2026 NBA Draft Winners and Losers With Joe House and J. Kyle Mann
119m 3s
The Bill Simmons Podcast discusses the 2024 NBA draft, emphasizing a shift toward data-driven, logical decision-making among franchises. While most picks are viewed as competent and well-justified, the Wizards’ massive contract with Trey Young draws sharp criticism for its lack of team fit and financial imprudence. A.J. DeBonsa’s selection by the Celtics is celebrated for his size, versatility, and defensive potential, while Darius Acuff’s draft and subsequent move to Sacramento generate excitement as a potential franchise savior. The Kings’ draft strategy is seen as a hopeful turnaround after years of poor performance, with fans embracing Acuff as a fun, impactful addition. The episode also reflects on how scouting and analytics have reduced unpredictability in the draft, making it more consistent yet less exciting. Live audience voting on Netflix, including questions about Acuff’s playoff chances and team dynamics, adds interactivity. Additional highlights include a sharp critique of the Warriors’ trade of Jared McCain for a future pick, viewed as a smart, value-driven move. The discussion concludes with a broader observation that while the draft is now more rational, it lacks the wild, unpredictable moments that once defined it—leading to a mix of nostalgia and concern about the future of the draft’s excitement.
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The Bill Simmons Podcast live on Netflix for my favorite day of the year. It's pretty sad that
this is my favorite day of the year, but it's the NBA draft. I'm with J. Kyle Mann from The Ringer.
I'm with the deliriously happy and possibly drunk Joe House, whose team had the number one pick
and took A.J. DeBonsa. We'll talk about that later.
We have a little gimmick. It's just for the live Netflix show only. We're going to have some
voting. They started this poll thing that they did during Star Search, and we have borrowed the
technology. And we're going to be able, if you're watching this live on Netflix, you're going to be
able to vote on stuff, including House's blood alcohol level. I wanted to mention we put up a
new Rewatchables on Monday night. We did Domestic Disturbance, the funniest From Hell movie of all
the From Hell movies. Had a great time with Sean Fennessy and Chris Ryan. We have another one
coming on Thursday, The Good Son.
Near House's golf podcast, Fairway Rolling, and you can listen and watch Kyle Mann on The Ringer
NBA show. Okay, guys. Winners and losers, and I have mostly winners. And I'm going to start here,
J. Kyle Mann, as a guy who works on our Ringer NBA draft guide and does lots of YouTube clips and
studies and obsesses over the draft. The drafts become less and less fun
over the course of the decade, as everybody just makes logical, smart decisions.
And nobody messes up. And we have no monkey wrenches and no wild cards and no great players
falling. I had the first 12 picks, regardless of the order. I thought we're the 12 best guys in
the draft. There were no stumbles at all. Is this just where we are now? We have too much
intelligence? How do you explain this? It seems like the nerds have taken over and the math has
kind of crept into the point where even I just feel like it's created these little guardrails for
have a wild take. I just feel like we have so much more numbers justification. Scouting has
improved. The information has improved across the board. I feel like we have fewer and fewer just
kind of like good old boy network GM kind of front office people out there. I mean, there's maybe one
or two left, but they're dwindling by the day. But I went through and I was doing my grades on this
and I was like, it was hard to really ding anybody hard for anything. I was like, I don't really have
any of these or Fs. There aren't any like Kintel Woods or what was the Juco guy that you guys took?
Keegan Brown or not? What was his name? Kendrick Brown. Kendrick Brown. Yeah, yeah. We don't get
those. How about the 20 guys House's team took? Yeah. I mean, 20 years ago, I just feel like the
Kings would have taken Nate Amen and we would have been like, what are they doing? And now they just
take Darius Acuff. House, you don't care because your team ended up with the number one pick. And
now you're the number 27, the Celtics, who have had a tumultuous week. I don't know if we're taking
a team psychiatrist or an actual player, but were you going to experience my reaction live? House,
your reaction? We had a lot of little birdies telling us that AJ was going to DC for the last
month and that's what happened. But were you scared in the moment of truth that that wasn't
going to happen? No, no, no. And honestly, you have to just keep the faith, let all of the stuff
happen out on the pitch. And I think that's what's going to happen. I think that's what's going to
happen. Let everybody talk their talk. I do want to set up right away. My blood alcohol content level is at
equilibrium. I'm at 0.0. No booze or boozer. No booze or boozer. I stand with my Mormon brother,
for a very clean start to our careers. Well, that's not the house I know. And Chris Ryan
stepped up for you last night because we brought him on for the, it wasn't an emergency podcast
because we knew Giannis was getting traded. So we called it an urgent gathering. It was being
CR and barrier and CR had come home from dinner and it had a couple of cocktails. Yeah. He was
a lively CR and he was especially, Oh, here we go. This is the only time I'll do this during
our live Netflix trap. The pick is in. They're showing Isaiah Evans.
Adam, Adam Silver's on the clock and he's going to tell us that the Celtics are taking.
Oh, a Houston forward, Kyle, man. What do you think of that pick?
Snack? Yeah. He's somebody that I've been a little more skeptical on because I said,
I thought he was kind of in this. Well, caveat he's, he's a guy that he's one of those
conditional kind of dependent guys. It's like if, if he went to a team with like poor development
mental structure, I would be worried about him because I'd worried that his offense was just in
this weird purgatory that needed to be straightened out where he was like a hypothetical stretch for
who really only got rent. He really didn't attack the rim. Even if he got run off the line,
he would take these like long twos that weren't pretty. Uh, he had to kind of be spoon fed any
offense that he got, but he's very big. He's very athletic. He has long arms rebounder.
I liked him. I liked him in college. Yeah. I trust the Celtics to kind of detangle
him and make sense of him. So that's a good one.
Six double doubles last year house pick 27. Okay.
You needed size. I mean, it's why you, you got your asses handed to you by the Sixers.
Man. One of many reasons, one of many, um, including the fact that we started Ron
Harper jr. At game seven, who hadn't played the whole series, maybe overthought it a little.
All right. So winners and losers, and I have mostly winners. And we're gonna go through this.
I did not send you the list. I'm going to be surprising you guys with all of these
and we can react. And it's a way for us to talk about the draft.
Um, as I mentioned, the big winners is just competence, just, just teams over and over
again, doing what seemed to be relatively the right thing.
I'm not a group thing guy, but you just kind of, it was always like, okay, they should
take him. And then they would.
Here's how, you know, the Kings just sat tight. They didn't do anything crazy. They
just sat tight and let the guy that made the most sense for them, the guy they had their
fun. He just landed in there. No, no irrational behavior out of the Kings.
Well, now, you know, you saw what the Clippers tried to do because there's so many,
there's so many info guys and newsletter guys, and you can basically get any message that you want
out all of a sudden, within two days of the draft, there was a, the Clippers are really becoming
intrigued by a cup. They like them. They've spent a lot of time on him. He could go screenshots of
this, the player development.
Yeah.
Coach's son. That was one of my more, that was one of the more entertaining. Like, I don't know
if that was an angular approach or what that was about.
Could you play a cup and dare Scarlett together? It might happen. And Vivek, you know, it was
like, it was just like watching somebody stay disciplined at a blackjack table for the first
time ever. And be like, Nope, I'm just going to double down on 11 here.
Do they keep Vivek in like, like the, like in the Wolfman, like they have leather straps
over his wrists and he can't touch his phone.
It's just like, or Hannibal Lecter or whatever it is.
They definitely like that article came out and they're definitely like, we can't live a vaccine.
He's going to trade our unprotected 2029 first to move up two spots. So yeah. Uh, house I'll start
with renewed hope, like legitimate renewed hope in Washington, Utah, Memphis, Chicago,
Sacramento, five punching bags, five teams that have been in the lottery a bunch of times or have
reached out to us.
Rebuilt a bunch of times teams that I think during the course of last year were either
egregiously tanking or not as blatantly tanking or actually screwing up the tank in Sacramento's
case and now that's one sixth one sixth of the league has hope when the crazy thing is in the
context of a third of the league tanking last season for each of the teams you just rattled off
you can come up with a decent interesting core of guys two or three or four young guys
all on this kind of trajectory we're on the same rookie contract like look at this little nucleus
that's that's coming together the bummer for those teams and and this is one of the things I'm looking
at from the Washington perspective the league is good the league is better like you know if you if
weren't if teams aren't tanking next year I was going through the eastern conference standings
trying to find who the three worst teams are you know is there a pathway for Washington to get to
the play-in well yes but you know what
it's not easy it's not an easy path um and obviously the the west is is uh you know just
nails across the board especially like I look at that Utah roster I'm like wow look oh I can't wait
to talk about that but look at the west your stupid team paid Trey Young but you have Trey Young
the Nets traded for Julius Randall but then now they have Julius Randall so you have this whole
weird thing that they did Kyle with the with the draft
order and the two ping pong balls if you're in the bottom three it already seems like it's affected
some of the stuff we've seen right like that teams teams are actually okay getting you know
basically good stat bad team guys which sorry house but that's what Trey Young is is been and
that's what Julius Randall is just say sorry to me might be what Michael Porter is but Kyle is this
where we're going uh I mean it seems like it uh well it's going to be interesting to see how
things shake up here now as um these teams are going to be going to be going to be going to be
like house was saying it's such a radical shake-up that all these have-nots and hopeless
wanderers in the desert are just no longer it was like quick change it was like the jazz just
have this like sight unseen team that might be I know house you were talking about being like a
playing team like the jazz might be I was we were joking about it on uh group chat where I was like
are they better than the suns and the blazers instantly with the roster that they have like
and and they're rolling this out and I know we'll talk about it more in detail but um pretty pretty
in terms of the competency in the in the way that these teams are being ran well let's talk about
them first house we'll save your team that's fine talk about them for a while um oh we have the
biggest winner around one was the first poll we did on the live netflix and house's wizards 36
so maybe the audience wants us to talk wizards first that's fine we'll do that winner the whiz
yeah aj de banza de banza I'm just gonna call him de banza and I'm gonna screw it up for 10 years
yeah
he was part of the big three we almost beat the celtics to make it all the way to the eastern
conference finals I remember you texting me during his rookie year being like I'm out
like third
the saddest thing is that you and Jalen that was the era where you and Jalen were interviewing the
prospects that as they came in and you fed me some information that wasn't very flattering
well yeah we were lukewarm on him we like to call him the most the one the one we were the most the
one we were the most worried about was the kid who lied about his age whose name I can't even
remember because it was so far ago but uh so favorite aj's ever thon maker right was that
right no not thon maker it was uh it was a kid who lied about his age his name I can't even remember
he was the shooting guard I can't remember blank and he was a lefty I can't remember anyway
wow incredible so aj soprano is the worst case aj scenario I think house
right aj feely's in the middle okay I don't know I couldn't come up with aj foight you didn't you
didn't get aj foight don't you remember that aj foight's a good one maybe this car driver from
our youth now here's where kyle fills a pot of water and dumps it on your head kyle you think
they should have taken boozer
just make the case no this is a can't lose draft I mean I I gave the top three picks all a pluses
because how often are you going to get and they said it repeatedly on the broadcast it is true
you could choose your flavor here of this neapolitan sweetness of prospect goodness at
the top of this draft and be come away satisfied um there's a perfectly reasonable case for taking
aj that I understand that is very sober like house tonight unfortunately but I just thought that uh
I thought the the basketball you know
said this you all repeatedly I just thought in the basketball sense to make them a competitive team
