February 20, 2024 • 48 mins
Episode 165: Let all hand-wringing cease and the tears be wiped away... Arky Shea and Joel C. Cordes have fixed the NBA All-Star game and all problems with no defense and high scoring are solved! Well, sort of. The guys also make predictions for the home stretch of the NBA season while breaking down Mike Conley's extension in Minnesota and Jacque Vaughn's firing in Brooklyn, plus much more.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:01):
Welcome into basketball by association. Myname is Association, joined by mister basketball.
Over there, Joel. See cortious, Joel. I want to get
straight to it, because I amI am. I'm in a loss for
words, and I really really don'tknow. And I've thought a lot about
(00:23):
this over the last four days orso. Let's just pause for a moment
and say, it takes a lotto make ARKI shavy out a loss for
words, so we know this hasthis has to be serious. This has
to be serious, Joel. Idon't know what to do with the All
Star Game. Join the club likesounds like that's everybody's I just, first
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of all, I wonder why ittook so long to get to two hundred
points for a team. Finally theydid it. So there's no joy in
that anymore. I just don't know, there's no there's nothing. Okay,
let me just ask you first,can you say anything positive about the All
Star just the game itself? TheAll Star Game itself. It's the thing
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that I always say, and it'sa backhanded compliment, but the All Star
Game is the chance to see allof these luminary players, these Hall of
famers, almost all of them willbe in the Hall of Fame on the
same court together, and to go, oh, it's super cool that Lebron
James is throwing a past to KevinDurant who knocked down a shot, Like
(01:34):
I don't get to see that anywhereelse besides my imagination and two K like
those are the only places you everget to see it, or maybe maybe
the Olympics. Right, So that'sthe positive out of it, full stop.
I had a friend text me onMonday, we're actually recording this and
(01:57):
posting earlier than we usually did inweek. It's the All Star week.
Nothing's playing till what Thursday or Fridaynight anyway, So we got we got
some time and we will talk aboutwhat's going into the second half of the
season, what are we looking forwardto. But at a friend that texted
me and asked me, like,hey, is this fun for you?
Like he knows I'm an NBA guy, and he knows I like to watch
(02:17):
my Knicks and watch some of theseguys. And I texted back, No,
this isn't This isn't fun for me. Like I saw a screenshot in
two thousand and one the East beatthe West. I think it was one
one eleven to one ten. Right, it was a super competitive and at
the time high scoring game. ThinkAllan Harrison may be in the MVP for
(02:39):
that doesn't really matter at this point. And then you sort of juxtapose that
to the fact that the East almostscored as many points as that game had
total, which is and the East, the East scored almost their total number
of points from the game in thefirst half of this one. Right,
(03:01):
it was like, none of that'sfun for me and I don't like.
So they go to this modified giantfootball stadium to have this basketball event and
then you have, you know,whatever it is. If you like the
celebrity All Star game, fine,which I don't. We talked about that
(03:23):
last week way too much and bothleft feeling icky from it. If you
like the skills challenge, eh,If you like the three point contest,
which it was kind of nice tohave a little bit of a twist with
the Curry versus a NASQ thing,that was an interesting little twists. Not
enough to drink draw me in forthe full night of activity, No,
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but they put on a good show. And I mean the fact that the
fact that she knocked down as manyshots and her one round as what it
took to be able to advance outof the men's round and was essentially at
the same point that the winner got. You know it just it shows again
the shooting prowess. That was fun. Yeah, And the slam dunk contest
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always never delivers, although you gota guy who's not in the league who's
winning the thing. I thought thisyear's slam dunk contest, not to get
too far off track, was wasdecent, Like there was nothing wrong with
this one. There was some thingsI had never seen before, which is
rare. But it's a thousand percentcomparative, right like it compared to what
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we've had, like the last decade. You know, you've had like a
dunk maybe or two, but that'sa two and a half hour, three
hour contest. Yeah, get it, one of those things made. But
if you can jump over shat withouta push off, without a push off
and throw down or reverse dunk,never seen that before. There's always a
(04:45):
push off, there's always the secretlittle hand push off. It was not
there. And and the little doubleclutch catch the ball in the air while
it's a party trick for sure.Never seen it before, Never seen it?
Okay, all right, fair enough, you don't watch enough of my
two K custom edition stuff. Butlike all of that culminated with just I
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don't even know what like the mostsupreme example for me, and I'll take
my most favorite thing I'm leading intothis of the entire weekend was the fact
that you had Luka Doncish and NikolaJokic just hamming it up to each other
and just giving each other crap everysingle event that they were at and having
a lot of fun with it.But when you watch Jokic and Luca just
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pass it back and forth, backand forth the entire trip down, no
one taking a dribble, just runof the entire corp freaking two and three
steps of piece, it's it epitomizeswhat that game is, which is,
yes, it's always been an exhibition, and yes we have really lost the
ability to sort of have it tobe competitive and fun no matter how many
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kinds of twist and turns you kindof do with it. But I don't
know what you're supposed to do withthis thing, if you're insistent on having
it in the middle of the season, if you're insistent upon having the fans
vote for their favorite players, becausethat's who they want to see and why
not I don't know for those whowant a better product, and I do,
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I really do, but I don'tknow what you do because for me,
first and foremost, there's way toomuch money in the NBA for these
guys to even get close to caringabout going full board. No matter how
much Adam Silver, which I lovedat the end being like, hey the
East you scored the most congratulations forthat, which is how we all sort
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of felt like, hooray, Idon't no matter how much Adam Silver puts
for incentives, like, it's justnot gonna be enough for these guys who
are the all stars, who aremaking already the elite money for them to
really care to be that quote unquotecompetitive for four quarters. There's a bigger
subtext, he I mean, wecould get into we could make this into
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a master's class, university class,you know, about capitalism and employees working
for the owner. But let's justlet's zoom back out and take the really
simplistic view of all that. IfI'm working for a job and I'm showing
up, I'm doing exactly what Ineed to do to get my paycheck,
and there are times that I worka little bit harder yep. And there's
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times that I may be even itout by working a little bit less.
But I show up and I domy job. I'm a good employee.
Am I going to show up anddo something to work extra extra hard,
maybe put myself in danger in someway, or put my future earnings at
this company in some way for somethingthat maybe the owners are telling me,
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Hey, it'll improve the visibility ofour company, it's going to improve the
overall health of our company, it'sgoing to make our customers happy. But
really, I know deep down allof those things that may be true,
and I may help achieve that goal, But who's going to get paid from
that, not me, the ownerof the company. The owner will make
all that money. So that's reallywhat this comes down to is. You
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know, the players have said,look, it is what it is,
but none of us are going togo out there and get hurt our team.
We're from the best teams typically,you know, the best teams in
each conference. These guys are criticalto the playoff hopes of their teams,
the championship hopes of their teams.There is a lot more money and a
lot more prestige and a lot morejob security running on being available for the
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rest of the season and those games, the ones that really matter. Then
to go out and try to pimpup the product of the All Star Game
that everyone's going to be disappointed withanyway, no matter what you do,
although people have a right to bedisappointed with the last couple of years especially,
But Okay, so I do agreat job with that and I get
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hurt. Do you think that myframeranchise two years from now, when I'm
still not right, still not healthy, is gonna go. You know what,
We're gonna keep you re signed.We're not gonna sell you down the
river for glue because you know,you really tried in that All Star Game
and we feel bad about that.I think the big eye opener with all
of this is Isaiah Thomas, SacramentoKings guard turned Boston Celtics guard, having
(09:24):
a phenomenal season, phenomenal season afew years ago, all start doing it,
all gets hurt, rehebs. TheCeltics say all the right things,
did they hesitate for even a splitsecond to ship him off when they could
get Kyrie Irving? They ship himoff to the Cavaliers he's never the same
player again as Isaiah Thomas. He'sout of the league now, he's tried
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to come back multiple multiple times.Guys look at that, and then they
know that the franchises can say allthey want, the league can say all
at wants about the product, theproduct, the product, and the players
go, I am, I'm theproduct. And if I'm not there,
I'm no longer a product to you, because that's what you see me as,
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not as a person. I'm theproduct is gone, I'm tainted.
You'll find a new product. Sothey're protecting themselves. And anybody who truly,
deep down has a problem with thatis full of crap, because you
know how you behave at your ownjob when you're being asked to do way
more and maybe even to put yourearnings in jeopardy. None of us are
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showing up for that, I am. Can I tell you the weird thing
in all of this, The ratingsare up. The ratings came out earlier
today. The ratings are up.Is the most watched NBA All Star Saturday
in four years. The ratings areup twenty percent for Sunday night. But
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no one seems to have any excitementor joy coming out of that game.
And it's not just social media,and it's not just the talking hands like
you and I aren't talking hands,and we're not huge on social media at
this point. We're just we're guysthat I don't know, we love the
product. I'm not trying to beone of those hey super old time you
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guys right like you and I constantlytalk about how there's really good teams playing
really good defense. Now we justassume everybody scoring one hundred and fifty points
a game. And yes, therewe are not crass traditionalists, you know,
or with some subtext that the gamewas better when it was whiter or
something like that. No, welove the game. We love the iterations
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of the game, and we haverespect for all of the different eras of
the game and the players. AndI think you and I do a great
job of finding like the best outof what we can in all of these
So how do we square that howwe feel about the game. And granted
we also are guys that are finewith the three points. The three point
proficiency has come up. It's madegames at a lot of fun to be
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able to watch too. How dowe square how we about the game?
Which I didn't ask you, butI could tell from your tone you weren't
a huge fan of it, Likeit wasn't the most enjoyable experience. No,
anybody who walked out disappointed. Iget it. I understand. I'm
not faulting you for being disappointed.You know, like, I don't know
what else do you expected? ButI don't know how do we square the
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fact that that still got us seeingan increase in ratings despite the fact that
everyone that watched who at least spokenup about it has had sour things.
I literally haven't heard one person,and I have a good friend group that
does like the NBA, not oneperson has been like that was fun,
you know, you know, wetext a little bit about Max mclun dunk
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and stuff like that, but likeno one was like for the game itself,
especially like that was really cool despitedespite a light up court and all
the other Shenanigan. Yeah, thatwas Maybe that's what's got the ratings up.
