December 5, 2025 • 46 mins
Jason reacts to the Los Angeles Lakers getting a buzzer-beater win over the Toronto Raptors. He discusses LeBron James's double digit scoring streak coming to an end, him making the right pass to Rui Hachimura for the game winner, and Austin Reaves continuing to play incredible basketball. Then he breaks down Tyrese Maxey and the Philadelphia 76ers getting a wild win over the Golden State Warriors who were missing Steph Curry, Jimmy Butler, and Draymond Green. He breaks down why the Dubs need more from Brandin Podziemski and Jonathan Kuminga. Finally, he answers mailbag questions including more possible trade destination for the Milwaukee Bucks and Giannis Antetokounmpo.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
The Volume.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
All right, Well, good to him tonight, you're at the volume.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Happy Friday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having
an incredible week. Got a jam pack show for you
guys today. I want to hit on the two crazy
games from last night before we get into our mail bag.
As Lebron James Is one thousand, two ninety seven game
streak of double figure scoring finally comes to end in
a poetic fashion as he makes an extra pass out
(00:39):
of an Austin Reeves double team that leads to a
wide open corner three for Ruey Hachimura to get a
big win for the Lakers without Luka Dancic on the
road in against a very good Toronto Raptors team. After that,
we're going to talk briefly about the Philadelphia seventy six
ers getting a win after blowing an eighteen point fourth
quarter lead versus the Golden State Warriors, an interest seeing
(01:00):
kind of like bench group for the war years that
came together. I also want to talk briefly about the
lack of development for some of Golden State's young players
and how that's been a big part of their struggles
throughout the season. And then as usual, on Fridays, we're
going to get into our mail bag at the tail
end of the show. You guys know the joke before
we get started. Subscribe to the Hoops to Not YouTube
channel so you don't miss any more of our videos.
(01:20):
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And then don't forget about our mail bags. If you
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(01:41):
just drop them in our full episodes on YouTube in
the comments right mail bag with a colon, write your question.
That's how I can sort through them when I'm looking
through the comments. We'll get to them on Fridays throughout
the remainder of the season. A couple other quick announcements.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Like this video.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
It's super helpful for us if you just would take
a second to scroll down and hit that like button
and then we have our second playback stream of the week. Tonight,
we have the Lakers on the road in Boston against
the Celtics. Should be a fun one. I've also got
my buddy Adam Taylor, who covers the Celtics individually as
a team, so he'll be joining us to hang out
(02:14):
for that Celtics game tonight. Should be a fun one.
All right, let's talk some basketball. So again, what looked
like it was going to be a slow night in
the NBA turned into a fun one thanks to a
couple of wild finishes in Philly and Toronto. And we're
gonna hit those two games before we get into our
mail bag. So Lebron's twelve hundred ninety seven consecutive double
digit scoring streak finally comes to the end. And according
(02:36):
to what both Lebron and Rui said in their postgame interviews,
essentially what happened was is Lebron knew the double team
was coming.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
I want to put him in a payoff spot. You know,
ar been cooking all night and you know, ost are
seeing our coach kind of you know, telling you know,
Scottie Barnes a possibly double So I wanted to keep
Rural on the same side to be my payoff, my
payoff spot.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
He knew that Austin, after cooking the Raptor for forty
four points last night, was going to get double teamed,
and so he directed Rui to go to what he
called the payoff spot, meaning the weak side corner, and
basically told him he was going to pass him the
ball and then light clockwork, the double team came from
Scottie Barnes against Austin. Lebron cut into the passing lane
(03:18):
and rifled a cross court pass right into the shooting
pocket for Ruey Hachimura, who wins the game with that
corner three. And it was kind of cool listening to
Lebron and Ruey talk about it after the game, and
specifically Lebron talking about that concept of the payoff spot,
because it's something we've actually talked about quite a bit
on this show, specifically a couple.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Of weeks ago.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
You guys might remember we had a conversation about this
surrounding Desmond Baine in the Magic offense. In some of
the sequence where Desmond Bain is off ball, the Magic
started putting him in the weak side corner instead of
on the opposite wing, essentially allowing him to be in
that payoff spot. The reason is is because many basketball
plays have repeatable sequences. Whenever a team doubles on the
(03:58):
strong side, almost always going to leave that weak side
corner guy open. Why because the strong side corner is
too easy of a pass to make. If you leave
the guy in the dunker spot open, he's gonna dunk it.
That's going to go in. Every single time the opposite
wing one pass away, it's an easy pass to make,
So you're going to rotate to that guy kind of
like a Manuel Quickly did on that final possession to Lebron,
(04:20):
and the guy on the opposite end of the court
is going to be the most difficult guy to pass to,
and the ball is going to take the longest amount
of time to get there, which is going to allow
your defense a chance to rotate. That's why that's the
payoff spot. That's the spot that a defense is most
willing to leave open, and that if an offense can
get it there soon enough, there's an open look to
(04:40):
be had. And that's what Lebron identified with that final sequence.
And again, Lebron saw that whole sequence before it happened,
informed his teammate about it, told him where to be
in to be ready, made the read so fast, and
made the pass on a line drive right into his
shooting pocket so the Raptors had no chance to rotate
in rooms. He burns them to win the game. Really,
(05:02):
just a classic career defining type of play from Lebron James.
One of my biggest pet peeves over the years with
the way Lebron has been covered is just the way
that he's portrayed by his detractors to be this guy
who cares more about things that have nothing to do
with winning, like himself or the showmanship or whatever it
(05:22):
might be off court behavior. People try to portray him
as a guy that doesn't care about winning. And here's
the thing. Does Lebron enjoy being famous? Clearly that doesn't
take a whole lot to come to that conclusion. Does
Lebron play to the camera and really lean into being
a showman? Of course he does. Does he care about
(05:43):
his individual records and personal resume more than most people. Yeah,
because he's the one player in NBA history to actually
get compared to Michael Jordan, and he's competitive and he
wants to win that race, and he knows that everything,
including the wins, including the individual records in his personal resume,
will help him achieve.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
That goal of his that he has.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
And the funniest thing about the people who focus on
those things is they refuse to acknowledge the how behind
those behaviors.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
You want to know.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Why Lebron has become so famous that he can play
to the camera whenever he wants. You want to know
why Lebron is the only NBA player to get compared
to Michael Jordan because he's one of the greatest winners
in the history of sports. Winning has always been the
main thing for Lebron, and it's been clearly demonstrated throughout
(06:33):
his career. This guy has won his conference ten times.
He's made it to the conference finals two additional times.
He's won more playoff series than any NBA franchise since
he came into the league in the summer of two
thousand and three. He's literally hoisted the Larry O'Brien Trophy
four different times, a feat only matched by the Golden
(06:54):
State Warriors since he came into the league, who achieved
two of those by putting together the most talent roster
in the history of the NBA by a wide margin.
He's the greatest winner of his era, and last night
was just the latest in a long line of examples
of it. I talk all the time about for young
players about how when you're having a bad game, you
(07:16):
just need to try to find a way to make
a play. Lebron wasn't ready for what they asked him
to do last night. We talked about it in the
Laker Collective pod with Trevor and yovonn yesterday in the morning.
I talked about it right on the playback stream before
the tip went up last night. Lebron last season was
healthy for all of training camp and still looked bad
(07:37):
for the first month. Why because he's forty years old
and it takes a long time for him to ramp
his body up for NBA basketball This season because of
the sciatica. He wasn't working out in July or he
got injured in July, but he wasn't working out at
the end of July or all of August or all
of September. He was starting his ramp up substantially later
(07:58):
in the process. This dude's been playing five on five
basketball against pros for a couple of weeks, and it
was fine when Luca was there because the team is
so damn good without him that they can rack up
regular season wins and let him slowly ramp up. It's
why I haven't been worried at all about how he's
looked over the last couple of weeks. Take your time, Lebron.
(08:19):
They're going to keep racking up wins even as you're
building your rhythm. But unfortunately, in congratulations to Luca welcoming
another child into the world, but because Luca's over in
Slovenia with his family, Lebron was basically forced through that
next man up mentality to be ready for something that
he wasn't ready for. He wasn't ready to be a
(08:41):
guy that had to be like one of the two
primary shot creators for the Lakers last night. He's probably
like a month away from that, at least a couple
of weeks. I expected him to be pretty mediocre last night,
and Scotty Barnes made things even harder for him. He
basically refused to switch off of him all game as
one of the big game plan things that was causing
(09:01):
problems for Lebron. So like in Guard Guard screens. They
were hedging and recovering. Even when Lebron was setting screens,
Scotty wasn't helping. He was doing everything he could to
stay attached to Lebron, and that was a big part
of why Lebron was four for seventeen. From the field,
Scotty Barnes athletically overwhelmed him one on one. So like,
just as a little side point, Scotty Barnes deserves a
(09:24):
ton of credit for being the first guy physically capable
of holding Lebron below a double digit scoring output. Took
seventeen shots, And it's not like Lebron wanted to shoot
seventeen shots last night. Like like I've seen people be like, oh,
he was four for seventeen last night.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
He was bad. You're a damn loser.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
You think Lebron wanted to take seventeen shots last night.
He had no choice under the circumstances but to try
to manufacture offense. The Lakers were playing Nick Smith Junior
in an attempt to try to find ball handling with
Luka Dancic out of the lineup. He wasn't close to
being ready for the role that he had last night,
but he had no choice but to try. And here's
(10:05):
the thing. He couldn't make a shot to save his
life at the rim or from the perimeter. But he
just found ways to contribute throughout the game. He had
eleven assists and zero turnovers, generating offense by like burning
the Raptors for helping off of the corners multiple times.
He drew a couple of double teams off of Jake
Laavia where he hit him in the corner for threes.
He caught a Manuel quickly once sitting at the block
(10:27):
about fifteen feet off of Dalton Connect in the right
in the left corner, rifle to pass right in the
Dalton Connects shooting pocket. He knocked down a three. Made
a bunch of advantage reads in four on three sequences,
one where Austin drew a blitz. Jackson got the ball
in the short roll, had made their pass to Lebron,
they rotated to Lebron, he just rifled it right back
to Jackson down the lane for a dunk. He drove
(10:48):
a close out off the left wing in the second
half and lobbed the ball to Deandrayton for a dunk.
The game winner to Rueye in the corner. Those are
all advantage sequences where he made that extra read that
ended up finished the play. He ran that two man
game with Austin to generate a bucket. He got one
right in the start of the third quarter, that classic
little inverted ball screen where Austin screens for Lebron and
(11:09):
then slips to the front of the rim and Lebron
just hits him with the bounce pass for a layup.