that was going to be very efficient and focused and get the most and elevate their guys I thought
boozer made a lot of sense but if they end up having trey on the team which it seems like they're
going to and if ad hangs around and you think about putting sar at the four and then you put
aj at the three and then you got trey or bub or whatever it's going to be at the two or kai shan or
you know will riley's been showing out and looking good um about the two but I I think they suddenly
have a pretty balanced team
like it's going to be pretty interesting I think so so house I I was studying him carefully this
whole week and all the interviews and then even today and at one point the pre-show somebody
complimented his outfit and he said I actually went to France to find this and brought it back
I'm like I don't know if I love that why don't you love that I didn't I didn't love it it's been
like how about getting in the gym and work about some threes um but he's he's very polished almost
a little too polished like polished enough where I'm like huh
he's young he almost seemed like a 19 year old he's trying I mean this is yeah you're very
polished 19 year old yeah that's right I mean so polished that the league selected him as their
sort of youth draft correspondent to go participate and and interview people and and you know be in
the playoffs and and be kind of a digital media guy for the that that's a lofty role that's I
loved that I thought it was very positive reflection on his maturity
the contradistinction it was you know when you're splitting the hairs so fine um his his
personality coming out was the kind of the opposite of what we saw out of Darren Peterson now
you're you're not drafting personality here but you know we are trying to come up with a reason
to choose one guy over another and that's part of why I like the Bonsa yeah Peterson seemed a little
better after he got picked he it felt like you could see the weight we'll talk about him in a
second so winner the Bonsa who is a very good player he's a very good player he's a very good
player he's a very good player he's a very good player he's a very good player you know we've talked
about him a bunch in the pod I remember when was that early February I had you on the pod Kyle and
I was like the Bonsa is gonna go first like this is this is a wrap the guy's he's he's too filled
out already like what's he gonna look like when he's 27 and there's just not a lot of guys like
him he's somebody that could have played in any of the last three playoff series we watched he
could have been thrown out there he would have survived physically there's if you're nitpicking
I don't know he like he talked about his off-ball defense like
some people don't love a shot yet it's all stuff that will get better and better as he goes along
but he seems like at one point house he said I've been number one my whole life I expected to go
number one in this draft Kyle that's just like the kind of confidence I think you would want
from your number one pick right yeah I mean he's he has earned confidence I think an interesting
thing about the Bonsa too that I've I've been amused by through watching him come up through
the grassroots circuit knowing people that have interviewed him and his family there is just a
stern focus about them you know
as a group and I have friends who know his dad who were like talking about he would have AJ talk to
these different players and just to like kind of get on his ass basically uh on purpose to give him
feedback critical feedback and he and he and his dad specifically I remember said I don't kiss his
ass ever he was just like on him all the time so that you got that going on that's the Rick Brunson
strategy worked when the next the title and and the other thing I wanted I wanted to tell house is
I was thinking about this this week if we watch these playoffs and we think about the way it gets
officiated if you watch your beloved Denny Avdia if you watch just any of these downhill guys or
whether it be Shea or whoever you think about the Bonsa's specific set of gifts he's not like I'm
just going to roast you with a live dribble he's not like one of those nuclear athletes but he's
his gracefulness and his balance and his power combined with being a pretty good athlete
getting downhill makes him really potent and I wanted to throw this stat at you house
listening I was looking at this uh did you want to jump in bill real quick no go you do it keep going
there was there was uh paint touches in division one college basketball this year guys that averaged
over 20 per game the top five is all point guards uh number one is Abuka Corey who got drafted
tonight he was luscious downhill we like Darius Darius this is efficiency uh among guys that had
over 20 a game Darius Acuff was number two among these point guards number three downhill
paint touch efficiency scoring the ball AJ de Bonsa so that's that's let's go that guy's six foot
nine so yes he is he's set up to just get to the line and score a ton just yeah by the way he plays
I mean we could do a whole thing of of effusive praise for what he's bringing to the table
the of that how how um easy it seemed like the scoring came especially after Saunders got hurt
where he became the focal point of the offense but what I really love is he goes both ways I love
seeing him go low and then he goes both ways I love seeing him go low and then he goes both ways
we don't care about his personal life oh pause
Jesus.
Go ahead.
It's like 1130.
Are you drunk?
I'm trying to rattle.
No, I was kidding.
Go.
Three hours ago, you would have gotten that.
I got it immediately.
Here's the thing with AJ.
He's not LeBron, obviously.
Nobody's going to be LeBron.
We'll probably never see LeBron again.
So don't aggregate this.
I'm not saying he's the next LeBron.
How many guys have come into the league since LeBron
where you say to yourself, eh, kind of a LeBron body, right?
Where you look at him and go, eh, I could see him at age 27
looking a little LeBron-ish.
That is not a long list, Kyle, man.
I would say that's less than 10 guys that we've had come into the league.
And sadly, not all of them are good.
Maybe you could have said that about Josh Jackson.
Like, oh, Josh Jackson, when he's 27, he might be ripped.
Turned out he wasn't in the league.
But physically, I think it's just going to be really easy for him
to get his points.
And the fact that he produced in college, I think, matters,
which is the same thing for Boozer.
So the Wiz are a winner.
Sadly, they're also a loser house
because you gave Trey Young four years, $212 million
with a player option year four
that I think he's already picked up.
I don't know who you're bidding against.
I don't know why he did it.
It was inexplicable.
We're going to do worse contracts with Waz in March.
I was screenshotting you pictures of us
with the first, second, or third pick next March.
We have to wait till March.
Why can't you?
Why can't you have good things?
Why can't you have good things for a week?
Why did this have to happen?
This is what I said with all the local folks here.
Like, did they have to announce this on Monday?
Why couldn't we just wait till Friday or something?
Make it a Friday news dump.
Let everybody be in the honeymoon period with AJ.
It would have been fine.
And I had already wrapped my head around the idea
that Trey Young was going to be in my life
for the next three years.
I imagine three years, 140, 100, maybe.
Like, we're crazy.
How about 100?
How about 340?
100 sounds great.
Really, you know.
But you have to, like, sort of go,
oh, Willie, there's a floor to the salary.
You have to have a floor to your salaries.
And you have seven guys on rookie contracts.
You got to pay somebody.
How's that?
You sound like CA.
You're just making.
I'm just telling you, I am literally making shit up
because it makes no sense whatsoever
to pay that man 53 effing million dollars a year.
No.
No sense under any.
Here's my problem with it.
And then I'll stop.
Give me one example.
I need one bit of evidence
that this guy at the point guard position
has made a teammate better.
Give me.
Yes, he helped John Collins rim run.
Yes, he helped Clint Capella rim run.
Neither one of those fucking guys are still with the Hawks.
He didn't help them, like, you know,
extend their careers with the Hawks.
And he was just in a situation where
they had the number one overall pick in the draft
and they had a real young stud in Jalen Johnson
and Trey couldn't coexist with those guys
for whatever the reason was stylistically,
whatever the vision is,
whatever Quinn Snyder's offense was,
it didn't work there.
So that's a lot of money for a, a, a project.
Project.
By which I mean, you're projecting.
You're two minutes.
You took two and a half.
Um, it's, it was horrible.
It was egregious.
It was a crime against the wizards.
And I don't know,
this would be the only reason I wouldn't want to go
to a wizards game next year.
And Trey Young's not, obviously not a bad player,
but I just think we, we did this when you did Bradley Beal
and Bradley Beal was coming off a good season
when you gave him the dumb contract.
Trey Young was coming off a season
where his team gave him away.
And, and the vicious history of this,
where it's like, well, Trey Young chose the wizard.
He did who wanted to trade for him.
Not one person.
How should I have this friend at CAA, Kyle?
Who's relatively powerful.
And we were texting him like, you guys,
why did you do that to the wizards?
Why did you do that?
Yeah.
We're congratulating him.
Like you, somehow you found the sucker at the poker table.
Uh, just hilarious stuff.
Anyway, they were, it's that team house.
Who's the leader of that?
I that's what we were speculating about.
I was just like, I could see, I don't want to speculate too much.
Here.
But I mean, I can see AJ and Trey being at odds at some point.
They like to have the ball.
I just, I'm just wondering who, where that seems like a lot
of personalities that I could see.
Well, the biggest problem with Trey is he's this three point Curry
lookalike three point shooter, but the threes don't go in.
And he doesn't play off the ball.
I mean, that's the key thing.
It makes sense if the threes go in, but he's been, you know,
low thirties now for three years.
Well, he's going to set up Trey.
Johnson's going to have nothing but open looks.
He's going to be, this is the master facilitator.
He's going to be the master facilitator.
What's Will Hardy capable of?
How can this all come together with this team actually trying to win?
And it feels like we might have the answer in the first 10 games of the season.
You said you think that Peterson's going to start.
I think it's fine to bring him off the bench.
Let Ace start.
Either way, it doesn't really matter.
But it's kind of an embarrassment of riches
and a really fascinating challenge for them.
But the West is so good.
It's Portland and Phoenix that they're going to be competing with.
In Portland, he still has a chance to get better.
We'll see with Phoenix.
The Netflix audience thinks Utah should take him, Peterson, 69% on that.
You mentioned the Fugitive.
I was noting this in our draft grades.
I was like, do you think Darren Peterson sees any sort of kinship
with Richard Kimball the way he's in a bus?
His college season is like a bus crash, and it's rolling down the hill,
and he miraculously escapes it as it explodes.
And still gets taken number two.
Do you think there's maybe some parallels there?
Shaves his beard, dyes his hair.
Yeah, it starts out bad.
I mean, there was one game where he told the coach,
wasn't that a big game, like 15 minutes before the game?
I'm not playing.
Not going, yeah.
That was when I got really concerned.
Look, the talent's there.
We've talked about it a bunch on the pod.
There's no question.
If you're going to pick who has come into the league in the last 30 years
who's looked the most like young Kobe, you would pick Peterson.
There's red flags, though,
that I can't ignore.
I don't know how it's going to play out.
I'd be hesitant to make a prediction,
but I will say this is the best scenario, I think, for him.
It's going to be far away in the Pacific Northwest.
Is that where it's going to be?
That's not Pacific.
Mountain West.
It's like almost 9 o'clock.
I had a whole John and Vinny's two hours ago.
To think Vegas, but like four hours.
It's closer to Vegas than you think out there.
Yeah, West Coast, whatever.
Perfect spot for him.
Well, I'm going to take a break and regroup
after saying Utah was in the Pacific Northwest.
We're going to be back in one second.
We'll do the rest of the winners and losers.
Yeah, there's some good ones.
All right.
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Winners and losers, we got to hit Memphis.
Shout out to our guy, Verno.
Verno was at a draft party.
He said the entire city was rooting for Boozer.
No disrespect to Peterson, but I think that city's had a little bit of a rollercoaster
ride the last few years with unreliable guys.
And I was basically looking forward to a guy who you could just come into the league and
pay him a little bit of money.
I'm not sure if that's a good thing.
soothing balm on their
bad feelings. I wondered if they
booed Silver, but of course they immediately
booed him when he came out. They did boo
the San Antonio Spurs, which I enjoyed.
All right. I'm
bouncing around. We haven't gotten to
Chicago yet, but we'll get to them
because I needed a loser.
Loser, number 10,
Brandon Burris, who I love.
Probably one of my three favorite guys in the draft.
Could have
gotten drafted by Dallas and played with Cooper
Flagg at number nine and Kyrie.
And just been in meaningful basketball games
right away with a bunch of role players.
He could have fallen to 11
and joined
Steph Curry, one of the 10
or 12 greatest players of all time
on their last run of relevance
with two years with Steve Kerr and
Draymond and maybe LeBron going there
and the whole thing. He could have been part of that
playing for Arizona's Steve
Kerr, the Arizona connection.
