Speaker 1: Next on the Drive, Tim McMahon dropping dimes for your
Speaker 1: NBA Daily assists.
Speaker 2: Van McMahon, Van McMahon batted a Land Texas blood As tickets, Mud,
Speaker 2: He's man, Van McMahon, Van McMahon, the man Man.
Speaker 3: He is Ban McMahon.
Speaker 1: He is the great Tim McMahon, who just a couple
Speaker 1: of days ago was on television sporting a very handsome
Speaker 1: cowboy hats? Or is ESPN Sports Center hits? Tim Happy Tuesday?
Speaker 1: Was that your idea or was the idea of one
Speaker 1: of the producers.
Speaker 4: Howdy Parker. No, that was definitely the idea of one
Speaker 4: of the producers. It actually believed or not? The first
Speaker 4: cowboy out of my life?
Speaker 3: Are you serious?
Speaker 1: Because you look like that was like a consistent thing
Speaker 1: that you that you sport from time to time.
Speaker 4: Well, listen, I am a Texan, but my first cowboy
Speaker 4: at and you know I can pull off a lot
Speaker 4: of looks.
Speaker 1: You sure can now what was on a few Which
Speaker 1: kicks did you go with for the cowboy hat?
Speaker 4: It was a simple look dead day. It was just
Speaker 4: some nice white and brown Nike blazer lows.
Speaker 3: Okay, very very nice.
Speaker 1: I've got to ask because I feel like everybody's been complaining.
Speaker 1: Did you run into travel issues going from Oka See
Speaker 1: to Indianapolis as well?
Speaker 4: Wasn't too bad? Had they always? You know, mixed emotions
Speaker 4: layover in my home airport where I don't actually get
Speaker 4: to go home. But other than thatt, no, no, no,
Speaker 4: just you know a little connection to here boo there,
Speaker 4: I was.
Speaker 1: Okay, fair enough. Well, since we're in Salt Lake, Tim,
Speaker 1: I won't bury the lead. I'll ask you a couple
Speaker 1: of jazz questions because over the past twenty four or
Speaker 1: forty eight hours, Sarah Todd, front of the show, works
Speaker 1: for the Desert Red News. Bill Simmons himself has talked
Speaker 1: about this. I think Zach Lowe, your former buddy, talked
Speaker 1: about it as well. That apparently, according to several outlets
Speaker 1: and sources, the Jazz are actively taking calls on Lowry
Speaker 1: and Walker, who I think are the two best players
Speaker 1: on the roster. Can you shed some light on this
Speaker 1: as a guy who knows people over there and covers
Speaker 1: the jazz for ESPN.
Speaker 4: Well, they actively took calls on him last summer too,
Speaker 4: so it's not necessarily a change. I mean, I think,
Speaker 4: as we found out last summer, there's a long way
Speaker 4: from actively taking calls to getting a trade done. I mean,
Speaker 4: they took a lot of calls on both those guys
Speaker 4: last summer and never got anywhere close to making a trade. Now,
Speaker 4: you know, I'm not going to sit here and tell
Speaker 4: you that there's no way those guys would be traded.
Speaker 4: If you're willing to listen, you're willing to make a trade.
Speaker 4: But I do think that the price is still pretty high,
Speaker 4: and you know, I don't know, you know, obviously Austin
Speaker 4: Age is running the show there now. I don't know
Speaker 4: if the price will be as high as it was
Speaker 4: last summer. But like you know, there's a whole lot
Speaker 4: of talk about Lowry going to the Warriors that never
Speaker 4: got close because not only were the Warriors not willing
Speaker 4: to discuss Brandon Podjemsky, but like the picks, they never
Speaker 4: got close in the Picks either. So we'll see what happens.
