#92Noon! 9a Hour 5/29 - Finch & Florio

The Wolves are alive! They win game 4 in Dallas last night, so coach Chris Finch kicks off the show with PA. Some Wolves talkers continue, up to Mike Florio's weekly appearance!

Episode Transcript

(00:04):
Shall we begin. I know we'regonna beat them. Clown fire away nine
too new, you, Homer.They can smell it stopping, stopping,

(00:38):
stopping, it's falling down. Soyou're telling me there's a chance. You

(01:02):
know, the NBA is really tough, and these guys are really good,
and Dallas has two really good closers, so you know, they're able to
make tough shots down the stretch,and they've been able to win games in
these series by doing that, youknow, regardless of how they played during
the game. So we just gotto try to contain those two. I
think we did a good job tonight, try to contain Jones Junior, PJ.
Washington. They're playing really well forthem, and you know, I

(01:23):
think we'll be in good shakes.And indeed our Minnesota Timberwolves, well they're
in shape. Good shape is onething. In shape is another. And
we welcome you to the stay inthe live edition of nine to Noon on
a beautiful Wednesday, and I'm Paulallen Or to produces, and we're happy

(01:47):
to be joined by Chris Finch,coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves. Rice Picks
Daily Fantasy Made Easy provides Chris,along with second Harvest Heartland and two Harvest
dot Org. Chris as a boardmember for Second Harvest Heartland. Check out
the website if you get the opportunityto harvest dot Org. Well, coach,

(02:07):
welcome home and you guys are stayingalive. How are you feeling right
now? I feel good, man. I'm happy to get out of here
with a win last night. Ofcourse, played really well, philp We
can even play better, which isan exciting thing. But nothing more exciting
than be able to come home fora big game five in front of our
home fans. With with with thethe postgame press conference, Chris, were

(02:29):
were you a little EDGYE? Wereyou exhausted? I mean it seemed like
you you were a little edgy inthat press conference. Yeah, a little
edgie. You know, I thought, you know, I thought our guys
fought through a lot of adversity lastnight, and you know, I just
felt that we weren't getting the respectthat we deserve in this series from a

(02:53):
variety of, uh, you knowplaces, but mainly on the floor.
And was my intention coming into thegame last night was to, as I
said, inject the emotion into thegame and make sure that people out there
recognized that we were here to fight, and and and you said that in
the press and the postgame press conference, and and and just doubled down on

(03:15):
it that that your job was toinject emotion into the game last night.
What does that mean? Yeah?I mean, obviously, uh, I
knew our players would come out,we'd play every play hard and give it
our all. But I also hadn'tfelt that we've been getting in respect from
the officials that we deserve, youknow, as a team that's accomplished and

(03:38):
played the way we had, AndI wanted to make sure that I was
out there going to fight the fightfor our guys who were fighting the good
fight. So with the with withwith the te When Cap picked up number
five right in front of your bench, what was that more emotion injecting?
Or did do you think the elbowt PJ shouldn't have been called? No?

(03:59):
I mean that was I mean thatwas a Scott Foster. Uh,
you know, had had warned meearlier in the game, and I mean
that call. I haven't really lookedat it again, so I don't don't
know. I do know it lookeda lot like the the dantic foul on
the sixth foul for for cat.So I'm not sure how one goes one

(04:25):
way and the other goes the other. But but you know, I just
waved off down Scott Foster, whichis apparently a taboo thing, and he
hit me with the technico so yougot for the wave off? Yeah,
the wave off? All righty?Now did uh did you do any damage
to the knee bouncing around on thesideline? It was I mean I was

(04:46):
gonna start. Yeah, I appreciatethe concern. No, I mean,
listen, it's it's been. Theknee is good, the pain is way
down. Uh, it's more justgeneral discomfort. As you know, Mike
has done an incredible job, asthe whole staff has done. But as
I'm allowed to do and able todo more and more, you know,
I want to be you know,up front, engaged, get back to

(05:08):
some of the old you know routine. And I'm still not able to be
out in front coaching, just youknow, for safety reasons. I just
couldn't get out of the way ofsomething that happened in front of me again.
But you know, in the inhuddles and timeouts that kind of stuff,
you know, I can do moreand more and just being able to

(05:29):
be up and be present and youknow, have interesting conversations with officials.
That's like all things I think Ican do to help impact the game.
They're not into they're not interesting conversationswith officials. They're injecting emotion. That
that's you're you're the inject You're you'rethe emotion injecting coordinator. That uh,
that's not bad to have on theresume next to head coach. But but

(05:54):
seriously, you got Carl going withthose threes last night. How how massive
was that? And by the way, congratulations on that victory. Yeah,
thanks, I mean it's huge.I mean, listen, Carl got himself
going. He you know, hereally did. He played within the game.
Everything that he did came within theflow of the game. You know,

(06:15):
you know, coming into a gamelike that and particularly you know,
have not play that well in theseries, you know a lot of players
would be super antsy, you know, try to chase the game and kind
of maybe try to do too much. He didn't. He stayed within the
flow, and you know, Ithought he turned down a few shots maybe
in the first half, but that'sokay. You know, he drove,

