Speaker 1: What is up Pelasiko's I Am Dana Valley coming at
you with the one, the only, the best co host
in the podcasting business, mister Grant Hughes. We are a
month into the NBA season officially when this is dropping.
This is one month since the NBAC were one month
in a day since it opened the twenty second when
you'll be listening to this, it's talk for some burning
questions that would Grant, I just have to get off
our chest, not our bear chess, because we don't want
to embarrass anyone else out there. So we are both
wearing shirts. But we've got a handful of questions and
we will take turns deciding which which direction we're going
to take them that we just think are going to
be important to clock for the rest of the year.
Some of them are micro dealing with a specific team.
A lot of them are more macro though, about things
that are happening around the league, situations that we're really
going to be tracking moving forward. Our first burning question, though, Grant,
how the heck are you doing?
Speaker 2: I'm doing well. Thank you for asking. I should have
used all that time to come up with something more
pithy to say, but I'll turn it back on you
because today's going to be a dialogue, Dan, how are
you doing?
Speaker 1: I am, I'm fantastic. This is one of my favorite
type of exercises to do, where it's we get to
bounce around to a bunch of different subjects where there's
some there's some micro implications, but there's macro implications as well.
I'm just curious because we did build like our pool
of questions that we will call from together. What makes
a burning question for you? What is it? Is it
more so, oh, this team is shocking or disappointing me
in some huge way, or is it this thing is
happening or this combination of things is happening, And how
does that change the competitive landscape in the sense of, oh,
is this team going to make a big move or
is this team suddenly a championship content? What makes a
burning question for mister Grant?
Speaker 2: I think I think it's one that has a little
bit of a tail to it. That's probably not the
right word, but something where Okay, so we get an
answer to this question, and then there's a very consequential
like so what that kind of comes after it? And
that's so what can touch on like you said, maybe
there's a trade to be to be made related to
this the answer we arrive at. If we arrive at
an answer, which, knowing me, usually I just end up
with more questions. Or it's gonna impact who's gonna make
the top four in either conference, or it's gonna impact
you know, probably not a player's legacy necessarily, but there's
got to be like some kind of okay. So we
got we've got to handle on the basic question, and
then it gives rise to several others that are going
to have some kind of say in what happens the
rest of the way this season. It's not just like
a who's the best at this or like rank this
team or do you know what I mean? There's got
to be some kind of okay. So we got that handled.
So now we have like, so what is the impact
of that demo line? I don't know, like a longer
it's got a longer reach than other questions. Like it's
kind of what makes it a burning question? To me?
Speaker 1: I'm pretty bummed.
Speaker 2: Because I thought this was just going to be legacy
rankings based on this season. But I get to do that,
we get Pitot.
Speaker 1: That's fine, I'm going to be super generous again, just
the charitable nature of my existence is it's beyond compare.
And I'm going to give you the first selection. Where
do you want to take us?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm going to start at the beginning of the alphabet,
just because that happens to be one of the things
we do.
Speaker 1: You dodge, you ass, Let's do it.
Speaker 2: Let's talk Atlanta Hawks. And the question is that some
version of are the Hawks better without Trey Young? Now
this is not a new question, but because Young's place
with the Hawks and really is placed in the league
and sort of what we make of him and his
impact on a team have kind of been an issue
for almost his whole career, just because of the extremes
that teams led by him tend to embrace. The reason
it's relevant now is because Treyong's out with a knee
injury and has been since the end of October, and
the Hawks have played differently, have in some respects been better,
in some respects worse. And so we just have a
little bit of a sample now to kind of look
at and try to figure out what is this team
without Trey Young? Because we have a pretty good idea
of what it has been with him, So just to
kind of throw some numbers out before we or you know,
some numbers and some observations out before we kind of
start to try to tackle this. Young went down with
a knees spraying against the Nets on October twenty ninth.
The Hawks win that game and then go seven and
four over their next eleven. So that's essentially their record
without him. Nothing spectacular. And you might say, like, well,
that's roughly in line with where we thought the Hawks
would be with a healthy Tray Young this season, Like
that's you know, that's a fourth, fifth, sixth, this best
record in the East kind of pace. That's what we
thought this team might do. It's relevant because now these
stats do not include the most recent Hawks games because
Hawks game because cleaning the Glass went down this morning,
and they're all updated as of last night, So deal
with it. Young's on off is a minus fifteen this season.
The Hawks net rating is better significantly without him. That's
all defense. Their defensive rating is plus fifteen point five
with Young on the floor, meaning it's fifteen and a
half points worse per one hundred. These have all normalized
a little bit because the Hawks lost their most recent game. Still,
they'll give you a sense of sort of what we're
dealing with sans Young, Atlanta's two best lineups without him,
which just to get the principles kind of in order
here Nikhil, Alexander Walker, Dyson, Daniel zacharysche Jalen Johnson, and
then with Porzingis at the five plus thirteen point one,
the offensive rating is one twenty four points one. Put
a Kong Wo in there for Porzingis, who's actually like
just as on the same footing now as a three
point shooter, which seems relevant to Porzingis uh plus thirty
two point eight one point fifty offensive rating. These are
all going to be lower after the game against the Spurs,
but still.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 2: Since Trey lefts or went out, the Hawks have really
only had like two really bad offensive games, which is
where you'd expect the kind of degradation of performance to come.
You know, you remove this guy that is your offense,
you're going to suffer there. They've had seven with an
offensive rating of at least one hundred and twenty one
points per hundred, so like that's more than get sufficient. However,
and the defense has been better obviously that's just like
they've had much more high turnovernights just because you take
Young off the floor and put just it's basically been
Alexander Walker, your defensive results are going to be better.
They're turning it over more. They've been susceptible to pressure.
Cleveland really was the first to kind of expose that.
This is now almost two weeks ago we're talking about.
But I don't know if you remember that game, but
like the Hawk looked really good without Young for a
couple and then exactly the type of issues you'd expect
a Rose where they can't get the ball over half court,
they get it over in the offense stalls because nobody
knows who's supposed to be doing anything. Alexander Walker and
Jalen Johnson have been very very good for like what
they've been up to this point as initiators of that offense.
I'm not one hundred percent, so actually I know I'm
not sold on one or the other of them being
good enough to be just this is the guy that
runs the show all the time. This is an alpha.
I think they're both like maybe luxuries as like secondary guys.
But even as much as Johnson has improved and as
like Alexander Walker at thirty eight against Spurs last night
as we're recording this and looked incredible. They still their
struggles were turnovers, gummed up offense occasionally. Like both of
those guys are great at what they do. You just
they're not replicating what Young did as sort of a
be all end all. So that kind of gets to
the next look this because we're still dealing in small
samples and the question that I sort of we need
to tackle is.
Speaker 1: The Hawks.
Speaker 2: Hawk can't be better without Young, They can be different,
But like if you just take what is so what
is the baseline we're working from? How good have they
been with Trey as like the alpha? And is that?
What does that mean? So just before we kind of
answered the ultimate question. Last year with Young on the floor,
all the on off swings, this is a little bit
of a yokic thing. Are huge with Young because he
makes the offense really good.
Speaker 1: But what is it?
Speaker 2: And we've talked about this with LaMelo, like always makes
the he makes the offense this much better. Well, but
how good is the offense in raw terms?
Speaker 1: Is that?
Speaker 2: Actually? Good? Is better? Good? Forty three win pace last
year with Young on the floor, thirty five win pace
in twenty three twenty four with Young on the floor
h forty five win pace plus one point three and
twenty two to twenty three with Young on the floor.
Go farther back you get a forty seven win and
a fifty three win way back in twenty twenty one,
and then a twenty nine win pace in nineteen twenty.
So there's one fifty win pace in there. There's a couple,
there's a thirty, there's some mid forties. That's where you
are with Trey Young. So I think if this is
as good as it gets, if that's what you were
with Trey Young leading the team mid load to mid forties,
let's say on balance with him on the court, why
would you continue to make him a singular figure, a
guy you might max on an extension as opposed to
looking at what you have with this younger, more athletic,
more balanced cores. Right, Because, like so, I'll just ask you,
is that is that pace? Is that level of production
with Young as the alpha? And we can talk about
why this is an unfair question in a second. Is
that good enough to justify? No, No, we're still built
around Trey Young. We're not trading him, we are going
to pay him on an extension and continue to be
oriented around him.
Speaker 1: No, it's not, but it's also you kind of have
to look at it through the lens of maybe it's
maybe it's not about giving him a max contract. Then
if it's to go into free here he declines the
player option, Okay, we're gonna throw you the four year max,
the five year max here. Then yes, it's a discussion.
But I don't think the pace at which their offense
is played in many of these lineups without Trey Young
is going to prove sustainable over the longer term. And
I didn't see their Spurs game, but I saw the
Pistons game, and you know what they lacked cut down
the stretch of that game. It was their offense, Like
you could just see that it's going to eventually get
clunky without Trey. And I understand that we're now veering
into territory of I'll say myself specifically, Dan said this
last year too, But like Trey Young shooting under twenty
percent from three, this is just we have not seen
the best version of Tray Young yet. And so I
think what I'm more open minded to is that unless
you think that Tray this is Trey right now, the
Tray that you watched before his knee injury, that this
is the new version of Tray Young. You have to
let this play out because one, what is the alternative
to move him and do what you're not moving Trey
Young and getting better? Because if you're moving Trey Young now,
teams are gonna know one why you're moving him. And
you're also moving him at a time when there's there's
not a bunch of years left on his contract. He
hasn't played his best basketball over the past year and change,
I suppose, So what are you actually getting for him?
And then if your I it's tough to build maybe
impossible to build just an elite defense around Trey Young.
Even if you want to point the well like he's
tried hard during the okay, great, like it's still going
to be super hard. I still think it's gonna be
harder for that. I don't look at Jellen Johnson, I
don't look at Nikil Alexander Walker. I don't look at
anybody else on this roster and think they can shoulder
the level of playmaking burden that for everyone else, that
Trey Young is always going to shoulder. I do also recognize,
though the fact that they've been better offensively this year
with him off, like off the court, is problematic, but
also speaks to I think a couple things. A lot
of those units are gonna be secondary units that you
get to go up against in the first place, and
I think that's a testament to Atlanta's depth. And then
we've how many times have you heard coaches, even just
the really smart x's and o's analysts, say teams sometimes
are just harder to scout without their best players.
