July 11, 2018 • 49 mins
Doug thinks the NBA would be making a mistake by changing the NBA playoff format and lowering the draft age from 19 to 18 and Adam Silver needs to stop trying to get people to like him. He also explains why LeBron James missed an opportunity to connect with his fans by skipping the pizza giveaway in Los Angeles. And Trailblazers G CJ McCollum joins the show to talk about the balance of talent between the Eastern Conference and the Western Conference plus his thoughts on LeBron signing in Los Angeles.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is the best of the Dog Dot Leap Show
on Fox Sports Radio Boom, What Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show,
Fox Sports Radio Coming to you from the City of Angels,
will continue to cover the World Cup. The Brits are
up one nil on Croatia. Croatia the country that everyone
(00:24):
I know who has ever been there, was like, dude,
that's the hidden gem of all hidden gems. I've literally
I've had friends play there, I've had friends coached there,
I've had a married to friends visit there, and everyone
I know is like, it's one of the most beautiful
places on earth. The people are nice, the women are stunning,
(00:45):
the food is good, and you get some of that
kind of old Eastern European charm with some of these
kind of classic older cities. Plus you got water and
beaches and lakes and rivers. It's amazing. It's like a
total hidden gym. That's head. I think we all want.
England versus France. Any rivalry that you can think of
(01:05):
pales in comparison to England versus France, even Russia versus America. Like,
imagine the scenario had we actually just qualified right and
Russia got into the finals Russia United States would have
been a historic matchup with superpowers. But here's the thing.
Soccer is bigger obviously in France and England than it
is here. But France and England arrivals, you're like going
(01:30):
back to what like the beginning of civilization in those eras.
In those areas, it it puts Duke and Carolina, Auburn
and Alabama and Michigan and Ohio State together to shame,
Dave literally fucked in wars against each other. They're separated
(01:52):
by a body of water. Like you can't make it up.
I have no idea if they like each other, but
the fact that one drive on one side of the
road and the other drives on the other side of
the road, that's crazy. Different languages. You got English muffins,
which are fantastic by the way, against French toast equally fantastic. Anyway,
(02:18):
we'll get to uh, we'll cover the World Cup as
it becomes necessary. Let's get Let's keep talking with some NBA,
shall we. Apparently Luke Walton was in the know has
been talking texting back with Lebron James that per Ramona Shelburne.
Luke had a great quote about the night he found
out that Lebron was coming to the Lakers, I'll share
(02:39):
that with you. But yesterday Adam Silver spoke to the
media about a quote robust conversation at the Board of
Governors meeting about improving the current competitive landscape and that
the NBA can create a better system. The two things
that were most discussed or that he was willing to
share was one changing the age limit of the NBA
(03:02):
and two potentially changing the playoff format of the NBA.
Let's start with the age limit, to which I don't
think he understood the information that was given to him.
So there's Commission on College Athletics chaired by Condoleeza Rice,
(03:22):
who oh yeah, by the way, doesn't really have anything
to do with college athletics. Condoleeza Rice is amazing, She's
incredibly accomplished. She apparently loves football, that's how she got
on the college football playoff committee. But she doesn't currently,
I believe, work at a university, nor has she recruited
in college. But like the problem with that committee is
(03:44):
like there's nobody who's really kind of present day invested
that much in college basketball, and yet their findings are
why the n c A is gonna make a change,
and the NBA is likely to make a change, and
the first part is changing the age limits. But what's
interesting about what Adam Silver said was my personal view,
(04:09):
as we are ready to make a change, it won't
come immediately. But when I weighed the pros and cons
and given the Condoleeze Rice and a commission is recommended
to the NBA that those one and done players now
come directly in the league. In essence, the college community
is saying we don't want those players anymore. It sort
of tips the scale in my mind that we should
taken a serious look at lowering the age to eighteen.
You're listening to the information all wrong. They don't want them, okay,
(04:36):
because they don't want the whole attitude persona of only
here for five minutes and then I'm gone, What's what
is in the best interest of the league is most important.
Instead of reacting to emotions, reacting to facts. Go back
(04:57):
to when we had no age limit. You guys, remember that.
Why did it change? Because NBA teams we're tired of
trying to evaluate players in high school. NBA coaches couldn't
win with the young players that they drafted. NBA g
ms were reaching and stretching to find the next stars,
(05:17):
but there was way more swings and mrs than there
were hits. And oh yeah, by the by the way,
even when there were I believe in two thousand five
was the last year you had like thirteen players drafted
straight out of high school. Most of those missed. They
(05:38):
didn't develop as human beings. What's a what's a healthier
What is a healthier system? The NFL system or the
NBA system. Steve Kerr wrote an article, go back and
read it. I tweeted out a relige today. He was
a GM in the NBA. He's now a coach in
the NBA. At the time, he was covering college basketball.
He's like, look, dude, you don't want this. You don't
(06:00):
want eighteen year olds. You want them to have to
stay in school for two or three years plus. It
builds It builds their brands, It builds their brands for
the teams they're going to join. It develops them as
people and as players. Adam Silver is reacting to Twitter,
he's reacting to motions. He's reacting to people who aren't
involved in the sport. And if you and I warned
(06:21):
college athletics like, if you want, if you want the
baseball system, you know what you're going to get out
of college basketball college baseball. How relevant is college baseball?
It's not. And then you look at the idea we
we we want what do you say? Let me be
(06:43):
clear on the current system. We want teams to compete
like crazy. So I think the Warriors, within the framework
of this deal, should be doing everything they can to
increase their dominance. But but Adam Silver says, we can
create a better system. We're not trying to create some
(07:05):
sort of forced parody. We want to realize. We want
to really be focused on parody of opportunity. There's so
many kind of conflicting alliances in where the NBA should go.
But again, you have to start with what's in the
best interest of the entire league. And while motion would
(07:26):
tell you, hey, go to one to sixteen, the fact
is that if you have an l A versus Golden
State Finals, you're not going to have the viewership that
you would have versus a Boston versus Golden State Finals.
That's just the reality of it. Don't believe me. I
give you Yankees Mets World Series terrible ratings nationwide. Not
(07:52):
only are sixty six percent of the TV viewers in
the Eastern Seaboard, but the fact is that once you
become a regional sport. Look at college football's numbers and
how they've struggled in the college Football playoff era. When
you get when you get regionalized, when you take Ohio
State out of it, when you take us you don't
put USC in it, your numbers are gonna suffer. And
(08:14):
the NBA is reacting on emotion and they're kind of
a step behind. And if you chase down the West
and say, hey, the West is better than the East
by the time you flip it and you make it
one to sixteen in a couple of years, because it
does take that much time to work out the scheduling changes,
the playoff changes, how to make it fair and equitable
for people. But I'm talking regular season schedule, not just
(08:34):
postseason schedule. The East is likely to be as good
or better. Remember Janice's in Milwaukee. Uh, Philadelphia appears to
be good. They're gonna be good. Boston's gonna be very
good for a long time. And we'll see if the
Wizards and a couple other teams can figure it out. Hell,
Toronto had the best record. Now Lebron's out, maybe they
(08:54):
can get over the hump. But it feels like Adam
Silver is reacting on emotion, taking the advice of others.
And while people didn't like David Stern because David Stern
could be abrasive, could be abrupt. Frankly, he could be
(09:15):
an a hole. He just could. He could be a
serious a whole. This dude's so not He's just too
nice and he's gonna get pushed around and manipulated and
mauld in this thing. He wants to be liked. He
wants people to really like him. That's cool, But you
(09:39):
know what people don't like Roger Goodell. How's the NFL doing. Oh,
the NFL is doing terrible. No, it's not, no, no,
it's not. The NFL didn't have Thursday Night Football five
years ago. Then they had a couple of games they
put on CBS. They have put games on their own
NFL network. Then they're like, hey, CBS, NBC, you guys
(10:01):
split it up. They didn't even rate that well. And
Fox came in and said, yeah, we're gonna blow that
off or out out of the water. You know why,
because you've got to have the NFL. It ain't about
being liked. It's not about making people happy but product,
but what's in the best interest of the league. And
(10:23):
while you're really close in the town might be in
an all time high, half the teams are trying to
be bad. And by trying to play catch up and
fix the thing and make it one through sixteen, you're
gonna cut up all of the different history of the
sport Lakers, Celtics, NBA file, all the East versus West.
You're gonna lose the Eastern Seaboard in an effort to
(10:46):
be liked. The league will lose popularity, will lose momentum.
It's not NBA two K. It's real life, right, I mean.
The comical part about the whole even eighteen year old
age limit is there is no age limit for guys
to go to the G League. They can come straight
(11:06):
at high school, go to the G League for a
year and be drafted. Let that now that more know that,
even though that's been available to them for a decade,
Let let some of them explore that. See how that goes.
Go ahead, try it for a year. They've been able
to come straight at high school for a long time,
they just can't get drafted. And even now they can
(11:27):
go to IMG Academy if they want, they can do
the prep school thing. In your effort to protect two
or three kids who might be forced to go to
college for a year, talk to the actual people boots
on the ground. They'll tell you none i them are
really ready. And the reason that the college system doesn't
really want them around is just kind of the whole
(11:49):
attitude of I don't need to be here. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays
at three p m. Eastern noon Pacific on Fox Sports
Radio and the I Heart Radio app. People can refuse
initials and nicknames all the time. It's not the same thing.
Initials are not nicknames. Joe Varden knows that he covers
the cas for Cleveland dot Com. It's got some great
(12:10):
insight on Lebron James. He joins us now on the
Doug glic Show. Uh, there's a three hour podcast out
there that here's how good it is show. I was
having dinner last night in southern in in Los Angeles
with a friend who lives in near the area where
Lebron lives. And he's like, have you downloaded the podcast
with Varden those guys. I was like, I've heard some
(12:31):
of it. We have it at work. He's like, no, no no,
three hours. It's all really really good for people who
want to get ahold of it? How do they do? So? Wow? Um, well,
there's actually two of them, uh that my colleagues and
I had had done. One was with Howard beck Um
the full which was in between games one and two
(12:54):
of the finals, and that's a lot more about just
what it was like for four years to kind of
lived together and lived through the Lebron phenomenon um and
we had a lot of fun with that. We also
drank three bottles of wine while we were doing it,
which was fun. And then, um, the new one is
uh at It actually actually through a local radio station,
(13:17):
point three FM in Cleveland. There there iPods or their
podcast channel, and that is where we kind of um
peel the a couple of layers back into what happened
in Cleveland and what happened with Lebron and Lebron and
Kyrie and and David Bladd and tylu and Dan Gilbert
(13:39):
and just kind of on down the line. But it's
so you kind of get that same flare of um
sort of the I don't know, just the camaraderie that
we had built, uh through four years together covering this team.
