Best of The Doug Gottlieb Show: 02/19/2018

Doug's not sure the NBA fixed their All Star game in the long term but this year was a perfect storm of circumstances. He brings up the challenges to trying to change the playoff format in the NBA. Plus Villanova head coach Jay Wright joins the show to discuss this year's team compared to his championship team from a couple season ago.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is the best of the Dog Gottli Show on
Fox Sports Radio. Boom, What Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show
back in sunny, cool Crisp California. Yeah, we complain because
it's only fifty five degrees here. There's a bad day,
but a clear day, not a lot of smog. No fog.

(00:21):
Mama did in fact kick the breakfast with no hog.
Hope you had a great weekend. I hope you're enjoying
what I would think to be a day off President's
Day weekend. Man, do we have a good show for you?
Jay right? Um? Look, I don't often offer complete and
full uh disclosure, but I will in this case because

(00:42):
I don't know if the guys heard it. I just
record an interview with Jay right. Busy man, I'm gonna
pretend like it's live when we play it for you,
And if you're listening to that long, we already got
you hooked. Anyway, it was really really good, but I
want to do it more like a conversation because I've
interviewed him so many times and I feel like he's
a friend and and I just I don't know, Um,
I think you'll really enjoy the conversation I had with

(01:05):
j Wright. That's about an hour and a half from now.
Karon Butler, I did not record this. He'll be joining
us in studio here in twenty minutes. He here yet,
this is right down the streets here yet I don't
know Karn Butler. And then David Griffin is gonna join
us in the third hour, first two hours. If you're
listening to us driving around on serious x M A
E three, you've got plenty of time to download the
I Heart Radio app or find a Fox Sports trade affiliate.

(01:26):
The former general manager of the Cleveland Cavaliers, David Griffin,
will join us. Will ask him his thoughts on the
new look Cavaliers, which we saw twice before the All
Star All Star break. All right, let's talk All Star games,
shall we? Did they fix it? Yeah? Yeah, okay, yeah,

(01:46):
I believe what happened today and the ratings and the
reaction to the game a lot of it. Storm get
to that in a moment. First, dear Fergie, Okay, the
Stars Angle banner can be a very difficult song to
sing that. I think we all know, each one of us,

(02:06):
at some point in time have gotten the verses screwed up.
Don't act like you haven't. You've looked. You had to
look up at the screen and be like, wait, where
is the word somewhere? Mm hmmm. Right, So she did,
in fact get the words right. She wasn't intending this.
People have tried to make it like it's Roseanne bar

(02:27):
screaming the national anthem. And no, this was not like
third level, her level her. She was trying to protest
by clowning it. I just felt like Fergie was trying
to play the part of Marilyn Monroe singing to JFK.
The differences that song was happy Birthday she she sexually
sang to the then youngest president in the history of

(02:49):
the United States, John Fitzgerald Kennedy. It is long, It
is not an R and B song. And if you're
trying to do Marvin Gay, I don't know Marvin Gay.
Marvin Gay is not a friend of mine. But you,
my lady, or no Marvin Gay. It it didn't come
off as intended. That said, she did at least get

(03:11):
the words right, So we'll give her somewhat of a pass. Uh.
I like Pharoe Williams, it seems like he's doing the
Benjamin Button and aging backwards. I thought the choreography was great,
but got that music was just a racket, just a racket,
and people criticized just and Timber like like Justimling was great,

(03:32):
but like five or six of his best songs he's sang,
he danced, he was good, played little piano, little homage
to Prince. That's what the halftime show is supposed to be,
not we saw from Pharrell w Him's choreography great. It
looked like they were all having fun. It was well shot,
it was well lit. It was interesting. But when the
song is bad, it's like when you order something from

(03:53):
a great restaurant and like the ambiance is great, the
services good. The wine was good. You know, I had
some Brussels sprouts to the side. The plating was good.
How is the steak cold and undercooked? That was the
half time performance. All right, enough, let's get to the game.
Team Lebron wins, Lebron James UH All Star Game m

(04:14):
v P. Here's Lebron. After the game. I had a
real game feel to it. And it starts with us
all these guys right here, and these guys came in
with the right mindset this UH, this weekend and we
wanted to give our beautiful fans and our beautiful game
played in over two crunches in the world a show.
And uh, we said we wanted to do it, and
we came out and we did that. So, I mean,
we got the best league in the world, and we

(04:35):
want to continue to do that every single day. Look,
I here's what it was, a perfect storm. Last year
was so bad. I didn't even watch it. I'll be
gonest with you, but I I've I've watched some highlights
of how bad the defense was. I looked at the
number of three point shots taken. I've heard the narrative.
Plus it was in New Orleans, which means all those
dudes were going out, not that they weren't going out

(04:56):
in l A. Um, it was bad. It was so
So you start with the fact that last year's game
was bad, then you add in the Laura Ingram nontroversy controversy, right,
combine it with Lebron having that seven weeks stretch where
he had the worst plus minus in the league, and

(05:17):
the Calves all of a sudden looking re energized over
the last two games, and Lebron potentially coming to l
A and hey, where was the All Star Game played
Los Angeles. Paul George also the eye of affection for
many Lakers fans. You had five players from southern California
playing in the game. See had all these things kind

(05:40):
of working for you. With the NBA last year was
the worst. They gave ownership to Lebron and to Steph
which at least made those two want to play better.
Those two want to lead some You add in some
youth to the game, right, do you like? Joel Embiid
hadn't been there before? Felt like he was playing harder
blocking shot because he didn't. He hadn't been to a