(06:38):
he made some good play and thenyou know, just stayed ready and then
we started kind of featuring them alittle bit more on some things in the
third quarter that got him going abit, and an Aunt started finding him
and Kyle, you know, Kylewas screening for him and everybody, and
so it was, you know,it was really Cat. It was Cat's
mindset, it was his composure,it was his willingness to let the game

(07:00):
to him, and then when itdid, he took full control. And
Chris in game four when when Imean Kat couldn't hit anything, and and
you kept him in and let himtry to shoot through it, which I
thought was really cool. It isit just a matter of confidence and time
before the Gift did shoot their waysout of slumps. I mean, you

(07:23):
know, it's too good of aplayer to to, you know, not
play really really well. And he'splayed really well for us in the previous
two series, been a huge partof the reasons that we've won those,
both offensively and defensively. And whatI would say is this, you know,
we've always felt this is going tobe a long series, doesn't matter

(07:45):
what you know, down oh three, down one to three, whatever it
is, And you know you haveto stay confident in your guys. And
we finished Game two with Nabs becausehe was on a heater, and that
was just the right thing to do. That's what the game told us to
do. In Game three, youknow, not played played well, but

(08:09):
we had to get Cat into theseries somehow, and you know, we
had to stay confident. He hadto know that we still believed in him.
And he's finished ninety five percent ofthe games that we've played, so
it's literally a vote of confidence morethan it was anything. And in some
small way, maybe that voter confidencepaid off to the last night's result,
you know, and and and withwith with Karl Anthony Towns and the fouls

(08:33):
is the preach to him just todo his very best to avoid the ticky
tech stuff for which he always getscalled. I mean that that that foul
trouble seemed to seem seemed to workon your last nerve last night. Yeah,
listen, I mean, you know, he gets a lot of offensive
fouls, and that's what I thinkcompounds the foul trouble sometimes with him,

(08:56):
the offensive fouls, you know,other than his his fifth foul, which
maybe you know, he kind ofstepped outside of the cylinder a little bit.
You know, he got two charges. I didn't think one was a
charge. One might have been acharge, but the one that happened early
in the game, I was like, I'm not going to challenge that because
I didn't think I'm gonna win it. And Matsield thing about these challenges like

(09:18):
they might you know, the likethe referees willingness to overturn their own calls
is something that you have to factorin, like, Okay, who made
the call? How often does thatguy overturn his own calls when he goes
to the monitor. These are things, right, you know, we know,
we know, we know Foster isone that overturns his own calls at
the lowest rate in the league.But I still challenged one of his calls

(09:41):
when Anthony had a steal because Ithought, you know it was Anthony.
It would have been our ball andAnthony's fourth, so it was a high
leverage situation. I thought we couldwin, and I thought we should have
won. But having said that,you know, Cats, our cats offensive
files were you know, the goodkind, if you will. They weren't
like hooks and plales and you knowthat kind of stuff. And yeah,
I mean like you know, he'sgoing to have some tick a tack defensive

(10:05):
ones from time to time. Buthe did a really good job. I
think the most important thing was hisfoul troubles. He played through it.
You know, he was able toplay through it, and we took him
out. We almost took him outrather and then he got an A and
one. I think Gorey got fouled, and you know, we left him
in and then he got got ona little roll after that. Christ bench
coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves, niceenough to join nine to noon the morning

(10:28):
after an elimination staving victory by theTimberwolves, still trailing Dallas three one in
the Western Conference Finals and to Gamefive is tomorrow night at Target Center and
on k f A m uh coachDallas and like Phoenix, Dallas bites a
lot on those Edwards drives and kicksto the corner for the threes? What

(10:50):
what? What? What leads tocalling that play? And do you like
want to call it all the time? It was terrific last night. Well,
there're a lot of different ways thatwe try to get Anthony to the
heart of the defense, and thenwe rely on Anthony to make the right
play, and I thought down thestretch he did an outstanding job and most
of the second half. To befair, you know, he came into

(11:11):
this to the game with an aggressivemindset. He was not going to go
out without giving its all. Beingaggressive with with with Tamam Milson, you
know, means getting up as manyshots as he possibly can. And he
set the tone for us and wewere up big on you know to start,
or up you know ten to startas a result of that. Then

(11:31):
you know, then as the halfwar on, first half war on,
you know, they just started sendingmore and more bodies and we looked at
some things that at halftime where wefelt we could counter that, and he
did a really good job of adjustingand then created a lot of buckets for
his teammates in the second half.Is part of being a head coach or

(11:52):
a successful head coach. I mean, you got a team in the Western
Conference finals, man, yet notdwelling. And what I'm getting getting that
is like in Game two, theMAVs were just begging to be blown out.
I mean, you guys had themthirteen fifteen, eighteen thirteenth for the
longest time that they got blown outin that Clippers series. They got blown
out once in the OKC series almosttwice, and so you can't dwell on