We were the three guys that stayed on the beat
the whole time and traveled the country with Lebron and
those guys and and um, you know obviously really got
(14:02):
to know him and know each other in a really
good way. Um. Some of some of what I've heard,
I can't tell you. I've consumed all of it, but
some of what I've heard paints the picture of Lebron
Um as a as a little bit one very very smart,
uh cunning in fact, but at times can be petulant, spoiled,
(14:23):
can throw fits all. Sometimes though he does things for
a purpose, Like how would you how would you characterize
to the person who hasn't seen the real Lebron how
would you characterize Lebron James as a teammate throughout those
four years? Yeah, I mean it's a really it's uh,
it's a complex picture when it comes to Lebron Um
(14:46):
as a as a a superstar athlete to work with.
From my perspective, I could not possibly have been treated better. Um,
you know, I I've worked and I've covered politics, I've
covered sports, uh um and and Lebron was my certainly
my favorite UM subject to cover and to work with
(15:07):
in my entire career. There's no doubt about that. As
a teammate, he was probably his at his best as
a teammate when he had older players on the team
that that he respected in a certain kind of way. Um.
(15:28):
He he needed to rely on those guys to create
the right loose, comfortable atmosphere in the locker room and
away from the court. Um. You know, guys like Channing
fry And and Richard Jefferson and James Jones, Um, they
could bring some levity to the situation, and they could
(15:50):
kind of invite everybody from the team from all corners
of the locker room out, you know, to dinner and
and to to two people's house is and you know,
they they they would invite themselves to Kevin Love's house
and have the whole team come over, Lebron included. And
you know, after a while they start going to the
Indians games, and when the Indians went to the World
(16:13):
Series and those kinds of things, that's when Lebron was
at his best. UM as a teammate. He was very
hard on Kyrie. Uh and at times Kyrie it totally
deserved it. There's no there's no question about that. That's
another longer discussion. Um, this year is a teammate Lebron.
(16:36):
It's it's it's hard because I think it's a teammate.
He really struggled this year. Um, he struggled throughout the year.
He was uncomfortable, which this is gonna sound so crazy,
but he he he had kind of lost his way
as the um kind of alpha leader of the team
(16:57):
when Dwayne Wade came on and and Isaiah Thomas and
Jay Crowder and Derrick Rose, like, these are guys that
are established veterans that can't really be talked to in
a certain way. And Lebron, of course was clearly the
best player and it was clearly his team, but he
had kind of gotten away from just kind of really
(17:20):
like enforcing his will as to how this was gonna go.
And then when all those guys got traded, like literally
all of them, Um, he he tried to reassume that role.
But these guys that he did, they brought in three
of them were young twenty five years old, and and
one was was George Hill, who had known from playing
against the playoffs, but he just didn't um, he didn't
(17:44):
really know the other guys in a way, and and
it it had just become too much of a task
to try to bring all this together in the two
months they had before the playoffs started. So what Lebron
end up doing, um by and large, was can get
upon himself and the Calves set up their team so
that regardless of who was on the floor or whatever, what,
(18:08):
what the other talent was, everything, literally every last little
thing was going to go through Lebron. And Lebron was incredible.
He was sensational and and and carried this team back
to the finals when no one thought they could make it.
And but but the Lebron, the teammate had long been
(18:28):
von by the time that had rolled around Joe Barton
from Cleveland dot Com joining us Doug Gotli show, Fox
Sports Radio. Why was he so hard on Kyrie? Well, um,
I mean he's Lebron put words to it himself way
at the beginning, early in that first season together when
he talked about bad habits, and in the truth of
(18:49):
the matter is that Kyrie had shown to be an
incredible talent, brilliant offensive player, killer, all those things, but
playing on a bad Cavs team, you know, I mean
pretty much maybe with the exception of the Stepian years, um,
the worst cast team in in franchise history, that was
Kyrie's team. And so he had developed a ton of
(19:11):
bad habits, things that you just don't do to play
winning basketball. And Lebron knew that he needed to kind
of to to cleanse Kyrie of that, but he also
kind of overstepped in a way that there wasn't enough
respect i think paid to just how good of a
player Kyrie was. And this this lasted a long time.
(19:34):
I mean, this lasted well into the year. Uh not
quite but almost up to the to where to where
Kyrie you know, knocked down that the game winner in
Game seven. I mean Lebron would publicly, um praise him,
praise Kyrie and talk about how he's a he's a
future m v P and all those things. But he
(19:57):
also like almost akin to like Mile hazing, Like he
would just kind of haze him and and just kind
of speak about him and to him in a certain way.
Um that that Rutsky read the wrong way. And then
also Kyrie and this is just totally I mean, a
warped view. Kyrie resented how much power and sway Lebron
(20:17):
had in the organizations, like basically totally disregarding that you
were talking about arguably the greatest player we've ever had,
certainly the greatest player in Cleveland. Um, you know, four
time m v P, two time champion before that. Uh
and and he just he didn't like it. He didn't
like that that reporters ran the Lebron when something happened
politically that that required some comment. Um, he didn't like
(20:42):
how much he didn't like that Lebron's friends were hired
for jobs in the organization and and on down the line.
So this is something that that festered over their time together.
And in the meantime, they produced the single greatest comeback
in the NBA Finals history and gave a town something
that that no one born after ninety four I had
(21:04):
ever seen. Furious Joe Barton joining us from Cleveland dot com. Um.
The a lot has been made of of Dan Gilbert,
of the fact that they that Lebron could never get
over the letter that Dan Gilbert, you know, wanted to
make decisions, wanted his team back. What's the reality to
(21:25):
who Dan Gilbert was in this entire story. Well, Doug,
that's a great question. And um, you know, I try
every chance I get to to kind of set this
this straight. Like the whatever animosity or whatever ill will
that there is or was between Dan and Lebron in
(21:45):
these in this second four years together, I call it overblown, um,
because it's portrayed as though there was a falling out like, oh,
you know, Lebron is just so furious with Dan or
so it up with Dan, or whatever the case may be,
and that that just wasn't true that they, um, they
(22:06):
agreed to kind of move past what had happened in
the past, but they didn't say they didn't shake hands
and say okay, let's be friends like that. They didn't
have a personal relationship when Lebron came back. Lebron did
not come back because of Dans um and and and
I think said Lebron was actually telling truth when uh
(22:27):
he said the Rachel at the start of the finals, like,
I hadn't working relationship with Dan. I mean, they didn't
have any personal relationship ever. Um. But you know, Dan,
for the most part, uh, spent a ton of money
and did what he said he would do, which is
fund the team that was capable of of of winning. Um,
(22:48):
and Lebron did what he said he would do, which
was come here and and and get that team to
the finals and and win. So UM, if if Dan
and Lebron on like has had reached some kind of
like new level of trust and friendship, maybe Ron would
have remained in Cleveland. Maybe. But I just think this
(23:10):
is a lot has a lot more to do about
what Lebron wanted for himself and his family and kind
of how he wanted to write his last chapter. And
part of that, Doug, is he he wanted to play
for the Lakers, like he has always thought it would
be really cool to play under that under that Moniker
and and now he he's got the chance to do
(23:31):
it will work? And And here's why I ask, because
I agree with you. You know, he had Channing Fry,
He had some of these these great teammates who, um,
they respected him but didn't take everything too seriously and
and kind of understood. But and even though I think
he respects Rondo and probably likes the grittiness and toughness
(23:52):
of Lands, and you know, these guys that that need
to play well that need to fit in. Even JaVale
McGee has seen JaVale McGee might be the only guy
who can have a good time and be a veteran.
Then you have all these other young guys who he
might like their talent, but they man, they're really young
and they might revere him, but that doesn't mean, uh,
they can be their best selves playing with him based
(24:14):
upon what they currently have, how they're currently structuring it,
do you think it will work? Well? Do I think
they're going to beat the Warriors this year? Uh? No, no,
almost no matter what I mean. Now, the Worriors would
need to devastating injuries to kind of bring them back
to the pack instead of just the requisite one uh
(24:37):
with five all stars over there. But I think this
is a bigger and I think this is a bigger
discussion too. Um. We were talking out here, I'm at
the Summer League, and we were talking with some of
the Lakers writers and I won't name names because they
got to work with a team now, but they were
questioned like, uh, you know, are the are the Lakers
right now? Are they even be? They better than the Rockets?
(24:58):
Are they better than the Pelican? They just kind of
name like three or four team those than the war Friors,
And UH and Jason and Floyd and I. You know
that two of the guys that have watched Lebron do
this for the last four years just just laughing at us, Like,
you cannot bet against Lebron unless it's the Warriors, who
have an unprecedented level of talent. You can't bet against
(25:19):
him at any point because he's that good. So yes,
I think it can work. However, Uh and I'll try
to get to the points because I can't. We need
to remember that in January this year, the Calves were
trending in a way that they would not have made
the playoffs. They were six and thirteen at one point,
and they had all these names and it just wasn't working,
(25:43):
and Lebron was in the locker room and they could
not win. Um And so I am fascinated. You know this,
like Lebron may have to change change a little bit
kind of how he approaches things away from the floor,
just to make some of these guys feel a little
bit better about things and try to kind of build
that build up, you know, the team and the camaraderie
(26:05):
component of this that it that it takes to be successful.
So I think, I think, I think it will work,
but I do absolutely recognize account it's going. It's going
to be amazing. What about what about the Calves? UM?
I like their point guard, and I do think Kevin Love.
It's gonna be interesting what they do with Kevin Love?
(26:25):
What do you think the process they go through is
do they tank? Is that is that the plan? How
do they plan to rebuild this thing? Well? So, I mean,
you know, we've taken like a tire iron to them
over this. Uh, just just searching for every nook and cranny,
every pressure point. Are you going to tank? Just because
that's kind of you know that that's the common knowledge,
(26:49):
is the right word. But that's like the opinion out there,
like you lost Lebron, you have their chance, you have
to tank. Um. And they insist, including like the guys
behind the scenes, they insist that that is not immediately
the plan. UM. They feel like their talent is underrated UM.