Eleven assists in zero turnovers. Just found a way to
generate offense as much as possible. And again, when you're
having a rough night as a basketball player, you just
have to try to find a way to make a
play or a couple of plays to help your team
(11:32):
win the game, and then no one's gonna care about
everything else. That happened obviously as the game winning assists,
but he had a big defensive rebound in crunch time,
boxing out Scottie Barnes underneath the basket. He had several
big defensive rotations late in the game that helped the
Lakers get stops. And by the way, the Lakers logged
a seventy eight defensive rating and clutch time yesterday, continuing
(11:53):
their trend to being the best clutch defense in the NBA,
as they improved a seven to zero in clutch games
the season. The Lakers have been able to get stop
up at the end of games when they need to anyway, Like,
as far as Lebron goes, I'm just going to enjoy
these final moments of his career while we can. I
think he's been an excellent example for young basketball players
when it comes to how to approach the game, impacting
(12:15):
winning through your effort, through your IQ, focusing on every
single facet of the game. He's just the greatest winner
of this era of NBA basketball, and no detractor will
ever be able to take that away from him, no
matter what they say. A couple other quick Lakers things
before we get to our mailbag. Austin Reeves forty four
(12:35):
and ten again last night, averaging twenty nine six and
seven on sixty nine percent true shooting this season. I
was talking about this last night on playback. To be clear,
the Lakers aren't getting Yannest, certainly not this season. If
they did, it would be because he somehow made it
to the offseason and the Lakers got access to another
draft pick. But I still think that's extremely unlikely. One
(12:56):
of these other teams is going to have so much
more to offer in terms of draft compensation as well
as a good young player, and they'll end up getting Yanis.
And again, if they even try to do it during
this season, it's just impossible. With the salaries, would be
extremely difficult for them to pull off. But just as
a thought exercise, I think he'd be the best player
included in any potential package for Giannis. Like if the
(13:19):
season ended today, Austin would make the All NBA team,
maybe even second team. He'd be a better center piece
than any of the other packages I've seen thrown around.
He's a better player than Jalen Johnson right now. He's
a better player than Pala Bancaro right now. He's a
better player than Steph Castle or Dylan Harper. He's easily
(13:40):
the best player in the league that's been thrown around
as a featured piece in one of these Giannis trade packages.
And I only say that as a thought exercise. Again,
I don't think Austin's going to be a Buck and
Giannis is going to be a Laker. I'm simply saying
this is how great of a player Austin Reeves has
become in this league. It's like dependable.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Now.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
It's like, oh Austin, we need him to get forty
and ten tonight, and he's just gonna get forty and ten,
a career high twenty two points in a single quarter
last night. Was bombing logo threes, frustrating the hell out
of Toronto's perimeter defenders with his pump fakes and drawing fouls.
Just literally just turning over his right shoulder on Colin
(14:20):
Murray Boyles and just showing the ball, leaves his feet,
draws the foul. Same thing against Jamal shd on the
left baseline, little step back, show the ball, Jamal lunges in.
They can't help themselves and they're committing fouls. He was
getting to the rim at will. He had this crazy play,
one of my favorite highlights of Austin's young career. In
crunch time, Lakers are down by two and it looks
like they're gonna call a time out. All the Lakers
(14:42):
players drift into the backcourt, just kind of waiting for
Austin to dribble across half court and call a time out.
Austin says, screw it, just drives to the basket and
scores a layup. Over a triple team to tie the game.
He's just an absolute hooper man, and it's been such
a joy covering the league to be able to watch
his ascent on the Lakers has been a lot of fun.
(15:04):
Lots of other shoutouts for Lakers role players in a
big roa to win. DeAndre Ayton was phenomenal in this game.
He was burning the Raptors in there at the level
coverage with lobs. So when Austin would come off of
a screen attacking Mamu in particular, Mamu was coming up
to the level. When Mamu would come up, Ayton would
roll behind him and Austin, who's been a terrible lob
thrower this year, actually was pretty good with his lobs
(15:24):
last night completed three of them to DeAndre Ayton over
the top. I thought Ayton's transition defense was amazing. He
was a part of several big transition stops that the
Lakers got in the second half just by sprinting back
and being big around the rim. He had the biggest
stop of the game, a switch on to Brandon Ingram
and crunch time on the second the second last possession,
so the final defensive possession guarding brandon ingram Won on
(15:46):
one runs with him along the lane line to the basket,
gets a great contest forces him into a miss. He
anchored the defense in the half court all night. Ayton
just continues to be amazing. Jacob Ravia kind had of
a bit of a rough first shift, but I thought
he was amazing in the second half. He was scrapping
on the defensive glass all night, either getting the ball
or like tapping the ball out to other Lakers who
(16:08):
could get the ball. He hit a couple of huge
corner threes off of double teams. At Lebron, he made
one of the biggest transition plays of the night. It
was actually a goaltend. It's this weird sequence where Mamu
was like probably going to miss a dunkey, like went
up to dunk it and like threw the ball into
the rim, and then Jake Lavia came flying in and
blocked it off of the rim.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
And here's the thing.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
It was probably a goaltend, but you know, it's bang bang.
Play had been lightning fast, and it was such a
weird play because Mamu was gonna miss anyway, and it
was just a big hustle play. That he made that
converted what would have been two points for the Rafts
into a stop. Ruly big game, makes the corner three
that wins it. Nick Smith again sliding into a bigger
role when the Lakers need ball handling. He also had
(16:48):
one of those big transition sequences last night. Austin had
a turnover that led to a runout. Nick Smith sprinted back,
stole the ball underneath the basket, and then went down
the other end. It hit a little mid range, a
jump shot, a four point swing. Massive, massive play there
in the second half. Just a really fun Lakers win.
I was fun listening to JJ Reddick talk about it
after the game. He was just talking about how it
(17:09):
was a very connected team and that he really enjoyed
competing with the guys. Really good vibes for a Lakers
team that's only a half game back for the second
best record in the entire NBA right now. With Luca
missing five games, with Lebron missing fifteen games, with Austin
missing a few games with a groin injury, it's just
been a special season for them so far, and another
(17:32):
challenge tonight in Boston, and might be without Lebron as well.
In addition, to Luca and that one is Lebron hasn't
hasn't been playing in back to backs to start the season.
We will be covering that game on Playback tonight at
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about gambling called one eight hundred Gambler. Another wild finish
in Philly. The Warriors went into Philly without Steph and Jimmy,
and then Draymond got his footst stomped on again, so
we ended up leaving the game in a walking boot.
(20:03):
So some more trouble there, although the reporting is that
Draymond is expected to continue to try to play through
that injury.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
Warriors couldn't score to save their lives.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Brandon Pajemski and Jonathan Minga both had really rough games.
I want to talk to them a little bit more
in a minute, because the negativity surrounding them is really
starting to reach a fever pitch right now. Tyres Maxie's
lighting him on fire on the other end, and the
Warriors end up going down by twenty two in the
first quarter. They end up stiff arming them around there
most of the rest of the game, but then the
Warriors mount and epic eighteen point fourth quarter comeback, led
(20:34):
by one of those classic little three guard lineups that
you know, Golden State fans complained about all the time.
We had Buddy Heal, d Anthony Melton, and Pat Spencer.
Will Richard got in there a little bit too, so
three of those four guards at any given time, Gie
Santo's playing the four, and then a mix of Al
Horford and Quinton Posts was the group that ended up
leading the comeback. Buddy Heals like constantly just running by
(20:56):
Tyrese Maxie and getting every single offensive rebound. Tyres Maxie's
got to be more intentive on the defensive glass. That's
something that's been standing out to me in film. He's
got to figure that out. It's just a little detail
that's undercutting some of his success. On the other end,
d Anthony Melton was flying around on defense, breaking plays up,
hitting jump shots. Pat Spencer continues to provide like that,
like little bit of audacious scoring in these situations, hit
(21:19):
and pull up threes, drawn fouls in the mid range
GUIs Santos hit a couple of spot up threes. He
had a spin move on the baseline that got the
Warriors bench all stoked, where he kind of got caught
the ball in the short corner and the possession kind
of died. No one was open, and he just ripped
to the right and pounded into his spin move, toasted
his man off the drible got into a little reverse layup,
a nice move from GUIs Santo's. Horford had a big
(21:42):
block and dropped coverage. He also had an assist out
of a post up double team, and Quinton Post hit
a couple of threes, all while the team was playing great,
great defense.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
On the other end.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
They've mixed in some one to three one zone during
that defensive run as well as some man demand. The
Sixers were kind of playing into it a little bit
by letting their foot off the gas and just passing
the ball around the perimeter and taking some bad pull
up jump shots. But the Warriors just battled, and all
of a sudden, Pat Spencer hits a three off the
left wing and they're up by four, and it's like,
oh man, like the Warriors are about to have a
(22:13):
massive win here. But the Sixers finally woke up and
they made four big plays late in the game that
ended up stealing the victory back in their direction. Quinn
Grimes had a big driving and one out of the
left corner where he just kind of went through Pat
Spencer's chest and got an and one. Tyres Maxi, after
settling a few times for some bad jump shots, finally
(22:34):
got downhill, pounded into a spin move over his right
shoulder and put it up off the glass with his
left hand. A really really nice basket attack from Tyras Maxey.
And then the final sequence, so the Sixers have the
ball down by one and VJ. Edgecombe identifies Tyras Maxey's
taken like a tough step back jump shot like eighteen
nineteen feet off of the left elbow, off of the
(22:54):
right elbow extended, and he airballs it. But VJ just
kind of like identify that the airball is coming and
just cuts into the open gap times it perfectly jumps,
grabs the air ball and feeds it back into the
basket to put the Sixers up by one. D Anthony
Mountain leaks out and Buddy Heal grabs the inbound and
just rifles it down the floor to the Anthony Meltin
(23:17):
wide open for what would have been a layup to
win the game. And Tyrese Maxy, who was literally like
wrapped up in the bench, in the Sixers bench because
on his fallaway jump shot he was like falling over
into the bench. He somehow entangles himself from the mess
and sprints back and blocks the Anthony Melton at the
buzzer to save the game, easily the best defensive play
(23:39):
of his young career, and just an insane display of
his speed in the open floor, and just a lot
of fun in that particular game. Couple really fun finishes
between the two games that we covered this morning, and
I love that about the NBA. Like we complain a
lot about the NBA regular season about how it's too
long and how it can last urgency sometimes, but that
(24:02):
was what looked like a pretty mediocre slate and it
gave us some really cool moments. And that's ultimately what
makes the NBA regular season still fun is that it
just provides so many moments over the course of those
six months. Yeah, there's a lot of bad games and
blowouts in there as well, but generally speaking, each week
you just get a dozen or so classic games with
(24:23):
great finishes with crazy highlights, and that's why we keep
coming back to this shit like a drug every single
year when mid October comes around, before we get to
the mailbag. I was thinking a little bit last night
about how things have gone so wrong for the Warriors
this year. And to be clear, it's not over for them.