What happens?
He gets drafted by the Bucs
at 10, the crappy Bucs.
The all-time mediocre.
There's never been a more likely 31
win team than this Bucs team.
And now he has to fight for shots
with a bunch of guys on their team.
And I just got bummed out, Kyle.
I think the good thing
about Burris, though, is that I don't know that he'll
necessarily be bummed
about that because he's just such a quality
like fits in wherever he is.
I mean, it's a missed opportunity for him.
Can I be bummed for him? You're welcome to do that.
Yeah, I'll permit that. He's
yeah, I mean, he
missed out on being in a more fun basketball
environment in the short term, obviously.
I think that you can clearly see the thinking
for the Bucs, though. It's just like they don't necessarily
I hope they're not thinking they know
they have a centerpiece right now. They're still going to
try to figure out what their direction is and
taking somebody that Burris will fit into whatever
they choose to do, you know, and then they took
a minute with their other pick as sort of an upside
swing. But I thought he
made sense for them to pick because he's just going
to be around for whatever happens.
And that's one of the things with this draft
house. I feel like 20 years ago, they'd
take a man at 10
and Burris falls to the
Warriors at 11. And then we spend the next
five years going, are you fucking kidding me?
How does this happen?
But no, the Bucs
wisely were like, you know who we should take
the guy who's by far the best player
in this spot right now. So now Burris has to
go to this weird team.
If he gets a text that says Kevin Porter Jr.
and Kyle Kuzma want to take you to dinner tomorrow
night. Again, I'd go with
sniffles, maybe some bronchitis,
maybe some tinnitus,
maybe you went to a concert. Your ears were hurting.
Did you
were you surprised that the Mavericks did not take
him because they took Merez Johnson instead?
All of that whole
situation with Dallas changed.
I think in a pretty dramatic
way with the Dusty May thing.
Yeah. Yeah. Like look at that
situation that presents itself. And the
most interesting thing is Dusty
May got to choose
his favorite who
he thought was going to be most impactful at
the pro level. And he chose
Merez. Here's the best
part about that house.
He can also say he didn't choose it.
Of course. No,
you're absolutely right. Yeah. So
I just got the job.
They were already locked in on
Merez. Obviously, I told them he's a great
kid, but you know, I can't
I just got hired. I can't come in
and start telling these guys what to do.
Like I just got
hired a week ago. But
you know, he probably was like, yeah,
because everything and this is why
we all love them, Kyle. Like this was just
the classic. These are the guys that would
fall in the draft 10 years ago, 15 years
ago, 20 years ago.
Just the heartbeat of a great team
in college.
The engine, all the quotes
about him was like, we could
never have a bad practice because of this
guy. Every time we needed to pick
up in a game, he'd do something. He was
relentless, the most competitive motherfucker
on the planet, all the stuff you want to hear
all things that we discounted for
years and years and then finally started listening.
But you were a little more
down on him in the draft guide than
where'd you land on
him?
I ended up with
Merez at 13. So I mean, I wasn't
like out.
Yeah. No, I mean
the argument there for him, he's really
young too. I think people should keep that in mind
like Merez played a year of college
at Illinois and went and played like FIBA
U19 with like AJ and Michael
Brown and those guys. So he's really
had a year. So he's young.
For a college sophomore and
just really dogged. I mean, and
I think that Cooper
being there and making like
the playmaking progress that he made
and then you got Kyrie coming back.
Granted, we don't totally know what's going to happen with that
because you were thinking maybe they'd make a swing
at like a playmaker type guy there.
But you talked about it that like I think
the conventional wisdom has just kind of evolved
over the years where you would just see
teams get in the top 10 and be like
it's this illusion of being
in the top 10 that makes you feel like
you have to be in this mindset of like, well, we're
here. We got to like take this chance on an upside
pick, right? It's like and the upside
picks year to year can be like
pretty volatile. They can be huge risks
and you'll see teams take the swing at
those guys and end up with like a Kevin Knox
or somebody like, oh, you get tantalized
like always inefficient, but I'm tantalized
and the safer thing to do is to take the
dude who can switch one through five like
Merez Johnson, who's a winner
who's going to be on your team. He's not going to be a star
but it's a safe smart
pick. I
like it. Yeah, I think it's good. I
told you I did this exercise. I went through the
last five drafts and tried to
separate the guys based on studs
playoff guys are just wildcards
and wildcards can be upside or small
guards or shooters
and the playoff guys year after year
like in last year's draft. It was
Cedric Howard Murray
Boyles Carter Brian and Hugo
were the four guys that
are just guys that have that playoff
profile that can guard different positions that
have energy. They bring some sort of skill set
that seems to matter when it gets to
April and May in 24
the playoff guys were
your guys are house. I can't
give him a stud, but
he's, you know, maybe Serge
Ibaka in the right situation. Better
Serge Ibaka
clinging AJ Mitchell
Jared McCain
Baylor Shireman
right? So again, like
no like small offense
first shooting guards. No
kind of upside guys. These
are just dudes that play and then
the year before that was
Kamara case on Wallace
Hawkeyes Derek Lively and
Pudzemski as like
your playoff guys. So I look at
Merez and I'm just like he just
feels like he's in those three
classes. I just I can just see
him in a playoff series. Everybody
seemed to think okay. See was either going to take
them or trade up if they didn't feel like they
could get him at 12 and
I do wonder if they've infected
the thinking of these teams a little bit back
to Milwaukee though.
Um, I had as a loser
the honest trade already 24 hours later, which I didn't like yesterday when we did the, the, uh, urgent gathering podcast. Um, I usually like to get a blue chipper when I'm trading one of the best 25 parts of all time. One of the things they got was the thirteenth pick in the draft and they took Nate Amen, who I think was the most polarizing guy of these first 15 classic.
He, he, he hits. I don't want to be mean about somebody who's 20, but hits the draft checklist of, well, he didn't shoot last year, but he's a good shooter. Well, he struggled down there down the end of last year, but he was injured. Um, you could see the upside. It's all like upside and not stuff. If you actually watch the games and you're just like, what is this guy? Is he Brad Sellers? So what is this guy?
Billis was like he got fouled a lot. He stuck his nose in there. It was just kind of, uh, really talk about the coach's kid.
Really getting creative with it. I mean, I do think there's something there. It's just a matter of where you, what level of investment you want to put in him. I mean, I was lower on him than consensus. I ended up with him at 20, uh, just because of where I was comfortable with that.
I mean, I heard somebody on another NBA show say that he reminded him of Perry Jones, the third, which is kind of honestly the way people used to talk about Perry Jones. He'd be like, Oh, it's so big. Watch him move. Oh my God. Just get caught up in these hypothetical vortex.
I find this hard to believe.
I actually. literally heard the opposite, that the calls were going out from the Milwaukee Bucks asking if
anybody was excited about this house. You never gave your thoughts on the podcast about the Miami
honest trade. Um, I, I, my first reaction was, wow, this is a rare lose, lose trade. You don't
get a lot of those in the NBA. Um, now for Miami had Miami had to do it. Cause what the hell else
are they going to do? But yeah, I didn't like that. It is Giannis. So I'm being a little,
I get it from their side. Yeah, I get it from exactly right. But like, okay, great job. They
moved up from being the play in 10th team to the fifth best team in the six best team. Yeah. What
do you think Kyle? You think they moved that high? I mean that this is the conversation to be had,
right? Well, you're factoring in five seed. You're saying Giannis is going to play
70 games with five. Exactly right. Which, um, that I am doing all, all of their top six guys
are going to play 70 games because they can't afford for any of those guys to miss 15 or 20
games here or there. They really, when we did the pod yesterday, we're like, well, they'll bring
Norm Powell back. And then today it's like, yeah, Norm Powell's not coming back. I don't have enough
money to pay him. So we'll see. They can patch it together. But what do you think Kyle? Defensively,
I think they could be pretty interesting. Um, I mean, they're going to, they're going to have to work
their magic and the margins and finding guys though. I mean, cause you're gonna, you're gonna
need some more, uh, you know, shooting. Yeah. You're going to need some more shooting. I mean,
but that's kind of their specialty. They pull those guys just out of the, out of nothing.
Like they find them to target them. And there's a few guys in this draft, I think that they could
go target, but I'll be, I'll be interested to see if they climb as high as five. I mean,
Giannis being on your team automatically makes you dominant in some capacity and he's always
something you got to deal with. So you guys might be right. I might be a little on the cynical side.
I'm just sad for the Milwaukee fans. The Milwaukee fans deserved the end of Giannis to be better than,
than it turned out. They, they got bummed out, blown out of the playoffs. Um, two years ago,
they got blown out of the playoffs or three years ago, two years ago, then didn't make the playoffs
last year. Yeah. I just, it's a bummer. And one thing I forgot to say yesterday, and I wish I had
been harder on this part yesterday, you know, they shouldn't trade Giannis a year ago, which we've
covered on many pots. I should have said yesterday, not only did not trade Giannis a year ago, they
went all in with that miles Turner hail Mary that involves stretching day lowered for 22 million a
year all the way through this decade. And now they've just traded Giannis for way less than
they probably could have gotten. Um, another loser. Hey, it's 2026 guys. The NBA still has
to do this thing where teams make a trade, but then somebody is on the clock and they make the
pick. But we just found out five minutes ago that the pick got traded. Why can't we figure this out?
Why not? How hard is this? We have everybody in the desk just said they flip 16 for 17.
It's not, it's okay. See in the clock at 16, not with Memphis takes Bennett starts.
No, they're taking for okay. See, we just heard that. Why do we have to do this?
Is there like some kind of legality thing there where they can like speculate about it on the
broadcast, but on the NBA, like can't officially say it. Is it like house? Is it something more
strict like that? Like, or what is it?
Well, they have to, I'm sure there's a process for submitting the trade and the trade has to
be approved by the league office. And until that's done, you know, no, no trade is official. So
house, they can do whatever they want. They can make the other thing. Speaking of doing anything,
you can, you can, uh, you can vote on Netflix right now, whether you think Giannis will ever
make the finals in Miami, not even win the finals, make the finals. I'm sad. What would
your take be on that house? No chance. No chance whatsoever. No chance. Zero. Never say
never, but unlikely. Can we talk about how it should not be two nights again? Don't do you
not, do you not miss the one night experience? Cause the second round is so bad. Like, isn't
it a waste of everybody's time to do it in one, like in two nights? I just, I want to go back to
one. I, uh, I have always wanted it to be, especially after having done the draft a couple
years, just the first 14 picks and take 10 minutes between picks. Oh, I like that. That way they can
have, this is my next loser. By the way, the, the Lisa,
Salters interviews when there's real basketball shit going on, who are these for? Who is it for?
Who are they for? They do a set with the fricking living room. What the fuck is that for Kyle? What
does this moment mean to you? It means a lot. It means a lot. I just got drafted. It's so
meaningful to me. Uh, really, really cathartic stuff. There's real basketball shit. Like the
Clippers took, you know, Wagler.
We're at five and it's okay. Now what's going to happen with these next four picks. And we,
we, it's just, I just feel like everybody watching this draft cares about the basketball stuff. Not
the, not the family stuff that we just some more in the weed, like maybe not too far in the weeds,
but just, can we get a little more like, what's this going to look like on court? Like go to the
screen, show us a clip, you know, two channels, they had ABC and that ESPN and somehow they had
Lisa Salters on both of them doing interviews, pick one, have ABC be the one my wife would watch.
