July 10, 2025 • 44 mins
When we think of finishing in the paint, our minds usually travel to high flying dunks. However, a crafty layup finish that defies gravity and the laws of physics equally can take our breaths away. Today, we salute the fearless players who were able to enthrall crowds and confuse defenders with their inventive footwork, incredible wingspans, unorthodox timing, and improvised creativity. Tune in to find out who were the best at finishing at the rim during an era still littered with big men stationed in the paint.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
What was the commercial fall down seven, Get Up eight,
which makes no sense. First of all, I'm like, yes,
he ain't gonna get up more times than you fall.
But yeah, that was that was a fire commercial.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
He became a part of his brand to a point
where it boosted sales for McDavid. You know what I mean,
everybody start wearing the pads. He was dressed like a
football player. Yeah, after a while they start suiting him up.
I mean, you know, they started with the sleeve, the debraces.
Then he started getting the thigh pads and the blood
pads and start wearing a little the padded Uh what's
the undertank? Like, bro, you're you're prepared for war?
Speaker 3 (00:33):
I did that in high school a kye. I wasn't
even attacking the rim.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
I was shooting all jump shots, but I had to
put the rid pad in the It made no sense
looking back on it, but the wade did I need
to do it.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Welcome back to another episode of Goat, What's Up?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Dot, What's Up Trey? Another another week at It, another pot.
We got some good stuff to talk about today, right.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Oh yeah, man, we got some great stuff to talk
about man, and this week, Man, you know you you
a little familiar man. I don't think a lot of
people know about your bag, man, but it's the greatest
layup package of the two thousands. Man. You know, you
got to get creative, man, when you can't dunk at
the rim, or or when you get there man AND's
somebody trying to block you. Man, take us, Take us
to a place where you got a seven footer, right,
(01:23):
you think you got a clear path, and now you
got to get creative from the layup.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, that's when the skill package comes into play. I
mean people think about layups and finishing at the rim,
and they don't think about all the work that you
put in in the gym, over the summer, over many years,
working on both hands, just being able to finish at
different angles, different ways over the over the big fellers.
So once you get in there, you never know what
angle you might have you got to you gotta have
(01:50):
a lot of options to go to. And it's also
another thing is creativity some of you. That's like growing
up watching the game, watching a bunch of different players.
You kind of just build on your creative liby of
different stuff you've seen people do and you just kind
of let nstick take over once you get in the
paint and get amongst the trees.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
I like to call this era the pre Jelly era, right,
and not too much English on it, man, But a
lot of guys are creative, a lot of high flyers,
a lot of creative highlights that we've seen from these
players that we're going to talk about. But I want
to jump a little bit into the criteria of why
they make this conversation. So these players were chosen for
(02:29):
their lay up efficiency, creativity, and impacting the two thousands
based on their reputation and available stats.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
You know, I mean the.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Layup specific data gives us this efficiency about the actual evidence.
So you can literally YouTube this and see these players
doing these crazy layups, these three sixty joints, falling, doing
all these things. I remember seeing MJ slap his hand
and I'm going outside trying to do that. I still
think that's one of the wildest layups that you will
(02:58):
see in this game. But super creative and and you know,
like in the two thousands, the defense was super physical,
a lot of hand checking. So, like you mentioned, these
are this is these these are the plays that come
to instinct from what you grinded in the summer and
just kind of preparing yourself to to to you know,
if if if the thing doesn't go as planned, this
(03:20):
is the backup plan.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
I'm glad you mentioned like the era and then the
style of play, because like in the two thousands, every
team had at least a seven footer or two center
or like playing some playing two bigs at the same time,
because I mean, you had shock in the league at
the time, right, so everybody had to have somebody guard
shack so on the other nights, even though you didn't
have might not have a dominant office of big there
were still people to hold down to pay defensively, like
(03:43):
just as opposed today's era. And not every lot everybody's
pacing space. Not everybody has that rent protecting center that's
going to be in there. So when these guards got
into the lane that we're gonna talk about today, they
had to deal with at least one big man who's
in there gonna protect the pay, maybe two. And they
could be physical with you. They could put your put
your arm on you and protect the room with the
other hand. It was it was a different style of finishing,
(04:05):
a different style of playing. The painting and how we
see the day, in today's game, in the two thousand
and tens, twenty twenties, and going forward.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Yeah, absolutely, well let's just jump right into it. Man,
We're gonna kick this off with Alan Iris's Ai clearly
has the crossover, had to take some of the deep threes,
et cetera. You know what I mean, had a little
versatile game, but he has some of the coldest finishes
as well. And he spent a lot of time on
the floor, you know what I mean. And I'm not
talking about playing, I'm talking about getting noted to the ground.
(04:35):
And he had to get real versatile at his size
at six feet one hundred and sixty five pounds, And like,
as you mentioned, there were some trees in the paint,
the tumbles of the world, the shicquill O'Neills, the Alonzo mornings,
and he had to find a way to create it
because he was not dunking on them every time.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
Yeah, I was fearless.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
And I remember like coming out when I was coming
out of out of the college and coming into the league,
I was talking to a scouting scout, like, what's one
thing you want to work on and get better at
your game? I'm like, I need to get bigger, stronger.
Obviously I need to get bigger. He was like, whoa, wha,
don't you want to get stronger? But you don't necessarily
want to get bigger because you can use that your
slight build, your size, how skinny you are to like
(05:15):
you to see your advantage in the league. So hey,
that's what Ai did, basically use his his his small stature,
his then build and kind of got into nooks and
crannies and crevices of the defense and used angles to
get in the lane and around people to finish that say,
maybe like a bigger guard kind of like what Trey
Young does now use his side to get different places.
And then a bigger guard maybe like Jalen Brunson per
(05:37):
se can't do the same type of thing because he's bigger,
he has to use more the physicality. So Ai was
stepping around guys, had to up and underfinishes with both hands,
and I think I remember in the two K game
he had like the layout package where he would throw
the ball way up off the glass like the underhand
schools that would go high off the glass. So that's
(05:57):
the one thing I remember Ai and his finishing was
just it was something we've really never seen before.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Yeah, yeah, definitely a skill and often imitated. All right,
this next one, man, they always tease him man because
they say he only got one hand, he only going
one way, Tony Parker, right, and even him only going
one way, you can't stop it. You can't stop it.
So if you want to call it out, he's still
going through you, around you, however you want it. And
his float game is so underrated, Like I don't think
(06:26):
it's talked about enough. Like it's one of the prettiest
things you possibly can see in basketball. It almost looks
like a tear drop.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
He patting that to him was like Kareem skyhook, Like
that was his shot. That's what you think about about
Tony Parker. He was going left, dribbling with his right hand,
finishing with his right scoop floaters off both feet, you
know he was. And the crazy thing about Tony in
his size, he was always you look at the stats
at the end of the year, he was always top
ten of points in the pain Yeah, every year because
(06:54):
he wasn't I mean, he was shot midis or whatever,
but he was trying to get that lane.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Yeah once he once he gets deep enough behind the
dotted line. You know, hey, that is going up and
you're not touching it, you know what I mean, You
might as well get back on defense. And he was
able to get some contact as well when he tried
to do that. So one of the I think a
lot of players in this game should be watching that too,
man adding it to the game, just because I feel
like it's a lost art. It's not as done as much,
(07:19):
you know what I mean. So I know John gets
a lot, he gets to the paint a lot, but
he's also explosive, so he's not trying to have that
soft touch. But Tony Parker and Derrick Rose spent a
lot of time in the paint off those two feet.
Speaker 3 (07:31):
Jumps, and Tony didn't like elevate. He was like more quick.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
He was just definishing his layer package, like quick stuff
and un necessarily I'm jumping up in the air and
then I'm gonna figure it out. It's more that I'm
not even I'm just gonna beat you to the punch,
get the ball up before you can jump.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
Now that's a great point. Man beating the guy to
the punch, not even allowing them to get and explode
all that other stuff. Man, just just straight to the point,
get back on defense. Uh, this guy is known as
a dunker. But since he's so acrobatic and and how
this this this game was and crafty and powerful, you
(08:07):
can check off all the boxes. Lebron James, he got
a lot of cold layups. Yeah, I would say he
probably did some more cold layups going into the twenty twenties,
but he definitely had some cold layups where he could
have dunked them easily.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
He think power because of his size, and I mean
he probably have by far the biggest player we're going
to talk about today on his list.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
But yeah, he has some like you said, he had
some some.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
School layup packages where he would take off up and
under some hanging the air double pump laid scoops and
going jumping from one side of the lane and finishing
on the other. Like he wasn't necessarily always getting there
trying to dunk on the on the bigs he was. Yeah,
he had some skill around the round the rim as
well putting off the glass. So got to give Brian
(08:48):
our respect when it comes to the layup packages too.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Yeah, absolutely, shouts the iceman shouts to doctor j man.
You know what I mean, They had to do it
for the next gear to do it, and you know,
obviously guys are trying to do it a little bit
better and a little bit more creative, but you know,
you gotta gotta gotta pay respect to the people before one.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
One more thing.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
One more thing we'll talk about with bron and the
layup packages. Like remember you should see like he get
on the break and it's one on one or two
on one, and guys who try to wrap him up
at the three.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
Point line or above the three point line.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
He would just take him with him all the way
to the rim and lay it in Like yeah, you
know what I'm saying, Like I'm grabbing his arm, but
you gotta literally tackle him and not let his arms
get above his waist or he gonna finish the end
one every time.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
So I mean, you gotta give them credit. He's playing
through the contact.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Yeah, I think that's super underrated that that actually kind
of works in his favor because when we think about
criteria and still being able to make the layup right,
I think that's that's going to be an interesting argument
towards the end because you could have a pretty finish
or you know you have layups, but like are you
(09:55):
making them with contact? Are you you know what I mean?
Do you make them count? Man? And And I think
that's an interesting conversation to go into what we're ranking
our top five good call.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
It was always hilarious because he would get the one
he look over they were paying over to the coach.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Coach would be like, you can if you're.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Gonna fall him, fallum, and the players on the court
like laughing, I tried too strong.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Yeah, he taking me to do Yeah, and no, and
nobody's really trying to hurt nobody, you know what I mean.