Speaker 2: Yes, I was just gonna say, like, there's there's some
element of teams have prepared to play the Hawks one
way for as long as a young has been there,
and maybe they're just catching opponents unaware, at least early on,
because it's like, well, who do we even focus on
right as a defense? I want to ask you, though,
the reason the question I posed is unfair, which is, like,
you know, if this is as good as it gets,
why would you continue to feature Trey? It's unfair because
like you don't. It's kind of a false choice, like
why why couldn't you embrace all this new talent? Jalen
Johnson's growth Alexander Walker's obvious fitness for like a slightly
scaled up role, a congluse new shooting. Why can't you
have Trey Young with all that right, Like, it doesn't
have to necessarily be Young and we play this way,
or these other guys and we play another way, Like
in an ideal world you have everything. You have all
these other secondary creators that are slotted into probably more
appropriate roles for their skill sets behind Young is the
number one. But that, though, gets to kind of the
core philosophical question here, which is is it possible for
him to be additive to a new identity for this
Hawks team? Or is Trey one of those kinds of
players that I fixate on constantly? I think this is
montellas scar tissue from going on twenty years ago. Now,
is he someone that can only be the player around
whom your team's identity is built? Can he only be that?
Or can you scale like scale down? Scale up is
kind of the wrong terminology. Additive is what I like?
Can he be an additive piece to what you're doing
as opposed to the thing that defines it? What do
you think, like, does Trey is Trey Ung only? Can
you only use him one way or can he be
part of a more collective group.
Speaker 1: I watch him and think that he can be part
of more of a collective group, and you see even
last year more things happening with him away from the ball.
But I do constantly come back to the fact that
it never feels like it's upticked in a way that
we even saw with Luca. Let's use Luka Doncrich and
Kyrie Irvy as an example. Those two together. The sample
size isn't the largest, but like Luca played when he
wasn't injured off the ball more, he was able to
play faster more. And I think we've seen Trey at
least up the speed like that hasn't really been an issue,
But there's never been what feels like more of a
wholesale shift. But then what I constantly come back to
the fact is, well, is there someone they've had that
is good enough to justify making that wholesale shift? And
I'm open to well, I'm not open. I would and say, well,
Jalen Johnson, idiot, that's the answer. Awesome, how many games
has Jalen Johnson missed over the past shureers and so
creating that dynamic I wonder if there's been sort of
some shifting floors below that. It's I think shocker. I
do land where you kind of do where. I don't
think they're this team currently. I don't think they're better
off without Trey Young. I think that they would maybe
during the regular season they might be fun. But there's
also other guys on this team. Yet, Trey Young hasn't
maybe had his healthiest run of basketball. He was dealing
with achilles stuff last year. But what are we Christophe
porzingis hardly a billboard for good health. Jalen Johnson like
he's ended up missing time over the past few years.
It's very to me it feels without Trey Young that
the offense, even if you like the aesthetics better, even
if you think the way they're playing is freer, just
overall better, it's more house of card z E than
an off you have a higher floor. I think with
Trey Young and all his flaws, I do think that
kind of answers the question of well, do you trade
him or suld you be shopping him right now? But
it makes it harder to evalue. It still does make
it harder to all the points that you made. He
has a player option for next season. What are you
doing with that at this point? No, I'm not maxing
him out. But if you're Trey Young and the Spurs
gave the Aaron Fox, the the no must no fuss Max,
he barely played for them, barely played alongside Victor Wimanyama,
and they gave it to him, I'm sure he's going
to be expecting something similar. And I will say, there's
no scenario in which he goes into Atlanta next year
on an expiring contract right where he exercises that player
option is still on the Hawks.
Speaker 2: It's I mean, it's hard, it's it seems very unlikely, right.
I think, however, I think if I'm the Hawks, this
I'm not. I think No, I think if I'm the Hawks,
I would prefer that to a rubber stamped MAX extension.
I just think, because my as the Hawks, my vision
of the next five years is not us playing the
same way we have with Trey Young over the last
five plus. Like I, what I want is a version
of Young that is not dominating the ball quite as
much as he is, that is more a piece of
what we do than the thing that dictates everything. And
I want to pay him that way, not as the
guy that like he's. There are certain like high usage
on ball superstars that are good enough to max out
and you just fit everything around them. That's a really
short list, and it's it's you know, all NBA guys,
top ten guys, right, And I don't think anyone would
argue Young is at that level. And so to me,
if he's not willing to be compensated like someone who
can can dominate a game for us night tonight, but
we're not. Our goal is not for that to be
how we survive or or fail. I want to pay
him like that. The the other thing we need to
think about, and I would ask you this is for
purposes of long term planning and for purposes of what
do we do answering the what do we do with
Trey Young question? From Atlanta's perspective, how much is the
high likelihood of you drafting the next Alpha with the
New Orleans Pelicans pick this coming June affecting your thinking? Oh,
let's say it's aj Debantza or Drew. Let's just say
you you you pick first, You're gonna get someone In
theory that like is you will orient your franchise around
and you have a young enough complimentary core porzingis accepted
to just reorient or it's like we okay, yeah, we
lost an alpha that could get us to play at
a forty three win pace. New guy, new guy in town?
Speaker 1: Is it that's still wanted? Decision though, that you would
then the Tray Young stuff. You're still waiting to address
it until the off season, then, right, because you don't
feel yes.
Speaker 2: But it's got to impact it, Right, it's got it.
Speaker 1: I think it's impacts it. But doesn't it sort of
support the idea that if you are going that direction,
this isn't the Hawks are immediately getting better without Trey Young.
This is they've decided to reset. And if that's the goal,
if what you said all at the top of it,
we're at the close of your opening monologue of it
saying this has been their ceiling basically with yeah, they
made the conference finals that one year, but this has
sort of been their ceiling. If they sit there and
they decide made four, he's maybe contending for a top
four spot in the East, never getting back to the
conference finals. We're not into that for the next half decade.
You're then actively deciding that's fine. Like again, I would
support that decision. If you're going to go through it
doesn't have to be a teardown or you trade everyone,
but you're looking to reorient for the longer game. Around
that Pelicans pick Jalen Johnson Resus Shay maybe, like by
the way, sort of the unspoken part of all this
is that, like Dyson, Daniels just has not been good offensively.
Speaker 2: To me, here is so bad against the in that game.
Speaker 1: It he just can't under like thirty five percent on
drives this year, and it's honestly, I would argue it's
borderlined inexcusable because when you look at Oh Kunglu, like
how many minutes are the Hawks playing with a stretch
big Almost all of them? Yes, And so that's you know,
we're not sitting here most should they have not given
him that extension that they gave him. So I feel
like Trey is just this frequent pariah and deserves it
to some extent. But I would on this issue, I
would wind up saying, if you think you're better off
without Trey Young, it's because you want to hit the
reset button. I think if the Hawks want to make
the most of this season, they need Trey Young. They
need him to be better, certainly from his own efficiency perspective,
but it's if it's not him who is just in
the half quarter you trusting to generate shots for others
at the rim like he can.
Speaker 2: Here's the thing, there is a scenario to me where
Jalen Johnson at this time next year is is at
a level where you're a better team built aroun him
than you are around Trey Young.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: I don't think he's there yet, but I think Johnson
has shown enough growth. And again the health question is
I mean, might just decide the issue with him and
has been part of the problem so far. But the
way he's progressed and some of the flashes that he
does shows like get to I mean just to invoke
like a very unfair comparison, getting to almost like a
Kate Cunningham level. Like I'm not closing the door on
that at all with him, but I am saying he's
not there yet, So there're to me, this is like
this is obviously sort of a deliberately sensational kind of question.
It's too like spur a discussion, right, are the Hawks
better without Trey Young? There's so many nuances that go
into this. I think I agree with you that the
answer at the moment is probably not. I think longer term,
I would disagree a little bit that if you move
on from Trey Young, I don't think it's necessarily a reset.
I think it's we believe in the other guys getting better,
Johnson in particul killer, and we believe in our ability
to maybe get another core piece through this upcoming draft
that lifts us to a higher level. Having said all that,
I really want to see when Young is back, can
he fit into what's happening here and can it be
a balance between the way he's played throughout his career
and the extremes that that has created. Can you balance
that with like what should be a good defense and
which should be like a pretty egalitarian offense there certainly
could be like Alexander Walker as your third option, Like
that's I mean, that's a real that's a scary offense, right,
talk about not knowing how to tackle that as a defense.
So I would like to see if this can all
if the Hawks can kind of have it all, you know,
once Young is back and up to speed and integrated.
Before I before I really conclude like, nope, we topped
out with Trey. We got to take take another path.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't really, I didn't ask this to you
after you asked to me. Do you think he's capable
of fitting in to this type of ecosystem? I'm not worry.
I'm really not worried about the speed they got out
in transition so much more last year with him. But
I'm just curious if it's not will he Do you
think that he is looking at what he's able to
do or how you've seen him play, do you think
that he is capable?
Speaker 2: Is it this ultimately the core question here? I think
I think we've like this. You sort of arrived at it,
and so this was actually gonna be my bonus philosophical question.
So I'm glad you got to it independently. I have
a hard time separating sort of my preferences about how
basketball should be played, like to my aesthetic. I like,
I didn't enjoy the James Harden Rockets all that much
because it was just one dude doing all this stuff
and everybody else depended on him, and it worked really well.
That team could have won a title if you just
plopped it into some random gar the Luca Mavericks, you know,
acknowledge his greatness, don't love watching it. Same with Trey
to a lesser extent, I don't, And maybe like my
personal aesthetic preferences. And just like basketball philosophies are bleeding
their gospel as far as I'm but but you know
what I mean, like it's bleeding into my answer to
this question, which is like I I would like to
see it. I just think there are certain guys that
they play a certain way and you got to build
the team around them in a certain way. And if
you try to mess with that, one they get pissed
off and don't like it and maybe want to leave,
or two they just can't. And Young is such an
extreme version of this because he is small, he cannot guard,
He's never shown a sustainability to play off the ball
and to like be a connective guy. His whole career
collegiate professional has been just the be all end all
for his team's offense. And maybe he can I'm skeptical
that he can be part of like a just a
more collective thing in Atlanta. And I don't even know
if you're maximizing his value that way. That's that's the
hang up with all of this is like to get
the absolute best out of Young and your team with
him on it, I think you play a certain way
and that's because he's not good at so many other
things you would need like a more complimentary guy to
be good at. So that my answer is, like, I
guess I'm skeptical that you can integrate Young and sort
of have it both ways. What do you think?
