2026 Finals Lessons, Giannis’s Next Stop, Brunson’s Apex, and Mike Brown’s Magic Touch With Doc Rivers

The Bill Simmons podcast is brought to you by PayPal. We are also brought to you by the Ringer podcast network, where you can find the new episode of the rewatchables. You put it up, uh, Sunday night, hand that rocks the cradle part of From Hell Month. The next one is going to be domestic disturbance with John Travolta and Vince Vaughn. This movie is really something. It's on Netflix right now. If you want to go check it out. Don't forget our basketball and soccer coverage. I'm loving the World Cup. The World Cup has been fantastic. You can check out the beautiful pod with Adam Friedland and Chris Ryan has been popping on there a bunch. We've had a whole bunch of fun guests. That's on Adam's feed Ringer gambling show as well. A lot of good gambling tips. I'm going to have the bundle on I think at the end of the week to talk, uh, even, even more soccer. Try to get some tips before we have this amazing USA game on, uh, on Friday. I can't wait for that. All right. Well, he came here for a game or didn't come here, but we did a podcast together after game one. Have not talked to him since the finals. Just a lot of big historical stuff coming from that finals, a lot of strategy stuff. We had to talk, Yannis, um, what we think is going to happen in the summer with all different teams. Favorite players, refs, all kinds of things from his last season with the bucks. And, uh, and he came over, which was great. So we're going to take a break, Pearl Jam. And then in the house, back reverse next, this episode of the Bill Simmons podcast is presented by PayPal. You know, a clutch move and you see one, a no look pass, a buzzer beater, a big steal. Well, imagine if you're wallet could pull off moves like that. That my friends is PayPal right now. You can find offers from hundreds of brands like Sony, all birds and viator and save offers before you check out earn unlimited rewards, plus you can add those rewards on top of credit card points. Now that is clutch. Download the PayPal app today, save those offers, start scoring rewards terms and exclusions apply. PayPal.com/rewardsterms, credit card points, subject to issuers, terms and conditions. All right, Doc Rivers is here in studio. We've never had this. This is great. Look at this. This is nice. This is got posters, people you played with in the J.A.F. session. Yeah. I see Austin cover up here, which I was telling my son, Austin Rivers, his name, Matthew Plays-Marco. Jim Burr. You, did you have a Nike poster or no? Combo. No. I had a reboot poster. Yeah. Yeah. I got to get that. Maybe I got to hunt that day. I have to get that again. Talk about, but let's do finals because you never talked about that. So we're big picture, levitating over everything. What do you think? What was your big takeaway from that series? I wanted more. It was the first take. It was an interesting bill. I played for the NICS and I played for the Spurs. And so I caught myself going back and forth. I was a NIC longer, so probably lean more that way, but I just wanted more basketball. And it got to the point. My son Spencer said it because he was cheering for the Spurs because when he grew up, he was living in San Antonio. Right. So he's cheering for the Spurs and he says, I don't want any more basketball. And I said, what? He's like, I can't take them doing the same thing every game. Gary Okie. Getting out to a lead, losing the lead. Here comes Brunswick. Here comes down the stretch of the game. But let's take a snapshot of the whole series. There was a lot of interesting things that happened to me. Obviously, the Wimby turnover, the pass, game two. But I thought where the game and the series change was Ather, game three. Ather? San Antonio. San Antonio one. San Antonio one. And Mike Brown walked into the media room and complained about files. And I thought, I didn't think it at the time. I thought it was a brilliant thing to do. I don't think that's why he was doing it, or maybe he was. But if you look from that point on, how it was called against him, Bronson, like game five and 18 free throws. The comeback game, and I talked about this with you, where everybody missed in my opinion, who I didn't even talk about, was Castle got in file trouble right before the second quarter. They had to take them out. That's when Bronson got cooking. He picks up his fourth two or three minutes into the third quarter. It was two minutes there. Yeah. So now he's off the floor again. It comes back in. It picks up his fifth. And so Bronson, that whole 29 point stretch, did it without happening to deal with Castle. And I thought that was huge for the Knicks and for Bronson. And I then I felt like it affected Castle and game five. It is bad in game five. It was like he lost his mojo. Yeah. And defensively, you know, all series against Oklahoma against everybody. You've been able to be physical and been up. And now he was thinking about it. You could see he was worried about you. Look at those last two drives by Bronson, that they hadn't done that all series. Yeah. They wouldn't let them do it. They weren't going to let them just go down the lane because they're more physical on them. But they were concerned about files where I thought, you know, you always go, well, what could Mitch had done. And listen, if I was coaching this first, I wouldn't have thought of this either at the time because it wouldn't have been on my mind. We just want a game. But if you watch the series, who was filed the most, Bronson or Wimbee? Wimbee. Yeah. Probably Wimbee at least even, right? But no one said anything about it. You know, and the difference was Wimbee was filed more off the ball. Every time he cut, every time he moved, I mean, they were they were forming them. They were hitting them. Even the alleged flagrant file that Wimbee really was just pushing down on Bronson. Yeah. He was pushing down on him because Bronson was grabbing his jersey and he turned around. It was like, get off of me, you know, so it looked battered and worse than what it really was. Right. All right. So, but I really thought that's where that series changed. And then San Antonio's inability, we talked about this in game one, I think. If he came down to a one minute game, the mixture going to win. Yeah, even in game five, but when it got to 83, 83, it's like, yeah, this is done. And nothing, San Antonio really could have done about it because the nicks know exactly who they are. Yeah. The last five minutes of a game, they know exactly what they're running. They know exactly who they're running it through with Bronson. They may change the guy who said to pick. They use the put towns in the parking lot because now you've just taken the center guarding him outside the paint. I like that phrase. Yeah. And so now you're left. If you go, you're leaving a great three point shooter. Yeah. So I thought every game in those five games the last four or five minutes, it was this veteran team that also had a closer. Yeah. Remember, he'd be brown. I remember when I was first our coaching and I was one of the things he told me, he's like, if you don't have a closure doc, I don't care how good your team is, he said, it's just like a company. Yeah. You don't have a closure in your company that can, that can close the deal. You are going to lose the deal. And that's what it felt like now, well, ironically, the closer for San Antonio is Harper. Yeah. And they didn't. Yeah. But they didn't want to admit he had, he probably wasn't 100% ready. Yeah, he wasn't ready for even though they use them more in game five. He had a couple of big plays down the trail. He missed the layup. Yeah. Yeah. Mr. Layup though. But Fox has been a great closer. Yeah. Not five of closures over the last four or five years, every year, he lost his confidence of, I don't know if he lost his, he definitely lost something. I thought he lost his health first and then confident second, you know, there wasn't the explosiveness getting in the basket in the same way. No. And then that him getting in the basket then allows him to do that little turnaround eight foot shot that he's great at. Well, you also all plays off each other. You didn't hear one time Mike brain or legs or any of them say Fox is the fastest guy in NBA. That's something you hear right. All right. That's where it was two years ago. Right. You didn't hear one time. And, you know, maybe the, the, the sprain ankle had some impact on him. It definitely had on the shooting. I thought what Mitch ran was terrific. They got that shot, even in the game five, he came off that little, we, we call it shake special. He played it. I run. It's a secondary second pick and row. When we, D H O's, the guard comes off, Fox got to his bread basket. I mean, the right where he wanted and it wasn't close. Right. And then he had the wide open three. So I never thought his shots were going in when it mattered, which is a bad way to get to that point. Yeah. That's not good. Yeah. It really did get to that point. Where is OG? Every shot I thought was going in. Yeah. - Still going in. - Even the bad shots. - Yeah. - You thought we're going in? going in. Uh, it's amazing what a series can do. Um, you know, but like for Mitch, what that puts a coach in a tough spot, you've had a, you had this closer. It has been reliable. He's been reliable for you. Yeah. Uh, in game seven, no, Oklahoma, he made every shot. Right. So you don't go away from it. You know, you, you keep going to it and, and, and give Mitch credit. He did, but it just kept coming up some guys. Right. I mean, over and over again, you know, and Wimby is going to learn a lot. Now, you'll learn a lot from this series. Someone was, was talking to a difference from him and Jabbar. And I said, well, uh, Jabbar was still in college at that age. Right. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and Wimby's in the game seven of NBA finals. So let's give him a great spirit. I do think it's a real issue that he can't seem to play more than 30 minutes. Well, I think he's, he's, he's like staggering around in these games. No, he's got a 40 plus. But I think it's a lead problem as much as a, a Wimby problem. Um, I think what the league does more is we, we give these minutes all year, but out to thought of ramping guys up as the playoffs gets closer and closer. Um, you know, who didn't do that was tips. No, tips ramped up from the start. And by the way, it may be I had a good email from a mail back pot. I did the other day about. Tips kind of conditioned these guys to go these big minutes and carry this big load. Yeah, it's not, it wasn't something that they didn't expect. Yeah, didn't want. But let me say this, players want to play. Right. Players don't actually want to sit. Players are told to sit. And then they are now in this culture where they accept what the trainers are telling them. I came from the culture. We wasn't listening to the trainer. You know, we told the trainer, like if the, if I came to a game and Joel, too, was my trainer with the Atlanta Hawks. Yeah. And Joe said, Doc, I think you should sit. I would sit out here. Right. And that was it. That was the conversation. There was no more. But think about how much you were making in the Hawks compared to what these guys make now. These are like these. Yeah. Look at $50,000,000 in the progress. Look at me walking. I should have listened to Joe. I should have listened to Joe more. That's a fact. But I do think they are more careful because not only are they paying a ton of money for the best players, but if something goes wrong with one of the best players, you almost, you don't have an out. Like looking at you with your honest system. Yeah. But you don't want your season single-handedly that you didn't want. Well, that's because we didn't have a second guy. Right. You know, team. But most teams don't. Most teams do. You know, if if Brunson went out, they still have towns and other guys. You know, but you're not going to win it. No, you're not going to win it. If your best guy is out of the playoffs, you may make a run. We made a run in, you know, and I, but you're not winning it. And where it always comes up when you have a guy out, is that game one through five if you can get there? It's game six and seven. Right. Those are the games that are almost unwinnable for you. That happened to Oklahoma City. Yeah, because they didn't have that extra guy. It was obvious. