Caitlin’s Late Scratch, Angel’s Offense, Rookie Check-ins, and JuJu Stories With Jordan Richard

It's Bob and everybody, it's Logan Murdock here from The Ringer, the 2025-2026 NBA season is here and we got your group podcast needs covered. On The Ringer NBA show, be sure to check out group chat with Justin Barrier, Rob Mahoney and Jake Hyleman on Sundays and Wednesdays and real ones. On Tuesdays and Fridays with myself, Rajabell, and Howard Beck, get your Ringer-related NBA podcast fix on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast. And of course, come find us on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok at The Handle Ringer NBA. Welcome to The Ringer NBA Show, I'm very excited to have in studio for the first time ever we have a guest in studio, Jordan Richards, he is the founder and CEO of Switch Cultures. He is a former Cooper played overseas for nine years, he is extremely tapped into the world of Hoops men's, women's grass roots, WNBA, NBA college. You name it, I honestly feel like you just love the game of basketball. Every time I talk to you, we have some sort of in depth Hoops conversation where we're like, yo, you know what, we kind of do like the Spider-Man memes thing, so I'm super excited to have you on the pod. Now, honestly, it's a real pleasure for me. First ever WNBA pod is my first year covering the W. I've been tapped in with the W for a long time. This light means a lot to me more than you know and respect to you because when I first met you, we were doing on the NBA side and your basketball knowledge is real and that's why me and you like hit it off right from the beginning because I saw your basketball knowledge. I'm like, oh, yeah, she knows what you're talking about, even on the NBA side and I know you know on the WNBA side, so. I appreciate you, man. I remember when I first met you, it was like Lakers games and it was like, oh, who's that guy asking like, that really interesting question? I was like, it was always you and I appreciate the way you communicate with players. Like, you ask about basketball, but I think they can tell that like, you care about them as a human being and like you understand, like even if somebody's having a bad night on the court, you know how to ask about that in a really, really like, connective way with them. So I've just always been super impressed with you, but look, our audience isn't here to hear us gas ourselves for each other. Let's get to it. Hey, you know we ready to get to it. Let's do it. I mean, we got the WNBA shirt so we can get right to it. Yeah, yeah, we got the WNBA shirt on today. Rocking this in studio after I was told, I looked like a judge because nobody could actually see the WNBA logo on it. So I had to, I had to bust out again, just to, you know, stop the fake news, speaking of fake news. Um, we're going to open today's show with our, why would you to do that segment where we pull threads occasionally conspiratorial threads on decisions that have sort of made an unsettling home in the back of our brains. Uh, this week's is pretty obvious. It is dominating the headlines late, last night, uh, lesson, I think a hundred minutes before the game after no report of any injury at all. She was not on the injury report at all. Caitlin Clark was marked as out for the Indiana Feevers matchup against the Portland fire. Uh, this has now created a bit of an internet storm in the way that really only like a innocuous Caitlin Clark things do. Of course. Yeah. Um, you know, there's a lot of theories out there. She's suspended for arguing with an assistant coach. She's secretly really more injured than people think she is to step white sending her a message. The fever or sabotaging her somehow, um, somebody's lying, somebody's plotting. This is all like, this is all like part and parcel of, of the Caitlin Clark discourse at this point. I don't think it's any of those things. However, I do think that there is a bit of conspiracy going on. I think Caitlin Clark is doing something in the middle of load management and injury management, which is why the response that Stephanie White has given about is she hurt. Is she not hurt? Has felt a little bit contradictory. Now, you've covered the NBA for years. The way that load management has worked historically is you're not actually really allowed to do it. So you kind of have to pull this line of, we don't want to worry you that this player is injured, but we also want to create enough concern that it justifies sitting her out. But there's a lot of ambiguity there and that ambiguity leaves some space for conspiracy. Yeah. I mean, a lot of times teams plan, you know, the way in advanced on dates where, you know, you can have potentially a rest period. Caitlin, what is a lead leader in the system right now with 9 a game. She sees every coverage imaginable. And for her against a team like Portland, who you know, at times is tough because they beat New York. They also are a team that does have, you know, players coming back in from overseas and playing to as well. They're a team that you can potentially do that with. You got Kelsey Mitchell on the other side too, who is cooking right now. So for me, I'm like, I didn't look twice at it, you know, especially being on the NBA side. You like, you used to seeing that all the time, but going and seeing Caitlin, you know, live at the Laker game, I could see why it's such a, I mean, at this part's game, I could see why it's such a commotion because I didn't man the amount of fans she has come up to every game is insane. I haven't seen that before. It's unreal. As you saw too, as well. So, but for me, do you feel like it's a big deal? She ever did 20 some points of game. Yeah. Nine assists. I think it's a big deal because of what you just said. The fever only let fans know about this, you know, an hour before. And I think a lot of that again, it's by design, but this is at a point where, you know, fans have bought their tickets. They're driving to the arena. It's tough. Like you said, you know, that's Mark's game. You're seeing people holding up signs, traveled from Vietnam to watch Caitlin Clark play. Right. So because of the unique position that she has in the WNBA, things like this become, it puts a spotlight on what is actually, you know, pre-regular practice in the WNBAs, you know, talking to a league source today, load management has been happening for ages. And I think the WNBA saw what happened in the NBA and they decided to be more proactive about how they actually get away with load management. So oftentimes what you'll see is player injuries, A, in the WNBA, there's not as much pressure to actually report, but when they do, sometimes the injury itself is exaggerated. So you can justify sitting a player, the liberty of done this, the aces have done this towards the end of the season where, you know, you kind of feel like you got your seed blocked up. You want to rest up for the playoffs. I'd probably put the Phoenix Mercury in that, in that camp too, just given how analytical they are and sort of how you saw some of the injuries to stars last year for them were pretty staggered, right? There's a number of teams who do this. The problem now for the WNBA though is that when Caitlin Clark does it, it creates a different conversation because the TV networks are going to be pissed about it. The sponsors are going to be pissed about it. The fans rightfully so are going to be pissed about it. And the question becomes, are they going to find her or are they going to find the fever for not reporting this injury on time? What do you think? I can't find this. You can't find the star, man. I mean, and it's conspiracy. So then, whether she counters with, I'm legit, you know what I'm saying? And then, it looks crazy. And I think the good thing that you did say was just mentioning the broadcast and the fighting for Caitlin Clark game. You have so many different TV networks that are fighting for that game. And like you said, the fans too as well, you know, that know an hour in advance. But as a team, if me and you are a coach, I'm not telling that Caitlin's out of the game because you know why then, the scout looks way different. The whole scout is basically going to be Kelsey and Caitlin have to start. Those are your two headed snakes right there. But, you know, if you tell someone early, like then the game plan changes. And Portland, a dangerous team, as you can see, they beat New York during the time when they thought they were comfortable, you know? So, that's New York's only lost this season. So, like, for me, I'm not really mad at it, to be honest with you. Yeah, I'm so used to it too, by the way. But man, Caitlin, like you said, is like the person that everyone goes to to watch. So, it's kind of tough. Yeah, the tough thing too is I think that we've got to give her some patience as well as well. You were at that Sparks game. Were you at the pre-game press conference? I didn't even know. That's where, and all the listeners out there, I've never seen a player. Other than Kevin Durant in his early OKC years through a press conference before the game started. She does it before almost every road game. Yeah, that's nuts. I don't believe it. It's different. Everything around here is different, right? Yeah. Yeah. Different. Can you tell everybody how OK-lin is, too? By the way? 24. Exactly. I don't know nobody else doing that. Hmm. Crazy. I know. I know. But, so, she said, she was asked about, you know, injury management, right? And, you know, she said she's in a very different position now, right? She went through her entire career without really having to. ever deal with injuries, then last year she gets hit with the hamstring, the ankle, and you know those injuries are all like connected to each other as well with the wear and tear of the season. And she's alluded to the notion that she might have come back to early or pushed it to hard last season. So I think this year she's kind of taking the opposite tack and she said, "I understand my body almost too well to a point now." And it's something that I probably wasn't enough in touch with before my injuries. Now I understand it very well and so you just become hyper cautious to certain things. In that press conference she also mentioned she ran 4.6 miles in the game versus Dallas on Saturday and she's trying to find that fine balance of getting over the mental hurdle after her injuries and finding that balance and she is using technology, she is using recovery means. Like this was the NBA like 10 years ago, the wearable set, catapult, like it's just a modern like who