Speaker 1: I think he's capable, I don't know if he's going
to And I also think part of that is now
that you have Jalen Johnson, it's less ex I just
don't like this. This feels like the season if Jalen
Johnson's healthy, you have all this space in the front line,
you have your minutes independent of Dice and Daniels, Like
this is the season that it would be. I think
the bigger question for me might be what is even
with that version of Trey Young? Do you think this is?
My bigger question is do you think that the defense
can ever be good enough to win at the highest level?
And that's I mean they have They're as close as
you can get to feeling like they have enough personnel
to do that, right.
Speaker 2: I think it's easier now than it's been in a
very long time to put together a really great defense
with a player like Young involved in it. You just
teams are better at hiding guys like that than they've
ever been. There's more zone being played that there's been
in a very long time. I mean, you're just in
your set defense a lot less this year than than
you've ever been, So like maybe the damage is mitigated
because you're not going against of course that I don't know.
I think it's possible. It's funny, like my hang ups
and my reservations about the Hawks like almost come more
the defense is like, yeah, that's issue for sure, It's
been for his whole career. I'm just more concerned with,
like what kind of team are we? Like are we
just built around this guy and everybody else is diminished
because of it? Or can we be a collective like that?
And that doesn't have as much to do with defense
as maybe what you're asking.
Speaker 1: No, it doesn't. I think what you're saying is the
idealized version of him is almost that Luka Doncic version
in Dallas where they were getting out in transition with him,
he wasn't always on the ball as much when he
was next to because what is and I guess in
theory you could do that next to Jalen Johnson.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, But I.
Speaker 1: Don't know it's fair because you've just never seen him
toggle the switch on and off or handle the duality
of it. It's it does feel like this is the
season to where if it doesn't happen, it's not even
if you believe Tree Young can still do it, I
don't know that he's going to get the opportunity to
do it Atlanta.
Speaker 2: I'd be honest with you, that's at some point that
like the shelf life is what it is, and you
go seventy eight years with the guy and you just
don't ever really win big time. It's like it just
the cycle continues.
Speaker 1: Twenty plus minutes on the Atlanta Hawks. So our national
NBA podcast has done that recently. We're going to do
another team that national podcasts don't talk about. Grant, I
have a question, how good are the Lakers really? Are they? Oh,
you know, this is a foremost threat in the Western Conference? Good?
Top four in the West, good, top three in the
West good? Or are they confusingly good to where they belong?
In kind of the middle tier along with the Minnesota Timberwolves,
where the Spurs are right now. The Phoenix Suns apparently
are they just not going to continue winning at their
current clip, even though now they're as healthy as they've
been because Lebron James is back, Luka Doncic's back, Austin
Reeves is on the floor. I went into this with
no strong opinion either way, in part because my priors
were I didn't think the Lakers were going to be
a heavyweight in the West, not that they were going
to be bad because you have Luca, you have reason,
you have Lebron. But if you would have told me
that Lebron was gonna miss the first was it fourteen
fifteen games of the season, and that they would be
eleven and four, I probably would have said no, especially
with Luca missing some time sprinkled in there. So I'm looking.
I'm why by the way, the Lebron returned, Just to
touch on that really quickly, I was a little bit.
I had to remind myself earlier on throughout that game
against the Jazz, okay, he hasn't played in a really
long time, because it felt like a lot of bystander stuff,
even on defense, and he finishes with twelve assists, six
of which come in the fourth quarter. And that was
just the It felt like, Okay, this is the vision
born to fruition. Lebron is going to pick and choose
his spots more than ever we've seen it. But now
you have Reeves, now you have Luca and the effortlessness
with which he just felt like there was just finding
the diving Jackson Hayes, some chemistry with DeAndre Ayton, the
some of the obscene passes he could just throw like
that I think was Jake Laavia caught one in the
far corner, clearly wasn't expecting anyone to throw that. It
was a reminder that Lebron can still just be really useful.
Where Ever, since Luca's come over in the trade, it's
been kind of well the Lakers around Luca's timeline. This
doesn't have to do with Lebron. He's definitely leave after
this season. I'm wondering if that casts a pal over this,
you know, year, rest of the year at all. His
future there, but his ability to fit in I'd like
to see more stuff. Can he be used as the screener?
Can he be just because I don't DeAndre Ayton's been fine.
Jackson Hayes has been fine. I don't love either of them.
I think they've been fine, like till we use Lebron
like maybe in the short role a little bit. How
many times? How many years have we been asking for that? Though?
But I'm watching them and the biggest question I still
have will be on the defensive end, because the offense
just its ceiling is what did we used to say?
It's thermonuclear as And they're only eighth in point score
per possession, but just like they're winning the minutes that
Austin Reeves plays without Luka Doncic, you can't, like, you
just can't defend this team on pick and rolls right
now because of what Austin Reeves is able to do,
what Luka Doncic is able to do. The Lakers Grant
are averaging one point one to two points persession in
the pick and roll. This is their ball handlers reversion
one point one to two points per possession. That's first.
The delta between them and second place OKAC is the
same as the delta between second place OKC and twentieth
place Chicago. OKAC is averaging point nine to eight points
per possession their pick and roll ball handlers are that
is just absurd. I think we're also seeing the benefits
of Marcus Smart as an example, by his standards, has
been pretty efficient when they've had him run some stuff
to where in Memphis and even at times in Boston
had to be almost the primary guy when they were
shorthanded or you were looking at him to run the
offense when it's Reeves or when there's Luca there, It
just makes life so much easier on him. Reeves and
Luca and now Lebron are all going to make their
big men.
Speaker 2: Look far better. This team hasn't even started hitting its
threes at the cliffew On Lucas still sub I think
thirty sub thirty three percent or whatever it is. They're
also just I look at some of their lineups and
part of me is, well, shouldn't they be trying to
squeeze in more of the defensive bodies here? And I
look at Ruy Hachima as that guy to say like,
how necessary is he? And he's just been efficient as hell.
He is shooting sixty plus.
Speaker 1: Percent on long mid range jumpers and sixty two percent
from mid range overall thirty one to fifty this year
to go with the usual reliance, like I should say,
usually reliable three point shooting. Since he's arrived in La.
I know he gets table set a lot now, but
he's shooting what he is from mid range. You have
that dependable threat from beyond the arc. What it's really
allowing the Lakers to do? Because I look at them
eighth in offense. That feels too low, seventeenth in defense,
that feels too high. I look at this group and
I think, why aren't they worse? There's value? What did
you say before with the Hawks? You're not getting your
offense set as often, it feels like anymore. The Lakers
getting their offense set a lot, and that invariably should
help their defense in some situations, it actually has not.
They're bottom five in defense after they make a three.
They're also six in points allowed for possession after they
miss a shot, and so like they are making efforts
to get back where I think when you look at
this team and the chemistry that it feels like, I
don't know what a Reeves, Dancic Lebron, what does that
trio look like? How what's the interplay look like with
them together? We've seen one game this season of it.
I don't know what we want more of or what
we're gonna see down the line, but what they're able
to do just with their based offense, base offense, excuse me,
gives them such a high floor that I'm now wondering
maybe I was just too low on the Lakers coming
in here.
Speaker 2: And I still have questions about the defense. But if
they can be seventeenth in defense and they're not getting
like you dig into the day, they're not getting super
lucky on opponent three point shooting, and it's just not
you start to think, okay, like there might be a
better team here than expected. For me, I still think
they need some more two way perimeter players, and I
don't look DeAndre Ayton has been good. I think that
he's helped them. You get to a point where you
are top ten in defensive rebounding. That's another thing that
helps your defense. It gets underrated sometimes, but ending possessions
like that's a big deal. You also put some of
the other things I look at, and just the way
some of the players are ending Luka Dacric is contesting
more shots at the rim than ever. I don't know
how to feel about that. Is that a good thing,
is it a bad thing? A zero idea? And that's
I haven't mentioned him too much here, but like he
just looks great, like he just when he's healthy.
Speaker 1: He just looks like he's moving super well. Everyone's going
to focus on the feltz felt physique. Sure, I'm sure
that's helping. He's going to be more efficient from three
point range. You have what we did an extensive episode
on Austin Reeves before. He is just one of the
most efficient, high volume ball handlers in the league right now,
one point twenty six points per possession out of the
pick and roll. That's a pretty big deal when you
consider basically half his minutes come without Luca, so he's
not always benefiting from that gravity. Look at the decisions
that he's been able to make out of double teams
when he's getting near the basket. This team, I don't
know that I underestimated them offensively, but I think I
might have underestimated their overall ceiling. I now throw it
to you, how good are the Lakers really?
Speaker 2: I think I'd start by saying a couple thinks have
broken very right for them. The Luca health fitness activity
being on just the absolute highest possible side of expectations, right.
I think some of the reasons we might have been
skeptical was one like, oh, how what's Lebron going to look? Like?
How much can he play? And then I don't know,
let's for me at least, let's let's see Luca do it.
Let's see him stay healthy before we say okay, yeah,
the conditioning and off court whatever stuff that the thing
of the past, like we've He's definitely delivered on that front.
So like one of the biggest reasons for skepticism is
not one now at least so far. And Austin Reives
leveling up. I don't know if that's more or less
sprizing than Luca just being this version of himself. I
didn't see Austin Reeves having like another leap like this
in him. Maybe he just needed the opportunity. I don't know.
So those have been positive breaks. Lebron missing time has
been a negative. I still think so Like if you
had said, going in Reeves is gonna play like this
and Luca is gonna play like this, you would have
probably said, well, this offense is gonna be top five offense,
just just because how could it not be if Luca
and just some dudes when Luca is his best self
is a top five offense. I think that the answer
to how good are the Lakers really still has to
hinge on the defense and how much you believe in it,
because the other thing we talked about a lot coming
in the season was with the Lakers' best lineups on
the floor, there will be three guys that opposing teams
go at, and this is probably more of a playoff question.
You're gonna go at Reeves, You're gonna go at don
if only because you need to try to wear them out.
You might go all Lebron because you'd like to see
if at his age, can he hold up over and
over that Now you can only go one guy per possession,
so maybe they could spread the load, and we just
didn't account for that when thinking about the defensive vulnerability here.
But I still am skeptical that this is like this
is and again this is probably more of a playoff question,
that this is a team that can win seven. You know,
I guess let's say three playoff rounds, because the defense
just doesn't seem like it has the personnel in the
biggest moments to really be a strength. And like you said,
what it's seventeenth right now, so like and they're also
the strength that's been fine, right.
Speaker 1: It's well, it's been.
Speaker 2: But the fact that seventeenth, I said, that feels too
good seaks to my view of their personnel.
Speaker 1: Look, you're not gonna win. To your point, you're not winning.
