Denver Survives! Suddenly Dramatic Playoff Weekend Alert With Rob Mahoney
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Coming up, Nuggets, Thunder, headed to a game seven. I'm talking about the Rob Mahoney along with a lot more basketball next. This message is a paid partnership with Apple Card. One of the most useful things in my life lately has been my Apple Card. It's great for game nights, vacations, just life in general. And applying was so easy and quick. You can apply, see your credit limit offer, and then start using your card in minutes. Do it while you're watching a basketball game and you can start making purchases before halftime even rolls around. I also love how I can get

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OKC in Denver is headed to a game seven Celtics Knicks on Friday night. And then if that's a game seven, that's going to be in Boston on Monday. So no Saturday game for us. I guess we're just going to have to watch movies. You can watch close encounters. I talked to Rob Mahoney. We did it live on YouTube.

And we had a great time talking about, can Jokic keep this going? Can OKC hold on? Lots of great basketball storylines. Rob threw some more water on me with the Celtics game six. It's all next. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. I'm waiting to remember

All right, we're live on YouTube. Bill Simmons here with Rob Mahoney. The Studio, episode nine. So I really liked what they... Oh, wait, what podcast is this? Talking basketball. We get a seventh game. We get one more Jokic game. We do. We get OKC versus Denver, which has been an absolutely awesome, awesome series. I felt myself getting sad in the first half when OKC started to pull away.

And I was like, oh man, what a journey this has been with Jokic. With this weird team and his teammates that are either hurt or they don't show up. Then they're good again. Then they're not good. And he's the one constant. And I guess this is how it's going to end. And then it flips. It's a borderline Strother game, but not really. There's some Murray in there. There's some Jokic. There are some heroes. Russell Westbrook, not a hero. No, no. I think we can give Julian Strother credit for this one as the Julian Strother game.

Really? You're going Strothergate? Because yesterday was clearly the Luke Kornacki. Yeah, maybe not quite that extreme, but the desperation for Denver, and we saw this in Game 5, they just needed somebody who could hit a couple of shots, and they would have probably pulled out that game or at least made it even more competitive. Him coming up with basically a solo run in the most competitive, tensest part of this game just cannot be overstated, the importance of that. And as you're saying, Russell Westbrook did have the kind of performance where...

He almost lost this game. He played poorly enough for extended stretches that it legitimately swung the momentum of it. And if Denver had to stretch his minutes or his importance even more because Julian Strother wasn't playing well enough, because Michael Porter Jr. didn't hit a couple shots, we could be having a very different mood right now for this pod. Well, it's funny. Strother was basically the bizarro Westbrook. Westbrook in the first half

Felt like he swung the game. At one point I looked, he had played, this is in the second half, he'd played seven minutes, he was minus 14 and it felt worse. Strother came in and it felt like he played seven minutes and he was like plus 84. But so it all balanced out. But

This is the problem with Denver. You get past the top three and I have no idea who's showing up. Like game five, it was basically those three guys and that was it. Yeah. And Brown has been, I think really good in the playoffs has been a little shakier offensive with this series, but you just don't know where you're getting. So Strother, do I trust he's going to do that in OKC in game seven? I don't. But weirdly, OKC has the same issue.

where they're dying for somebody to have a little three minute run, right? They don't know. It was Isaiah Joe for a while, but it feels like he's kind of gotten nudged out

And, you know, weirdly, sometimes it can be Caruso just kind of as a two-way guy. For sure. But they're not getting that wild card. So, so much is on SGA and Jalen Williams. And then Jalen Williams stunk tonight. That's the thing. And I would even set it up differently where it's like if J-Dub isn't performing, then you now need three wild card players to do well. And so, yeah, you get a good Case and Wallace stretch in the second quarter. You're getting some good Alex Caruso minutes. But like when it comes down to it,

Not enough guys can hit shots. You know, you don't get the same like Lou Dort streak. You don't have the same like Chet cashing in on his three. Like enough of those plays have to swing in your favor to win a game like this. And J-Dub just straight up for a player of his caliber, an all NBA caliber guy in the regular season, wasn't good enough to win this game. And that happens sometimes. It certainly happens with players who are as young as he is, but it's a reality of Oklahoma City's situation. That was the number one thing we were worried about with OKC in the playoffs. Yep.

Is your second guy ready yet? You know, and you go through the history of the league and the second guy has to be a little more consistent than he's been. But there's so many ways to go here. Do you think less OKC because it's taken seven games to beat this pretty flawed Denver team that's built around one transcendent, one of the great playoff players of all time at this point? Or so that's door A or B. These are the two best teams in the league.

And if OKC gets through this, we're smooth sailing after this. I mean, I don't think it's either of those doors. I mean, give me a door C. I mean, door C, the Nuggets are really good. And yes, they have question marks beyond the top three or four guys. But those top three or four know what they're doing, know how to play together, know how to find like all of the inroads to playoff success. And so like this feels like a very natural graduation point for Oklahoma City. Like they're either going to be able to beat a team like that or they're not.

And they're either going to be able to overwhelm a team like that or they're not. And I thought there were stretches of this game where you could see the Thunders completely mucking up Denver's pace of play, the flow of their offense, disrupting their defense by extension. Like all the pieces were there during that run you were talking about. And then the Nuggets just like reeled it back in. One Julian Strother bucket at a time. An incredible Jamal Murray third quarter that I thought like they do not win this game without it. And ultimately like they have a calm and a patience mentality

that is really hard to manage against the way Oklahoma City plays defense. Like this is a frenetic defensive front with a lot of activity that can force a lot of turnovers. And until the Nuggets briefly lost their collective minds down the stretch of the fourth quarter where they were just turning the ball over every possession, they were actually winning the turnover battle in this game. And it's like, if that's what the bulk of the game is going to be, Denver is going to win. And I don't think that reflects poorly on the Thunder, just to say like they have to be able to match that level of precision in a game seven.

That's what makes OKC one of the many things that makes them so weird as a great team. Normally, teams have runs and it's with threes, especially in the modern NBA. It's like, oh, my God, 12-0 run, four threes. Yeah. And OKC, it's all defense related. Four steals in a row for OKC. They've all turnovers and transition points. And that's kind of how they come back in games.

with their defense. I'm still not positive they know who their five guys should be on the stretch, and I'm also not sure it matters. But you think like game five, I mean, think about it this way. If Dort doesn't get hot for three minutes in game five, and if Jalen Williams doesn't make that shot on the left side that I still can't believe went in,

Those two events, Denver wins, and now we have this game six where I think we probably get the same result. Maybe so. Now we're going back for game seven. This is like the kind of series that I grew up with and you grew up with too. This is a classic 1980s

We go back and forth. We go back and forth. Okay, here we go. Game seven. Right. This is like CBS 1987. Denver came back in game six and we're just doing it. We're playing all the hits and then OKC, they got it out. They advance. And we talk about what an important series this was for their growth. They had to get over the hump. So it's all the makings of that. And yet

Jokic is so great. I just don't want to play him if it's one game. They have two days rest until Sunday. And he's probably going to play, what, 43 minutes, 44 minutes? As much as it takes, yeah. They did it today. Legler, who I thought was fantastic today. I really think he's the best TV analyst we have at this point. And he was talking about even to get him an extra minute and a half in the fourth quarter was so huge. Like, think how stupid that is.

