The Thunder Get Physical to Take Game 2. Plus, the Offseason Wheel of Destiny. | Group Chat

Hello and welcome to Group Chat. I am Justin Verrier and joining me, Rob Mahoney. Rob, have you been pounding electrolytes after yet another incredible game between the Spurs and the Thunder? I am pounding them because, like, how am I also going to pull a hamstring? Like, is that why Kyle isn't here today? I think so. Yeah. He just needed a DMP old for the night, but we powered through and good God did the Spurs and the Thunder power through in this game two performance. I feel like the first game was just the spectacle of it all. The two overtimes, a Wemby shot that's like, we're going to see that shot a thousand more times before he gets into the Hall of Fame in 20 years. Wait, genuinely to pause for a second. Yeah. What's the over under? On how many times you and I will see that? see that shot before we die it's hundreds right it's like at least two to five hundred it'll be a matter of every highlight package of his like playoff performances it'll be a part of his like you know hall of fame clip reel someday hopefully so i don't think we're ever going to escape it i'm not mad about it uh i think this one will go into a hall of fame like clip package but it might just be one that circulates online about isaiah hartenstein because this game was was very much like the mma wrestling like you have to survive this matchup and i think hartenstein broke out literal mma moves against women in order to corral him in the paint well i already have started separate clip farms uh just pulling those packages together some like pro okc propaganda some pro spurs propaganda being like look how dirty this is you really can't have too many bases covered but what an isaiah hartenstein game and what honestly an incredible performance by mark dagnall and the thunder and hartenstein more broadly to pull him into relevance in the series when it seemed like he might be played out of it or at least played into somewhat meaningless minutes by as soon as game two or game three we're going to talk about all that all the action from game two between the thunder and the spurs we're going to look ahead to nick's calves game two at msg then we're going to get into some off-season talk first jason kidd out with the mavericks and then we're going to debut the off-season wheel of destiny it's actually a name tk we're not totally sure if we like that one but if you have other ideas yeah or if you're a sponsor you want to sponsor that ferraro our guys in the chocolate factory let us know uh but first we gotta take a break the ringer nba show is brought to you by fan duel the conference finals are here think you know how it'll go down take your shot with fan duel and get closer to the action fan duel is the best place to bet the team's players and plays during the nba postseason build the same game parlay for a shot at a bigger payout or try live betting and jump into the action after tip off download the fan duel sportsbook app now and play your game 21 plus select states 18 plus dc kentucky or wyoming gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER call 1-888-789-777 or visit ccpg.org chat in connecticut all right so this one was dare i say a slobber knocker so we had potentially three injuries we know of two j-dub left the game with a hamstring injury harper dylan harper leaves later on with a right leg injury and then it seemed like aj mitchell even was like really gingerly walking off the court and seemed pretty concerned when he fell uh it seemed like his hamstring so we have all of that and that's on top of deer and fox who also did not play in game two after game one that's right so clearly the double ot game kind of filtering into this one we had 22 players check into this game including 12 from okc and it wasn't just like a late game like oh like we're getting a bunch of bodies in to fill out the game there was like an aaron wiggins like like 11 seconds like end of a quarter situation but with nine minutes to go in the second quarter okc had already played 11 different guy we had mclaughlin out of nowhere mclaughlin real jordan mclaughlin minutes come on he's back the spurs 21 turnovers but god isaiah hartenstein basically being an offensive tackle in this one in order to wrangle wemby it was effective yes i do wonder going forward if they'll allow it to be effective go in three and four and beyond but like i think this is the air isaiah hartenstein game rob i think it has to be i think the combination of what he was doing defensively physically getting under wemby's skin and just guarding wemby in the first place right being on the floor enough to take that assignment away from you know j-dub who even when he was out there it's like let's try to limit that matchup as much as possible alex caruso can only do so much as we saw in game one you need that size against him and this felt like a night and day affair in terms of where wemby was getting his touches and the way he was playing and the way he was playing against him and the way he was playing against him in the first place and i think a lot of that was because of that physicality and because of the way hartenstein was denying him from just like i'm pro football hall of famer brian dawkins and i lived for a long time with something i did not know the name of major depressive disorder i carried sadness and anger because i thought i could handle it alone but i couldn't now i want to make sure others know that that support is out there if you're experiencing similar symptoms talk to a health care professional visit mddallies.com to watch my story paid partnership with johnson and johnson brian dawkins is not prescribed caplyta lumateperone this little light of mine in the dark found a hopeful sign i needed more from my antidepressant so my doctor added caplyta lumateperone proven to provide greater relief from depression symptoms than an antidepressant alone building on my progress without starting over caplyta is for adults with major depressive disorder when used with an antidepressant and is available by prescription only individual results may vary in clinical trials weight gain was not common elderly dementia patients have increased risk of death or stroke caplyta is not approved for dementia related psychosis call your doctor about new or sudden mood changes behaviors or suicidal thoughts right away antidepressants may increase these risks report fever confusion stiff muscles which may be life-threatening or uncontrolled muscle movements which may be permanent high cholesterol and weight gain may occur as can high blood sugar which may be fatal monitoring is recommended common side effects are sleepiness dizziness nausea dry mouth feeling tired and diarrhea these aren't all the side effects ask your doctor about caplyta learn more at caplyta.com or call 888-252-4824 walking to the basket to set up shop and also contesting both in terms of if he had to step up to get a hand up against like a an entry pass or playing back with wimby to try to deny him both really effective but with all of that with the couple of push shots going in for him which are honestly very important and also the the offensive rebounding where he was part of just a larger kind of gang rebounding effort by the thunder to neutralize a huge spurs advantage that's enough to tip a game like this so i think there was a chorus of people wondering if hartenstein just wasn't built for this series didn't play a lot in game one it seemed like they were matching more of his minutes with cornet than wimby and we'd seen that in the past caruso seems to be just an interesting foil for wimby and so i just wrote that as much as possible i was a little skeptical though because especially as the data started to come in and you saw where wimby was effective in that game like obviously the big shining moment was the three from steph curry range and that's the one that's going to get a lot of attention deservedly shut so right but like there's this one graphic that was circulating i think it was from the espn broadcast or maybe it was even like a kurt goldsberry thing because it was one of those like you plot every bucket from the guy like visually speaking uh and they were all at the basket 13 buckets right at or near the basket and i'm just like hartenstein's not this big old plotter who can't move with them and also if wimby's going to be at the basket that is where you want hartenstein to be a little bit more physical with them it seemed like they had the same sort of idea and from the jump it seemed like hartenstein went into this game basically being like i'm at the very least going to use all of my fouls like if i'm only going to play 12 minutes i'm going to fall out of this game they didn't call it and so he kind of just kept going with it it just seemed like wimby was a little like thrown for it like maybe quite literally thrown because sometimes he was just like really getting in there and just like hooking them and whatnot but like i just don't know what you do if you're wimby in that situation if they're going to let that go uh well you elbow naz read in the throat historically is what you do right so you're saying take a shot at like jared mccain i'm not saying you should but like you understand why the frustration boils over this happens to stars of all kinds you know if you are a player who is working inside at all or even if you're someone like steph curry who's trying to work around screens you just see all of the grabbing and holding and body bumping and hooking that happens with players like that like you have to find ways to limit them and you're right they can't call everything they did call a foul trouble and mark dagnell and his staff are like no it's cool stay out there because frankly for someone like hartenstein it's just not really gonna be a problem like he's not gonna push 40 minutes in a game like this and so if he fouls out and that limits how much he can be on the floor in the end game so be it you play smaller the thunder perfectly comfortable doing that and in the meantime you wage some psychological warfare on wimby and maybe draw some fouls going the other way in the process i thought oklahoma city overall just took it to wimby so much more consistently than they did in game one they drove at him they got some fouls racked up on wimby to the point that the spurs had to use repeated challenges to peel some of them off to keep him on the floor but like don't treat it as a given that wimby is going to be there and be in the right position at all times like drive aggressively be incredibly physical with him get him into the muck either so he's out of position and just kind of like bumped off ever so slightly from where he wants to be as a rim protector or i mean maybe even push him out of position he just needs a breather because of the physicality of the game or if he gets into foul trouble himself like they did enough to kind of make that less of a certainty in game two so when b had 13 paint buckets as i was alluding to in game one he had eight paint attempts attempts huge in game two so that was the strategy paying off on the other side of this with uh just a lack of guard depth even to start with not having a fox definitely showed uh especially once harper goes down with an injury seemed like he collided with chet on a rebound but it seemed like he had a right leg injury as a result of it he came back it seemed like only to potentially shoot free throw that he didn't have to take went away and then we never saw him again but castle once again this is the turnover is just racking up there i think he had five uh just like really early in this one i think like early in the second quarter by the end of the game he had nine and so combined with last game he has 20 over the past two games uh and i have this stat from justin russo so in addition to sleepy floyd you cade cunningham and james harden steph castle becomes one of four players in league history to have 20 turnovers during any two-game stretch he's the first person to do that in the postseason uh yikes not a list you want to be on look i'm of two minds about the turnover issues more broadly one especially when you're already down a couple of ball handlers by the end of the game some of these things are just going to happen like steph castle is going to be overtaxed there are going to be some mistakes some of them i will say late were quite costly right the spurs did mount quite like a pretty nice comeback to put themselves in a position to challenge this game in the final minutes and then castle tried to find i want to say it was julian champagny who he thought was cutting backdoor but wasn't and threw away like the the back breaking possession that really could have made this thing interesting that's tough earlier