I don't think you're winning never mind three. You're not
winning two two playoff series in the West. If you
rank in the bottom ten of efficiency allowed from both
three and at the rim. I don't care what types
of shots you're allowing, you're just not going to You're
not gonna win two playoff series.
Speaker 2: Yeah, happening. So I think it's fair to say the
Lakers are better than either of us thought. But how
much better? Because what was there over under? Like we
both went under, I think, but it was because it
was like forty nine or forty eight or something in
that range. If memory serves, which usually it doesn't, I
don't think that they are on the level of some
teams we're going to talk about later. Like certainly Okay
sees its own thing, but like Houston, Houston Denver skeptical, right,
and like Houston is not a perfect team either, as
we're going to talk about. So I would say the
Lakers are certainly better than I thought, but I still
have real questions about the defense.
Speaker 1: Well here's the sort of fight and like to their point,
they do have just some like really good wins. Though
this year beat you beat the Wolves when you didn't
have or Lebron you be I think the Wolves when
you did have Luca and Austin Reeves and that was
the one time the Wolves had Anthony Edwards. I believe
they did lose the Golden State to open the season.
But my question, I guess to you is, and I
think you do need to see more of Okay, well
what does this look like with Lebron James And I
think it's I think the office is just gonna get better.
He's probably even gonna help them get out and transition more,
just like with a hit head pass. And that's what
is that one of the things we don't appreciate about
him enough or is it adequately appreciated? Whereas it when
he wants to that dude just still just like gets
up and down the floor on offense with the ball
in his hands. But are they good enough to view
this season as well. We shoot, because we kind of
looked at it as they're gonna play out this season,
They're gonna have caps based next summer, They'll have multiple
draft picks they could trade next summer, and that's when
they will kind of reevaluate what's gonna happen with Lebron
He's coming off the books as well, reeves his free agency.
Or are they good enough? Do you think are they
better enough than we expected to? Kind of view making
mid season upgrades as a necessity because I think you
could another backup big would be nice. We've mentioned two
way wings, like a combo wing or somebody like Naji
Marshall that we were texting he would be fun for
this team.
Speaker 2: I think part of the reason we weren't all in
on the Lakers is because of the way they behaved
this past offseason and how it suggested that like this
wasn't a year that they're really going for it, And
now the way that they've played and the reason we're
talking about them is because it kind of seems like
they might be a move away I from really going
for it, So in some senses, it doesn't like they're
they might be surprised by how they've played so far.
I think it would be a little bit. Man, you
can't call it short sighted to go for it this year,
right if you think you're close and they sustain like
roughly this level of play on offense because you have
Lebron he's one hundred. Like yeah, But I think if
you're viewing it as Austin Reeves and Luca are the future.
Speaker 1: Is it is?
Speaker 2: It?
Speaker 1: Doesn't it become short sided at that point? And then
how does how do you reconcile the Oklahoma City of
it all? It's not well, I know teams don't approach us,
well we just ride a hold off until Oklahoma City
starts to peter out because that's probably never gonna happen
at this point. But all you do have to weigh
if it costs a first round pick to make a move.
I think you have to view it through the lens
of And we're going to talk about this in a
little bit, is does this help us beat okay See
and Denver?
Speaker 2: What's your two? You probably have to go through both
you to come out of the West. I just think
like maybe this is like do you just take the
Darryl Morey of it? Like approach. It is like, if
we have a five percent tiitle equity, we're in, we
gotta go for it?
Speaker 1: Well do you?
Speaker 2: And like they have, I have no idea like how
like what probably the odds would say they do have
a five percent chance. I don't know what. Maybe he's
got proprietary metrics that decide what five percent of di
equity actually is. I mean, I guess what I would
say where I would land is. I thought prior to
the season that it made sense for them to sort
of do some keep the powder dry kind of behavior.
Now with Reeves playing like this, with Luca looking like this,
with Lebron like making so much sense as like a
kind of lower usage pick your spot's third option, who
just like can only help you, I'm a lot more
open to the idea of let's move some stuff because like, yeah,
there's there's always gonna be like, I don't know, can
we beat Okacy? Like fear of acknowledgment of how dominant
Okase looks cannot be the reason you don't go make
a go for it trade because like what if Shaye
gets hurt? What if Jada's wrist is never right? Like,
you can't I don't think you can let that be
the reason you don't make a move. If you don't
make win now move as the Lakers now, it's because
you've got bigger plans for the next seven years or whatever,
and it's just like and you have a little chance
at a title.
Speaker 1: Based on the timing of them announce say, I know
ownership is changing, but like you get rid of Joey
and Jesse Buss and then you got rid of most
of the scouting department too. Apparently I kind of wonder
if that's the route they're taking, maybe that doesn't impact
their approach to the trade headline. So to wrap it
up here, the Lakers level of good, I want to
frame it in, well, what player away are they? Is it?
So let's say here's a really this wow. I don't
know if they could get him. I think they probably could.
Herb Jones, does that was that the name of you
were thinking?
Speaker 2: Honestly? I went Trey Murphy first, and I was like, no,
he's not enough defender at all, Like Andrew Wiggins, What
are they and Andrew Wiggins like just just to pick
the like, yeah, can definitely guard and help you on
both ends.
Speaker 1: Not a star.
Speaker 2: Herb Jones would like it if I trusted his shot a.
Speaker 1: Little bit more of his team is I mean when
you look at Marcus Smart or even j Colaradiaz sub
thirty five percent gave Benson, of course.
Speaker 2: Well are they a healthy Dorian Phinney Smith away? Does
that do anything for you?
Speaker 1: That would be a set?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 1: When is Doriy Phinney Smith going to be helped?
Speaker 2: I think I don't know there was a time when
Dorian Finney Smith, Like however many year, three, four years
ago would have been like, yep, that's that's the guy.
That's what you're talking about, right.
Speaker 1: Wiggins would be interesting, Herb would be interesting. Naji Marshall's
not a good enough shooter, but I think he would
help them a bunch. Although this team is what he's
doing downhill. I mean they're shooting fifty nine percent on drives.
Speaker 2: Just okay, PJ. Washington, I mean he's not available, but
like a player like that, and then I think we're
talking Yeah, he also can't be trie Herb Jones could
be traded. No, we're just talking level of player like that.
Like yet, he's a good starter, He's a two way player,
can guard a loss positions, will can do enough offensively
to not be like a you have to account for him.
Speaker 1: I think where I would land on it is that
if you could and Herb Jones could be traded in
mid January, it wasn't sure if you could get a
Herb Jones because these are guys that are gonna cost
you a first round pick. I'm probably doing it, and
maybe that's damning with faint praise. But if you can
get a Wiggins, so I don't think who would you
either have? Is this team Herb Jones or Andrew Wiggins.
Speaker 2: I mean, Wiggins makes a lot, but I think he's
expiring so or maybe has a player option.
Speaker 1: Honestly, if you could give the Van doh contract to
Miami with a first round pick and then step ladder
your way there with other salaries, I might.
Speaker 2: I might prefer the Wiggins route. Yeah, I mean NBA
champion Andrew Wiggins. Let's not forget that.
Speaker 1: You're up next. What are we talking about now?
Speaker 2: Let's talk about Andrew Wiggins. Is this is gonna be
a Wiggans centric podcast. Let's talk about his current team,
the Miami Heat. The question it's kind of a set
of questions here, but the main one is like, what
is the way that they're playing right now that the
way that they've started the season, what's that mean for BAM,
for Tyler Hero and really just kind of like the
team and how how it looks going forward. The way
that they have played is interesting and has been the
topic of a great deal of discussion. Just to put
like a just a quick synopsis together, they're nine to
six thirteenth on offense, seventh on defense. They're on pace
for like fifty two wins. They're five and two over
the last couple weeks. They're doing this by playing a
very unusual style that is extremely fast, does not involve
a lot of ball screens. Some numbers there. Their fourth
in transition frequency, first in pace one hundred and six
point three positions per forty eight. They're number two in
total time to shot just around ten seconds, which is
like two full seconds faster than last year. So they're
sprinting the ball up their number two and fast breakpoints.
They're second in drives. They're tied for the fewest average
seconds per touch, so the ball hops they have the
highest average speed. Just how fast are guys moving? And
the crazy thing is if you sort that by offense.
Their speed on average of five point two three miles
per hour on offense is way way ahead of second place,
which is at four point nine to six. And the
difference between that is kind of like, I can't remember
the exact numbers, but when you've said, you know, the
difference between first and second is like the difference between
second and twentieth's that's the level of distinction we're talking
about here. I would note, though, that the Houston Rockets
and the Denver Nuggets are the slowest and third slowest
teams in the league. By that metric, those are the
top two offenses in the NBA. Going fast does not
necessarily mean you have a good offense. So what I
would pause it before we get to the Bam and
hero of it is that the way the Heat playing
right now, to me, is a great way to rack
up regular season wins and set a high floor for yourself.
I don't know that it is like an optimal system
with any personnel, because part of the reason they're playing
this way is like here, being out means you don't
have someone that you want to spam pick and rolls with,
or slow the offense down and try to hunt like
conventional shots. With the fact that there are other teams
playing very very successfully, playing much better offense than the
Heat in quote unquote more conventional ways, suggests to me
that this isn't like a hack, like the Heat have
not solved NBA offense. I think this works with what
they have. I don't know that it's necessarily the best
way to play offense for every team. I think teams
will take elements of this just because it's exciting and
might again set a high floor. But so what's that
mean for Hero and Bam? To me, the Bam fit
is just like a no brainer because he's shooting more
threes than he ever has.
Speaker 1: Almost six a game.
Speaker 2: And then see, right, he's not someone Mike Sheer had
a phenomenal basketball's poetry, just a great like right up,
And it's a couple of weeks old now, but all
of it still applies, Like what are the Heat doing?
What's different? A lot of the stats I looked up
stemmed from what he was showing in film and stuff
like that. The Bam fit to me is just kind
of like, Yeah, he's a smart passer, he's athletic, he
moves well, you should play fast with that guy, and
now that he shoots threes, everything kind of works like
you get bam and isolation against the center, which is
all just the Heat's offense doesn't necessarily like get categorized
as ISO heavy, but like that is kind of what
it is, because the goal is you drive your guy
to the basket and either try to beat him one
on one or start the spin cycle. He's fine there.