Speaker 4: Stay tuned. I do I do think though that you know,
Speaker 4: when you heard Austin Ames basically say we're not going
Speaker 4: to tank by manipulating minutes as you know, or you
Speaker 4: know basically they're not going to tank with disingenuous injury
Speaker 4: reports is what he meant as well. There, he didn't
Speaker 4: say they weren't going to be bad. He didn't say
Speaker 4: that the you know, the roster wouldn't be very difficult
Speaker 4: to win with next year, and so you know, I
Speaker 4: don't I'll put it like that, I don't think that
Speaker 4: the Jazz are planning to win thirty five games next year.
Speaker 1: So, ultimately, you know, if all of this is true,
Speaker 1: and I have no idea, it feels like everyone's just
Speaker 1: discussing the possibility, because, as you've said, even though Lowry
Speaker 1: could not be traded after being signed, it felt like
Speaker 1: prior to them signing him, they were con you know,
Speaker 1: at least considering moving on from him, at least considering.
Speaker 1: So if they're really actively I'm not gonna say shopping
Speaker 1: to your point, I'll just say taking calls and kicking
Speaker 1: the tires on the interest for marketing and the Walker one,
Speaker 1: I don't know, man, he's twenty three and he's so good.
Speaker 1: That's gonna be tough if they end up deciding to
Speaker 1: move on from him. But is it just safe to
Speaker 1: surmise that maybe they add number five this year and
Speaker 1: number twenty one this year, and maybe two second rounders
Speaker 1: that are nineteen, twenty twenty one, next to Kyle Philipowski
Speaker 1: who's twenty one, and Isaiah Collier who's twenty and Taylor
Speaker 1: Hendricks who's twenty one, and Keyontae George who's still young,
Speaker 1: and Cody was twenty, Like, is it safe to say
Speaker 1: that they're probably just gonna maybe do what the Wizards
Speaker 1: did last year?
Speaker 3: And know we're not tanking, but we are playing young.
Speaker 1: Players exclusively that aren't ready to win pro basketball games.
Speaker 4: I think that's a you know, that's a fair belief. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't know. Like, look, I thought that they were
Speaker 4: gonna end up trading one of their veterans or even
Speaker 4: a couple of their veterans Clarkson Collins, Colin Sexton before
Speaker 4: last year's trade deadline. That never happened. They just have
Speaker 4: long running cases of like planet FASTI the itis and
Speaker 4: don't even remember what else was on the injury report.
Speaker 4: If you take off Stage's word the you know, the
Speaker 4: uncurable uh planet fastidis cases won't continue. But again, I
Speaker 4: don't think they will have as many veterans on the
Speaker 4: rosters even they did last year. You know, this is
Speaker 4: this is a franchise that's a long way away. From
Speaker 4: uh putting together a competitive team. Now, Walker Kessler could
Speaker 4: certainly be part of their next competitive team. I mean,
Speaker 4: you can make a case that marketing could as well.
Speaker 4: I think it's a little bit harder to make the
Speaker 4: case for Loally.
Speaker 1: All right, before we move on to the finals, which
Speaker 1: we will because there are teams playing, do you have
Speaker 1: a pulse on how the front office feels about this
Speaker 1: group of young players? And I mean it's not fair
Speaker 1: to lump them all in together because their unique circumstances. Namely,
Speaker 1: Taylor Hendricks got hurt. We don't know as much about him,
Speaker 1: but the Keyante Georges, the Isaiah Colliers, the Kyle Philipowski's,
Speaker 1: the Cody Williams, like the draft picks that they've made,
Speaker 1: the young players they've drafted, how do you think the
Speaker 1: front office is.
Speaker 3: Currently analyzing them and what they could be.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know it's still so young, but we've
Speaker 1: got to talk about the players that could be part
Speaker 1: of the future.