in the game though you're right there were a lot of turnovers that were just like a little needless they were just kind of mishandling the ball like he has to clean some of this stuff up i'm okay with the ones that are sins of aggression though you know like the ones where he is driving into and through people and i mean for as much as this was the isaiah hartenstein game dunking all over the top of people as well like we love those parts of the steph castle experience and they're really important to what the spurs do and so you want it's hard to have one without the other when your guard is this young and this inexperienced and going through all these playoff battles for the first time against the best defensive team in the sport but it has to be better than historically all the time and i think that's a really good awful turnover list like it just has to be a little bit cleaner than that yeah and this is where the lack of experience i think begins the show in part because like i just don't think that a lot of these spurs players have played this much and like ever like this much in a season this much in a postseason and so i do have to wonder if these sorts of things are starting to compile also like this is kind of who castle is you want him to be the brash aggressor especially defensively who brings the athletic and physicality edge that is caught up against the kind of pivot pivot moves from dylan harper and the smoothness of that and then fox is kind of more of the steady hands not having the fox steady hand in this one was really disappointing um i have to imagine the decision there was partly influenced by the fact that they won the first game perhaps they were being a little bit more cautious with this one um but you definitely saw where like they needed that i will say like they were in this game down to the end without that and so they have to probably feel good about that especially when you factor in the whistle that they were getting but like just relying on castle i mean he's a second year player this just felt like a lot on him considering the moment well this is one where you can't know what happens in this game if you're the spurs and so the opportunity to go up to oh and really take a stranglehold in this series it would be an incredibly tempting one but they thought they were going to have dylan harper who had the start of yet another great game and as we're saying all this about stefan castle and his turnovers we should note dylan harper is like an exceptionally low level player and he's a really good player and he's a really good player and he's low turnover creator particularly for his age and so if he had been a part of this game all the way through as they had intended maybe the spurs win this thing like maybe they're clean enough in terms of their execution with the two guards out there because this is something that both of these teams are now reckoning with these are two clubs that love to have that kind of dual ball handler approach basically at all times so the thunder shea and j dub and aj mitchell are kind of like toggling in pairs for the most part of the rotation and for the spurs they have their three guards who when healthy are all kind of taking turns as well but that's just like throwing out the window and the thunder are a little more equipped to deal with that given the guys who they still have healthy but i can't wait to see depending on who is available for game three how both of these defenses kind of approach that like if aj mitchell can't go and j dub can't go for game three how how aggressively are the spurs going to go after shea and the same you can say about stefan castle as well like for as much as you want to focus on wimby there's a real opportunity to shake these guys up just based on the lack of alternative ball handling on the floor with all due apology to jordan mclaughlin who i how it has to be the most like gen x looking man who is gen c did you think for a second wait is that javon carter wait no no it's actually jordan mclaughlin they are one there i mean have we ever seen them in the same room are we sure they don't share an energy source of some kind it's true but like this is where i think the depth of the thunder like pays off we keep talking about it but it's like it's just so unparalleled in recent basketball history and stuff like that so i think it's a good thing that they're not down it's just it's tough that like i already thought like they were a little bit shaky without j-dub in their late especially considering how much they were hounding sga like we want we need to get into like some of the zone like defenses they were throwing out there and also the aggressive pickup points on the doubles on shea um the longer the game went on but obviously aj was the release valve for that i thought he was a little loose with his dribble at times wasn't particularly efficient scoring wise but then he goes out and all of a sudden jared mccain is the one to step in there and i have to say mccain didn't have a particularly good shooting performance like there were a couple like wide open like looks for him especially in that short corner and i was like oh would have been nice probably would have tilted things but he came up with a lot of big plays including like the the tip that that he won he got the banker to go in and then late he was the one handling the ball in order to set up shea for the midi and so like this is what happens when you go three to four deep and this is what happens when the sixers unfortunately gift you a critical rotation player in the midst of a like a back-to-back sort of uh title chase there it's an underrated part of mccain's game uh he's like he's no one's idea of a night of like a you know first class defender you don't count on him to pull down like a ton of rebounds but he clearly can shoot he's a great off ball mover in that way but he can also handle a little bit he can get you into some sets like you don't want him to do anything too flashy but i think he's actually played a really important part for them in transition as well like he's one of the one of those guys who like if he catches with any room in front of him he is taking off in a dead sprint to try to get to the basket he's not running to the three-point line he's not kind of dawdling he's not trying to reset the offense he is trying to turn every borderline scenario into fast break points and he might have to do that even more if some of these other guards and j-dub aren't aren't ready to go for game three like they're gonna need that influence and to be honest though like all of this depth for okc all that we we talk about that we praise it all depends on shea even still and and you could see that some in game one like if you can kind of bottle and the MVP second guess himself or second guess his reads even just a little bit you can really limit what the thunder are offensively i thought this was like an unbelievable game from shea in that regard and such a cool response from him i would say in part because he was not making the right basketball play all the time it was like i see the open shooter on the weak side i don't care like that that three points that we could get is nice but you know what is more important than that is like that i am that the spurs are feeling shea as a live threat all the time and so he was hunting mismatches hunting opportunities quick hesitations into really decisive moves into his mid-range stuff i mean just like a a virtuoso performance from one of the great and well-balanced scorers in the league and one that you know is not a given after the way he played in game one and the spurs defended him in game one a classic cool to use your term like 30 and 9 you look up and all of a sudden it's like oh she is 30 and 9 like i have but you saw once he started to click in in the third quarter i almost felt like the spurs kind of overreacted like they went to the matchup zone and i felt like they weren't executing every play but i felt like the thunder were getting good looks including some of those corner looks from from i think it was aj and i think also mccain like i was surprised not only that they went to it i understand it as like a mix-up just to like throw something new at them but it almost felt like an overreaction when they had largely contained shea to being just like effective but like not taking over the game i wonder i'm curious what you think about that like i don't know just felt like a little bit too much too soon from the spurs defense i mean the zone was pretty good in game one i thought it was a nice as you said like a change of pace alternative the problem is once you put that on tape and you saw this with the way that the thunder were executing against it i mean jesus christ it was just caruso at the free throw line yeah it was like fucking prime magic you know caruso at the free throw line and then it was just everything underneath like wemby pulls up everyone's cutting back door now you're finding ways for chet to get involved in the offense because he can be a cutter in that way this is this is one of those things with wimby where i think if you're a role player on the opposing team you are tempted to always be programmed to think space spacing spacing spacing stand on the corner hold my spot maybe do an exchange on the weak side to kind of confuse the defense a little bit but like we have to maintain the spatial integrity of our offense above everything else with wimby though like you have to overwhelm him with activity like you have to pull him in different directions and then you have to pull him in different directions and then you have to pull him in different directions and dare him to make like the close out to the other side of the lane that no other shot blocker can because yeah he's going to get it at it sometimes and he might even have a historic like block total like he did against the wolves but you just have to keep doing it and keep going at him and keep pulling him in all those different directions at once and you're just not going to do that with lou dort taking corner threes like it's just not going to freak out the spurs in the way that getting caruso to the middle of the floor against the zone and then just pinpoint passes on the baseline like that's going to stress test what the spurs do yeah speaking of door we should mention he started pretty well like he put up like five points in short order but all of a sudden as we look through the minute totals like didn't play much down the stretch um what do you think about that like i think he was lumped into the isaiah hartenstein conversation after game one like maybe he's just like not built for this particular series do you think that's the same case in game two well i think just in general it is more of a alex caruso case and wallace aj mitchell kind of series than it is a lou dort one but i i was pretty this episode is brought to you by sony pictures classics a perfect crime film says the daily beast john taturo gives a career best performance don't miss the acclaimed new thriller the only living pickpocket in new york taturo stars as an aging master pickpocket whose latest score puts him in the crosshairs of a ruthless crime family also starring giancarlo esposito tatiana maslany will price and steve buscemi see the film that the la times calls instantly classic the only living pickpocket in new york opens only in theaters october 23rd in new york in los angeles nationwide october 30th like encouraged by that initial stretch and who he was you know we know what lou dort can do defensively uh we know that his shot is going to come and go but he might show up in a huge game at the right moment but he was a driver in a way that i thought allowed okc to be a little more selective about who was actually taking the jumpers like he was attacking and then spraying out to other guys like setting up j will for a three who's just a much better option for that shot so if if he can continue to do that that's nice i just think if j-dub is hurt in particular there's not a lot of room for lou dort to be a huge part of this series like now getting secondary ball handling or on the floor is such a primary concern for them even if it is case and wallace even if it is alex caruso like you just need guys who can handle and create a little bit and facilitate some offense for you and lou dort driving will take it in small doses but like you you don't want that as a as a serious mechanism of your offense well this is going to be interesting going forward now because j-dub i would say of all the injuries that happen that's the one that's obviously going to be a huge concern not only because of where he is in the hierarchy but it's the fact that this is the same hamstring that he injured throughout the season like he hasn't been right