They gonna they're gonna do that the most obvious NBA
file that they can do, but they're not gonna try
to take him out. D way d w A man
flash flash falls into this. This is the Flash era
for sure. He falls into it, like the conversation with
(10:36):
Alan Iverson where you know he's aerial but he almost
can get clipped out the air because he's taken off
so far and he's damn there falling on his back
and he's like scooping it up or you know what
I mean, one of those crazy finishes where he's not
even looking at the rim and he had a ton
of those.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
He had. The footwork was crazy.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
That's the Converse era.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Yep, yep, yeah, he had the footwork in the Lion.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
The Euros and he was in the Ai realm where
you like every time he went to the lane, he
went down because he got hurt, like he done for
the night. But I always found a way to get up.
You don't know if they're acting and what the foul
or actually got hurt it.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
They just going there and getting delivering some some some blow.
But they know what I'm saying, Just that the acrobatic finishes,
stepping around attacking the bigs, I mean young d Wade,
flash d Wade before the knees caught up to him.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
It was fun to watch.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Hold your breath, all Star. He's hold your breath, all Star,
you know what I mean with the crowd like it's
gonna be all right, Like you know what I mean,
because because you never know in them and and it's
one of them things where he falls and you hear it.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
On team what was the commercial fall down seven, Get
Up eight, which makes no sense. First of all, I'm
like he ain't gonna get up more times than you fall.
But yeah, that was that was a fire commercial.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Yeah man, I mean look it was. He became a
part of his brand to a point where boosted sales
for McDavid.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Everybody start wearing the pads. He was dressed like a
football player. Yeah, after a while they start suiting him up.
I mean you know, they started with the sleeve, the
knee braces. Then he started getting the thigh pads and
the blood pads and start wearing a little the padded
Uh what's the undertank? Like, bro, you're you're prepared for war.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I did that at a high school a kye. I
wasn't even attacking the rim.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
I was shooting all jump shots, but I had to
put the rid pad And it made no sense looking
back on it, But the way did I need to
do it? I remember Coach k cussed me out one day,
Oh really cussed me out because I got it like
a I fought through a screen and a guy need
me in my thigh and I wasn't wearing I wasn't
wearing the thigh pass, so I missed the practice.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I was hurting. We need to be wearing it. Why
you're not wearing the path.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
From the every day since that dude, I had to
pass on shoot around practice every day.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
I wasn't it wasn't gonna happen again.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Coach, we don't see them injuries that often, but we
also don't see those those pads being worn anymore. But
when they came to play, I mean, this is kind
of like sidetrack, But how terrible is that injury? I
feel like every game you think you're gonna have a
great game, you get need Like when you're feeling good
(13:16):
and you're like, hey, this is about to be the game.
I'm about to have a game. I just made my
first three. It's it's about to pick up. I got
nine points. And then it's a knee and then you
can't do anything to You can't like he you can't
massage it out. It's just one of those bone to
bone joints where you're just out.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
It's one of the most painful, one of the most people.
And to everybody else it looked like you what you
hear't really do anything? Yeah, Like you can't really tell
what happened, but you're feeling it, and that's all you're thinking.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
About the rest of them.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
So I had to bring that up because those paths
are super important in this in this era. The next
person we're talking about another legend, Kobe Bryant, cold Man
super like you know, however, he like Ron br Like
you know what I'm saying. You get to that that
point where he's in the air and he's changing it up,
but obviously he's he's he's a school of Michael Jordan.
(14:09):
So you know, a lot of a lot of those
finishes he wanted to recreate, man, and he was able
to do it Man. And you know, I think the
most underrated part of Kobe's layup packages his post lay up. Okay,
you know what I mean, where he's spinning out of
the post back to the basket. You know, obviously he's
one of the one of the best post players as
a guard like Michael Jordan, where he gets to a
(14:30):
low block and he don't see that help and he's
spinning off you he getting a thunder and he's scooping,
and I just think that's a lost art in general,
maybe just because a lot of guys just ain't posting
up as much. But dude, he when he got you
on a low block and he was doing that. I
mean that's when the mike and drills do. People still
do mike and drills.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
I do. I still do them regularly. It just helps me.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
Every first thing is when I come in to the gym,
I'm around the basket. I still do mic and to
help on help the touch and get used to the room.
But when it comes to cod like he used his link.
We talked about Ai using his slight buildings. He like
he was so long and his arms along and he
could like he uses like he did the up and
under like you know you're seeing in WNBA women's basketball
where everybody thinks it's a travel where you go up
(15:15):
and under step through. Yeah, that's you jump off your
pivot foot where it's not a travel, but it looked
like it.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
That was his thing.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Like he would he would pivot you to death, use
it footwork and then scoop you. And that's part of
the post work that you was talking about.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
I want to say, I think Kobe Bryant edged Michael
Jordan and footwork right. He mastered it to a point
where Michael got to it. Then he Scott some work
with h Hakeem Olajuwan and once he got to that
he could tie rope.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
I'm talking about, like you think it full work was
better to get I think.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
But but again it's kind of hard to say, like
because he had to learn from Mike. He had to
learn from Mike to get to that point to.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
Master I don't know if I'm brother, I see what
you're saying, but I don't know because Mike was just
so feathery with it.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
Man, I get it, I get.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
I'm not I'm not because it had he had to
do it in order to inspire to get to this.
So I think, like, it doesn't.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Taking like you're taking to Chris Brown, Michael Jaackson, Like yes,
Like he's in that way.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Where it's like it's visibly transferable, And a lot of
guys started studying him because as a player, I was
thinking about how can I improve as a player, and
I started watching Kobe. I didn't even like Kobe Bryant
because he imitated Michael Jordan's so much. But the one
thing I did respect was the footwork. Right when you
think about how you mentioned the jumps, the two foot
(16:35):
jump stop, which ain't really done too often anymore. The
reverse pivot the step in and then you know it
turns into a layup or a midi. It's just it's
just one of those things. But also just the you
know coke, yeah, and then have to do that Mike,
Mike just.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
You know what I mean, he ain't playing.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Cole gonna do a little up bake up, bake up,
bake spin reverse pivot, and I just I just really
was just like, dang, I really got to get my
footwork ready, because like I mean, it's almost like ballerina,
like you know what I mean, to a point where
he getting guys like, you know, Mike not playing around Mike,
Mike jab you one time you put a hand of
he still cashing.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
He ain't.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
He ain't really doing too much on it on the wing.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
But cod when you watch Cob, you could tell, like
the mint of amount of time and the hours he
put into his footwork, like in the paint, you could
tell that ain't.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
That's not an accident, man, bro.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
People that worked out with him saying hours he would
do three hour no ball workouts.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, or he would do like I don't even like
I don't like shell drill. So that's that's that's insane
I don't like shell drill, you know what I'm saying, Like,
I don't like shell drill.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
So the idea that hey, we about to go in
here and we about to work on nothing like nothing
but footwork and like hypothetical scenarios without a basketball.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Or he would do like one move for thirty minutes
until he felt like he mastered it. Like that, he
would do the like to the jab or the spind
pivot move over and over and over until he mastered it.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
He could be doing for forty five minutes.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
That's the type of like meticulous like attention to detail
that translated over the games because you could like literally tell.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Yeah, yeah, no, you could see it. He knew, oh
this is why I missed the shot by an inch,
letting me get right back to that same spot and
fix it. This is right here. I'm about the game, y'all.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
That's a sickness, man. But shout out to code Bear
recipes to the great one. You know this dude right here, man,
he an underrated guy. You know the Mississippi bullet monte Elis.
I still think he wanted the uh, he wanted my
layup goats athletic.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Let's talk about my man in an unorthodox game, six three,
unorthnized game, like you can't really six two yeah, six two,
six three. So he was STEP's teammate this first few
years in the league, and like we said, talk, I'm like,
Mante is so nice.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
But what does he work on in the summer? Like
what kind of workout can you put him through?
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Because nothing he does is like drill work or skill
Like he just he could Like his handle wasn't that nice. Yeah,
his footwork wasn't that crazy, but he was just he
getting that lane in as soon as he could take
off and jump, he would, and then he'll figure it
out in the air, like he'll take off, do a
three sixty, layup up and under just quick floater off
(19:28):
the glass and like like say something you can't teach.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
But he just he was so nice underrated finisher.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Shit, hey when he played and we believe I just
seen it, just like hey, this is where he going.
And then when he got a little bit more you
know what I mean, freedom to kind of like score
and score and score like that dude, he would literally
glide and lay it up. He wasn't never thinking about dunk.
It always was a layup thing, like oh, how can
(19:56):
I use a glass? And obviously the next the next
generation is reerving, you know what I mean that twenty
eleven coming into the league. But Monte is like one
of them ones were you just like, I don't even
know how he doing this? And I went to a
lot of those warriors we believe practices, you know what
I mean. In the following year, Marcus Williams was on
(20:17):
that roster, and I just wanted to see how Monte.
But Monte end up getting hurt, so I didn't get him.
I didn't get that much of like the invisibility of
like what is he doing? That makes it so different man.
But even in Milwaukee, the Dallas years, he still continued
to have his layup package and that was super important.
Speaker 3 (20:34):
Can't do it when they do it.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Remember when they drafted s Death and he was you
know what I'm saying, he was little guarding there and
they drafted another six two six three guard coming in
and he like houses going back.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
It gonna work. I can't do it. Can't play two
small guards back.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Then, they can't in a getting buckets one a lot
of stops.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
But yeah, he was scoring that involved man.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Yeah, that's one thing he could do, man, and a
lot a lot of those points. I would definitely love
to stat nerd and see how many of those those
points he had were actual layups. This next person wanted
to callest crossovers super explosive, but had some of them
the most windmill crazy layups athletic. Steve Francis like he
(21:22):
already had that, Like this is the one thing about
the two thousand Guard. They over sold the crossover, Like
they over sold the crossover so much, like they wanted
to make sure that's an n one little effect on
it where they just wanted to hit you with the
move right and you all the way over there. They're
gonna look, then they gonna go do the layup. And
Steve Franks the type of person like he's so strong,
(21:44):
well you don't know if he gonna dunk, so he
might just pull back and then bring it in and
duck then, you know, and just really showing like, oh
I can glide and I can put a little bit
sas on that. And I mean I think the I mean,
I think we can kind of speak on both of
these players. We kind of I know they hate they
have like a rivalry. Him and Baron Davis. They have
(22:05):
like similarly on the same wave.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
I was gonna bring up that I was gonna bring
up in the same conversation and you said it like
both of these like they look different body type, but
they but they played it like similar strength. They're both
super strong, like Steve be Diddy look strong, but Steve
Fancers was strong too, even though he didn't look it
like they were. And you said it like just to
put the cherry on it, like they were getting a
lane and they thinking dunk. Right, most of the time
(22:30):
they get in there thinking dunk, but then you take off.