did like the hour ring tracking, the sleep score tracking that like people are doing on a day-to-day basis that aren't even professional athletes. She's deep in that stuff now and like she said it's a mental hurdle. So we also got to give her that space to be like, "Yo, like it's yes, you're show time. Yes your box office, yes everybody came to see you. It's very disappointing for fans. I think that's like the unbridgeable vibe. It sucks. It absolutely sucks. It's a really unfair deal for them. I don't think it's necessarily changing because you're the fever. If you're also the WNBA, you don't really want to get in the way with it of this. You would much rather have Caitlin sit some game against the fire in May that's like against OKC versus the Spurs in the conference finals and you would have her be out in the playoffs. This is the type of sort of like management that you're also like Maniford Adam Silver if you're Kathy Engelbert. You're kind of just going to be like, "All right." I'm not saying I'm not saying the word. I'm not going to lie to you just for the simple fact that we saw what the WNBA was last year without Caitlin. We got to make sure that she is healthy as possible because the WNBA does need Caitlin as being honest. Well I do think that they had made, I think it's interesting, right? I think that the WNBA found its own footing without Caitlin in a way. Especially if they could survive. Paige did a great job in terms of like being the next one to really step in and showcase like that. And then we also had Angel, we also had several other players on yet now stepping into hers. We've had shots at the W because we're starting to really start to have a lot of different players to really bring the W up. It's not just one. We know a lot of people are like, "Yo, Caitlin, but there's a lot of players that are there, but when you have Caitlin along with the rest of the league, it's different, it's different. It's different. It's different, definitely. I mean it bears itself out in the numbers, right? Like most of these non-Caitlin games, there's early this season, they're doing like $1.3 million, $1.1 million, the Toronto tempo debut on, like they actually had a great, so the Toronto tempo debut is one that I have to call out as a Canadian because the Raptors used to get this all the time with like bad ratings, right? Those ratings are happening in Canada. They had over a million people watch on TSN, so when you have like less than 500,000 people watch in the States, that's actually 1.5 million overall. So that is something that you just have to watch, but yeah, like those are doing the millions, like the one million. Caitlin, then you get like 2.5 million, so it's like it survives without her. It's growing without her, but then she just takes it to a completely different level. And I think everybody understands that. Thank you. There's different levels and there's different tiers. If you are a WFIN and if fever do come into town, go to a game. Don't show up on time. Show up a little bit early, 30, 40 minutes early, you'll see what we're saying. Like I never seen that many people wait for a player, you know, like that. Like Caitlin, man, there was, it looked like honestly the OKC Thunder, or it looked like it gave me like Steph Curry vibes. For sure. Yeah, when people used to come early watching shoot. And that's when it kind of like sunk in for me where I was like, yeah, she and the difference here in terms of like her stardom and fan base. So, you know, it's early, we got to just make sure she healthy and they won the game. If they lost the game, then it'll be a lot of different conversation for me. That's a good point. If they lost that case, we would be having a very different conversation. That's so true. But you know what? Indiana blew them out. And I think you're probably right that the surprise element had something to do with it. And look, they're, they're a great team. They know how to play without her. They had to do it last year. So you can, you know, you can play the long game a little bit with her if you want. Real quick on the fever for you. Kelsey Mitchell. That's the player that even on the NBA side, like a lot of players bring up every specter game so much. Yeah. Do you think she gets the credit she deserves in terms of like people recognizing her as one of like the bucket getters in terms of like being in that top five to 10 range of bucket getters in the dub? Yeah. She absolutely should. I hope so. I think that, especially what she did last year, definitely put some more eyes on her. I think she spent so many years on a fever team that wasn't making the playoffs that she almost had that reputation of like, is she a good player or is she, is she just like, you know, good stats, bad team type of player, right? Now she's elevated her game. Her finishing is even better this year. That like Caitlin hit her with that like against the mystics and over time underneath the rim. She's like in a bad angle. She finishes like offhand up like this. There's so many of those this year. Her finishing her creativity, it's just, it's just next level. I think she's like what she's scoring like 26 points per game, something like that. Yeah. I think she had 23 right now. She's shooting like a crazy high percentage in both threes and field goals. Like, yeah, her percentage is there to Kelsey two men like, same foot, same hand finishing. Like, they run a lot of double, you know, double staggers for like, I love watching her play, man. She got so much game. I'm glad she's finally starting to get the recognition she deserves. Yeah, for sure. For sure. I agree. All right. Next topic here is the wedgie, the thing that nobody's really acknowledging that's making us all a little bit uncomfortable and it would just be so much better if, you know, somebody just grabbed that ball from between the hoop and the backboard and poked it out and we just, we just had a conversation about it. So for me, it's going to be Angel Reese's slow start on offense. So far this season, she's averaging 10 points on 33% shooting. She's still killing it on the board, 13 rebounds. Uh, two and a half assists, but five and a half turnovers. Now, this is a second year in a row that she's going to have more turnovers than assists and she's still doing it defensively. She's got the steals. She's got the blocks going, but on offense right now, the dream are 40 points worse when Angel is on the court versus when she sits. I know it's a very small sample size and I think there are reasons that this is happening that we can get into. I'm curious. What do you make of Angel? Start. Man. I'm all for it by you, Barbie, man. I'm not going to lie to you. Her gravity, she plays hard, she runs the floor, um, daily lost by one point at a big lead. No breed Jones in the building like they have a, I mean, this team like is honestly showing that they're definitely a contender. I think you've got to figure it out with Angel. One bad game. I mean, the other game, she went double, double and both of them in and out style animal style fries, as we call it out here in LA. But for me, the way she plays, the one thing I would suggest for her in terms of her finishing and her percentages, majority of the basket she does miss, she's not playing off two feet. Every time she does play on two feet, it's a bucket. But a lot of her finishes are of one lay and like usually as you watch, you know, some of the best scores, you watch Paige, you know, you watch Stewie, like they play off two feet. She got to play off two feet. And a lot of her misses when you watch her next game, it's all one leg, even in the transition when she missed the layup, one leg, two feet. Every time I watch almost all of her buckets and possessions, she's good. But in terms of it, for me, got to play her half two. I know, you know, the big, how do I pronounce your last name? Want to make sure I'm saying the right? Medina O'Cott. O'Cott. Big dog. We like what she's doing. Had a good game, two last game. That was yeah, 14 rebounds in that game, yeah, yeah, 14 rebounds. You could say she could have played more, but I'm going with Angel. I'm not going to lie. We got to figure it out. And we got to win them tight games this early this season. Well, it doesn't have to be either or, right? Because I think one of the things that's compounding the issues right now for Angel is that she's playing out a position at the five until Brett Jones comes back. If Medina O'Cott, six, six, roll threat, also coming in from South Carolina, playing a role that she was used to playing at South Carolina, can actually give you some starting minutes. Maybe you actually put her in the starting lineup until Bri Jones is back. Then you can move Naz Hillman to her more natural position of being the sixth woman again, playing more of the three, four, because right now they have two players. Naz Hillman is also playing out a position quite a bit too. So I think that would help Angel and long run, she's going to have Bri Jones. So she'll be back at the four. So you mentioned the finishing, right? That balance issue compounds itself even more when you're playing against bigger players. And like that finishing, when you're trying to finish against height, it's just a different thing, right? So I think that would definitely help them. Yeah. And I think a lot of people give Angel a lot of flack for finishing and all that. see the tapes people make. I'm like, first off, bro. We seen one of the best rebounds I've ever seen. You can say she missed the shots and your hips, bro. If that was the case, everyone would do it. And no one can't do it. Let's start there. But when she does get her rebounds, there's three defenders there every time. - Yeah. - Yo, I was kind of astonished at how many people are there when she gets her rebounds. But for me, it's her motor, man. She could not have to play with that motor every year, with the amount of money and how she's playing. Her motor is big time point. - Yeah. - And her gravity. Look what it does for Gray. Gray is back in this year. She's top three scoring the W right now. So for me, I'm letting this slide. We got to win that game, no. 