May 21, 2018 • 39 mins
Doug talks about the Warriors absolutely crushing the Rockets in game 3 of the Western Conference Finals. He explains why the NBA's regular season is a lot like checkers, and why the playoffs are more like chess. Plus 5x NBA All Star Tim Hardaway joins the show to discuss the Warriors dominance and whether the Cavaliers can continue their comeback against the Celtics in the East.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is the best of the Doug Gottlieb Show on
Fox Sports Radio. Boom one Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show,
Fox Sports Radio. Out here in uh slightly overcast post
thunderstorm Las Vegas as uh Las Vegas recovering from a
wild weekend big concert. Also the billboards a ward showing
(00:24):
Oh yeah, by the way, they got a hockey team
gonna play for the Stanley Cup Finals. That is that
is absolute craziness. It's Southern California all over again. We'll
get to that. That parallel upcoming on the Doug Gottlieb Show.
But it's the anniversary of Coaches Versus Cancer. This is
the eleventh annual Coach Versus Cancer Las Vegas Golf Classic.
(00:46):
We're bringing you some of these coaches who have bound
together to fight and try and eradicate the world of cancer.
More on that upcoming. But um matter of fact, Lon
Cruger is gonna join us seas. In fact, the host.
He started this when he was the head coach at
un l V. He was the coach of Trey Young
with let the country and scoring and assists. Will get
his thoughts on the NBA playoffs on Trey Young and
(01:08):
on the lottery where where he fits in best that
have coming In just a fifteen or twenty minutes or so,
we will get to a little of the hockey and uh,
and a little on Major League Baseball, but a lot
on the NBA and and not the most entertaining games
in the world unless you're a fan of the two
home teams over the weekend. Calves blow out the Celtics
(01:32):
and the Warriors Warriors eviscerate the Rockets in the second half.
I mean there there should no longer be a written
definition of the term boat race. All they have to
do is show highlights of the second half Rockets Warriors
yesterday and go, oh, that's what being boat raced is, right, Yeah,
(01:53):
giving up, uh, this is not this is a correct
stat giving up uh, sixty seven need two points in
the second half, seventy two. Now, part of it is
made worse when your backups come in and hit a
bunch of shots, even in garbage time. But one twenties
six to eighty five was the final score, and it
felt like one. It really did. And you know, among
(02:19):
the things everyone's talking about today the Steph Curry going
nuts in the second half and yelling this is my
blanket house. Uh, it's the overall dominance of Curry and
Durant when they're both hitting. How much different is this
team and the juxtaposition of that with with Chris Paul
(02:41):
and James Harden, who combined to make twelve of thirty
two shots. But I think that that some of this
is the we we so often fall in the trap
of regular season, regular season, regular season, and it's it's
hard because though there are Cologne games in the regular season,
(03:02):
there are games to which they play with semi playoff
intensity in the regular season. The fact is it's almost
like a different sport. We said this to start the playoffs.
You watch game winning like wow, it's it's a different
level of sport. And the punching and counterpunching from the coaches,
from the players. I mean, really, all that the Warriors did,
(03:26):
all the Warriors did to the Rockets is a little
bit of what the Rockets did to the Warriors in
Game two. Right. They pushed the tempo and they attacked
James Harden and Chris Paul defensively, which wore them down
offensively and frankly, they were the two weakest links defensively.
As well. Paul is a very good defender, but he
can't do anything when he gets matched up with Kevin Durant.
(03:48):
And you know, James Harden is not a good defender,
and they want to put him, you know, in isolation situations,
during pick and roll situations, as often as possible. Some
of this is I'm not gonna and I it's some
of its confirmation bias. Right. I started with the premise
that I struggled to watch James Harden because there's such
at times, little efforts, such a big give up what
(04:10):
I called give up factor. Anybody can get beat, but
it's do you get beat and then go like heyah,
or do you get beat and then you fight, you scrap,
you claw, you do anything you possibly can to get
back into the play. That's what most other stars do.
(04:34):
That's what James Harden doesn't do. Right, James Harden isn't
just a bad defensive player. He has the give up factor.
You know, it's a very quick give you beat him
and he's like, all right, we'll get it out. The
net will go the other way. It's just hard. It's
hard to buy into any of your defensive metrics. Well,
you know, in the regular season. He was stopped with
(04:54):
the regular season discussion. It is also one of those
reasons to which people misunderstand what an m v P is.
Coward talks about this all the time. Well, you know,
Lebron James, this and that, Like dude, the m v
P has just who had the best regular season. The
coach of the year is just who had the best
regular season co who did the best regular season coaching job.
(05:16):
And as long as we understand that we judge people
based upon the playoffs historically, we understand the true greatness
of somebody based upon the playoffs historically, then we can
somehow in our minds differentiate that the the regular season
is checkers and the postseason is chess. There are some similarities.
The board in fact is the same, but the game
(05:38):
is far different, far more intricate, and far more skill based.
Regular season, you may get a guy who is you know,
teams this year. We had more injuries this year than
we had in any previous year, in spite of the
fact they lengthened the season gave guys more time off.
What the NBA didn't account for was guys had more
time off, so they went out more. Al Right, some
(06:01):
times practice too much, some teams practice too little. Some
guys just got hurt more. And then we had a
a record number of teams openly trying to take, openly
trying to lose, And so it's really hard to tell,
like are we really that good or were they really
that bad? And maybe sometimes it's the case of both.
(06:27):
But as effective as James Harden and Chris Paul were
at times in the regular season, remember they didn't play
the whole season together, and at times as they have
been effective together in the postseason. Some of this is
it's a two star team, right as opposed to the
Warriors are a three star team having three stars, three
guys that can absolutely stretch the floor. And some of
(06:50):
this is also a case of we've all known, we've
all known that you are in basketball and basketball you
are who your coaches and you are who your best layers.
And when your coach doesn't have an affinity for defense
in terms of coaching it, you can hire an assistant
coach who becomes your Jeff Bizdelka is his defensive coordinators
defensive guru. That's great, But if your head coach isn't
(07:14):
bought into defense, defense isn't willing to sit your best
player because he doesn't play defense or play selfishly. And
if your best player doesn't have an affinity for defense,
that's who your team is. That's your team is. So
is this confirmation bias coming off of an ass weippon? Sure?
You know we probably Yeah, I'm sure you're sitting there
(07:35):
going godly. We could have had this discussion off of
game two. You would have a different tune, maybe a
little bit. But one game is one. Anybody can fake
it for one game. You want to sit there and go, hey,
well game two was different. Yeah, that's faking it for
one game. Couples that are getting a divorce can put
(07:55):
on a happy face when they go to somebody else's wedding,
or they go to somebody's few and roll, they go
to a family event, and anybody can fake it for
one night. Hell, lots of you guys, lots of women
have faked it plenty of nights. Fake it for one night.
That's what the Rockets did. One night they were tough,
one night they got the calls, one night they made
the shots. But who you are in the playoffs is
(08:18):
who you really are. And this is a team to
which they didn't value the ball. I mean, the Rockets
turn the ball over nineteen times as opposed to the Warriors,
who are a high turnover team. They only turned over
eight times. Steph Curry's a high turn over guy, only
have one turnover last night. So we've seen kind of them,
(08:40):
the top and the bottom for the Warriors, and we've
seen just about the middle, which was Game one where
the Warriors were I think, I think handily enough better,
but not what we saw last night. But you have
to you have to mentally and physically throw out, throw
out anything you see from the regular of season, because
(09:00):
the postseason tells you all you want to know, and
the postseason, dude, I don't care. James Hardwin's m VP.
That dude can't keep anybody in front of him and
doesn't seem to care, doesn't seem to care anybody. These
guys are so good. Anyone can get beat, anyone can
be made to look really bad. They can shoot thirty
five feet out, the freak athletes with great handles, Kevin
(09:22):
Durants seven ft tall, Steph Curry, you can't touch him,
and he's got a crazy handle and shoots unbelievable shots.
Anyone can get beat. But when you just give up,
when a guy goes past you. I have a hard
time buying into that. Regardless of the sixty regular season wins,
they don't mean anything. They just don't. The regular season
(09:46):
is checkers, fun game. But your kid can beat you
at checkers. You can get caught in a bad movie
like it's checkers. You can beat in chess. That's that's
totally different. Thinking man's game, knowing the whole board, understanding
different moves. There's defense to it. Sometimes there's sacrifice to it.
(10:06):
You've gotta sacrifice some of your ponds and some of
your lesser uh, some of your lesser figures as opposed
to sacrifice and your queen, and of course you can
never sacrifice the king right the season's Checkers, Postseason's chest.
