The Memphis Lowdown, and Forgotten NBA Playoff Teams With Ryen Russillo and Chris Vernon
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The Prestige TV podcast. We broke down episode seven, the second to last episode of White Lotus season three. Me, Mallory, Joanna. You could check that out on Spotify on video. This episode is brought to you by Vrbo Private Vacation Rentals. With Vrbo, you always get the whole house so you and your fellow fans can cheer on your team.

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They'll be friends. They'll be family. Ideally, they'll be the ones who also root for my teams. Plan a winning vacation. Make it a Verbo. We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. If you missed our Prestige TV podcast about White Lotus Episode 7, go check that out. Rewatchables is coming Monday night. It's going to be the live show that we did in Boston at House of Blues. Meet Rusillo.

Chris Ryan, Sean Fantasy. A great time was had by all. I had a ball. It was awesome. It was great to finally do one in Boston. So that is coming and you'll be able to watch that on the Ringer Moves YouTube channel or you can watch it as a video on Spotify. We have a big announcement. So once upon a time at Grantland, I used to work with a guy named Zach Lowe.

We hired him from Sports Illustrated and he became an awesome, awesome basketball writer and podcast for us over the next few years. I left Grantland. We have not worked together for 10 years. And now we're going to be working together again because Zach Lowe is coming to The Ringer and he's coming to Spotify and he's going to have his podcast and we are going to launch it next week. Zach is going to be on my podcast on Tuesday. We're going to catch up on basketball and a whole bunch of things. But, um,

Get ready. We have a trailer coming. We have the podcast name. I think he might even, I don't even know if Zach knows this, but there might be a TikTok. So lots of good stuff coming. But obviously Zach's one of the best people I've ever worked with and was really hoping at some point in life we would get to work together again. So it's happening and it's going to be in time for the end of the NBA season. We're going to get his awards soon.

which I always loved reading. And then we'll get him for the playoffs and beyond. So Zach Lowe, welcome aboard. Couldn't be happier about it. Coming up, I'm going to talk to Ryan Marcillo and Chris Vernon at the very top because we've got to find out what's happening to Memphis. First, our friends from Pearl Jam. ♪

All right, recording just after 6 p.m. Russillo is here, as always, on Sunday nights. Chris Vernon joining us from Memphis. Memphis was in the news this week. They fired their coach. It was shocking. I guess it wasn't that shocking if you looked at their record last 25 games. But, Verno, before we find out from you what happened, Russillo, give us your 30-second reaction to finding out Memphis had fired their coach with three weeks left in the season when they were a top-five seed.

It made all the offseason stuff make sense when you blast out a guy's entire assistant staff and don't really consult him to bring in the new assistants and then run an offense that I don't think he wanted to run, that they won too many games for them to do something ultimately they really wanted to do. And for them to do this when everybody thinks he's a pretty good coach and considering the injuries for them to do this, this means they've wanted to fire him for over a year is my outside take.

All right. Now, Verno's inside take. Verno, you're in Memphis. You also host the mismatch for us. But you're in Memphis. You're doing all the pregame shows. You have the radio show. This is your city. Were you surprised? Absolutely stunned. Stunned. Stunned. Okay. Yeah. Oh, yes. Absolutely. Not that nobody fires their coach with nine games to go.

I think we were all of the opinion. I agree with Ryan, right? Like, okay, this has gone the wrong way, but teams go the wrong way a lot during NBA seasons. We've seen it over and over again where you're just not playing. You're not playing anywhere near your best basketball at the end of the year. And sometimes the coach can beat it, but you're deciding on a pie chart how much the coach is to blame. But one of the things that is common is that you play it out.

And then in the off season, something takes place because you're that far down the line. Cause you, how many, how many big changes can happen with nine games left to go? And the answer, I guess is still to be found out because what they're attempting to do is throw on the emergency break here at the end and say, look, you got nine games left. You don't want to be, or I guess eight games now after last night against the Lakers, but

you don't want to be in a play-in situation. You're probably going to have to get to at least, say, 48 wins in order to not be in a play-in situation. So that means you got to play 500. And you haven't played 500 in a long time. You haven't beaten a team over 500 since February 2nd. And so it's like, yeah, this is way late in the season, but it's

It's kind of nut cutting time. Like if you're, if you're going to not be in the play in and if,

Unfortunately for them in the playoffs, you have to play a good team. So if you want to be able to beat a good team, like then you want to try something different, even if it is this late. But it's the I think I think I fall in line with everybody. It's not that they did it. It's when they did it. The timing of this. Usually you don't get this late in the season before a guy is let go.

So last 25 games, there were 11 and 14, 15th net rating, as you mentioned. And I didn't even realize that they hadn't had a good win in that long until you texted us that. And I went back and looked at the schedule and I was like, oh my, my God. I, I guess for so the thing that with, when you do something like this,

It makes me think that they think they still have a chance to make the Western finals and it wasn't going to happen with the current situation. But if they can change the coaching, maybe they have a chance to make the Western finals. And I think I disagree. But on the other hand, like this was the team everyone wanted to play in the West.

You know, like if you were in the 6-7-8 range, you were like, man, it would be really cool if we could play Memphis. So I think that's why you make the change. But I don't think they have enough talent to be dangerous in the West. Do you? No, they're like...

I don't know if I should say my least favorite team, but I have to get all the way to Dallas before I'm as not as excited about another team. And depending on how the city goes. In the West, you mean? Yeah. If you look at the West and you say, you know, what's the best case scenario? Because it's just crazy that it feels like not that long ago.

This is a team that was a two seed back to back seasons. And you're like, man, like what, what could this team do? And this makes sense. And we're all excited about John. They've got all these nice young players and you're like, okay, well these playoff losses, these are their, you know, we've talked about this a lot of the last couple of weeks. These are their seasoning seasons. And then they have their injury issues. And then when you watch them this year, they're,

You know, they still had a decent enough record. Even 11-14 isn't really that bad. But when you look at, as Verno says, the record against any of the good teams, if you look at where they stand in the West and the expanded standings, they're 11-21 against teams that are 500 or better.

Golden State's 500. Minnesota's 14 and 20. So it's still marginally better. The Clippers with their stuff are 14 and 22. You got to get to Sacramento, who's the 10 seed right now, to have something that resembles how bad Memphis' record is against those teams. So, you know, look, is it Jenkins? No.

You know, Jot supposedly in that piece from The Athletic talked about how he didn't like the offense. I mean, the irony of this is that the Finnish guy now that's the new head coach, like this was part of the offense that he brought from Europe. And I know when the NBA thinks, where do we go for head coaching? It's like, let's start in Finland.

But I think LaRoche, the other guy who was let go with Jenkins, he was big on this offense too. Here's what I know. You can run whatever fucking offense you want with this team. I know exactly what it's going to look like in the last couple minutes. And I'll be honest, this is like the first season with Ja where I go, I think I'm out. I'm not all the way out right now. I don't want to make that official statement because he's still young enough

but when he's the face of your franchise and leader, like, look, man, I text, Verno texted me a single tear emoji on a face after I did an open a couple of years ago. It's the whoop that trick game where they beat the golden state warriors are down three, one, they won by 39 points. I think recency bill had a take that you can't win an NBA championship, having that kind of loss in the playoffs. Recency bill was came out big that day. Right, right. And, um,

I know it was fun, and it's probably a memory a lot of Memphis fans will have because that was a lot of fun for everybody that night. Ja, by the way, didn't play in that game, if anybody needs that reminder. And look, it's going to be a little mean, but my initial thought watching that game was these guys are losers.

Okay. And I wanted them to get their asses handed to them in game six. And they did. So wait, so are you the one that called Dylan Brooks and told him to shoot it 30 times? Thanks a lot, Ryan. In retrospect, now I find out who told you, who told him to. You know what? Perfect transition. Because then in the next year,

They lose to the Lakers. They lose in six. They lose by 40 points in game six. And everyone blamed Dylan Brooks. Right. Well, Dylan Brooks brought it on himself a lot, too. Like, that was the offseason of where it was like, get ready to learn China, buddy. And it was like, you know, I'm saying that wrong on purpose. But...

He was like, I'm going to be the bully with LeBron. No, no. He said, I poke bears. Right. But I'm just saying he wanted to be the bully in the series against LeBron, and then he didn't want to do a media availability twice after two of the losses. Right. Verno drove him to the airport. He just wanted to make sure he got on the plane. Hey, look. And Brooks has proven he was worth the contract. My overall thing with this team, Verno, is that it went from this like,

really likable underdog we don't give a shit this is who we are you know the grizzlies identity to you guys haven't done shit in like four years and i know injuries are part of the story and it's like i'll watch some of these games it's like dude you guys carry yourselves like you've done something in this league they do not they do not carry themselves like that anymore right now chris

He's insufferable to watch right now. They don't carry themselves like that. Look, that's part of the problem is that whole edge, that whole fun, all that stuff that basically Oklahoma City has completely stolen from the Grizzlies, but you guys all ejaculate over it. You know why? Because they're good. Yeah, right. They win.

Grizzlies were good, right? And then what happens is you are the good young team. You're the new kid on the block. And then you get beat. And then everybody loves to say that your chest was out too much. And you want to push down a peg, right? Here's the deal. They have, over the course of the last year, was a completely lost season. Absolutely. And this season, Morant, I think Morant wanted to have

the like revenge season. Right. And I think he wanted to come back and prove to everybody. So you were telling us what was going to happen? You were texting me in-house. You were telling us revenge season. That he's way down the list on all of these like best players in the league and all that kind of stuff. And everybody's just forgotten about him. Right. He got into trouble. Then last year he lost the season.

So he comes back this year. And next thing you know, and I know you say it doesn't matter what kind of offense they run. I don't agree because I was in, unfortunately, with my mismatched brother and Jacoby in New York City. And I was there watching the Knicks beat the Grizzlies by a thousand. And what happened is you you started running an offense that famously you can go find every article.

doesn't run ball screens they run less ball screens than any team in the entire NBA so guess what happened this year what happens is team comes out and they say all right we're gonna guard you with Mikel Bridges who's six foot nine and has a 7'10 wingspan and he's gonna be guarding you the entire time and guess who you're never gonna get off of you because your team doesn't

Use ball screens. And so next thing you know, John Morant standing in the corner playing thumb wars with Mikkel Bridges. And the whole world is like, what is going on? This guy's one of the best players in the world. So then they tried to save it this year. Well, I mean, in March. Hold that point. In March, he's averaged, what, 38 and 5 while shooting 50% from the field in the games that he's played.

Right. Like, but because they, but if you go back and watch, they've started running all these high ball screens again, they've started getting, they, they moved it back because it got to such a breaking point. And it's like, hold on now, we've got an offense that is good for players six through 10, maybe players four through 10.

But is it not one through three? But is it the best thing for your best player? Right. And, and it obviously, and it hasn't been the best for Desmond Bain either. Right. Like, so there's been a push and pull to this. And obviously when they play against good teams, it's been all year. They haven't been able to beat good teams. Their record is based upon them beating up bad. Enough foreplay. This to me is a whole job situation. And John doesn't play enough. And John's not reliable enough. And I wrote down,

Can you actually compete for a title if you can't count on your best guy emotionally or physically? Now think about like Embiid is in that class, right? Kawhi and the Clippers. Not Kawhi before the Clippers, but Kawhi during the Clippers. Is he going to be out there? What am I getting? Is he going to be out there in April? I have no idea. C-Web on the Kings after the 0-1 playoffs. Is he playing? Is he not playing? I don't know. Vince Carter, Allen Iverson.

Kyrie before Dallas Zion right now, if you don't have that reliability with your best guy, can you even have a chance to win a title? And I think the answer is no, he's 25. Now he made, he made all NBA second team three years ago. And this year he's missed 30 games already. And it's not even like a Brunson thing where he got hurt and he's out for six weeks. Like he just, he'll miss eight games. He'll miss six games. So miss three games. When you go to work, do you even know if John's playing?

That's the season he's had. Yeah, no. And that has been frustrating across the board, right? Because he had this... He started off well, and then he got hurt, and he got clipped out of the air by Christian Coloco. Then he came back. Then he was playing a game in New Orleans, and he ran into a Daniel Tice screen, and his shoulder got screwed up again. And then he's... I mean, it's just been...

one thing after another. But is that going to be his career? I guess is my question because he just seems like a nagging injury guy to me. And maybe it will be, but I will say I have always stood tall on this that over the years there is a reason, and you're the guy that wrote the book of basketball, there's a reason these guys, no matter how great they are, no matter what level you think they're at,

I don't know why it's the number, but they're 27 years old. They are 20. Yeah. Yeah. Is that what he's going to learn to shoot? I don't know. Did Jalen Brown learn how to shoot? Cause I heard you guys shit on him for eight straight years. And then he won finals MVP last year. So I, it can happen. Um,

He shot over 31% one time out of the last five years. I mean, you really want to compare him to Jalen Brown. Like, you think you're hurting my feelings, but you're not. Yeah, that's it. That wasn't the way to go at Rosillo. I would have attacked Blake Ladley in the town before that. Jalen was 31, 40% in his second year from three. I mean, look, Vern, what I would say is if you're this high, you should. The point is, at 27, guys change.

