May 28, 2024 • 40 mins
Colin says even though the Celtics rolled through the East this year while heading to the Finals, they still don’t come off as the best team in the league. Tom Brady will not only make an amazing broadcaster but his ability to always stay competitive will elevate his personality. Bill Walton wouldn’t be accepted in this day of age with his strong opinions and hippie lifestyle. Plus, Nick Wright stops by to break down the upcoming NBA Finals
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):
Thanks for listening to the Best of the Herd podcast.
Be sure to catch us live every weekday on Fox
Sports Radio in noon to three Eastern nine am to
noon Pacific. Find your local station for the Herd at
Fox Sportsradio dot com, or stream us live every day
on the iHeartRadio app by searching Fox Sports Radio or FSR.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
This is the Best of the Herd with Colin cowher
on Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
Oh here we go.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
One team already in waiting for the Mavericks to arrive
in the finals, live in Los Angeles.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
It's the Herd.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Wherever you may be and however you may be listening.
Thanks for making us part of your day. Nick Right
one hour, Jmac, I took a bold, dynamic stance this
playoffs year, taking Boston to get to the finals. You
took an equally aggressive stance on the Dallas Mavericks getting
to the finals. I think we're both going to be right.
(01:01):
But I was thinking about something we talked about this yesterday,
and for all those who watched on Memorial Day, I
hope you had a great weekend of reflection, spent time
with your family, but I want you to think about this. Jmax.
So the Celtics, as predicted, rolled through the East twelve
and two, a lot of blowouts. They were forty one
and eleven against the East. The East Coast, where I
(01:23):
spent most of Memorial Day weekend, has great bagels, not
a lot of great NBA teams. Is Boston won. I'm
not sure I thought about this last night. What the
Celtics are are a perfect reflection of what basketball is
in the NBA in twenty twenty four. They are offensively gifted,
(01:47):
and the league's never been more offensively gifted. Six guys
on this team could drop twenty points in the finals.
You wouldn't be surprised. They're rich. Derek whitez their number
three or four starter. He'll make eighteen million this year.
They're mobile. Drew Holliday porzingis Derek White not drafted by
the Celtics. They're cohesive team above everything else. That's very
(02:09):
much a mantra international and domestic basketball. And they're a
little soft. They're about a five hundred team at home
in the playoffs the last three to four years. And
they are very very good and very skilled, but they're
not great. And I don't know how to make the
Celtics go from very good to great, and that's where
(02:33):
it's interesting. Jason Tatum's their best player, but offensively he
mostly floats off ball. He does not take the game over.
He is not Luca, his personality is not Alpha. His
usage rate is not that high. It was below Cam
Thomas this year. Jaren Jackson, and he's the best player,
(02:53):
probably on the best team. It's a different world we
live in. If you watch the Celtics play on five
different possessions, they could have five different Celtic players score.
It would look fantastic. It's almost too collaborative. What do
I mean because in my entire life in the NFL,
(03:18):
even in pitching in the big leagues, in the NBA,
there's a Verlander, a Brady, a Lebron, a steph An,
mj a Kobe, and Dallas has one. It's called Luca.
Get me the ball, I'll get the out, I'll make
the pass, I'll get the bucket. And that's not what
(03:38):
Boston is. They're really smart, and they're really collaborative, and
they like to get Derek White involved. And the ball
moves beautifully. It's esthetically pleasing, but it's not old school.
And in my life, Mahomes can play poorly fourth quarter,
give me the ball for it. That's what I've seen
(04:03):
Steph Curry, a KD, A Lebron, An MJ A Kobe.
But the Celtics very much are twenty twenty four basketball,
and that maybe is how basketball turns out over time,
collaborative over alpha, sharing, over the individual. Tatum may have
idolized Kobe Bryant, but their basketball ideology is very different.
(04:28):
Tatum sometimes floats, gives the ball up, views others, and
still ends up with twenty nine points, seven rebounds, a
couple of blocks. He's a tremendous athlete, but his ball
use is dreat far below Luca. Luca's old school. I
always have this feeling in the off season. He gets
on that Gulf stream, lights up, a smoke, big couple
(04:50):
of beers. He's on his way to not working out
for two months. That's old school, and so is his game.
So the Celtics in the MAVs is a I sick
matchup of old versus new, and the old historically creates dynasties,
does collaboration with a star that sometimes is just part
(05:10):
of the offense, not the offense late in games. So
I thought it was fitting as they swept the Pacers
that Jalen Brown, their number two player on most nights,
ended up being the MVP of this series.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
I think I'm one of the best two way wings guards,
whatever you want to say in this game. You know,
I thought this year, I've taken a level and I've
increased it. I took the matchup. I picked up guys
full court, I chased guys off screens. I battled with bigs,
and you know, I felt like I should have been
all defensive. But you know, as as time has gone
by and I got to this point, like I just
(05:47):
I stopped caring and I just embrace. I don't care
who sees what. As long as my team knows my value,
my city knows my value, my family. That's all. That's
all I really care about.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
It's sort of like we hear about that, bring the
dog to work, the googlization of work, collaborative fridays off,
everybody gets along. In a perfect world, that's the way
it would be. We would all have balance, we'd like work,
but family took precedence. Fifty hour work weeks. Let's not
do any of that. The Celtics are new and collaborative
(06:23):
and there's chemistry and they share and there's a different
score every possession. I think it can win a title,
but I don't know if it can against Luca. And
I don't know if that very good will become great.
We'll see. So I was took a few days off
last week, headed back out east in New England, Patriots
(06:44):
Territory in Rhode Island, and I put my Patriots hat
on and I go walk walking on the beach, ride
the e bike, you know, one of the peeps. And
I get asked this a lot, a lot more than
I thought I would be asked, how do you think
Tom Brady's going to do as a And Brady was
on our show yesterday and I say, I always have
(07:05):
the same opinion. If people have a couple of minutes,
I'll share it with him and I'll say, well, the
traits and the habits that created the quarterback will probably
create the same broadcaster. I'll give you an example. I
thought Tony Romo was always underrated as a quarterback. He
got a lot of criticism. I thought he was very good,
(07:28):
but he was loose. It was often instinct, it felt
like over details and prep. It was gut feeling sort
of like George Bush as a president, right kind of
going with his gut. You wish he would be more
into the prep for the details. And I actually like Bush,
but I always felt Tony Romo as a player was flashy,
(07:49):
really gifted, underrated, really talented, a bit of an ad liver,
feelings over facts. And as a broadcaster I feel the
same way. He's a risk taker, calls out plays, sometimes
makes weird sounds. I'm not sure which direction he's going,
but by the end of it, it's usually wildly entertaining.
(08:12):
And then there's Tom Brady, who as a player was
meticulous and thorough, a people pleaser and detail and that's
what I think you'll get as a broadcaster. Brady will
be the opposite of Tony Romo, and you can pick
your favorite. They'll both make a lot of money, they'll
(08:32):
both be very good, but they will be opposite his broadcasters.
I talked about Tom's competitive nature as he heads into
the booth at Fox.
Speaker 5 (08:42):
I think, if I want to put effort into something,
then naturally I'll be Naturally I'll be more competitive at
it because I'll invest it a little bit of my time,
a little bit of my energy into it. Certainly with
the broadcaster. I don't think for me it's about competition.
I think it's for me it's about did I put
everything I could into it? And did I give the
(09:03):
fans everything that they tuned in for? And that's really
how I end up gauging myself. And I'll have to
look at myself at the end of every Sunday night
going did I do a good enough job? Did I
live up to the belief that Fox had in me?
Did I live up to the expectations of my teammates
Kevin Burkhart and Aaron and Tom and the entire team.
(09:25):
That's ultimately how I judge myself in that new role.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
Just like he was as a quarterback, a people pleaser.
Didn't have dinner with Belichick for twenty years, but always
at some levels sought his approval. John Madden coached or
taught a class on football at cal Poly, and, fittingly,
John Madden, the greatest analyst ever who worked at this network,
among others, was a teacher on the air, the telestrator.
(09:51):
He was trying to teach you football in a very
relatable way. John Gruden intense passionate as a coach and
as a TV analyst. I think Brady will be exactly
what he was as a quarterback, really into the details.
I asked him, and this was so Brady the answer.
(10:13):
Did you pay attention to the league when you were
playing beyond the Patriots?