They can hang so long and so athletic and creative,
like I can't dunk. Well, let me make a highlight
lay up. I might spin off you three sixty reversed layup,
I might cot back, switch hands and finish up and
under like they're really going off taking off on two
feet and I'm gonna figure it out in the air.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, I mean, those dudes are are so ridiculous. But
also those are the ones that you like, he dunk
that because you just didn't think, like you know, like
you don't know what you're going to get when they
leave the ground. And that's you know, Bed obviously dunking
on Carolinko and Steve franc has got a lot of
a lot of highlights like that.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
So I mean, I think those two are the that's
I think those are the best job on rent. Like
comparisons to me, Yeah, yeah, because that job like that,
he getting into the lane, he well, until he said
he ain't dunking no more. I'm getting I'm thinking he
thinking dunk and then some of his best layups came
off of I want to dunk it first. I know
I can't dunk it. Now, let me let me get
(23:31):
creative and lay it in.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Yeah, yeah, no, I mean any guy that actually can
change the style of jump, Yeah, you're you're just you're
just ridiculously gifted. You know what I mean. If you
jump up and you could turn what.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Me and ninety nine percent of guards in the in
the league. You gotta have a plan before you jump, right,
You're not even even when you pick the ball up.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
You gotta have a plan, like, all right, this is
what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
They are like apex of that jump figuring out what
they're gonna do, Like.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Being able to spin midjump is crazy. I just I
can't even fathom because they jumped so high so it
still allows them to be effective. They're not they're not
going down. They're going up still and it's like, huh,
how is that happening?
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Yeah? And a lot of it is with contact.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Yeah, like and that's and and that's where the change
up goes because they're doing this happening and and still
being able to finish it, Like how are they still
going up? So yeah, man, shout up to those two.
I know they hate being compared. They still got a
little friendly rivalry right now. But yeah, man, they they
put on in the two thousands man as some of
(24:40):
the strongest finishers, uh and great layup packages. So had
to shout them out and combine them into Uh. This guy,
you guys watched really closely. He almost I want to
say him and Gorean Drogic changed the trajectory towards the
end of how guards laid the ball up the Steve
Nash right and jumping off the wrong foot. And I
(25:03):
remember we worked out with Goran Projic's trainer. It's just
like nine and he had me jumping off the right,
so I can do you know what I mean, And
I'm like, what same for the same hand, same for
the same hand layups. So you remember time, so you
(25:24):
remember when this came through with everybody that.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
We started working on the minster, we started working with
our trainers, We're watching film and because it was like
it was different and it didn't take a lot.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Of like.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
It don't take a lot of energy either, and you
could work on it as you get warmed up within
your your workout. But it really it's about timing the
shot the shot blocker, not allowing the shot block at
the time when you're gonna jump. Because usually your whole
life you see when you when you're making the right
handed layup, jump off your left leg right. So now
I was like, no, we're gonna do right. If we're
(25:59):
making right and we're gonna go off all right, left,
off left, just to you can use it. You can
find off the defender and time it up, get off
the glass quick so they can't block it. And yeah,
Steve Nash brought it into the league and he would
do it high off the glass. Sometimes he used the glass.
Sometimes he would It was like an underhand scoop floats
school that you see a lot of guards do now
added that to my package.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
He's literally hitting backhand on backboard like, yeah, you know here,
here's one of the quick ones, right. But it definitely
threw me off man when I first got introduced to it.
But I thought it was a neat trick, man, because
it brought me time, especially when I was trying to
adjust to like getting ready for the pro level and
seeing more bigger defenders, you know, run into the six
(26:39):
tens and above, and I'm like, oh, yeah, this athletic
stuff not gonna work for me, So I need to
figure it out. Let's let's let's peel back the onion
for the for the for the listeners about putting a
shot blocker in the rim right and not allowing them
to block in this skill right, because a lot of
people are like, yo, how these guys get it and
(27:00):
you're taking away because when they jump, they go right
into the net, you know what I.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
Mean, Yeah, you can step them under that under the basket.
So one of the guys I wanted to bring up,
I don't know if he was on your list, but man,
he's on the list one of the best at this,
and he's in my top five. I'm letting you know,
now he's finishing because he brought the euro over whatever.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
But you talk about stepping.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
In or using a rim as a as an officer
player to fend off the defender. He would do the
step into your body with his say, on the left
side of the basket with his right and then do
the outside hooked lay up, you know what I'm saying.
So that like sometimes the centers can't even jump or
they'll be touching the net grabbing in their fingers would
be in the net. Like that's that's part of that
(27:41):
footwork and skill work.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
We like.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
It's kind of like a hook lay up. You're finishing
why while you're stepping in the other way. That's crafty,
crafty finishing. That's I feel like him and Steve Nash
kind of had his game too, where you was stuff
he's like never seen before, and the stuff you didn't
have you'd have to be athletic to do.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Yeah, I see, And that's another thing. If you never
hoved or you ain't never like got to that point
where it was enough shot blockers on the floor, that's
an interesting viewpoint of it, you know what I mean.
You're no longer saying how if you've been in that
situation and you're understanding how like like the certain tricks,
you know what I mean. I'm not sure if you
(28:21):
ever got to play at the Hacks. I think you
probably still was at Duke at the time. But it
was Eric Maynor. It was guarding Eric Maynor up there
during the summer workouts, and I'm guarding him close and
I'm on him, I'm fighting through screens. I'm doing this
whole thing. This is when the whole This is when
(28:43):
the Thunder, the young Thunder, Scottie Brooks Thunder team were
always spending time together, like they implemented the Spurs thing
where they would all hang out. Coyle, Yeah, the college
boy Katie Serge, James Russ.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Right.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
So they're playing in the ACKs in LA and during
this time I'm guarding Eric Mayner and he took this
whole idea where I'm reaching, he grabs my wrists, brings
it close to his hip and he's hiding basically that
he's holding my wrists and creating separation. And this is
when I was like, Yo, the NBA is different because
(29:19):
in any other play, Iff, I'm playing against somebody than
not creating this space. He knew how to create the space,
and it just woke me up and I was just
like how I view the game now, I understand how
a guy is getting loose enough to get you know,
there's just so many different tricks, man.
Speaker 1 (29:38):
Yeah, he probably learned that from somebody in the league.
So it's like, yeah, and that's the tricks you gotta
have when your guarden. And sometimes it's the athletical b
you gotta at disadvantage physically, maybe you gotta have all
those tricks.
Speaker 3 (29:50):
And I learned tons of it myself.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Like the more physical sometimes the more physically you are
with me, I'm gonna use it to your advantage because
I'm like I said, chicken, when you hold you just
to slip around you. And that's I mean, we talk
about all these guys on this list, they all had
different tricks to finish.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
Over people who are bigger, stronger. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
It was just subtle, Like you said, subtle stuff you
see if you're a hooper that like the average basketball
fan might not catch.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
So like so like we see, like you see a
player like like Shay or Trey or Jaylen Brussell who's
always getting to the line are always beating the man
in situations where you don't think and that defends like
he's grabbed me's hold of me. That's the type of
stuff that's going on that the ref might not see,
the fan might not see, but only the defender knows.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Oh yeah, if you're not sitting course, if you're not
sitting courtside or a decent viewpoint to see it actually happening, right,
because there's a lot of a lot of hand holding,
a lot of like pesky files, a lot of scratching.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
You know.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
You know, you've probably gotten a shower and it burned
because somebody has scratched you up, because you know what
I mean. But nobody else can see that because it's
a lot of a lot of cat fighting on the court,
you know what I mean when you getting to it,
especially a guy picking you up full god trying to
be you know, contact wise, he might have bumped you,
he looking you, looking at the ref to make sure
that he's seen that. Next time you might go and
(31:19):
hit him. You might try to do a little thing, man,
But you know, it's definitely a physical game. That's very underrated.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
Man.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
If you if you ain't catching it and That's why
certain plays, and you mentioned the shades and the Jalen
Brunton's are very effective, you know what I mean, where
you feel like I can't touch this guy, I can't
guard this guy.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Why is it this?
Speaker 2 (31:38):
And you look at the bench and the coaches like
you'll figure it out, Like I ain't trying to hear it.
You know you're gonna have to work through that. And
and they have those advantages where they know the rules
because once you know the rules too. Chris Paul's very
good at this, just studying the book of like, hey,
I'm gonna take this jumper right now because he's right
and he didn't move quick enough for me to land.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
Speaking of christ is he in this conversation?
Speaker 2 (32:02):
Chris paus now in this he has now entered the chat.
I don't know how I missed that, but you're right,
Chris Pauls should be in there.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yeah, I mean, the laf package ain't crazy, but he
he and that Tony Parker realm of floaters.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Yeah, when he was younger.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
I feel like most guards that were in the top
guards have to have to be in this conversation. Man,
they had a lot of layouts. They're not it's not
too many explosive outside of Bead and Steve Francis Man
that were just booming, booming. Everybody else was kind of
float game.
Speaker 1 (32:29):
I remember the game like he was in New Words.
They played La in the playoffs. He had about forty
off straight floaters. Yeah, like eight floaters in that game.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
I would probably parallel from Tony Parker obviously, you know,
he was on the winning side and Chris Paul kind
of was, you know, didn't have the best teams set
up for him to be successful. But uh, you know,
he definitely was kind of in a parallel of that,
you know what I mean, Like Tony had the float game,
but then Chris Paul had other ways to be effective.
(33:02):
You know, both had midi's and uh you know, and
I think that's the traditional two thousand guard.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
Okay, yeah, I mean the same realm with how they
did it. But Tony Parker was trying to score that ball.
Chris Paul for the majority he was trying to get
assist justeahd teammates up.