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so, so when be part of this, so you think like he doesn't have the signature shot yet. That's it. He's now dealing with this. I love the shot he missed in game two. Which one? The one at the elbow. That was a pick and roll pop right to the elbow. That's his, that's his breath. Yeah. What are his spots going to be? Yeah. That's the elbow will be one for sure. Yeah. Like top of the foul line. Yeah. Because it's how it seems like he has a lot of trouble getting to the block. Like Cream would, he would do that weird thing where he would kind of back in and take these little weird steps and then all of a sudden he was in a spot. Okay. We got to a spot. And then the jump hook. I mean, there's a sky hook. No one's ever going to have that shot. If we can develop a sky hook, the game's over for everybody. How about, can we get a jump hook? Everybody in the league has a jump hook. So I, I was on the phone with about four or five coaches a day before yesterday. And we were just talking about the game. Right. And what would each guy do with maybe one of the guys that you know, everybody's home at the back to the basket. The only thing with back to the basket is, yeah, we'll throw it to you and they're going to trap you. And then you have to give it up. Yeah. And he said, no one is talking about Jack Sigma. And he's like, what if when we just face Sigma? What if he face you? And if you don't, what can you do? Well, that was the old Tim Duncan. Yeah. Just face you off. He from the basket. And just shoot it. Like on the post turned face. Shoot it. If they come up on you, put it on the floor. You know, I think that's a move he will have to develop. I remember sitting with pop and watching Wimbee practice is rookie year because I was on TV. And that's too much. And I actually said it and pop's like, thank you. Thank I said, why is he fading? Well, that was the little chamberlain problem. Yeah, just go up and shoot. Right. No, why are you going back? Yeah. No one's going to block your shot. And also he's a great free throw shoot. Right. So that's the difference. He can really shoot the ball. And it's a balance issue at times with him. You could see his off balance a lot. You know, that may be strength. That may be balance and fatigue and fatigue. Yeah. Yeah. So what KG had, he had the little turn around. Yes. Near the baseline. But then I always liked when he faced up. And he would do like the stutter step stop. Yeah. And he encounters everything. Yeah. Wimbee, what do you do? The great great guy for Wimbee to work with. They have the same type of intensity. Right. But KG's like a much taller Wimbee. Yeah. KG's workouts were amazing. I mean, he used to put these shoes on the floor, which has a coach I had never seen. Yeah. We used cones. He would actually put two shoes and make them face like the player because he said I want to attack the feet. So he would just he would stand there and he moved the shoes over and attack that. Then he put the two shoes over and attacked that. It was genius. So he would always look at the feet over anything else. Yeah. He wanted to attack the feet. And he's interesting. He would teach guys. He saw one foot just turned, say he's dead. He knew exactly what he was going to attack. So it's pretty impressive. I remember there was the Dave DeBoucher thing where he always looked at the guys eyes. Yeah. And he wouldn't he said everybody who is about to shoot looks at the rim no matter what they're doing. Eventually, they're going to look at the rim. Well, they have to. And that's what I know. And he was like the only guy who never did it was a Roman row. All of a sudden he was shooting and it was like you were looking over there. That's pretty impressive. But he said that was the only one. Yeah. But he was like I always followed the eyes. That's why he was so good defensively. So KG's looking at the feet. He just look. He's got the ball looking at he squares up and he looks at your feet. Yeah, even if Wembee had the Tim Duncan face up KG kind of starter step stop and he's shooting over you. And then just like a seven foot jump hook. Yeah, but even more shots than he has now. Yeah, but just the face up to me is because you can't double team him. He sees you coming. He will pick you apart. You know, and I think that's one thing they'll do and and and then more work at the elbows because I thought he was very efficient there most of the season. And it just seemed like they got away from him. But I felt the physicality in the in the fatigue played a major factor. Well, they were doing a bunch of stuff for them too. Like on box outs, they were like ramming them in the back. They hit him every chance they got you have to the other thing they did that Oklahoma didn't do. They attacked Wembee. Yeah. Yeah. All three of the playoffs, no one attacked Wembee. They played away from Wembee. The next like we're going to right after you. We're going to attack you. We're going to make you follow us. We're going to make you move your feet. I thought that was a great game plan. And it felt like Brunson kind of figured him out as the series went along a little bit because he really touched him. It's crazy that when you look at it, Brunson versus Wembee and Brunson gets 18 inch difference. Brunson is figuring anything out. Yeah. Yeah. It's unbelievable. Brunson, I tell you, man, every time you watch him, you get more and more impressed with him. I think you still watch him waiting for him not to be able to do what he does. You know, I think the whole league for two years or what he can't keep doing this. He can't. And he can. It's who he is. Yeah. He almost feels like he's like a heat check guy. Yeah. All game. Yeah. And just like he's going, you know, the 45. I mean, come on. He scored half the team's points. Like he willed a game for the New York Knicks the Winter World Championship. Yeah. So I did a pot on Monday and I was, you know, my book of basketball where I ranked everybody. Yeah. And the big thing for the rankings was we the best guy in a title team. Did you read the alpha? Did you take a take a team to the promise land, which I just think is a different level of basketball. It is. So I had I put Brunson. I put him a bunch. I changed my list and I put him 41 and I put him ahead of guys like Nash and Kid and Luca. And I'm like, this is the whole point of basketball is to be the best guy in a title team and to do this stuff that he did in game one of the Cleveland series throughout the finals, especially game five, which I think is in the running for one of the best finals games played this century. Yeah. So I, you know, he's never been I'm supposed to be a guy, but I feel like he has to be treated that way now. I think he will be. Yeah. It's almost like the voters didn't believe either. You know, I didn't vote for him. I voted for him. Second team. Yeah, they don't believe. Even though his team's record is great. He keeps doing the same thing about 29 points of game in four playoffs. Now. Yeah, this is a four year stretch where those are Shay stats, those are Kobe stats, so everybody's that other than Michael. Those are all the other great players. the other thing I keep saying it and I'm going to say it until the cows, you know, whatever to come in or whatever they're supposed to do. We don't evaluate what a great player is right in my opinion. I was so excited to talk to you about this. Yes, because winning and leading is part of that. And if you can't do that, then really all you're doing is playing your game. And you're putting up stats. Yes. You know, I got to play my game. Well, winners play their game and they give room for everybody else on their team to play their game and they encourage. They do all the things that are required. Right. More than just score 30 points. You know, they lead, they push, you know, Michael push. He pushed his teammates, but he also trusted, you know, two of the games, two of the series they won came off of Michael Jordan Bass. You know, he was willing to make the right play. It was 11 assists a game in the 91 finals. Exactly. So he was willing to make the right play at the right time. And Brunson let their team to an NBA title. He didn't just play his team to an NBA title. Well, and that's part of the problem. And I was really interested to see how people would react when I was like, this is where Brunson is now. Yeah. This is my system. I did this when Dwayne Wade won in 06, when Walton won in 77. Like, if you do this once, that's more important than what you did for 15 years if you, you know, you made some conference finals and that's it. This is the whole point of playing basketball. Because basketball is not boxing. It's a team game. Yeah. And you have to win to be considered a great player. Well, think about what Paul Pierce would owe it meant. Yeah. They're all sitting on straight up and on. There are some guys that never had talent around it. It's a small pool. Well, I always use Barkley as the example. Right. To me, I don't hold no title against Barkley because I feel like in 93, he was, he went against the best part of all time at the peak of his power. And he never had telling around him until he got to Phoenix. Right. And Kevin Johnson let him down the first half of that finals. I don't have a chance. But they, no offense. They're plenty of bulls that went in that series in any way or form. They were just not, you know, the bulls were the better team. I thought the nicks were the better team that year, really. You want me to be honest. But I was on the nicks. And remember, yeah. That, that still bothers me, you know, that, that lost to the bulls. We're up to, oh. And then, well, Jordan put the double neck on you in game three, right? Game four, one of the game three, the media. And I like that. I don't know if we've talked about this. Yeah. Game three. What happened with the media? It was, I want to say a three or four day break between game two and three, which allowed them to kind of. Captured themselves a little bit. But more importantly, the media beat up Jordan every day because they saw that he was at a casino. Right. And for four days or three days, whatever it was. Jordan is sitting at home hearing that he let his team down. Does he care anymore? Yeah. What's wrong with the guy gambling? Yeah. No. And, yeah, Jordan happened from that point on. I think one of the toughest things with the valuating bet. So I look at that nicks team. And it basically comes down to that, the Charlottesmith sequence, right? Yeah. And you could blame. Okay. Charlottesmith should have scored. Maybe you should have added a slightly better poor than Charlottesmith. Or, you go the other way and go, this is why the bulls are so great. They protected the rim and they had no center out there. And those guys were so great in the moment. That's what made that team special. That's the difference. Yeah. It's not that Charlottesmith missed the three layups. I lost BJ. I'm strong late in the game and he got a three. You know, it's a play we worked on all the time that you had to. You know, block out, but not get sealed. And I had to block out. I think it was horns grant. And as I was blocking them out, I got too low. And now he seals me in that I couldn't get back on the ball swing and BJ makes a three. I think we missed two technical foul free throws in that game. I always took the, I was the best free throw shooter on the team. I think I played, I'm going to go look now that I'm thinking about it. I think I played 38 minutes, the 37 minutes. Both texts were in the time and I was out of the game. And so whoever shot him, missed them. So it was all like it was like 10 little tiny things. Yeah, it's always. And Michael Jordan. But at the end of the day, who was our second best player? Yeah. I'm not sure. Starks was by the way he played, but he wasn't really the second best player every night. They had Pippin, you know, it was clear who their second best. So they was one of the seven best guys in the league. Exactly. So when you make that case, it's hard to say that you would have won, but I think we would have. We had a chance. I mean, San Antonio was a little like that too, right? Yeah. Who was their second best player? Well, it was Fox all year. But it might have been Harper by the time I got to the title by game seven, but by game. Game five. Game three. It was Fox. Yeah. It's something with Fox. I mean, it was Harper. It was something with Harper that he would make a mistake and come out and go back in. So, you know, there's a disorder added. You don't know a player until you coach a player. There's something that he was doing that made him come out at times. And I couldn't figure it out. Interesting. Yeah. So he's a 20 year old point guard. Yeah, that's part of it. You were a point guard. Yeah. And he's like me too, because a hundred times better than me. But I wasn't a point guard in college. Yeah. I just led the team and assist. Yeah. And then when I got drafted, I remember my first conversation with my fatel. I said, you're going to be the point guard or the line of hawks. And I'm like, okay. You figured out. It's like Dennis Johnson. Oh, exactly. But if we didn't have even the 80s, we didn't have some traditional point cards like the way people think of them. Well, we had some. That guy could bring up the ball. I think I was. Well, then you would have the Isaiah John Lucas. I mean, he's a special basketball player. And he will be their second best player. Like I was trying to think of him in the context of when like Kate came into the league or Chris Paul. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. I think Harper is that and probably didn't execute things properly all the time. You know, but he'll learn all that. I mean, he is special. He's a special basketball player. Like I was trying to think of him in the context of. Yeah. Like that where you knew right away. I feel like that with him. Yeah. Harper. Yeah. But they're completely different. I mean, Harper's a score. Yeah. He's a scoring point. Reminding me more of Roch Strickland. What is finishing? Ooh. I mean, he can. Harper finishes at angles. You know, I think it was game five, the one where he was under a basket and come to the verse. Yeah. Come on. I couldn't have made that in a gym by myself. Right. I could have tried that shot 10 times. I'm missing it all 10 times. He's doing it in the NBA finals with ease. You know, it's amazing. And now it's time for a cross. The errors brought to you by new era, the official cap of the NBA. So we just had the finals. And as always, I thought a lot about history and the errors intersecting. And some of the greatest matchups we've seen throughout history. The new era NBA hardwood classics collection celebrates these legendary teams and errors in moments. So perfect time to put the finals matchup side by side with a classic from the past. Gotta talk about Reggie Miller here. Like we think about new era. Players that bridge 80s, 90s, 2000s, Reggie Miller drafted in the 80s. Really starts to hit it in the 90s. First there, I think it was 91. He's in the Larry Bird's last great moment. The 91 Boston and Anna final first round. And then we go through. Now he has the Knicks battles in 94 and 95. And then you go to 99. They get the heartbroken biologist. 