Be sure to catch live editions of The Doug gott
Leaps Show weekdays at three pm Eastern noon Pacific on
Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. I
(10:28):
hate to say I told you so, but I did
tell you so. What what happens is when you try
and explain, like, look, you can explain a lot of
things to me that I don't know, right, that I
don't know that I've never done before. Like we're sitting
out here at Shadow Creek and I've played golf before,
but I am not a golfer. So if you're trying
to I'm not to the point. You know, when guys
(10:48):
start talking about their golf swings. You know what I
like to do it. You know my want backswing and
you want to get the club head, you know, the
face to do this. And then like I'm listening to
you might as well be, you know, explain to me
the pythagram theorem, Like I really don't. I cannod and
I can kind of get it, but I haven't actually
done it. So when I when I say to somebody like, hey, um,
(11:13):
point guards don't need to rebound, right, They're like, what
do you know about point guard rebounding in the NBA?
You never played, Like, listen, I may not know the
pythagram theorem. I may not really truly understand how my
backswing and tempo and my hips and everything. Like I'm
just I'm still at the stage where, like, you know what,
(11:36):
I want to get the club head on the ball.
I can feel what it feels like when I hit
it just about right. Hopefully it doesn't tail too much, right,
and I know about how far my club's go. Like
it's pretty simplistic way of playing golf. Like I'm okay,
I can handle my own I struggle to read greens.
I can tell you about the point guard position. It
is not a rebounding position. It just does not. And
(12:00):
when when I look at like and stats don't always
tell a story, but enough stats do tell enough of
a story. Case in point, look at box scores. Look
at box scores, and you show me the great You know,
Chris Paul last night has nine defensive boards. He ends
(12:21):
up with a double double. He didn't actually play well,
but for the most part, the whole guard rebounding thing, like,
you don't really rebound as a point guard. You want
to get out so that you get the second pass,
so that you can beat people down the court. You
don't want to be worrying about rebounding. You want to
be worrying about who am I going to beat up
(12:43):
the court. But the only double digit rebounder over the
weekend was Chris Paul getting nine defensive boards, which is good.
Is fine. They also got bombed by forty one. There
is no correlation between winning basketball games and point guard rebounding.
I bring that up because the Russell Westbrook averaging a
(13:06):
triple double stuff is cool, right, It's cool, it's clever,
it's fun. All that stuff great it has. It plays
no part at all, none in in deciding who wins
an NBA championship. Do you have to go in at
the end of the game and everybody rebounds, Yes, But
(13:27):
the idea of averaging double digit rebounds that that ends
up being in a selfishly unselfish play. It just does.
It's a lot like you can be selfish to have assists.
Sometimes you gotta get rid of the ball and let
other people play with it. You know, people get onto
Kyrie Irving when they say Kyrie doesn't average near there
as many assists as Steph Curry. That's true, but Steph
(13:48):
Curry one. He also turns it over to he does.
He doesn't always throw it up. He wants to make
He wants to make a play and then kick it
out so that you shoot the basketball. It's a different
style of kind of the same thing as Kyrie. Kyrie
oftentimes will throw the ball up the Cordian transition because
he's not a great not a great creative passer. Fox
Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in the nation.
(14:09):
Catch all of our shows at Fox sports radio dot
com and within the I Heart Radio app. Before the
series even began, Howard Beck wrote an article for Bleacher
Report about the remaking of the Rockets offense, and we
thought it'd be great to reach out to him. He covers,
the league knows it so well. After we've had three games,
I'm watching the Rockets against the Golden State Warriors, he
(14:30):
joins us now on the Doug Otlip Show on Fox
Sports Radio. For people who didn't read um, seven seconds
or more than remaking and is so ball awakening of
Mike D'Antoni. Uh, what was what was the what should
the takeaway be from the article? I mean there are
several I think, um, and thanks for citing it. I mean,
I think the main thing, and this was the curiosity
(14:53):
that led me to this story, to let me to
go to Houston go talk to to Mike dantoni about it,
is just that, you know, Mike himself has has kind
of undergone a bit of an evolution as a coach.
You know, he broke through in the NBA. His fame
is due to those Phoenix Suns. Teams of the mid
two thousands with Steve Nash, and those teams were known
not just for getting up and down the floor and
shooting a lot of freeze and the spread offense and
(15:14):
the pick and roll, but for the fact that it
was all about ball movements that Mike his his pet
phrase was the ball finds energy, and what he meant
by that was, hey, you know, passed the ball, move around,
It'll come back to you. The ball will find you.
And what he has now in Houston with Harden and
Chris Paul is a very isolation heavy attack. In fact,
(15:36):
they were the most isolation heavy offense in the entire league.
And the irony, of course in all this is that
the whole league has in the last you know, twelve
thirteen years since the Sun's broke through, the whole league
has gone that direction where pace and three point shooting
and also just you know, ball and player movements, uh more,
(15:56):
fluid offense has taken over the league. And so what
Mike is doing in Houston, what the Rockets are doing,
is a little retro in some regard um. The basics
are still there of what Mike D'Antoni has always believed in,
but if you had asked him in two thousand five about,
you know, playing this much isolation. He doesn't like to
admit it, but I think he would have uh flipped out,
(16:20):
And so he used to He used to go ahead,
you know. He used to say, you're either a ball
move or a ball stopper. And he didn't like ball stoppers.
Right like Kobe Brown is one of his least favorite
players in the NBA when they were competing against him,
because Kobe was a ball stopper. And now he has
had to kind of embrace. Now. Look, it's a hybridization, right.
They still are spaced around the three point line. They
(16:40):
still have one big guy in screening rolling with an
empty lane like those as you pointed out, those are
still But he is embracing something he used to not dislike,
he used to despise. I guess the question is is
he enjoying it or is he is he just doing
it because that's the best that they can do with
this personnel. Well, it's two things. One he enjoys winning.
(17:02):
They want sixty five games and they're in the conference finals,
place that he hadn't been in a while. James Hard
had only been to once and Chris Paul had never
been to so they've got a chance to make the finals,
and I think he's certainly enjoying that. If he if
you were going to give him truth serum, and you know,
I asked several people close to him about this, you know,
given truth hereum, I think Mike would probably say, yeah,
you know, aesthetically it's not what he prefers. But the
(17:26):
difference also is this and now you know, cynics will
say it's splitting hairs, but you know, basketball wise, it's rational.
What Mike says is, look, they're still running pick and
roll first, They're still trying to keep things moving. But
in an NBA where everybody is now switching on defense,
you're ending up with a mismatch. And James Harden is
a killer in isolation, especially against bigger guys, and so
(17:50):
if you're gonna have a weaker defender or a bigger
guy on him because of the switch that was a
response to their pick and roll, which is Mike's pet,
you know, go to offense, then then it almost forces
you to go isolation because he's so good at it.
So Mike and braces it in that regard, he would
still rather not have the ball be pounded for you know,
(18:10):
too much of the shot clock, of course, but if
it leads to a high percentage shot. And most of
what Harden does is that because he's either going to
or eye efficiency shot, I should say he's either going
to get to the rim or draw foul and go
to the line, or he's gonna hit one of his
three Like those are shots that Mike Dantoni has always prioritized,
even in the free analytics era, D'Antoni was one who
(18:30):
prioritized three pointers, shots of the rim, and foul shots.
And in the analytics era, we now know that that
is the best approach, right And I don't know if
he started based on analytics or just that's how they
played in Europe, you know. And that's and you know,
it ends up evening out some of some athletic mismatches.
It's it's really smart and it's taking the basketball role
(18:50):
by storm. What what what about James Harden? Right? Like
my issue with with the Rockets is D'Antoni has never
been He can say all the right things in the
microphone about defense, but he's he's an offensive guy. He
hires somebody else to do defense. Um and Harden is
kind of the same way, right, Like he's he's all
(19:11):
about is it's about offense? Aren't they showing maybe their limitations?
And I know that the offense wasn't good last night,
and maybe that's one of the reasons they got beat
But I mean, it's not just that he gets beaten
by great one on one players. It's that he gets
beaten and then just kind of stands there and watched
them lay the ball in or shoot on contested shots.
There's just a there's a give up factor to it.
(19:33):
And I wonder how much D'Antoni enjoys that, even if
he's not really a defensive guy. Well, I would just
say this. I mean, first of all, Mike's teams in Phoenix,
we now know through the benefit of advanced stats that
when you're measuring defensive efficiency accounting for pace, because some
teams were middle of the pack, they were not the
worst than the NBA, or not even near the worst
than the NBA and defense they were middle of the pack.
(19:54):
They were in the teams um his Rockets team the
last couple of years, UH has been making great strides defensively.