Hero is more interesting just because he's someone that has
a higher touch time, He dribbles the ball more. He's
a very good pick and role player. He can shoot
on you know, coming off screens really effectively. Like he's
a good offensive player in what you might term a
more conventional approach. That said, though, if you just look
at last year's numbers, Davion Mitchell and Terry Rozier had
longer average TOUCHI dribbled more. So, like Hero's not coming
in as like we're not talking about someone like on
a Jalen Brunson level of like you're gonna have to
reduce your your time on the ball and your touches
and your primacy in the offense. Like Hero wasn't and
isn't that type of guy. So I'm pretty confident that
he can fit into what the Heat doing. I think
my question to you is, once you got Hero and
Bam back in the fold, would you imagine the Heat
utilizing more of Like, Okay, yeah, we have the style,
we have our principles. We want to get it over
half court, we want to drive. We may known scept
ball screens. But do you think that you tailor stuff
to Hero and to Bam or do you say, guys,
this is what we're doing, fit in, like just play
the style? Like which way would you? Because I would
note too before you answer, like the offense is way
better than it's been. They've been twenty first or worse
and worse in scoring efficiency each of the last three years.
It's thirteenth. Now there's still a defense first team, there's
seventh on defense. Like, the Heat are better, they're not
a great offense, So like, which way does that cut?
As you're trying to decide how to use Hero Bam
and like, think about what style you want to play
with those guys.
Speaker 1: I really do not worry about their Hero fitting into
the offense. As you already said, and we've kind of
seen even last year, there's going to be value in
their seventh and half court offense right now, I think
they're just gonna be value in having your best passer
on the floor when you are going to be in
situations where maybe the half court like you're gonna have
to those possessions are going to last longer. I also
think that we have seen in the past that Hero
doesn't have to slow down your attack. In part you
mentioned the stuff they can run for him away from
the ball, but just in terms of, oh, if this
team needs to get out in transition, like Hero doesn't
necessarily isn't that He's not Jimmy Butler. He's not I
think going to inherently look to slow it down, And
so I think that benefits them. And even last year,
like they were in transition basically like the same amount
of time when he was on or off the court,
and so I would think that he can fit into
regardless of whether he's being used on the ball or
off the ball. You mentioned it at the end was
gonna end up being I think the bigger issue for
this team, and I might just trust them to figure
it out because it's Eric Boelscher and it's the heat.
What do they look like defensively when presumably Norman Powell
and Tyler Herro are both playing minutes together. Because I
do think the theory and maybe it's not anymore because
of how good the offense has been, how good Norman
Powell has been when he's been healthy without Hero, I
thought the theory was, well, they really want both of
these guys to be on the court. They have to
be at some point they are. They're two of your
three best offensive players, so you can stagger them and
I think that would actually help you. One maybe preserves
a lot of what you're doing, but it also kind
of allows you to say, well, Hero comes in and
during his staggered minutes is maybe that's when we change
our fastball and we saw it with I don't know
if that would Memphis offense have worked out in the
playoffs last year had they stuck to it, like, we
don't know, so there need to be proof of concept.
I think I find myself sort of wondering. I think
they could get better offensively when Tyler Hero was healthy,
But will it come at a defensive trade off when
you're looking at some of their core lineups, because now
you're gonna start getting into Okay, well, if it's Norman
Powell and Tyler Hero. How do you want to game
the front court? Do you want Nikola Jovic on the
floor for any of those minutes and you're providing the
extra stretch?
Speaker 2: Is it we need to go duel big with kohlil
Ware and bam Adebayo for a lot of those minutes?
Speaker 1: Are we downsizing a little bit more? There's a debyon
Mitchell and Andrew Wiggins on the court. It's I think
it's more of a good problem to have than an
actual problem, but it is something with Because Norman Powell
is headed for free agency, Tyler Hero has one year
left on his deal was extension only. Will this past fall?
You get into wondering in theory, if you look at
Miami on paper, their biggest need is still the same,
it's the lead playmaker for the entire team. Maybe the
bigger question is does Tyler Hero provide enough net offensive
value as a score and a playmaker now to you
for you to view the Heat as a team that
maybe they're not gonna double and triple down around this core.
But it's okay, we're not looking at we need to
move like what is more likely that Miami is good enough?
I guess to make additions this year and moving forward,
or that they're gonna need to have maybe not a
hard reset, but one of Hero or Bam. It's gonna
need to be changed up from them, and more likely
it would be Hero because moving Bam would be the
hard reset, right I think.
Speaker 2: I think my gut is that just let's get real
stupid about it, they still need a guy who's better
than their best guy if they're going to try to
win a championship. I think, like I think Bam Bam,
we love Bam like that's that's that's a given. He's
not the best player on team that wins a title
or goes to the finals. I don't think like you
need your Jimmy but your prime Jimmy Butler's or whoever
to sort of put him in the right spot. And
Hero certainly is not to me the type of player
that you can build an offense around. So yeah, I
guess then if this holds up and the Heat have
even more success with those two guys, you probably look
to add as opposed to a reset. The one thing
I just just like kind of thought extra size like
with respect to integrating Bam and Hero. BAM's back heroes,
not if you're trying to decide what style you want
to play as the heater, like how much you want
to keep doing these types of things that you've been
doing versus more conventional stuff. I think, don't you think
that maybe one of the issues you have to consider
is like, well, this style has gotten a version of
Heimehawk as junior that did not exist before, and he's
if he's not the most improved player, he's on the
short list of candidates right now. I think you could
make similar cases for like Simone Fontecio is finally like
the guy that everybody hoped he would be in this system.
He's benefiting from the drivekick drive kick, Like oh man,
the defense just like got itself tied in knots open shot.
Maybe Jovic is that way, Maybe Davion Mitchell's that way,
Like those guys HeLa Larson seems to all even where
is like, well, nobody boxed him out because we're all
scrambling everywhere, and he has a seventeen rebound game. So
those guys I think are more dependent for their success
on the way the Heat are playing right now, and
I think maybe you have to factor that in when
you're deciding like, all right, well, but Hero and BAM
maybe play better in this conventional way, Like, yeah, they
might be a little better there. I think the wiser
move is to trust your absolute most talented players to
fit into this system that because if you tweak this
and go back to more conventional stuff, I think you
might lose a lot from these other role guys that
have excelled with how you're playing now. So you just
have to trust the talent top end talent to figure
it out because you don't want to mess up what's
worked so well for a lot of the other guys
that maybe aren't this good in any other style of play.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, how much like where's it
going to get you? If you're viewing, let's just use
heroes we've seen, like we have proof of concept with
BAM for this season. If you're worried about, well, what
is Hero going to do to Heim Bayakas Junior, who
is needs to have the ball in his hands, like
to really be irreactful on the offensive end. Yes, now,
I think Hero is good enough to where you can
still allow that. But if you have if you need
your your best player, one of your two best players
to unless you actually think that Highway Hawk is junior,
is more valuable than Tyler Hero, and that maybe that
would be a different discussion, but like Simony Vontekio certainly is.
And it's yeah, you don't want to end up shifting
the ground beneath your star players too much just to
account for Hi may Hawk as junior. That's not where
I'm at. And I know, I oh, go ahead, and.
Speaker 2: No, I think I know, I don't I agree. I
would say, like I would use Powell as a comp
like he's looking great, he's fine in playing this way,
and you would certainly argue that, like at least last year,
Powell and Hero were pretty close to equals, right, like
in terms of like overall production, and like who's the
better player. I think Hero, just given his youth and
ball handling and stuff, might be better. But like it's
more of like I trust the top end talents like
Hero to figure out how to play just as well
in this style as any other, more than I trust
these four or five other guys to be able to
be this good if we change how we play. You know,
it's not like it's not I get what you're saying.
It's like Yeah, you can't ask the best guy to
play a certain way because you're worried about your fifth
best guy. But I think like it's more just you
can trust the higher end talents to figure it out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I look, I think they will. I mean
even like Hero is the one that you we guam onto,
because I think he played more of that like Norman Powell.
Even last year during the Starless Minutes. It wasn't just
him dominating everything Hero at points needed to for Miami.
I think the way that he changed.
Speaker 2: A shot giant for a lot of last year. He
was in the sixty seventh percentile of catch and shoot
three pointers per seventy five possessions, and that's on a
team that didn't really have anyone to get him.
Speaker 1: The ball for a majority of the season. So now
you look at the way the heater playing, I'm I'm
pretty optimistic. I don't know what their ceiling is though,
with the exact core as it currently stands, but the
way the East is shaking out, I don't think the
Knicks or the Calves have really impressed anybody, and so
it feels like there's decidedly at least three spots, depending
on how you feel about the Pistons and the Raptors.
It feels like there's three spots in the top four
in the East that might just be up for grabs.
People probably had it penciled in as two, but with
the Magic playing the way they are, the Heat could
be one of them. And I honestly think that Hero
is gonna make them only better, maybe more variable, and
maybe there'll be a learning curve there. But this, I
guess this is an optimism pod.
Speaker 2: It's up for the Hawks is that we're higher on
the Lakers and we're higher on the Heat and when
we started, yeah, I'm going to take us to Speaking
of top four in the East, you know who's number
two in the East? Grant is it you? Are they
yours or are they mine? Though they can be yours.
I believe it is your Toronto Raptors. It is, and
the Toronto Raptors are killing it.
Speaker 1: I'm happy that I smashed there over when we were
going through that exercise. They are among the teams who
rank in the top ten of offense and defense. Their offense,
they're not taking a ton of threes, they're shooting them efficiently.
They are first in transition frequency only the Wizards, Grant
play faster after a mishot by the opponent. So just
looking at the average offensive possession time, only the Wizards
are faster after the opponent misses a shot. Now you're
kind of looking The big question with the Raptors is, well,
how are they going to operate when they're in the
half court when things have to slow down a little bit.
Even if they're trying to go through their actions faster, Grant,
they're going to be pretty good. They're third in half
court offense efficiency this year. Some one of the most
interesting things I think is, Okay, what does Brandon Ingram's
role look like on this team? It works, It's a
more streamlined version of what he needs to do. It's
focus on scoring for the most part. He doesn't have
to do as many much playmaking. But he's also not
it's not scoring where okay, you go through your typical
machinations and dominate the ball for X amount of seconds
his last healthy season, so not in twenty twenty three,
twenty In twenty twenty three twenty twenty four, excuse me,
he averaged four point zero one seconds per touch and
three point one seven dribbles per touch. Forty one point
five percent of his twos came off asis this year,
three point one seven seconds per touch, two point two
dribbles per touch, and about forty seven percent of his
twos are coming off a sis. That's a career high.
And I know that still doesn't seem like a high number,
but I was watching it struck me the most. I
think in their game against the Rockets, I wanted to know,
has he ever just like came off of more screens
away from the ball and then gone right into a shot.
