Speaker 1: Next on the drive, Tim McMahon dropping dimes for your
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Speaker 2: tickets mud He's main Ban McMahon, Van mcman The Man.
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Speaker 3: That random, big, busy NBA news.
Speaker 1: Cycle over the past twenty four hours. Our next guest
Speaker 1: good enough to give us some time. NBA Finals week.
Speaker 1: Tim McMahon, Happy Tuesday, sir.
Speaker 4: How are you, howdy partner? How you doing?
Speaker 3: I'm good, I'm good.
Speaker 1: So I see let's say, yeah, I see two Jordan elevens.
Speaker 1: I see two Jordan threes. I see a Jordan four.
Speaker 1: I think that's a six. I see two Jordan ones.
Speaker 1: How many how many pairs of shoes are you bringing
Speaker 1: for this NBA Finals trip of yours?
Speaker 4: Yeah, you are looking at ten pairs. There there will
Speaker 4: be a pair of my feet, then there'll be a
Speaker 4: pair of running shoes, and there will be some Sabrina one.
Speaker 4: That's what I'm hooping in these days. I can't wear
Speaker 4: I can't wear NBA signature shoes, so I guess some
Speaker 4: sabrinas fair enough.
Speaker 3: Best Jordan's.
Speaker 1: I did not know you were a sneaker head, and
Speaker 1: I am a sneaker head in recovery. I have a decent,
Speaker 1: not great collection, but I don't like to spend six
Speaker 1: hundred dollars on shoes anymore. So best Jordan's in your opinion, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't spend six hundreds.
Speaker 4: I like the threes the best. Yes, I am an
Speaker 4: old school guy. You know. You see a lot of
Speaker 4: one stories that do have some two twos lows in there.
Speaker 4: I like the fours five. Yeah, I'm old school. I'm
Speaker 4: like back to the childhood type stuff. The threeses are
Speaker 4: my favorites.
Speaker 3: Threes is the correct answer, all right.
Speaker 1: I already buried the lead, tim because we actually have
Speaker 1: a big piece of jazz news to talk about. Austin
Speaker 1: Inge was announced yesterday as the Jazz President of Basketball Operations,
Speaker 1: and his father, Danny, the CEO of the Jazz, will
Speaker 1: report to him. Justin Zenik, the general manager of the
Speaker 1: Utah Jazz, will report to him. So there was a
Speaker 1: lot of clarity in the presser yesterday in a way
Speaker 1: that quite frankly, Tim, we have not heard. Even when
Speaker 1: Danny was hired, it was kind of like he doesn't
Speaker 1: want to do anything day to day, so he's just
Speaker 1: gonna kind of hang out. Xanik is going to do
Speaker 1: most of the groundwork. So we actually have a little
Speaker 1: bit more clarity with the hierarchy of this front office,
Speaker 1: more so than we've had in a few years.
Speaker 3: What's your reaction.
Speaker 4: I believe that Danny Ainge is reporting to his son
Speaker 4: when I see it. But Danny, like, he's not, like
Speaker 4: he said, he's not a day to day guy. He
Speaker 4: wasn't handling the trade calls and you know down in
Speaker 4: THEMITTI gritty of dealing with the agents and you know,
Speaker 4: at the gms and whatnot. That's been justin Zani's job.
Speaker 4: I think Danny's more of kind of like the senior
Speaker 4: advisor almost to Brian Smith. But you know, obviously people
Speaker 4: are going to look at this, and I think that
Speaker 4: there will obviously be the initial reaction of mechanism of work.
Speaker 4: The one thing I would say is there is not
Speaker 4: a single executive in the NBA who considers often Age
Speaker 4: anything but immensely qualified for a position like this, like
Speaker 4: he was going to be a candidate for other teams.
Speaker 4: You know, he's obviously been in Boston for a while,
Speaker 4: been a significant part of building that Celtics championship team.
Speaker 4: So you know, I do think that this is the
Speaker 4: addition of a strong executive mind to the Jazz's front office,
Speaker 4: and he will be leading the front office. He ultimately
Speaker 4: he's going to be the top basketball uh you know, executive,
Speaker 4: you know, the probably the last voice in Ryan Smith's ear.