People are like, oh, thecourt's gonna light up on the things
the celebrity All Star Game three pointline can move. They will give you
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a four point line that goes backand forth. You never know when the
fourth quarter where it will be like, I don't I don't know how.
I don't know how to square withthe fact that I hated the All Star
Game and more people watch it thanever, it's still no one's been like
that was fun. Did it makeany difference to you whatsoever that it was
East versus West, versus captain's pickinglike in the grand scheme of once you
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got into the game, did anyof that matter? I preferred East versus
West, but like to me,it didn't like it wasn't gonna keep me
from watching it or watching it evenmore and more intently, like to me,
like there's so much movement among theplayers two teams anyway, the like
whether Giannie and Lebron are picking forthe fiftieth straight year for their favorite team,
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or whether or not it's gonna beEast versus West, Like it's I
don't feel like there's a huge loyaltyto a conference anyway at that point,
I do prefer versus West for tradition'ssake. But try on this idea for
size. And this just came tome as we're talking now. This was
not pre prepped, even though Iknew we were going to talk about this
topic. But it just came tome right now. The NBA cannot sit
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there and say we're protecting the sanctityof this game and the number of players
in by having only twelve guys oneach roster because XYZ and that they'll play
that game. That's what Adam Silversaid. He's like, well, the
players like it when it's a smallernumber, do they? You're always leaving
three or four guys off of eachconference that have as much of a case
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to be there as anybody else,but they're oftentimes penalized by being in a
smaller market. What if we expandthe rosters on either side to fifteen,
so we've got thirty total players,and really we might have to in order
to make this work, we probablyhave to expand it to thirty two players
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total, so sixteen for each teameach conference. But we split that them
up into four teams of eight,and we play a little mini tournament and
the winners out of the East advanceto the winners out of the West,
and you play that and so youhave a little bit more and what do
you have writing on it? Youhave actually winning games to advance. You
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have the pride aspect of it,and when you still get into the all
Star like championship game, what doesit really mean. Well, that's up
to the NBA to maybe sweeten thepot a little bit for the players,
not for the teams, not forthe product, sweeten it for the players
in a selfish way. But youcan always throw like a charitable match of
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dollars or something on top of itto make it be a little altruistic.
But give me, give me alonger game, because we've got tournament play
like this, give me eight playersper roster, so you get subs in
there, we see a few extraguys, and we turn it into the
little mini All Star tournament that I'lltune in for that next year. I'll
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tune into that for the next fiveto seven years. And really that's all
that matters, right, Yeah,because the NBA is constantly experimenting with stuff.
I mean, the season tournament thehuge example for that, the the
led court for whatever ITA's and theyou know, the having Lebron and Giannis
players for this, I think,if you're going to have popularity for but
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god, this is why I'm sospeechless for this, Like I don't know
what to do with it, becauseI love your idea, but the NBA's
in they're looking at the ratings like, why would we change like if if
we if our ratings are up despitethe fact that Adam Silver clearly wanted more
effort, right, And you cantell they like because maybe a short term
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game long term loss. And Idon't think the NBA is stupid enough to
not see that. I'm not thinkingthat they are, but the taking what's
swirling around, but the fact thatthey didn't make some changes like East going
to West, so on and soforth, like it Clearly it depends on
what the NBA looks at as faras the metric that they think moved the
needle. Was it the move inthe east versus west? So they need
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to maybe just make little tweaks totry to get a little bit more effort.
Feel it like the effort didn't reallymatter that much unless all of the
negative attention you got from the twoto eleven to when eighty seven or whatever
it was game, unless that goesinto next year's game where people are like,
Okay, that was the tipping point. I don't want to watch a
two hundred point game, even thoughwe kept getting closer and closer to it.
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Maybe they're like, look, yougot the two hundred, I don't
want to be a part of this. That maybe they got a bunch of
people to watch the newly revamped FallStar Game they tuned in and then said
nah, no more, no more. Then maybe at that point you look
at blown up because I'm with you. I look the NFL Pro Bowl numbers,
they're like they actually did about thesame numbers, like five and a
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half million people sort of watch,which is great, right, but especially
considering where the Pro Bowl was,you know, like right right, really
in trouble too not so long ago, they completely changed their format. They
basically said, we're not getting effortin the football game itself, so let's
change it. So they're all star. Pro Bowl games got like five and
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a half million people to be ableto watch. NBA All Star Game got
about five and a half million peopleto watch, which is a phenomenal thing
for the NBA because everyone's always tryingto compare the two and they're just apples
and pomegranate to that point. Mmhm. So if you're the NBA,
do you consider then doing something likeyou're talking about blowing it up entirely because
you're already doing a skills challenge thatapparently enough people like, so what else
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are you going to be able todo? The end season tournament got a
lot of publicity, I think becauseI think and a lot of people really
cared about as far as the players, because people like tournaments, and there
was there's breaking rates associated tournaments,there's competition, there's clearly some money,
there's stakes in it for just abouteverybody that if the stakes weren't even that
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good yet this year, to agreewith your point, you and I both
said the stakes need to be higher, but you seem to be on the
right track with this, and somaybe a little mini tournament for the entire
evening. You're already there for threehours anyway, like you're going to go
to these big You're not going toplay a full forty eight minutes for both
games. Now, basically make likemaybe you make you know, maybe like
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you have one quarter for each partof the bracket or something like that,
or I don't know, depending onhow many teams you decide to figure out,
right, if you get four eightman teams, right, so the
four teams could play, you knowin the first two right of your quarters,
you have the halftime for everybody tobe able to rest, and then
maybe the second half, you know, you start to figure out the championship
in the Constellation Game, right,I don't know, maybe that might work.
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It might be someone in chrut justbecause there's competition sort of in it.
But again, how much I heardMichael Wilbon. Michael b he has
been on this uh betwagon for years. He says, if you want to
make the All Star Game mean something, make it United States versus the world.
H then you get bragged rights intoit. Then you get people who
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are like patriotic about it, likehey, my guys and Kevin Durant and
Lebron stuff. They're gonna be Lucaand they're gonna be Nicola, and they're
gonna be all these Dario gonna beall That's right. I said it.
They're gonna be bobbed on. They'regonna beat them. Uh. Maybe he
introduced an element of that, likewe used to have something like that leading
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up to the All Star Game.Basically, maybe the problem the problem is
with the voting and the the nomineesthen for the reserves is you won't have
an even number on either side,and so you'll be penalizing the lower Once
again, it's the guys at theend of the list, on the fringe
of the All Star who're gonna eitherget penalized or a bonus depending on what
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nationality they are and what deficiency youhave in the roster, to try to
even it out. That's the mainconcern I would have with that. I'm
not against the idea. I'm notagainst the idea either. I mean I'm
for throwing in some xenophobia in this. I like that, I like being
eight other countries archieche from Alabama,everybody. First of all, let's not
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better than that. I don't know, man like to me, there could
be a revent and maybe that's themore subtle way to do it than to
turn it into like a mini tournamentat the beginning. And I'd be okay
with watching that because I would loveto sort of see these guys, but
also thinking we need to move onat the point because the All Star Game
issues are going to be prevalent fora while. Like it's just you're fifty
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games in a season. How mucheffort are you gonna get for guys who
still have thirty games and they stillwant to be able to sort of try
to make the end run win win, I actually win World Championship. And
here here's the thing beyond the score, what really stood out to me.
This will be my last point beyondthe score, because that's what everybody has
hung up on. But you playeda full forty eight minutes. You scored
nearly three hundred and fifty points.The Western Conference All Stars were called for
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two personal fouls the entire game.The Eastern Conference All Stars were called for
one personal foul the entire game.Nobody should be hacking or playing dirty in
an All Star game. Absolutely not. But there you see that, like
there's there's no even attempt at defense. But we do say, like,
oh, I wish I could seeLebron James in a dunk contest. Why
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won't Lebron do a dunk contest?You know what he is, He's in
a dunk contest. It's called theAll Star Game. There's quasi in game
dunks. That's that's kind of cool, Like you do get to see him
in a dunk contest with all theother stars. This is not a game.
This is not a novel argument.But like the level of creativity in
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games in the season off the backboards, behind the backs of the stuff you
would think would be dunk contest worthy. It is happening in the middle of
February. In the game, spleadingup to this, like there's just the
novelty of being able to have allthese guys because I've all I'll tell you
this, I've watched when Miyama playlike six games. You know, like
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I couldn't do that back when theAll Star Game was like, you know,
the thing you can only see everybodywants every now and then. Mm
hmm, ESPN, ABC, Tand T have all given us the ability
to watch a lot more high qualitystar towers he's sort of ever had,
So it's not as special. It'sstill special have them all on the court
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at the same time. Let's seethem all over social media. You know,
every highlight that you want, you'regonna see that. Every My timeline
is littered with highlights every since everysingle night is highlights. So what's so
special about a highlights for two anda half hours, you know, it's
it's just it's sort of interesting,sort of pay attention to if the NBA
wants to tweak this at all,or if they look at the ratings,
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and I think Adam Silver want todo something. Even though the ratings were
up, he seemed seemed genuinely disgusted. But the fact that it was two
and eleven points score by one,and you don't see him publicly annoyed very
often. You would see it likeevery single day with David Stern, Right,
David Stern was just perpetually pissed allthe time. He wore that on
his sleep. Adam Silver is muchmore political and much more like image driven,
(24:21):
and I think in a good way. He also seems a little more
even keeled and like objective about certainthings. So to see him annoyed on
national TV, that's a big deal. That's like saying archiche is at a
loss for work. You know,it's a big deal. Yeah. Like
he literally was like, I cannothide this anymore. Congratulate, I will
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my truth. Wow. So Iguess one of you have to have this
trophy, right, Mercy, Idon't want to be a part of this.