It has happened over and over again. But will this change when I watch Memphis, especially in the last four minutes? It's my only hope, Bill. My only hope is that it changes. He's just going to the basket, right? And he's probably, if he's not the most electric guy in the league going to the basket with the game on the line, he's in the top three. And that's what you're doing over and over again. I,

I would say this with other guys too in the playoff series. I kind of feel like I know what Memphis is doing in the last three minutes. And guess what? They're going to give Ja the ball and he's going to go to the basket. And over the course of four rounds, either I'm stopping it or he's getting hurt.

And I think that's the point of the career that he's at. And that's why, you know, this is a little recency bias because he's, Verno, he's played 301 games in six years. I got it. 301 total. I was listening to this pod a month ago and you guys were going bonkers over how great Jaron Jackson has become. I love it. So there is a difference now. There is a difference now, right? Yeah, so plays.

Between between Jared Jackson's closed a lot of games for the Grizzlies this year. Jared Jackson's had a lot of big fourth quarters for the Grizzlies this year. And obviously they've got to figure out a way. Look, last night, they job was not very good, but they all had 20 plus in the game. But.

they can't give up 135 points. Like you're not winning any games if you give up 135 points. But the trick is, can you get all three of those guys playing great simultaneously? And if you can, then you've got a chance to be a really good team. What do you mean by really good? Like give us what you think the ceiling version of this group is. This group, I would say winning a first round series, it would be the ceiling. Yeah.

I do not think they can get that good. Wow. That got dark. Well, I mean, there's only four teams remaining. Do I think they're one of the best four teams in the Western Conference? No. We were doing, are the Grizzlies the stealth title contender in the league before the season? Now I'm going to do a celebration if they win one round? No, no, no, no. Hold on now. You're asking me what I think they do.

OK, well, if you win a second round series, you're in the Western Conference finals. True. OK, so now I do. I have a question for Rosillo. And then I think they'll be in the West final. Like, I mean, I think if they want to hurt at this point, if they want a first round series, I'd be happy. Rosillo is job better in any way from three years ago.

No, it's way worse. From what you've seen. You think it's worse? I've been a little harsh here, but every now and then I have to be honest with the thoughts I have from five months on the couch. And

If I look at the job part of it, his third year in, he's seventh in MVP. He's 22 years old. It's the only year he shot it well from three. He was 34% his rookie year. He was 30% his second year. Then he was 34%. And from three since then, 31. Granted, you could throw away 23, 24. He played nine games, so he was under 30%. But this year, 44 games.

he's, he's 29% again from three and he's never played more than 67 games in a series. That was his rookie year. It's 63, 57. Um, yeah. Well in,

in a, in a season. You're right. And then this year it's, it's 44. My, my issue is this. It's a couple, it's a couple of things and I'll make them quick when he got into trouble. And this is again, me only reading everything else, everybody else read. So it's not like anybody talked to me about it. So maybe the NBA had more information. I thought it was an excessive punishment. Okay. As dumb as it was, whether he did, I did too. I was saying at the time, I actually think this is pretty excessive in the NBA is like trying to set an example here.

here. So you have this shoe deal. You have the max contract. I mean, he's getting paid major guaranteed money the rest of the way. Like this guy is about to be he's on the cusp of like being one of the faces of the franchise. And I think everybody felt really good about it because he was so goddamn fun to watch. And when he did the interview with Jalen Rose, I was like, oh, that scared me, man. It scared me because there was like

oh, you actually think everybody else is the stupid one here? And so as I continue to watch which direction it's gone, four straight years of the advanced stuff going in the wrong direction, and when I've watched them this year, and maybe, look, you know this team a hundred times better than I do, and the frustrations with the offense. But I also felt like his play led to more frustration where it was just this high, barreling, like, let me, in the half court, them trying to figure out a way to get him free led to him just being like, I'm going to

I'm just going to barrel into dudes and then I'm going to bitch and I'm not going to get back into defense. And when you start doing that kind of stuff and you're distracted with the game, even though I know a lot of guys complain, I just found it like unlikable. And I'm sitting there thinking, if this is the face of your franchise now at 25, I do think you have major problems in a way that I was hopeful for him three years ago. I am not today. You don't think you can grow up.

Well, there's two questions, right? Can he grow up and mature? We've seen guys do it, especially as they hit their mid-20s. The other problem is the durability thing. I was shocked. I was looking at his basketball reference. I thought there was one season when he played. He hasn't played more than 2,100 minutes in a season ever. I look at something like that, and then you look at the three-point shooting's not better, the free throw attempts are...

are going down from where they were a couple of years ago. I just, all that stuff worries me. The team's getting worse. This coach just got fired. And it seems like, you know, I don't know if this is, I was asking around trying to get, trying to get basically gossip about the situation from people. What do you think happened?

And the consensus, which may or may not be true, is that the organization and the GM was higher on Ja as the face of a franchise than the coach was. And that became a real issue between the two sides. I don't know if that's true. I don't think that's true at all. You don't think that's true? No, Taylor loved Ja. Loved him. Do you think Taylor felt like he could...

succeed with Ja long term? Yes. I think Ja was probably the least of the issues. Ja's availability was

It's a serious issue. So what are the issues? Like, what can you tell us? Yeah, well, ability. So what are the issue? But that is an issue, though. That's part of the job thing that you're building a franchise around a guy who you don't know if he's going to be out there or not. That's a real thing. I think my opinion would be that Taylor probably changed this year in some ways because the staff got gutted. Right. Right. Who's going to be happy about that? And here's the other thing. And this is something that I've been very critical of them about.

They have got to have veterans in the locker room. So they tried it last year, but then the season went to hell, so it didn't matter. And that was Marcus Smart, and that was Derrick Rose. Great veteran leadership. No, but they did have an impact on Morant, right? You hadn't heard one bad thing about Morant in a year and a half. Like, he has not been. No, but I'm just saying, like, if you're going to Marcus Smart to solve your locker room problems, you've made a mistake.

A Derrick Rose is a different conversation because I think people love Derrick Rose. And I think Derrick is like awesome. And everybody loves that, too. The idea is a guy that's been through a lot of games, a guy that's been through a lot of seasons, a guy that's played a lot of NBA minutes and playoff minutes. What the Pistons did this year when they got some of their old guys. Yeah, right. Just somebody to turn to. Right.

And then again, it was another double down on youth. That's where it went wrong two years ago with the team that Russillo ended up hating, right? Like the team that they loved had Tyus Jones and it had DeAnthony Melton and it had Kyle Anderson. And before that, they had Jay Crowder and they had Solomon Hill and they had these guys, right? Like there's no vets. There's nobody on the team over 30.

Oh, is that true? There's nobody on the team. Well, because the other thing I wrote down. It's conchar 29. And so, but they violated my too many guys theory too.

How many guys in that roster are like, I could be playing 35 minutes right now? You can't have more than like 11 of those. Like I saw Gigi Jackson got sent to the G League, right? And also, I mean, he's good. I know. But one of the big problems is they play 11 guys too many minutes.

Right. Well, yeah, you're in the middle of the Yang. They play too many guys. You know, they play 11 guys too many minutes in the games. But I would say that you've got to have veterans in that locker room. And I think that because we can always like the coach is the guy that's going to fall on the sword when things go wrong. Right. But locker rooms are about veterans.

those players and I do think that in the absence of a veteran and in the absence of your best player like it's hard to be the guy and a voice when you're not available so Baines kind of walked into that role for the team and I think that there so I think there's a couple things at play here I think you had you know a

a guy who probably changed up a little bit because he's, it's a new offense and now he's got a frustrated star, whatever. And there's really, there's no guy in the locker room to be like, Hey, this is okay. Everything's going to be fine. Or guy in the locker room, like who's throwing a chair. Who's making sure that this thing gets turned around because shoving out Dharma under the bench. Yeah.

Oh, it's Desmond Bain. It's Desmond Bain. That did happen. And so they were like melting down amongst themselves. But as you said, I mean, they're 9-14 in their last 23 games. Five of those wins are against Phoenix and Utah. Yeah. So they haven't beaten anybody. I have a question for Ursula. And, Vernon, you're not allowed to answer because you would be too positive on it. All right. If I have Ja and Bain and Triple J—

for the next five years? Is that enough? Is that, could that be my version of a big three? Or do I need to start thinking, where am I going to be two years from now? And do I need to trade Bain or, or, or Ja?

Can I build around those three guys and build an actual title team around those three guys? No, you can't. That's not a title team because there's a problem. And it's interesting that you talked about Taylor's relationship with John. Again, Verno knows this stuff way better than you or I do. So I'm deferring to you on this. Yes. But like knowing how Zach is and

And how, by the way, he's been awesome. Like if you just go through all the transactions, like he's generally been really good. He's kind of ahead of people on some stuff. There's so many players on this roster that I do like. Like I like Aldama this year. I always liked Bane. I fell in love with Triple J this year just because I feel like he took it to another level of just all of his offensive stuff. I think the ED thing's

pretty much the way I thought it would go. And, you know, there's been some nice players here or there. You know, Vince has been hurt. Gigi's been hurt. Shot selection's an issue with those dudes. But there might be something. Like, if I go through the roster, there's a lot of stuff that I like that the front office has done. But if they're...

as analytical about it as people suggest, then how is Ja as a high usage, no defense, hurt a lot, can't make threes for four years. How is that even? It's like when Darryl was running Houston and he traded for Russell Westbrook and you go, the only reason he did this is because of Harden because there's no way ever. There's never been a day in Darryl Morey's life where he looked at the Russell Westbrook profile and was like, I want to sign up for some of that.

So I think Ja, and Verno, maybe I'm wrong, but I feel like it's a little bit, look, I'm not comparing him to Lomelo. I'm not comparing him to Trey because Ja at his best was in the conversation for one of the most impactful players. Like kind of, you know, again, that third season, what we thought he could do, even though Trey's put up the numbers. But I would be worried that the decision about Ja would be about what a huge star he is in your hometown.

And how important that is that, all right, maybe if we're not winning the West, at least we have something that everybody's excited about and everybody's buying the jerseys because I think he falls into that category. Well, I mean, that's not a Memphis thing. Okay. Nobody, nobody is promoted more by Nike than this guy. All right. So it's not just like, I mean, that's part of it. Right. There's a lot of people that have that stock in it. I am. And again, I am of the opinion it's still in there. I mean, I've literally watched it this month.

I watched him be the best player on the floor against the best team in the NBA when Cleveland came to town. He had like 44, eight and six. I mean, he was dominant. He still got that. Can you lose by 20? No.

He's still got that in him. I mean, look, every time they play a good team, they lose. Well, here's the thing. To me, this is the crux of the issue. They only lost by nine, but they got back in it in the fourth quarter. They were down 25. Yeah, they were down big. He was awesome, though. He was awesome, and then they just gave up layups on the other end. This is the NBA that I, you know, in the 90s,

This was the NBA that was kind of so fascinating and so depressing. At the same time, we had all these awesome players and teams just giving up on them or wondering if they should give up on them or I don't want to trade this guy because they might blossom. And they went everywhere from Kenny Anderson, Leitner, Derek Coleman. But then there would be the C-Web trade where Washington's like, ah, I don't know. We know the talent's in there, but

fine, we just got to bring a vet. Let's get Mitch Richmond. Then C-Web goes to the Kings and he's awesome. And I think that's the fear when you have one of these guys. You're not winning with them. I mean, they're winning, but they're not going to actually win the title of a job right now. You don't want to trade them either because you don't want to trade them. And then two years from now, you look like a complete shithead because he's in the Western Finals averaging 32 a game. So you're kind of stuck. I know I'm in a bad spot because they just fired their coach, but they're still...

right in the playoff mix. And as Ryan said, like last season was a thrown away season. Okay. Yeah. The whole team got injured. They played more players than ever. And what happened to job? No, hold on. The two seasons before that, they were the two C both seasons. Okay. This season. It's kind of crazy because it's really only one bad year. This season, this season before this nine and 14 stretch,

They were the two seed. They were on their track to being the two seed in a pitch of a Western conference three out of the last four years.

Before this thing went to hell. So, I mean, I could just pause on the whole like, where's this thing going? What are we going from here? I mean, they were about to be the two seed again for three out of four seasons. That's pretty damn good. And that's a pretty good reflection on your best player. Can you walk us through how much he means to Memphis? Because that's the part we're still in. I aren't going to get like what, like how popular is he on a scale of one to 10? What does he mean? Big picture? I mean, I would say,

Yeah, he's for sure the biggest athlete we've ever had here. It's not even close. Yeah, it's not even close. It's not even close. I mean, Penny in college, but I mean, that was a local thing, right? But I mean, Ja is a worldwide thing. And I would say, I mean, like, let's just say, I would tell you this. There's probably, if I went, if I dropped my kid off at school tomorrow, I would say,

I'd say 60% of that class, boys and girls, have had a pair of jobs. I'd say at least 60%. At least. And I would say most have the jersey. Most. None of this surprises me. He's that much fun. I mean, when he is right, it's one of the most fun things in the NBA. But

I can only share personally how I felt watching. And over the course of this season, I went from hopeful to I kind of couldn't stand it anymore. And I totally get that because, look, he is frustrated to me, too. I'll say this. What was crazy is when I say people change. I was at the game last night watching Memphis play against the Lakers.