Speaker 4: So I don't know exactly how I don't want to
Speaker 4: speculate on how Justin Zanik feels about this. This is
Speaker 4: the second time somebody's been hired over his head by
Speaker 4: Ryan Smith, but he dealt with it just fine, uh
Speaker 4: under Danny Ainge. And you know, I don't know how
Speaker 4: they'll divvy things up in terms of like trade talks
Speaker 4: and dealings with agents, et cetera, et cetera. I thought
Speaker 4: the most interesting from the press conference was his answer
Speaker 4: on the tanking question. And I thought it was a
Speaker 4: pretty direct answer that still managed to leave some wiggle room,
Speaker 4: if that makes sense. But you know, there was, as
Speaker 4: you might expect, a lot of reaction within the Jazz
Speaker 4: organization when the worst case scenario and also the most
Speaker 4: likely scenario is what happened in a lot of and
Speaker 4: it's not just about the lottery odds. You discouraging tanking
Speaker 4: and those kind of are coming into play and you know,
Speaker 4: getting smacked of that reality, but the damage that you're
Speaker 4: doing the player development if you have another season where
Speaker 4: they take the approach that they did last year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and your point about Danny is a really good one.
Speaker 1: And look, I've known the ages of my entire life,
Speaker 1: and you know, Danny doesn't need me to stand up
Speaker 1: for him, and quite frankly, neither does Austin. Austin does
Speaker 1: have a track record as a basketball decision maker for
Speaker 1: an organization that's really been the class of the league,
Speaker 1: among the class of the league for a long time,
Speaker 1: including the fourteen slash seventeen years he's been involved there.
Speaker 1: So their acumen and pedigree speaks for itself, it really does.
Speaker 1: But the Danny point is interesting, Tim, because I've honestly
Speaker 1: just wondered how invested he's been in this entire thing
Speaker 1: at all. And look, he's around, he's at games, and
Speaker 1: he's at workouts and such. But I also know he
Speaker 1: likes those riverside tea times. And I also know that
Speaker 1: he likes spending time I'm with his grandkids. He's not
Speaker 1: one of those guys that just gives you a face value, Hey,
Speaker 1: I want to spend time with my family. Answer then
Speaker 1: goes and travels to Europe for six months out of
Speaker 1: the year. He's a father and a grandfather, and he
Speaker 1: is living his life in his later stages in the
Speaker 1: way that he wants to do it. I wonder if
Speaker 1: you think Austin's addition could indicate that Danny will even
Speaker 1: be a little bit more removed than he has been,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 4: And look, it's not like Danny Ainge wanted to go
Speaker 4: work for the Utah Jazz exactly. He was recruited by
Speaker 4: Ryan Smith. And again I don't necessarily know that this
Speaker 4: is going to change a lot for Danny, because he
Speaker 4: wasn't doing the day to day stuff. You know, he
Speaker 4: wasn't grinding on the trade calls, and he wasn't you know,
Speaker 4: worrying about who they're going to sign to a two
Speaker 4: way contract. He wasn't dealing with the agents. That's all
Speaker 4: been justin Xanik's job. And so I don't know if
Speaker 4: this changes is a lot for Danny. Again, I'm more
Speaker 4: curious to know how much will it change for Justin Xanik.
Speaker 4: But you know, this is a by NBA standards. They've
Speaker 4: had a relatively lean front office. You know, they've also
Speaker 4: let a couple other people in that front office go
Speaker 4: this off season, so you know, there still could be
Speaker 4: some hires to come well. You know, and the other
Speaker 4: thing I think that we should point out is, you know,
Speaker 4: while Will Hardy wasn't like part of the hiring process
Speaker 4: for us and names, they do have a relationship. You know,
Speaker 4: they did work together for a year in Boston. You know,
Speaker 4: I do know there's a lot of mutual respect there
Speaker 4: and you know, I would certainly anticipate that it would
Speaker 4: be a productive, harmonious head coach lead executive relationship between
Speaker 4: those two.
Speaker 1: So the xantic portion tim Okay, So let's let's be
Speaker 1: very clear. If you are able to traverse your way
Speaker 1: into an NBA general manager job, you simply want to
Speaker 1: keep that job.
Speaker 3: And it is one of.
Speaker 1: The best jobs that Justin probably ever thought he could get.
Speaker 1: He was a finalist in Milwaukee, in the fact, I
Speaker 1: think he actually almost took the job.
Speaker 4: No, he was and then they he was like next
Speaker 4: in line, and I forgot the exact circumstances, but he
Speaker 4: kind of got strength and that deal.