this entire regular season into the postseason and so we're recording this around 9 p.m pacific right now right after the game so we're not totally sure what's going on they'd called it tightness as opposed to a strain but clearly something was not right for him to not come back like i mean a strain is kind of tightness to you know it's the generalization of these terms like we gotta we gotta relax um but i i would have to assume like his like availability for the rest of this series is probably in doubt at this point i think it ultimately like circles back to chet and like how much he's doing or not doing i feel like he had moments in this game uh there was one series where he was blocked i believe on two successive possessions uh from when we won that got overturned for a challenge uh and so he had some moments i just feel like chet's never gonna be the one to really assert himself especially offensively in a way that's really going to satisfy you he's going to play within the game and in this one when wimby's out there it's just way more difficult for him and so i don't know i just i keep coming away from these performances especially considering how much this was built up to be chet versus wimby from when they first came into the league it's really just become like wimby's taken off and it's like see in the background um what do you think about chet in this one i mean he did guard wimby some too and Hardenstein and keeping some of the Thunder Smalls out of that matchup a little bit which I do think is important this was a better scoring game for him a better offensive game for him period all of the downstream stuff off of Shea being so aggressive helps Chet be great I would disagree with you a little bit though on the idea that Chet can never be the guy who's like really pushing it I think against two-thirds of the league he could be that guy and if especially if other teams play small we saw enough signs from him this season where he was like beasting other small ball fives just with his length and finishing inside like was a real force in there in a way that I think a lot of people would have been waiting for it's just that's not going to happen with Wimby that's not going to happen with Luke Cornett and so unless the Spurs at some point in the series bail on Cornett and go back to like Harrison Barnes and Keldon Johnson at the five as they've done at points this season maybe that's a time where he can be like really aggressive with his offense but it's just going to be hard for him to get to any of his stuff anytime Wimby is on the floor and so so long as that is the case it's going to be a little more like this a little pretty situational pretty contextual can you knock down the occasional like corner three spot up shot and also can you be aggressive in the dunker when you know the defense pulls towards Caruso or Shea or whoever yeah I guess I'm asking a lot for him although like considering like his talent and like just his skill set package like I don't think it's unreasonable a lot of it just comes down to like self-creation putting on the deck like like seeing what the defense gives you and creating off of that which is high level stuff for most players we're talking about like MVP all NBA level stuff but like Chet is in this ballpark and just doesn't feel like he has the confidence perhaps in his dribble in order to do that but I mean would you against the Spurs like with Castle lurking next door yes it's particularly difficult in this man especially considering how much size you're given away and even in some of the no center lineups where Chet is the de facto big it seemed like they were getting really pummeled on the board with Cornett in there I think there was like four rebounds just right off the bat with when they went to that and it's just like I don't know I just it was especially with J-Dub out you want more from Chet and I realized that the Spurs are a certain challenge but still like this is kind of what they need in this moment otherwise you're really banking on AJ Mitchell being the guy from the Lakers series or some of these other guys who are typically thrust into more narrow reserve supplementary roles to take on like a real thrust and the only guy that was consistently done that for the Thunder outside of AJ in the Laker series has been Caruso and like they'll get that from him I imagine just because he just comes alive in these sorts of moments but you're hoping for a lot for like not a lot of resources it I think it's totally fair points on Chet I think the only the only caveat I would add is like the Thunder offense overall was plenty good enough in this game to win where you don't necessarily need him to be forcing the issue and so it felt like the kind of game where Shea had a lot going a lot of the other supporting cast were making shots or making impact plays and so there wasn't even really that moment where it was like Shea is out for three minutes where is the offense gonna come from like the Thunder were just in a good flow for the most part which is I think the most demonstrable difference from game one so you're the Spurs we're going back home you're putting on the Spurs the literal Spurs and the cowboy hats and you're going out to Kelton Johnson's lamb farm uh what are you talking about what are you drawing up for the next game uh I mean what we're gonna do with all this lamb I think is where we start where we start don't fucking touch that lamb okay fair enough they're only for petting I will say on the Kelton Johnson front this did feel like a game where he was a shot in the arm for them and if you're gonna if you're gonna levy any criticism toward Chet the possession where Kelton Johnson like big boy Chet into three straight offensive rebounds and just like put back his own shot like that's the kind of thing you want to see Chet be able to put away okay by the way tough we we didn't talk about the self fouls from Wemby like he had three of them got his own offensive and almost like knew he missed it and just immediately followed it up and just no one could even get in his way because his limbs are just so gigantic that tip the tip dunk like the the self put back tip dunk that Wemby is like pulling off on a regular basis now is just like a visually jarring play to see I also think this is one of those things where you know as we've talked about all of the ways in which him just like getting a little bit older and a lot less and so there are so many of those plays where whether it's a runner or just like something around the basket he's kind of chucking up he's always there like pursuing his own shot and that's that's the kind of thing where if you're just doing that again and again and again it can feel like a really overwhelming element of the game we gotta get with those monks man I mean we seriously do like do where do we even start like do do monks have a linkedin page well it's funny because Ramona Shelburne wrote that piece for ESPN and like her like tweet out of it was like oh I've been waiting all year for this and I'm like I'm gonna do it I'm gonna do it I'm gonna do it I'm just like thinking like what is the process does the monk have a PR guy like are you sending it via email is it more of a snail mail situation like how do you get in right just keep it on them all the time um yeah I was just I'm more fascinated by the story behind the story of how you get in touch with the monks I think we're gonna have to find out I mean could we do this this offseason like would you be willing be you and Kyle go out spend some time with the monks like could we could we do a month in a monastery uh I don't know I don't know I don't know I don't I would last maybe a couple days before I needed to check some stupid social media app and that's the breaking point for you you're like I gotta know who's hitting me up on blue sky uh or if I don't have like a burger for like two weeks I would probably I don't think I could subsist on just like rice and whatever like vegan diet they're probably serving them it'd be it would be an adjustment for us but that part might be healthy for all involved and certainly the benefits you know if it's good enough for Wemby I think would be good enough for us but sorry we've gone very far afield from the larger question of what you actually do if you're the Spurs and I don't even know how you begin to broach that until you know if Dylan Harper is going to play or deer and fox is going to play because the game plan for a stefan castle co-signed jordan mclaughlin run offense uh has to be dramatically different does it not absolutely uh unless mclaughlin turns into jevon carter and gives you a different dimension here sure uh i think you walk away from this one sending a lot of emails to the league about the physicality yeah and now i'll say this the spurs match that down the stretch at a certain point just felt like they just said fuck it and we're just going to harass sga and like deny deny deny every single time as you should as you should it's just like they just don't benefit from the same sort of advantage because like wemby's just such a unique thing and like if you're going to physically restrain him from getting going like yeah it's really you can't turn to your other card in order to make something happen it's true um and so that would be my first point of emphasis would be literally getting the points of emphasis out to the next batch of referees um but from there i don't know i they were right in this down the stretch i feel like they played a good game considering who they have they just got to hope that fox and or harper gets back into this one for sure and i think even if those guys don't play there's so many ways to tap into wemby and his skill level that are devastating for opposing bigs who try to guard him like there's a reason why the idea of isaiah hartenstein guarding him in the first place felt like a dangerous thing to do for the thunder and so you just have to kind of exercise some of those things it's it's running wemby off of curls as if he's clay thompson and then now you're asking isaiah hartenstein this like big hulking center to be a lock and trail defender in a way that like he's never going to be able to do well and then you create switches that way then you get some momentum that way you turn a couple of those curls into moves where wemby is going around the screen and then straight towards the rim and now you have the misdirection to your offense so it's like there's a lot of off-ball stuff you can do with wemby now that you know who's going to be covering him a little bit more and i think they do know that regardless of whatever the thunder might want to do as like a counter counter punch because j-dub would be the alternative and i think it's very safe to say even if j-dub does play asking him to guard victor webb and yama under these circumstances might just be like a little too extreme for the thunder to do yeah i think that's right i think almost looking at wemby is more of an off the ball guard type because you saw like him get into the playmaking flow eventually he clicked in a little bit later that he had six assists in this game but like if you're trying to weaponize his passing and if you're anticipating that level of physicality uh staunch at the basket like are you like looking more in advance in the same way that caruso knew when the zone came it's like you were already a step ahead there i wonder if wemby can be looking to weaponize his passing more because he is so dangerous with that as well it just takes him a little bit more to get into that mode yes and i think the other thing is like the defensive glass has to be a huge point of emphasis for the spurs if you if you want to think about like where the margins in this game stretched or changed from game one when b shot profile what shea was able to do off the dribble and then also just like the volume game of the thunder getting shots like they were again successful in creating turnovers and then the offensive rebounding margin so in game one the spurs were rebounding 36 percent of their own misses oklahoma city 19 percent of their own misses game two dead even 37 percent apiece and you have to keep isaiah hart and shine off the glass easier said than done you have to keep some of these like hustlers who are coming in from the perimeter your crusoe lou dort case and wallace types off the glass as well like there's so many people for okc who were just scooping up opportunities based on the fact that your defense was a little scrambled it was a little stressed out and that's the kind of thing you can clean up i think with a little bit of focus and a little bit of tape i do think clean is the right word i just felt like the thunder played a particularly sharp game in this scenario and i mean you expect that considering