October 30, 2025 • 35 mins
Jason reacts to Austin Reaves hitting a wild buzzer-beating game-winner for the Los Angeles Lakers vs. the Minnesota Timberwolves and why he's excited for the returns of Luka Doncic and LeBron James. Then he breaks down the Boston Celtics’ win over the Cleveland Cavaliers and why there are reasons to be optimistic about Jaylen Brown's team. Finally he discusses the undefeated Chicago Bulls and their intriguing start to the NBA season.
All lines presented by Hard Rock Bet.
#Volume
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 (00:01):
The volume. All right, well, good hoops today, you're at
the volume. Happy Thursday, everybody. Hope all of you guys
are having a great end to your week. Got a
jam pack show for you guys today. Austin Reeves continues
(00:23):
this ridiculous week with a game winning floater over the
Minnesota Timberwolves on the road, not saying, another really important
win with both Lebron and Luca out as the Lakers
go to three and two. We're going to talk a
little bit about Austin as well as the upcoming infusion
of Lebron James and some of my thoughts that I
have surrounding that. After that, the Boston Celtics got a big,
(00:45):
impressive win last night against the Cleveland Cavaliers at home.
Going to talk about some of the early metrics for
Boston on both ends of the floor. Then at the
tail end of the show, the Chicago Bulls improved to
four and oh after beating the Kings last night. We're
going to talk about what some of the specific areas
(01:06):
of the game where Chicago's kind of a unique team,
a team that is prioritizing defending the three point line
over the paint. Some interesting stuff to get into there,
we'll talk about what their upcoming schedule looks like and
what I expect from them as we move forward this season.
You guys are the joke before we get started. To
subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channels you don't miss
any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at
underscore json lt so you guys don't miss show announcements.
(01:29):
Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever you get your
podcast and our Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if
you leave a rating and a review on that front.
Jackson's doing incredible work on our social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook,
and TikTok. Make sure you guys follow us there for
more content throughout the season. Then, last, but not least,
we're going to be recording our regular Friday mail bag tomorrow,
So if you have any questions about anything, especially the
(01:49):
games from tonight's slate, because we'll want to touch on
some of those tomorrow as well, drop him in our
YouTube comments again. Full episodes on YouTube in the comments
right mail bag with a colon ret question. We'll get
to them on Fridays throughout the remainder of the season.
All right, let's talk some basketball, So we're gonna start
with some Lakers. Lakers win one sixteen to one fifteen
(02:10):
last night on the road in Minnesota. Kind of the
showdown of the teams down a bunch of key players, right,
the Lakers obviously without Lebron James and Luka Doncic, and
the Minnesota Timberwolves without Anthony Edwards, right, kind of a
crazy game. Austin Reeves torched the Wolves all night with
his passing, and a bunch of Lakers did a great
job paying off those sequences. Jake la Ravia had his
(02:31):
second big moment as a Laker. I thought he made
a couple of huge plays down the stretch of the
Sacramento Kings game that were kind of like more individual moments.
This whole game was a moment for Jake. He hit
five of six threes at twenty seven points on the road.
Rui was his typical solid self had seventeen points. DeAndre
Ayton continues to score really well in the pocket off
(02:52):
of both Austin and Luca, but especially off of Austin.
This week. He at seventeen more points last night. DeAndre
eight in this season is shoot twelve for twenty on
the roll. That's getting one point one to three points
per possession. Really solid, especially considering he had no Lebron
two games without Luca, a lot of you know, two
(03:13):
games with Luca total Lebron zero games, a lot of
lineups with less shooting where he's getting swarmed down the roll.
To me, that twelve for twenty is a really strong
number for him. He had some tough ones last night too,
a really tough floater over the top of Rudy Gobert
and crunch time Dalton connect had fifteen off the bench
and the Lakers control. They were up twenty in the
(03:35):
third quarter. The Wolves didn't quit though, right they got
a burst out of Bones Highland and the third quarter
and then down the stretch they played some pretty impressive basketball.
I thought they switched to kind of like a zone
defense where they were trying to get the ball out
of Austin's hands, kind of like a ball pressure zone
where they were pressuring Austin and really trying to get
the ball out of his hands, out of the screens
that eighton was setting at the top of the zone,
(03:56):
and so it just led to a lot of these
like kickouts for mediocre catch and shoot threes for guys
like Ruy and Jake Laravia who are a little gun
shy on some of the more contested threes, and so
the Laker offense fell apart a little bit down the stretch,
and then on the other end of the floor, I
thought they played some really good basketball. They attacked quickly
in transition and in semi transition, they make good kickout
(04:17):
reads and guys hit some shots. Jade McDaniels hit some threes,
Dante DiVincenzo hit some threes. Mike Conley has a really
nice little bounced pass after looking off the low man
to get Jade McDaniels a dunk, and then on the
key possession late down by one, Julius Randall's working on
Jake Loravia on the left wing, and one of the
key details was Deandreton ended up getting switched on to
(04:37):
Mike Conley off the right wing, and so as a result,
he was kind of in a different spot to help
on the drive than he typically would be in there
was no rim protection. Julius beats Jake to his right
and then gets back to his left hand and finishes
at the rim. All of a sudden, the Wolves are
up by one. But just like in the Kings game,
(04:58):
if you guys remember I could tell he started to
get fatigue towards the end. No surprise, they're completely devoid
of ball handling, which puts so much pressure on Austin
in these games, and so fatigue's obviously going to play
a role, right. But Austin on that final possession, just
like in the King's game, I kept talking about how
he just needed to get to the rim one more time.
He needed to get one more quality too, and he
(05:18):
did against the Kings in the form of a floater.
Did it again against Minnesota in the form of a floater.
He comes off that screen and one of the things
that a specific detail because he splits Rudy Gobert right.
So like one of the things you got to do
in order to split a ball screen, you have to
show real threat to turn the corner around the left
on that left hand side. So he's coming off the
(05:40):
screen towards his left right and he's got to get
Rudy to jump out too far. If he gets Rudy
to jump out too far to Austin's left hand, that's
what opens the window for him to split back to
his right hand and so one of the things that
Austin does extremely well. We talked about this after the
Kings game, but he gets downhill in ball screens, he
(06:00):
really really comes off with speed and with pace right
and so Rudy jumps way out. As Austin all game
long had been on some key possessions. Late in the
game too, Austin had dragged that Rudy hedge out, like
Rudy would come up high and Austin would drive around him,
and so Rudy would kind of flatten that out towards
(06:20):
the sideline. And so what that did is it's set
up the split. As Austin came off that ball screen,
Rudy went wide, Austin split back towards the middle. Dante
Devenenzo peels off his man and gets right in the
lane to take a charge. Austin stops short, shoots the
little soft floater at the buzzer, and all of a sudden,
that game is over and now the Lakers are three
(06:41):
and two. What a week for Austin Reeves. In the
three games since Luca Dncis went down, forty points five
rebounds in tennysis per game, two point three steals per game,
and he's been fifty to forty ninety specifically fifty percent
from the field, forty one percent from three to ninety
three percent from the line. He's leading the entire league
(07:01):
in free throw attempts per game this season. Thanks to
Shay totaling a grand total of eight free throws in
his last three games, He's now not on that twenty
free throw per game pace he started the season with.
Austin's not leading the league in free throw attempts per
game at eleven point six per game. But don't let
that fool you and thinking he's not getting buckets. He's
averaging ten point four made field goals per game to
(07:24):
start the season. That ranks ninth in the entire NBA.
It's just been really cool as a fan, as someone
who's rooted for this team over the entirety of this
five year stretch. It's been really cool as a fan
to just watch the kind of different levels of his
rise as he's gone on this journey over the last
half decade. Like as a rookie, if you guys remember,
he really impresses Lebron in the team's mini camp before
(07:47):
training camp, gets kind of a vote of confidence from
the core guys on the team. He immediately comes in
and plays a role. He's playing twenty three minutes per game.
He was only averaging I want to say it was
like seven points per game. But he was their second
best plus minus guy that year, Like the Lakers were
(08:07):
seven point two points per one hundred possessions better with
him on versus off. Just did all these little things,
like he would attack closeouts and compete on defense and
get random little steals, little bits of playmaking here and there.
That kind of pulled everything together for them as an
off ball player. And in the second year, his role grows, right.
He goes up to twenty nine minutes per game, he
(08:28):
goes up to thirteen points per game, had a couple
of big breakout games. He had a thirty five point
game and a win on the road against the Orlando Magic.