4 point play 2000. They make the finals. And it really feels like Reggie's going to finally get there and win it. And then sadly for him, Kobe ascends. And then not to mention in 98, they came the closest out of anyone to beating Jordan's bulls. So he intersects with Bird, Jordan, Kobe and Shaq. And then you go into the 2000s and he has one last run. Like they almost beat the Nets. He's not involved in the art test mainly, but he's on that team. He just saw a lot of things, man. And the best of the sports, totally different by the time. By the time he's he's leaving there in the mid 2000s. Because this three point shot that he was special at. Now it's about to come back in a big way. Jeff Curry is about to join the NBA and the league and the geometry league is about to change. So Reggie Miller is a good one. 80s all the way through the mid 2000s and boom sports changing. Relive vintage logos and timeless icons with the NBA. I'm sorry with the new era NBA hardwood classics collection. Available in a wide range of silhouettes, including the iconic fitted 5950. Or adjustables like the 940 of frame and 970. And some great hardwood classics in peril as well. Visit new era cap dot com to shop now. Use one time code ringer for 20% off your first order. So you talk about like the little differences between teams. Like so I went to the bird Dominique game, which you were great in. You got you got a standing up. when you fell out. Yeah, that was cool. That was the crack. I appreciate it, dude. That was the breaking point for me with Boston. That was it. You were like, I like these people. Yeah, I hate it. Boston. Yeah, when we appreciated it. And that changed my entire mindset of Boston. I love these people. These people are pretty cool. Well, so Dominique at one point, he's number two in MVP. Yeah. He's one of the five or six best players in the league for five years. And that's like his moment to either ascended out of sand, right? And birds like just a whiff better than him. Yeah. Partly because Dominique, I wouldn't say was the strongest defender, right? And you didn't have that. Maybe if you're doing it now, it was a different guy as a bird. We called it. He was an occasionally great defender. They were sporadic. Yeah. I remember for telling us and occasionally, Dominique is the greatest defender in the league. Right. We just need that to be more. Well, but I think, but he has a score, but he's a, well, that's the thing. He's carrying a lot offensively. And he comes, so and that's the closest he ever comes, right? And then you go back to the Lakers, who ended up taking worthy over him. Yeah. And where the ends up in all these games and he's big game James and he has the big game seven and 88. And Dominique's on this other team where he has a much bigger bird. And if you flip them, you don't know. You don't know. But I mean that Tracey McGrady made that comment like that. If I was on the Lakers, I would have, and I said, no, you just don't. But think about Dominique on the showtime Lakers, that might have been like pretty spectacular. It would have been fun for sure. But he also wouldn't have been able to guard bird. Yeah. And I don't know what you would know. Yeah. But it been interesting. I love doing that. Like if such and such was here, would he had won as much or won last one more? Yeah. I think it's hard to say. Like Tom Chambers is another one. Yes. Who is really good. It's like if he had just been on the Lakers instead of worthy, would we be talking about him reverentially is one of the best forwards in the helps. I mean magic was again, the reason magic. I struggle taking magic out of the top five of all time. He's fifth for me. Yeah. Because of not what he did is his presence. He made, I mean, he resurrected Kareem Abdul Bar's career and his love for basketball. Yeah. He gone from the Lakers for losing games, not playing well. I don't know if you remember their first game was against the Clippers. Yeah. Yeah. And the hug game and the hug game. Yeah. I mean, I think that changed Jabars second half of its life basketball wise. And it was huge. I forget who said this on my podcast. I'm going to say it was Nick Wright, but I'm not positive. It was recent. Certain players love playing basketball because they love playing basketball. And then certain players play because they absolutely love winning and want to win all the time. And magic was one of the few who was both at the same time. We love basketball, but he also really, really loved winning. Yeah. I don't know. It's fun to imagine going into my rookie year, they used to have that barnstorming tour in Michigan. Right. And I was included in that. Yeah. We would go and sell out like a little enlancing and then after the game. And I'm not being honest. The gate, they would bring the gate in the cash. And Charles Tucker would, you know, to say, for God's father, it'd be 10 for magic. Yeah. Five for Isaiah. One dollar for dog. And it was, it was unbelievable. Yeah. But I remember going to Magic's house. Yeah, we're sitting there and magic was out. I want to say his plan marker, Gwire, tennis in the backyard. And I'm just sitting there. Isaiah was playing marker, Gwire and tennis. No, no magic was. Magic was playing market magic had a tennis court in the back of his house. Okay. And we're just, you know, we're not watching the game. We're sitting in the house, you know, drinking Kool-Aid or whatever you're just hanging out. And I was in magic, bust the door open, the throws a racket across the room and just walked and leaves. And I'm like, what the, what's going on here? And he lost. He lost, he lost, he lost the tennis match. And I want to say, wherever we're supposed to go that night, he didn't want to go. I mean, he, I was like, this guy didn't like lose it. What's that KG was like that right? The practices. Oh, yeah. KG, you know what's great about KG? He loved the competition in practice, but he also loved when the other team was into it. You know, that first practice we had, we lost, the starters lost. And the whole bus ride, you know, we were in Rome. Yeah. The whole bus ride, Eddie House, Tonya, they're giving it to him. Just giving it to him. And Cap was like, all right, yeah, okay. That next day, it was, it was incredible. The energy that he brought to that practice. That was one of the days of two tips. It was like, we're going to be hard to beat. What? Speaking of tips, they just win the title of the year after he gets five. Yeah, that's tough. Do you take that as a positive or negative if your tips? Because I got a great email a couple of days ago from a listener who's like, tips conditioned these guys in a lot of different ways. And like, you should get some credit for this. A lot of credit defensively. You know, they didn't vary from that sense than the system. Brindinal Connor was my assistant coach. Yeah. In Boston and with the Clippers is who Mike Brown hired as his defensive coach this year. And that's, we are from the, the, um, Dick Harder system of defense. So he brought that to the next. It was already kind of in. Brandon made a lot of changes, but, you know, it was pretty cool. Haven't said that, Bill, you're a human. All right. And if, if I was fired, um, and then team one, the world championship, the following year, uh, I get, I would know deep down that I really helped that team. Um, but it wouldn't feel that way as you're actually. And I think Tim's was very happy for a lot of their guys. Yeah. Uh, probably not all of them, but for a lot of their guys. But it also, it hurts you too. It's just human, man. Uh, we forget that we're all humans. And that would hurt, that would hurt a little bit for sure. Where would you put Jalen Brunson again? It's like Isaiah and some of the other Chris Paul, some of the other tough little guys. We, we had that, uh, well, I think, you know, and that nothing against Chris, I think you would just put him against all the guys who have won titles. Yeah, yeah. I think you would have to shorten that list. Uh, it, that becomes a much shorter list. That's basically Isaiah, Tony Parker. That's exactly right. Yeah. That's, uh, that's, that's who you have to put him against, you know, um, because he powered them. Uh, you say Gus Williams. Good call. Yeah. Gus Williams. I apologize to him on my Monday podcast because I forgot to mention him in the great small guards because he always gets left out. Well, he was the best guy in the next nine sonics. What about who's who's never won a title without Russell though? Yeah, that's true. Um, and Russell was the best player on the team. Uh, yeah. Good point. Cause yeah, he was close, close, close Russell showed up. Lot of easier than Russell. So I would start with that list. Yeah. First, and then you can go back to the other guards because Brunson was so much different. Like all the small guards would have really struggled guard Brunson. That, that, I mean, all of them, now he would have struggled guarding him as well. Cause one of the things, so I did my thing yesterday and I had him ahead of Luca all time and right now, I had a Laker fan who was like, that's insane. Like Lucas, Lucas 33 and nine and I'm like, yeah, but the whole point of ask was winning the title. Luca was in a similar situation in the 24 finals right against Boston. They're down two, oh, game three. And then he has that whole thing where he kind of kind of implodes and fouls out and then tells him to challenge it. And it's like, if that's part of it, Bill, like, do you have the makeup to win? That's what I was talking about. Like missing. If you, so you're telling me if you switch Luca and Brunson, the next one, the title of Luca, or you discounting all the other stuff, Brunson did for that. No, I would say no, they wouldn't, at least from what I've seen so far. Yeah, I love Luca. Right. He's just not there yet. Not yet. You know, and, you know, health conditioning could look at sustain that type of intensity for that long. I don't know if he could have couldn't, but I know Brunson could. And there's something and there's something about whatever Brunson did with that team that the guys around him were the best versions of themselves, which I think his should count as a trait for basketball players. That's what the KG was great at. It's what Casey Jones told me that we're sitting around in my office one day and I said, so what was, what was Bill Russell's secret? He always left for him. That's what he said. He's like, he knew for him to be great. He had to give everybody else enough room to be great as well. What would you keep hearing it so often by players? I got, you know, they got let me play my game. Okay, we will, but that means he can't play his game. If you're going to be dribbling the ball, or he can't play his game. And so I'll let you play your game, but we're going to lose. Right. Or can you play your game and allow him to play his game and him to play his game in your team win? Because if you can't do that, if you think the only way you can win is just with you with the ball in your hand every possession. He had a lot of people think that, but it hasn't happened. It's in the history of the game. Right. It's never happened. It has never happened in the history of basketball that a guy, every time down, just dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, either shot it or passed it. No one's ever won that way. So, I mean, I love history. Right. And even one person was [BLANK_AUDIO] playing that way. Yeah. It was more because he kind of had to for like nine straight minutes or they weren't going to score. Yeah, but they also moved the ball. They advanced the ball. They got it back to fast break points, but down the stretch, they went to that. Yeah. Other parts they went away from that. They what they did a great job of they knew when it was too much Bronson. And what Mike did so well this year is he instilled the ball movement, you know, playing through towns, even without towns, just moving the ball. Where in the past, they hadn't done that. It just stayed in Bronson's hand. It's almost like they had a little barometer. Uh-oh. It's too much. And they got away from it. And then they would go back to it. So I thought that was the different thing. The other thing with Mike Brown, he used the hell out of his bench. Right. He really did. I thought I thought Mike Brown coach an amazing series. Even his challenges, well, the nicks have the best challenge system in NBA. It's one game. They know challenges. It's funny. They'll build people think it's the coach. It goes. They had coach has very little to do. It's some dude that he trust completely on the bench. And the nicks, I think two or three years in a row have led the NBA in challenges. It's a weapon. Right. And they're good at it. They're quick. You know, I remember we played them last year. And I was like, do they have a quicker computer? I mean, what the hell's going on? But the guy actually also understood, you have to understand the rules. You have to understand the rules to be a good challenger. Was that a foul before the play? Why use your time out now? You know, is this the right time? Even if you're right. They had one in game one or two, but they were right. They knew it, but they didn't challenge because they already had one challenge that they won. And they were like, no, this isn't the perfect time for us to use the second one. If we use the second one now, we're done. And they end up using it in a third or fourth quarter, where it came back to really help them. So, yeah, they're really good at it. But what else might did was that bench, man. What I want to do what he did without towns, basically playing half the game and just figuring out how to patch together non-towns minutes so they could hang around. And impressive. He had the courage. He had more courage than I did as a coach in bigger games. Like, what do you mean? Well, he was putting in guys that he hadn't played. You know, that was something you just wouldn't do. No, no, no, unless the guy has proven it all year, you know. But, you know, he puts in different guys that, you know, he went away from Duke's. Duke's was great. He should have. Duke's in the finals could make a shot. He could make a shot. So then he goes to Sham. I love that one. Then he goes to courty. Yeah, hook 40 out of nowhere. Yeah. And then he goes to Clarkson. Yeah, right? Right. Clarkson hadn't played throughout the series. Yeah. Game four of the comeback. He stays with Avarado. Yeah. He stays with him. You know, now I did that. You remember we won the one game where I didn't bring in Paul or none of the big three. It was the big baby Nate Robinson. 2009. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that group. Yeah. And we won. I think it was a finals game maybe with that group on the floor. But I had played them all year. So I did have more confidence in them. But he had gone away from Clarkson all year. You know, it's funny. He did put them in the NBA cup game, if you remember. Yeah. He hadn't used them in Clarkson came in and played great. But even in that game, the cup game against the Spurs, Tyler Colick, he put them in and he played great. So I loved him. Mike kept trusting everybody. I thought that was really impressive. It's funny. He got fired three times, four times. Yeah. It's called recently in his sacrament. It's got coaching. Right. And then meanwhile, all the other coaches like Mike Brown's a really good coach. Yeah. And then finally he's in the right spot. Now it's like, I've always thought of innovations and restaurants. Yeah. Now he can't. He'll never have to pay for another meal. Did that happen to you after '08 when you're walking in restaurants in Boston? Still the us. You know, because they had equipped. He walked into the polo lounge in New York. Yeah. If it just started standing up and doing this. Yeah. But right after I remember us walking in me and Sam Kaseo and it was a little uncomfortable. Yeah. You know, walking a restaurant and people stand up and try to pay. You had no chance of paying. I did like that. I'm known for being a little tight. So I absolutely love that part. Yeah. Yeah, because the results were 22 years. This was 53. Yeah. But it had a little bit of the same stuff of like, you know, a lot of losing. A lot of like, I remember back when we were good. And now we're not. Yeah. And you know, Boston's fans now have gone through so much winning. You know, when I when I get upset when we're bouncing back. When I got the Boston the Red Sox had one in a thousand years. Yeah. Patriots had one. The Bruins had one. The Celtics had one. Then all of a sudden we're all winning. And I just always think back to man, there's a kid that's seven years old that thinks, this is how it is. Right. That's selling from the Celtics. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Suns all day. They were born like right when when Brady showed up. They were. Yeah. They were born at the perfect time in Boston. They think winning is like they're entitled. Yeah. 13 titles. I don't know. However many years that was one thing I'm Brunson. So I was arguing with a look of a look of friend of mine. And we started talking about Hardin's like and right. You know, I know you don't like Hardin. There's just no way Hardin was worse than Brunson. Like you have Hardin has to be above Brunson. I'm like, all right. You make the case. So it makes the case. It's like you win the MVP. You know, it's 36 points of game. We're like arguing back and forth about it. And I was like, all right, I hear everything. Give me your best Hardin here in 2018. It's like 2018. I'm like, all right, take 2018 Hardin and put him on this next team. Do you think they win the title? And he goes, well, but that's and I was like, that's your answer. That's the answer. That's your answer. That's why Brunson has to be ahead of Hardin. That is the absolute. You just already started stammering and making excuses. Yeah. It's the answer that we should all go by. Right. You know, there's a lot of players, you know, James is a phenomenal player. In my top 50, I still think the best part of his game he doesn't like as much as I love the point guard put. Yeah. I think I think he has as good a vision as anybody that I've seen next to Rondo and Chris. Yeah. And but he could score two and he liked to drive. We like to hope the ball. See, James doesn't give everybody else enough room to be great. Yeah. He is the only one that can be great on his team. You know, he has to be the greatest. Yeah. You know, I don't even think it's a jealousy thing. I really don't. I just think it's the way he plays. And that's how he plays. You know, as he said, he's a system. You know, but that system to me is not the way to win. You know, I still go back. You look with James with us in Philly the first half of the year. Yeah. Uh, he gave himself up to the team. Uh, he was playing unbelievable basketball. And I thought there was nobody better than us. Yeah. And then it kind of changed. You wanted to go back. You could see it slowly. Like he was uncomfortable in that row. One of the things I did like about that soccer, though, he practiced every day. Like it's funny how people don't look at him like that. James Harden loves playing basketball. And he's durable. Uh, very, I totailoo that I said, listen, you're going to need a guy to practice every day. And he's going to play 88s. Like there's something good about that. The bad part is can you win with it. Imagine setting your makeup. Then forgetting it's even theirs. Meet new grippy setting mist from Mavily New York. Jelly mist technology locks in your look for up to 24 hours with flexible all day comfy grip. No tightness, no stickiness, no residue, just plump, dewy, hydrated skin that still feels like your skin. Try new grippy setting mist from Mavily New York. Maybe it's Mavily. The other thing I've been talking to people about is the 10 week playoff run and being durable and actually getting better as those 10 weeks goes along versus going the other way. I think Wendy's a decent example of this, but he's 22. But I think every team does that in every player. Well, you want what you want is that grind is so hard and you got to keep climbing the rungs and some guys can't do it. And even LeBron in 2011, like by the time we got to the finals against Dallas, like he cratered. Yeah, you need to learn how to win. He had to learn how to win. He hadn't figured it out yet. I thought LeBron's growth where he became one of the best all time was between 11 and 12. Yeah, right. And I thought inside that you were in the you were part of the shrapnel. But I remember we played them in a game, maybe a preseason game. And he was calling out the sets. And I remember turning to I think it was Laurence Frank. You're like, I know. This is different. Yeah. He didn't he didn't prepare it before like that. He came out and played. But he was 21 over here. He's going. I was like, wow. Now that's different. And when he started doing that, the other thing I thought Miami, you know, Kevin Gardner and them loved it. I showed a video before game 1 or 2. It was before game 1 when we played, you know, 2012. Yeah, they were the, you know, you know, the big favor. you know, we were old and I showed a video of the Wayne Way Chris Bosch and LeBron before the game doing their they can't shake things after the game they would do it and I said those three guys can that not beat us 12 guys and until they figure out they're going to need those other nine guys we got these guys they can't beat us if you know what you were counting on being up about to go up three two and game five and all your guys talking so much shit to LeBron that he finally said, well, that older guys Paul, Paul gets that the all time bad trash talk story. Well, he probably changed the course of LeBron's career. Yeah, actually, I do think if we had one that series somehow they're about to break them up because they had lost the year before Chris Bosch was gone. At least trade Chris Bosch. Yeah, somebody was gone. I feel the way about the 2016 Cavs if they lose to go and stay. Kevin Lovers out of the next guy. It's amazing. It's amazing how a bounce or something. Right. You know, it was Jeff and Gunny who I think is an excellent coach. Right. But Jeff and Gunny was about to get fired with the nicks and Alan Houston takes a shot. Oh, and I did bounce bounce bounce bounce on a ram and goes that way. If the ball goes this way, Jeff and Gunny fired the box. If Kevin Durant's foot was back this much, they were going to fire butt. Well, I think the 2014 Clippers is a good what if team because you have sterling happening, which is still one of the craziest things that teams ever had to deal with in playoffs. And then just Chris Paul, the safest bet on the planet, just having a complete meltdown in the last minute of game four or game five, whatever. Yeah, you know, it's funny. I thought, I don't know if we would have won it or not, because when you look back, and that's where some of the players can mad at me when I say when you look back on our team, we didn't get along the way we were supposed to to win. And so if that's, if you didn't have great chemistry, it's hard to win. But that year, I thought we kind of had it. Blake and Chris kind of, whatever their stuff was, and that happened before I got there. They kind of moved it to the side. There were so many mistakes and Chris was literally. Chris is the smartest right player that I coached in my career. You know, I think Ronald is the smartest. Who also never made mistakes. He's like the best just turn over and never turn them all over. But, but we're supposed to file out of the time out. His guy got it. He didn't file. He tried to trick the game. That was the one thing that me and him but here it's about all the time. You don't need to trick the game. Oh, the, you remember it's the end of all. And honestly, he did get fouled. Yeah, but they didn't call it. Right. And so Oklahoma gets it and they come back and scores. That was like when Bronson got fouled for 10 seconds left and they didn't call it. They didn't call it. But the ball went to Bridges. Yeah. So that was almost the disaster. It was going to be a disaster. So that's, you know, but man, that changed the fortune of the Clippers. That one game really did. Yeah, you had that one. We've talked about this before on pods. But the, the ones that you almost could have won and two bad things happen are the, are way worse than winning. Well, I've had the, uh, winning is here in the, in the losses. Yeah, the size, yeah, the winning is always, if you win it all, there's nothing that's ever going to beat that except for mentally, you'll also hurt more. Right. You know, you take more about the losses. And I talked about 210 way more than 28. And that's, you're not being like, Oh, remember that O8 the train series. That was great. That's, that's what coaches. I mean, I had the three one lead against the Troy, where we were, we weren't supposed to be in that series. If you ever go back and look at our, the magic team, uh, yeah. And then Tracy McGregor, he stands up. This series is over. Right. You know, I didn't know he said that, but that's, he said it in the media. Nobody should ever say that. Never, never, never. And then think about this. Rick Carlisle got fired because of that series. Yeah. Because Joe Dumas, I guess all years said you got to play this kid named Tasha on Prince. And he didn't play him all year. And then game four, he put him in at the end of the game. And he was phenomenal by game seven. He was their go to guy. I mean, it was crazy. Yeah. And I really believe that's what got Rick fire. Jesus. Yeah. Uh, we were talking on a previous podcast about these teams that got the secret, which like the O4 pistons is a good example. This next team, the 14 spurs. Now, there's other like the O8 Celtics were so talented. It's almost like the talent is getting it. But it was more of the play. Um, we played together. Right. So when do you know that it happens as a coach? Is there a moment there in the season or playoffs with the next state? It was the last 16 games. But that's how it happens most of the time. Like we were not ready to win when the playoffs are. Yeah. People think we were. We went seven games against the Hawks. The first two teams. Yeah. And the second series was Cleveland. It was probably the second best team in the East. Um, another seven game series. Um, where we turned into a championship team was when we lost game two at home against Detroit. And then if that's when when we went to Detroit and won, that was the moment that we went from here to here. And for the next, it was game four Atlanta. Right. When what I think tell people each round as much as each players think they know and coaches all of us. You're good in the first round. Your team is different in the second round. You win that round. Your team is different again in the third round because you keep growing. You keep trusting. Uh, guys start either becoming more and selfish. They start seeing themselves with a chance to win each round. Your team gets better. Each round it does. And that's everything. Uh, what's your theory for why home court advantage seemingly does not matter anymore? I don't have one. I really don't. I thought about it, um, you know, the talent, the offense, um, three point shooting variants. I think travel. I think the travel is easier. What about what about DMs and Tinder and all you don't have to go to clubs to meet girls that help, that helps, you know, that help Dominique. As I think Pat Riley said, it's, it's, it's not the act. Yeah. It's the chasing. Right. You know, so yeah, I think all that, uh, but I do think it's a three point shot that has changed because the next one, two in Cleveland, yeah. And then all three in San Antonio. Look at last, last year in Indiana. Another one. They didn't care where they played. Yeah, there's no, but shooting, three point shooting has changed though. There's no lead that's safe anymore. I have a Boston fan front of mine says the biggest thing that's changed is they have all these rules that the fans can't be super mean to the other team anymore. Oh, no. They're, they're, they're still pretty mean. Cause they, you know, there, there's been teams where they would put people behind the visiting bench and they would just yell at the guy on the barber. Yeah, yeah. That, that, that air is kind of over there. It's gone. Yeah, you don't feel like you're, oh, my God. It's, it's fun. As a player, I love the road. I love playing on the road. Well, those are the best wins, right? When you shut the crowd, I'm better. It's, it's the most powerful. Cause I wanted to beat the Lakers so bad in game five. Yeah. I wanted to win there. So bad. I just talked about this game in a podcast. Yeah. Cause I was telling a story about how that next game five with Foster, reminded me of game five, oh, eight with Foster, where Ray Allen had five thousand a second half. Yeah. And so to Paul Pierce. Yeah. And Ray Allen fouled out of the game. How many games did Ray Allen fouled out of his life? Yeah, not many. That was one of those where I was like, yeah, I just wish we had got a good way. Well, either. I didn't get anybody. I thought that was the first game, the only game you