Speaker 3 (33:17):
Tony Parker was a score getting land figuring.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
That's the same thing I left Rondo off. I left
Rondo of this because a lot of again this is
the passing of the traditional pass first point guard, right. Yeah,
they would get twenty points, but they were more focused
on assistant turnover ratio, you get what I'm saying. So
that's what the Chris Paul's, the Rondo's.
Speaker 1 (33:39):
I mean, there's a lot of points, a lot of
guards in the are that could finish. It's just yep,
it's the Oprache line. You got to the top of
the top to get in here.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Absolutely, we're going to close this one off with Jamal Crawford.
Jamal Crawford, big guard. Obviously, again, same thing we mentioned
with Steve Francis and Baron Davis's gonna hit you with
the move first and then figure it out from there.
Too much, not too many dunks, you know what I mean,
very unselfish when it came to if somebody could put
(34:06):
on a better dunk than him, he was going to
give it up. But he loved to score, so he
was gonna score any way he possibly could, and he
finished at the rim even though he was six or five.
He would try to, you know, lay instead of dunk,
you know what I mean. But obviously his favorite players
was Magic and you know Isaiah Thomas so you know,
he emulated that way. He didn't spend too much time
(34:28):
on the rim.
Speaker 3 (34:29):
Yeah, I'm thinking j crossover.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
I think about obviously the handle and the stuff like
before he went to finish the finish light at the rim.
Like he was crafty with at highlights to get to
a position where he could just make a simple layup.
To me, most of the time like behind the back
pick up into the layup package and stuff like that,
he was he did it in a different way to me.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Yeah, I was gonna say he might be known as
like literally for a combo package, right, And that's the
same thing you say a you say the d way
to the world the Steve Francis and the BDS is
that it's more of the setup. I hit you with
the move and then it's the like continuation to the layup.
(35:13):
The layup don't have to be great because the move
is so good, so you know what I mean, it
just kind of goes a continuation for that. So those
would be probably the combo package guys of the two
thousands that get looped in. So I understand why Jamal
Craft for gotten there, but he's definitely a part of
that criteria. The combo package. We're gonna take a quick break,
(35:34):
but when we come back, we're gonna give our goat
top body. All right, dot man, we went through some
(35:59):
great players. I'm definitely curious to see who makes your
top five.
Speaker 3 (36:04):
Every week.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
You surprise me, but you make some valid points. Man,
on your on your on your debates, man, and I
really want to see who's number five for this man
because this was kind of tough.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
So when I go through my top five, you're gonna
see kind of like a little trend where I ain't
showing as much love to the athletic guys. If you
feel like I mean in my round, when you you
got to use pure skill, craftiness, quickness and stuff to finish.
So that's what you go see in my top five.
At number five, I got Manta Ellis, which even though
(36:36):
I said not athletic, he was just different with it.
You can't like, you can't teach the way he played,
So I mean, I just love like watching him getting
that lane and finished. Number before I Steve Nash, who
I learned a lot from Tony Parker. Number two I
got Ai and number one I got Man New because
Man New got it just craftiness. He brought the euro
(36:59):
over I feel like, and then he had, like I said,
the step INDs, the floaters, the up and unders, like
you never know what you're gonna see from him when
he got to lane to finish. So, man, it was
my favorite layout package, maybe ever in the league, but definitely.
And he number one of my top five for this
era of layup packages.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Mmm, I like that man for me, number five, Steve Nash,
number four, Tony Parker, number three, I'm gonna go with
d Wade. I'm gonna go with d Wade, and then
number two, I'm gonna go with man new Genobili and
(37:43):
at number one, Monte.
Speaker 3 (37:44):
Ellis Monte number one.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
Monte's Monte's my goat man for layup packages in the
two thousands.
Speaker 3 (37:51):
That's a shocker.
Speaker 2 (37:52):
Yeah, man, So you know, shouts to Genobili and then
other guys are named man, but I still, you know,
I gotta go with mante l a do it all,
you know, yeah, it all, you do it all? You know,
So I had I had to roll with that. But
a couple of innovators, you know what I mean. No
to Tony Parker and the floater, No to Steve Nash,
(38:13):
and off foot, same foot lay and then you know
D Way with acrobatic you know, physical fall layups.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (38:24):
You know that that way, that's that was the help.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
I couldn't go D Way, I couldn't go Brian be Diddy,
Steve friends, and I just yeah, they dunkers, They dunkers
to me and some crazy layup highlights.
Speaker 3 (38:37):
But that's just not how I get down with it.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
I gotta go to I gotta go to guys that
I can relate to and stuff I can actually work
on and practice for my personal tough five.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
But yeah, no, I respect it.
Speaker 3 (38:46):
That's what I said.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
I looked at it the only way. When you look
at that, I kind of feel like that's how I
picked it too. At different points in my life. I
was athletic at one point, I say, d w A.
But and as things changed, it became a point guard,
the floater, the same foot and then you know what
I'm saying, putting people in the rim. So it was
the evolution of of the of the of the lay
(39:10):
up and how important.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
You know, you know what it was also fared about
the two thousands when you got b Diddy, Steve Francis.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (39:18):
AI, I got a couple of these, Montet got a
couple of these, like the lib lay up, so like
they'll have a lib you seeing some of the highlights
back in the day were like the live and they
can and they can't dunk it Mark Marberry.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
But see Marbury's in that Steve Francis, Baron Davis Combos.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
In that same roum. He's in that trying to dunk finished.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
Marbury would definitely get libbed too. He either goes lay
it up, it'd be a yeah, I don't we don't
see that no more. I don't know if it's kind
of a it's maybe difficult to do because you're you're
likely to miss it.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Lay live plays for the point guards back then, for
some reason they get the lib. I can't dug it,
so I'm just gonna three sixty layup or finish it
under and try to make it look all that. For
whatever reason, you saw that way more in the two thousands,
like it seemed like.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
It was just it was a why not I don't know.
I mean the guard to guard and we talked collegiate,
you know, Ben Gordon would probably been in that mix,
you know what I mean like I know for sure.
Speaker 3 (40:20):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (40:20):
Darrell Right was my AU teammate. He would throw me
lobs and au.
Speaker 3 (40:24):
You know what I mean. I mean, bring that back, man.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
I want to see some draw some live plays off
of brusting and stuff and traces of jobs for nine Dunkers. Man, Yeah,
I mean Joe, he's gonna get his libs on transition.
Anybody under sixty four, anybody under six four. I want
to see a live.
Speaker 3 (40:44):
Play bringing back man.
Speaker 2 (40:45):
Put in the breaking back, please please, I think we
would love to dunk the small Dunkers again. Man, all right,
we're gonna take another break, and when we come back,
we're gonna do our favorite segment Born in the Wrong Era.
This one should be interesting because I'm really a lot
of these guys are so close to the current gam
that we might have to find somebody in the archives,
(41:07):
but I can't.
Speaker 3 (41:07):
It's always tough. It's always tough. But I got with.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
All right, dot favorite segment born in the Wrong Era?
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Who you got more in the wrong Era.
Speaker 1 (41:30):
It's like I said, it's tough because it's close to
the era where now, so you got to get creative
with it. But I'm going Steve Nash because you see
him in his style of play in so many players
in today's era. You could tell people watching them, you
can tell people worked on it, like we were talking
about earlier, to the underhand, same foot, same hand, finishing
(41:51):
that type of thing. So you see him in so
many different players that obviously he can come in today
and today's the way that his style of player to
kind of hear him and Dantony Brow to the league
with the pace he could get in there finish all
type of different ways. So why not come and bring
Steve Nash back into the era and let him do
his thing and and in the ara that he has
(42:12):
a stamp all.
Speaker 2 (42:13):
Over, I'm gonna be biased. I'm gonna take this la
and go Baron Davis. That's no brain er answer. I mean,
athletic can score, it can get people involved, can defend
at times very strong, plagued with injuries, but saying we
wrote wrote the story differently and allowed him to be
(42:33):
healthy and just you know with today's medical he's one
of the top ten guards in this in this era
and had and had the swag.
Speaker 3 (42:42):
Yeah, he had it all. He was He'll be a
star today.
Speaker 2 (42:45):
Star for real. The stuff he was doing in this era,
him and Steve Nash had a YouTube show, you know
what I mean, like they was. They was leaning into
their personalities a lot, man, And I think that helped.
Speaker 3 (42:54):
He didn't really have it. He didn't have no weakness.
He didn't really have no weakness. Man.
Speaker 1 (42:58):
He could shoot the ball, like I said, athletics all
get out. He could post you play the pick and roll.
I mean he enerted god.
Speaker 3 (43:08):
That was the nickname.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
Boom Dizzel Boom dizzel Man like this point man one
of one of the guys man for.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
Real shut out O.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
All right, man, well tell him where to find you
die this this is a rap.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
All right, we did it again. Find me at s
Doc Curry on our socials, Get at me.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
Tell me some of your favorite layer packages of the
two thousands something some guards you might have forgot, even
fours the bigs.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
If we miss some layer packages out there, let us
know that's real. You can find me at Travon on X.
You can find me an Actrey on Instagram. Make sure
you tell a friend and tell a friend to like
comment reshare all those things got?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
Yep? It's another good one. It's a deep cut.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
Go This has been a Unanimous Media original. Goat was
produced by iHeart Podcasts and Unanimous Media. It was hosted
by me Travon Edwards and Steth Kurk. Executive produced by
Stephen Curry and Eric Paton. Co executive producer Klenna Maria Cutty.
(44:17):
The executive producers at iHeart Podcasts are Sean Titon and
Jason English. This series was produced by Derek Jennings and
Peter Kucher, co producer Kurt Redny. Original music by Jesse Woodard.
Special thanks to Stephen Curry and Will Pearson. Go is
a production of Unanimous Media and iHeart Podcasts. For more
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
(44:41):
wherever you get your podcasts.
What was the commercial fall down seven, Get Up eight,
which makes no sense. First of all, I'm like, yes,
he ain't gonna get up more times than you fall.
But yeah, that was that was a fire commercial.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
He became a part of his brand to a point
where it boosted sales for McDavid. You know what I mean,
everybody start wearing the pads. He was dressed like a
football player. Yeah, after a while they start suiting him up.
I mean, you know, they started with the sleeve, the debraces.