And last year I did this whole bit about how I can't take this Luca thing anymore. I don't care that they're winning. He is perpetually aggrieved. Do you remember I texted you this, Ryan, when I was talking about Ja earlier this year? Like everything is, I'm just pissy about everything. And I see it in your body language. I saw Luca's teeth more last night playing for the Lakers than I've seen in all those years. I mean, he's like happy. He's like, he was jovial with the refs last night.

Like, you know, playing butt taps or whatever. Trust me, that's not every night. You caught him on a good night. Maybe I just caught him on a good night. You did, because he's been back to pretty much normal. Now he's all over the place. Once he got back in his shape, he was more, that was the funniest thing about him when he came back with the Lakers. He was just so exhausted he didn't have time to complain about anything. Yeah.

I went to the Chicago game a week ago. He was fighting with literally every ref. He was arguing with the players of the other team. So you understand and the listeners understand this isn't about me talking about like off the court stuff. I don't, I mean, I'm sorry, but I think there's a lot of guys that are probably really immature that we never hear anything about. And they're some of our favorite basketball players. So I'm not even really putting this into it. What I'm saying is,

I think there's again, because of who he was in that third season. I understand how he sees himself. Right.

He should. I'd rather have a guy who's confident out there than second guessing himself. But the more I've watched this year, when I think about like, hey, it's another year where he can't hit any shots. It's another year when it's the wrong night. He's just flailing into the paint, hoping somebody fixes it for him. And there's just a lot of possessions that I don't love. I go, all right, well, if this team's in the playoffs, like I'll tell you right now,

I don't care which year you pick them to be the two seed. I bet you if you went through it, like I think all seven other teams, one through eight would want to play Memphis in the first round this year, at least this year's team. I don't know that anybody's ever been scared of them. Maybe you take offense to that in 22. You might be right because that was a pretty good team, but.

It's just going in the for this young group that is right now supposed to be scaring some teams. It is going in a direction I did not think it was going to go to when 22 finished out. Here's the only thing I'll say, and maybe we will see the rest of the way. Look, this is going to be a very telling week.

They play Boston on Monday night. They play Golden State on Tuesday night. There's nowhere to run, right? You're having to play two of those teams that you would have to see. These are playoff caliber teams. These are two of the best teams. Certainly the best teams in the last month and a half of the season, okay? So you're going to see that. I will also say that they've played, what, 73 games so far? And this is a demerit on Morant, but...

This season, they have had, so whenever you're making your predictions on what you think is going to happen, they have had John Morant, Desmond Bain, and Jaron Jackson Jr. in the lineup together, 31 of those 73 games. 31. That is a very, very low number. So there is a small sample size of what their true ceiling could be.

And by the way, with those three guys on the court, they have been fantastic as they have three of the last four years when they've been on the court. And I look there. They got rid of the coach. So, I mean, who knows what's going to happen going forward and who knows what's going to happen with Morant and who knows if those three guys are going to be able to get to the playoffs healthy. But who's guarding Jokic?

I will say, I mean, I think the same guy that guards them for every team. Every, yeah, every, everybody has. I mean, who has a good option? You got a good one. Minnesota. That's about it. I think we all like Sharon. No, they, they, they ended up guarding with towns and he's in New York. No, they, they throw that Nas Reed go bear. They throw all those dudes in them. Wait, could I read you this fan duel bet?

I just don't want Jaren to foul out in the first half. Yeah, that's my issue. You and me too. Zach Eady! You don't want Zach Eady! It's what he's there for! FanDuel has a team to advance bet. Oh, great. We can go through and be like, hey, will this team make round two? They have odds for shit like that. Memphis to make round two, yes, is plus 210.

Damn. No, it's minus 270. And then if you want to bet Memphis, hey, they're going to turn this around West Finals. Memphis to make the West Finals. What do you think the odds are, Rusillo? A billion to one. Memphis has to make the West Finals. It's got to be. They don't want to go crazy. I'll say it's plus 850.

See, we're so getting good at this. 10 to 1. Oh, wow. Yeah. 10 to 1. You're saying there's a chance. No, come on. But it's interesting because like the Clippers are plus 150 to make round two. Oh, and then the run to I know Verno's face. I was with you. I'm like plus 150 to make the Western Conference. No, but then they're plus 520 to make the West Finals. The Clippers. So they are low. Memphis is like the kind of the the one to jump on if you're looking at odds.

Look, I don't even want to say it because it'd be famous last words. Look, the one that we do it. Yeah, just blurt it out, blurt it out so we could cut it. And then when you have a month later, just send it back to you and try to make you feel bad about it. Go ahead. Say Houston was the only one that we have looked at and been like, OK, maybe. Well, even when things have been going terribly.

Just because they have no playoff scars, it's going to be their first run through. And we have played absolute wars with them this year. They are clearly been much, much better than Memphis over the course of the last month.

But if there was a team that like, and Minnesota too, they've played well against Minnesota, but like those older, like vet teams, the Warriors, the Clippers, the Lakers, obviously Oklahoma city's beat the shit out of them every time they put like, yeah, like that's part of this. And part of the reason that we didn't, nobody in Memphis was like, Oh my God, we just fired the coach because we've been sitting there for two weeks going, Oh,

There's nobody we want to play in the playoffs. Right. Like like we're not beating the Lakers. We're not beating the Warriors. We're not beating like the only teams you would have a crack against are teams that have young stars as well. Minus Oklahoma City, who you have no chance against. Right. Verno, we have to take a break. Do you want to stay with us and talk basketball for 20 more minutes or do you have to go to bed?

I don't have to go to bed. I'll stick around. You got like seven kids. All right, we'll take a break. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. We are getting close to the NBA playoffs, which means we are getting close to the NBA finals. One of my favorite sporting events, not just because it's really fun basketball at the highest possible level, but all the historical legacy stuff. It's my favorite. You've heard me talk about on the podcast many times. Speaking of finals, Michelob Ultra has given me the chance to

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at mcglobaltra.com slash rules for price and detail, message and data rates may apply void where prohibited. So one thing I love about hearing Verno talk about basketball is he's actually in the arena or near the arena around these teams going to these games and picking up shit. So what have you picked up the last

like six, seven weeks, especially when these teams are passing through. Like recently you had the Lakers in this weekend. What were the things you noticed that you would have noticed just from a television? The Laker thing, the vibe was like,

Usually when you're around like that, and I'm talking about like the traveling party, everybody's kind of like bouncing around like, you know what I mean? Like it's like, and then you watch Luca go out there and you're like, this is, this is stupid. Like you see that last night was the first time I've seen it in person. You guys have been in person in LA, but I mean, the first time you see it, like right in front of your eyes, it's different when it's on TV, you see it in front of your face. You're like,

Like, good grief. I mean, I really felt like LeBron last night. It was one of those where it's like, I think what we're going to see with LeBron, he is going to expend the minimum amount of energy until he has to. And this enables him to do that. He had to try a lot when it was just him and Anthony Davis. Like, there's all kinds of time that he doesn't even have to do anything with that team. So I... But I also think they...

I think they're going to regret calling off the Mark Williams thing. Not that he's like frigging Bill Russell, but my God, they have nothing at the rim. Nothing. I think Memphis had damn near 70 points in the paint last night. I mean, there's just once you drive past them.

You know, and Reeves, you can drive past and, you know, LeBron, you know, is not the defensive stalwart that he once was. Maybe that'll change in the playoffs. Luka, obviously, you know, you just throw these guys at a bunch of different actions and then you can get to the basket and there's nobody really there to dissuade you. They've got, you know, they'll play Jackson Hayes. They'll play Vando. They'll play whoever. So somebody that can get to the basket a lot going to give them problems. But man, I mean,

Reeves was the best player on the floor last night by a wide margin when I saw him. So that was super interesting for me to have caught a game where Reeves was that good.

just dynamic offensively because you wondered how does he fit in with the other two? He was the best of the three. Did you see the quotes from JJ after that game where he met with them before the game and was trying to figure out how the three of them could be more aggressive working off each other? Yeah. Rosillo would be crazy if I put Reeves first team all NBA. That's too high, right? Second,

Second team, maybe the max frame. Let's see how the season closes. All right. Nine games left? I don't know. Brunson's not going to hit 65 games. There's a spot now in 13-ball NBA, and it's basically for sale now on eBay. I don't know who's grabbing it. Yeah, I think you would be unsurprised when you ask me about the teams that I've seen in person. The good teams are the ones that

for sure stand out. And there's honestly, there's not that many of them. So when you see Cleveland, it stands out. When you see Oklahoma City, it stands out. Maybe we'll see when I see Boston tomorrow night, it'll stand out. But like generally, you find like

Like throughout the league, there's a lot of teams that don't know what to think about their team outside of the extremely good ones. Right. Yeah. You're even you even see the Knicks and they're like, I don't know. We never beat anybody either. And, you know, like and that's that's the three seed. Right. So, I mean, there's really just Cleveland, Oklahoma City, Tennessee.

And Boston. Cleveland, Oklahoma City, Boston. I would say that's about the list of teams that like they have, like, as they say, aura about them. And like they they're completely confident in what's going on with their season and what they are and what their capabilities are. And I think everybody else has no idea how it's going to go from the rest of the way. That's what I that's what I guess. Some teams are more down than others.

about their chances, obviously. But I don't think anybody has some kind of, I think it's going to be very matchup and health dependent. I think most people feel that way. Do you agree with that, Araceli? Yeah, I think, you know, depending on the week, like you look at this Houston run and you go, okay, you know, we're back to being excited about Houston. But if you go through it, what's the best win in those 11 of those 12 games? I mean, there's an argument in Chicago.

which no one would be looking at as being like, Hey, we beat Chicago. But Chicago's played better as of late. And I still like there's things about Houston that I really like this double big thing that they were trying in the beginning with Steven Adams. I was just like, I didn't really understand it. You know, he's a big that you can completely ignore offensively. And if he's catching it outside of the paint, that it just means the,

paint in the driving lanes are packed because nobody's paying any attention to him. They don't want him to shoot. And now when you look at his net rating over the course of these 12 games, it's one of the best. So I think there are coaches that do a really good job in season developing options. Clearly Oklahoma City's tried to experiment and they still kill everybody.

which is like the scariest part of what they're doing. I mean, that's kind of been the Celtics lately too. The Celtics are beating everybody and they're resting two, they're leaving, they're resting two guys a game and it doesn't seem to matter. They're 14 and one in the last 15. Well, that's a weird thing. It doesn't seem like they're trying. And you've got, well, like in the East, there's Cleveland, New York, Boston, and Indiana now, especially with the Dame thing, right? And I think we'd be surprised. But if I just pushed it to you guys and said,

Okay, let's set Oklahoma City aside. Like you asked the whole like make the second round. Who has the second best odds to make the second round? That thing that you pulled up? Denver? It's going to be Denver or LA. I think it's switched. No, I think it's the Lakers. No, the Lakers. No, no.

All right, hold on. If you were going to bank on somebody, if I just said you've got to put it down, they're going to be in the second round in the West that's not named Oklahoma City. So Denver has the best odds minus 184 to make round two. Lakers are minus 160.

And OKC is minus. I mean, if Denver draws Golden State or the Clippers, that is no picnic. I want to talk about this because I was doing I was doing all the matchups today after some in Minnesota just won. But it looks like it's OKC against Minnesota or the Clippers right now. What's that injury report post that game against Detroit?

Well, Minnesota won. Yeah. We don't know about suspensions. Lakers Memphis right now, but it does seem like with the next two Memphis games, maybe they dropped down. But the other two are Denver Golden State and Houston Clippers. And I was looking at the conference finals odds. The Fandle does not believe in Houston.

Houston was plus 790 to make the West finals. And right now, if you look at it, they're definitely the two seed. They're going to have home court in the first two rounds. And they're plus they're almost eight to one odds to win two rounds when they have home court, which speaks to Verno's point. Nobody trusts Houston. Well, I've lived this life. Yeah. The two seed life. You guys know one year you drew the one year you drew the Warriors. If you're Memphis and then one year you drew the Lakers.

Like you're going to have to face one, some kind of veteran, you know, hardened team. Well, right now, I mean, that group, that group for the two seed is Golden State, Minnesota and the Clippers. Nobody's going to pick Houston against them except people from Houston. Yeah, I think I think Houston will be underdogs against all three teams. If if Kawhi is playing, I'll wait to see if Kawhi is playing. There's an argument if Kawhi is healthy that they should be they should have the second shortest odds of any team in the West to make the Western Conference Finals.

I think it's totally fair. That game against Cleveland he had last week, I mean, that was great. They must beat Cleveland today without Kawhi. But I was like, is this what it's going to be like? Because he looked like freaking San Antonio Kawhi. He was unbelievable. He looked awesome. I saw him in person on Sunday night against OKC.

