Speaker 1: What is up, Fellowshikos. I am Dan Favalley coming at
you with my certified fantabulous co host, mister Grant Hughes.
It is peace or panic time, because obviously we've seen
enough basketball to decide whether these teams even the panic
button or if they just need to chill out and
everything will be fine. Before we get into it, the
question everyone actually wants to know the answer to, mister Hughes,
how the heck are you?
Speaker 2: I'm doing fine. Happy to be here discussing piece of
panic with you. It's a good time to do it
because it's just early enough to where either reaction can
be irrational. But we're just going to do our best,
so I'm excited about that. But also because I'm turning
over a new leave. How are you doing?
Speaker 1: I was editing the last podcast. I was like, he's good. Now,
gonna ask me every time because he's the type of
person to remember me saying that I am doing okay.
Although I do feel a little accost is.
Speaker 3: I know it.
Speaker 1: These are automated stuff. I got. Anyone who lives and
who might care knows that I've been taking a gym
break just because my body was so battered and I
got so sick, so I took two weeks off. By
the time you listen to this, it goes out on Saturday,
I will have been back to the gym, which is exciting.
But I got a text message this morning grant from
my gym saying we miss you. It's been a bit
since your last workout. It's like automated, like do you
need help, like a trader or something, And I was
just like, I feel so accosted right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I mean the good news is if you ever,
like say, fell down your basement stairs or something, and
we're trapped at the bottom and needed someone to check
on you, maybe your gym would be.
Speaker 1: There thirteen days later. Yeah. If no one found me,
gym would be you.
Speaker 2: Could survive that. Do you have any canned goods down
there you could live on?
Speaker 1: I should stop them now, right, So that's nice.
Speaker 2: Thanks, Thanks gym computer for showing some concern.
Speaker 1: So yeah, for anyone who cares, they should be pumped
that I get to go back to the gym on
Saturday morning. And I'm I'm ready, like I'm itching. I
made it to two weeks. My entire family is shocked
that I made it to two weeks. I'm ready. I
know no one cares about this, but I'm so excited
I'm going to talk about it anyway. I'm ready to
get back.
Speaker 2: Hey, I asked how you were doing, so obviously I care.
Speaker 1: We're doing better than some of these teams, Like I
can say that right now before we really get into it.
I did want to ask you. The way I approached
it was, I'm not putting Yeah, records matter here, but
I'm not putting as much stock in the raw records,
especially if there's injuries. And I'm because some of these
teams I think right now have a winning record, and
so I'm more so looking at it. Have I seen
they're one clearly not doing as good as they were
supposed to or would like to. But two, do I
see anything to that would make me I would say
concerned longer term in a way that's no. The answers
not currently on the roster in time is not going
to fix what we feel els them. And that's the
approach that I took through this exercise.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I think it's always and as I'm
scanning the topics, we're going to hit here like it's
always more interesting if there's something beyond just like oh
they've they're they're two and six or whatever, that's bad,
you know, like it's I think that's the right approach
is to look at it and say, like, well, are
any of the things contributing to this bad record? Like
are there going to be easy fixes? Or like what
does it mean if you can't fix this over the
over like a multi year time horizon? Potentially even for
some of these teams, like I think, yeah, the ones
that have little like where the cracks like go out
a lot farther than you you know then you or
go a lot deeper than you can see on the surface,
those are the those are the good ones you want
to focus on for something like this.
Speaker 1: We begin with the Milwaukee Bucks grant. I didn't give
you any sort of say in the order. Was I
have it in a doc and I just put the
the assets for the screen together in that order. So
that's the order we're going in, and you have no
say in it. How does that make you feel?
Speaker 2: I mean, you know, I just had to scroll down
like four teams to get to them in my notes,
So you know, you've inconvenienced me pretty greatly. Here I'll
get through it though. Thanks.
Speaker 1: So the gist of you want to do that? Just
I know they're a team you were thinking about to
did you want to do the gist of what what?
What's concerned you about that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think I think it's you know,
even though this is isn't the total focus, it's helpful
to start with the basics. So they're two and six,
there have a negative four point five net rating. That
has that dropped by about four points I think, or
maybe a little more. It might have been in the
nines prior to a win the night before we're recording this.
So that's Thursday night against Utah, which, by the way,
that was a game until like a good chunk of
the third quarter had elapsed. And so yeah, it's a
It was a twenty three point win, which you know
helps the net rating and all that stuff. It's still
Utah a one and seventeen. That is just like mailing
it in, I mean, because they're just playing a bunch
of young guys, but to a ridiculous degree. And again,
it was a game so like Milwaukee, and it was
at home. It was in Milwaukee, and the Bucks had
to like actually like nut up to win that game.
So that's that two and six is still pretty iffy
to me. I don't know, we could just talk about
like what's not working here, you know, I guess kind
of split up into little little bits. It's but like
the the thing in your notes, which I think is appropriate,
is just like the sky's falling. It just feels like
this is a bad situation for any number of reasons.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Do you want to talk about like the some of
the specifics of like what's not happening on the court
for them to succeed or is or is the macro
like here's the overall situation and why it's tough? Is
that more interesting to you? So?
Speaker 1: I think you look at and just their overall vitals,
which again can still be skewed. When we're like eight
ten games into the season, you look at them being
nineteenth in offense, and you're just kind of like, all right, whatever,
Like that's just not there's no way that sticks. And
you can at least I guess. I mean Gary Trent
Junior before he was demoted from the starting five, which
he signed in Milwaukee under the guys that he would start.
I do give coaches credit for kind of throwing that
out the window, like you need to do what you
think is to win. Is Andre Jackson the answer to that,
I have no idea. I didn't watch To be clear,
I didn't watch Bucks Jazz. I was keeping track of
the score. It was the third I can't I think
it was the third quarter. Maybe was the end of
the first half of the Jazz. We're leading, and I
was like, oh God, if they win, this will be
a disaster.
Speaker 2: I will say, Jackson, did you know it's not It can't.
It's a huge problem if like, oh, he's the solve,
but like he definitely did. He's super energetic, very athletic,
like makes he's like a make stuff happen guy, and
he did inject the Bucks lineup with that, and it
is a lineup generally speaking, that skews old and unathletic
and just not quick. And he was notable for like
how he's he just stood out because he he is
quick and he hit, he does play hard, and he
is like disruptive. So but like I mean, okay, so
that's that's kind of what Gary Trent was supposed to
be as a defender, Like he's a steals Maven, but
like Jackson did bring a lot I think of what
the Bucks must have hoped he would bring. But how
much that matters when you're in this overall tough situation.
It is hard to.
Speaker 1: Say the fact that we're sitting here talking about Jackson
though he's just kind of an indictment of itself. And
I think, look, you can also chalk Gary Trencher is
gonna start hitting shots eventually, I would assume, is my guest,
and then Chris Middleton. It's both concerning and then also
a relief. It's okay, he comes back. The offense in theory,
Giannis has to do even less on the ball at
that point. So the offense, I really do believe will
be fine. I don't know what to make of this
defense in terms of, okay, well, what's the silver lining here? There?
They do a better job, I think keeping opponents out
of transition when they're missing shots, but like they're still
just getting destroyed in transition. I think a lot of
that comes back to the old and non athletic stuff
from you and their half court defense. It really looks
like it's not. At one point this season, grabbing those
defensive rebounds was an issue. They really haven't been an
issue of late, and like you're still getting burned in
the half court, I think because and maybe Jackson helps
with this more than Trent does. But the ball containment
on this team is still really bad. And that's the
other thing that comes back to, Well, they're not super
athletic or mobile. It's just beyond a tena koumpo. Like
we're talk about thirty year old at Temtacombo who's not
supposed to be Like, that's just not how he defends.
That's not a criticism of him. They just don't have that.
And if Chris Middleton comes back, what look series Even
bugging out about the buck start, the thing that I'm
really just thinking about is if Chris Middleton comes back,
will I really do believe he will be fine on offense?
What is he gonna look like after all these surgeries
on defense where he's kind of already slipped. So isn't
there a chance that their core lineups aren't gonna be
as equipped to get stops here? And I think that's
my biggest takeaway before throwing it back to you, is
the defense is the bigger problem to me, even though
the offense hasn't been great, and I don't know that
they have the in house fixes to fix that, the
in house fixes to fix that has that for verbiage.
Speaker 2: They don't. And I would say, even just to piggyback
on that a little bit, the Middleton return like might
make it worse, right, like it didn't need the opposite,
like defensively I'm talking about specifically, so just to further
illustrate again, like oh, they're they're old, they're on athletic.
That's just like, okay, where are your numbers? Okay, here's
they're thirtieth in offensive rebound rate. Now, sometimes that's a
tactical choice. But their transition defense also sucks. So that's
a real problem. If you're not getting you're not crashing
the offensive glass. And that's kind of a hustle thing too, right,
Like if if it's the case that the Bucks are
being told like go get those offensive boards and they
just can't, well then it's like, all right, well that
explains the transition. I don't know, like that they're sort
of two separate issues. The point is they're not getting
second chance points because they're not beating anybody to the
offensive boards. They're also twenty ninth. They were thirtieth until
the Jazz game in forcing opponent turnovers. And it's just like, so,
not only are you not like sometimes you can be
a bad defense because you're gambling and like, okay, maybe
maybe you're just risking giving up points because you're trying
to create chaos. They're not doing that, and they're also
just not sound as like a keep it in front
of you kind of defense. So like, Damian Lillard, look like,
I think it's time for like an acknowledgment that like
this has been the knock if you were in the
camp that, oh, Damian Lillard's overrated, Like if you had
ever had that thought and like really embraced it over
the last decade plus, you'd point to, like he's a
terrible point of attack defender, and so like he has
to be great as a singular shot generator and three
point shooter and pick and roll ball handler on offense
to offset that stuff. And he's still great at all
the offensive stuff, but he's just worse at a thing
that he was already very bad at. So I forget
who had it. There's a stat that he's getting targeted
more than anybody else as a pick and roll defender,
like they're just calling him up opposing offenses and just
like over and over again, finding cracks and just exploiting
his inability to defend the point of attack. And that's
not going away because you can't take him off the
floor because he matters so much to your offense, which
isn't all that good anyway, you know. So there's the
fixes are just like you would normally just say, oh,
they got a trade for younger guys or trade for
more disruptive defenders, and like they can't. So it's it's
gonna I would say that if the Bucks pull out
of this, it'll have to be because they just figure
out how to be like a top five offense, you know,
because the defense I don't. I just don't think they
have the guys that can that can make a big
enough difference athletically, you know, turnover producing like that. I
just those guys aren't on the roster. And even if
they are, like say Jackson, you just you can't give
him a role where he plays like more than a
healthy Middleton because that's just that's not how NBA rosters work.
So yeah, I think the defense is really kind of
an intractable problem. Now watch them go ranked top ten,
you know, for the rest of the year. But uh,
it's it's a personnel thing. I think as much as
anything else.