Then he started getting the thigh pads and the blood
pads and start wearing a little the padded Uh what's
the undertank? Like, bro, you're you're prepared for war?
Speaker 3 (00:33):
I did that in high school a kye. I wasn't
even attacking the rim.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
I was shooting all jump shots, but I had to
put the rid pad in the It made no sense
looking back on it, but the wade did I need
to do it.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
Welcome back to another episode of Goat, What's Up?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
Dot, What's Up Trey? Another another week at It, another pot.
We got some good stuff to talk about today, right.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Oh yeah, man, we got some great stuff to talk
about man, and this week, Man, you know you you
a little familiar man. I don't think a lot of
people know about your bag, man, but it's the greatest
layup package of the two thousands. Man. You know, you
got to get creative, man, when you can't dunk at
the rim, or or when you get there man AND's
somebody trying to block you. Man, take us, Take us
to a place where you got a seven footer, right,
(01:23):
you think you got a clear path, and now you
got to get creative from the layup.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
Yeah, that's when the skill package comes into play. I
mean people think about layups and finishing at the rim,
and they don't think about all the work that you
put in in the gym, over the summer, over many years,
working on both hands, just being able to finish at
different angles, different ways over the over the big fellers.
So once you get in there, you never know what
angle you might have you got to you gotta have
(01:50):
a lot of options to go to. And it's also
another thing is creativity some of you. That's like growing
up watching the game, watching a bunch of different players.
You kind of just build on your creative liby of
different stuff you've seen people do and you just kind
of let nstick take over once you get in the
paint and get amongst the trees.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
I like to call this era the pre Jelly era, right,
and not too much English on it, man, But a
lot of guys are creative, a lot of high flyers,
a lot of creative highlights that we've seen from these
players that we're going to talk about. But I want
to jump a little bit into the criteria of why
they make this conversation. So these players were chosen for
(02:29):
their lay up efficiency, creativity, and impacting the two thousands
based on their reputation and available stats.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
You know, I mean the.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Layup specific data gives us this efficiency about the actual evidence.
So you can literally YouTube this and see these players
doing these crazy layups, these three sixty joints, falling, doing
all these things. I remember seeing MJ slap his hand
and I'm going outside trying to do that. I still
think that's one of the wildest layups that you will
(02:58):
see in this game. But super creative and and you know,
like in the two thousands, the defense was super physical,
a lot of hand checking. So, like you mentioned, these
are this is these these are the plays that come
to instinct from what you grinded in the summer and
just kind of preparing yourself to to to you know,
if if if the thing doesn't go as planned, this
(03:20):
is the backup plan.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
I'm glad you mentioned like the era and then the
style of play, because like in the two thousands, every
team had at least a seven footer or two center
or like playing some playing two bigs at the same time,
because I mean, you had shock in the league at
the time, right, so everybody had to have somebody guard
shack so on the other nights, even though you didn't
have might not have a dominant office of big there
were still people to hold down to pay defensively, like
(03:43):
just as opposed today's era. And not every lot everybody's
pacing space. Not everybody has that rent protecting center that's
going to be in there. So when these guards got
into the lane that we're gonna talk about today, they
had to deal with at least one big man who's
in there gonna protect the pay, maybe two. And they
could be physical with you. They could put your put
your arm on you and protect the room with the
other hand. It was it was a different style of finishing,
(04:05):
a different style of playing. The painting and how we
see the day, in today's game, in the two thousand
and tens, twenty twenties, and going forward.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Yeah, absolutely, well let's just jump right into it. Man,
We're gonna kick this off with Alan Iris's Ai clearly
has the crossover, had to take some of the deep threes,
et cetera. You know what I mean, had a little
versatile game, but he has some of the coldest finishes
as well. And he spent a lot of time on
the floor, you know what I mean. And I'm not
talking about playing, I'm talking about getting noted to the ground.
(04:35):
And he had to get real versatile at his size
at six feet one hundred and sixty five pounds, And like,
as you mentioned, there were some trees in the paint,
the tumbles of the world, the shicquill O'Neills, the Alonzo mornings,
and he had to find a way to create it
because he was not dunking on them every time.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
Yeah, I was fearless.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
And I remember like coming out when I was coming
out of out of the college and coming into the league,
I was talking to a scouting scout, like, what's one
thing you want to work on and get better at
your game? I'm like, I need to get bigger, stronger.
Obviously I need to get bigger. He was like, whoa, wha,
don't you want to get stronger? But you don't necessarily
want to get bigger because you can use that your
slight build, your size, how skinny you are to like
(05:15):
you to see your advantage in the league. So hey,
that's what Ai did, basically use his his his small stature,
his then build and kind of got into nooks and
crannies and crevices of the defense and used angles to
get in the lane and around people to finish that say,
maybe like a bigger guard kind of like what Trey
Young does now use his side to get different places.
And then a bigger guard maybe like Jalen Brunson per
(05:37):
se can't do the same type of thing because he's bigger,
he has to use more the physicality. So Ai was
stepping around guys, had to up and underfinishes with both hands,
and I think I remember in the two K game
he had like the layout package where he would throw
the ball way up off the glass like the underhand
schools that would go high off the glass. So that's
(05:57):
the one thing I remember Ai and his finishing was
just it was something we've really never seen before.
Speaker 2 (06:02):
Yeah, yeah, definitely a skill and often imitated. All right,
this next one, man, they always tease him man because
they say he only got one hand, he only going
one way, Tony Parker, right, and even him only going
one way, you can't stop it. You can't stop it.
So if you want to call it out, he's still
going through you, around you, however you want it. And
his float game is so underrated, Like I don't think
(06:26):
it's talked about enough. Like it's one of the prettiest
things you possibly can see in basketball. It almost looks
like a tear drop.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
He patting that to him was like Kareem skyhook, Like
that was his shot. That's what you think about about
Tony Parker. He was going left, dribbling with his right hand,
finishing with his right scoop floaters off both feet, you
know he was. And the crazy thing about Tony in
his size, he was always you look at the stats
at the end of the year, he was always top
ten of points in the pain Yeah, every year because
(06:54):
he wasn't I mean, he was shot midis or whatever,
but he was trying to get that lane.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Yeah once he once he gets deep enough behind the
dotted line. You know, hey, that is going up and
you're not touching it, you know what I mean, You
might as well get back on defense. And he was
able to get some contact as well when he tried
to do that. So one of the I think a
lot of players in this game should be watching that too,
man adding it to the game, just because I feel
like it's a lost art. It's not as done as much,
(07:19):
you know what I mean. So I know John gets
a lot, he gets to the paint a lot, but
he's also explosive, so he's not trying to have that
soft touch. But Tony Parker and Derrick Rose spent a
lot of time in the paint off those two feet.
Speaker 3 (07:31):
Jumps, and Tony didn't like elevate. He was like more quick.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
He was just definishing his layer package, like quick stuff
and un necessarily I'm jumping up in the air and
then I'm gonna figure it out. It's more that I'm
not even I'm just gonna beat you to the punch,
get the ball up before you can jump.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (07:46):
Now that's a great point. Man beating the guy to
the punch, not even allowing them to get and explode
all that other stuff. Man, just just straight to the point,
get back on defense. Uh, this guy is known as
a dunker. But since he's so acrobatic and and how
this this this game was and crafty and powerful, you
(08:07):
can check off all the boxes. Lebron James, he got
a lot of cold layups. Yeah, I would say he
probably did some more cold layups going into the twenty twenties,
but he definitely had some cold layups where he could
have dunked them easily.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
He think power because of his size, and I mean
he probably have by far the biggest player we're going
to talk about today on his list.
Speaker 3 (08:24):
But yeah, he has some like you said, he had
some some.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
School layup packages where he would take off up and
under some hanging the air double pump laid scoops and
going jumping from one side of the lane and finishing
on the other. Like he wasn't necessarily always getting there
trying to dunk on the on the bigs he was. Yeah,
he had some skill around the round the rim as
well putting off the glass. So got to give Brian
(08:48):
our respect when it comes to the layup packages too.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Yeah, absolutely, shouts the iceman shouts to doctor j man.
You know what I mean, They had to do it
for the next gear to do it, and you know,
obviously guys are trying to do it a little bit
better and a little bit more creative, but you know,
you gotta gotta gotta pay respect to the people before one.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
One more thing.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
One more thing we'll talk about with bron and the
layup packages. Like remember you should see like he get
on the break and it's one on one or two
on one, and guys who try to wrap him up
at the three.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
Point line or above the three point line.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
He would just take him with him all the way
to the rim and lay it in Like yeah, you
know what I'm saying, Like I'm grabbing his arm, but
you gotta literally tackle him and not let his arms
get above his waist or he gonna finish the end
one every time.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
So I mean, you gotta give them credit. He's playing
through the contact.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Yeah, I think that's super underrated that that actually kind
of works in his favor because when we think about
criteria and still being able to make the layup right,
I think that's that's going to be an interesting argument
towards the end because you could have a pretty finish
or you know you have layups, but like are you
(09:55):
making them with contact? Are you you know what I mean?
Do you make them count? Man? And And I think
that's an interesting conversation to go into what we're ranking
our top five good call.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
It was always hilarious because he would get the one
he look over they were paying over to the coach.
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Coach would be like, you can if you're.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Gonna fall him, fallum, and the players on the court
like laughing, I tried too strong.
Speaker 2 (10:15):
Yeah, he taking me to do Yeah, and no, and
nobody's really trying to hurt nobody, you know what I mean.
They gonna they're gonna do that the most obvious NBA
file that they can do, but they're not gonna try
to take him out. D way d w A man
flash flash falls into this. This is the Flash era
for sure. He falls into it, like the conversation with
(10:36):
Alan Iverson where you know he's aerial but he almost
can get clipped out the air because he's taken off
so far and he's damn there falling on his back
and he's like scooping it up or you know what
I mean, one of those crazy finishes where he's not
even looking at the rim and he had a ton
of those.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
He had. The footwork was crazy.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
That's the Converse era.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Yep, yep, yeah, he had the footwork in the Lion.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
The Euros and he was in the Ai realm where
you like every time he went to the lane, he
went down because he got hurt, like he done for
the night. But I always found a way to get up.
You don't know if they're acting and what the foul
or actually got hurt it.