All right, let's move forward.For the most several minutes we have
here, I want to ask youabout one thing and then sort of some
thoughts going into the beginning of theseason. First of all, we talk
about and Alla being promoted as inthe Nets interim coach. The Nets aren't
(25:03):
good. I don't think it's sortof a huge deal at this point,
But I want to ask you abouta certain team you may know reup a
Mike Conley junior. He was goingto be a free agent at the end
of this year. Now he isgoing to be signed up for this year
and the next two years afterwards.He's quite quite a nice season for your
guays. So a couple quick momentson the reupping of Mike Conley, not
(25:26):
even letting him get to the testof free agent markets. I think it's
a sign of respect. I thinkit's a sign to the rest of the
roster that, like we are,this is our window. We are committed
to this. Everybody likes Mike everywherehe's ever played. The fans love him,
his teammates love him. He isjust one of those guys. He
has a glue guy on and offthe court. He has been nothing but
(25:48):
a pros pro from Minnesota. AnthonyEdwards loves the guy, and Anthony Edwards
has played with some point guards thathe loves. He loved Patrick Beverly,
he loved Ricky Rubio. He isstill good friends with Rubio. He's had
a lot of mentally from their goodpals. Yeah, him and Rubio were
really really close, and he creditshe credits Ricky Rubio, especially for his
(26:11):
rookie season, for showing him theropes. And he credits Pat Bev for
coming in and adding that edge andshowing him what it would take to really
get under people's skin and go afterpeople. And with Mike, it's been
that like brotherly relationship with this guyis my big brother. He's got my
back. He's been around the blocka million times. He is all about
(26:33):
winning. He's all about the team. That's all that matters. And Anthony
Edwards has soaked up. I thinkthose different lessons from those different point guards
like a sponge. Anthony Edwards wasarguably at his worst when playing with D'Angelo
Russell as a point guard. Andthat's no knock on Di Lo, who
brings a lot of great things tothe table, but as a gunner and
as somebody who's inconsistent and oftentimes fallsinto doing things his own way, you
(26:57):
saw Anthony Edwards mimicking that just alittle bit too, especially last year as
they struggled so Mike being in thelocker room and on the floor is great.
Is this going to be his retirementpackage? It might be. I
don't see Mike Conley as a guywho's going to hang around long after his
cell by date. I think he'llgo into coaching. I think he'll be
(27:18):
a really good coach, like JacqueVaughan, like Kevin Ollie, like a
lot of these point guards who maybeweren't perennial All Stars, but they show
up and they know the game,they know how to communicate. They were
good dudes, you know Tylu whenthey played. Guys like that, they'll
be successful. And I think MikeConley is in line to be somebody like
that, either at the college levelor the NBA level. Is he going
(27:40):
to be the long term starter forthe next three years in Minnesota, two
years whatever that, I don't know. I think he'll probably be the starter
in name and the minutes are goingto continue to go down. This might
be the last year for him wherehe is a big minute guy. They
are very clearly and successfully grooming NikhilAlexander Walker to be I think the starting
backcourt made with Anthony Edwards over thelong term of this window, and they
(28:04):
want Anthony Edwards to be the prototypicalJordan type of scoring guard who also is
a great defender. They want AlexanderWalker to play the Ron Harper role where
he is a big, lanky guardwho is defense first, and that's what
Walker has turned into, but canknock down a shot, has the chops
to chip in some points along theway, but just gives you another big
(28:26):
body in the back court. Andthey've been working on that all year.
It's really really obvious that's going tokeep happening. And I think that Mike
will start for as long as youcan do that with a straight face,
and then it's gonna be Alexander Walkerafter that, and that's fine. Like
I think Mike Connley is one ofthose guys who will be fine coming off
the bench if he's helping his teamwin. And that may be two years
(28:48):
down the road yet, but thisis a good move. I think it's
as much a signal to the restof the guys on the team and the
organization that says this is about winningand work into it now so that the
stakes are high. You're either hereto win or you're not. I think
it's interesting that you compared him inthe potential coaching role to the recently fired
(29:11):
Chock Vaughan and the replacement for JacqueVon and Kevin Ollie. Uh both both
they're both good coaches. You thinkJack John's a better coach than Kevin Ollie
than Mike Conley rank and real quickone two three better coaches jaq Von,
Mike Conley Jr. And Kevin OlliJacque Vaughan, Kevin Oli, Mike Conley
(29:32):
in that order. Because Jacques Vaughanhas coached at the NBA level now for
a while, both as an interimas an assistant as a head coach.
Kevin Ollie's been a very good collegecoach and he's going to get his chance
at the NBA. We know itdoesn't always translate up, but it is
a big sign when a guy likeKevin Ollie, who is very successful collegiately,
is willing to take the assistant joband learn the ropes even though he
(29:56):
played in the NBA for like adecade, but to come back learn the
ropes that way and not be like, No, I've had such a successful
college program, I couldn't possibly doanything less than be the head coach and
the president of basketball operations for yourteam. There are college coaches like that
out there, many of them,and those are the guys that typically flame
(30:17):
out the hardest. Those were thetwo I was exactly thinking of, you
know, and then to a lesserextent like John Bline, you know,
and guys like that that have comein and flamed out hard. The coach
John Bale was he was he apresident of basket operations too, not with
the CAVSKA, but I was.He did get a big sweetheart deal when
they He got a big sweetheart dealwhen they brought him in. Okay,
(30:41):
all right, well, let's let'sspend the last few minutes talking about the
future of the NBA and I meanled courch for everyone. Actually the second
half of the season, which islaughable because you know, like the Celtics
are fifty five games in halfway.Yeah, it's the it's the last third
of the season. Whatever. Okay, projection wise, the first team I
(31:03):
wanted to ask you about, andthen I actually watch want to ask you
about one or two teams and theysort of get you to sort of predict
what you think, big story mighthappen the rest of the way. Milwaukee,
right now is the three seed.Milwaukee's eight and a half games back.
But since mister Doc Rivers has beenthe guy, they've been terrible,
(31:25):
and I mean on the court andokay, but bring Adrian Griffin back,
but Winton Laws, they have beendisgusting. So let me ask you this.
Do you think Milwaukee sinks further bythe time we get into the playoffs?
Do you think Doc Rivers was thatbig of a detriment and upsetting the
(31:47):
momentum that Milwaukee had, even thoughsome of the players may not have loved
the momentum that we're still a ridingpretty high. Or do you think they
just need more time with Doc andhis coaching that they will get the ship
rewriters, doct added a bunch ofyou player they just changed a coach.
I believe that the Cleveland Cavaliers arenot the long term second seed in the
(32:07):
Eastern Conference. I think it willeither be the Bucks or the Knicks.
The Knicks have more momentum, butthe injury problems. The Bucks have a
healthier roster right now. But asyou said, all that stuff to figure
out, and so if the Bucksdo fall, it's not going to be
far. It would be down intothe fourth seed, and I think Cleveland
is probably going to be at theend of the season sitting in the third
(32:29):
or fourth seed. Strong team,but they're going to benefit from the fact
that Philly now is right back tohaving joellenbeat injury issues. In Indiana,
as good as they've been, nota good defensive team, and it is
probably still one or two years awayfrom like really being a true contender.
Miami doesn't have the firepower, althoughyou know, getting to line right,
and they've added some pieces here,Terry Rogier and so forth. They're going
(32:51):
to keep tinkering and they'll be inthe hunt. But yeah, so I
think Milwaukee they could fall, butit won't be far. I think they
have just as much of a chanceto bump up into that second seed,
although it kind of feels like ifNew York can just get healthy, it'll
maybe be the next All right,then let me ask you about once even
in the West, that's the GoldenState Warriors. They're two and a half
(33:12):
games up for the play in atthe ten seed at this point, and
they had to win eight of theirlast team just to get there. At
this point to get into the numberten spots. So Golden state. We
still both feel fairly confident they're makingit into the playoffs, the play in
at least, yeah, the playingpart of the playoffs. That kund of
all to the playoffs technically, Butthat's just the way I look at it
(33:37):
is, this is this team capableof not making the play in twenty nine
games left if you have an injuryto staff, absolutely, let's just stay
there. They're healthy as they areright now. You know, they keep
(33:57):
what it is, right, Imean, they bench Clay the other night
and he came off and then youhad like thirty five points or something coming
off the bench. So yep,like it's it's not as if you know,
it's been a ton of injury.That's sort of the same this year.
They're eight and two in their lastten games. Yeah, so that
and that got but that got themup to the ten spot, right like
they've been flirting with that nine tento eleven see spot for the last I
don't know, for the most ofthe season. So what is this team
(34:21):
capable of not making the playoffs thisyear? Only if they start to sink
again and Houston gets hot, becauseyou look at those teams underneath them now
and I think the West and theEast have both sorted out generally into about
exactly how we thought it would go, with maybe one or two exceptions here
or there in the ordering of thestandings, and maybe in each conference there's
(34:45):
one team hanging out there. Inthe West, it's Dallas. In the
East, it's probably Chicago. Whereyou go, man, I didn't actually
see them being up this far.There's still time for them to drop out,
but I didn't see them doing it, and it looks like they maybe
have some staying power. Utah Idon't think actually wants to win, just
like they got to this point lastyear. Because they're well coached and it's
(35:07):
a decent roster, but they're stilltrying to help the roster. Yeah,
they can't help it, but theythey know that they still need to add
more talent and the only way todo that in Utah is through the draft.
You won't get free agents. It'shard to do with trades. Memphis,
Portland, San Antonio. Not onlydid they probably not want to win,
but they're not capable of winning enoughto threaten Houston was supposed to be
(35:31):
winning more than this. They aregunning for a play in spot. They've
had some injuries. They've had someinconsistency. They're still young, especially their
young players like Jalen Green and JabariSmith, guys like that Amon Thompson.
They struggle with their consistency big time. But they're they're supposed to be in
(35:51):
the hunt and they'll continue to push. So Golden State doesn't have a lot
of competition if you only have oneteam underneath you nipping at your heels.
But you look at all the otherteams above them, Dallas, Sacramento,
the Lakers, maybe even the Pelicansby default because they're sitting in the sixth
seat out of those teams, canyou really see anybody where the bottom is
(36:13):
going to fall out or likely to? It all comes down to injury,
right, It would be major injuryto one of those and Golden State,
you know, continuing to win andthen Houston gets in. So I think
really the only major threat here ifall things remain equal, the Warriors not
shooting themselves in the foot, nothaving Draymond miss any more time. You
(36:36):
know, Clay's got to find something, Andrew Wiggins has got to find something
like come on, be productive alittle bit. They've got to find that,
and they got to hope that Houstondoesn't go on a tear because everybody
matured over the All Star break whenthey were in Cabo, which is a
great place to mature, by theway. Yeah, exactly. He's been
a handful of days in Cabo andall of a sudden, a boom,
You're like, I'm two extra yearsin the league. I got that under
(36:59):
my belt, and I feel youget that Rockets, Banana boat going,
you get to Buntu going, andall of a sudden, yeah, you're
You're in the championship game. Idon't. I'm not as down on Utah
after I've watched them this year asyou are, as far not wanting to
win. Right. They are wellcoached. I think they could come.