Speaker 5 (10:18):
I tried to pay attention and follow every team every week.
It's that was our job, that was to understand the
whole league the perspective, every game counts, Those games meant
whatever games, they meant a lot to the division standings. Ultimately,
because our team was very competitive, the conference standings were
very important. You didn't look too much beyond that, and
(10:39):
we never talked about the playoffs and so forth. But
I knew what every division opponent was doing every week.
Where there were upsets, where there were injuries, those were
all very important to the success of our team.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Of course, Tom Brady knew what everybody else in the
league was doing as a quarterback and as a broadcast
I think that's what he'll deliver. Bill Walton passed away yesterday.
We talked about it briefly during our show. I grew
up in the Pacific Northwest, so right equidistant between Seattle
(11:13):
and Portland. But because I was in Washington State, I
got the Sonic games, but I occasionally listened, but now
more than occasionally listen to the Blazer games on radio
because I preferred their radio announcer Bill Shanley. So it
was a different era in a time. And I want
to talk about Bill Walton coming up and how he
would be accepted today. Oh, his basketball would be just fine.
(11:37):
That's coming up.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays
in noon eastern non am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio
FS one and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
The Great Bill Walton broadcaster, College Venom NBA All Star
passed away yesterday, seventy one years old. Two things about
his game I feel very strongly about. If he remained healthy,
he would be in a short list of the second
greatest center of all time. To Kareem Abdul Jabbar, he
(12:07):
would not have been that score. But Shack was all power,
a Keem was mostly footwork. Wilt was flashy but unfocused.
Russell was dominant defensively but limited offensively. Walton had a
dexterity that was hard to match. He was layered. He
was Jokich fifty years ago. The second thing I feel
strongly about his game today would have aged beautifully again
(12:34):
seventy four seventy five. He was often viewed and seen
more regularly in college at National Power UCLA, where two
years he went thirty to zero. Then he would be
in Portland because when he broke into the NBA, I
began watching the NBA. In the Walton days in the
Pacific Northwest, you'd get college games as often as NBA games,
(12:54):
even the finals were on tape delay. What I find
fascinating about Bill Walton is not just his game, which
again I think would have aged beautifully. He was almost
unique and mythological as a player. There was nothing like
him or his personality. And as I watched people yesterday
(13:15):
honor and celebrate him, and I realize, and I think
most sports fans do, who got a glimpse of Bill
even on YouTube highlights, that he was years and generations
and decades before his time. I wonder if he entered
the NBA now, would he be honored and celebrated to
this level. We live in a country now where people
(13:37):
are more tribal than ever, and Bill Walton was the
absolute opposite of stick to sports, I mean, the polar opposite.
Would you accept somebody who was gifted, but may have
thought much differently about politics in the world than you do.
When Walton broke into the NBA, he was seen as unique, funny, quirky,
(14:03):
odd and incredibly gifted. His best friend was nature. Second
best was John Wooden. He was like Bigfoot with a hook.
You didn't see him very frequently. I first got introduced
to him in the Northwest. You'd see him against the
Sixers and Doctor j But we put our arms around
(14:23):
the big fella. Would we do it today? I'm afraid
we wouldn't. The world we live in doesn't have room
for opinions that many people don't agree with. And what
Bill believed in. He was anti Vietnam War and he
was on the right side of that. For the record,
or we probably should have never been in. But Bill
(14:46):
had strong opinions and he really wasn't concern how they landed.
For you, Oh, he could be a great teammate. When
he went to UCLA, he was a hippie with long hair.
John Wooden said you need to get a haircut. He said,
I'm not going to John Wooden said, we'll mish a
big fella. Bill got on his bicycle wandered cross campus,
(15:07):
and got it cut. But sometimes I wonder the people
we honor if they were around today and breaking into sports,
would we accept them as much as we honor them today.
Bill was very unique and very different, cool stuff to celebrate.
I wish we did it today more often.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd Weekdays
and neonon Easter n a im Pacific two.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
NBA Insiders podcasting twice a week to plug you right
into the NBA grapevine.
Speaker 6 (15:37):
All happening in only one place. This League Uncut, the
new NBA podcast with me Chris Haynes and me Mark
Stein join us as we team up to expound on
everything we're covering. Hearing and Chason.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
Listen to This League Uncut with Chris Haynes and Mark Stein.
Speaker 6 (15:55):
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
your podcast.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
I'm not sure I've ever learned less about a team
than I did about the Boston Celtics in this playoff run.
And I'm not blaming them. They're human, They're much better
than all these teams. We've had thirteen playoff series, three sweeps,
three gentlemen sweeps, and probably another tonight, meaning seven of
thirteen will be sweeps or gentlemen sweeps over half. So
(16:20):
I was thinking about this, the two easiest ways to
win a chip in the NBA. Number One, you know
you're part of a great dynasty, a collective. Now they're
hard to build, but once you build them, you have
great talent. Even a star can have an off night.
And the second easiest way is as an underdog with
no pressure and you catch everybody by surprise. They're raptors
(16:41):
in Kawhi, Dirk and the MAVs. The Celtics are neither.
I don't think they feel like a dynasty. They're too quirky.
They lose too many home games against sometimes inferior teams,
and they're significant favorites. Draft Kings are minus two twenty five,
so they're not sneaking up on anybody. And I also
(17:02):
think they have mounting pressure this year. So they were
twenty three and seven against the West, so we know
they're good. They dominated the East in the regular season
and the playoffs, so we know they're dominant in the East.
They were also very good in the West. They have
the deepest roster in the NBA, in my opinion, the
most offensively skilled roster, in the NBA, the Western teams
(17:23):
that were only getting better. And what's interesting is if
they lose this year to the Mavericks, and that's certainly possible,
what's the pressure going to be like next year? Because
Tatum's going to sign the max deal, Brown's already got one.
There's going to be real limitations on what this team
can do with their roster. So they're better to get
it now. We've already seen them fold as a younger
(17:47):
version of this duo against the Warriors. If they folded
again against the more mature team, right, they folded against
the Warriors, and we kind of said, well, it's Stephan
is the Warriors, but what if they fold again against Dallas?
What is next year with the tarmac shortened gonna be? Like?
(18:08):
So I think it is this this Celtics duo. You
kind of gave him a little bit of a pass
losing the staff and Draymond and Clay and Steve Kurry
gave him a little bit of an emotional pass. Not
quite ready like we view and now not quite ready
but Jos wait, well, the just waiting's over. They're the
(18:28):
heavy favorite. This duo has been around a lot longer
than Luca and Kyrie. Here's Jalen Brown.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
We feel like we're a different team than we were
last year and the year before that. I know everybody
wants to continue to kind of pigeonhold us to what
we happened in the past, but we've had a different
team every single year, different coaches. We've had like three
coaches in the last five years, and still people want to,
you know, just make it seem like it's the same.
It's the same, it's the same. Time has gone by,
(18:55):
experience has been gained, and I think we are ready
to put our best footfall.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
It is interesting, though they are very much symbolic of
the current NBA. Jason and I are not big romanticizers
of the past. You can go back to the thirty
for thirties on the Reggie Miller Pacers. He was the
only guy on that team that could shoot a jumper,
you know. Or you go back to the Knicks, where
they tackled people, but nobody, even John Starks wasn't a great,
you know, natural elite consistent shooter. You start looking, I mean,
(19:24):
just think about the top ten players in a Mavericks
Celtics final. If Lucas won Tatum's two, Jalen Brown three,
he's more consistent than Kyrie four, Derek White five, Porzingis six.
I mean, then you start getting into Drew Holiday seven, PJ.
Washington eight, Lively maybe nine, al hor Al Horford had
(19:48):
twenty some points the other night. Al Horford is a
very dependable big offensively at least, so you're talking about that.
The offensive skill in this final is going to be
absolutely sensational if Porzingis plays. I think they're a little
bit the opposite of the Tea Wolves. Dallas didn't match
up great with Denver, they match up very well with Minnesota.
(20:12):
Minnesota in half court offense is awful consistently. Boston is
sometimes engaged, sometimes not on the defensive end, but they're
almost always good enough offensively to win a game. So
a lot of times Dallas just let Minnesota fumble over
themselves offensively. Boston doesn't do that. Now, if Porzingis isn't healthy,
(20:37):
Dallas could pick and roll him to death. But my
guess is this is the time a deeper offensive roster,
not as reliant on one or two guys. But historically,
the two best closers in a series, Shaq and Kobe
win the series with that. Nick Wright joins us Live.