Speaker 4: I mean, there have been glimpses from some of those,
Speaker 4: But like Cody Williams, obviously you weren't making a lot
Speaker 4: of grand conclusions about him. After the last season. You
Speaker 4: knew he was wrong when you draft him, you know,
Speaker 4: didn't do a whole lot of lead lot like Taylor
Speaker 4: Hendricks and uh, you know after his rookie year, they
Speaker 4: did feel like Taylor Hendricks made some massive strides over
Speaker 4: the summer and then unfortunately he got hurt very early
Speaker 4: in the season. I think, you know, all the guys
Speaker 4: you mentioned, Isaiah Colliers probably impressed the most. You know,
Speaker 4: Keyante George has has shown glimpses, but there was disappointment
Speaker 4: and his lack of competitiveness on the defensive end this
Speaker 4: year for sure. So you know, one thing you can
Speaker 4: say is there's not a guy who's shown any uh
Speaker 4: you know, who's provided any great uh reasons for confidence
Speaker 4: that they can be like a major piece of a
Speaker 4: championship type of core from that group. Now they're young,
Speaker 4: maybe maybe there's you know one two, a few of
Speaker 4: those guys can grow into that. But for having as
Speaker 4: many young guys on the roster, you'd hope there would
Speaker 4: have been more so forward than there has him from
Speaker 4: that group.
Speaker 3: For sure.
Speaker 1: No, I agree there all right before we get to
Speaker 1: the finals, I mean you just hear all of these
Speaker 1: conversations about what could be a very dramatic, massive offseason
Speaker 1: in the NBA, and you know coaches and coaches have
Speaker 1: already lost their jobs. We talked about Tom Thibeau last week.
Speaker 1: Of all of the big names that could be on
Speaker 1: the move that could actually change a landscape of what
Speaker 1: the league could look like, who would you say is
Speaker 1: the most realistic and where would you say is the
Speaker 1: most realistic landing spot?
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, it will be very surprised if Kevin
Speaker 4: Durand does not get traded. And you know, most realistic
Speaker 4: spot that I don't know, there's probably six, maybe more
Speaker 4: than that, like realistic candidates. I just kind of would
Speaker 4: be throwing dark right now to say where I think
Speaker 4: he would land out of those. You know, right now,
Speaker 4: I'm not sure if Jannis is going to be on
Speaker 4: the trademark it or not. It's it's really kind of
Speaker 4: up to him. Like the Bucks don't want to trade him.
Speaker 4: If he goes to them and ass out, I think
Speaker 4: they would grant the request and try to get a
Speaker 4: good value for him. But it hasn't happened yet. The
Speaker 4: Bucks have been out of the playoffs for quite some time,
Speaker 4: so you know, the honest thing is at a stay
Speaker 4: tuned stage right now.
Speaker 3: So among your duties for the worldwide leader.
Speaker 1: Dallas Mavericks, of course, is a team you cover and
Speaker 1: cover well and no people over there. I just don't
Speaker 1: know why Jason Kidd would leave what Dallas has in
Speaker 1: exchange for what New York has, And I don't know
Speaker 1: how really this is your buddy, Brian Winhorse is the
Speaker 1: one that's talked about it, But they just landed the
Speaker 1: number one overall pick. Yes, they traded your boy Luca,
Speaker 1: but we're still looking at a roster with Ad and
Speaker 1: Kyrie and some other you know, PJ.
Speaker 3: Washington, Klay Thompson's.
Speaker 1: It is far from a bad situation, and honestly, with
Speaker 1: Cooper Flag on the way, it feels like it could
Speaker 1: be sustainable for a lot longer than anything New York
Speaker 1: has on their roster. So how real are these rumors?
Speaker 1: And if you're Jason Kidd, is that something you really
Speaker 1: want to look to do?
Speaker 4: Well? I would say that the Knicks did just come
Speaker 4: off of a Conference finals appearance with a franchise player
Speaker 4: who Jason Kidd knows very well and likes a lot,
Speaker 4: really respects talking about jenen Brunson, obviously, and if there
Speaker 4: was anything to it, this stuff would have been squashed.