Speaker 1: Right, and they gave it to Horst and then Dennis
Speaker 1: Lindsay moved on and jay Z was elevated to general manager.
Speaker 1: And Tim, I know that you said that you don't
Speaker 1: want to speculate on where his head is that with this,
Speaker 1: But where's his head at with this?
Speaker 4: I haven't talked to him, and I'm not going to
Speaker 4: put words in a guy's mouth, you know. I mean,
Speaker 4: jay Z has always been a very faithful, hardworking employee
Speaker 4: of the Utah Jazz. I don't know anything that would
Speaker 4: indicate that that would change. Yeah. The other thing is
Speaker 4: he's had some extremely serious health issues. You know, how
Speaker 4: to get a life stating transplant. You know, maybe taking
Speaker 4: a little bit off his plate would be beneficial. Man.
Speaker 4: But again, that's me getting into speculation that I really
Speaker 4: don't want to do because I have not had a
Speaker 4: discussion with him.
Speaker 3: So let's go back to what you reference.
Speaker 1: And that was Austin's answer as a result of the
Speaker 1: question asked by our very own Sean O'Connell about the
Speaker 1: philosophy on tanking and it was a great SoundBite. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've had a lot of people send it to me like, oh,
Speaker 1: I guess things are changing, but I don't believe it
Speaker 1: to be true. And it's pretty simple, tim like, there
Speaker 1: is this top eight protected first round pick next year
Speaker 1: that if the Jazz aren't in the top eight, it
Speaker 1: goes to the team that's probably about to win the
Speaker 1: World championship, and then the year after I believe it
Speaker 1: conveys to two second rounders.
Speaker 3: I think something like that.
Speaker 1: So next okay, So next year is the final time
Speaker 1: that the bill could come do. And when you are
Speaker 1: a team that is in such bad need of a
Speaker 1: talent infusion, you cannot afford to lose a f round
Speaker 1: pick that could be, you know, a player that ultimately
Speaker 1: does hit, because they need players that are going to hit.
Speaker 1: So I understand what Austin said. I don't believe that
Speaker 1: that's going to be the approach. How do you think
Speaker 1: they do approach this season based off of the need
Speaker 1: to hang on to an asset I believe they badly
Speaker 1: need to hang on to.
Speaker 4: Can you read the exact quote to me? Do you
Speaker 4: have that in front of you?
Speaker 1: It was simply if Seohn asked him his philosophy on
Speaker 1: tanking manipulating minutes, you know, in the name of better
Speaker 1: draft odds, and Austin simply said, you will not see
Speaker 1: that this year.
Speaker 4: So you might see and you don't have to call
Speaker 4: it tank, and you might see long term transactions that
Speaker 4: make it even more difficult for the Jazz to put
Speaker 4: a winning product on the floor next year. Is that
Speaker 4: tanking or is that doing what's in the best long
Speaker 4: term interest of your franchise. I think, you know, if
Speaker 4: you take his statement at face value, they're not going
Speaker 4: to tank by coming up with mythical injuries. Okay, They're
Speaker 4: not going to tank by sitting there better players during
Speaker 4: the fourth quarters. They're not going to be you know.
Speaker 4: I mean, I think a fair word is dishonest about
Speaker 4: trying to on a night to night basis win basketball games.
Speaker 4: That doesn't mean that they're going to win a lot
Speaker 4: of games next year. Now, Will has proven that if
Speaker 4: if you know, if you give him NBA caliber talent,
Speaker 4: that he's probably gonna the Jazz will probably win more
Speaker 4: games under his coaching, then you would think just looking
Speaker 4: at it on paper, Uh, you know, if they're if
Speaker 4: they're not doing you know, egregious tanking measures, but like,
Speaker 4: look at the Western Conference, tell me which team you
Speaker 4: realistically think the Jazz are going to be better than
Speaker 4: next year?
Speaker 3: There is one?