(20:59):
I will say this, you have been I think I
have questioned at times Tatum. You at times have questioned
the Celtics. I said this earlier that history tells me
the alpha wins, whether it's Mahomes in the fourth quarter,
Brady Lebron, Steph, Kobe, mj the Celtics are more collaborative,
(21:19):
They're more twenty twenty four basketball. Is that sometimes Tatum floats,
he's off ball, he.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Doesn't have usage.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
And I say to myself, this final is a classic
matchup of modern collaborative basketball and a little old school Luka, Kyrie,
give me the ball, get out of the way, set
me a screen. Do you have a strong opinion about
this series going into it when the MAVs finish off
the Tea Wolves.
Speaker 7 (21:44):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I'm biased because going into the playoffs,
I think I was probably one of the only people
in the country that was picking the MAVs to win
the championship. And so yeah, I like how the MAVs look,
and I like that they're getting healthy. I know Live
is out, but they're going to be getting Lively is
out right now, but he should be back for the finals,
they could be getting Maxi Kleba, who was a big
(22:07):
loss for them. They just haven't shown that back as well.
And your point about going with the alpha is the
best player in the series does not always win, but
if the best player, if you're going to overcome the
other team having the best player, you need to have
a legendary or at least legendary adjacent team, or the
(22:30):
other team needs to be going through significant injury issues
or turmoil. And so the Celtics have the resume of
a legendary team. They have the point differential of one
of the ten best teams ever. They have the record
of one of the fifteen best teams ever. I don't
see that when I watch them, And maybe part of
(22:51):
that is because all of the teams that are on
those lists have a guy who is a guaranteed statue
in front of the arena when the moment he's done
playing guy, and this Celtics team does not have that.
They have a Hall of Famer in Jason Tatum, an
awesome number two in Jalen Brown, and obviously a very
(23:14):
well constructed roster and maybe the best starting five in basketball.
But as you and I have discussed previously. If Jason
Tatum is the sixth or seventh best player in the league,
NBA history tells us typically that doesn't win the championship.
In the last forty years, the only teams to win
(23:37):
the championship with the sixth or seventh best player in
the league as their best player are the four Pistons,
where you had the Lakers lose their entire wing, not
wing pardoning, power forward rotation to injury and they were
clearly sick of each other.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
The eight Celtics that did it.
Speaker 7 (23:57):
With KG Ray, Allen, Paul Piers, three awesome players, but
none best player in the league level beating Kobe when
he was on that level, and the twenty eleven MAVs.
Speaker 3 (24:08):
Those would be the examples.
Speaker 7 (24:10):
And the twenty eleven MAVs we attribute to Lebron melting
down as people call it in that series. That's the
entire list of the last forty years. Every other champion
has had a guy like Luca, a guy who is
going to be in the top twenty at a minimum
all time discussion. So that is my hang up with
Boston and Boston's gaudy record against three middling teams with
(24:35):
all of which without their best player for part or
all of the series, was not enough to sway me
from that initially.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
So you know, it's interesting and maybe I shouldn't juxtapose this,
but it just popped into my head. We celebrated and
honored the very unique, outspoken Bill Walton in his passing
yesterday anti war, anti establishment, never anti social sit ins
politically at UCLA, and we celebrated it. Kyrie Irving similarly
(25:09):
pushedback in our government in a vaccine. I may disagree
with him strongly and agree with Walton's stance on the
Vietnam War extensively, but it is interesting is that the
NBA has always been the sport that allows for some
social opinion, and there was almost no market for Kyrie
Irving out of Brooklyn, and in retrospect, is that fair?
(25:34):
Is that fair because he took a stance many did
on the vaccine. The Boston thing didn't work, but let's
be honest, not every star to a new team works
in the history of the league. Michael Jordan ran through coaches.
He just stayed in Chicago. What is your view not
today on Kyrie because it's working, but sort of going
into Dallas, how did you, what was your opinion on
(25:57):
how it would work and his career pre this.
Speaker 7 (26:01):
So listen, I have a I don't even know if
it's adjusted my opinion so much as I have new information.
The MAVs were my pick to win the title last season,
and then they traded for Kyrie.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
And I was so down on it.
Speaker 7 (26:17):
I said, well, now they can't win the title because
Kyrie had been a negative when it came to winning
for six consecutive years.
Speaker 3 (26:27):
That is not who he is now.
Speaker 7 (26:29):
So I think the fair reading of Kyrie's history, if
I may this will.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
Take a moment.
Speaker 7 (26:34):
Is this Kyrie, before Lebron got to Cleveland hadn't been
a part of winning basketball at the professional level. He
gets to Cleveland, they have this dynamic partnership that seems
to work brilliantly and beautifully. In the press conference after
the final game they play together in the Finals in
(26:56):
twenty seventeen, Kyrie says, basically, put some spec on Lebron
James's name. He just averaged a triple double on these finals.
I can't wait to continue playing with and learning from him.
Before they set foot on a court together again, he
reportedly said, I so badly don't want to be here.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
I will have knee surgery if you don't trade me.
Speaker 7 (27:18):
So that seemed to be a very quick sweat, you know,
kind of flip of the pendulum out of nowhere. He
then gets to Boston and it flatly does not work.
His first year there, he's oddly not on the bench
for their playoffs when he's hurt. His second year there,
he demands to guard Giannis in the playoffs and.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
They get cooked.
Speaker 7 (27:39):
Then he releases a commercial saying I hope to be
here forever, then demands another trade in that time frame, right,
he scolds the media for saying, how dare you say
Kevin Durant and I were plotting to get together in
that hallway at the All Star Game? It was just
two friends talking. When it turns out they were exactly
doing what he said they weren't doing. Gets to Brooklyn, says,
(28:01):
we don't need a coach, We're all coaches. Steve Nash's
co coach. That doesn't work out. While in Brooklyn, Yes,
the vaccine, but then also the very odd stubbornness about
not backing down about that documentary that he promoted that
to this day, I don't think he actually watched, and
I don't think he believes those awful things that were
(28:21):
in that documentary. I just think he felt boxed in
and was like, I'm not gonna apologize because that's not
who I am. So all of that was the data
we had about a player who had dealt with injuries,
who hadn't been a part of winning outside of the
three years with Lebron.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
That's the data we have.
Speaker 7 (28:38):
The data we have since then is getting to Dallas,
teaming up with Jason Kidd, the relationship with Luca, and
his own personal maturation and evolution as a person on
and off the court.
Speaker 3 (28:52):
You are getting the.
Speaker 7 (28:53):
Very best version of Kyrie Ura, a socially conscious, thoughtful,
good hearted guy who is not letting so much of
the other stuff kind of tear him off the basketball court.
And when you have that version of Kyrie Colin, he's
one of the most dynamic under six foot four players
in league history. And so I have massive respect for
(29:15):
what Kyrie's done. I have massive respect for Kyrie Irving
kind of finding.
Speaker 3 (29:21):
In the public guy who he wants to be, and.
Speaker 7 (29:24):
The Kyrie Irving the basketball player when he's been available,
has always been special to watch, and so Yeah, this
is a you know, into his thirties kind of evolution
and reinvention, and of course he deserves enormous credit for that.
Speaker 1 (29:40):
So I grew up in the Pacific Northwest. The first
team I fell in love with was probably in my region,
was maybe Thesonics, and then it was the Blazers the seventies.
That was very kind of the Pacific Northwest. Downtown Freddie Brown,
Jack Sick, mcgus, Williams, into Bill wh Alton, Jeff Petrie,
(30:00):
Dave Towards like all that stuff. Jack Ramsey the legendary coach.
But the league was not televised to the level it
is today. I lived between equidistant between Seattle and Portland,
but I was in Washington State, so I got sonic stuff.
But I would occasionally hear Bill Shanley, the Portland radio announcer,
who was much more colorful than the Seattle broadcaster. And
Walton was this nineteen seventy four, seventy five, seventy six.
(30:22):
He was this quirky figure, mythological almost because you didn't
see him in the regular season. You just heard about
this hippie in Portland who nobody could stop, and you'd
seen him in college. So this is the really the
beginning of me watching television in the early seventies, and
he was against the war and outspoken, an iconoclastic, and
(30:43):
all this stuff I said this morning.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
I believe.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
He's several generations ahead of his time. Not one that
he was Jokich, but a better defender fifty years ago.