And they feel like the guys that they brought in,
(27:10):
as it turned out, weren't great fits to play under
the kind of pressure that it takes the play with Lebron,
who's trying to go to a fourth finals and and
expect so much without time to gel and they just
think that those guys on their own, um aren't going
that that that there's that there's potential there. They also think,
(27:32):
and maybe this is part of it, is market wise
that you don't just trade Kevin, just trade him. Um,
you need to get like you need to get the
right pieces for him. And the market might not be
there for him now. So they're they're really there. There
is a very viable case to be made to bring
this team back, bring Kevin back, um, and and see
(27:53):
how it goes. You know, Uh, the East is gonna
be weak. Um, there's two playoff spots that you know,
you think that might be there. And you know the
rest of the league doesn't think that Calves are gonna,
you know, be a candidate for him, but right now
the Calves kind of do. And and there's no harm
in trying it. And if and if things go awry,
(28:15):
then you trade Kevin at the deadline and and you know,
you look for picks and those kinds of things and
you start to start to rebuild. Then but if if
it works, Doug, Um, what a story for Dan and
what a story for Kevin? And the thing they've been saying,
is you know, these rebuilds are not guaranteed to work. Like, yeah,
(28:36):
the Sixers are a heck of a story after just
five awful, terrible, horrendous years. And oh, by the way,
if they don't trade for Kawhi Leonard, they're probably not
getting into the finals anyway. I mean, like that's how
hard it is. And and you know, and like, look,
they're they're betting on bad to stay healthy. They're betting
on Ben Simmons, developer jump shot so and and look
(28:58):
that's the best at the Mill Hockey Bucks. They tanked
and they got a great player out of it, but
they were you know, they still were out of the
first round of the playoffs. I mean, still, it doesn't
it doesn't. It doesn't always work. It's a it's a
great point. Download those podcasts. It's incredible conversation. Enjoy the
summer league, and uh we'll talk soon, Joe, great stuff, man, Okay,
thanks for having me, Doug Joe Varden Cleveland dot com.
(29:22):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Fox sports
radio dot com and within the I Heart Radio app
Lebron James did in fact tweet out specifically, so Blaze
Pizza welcomed him in okay, Blaze Pizza sent out the
you know for every everybody, but Lebron was the one
(29:42):
who who said, um who tweeted out that he was,
you know, haven't been to a pizza party in a minute,
with the what's the what's the emoji? Where you're the
thinking man emoji with the hand over the chin Culver
City question mark. Come on man, that's teasing people like,
go to Culver City. This was after Blaze Pizza said
(30:05):
are you ready for the King of All Pizza parties
were celebrating Lebron james arrival to l A with three
pizza seven attends not by any of our l A locations,
and he tweeted out Culver City. Look, do I think
this is like the end of a friendship and a bromance?
Like your fans are a lot like you know what
they're like. They're like people who watch evangelists on TV.
(30:30):
They do they they just they they they want to
be a part whoever the second the next next Jesus
is they want? It was first it was Magic, Forget Magic,
Now it's Kobe. Forget Kobe now it's Lebron. We used
to not like Lebron. Now we like Lebron because he's
on our team. Like, okay, Lebron Pizza, just lead us,
(30:50):
lead us to a championship, lead show up beat one
of us. And here's the thing. I don't think this
is anything damning towards Lebron in the future. I'm not
gonna but it's a great missed opportunity because the one
thing that Kobe has never been able to be though
he was loved, Like if you've ever been the Staples,
(31:13):
Staples is there's stowage is basically the upper level. Right,
it's a weird arena in it's set up. They're downstairs
right when you get down on the floor level, those
are high dollar. Okay, but the hardcore ultra Laker that that.
But that's like you go there date night, you go
there to be seen. But the Laker fans, real fans
(31:35):
of real people are up in the upper deck. That
crowd loved Kobe Mamba mentality, but he was never really
one of them. Italy Philly lives in you know, he
lives in Newport, like he didn't live in l a
And not that Lebron is really one of them. He's
from Akron to Miami to Cleveland back to here. He
(32:00):
does does live in l A proper lives to listen Brentwood,
and this was a chance to at least dip his
tell and being a man of the people. Hey, you
know what I'm in to Blaze Pizza in l A.
Let's go to Culver Cities right around the corner and
just show up. And I mean like, look, if I
was advising Lebron James, I would have told him like, hey, dude,
let's get there and wait in line. Not get there
(32:23):
and even do the Lebron thing where you have security
and cut through and you shake hands. Just go there
and wait in line, be like, hey, man, what's up.
I'm not gonna sign argraphs. Just got a pizza. Bring
whoever's with you. We all came to get free pizza. Yeah,
I just signed for her fifty three million dollars. But
it's free pizza. Who says no to free Blaze pizza.
Nobody says no to and you would have won the people.
(32:46):
I just I feel like it's missed opportunity at all.
Did he come here to win another title, to win
number eighteen, or do you just come here to do
the l a thing, to be in movies, to be
an actor, because that's what everybody comes here for, right
actor director, I'll get a script you gotta see. That's
what Lebron, That's what it feels like. Try to be
(33:11):
a man of the people, of the people. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Doug gott Leap Show
weekdays at three p m. Eastern noon Pacific on Fox
Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. The basketball
world is really in Las Vegas NBA Summer League. They
got the Board of Governors meetings, and they got guys
(33:31):
like CJ McCullum has got an awesome podcast out there.
He kind of have to join us here on The
Doug Gottlieb Show. CJ, how are you? I'm well, how
you guys doing good? Man? Um, let me start with
what everybody's talking about with your team. What did you
make of the original tweet by Damian Lillard. I actually
didn't even see it until it was on What Leisure
(33:55):
Reporter or something like that. I wasn't really pay attention,
but um, I know a mus talked to Dame pretty often.
Why didn't really take us think of it? As anything.
But in the outside world, if you're not part of
the organization, then I can see how you would leave,
you would be skeptical or maybe I think I think
something of it. Yeah, so it was what I mean,
is that is that really what it is? It was
(34:15):
just one of those cases where he just really said,
I'm typically a happy camper, right that that was just
tweet I'm typically a happy camper. It what did we
misperceive the Hunter forty characters? It wasn't even Hunter forty
characters that he put out there. Yeah, yeah, I think
it was a little blown out of portion, blowing out
a portionate a little bit, just based on what's going on. Obviously,
(34:36):
there's a lot of rumors spoiling around our team in general,
there have been room much for years. Someone asked him
a question and he answered they basically saying that he's
typically happy, like basically like he suddenly happy all the time.
So I think I think that was accurate statement and
what he said, he typically is happy, you know, most
of the times. And people are gonna make up rumors
in garless and what you say if you answer, if
(34:56):
you don't answer it, there's always going to be something.
But I mean, and it comes down to it, he's
a member of the boat in trouble. What was your
reaction when Boogie signed with the Warriors. I was I
was actually on a plane flying back from Miami to Portland,
and my girls showed me her calm. She was like,
(35:17):
Mark's cousins just signed. And I was like, stop playing,
stop playing. I went to sleep. I didn't leave it.
Then I woke up two hours later, I signed into
my WiFi and sure enough that had happened. I was shocked.
I was surprised, you know, at the number he signed for,
Surprise that he chose the Warrior, Surprise that or other
teams were interested in, Surprise that he didn't get a
(35:40):
bigger offer from another team. Surprised the Lakers did go
after him. There was a lot of thought that went
through my head at that time, so I had to
detect him. I guess, I guess my question there. Let
me get you guys from the playoffs. They've done it
a couple of times. Um, are we sure it makes
them better? And and here's why, Like I understand, like
in the world of fantasy sports, like you add an
all star to a team, like yeah, but one he's
(36:03):
coming off injury and too. You know, the beauty to
them was that they could play small and switch everything.
They may be like, look he can boogie if if
healthy can really play, We don't know healthy he'll be
and help good he'll be, and it changes their ability
to switch everything because he's a true five defensively, all right.
(36:23):
I think it'll be tough at first. They gotta make adjustments.
Obviously he's not gonna be able to play and start
the season. They'll probably stay out a little bit to
get more comfortable with, you know, the recovery process of injury,
more comfortable with the Warrior's offensive decen schemes and principles.
But overall, I think when once they figure it all out,
it's help them because the fact that he's probably the
best back to basket guy you know on their team
(36:46):
for sure. I think Sean Evistin was the biggest post us, right,
Draymond passes a lot of the postal he doesn't really score,
and that gives him just a different you know, he
can shoot three, he's capable pastor has great vision average
or five of such a game, and can embrace double
teams in fourth of other teams so overall, I think
once they figure out the continuity and and you know,
the touches and where he's gonna get his shots from it,
(37:07):
I don't see why they can't be successful with arguably
the best big in the NBA. The podcast is called
The Pull Up uh C J McCollums. To start with
the goal with the with the Portland Trailblazers. He joints
us in the Doug Gotlip Show here on Fox Sports Radio.
Let's get to lebron Um. It felt like there was
a foregone conclusion that he would end up in l A.
(37:30):
When when it became official that he was going to
l A, what did you think. I wasn't surprised when
you look at the options on the table for him,
and you know, based on the type of situation he
was looking for the market obviously, what he's doing in
the community, what he's doing outside of the sports round
with deduction and getting more involved with Kale, and it
(37:51):
made sense um looking at its careerently, how many years
he put in there and what he's done for the community,
when he's done to the state of Ohio, the game
of bath money, and I felt like there was only
two options and I don't think the Houston Rockets was
options he wanted to take agreed. Um, how far away
are they when they add Lebron? I mean, you have Lebron,
(38:13):
you always have a chance. You can put the brunt
out there where for fifteenth men on the roster and
you're gonna have a chance to win games. So it's
just more about health, you know, how they figure out
the rotation with with Rondo coming in there, just signed Pole,
they got kuz Money, got Angram, they got a lot
of wings who can play. You just gotta figure out
the rotation, who's going to start, a point guard, who's
(38:33):
gonna close game? And obviously matchups will be a will
be something to look forward to the seeing in the
Western Conference because you never know what the are gonna get.