Speaker 4: Okay, I was gonna wait. So look, they they went
Speaker 4: all out to get the worst record in the league
Speaker 4: last year. They ended up with the fifth pick, which
Speaker 4: again was the worst case scenario in that situation and
Speaker 4: by far the most likely. It's like forty seven point
Speaker 4: nine percent chance that if you have the worst record
Speaker 4: in the league, that's where you're gonna land. So it's
Speaker 4: not a shock that's where they landed. Now, what did
Speaker 4: they pay in terms of player development? Maybe bad habits
Speaker 4: kicking in, you know that sort of thing. How much
Speaker 4: they did they stunt the growth of you know, recent
Speaker 4: draft picks that are on that roster, that were in
Speaker 4: that rotation. You know, those are all questions that need
Speaker 4: to be discussed internally much less you know, on radio
Speaker 4: shows and whatnot. But I think realistically, you know, they're
Speaker 4: not going to make win now trades this summer. I mean,
Speaker 4: that'd just be silly. I think realistically, like we're looking
Speaker 4: at a team that's probably going to still land pretty
Speaker 4: high in the lottery. Now, if you land fifth or sixth.
Speaker 4: You know, I'm not looking at the table right in
Speaker 4: front of me. But to get to your point, the
Speaker 4: fear isn't necessarily oh my gosh, we might have fifth
Speaker 4: or six taken the drafting in it, so we might
Speaker 4: get leap frogged a couple of times. And you know,
Speaker 4: if you're if you're seventh especially, might get leapfrog a
Speaker 4: couple of times. Lad ninth. That would be a disaster.
Speaker 4: It would be a total disaster. Obviously, it's in the
Speaker 4: ninth overall pick to the Oklahoma City Thunder, So there's
Speaker 4: a there's a lot of gray here, a lot of
Speaker 4: nuance here. But to just repeat the approach that they
Speaker 4: took last year, I mean, I think you're kind of
Speaker 4: giving up on the young guys on the roster if
Speaker 4: you want to do that.
Speaker 1: So if they if they, if they want to uh
Speaker 1: go about their business of losing while being serious about
Speaker 1: trying to compete, I feel like it means they have
Speaker 1: to move off of marketing and probably Kessler, because if
Speaker 1: if Larry plays seventy five games, if Walker plays seventy
Speaker 1: seventy five games, if Colin Sexton plays seventy to seventy
Speaker 1: seventy five games and John Collins was better. And your
Speaker 1: point about Will is absolutely spot on. Okay, with a
Speaker 1: coach who has shown that he can maximize whatever talent
Speaker 1: he has if you allow him to maximize it, I
Speaker 1: see a team that could win thirty thirty five games
Speaker 1: in the West. I don't see a team that's making
Speaker 1: the playoffs or hanging a banner. But I see a
Speaker 1: team as presley constituted, and certainly if they draft a
Speaker 1: kid at five, they can step in and play right away,
Speaker 1: and they play all the vets and they do their
Speaker 1: best to win games. I see a team that can
Speaker 1: win between thirty and thirty five games, which puts you
Speaker 1: right in that area of potentially not being in the
Speaker 1: top seven or top eight, which is the worst possible
Speaker 1: outcome that we could actually come up with. So if
Speaker 1: they are going to do the thing where it's like, no,
Speaker 1: we are going to put our best foot forward and
Speaker 1: try to compete, I think it means they have to
Speaker 1: move off of Larry and probably Walker.
Speaker 4: I would agree that, you know, if they if they
Speaker 4: reached the conclusion that hey, we have got an reasonable conclusion,
Speaker 4: we've got to at least be in the top eight
Speaker 4: that there's you know, they need to address some of
Speaker 4: the uh Win probability issues. I had to put it
Speaker 4: politely via the trademarket, and I mean, do you think
Speaker 4: anybody in that roster is untouchable? No, Lowry wasn't untouchable
Speaker 4: last year. Now, their asking price for Lowry was I
Speaker 4: think other teams would say way too high, you know.
Speaker 4: Does that come down this year? I don't know. Again,
Speaker 4: I think those are discussions that need to be had.
Speaker 4: I don't think they asking price for Sexton or for Collins,
Speaker 4: or for the Clarkson or is too high, you know. Tesser.
Speaker 4: To me, that's a tough one though, because he absolutely
Speaker 4: is a guy who you could envision as the defensive
Speaker 4: backbone of a good team, you know, four or five
Speaker 4: years down the road. You know, it's not hard to
Speaker 4: look at Kessler, not not as like your franchise player obviously,
Speaker 4: but as a piece of a foundation that you can
Speaker 4: build upon. So that that one's tougher for me.
Speaker 3: I agree with you. I love Walker, I love Larry.
Speaker 3: Larry's good man.