Speaker 1: I have wondered though, just because so many guys. I mean,
you look at Bobby ports Is shooting really poorly from
the perimeter, ditto for Brook Lopez at this point, and
it makes you wonder, as we're talking about all these
guys weren't making shots. Once you make shots, in theory,
your defense will then be able to get more set,
should just be better off. But when you watch this team,
you don't. You don't feel that, honestly, not that you
make the case it's even worse. But they're they're twenty
eighth in points peres after they make a shot, So
it's like your defense has the opportunity to get set
and you're still bottomed. Like that is the thing that
I think stands out the most. And to your point
about the pick and roll stuff, you said that it
made me think of it, so I looked it up.
There are two teams that allow more points per possession
to pick and roll ball handlers right now. They are
the Atlanta Hawks. By the way, I will say Trey
Young puts up more defensive resistance at this point than
Damian Lillard. I think that's probably when it comes to screening.
Maybe that's probably the way to say. And then the
Detroit Pistons, who are just I mean, they're the Detroit Pistons.
Speaker 2: So Jalen Duran is low key really terrible at playing
the cat and mouse stuff.
Speaker 1: Look, the final question here is we're not gonna get
into the honest trade stuff. Maybe we'll do something on
that later, but they've already come out and said they're
not gonna trade him. It's not a reality right now.
As the reporting ESPN. I'd be shocked if it happens
mid season. I want to go the other way, like,
is it taught? Like if you're if you're actually committed
to making the most of this window, is it Does
it make sense to say, all right, like it's time
to put the twenty thirty one draft pick on the table.
We can't aggregate salaries. We have Bobby Portis's money. Hell,
we have Brook Lopez's money. If you think the right
opportunities out there, maybe someone wants Middleton. Is it reckless
if you're the bucks to think in those terms? Though,
with the gannest noise floating around, or even given the
reality that okay, well who's the player that would be
available that's just gonna solve everything here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't. I don't know that i'd call it
reckless because like it's kind of like just being pot committed,
like what's one more first at this point? You know,
if you're not gonna be if you're gonna say we're
not trading you, honest, then I do think just throwing
that at like what's the difference, Like, okay, so now
we're just out of picks through twenty thirty one instead
of twenty thirty, Like, I don't know if it doesn't
So I think I thought you were gonna say, does
it make sense to start looking at a dame trade,
which I would also say you should do before you
start thinking about moving you, honest. But but yeah, I
think again, and now you're you're right that like who's
the guy. I don't know that there is the guy
out there that portis in a first or Lopez in
a first will get you that's going to solve all
the issues.
Speaker 1: But I have one idea that may need to be
fleshed out a little bit involve some other teams, and
again the Bucks can't aggregate, So like, this is the
guy that goes out and that's it. But right now,
would you consider giving up Chris Middleton and your twenty
thirty one pick for Dylan Brooks and I don't even
know like Tarry Ethan? Like, would the Rockets even do
that to get Middleton? That Bucks? Just Tar Eastan's been
good yea this year, but that twenty thirty one pick.
If you're a Rockets team worried about paying Easton to
his next deal, you have your Bar, You've Paide and Goon,
you have Jalen Green. Doesn't have to be Easan. They
have other players they could send out, But like, is
that a deal? Honestly, Ethan would be more intriguing. But
if it's just Dylan Brooks and again other money in
there to flesh it out, is that too? Is that
too ridiculous for Milwaukee's end to say, well, we're gonna
trade this guy who's just ingrained into the fabric of
their Giannis era success plus our twenty thirty one pick
to get back Dylan Brooks, who's decidedly a role player,
but way better than anyone defensively on the roster right now,
aside from of course you honest.
Speaker 2: I mean I would just ask like, who do you
think is gonna be if you just view it through,
like in terms of total volume of contributions, who's gonna
make a bigger positive impact over the next what's three years?
Middleton or Tari Eastan. I would probably just pick Easton
because I think he's at the point in his career
where you could count on him being healthy. I know
he missed most of a ton of last year, but
compared to Milton, who's the trend arrow on his career
is pointed down at this point with the injuries and
the age and all that stuff. So no, I don't
think that's a ridiculous thing to pursue. I think I
wasn't with you when you said Brooks first, but once
you got to Easton and then I was like, Yes,
that's exactly the type of guy that you would want
on this roster if you're trying to fill all these
solve all these like athleticism and hustle problems, particularly on defense.
Speaker 1: I don't think the Rockets do it personally, I don't
want Yeah, well, I think the idea it would be
someone who can come in not just generate looks, but
like it's more floor spacing around their main guys. And
they're like, there's seventh in offense, but twenty ninth that
affected field coal percentages. So it's so bizarre. I wouldn't
do it if I was Houston. So a rockets yance
tend to get mad at me when I throw out
Easton trades. I'm just talking from the Bucks. So what's
the verdict here, Grant? Is it peace or is it panic?
Speaker 2: It's it's panic. It just has to be. I mean,
we didn't even talk about doc Rivers. When's the last
time Doc Rivers like turned it around for a team.
It feels like the opposite tends to be.
Speaker 1: What happened guaranteed they're gonna make the playoffs?
Speaker 2: He did? That was I mean, you know, if you
don't believe in yourself, who will. But that's a that's
a bold claim at this point. What is what's the
stat over the last twenty five years three teams that
started one and six made the playoffs and the Bucks.
Speaker 1: It was pretty low, it was, and he was he
guaranteed it though, So that's the doctors guarantee which means Bucks.
Speaker 3: Fans, this is a perfect panic.
Speaker 1: So yeah, sorry Bucks fans, but it's panic time. Our
next team grant that you again have no say in
the order. The New Orleans Pelicans. Uh, I'll take them.
You did the Bucks. So look, injuries are the story here.
I don't who tell me who's healthy.
Speaker 3: On the Belicans?
Speaker 1: Rosser right now that might be easier. But but when
all said and done, Trey Murphy, who's you have to
play this season? He will have missed extensive time along
with CJ. McCollum, HERB Jones. We saw Zion get bit
a little bit like he was dealing with a thigh slash,
squad sledge hamstring thing, and then he was playing. Jordan Hawkins,
who's been good this year, has some back stuff going on.
We're all really excited because Brandon Boston Junior is making waves,
which is not something that you could have seen coming here.
So this team is just they're just banged up out.
Dejonta Murray of course is out. They're banged up. However
you look at I think one Zion Williamson season has
been wildly uneasy, and I don't know how much of
that will change as they get healthier, I'm sure some
of it will, but his rim, pressure and finishing like
they're just not as stand out as they were. Right
now he is, I don't use the words checked out.
He's clearly not as good defensively as he was last year.
And so if he's not gonna be desion that you
and I believe is just a top ten to fifteen
player in the NBA, that's an issue on to itself.
I think the bigger issue is even with Brandon Ingram,
who we've been pretty hard on. So credit to Brandon
Ingram for bringing up his three point volume. Overall, this
team's offense still just doesn't make sense. Their bottom three
in points score per possession, dead last defensive rebounding rate,
which who could have thought after just letting Yonis Valanciunas
and Nauji Marthy Marshall both go. Even Meci's had some
really good stretches, but you're just not equipped to end
possessions for other teams right now. I do think opponents
are running a tad hoot from three at the moment,
they're around forty percent, but the Pelicans are also dead
last in the share of attempts that they're allowing at
the rim from their opponents. So that's the sorry, that's
the defensive stuff, like there's a clear dip there and
herb Jones will help some of it, but you were
undersized to begin with and maybe not equipped to be
elite on that end. I find myself just more concerned
with the offense because I think when you look at
the talent on this hroster at full strength, that's how
it skews. They're still eighteenth and half court efficiency and
they're too slow overall. I know a lot of people
have pointed to that they're about top ten in transition frequency,
they are still in the bottom five in overall average
offensive possession time. They're just not making an effort to
run after they're grabbing rebound, like that needs to be
more of a focus when I think you could argue
it needs to be more of a focus when you
have everybody, but especially now when you're not equipped to
break down set defenses. And so you combine that with
the lack of three point a tenth rate, and it
just sort of and like, okay, when you are in transition, great,
You're not efficient in transition right now. So I don't
know again, we can chalk some of this up to injuries,
but like between the Zion and even this, plus what
they were doing on offense before all these Murray was
injured out the gate, fine, but like even before they
really got banged up, the offense was just not turning
heads in the right way. And I don't know, we
know the solve is what you need to render a
verdict on are you trading Brandon and figure it out
from there, But I'm sure there's a level level. Do
we need to see if Brandon Ingram is taking this
many threes and we also have CJ and Trede Murphy
in the rotation and we think we can sprinkle in
minutes for Jordan Hawkins? Places is there a path to
this team just kind of face hearing at what I
think is their biggest concern would be the offense, because
I do think they punted on some not defensive versatility,
because they should be pretty versatile defensively, but they inherently
punted on But we're just not going to be big
on like ever on defense, and we're not gonna be
equipped to hit the glass like that. So does this
team have the latitude to say, hey, like let's see
if we get healthy and we figure it out with
this current.
Speaker 2: Construction, I think, yes, I think I have a little
bit of a different take on it. I'm more concerned defensively,
so I was gonna say, I think, yes, you probably
should if you're New Orleans, just hope you get everyone
back and then see what that offense looks like. Because
this is a team that the decisions they made and
didn't make with respect or roster construction that I think
intended to just like outscore people. I still think that's
possible with the personnel and now look all of the lingering,
how do you build a team around Zion Williamson Like
those are all still there Offensively, like he's just his
his unique game strength and weaknesses are just like that's
it's just weird and hard to build a sustainable offense.
Because if everybody's healthy and he's playing at peak levels,
you can have him on the ball. He's a load
to guard and you can spread the floor around him.
That's a great theory of an offense. I still think
it's worth seeing if that can work. Defensively, though, Like
I mean, didn't we spend all last year trying to
decide whether they actually the Pelicans actually were good at
defending threes or were lucky like, but remember that when
that was the narrative, Like that'd be nice if that's
what we had to focus on now, because it's just
you said it like they chose to be small. And
I think even if you're healthy, even if you've got
herb Jones and Trey Murphy and Dejonte plays better defense,
you know, looks more like san Antonio Dejonte as opposed
to Atlanta. You're just so small and you're so bereft
of a back line defender that can clean up messes
that I just and forget. I mean the other thing,
they're dead last. They give up more offensive rebounds than anybody,
and that's clearly just a size thing. And Zion being
often the biggest guy on the floor is just like
he's not a good rebounder like full stop. That's just
part of the package with him. So I don't know
how they fixed the defense. I can imagine the offense
sorts itself out when healthy. But the other side is
just like you're always going to be small, You're always
going to be vulnerable at the rim. You're gonna have
a hell of a time, finishing possessions with defensive rebounds,
like we know that. So I think that's where I'm
actually more concerned. And I don't know what the solve
is other than we trade brandon Ingram for a big guy,
which is like the most hack you know, over discussed
angle about this team that we haven't left alone for
like a year. But you know, so I can understand
why you're concerned with the offense. I just think of
the two, the defense is more more of a worry
for me.
Speaker 1: You know. I think why I'm concerned with the offense
is you mentioned it at the top of what you
just said of like that's what they were supposed to
like that was where their identity was supposed to shine through.
I think we were all always worried that the three
point volume still might hover bottom of the barrel. But
the Dejonta Murray trade and then the way that they
built their front court, to me, was very clear an
investment of we're gonna be in e leite offense and
we believe the defense will be good enough. And look
for until I heard Jones injury, like they were surviving
and so I'm not saying I have more hope for
the defense. I think I'm just more down on the
offense because it's is this really just a full strength personnel?