Speaker 4: If Jason Kidd was just happy to be in Dallas
Speaker 4: and wouldn't want to consider the next job, he would
Speaker 4: have made that very clear by now, you know, if
Speaker 4: the Mavericks were just unwilling to consider allowing j Kidd
Speaker 4: to and I'm not gonna say talk to the Knicks,
Speaker 4: to go to the Knicks because you're not granting he's
Speaker 4: not asking for permission to interview. He's asked for permission
Speaker 4: to be hired. The Mavericks weren't willing to consider that,
Speaker 4: it would seem reasonable that they would have made that
Speaker 4: very clear. Now. So the stuff has been out there
Speaker 4: for a little while and it hadn't been squashed, and
Speaker 4: so you know, we will see what happens. But it's
Speaker 4: also been a pretty sloppy process by the Knicks. That
Speaker 4: we're being honest, Like I don't really understand you fire TIBs,
Speaker 4: you're top targeted a guy who's with another team, you
Speaker 4: still have an after permission, like I don't you know,
Speaker 4: I don't know, like the plant bees apparently, like you know,
Speaker 4: I mid Oakland rockstormline that happened, Chris Binch, I'm not
Speaker 4: sure why the Wolves would allow that to happen. So
Speaker 4: it's it's been a strange process by the Knicks.
Speaker 1: What would that compensation package look like? New York does
Speaker 1: not have draft capital, Like, how would that What do
Speaker 1: you think that would look like if it actually went down.
Speaker 4: I mean, they do have some draft capital, they just
Speaker 4: don't have, you know, great draft capital. They got kind
Speaker 4: of a phony first round pick because the protections from
Speaker 4: the Wizards. You know, there's some swaps, there's some you know,
Speaker 4: they got seconds like, I mean, it's not like the
Speaker 4: Mavericks are going to get like a bonanza first round capitol.
Speaker 4: Ab but obviously, but here's a thing. If if it
Speaker 4: reaches a point where the Mavericks feel like j Kidd
Speaker 4: has made up his mind, I don't know if you
Speaker 4: want to permit him from leaving.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's fair for sure. All right, Well there's still
Speaker 1: teams playing basketball.
Speaker 3: So let's move over there. Move over there? Does does uh?
Speaker 1: Does Oklahoma Cities Arena remind you at all of the
Speaker 1: Jazz Arena when the Jazz are good in the postseason,
Speaker 1: Like it feels like there's that same type of like
Speaker 1: elevated atmosphere and noise and the crowd is like on
Speaker 1: top of you like it is at the Delta Center.
Speaker 1: Does it feel at all the way Salt Lake does
Speaker 1: when the Jazz are good in spring? Oh?
Speaker 4: Yeah. Also the fact that it's a small market. You know,
Speaker 4: I know there's hockey now, but when I was covering
Speaker 4: Jazz playoff games is the one major show, you know,
Speaker 4: the one major league team in town. I would certainly
Speaker 4: say that those two arenas lead league in percentage of
Speaker 4: PREB T shirts war. I mean, you know, there's some
Speaker 4: phenomenal color coordination going on for sure, like you've seen
Speaker 4: when the Jazz had like the whole spectrum from red
Speaker 4: to you know, orange and yell and all that, like
Speaker 4: you know, and then I'm telling the thing about like, Okay,
Speaker 4: see dude, that place is packed and loud to lay
Speaker 4: up lines much less open tips.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks like a really cool environment. A fan
Speaker 1: base really enjoying that moment, all right. To start the series,
Speaker 1: I picked OKC in five. Doesn't make me unique. Feels
Speaker 1: like most everybody picked OKC in four, five, or six.
Speaker 1: To continue to be tremendously impressed that Rick Carlisle is
Speaker 1: maximizing this roster the way that he is. They're able
Speaker 1: to get a split heading back to Indianapolis, which will
Speaker 1: take place tomorrow, which will be on our radio station
Speaker 1: at six.
Speaker 3: Thirty Mountain time.
Speaker 1: Did anything from the first two games change your opinion
Speaker 1: on how this ultimately will play out?