(12:16):
that, right, But they werebegging to be blown out in Game two,
weren't they. Yeah, I meanwe had them. I think that's
the game two is the pivot gamefor sure, you know, whether it
be the blow in the big leador or or getting beat at the buzzer
with the daunted shot. But youknow, you can't dwell on it.
Every game has its own personality.You know, what's what happened yesterday is

(12:39):
unrelated to what will happen tomorrow,and that cuts both ways. You know,
we're still backs against the wall.Got to come out fight and stay
with the play with the same desperationand intention that we played with last night.
But yeah, you got to havethe ability to move on. And
you know, it's a really reallygreat team that we're playing in. You

(13:01):
know, not they're not just they'renot the fifth best team in the Western
Conference. I mean since the tradedeadline, they've they've been top four in
offense and defense with the with thegreat the best points differential amongst the starting
five them, They've they've been areally, really great job of remaking their
team midseason, and they're easily they'reeasily a top you know three team in

(13:22):
the West if you think about it. So and they have two great players
that are playing at a high leveland able to close games with either of
them. So you know, lossis hurt. They certainly do. It's
been an unbelievable series. If you'rejust a fan of basketball NBA basketball,
you know, when you're in it, obviously, you know, and you

(13:43):
come up short, you know,you got to keep going back and figuring
it out. But but yeah,you got to move on from what just
happened and try to, you know, come up with a new game plan.
But you can't dwell on the resultsof it all. K Kyle Anderson
man is so smart. I mean, he got, you know, one
of those threes that that we're talkingabout Edwards Edwards drives kicks to the corner.

(14:03):
Alexander Walker hit a big one,but I mean, you guys missed
a fair amount of him too.I mean, if you're hitting those wide
open threes on that Edwards kick,holy cow. But but anyway, he
got Kyle got Towns lined up onone of those threes right in front of
your bench. And set that sweetlittle pick and like when when he put
him into the right spot and Anthonywas patient enough, knowing Carl needed to

(14:26):
be there, so he waited forslow mo. Then he penetrated, he
got that little pick. What whatwhat led you to believe into the series
Kyle Anderson had such a key role. Well, I think a couple of
things. One is his versatility,you know, we needed. We know
it's the way that they play.We would need his defensive versatility. He's

(14:48):
been a pretty good Luca matchup forus in the two years he's been here.
You know, just with the waythat they were going to play defense,
we felt that he was going tobe able to on lock shots for
for us. You know, Kyledidn't you know, Kyle didn't play a
you know, major minutes in thelast series, in the Denver series because

(15:09):
it was different. It was moreabout how many big bodies can you throw
it at Jokic. Now it becomeshow many different looks can we give those
two guards? And you know,and also at the other end, you
know, just we always know howmuch more you know, kind of settled
and secure we feel with Kyle outthere helping to orchestrate offense and Luca's immortality.

(15:35):
I mean, there ain't no doubtabout it. But but so so,
you know, this may seem preposterous, but Kyle bugs him. Haven't
you noticed that there are times Kylebugs Luka doncic Oh for sure. I
mean, you know, he's gota big body. I mean, Luca's
you know, I mean, lucasan incredible player, the best in the
world right now. But what youdon't realize about is big. You know,

(15:56):
it's big, He's strong. He'sgot to body hits you first.
You gotta be able to absorb thathit, you know, and when you
know they especially with the way theyallow him to, you know, push
off to create separation. You gotto be able to withstand that and still
have no length, you know,in the footwork to contest and and compete.

(16:18):
So he does a good job withwith that and gives us some switchability
too, which is always good whenyou have a such a high IQ pick
and role player like Luca. WhenChris when when when you say they allow
him to push off, do youguys have like pregame meetings with the Rats
where I mean, I'm just usedto this from the NFL. It happens
every single game where you like meetand and you let them know either you

(16:42):
got something tricky comings you know,don't freak out when you see this,
or hey, can you can youguys do a better or can you guys
monitor this? And and maybe thepush offs, like do you have those
meetings? No, not pregame,you know, I mean the pregame meetings.
There more informality with the with thecaptains and the officials. I don't

(17:03):
think there's anything of substance discussed therecertainly nothing amongst the coaches or whatever.
Any kind of points of emphasis thatwe want to draw we have to do
through official channels post game. Uh. But you know, you see it
a lot, you know, yousee, I mean the defense has become
you know, more prevalent in theleague, uh coming you know, certainly

(17:26):
in the second half of this season, which is great to see, adds
to the overall kind of flavor ofthe product. Uh. But I still
think the offensive teams and offensive playersare given too much advantage on just simple
push offs to create space, andthen when the defender tries to close that
gap and the offensive player steps backinto it, they call the foul.
Seems a little unfair to me.Someone's gonna push me off, and I

(17:48):
try to come back and retake myspace and they launch themselves at me.
I've been put out of disadvantage,and I think it's something that the league
needs to continue to look at totry to mitigate. What what What did
you think of Anthony's overall game?I thought it was outstanding, you know,

(18:10):
it really was. I thought,you know, he was gonna be
aggressive, one of the ball inhis hands down the stretch. I thought
for the most part, he madegood decisions. You know, even the
shots that he got too we gotthere under control and they're clean. You
know, he didn't try to dotoo much. He just got to the
spot, rose up, made theshot. Even the step through bank shot
was something that you know, hedidn't over complicate. Found you know,