The answer is no. Uh. This is the highest like
off ball screen usage that he has ever gotten. That's
a big deal. He's also it's his lowest true usage
season since twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, and true usage just
takes into account some additional playmaking metrics in addition to
possessions that ends in turnovers and shots. They have really
trimmed down his role. There's some awkwardness there. He's shooting
under thirty percent on catch and shoot threes, which over
the past few games has basically been removed from his diet.
I think you could look at that and say, well,
he'll get better there. I think the fit has been
far more if not seamless more intuitive than you would
have expected killing it from mid range, as are the
raptors in general. The other three players that I think
you need to shout out a ton of players, but
more of the quick hitters. Emmanuel Quickly another guy who
just seems like he's operating within the ecosystem better, not
really forcing things. They're not running asking him to run
a ton of the offense run basic stuff. But he's
also not turning it over at all, and so it's okay.
These are lower usage primary ball handlers when you look
at him or RJ. Barrett, but if they're not going
to turn the ball over a ton, that's great. RJ.
Barrett he's another guy who it's his off ball usage
is through the roof, even relative to what he was
doing in Toronto before this. This is the lowest dribbles
per touch of his career. He's has the highest drive
pass out rate of his career, and fifty six point
three percent of his twos are coming off asis. That's
the second highest of his career, and this has been
one of the most efficient versions of himself. He's only
average more points per shot attempt once The final main
player I mean Yaka Perl here too. The space he
creates with his screens, the decision making he can make
on rolls have been great. I would like to start
the Scotti. Barnes belongs on the back end of the
MVP ballot conversation right now. He finished tenth in my
latest MVP ladder. I think he was one of the
names we mentioned when we were trying to with a
twist it who's someone that can come out of nowhere
and enter the MVP running. He has been excellent for
I want him to take fewer mid range jumpers. I
just I don't love it. The efficiency's not there. I'd
like to see less of it. He's shooting really well
on above the break threes right now, forty four percent
on our threes. Really big deal. I think he is
probably like he just seems to have the assist numbers
won't always show it, although he's of course up there.
Over five is his per game. He just has the
most connectivity with everyone else on the team compared to
anyone else on the team. Smart passing, he's finding players
that are cutting in from the wings. Really great chemistry
with Yaka Perto when he's in the short role defensively,
he is just Scotty Barnes at this point as a behemoth.
The rim protection numbers are not great, but he's also
contesting a career high of opponent shots at the basket.
Good luck, just like making a pass with him on
the court. On the ball, try to make an entry pass,
good luck with him there. The defensive playmaking is kind
of insane. He is on pace grant of anyone who
has averaged over thirty minutes per game in a single
season to become the first player to get one point
five steals and one point five blocks per thirty six
per one hundred possessions. Excuse me, I messed it up.
The last player to get two steals per one hundred
possessions and two point five blocks per one hundred possessions
while averaging at least thirty minutes per game was Anthony
Davis in twenty nineteen, twenty twenty. Just to put the
defensive play making a context, and there are two plays
when you're looking at that have stuck out to me,
one of them recently, and they were both against the Calves. Ironically,
where Scotty Barnes's defensive value leads through for me, the
most recent one was against the Calves, and I think
it was actually brought up by I want to say
it was the dunker spot. But Scotty Barnes flies in
from the middle to cut off Donovan Mitchell on the
south wing. I know what you're talking, teleports over to
Evan Mobley on the left side of Mitchell, passed at
him to block the three pointer and then ends up
getting the basket in transition. That's great. That's probably a
play that stood out to a bunch of people earlier
in the year though, against the Calves, he had this
play where it was kind of broken, kind of by design,
but he over closes out on Dean Wade a voice fouling,
but ends up behind Dean Wade, so he shifts over.
Dean Wade puts the ball on the floors, driving Scotty
Barnes shifts over to Evan Mobley, who is lifting out
of the corner at that point. Dean Wade then kicks
it out to Evan Mobley and Scotty Barnes's body is
just not in a position to defend anything at this point.
Evan Mobley catches it.
Speaker 2: On the go, gets all the way downhill, Scottie Barnes
is there and by the time Evan Mobley's deep into
his drive, Scotty Barnes I don't even thinks caught the
free throw line. Yet by the time he ends his drive,
Scotty Barnes is right there with two or three Raptors.
Evan Mobley makes the dump off pass to Dean Wade
right around the basket. Scotty Barnes rotations and just blocks
the shot. The possession that looks like it was going
to be a blown defensive possession for the Raptors is
blown up by Scottie Barnes. He is going to make
if he stays healthy and All defense team this year.
Shout out to Samson Folk came on the podcast for
the Lookhead asked me if I thought he would make it.
Speaker 1: I said so outside that Remban possibility.
Speaker 2: I don't know if I'd predict it, should have predicted it.
He's been fantastic. This team is fantastic, and the final
note I have on them is they're also just deep.
They have the best bench point differential per one hundred
posessions in the league right now, mad Who's been a
breath of fresh air. Shout out to Samson Again, the
Mamu drives have been great. There's not a ton of them,
he's shooting over sixty percent on them. But the way
he can play, it's not just the spacing for him.
He opens up the floor.
Speaker 1: Grady Dick. I still don't know what to make of
Grady Dick, but the Raptor's rim frequency shoots through the
roof with him on the court because defenses defend him
like he's this five alarm fire, even though the efficiency
says that he's not a five alarm fire. So this team,
if we're talking about Miami Atlanta, which of these teams
that are kind of they're viewed as dark horses or
they're playing like dark horses with a bigger threat non
pissed his division because they're lording over everyone right now.
I am most immediately high on the Toronto Raptors as
just after get through the Pistons, the Calves, the Knicks.
I think they're the team I look at right now
in the East and say, yeah, they're they're going to
be the fourth or the third best team in the East.
Speaker 2: Looking back at what we came into the season, kind of,
I don't know if you had to do the thumbnail
sketch of like our the raptors look ahead or maybe
not not the look at our thoughts. What do you
think we, the collective basketball consuming public, we got most wrong?
And I'll give you three choices, kind of increasing from
micro to macro, the pertal extension Ingram's fit, or the
broader like what the fuck is this roster? The construction right,
because that was just like everybody conceded, like, yeah, there's
a lot of talent on this team. None of it
makes sense together, Like which of those three things, based
on what you've seen so far this season and just
how they've played, how they perform, which of those three
things seems like the most wrong analysis? It's probably the
brandon Ingram fit, although I think you could just say
the broader strokes because I think I don't know what
to fold the brandon Ingram fit into because everyone was
working it was the one ball argument, well how does
this impact Scotty? How does it impact like I mean,
just to credit the doubters a little bit, it's like
it was the one ball thing, but it was also
like is he gonna shoot enough threes? It was can
he be part of a team that wants to move
the ball the way that dark Oreyakovich wants his teams
to move the ball, Like was I mean, I know
you're simplifying, but like they're I kind of I actually
agree with you. Well, I don't know how to separate
the Ingram question from the overall roster construction, but like
those were real concerns, and like all the numbers you
laid out, Ingram has been like just different than But
what you hit on is I think you could look
at it and say four to threes a game thirty
percent from No, that's not that's not enough.
Speaker 1: And so what does this impact it at all over
time is a question you could have. But I still
think it's when you look at the general principles with
which the Raptors play. People were overly concerned, probably including
myself there, but I was more of a Raptor's optimist,
like in general. But even this out of the gate
top ten in offense not something I would have expected.
I will say the other thing though, that we might
have just underrated, which and I mean this collectively, which
is kind of funny because now we know how important
depth is. This team does just have a lot of
guys and so if all the fits aren't intuitive, it's
like jameson Battle can come in and lock him in.
It's like, oh, chio Bogi's kind of buried on this
team right now. They just like calmery Boyles. What did
we sit here and say how many times it was
we love CMB. We don't like the idea of CNB
on the Raptors because why we hate the idea of
someone who plays his ass off on defense. No, I
didn't think he's like he has some inflated three point
shooting games, and he's been better out of the short
role than I expected. I think the things we got
underestimated the most was them to continue playing how they
wanted to on offense at full strength, and then just
what the depth would wind up doing for this team,
because I think that depth contributes to why they're able
to play the way that they do on offense.
Speaker 2: I don't know if I'm ready to say that, Like,
broadly speaking, the NBA has just leveled up in terms
of maybe it's coaching staff, maybe it's analytics staff in
just figuring out like, yeah, we over index on this
and we're weak here, but here's how we should play
to get the most out of this talent that we have.
Like we just talked about the Heat and now we're
talking about the Raptors, and those are two teams I
think that are not like what you'd call balanced or
capable of playing like conventional basketball and excelling. But it's
like they are. They have a lot of like a
couple things and they're just leaning into strengths, you know,
Like the Raptors have like length and athleticism and good
passers and depth, and it's like, Okay, we'll play this
way and get the most out of it. It doesn't matter
that Murray Boyles and like Ingram and Barnes and Peerle,
like that's what those are, all weird fits. Like yeah,
those are issues, But do you see what I'm you
know what I mean? Like it does feel like we're
seeing more and more of like we're gonna play this
kind of The Raptors aren't extreme in like the same
way the Heat are or the Rockets are, but like,
I don't know, it's starting to feel like teams are
more willing to just we're gonna do some weirder stuff
and like play sort of an unbalanced way because that's
who we have and that's how we'll be best and
like maybe there's just we've did the league just get
smarter every year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good point. It's we also might just
be do we need to start looking at teams where
it's if you can actually map out an eight or
nine man rotation of real NBA players.
Speaker 2: Not like how talents.
Speaker 1: Sure you have to stretch it, Yeah, it's if if
you can just like the Heat would be another good
example of this, and they don't necessarily have a top
ten guy, So yeah, we know the Lakers will be
good because they have Luca, or that the Bucks will
kill opponents when your Honis is on the floor. It
happens when he's off. If you just have the blueprint
of no, we can name you eight nine guys right
now that would belong in an NBA rotation, not just yours.
We might just be understay in the value of that.
Speaker 2: Right well, Pacers last year, same thing, it's like, well, yeah,
we could go deep as you want, Like we'll just
we'll play fast and everyone we put on the floor
is good. Deal with that, like, because you probably can't
do that most nights. You know, as an opponent, I
would put a button on this and say, we're talking
regular season for all of these teams so far.
Speaker 1: No, they're winning the title.