She likes the interviews. I want to know all the mechanics of the draft as it's happening.
Atlanta's on the clock at number eight. It's like, are they going to trade this?
This has been rumors all week that they might trade this, who would trade it? What are the
candidates? Could, could they trade this right now for trade Murphy? But no, we had to, we had
to interview Darius Acuff and his family. And I just don't know who that's for. I don't get it.
What's a, what's a back of the envelope math guy's name. We could have that feed
where they go to him and he just for 30 seconds shows you like the, the analytics or the,
Oh, Kornacki.
Yeah. Kornacki, something like that, like a little more, but yeah.
Well, we'd just, we'd run them for this.
Um, uh, good news guys. The calls are continuing to come in for bucks players.
The votes are just ringing.
Yeah. They just got a Kuzma call, uh, winner.
It was Samsonite the, the luggage company. Oh, uh, the bags are packed.
The votes came in too for Yannis and, uh, 87% of people watching this said, no, he will not
make the finals of Miami 87. Sorry, Miami winner, Darius Acuff going to Sacramento. Is he the most
fun Sacramento king we've ever had? What's your top three house? Well, they were, they were so
white chocolate. Yeah. I mean, like dude, yes. I mean, come on.
Mitch Richmond.
Oh, sure. Sure. Yes.
Would you put boogie on there?
That era that Doug Christie was an endless source of amusement.
Doug Christie wasn't fun except.
Oh yes. He was fun.
Entertaining to talk about Doug Christie. Inherently fun is kind of, I don't know about
that one. I'll phrase it another way. Who is the best league pass guy we've had. I've had
league pass since 2000 or 2001. Who's the best league pass guy they've ever had.
Chris white chocolate end of story, right? I mean that run, that run like early basketball
internet where they were like the clips where you could watch the top 10.
I don't know. I always joke about this. The white chocolate is a problem versus what
it was like to just watch white chocolate for 82 games, but that was pretty big disparity.
That was pre widespread league pass. So perception was reality. I was seeing those clips and
I was like, he's great. I didn't realize he was not great for years. It was a long time.
There's a chance a cuff is just absolutely awesome on the Kings and everyone in Sacramento
is going to be wearing a cup jerseys. I'm all in house. And I have been all in really
for the entire college basketball season loved him. Um, he, he checks every box for me, including,
including it's not perfect because he's not gigantic. He might get picked on defensively.
Um, he's going to a franchise that has had, uh, been living under a ladder and, and has
black cats on the front door when you walk in and every sort of bad luck broken mirrors
everywhere and every sort of bad luck thing you can have.
I just think the kids got it. And, uh, and we'll talk about one team that passed up on
them. But Kyle, uh, are you as on a scale of one to 10, where are you compared to being
on a scale of one to 10?
I think I'm my, the, the framing of how I like a cuff is maybe a little different than
I don't know. I don't know what you all are envisioning for him, but I've thought of him.
If you're writing him as your like primary offensive star, who's just always got the
ball in his hands and you're living and dying with what he does in the half court. I don't
love that as much as I like him as like a very, very good game manager guy who can hit
open shots, who can bring stability. Lord knows the Sacramento Kings could be the best
use that on in all facets um i mean it's it's funny it's almost been 10 years ago since they
took fox that was the last time that they you know took a yeah took a promising guard who was you
know bright kid and everything that's i i'm i'm with him is not as necessarily like this our whole
solar system revolves around this guy i think he's probably better as like your third star i think if
you're gonna build a team like a a high level team so house could he be as good as kairi in your
opinion i have a different comp for him um that i felt this this way for a long time i really feel
like he's the second coming of dame i feel like he's dame 2.0 and i love it that that's what i'm
gonna steal it 44 from three as a freshman in fucking college and could just they weren't easy
threes volumes they weren't open threes yeah he didn't play anybody pass the ball he was the only
dude on that that team that team was yackety sacks they were athletic but they didn't have anybody he
shot like 51 on catch and shoots and he barely got any that's another i think dame's way better
the kairi
with the Kyrie part that he reminds me of is just the either hands thing in
traffic,
like his ability to just finish at these weird goofy angles.
I don't think Dame can do that.
Dame came into the league after,
I think it was 22 and was,
was good right away,
but it,
it,
it took him,
I would say three years.
Like I remember he had a really bad playoff series in 2015 against Memphis.
It took him a couple of years to then go up that next level.
I feel like a cup's going to be further along and he's younger too,
but I liked the Dame thing.
I,
to me,
that's the motto of like,
could he be at 25 points a game,
like 25 and seven has the ball a lot.
Maybe you need some extra offense next to him,
but that would be what I see Kyle.
Yeah.
I said,
when did Dame hit the game set that series winner?
Was that 14 or 15?
Yeah,
it was later.
It was,
I think the 17 range.
It was after KD left.
Okay.
See,
so anyway,
the Kings who,
you know,
have been,
are probably the biggest train wreck in the league.
I would say,
do we have a bigger train wreck?
Now they have a fun player.
I'm excited for their fans.
I don't know if this was a,
I don't know if this was a winner or a loser,
but the warriors,
it seemed like Joe Lake up,
had an argument with Mike Dunleavy in the draft party.
And it might not have been,
I'm just seeing what I said on social media,
but I thought that was pretty funny winner.
Kyle,
you love this one.
The Spurs at 20 drafted your guy.
You've been riding for somebody.
Why don't you tell us about him?
Uh,
Jane Quaintance was like a pretty highly regarded prospects.
Um,
he went to Arizona state last year and everybody that watched his tape from
Kentucky this year,
I've had people be like,
Oh,
you're just,
it's just Kentucky.
I'm like,
he barely played for Kentucky.
It's like,
it really is not that all of his tape is for Arizona state.
He was 17 years old and was like defensively,
just ridiculously dominant.
Um,
I just think that,
uh,
I had this thought process during the playoffs.
He's,
he's probably,
if he's healthy,
that's the big question is that's,
the thing that happened between now and when he was dominant,
Arizona state is he,
you know,
had towards ACL came back too early.
There's some like real,
like time Lord kind of worry about like,
is this going to keep happening with him?
But if he's right,
I think that he could net out where he could be as high as like five in this
draft in like a few years from now,
because he's that defensively special in my opinion.
I know people have worry about his offense,
but I'm just like,
this dude dunks everything.
We don't worry about what Mitchell Robinson does around the basket.
I'm like,
he screens and he dunks everything.
He's time Lord.
Fish.
You had this,
you tweeted this one in,
in may you tweeted how he'd be the perfect guy for the Spurs.
This was like a month ago.
I mocked him to the Spurs.
And one of our mocks was,
I was like,
I didn't have any intel.
I was just like,
I think this just makes a lot of sense.
It's because he fits their brain in terms of the type of kid he is
to little soft-spoken,
pretty bright kid plays chess.
He's a big chess player.
And then,
yeah,
after one game with the,
during the playoffs,
when OKC beat the Spurs,
I was like,
they need acquaintance.
They need to draft acquaintance.
Would you,
would you rather,
would you rather drafted him or a head coach?
What a set up.
So rude.
So rude.
Why'd you,
why'd you make me make that joke?
You texted me to set you up with that.
No,
he didn't.
No,
listen,
Mitch Johnson's a great coach.
None of that finals was his fault,
except for the 43 things that happened that were poorly coached.
The whole team is young.
They're all experiencing this for the first time together.
Don't blame him.
They're all young.
The whole thing is young.
House and I made fun of Rick Adelman during college and then after the college.
By the way,
RIP Rick Adelman.
He was Hall of Famer.
No,
he was great,
but we would always get mad about his game management.
And Mitch Johnson's game management was a hundred times worse than all the,
all the stuff we had with him or Dunleavy or some of the other coaches we used to make fun of.
So I don't know.
Mitch Johnson's younger than Steph Curry.
He's young.
He's young.
That,
that whole thing,
I chalk up,
but,
but I think Quaintance is absolutely perfect because you know that it solves a lot of the,
the defensive challenges that this team,
they just need,
they need,
they still need size,
which is a very weird thing to say with when,
who cares whether or not Quaintance can score.
It doesn't matter.
You're not worried about,
you have a year with them too.
Cause you have Cornette.
Yeah.
I think Carter,
Brian's going to play for them next year.
By the way,
they,
Netflix did a poll for,
is Darius Acuff the most fun Kings rookie basically ever in 50,
74% said yes.
Keegan Murray had a lot of buzz when they,
when he,
when he's going to be more fun than Keegan Murray.
Come on.
No,
but I'm saying the buzz surrounding him.
And as he,
and as he arrived there,
there was a big excitement.
Exciting.
One more cutting.
Yeah.
One more winner before we go to break.
Daryl Morey
trades Jared McCain for pick 22 in three seconds.
And then Jared McCain goes to,
okay,
let's see.
And does really well there.
And it's,
I think one of the reasons Daryl Murray gets fired.
Well,
Philly with 22 takes file on who is one of my favorite guys in the draft.
I think he's been vindicated.
Great trade.
Just like that.
Love it.
McCain is a declining asset.
He just turned him into file on and two more years at a rookie contract.
Let's go,
Daryl.
Somebody hire him.
I had it on good authority that they wanted violent last year.
They,
they might've promised him last year.
So Daryl's wow.
It's the Daryl's vision fulfilled.
And,
uh,
yeah,
that's a Daryl juice behind him.
Sprinkles.
Daryl juice.
Uh,
did he,
do I like file on too much or like,
cause the knock on him is he's getting too skinny and there's a whole weight
limit thing with point guards where if you go below 175 pounds,
people get concerned.
I don't care.
I was a little more leaning towards the Hornets taking him.
I thought that's who they should have taken.
You know,
I know the Christian Anderson pick that I know our guy con is going to have another dude.
Who's a great,
uh,
drool pull-up shooter fits their brand.
But I thought a cuff is a tougher player.
Like I thought that he would be a better file on him.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I thought that file on would fit with the Hornets better.
I was surprised they didn't tell you.
I agree.
I thought every pick after 14,
I was ready for him to go and guess what house.
Now he goes to 22.
He goes to Philadelphia,
a city that,
uh,
takes everything personally and hates everybody else.
And he's going to have a giant,
chip on his shoulder.
It's going to fit right in.
It's going to be a great situation for him.
All jokes aside.
I think that with that back court and,
and you know what they're capable of them together.
Yeah,
let's do it.
Um,
all right.
We have a lot more to get to.
We're going to take one more break.
Uh,
it's like going to be a little bit longer when we have,
we'll have time to look at Twitter for two minutes,
but,
uh,
we're gonna take a break and come back with the rest of the
winners and losers.
Now for a special part of today's episode,
where we're going to be talking about the superior matches,
teams,
and players of.
FIFA world cup 26 brought to you by Michelob ultra,
the official beer sponsor of FIFA world cup 26 and a
superior light beer.
So let's get into the moments that stood above the rest
and made a superior level of impact.
At least so far,
we're still pretty early in the world cup.
My MVPs right now,
messy has to be number one,
already a legend already,
probably leading the goat combo had five goals in two games,
missed a penalty kick to make it a little interesting in
the second game that he played.
But,
uh,
he was so great to watch so special.
And,
um,
I was thinking he might have the highest approval rate of
any athlete at any sport right now.
Who doesn't like messy.
If somebody said they didn't like messy,
you would look at them like they were staring at you cross-eyed
or something.
Like it's an insane opinion.
Everyone loves messy.
That's it.
This just reinforced that.
So that's one,
uh,
second one for me,
team USA,
which,
uh,
threw its hat in the ring as a perennial,
uh,
power.