In fact, was one of the best defensive teams in
the league this year in terms of defensive efficiency. So
the knock on on Mike D'Antoni that that, oh, he
prioritized offense at the expensive defense I think was always
a bit of a misnomer, something that he himself actually
(20:14):
fed into by some of his own remarks back in
the day. But um, and Jeff Bizelic is the lead
assistant in charge of defense. Now, this has been a
great defensive team and they're switching defense, you know, they're
they're embracing that too. They're switching defense. Has been incredibly effective.
But if we're going to evaluate their defense based on
what happens against the Warriors in a series, it's a
(20:35):
little bit tough because the Warriors, you know, destroyed just
about everyone and that's just a fact or a factor
of having four All Stars and two m vps on
the floor. Um, I don't know, I don't know that
any defense is going to be fairly judged when they're
playing the Warriors. What happens if they lose this series?
(20:56):
Like like you know, Chris Paul came over to go
all in and you know, up brutes his family and
there's a lack of happiness there with the lack of
progress in l A. But he could be he's a
free agent. What what what happens with this team if
they if they lose in five or and six, um,
you know, regardless of how many games they lose in
(21:16):
even if they go to seven and lose. I mean,
I think the real concern is how do you improve period?
Chris Paul is thirty three, and the window for him,
you don't know how long it's gonna be. You know,
point guards in particular at that size around six ft
six one point guards don't necessarily uh age welder games
(21:38):
and you never know which day is the day they're
going to just kind of fall off a cliff. So,
you know, they went from very team to sixty five
win team with Chris Paul in the mix. I just
don't know what they're true window is with him there.
And then if it's not him, who are you replacing
him with? Um? You know, if Chris Paul will be
a free agent the summer. Of course, Clint Capella is
(21:58):
a free agent restricted and there will be a big
market for him. So the challenge is how do you
in the within the constraints of salary cap and everything else,
make this team better. Um, But that's that's not just
the Rockets issue, that's everybody's issue. You know, how do
you catch a team with four all stars in the Warriors? Well,
there's a guy in Cleveland who could be available. There
(22:21):
is that guy, UM, and the Rockets of course won't
have cap room. But you can get creative, you can
find ways to create that room, Um, Darryl Morey. But
you know, obviously the Rockets GM is as creative and
as aggressive as they come, so he will certainly be
in pursuit, as will a lot of others. Um of Lebron,
(22:42):
but you know that's I don't know how realistic that is.
And if it's not him, what else? What other options
are there? Could they make a trade for Kawhi Leonard
if if the Spurs are ready to move on from him.
Could they make a move for Paul George if if
the George leeves Oklahoma. There will be you know, there
will possibilities, but they're going to be a high degree
(23:03):
of difficulty options. Howard back joining us on the Doug
Gotlip Show on Fox Sports Radio works for Bleacher Report
cover in the NBA. All right, let's go to the
other series. It felt like a mismatch in Boston. Now
it feels equally like a mismatch in Cleveland. Game four
is a really telling game. What do you think we're
gonna see? That's funny. I was in Cleveland for Game three.
(23:28):
I'm not there for Game four. I was in in
Cleveland for Game three, and you know, everybody's always chattering
about this, asking each other that, what do you think?
What do you think? My feeling that day was, I'm
almost certain they're gonna win Game three. I was pretty
sure that the Cavaliers were not going to go down
three O. The lebron was not gonna be down three O.
But my first comment after that was, but I have
(23:50):
no idea what happen in Game four, and I'm still
not sure. I mean, my my gut says, uh, they'll
pull out another one. They'll tie this series. It will
become the best of free and you know that's that's
how I would expect it to unfold. But you know,
the Celtics have been you know, they've been incredibly resilient
all year for a team that is young in key spots.
(24:11):
They obviously are a really well coached, very smart team. Um,
there will be adjustments to come tonight, we'll see what
that actually is. But you know, I have a feeling
as bad as this Cavalier's roster is, I think that
Lebron can get them to at least one more win
and tie this series. First, I don't think the rosters
(24:35):
as bad as people would. You know, like, look, is
it as good as it has been? You think, how come? Um,
you have obviously you know one generational player in Lebron James.
You have one other player and Kevin Love, who is
been an All Star and is an above average player,
but he's not a creator. And then you have a
bunch of guys who are average at best, too below average,
(24:57):
and many of whom had no postseason experience. I'm talking
about the guys that got in trade. Jordan Clarkson, Rodney Hood,
Larry Nance Jr. Have done almost nothing in this postseason
for this team. So you've got a rotation that's really
full of holes. You don't have a Kyrie Irving or
you don't have a Dwyane Wade that Lebron had next
to him in Miami. So, by definition, and I've said
(25:18):
this from the beginning of the season, before the trades,
after the trade, this is the weakest supporting cast Lebron
has had since two thousand nine ten when he left
Cleveland the first time. And that's not that's that's not
even hyperbole. That's just just the fact he doesn't have
that dynamic co star that he had in those seven
straight trips to the finals. No, I understand that. But
(25:39):
he's also going against the Celtics team and any other
They're they're two best players, right like like well, like
Terry Terry Rose Terry Rosier. Does he start on any
other any other playoff team? I would have to go
through them in my head, but I think he would
start for a few of them. I think Terry Rosier
simply needed the opportunity in his what third year ever
(26:00):
to show what he had and then and then like
kind of go through it and you say, I mean
the rest of the roster is so young you can
Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum were both number three overall
picks who had you know, great potential at the moment
they were drafted, have clearly developed some and are putting
(26:22):
up numbers and defend and are like you can see
them night in, night out. If you didn't know what
year they were in the league, you would think they
were five year veterans. You wouldn't. So if your guys
are playing at a level in terms of their actual
talent and their poise that appears like a veteran, you
can no longer say, well, they're just missing all this talent. Sure,
of course they're missing Carrier and Gordon Hayward. But first
of all, Al Horford is incredibly underrated and incredibly valuable
(26:45):
to them, and Tatum and Brown and Rose Deer are
very good young players, young, sure, but very good. Marcus
smart Is it is a guy that every team in
the league would love to have, and they will will
be chasing him this summer during his re agencies. So
just because they're missing to all stars, which is not
to be diminished, it doesn't mean that they don't also
(27:07):
still have a wealth of talent there. In fact, they
have far more talent overall Lebron notwithstanding, than the Cavaliers do. See,
I look, I think here here's where I think the flaws.
I think the flaw is in everyone try to construct
a team around Lebron where you get shooters to give
him space. Right, he needs guys give him space, and
(27:27):
they they didn't. They don't have great athleticism, and and
then their offense up until Game three, when they started
running a lot of pick and roll, a lot of
ball screen to try and create some mismatch. It was
a lot of off the ball screening and movement looking
to get switches and slips and jump shots, and then
playing off of Lebron. So I think I think there's
a The two flaws were in the construction of the
(27:50):
team and the in terms of roster and in construction
of the offense only playing one way, which really limited them.
But I mean, like, look, Mark Smart. I love Marcus Smart,
hey went to Oaklhoma State, plays his nuts off, but
like Marcus Smart can't shoot. And though we're seeing the
value of all the other things he does, that's not
something that for example, a team like Cleveland would value,
(28:13):
right because well, he can't shoot, so he can't play
with Lebron. They've tried to construct a team around what
he does and how he creates and he can create
shots for everybody else, and and that has its limitations.
I would just say this, if the if the Cavaliers
had the opportunity right now to swap Jordan Clarkson or
Rodney hood for Marcus Smart. They would do it in
a heartbeat, no, no question. But again you're you're, you're
(28:36):
that those are bench players, right, And look, I didn't
like the Jordan's I thought that Jordan Jordan Carkson is
a classic case of guy puts up numbers on really
bad teams. We think he's gonna put up those numbers
on a good team, even off the bench, and he cannot. Okay,
he's he's been exposed. But like Marcus Smart is a
six or seventh man on any of these teams. He
just happens to fit with the way in which Boston plays.
(28:57):
They give him twenty five minutes. They don't care if
he misses ots. They just let him play. Where's a
lot of teams, you know, heat you can't play him
thirty five minutes a game because he can't shoot. That
would be the limitation on most of the good teams
in the NBA. Sure, And to your point, look, the Cavaliers,
it's not a well constructed group overall, But it was
a group that was constructed basically, you know, reconstructed twice
(29:19):
in less than a year, both times under incredibly adverse circumstances.