They're three and a half games back of the sixth
seed to get out of the plane. That's an achievable gap.
(24:45):
And when they have their top three guys healthy and
available on the floor, they've been really.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Good this year.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
But I was thinking about it because, like, the reason
why they're below five hundred instead of staying afloat has
essentially come down to the lack of development of their
young talent. You look at the end of their roster,
a lot of those guys have been great, Like you
keep finding the Will Richard types and the Pat Spencer types,
and the Gie Santos types, and the guys that can
be their eighth, ninth, tenth man on any given night
(25:13):
when Steve Kerr needs to find some quality rotation minutes
in the back end of his roster, they keep succeeding there.
Their stars are just true pros right. They do their
jobs every night when they've been on the floor, they've
been winning their minutes. The stars do their jobs. They've
been perfect. There's been bad games mixed in there, but
for the most part, those guys have been really, really good.
It's that middle tier of the roster where they've needed
(25:36):
some of these not like the undrafted second round pick
types to pop, but where they've needed like these first
round pick, high pedigree dudes to pop, and they just
have it. And they've needed Pods to be on a
little bit more of that Austin Reeves type of trajectory
of becoming like a legitimate offensive weapon at the guard spot,
(25:58):
and he just hasn't become that. He needed Jonathan Kaminga
to become something closer to what Pascal Siakam or Ogn
Andobi have become, and he just hasn't. And it's because
of that. It just puts so much more emphasis and
pressure on the older veterans to be awesome every night,
and it forces Steve Kerr to lean on his eighth, ninth,
(26:19):
tenth man more often. And those guys they can do
their jobs, but ultimately it's a key possession late in
the game and de Anthony Meltons isoing off the top
and smoking a left handed layup off the glass. It'd
be great if one of those first round picks that
you had, a lottery pick could have developed into a
guy when steps out with a thigh contusion that could
(26:42):
come in and get a bucket when the team needs
a bucket. And that lack of development in that middle
portion of their roster where some of their higher pedigree
young talent has been that lack of development I think
ultimately has been the thing that's led to this frustrating
start as the Warriors end up slipping below five hundred.
All right, let's get into our mail bag. First question,
(27:04):
would you rather see the Spurs split up their young
core in depth for Giannis or trade sohan Olynic three
or four first for Trey Murphy If it takes that
much man three or four first for Trey Murphy would
be pretty wild. I keep thinking about things in the
context of Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City isn't going anywhere. You
(27:25):
have to find a way to compete with them. They're
gonna get another lottery pick this year. Chet is gonna
keep dramatically improving year over year, so is Jalen Williams.
Shay has shown another leap basically marginally across the board
in his game this season.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
This season, A J.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
Mitchell has popped. They have other first round picks that
have gotten hurt that I'll be rejoining the team at
some point in the future. Cason Wallace is going to
continue to get better. The Thunder aren't going anywhere. This
is an arms race. Now you have to call on Giannis. Now,
I'm not saying like I personally hope that Giannis stays
out in the East. We talked about that yesterday. I
(28:04):
think it's better for the conference balance in the NBA.
And I don't think it's good to have all four
of your top tier superstars and all four of your
top tier contenders all out in the Western Conference.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
I don't. I don't think that that.
Speaker 3 (28:15):
And then you know, Luca and the Lakers are probably
that like fifth team, and like, you just don't want
all of those teams all stacked up in one conference, right,
But San Antonio shouldn't care about that. They should care
about how they're trying to compete with the Yoklahoma City
Thunder at the top of the conference. And if you
make a deal for Giannis. You can get it done
with something like Harrison Barnes and Keldon Johnson in either
(28:38):
of your two young guards Dylan Harper or Steph Castle,
just one of them and some draft compensation. If you
do that, your starting lineup becomes Dearon Fox, Devin Vassel,
Julian Champagnee, Giannison Tennecompo, and Victor wem Minyama. That is
a frightening combination of a duo that's impossible to score
(28:59):
on at the rim and Giannis and Wemby and super
athletes on the perimeter. Dearon Fox shooting the three super
well this year, Devin Vessel, Julian Champagnee traditional shooters, that's
shooting and two way talent on the perimeters, surrounding two
of the very best front court players literally in the
history of the league for Giannis and soon to be
for Victor Webbinyama. And you don't sacrifice much in depth.
(29:22):
You still have Steph Castle off the bench, You still
have Luke Cornett off the bench, you still have Jeremy
Sohan off the bench. That's probably the best top eight
in the entire NBA, even over a team like ok
See and you'd still have flexibility to make moves and
pivot off of that core if you need to. There's
a depth there of like literally three starting caliber awesome
(29:46):
guards there. You could flip one at some point in
the future if you needed to, say Steph Castle makes
a leap and you pivot off of the Aaron Fox
or whatever it is. It's not like you're tying yourself
into honest and sacrificing your entire future.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
It's a no brainer. You make the call.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
Maybe you get out bid, Maybe Orlando ends up jumping in,
Maybe Atlanta ends up jumping in.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Maybe Oklahoma City ends up jumping in. Who knows.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
But I think you make the call because you're the
one team that presents a real physical dynamic that Okac
could struggle with, and that's Giannis and Wemby completely shutting
down the rim and having the type of big athletic
guards that can make things a little bit tougher on
Okac's pull up jump shooters. It's an arms race, okay.
See he's a junger not and you're one of the
(30:30):
few teams positioned well enough to actually compete with them
in the coming years. I think it's something you have
to consider, what do you think will happen if OKC
approaches the Bucks and offers JDub plus salary filler, probably
Hartenstein with picks for Jiannis. For the record, I don't
think Sam Presty will ever do something like that, but
I think it's the best return that the Bucks can
get on Yiannis and instantly makes okay See the favorites
(30:52):
to win the title to potentially being more scary than
the twenty seventeen Warriors. Another question, do you think if
a move like that was on the table, Shouitt Adam
Silver stop it to straight up say no to this
trade because it would make the league so unfair.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
So here's the thing.
Speaker 3 (31:06):
I agree with you that if the thunder actually wanted Giannis,
they could have him. They've got all the draft picks,
they've got all the talented young players. They could certainly
make something like that happen. It's just an unnecessary risk
for oka See.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
So think, are it this way?
Speaker 3 (31:21):
You've already made yourself, as currently constructed, a substantial championship favorite.
We'll see how things go over the next month. There's
a lot of basketball games to be played, and okay
See definitely has a tougher December schedule, but at some
point in the next month, if things stay the same.
In our next contender rankings, I'm going to put Okac
in a tier by themselves at the top of the
(31:43):
league without any trade. Jannis has become a bit injury
prone in recent years. He's heard again has calf injury.
He's missed a bunch of playoff games over the course
of the last few years. So you could, yes, increase
your championship odds this season, but also have a higher
risk for some sort of derailing injury where if you
(32:06):
don't have Ja Dubb and you don't have a Yannis,
and you don't have an Isaiah Hartenstein, then you could
run into an issue where you become more beatable. This
season right now is currently constructed. They might not be
as much of a favorite as they would be if
they made a Giannis trade, but I think they're more
resilient to injuries right now because they're younger. They're built
(32:26):
in a way to where even if Jadub is out,
they can handle, you know, large chunks of the regular season.
I just think for Okay see, it's an unnecessary risk
for them, So I'd be stunned if they made a
Yianni's trade. Next question, do you buy the idea that
(32:47):
the Orlando Magic are a better basketball team without Palo
or is it just better spacing from Da Silva and
Jet Howard playing in place of Pallo couple things. I've
mentioned this a lot lately, but the Magic started their
turnaround before Palabun Karol got hurt. They were five and
two in the last seven games that Paalo played in,
(33:08):
and they had already started to flash some of those
higher end passing and driving kick sequences, some of the
spacing principles that we discussed when we had that conversation
surrounding putting Desmond Baine more in the play finishing spot
in the weekside corner when they're running action. That was
when Palo was still playing, and so it's one of
(33:29):
those things for me that like, yes, the team is
playing really good basketball right now. Specifically, they're moving the
ball more than ever. Their assist percentage is dramatically higher
than it was the entirety of this Palo in Fran's era.
In the last few seasons, they've gained some real momentum
as like a ball in player movement type of team
and They've had some improvement in some key areas with
(33:51):
their jump shooting, and they are starting to get out
and transition more, which is something we've been begging for
for Orlando forever. But they did start those trends before
Palo got hurt. So here's the thing. See what it
looks like when he comes back. There's a version of
this where he comes back and he just continues to
buy into that and he's more talented and as a team,
you look better. There's also a version where he comes
(34:12):
back and he makes things clunky and you lose some
of that identity. But ultimately, I think as long as
Palo's on the roster, you've got to try to see
if he can make things work in this system. And
I do want to give him a little bit more
credit than just saying, oh, Pallo's out, the Magic are
kicking butt again. They started this these winning habits before
(34:32):
Palow got hurt. I do still like this a lot
as a Yiannis destination for this reason. Paalo is, in
theory on paper, kind of a clunky fit in a
ball in player movement type of attack, and bringing in
the guy like Gianis is just dramatically better than Palo
could vault Orlando up to being a clear top tier
contender and far and away the best team in the
(34:52):
Eastern Conference, an unbelievable defense, rebound transition team, And yes,
there would be some clunkiness on offense, but I think
they'd be better than people. I think there's a lot
of natural synergy between him and a guy like Desmond
Bain too. I still like that as a Yiannis destination,
but take Gianna's trade and remove it from the equation.