He had four to twenty five plus point games in
that season. But he really broke out in that second
year in his playoff runt. If you guys remember that
was twenty twenty three, that was when the Lakers made
it to the Western Conference Finals. Austin Reeves had eight
(08:50):
twenty point games in their Western Conference Finals run. He
definitively separated himself as the Lakers' third best player and
as their second best ball him which kind of tied
up the next two years where he essentially became their
featured secondary ball handler off of Lebron. Started a little
bit lower while D'Angelo Russell was in the equation, but
(09:10):
he still was up over twenty percent and usage rate
in each of those years, and then after the D'Angelo
Russell trade, he walked into an even larger role, especially
after Anthony Davis went down last year, and he started
to demonstrate that he's capable of some lead ball handling again.
Over his last thirty two games in the regular season
last year, he averaged twenty three points per game on
j just shy of fifty forty ninety. But we all
(09:33):
know what happens in the Minnesota series. Definitely not at
his best, really struggled with ball pressure, really struggled in
catch and shoot situations. But to Austin's credit, he just
took that and use it to motivate him and he
clearly worked his ass off all summer. With something we
heard from JJ Reddick talking about how he was the
best player in the gym all summer because now he
clearly has made a leap. He looks like a legit
(09:57):
all star level ball handler in this league first five
games because again, remember he had twenty five and twenty
six in his first two games too, playing off of Luca,
who was averaging over forty in those games. Right, but
Austin thirty four points, six rebounds, and ten assists per
game on sixty nine percent through shooting in his first
five games of the season just extraordinary. And you know,
(10:19):
again as a fan, just to watch his journey from
like quality role player off the bench to like secondary
ball handler to a guy who could step in in
a big spot, like, oh, Lebron and Luca are both
out against the Pacers, we need you to lead us.
It's like, oh shit, like he can kind of give
you a thirty point triple double and step into a
(10:40):
big spot and help your team to Now all of
a sudden, he looks like a legit, bonafide all star
level ballhandler in this league. It's just been a really
cool experience to watch him as a fan. And again,
like when Luca goes down, he rises to the very
top of the scouting report for these defenses, and it
just hasn't mattered. He's just cooked these dudes. I've just
(11:00):
been so impressed by Austin. Can't say enough about his
start to this season. Well, last thot on the Lakers
before we move on. First of all, talked about this
over the summer. I'm not naive. I know there's a
large contingent of NBA fans that really don't like Lebron
and that tends to color a lot of the discussion
around him. But let me be very clear. If you
(11:22):
have watched the way that Austin and Luca have played
to start the season and seen how good they've been,
and you came to a conclusion like Lebron was holding
these guys back, or that the Lakers don't need Lebron,
I think you are spectacularly wrong. It is a classic
case of overthinking the game. Austin's entire growth trajectory that
(11:45):
I just laid out for you came alongside Lebron. Austin
has literally been on the record talking about how Lebron
in particular helped set him up for success in his career,
and how Lebron and Anthony Davis gave him the vote
of confidence early in their career, Luca last year was
a very different player than he was this year. That's
(12:06):
not a Lebron problem. That's a Luca finally got into
peak shape type of result that you're seeing. This is
overthinking it from these people that think Lebron's not going
to help this team, or that he's not going to
be able to come in and immediately help. Lebron is
the greatest Swiss army knife in the history of basketball.
He is great at like a dozen things, many of
(12:29):
which are specific weaknesses on this Lakers roster. The Lakers
have been a bottom ten defensive rebounding team. Lebron is
one of the best defensive rebounding forwards in the league.
The Lakers are eighteenth in defensive rating. Lebron can help
in like a half dozen ways here, Like he was
literally the best switch defender in the league last year
by ISO efficiency. He's an excellent back line communicator, which
(12:53):
I think will work wonders for Deandrey and having like
a super high IQ low man behind Aighton that can
help signal to him what to do specific plays that
are about to happen, Like Lebron is going to be
the IQ foundation for Deandret and in his coverages. He's
going to be so helpful there. And then most importantly,
like this team struggles with athleticism, and even old Lebron
(13:16):
fundamentally alters the athletic profile of the team for a
team that desperately needs it. Then, on offense, like Lebron
is on back to back seasons of being like a
mid forties catch and shoot three guy, you can't leave
him open. That's a huge value off of Luka Doncic
in particular. You guys have watched this season already multiple
games or either Austin or Luca. Both of them have
(13:40):
fried teams so bad that they've started to blitz them
in ball screens twenty five thirty feet from the basket.
That leads to a lot of four on threes. Having
Lebron like a souped up Draymond is the perfect guy
to have on the floor to help turn those four
on threes into wide open layups, dunks and three. If
(14:00):
he ends up being the short role man, you can't
have a better guy in the league to make that
next read. If he ends up on the weak side,
he's going to hit the catch and shoot three. And
he's an excellent cutter along the baseline, He's like the
perfect weapon to deploy in those situations. And then lastly,
Lebron provides depth of ball handling. You want to know
why they lost to Portland because every single time Austin
was off the floor, they had no chance to generate
(14:22):
a shot. I like Marcus Smart. I think Gavee Vincent's
had some moments, but ideally the two of them are
in smaller ball handling roles. If you have Lebron out there,
not only does he compliment the two of them when
they're on the floor together, but when Austin or Luca
go to the bench, now all of a sudden, it's
not just Luca by himself or Austin by himself, it's
Austin and Lebron. It's Luca and Lebron. There's depth of
(14:45):
ball handling. You're gonna have a second team All NBA
level secondary ball handler on the floor in all of
those units. So, in other words, do I think the
Lakers could use the guy who made second team All
NBA last year and is great eat at a bunch
of things that the Lakers suck at? Yeah, big shock,
I know, I can't believe it even has to be explained,
(15:08):
there are a lot of minutes in this rotation right
now that are going to fringe level NBA players, and
those minutes are gonna be going to Lebron freakin' James.
It is not complicated. Get those guys out there together
and see what they can do. Today's show is brought
to you by our new presenting sponsor, hard Rock Bet.
(15:29):
The NBA hardwood is heating up. If you haven't placed
your first bet on hard Rock Bet, now's the time
to get off the bench and shoot your shot. Bet
five dollars and if it wins, you get one hundred
and fifty dollars in bonus bets on top of your winnings.
Plus all week on hard Rock Bet, you can get
an NBA parlay boost for the games. There's new promos
every day. Boost your same game Parlay or same Game
(15:51):
Parlay Max, so your bet pays extra winnings. But if
you want to go from the hardwood to the gridiron,
it's a great week to bet on football. It's week
nine and you can get profit boosts for every game
day through Monday night. College and Pro. There's promos every
day to help you get in on the action. Download
the hard Rock Bet app today and make your first
deposit offered by the Seminole Tribe of Florida. In Florida,
(16:15):
offered by Seminal hard Rock Digital LLC. In all other states.
Must be twenty one plus and physically present in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana,
New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, or Virginia to play. Terms and
conditions apply. Concerned about gambling in Florida, call one eight
three to three play wise. In Indiana, if you or
(16:35):
someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help,
call one eight hundred and nine with it. Gambling problem
called one eight hundred gambler in Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee,
and Virginia. Let's move on to the Celtics. Celtics end
up blowing out the Calves last night. Both teams came
(16:56):
out absolutely guns blazing from three. I believe at one
point the two teams were eighteen for twenty four combined
from three. I did think Boston got slightly better looks
in that stretch, Like Donovan Mitchell was five for five
from three in the first quarter, and there was some
tough tough shots that he had, including a ridiculous like
break rhythm pump fake three that he hit at the
(17:17):
first first quarter buzzer. Sam Houser I think at four
threes in the first quarter, and most of them were
wide open catch and shoots because DeAndre Hunter just kept
roaming off of him over and over and over again.
Like DeAndre Hunter just was not learning his lesson from
watching Sam Houser hit threes. There's actually a funny end
of the first quarter interview where Evan Mobley was asked
(17:37):
about Sam Hauser and Mobley didn't mention DeAndre Hunter by name,
but he was obviously irritated while he was saying, like, hey,
we need to stay home on him and trust our defense.
So I did think that despite the hot shooting, I
thought it favored Boston a little bit in shot quality
early and then in the late second quarter, as things
were back and forth with that shooting display, the Celtics
(17:59):
up there inten City a little bit, the Calves started missing.
Donovan Mitchell took several super tough shots at the end
of the second quarter, and then that's when Jalen Brown
got going and he had a little tough shot making
stretch of his own there, he had a couple of
tough step back threes and then he hit a right
like a left shoulder going to his right, little mid
range pull up over DeAndre Hunter off of a spin move.