The first time with Harry Irving's gun to your head
saying get me out of here, and they made a
deal that looked okay on its face, but was predicated
on Jay Crowder being better than he'd been in the
Boston the last couple of years, predicated on Isaiah Thomas
actually overcoming a really serious hip injury that he could
(29:40):
not overcome, and on him fitting in um and then
they when when all that went bust, they did what
they could at the trade deadline, and look, they swapped
out a bunch of of, you know, useless pieces for
the most part, for pieces that looked like they might
at least be younger and more athletic. It just turns
out that they haven't fit as well, or couldn't come
together as quick, or maybe weren't as good as they hoped.
(30:02):
But the bottom line is they were doing this under
duress twice over overhauling the roster, and you know that
that's it's it's not like they set out to put
together a group that looked like this. It's what they
could do under the circumstances. It's a it's a it's
a great point. What's your level of confidence that they
can win this series? Oh? I still think they have
a good shot. Um. You know, as much as this
(30:24):
Celtics have not shown their youth for the most part,
you know, there are still a young group that is
going to make their mistakes. We saw a little bit
of that in Game three. And Lebron is just the
ultimate X factor. I mean, you know, he can. You know,
there are times we've seen him single handly win games.
There are times in this postseason we've seen him put
up monsters uh stat lines, you know, forty triple doubles
(30:47):
and still lose because of how weak the supporting cast is.
But I think they're gonna get this one to night.
I think it becomes the best of three and then
we'll see. Uh. You know, it's it's tough to win
in Boston. They have an incredible home quote advantage there.
But I still think as weak as I believe this
Cavaliers supporting test to be, I still think they have
a shot against the Celtics, uh, just because of the youth.
(31:10):
And and again I know they're not showing that youth
very often. They're playing like the veteran t Hey great stuff, Howard,
love the uh, love the the article, and love the
working covering. The NBA. Look forward to talking in the
very near future. Thanks so much for joining us on
Fox Sports Radio. Appreciate it anytime. Be sure to catch
live editions of The Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays at three
(31:32):
pm Eastern noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the
I Heart Radio app. Five time NBA All Star, you
send me a first team on NBA, three times second
team on n b A he's uh his numbers retired
at you tap man Killer crossover himself. Tim Hardaway kind
of to spend some time of this year on the
(31:53):
Doug Gotlip Show. Tim, How are you? I'm good? How
you doing good man? Let's let's start with last night. Um,
how much of it was Step just getting it going?
How much of it was felt like the rockets kind
of especially Hardaway waved a little bit of a white
flag defensively. Well, you know, I just think that Step,
(32:13):
you know, just finally found this what he'd be looking for,
his shot, you know, found his mojo again. You know,
sometimes it happens like that. You understand, he hasn't played
what say, in about six weeks or whatever. And when
he came back, you know, you fresh on your legs
and and everything's working for you and and you're making us,
you know, making stuff happen. Then you know, um, um,
(32:39):
stuff just stopped sappening for you. So that's normal. And
and that's what happened to him. Now he has to
you know, he keep playing a game of basketball, Keep
shooting the same shots you've been shooting, Keep going through
your preparation like you've been going through your preparation. Don't
stop nothing. And I'm it's gonna come back. They always do.
And it did last night, and um, and it's great.
(33:00):
And he was at home when he got um going.
You know, when you're at home, you get your home cooking,
you and your own your own bid, you with your wife,
you with your kids, you you know, you with your family.
You you're talking, you're you're joking around and is you know,
you're just having fun. But uh, and and now he
got his mojo back and he feels good. Now the
team is gonna going out and feel great about him. Um,
(33:23):
get his mojo back, and now they're you know, they're
gonna take it to another level. Is there anything Houston
can do? Um? You know what they've been doing this
all season long. They're not gonna change they're gonna play
the same way. Um in the playoffs. And Tony told you,
the rest of the team told you. You know that
this is what they do, that's who they are. Um.
(33:45):
They're not gonna change nothing. So um, the only thing
you could do is play the defense where you're supposed
to play defense, um, um, and hope that you know,
these guys miss shots, but you know that that's what
they do. They make shots. I mean Golden State Warriors
when they're healthy, they don't. They have a tough team
to beat, no question. But I also think there's you
(34:07):
know they they you can the threes. You can't stop, right, Like,
if you're there and you're challenging a three, that's just
that's just hey, you know there's there's But Houston had
a bunch of turnovers and they gave up a lot
of you know, one of the things got stuff going
tim with some of these backdoor cuts and drives to
the basket. You know, you've got to play the percentages
on the threes and hope that they miss. And I
agree with you. You make seventeen and thirty four, you're
(34:29):
gonna beat everybody you play, right, But the difference becomes
difference becomes when you're giving up layups. And it felt
like I felt like Houston fell asleep a little bit
on some of those cuts and some of those drives.
And if you give up the layups, now of a sudden,
you automatically collapse and then you're gonna give up more threes,
right exactly. But you know what, that's what make Gold
(34:50):
mistakes so good. They play all different type of waves.
They could beat you all different types back cuts, um
going to the whole with slips uh um uh. You know,
and they and they and they passed the ball very
well too. And and that's what they when they don't
turn the ball over and they just uh played the
way they're supposed to play. And that's what that's what
(35:11):
makes on Gold and stay so tough, so tough. But
you know, like last night, they got they had everything going.
You know, they had lay ups going, they had back
doors going, they had um everything going, and they had
um the three is going. So I mean everything was
cooking for him while they're at home. Now, the adjustment
(35:33):
is we still play our same way. And Houston they
missed a lot of layups too. They missed a lot
of layouts at the rim, you know hard and missed
some layups at the rim. Chris Paul missed one lay
up at the rim. You gotta make laps when you
get those lay ups. You gotta make those layouts, and
you gotta make those laps count. So um uh, you know,
I think that that's what they're looking at two and
(35:54):
and to me, you know, I think, um, you know, Houston,
this is what they've been doing on all year, shooting
the three, shooting at three, shooting at three. You know,
sometimes you just gotta take the shot that's given to you,
and they don't. They don't want to do that. If
it's a mid rain shot, you gotta take it two
of it. To a layup is a two a jump shot?
Mid range jump shot? Is it too? So I think
(36:17):
they get so wrapped up and I gotta take a
layup for three, you know, and instead of just playing
the game of basketball. So uh, you know, and that
and that's what Houston has to do. They just got
to continually just play the game basketball and and and
and played better defense than what they played yesterday last night.
And you know, just hopefully that that the Warriors missed.
(36:38):
But they're at home. They don't miss a lot. At home,
Tim Hardaway joining us to the Doug Ollip Show Fox Sports,
trading to go to the other side. Cleveland at home
again against Boston. Boston looked just too quick, too athletic,
um and physically they kind of pushed around Cleveland and
there at their place. They go to Cleveland and now
of a sudden, they looked like the younger team. They
(36:58):
looked like a team missing Gordon Heyward and Kyrie Irving.
What What's I mean? It's so hard to tell when
you if you only watch game three, you're like, all right,
this isn't a competitive series. If you watch game oneing
game two, you'd have the exact same thought, only the
teams would be switched in your mind. Help me out,
who's actually the better team in the series. Well, the
(37:19):
better team in the series is no, no question, is
is um um the Boston Celtics. All right, But you
got Lebron on the other team. And Lebron when when
you let him dictate how his team is going to
play and you're not making shots on the other end, Um,
it's gonna be a long night for you. Lebron is
(37:40):
very good at what he does, and when he orchestrates
the game like a conductor like you always do. Then
nine times out of ten, he's gonna give us his
team a chance to win. And that's all he wants
to do, give his team a chance to win at
the end, to get at the end of the game.
And I tell you this, if Boston don't get this
game tonight, they're gonna be an the world of trumble.
(38:01):
I think if you let them get tied up to
too going to game three. Um, you give him Lebron,
you understan making Lebron understand what he needs to do
and giving him the understanding what his team needs to
do out there on a basketball court to be successful.
And uh, if it goes to a game seven, oh,
I wouldn't bet against Lebron. But you know the UM,
(38:25):
like Al Horford said, they gotta come out and just
play basketball what they did the first two games. Take
it to the Cleveland Cavaliers. UM play aggressively, don't play passively. UM,
make make the right passes, UM, don't turn the ball over,
and just UM play their game. When they play their games,
they're unstoppable. They areunbeatable. But when they don't play their game,
(38:47):
then they look really bad, you know, like they did
in Game three. They look really bad but really young.
And they look discombobulated in that game, yes they did.
They looked discombobulated. But I mean, now on, they've been
in enough games on the road in the playoffs to
understand what they need to do. They need to come
out and play harder, play better. Don't turn the ball
(39:09):
over and make shots. When you're making shots, you know,
life is better, you know. And they got to move
the ball, don't get stagnant. Just let's play some basketball,
Tim great stuff. Can't tell you how much I appreciate
you join us to give us your incredible insight into
the NBA. Appreciate you being our guest on Fox Sports Radio.