You got to see what it looks like when Palla
comes back, because he was a part of his success
(35:12):
before he got hurt. Should the Warriors trade Buddy Healed
from Buddy Heeld and Moody for John Collins. I know
Collins isn't the perfect player slash fit, but I think
the Warriors can afford to give up some guard depth
with Seth and Melton coming in. Would love to hear
if you think this would help the Warriors. I agree
that they can afford to make some sort of consolidation
(35:33):
trade from the guard position, but I keep coming back
to offensive firepower. The Warriors are twenty third in offensive
raiding this year, yet just like last year, once again
in the latest example of Steph's absurd advantage creation and
why he's still one of the greatest offensive engines in
the sport. The Warriors with Steph Curry on the floor
(35:53):
this year have a one nineteen point three offensive rating
and it was one twenty last year. He continues to
be an elite NBA offense in and of himself. Why
are they twenty third in offense though? Because they have
a one toh eight offensive rating in eleven hundred and
sixty eight possessions. With Steph off the floor. They can't
(36:15):
score unless Steph creates it. And it's a problem even
with Jimmy on the floor, without Steph only a one
to twelve point six offensive rating, he hasn't been able
to carry the load. And that's another conversation to have
around Jimmy and the lack of offensive ceiling that we've
seen there. But ultimately, because of that, and because the
young guys like we talked about earlier and Kamina, Kamina
(36:37):
and Pods haven't popped offensively. You need firepower. You need
someone who can score the basketball. You need someone that
can raise the floor of this offense when Steph is
off the floor, and that ultimately needs to be the
kind of guy that they target. Whether that's a Trey
Murphy or it's a Malik Monk, or it ends up
being some other type of higher level offensive player. They
(36:59):
need to bring a higher end offensive floor to the
table through the trade market. That needs to be the
kind of thing that they're targeting. Hey Jason, longtime listener.
My question is this. I've always been of the mindset
that la should flip Reeves, given that Luca and Reeves
backcourt long term seems to lack too much athleticism and
foot speed to coexist. The problem always was whether Reeves
(37:22):
trade value could net enough to make it worth it.
Now the way he's playing currently having one of the
most efficient, high volume scoring seasons ever for a guard,
I'm wondering who you realistically think they could get for
him if it's worth it, and if you see a
potential long term fit with Luca, so they should hold
on to him. Keep up the awesome work. Thanks for
supporting the show. I really appreciate it. So this is
the thing with Austin. He's made himself so good that
(37:47):
you basically can't trade him unless it's gonna get back
a guy like Giannis there was a time when Yiannis
was when Austin, excuse me, was less consistent, and it
was like, yeah, you go for twenty three some night.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
Other nights he wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (38:02):
And the lack of that consistent offensive pop made it
so that his defensive limitations, because he's a lesser athlete,
that would pop up every once aile. Austin's a fundamentally
sound athlete, he just has athletic limitations, right, But like
some of those athletic limitations would become a bigger problem
because he wasn't as good offensively as he needed to
(38:23):
be to cover for that gap. Right, During those times,
I used to think about Austin trades and I'd be like, okay,
Like I really like Austin. I think that he, you know,
in the right system, could be the third best player
on a championship team if he's surrounded by lots of athletes.
But like, you know, maybe they'd be better served turning
him into a plus athlete, someone that is like maybe
(38:45):
not quite as good offensively, or maybe you attach him
to a pick to bring back a higher level guard
or whatever it is, but maybe the Lakers need some
more athleticism at that spot. Austin's become so good offensively
that any perceived potential upside that you get by bringing
in a better athlete would be dramatically undercut by the
(39:06):
fact that Austin is just a way, way better offensive player,
and that just kind of puts any conversation surrounding trading
him dead on arrival. Austin just went for forty and
ten again last night. He's literally averaging what twenty nine
seven and twenty nine six and seven on sixty six
(39:27):
sixty seven percent true shooting this year.
Speaker 2 (39:29):
He's like so.
Speaker 3 (39:30):
Unbelievably good now that it dramatically under it dramatically outweighs
any sort of downsides that come with his athleticism. So
if you're not getting a dude that is like legitimately
just better than Austin who is now, you know, he's
like a third team All NBA guy this year. So
if you're not getting back like a second team All
(39:51):
NBA guy in an Austin deal, it just doesn't make
sense to do it at this point. And he's just
the perfect guy to situate with Luca long term because
he can complete run the offense when Lucas out. Remember
the year where Luca had the injury. I think it
was twenty twenty two, and Jalen Brunson like had to
win a big playoff game on the road in Utah
(40:12):
or against Utah. It might have been at home, I
can't remember, but its in twenty twenty two. Jalen Brunson
took a game early in that series without Luca. That
was what made him the ideal Luca partner. He could
play off of Luca when Luca was there, and he
could step into that number one role when Luca had
to miss a game for an injury. Austin has clearly
demonstrated that he can be that kind of guy. At
(40:32):
that point, he's foundational to the Lakers and you can't
move off of him unless some sort of dramatically better
option shows up in the future. Thinking Basketball just made
a whole video about how the league about how the
league in general, but especially the Miami Heat, are purposely
running fewer pick and rolls. I think Miami is only
running something like thirteen pick and rolls per one hundred.
I definitely checked that video out. I think you might
(40:54):
be disappointed if you're expecting to see the Heat run
more pick and rolls. Eventually. So here's the thing I
think that the offense at the Heat are running is
a really fascinating bit of basketball philosophy, essentially, like why
do we run pick and roll? Why do we run action?
We do it to get an advantage. You do it
to try to force the defense to react if we
(41:15):
score enough going over the top of the screen. Eventually
they're big will come up to the level. If they're
big comes up to the level. Now they're defending it
three on two, we get the defense in rotation. Now
we're starting to get those skip passes for open threes
and guys cutting along the baseline and all the good
things that come when you get a three on two
on the offensive.
Speaker 2 (41:32):
End of the floor. Right, that's why you run pick
and roll. Why do the Miami Heat play the way
they play.
Speaker 3 (41:39):
Because they get their advantages through driving, by pushing the
ball up in transition, playing super fast. They get those
advantages the open man in the corner, the two on
the ball sequence as someone helps on a drive, they
get those with their transition pushes. And then in the
half court they just try to beat their man off
the dribble. Right like down the roster too, like You'll
see Pelo Larson just no offensive advantage catches on the perimeter.
(42:03):
Pelele will just throw a damn jab step and then
hit a gap and all of a sudden, the defense
reacts kick kick, open three or open shot for someone else.
Like they use dribble penetration to generate those initial advantages.
And it fits their roster because they don't really have
a lot of high level pick and roll players. They
got one and Tyler Harrow, but everyone else. It's like
Jaimehakez is at his best attacking downhill in semi transition
(42:26):
and turning his back to the basket and posting. Daveon
Mitchell is at his best just isoing a dude off
the top of the key and hitting him with the
dribble combination to try to beat him off the dribble
and get all the way to the basket, right, So
it fits their roster extremely well. Now, why did I
say in that Tyler Harrow video that I think they'll
eventually run more pick and roll. It's about variety. So
for instance, take the end of the Dallas Mavericks game.
(42:48):
For example, you put Naji Marshall on Tyler Hero and
Nazi's doing a really good job, and all of a sudden,
Tyler's not feeling comfortable beating him off the dribble. Well,
it'd be nice in that situation if you could still
go to your best player, because at the end of
that game, Tyler didn't seem to want the ball much.
But if you're running ball screens with Bam, maybe Tyler
is more engaged in the offense at the end of
(43:10):
that game, and your best offensive player has the ball
in his hands more as a counter when the actual
offense isn't working. And that's all I was saying is
like I expect over the course of the season for
the Harrow or the Hero Bam pick and roll to
at least occasionally be used. That doesn't mean they're going
to bail on the system. The system is perfect for them,
and on many nights it works great for Tyler. It's
(43:32):
an offense that I think will continue to be their foundation.
I just think they'll lean on pick and roll as
a counter a little bit more than people think as
we get deeper into the system. A couple more quick
ones before we get out of here. If you were
a GM, would you prefer to build around a top
tier superstar with slightly questionable character for the sake of example,
say prime James Harden or a second tier superstar with
solid character, someone like Jason Tatum. I'm just going to
(43:54):
keep it to these two. Would I rather build around
prime Jason Tatum or James Harden. It'd be Jason Tatum.
And a lot of that has to do with if
you're saying slightly questionable character. I think James Harden's a
good person and a good teammate. I think the main
issue with James Harden is his unwillingness to do the
work on the margins. He has been a big problem
for the Clippers defense during some of their losing issues
(44:14):
that they've had this season, and that's been an issue
throughout his career. A guy like Jason Tatum may not
provide that dramatic offensive upside, but he's just so well
rounded around the margins that he's going to be able
to anchor me on both ends of the floor in
a way that makes him easier to build around. So
for those two specific examples, I would take Jason Tatum.
Last question, Hey, Jason, longtime fan, been here since before
(44:36):
you had your own channel and everything was on the
volumes feed.
Speaker 2 (44:38):
Lol.
Speaker 3 (44:38):
What do you think about Kat to a cat for
a d trade for both sides. I think the salaries match.
AD gives the Knicks a higher ceiling things to his
defense if he reaches his peak again, and he's a
damn good offensive player too. He is averaging twenty five
and eleven on good efficiency. Sure, the Knicks would get
to the finals with Kat, but once you're there, do
you even have a puncher's chance with two great offensive
liabilities as your two best players? I think they'd get killed.
(45:00):
Of course, Ad also comes with a ton of risk
for Dallas. You get a big salary, but you stay
relevant and you can space the floor.
Speaker 2 (45:05):
Flag.
Speaker 3 (45:06):
Yeah, I like it as a roster balancing move for
both teams. For the Knicks once again, in that Celtics game,
Karl Anthony Towns was an absolute nightmare on defense, Batching
coverages early in the game, just making a bunch of
silly mistakes down the stretch, like chasing Jordan Walsh off
the corner when he's made three corner threes all season,
giving up an open layup like, just all sorts of
nonsense from Kat that continues to cost his team at
(45:28):
the end of big games. To me, putting him in
a situation like Dallas where he's anchored by centers and
he's playing at the four kind of like he was
in Minnesota is a better situation for him. And he's
a good offensive fit for a team that needs jump
shooting like you wouldn't believe. I really like that fit there.
And then for the Knicks, Anthony Davis, to your point,
actually gives you a legitimate athletic imposition to bring to
(45:51):
a finals matchup against in Oklahoma City. I think if
flat out makes him better on both ends of the floor.
I think Ad brings a vertical spacing role man short
role element to his game that is higher level. I
think he's a better post player than Karl Anthony Towns
in a large sample against elite defenses. I think he
handles double teams better. I don't think he's great at it,
but I think he's better than Kat at it. Like
(46:11):
I think, I think it would just be the kind
of move that makes sense for both teams. The Knicks
have more urgency, the MAVs don't. Well, Cat's two years younger.
I think there's a lot of reasons why that deal
makes sense for both teams. All right, guys, It's all
I have for today is always to sincerely appreciate you
guys for supporting us, in supporting the show. We'll be
back tonight on playback for Lakers Celtics. I'll see you
(46:31):
guys at four pm Pacific time. If we don't see
you have playback, We'll see you guys on Monday morning
for our weekly power rankings.