It's like, oh, we're able to not bring him back in until the eight minute mark instead of the 930 mark. But that's like how important he's become now, where you feel like if you can get to eight minutes in the fourth quarter, it's like a fucking miracle. Yeah. But that's who he is. And that's where that Nuggets team is. I wonder if we'll see more of that from the Thunder, too, in game seven. I mean, obviously, it's a season on the line game. Everyone's going to play a little bit more. But relative to this one, yes, there were a couple of Thunder players who were in foul trouble and that shook up the rotation.

I also thought Mark Dagnall in general was just like trying a bunch of very different stuff from what Oklahoma City usually does. They played some lineups that were smaller than they ever play. There were some lineups with Jalen Williams. Jay Will is the only big on the court, which they very rarely, if not,

never do effectively in competitive games. Stuff that we just have not seen from them in the playoffs, including some shorter stints for their key guys, where they were pulled in and out quickly to get a quick blow, to get a quick rest. I'm kind of wondering from a coaching staff perspective for them if they're thinking...

we can trust our decision making a little better if these guys are a little better rested. But in doing so, you're trading off some minutes for really good players and you're trading them for guys who are a little flawed, who are going to have some streaky shooting or some bad turnover problems. And I think those chickens kind of came home to roost for the Thunder a little bit.

Well, they had the SJ gets the fourth foul right near the end of the first half. It's a terrible foul. Really? Like really, really. Even Carl Anthony Towns was like, wow. Wow. I can't believe that. So they play him the first five minutes of the third quarter. And then he pulls him because he knows, I just want to get, I'm glad I got that five minutes. But then he doesn't play the last seven minutes of the third quarter. And you really felt it.

On OKC, that's where it's like nobody they have is really ready to run an offense in a game like that was that important for Denver for seven minutes. And if you're talking about like whatever happens to them, this is I still think they're going to win the title. But if they don't, probably the thing they're going to look at is who can come off the bench and be.

who can actually like create a little offense. Yeah. Like Isaiah, almost like Isaiah Joe as a lead guard type of person. Just, I don't even know what that means. I don't even know who that is, but like, like what the Celtics have with Peyton Pritchard, where he can come in and be like, oh, he might take some shots and he'll dribble and he'll push the pace and he's a change of pace. They don't really have anybody like that. So it all falls on Jalen Williams. And when he's bad, then what do you do? Yeah.

Yes. I think Jalen Williams, like he has elements and stretches. And even in this game, like he ends up with 10 assists. Like this is a good playmaking game for Jalen Williams overall. He's still critical in cracking that like first line of defense, specifically when Denver zone, uh, like,

He's a really important part of that equation. And yeah, when Shea's off the floor, obviously he's your go-to guy for all of that creation. It just would be a little easier, as you're saying, if you had a backcourt counterpart who's a little bit more comfortable with the ball in their hands. Just a little bit. And you can do, you know, you can put Caruso in some of those spots as kind of a trigger man, but he's not a traditional, like,

attacking ball handler, or at least you kind of don't want him to be. Cason Wallace, again, I like a lot, can get a little fast and loose with the passing and his handle sometimes. You just start looking around their backcourt rotation, and it's a lot of guys who you trust in certain moments, you trust in certain roles. But there's a reason why Shea has the ball in his hands a lot. And one is because he's really good at it. And two is because there just are not a ton of ball handling alternatives as a primary initiator.

And it doesn't matter when you're up 20 and you're up 15, which is where they've been the whole season. And, you know, odds, I didn't look at what the line is, but odds are they're going to be like eight, nine, 10 point favorites somewhere in there. And yet Jokic, um, the Jokic stuff. So I was looking his this year, last year and 23, the title year. So now it was 45 playoff games for him. Pretty big sample size.

45 playoff games, 29 points a game, 13 rebounds a game, nine assists a game. This is for 45 playoff games. What does he have today? 29, 14 and eight. Right on the money. So it's like, whoa, Jokic had a good game. It's like, nah, it's typical Jokic playoff game at this point. Made his free throws down the stretch, which was something that was getting a little shaky there for a couple of games. In general, it just feels like they played a ton. It feels like they played twice as many playoff games as everyone else in the NBA.

Like these, it just, every single game feels like it has this extra weight to them and it's do or die and it's down the stretch and Jokic seems exhausted and nothing has been easy. That Clipper series was a nightmare until game seven.

And then this series, you know, I'm sure they're kicking themselves about game five. That's if they, they go home for the summer game five is the one where it's going to be like, really Lou Dort? I mean, the Thunder of theirs too. Like, you know, they're Aaron Gordon moments. Like they're, they're counterbalancing forces in terms of like clutch play or street play. Like this is the playoffs. That's what happens. Ultimately though, I think, I think you're zeroing in on the right factors for Denver, which is like, are they just going to have the energy reserves to,

to finish this thing out when Jokic... Everything is so hard for Jokic. I wouldn't say he was at any point in this game exactly picking the Thunder apart. It was more Oklahoma City's deciding they're obviously going to crowd the lane and put as many bodies around him as possible. They're going to try to stay attached to Jamal Murray. And they're basically taking away the Aaron Gordon lob from Jokic. And they're just saying, Christian Brown, Russell Westbrook, Michael Porter Jr., Peyton Watson, Julian Strother in this one. We're just going to trust...

that we can rotate out to you fast enough to mess you up, whether it's taking the shot or putting the ball on the ground. And Denver just won enough of those plays. But it wasn't surgical. It was difficult. It was arduous. It's challenging every single step of the way. And they're going to have to do all that again. And they're going to have to do it all again against a team that is younger, that is deeper, that has a little bit to rally, that will have home court advantage. The Thunder have a lot of factors kind of swinging in their favor as this thing goes to seven. And so it's like you want to trust Denver.

the kind of veteran know-how of the Nuggets, but it's kind of hard to with a series that's been disbalanced overall. Yeah, especially when OKC is just giving them corner threes like they're free candy in a drugstore. Yeah. Like, take one. No, take another one. You want to drive toward the basket this time? Go ahead. We'll give you that too. They're just packing...