Is that if the injuries didn't play place, And this
is hyperbolic, perhaps we would say is the second best
center ever to Kareem. He would never score like Kareem,
but the second best center ever.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Oh, I think that's legit.
Speaker 7 (31:08):
You think so too, Go ahead, I'm sorry, I just
think I think he was on that track. Yeah, I
just listen if I may about because you and I
have oddly different formative experiences with Bill Walton, which I'll
get to, but his playing career I saw none of.
But because I consider myself a bit of an NBA
historian basketball historian, what should be noted is this, If
(31:30):
you ask someone who is the greatest college basketball player
of all time and they give any answer other than
Leuel Sender or Bill Walton, they're wrong, right, Those are
the only two eligible answers. Bill Walton did not lose
a basketball game. From the middle of his junior year
(31:51):
of high school until the middle of his middle of
his senior year of college, he had an eighty eight
game collegiate winning streak. He was the most outstanding player
in back to back final fours. He played arguably the
greatest game ever, the twenty one of twenty two forty
four points. He then won in the National Championship Game.
He then walks into the league and in nineteen seventy
(32:13):
seven is the best player on the champion beating Kareem
and then beating Doctor J when Doctor J might have
been the best player in the world. The next year
is the NBA MVP, and he breaks his foot and
the career is never the same. So my experience with
Bill Walton, Colin and I don't think I've ever told
you this is and you'll laugh at me when you'll
(32:35):
laugh when I tell you this. When I was a
little kid and I told people what I wanted to
do when I grew up, I wanted to be Bill
Walton because I didn't know that to be the color
commentator you needed to either play or coach. But what
he did on the NBC broadcast with Steve Snapper Jones,
(33:01):
I thought was the coolest thing ever. And it is
part of me falling in love with basketball. He's the
soundtrack of it. And I'm sad that I never once
got to cross pass with him to tell him this anecdote.
I remember vividly being a little kid watching the NBA Playoffs,
watching a Bulls game, and my mom's saying, like seeing
(33:23):
a look on my face that I.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Was upset, and she was like, what's wrong?
Speaker 7 (33:27):
And I'm like, man, Steve Jones is being so mean
to Bill again, because I didn't know they were like
good friends and they were always giving each other a
hard time.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
And so he is.
Speaker 7 (33:39):
And for his broadcasting career, the stories that he has,
the stances that he took that were dangerous and risky,
and he stayed true to himself. And oh yeah, by
the way, was the greatest passing big man ever until Jokic,
and maybe including Jokic. A legendary life in a legend career.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Yeah, it's he was so perfectly connected to the Pacific Northwest,
you know, which when I grew up in the Pacific Northwest,
it's grainy, it's it's a it's got you know, it's
it's a little counterculture, you know what I mean. There's
no question he grew up in California, which has always
been left of center in America. And then he went
up to the Pacific Northwest. That's the only place more
(34:23):
left the California. Yeah, yeah, and uh. And then he
got Jack Ramsey, a very one of the great teachers.
I mean, can you imagine that your two coaches, he
may have literally had the perfect coaches. John Wooden, the
ultimate teacher, who kind of brought him back on the
fairway bill could get a little sideways, brought him back
(34:45):
on the fairway. And then Jack Ramsey, who was always
from his dress. Jack Ramsey legendary for these wild like
disco pants that Jack Ramsey kind of leaned in to
the unique personality of Bill in the pro game as
always been a little bit more about the player than
the coach. But it's fascinating that Walton loved both the
(35:07):
restrictive mentor in college, the conservative mentor, and then the
colorful NBA coach. And it shows the dexterity of his
personality that they both loved him, and he loved both.
It would be like going Andy Reid to Belichick and
you got along with both, and I just I think
that speak well.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
Of one hundred percent.
Speaker 7 (35:30):
And then the one other kind of final act of
his playing career, he wins sixth Man of the Year
for what a lot of people consider the greatest team ever,
the nineteen eighty six Celtic. Yes, great and adds, you know,
and finds a way to fit in with that very
unique culture absolutely seamlessly. This is you and I talked
(35:51):
about this a couple of weeks ago, oddly on your podcast,
that he's one of the reasons why when Damian Lillard
left the Portland Trailblazers and every story was written as
greatest Blazer ever. I was like, you've got to be
kidding me, Like Bill Walton played for them, and not
to mention Clyde Drexler.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
No, he and he was.
Speaker 7 (36:13):
He more so than Grant Hill, more so than Tracy McGrady,
more so than Derrick Rose. He is the biggest what
if he stayed healthy. Yes, in NBA history is Bill White.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
Yeah, that's a great way to put it in the history.
And I'm trying to think, you know, Roberto Clemena and
baseball the plane crash. Sure, I didn't grow up with
Roberto Clemeny, although I love those Pirates teams that were
extended beyond him for years and years and years. But
I think people look at Roberto Clemeny and go, oh,
that would have been maybe the greatest player of all time.
And we've seen this with musical stars who have either
(36:49):
taken their life or there have been tragedies beyond their control.
But I think in sports it's very rare that you
have an athlete and everybody summarily agrees, oh god, if
he would have been healthy, and nobody fights it. Like
every basketball historian was like yeah, Like he was twenty
one to twenty two against Memphis in a national championship game,
(37:11):
twenty one of twenty.
Speaker 7 (37:12):
Two to go by the way, by the way after
that was after being undefeated on the freshman team and
to finish his second straight undefeated year for the you know,
the varsity team at UCLA. He had never lost a game,
was going for his second straight title. Was twenty one
of twenty two. Yeah, there is are The other athlete
that comes to mind, I guess would be Bo Jackson,
(37:33):
where people are like, oh, man, what would have been?
But Walton absolutely was on that level, and that to
me is a testament to the beauty of his spirit.
Speaker 3 (37:44):
And I'm really glad we're spending the time.
Speaker 7 (37:45):
On this is that he didn't become bitter or jaded
because of that. He and instead transitioned to, Okay, I'll
make the most of what's left of my NBA career
and then be associated. He went from calling the NBA
Finals to doing PAC twelve after dark and loved every
(38:06):
minute of it. Yeah, and so God bless him and
his friends and family.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
I went back yesterday and watched thirty thirty five minutes
of Old Blazer and UC anything I could get my
hands on. He was on the Clippers, and I'm glad
you gave them credit. The best iteration of that Celtics
team could have very well been the eighty six team,
and he was. I mean, it's just Walton was just
(38:32):
a phenomenal player. And you know, the only positive that
ever comes out of a sudden death or one that
surprises us, is that it becomes a history lesson. And
Walton is teaching us so much about getting along, viewing
the world, willing to compromise your own goals, sacrificing for others.
(38:53):
Bill's a bit of a walking history lesson, and the
more you read about him, the better person you want
to be. Like I read things on Bill yesterday. I light,
you know, I got to be better at that, I
got to be a better teammate. And I think that's
a great acknowledgment of Bill, is that you read things
about him and think, I need to be a little
better person.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
And he might be. And I know we got to go.
Speaker 7 (39:16):
He might be the main character or he is the
main character of what might be the greatest sports book
ever written, Breaks of the Game by Tom Howersam.
Speaker 3 (39:25):
And so if people want to kind of they followed.
Speaker 7 (39:28):
The seventy seven Blazers around for a year and Walton's
at the center of that. And so now, I mean, goodness,
that's a you know, almost a fifty year old book
at this point. But I don't know that any sports
books ever topped it. It's definitely worth people's time if
they want to know more about that era of basketball.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
And also Bill Walton in that Blazer.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Give that book one more pop, because I'm gonna buy
it on Amazon.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
What's it called, oh, Breaks of the Game? Breaks of
the Game.
Speaker 7 (39:50):
I mean, it's probably the most famous sports book of
the at least. I don't know man pre Friday Night Lights,
maybe ever. Breaks of the Game by Tom Howers. How
I'm going to mispronounce his name. Haberstram Pardon me. Is
probably the greatest sports book ever written. Yeah, there you go,
pre plug.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Hey, great seeing you, Boddy, Yeah you too, see a
letter come all right,
Thanks for listening to the Best of the Herd podcast.