It's not perennial because it's,
it's the first time it's happened in 2010,
but it sounds really good that it's a printer power,
but yeah,
this is the first time we've actually thought that an American team
could make maybe the final eight,
maybe even the final four as crazy as that sounds since 2010,
since Donovan with the Algeria goal.
And,
uh,
it's been a long 16 years really ever since.
And now hope again,
very exciting to the point they're playing their third world cup
game.
They can rest most of their starters.
So that's been great.
Uh,
third thing for me,
Alexi,
Dallas,
great job getting everybody talking about the box studio show.
Good job.
People are talking about it.
Fourth one,
the African nations.
Um,
you have Morocco,
Egypt,
Ghana,
Cape Verde and,
and the DR Congo all probably making the final 32.
I think the record before was three,
but,
uh,
I just watched today.
I watched Ghana tie,
England.
They,
they parked the bus,
um,
which as somebody who's been involved in a lot of youth in high
school and college soccer watching over the years,
it's,
it's mostly annoying when teams parked the bus,
but in this case,
Ghana did a really good job.
They needed to tie.
They parked the bus.
They knew what they were doing and they got out of it.
Now they're going to make around 32.
So,
uh,
just cool though,
to see like this entire continent kind of make their presence felt,
especially with the extra teams.
Um,
so you have that,
uh,
goals.
We have more teams,
which,
you know,
there's six to eight teams that probably have no business whatsoever being the
world cup,
but it has led to more goals.
It's led to,
um,
you can do parlays where you have bet somebody to have two goals in a
game with somebody else to have two goals in a game,
like all kinds of fun things.
Who doesn't love goals?
Uh,
as we keep going in the world cup and the games get better and better,
it's going to be a lot of one,
nothing,
a lot of two,
one,
you're going to miss some of these goals.
Rinaldo.
That's been fun.
Is he?
washed up. Well, he scored two
Two goals today against a team that wasn't good, but he had two goals.
But it's fun to watch somebody just trying to hold on who doesn't have it anymore.
Who can't identify with that?
And then last but not least, for me, just out of the early stuff,
it really looks like we're getting France versus Germany in the round of 16.
I like when we have World Cup matchups that also feel like they could have been
any sort of major conflict that we've had in the world in the last 400 years.
France-Germany just feels weighty.
It feels important.
It feels like that's a game that should be in the finals.
No, we're going to get it in the round of 16, and it's going to be awesome.
And we're going to get Mbappe and a very, very fun France team
who, if I had to pick right now, I'm leaning toward Argentina
just because of Messi and just because they play so great together.
But France would be the other one.
I think those would be my two.
And not hot takes.
Because those are two of the favorites.
But anyway, those are my superior moments.
Ultra wants to hear your superior moments from the FIFA World Cup 26.
You have the chance to vote after every FIFA World Cup 2026 match
for the superior player of the match on the FIFA Plus app.
That player will get the superior player of the match trophy
representing the host countries of Canada, Mexico, and of course, the U.S. of A.
Celebrate every goal, save, and win with U.S. soccer and Michelob Ultra.
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So before we continue with the winners and losers,
one of my favorite things is to go back
and look at the top 100 high school class
of all the high school guys who then just got drafted.
Which is the Dabonsa class.
And if you go back, Dabonsa was one,
Peterson was two, and Boozer was three.
Wow.
Start there.
Can you guess who the number four pick was?
He was somebody taken in the first 20 picks.
Let House guess, because I follow this stuff.
Oh, you already know the answer.
Kyle Mann probably knows the answer.
He went in the top 20.
Hold on, hold on, hold on.
I'm scrolling through super fast.
House, don't cheat.
Amen, amen, amen.
That would be my guess.
House cheated.
No, it's just. Draft up.
I have. This is the draft.
How would I know?
Nate Amen was fourth.
Some trackpad action over there I was suspicious of.
Yeah, because I'm looking at the draft.
Taylor Wilson fifth.
And number six, the Celtics pick.
Ooh.
Yeah, baby.
This is something. Snack.
They used to do in the past with Danny Ainge.
They would take these dudes that had a weird college year.
And I don't think he even had a weird college year,
but they would take somebody that. They're basically banking on what he was the year
before his college year.
I remember they did this with Avery Bradley
because Avery Bradley was the number one pick in the draft.
They took him, whatever.
Acuff was seven.
Brown was eight.
Coop Pete was 10.
Burries was 12.
And we could keep going.
And then Kingston Fleming's 22.
Can I give you an example of a good version
of a guy falling the way that Snack did?
This is an example of it working.
Is Jayden McDaniels coming out of high school?
Was a kid who thought. Bill has got me very happy.
Tell me more.
Jayden McDaniels was a kid who basically thought
he was Kevin Durant coming out of high school
and played like he was just like,
I'm just a dribble pull-up guy,
a tall dribble pull-up guy.
Something happened to him when he was in between
college and the NBA where someone got in his ear
and was just like, hey man,
you can make a lot more money if you do this.
And it got through to him and he turned,
just the switch flipped.
And suddenly he's this defensive monster.
Snack. I'm just saying there are many paths to being successful
if you have the right people around you.
So I hope that's what's happened here.
That's what I told House when I wanted House
to be a competitive eater when he was in law school.
And I was like, you can make a lot more money eating.
I know you can do this.
He didn't listen to me.
All right.
So more winners and losers just quickly.
Dusty May, we mentioned, who gets this Dallas job,
has Cooper flag, and then three of his kids
get drafted in the top 12.
That was pretty fucking cool.
Like that.
Okay.
This is a combo.
The Hawks and the Pelicans.
Hawks as the winners.
Pelicans as the losers.
Because they traded Derrick Queen for Kingston Flemings,
as it turns out.
That is the final haul on that trade from a year ago.
So I'll ask both of you,
who would you rather have, Derrick Queen?
Maybe this would be a good Netflix poll.
Derrick Queen or Kingston Flemings?
Who would you rather have for the next 10 years?
I was amazed by Derrick Queen.
So you're pro Derrick Queen.
I think the way it shook out, it's now a closer call.
It doesn't excuse the unprotected nature of the pick.
There's no excusing that ever under any circumstances.
But having seen Derrick Queen play NBA basketball
against NBA players, I know that he can play in the NBA.
I know he's got, you know.
I really liked him, too.
I don't, I think he's going to have to be on the right kind of team
with the right kind of people around him.
And that person is not Zion Williamson.
But, but I do think it's, we'll see with Flemings.
What do you think, Kyle?
Queen was, I mean, they both have issues, right?
I mean, when you weigh them, you get this,
because Kingston's a little small.
Derrick is like, is he a center?
You got to put him next to like a stretch five to for it to really work.
So there are a lot of kind of caveats to work through.
I personally think,
I think I would,
I think I would lean towards Kingston right now,
just because I think Kingston is going to be additive in that people,
people are like pitting him against these other guys as like scoring guards.
Kingston, like is very, very fast, like getting off the ball.
I think his shot's going to come around.
He's a transition monster.
I compared him to like Tyrese Maxey a little bit
and transition with his speed.
But then, you know, I don't know.
I'm still not sure if Queen is going to be like a playoff level guy.
Like the defensive stuff just really concerns me.
Is the shooting going to come around?
Could it be a good stats, bad team guy, basically?
Can you imagine Queen playing in like any of the last two series?
Like, I just kind of feel like they'd go at him every single time.
You know, I like him.
That the thing I do like about him is he's always excelled wherever he's been.
He's one of those guys, which is like the best part of Cam Boozer too.
Like wherever he's been, he's been on good teams.
He's been the guy, um, they're putting together a little Netflix poll.
We're going to have the, we're gonna have the people decide Flemings or Queen.
This would be one of the only polls.
Um, the Hawks ended up with Flemings.
They took Zuby, one of my at 23, who was one of my favorite, I thought he, I was hoping
he would get to the Celtics and they use their cap space to trade for Aaron Wiggins, basically
got him for free.
And I really like Aaron Wiggins.
It wasn't his fault.
He was like this completely loaded team and they re-signed McCollum.
Um, I like where they're at.
The one thing they were really missing was somebody like Fleming, Fleming's like, uh,
you know, a point guard who could guard other teams, point guards who could push the ball
and push the pace, create a little offense.
Um, I like the pick.
I thought that's who they were going to take and, and, uh, I still really like Burry's.
That was the only thing I was thinking was, could they take him, maybe play him and McCollum
together, but I, I get why they did what they did.
So we do have results.
Netflix audience, 67% for Derek Queen, 33% for Flemings, Joe Dumars vindicated one year
later after getting pillared on this podcast everywhere else.
I mean, kicks and makes play and you think, yeah, well, we'll see what that poll looks
like in a year.
No offense.
Anyway, good night for the hog.
Good night for the Clippers, who is another winner.
They turn zoo bots who, uh, I voted for 13, my MBA a couple of years ago, but last year
was not playing like it.
They turned him into Wagler and a 2029 pick a, I thought Burry's made a little more sense,
but Wagler, the higher upside.
And it really seems like Kyle, it feels like that 46 point game against Purdue was a transformative.
draft pick thing, even more than the final four.