(18:33):
found found cat at the right timea couple of times for big trees,
you know. And defensively, hewas really good on Luca, kind of
just navigating a lot of a lotof their picks. A couple more here
with Chris Bench, coach of thetimber Wolves. Thank you. Thanks for
the time too, Chris Kyrie anytime. Kyrie was fourteen and zero all time

(18:55):
and close out games. Now he'sfourteen and one at anything, just ripped
leading to his off night. No, I mean, I mean, like
he's phenomenal player playing an incredible levelright now. To me, it's some
of the best basketball I've ever seenhim play. They've got a great chemistry
with his team. Uh, youand Luca have figured it out. Uh,

(19:18):
he's got the ability to get anywhereon the floor. Of the best
ball handler in the league and oneof the best finishers in the league too,
So he's got a complete package,and he's guarding at a high level.
Uh, you know, there's gonnabe nights where you just the shots
just don't go in. I meanthose guys, those guys have been making
shots at such an incredible rate,and a lot of them are tough contested

(19:40):
shots, and so some nights they'rejust not going to go in. I
mean, we've you know, heseemed that with Kat. It was not
like Kat hadn't had good looks.It just hadn't gone in the first couple
of games of the series. Soyou know, we got to got to
continue to fight him and you know, show him, show him the crowd
and trying to make it as hardas possible. But you know, I

(20:00):
don't think there was like a scriptthat we could you know, that we
had any kind of secret to tofigure it out. What about what what
did you guys change in halftime?You said after the game the adjustments played
into the win. I think itwas more just offensively, you know,
we're just figuring out where where wecould, uh we could, you know,

(20:23):
kind of take advantage of a fewthings based on how they were guarding
and Rudy Gobert what what What didyou think of Rudy's overall night? Quite
physical, wasn't it. Yeah?I thought it was his best game of
the series. I thought active asactivity on defense was, Uh was where
it was where it's always been.He looked more like his normal self.

(20:47):
We did a lot better job ofprotecting him when he was able to be
aggressive, which is, you know, one of the one of the things
we hadn't been able to do.So we've been giving up a lot of
lobbs in the series. Just neededto free him, free him in his
mindset. Uh, you know,I thought, uh, you know,
he was he stayed really composed througha lot of wrestling out there and and

(21:12):
just kept playing and you know,we were in foul trouble and we were
able to survive that. But Ithought it was his best game in the
series. So we're gonna need moreof it. So so you last one,
you you got the whole thing seeminglywrapped up. You know you're going
to come back home, and ofcourse Luca hits the late three and gets
found. I mean, nothing's easyin this series, right, No,

(21:34):
not at all. I mean,when you have great players out there,
they're a capable of doing great things. You know, I thought we left
some money on the table with ourturnovers and our mystery throws. I thought
we could play it even better.We did a much better job of closing
that game. I mean it wasit felt like every other game in the
series. We just we didn't turnit over. We got a good shot

(21:56):
every time, and we were ableto get stops down to stretch. And
that's the combination that you have todo to win those games. You know,
they're gonna make some great shots.They've proven that all series that they
can do it. So you've gotto be able to, you know,
score alongside of them and get enoughstops yourself. Big time, my ma'am,
And Thanks for everything you do forSecond Harvest tar Land. Okay,

(22:18):
I appreciate it. PA, thanksso much. Yeah, see you about
good luck tomorrow night. But thanks. Chris Bench, coach of the Minnesota
Timberwolves. To start to nine tonoon after a thrilling victory over the Dallas
Mavericks where our beloved timber Wolves arestaying alive. Oh you know you could
tell that we had that desperation thatmakes us special. Talks about it and

(22:41):
shoot around. Just that desperation playingwith so much energy on defense, you
know, making those rotations, andthe players needed to win. Just desperate.
Uh, you know, we leftit all out there. We got
to be able to do it againin about forty eight hours. It's exciting.
Uh, it's good to get onthe board. Got to get want
to get to got to get one, to get too, then you got

(23:03):
to get two, to get three, and then maybe history can be can
be made. But the saga,the drama, the comeback, the elimination
staving continues tomorrow evening at Target Centerfor the Minnesota Timberwolves, a team that
plays in Minneapolis, which is inthe state of Minnesota. The fan has
learned a place that it's now invogue to complain that that you have to

(23:27):
come, that you have to cometo like Shaquille O'Neill and Charles Barkley,
where that whole thing. I mean, it's actually starting to work on my
last nerve where I'm like, okay, after the first time, cool,
all right, second time cool,third time? Oh great, we get
to go back to the snow whereit's going to be seventy eight and sunny
tomorrow, where like in Dallas it'seighty three and rainy. It just it's

(23:49):
it's trite. It's an overplayed clichedbit that they just keep running into the
ground and we still fly over countrythough, pa I understand that, but
I mean get a new bit.I mean, has Draymond Green usurping spots
and or time to talk on TNT'spre halftime in postgame show so so thrown