Be sure to catch us live every weekday on Fox
Sports Radio in noon to three Eastern nine am to
noon Pacific. Find your local station for the Herd at
Fox Sportsradio dot com, or stream us live every day
on the iHeartRadio app by searching Fox Sports Radio or FSR.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
This is the Best of the Herd with Colin cowher
on Fox Sports Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
Oh here we go.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
One team already in waiting for the Mavericks to arrive
in the finals, live in Los Angeles.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
It's the Herd.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
Wherever you may be and however you may be listening.
Thanks for making us part of your day. Nick Right
one hour, Jmac, I took a bold, dynamic stance this
playoffs year, taking Boston to get to the finals. You
took an equally aggressive stance on the Dallas Mavericks getting
to the finals. I think we're both going to be right.
(01:01):
But I was thinking about something we talked about this yesterday,
and for all those who watched on Memorial Day, I
hope you had a great weekend of reflection, spent time
with your family, but I want you to think about this. Jmax.
So the Celtics, as predicted, rolled through the East twelve
and two, a lot of blowouts. They were forty one
and eleven against the East. The East Coast, where I
(01:23):
spent most of Memorial Day weekend, has great bagels, not
a lot of great NBA teams. Is Boston won. I'm
not sure I thought about this last night. What the
Celtics are are a perfect reflection of what basketball is
in the NBA in twenty twenty four. They are offensively gifted,
(01:47):
and the league's never been more offensively gifted. Six guys
on this team could drop twenty points in the finals.
You wouldn't be surprised. They're rich. Derek whitez their number
three or four starter. He'll make eighteen million this year.
They're mobile. Drew Holliday porzingis Derek White not drafted by
the Celtics. They're cohesive team above everything else. That's very
(02:09):
much a mantra international and domestic basketball. And they're a
little soft. They're about a five hundred team at home
in the playoffs the last three to four years. And
they are very very good and very skilled, but they're
not great. And I don't know how to make the
Celtics go from very good to great, and that's where
(02:33):
it's interesting. Jason Tatum's their best player, but offensively he
mostly floats off ball. He does not take the game over.
He is not Luca, his personality is not Alpha. His
usage rate is not that high. It was below Cam
Thomas this year. Jaren Jackson, and he's the best player,
(02:53):
probably on the best team. It's a different world we
live in. If you watch the Celtics play on five
different possessions, they could have five different Celtic players score.
It would look fantastic. It's almost too collaborative. What do
I mean because in my entire life in the NFL,
(03:18):
even in pitching in the big leagues, in the NBA,
there's a Verlander, a Brady, a Lebron, a steph An,
mj a Kobe, and Dallas has one. It's called Luca.
Get me the ball, I'll get the out, I'll make
the pass, I'll get the bucket. And that's not what
(03:38):
Boston is. They're really smart, and they're really collaborative, and
they like to get Derek White involved. And the ball
moves beautifully. It's esthetically pleasing, but it's not old school.
And in my life, Mahomes can play poorly fourth quarter,
give me the ball for it. That's what I've seen
(04:03):
Steph Curry, a KD, A Lebron, An MJ A Kobe.
But the Celtics very much are twenty twenty four basketball,
and that maybe is how basketball turns out over time,
collaborative over alpha, sharing, over the individual. Tatum may have
idolized Kobe Bryant, but their basketball ideology is very different.
(04:28):
Tatum sometimes floats, gives the ball up, views others, and
still ends up with twenty nine points, seven rebounds, a
couple of blocks. He's a tremendous athlete, but his ball
use is dreat far below Luca. Luca's old school. I
always have this feeling in the off season. He gets
on that Gulf stream, lights up, a smoke, big couple
(04:50):
of beers. He's on his way to not working out
for two months. That's old school, and so is his game.
So the Celtics in the MAVs is a I sick
matchup of old versus new, and the old historically creates dynasties,
does collaboration with a star that sometimes is just part
(05:10):
of the offense, not the offense late in games. So
I thought it was fitting as they swept the Pacers
that Jalen Brown, their number two player on most nights,
ended up being the MVP of this series.
Speaker 4 (05:27):
I think I'm one of the best two way wings guards,
whatever you want to say in this game. You know,
I thought this year, I've taken a level and I've
increased it. I took the matchup. I picked up guys
full court, I chased guys off screens. I battled with bigs,
and you know, I felt like I should have been
all defensive. But you know, as as time has gone
by and I got to this point, like I just
(05:47):
I stopped caring and I just embrace. I don't care
who sees what. As long as my team knows my value,
my city knows my value, my family. That's all. That's
all I really care about.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
It's sort of like we hear about that, bring the
dog to work, the googlization of work, collaborative fridays off,
everybody gets along. In a perfect world, that's the way
it would be. We would all have balance, we'd like work,
but family took precedence. Fifty hour work weeks. Let's not
do any of that. The Celtics are new and collaborative
(06:23):
and there's chemistry and they share and there's a different
score every possession. I think it can win a title,
but I don't know if it can against Luca. And
I don't know if that very good will become great.
We'll see. So I was took a few days off
last week, headed back out east in New England, Patriots
(06:44):
Territory in Rhode Island, and I put my Patriots hat
on and I go walk walking on the beach, ride
the e bike, you know, one of the peeps. And
I get asked this a lot, a lot more than
I thought I would be asked, how do you think
Tom Brady's going to do as a And Brady was
on our show yesterday and I say, I always have
(07:05):
the same opinion. If people have a couple of minutes,
I'll share it with him and I'll say, well, the
traits and the habits that created the quarterback will probably
create the same broadcaster. I'll give you an example. I
thought Tony Romo was always underrated as a quarterback. He
got a lot of criticism. I thought he was very good,
(07:28):
but he was loose. It was often instinct, it felt
like over details and prep. It was gut feeling sort
of like George Bush as a president, right kind of
going with his gut. You wish he would be more
into the prep for the details. And I actually like Bush,
but I always felt Tony Romo as a player was flashy,
(07:49):
really gifted, underrated, really talented, a bit of an ad liver,
feelings over facts. And as a broadcaster I feel the
same way. He's a risk taker, calls out plays, sometimes
makes weird sounds. I'm not sure which direction he's going,
but by the end of it, it's usually wildly entertaining.
(08:12):
And then there's Tom Brady, who as a player was
meticulous and thorough, a people pleaser and detail and that's
what I think you'll get as a broadcaster. Brady will
be the opposite of Tony Romo, and you can pick
your favorite. They'll both make a lot of money, they'll
(08:32):
both be very good, but they will be opposite his broadcasters.
I talked about Tom's competitive nature as he heads into
the booth at Fox.
Speaker 5 (08:42):
I think, if I want to put effort into something,
then naturally I'll be Naturally I'll be more competitive at
it because I'll invest it a little bit of my time,
a little bit of my energy into it. Certainly with
the broadcaster. I don't think for me it's about competition.
I think it's for me it's about did I put
everything I could into it? And did I give the
(09:03):
fans everything that they tuned in for? And that's really
how I end up gauging myself. And I'll have to
look at myself at the end of every Sunday night
going did I do a good enough job? Did I
live up to the belief that Fox had in me?
Did I live up to the expectations of my teammates
Kevin Burkhart and Aaron and Tom and the entire team.
(09:25):
That's ultimately how I judge myself in that new role.
Speaker 1 (09:28):
Just like he was as a quarterback, a people pleaser.
Didn't have dinner with Belichick for twenty years, but always
at some levels sought his approval. John Madden coached or
taught a class on football at cal Poly, and, fittingly,
John Madden, the greatest analyst ever who worked at this network,
among others, was a teacher on the air, the telestrator.
(09:51):
He was trying to teach you football in a very
relatable way. John Gruden intense passionate as a coach and
as a TV analyst. I think Brady will be exactly
what he was as a quarterback, really into the details.
I asked him, and this was so Brady the answer.
(10:13):
Did you pay attention to the league when you were
playing beyond the Patriots?
Speaker 5 (10:18):
I tried to pay attention and follow every team every week.
It's that was our job, that was to understand the
whole league the perspective, every game counts, Those games meant
whatever games, they meant a lot to the division standings. Ultimately,
because our team was very competitive, the conference standings were
very important. You didn't look too much beyond that, and
(10:39):
we never talked about the playoffs and so forth. But
I knew what every division opponent was doing every week.