And that's why the Yoka just assist totals. I mean, I think he finished with eight today. Yeah, which is high for this series. A couple of those, like that last one he had to Brown was like the thread the needle out of nowhere Larry Bird type pass. But, you know, they don't want him to finish with 12, 13, 14 assists. I still feel like he could score even more. There was a couple of times when he would get the ball at the foul line and he would turn and then he would just kick it out. And it's like, just take Hardenstein. Like, you know, you can get that little

lob jump hook on him at any time. Um, has this series, I know it's a regular season award. Did you vote for a Yokeage or SGA? I forget. I voted Yokeage. Right. Did this series make you regret anything or feel stronger about your vote? I mean, I know it's playoffs is different than regular season, but to me, it's like, I felt like it really made the cases for both guys, especially game five, but I feel better about the Yokeage vote. Um, I just, I, I,

I think he's the best player in 13 years. I think that's the area. It is a completely separate award. It is a regular season award, as you said. Those are the criteria.

Part of my criteria in voting for Jokic was I think he's the best player in the world. And I start from that place. And anyone else I'm going to vote for instead kind of has to prove overwhelmingly that they are the best player instead or that they had a superior season instead. I thought Shay got really close and I couldn't quite get there. But ultimately, like this does confirm that. Like, I think Jokic has been the best player in the playoffs overall. I think he's been the best player in the series overall. Him or Julius Randle. It's now a toss-up. One of the two. Yeah.

You know, Shea had a tremendous game, but I think you, and if anything, I thought him running into the wall in this particular game had much more to do with the fact that his teammates couldn't hit shots. And so all of a sudden you see the crowd coming in around him. He can't get to the basket anymore. But I thought this was Shea's most successful game

breaking down the defense, getting all the way to the rim. He was pretty relentless in that regard. And I wonder how much of that had to do with he was kind of holding his right hand for a lot of this game. It seemed like he injured it or jammed it somehow. We'll have to see kind of what happens with that. And so maybe he was looking to drive more than shoot, but I thought it suited him. I thought he did a really good job with that part of his game, which has not been a given against this Denver defense for a lot of these contests.

Really, really, really, really great scoring guard. I mean, he was 11 for 16 today. Unreal. They were king on him. He just always takes good shots. It's surprising when he misses. He just has figured out how to navigate all the weird pseudo travel, pseudo carry stuff that people get away with. He's like one of the best at it. Always is like able to pull off an extra like foot and a half, two feet. I haven't really seen anybody slow him down.

You know, Chris Dunn, a tiny bit. Not Chris Dunn. Who'd they play in the last one? I'm blanking. Who was the guy? There was one guy on Memphis that I felt like. Did anyone on Memphis really slow him down? Maybe nobody. Maybe I'm just hallucinating. I think it was nobody with all due respect to the Grizzlies. Chris Dunn did a, I guess he did a good job on Murray a couple of times until he couldn't make a corner three anymore. Mixing up my series. Um,

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And it smells like victory for all of us. Pressure rankings for Game 7. Who has the most pressure in this game? Who are you the most worried about? I think we already answered it. I think it's Jalen Williams. I think so, too. And maybe two is Chet. Chet. In what capacity? Guarding Jokic or threes or what? Just as a third scoring option? I mean, he doesn't really guard Jokic all that much. Like, they want Isaiah Hardenstein on him as much as possible. So, for me, it's more...

Can Chet do the right balance of finishing like contested finishes inside against other bigs like Jokic, which we saw he kind of struggled with some of that in this game? Will he have opportunities to beat smalls inside who are kind of cross matched against him? And Denver's gotten away with that for parts of the series overall, like putting smaller guys on him for stretches, whether it's man or zone.

And then the threes are going to be what they are. That's going to come and go a little bit, and you're going to have to live with that balance. With Chet, it's always like, where are you finding the other offense? I thought he found enough in this one overall, but a new game is a new day. You're going to have to do that all over again. You have to run the court and transition and finish as well as you did all over again. Those two guys are such huge variables in a game like this, just because we haven't seen them do it in the way that we've seen Jamal Murray do it before.

So you have, I agree with this, Jalen Williams one, Chet two. Yeah. Then a Denver guy has to be three. So who's the Denver guy? Probably Michael Porter Jr. Do we, can you have pressure if I'm not expecting anything from you? I would say it's Christian Brown because the threes, what was he on the threes today? He shot quite well from three to six. I feel like if he can hit some threes, now I at least have a semi fourth guy.

Right. And Porter is just, I have no idea what I'm getting with him. I mean, Porter just seems, I feel bad for him because I don't think we knew he was hurt in the Clippers series, at least for

A couple games now we know like we're going to find out. It's quite bad. Yeah, we're going to find out he has like torn ligaments in his shoulder or whatever it is. But it's just too erratic. He's better than he's playing. He is better than he's playing. I think the tradeoff is Christian Brown, regardless of whether he's hitting threes or not, will get you cutting baskets, will get you transition baskets, will play great defense at the whether it's at the top of that zone or guarding someone like Shea for the majority of these games. Like he's going to provide value.

When Michael Porter Jr. isn't hitting shots, he doesn't provide a lot of value. And you saw some plays where he was just getting not only, you know, beat on ball, but beat backdoor, beat in rotation. Like just they need that. And like Christian Brown, I think to me is there. Like he's going to his offensive contributions are going to vary a little bit. You have the rock solid top three. Then you have whatever you get offensively from Christian Brown. And then it's how do we string together enough minutes to make this rotation work?

And not only did you get good Julian Strother minutes in this game, I thought you had really good Peyton Watson minutes for stretches, like offensively, not exactly what you want, but his block on J-Dub in transition in the fourth quarter was one of the biggest plays of the game. His, like their collective ability, that group to survive the non-Jokic minutes at the beginning of the fourth quarter. Again, a crucial Julian Strother time, as crazy as that sounds.

unbelievably important in a game like this. And so the cascading effect to all the other Nuggets, those are guys I expect a little less of. Michael Porter Jr. kind of needs to give them 20 to 30 playable minutes. And we're going to see if that's possible for him in Game 7 or not. I watch a lot of Nuggets. And Westbrook, there can be like he's chest out, maniac, screaming to the crowd, Westbrook. Or he can be, I'm in my own head, Westbrook, which we've seen at a lot of different end of the seasons.

I don't think he's looked the same the last two games. I'm not even talking about how he's playing. And I really wonder if that Ramona Shelburne story in ESPN is

was a bad thing for him. Interesting. Because I just, he's looked the last two games. As you know, I'm the body language doctor. I graduated 1998. Do you have to like recertify your boards or something? No, I just got the diploma and just put it up. It's over there. You're done. Yeah, it's over there. I just think you should keep up with the most recent like research on these subjects. You have to go to a conference or something. Yeah, maybe I should go take a psychology seminar every once in a while.