Like if if de Jontay Murray never gets injured, is
that what the difference is? Or did this like has
brand Ingram been forced to take more threes now? Because
I just I don't have answers for what their offense
is gonna look like at full strength, and I feel
like we should And maybe also what might just really
be tainting my view of it is Zion has not
been consistently like the Zion you would want. He was
sick to start the season again. Now he's dealing with
some lower body stuff, it seems like. And that kind
of lends itself to a different question here is you
said you could trade brand Ingram for a big but
can you? Yeah, what is the like this? And that's
also looming over all this. They could it'd be different
if they were just running rough shot over everybody, but
they're not, and so you still have the brandon Ingram
contract situation looming over all this. And I know you
didn't pay trade Murphy. I guess a ton some people
were expecting more, but this isn't gonna be a team
that pays everyone moving forward, And so if you're trying
to scope out even post December fifteenth trade opportunities, I
don't know what it is the part of me think
the Pelicans think Jared Allen was just gonna be eminently
gettable because the way the Cavs are playing, I don't
think he would be.
Speaker 2: No, I was gonna If you want to really work
big to small in diagnosing what's going on with the Pelicans,
is it is it over a big how big of
an overreaction to what's happened so far? Is it to ask, like,
can Zion Williamson be the best player on a team
that makes a deep playoff run? Like? You know, I
know we're dealing with fewer than ten games from him
so far this season, but he hasn't looked, you know.
I'm just I'm getting struck increasingly by the thought that like,
for this to work optimally for New Orleans and for
like to overcome the weird roster building constraints that having
Zion in a major role presents, like, doesn't he just
have to be like the guy that's getting you twenty
seven on sixty percent shoot? Like, doesn't he does he
have to be that great for the whole theory of
this team to work? You know what I mean? Like,
is it time to like really ask can he can
you have like this version of Zion as a like
be all end all, you know figure on your team?
Like I kind of certainly this one isn't good enough,
but like, does he actually have to be like the
spectacular version of himself we've seen for like thirty game
stretches a couple of times, Like is that the only
way this team can win a couple of playoff rounds?
I mean, like that's so if you're working big to small,
that's definitely like the top line question you have to ask.
I don't know they're not going to trade him obviously,
but like it's something I've been thinking about.
Speaker 1: Well, but what happens if the answer is no, Well.
Speaker 2: Then your whole team is like needs to be reevaluated,
right because you've made a lot of decisions based on
the idea that Zion can be your number one on
ball creator at high volume for a whole seat in postseason.
Like that's the that's that's what the thinking is for
this team, isn't it?
Speaker 1: Yeah? It is, And I'm just saying you've now gotten
to a point where you're not out of options, But
if you don't think Zion is, Like, what if they
decide that Zion's more equipped to We're just gonna have
him be the primary screener and we'll try and find
someone who's like taller and be able to stretch the
floor around him. He's more of a secondary option. And
then it's well, what does that mean? Does it make
Brent Ingram and de Jonte Murray more important? Does it
make them less important? Because now you want someone who's
going to be a better shooter that's running those actions
with Zion primarily. And look, I don't I'm I'm saying
I don't have the answers. Yeah, and I tend to
be higher on this team than most, and I really
want to see what they look like at full strength.
But I think we also have to acknowledge that maybe
through through no fault on their own, I would say
that's never gonna happen. How many years have we.
Speaker 2: Been saying this, right, that's the thing, Like, well, the
problem is, you know, Zion could put together an incredible
two weeks and then we just have to say a
lot weird that. Okay, So, yes, you can build a
team that's gonna win multiple rounds around it, you know,
but but the fact that it can come and go
and and has often gone is like a problem. He's
a hard he's a great individual offensive player, he's just
hard to build around. And it doesn't help that again,
you don't have the whole compliment of supporting players around
him to get a sense of like, Okay, look we've
got we've got a sense of how this works. Let's
tweak this, that and the other. Like you just you're
more than any other team here. We're just like lacking information.
I feel like on New Orleans because of all these injuries.
That's a cop out, but it's just it's the fact.
Speaker 1: But it's still for me. The verdicts panic time. Yes, agree,
this is a perfect panic is our next team ready
to panic though, mister Grant Hughes, we this is this
is a big one. I think the New York Knicks
they have what is a top four offense right now,
but they've lost some games that you would have liked
to have seen them one they're under five hundreds. We
record this, I think specifically, you know, you get beat
down by the Celtics, okay, whatever, But like the games
against the Rockets and Hawks, those feel like games specifically
they should have won. I think you look at what's
happening and the defense when you filter out the Boston game.
I know it's a big game to filter out, but
it has not been bottom of the barrel. It's been Statistically,
it's been fine. They're almost in the same vein of
the Pelicans, except they do have a top five offense
that it doesn't look convincing and it was supposed to
be indomitable, and I think, look, a couple problems here
are I have two major thoughts on this, and this
is your team, but I'm seizing it because it's the Knicks,
So I apologize. Please do They're dead last in average
possession time right now. I believe that might have picked
up a little bit, so maybe they climbed to like
twenty eighth or something. No, they're dead last and average
offensive possession time, they're bottom seven and fourth quarter offense,
and that's without the Celtics game included one. Jalen Brunon
has not been great. He is there, he's dribbling the
ball more per touch and he's always gonna be. I
think he led the league in like average possession time
last year, but the fact that he's still in the
top two. I think that one is from Jonathan MacCray
of Knicks Film School had the rankings of it, but
I'm looking at it, and this was my take on it.
The fact that he still needs to have the ball
that much, to me, feels problematic, but he's not doing
a good job of keeping it moving and just he's
contributed to the Knicks kind of slowing down and having
this rickety process. My other takeaway though watching them is
even in a game against the Hawks where they shoot
really well from three, the supporting cast and you and
I have talked about this concern before, and it feels
like it's coming to bear. There is this glaring lack
of secondary Let's call it aggression because and creation Josh
Hart is aggressive. He will give you rim pressure. No
one else is really right now. It doesn't help that
mchal Bridges is not shooting all too well. And Karl
Anthony Towns, to be fair, Karl Anthony Towns has been
Karl Anthony Towns for anyone who didn't watch him in Minnesota.
By and large, there's probably been some more defensive miscues
this season. That's a symptom of a new team like
this is the Karl Anthony Towns experience. It looks like
a megastar certain games, feels like he vanishes in others.
But like when you're watching the ball move around, it's
almost sometimes to a detriment whereaf like Jalen Brown doesn't
have the ball. You don't trust that Michale Bridges or
Karl Anthony Towns or like o Jiannanoby might be even
more aggressive when it comes to attacking closeouts than those
guys right now. You don't trust that these guys aren't
gonna pass up threes or chances to get going downhill
to swing it to Josh Hort up Josh Hort, Josh
Hart in the corner and then he will either dribble
or he'll shoot, and defenses are gonna be okay with that.
And it's so weird for me to be focused on
the offense when they're top five in points per possession.
But the process hasn't been convincing. And here's where my
concern kicks in. They are going to be absolutely fine
offensively during the regular season. My qualms are when you
look at the fourth quarter, when you look at crunch time,
I feel like those are going to provide sometimes or
at least a fair amount of glimpses into how you're
going to function in a playoff setting. Right now, this
Knicks offense, whether it's Jalen Brunson's fault or a roster
construction thing or both, there's still too much responsibility on
Jalen Brunson, or there's still too much Jalen Brunson for
a team that played basically every trade chip that it
had over the past what nine ten months, And that's
kind of my takeaway. I'm worried about the defense mckel
bridges relative to what mchel bridges is supposed to do
has not been great. Benji Holtzman over at Next Film
School had a good little Twitter thread about this how
there's been some kind of miscommunication between him and OG.
I think OG has cleaned up a lot for the
Knicks defensively. I almost feel like, unless mckel bridges is
really good to become like Pete mckeal Bridges, they might
be one serious defensive player short on the perimeter to
tie this all together at both ends of the floor.
So anyone who's waiting on Mitchell Robinson to come back,
and like, well, let's just play him in Towns together. Yeah,
do that. Try it for sure. One it's gonna come
in an offensive cost. And two now you're putting a
different type of responsibility on Carli Towns. Karl Anthony Town's defensively,
he showed that he can handle it in Minnesota, but
like Mitchell Robinson is not Ruby Gobert.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so you I mean, I'm curious do you
think I know you said the offense you think is
going to be would you say offense you think or
the defense you think is gonna be fine?
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't know what to take away from
the defense because they're twenty first overall. But I think
if you filter out the Celtics game, it's they're like
seventh or tenth or something.
Speaker 2: It's totally fine overall bottom line without the Celtics game.
But there are some like I don't know if you
mentioned the rim. The opponent rim accuracy is like through
the roots unsustainable, Like I think I was. I was
working on something the other day and I had kat
As allowing eighty three point eight percent inside six feet
and I think if you slice that thinner and it's
like inside five or three, you can get it. It's
like he's like allowing like ninety percent almost, Hey, that's.
Speaker 1: Lower than the one hundred percent he was allowed. He's
like that. Opponents started off shooting twelve of twelve on
the season against him set the rim, and he you're right,
eighty four point by the way, what they're shooting against Towns.
Speaker 2: So my question is then, like that's an insane number,
Like nobody allows like that level of rim accuracy over
a full season. So I was gonna ask, like, I
think the the everything you said about the offense, the concerns,
they're totally well founded. Like I think it's it's jarring
how often I mentioned this already this season, much earlier
in the year. How often other Knicks players when they
touch the ball just immediately look for Brunson to come
get it back. And it's just it's like, I mean,
talk about being predictable and not having any kind of flow,
Like that's that's an issue. So that's that seems like
that seems stylistic, But the defensive issues seem personnel based,
particularly with Kat as your rim protector, and those numbers
are extreme. So I'm just having a hard time deciding
which of those two things I think is most easily solvable,
Like will the rim accuracy by opponents just reress because
you can't continue to give up ninety percent shooting like
that's I mean, sure, that seems reasonable. And can the
knicks open the offense up a little bit so there's
a little more flow unless just like brunts and dribbles
the air out of the ball, gives it up, gets
it back, you know, it's like it takes forever into
the shot clock to score. Like I don't know, I
don't know how you solve that one. Like the defense
I think might just correct itself a little bit, but
I don't know how you change, Like you just have
to introduce someone else that'll make decisions, or you have
to get Tom Thibodeau to just tell guys like, hey,
just play free Fellas, which seems like so anathetical to
what you think of with him.
Speaker 1: But it's also you're talking about the guy Tom, who
is that guy?
Speaker 2: If it's not, you don't have that guy.
Speaker 1: It would have to be it's not campaign, it's not
Tyler Kolek. It's definitely not going to be precious to
a It's not gonna be put Home Dottie eight. It's
it's supposed to be Karl Anthony Towns and McHale Bridges.
And I think in theory, everyone who's watched Karl Anthony
Towns enough knows that it's probably never gonna be Towns.