(18:19):
He had ten points in the final four minutes of
the second quarter while the Calves went cold and the
Celtics ended up going into the half up by fifteen,
and from there the Calves probed a bit, but they
never got any closer than nine points the rest of
the way. Jalen Brown finished with thirty points and just
two turnovers. Sam Howser finished with twenty one. Josh Bnnott
a very active double double. He had eleven points and
(18:41):
fourteen rebounds. I've liked him with the starting group, like
he's just athletic and he anchors the team in some
key areas like that. It's been really interesting to see
the like with Tatum out of the lineup, the obvious
ways that he was able to help in the past,
and one of the things was he was just a big,
versatile athlete on the front line that could do a
(19:03):
lot of things on defense in that especially could defensive
rebound right and like this rebounding thing has been a
huge problem for the Celtics in the early part of
the season. On the defensive end of the floor, Josh
Manott helps there. Fourteen rebounds really helps there, and he
also brings a transition athleticism element that I like. He
has sixteen transition points already this season on just nine possessions.
(19:24):
It's one point seven to eight points per transition attack.
And so far he is doing pretty well as an
off ball score in spot up situations and it cuts.
He has sixteen points on fourteen possessions. That's one point
one to four points per possession. That'll do like. It's fine.
He's just providing that Swiss army knife forward that can
do a little bit of everything as an athlete, and
(19:47):
that's been really valuable for that starting group. Now let's
take a look at the early season Celtics. As we
zoom out a little bit. They dropped their first three games.
As we know, the Philly game they should have won,
they just blew it late. A couple of things go
differently down the stretch little bit a little bit too
much of that, like high post up from Dalen Brown
that wasn't leading to great shots. But then they drop
a game to the Knicks, and Madison Square Garden, And
(20:09):
so the Pistons in Detroit looking at an zero three start, right,
but they have back to back blowout wins over the
Pelicans and Calves by combined fifty two points. That gets
them up to two and three, and very easily could
be three and two. Things go a little different their
top ten in offense and defense. Still, they're ninth in offense,
ninth and defense, and seventh and net rating. The defense
has been built very much around swarming with their speed,
(20:32):
especially in the paint, and living with kickout threes kind
of makes some sense with the way their team is
put together. They don't have much in the way of
rim protection or defensive back line, so the only way
they're going to protect the rim is as a team,
so they do a ton of swarming and so as
a result, they have that classic trade off, right, thirty
eight points in the paint allowed per one hundred possessions.
That's the best in the league. But they're also giving
(20:54):
up the fourth most threes in the NBA. Now, when
you dig a little deeper, just by giving up a
lot of threes, they are doing a great job with
their closeout like it close outs like despite giving up
the fourth most threes in the NBA, they're only giving
up the eleventh most unguarded catch and shoot threes. So
they're skewing a larger percentage of those threes towards off
(21:17):
the dribble threes and contested threes, and as a result,
teams are shooting twenty seven percent on unguarded catch and
shoot threes against them. Now, some folks will just call
that variance that certainly plays a role, but you guys know,
I'm a big believer that that sort of thing fallows
pretty far down the list behind some of the controllables
like leaving the right shooters open. Overall intensity of your
(21:40):
ball pressure and your closeouts leading to shooters being uncomfortable
and a little bit rushed on their catches right from there,
as is typical with most unbalanced rosters. And again, this
is a roster that skews heavily towards perimeter talent. They
have some margins where they're really strong, and they have
some margins where they're losing their ass. They can't rebound
(22:01):
on defense at all. Right now, they're twenty ninth in
defensive rebounding percentage. I think they gave up eleven more
offensive rebounds last night against Cleveland, But they get a
lot of that back on offense, mainly with the speed
of their guards and consistent habits like corner crashing. They
do a really good job. This has been something the
Celtics have been good at for years. They are ninth
in offensive rebound percentage and they are seventh in second
(22:22):
chance points per one hundred possessions. Although it's worth mentioning
that their transition defense hasn't been great. That tends to
be related to that offensive rebounding piece, but that has
been a margin that they've been able to use to
make up some of that defensive rebounding margin that they're losing.
And then they've been decent at forcing turnovers. They're averaging
the fewest they're averaging the fewest turnovers in the NBA themselves,
(22:44):
and then they're middle of the pack forcing turnovers, so
they're generating a little bit of extra margin by winning
the turnover margin. Jalen Brown his kind of debut in
this leading role. It's been up and down. Like he's
twenty seven points per game on sixty four percent sure shooting.
That's very good obviously, right, thirty five percent on off
the dribble, threes fifty percent on twos inside of seventeen feet.
(23:07):
That's good short range shot making, seven for twelve on
catch and shoot threes, seventy one percent at the rim.
Those are all really strong indicators for Jalen Brown, but
not a good playmaking start right, Nineteen assists, eighteen turnovers
to start the season. I'm gonna zag here though, because
I don't really mind. As I've watched the Celtics in
(23:29):
the early part of the season, I kind of like
the way they've channeled Jalen Brown. Like I've always believed
self awareness is key. And that's not to say that
I don't want Jalen to make some improvements as a playmaker.
Of course, that would be a big step forward for
him in his career. However, what is Jalen Brown like
at his core? Like, if I ask you guys just
(23:50):
to describe to me Jalen Brown as a basketball player,
You're probably gonna say some combination of He's a scoring
forward who is a primary point of attack defense option. Right,
those are the two things that he's best at. He's
best when he is aggressive as a scorer, both in
transition and in the half court as a driver and
(24:10):
as a post a threat, and when he's guarding the
other team's best player, that is when Jalen Brown is
at his best. This team has a depth of guard talent, right.
They've got guys like Peyton Pritchard and Infrety Simons and
Derek White that can run action and make reads out
of the action. As a matter of fact, it's one
(24:30):
of the few places on the roster where they actually
have some depth. Right. So I kind of like this
idea of channeling Jalen Brown as a score Like, hey, dude,
we don't need you to go out there and get
seven eight assists a game. I ideally you'd cut down
on the turnovers a little bit, but just go out
there and be aggressive. Go out there and look to
score the basketball. You don't have to be as picky
(24:53):
as you were in years past when we had more
talent and we were generating all these wide open threes
and layups. Go out there at you see some opportunities
to attack in the mid range attack, if you see
some opportunities to attack with your pull up three attack,
there's a little bit more aggression, a little bit more focusing.
Jalen Brown into his strengths and like that makes sense
(25:13):
to me. Again, ideally, you'd like to see him, you know,
one assists more per game, one fewer turnover per game, right, ideally,
But I don't hate the idea of channeling Jalen Brown
into his best trait, which is the ability to score
the basketball, then trusting the fact that you have shot
creation talent off of him that can help get you
going into action. I mean again, like they're a top
(25:33):
ten offense without Jason Tatum so far. I think it's
working given the talent that they have available to them.
Last note on the Celtics the Infrety Simons experiment. I
want to be clear, it hasn't been all bad. He's
shooting the three ball well. He brings like a dynamic
pull up shooting element that you don't see in the
past from the Celtics team. Right. But he has eight
(25:56):
attempts at the rim in over one hundred and forty
minutes play. This is something that I had my eye
on in preseason. I was hoping that he would be
able to bring a rim pressure element to the Celtics
offense that sometimes was lacking in years past, and that
hasn't really materialized, at least not yet. There was a
(26:16):
play in the early second quarter where he had Tyrese
Proctor on a switch and he tried to break him
down off the dribble and he just wasn't getting even
remotely close to a step and he had to settle
for like a one like fade away. And it's a
combination of two things. On the one hand, he is fast,
but he's not transcendently fast, and then two doesn't bring
(26:36):
a lot of like physicality to his drives, Like it's
pretty easy to bump him off his line. He's not
a player that's going to get an angle on you
and then use that shoulder to continue to gain leverage
on you as he goes downhill. Right, So, like I've
been a little disappointed on that front. Again, it's still early.
I just thought with all the Celtics spacing that it'd
be something that would be a kind of a legitimate
(26:59):
dynamic offense, and it just hasn't materialized yet. And it
has been pretty bad. In the plus minus stuff. The
Celtics have been twenty six points per one hundred possessions
better with Anthony Simons off the floor versus on, So
it hasn't been pretty on the box score, but anyway,
solid start for the Celtics and they could easily be
three and two right now. All right, last segment for today,
(27:21):
how about the four in oh Chicago Bulls struggled a
little bit with the Kings in the first half last night.
