expectations.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree, all right, I got an I got
Speaker 2: another pick here. It's a little bit of a different
Speaker 2: type of team because I think those two were I
Speaker 2: think the Wizards probably would have been my second pick
Speaker 2: as well. So I'm gonna go Dallas Mavericks. This is
Speaker 2: it's a bizarre roster can struction. It's just the powerful.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm gonna forget some. But you have Cooper Flag,
Speaker 2: you traded for Santi Aldama. Naji Marshall's probably best used
Speaker 2: as a for PJ Washington. Same there, Klay Thompson is
Speaker 2: a is a for at least do me a favor.
Speaker 1: Just name the team players on this team who aren't
Speaker 1: best suit forward Kyrie Irving?
Speaker 2: Right sure, yeah, I don't know. Right. Defensively is can
Speaker 2: you hold up so a million forwards? Not a lot
Speaker 2: of point guard depth behind Kyrie Irving because Brandon Williams
Speaker 2: has not comeback yet. I feel I think that's someone
Speaker 2: they should definitely want to keep around if they can. Uh,
Speaker 2: Center seems fine, but you've got Derek Lively's health, you've
Speaker 2: got Gafford kind of underperforming. It's just a lot of fours,
Speaker 2: and it does, again feel like a roster setup. That
Speaker 2: I mean, it's it's not designed to make things easier
Speaker 2: functionally for Cooper Flag again two years in a row.
Speaker 2: Now we're going in where it's like, I just I
Speaker 2: don't know that it's it's it's it doesn't feel like
Speaker 2: trial by fire, like on purpose, because like why would
Speaker 2: you do that too? You know what I mean? Like
Speaker 2: it feels like they're making it deliberately hard on him,
Speaker 2: but I don't know how deliberate that is. It's just
Speaker 2: this is a weird collection of players and it doesn't
Speaker 2: seem to suit a Flag all that well. I do
Speaker 2: think if Irving is healthy, you get a lot more
Speaker 2: reps where he's playing off of somebody, and maybe you
Speaker 2: then get to see the defensive ceiling that everybody thought
Speaker 2: was an absolute given. If flags lyft on offense isn't
Speaker 2: quite as high. And we come out of this coming
Speaker 2: this following year thinking even more highly of him right,
Speaker 2: because well, we've seen him exceed expectations as an offensive playmaker,
Speaker 2: as an on ball guy, and then the defense showed
Speaker 2: up second year, and then we're primed to put him
Speaker 2: on all NBA teams this third year or whatever. If
Speaker 2: he doesn't do that this season, then you're still relying
Speaker 2: on Kyrie Irving to be healthy and productive for most
Speaker 2: of this year and to be on the team. Because
Speaker 2: he still profiles as a trade candidate. There's plenty of
Speaker 2: teams that could u him. So this is more strictly you.
Speaker 1: Think Portland takes a look, kicks the tires.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know again, he just he fits a
Speaker 2: tight So yeah, that this is this is a more
Speaker 2: narrow thing. But as I was going through the rosters
Speaker 2: around the league, this one just just jumps out of me.
Speaker 2: Is why why is it built this way? Like if
Speaker 2: they drafted more as Johnson too, who like I don't,
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 1: Know, that's the what seems just as a fit with
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag, I think it's terrible. And then also I
Speaker 1: don't that is the you don't necessarily make that pick
Speaker 1: because it's at the best fit with Cooper Flag. I mean,
Speaker 1: Brydon Burry's and that's bot I think would have been
Speaker 1: the right call there. That being said, the Santi aldomitrate
Speaker 1: is the one that I still just can't That was
Speaker 1: my well, what is going You can talk your stuff,
Speaker 1: all right, if they think Marcus Sasser is going to
Speaker 1: provide some shooting and not gonna get trucked. Defensively, they're
Speaker 1: another team and maybe they're just a suit they're assuming
Speaker 1: that they'll go about more of their business in the
Speaker 1: middle of the season. But they're another team where this
Speaker 1: just sort of feels unfinished because you're every I would
Speaker 1: echo everything you said. I like, defensively, they're gonna be
Speaker 1: huge and pretty versatile when you look at the guys
Speaker 1: that are on the roster.
Speaker 2: Right, we said that exact thing last year, too, right,
Speaker 2: it was I remember when we talked about Dallas. It
Speaker 2: was like, they're gonna rebound the shit out of the ball.
Speaker 2: They're gonna be big at every position, they're gonna defend.
Speaker 2: The offense is gonna suck, and maybe they win forty
Speaker 2: games that way. It's like the personnel's kind of different,
Speaker 2: but it's also kind of the same. Like going in
Speaker 2: I can imagine we might say very similar things about Dallas,
Speaker 2: except Kyrie Irving will be there, Like you know what
Speaker 2: I mean, they kind of have recreated the same problems
Speaker 2: they faced last year, but with just some new personnel.
Speaker 1: Right, and they haven't like do they They were so
Speaker 1: they were twenty sixth in offensive rebounding last year? Is
Speaker 1: that like something that you see them improving upon with
Speaker 1: this but like something al Dama's not gonna give you
Speaker 1: much of that, maybe more as Johnson helps you there
Speaker 1: a little bit, but it's confusing. The one thing I
Speaker 1: have wondered, and I don't know if this puts their
Speaker 1: off season a better light, but if you're incredibly concerned
Speaker 1: about the health of Derek Lively moving forward, does that
Speaker 1: help explain the off season a little bit more?
Speaker 2: I mean a little bit. But it's not like a
Speaker 2: lot of these fours that we just listed are also
Speaker 2: potential fives, you know, Like I think if I mean,
Speaker 2: maybe Johnson, I can't claim to have watched a heck
Speaker 2: of a lot of college basketball this year, but maybe
Speaker 2: Johnson is someone they view as I don't know, in
Speaker 2: like a Colin Murray Boyle's mold where it's like he's
Speaker 2: not really a five, but he can do it, you know,
Speaker 2: like like Murray Boyle's is. If Johnson is anywhere close
Speaker 2: to the defender of Murray Boyles is like, then I
Speaker 2: retracked everything I said. You have your center. He's not
Speaker 2: a power forward all that stuff, but it doesn't seem
Speaker 2: like that's the profile for him. I do agree that
Speaker 2: this seems like a situation you can trade yourself out
Speaker 2: of because teams will be interested in Washington and Marshall.
Speaker 2: I think as long as you're not trying to get
Speaker 2: first back or anything like that, you can clean up
Speaker 2: the roster that way. But they're not out a wings
Speaker 2: here like Max Christy and Caleb Martin. I guess who
Speaker 2: really like is kind of a forore even might add
Speaker 2: him to the pile of power forwards. Really, so Marcus Sasser,
Speaker 2: i'd like, is he you can use him as a
Speaker 2: combo guard? I guess I just I don't know. It's unbalanced.
Speaker 1: There's a lot on Kyrie Irving being healthy and then
Speaker 1: Sergio de la Area gonna be good right away. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of that happening here, and I guess maybe
Speaker 1: that speaks to when you're looking at Sergio, Oh, we'll
Speaker 1: have the runway or maybe they'll give Marcus Sassar more
Speaker 1: agency than he ever had in Detroit because Massiu Jerry,
Speaker 1: by way, the moves that made sense. Hiring Massiu Jerry,
Speaker 1: sure firing Jason Kidd. I won't claim to know enough
Speaker 1: about what Dusty May is gonna bring as a head
Speaker 1: coach just yet. We'll dig into that like before the
Speaker 1: season starts. Those are all fine. I just this roster
Speaker 1: offensively specifically again and then also just getting ready to
Speaker 1: even if Kyrie Irving is playing, aren't you getting ready
Speaker 1: to kind of pull your hair out at why as
Speaker 1: Cooper flag like your two or your three? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, dijita vous a little bit. We were asking the
Speaker 2: same questions last.
Speaker 1: Year with the fourth overall pick, my second overall pick
Speaker 1: in the most confusing teams NBA draft. I feel like
Speaker 1: you're gonna be able to guess where we're going with this,
Speaker 1: the New Orleans Pelicans.
Speaker 2: So are the comments.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing I don't understand, like the let's start here,
Speaker 1: this is not They're not confusing in the sense that
Speaker 1: we have to sit here and demand that they should
Speaker 1: have traded everybody at this point. I think that's a
Speaker 1: reasonable thing to say, is they should have held some
Speaker 1: kind of fire sale grant. Their transactions this year have
Speaker 1: been basically exercising Karla Makovich's team option, declining Kava Luni's
Speaker 1: team option, and re signing DeAndre Jordan on a two
Speaker 1: year deal not a one year deal, so that they
Speaker 1: would get They were so worried about the market that
Speaker 1: he had that they had to give him two guaranteed years,
Speaker 1: which more power to him being a great locker room presence.
Speaker 1: And that is believable because remember what happened in Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: where not only did Kyrie and Kevin Durant force the
Speaker 1: Nets to sign him, they both took Kyrie took less
Speaker 1: and Durant lowered his uh like he took an incentive
Speaker 1: based structure so that the Nets could overpay DeAndre Jordan.
