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Welcome to the low post podcast on a Wednesday morning.
Oh, you thought we were going to get too sweeps.
You thought we'd have eight days off
before the NBA finals.
You thought this was going to be easy for the Miami Heat.
It might still be easy.
Who knows?
No, the Boston Celtics, the most confusing team in the NBA,
go into Miami.
And I don't think I've ever seen a team do the thing
where they let go of the rope in one game, in a playoff series.
And that letting go of the rope takes them
to within a game of elimination and turns the series
into a blowout.
And come back to next game and fight with grit and precision
and calculation for their season.
Usually, like I thought back to 2019 Milwaukee Boston
when Boston won the first game.
And then it just kept on getting worse and worse and worse
and worse and three one Milwaukee.
And you were like, game five seems like it's going to be
a bucks roll over the way this is going.
And it was a bucks roll over.
And this was not Mr. Goldberry.
How are you, sir?
I am well.
It's good to see you, Zach.
I watched that game last night with very just open mind.
I didn't know what to expect.
And it turns out we got the outcome of, like you said,
Boston getting off the mat and making you, my friend,
get on an Amtrak train and travel up the eastern coast
to game five.
And let me tell you this, if you're on the quiet car,
be quiet.
The quiet car is called the quiet car.
Keep your cell phone conversations to a minimum, people.
Yeah, just cell phone or cell phone.
No cell phone talk on the other.
I don't know what the other rules are.
Look, I am a, you will not hear a peep out of me.
Unless I'm, unless I'm asked a question by the Amtrak staffers.
Anyway, before we get to Boston, Miami,
and whether this is already perilous for the eighth seated
Miami Heat, who need, I remind you,
had a negative point differential.
And we're not a team that appeared
to be building towards some late season
crescendo salvaging a subpar regular season.
We're a team that got shellacked by the Hawks
in the playing game and was wheezing
to an ignominious demise against the Chicago Bulls,
who probably are looking at all this and saying,
hey, should we give Vooch four years?
$9 billion, we're right there.
We're right there on the doorstep.
You're not right there on the doorstep.
Before we get to all that, I wanted to start with just quickly.
Denver Nuggets fans, you know I love the Nuggets.
You know I love Yogich.
You know I love watching them play.
We're going to have so much time to talk about the Nuggets,
that it is only natural that we are using this time
to talk about the greatest player in the world
suggesting he might retire to what the hell's
going to happen to Boston if they win,
or if they lose the series to, or if they win this series,
I guess to the Heat in this improbable run.
But I do want to just lead off with Mr. Goldsberry.
The Nuggets are in the finals for the first time
in the history of the NBA history of their franchise.
Swept the Lakers, each win more collection
impressive than the last seemingly.
I just want to get your quick reflections
on watching the Nuggets team and what, if anything,
you have found your brain thinking about now
that they're in the finals.
Well, small market quote unquote Western Conference teams
have been disrespected for years in sports media
in the general NBA discourse.
So welcome aboard that train Denver.
You are being overlooked.
But you have international stars that tend
to get overlooked as well.
Welcome aboard that train.
But Nicole Yokich does look like the best player in the world.
I was not one of those people who was saying that.
I was always a honest guy over the last few years.
And Jamal Murray.
So the combination, Zach, here's what I'd ask you.
The combination of Jamal Murray and Nicole Yokich,
the best duo in postseason history since,
I don't know what the answer to that is,
but that's where my brain has been going.
But they got a 50, 40, 90 split on 30 points.
That's what Jamal just did.
And then obviously Yokich getting a triple double
with 30 points and doing everything.
I don't know of a better one, two combination
that I've seen in the postseason in a very long time.
Well, I was going to say, I might have to,
I might have to pump the brakes on your,
maybe cut the brakes, like,
cut the brakes.
That's a dangerous, into the sandbags on the side of the road
that are there for runaway trucks.
Because they got to win a title before I start, you know,
like Shaq Kobe, Jordan Pippin, LeBron, Wade,
all the Warriors.
I'm saying that's a long time ago.
That's long, well, the Warriors not a long time ago,
but the other ones you mentioned,
I'm just, that's where my brain is going.
I'm starting to think like that with these two guys
in this exact playoff run.
Here's where my brain is going.
The great thing about sports is you never know
when you're going to learn something interesting about a team.
And I think back to the end of the 17-18 regular season.
It was a season that started off
disappointingly for the Nuggets.
They had signed Paul Millsap in free agency.
They were all in on Yokich.
It was Jamal Murray's second season.
And the integration of Millsap was clunky
to start with the offense wasn't flowing.
They kind of just were, they were a 500 team for 70 games,
but they were still mathematically in the race for number eight
and they had made a big deal of like,
our goal is to make number eight.
And in the last, let's say two weeks of the season,
they essentially had to win out to have any chance
at number eight.
And I think they won six or seven in a row
to end that season.
A lot of them against good competition.
They like, they did not, one, two, three,
Cancun, they did not have half an eye on their summer plans.
They went all in, won every game
and forced the winner take all for the eighth seed
season finale in Minnesota,
which they lost in overtime to the Minnesota team
that had Jimmy Butler on it.
And Yokich went bananas in that game
and nearly carried them to a win.
And sometimes, you know, you have a tendency
to look away at the end of the regular season,
even to a team that's like,
I have what chance do they really have
at forcing this one game winner take all thing,
kind of like Phoenix in the bubble.
Like what chance do they really have
at trying to get into the playoffs?
They're so far behind.
And you look at them and you're like,
oh, there's a toughness here,
there's a determination here,
there's a will here that is interesting.
Next year, not only do they make the playoffs,
they get to the second round of the playoffs
and they lose in game seven at home to Portland.