Speaker 2: It's gonna be I think. I think my theory that like,
well we can be unbalanced and successful, that's gonna run
into like some higher hurdles I think in the playoffs.
But we are where we are in the season, so
that's all we can talk about.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm buying what I'm seeing from the Raptors definitely
regular season wise, but there they'll be. I want to
see them and maybe the heat, Like, I don't want
to see those teams make changes before the playoffs because
I want to see what this looks for those two teams,
especially what it looks like in the playoffs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we got to get into some lightning round topics
here pretty soon. I think we're running short.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're up, So pick one.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about some uh some kind of a blow
it up potential teams, like the disaster teams I guess
you'd call them. Yeah, they're all pretty big disasters. So
which of let's just say the following Dallas, Sacramento, Indiana, Memphis,
and the Clippers is most likely or best position or
makes them would be best served by blowing it up,
and I'm gonna I'm gonna rank them starting at the
end of this just so we can kind of dispense
with them and you tell me if you agree or disagree.
So to me, there's like there's five teams here, one, three, four, five,
and I have a four A and a four B
at the end of the list, which is like, it's
more about can they blow it up? And how easy
is that going to be? And that is four A
is the Kings and four B is the Clippers. Not
saying neither of those teams should blow it up, it's
just like, what's that look like? I think they both
and the Kings absolutely need to. But if you're the Clippers,
all right, are you interested potential trade suitor and James
Harden or Kawhi Leonard at high costs? No? Okay? Are
you interested in like the fourteen? Oh shit, they got
old fast served and role players we have? I mean maybe,
but like what's the return on that? Are we getting
seconds and like equally useless money? Really hard for the
clip the Kings. It's like Deroza Levine Sabonis too, he's hurt.
It's gonna miss a month with the Tormentiscus like minimum,
who's looking at those contracts and seeing positive value. I
mean Keegan Murray hasn't hasn't played, or I think maybe
he just came back. Either way, it's like, yeah, team's
just interested in him, so hyper domos to not play right,
So it's really hard for those teams. So then we'll
jump back to the top of the list best position
to or makes the most sense to quote unquote blow
it up to me. Dallas is number one, and we've
already got the rumblings of the eighty stuff and Mark
Cuban posturing like no, no, no, we're not trading him,
which is like, of course, what you do.
Speaker 1: Did you read I'm sorry you read the Tim McMahon
piece where quote the source that said when they were
asking about Mark Cuban feeling more involved, like he's floating
in his Sketchers right now.
Speaker 2: That's that's from the Sketchers brand rep. Probably, so I
think it's Dallas because you have Anthony Davis to trade,
you have the well, yeah, why wouldn't you start over
or not not totally start over, but like you have
Cooper Flag, so there's your foundational piece. I still like
basically all their role players. You know, I love PJ.
Washington like you. Every time I mentioned him, you have
to remind me he can't be traded. I wouldn't trade PJ. Washington,
I'll say that, but you.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't trade it. PJ.
Speaker 2: Washington if you move, If you move Anthony Davis and
don't like, just erase him from the salary sheet. The
only guy making more than eighteen million dollars on Dallas's
payroll next year is Kyrie Irving. So like, they got
all these theoretically tradeable numbers if they want to do something,
so like they just and to turn the page aspect
of it. With Nico Harrison being gone, like now you
can analyze this roster with clear eyes and not feeling
pop committed. So Dallas makes the most sense and seems
to be best positioned and probably should be incentivized to
kind of blow up is maybe too strong, but like
we're going to refresh a little bit here after that.
It's to me it's the Grizzlies, just because you know,
the Jamrant era feels like it's coming to a close.
Already did the Desmond Bine trades, So you obviously are
open to the concept of kind of moving off some
core guys. The Pacers I stuck in the middle because
I don't want them to blow it up. I just
it's like, I don't know what that would even look
like for them. So maybe you can agree disagree with
the rankings, talk about whoever you want.
Speaker 1: The Pacers feel least likely and also like they shouldn't.
It was just that they were the team, like this
group of teams was who were disastrous relative to expectations,
and even without Tyre's Haliburn. You and I know they've
dealt with injuries beside from aside from Haliburn. We look
at them and say, oh, they're gonna have as many
wins fifteen games out of the season as the Brooklyn Nets.
Speaker 2: Well and two. I would point out that like both
for the Pacers and the Kings, for different reasons, it's like,
this is fine because the Pacers got their pickback and
t and tyrese Alburn's out, so it's like, all right,
the gap year was always like a maybe kind of
in there thing, and now it just isybody got hurt.
And for the Kings it's like, well, you don't have
a choice because you're this bad, and the vibes are
this messed up and now your best player's hurt, so
like they're not. It's like you talk about like executives
taking a club out of the coach's bag. Sometimes it's like, well,
now the King's just like they cannot win, so there's
no reason they can't go chase the next Levine or
DeRozan and they just have to be bad. So it's
kind of like it's not the worst thing that they're disasters.
But sorry, go go ahead.
Speaker 1: No, no, that's totally fine. I would agree most of
what you said. The matters are probably the right answer.
I agree with everything you said about the Clippers. I
do kind of feel like I want to see the
Grizzlies just blow it up and get it over with, though,
because it's you're probably trading John Moran at the idea
of his value. I just don't know if it's ever
going to be much higher than it is now. And
there's just like you already traded Desmond Bane. You've telegraphed that,
like you're not married to this era, so it sort
of feels like you're unnecessarily hovering in the in between.
Maybe they look at it as well. Right now we
have Ja Morant and we're still pretty bad.
Speaker 2: Or you know, eleventh in the Western eleventh in the
Western Conference, you sort of Jamaran, we sort of that,
but he's there, so I think, And also I'm wondering
if their baseline of assets outside of Okay, yes, you
have Anthony Davis and Dallas, you have Jamran and Memphis.
When you trickle down, who has the more valuable role
players that you could kind of get things for?
Speaker 1: And I actually think it might be but Grizzlies just
because PJ. Washington can't be traded in Dallas. I know
teams want Daniel Gafford, but what are you even getting
for Derek Lively at this point? Whereas if you're Memphis
you also have oh you in theory, you have two dudes.
I don't know where they would land on this, but
if you wanted to trade Jared Jackson Junior, imagine what
you get for him.
Speaker 2: So I assume they don't want to they renegotiate and extended,
But Santi al Dama, what is it?
Speaker 1: What can you get for someone like him? I just
and then Grizzlies are just so jumbled. I have no
idea because let's say this, we know what the mass
will do if they blow it up? What is it?
Speaker 2: What are the Grizzlies doing if they blow it up?
If they don't blow it up, I have zero idea.
And so right, the reason they're trickiest because like, how
how it's not easy to trade jam Rant? Alright, well
it's not easy to trade them and get anything back.
They're like, yeah, of course we'll do that. It's just
your your the market is brutal. But I think you're
right that, like the longer this goes on, maybe it
doesn't get any better.
Speaker 1: Let's move on to Okay, Grant, who is the best
team in the NBA? We're going to operate under the
assumption that Okac is one. I know bold, and I'm
gonna say Denver is two. I haven't seen anyone that
makes me think denver Is is belonging in a tier
with anyone other than Okase. It feels like maybe those
two teams each belong to their own tiers?
Speaker 2: Even can can I steer us to two teams to
really focus on?
Speaker 1: So the Pistons good?
Speaker 2: What would you say if I think it's Houston or
Detroit need to be the top. Things we talked about.
Speaker 1: That wouldn't shock me too much because I don't. The
Knicks just don't. I watched a lot of Knicks. Everybody
knows that they don't have that level. It's just they
don't have it. I like what the offense looks like
under Mike Brown, but they need to trade at minimum
for at least one other good combo wing because they
can't defend with og An Andobi off the off the floor.
Speaker 2: The defense is the issue right with them. That's that's
where I was like, Oh, I don't know that that that.
Speaker 1: Bumped bump and the defense and the sample sizes getting
a little big when you look at last season, he
like Mitchell Robinson, can't anchor the defense by himself, and
it's I don't know that you need og Ananobi to
anchor a defense when you have liabilities in Cat and
Brunson rather than just one of them, to where it's
probably unrealistic to ask Mitchell Robinson to shoulder even covering
up for Cat at this point when you look at
his past ankle injuries. It's not the Knicks. It could
I I would nominate to put the calves in there
because they to be healthy and I kind of don't
trust them. But the talent on paper, and I don't
know that they deal with physicality all that well just yet.
Donovan Mitchell is just incredible. Evan Moby still has the
Evan Moley might be the best two way player in me,
like he's certainly in the commerce theaters him. There's I
mean non Webby division, but just two way straight player.
I know that's a dumb honor. Let's see what they
look like at full strength. But the way I was
gonna say it is do the Pistons belong in here?
Speaker 2: Because I was trying to look at this as teams
who don't need to make a move to be considered
the third, that have the third best like title shot.
Speaker 1: I'm not putting the Pistons there yet. I think that
they still need one very clear thing that we've talked about,
and I do not believe that that one very clear
thing is a healthy Jade and Ivy I would agree
with that, I think.
Speaker 2: So I went into this thinking like, we have to
talk about the Pistons, but it sort of can't be them, right,
especially if we're comparing it to Houston, Who's that has
the better net rating that you would certainly still say
has the more established stars in like Shingoon. I mean,
Kate is You could say Kate is probably the best
player on either of those two teams, right, that seems fair.
He's he's better. I think I would take Kate over
Shangoon if we're drafting Rockets and Pistons collectively.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I I, well, I just did Actually, Okay, it's
going to drop soon, that's true. So yeah, I guess
that's why am I talking about this?
Speaker 2: You did it? But but like so Houston just has
I don't know the track record they like they have
Kevin Durant, like im and Thompson, everybody agrees is great.
There's the defensive infrastructure, the size, the offensive rebounding advantages,
and then if you dig into the numbers, like to me,
there are almost more thing if you now what you said,
maybe is where the conversations to start and finish is
like you need Ivy's not solving it. You need someone
in the Ivy spot that is way better than Jade
and Ivy secondary creator, way better than backup pointer, I
would say too for sure, way better than Lover. What
about don Is Jenkins though, well, he's like legit good.
It's like he really is actually good.
Speaker 1: I want to make this And we did a long
thing on the Pistons, and I know Pistons fans, a
lot of them think nobody talks about their team. The
Pistons absolutely look like a top four team in the East,
but the third team most likely to win a title.
I'm just saying they're one move away. For me, putting
them in that discussion is a hall off. Trying to
boil it down too.