Speaker 4: No, it's it's honestly, it's the Pacers for getting out
Speaker 4: of there with a split when they have led for
Speaker 4: a total one minute, fifty three seconds in the first
Speaker 4: two games and the majority of this series. Okay see,
Speaker 4: he's had a double digit lead, but the only thing
Speaker 4: that matters is it's one to one. But I'll tell
Speaker 4: you what you know. Shaye by his MVP standards, he
Speaker 4: had a mediocre thirty eight point performance in game one,
Speaker 4: Game two, Ho ho boy. He was cooking. He was comfortable,
Speaker 4: he was efficient, he was get everybody else rolling as well.
Speaker 4: The Pacers have a real problem to figure it out there.
Speaker 4: If Shae is that comfortable, it's gonna be hard for
Speaker 4: the Pacers to win.
Speaker 1: The Halliburton stuff, you know, ultimately, just nothing through the
Speaker 1: first three quarters and then kind of gets going in
Speaker 1: the fourth when they were already down twenty. But what's
Speaker 1: what's fair to say? Like, okay see, did this to
Speaker 1: aunt two? Like it's it's who they are, and it's
Speaker 1: easy to criticize Haliburton to say, wake up at the
Speaker 1: start of the game, Uh, they're seven and one. When
Speaker 1: he scores twenty points and then wins, he's like twenty
Speaker 1: one points, ten assists, and losses he's like eleven points,
Speaker 1: five assists. So is this something that Indiana needs to
Speaker 1: look at as far as getting him going earlier? Is
Speaker 1: this just kind of like you tip your cap to
Speaker 1: the best defensive team we've seen in maybe ten fifteen
Speaker 1: years in Oksee.
Speaker 4: I mean Albert had twenty one and eleven against the
Speaker 4: Thunder during the regular season. That sounds great, but it's
Speaker 4: a two game total. I mean, dude, when you're dealing
Speaker 4: with loudor or Alex, you know, if it's not himlet's
Speaker 4: Cruso or it's Casey Wallace, maybe get switched on to
Speaker 4: a Jayn Williams. That's tough, and they've made him play
Speaker 4: in the half court. Haliburton had one transition played with
Speaker 4: the ball in his hands in game one or a
Speaker 4: game two, rather one, it was a turnover for Tyros Halbert.
Speaker 4: Not to generate a single point in trans for an
Speaker 4: entire game. That's that's the problem for the Pacers. If
Speaker 4: they can't get out and run, it's going to be really,
Speaker 4: really hard for them to score with any level of efficiency.
Speaker 4: And you know, credit to Okay, see they make that
Speaker 4: very difficult. And I do think that has a lot
Speaker 4: to do with Mark Dagenhall's decision not to play the
Speaker 4: two bigs together. You know, they did for I think
Speaker 4: five minutes in Game two, but they've only played together
Speaker 4: for five minutes in this series. And you know, I
Speaker 4: think he probably watched the Eastern Conference Finals looked at
Speaker 4: how badly the Knicks struggled in transition. You know, how
Speaker 4: many passed calf Siakam buckets were just him being fast
Speaker 4: and you know, getting the look ahead pass and finishing
Speaker 4: and decided, hey, you know, priority number one is going
Speaker 4: to be taking away transition from the Pacers, who have
Speaker 4: a great engine to that offense in Haliburn, who you know,
Speaker 4: plays faster than any team in the league. And again,
Speaker 4: if you take that away from there, they're not a
Speaker 4: team that's to be able to grind out.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 4: You know, good possession after good possession in the half
Speaker 4: court against this defense when it's set.
Speaker 1: I thought we would actually see to your point about
Speaker 1: the two bigs. I thought dag Naut would go away
Speaker 1: from it in game two, which he did not do.
Speaker 1: Did that surprise you after they lost game one?
Speaker 4: Well again, oh, you said you thought he'd played together
Speaker 4: a lot in game two or that he would stay
Speaker 4: away from it.
Speaker 1: I thought maybe we'd see more of them together only
Speaker 1: because they lost game one.