'Cause they were up big and I can't. - They were up big, yeah. They were up big. I think, well, no, actually the ACEs were up big and Atlanta made a comeback. So they almost got there. - Yeah, actually you're right, yeah they did. - Yeah, I'm sure Mo was the other way around. They ended up losing by one. So, and look what they are, two and one right now. - Yeah, and you're, hey, you're lost against the champs. So it's not like a panic meter moment. I also think to your point, playing with Alicia Gray, now playing with Ryan Howard, although she was out in that game. This is the first time in a while that like, Angel's not really like the number one, number two, even number three option. She's not having plays run for her. So I think it's also her figuring out a way, like she is gonna create that gravity, right? So sometimes you're gonna have Alicia Gray's actually gonna benefit from that gravity or Ryan Howard's actually gonna benefit from that gravity. I think she's gonna figure out like, how to even find more of her buckets in those situations where you're not having a play run for you and her teammates as that chemistry develops. They're gonna do a better job finding her or defense is also gonna react too. 'Cause right now the other key is like, Atlanta's having a really tough shooting start. And that's not gonna hold. They have too many just main shooters. So once they start hitting those threes, then the floor is gonna open up for Angel as well too. So yeah, I'm with you. This is not something that I'm like remotely panicking on. But I like, I wanted to touch on it. 'Cause like you said, like there's the highlight clip, the low-lake clip farming of Angel Reese. - It's crazy, come on. - Come on, yeah. - Come on. - And we gotta talk about like, hey, play your struggle. Like, you know, and she obviously has some flaws in her game. But it's not as overblown as like, you know, the world will make it out to be. - Yeah, if her motor was down or something, then you got something to talk about. But her motor is extremely high. She's running the floor, rebounding the gravity of her rebounding in terms of how many defenders are down there boxing her out. It's unreal. That opens up a lot of space for her other teammates too as well. And I mean, for me, like, this is our second topic. We talked about that Atlanta dream. Last year when we talked about that Atlanta dream last year. - I was talking about the Atlanta. - Well, of course, we know, we know, yeah. We know you were talking about it. - They were my dark horse. - I was saying, like, you were talking about them, but like, now look what the whole change the dynamic of that team is now. And, you know, the biggest thing in this, for me, is winning. They lost to the defendant champs, because they got a player named Kennedy Carter that shooted over 67 from the field. She shouldn't even be on Aces right now. We were probably with the devil, but, yeah, they tough, man. Tough team. They lost by one, I'll take it, but we got to just keep letting her angel rock out, but two feet, age, that's all I'm saying, two feet. - Two feet. - Yeah, two feet. - She played two feet with good money. - Okay. - Yeah, so speaking of motor, so motor, I think, is one of the most underrated skills in the WNBA, right? Like, everybody says, like, to your point, right? Like, the notion that it's easy to play with a lot of motor consistently, and also be under control while you're doing that. Which leads me to my maya culpa. Kiki Rice, I apologize. This is my Kiki Rice appalling form. - We need the Rubin Stutter, that's sorry, 2006 version from you. We need to go ahead and sing it. - No, no, I can't, no, you don't want to hear me sing. You don't want to hear me sing. They put me under a microphone for my takes, not for my singing voice. - Right. - So when the draft happened, Kiki at number six fell a little bit high for me. I was also something that I took a little bit more to heart because, as you know, I am Canadian. So I'm very concerned with what the tempo we're doing at all times. And my feeling was just that I didn't love her finishing, at UCLA, her finishing percentages. And I thought that she wasn't like, she didn't take enough risks on the pick and roll, on offense. I was kind of like, and you know, all this translates to, honestly, maybe she wasn't flashy enough. Maybe I was missing something with her, but right now, with the Toronto tempo, she is absolutely killing it. And I think one of the biggest things that she has right now is just one of the most underrated motors in the game, like the way she's getting to the rim, the space in the WNBA, she's shooting 77% at the rim. I think when she hits her prime, she's gonna be impossible to get off the free throw line. She's also just got the size advantage against every other guard that like down the line, if she becomes a post threat, it's over, it's over. But to me, honestly, the most impressive thing has been like the efficiency combined with the lack of turnovers. And we've known this about her. Kiki Rice just doesn't make a lot of mistakes. And she's almost like, man, she's almost like reminding me a little bit of Kyle Lowry. Like she fit into a lot of context. You can use her in a lot of different ways, defensively. And she's got this sort of like atypical genius. She might not make like the threat the needle pass, but she'll, she's so rarely gonna make a bad decision. And she's gonna kind of make those, she's gonna make those calls that like, come from high basketball IQ that aren't gonna show up in the box for her. - I like Kiki, man. I think there's an old saying like, a lot of times film does tell lies. You need to go watch Kiki in person to appreciate Kiki. She's way bigger. I know it says she's a big guard. But when you see her in person, alongside psych, she's a big guard. I didn't realize how big she was. And like you said, she plays the game so sound. She don't talk much. She don't say much, but I think now I'm starting to see her voice and how she does find ways to get, you know, to her spots. Like one, one position. She told psychs to clear out. She gets to the elbow, gets off two feet, midi cash. And like you said, no turnovers in the game I went to against the sparks the last one. Like for me, she does a lot of things really well. And yeah, like you said, she's such a nightmare when she gets to the basket. She draws a lot of fows and her confidence level is kind of going to be scary of how it's going to be. Because ended up talking to coach about her. And she said, yeah, man, we're not afraid to let her rock out. And when you had that type of confidence as rooks, I think that's big. And you know, for you, why don't we see so many rookies get, you know, opportunities more so on the W? Because I see Kiki and others, when they get the opportunity, their game just goes to another level. Look, we only like four games in. And look where Kiki's games turn into. We're even looking at Olivia Miles, right? Same. She's running more pick and roll than anybody in the league. Cheryl Miller is basically giving her the keys to this offense and said, go. And the chemistry she has with her teammates also showed out to her teammates because it's not very often that a rookie walks into a locker room. And the player playing her same position is like, you know what, I'm rocking with her. Courtney Williams has been a great vet. She gets to move back to her natural position too. She gets to play something. She's just a buzz, man. She's a Courtney, man. All right, we got to show a throw a shout out to my cousin too, near coffee. Hey, Olivia, you about to get my cousin paid, man. You keep doing that. Hey, I'm excited for it. She hit the three. Hey, yeah, like you said, it's just like, look at how Olivia plays the game. Like, it's honestly really scary because the feast is not even there yet. And the way Olivia commands that offense, it looks like she's been in the W like four or five years. And yeah, I think what in the last three minutes of a game, she found near three times in a row on the three. And I'm like, the whole team's conforming to her. That's why I'm like, for me, I'm like, if you win a W, you've got to play the rooks. That's a big thing in NBA, playing your rookies if they're a top hit. Now I'm seeing Kiki where her game is going, but Olivia's game is going. I'm like, you've got to play the rookies a lot more. - Yeah, for sure. And then you also have the opposite end of it where like, AZFUD, I think she's playing herself into a starting goal right now. Now, Jose Fernandez, after, I'm curious what you made of Jose Fernandez's comments, actually. - Love it. - Yeah. - Man, bro, we got to hope people accountable on this team. And Enrique, shout out my dog, Enrique. I mean, that's a cool friend of mine, but everybody on the team got to get held accountable. Now, if they respond bad, then you got something to talk about, but look how they respond it. - Yeah. - When you respond, it is cool. - Yeah. - I just don't understand from your point of view with everyone's comments and everybody freaking out over someone holding the team accountable. Are people not used to that? Like, what was your take on that? - Well, I think part of it was, it was like two, three games into the season. And I don't think that he actually, I don't think he walked into that press conference intending to say what he said. I don't think it was pre-planned. It was the final question. It was a follow-up. You basically unloaded the clip and he told the media basically what he said in the locker room to those guys. And he actually apologized to the master and said, "Hey, look, that's maybe something I should have kept in the locker room. Maybe I didn't need to go off to you guys in public." I wonder if maybe you're getting at a sense of sensitivity as far as people don't always like when WNB players - Get covered. Fairly, but I think in that instance because I also think that there's a lot of things he didn't do correctly like you can call your players out for being selfish, and that's one thing. The defensive coverages that they had that they actually went and fixed, and the rotations that they had. He is playing AZ more now, you know, Maddie had a great game and she didn't get to really play after the key. I think he also looked a mirror a little bit and said, okay, like, I need to point to finger a little bit of myself. And it's not really, to me, it's just, you know, the kind of stun game who's a friend of the pod said this, like, he only yet so many cracks at the apple with stuff like that. Like, do you want to play one of those cards two games in the season when you got 42 more. They responded. They did respond. So you got to give me credit. And like, for me, if you would have called someone out by name, I would have been like, that's wrong. You know, I'm saying, now he apologized to the team, even though he was strict on his team. But if they didn't respond, it'd be different. This team actually is a team I feel confident with doing that with. You got AZ, who