And it just seems like he has his bounce. I don't know how long it's going to last, but he had the same bounce that he had like five, six years ago. And he's so big. It was now they didn't have Jalen Williams in that game.

But OKC, other than Jalen Williams, doesn't even have somebody, even Doerr. I mean, Doerr, who I think has a chance to be defensive player of the year, as crazy as that sounds, Doerr's like 6'2". You know, and he's guarding Kawhi. Kawhi's got a legitimate six inches on him. Can we talk about Houston for a second? They're 14-6 in their last 20. Doerr's not 6'2", by the way.

Oh, I think he's 6'2". How tall do you think he is? No, he's a big wing. He's listed at 6'4". So 6'2", short dude. I'm telling you, I was watching him in the game and I was sitting next to Mike Tolan who I share the seats with. And we were trying to figure out how tall he was as he stood next to other players. We were like, that dude looks 6'2". But Jack guys always look shorter.

He was shorter than SGA. I love it. Bane's like 6'7". I've been saying it my whole life too, Ryan. Well, here's the thing with Houston though. 7-2 against the Cavs, Celts, and Clippers.

seems to be the only team that has their number, but the Jalen ground is Jalen Green. Has he sucked you in post all-star break for Silla 22, six and five. They're talking about how the assist numbers are up. He's creating for other guys. Are you, are you buying in yet or now? You're going to need him to close some playoff games. So, you know, this is your guy and

And you're going to have to let him make his mistakes. And then also the nights where no one can stay in front of him. And you just hope that there's enough spacing around it. And that's where EMA is going to have the Shingun situation. He's probably not going to want to close double big and clog up some of that stuff. Cause that's all he's going to run. They're going to run some pick and roll for green. And,

Last year, you're right. To remind everybody, when Shingun was out and hurt, that's when I felt like the light bulb went off for Jalen Green because it wasn't just the scoring and the efficiency. It was the playmaking. It was understanding the help and all that stuff. Now this year, it's been kind of up and down. It's been better lately. I think the key for them is that even with Van Vliet and the numbers where they had some – there's some numbers out there that are strange with clutch. I haven't looked at it in a couple weeks, but Oklahoma City had one of the worst clutch defensive numbers in the league. Then you go, okay, what does that mean?

Do they get tight defensively? Like they said, they're just not good enough. They're not old enough to play good defense. It probably just means that that's what the numbers are. It doesn't mean anything. And the same could be said for Houston's offense, where when you looked at their clutch closing numbers, you just went,

Oh, well, this actually, this is what it looks like, except they had a really good record. Like when you watch them in some of those moments against a good team, you're like, what is it here that I like? Is it a Van Vliet Hail Mary? The Van Vliet step back with two seconds left for the shot clock? Yeah. Or, you know, do I want Jalen Green going? I'm going to take off and I have no idea what's going to happen on the way there. But look, with Van Vliet, they're 38 and 17.

And so part of it, believe it or not, thinking because of his stature, he's going to get targeted. The deflections and all the stuff that he's always done going back to Toronto, he's just better. He impacts them in those moments because he's just somebody who's a lot more trusted, who's played a lot longer. So,

I love watching Houston. It's just going to be hard for me to pick them against one of those veteran teams because Golden State feels like a new version of it. With Kawhi, it's a new version of it. Although, as soon as you want to throw at me Harden being like, wait, Russillo, you're picking Harden to make sure this team gets to the West? Well, it would be Zu, it would be Norman Powell, who is terrific again today. And again, it's healthy Kawhi with all that stuff. And then on top of that, Minnesota. Minnesota just feels better now.

Even with those Pacers losses that were kind of crazy because Obi Toppin didn't miss any shots against them for a little while. Hold Minnesota for a second. One other thing happened with Houston. Your guy, Eason, has started to come on for the...

I don't, I, to me, I think there's a couple of teams, Verno, that I just can't figure out what the ceiling basement situation is. And now, and it sounds like a cop-out to be like, yeah, I don't know. But Minnesota is like that for me. And Houston's like that for me. I can actually see with the, the amount of athletes and the defense that Houston has, uh,

I could actually see them just destroying somebody in round one. And we're like, oh my God, the rockets are here. And I could also see them shooting 22% from three during entire series of getting blown out. Same thing for Minnesota where you see them on the right night and you're like, shit, they're fucking loaded. And they look like they like playing with each other. And then you catch them another night

It's not there. Those are my two teams where I just, I don't know what to think. Totally fair. And what I would say is one of the things, and this is part of why the young teams are

have to get their playoff scars is because when you get to the playoffs, these teams are going to be able to game plan against one team, and now they are directing those shots to who they want those shots to go to. So you inevitably have to have guys step up. Last year, the reason we've got Dallas in the Western Conference Finals is because Oklahoma City says, you know what? If we lose to freaking Derrick Jones Jr., and if we lose to P.J. Washington, so be it.

And then they did. And then they did. Right. That's the trick. It's like,

Bro, are you going to count on Julius Randle? Because Anthony Edwards doesn't get to have 45, right? We're selling out against Anthony Edwards. We're selling out against, right, Jalen Green or whoever, or Shen, whoever the case may be in Houston. And that's the part of going through those reps. Last year, Oklahoma City will go through it again, and maybe they will be much better served for last year. But you remember, you're going to get to a point where a team just says, you know what, man?

If Kaysan Wallace and Lou Dort and Jalen Wood, those guys do it, but...

Let me tell you who's not going to have 45 in this game. Shea Gilders, Alexander, right? That's what the Celtics did. Celtics stayed in Boston and Wallace was the one that got them. That's right. And it's been Aaron Wiggins in some cases, right? They've got a bunch of different guys, but the lights get a little bit brighter. And now it's a little bit harder for those guys. And I think there's once you get to you guys should do this one week like

And that's why I like what Ryan said about the Clippers when he brought up the Harden thing. Because he said, bro, because you might, because Norm Powell may get you. Zubach may get you. Like the level of importance that Harden has is not the same as it is in all those other Harden teams because they've got other guys that could do it. But like how many of these teams, even if you want to start with Oklahoma City, like the second guy,

The second guy, how much do you trust whoever the second best player on that team is? Well, so it's that. And that's going to matter a great deal, right? Well, you have the second guy and then you have the knock yourself out guy. And we haven't talked about this. Somebody is having a, Hey, if he's going to make it, knock yourself out. Uh, somebody is now, if we did the all NBA team for that, Kyle Kuzma has my first team vote right now.

Because teams are playing Milwaukee and they're just like, yo, Kuz, feel free. No, take it. Please. Here's what I'd say, though, guys. I'd say that the argument I make there, it's the best argument for the Lakers or the Warriors.

Right. It's the best argument. Cause there's like, Oh shit. Reeves is in the corner. Oh shit. Oh God. Oh, I forgot to guard Luca for a second. Cause you're going down the list and you're going, okay, well, so their second best guy is Jalen Williams and their second best guy is Jamal Murray. And their second best guy is Alper and Shingun or Jalen green, whichever we want to choose. Their second best guy is Jared Jackson jr. Their second best guy is Luca or LeBron. Their second best guy is Butler, right? Like, I mean, it's,

It's a real thing that happens every year in the playoffs. The Minnesota part, which makes me like they're 11 and three in their last 14. If you go through the March numbers, DiVincenzo's, it's a real thing. Now he's had threes. This is the best I've probably felt about Jaden McDaniels offensively because it's not just the shooting, which has been great in March, but there's a lot of times with him. I was like, I have no idea if you get zero or 18, totally like the odds would be even on both of them. And yeah,

A lot of series, too, if you want to do this, because I know we were probably going to do this with the Pacers, so I don't know if we're doing it now. But if you're looking at series and being like, how often will this team have the best player? And there's some series and there's some matchups where it feels like Minnesota is going to have the best player. And that Denver game, it was before taping. I was super fired up. I was going to open my show with it because I felt like, all right, let's see what Minnesota has there. And there's certainly fluky results. You're like, what happened there? That game felt like this is going to matter tonight. And

And for Minnesota to beat them by 20 in the way that they did, it has me where we've all just assumed like, hey, it's the three teams with OKC, Cleveland, Boston, and then Denver has to get the benefit of the doubt because they have the best player with Jokic, which is where I've been for most of the season. I'm really worried about Christian Brown fighting against SGA and fighting against Ant and being the primary guy. Like maybe they'll throw Peyton Watson at them.

as some size thing but like Peyton Watson's best defensive stuff to me is like at the rim helping I don't really like look if he was that great on the ball then they wouldn't be playing Christian Brown so many minutes against these dudes as the primary defender and you know nothing against him but like he's fighting for his life against these dudes and that's Denver's that's the thing that I've seen from him and some of these more high profile matchups so you

Sure, there's some weird results we have every night throughout an NBA season, but that game in particular felt like something and a bit of a reminder. And now the fact that they have all of this outside shooting working for them, Minnesota is, and it's not that

They were bad. It was that we went into this year thinking, can this team win a title? And it hadn't looked like they had any chance for months and months. And I'm not necessarily putting them in that group, but it's now the best that I felt about them. Do you trust Randall?

No, no. But I think Finch will look at it. No, but there's certain coaches, like we were talking about Emei there a bit. You know what he's going to do? He's going to look at how the last five minutes are going in a playoff game, and he's not going to give a shit about anybody's feelings. And if it's Amin Thompson out there instead of Jalen Green because he likes it, then fine. If it means Benzing Shingun, fine. He'll do it. And I think Finch will do some stuff here too, whether it's a weird Gobert night or a Randall night where it's not working out, where they can...

Or McDaniels is one for ten. Oh, no. Yeah, you're right. He's got big balls. Finch does. Because you remember early in the year, that game where they had the torrid comeback against Oklahoma City. He sat in. Their best win of the year. And he just didn't put him back in. And I was like, bro, this takes guts. This takes guts. You know, on Minnesota...

There's some good advanced metrics for them too. Like their last 25 games, there's six net last 15, their fourth net, all the three point shooting has been really good for them. Edwards has been better the last two months. Um, they got a really good coach too. They've got a good, yeah. I'm trying not to get sucked in with them, but you conversely, the nuggets who I think we're Sello. I think we, we haven't really talked about it, but I think we have equal concern with our guy Joker.

I just feel like their best, when they play the really good teams, it just doesn't seem like they have enough. Like they're 0-7 against Boston, Cleveland, and Minnesota. In their last 50, their 20th net and their negative net. And it just feels like there's certain nights where if Jokic isn't awesome, they're going to almost get blown out. You know, I'm really worried about them in the playoffs because I don't want... That's a team, like if you were going to say, what team is going to get swept in round one? It would be everybody would be shocked.

That would be one of my candidates. And by the way, I would also want to be surprised that they made the Western finals. That's why the West is so fucking hard to figure out. Yeah. I am much more concerned about young teams being bad at the end of the year than I am vet team. Yeah, that's fair. I think we get to this time and vet teams are like, dude, we don't care who we play against. We got to beat somebody to good to get there. And so the idea that they're not locked in, you know, for 82 games. Does anyone have more knock yourself out guys than Denver though?

I mean, Denver has half of their 10-man rotation is, go ahead. Hey, the Lakers that night where they beat them, where they just packed the paint and they were like, let's have guys keep one foot in the paint when it was like weak side going, if there's two over there, we don't care. And even if Aaron Gordon's shooting 40%, we don't care. We're ignoring him. We're ignoring Westbrook. We're ignoring Watson. We're ignoring Cervantes.

Certainly Brown, even though there's some nice numbers there from Brown, who I think a lot of it can be influenced by Jokic. And so if you're running that two-man thing and you don't really care, I'll never forget watching that Golden State series against Houston in 18. And

You're like, wait, Houston, could they win this? And I loved it. They were so aggressive in that. They just said, we're guarding three people and we do not give a shit about the other two. We're guarding three with five. And that's the best part about the playoffs. And honestly, to your point, Bill, like when you watch Houston or you watch Minnesota or all these different things, I wouldn't trust anybody that tells me they know what's going to happen. And they know definitively, like, this is what Houston can do or what they're not, what they could do, but what they're going to do, because there have been,

We thought we knew it. Of course, we were surprised by sports all the time, but we thought like it was a pretty, it felt pretty clear going into this season of like, this is kind of how deep the West is. And instead it's just OKC with these coin toss teams, depending on the week. Yeah. You know, I will say this. If you, Verno, please tell your new coach, the Finnish guy, what's his name? What's Finnish guy's name? Tuomas Tuomas.

I love the Finns. Frank Isola's brother. No, no, no, no. They call him Coach T.I. Coach T.I. Listen, if you play the Lakers, and this to me is a, this is coaching malpractice if anyone doesn't do this in the playoffs. You got to pressure those fucking guys 94 feet. The

Luka and LeBron bring the ball up. Neither of them want anybody to bug them until they get to midcourt. Luka gets actually mad. He almost punched Josh Giddey in the game I went to last week. LeBron will just pass it immediately. And you just got to wear those guys down. It's almost like a football game where you're just running up the middle trying to make the defensive line tired. Good luck. By the way, though, good luck getting a starter, like a starting five NBA guy. Be like, hey, you're picking up 94 tonight.