His body language the last two games felt a little last year on the LeBron Lakers-ish to me. Uh-oh. Or Clippers playoff-ish, just a little off the rails and not... I thought one of the cool things about, especially in the Clippers series...

was he really brought energy and charisma and personality and passion and seemed like was the teammates were in. You have these stories where you have unnamed teammates taking shots at you. And I don't know, like he's a human being. Like if you read that or hear about that,

you, you all of a sudden you have eyeballs in the back of your head, but I thought it was, I just think there's a strange vibe to him. I don't know if the playing in OKC, I think that part's also weird where he's, you know, the most popular OKC player ever. He leaves, they immediately replace him with a more popular player and a better team. And, you know, it seems like he's got that even in the first couple of games of the series, I felt like he was really taking that personally. Now he feels more like Clippers series last year, train wreck Russ, uh,

than additive Russ. The tricky thing with him is like you want to give him credit and be forgiving of the energy he plays with. He is attacking these possessions in ways that is like undeniable and is valuable in series like the Clippers one at points in this series as well. But you're seeing a weird tension point with him, specifically with the Thunder, where the Thunder want to get out and run so badly. And Russell Westbrook wants to both drive and hit the offensive glass so badly. Available.

And he's going and he'll miss a lot of those opportunities. And great, those are opportunities he's creating out of thin air with effort. But then he ends up on the ground and two other nuggets are trying to hit the offensive glass. And now all of a sudden you have three on one for the Thunder going the other way. And so you have this like push and pull of, yeah, you want those energy and effort plays.

but maybe not all the time and maybe not consecutively. Like I think end of the game was perfect when he, when he broke the press and that was the clinching play of the game. Basically that was big first quarter. He comes in and there are like five straight rust possessions, turnovers, misses. Yeah. I think he got to the free throw line. One of those times. I swear that's happened 10 times where for 90 seconds, it's the worst 90 seconds you've ever seen in your life. It's like four plays in a row where you're like, Oh my God. Yeah. In four turnovers and two missed layups.

in 16 minutes. You just have to hope that it offsets at some point, right? That the other plays swing the other way and you get enough good Russ to counteract the bad Russ, but they're going to have to ride him regardless. Like he's going to have to play significant minutes in game seven. He's going to play a role in game seven. Hopefully he does a little bit better on balance than he did in this one because I thought this was a rough Russ performance. OKC favored by game seven.

The case for them in game seven, if we're going to play both sides, almost like how I do for a football playoff game where I'm like, all right, if this team wins, here's how I think it goes. If this team wins, this out's going to go. If OKC wins, Shea will get his 31 to 33. Figure a solid two very good Jalen Williams game somewhere in there. Chet's probably in the 1911 range. Yeah. The key with game sevens, and you saw it last round, there's always a weird guy.

There's a Grant Williams hitting six threes. There's Christian Brown in game seven who just catches fire from three. There's always a role player who has an awesome game. And OKC has a lot more candidates for this than Denver does. I mean, we could pick, you could go Lou Dort, you could go Caruso here. You can say Kaysom Wallace is going to come in and hit five threes. It could be one of those dudes that are up by 18, defense kicks in, and they're just comfortably ahead. I think if Denver wins...

It's the classic Jokic plays 44 minutes. They have the lead most of the game. They're up seven with, you know, nine minutes left. They're rolling the ball in. He's just killing clock. And he does that thing. Yeah. He's literally the best ever at it of I'm going to kill. I'm just going to shave seconds off this clock even before the 20. I'm going to make this a 35 second possession with all the I think Murray has to come through. I think Brown needs to hit threes.

Westbrook needs to be additive, not subtractive. I don't even, I'm not even going to say we need a Strother, Watson. I'm not expecting that. I don't think those guys show up. They need five guys and I think Westbrook has to be one of them. What do you think? Five guys makes sense. I could easily see this being a Denver game where only six players for the Nuggets play

considerable minutes. One of them, as you said, being Russ in addition to that starting five. On OKC's side, I am fascinated by the J-Dub element. I think Crusoe is someone I just don't bet against in games like this. Lou Dort,

I really respect the way Lou Dort will fire. He's being challenged to hit shots. That's going to go whichever way it goes, whichever way the wind is blowing. His confidence, though, does not get shaken. And I think Oklahoma City needs some of that in this game seven. I feel like part of the issue with J-Dub and Chet both, you've seen both of those guys over these last two games

air ball threes, like bad, bad misses. And you've seen a lot of Thunder players up and down the rotation, like miss dunks, miss layups, like very makeable stuff for them. Of course, if enough of those plays swing, they're going to win a game like this one. But moreover, they just need guys who are going to have nerves of steel. I trust Shea in those moments. I trust Lou Dorton Caruso in those moments. I trust Isaiah Hardenstein in those moments. I think even though Jokic is

like having a Nikola Jokic series, Oklahoma city just isn't in this at all. I don't think without Hardenstein playing him defensively, the way he is wearing him down to the degree that one can has been so important. But like, I think they just need that kind of nerve that you're going to get from Jamal Murray. And on the Murray side, like he almost was a scratch in this game because of an illness that,

Is Jamal Murray feeling better in 48 hours or is he at the start of something that's going to get worse in 48 hours? I have no idea. If I was a coach, I'd play it though. Say, I don't know if I'm getting Jamal today. Yeah, I don't know. We'll see. Game time. And then Jamal's fine. Okay. He's not going to play. Yeah.

I know you said Chet's not guarding Jokic, but I still feel like he's one of the two people guarding Jokic, even though he's not really guarding. You know what I mean? Yes. Yeah, for sure. They're basically double. And Caruso is the other one. It's those three. And then there's the 10 Jalen Williams minutes. So I think Jalen Williams has outkicked his coverage in this series. It's been pretty solid. Yeah. Been a little feisty. One of the things with the game seven, you know, some guys just, they just shrink from the moment.

And it usually happens with the younger teams or the role players, or like even, I know it wasn't a game six yesterday. It was a game or not a game seven. It was a game five, but the role players can go sideways. Like you have like the Struis goes over nine. Sure. Ty Jerome doesn't look like Ty Jerome anymore. It's funny. It's funny to hear some of the dialogue about that. I thought Indiana was just clearly better. And it's like, well, Cleveland had all these injuries. It's like, I don't know. Did they like their role players fell apart where those guys hurt?

That part was true. I think Garland was definitely a little hampered, but so they should lose in five and get killed in a couple of the games and just roll over at home in a must-win game. Like that's because Garland's toe hurt. Like there was way deeper stuff going on with them. And I thought Indiana kind of broke them as the series went along. I think that has to be Denver's goal in Oklahoma City. It's a young team.