And I know that you could probably do more about
Teams are comfortable right now putting smaller players on Towns
and he's not attacking them. They're not really trying to
throw him the ball down low. I don't know if
that's going to open up a ton of stuff, because
then you are, if you're putting karlint Towns down low,
opponents are probably gonna take that too, like he can
mash those dudes, but like he's one, he's not gonna
do it consistently. And then like you're giving up the
five out spacing that you said that you wanted. So
I'm inclined to say like a lot of stuff is
going to normalize. But I don't know what the long
term defensive outlook is for this team. I assume it'll
get better just if Mitchell Robinson gets healthier, but even
just look the starting lineup for the nine percent title
of defensive rating, and opponents have run hot from three
in those minutes. But like when you're running hot from
three and at the rim, like, are both those things
going to going to regress to the rival offense? So
that is concerning. Look, they've had some success when you're
plugging Duce McBride in there at points, but that, by
the way, that's also another problem with this team is
right now they go six players deep. This is a
six player team, and I think you can even argue
on a lot of nights it's a five player team
based off how people are playing. I would say that
at their peak, if you expect them to run deeper
than seven, that's ambitious, and I don't. I think people
will campaign in proach the two on Mitchell Robinson and
Miles McBride. No, but yes, yes to two of those guys,
But you can't not all of those guys are gonna play.
Are not going to give you this playoff depth. And look,
you're gonna shorten your rotations anyway in the playoffs. So
seven guys that you trust, I would argue, is enough
or at least close to enough put to get through
the regular season at this point, and when your offense
is so efficient but also right now feels fatally flawed,
does it? Am I just an idiot? Like is that
an incoherent takewards? Yeah, the offense is top five, but
it has like these fatal flaws.
Speaker 2: Yeah no, that's why I struggle with it. But yeah,
I know, just like you gotta have someone besides Brunson
that can do like it just feels way too heliocentric.
I get we need to do this. I know it's silly,
but like, are we having anything close to this conversation
if Julius Randall and Dante DiVincenzo are on the roster
and Kat isn't, Like do you think, like what's the
same and what's different about because I would imagine that offensively,
we're not having a similar conversation about like, oh my god,
Brunson has to do way too much. There's no scoring depth,
like no one else could do anything. I don't think
we're we might be having the defense conversation, but I
don't know that we would with the offense, which is
nuts because Kat is supposed to be a phenomenal offensive player.
Speaker 1: I think we might still be having the conversation because
the Knicks aren't generating rim pressure with Pristine's facing as
it is, And I don't know that Julius Randall, I
guess on the ball, he's gonna get to the rim
more than a car Anthony Towns would, But is he
going to open up the floor for everyone else to
do that? I don't know if you have Dante DiVincenzo
instead of I honestly don't know. That's what's so. I
do think that they would have more secondary creation on
this team, But then you have to ask yourself, like,
what does it look like defensively with Randall and Donte DiVincenzo. Okay, fine,
but handle instead of Towns as your day facto? Big?
Is that actually any sort of an upgrade? Maybe in
certain one on one situations. Perhaps it's it's fascinating, and
I'm still to wrap up, I guess on the Knicks
unless you have other thoughts, there's still so much this
team needs more time. It was just put together, I
do think. I guess. I don't know how importantly to
view the prospective return of Mitchell Robinson in like six
weeks or whatever it's gonna end up being, or by
twenty twenty five. So eight weeks whatever it is, But like,
does he help like to a degree where it's like
we kind of just need to get there and then
we can evaluate this team or is it for you?
Is it all right? We reached December first and we're
still dealing with these up and down performances. It's time
to what is it time to do?
Speaker 2: I would say Robinson would help be and I think
maybe counterintuitively more with the offensive stuff, because like the
second element of the Knicks scoring that was so good
in addition to Brunson over the last couple of years
is just they get every offensive rebound and that I
mean a lot of that was Isaiah Hartenstein, but Mitchell Robinson,
you know, was a thing before Hartenstein got there, and
just getting offensive boards and been firing it out for threes.
Like remember how they generated the most three points, the
most points off offensive boards of anyone in the league
last year because they would just turn him into threes.
And maybe that's like, actually the difference is like, Okay,
so now when Brunson can't do something on his own,
the possession ends as opposed to last year. Half the
time that's an exaggeration, but a lot of the time
you were getting second chances and they were good looks
because Mitchell Robinson was getting offensive boards like that. That
might just be the main difference this year because I look,
last year they were first an offensive rebound rate their
eighteenth as we're recording this today. So maybe that's you know,
that's not nothing, that's a that's a big factor. You
don't think of Robinson as like, oh, he's going to
solve the offense, but he would give them an element
back that they don't have right now.
Speaker 1: But then you're then is sacrificing the element that you
have as a team, like when you're actually looking at
the spacing, because you can't even trust you can trust
Mitchell Robbinson to like maybe finished lobs, but you even
you're definitely not trust him to do any decision making
with the ball. You could barely trust him to hold
on to the ball on his catches. So they're fascinating.
I am personally inclined to I'm gonna give them a time.
Oh Bert doesn't agree.
Speaker 2: Bert does not agree with you. I didn't even hear
what you said. If it was piece or panic because
someone rang my doorbell and.
Speaker 1: Then dog's going I'm gonna I'm gonna go with peace here.
What about you?
Speaker 2: I was hoping you'd say that. I think peace is
the right call.
Speaker 3: This is no timed up panic.
Speaker 1: Anyone who likes toy story should better appreciate these little
references we have going on here. Our next team, Grant,
and I know you've been itching to get to this one.
Of course, the Orlando Magic, who I would say, or
I guess it's been a few games, so they're not
an eleventh hour entrant. But this is probably not a
team that we would have thought we'd be talking about
if you asked us about a week or two ago.
Do you want to take us through what's going on
with them? They're not missing anybody, right, or are they?
I can't remember.
Speaker 2: You start this discussion with the turning point of the season,
which is Paul Bencro's oblique injury. I would say predictably,
the offense has has just crumbled since he's been out.
They're dead last and offensive ratings since he got hurt,
and it's like the margin is not small. The guys
that you would hope could step up Franz Wagner, Mac
Max player Franz Wagner, Anthony Black, who I think had
looked pretty good, and I continue to be more optimistic
about those guys are just kind of overburdened in more
like primary and secondary creative creation. Roles Cole Anthony isn't
playing like Black had overtaken him in the rotation, hasn't
made shots, And I guess the question is, like do
we just view this as like, well, of course Orlando
is struggling to score without bank Caro. Everybody already knew that,
you know, offense was a weak point for this team.
We've been begging for another you know, shot maker, shot
creator to be added to this roster for a couple
of years. So like, yeah, bank Caro's out there, gonna
fall apart, Like no problem. When he's back, they'll be
good again. Or is it more of like a is
it highlighting a more structural issue that like, yeah, no,
we do need to be able to do something without Bankaro,
Like so is a gap You're okay? Or are we
already forty seven win team that's trying to win now
so we got to make a trade to fix it.
I would say, like before I turn it over to you,
it's always more I don't know, comforting or less panic
inducing for me when a team is struggling in exactly
the way you would expect it to struggle if they
lost a certain player, So like this is just like
it's like a one, it's like a very direct A
to B thing like ban Caro's hurt, they can't score,
Like okay, yeah, I would have been surprised if that
had not been the result. So does that change anything
for you? Or are you or I don't know. Maybe
the more interesting thing is the last question I asked
was just like can they afford this or is this
a situation where you might need to make a move.
Speaker 1: So if it were me, I would make a move
just because I think that their their defense can be
good enough, and like their offense was good with ben Caro.
But you framed an interesting way where it's, well, if
you don't have Palo ban Caaro, you're not gonna win
anything special anyway. But I do think it comes back
to you expect him to return in time for the playoffs,
but you need to be in a position to still
be in the playoffs, and right now your offense is
so grant it's not even close. When you're looking at
how they performed over the past, like they have an
offensive rating outside of crunch time under ninety three, and like,
I think it's ninety two to four was the exact
number I had written down. That is putrid during those
like it dating back to the game where he actually
suffered the injury and where is where is the solve?
The answer that's on the roster I tend to be higher.
I actually just wrote about how I think Jalen Suggs
has improved again year over year when it comes to
his playmaking and decision making. He and Franz Wagner, they
just all look over text. I don't know that that's
ever gonna be Anthony Black's best role to run more
of a methodical offense type. I also think you have
to ask whether, okay, let's just say not everything's about
half court initiation per se. Okay, fine, are you then
equipped to all, right, like, let's just play faster, get
out in transition more and maybe create chaos that way?
That has not been Orlando's MO under Jamal Moseley, And
I think there's probably a debate is do they have
the personnel all the time to do that? And the
answer might not be no. They're definitely equipped to play faster,
and we saw that. We've actually seen that through like
I guess, for small stretches, but it's never been something
that becomes part of their identity. And so even now
they're twenty second in average offensive possession time and they're
getting out in transition I think a little bit more
than last year, but they're not efficient in those situations.
So you're not going to be able to tread water
that way by kind of being okay, this is not
we see bad teams do this a lot, whereas we
don't have a ton of creations, so we're gonna play faster.
And in the Magic's case, they're so good defensively and
they can create so much chaos defensively that you could
almost envision a scenario where all right, hey that that
actually works, like why, But again, they're not a team
that like forces turnovers a ton relative league average, so hey,
maybe that doesn't work. But you do grab defensive rebounds
a bunch. I think they're the best defensive rebounding in
the team in the league right now, So I do
think there's some low hanging fruit, and I actually hadn't
thought of it as well. You would expect them to
suck on offense without Palo, So it's almost encouraging that
that's the answer. But if he's out, the word that's
been thrown around is indefinitely. Yeah, you need to figure
out a way to win some games. I know the
East is weird where five hundred might just get you
what a top six spot. At this point, they're not
playing five hundred basketball without Palom and Caro, and so
I'm not saying they need to go out and trade
for LaMelo Ball or go all in, but once they have,
you know, some of these restrictions lifts on the salaries
that they could trade, they are built to make a
move for someone who is a prominent part of their rotation,
even if it's not the all in move like you
can go out there, I would think maybe this is
too well in. But a Kobe White. We've mentioned how
many times we mentioned Anthony Simon's He's not a super
great initiator, but he does enough and he's gonna open
up the floor for everybody else that it would pan out.
I think that even if Ben Carrol's gonna come back,
let's say before January or something, that still is something
they need to investigate, because now you've shown or we
can't tread water without him, and minutes without him, they'll
be important in the postseason, Like he's not gonna play
forty eight minutes a game, and so you want to
have I would. I'll frame it this way to close it.
After my long ramble. They need more alternative safety valves
on this team because the ones they have they're such
a big drop off. I think this is probably one
of the bigger drop offs when you look at the
level of their number one option to their number two,
certainly among good deals. Look, they might be running into
the same issue as kind of like the Knicks, but
the gap is probably even wider between Ben Carro and
their second best initiator.
Speaker 2: He could ah Man, I don't know that it could be.
I guess, like I would just say, nothing that's happened
with ban Caro out has like actually changed what I
think about the magic and what they need and what
they should do. It's just illustrate, it's just very clearly
illustrated that what we've been saying whatever, but not just us,
what everybody's been saying forever about they just need more
guys to create shots. Like that's just that's that's true.