(06:01):
bunch of All Star games. He couldn't take it for granted.
All of those things combined and I thought the All
Star Game was better. But part of it was the
bar was set so low from last year. It was
a culmination of things, combined with it being in Los Angeles,
who was trying to recruit two players to take their
max contracts, playing the house where Kobe built, No Lakers,

(06:25):
there's we did the whole thing. It worked, but will
it work long term? Where's the All Star Game next year?
Next year? Did Charlotte finally get it back? Next year?
Because next year. It feels like you're gonna have to
keep tinkering with it, keep trying to make it special. Look,
it's the hardest thing with being married is trying to

(06:47):
make each state session. My wife and I we we
did this last week. We're like, hey, let's just go
out and have dinner. We gotta sit here, my wife,
my my mom came down, watched the kids, who went
and had dinner and we hadn't. I've been traveling so
much with gone with Super Bowl and then gone in
New York. Last week. I had one night and we
went and had dinner. It was nice. But we talked

(07:09):
to each other several times a day on the phone.
We text each other kind of constantly. Like I can't
say that it was it. It's an effort to make
it special. It was seventeen years. Doesn't mean I don't
like her company, but like, okay, we've talked about that topic.
I know your stance on that topic. We talked right,
Like we talked about all these things. So it's hard.

(07:30):
So if it was me and I'm the commissioner of
the NBA, I keep tinkering with it. The first thing
is I think all teams should wear their traditional jerseys
home and road. I like that one was black. Team
Lebron was white. Team step was black. They put their
teeth logo on it. But I always thought one of
the cool things with All Star Games is when you're

(07:52):
wearing your own team's jersey and you're playing together. Let's
all wear our darks today balls and everybody else wears
the home whites. But you know, this year you had
two captains. Obviously, next year you run the possibility of
having the same two captains, or at least one of
those two captains. Again, do you have legends pick Next
year They're gonna televise the picts, which I love, which

(08:14):
I love um, but it also feels like, look you could,
you could. I like the idea of money and win
or take all make it more money, more money, more competitive,
And it was great they were playing for charity, but
like when you're playing for yourself too, and I helped.
I think the money this year helped them play a
little bit harder, at least in the in the last

(08:37):
part of the fourth quarter. So did they fix it temporarily? Yeah,
it showed that you can, at least in spots play hard.
They're getting a lot of credit for playing hard when
really was Joel and Bid blocked a couple of shots
early in the game, and then the last part of
the fourth quarter they did in fact compete and switched
screens and make some shots and foul each other to

(08:57):
pretend like they were playing hard. But let's not act
this was, you know, some Eastern Conference nineteen nineties series
where they're they're clotheslining each other, fighting over ever loose ball,
playing through pain and blood, sweat and tears to win
a game. For an All Star game, they played a
little bit better, a little bit more team oriented basketball
at both ends of the floor, but for a basketball game,

(09:20):
it was a tough watch for about three quarters. The
culmination of Laura Ingram Lebron possibly come into l a
playing in Staples Center, five guys from southern California trying
to show out on some level for the home, for
their family, for their hometown fans. The fact the league
was embarrassed last year made it better, But you probably
want to continue to reinvent yourself if you're the NBA.

(09:43):
Be sure to catch live editions of The Doug gott
Leap Show weekdays at three pm Eastern noon Pacific on
Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. Adam
Silver has some thoughts. And what I like about Adam
Silver is I would call him part pragmatists, part progressive.
But Adam Silver think as identified a problem which many

(10:06):
of us have discussed, which is the imbalance of power
between Western Conference teams and Eastern Conference teams. Here's his
thoughts on changing the playoff format. When we get to
the playoffs, should we be soon are we taking either
the best sixteen teams or even if we go eight
from the West, eight from the East, seating one through
sixteen going into the into the playoffs. And that is
something that has gotten serious attention or not not just recently,

(10:29):
but over the last few years at the league office.
So look, they're paying attention to it. It's very important
to note they're not changing it. So don't run around
at the office, don't go down to twenty four hour
fitness and be like, yo, I heard they're changing the
playoff format. Like, no, they're discussing it because it's what
smart people do. They discuss it and discuss it and

(10:51):
discuss it, and they discuss it some more. Maybe they
throw up some potential formulas and it's a great it's
in theory, it's great in practice, really hard. Um. I
do believe that the Western Conference is better, discernibly better.
Maybe maybe, Like as of right now, Minnesota is the

(11:16):
fourth best team in the West. Would they be better
than the fourth best team in the East, the Washington Wizards.
Probably not better in the Calves, Nope, Ben the Celtics
are we not raptors? Like the balance is actually a
lot more even than you think. You think Oklahoma City, like, man,
they got Paul George, and they got Carmelo Anthony, and

(11:38):
they got Russell Westbrook. And see if in Adams like,
they're in fifth in the West, which may speak to
the power of the West. But the Nuggets are in six,
the Trailblazer and seventh. The Pelicans are in eighth. The
Pelicans are eighth, and they don't have DeMarcus Cousins. The
worst isn't that strong, It's just not. The perception is
the West is strong because they have both the Rockets
and the Warriors, and the thought is the Spurs. But

(11:58):
if the West was so strong, then why have the
Spurs been able to be thirty five and twenty four
without Kawhi Leonard playing much of that first half of
the season. It's just not it's not that dominant. Additionally,
ultimately this will even itself out. It always does. At
some point the Philadelphia seventy six ers will be a
consistent playoff team, which they they're They're on the brink

(12:20):
of getting into the playoffs the first time since the rebuild.
The Knicks couldn't be this bad forever. The Celtics have
a ton of young talent. They're gonna be good for
a long time. We'll see if the Calves end up
losing Lebron James. Meanwhile, the Wizards, the Pacers, the Bucks
have Janison and the Koopo. They're gonna be good for
a long long time. The reason that it's super flawed