They trailed by twelve in the late second quarter, but
then they went on a run spanning the few minutes
before the end of the half and the few minutes
after halftime, and they completely flipped the script and they
went on to win by double figures. Madus Bozellis put
up the third highest point total in his young career
(27:43):
with twenty seven. Good mix of spot up shooting, which
has been important because he struggled with that to start
the season. High level close out attacking, which I always
think is an underrated part of modern NBA offense, like
if you catch with the guy chase chasing you off
the line, can you go get a bucket? Had several
sequences like that, cutting along the baseline running in transition.
He even got a couple of buckets off of action
(28:05):
attacking off of Vucevic on the left wing, one on
a dho and one on like a little pick and
roll and he just could get into the middle of
the floor, get his defender on his hip, and just
get like a little short range shot in the lane.
I think he had one where he like knocked over
his man and then did a step through move and
got a layup. It was good to see him break
out as a spot up player because that had been
where he had been roughest to start the year. But
(28:27):
he finally had some catching two jump shots and he
showed some of that off the dribble pop that made
him such an exciting player coming out of G League.
Knight and he's just a really dynamic athlete. He's active.
He gets six rebounds on two point three stocks per
thirty six minutes, and he's been very good at the rim.
He's got twenty six attempts at the rim at sixty
(28:47):
nine percent. That's nineteen in the entire NBA so far
in shots made at the rim per game. And it's
just that steady driving in transition, cutting along the baseline
and slashing off the catch. He's just getting to the
paint as this big fluid athlete really often to start
the year. And the main thing with this jumper that
(29:08):
I've noticed is he hits it when he's open, and
he struggles versus contest. So there's a little bit of
like learning how to shoot under duress that I think
will be a big step forward for him. But he's
five for eight on unguarded catch and shoot jump shots
and one for nine when he's guarded. I would buy
all the Bizelli stock I could find if I were you.
He's only twenty one years old, He's already contributing in
(29:31):
a real way in a winning context, and he just
has that really impressive combination of athleticism, polish and motor
meaning he plays hard all the time that I think
bodes well for his future in the NBA. I caught
a bunch of Bulls film this morning, and they're really
fun to watch. Third in defense, fifteenth in offense, fifth
(29:54):
in net rating here in the early part of the season.
The third and defensive rating thing is super interesting to
me because they have some super weak metrics in some
key areas. Maybe you know how we were just talking
about Boston and the idea of them kind of lacking
perimeter or excuse me, lacking rim protection but having plenty
of perimeter quickness, and how for them they're manifesting with
(30:16):
swarming and conceding threes. It's been the exact opposite for
this Bowls team. They have been far and away the
worst paint defense in the league, giving up sixty four
points in the paint per game another week metric for them.
They've been the worst team in the league at forcing turnovers,
but Billy Donovan knows they don't have rimp protection and
(30:37):
he's got good athletes on the perimeter, so they've keyed
their defense around chasing guys off the three point line.
They're also allowing far and away the fewest three point
attempts per game at just twenty six, and teams are
shooting just twenty six percent on those threes. They've also
been an excellent defensive rebounding team. This is what I
mean by the margins like not forcing any turnovers, give
(31:00):
up a million points in the paint, but never giving
up threes, and getting every single defensive rebound. It's like
a and again. Part of that defensive rebounding is connected
to their talent right Like Vucevich is an excellent defensive rebounder,
Josh Giddy is an excellent defensive rebounder. All their guards
and forwards are pretty solid. They scrap for the ball.
They've grabbed seventy six percent of their opponent's missus, which
(31:20):
ranks second in the MBA. But it's also part of
that shot diet. Like when you're not giving up many threes,
there's fewer long rebounds. Longer rebounds have more potential to
be secured by corner crashes and other perimeter players from
the opponent right, So like keeping shots closer to the
rim is also helping them in their defensive rebounding, and
then again that sparks them in transition, where they've been
(31:40):
really good. I've been really impressed by Josh Giddy in transition.
He's just always getting the ball and probing in that
like semi transition phase where the defense isn't quite set
and he just finds a way to get an angle
and kind of get into the elbow paint area. Guys react,
and then he's hitting cutters in spray outs to shooters
over and over and over again. And Nicole Vusovich is
(32:02):
absolutely bludgeoning teams as a trailer in transition. They got
another couple of those against Sacramento. That has been one
of Giddy's favorite kickout reads like Vouchs just trails the
floor right at the top of the key, Giddy probes
into the lane. If he doesn't find anything in the
corners or as a cutter, he just quick turns and
pitches it back to Vooch. Booch has his momentum going
(32:22):
towards the basket, he can rise up and knock that
shot down at a high clip. And then in the
half court, they don't really have a lot of wasted possessions.
They're pretty steady through Josh Giddyon pick and roll, and
Vusovich in the post, often in a two man game,
and they've just been really good. Vouch has been very
efficient in the post so far to start this year.
Josh Giddy continues to show improvement as a three point shooter.
(32:45):
And then out of action Giddy, as we've talked about
over the summer, he just makes the right reads and
gets their offense movement. He's just a guy that's going
to come downhill in the action, wait for the defense
to react and make the kickout read that starts their
drive in kick, and then they we just had really
smart drive and kick basketball off of that. Trey Jones,
Madus Buzellis Isaacacorro, even Kevin Pritchard and excuse me, Kevin Herder,
(33:09):
not the GM of the Pacers. Kevin Herder, Patrick Williams
and iod assume we've all done a really nice job
coming in off the bench and continuing that drive and
kick attack. And then Trey Jones has been a revelation
to start the year. He's run forty nine pick and
rolls as that secondary ball handler and generated fifty six points.
That's one point one to four points per possession, which
is excellent. Nothing overly complicated there. He's attacking the rim
(33:30):
really well off those screens and he can make all
of the reads. The Bulls currently lead the league in
paint points on offense as much as they're giving up
point paint points on defense. They are the number one
paint scoring offense to start the year, just shy of
sixty points in the paint per game, and it's because
all of their perimeter players attack the rim like crazy.
(33:52):
Josh Giddy is always downhill and using his strength to
get to the rim for layups and short floaters. Manus
Buzzellis is scoring there like we talked about earlier, slashing
in every phase of the game. I had assume moves
always attacking the rim. We mentioned Trey Jones and his
ball screens getting downhill. They just play a really fun
brand of basketball on both ends of the floor. And
(34:12):
I want to shout out Billy Donovan because he's capitalizing
on a lot of specific margins, right, Like you know,
when you have a weakness, you also have strengths. Typically
identifying what your weaknesses are, identifying what your strengths are,
and trying to capitalize on those margins to cancel each
other out so that you can use your talent playing
in transition off and using your advantage creator and Josh
Gitty to sparks, driving kick sequences, winning the margin on
(34:36):
the three point line. Like again, like putting yourself in
a position where you're not dealing with as many long rebounds.
You know you're not good in the paint, but you're
chasing teams off the three point line and you're getting
every defensive rebound, and then in the half court, you're
consistently playing through your two best offensive players, and you
have guys that know how to playoff of those advantages.
It's a proven formula in this league and it's been
working for the Bulls earlier that said they're headed into
(34:59):
a bru stretch of schedule from here home and home
with the Knicks, home for Philly. I say home and home,
meaning to go to MSG for one of those two games,
then home for Philly, at Milwaukee, at Cleveland, home for
San Antonio, and then at Detroit. So over the next
two weeks we will definitely find out how real this is.
Their offense hasn't been perfect to start this year. They're
(35:21):
going to be playing against some better defenses. I'm curious
to see how well that holds up. But a really
nice start for the Chicago Bulls. All right, guys, that's
all I have for today is always a sincerely appreciate
you guys for supporting us and supporting the show. We
will be back tomorrow morning with probably a game reaction
or two and then some mail bag questions, so make
sure you guys get your questions into the mail bags.
(35:42):
I will see you guys tomorrow
The volume. All right, well, good hoops today, you're at
the volume. Happy Thursday, everybody. Hope all of you guys
are having a great end to your week. Got a
jam pack show for you guys today. Austin Reeves continues
(00:23):
this ridiculous week with a game winning floater over the
Minnesota Timberwolves on the road, not saying, another really important
win with both Lebron and Luca out as the Lakers
go to three and two. We're going to talk a
little bit about Austin as well as the upcoming infusion
of Lebron James and some of my thoughts that I
have surrounding that. After that, the Boston Celtics got a big,
(00:45):
impressive win last night against the Cleveland Cavaliers at home.