can't get fined anymore. It was 20 years ago. You didn't get any whistle. I thought, yeah, that's, well, we didn't get any whistle in the game seven. That's for a whole nother show. You know, the, the, the officiating change. Yeah. From the first half to the second half. You know, in that seventh game in 210. When they allowed Pog saw to just shove everybody around. Yeah. Went from, they, they wasn't calling anything to, I think it was 17 to five. But that's a good example of the little margins, right? So why, why did we ultimately, I'm going to say we like I was like, well, to we, why do, why do we lose that game? Because Rashid Wallace had played 35 minutes. Yeah. Yeah. And because Perkins is out and that tilted it just enough. And you didn't have, you were 10 men. And Kevin was more like Wimby than in the fact that he, Wimby and Kevin was exhausted. He's three rebounds in that game. Yeah. Kevin, Kevin's, once he got back from injury, he never could practice the work the way he worked. And fatigue was a major factor with KG. And that's, that was because Saul was feasting. Yeah. And that's where the Saul, we let him out of, we own him. But we let him out of the bag. Well, that's the thing with these, when you talk about the margins, because a great one was 2016 game seven, wears calves, bogates out, Barnes is unplayable. Yeah. Also, and Festus Isili is out there with six minutes, like LeBron Targetsome gets six points out of them. Yeah. And that swings the game, right? And it's like, but that little thing, but it's not, it's, yeah, it's a little thing, but it's a huge thing. And it's always find that interesting. Like LeBron had figured out how to win now, you know, one in Miami, he had gone through those each rounds. And so now he knew how to win. He become a winner because I felt like he was, I mean, he's easily one of the four or five smartest players of the century, right? And then he's probably the best athlete of the century, but something had to like settle in with him. It was almost like a, like a cake. Yeah. He had to like stay in the oven for a while. He had to settle. We had to figure out how to win people and the pressure. I think he was putting out a win. How do you know how to? Right. You know, if you haven't won. You don't think he learned from Ricky Davis, but there are some people with natural, you know, magic was a winner coming in the pros in one of national title. The biggest game. And I think the biggest college game in the history of college basketball has to be. And I think it's still is. Yeah. You know, I know where I was at when Larry Bird and magic played. I remember that game. Would you see that stat that Brunson was the 15th guy to win high school college and NBA? Yeah. That's not that. No, that's a lot. You know, who else is on there? Karim Russell and magic. Yeah. I was going to say that's a lot like Bill, that's people that has to matter. It matters more than so many other things. This guy just keeps winning. He may not be done. Well, they put that team probably has two years left, but now they're going to deal with the pet Riley disease or more. Yeah. I gave up stuff. Now I'm not as excited to give up stuff. I don't really like shooting eight shots of game anymore. Michael called it the trophy tour. You're going to deal with all the trophy tour guys and I remember asked what are you talking about? He said, Oh, no, these guys, they're carrying the trophy that they're at hometowns. They have been parades for them. Uh, they're going to come back. They're going to want more. Really? I like that. Yeah. He called it the trophy tour. Did you see the Jim Dole in speech? No. About. I got to send it to you. No, he this, uh, Brunson's podcast, they put the speech on their feed. He gave a 15 minute speech to the team before the playoffs. Wow. Sat in front of them. I couldn't believe it. It's like a great speech. It's like a sports movie. I have to see this in this whole speech about. I think this team is going to win the title, but it's only going to happen. If you guys dedicate this, you're going to have to put the team above your set. It's like he, it was kind of great. He's like, you're going to have to tell one, at one point he goes, I'm going to give you a wife for your significant other championship rings. If we win this because they're going to have to sacrifice to this has to be all you think about. Wow. This is going to be the hardest thing in your life. I've rightly speech. Well, then he goes, if we win what this will mean in New York City, I can't even explain to you what's going to happen to everybody in this room. You got to watch it. You're like, I didn't know you had this in your jersey. They've done everything right. Leon, man, we talked about this two podcasts ago about Leon and Wes, yeah. Yeah, but anybody, and I remember I said anybody can get the star. I can make a trade. I can take over to tomorrow and find a way of getting the star. But can you put the right people around them and God darn every decision they made came up, go. It came up. Go. Would you, I talked about this before, but would you, do you think the job of being a GM with relationships and knowing kids who turn into adults that you recruit and stuff? That feels like more of an advantage than like, West New Townsland is 15, you're trying to get them right. Like, he's known that guy forever. So he's like, Oh, it's a contract. Absolutely. No, no, he's a kid. We got to get him in. If you should more owners be looking at people who were like agents or agents or even players who want to be front office people, you know, Chris Paul do this. I don't know if he has a relationship, right? Yeah. But one thing Chris does, you know, is he knows players. I guess Jamal Crawford knows everybody in the league, you know, right. He's voted team, teammate of the year every year, yeah. If you wanted one guy to get, and I'm joking, the other Jordan, those singly, every single person in the league, it's funny when you play on the Olympic team, coach Kate calls me. He's like, Hey, this guy's the pi piper. I have never seen a guy that everyone wants to be with and indeed, you know, have we ever talked about this? Because when I had that, well, I still have the Cooper said tickets, but when he didn't play, he was a plank. He was like a scrub on the quipers. But before and after the games, he knew everybody on the other teams, and it was like, can chase bugs. And I was saying to my wife, like, I don't know what to deal with with this backup center. He knows everybody in the league. When I got him, and you know, when I came and we had the big talk and for him, you know, my, my favorite player coach stories of all time, I gave him that long list. Like, you know, he told me he wanted to score more. Yeah. And that's why he didn't play well the year before he was poutin. You know, it was my first year there, it was my first meeting with DJ literally my first meeting. We're at Nobu. Yeah. And I was like, so many down there told you that you were going to score more. He said, no, he told me to work on my offense. And then I did that and then get the ball. I said, I'm going to have you work on your offense too, but I'm going to guarantee you one thing. And he says, what's that? I will never call a play for you. Never. And he's looking. I mean, this is our first meeting. Yeah. I said, but if you get every rebound, you become, I'm going to make you the defensive captain. I get my list. Yeah. All defense, you know, all start team, rebounding title, rebounding title, all these lists. And then NBA champion, and it's an emotional one. He checked them all off. And then when you won the title with the Denver Nuggets, I'm built 10 minutes after the game. I get a bean on my phone. It's a picture with him in the trophy, and he had the note. And it said checked. Wow. Yeah. Awesome. Is that. Yeah. That's, that was the Andre. That was pretty cool. We took chair and get in the room. Yeah. Don't get me started with that one. I'm going to give you the one thing I loved about that. And we would, me and Danny loved, we had a great relationship. But my son, Jeremiah, played with some of these guys now. I think he told me that he knew, doing the draft, doing that draft, J.R. Kids. He's like, I'm telling you, I played with him. And Danny loved him. Danny loved him. Well, Danny's had a pretty high batting average. Yeah, that's why. Listen, I knew with Danny, he said, let him do it. Whatever. Right. Most of the time. Well, you know, it's funny now. They have the second pick. And people, like Peterson said, he wasn't going to work out for them. Yeah. And it's, nobody's going to know who you taught anyone who's like, I know what you taught is going to do. It's like, good luck. Well, I don't think people who work for Utah knows what Danny's going to do. It was over game one or game two, I had Larry over in Lawrence, Frank. And it's funny. Larry really enjoyed, enjoyed Lawrence, Frank as Lawrence, you know, was that active? Right. Just ask questions. He's asking, he's just buzzing with questions. And we start talking about Danny and we laugh and like, no one knows what Danny is up to. No one. And it's the truth. I think they're going to take Kambuser only because of 25 years of watching how Danny thinks about this stuff. Yeah. I just think he's going to be like, you know what? That guy's just really good. Danny knows. Take it. That guy. I will say this about Danny. He knows already. Yeah. I guarantee you that. Like walking to a bar and seeing a girl, you know, now he's trying to sell other franchises on someone else. You know, what he does. So, um, do you have you looked at the draft at all or not? Not much. And that's it. No. You're like a retired guy. Yeah. I'm playing golf golf and trying to build your endurance up on him on the court. Yeah. Terrible golf, but I enjoy it. Yeah. Well, we got to talk about Yana Straids. Yeah. So, when you have a trade hanging over a team like that, and it's not just Yana's in the box and other stuff, but, and then the way stuff's reported now and talked about. Yeah. Um, how do you navigate that as a coach or you don't? You do. Uh, I probably, um, underestimated the damage that it was doing to our team. Yeah. Um, because, you know, first of all, a lot of the reports, they were just not accurate. Yeah. And, and, and, unfortunately, it doesn't matter if they're accurate or not. It's out because the reports are poor and they're six hours of, you know, shelf life out of it. You know, as Al, Michael says, some of these guys, they report on the news and then they, they didn't do reports on the news that they created. Right. And so it just, it's like a double dip, but take it back to the buffet table. Yeah. It takes a life of its own, um, because I knew what Yana's was telling me. Yeah. So some of this stuff just wasn't right, wasn't true. And, uh, but that doesn't mean the agents wasn't telling someone else something else. You know, it didn't matter. It did damage because if you're a coach, I'm trying to get Bill Simmons to play his role. You know, I play my role. Why am I going to play my role? I best play it. I didn't want to be here. Yeah. You know, uh, and that is the damage it does. The honest, really never said to the players that he wanted to leave. And he never probably said he wanted to stay, you know, and so, so it's just like everything is uneasy. Yeah. But he did tell him once, guys, I'm here. I'm here. He told me that, you know, sir, but coach, I'm going nowhere. Tell me long before the trade deadline, uh, before I'll sort of write coach, I'm going nowhere. I don't want to go anywhere. - So what am I trading for if I'm getting him? Because I don't know if you're aware, but the Boston Celtics are one of the possible teams. - I've heard. Well, you're getting a rejuvenated healthy, Janice. - Is it a healthy or a hopefully healthy? - No, he's healthy. And I also think this'll be his first time in four years and not having your basketball. So Janice and I had a conversation. I want to say a month before the season ended. And you remember the whole, should you come back? And I was honest, I said, Janice, in my opinion, all right, you shouldn't come back, season's over. - Yeah. - You need to sit, I said, but you should look at this as a great opportunity. You can start working out now. You can bring in your guy that you work with and you can start now for next year. There's no European basketball. You get a whole year to really work on your scale. - Like the Rocky III, I had the Tiger. - Yeah, yeah. And he started doing it. He was doing it. And you know, before I left, he was already into his workouts. You know, so I think there's going to get that. I think it'll be good for him probably, you know, just to get all this stuff off of him. He can focus on basketball and playing. - But how does it make sense? - And I've already said on the record, I kind of hope the Celtics don't trade for him because I think it's risky 'cause this will be his 14th year in the league. The history of big men is they get older. - No, he's not a typical big man. - He said it, I know, but I'm just going by history. I don't think it's, it's not like getting KJ in 2008. - Yeah, and also with any trade, you risk chemistry. You don't, even if you think your chemistry is not great now, you risk making it way better. You also risk making it worse. - We've seen this happen and then be over and over again. - Over and over again. - But for him, I don't understand why he would want to go to, my aim is the one I don't, I can't figure out. Unless they have other moves coming in, I don't know, 'cause it's like, all right, it's him and Bambi, you just traded everybody else. - And where you going? - And you would have traded your closer, 'cause Taylor Herald's a closer. - Right. - You know, see what you want about him, but he's a straight opponent. - So why would I want to go later early? I would just rather stay and walk at that point. - That's where he's trusting their front office that they have the ability to add more pieces. You know, those are the talks we're talking in. - After the last two rounds of basketball, we watched, you need like seven, eight. - You need a lot of guys. - It can't just be you and Bambi on the, you can't be you and Jason