With bank Cao. That's obviously true without him, and his
absence just highlights that. I guess, so like, I don't
I think whatever level of urgency you thought there was
for them to go, you know, I don't know, go
go back farther, like try to sign the league Monk
or or try to trade for Simons or try to
trade for LaMelo or whoever you want to pick. Like,
I think you should feel exactly the same way as
you did before, which is like, well, clearly they need that.
Speaker 1: But isn't isn't there something too? Okay? They have the
ability to do this and the flexibility to do it
over the summer and didn't and now they're in this
situation like doesn't that have to add a layer? Or
because I'm assuming they were banking on we're just gonna
have guys that develop enough to handle this. And I'm
sure they didn't expect to go without Palo for some
long stretch of time. But this is okay. It's it's
comforting that this is where you're supposed to struggle. This
is the exact scenario on which you should struggling. But
there was a way or ways for you to not
be so bottom of the barrel offensively in this situation,
and you I would say they actively opted against exploring
players who could help them.
Speaker 2: There, maybe I should tweak what I was saying. What
I think I'm trying to commit convey is like I
think the level of urgency Orlando should be feeling now
about getting more offensive shot creation is the level they
should have been feeling over the summer, like right, like
it should have been, like they should surely they knew
that Polo was this important or should because you sort
of can't. You don't get to one believe Paalo is
going to be an All NBA superstar and then at
the same time think like, oh we got enough if
he gets hurt or like that's those two thoughts like
don't get to coexist. So I think it's it's clearly
urgent now it should have been something that Orlando viewed
with that with this current level of urgency in June
and July, like just because this is this is the
most obvious like struggle stretch for a team you could
have ever foreseen, Like when you went down, this is
exactly what should have been expected.
Speaker 1: Now does it change at all? Though? Like is there
less urgency because this isn't. Yes, it's a team that
is built to compete now, but does anyone have them
built as a contender? And so does that take away
for as we get to the are you? Is it
peace or panic for you? And what's the nutshell reason
as to why you're going that direction?
Speaker 2: It's still peace for me, just be even though, like
we just said the word urgency fifty times, just because
you have the core, you still have the outs and
the flexibility and the ability to make trades. You're not
stuck like a lot of these other teams are.
Speaker 1: You're not.
Speaker 2: You weren't a contender before, Like you're just trying to
crack that group and you're sort of still there when
you're healthy. So like I don't I don't view this
as a panic situation. I think you you're young enough,
you're projectable enough, you know what your needs are. I've
still peace for me.
Speaker 1: I'm going so so for anyone keeping score at home,
grant is good.
Speaker 3: I'm going to the perfect panic.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to excuse what they decided not to
do over the summer anymore. This is now, that's proof
of the doubt. And you're good now, And look at
the lay of the East. Grant, the way they were
playing like there was you want to talk about who's
the third best team in the East, It could have
been Orlando and now it still could be. How long
are you gonna be without Paalo? You don't have the
personnel survive without him. That's an F minus minus level
of decision making from the front office. Still we move on,
though I'm glad we disagree. This is a big one.
Grant the Brooklyn Nets. They're way goddamn much.
Speaker 2: What are you doing, guys? They weren't supposed to get
four wins until like January. This is bad.
Speaker 3: This is a perfect tunk of panic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's so. It's a super quick one. But like
Dennis Shrewder needs to be like they need to bench
him in every single home game, but like he has
been lighting it up and they're just they're winning too much. Grant,
this offense is top ten and half court Dennis Truder
needs he needs to be suspended. He's playing too well.
Speaker 2: Conduct detrimental to the team, get out of here. But
contact not detrimental enough to detrimental enough and therefore death
Yeah no, they I mean we could obviously this is
like have a joke, but like, not only are the
nets like competent, they're kind of fun, Like they're playing hard.
I think whatever the first year Jordi Fernandez coach bump is,
they're getting it like that. Guys seem bought in. Everybody
that everyone you would be excited to see something from,
Like Noah Clowney's had some flashes. I very much enjoy
the stylings of Cam Johnson as just I trust him
to shoot it whenever he's open, and some of this
secondary playmaking stuff is interesting. I don't know how sustainable
it is, but yeah, like they just Cam Thomas is
doing what you want Cam Thomas to do. They they
just have been like a hard playing, like shockingly exciting
watchable team so far. I don't think that'll continue, but
uh they you can't. You can't just keep paying in
these wins. You got that pick reason.
Speaker 1: You have a two year window to be bad. Look,
they don't even have Trent and Watford back yet, and
he's gonna add at least fifteen wins. So it's panic
time for Brooklyn, our next team. I really hope people
understand the bit there. If they don't, I'm gonna be
that's just tragic, but the next team, grant you should
the nugget we're onto the Nuggets. Have they graduated from
this discussion and not just and it's not even just
the win over OKSE, but that was riveting as hell
for anyone who was watching. But like now, we've kind
of seen some higher leverage moment moments where not only
is Michael Malone trusting the quote unquote kids, but the
kids are delivering and even when they're not. Peyton Watson
against the thunder missus consecutive crunch time three throws, then
has the game winning block rust it seems like trying
to give his former team a victory. There By he
looked like he was gonna smack Shay in the head
or whatever it was on that play. I don't know
if you saw it, but where are you at with
this team? Because I think, look, Aaron Gordon, he's out
with that calf strain for a while. Jamal Murray, he
still can cuss protocols if you've seen anything on him,
but he missed a few games. I think the bigger
thing is even when he was on the court, it
wasn't like he wasn't setting the world on fire. For
most of it, and they gotten to a point where
Michael Malone was playing him independent of NICOLEA. Jokic less
frequently than ever, and they're still incredibly dependent on Jokic. Surprise, surprise,
it's a three time MVP. That's not breaking news here.
There's still just something like do you think that they've
graduated from us having this discussion.
Speaker 2: Is I think, well, we didn't even discuss which teams
we were going to talk about beforehand, and we both
picked the nuggets independently, So I think that's a pretty
good indicator that, like, no, they still are at least
worth conversation. I think it's a couple of things, like
it's nice that I guess Malone has has started to
embrace some of the younger guys, and I mean some
of that's by necessity, just because of injuries, but I think,
like that's that's encouraging to me that you know, it's
not encouraging that it took injuries to get Watson and
Brown like more real minutes. Brown's a little different category
at this point. I think he's kind of established quite
a bit more than Watson has, But I don't know.
I still think some of the structural things we're concerned
about are there, and you start with just like the
financial picture, the lack of flexibility, the you know, if
you're trying to make trades, it's like what can we
get for Zeke naujy and what you know? That's just like,
that's still an issue. The on off splits are still insane.
Although it's really funny to me that Christian Brown now
has the biggest positive net rating swing it's thirty nine
point seven. Yokich is a real bom at thirty four
point eight, but that's just because their minutes tend to
be matched up almost exactly. All that stuff is still there.
The low three point volume, they're dead last in the league,
but they're making thirty eight point nine percent of their threes,
which is six best in the league.
Speaker 1: So, like Michael Porter Junior is coming alive a little
bit more.
Speaker 2: I guess, would be my suggestion if you're gonna let's
get that percentage down to like thirty seven, but let's
get you in the middle of the pack in the
temper rate would be nice. I think the panic is
more of the like the structural bigger issues, the lack
of depth, the lack of flexibility, that can't survive without Jokic.
Stuff that's all still there. And if you're talking about
a team that has won a title and has a
three time MVP and should absolutely only care about winning
a title, that stuff all matters, that's all relevant. I
guess some of the you know, their their offenses in
the top ten. Now they got a winning record. All
that stuff is great. But so you're not panicking about
anything quite like that. But I mean, Aaron Gordon's out,
Murray doesn't look himself, and all that other stuff is
still there. So they have not The answer to your
first question is no, they have not graduated out of
this discussion.
Speaker 1: To me, is there How encouraged are you by the
recent performances we've seen, not like not even just from
the quote unquote kids, but like Malone turning to them,
was it we had that piece from ESPN which was
clearly let's just say it was heavily sourced from Calvin Booth.
I would argue if you weren't I saw this. I
was listening to What's in the game, NBA, But what's
in the game Podcas and Will and Grace were talking
about how if you didn't know anything about the Nuggets
to this point or what was going on behind the scenes,
you would have like came away being really frustrated with
Michael Malone and thinking that he was the villain basically.
I thought that was a great way of putting it. So,
but like, did they finally just take enough clubs out?
As like Russell Westbrook he's starting, so it's not like
he fully trusts the kids there, and he did insert
I think it was against the Thunder. He put Russ
in for Strawther for defensive reasons, which I get it,
Like Russ's had his moments to He's still for Netik there.
I don't think they've graduated either, and I would say
they're still just beholdened to the whims of ambiguity more
than any should be contender, like is supposed to be.
And I think the bigger issue here is that, okay,
even just look at what they're doing. I mean, you
said this, and that, we've said this, how many podcasts
now just like looking at the decisions they've made over
the past, you off seasons, even with their mini mL E,
you're now still beholden to the whims of Russell Westbrook,
which is it's just never a good thing. I'm sorry,
it's just post whatever he year twenty seventeen, and it's
just not a good thing. And I think the bigger
issue is, Okay, fine, this is the reality. This is
what you're trying to do. The front office has made
that clear, the fact that you can't count on like
your second or third most important offensive players to consistently
be the second or third most important version of them.
And look, if you think Aaron Gord is more important
than MPJA offensively, that's fine, but I'm talking about MPJ
and even more specifically, Jamal Murray, who needs to be
the second most important player offensively. And we need to
get to a point where we're talking about more than man.
His chemistry with Yokic is insane, and just look at
some of the big time moments he's had for a
championship caliber team in the postseason, a team that actually
won the title. We got to move beyond that. Like
it's we've reached the point of his career where it's
how do we separate what he is with Jokic, what
he has done in the past, versus if they're gonna
do this without sacrificing what's left of Yoki like sacrificing
a chunk of Yokic's title window. And I would say
it's generous to say what it. Booth basically says like, oh,
we think his title windows about half over nobody and
much one of these other guys turned into a superstar.
You've got title windows closed super fast. And I would say,
while Nicoliokachi is like he's built to age, well, you
have threatened to run him aground in the back a
half decade. So I'm I'm leaning towards peace with this
team because I guess maybe I'm, you know, really buying
into like kind of some of the recent performances, but
they're they're towing the line for me.
Speaker 2: They are I think, I think just Yoka's presence, I mean,
he won that Oklahoma City game, just forget the numbers,
like he just was in charge of what was happening
on the floor. If you have that guy, it's hard
to be too panicked. And the other thing is I
do think you can see like it's it feels like
it's nobody wants to be on Calvin Booth's side. It
doesn't seem like because of some of the decisions that
have been made, But I do think you can see
the vision of what he sort of thought might work
for this team, which is that Brown and Watson and
Strong other have to matter. Now it took injuries to
give them the opportunity to matter. But I do think,
you know, to varying degrees, Brown being the most significant,
those guys are contributing, and like that should should that continue?