Speaker 1: So this is not There is a precedent for needing
Speaker 1: DeAndre Jordan in the locker room apparently. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: it's good, but there is a precedent for it. What
Speaker 1: is I saw and she's no longer employed by the team,
Speaker 1: but I saw. Teresa Witherspoon had a quote the other
Speaker 1: day about like, yeah, if they finally give the keys
Speaker 1: to Zion Williamson, and I'm in my mid like, well,
Speaker 1: hold up, that's that's not the way that this roster
Speaker 1: is built. There's okay. If de Jontay Murray's there and
Speaker 1: Trey Murphy's they're okay, fine, Like you've Jeremiah Fears and
Speaker 1: Derek Queen. That is the antithesis of trying to build
Speaker 1: around Zion Williamson. I'm not saying they should have traded
Speaker 1: him for pennies on the dollar if there's no value there,
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I'm kind of saying, what
Speaker 1: is like pick a I want to say pick a lane,
Speaker 1: but I don't even know like what laying they're in
Speaker 1: right now. It's not even like they're just they're careening,
Speaker 1: like from side to side or they've already gone off
Speaker 1: the cliff. I don't look at like they don't. If
Speaker 1: you point to anyone on this roster, or trying to
Speaker 1: point to anyone on this roster and say, who is
Speaker 1: our north star, the person that's gonna guide us our
Speaker 1: decisions moving forward, the closest you get to an answer,
Speaker 1: it's still Zion Williamson. It can't be like Trey Murphy
Speaker 1: fits everywhere, but he's not high enough end to say
Speaker 1: that's the guy that's gonna direct like kind of how
Speaker 1: we flesh out the rest of our roster and now
Speaker 1: if you wanted to go whatever this current direction is
Speaker 1: is my god, did you need to acquire more shooting
Speaker 1: than you have on the roster right now? There is
Speaker 1: Trey Murphy and that's it, Like if you if we
Speaker 1: want to go, we want to talk about it. Herb Jones, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Jordan Poole before he got to New Orleans. So that's
Speaker 1: just like they were better when de Jontay Murray came
Speaker 1: back next season and so having that kind of organizer type,
Speaker 1: but where where does that even fit into what we
Speaker 1: just have Derrek, Queen, Enzion Williamson and Jeremiah Field Fears,
Speaker 1: all three of whom can cannot shoot. I don't want
Speaker 1: to say that about Jeremiah Fears, but he's not He's
Speaker 1: nowhere near a knockdown shooter. His game is pride on
Speaker 1: I can get to the basket and my liveable when
Speaker 1: I'm in the lane. I don't know what this team
Speaker 1: is trying to do. And this this is kind of
Speaker 1: an extension of do you remember this was like a
Speaker 1: month before the trade deadline this past year where it
Speaker 1: came out I think was Chris Haynes had the report
Speaker 1: that the Pelicans were basically closer business and little did
Speaker 1: we know that he was also talking about the offseason
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 2: I mean, the core issue here seems to be it's
Speaker 2: at the top, right, it's the ownership management thing, Like
Speaker 2: Joe Dumars and Troy Weaver get put in. It's true Weaver, right,
Speaker 2: that's who that's who's there kind of him and Dumars
Speaker 2: are splitting the gig? Do I have that right? I
Speaker 2: know what It's like everything you said is right about
Speaker 2: how the roster makes no sense. I would even add
Speaker 2: that it used to be that you had to build
Speaker 2: such a specific team around Zion that it like no
Speaker 2: roster could make sense with Zion and without you know,
Speaker 2: so that was always a huge challenge with him. Now
Speaker 2: it's like you still have to do that. He still
Speaker 2: probably is there North Star, only he's not good enough
Speaker 2: to justify being built around in that way.
Speaker 1: Good news.
Speaker 2: The Pelicans aren't trying to build anything. They're not doing anything,
Speaker 2: so so like the inaction is confusing because it well,
Speaker 2: let's let's let you speak for the Pelicans right now,
Speaker 2: do you think they believe that this roster is good enough?
Speaker 2: Or is it a situation where it's like or it
Speaker 2: makes sense and has upside and whatever, or there is
Speaker 2: a situation where, like the ownership management situation is so
Speaker 2: out to lunch that it's like we're not even like
Speaker 2: making calls. We're all like Joe Dumars has like has
Speaker 2: passed his expiration data as a decision maker and it's
Speaker 2: just like we're not doing anything because we're just collecting
Speaker 2: a check and whatever. You know what I mean, Like,
Speaker 2: is it just everybody is asleep at the wheel or
Speaker 2: is it do.
Speaker 1: You think Troy Weavers at that point of you could
Speaker 1: make that case for Joe Dumars and Gail Benson, But
Speaker 1: do you think Troy Weavers that like don't you think?
Speaker 2: Well, but is he empowered to do anything? Maybe is
Speaker 2: the sub question?
Speaker 1: Je Bay is on this team, so why not?
Speaker 2: I just this is why it's confusing. I don't even know, Yeah,
Speaker 2: we don't know what they think about this team, Like.
Speaker 1: Well, they're acting as if they are they're acting they're
Speaker 1: not necessarily acting as if they think they're good. They're
Speaker 1: acting as if they believe they already have the big
Speaker 1: picture talent in place, and both by the way, both
Speaker 1: vantage points would be wrong. You're not good. And I
Speaker 1: thought there Queen and Jeremiah Fears were fine last year.
Speaker 1: They each had their bright spots, and I think I'm
Speaker 1: higher on Queen than Jeremiah Fears at this point, I
Speaker 1: don't look at any one of them and say, that's
Speaker 1: like a potential cornerstone right there. Maybe they are, but
Speaker 1: you don't have enough information and so you don't even
Speaker 1: have so forget if we throw if we give them
Speaker 1: the benefit of the doubt and say, and I'm not
Speaker 1: prepared to give them better for the doubt. But let's
Speaker 1: hypothetically say they're not sitting there thinking they are good.
Speaker 1: They know that they don't measure up to the rest
Speaker 1: of the Western Conference. They are then sitting here kind
Speaker 1: of like thinking Detroit Pistons before, like their breakthrough season,
Speaker 1: not last year, but the year before, where it's like,
Speaker 1: you know, we haven't been good yet, but there's no
Speaker 1: reason to do anything nuclear to sell off guys, or
Speaker 1: to go consolidate into someone who might be our face
Speaker 1: of the present, or to pair with Zion or to
Speaker 1: pair with Maybe they fear uh, fear Fear Fear, feel
Speaker 1: about Fears or Queen with you need like, But that's
Speaker 1: wrong too because you don't have like, You don't have
Speaker 1: that blue chip talent that you could definitively say and
Speaker 1: that's not This doesn't mean that every move needs to
Speaker 1: be geared towards we either need another star or we
Speaker 1: need this super high end youngster. But you gotta do something.
Speaker 1: And if you believe that Jeremiah Fears and Derek Queen
Speaker 1: are the future, let's just let's just assume they believe
Speaker 1: that is why do you not have more shooting on
Speaker 1: this roster? Why are you not working the Like Anthony
Speaker 1: Simon's went for six point three million dollars six million
Speaker 1: dollars year. I'm not saying he would have taken that
Speaker 1: to go to New Orleans, but like, you could have
Speaker 1: got out there and done something anything. Their financial situation,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say is enviable, but they're not so close
Speaker 1: to the tax. They're eight point four million dollars beneath
Speaker 1: the tax. That is, you could have signed somebody better
Speaker 1: than DeAndre Jordan. You could have gone out and tried
Speaker 1: to make a trade without attaching meaningful draft equity to
Speaker 1: the assets. That were going out. I just don't. I
Speaker 1: don't get any of this, and I would have this
Speaker 1: isn't I don't want to veer into just do something territory.
Speaker 1: But wouldn't you have been more encouraged if they just
Speaker 1: took the jah Morant type package or Tray Young type
Speaker 1: package for Zion, because then you can point to, you
Speaker 1: know what, Oh, they're fully invested in Queen and Fears.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I feel good about it, but
Speaker 1: at least they're showing that that's what they're fully invested in.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, I think the moment he had
Speaker 2: positive value, if that ever happened at any point this
Speaker 2: past season, they should have traded him. But well, you
Speaker 2: I think you're right that the moment Zion had neutral value.
Speaker 2: They should have moved him, just because it organizes your
Speaker 2: team in a way that like, you're probably wrong, But
Speaker 2: then you do get to say, all right, it's Queen
Speaker 2: and Fears and we're going to figure it out around
Speaker 2: these guys, and we can we can make roster decisions
Speaker 2: with them at the center of it. Speaking of which,
Speaker 2: who's playing center for this team? That's another confusing aspect.
Speaker 1: Andre Jordan, right, thank you.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, what about the other forty six and a
Speaker 2: half minutes of the game, Like it's fine, oh, perfect, great, Yeah,
Speaker 2: that was a problem. That's been a problem since time
Speaker 2: I memorial. The Pelicans to me feel like, do you
Speaker 2: ever have like a like a just like a basic
Speaker 2: office job that maybe like there's a it's like a
Speaker 2: branch office and there's like a middle manager in charge,
Speaker 2: and morale sucks, like the person in charge doesn't really
Speaker 2: have any power, is not motivated to improve anything, and
Speaker 2: like the copier doesn't work. It's like one out of
Speaker 2: every three days the copier works, and it's like we
Speaker 2: need this fixed, and everybody's like I don't want to
Speaker 2: fill out the work order, like I just it's just
Speaker 2: fuck it. We'll just we'll get through it. Like that's
Speaker 2: what the Pelicans feel like to me, where like nobody's
Speaker 2: motivated or empowered to actually do anything, and so you
Speaker 2: just kind of like zombie walk along and and don't
Speaker 2: have any like any incentive to or ambition to change
Speaker 2: anything or fixtion.
Speaker 1: But what's interesting is that there are they in a
Speaker 1: position to even think that way, because it's not like
Speaker 1: the if we're talking about I guess Portland's at the
Speaker 1: top of the list now when you're talking about relocation.
Speaker 1: But New Orleans is the team, and I'm not advocating
Speaker 1: for it, but that is the market that is pointed
Speaker 1: to as if relocation, like there shouldn't be a basketball
Speaker 1: team in New Orleans. And so if you're is that
Speaker 1: what you're trying to do, fast track yourself out out
Speaker 1: of here?
Speaker 2: In a major league situation where ownership is trying to
Speaker 2: tank the teams, it gets, it gets moved if you
Speaker 2: have to.
Speaker 1: Be I would be curious to know what Pelicans fan
Speaker 1: out there is reasonably high on this team to the
Speaker 1: point that show me the pathway to the Pelicans being
Speaker 1: a top eight team in the Western Conference next season.
Speaker 1: It does not exist. It does not exist.