Tatum. - Yeah. Well, the Celtics still have a lot of players. - No, I know. - There's a much safer thing for him. The only thing from the Celtics point of view is you are shortening your window, you know, because Giannis is older and Brown is younger. - Well, Giannis is older with more miles on him. - But you also maybe, after that window, giving yourself a chance to have another window with Jason Tatum, you know what I mean? So it depends on how the front office is look at it. - What would you do if you were Boston? - Ooh, that's a tough one. You know, I don't ever say it because I don't know-- - 'Cause you traded for KG, you had a five-year window KG, right? - Yeah. - You knew it was like, I've had my peers with Ray. - Yeah. - This is four to five years. - I remember we thought, when we did it, we thought we had a three to four-year window with age. And obviously KG got hurt. We didn't know that was gonna happen. That's why you can't take anything for granted. I said to the other day, you remember when Oklahoma City, KG, KD, James Harden, Abacca. - I was nuts when this happened. They thought their window was limitless. - Yeah, my brain. I remember my brain say, well, you know, they lost this series that might have me, but they're gonna be back here many times. They never made it back. Like assuming-- - 86 rockets. - Yeah, you can never-- - 95 magics. - There's no assumptions. This league winning is brutally hard. You have to play well. You have to act right. You have to get along. You need luck. You need everything to win a title. And if you don't get everything, you're not going to win. - So you think you get, Yannis, these next two years would be the years you have to cash in. - Yeah, he's gotta be. He's so motivated. You know, it's not like he's not always, but he just motivated. He wants to win another title. Yannis wants to win. Like, it's interesting. We were just talking about it. He didn't talk a lot about his play. - Yeah. - He talks about winning. And Yannis wants to win. - I don't know what the right team is for him. - I don't need it. - To actually win a title. - You have to have a closer with him. And that's what-- - That's what the Tatum, that's why the Tatum makes more sense. Because you, a two-man game with Yannis and Tatum. Good luck. - The only thing I said on the pod that I guess it was a reporting, but I know I'm right, is that the Salt Expanded offer. I don't know if Jaylen Brown was in it. I assume he has to be in it. - Yes, I don't know how you get that. I don't know either, but I don't know how you would make an offer without him in it. - The problem with our league now is, when I first started coaching, you could have all these conversations and the player would never know. - Never know. - Now the player always does. - They know what, 10 minutes after the conversation. 'Cause this is what happened with Katie and Brooklyn, with Jaylen Brown. - Yeah, once-- - When he heard about that. - Once the news happens, there's damage, it's really tough for teams. You should have conversation. You should always try, listen to everything. That didn't mean you're doing it. And my guess is, what in the Celtics calling, it was probably Milwaukee calling Boston. - Or they're trying to figure out, they're talking basic vague parameters and Milwaukee goes, "Well, if we got Jaylen Brown, "could we spin him?" Now you talk to another team and now-- - Everyone says there's gonna be three teams. Whatever this is. - It has to be. - If it does happen, it'll be three teams. It's just, you know, what's the call? - It could be the Clippers. Jaylen could be coming L.A. - I actually wouldn't be surprised at all if the Clippers were involved in this at all, with the financial ability of Steve Bomber and that organization. - And they have some calf space and they have the fifth pick. They also will have 80 degrees in no humidity and they have an ocean. People like that. They players like that, you know, before, it was all Lakers, you know, one of-- - It was a little like the Nets Next situation. - Yeah, but now, you know, that's one of the things I would say if I have a lot of pride about things which I never do, 'cause I'll ever think in those terms. But that's one of, like-- - No, you should take pride of that. - We wanted to, when I took that Clipper job, I remember said, I said it in the press conference, we're gonna make this a destination. We're gonna make the Clippers a place that people want to come to. Now, I didn't know at the time with Donald Sterling as the owner. That was a pile of sky thought, when you think about it, but even Donald paid, you know, for players, but then when Bomber came organizationally, like everything's first class, they do everything right. I mean, it's, they do it the right way. - Yeah, when I got my tickets in '04, I just got it for the other teams, which is why most of the people were there, right? And then-- - Still doing them, unfortunately. - And it was really kind of fun to go to the games. They were so dysfunctional year after year after year. And then, you know, it was little baby steps. They draft Blake, he finally gets there. The Chris Paul thing falls out of the sky, and all of a sudden it starts to look like a real team. - You know bad, so when I was traded to the Clippers as a player. - Yeah, in the '90s. - My wife, Chris Rivers, goes to the first game. And she's in a stance crying. True story, she sit next to Gloria Schuller. That was Mike Schuller's wife. - Yeah. - And Gloria is consoling her, like, what's wrong, baby? My son is, and she says, my husband is no longer in the NBA, and he doesn't know it. - Oh, my God. - And she was like, say, no, baby, that's not true. That's not true. - No, it isn't NBA team. - Yeah, and she kept saying, no, it's not. Now, way back then, if you remember at the Clip Joint, that thing was a mess. It was a mess. - I never went there, 'cause I would never been in LA until the 2000s. - Oh, I heard it was the sports arena or whatever. - Sports arena was a mess. - Yeah. It was a mess. They had comedians doing shows after the game, but you could literally check yourself in. It was no one there. - It was crazy. - It's one of the only good sports documentary ideas left that I don't think Balmer would ever let happen, like the actual history of the Clippers. And what the-- - Well, if I'm Balmer, I would, because the ending is a glorious story, and he was the white knight. - I hope it's glorious. We don't know how the aspiration schedule is going to be about. - At worse, he's still going to be there, and he's still going to keep doing things well. And so I wouldn't worry about it. - So you, if you're the Clippers, you would rather have a star than the fifth pick. - Ooh, yeah, I think if you have Hawaiian Garland, if you have a really good front office-- - Yeah, I think right now, here's my belief in a lot of front offices, don't believe this happened, half. If you legitimately can look at yourself in the eye and say, if we do this move, We have a chance. the win, you should go for it. I think so many franchises have waited. No, man. You know, this is not to, if this is the time, you got to, you got to cash in. But you got to have a very honest, like, isn't or isn't it? Because a lot of teams think they do it and that what did they do? You know, and I don't, I remember last year. Oh, good. Last year Orlando traded for Bain. And they said, now we have a chance. And I was like, what? No, you know, you're better. It's a hell of a trade. It's a good trade. But you're not ready to win yet. That's how I always feel about these trades. If I'm, if I'm doing it, I better at least have a chance. Yeah. But you have to be honest enough to evaluate the league and what you have for sure. Like Celtics, Ray Allen trade, then the KG trade, you basically trade all your assets. But now, I've known the best team in the East. Of course, I'm going to do that. We knew immediately we had a shot. We knew we knew we had to be Detroit, Cleveland and the Lakers. Right. You know, in whatever order, we knew that had to happen. Well, the richest trade, which I guess I'll take the loss on this one, but the thing I didn't like about it was like, this is it. This is your move. Like, now you have no more moves, but he is. But it turned out they had an extra move because the town's trade. Yeah. He came the extra move. I thought after bridges, I didn't think it was funny. Everyone made the big deal about the bridges trade. Five pictures is a lot. Well, it was anything they could have given them for your honest. It still didn't constrict them. You know, they went out and got towns. It didn't stop them. Yeah. And I don't know if there's a better role player for your basketball team. The bridges. Yeah. He's willing to take four shots, 15 shots, six shots. Every game he shows up. You didn't know. And by the way, he plays basketball. He's out there. He does a best game. Yeah, he plays every night. And he's still one of the better defenders every single night. Yeah. He's a pretty important guy to have on your team. If you were Orlando, would you think about Paolo for your honest? I don't know, man. That's it. Is that does that suit you in the title convo? Yeah, I would do it if I'm Orlando. If I thought that put us over the hump or I got you honest. I have fronts. I have bane. I have sugs. I don't know if you have enough shooting. Maybe in fridge. I can get somebody. Yeah, if you can get enough shooting, you know, I don't know what the other moves like I keep saying it. I can go get it, you honest, right? But does that put us over the top? And do we know how to make the rest of the moves to win? Teams do it over every year. Bill every year. We see it. Teams go and get a star. How about Houston? I have van Blee coming back. I have to give up shingoo in the trade. I'm guessing. And maybe Jabari Smith too. And I might have to take a contract back. I don't know. I don't know if that works. I don't think it works either. Yeah, I don't think I'm better than San Antonio or O.K. C either way. Yeah. And then San Antonio is the interesting one, but I don't think they would do it. They probably wouldn't do it. Oklahoma could as well. Oklahoma has not their style. Oklahoma could do any trade they wanted to. Right. I mean, what they have, what Sam has done is a 12 and 17 in this draft. They're mad at draft picks. Yeah. Oh my god. What are we going to do with all this stuff? He's in the first situation ever. He's like, I think I'd rather have the eighth pick than the 12th pick. Yeah. I'm just going to go trade for it. Hey, Atlanta. Here's seven picks for. There's no doubt that he's going to do a two for one. He has to. You know, he almost has to. Well, there's a center in this draft who I like, the Michigan Kid Mara. Yeah, he's solid, but I'm watching enough. Yeah, you've watched them. Order me. Well, he's sem for three. Yeah. He's a good passer. And I'm through the, through the Wembee prison now. Yeah. I need size. Where am I getting size? Yeah, Wembee is everybody in the West. Yeah, it's a think about it. You have to think about it. You know, um, you know, the fun of the nicks, they didn't just where I was way wrong. There's no way I thought towns would or could guard Wembee. And he did an amazing job. And he didn't really have dumb fouls in town. No, no, you know, the end of the fight. You made an interesting statistically going into the series. You know, who's the best defender on Wembee plus minus who? OG. And I think in the league, he had the highest plus minus guard. Do you know he was that good? No, no, I knew he was a great defender, great, like elite. I never thought he'd be able to shoot and make shots and make plays the way he does. And I never knew he had the IQ. Yeah, he has an incredibly high basketball instinctive IQ. I love how he, there's got to, there's no way to have a stab for this. But like, do you do the most positive things that you're capable of doing in the least negative things? Yeah. Something about like, do you know yourself the best out of anyone? Like you always have these guys who are like, oh, I bet I can do it and they can't. He never knows anything he can't do. Yeah. The whole league has, has irrational confidence. Right. Every player has a rational confidence. That's what makes him good. Uh, but if you want to be a successful coach, I always tell young coaches, if you can get all 12 year guys to know exactly who they are, now you're never going to do that. But if you can do that, you will never lose. What do you never lose? You talk to coaches all the time. All the time. You're like the, uh, fucking Yoda coach. You talk a lot of them. What is their biggest thing that they're worried about now? Like just with basketball in 2026? No one's ever asked that question. I mean, that's a great question. Thank you. I think a lot of them are concerned with how many the outside forces touching their players. There's just too many people. You mean like shooting coach, manager, agent, even inside. Like you got 10 skilled development guys who I love. Uh, you have the medical team now is bigger than your coaching staff. There's just so many voices and how do you manage those voices? Like culture is not just the players. If you're culture in the training room or with your skill development aren't all locked in on the same thing, you know, that went right. Um, you know, 15 years ago, I had to worry about four coaches in two hours. You might add two. Yeah, two or three coaches and two trainers. It was easy to kind of circle the wagons and have a great culture now. You got, you got, you know, a lot of people. How many coaches do we actually need in all seriousness? Because like I was watching they were showing the 76 finals. Yeah. And the Celtics had Tom Henson as the head coach. John Killay is assistant. And that was it. Yeah. It's just the two of them. And if both of them got thrown out, like Dave Cowan's had to become the coach. Yeah, well, we had Dick Harder and Jeff and Gandhi. It sounds great. Yeah. Is that easy? It was so cool because I remember I hurt my knee and I needed a coach to come rebound for me. I didn't have to skill the development guy. I do a lot of skill development guys. I think they really helped the players. Yeah. Um, I would call Jeff and Gandhi. And