(12:43):
is you don't have balanced schedules. I'm a big balance
schedule guy. So you can't throw them into the same
pot when they don't have the same record. You have
to have East West, not just for rivalry sake, but
for context sake. Here's what I mean. This is the
problem with Big ten football. If you want to tell

(13:04):
me that the West is better in the East and
deeper than the East, all right, I'll buy it. I
still think it's deeper. I don't think it's that much deeper.
Like the Lakers are in what eleventh place, they're not
a good team. They're in eleventh places there in the
East as well, right the Jazz who have lost all
these different players, and like the Jazz arine tenth place,
like they're not great either. They wouldn't be great in

(13:26):
the East. But whatever you want to tell me. The
West is a little bit better. Fine, but the Western
Conference teams play against the Western Conference teams more, so
you can't say we're gonna do well. It's all six
best best sixteen teams because you can only go by record,
and if the Eastern Conference teams play against the Eastern
Conference teams more This is a lot like Wisconsin in
the in the Big Ten. You can't compare the the

(13:49):
the record of Wisconsin this year in the Big Ten
in football, who only played Michigan from the other side
and played them at home, with Ohio State, who played
Oklahoma at a conferen played Michigan, played Penn State, played
Michigan State. You can't or Michigan who played the Penn
State Ohio State um both on the road and then

(14:10):
had to go to Wisconsin. Unbalanced schedules makes it impossible
to evaluate the East versus the West, so I change.
It's simply an overreaction to the perception that the West
is dominant over the East, and it really isn't. The
Warriors are dominant, the Rockets seem to be dominant, but

(14:33):
if yet to do anything much in the playoffs. We
think the Spurs are always going to be good, but
they're going through a bit of a refresh here. But
they're still you know, they're winning, but they're not that
much more talented than anybody else, especially without Kawhi Leonard,
tell me where the depth of the West really is.
Do you want to tell me it's the Timberwolves. Fine,

(14:53):
but there's no no stat no record that would tell
you they are in fact dominant against the East or
against anybody in basket ball. So listen to what Adam
Silver saying. We've discussed it. It's interesting. We just don't
know a perfect plan yet. If you go top sixteen
teams regardless of record, would mean the thought would be
you'd have more teams from the West involved, But the

(15:16):
problem is that that's not really a reality. If you
went eight and eight, you're gonna go based upon record
and seeding teams, and that's not fair because they're the
context matters in the East plays more against the East.
There's not a balance schedule. If you're gonna completely remake
the schedule regardless of division and have everybody play each

(15:37):
other the same number of times, it's still not truly
a balanced schedule. But then, and maybe only then, could
you have a sixteen team winner take all, doesn't matter
where you are tournament. But until that happens, it's a
conversation that doesn't really fix the problem. Fox Sports Radio
has the best sports talk lineup in the nation. Catch
all of our shows at Fox sports radio dot com

(15:57):
and within the I Heart Radio app. And overhead coach
j Wright joined us on the Doug gott Leave Show
here on Fox Sports Radio. Jay, thanks so much for
taking time with us. Congrats on the wind and was
amazing and yet felt like Round Hug Day all over again. Um,
going into Saturday, what was your level of confidence that
you could get to win? We were felt good coming

(16:19):
to the game because we had gotten some guys back
and they had started to practice. You know, losing Phil
Booth was a blow to us and um, Eric Pascal,
It's is kind of weird how that happened, and we
found out on the way to the to the game
that he wasn't go to play. Um, so just kind

(16:39):
of weird circumstances every team goes through doing a year.
And the other thing was we had two other players, um,
Jermaine Samuel's and Colin Gillespie broke their hands also, so
they didn't practice for a long time and they were freshmen.
So it's we've been kind of getting guys back a
little bit. We've been piecemell on it. So going into
this avior game, we were better than we looked in

(17:02):
the two losses. Okay, So, um, you walk into that
building and one of the things that I think has
helped in games like that for you is because you've
dominated the Big East, you're everybody's biggest game, right and
so even though you have some young pieces you mentioned
Gillespie and Samuel's and but you know, and and Amari
didn't play obviously last year, but everybody else you've played

(17:26):
in environments like that. How much does that help you
process the zoo that was the Cintas Center and where
your guys could focus even right after the jump. All
that's a very important point, Doug, because our guys are
used to that. You know, it's been, um since the
New Big East started kind of in the last four years.

(17:48):
You Um, even in the first year of the New
Big East, you know when we went to Xavier, well
that was the first time that that villaan Ova played Xavier,
you know, in the new league, so it was a
big game. UM. So our guys everybody comes in this
program is used to that now and you know that, um,

(18:11):
everywhere we go where you know, where the the big game,
and uh, they don't really know any other way, which
is pretty cool because in the beginning it was you know,
in the first year was kind of new. Second year
you had a little bit of experience. But now the
guys that are here that they really don't know any
other way and they actually enjoy those atmospheres. Am I

(18:31):
crazy to say this team has more more talent, uh
than the national championship team. Now you're you're probably right,
it does. But as you know, um, just having talent
doesn't um ensure you that type of success. You know,
probably you know, probably the top five, top six, we

(18:55):
probably do have more talent, but there's so many intangibles
that a guy like Ryan Chidiacano as a as a
senior and Daniel Chef who as seniors brought to that team.
You know, we don't have any seniors on this team. Um,
so that's a little bit different, but it also gives
us the chance to improve more than that team had
the ability to do at the end of the year. Yeah.