Speaker 2: It's it's yeah, it's it's I mean, hasn't the like
Speaker 2: the main the overarching issue with New Orleans for however
Speaker 2: long been that like it's not the top priority of ownership.
Speaker 2: It's because the Saints. It's the Saints that mat and
Speaker 2: the Pelicans get like reduced staff or like staff pulling
Speaker 2: double duty for both organizations, and they're just like the
Speaker 2: little brother that no one's paying attention to isn't like
Speaker 2: that's that feels like.
Speaker 1: Tick to that this team makes no sense and is
Speaker 1: confusing as hell.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, well, nobody's it. I don't know what else
Speaker 2: to say. This is like I think the first comment
Speaker 2: Rome said, uh, there's nothing confusing about the Pelicans. They're
Speaker 2: a terrible team. Like, yeah, maybe we've overthought it a
Speaker 2: little bit. They are just bad. Okay, is it my pick? Yea,
Speaker 2: Pelicans are on my list for sure. Okay, Uh, let's go.
Speaker 2: Let's go Phoenix Suns here. Oh, this is enough.
Speaker 1: You're trying to insinuate that giving up a twenty thirty
Speaker 1: three first round pick for the right to pay Miles
Speaker 1: Bridges is in Well, Dan, it's not.
Speaker 2: The first bullet point on my list of notes, but
Speaker 2: it is the first sub bullet right under Bridges trade.
Speaker 2: There's giving up twenty thirty three first is right there. Uh,
Speaker 2: that's that's another one where I've mentioned how, like Washington,
Speaker 2: we were kind of like, all right, things are making
Speaker 2: sense here. For a brief moment last year it seemed
Speaker 2: like the Suns were, to our surprise, like functional and
Speaker 2: had made some good decisions. And I mean, I I
Speaker 2: don't know how you've we've talked a little bit about it,
Speaker 2: like Colin bless by, Colin Gillespie a new contract, great,
Speaker 2: Jordan Goodwin great, happy with that too, Mark Williams don't
Speaker 2: love it, but not a crippling number there. Uh. Their
Speaker 2: return on Kevin Durant seemed fine, like Dylan Brooks played
Speaker 2: pretty well for them. Mala Watch has looked like pretty
Speaker 2: darn interesting in summer League. He's hitting threes like.
Speaker 1: He's humble, did you see it? Humble as hell? Where
Speaker 1: he's talking about no such there's no such thing as
Speaker 1: being too good for summer league. Automatically love him.
Speaker 2: Can we you know what, can we make you trash
Speaker 2: your pick based on no? No, No, I will not, I
Speaker 2: will not. Let's take an official stance right now. I think,
Speaker 2: come on, Malawatch is like he's it needs to be
Speaker 2: one of our guys. I think I think it's not
Speaker 2: too late. He's he has the official Hardwood Knocks endorsement.
Speaker 2: He's he's he gets it.
Speaker 1: But now it's this team used to have that endorsement,
Speaker 1: like last year was the oh we were so wrong
Speaker 1: about them, and that they played hard and they they
Speaker 1: had non bigs offensive rebounding and they they were gritty
Speaker 1: on defense, and like, what is Dylan Brooks doing is
Speaker 1: to look at Jordan Goodwin's locking people up and it's
Speaker 1: it's not the fault of the players that we're here,
Speaker 1: but it's just it's tough to make them. I can't
Speaker 1: give them the Hardwood Knocks over arching stamp endorsement stamp
Speaker 1: just because of like the Miles you might be on
Speaker 1: Mute Grant or.
Speaker 2: Phoenix Phoenix as a team because Bert's over here whining
Speaker 2: he doesn't like the Suns either. No, Phoenix as a
Speaker 2: team doesn't get it. But but Malawatch has the stamp.
Speaker 2: We'll come up with an official stamp. We like him,
Speaker 2: doesn't mean it's to be great.
Speaker 1: He plays more minutes this year. Him or Mark Williams.
Speaker 2: I mean, I really hope it's Malwatch. But also I
Speaker 2: really like oh so a Gadaro too, So.
Speaker 1: That's not That's another thing they That's not the question.
Speaker 1: I was a factory, Mark factory in Mark Williams's injury
Speaker 1: history and probably the investment you have in malea Watch
Speaker 1: long term, I'm gonna pick this. He's our guy. The
Speaker 1: answer is Mile Watch Grant. You know what you hesitated,
Speaker 1: that's disappointing. Yeah, I mean, I just well because I'm
Speaker 1: a little reticent to suggest the Suns will make the
Speaker 1: right decisions. That's right, he didn't go to Michigan State,
Speaker 1: so that he did not it really I want to
Speaker 1: make this more complicated, but the glaring like red light
Speaker 1: of giving up that twenty thirty three first to bring
Speaker 1: in Miles Bridges for Royce O'Neil and Grayson Allen and
Speaker 1: that whatever worst of the worst of the worst twenty
Speaker 1: nine pick whatever it was, like I would take the
Speaker 1: picks out. I'm not trading, uh, Grayson Allen and Royce
Speaker 1: O'Neil for Miles Bridges, like start there, right. And then
Speaker 1: I'm also because part of the reason, not just like
Speaker 1: the Miles Bridges of it all is just like I
Speaker 1: think you and I are both like I'm not trading
Speaker 1: for that guy.
Speaker 2: You're not giving me that guy like that. I just
Speaker 2: I don't want him on the team. That's one this
Speaker 2: this Sun's team like had middling offensive performance because it
Speaker 2: shot the three like pretty well, and you just gave
Speaker 2: up two guys that you could rely on to do
Speaker 2: that for one that you can't. And then on top
Speaker 2: of that, the pick where this was kind of your like,
Speaker 2: of course it's your Alaska's, it's the furthest out you
Speaker 2: could move. Now to give that up just tells me
Speaker 2: that like much like the Wizards, it's kind of like, oh,
Speaker 2: you did just kind of show us who you are again,
Speaker 2: like you had you had a moment there where we've
Speaker 2: thought things were being done sensibly and now it's nope,
Speaker 2: we're willing to just fire this pick, you know, into
Speaker 2: space and we'll just continue having no outs, you know,
Speaker 2: for for for Miles Bridges, For Miles Bridges, it's crazy.
Speaker 2: Don't trade with Charlotte.
Speaker 1: That's that's where I'm miss Yeah, that's the moral of
Speaker 1: the story for for Phoenix. Yeah, look, if you there
Speaker 1: probably would have been if we were sitting here and
Speaker 1: they didn't do really any They brought back cong Lesbie resign,
Speaker 1: Mark Williams resigned, Jordan Goodwin, they're banking on common mile
Speaker 1: Watch getting better. I don't know that we would have
Speaker 1: criticized them heavily. We would have said, yeah, this is
Speaker 1: they were in the middle of the Western Conference, Like,
Speaker 1: it makes sense that they didn't fire their best trade
Speaker 1: chips that were left unless there was this name that
Speaker 1: made sense that could elevate them into a different tier
Speaker 1: in the West. I think some Suns fans might have said,
Speaker 1: we want to see them do more. They were talking
Speaker 1: about how happy they were with this past season, which
Speaker 1: is like, yes, they did surprise people, but like at
Speaker 1: the end of the day, they were a first round
Speaker 1: playoff stepping stone, and so not taking a bigger swing
Speaker 1: would have been disappointing to some. The alternative of doing
Speaker 1: nothing beats the quote unquote big swing that they just took.
Speaker 1: Because this is a team and I've said this many times,
Speaker 1: maybe he will prove me wrong on the basketball court
Speaker 1: in Phoenix. I think Miles Bridges is one of the
Speaker 1: biggest empty calorie guys in the league, not the single
Speaker 1: biggest one. You were just hovering around the bottom five
Speaker 1: in first chance offense, So forget about the offensive rebounding opportunities.
Speaker 1: This is not someone I've seen things about like he's
Speaker 1: a little bit better passer than you think, and he's
Speaker 1: gonna give them some like dribble penetration. It's not going
Speaker 1: to be a Charlotte was just better statistically without him
Speaker 1: on both sides of the ball. So trading for him
Speaker 1: is one I the off court stuff, the felody, domestic violence,
Speaker 1: him pleading no contest like that is that that should matter.
Speaker 1: But if you move that aside and look at the
Speaker 1: basketball element, if you wanted to trade for him, okay,
Speaker 1: to give up your best trade chip to do it
Speaker 1: makes zero sense. And it's like you said, it's the
Speaker 1: Wizards kind of maybe re revealing who they were. But
Speaker 1: in this case, it's what made you think like, at
Speaker 1: least with the Wizards, there was an there had to
Speaker 1: be an urgency because you were slow playing it maybe
Speaker 1: for too long for Ted Deansis's liking Phoenix just we
Speaker 1: were just exited in a miniature era of just awful
Speaker 1: vibes where they mortgaged everything to the hilt and got burned.
Speaker 1: And so you decided to do more of it for
Speaker 1: what the right to maybe finish sixth in the Western Conference,
Speaker 1: which I think if most people did their Western Conference
Speaker 1: tiers right now, they're not gonna beat the Timberwolves or
Speaker 1: the Nuggets, or the Spurs or the thunder. Are they
Speaker 1: gonna be ahead of the Lakers or the Rockets. So
Speaker 1: like we're already talking seventh type territory like this is
Speaker 1: they're confusing in the sense that I don't know. Were
Speaker 1: they so high on their own supply that they thought
Speaker 1: Miles Bridges is the difference between what and what like
Speaker 1: between where they were and maybe flirting with fifty winds
Speaker 1: because there's no way that's the case.
Speaker 2: No. I wish that I could have thought about nominating
Speaker 2: them for this because I don't love the Mark Williams
Speaker 2: move and been like, whoa, well, what about Mala watching
Speaker 2: a guitaro and then not done it because that's not
Speaker 2: sufficient and yet here and the Bridges move is just
Speaker 2: like I can't. I can't get there on any level.
Speaker 2: Who's your next pick? All right?