Speaker 2 (46:36):
I will see you guys then,
The Volume.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
All right, Well, good to him tonight, you're at the volume.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Happy Friday, everybody. Hope all of you guys are having
an incredible week. Got a jam pack show for you
guys today. I want to hit on the two crazy
games from last night before we get into our mail bag.
As Lebron James Is one thousand, two ninety seven game
streak of double figure scoring finally comes to end in
a poetic fashion as he makes an extra pass out
(00:39):
of an Austin Reeves double team that leads to a
wide open corner three for Ruey Hachimura to get a
big win for the Lakers without Luka Dancic on the
road in against a very good Toronto Raptors team. After that,
we're going to talk briefly about the Philadelphia seventy six
ers getting a win after blowing an eighteen point fourth
quarter lead versus the Golden State Warriors, an interest seeing
(01:00):
kind of like bench group for the war years that
came together. I also want to talk briefly about the
lack of development for some of Golden State's young players
and how that's been a big part of their struggles
throughout the season. And then as usual, on Fridays, we're
going to get into our mail bag at the tail
end of the show. You guys know the joke before
we get started. Subscribe to the Hoops to Not YouTube
channel so you don't miss any more of our videos.
(01:20):
Follow me on Twitter and underscore jcnlts. You guys don't
misshow announcements. Don't forget about our podcast feed wherever you
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helpful if you leave a rating in a review on
that front. Jackson's doing incredible work on our social media
feeds on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and TikTok. Make sure you
guys follow us there for more content throughout the season.
And then don't forget about our mail bags. If you
want to get in questions for our Friday mail bags,
(01:41):
just drop them in our full episodes on YouTube in
the comments right mail bag with a colon, write your question.
That's how I can sort through them when I'm looking
through the comments. We'll get to them on Fridays throughout
the remainder of the season. A couple other quick announcements.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Like this video.
Speaker 3 (01:53):
It's super helpful for us if you just would take
a second to scroll down and hit that like button
and then we have our second playback stream of the week. Tonight,
we have the Lakers on the road in Boston against
the Celtics. Should be a fun one. I've also got
my buddy Adam Taylor, who covers the Celtics individually as
a team, so he'll be joining us to hang out
(02:14):
for that Celtics game tonight. Should be a fun one.
All right, let's talk some basketball. So again, what looked
like it was going to be a slow night in
the NBA turned into a fun one thanks to a
couple of wild finishes in Philly and Toronto. And we're
gonna hit those two games before we get into our
mail bag. So Lebron's twelve hundred ninety seven consecutive double
digit scoring streak finally comes to the end. And according
(02:36):
to what both Lebron and Rui said in their postgame interviews,
essentially what happened was is Lebron knew the double team
was coming.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
I want to put him in a payoff spot. You know,
ar been cooking all night and you know, ost are
seeing our coach kind of you know, telling you know,
Scottie Barnes a possibly double So I wanted to keep
Rural on the same side to be my payoff, my
payoff spot.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
He knew that Austin, after cooking the Raptor for forty
four points last night, was going to get double teamed,
and so he directed Rui to go to what he
called the payoff spot, meaning the weak side corner, and
basically told him he was going to pass him the
ball and then light clockwork, the double team came from
Scottie Barnes against Austin. Lebron cut into the passing lane
(03:18):
and rifled a cross court pass right into the shooting
pocket for Ruey Hachimura, who wins the game with that
corner three. And it was kind of cool listening to
Lebron and Ruey talk about it after the game, and
specifically Lebron talking about that concept of the payoff spot,
because it's something we've actually talked about quite a bit
on this show, specifically a couple.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
Of weeks ago.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
You guys might remember we had a conversation about this
surrounding Desmond Baine in the Magic offense. In some of
the sequence where Desmond Bain is off ball, the Magic
started putting him in the weak side corner instead of
on the opposite wing, essentially allowing him to be in
that payoff spot. The reason is is because many basketball
plays have repeatable sequences. Whenever a team doubles on the
(03:58):
strong side, almost always going to leave that weak side
corner guy open. Why because the strong side corner is
too easy of a pass to make. If you leave
the guy in the dunker spot open, he's gonna dunk it.
That's going to go in. Every single time the opposite
wing one pass away, it's an easy pass to make,
So you're going to rotate to that guy kind of
like a Manuel Quickly did on that final possession to Lebron,
(04:20):
and the guy on the opposite end of the court
is going to be the most difficult guy to pass to,
and the ball is going to take the longest amount
of time to get there, which is going to allow
your defense a chance to rotate. That's why that's the
payoff spot. That's the spot that a defense is most
willing to leave open, and that if an offense can
get it there soon enough, there's an open look to
(04:40):
be had. And that's what Lebron identified with that final sequence.
And again, Lebron saw that whole sequence before it happened,
informed his teammate about it, told him where to be
in to be ready, made the read so fast, and
made the pass on a line drive right into his
shooting pocket so the Raptors had no chance to rotate
in rooms. He burns them to win the game. Really,
(05:02):
just a classic career defining type of play from Lebron James.
One of my biggest pet peeves over the years with
the way Lebron has been covered is just the way
that he's portrayed by his detractors to be this guy
who cares more about things that have nothing to do
with winning, like himself or the showmanship or whatever it
(05:22):
might be off court behavior. People try to portray him
as a guy that doesn't care about winning. And here's
the thing. Does Lebron enjoy being famous? Clearly that doesn't
take a whole lot to come to that conclusion. Does
Lebron play to the camera and really lean into being
a showman? Of course he does. Does he care about
(05:43):
his individual records and personal resume more than most people. Yeah,
because he's the one player in NBA history to actually
get compared to Michael Jordan, and he's competitive and he
wants to win that race, and he knows that everything,
including the wins, including the individual records in his personal resume,
will help him achieve.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
That goal of his that he has.
Speaker 3 (06:03):
And the funniest thing about the people who focus on
those things is they refuse to acknowledge the how behind
those behaviors.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
You want to know.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Why Lebron has become so famous that he can play
to the camera whenever he wants. You want to know
why Lebron is the only NBA player to get compared
to Michael Jordan because he's one of the greatest winners
in the history of sports. Winning has always been the
main thing for Lebron, and it's been clearly demonstrated throughout
(06:33):
his career. This guy has won his conference ten times.
He's made it to the conference finals two additional times.
He's won more playoff series than any NBA franchise since
he came into the league in the summer of two
thousand and three. He's literally hoisted the Larry O'Brien Trophy
four different times, a feat only matched by the Golden
(06:54):
State Warriors since he came into the league, who achieved
two of those by putting together the most talent roster
in the history of the NBA by a wide margin.
He's the greatest winner of his era, and last night
was just the latest in a long line of examples
of it. I talk all the time about for young
players about how when you're having a bad game, you
(07:16):
just need to try to find a way to make
a play. Lebron wasn't ready for what they asked him
to do last night. We talked about it in the
Laker Collective pod with Trevor and yovonn yesterday in the morning.
I talked about it right on the playback stream before
the tip went up last night. Lebron last season was
healthy for all of training camp and still looked bad
(07:37):
for the first month. Why because he's forty years old
and it takes a long time for him to ramp
his body up for NBA basketball This season because of
the sciatica. He wasn't working out in July or he
got injured in July, but he wasn't working out at
the end of July or all of August or all
of September. He was starting his ramp up substantially later
(07:58):
in the process. This dude's been playing five on five
basketball against pros for a couple of weeks, and it
was fine when Luca was there because the team is
so damn good without him that they can rack up
regular season wins and let him slowly ramp up. It's
why I haven't been worried at all about how he's
looked over the last couple of weeks. Take your time, Lebron.
(08:19):
They're going to keep racking up wins even as you're
building your rhythm. But unfortunately, in congratulations to Luca welcoming
another child into the world, but because Luca's over in
Slovenia with his family, Lebron was basically forced through that
next man up mentality to be ready for something that
he wasn't ready for. He wasn't ready to be a
(08:41):
guy that had to be like one of the two
primary shot creators for the Lakers last night. He's probably
like a month away from that, at least a couple
of weeks. I expected him to be pretty mediocre last night,
and Scotty Barnes made things even harder for him. He
basically refused to switch off of him all game as
one of the big game plan things that was causing
(09:01):
problems for Lebron. So like in Guard Guard screens. They
were hedging and recovering. Even when Lebron was setting screens,
Scotty wasn't helping. He was doing everything he could to
stay attached to Lebron, and that was a big part
of why Lebron was four for seventeen. From the field,
Scotty Barnes athletically overwhelmed him one on one. So like,
just as a little side point, Scotty Barnes deserves a
(09:24):
ton of credit for being the first guy physically capable
of holding Lebron below a double digit scoring output. Took
seventeen shots, And it's not like Lebron wanted to shoot
seventeen shots last night. Like like I've seen people be like, oh,
he was four for seventeen last night.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
He was bad. You're a damn loser.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
You think Lebron wanted to take seventeen shots last night.
He had no choice under the circumstances but to try
to manufacture offense. The Lakers were playing Nick Smith Junior
in an attempt to try to find ball handling with
Luka Dancic out of the lineup. He wasn't close to
being ready for the role that he had last night,
but he had no choice but to try. And here's
(10:05):
the thing. He couldn't make a shot to save his
life at the rim or from the perimeter. But he
just found ways to contribute throughout the game. He had
eleven assists and zero turnovers, generating offense by like burning
the Raptors for helping off of the corners multiple times.
He drew a couple of double teams off of Jake
Laavia where he hit him in the corner for threes.
He caught a Manuel quickly once sitting at the block
(10:27):
about fifteen feet off of Dalton Connect in the right
in the left corner, rifle to pass right in the
Dalton Connects shooting pocket. He knocked down a three. Made
a bunch of advantage reads in four on three sequences,
one where Austin drew a blitz. Jackson got the ball
in the short roll, had made their pass to Lebron,
they rotated to Lebron, he just rifled it right back
to Jackson down the lane for a dunk. He drove
(10:48):
a close out off the left wing in the second
half and lobbed the ball to Deandrayton for a dunk.
The game winner to Rueye in the corner. Those are
all advantage sequences where he made that extra read that
ended up finished the play. He ran that two man
game with Austin to generate a bucket. He got one
right in the start of the third quarter, that classic
little inverted ball screen where Austin screens for Lebron and
(11:09):
then slips to the front of the rim and Lebron
just hits him with the bounce pass for a layup.