Going to talk about some of the early metrics for
Boston on both ends of the floor. Then at the
tail end of the show, the Chicago Bulls improved to
four and oh after beating the Kings last night. We're
going to talk about what some of the specific areas
(01:06):
of the game where Chicago's kind of a unique team,
a team that is prioritizing defending the three point line
over the paint. Some interesting stuff to get into there,
we'll talk about what their upcoming schedule looks like and
what I expect from them as we move forward this season.
You guys are the joke before we get started. To
subscribe to the Hoops Tonight YouTube channels you don't miss
any more of our videos. Follow me on Twitter at
underscore json lt so you guys don't miss show announcements.
(01:29):
Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever you get your
podcast and our Hoops Tonight. It's also super helpful if
you leave a rating and a review on that front.
Jackson's doing incredible work on our social media feeds on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook,
and TikTok. Make sure you guys follow us there for
more content throughout the season. Then, last, but not least,
we're going to be recording our regular Friday mail bag tomorrow,
So if you have any questions about anything, especially the
(01:49):
games from tonight's slate, because we'll want to touch on
some of those tomorrow as well, drop him in our
YouTube comments again. Full episodes on YouTube in the comments
right mail bag with a colon ret question. We'll get
to them on Fridays throughout the remainder of the season.
All right, let's talk some basketball, So we're gonna start
with some Lakers. Lakers win one sixteen to one fifteen
(02:10):
last night on the road in Minnesota. Kind of the
showdown of the teams down a bunch of key players, right,
the Lakers obviously without Lebron James and Luka Doncic, and
the Minnesota Timberwolves without Anthony Edwards, right, kind of a
crazy game. Austin Reeves torched the Wolves all night with
his passing, and a bunch of Lakers did a great
job paying off those sequences. Jake la Ravia had his
(02:31):
second big moment as a Laker. I thought he made
a couple of huge plays down the stretch of the
Sacramento Kings game that were kind of like more individual moments.
This whole game was a moment for Jake. He hit
five of six threes at twenty seven points on the road.
Rui was his typical solid self had seventeen points. DeAndre
Ayton continues to score really well in the pocket off
(02:52):
of both Austin and Luca, but especially off of Austin.
This week. He at seventeen more points last night. DeAndre
eight in this season is shoot twelve for twenty on
the roll. That's getting one point one to three points
per possession. Really solid, especially considering he had no Lebron
two games without Luca, a lot of you know, two
(03:13):
games with Luca total Lebron zero games, a lot of
lineups with less shooting where he's getting swarmed down the roll.
To me, that twelve for twenty is a really strong
number for him. He had some tough ones last night too,
a really tough floater over the top of Rudy Gobert
and crunch time Dalton connect had fifteen off the bench
and the Lakers control. They were up twenty in the
(03:35):
third quarter. The Wolves didn't quit though, right they got
a burst out of Bones Highland and the third quarter
and then down the stretch they played some pretty impressive basketball.
I thought they switched to kind of like a zone
defense where they were trying to get the ball out
of Austin's hands, kind of like a ball pressure zone
where they were pressuring Austin and really trying to get
the ball out of his hands, out of the screens
that eighton was setting at the top of the zone,
(03:56):
and so it just led to a lot of these
like kickouts for mediocre catch and shoot threes for guys
like Ruy and Jake Laravia who are a little gun
shy on some of the more contested threes, and so
the Laker offense fell apart a little bit down the stretch,
and then on the other end of the floor, I
thought they played some really good basketball. They attacked quickly
in transition and in semi transition, they make good kickout
(04:17):
reads and guys hit some shots. Jade McDaniels hit some threes,
Dante DiVincenzo hit some threes. Mike Conley has a really
nice little bounced pass after looking off the low man
to get Jade McDaniels a dunk, and then on the
key possession late down by one, Julius Randall's working on
Jake Loravia on the left wing, and one of the
key details was Deandreton ended up getting switched on to
(04:37):
Mike Conley off the right wing, and so as a result,
he was kind of in a different spot to help
on the drive than he typically would be in there
was no rim protection. Julius beats Jake to his right
and then gets back to his left hand and finishes
at the rim. All of a sudden, the Wolves are
up by one. But just like in the Kings game,
(04:58):
if you guys remember I could tell he started to
get fatigue towards the end. No surprise, they're completely devoid
of ball handling, which puts so much pressure on Austin
in these games, and so fatigue's obviously going to play
a role, right. But Austin on that final possession, just
like in the King's game, I kept talking about how
he just needed to get to the rim one more time.
He needed to get one more quality too, and he
(05:18):
did against the Kings in the form of a floater.
Did it again against Minnesota in the form of a floater.
He comes off that screen and one of the things
that a specific detail because he splits Rudy Gobert right.
So like one of the things you got to do
in order to split a ball screen, you have to
show real threat to turn the corner around the left
on that left hand side. So he's coming off the
(05:40):
screen towards his left right and he's got to get
Rudy to jump out too far. If he gets Rudy
to jump out too far to Austin's left hand, that's
what opens the window for him to split back to
his right hand and so one of the things that
Austin does extremely well. We talked about this after the
Kings game, but he gets downhill in ball screens, he
(06:00):
really really comes off with speed and with pace right
and so Rudy jumps way out. As Austin all game
long had been on some key possessions. Late in the
game too, Austin had dragged that Rudy hedge out, like
Rudy would come up high and Austin would drive around him,
and so Rudy would kind of flatten that out towards
(06:20):
the sideline. And so what that did is it's set
up the split. As Austin came off that ball screen,
Rudy went wide, Austin split back towards the middle. Dante
Devenenzo peels off his man and gets right in the
lane to take a charge. Austin stops short, shoots the
little soft floater at the buzzer, and all of a sudden,
that game is over and now the Lakers are three
(06:41):
and two. What a week for Austin Reeves. In the
three games since Luca Dncis went down, forty points five
rebounds in tennysis per game, two point three steals per game,
and he's been fifty to forty ninety specifically fifty percent
from the field, forty one percent from three to ninety
three percent from the line. He's leading the entire league
(07:01):
in free throw attempts per game this season. Thanks to
Shay totaling a grand total of eight free throws in
his last three games, He's now not on that twenty
free throw per game pace he started the season with.
Austin's not leading the league in free throw attempts per
game at eleven point six per game. But don't let
that fool you and thinking he's not getting buckets. He's
averaging ten point four made field goals per game to
(07:24):
start the season. That ranks ninth in the entire NBA.
It's just been really cool as a fan, as someone
who's rooted for this team over the entirety of this
five year stretch. It's been really cool as a fan
to just watch the kind of different levels of his
rise as he's gone on this journey over the last
half decade. Like as a rookie, if you guys remember,
he really impresses Lebron in the team's mini camp before
(07:47):
training camp, gets kind of a vote of confidence from
the core guys on the team. He immediately comes in
and plays a role. He's playing twenty three minutes per game.
He was only averaging I want to say it was
like seven points per game. But he was their second
best plus minus guy that year, Like the Lakers were
(08:07):
seven point two points per one hundred possessions better with
him on versus off. Just did all these little things,
like he would attack closeouts and compete on defense and
get random little steals, little bits of playmaking here and there.
That kind of pulled everything together for them as an
off ball player. And in the second year, his role grows, right.
He goes up to twenty nine minutes per game, he
(08:28):
goes up to thirteen points per game, had a couple
of big breakout games. He had a thirty five point
game and a win on the road against the Orlando Magic.
He had four to twenty five plus point games in
that season. But he really broke out in that second
year in his playoff runt. If you guys remember that
was twenty twenty three, that was when the Lakers made
it to the Western Conference Finals. Austin Reeves had eight
(08:50):
twenty point games in their Western Conference Finals run. He
definitively separated himself as the Lakers' third best player and
as their second best ball him which kind of tied
up the next two years where he essentially became their
featured secondary ball handler off of Lebron. Started a little
bit lower while D'Angelo Russell was in the equation, but
(09:10):
he still was up over twenty percent and usage rate
in each of those years, and then after the D'Angelo
Russell trade, he walked into an even larger role, especially
after Anthony Davis went down last year, and he started
to demonstrate that he's capable of some lead ball handling again.