Speaker 1: So I think this is gonna enrage some people. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go with the Los Angeles Lakers on my list.
Speaker 1: I actually do not It's risky, but I don't have
Speaker 1: a problem with the money they gave Walker Kestler one
Speaker 1: hundred and thirty million dollars just first starting caliber center
Speaker 1: who is statistically can be a transcendent like rimp protector
Speaker 1: and defensive base sure. Giving up control of four first
Speaker 1: round picks to outright two swaps insane, insane. I don't
Speaker 1: care that you Lukanchich on your team. He's not signed
Speaker 1: that deep to when those picks are going to convey,
Speaker 1: then to go out, and when we're in a market
Speaker 1: where you have Norman Powell who just made an All
Speaker 1: Star team, couldn't get more than one guaranteed year. Mam
Speaker 1: who gets four guaranteed years. I like Mamu. I think
Speaker 1: the deal is a little rich. I like Mama four
Speaker 1: guaranteed years. Quentin Grimes who need to sign the qualifying
Speaker 1: offer last year, four guaranteed years, Colin Sexton two guaranteed years,
Speaker 1: which wouldn't you have rather just had Marcus Smart back?
Speaker 1: Based on what your team needs? What is this team's identity? Also,
Speaker 1: here's another question, what are they doing at backup five?
Speaker 1: I get the JJ Reddick probably didn't like DeAndre Ayton.
Speaker 1: DeAndre Ayton is a backup versus DeAndre Ayton as a
Speaker 1: starter when you also lost Jackson Hayes. What is the
Speaker 1: plan here? Is it to downsize with Vando? Is it
Speaker 1: to use Mama with the five? Because I got news
Speaker 1: for people that's not gonna fly. You don't have like
Speaker 1: Desire Williams signing. I really liked that. Being linked to
Speaker 1: matist Thibele makes sense them being linked to Jonathan kaminga
Speaker 1: and being willing to give up a twenty thirty two
Speaker 1: swap to make a sign and trade happen. No, that
Speaker 1: doesn't make any sense. I they're confusing because for a
Speaker 1: team that needs to operate as if they're trying to
Speaker 1: maximize Luka Doncics's window, they feel like they chose this
Speaker 1: weird middle build that the end result. I'm open to
Speaker 1: the idea they might be better during the regular season
Speaker 1: reason Luca remain healthy. Sure in the playoffs, I don't
Speaker 1: see a team right now that can win more than
Speaker 1: a single playoff series. And if I had to guess
Speaker 1: we're gonna do, you should subscribe to our patron because
Speaker 1: we're gonna be doing the Superstar Trade Draft at the
Speaker 1: end of this month. I don't think. I honestly think
Speaker 1: this is the off season that is putting Luca's future
Speaker 1: in LA like it's the now in the coffin. This
Speaker 1: is gonna be another two season thing, Max, because this roster,
Speaker 1: what is there? I don't I keep seeing they they
Speaker 1: rebuilt this roster in the image of Luka Doncic. How
Speaker 1: was Luka Doncics blindfolded and just pointing at names on
Speaker 1: a board and that's what you did. I don't like,
Speaker 1: how is this team if it was rebuilt in the
Speaker 1: image of Luka Doncic aside from getting Walker Kessler, where's
Speaker 1: the evidence that, Like, how is Colin sext and someone
Speaker 1: who is in the image of Luke? Why is we're
Speaker 1: quite and grinding him so tight when he was in
Speaker 1: Dallas that yeah, we needed to bring him, bring him on.
Speaker 1: I don't And by the way, way this this franchise
Speaker 1: might be the best in the league at watching the
Speaker 1: complete opposite and decide like happening in the playoffs and decide, yo,
Speaker 1: we don't really need like true wings, like those are
Speaker 1: that important.
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know how long the list of
Speaker 2: players in the league is.
Speaker 1: I forgot about it. Yeah, that's Cavanloney who couldn't get
Speaker 1: into Pelicans rotation.
Speaker 2: Ye great locker room presence, can't. I don't think you.
Speaker 1: Can play them anymore Looney or DeAndre Geordan.
Speaker 2: I mean that's a it's gonna go down to the wire.
Speaker 2: That might depend on if if somebody gets a game
Speaker 2: at the end of the year. Uh, I don't. It
Speaker 2: does seem like Luca put his thumb on the scale
Speaker 2: for Walker Kessler yes, I mean, like I think, I
Speaker 2: think that has to be a factor. I just don't
Speaker 2: think you should ever let like Lebron's a bad GM.
Speaker 2: Like the players are terrible at this, the guys because
Speaker 2: they don't think about it in terms of like, well,
Speaker 2: if we do this, not only are we paying him
Speaker 2: the money, we're giving up all the assets that we
Speaker 2: would need to have the flexibility for other moves to
Speaker 2: make this team better down the line, like Luca's not.
Speaker 2: I don't think, I mean, I'm just I'm just totally speculating,
Speaker 2: but like, I don't feel like players think about those
Speaker 2: things like the actual cost of going go get the
Speaker 2: guy that I like, and whether Kessler's the right guy
Speaker 2: or not remains to be seen. Like I think, I
Speaker 2: think the center depth issue is a massive problem, partly
Speaker 2: because you can't count on him to necessarily be healthy.
Speaker 2: I know he had like it's a shoulder injury so
Speaker 2: that it had surgery. Whatever. It's not like he has
Speaker 2: chronic like calf streams or whatever. But still the Senate
Speaker 2: def behind him is terrible. I don't think you can
Speaker 2: play MoMu as a backup center and get away with it.
Speaker 1: And by the way, Walker Kessler has averaged over thirty
Speaker 1: minutes a game once and it was the season in
Speaker 1: which he played five games. Yeah, and he's thirty minutes
Speaker 1: the season he played in fifty eight games, and then
Speaker 1: he's in the twenties. I'm not saying he can't do it,
Speaker 1: but they treated it as like a sure thing, and
Speaker 1: even through the lens of to take riks Risks with
Speaker 1: Luca on board. Sure, that was an insane cost that
Speaker 1: they gave it, Like the draft, the money you can
Speaker 1: get me on board with that, don't have the four years,
Speaker 1: one hundred and thirty million dollars feels based off the
Speaker 1: track record, but you are it is an investment in
Speaker 1: what you believe he can do, and so are the
Speaker 1: first round picks. But if the alternative is just I
Speaker 1: get to keep control of those four picks and not
Speaker 1: have Walker Kessler, Yeah, what just be the Mitchell Robinson
Speaker 1: team at that point, Like if that was the opportunity cost?
Speaker 2: Yeah, So I think like there are some elements here
Speaker 2: that you can see the logic. I think in like, yes,
Speaker 2: we understand the type of team you should build around
Speaker 2: Luka Dancic because the MAVs did it and they made
Speaker 2: the finals. Like it and so okay, Austin Reeves is
Speaker 2: in the Jalen Brunson role, except he's making ten x
Speaker 2: whatever Jalen Brunson was.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he took like five million less.
Speaker 2: Than nine point seven head And I yeah, you go
Speaker 2: get Kessler because that's you. You got to have that
Speaker 2: center position, the room rolling guy, the paint protector, got
Speaker 2: to have that. But like, there's unless you really think
Speaker 2: Zion Williams is gonna fill this role, and I'm with you,
Speaker 2: like for the price, you absolutely sign him for that,
Speaker 2: or if you think Quentin Grimes is up for this.
Speaker 2: I don't see the defensively versatile athletic combo forwards and
Speaker 2: wings that will make threes and defend, Like I just
Speaker 2: that element is just not present here. So that's really,
Speaker 2: as much as anything why this team is confusing, because
Speaker 2: you seem to understand some of the pieces of what
Speaker 2: a Luka Doncicch led team should be, but you really
Speaker 2: glossed over, maybe like the core element of what you've
Speaker 2: got to have to make this whole thing work. So
Speaker 2: I agree, and I haven't really thought about the is
Speaker 2: this pushing Luca out? But in the sense that, like, so,
Speaker 2: how do you improve this team now without moving some
Speaker 2: of your key pieces for like not and not getting
Speaker 2: back the best player in any of those deals because
Speaker 2: you know Sweeten like.
Speaker 1: And also watch off their non Luca players has positive
Speaker 1: trade value right now? Austin Reeves maybe like that. Let's
Speaker 1: just say, Austin Reeves, does Walker Kessler have positive trade
Speaker 1: value on this deal? I would say, TBD, Well, you're
Speaker 1: not getting back what you gave up for Walker Kessler.
Speaker 1: No you're not.
Speaker 2: You're not getting Yeah, I I I don't know, so yeah,
Speaker 2: I agree, they're on my list too. All right, we
Speaker 2: gotta get another team here. Dang, I think you took Amine,
Speaker 2: so I got to go off the board here.
Speaker 1: You only had a list of three teams.
Speaker 2: At six, that's right, we boke All six of mine
Speaker 2: were on your list. Let's see. Well, I mean, do
Speaker 2: you want to talk about the Warriors?
Speaker 1: I could?
Speaker 2: I mean, because at at a base level, they're trying
Speaker 2: to maximize Steph Curry. This is all old news. They're
Speaker 2: trying to maximize Steph's prime, and the hope in achieving
Speaker 2: that rest so on Lebron James choosing them. And if
Speaker 2: he doesn't, how can you go into this season saying
Speaker 2: anything better than what happened last year is possible, and
Speaker 2: last year was not nearly good enough. There was that
Speaker 2: one play in game where I was like, oh, and
Speaker 2: I'll treasure it forever because it was a great STEPH game.
Speaker 2: Steve is never gonna stop talking about it. How like
Speaker 2: that was our reminder of what it felt like. That
Speaker 2: was that was pure basketball. That's all you got really,
Speaker 2: So I don't think you could say it's I don't know.
Speaker 2: Really what's happened here is like the heart, it keeps
Speaker 2: winning over the head, which I'm fine with because that's
Speaker 2: how I think about the Warriors. But if you don't
Speaker 2: get Lebron, what is your argument going into this season
Speaker 2: that anything will be different and that we will be
Speaker 2: that that better, better things can happen than we saw
Speaker 2: last year.