I'm pretty sure you con got custom view time riding that news to a same with page, right? Same with Jessica who's played in Europe. That's normal. Yeah. People go out and call out players all the time in Europe and go by name. Yeah. He didn't say anything by name. So like, for me, I was cool with it. Yeah. I didn't, I didn't know if he would have said someone's name. I would have been like, okay, that's bad. But he didn't. And they responded. Rekate, too. She played in Russian for a long time. They would do it. They got it used to that. That's it. So there's a cultural difference there. Yeah. Okay. Way different. Like you lose games over there. You play on the top teams. Oh, you're going to hear air full. That practice, the practice for the next week is going to be hell. You know what I'm saying? So like, if it would have been more for me if players would have said something. Yeah. But players responded. So I wasn't, I didn't take it. I was a little shocked at Cynthia, though, because Cynthia played in Europe for a long time beforehand and played on Houston. So how did you feel about Cynthia's comments on it? I mean, I think, I think like her doing the language thing, like, I think she's just, that's just good TV. Yeah, it was great. That's good TV. That's what I said. Yeah, like she was meant, but it blew up. And I'm like, yeah, I didn't think she was saying it from a bad place. I think they were just a little folk fun at each other on TV. That was it. I didn't think you see those days response. Yeah, he's, he's smoking, he's smoking Italian too, right? Yeah. Yeah, like. And he said, yeah, come to a practice. I thought it was good. This is also part of man. Like we got to let the WNBA be fun. Be bloody. It's everything. I see it. And how passionate your fans are like about this game and like over time, people are going to get used to this. It's going to make it even better. And I love it. Yeah. If they didn't respond and I'll have a way different story on it. For sure. I know you have some thoughts on these rookie minutes. So you feel do you feel lazy should be starting? I love Odyssey Sims. She's been good for them. Yeah, at some point, AZ has to start. And I know Odyssey has played in that role before. So I think that will be where it comes from. Jessica's been really well for that team too as well. I mean, she's like the blue guy on that team. Blue woman, I would say, on that team. But it's the average in like 12, 6 and 7. Yeah. And she had a triple double last. And then almost had a triple double the game before. I'm like, she's been flirting with the triple double really the whole season. Like every game. It's like she's one or two rebounds off or something like that. Yeah. It's tough on the AZ theme because when you dress someone one, you always have to play them. Yeah. They're in a tough spot because I really feel like they feel like they're a championship team this year. So now like what do you do when you feel like you're a championship team? Usually that per team that don't have the number one pick is not a championship team. Yeah. So what do you think in terms of that? Well, here's the thing we talked about load management early in the podcast. Yeah. Another way that teams secretly do load management is that when they have players coming in from a long college season, when the player is coming in from overseas too, they'll slowly work them in as well. You don't really necessarily want to wear AZ down right now. If you truly believe that you are a title team, we've seen this in the past rookies. They start losing steam at the end of the season too. So now I think what they're trying to do is manage that load as well. They want to pick in May. They want or sorry, they want to they want to peak in like, you know, October. They want to be playing in October, right? Yeah. So it's just a completely I think that's part of the calculus here. And they also want to play a page on and off the ball at the same time too. So that's why you want to point guard there and Odyssey Sims. So I get it at the same time when you have page gay. Jess and AZ on the court together. They're dangerous. It's so nice. Like you have to find as many minutes as you possibly can for those players. And I think Loki I think those days doing that. He's just starting certain players, but he's. Yeah. Now he's starting to fit it. Like I think part of as part of why I kind of took issue with him. Because I was like, you're still figuring out your rotation. Definitely. You know what I mean? But now I think he's starting to. And I think people have to realize coaching styles are way different. Yeah. When you drive someone number one, sometimes you have coaches. Like you just said, that want to protect their players in terms of not putting. Crazy amount of pressure on them and let them ease into that starting role. She would eventually get there. I see that. As the year goes on, she will be there. But at the same time, there's so much pressure with these picks. And when you go one, you have to let that person have as much confidence as possible. Yeah, we might have to take a few losses to get there and times. But yeah, AZ should. Her minutes should up up sticking out. She's been, you know, playing well. And he just said in the last press conference. Yes, she deserves more minutes. Yeah, yeah. He knows. Jose knows what time it is. Yeah, he does. Yeah. Another wedgie, another rookie related wedgie is Lauren Betts. And her fit in Washington with Shakira Austin. So Bernd Shakira only played 10 minutes together this season. What do you think about that? Man, there's a person by the name of Kiki. Kiki. Do you love me? I do love you Kiki. I had to go live double double you leave the league and rebounds right now. She's making this real hard. Yeah. She's the one that's really making it hard. But at the same time. Wait, let me ask you a question. Yeah. More improved this season. Sonya Citron or Kiki here then. Oh, you're not playing no games. At first, I would do the Sonya. You know, the little Sonya. A little celebration. I would have done that until the last game. She got went down to 20. And Kiki on another path with the double double leading the league and rebounds. So right now. There in the battle. But I give Kiki a little bit over top just because of the last game. But before that, I would add some of your buff. For me. That's why I'm going right now. He's a good problem. He's a champagne. Shake to juicy lobster to buttery. Yeah. Yeah. We like that. Yeah. We like going to the top of the line restaurants. Man, with the mistakes is. It's tough, man. Because. Their fan base is growing. People really rock with them. Sonya's start. I'm getting there. Um, Shakira coming off of China. Hers or, you know, what she's been able to accomplish and how much money she just made. Big boy contract. She might be most improved player of the year. We talk about their improvement. She might be her too. She got you got to throw her in there. Yeah. You can throw her in there. You know, I got some other on the list. But I like Shakira awesome a lot. So. But my thing is is what you. When you watch Lauren Betts play on this team. She knows how to make the high low pass. She does it. She can shoot. We got to extend her to the three. Her jumper is pretty. Like when you really look at it. And look at her catching shoe shots. Like. If you don't believe in Shakira shooting it. Then let Lauren trying to shoot it. At times. She might be the she might be the true man and in the offense. So let her do that so you can potentially play them because. You're going to be in a big problem. As. Lauren's, you know, season goes along. Because she should play a lot more minutes. I think she's average on what 11 to 14 minutes a night right now. But that's not enough for her, especially what she's shown. Should be giving people fits out there too. Like. It's New York. Deep seal on. Then how one against Don Quill bump fade over to like right shoulder. Like she got a game. Mm hmm. Yeah. She's averaging 15 minutes per game right now. I think that. What they're doing is they're playing Shakira with the starters. And then they're playing Lauren beds with Angela do believe. Well, I think they're trying to do is. Basically give both of those players enough spacing that they can start to do their thing. Yeah. I think things will click for Lauren and will really, really get. The truth of whether those two fit together once the game slows down for her a little bit more. You mentioned the jumper. It's pretty. She's rushed right now. Yeah. So she's got to wrap those out. Yeah. She still attracts so much gravity when she's got the ball on her hands. The reads like they like it's kind of like UCLA with her, right? Yeah. It took her. It took her some time to sort of like figure out how to read the game fully. Now she's in a completely different context. A competition is unlike anything she's ever seen. So I think, honestly, she's just got to find her sea legs a little bit. And then we'll start to be. able to see what she can really do, but I do kind of worry about the long-term fit, because I think Washington, they took the best player available at number four, right? Now, you can make the argument that maybe, you know, maybe Kiki Rice, especially given that guard rotation, could have been a better fit for them there, or they could have done a drafted stash, because it does now put them in a tough position. They got Cody though. They kind of cooked up in a draft. Oh, they had a great draft. They just also had. It scared me. But you got to develop these players once you draft the play. I agree with that. Yeah. So then how do you find all the minutes? Yeah, they did go best to play the Wagner, what you saying. Kiki is the one that really makes it very hard, and she is so skilled and talented too, on top of what she's doing. You know what's crazy though? The minutes are very strange, but that team and the characters they have on that team, they look like they really rock with each other. They love each other, yeah. Yeah, like when you have that, it's tough to really break that up because they have something to do. Great building with that team. It's like early days Oklahoma, Thunder. Yeah. Yeah. Like Kiki always doing this, like her and Sonya rock with each other, you see Shakira come in, they rock with each other. You know, like Lauren comes in, they start fin writing, you can just tell like this team, like the chances of tick tocks, all of that, yeah, it's a vibe. You can feel it. I think that they went through so much together because like coming in as rookies, now