Speaker 2: Don't I don't think that's crazy. I think I probably
agree with you. But as I'm looking for stuff to flag,
like how we separating Houston and Detroit? All right? Like,
so I'm gonna look at Houston's ridiculous three point shooting
and say that's not sustaining, right, I'm definitely gonna start there.
They're number one in the league the offensive rebounding. That's
gonna be there for the Rockets. The Pistons are number
three an offenseive rebound rate. Like, I don't think that's
any less real. The Pistons two are eighteenth and three
point percentage. Now that that feels like one you could say, well,
that'll get better, but two, like, I don't know will
it because of the personnel. So that's what you flag there.
I think the biggest thing that I'm conc learned about
other than Detroit's maybe needing somebody in the IVY spot
that's better than ivy. The Pistons, like, as part of
all this paint dominance and rim stuff, they just foul
the shit out of everybody. Uh And I just that
they're the highest opponent free throw rate in the league.
Houston has the lowest, and the difference is ten more
made free throws per hundred field goal attempts per like,
which is just like you're spotting ten Like that's just like,
That's why you might circle back to Houston, is what
I'm saying. Is like, even if you don't believe in
the three point shooting, the points the Pistons give away
by fouling so much, it's just like that you can't
continue to do that, especially if you don't address the
IVY spot.
Speaker 1: I also give the edge to Houston because of Reed Shepherd.
I know that this is going to sound painfully compred
but no, no.
Speaker 2: Hold on, what if what if Reed Shepherd was on
the Pistons, how would you feel about the Pistons?
Speaker 1: Would probably might pick the Pistons well, Bill, because no,
here's the actual thing. We both coming into this season,
we both probably would have identified these teams as having
almost the same need. Maybe we might have used on
a higher urgency with Houston to where I didn't know
Alprin Schankin was going to bring the ball up the
floor on basically every single possession. We don't it was
gonna have to be more of a men Thompson doing
that stuff. Especially with Brett van Fleet injured. You have
al Prince Shang Gun with this version, this version of
alp Prince Shang Gound excuse me, so you have Alperton
Shang Gouden King cunning him the heads of your offensive
snakes today. Reed, Shepherd is the better second guy to
come in either score a bunch of points or initiate
the offense than anyone the Pistons have right now to
do that, and he has proven that. Now.
Speaker 2: I think I'm not gonna sit here and say, oh, like, yeah,
you go Ben shank Gun in the playoffs and Reach
Shepherd will run things.
Speaker 1: But we're trending in sort of that direction. So I
think their second deary, their best second offensive player. I
really think that Houston one has more options because Kevin
durant Aman Thompson reed Shepherd. They have the ability to
in my eyes, to play in a bunch of different
ways offensively and to beat you a bunch of different
ways offensively, where with Detroit it is more likely to
bog down and become cake.
Speaker 2: Cunningham needs to do literally everything, and like the defense
and the toughness, the physicality, like all that stuff works
in the regular season, it'll work in some playoff matchups,
but you're gonna need an audible offensively at some point
you're just close.
Speaker 1: Like I feel like now we're demeaning the Pistons. The
bigger insult Worth throwing is why aren't the Calves just
the answer here?
Speaker 2: Well, so the reason I didn't focus on them is
because I think the analysis is pretty quick, which is like,
I don't know, they haven't been healthy this year. Garland's
toe is a problem again. But if you have all
four of those guys there, and then like if Max
Struce is like if they have if they could get
their rotation healthy, it probably just is the Cavs. But
you'd say, like, I don't know, man, they just like
you said that, I'm not sure about them with physicality
and they're kind of defined by their playoff disappointments so far,
at least with this crew. But now there are reasons
for that. But like an injury is a factor there.
But like the analysis for Cleveland is quite a bit
like more concise and maybe not that interesting, So that's
part of it. But like, I do think the way
that Detroit and Houston have played, like I other than
the Rockets three point shooting, like, none of this feels
flimsy to me. Like that's not to say they're perfect.
I think we've we've isolated what the issues are and
what they might need. But I don't I think if
Cleveland enters the conversation, which it will if they get,
if it gets healthy, neither of these two teams are
leaving it. I don't think. I think what we've seen
so far from Detroit and Houston is like, yeah, they
should be in this conversation for sure.
Speaker 1: Our final question, grant what should be contender has more
reason to panic, and that would be the Warriors, the Timberwolves,
or the Magic.
Speaker 2: Man. I think it has to be the Warriors, even
though all their best lineups when everybody's healthy, are still
just crushing. They're the most US starting lineup is like
plus nineteen. Their top four most used lineups are all
better than that, So it's just like, okay, when you
get into the deep bench and the mix and match
or the old guys don't play, that's when it falls apart.
So like the analysis from preseason and now is not
that different, except like, the team is nine to eight
and has had some just dog shit losses and Steph
Curry will give you forty six and forty nine and
just like truly heroic nights and then book in that
with like a nine pointer and an eleven pointer, so
he can Curry can still reach the heights. But it
isn't an everyday thing, which is just how the aging
curve works. So relative to the Timberwolves, who are like
have kind of like both them and the Magic have
very much righted the ship over the last two weeks
or so, I think Minnesota's like six and one, Orlando's
five and two, and Orlando's peripherals like fifteen defense fifteen
in offense over the last couple of weeks are just like, yep,
that's what the good version of Orlando's supposed to look like, right,
Like that's there they are it's it's harder to get
concerned about either of those two than it is with
the Warriors because they just just like the bottom line
results haven't been as good with Golden State and we
still haven't had a protracted Steph Absence. He was sick
for a couple of games, but like the worst hasn't
happened for Golden State yet. What do you think?
Speaker 1: I it has to be the age thing with like
Steve Kerrz, He's done this before, so it's not now
it's hurting the Warriors. So it's specific. But him saying
the FBA season needs to be shorter is kind of
this early is kind of a harbager of we're fucking
old and we're not going to.
Speaker 2: Have our best hired man. Yeah, we're tired, man, We're
too old for this shit. That was That's what That's
what that rank like. It has to be the Warriors
also because they play in the West and so with Minnesota,
it does feel like their offensive baseline is going to
be super high. I am concerned about their defense, which is, yeah,
it's well little in State.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's ball containment issues. Anthony Edwards waxing and win
even he's been rough offensively recently, but you just know
he'll normalize there. I actually think if we were to
rank these, I'm still second most concerned about the magic.
I Okay, great they're fifteenth in offense or great, awesome,
that's why you gave up four first round picks to
get We're hennry that did Strix from desertit so I
I because now you're just you're gonna get expensive. You're
out of move Jaellen Suggs. I will say the dials.
I'll go to eleven on that dude. It's fun to
see him playing so well. So I they're top of
getting what they're getting out of Tristan da Silva. Anthony
Black is shooting fIF he's shooting fifteen percent on step
back threes. He's a ball sample. He's looked good. So
they have the talent, but they also feel like their
margin for error is just as slim as the Warriors.
But they play in the East, and that's why it's
problematic to me, So their offense needs to They're just
they're trying to play too like they view these it'll
be like one on three in transition, and they're treating
it like that's somehow an advantage that's not been playing
fast needs to me you can bring it back out
when it's only one on three. So but it's the Warriors,
they're just yeah, because all the COMINGA stuff, the pod stuff,
and it's I don't even know because people keep saying, yeah,
they're a team that needs to make a trade, and
I'm like, so the the goal is to shorten this
rotation because you're not just trading Kaminga for four different guys.
He doesn't mean that much money.
Speaker 2: I think too, Like the Warriors have now crept up
to are crept down to last in the league. And turnovers,
which is just always built in, but now it's getting
kind of extreme turnover rate. I should say, I don't
know what the raw total is, said, like, do you
think it's crazy to say though that like the absolute
apex level of any of these three teams is still
highest with the Warriors, But it's just like it's so
fragile that like you just you might get it, you
won't get it as frequent as you might with these
other teams. And so that means the floor is higher
for both Orlando and Minnesota. Yeah, the floor is higher
for those two. Yeah, you're right, that's the best way
for him.
Speaker 1: The Warriors have the highest ceiling and does that, and
I guess when you look at their timeline, they are
the ones that need to operate with the most urgency.
I just and what's this? What's the idea solve here?
What is the is there? Is it? Is it an
archetype of player that can come in and meaningfully change
things or do you look at this as well, this
is a we might just need more bodies issue. This
isn't about getting a singular type of body.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's I don't know that it's not.
It's not as easy as solving it with like put
this player in the rotation because it's like the rotation
when its whole has dominated. So it's but like, so
the solve is like make these guys less old and
make them able to play more. And it's just like
that isn't there? And so yeah, you turn kaminga In
or Pajemski into something I guess, and maybe that makes
it so you don't have to lean as hard on
on the old guys. But actually one solve would be
all Al Horford has been wildly inconsistent and that has
had some really terrible nights and might just be at
an age where it's like, oh, it happened.
Speaker 1: He's he's he's suffering from that Chris Paul arc Last year,
how good was Chris Paul starts every game for this, Yeah,
it's happened. This year, it got it was gonna happen,
and I'm not it's it's too early to say it's
it's it has officially happened, and it's irreversible. But the
early results have suggested that, yeah, well if he's thirty nine,
so this is this is what it looks like, one
real quick thing that I didn't think it was going
to be this bad. And I know it's still early,
but them being a minus seven when Jimmy Butler plays
without Steph Curry, to the point of having Jimmy Butler
on this team, not that it doesn't eat it, but
you get what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: That was the one principal benefit was that he would
prop up those minutes and you don't just give it,
give everything back when when STEP's off the floor. Yeah, no,
that's a huge issue. The turnovers are a huge issue
coming in Pajemski not performing the expectations. I don't know
what expectations were. Not performing is an issue all foreseeable,
right y Oh, then it's gonna get healthy at some
point and everything will be solid. I'll tell you what,
if he looks good at all, Pajemski's minutes are gonna
get cut, buddy, like if he makes open threes and
drives a little bit, just saying yeah, no, it's got
to be the world. They but we knew that, right,
we knew they were fragile.
Speaker 1: Do you have a second, really quick, between Orlando and Mini?
Who are you more concerned about?
Speaker 2: Oh, Orlando, Yeah, just because the offense. I'm gonna need
to see a lot more from the offense to believe
in it. And the silver lining might be the Orlando
is a new coach away, except that that's a next
year thing. You know, it's enough what we've talked about.
How that won't solve it this year if the offense
just continues to ebb and flow.
Speaker 1: Are you ready to take this out of here? Sir?
Speaker 2: I am ready. Thanks everybody for listening, for watching. Please
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