Can you break them? Can you make them doubt themselves? Can you be super physical with them? And you have this just monolith at center who needs two guys to stop him at all times. And can he just elevate everybody?

Not bad against them. That's definitely the model. Yeah, like the mental game has to be a huge portion of it for Denver. Like in the case of a Nuggets win, it is wearing them down. It is putting enough pressure on the Thunder where they have that second or third quarter swoon where they just go completely off the rails. I just think with OKC, that's pretty tough to do generally. Yeah. Unless you see kind of even in this game, like they weren't hitting shots, but I thought they stuck to their process. I thought they kept executing on defense. Like,

They are who they are for a reason in terms of their dominant regular season and the Nuggets who they are who they are for a reason in terms of their ability to pull out series like this. And so I think the Thunder are a tough team to take off the tracks. I think that there are going to be times where, yeah, they show their youth more than others. I would be shocked if OKC gets like really shaken up to the point that they just fold. That just doesn't really seem to be in the DNA of this group.

You know, when I went to that game for the Clippers series, which was just the best game I've seen in eight years and the Nuggets came out, it was clearly like a game seven for them. And they had all these things they want to do. And one of them was Gordon was just going to really, really attack Kawhi 94 feet and was really aggro physical. And Jokic was just a maniac yelling at the refs. And I think if they come out that way, I think they can win. I think if Gordon comes out like

I'm taking Jalen Williams out of this game. I think I can get new as head. Um, I think I can bang guys around. I think I can control the boards with yoke edge. I think we can get the rebounding advantage. I think we can talk shit. You get Murray talking shit. And I, I don't know. I, I, even though they were the champs two years ago, instead of one year ago, it's, I hate playing teams that,

have been in a lot of games like this. Of course. This is it. If OKC gets through this, they win the title. I just don't think anybody stops them if they win this game. I think that's what it is. I'm not sure if Denver is definitively the second best team or not. Assuming that Oklahoma City is the best, if these are the top two teams or not. But if Oklahoma City can survive this, then they are unquestionably good enough to win it all. I thought that regardless. I picked them as my choice to win the title coming in.

I maintain that. I think they will pull out game seven, but this is what you got to do to do it. Like, I mean, this is nut crunching time of the highest order, a game seven against the Nuggets, and they're going to have to prove it every possible way. Indiana versus OKC. If that ends up being the finals, it's pretty good finals.

I love Indiana. I really think they know who they are and I think they're really hard to play and I think they're not afraid of anybody. We'll see what happens with that. This episode is brought to you by The Home Depot. Whether he's been perfecting the patio all spring or is the groundskeeper of the yard, The Home Depot has fast free delivery on gifts to help him do more this Father's Day. Check out cordless power must-haves

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slash Simmons and you get 20% off your first purchase with Viori. V-U-O-R-I dot com slash Simmons. Enjoy free shipping on all U.S. orders over $75 plus free returns. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. All right. Audible quickly to Celtics next. Yeah. How are you feeling? Tomorrow night. So, you know, I potted with Jacoby right after the game and then I zoomed through the game this morning and, um,

It was really interesting how different the Celtics were without Tatum. You know, when you remove like all the points and the fact that he was the best rebounder on the team and he had the ball so much, how they kind of changed their style to play without him, which I think I realized when I was watching real time, but I didn't really catch until I watched it again. They just played with more pace and it was intentional. There was more cutting.

Um, and they did some stuff that I think is bad for the Knicks defensively. Cause I don't think the Knicks, I don't think Towns wants to run back. I don't think he wants to worry about fast breaks and I don't think people, they want to worry about back cutters and all the stuff the Celts were doing. The, the, the amazing thing though is I just didn't know Jalen Brown had that game in him. That was awesome. Like basically doing a Tatum impersonation, but a little bit better in some ways cause he brought the ball up faster than

I think the biggest fault I think everyone has with Tatum is he's very deliberate and he'll walk the ball up and he'll just decide what to do. And there'll be eight seconds left in the shot clock and he'll get in the offense. The Celtics yesterday were like, go, go, go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. That was one thing. And then the other thing was Porzingis was just so bad, which we talked about last night.

And then you look at the stats for the series and he's played 82 minutes. He's five field goals. Yeah. He's like a minus 27 for 100 is rating. And he's such luggage that I think just not playing him. I feel bad for him. He's like, Missoula said he can't breathe. Yeah.

But he kind of needed to bottom out like this. He needed to be so bad that they had to take him out. And they did. And they benefited immediately from the Luke Cornett minutes. And even if they play Keita, who I think I was talking to my dad about this today because my dad likes Keita. And Keita is you can only play him against certain teams. But Mitchell Robinson is the type of center that you can play him against. He needs to be against big guys that are near the basket because that's what he's good at. He's got long arms and he can defend the rim. So I think if you replace the Porzingis minutes with Cornett

and a little Kada, they're just better off from a math standpoint. And then if they keep playing with pace, you know, then you're putting at least some pressure on the Knicks, right? Because the real thing is the Knicks aren't playing well. They fall in band 14 in every game.

I looked it up. Bridges has zero free throws in the series is shooting 39%. OG hasn't done anything in four games. Towns has two threes, the whole series, right? Brunson and Hart and Robinson are the guys playing the best for them, but they're the doors open. So if the Celts can play with pace and hang around, maybe what, how do you see it? I appreciate you talking yourself into it. I'm not talking about self into it. I'm talking myself into the case for it. Okay. That makes sense. Uh,

Keita is not going to save you. I want to put that off to the side right now. Over the corpse of Porzingis? I think the answer is neither. I think, to me, the takeaway from this last game was they just need to be comfortable with some of those smaller looks, like the three guards plus Jalen Brown plus one of the bigs. That was a pretty successful formula. And so as much as you can stretch those guys out, and that's going to be a lot of... By the way, Rob, we knew this before the series. That's going to be a good lineup. We knew the two bigs. Maybe it was a mistake. Okay.

I think it works sometimes, but not others. Not in this series. Yeah, this is not the time for it, unfortunately. So yeah, I think whoever between Horford and Cornette is kind of better in that moment for the lineups on the floor, that's all great. And then otherwise, you're just trying to stretch out the guard minutes as much as you possibly can. You're also hoping for another Derek White explosion, which he's certainly capable of and is just one of the best shooters in the league. So I'm never going to put that past him. But the combination of incendiary Derek White game

One of the best two-way games we've seen from Jalen Brown in quite some time. A good Peyton Pritchard game. A great Luke Cornett game. That's a lot of ifs that have already been stacked on top of each other. Awesome Drew Holiday second half. Yeah. The best he's looked in a while. Yeah, they had a lot of guys playing really well. For sure. But the Knicks have a lot of guys not playing well.