Speaker 1: Is Jimmy Butler having a half season off is going
Speaker 1: to be fresh and you catch lighting at a ball,
Speaker 1: I'm not even and Jacksville London Brok's able to contribute, right,
Speaker 1: which I will say about Yaxville. So after he played
Speaker 1: twenty seven plus minutes against the Knicks the other night,
Speaker 1: he was out there in between timeouts during Miami Toronto
Speaker 1: summer League basically like holding the T shirt toss. He
Speaker 1: was throwing the T shirts out in the street clothes,
Speaker 1: so that that dude gets it. And I think that's
Speaker 1: where at least one first place Rookie of the Year
Speaker 1: vote alone, I just want to throw it out there.
Speaker 1: That's that's the pathway. And by the way, the reason
Speaker 1: I don't find them confusing is this has been their
Speaker 1: stick for a while, is we will be.
Speaker 2: Well, we're just used to it though, We're just that
Speaker 2: doesn't mean it's not like illogical.
Speaker 1: Yeah no, you're well, yeah, all right, you're right. So
Speaker 1: just because I understand their their irrationality doesn't make it rational.
Speaker 1: Yeah that makes sense. Yeah, but it's hasn't it been
Speaker 1: the same song and dance basically every summer for the
Speaker 1: past since they won the title. Words, we're kind of
Speaker 1: sort of linked to this one big name, and we
Speaker 1: weren't really all in because with Lebron it's are we
Speaker 1: sure they're like ready to give him the non text mL.
Speaker 2: I mean, if that's a sticking point, we gotta have
Speaker 2: a conversation.
Speaker 1: So they're confusing. But they've been confusing for a while,
Speaker 1: and maybe that's what makes them not as confusing to
Speaker 1: me is that they seem very content to just let
Speaker 1: this ride off into the sunset while being mediocre, and
Speaker 1: they're gonna, you know, let it ride out with Steph,
Speaker 1: and that's I guess they've earned that right with four titles.
Speaker 1: But they can't come out and just say then they
Speaker 1: kind of have in so many ways said it, But
Speaker 1: you can't come out and just say, yeah, we're not
Speaker 1: trying to win titles anymore, like this is just that
Speaker 1: would be too expensive and too risky and we'd mortgage
Speaker 1: too much of our future for an abridged window that
Speaker 1: might not even end up panning out. But the fact
Speaker 1: that Steph is just when he's playing, is still very
Speaker 1: clearly like a top ten to twelve player in the.
Speaker 2: League is well, and even if he is not, it's
Speaker 2: it's like he's top five in giving you the feelings
Speaker 2: you want to feel, you know, if you're a Warriors fan,
Speaker 2: it's just like you're just every every like little you know,
Speaker 2: three possession scoring streak in a row is just like
Speaker 2: just scratches that little itch of like, hey, hey remember
Speaker 2: when this was like remember when things were this way
Speaker 2: all the time? And that's enough, honestly, I think for
Speaker 2: like the vast majority of Warriors fans, but I nominated them,
Speaker 2: so I have to concede that, like, from a purely
Speaker 2: logical perspective, what they've done for the last like two
Speaker 2: or three years, it's just like, this isn't This isn't
Speaker 2: how a normal team should be operating.
Speaker 1: No, I'm with you there. I didn't want to get
Speaker 1: your thoughts though on someone posts this in the discord
Speaker 1: and now I can't find it. Okay, so I can't convert,
Speaker 1: so kill Haws and our discord posted Lebron James. Oh no,
Speaker 1: this is it turns out that it did not happen,
Speaker 1: so I'm not going to bring it up. Never mind, then,
Speaker 1: but are you still clinging to Lebron James? Using the
Speaker 1: meaningful basketball is sort of a clue that, oh, maybe
Speaker 1: he really is considering I mean, I'm not.
Speaker 2: I feel like when I said that to you, you
Speaker 2: really were like, this is this?
Speaker 1: I haven't like Grant. I've done podcasts in radio spots
Speaker 1: where I've brought up that moment as that I was
Speaker 1: so short was Cleveland or bust and then my co
Speaker 1: host comes in just with this like baseless bread crumb
Speaker 1: that I'm now clinging to and.
Speaker 2: I mean it's it's it's good to believe, it's it's
Speaker 2: important to believe in something. I think. Uh I I
Speaker 2: am less sure that it's gonna happen than I was
Speaker 2: initially when like, oh my god, they're gonna do They're
Speaker 2: gonna do a d and Lebron Like that's that's that's
Speaker 2: how it's gonna work out. Like if you force me
Speaker 2: to give a percentage likelihood on Anthony Davis and Lebron
Speaker 2: being on the team next year. At that time when
Speaker 2: that news was just breaking out of been like sixty five,
Speaker 2: it's like overwhelmingly likely. Don't know what, you would never
Speaker 2: bet against it, you'd be a fool. But now it's like,
Speaker 2: it doesn't seem like Davis is going anywhere. I will say,
Speaker 2: like getting Lebron still seems We talked about it off
Speaker 2: air a little bit. The Warriors make as much sense
Speaker 2: as anybody. Like Cleveland's a sentimental pick. If I had
Speaker 2: to guess, I would just say Cleveland because I don't
Speaker 2: know if it just yeah, he's gonna go finish where
Speaker 2: he started, like that kind of thing. But I think
Speaker 2: the Warriors to me are like second or third most likely,
Speaker 2: and it may maybe the gap isn't even that big
Speaker 2: between one and two and three and then getting Lebron.
Speaker 2: I do think if if they are finally ready to
Speaker 2: like put some chips on the table, maybe the next
Speaker 2: guy that gets you know, itchy to leave a big
Speaker 2: star is like maybe the Warriors are higher on my
Speaker 2: list of teams I'll extend with or want to steer
Speaker 2: myself too, because like Lebron is there, and that's more
Speaker 2: enticing than just like well Steph in half a season
Speaker 2: of Jimmy Butler and.
Speaker 1: Like you're talking about a Bronni consolidation trade is sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, whatever you have to give up to get him,
Speaker 2: I think I think you probably do it. No.
Speaker 1: I know, if I was the Warriors, I was just
Speaker 1: try and trade for him. Right now, it's just sort
Speaker 1: of a like.
Speaker 2: A ransom situation, like just like do you ever want
Speaker 2: to see him again? Play with him every day?
Speaker 1: Do you ever want to see him outside of the
Speaker 1: G League? You're gonna you're design with us.
Speaker 2: I like, Mike, don't leave you on the phone with
Speaker 2: like one of those voice disguisers, like we have your boy.
Speaker 2: You know what you need to do? Uh Yeah, I
Speaker 2: don't know. I I hope they get Lebron. I don't
Speaker 2: know how likely it is anymore.
Speaker 1: I don't Hey, look, this is why you subcribe to
Speaker 1: our Patreon for more on bias takes Like I hope
Speaker 1: the Warriors get Lebron.
Speaker 2: I mean, isn't that Isn't that more fun than Cleveland
Speaker 2: unless you live in Cleveland, and then you're.
Speaker 1: Like I would say, with the exception of Miami, any
Speaker 1: spot is more fun than Cleveland. Just because I don't
Speaker 1: think he meaningfully improve there's that word improves their championship
Speaker 1: equity and poetic like the poeticism of it. You can't
Speaker 1: like the emotional component. I can't argue against it. I
Speaker 1: just want to see something new with him, and if
Speaker 1: you want another title with just a different team I have.
Speaker 1: I've had people come up to me normal that's the
Speaker 1: only place I go. Not a brag, but like at
Speaker 1: the gym and when they try to invariably talk to
Speaker 1: me about the NBA. I don't like Lebron. He just
Speaker 1: plays for whichever team he wants and like Jordan was
Speaker 1: undefeated in the finals, could be times Lebron got to
Speaker 1: the finals and like winning a championship with all these
Speaker 1: different franchises is incredibly difficult. So I would I want
Speaker 1: him Golden. To see him play with Steph I think
Speaker 1: would be high up on my League Pass rankings. But
Speaker 1: I would love to see him go to Minnesota or Denver. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it would be there's a lot of big Oh right,
Speaker 1: he's a basket He's a real basketball sick go. Speaking
Speaker 1: of Grant though, with the what is this the eighth pick, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm going to go to one of Lebron James's potential
Speaker 1: teams that has also kind of been ruled out as
Speaker 1: one of no longer his potential teams, the Denver Nuggets.
Speaker 1: I do find it interesting that in a summer in
Speaker 1: which Nicoliokich has so far declined to extension for reasons,
Speaker 1: we could talk about the financial reasons. Right now. He
Speaker 1: can get the Donovan Mitchell Special, which would be four
Speaker 1: years and two hundred and seventy seven plus millionllion dollars,
Speaker 1: or he could wait next year and if he wants
Speaker 1: to sign a full five year contract that could be
Speaker 1: worth three hundred and fifty three point two million is
Speaker 1: the projected total. By the way, that number is going
Speaker 1: to go down because the NBA salary cap projection is
Speaker 1: just keep being lowered. I love how people are still
Speaker 1: some people are still using like the ten percent year
Speaker 1: over year. That's not it's not happened anymore. But he
Speaker 1: hasn't signed an extension, which last year that raised eye brows.
Speaker 1: It should be raising eyebrows no matter what you think
Speaker 1: he might be saying publicly. There was that that Serbian
Speaker 1: interview that we also where he has said he wants
Speaker 1: to retire in Denver. I don't I don't doubt those intentions.
Speaker 1: You've done basically jack shit. You lost Tim Hardaway.
Speaker 2: Junior high Jones, Dan, what are we doing?
Speaker 1: You brought back Tias Jones and so that just leads
Speaker 1: me to say, oh, you still need a backup point guard.
Speaker 1: You signed Diallo and is are we but okay? Cool?