Well, but I think you're going to have to like if OKC plays the playoffs. Sure. But in a regular season. Right. In the playoffs, though, if I'm like like if they play Memphis or Houston or whoever, that's those are the perfect teams to buy. Hey, Tyrese and.

94 feet with these guys when you're in the game. You got to do it because I do think you can wear them down. Those guys have a big responsibility and they can't guard anybody. Well, and it was crazy because Memphis, of course, had fired their coach. It's all the things. So you got this weird feeling walking into the arena. Now you're facing LeBron and you're facing Luca and you're facing the Lakers. And of course, all these Laker fans have got their jerseys on. They showed up to the game and you start the game and you got whatever game plan you had to deal with those guys.

And Gabe Vincent turned into, like, Klay Thompson and made everything. It's like, okay. Like, seriously? Like, this is the plight? Yeah, they do have some wild card guys. Somebody's got to take the open shots. Like, they, you know, Rui Hachimura is always the guy, obviously. And that's the thing. Look how much...

And they got to play small against you guys, too. That's the other thing. They love being like, seriously, we playing Jackson 15 minutes tonight. We can go with Rui. Like, I think that's the preference. And that will be when we see these matchups once the season's over, you know, we get to play and stuff. That's going to be a huge part of like the Lakers path for me to be like, how long can they go small?

Right. And who's going to push them hard? I think they'll go small against Denver, too. I think it's going to be on Rui just to be like, look, we know he's stopping him, but you're just going to stay in front of him and he's going to get his numbers. But at least he's, look, I don't want to say contained, but I thought Rui fought really hard in that game against them when they were matched up. So credit to Rui Hachimura. I like how it's played this year. Yeah. Credit to Rui Hachimura.

Verno, we're going to let you go. Say hi to everybody in Memphis. Say hi to my favorite team tomorrow. I hope they do well against you. Good to see you. There's no excuses, right? Because I remember earlier this year when John Moran had a triple-double at halftime and he was the best player on the floor in Boston. It was like our fifth game in seven nights, something like that. I remember that game. Tired legs. We're fine for tomorrow night. No excuses.

please don't beat us by 40. We just fired our coach. We don't, we don't, we don't, you know, what's happening. We don't, we don't need anything else bad to happen right now. You guys are going to win. No, no, this pot will come out. You'll win. Jaws. Yeah. Have a great night. And there's like an immediate, like in the moment, like, Oh my God. And then he'll get traded to Atlanta in two years. And then you guys would be like, we're still, it was right.

How dare you? How dare you? Bye, Verna. Thanks for coming on. We're going to take one more break. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. Michelob Ultra, a superior light beer and the ultimate trophy. Win or lose, you're bound to enjoy the ride with a good beer in hand. Michelob Ultra, crisp, refreshing, only 95 calories, a superior light beer.

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That's linkedin.com slash Simmons to post your job for free. Terms and conditions apply. And now for a special part of the show brought to you by Workday. Are you a forward thinker? Then you need an HR and finance platform that thinks like you do. Workday, the AI platform that helps propel your organization, your workforce, and your entire industry into the future. Workday, moving business forever forward. Rosillo, we've watched two weeks of March Madness.

your single favorite non-Cooper flag prospect that you've seen. The one that just puts a hop in your step.

Clayton Jr. of Florida. The shot that he hit the three where he ended up taking it out from the paint, sprinted to the three-point line, and then turned around, won. Not only had the Stones take it, but make it. Look, I'm late to college basketball. Because of St. John's, I was watching more this year. Free time, I'm not going to be watching it instead of NBA. We already know my deal. But I really got into all the conference championship stuff when they played against Tennessee in the SEC tournament.

I texted the team and I said, Hey, I just looked at ESPN.com and like, I understand Clayton Jr. The argument against him, but he's not even in a second round pick. And they were like, no, he's a pro. He's a pro. He is an absolute beast of a player as far as just the confidence. So Walter Clayton Jr. Was at Iona goes home to Florida. And now the Gators are in the final four, that shot that he hit in that game and that comeback against tech that

That was big time stuff. And look, he had a couple other shots earlier. Houck had some big threes as well. So I think that comeback when it looked like it was over with only a couple minutes to go. I've loved watching this tournament. I know, you know, look, the next three games in Elite Eight weren't really exciting, but this has been, I've watched a ton of this tournament.

Clayton jumped out to me as well. And I looked at our draft guide to see if he was in the top 14 and he wasn't. And, uh, I don't think he's even a first round pick right now. Right. But,

I don't know. I thought the same thing you did. He seemed completely unafraid. Guys have fooled us in March Madness, though, where they look awesome and they make big shots and we go, oh. But that guy, those were some big-ass shots because it wasn't just that last one you mentioned. He's older. He's been around. So that doesn't help. He's 6'3 as a guard. He's not necessarily the most athletic dude, but he just...

I love the way that guy plays basketball and it's not just that show. Well, thanks again to Workday for sponsoring this segment. Learn more at Workday.com. So we're going to do a gimmick called the NBA forgotten teams that just don't get talked about enough on shows like this. And we did a couple of them. Actually, we did Minnesota. We did the Rockets. Talk some Clippers. There is this Detroit, Indiana, Milwaukee trifecta. And it looks like where we're landing now, Detroit, Milwaukee,

is not going to play the Knicks, which is a huge bummer. And we're, because I was really excited for that series. We, before we started recording today, Detroit gets into another altercation in Minnesota that we probably could have predicted. I wish there was a way to bet on a, you want a little timeline of it. So defense, Jenzo pushes Stewart on a rebound, go to a dead ball. Stewart walks directly at him, bump Steven Jenzo. And you're like, that seems a bit excessive. Yeah. Then,

DiVincenzo moments later, when we get back to action off a miss barrels in to, uh, Fontecchio and Stewart doesn't like it stands over DiVincenzo grabs the ball away from him. And DiVincenzo probably said something, but he was sitting on the ground. As soon as he goes to get up, he shoves DiVincenzo, right? Yeah. Gets the technical. So now we're hot. Does Stewart lead the league and stand over a guy moments this year?

Sierra number one standover guy, guy. I don't know. He's third in text, though. I was surprised. It seems low. Yeah. Ants number one, actually. So then we have Ron Holland, who is just a young apprentice Jedi to Isaiah Stewart. But if you compared him to run our test, maybe with you on this podcast a week ago, I said there was run our testy vibes.

I don't know that anybody said it before you of like, look, local people that are on the Pistons are all over it. But Holland has a switch. And so he got knocked down on a screen again, which was that whole Bickerstaff game when he freaked out and said, we're not going to be disrespected. I think he is a bit of like the head of the snake thing where it's he's so hot the entire game that sometimes

some of the other guys pick up on that. So Holland gets knocked down. Then the next time he has the ball, he drives at Nas Reed and hits a really nice floater baseline over him. Okay. So then they come down the other way. Nas wants to take it Holland. And I was like, man, this is fun. That was a fun fucking Sunday afternoon game for us out West here.

And Nas totally overreacted to the Holland part of it. So then he starts going at it. DiVincenzo, third man into the ring. Holland pushes him off. DiVincenzo goes for the massive neck pushdown. And all I'm watching is there's a scrum right in the baseline courtside seats, Bill. All I'm waiting for is who's going to punch Gobert.

because it's this extra target. It's like there's a skyline and then there's Gobert. Yeah. Who built that? Like, oh, this Japanese guy. And so you think Beef Stew is just going to randomly come in and throw the quick punch as he's going to break it up? But the problem was the stew was already like, I still need to mess up DiVincenzo, but Sasser was trying to get to him. And it looked like DiVincenzo was on a ride at some point. I would say this for a Pistons team. And I think we touched on it in the very beginning.

Like this team's like, I know we're going to do this others group, but they were nine and 15. They're 33 and 17 since that. So over 50 games, they're 33 and 17. You know, their net rating bill.

Over these last 50 games, is fourth best in the NBA. So yes, Isaiah Stewart is looking for a fight all the time. You really, I think every team needs one guy like this. If you have two, it could be an issue with Holland. That was the Indiana Pacers issue. You can't have like two or three. You can't have Artest with Steven Jackson.

No, you love having the one, though. Yeah. So I could tell you like there's some like Stewart completely overreacted. Nas overreacted on his part of it. But damn it, this team has sucked. And so if this is part of it, I couldn't believe it when I saw fourth best net rating in the NBA over the last 50 games. Then let the boys watch, you know?

Well, I looked at, it's funny you did the last 50. I did the last 25 before today because they got shellacked in the second half. This was before today. Yeah, I did it this morning. 17 and eight in their last 25 before today. They were third net rating, but they were fifth offense, second defense. And I put in all caps as a question to ask you,

At what point do we take the Pistons seriously? Because that's a really big sample size. I remember like three weeks ago, we talked about, could there be a team like Dallas last year where we just didn't take them seriously, but there were all these signs in the last 30 games. And you have to almost throw out every Dallas stat prior to the acquisition of Gafford and P.J. Washington. Right. So with Detroit, they add Schroeder, who is in the equivalent of Gafford and P.J. Washington,

But he did give them a little extra balance and a different look in crunch time. And he's somebody who's been in big games. And he's another guy who's, and I mean this as a compliment, he's a fucking dick. Yeah. They just have a team full of guys who are like, I don't care if you think I'm a fucking dick. I'm going to keep coming. And I'm going to know you and I'm coming after you. Beasley's, who knew he had this?

Well, I think this was always the idea of Beasley. I was always shocked that a team would bring him in and be like, oh, we need him for his spacing, his 3 and D. I'd be like, where's the 3 and D part? And I know that the shooting numbers will tell you that over the years, but I just never felt like I ever trusted him. There's certain guys, I can't even write it down and say that this is true, but there's guys that I know, like Andrew Wiggins is hitting the 3 in the corner with 4 minutes left. He's not hitting the...

corner three with two minutes left. And there's a bunch of guys, like Beasley has been so huge for them, spacing alone. I mean, when you start sorting out what their numbers are, they're seventh in offense in the last 50, they're fourth in defense in the last 50, they're ninth in shooting. They're also playing a million guys, which I don't know what that means for them in the playoffs, but in March they played 11 players, 13 or more minutes, which we've already touched on with the Pistons. But I am with you in that

You got to throw away the first couple months because it was new. By the way, Cade, as I keep saying, by the way, here. We didn't mention Cade yet. Yeah, Cade's missed four straight with an injury that shouldn't be that big of a deal. But the Pacers, if you want to do the 51 games with them, because I was doing it like, all right, what's your low point record-wise, right? And then what are you since then? So the Pacers at one point were below .500.

I guess I don't have the record stuff in front of me, but they are 34 and 17 since December 5th. The same...

the same number, I guess now the Pistons are 33 and 18. They're some of their ranking stuff. Isn't actually as impressive as Detroit's is, but that expanded standing stuff that I always like looking at, like, how do you do against those teams over 500, you know, other than Cleveland and Boston who have really good records. If you look at it, the East, you know, the Pacers are 16 and 15, the Knicks are 12 and 18, Detroit's 10 and 20, Milwaukee's 11 and 20, um,

This has been a really good team since that stretch as well, but the wins against the 500 teams tells us the Pacers are better, but I still think it's open for discussion, which I'm now going to pivot it back to you. I'll start with the Pistons. Okay. I think Cade is the best player in a Pistons-Pacers series, as good as Halliburton's been the last two months. I think he's a top 10 to 12 guy, so you got that.

Pistons can rebound and defend. They're plus four, plus five rebounding every single game. And they have multiple guys that can, I think Schroeder's a huge pest in a Pacers series. And by the way, the reason we're talking Pistons Pacers is it looks like this is going to be the four or five. Beasley and Hardaway are making six threes a game, 40%. And they make big threes at the end of games. They run plays for them.

I mean, one of their plays, they'll be down, you know, 1.40 seconds left and they'll run a big play to send Beasley coming off some sort of screen and he'll make it. And remember, Hardaway was just out of the rotation last year too. And at times you can't roll him out there, just see what happens. They were done with him.

And I like that. I know Cade's missed a couple games here, but their best guys for the most part play unless they got suspended for fighting, which is going to happen today. I think they're a real team. I was really excited for them to play the Knicks because I genuinely thought they could beat the Knicks in a series. Pacers is a little more interesting. Now, you mentioned that even the last 25 games, they're top eight net. Halliburton is the numbers that jumped out to me. Since New Year's, he's 20 and 10.

51%, 44% from three. And that's in 33 games. They're 24 and nine in those games. And I test wise, it seems like he's back. We were worried about him, but it seems like he's back. And you noticed that the other day in the Laker game, when Carlisle went offense defense with him and it was fucking stupid and in that they weren't able to get it back in the last 50 seconds. It was one of the reasons they lost my thing with Indiana. They shoot themselves in the foot

so many times in these games. I feel like they're in every game. It doesn't matter who they're playing. They're winning or they should be winning. And yet you watch them in the last couple of minutes, you're like, why are they doing that? Why is that guy out there? Why was that their play coming out of the timeout? I think their fans are just as frustrated as I probably am watching them. I think the ceiling of that team is really good. And it feels like they're their own worst enemy a lot of the time. That's my Pacers takeaway.