(19:16):
And the other part about improving is granted, Like you
know you're you're down floor guys, Um going back a
couple of weeks ago or a week and a half ago, right,
so you mentioned too broken hands, booth, Pascal, you know,
have all these injuries. Uh, that might actually help you
here for the stretch run where um, you know Dante
has to take a bigger role. Um that you know,

(19:38):
you can't be can't be passing well the guys that
you had, the guys in that room had to kind
of explore all the different attributes, especially at the offensive end,
that might help you for the stretch. Unfair definitely exactly.
That's what I meant earlier when I said, um, we
we weren't uh we we were feeling much better going

(20:01):
into this Avia game than we actually looked in the St.
John's game and the Providence game. For instance, and no excuses,
everybody's going through it during the season, just that it's
it's why we felt better going into Xavier. Um the St.
John's game, you know, on the way as we're leaving
for the game, uh, you know, we find out Eric

(20:22):
Tosca is not playing well. Jermaine Samuels was coming off
a broken hand. He wasn't supposed to play in that game.
He had only come back for one day. So he
plays in the St. John's game with literally half a
day practice and thinking he's not gonna play well. He
you know, then he gets to play in that game,
and we get a couple of days practice and we

(20:42):
got Providence. He plays in the Providence game a lot more. Um,
you know St. John's game. Colin Gillespie had only had
a game or two back from a broken hand, so
he hadn't played that much. Now he has to play
a lot. So it didn't look good in the St.
John game of the Providence game. But those games really
help those guys because they played a lot. Now we
go at Xavier. Colin Wesbie has a great game at Xavier.

(21:06):
Jermaine Samuels gives us great minutes off the bench and
um Damir Cosby Brown treat another freshman plays really well
because he had to play a lot in those games.
Even though we lost, he played a lot. Yeah, Jay
right joining us on the dug Otlip Show. I guess.
I guess people think it's a weird year. And it's
maybe because the Kentucky's the u c l as the

(21:28):
Dukes maybe not not as down as the other programs.
Can's obviously sustained some losses, but still the top the
Big Twelve, tied to top the Big Twelve. I think
it's because Indiana probably not gonna make deternament. I think
it's because the blue Bloods might be maybe are a
little bit down, although you guys are quickly becoming a
college basketball blue blood. How would you if you had
to characterize this season to somebody who hasn't been paying attention.

(21:50):
Would you say it's a down year? Would you say
it's a blue bloods? How would you characterize it? Yeah?
I would. I would characterize it exactly how you said
that it's it's a down year for the blue Bloods
in the regular season. But I'm sure those guys are
looking at it. Let's let's say the Kansas is the
even the Texas is, the Duke's, the the Kentucky's, you know, nobody,

(22:16):
even Michigan State. You know, they're at the top, but
maybe not playing as everyone expected them to. You know, um,
you know Indiana. I'm sure those guys are saying, you
know what, this is our chance to struggle a little bit.
During the regular season. We don't get to do that

(22:36):
a lot. But maybe we get hot at the at
the end of the season and we get hot in
the tournament. I don't I don't hear anybody saying, you
know what, I hope we get matched up against Kansas
in the second round. And I hope we get matched
up against Kentucky in the second round. Nobody saying that.
You know, um, there's place I used to work. ESPN.

(22:58):
They've they seemingly have handed out the National Player of
the Year trophy to Trey Young. And I like Trey
and I know you've interacted with him, and I know
like he's not there's not there's no unlikable part of
him as a kid, and he's put up remarkable, remarkable numbers.
But I watched Jalen play and look, I mean, it's
one thing to average twenty game and five assists and

(23:20):
less than two turnovers a game, to shoot fifty four
from the field as a point guard forty three and um,
your guys defensive numbers are off the charts, your twenty
four and three. You just go into two Xavier and
beat them on their home turf in and what was
an absolute zoo of an atmosphere before that game, and
you just silence that crowd. Um, give me your sense

(23:41):
from a guy who's coached players of the Year player
of the year candidates, you know what, what about Jalen's
year has been special for you to coach? Well, I
appreciate you mentioning that and and describing his his UH
numbers as you did, because you know, when you're coaching
the guys and you're telling them that you don't have

(24:03):
control over whether you're National Player of the Year or not,
you know it said it's all about it's about a
hype machine, you know. And um, as you said, you
know ESPN does a great job of that, And UM,
I can't, you know, I can't coach the guys and
say we don't want to concentrate on that stuff. Let's
let's be the best player you can be. And then

(24:23):
let's see what our destiny is at the end, and
then go out and be promoting it all the time
because and then you're not legit, but it is. It's
it's you stated it very well. If you look at
efficiency and a guy that's a leader, he's a point
guard and as a you look at his numbers and

(24:44):
what his team's doing. Jalen could go get thirty five
every night with these, but he plays the game to win.
He plays the game to lead his team. There's a
great play at the end of the Xavier game where
we either the shot crocks, there's there's like forty five
seconds left, we have a ball, so there's a shot
clock differential. We have to take a shot. They're going

(25:04):
to get the ball back for the last shot. It's
a fifteen point game or something like that. He runs
pick and roll. He's got a wide open shot to
get a three, and he chooses to throw it underneath
and get it dunk for Eric Pascal. So you know,
if he's going for numbers, he gets the three, but
he gets his teammated dunk. That's what a great player does.
And um, I'd love to see him get Player of

(25:25):
the Year. But you know, we're not gonna work to
do that. I thank you for mentioning it. I think
he's the best player in the country. I think he's
the best leader in the country. I think he's the
most efficient player in the country. Um, and I feel
bad sometimes when I see the hype machine for Trey Young.
And like you said, if Trey Young wins it, he's
a great kid and a hell of a player, you're