All right, thank you,
This is the best of the Doug Gottlieb Show on
Fox Sports Radio. Boom one Up America, Doug Gottlieb Show,
Fox Sports Radio. Out here in uh slightly overcast post
thunderstorm Las Vegas as uh Las Vegas recovering from a
wild weekend big concert. Also the billboards a ward showing
(00:24):
Oh yeah, by the way, they got a hockey team
gonna play for the Stanley Cup Finals. That is that
is absolute craziness. It's Southern California all over again. We'll
get to that. That parallel upcoming on the Doug Gottlieb Show.
But it's the anniversary of Coaches Versus Cancer. This is
the eleventh annual Coach Versus Cancer Las Vegas Golf Classic.
(00:46):
We're bringing you some of these coaches who have bound
together to fight and try and eradicate the world of cancer.
More on that upcoming. But um matter of fact, Lon
Cruger is gonna join us seas. In fact, the host.
He started this when he was the head coach at
un l V. He was the coach of Trey Young
with let the country and scoring and assists. Will get
his thoughts on the NBA playoffs on Trey Young and
(01:08):
on the lottery where where he fits in best that
have coming In just a fifteen or twenty minutes or so,
we will get to a little of the hockey and uh,
and a little on Major League Baseball, but a lot
on the NBA and and not the most entertaining games
in the world unless you're a fan of the two
home teams over the weekend. Calves blow out the Celtics
(01:32):
and the Warriors Warriors eviscerate the Rockets in the second half.
I mean there there should no longer be a written
definition of the term boat race. All they have to
do is show highlights of the second half Rockets Warriors
yesterday and go, oh, that's what being boat raced is, right, Yeah,
(01:53):
giving up, uh, this is not this is a correct
stat giving up uh, sixty seven need two points in
the second half, seventy two. Now, part of it is
made worse when your backups come in and hit a
bunch of shots, even in garbage time. But one twenties
six to eighty five was the final score, and it
felt like one. It really did. And you know, among
(02:19):
the things everyone's talking about today the Steph Curry going
nuts in the second half and yelling this is my
blanket house. Uh, it's the overall dominance of Curry and
Durant when they're both hitting. How much different is this
team and the juxtaposition of that with with Chris Paul
(02:41):
and James Harden, who combined to make twelve of thirty
two shots. But I think that that some of this
is the we we so often fall in the trap
of regular season, regular season, regular season, and it's it's
hard because though there are Cologne games in the regular season,
(03:02):
there are games to which they play with semi playoff
intensity in the regular season. The fact is it's almost
like a different sport. We said this to start the playoffs.
You watch game winning like wow, it's it's a different
level of sport. And the punching and counterpunching from the coaches,
from the players. I mean, really, all that the Warriors did,
(03:26):
all the Warriors did to the Rockets is a little
bit of what the Rockets did to the Warriors in
Game two. Right. They pushed the tempo and they attacked
James Harden and Chris Paul defensively, which wore them down
offensively and frankly, they were the two weakest links defensively.
As well. Paul is a very good defender, but he
can't do anything when he gets matched up with Kevin Durant.
(03:48):
And you know, James Harden is not a good defender,
and they want to put him, you know, in isolation situations,
during pick and roll situations, as often as possible. Some
of this is I'm not gonna and I it's some
of its confirmation bias. Right. I started with the premise
that I struggled to watch James Harden because there's such
at times, little efforts, such a big give up what
(04:10):
I called give up factor. Anybody can get beat, but
it's do you get beat and then go like heyah,
or do you get beat and then you fight, you scrap,
you claw, you do anything you possibly can to get
back into the play. That's what most other stars do.
(04:34):
That's what James Harden doesn't do. Right, James Harden isn't
just a bad defensive player. He has the give up factor.
You know, it's a very quick give you beat him
and he's like, all right, we'll get it out. The
net will go the other way. It's just hard. It's
hard to buy into any of your defensive metrics. Well,
you know, in the regular season. He was stopped with
(04:54):
the regular season discussion. It is also one of those
reasons to which people misunderstand what an m v P is.
Coward talks about this all the time. Well, you know,
Lebron James, this and that, Like dude, the m v
P has just who had the best regular season. The
coach of the year is just who had the best
regular season co who did the best regular season coaching job.
(05:16):
And as long as we understand that we judge people
based upon the playoffs historically, we understand the true greatness
of somebody based upon the playoffs historically, then we can
somehow in our minds differentiate that the the regular season
is checkers and the postseason is chess. There are some similarities.
The board in fact is the same, but the game
(05:38):
is far different, far more intricate, and far more skill based.
Regular season, you may get a guy who is you know,
teams this year. We had more injuries this year than
we had in any previous year, in spite of the
fact they lengthened the season gave guys more time off.
What the NBA didn't account for was guys had more
time off, so they went out more. Al Right, some
(06:01):
times practice too much, some teams practice too little. Some
guys just got hurt more. And then we had a
a record number of teams openly trying to take, openly
trying to lose, And so it's really hard to tell,
like are we really that good or were they really
that bad? And maybe sometimes it's the case of both.
(06:27):
But as effective as James Harden and Chris Paul were
at times in the regular season, remember they didn't play
the whole season together, and at times as they have
been effective together in the postseason. Some of this is
it's a two star team, right as opposed to the
Warriors are a three star team having three stars, three
guys that can absolutely stretch the floor. And some of
(06:50):
this is also a case of we've all known, we've
all known that you are in basketball and basketball you
are who your coaches and you are who your best layers.
And when your coach doesn't have an affinity for defense
in terms of coaching it, you can hire an assistant
coach who becomes your Jeff Bizdelka is his defensive coordinators
defensive guru. That's great, But if your head coach isn't
(07:14):
bought into defense, defense isn't willing to sit your best
player because he doesn't play defense or play selfishly. And
if your best player doesn't have an affinity for defense,
that's who your team is. That's your team is. So
is this confirmation bias coming off of an ass weippon? Sure?
You know we probably Yeah, I'm sure you're sitting there
(07:35):
going godly. We could have had this discussion off of
game two. You would have a different tune, maybe a
little bit. But one game is one. Anybody can fake
it for one game. You want to sit there and go, hey,
well game two was different. Yeah, that's faking it for
one game. Couples that are getting a divorce can put
(07:55):
on a happy face when they go to somebody else's wedding,
or they go to somebody's few and roll, they go
to a family event, and anybody can fake it for
one night. Hell, lots of you guys, lots of women
have faked it plenty of nights. Fake it for one night.
That's what the Rockets did. One night they were tough,
one night they got the calls, one night they made
the shots. But who you are in the playoffs is
(08:18):
who you really are. And this is a team to
which they didn't value the ball. I mean, the Rockets
turn the ball over nineteen times as opposed to the Warriors,
who are a high turnover team. They only turned over
eight times. Steph Curry's a high turn over guy, only
have one turnover last night. So we've seen kind of them,
(08:40):
the top and the bottom for the Warriors, and we've
seen just about the middle, which was Game one where
the Warriors were I think, I think handily enough better,
but not what we saw last night. But you have
to you have to mentally and physically throw out, throw
out anything you see from the regular of season, because
(09:00):
the postseason tells you all you want to know, and
the postseason, dude, I don't care. James Hardwin's m VP.
That dude can't keep anybody in front of him and
doesn't seem to care, doesn't seem to care anybody. These
guys are so good. Anyone can get beat, anyone can
be made to look really bad. They can shoot thirty
five feet out, the freak athletes with great handles, Kevin
(09:22):
Durants seven ft tall, Steph Curry, you can't touch him,
and he's got a crazy handle and shoots unbelievable shots.
Anyone can get beat. But when you just give up,
when a guy goes past you. I have a hard
time buying into that. Regardless of the sixty regular season wins,
they don't mean anything. They just don't. The regular season
(09:46):
is checkers, fun game. But your kid can beat you
at checkers. You can get caught in a bad movie
like it's checkers. You can beat in chess. That's that's
totally different. Thinking man's game, knowing the whole board, understanding
different moves. There's defense to it. Sometimes there's sacrifice to it.
(10:06):
You've gotta sacrifice some of your ponds and some of
your lesser uh, some of your lesser figures as opposed
to sacrifice and your queen, and of course you can
never sacrifice the king right the season's Checkers, Postseason's chest.