Speaker 1: Like I'm just trying to understand how this thing can
Speaker 1: work with the long term game in mind, because to
Speaker 1: your earlier point him, they're a marathon away from the
Speaker 1: better teams in the Western Conference. I mean, Chris Finch
Speaker 1: after the Minnesota loss, He's like, hey, there are thirteen
Speaker 1: teams in the West. They're going to be trying to
Speaker 1: compete for home court. And it's like, oh, okay, so
Speaker 1: it's probably the Jazz and the Blazers that aren't. But
Speaker 1: because they're so far away, part of me believes they're
Speaker 1: probably going to look at some of the stuff and
Speaker 1: keep the you know, the mindset of we are three,
Speaker 1: four five years away from being being able to compete
Speaker 1: with the top teams, and maybe that does make Walker expendable,
Speaker 1: even though I agree with you that's a tough, tough
Speaker 1: decision to make because he's been so good.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and again, like they would listen to him last year,
Speaker 4: but they were asking for at least a couple of
Speaker 4: first round picks, and you know, and and then if
Speaker 4: you get into the discussions around now, what are the
Speaker 4: quality of picks, blah blah blah. You know, the lottery
Speaker 4: things also interesting to me because honestly, if you're going
Speaker 4: to trade him, was he more or less valuable in
Speaker 4: the trade market before you gave him a full blown
Speaker 4: max contract, you know, And I don't know, and I
Speaker 4: don't know. I don't know what his value would be
Speaker 4: in the trademarket now. I do think it's like Austin
Speaker 4: Ainge has to find out doesn't mean he has to
Speaker 4: trade him, but he has to find out what the
Speaker 4: value is. And I'm not sure, you know, And just
Speaker 4: like you can't really evaluate marketing his performance last year,
Speaker 4: I mean, it's such a weird situation or Dad not
Speaker 4: to play for no, they were clearly tanking, you know.
Speaker 4: He was out of the line up every couple of
Speaker 4: games just because they're like, hey, if you play, we
Speaker 4: might actually actually win this one. But he had a
Speaker 4: bad year. I don't know, man, I think I think
Speaker 4: some teams might have trouble figuring out what his value
Speaker 4: would be.
Speaker 1: So with the news today that the New York Knicks
Speaker 1: have moved off of Tom Thibodeau, you know, after going
Speaker 1: to the Eastern Conference finals, after winning fifty games and
Speaker 1: back to back years making the playoffs for the last
Speaker 1: five the last three years, the most playoff wins belong
Speaker 1: to Boston, Denver, and New York is third. It's another
Speaker 1: example of an impulsive owner who'd rather play the kazoo
Speaker 1: for his dumb band that actually continue to build something
Speaker 1: that means something. And so where where I think and
Speaker 1: look to be fair. Only time will tell if this
Speaker 1: is going to work. But bottom line is you need players,
Speaker 1: Nick players. The Jazz don't. But what Ryan has elected
Speaker 1: to do is kind of the anti Dolan approach. And
Speaker 1: Will Hardy, who's won thirty four percent of his games,
Speaker 1: is under contract forever and now he's locked in his
Speaker 1: front office guys that you know, I believe will be
Speaker 1: around for a long long time. Only time will tell
Speaker 1: if this is the right approach, And the bottom line
Speaker 1: is you do need players, but Ryan has elected to
Speaker 1: believe in the people he's hired and give them stability
Speaker 1: moving forward and playing the long game to try to
Speaker 1: build this thing.
Speaker 4: You know, I think good ownership is hiring good people
Speaker 4: and trusting them to do their job and supporting them
Speaker 4: without meddling. You know, Jim Dolan is not a good owner.
Speaker 4: He's just not. The next have been good the last
Speaker 4: four years, you know, Leon Rose, I would say done
Speaker 4: a good job all things considered, But I mean, I
Speaker 4: just I don't understand fir and Tips here, and there
Speaker 4: have been noise about his job maybe being in jeopardy
Speaker 4: for really going back months now, for a lot of
Speaker 4: the season, but after an Eastern Conference Finals birth, and
Speaker 4: I don't know, maybe they I would hope they know
Speaker 4: who their next hire is going to be. I don't
Speaker 4: know that. I've not even heard like really informed speculation
Speaker 4: on that yet. But just firing TIBs and then by
Speaker 4: figuring it out on the fly that doesn't seem to
Speaker 4: be a good plan. Now, good luck getting any idea
Speaker 4: of what their actual plan might be, because you know what.