like every time i saw billis on a show he was talking about it like he watched a ufo land
like what this kid did against purdue and i watched all the highlights from it it really
was great he was 9 for 11 from 3 but that's kind of the that's the game you point to if you're like
hey can can i spend can you send me 10 minutes on what this kid's like and you'd send him the
purdue game and be like this is this is the best version of him right that was an example of a team
that purdue team was especially like not equipped to check a 6-6 ball screen savvy point guard who
has like crazy triple pull-up like he shot 40 on pull-up threes just in pick and roll on pretty
high volume so if you conceded that shot to him he made it and that they you know purdue had a
kid oscar cluff who was just kind of this like he kind of looked like a dad in a men's league out
there he was good player but he just he was not not fleet of foot out there to guard a keaton
wogler and he he lit him up so um yeah but overall man i i think this pick makes sense
because i'm i'm putting less pressure on him and garland like being on the floor all you know
together all the time i think you bring them along a little slow let wogler get the reps with
the second unit might play with the starters a little bit and be like the secondary kind of guy
because he's capable of that like he has a lot of spot up uh chops too so he'll be a spacer for
them until he's ready to kind of take more of the car keys i mean potentially three
20 point a game scores i'll here's the big test for wogler i'm gonna ask house house you're in town
and i have clipper tickets they're not they're not playing anybody it's not like golden state
or somebody that we would be like of course we're going it's it's like a middle of the road team
it's not milwaukee either it's it's like uh it's not brooklyn let's say it's like the pistons well
you'd be excited to see the pistons definitely yeah um it's it's like an eight or it's like the
phoenix phoenix is in town and i'm like we could go we could drive down the game and it'd be like
45 minutes this will be we'll eat at the game and you get to see keaton wogler are you saying yes or
no is that pulling you away from a good from a good meal house or we could just order food at
my house and watch games on the three tvs does keen wogler get you to get in the car
and go 45 minutes to the intuit dome to go see him the problem is i have really good seats
i haven't been to the intuit dome yet so i would definitely say yeah whenever the first time is
that i'm there that we can go to a game i'm gonna go on again it won't matter but i do i am interested
in in whatever this clippers team ends up being because they're in the midst of not quite they're
retooling it's it's interesting to me um and i love wogler's iq the thing i was wondering about
where was he on your high school list because he's a kid
he didn't exist right he didn't make the top 150 right he had one of the great
out of nowhere runs in the history of college basketball yeah what about the stanford kid the
uh the point guard didn't he also come out of nowhere uh yeah not like that i mean people
knew who he was okay well he was going to harvard he was supposed to go to harvard so i don't
the thing with wogler wogler i'm calling wogler like he's related to franz wagner
the thing with wogler um
if you're just going ceiling from the fifth pick on you probably the highest ceiling right kyle
like that's somebody that you like he might be shea gilgis alexander for all we know because
if you if you're talking about just watching i actually went back and watched shea's
kentucky his year like the the 15 minute youtube clip of shea and it's like
you can see the pieces of it you couldn't see the mvp version of it but you could see the pieces
and the footwork and the two-way game and he was a better two-way player than
the two-way game and he was a better two-way player than the two-way game and he was a better
two-way player than wogler was but wogler offensively was way ahead of where shea was as
at kentucky right yeah they're it's interesting because they're kind of inverted like in the way
that they like wogler is all like he's just so methodical like setting up ball screens to get
to his shot and he can just burrow his way into the mid-range and in college shea was the opposite
he was just like he was just uncheckable getting downhill like and he was just a layup master well
a lot different than the way he plays now terms of having upside i mean upside at this spot
you know he's just a layup master he's just a layup master he's just a layup master he's just a
the upside i feel like kind of falls that fell off in terms of like the legitimate swings of
they could be stars it's only like two or three guys past past five uh and walk them including
wogler so um who are the other guys a cuff is on that list for you or no uh i feel like i kind of
know what a cuff is i don't know i don't know where the levels are that we go that are just
brown is yeah i think brown is one of the guys another a sneaky one is dalen swain who the
bulls ended up with i think he's like a sneaky we have the bulls coming up yeah 15th pick so um
i think clippers had to do it it's one of those things that if they had the eighth or ninth pick
it probably would have made more sense they would take him burries and that would have been a classic
two guard but uh they'd take a swing loser steve kerr um who's gonna have to coach yaxel and draymond
at the same time what is this gonna be like two of the most passionate guys we've had in the league
in 10 years both winners and losers i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't
know what's going to happen what's going to happen kyle i kind of wonder what yaxel is going to look
like in a system that is going to require his attention to be divided a lot we will see about
that because he played on just a battering ram of a michigan team and his job was to guard the ball
most of the time so he had everything that was important to him was in front of him so i'll just
be curious to see what's going to happen in the next couple of years i don't know i don't know
what's going to be in the like speed of the reed react golden state system while it's still there
you know they're going to have him probably pass this into some other era of a different style
that i'm sure he'll define him but in the short term i'll be curious to see how turbulent uh his
ability to like keep up with the speed of what they do is because you could see some like well
you want to say jordan pool i'm not saying he's going to like give him a concussion for a punch
but i don't want to be off the opposite the vets will bring him along and get and give him like
guardrails that'll be good for him so i'm going to be curious to see what's going to happen in the
next couple of years i don't know it's going to be fascinating to watch well he's almost the same
age as some of the vets so it's fine he's gonna be 24 in december are you older than moses moody
i 100 agreed with the pick uh i thought they would have taken more as there if they
but you know dallas jumped on him at nine house draymond yaxel curry
poor zingas and lebron james how far am i going to go i don't know i don't know i don't know i don't
know how far i'm going how far am i going in the west that changes things uh i think you can make
it out of the play-in i think you can make it out of the play-in what if i changed poor zingas for
anthony davis oh no joke anthony davis draymond yaxel curry and lebron i just go big i have size
everywhere and i have two guys draymond and yaxel who can guard perimeter guys he made a face like
he'd take kp back no i would not
i would not there's no no scenario i mean kyle i think it has to be that'd be one way to get in
with jaylen brown jaylen brown loved him be like we didn't really try to trade you and kp's coming
back um three-way trade all's forgiven house didn't seem that excited about lebron and yaxel
and the warriors with anthony davis it didn't seem like a change your finals pick of san antonio okay
see um winner quickly chicago they get wilson at number four with a chip on his shoulder i love
wilson i just think
um
completely all hundred percent in i'm all in um and he's the first legit bull star since derrick
rose you could tell me that vucevic was a star or jimmy butler pre-miami um fine whatever uh this
this kid has it they'll probably build the team around him i hope they keep giddy they'll be
playing up and down and everybody's gonna love him and then they get swain at 15
kyle would you say this is your number one winner of the draft swain and wilson together i like it
together
i had a funny moment where i sat down and i was like huh
caleb wilson with this bulls roster and i started looking down the bulls roster and i was like ah
fuck it i was just like what am i even thinking about i was like what you start trying to do the
gymnastics of like what if they had had io and kobe white on the team that they just could have
brought back with their bird rights on top of giddy and right caleb wilson probably would have
absolutely maybe made more sense i got a wild one for you i think i think dalen swain could be
swappable for josh giddy because they're similar
i think they're similar to josh giddy i think they're similar to josh giddy i think they're similar to josh giddy
place like i think he could be he could end up being a better two-way player than josh and do
similar things similar size playmaker athlete and then he can play defense so well to that point
every year there's the kawaii right where kawaii in 2011 i sent house a clip today of when the
wizards jay billis is at the desk and he's like i think kawaii leonard would be a great pick here
at number six um he's i think he's gonna be a really good player blah blah blah it fits in
with the wizards and then it goes
to the podium and they're like with the sixth pick the washington wizards take jan besley
it wasn't kawaii leonard um but every year there's the kawaii leonard of wow this guy could just blank
he'll be awesome so with swain isn't it if this guy can just he can just figure out how to shoot
this kid's gonna be awesome because he rebounds and defends like he runs the floor he does
everything else but the shot is why he wasn't a lottery pick so what if he
learn how to shoot Kyle.
He can score.
He can really score.
He's just got kind of a
deliberate wind-up shot and i don't know if it's a rebuild it's just he got to the point where if
you gave him time it wasn't like thompson twins where it's just like all right let's just run the
other way this ain't gonna happen he he can score like and he has touch so it's kind of you kind of
can talk yourself into it happening but somebody was asking me about like who has the best handle
in this class and i was just like swain has some of the best dribble separation in the class with
like a cory like he's he's nasty he can like you'll watch him get low with the ball you'd be
like i can't tell if that dude's like six one and then when he stands up you're like holy shit he's
huge he's like six seven and a half and choose so that's a great bet for chicago uh before we do our
next winner and loser we have to wake up house a little bit because it's 12 30 so house i ordered
from john and vinnie's no no i'm just gonna i'm gonna talk about food to get you excited good it's
my wife's away that means that means the uh food delivery order
for the solo you really have nobody judging you or anything i did john and vinnie's i got uh the
the chicken cutlets with the gem lettuce salad that they have with the spicy dressing yeah and
then you know what else i did i just got a pizza even though i don't eat pizza and i don't really
eat bread i got the sunny boy pizza which is bacon and uh and cheese and there's some like
caramelized onions on it you didn't have two pieces of that or any of that bullshit right
i did it i gave the crust to the dogs and they were very great
for the crust of the dogs i got a big plate i cut up the chicken cutlet i put it put it in their
spicy little salad i put a little balsamic on it and and i just chowed down and it was wonderful
rare special unexpected where you're you know you're because you're married you have a diagnosis
you're with your wife and you have your time it's a negotiation for dinner we're gonna do this
and jkm you share what we're gonna share together oh no just like when you get the time where it's
gonna order for me and i i'm gonna i yeah i'm gonna have a cheeseburger one of the hot dog
with a little cheese on it too this is why i always win because i always play the only child
card for this stuff it's like i don't want to share i'm the only child people just sleep
i do i just i don't want to share i do that with everyone who is friends with me knows like desserts
i don't want to share dessert i don't want to share ice cream with you i don't want to share
pudding with you i don't want to share sunday with you i've never tried to share dessert with
you
i don't want to share my direction i don't ask i might grab the first bite but i don't like sharing
i'm an only child i'm not used to it it's a great point i don't know house had multiple brothers he
is a sister yeah he's used to sharing food anyway back to the draft winners and losers
so sean marks i don't know whether to give him a winner or loser i'll let house decide
loser i don't need any more information uh you just said they showed him in the draft
room they're celebrating like they just won the finals the whole that strapped him was celebrating
and it was because they were taking mikhail brown who um who missed 14 games last year and has a bad
back and high fives around i mean yeah he's the he's the guy out of all these top 12 guys the guy
i was worried about the most i might be wrong i'm not saying he's gonna be a bust i just have
concerns with the injury prone stuff durability and the fact that he's talking in interviews about
i was in so much pain
with my back like you're 19 why do you have back problems this this makes me nervous kyle
yeah they just kind of slid it in there that they were like uh yeah he played fewer games
than darren peterson and the peterson thing we were speculating we still didn't totally know what
it was and we were like i think we're on the other side of this it's not really bad back
is like that's that's not one that you want coming in i've like michael porter jr came in and had
what the micro discectomy i haven't had back surgery but i think that was the procedure
um yeah i don't know if he's out of the woods in the back thing but even if he was if we're just
talking about him as a player uh my whole thing the whole time is just he's super talent man i
mean like he's he can he pushes you to have like a high pickup point he can shoot the shit out of
the thing he can really pass the ball with either hand it's just he's a little chaotic maybe he
reigns that in in the half court like he gets it he seems to drive without a plan a little much
for my liking to the point of like it's it's a little bit of a lamello s
chaos in a way that's that's but lamello is also you think julius rando and michael porter jr will
enjoy that or no i'm not saying it could happen for him he's he really did he really does have a
lot of talent he has more and it makes sense for the nets if you're looking at the guys they don't
have anybody with that kind of upside on their roster right now every year kyle gets super
conflicted with one guy in the lottery and this has been your guy for three months you're just
like i i thought you were saying
my god yeah no you get really conflicted because he is probably if you're building the buildings
of all these guys he is one of the biggest buildings because his basement goes 10 floors
down but the ceiling goes pretty high too we're up 20 floors the other way i don't know i'm listen
house i'm admittedly terrible at at analyzing guys like this because i gravitate away from these guys
they make me nervous and i always am glass half empty on these guys instead of glass half full
these super talented
kind of chaotic i'm not sure if you're durable like i i just get worried where are you on this
exact same place and here's the problem uh i feel like we've earned the skepticism like
the nets had was it five or six first round it was five first round picks last season
we set the over under at one will one of those five picks a year ago we did this a year ago
look like an end an actual
nba player guy in april and may and june do do we think that they got got there do we think they
got to one demon maybe that's it maybe triori is a tenth man i mean jkm are we being too harsh
no one's rough no one danny wolf no one uh it was uh drake powell was the other one from north
carolina the athletic uh well here's the thing this is one of my favorite draft things where
you do a draft last year and it's like well we took point guards
last year we can't take a cuff
are you sure because it comes better than every point guard you have name one who can play it's
like when teams do this in the nfl with quarterbacks so we can't take a quarterback we
took one last year it's like yeah you took a shitty quarterback last year you still need a
quarterback just because you took quarterback last year doesn't need you still need one uh i just
would have taken a cuff and i would have figured it out and tried to figure out what he looked like
um and just gone that way that's i think the if you're the nets i'm not looking for upside
i kind of i kind of just want somebody good i've just lost the city which i had lost anyway
i lost it 19 times over with this next finals and i thought a cuff would have at least solved
a little bit of buzz problems now they're you know keeping their fingers crossed with brown
who has the upside there's bigger than a cuff and sure
they're past him being good i would say who's your comp for him for if he's actually really
good who is he well i mean i've comped him to anthony simons and kiante throughout because
i've said i'm like i'm not sure that he's like a bona fide like i know i can build a team a
basketball team around kiante work towards earning a little more positivity and optimism on that front
this past year not according to the jazz because they were like hey we want to see you do it again
but i thought it was interesting that michael compared himself to anthony simons
so i kind of feel like he's going to be that's kind of what i expect him to be like
this guy could go get 30 40 on a given night he's kind of our he's he's sort of adjacent to our
superstar but on any given night he could look like a superstar that's kind of what i expect him
to be because he's super talented it's and defensively going to be a struggle but the
talents there house did that make you feel better or worse absolutely terrible
i feel worse
everybody's trying to find a team the poor guy like
everybody well we tried with anthony for a little while and you know so the injury he's injury prone
the defense might not be there and he's adjacent to my star i tried to get not conflicted for a
minute give me just give me that let me have that this episode is brought to you by my old friend
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refunds hey i was lucky enough to get a son and a daughter through their early teens and their
mid-teens in the social media era and even though we were constantly monitoring it there's still
a whole bunch of stuff that can go wrong
and that's why instagram teen accounts have automatic protections on by default built-in
content settings for the content teens can see contact limits for who can contact them and time
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slash teen accounts.