Okay. Uh, just for the record, I think game three hard away played like 19 minutes and missed every single shot, but they got killed in the third quarter. Um,

I don't know the answer yet to who I like more between Detroit and the Pacers because that Pacers record against 500 or better, I think is a very telling thing. It's one of the most important things I look at when I'm getting ready for the playoffs and be like, hey, are you actually beating any of these good teams? I mean, this is a perfect second part of like the Memphis. Like, okay, what's your seed? Oh, you have the worst record against 500 or better teams of the top eight teams in the West. Like,

Like that's something you were 18 and oh, against the worst five teams in the East. Right. Uh, the Halliburton part. Remember last year, free all-star, uh,

His splits, 22, 4, 12 shooting splits, 49, 40% from three. After the all-star break, you're like, oh, what happened to this guy? Now he's dealing with a bunch of different injuries, 17 points, four boards, 10 assists. The shooting splits went down to 45 and 30. That's in 26 games. Pre-all-star this year, 18, three and a half, eight and a half assists a game, shooting splits, 45, 37% from three. And you're like, this is a really long stretch of Halliburton not being the all-NBA guy. Almost an entire year. Right.

um granted it's only 15 games but since the all-star break he's 22 a game almost four boards 11 assists 54 and 45 percent shooting splits and so that again it's only 15 games it's a reminder of this dude that we got so incredibly excited about it was so bad during that long year we almost did a pod of was everyone wrong about the sabonis trade um

you know, kidding around, but it's just how many times we kind of litigated a bunch of different trades that have happened. But even with that, there have been times where I go, do they,

And maybe it was prior to the all-star break, but I'd be like, do they trust them hard a little bit more? That's not the case right now. Cause Halliburton's breaking the paint. He's just flying around. He's doing all this stuff that we fell in love with when he was in college. You're like, this guy just sees the game in a different way. Um, they clearly have a knee Smith, Matherin decision. I think that they like Matherin better. And the funny thing is with knee Smith coming back because they had all of these injuries that really held back their depth. Uh,

I would think that Neesmith would be the primary defender on like the other stud. And it looks like they may like Nembhard better. I don't know what that means. It almost seems like they just want offense and they don't even care about having a guy out there who can stop the other guy because they think they can outscore whoever they're playing. I said a rotation problem. Like, you know, so if I said, hey, I like the Pacers because of the record and then you go, OK, but.

The Pacers, defensively, the numbers are a little bit better than you would think because they were a disaster last year. They're better, but then it's a bit like the Knicks where you go, okay, I've got these other defenders that maybe give me a chance, but if it's Turner who's been in decline...

as the back line of the defense. And then, I mean, they've had to play Thomas Bryant 15 minutes a game in March. He's got a massive negative net rating. They've even played Tony Bradley like five minutes a game. So like the center part

They don't really have any other option at all unless they want to go see Ockham and play small in a certain matchup. But again, back to my Knicks comp here, it's like this fun team we all really like, but it's like, do I really take them seriously enough when it feels like the head of the snake in Halliburton can be hunted and then your center is somebody that

People feel like, you know what, we're probably going to have a really good chance attacking them over the course of a series. I know Pacers fans get like really upset of us maybe nationally being dismissive. It's like, hey, we made the Eastern Conference finals last year. Well, let's go through it, man. I mean, Milwaukee had the injuries. The Knicks had the injuries and it was a fun four games against Boston. Like those are really fun games.

but it's always going to fall into the category of kind of like Atlanta's Eastern Conference Finals and Portland's Western Conference Finals. Like, congrats on getting that far, but no one expected it. I think it was more impressive than the Atlanta, that weird Atlanta-Philly series because Philly just completely fell apart during that series. I mean, Atlanta was down big in some of those games. The Indy

That goes back to the point I made earlier. They completely fucked up game one when Jalen hit the shot in the corner and they completely fucked up. I think game three and game four, they could have won both of those games. And Carlisle is a really good coach, but he does some, um,

end of the game stuff that I just, I don't understand. And the teams do weird stuff. Right. But if they had one game one, then Boston's going to, they're just going to, the series is going to feel different. They were in three of those four though. And in like a real way that, but this goes back to my point. I think Indiana is good. Like I'm actually, I'm pro Indiana. I think that I like they're in the four seed. If they're, if it's a four or five and it's Indiana, Detroit, and I'm Cleveland, I'm like, fuck.

This is who we get in round two. It's a play Indiana. Like they're a pain in the ass and you're going to score on them. They're also going to score on you. I just think they want to go up and down, up and down, up and down. And I think they can play with Cleveland. I don't know if they'll beat them.

But that's not a great round two draw for a team that's about to win 66, 67 games, you know? Or you get Detroit and you're in a fistfight with Detroit. If they're both healthy, I think Cleveland dissects them in a way that you go, okay, like it's, we can't stop the flood. Like there's nothing that we can do. Even though the Pacers defensively, when I ran the numbers again and split it up a little bit, you know, since December 5th, they're actually like,

12th defensively that that at least gives you a chance you know because i used i like how they're playing i used to talk about really like haliburton too as like midwest knicks same profile really good players um i i like the pacers depth you know other than the center part of it i like some of the stuff they can do but it's kind of back to your cade point which i think cade is your answer

But is there a series where the Pacers would have the best player in any of those series? I guess the problem for me with Cleveland and the reason I don't want to overreact to some of these losses in the four game winning streak, but at the same time, their defense hasn't been good now for a month. You know, they're, they're not even in the, I think like net rate in the last,

15 games or so. They're 15th. They got torched by the Clippers tonight and outscored them. But over and over again, you're watching them like outscore other teams versus what they were doing in the first four months where I thought defensively, even though it's a little weird with the guards, I thought they could get stops when they needed to get stops. And now I'm wondering if they can. So if I'm Indiana and I see those guys in round two,

I feel like I can score on them and I feel like I can hunt guys in their team and I can hang around and who the hell knows. I still think Cleveland's going to make the Eastern finals. And you know, I, I, I really felt like they were going to make the finals three, four weeks ago from what I was seeing. They were hitting every check Mark. Like even if you look at the teams that do you see this stat about the teams that started out 50 and 10, you basically have a 50% chance of winning the finals based on the history of this. If you start out 50 and 10,

One, two, three, five times didn't, five teams didn't win the title starting out 50 and 10 and six teams did. So the 50 and 10 is like no joke, but I do feel like they lost momentum the last four weeks. And defensively, I just, I'm not seeing it with them. Okay. You're right. But do you believe it?

I don't know what to believe. That's why the seasons have been so weird. Do you believe they'll be bad on defense and not shoot it well? I think there's issues with them defensively that I think the smarter teams have exploited. And maybe that's a little follow the leader where teams, the other teams are watching. Orlando, the smarter offensive teams out there. No, I'm talking about like the way teams like Celtics and OKC have attacked them.

That might be what's happening where teams are like, Oh, look at what they did. Oh, here's something picked up. I don't know. Maybe, but they're also missing a million threes. I mean, Mitchell's shooting splits in this stretch, the last eight prior to today's game, he's 36 and 22% from three. He had that two and 18 game against Phoenix. He went, Oh, eight from three. I didn't even think they were bad looks. He just, you know, high volume, the Clippers. He was five to 18. Um, I, I,

I just think they're so good and they've been so good for so long. And it's not because of playoff success in previous seasons. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt. It's, I think there were a million games up and so that's the thing you have. That's what you have to point to and be like, they have had nothing to play for other than one seed in the finals to home court. Basically, that's the only thing they've had to play for for the last month.

And then they lost that. So now it's like, what do you have to play for nothing? And I watched the game today. They were, they got up 34, 17. I thought they were clearly the better team. The Clippers stayed in it with some threes there to make the score look a little bit closer. So yeah, like the technically without Kawhi, the Clippers came back and fought this against the full group with Cleveland. They didn't have Ty Jerome today. He's out with a knee thing, but yeah,

I just like, okay, maybe you're right about the defense, but this team isn't all of a sudden just going to not shoot well. That would be very surprising to me. And if you look at their true shooting on the season, it's like first. And if you look at it through this down stretch here, and it reminds me a little bit of Denver in 23. Denver closed the season. What were they? They were 46-19, then had a 5-7 stretch.

uh in march so actually they closed the season they won their nba title they closed it seven and ten in their last 17 this episode is brought to you by the wells fargo active cash credit card this is an ad for the active cash credit card from wells fargo that's a mouthful but that's because it packs a lot in earn unlimited two percent cash rewards on purchases with a big or small so whether it's buying tickets to the game with your mom or grabbing coffee with your dog

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I don't know how long Dame's going to be out, but it doesn't look great. Portis is suspended. Kuzma has given them some energy and some rebounding, some defense, and his offense is not good enough. And they're just getting waxed by certain teams. And it's starting to feel like they sold their souls to win one title. The weird breaks they're getting and just the bad luck and the way the trading drew for Dame and all the stuff they gave up, it just feels like their window has come and gone.

And I think if I'm a Bucs fan, I don't know what I'm feeling good about right now other than the fact that Giannis is on my team. Well, it wouldn't be today. They gave up 145 points to the Atlanta Hawks today. So that's playing Kuzma. You think with Dame out of the lineup, that wouldn't make your defense worse. 145. I don't know. Milwaukee looks... I never really understand it because I would say like of all the fan bases that you hear from, Milwaukee fans get really, really chesty in an annoying way. You know?

And obviously it's not all Milwaukee fans, but the loudest ones find the most creative ways to feel slighted. And I just never understood. You watch this team like, yeah, when they started four and nine, it's like, are they really going to be this bad?

Not really the case. They put together a nice little one win streak there, but it was, you know, the Houston win was close. Chicago stunk back then. They did beat the Pacers and Charlotte, Miami, Washington, Detroit, you know, look, it was right before we were kind of doing some of the Detroit stuff. So I'm like, I'm not, it just feels like, Hey, they win three or four and they lose three or four. They win three or four, they lose three and four. And,

I've watched them a lot because I keep trying to figure out if there's something I'm missing. And I think that's kind of the point. You're not really missing anything. They are plus 245 on FanDuel to make it to round two. So that means Knicks, Bucks, round one, the Knicks will be at least minus 300 favorites. And that's how the betting public sees it. And it's not great for Milwaukee. They are 19 to one to make the Eastern finals. And there's going to be, look,

We always talk about it. We've been doing this pod for a few years together. We get to the summer and there's always like the two stars like, whoa, this fell apart fast. And I don't know. Giannis has to be one of the guys considered because I don't know if you're him. Maybe you're happy staying in Milwaukee. You want to retire as a buck. But if you're just thinking big picture, do I want to get back to the finals? Do I want to have another relevant season? It's not going to happen with the group they have now. Kyle Kuzma is not saving it.

So I don't know what the answer is on that one. I saw some net rating stuff because I totally understood the Kuzma trade just to feel like they'd have a little bit more juice with it. But I don't have it in front of me. I was trying to find it here because I don't think it's like the raw net rating number, but there's some stuff, some on-off stuff with Kuzma that is rather alarming. But without Dame, which is a really serious issue here, what are we doing?

What are we even talking about? Like with Dame, if everything was right with Dame health-wise. Against the Knicks, would you still take him? I would not. Would you take him against the Pacers? No. Would you take him against the Pistons? So Dame's playing? Yeah, I probably would. Because Dame's obviously better this year. I mean, offensively at least, but.

So I would take them over the Pistons just because nobody in the Pistons has played in a playoff game, basically, except for the Beasley Hardaway types. But I wouldn't bet on the Bucs. Dame got knocked out of any chance to be in the All-NBA. Just wanted to mention this quick. Mitchell, if you did the first team, we got two weeks left. Is Mitchell in there?

Over Edwards for you? It's a bad shooting month, but yeah, I think I still have him in there. I still have it slight. I same way. I have slight edge for Mitchell there. We had JJ, Triple J, LeBron, Mobley, Cade, Edwards as a likely second team. And then I wonder if KD has played himself into third team possibilities just because we're not going to have Brunson and we're not going to have Dame. Is Harden in the all NBA mix for you?

He wasn't the first time we did the exercise two weeks ago. Uh, so I don't, I didn't have it then. Who are you moving out? Can I give you some hardened stats? Yeah. I'll just give you this one. 25, six and nine since the all-star break. Like he's actually having a, he's having a, well, it's like, I don't know. When was the all-star break? Mid February. Yeah. 15, something like that. Um,

And he's been pretty durable. So I think he's in the mix. It gets really confusing. I mean, Halliburton, I think is in the mix too, especially if Indiana can, can keep playing while I think he's entered the fray. Um, other than that, I don't, I mean, Garland, Trey, not voting for Trey for all and behave. They don't have a winning record. It's tough. We lost a lot of guys. That's 19 games for Harden. Yeah. We lost a lot of guys, man. Reeves.

Reeves. Do you want to start the Reeves hive now? I think they should move it to 60 games. I think the 65 is prohibitive because it's not Brunson's fault. He got hurt in overtime of a fucking Lakers game when he was doing everything and he stepped on somebody's foot. And now he's not an all-NBA player. He's one of the best 10 guys we had this season.