You never know we're gonna match up. Anything is possible there. Look,
there are people, there's a lot of people who think, hey, man,
Western Conference is so loaded that we should go one
through sixteen. Um, I sit there and go like, you know, look,
(38:56):
I think the Western Conferences is better than the Eastern Conference.
But I'm not sure we're giving credit for for for
Milwaukee and and what what Janice is helping build there,
But we gotta pay attention to Philadelphia and what those
young guys. They're going to get better. Boston at full
strength should be very very good. Toronto is pretty good
as well. Like are we completely dismissing the East a
(39:19):
little bit too early? I mean, I think the Eastern
Conference is good, but the Western Conference, you know, the depth.
You look at the dominance of some of the teams
to have won in the last few years, that the
Rockets win the sixty five games and not even um
getting to the finals. You look at the Worris, how
(39:39):
DoD they've been the last years. I think you you
look at the top of the West and the top
of the East, and that's where the comparisons come out.
And then you add Lebron to the Western Conference and
Cathmen teams start to or people start to talk about
the differences in the Eastern West. I think it's both
very competitive, but the edge probably goes to the West
right now just because of the depth and and how
good the topic is. So there are some very strong
teams in Eastern, but the the proof is into putting.
(40:03):
The Warriors have been dominant and they've contended for champions
last couple of years, the only other team to compete
with him is the team Lebron was on, and now
Lebron's in the in the Western Conference. So I think
that's why there's a disparity, and people continue to try
to put down on the other conference that that part
is fair. Um Sege McCullum joining us obviously. We we
started by reacting to what Damien tweeted. And I think
(40:24):
the reason is, look, you guys were great in the
second half of the season, him especially at incredible second
half of the season, and uh and but there there
there's always gonna be people that say, look, that's as
good as it gets, like you're never gonna take that
next step, and so and so when when he tweets out, hey,
I'm always at the camper about the possibility of going
(40:45):
to Lakers, there's like a confirmation bias in it, right, like, oh, well,
of course he wants to go to a team with Lebron,
so now he can compete for a championship. What's it
like to deal with the reality of man, it's really
hard to get that one more step, that Warriors level step,
or even that Rockets level step. When you're in Portland Yeah,
it's tough. It's tough to win regardless of where you're at,
(41:08):
especially in the Western Confluence. And you haven't played the
Warriors a lot of times the last you know, five years.
You see what a championship caliber team looks like. You
see how they execute, you see how they play together,
you see how great they are defensively, and it's it's
tough and it's frustrating, but it's a part of life.
Nothing that's in life is going to be easy. It's
not easy to to live in America. It's not easy
to work at a nine to five, it's not easy
(41:29):
to play in the NBA, and it's not easy to
make it right. You gotta figure out ways to improve,
figure out ways to get better, and control the controllable.
That's kind of how I've always lived my life. I
can only control my preparation, my mindset, and my attitude
every day. The rest of it's gonna be what it's
gonna be. Okay. So uh, The podcast is called The
Pull Up. If people haven't heard, haven't downloaded it, what's
(41:50):
it like? He's definitely subscribe, you can subscribe anywhere. To
Pull Up would basically just talk about what's going on
in the NBA. I get wine recommendations. I can of
the recommendations. Occasionally, I've had guests on. We'll continue to
add guests from different backgrounds and Loss of Life. I've
had the producer of Billions on the five Love. I've
id d weight on. I am a huge Billions fan,
(42:12):
So shout out to shout out to Blank, We're coming on.
But it's been great. It's been great for me to
just kind of talk about my thoughts on the NBA
and I thought on similar league, certain rookies I think
about a play well, like Kevin Knox, who's surprised a
lot of people although he was food on Draft night,
you know, typical Knicks fans Draft night. I think he's
gonna really help them. But you just give a variety
(42:32):
of takes, you know, on what it's like to be
in the NBA. But it's like to you know, watch
the games in my point of view. Okay, so let
me let me ask you about Kevin Knox. I too
liked him before the draft eighteen. I think, you know,
as a face up four can play some three. You
know his his body's gonna get even better. Um So,
why do you think Why do you think some teams
(42:53):
missed on him. I think a lot of Kentucky players
are better in the NBA. Um there's so much talent
around them, their certain rules to where you know Anthony Davis,
if you look at Devil Booker Stave, I don't think
it's the NBA even cry Anthony Town. But I think
he's starting to see how well rounded he is as
a players. Versatility, you can shoot obviously, has a nice
(43:13):
looking jump shot, even though you know the show about
thirty time or thirty six percent. Here in college. He's big,
He's able to guard. Like you said before, you can guard.
The four industry is a large wing of athleticism and
ability to you know, push tempaul off off of rebound.
So I think he has all the tools to be successful,
just about putting them together. Who's been disappointing to you
that you've watched in Vegas? Yeah? I honestly I haven't
(43:36):
really watched that much. I've been working out. Wait wait, wait, wait, wait.
You can tell me how much you like how Kevin
Knox and other rookies, but you you don't get you
don't offer up anything negative, well not really, because it's
it's summer league. So when when you play well, I
watched how you played well. I don't necessarily judge to
the points, to these six rebounds. I'm looking at how
(43:57):
you're scoring. Does to translate to an actual NBA game?
You know, can you score at three levels? You have
a mid range game? Can you finish your on the
basket but you have a float? Or if you're a guard,
can you shoot threes catching? Shoot open? Can you shoot
threes catching shoe contested? Can you shoot threes off the dribble?
So that's kind of what I watched, and whether you
make or miss it, I can tell them your skill sets,
you're gonna be successful now. So I don't really get
caught up in trade y'all shooting poorly or shooting well,
(44:20):
because you know, like historically he's made shots. It's just
about the shot selection where he's shooting shots, from how
he's running the offense, and once he gets more comfortable
and the resta room he's get uncomfortable, still be successful.
But Summer league is isn't always indicative of the NBA success.
You got guy like John Selby who has one really MVP.
You got a guy like Draymond will be terrible and
some of the one of the one of the worst
some of the players we've ever seen, honestly, and he's
(44:42):
a very very good NBA players, So it doesn't necessarily
always equating to accept either way. I just kind of
try to watch the intangibles and as a player who
plays the game and has guarded certain guys, like how
does how do they score? How do they de fan?
How's their bi langues? That stuff that translates to success
or failure in league? How how and I look, I
I completely agree with you in terms of people get
(45:03):
so caught up and make or miss. It's more about
the shot selection. It's also about can you get by guys?
But what about the other end of the floor in
terms of level of effort, level of toughness, and level
of ability. Um, I don't think it. Fans think nobody
guards anybody in the NBA. The reality to it is
if you can't guard anybody, you can't play in the NBA.
(45:25):
How much do you pay attention to that? Definitely attention
to that as well. And it's the saying goes, there's
there's great defense, and that's better offense. There's a lot
of great defense out there. And there's a lot of
extremely talented players offensively to where like Kevin Durant, you
can play great defense to do everything in your power
to prevent a tough shot and he still makes it.
(45:45):
So it can a guy move, you see, as you
know the angle, you help them to communicate that deep
How does you fire over screens to the guard? Those
are things that are a cruisial part of the game.
You're looking at nine hundred and fifteen. Pick a roll.
Think about how many possessions in the game can you
get over screened? Is he weak? Is he's strong physically?
You know, as he died, as he crashed. If you're
a big man, does he boxed out or just go
(46:06):
to the rebound because you have a motor. You know,
there's a questions about DeAndre Ada and whether or not
he has the motive. I think he's coming out with
a chip on his show to try and get chased
down block, going after every offensive rebound, trying to show
that you know, he does have a motor and he
is worthy of the CJ. McCullum, great stuff that you're
giving us um. Okay, So knowing all of this and
knowing all of the things, you look for stug Gotlib
(46:28):
show here on Fox Sports Radio. Um, I'm fascinated by
the mellow thing, right, so mellow mellow. It looks like
they're either going to trade him or buy him out,
or smooth him or not smooth them a stretch him
and so he'll be gone from there? Does it? Does
it change in a locker room how he can be
(46:49):
and how the presidency has based upon the salary he earns.
What I've always thought on this as a working premise,
you live in you work in NBA locker rooms. I
do not. I've always thought, hey, man, if a guy's
making twenty seven million, he's got a little bit more
say than if a guy's playing at the minimum because
he was bought out at seven million. I guess my
question is, Kenny is can you get the best out
(47:12):
of Melow whatever he's got left in a championship type
situation if the leadership is different and if he's making
a different salary. Absolutely, I think Melow is who he is.
He's a FORMA five score. He showed that because sport.
So I think the motor of the drive is gonna
be there. He's gonna be out the group people wrong
and She's a big, big year for him individually, and
(47:32):
he's gonna do whatever it takes to to help himself
succeed individually and the health of teams, So salaries decide.
You know, there's a lot of wealth with people to leave.
There's a lot of guys who want minimum, let's say,
from a credibility and ability standpoints, will respect them. Now,
it's just about and finding the right situation, whether that's
Miami or that's Houston or wherever he decided to go,
(47:53):
and then applying himself and making shots, you know, defending better,
doing those things that you know, whatever team he goes
to is gonna need for this for them to be successful,
for him to continue to stand his career. The podcast
is called to pull up CJ McCollums to watch them
with the Portland Trailblazers. You fall on social media and
apparently gives wine recommendations as well. What I need. I
(48:14):
don't need that. I just need the cell phone because
I never know what to order with one. I can't
listen to the podcast and then remember that and then go, okay,
to write this down. I'm gonna order this one. I need,
like you know, I need to sound like, I know
what I'm talking about. I was at a restaurant last night.
They're like, do you want one? I was like, I
have no idea what I'm looking at? None? Yeah, man,
you gotta here. I try to educate yourself. I ask questions,
(48:35):
use the vino app and to figure out ways to
uh take certain lines, learn about the great researching, and
then actually continue to go to a certain major at restaurants.
You'll be able to pick out let whether you want
a French Bordeaux, whether you want to Italian one, and
you want to software at a bowl red a strong red.
Do you want a Sonoma coach or do you want
more of a smooth Italian Italian grapes? So you just
(48:58):
gotta go through it. The more you take said, the
more you're asking questions, it's easier to kind of learn
about it. And then when you do liontation and things
of that nature you are comfortable with, you know, go
on through the selection process. Great stuff. C J. C J. McCollum,
thanks so much for joining us. No problem at all.