And that's the case. It's like, Hey, these guys are trying to give us the series. They keep, they, we keep taking 14 point plus leads on them every game. Like, let's just kind of bang it home. Yeah. White's not going to go seven to 13 again. Um, can they patch together? Porzingis played 12 minutes.

So Cornette's going to get those 12 minutes. Yeah. If he gets in any foul trouble, tired, whatever, then you're looking at Horford. If Horford looks tired, then some Kata is a backup, I think, over Porzingis. Yeah. I think he's got to be out of there. I don't think they can win the game unless Jalen plays close to where he was in game five. Yes. I think that's the one necessity. It's incredibly hard to do. Like he played with a level of calm and precision that is not

a staple of his game. Did you think he had that in him? Because I did not. I've never, I mean, we've obviously never seen that level of playmaking from him before. This is a career high, so the high watermark is there. But just in terms of the way you approached it, as you described, where there's like an urgency to the way he's playing, there's a force to the way he's playing, but he really never felt out of control. And the Tatum conversation

contrast that you highlight, I think, is really interesting because you're right that he can be a little deliberate. And when you're winning, when you're going to titles, when you're having an incredible regular season, that deliberate pace feels like confidence. And when you're frittering away leads or you're blowing these games against the Knicks, it feels a little too delicate. It feels like a little too indulgent in terms of getting the offense set up. Sometimes you just have to get out there and play and flow. And you have to understand that with where the Celtics are, they can't leave anything

anything out there. Like they can't leave anything on the floor as far as like options, easy baskets, quick transition, like quick striking plays. They need all of that shit. And so like they have to go fast and they have to play some more offensive oriented lineups relative to the two big stuff that we were talking about. Like they have to have that sort of Jalen Brown. And clearly he's capable of it, but asking him to do all of that again is a lot. I just want to say that.

Well, and to rebound like they did in game five, because that's the other way. The ways this goes wrong is the Knicks control the boards. One of the two guards gets in foul trouble. Bridges, Oren, and Obi catch fire offensively at least a little bit. I don't know if Towns, the rumor is that his hands hurt, and that's why he's not shooting threes. But Towns having two threes in five games in the series is just weird. He was somebody that routinely would have two to four.

in a playoff game and now he doesn't make anything. So, and there's, there's a Deuce McBride coming in and,

I thought it was a really good deuce minutes, honestly. And they desperately needed that. He's had some real cold stretches in these playoffs. And so getting some positive momentum for deuce, another team that just like needs rotation players in the worst way. And one of them is Mitchell Robinson, who is in some cases getting fouled on the floor, fouled off the floor. In some cases going six of six from the line. We salute you, Mitch. Uh, you know, they're just, they're desperate for bodies. Yeah. My dad said yesterday, my dad was there and he said, uh,

the crowd was just awesome. And Jalen Brown said that after the game, he said, he thought it was like one of the best crowds of the year. And it really meant a lot to them that instead of being like, Oh, the season's over. Tatum's hurt. All these people showed out and were like, we're not losing. And they really fed off that. And that's what, when you have this series and the generations of fans that both teams have,

You would think the same crowd would be there for the Knicks, but the stakes are a little different. The Celtics won the title last year. The Knicks haven't really had anything good happen to them since 1999. And, you know, this is, this would be a catastrophic 3-1 loss to be up with the best player in the other team going out. Everybody's already sinking into the next round.

All of a sudden it falls apart in game five. Now in game six, you're down to eight. The energy of the crowd will be really interesting. I think the crowd will be great, but it's also insane. It's going to get super nervous if this is actually a game.

I agree with that. And you can see that look from the Celtics perspective, this game five, you're coming off of this catastrophic franchise altering injury. Yeah, there is a little bit of like a pride that kicks in an adrenaline that kicks in a collectivism of like, you got to go out and like, make your make your group proud and your fans and your city, however far you want. Not in our house. It's a moment, right? Like the response game after the Tatum injury is a moment.

Now all that energy has dissipated. You let down a little bit. You did the thing where you proved everybody wrong. You had this impressive game. Do it again at MSG. I think it's going to be just incredibly challenging. I think that place is going to be rocking. I fully expect...

I fully expect the Knicks to win it, to be honest with you. I just think that they're good enough. I think they will get enough from the OG McHale combo. Or if you want to extend it again, OG McHale, Josh Hart. Two of those three guys have to have some kind of offensive game for them to win, usually. And I think they're going to get it in this one. The counter is the last six halves we've played, the Knicks have played one good half. Game four, second half, they were incredible.

I mean, that's in the running for best half anyone's played in the playoffs. I think they were 30 for 45. Yeah. Shooting like they were just lights out flame shooting out of their ass. They were awesome. So they have it in them. You didn't think their first like the first half of game five. I thought they were pretty good.

Yeah, they're pretty good. But it's, you know, when Josh Hart's making threes, it's like, okay. I mean, sometimes you lose because Josh Hart made three. It's just like, come on. I was happy every time he took a three. I never thought they were going in. But,

I thought game four, they were just getting every shot they wanted. The ball was moving and the crowd was like just electric. Like the Celtics, people forget because Tatum got hurt, but they were about to go down nine in that game. They lost that game when Tatum was incredible. Tatum was on his way to a 50 point game and they were going to lose anyway. So,

Do the Knicks have that again in them? My guess would be between game six and game seven, they're probably going to have, they probably have one good game left in them. Do I think Jalen Brown can do that two more times? That seems more far-fetched. It does seem more far-fetched.

I think anybody would love to see it just in terms of any great player reaching those kinds of heights again and again and again as the games increase in stakes, as it becomes harder and harder to do it. Like that would be a Jalen Brown coronation moment for a guy who just came off a finals MVP. Like that would be incredible. I just don't see it. I don't think he has that much in the cards. Can I make the case? I would assume you would. I don't know if I see it either, but here's the case. And I've followed him for nine years.

And I really do think he cares about all this stuff and cares about his place in the hierarchy and really is one of those, I'm not appreciated enough. People don't realize how good I am. He won the awards last year. And even then it was like, he didn't make the Olympic team. You know, Kawhi got sent home. They called him Derek White. There's always a lack of respect thing with him, which I think is somewhat genuine. It's Tatum's team. Tatum gets introduced last. Tatum gets hurt. Season's over.

And I think the guy that I saw in game five was like, you know, and Tatum and Brown love each other. Like it has nothing to do with the injury. It's just like, this is my team too. I'm going to fucking protect our house. I really felt that in that game. Can you keep it going for two more days? I have two more games. I don't know. But you know, we do the ringer 100. He's always in the top 25. It's not like he's chopped liver. Like he's,

a really good player. He's an all-star and he's somebody that is capable of having games like he had in game five. I've never seen him be that patient, be that good with the ball. Like he only had two turnovers. He actually could dribble the whole game, which was uncharacteristic. He really led the offense. And it was like a side that I just, you see it sometimes when they'll rest Tatum and it's like, Oh, Jalen Brown gets his own game and he gets to like run the offense. Yeah.