You know, it's one thing if it's John, you're missing six here, eight here. It's one thing if you're Kawhi and you're sitting, you know, nobody ever knows who you're going to play. The Brunson thing was a fluke injury that wasn't his fault. And the guy's a warrior and he's playing 37 minutes a game. And I just, I almost wonder if it should be minutes instead of games. I don't know, man. I don't care actually.

I I'm with you on the Brunson thing, but I think as soon as the voting. Yeah, I know. But I'm just saying clearly I care for the voting, but it's just my natural reaction now with everything. It's like, hey, we kind of figured out something that makes it better. And there's an incentive for guys to play. And it's like, yeah, but can we change it? Like, here's the NBA got it wrong. And it's like, Jesus Christ, like we're just trying to run a league here. 60 bucks to Booker. Is he in the mix for you?

He's always in the mix for me. But if we're talking, it'd be funny if two sons made it and they finished like six games under 500. He was on my, my worksheet. Yeah. Um, why don't you do some March madness before we go? Sure. Do you like this new kind of world where we just have really good teams going against each other, almost like women's basketball. And we don't have the same kind of Cinderella situation, but the actual quality of the games is better.

Look, I feel like an elitist saying this, but I've said it for years, is that everybody likes a Cinderella until it fucks up your TV schedule. Right? And you're going, who's on St. Peter's again? You know, I actually just want to watch North Carolina, Arizona. Yeah. And so I think everybody loves a Cinderella until...

They're like, I don't know what this matchup is. So look, if Colorado State doesn't give up the queen game winner, then I don't know if the headlines are different. But since it's all blue bloods, not necessarily blue bloods, but like the power for conferences now and it's 16 for 16 and then it's all chalk all the way. Like this was an historic. If you looked at some of the Ken Palm stuff, the top four seeds going into this tournament, they're combined whatever his ranking system is.

It was the highest four quality teams you'd had in tournament history for one seeds since they had expanded this thing. And not to 68, like we're going back almost 40 years. So,

We knew on paper it was going to be really good. And, you know, the way the Duke-Bama game played out, like, Bama was a really good basketball team. They couldn't, it wasn't shooting variants and not making threes. There was no good shots available for them for 40 minutes. Like, what Duke did to those dudes, a good, a really good basketball team in Alabama that felt like they were in the mix or the same tier as a Florida team.

Or in Auburn, you know, look, you're going to dig them a little bit because Auburn looked like the best team all season long and everybody fell in love with Florida as they won the SEC championship bill. But to watch Alabama win

Go the whole game being like, I guess I'll just shoot it from here again because we can't get past the perimeter guys. We're never getting into the paint. We can't post it up against these guys. Even if we get a screening, we get some angle. Malawach is coming over here. This dude started playing basketball four years ago and a seven foot two and he's altering every shot at the rim. Yeah, look, I I've loved watching this tournament, even if it hasn't been the buzzer beater and the drama stuff.

So, and I need more than, well, I always say this kind of stuff, but like, I need more than one year results to just say, this is now the new normal. Now it's very clear the mid-major programs, the strength that they had, the advantage that they had against some of the other higher profile programs was that they had continuity, that a lot of their guys were,

we're playing together multiple years, maybe even a little bit older and sticking around. They don't like, we ignore that basketball far too often that it's the same thing in the NBA. Like have these guys actually played together for a long time? Like that's a massive advantage that I feel like has never, ever talked about, or at least we've, we've diminished the importance of that continuity. And so maybe that's, maybe this is the first year of the new normal, but I would need it to be like this. And in a single elimination, like,

We're definitely going to have Cinderella teams again. We're just going to have weird scores that'll happen. It just didn't happen this year on the top of the field as we knew going in was historic anyway, and it's played out that way. I like watching really good basketball teams. I'm a snob. I like watching good, good sporting events and good teams. And the quality does seem a little higher, but Duke is like, I miss it when you watch them, like the ceiling of the guys they're putting out there and how they play together, which is, I talked about this with Tate and Kyle the other day, like

it's not just like, Oh, they have four, like that 2000, what was that? 2019 Duke team. And it was like Zion and RJ Barrett. And it's like, look at all these lottery prospects, but it didn't feel like a team. This Duke team now feels like an actual basketball team that you would have put together like a GM, like the way they play together. I think that's been really interesting to watch because I had just gotten to the point with college basketball. I was like, this all feels fucking random. Everyone's just chucking up threes and

Some of them will go and some of them won't, but that, but I think the quality has been higher. And the other thing is some of the teams feel like they have different identities almost, which is the way college, when we really love college in the eighties and nineties, the teams would have these different personas. Like St. John's is like, Oh, the pressing team, Texas tech was like, these guys are just fucking huge. Like they're just like big bully ball team. So that, that part's been really fun to watch move far knowing fun, knowing nothing.

And then you watch the games today and it's like, Jesus Christ, Houston. It's the athlete team. So that part I've enjoyed. Yeah, Tech almost won. I mean,

It's going to be tough for Tech fans today going, you kind of blew that one. But again, we've already been talking about the Gators and the shot making. They just, everybody between Houck and Clayton Jr., they hit every one of those threes when they needed to. And then they missed the front end of the one-on-ones on the other side twice. But Tech was looking like they were going to run away with that game with post-ups, old school post-ups. Somebody was sitting on a couch. A young man listening to us right now was on the couch with his father, maybe even his grandfather. And he was like,

That guy reminds me of Adrian Dantley.

Although Adrian Daly probably had a little bit more face-up. Like, I could have just gone real old-school post-up guy, and I don't want to use McHale here, but they got back into it because Florida could not handle the big guy, Williams, I think, from Tech, who just was destroying him. With space. Yeah, they were just kind of spacing it out for him and chucking it to him, and he was doing this. They didn't want to double him. The spins or face-ups. It was pretty interesting. Yeah, right, because you could see Florida's like, we don't want to double here, and then...

They finally like had a guy overplay his shoulder so much that it kind of screwed him up a little bit. Yeah. Look, man, like even Tennessee, what Tennessee did to Kentucky in that first half was horrifying. It was I mean, the energy, the effort. I think because as NBA guys, whenever I dig into the college stuff, there's this abruptness, the shock part of like, oh, my God, like who's actually going to score?

Like, do they have like, we're just so used to the NBA now. It's weird if there's two guys that aren't offensive threats on the ball. And in college, you might have like lineups where it's always three guys that aren't really a threat with the basketball and they play so damn hard, especially in these tournaments. They're just going to play harder than anything you're going to see in the regular season, the NBA for the most part, which would only make sense. I don't even think it's a criticism of the NBA. It's just the reality of it that,

once you get past like what the hell are they doing is anyone ever going to score that's a terrible shot or where are the shot makers like Lanier I know Tennessee gets eliminated today but that guy's like one of the just pure shot makers I watched all season in college hoops like damn like this guy's getting into this kind of stuff as a college player and so you have Tennessee just swallow up Kentucky and

And then they go up against Houston where you're like, I don't know, are a couple guys going to get, are their careers going to end in this game? Because you know how physical it's going to be. And granted, it was 29-8 with 3.38 to go in the first half. And Houston basically reminds Tennessee, you think what you did against Kentucky, you're going to be able to do against us? And then Kentucky even has, or excuse me, I think Tennessee had the ball down 10 making this run. And they played so hard to close this game.

which is a credit to Rick Barnes and everybody with Tennessee. So I'm going to say nice about something about the team that lost here. I don't know how many other teams in college basketball are able to hold off the effort that Tennessee was playing with. And yet Houston was able to get it back up to 20 because there was about this six or eight minute stretch where I'm like, is Tennessee going to find a way to actually get back in this game? And if you can appreciate the effort and obviously the pageantry, which we've always talked about in the past, it helps you get over some of the moments where you're

There's just such a gap between the shot making ability and, you know, how clunky the college game can look at times because a lot of it times like these guys are busting their asses. Every single rebound is a wrestling match. I think the shot making is I just wonder if basketball is just going to another level as we're watching it just at all levels. Like you watch some of the drives and the finishes that the college guys have.

And some of these guys aren't even going to potentially even play in the NBA or some of the threes, like the threes that Clayton Jr. is making. The artistry feels like it's gone up a level versus where we were before. Now, some stuff has changed. Like when we did Blue Chips for the rewatchables and you watch Bobby Hurley is in that movie and he's just like the old school classic point guard head up. I'm just going to set up. Those guys seem to be kind of gone and they've just been replaced by these guys

all these different shooting point guards that all seem like they, they, every team has like three of them. Um, and then flag is another one who just seems like a complete anomaly for what we're watching. But, um, for the most part, like you watch some of the shop making and it's, it's really high level. I just wonder if,

Maybe it's the camps. Maybe it's people following like the previous generations and stealing the best things from them as they watch and they're playing when they're eight years old. But it just seems like people are getting better at basketball. Is that crazy? Like there'll be finishes in traffic where guys are bouncing off each other and doing like spin, spin layups. Like Jesus Christ, that's like a round two NBA playoff shot. This guy's like the fucking fourth guy in Florida.

Now, wait, if you're missing Bobby Hurley, do you feel like you didn't spend enough time with Steven Ashworth this year or Creighton? I probably didn't. And probably not the Illinois guy either. The pick and roll guy with the long last name. I don't think I didn't spend enough time with him either, but that's why we have YouTube when I'm doing, when I'm jumping in late on the draft, falling in love with different people. So I did a little exercise. I was going to say it for my pod, but I'll do it now. The Cooper stuff. Now that I feel I'm caught up on him. Yeah. I asked,

I asked, I think it was, I don't think I got 10 responses. So maybe I'm not as cool as I thought. I think I sent out 10 texts to NBA teams being like Zion coming out, Cooper coming out. So I have eight responses. What do you think the vote is for Cooper or Zion? Who is going to be a more reliable superstar? No, we can't do that. It's a little hard to put the toothpaste back in the tube because we have all the Zion information, but go back to when Zion was coming out. But what's the question? They're the number one pick.

What's the question? Who do you like more as a prospect coming into the draft? If they were both coming out with only the one Duke year behind them, how would you rank Cooper Flagg and Zion Williamson? We both really love Zion coming out of college.

Loved him. I'm going to say Cooper is more of a sure thing. So he'd be ranked slightly higher just because whatever he's doing is going to translate so well. There's less variance with the ceiling. And Zion was always like had the higher ceiling, but he was always in the air. There was always the injury fear with him. I just think Cooper's a safer bet. So I would say him. 5-3 in favor of Cooper.

So not the most scientific polling. I don't know. Interesting. No, but it doesn't represent. It's just, you know, you could have five guys. He's the best. He's the best kind of ceiling prospect that's come out of college since I am. Right. Yeah. Right. Cause I mean, you know, clearly women Yama was generational, but not a college background. Right. Doesn't count. Davis at Kentucky Zion. Like if you're just going like the last 15 years, I think he's Cooper's in that conversation. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, he's definitely, there's way more anticipation for him than there were Anthony Edwards. Well, it's interesting though, because it's different than the typical college guy that comes in because you stick them on these different teams and he can kind of fulfill whatever you were missing. You know, he goes to Charlotte. He just has this immediate impact in all these different ways for them. Right. He goes to Washington, you put them next to SAR, same thing. I just be, I just don't think there's a team that's like, yeah, this is going to be a weird fit for us. Um,

And I can't wait, but we'll see. We'll see with, uh, we'll see with some of these other Duke guys too. Cause the seven foot two guy is fascinating. I'll watch it. I don't know what to make of that guy. Can nipples good too. He's so I'm already on the record. He's going to go five spots too late in the draft and it's going to be stupid. I don't know if it'll be, he should have gone 11 and he ends up going 16. He should have gone 14. He ends up going 19. I don't know. Teams will talk themselves out of them. I think. I don't know if it's cause I grew up such a passionate hater of Duke.

And then once I started working in the business, I just started respecting it a lot more. And the weird thing was that Zion year, I found myself doing the impossible and like not hating Duke and wanting, I wanted him to advance, which is, I don't think it's ever happened. And you know, it's a, it's a big East ACC thing. It's, it's very natural to fans. I mean, I know you're sick of hearing it, but when they're killing Alabama and then they start sharing the notebook and

And it's like, hey, you lost last year in the Elite Eight, NC State, and John Shire's like, I had to examine, re-examine the entire program top down. And we needed to re-emphasize these things and we needed to build this team in a certain way. And I'm listening to all of it. It all sounds incredible. But I also think that people have a habit of, in certain industries,

making their job seem like it's more challenging than it is or complicated perhaps is the right way to say it because we all know coaching this kind of program is complicated for everybody it's going to just wear you out but i'm sitting there i'm in my hotel room and i'm listening to all this stuff is they're killing alabama and i'm thinking like so you had to have a philosophical adjustment to want to bring in three lottery picks yeah is that the whole goal every year

Also, do you have a philosophical adjustment to having Cooper Flagg on your team? Yeah. You know, we examined everything. We did the work. We triple checked everything and we thought, hey, we have a chance to have three lottery picks. They're all huge. Yeah. Should we do that? Phil, does it match our new philosophy? And it's like, you know, I bet it does. My guess would be so. I looked at the marriage. Should I have the best guy in six years of my team? And the answer, you know, I stumbled into it, but it was yes.