Eleven assists in zero turnovers. Just found a way to
generate offense as much as possible. And again, when you're
having a rough night as a basketball player, you just
have to try to find a way to make a
play or a couple of plays to help your team
(11:32):
win the game, and then no one's gonna care about
everything else. That happened obviously as the game winning assists,
but he had a big defensive rebound in crunch time,
boxing out Scottie Barnes underneath the basket. He had several
big defensive rotations late in the game that helped the
Lakers get stops. And by the way, the Lakers logged
a seventy eight defensive rating and clutch time yesterday, continuing
(11:53):
their trend to being the best clutch defense in the NBA,
as they improved a seven to zero in clutch games
the season. The Lakers have been able to get stop
up at the end of games when they need to anyway, Like,
as far as Lebron goes, I'm just going to enjoy
these final moments of his career while we can. I
think he's been an excellent example for young basketball players
when it comes to how to approach the game, impacting
(12:15):
winning through your effort, through your IQ, focusing on every
single facet of the game. He's just the greatest winner
of this era of NBA basketball, and no detractor will
ever be able to take that away from him, no
matter what they say. A couple other quick Lakers things
before we get to our mailbag. Austin Reeves forty four
(12:35):
and ten again last night, averaging twenty nine six and
seven on sixty nine percent true shooting this season. I
was talking about this last night on playback. To be clear,
the Lakers aren't getting Yannest, certainly not this season. If
they did, it would be because he somehow made it
to the offseason and the Lakers got access to another
draft pick. But I still think that's extremely unlikely. One
(12:56):
of these other teams is going to have so much
more to offer in terms of draft compensation as well
as a good young player, and they'll end up getting Yanis.
And again, if they even try to do it during
this season, it's just impossible. With the salaries, would be
extremely difficult for them to pull off. But just as
a thought exercise, I think he'd be the best player
included in any potential package for Giannis. Like if the
(13:19):
season ended today, Austin would make the All NBA team,
maybe even second team. He'd be a better center piece
than any of the other packages I've seen thrown around.
He's a better player than Jalen Johnson right now. He's
a better player than Pala Bancaro right now. He's a
better player than Steph Castle or Dylan Harper. He's easily
(13:40):
the best player in the league that's been thrown around
as a featured piece in one of these Giannis trade packages.
And I only say that as a thought exercise. Again,
I don't think Austin's going to be a Buck and
Giannis is going to be a Laker. I'm simply saying
this is how great of a player Austin Reeves has
become in this league. It's like dependable.
Speaker 2 (13:59):
Now.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
It's like, oh Austin, we need him to get forty
and ten tonight, and he's just gonna get forty and ten,
a career high twenty two points in a single quarter
last night. Was bombing logo threes, frustrating the hell out
of Toronto's perimeter defenders with his pump fakes and drawing fouls.
Just literally just turning over his right shoulder on Colin
(14:20):
Murray Boyles and just showing the ball, leaves his feet,
draws the foul. Same thing against Jamal shd on the
left baseline, little step back, show the ball, Jamal lunges in.
They can't help themselves and they're committing fouls. He was
getting to the rim at will. He had this crazy play,
one of my favorite highlights of Austin's young career. In
crunch time, Lakers are down by two and it looks
like they're gonna call a time out. All the Lakers
(14:42):
players drift into the backcourt, just kind of waiting for
Austin to dribble across half court and call a time out.
Austin says, screw it, just drives to the basket and
scores a layup. Over a triple team to tie the game.
He's just an absolute hooper man, and it's been such
a joy covering the league to be able to watch
his ascent on the Lakers has been a lot of fun.
(15:04):
Lots of other shoutouts for Lakers role players in a
big roa to win. DeAndre Ayton was phenomenal in this game.
He was burning the Raptors in there at the level
coverage with lobs. So when Austin would come off of
a screen attacking Mamu in particular, Mamu was coming up
to the level. When Mamu would come up, Ayton would
roll behind him and Austin, who's been a terrible lob
thrower this year, actually was pretty good with his lobs
(15:24):
last night completed three of them to DeAndre Ayton over
the top. I thought Ayton's transition defense was amazing. He
was a part of several big transition stops that the
Lakers got in the second half just by sprinting back
and being big around the rim. He had the biggest
stop of the game, a switch on to Brandon Ingram
and crunch time on the second the second last possession,
so the final defensive possession guarding brandon ingram Won on
(15:46):
one runs with him along the lane line to the basket,
gets a great contest forces him into a miss. He
anchored the defense in the half court all night. Ayton
just continues to be amazing. Jacob Ravia kind had of
a bit of a rough first shift, but I thought
he was amazing in the second half. He was scrapping
on the defensive glass all night, either getting the ball
or like tapping the ball out to other Lakers who
(16:08):
could get the ball. He hit a couple of huge
corner threes off of double teams. At Lebron, he made
one of the biggest transition plays of the night. It
was actually a goaltend. It's this weird sequence where Mamu
was like probably going to miss a dunkey, like went
up to dunk it and like threw the ball into
the rim, and then Jake Lavia came flying in and
blocked it off of the rim.
Speaker 2 (16:25):
And here's the thing.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
It was probably a goaltend, but you know, it's bang bang.
Play had been lightning fast, and it was such a
weird play because Mamu was gonna miss anyway, and it
was just a big hustle play. That he made that
converted what would have been two points for the Rafts
into a stop. Ruly big game, makes the corner three
that wins it. Nick Smith again sliding into a bigger
role when the Lakers need ball handling. He also had
(16:48):
one of those big transition sequences last night. Austin had
a turnover that led to a runout. Nick Smith sprinted back,
stole the ball underneath the basket, and then went down
the other end. It hit a little mid range, a
jump shot, a four point swing. Massive, massive play there
in the second half. Just a really fun Lakers win.
I was fun listening to JJ Reddick talk about it
after the game. He was just talking about how it
(17:09):
was a very connected team and that he really enjoyed
competing with the guys. Really good vibes for a Lakers
team that's only a half game back for the second
best record in the entire NBA right now. With Luca
missing five games, with Lebron missing fifteen games, with Austin
missing a few games with a groin injury, it's just
been a special season for them so far, and another
(17:32):
challenge tonight in Boston, and might be without Lebron as well.
In addition, to Luca and that one is Lebron hasn't
hasn't been playing in back to backs to start the season.
We will be covering that game on Playback tonight at
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Rock Digital LLC. Must be twenty one plus and physically
present in Michigan to play. Terms and conditions apply. Concerned
about gambling called one eight hundred Gambler. Another wild finish
in Philly. The Warriors went into Philly without Steph and Jimmy,
and then Draymond got his footst stomped on again, so
we ended up leaving the game in a walking boot.
(20:03):
So some more trouble there, although the reporting is that
Draymond is expected to continue to try to play through
that injury.
Speaker 2 (20:10):
Warriors couldn't score to save their lives.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
Brandon Pajemski and Jonathan Minga both had really rough games.
I want to talk to them a little bit more
in a minute, because the negativity surrounding them is really
starting to reach a fever pitch right now. Tyres Maxie's
lighting him on fire on the other end, and the
Warriors end up going down by twenty two in the
first quarter. They end up stiff arming them around there
most of the rest of the game, but then the
Warriors mount and epic eighteen point fourth quarter comeback, led
(20:34):
by one of those classic little three guard lineups that
you know, Golden State fans complained about all the time.
We had Buddy Heal, d Anthony Melton, and Pat Spencer.
Will Richard got in there a little bit too, so
three of those four guards at any given time, Gie
Santo's playing the four, and then a mix of Al
Horford and Quinton Posts was the group that ended up
leading the comeback. Buddy Heals like constantly just running by
(20:56):
Tyrese Maxie and getting every single offensive rebound. Tyres Maxie's
got to be more intentive on the defensive glass. That's
something that's been standing out to me in film. He's
got to figure that out. It's just a little detail
that's undercutting some of his success. On the other end,
d Anthony Melton was flying around on defense, breaking plays up,
hitting jump shots. Pat Spencer continues to provide like that,
like little bit of audacious scoring in these situations, hit
(21:19):
and pull up threes, drawn fouls in the mid range
GUIs Santos hit a couple of spot up threes. He
had a spin move on the baseline that got the
Warriors bench all stoked, where he kind of got caught
the ball in the short corner and the possession kind
of died. No one was open, and he just ripped
to the right and pounded into his spin move, toasted
his man off the drible got into a little reverse layup,
a nice move from GUIs Santo's. Horford had a big
(21:42):
block and dropped coverage. He also had an assist out
of a post up double team, and Quinton Post hit
a couple of threes, all while the team was playing great,
great defense.
Speaker 2 (21:50):
On the other end.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
They've mixed in some one to three one zone during
that defensive run as well as some man demand. The
Sixers were kind of playing into it a little bit
by letting their foot off the gas and just passing
the ball around the perimeter and taking some bad pull
up jump shots. But the Warriors just battled, and all
of a sudden, Pat Spencer hits a three off the
left wing and they're up by four, and it's like,
oh man, like the Warriors are about to have a
(22:13):
massive win here. But the Sixers finally woke up and
they made four big plays late in the game that
ended up stealing the victory back in their direction. Quinn
Grimes had a big driving and one out of the
left corner where he just kind of went through Pat
Spencer's chest and got an and one. Tyres Maxi, after
settling a few times for some bad jump shots, finally
(22:34):
got downhill, pounded into a spin move over his right
shoulder and put it up off the glass with his
left hand. A really really nice basket attack from Tyras Maxey.
And then the final sequence, so the Sixers have the
ball down by one and VJ. Edgecombe identifies Tyras Maxey's
taken like a tough step back jump shot like eighteen
nineteen feet off of the left elbow, off of the
(22:54):
right elbow extended, and he airballs it. But VJ just
kind of like identify that the airball is coming and
just cuts into the open gap times it perfectly jumps,
grabs the air ball and feeds it back into the
basket to put the Sixers up by one. D Anthony
Mountain leaks out and Buddy Heal grabs the inbound and
just rifles it down the floor to the Anthony Meltin
(23:17):
wide open for what would have been a layup to
win the game. And Tyrese Maxy, who was literally like
wrapped up in the bench, in the Sixers bench because
on his fallaway jump shot he was like falling over
into the bench. He somehow entangles himself from the mess
and sprints back and blocks the Anthony Melton at the
buzzer to save the game, easily the best defensive play
(23:39):
of his young career, and just an insane display of
his speed in the open floor, and just a lot
of fun in that particular game. Couple really fun finishes
between the two games that we covered this morning, and
I love that about the NBA. Like we complain a
lot about the NBA regular season about how it's too
long and how it can last urgency sometimes, but that
(24:02):
was what looked like a pretty mediocre slate and it
gave us some really cool moments. And that's ultimately what
makes the NBA regular season still fun is that it
just provides so many moments over the course of those
six months. Yeah, there's a lot of bad games and
blowouts in there as well, but generally speaking, each week
you just get a dozen or so classic games with
(24:23):
great finishes with crazy highlights, and that's why we keep
coming back to this shit like a drug every single
year when mid October comes around, before we get to
the mailbag. I was thinking a little bit last night
about how things have gone so wrong for the Warriors
this year. And to be clear, it's not over for them.