They got some pieces they got.I was really low on the mo I
thought they could be the worst teamin the West, but you did.
(37:21):
Yeah, the coaching is not allowingthem to be the worst team in the
West, and that's to me surprising. I think Houston and Utah are both
real threats to uh TO to toa Golden State because both seven in their
last ten games. Whatever that means, you know, I'll tell that Utah
you top before they lost four fourin a row they had beaten they didn't
(37:45):
have time. They've beaten Milwaukee likethey'd beaten Milwaukee, and I don't know,
they beat another really good team rightbefore that. I think they beat
the Lakers in there. Maybe notin that stretch, but it was recently.
Trying to think it was Megan goingup their schedule. No, they
say Milwaukee, Milwaukee and somebody elsethat was a good team that they'd be.
(38:06):
I don't know. But anyway,so for me, I think that
they're Islahoma City City. Yeah,a couple of nights after beating Milwaukee.
Yeah, so I think Utah isa real threat, and I think Houston
is also a real threat. Ithink Houston is pretty well coached. A
lot of it's to youth and tryingto get some of that, as you
say, maturity on your belt,I think, and a lot of new
pieces, you know, Fred vanVliet and and Dylan Brooks and and Jeff
(38:28):
Green. There's a lot of newveterans that are I think there's a to
me in my head, I thinkthere's a forty percent chance they don't make
the playoffs. Okay, yeah,and there they're only like two and a
half kind of them all year thoughI mean to be fair, but not
to miss the playoffs. Like Ithought they would be in like the nine
ten area, but like I didnot think that they would just be this.
(38:52):
I wouldn't even say hot and cold. They're just cool and cold,
like kind of warming times cold,never really putting together any stretch of really
good basketball for a week or twoat a time, just sort of all
over the place. But I don'tknow which, by the way, would
be the I think official end ofthe dynasty if they didn't make the playoffs,
because they're not coming back next year, especially if they made the playoffs
(39:14):
and winning the title. They're notwinning the title this year, Like they're
done as far as that dynasty's consiers. They're fourteen and fourteen at home,
like at home, all right,Joe going forward. Give give me a
team to watch out for or aheadline to pay attention to, and you
think for the last half of theseason, as we get to the last
(39:37):
twenty eight to twenty nine thirty thirtyone games of everybody watch what happens to
the Oklahoma City Thunder as a bellweatherfor how much of a threat they are
or are not in the Western Conferenceif they drop two to three seeds here,
which is kind of what I thinkis going to happen, because youth
is going to catch up, assome of these really good veteran teams in
(39:58):
the Western Conference now kicking into highgear. If they drop two to three
seeds, they're not a threat yetthis year, but they're coming next year,
and we all know that, andwe all got to be real scared.
They're going to take their lumps.But if they somehow stick around in
the second seed the rest of theyear, maybe even overtake Minnesota, they're
a game and a half back forthat number one seed. They are not
(40:20):
only a legit threat because of thatregular season standing, they're a legit threat
to make it to an NBA Finalsalready, this young and with shades of
the Kevin Durant, James Hard andRussell Westbrook surge of Baka Thunder from yesteryear.
Jeff Green on that team too,where they were just loaded with young
talent and all of a sudden maturedway faster than everybody thought and they're like,
(40:42):
oh crap, we can't hang withthese guys. So that's a team
that I'm really intrigued with. Everybodyelse. It's almost always for these veteran
teams. Now it's who gets healthyin time, not just in time to
have your guy be able to suitup for the first playoff game. Yeah,
that's important, But do you gethealthy with ten to fifteen games left
to go in the regular season toreintegrate a Julius Randall or a Mitchell Robinson
(41:07):
speaking about the Knicks or a Joeel Embiid with the Sixers, like,
yeah, you've played with those guysbefore, but when they're out for a
long period of time, the teamchanges, the chemistry adjusts. Different guys
had to step up, roles changed, they morphed, and now you're suddenly
asking everybody else to go back towhat they were doing before, some of
(41:28):
which they may not want to doas they've taken on bigger roles. And
you're asking a guy who's rusty tocome into and maybe even still recovering,
to come into this new chemistry makeup. And it's a lot more difficult than
you think. And so the teamsthat get healthiest the fastest, especially these
veteran teams that are actually in thehunt, those are the ones to watch
(41:50):
out for. I don't really havelike a low lurking team, whereas I
mean, maybe it's Miami, butMiami I got one in the who you
got watch out for the Orlando Magic. They are in the eighth spot right
now. I think they could sneaktheir way into a four seed. Wow,
(42:10):
Okay, it's not just about howgood they are, because they are
pretty good. They are a prettytalented team. But their their final twenty
five or so games really easy.There are only three games out by the
way, to three games out ofthe four spot or the four spot.
Listen to this schedule right out thegate for when they start back on Thursday.
Now they have the Calves, butafter that Pistons, Hawks, Nets,
(42:36):
Jazz, Pistons, Hornets, Wizards. Then it's the Nicks and Pacers.
Then it's the Nets, Raptors,Raptors, Hornets, Pelicans. Like
they could Ergendy screaming, what isthis amateur hour? They could go on
a run right out the gates andthey could find themselves within a couple of
a game or two of a fourseed. After the next week two well,
(43:01):
I guess we're Tuesdays. Maybe aftertwo weeks they have a real chance
to make a really big in rowat the very beginning of this beginning of
this stretch run. And then youknow what it is. It's health and
it's the momentum you have going intothe playoffs. Right if they're playing like
they are on fire, they're gonnabe hard to beat momentum wise, like
(43:24):
they'll be. I'm not saying thatthey're gonna win a bunch of rounds.
I'm not saying they're gonna win.Let it play a spoiler, yeah,
but they could be a big spoil. They could be hosting I think at
that four spot. I think it'svery, very doable. That schedule,
it's right there in front of them. It's I haven't done the math on
it, but it's gotta be oneof the easiest for ten game stretches to
(43:44):
come out of the come out ofthe All Star breakout there, if not
the easiest. I to choose aspoiler. In the West, it's a
team in a similar situation, butI don't know their schedule and I'm not
gonna dig into everything there. Butthe one team that really scares me as
a wild card, because I dothink they're capable of beating anyone on any
given night, and that could messup seating along the way. I do
(44:07):
think they're capable of winning a roundin the playoffs as well, though we
saw during the NBA Cup maybe themget exposed a little bit in that championship
round. The New Orleans Pelicans,if healthy, are young but veteran,
well coached, also have been togetheras a core now for a bit,
even though they haven't all played togetherall the time because of those health issues.
(44:28):
But when you actually watch them play, like Oklahoma City, they cause
massive problems with their athleticism, withthe sheer size of their roster, especially
in that starting lineup, and thefact that they just bring waves of energy
guys off the bench who have apretty decent head about them. It's not
(44:49):
just you know, chicken with thehead cut off energy. It's they fill
a role and they've got a lotof different looks they can get to that
bench, and now that they're prettyhealthy. Like OKAC, we had we
had concerns about both of those teamsyoung benches, but the starting lineups being
intact and being healthy means that thoseyoung guys are not overexposed. And in
both cases well coached teams where theguys have matured a little bit faster than
(45:14):
we thought they would. And look, ready, New Orleans could be that
Orlando type of spoiler in the West. I think here's New Orleans schedule starting
Thursday. Rockets, Heat, Bulls, Nicks, Pacers, Pacers, Raptors,
seventy six ers. Not easy,but as easy as Orlando. Yeah,
but doable, but very doable.And they wrap up in See.
(45:38):
They're there because they used to havethe Bucks. Okay, see on the
schedule. Okay, so he's onlythere one more time. The Celtics are
still in the schedule. Yeah,they don't have a bunch of easy games.
The Clippers are still in the schedule. Once they're done with Minnesota for
the year, they've already gotten theirfour matchups and with them, I think,
(45:59):
so how did they get split?Who got it? I think I
have to go back and look.I think Minnesota was three to one out
of those, but they may havesplit because they New Orleans is a team
that, no matter how poor they'vebeen, like injury wise, they've played
the Wolves top over the last coupleof years. That's been a difficult matchup
(46:20):
for both teams. I'm going tolook through Hey, hey, Joel,
if you guys aren't on Herb Jones. Get on Herb Jones. Oh already
there, man. Minnesota beat themin November, Minnesota lost to them at
the beginning of December. Minnesota lostto them at the beginning of January.
(46:43):
And do they only play them threetimes this year? I guess lucky for
them, they only play them threetimes. So yeah, they went one
and two against New Orleans. Mmhmmm, hmmm hmm. I believe all
right, So that's gonna do itfor us. The second half of the
season is still two days away,so we still gotta wait for the basketball
(47:06):
that happen. It feels like foreversince we've seen a meaningful, fun basketball
game. That's okay once again,we've solved all the league's problems. We
did it again, and there's somegood games. Houston, New Orleans is
the first game back. The Clippersand the Thunder first game back. Boston
and Chicago first game back, NewYork, Philadelphia his first big back,
Orlando Cleveland's first game back. Ofcourse, the one I'm gonna be watching
(47:29):
the most is Detroit and Indiana.That's the first night back, so and
be huge on the Pacers to score. They're on two hundred and eleven points
in that game against Detroit. Actually, that probably begets the Wizards. To
be honest with you, that wouldhappened. But to be fair, by
the way, the East has twoteams that still haven't won ten games.
What if, guys, you guysare terrible? All right, Joel,
(47:49):
that's gonna do for us. Thispodcast is over. When we come back,
the Knicks will have to overtake inthe cast for the second seed,
and Joel's Minnesota Timberwolves will be first. With a bullet that gonna be fun.
Let it be written, let itbe done. That's right from our
mouth to God's ears, Joel,say goodbye to the good people. Goodbye,
(48:09):
good people. Will do it again. You can catch us Spreeker Spotify,
iTunes for the audio only version,YouTube for the video version, Like
share, subscribe to all those goodthings. We'll see you next time.
Welcome into basketball by association. Myname is Association, joined by mister basketball.