But, you know, if you're talking about guys who have the most to gain in the playoffs the rest of the way, if he could somehow bring the Celtics back and beat the Knicks like this, people would think of them in a totally different way. I think I agree. I would agree with that. And I think as far as like bigger statements go to.

Jason Tatum has a long road ahead of him in terms of his rehab. And the Celtics have a lot of decisions to make as far as what this team is going to look like during his absence, if they need to make radical changes sooner than later. I've been in some dark places, Rob. Understandably. It forces you to ask some really difficult questions about the construction of the team. If those questions start from a place of, holy shit, Jalen Brown just did something we didn't even know he could do. He occupied a role for our team. We didn't even know he was doing at that level that consistently.

okay, then we're getting rid of some of the darkness. You know, we're staving off a little bit of it. I think a lot of those questions still remain, but they become a little bit simpler. I said that to Jacoby last night and I really meant it.

he was so good in that game yesterday that I think it reminded people because the instinct when Tatum goes out and you think next year is done and just like, all right, maybe it's time to trade Jalen Brown and break it up and, you know, try to do the quick rebuild for a year. And then Tatum comes back. But then you watch him in a game like that last night. It's like, I don't want to trade that guy. No, this is, you know, one of the best 20 to 25 players in the league. And he's in his prime. What are we trading him for? Three quarters in the dollar. Why would we do that? Um,

Um, then the other thing, and this is what I mean by dark places, researching Achilles surgery and all the different times. And if you, if you do it in the morning, it might add three months, really might shave three months off your recovery, which is what they did. They did the surgery in the morning. Wait, in the morning, it shaves time off your recovery. Yeah. Cause the whole, I guess the whole mindset, and I think this is somebody did this, maybe it was Kobe, but they found out about it. Um, it's before the swelling kicks in.

If you do it as close as possible to when the injury happens, it saves three months of rehab. So they went, they sprung the next day. Three months of rehab. I'm just telling you. How does it affect if Mercury is in retrograde? Like, I think there's a lot of conditional factors here we're ignoring. I,

I don't know what to tell you, Rob. They didn't have to get on a plane. It's bad to fly before the surgery. It's bad to go up and down. That makes sense. And the longer between the injury and when you have the surgery, there's less blood in your leg and then it gets swells up. So anyway, they did it in the morning and they felt really good about it. And now they're thinking like, shit, maybe he can be back in February. This could be a nine month injury.

I will believe that when I see it. That's ambitious. I feel the same way. Yeah. But I think the difference with him and like Kobe Bryant and Aaron Rodgers and some of these other people is he's 27 years old. He's in the prime of his career. He's going to heal faster. And they really do feel like they did everything. They got the best possible doctor. They did the surgery within 12 hours of the injury. And they feel like it went as well as it possibly could have gone. So who knows? So if you're thinking like...

And this guy's also a maniac. Like he will, you know, they're going to have to like stop him from going too far and going too hard and trying to rehab too hard. So anyway, if you feel like, hey, can we hang around in the East, which is going to suck? And could he be 90% of what he was in April? And, you know, I don't know. I don't think he's going to be 90% of what he was in April. I think that's too much to put on him.

I think you're right. But where I was yesterday versus where I was today, at least I'm like, hey, maybe he'll be back in April. Yesterday, I was like, my whole decade's over. What are we going to do? We're getting rid of everybody. So I don't know. It's still as bleak as it could possibly be, but it's not.

You know, when I hear nine months versus 18 months, I'm like, okay. It's true. We got you off the ledge. I can't also like knock the drink out of your hand. You know, like we're just trying to cope here ultimately. And I support you in that. Yesterday was hard. Yesterday was a harsh day because there was no information. Yeah. And then it's like, is this worse? Is it like torn ankle ligaments and an Achilles? It was just not great. Before we go.

Do you feel better or worse or the same about the Minnesota Timberwolves? I think mostly the same, oddly enough. Look, anytime you're getting to the conference finals, especially in consecutive seasons, that's an incredible accomplishment that has nothing to scoff at. They did it by being the Wolves in every possible respect. Completely overwhelming in some moments.

like completely baffling in other ones. And I say that, you know, Julius Randall included as part of that, even though he may well be the best player in the world or the second best behind Ant in some moments, those guys are capable of incredible mistakes and miscues and passes that don't make any sense. They're also capable of just bullying you and overwhelming you with scoring and collectively as a group, like their defensive acuity and the precision and the effort that they play with. I'm so impressed by, I,

I, so I would say like, I was kind of feeling this way about them down the stretch of the regular season. Like, okay, they were really pulling together. Julius Randall, this has been a building momentum now for a couple of months consecutively. Uh,

And so they've been that kind of team. The question is, are they going to play the kind of opponent where all of those mistakes are going to catch up to them? This is something we were talking about on group chat, too, where it's like they kind of know how to play the Nuggets. I'm not so convinced they know how to play the Thunder. And so the fact that this thing is going to a game seven and will be a quick turnaround into a series for them, they could have to figure out how to address OKC very quickly. Hmm.

I feel slightly better because of Randall's now put together a little resume here. It's tremendous. What's crazy is like during the Lakers series, I went to a couple of those games and he was doing really well in the Lakers series. And it's like, ah, well, it makes sense. You know, LeBron, LeBron's 40. They don't really have a backup, but like he was kind of attacking. Sometimes it was smaller guys. His team was a good matchup for him. Yeah. And then you watch Golden State.

you know, Draymond was guarding him. Yeah. We just saw what Draymond did to like Alper and Shangoon and locked him up. Right. I don't know if I've seen somebody that comfortable against Draymond. It was alarming, honestly. And then they're throwing Kaminga at him, but he just had his way. So then you start thinking, okay, so what's the bad matchup for him? Because it seems like he's bully balling basically everybody who is from six, nine and under. So then I started thinking about them against OKC and,

I guess they would go double bigs. Maybe, maybe, maybe they throw Hartenstein on them.

That would be fascinating. I think they could probably get away with that in that matchup, right? Just because like Rudy and Chet feels more viable. And then obviously for Denver, like I think Aaron Gordon is a pretty good physical matchup, but that's probably the best for him. Yeah. But as you just alluded to, Draymond's a pretty good physical matchup and he was just getting blown off his spot every time Julius dipped that shoulder and was just getting right into the lane, getting to easy looks like the combination for Julius Randall. And this has always been in his game. He was just doing a lot of wayward things and taking a lot of bad shots that were counteracting this stuff.