the circumstances but like i just castle if he's just like cutting these turnovers in half like i think this is a completely different ball game i just don't know how to take his mode out of him in order to like drain him more i don't know if it means taking the ball out of his hands more and getting more in situations where he's creating off the catch um and more of as a secondary option but then who's dribbling the ball like this this is the problem like he i think he has to be this at this point he just has to not be like committing historical levels of turnovers in the process and believe it or not based on these first two games stefan castle does have it in him to not turn the ball over nine or ten times yeah uh if you're isaiah hartenstein's agent have you already logged like multiple calls to sam prestey being like listen we know we have the option but like come on like we need we need the five-year extension at this point because you're not getting this from anywhere else you think the thunder don't know how important isaiah hartenstein is you think they don't know how good he is well we've talked around this in the past a bunch where it's just like they gotta cut somewhere right like they cannot roster all these guys forever or even pass this playoff run hartenstein makes the most sense if only because like he has team option he was already paid so much to begin with he's super valuable to anyone else around the league i think like we expected this to be a balloon payment perhaps he'd go down to something a little bit more reasonable either with the thunder or somebody else yeah like i don't know why you can't just keep like doing this over and over again keep getting those balloon payments from other teams and just like be a journeyman to to build the stability in your front court um but just like at a certain point you got to move on to the next wave because you can't roster these guys sorber is just not playing like they have him they could draft an other guy they have all these picks where they can't even draft all of them because they don't have the roster spots it's just like it's tough but this is the this is the trade-off like he means so much to them and he's so integral to the particular nuances that they need from that specific role that's the thing i i i think the larger idea of the thunder having to cut somewhere is inevitable right they're going to have to make concessions they're gonna have to trade away multiple picks or players to consolidate like they're just not going to be able to have room at some point they're just going to hand like lose isaiah hart and shining for agency and make chet their full-time five i think chet is ready for a lot of that but for a series like this one which is the time you really need him to be ready for it clearly not quite up to it for you know 40 minutes of that kind of that kind of heat that's that's a lot to put on anybody i think we also be realistic now about this is two straight years of j-dub having like recurring ongoing unrelated injuries like i'm not saying it's a chronic thing but he's picking up a lot of stuff as he goes and that's the flexibility piece of your team that allows you to play big and small chet is the other flexibility piece of your team that allows you to play big and small but you can't do that if you don't have another good center and jay will is probably like the best third string center in the entire league like very overqualified for the role he plays a really good player but you're not just gonna be able to plug jay will into a lineup and get everything you were getting from isaiah hartenstein like this i think the physicality the size the weird combination of like high post plays the size of jay will is a very good center and jay will is a very good center the size the weird combination of like high post plays the size of jay will is a very good center the size the size of jay will is a very good center the size of jay will is a very good center playmaking and touch on that floater it's just a really nice combination of stuff that you're getting that you're not going to replace easily it is funny watching the like the push shovel shot that he has going like how much more he needs to push i know arc higher in order to just get it over with me unbelievable this felt like it felt like in between games one and two some thunder assistant had like a giant you know like foam wand it was just like trying to emulate the reach of victor webb and yama to get that that arc just right and you know what it paid off congratulations to them i'm sure they have all the spreadsheets there was that recent article where like hartenstein was getting interviewed and he's like oh a ball wasn't on a rack and he's like by the end of this interview it's going to be back and sure enough like a couple of minutes go by and someone comes up picks the ball puts it on the rack because that's the thunder culture um do you feel like you have a handle on where this series will go from here like did the first two games clarify anything for you to make like any reasonable prediction or outlook on this one i was hoping to come out of game two with that but i feel like the injury have made it cloudier than ever do you feel certain of literally anything in life but even in this series definitely not in life okay but one thing i had been saying going into this is i felt like the thunder needed j-dub in order to win this i do think that's unfortunately coming to bear i really hope he's okay this is this is fantastic yeah this is unbelievable like i keep i always say that like uh like just saying that we need seven games of something is like the lowest form of nba discourse it's like it's it's like a lot of people don't know about it but i think it's a lot of people like the remember when from the sopranos sure a reference that that you don't get i don't but holy shit this is like this is incredible like i can't remember the last time like every single game you're looking forward to it pins and needle on every single possessions this is real like no skips like can't miss a second yep and this is like this is living up to everything we expect to be this intense and this high level in terms of the play and also of both of the first two games for me i think it's a lot of fun i think it's a lot of fun i think it's a lot of fun i think it's a lot of fun i think it's a lot of fun i think it's a lot of fun i think it's a lot of fun i think so different from one another there just aren't that many teams who are capable of that kind of variation like you have these incredible tactical responses you have rotation shifts from both teams you have the mvp like changing the way he's navigating one of the greatest challenges he's seen in his playoff career to this point like this is the shit we live for this is exactly what we want i i honestly don't think it's going to be entirely compromised even by the injuries we've seen so far like i'm with you without j-dub it's it's a much harder proposition for the thunder to win all the more reason why they absolutely had to get this one if they lost j-dub and went down oh two that's the series like that's probably it right there but keeping a pulse finding enough to work shea getting right isaiah hartenstein proving he can hang in this series like there's all of these little momentum indicators that i think are still saying this is probably a thunder series but it's always easier said than done when wimby and for us. We're going to get some electrolytes flowing again, and then we'll be back. and talk about the East. The Ringer NBA show is brought to you by FanDuel. The NBA playoffs are here and everything's on the line. Every possession matters. Every bucket swings the game. And tonight is your shot to boost your bet. That's right. All customers get a profit boost tonight. So when the moment hits, your win hits bigger. And FanDuel is giving you better payouts on same game parlays, all NBA playoffs long. Lock in your bets, boost your odds and make the playoffs pay off with FanDuel official sports betting partner of the NBA. Head to FanDuel.com slash Ringer NBA to get started FanDuel, play your game. 21 plus select states or 18 plus DC, Kentucky or Wyoming. Opt-in required, bonus issued as non-withdrawable profit boost tokens. Gambling problem, call 1-800-GAMBLER. Call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org slash chat in Connecticut. All right. So we're recording. We're recording this, what? About like 24 hours since the game one of Knicks and Cavs. Do you think that Kenny Atkinson still doesn't think he should have switched out James Harden after getting roasted like, for what was that? Like 10 minutes of game time straight? I think he just sat up all night, like almost calling timeout, but then stopping short every single time somehow. Do you think, do you actually believe him when he was saying that? Or do you think he was just trying to save face because he knew that like that would get back to James Harden? It seems like he's taking considered effort to make sure that Harden, like being like allowing him into the coaching huddle and just like preparing him because they have to sign him to a new extension coming up soon. Yeah. Like I have to imagine that was messaging more than what he actually believed because he was getting absolutely flambéed. I'm really glad you brought this up. Everyone responds to coaches and press conferences as if they are speaking truth to like their word. That is not the purpose of that place. Like they can say things to their team all the time. Why would they go up there in front of everybody and say what they actually think? That's not the way it works. I think you're right most of the time. 95% of the time. The problem is on the flip side of that, in the Knicks presser, Mike Brown was saying things like this. Yeah, it's true. When I was in Golden State and we played Houston, we counted James Harden's dribbles. We told our guys he's dribbling close to 1,000 times a game. Keep picking him up full court and making him dribble. At the end of the game, it would wear him down. Mike, you're just giving it all away. What are you doing, brother? But again, it's not like we don't know that. Right. And if anybody who watched that game or watched even the first couple possessions of Jalen Brunson going to work. I remember there's a very critical moment and if you watch just the highlights of Brunson going to work at the end of the game, they go up eight. It's like, oh, that's enough of a buffer where you could just stem the tide and go from there and the Cavs can still win this. They kept going for it over and over again. It's just like, honestly, it's tough to watch after you watch it. It was. I can't remember the last time we saw a player of James Harden. Stature like this is a Hall of Famer, right? This is like an incredibly accomplished guy, you know, an MVP, you know, clearly. And he's just being embarrassed in every possible way. Like it was like if at first it was Jalen Brunson, but then it kept getting worse. Then it was like OG at a no be driving on him. It was like, you know, Mikhail Bridges getting opportunities, his miscommunication, I believe, also leading to at Landry Sham at three, if I'm not mistaken, just so many James Harden oriented mistakes. But to circle back to the Kenny Atkinson part of that, I do want to defend Atkinson a little bit because this is a real like you could have lost the war right here kind of moment. The Cavs played really well in this game. James Harden was a functional part of that for the vast majority of it and then was picked on relentlessly defensively. And yes, Atkinson should have called timeout. I think the timeout is more important than the idea of pulling him. It was like you need to call timeout. So you need to get some pre-switching organized in terms of what your team is doing, some scramming out of those situations where you have, you have defenders who are kind of conveniently nearby who can jettison Harden from that situation. And frankly, you need to have a pep talk with James Harden about like not just conceding this so easily. Like him and any other player he was involved with on those screens, like they were just walking through and giving it up. And James Harden's like, I got this as he gets roasted 10 consecutive times. You can't do that. But I also don't think you can bench James Harden in game one for really obvious reasons. And you also can't bench James Harden, as you noted, when you're trying to make him a long-term part of your team or at least a medium-term part of your team for the next like two or three years. I have a lot of thoughts about this. In usual circumstances, I tend to like coaches who let teams just play through it, especially if like you have a more veteran-laden team and a team that's