Over there, Joel. See cortious, Joel. I want to get
straight to it, because I amI am. I'm in a loss for
words, and I really really don'tknow. And I've thought a lot about
(00:23):
this over the last four days orso. Let's just pause for a moment
and say, it takes a lotto make ARKI shavy out a loss for
words, so we know this hasthis has to be serious. This has
to be serious, Joel. Idon't know what to do with the All
Star Game. Join the club likesounds like that's everybody's I just, first
(00:48):
of all, I wonder why ittook so long to get to two hundred
points for a team. Finally theydid it. So there's no joy in
that anymore. I just don't know, there's no there's nothing. Okay,
let me just ask you first,can you say anything positive about the All
Star just the game itself? TheAll Star Game itself. It's the thing
(01:12):
that I always say, and it'sa backhanded compliment, but the All Star
Game is the chance to see allof these luminary players, these Hall of
famers, almost all of them willbe in the Hall of Fame on the
same court together, and to go, oh, it's super cool that Lebron
James is throwing a past to KevinDurant who knocked down a shot, Like
(01:34):
I don't get to see that anywhereelse besides my imagination and two K like
those are the only places you everget to see it, or maybe maybe
the Olympics. Right, So that'sthe positive out of it, full stop.
I had a friend text me onMonday, we're actually recording this and
(01:57):
posting earlier than we usually did inweek. It's the All Star week.
Nothing's playing till what Thursday or Fridaynight anyway, So we got we got
some time and we will talk aboutwhat's going into the second half of the
season, what are we looking forwardto. But at a friend that texted
me and asked me, like,hey, is this fun for you?
Like he knows I'm an NBA guy, and he knows I like to watch
(02:17):
my Knicks and watch some of theseguys. And I texted back, No,
this isn't This isn't fun for me. Like I saw a screenshot in
two thousand and one the East beatthe West. I think it was one
one eleven to one ten. Right, it was a super competitive and at
the time high scoring game. ThinkAllan Harrison may be in the MVP for
(02:39):
that doesn't really matter at this point. And then you sort of juxtapose that
to the fact that the East almostscored as many points as that game had
total, which is and the East, the East scored almost their total number
of points from the game in thefirst half of this one. Right,
(03:01):
it was like, none of that'sfun for me and I don't like.
So they go to this modified giantfootball stadium to have this basketball event and
then you have, you know,whatever it is. If you like the
celebrity All Star game, fine,which I don't. We talked about that
(03:23):
last week way too much and bothleft feeling icky from it. If you
like the skills challenge, eh,If you like the three point contest,
which it was kind of nice tohave a little bit of a twist with
the Curry versus a NASQ thing,that was an interesting little twists. Not
enough to drink draw me in forthe full night of activity, No,
(03:43):
but they put on a good show. And I mean the fact that the
fact that she knocked down as manyshots and her one round as what it
took to be able to advance outof the men's round and was essentially at
the same point that the winner got. You know it just it shows again
the shooting prowess. That was fun. Yeah, And the slam dunk contest
(04:04):
always never delivers, although you gota guy who's not in the league who's
winning the thing. I thought thisyear's slam dunk contest, not to get
too far off track, was wasdecent, Like there was nothing wrong with
this one. There was some thingsI had never seen before, which is
rare. But it's a thousand percentcomparative, right like it compared to what
(04:25):
we've had, like the last decade. You know, you've had like a
dunk maybe or two, but that'sa two and a half hour, three
hour contest. Yeah, get it, one of those things made. But
if you can jump over shat withouta push off, without a push off
and throw down or reverse dunk,never seen that before. There's always a
(04:45):
push off, there's always the secretlittle hand push off. It was not
there. And and the little doubleclutch catch the ball in the air while
it's a party trick for sure.Never seen it before, Never seen it?
Okay, all right, fair enough, you don't watch enough of my
two K custom edition stuff. Butlike all of that culminated with just I
(05:09):
don't even know what like the mostsupreme example for me, and I'll take
my most favorite thing I'm leading intothis of the entire weekend was the fact
that you had Luka Doncish and NikolaJokic just hamming it up to each other
and just giving each other crap everysingle event that they were at and having
a lot of fun with it.But when you watch Jokic and Luca just
(05:31):
pass it back and forth, backand forth the entire trip down, no
one taking a dribble, just runof the entire corp freaking two and three
steps of piece, it's it epitomizeswhat that game is, which is,
yes, it's always been an exhibition, and yes we have really lost the
ability to sort of have it tobe competitive and fun no matter how many
(05:55):
kinds of twist and turns you kindof do with it. But I don't
know what you're supposed to do withthis thing, if you're insistent on having
it in the middle of the season, if you're insistent upon having the fans
vote for their favorite players, becausethat's who they want to see and why
not I don't know for those whowant a better product, and I do,
(06:16):
I really do, but I don'tknow what you do because for me,
first and foremost, there's way toomuch money in the NBA for these
guys to even get close to caringabout going full board. No matter how
much Adam Silver, which I lovedat the end being like, hey the
East you scored the most congratulations forthat, which is how we all sort
(06:39):
of felt like, hooray, Idon't no matter how much Adam Silver puts
for incentives, like, it's justnot gonna be enough for these guys who
are the all stars, who aremaking already the elite money for them to
really care to be that quote unquotecompetitive for four quarters. There's a bigger
subtext, he I mean, wecould get into we could make this into
(07:03):
a master's class, university class,you know, about capitalism and employees working
for the owner. But let's justlet's zoom back out and take the really
simplistic view of all that. IfI'm working for a job and I'm showing
up, I'm doing exactly what Ineed to do to get my paycheck,
and there are times that I worka little bit harder yep. And there's
(07:25):
times that I may be even itout by working a little bit less.
But I show up and I domy job. I'm a good employee.
Am I going to show up anddo something to work extra extra hard,
maybe put myself in danger in someway, or put my future earnings at
this company in some way for somethingthat maybe the owners are telling me,
(07:46):
Hey, it'll improve the visibility ofour company, it's going to improve the
overall health of our company, it'sgoing to make our customers happy. But
really, I know deep down allof those things that may be true,
and I may help achieve that goal, But who's going to get paid from
that, not me, the ownerof the company. The owner will make
all that money. So that's reallywhat this comes down to is. You
(08:11):
know, the players have said,look, it is what it is,
but none of us are going togo out there and get hurt our team.
We're from the best teams typically,you know, the best teams in
each conference. These guys are criticalto the playoff hopes of their teams,
the championship hopes of their teams.There is a lot more money and a
lot more prestige and a lot morejob security running on being available for the
(08:37):
rest of the season and those games, the ones that really matter. Then
to go out and try to pimpup the product of the All Star Game
that everyone's going to be disappointed withanyway, no matter what you do,
although people have a right to bedisappointed with the last couple of years especially,
But Okay, so I do agreat job with that and I get
(08:58):
hurt. Do you think that myframeranchise two years from now, when I'm
still not right, still not healthy, is gonna go. You know what,
We're gonna keep you re signed.We're not gonna sell you down the
river for glue because you know,you really tried in that All Star Game
and we feel bad about that.I think the big eye opener with all
of this is Isaiah Thomas, SacramentoKings guard turned Boston Celtics guard, having
(09:24):
a phenomenal season, phenomenal season afew years ago, all start doing it,
all gets hurt, rehebs. TheCeltics say all the right things,
did they hesitate for even a splitsecond to ship him off when they could
get Kyrie Irving? They ship himoff to the Cavaliers he's never the same
player again as Isaiah Thomas. He'sout of the league now, he's tried
(09:46):
to come back multiple multiple times.Guys look at that, and then they
know that the franchises can say allthey want, the league can say all
at wants about the product, theproduct, the product, and the players
go, I am, I'm theproduct. And if I'm not there,
I'm no longer a product to you, because that's what you see me as,
(10:07):
not as a person. I'm theproduct is gone, I'm tainted.
You'll find a new product. Sothey're protecting themselves. And anybody who truly,
deep down has a problem with thatis full of crap, because you
know how you behave at your ownjob when you're being asked to do way
more and maybe even to put yourearnings in jeopardy. None of us are
(10:31):
showing up for that, I am. Can I tell you the weird thing
in all of this, The ratingsare up. The ratings came out earlier
today. The ratings are up.Is the most watched NBA All Star Saturday
in four years. The ratings areup twenty percent for Sunday night. But
(10:54):
no one seems to have any excitementor joy coming out of that game.
And it's not just social media,and it's not just the talking hands like
you and I aren't talking hands,and we're not huge on social media at
this point. We're just we're guysthat I don't know, we love the
product. I'm not trying to beone of those hey super old time you
(11:15):
guys right like you and I constantlytalk about how there's really good teams playing
really good defense. Now we justassume everybody scoring one hundred and fifty points
a game. And yes, therewe are not crass traditionalists, you know,
or with some subtext that the gamewas better when it was whiter or
something like that. No, welove the game. We love the iterations
(11:35):
of the game, and we haverespect for all of the different eras of
the game and the players. AndI think you and I do a great
job of finding like the best outof what we can in all of these
So how do we square that howwe feel about the game. And granted
we also are guys that are finewith the three points. The three point
proficiency has come up. It's madegames at a lot of fun to be
(11:56):
able to watch too. How dowe square how we about the game?
Which I didn't ask you, butI could tell from your tone you weren't
a huge fan of it, Likeit wasn't the most enjoyable experience. No,
anybody who walked out disappointed. Iget it. I understand. I'm
not faulting you for being disappointed.You know, like, I don't know
what else do you expected? ButI don't know how do we square the
(12:18):
fact that that still got us seeingan increase in ratings despite the fact that
everyone that watched who at least spokenup about it has had sour things.
I literally haven't heard one person,and I have a good friend group that
does like the NBA, not oneperson has been like that was fun,
you know, you know, wetext a little bit about Max mclun dunk
(12:41):
and stuff like that, but likeno one was like for the game itself,
especially like that was really cool despitedespite a light up court and all
the other Shenanigan. Yeah, thatwas Maybe that's what's got the ratings up.
People are like, oh, thecourt's gonna light up on the things
the celebrity All Star Game three pointline can move. They will give you
(13:01):
a four point line that goes backand forth. You never know when the
fourth quarter where it will be like, I don't I don't know how.