Speaker 3 (11:14):
You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
They just going there and getting delivering some some some blow.
But they know what I'm saying, Just that the acrobatic finishes,
stepping around attacking the bigs, I mean young d Wade,
flash d Wade before the knees caught up to him.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
It was fun to watch.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
Hold your breath, all Star. He's hold your breath, all Star,
you know what I mean with the crowd like it's
gonna be all right, Like you know what I mean,
because because you never know in them and and it's
one of them things where he falls and you hear it.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
On team what was the commercial fall down seven, Get
Up eight, which makes no sense. First of all, I'm
like he ain't gonna get up more times than you fall.
But yeah, that was that was a fire commercial.
Speaker 2 (11:55):
Yeah man, I mean look it was. He became a
part of his brand to a point where boosted sales
for McDavid.
Speaker 3 (12:01):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Everybody start wearing the pads. He was dressed like a
football player. Yeah, after a while they start suiting him up.
I mean you know, they started with the sleeve, the
knee braces. Then he started getting the thigh pads and
the blood pads and start wearing a little the padded
Uh what's the undertank? Like, bro, you're you're prepared for war.
Speaker 3 (12:21):
I did that at a high school a kye. I
wasn't even attacking the rim.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
I was shooting all jump shots, but I had to
put the rid pad And it made no sense looking
back on it, But the way did I need to
do it? I remember Coach k cussed me out one day,
Oh really cussed me out because I got it like
a I fought through a screen and a guy need
me in my thigh and I wasn't wearing I wasn't
wearing the thigh pass, so I missed the practice.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I was hurting. We need to be wearing it. Why
you're not wearing the path.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
From the every day since that dude, I had to
pass on shoot around practice every day.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
I wasn't it wasn't gonna happen again.
Speaker 2 (12:56):
Coach, we don't see them injuries that often, but we
also don't see those those pads being worn anymore. But
when they came to play, I mean, this is kind
of like sidetrack, But how terrible is that injury? I
feel like every game you think you're gonna have a
great game, you get need Like when you're feeling good
(13:16):
and you're like, hey, this is about to be the game.
I'm about to have a game. I just made my
first three. It's it's about to pick up. I got
nine points. And then it's a knee and then you
can't do anything to You can't like he you can't
massage it out. It's just one of those bone to
bone joints where you're just out.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
It's one of the most painful, one of the most people.
And to everybody else it looked like you what you
hear't really do anything? Yeah, Like you can't really tell
what happened, but you're feeling it, and that's all you're thinking.
Speaker 3 (13:47):
About the rest of them.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
So I had to bring that up because those paths
are super important in this in this era. The next
person we're talking about another legend, Kobe Bryant, cold Man
super like you know, however, he like Ron br Like
you know what I'm saying. You get to that that
point where he's in the air and he's changing it up,
but obviously he's he's he's a school of Michael Jordan.
(14:09):
So you know, a lot of a lot of those
finishes he wanted to recreate, man, and he was able
to do it Man. And you know, I think the
most underrated part of Kobe's layup packages his post lay up. Okay,
you know what I mean, where he's spinning out of
the post back to the basket. You know, obviously he's
one of the one of the best post players as
a guard like Michael Jordan, where he gets to a
(14:30):
low block and he don't see that help and he's
spinning off you he getting a thunder and he's scooping,
and I just think that's a lost art in general,
maybe just because a lot of guys just ain't posting
up as much. But dude, he when he got you
on a low block and he was doing that. I
mean that's when the mike and drills do. People still
do mike and drills.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
I do. I still do them regularly. It just helps me.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
Every first thing is when I come in to the gym,
I'm around the basket. I still do mic and to
help on help the touch and get used to the room.
But when it comes to cod like he used his link.
We talked about Ai using his slight buildings. He like
he was so long and his arms along and he
could like he uses like he did the up and
under like you know you're seeing in WNBA women's basketball
where everybody thinks it's a travel where you go up
(15:15):
and under step through. Yeah, that's you jump off your
pivot foot where it's not a travel, but it looked
like it.
Speaker 2 (15:21):
Yep.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
That was his thing.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Like he would he would pivot you to death, use
it footwork and then scoop you. And that's part of
the post work that you was talking about.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
I want to say, I think Kobe Bryant edged Michael
Jordan and footwork right. He mastered it to a point
where Michael got to it. Then he Scott some work
with h Hakeem Olajuwan and once he got to that
he could tie rope.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
I'm talking about, like you think it full work was
better to get I think.
Speaker 2 (15:47):
But but again it's kind of hard to say, like
because he had to learn from Mike. He had to
learn from Mike to get to that point to.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
Master I don't know if I'm brother, I see what
you're saying, but I don't know because Mike was just
so feathery with it.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
Man, I get it, I get.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
I'm not I'm not because it had he had to
do it in order to inspire to get to this.
So I think, like, it doesn't.
Speaker 1 (16:08):
Taking like you're taking to Chris Brown, Michael Jaackson, Like yes,
Like he's in that way.
Speaker 2 (16:14):
Where it's like it's visibly transferable, And a lot of
guys started studying him because as a player, I was
thinking about how can I improve as a player, and
I started watching Kobe. I didn't even like Kobe Bryant
because he imitated Michael Jordan's so much. But the one
thing I did respect was the footwork. Right when you
think about how you mentioned the jumps, the two foot
(16:35):
jump stop, which ain't really done too often anymore. The
reverse pivot the step in and then you know it
turns into a layup or a midi. It's just it's
just one of those things. But also just the you
know coke, yeah, and then have to do that Mike,
Mike just.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
You know what I mean, he ain't playing.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Cole gonna do a little up bake up, bake up,
bake spin reverse pivot, and I just I just really
was just like, dang, I really got to get my
footwork ready, because like I mean, it's almost like ballerina,
like you know what I mean, to a point where
he getting guys like, you know, Mike not playing around Mike,
Mike jab you one time you put a hand of
he still cashing.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
He ain't.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
He ain't really doing too much on it on the wing.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
But cod when you watch Cob, you could tell, like
the mint of amount of time and the hours he
put into his footwork, like in the paint, you could
tell that ain't.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
That's not an accident, man, bro.
Speaker 2 (17:30):
People that worked out with him saying hours he would
do three hour no ball workouts.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, or he would do like I don't even like
I don't like shell drill. So that's that's that's insane
I don't like shell drill, you know what I'm saying, Like,
I don't like shell drill.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
So the idea that hey, we about to go in
here and we about to work on nothing like nothing
but footwork and like hypothetical scenarios without a basketball.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
Or he would do like one move for thirty minutes
until he felt like he mastered it. Like that, he
would do the like to the jab or the spind
pivot move over and over and over until he mastered it.
Speaker 3 (18:11):
He could be doing for forty five minutes.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
That's the type of like meticulous like attention to detail
that translated over the games because you could like literally tell.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Yeah, yeah, no, you could see it. He knew, oh
this is why I missed the shot by an inch,
letting me get right back to that same spot and
fix it. This is right here. I'm about the game, y'all.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
That's a sickness, man. But shout out to code Bear
recipes to the great one. You know this dude right here, man,
he an underrated guy. You know the Mississippi bullet monte Elis.
I still think he wanted the uh, he wanted my
layup goats athletic.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Let's talk about my man in an unorthodox game, six three,
unorthnized game, like you can't really six two yeah, six two,
six three. So he was STEP's teammate this first few
years in the league, and like we said, talk, I'm like,
Mante is so nice.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
But what does he work on in the summer? Like
what kind of workout can you put him through?
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Because nothing he does is like drill work or skill
Like he just he could Like his handle wasn't that nice. Yeah,
his footwork wasn't that crazy, but he was just he
getting that lane in as soon as he could take
off and jump, he would, and then he'll figure it
out in the air, like he'll take off, do a
three sixty, layup up and under just quick floater off
(19:28):
the glass and like like say something you can't teach.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
But he just he was so nice underrated finisher.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
Shit, hey when he played and we believe I just
seen it, just like hey, this is where he going.
And then when he got a little bit more you
know what I mean, freedom to kind of like score
and score and score like that dude, he would literally
glide and lay it up. He wasn't never thinking about dunk.
It always was a layup thing, like oh, how can
(19:56):
I use a glass? And obviously the next the next
generation is reerving, you know what I mean that twenty
eleven coming into the league. But Monte is like one
of them ones were you just like, I don't even
know how he doing this? And I went to a
lot of those warriors we believe practices, you know what
I mean. In the following year, Marcus Williams was on
(20:17):
that roster, and I just wanted to see how Monte.
But Monte end up getting hurt, so I didn't get him.
I didn't get that much of like the invisibility of
like what is he doing? That makes it so different man.
But even in Milwaukee, the Dallas years, he still continued
to have his layup package and that was super important.
Speaker 3 (20:34):
Can't do it when they do it.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Remember when they drafted s Death and he was you
know what I'm saying, he was little guarding there and
they drafted another six two six three guard coming in
and he like houses going back.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
It gonna work. I can't do it. Can't play two
small guards back.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
Then, they can't in a getting buckets one a lot
of stops.
Speaker 3 (20:56):
But yeah, he was scoring that involved man.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Yeah, that's one thing he could do, man, and a
lot a lot of those points. I would definitely love
to stat nerd and see how many of those those
points he had were actual layups. This next person wanted
to callest crossovers super explosive, but had some of them
the most windmill crazy layups athletic. Steve Francis like he
(21:22):
already had that, Like this is the one thing about
the two thousand Guard. They over sold the crossover, Like
they over sold the crossover so much, like they wanted
to make sure that's an n one little effect on
it where they just wanted to hit you with the
move right and you all the way over there. They're
gonna look, then they gonna go do the layup. And
Steve Franks the type of person like he's so strong,
(21:44):
well you don't know if he gonna dunk, so he
might just pull back and then bring it in and
duck then, you know, and just really showing like, oh
I can glide and I can put a little bit
sas on that. And I mean I think the I mean,
I think we can kind of speak on both of
these players. We kind of I know they hate they
have like a rivalry. Him and Baron Davis. They have
(22:05):
like similarly on the same wave.