Speaker 1: But like Spencer Jones is it? Is he part of
Speaker 1: the planet anymore? And you still have the big note
Speaker 1: here is Peyton Watson slowing around in the restricted free
Speaker 1: agency market. Now I'm not criticizing or saying the Nuggets
Speaker 1: are confusing because they haven't paid him yet. This is
Speaker 1: how RFA works. The way the Pistons are playing with
Speaker 1: Jayleen Duran is perfect. I know there are other teams
Speaker 1: like the Nets and the Clippers that have been interested
Speaker 1: in Peyton Watson, but there's been no offer sheet and
Speaker 1: so everything has to run through the Nuggets.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Anyway, I'm looking at this and thinking, you bring back
Speaker 1: Peyton Watson? Is that just enough? Are we also assuming
Speaker 1: that they're not gonna like there was the report from
Speaker 1: the Steinline that well, they're not obligated to cut money
Speaker 1: if they go into the second apron. They're inside, They're
Speaker 1: like right at the second apron at this moment, they're
Speaker 1: not there, but they're pretty close. Peyton Watson's getting even
Speaker 1: if you think he gets less than Christian Brown, he's
Speaker 1: not getting less than twenty million right to start.
Speaker 2: It would be shocking.
Speaker 1: So you're a repeater team who's blowing past the second
Speaker 1: apron to field the same core that lost in the
Speaker 1: first round. I'd call schnet on that. So something afoot
Speaker 1: has to be happening here. But what is it? And
Speaker 1: do the Nuggets come out of this? Is there any
Speaker 1: scenery in which the Nuggets exit this off season and
Speaker 1: you feel better about this team than you did entering
Speaker 1: last year. And I'm struggling to find the I mean,
Speaker 1: I like, hey, Trayvon Brazil drop thirty five yard right
Speaker 1: and he was my guy. But to be with all sincerity,
Speaker 1: I don't know what's going on here, but for a
Speaker 1: team that I'm not saying they needed to do something reckless,
Speaker 1: trade everybody. Because you and I have talked at length,
Speaker 1: it's easy to say, well, just trade Jamal Murray or
Speaker 1: Aaron Gordon for who and how do you how does
Speaker 1: that make you better? But in an off season, in
Speaker 1: a summer, when it doesn't seem like Nicolaiokich is gonna commit,
Speaker 1: like formally commit to you in the future, like for
Speaker 1: this to be what's happened so far, or even just
Speaker 1: bringing back Peyton Watson or running it back in general,
Speaker 1: it feels unsettling.
Speaker 2: I was, you know, I've been thinking lately that so
Speaker 2: for a while there the sort of examples of what
Speaker 2: the second apron Era was going to do to team
Speaker 2: building were Boston, who stripped it down and maybe still
Speaker 2: the Jayalen Brown trade is kind of like the final
Speaker 2: move of like this is what happens or the thunder,
Speaker 2: but then the thunder just kind of managed it well enough,
Speaker 2: like there are still a little ways away from the
Speaker 2: real pain. I'm starting to wonder if maybe Denver is
Speaker 2: actually the team that you see the Like this is
Speaker 2: quint essentially what happens when you win a championship and
Speaker 2: things get expensive and there's just over the ensuing years,
Speaker 2: there's just the degradation and talent as your own players
Speaker 2: cost more and you try to hold it together and
Speaker 2: you make these cost cutting moves that everybody hates. But
Speaker 2: like this is where you end up, which is they
Speaker 2: have to make a move, and it's kind of impossible
Speaker 2: to imagine them in the aftermath being better, where it's
Speaker 2: just you keep running into it's hard to stay even
Speaker 2: as good as you were, because if you're even if
Speaker 2: you're selling off pieces and trading picks or whatever, like
Speaker 2: it's just like over time, and it's not a long time.
Speaker 2: It wasn't that long ago they won the title. You
Speaker 2: just you just kind of slowly by degrees, have to
Speaker 2: tear yourself apart. And like, in some ways that's more
Speaker 2: painful than what Boston had to do, or like what
Speaker 2: the Thunder may eventually have to do, because it's just
Speaker 2: there's a hopelessness attached to it, and like an inescapability
Speaker 2: attached to it. It's it's kind of bleak, right because, like,
Speaker 2: paint me the scenario where we go into this season
Speaker 2: saying Denver actually has a better chance to advance a
Speaker 2: long way than they did last year, and what's that
Speaker 2: look like? It's just what I mean, right, they might
Speaker 2: get out of the first but like their profile as
Speaker 2: a more serious contender. It's just like Peyton Watson takes
Speaker 2: a leap, they keep him, they pay what it costs,
Speaker 2: they take he takes a leap, and they're willing to
Speaker 2: pay massive repeater tax. Like they haven't acted like a
Speaker 2: team that ever been willing to do that. So I
Speaker 2: just it is they do now feel to me like
Speaker 2: the team you'd point to, like say you're criticizing your
Speaker 2: team or any team for doing what the Celtics did
Speaker 2: last summer or like those kinds of moves. He's like,
Speaker 2: do you want to end up like Denver where it's
Speaker 2: just like you just slowly degrade and there's no you
Speaker 2: just don't have the ability to like improve yourself like that.
Speaker 2: That seems worse than what Boston went through because I
Speaker 2: like looking forward, like Boston seems like like a hopeful place,
Speaker 2: like we don't like that trade, but but you know
Speaker 2: what I mean, it feels like Denver is just like,
Speaker 2: what do you do?
Speaker 1: I do think part of it, though, is and we're
Speaker 1: pointing to one move here is so yes, there has
Speaker 1: been that slow degradation. But last years a perfect example.
Speaker 1: Looking back, even if we ended up being too low
Speaker 1: or I was, I don't remember where you ended up
Speaker 1: on it. So I want to put words in your mouth.
Speaker 1: Even if I ended up being too low on the
Speaker 1: Cam Johnson for Michael Porter Junior twenty thirty two first
Speaker 1: round pick deal, that was your last best bullet on
Speaker 1: the trade market, and that's what you did. Is that
Speaker 1: acceptable when framed through that view? And the answer is
Speaker 1: just no. I thought Cam Johnson was fine for them
Speaker 1: last year by like, he didn't start out too great,
Speaker 1: but by the end of the playoffs he was one
Speaker 1: of their most trustworthy guys. And he still ended up
Speaker 1: the percentages from three we're still pretty hot, and he
Speaker 1: just had moments where's, oh, okay, I see the vision here,
Speaker 1: but now we're talking about, oh, are they gonna need
Speaker 1: to like just dump him because we know they're not
Speaker 1: going to go this far into the second apron and
Speaker 1: by the way, for a team that you don't think
Speaker 1: can make it out of the conference, No, you shouldn't
Speaker 1: be like twenty million dollars into the second apron or
Speaker 1: whatever it is. That's a fact. So it's not. Yes, again,
Speaker 1: there was sort of the gradual decline from them, and
Speaker 1: they had some injuries crop up. But it's also I
Speaker 1: don't know that they've maximized the opportunities that were before
Speaker 1: them since they won the title. I don't think they
Speaker 1: have it all. They didn't negotiate with Jamal Murray at all,
Speaker 1: Like if we want to hammer the Wizards for Trey
Speaker 1: Young or the Spurs for Darren Fox, certain teams where
Speaker 1: you have the margin for error where it's no, you
Speaker 1: shouldn't have done that. But look at the Spurs because
Speaker 1: so many of the guys are on their their rookie scales,
Speaker 1: or Wemby's just not gonna take the escalator language in Washington.
Speaker 1: You just haven't paid anybody yet. So not that it's
Speaker 1: a good move, but it's, oh, we can stomach this.
Speaker 1: You knew you were gonna get progressively more expensive. And
Speaker 1: what was the market for Murray now? I'm not if
Speaker 1: he wanted to explore the open market. I'm not saying
Speaker 1: just from running the team the way things are working
Speaker 1: right now, like they're just even Aaron Gordon on his extension,
Speaker 1: I think he's invaluable to this team. He's also probably
Speaker 1: more valuable to the Nugget than any other team in
Speaker 1: the league. And so to not negotiate harder on those
Speaker 1: types of deals when it was like the climate isn't
Speaker 1: necessarily what it is now, but it had shifted enough
Speaker 1: to people thought the Aaron Gordon extension, it feels as
Speaker 1: if people were mostly okay with they might have acknowledged, oh,
Speaker 1: the back end of that could be rough. The Jamal
Speaker 1: Murray deal, it was actually viewed until this season is
Speaker 1: worse than it is now, Like people are, oh, you
Speaker 1: might have net positive value or be a slightly met
Speaker 1: positive So there's just been too many missteps or missed
Speaker 1: opportunities there and now I don't know how you get
Speaker 1: better is the answer. Like that's why they're confusing and
Speaker 1: the fact that they've done so, Look, who's the best
Speaker 1: shooter on Like, Okay, it's not Jamal Like aside from
Speaker 1: Jamal Murray and Nikole Jokic, you have Cam Johnson. Like
Speaker 1: I get is that enough shooting? I guess in an
Speaker 1: offense when the Kohle Jokic, it doesn't matter, You're just
Speaker 1: gonna be top three.
Speaker 2: It's depth and defense, depth and defense for them, like
Speaker 2: nice too. Yeah, yeah, I mean, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 2: The thing is, like I guess, sort of implicit in
Speaker 2: what I've been saying of like, this is what happens
Speaker 2: if you just try to hold it together. Uh. In
Speaker 2: the apron era, if they had done the opposite and
Speaker 2: moved Murray or or played hardball with Gordon, like, we
Speaker 2: might be in a situation where it's like Yokic isn't
Speaker 2: even on this team anymore because he's just like forget it,
Speaker 2: you know, like I can't win here. You guys are
Speaker 2: going in a different direction by trading all these players
Speaker 2: that I view as integral to our whole operation, and
Speaker 2: you force him out sooner it's kind of I mean,
Speaker 2: I don't know. And in a roundabout way, this is
Speaker 2: just illustrative of the corner that the apron era sort
Speaker 2: of allows you to paint yourself into where there isn't
Speaker 2: like a good way. There's no there's no like there's
Speaker 2: a way that doesn't hurt in some fashion to to
Speaker 2: sort of go forward after you've been successful and you
Speaker 2: have expensive players because they were good and helped you
Speaker 2: win at a high level, Like this is just where
Speaker 2: you end up.