better at improvising on the fly, which like that kind of was the superpower of the Cavs offense last year that they could just do so much kind of in the midst and the flow of their offense. Obviously Harden's a new player to all that, but clearly like he has that mode in him. And so I don't hate it most of the time. There's that Julian Schimpenny like last second shot that people were criticizing. I was like, he got a good look and he's a good three-point shooter. Like these things just happen and I don't mind it most of the time. The big two things that stuck out to me here was one, you're coming off 14 playoff games in the previous two series. Like this team was clearly tired and the fact that they weren't effective offensively to stop anything, like to counterbalance any of these defensive errors, which I think is a big thing. With any sort of offense, would have won them the game. Like you just need to give these guys a blow, Harden in particular. Like that's a problem in and of itself. The other thing is like, this is a team, the Cavs, that's in the second apron, presumably in order to build themselves for this specific moment. And I constantly find myself in this situation with Cleveland where it's like, they don't have the necessary piece for the necessary situation that they're in. And so you would want to say like, Keon Ellis, can he give him a look? But obviously Atkinson, for whatever reason, just doesn't want to play him in most circumstances. All the other wing options that they tend to have in order to replace James Harden in this situation. I don't know if it's like appreciably better. Like maybe Max Drews could have done better, but like when you put one in, you're developing a hole elsewhere and they were just seeking out the switches to begin with. For a team that's built so deep as them, in air quotes, deep, I constantly wonder like why they don't have the right component for the right situation. This was one of those times. I agree with you. I also don't know how many teams, do you have the right component for this situation? Like who out there feels great about like, we're going to put our weakest defender in the lineup is going to be targeted by Jalen Brunson. It's not going to go great for pretty much any team out there. Like this is what Jalen Brunson does. This is what the Knicks do. The fact that they have so many guys who can work functionally as screeners is one of the most devastating parts of their offense. Like you can use OG in that spot. You can use Mikael Bridges picking and popping. Cat obviously has a natural pick and roll chemistry with Brunson. There's just a lot you can do. And so, you're going to be kind of a little screwed or at least behind the eight ball anytime you're in the clutch against the Knicks. That's just part of the enterprise of playing them. I just think you have to try a little harder. I think even if you, even if you had said, we're going to pull James Harden, which I would not advocate you do, but if you did and put Sam Merrill out there instead, I can't even remember if he's on the floor for how much of that stretch, but like say he's the defender who's being targeted. I just trust that Sam Merrill is going to at least try that he's at least going to try to not fall into that switch. And that's the bare minimum of what you're asking. I say all of this with the knowledge and understanding that actually that James Harden did well defensively in other parts of the game, doing other stuff like cat tried to post him up and failed. Like, like, you know, tried to turn and end up turning the ball over because Harden is so stout and because he can prevent you from getting to your spots inside. It just can't be like this. It really just can't. I mean, that's his advantage is that he is big and physical and he could actually switch on to TM. The Rockets use that to great effect. It's just, he had several moments like Brunson, had a couple of like, just like amazing plays. And I'll just stop here and say, like I typically Blanche at times watching Brunson because he's one of these technicians who is typically using the threat of like going to the line to his advantage. And sometimes it's like things could get into grifting. It's just not my style of basketball. This was like pure ballet out there. Like he was just having an absolute heater for the ages and just like watching him like put Harden into a spin cycle was something to behold. But there were certain times where Harden was just glitching. Like controller style. Like one of those famous plays that gets brought up time and time again about his defense. Like he was just flat footed. A lot of times he would reach and Brunson was off. It's just like there were a lot of just embarrassing moments for somebody just like a basketball player in that position. Yeah, I get like his history and like his status in the league and you don't want to like affect that. They had to do something like you just had to do anything. And the problem is going forward. Like so much went well for the Cavs in that game. I wonder if this is the type of thing like you just cannot come over because it was one of the best comebacks in Nick's history. Their vaunted history is in recent playoff history. One of the worst meltdowns I can remember. It's just like those type of things, man. Psychologically are tough to get over. I mean, just from the perspective of the Cavs had to have the kind of series in which they, you know, they didn't have to pitch perfect games all the way through, but they had to compete and perform at an incredibly high level to stick with the Knicks every step of the way. New York shot for absolute shit for like the first quarter and a half of this game. Like that's not going to happen every night. They've been one of the hottest shooting teams in the playoffs. I don't think that's due for a regression to the mean. Maybe this was the extent of that regression was like, you know, a one quarter of cold shooting. And then we're right back to business as usual with all of these guys nailing jumpers. This was the chance. Like these are the kinds of games that hang over you as a team, both psychologically, but also just in the numbers game. Like you just really, really needed this one. If you were Cleveland and we rightly focus on Harden getting picked on defensively and what the Cavs were and weren't doing to accommodate that. he also just only scored three points in overtime. I think that was the hardest part of watching them was either James Harden would just be completely not involved in the play. Then you're asking, why is he on the floor at all? If he's just going to get killed on one end and not contribute on the other, or he would be trying to do way too much with the ball. And their offense just got bogged down to its barest and least functional elements at the point of the game where everyone was running on fumes and they just didn't have anything left to contribute. That's what I'm worried about most of on the Cavs. Again, you played so many games the previous two series, and the last thing you want to see is an overtime game where you let that slip away. Having said that, if you're Kenny Atkinson, you got the hair gel going. You just put a big old glop in there and just didn't give a shit about what it looked like. That's rude. I mean, he's one of the nicest coaches out there. He will take your question and really put some thought to it, and I really appreciate it. But he looks like he's going through it every time he steps out. So do they all. Who else? Who is the coach who looks super well-adjusted at all times? I feel like Mitch Johnson is just really calm, cool, and collected. He's new to this. That's true. Look at Steve Kerr when he took that job versus now. He has aged three lifetimes in that stretch. Did you ever have a hair gel moment? Of course. Did you ever use it? Okay. I lived in the early 2000s. I was in middle school. We were just spiking it straight up. And then maybe a little swoop at a certain point. Oh, like a little spiky front thingy? Spiky front, but smooth. A and F sort of vibe? I mean, a little less preppy than that for me personally, but I can't say I wasn't an associate hair-wise. Okay. So what are you looking at going into this next game? Do you think there's anything you could build on? If you're actually going to do something this time, what would you be doing? I think the weirdest thing about this Harden conversation is it's not like the Knicks are going to come out and do that again from the very first possession of the game. I think that's the kind of thing you do kind of keep behind glass for when you need it. Unfortunately, I don't think the Knicks are going to need it all the time in this series for the Cavs. I think New York's offense is going to be more functional. I think over the course of the game, even before they started targeting Harden, they just tapped into some better flow and some better rhythm. And that was what really catalyzed their production overall. But I'm just still really worried about this game. Even when Cleveland played, I thought one of their better defensive halves, if not three quarters that I've seen from them. In a long time, I just think it might not be enough. Especially when you look at Cat just kind of reverting back to old school Cat. That was hard. The dumb ass fouls just start rolling and all of a sudden it seems like he's in his tailspin. You have to imagine he would pull himself out of that going forward and that you probably squandered that opportunity. I do look at Josh Hart and wonder if this just isn't his particular series and if they're going to diminish his role. Then Landry Schammett steps up. We'll see if it's going to be Schammett again. But if Schammett's going to be out there, especially in critical moments, that's just two very small guards that you can target with your two offensive maestros out there. There's going to be spots to give it back to them. I just wonder, do they have it in them in order to put that push together in order to do so? But there's spots, there's opportunities. They were up big on this game until everything just completely collapsed. I do think Hart plays less and less of a role as it goes. And he seems to acknowledge some of the reality of that already. That, to me, was the biggest. It was the biggest contributor to their flow. It was just like as soon as he came out of the game, their spacing fucking unlocked. And a lot of that is Schammett is a particularly good shooter. But even when Deuce McBride was out there, wasn't scoring, but just the threat of him as an actual shooter and someone you have to respect, I thought, opened up a lot of things for New York. So I would say the size is an issue, particularly with Donovan Mitchell and James Hart, two big-bodied, strong guards, even if they aren't super, super tall, but can work through guys. But Schammett is not. Schammett is targetable because of his height, but like pesky and involved and like will take charges like he will bait you into some offensive fouls if you do want to try to hunt him down. So and Deuce is like really stocky and also annoying in his own way to try to like score against. They're small, but they're not as easy a target as you might think. Even Brunson, like Brunson will draw three charges in a game like it's nothing. Yeah, I've started to hear from Spurs fans because especially after the game one, I think everyone was riding high. But after they saw the Knicks. When they're getting flashbacks to the cup, like I think like us from afar, like I think the Spurs will win that series. But like I think Spurs fans like have some PTSD and they don't want to see sure coming out of that. Can you blame them? No, I mean, they're seemingly the team of destiny out of these. And when they have it right, you see it snowball the way it did. Yes, they just have so much going for them. And they have this sort of size that I think would give fits to either team coming out of the West. I do think the West ultimately. It will probably be the de facto championship. I think whoever is coming out of there is going to win it. But like Knicks have some stuff to them. You know, they clearly do. And you're right about the team of destiny. But this this win especially is like fodder for the championship DVD, like commemorative. Like you can see this part of the narrative taking place as they make a run to the finals. Remember when John Starks almost blocked even though he wasn't playing in the game? You're telling me you're going to forget that sometime? I definitely will not. It's going to be etched in there forever. But I think. Yeah, I agree with you about overall. The West does feel like the de facto finals. I also thought even though these games have all been highly entertaining, this is tremendous conference finals basketball. If