(24:15):
Barkley and O'Neill off that all theycan do is complain about coming back to
Minnesota. Mean, it's it's justtright. I mean, it's Draymond Green.
It's so sad. The NBA Show, which for basketball and or I
think it's called Inside the NBA,which for basketball and non basketball fans has
been so well respected and revered overthe years for the authentic nature of its

(24:41):
commentary, the authentic nature of therelationships Ernie Johnson, Surrogate Dad guides with
the Surrogate Kids, Shaquille O'Neil,Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley. And correct
me if I'm wrong here, becausethis came up last week. So like
inside the NBA on T and T, that's Dad, the whole thing moves
to ESPN or something like that.Well, I don't think it's gonna I

(25:03):
don't think they're moving. Okay,No, the contract's coming up, so
they're gonna have one more season nextyear. And somebody said last week it
might have been Jim Pete. Well, the new TV deal is is so
ESPN is gonna get the games,but the idea is the rights to the
show, right, And then nowyou've got to talk seventy year old Ernie
Johnson to move from Atlanta to Bristolor or wherever, and and Barkley's come

(25:29):
out and interviews himself and he kindof thinks that, Okay, the whole
thing might be over. Yeah,so it's it's certainly entering the twilight stages
of that group. And that program, well, it's it's it's which has
been awesome if it's going out inany fashion, certainly for this season,
it's doing so shabbily and awful sincethey added Draymond Green. I mean,
Shaq, Kenny and Charles are notnearly as cohesive and authentic with Draymond around.

(25:52):
I loved your tweet last night,and it was accurate too. Is
like the postgame player should have beenRudy Gobert put them up, but Rudy
Gobert up there with Draymond Green,you know, after Draymond is has said
taking some low hanging fruit related things. I'm just surprised that that that a
current player with multiple rings would becomethat petty and that and and that and

(26:18):
that's small minded. It would havebeen. It was a brilliant tweet last
night. It would have been awesomeif they brought Rudy. And it stinks
too because Draymond when he's actually talkingbasketball, like clearly there's a wear into
the TV vibe. Super smart,super smart player who happened to play with
you know those things floating around bestbackcourt duo history of league. Luca and

(26:38):
Kyrie have sparked a lot of thosetalkers, right, he played with Stephan
Clay right, I mean, andand when he's not choking people and getting
fined and complaining that the NBA doesn'tmake it feasible for him to have wealth
after he's retired, when he's notsaying ridiculous things, he's super smart of
the game, and he's good player. And he's good in that commercial with

(27:00):
that dog which I can't remember.It's a dog staring at him, staring
at the dog, and like thedog backs off for somebody's in a commercial,
big commercial during these basketball games.And he's really really good at it.
But he's replaced all of that withbitterness and pettiness. And you know
with with Barkley, I love Chuckso much. And at the first time
he's like, I only brought twosuits. I don't want to have to

(27:21):
go back. Like that's I enjoyedthat first. That was the baseline of
what now has become a fifty ensuingright. Well, I mean, now,
granted, you know we're compensated byf M one hundred point three kfan
your beat bits into the ground leader, I always love that one, so
it is I always love that one. An interesting twist of fate. I

(27:44):
always love that one, or twistof turn of opinion. I always love
that one. Those at kfan,I always love that one are saying to
people. I always love that one. Get a new bit or stop running
the bit into the ground. Ialways love that one. But the bit
involves the place that we happen tolike. Now, what we don't like
is foul trouble for our favorite team. Yeah, and Chris Finch, you

(28:07):
know who just was on nine tonoon. We'll play a back a couple
of hours from now if you missedit. But you know, he he
said something that mildly surprised me whenwhen discussing Karl Anthony Town's foul trouble and
just foul trouble overall with the teamGobert and Anthony Edwards to a certain extent.
But he was like, the offensivefouls, there were two. There

(28:30):
were two offensive fouls where he's like, you know, those are born of
aggression, those are born of Carlheading to the basket paraphrasing looking to make
something happen. Yeah, did Klibatake both those charges? I think it
was Kleeba. Yeah, he tookone for sure, and he might have
missed with their mix a little bitlast night too. They couldn't get they
couldn't get him all squared away.But that's okay. It's I'm mildly on

(28:52):
the other side of what Chris said, and I'm not second guessing guy.
He knows more about it than me. But you know, at least with
one of those offense fouls, itthey're very easy to see coming and for
the player to stand in front ofCarl and take a sense charge because he
buries his head. He's there's somebowl in China shop terrorism and he ain't

(29:15):
stopping now. On one of them, he was pondering passing, but it
was too late. So you knowthose there were three fouls last night by
Carl. The third one just reallyworked on my last nerve man where they're
either born, if he's tired andhe's reaching, or he just doesn't get
it. And the reason I bringit up like that so Tertley specifically after

(29:37):
he had his best game of theseries. That's the reason. And you've
been hammering on it hard when we'vebeen together talking about it. You aunt
for Doe, but you Carl forshow. And if you don't, if
you don't Carl for show, thenyou don't ant for Doe because as we
established the other day, Okay,Indy's done all right, So Indy Halliburton