Over his last thirty two games in the regular season
last year, he averaged twenty three points per game on
j just shy of fifty forty ninety. But we all
(09:33):
know what happens in the Minnesota series. Definitely not at
his best, really struggled with ball pressure, really struggled in
catch and shoot situations. But to Austin's credit, he just
took that and use it to motivate him and he
clearly worked his ass off all summer. With something we
heard from JJ Reddick talking about how he was the
best player in the gym all summer because now he
clearly has made a leap. He looks like a legit
(09:57):
all star level ball handler in this league first five
games because again, remember he had twenty five and twenty
six in his first two games too, playing off of Luca,
who was averaging over forty in those games. Right, but
Austin thirty four points, six rebounds, and ten assists per
game on sixty nine percent through shooting in his first
five games of the season just extraordinary. And you know,
(10:19):
again as a fan, just to watch his journey from
like quality role player off the bench to like secondary
ball handler to a guy who could step in in
a big spot, like, oh, Lebron and Luca are both
out against the Pacers, we need you to lead us.
It's like, oh shit, like he can kind of give
you a thirty point triple double and step into a
(10:40):
big spot and help your team to Now all of
a sudden, he looks like a legit, bonafide all star
level ballhandler in this league. It's just been a really
cool experience to watch him as a fan. And again,
like when Luca goes down, he rises to the very
top of the scouting report for these defenses, and it
just hasn't mattered. He's just cooked these dudes. I've just
(11:00):
been so impressed by Austin. Can't say enough about his
start to this season. Well, last thot on the Lakers
before we move on. First of all, talked about this
over the summer. I'm not naive. I know there's a
large contingent of NBA fans that really don't like Lebron
and that tends to color a lot of the discussion
around him. But let me be very clear. If you
(11:22):
have watched the way that Austin and Luca have played
to start the season and seen how good they've been,
and you came to a conclusion like Lebron was holding
these guys back, or that the Lakers don't need Lebron,
I think you are spectacularly wrong. It is a classic
case of overthinking the game. Austin's entire growth trajectory that
(11:45):
I just laid out for you came alongside Lebron. Austin
has literally been on the record talking about how Lebron
in particular helped set him up for success in his career,
and how Lebron and Anthony Davis gave him the vote
of confidence early in their career, Luca last year was
a very different player than he was this year. That's
(12:06):
not a Lebron problem. That's a Luca finally got into
peak shape type of result that you're seeing. This is
overthinking it from these people that think Lebron's not going
to help this team, or that he's not going to
be able to come in and immediately help. Lebron is
the greatest Swiss army knife in the history of basketball.
He is great at like a dozen things, many of
(12:29):
which are specific weaknesses on this Lakers roster. The Lakers
have been a bottom ten defensive rebounding team. Lebron is
one of the best defensive rebounding forwards in the league.
The Lakers are eighteenth in defensive rating. Lebron can help
in like a half dozen ways here, Like he was
literally the best switch defender in the league last year
by ISO efficiency. He's an excellent back line communicator, which
(12:53):
I think will work wonders for Deandrey and having like
a super high IQ low man behind Aighton that can
help signal to him what to do specific plays that
are about to happen, Like Lebron is going to be
the IQ foundation for Deandret and in his coverages. He's
going to be so helpful there. And then most importantly,
like this team struggles with athleticism, and even old Lebron
(13:16):
fundamentally alters the athletic profile of the team for a
team that desperately needs it. Then, on offense, like Lebron
is on back to back seasons of being like a
mid forties catch and shoot three guy, you can't leave
him open. That's a huge value off of Luka Doncic
in particular. You guys have watched this season already multiple
games or either Austin or Luca. Both of them have
(13:40):
fried teams so bad that they've started to blitz them
in ball screens twenty five thirty feet from the basket.
That leads to a lot of four on threes. Having
Lebron like a souped up Draymond is the perfect guy
to have on the floor to help turn those four
on threes into wide open layups, dunks and three. If
(14:00):
he ends up being the short role man, you can't
have a better guy in the league to make that
next read. If he ends up on the weak side,
he's going to hit the catch and shoot three. And
he's an excellent cutter along the baseline, He's like the
perfect weapon to deploy in those situations. And then lastly,
Lebron provides depth of ball handling. You want to know
why they lost to Portland because every single time Austin
was off the floor, they had no chance to generate
(14:22):
a shot. I like Marcus Smart. I think Gavee Vincent's
had some moments, but ideally the two of them are
in smaller ball handling roles. If you have Lebron out there,
not only does he compliment the two of them when
they're on the floor together, but when Austin or Luca
go to the bench, now all of a sudden, it's
not just Luca by himself or Austin by himself, it's
Austin and Lebron. It's Luca and Lebron. There's depth of
(14:45):
ball handling. You're gonna have a second team All NBA
level secondary ball handler on the floor in all of
those units. So, in other words, do I think the
Lakers could use the guy who made second team All
NBA last year and is great eat at a bunch
of things that the Lakers suck at? Yeah, big shock,
I know, I can't believe it even has to be explained,
(15:08):
there are a lot of minutes in this rotation right
now that are going to fringe level NBA players, and
those minutes are gonna be going to Lebron freakin' James.
It is not complicated. Get those guys out there together
and see what they can do. Today's show is brought
to you by our new presenting sponsor, hard Rock Bet.
(15:29):
The NBA hardwood is heating up. If you haven't placed
your first bet on hard Rock Bet, now's the time
to get off the bench and shoot your shot. Bet
five dollars and if it wins, you get one hundred
and fifty dollars in bonus bets on top of your winnings.
Plus all week on hard Rock Bet, you can get
an NBA parlay boost for the games. There's new promos
every day. Boost your same game Parlay or same Game
(15:51):
Parlay Max, so your bet pays extra winnings. But if
you want to go from the hardwood to the gridiron,
it's a great week to bet on football. It's week
nine and you can get profit boosts for every game
day through Monday night. College and Pro. There's promos every
day to help you get in on the action. Download
the hard Rock Bet app today and make your first
deposit offered by the Seminole Tribe of Florida. In Florida,
(16:15):
offered by Seminal hard Rock Digital LLC. In all other states.
Must be twenty one plus and physically present in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana,
New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, or Virginia to play. Terms and
conditions apply. Concerned about gambling in Florida, call one eight
three to three play wise. In Indiana, if you or
(16:35):
someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help,
call one eight hundred and nine with it. Gambling problem
called one eight hundred gambler in Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee,
and Virginia. Let's move on to the Celtics. Celtics end
up blowing out the Calves last night. Both teams came
(16:56):
out absolutely guns blazing from three. I believe at one
point the two teams were eighteen for twenty four combined
from three. I did think Boston got slightly better looks
in that stretch, Like Donovan Mitchell was five for five
from three in the first quarter, and there was some
tough tough shots that he had, including a ridiculous like
break rhythm pump fake three that he hit at the
(17:17):
first first quarter buzzer. Sam Houser I think at four
threes in the first quarter, and most of them were
wide open catch and shoots because DeAndre Hunter just kept
roaming off of him over and over and over again.
Like DeAndre Hunter just was not learning his lesson from
watching Sam Houser hit threes. There's actually a funny end
of the first quarter interview where Evan Mobley was asked
(17:37):
about Sam Hauser and Mobley didn't mention DeAndre Hunter by name,
but he was obviously irritated while he was saying, like, hey,
we need to stay home on him and trust our defense.
So I did think that despite the hot shooting, I
thought it favored Boston a little bit in shot quality
early and then in the late second quarter, as things
were back and forth with that shooting display, the Celtics
(17:59):
up there inten City a little bit, the Calves started missing.
Donovan Mitchell took several super tough shots at the end
of the second quarter, and then that's when Jalen Brown
got going and he had a little tough shot making
stretch of his own there, he had a couple of
tough step back threes and then he hit a right
like a left shoulder going to his right, little mid
range pull up over DeAndre Hunter off of a spin move.
(18:19):
He had ten points in the final four minutes of
the second quarter while the Calves went cold and the
Celtics ended up going into the half up by fifteen,
and from there the Calves probed a bit, but they
never got any closer than nine points the rest of
the way. Jalen Brown finished with thirty points and just
two turnovers. Sam Howser finished with twenty one. Josh Bnnott
a very active double double. He had eleven points and
(18:41):
fourteen rebounds. I've liked him with the starting group, like
he's just athletic and he anchors the team in some
key areas like that. It's been really interesting to see
the like with Tatum out of the lineup, the obvious
ways that he was able to help in the past,
and one of the things was he was just a big,
versatile athlete on the front line that could do a
(19:03):
lot of things on defense in that especially could defensive
rebound right and like this rebounding thing has been a
huge problem for the Celtics in the early part of
the season. On the defensive end of the floor, Josh
Manott helps there. Fourteen rebounds really helps there, and he
also brings a transition athleticism element that I like. He
has sixteen transition points already this season on just nine possessions.