you're going to sit there and pretend even after the Knicks come back that these games are like qualitatively the same in terms of what's happening in the East and the West. I just like don't agree with you on basically any level. Like they're close. They're competitive. But there were parts of this Eastern Conference finals game where it was like these teams are trading mistakes. And I just never really get the sense of that with with Spurs Thunder, even when Stefan Castle is committing like nine turnovers. Listen, we convinced ourselves that Blazers Spurs was like a real clash of the Titans going on there. Did we? I did. This is just it's a different sport. What the Thunder and Spurs are doing. It's just like it's completely different. It's on a level of like everything you see in documentaries and all. Like the Titans going back and forth to each other. It's amazing. But like this other series, like lived up to it in game one. So we're spoiled, Rob, with these conference finals. When was the last time we ate this good? Like this is really like I know the ratings were constantly getting like, oh, this is a high, high watermark for, you know, these various streaming services that are involved now. But like this feels like a peak of recent NBA interest in terms of like seeing when be unlocking game one and then seeing the Thunder responding game two in this incredible Knicks game. Come back in game one. But it also just feels like a kind of a tipping point to a different version of the NBA that we're about to see for the first time. And there's a lot of familiar characters, and I'm sure there's plenty of plenty of fixtures of the last era of NBA basketball who are going to have their things to say about where the game is going. But to feel like we are shifting into something almost completely new is a really energizing feeling for the league and for people like us watching it. And I just can't wait to see if this is the ground floor of it. Like, where do these teams go from? Where do the teams that try to challenge the Spurs and the Thunder and the Knicks and the Cavs go from here like this? We're unlocking something really, really fun. Yes, we're on the verge on the precipice, if you will, of something new and exciting. But it's not the new era of basketball. It's the offseason wheel of destiny, my friend. We're going to break that out right after this. This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Ever find yourself scrambling to grab that special something for a last minute party, a spontaneous date, or even that impromptu game night at home? That's when Prime's same-day delivery swoops in. That essential item you thought you'd miss delivered. The plan saved. The win secured. Because with Prime's same-game delivery, you can grab it and go before the moment passes you by. Same-game delivery. It's on Prime. Visit Amazon.com slash Prime to find millions of items delivered fast. Available in select areas. Terms apply. All right. We're going to delay the wheel just slightly. In fact, we probably don't even have enough time to be doing this. We're going to be doing the wheel because we're already about an hour into this podcast, even though it's just the two of us. But we're going to do the wheel. It might just be one spin, but we'll do it. But first, we need to talk about Jason Kidd being fired from the Mavericks. That's not on the wheel because we need to ensure that we talked about it. Sure. I just keep feeling like the moves that the Mavs have made post-Luca trade, they've made ultimately the right decisions. But I'm not going to give them a pat on the back because it seems like the process to get there was more out of, you know, fear of, like, your business losing value than it was, like, you really got it right this time. It just seems like Dumont turned the franchise over to Jerry, like, classic, like, we're going to hire the right guys. And, like, credit to you, you overpaid, like, a guy who's had tremendous success in this league. Why do we care how much he gets paid? Like, if you hire a good person, that's probably a good decision. Right. No, but I guess I'm just saying, like, he just went out and made sure to get the top guy no matter what. Yeah. Yeah. Dealing with any sort of the particulars of it. And then that guy was like, I don't want this coach that you overpaid previously, including last offseason, in order to keep him away from the Knicks. And so, like, clearly you liked Kidd to the point where, like, there were reports that Dumont was even considering bringing him into the front office in order to lead this whole thing. But Jerry comes in, Kidd goes out, and here we are with a brand new fresh start. So all's well that ends well. I guess. I mean, look, this is a good decision. I just think one of the most important things that the Mavs can have right now after a season where they basically had like two co-general managers after their other one was run off in disgrace is organizational clarity like i i hesitate to give patrick dumont credit for basically anything at this point but after the colossal fuck up of trading luka donchic in the first place throwing up your hands and saying i'm gonna hire somebody who is wholly qualified to run this team and let them run it on their terms does seem like a pretty smart thing to do uh jason kid's like a good coach uh but there are multiple kinds of nba coaches like there are the guys who just want to show up and sleep in their office and grind tape and just like i'm gonna work out 50 different pick and roll counters for my team and that's literally all i want to do and then there are the coaches who treat literally everything they do as an exercise to consolidate power and yeah i think you can orchestrate a mutiny yeah uh you know you can fill in the gaps on which one you think jason kid is uh so i i think jettisoning him from the team at this point makes sense transitioning a lot of things within the organization right now makes sense is it fair to all of those people involved maybe maybe not i think it's probably more fair to kid than most because that dude was heavily involved in everything that happened to this point including trading luka donchic and so he's going to collect his checks he's going to be well compensated to go do whatever it is he wants to do next i also think treating like you can't keep chasing the sunk cost of a playoff version of the maps that doesn't exist anymore and so messiah getting rid of kid is part of that but also him coming out his press conference and saying like we are going to make all of our decisions based on the future based on the fact that we have this 19 year old generational player everything we do is oriented around that that's the encouraging part yes i think if you kept kid around there would still be this toggling between what happened before and trying to officially turn the page i think even hiring mike schmitz as your gm was kind of a signal to this before we got the kid firing because like schmitz's whole thing is like his uh boots on the ground scouting expertise he's been in like really in the dirt of like going abroad and everything else for so many years obviously he was up here in portland for a couple of years i got to i knew him before that but i obviously got to know him up here like it seems like they are very much committed to just like turning the page and starting from scratch with cooper flag i think that's the right move like i think kairi irving becomes a big old question mark for this team there's obviously other pieces that i think could be helpful to other contenders gafford for one bj washington perhaps in addition to him but like i think everyone was on the same page as soon as they got cooper that the future was the north star yeah and to see organizational alignment behind it i think just gives clarity not only which is important to like every fan base but i think it's especially important in dallas where just things have just been an upheaval since the luca trade just like having some sort of direction to know where you're going to know we're not chasing the playoffs with ad and kairi and rookie year cooper i have to imagine that maz fans feel pretty like content if not good about everything that got them yeah i mean if you want to look at the before and after of you were just in the nba finals and now you're here it's not great scratch but to zoom out and be like okay all of those things have happened but the team is in a position now where you you probably trust the track record of the guy who is now running basketball operations for the team you trust a lot of the rank and file you trust the direction that the team is moving in and that it is one consistent direction based on all of those people's agreement that's just more than they could have asked for a year ago clearly because the mavs were not feeling very content to do all those things at once so necessary steps it's not it's not going to change everything overnight like this is not going to be a super competitive team in the west for the near future it's an incredibly deep conference among other problems but here they are actually picking a direction hopefully actually following through on it and trying to move some of these other pieces and players along in a way that's commensurate of that do you think that they try to move on from kairi next because at the presser jerry was like well at the very least we want to see cooper play with kairi yeah and i think like just in terms of like checking the box emotionally for fans because they have been sold this and probably been looking forward to that for a year i think that's a good thing to do i also think that's the right thing to do in order to establish his value and perhaps we're looking to move on as soon as possible you just lose any and all leverage you would want in that situation but like sure do you think like it would make sense especially considering like all the suitors that could potentially use him detroit whatever like now would be a good time to do so now ish right like you know he he's i think the the issue for the mavs more broadly with kairi is like you don't necessarily want to be giving him his next contract and so whether that's trading him over the course of this coming season or the following one where i believe he has a player option like that's kind of the timetable and the team is really in no rush to compete or do anything else during that time it's just like develop cooper bring in young talent cultivate it together kairi can be a part of that stuff and he showed during the last competitive iteration of the maps that he was actually quite a good leader and communicator with the young guys specifically was a really good conduit for them and so if he wants to be a part of it i don't see that there's like a rush to push him out the door and that allows you to play that kind of leverage game where he can be an important part of the game and he can be a part of the game and he can be a part of the a certain stage of your rebuild and then when maybe the playoffs are coming up and you're getting close to the trade deadline and kairi's like man i actually would like to compete somewhere that could just be what's best for everybody involved yeah all right are you ready for the journey you're about to embark on your life will never be the same after this i really don't think it will but i'm ready to learn my destiny all right so we have a lot of time to fill coming up because obviously games are getting fewer and fewer we're going to turn the page to the off season at a certain point we need to fill some time and we need to check in on some of these off-season teams because a lot of things are starting to percolate like once the finals hit like teams just don't have anything to do with themselves in between the games and so like rumors start to really start to hit the fan um so we have brought to you our latest group chat bit the off-season wheel of destiny just in case you were concerned that this wasn't an actual physical wheel or if you're listening to this podcast versus watching it i think you need to come see the wheel but also see the glint in justin's eye as he presented this this is really your child can i fit it on my desk will the camera pick up on the full wheel tbd but i feel like we need a drop for this perhaps like maybe not at nine pacific one of our producers can come up with something i feel like one of those um maybe like a gunshot like yeah or something like that or or like one of those things going why a gunshot well i was thinking specifically so i have a extra ticket to rick ross backed by a symphony at the portland symphony okay and whenever so it was the wildest performance because one the dj for whatever reason they still use the dj even though the point of having a symphony is to back