I think then suddenly all the depth and the non
Jokic minutes and the lack of flexibility, all those things
that I raised this concerned matter less, because Okay, we've
got two or three younger guys that are cost control
than helping like and should continue to get better. So
I can see the I can see the outlines of
sort of what the theory of this. I keep saying
theory of the team, but I don't know. It's stuck
in my brain. I can see the outlines of it
with this group, So I think it's I think it's
a piece for me as well.
Speaker 3: This is no time up.
Speaker 1: Panic about the next team, though, Grant, as we move
on to your beloved Philadelphia seventy six.
Speaker 2: Ers, I mean, can we just skip to it? No?
So they look, the injuries are the story. They just
you you get Paul George back and Tyres Maxy strains
the hamstring. Joel Embiid is suspended at least we when
and Beat will be back. That'll happen on Tuesday.
Speaker 1: Is they're not some type of investigation into oh, he's
suddenly ready to play after he got suspended.
Speaker 2: This is a baseball thing. This is a baseball thing
where pitchers will get suspended for throwing it back or whatever.
And like they only pitch every five days, so if
they get like a suspension, it's just like, Okay, it's cool.
They're they're just not going to pitch then. Anyway, it's
very much what's happening here, Like and be probably wasn't
gonna play, so we'll just eat these suspension games that way.
That's what this is, right, isn't it?
Speaker 1: And I guess they covered themselves by kind of leaving
his status up in the air, like because it was
never Omb's out for X amount of time or definitely,
so they're allowed to do something like this. I just don't.
Speaker 2: I mean, so, like, I know the numbers are what
they are, and and I guess we could talk about
them if you want, but like the early season stats
are screwy anyway, and for this team, it's just like
it doesn't matter because like like no statistical well I
don't know, maybe there are some, but like what statistical
achievement or failure is actually like indicative of what this
team will be going forward because Embiid hasn't played yet
and like any second that matters for the Sixers, m
Bid will be on the floor and hopefully george An Maxi.
So it's like we actually don't have any sense of
what this team can be. But obviously then that the
problem is that we don't have any sense of what
this team can be because everybody's the guys.
Speaker 1: That matter are hurt.
Speaker 2: So like that's that's just that's the start, middle, and
end of the story for the Sixers at this point
is just the injuries make it impossible to know what
they are and the concern is that they'll just continue
to be like the injuries won't go away. I guess
is the if you're panicking, that's got to be why.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I even digging into their offense, which has been bad,
it's kind of like, all right, what are you trying
to take away from what what might stick? And they're
shooting forty percent on wide open threes, and so even
looking at the gou like so many players are missing
shots right now, So even looking at how much they've struggled,
even looking at the fact that they're not getting their
thirtieth in rim percentage and that's not you know, is like,
is a Joelle Ebiid and Paul George? How much are
they going to fix that? This version of Paul George?
But we haven't seen them together, if anything, Like, do
you come away from this team thinking that, oh, they
were playing kind of slow even with the version without
like two of their older stars. Are they just a
little bit older and not as athletic as you would
like them to be that maybe we were considering coming
into this or is it like do we just focus
purely on the injuries? I guess what I'm getting at
is is there any one thing about their struggles on
the floor that you're willing to monitor as they get
to full strength as I'm not sure if this is
a thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting, I would say, I feel like there's
been a lot of stuff pre injury about Maxi's struggles
as like as a as a creator, like getting into
the lane. I think there was a stat like he
had one assist the other night in which he touched
the paint and delivered a pass that resulted in a score.
Like he's not that like that, that's not something he
does well yet, Like he's just not a guy that
breaks the defense down and creates shots for other people.
So I would be worried about that, particularly if you're
asking him to like attack and advantage situations off of
having embid you know, draw doubles or whatever, Like are
they gonna have enough creation if Embiid isn't isn't like
an MVP level player, maybe just because George will help
with that. I don't know if I, I guess answer
your question. I don't know if I look at any
particular trend or stats so far and trust it to
like start being concerned about it just just like because
I can't. I don't know it. It's part of the
reason I haven't watched a ton of sixers so far
is because like what am I gonna learn about this
team that matters without Embiid and George on the floor,
Like that's like I just so you know, the pain,
this lack of speed, the slower stuff, you know, the
dearth of athleticism, Like, yeah, I could definitely see that
being an issue, But I just I don't know. I
guess I'm not ready to make huge judgments without seeing
the team as it's theoretically gonna look when the games
matter over lining.
Speaker 1: Yeah, being sixth in free throw a tenth three when
Joel e beat is yet to play compressive.
Speaker 2: That's great.
Speaker 1: Yeah it So it's just let's just say it's just
the injuries. Then is it piece or panic?
Speaker 2: This?
Speaker 1: We don't spend a lot of time as team. It's okay,
these guys will come back, but for how long? And
at this point? So Maxi's out? They say at least
two weeks with the hammy injury. Did do we see
the big three play together before Thanksgiving?
Speaker 2: So this is why? Uh, I don't know. I'll just
jump to it. It's still panic for me because I'm
going to drop.
Speaker 1: The do you enjoy this at all? I'm the only
one who's like, no, I'm very much enjoying it.
Speaker 2: That's why I stopped, so you can do it. Uh,
I just don't Why why are we confident that the
injury trend is going to reverse? Why do we think
that Okay, once Paul George and once Joel and beat
are back, it'll be fine. They won't play back to backs,
but you know, we're gonna get sick, Like I just
I don't think that's gonna happen. And this is a
team that's designed to win now immediately and the playoff
seeding stuff might matter, and that's gonna be hard with
one to two of these guys not playing all the time.
I am just concerned with a roster that I don't
believe can stay healthy at the top, like and I
don't know if the regular the start of the season
has a whole lot to do with that. I think
that was a concern all along.
Speaker 1: Well, do you know what's interesting? I think I think
it was Nate Duncan or Danny LaRue where both of
them are making this point the load manages stuff from
the sixers. It makes sense in theory. You know, you
want to see the stars play. Is the season too long?
These guys get paid enough money. I'm not trying to
have that discussion, but is the NBA built for teams
to do that anymore? With so much parody? Because their
point was and I think we it bears this out
when you look at the standings. I mean in the
Eastern Conference. As we're recording this, the Pacers are at
five hundred and they have a third seed in the East.
It just feels like there's fewer bankable wins on the table. Now.
Later in the season, maybe that changes as Chicago and
Brooklyn kind of have their come to Jesus, you know,
trades like fire sales. But as of right now, you're
conceding ground that you were already kind of working if
you thought Juwon b was gonna miss twenty games regardless,
you're already kind of working with a slim margin for error.
And that's why I am with you that you have
to panic, because one, you can't bank on these guys
being available. And it's a fair question that by the
time Joeanbe comes back, how many wins do you have,
and like, do you just have enough time to make
up the gap to be avoid to play in essentially.
Speaker 3: So this is a perfect of panic.
Speaker 1: Our next team, grant. These next two teams are tough
for me. I don't know how you feel about them. Yeah,
this was your nomination. I didn't have them in here,
I think because my expectations for them were were low.
Is this Our expectations were low, but holy f moment?
Is it a did Dan and Grant record the segment
of are the Lakers trying to are they proving everybody wrong?
Did we jump the shark on that one? What happen?
Speaker 2: That's just how fast things change. The three and zero
start gave way to a one and four road trip
in which the only was a single digitter over the Raptors.
So not a great follow up to what looked like
and sold me. I think to some extent, Oh my god,
JJ Reddick has got this wired tight. He's got the
Lakers doing what they need to do. Anthony Davis has
empowered Austin Reeves, like all this stuff we talked about
like not that long ago at all. It's just some
of the some of the most I don't know, not
jarring because it's like maybe you could have seen this coming.
But like, concerning numbers, this is the worst transition defense
in the league in terms of opponent points added per
one hundred possessions, twenty ninth in frequency, thirtieth in points
allowed per play. Like, I mean, if this is the
only issue, I guess that's sort of an optimistic thing
because you can just like say, hey, Fellas, get back
and maybe you can be the twentieth transition defense instead
of dead last. Can't be that hard to fix. And
this is the number twelve half court defense, So like, okay,
that's you know, better than they were a year ago.
They were sixteenth last year. I don't know if that
changes any of the like bigger concerns we had coming
into the season about can Lebron and Ad stay healthy.
AD's got a foot thing already that I think he's
going to play through, but not great When it is
never no and it's it's been around since last year,
it's like okay, cool, Well, like why are you play
in the Olympics? Then, I don't know that was We
had a fun ride with the Olympics anyway. But so
I guess I'm having a hard time choosing between the
extremes of the good start and the brutal road trip.
Speaker 1: So I don't know.
Speaker 2: I'll throw to you, like we've got the numbers. The
transition stuff is a big deal. Is there anything else
that's like standing out as what are the other reasons
we're even having this conversation about the Lakers. If we
just ditch the record and talk about like what's actually
happening with.
Speaker 1: Well, how many? Here's my question. It might this is
probably a little too basic, especially for the way this
podcast conducts itself. But who do you trust outside of Ruey, Lebron,
A d and Eves.
Speaker 2: I can tell you JJ Reddick does not trust D'Angelo Russell.
We'll learned that six minutes in the second half the
other night. Did you see did you seen the video
of Reddick like like in the chair in his coach's
chair as Russell like just goes to sleep for the
third time in a row and it's backcut or doesn't
play defense, he's like slamming the chair cushion. Have you
seen this video yet?
Speaker 1: I have not seen the video. I did see the
clip of his like he wasn't shy about talking about it.
He complimented Lebron too. Yeah, maybe trying to pad those
future podcasts downloads once once Lebron and he retire or something.
But he so I respect it, by the way, Like
that's just I I appreciate when coaches do that. I
know the optics the Bron's bread and but ed he's
a first time coach. But what is everyone's complaint been
with the Angel Russell is probably exactly one of those.
Is like the biggest things of just falling asleep taking
bad shots a lot of the time. On offense, he
goes on those heaters and it's fine, but like he
just falls asleep or doesn't look like he's engaged on defense.
Speaker 2: Reddick's fate like it's a two minute clip from the
presser where he gets asked about Ultimately he gets up
like the question is like, what are you going to
talk to the team about the effort level or whatever,
and he goes, I just did, and then like drops
the mic and walks off like that this that presser
two minutes prior to that, he's being asked a question.
His face is like if if you were looking at him,
you would think that he's like it's taking every shred
of restraint for him not to just like chew his
own tongue off in frustrating. He's just like his face
so like so tense and tight, like like the jaw
muscles are strained as he's listening to this question and
all you you know, all he's thinking about is like
I'm so angry right now about how we play, Like
I can't hold it together. He's gonna put some all
time press conference faces, uh into the pantheon. I'm I'm
convinced already as a first year head coach, Like and
I think it's actually good because he's he It's gonna
take like some come to Jesus talks to get some
of the stuff ironed out. And maybe you can't get
D'Angelo Russell to try all the time, Like maybe that's
just not possible, like I mean, his career would suggest
like no one's ever done it. No one's ever managed
to get max effort from that guy over a full season.
It can't have it happen. So like maybe Reddick being
like looking like the angriest version of Quinn Snyder sometimes
like Quinn Snyder's had some faces too, Maybe that gets
it done. Maybe it doesn't. Surely they can fix the
transition defense, like that's the whole team thing. You gotta
be able to fix that. And if you can do that,
then I'm less concerned. But man, like, who do I trust?