(25:45):
not gonna be upset about it. But I do, I
really do believe that Jalen is the best I agree
with you. How does he lead? Because he doesn't strike
me as being a yeller and a streamer, but but
he obviously leads. Is it simply by example? Does he
talk to guy like? What is his his leadership style?
You know? The final piece of his leadership style is

(26:09):
starting to get into guys faces. And we're gonna have
practice today and the highlight of all the highlights of
that game that we're going to show the staff is
Jalen after they score in transition, getting up and getting
in mcal bridges his face because he didn't step up
and stop the ball in transition. And that's something that

(26:31):
that Jalen doesn't like to do a lot, but we're
trying to get him to do to be the final
piece because he leads by example. By academically, he graduates
in three years. He's a machine academically. He's the hardest
working guy on the team. He's in the gym first
and last. Every day. He eats the right way. He's
the most mature person in this program and the most committed,

(26:55):
including me. He's more mature than me. He is incredible
in terms of how he leads his life. But the
final pieces, he's got to come out of him so
and get uncomfortable and get into his teammate's faces at
the right time. He did that at Davior and we're
gonna accentuate that more than anything else he's done. You know, Look,

(27:17):
there's a piece out there. I think he asked me
and actually dot com has Roten has written a piece
today which I was reading earlier coming in. I always
talks about over the last five years, you guys have
been the best program, uh in college basketball, and kind
of here's the journey. Yet four those five years, we've
talked about in the past that you guys haven't made
it out of the first weekend. So you gotta you
gotta it's a little bit of draw. You gotta be lucky,

(27:38):
you gotta be healthy, you gotta make shots. Off of
the year you won national championship. You went the first
two months of the season without making shots, and then
in the tournament you made so many shots that you
just blew the doors off of people. I mean, you
beat Oklahoma by forty four points in the national semifinal,
but even that took a last second shot to beat
North Carolina, So that everything kind of has to work out.
But does it Does it feel like that kind of

(27:59):
special year? You know, it does, Doug, But those years
when we lost the second round, it did? Man? Uh,
you know, maybe I don't know, Maybe that has something
to do with why are we're losing the second round
sometimes that I've feeling so good about him? I don't know.
I and I've you know, I've tried different little things

(28:22):
as a head coach and and what I've learned over
those those five years because we've had great regular seasons. UM,
it's just you know, you gotta do. You gotta do
what you do. You gotta do the best you can,
make the best decisions you can, and each year is unique. UM.
For instance, this year, you know, we're coming down the

(28:44):
stretch here where like we we feel like we can
get a lot better. We're just getting guys back. We
haven't We don'tna Phil Booth back yet. He hasn't even
practiced yet, just got his cast off. So we feel
like we can keep improving at the end, where those
other years at the end of the year, we were
just trying to keep everybody to see stay fresh because
we had everybody, you know, and except for last year.
Last year we only had seven guys because we you know,

(29:06):
we we lost the Mary Spellman. Um. You know, we
had still Booth out for the season last year. So
every year is different, but I always feel like it's
the year and I've learned that you've got to make
the best decision you can, do the best you can,
and then at the end of the year, your destiny
will reveal itself to you and you just gotta live
with it all right, last thing on the conference, and

(29:26):
I know you were all supposed to show for the
conferences either we cover or that we play in, and like, look,
this is a league to which um, I thought everybody
thought St. John's would be better. Um, And obviously they
were they were good in the night they played you
and you guys couldn't make a shot, um, And you
know George Town's rebuilding to Paul's rebuilding. But the rest
of the league by and large was great out of conference,

(29:46):
I mean great out of conference. And yet now it's
beating up on each other. Now it's beatne themselves. And
so you know Marquette, they had a big win over
the weekend, but you know, there and you guys went
in there. One this year is opposed to last year.
But they're below five. H Now, what looked like the
deepest league in the country feels like a league to
which you feel five teams will probably get in and
I don't know who else get you know, like you

(30:09):
gotta all right, the seton Hall still alives. How would
how would you, um, if you're trying to be fair
to how good this league is as opposed to the
rest of the country. You've seen it all, you've coached
against it all, You've played the Gunzagas of the world,
you played Tennessee already this season. What are your thoughts
on the depth of quality teams within the conference? Well,
it's too interesting. Points you brought up there first I'll

(30:31):
address the depth of the conference. But the second point
that's really interesting is how when the conference is really
good top to bottom, how you can actually hurt each other.
You know, um, I think this year topped a bottom
one to ten. I don't even know who's ten is
the Paul ten because I look at them all the same,

(30:53):
but you know the Paul twice depot went into Xavier
and almost had Xavier beat St. John's at the bottom,
beat us, and I I wasn't and beat too. Right,
they do maybe Duke at Madison Square Garden, which let's
be honest, that's more Duke's home court than St. John's
home court. Yeah, exactly. And we played at St. John's

(31:18):
and Law and won by seven. So when they came
in here and we found out that Prescott wasn't playing
for a game, we we we all put up, man,
this is gonna be brutal. And they lost their best
player Lovette. Marcus LaVette is arguably better than Ponds, and
he didn't play this year. That's what happened to them

(31:39):
in the in the Big East season, and then they
started to figure out out how we're gonna do this
with autum so I think top to bottom. If that,
if they're the worst team and Xavier or sort of
one of the best teams, it's the best it's ever been.
And I'm even including the old Big East days because
you know, in the old Big East days, the great