(29:57):
and maybe Siakam, maybe Miles Turnerkind of turned into emhard to be honest,
them hard with a couple of bigperformances at the end of the series,
right, channeling is an inner youngerbrother for the Zags. Well,
Tatum and Brown are Luca and Kyrie. I mean, if it comes to
that that quartet right there, that'sas good as it gets, right,

(30:22):
you know, unless Karl Anthony Townsbecomes that one. A yeah, And
so that's why that's why we hammeredon it as as much as we do.
And I'm the individual during the courseof the years who has said Carl
Anthony Towns is no better than athree maybe a four on a championship type
team. Well, that's not mybelief anymore, and who cares about my

(30:44):
stupid ass belief. It's the wayCarl has pushed through things and reidentified himself
to a certain extent, specifically withthe officials, to where after last night's
game, Kyrie Irving paraphrasing is like, no, we I had a ton
of respect for Kat. Everybody inthis room knows how he can wreck games.
He referred to critics as unfair,thank you. Despite unfair criticism,

(31:08):
thank you. They respect him right, And that's Kyrie Irving Man, super
smart and super well spoken and superimportant, and he's like, nah,
the criticism's unfair, perfectly stated.But that last foul worked on your last
nerve, didn't it? No,it did, because I don't know what
And I'm glad you mentioned. Youmentioned this with Chris, and Chris said
it perfectly. I disagree when hetalked about that offensive foul that Kat had

(31:33):
on PJ. He elbowed him inthe face, and they've made that like
a topic number one. You putcontact on somebody above the neck and they're
going to call that foul. Now. They could have even gone farther and
hit him with a flagren. Ibelieve they left it as a common foul.
Yep, him fouling out on thatLuca. There's a training video.
You can find it on Twitter.As a matter of fact, we kin

(31:55):
about officiating and offensive fouls as itrelates to shooters, and I believe there's
even a nickname for it. Ithink it's the James Harden rule. It
might be, and I could bewrong on that. The idea is is
as Luca on that three point shotfakes going forward and Cat moves back off
of the shove right, so youpush that offense. The offensive player pushes

(32:20):
the defender back, then he fakesthe shot, allows Kat to get airbord,
and then he just launches himself intoKarl Anthony Towns right and one of
his feet is back down on theground. He did not jump into the
natural space to eliminate Luca's ability totake the shot. Luca just launches himself

(32:42):
into Cat and then hucks up theball, gets those three free throws,
and Cats on the on the benchfor the rest of the night. In
the NBA official video of how tocall these as offensive fouls, Wow,
he's the example. Luka Dotsich isthe exam of exactly what he did last
night, where he eliminates Kat fromhis own space with the shove, then

(33:08):
he steps behind the line, Catjumps to defend, and Luca just throws
himself into Carl. It should havebeen an offensive foul and I just can't
believe in that moment with the emphasisand those sorts of situations. Luca with
the big body uses it well.I mean, you know the I love

(33:28):
Luca's game so much, minus thetemper tantrums. To be honest with you,
I love Luca. I don't knowhow anybody can with the shooting ability,
the fadeaways, the fallaways. Itjust thinks that it's we're the ones
that are on the wrong side ofit. But that should have been a
foul and or should have been afoul on Luca. So things like that,
and so you lump that into themoment. I'm looking in on a

(33:50):
singular moment over the course of thegame. That matters more when Carl is
doing the things inside that he wasdoing last night with the charges. So
Carl, I do believe that heis a smart player, but I also
believe that he's an emotional player andhe needs to be more mature in those
moments. The earlier fouls made thatfinal one against Luca hurt more. But

(34:14):
yeah, Lucas Lucas the example.Yeah, he's the dog, and he
ended up shooting some free throws thatmattered, thankfully, and with the dagger
nas on the inbound, by theway, what a huge bucket that was,
Yeah, it was. It wasfinally closing out in the clutch,
and that's why we're still alive.Talkbacks Free iHeartRadio app. Thirty seconds to

(34:35):
Opine on the timber Wolves elimination stavingvictory last evening. We'll play something back
about thirty minutes from now around thecorner Mike Florio pft. Yeah, you
know we all righty a break frombasketball momentarily. Adam Schefter of ESPN is

(35:20):
reporting the Minnesota Vikings and guard DaltonReisner have gotten together on a one year
deal. It has been corroborated andor confirmed by the likes of Been Gesling,
Alec Lewis, Kevin Seaffert from ESPN. So Dalton Reisner, guard who
played a majority of the games lastyear at left guard, reportedly has re

(35:45):
signed with the Minnesota Vikings. Andthey practiced today and Friday, and then
they have mandatory mini camp next weekand to chat about that and much more.
As Mike Florio from ProFootball Talk dotcom, Mike, sorry for the
sorry for the delay of game herewith these Timberwolves man in the Western Conference
Finals, are you getting bit oftad by these Wolves? They stayed elimination