Speaker 1: Do you think Wemby's painted Yokic into a corner where
Speaker 1: now he yes, he's gonna need to take a pay cut.
Speaker 2: I mean, I know you guys talked about this a
Speaker 2: little bit, but like I I my suspicion is that
Speaker 2: I wasn't surprised that Wemby did what he did. If anything,
Speaker 2: I was surprised he didn't take an even bigger discount.
Speaker 2: I gotta believe this was the largest discount he felt
Speaker 2: he could take without incurring the wrath of like every
Speaker 2: other player.
Speaker 1: The players Union, yeah, which already wasn't happy by it, right,
Speaker 1: Which I think that's what this was. This is off
Speaker 1: topic a little bit, but we got a lot of
Speaker 1: pushback from that, saying like, why are we criticizing what's
Speaker 1: happening with the Bucks and Gary Trent Junior? But why
Speaker 1: isn't it salary caps or a convention with what Jalen
Speaker 1: Brunson and Victor Woman Yama did. I just wanted to
Speaker 1: point out I didn't know that that was a thing.
Speaker 1: It was a more common response than I thought, and
Speaker 1: some people were like, pretty I don't want to use
Speaker 1: the word hostile, like they were pretty passionate about it. One.
Speaker 1: I think the bigger difference is those players were already
Speaker 1: under contracts with these teams, and Jalen Brunson's case, he
Speaker 1: took the maximum allowed to him at the time. There's
Speaker 1: no the The issue is, and now, if we find
Speaker 1: out that the Spurs and Wemby or the Knicks and
Speaker 1: Brunson have an agreement in place, you sign something like
Speaker 1: when you're like inking these contracts or electronically signing these
Speaker 1: contracts that said there is no other agreement in place.
Speaker 1: It's apparently a big stipulation when you're signing minimum deals specifically,
Speaker 1: which is what Gary Trent Junior was on. And the
Speaker 1: other thing is that Gary Trent Junior then proceeded to
Speaker 1: get like Victor O Miyama had a Gary Tran Junior
Speaker 1: signed a three year minimum deal or something, and he
Speaker 1: just said like, yeah, this is not what I'm worth.
Speaker 1: I could make more, but I'm signing this three year
Speaker 1: minimum deal. There's actually nothing wrong with it. Like Wemby
Speaker 1: is saying I'm taking this for the life of this deal.
Speaker 1: It's still technically the maximum allowed or close to it.
Speaker 1: It just doesn't have the hypotheticals in this. The same
Speaker 1: thing with Jalen Brunson, like the Gary Trang Junior when
Speaker 1: he did get paid, Jalen Brunson and Victor Miyam are
Speaker 1: being paid below market money. Let's say characters jug got
Speaker 1: way above his market value. So like, that's just I was.
Speaker 1: I don't they seem like apples and oranges situations to
Speaker 1: be either all looped under the same umbrella of is
Speaker 1: like do players need to take less? Or like, is
Speaker 1: this a way to gain the system in the case
Speaker 1: of the bucks, so that if you're good and you're
Speaker 1: trying to maximize the window, can you get guys who
Speaker 1: are implact players to come in a lower number. But
Speaker 1: I was surprised that it was more of a common
Speaker 1: refrain than I had. Honestly, I hadn't even thought about, well,
Speaker 1: what's the why isn't what Wemby's doing or what Jolen
Speaker 1: Brunson did salary cap circ convention.
Speaker 2: I yeah, I think it's kind of apples and orangesy.
Speaker 2: It's also kind of like when what about ism is
Speaker 2: taken to like an even stupid or extreme where it's like,
Speaker 2: well but how about this, like why aren't you That's
Speaker 2: like they're not the same. It's Gary Trent's situation is
Speaker 2: he's being paid far more than he is worth after
Speaker 2: taking deals that one of them was maybe like it's
Speaker 2: a player last year, yeah right, so and and whereas
Speaker 2: like a player sacrifice, like it's I get it, Like
Speaker 2: I guess, I guess on some level they share the
Speaker 2: fact that a player is taking less than he could get.
Speaker 2: But unless you're willing to show how Brunson and Wemby
Speaker 2: are like gonna be made whole or more than whole
Speaker 2: on the back end with some other deal that's already
Speaker 2: been agreed to, this is not the same thing, right
Speaker 2: even if so, let's let's not just signing a below
Speaker 2: more market value, it's a contract. It's doing that knowing
Speaker 2: that you will be paid above market or paid in
Speaker 2: some other way as a result of taking that deal.
Speaker 1: And maybe that becomes an issue with Jalen Brunson on
Speaker 1: his next deal, But when he's extension eligible next summer,
Speaker 1: the Knicks probably give him a max deal unless he's
Speaker 1: want to take less can you sit there and say definitely,
Speaker 1: Like Jallen Brunson isn't a max player, why would you
Speaker 1: get right?
Speaker 2: Yeah, It's like it's such a difference of degree, Like
Speaker 2: if Jalen Brunson had a terrible year going into when
Speaker 2: he's eligible to sign his next contract, you'd still be like,
Speaker 2: he's still worth it. You know.
Speaker 1: The Bucks went through this a little bit with Bobby Porus,
Speaker 1: and we even saw the Clippers with Nicholas Batoom when
Speaker 1: those guys ended up signing deals though they were at
Speaker 1: least a round market value, right, we're looking at this garage,
Speaker 1: at the four guaranteed years that way above market values.
Speaker 1: The issue I didn't mean that they're else there. I
Speaker 1: have one more team on my list. Do you have
Speaker 1: another team?
Speaker 2: I could like vamp and pick one, but let's just
Speaker 2: talk about your last one. Uh.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised we haven't talked about them yet, But maybe
Speaker 1: the bar solow that we didn't.
Speaker 2: Think as well. I mean, this is I don't want
Speaker 2: to cut you off, but this is one where it's
Speaker 2: like you could just make the case that they're bad
Speaker 2: and stupid and it's not that confusing and we're used
Speaker 2: to it, but go ahead.
Speaker 1: Look anytime that like your big offseason move outside of
Speaker 1: the draft is waving Demard rozen and then potentially stretching
Speaker 1: his salary so that you can make sure you're not
Speaker 1: in the luxury tax for a twenty something win team. Fireworks, Baby,
Speaker 1: I don't Here's here's the thing. I don't actually know.
Speaker 1: This is why they're being taken Solow. They're still confusing
Speaker 1: as hell because I don't understand the theory of this
Speaker 1: team and the I felt so bad for Kings fans.
Speaker 1: I didn't watch a ton of him in Summer League,
Speaker 1: but there was a game where I, like Darius A.
Speaker 1: Cuptry just not looked like he was engaged at all
Speaker 1: the defensive end or anything, and I was just like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, Kings fans need like some type of
Speaker 1: a reprieve from this shit show. You can't write them
Speaker 1: off based on that. I like Nee Clifford still like
Speaker 1: the maxim right, no good. Find Dylan Cardwell, who was
Speaker 1: pissed after one of the games, which if you're gonna
Speaker 1: get mad after some of league, I respect it.
Speaker 2: You have that guy has to be on this team
Speaker 2: like to just to make sure there's always going to
Speaker 2: be a pulse. He absolutely provides that, Sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 1: What you could sit here and say is what did
Speaker 1: you want them to do? The answer is going to
Speaker 1: be blow it up. Do any of their individual players
Speaker 1: have value in a vacuum? And that's fair, that's why
Speaker 1: they're being taken so low. But they talked about a
Speaker 1: lot as just what Scott Perry's vision for this roster
Speaker 1: is going to be moving forward. I still have no
Speaker 1: idea what that vision entails. And if we're sitting here
Speaker 1: in the middle of July and we know that they're
Speaker 1: not planning anything bigger, just because you did waive to
Speaker 1: Martos and you couldn't find a trade candidate for him,
Speaker 1: or the plan wasn't to then use him and trade
Speaker 1: it his full number, Like I thought the precious Chua
Speaker 1: deal was fine two years and eleven million bucks and
Speaker 1: he had played some really good minutes for them. Time
Speaker 1: will tell what whether Darius A. Cuff Junior was the
Speaker 1: right pick. It's just you know that they're not trying
Speaker 1: to be good and that they're they've kind of boxed
Speaker 1: themselves into a corner. But I look at this team,
Speaker 1: I'm just like, what is actually going on? Like what
Speaker 1: what is the identity. First of all, they don't have
Speaker 1: a defensive identity. I don't know, like forget about what
Speaker 1: is their offensive identity.
Speaker 2: It's it's I mean to me, what's happening here, if
Speaker 2: you want to be as nice about it as possible
Speaker 2: is they're kind of just waiting it out because I
Speaker 2: don't think. I don't you can't trade Levine for anything,
Speaker 2: at least right now. Maybe that changes if he is
Speaker 2: great in the first half and somebody's willing to pay this,
Speaker 2: you know, half of his his salary after the trade
Speaker 2: deadline or less than that. Actually, Sabonis, I don't think
Speaker 2: has positive trade value like Kegan Murray of all people,
Speaker 2: like was untouchable a couple of years ago, And but
Speaker 2: I don't know if he has positive trade value, Like
Speaker 2: he has to play himself into like being tradeable, and
Speaker 2: I don't think want to trade him just as a
Speaker 2: threshold issue. I think you're just kind of waiting for
Speaker 2: some of these contracts to get closer to their conclusions,
Speaker 2: and like that's not the You certainly cannot cannot attach
Speaker 2: draft assets to move off of these bad contracts that
Speaker 2: you stuck yourself with. You just have to sit there
Speaker 2: and wear it until until they're movable for something that
Speaker 2: doesn't compromise your future. So like, it's it's confusing how
Speaker 2: they got here. It's confusing how they empowered the people
Speaker 2: that contributed to getting them here, Like Doug Christy is
Speaker 2: still the coach.