Where there were upsets, where there were injuries, those were
all very important to the success of our team.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Of course, Tom Brady knew what everybody else in the
league was doing as a quarterback and as a broadcast
I think that's what he'll deliver. Bill Walton passed away yesterday.
We talked about it briefly during our show. I grew
up in the Pacific Northwest, so right equidistant between Seattle
(11:13):
and Portland. But because I was in Washington State, I
got the Sonic games, but I occasionally listened, but now
more than occasionally listen to the Blazer games on radio
because I preferred their radio announcer Bill Shanley. So it
was a different era in a time. And I want
to talk about Bill Walton coming up and how he
would be accepted today. Oh, his basketball would be just fine.
(11:37):
That's coming up.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd weekdays
in noon eastern non am Pacific on Fox Sports Radio
FS one and the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
The Great Bill Walton broadcaster, College Venom NBA All Star
passed away yesterday, seventy one years old. Two things about
his game I feel very strongly about. If he remained healthy,
he would be in a short list of the second
greatest center of all time. To Kareem Abdul Jabbar, he
(12:07):
would not have been that score. But Shack was all power,
a Keem was mostly footwork. Wilt was flashy but unfocused.
Russell was dominant defensively but limited offensively. Walton had a
dexterity that was hard to match. He was layered. He
was Jokich fifty years ago. The second thing I feel
strongly about his game today would have aged beautifully again
(12:34):
seventy four seventy five. He was often viewed and seen
more regularly in college at National Power UCLA, where two
years he went thirty to zero. Then he would be
in Portland because when he broke into the NBA, I
began watching the NBA. In the Walton days in the
Pacific Northwest, you'd get college games as often as NBA games,
(12:54):
even the finals were on tape delay. What I find
fascinating about Bill Walton is not just his game, which
again I think would have aged beautifully. He was almost
unique and mythological as a player. There was nothing like
him or his personality. And as I watched people yesterday
(13:15):
honor and celebrate him, and I realize, and I think
most sports fans do, who got a glimpse of Bill
even on YouTube highlights, that he was years and generations
and decades before his time. I wonder if he entered
the NBA now, would he be honored and celebrated to
this level. We live in a country now where people
(13:37):
are more tribal than ever, and Bill Walton was the
absolute opposite of stick to sports, I mean, the polar opposite.
Would you accept somebody who was gifted, but may have
thought much differently about politics in the world than you do.
When Walton broke into the NBA, he was seen as unique, funny, quirky,
(14:03):
odd and incredibly gifted. His best friend was nature. Second
best was John Wooden. He was like Bigfoot with a hook.
You didn't see him very frequently. I first got introduced
to him in the Northwest. You'd see him against the
Sixers and Doctor j But we put our arms around
(14:23):
the big fella. Would we do it today? I'm afraid
we wouldn't. The world we live in doesn't have room
for opinions that many people don't agree with. And what
Bill believed in. He was anti Vietnam War and he
was on the right side of that. For the record,
or we probably should have never been in. But Bill
(14:46):
had strong opinions and he really wasn't concern how they landed.
For you, Oh, he could be a great teammate. When
he went to UCLA, he was a hippie with long hair.
John Wooden said you need to get a haircut. He said,
I'm not going to John Wooden said, we'll mish a
big fella. Bill got on his bicycle wandered cross campus,
(15:07):
and got it cut. But sometimes I wonder the people
we honor if they were around today and breaking into sports,
would we accept them as much as we honor them today.
Bill was very unique and very different, cool stuff to celebrate.
I wish we did it today more often.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Herd Weekdays
and neonon Easter n a im Pacific two.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
NBA Insiders podcasting twice a week to plug you right
into the NBA grapevine.
Speaker 6 (15:37):
All happening in only one place. This League Uncut, the
new NBA podcast with me Chris Haynes and me Mark
Stein join us as we team up to expound on
everything we're covering. Hearing and Chason.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
Listen to This League Uncut with Chris Haynes and Mark Stein.
Speaker 6 (15:55):
On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get
your podcast.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
I'm not sure I've ever learned less about a team
than I did about the Boston Celtics in this playoff run.
And I'm not blaming them. They're human, They're much better
than all these teams. We've had thirteen playoff series, three sweeps,
three gentlemen sweeps, and probably another tonight, meaning seven of
thirteen will be sweeps or gentlemen sweeps over half. So
(16:20):
I was thinking about this, the two easiest ways to
win a chip in the NBA. Number One, you know
you're part of a great dynasty, a collective. Now they're
hard to build, but once you build them, you have
great talent. Even a star can have an off night.
And the second easiest way is as an underdog with
no pressure and you catch everybody by surprise. They're raptors
(16:41):
in Kawhi, Dirk and the MAVs. The Celtics are neither.
I don't think they feel like a dynasty. They're too quirky.
They lose too many home games against sometimes inferior teams,
and they're significant favorites. Draft Kings are minus two twenty five,
so they're not sneaking up on anybody. And I also
(17:02):
think they have mounting pressure this year. So they were
twenty three and seven against the West, so we know
they're good. They dominated the East in the regular season
and the playoffs, so we know they're dominant in the East.
They were also very good in the West. They have
the deepest roster in the NBA, in my opinion, the
most offensively skilled roster, in the NBA, the Western teams
(17:23):
that were only getting better. And what's interesting is if
they lose this year to the Mavericks, and that's certainly possible,
what's the pressure going to be like next year? Because
Tatum's going to sign the max deal, Brown's already got one.
There's going to be real limitations on what this team
can do with their roster. So they're better to get
it now. We've already seen them fold as a younger
(17:47):
version of this duo against the Warriors. If they folded
again against the more mature team, right, they folded against
the Warriors, and we kind of said, well, it's Stephan
is the Warriors, but what if they fold again against Dallas?
What is next year with the tarmac shortened gonna be? Like?
(18:08):
So I think it is this this Celtics duo. You
kind of gave him a little bit of a pass
losing the staff and Draymond and Clay and Steve Kurry
gave him a little bit of an emotional pass. Not
quite ready like we view and now not quite ready
but Jos wait, well, the just waiting's over. They're the
(18:28):
heavy favorite. This duo has been around a lot longer
than Luca and Kyrie. Here's Jalen Brown.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
We feel like we're a different team than we were
last year and the year before that. I know everybody
wants to continue to kind of pigeonhold us to what
we happened in the past, but we've had a different
team every single year, different coaches. We've had like three
coaches in the last five years, and still people want to,
you know, just make it seem like it's the same.
It's the same, it's the same. Time has gone by,
(18:55):
experience has been gained, and I think we are ready
to put our best footfall.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
It is interesting, though they are very much symbolic of
the current NBA. Jason and I are not big romanticizers
of the past. You can go back to the thirty
for thirties on the Reggie Miller Pacers. He was the
only guy on that team that could shoot a jumper,
you know. Or you go back to the Knicks, where
they tackled people, but nobody, even John Starks wasn't a great,
you know, natural elite consistent shooter. You start looking, I mean,
(19:24):
just think about the top ten players in a Mavericks
Celtics final. If Lucas won Tatum's two, Jalen Brown three,
he's more consistent than Kyrie four, Derek White five, Porzingis six.
I mean, then you start getting into Drew Holiday seven, PJ.
Washington eight, Lively maybe nine, al hor Al Horford had
(19:48):
twenty some points the other night. Al Horford is a
very dependable big offensively at least, so you're talking about that.
The offensive skill in this final is going to be
absolutely sensational if Porzingis plays. I think they're a little
bit the opposite of the Tea Wolves. Dallas didn't match
up great with Denver, they match up very well with Minnesota.
(20:12):
Minnesota in half court offense is awful consistently. Boston is
sometimes engaged, sometimes not on the defensive end, but they're
almost always good enough offensively to win a game. So
a lot of times Dallas just let Minnesota fumble over
themselves offensively. Boston doesn't do that. Now, if Porzingis isn't healthy,
(20:37):
Dallas could pick and roll him to death. But my
guess is this is the time a deeper offensive roster,
not as reliant on one or two guys. But historically,
the two best closers in a series, Shaq and Kobe
win the series with that. Nick Wright joins us Live.
(20:59):
I will say this, you have been I think I
have questioned at times Tatum. You at times have questioned
the Celtics. I said this earlier that history tells me
the alpha wins, whether it's Mahomes in the fourth quarter,
Brady Lebron, Steph, Kobe, mj the Celtics are more collaborative,
(21:19):
They're more twenty twenty four basketball. Is that sometimes Tatum floats,
he's off ball, he.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Doesn't have usage.