Thank you,
This is the best of the Dog Dot Leap Show
on Fox Sports Radio Boom, What Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show,
Fox Sports Radio Coming to you from the City of Angels,
will continue to cover the World Cup. The Brits are
up one nil on Croatia. Croatia the country that everyone
(00:24):
I know who has ever been there, was like, dude,
that's the hidden gem of all hidden gems. I've literally
I've had friends play there, I've had friends coached there,
I've had a married to friends visit there, and everyone
I know is like, it's one of the most beautiful
places on earth. The people are nice, the women are stunning,
(00:45):
the food is good, and you get some of that
kind of old Eastern European charm with some of these
kind of classic older cities. Plus you got water and
beaches and lakes and rivers. It's amazing. It's like a
total hidden gym. That's head. I think we all want.
England versus France. Any rivalry that you can think of
(01:05):
pales in comparison to England versus France, even Russia versus America. Like,
imagine the scenario had we actually just qualified right and
Russia got into the finals Russia United States would have
been a historic matchup with superpowers. But here's the thing.
Soccer is bigger obviously in France and England than it
is here. But France and England arrivals, you're like going
(01:30):
back to what like the beginning of civilization in those eras.
In those areas, it it puts Duke and Carolina, Auburn
and Alabama and Michigan and Ohio State together to shame,
Dave literally fucked in wars against each other. They're separated
(01:52):
by a body of water. Like you can't make it up.
I have no idea if they like each other, but
the fact that one drive on one side of the
road and the other drives on the other side of
the road, that's crazy. Different languages. You got English muffins,
which are fantastic by the way, against French toast equally fantastic. Anyway,
(02:18):
we'll get to uh, we'll cover the World Cup as
it becomes necessary. Let's get Let's keep talking with some NBA,
shall we. Apparently Luke Walton was in the know has
been talking texting back with Lebron James that per Ramona Shelburne.
Luke had a great quote about the night he found
out that Lebron was coming to the Lakers, I'll share
(02:39):
that with you. But yesterday Adam Silver spoke to the
media about a quote robust conversation at the Board of
Governors meeting about improving the current competitive landscape and that
the NBA can create a better system. The two things
that were most discussed or that he was willing to
share was one changing the age limit of the NBA
(03:02):
and two potentially changing the playoff format of the NBA.
Let's start with the age limit, to which I don't
think he understood the information that was given to him.
So there's Commission on College Athletics chaired by Condoleeza Rice,
(03:22):
who oh yeah, by the way, doesn't really have anything
to do with college athletics. Condoleeza Rice is amazing, She's
incredibly accomplished. She apparently loves football, that's how she got
on the college football playoff committee. But she doesn't currently,
I believe, work at a university, nor has she recruited
in college. But like the problem with that committee is
(03:44):
like there's nobody who's really kind of present day invested
that much in college basketball, and yet their findings are
why the n c A is gonna make a change,
and the NBA is likely to make a change, and
the first part is changing the age limits. But what's
interesting about what Adam Silver said was my personal view,
(04:09):
as we are ready to make a change, it won't
come immediately. But when I weighed the pros and cons
and given the Condoleeze Rice and a commission is recommended
to the NBA that those one and done players now
come directly in the league. In essence, the college community
is saying we don't want those players anymore. It sort
of tips the scale in my mind that we should
taken a serious look at lowering the age to eighteen.
You're listening to the information all wrong. They don't want them, okay,
(04:36):
because they don't want the whole attitude persona of only
here for five minutes and then I'm gone, What's what
is in the best interest of the league is most important.
Instead of reacting to emotions, reacting to facts. Go back
(04:57):
to when we had no age limit. You guys, remember that.
Why did it change? Because NBA teams we're tired of
trying to evaluate players in high school. NBA coaches couldn't
win with the young players that they drafted. NBA g
ms were reaching and stretching to find the next stars,
(05:17):
but there was way more swings and mrs than there
were hits. And oh yeah, by the by the way,
even when there were I believe in two thousand five
was the last year you had like thirteen players drafted
straight out of high school. Most of those missed. They
(05:38):
didn't develop as human beings. What's a what's a healthier
What is a healthier system? The NFL system or the
NBA system. Steve Kerr wrote an article, go back and
read it. I tweeted out a relige today. He was
a GM in the NBA. He's now a coach in
the NBA. At the time, he was covering college basketball.
He's like, look, dude, you don't want this. You don't
(06:00):
want eighteen year olds. You want them to have to
stay in school for two or three years plus. It
builds It builds their brands, It builds their brands for
the teams they're going to join. It develops them as
people and as players. Adam Silver is reacting to Twitter,
he's reacting to motions. He's reacting to people who aren't
involved in the sport. And if you and I warned
(06:21):
college athletics like, if you want, if you want the
baseball system, you know what you're going to get out
of college basketball college baseball. How relevant is college baseball?
It's not. And then you look at the idea we
we we want what do you say? Let me be
(06:43):
clear on the current system. We want teams to compete
like crazy. So I think the Warriors, within the framework
of this deal, should be doing everything they can to
increase their dominance. But but Adam Silver says, we can
create a better system. We're not trying to create some
(07:05):
sort of forced parody. We want to realize. We want
to really be focused on parody of opportunity. There's so
many kind of conflicting alliances in where the NBA should go.
But again, you have to start with what's in the
best interest of the entire league. And while motion would
(07:26):
tell you, hey, go to one to sixteen, the fact
is that if you have an l A versus Golden
State Finals, you're not going to have the viewership that
you would have versus a Boston versus Golden State Finals.
That's just the reality of it. Don't believe me. I
give you Yankees Mets World Series terrible ratings nationwide. Not
(07:52):
only are sixty six percent of the TV viewers in
the Eastern Seaboard, but the fact is that once you
become a regional sport. Look at college football's numbers and
how they've struggled in the college Football playoff era. When
you get when you get regionalized, when you take Ohio
State out of it, when you take us you don't
put USC in it, your numbers are gonna suffer. And
(08:14):
the NBA is reacting on emotion and they're kind of
a step behind. And if you chase down the West
and say, hey, the West is better than the East
by the time you flip it and you make it
one to sixteen in a couple of years, because it
does take that much time to work out the scheduling changes,
the playoff changes, how to make it fair and equitable
for people. But I'm talking regular season schedule, not just
(08:34):
postseason schedule. The East is likely to be as good
or better. Remember Janice's in Milwaukee. Uh, Philadelphia appears to
be good. They're gonna be good. Boston's gonna be very
good for a long time. And we'll see if the
Wizards and a couple other teams can figure it out. Hell,
Toronto had the best record. Now Lebron's out, maybe they
(08:54):
can get over the hump. But it feels like Adam
Silver is reacting on emotion, taking the advice of others.
And while people didn't like David Stern because David Stern
could be abrasive, could be abrupt. Frankly, he could be
(09:15):
an a hole. He just could. He could be a
serious a whole. This dude's so not He's just too
nice and he's gonna get pushed around and manipulated and
mauld in this thing. He wants to be liked. He
wants people to really like him. That's cool, But you
(09:39):
know what people don't like Roger Goodell. How's the NFL doing. Oh,
the NFL is doing terrible. No, it's not, no, no,
it's not. The NFL didn't have Thursday Night Football five
years ago. Then they had a couple of games they
put on CBS. They have put games on their own
NFL network. Then they're like, hey, CBS, NBC, you guys
(10:01):
split it up. They didn't even rate that well. And
Fox came in and said, yeah, we're gonna blow that
off or out out of the water. You know why,
because you've got to have the NFL. It ain't about
being liked. It's not about making people happy but product,
but what's in the best interest of the league. And
(10:23):
while you're really close in the town might be in
an all time high, half the teams are trying to
be bad. And by trying to play catch up and
fix the thing and make it one through sixteen, you're
gonna cut up all of the different history of the
sport Lakers, Celtics, NBA file, all the East versus West.
You're gonna lose the Eastern Seaboard in an effort to
(10:46):
be liked. The league will lose popularity, will lose momentum.
It's not NBA two K. It's real life, right, I mean.
The comical part about the whole even eighteen year old
age limit is there is no age limit for guys
to go to the G League. They can come straight
(11:06):
at high school, go to the G League for a
year and be drafted. Let that now that more know that,
even though that's been available to them for a decade,
Let let some of them explore that. See how that goes.
Go ahead, try it for a year. They've been able
to come straight at high school for a long time,
they just can't get drafted. And even now they can
(11:27):
go to IMG Academy if they want, they can do
the prep school thing. In your effort to protect two
or three kids who might be forced to go to
college for a year, talk to the actual people boots
on the ground. They'll tell you none i them are
really ready. And the reason that the college system doesn't
really want them around is just kind of the whole
(11:49):
attitude of I don't need to be here. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays
at three p m. Eastern noon Pacific on Fox Sports
Radio and the I Heart Radio app. People can refuse
initials and nicknames all the time. It's not the same thing.
Initials are not nicknames. Joe Varden knows that he covers
the cas for Cleveland dot Com. It's got some great
(12:10):
insight on Lebron James. He joins us now on the
Doug glic Show. Uh, there's a three hour podcast out
there that here's how good it is show. I was
having dinner last night in southern in in Los Angeles
with a friend who lives in near the area where
Lebron lives. And he's like, have you downloaded the podcast
with Varden those guys. I was like, I've heard some
(12:31):
of it. We have it at work. He's like, no, no no,
three hours. It's all really really good for people who
want to get ahold of it? How do they do? So? Wow? Um, well,
there's actually two of them, uh that my colleagues and
I had had done. One was with Howard beck Um
the full which was in between games one and two
(12:54):
of the finals, and that's a lot more about just
what it was like for four years to kind of
lived together and lived through the Lebron phenomenon um and
we had a lot of fun with that. We also
drank three bottles of wine while we were doing it,
which was fun. And then, um, the new one is
uh at It actually actually through a local radio station,
(13:17):
point three FM in Cleveland. There there iPods or their
podcast channel, and that is where we kind of um
peel the a couple of layers back into what happened
in Cleveland and what happened with Lebron and Lebron and
Kyrie and and David Bladd and tylu and Dan Gilbert
(13:39):
and just kind of on down the line. But it's
so you kind of get that same flare of um
sort of the I don't know, just the camaraderie that
we had built, uh through four years together covering this team.