Be sure to catch live editions of The Doug gott
Leaps Show weekdays at three pm Eastern noon Pacific on
Fox Sports Radio and the I Heart Radio app. I
(10:28):
hate to say I told you so, but I did
tell you so. What what happens is when you try
and explain, like, look, you can explain a lot of
things to me that I don't know, right, that I
don't know that I've never done before. Like we're sitting
out here at Shadow Creek and I've played golf before,
but I am not a golfer. So if you're trying
to I'm not to the point. You know, when guys
(10:48):
start talking about their golf swings. You know what I
like to do it. You know my want backswing and
you want to get the club head, you know, the
face to do this. And then like I'm listening to
you might as well be, you know, explain to me
the pythagram theorem, Like I really don't. I cannod and
I can kind of get it, but I haven't actually
done it. So when I when I say to somebody like, hey, um,
(11:13):
point guards don't need to rebound, right, They're like, what
do you know about point guard rebounding in the NBA?
You never played, Like, listen, I may not know the
pythagram theorem. I may not really truly understand how my
backswing and tempo and my hips and everything. Like I'm
just I'm still at the stage where, like, you know what,
(11:36):
I want to get the club head on the ball.
I can feel what it feels like when I hit
it just about right. Hopefully it doesn't tail too much, right,
and I know about how far my club's go. Like
it's pretty simplistic way of playing golf. Like I'm okay,
I can handle my own I struggle to read greens.
I can tell you about the point guard position. It
is not a rebounding position. It just does not. And
(12:00):
when when I look at like and stats don't always
tell a story, but enough stats do tell enough of
a story. Case in point, look at box scores. Look
at box scores, and you show me the great You know,
Chris Paul last night has nine defensive boards. He ends
(12:21):
up with a double double. He didn't actually play well,
but for the most part, the whole guard rebounding thing, like,
you don't really rebound as a point guard. You want
to get out so that you get the second pass,
so that you can beat people down the court. You
don't want to be worrying about rebounding. You want to
be worrying about who am I going to beat up
(12:43):
the court. But the only double digit rebounder over the
weekend was Chris Paul getting nine defensive boards, which is good.
Is fine. They also got bombed by forty one. There
is no correlation between winning basketball games and point guard rebounding.
I bring that up because the Russell Westbrook averaging a
(13:06):
triple double stuff is cool, right, It's cool, it's clever,
it's fun. All that stuff great it has. It plays
no part at all, none in in deciding who wins
an NBA championship. Do you have to go in at
the end of the game and everybody rebounds, Yes, But
(13:27):
the idea of averaging double digit rebounds that that ends
up being in a selfishly unselfish play. It just does.
It's a lot like you can be selfish to have assists.
Sometimes you gotta get rid of the ball and let
other people play with it. You know, people get onto
Kyrie Irving when they say Kyrie doesn't average near there
as many assists as Steph Curry. That's true, but Steph
(13:48):
Curry one. He also turns it over to he does.
He doesn't always throw it up. He wants to make
He wants to make a play and then kick it
out so that you shoot the basketball. It's a different
style of kind of the same thing as Kyrie. Kyrie
oftentimes will throw the ball up the Cordian transition because
he's not a great not a great creative passer. Fox
Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in the nation.
(14:09):
Catch all of our shows at Fox sports radio dot
com and within the I Heart Radio app. Before the
series even began, Howard Beck wrote an article for Bleacher
Report about the remaking of the Rockets offense, and we
thought it'd be great to reach out to him. He covers,
the league knows it so well. After we've had three games,
I'm watching the Rockets against the Golden State Warriors, he
(14:30):
joins us now on the Doug Otlip Show on Fox
Sports Radio. For people who didn't read um, seven seconds
or more than remaking and is so ball awakening of
Mike D'Antoni. Uh, what was what was the what should
the takeaway be from the article? I mean there are
several I think, um, and thanks for citing it. I mean,
I think the main thing, and this was the curiosity
(14:53):
that led me to this story, to let me to
go to Houston go talk to to Mike dantoni about it,
is just that, you know, Mike himself has has kind
of undergone a bit of an evolution as a coach.
You know, he broke through in the NBA. His fame
is due to those Phoenix Suns. Teams of the mid
two thousands with Steve Nash, and those teams were known
not just for getting up and down the floor and
shooting a lot of freeze and the spread offense and
(15:14):
the pick and roll, but for the fact that it
was all about ball movements that Mike his his pet
phrase was the ball finds energy, and what he meant
by that was, hey, you know, passed the ball, move around,
It'll come back to you. The ball will find you.
And what he has now in Houston with Harden and
Chris Paul is a very isolation heavy attack. In fact,
(15:36):
they were the most isolation heavy offense in the entire league.
And the irony, of course in all this is that
the whole league has in the last you know, twelve
thirteen years since the Sun's broke through, the whole league
has gone that direction where pace and three point shooting
and also just you know, ball and player movements, uh more,
(15:56):
fluid offense has taken over the league. And so what
Mike is doing in Houston, what the Rockets are doing,
is a little retro in some regard um. The basics
are still there of what Mike D'Antoni has always believed in,
but if you had asked him in two thousand five about,
you know, playing this much isolation. He doesn't like to
admit it, but I think he would have uh flipped out,
(16:20):
And so he used to He used to go ahead,
you know. He used to say, you're either a ball
move or a ball stopper. And he didn't like ball stoppers.
Right like Kobe Brown is one of his least favorite
players in the NBA when they were competing against him,
because Kobe was a ball stopper. And now he has
had to kind of embrace. Now. Look, it's a hybridization, right.
They still are spaced around the three point line. They
(16:40):
still have one big guy in screening rolling with an
empty lane like those as you pointed out, those are
still But he is embracing something he used to not dislike,
he used to despise. I guess the question is is
he enjoying it or is he is he just doing
it because that's the best that they can do with
this personnel. Well, it's two things. One he enjoys winning.
(17:02):
They want sixty five games and they're in the conference finals,
place that he hadn't been in a while. James Hard
had only been to once and Chris Paul had never
been to so they've got a chance to make the finals,
and I think he's certainly enjoying that. If he if
you were going to give him truth serum, and you know,
I asked several people close to him about this, you know,
given truth hereum, I think Mike would probably say, yeah,
you know, aesthetically it's not what he prefers. But the
(17:26):
difference also is this and now you know, cynics will
say it's splitting hairs, but you know, basketball wise, it's rational.
What Mike says is, look, they're still running pick and
roll first, They're still trying to keep things moving. But
in an NBA where everybody is now switching on defense,
you're ending up with a mismatch. And James Harden is
a killer in isolation, especially against bigger guys, and so
(17:50):
if you're gonna have a weaker defender or a bigger
guy on him because of the switch that was a
response to their pick and roll, which is Mike's pet,
you know, go to offense, then then it almost forces
you to go isolation because he's so good at it.
So Mike and braces it in that regard, he would
still rather not have the ball be pounded for you know,
(18:10):
too much of the shot clock, of course, but if
it leads to a high percentage shot. And most of
what Harden does is that because he's either going to
or eye efficiency shot, I should say he's either going
to get to the rim or draw foul and go
to the line, or he's gonna hit one of his
three Like those are shots that Mike Dantoni has always prioritized,
even in the free analytics era, D'Antoni was one who
(18:30):
prioritized three pointers, shots of the rim, and foul shots.
And in the analytics era, we now know that that
is the best approach, right And I don't know if
he started based on analytics or just that's how they
played in Europe, you know. And that's and you know,
it ends up evening out some of some athletic mismatches.
It's it's really smart and it's taking the basketball role
(18:50):
by storm. What what what about James Harden? Right? Like
my issue with with the Rockets is D'Antoni has never
been He can say all the right things in the
microphone about defense, but he's he's an offensive guy. He
hires somebody else to do defense. Um and Harden is
kind of the same way, right, Like he's he's all
(19:11):
about is it's about offense? Aren't they showing maybe their limitations?
And I know that the offense wasn't good last night,
and maybe that's one of the reasons they got beat
But I mean, it's not just that he gets beaten
by great one on one players. It's that he gets
beaten and then just kind of stands there and watched
them lay the ball in or shoot on contested shots.
There's just a there's a give up factor to it.
(19:33):
And I wonder how much D'Antoni enjoys that, even if
he's not really a defensive guy. Well, I would just
say this. I mean, first of all, Mike's teams in Phoenix,
we now know through the benefit of advanced stats that
when you're measuring defensive efficiency accounting for pace, because some
teams were middle of the pack, they were not the
worst than the NBA, or not even near the worst
than the NBA and defense they were middle of the pack.
(19:54):
They were in the teams um his Rockets team the
last couple of years, UH has been making great strides defensively.
In fact, was one of the best defensive teams in
the league this year in terms of defensive efficiency. So
the knock on on Mike D'Antoni that that, oh, he
prioritized offense at the expensive defense I think was always
a bit of a misnomer, something that he himself actually
(20:14):
fed into by some of his own remarks back in
the day. But um, and Jeff Bizelic is the lead
assistant in charge of defense. Now, this has been a
great defensive team and they're switching defense, you know, they're
they're embracing that too. They're switching defense. Has been incredibly effective.