Georgia is kind of functionally a rookie, Lauren's coming in with her former teammate as well. You got cast Prosper in there as well, and as much as like, yeah, they don't have the vets, but they have, they have congruency in what their experiences are. So that creates a level of sisterhood as well when you're going through all the same things at the same time. It's like having a college roommate, like think about the people that you like graduated high school with or that, like you went to college with, like those are the people that you're just going to be like, man, like we were, we were in it together. We were in the foxhole together. Exactly. That creates a completely different sort of level of engagement, especially when, as you know, like, I think locker rooms and the pros, there's so much more of like an office job than they are. And the mystics, they still look like a college team. You know, they have that. They are. And you guys, what, I mean, for everybody out there, when you look at the new CBA, you got to really look at it because you made a great point about KC. You got all these girls on rookie contracts. It's going to be tough to really trade them because you're able to still continue to get pieces because you got all these girls on rookie deals. Yeah. And like, I'm starting to see the mystics starting to see the formula of like, okay, see the spurs. It starts seeing a lot more teams like, as you see, Dallas, they're doing the same thing, like, yeah, building pieces around these, these, you know, stars because you have teams like New York, who is spending a lot of money. You're going to need those rookie scale contracts to offset that too as well. So I don't think we're going to see a trade anytime soon. We're going to have to get used to this group. I don't see it. I'm okay with that. They don't have to rush their process at all. But they got to play them. That's a problem. They got to play them. They got to find a way. Like, yeah, I'm honest. I'm kind of okay with the way things are at right now. I think Lauren needs to get her reps and also it's the same thing with like, she just came off the final four. She played as late as you can possibly play into the season. Man, when you see Lauren in person, you've got to play her, oh, my gosh, I know she have fit. I can imagine deep selling her deep selling me the whole game. That wears you down physically and she runs the floor at that size. And we got to find a way. But my question for you is, why don't we see more of the bigs get pushed to shoot the three like we do in the league? So many bigs. I don't really see them like, hey, shoot the three shoot the three shoot the three. I don't really see it. Like, why is that? I think the W game is a little different. I think it's still sort of, I still think that some of the most efficient ways to create offense are having like a double post. You can create a lot of gravity that way. Look at how the ace is won the title with Melissa Smith, once they traded for her, what that opened up for Asia Wilson. So I think part of it is that part of it is probably just more conventional style of player development as well. But right now, like the guards are coming for the perimeter is coming, right? And we're seeing that. We're seeing the value of that with these teams that really space out the floor, Minnesota, New York. When you put Asia in those like five out lineups, what are you going to do with that? So I think it's part of that, part of that evolution is starting to happen. I don't think that there's necessarily an aversion to it. It just hasn't happened yet, but it's on its way. Because man, just imagine in the playoffs, when the game gets tight, you need rebounds and scoring in a paint. You have Shakira, Kiki and Lauren playing big minutes all three of them. They are going to wear teams down. They ain't going to be able to do nothing with that. Well, that's a code you're trying to crack, right? Like how do you have the size on the core and maintain your space? And Lauren's form, for me, she's probably the one where I think she can shoot the three. We just don't see her do it. That's why I keep saying her name. Shakira, I mean, I know people don't believe in the three, but I think you've got to figure out which one you want to really start shooting it. Yeah. Because that needs to happen for you guys to all three of them work. Yeah. You get problems at some point, but even though they're close, but you've got to figure out what it would make it work. To be continued. To be continued. To be continued. We'll see what happens. Nope. Do you want to talk about Britney Sykes? Man, that might be, we got to talk about her. For me, so yesterday, before we had to, we talked about it, my answer has changed. Oh, okay. I have. You said this might happen. Yeah. I said this might happen. I have Britney Sykes as my most improved. She's second in the W in scoring right now with 25 again. But then I started looking up some buckets and then I see Kennedy Carter come in. She's average at 19 points and she's shooting 67 from the field. That is ridiculous. I think I have Kennedy at one. Is she most improved? Because we've always known that she could do this. She's coming off the bench. Maybe you're six, my six women of the year perhaps. True. I like how you did that to make her where she can get an award. I just never have seen someone shoot 67 from the field like this as a guard as a guard. And in the W, if you look at people's percentages, you got like W like the top guard in the most efficient. She like 46, 47. And you don't really see too many W NBA guards shoot over 50 from the field. She's shooting 67. If she is in the 60s, I might have to give her the award. I just have to bear. Harvard's on that. That's nuts. But Sykes, what she is doing is incredible. She averaged 15. I think the most in her in her W NBA career, I believe 15 or 16, I'm not mistaken. She jumped all the way to 25 and it's take the role she is in terms of like, shoot, she be clear. Marina out. Telling people to get out. Let me get my bucket. Like she manipulate the style flow. But I had Sykes one, but the 67s cooking me right now, not going to, I'm not going to fight you on that. Yeah. What did Kitty Carter offers us? You know. She wasn't in the league. No, I'm saying her last year in the W. That's why I'm trying to get in the bag because it was I think her context was very different because Chicago, like pretty clogged up. She had to shoot those floaters up a lot more. Honestly, it's pretty similar. She's averaging 19 and then she's, she averaged 17 last year or the last year that she was in the league. Granted, she's a lot more efficient now. I think she's getting to the layout because it's just who you who you help off of on that age team, right? Yeah. I got to talk about Sykes though, because you got me thinking about her, she's nearly doubled her shot attempts, her free throw attempts, she's averaging 10 free throws a game. It's a layup line for her, she goes downhill, she's unstoppable. And then man, Toronto did a very interesting thing in the last game against Phoenix. They use Brittany Sykes to guard Alyssa Thomas. Have you ever heard of a guard trying to guard Alyssa Thomas? They run inverted picking roles to get the advantage of getting a guard onto Alyssa Thomas. Toronto said, like, Temi's already out, Niara Sobby's out now. We would rather put a guard on her than like make Laura Yusquita try to do this right now. Yeah. And she did a pretty damn good job. Great job with her athleticism being able to jam and getting to, you know, Alyssa Thomas' body. And usually athletic guards really succeed on Biggs. And Alyssa Thomas too is like second and assist in the W right now. Like for me to get her out of DHO situations and inverts, like, we got to put a guard on her. That's so smart. No bigs can handle her right now. Yeah. And how strong she is too. I'm putting a guard on her. And I might be the rest of you. You might see a lot more teams do it. It might be because then, like, what's the point of them even running a screen? They usually run the screen together. the guard on her. And then if you just switch switch it like that just that just shuts off the tap between it. It's pretty rare for a team to be able to do that. Honestly shout out to Sandy Brindello too because like I did not know that she had that level of like defensive flair and creativity in her game plan as well. So I love her going for it that way. She's great like on you know like locker room coach. Her adding this sort of like because that's one of the reasons she got let go of the Liberty as well is that she wasn't necessarily the most creative as far as like let's go positionally. It's basketball. Let's just you know throw throw out like something that like no one's ever seen before. That's kind of like what their the Liberty want with uh with Christa Marco at their starting to get from him. But it's dope that Sandy is doing that in Toronto too. Oh yeah. Sandy got a chip on her shoulder. She got so far. She got some fire in her eyes. You can see she's got some really the proof. Yeah. She got some really the proof. Yeah. Yeah shout out Sandy because how it ended in the last question I always we know what she got here with in the press conference before. Yeah. That was crazy. That was nuts. But I'm glad she got a chip on her shoulder and this team actually looks out. She makes some great adjustments and how she's fitting this team and bringing them together. That's been really cool to see to be honest. Yeah. Yeah. Like who would have thought Sykes would be number two in the WN scoring right now. All right Kelsey plan was she doing this crazy to by the way even though they losing but that's another time. That's not because of her scoring though but yeah you're right. Talk to topic for another day. I know you've been watching Liberty it's on. He had a question for you. Yeah. I think so they already um you know no Sabrina no no no no uh no so I believe right now right 117 offensive rating leading the league. Best offensive rating of all time is 116. Can they have the best offensive all time? This is showtime in the East Coast. Okay remember one I know they're probably not at one of the best offensive uh statistically and analytically they are though but know tumult the team I'm about to say. Okay. The Houston comments for me I'm never going to go against them. I can't do it. Like Cynthia. Yeah. Thompson. Like swoops. That's a big three. Hey man I ain't never seen no group like that ever so but in terms of it they have so much that uh Sasha's playing tonight too by the way uh so we're going to see her first game and how the group meshes they have they're one of the other teams we talked about the mistakes they're going to have to figure this out because they got another person that I got at top two on our rookie at a year race Pauline who is shooting a crazy percentage right now average in over 1617 points are Ricky sees I know everyone's gonna be like she's not really a rookie but she technically is her. I mean she's only 24 years old. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. So what are we saying? Yeah. But a lot of people don't want to give her the rookie stamp I've been seeing so I'm going there Marine. We know what she's been able to do. Yo Marine in this crystal. Yeah. Yeah. Right. I'm saying I don't get Chris. Yeah. I had Chris you know he was with the Warriors but me and him got real close because he was coaching the national team for the Bahamas and me and him got close off that but you know Shawn my dollar Becca Gardner too out there doing her thing in another season but they have too much over there and for me if I'm a GM on another team. I know y'all got a problem y'all might like to get fixed like let me help y'all out with that problem. That's me. Who are you calling? Who are you calling about? I'm trying to get Marine number one because the contract is new Jonathan don't be playing no games as I've heard. So we might have to make some calls on them. Maybe I might have to get Pauline too. I don't know if y'all want to get rid of her because of y'all contract situation. That's going to be the tougher one. But Marine let's have a conversation. Let's have a real conversation on that. Say we're Rebecca who can help a lot of teams out there. I know everybody was going crazy about the neighboring thing but she's top 5 on that team is going to attend a game in 20 some minutes. So they have a huge problem right now for me. A great problem to have. They have way too much depth because Benizah too. What are they going to do? Yeah. Yeah. I mean it's going to be hard to get Marine or Pauline I think because you have them on that reserve deal. You can negotiate their rights with them. You can have them for another couple of years as well. But Marine seeing I have the power now. No Sabrina. I'm cooking. I lead the league in threes. Yeah. Right. And like I see what my role could be on another team. Yeah. Now Sabrina comes back. Them touches go way down. We got a knock on the door. They can't afford Marine next year. Can they afford Marine next year? Well they have. This is this is a weird sort of probably the last thing in the CBA that I think the players Union kind of ended up losing on is she is an ERFA next year, which means that her rights. So her rights are reserved, which means that like Benizah last year, which is part of the reason they were able to sign her to only a $400,000 contract for one year. Now with Benizah's little different, she was injured. I think there's a bit of a proof at year. But when you have a reserve contract, that means that your team can like you can only negotiate with the team that you're currently on for your fine. She's on a reserve for another year. I thought she was done. Are you sure? I think they have her on her. She's reserved on another year, bro. I think they do. No way. She's an ERFA next year. No way. You're right though. It shouldn't be. She shouldn't be another one. I thought this was the last one. If she's on a reserve for another year in New York, it's bacon in terms of their cat. Well, that's part of the, that's why it's such an advantage to sign players to feel this from overseas. Yeah, it is. And great points to you as you look at these stats. Women, girls, young girls out there. The European wave, they're coming. What's going on? The WMBA looking a lot different with the European's coming in and international prospects. I'm seeing a lot more of them. They have won in the rookie of the year race too over their own Mercury too as well. You're seeing a lot more players from Europe coming here as you say because you're on reserve, which means you can't go to another team. I to learn that when I covered this, covered the W this year is that the reserve contracts is much different than it. Yeah, it's kind of like being unrestricted, but you got core and reserve, but it's not because they can't really go to another team really. No, exactly. So yeah. Are you sure, Maureen? I got it. That's what it says. It's what it says, but you're right. It's kind of, oh, the Maureen is untraitable then. Yeah. She was, she's a reserve then. Then you're going to, she's not going to get traded. Yep. And so was Pauline. I knew Pauline was in New York is just galaxy brain when it comes to their cap. They're baking. People have no clue what they're doing. They are really baking like at a crazy rate. And yeah, like Benazio, the rest of them, they are locked in on that reserve deal. Like he said, he'd be cooking on the reserve. Don't for sure. For sure. For sure. They're playing a different game. Who do you have as your rookie of the year? I got to live with you miles that one because I think it's going to play out, but Pauline is a close to right now. Yeah. I got it. Yeah. I got to give it to Olivia. And that's no disrespect to Pauline. Like Kiki's having an incredible start to the season. Yeah. It's just man, like the things that Olivia Miles is doing is just undeniable. Like I think she's going to run away with it to be honest. Like she'll get some competition. I also think in Phoenix, no, I think the scouting report's going to catch up with a little bit as well too. Like that's part of it with the European players. They get it early season boost because no one really knows how to guard them. I don't know why you could just Google that she can shoot the ball, but nobody was treating her like she could. Now teams are trying to treat her like she could. So I think that I think she's good player and she's got a ton of things she can do and put pick and roll. But there's going to be I think an adjustment period is coming for her too. There it is. That's why I see Olivia run away with it. And Olivia is she in 47 from the field too. By the way, as a GM, why the heck would you let Olivia go play with Naphisa Collier? That's the first thing I thought about. I'm not letting that happen. Them two together. Yeah, you can blame. Look, blame Kurt Miller. They had the number one pick in Dallas. You can also blame Chicago. Oh, I forgot my Chicago's guy's square swear jar. But hey, there's a one who gave him a pick swap and then had a horrible season, right? So there's that aspect of it. And then we're going to be looking at this with Washington, because Washington is Chicago's 2028 pick and they have a pick swap for next year. So these teams that are playing chess, you can play chess in the WNBA. If you have like, if you have the ownership directive to be able to play the long game in this WNBA, you're going to really benefit like come 2028, 2029. These owners that let their GMs cook, they're going to be very happy that they did. Just what I'm saying. That's the first thing I looked at in this draft. I'm like, there's no way I'm letting Olivia and Naphisa play together. Did you watch speaking of tanking, basically, right in traffic? Did you watch the Seattle storm, Connecticut sun tank off? Man, and then Kennedy Burke hit the game. winner, right? Yeah. What do we really cause Seattle's team to take off? No, I feel like they've been when you're when you're getting out to got the better team. If you're on paper, if you really look at it. Yeah, but they're they're all in a race to the bottom right now. They're in those juju sweepstakes. What's sure? And you've got that Texas ad on that Madison Booker sweepstakes, too. That's that's right. Seattle clothes with Jade Melbourne, other most improved candidate for me, the Tisha Hyde, I'm in Lexie Brown, and Kenzie Holmes, and then Tween Steph Dolson and Ziya Cote. They got young to me though. But they who's on the bench there, Flasier Johnson on the bench there. I love Flasier. Um, and look, I may not necessarily be having the best shooting start, but true. And they didn't do the most egregious version of it. I think what Rashid Mesie and did with Connecticut. Now, he stuck with a lineup that got them back into the game. And on a level, you got to respect that. Yeah. However, at the same time, let me pull up. Let me pull up this box board for y'all. Seattle first year coach, man, from Liv, she trying to get a dump. She trying to get some dumps. You don't think so? No, they're they're they're rebuilding. They're absolutely. And I would I wouldn't back it. Yeah. But she get back. Yeah. She said, she'll be she'll be there soon. anytime soon. She'll be there soon. Yeah. Um, Rashid closes with Ashlyn Jackson, Charlize Leisure Walker, Nell and Gloma, Olivia Edwards, Kennedy Burke, who's on the bench, Haley Van Lith, and he's some more two most improved player candidates, Sonaya Rivers, and Diamond Miller, and he's some moral, um, place six minutes. That's why I need to place four minutes. See, I didn't know you was going to get in your bag that's why I said you car low key. I didn't say, I mean, not you car. I said Connecticut low key because Seattle was trying to compete to me. You know, they have to play us out. I saw, I saw with, you know, the son were doing. So that I agree with you. That's one of the team I'm looking at to be honest. Yeah. It's the son. It's more so the son. Now I think I think look, I think Seattle was playing in the tanking sandbox a little bit. Yeah. And they ultimately ended up, they lost the game so they won the game that way. Yeah. But you think it's going to be tough when I will get there because you've got a player and if they start winning well, she's 19 years old. She might be good. She might be good. A lot a lot of feedback. I was getting from the qualifiers was that, you know, she's nice. She's really. No, I think I would have taken her number one. I would. I would have dealt. Oh, 100% I would take. Oh, we had bad work. So who's three? We know. I would have done all of them Olivia Miles Lauren beds, easy fun. Okay. That was that was my. Okay. Yeah. That was my top four. What was your top four? I don't live. Yeah. Miles going one. She's 15. She's 15 minutes from the facility in Dallas. Yeah. So I'm thinking they saw her more than anybody. Yeah. They're my. But I went her one. Minnesota was following her though. Like they were all over 12 turn. Oh, they were everything that followed her as much as they want. You have the number one. This