We were the three guys that stayed on the beat
the whole time and traveled the country with Lebron and
those guys and and um, you know obviously really got
(14:02):
to know him and know each other in a really
good way. Um. Some of some of what I've heard,
I can't tell you. I've consumed all of it, but
some of what I've heard paints the picture of Lebron
Um as a as a little bit one very very smart,
uh cunning in fact, but at times can be petulant, spoiled,
(14:23):
can throw fits all. Sometimes though he does things for
a purpose, Like how would you how would you characterize
to the person who hasn't seen the real Lebron how
would you characterize Lebron James as a teammate throughout those
four years? Yeah, I mean it's a really it's uh,
it's a complex picture when it comes to Lebron Um
(14:46):
as a as a a superstar athlete to work with.
From my perspective, I could not possibly have been treated better. Um,
you know, I I've worked and I've covered politics, I've
covered sports, uh um and and Lebron was my certainly
my favorite UM subject to cover and to work with
(15:07):
in my entire career. There's no doubt about that. As
a teammate, he was probably his at his best as
a teammate when he had older players on the team
that that he respected in a certain kind of way. Um.
(15:28):
He he needed to rely on those guys to create
the right loose, comfortable atmosphere in the locker room and
away from the court. Um. You know, guys like Channing
fry And and Richard Jefferson and James Jones, Um, they
could bring some levity to the situation, and they could
(15:50):
kind of invite everybody from the team from all corners
of the locker room out, you know, to dinner and
and to to two people's house is and you know,
they they they would invite themselves to Kevin Love's house
and have the whole team come over, Lebron included. And
you know, after a while they start going to the
Indians games, and when the Indians went to the World
(16:13):
Series and those kinds of things, that's when Lebron was
at his best. UM as a teammate. He was very
hard on Kyrie. Uh and at times Kyrie it totally
deserved it. There's no there's no question about that. That's
another longer discussion. Um, this year is a teammate Lebron.
(16:36):
It's it's it's hard because I think it's a teammate.
He really struggled this year. Um, he struggled throughout the year.
He was uncomfortable, which this is gonna sound so crazy,
but he he he had kind of lost his way
as the um kind of alpha leader of the team
(16:57):
when Dwayne Wade came on and and Isaiah Thomas and
Jay Crowder and Derrick Rose, like, these are guys that
are established veterans that can't really be talked to in
a certain way. And Lebron, of course was clearly the
best player and it was clearly his team, but he
had kind of gotten away from just kind of really
(17:20):
like enforcing his will as to how this was gonna go.
And then when all those guys got traded, like literally
all of them, Um, he he tried to reassume that role.
But these guys that he did, they brought in three
of them were young twenty five years old, and and
one was was George Hill, who had known from playing
against the playoffs, but he just didn't um, he didn't
(17:44):
really know the other guys in a way, and and
it it had just become too much of a task
to try to bring all this together in the two
months they had before the playoffs started. So what Lebron
end up doing, um by and large, was can get
upon himself and the Calves set up their team so
that regardless of who was on the floor or whatever, what,
(18:08):
what the other talent was, everything, literally every last little
thing was going to go through Lebron. And Lebron was incredible.
He was sensational and and and carried this team back
to the finals when no one thought they could make it.
And but but the Lebron, the teammate had long been
(18:28):
von by the time that had rolled around Joe Barton
from Cleveland dot Com joining us Doug Gotli show, Fox
Sports Radio. Why was he so hard on Kyrie? Well, um,
I mean he's Lebron put words to it himself way
at the beginning, early in that first season together when
he talked about bad habits, and in the truth of
(18:49):
the matter is that Kyrie had shown to be an
incredible talent, brilliant offensive player, killer, all those things, but
playing on a bad Cavs team, you know, I mean
pretty much maybe with the exception of the Stepian years, um,
the worst cast team in in franchise history, that was
Kyrie's team. And so he had developed a ton of
(19:11):
bad habits, things that you just don't do to play
winning basketball. And Lebron knew that he needed to kind
of to to cleanse Kyrie of that, but he also
kind of overstepped in a way that there wasn't enough
respect i think paid to just how good of a
player Kyrie was. And this this lasted a long time.
(19:34):
I mean, this lasted well into the year. Uh not
quite but almost up to the to where to where
Kyrie you know, knocked down that the game winner in
Game seven. I mean Lebron would publicly, um praise him,
praise Kyrie and talk about how he's a he's a
future m v P and all those things. But he
(19:57):
also like almost akin to like Mile hazing, Like he
would just kind of haze him and and just kind
of speak about him and to him in a certain way.
Um that that Rutsky read the wrong way. And then
also Kyrie and this is just totally I mean, a
warped view. Kyrie resented how much power and sway Lebron
(20:17):
had in the organizations, like basically totally disregarding that you
were talking about arguably the greatest player we've ever had,
certainly the greatest player in Cleveland. Um, you know, four
time m v P, two time champion before that. Uh
and and he just he didn't like it. He didn't
like that that reporters ran the Lebron when something happened
politically that that required some comment. Um, he didn't like
(20:42):
how much he didn't like that Lebron's friends were hired
for jobs in the organization and and on down the line.
So this is something that that festered over their time together.
And in the meantime, they produced the single greatest comeback
in the NBA Finals history and gave a town something
that that no one born after ninety four I had
(21:04):
ever seen. Furious Joe Barton joining us from Cleveland dot com. Um.
The a lot has been made of of Dan Gilbert,
of the fact that they that Lebron could never get
over the letter that Dan Gilbert, you know, wanted to
make decisions, wanted his team back. What's the reality to
(21:25):
who Dan Gilbert was in this entire story. Well, Doug,
that's a great question. And um, you know, I try
every chance I get to to kind of set this
this straight. Like the whatever animosity or whatever ill will
that there is or was between Dan and Lebron in
(21:45):
these in this second four years together, I call it overblown, um,
because it's portrayed as though there was a falling out like, oh,
you know, Lebron is just so furious with Dan or
so it up with Dan, or whatever the case may be,
and that that just wasn't true that they, um, they
(22:06):
agreed to kind of move past what had happened in
the past, but they didn't say they didn't shake hands
and say okay, let's be friends like that. They didn't
have a personal relationship when Lebron came back. Lebron did
not come back because of Dans um and and and
I think said Lebron was actually telling truth when uh
(22:27):
he said the Rachel at the start of the finals, like,
I hadn't working relationship with Dan. I mean, they didn't
have any personal relationship ever. Um. But you know, Dan,
for the most part, uh, spent a ton of money
and did what he said he would do, which is
fund the team that was capable of of of winning. Um,
(22:48):
and Lebron did what he said he would do, which
was come here and and and get that team to
the finals and and win. So UM, if if Dan
and Lebron on like has had reached some kind of
like new level of trust and friendship, maybe Ron would
have remained in Cleveland. Maybe. But I just think this
(23:10):
is a lot has a lot more to do about
what Lebron wanted for himself and his family and kind
of how he wanted to write his last chapter. And
part of that, Doug, is he he wanted to play
for the Lakers, like he has always thought it would
be really cool to play under that under that Moniker
and and now he he's got the chance to do
(23:31):
it will work? And And here's why I ask, because
I agree with you. You know, he had Channing Fry,
He had some of these these great teammates who, um,
they respected him but didn't take everything too seriously and
and kind of understood. But and even though I think
he respects Rondo and probably likes the grittiness and toughness
(23:52):
of Lands, and you know, these guys that that need
to play well that need to fit in. Even JaVale
McGee has seen JaVale McGee might be the only guy
who can have a good time and be a veteran.
Then you have all these other young guys who he
might like their talent, but they man, they're really young
and they might revere him, but that doesn't mean, uh,
they can be their best selves playing with him based
(24:14):
upon what they currently have, how they're currently structuring it,
do you think it will work? Well? Do I think
they're going to beat the Warriors this year? Uh? No, no,
almost no matter what I mean. Now, the Worriors would
need to devastating injuries to kind of bring them back
to the pack instead of just the requisite one uh
(24:37):
with five all stars over there. But I think this
is a bigger and I think this is a bigger
discussion too. Um. We were talking out here, I'm at
the Summer League, and we were talking with some of
the Lakers writers and I won't name names because they
got to work with a team now, but they were
questioned like, uh, you know, are the are the Lakers
right now? Are they even be? They better than the Rockets?
(24:58):
Are they better than the Pelican? They just kind of
name like three or four team those than the war Friors,
And UH and Jason and Floyd and I. You know
that two of the guys that have watched Lebron do
this for the last four years just just laughing at us, Like,
you cannot bet against Lebron unless it's the Warriors, who
have an unprecedented level of talent. You can't bet against
(25:19):
him at any point because he's that good. So yes,
I think it can work. However, Uh and I'll try
to get to the points because I can't. We need
to remember that in January this year, the Calves were
trending in a way that they would not have made
the playoffs. They were six and thirteen at one point,
and they had all these names and it just wasn't working,
(25:43):
and Lebron was in the locker room and they could
not win. Um And so I am fascinated. You know this,
like Lebron may have to change change a little bit
kind of how he approaches things away from the floor,
just to make some of these guys feel a little
bit better about things and try to kind of build
that build up, you know, the team and the camaraderie
(26:05):
component of this that it that it takes to be successful.
So I think, I think, I think it will work,
but I do absolutely recognize account it's going. It's going
to be amazing. What about what about the Calves? UM?
I like their point guard, and I do think Kevin Love.
It's gonna be interesting what they do with Kevin Love?
(26:25):
What do you think the process they go through is
do they tank? Is that is that the plan? How
do they plan to rebuild this thing? Well? So, I mean,
you know, we've taken like a tire iron to them
over this. Uh, just just searching for every nook and cranny,
every pressure point. Are you going to tank? Just because
that's kind of you know that that's the common knowledge,
(26:49):
is the right word. But that's like the opinion out there,
like you lost Lebron, you have their chance, you have
to tank. Um. And they insist, including like the guys
behind the scenes, they insist that that is not immediately
the plan. UM. They feel like their talent is underrated UM.