the songs with the actual symphony the dj and the drummer were in sync and so the click track was like off and so it was wild but also he would just like get first of all a lot of bangers from rick ross didn't know he had that sort of catalog but he would only do like a verse or two of his biggest songs and all of a sudden there'd be like and like out of nowhere the song would just stop and then he'd hit the maybach music thing like 30 times and then just go on i mean that's when you know you have a deep catalog when you're just doing like medley versions of your hits because you have so many hits to pack in yeah uh so yeah a couple couple of weekends ago i was watching rick ross backed by a symphony but also a dj and also not finishing his song so that was cool i love the life you lead uh i love this new bit that you have concocted i think the wheel of destiny will be very fruitful for us and we're going to add to the wheel so like one if you have mailbag questions you have particularly good ones we're going to start putting them on the wheel and you can email us ringer group chat at gmail.com i would say the broader the better you know like not something that happened in the news the week that you're sending the email i almost want the spirit of like nba reddit off-season questions of like if you tethered all the defenders arms together could you circle the ball handler kind of debate like that's the kind of intellectual exercise i would like us to participate in yes but no other references or anything to do with reddit beyond that specific no no no um so we have that i think we talked about doing some like personal questions dredging up the new york times questions for love yeah right the questions to fall in love i mean we we did those with waz and not kyle so maybe the three of us need to reconnect oh like a like a or throuple retreat i mean we we are a true throuple i feel like we have all of those internal dynamics between us so you have right now for this inaugural edition just some like percolating off-season topics most of them have two slots yannis has four which i think we're going to keep this going forward because yannis is the danger zone yeah it's colored in red if you can see it i don't know i'll just hold it now we get the glare whatever um but yannis is like you we i just don't want to talk about it i don't want to talk about it i don't want to talk about it whatsoever i don't think anybody wants to talk about it whatsoever and so the yannis squares are basically you have to come up with something to say about yannis yeah so it's really like the you land on free parking or what what are the danger ones on monopoly well free parking is the opposite free parking at least house you get all the money right this is go to go directly to go directly to yannis jail do not pass go do not collect two hundred dollars but you must come up with a thirty second to a one minute original take about yannis exactly okay so i'm going to spin it for the first time okay are you ready have you practiced yes i have just want to make sure here we go all right no way me no way me no way me no way me no way me oh we got the orlando magic okay uh who have come up in part because of jason kidd uh so they do not have a coach one of the few teams that has an opening right now uh i also think they are interesting because i think as we get deeper and deeper into trade rumors and trade machine season they're gonna come up a lot i think my question for you first and foremost is do you feel good with just changing the coach or does this team need a bigger facelift considering what happened to them over the course of this season and just not getting quite far enough against the detroit pistons in the first round so if the magic were any other team i would say maybe you just change the coach for now and start to feel out what that change does for you and then what you need as a the only reason the magic changed that calculus is like they've gone into like each of the last three seasons being like okay we finally got our guys back let's like ease back into it and then we're gonna figure it out and then by mid-december somebody's injured something has happened there's calamity in the lineup like jaylen zuggs franz wagner palo bancaro somebody is out at basically any given point in time i don't know when the last stretch was where we saw like six contained weeks of the actual orlando magic i'm almost compelled to say at this point like maybe you just need to make some additional roster move obviously you are changing the coach but like something more significant even than that and as loathe as i am to even throw this out there i wonder if the jaylen zuggs time might have run its course um yeah we've we've talked about their need for just like an organization more of an organizing ball handler for a long time maybe you can bring in a coach who works really well with what zuggs does maybe not but i feel like their needs do transcend the game and i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing because i think that's a good thing and do transcend also just like some of the relationships between players and coach which seem to be pretty frayed with jamal mosley by the end of it i think they need something to unstick their offense consistently and i think they could do that with just rotation shooters having more of a depth of there they could cycle through and hopefully someone provides the stretch they need to so you aren't in situations where you need to start jamal kane and hopefully he could provide that uh and you could do that on the fringes you could just do what the heat do and kind of build these guys into guys i just think it becomes a little bit more difficult and also their timetable is much shorter at this point the trouble is in order to perhaps get a big heaping dose of that all at once you're trading something critical from your team and sugs makes the most sense i think one just seems to be the emotional balance of this team and trying to extract that from this becomes difficult also the injuries like does he have this type of value outside of this in order to get you the type of help that you need and so are you almost like backdoor forced into another big move to compound the big movie made with desmond bain in order to happen i mean kairi makes a lot of sense if all of a sudden he comes on the market i think he could be valuable there especially if you decide that like now is the time and they're like the window with paulo and franz going into their second contracts uh for like the next three four years but how do you even how do you even get the mavs on the line for a deal like that like what are you dangling for someone like kairi i think at that point you're starting to talk about franz and paulo is like the next three four years and then you're like oh my god i'm gonna is like the the key to that obviously that would be too much yeah for just kairi considering his age and his contract and all this other stuff but like that's what it gets to that point quicker than i think you would hope so perhaps like stasis is the the best option i mean i would even be thinking about like what about paulo for like the darren peterson pick you know like if he falls to three perhaps or yeah if there's anything that happens there that could be interesting to me just some sort of like offensive ball handler not quite an engine who will step on paulo but you could basically time share it that way like if it's franz or paulo right yeah like something to split that up and make the team a little bit more conventional in ways that i think would benefit paulo in particular yes well let me throw this out there do you think there's a scenario where you could trade anthony black for such a player yes but i also love him i do too but he's very much not the kind of guard who does those things he's not the kind of guard who does those things he's not the kind of guard who does those things he's not the kind of guard who does those things like he does a lot for them and his versatility and just his development over the course of last season remarkable stuff i think would be really hard for the magic having invested him to like punt now that he's starting to put things together but this is kind of the sugs black quandary in a nutshell is like do you trade these guys who do these things that are really critical to the identity and the spirit and the culture of your team for somebody who if you're trading sugs would probably just be a worse player that you're getting in return like a worse but healthier and player might be kind of like the zone you're aiming for or for anthony black somebody who is frankly like less dynamic in return but a little bit more of a table setting point guard who could organize everything around him are those stylistic shifts enough to at least kind of get you on the line i guess this is where you bring us back to the coaching hire too and someone like kid if not kid himself like does someone a little bit more creative a little bit more inventive is he able to tap into some of the unique qualities of the coaching hire that he's been able to tap into get him to buy into being more of a big creator rather than a creator who is big yeah uh like is there anyone that can perhaps unlock what this existing roster has i mean kid has done some of that like you want to give him the appropriate credit in terms of empowering yannis in a certain way as a ball handler to be like his most downhill aggressive self uh to finding versions and flexible versions of the mavs offense that unlocked like layers of action beyond just luka donchage dominating the ball like there's a real nuance to the best versions of the mavs i just like the idea of jason kidd when someone like billy donovan is on the market maybe billy donovan doesn't want that job but if you are going to keep jalen suggs for example bring in like give me billy donovan and give him a chance to recreate that magical 15 game sample of the chicago bulls where they're running and gunning and forcing like creating all this havoc like that's a version of a team that jason's the that jalen suggs is the point guard makes sense for and you still have to channel a lot in the half court that that may not be what magic fans want to hear like we're gonna have to figure out the half court stuff later has historically not worked very well for this group but i don't know like jason kidd is the master tactician of a half court offense also hasn't necessarily been his strongest suit every step of the way right then if you're the one hiring him then you have to watch out for your job in two years simply wouldn't be me yeah um i'm having fun with the wheel do we want to take another spin do you want to take one now or do you want to save it for later that's the only question i can come up with more let's take another all right let's take another spin with it it just better not be honest oh the timber wolves okay this might be honest that was the trouble with the honest square and then it does relate to a lot of these all the other squares well it also circles back to kairi too i think there was some scuttlebutt from unverified sources that perhaps like anthony edwards would like a little kairi action to compliment what he's going i think he makes a lot of sense there he'd be awesome and so i think the overarching question with the wolves right now is do you keep pushing forward despite hitting your head on perhaps the ceiling of the scene we can kind of go back and forth on that or is there any way to take a step back to take a step forward in order to make sure like it has a longer runway than just the next year or two yeah well so taking a step back what exactly does that entail we've you know julius randall's name has been out there for understandable reason are we talking about something as dramatic as also or instead trading rudy gobert like is that on the table do you think um if i was them no because i think you have so much good going for you right now it would really be hard to unspool it i see the logic in doing so especially because you kind of went pay pick bankrupt going for dillingham and obviously trying to get gobert in the first place that perhaps recouping some of the draft capital could set you up going forward to make other moves it just gives you as we say in the nba optionality in order to figure things out down the road in a way that right now they're really kind of bound to what they have but i do think a kairi kind of splits the baby where it's just like you have so much there and like maybe a lot of wolves fans are feeling a little upset after like getting to this far in the playoffs yet again um i don't know there's just like this is a good team and in the right circumstances i think it still just needs like a shot in the arm in