(36:09):
last night, and I know youwatched the games. I can understand why
you would forget where your bread's butteredon a daylight today, the one game
that the Wolves are going to winin the conference finals, you need to
go all in with it because therewon't be another one. Well, why
would you say something like that.We're coming home tomorrow. I'm just having
fun. My son is all in. You know, we're coming up to

(36:30):
a game if they make it tothe finals. And it's been excruciating to
watch these games because it feels likethey could have won every single one of
them. It could have been afour to zero sweep for the timber Wolves,
which makes me think there is areal possibility that when things turn around,

(36:52):
could turn around things maybe you know, looking up and when you're down
three to zero, it's just oneone at a time, right, and
you get that first one, youget the second, the second one is
the key. You get the threeto two that changes everything. So you
know, we'll see. I'm optimisticand we're hoping that we can come up
there and check out a finals gameagainst the Boston Celtics. So yeah,

(37:15):
he's all in. He he's reallyinto it, and I'm into it because
he's into it, so it's goodfun. Isn't that awesome? I mean
so so Alexander, young Alexander,what is he about? Twenty seven,
twenty eight years old, twenty sixthteenty bingo? Wow, wow, impress
it right? Well, my son'stwenty three. And isn't it amazing?

(37:35):
Like if your son gets into somethingand you got an opportunity to spend some
time with them and watch it andtalk it out together, just how wonderful
that is. And what I'm talkingabout is like my son, my son
Derek loves UFC. I mean,up until a year ago, I couldn't
care less about UFC. But wheneverthey have one of those big Saturday night
bits and we get together with otherfamily members and his friends. I mean

(37:59):
that's now, all of a sudden, I like it, Like I'm following
it a little bit. You know. Well, UFC is so much more
brutal than football. It's incredible.And if UFC had the same attention and
platform that football does, people wouldwant to have it banned. Anytime I
hear people complain about the brutality offootball, I say, go watch some

(38:22):
of the uf You got seven concussionsthat someone suffering on the way to the
ground. When the thing finally fallsapart, you've got the referee throwing himself
over top of the fighters to tryto separate them. I mean, it
is a level of brutality that footballhas never had. And I've actually stopped
watching it. I got to apoint where I couldn't do it anymore.
We used to watch it, andso I just can't do it. But

(38:44):
yeah, it's good to have somethingyou can enjoy with your adult child once
they go through that phase of thinkingDad isn't cool and I don't want to
be around dad, and then theyrealize Dad's okay. It's fun to hang
out and do stuff. Are youor at least reading what you wrote about
the Pioneer Press slash Charlie Walters nuggetthe other day about Jefferson and potentially being

(39:10):
traded and draft Night Malik Neighbors wholething. Uh it? Were you surprised
it wasn't like a full blown storythat that that column aside indicating oh,
just that the vike Vikings perhaps consideredtrading him, which which I don't believe
they did. But nevertheless, itwas just a column aside that was strange.
Now, let me give you thebackground on this. I was told

(39:32):
during the draft the first night ofthe draft, as it was happening that
the Chargers were considering trading out ofthe five spot. Some in the room
wanted to trade down Jim Harbaugh helpfirm for Joe Alton Notre Dame tackle at
number five, and I was toldthat the buzz was vikings up to number

(39:52):
five to get Malik Neighbors. AndI mentioned that on the videos that I
was doing one pick at a time, and I was never able to nail
it down after the fact, soI never wrote anything about it at PFT,
and I kind of regretted even sayinganything about it, but I try
to be very transparent in the thingsI'm hearing. I tried to couch it
all properly, but I never madeit a big deal because I wasn't able
to nail it down. Chris Simmswas hearing the same things from different sources

(40:15):
the same night, and we hadbeen talking about it, but we never
did anything with it. And thenthat thing shows up, and yeah,
that was one of the things wesaid when we talked about it on our
show yesterday morning. Look, we'renot here to make editorial decisions with the
same Paul Pioneer Press. But howon the hell is that an Oh,
by the way he talked at thebottom of a column, that's a big
deal. And Walters went to aplace we didn't go to. Walters said

(40:37):
that if the trade up to getneighbors had happened, the Vikings would have
traded justin Jefferson. I never heardthat part of it. And frankly,
if you go neighbors first and thentrade Jefferson, you've killed your leverage.
You better have a deal in placefor Jefferson when you move up for neighbors,
because the moment you get neighbors andstart taking calls and making calls about

(40:59):
Jet, you're not going to getwhat you could because they know you're going
to try to move him. ButI thought maybe they would just try to
get through another year. I don'tknow what. I didn't know what they
were going to do. I wasstunned when I heard it, and I
didn't write anything about it until Isaw that item in the Pioneer Press.
And I assume they've got editorial standardsthat required vetting and confirmation and whatnot.

(41:20):
And I know the Vikings will getthe word out of the people covering the
team that it's not true, becausethat's the last thing they need right now.
And I've seen some of the peoplewho cover the team say that it
wasn't gonna have a What else wouldthey say, Paul, What else are
they going to say, Yeah,we tried to do it. Now that
the ship's sailed, they it's amust lie situation. So between Sims hearing
it, me hearing it, andWalter's writing about it, they're smoking.