(19:24):
It's one point seven to eight points per transition attack.
And so far he is doing pretty well as an
off ball score in spot up situations and it cuts.
He has sixteen points on fourteen possessions. That's one point
one to four points per possession. That'll do like. It's fine.
He's just providing that Swiss army knife forward that can
do a little bit of everything as an athlete, and
(19:47):
that's been really valuable for that starting group. Now let's
take a look at the early season Celtics. As we
zoom out a little bit. They dropped their first three games.
As we know, the Philly game they should have won,
they just blew it late. A couple of things go
differently down the stretch little bit a little bit too
much of that, like high post up from Dalen Brown
that wasn't leading to great shots. But then they drop
a game to the Knicks, and Madison Square Garden, And
(20:09):
so the Pistons in Detroit looking at an zero three start, right,
but they have back to back blowout wins over the
Pelicans and Calves by combined fifty two points. That gets
them up to two and three, and very easily could
be three and two. Things go a little different their
top ten in offense and defense. Still, they're ninth in offense,
ninth and defense, and seventh and net rating. The defense
has been built very much around swarming with their speed,
(20:32):
especially in the paint, and living with kickout threes kind
of makes some sense with the way their team is
put together. They don't have much in the way of
rim protection or defensive back line, so the only way
they're going to protect the rim is as a team,
so they do a ton of swarming and so as
a result, they have that classic trade off, right, thirty
eight points in the paint allowed per one hundred possessions.
That's the best in the league. But they're also giving
(20:54):
up the fourth most threes in the NBA. Now, when
you dig a little deeper, just by giving up a
lot of threes, they are doing a great job with
their closeout like it close outs like despite giving up
the fourth most threes in the NBA, they're only giving
up the eleventh most unguarded catch and shoot threes. So
they're skewing a larger percentage of those threes towards off
(21:17):
the dribble threes and contested threes, and as a result,
teams are shooting twenty seven percent on unguarded catch and
shoot threes against them. Now, some folks will just call
that variance that certainly plays a role, but you guys know,
I'm a big believer that that sort of thing fallows
pretty far down the list behind some of the controllables
like leaving the right shooters open. Overall intensity of your
(21:40):
ball pressure and your closeouts leading to shooters being uncomfortable
and a little bit rushed on their catches right from there,
as is typical with most unbalanced rosters. And again, this
is a roster that skews heavily towards perimeter talent. They
have some margins where they're really strong, and they have
some margins where they're losing their ass. They can't rebound
(22:01):
on defense at all. Right now, they're twenty ninth in
defensive rebounding percentage. I think they gave up eleven more
offensive rebounds last night against Cleveland, But they get a
lot of that back on offense, mainly with the speed
of their guards and consistent habits like corner crashing. They
do a really good job. This has been something the
Celtics have been good at for years. They are ninth
in offensive rebound percentage and they are seventh in second
(22:22):
chance points per one hundred possessions. Although it's worth mentioning
that their transition defense hasn't been great. That tends to
be related to that offensive rebounding piece, but that has
been a margin that they've been able to use to
make up some of that defensive rebounding margin that they're losing.
And then they've been decent at forcing turnovers. They're averaging
the fewest they're averaging the fewest turnovers in the NBA themselves,
(22:44):
and then they're middle of the pack forcing turnovers, so
they're generating a little bit of extra margin by winning
the turnover margin. Jalen Brown his kind of debut in
this leading role. It's been up and down. Like he's
twenty seven points per game on sixty four percent sure shooting.
That's very good obviously, right, thirty five percent on off
the dribble, threes fifty percent on twos inside of seventeen feet.
(23:07):
That's good short range shot making, seven for twelve on
catch and shoot threes, seventy one percent at the rim.
Those are all really strong indicators for Jalen Brown, but
not a good playmaking start right, Nineteen assists, eighteen turnovers
to start the season. I'm gonna zag here though, because
I don't really mind. As I've watched the Celtics in
(23:29):
the early part of the season, I kind of like
the way they've channeled Jalen Brown. Like I've always believed
self awareness is key. And that's not to say that
I don't want Jalen to make some improvements as a playmaker.
Of course, that would be a big step forward for
him in his career. However, what is Jalen Brown like
at his core? Like, if I ask you guys just
(23:50):
to describe to me Jalen Brown as a basketball player,
You're probably gonna say some combination of He's a scoring
forward who is a primary point of attack defense option. Right,
those are the two things that he's best at. He's
best when he is aggressive as a scorer, both in
transition and in the half court as a driver and
(24:10):
as a post a threat, and when he's guarding the
other team's best player, that is when Jalen Brown is
at his best. This team has a depth of guard talent, right.
They've got guys like Peyton Pritchard and Infrety Simons and
Derek White that can run action and make reads out
of the action. As a matter of fact, it's one
(24:30):
of the few places on the roster where they actually
have some depth. Right. So I kind of like this
idea of channeling Jalen Brown as a score Like, hey, dude,
we don't need you to go out there and get
seven eight assists a game. I ideally you'd cut down
on the turnovers a little bit, but just go out
there and be aggressive. Go out there and look to
score the basketball. You don't have to be as picky
(24:53):
as you were in years past when we had more
talent and we were generating all these wide open threes
and layups. Go out there at you see some opportunities
to attack in the mid range attack, if you see
some opportunities to attack with your pull up three attack,
there's a little bit more aggression, a little bit more focusing.
Jalen Brown into his strengths and like that makes sense
(25:13):
to me. Again, ideally, you'd like to see him, you know,
one assists more per game, one fewer turnover per game, right, ideally,
But I don't hate the idea of channeling Jalen Brown
into his best trait, which is the ability to score
the basketball, then trusting the fact that you have shot
creation talent off of him that can help get you
going into action. I mean again, like they're a top
(25:33):
ten offense without Jason Tatum so far. I think it's
working given the talent that they have available to them.
Last note on the Celtics the Infrety Simons experiment. I
want to be clear, it hasn't been all bad. He's
shooting the three ball well. He brings like a dynamic
pull up shooting element that you don't see in the
past from the Celtics team. Right. But he has eight
(25:56):
attempts at the rim in over one hundred and forty
minutes play. This is something that I had my eye
on in preseason. I was hoping that he would be
able to bring a rim pressure element to the Celtics
offense that sometimes was lacking in years past, and that
hasn't really materialized, at least not yet. There was a
(26:16):
play in the early second quarter where he had Tyrese
Proctor on a switch and he tried to break him
down off the dribble and he just wasn't getting even
remotely close to a step and he had to settle
for like a one like fade away. And it's a
combination of two things. On the one hand, he is fast,
but he's not transcendently fast, and then two doesn't bring
(26:36):
a lot of like physicality to his drives, Like it's
pretty easy to bump him off his line. He's not
a player that's going to get an angle on you
and then use that shoulder to continue to gain leverage
on you as he goes downhill. Right, So, like I've
been a little disappointed on that front. Again, it's still early.
I just thought with all the Celtics spacing that it'd
be something that would be a kind of a legitimate
(26:59):
dynamic offense, and it just hasn't materialized yet. And it
has been pretty bad. In the plus minus stuff. The
Celtics have been twenty six points per one hundred possessions
better with Anthony Simons off the floor versus on, So
it hasn't been pretty on the box score, but anyway,
solid start for the Celtics and they could easily be
three and two right now. All right, last segment for today,
(27:21):
how about the four in oh Chicago Bulls struggled a
little bit with the Kings in the first half last night.
They trailed by twelve in the late second quarter, but
then they went on a run spanning the few minutes
before the end of the half and the few minutes
after halftime, and they completely flipped the script and they
went on to win by double figures. Madus Bozellis put
up the third highest point total in his young career
(27:43):
with twenty seven. Good mix of spot up shooting, which
has been important because he struggled with that to start
the season. High level close out attacking, which I always
think is an underrated part of modern NBA offense, like
if you catch with the guy chase chasing you off
the line, can you go get a bucket? Had several
sequences like that, cutting along the baseline running in transition.
He even got a couple of buckets off of action
(28:05):
attacking off of Vucevic on the left wing, one on
a dho and one on like a little pick and
roll and he just could get into the middle of
the floor, get his defender on his hip, and just
get like a little short range shot in the lane.