(32:00):
ones at the top at the bottom were Old DePaul
at the bottom, of Rutgers at the bottom. Even before that,
when we would have like back in the eighties, when
we would have like an eight nine game, you know,
might be you know, maybe BC Um, you know Seaton Hall.
Back then, it might they maybe you had two teams

(32:21):
that were down. Remember used to have the old eight
nine game. There was a single game both of them
might be down, and then maybe the seven other teams were.
But this this year, one through ten, when we go
to that tournament, everybody in this league knows whoever's ten.
But do you imagine if Saint John's ten. You got
to play them at the Garden first game and you

(32:42):
so that's one part, but the second part of his
because of that, you mentioned it, like Marquette, we won
like a one or two point game at Marquette. This
year they might be on the bubble for some tough losses,
but they were they were they lost to St. John's,
they it might hurt them, even though they did really

(33:03):
well out of conference. So it's it's it's those numbers
of who makes the tournament and what's the best conferences.
It's really difficult to determine. Now what's happened to you guys.
It happens in the Big Twelve, honestly. And you know
the league I played in where where when you have
those ten team double round robin leagues and the team
when everybody's kind of alike, and you know, you beat

(33:23):
up on each other, and you look at the well
they have nine conference and I was like, yeah, all
those teams are good as opposed to you know, there
are other leagues to which the bottom there's a definitive
And if you play, for example, in the Pac twelve,
if you play Washington State twice, you know, and you
play uh, You're that's that's two wins, right, So if
you play Washington and you play Cal twice, that's four
wins you have. Whereas there there are four wins you

(33:43):
can chalk up in the Big Twelve or in the
Big East because those the teams at the bottom are
just not that far away from the teams to the top,
and then you look at and then there could be
a year, for instance, like last year, where the top
six are good and there's a clear separation between the
bottom four. So it works out. You get six teams in,
you get sixty of your teams in at the conference.

(34:06):
That's a hell of a year for your conference. But
it works out because there's a separation between the bottom
four and that the numbers work out. You don't hurt
each other, you know, but when it's real strong one
through ten, you can hurt each other. Well, listen, it's
good to see your team get back getting healthy. Phil, Phil,
when do you when do you think we'll see him?
Will he play against Creton? You believe Saturday? I think

(34:28):
we have a good shot against Creighton. Um, we're gonna
try him this week and see if we can get
him for any type of minutes against the poland Wednesday.
All right, well, listen, get out to practice. I know
you got some film to watch in the meantime. Congrats
and to win Austin to watch this team and uh,
I cannot tell you how much respect I have for
the season and the way in which Jalen carries himself
it's it's been amazing to watch. I hope selfishly, I

(34:50):
hope he comes back for another year, but obviously he's
done so far just about as much as you can
do in three years of playing college basketball. I agree
with you Adercent on that man. Thanks Jay, Thanks do
talk anybody pleasures mind j Right from Villanova joining us
on The Doug gott Leap Show. Be sure to catch
live editions of The Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays at three

(35:11):
p m. E ster noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio
and the I Heart Radio app. And now Lebron James
versus Laura Ingram took center stage all weekend long. Here's
Dan Patrick's take on that face off. I love the
fact that Lebron James put himself out there. If Michael Jordan,

(35:31):
Tiger Woods, and Derek Jeter weren't comfortable, that's fine. That's
on them. I don't it's not I don't even have
to agree with what one of these athletes says. I
don't have to agree with what Colin Kaepernick does or
says Malcolm Jenkins. I don't have to agree with it,
but I have to look at it and understand that
you're putting yourself out there. You're willing to be involved

(35:53):
in the conversation. You're looking, is there a solution? Can
I just sit here and just play a game? You
know that then if you don't say anything, then somebody's
gonna say, how do you just play basketball? And you
don't care about these social issues? You don't care about
gun laws or the n r A or Yeah, So
these athletes are put in a real conundrum there. Look,

(36:15):
I was embarrassed by with Laura Ingram said. I just
was because I just don't like the idea that Laura
Ingram works for Fox News. If you missed it last
week she called out Lebron James because in a piece
I think it was on the Uninterrupted Run, Right, is
that one? What was on UM? He said that the

(36:36):
president doesn't care about people, but he used some terse words.
And what I what I really don't like is she
went to Dartmouth, she went to Virginia, UM, and I
felt like her judgment was not based upon what he said,
but from his lack of a college education. Right, she had, Look,

(36:57):
if you want to pick apart any part of my
me debating, you pick apart the substance of my debate,
don't pick upart the person, because the truth is that
Lebron though he did not go to college, and I
don't agree with everything he says. I don't agree with
a lot of things he says, are a lot of
things he does. I can listen to him, though, and
understand he's a pretty intelligent person. And I felt like

(37:17):
it was an attack on his intelligence, not because he
appeared to be unintelligible, but because he didn't go to college.
And that isn't a mistake of arrogance, all right, That
is the that is the type of elitism which some
on Laura Ingram side would would accuse others of. Yeah,
I do think it's generally a better, better, better thing

(37:40):
to do is to go to college surround yourself with
people trying to obtain social and literal education. But Lebron
James has lived, has become a pretty good story and
pretty good leader in UH in the community. It has
done a lot of things to help other kids get
to college. And to simply say he's unintelligent because of
something he said, and maybe the way in which you

(38:00):
took it, I thought was elitism at its worst. At
its worst, it was just a bad look all around.
Maybe the most impressive part about it wasn't that Lebron
spoke out and Lebron took offense to it, because that's
who Lebron has always been. But it's that he pointed
out in his first response to her that she got