I don't know how to square withthe fact that I hated the All Star
Game and more people watch it thanever, it's still no one's been like
that was fun. Did it makeany difference to you whatsoever that it was
East versus West, versus captain's pickinglike in the grand scheme of once you
(13:24):
got into the game, did anyof that matter? I preferred East versus
West, but like to me,it didn't like it wasn't gonna keep me
from watching it or watching it evenmore and more intently, like to me,
like there's so much movement among theplayers two teams anyway, the like
whether Giannie and Lebron are picking forthe fiftieth straight year for their favorite team,
(13:46):
or whether or not it's gonna beEast versus West, Like it's I
don't feel like there's a huge loyaltyto a conference anyway at that point,
I do prefer versus West for tradition'ssake. But try on this idea for
size. And this just came tome as we're talking now. This was
not pre prepped, even though Iknew we were going to talk about this
topic. But it just came tome right now. The NBA cannot sit
(14:09):
there and say we're protecting the sanctityof this game and the number of players
in by having only twelve guys oneach roster because XYZ and that they'll play
that game. That's what Adam Silversaid. He's like, well, the
players like it when it's a smallernumber, do they? You're always leaving
three or four guys off of eachconference that have as much of a case
(14:33):
to be there as anybody else,but they're oftentimes penalized by being in a
smaller market. What if we expandthe rosters on either side to fifteen,
so we've got thirty total players,and really we might have to in order
to make this work, we probablyhave to expand it to thirty two players
(14:54):
total, so sixteen for each teameach conference. But we split that them
up into four teams of eight,and we play a little mini tournament and
the winners out of the East advanceto the winners out of the West,
and you play that and so youhave a little bit more and what do
you have writing on it? Youhave actually winning games to advance. You
(15:18):
have the pride aspect of it,and when you still get into the all
Star like championship game, what doesit really mean. Well, that's up
to the NBA to maybe sweeten thepot a little bit for the players,
not for the teams, not forthe product, sweeten it for the players
in a selfish way. But youcan always throw like a charitable match of
(15:41):
dollars or something on top of itto make it be a little altruistic.
But give me, give me alonger game, because we've got tournament play
like this, give me eight playersper roster, so you get subs in
there, we see a few extraguys, and we turn it into the
little mini All Star tournament that I'lltune in for that next year. I'll
(16:03):
tune into that for the next fiveto seven years. And really that's all
that matters, right, Yeah,because the NBA is constantly experimenting with stuff.
I mean, the season tournament thehuge example for that, the the
led court for whatever ITA's and theyou know, the having Lebron and Giannis
players for this, I think,if you're going to have popularity for but
(16:26):
god, this is why I'm sospeechless for this, Like I don't know
what to do with it, becauseI love your idea, but the NBA's
in they're looking at the ratings like, why would we change like if if
we if our ratings are up despitethe fact that Adam Silver clearly wanted more
effort, right, And you cantell they like because maybe a short term
(16:49):
game long term loss. And Idon't think the NBA is stupid enough to
not see that. I'm not thinkingthat they are, but the taking what's
swirling around, but the fact thatthey didn't make some changes like East going
to West, so on and soforth, like it Clearly it depends on
what the NBA looks at as faras the metric that they think moved the
needle. Was it the move inthe east versus west? So they need
(17:11):
to maybe just make little tweaks totry to get a little bit more effort.
Feel it like the effort didn't reallymatter that much unless all of the
negative attention you got from the twoto eleven to when eighty seven or whatever
it was game, unless that goesinto next year's game where people are like,
Okay, that was the tipping point. I don't want to watch a
two hundred point game, even thoughwe kept getting closer and closer to it.
(17:33):
Maybe they're like, look, yougot the two hundred, I don't
want to be a part of this. That maybe they got a bunch of
people to watch the newly revamped FallStar Game they tuned in and then said
nah, no more, no more. Then maybe at that point you look
at blown up because I'm with you. I look the NFL Pro Bowl numbers,
they're like they actually did about thesame numbers, like five and a
(17:55):
half million people sort of watch,which is great, right, but especially
considering where the Pro Bowl was,you know, like right right, really
in trouble too not so long ago, they completely changed their format. They
basically said, we're not getting effortin the football game itself, so let's
change it. So they're all star. Pro Bowl games got like five and
(18:15):
a half million people to be ableto watch. NBA All Star Game got
about five and a half million peopleto watch, which is a phenomenal thing
for the NBA because everyone's always tryingto compare the two and they're just apples
and pomegranate to that point. Mmhm. So if you're the NBA,
do you consider then doing something likeyou're talking about blowing it up entirely because
you're already doing a skills challenge thatapparently enough people like, so what else
(18:37):
are you going to be able todo? The end season tournament got a
lot of publicity, I think becauseI think and a lot of people really
cared about as far as the players, because people like tournaments, and there
was there's breaking rates associated tournaments,there's competition, there's clearly some money,
there's stakes in it for just abouteverybody that if the stakes weren't even that
(19:00):
good yet this year, to agreewith your point, you and I both
said the stakes need to be higher, but you seem to be on the
right track with this, and somaybe a little mini tournament for the entire
evening. You're already there for threehours anyway, like you're going to go
to these big You're not going toplay a full forty eight minutes for both
games. Now, basically make likemaybe you make you know, maybe like
(19:26):
you have one quarter for each partof the bracket or something like that,
or I don't know, depending onhow many teams you decide to figure out,
right, if you get four eightman teams, right, so the
four teams could play, you knowin the first two right of your quarters,
you have the halftime for everybody tobe able to rest, and then
maybe the second half, you know, you start to figure out the championship
in the Constellation Game, right,I don't know, maybe that might work.
(19:51):
It might be someone in chrut justbecause there's competition sort of in it.
But again, how much I heardMichael Wilbon. Michael b he has
been on this uh betwagon for years. He says, if you want to
make the All Star Game mean something, make it United States versus the world.
H then you get bragged rights intoit. Then you get people who
(20:12):
are like patriotic about it, likehey, my guys and Kevin Durant and
Lebron stuff. They're gonna be Lucaand they're gonna be Nicola, and they're
gonna be all these Dario gonna beall That's right. I said it.
They're gonna be bobbed on. They'regonna beat them. Uh. Maybe he
introduced an element of that, likewe used to have something like that leading
(20:32):
up to the All Star Game.Basically, maybe the problem the problem is
with the voting and the the nomineesthen for the reserves is you won't have
an even number on either side,and so you'll be penalizing the lower Once
again, it's the guys at theend of the list, on the fringe
of the All Star who're gonna eitherget penalized or a bonus depending on what
(20:55):
nationality they are and what deficiency youhave in the roster, to try to
even it out. That's the mainconcern I would have with that. I'm
not against the idea. I'm notagainst the idea either. I mean I'm
for throwing in some xenophobia in this. I like that, I like being
eight other countries archieche from Alabama,everybody. First of all, let's not
(21:15):
better than that. I don't know, man like to me, there could
be a revent and maybe that's themore subtle way to do it than to
turn it into like a mini tournamentat the beginning. And I'd be okay
with watching that because I would loveto sort of see these guys, but
also thinking we need to move onat the point because the All Star Game
issues are going to be prevalent fora while. Like it's just you're fifty
(21:37):
games in a season. How mucheffort are you gonna get for guys who
still have thirty games and they stillwant to be able to sort of try
to make the end run win win, I actually win World Championship. And
here here's the thing beyond the score, what really stood out to me.
This will be my last point beyondthe score, because that's what everybody has
hung up on. But you playeda full forty eight minutes. You scored
nearly three hundred and fifty points.The Western Conference All Stars were called for
(22:03):
two personal fouls the entire game.The Eastern Conference All Stars were called for
one personal foul the entire game.Nobody should be hacking or playing dirty in
an All Star game. Absolutely not. But there you see that, like
there's there's no even attempt at defense. But we do say, like,
oh, I wish I could seeLebron James in a dunk contest. Why
(22:26):
won't Lebron do a dunk contest?You know what he is, He's in
a dunk contest. It's called theAll Star Game. There's quasi in game
dunks. That's that's kind of cool, Like you do get to see him
in a dunk contest with all theother stars. This is not a game.
This is not a novel argument.But like the level of creativity in
(22:48):
games in the season off the backboards, behind the backs of the stuff you
would think would be dunk contest worthy. It is happening in the middle of
February. In the game, spleadingup to this, like there's just the
novelty of being able to have allthese guys because I've all I'll tell you
this, I've watched when Miyama playlike six games. You know, like
(23:11):
I couldn't do that back when theAll Star Game was like, you know,
the thing you can only see everybodywants every now and then. Mm
hmm, ESPN, ABC, Tand T have all given us the ability
to watch a lot more high qualitystar towers he's sort of ever had,
So it's not as special. It'sstill special have them all on the court
(23:32):
at the same time. Let's seethem all over social media. You know,
every highlight that you want, you'regonna see that. Every My timeline
is littered with highlights every since everysingle night is highlights. So what's so
special about a highlights for two anda half hours, you know, it's
it's just it's sort of interesting,sort of pay attention to if the NBA
wants to tweak this at all,or if they look at the ratings,
(23:55):
and I think Adam Silver want todo something. Even though the ratings were
up, he seemed seemed genuinely disgusted. But the fact that it was two
and eleven points score by one,and you don't see him publicly annoyed very
often. You would see it likeevery single day with David Stern, Right,
David Stern was just perpetually pissed allthe time. He wore that on
his sleep. Adam Silver is muchmore political and much more like image driven,
(24:21):
and I think in a good way. He also seems a little more
even keeled and like objective about certainthings. So to see him annoyed on
national TV, that's a big deal. That's like saying archiche is at a
loss for work. You know,it's a big deal. Yeah. Like
he literally was like, I cannothide this anymore. Congratulate, I will
(24:41):
my truth. Wow. So Iguess one of you have to have this
trophy, right, Mercy, Idon't want to be a part of this.