Speaker 1 (22:07):
I was gonna bring up that I was gonna bring
up in the same conversation and you said it like
both of these like they look different body type, but
they but they played it like similar strength. They're both
super strong, like Steve be Diddy look strong, but Steve
Fancers was strong too, even though he didn't look it
like they were. And you said it like just to
put the cherry on it, like they were getting a
lane and they thinking dunk. Right, most of the time
(22:30):
they get in there thinking dunk, but then you take off.
They can hang so long and so athletic and creative,
like I can't dunk. Well, let me make a highlight
lay up. I might spin off you three sixty reversed layup,
I might cot back, switch hands and finish up and
under like they're really going off taking off on two
feet and I'm gonna figure it out in the air.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Yeah, I mean, those dudes are are so ridiculous. But
also those are the ones that you like, he dunk
that because you just didn't think, like you know, like
you don't know what you're going to get when they
leave the ground. And that's you know, Bed obviously dunking
on Carolinko and Steve franc has got a lot of
a lot of highlights like that.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
So I mean, I think those two are the that's
I think those are the best job on rent. Like
comparisons to me, Yeah, yeah, because that job like that,
he getting into the lane, he well, until he said
he ain't dunking no more. I'm getting I'm thinking he
thinking dunk and then some of his best layups came
off of I want to dunk it first. I know
I can't dunk it. Now, let me let me get
(23:31):
creative and lay it in.
Speaker 2 (23:32):
Yeah, yeah, no, I mean any guy that actually can
change the style of jump, Yeah, you're you're just you're
just ridiculously gifted. You know what I mean. If you
jump up and you could turn what.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Me and ninety nine percent of guards in the in
the league. You gotta have a plan before you jump, right,
You're not even even when you pick the ball up.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
You gotta have a plan, like, all right, this is
what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
They are like apex of that jump figuring out what
they're gonna do, Like.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Being able to spin midjump is crazy. I just I
can't even fathom because they jumped so high so it
still allows them to be effective. They're not they're not
going down. They're going up still and it's like, huh,
how is that happening?
Speaker 3 (24:17):
Yeah? And a lot of it is with contact.
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Yeah, like and that's and and that's where the change
up goes because they're doing this happening and and still
being able to finish it, Like how are they still
going up? So yeah, man, shout up to those two.
I know they hate being compared. They still got a
little friendly rivalry right now. But yeah, man, they they
put on in the two thousands man as some of
(24:40):
the strongest finishers, uh and great layup packages. So had
to shout them out and combine them into Uh. This guy,
you guys watched really closely. He almost I want to
say him and Gorean Drogic changed the trajectory towards the
end of how guards laid the ball up the Steve
Nash right and jumping off the wrong foot. And I
(25:03):
remember we worked out with Goran Projic's trainer. It's just
like nine and he had me jumping off the right,
so I can do you know what I mean, And
I'm like, what same for the same hand, same for
the same hand layups. So you remember time, so you
(25:24):
remember when this came through with everybody that.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
We started working on the minster, we started working with
our trainers, We're watching film and because it was like
it was different and it didn't take a lot.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Of like.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
It don't take a lot of energy either, and you
could work on it as you get warmed up within
your your workout. But it really it's about timing the
shot the shot blocker, not allowing the shot block at
the time when you're gonna jump. Because usually your whole
life you see when you when you're making the right
handed layup, jump off your left leg right. So now
I was like, no, we're gonna do right. If we're
(25:59):
making right and we're gonna go off all right, left,
off left, just to you can use it. You can
find off the defender and time it up, get off
the glass quick so they can't block it. And yeah,
Steve Nash brought it into the league and he would
do it high off the glass. Sometimes he used the glass.
Sometimes he would It was like an underhand scoop floats
school that you see a lot of guards do now
added that to my package.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
He's literally hitting backhand on backboard like, yeah, you know here,
here's one of the quick ones, right. But it definitely
threw me off man when I first got introduced to it.
But I thought it was a neat trick, man, because
it brought me time, especially when I was trying to
adjust to like getting ready for the pro level and
seeing more bigger defenders, you know, run into the six
(26:39):
tens and above, and I'm like, oh, yeah, this athletic
stuff not gonna work for me, So I need to
figure it out. Let's let's let's peel back the onion
for the for the for the listeners about putting a
shot blocker in the rim right and not allowing them
to block in this skill right, because a lot of
people are like, yo, how these guys get it and
(27:00):
you're taking away because when they jump, they go right
into the net, you know what I.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
Mean, Yeah, you can step them under that under the basket.
So one of the guys I wanted to bring up,
I don't know if he was on your list, but man,
he's on the list one of the best at this,
and he's in my top five. I'm letting you know,
now he's finishing because he brought the euro over whatever.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
But you talk about stepping.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
In or using a rim as a as an officer
player to fend off the defender. He would do the
step into your body with his say, on the left
side of the basket with his right and then do
the outside hooked lay up, you know what I'm saying.
So that like sometimes the centers can't even jump or
they'll be touching the net grabbing in their fingers would
be in the net. Like that's that's part of that
(27:41):
footwork and skill work.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
We like.
Speaker 1 (27:43):
It's kind of like a hook lay up. You're finishing
why while you're stepping in the other way. That's crafty,
crafty finishing. That's I feel like him and Steve Nash
kind of had his game too, where you was stuff
he's like never seen before, and the stuff you didn't
have you'd have to be athletic to do.
Speaker 2 (28:01):
Yeah, I see, And that's another thing. If you never
hoved or you ain't never like got to that point
where it was enough shot blockers on the floor, that's
an interesting viewpoint of it, you know what I mean.
You're no longer saying how if you've been in that
situation and you're understanding how like like the certain tricks,
you know what I mean. I'm not sure if you
(28:21):
ever got to play at the Hacks. I think you
probably still was at Duke at the time. But it
was Eric Maynor. It was guarding Eric Maynor up there
during the summer workouts, and I'm guarding him close and
I'm on him, I'm fighting through screens. I'm doing this
whole thing. This is when the whole This is when
(28:43):
the Thunder, the young Thunder, Scottie Brooks Thunder team were
always spending time together, like they implemented the Spurs thing
where they would all hang out. Coyle, Yeah, the college
boy Katie Serge, James Russ.
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Right.
Speaker 2 (28:58):
So they're playing in the ACKs in LA and during
this time I'm guarding Eric Mayner and he took this
whole idea where I'm reaching, he grabs my wrists, brings
it close to his hip and he's hiding basically that
he's holding my wrists and creating separation. And this is
when I was like, Yo, the NBA is different because
(29:19):
in any other play, Iff, I'm playing against somebody than
not creating this space. He knew how to create the space,
and it just woke me up and I was just
like how I view the game now, I understand how
a guy is getting loose enough to get you know,
there's just so many different tricks, man.
Speaker 1 (29:38):
Yeah, he probably learned that from somebody in the league.
So it's like, yeah, and that's the tricks you gotta
have when your guarden. And sometimes it's the athletical b
you gotta at disadvantage physically, maybe you gotta have all
those tricks.
Speaker 3 (29:50):
And I learned tons of it myself.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Like the more physical sometimes the more physically you are
with me, I'm gonna use it to your advantage because
I'm like I said, chicken, when you hold you just
to slip around you. And that's I mean, we talk
about all these guys on this list, they all had
different tricks to finish.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
Over people who are bigger, stronger. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (30:12):
It was just subtle, Like you said, subtle stuff you
see if you're a hooper that like the average basketball
fan might not catch.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
So like so like we see, like you see a
player like like Shay or Trey or Jaylen Brussell who's
always getting to the line are always beating the man
in situations where you don't think and that defends like
he's grabbed me's hold of me. That's the type of
stuff that's going on that the ref might not see,
the fan might not see, but only the defender knows.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Oh yeah, if you're not sitting course, if you're not
sitting courtside or a decent viewpoint to see it actually happening, right,
because there's a lot of a lot of hand holding,
a lot of like pesky files, a lot of scratching.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
You know.
Speaker 2 (30:57):
You know, you've probably gotten a shower and it burned
because somebody has scratched you up, because you know what
I mean. But nobody else can see that because it's
a lot of a lot of cat fighting on the court,
you know what I mean when you getting to it,
especially a guy picking you up full god trying to
be you know, contact wise, he might have bumped you,
he looking you, looking at the ref to make sure
that he's seen that. Next time you might go and
(31:19):
hit him. You might try to do a little thing, man,
But you know, it's definitely a physical game. That's very underrated.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
Man.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
If you if you ain't catching it and That's why
certain plays, and you mentioned the shades and the Jalen
Brunton's are very effective, you know what I mean, where
you feel like I can't touch this guy, I can't
guard this guy.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Why is it this?
Speaker 2 (31:38):
And you look at the bench and the coaches like
you'll figure it out, Like I ain't trying to hear it.
You know you're gonna have to work through that. And
and they have those advantages where they know the rules
because once you know the rules too. Chris Paul's very
good at this, just studying the book of like, hey,
I'm gonna take this jumper right now because he's right
and he didn't move quick enough for me to land.
Speaker 3 (31:59):
Speaking of christ is he in this conversation?
Speaker 2 (32:02):
Chris paus now in this he has now entered the chat.
I don't know how I missed that, but you're right,
Chris Pauls should be in there.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yeah, I mean, the laf package ain't crazy, but he
he and that Tony Parker realm of floaters.
Speaker 3 (32:12):
Yeah, when he was younger.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
I feel like most guards that were in the top
guards have to have to be in this conversation. Man,
they had a lot of layouts. They're not it's not
too many explosive outside of Bead and Steve Francis Man
that were just booming, booming. Everybody else was kind of
float game.
Speaker 1 (32:29):
I remember the game like he was in New Words.
They played La in the playoffs. He had about forty
off straight floaters. Yeah, like eight floaters in that game.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
I would probably parallel from Tony Parker obviously, you know,
he was on the winning side and Chris Paul kind
of was, you know, didn't have the best teams set
up for him to be successful. But uh, you know,
he definitely was kind of in a parallel of that,
you know what I mean, Like Tony had the float game,
but then Chris Paul had other ways to be effective.
(33:02):
You know, both had midi's and uh you know, and
I think that's the traditional two thousand guard.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
Okay, yeah, I mean the same realm with how they
did it. But Tony Parker was trying to score that ball.
Chris Paul for the majority he was trying to get
assist justeahd teammates up.