I think he had one where he like knocked over
his man and then did a step through move and
got a layup. It was good to see him break
out as a spot up player because that had been
where he had been roughest to start the year. But
(28:27):
he finally had some catching two jump shots and he
showed some of that off the dribble pop that made
him such an exciting player coming out of G League.
Knight and he's just a really dynamic athlete. He's active.
He gets six rebounds on two point three stocks per
thirty six minutes, and he's been very good at the rim.
He's got twenty six attempts at the rim at sixty
(28:47):
nine percent. That's nineteen in the entire NBA so far
in shots made at the rim per game. And it's
just that steady driving in transition, cutting along the baseline
and slashing off the catch. He's just getting to the
paint as this big fluid athlete really often to start
the year. And the main thing with this jumper that
(29:08):
I've noticed is he hits it when he's open, and
he struggles versus contest. So there's a little bit of
like learning how to shoot under duress that I think
will be a big step forward for him. But he's
five for eight on unguarded catch and shoot jump shots
and one for nine when he's guarded. I would buy
all the Bizelli stock I could find if I were you.
He's only twenty one years old, He's already contributing in
(29:31):
a real way in a winning context, and he just
has that really impressive combination of athleticism, polish and motor
meaning he plays hard all the time that I think
bodes well for his future in the NBA. I caught
a bunch of Bulls film this morning, and they're really
fun to watch. Third in defense, fifteenth in offense, fifth
(29:54):
in net rating here in the early part of the season.
The third and defensive rating thing is super interesting to
me because they have some super weak metrics in some
key areas. Maybe you know how we were just talking
about Boston and the idea of them kind of lacking
perimeter or excuse me, lacking rim protection but having plenty
of perimeter quickness, and how for them they're manifesting with
(30:16):
swarming and conceding threes. It's been the exact opposite for
this Bowls team. They have been far and away the
worst paint defense in the league, giving up sixty four
points in the paint per game another week metric for them.
They've been the worst team in the league at forcing turnovers,
but Billy Donovan knows they don't have rimp protection and
(30:37):
he's got good athletes on the perimeter, so they've keyed
their defense around chasing guys off the three point line.
They're also allowing far and away the fewest three point
attempts per game at just twenty six, and teams are
shooting just twenty six percent on those threes. They've also
been an excellent defensive rebounding team. This is what I
mean by the margins like not forcing any turnovers, give
(31:00):
up a million points in the paint, but never giving
up threes, and getting every single defensive rebound. It's like
a and again. Part of that defensive rebounding is connected
to their talent right Like Vucevich is an excellent defensive rebounder,
Josh Giddy is an excellent defensive rebounder. All their guards
and forwards are pretty solid. They scrap for the ball.
They've grabbed seventy six percent of their opponent's missus, which
(31:20):
ranks second in the MBA. But it's also part of
that shot diet. Like when you're not giving up many threes,
there's fewer long rebounds. Longer rebounds have more potential to
be secured by corner crashes and other perimeter players from
the opponent right, So like keeping shots closer to the
rim is also helping them in their defensive rebounding, and
then again that sparks them in transition, where they've been
(31:40):
really good. I've been really impressed by Josh Giddy in transition.
He's just always getting the ball and probing in that
like semi transition phase where the defense isn't quite set
and he just finds a way to get an angle
and kind of get into the elbow paint area. Guys react,
and then he's hitting cutters in spray outs to shooters
over and over and over again. And Nicole Vusovich is
(32:02):
absolutely bludgeoning teams as a trailer in transition. They got
another couple of those against Sacramento. That has been one
of Giddy's favorite kickout reads like Vouchs just trails the
floor right at the top of the key, Giddy probes
into the lane. If he doesn't find anything in the
corners or as a cutter, he just quick turns and
pitches it back to Vooch. Booch has his momentum going
(32:22):
towards the basket, he can rise up and knock that
shot down at a high clip. And then in the
half court, they don't really have a lot of wasted possessions.
They're pretty steady through Josh Giddyon pick and roll, and
Vusovich in the post, often in a two man game,
and they've just been really good. Vouch has been very
efficient in the post so far to start this year.
Josh Giddy continues to show improvement as a three point shooter.
(32:45):
And then out of action Giddy, as we've talked about
over the summer, he just makes the right reads and
gets their offense movement. He's just a guy that's going
to come downhill in the action, wait for the defense
to react and make the kickout read that starts their
drive in kick, and then they we just had really
smart drive and kick basketball off of that. Trey Jones,
Madus Buzellis Isaacacorro, even Kevin Pritchard and excuse me, Kevin Herder,
(33:09):
not the GM of the Pacers. Kevin Herder, Patrick Williams
and iod assume we've all done a really nice job
coming in off the bench and continuing that drive and
kick attack. And then Trey Jones has been a revelation
to start the year. He's run forty nine pick and
rolls as that secondary ball handler and generated fifty six points.
That's one point one to four points per possession, which
is excellent. Nothing overly complicated there. He's attacking the rim
(33:30):
really well off those screens and he can make all
of the reads. The Bulls currently lead the league in
paint points on offense as much as they're giving up
point paint points on defense. They are the number one
paint scoring offense to start the year, just shy of
sixty points in the paint per game, and it's because
all of their perimeter players attack the rim like crazy.
(33:52):
Josh Giddy is always downhill and using his strength to
get to the rim for layups and short floaters. Manus
Buzzellis is scoring there like we talked about earlier, slashing
in every phase of the game. I had assume moves
always attacking the rim. We mentioned Trey Jones and his
ball screens getting downhill. They just play a really fun
brand of basketball on both ends of the floor. And
(34:12):
I want to shout out Billy Donovan because he's capitalizing
on a lot of specific margins, right, Like you know,
when you have a weakness, you also have strengths. Typically
identifying what your weaknesses are, identifying what your strengths are,
and trying to capitalize on those margins to cancel each
other out so that you can use your talent playing
in transition off and using your advantage creator and Josh
Gitty to sparks, driving kick sequences, winning the margin on
(34:36):
the three point line. Like again, like putting yourself in
a position where you're not dealing with as many long rebounds.
You know you're not good in the paint, but you're
chasing teams off the three point line and you're getting
every defensive rebound, and then in the half court, you're
consistently playing through your two best offensive players, and you
have guys that know how to playoff of those advantages.
It's a proven formula in this league and it's been
working for the Bulls earlier that said they're headed into
(34:59):
a bru stretch of schedule from here home and home
with the Knicks, home for Philly. I say home and home,
meaning to go to MSG for one of those two games,
then home for Philly, at Milwaukee, at Cleveland, home for
San Antonio, and then at Detroit. So over the next
two weeks we will definitely find out how real this is.
Their offense hasn't been perfect to start this year. They're
(35:21):
going to be playing against some better defenses. I'm curious
to see how well that holds up. But a really
nice start for the Chicago Bulls. All right, guys, that's
all I have for today is always a sincerely appreciate
you guys for supporting us and supporting the show. We
will be back tomorrow morning with probably a game reaction
or two and then some mail bag questions, so make
sure you guys get your questions into the mail bags.
(35:42):
I will see you guys tomorrow
Host
Jason Timpf
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!
Ruthie's Table 4
For more than 30 years The River Cafe in London, has been the home-from-home of artists, architects, designers, actors, collectors, writers, activists, and politicians. Michael Caine, Glenn Close, JJ Abrams, Steve McQueen, Victoria and David Beckham, and Lily Allen, are just some of the people who love to call The River Cafe home. On River Cafe Table 4, Rogers sits down with her customers—who have become friends—to talk about food memories. Table 4 explores how food impacts every aspect of our lives. “Foods is politics, food is cultural, food is how you express love, food is about your heritage, it defines who you and who you want to be,” says Rogers. Each week, Rogers invites her guest to reminisce about family suppers and first dates, what they cook, how they eat when performing, the restaurants they choose, and what food they seek when they need comfort. And to punctuate each episode of Table 4, guests such as Ralph Fiennes, Emily Blunt, and Alfonso Cuarón, read their favourite recipe from one of the best-selling River Cafe cookbooks. Table 4 itself, is situated near The River Cafe’s open kitchen, close to the bright pink wood-fired oven and next to the glossy yellow pass, where Ruthie oversees the restaurant. You are invited to take a seat at this intimate table and join the conversation. For more information, recipes, and ingredients, go to https://shoptherivercafe.co.uk/ Web: https://rivercafe.co.uk/ Instagram: www.instagram.com/therivercafelondon/ Facebook: https://en-gb.facebook.com/therivercafelondon/ For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iheartradio app, apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.