I don't trust anyone other than who you said to
the circle all the way back, and I certainly don't
trust Russell, like that's just he's he was signed to
that deal to be traded and then they couldn't trade him.
It's just he's gotta go now, right, Isn't that where
this is going?
Speaker 1: Where are you going on for who? I mean the
expiring contract shore, But what's the I mean, we can
mention Zach Lavine again or whatever, but do you view
that as okay? The offense is ticked it down from
where they were, and they could certainly use his three
point five volume. This is I think it's clear. I
don't know what we were anyone was necessarily expecting Reddick
to do. But you're not going to coax three point
volume out of this roster. They're taking a fewer percentage
of their shots from three than they did this year.
Now they've replaced that with some looks at the rim,
which is great, So you kudos there, but I don't.
I just don't know the reason to be. My expectations
were probably like this is where they would be, and
I think I probably overreacted to their start. So I'm
I'm not inclined to panic just because I don't know
what else the Lakers.
Speaker 3: This is no timed up panic.
Speaker 2: I agree. I think it's I think it's a it's
piece for me hit it.
Speaker 3: This is no timed up panic.
Speaker 2: And part of that is, uh, they still have a
trade to make now we've just said, like, well what,
but I think like just having that out they have,
they have stuff to do, Like if it becomes clear
that Russell just can't be on this team anymore, and
like you're gonna diminish his already diminished value by basically
benching him, like they can make a move. So like,
I don't know if that means it's panic if you're
making a sort of panic trade, but they have an out,
and I'm less inclined to panic if I think a
team can sort of clean up some of the personnel
if it really wants.
Speaker 1: Do you trust them to actually make a trade.
Speaker 2: That I don't know that I don't know. I wish
they'd done it before, done it sooner.
Speaker 1: Our final full team before we get to some quick
hitter is grant. I'm heat. I I'm not gonna lie.
I've said this that I just can't get a sense
of what this team is, either how bad they are
or how good they are. Whenever I watch them. It
feels like I've said this before. They don't have an
identity right now, they're below averaging offense and defense. Opponents
aren't even shooting that well at the river from three
right now, when you watch them, it does feel like
there's not the same level of I don't know if
the urgency is the right word, but like really just
locked in, like, oh, those rotations are on point and
they're not going to get thrown off by what opposing
teams are doing as much. And so that's kind of
you know, that is supposed to be your identity, because
we knew that there would be a slog for this
team on offense, but to be at this point defensively
where you don't necessarily trust like your ability to yeah, okay,
this is still a team that has the personnel to
where they could force some turnovers and create chaos that way.
But when you're really just like you're going through most
especially in third quarters. That was one of my other points.
They've had some really bad third quarters here, and there's
still a team that does a good job of limiting
looks at the rim and okay, like maybe there's like,
could you take in a little bit of luck from
our team's gonna shoot a trillion percent from it range
the entire season Okay, maybe not, but there's just something
inherently off about this team. You have some guys who
are just frankly not making shots. I think anyone who's
watched Jimmy Butler can sense that. Okay, there's still a
switch he could flip. He just doesn't flip it until
the fourth quarter. But if you look at some of
his splits, like scoring splits, like compared to the fourth quarter,
it's fucking wild. And I don't this is where I'm
at with them, and I'm curious as to where you lean.
By the way, there's some like weird band concerns here.
I don't know if the Heat are trying too hard
to be a five out team when they don't have
the personnel to do it. This is his most efficient
season ever. It doesn't help that Nikole Yovich has not
shot the ball well. I think Tyler Hero looks good.
We've seen a lot more of pel Larson than I
ever thought as a Pel Larson fan that we would
ever see. And so my question kind of here is
it's not even can this be solved in house? That
is the question we're asking. But when I look at
this team, I'm starting to think, oh, they need a
best player? Is that too over the top?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, if it's not, it was Jimmy Butler,
and like, I don't I just don't know that in
his age thirty five season and given the injuries that
have just you know, factored into the last five years,
more than that you can can based on how he's
looked so far this season overall, like eighteen a game
that's not enough, like and the relying on the switch
flipping thing, like, Okay, you still got to get to
the games where it's worth flipping a switch. And if
you continue down this road, that's you're not going to
get there. You're going to make your seating even for
the heat, you know, you might make your seating such
that it's just too hard to get there. They've overcome
that in the past. The BAM thing is what's really
strange to me. I wanted to double check this, like
because he it's it's improved since, but there was a
minute there. He had a big game recently where he
was like fourth in shot attempts on the team, and
I just and like, I don't certain the theory of
like how do we take the next step? Can't just
be Tyler hero shoots more and makes more like that
it was going to always need to be BAM taking
the offensive step forward. And he's still under forty percent
from the field. He's not making threes, he's only taking
two a game. That it may just be the fixation
on the five out or something that's like yeah again,
heart totally will conceive. This is a hard team for
me to get a read on. But something does feel off.
Doesn't feel like they're maximizing their best players for BAM
in particular, but like a lot has gone right too,
Like Tyler Heroes making everything that he puts up, shooting
forty five percent from three, making half his shots from
the field, leading him and scoring by a pretty healthy margin.
Terry Rozier is almost a forty percent from three. Like,
there's a lot of stuff has gone well, you know,
around the periphery, but this is still just like, I
don't know what this team is. This seems not great
at anything. You would have thought it'd be defense, but
maybe Hero playing a bigger role makes that impossible.
Speaker 1: I don't know that was the Yeah, it's like, is
that is that a symptom of the defense is that
we've seen a lot of okay, you're gonna have Terry
Rozier and Tyler Hero on the floor together. Is that
just something they have to come to accept now then
not those minutes, but like, okay, the defense is just going.
Speaker 2: To be Yeah, I mean this is I mean.
Speaker 1: The starting lineup, by the way, is getting annihilated this year.
They're like a minus fifteen plus points per one hundred possessions.
It's bad.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean back when the Heat this is probably
two three years ago now, I distinctly remember we had
the conversation. It was probably in like a playoff preview
setting of the Heat, great defense, how do they score enough?
It's like, oh, well, Tyler Hero, maybe he was coming
back from injury or something. It's always good, Like that's
your guy. He's going to come in and be an
attention drawer on offense and a shot maker. But that's
going to compromise your defense. Is it worth it? Is
the trade off? Worth it? And that's the Tyler Hero
conversation with the Heat for several years and so far,
it's like, I don't know, maybe not because like he
can't really shoot it, he can't shoot it better than this,
Like that's just you know, not realistic. Over any kind
of sustained stretch and if if, now, maybe it's unfair
to put all the defensive struggles on him, certainly it is,
but like he's not helping on defense, so maybe that's
just this is just what you're going to get. This
is the trade off, And if Butler's not a superstar
anymore and Bam is not the best version of himself,
then that trade off is actually not worth it. I
don't know that that's just just fitballing.
Speaker 1: I do sometimes you would. I mean, the free throw
shooting for this team has been inexplicable as well. But
I sometimes wonder if like what we're seeing from Bam
feels like it might be more to do with how
they're using him of what the Heat are trying to be.
And but even if even if you don't want them
to be a five out team, like what is the
like is it just we want to play Hakes instead
of Yovic in certain minutes, like they've gone to like
a bunch of different lines there. I know that I saw.
I don't know if these were Heat fans are just
people on social media we're calling like Khalil Waer needs
to play. I don't think that like maybe you're defense
in like if you're going from Jovic to him, or
certainly if you're gonna break up the dual guards and
try and play him. But I just don't know, like
is it just inserting. Look, they've had some success with
like a couple of like the BAM and No Jimmy units,
Like that's not going to be the answer. So part
of me wonders is this summer early season noise. I'm
inclined if you thought the heat we're gonna And by
the way, the other thing that I think is factory
into how I feel about them very quickly if the
problem isn't in the house, Like what is the trade
they can get to? I think they can open up
two first round picks to trade if they really want to,
and they're going to be conditional. Okay, great, So it's
two picks in first rounders and what is that? Excuse me,
it's two picks in salary and who and the fact
that if you actually believe is I'm starting to, I
guess I'm not there yet that they need a best player.
They don't have enough to trade for a best player.
Speaker 2: Well, and conversely, what they do have is an expiring
cont essentially in Jimmy Butler that you could trade to
go the other way like that, that's way more feasible, plausible,
whatever able. Then the go get the guy who's better
than anyone we have right like that, that that you're
going steering into it, which is weird because it's not
like the Heater loaded with, like, you know, a bunch
of other cheap young guys that they can build around,
Like the teardown trade is just way more like I
don't know, foreseeable.
Speaker 1: Maybe yeah, I don't. I'm gonna go with I don't
know what if my expectations weren't super high for them
to be, I don't know what to do. What is
your verdict here?
Speaker 2: My thought is kind of along the same lines is
if a team has outs, which I guess trading Butler
would be an out here, I'm less inclined to panic,
so I'm gonna go peace. But that's also partly because
I don't think I believe the Heat were gonna be
a top four in the East team anyway, and they've
got every chance of just being a play in. They
got every chance of being kind of what they've been
the last couple of years seating.
Speaker 1: Wise, Grant said it. I'm just gonna ride the coatails
of it. It's justic I really I could probably talk
myself into panicking though, So you know what I'm gonna throw.
I just I don't know that they have outs because
if the out, they don't rebuild, So like trading Butler
not an out to me. We have some quick hitters here.
Did you want to alternate like new style? Just no justification?
We could throw it to each other. Are you are
you panicking here? And uh, I gotta start it off
Grant piece or panic on chet Holmgren's three point volume
men percentage at the moment?
Speaker 2: Uh? Peace? Not concerned? He's does so much else well
that like he need keep be an adequate three point shooter.
And I'm like, I'm good with it.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna throw up the for we have like
twenty here. I'm not throwing up the toy story thing
for all.
Speaker 2: I mean ask Tyres Haliburn looking passive? Uh not? Nothing
close to pre Hamstring Tyres from last year. Well I'll
start with that. What Tyre's Haliburn? Are we concerned?
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do peace, But I'm getting closer and closer
to to panicking on that one. He just he looks
out of sorts.
Speaker 2: What about Indie overall? Just package it up.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna say peace because they have outs,
like they can make traits to get in. We know
the wing defender and the defense has been about as
bad as we would expect, where it's like it's not
bottom five, but it's still gonna be in the bottom ten.
And they have the rebounding issues. So they're kind of
in the what did you which teams? You say this
about the Magic where it's all right, like we know
their core issues are like the issues we expected. That's good,
but the tyres, haliburt and stuff like if that leaks
into December, now we gotta we gotta have a conversation.
I'm waiting for you to read the me with those
mine Grant Dallas's offense, their averaging points per possession and
three point percentage starting lineup not setting the world on fire.
The defense is getting cooked largely on opponent threes there
uh PJ Washington, Luka Dancic, Naji Marshall. They're not making
threes at a high clip. I know that you're not
gonna panic about that with Luca. Nobody should, but Luca
right now is just the only player that gets to
the foul line aside there like the Bigs will get fouled.