Well, I'll give you a positive
winner. We can end on.
Charlotte gets
Steinbach at 14
and they take Anderson
at 18. They take two German guys.
They just said, fuck it.
We're double German-ing down.
And guess what? There's another one tomorrow
in the second round that they can take the guard
who's the teammate on the young German
team, right? Jack Kale, yeah.
Yeah, people kind of like him. I wasn't
that impressed with the thing.
They should bring in Rondo while they're at it.
I mean,
not Rondo, Schroeder.
Schroeder hasn't played for Charlotte yet.
The German Rondo, yeah.
So other than Khan having to learn German,
I think both of those guys are playoff rotation
guys. I like Anderson.
He was another one of those guys
I was hoping would miraculously fall to the Celtics
where he's just, I know what he is.
He's going to be able to create offense. I don't think he's
one of your three or four best guys
on a championship team
or a high playoff team.
But I think he could be the third guard
on a really good team, which is what
he would be on the Charlotte team. So I like that.
And then Steinbach. House, you would like
Steinbach? Now, I'm not sure he'll ever be able
to play defense successfully ever.
But he
is a motherfucking rebounder.
Holy shit. I really. He was one of the guys I probably spent the most time
on because he's
definitely an NBA player and he's
definitely a rotation guy and he might be a little
flawed, but has. a couple above
average skills, Kyle. Like, seems
like pretty high IQ. Played
with adults
overseas when he was like 15, 16,
17. Just got the shit kicked out of him.
And he is an awesome
rebounder. Like, awesome.
So I don't know. I kind of like the pick
for them at 14, even though I'm not sure
if he's ever the fourth best guy on a really
good team. I think that
he. I've said that he's
like the spiritual successor to Stephen
Adams because you can watch him play.
And he's just an absolute
pain in the ass. Tedious.
Like, annoys people with his ability
to just get his hand on every ball.
But the fit with this Charlotte team,
it just makes so much sense because
you're basically just putting like a garbage
disposal at the bottom of. Like, he makes so much sense.
I made this comparison that I used to. I love to shoot threes. I used to play pickup with this
like 5'7 dude who was like the
best rebounder I've ever played with.
His nickname was The Wolverine. His name is
shout out to Kenny. But I would literally just
shoot threes and he would walk the ball back
out to me at the top of the arc and hand it back to
me. And I was joking with Vareer. I was
like, this is the equivalent of that for the Hornets.
It's like, they've got these guys who want to get
shots up. Christian Anderson, 100%
in line with that. One of the best pull-up shooters
in the country this past year. Steinbach
is just going to just inhale. Every rebound that comes like him
is like a rock near
an event horizon at a black hole. It's just
like, it's going in the black hole.
Like, that's what Steinbach is like.
I haven't seen any of this guy.
I haven't checked him out. I love this.
He would have been the guy we would have loved to have played
pickup with. Where he's like moving
toward where the rebound's going to be as the guy's
shooting it. He's just like, he's over there.
That means the ball's probably
going to go a little long and maybe bounce here
and I'm just going to move here now and then I'm going to
tip it in. Like, he just. He's going to be a double figures rebound
guy playing like 24 minutes
a game. And then probably will give up
a bunch of shit on the other end. They need it
though. They're dying for that.
They need that size. They need
that. That rebounding bolster. I wouldn't have liked
them 9-10, but I thought 14 was
the right range. And the last team we didn't talk to,
which I'll let you guys decide if
they're a winner or a loser, but OKC
who had 12 and 17 didn't
trade up. And they took
Mara who was
being rumored to be going 6-8
range at one point. I did this on my pod
last week. The more I stared at it, the
minutes per game just weren't there. Like, he
barely played a UCLA, played 23
minutes a game last year. I think he is
what he is, which is like, he's coming off
the bench. Maybe
Luke Cornett crossed
with Porzingis on the Celtics style
as like a change-the-game type
thing and giving you 8-9 minutes
in a half. I don't think he's
a starting center. Eadie was different
because Eadie played big minutes at Purdue
and showed the work. Now he already broke
down. But I think for what OKC
wants, Kyle, this guy comes
in. He's certain matchups,
7-8
minutes, some Hartenstein insurance,
pretty good passer
really good hands. Seems
like his teammates love them.
And I thought there was a chance
he could fall to Charlotte, which I think would have been great
for them. But I think for
OKC at 12, if you're not getting Moraes
and you're not getting Yaxel, this was the logical
next pick, right? Yeah.
I mean, I think it checks a lot of boxes.
You know, obviously
there's that big guy in the West
that this is akin to when Shaq
was in the West. Six more fouls.
Just started affecting
roster construction in a way that we
haven't really seen in a while. That'd be
an interesting study to do, like which guys caused
the most ripple effect of roster
construction. But Mora, yeah. The other thing, too,
is that the idea of Mora kind of
fits what I thought OKC might
do with Edie a couple years ago.
I thought that it'd be interesting if they just took
Edie and was like, we play this
one way, but for
16 minutes a game, we're gonna
play in this other way that is gonna be
brutal for you. We're fucking you up.
Yeah. And I think Mora,
but also Mora adds, he adds the women
insurance, but he also adds, his
passing adds another, he instantly
would become one of their best passers, I think.
And you could play him with those
movement shooters like McCain, who
loves to play on and off ball.
You got Isaiah Joe still.
I forget his contract situation, but then Jalen
Williams, I think he makes sense
on that front, too, if they choose to keep him.
You know what he just
laid out, House, reminded me of in the mid-80s
when we had that
Celtics-Rockets finals, and it was Hakeem
and Samson, and
Mora,
Cale, Parrish, Walton, Bird,
and then everybody in the league was like, we gotta get bigger.
Need centers.
And then all of a sudden, there were these hilarious
draft picks for like three straight years.
John Conkack, Joe
Klein, Uwe Blob.
That was the era. People were just grabbing
centers, because it was like, oh, we need them, we need them,
need them. I don't know if this was the
version of that, but you liked this pick, too, for them, right?
Absolutely. For all the reasons
JKM just laid out, but
in addition,
it's so
consistent.
Consistent with the path
that they're on, because they have to flip out
a couple of these
guys that they, you know, they're at the end of the
rope. Might be Hardenstein. Yeah, it could be.
And maybe Dort.
And now we've got two viable
Sturtz and Mora, both
guys that slide in, rookie
contracts. Not in a hurry. We don't
have to, like, they don't have to immediately contribute.
They can get some minutes. They're
sitting on Topich and the
kid from Georgetown, right?
Yeah, and those guys might be, they might be punting on those guys.
Maybe so.
They never set the floor. Well, Sturtz was
thanks to Kyle
and Tate's prodding, I became
more and more fascinated with Sturtz.
The minutes thing is, like, one of the craziest
things I can ever remember in all the draft studying.
He's like an Alabama running back.
The marathon man. He played over
1,300 minutes in college.
It's, like, impossible.
He didn't even make the Final Four.
To the running backs in Alabama.
It just doesn't come out of games.
I don't remember college basketball
players, this being, like,
part of the appeal is, I don't come out
like the way we would have centers
40 years ago. Good shooter.
You seem to think, Kyle, you thought
he could be a little initiated in the
offense-y in the red system, right?
Yeah. Yeah. I mean,
he transferred up from Division II. I think
it was Northwest Missouri State, and they just
kicked ass, and his coach, Ben McCollum, and they
just leveled up together. Went to Drake,
kicked ass, won in the tournament. Leveled
up to Iowa, kicked ass, and he just
carried a gigantic
pick-and-roll load. I just kind of
feel like Sturtz, when he
gets in the NBA, is going to be like, you mean
somebody else could handle the
ball for a little? Like, oh, what am I
going to do? I could just catch and shoot it?
Catch it and shoot it?
That's okay? I love this. You know, I just
think that that's going to be
a nice breath of fresh air. But he
fit, he grew up an Oklahoma City fan,
if I'm not mistaken. He's a Midwest kid, and
he fits their profile. Classic Preston.
He fits their profile. Yeah, Preston's like, this kid will love it here.
He won't complain once.
He has one of those haircuts from, like, the
late 50s. Not early 50s,
late 50s. Real big
hair cut, yeah. He went to his uncle's
barber shop, and he got, like,
a little. But I thought that was a
really nice one. It was right around. Again,
this goes back to the problem with talking
about this draft. It was right around where he was supposed
to go. You could call out the
picks in real time as they were happening
for the first, I don't know, 15,
16, and probably be right
most of the time. So, yeah. So,
House, do you feel like
I think Wemby's losing sweep?
Over this Mara pick, or no? Absolutely
not. He's like, oh,
another Oklahoma
City chump that I'm gonna
put into my french fry machine
and slice
him up. He was like, you
should've gotten a PEDs dealer for
Chet Holmgren. She drafted that, because
I'm just gonna run all over him
again.
Alright, so before we go on Winners and Losers,
this is a day after the
Moua. Oh, wait, I
had one more thing. What was your favorite pick after
like, last 12 picks of the draft, Kyle,
just for a team and matchup?
Because some people like
the Lakers, that guy they got from
Baylor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Carr
is awesome. He's a good
fit with them, because I think that that's the right
environment for him.
They'll be able to bring him along slowly,
and he's gonna get the types of shots that
are gonna be good for him. Luke is
just gonna, you know, baby bird feed
him the types of looks that'll
be good for him. You know, I said I like the Quainton's
pick.
Other than that, I mean. Josh Jefferson is a good player.
You know, that's, of course,
that's another sort of dubious shooter
that Brooklyn picked up.
Alex Caravan's a good add for,
I just actually just now noticed
that Sacramento's going to be,
if you want to add two culture guys
that are going to, you know,
maybe start to shift some of the vibe
in Sacramento, Caravan's another dude
who, that's the last place
I would have thought he would have ended up.
But, you know, guy played for UConn,
one, I'm really, really winning player.
So, yeah, here we go.
Maybe things are changing.
House, where do you think Hugo
would have gone in this draft?
Hugo Gonzalez, I call him Hugo.
Where do you think Hugo goes in this draft?
Second round.
House, where do you think Hugo would have gone?
No, in all seriousness, where does he go?
He's 20 years old.
Which version of,
if he had come into this draft
as the player that he is right now.
We saw him for a year,
there's a new rule,
he gets to reclassify and go back in the draft
and get drafted by someone else.
Uh. I feel. 15, I don't know that I would. Oh, thanks, House.