But if we're going to evaluate their defense based on
what happens against the Warriors in a series, it's a
(20:35):
little bit tough because the Warriors, you know, destroyed just
about everyone and that's just a fact or a factor
of having four All Stars and two m vps on
the floor. Um, I don't know, I don't know that
any defense is going to be fairly judged when they're
playing the Warriors. What happens if they lose this series?
(20:56):
Like like you know, Chris Paul came over to go
all in and you know, up brutes his family and
there's a lack of happiness there with the lack of
progress in l A. But he could be he's a
free agent. What what what happens with this team if
they if they lose in five or and six, um,
you know, regardless of how many games they lose in
(21:16):
even if they go to seven and lose. I mean,
I think the real concern is how do you improve period?
Chris Paul is thirty three, and the window for him,
you don't know how long it's gonna be. You know,
point guards in particular at that size around six ft
six one point guards don't necessarily uh age welder games
(21:38):
and you never know which day is the day they're
going to just kind of fall off a cliff. So,
you know, they went from very team to sixty five
win team with Chris Paul in the mix. I just
don't know what they're true window is with him there.
And then if it's not him, who are you replacing
him with? Um? You know, if Chris Paul will be
a free agent the summer. Of course, Clint Capella is
(21:58):
a free agent restricted and there will be a big
market for him. So the challenge is how do you
in the within the constraints of salary cap and everything else,
make this team better. Um, But that's that's not just
the Rockets issue, that's everybody's issue. You know, how do
you catch a team with four all stars in the Warriors? Well,
there's a guy in Cleveland who could be available. There
(22:21):
is that guy, UM, and the Rockets of course won't
have cap room. But you can get creative, you can
find ways to create that room, Um, Darryl Morey. But
you know, obviously the Rockets GM is as creative and
as aggressive as they come, so he will certainly be
in pursuit, as will a lot of others. Um of Lebron,
(22:42):
but you know that's I don't know how realistic that is.
And if it's not him, what else? What other options
are there? Could they make a trade for Kawhi Leonard
if if the Spurs are ready to move on from him.
Could they make a move for Paul George if if
the George leeves Oklahoma. There will be you know, there
will possibilities, but they're going to be a high degree
(23:03):
of difficulty options. Howard back joining us on the Doug
Gotlip Show on Fox Sports Radio works for Bleacher Report
cover in the NBA. All right, let's go to the
other series. It felt like a mismatch in Boston. Now
it feels equally like a mismatch in Cleveland. Game four
is a really telling game. What do you think we're
gonna see? That's funny. I was in Cleveland for Game three.
(23:28):
I'm not there for Game four. I was in in
Cleveland for Game three, and you know, everybody's always chattering
about this, asking each other that, what do you think?
What do you think? My feeling that day was, I'm
almost certain they're gonna win Game three. I was pretty
sure that the Cavaliers were not going to go down
three O. The lebron was not gonna be down three O.
But my first comment after that was, but I have
(23:50):
no idea what happen in Game four, and I'm still
not sure. I mean, my my gut says, uh, they'll
pull out another one. They'll tie this series. It will
become the best of free and you know that's that's
how I would expect it to unfold. But you know,
the Celtics have been you know, they've been incredibly resilient
all year for a team that is young in key spots.
(24:11):
They obviously are a really well coached, very smart team. Um,
there will be adjustments to come tonight, we'll see what
that actually is. But you know, I have a feeling
as bad as this Cavalier's roster is, I think that
Lebron can get them to at least one more win
and tie this series. First, I don't think the rosters
(24:35):
as bad as people would. You know, like, look, is
it as good as it has been? You think, how come? Um,
you have obviously you know one generational player in Lebron James.
You have one other player and Kevin Love, who is
been an All Star and is an above average player,
but he's not a creator. And then you have a
bunch of guys who are average at best, too below average,
(24:57):
and many of whom had no postseason experience. I'm talking
about the guys that got in trade. Jordan Clarkson, Rodney Hood,
Larry Nance Jr. Have done almost nothing in this postseason
for this team. So you've got a rotation that's really
full of holes. You don't have a Kyrie Irving or
you don't have a Dwyane Wade that Lebron had next
to him in Miami. So, by definition, and I've said
(25:18):
this from the beginning of the season, before the trades,
after the trade, this is the weakest supporting cast Lebron
has had since two thousand nine ten when he left
Cleveland the first time. And that's not that's that's not
even hyperbole. That's just just the fact he doesn't have
that dynamic co star that he had in those seven
straight trips to the finals. No, I understand that. But
(25:39):
he's also going against the Celtics team and any other
They're they're two best players, right like like well, like
Terry Terry Rose Terry Rosier. Does he start on any
other any other playoff team? I would have to go
through them in my head, but I think he would
start for a few of them. I think Terry Rosier
simply needed the opportunity in his what third year ever
(26:00):
to show what he had and then and then like
kind of go through it and you say, I mean
the rest of the roster is so young you can
Jalen Brown and Jason Tatum were both number three overall
picks who had you know, great potential at the moment
they were drafted, have clearly developed some and are putting
(26:22):
up numbers and defend and are like you can see
them night in, night out. If you didn't know what
year they were in the league, you would think they
were five year veterans. You wouldn't. So if your guys
are playing at a level in terms of their actual
talent and their poise that appears like a veteran, you
can no longer say, well, they're just missing all this talent. Sure,
of course they're missing Carrier and Gordon Hayward. But first
of all, Al Horford is incredibly underrated and incredibly valuable
(26:45):
to them, and Tatum and Brown and Rose Deer are
very good young players, young, sure, but very good. Marcus
smart Is it is a guy that every team in
the league would love to have, and they will will
be chasing him this summer during his re agencies. So
just because they're missing to all stars, which is not
to be diminished, it doesn't mean that they don't also
(27:07):
still have a wealth of talent there. In fact, they
have far more talent overall Lebron notwithstanding, than the Cavaliers do. See,
I look, I think here here's where I think the flaws.
I think the flaw is in everyone try to construct
a team around Lebron where you get shooters to give
him space. Right, he needs guys give him space, and
(27:27):
they they didn't. They don't have great athleticism, and and
then their offense up until Game three, when they started
running a lot of pick and roll, a lot of
ball screen to try and create some mismatch. It was
a lot of off the ball screening and movement looking
to get switches and slips and jump shots, and then
playing off of Lebron. So I think I think there's
a The two flaws were in the construction of the
(27:50):
team and the in terms of roster and in construction
of the offense only playing one way, which really limited them.
But I mean, like, look, Mark Smart. I love Marcus Smart,
hey went to Oaklhoma State, plays his nuts off, but
like Marcus Smart can't shoot. And though we're seeing the
value of all the other things he does, that's not
something that for example, a team like Cleveland would value,
(28:13):
right because well, he can't shoot, so he can't play
with Lebron. They've tried to construct a team around what
he does and how he creates and he can create
shots for everybody else, and and that has its limitations.
I would just say this, if the if the Cavaliers
had the opportunity right now to swap Jordan Clarkson or
Rodney hood for Marcus Smart. They would do it in
a heartbeat, no, no question. But again you're you're, you're
(28:36):
that those are bench players, right, And look, I didn't
like the Jordan's I thought that Jordan Jordan Carkson is
a classic case of guy puts up numbers on really
bad teams. We think he's gonna put up those numbers
on a good team, even off the bench, and he cannot. Okay,
he's he's been exposed. But like Marcus Smart is a
six or seventh man on any of these teams. He
just happens to fit with the way in which Boston plays.
(28:57):
They give him twenty five minutes. They don't care if
he misses ots. They just let him play. Where's a
lot of teams, you know, heat you can't play him
thirty five minutes a game because he can't shoot. That
would be the limitation on most of the good teams
in the NBA. Sure, And to your point, look, the Cavaliers,
it's not a well constructed group overall, But it was
a group that was constructed basically, you know, reconstructed twice
(29:19):
in less than a year, both times under incredibly adverse circumstances.
The first time with Harry Irving's gun to your head
saying get me out of here, and they made a
deal that looked okay on its face, but was predicated
on Jay Crowder being better than he'd been in the
Boston the last couple of years, predicated on Isaiah Thomas
actually overcoming a really serious hip injury that he could
(29:40):
not overcome, and on him fitting in um and then
they when when all that went bust, they did what
they could at the trade deadline, and look, they swapped
out a bunch of of, you know, useless pieces for
the most part, for pieces that looked like they might
at least be younger and more athletic. It just turns
out that they haven't fit as well, or couldn't come
together as quick, or maybe weren't as good as they hoped.