And they feel like the guys that they brought in,
(27:10):
as it turned out, weren't great fits to play under
the kind of pressure that it takes the play with Lebron,
who's trying to go to a fourth finals and and
expect so much without time to gel and they just
think that those guys on their own, um aren't going
that that that there's that there's potential there. They also think,
(27:32):
and maybe this is part of it, is market wise
that you don't just trade Kevin, just trade him. Um,
you need to get like you need to get the
right pieces for him. And the market might not be
there for him now. So they're they're really there. There
is a very viable case to be made to bring
this team back, bring Kevin back, um, and and see
(27:53):
how it goes. You know, Uh, the East is gonna
be weak. Um, there's two playoff spots that you know,
you think that might be there. And you know the
rest of the league doesn't think that Calves are gonna,
you know, be a candidate for him, but right now
the Calves kind of do. And and there's no harm
in trying it. And if and if things go awry,
(28:15):
then you trade Kevin at the deadline and and you know,
you look for picks and those kinds of things and
you start to start to rebuild. Then but if if
it works, Doug, Um, what a story for Dan and
what a story for Kevin? And the thing they've been saying,
is you know, these rebuilds are not guaranteed to work. Like, yeah,
(28:36):
the Sixers are a heck of a story after just
five awful, terrible, horrendous years. And oh, by the way,
if they don't trade for Kawhi Leonard, they're probably not
getting into the finals anyway. I mean, like that's how
hard it is. And and you know, and like, look,
they're they're betting on bad to stay healthy. They're betting
on Ben Simmons, developer jump shot so and and look
(28:58):
that's the best at the Mill Hockey Bucks. They tanked
and they got a great player out of it, but
they were you know, they still were out of the
first round of the playoffs. I mean, still, it doesn't
it doesn't. It doesn't always work. It's a it's a
great point. Download those podcasts. It's incredible conversation. Enjoy the
summer league, and uh we'll talk soon, Joe, great stuff, man, Okay,
thanks for having me, Doug Joe Varden Cleveland dot com.
(29:22):
Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in
the nation. Catch all of our shows at Fox sports
radio dot com and within the I Heart Radio app
Lebron James did in fact tweet out specifically, so Blaze
Pizza welcomed him in okay, Blaze Pizza sent out the
you know for every everybody, but Lebron was the one
(29:42):
who who said, um who tweeted out that he was,
you know, haven't been to a pizza party in a minute,
with the what's the what's the emoji? Where you're the
thinking man emoji with the hand over the chin Culver
City question mark. Come on man, that's teasing people like,
go to Culver City. This was after Blaze Pizza said
(30:05):
are you ready for the King of All Pizza parties
were celebrating Lebron james arrival to l A with three
pizza seven attends not by any of our l A locations,
and he tweeted out Culver City. Look, do I think
this is like the end of a friendship and a bromance?
Like your fans are a lot like you know what
they're like. They're like people who watch evangelists on TV.
(30:30):
They do they they just they they they want to
be a part whoever the second the next next Jesus
is they want? It was first it was Magic, Forget Magic,
Now it's Kobe. Forget Kobe now it's Lebron. We used
to not like Lebron. Now we like Lebron because he's
on our team. Like, okay, Lebron Pizza, just lead us,
(30:50):
lead us to a championship, lead show up beat one
of us. And here's the thing. I don't think this
is anything damning towards Lebron in the future. I'm not
gonna but it's a great missed opportunity because the one
thing that Kobe has never been able to be though
he was loved, Like if you've ever been the Staples,
(31:13):
Staples is there's stowage is basically the upper level. Right,
it's a weird arena in it's set up. They're downstairs
right when you get down on the floor level, those
are high dollar. Okay, but the hardcore ultra Laker that that.
But that's like you go there date night, you go
there to be seen. But the Laker fans, real fans
(31:35):
of real people are up in the upper deck. That
crowd loved Kobe Mamba mentality, but he was never really
one of them. Italy Philly lives in you know, he
lives in Newport, like he didn't live in l a
And not that Lebron is really one of them. He's
from Akron to Miami to Cleveland back to here. He
(32:00):
does does live in l A proper lives to listen Brentwood,
and this was a chance to at least dip his
tell and being a man of the people. Hey, you
know what I'm in to Blaze Pizza in l A.
Let's go to Culver Cities right around the corner and
just show up. And I mean like, look, if I
was advising Lebron James, I would have told him like, hey, dude,
let's get there and wait in line. Not get there
(32:23):
and even do the Lebron thing where you have security
and cut through and you shake hands. Just go there
and wait in line, be like, hey, man, what's up.
I'm not gonna sign argraphs. Just got a pizza. Bring
whoever's with you. We all came to get free pizza. Yeah,
I just signed for her fifty three million dollars. But
it's free pizza. Who says no to free Blaze pizza.
Nobody says no to and you would have won the people.
(32:46):
I just I feel like it's missed opportunity at all.
Did he come here to win another title, to win
number eighteen, or do you just come here to do
the l a thing, to be in movies, to be
an actor, because that's what everybody comes here for, right
actor director, I'll get a script you gotta see. That's
what Lebron, That's what it feels like. Try to be
(33:11):
a man of the people, of the people. Be sure
to catch live editions of The Doug gott Leap Show
weekdays at three p m. Eastern noon Pacific on Fox
Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. The basketball
world is really in Las Vegas NBA Summer League. They
got the Board of Governors meetings, and they got guys
(33:31):
like CJ McCullum has got an awesome podcast out there.
He kind of have to join us here on The
Doug Gottlieb Show. CJ, how are you? I'm well, how
you guys doing good? Man? Um, let me start with
what everybody's talking about with your team. What did you
make of the original tweet by Damian Lillard. I actually
didn't even see it until it was on What Leisure
(33:55):
Reporter or something like that. I wasn't really pay attention,
but um, I know a mus talked to Dame pretty often.
Why didn't really take us think of it? As anything.
But in the outside world, if you're not part of
the organization, then I can see how you would leave,
you would be skeptical or maybe I think I think
something of it. Yeah, so it was what I mean,
is that is that really what it is? It was
(34:15):
just one of those cases where he just really said,
I'm typically a happy camper, right that that was just
tweet I'm typically a happy camper. It what did we
misperceive the Hunter forty characters? It wasn't even Hunter forty
characters that he put out there. Yeah, yeah, I think
it was a little blown out of portion, blowing out
a portionate a little bit, just based on what's going on. Obviously,
(34:36):
there's a lot of rumors spoiling around our team in general,
there have been room much for years. Someone asked him
a question and he answered they basically saying that he's
typically happy, like basically like he suddenly happy all the time.
So I think I think that was accurate statement and
what he said, he typically is happy, you know, most
of the times. And people are gonna make up rumors
in garless and what you say if you answer, if
(34:56):
you don't answer it, there's always going to be something.
But I mean, and it comes down to it, he's
a member of the boat in trouble. What was your
reaction when Boogie signed with the Warriors. I was I
was actually on a plane flying back from Miami to Portland,
and my girls showed me her calm. She was like,
(35:17):
Mark's cousins just signed. And I was like, stop playing,
stop playing. I went to sleep. I didn't leave it.
Then I woke up two hours later, I signed into
my WiFi and sure enough that had happened. I was shocked.
I was surprised, you know, at the number he signed for,
Surprise that he chose the Warrior, Surprise that or other
teams were interested in, Surprise that he didn't get a
(35:40):
bigger offer from another team. Surprised the Lakers did go
after him. There was a lot of thought that went
through my head at that time, so I had to
detect him. I guess, I guess my question there. Let
me get you guys from the playoffs. They've done it
a couple of times. Um, are we sure it makes
them better? And and here's why, Like I understand, like
in the world of fantasy sports, like you add an
all star to a team, like yeah, but one he's
(36:03):
coming off injury and too. You know, the beauty to
them was that they could play small and switch everything.
They may be like, look he can boogie if if
healthy can really play, We don't know healthy he'll be
and help good he'll be, and it changes their ability
to switch everything because he's a true five defensively, all right.
(36:23):
I think it'll be tough at first. They gotta make adjustments.
Obviously he's not gonna be able to play and start
the season. They'll probably stay out a little bit to
get more comfortable with, you know, the recovery process of injury,
more comfortable with the Warrior's offensive decen schemes and principles.
But overall, I think when once they figure it all out,
it's help them because the fact that he's probably the
best back to basket guy you know on their team
(36:46):
for sure. I think Sean Evistin was the biggest post us, right,
Draymond passes a lot of the postal he doesn't really score,
and that gives him just a different you know, he
can shoot three, he's capable pastor has great vision average
or five of such a game, and can embrace double
teams in fourth of other teams so overall, I think
once they figure out the continuity and and you know,
the touches and where he's gonna get his shots from it,
(37:07):
I don't see why they can't be successful with arguably
the best big in the NBA. The podcast is called
The Pull Up uh C J McCollums. To start with
the goal with the with the Portland Trailblazers. He joints
us in the Doug Gotlip Show here on Fox Sports Radio.
Let's get to lebron Um. It felt like there was
a foregone conclusion that he would end up in l A.
(37:30):
When when it became official that he was going to
l A, what did you think. I wasn't surprised when
you look at the options on the table for him,
and you know, based on the type of situation he
was looking for the market obviously, what he's doing in
the community, what he's doing outside of the sports round
with deduction and getting more involved with Kale, and it
(37:51):
made sense um looking at its careerently, how many years
he put in there and what he's done for the community,
when he's done to the state of Ohio, the game
of bath money, and I felt like there was only
two options and I don't think the Houston Rockets was
options he wanted to take agreed. Um, how far away
are they when they add Lebron? I mean, you have Lebron,
(38:13):
you always have a chance. You can put the brunt
out there where for fifteenth men on the roster and
you're gonna have a chance to win games. So it's
just more about health, you know, how they figure out
the rotation with with Rondo coming in there, just signed Pole,
they got kuz Money, got Angram, they got a lot
of wings who can play. You just gotta figure out
the rotation, who's going to start, a point guard, who's
(38:33):
gonna close game? And obviously matchups will be a will
be something to look forward to the seeing in the
Western Conference because you never know what the are gonna get.
You never know we're gonna match up. Anything is possible there. Look,
there are people, there's a lot of people who think, hey, man,
Western Conference is so loaded that we should go one
through sixteen. Um, I sit there and go like, you know, look,
(38:56):
I think the Western Conferences is better than the Eastern Conference.