Speaker 1: Like I don't like.
Speaker 2: I guess maybe maybe the logic there is like we
Speaker 2: know we can't do anything, so why go get Like
Speaker 2: it doesn't even matter who the coach is. Like that
Speaker 2: feels kind of crazy to me because you do have
Speaker 2: a rookie in a cuff that, in theory is gonna
Speaker 2: be like he's got the keys, I think, so you
Speaker 2: definitely want like a better developmental environment for him. But
Speaker 2: this is just sort of mess. It's it's confusing as
Speaker 2: to what's confusing is like how did it get this bad?
Speaker 2: That's that's that's hard to fathom because it took so many,
Speaker 2: so many great contributors over so many years to put
Speaker 2: them into the condition.
Speaker 1: What was the inflection point for them? Do you think
Speaker 1: it was the decision to move on from Mike Brown
Speaker 1: and everything sort of snowballing from there.
Speaker 2: I I don't know that Mike Brown would have saved this,
Speaker 2: you know, I.
Speaker 1: Think, but think about what that led to the relationship
Speaker 1: with dearon Fox.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, if you really wanted to go back,
Speaker 2: it might just be the Halliburton for Sabonis trade, because
Speaker 2: they've made a decision at that point that like the
Speaker 2: type of player we believe we should be led by
Speaker 2: is Fox and then Sabonis, and so we will then
Speaker 2: surround them with Derozen and Levine and that type. And
Speaker 2: like maybe if you just picked Tyre's Halliburton, you build differently.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I didn't honestly, I didn't see the Tyre's Haliburton trade
Speaker 1: coming up. I'm sure King's fans really appreciate you.
Speaker 2: And that, I mean, that was terrible at the time. Sorry.
Speaker 1: Can I provide a peak behind the curtain though, of
Speaker 1: your loyal of your actual respect for the King.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: We have a new merch line that is going to drop,
Speaker 1: hopefully shortly, and Grant and the test merch that is
Speaker 1: being sent to him as we speak, hopefully there They
Speaker 1: are team themed, So that's your little peak behind the curtain.
Speaker 1: Grant picked four teams and the Kings were one of them.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I didn't follow up in the moment when I when
Speaker 1: I actually wish we wanted passure. I was just like,
Speaker 1: is this like a bit are you kidding?
Speaker 2: It's a great design. Sorry, sorry, I love great design.
Speaker 2: The logo it works perfectly because it's because the lettering
Speaker 2: makes sense. It like looks a lot like the logo,
Speaker 2: like the actual King's script and logo on first look.
Speaker 2: I don't want to give too much away, but it
Speaker 2: jumped out of me like that's a good one, and
Speaker 2: so I had to have it. I you know, I
Speaker 2: don't discriminate. I'm not listening. My anti King's bias does
Speaker 2: not extend to good logos.
Speaker 1: And and we've established that you are a fashion used
Speaker 1: to too, absolutely, I mean look good, feel good.
Speaker 2: Look.
Speaker 1: So just to get us to ten teams, I want
Speaker 1: to nominate another one very quickly. I'm kind of balancing
Speaker 1: back and forth. I think some people are gonna pick
Speaker 1: the pistons. I want to talk about that.
Speaker 2: Well, so let's real quick, let's pick them, because I
Speaker 2: do I did. I did kind of have them out
Speaker 2: of the corner of my eyes. I was looking at
Speaker 2: just a list. Is what's confusing about them? I don't
Speaker 2: think anything's confusing to me about how they're handling Jalen Duran,
Speaker 2: because I think this means they're drawing an appropriately hard
Speaker 2: line on what they're willing to pay him. That part's fine,
Speaker 2: just the it's kind of been a few years of
Speaker 2: this issue of like just put the right kind of
Speaker 2: support staff around kid Cunningham, you know. And we can't
Speaker 2: be that critical because they won sixty games, But is
Speaker 2: that a lot? It seems like a decent number, you know,
Speaker 2: it didn't amount youer than seventy four, but still fier
Speaker 2: than seventy four, but more than more than fifty nine. Uh,
Speaker 2: it just you. So Tobias Harris goes out like they've
Speaker 2: chosen John Collins. I'm doing this off the top of
Speaker 2: my head. I should have our transaction lists open here?
Speaker 1: Who are the other Isaiah Joe? They get in there right,
Speaker 1: which ends up confused.
Speaker 2: For them essentially swapped out Isaiah Stewart, which I'm okay with,
Speaker 2: especially after some of that reporting that like he was
Speaker 2: pissed off about his minutes in the playoffs and Paul
Speaker 2: reid Is was playing over him and it's a lot cheaper,
Speaker 2: So I'm fine with that.
Speaker 1: I also think, so here can I give you what
Speaker 1: I think might be a hot take is I am
Speaker 1: more confused at this point by the Miami Heat that
Speaker 1: I am the Detroit Pistons. I ultimately would have settled
Speaker 1: on the Miami Heat because, well.
Speaker 2: But you fully understand why the Heat did what they did.
Speaker 2: It's just a bad decision.
Speaker 1: No, it's a bad decision. But then what have they done? Like?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 1: Like? How have they made it make sense that we're
Speaker 1: just gonna have no ball handlers? Then why did you negotiate?
Speaker 1: What's confusing is why didn't you negotiats? Again, it was
Speaker 1: a market of two teams. Why weren't you negotiating harder
Speaker 1: in the honest trade. But for the Pistons, here's what's
Speaker 1: confusing about them. Nothing I'm with you, Nothing about the
Speaker 1: Jayleen dur and stuff. I actually think he's John Collins.
Speaker 1: I'm not. I'm surprised that Isaiah Stewart had so little
Speaker 1: value on balance, But I actually like John Collins for
Speaker 1: this team because he's a higher volume three point shooter
Speaker 1: and so you can play him next to Jayleender and
Speaker 1: if you want, he's a higher volume pree point shooter
Speaker 1: than even Tobias Harris. I think this team will miss
Speaker 1: what becomes confusing about this team is they seem to
Speaker 1: be making a big bet on spacing, improved spacing and
Speaker 1: internal development. I'm fine with the spacing aspect of I
Speaker 1: think going from Tobias Harris and Isaiah Stewart to John
Speaker 1: Collins and Isaiah Joe that's a spacing upgrade, right like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And if you think Kevin Hurder is going to
Speaker 2: be better, which apparently the Pistons do, based, yeah, do you.
Speaker 1: Need contracts to trade? But that that is confusing? Yes,
Speaker 1: I do believe. What's even so you you then make
Speaker 1: the Karris Lavert trade. What what is confusing is they
Speaker 1: don't have the internal development part is I don't look
Speaker 1: at this roster and say, between Donnish, Jenkins or even
Speaker 1: Asar Thompson, is that secondary ball that primary secondary ball
Speaker 1: handler in place? My answer to that is still no.
Speaker 1: And so that leads me to believe they're so far
Speaker 1: under the tax right now? Are they waiting for the
Speaker 1: Jalhen Duran thing to settle so that they could then
Speaker 1: Is there another move in play here? Because their off
Speaker 1: season does feel anti climactic. But actually, don't think that's
Speaker 1: confusing when you do look at what the logic of
Speaker 1: these moves would be I think that they have improved
Speaker 1: the spacing and I don't know that they've weakened Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I would say they probably haven't. Like Karris Lavert
Speaker 1: was not a huge part of what they were doing
Speaker 1: last year. So have they weakened the secondary creation around
Speaker 1: Ky Cunningham. The answer is no, it does. The confusing
Speaker 1: part is, well, what are you have to be waiting
Speaker 1: for something? Because the grand theory of this team can't
Speaker 1: be like, well, yeah, we're gonna sign John Collins, bringing
Speaker 1: Isaiah Joe, bring back Jalen Durnham, like now we're ready
Speaker 1: to win the championship.
Speaker 2: Right, And I think too maybe you're right that, like,
Speaker 2: if there's anything confusing here, it's I it's maybe procedural,
Speaker 2: just because like it to illustrate, like if they had
Speaker 2: already agreed to terms with Jalen Durant and then still
Speaker 2: hadn't done anything to address the lack of improved secondary playmaking,
Speaker 2: that would feel a little weirder. And then maybe even
Speaker 2: then the argument would just be, like, you know, contrary
Speaker 2: to our hardballing Jalen duran Uh, we think he's got
Speaker 2: even more secondary creation in him after the breakthrough he
Speaker 2: made last year as an offensive player. Like, I don't
Speaker 2: know that that would feel kind of kind of like
Speaker 2: a weird uh double talk, but it is, I guess
Speaker 2: because the Duran stuff sort of needs to resolve before
Speaker 2: they go do something else. Like maybe that explains some
Speaker 2: of it, but they couldn't. Just doesn't outside of outside
Speaker 2: of Kate Cunningham in the postseason. Yeah, and they didn't
Speaker 2: go get anybody else that can create a shot.
Speaker 1: No, I mean, Gary Harrison, Torrian Princes aren't going to
Speaker 1: do that for you again. Yeah, they'll prove the creation
Speaker 1: for you. So they're they're lightly confusing, but I'm actually
Speaker 1: personally more confused. Bye, Miami, that's fair. Do you have
Speaker 1: anything else that you'd like to get to before we
Speaker 1: skidaddle out here?
Speaker 2: So we can skidattle. Great to speak to you again.
Speaker 2: Let's not do two weeks. Well, we might have to
Speaker 2: be two weeks off because don't want.
Speaker 1: To apologize for anyone who's coming here at two o'clock
Speaker 1: am Eastern time, why we're not live.
Speaker 2: Hope you had a great pay good night, sleep well,
Speaker 2: good luck, Yeah, good night and good luck. Thanks everybody
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