Speaker 4: Yeah, uh, you know again, I think he had good
Speaker 4: reasons for that. I think it's something where he doesn't
Speaker 4: want to play those guys together when Haliburt and Siakam
Speaker 4: are on the court, you know, because those guys obviously
Speaker 4: as good as it gets in the in the league,
Speaker 4: create and transition opportunities, played together for five minutes. But
Speaker 4: you know, I think he was pretty confident that his
Speaker 4: decision was the right one. And in game one, and
Speaker 4: again you can criticize, probably change the starting lineup, and
Speaker 4: he'd have the same starting lineup for every playoff game
Speaker 4: before that, and you're blinking first, and you know, you
Speaker 4: can criticize all those things. It's not like the start
Speaker 4: is what cost him in that game. They fell apart
Speaker 4: in the last five minutes. It'll really last three minutes
Speaker 4: of that game. So I think he looked at it
Speaker 4: and said, Okay, you know, all the reasons we decided
Speaker 4: to do this in the days between the series still
Speaker 4: hold up, So we're going to stick with it.
Speaker 3: Do you think?
Speaker 1: I mean, look at this point, you know, adjustments or
Speaker 1: schematic approaches that are different or even rotational decisions. Like
Speaker 1: you're in the NBA Finals, You're three wins away from
Speaker 1: being a world champ. But is there anything that you've
Speaker 1: seen that Indiana can do that gives them a better
Speaker 1: chance to make the rest of the series interesting?
Speaker 3: Does he does Rick shrink his rotation?
Speaker 1: I don't know because where it's it's June, like, these
Speaker 1: two teams are who they are. But can Indiana do
Speaker 1: anything to maybe extend this series longer than most people think.
Speaker 4: I don't underestimate Rick Cardisle, you know, I don't underestimate
Speaker 4: his ability to come up with solutions. Rick's a lot
Speaker 4: smarter than I am, because I'm struggling to see what
Speaker 4: those solutions might be.
Speaker 1: Sure, all right, before I say you loose, what does
Speaker 1: your guy tell you about tomorrow? Does Indiana get the
Speaker 1: proverbial Game three at home?
Speaker 4: Well? You know what this is interesting? The thunder of
Speaker 4: stunk in Game three during this postseason they're one of
Speaker 4: two and the one they had to come back from
Speaker 4: twenty nine down after John Moran got hurt. So that's
Speaker 4: a trend that I would recommend that the Thunder would
Speaker 4: be determined to end. Again. I think they are the
Speaker 4: better team by a significant margin, you know. I think
Speaker 4: that they just present matchup problems that are going to
Speaker 4: be very tough for the Pacers to solve. But you know,
Speaker 4: we'll see there's gonna be the energy of the crowd,
Speaker 4: you know, especially if the Pacers can give this crowd
Speaker 4: some reason to sustain that energy early on, then you
Speaker 4: know we might have a good game on our hands.
Speaker 1: All right, my guy, Well, enjoy Indianapolis. Glad you've traveled safely.
Speaker 1: Thank you for the time to day and we'll chat zoom.
Speaker 4: Hey, you'll appreciate this. Guess where we are having to
Speaker 4: pick up hoops from tonight?
Speaker 3: What do we got? Who's yours? Jim?
Speaker 4: Yes, sir, field House got a boy?
Speaker 3: Is mcten seed playing with you?
Speaker 4: Oh he's the one who? Yeah, Scott Agnes, who's you know,
Speaker 4: a local guy up here? And McK tanner the ones
Speaker 4: who made sure that we were able to make this happen.
Speaker 4: So looking forward to that. Hopefully I'll be able to
Speaker 4: walk up right at the.
Speaker 3: End, four passes before you shoot it, you know the
Speaker 3: you know the rules.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's found good brother.
Speaker 3: Tim McMahon covers the NBA for ESPN.
Speaker 1: Always appreciate his time on Twitter at ESPN Underscore McMahon.
Speaker 1: You can also find the link to his book that
Speaker 1: he wrote about Luka Doncic Luka Doncic in the Curse
Speaker 1: of Greatness And Yeah, it's been a big year for
Speaker 1: our guys, really kind of risen up the ranks over there.
Speaker 3: Very happy for Tim. He's been a long time friend
Speaker 3: of the show.