order to get a little farther i can see also like malaise setting in because you see the spurs and the thunder like holy shit for the next decade this is we're gonna have to deal with yeah but like we've seen windows just open the happened with the pacers last year where it's like everything just hits right you're the team that's like catching fire and like maybe the j-dub injury happens maybe when b's hurt one year and all of a sudden you're the top dog again i would give it at least another go with it if i could have someone offensively to compliment edwards in the way that he's needed for the past couple years yeah in terms of who you would have won in that spot kairi is a pretty fucking awesome version of that player i would say in a couple of different critical ways one we've already seen who he can be working off another ball dominant i mean lebron james and a creator but i think luca is the more pertinent example here is like you want another guard who mostly has the ball in their hands who is mostly creating and you know getting kind of like five on and four advantages and things like that out of the pick and roll and then when kairi catches on the weak side or catches on the kick out when someone like ant is pressured he's so great at like compactly and efficiently manufacturing a little bit of space get a shot off like it is it is almost the exact sort of offensive skill set you want next to ant because i i've gotten with the to the point with edwards where i don't want somebody who is a ball dominant like even a great playmaker next to him like i think that would be a little too a little bit too much of an offset in terms of what i want and to ultimately be like i do want to continue to channel these instincts of who he can be as a creator and the pressure release of another guard is someone like kairi is someone who i think is weirdly enough another score first player more than it is a pass first point guard i guess the other option is just the honest nuclear option sure and it seems a little bit too soon to hit this sort of button but as you're just like strolling through the contracts you're like and has three more years left on his deal that's a long time especially considering they could overpay him going forward he's going to hit all the benchmarks in order to hit super maxes going forward and all this other stuff if they can get yannis they should get yannis i just don't think they can yes right that's one component to it where it's just like you don't have the picks so you're gonna have to make up the capital via players and perhaps you could spin certain players for picks to other teams yes but like you're gonna have to really like gut your team in order to do it my worry would be like and yannis is like an incredible duo like what's left over for them to hit the ground running with because especially if yannis isn't going to hit uh get signed an extension if isn't going to sign an extension you're defining yourself to like a really tight window i just don't want to do that with him like i want to have him for the next 10 years in my life and like build more contenders around him you're getting into the same problem that milwaukee had with yannis which like obviously worked but like his one title i don't know i almost wondered this as a fan like do you want the one title or do you want the like are you willing to accept all the weird stuff that comes after that there's the multiple seasons kind of caught just trying to like bring anything out of the last of the season yannis is like waning years with your team i mean if you take one title or if you have the chance to get a title you should probably do it like i don't understand what's wrong with that just because it got a little weird after the fact well i just don't think like one title would be the benchmark for me maybe for a franchise that suffered as much as like milwaukee had gone through some pretty dark years like the minnesota timberwolves perhaps that that's different yeah so maybe minnesota is one of those teams but like when everyone looks back at like lebron and like oh they won the one title everything is fine like like i set the bar more based on the player and like it's more of like a two like over unders like two titles if you have him as your best player and you like like build the right team around him one and a half i don't think it's just one if i have anthony edwards in my building like i want to be a dominant player for multiple years i think the over under for most players is like 0.5 like if you can get a championship you did it like no one can ever take that away from you i think the thing about yannis and the bucks too is to me it's less about everything that's happened since the title which has just been a string of like unfortunate injuries plus like the dame thing like never took off in the way that they imagined it would uh and then all of the kind of like is he going to be traded or does he want to be traded mess that followed that that's all kind of what it is it's like the years leading up to the championship were also fulfilling years like they got to see bucks fans in milwaukee and otherwise like the core of an entire team take steps together until they want it all like that's the process you want that's the thing that i think when you talk about these championships that don't feel the same as other ones it's usually when a through a weird confluence of events like the right players come together at the right time and all of a sudden like kawaii leonard's on your team and you win you know it's like yes kyle lowry's also there pascal siakam's also there like you have the organic elements and that toronto season was like rapturous sorry um in for many reasons but it's just not the same thing as like building up the star of your team with its supporting cast from within over time like that's the kind of thing you can't replicate and that's the kind of thing that if you do take a swing for yannis as the wolves let's be real you would be given like giving away i don't see a scenario in which the wolves trade for yannis and jayden mcdaniels is still on this team i don't think he goes to milwaukee because the bucks have no real use for him but he would be the exact sort of player you were citing as like you got to find a third or give up real draft capital to juice the trade i think this yannis conversation we can kind of button this up here like i think this is the litmus test for the viability of swinging for the fences and gutting your team for one true blue in his prime superstar considering the context of the nba right now everything we're seeing with the cba and what's to come with the picks and the there was actually this this kind of um this report that true hoop henry abbott tweeted out today about the teams that have the bulk of their team that's under 25 it's all the collective minutes that under 25 players played for uh their team this year and number two on that list is the thunder number five on the list is the spurs number one is the magic number three is the pistons number four is the rockets obviously things didn't go as well for them but like i do think we're turning over to a league where youth matters like depth matters and so if you're the wolves you're right in the center of this do you hit the button for yannis try to go for for one or two years or do you take a step back try to get younger players in the mix here because as we're seeing like having a depth of young guys really matters it does really matter and that's where you know the implications of something like dante divincenzo getting hurt are kind of catastrophic to the wolves in their way like because that's a player who would have been a crucial depth piece an important shooter to round out some of these lineups that we're talking about where oh are you going to have like the right supporting cast if yannis does come well dante would have been great for that or he would have been an enticing player to dangle in some of these potential trades to reload the wolves and instead not only did he miss out on some critical moments of their playoff run but he's going to be on the mend for a long time we'll see kind of like when he can come back and how he looks when he does but they weren't really in a position to lose anybody or to have any caveats or to have anyone's kind of like like value diminished over the course of these last couple months and yet here they are trying to offload julius randall here they are trying to figure out how to replace dante here they are like you know stretching out mike conley for every minute he's worth at his age like i i would say that they might need to make a more dramatic shift just because the present tense as it's constructed was good enough to make a run but i don't think it's going to be good enough to make a run again unless something materially changes here all right that's the wheel of destiny i did it i feel great about it um yeah do i feel great about the fact that we spun twice didn't get yannis and still ended up talking about yannis like we have to find a way out of this at some point you can't say it out loud then they're just gonna jinx us going forward we're gonna get yannis every single time now um but yeah do we take those do we take the wolves and the magic off of the wheel yeah i think so once you talk about them they're off but yannis stays on yes uh we might throw some garden updates on there as well that might just be the whole wheel one time you guys are aware of it just different vegetables all around oh man i'm making progress baby i can't wait to hear about it but don't tell us one word until we spin it appropriately it has to be on the wheel um all right let's wrap it there thank you to victoria valencia and isaiah blakeley for staying up late with us thank you to ben cruz we'll be back on monday talk to you then 21 plus and present in select states for kansas in affiliation with kansas star casino or 18 plus and present in dc kentucky or wyoming gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER or 1-800-MY-RESET call 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org chat in connecticut or visit md gambling help.org in maryland hope is here visit gambling helpline ma.org or call 800-327-5050 for 24-7 support in massachusetts or call 1-877-8-HOPE-NY or text hope ny in new york louisiana call 1-877-770-7867 are you looking for support in your weight management journey zep bound terzepatide may be able to help zep bound is a prescription medicine used with a reduced calorie intake and a reduced calorie intake and a reduced calorie intake and a reduced calorie diet and increased physical activity to help adults with obesity or some adults with overweight who also have weight related medical problems to lose excess body weight and keep the weight off zep bound is approved as a 2.5 5 7.5 10 12.5 or 15 milligram injection zep bound contains terzepatide and should not be used with other terzepatide containing products or any glp-1 receptor agonist medicines it is not known if zep bound is safe and effective for use in children don't share needles or pens or reuse needles don't take if allergic to it or if you or someone in your family had medullary thyroid cancer or if you've had multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2 tell your doctor if you get a lump or swelling in your neck stop zep bound and call your doctor if you have severe stomach pain or a serious allergic reaction severe side effects may include inflamed pancreas or gallbladder problems tell your doctor if you experience vision changes before scheduled procedures with anesthesia if you're nursing pregnant plan to be on the right track if you're not you're on the right track if you're on the right track if you're taking birth control pills taking zep bound with a sulfonyl urea or insulin may cause low blood sugar side effects include nausea diarrhea and vomiting which can cause dehydration and worsen kidney problems talk to your doctor call 1-800-545-5979 or visit zepbounds.lily.com ulcerative colitis and crohn's disease symptoms don't pause for the moments that matter that's why understanding your treatment options matters discover what's possible with treatment options Trimphia, guselcumab. Trimphia is a prescription medicine. used to treat adults with moderately to severely active Crohn's disease and adults with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis. Serious allergic reactions, increased risk of infections, or lower ability to fight them in liver problems may occur. Before treatment, get checked for infections and tuberculosis. Tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine. Talk to your doctor and explore what's possible. Or call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more about Trampaya. and visit trimfireradio.com.