(38:21):
what she wanted because they're talking about it, which is
where I think everybody is torn. Do I do I
fight back or do I pretend like she didn't exist?
It's really it's a it's a very hard place to
Lebron to be in. Now here's the part though, that
I will um. I will challenge Lebron and Lebron's defenders

(38:42):
on I have no problem with Lebron, James or anybody
else speaking out on politics, but if you take a
political stand, you have to be prepared for people to
counter that political stand with their own beliefs. Again, I
don't like what Laura Ingram said, and her point was
not too All she could have done was say, if
she thinks that the president does care about people, point
out why she thinks the president cares about people, and

(39:03):
it makes his remarks seem unintelligent or ill informed. She
didn't do that. She simply did name calling elitist. You
didn't go to college. And by the way, she even
screwed that thing up. Then she made up. As someone
once said, shut up and dribble. No one once said that,
you just said it. Don't quote somebody something that's not
a quote. I hate that. Uh. The only thing worse

(39:27):
than that is copying somebody's quote and then pretending to
like it's your own. What's in a name? I said that?
Actually that was Shakespeare, right. That's the only thing that's worse.
But the only the one thing the Lebron and any
of these other politically active athletes need to understand is
I have no problem with you thrusting yourself into political discussion,
but understand, political discourse comes at a price, and that

(39:49):
means that your stance can be, uh can be slaughtered
by the other sides. Facts. Fox Sports Radio has the
best sports talk line up in the nation. Catch all
of our shows that Fox sports Radio dot com and
within the I Heart Radio app. David Griffin joins this
former Caves general manager. You like that, Jim, Are you
a fan of David Bowie? You're David Bowie guy. Of course, absolutely,

(40:12):
I'm not even that much. Yes, Well, like, look I
I do have a thought on any kind of classic
rock or even rock or even oldies radio right like
these have The world has spoken and said these are
great songs, classic songs. So even if you don't like
the genre, you know at least it's the best of
that genre. That's the reason that you can go back

(40:33):
and listen to any sort of seventies, eighties, nineties, sixties,
best of it literally has been decided, has been filtered. Um,
it has been judged, and the verdict is these are
the best of what we got. Yeah. No, I agree
with that. I'm a sheep in that way myself. If
you tell me it's good, I believe it good enough. Okay,
So let me get Let me get your reaction on

(40:55):
what had been wrong with the Cleveland Cavaliers. As a
guy who had run that team up until the end
of last season, and you saw how much they struggled mightily.
They did have some injuries. What were your thoughts on
what exactly was what was what was the cause not
the symptoms, what was the cause of the illness with
the team? Yeah? So, I mean they were just spiritually broken, um,

(41:18):
And I think you could see it. It happened about
the time that Isaiah and Triston came back from injury,
I think they won seventeen of eighteen or eighteen of
nineteen at one point. And when you have fewer mouths
to feed on a team, it's a lot easier, and
they were really playing well. Their rotations had made perfect sense. Uh,

(41:39):
Kyle Korver and Chaining Fry were number one and number
two during that winning stretch on their team in terms
of plus minus um in each rotation they were playing
was was plus to the point where they were actually
better when Lebron sat down than at any time in
Lebron's time back in Cleveland. Everything was clicking for them,

(42:02):
and I think what happened was when Isaiah and Tristan
came back, it changed both the starting lineups and the
bench lineups, and no rotation made sense anymore. You had
a lot of ball dominance in that first group and
not nearly enough defense with Isaiah and vice versa. You
you had a situation where the bench also wasn't able

(42:22):
to get stopped, but they didn't have enough playmaking and
play creation, so the fit was just all wrong. When
their pieces were healthy, and unfortunately they were able to
kind of swath the decks and start over again. Okay,
Now they're also helped out though by Dan Gilbert, who
I know. Like it's mixed in any any any post relationship,
it's mixed. There's good, there's bad. The one thing he

(42:44):
should get credit for is this has the potential of
financially being really damaging to the team in the future.
Right if Lebron does in fact doesn't opt out and
he you know, he sticks with this current contract and
they keep this, they keep what they had have. Uh,
it could be over a hundred and fifty million in
luxury textures. So there is something to the owner going like, hey,

(43:06):
do what you gotta do to try and fix it. Correct, Yeah,
no question. And even in the short term he went
seven million more to the bat in terms of tax.
So if you're a Cavs fan, Dan's exactly the kind
of owner you want because he's all about delivering championships
and he's never once blinked at doing what was necessary

(43:26):
to put his team in the best position to win.
And and that's what you asked for a right. Originally
it looked like they were trying, Uh, they're trying to
make a move for DeAndre Jordan's and ultimately they couldn't
get that one done. We know what was done. What's
your reaction to the moves that they made. Well, first
of all, I think Kobe Altman and his team did
just a truly remarkable job of of playing the cards

(43:49):
they were dealt in the off season. They were dealt
and almost untenable situations, and they found a way to
thrive in all of that adversity. But that collection of
deals they made put them in a really unique position
to be infinitely more competitive in the here and now
and have a far greater sustainable future. Uh, the Larry
Nance acquisition is a huge one. His defensive versatility is

(44:13):
a really really big deal. But it gives them a
similar rolling, dynamic finisher that DeAndre Jordan's might have. But
it gives it to them in the form of a
guy who has enough versatility to switch in the perimeter
and when you're gonna match up with Houston or Golden State,
and even with what Toronto is doing, now, you know
they're moving bodies involved so much better. The Cavs teams

(44:36):
have not traditionally defended that very well. The Cavs defense
is always good in the playoffs, when you can load
up opposite of pick and roll, and if you move
bodies and ball, you can really put them in jeopardy.
So the addition of nance was huge in that regard,
and I think Rodney Hood is going to be a
real lex factor as well. I do to David Driffin