(30:02):
But the bottom line is they were doing this under
duress twice over overhauling the roster, and you know that
that's it's it's not like they set out to put
together a group that looked like this. It's what they
could do under the circumstances. It's a it's a it's
a great point. What's your level of confidence that they
can win this series? Oh? I still think they have
a good shot. Um. You know, as much as this
(30:24):
Celtics have not shown their youth for the most part,
you know, there are still a young group that is
going to make their mistakes. We saw a little bit
of that in Game three. And Lebron is just the
ultimate X factor. I mean, you know, he can. You know,
there are times we've seen him single handly win games.
There are times in this postseason we've seen him put
up monsters uh stat lines, you know, forty triple doubles
(30:47):
and still lose because of how weak the supporting cast is.
But I think they're gonna get this one to night.
I think it becomes the best of three and then
we'll see. Uh. You know, it's it's tough to win
in Boston. They have an incredible home quote advantage there.
But I still think as weak as I believe this
Cavaliers supporting test to be, I still think they have
a shot against the Celtics, uh, just because of the youth.
(31:10):
And and again I know they're not showing that youth
very often. They're playing like the veteran t Hey great stuff, Howard,
love the uh, love the the article, and love the
working covering. The NBA. Look forward to talking in the
very near future. Thanks so much for joining us on
Fox Sports Radio. Appreciate it anytime. Be sure to catch
live editions of The Doug Gottlieb Show weekdays at three
(31:32):
pm Eastern noon Pacific on Fox Sports Radio and the
I Heart Radio app. Five time NBA All Star, you
send me a first team on NBA, three times second
team on n b A he's uh his numbers retired
at you tap man Killer crossover himself. Tim Hardaway kind
of to spend some time of this year on the
(31:53):
Doug Gotlip Show. Tim, How are you? I'm good? How
you doing good man? Let's let's start with last night. Um,
how much of it was Step just getting it going?
How much of it was felt like the rockets kind
of especially Hardaway waved a little bit of a white
flag defensively. Well, you know, I just think that Step,
(32:13):
you know, just finally found this what he'd be looking for,
his shot, you know, found his mojo again. You know,
sometimes it happens like that. You understand, he hasn't played
what say, in about six weeks or whatever. And when
he came back, you know, you fresh on your legs
and and everything's working for you and and you're making us,
you know, making stuff happen. Then you know, um, um,
(32:39):
stuff just stopped sappening for you. So that's normal. And
and that's what happened to him. Now he has to
you know, he keep playing a game of basketball, Keep
shooting the same shots you've been shooting, Keep going through
your preparation like you've been going through your preparation. Don't
stop nothing. And I'm it's gonna come back. They always do.
And it did last night, and um, and it's great.
(33:00):
And he was at home when he got um going.
You know, when you're at home, you get your home cooking,
you and your own your own bid, you with your wife,
you with your kids, you you know, you with your family.
You you're talking, you're you're joking around and is you know,
you're just having fun. But uh, and and now he
got his mojo back and he feels good. Now the
team is gonna going out and feel great about him. Um,
(33:23):
get his mojo back, and now they're you know, they're
gonna take it to another level. Is there anything Houston
can do? Um? You know what they've been doing this
all season long. They're not gonna change they're gonna play
the same way. Um in the playoffs. And Tony told you,
the rest of the team told you. You know that
this is what they do, that's who they are. Um.
(33:45):
They're not gonna change nothing. So um, the only thing
you could do is play the defense where you're supposed
to play defense, um, um, and hope that you know,
these guys miss shots, but you know that that's what
they do. They make shots. I mean Golden State Warriors
when they're healthy, they don't. They have a tough team
to beat, no question. But I also think there's you
(34:07):
know they they you can the threes. You can't stop, right, Like,
if you're there and you're challenging a three, that's just
that's just hey, you know there's there's But Houston had
a bunch of turnovers and they gave up a lot
of you know, one of the things got stuff going
tim with some of these backdoor cuts and drives to
the basket. You know, you've got to play the percentages
on the threes and hope that they miss. And I
agree with you. You make seventeen and thirty four, you're
(34:29):
gonna beat everybody you play, right, But the difference becomes
difference becomes when you're giving up layups. And it felt
like I felt like Houston fell asleep a little bit
on some of those cuts and some of those drives.
And if you give up the layups, now of a sudden,
you automatically collapse and then you're gonna give up more threes,
right exactly. But you know what, that's what make Gold
(34:50):
mistakes so good. They play all different type of waves.
They could beat you all different types back cuts, um
going to the whole with slips uh um uh. You know,
and they and they and they passed the ball very
well too. And and that's what they when they don't
turn the ball over and they just uh played the
way they're supposed to play. And that's what that's what
(35:11):
makes on Gold and stay so tough, so tough. But
you know, like last night, they got they had everything going.
You know, they had lay ups going, they had back
doors going, they had um everything going, and they had
um the three is going. So I mean everything was
cooking for him while they're at home. Now, the adjustment
(35:33):
is we still play our same way. And Houston they
missed a lot of layups too. They missed a lot
of layouts at the rim, you know hard and missed
some layups at the rim. Chris Paul missed one lay
up at the rim. You gotta make laps when you
get those lay ups. You gotta make those layouts, and
you gotta make those laps count. So um uh, you know,
I think that that's what they're looking at two and
(35:54):
and to me, you know, I think, um, you know, Houston,
this is what they've been doing on all year, shooting
the three, shooting at three, shooting at three. You know,
sometimes you just gotta take the shot that's given to you,
and they don't. They don't want to do that. If
it's a mid rain shot, you gotta take it two
of it. To a layup is a two a jump shot?
Mid range jump shot? Is it too? So I think
(36:17):
they get so wrapped up and I gotta take a
layup for three, you know, and instead of just playing
the game of basketball. So uh, you know, and that
and that's what Houston has to do. They just got
to continually just play the game basketball and and and
and played better defense than what they played yesterday last night.
And you know, just hopefully that that the Warriors missed.
(36:38):
But they're at home. They don't miss a lot. At home,
Tim Hardaway joining us to the Doug Ollip Show Fox Sports,
trading to go to the other side. Cleveland at home
again against Boston. Boston looked just too quick, too athletic,
um and physically they kind of pushed around Cleveland and
there at their place. They go to Cleveland and now
of a sudden, they looked like the younger team. They
(36:58):
looked like a team missing Gordon Heyward and Kyrie Irving.
What What's I mean? It's so hard to tell when
you if you only watch game three, you're like, all right,
this isn't a competitive series. If you watch game oneing
game two, you'd have the exact same thought, only the
teams would be switched in your mind. Help me out,
who's actually the better team in the series. Well, the
(37:19):
better team in the series is no, no question, is
is um um the Boston Celtics. All right, But you
got Lebron on the other team. And Lebron when when
you let him dictate how his team is going to
play and you're not making shots on the other end, Um,
it's gonna be a long night for you. Lebron is
(37:40):
very good at what he does, and when he orchestrates
the game like a conductor like you always do. Then
nine times out of ten, he's gonna give us his
team a chance to win. And that's all he wants
to do, give his team a chance to win at
the end, to get at the end of the game.
And I tell you this, if Boston don't get this
game tonight, they're gonna be an the world of trumble.
(38:01):
I think if you let them get tied up to
too going to game three. Um, you give him Lebron,
you understan making Lebron understand what he needs to do
and giving him the understanding what his team needs to
do out there on a basketball court to be successful.
And uh, if it goes to a game seven, oh,
I wouldn't bet against Lebron. But you know the UM,
(38:25):
like Al Horford said, they gotta come out and just
play basketball what they did the first two games. Take
it to the Cleveland Cavaliers. UM play aggressively, don't play passively. UM,
make make the right passes, UM, don't turn the ball over,
and just UM play their game. When they play their games,
they're unstoppable. They areunbeatable. But when they don't play their game,
(38:47):
then they look really bad, you know, like they did
in Game three. They look really bad but really young.
And they look discombobulated in that game, yes they did.
They looked discombobulated. But I mean, now on, they've been
in enough games on the road in the playoffs to
understand what they need to do. They need to come
out and play harder, play better. Don't turn the ball
(39:09):
over and make shots. When you're making shots, you know,
life is better, you know. And they got to move
the ball, don't get stagnant. Just let's play some basketball,
Tim great stuff. Can't tell you how much I appreciate
you join us to give us your incredible insight into
the NBA. Appreciate you being our guest on Fox Sports Radio.
All right, thank you,
Host
Doug Gottlieb
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