He's nimble in a way that basically no one as strong as him is on offense. Like the way he's able to move and change directions very quickly in addition to being that burly. An incredibly rare combination to have short of like LeBron James. Well, the other thing that's happened, there was always a weird, ah, should Nas Reid be getting these minutes over him and what's their best lineup? And then that kind of shook out organically, I think, over the last month. And now Nas Reid is a bench player again. And

and Randall and go bear. And the fact that they can keep go bear on the court, we'll see if they're able to do that against. Okay. See, um, but I don't know. They're really good. And I'll say one thing with one thing with Edwards, uh,

He will feel like he's the best player in an OKC series, even if Shea is the MVP of that series. So, you know, I do wonder, are they one of those teams that just kind of ebbs and flows with the opponent? So it's like, oh, we're going to be Golden State. You know, they lose game one, which and they stunk. Yeah. Right. I think that's the counterpoint is game one. And maybe it's like Steph leaving kind of takes the air out of it for them. But they weren't playing particularly well when Steph was in that game. Yeah. I don't know.

I don't know. I do think there is some of that, right? I think it's true of a lot of teams, especially one that's as like

Minnesota, we don't think of as a young team, but there are a lot of players in that group that are still relatively early in their careers that are quite emotional as players that you could see the let down of having Steph taken off the floor or having a subpar opponent change the way that they think about attacking or kind of just like put the back on their heels a little bit where they're not quite going as hard as they need to. That's a group that has to go full bore to be as dominant as they ultimately want to be and as we've seen them be at their best moments in these playoffs.

Did your Butler stock drop for you? A little bit. Game three was his game and they couldn't steal it. And that felt like he threw all his eggs into that basket and then he was a no-show in the last two. It's another one of those, like, what do we expect? You know, like, he kind of is this guy where he doesn't want to have to score 30. That's not the way he would prefer to play basketball. And so when he's kind of forced to, kicking and screaming, dragged into it,

He can't just do it game after game after game. And we saw even in his best case scenario, by the end of that game, he was kind of out of steam. Like he didn't really have what it took to finish it. It's hard work putting up 30 plus and closing and bring like every crucial basket down the stretch, specifically in a game like that, where the Golden State role players weren't exactly all carrying their end of the bargain either. And so Jimmy Butler is a great,

second best player on a team behind Steph. Like a great match, a great fit. I think they're going to be in a great position going into next season. They need to make some minor addresses to their rotation, ultimately get another team that needs a couple of more rotation-worthy guys. But I love the way Jimmy Butler fits. I just don't love him as the defining option of a team without Steph. Well, the good news for them, Kameka now has signing trade potential. It's the one winner of the playoffs for them.

They now know they can trade him for something. You think there's enough proof of concept there for somebody to buy? Like yesterday, he had he had like 23 points in 29 minutes, you know, put him put him on some of those teams in the East and just kind of let him loose. Yeah, I don't know. I would take a chance if you're a GM of like, let's say you're the Pistons GM.

You're like, we don't have a, you know, we're probably not going to get a massive free agent, but could we get one more scoring forward? Or like you're Charlotte or you're the wizards. Like, you know, the East, I mean, this is a whole other story though. What's going on. If Giannis gets traded to the West, this is another thing with Tatum. Like can Tatum come back in April? The East is going to be awful. It's going to be like Indiana and New York. That's it. It's going to be nobody else. Maybe Orlando, maybe Detroit. It's a nightmare. Yeah.

I mean, you're seeing Indiana, New York seize on these opportunities, right? And there's going to be another version of that next year when somebody else gets injured or as you're saying, like maybe the Celtics will be at the highest end of that mix. Maybe they won't.

I get why somebody would talk themselves into Kuminga. I think you phrased it the right way. It's, are you looking for a scoring forward? Because if you're looking for an athletic do-it-all forward, you're going to end up with a guy who's going to average like 16.5 points and get two rebounds a game, despite the fact that he's 6'8 and should be able to outjump everybody, but just does not. So if you can calibrate your expectations accordingly, that he will run the floor and run some possessions and put up some points for you...

I think Kuminga can absolutely be that guy. Can he be anything else? I remain a little unconvinced. The case against him, and I think that's a strong case, is he put up stats and they got their asses kicked in those games. It often happens, unfortunately. And it's like, all right, he was out there a lot and they were losing by 10 to 15 every game. Yeah.

Maybe that's something. All right. So your pick for OKC Denver is OKC. I'm going to take OKC as much as it pains me again to vote to pick against Jokic, pick against Aaron Gordon and Jamal Murray. Like those are guys that you want to ride or die with in games like this. But I think the Thunder have enough and I think we're going to see it. We're going to get a moment from them in response. I'm going to make a rare semi cop out, but not totally prediction.

Are you allowed to do that? OKC either wins by 15. OK. Or Denver wins. That's two different predictions. But I think it's one or the other. I don't think it's like a close game that OK, I think OKC either comfortably wins. And I think if it's close, I think Denver wins. So kind of an Exceltic situation. Like, you know, if it's close, the Knicks have won those games. And if this game is close, the Nuggets would win this game, you're saying? Yeah. Yeah.

That's what I'm saying. I could absolutely see it. I mean, Nikola Jokic in crunch time is as good as it gets. Who are we to stand in the way of Aaron Gordon and one more potential game winner? Clearly he has it in him. I'm really going to miss Jokic. My daughter was asking...

Because I was reading for Denver and she's like, what'd you bet on Denver? And I was like, I didn't bet on this series. I don't need to bet on Jokic. You bet your heart. It's just my heart. He has the Nuggets at my heart. I don't need to have money on them. I just want them to win. I like watching them. I don't want them to go away yet. I really enjoy it.

They might not, you know, we may have more Nikola Jokic left in this run. I like watching him unlock this fucking hornet's nest defense of multiple bigs throwing at him and these little gnats coming behind him and him just trying to navigate it and figure out what to do. I'm going to miss it. All right, Rob Mahoney, when's your next podcast?

God, I don't even know. I think we're delayed because normally we do group chat on Saturday nights. Our first no playoff game day this coming Saturday. So we're moving our group chat to Monday. Wow, we might have to spend time with our loved ones. I don't even know how to do that anymore. Jesus. I'm a shell of a human being, but I'm going to try to drag myself out of my apartment. What's your number one TV show right now?

i think it's still the last of us right now although poker face is coming in quite strong i'm enjoying the start of that oh okay poker face yeah there you go all right rob mahoney great to see you thanks to everybody who hung out with us on the uh youtube stream and thanks to gahow eduardo as well and i will see you on sunday with uh russell we're going live after the okc game thank you rob thank you everybody thanks bill

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