So I will tip people were concerned about Dallas defense,
it's held strong. I think Luca's had a pretty good
defensive season as well. Are you piecing or panicking the
Mavericks being run of the bill on offense so far?
Speaker 2: No? I mean, yeah, the defense is probably more concerning
and just if you have the team, no, we we
view them through the prism of like can they can
they figure it out on offense in the postseason? Yes,
we know that they can. They have Luca and like
guys will make or miss shots. But I just I
can't get concerned about an offense that's run by Luka Doncic.
Speaker 1: I'm with you. I think piece is the right call
on their offense.
Speaker 2: All right. Moving to Charlotte, Mark Williams still out with
a foot spring and now, by the way, Nick Ri
also out, So Tod Gibbs Todge Gibson has been resurrected
by someone other than than Tom Thibodeau, so that's fun
for him. From Sis Austin Lake and Total Williams is
now missed over three hundred and thirty days, which means
he holds the current record for the longest time sidelined
by an active NBA player. Great tidbit there, Mark Williams
and or Charlotte do what you like, piece of panic.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna panic over Charlotte. I mean, they're they
have Mellow, They're gonna be and they have Brandon Miller.
I'm panicking if you're gonna be mentioned as like in
Matt factoid that a record previously held by RW three.
It's it's time to panic and have a discussion. It's
also get Miles Bridges off this team already, please, Like,
what is the not even good at this point? So
what's the theory of him that.
Speaker 2: The theory is that's even harder to move him now
because you've got the pr stuff and he's bad.
Speaker 1: Okay, Josh Giddy Grant and I mean or maybe it's
the bulls at large, but Josh Giddy putting up numbers,
shooting well from three, but he is the team's worst
net rating swing. Is there any chance this trade, piece
or panic? Is there any chance this trade doesn't look
like an all time fumble? But because at this point,
so he puts up numbers, you're probably not bad enough yet,
and we'll assume they'll be bad enough. Then you're gonna
pay him after he doesn't contribute to winning. I just
I need you to justify piece for me if you're
gonna go with that round.
Speaker 2: I mean, it can't really. I just I don't know
how much has changed about in my opinion on this
since the trade happened, Like it just because it didn't
make sense then and it's okay, so what now, and
nothing's really all that different. I think that the way
the way this isn't an all time fumble is if
the Bulls like retain Josh Gitty on a mid level
in the contract somehow, like that's fine, but yeah, it's
just Or if Alex Caruso just suddenly becomes terrible and
like that's just what his market value is, that's also
not happening. It's a panic like this. The best case
scenario with regard to the Bulls and Josh Gitty is what,
like I guess that he breaks out and is a superstar.
If we're gonna talk about like totally fancy fuld best
case scenarios, don't.
Speaker 1: See it kudos tod he's driving the tank in his
minutes though, kudos to Yeah, he's doing what.
Speaker 2: He's I guess doing what he's supposed to do with
other bulls. Don't really think that way, Dan Simoni. Fontecio
hasn't made any threes. That's an exaggeration, but not shooting well.
You know, the theory of him and several others on
this team was that talking about the pistons, was that
like we'd open the floor up for Ivy Cunningham, Asar
Thompson if he were ever gonna play. Fantakio is not
really helping in that effort. Some other guys are. So
what do we How do you feel about him specifically?
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go peace on it. I think he's just
what he did last year when he came over into Detroiting,
what he did in Utah. I think there's the track
record there. Grant Piecer, Panic, Brandon Pudemsky, He's he's helped
drive winning, but he's shooting twenty percent on wide open threes.
Pie Panic on his jumper.
Speaker 2: Oh, panic on panic on his jumper slash scoring. I'm
concerned that, like just the way he shoots it and
his physical frame. It's gonna make it impossible for him
to ever reliably get his own shots or be a
steady scorer in his own right. Great at everything else though,
like and just drives winning. So I don't know what
you do. You can like he's still a super positive player,
but the scoring is just I mean, we talked about
this before and it's not going away. Like he's just
it's gonna be a struggle for him to create his
own shots. This is me, reed, Shephard, our guy who
just doesn't play. Are we concerned that he's just basically
out of the rotation most nights?
Speaker 1: No, I'm gonna go piece just because the Rockets, we
said it, they have too many damn good players and
this would be something to if they don't put up
minutes for him eventually, and maybe this ends up benefiting
him somehow. I have no idea, but I can't can't
bring myself to panic. There we let's oh, okay, Terrence
man Grant, he always kind of gets off to slow starts.
He's been uneven offensively. Do we just dismiss this as
early season noise, especially given how good he and the
Clippers have been defensively this year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't. I don't know what anyone expected from
Terrence Man. I think uneven offense is just part of
the package. So I'm not I'm gonna go piece there.
I think he's still kind of a really important player
there because you have Arden and you have Norm Powell,
and somebody's got a guard guards and he can do that.
Speaker 1: I do kind of find him less important to this
team now because you have Jones and done yes, and
if you're gonna play Norm Powell a bunch of minutes
because of his offense, like in once Kawhi's back, maybe
that's what and like a mere coffee's been playing pretty
well even though the net ratings, I guess we'll forever
say otherwise what our discord has called him? Negative Tatum? Uh,
negative Jason Tatum. So I found that funny, But yeah,
I'll be pieced there all right.
Speaker 2: Uh, this is a Memphis slash Marcus Smart in particular
question Panic.
Speaker 1: Let's just move on. It's Panic time with Marcus Smart.
That's trade. I don't even I know this is your
It's so bad.
Speaker 2: It seems so bad, doesn't it. It just gets worse
all the time.
Speaker 1: He's he's not healthy and he has not. He was
you surfed in the rotation before he was injured by
just a bunch of dudes, So it's panic time there.
I don't even know. He has one year left in
his contract after that, so maybe you could move him
and attach him to stuff. But what you gave up
for him, uh, disaster, We move on. Sorry, I had
a hijack. That's it's panic time. Grant. Dennyava has not
looked great in Portland's offense. Is this a surrounding personnel,
too many uncomplimentary cooks in the kitchen situation? Or is
it time to panic a little bit?
Speaker 2: I I just I'm not gonna panic about Denny. I
we love him. I love him. I think he's a
winning player. I think the situation in Portland is just weird.
Did they have the two timelines going on? I just
it's got to be difficult for him to sort of
catch a rhythm and figure out what like he needs
to be doing. The shooting is you know, like, I
don't know, he just figured out how to shoot last year,
so maybe that was a little bit of an anomaly.
But I just, like so many of the other things
he does, I'm not I can't get too worried about it.
Speaker 1: Still like him next up Sacramento Kings Grant top of
the rotation is still playing quite a bit. Michael Brown
is Michael Brown. I want Michael Malone out there. Mike Brown.
I think it's pulled back, like we've seen the minutes,
a little bit more distributed. But is it piece or
panic when it comes to they go more than seven
players deep at the moment.
Speaker 2: I mean, I just say the numbers are where they
need to be. There the fourth best offense, they're just
outside the top ten on defense. I mean, like so,
so I guess, like, whatever you're doing, keep doing it,
But I I guess i'd be concerned that, Like, you know,
Kevin Herder has been a real like part of this
starting lineup in rotation, and like how much are you
gonna trust him going forward? And the way to what's that.
Speaker 1: To stay healthy? By the way, what has already been
two games?
Speaker 2: I think he's got he's got six of Yeah, he's
played in six of eight so far. Ke On Ellis
hasn't been as big a part. But then, like I
guess where are you going after that? Because Trey Lyles
hasn't made a shot and then beyond there. It's like
Doug McDermott got a start sprinkled in there. So they
just I guess i'd be concerned that they're they're going
seven deep maybe with the herder, you know, piece of it,
the hurder Ellis part being a little tricky, but I
don't know what what who are you giving up to
go deep in that rotation. I'm not sure where that
helps coming from. I'm not panicking though, just because the
team is good. They're five and three, top five offense.
It's it's what they're supposed to be.
Speaker 1: I would have been panicking, but ke On Ellis has
played like a bunch more minutes over the past few games.
So Michael Brown dated yours, yours, truly, two.
Speaker 2: Time Coach of the Year, Michael, Michael. We're gonna call
him Michael from now on. I just that I was
looking at something the other day and I was like, yeah,
that's right, he's got twice. This is this is a
big one. Victor Women. You have a shot selection slash,
offensive usage slash, like what do we do with this guy?
Questions as an offensive player?
Speaker 1: I the look he's shooting under like twenty percent on catches.
You threes, so maybe there's a little panic there. But
let's see Devin Masel come back. Let's see the Spurs
throw out some like units that have really like they're
trying to figure out what Steph Cassel. They had him
on the ball a bunch during there. They beat was
at the Blazers game the other night, and he had
some moments. I'm gonna give peace because I believe in it.
We believe in Wimby, So let's I aspire to taminate Peace.
Toronto's defense grant dead last in half court, IQ and
Scotti are out obviously, but does this team have a
ceiling that it's higher than let's say bottom three in defense?
Speaker 2: I was gonna say higher than dead last. Yes, I
believe their ceilings higher than dead last. I mean, I'm
I would go piece just because, like, what did you
expect from the Raptors this year? If they're bad, that's great.
I just you know, yeah, having having Barnes and quickly
just as like quality defenders on the floor, Like, yeah,
they have a higher than a bottom three ceiling and
if they don't great, you'll lose games and get a
better pick. Keante George dan Our guy, let's just go
on a one to ten. What's your level of confidence
in him becoming I'm gonna say, uh, a quality starter
in the league long term.
Speaker 1: He shoots well from three over the past few games,
so I feel like it's a ten. I'm probably at
if you would have asked me last year, just like, yeah,
based off everything, the aesthetics of the game might have
been like a seven or eight. I'm kind of in
like the four or five range.
Speaker 2: Oh I was six. I still kind of believe, but
I yeah, it's so hard to judge him in this environment, right,
like who it's how can you tell?
Speaker 1: I do I respect a three point volume this season?
Though I respect it? And Washington Wizards grant we don't.
You talked a lot about Alex are So it's probably peace,
but he's one of ten on two's from short, from
float to range, and just his overall shot profile on like,
his finishing isn't super elite. How are you feeling about
him as a even a play finisher on offense? It's
work that.
Speaker 2: Way, not good, I think, I think defensively, I can
see it. Offensively, I just really have questions about like what,
like how big of a role he should even have
in your offense at this point. Now, like it's hilariously
early in his career, so he can develop like five
skills in the next couple of years that change that.
But I just don't know what he's going to be
as a finisher, as a shooter. It's it's really so
I guess it's so early. But if it's Piece or Panic,
I'm panicked about his offensive potential, I don't know what
it is.
Speaker 1: Are you ready to take it? Look, I know people
are gonna be upset. The podcast is over.
Speaker 2: But.
Speaker 1: We will be back next week. Do you want to
take us out of here?
Speaker 2: Grant Perfect, thanks everybody for listening. Let us know what
we should have been more peaceful about or panicked about more.
I think we did a fair I think we split
it pretty even. Hopefully we're not alarmists, but sometimes we
trend that way. If you have an already rate review, subscribe,
make sure you give us some comments on YouTube healthy algorithm,
love us back, join our discord. Sometimes we solicit you know,
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so that's a good way to get involved. I'll leave
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