They're three and a half games back of the sixth
seed to get out of the plane. That's an achievable gap.
(24:45):
And when they have their top three guys healthy and
available on the floor, they've been really.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
Good this year.
Speaker 3 (24:51):
But I was thinking about it because, like, the reason
why they're below five hundred instead of staying afloat has
essentially come down to the lack of development of their
young talent. You look at the end of their roster,
a lot of those guys have been great, Like you
keep finding the Will Richard types and the Pat Spencer types,
and the Gie Santos types, and the guys that can
be their eighth, ninth, tenth man on any given night
(25:13):
when Steve Kerr needs to find some quality rotation minutes
in the back end of his roster, they keep succeeding there.
Their stars are just true pros right. They do their
jobs every night when they've been on the floor, they've
been winning their minutes. The stars do their jobs. They've
been perfect. There's been bad games mixed in there, but
for the most part, those guys have been really, really good.
It's that middle tier of the roster where they've needed
(25:36):
some of these not like the undrafted second round pick
types to pop, but where they've needed like these first
round pick, high pedigree dudes to pop, and they just
have it. And they've needed Pods to be on a
little bit more of that Austin Reeves type of trajectory
of becoming like a legitimate offensive weapon at the guard spot,
(25:58):
and he just hasn't become that. He needed Jonathan Kaminga
to become something closer to what Pascal Siakam or Ogn
Andobi have become, and he just hasn't. And it's because
of that. It just puts so much more emphasis and
pressure on the older veterans to be awesome every night,
and it forces Steve Kerr to lean on his eighth, ninth,
(26:19):
tenth man more often. And those guys they can do
their jobs, but ultimately it's a key possession late in
the game and de Anthony Meltons isoing off the top
and smoking a left handed layup off the glass. It'd
be great if one of those first round picks that
you had, a lottery pick could have developed into a
guy when steps out with a thigh contusion that could
(26:42):
come in and get a bucket when the team needs
a bucket. And that lack of development in that middle
portion of their roster where some of their higher pedigree
young talent has been that lack of development I think
ultimately has been the thing that's led to this frustrating
start as the Warriors end up slipping below five hundred.
All right, let's get into our mail bag. First question,
(27:04):
would you rather see the Spurs split up their young
core in depth for Giannis or trade sohan Olynic three
or four first for Trey Murphy If it takes that
much man three or four first for Trey Murphy would
be pretty wild. I keep thinking about things in the
context of Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City isn't going anywhere. You
(27:25):
have to find a way to compete with them. They're
gonna get another lottery pick this year. Chet is gonna
keep dramatically improving year over year, so is Jalen Williams.
Shay has shown another leap basically marginally across the board
in his game this season.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
This season, A J.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
Mitchell has popped. They have other first round picks that
have gotten hurt that I'll be rejoining the team at
some point in the future. Cason Wallace is going to
continue to get better. The Thunder aren't going anywhere. This
is an arms race. Now you have to call on Giannis. Now,
I'm not saying like I personally hope that Giannis stays
out in the East. We talked about that yesterday. I
(28:04):
think it's better for the conference balance in the NBA.
And I don't think it's good to have all four
of your top tier superstars and all four of your
top tier contenders all out in the Western Conference.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
I don't. I don't think that that.
Speaker 3 (28:15):
And then you know, Luca and the Lakers are probably
that like fifth team, and like, you just don't want
all of those teams all stacked up in one conference, right,
But San Antonio shouldn't care about that. They should care
about how they're trying to compete with the Yoklahoma City
Thunder at the top of the conference. And if you
make a deal for Giannis. You can get it done
with something like Harrison Barnes and Keldon Johnson in either
(28:38):
of your two young guards Dylan Harper or Steph Castle,
just one of them and some draft compensation. If you
do that, your starting lineup becomes Dearon Fox, Devin Vassel,
Julian Champagnee, Giannison Tennecompo, and Victor wem Minyama. That is
a frightening combination of a duo that's impossible to score
(28:59):
on at the rim and Giannis and Wemby and super
athletes on the perimeter. Dearon Fox shooting the three super
well this year, Devin Vessel, Julian Champagnee traditional shooters, that's
shooting and two way talent on the perimeters, surrounding two
of the very best front court players literally in the
history of the league for Giannis and soon to be
for Victor Webbinyama. And you don't sacrifice much in depth.
(29:22):
You still have Steph Castle off the bench, You still
have Luke Cornett off the bench, you still have Jeremy
Sohan off the bench. That's probably the best top eight
in the entire NBA, even over a team like ok
See and you'd still have flexibility to make moves and
pivot off of that core if you need to. There's
a depth there of like literally three starting caliber awesome
(29:46):
guards there. You could flip one at some point in
the future if you needed to, say Steph Castle makes
a leap and you pivot off of the Aaron Fox
or whatever it is. It's not like you're tying yourself
into honest and sacrificing your entire future.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
It's a no brainer. You make the call.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
Maybe you get out bid, Maybe Orlando ends up jumping in,
Maybe Atlanta ends up jumping in.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Maybe Oklahoma City ends up jumping in. Who knows.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
But I think you make the call because you're the
one team that presents a real physical dynamic that Okac
could struggle with, and that's Giannis and Wemby completely shutting
down the rim and having the type of big athletic
guards that can make things a little bit tougher on
Okac's pull up jump shooters. It's an arms race, okay.
See he's a junger not and you're one of the
(30:30):
few teams positioned well enough to actually compete with them
in the coming years. I think it's something you have
to consider, what do you think will happen if OKC
approaches the Bucks and offers JDub plus salary filler, probably
Hartenstein with picks for Jiannis. For the record, I don't
think Sam Presty will ever do something like that, but
I think it's the best return that the Bucks can
get on Yiannis and instantly makes okay See the favorites
(30:52):
to win the title to potentially being more scary than
the twenty seventeen Warriors. Another question, do you think if
a move like that was on the table, Shouitt Adam
Silver stop it to straight up say no to this
trade because it would make the league so unfair.
Speaker 2 (31:05):
So here's the thing.
Speaker 3 (31:06):
I agree with you that if the thunder actually wanted Giannis,
they could have him. They've got all the draft picks,
they've got all the talented young players. They could certainly
make something like that happen. It's just an unnecessary risk
for oka See.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
So think, are it this way?
Speaker 3 (31:21):
You've already made yourself, as currently constructed, a substantial championship favorite.
We'll see how things go over the next month. There's
a lot of basketball games to be played, and okay
See definitely has a tougher December schedule, but at some
point in the next month, if things stay the same.
In our next contender rankings, I'm going to put Okac
in a tier by themselves at the top of the
(31:43):
league without any trade. Jannis has become a bit injury
prone in recent years. He's heard again has calf injury.
He's missed a bunch of playoff games over the course
of the last few years. So you could, yes, increase
your championship odds this season, but also have a higher
risk for some sort of derailing injury where if you
(32:06):
don't have Ja Dubb and you don't have a Yannis,
and you don't have an Isaiah Hartenstein, then you could
run into an issue where you become more beatable. This
season right now is currently constructed. They might not be
as much of a favorite as they would be if
they made a Giannis trade, but I think they're more
resilient to injuries right now because they're younger. They're built
(32:26):
in a way to where even if Jadub is out,
they can handle, you know, large chunks of the regular season.
I just think for Okay see, it's an unnecessary risk
for them, So I'd be stunned if they made a
Yianni's trade. Next question, do you buy the idea that
(32:47):
the Orlando Magic are a better basketball team without Palo
or is it just better spacing from Da Silva and
Jet Howard playing in place of Pallo couple things. I've
mentioned this a lot lately, but the Magic started their
turnaround before Palabun Karol got hurt. They were five and
two in the last seven games that Paalo played in,
(33:08):
and they had already started to flash some of those
higher end passing and driving kick sequences, some of the
spacing principles that we discussed when we had that conversation
surrounding putting Desmond Baine more in the play finishing spot
in the weekside corner when they're running action. That was
when Palo was still playing, and so it's one of
(33:29):
those things for me that like, yes, the team is
playing really good basketball right now. Specifically, they're moving the
ball more than ever. Their assist percentage is dramatically higher
than it was the entirety of this Palo in Fran's era.
In the last few seasons, they've gained some real momentum
as like a ball in player movement type of team
and They've had some improvement in some key areas with
(33:51):
their jump shooting, and they are starting to get out
and transition more, which is something we've been begging for
for Orlando forever. But they did start those trends before
Palo got hurt. So here's the thing. See what it
looks like when he comes back. There's a version of
this where he comes back and he just continues to
buy into that and he's more talented and as a team,
you look better. There's also a version where he comes
(34:12):
back and he makes things clunky and you lose some
of that identity. But ultimately, I think as long as
Palo's on the roster, you've got to try to see
if he can make things work in this system. And
I do want to give him a little bit more
credit than just saying, oh, Pallo's out, the Magic are
kicking butt again. They started this these winning habits before
(34:32):
Palow got hurt. I do still like this a lot
as a Yiannis destination for this reason. Paalo is, in
theory on paper, kind of a clunky fit in a
ball in player movement type of attack, and bringing in
the guy like Gianis is just dramatically better than Palo
could vault Orlando up to being a clear top tier
contender and far and away the best team in the
(34:52):
Eastern Conference, an unbelievable defense, rebound transition team, And yes,
there would be some clunkiness on offense, but I think
they'd be better than people. I think there's a lot
of natural synergy between him and a guy like Desmond
Bain too. I still like that as a Yiannis destination,
but take Gianna's trade and remove it from the equation.