All right, let's move forward.For the most several minutes we have
here, I want to ask youabout one thing and then sort of some
thoughts going into the beginning of theseason. First of all, we talk
about and Alla being promoted as inthe Nets interim coach. The Nets aren't
(25:03):
good. I don't think it's sortof a huge deal at this point,
But I want to ask you abouta certain team you may know reup a
Mike Conley junior. He was goingto be a free agent at the end
of this year. Now he isgoing to be signed up for this year
and the next two years afterwards.He's quite quite a nice season for your
guays. So a couple quick momentson the reupping of Mike Conley, not
(25:26):
even letting him get to the testof free agent markets. I think it's
a sign of respect. I thinkit's a sign to the rest of the
roster that, like we are,this is our window. We are committed
to this. Everybody likes Mike everywherehe's ever played. The fans love him,
his teammates love him. He isjust one of those guys. He
has a glue guy on and offthe court. He has been nothing but
(25:48):
a pros pro from Minnesota. AnthonyEdwards loves the guy, and Anthony Edwards
has played with some point guards thathe loves. He loved Patrick Beverly,
he loved Ricky Rubio. He isstill good friends with Rubio. He's had
a lot of mentally from their goodpals. Yeah, him and Rubio were
really really close, and he creditshe credits Ricky Rubio, especially for his
(26:11):
rookie season, for showing him theropes. And he credits Pat Bev for
coming in and adding that edge andshowing him what it would take to really
get under people's skin and go afterpeople. And with Mike, it's been
that like brotherly relationship with this guyis my big brother. He's got my
back. He's been around the blocka million times. He is all about
(26:33):
winning. He's all about the team. That's all that matters. And Anthony
Edwards has soaked up. I thinkthose different lessons from those different point guards
like a sponge. Anthony Edwards wasarguably at his worst when playing with D'Angelo
Russell as a point guard. Andthat's no knock on Di Lo, who
brings a lot of great things tothe table, but as a gunner and
as somebody who's inconsistent and oftentimes fallsinto doing things his own way, you
(26:57):
saw Anthony Edwards mimicking that just alittle bit too, especially last year as
they struggled so Mike being in thelocker room and on the floor is great.
Is this going to be his retirementpackage? It might be. I
don't see Mike Conley as a guywho's going to hang around long after his
cell by date. I think he'llgo into coaching. I think he'll be
(27:18):
a really good coach, like JacqueVaughan, like Kevin Ollie, like a
lot of these point guards who maybeweren't perennial All Stars, but they show
up and they know the game,they know how to communicate. They were
good dudes, you know Tylu whenthey played. Guys like that, they'll
be successful. And I think MikeConley is in line to be somebody like
that, either at the college levelor the NBA level. Is he going
(27:40):
to be the long term starter forthe next three years in Minnesota, two
years whatever that, I don't know. I think he'll probably be the starter
in name and the minutes are goingto continue to go down. This might
be the last year for him wherehe is a big minute guy. They
are very clearly and successfully grooming NikhilAlexander Walker to be I think the starting
backcourt made with Anthony Edwards over thelong term of this window, and they
(28:04):
want Anthony Edwards to be the prototypicalJordan type of scoring guard who also is
a great defender. They want AlexanderWalker to play the Ron Harper role where
he is a big, lanky guardwho is defense first, and that's what
Walker has turned into, but canknock down a shot, has the chops
to chip in some points along theway, but just gives you another big
(28:26):
body in the back court. Andthey've been working on that all year.
It's really really obvious that's going tokeep happening. And I think that Mike
will start for as long as youcan do that with a straight face,
and then it's gonna be Alexander Walkerafter that, and that's fine. Like
I think Mike Connley is one ofthose guys who will be fine coming off
the bench if he's helping his teamwin. And that may be two years
(28:48):
down the road yet, but thisis a good move. I think it's
as much a signal to the restof the guys on the team and the
organization that says this is about winningand work into it now so that the
stakes are high. You're either hereto win or you're not. I think
it's interesting that you compared him inthe potential coaching role to the recently fired
(29:11):
Chock Vaughan and the replacement for JacqueVon and Kevin Ollie. Uh both both
they're both good coaches. You thinkJack John's a better coach than Kevin Ollie
than Mike Conley rank and real quickone two three better coaches jaq Von,
Mike Conley Jr. And Kevin OlliJacque Vaughan, Kevin Oli, Mike Conley
(29:32):
in that order. Because Jacques Vaughanhas coached at the NBA level now for
a while, both as an interimas an assistant as a head coach.
Kevin Ollie's been a very good collegecoach and he's going to get his chance
at the NBA. We know itdoesn't always translate up, but it is
a big sign when a guy likeKevin Ollie, who is very successful collegiately,
is willing to take the assistant joband learn the ropes even though he
(29:56):
played in the NBA for like adecade, but to come back learn the
ropes that way and not be like, No, I've had such a successful
college program, I couldn't possibly doanything less than be the head coach and
the president of basketball operations for yourteam. There are college coaches like that
out there, many of them,and those are the guys that typically flame
(30:17):
out the hardest. Those were thetwo I was exactly thinking of, you
know, and then to a lesserextent like John Bline, you know,
and guys like that that have comein and flamed out hard. The coach
John Bale was he was he apresident of basket operations too, not with
the CAVSKA, but I was.He did get a big sweetheart deal when
they He got a big sweetheart dealwhen they brought him in. Okay,
(30:41):
all right, well, let's let'sspend the last few minutes talking about the
future of the NBA and I meanled courch for everyone. Actually the second
half of the season, which islaughable because you know, like the Celtics
are fifty five games in halfway.Yeah, it's the it's the last third
of the season. Whatever. Okay, projection wise, the first team I
(31:03):
wanted to ask you about, andthen I actually watch want to ask you
about one or two teams and theysort of get you to sort of predict
what you think, big story mighthappen the rest of the way. Milwaukee,
right now is the three seed.Milwaukee's eight and a half games back.
But since mister Doc Rivers has beenthe guy, they've been terrible,
(31:25):
and I mean on the court andokay, but bring Adrian Griffin back,
but Winton Laws, they have beendisgusting. So let me ask you this.
Do you think Milwaukee sinks further bythe time we get into the playoffs?
Do you think Doc Rivers was thatbig of a detriment and upsetting the
(31:47):
momentum that Milwaukee had, even thoughsome of the players may not have loved
the momentum that we're still a ridingpretty high. Or do you think they
just need more time with Doc andhis coaching that they will get the ship
rewriters, doct added a bunch ofyou player they just changed a coach.
I believe that the Cleveland Cavaliers arenot the long term second seed in the
(32:07):
Eastern Conference. I think it willeither be the Bucks or the Knicks.
The Knicks have more momentum, butthe injury problems. The Bucks have a
healthier roster right now. But asyou said, all that stuff to figure
out, and so if the Bucksdo fall, it's not going to be
far. It would be down intothe fourth seed, and I think Cleveland
is probably going to be at theend of the season sitting in the third
(32:29):
or fourth seed. Strong team,but they're going to benefit from the fact
that Philly now is right back tohaving joellenbeat injury issues. In Indiana,
as good as they've been, nota good defensive team, and it is
probably still one or two years awayfrom like really being a true contender.
Miami doesn't have the firepower, althoughyou know, getting to line right,
and they've added some pieces here,Terry Rogier and so forth. They're going
(32:51):
to keep tinkering and they'll be inthe hunt. But yeah, so I
think Milwaukee they could fall, butit won't be far. I think they
have just as much of a chanceto bump up into that second seed,
although it kind of feels like ifNew York can just get healthy, it'll
maybe be the next All right,then let me ask you about once even
in the West, that's the GoldenState Warriors. They're two and a half
(33:12):
games up for the play in atthe ten seed at this point, and
they had to win eight of theirlast team just to get there. At
this point to get into the numberten spots. So Golden state. We
still both feel fairly confident they're makingit into the playoffs, the play in
at least, yeah, the playingpart of the playoffs. That kund of
all to the playoffs technically, Butthat's just the way I look at it
(33:37):
is, this is this team capableof not making the play in twenty nine
games left if you have an injuryto staff, absolutely, let's just stay
there. They're healthy as they areright now. You know, they keep
(33:57):
what it is, right, Imean, they bench Clay the other night
and he came off and then youhad like thirty five points or something coming
off the bench. So yep,like it's it's not as if you know,
it's been a ton of injury.That's sort of the same this year.
They're eight and two in their lastten games. Yeah, so that
and that got but that got themup to the ten spot, right like
they've been flirting with that nine tento eleven see spot for the last I
don't know, for the most ofthe season. So what is this team
(34:21):
capable of not making the playoffs thisyear? Only if they start to sink
again and Houston gets hot, becauseyou look at those teams underneath them now
and I think the West and theEast have both sorted out generally into about
exactly how we thought it would go, with maybe one or two exceptions here
or there in the ordering of thestandings, and maybe in each conference there's
(34:45):
one team hanging out there. Inthe West, it's Dallas. In the
East, it's probably Chicago. Whereyou go, man, I didn't actually
see them being up this far.There's still time for them to drop out,
but I didn't see them doing it, and it looks like they maybe
have some staying power. Utah Idon't think actually wants to win, just
like they got to this point lastyear. Because they're well coached and it's
(35:07):
a decent roster, but they're stilltrying to help the roster. Yeah,
they can't help it, but theythey know that they still need to add
more talent and the only way todo that in Utah is through the draft.
You won't get free agents. It'shard to do with trades. Memphis,
Portland, San Antonio. Not onlydid they probably not want to win,
but they're not capable of winning enoughto threaten Houston was supposed to be
(35:31):
winning more than this. They aregunning for a play in spot. They've
had some injuries. They've had someinconsistency. They're still young, especially their
young players like Jalen Green and JabariSmith, guys like that Amon Thompson.
They struggle with their consistency big time. But they're they're supposed to be in
(35:51):
the hunt and they'll continue to push. So Golden State doesn't have a lot
of competition if you only have oneteam underneath you nipping at your heels.
But you look at all the otherteams above them, Dallas, Sacramento,
the Lakers, maybe even the Pelicansby default because they're sitting in the sixth
seat out of those teams, canyou really see anybody where the bottom is
(36:13):
going to fall out or likely to? It all comes down to injury,
right, It would be major injuryto one of those and Golden State,
you know, continuing to win andthen Houston gets in. So I think
really the only major threat here ifall things remain equal, the Warriors not
shooting themselves in the foot, nothaving Draymond miss any more time. You
(36:36):
know, Clay's got to find something, Andrew Wiggins has got to find something
like come on, be productive alittle bit. They've got to find that,
and they got to hope that Houstondoesn't go on a tear because everybody
matured over the All Star break whenthey were in Cabo, which is a
great place to mature, by theway. Yeah, exactly. He's been
a handful of days in Cabo andall of a sudden, a boom,
You're like, I'm two extra yearsin the league. I got that under
(36:59):
my belt, and I feel youget that Rockets, Banana boat going,
you get to Buntu going, andall of a sudden, yeah, you're
You're in the championship game. Idon't. I'm not as down on Utah
after I've watched them this year asyou are, as far not wanting to
win. Right. They are wellcoached. I think they could come.