Speaker 4: You know what the Jazz do, and almost every team
Speaker 4: in the league does it, with the exceptional one. When
Speaker 4: they make a major, major decision, they have the people
Speaker 4: who made the decision hold a press conference where they
Speaker 4: can be asked about things, where they can explain why,
Speaker 4: where they can explain their vision. The Knicks don't do
Speaker 4: that at all. And I don't understand that either. There's
Speaker 4: a lot of things that I don't understand about the Nicks.
Speaker 4: But you just you're in the midst of your most
Speaker 4: success full run in at least a quarter of a century,
Speaker 4: and then you say you need to get a new voice, okay,
Speaker 4: and Honestly, I really don't even want to hear from
Speaker 4: Leon Rose or Jim Dolan. What I really want to
Speaker 4: get is Jamn Bruns's honest thoughts on this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, No, for sure.
Speaker 1: He was asked about coach coach Tibbodeaux after Game six,
Speaker 1: and I thought he gave a really supportive, salient answer.
Speaker 1: I wonder how much of this and this is I
Speaker 1: guess it was. Haberstrow hopped on yesterday and pointed out
Speaker 1: because I asked him. I asked Tommy yesterday, what does
Speaker 1: the offseason look like in New York? Because I think
Speaker 1: they've got a cat problem.
Speaker 3: And the cat.
Speaker 1: Conundrum is interesting because there's so much to like about
Speaker 1: his game and then he just he doesn't close out,
Speaker 1: doesn't guard. You can put him in pick and roll
Speaker 1: and he looks like he's never done it before. And
Speaker 1: Tom brought up this whole Leon Rose worldwide West Karl
Speaker 1: Anthony toown CAAA relationship that had gone back to Kentucky basically,
Speaker 1: and there's a case to be made that this is
Speaker 1: the second time. Maybe Kat wasn't thrilled for the plane
Speaker 1: plane for Tom. He played Borham in Minnesota too. Is
Speaker 1: there anything there? I mean, you bring up the Jalen portion,
Speaker 1: and Jalen is more important than Cat.
Speaker 3: Is he just is to the Knicks.
Speaker 1: But do you think there's anything with this Cat thing
Speaker 1: that you know was a theory that's being thrown around.
Speaker 4: The thought crossed my mind. Definitely crossed my mind. And
Speaker 4: I'll be honest with you. When they traded for Cat,
Speaker 4: one of the first things that I wondered was how
Speaker 4: is that going to work with Tibbs? Because it was
Speaker 4: not pretty in Minnesota. You know, I've reached out to
Speaker 4: some people to try to get some clarity there. I
Speaker 4: don't have that right now, so I don't want to
Speaker 4: get too far out, you know, kind of over my skis.
Speaker 4: But yeah, definitely the thought cross my mind. You know,
Speaker 4: I'll also say this, there are people in Minnesota who
Speaker 4: think that the Knicks traded for Cat is a stepping
Speaker 4: stone to make another trade. So, you know, it'll be
Speaker 4: interesting to see. There's gonna be a whole lot of
Speaker 4: big splashes this summer. It'll be interesting to see if
Speaker 4: Kat's part of another one or if he's back in
Speaker 4: New York next year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, look, I think they were ahead of
Speaker 1: schedule by making to the Eastern Conference Finals. But I
Speaker 1: think if they have premonitions of going beyond it, they've
Speaker 1: got serious, you know, issues with their roster.
Speaker 3: They don't have depth either.
Speaker 1: I mean a lot of people are saying, you know,
Speaker 1: and I said this too, because Kat and Jalen and
Speaker 1: everybody they just look gassed in the fourth. So I
Speaker 1: talked to you about can you find ten minutes for
Speaker 1: Delon right or precious Achiuwa? But like their bench is bad.
Speaker 1: I understand what Tom looks down his bench and is like,
Speaker 1: I've got to play these guys.
Speaker 3: They are so much better. Do you think they move
Speaker 3: off of Kat?
Speaker 1: I mean, you think that's a realistic thing and try
Speaker 1: to reformulate something different.
Speaker 4: I think he would have to be an awfully big splash,
Speaker 4: an awfully big splash for that to happen. But we
Speaker 4: will see, you know, I will say this. I've talked
Speaker 4: to people in the next front office and kind of
Speaker 4: the joke there is, why do we go through all
Speaker 4: this trouble looking for players knowing the TIBs is going
Speaker 4: to play at seven anyway? So that's fair, you know,
Speaker 4: you can kind of chicken an egg that all you want.