It's really nice to have them. We were in Boston for the rewatchables. We did a Goodwill hunting on Thursday and the weather was terrible the entire time, except for like one hour, one half you split, you, you lasted two days. You were out. I left a day early. And the first day we were there, the Red Sox were one and oh,

People are feeling great. And now they're one in three and everyone's freaking out about Raphael Devers. Baseball is back, baby. We've already run the gamut of emotions in four days. I'm on three Devers panic texts and wondering that, and the Yankees are using the torpedo bats and really running the gamut of emotions already. Major league baseball. I don't understand these torpedo bats at all. How did we still figure out how to innovate with baseball bets?

In 2025, how did we not run out of every possibility with these things? Now it's like, let's soup up the barrels. I have no education on it, so let's start there. But I found it a little weird that I didn't know that you could just make your own bats now. You just can't use aluminum bats seems to be the only, and you can't cork your bat. Those seem to be the two rules. I don't get it. And of course, it's the Yankees that have figured this out.

So we're off to a great start. You see Nestor came in and gave up three home runs on three straight pitches? Yeah. Torpedo bats or did they hate him? And I saw Judge wondering, should he get a torpedo bat? Because it's been working for him the last two years. He doesn't want to change it up. I just think when you have something called a torpedo bat, it's probably going to get banned from the league within a year. Just the name itself. It's like, how long is this going to last?

Probably over under three months. What could you have named it to prevent the pushback, though? Something less hostile, the human bat? The big barrel bat. No, I don't think you could do that. I think that's too aggressive. Barrel 2.0? The natural resource bat. Barrel, big barrel. Did you pick a side in Stephen A. versus LeBron, or did you set it up? It reminded me of a lot of political debates. I was like, I have to pick one. So you set it up.

Yeah, dude, we've talked about Stephen A. How many weeks on this pod? I don't, I'm ready to move on right now. Good. Just to know if you picked a side. I didn't. I think some quotes, like anything with me, I thought some of the quotes made sense. I thought some of the quotes were ridiculous and I'm sick of talking about them. Any last things before we go that you wanted to hit? Anything weird? Any book you're reading? What'd you read in the plane home?

I read Tim McMahon's Wonder Boy Luca book. How was it? Which I really enjoyed. And I enjoyed having him on. It was a sports book. It was like 380 pages. So I was like, oh, right, Tim. Here we go. This guy's not sending out a little pamphlet with Luca on the cover. No mail-ins for Tim. Yeah. I was like, because, you know, some of these sports books, I don't like reading them that much anymore just because in my free time, I don't want to do more sports. But, yeah. Oh, I have one for you. I don't know if I should share this.

It's good though. It's up to you. I sat next to Liv Tyler on the flight home and she was awesome. She was so nice.

And then I was telling her, because she lived in Maine, and I was telling her, you know, what we did for work. And I was like, well, I'm pretty aware. I know what you do for work. Because I was like, do I play it that I don't know who she is? Or do I say, hey, I know who you are? You've got to be authentic. Right. And I said, hey, look, I'm not going to pretend that I don't know who you are, because I figured it out. And then we were talking about Maine, and I was talking about Martha's Vineyard, and I was talking about Vermont. And then she...

was like, I don't really know that much about basketball. I said, well, funny enough, I'm like this guy right here. And it was during the Duke Alabama game. I was like, this guy's from Maine and he's the best player in college basketball. And he's going to be the number one pick in the draft. And she was like, that's, that can't be normal that he's from Maine. And I said, look, you you're already on your way. So, but yeah, really nice. Like not, you know, she's a huge movie star and she was like,

totally friendly, normal. And then I was like, hey, I got to get back to the game. Headphones. And she's like, you headphones there. But she was ready. She was like, I'm going to watch a movie. She's like, we'll check back in in a couple hours. And I was like, deal. Did you do the I saw I saw your dad play at Avalon in 1994. You didn't do any of that. Like I have a pump cassette tape that I was wondering if I could get autographed.

So you, you headphones are, that's a really interesting move. Yeah. See, now that's going to be the part. I didn't really realize that. Well, Alabama, it's your job. It's your job. Yeah. I mean, do you know how much of the first game I missed? I flew back today and, uh,

I had the games, but the Wi-Fi, we just, it's 2025 and the Wi-Fi just, I don't know why I thought I'd be able to prepare for a lot of this pod and that the plane would come through, but I made it work. But I just feel like the Wi-Fi should be 100% at this point on planes. What's your best famous person encounter on a cross-country flight back to LA? Because you never know. Like when you're leaving another major city and you're on that direct, that big boy flight,

Maybe you're sitting up close, a little closer to the guys driving the plane. I have, I actually have a story. I think I wrote about 20 years ago, but I'll, I'll do it again. We flew to Houston for Jimmy Kimmel live in 2000, 2004 Superbowl, Pat's Panthers, 2003, 2000. No, it was so February, 2004, we're going to Houston. So we were in writer's guild. So it was first class. It was in first class. I was sitting in a seat.

And, uh, one of the other writers was like two rows behind. And I was like, I want to sit with him. Asked, asked, uh, the person next to him to switch seats with me. And they switched seats. And then five minutes later, Jacqueline Smith from Charlie's Angels sat in the seat right next to the one I gave up.

And she was still smoking hot at that point. She was probably, I don't know, early 50s. That was better for her. How, what would you have done? I would have been next to her for three hours. And it was like, I love Charlie's Angels. So I would have, I don't know how that would have gone. But the most fun, this is, I don't know if I told you this one. Look, I'm going to give you credit here because you would find a way to get past the awkwardness. Because like you, let's not kid ourselves. You've been in this world. I don't know, 22 years ago? I don't know. I think I would have froze.

I think I would add a bad lead. I don't know. I've seen you. I've seen you in settings where I was kind of shocked at how...

How I can navigate stuff? Yeah. How cool you navigate like different stuff. And I remember even asked, it was like another director. I was like, he's just going to sit over with those guys the rest of the night. And the guy was like, I've never seen anybody like Bill. Like Bill can hang out with those guys. You can hang out with those guys. And like, look, we're talking different backgrounds. I think it was the documentary. Was it, was it the juice world documentary? And I was, I was like, he's just going to hang out with those guys all night. I was like, that's. And it was like, yeah, man, Bill, Bill can just,

He just can move. He can move and he navigates all this stuff really well. That's what my scouting report says. Yeah. The scouting report can move in different areas. Here's my best airplane story. I've never told this story to you. Flying back, Super Bowl, Colts. Who did they beat, Peyton? Saints. Colts Bears. Oh, Colts Bears. Rex Grossman. Flying back,

And I'm flying back day of the game because I don't want to be there. And Peyton Manning wins the Super Bowl. I'm still pissed off about the AFC title game. And I'm sitting next to this lady and the plane never, it doesn't take off for like an hour. Just like a stuck on the runway situation. So start talking to the lady. And it was Rick Riley's girlfriend, but she didn't know who I was. And she starts telling me about how Rick Riley's going to leave Sports Illustrated. And he thinks he wants to go to ESPN, but he doesn't really like writing his column anymore.

But he's so much money. He's going to have to. And she's just giving me all this stuff. And I'm like, oh, my God. And goes through this whole thing. He's probably going to do the deal. She told me to go back to Sports Illustrated. But he doesn't he doesn't really like writing it anymore. And I'm like, oh, my God. So then she's like, what do you do? And I'm like, oh, ironically, I work for ESPN.

Um, I write a column for them and, uh, and so she's like, oh, that's so weird. But how long have you had the calm? Blah, blah, blah. So then she's texting with them and she looks at me and goes, he's telling me not to tell you anything, but I feel like, so now you can't tell anyone, but now I feel like it's almost 20 years later. I could probably tell that story because I felt bad because she was nice.

That's amazing. Yeah. So she then told you that he was texting her? Like, I understand him saying. You're sitting next to Simmons. Don't say anything. You're literally texting. You're telling the one person that you shouldn't. I mean, other than the people making the decision, but if they had already offered. So I guess there's, I'm trying to think where you were ranked on the worst possible people in the world to have that information. So I guess there's probably like four decision makers that'd be ranked ahead of you. So I'll put you fifth.

Right.

I think he was talking himself into it, which was really instructive to me because I was, you know, I'm still like trying to climb the ladder and I'm like, this is great. This guy doesn't sound like he's that hungry anymore. I can beat this guy because I'm a competitive psycho. Yeah. Cause I remember, um, I remember you being really excited in support of that signing. Well, he took a shot at me. We made up. We, I think he came on the pot at one point, but yeah, he took a shot about how long my columns were.

And I was like, I'm just over here, motherfucker. Did you have to go to therapy for that? No, I was, I made me mad. I was like you, I went into like fucking gym in the town mode. Like who's car are we taking?

I, uh, I'll be honest. Any encounter I had with Rick in person was fun. Yeah. He's a good guy. I ended up, I really ended up liking him. I ran into him a couple different times and he was like incredibly cool to me. Um, and the first time, like I was a complete nobody. Yeah. So he had, he had no reason, but I think he thought, I think he might've thought I was somebody else. Maybe that's why he liked me. But, um,

That's really, really funny. So anyway, sports, then they put them on sports center too. Wasn't that part of the thing? They gave him a talk show, whole, whole bunch of stuff. He was writing the column for the, uh, the magazine. It was an instructive lesson to me. I told, I came home and I told my wife, if you're ever sitting on a plane next to anybody, don't start talking about my career or my contract, my contract negotiations with them. The best is that she told you that then she was telling her stop talking to him. Well, he started, I think it was yelling at her and, and text.

I would have been like, you can't, you got to stop. And then she was like, well, now it's too late. I'll never forget. Like in my stretch of like the skipper meetings that I would have, you know, like when you were lucky enough every now and then. And he was, when you had your first skipper meeting,

As an on-air person, you were like, oh, okay. Like, now I know why this guy's in charge. Yeah. Because he fucking kills it in those meetings. Like, he's just... It's great. Turns it out. It's not even that he's just folksy. He's making all these points and you're kind of like, I thought this before.

And then now I left and I totally get why you did that and why you did this and why you did all these things. Cause then he'd also like try to make you feel like you were in on something. He wasn't telling anybody else. He'd be like, I was watching sports center the other day and I saw someone on and I didn't know their name. I didn't know their background, Ryan. And I thought that's bad. I'm here every day. I'm in charge. And I, I, I was like, I do not know this person.

That's not something that should happen on television. So when the Riley thing, because there's a lot of people that are pissed off because Riley that always felt like, hey, is somebody who doesn't work here? Let's pay them way more money than somebody who doesn't work. It was a strategic move by him where he felt like he was crippling Sports Illustrated by doing that. And it was he wasn't wrong. Right. And I didn't even bring it up. It was almost as if he was just like, I'm going to let Ryan have this piece of information.

Yeah. And then if he's ever in a cocktail party with somebody again, I never went to any of that stuff. But like, you know, like, well, Rick Riley was a great signing because he was like, we spent a few million dollars. We destroyed Sports Illustrated. Right. I don't know if that was true, but it was it was the right it was the right narrative. I think Sports Illustrated, I'm figuring out the web destroyed Sports Illustrated.

Yeah. It's also like, yeah, because because print killed it in every other avenue. Yeah. So was that a was that a Rick Riley thing or was a print thing? But I it wasn't even whether or not Skipper was right. The lesson was.

sharing your strategy in a very clever way where you would gain allies for a decision at the time that was very controversial internally because on-air people are maybe the pettiest people ever and if somebody comes in from the outside and he was going to surpass so many different people salary wise people were just going to be pissed because that's what happens yeah no i know i remember um

Well, that was a fun one. I, by the way, Rick Riley's girlfriend, wife, whoever she was, she was very nice. I don't want to get in trouble now if they're still together. It was also 20 years ago. Who cares? Uh, all right. That's it. So you got two podcasts this week, next week. Uh, we have something fun for the Sunday episode and then, uh, then we're in the home stretch here. Good to see you. Thanks for coming to Boston.

Uh, yeah, no, thanks for having me. The Goodwill hunting thing was awesome. It was, you guys are so good. You should see our, ah, you fit in great. It was a really fun one. No, I was really good on the pod. I'm not being humble. I'm just saying you three are also very good. Thank you. See you next week.

All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Ryan Masillo. Thanks to Chris Vernon for joining us. Thanks to Saruti and Gahal and Kyle. As always, don't forget, you can watch this on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. You can always watch it as a video podcast on Spotify. New rewatchables coming tomorrow. Good Will Hunting, Prestige TV podcast, White Lotus episode seven is up. And last but not least, the Zach Lowe show is coming. So get ready to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Very excited about that.

We will see him on this podcast on Tuesday. Must be 21 plus and president select states for Kansas and affiliation with Kansas star casino or 18 plus and president DC gambling problem. Call 100 gambler, visit rg-help.com call 1-887-897-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat.

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