that's, you know, it's funny. Jeff would come and just Jeff was the greatest freaking guy because he shut his mouth and he just rebounded for me. He could tell like I was just shooting shooting. And if I miss, you run and get it and throw it back, wouldn't say a word. Just, just bag balls for you and shot. And you know, wasn't until middle of that workout one night, we're just sitting there talking afterwards. And he said his age. And I said, wait a minute. I'm older than you. What? You know, I didn't even know that. You know, Jeff and he's in that crazy. Yeah. So they worry about outside forces. Yeah. How about wear and tear of the schedule? Not as much as you think. Yeah. I think the coaches worry about that far less than front office and medical teams do. Um, and then I think, um, they do worry about it's harder to get players to buy in now because of the two ways. No, because of all the other stuff. You know, everyone has their own brand now. They'll everyone. Right. You know, guys who you're like, why do you have, why do you have a person? Yeah. You know, why do you have a publicist? What do you need a publicist for? Yeah. They all haven't been. Yeah. They all have them. They're hawking, selling something, creating something. I mean, this is real business and money for these guys. So I think that's what they're more concerned by than anything else. Hmm. I have something that you don't know about. You know what that is? No. Oh my gosh. This is awesome. Where did you get this from? I after the 2007 draft. Yeah. Somebody who's being grabbed this for me and sent me an email and said, Hey, I grabbed the envelope. Do you want it? And I was like, Fuck yeah. I'll take it. Not realizing how about that? Yeah. Just want a title for me. That one. You a title. I just want me a title. I will say that was the lowest our offices ever been. I mean, the lowest I think I've ever been as a sports fan did everything to get the best pick. I mean, I wish I could have some of those games back that, that, I mean, you're just I sewing for Joe. I would look up in the stands some nights and, you know, let's say, girls having a night or somebody. And then he's looking to me like, Right. Take him out. I remember Rondo was almost like too good to play it. Yeah, Ronald. I mean, it was so that one comes up. That's it. That was, yeah, that was a rough night. Cause think about it. If we got, if we got one, and you took Odin, you probably doing TV last 15 years, Danny swears he was taking, he would take a grant. Yeah. And I don't know if that's true. I think that's true. But then he kept things so close. I wouldn't have known until late anyway. Well, the story I was heard was that the Celtic doctor had a great doctor back there. Dr. McKean, yeah, the best that he saw the Odin stuff. And he was like, he actually gave a couple of flags. The only one that always, you know, Dr. McKean, I've become best friends with golf. And the only thing I still kill him on a Brandon Roy, like we could have had him. And he said, guys, no, he was going to wasn't wrong. He was like four years, your window. Yeah, you know, he said it was a really good five years. Yeah. And I always said, I would have taken those five years. Right. But it was, it was amazing how correct. He said, that guy is going to play four or five years. And then his career is going to go the other way. I mean, it was like to the year of somebody. Jesus. Yeah. So what's your final yana's prediction before we go? I think he gets moved. He thinks it's moved. Yeah. He's coast or west coast. I don't, you know, I think teams make a mistake when they worry about that. Get the best deal. Okay. But I'm saying, would you predict the Eastern Conference or Western Conference? I'm going to go west. You're going well. I'm sorry. I'm going to go east. You're going to go east. Yeah. Do you think Yana's will be in the NBA finals again? Yes. If he goes to the right place. Do you think the NASA's will be in the NBA finals again? He'll be there. He'll be there for sure. He won't be on the table. What was the NASA's best pickup basketball strength? Energy. One thing I tell you, like the dude, there were days where he actually was useful because, you know, he would ramp it up. Yeah. He was playing hard. Like the NASA's knowing when the practice gets him. Yeah. I was going to say, was he the guy in the gym that everybody was getting mad at? Yeah. He was trying to. Yeah. Yeah. You know, what was that for me? But Leon with the ref. Oh, interesting. Yeah. I made the all-star team that year. And I swear to gosh, it's because of Leon with. I hated him. I went back didn't you playing 42 minutes and back then you practiced every day. Right. And you scrimmaged a lot. And, you know, I just played 42 minutes during DJ. And the next day, we're practicing then Leon would is picking me a full court. You know, there were days I wanted to just punch him. But that's probably why it hurts when you hit a five-wood down. Yeah. No doubt. It hurts when I've been down. You played probably 80 games. Yeah. Yeah. It's funny. How do you? The last game to Leon did, I say Leon. You move just like me. We did too much. Who would you think, by the way, I had, before we go, I had you just coached a team questions random ones. Who did you think the best ref in the league was? You're in that right now. Right now. The best ref this season that you saw. I thought Scott Foster. Scott Foster. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. I thought I think he has really become a, you know what I've learned. It's not just his refereeing. Where Scott has improved. It's his people skills. And, you know, there's a couple of other ones that I really like. Any young ones? Josh Tiffin, I think, has a good demeanor overall. Takes it very seriously. I love, I love, I learned a little bit doing COVID. I got a chance to go off with some of the rest. Oh, interesting. And it's interesting. I love, I have found this thing. Some of these guys care so much. They want to be like really good at their jobs. And those are the guys I like. Then there's another group of guys that like, why are you so upset? It's just the gay. You know what I mean? And so give me that first group because it hurts them. Like they know when they make a mistake. And it hurts them just like you. Those are the rafts you want. Scott Foster. Yeah. I think he's really, he's a solid NBA rep. What coach impressed you the most that you went against? Well, that's a great boy. You're good questions. But I forgot to ask you these the last time you run. Yeah. Was there one where you're like, man, that guy's got fucking everything going here. Well, I mean, it's stuff like the home one was so good. Yeah. But I still think he's really good. Yeah. I think I think he's, he's really marked that like he does, he makes the right plays, he subs the right guys in. Though, I thought in the, the last series with guys injured, you know, it was, it was tougher for him. Yeah. I was impressed with Mike Brown this year. You know, you know, I've played against him and coach against him and two weeks and you know, I beat him twice when he had LeBron. Yeah. And I think his growth has, he's a different coach from when he was back then. There's no, like he's different. I love and I'm a couple, we got to come with this. I loved their certain coaches. You better be ready. Right. And then there's other coaches I felt like. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is this is doing. Yeah. There's certain, their coaches that I felt because I thought one of the things I did well throughout my career was ATL. You know, we call it time out. We were scoring. Yeah. I had a very, very, very prominent coach. They told me he lost, he admitted this. He lost the game to me because they had a time out. We didn't and he didn't use it because he didn't want me to be able to drop a play. And he said it was so stupid that he didn't. Yeah. And there's coaches that you feel the same about. Like, yeah, I call it time out. They're going to get to drop a play too and he's killing us right now. Right. Out of time out. So there's, you know, that goes both ways with coaches and Stevens was the best I ever saw at that. Brad was great out of time out. I don't know. He must have had like some database of all these crazy plays that you have. Yeah. Yeah. You would be amazed at the coaches. Like, Tai Lu has every ATL that I've ever drawn up. Really? Yeah. The entire time he was my assistant, he's just like in a Google doc or something. No, he'd even draw it up and keep it. He had a book. He'd even draw them all up and he would keep them. And they beat us in Philly one game with one of my plays and it incensed me. It just, she hits me off. So bad. They literally ran a play that, that, yeah, and it was flawless. And, you know, we talked about it afterwards. She's laughing. I said, like, and tips did that a lot. You know, the run, you know, we all steal from each other. Nobody's a genius in this. We all think we are. No ones. You, I can watch a game. I watch a game now. Who? Wow. That's good. I can tweet this. You know, that's how coaches watch games. It's pretty cool. Yeah. I remember game one. We were texting and you were like, I don't like, I don't like this Wembe on towns. Yeah. I don't like this. He's going to hill get away from this. This goes like, I kept telling you. I don't like this match up. Yeah. Well, guess what? He stopped doing it by game three. Yeah. Give me two young players who weren't superstars or known stars yet that you think are going to get there. Well, he's known, but Edgecomb has a chance to be really good because he has the makeup and I think having Maxie around him. So you're buying stock on the Maxie Edgecomb. Maybe too small. What did you like about Edgecomb is Edge like he's going to be what Edgecomb is going to be. I don't know how good he'll be offensively. He know he played on Austin's a you team. He's ahead of where I thought he was already, but he's going to be an elite defensive player in NBA elite. That's coming and you can see that. I'm trying to canvas the league with my imagination because I would have thrown Dylan Harper in there before the fight. Well, Dylan Harper's already known. Yeah. Yeah. Like that's the obvious choice for all of us. Dylan Harper. I'm thinking like Castle is the other guy that we don't talk about enough. You know, Castle is a being a consistent shooter away from being a consensus is also a player every year. How about Cedric Howard? I don't know yet. You like him. Yeah. Yeah, you like him. I'm not sure yet. I do. I'm not sure about the intangibles. Yeah. It's tough because he was on a shit team. Yeah. It's so hard to judge some of these guys. And it's also hard to judge a guy on a good team that doesn't play a lot or plays role. You know, you don't get to see it. My problem is I don't go to as many games as I used to and I always pick up. I'm sure you're the same way. You pick up so much more in person. Oh, you do. It's the quippers back up center. Yeah. Who ended up getting hurt? Neater house or whatever. Yeah. I love that guy. Yeah. That guy's going to be. Yeah. That guy's that guy's a guy. He will be like in a playoff rotation. What's got a question for you? Other than Boston. Yeah. Next. Who will be the other two teams in these? Next year. I'm interested to see what Charlotte does with 14 and 18. And it may be next year's not their year. Maybe they'll be like, we'll draft two more guys. This is a slow build. Yeah. But I also think they could zag the other way and just go get somebody really good and make a run in it with the shooting they have. I wouldn't be surprised if they move someone and then did the trade as well. Honestly, that was like an interesting, honest team to me. It's different timeline, but yeah. But Charlotte was a wild car for me though. Charles is one of those young coaches that I was-- But it's the other thing, they're really well coached. That I was extremely impressed with. We beat them three out of four times. And we caught him early. And I remember sitting with John when our horse in the office and he said, man, that team's coming. I said, oh, they're here. Right. I said, I don't know if they know it, but they're here. So, I would go Boston. What do we think Cleveland's going to look like? I don't know. Who knows? You know, they're going to be in it. You know, Cleveland, they have to make some decisions. Well, they can't have $120 million tax. Well, can they win with both big guys to me? It's not the money. They can move the money. Go trade out. That's the court, the question for them. Well, one of the things I wonder, like, do they trade out and then assign and trade with LeBron for the LeBron, Cleveland, farewell touring, does he want to do that? That whole thing is going to be a mess. I mean, whatever LeBron does. And he, listen, he deserves it. But where he goes and what he does, it feels like things are fractured a little bit now. I, with him, but I don't know if that's actually true, but it feels that way. Everything feels fractured until they figure out a monetary figure to make it unfractured. The makeup is unbelievable and aren't there. Well, I told you, I think he's going to go in state. I really do have something that's going to happen. I don't believe that, but you've said that. I really think he's going to have-- All right, so Boston, New York, Cleveland kind of lingering. I don't know about Orlando. Well, the two teams, to me, that people are sleeping on, is what Atlanta does, and then what Indiana does. Giddens hoop was big for them. Yeah, I worry about it. They would rather have that fifth pick or whatever. But Giddens hoop was, they're going to be good next year. Now, I just would tell Bern going to look like in what's his confidence like. He's probably playing now. I would assume. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, Indiana is a wild go. And Indiana is the one team that's like, we could beat the next. And then the biggest wild card is Detroit, who we didn't mention. What are they going to do with the cat with the-- with they have all their picks? I'm glad I don't have their decision. It's, to me, they have a franchise defining decision to make, and I'm not sure which way you go. And that's what-- What do you think's the decision? During. Oh. I think that we know how that's going to play out, right? Well, they're going to pay them. But are they going to pay them the max? Are they? If they pay them the max, I just wouldn't do that. Yeah, I mean-- You can't pay a center of the max that's not Wembo Niamo basically. Yeah, I mean, that's a brutal decision, because if I was another team with money, you wouldn't mess the business up. You sign up to an offer. That should be Brooklyn, right? Yeah, sign up to an offer sheet. Isn't Brooklyn the only one with-- Yeah, there's only two teams I thought. Yeah. But you get a two for one. If they sign them back, they hurt their team. If they don't sign them, they hurt their team. Well, shit. I mean, this is no matter how much the NBA changes, this has happened every decade. Like, remember, McElvin and Seattle, and somebody offered sheet of him or whatever, and then he made more money than Sean Camp. And that fucked your team up. I remember Sean Camp. John Conte, right? Yeah, that's another one. John Contrac. Well, he was on your team, you right? Yeah, yeah. Who was the manist at that, Kevin Willis? Dominique. He's making more than Dominique. He makes more than Dominique. He makes more than every one. Oh, no. It's funny. But Dominique had the nightclub. He was fine. Yeah, he had 21s in the nightclub. I remember Stan Castin, who was, you know, Dr. Lornau. Yeah. But I remember Stan Castin calling me, and I said, hey, I need to sit with you in Dominique. We got this situation. And I remember sitting and talking about the cock. I could care less. Right. He could care less. I was happy for John Conte. I got like, well, you can turn it down. But the pisses did. It just screw us. And they got, and they did. It bothered our team. That GM was great. McQuasky. He was great. He was good. Yeah. He was mad because Stan Castin put an off sheet on James Edwards. And he told Isaiah and then the next reagent that the Hawks have, we're going to bother them. And that's why he did. Right. I make that that with the Knicks, because they were sniffing around McHale and McHale was restricted. So he's saying it was like slide Williams and Marvin went over to the three guys were and he made them match all right. It is a great arrow. You know, greatest coach, no one of them. Red is the greatest GM ever, front off ever. Feels like it is. Oh, it's, if you go by the, just, how they built the one team, you know, they got Joe, they got Kevin McHale and Robert Parris for Joe Berry Care. They draft Danny Ange, knowing he's going to play baseball, Trenton Bird and draft a bird the year before they get DJ for Rick Roby. I think he traded for Bill Russell. Yeah. I mean, I didn't know that. Oh, yeah. Okay. Then it's over. Yeah. The debate is over there. Yeah. He's like, I like that Bill Russell guy, but you should do a show on who follows after that. So I think Prestee's in the running. He is now for sure because instead, because he's nailed the draft fix. And he's made some really good trades and honestly, like that. And you were there for the quippers and they're like, we need to do this. And he's like, I have to have SGA and I have to have all of these picks or I'm not doing it. Well, we can't do that. Okay. No trade. But he kind of waited out. It was a great. This is what Sam Presley learned this time around that he didn't know the first time when he had all the players getting shade was great. Get Williams is great. You know what changed the team? He went out and got Caruso and hard thing. Those are the moves. You have to learn how to make when you're a front off his guy. And Sam didn't know how to make that move early on. And now he understands the value of that. Well, that's another team to watch right now, because they got Dort and a team option. They've heart and style and a team option. They're gonna, I don't think they'll ever pay second April. They're really strange team because they have so many picked, so many players. They are looking at this guy and say, well, we can play this guy. You know, right? They had that Thomas Sorber guy. They drafted. Yeah, they have the riches of all. Yeah. So they could do, that's a team that Atlanta could potentially trade with. They could do whatever they want. I'm with you and Atlanta, but Atlanta has the same issue that you talked about earlier about who's scoring for me in the last four minutes of the game. I said it. It was CJ in those two nickes and then he's 34 years old. Yeah, he's 34. And that's how I looked at that series was like, if you've cut down, who's their score? Like these, I'm telling you, man, if you want to look at a championship team, start with the closers. Well, how about the box that you're a Yannis one was mostly middle 10, it was middle 10 closing. You know, the biggest change that buck, I mean, but May was Yannis had the ball a lot. They took the ball out of Yannis's hands and put it in Drew's hands. And Chris Middleton's hands and Yannis became the roller. And that two man combination was unguardable, unguardable. And then they put holiday on first call at the game three or what of game two, that changed the whole series. Either way, Drew Holiday, did you know that that could have been the other person they traded there as Garland for? Oh, did you read that? That was a report. Yeah, wow. It was there. It's been hardened in Drew Holiday. Do they beat the next or come close with Drew Holiday? Yeah. It's pretty interesting. He's he's wanted to great teammates and team players in the last 10 years. Is that bad? I would last 20. Yeah. Is that valuable to your team? It's just everything right. Deer and Fox going for the lap. I never got your point card take on this. We didn't talk about this. Yeah. Well, I want you to go back and look at film. That forever stills the ball from a key Malaysia in game one of the Western kind of finals. I grabbed the ball and I threw it ahead. You're in San Antonio. I'm San Antonio. Grabbed the ball. Throw it ahead to Sean LA Sean, probably said to just dribble the clock out, right? The attacks the basket gets fouled. I think he makes one in Robert or who was 0 for makes a three at the buzzer. So yeah, you drove that darn clock out. Now he wouldn't have driven the clock out. And he would have probably maybe you chopped three more seconds off for at least three. But then now the foul to give timing comes in. There were so many things that went wrong there. I mean, why would you foul? That was Fox two and half court. That kind of got lost in the whole thing. Yeah. No one talked about that. And it looked like Alvarado almost went back almost, and I think if he had waited another second, he was going that way. But besides that, Alvarado wasn't looking to shoot. He was looking to get the ball to Brunson as fast as possible. They could have wasted four seconds more. It would have been a two second timeout. They would have had two seconds in a timeout. What did you feel about Mitch not calling timeout right for Wimby through the ball away? And that's the only thing I didn't like. Now if I was because it's fast, right? He gets a rebound. He's right in front of him. Yeah, but you knew it was coming. You would have been prepared. Let's say if I was flipped, if I was the next I wouldn't call a timeout, because they're veteran team. Right. They know what to do. And I wouldn't want to sit and tell me to sit the defense up. The only reason I would have called timeout, and I said it right away, is because they're so young. That's it. And Wimby gets a lot of heat from that, but I'm telling you, if you watch this first play, they are the best advanced past team in the NBA. They do it every time they grab it and they throw it. And you can see it was a castles for he will eat. eyes were there and then he turned the wrong way. - Would you see the other angle? - Yeah. - He had both point guards to his right. - Yeah. - And he was looking up this way, but he always fought right there with his hand up. - They always threw it ahead. That's what they do. And you know, but that one, yeah, I'm calling it a time up. - And then in five years, they wouldn't. - How did you feel about Wembee being 30 feet from the basket on the OG tip play? - I didn't like that. - I said that yesterday. You know, you remember them coming out and Wembee was. - They seemed they were disheveled. - Yeah. I don't know what happened. - There was a good camera behind the basket. - Yeah. - Somebody came in that they weren't anticipating. - Somebody in the mix came in that they didn't account for. And the other thing I think is they were surprised OG was taking the ball out. I don't know. Something happened there that I don't know. Only thing that I do know is I wouldn't, I don't think they wanted Wembee being the guided trap Brunson. - Well, wouldn't you want Wembee in the paint just to get - I would have put Wembee in the-- - Just to challenge any drive? - I think you put Wembee on towns. - Yeah. - And you know there's not gonna be a drive. There's gonna be a shot. And you want your biggest shot. - Six seconds left? - You want your biggest guy under the rim. And he would have been if he had a bent on towns. You know, he would have been there. I think that was a tough one. But I think-- - It was still one of the eight greatest places in history of the league. - He was on towns. - Yeah. - When he came out, you could see him. He was there. And then the guards start pointing. - I would love to know what actually happened. Because something on that floor, one of those guards said, no, you go here. I mean, they were, they, something messed them up. And I don't know what it was. - Mitch Johnson, this summer, we'll be thinking about why did the ball have to bounce front of the rim straight towards LG Light? Like, what are the odds? - Perfect bounce. - It was a brick. - First of all, not only the perfect bounce, you know how hard it is to tap that in? The ball didn't have to go in. - I think that was like a one and a hundred thousand play. - It was, but it's also one and a hundred thousand being alert. - Yeah. - Like a lot of guys would have been standing there. He saw it and went for it. - And then there's an angle of Fesele comes from the side to try to hit the ball. - Yeah, probably this is it by like an inch. - Probably was the guy that I thought could have got there step earlier. If Harper gets there step earlier, he's in front of OG. - So if the spurs, when that game, when happens? - I think the next one, the series. - I think the next one, the series anyway. - Yeah. - Yeah, I agree. - 'Cause they could go in San Antonio and win it. - Yeah, I think it's clearly they have five exact same games. I think we would have had two more of those games. And that's what I want. I just want a more basketball. All I have now is a U.S. Open this week and golf. - Who's your pick? - That's a good, I'm going with Zander Shafley. - That was one of mine too. I have him or Fleetwood. - Yeah, Fleetwood, I don't know the length, but I'm going with him and then I think Scott he's going to have a good week this week. - Is it true you're playing in a celebrity tournament? - Yeah, I'm going to play. Yeah, you know, the bar has been low. - Can you play Larry? - The bar has been, Larry is supposed to play with me. I've told NBC that Larry wants to play. Right, Larry calls me and says he wants to play. Now, you're getting to know Larry, but I've known Larry for 35 whatever he is. - You guys are my favorite buddy, Copcom. - Yeah, there is a hundred percent chance if Larry commits, he's going to back out. If all Larry needs is the night before we're leaving to hit a shot and it goes wrong and he's out. - That's it. - There's no way Larry's out. - I still can't believe he went to game four. After the game three loss, I thought he was a hundred percent chance he's flying back. - Trust me, there was a conversation about it. It's also, he told me if he could have left at halftime of game three. - He would have just had to think about it. - But it did give us one of the single funniest videos in the history of the NBA, the Josh Hart layup. - And then he gave me the greatest text in game three. I'm sitting there watching and I get a text and it says, "Hey, can you tell your buddy Mitch to standing in my way? Can you ask him to please move?" (laughing) - He's blocking his view. - He's blocking his, Larry's at the whole game. He's trying to look around. He said, "And I can deal with Mitch, but then they had this other guy." - His other assistant. - Yeah, he kept jumping up. And I was like, "Natch you too." - It's a curve episode, it's a curve. So it was funny. - All right, Doc Rivers. - Good to see you. I love your studio. - Thanks for coming over. This was a blast. - Hey, Bill has an amazing house, people. Woo, it's amazing. - Thanks, Doc. - Yeah, it's nice. - All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Doc Rivers. Thanks to Gahau and Eduardo as well. Don't forget rewatchables, hand that rocks the cradle. That one is already up, domestic disturbance. Thanks, will you please watch this? John Travolta, Vince Vaughan trying to be a bad guy, really special movie. I think I'm gonna have one more podcast before the end of the week. So we'll try to have something hopefully Thursday or Thursday night, heading into the second USA World Cup soccer game. I can't wait. See you later in the week. (upbeat music) ♪ Wanna see them ♪ ♪ Wanna wait so long ♪ ♪ And say ♪ ♪ I'm gonna have a feeling I'm swept in ♪ ♪ Wanna wait so long ♪ ♪ Wanna wait so long ♪ - Must be 21 plus in president's select states for Kansas in affiliation with Kansas star Casino or 18 plus in president DC Kentucky or Wyoming. Gim, prom, caught 100 gamble or 1-800 by reset. Call 888-787777 or visit ccpg.org/chat and Connecticut. Or mdgamblinghelp.org in Maryland. Hope is here, visit gamblinghelp.line ma.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24/7 sport and Massachusetts. Or call 877-8 hope and why. Or text hope and why in New York for Louisiana call 877-770-7867. - Imagine setting your makeup, then forgetting it's even theirs. Gel to mist technology locks in your look for up to 24 hours with flexible all day comfy grip. No tightness, no stickiness, no residue. 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