(41:42):
Baby. Whether or not there's fire, I don't know because I was never
able to confirm it, but man, there's smoke. Well, why I
never brought it up with you isa reading between the lines. It's you
know, obviously I don't know whoprovided that to you, But for you
to not go with it, fuldrottle means it's not like an A list
source. It's no, no,no, no, no, no no
no. It is an A listsource. But I need a B source

(42:07):
too for something like that. Imean, I do have standards. Some
people might not think that what Ido, and there's been plenty of crap
over the years. I haven't runthat I knew was true, and I
later kicked myself for not doing itwhen it finally came out with this one.
Well, and you know, oneof the arguments I saw in response
to it was, well, whydid they do that? Jefferson's clearly better.

(42:28):
You know why they would do itbecause Neighbors signed a contract for the
Giants as a six overall pick fortwenty nine million dollars for four years total.
That's why you do it. Andthat gets back to the broader question
dollar per dollar, is it sensibleto give receivers with three four years of
experience each gigantic contract when you candraft the guy and pay him a lot

(42:51):
less for four years than what you'repaying the guy for one year. Well,
the part of the reason I didn'tbring it up is it just giving
up more ultiple first round picks fora wide receiver, skipping a quarterback and
a defensive player, and then potentiallytrading Jefferson. It just it was too
much. It just it's too grandiose, it's too fantasy football, like,

(43:13):
it just made no sense. Well, that doesn't mean the calls weren't made.
That doesn't mean the effort wasn't made. The Chargers were talking to somebody
about trading out of five and therewere people in that room that wanted to
make the trade, and Harbaugh didn'twant to do it. He wanted to
stay put for Joe all so Ireally wanted to nail it down before I
did anything with it. And whenWalters posted that, and I know that

(43:37):
it's weird that it was late inthe column. And again, maybe this
is one of the reason why newspapersare going out of business. They have
a good story fallow into their lapsand they bury it as the twelve item
on a fifteen item column. That'stheir business. But I assume they've got
standards before they would allow that tobe put in print. And so who
knows, But I do know this, if it's true, they're never going

(43:58):
to admit it. Now. It'snot going to make it any easier to
get a deal done with Justin Jeffersonif you start telling the world we thought
about drafting his replacement moving on yeahwith them, And you know, I
mean it's cliche, but I meanit's the two sides working to get together
on a deal. It just I'venever had reason to believe that it's not
going to happen. So I meanthat's other than the fact that it hasn't

(44:20):
happened right, other than the factthat the ball was on the tee last
year and the Vikings refused to getto where they needed to be. Here's
the issue. There's two issues.Structure and I've been talking about structure for
one year almost exactly to the day. Structure is a problem because the Vikings
don't fully guarantee enough of the deal. They need to come around there,
and then it's going to be dollars, and the dollars go up, and
they have to accept the fact thatdelay is never on your side when you're

(44:43):
the team, and if you wait, it's always going to go up.
And I think they're going to haveto land somewhere between thirty five to thirty
eight million a year and new moneyaverage on a probably four year total deal,
three year extension on the one yearremaining guarantee the first three years,
or maybe be guaranteed the first twowith the third year kicking in after one
year, because they're not going tocut him after one year, so it

(45:05):
makes three years fully guaranteed. Asa practical matter, that's what they're going
to have to do at this point. Quacey wrote the check at the scouting
combine when he said that Jefferson deservesto be paid like a top non quarterback,
Well, thirty four million was thehigh bar with Nick Bosa, and
the salary CAP's gone up. Ithink that sweet spot's thirty five to thirty
eight guaranteed the first three years.I could broker this thing by lunchtime,

(45:28):
Hartfield's time. I know, yougot to get to get everybody in the
room and I get this thing workedout by by this is the time we
unwrap the sandwiches and you know,eat the pickle and do you eat the
pickle and then the sandwich to eatthe sandwich and then the pickle, pickle
then sandwich or pickle on sandwich.Now, I know you've got to go
in a minute, but I gotto ask you. I the pickle away
you you wrote at his best justinJefferson is better than Randy moss What leads

(45:51):
you that conclusion? Because he doesit all. Moss did a handful of
things extremely well. Jefferson runs allthe routes. Jefferson does everything. And
you know Mossett was that dramatic deepball, ran past everyone and caught everything
that came his way to take ashort pass and just blow past everyone.

(46:12):
There wasn't a lot of intermediate stuffin the mods game. Jefferson just does
everything he does. He's like arowbody, it's like a cyborg. He
does it all and he's never causedI've said this on your show before.
He's never caused a single problem.And there's value in that you can trust
him to do what needs to bedone and when you pay him, he's
not all of a sudden going tobecome a different guy than he's always been.

(46:34):
So I'm holding out hope. I'mI'm I don't know that it's going
to happen, but I'm holding outhope that by the time they convene for
the mandatory mini camp, they'll they'llbreak through the remaining walls and get something
done. Thanks for the time,have a good day. See Mike Florioprofootball
Talk dot Com. Back to theTimberwolves and staying alive and staving elimination after

(46:54):
this on KFA