But I'm not sure we're giving credit for for for
Milwaukee and and what what Janice is helping build there,
But we gotta pay attention to Philadelphia and what those
young guys. They're going to get better. Boston at full
strength should be very very good. Toronto is pretty good
as well. Like are we completely dismissing the East a
(39:19):
little bit too early? I mean, I think the Eastern
Conference is good, but the Western Conference, you know, the depth.
You look at the dominance of some of the teams
to have won in the last few years, that the
Rockets win the sixty five games and not even um
getting to the finals. You look at the Worris, how
(39:39):
DoD they've been the last years. I think you you
look at the top of the West and the top
of the East, and that's where the comparisons come out.
And then you add Lebron to the Western Conference and
Cathmen teams start to or people start to talk about
the differences in the Eastern West. I think it's both
very competitive, but the edge probably goes to the West
right now just because of the depth and and how
good the topic is. So there are some very strong
teams in Eastern, but the the proof is into putting.
(40:03):
The Warriors have been dominant and they've contended for champions
last couple of years, the only other team to compete
with him is the team Lebron was on, and now
Lebron's in the in the Western Conference. So I think
that's why there's a disparity, and people continue to try
to put down on the other conference that that part
is fair. Um Sege McCullum joining us obviously. We we
started by reacting to what Damien tweeted. And I think
(40:24):
the reason is, look, you guys were great in the
second half of the season, him especially at incredible second
half of the season, and uh and but there there
there's always gonna be people that say, look, that's as
good as it gets, like you're never gonna take that
next step, and so and so when when he tweets out, hey,
I'm always at the camper about the possibility of going
(40:45):
to Lakers, there's like a confirmation bias in it, right, like, oh, well,
of course he wants to go to a team with Lebron,
so now he can compete for a championship. What's it
like to deal with the reality of man, it's really
hard to get that one more step, that Warriors level step,
or even that Rockets level step. When you're in Portland Yeah,
it's tough. It's tough to win regardless of where you're at,
(41:08):
especially in the Western Confluence. And you haven't played the
Warriors a lot of times the last you know, five years.
You see what a championship caliber team looks like. You
see how they execute, you see how they play together,
you see how great they are defensively, and it's it's
tough and it's frustrating, but it's a part of life.
Nothing that's in life is going to be easy. It's
not easy to to live in America. It's not easy
to work at a nine to five, it's not easy
(41:29):
to play in the NBA, and it's not easy to
make it right. You gotta figure out ways to improve,
figure out ways to get better, and control the controllable.
That's kind of how I've always lived my life. I
can only control my preparation, my mindset, and my attitude
every day. The rest of it's gonna be what it's
gonna be. Okay. So uh, The podcast is called The
Pull Up. If people haven't heard, haven't downloaded it, what's
(41:50):
it like? He's definitely subscribe, you can subscribe anywhere. To
Pull Up would basically just talk about what's going on
in the NBA. I get wine recommendations. I can of
the recommendations. Occasionally, I've had guests on. We'll continue to
add guests from different backgrounds and Loss of Life. I've
had the producer of Billions on the five Love. I've
id d weight on. I am a huge Billions fan,
(42:12):
So shout out to shout out to Blank, We're coming on.
But it's been great. It's been great for me to
just kind of talk about my thoughts on the NBA
and I thought on similar league, certain rookies I think
about a play well, like Kevin Knox, who's surprised a
lot of people although he was food on Draft night,
you know, typical Knicks fans Draft night. I think he's
gonna really help them. But you just give a variety
(42:32):
of takes, you know, on what it's like to be
in the NBA. But it's like to you know, watch
the games in my point of view. Okay, so let
me let me ask you about Kevin Knox. I too
liked him before the draft eighteen. I think, you know,
as a face up four can play some three. You
know his his body's gonna get even better. Um So,
why do you think Why do you think some teams
(42:53):
missed on him. I think a lot of Kentucky players
are better in the NBA. Um there's so much talent
around them, their certain rules to where you know Anthony Davis,
if you look at Devil Booker Stave, I don't think
it's the NBA even cry Anthony Town. But I think
he's starting to see how well rounded he is as
a players. Versatility, you can shoot obviously, has a nice
(43:13):
looking jump shot, even though you know the show about
thirty time or thirty six percent. Here in college. He's big,
He's able to guard. Like you said before, you can guard.
The four industry is a large wing of athleticism and
ability to you know, push tempaul off off of rebound.
So I think he has all the tools to be successful,
just about putting them together. Who's been disappointing to you
that you've watched in Vegas? Yeah? I honestly I haven't
(43:36):
really watched that much. I've been working out. Wait wait, wait, wait, wait.
You can tell me how much you like how Kevin
Knox and other rookies, but you you don't get you
don't offer up anything negative, well not really, because it's
it's summer league. So when when you play well, I
watched how you played well. I don't necessarily judge to
the points, to these six rebounds. I'm looking at how
(43:57):
you're scoring. Does to translate to an actual NBA game?
You know, can you score at three levels? You have
a mid range game? Can you finish your on the
basket but you have a float? Or if you're a guard,
can you shoot threes catching? Shoot open? Can you shoot
threes catching shoe contested? Can you shoot threes off the dribble?
So that's kind of what I watched, and whether you
make or miss it, I can tell them your skill sets,
you're gonna be successful now. So I don't really get
caught up in trade y'all shooting poorly or shooting well,
(44:20):
because you know, like historically he's made shots. It's just
about the shot selection where he's shooting shots, from how
he's running the offense, and once he gets more comfortable
and the resta room he's get uncomfortable, still be successful.
But Summer league is isn't always indicative of the NBA success.
You got guy like John Selby who has one really MVP.
You got a guy like Draymond will be terrible and
some of the one of the one of the worst
some of the players we've ever seen, honestly, and he's
(44:42):
a very very good NBA players, So it doesn't necessarily
always equating to accept either way. I just kind of
try to watch the intangibles and as a player who
plays the game and has guarded certain guys, like how
does how do they score? How do they de fan?
How's their bi langues? That stuff that translates to success
or failure in league? How how and I look, I
I completely agree with you in terms of people get
(45:03):
so caught up and make or miss. It's more about
the shot selection. It's also about can you get by guys?
But what about the other end of the floor in
terms of level of effort, level of toughness, and level
of ability. Um, I don't think it. Fans think nobody
guards anybody in the NBA. The reality to it is
if you can't guard anybody, you can't play in the NBA.
(45:25):
How much do you pay attention to that? Definitely attention
to that as well. And it's the saying goes, there's
there's great defense, and that's better offense. There's a lot
of great defense out there. And there's a lot of
extremely talented players offensively to where like Kevin Durant, you
can play great defense to do everything in your power
to prevent a tough shot and he still makes it.
(45:45):
So it can a guy move, you see, as you
know the angle, you help them to communicate that deep
How does you fire over screens to the guard? Those
are things that are a cruisial part of the game.
You're looking at nine hundred and fifteen. Pick a roll.
Think about how many possessions in the game can you
get over screened? Is he weak? Is he's strong physically?
You know, as he died, as he crashed. If you're
a big man, does he boxed out or just go
(46:06):
to the rebound because you have a motor. You know,
there's a questions about DeAndre Ada and whether or not
he has the motive. I think he's coming out with
a chip on his show to try and get chased
down block, going after every offensive rebound, trying to show
that you know, he does have a motor and he
is worthy of the CJ. McCullum, great stuff that you're
giving us um. Okay, So knowing all of this and
knowing all of the things, you look for stug Gotlib
(46:28):
show here on Fox Sports Radio. Um, I'm fascinated by
the mellow thing, right, so mellow mellow. It looks like
they're either going to trade him or buy him out,
or smooth him or not smooth them a stretch him
and so he'll be gone from there? Does it? Does
it change in a locker room how he can be
(46:49):
and how the presidency has based upon the salary he earns.
What I've always thought on this as a working premise,
you live in you work in NBA locker rooms. I
do not. I've always thought, hey, man, if a guy's
making twenty seven million, he's got a little bit more
say than if a guy's playing at the minimum because
he was bought out at seven million. I guess my
question is, Kenny is can you get the best out
(47:12):
of Melow whatever he's got left in a championship type
situation if the leadership is different and if he's making
a different salary. Absolutely, I think Melow is who he is.
He's a FORMA five score. He showed that because sport.
So I think the motor of the drive is gonna
be there. He's gonna be out the group people wrong
and She's a big, big year for him individually, and
(47:32):
he's gonna do whatever it takes to to help himself
succeed individually and the health of teams, So salaries decide.
You know, there's a lot of wealth with people to leave.
There's a lot of guys who want minimum, let's say,
from a credibility and ability standpoints, will respect them. Now,
it's just about and finding the right situation, whether that's
Miami or that's Houston or wherever he decided to go,
(47:53):
and then applying himself and making shots, you know, defending better,
doing those things that you know, whatever team he goes
to is gonna need for this for them to be successful,
for him to continue to stand his career. The podcast
is called to pull up CJ McCollums to watch them
with the Portland Trailblazers. You fall on social media and
apparently gives wine recommendations as well. What I need. I
(48:14):
don't need that. I just need the cell phone because
I never know what to order with one. I can't
listen to the podcast and then remember that and then go, okay,
to write this down. I'm gonna order this one. I need,
like you know, I need to sound like, I know
what I'm talking about. I was at a restaurant last night.
They're like, do you want one? I was like, I
have no idea what I'm looking at? None? Yeah, man,
you gotta here. I try to educate yourself. I ask questions,
(48:35):
use the vino app and to figure out ways to
uh take certain lines, learn about the great researching, and
then actually continue to go to a certain major at restaurants.
You'll be able to pick out let whether you want
a French Bordeaux, whether you want to Italian one, and
you want to software at a bowl red a strong red.
Do you want a Sonoma coach or do you want
more of a smooth Italian Italian grapes? So you just
(48:58):
gotta go through it. The more you take said, the
more you're asking questions, it's easier to kind of learn
about it. And then when you do liontation and things
of that nature you are comfortable with, you know, go
on through the selection process. Great stuff. C J. C J. McCollum,
thanks so much for joining us. No problem at all.
Thank you,
Host
Doug Gottlieb
Popular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.