Top 15?
I don't think I would have him much higher than. Yeah, like, I think that's fair.
I think he would have been around Yaxel, honestly.
Listen.
That's top 15.
The national media is having,
the national basketball fans
having a lot of fun about
Hugo potentially being the deal breaker
for the honest thing.
Is that what this is about?
It is funny.
I'm just telling you,
they value him like he would have been
in the top 12 of that draft.
Okay.
And the thing is,
here's the thing,
and I don't know if I said this
strongly enough yesterday,
like, they made one offer two weeks ago.
And it was, you know,
Jalen and two picks.
Was it a firm offer?
Was it, we'd probably do this?
I don't know what they said.
They never made another offer.
And I think the Bucs were
waiting for them to circle back
and they just, they were like,
eh, I don't know.
It almost made me wonder
if they had buyer's remorse
after they made the first offer.
Where like a day later,
they're like, fuck, why do we do that?
And then Milwaukee's like,
hey, still waiting on that.
Next off.
And like, yeah, maybe tomorrow.
And they just like never,
they never made another offer.
So I don't know how badly
they wanted Giannis,
but I'll tell you this though.
A day later, I'm, I'm,
I'm actually really relieved
that that didn't happen.
Now we have to figure out
the Jalen Brown part,
which I think is going to be
for an interesting ride this summer.
Well, how do you think
it plays out house?
I think it's completely solvable.
I don't know why.
I think that if they all say
the right thing to do
is to bring the team
back together
and we're going to go in
and we're all together
on this effort,
then that's it.
The, you know,
Jalen can come in
and they'll do a team meeting.
Like those guys
want a championship together.
And I think that like,
you know, it's business
that's happening around them
on the outside.
But I think inside
that locker room,
JB and, and, and, and Tatum,
like they, they carry weight.
And if those two guys
that the most important thing
is are those two guys
on the side,
on the same page,
does it seem like whatever?
They're both in France right now.
So there we go.
All right.
I don't know if they're together
or they spend any time at all.
Go find a bottle of Bordeaux together.
Are you okay with that, Bill?
I mean, they're in France.
What if they're picking out clothes?
Is that, it was a problem with AJ.
I'm just, I'm just wondering.
I'm just asking questions.
I just didn't know if AJ
had to fly to France
to get a suit.
Now the thing with those guys,
I think a lot of the times
the problems with the NBA
is it's not the two guys.
It's the people around each guy.
That becomes a problem.
Okay.
And, you know,
you have somebody like House
in my life being like,
I can't believe ESPN did that.
It's fucking assholes.
I'm like, yeah,
they're fucking assholes.
You just need me, Mark Jackson.
No, I didn't.
They actually were assholes.
I actually didn't need House for that.
But yeah,
I was thinking about the maddest
I've ever been at somebody
I worked with
where I still had to do my job,
but it was definitely
after I got suspended
for three weeks,
two without pay.
And then I had to go back
and start writing my,
my column again
and do grant loans
and basketball hour.
And you know what?
Like I sucked it up
and did my job,
but that's what Jalen Brown's
going to have to do
because he's making
57 million a year.
So I'm sure his feelings are hurt,
but what's he going to do?
It's going to pay to play basketball
and he was in a trade
and he's going to have
to figure it out.
Now,
the bigger question for me
is
do the Celtics think
it's salvageable
and what happened
over the last six weeks
that made them think
that they should pursue a trade
with Jalen in it
in the first place.
So only they know that.
We did have a last poll house.
For the Netflix audience.
Who is the most likely
to end up in my will?
And the choices were
Hugo,
Khan Knipple,
or Joe House.
And Khan won 62%.
Of course.
I was hoping all three of us
might make it.
Why can't all of us
get a little something?
A little 33.33.
Maybe that's how
I'll split it up.
I'll split it up
by the results
of the Netflix poll.
It feels fair.
Listen,
Khan and I have to work
on our German this summer.
We're going to have
a very busy summer.
Put him in the car.
He's got two German teammates.
I want him to be prepared.
Drive him around LA.
He's got a 110.
He's got to learn about sauerkraut.
What are some of the good
German food suggestions?
Strussel?
German food is
the sausages
and the,
yeah,
spetzel.
It's like,
it's very heavy.
It's good fall food.
Well,
we've ordered,
there's a good German place
near us
that we've ordered.
Wursthaus.
Yeah,
that makes sense.
It's good,
but you feel sick
for like two hours after.
That's why they have to drink
the sauce.
It's like a dark beer
because the key is
to make yourself feel even worse.
Fill your stomach.
Yeah,
the food is heavy
and it's like,
what can we add to this?
I'm German.
We're a brooding,
vice-driven people.
We want to sit around
and,
you know,
that's what we want to do.
What's your favorite German food?
How's your last in the poll?
You're 18% right now.
I don't have one.
Who goes ahead of you
two at 20?
I got cut out of the will.
Sons of bitches.
It don't happen.
Jesus,
I was going to at least
leave you some of the uncuts.
Carpool Con.
Cutting sheets of my action
in my attic.
All right,
Kyle,
any last thoughts?
Oh,
man,
I mean,
we covered a lot there.
I think that draft
from a talent standpoint
was an A
and from an entertainment standpoint
probably a C-.
A little uneventful.
Yeah,
it wasn't,
yeah,
we got the lake of argument.
It'd be interesting
to see what went on with that.
I mean,
I didn't get to monitor
the social media as much
as I was writing as it went,
but
takeaway here,
I mean,
like we've said,
all three,
these top three teams
could,
come away happy.
I really think
that's a distinct possibility.
I don't know that we're going
to have a secretariat gap.
We might,
but I'd be surprised.
House,
last thoughts
other than AJ DeBonta
is on your team.
I want to find
a young aspiring writer
that we can do
running diaries with,
bring back the running diary,
but I don't want to have
anything to do with it
by name.
I don't want you to have
anything to do with it
and I want JKM to name it.
There were amazing,
amazing jokes to be made
about many aspects
of what we observed tonight.
There were lots of things
that we saw.
Some happened over text.
Yeah, there was some text.
There was like,
the sitting down
in the living room thing
had a ton.
There was some very interesting
family dynamics.
So there was,
there was like,
you know,
unexpected relationships.
There was some random
aging cameos.
There was,
it was,
I just.
There was the ESPN cameraman
just honing in on the guys
who hadn't gotten picked yet.
It's like,
hey, it's filing
and just.
Get out of his face.
That's a,
that's a tradition though.
Are you sad?
Do you feel sad yet?
Where are the tears?
Show me the tears.
Good.
Anyway.
ESPN had five people
on the booth,
which would have driven me crazy.
See, that's,
we need a,
we need a burner diary.
That's,
that's my takeaway
because we can't have
anything to do with it anymore.
We can't make the jokes
we used to make.
I think you're right.
Well,
I'm sorry you lost
in the poll house.
Kyle, man,
great to see you.
Great work on the draft.
I thought it was
one of your best ones.
Loved it.
Joe House,
congrats on the win.
It was great as always.
Thanks to everybody
at Netflix.
Thanks to Kyle and Eduardo
and Jack and Chris as well
for helping out
with the live stream.
Guess what?
I'm not going to have
a podcast on Thursday house.
Do you know why?
Are you going to Hawaii?
No.
Oh,
I'm getting a colonoscopy.
Finally.
Thank God.
Not by you.
I'm doing it.
You have no idea.
I know.
You're going to be,
you're going to come out
when they wake you up.
You're going to be like,
oh no, no, no, no.
Just put me back.
Let me sleep for another hour.
Give me more of the special.
It's special.
It's incredible.
It's the best.
I mean,
if,
if,
if I wish I had a colonoscopy
on Thursday,
maybe I'll sign myself up for one.
It's the best nap.
That's the lesson
at the end of this two hour podcast.
Take care of yourself.
I'm going to take care of yourself.
I take care of myself
in all these different ways.
And for whatever reason,
this was the one thing I hadn't done.
So I'm doing it on Thursday.
No,
a new rewatchables on Thursday,
though.
We have the good son going up
and then I'll be back on Sunday
with the good son.
The good bottle.
A new live show.
Do you only way I will do a podcast
before Sunday is if there's some sort
of Jalen Brown trade,
even if it's right after the colonoscopy,
I'm coming on.
I don't care if I'm drunk.
Yeah.
Post colonoscopy,
Jalen Brown trade pod.
The drugs are good.
Yeah.
All right,
Kyle house.
Thank you.
Thanks everybody.
Netflix.
And I'll see you on Sunday.
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Podcast Summary
Key Points:
The NBA draft was marked by high-level team competence, with few questionable picks and a lack of dramatic missteps.
The Boston Celtics' selection of A.J. DeBonsa as their No. 27 pick was praised for its alignment with team needs, highlighting his size, versatility, and defensive potential.
The Washington Wizards’ decision to sign Trey Young to a massive four-year contract sparked backlash, with critics calling it a "crime" due to poor fit, lack of impact, and financial overreach.
Several draft picks, including Darius Acuff, Jared McCain, and Keegan Murray, were seen as solid value, with Acuff especially celebrated for his potential to bring stability and energy to the Sacramento Kings.
A major point of discussion was the growing influence of data-driven scouting, reducing the role of traditional "wild card" or "intuitive" draft decisions.
The episode featured live audience voting on Netflix, including a poll on whether Darius Acuff would make the finals with Miami.
A notable trade occurred where the Warriors traded Jared McCain for a future pick, which was seen as a shrewd move that restructured their draft strategy.
The show highlighted the contrast between team rebuilding efforts and the increasing predictability of modern draft outcomes, with some fans expressing disappointment at the lack of excitement or "luck."
Summary:
The Bill Simmons Podcast discusses the 2024 NBA draft, emphasizing a shift toward data-driven, logical decision-making among franchises. While most picks are viewed as competent and well-justified, the Wizards’ massive contract with Trey Young draws sharp criticism for its lack of team fit and financial imprudence. J.
DeBonsa’s selection by the Celtics is celebrated for his size, versatility, and defensive potential, while Darius Acuff’s draft and subsequent move to Sacramento generate excitement as a potential franchise savior. The Kings’ draft strategy is seen as a hopeful turnaround after years of poor performance, with fans embracing Acuff as a fun, impactful addition. The episode also reflects on how scouting and analytics have reduced unpredictability in the draft, making it more consistent yet less exciting.
Live audience voting on Netflix, including questions about Acuff’s playoff chances and team dynamics, adds interactivity. Additional highlights include a sharp critique of the Warriors’ trade of Jared McCain for a future pick, viewed as a smart, value-driven move. The discussion concludes with a broader observation that while the draft is now more rational, it lacks the wild, unpredictable moments that once defined it—leading to a mix of nostalgia and concern about the future of the draft’s excitement.
FAQs
Uber Eats is offering 10 free boneless wings from Wingstop on qualifying orders during game days, valid from September 14–27 and November 2–16.
Fans can use PayPal to save offers before checkout, earn unlimited rewards, and combine them with credit card points for added value.
The audience can vote live on Netflix for fun polls, such as House's blood alcohol level, adding interactivity and engagement to the live broadcast.
The podcast notes that recent drafts show fewer mistakes and more logical decisions, with improved scouting and fewer 'wild cards,' suggesting a shift toward data-driven team building.
The panel praised A.J. DeBonsa as a well-rounded, mature, and physically strong player with strong defensive and offensive potential, especially suited for a team like the Celtics.
The panel criticized the contract as excessive and poorly justified, noting it lacked evidence of team improvement and raised concerns about high salaries for a player with limited offensive impact.
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