Speaker 4: But their depth was not They did not have quality
Speaker 4: depth and listen, I think macal Bridges is a very
Speaker 4: good player. Certainly giving up five picks for him was
Speaker 4: a questionable move.
Speaker 1: What stood out most and maybe we need to talk
Speaker 1: about well, you know this because you covered him. I mean,
Speaker 1: Rick Carlisle is he's so good, you know, and it's
Speaker 1: been interesting listening to him after both the Knixt series
Speaker 1: and the Cavs series just kind of say we're flying
Speaker 1: right now, like these teams just ran into a group.
Speaker 1: That's what stood What stood out most about the way
Speaker 1: the Pacers were able to figure it out they started
Speaker 1: ten and fifteen. And your thoughts on the fact that
Speaker 1: Rick Carlile once again is back in the NBA Finals
Speaker 1: with a roster that nobody thought had a chance.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think just what stands out the most to
Speaker 4: me is just how unique their style of play is
Speaker 4: and how good they are at it and how well
Speaker 4: suited their personnel is for it. They play fast, and
Speaker 4: it's wide open spaces and it's perfectly tailored to Tyrese Halliburton.
Speaker 4: And you know, I see the roots of this whole
Speaker 4: thing in the Mabicks twenty eleven championship season when Kid
Speaker 4: handed the keys over to Jason Kidd and kind of
Speaker 4: really adapted and changed his offensive philosophy. And this is
Speaker 4: like an extreme version of that, where it's Rick's not
Speaker 4: calling plays. He has created a system and a scheme
Speaker 4: and he's trusting a brilliant offensive playmaker to run it
Speaker 4: at extraordinarily fast paced and it's working, wonders. And I
Speaker 4: tell you what, man, You know, I sketched my head
Speaker 4: about Tims getting fired, but it was a just appalling
Speaker 4: how horrible the next transition defense was in that series?
Speaker 4: How many times did the Knicks score? And three or
Speaker 4: four seconds later, Pascal Siakam just ran a go Riding's
Speaker 4: laying it up on the other end, for sure, Like
Speaker 4: how many fast breaks were there? And give the Pacers
Speaker 4: a lot of credit for that too, but like, my goodness,
Speaker 4: how many fast breaks can the team have off of
Speaker 4: a may bucket? But again, that's just like the Pacers
Speaker 4: are relentless and very well constructed to run that style
Speaker 4: of offense from the quarterback, you know, to all the
Speaker 4: other guys, you know Siakam in particular, but the other
Speaker 4: guys as well, who were spacing the floor and finishing
Speaker 4: plays all.
Speaker 3: Right, Tim, Before I set you loose. There is the
Speaker 3: finals that's last to be played.
Speaker 1: We've already launched into so many dramatic offseason storylines that
Speaker 1: we forget. Starting Thursday, Oklahoma City and Indianapolis will do
Speaker 1: battle for the right to be the NBA champ. It
Speaker 1: feels hard, almost impossible for anybody to slow down this
Speaker 1: OKC train based off of what they've done all year.
Speaker 1: Quite frankly, twenty nine to one against the East. Can
Speaker 1: Indiana make it interesting?
Speaker 4: Do you think Rick Carlisle would have to pull the
Speaker 4: kind of miracle that he did in twenty eleven when
Speaker 4: he out coached Eric Spolstrom, not saying he can't do it,
Speaker 4: but saying it's going to be tough.
Speaker 1: All right, man, Well enjoy the trip. I'm glad you
Speaker 1: have accurate and enough footwear, and I'm glad I've learned
Speaker 1: this information about you today.
Speaker 3: Good insight on the show and we'll chat soon.
Speaker 4: Thanks, Tim, appreciate it as all right.
Speaker 1: Tim McMahon covers the covers the NBA for ESPN covers
Speaker 1: the jazz. He's the jazz guy for the Worldwide Leader
Speaker 1: at ESPN. Underscore at McMahon is where you find him
Speaker 1: on Twitter. He did write a book about Luka Dotcic
Speaker 1: called Luka Dotcic in the Curse of Greatness, and the
Speaker 1: links are up on his Twitter page at.
Speaker 3: ESPN Underscore McMahon tim.
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