Speaker 1 (21:27):
And I say to myself, this final is a classic
matchup of modern collaborative basketball and a little old school Luka, Kyrie,
give me the ball, get out of the way, set
me a screen. Do you have a strong opinion about
this series going into it when the MAVs finish off
the Tea Wolves.
Speaker 7 (21:44):
Yeah, yeah, I mean I'm biased because going into the playoffs,
I think I was probably one of the only people
in the country that was picking the MAVs to win
the championship. And so yeah, I like how the MAVs look,
and I like that they're getting healthy. I know Live
is out, but they're going to be getting Lively is
out right now, but he should be back for the finals,
they could be getting Maxi Kleba, who was a big
(22:07):
loss for them. They just haven't shown that back as well.
And your point about going with the alpha is the
best player in the series does not always win, but
if the best player, if you're going to overcome the
other team having the best player, you need to have
a legendary or at least legendary adjacent team, or the
(22:30):
other team needs to be going through significant injury issues
or turmoil. And so the Celtics have the resume of
a legendary team. They have the point differential of one
of the ten best teams ever. They have the record
of one of the fifteen best teams ever. I don't
see that when I watch them, And maybe part of
(22:51):
that is because all of the teams that are on
those lists have a guy who is a guaranteed statue
in front of the arena when the moment he's done
playing guy, and this Celtics team does not have that.
They have a Hall of Famer in Jason Tatum, an
awesome number two in Jalen Brown, and obviously a very
(23:14):
well constructed roster and maybe the best starting five in basketball.
But as you and I have discussed previously. If Jason
Tatum is the sixth or seventh best player in the league,
NBA history tells us typically that doesn't win the championship.
In the last forty years, the only teams to win
(23:37):
the championship with the sixth or seventh best player in
the league as their best player are the four Pistons,
where you had the Lakers lose their entire wing, not
wing pardoning, power forward rotation to injury and they were
clearly sick of each other.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
The eight Celtics that did it.
Speaker 7 (23:57):
With KG Ray, Allen, Paul Piers, three awesome players, but
none best player in the league level beating Kobe when
he was on that level, and the twenty eleven MAVs.
Speaker 3 (24:08):
Those would be the examples.
Speaker 7 (24:10):
And the twenty eleven MAVs we attribute to Lebron melting
down as people call it in that series. That's the
entire list of the last forty years. Every other champion
has had a guy like Luca, a guy who is
going to be in the top twenty at a minimum
all time discussion. So that is my hang up with
Boston and Boston's gaudy record against three middling teams with
(24:35):
all of which without their best player for part or
all of the series, was not enough to sway me
from that initially.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
So you know, it's interesting and maybe I shouldn't juxtapose this,
but it just popped into my head. We celebrated and
honored the very unique, outspoken Bill Walton in his passing
yesterday anti war, anti establishment, never anti social sit ins
politically at UCLA, and we celebrated it. Kyrie Irving similarly
(25:09):
pushedback in our government in a vaccine. I may disagree
with him strongly and agree with Walton's stance on the
Vietnam War extensively, but it is interesting is that the
NBA has always been the sport that allows for some
social opinion, and there was almost no market for Kyrie
Irving out of Brooklyn, and in retrospect, is that fair?
(25:34):
Is that fair because he took a stance many did
on the vaccine. The Boston thing didn't work, but let's
be honest, not every star to a new team works
in the history of the league. Michael Jordan ran through coaches.
He just stayed in Chicago. What is your view not
today on Kyrie because it's working, but sort of going
into Dallas, how did you, what was your opinion on
(25:57):
how it would work and his career pre this.
Speaker 7 (26:01):
So listen, I have a I don't even know if
it's adjusted my opinion so much as I have new information.
The MAVs were my pick to win the title last season,
and then they traded for Kyrie.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
And I was so down on it.
Speaker 7 (26:17):
I said, well, now they can't win the title because
Kyrie had been a negative when it came to winning
for six consecutive years.
Speaker 3 (26:27):
That is not who he is now.
Speaker 7 (26:29):
So I think the fair reading of Kyrie's history, if
I may this will.
Speaker 3 (26:33):
Take a moment.
Speaker 7 (26:34):
Is this Kyrie, before Lebron got to Cleveland hadn't been
a part of winning basketball at the professional level. He
gets to Cleveland, they have this dynamic partnership that seems
to work brilliantly and beautifully. In the press conference after
the final game they play together in the Finals in
(26:56):
twenty seventeen, Kyrie says, basically, put some spec on Lebron
James's name. He just averaged a triple double on these finals.
I can't wait to continue playing with and learning from him.
Before they set foot on a court together again, he
reportedly said, I so badly don't want to be here.
Speaker 3 (27:15):
I will have knee surgery if you don't trade me.
Speaker 7 (27:18):
So that seemed to be a very quick sweat, you know,
kind of flip of the pendulum out of nowhere. He
then gets to Boston and it flatly does not work.
His first year there, he's oddly not on the bench
for their playoffs when he's hurt. His second year there,
he demands to guard Giannis in the playoffs and.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
They get cooked.
Speaker 7 (27:39):
Then he releases a commercial saying I hope to be
here forever, then demands another trade in that time frame, right,
he scolds the media for saying, how dare you say
Kevin Durant and I were plotting to get together in
that hallway at the All Star Game? It was just
two friends talking. When it turns out they were exactly
doing what he said they weren't doing. Gets to Brooklyn, says,
(28:01):
we don't need a coach, We're all coaches. Steve Nash's
co coach. That doesn't work out. While in Brooklyn, Yes,
the vaccine, but then also the very odd stubbornness about
not backing down about that documentary that he promoted that
to this day, I don't think he actually watched, and
I don't think he believes those awful things that were
(28:21):
in that documentary. I just think he felt boxed in
and was like, I'm not gonna apologize because that's not
who I am. So all of that was the data
we had about a player who had dealt with injuries,
who hadn't been a part of winning outside of the
three years with Lebron.
Speaker 3 (28:36):
That's the data we have.
Speaker 7 (28:38):
The data we have since then is getting to Dallas,
teaming up with Jason Kidd, the relationship with Luca, and
his own personal maturation and evolution as a person on
and off the court.
Speaker 3 (28:52):
You are getting the.
Speaker 7 (28:53):
Very best version of Kyrie Ura, a socially conscious, thoughtful,
good hearted guy who is not letting so much of
the other stuff kind of tear him off the basketball court.
And when you have that version of Kyrie Colin, he's
one of the most dynamic under six foot four players
in league history. And so I have massive respect for
(29:15):
what Kyrie's done. I have massive respect for Kyrie Irving
kind of finding.
Speaker 3 (29:21):
In the public guy who he wants to be, and.
Speaker 7 (29:24):
The Kyrie Irving the basketball player when he's been available,
has always been special to watch, and so Yeah, this
is a you know, into his thirties kind of evolution
and reinvention, and of course he deserves enormous credit for that.
Speaker 1 (29:40):
So I grew up in the Pacific Northwest. The first
team I fell in love with was probably in my region,
was maybe Thesonics, and then it was the Blazers the seventies.
That was very kind of the Pacific Northwest. Downtown Freddie Brown,
Jack Sick, mcgus, Williams, into Bill wh Alton, Jeff Petrie,
(30:00):
Dave Towards like all that stuff. Jack Ramsey the legendary coach.
But the league was not televised to the level it
is today. I lived between equidistant between Seattle and Portland,
but I was in Washington State, so I got sonic stuff.
But I would occasionally hear Bill Shanley, the Portland radio announcer,
who was much more colorful than the Seattle broadcaster. And
Walton was this nineteen seventy four, seventy five, seventy six.
(30:22):
He was this quirky figure, mythological almost because you didn't
see him in the regular season. You just heard about
this hippie in Portland who nobody could stop, and you'd
seen him in college. So this is the really the
beginning of me watching television in the early seventies, and
he was against the war and outspoken, an iconoclastic, and
(30:43):
all this stuff I said this morning.
Speaker 2 (30:46):
I believe.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
He's several generations ahead of his time. Not one that
he was Jokich, but a better defender fifty years ago.