(44:56):
hosts Deals and Dungs every Saturday on Sirius X m
NBA Radio, be heard multiple times every week on Serious
Sex m NBA Radio as well. He's kind of to
be our guest of course. Most recently he was the
general manager of the Cleveland Cavaliers, who went to three
straight NBA finals and and one one two years ago. Okay,
so um, I have I have two flaws that I

(45:17):
found with the acquisitions. Can I hit you with him? Alright?
First one is the same problem they had before. What
happens when Kevin Love gets back? Yep, And I think
that's fair. I think what's interesting is because Kevin is
such an elite defensive rebounder, He's actually much better defensively

(45:37):
than people give him credits for. I think people want
to believe Kevin is not a creative to the group defensively,
and he actually is. So I think having the Larry
on the court and having Tristan on the court either one.
It gives them the opportunity to always keep a high
level defensive presence on the floor that pairs well with Kevin.
So I think the fit with Kevin's gonna be really,

(45:59):
really good. I think the question is going to be
how do they keep all those wings happy, how they
how do they feed all of those mouths they have
in the backcourt and still keep the front court as
sound as it will be with Kevin's presence, because again,
when you're an elite defensive rebounder and you shoot from three,
you're a really vital piece to a team led by

(46:21):
Lebron right and and he's also one of the things
he's been able to is play the five for them,
which opens up the lane for Lebron playing the four.
But if you put him at the five, now that
means you sit Tristan, you you or you're sit nance
and you're playing with those wings. So you almost have
and he's going everybody know Kevin Love is going to play.
You need his offense. You don't pay him max money

(46:41):
to have him sit. Even if he plays only thirty
minutes a game, that's still thirty minutes to which you
gotta juggle, juggle the roster. Second part is, um, look,
this whole thing is based upon their ability to compete
at the very top level. And though yes you'll have
more ball movement and less ball dominance, one of the
things that hate it work during your tenure there was

(47:02):
you had somebody opposite Lebron who could go get his
own shot. And I don't see that on this roster.
Am I missing it? Yeah? So I think Jordan Clarkson's
somebody that they're gonna hope can do more of that
in in big game situations than he ever has before.
Obviously he's never been in a situation where he's been
he's been asked to do that in playoff basketball. But

(47:24):
Jordan is a guy that can go get a shot.
The other thing that Rodney Hood does that I think
makes them really interesting is Robby is just a basketball play.
He can a script escape, dribble left or right. He
can hit a pull up, so he's not going to
be stuck with it. Goes swing, swing, and he has
to shoot whatever shot he gets. He's going to be

(47:44):
able to put himself in position like a basketball player
to get to a shot. Now, it might be a
mid range pull up, but if you're efficient with that,
you're in good shape. I don't disagree with you that
Kyrie's absence is going to be felt in in the playoffs,
and the deeper they go in the playoffs, you feel
it more. But I think there thought is that between

(48:04):
Jordan Clarkson and Hood, they'll have enough secondary playmaking and
facilitation to be able to absorbable. David Griffin joining us
former general manager of the Cleveland Cavaliers. Most recently, of course,
you can hear him on serious XM NBA radio. He
joins us on the Doug Gottlieb Show. Um, look, it's
an impossible, uh question to put you on the spot,

(48:24):
but um, of course I have to ask it, and
I want your most honest opinion. It's possible, but let's try. Okay,
So but look, I mean it's a possible to No,
I don't think. I don't know if you unless you know,
if you know, if you feel free to blow it out.
Do you think legitimate this this changes the likelihood of
Lebron staying or leaving. You know, I think it probably

(48:48):
puts a greater likelihood that he stays. Just because he
can see a sustainable group that he could play with.
Now again you pointing this out, Dan is gonna have
to be comfortable with an all in payroll of more
than a quarter of a billion dollars in order to
achieve it um. But I think, as Lebron, as you
look to the future, this younger, more athletic group that

(49:11):
gives you a larger, larger margin of error for the
regular season, even if they may not be quite as
well built for the finals themselves. Because the margin of
error will be so much better, his experience in the
regular season will be an awful lot more enjoyable than
it was at the beginning of this year. So I
think it puts them in a better position. I still

(49:33):
think that if he makes the decision to go elsewhere
for everything he does for Northeast Ohio, I think he's
earned the right to do it. But I certainly think
this gave them the best chance to keep them they've had.
Here's let me present to you the counter argument. If
he feels reinvigorated playing with younger players, couldn't the Lakers

(49:54):
then use that as part of their sale. Hey man,
you come here, we got a bunch of young dudes
that you'll love playing with two and will put another
superstar around you and we'll have more cap flexibility than
the team that you're playing with in Cleveland. Sure, and
and Philly, I think gives them a similar situation of
a bunch of young guys uh that are really really
potential stars in the making. Um. I think they could

(50:16):
put themselves in a position financially where they could be
uh looking to add some big talent as well. So, yes,
there's absolutely threats to Cleveland in a way that I
don't think there were before. And I think it's because
Lebron has already won the championship there and I think
to some degree he feels like he's delivered on what
he promised and so now he's in a situation that

(50:38):
whatever box it is he's going to check with the decision.
He can do that without feeling like he owes something
to Cleveland. And I think that's meaningful. And as I said,
I think he's earned that. David great stuff Man check
out his radio show. It's called Deals and Dunks every
Saturday on Sirius x m NBA Radio. He also pops
on other shows on Serious x m NBA Radio and
hopefully he'll join us again as well. David Griffin, David,

(51:00):
thanks for joining us, Thanks so much. Pleasures always always
mind