You got to see what it looks like when Palla
comes back, because he was a part of his success
(35:12):
before he got hurt. Should the Warriors trade Buddy Healed
from Buddy Heeld and Moody for John Collins. I know
Collins isn't the perfect player slash fit, but I think
the Warriors can afford to give up some guard depth
with Seth and Melton coming in. Would love to hear
if you think this would help the Warriors. I agree
that they can afford to make some sort of consolidation
(35:33):
trade from the guard position, but I keep coming back
to offensive firepower. The Warriors are twenty third in offensive
raiding this year, yet just like last year, once again
in the latest example of Steph's absurd advantage creation and
why he's still one of the greatest offensive engines in
the sport. The Warriors with Steph Curry on the floor
(35:53):
this year have a one nineteen point three offensive rating
and it was one twenty last year. He continues to
be an elite NBA offense in and of himself. Why
are they twenty third in offense though? Because they have
a one toh eight offensive rating in eleven hundred and
sixty eight possessions. With Steph off the floor. They can't
(36:15):
score unless Steph creates it. And it's a problem even
with Jimmy on the floor, without Steph only a one
to twelve point six offensive rating, he hasn't been able
to carry the load. And that's another conversation to have
around Jimmy and the lack of offensive ceiling that we've
seen there. But ultimately, because of that, and because the
young guys like we talked about earlier and Kamina, Kamina
(36:37):
and Pods haven't popped offensively. You need firepower. You need
someone who can score the basketball. You need someone that
can raise the floor of this offense when Steph is
off the floor, and that ultimately needs to be the
kind of guy that they target. Whether that's a Trey
Murphy or it's a Malik Monk, or it ends up
being some other type of higher level offensive player. They
(36:59):
need to bring a higher end offensive floor to the
table through the trade market. That needs to be the
kind of thing that they're targeting. Hey Jason, longtime listener.
My question is this. I've always been of the mindset
that la should flip Reeves, given that Luca and Reeves
backcourt long term seems to lack too much athleticism and
foot speed to coexist. The problem always was whether Reeves
(37:22):
trade value could net enough to make it worth it.
Now the way he's playing currently having one of the
most efficient, high volume scoring seasons ever for a guard,
I'm wondering who you realistically think they could get for
him if it's worth it, and if you see a
potential long term fit with Luca, so they should hold
on to him. Keep up the awesome work. Thanks for
supporting the show. I really appreciate it. So this is
the thing with Austin. He's made himself so good that
(37:47):
you basically can't trade him unless it's gonna get back
a guy like Giannis there was a time when Yiannis
was when Austin, excuse me, was less consistent, and it
was like, yeah, you go for twenty three some night.
Speaker 2 (38:00):
Other nights he wouldn't.
Speaker 3 (38:02):
And the lack of that consistent offensive pop made it
so that his defensive limitations, because he's a lesser athlete,
that would pop up every once aile. Austin's a fundamentally
sound athlete, he just has athletic limitations, right, But like
some of those athletic limitations would become a bigger problem
because he wasn't as good offensively as he needed to
(38:23):
be to cover for that gap. Right, During those times,
I used to think about Austin trades and I'd be like, okay,
Like I really like Austin. I think that he, you know,
in the right system, could be the third best player
on a championship team if he's surrounded by lots of athletes.
But like, you know, maybe they'd be better served turning
him into a plus athlete, someone that is like maybe
(38:45):
not quite as good offensively, or maybe you attach him
to a pick to bring back a higher level guard
or whatever it is, but maybe the Lakers need some
more athleticism at that spot. Austin's become so good offensively
that any perceived potential upside that you get by bringing
in a better athlete would be dramatically undercut by the
(39:06):
fact that Austin is just a way, way better offensive player,
and that just kind of puts any conversation surrounding trading
him dead on arrival. Austin just went for forty and
ten again last night. He's literally averaging what twenty nine
seven and twenty nine six and seven on sixty six
(39:27):
sixty seven percent true shooting this year.
Speaker 2 (39:29):
He's like so.
Speaker 3 (39:30):
Unbelievably good now that it dramatically under it dramatically outweighs
any sort of downsides that come with his athleticism. So
if you're not getting a dude that is like legitimately
just better than Austin who is now, you know, he's
like a third team All NBA guy this year. So
if you're not getting back like a second team All
(39:51):
NBA guy in an Austin deal, it just doesn't make
sense to do it at this point. And he's just
the perfect guy to situate with Luca long term because
he can complete run the offense when Lucas out. Remember
the year where Luca had the injury. I think it
was twenty twenty two, and Jalen Brunson like had to
win a big playoff game on the road in Utah
(40:12):
or against Utah. It might have been at home, I
can't remember, but its in twenty twenty two. Jalen Brunson
took a game early in that series without Luca. That
was what made him the ideal Luca partner. He could
play off of Luca when Luca was there, and he
could step into that number one role when Luca had
to miss a game for an injury. Austin has clearly
demonstrated that he can be that kind of guy. At
(40:32):
that point, he's foundational to the Lakers and you can't
move off of him unless some sort of dramatically better
option shows up in the future. Thinking Basketball just made
a whole video about how the league about how the
league in general, but especially the Miami Heat, are purposely
running fewer pick and rolls. I think Miami is only
running something like thirteen pick and rolls per one hundred.
I definitely checked that video out. I think you might
(40:54):
be disappointed if you're expecting to see the Heat run
more pick and rolls. Eventually. So here's the thing I
think that the offense at the Heat are running is
a really fascinating bit of basketball philosophy, essentially, like why
do we run pick and roll? Why do we run action?
We do it to get an advantage. You do it
to try to force the defense to react if we
(41:15):
score enough going over the top of the screen. Eventually
they're big will come up to the level. If they're
big comes up to the level. Now they're defending it
three on two, we get the defense in rotation. Now
we're starting to get those skip passes for open threes
and guys cutting along the baseline and all the good
things that come when you get a three on two
on the offensive.
Speaker 2 (41:32):
End of the floor. Right, that's why you run pick
and roll. Why do the Miami Heat play the way
they play.
Speaker 3 (41:39):
Because they get their advantages through driving, by pushing the
ball up in transition, playing super fast. They get those
advantages the open man in the corner, the two on
the ball sequence as someone helps on a drive, they
get those with their transition pushes. And then in the
half court they just try to beat their man off
the dribble. Right like down the roster too, like You'll
see Pelo Larson just no offensive advantage catches on the perimeter.
(42:03):
Pelele will just throw a damn jab step and then
hit a gap and all of a sudden, the defense
reacts kick kick, open three or open shot for someone else.
Like they use dribble penetration to generate those initial advantages.
And it fits their roster because they don't really have
a lot of high level pick and roll players. They
got one and Tyler Harrow, but everyone else. It's like
Jaimehakez is at his best attacking downhill in semi transition
(42:26):
and turning his back to the basket and posting. Daveon
Mitchell is at his best just isoing a dude off
the top of the key and hitting him with the
dribble combination to try to beat him off the dribble
and get all the way to the basket, right, So
it fits their roster extremely well. Now, why did I
say in that Tyler Harrow video that I think they'll
eventually run more pick and roll. It's about variety. So
for instance, take the end of the Dallas Mavericks game.
(42:48):
For example, you put Naji Marshall on Tyler Hero and
Nazi's doing a really good job, and all of a sudden,
Tyler's not feeling comfortable beating him off the dribble. Well,
it'd be nice in that situation if you could still
go to your best player, because at the end of
that game, Tyler didn't seem to want the ball much.
But if you're running ball screens with Bam, maybe Tyler
is more engaged in the offense at the end of
(43:10):
that game, and your best offensive player has the ball
in his hands more as a counter when the actual
offense isn't working. And that's all I was saying is
like I expect over the course of the season for
the Harrow or the Hero Bam pick and roll to
at least occasionally be used. That doesn't mean they're going
to bail on the system. The system is perfect for them,
and on many nights it works great for Tyler. It's
(43:32):
an offense that I think will continue to be their foundation.
I just think they'll lean on pick and roll as
a counter a little bit more than people think as
we get deeper into the system. A couple more quick
ones before we get out of here. If you were
a GM, would you prefer to build around a top
tier superstar with slightly questionable character for the sake of example,
say prime James Harden or a second tier superstar with
solid character, someone like Jason Tatum. I'm just going to
(43:54):
keep it to these two. Would I rather build around
prime Jason Tatum or James Harden. It'd be Jason Tatum.
And a lot of that has to do with if
you're saying slightly questionable character. I think James Harden's a
good person and a good teammate. I think the main
issue with James Harden is his unwillingness to do the
work on the margins. He has been a big problem
for the Clippers defense during some of their losing issues
(44:14):
that they've had this season, and that's been an issue
throughout his career. A guy like Jason Tatum may not
provide that dramatic offensive upside, but he's just so well
rounded around the margins that he's going to be able
to anchor me on both ends of the floor in
a way that makes him easier to build around. So
for those two specific examples, I would take Jason Tatum.
Last question, Hey, Jason, longtime fan, been here since before
(44:36):
you had your own channel and everything was on the
volumes feed.
Speaker 2 (44:38):
Lol.
Speaker 3 (44:38):
What do you think about Kat to a cat for
a d trade for both sides. I think the salaries match.
AD gives the Knicks a higher ceiling things to his
defense if he reaches his peak again, and he's a
damn good offensive player too. He is averaging twenty five
and eleven on good efficiency. Sure, the Knicks would get
to the finals with Kat, but once you're there, do
you even have a puncher's chance with two great offensive
liabilities as your two best players? I think they'd get killed.
(45:00):
Of course, Ad also comes with a ton of risk
for Dallas. You get a big salary, but you stay
relevant and you can space the floor.
Speaker 2 (45:05):
Flag.
Speaker 3 (45:06):
Yeah, I like it as a roster balancing move for
both teams. For the Knicks once again, in that Celtics game,
Karl Anthony Towns was an absolute nightmare on defense, Batching
coverages early in the game, just making a bunch of
silly mistakes down the stretch, like chasing Jordan Walsh off
the corner when he's made three corner threes all season,
giving up an open layup like, just all sorts of
nonsense from Kat that continues to cost his team at
(45:28):
the end of big games. To me, putting him in
a situation like Dallas where he's anchored by centers and
he's playing at the four kind of like he was
in Minnesota is a better situation for him. And he's
a good offensive fit for a team that needs jump
shooting like you wouldn't believe. I really like that fit there.
And then for the Knicks, Anthony Davis, to your point,
actually gives you a legitimate athletic imposition to bring to
(45:51):
a finals matchup against in Oklahoma City. I think if
flat out makes him better on both ends of the floor.
I think Ad brings a vertical spacing role man short
role element to his game that is higher level. I
think he's a better post player than Karl Anthony Towns
in a large sample against elite defenses. I think he
handles double teams better. I don't think he's great at it,
but I think he's better than Kat at it. Like
(46:11):
I think, I think it would just be the kind
of move that makes sense for both teams. The Knicks
have more urgency, the MAVs don't. Well, Cat's two years younger.
I think there's a lot of reasons why that deal
makes sense for both teams. All right, guys, It's all
I have for today is always to sincerely appreciate you
guys for supporting us, in supporting the show. We'll be
back tonight on playback for Lakers Celtics. I'll see you
(46:31):
guys at four pm Pacific time. If we don't see
you have playback, We'll see you guys on Monday morning
for our weekly power rankings.
Speaker 2 (46:36):
I will see you guys then,
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