Is that if the injuries didn't play place, And this
is hyperbolic, perhaps we would say is the second best
center ever to Kareem. He would never score like Kareem,
but the second best center ever.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Oh, I think that's legit.
Speaker 7 (31:08):
You think so too, Go ahead, I'm sorry, I just
think I think he was on that track. Yeah, I
just listen if I may about because you and I
have oddly different formative experiences with Bill Walton, which I'll
get to, but his playing career I saw none of.
But because I consider myself a bit of an NBA
historian basketball historian, what should be noted is this, If
(31:30):
you ask someone who is the greatest college basketball player
of all time and they give any answer other than
Leuel Sender or Bill Walton, they're wrong, right, Those are
the only two eligible answers. Bill Walton did not lose
a basketball game. From the middle of his junior year
(31:51):
of high school until the middle of his middle of
his senior year of college, he had an eighty eight
game collegiate winning streak. He was the most outstanding player
in back to back final fours. He played arguably the
greatest game ever, the twenty one of twenty two forty
four points. He then won in the National Championship Game.
He then walks into the league and in nineteen seventy
(32:13):
seven is the best player on the champion beating Kareem
and then beating Doctor J when Doctor J might have
been the best player in the world. The next year
is the NBA MVP, and he breaks his foot and
the career is never the same. So my experience with
Bill Walton, Colin and I don't think I've ever told
you this is and you'll laugh at me when you'll
(32:35):
laugh when I tell you this. When I was a
little kid and I told people what I wanted to
do when I grew up, I wanted to be Bill
Walton because I didn't know that to be the color
commentator you needed to either play or coach. But what
he did on the NBC broadcast with Steve Snapper Jones,
(33:01):
I thought was the coolest thing ever. And it is
part of me falling in love with basketball. He's the
soundtrack of it. And I'm sad that I never once
got to cross pass with him to tell him this anecdote.
I remember vividly being a little kid watching the NBA Playoffs,
watching a Bulls game, and my mom's saying, like seeing
(33:23):
a look on my face that I.
Speaker 3 (33:24):
Was upset, and she was like, what's wrong?
Speaker 7 (33:27):
And I'm like, man, Steve Jones is being so mean
to Bill again, because I didn't know they were like
good friends and they were always giving each other a
hard time.
Speaker 3 (33:38):
And so he is.
Speaker 7 (33:39):
And for his broadcasting career, the stories that he has,
the stances that he took that were dangerous and risky,
and he stayed true to himself. And oh yeah, by
the way, was the greatest passing big man ever until Jokic,
and maybe including Jokic. A legendary life in a legend career.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Yeah, it's he was so perfectly connected to the Pacific Northwest,
you know, which when I grew up in the Pacific Northwest,
it's grainy, it's it's a it's got you know, it's
it's a little counterculture, you know what I mean. There's
no question he grew up in California, which has always
been left of center in America. And then he went
up to the Pacific Northwest. That's the only place more
(34:23):
left the California. Yeah, yeah, and uh. And then he
got Jack Ramsey, a very one of the great teachers.
I mean, can you imagine that your two coaches, he
may have literally had the perfect coaches. John Wooden, the
ultimate teacher, who kind of brought him back on the
fairway bill could get a little sideways, brought him back
(34:45):
on the fairway. And then Jack Ramsey, who was always
from his dress. Jack Ramsey legendary for these wild like
disco pants that Jack Ramsey kind of leaned in to
the unique personality of Bill in the pro game as
always been a little bit more about the player than
the coach. But it's fascinating that Walton loved both the
(35:07):
restrictive mentor in college, the conservative mentor, and then the
colorful NBA coach. And it shows the dexterity of his
personality that they both loved him, and he loved both.
It would be like going Andy Reid to Belichick and
you got along with both, and I just I think
that speak well.
Speaker 3 (35:28):
Of one hundred percent.
Speaker 7 (35:30):
And then the one other kind of final act of
his playing career, he wins sixth Man of the Year
for what a lot of people consider the greatest team ever,
the nineteen eighty six Celtic. Yes, great and adds, you know,
and finds a way to fit in with that very
unique culture absolutely seamlessly. This is you and I talked
(35:51):
about this a couple of weeks ago, oddly on your podcast,
that he's one of the reasons why when Damian Lillard
left the Portland Trailblazers and every story was written as
greatest Blazer ever. I was like, you've got to be
kidding me, Like Bill Walton played for them, and not
to mention Clyde Drexler.
Speaker 3 (36:11):
No, he and he was.
Speaker 7 (36:13):
He more so than Grant Hill, more so than Tracy McGrady,
more so than Derrick Rose. He is the biggest what
if he stayed healthy. Yes, in NBA history is Bill White.
Speaker 1 (36:26):
Yeah, that's a great way to put it in the history.
And I'm trying to think, you know, Roberto Clemena and
baseball the plane crash. Sure, I didn't grow up with
Roberto Clemeny, although I love those Pirates teams that were
extended beyond him for years and years and years. But
I think people look at Roberto Clemeny and go, oh,
that would have been maybe the greatest player of all time.
And we've seen this with musical stars who have either
(36:49):
taken their life or there have been tragedies beyond their control.
But I think in sports it's very rare that you
have an athlete and everybody summarily agrees, oh god, if
he would have been healthy, and nobody fights it. Like
every basketball historian was like yeah, Like he was twenty
one to twenty two against Memphis in a national championship game,
(37:11):
twenty one of twenty.
Speaker 7 (37:12):
Two to go by the way, by the way after
that was after being undefeated on the freshman team and
to finish his second straight undefeated year for the you know,
the varsity team at UCLA. He had never lost a game,
was going for his second straight title. Was twenty one
of twenty two. Yeah, there is are The other athlete
that comes to mind, I guess would be Bo Jackson,
(37:33):
where people are like, oh, man, what would have been?
But Walton absolutely was on that level, and that to
me is a testament to the beauty of his spirit.
Speaker 3 (37:44):
And I'm really glad we're spending the time.
Speaker 7 (37:45):
On this is that he didn't become bitter or jaded
because of that. He and instead transitioned to, Okay, I'll
make the most of what's left of my NBA career
and then be associated. He went from calling the NBA
Finals to doing PAC twelve after dark and loved every
(38:06):
minute of it. Yeah, and so God bless him and
his friends and family.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
I went back yesterday and watched thirty thirty five minutes
of Old Blazer and UC anything I could get my
hands on. He was on the Clippers, and I'm glad
you gave them credit. The best iteration of that Celtics
team could have very well been the eighty six team,
and he was. I mean, it's just Walton was just
(38:32):
a phenomenal player. And you know, the only positive that
ever comes out of a sudden death or one that
surprises us, is that it becomes a history lesson. And
Walton is teaching us so much about getting along, viewing
the world, willing to compromise your own goals, sacrificing for others.
(38:53):
Bill's a bit of a walking history lesson, and the
more you read about him, the better person you want
to be. Like I read things on Bill yesterday. I light,
you know, I got to be better at that, I
got to be a better teammate. And I think that's
a great acknowledgment of Bill, is that you read things
about him and think, I need to be a little
better person.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
And he might be. And I know we got to go.
Speaker 7 (39:16):
He might be the main character or he is the
main character of what might be the greatest sports book
ever written, Breaks of the Game by Tom Howersam.
Speaker 3 (39:25):
And so if people want to kind of they followed.
Speaker 7 (39:28):
The seventy seven Blazers around for a year and Walton's
at the center of that. And so now, I mean, goodness,
that's a you know, almost a fifty year old book
at this point. But I don't know that any sports
books ever topped it. It's definitely worth people's time if
they want to know more about that era of basketball.
Speaker 3 (39:43):
And also Bill Walton in that Blazer.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Give that book one more pop, because I'm gonna buy
it on Amazon.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
What's it called, oh, Breaks of the Game? Breaks of
the Game.
Speaker 7 (39:50):
I mean, it's probably the most famous sports book of
the at least. I don't know man pre Friday Night Lights,
maybe ever. Breaks of the Game by Tom Howers. How
I'm going to mispronounce his name. Haberstram Pardon me. Is
probably the greatest sports book ever written. Yeah, there you go,
pre plug.
Speaker 1 (40:05):
Hey, great seeing you, Boddy, Yeah you too, see a
letter come all right,
Hosts And Creators
Colin Cowherd
Jason McIntyre
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.