They got some pieces they got.I was really low on the mo I
thought they could be the worst teamin the West, but you did.
(37:21):
Yeah, the coaching is not allowingthem to be the worst team in the
West, and that's to me surprising. I think Houston and Utah are both
real threats to uh TO to toa Golden State because both seven in their
last ten games. Whatever that means, you know, I'll tell that Utah
you top before they lost four fourin a row they had beaten they didn't
(37:45):
have time. They've beaten Milwaukee likethey'd beaten Milwaukee, and I don't know,
they beat another really good team rightbefore that. I think they beat
the Lakers in there. Maybe notin that stretch, but it was recently.
Trying to think it was Megan goingup their schedule. No, they
say Milwaukee, Milwaukee and somebody elsethat was a good team that they'd be.
(38:06):
I don't know. But anyway,so for me, I think that
they're Islahoma City City. Yeah,a couple of nights after beating Milwaukee.
Yeah, so I think Utah isa real threat, and I think Houston
is also a real threat. Ithink Houston is pretty well coached. A
lot of it's to youth and tryingto get some of that, as you
say, maturity on your belt,I think, and a lot of new
pieces, you know, Fred vanVliet and and Dylan Brooks and and Jeff
(38:28):
Green. There's a lot of newveterans that are I think there's a to
me in my head, I thinkthere's a forty percent chance they don't make
the playoffs. Okay, yeah,and there they're only like two and a
half kind of them all year thoughI mean to be fair, but not
to miss the playoffs. Like Ithought they would be in like the nine
ten area, but like I didnot think that they would just be this.
(38:52):
I wouldn't even say hot and cold. They're just cool and cold,
like kind of warming times cold,never really putting together any stretch of really
good basketball for a week or twoat a time, just sort of all
over the place. But I don'tknow which, by the way, would
be the I think official end ofthe dynasty if they didn't make the playoffs,
because they're not coming back next year, especially if they made the playoffs
(39:14):
and winning the title. They're notwinning the title this year, Like they're
done as far as that dynasty's consiers. They're fourteen and fourteen at home,
like at home, all right,Joe going forward. Give give me a
team to watch out for or aheadline to pay attention to, and you
think for the last half of theseason, as we get to the last
(39:37):
twenty eight to twenty nine thirty thirtyone games of everybody watch what happens to
the Oklahoma City Thunder as a bellweatherfor how much of a threat they are
or are not in the Western Conferenceif they drop two to three seeds here,
which is kind of what I thinkis going to happen, because youth
is going to catch up, assome of these really good veteran teams in
(39:58):
the Western Conference now kicking into highgear. If they drop two to three
seeds, they're not a threat yetthis year, but they're coming next year,
and we all know that, andwe all got to be real scared.
They're going to take their lumps.But if they somehow stick around in
the second seed the rest of theyear, maybe even overtake Minnesota, they're
a game and a half back forthat number one seed. They are not
(40:20):
only a legit threat because of thatregular season standing, they're a legit threat
to make it to an NBA Finalsalready, this young and with shades of
the Kevin Durant, James Hard andRussell Westbrook surge of Baka Thunder from yesteryear.
Jeff Green on that team too,where they were just loaded with young
talent and all of a sudden maturedway faster than everybody thought and they're like,
(40:42):
oh crap, we can't hang withthese guys. So that's a team
that I'm really intrigued with. Everybodyelse. It's almost always for these veteran
teams. Now it's who gets healthyin time, not just in time to
have your guy be able to suitup for the first playoff game. Yeah,
that's important, But do you gethealthy with ten to fifteen games left
to go in the regular season toreintegrate a Julius Randall or a Mitchell Robinson
(41:07):
speaking about the Knicks or a Joeel Embiid with the Sixers, like,
yeah, you've played with those guysbefore, but when they're out for a
long period of time, the teamchanges, the chemistry adjusts. Different guys
had to step up, roles changed, they morphed, and now you're suddenly
asking everybody else to go back towhat they were doing before, some of
(41:28):
which they may not want to doas they've taken on bigger roles. And
you're asking a guy who's rusty tocome into and maybe even still recovering,
to come into this new chemistry makeup. And it's a lot more difficult than
you think. And so the teamsthat get healthiest the fastest, especially these
veteran teams that are actually in thehunt, those are the ones to watch
(41:50):
out for. I don't really havelike a low lurking team, whereas I
mean, maybe it's Miami, butMiami I got one in the who you
got watch out for the Orlando Magic. They are in the eighth spot right
now. I think they could sneaktheir way into a four seed. Wow,
(42:10):
Okay, it's not just about howgood they are, because they are
pretty good. They are a prettytalented team. But their their final twenty
five or so games really easy.There are only three games out by the
way, to three games out ofthe four spot or the four spot.
Listen to this schedule right out thegate for when they start back on Thursday.
Now they have the Calves, butafter that Pistons, Hawks, Nets,
(42:36):
Jazz, Pistons, Hornets, Wizards. Then it's the Nicks and Pacers.
Then it's the Nets, Raptors,Raptors, Hornets, Pelicans. Like
they could Ergendy screaming, what isthis amateur hour? They could go on
a run right out the gates andthey could find themselves within a couple of
a game or two of a fourseed. After the next week two well,
(43:01):
I guess we're Tuesdays. Maybe aftertwo weeks they have a real chance
to make a really big in rowat the very beginning of this beginning of
this stretch run. And then youknow what it is. It's health and
it's the momentum you have going intothe playoffs. Right if they're playing like
they are on fire, they're gonnabe hard to beat momentum wise, like
(43:24):
they'll be. I'm not saying thatthey're gonna win a bunch of rounds.
I'm not saying they're gonna win.Let it play a spoiler, yeah,
but they could be a big spoil. They could be hosting I think at
that four spot. I think it'svery, very doable. That schedule,
it's right there in front of them. It's I haven't done the math on
it, but it's gotta be oneof the easiest for ten game stretches to
(43:44):
come out of the come out ofthe All Star breakout there, if not
the easiest. I to choose aspoiler. In the West, it's a
team in a similar situation, butI don't know their schedule and I'm not
gonna dig into everything there. Butthe one team that really scares me as
a wild card, because I dothink they're capable of beating anyone on any
given night, and that could messup seating along the way. I do
(44:07):
think they're capable of winning a roundin the playoffs as well, though we
saw during the NBA Cup maybe themget exposed a little bit in that championship
round. The New Orleans Pelicans,if healthy, are young but veteran,
well coached, also have been togetheras a core now for a bit,
even though they haven't all played togetherall the time because of those health issues.
(44:28):
But when you actually watch them play, like Oklahoma City, they cause
massive problems with their athleticism, withthe sheer size of their roster, especially
in that starting lineup, and thefact that they just bring waves of energy
guys off the bench who have apretty decent head about them. It's not
(44:49):
just you know, chicken with thehead cut off energy. It's they fill
a role and they've got a lotof different looks they can get to that
bench, and now that they're prettyhealthy. Like OKAC, we had we
had concerns about both of those teamsyoung benches, but the starting lineups being
intact and being healthy means that thoseyoung guys are not overexposed. And in
both cases well coached teams where theguys have matured a little bit faster than
(45:14):
we thought they would. And look, ready, New Orleans could be that
Orlando type of spoiler in the West. I think here's New Orleans schedule starting
Thursday. Rockets, Heat, Bulls, Nicks, Pacers, Pacers, Raptors,
seventy six ers. Not easy,but as easy as Orlando. Yeah,
but doable, but very doable.And they wrap up in See.
(45:38):
They're there because they used to havethe Bucks. Okay, see on the
schedule. Okay, so he's onlythere one more time. The Celtics are
still in the schedule. Yeah,they don't have a bunch of easy games.
The Clippers are still in the schedule. Once they're done with Minnesota for
the year, they've already gotten theirfour matchups and with them, I think,
(45:59):
so how did they get split?Who got it? I think I
have to go back and look.I think Minnesota was three to one out
of those, but they may havesplit because they New Orleans is a team
that, no matter how poor they'vebeen, like injury wise, they've played
the Wolves top over the last coupleof years. That's been a difficult matchup
(46:20):
for both teams. I'm going tolook through Hey, hey, Joel,
if you guys aren't on Herb Jones. Get on Herb Jones. Oh already
there, man. Minnesota beat themin November, Minnesota lost to them at
the beginning of December. Minnesota lostto them at the beginning of January.
(46:43):
And do they only play them threetimes this year? I guess lucky for
them, they only play them threetimes. So yeah, they went one
and two against New Orleans. Mmhmmm, hmmm hmm. I believe all
right, So that's gonna do itfor us. The second half of the
season is still two days away,so we still gotta wait for the basketball
(47:06):
that happen. It feels like foreversince we've seen a meaningful, fun basketball
game. That's okay once again,we've solved all the league's problems. We
did it again, and there's somegood games. Houston, New Orleans is
the first game back. The Clippersand the Thunder first game back. Boston
and Chicago first game back, NewYork, Philadelphia his first big back,
Orlando Cleveland's first game back. Ofcourse, the one I'm gonna be watching
(47:29):
the most is Detroit and Indiana.That's the first night back, so and
be huge on the Pacers to score. They're on two hundred and eleven points
in that game against Detroit. Actually, that probably begets the Wizards. To
be honest with you, that wouldhappened. But to be fair, by
the way, the East has twoteams that still haven't won ten games.
What if, guys, you guysare terrible? All right, Joel,
(47:49):
that's gonna do for us. Thispodcast is over. When we come back,
the Knicks will have to overtake inthe cast for the second seed,
and Joel's Minnesota Timberwolves will be first. With a bullet that gonna be fun.
Let it be written, let itbe done. That's right from our
mouth to God's ears, Joel,say goodbye to the good people. Goodbye,
(48:09):
good people. Will do it again. You can catch us Spreeker Spotify,
iTunes for the audio only version,YouTube for the video version, Like
share, subscribe to all those goodthings. We'll see you next time.
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