Speaker 3 (33:17):
Tony Parker was a score getting land figuring.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
That's the same thing I left Rondo off. I left
Rondo of this because a lot of again this is
the passing of the traditional pass first point guard, right. Yeah,
they would get twenty points, but they were more focused
on assistant turnover ratio, you get what I'm saying. So
that's what the Chris Paul's, the Rondo's.
Speaker 1 (33:39):
I mean, there's a lot of points, a lot of
guards in the are that could finish. It's just yep,
it's the Oprache line. You got to the top of
the top to get in here.
Speaker 3 (33:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
Absolutely, we're going to close this one off with Jamal Crawford.
Jamal Crawford, big guard. Obviously, again, same thing we mentioned
with Steve Francis and Baron Davis's gonna hit you with
the move first and then figure it out from there.
Too much, not too many dunks, you know what I mean,
very unselfish when it came to if somebody could put
(34:06):
on a better dunk than him, he was going to
give it up. But he loved to score, so he
was gonna score any way he possibly could, and he
finished at the rim even though he was six or five.
He would try to, you know, lay instead of dunk,
you know what I mean. But obviously his favorite players
was Magic and you know Isaiah Thomas so you know,
he emulated that way. He didn't spend too much time
(34:28):
on the rim.
Speaker 3 (34:29):
Yeah, I'm thinking j crossover.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
I think about obviously the handle and the stuff like
before he went to finish the finish light at the rim.
Like he was crafty with at highlights to get to
a position where he could just make a simple layup.
To me, most of the time like behind the back
pick up into the layup package and stuff like that,
he was he did it in a different way to me.
Speaker 2 (34:51):
Yeah, I was gonna say he might be known as
like literally for a combo package, right, And that's the
same thing you say a you say the d way
to the world the Steve Francis and the BDS is
that it's more of the setup. I hit you with
the move and then it's the like continuation to the layup.
(35:13):
The layup don't have to be great because the move
is so good, so you know what I mean, it
just kind of goes a continuation for that. So those
would be probably the combo package guys of the two
thousands that get looped in. So I understand why Jamal
Craft for gotten there, but he's definitely a part of
that criteria. The combo package. We're gonna take a quick break,
(35:34):
but when we come back, we're gonna give our goat
top body. All right, dot man, we went through some
(35:59):
great players. I'm definitely curious to see who makes your
top five.
Speaker 3 (36:04):
Every week.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
You surprise me, but you make some valid points. Man,
on your on your on your debates, man, and I
really want to see who's number five for this man
because this was kind of tough.
Speaker 1 (36:16):
So when I go through my top five, you're gonna
see kind of like a little trend where I ain't
showing as much love to the athletic guys. If you
feel like I mean in my round, when you you
got to use pure skill, craftiness, quickness and stuff to finish.
So that's what you go see in my top five.
At number five, I got Manta Ellis, which even though
(36:36):
I said not athletic, he was just different with it.
You can't like, you can't teach the way he played,
So I mean, I just love like watching him getting
that lane and finished. Number before I Steve Nash, who
I learned a lot from Tony Parker. Number two I
got Ai and number one I got Man New because
Man New got it just craftiness. He brought the euro
(36:59):
over I feel like, and then he had, like I said,
the step INDs, the floaters, the up and unders, like
you never know what you're gonna see from him when
he got to lane to finish. So, man, it was
my favorite layout package, maybe ever in the league, but definitely.
And he number one of my top five for this
era of layup packages.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
Mmm, I like that man for me, number five, Steve Nash,
number four, Tony Parker, number three, I'm gonna go with
d Wade. I'm gonna go with d Wade, and then
number two, I'm gonna go with man new Genobili and
(37:43):
at number one, Monte.
Speaker 3 (37:44):
Ellis Monte number one.
Speaker 2 (37:47):
Monte's Monte's my goat man for layup packages in the
two thousands.
Speaker 3 (37:51):
That's a shocker.
Speaker 2 (37:52):
Yeah, man, So you know, shouts to Genobili and then
other guys are named man, but I still, you know,
I gotta go with mante l a do it all,
you know, yeah, it all, you do it all? You know,
So I had I had to roll with that. But
a couple of innovators, you know what I mean. No
to Tony Parker and the floater, No to Steve Nash,
(38:13):
and off foot, same foot lay and then you know
D Way with acrobatic you know, physical fall layups.
Speaker 3 (38:22):
You know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (38:24):
You know that that way, that's that was the help.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
I couldn't go D Way, I couldn't go Brian be Diddy,
Steve friends, and I just yeah, they dunkers, They dunkers
to me and some crazy layup highlights.
Speaker 3 (38:37):
But that's just not how I get down with it.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
I gotta go to I gotta go to guys that
I can relate to and stuff I can actually work
on and practice for my personal tough five.
Speaker 2 (38:45):
But yeah, no, I respect it.
Speaker 3 (38:46):
That's what I said.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
I looked at it the only way. When you look
at that, I kind of feel like that's how I
picked it too. At different points in my life. I
was athletic at one point, I say, d w A.
But and as things changed, it became a point guard,
the floater, the same foot and then you know what
I'm saying, putting people in the rim. So it was
the evolution of of the of the of the lay
(39:10):
up and how important.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
You know, you know what it was also fared about
the two thousands when you got b Diddy, Steve Francis.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (39:18):
AI, I got a couple of these, Montet got a
couple of these, like the lib lay up, so like
they'll have a lib you seeing some of the highlights
back in the day were like the live and they
can and they can't dunk it Mark Marberry.
Speaker 2 (39:33):
But see Marbury's in that Steve Francis, Baron Davis Combos.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
In that same roum. He's in that trying to dunk finished.
Speaker 2 (39:42):
Marbury would definitely get libbed too. He either goes lay
it up, it'd be a yeah, I don't we don't
see that no more. I don't know if it's kind
of a it's maybe difficult to do because you're you're
likely to miss it.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Lay live plays for the point guards back then, for
some reason they get the lib. I can't dug it,
so I'm just gonna three sixty layup or finish it
under and try to make it look all that. For
whatever reason, you saw that way more in the two thousands,
like it seemed like.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
It was just it was a why not I don't know.
I mean the guard to guard and we talked collegiate,
you know, Ben Gordon would probably been in that mix,
you know what I mean like I know for sure.
Speaker 3 (40:20):
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (40:20):
Darrell Right was my AU teammate. He would throw me
lobs and au.
Speaker 3 (40:24):
You know what I mean. I mean, bring that back, man.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
I want to see some draw some live plays off
of brusting and stuff and traces of jobs for nine Dunkers. Man, Yeah,
I mean Joe, he's gonna get his libs on transition.
Anybody under sixty four, anybody under six four. I want
to see a live.
Speaker 3 (40:44):
Play bringing back man.
Speaker 2 (40:45):
Put in the breaking back, please please, I think we
would love to dunk the small Dunkers again. Man, all right,
we're gonna take another break, and when we come back,
we're gonna do our favorite segment Born in the Wrong Era.
This one should be interesting because I'm really a lot
of these guys are so close to the current gam
that we might have to find somebody in the archives,
(41:07):
but I can't.
Speaker 3 (41:07):
It's always tough. It's always tough. But I got with.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
All right, dot favorite segment born in the Wrong Era?
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Who you got more in the wrong Era.
Speaker 1 (41:30):
It's like I said, it's tough because it's close to
the era where now, so you got to get creative
with it. But I'm going Steve Nash because you see
him in his style of play in so many players
in today's era. You could tell people watching them, you
can tell people worked on it, like we were talking
about earlier, to the underhand, same foot, same hand, finishing
(41:51):
that type of thing. So you see him in so
many different players that obviously he can come in today
and today's the way that his style of player to
kind of hear him and Dantony Brow to the league
with the pace he could get in there finish all
type of different ways. So why not come and bring
Steve Nash back into the era and let him do
his thing and and in the ara that he has
(42:12):
a stamp all.
Speaker 2 (42:13):
Over, I'm gonna be biased. I'm gonna take this la
and go Baron Davis. That's no brain er answer. I mean,
athletic can score, it can get people involved, can defend
at times very strong, plagued with injuries, but saying we
wrote wrote the story differently and allowed him to be
(42:33):
healthy and just you know with today's medical he's one
of the top ten guards in this in this era
and had and had the swag.
Speaker 3 (42:42):
Yeah, he had it all. He was He'll be a
star today.
Speaker 2 (42:45):
Star for real. The stuff he was doing in this era,
him and Steve Nash had a YouTube show, you know
what I mean, like they was. They was leaning into
their personalities a lot, man, And I think that helped.
Speaker 3 (42:54):
He didn't really have it. He didn't have no weakness.
He didn't really have no weakness. Man.
Speaker 1 (42:58):
He could shoot the ball, like I said, athletics all
get out. He could post you play the pick and roll.
I mean he enerted god.
Speaker 3 (43:08):
That was the nickname.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
Boom Dizzel Boom dizzel Man like this point man one
of one of the guys man for.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
Real shut out O.
Speaker 2 (43:17):
All right, man, well tell him where to find you
die this this is a rap.
Speaker 3 (43:23):
All right, we did it again. Find me at s
Doc Curry on our socials, Get at me.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
Tell me some of your favorite layer packages of the
two thousands something some guards you might have forgot, even
fours the bigs.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
If we miss some layer packages out there, let us
know that's real. You can find me at Travon on X.
You can find me an Actrey on Instagram. Make sure
you tell a friend and tell a friend to like
comment reshare all those things got?
Speaker 3 (43:51):
Yep? It's another good one. It's a deep cut.
Speaker 2 (43:53):
Go This has been a Unanimous Media original. Goat was
produced by iHeart Podcasts and Unanimous Media. It was hosted
by me Travon Edwards and Steth Kurk. Executive produced by
Stephen Curry and Eric Paton. Co executive producer Klenna Maria Cutty.
(44:17):
The executive producers at iHeart Podcasts are Sean Titon and
Jason English. This series was produced by Derek Jennings and
Peter Kucher, co producer Kurt Redny. Original music by Jesse Woodard.
Special thanks to Stephen Curry and Will Pearson. Go is
a production of Unanimous Media and iHeart Podcasts. For more
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
(44:41):
wherever you get your podcasts.
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