isn't good. You could have followed. I would have waved at you at the gym. I'm very comfortable right now. Right. I'm very comfortable. Um, I would have went Olivia one. Yeah. And I would have went probably Lauren that's two. Three. I would have went. I would have been four. I would have went. Um, AZ. And then five. I would have, you know, same group. That's how it kind of went out. Kiki the rest. Yeah. We weren't in charge, though. So what are you going to do? Hey, honest, this is my first real WNBA draft. I was really, really liked it. I was very shocked. Yeah. But AZ, you know, one of the faster shooters I've ever seen in person, let's know, know anything to her. She had a crazy season and crazy college career. I just thought Olivia Miles was just so magical, bro, that. Yeah. No disagreements there. Yeah. We got a magical player potentially in the next draft to though. Magic play yours. Play yours for sure. Yeah. I know you had some juju walking stories for me. Oh, man. Shout out my dog, juju. Hey, honestly, Jay, the bun has always been that's one bun. I've never seen move when it plays. That bun has not moved one time since high school has a move. Yeah. But shout out juju. Um, me and her mom for that. Shout out mom's too. Shout out mom shout out pops. Um, me and juju got real close because, uh, you know, I got a lot of her workouts during the summer with Phil Handy. Um, kind of funny story. How they even, how we all even got linked up is COVID hit. And, uh, Kobe had passed the way and feels like, man, I really want to continue to do what, you know, me and Kobe talked about and I was like getting more into the woman space. And, uh, he was like, man, any girls like out there and then me and Ed, you know, who was at CRK and at the time before she got there because she was at Woodward, uh, high school. They were like, man, we're like juju walkins. And, um, I still had the DM on my phone. I deemed her and was like, yo, you know, you want to do a workout? I know it's COVID, you know, uh, Phil Handy was on the Lakers at the time. I was like, works out, you know, LeBron, Kyrie them. And she was like, yeah, she was like, but, you know, she was like, my mom is on here right now. So let me talk to my mom. Okay. So, you know, me and mom's talked for for a little bit. We finally got it up, got it together. This is at the time where everything was kind of still closed during COVID. So we got sports Academy kind of gives me chills because it was the mom, but Academy before. Yeah. And, um, man, first ever workout, I'd never forget. She came in. I didn't see mom's face probably for seven months because she had a mask on every time. Everyone else, I seen Drew like, and we started rocking. When I think the third or second workout, she worked out with Chelsea Gray. And man, we've been close since COVID. And it's been phenomenal to see what she's turned into. She's probably one of the hardest workers I've seen. Last year, she, uh, I think she broke her hand and ran, did all left you work out. Yeah. Yeah. She had that surgery in there. Yeah. Yeah. Like phenomenal person, man, phenomenal work ethic. And it doesn't surprise me where she is right now. So, man, shout out to what she did because I'll never forget when she first went to USC. She had told me at McDonald's that when she went to USC, she wanted to make sure that she brings USC back to, you know, what it used to be in women's sports. And especially women's basketball. And look what she's done. I mean, Keke ends up transferring in. You got jazz over there. You got tonight, a comment who was an animal that she did exactly what she said she was going to do. So respect to her, man. Yeah. Yeah. She put it back on the map. I know cold proud to me. I know cold so proud. Let's cope. If you go look at Cobb's followers, shout out to Kobe, because it's, it's telling me about the women's was, was elite. He follows you. Mm hmm. They got many years ago. Yeah. Yeah. You look at his father with Judy. He knew what it was. Yeah. Yeah. So. Wow. That's amazing synchronicity with all those things. Yeah. Crazy. That's pretty, that's pretty special. Wow. So she's been work, she was working out with W players as well back then. Working out with W. That's the honestly no lie to you. It feel you can, you can attest. Yeah. In the first five minutes of her working out, we said, this is, this is a pro. You can just tell she's a big art. She's holding her own against them. Yeah. She's beating any of them. Yeah. Like, and just how she looks like. Mm hmm. Yeah. She's a big guard at that size. And what she can do, you can just tell New York. Then honest. Yeah. She's worked out with all the great Kyrie, Cav, KD, I call him Cav, but James, like, she, she used to this. Yeah. Yeah. But I don't feel great having a pick. I have handheld doggo, Madison Booker, Juju. Mm hmm. You know, I think Juju is going to stay another year though, me personally, but yeah, I can see it. I can see why do you think she stays? Unless she won a double championship, she's still got records to break. Mm hmm. She getting big bad jobs, not finished job, not finished. Unless she won it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's true, but that that that USC team next year, they could they can do it. They could definitely do it. Um, you know, you're good. Who's your MVP? Why are you looking up the next Asia? Okay, she's just go. She's just to go. Yeah, you got the MVP right now. Yeah, 100%. Who are you? I'm just saying we're only three games in. I'm not going future. It's great to play it all time. I'm not arguing that I see it. Like, three games in. Yeah. Oh, three games in. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, Stewie. Stewie's been. I was about to say that. Yeah. Oh, now we talking. How you speaking my language to me? Okay. Okay. That's who that's who I was. Yeah. For sure. Second and blocks right now, too. Uh, yeah. I'm going to do a little bit of everything. Yeah. Well, he's an interesting thing about. So I've been emailing back and forth with a son Connecticut son fan. And I feel like this as a fan. This is probably one of the most devastating experiences. Like not only are you leaving losing your team, right? Yes, you. And you're watching a whole bunch of young players. but you're watching them develop and you kind of like have a bittersweet feeling about it because you're always going to roof for them but at the same time like whatever they do next like they're going to do it for a Houston franchise that like ripped your heart out and you could have potentially had this team just be in Boston this whole time. And I think just from a fan perspective like that that absolutely sucks. So on that note, I wanted to introduce a new segment that we're doing and I'd love to have you participate in it. I'm not sure I'm not sure if you know your spiritual person or religious. Okay, so we're going to do some positive affirmations because I'm more of a secular spiritual person like everybody else in L.A. I've replaced actual religion with YouTube meditations. So you can do this with me. All right, let's do it. Okay, all right. So tonight's meditation is for the Connecticut sun fans who have survived dynasty transitions, casino traffic, and the psychic burden of knowing that just like everything else you've ever loved, you're eventually going to have to like go with these players. So you got to get you got to love without attachment in the situation. So all right, let's close your eyes. Okay, I was about to ask you if we go in that way. All right, let's get it. Inhale through your nose, exhale, slowly, and release all earthly attachment to substitution patterns. Unclench the muscles that tightened, watching the Tisha Hydeman shoot late game jumpers, and now repeat after me. I trust that there is a higher purpose behind a most improved player candidate getting only six minutes. I trust that there's a higher purpose for a most improved candidate only in six minutes. Rashid Mezean's rotations are an illusion. Anisa Moro's most improved player case is a reality. Rashid Mezean is his rotations are illusion. Anisa Moro getting a most improved is not an illusion. Gample Pavilion is only 45 minutes away, and I am safe there. Sarah Strong will be the number one pick for an eventual Boston franchise. Is Juju in that class? Do you still want me to say this? If you feel like you can't say it, you don't have to say it. If it doesn't resonate with you, if you feel like it's not in alignment with what you believe, you definitely don't have to say. Okay, hold on. Blanca Cignonius will be the number one pick for an eventual Boston franchise. We love Blanca. Blanca will be a number one pick for eventual franchise. We like Blanca. Was that 2029? Yeah, we like her a lot. I let go of all attachments to Nell and Gloma's future development. I let go of all attachments to say Nell and Gloma. No one Gloma. I just want to make sure I say the name right to her what? Future development. Future development, yeah. It will come back to me through Agama gear and communion. It will come back to me on Agama and Cignonius. My suffering is not for the benefit of the Houston franchise. The truth exists beyond box scores or wins. My suffering what? The truth exists beyond the box score or wins. The truth exists beyond the box score and the franchise. I release my attachment to who starts and who closes. All right, now you're ready. You can open your eyes. Wait. Wait for your toes. Stretch out. Like stretching out. Look, I'm doing this too, by the way. Sorry, you can't defend. I mean, sorry, Connecticut Sunfans. I don't know if you remember this, but they did this in Houston. They used to raise the roof. Oh, that's cold. That is cold. Right. Is there feeling safe? I am so sorry. Look, sorry. The basketball gods work in mysterious ways. They make it in mysterious ways. I'm raising the roof again because they that was something they used to do in the comments and I see the vision. I'm not going to lie to you, but Connecticut, I was hoping y'all stay can't lie to you guys. Man, Houston going to have some special going over there because yeah, I feel bad for y'all because the pigs in these next three years. Oh my god. I think I think everything that they just came from the meditation is just completely out the window after that. You definitely do some yoga somewhere. We did the first breath. You said, I want you to release all the energy. The way you said it, too, is like, you definitely do yoga. I'm not dead. My YouTube history is it's full of that. Oh, it's YouTube. I thought, you know, I thought you were going to you know, some hot yoga classes. No, no, I do it all at home. I do it my backyard room. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Yeah, you didn't you do anything like that. It's tough. I don't know if my brain is supposed to go a mile a minute while I'm doing the yoga. I need to slow my brain down. That's the idea, right? Yeah. How do you do it? Did it take you some time? Well, you know, I think some people meditate better when they're moving. Like I think the tricky thing for them is that their mind race is even more if they're not moving. So like if you try meditating while you're actually just like find like whatever your natural movements are in your body or like going for a walk or whatever you do physically these days, like that might actually be better. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We'll see. Report back when the next time you're on the pod. I see we can get you into a Zen state. We're trying to get into a Zen state pot. We're trying to get into a Zen state. All right, before I let you go, is there anything else you want to talk about? Yeah. Okay. For you, we didn't really get a chance to really discuss how you feel about for me more so the Liberty as a team with Sabrina and, um, sought to get back. Is that going to be a good thing or is it going to be like, man, they got to figure this out. We have not seen, we have a number one offense. Yeah. And we have Sato who shot us out too. I like her game. You also have Sabrina, but then you also have so many players on that team that are. Yeah. Well, I think that's part of the reason that they bought DeMarco in, right? Is this New York team historically has always had a lot of talent, but they always they haven't always found the right fit. You know, you have Sabrina surrounded by all this talent, but her efficiency is not quite there. John Kweil Jones is probably the most efficient player on the team, but for some reason she's not getting like, she's getting less than 10 shots per game. Yeah. So I think it's going to be on him to organize that offense. And I think that, you know, he's definitely somebody who we like, if you take like the experience that he's had with the Warriors, I think that you could impose some of those like that style of play onto them. We saw it a little bit in the preseason. Sabrina being used as a screener and then flaring out, that's a nightmare for opposing defenses, right? And it gives a player like JJ or Stewie or Satu like an open lane to the rim. So they're going to have to play a modern style. They're going to have to use those inversions a lot. And I mean, time will tell. I'm actually genuinely pretty optimistic about how many games the Marine play with play with a Sabrina in the preseason. Because Sabrina got hurt in that game, right? I'm just, you know, okay. Yo, like, I feel like you want to cook here. I'm like, what do you think? I'm very, very nervous with the, I love the team. I love the players they have. They have too much that their group has seen themselves. And in star light situations and see what they can become. Yeah. Like it's so hard to like when Marine and Pauline are cooking the way they are and the rest of the group to be like, yo, ministering. Could the Sparks get bad enough that the league steps in a little bit? Now, the NBA, the NBA just lottery. Somehow, the number one pick always goes to the team that really needs the number one pick. Now, of course, we've all seen the lottery. But like, and people will tell you, I've seen a lottery balls. I've seen them. I don't, this might be my actual conspiracy theory. Somehow, the NBA always gives the number one pick to pick pick to the team that it would be most convenient for the number one pick to go to for commercial reasons. Hey, this will be just a basketball reason you might break off the sweats and be like, we coming to the go. Have to get the first pick. It's bad enough. They already missed out on page. They really thought they were going to get page. I guess the counter to that would be if the WNBA was point off that kind of chicane or even page would probably be in LA. After sparks get one or two, we good money. They even get three. We good money. You get handheld dog or you get battered some bookers. You get juju. Oh, we got to do it. Yeah. And now, I don't know. The problem is they told the team that they're in winning mode. Yeah. Well, that's why you don't make the Portland trade, in my opinion, because now you have to fast track everything. And when you try to fast track things, things get lost. That's what the the Sparks team is a lesson in break now. Once you trade Don Malonga, then you're motivated, now you kind of like now you go ahead you trade Wukia for aerial actions. What's next, you know, like that's these moves they compound on each other. Yeah, you as I said the next three drops are so crazy. Do you, and the reason why we talked about the trades and the W, we looked at teams that have stacked rosters and when players make so much money, you see stars get traded all the time in NBA. Now we have W NBA players making a way different salary now. So there's going to be a point in time just cap wise where you have to trade a star. So do you make a trade for a big player and give up one of these picks? And if you're a team that has top talent, do you make a trade? It's my question, and then go young. Yeah, I mean, teams are going to start seeing more teams in the W make trades because they don't once the last time we've seen three big trades in the season in the W. Like make a trade. You're starting to see it happen, but okay. I'm going to go through a list of players. Okay. Would you trade them for? Do you walk it? We go out and out of some book. We got to put her in the group too. Yeah. I'll go through the obvious like, Asia Wilson, you're not trading. And we got to put rules to this. Am I factoring that they're on a rookie scale for four years? Yeah, yeah, you're figuring factoring and everything. So, okay, Asia, you're obviously not trading her list of Thomas. They're not. No one's respect to listen to Thomas. Like at her age, nobody is like trading their number one pick for her. A piece of Collier. Would I trade my number one pick for the piece of Collier? If you're a Minnesota, you trade the number one pick for the piece of Collier. She didn't too much for that city. What if you, what if she's leaving? She's on last year for contract. A conversation with her about that. Yeah. That's too tough. That girl is the probably one of the best mid-range scores with Asia. I agree with it. You know you can keep her. Am I am I trading my pick to get in the visa? No, no, you're you're you're Minnesota. In all of these cases, you're. But I get the number one pick. Yeah. And I'm Minnesota. Yeah. Am I trading the fee so to get the number one pick? Yeah. But look, you've done a great for this franchise. I need to have a conversation with you. Are you committed to us? If you committed, I'm committed. Yeah. If you're not, then we get the number one pick. That's it. That's what you have to do now. Like, let's keep going. All right. I like this game. I'm not mad at this. Page backers. Heck, no. We're not trading pet. Well, oh, I get paid. No, no, no, no, you're trading pitch. No. Kate. Kate. Can't do it. Kelsey Mitchell. Kelsey Mitchell. I would get fired. Yeah. You have to. Jackie young. You have to. Yeah. Sabrina, we kind of already talked about. I would definitely. Yeah. You have to. Stewie. How does stewie. Ah, man, I can't do a stewie dog. 31. She's only 31. It's not. Can't do it, man. You get fired for those things. So you got to factor that into you trade stewie. Yeah. I'm not doing it. What if you don't trade her? For the number one pick. Yeah. You're getting. You're still getting fired, though. You're screwed. You're screwed. I look like you don't. All right. One thing that you're going to learn. Like, especially shout to the show. One thing you're going to learn. Is that. There's resumes. That you stick with for the rest of your life. You don't want to be that person. Oh, yeah. He traded Kaylyn. He traded stewie. That's the only problem with these. Yeah. They stick with you forever. Alicia Gray. No more pick. I love Alicia Gray. No more pick. No more pick. It's tough. But. Cap wise and flexibility wise. It puts you too much in a good spot. Alia Boston. No more pick. Yeah. All right. I think I'm mostly looking. Yeah. Alia, think about it though. Yeah. We might. Bigs are so important. She might be the next. Great big. She's a great big. After. After it's time. She's already a great big. But then like once it's not. Feast time anymore. Once it's not Asia's time anymore. It's not the gates wide over. Alia Boston's a really good one. Just for the simple fact. She signed a six year deal. She probably got you. You probably saved a lot. Did she sign a six year? I think. Well, it'll be like. It'll expire at the end of her six year. But I think it's like the epic. It's a great big. She's a great big. After it's time. I think it's like the epic provision is like a three year. And the cat goes up every year. That deal might be very cat friendly. When it's all said and done. Yeah. To be honest. Shout out to Alia for securing the back. I am such a believer. I'm Madison Booker and Jews, you know. Them two are like. Potentially some of the best we've seen. Definitely. Definitely up there. So that's how I think it impacts. Hey. Shout out to women in W.A. Play. It's not nothing. Yeah. You can get generational. You're talking about like we throw that word around a lot. So that's generational. That's generational. That's that's franchise changing. That's the next ten years of your franchise. Generation. Yeah. That's bigger than the program. Generation. Yeah. It's tough. All right, Jordan. Thank you so much for hopping on the show. Appreciate you. Come on now. Thank you. Thank you for having me too. I appreciate you. Follow switch cultures on Instagram. If you aren't already. You guys do excellent breakdowns. Excellent interviews. I'm so excited to watch some of your WNBA content as it starts to come out. And just continue to see it. See you at these games. I've always loved what you've done in the NBA space. Oh, my just super hyped that you're going to be the WNBA space as well. Shout out to your sister and sister action too. Shout out to Ash. Shout out to sis man. You're cooking up doing your thing man. Shout out to Ash too. All right. Thanks man. Thank you to Oscar for production help. And thank you to us to Fawn Anderson as always. And we will tap in with you guys on Monday. [Music] [Music] [Music]