CJ McCollum carries the blazers over
to the finish line.
The game is totally gassed.
Portland to their credit finds a way to win.
Heartbreaker for Denver.
That's 18, 19, 19, 20, bubble.
Weird season, bubble.
Kind of like the Nuggets run to the conference finals.
Kind of was a little bit dismissed,
like a lot of the runs in the bubbles were,
in the bubbles, the bubble were dismissed.
Humiliated the Clippers in seven games
coming back from three one,
had come back from three one against Utah.
In the first round,
and I think the double three one comeback
is part of the reason that people didn't quite know
what to make of that was like,
was that a, were those collapses by the other teams
or they come backs by Denver?
The first three or four games that Utah series,
like they couldn't get any stops
were those more indicative of what the Nuggets were.
People kind of didn't know, those were real to me.
Like I remember writing a preview of game seven
of Clippers Nuggets and I knew that all of the discourse
was about the Clippers and how disastrous this would be
for the Clippers in the first year of Kawhi and PG
to blow a three one lead
when they were just loaded for bear that season.
And I made my preview about the Nuggets instead
and about building from that game in 2018
against Minnesota to that game in game seven.
And of course they obliterate the Clippers in game seven,
flash forward to the next year,
out of the bubble,
in comes Aaron Gordon,
they look just utterly dominant.
Jamal Murray gets hurt at the end of the season,
and they go through this two year waiting period
and they're off over here to the side.
People kind of just, oh, this yoke at MVP,
like that's awesome.
Look, he's carrying these guys couple MVPs
to their credit.
They win around in 2022 or 2021 rather
before losing to Phoenix in the second round
and the sweep that was not great,
but they want a playoff round.
So without Murray, it's a big deal.
The next year they lose to the Warriors
and the first round, the Warriors end up winning the title.
They're off to the side.
We haven't seen the real nuggets.
Now we see the real nuggets and boy, are they real.
And they're here and their time is now.
And that two year period was part interruption
and part continued growth, particularly of yokech,
part tweaking of the roster in preparation for this year,
for this playoff run with the Bruce Browns and KCPs,
the guards who enable more defensive flexibility,
more 3 and D stuff,
all the more Aaron Gordon integration with yokech,
all of it peeking now.
That's a five year arc.
It's so cool to see a five year arc like that
that makes sense narratively.
It's almost like back in the 80s
when teams had to lose and lose and lose
and like get around further every year,
get around further,
the bowl's gotta get by the Pistons.
The Pistons gotta get by the Celtics.
It's not quite that direct one on run rivalry
with anybody in the West,
but I think it's a cool,
when you really zoom out and look at it,
it's a cool half decade arc
that their time is now, their time is here
and they're waiting in the finals
and I think they're gonna be favored.
I think no matter who gets out of it,
even if Boston somehow pulls this off
and the Celtics have home court advantage,
that's my brain on Denver.
Yeah, they cook their own food
in an era of super teams and quick fixes.
Like you said, five year arc,
a lot like sort of the Boston Celtics
or the heat to some degree, but you know,
I think that's interesting.
One thing I would add is
they've always broken down.
I stole this from you back in the day, my dude.
I believe it was you.
A lot of us use it now.
You gotta be a top 10 defense to win the NBA title.
It's some sort of rule, it's some sort of law.
They look like they're gonna be the first team
to really violate that rule in a long time.
I've been really skeptical of them
even in this last few years
because their playoff defense hasn't been very good.
I think they ranked 12th, 12th and 16th
in the last three tournaments.
Here, they're first in offense.
They have the best net rating and that defense isn't great,
but it's gone from bad to sort of average.
I think they're eighth in the tournament right now.
And they're offense.
What did you call it?
The tournament.
I heard someone in these announcer's say then,
I was like, oh, that does sound kind of cool, you know?
But anyway, Zach, I wanted to get your thoughts on that
just briefly, that law that you,
I think you brought it into me
and maybe it's for illustrated arrows, Zach.
Yeah, we're talking now 13, 12 years ago.
I wrote a piece back then about how
in elite defense was a slightly, slightly better predictor
of championship equity than in elite offense.
And in the last 10 or 12 years,
that has flipped a little bit
and it's more skewed, tiny bit toward elite offenses.
Being a, I mean, in reality, you have to be good at everything.
This is the highest stage of the league.
But the model for the Nuggets was always the 2017 Cavs,
I thought, who were just a dynamite
gangbusters offensive team
and like a good enough defensive team
and in a normal NBA season with a normal landscape of teams
that did not include a salary cap spike
enabled Kevin Durant to the Warriors transaction.
That team, I think, would have won the title
and they're all very confident
that they would have won the title.
And I've been thinking about that team a lot
because of LeBron this week,
hinting that he might maybe possibly consider
for a second retirement
and getting all the sort of LeBron thoughts in my brain
in order in the four and six
or whatever is record in the finals
that's gonna always be the sort of thing held against him
in the Jordan comparison
and how the Durant thing really sort of changed.
Like that would look different
had the Durant thing not happened,
but it happened, but I wanna talk about that.
I wanna talk about Celtic seed.
I will open the floor to you.
What did you see last night from Boston
and or from Miami that should give the people
any belief that DeSeltics could break the 150 team
losing streak of teams that are down 03 in series?
And I'm not asking that question for each other.
I'm asking you for real.
What did you see that seems sustainable?
I would say the headline is the Celtics look like the Celtics.
For the first time in the series,
they played great defense.
They made their three-way point shots.
And this guy named Jason Tatum was visible down the stretch.
I expected all of those things to be true
coming into these conference finals,
but it took Boston until game four
to manifest their normal identity.
And let me say this, let me get the people excited.
Given these teams regular season profiles,
if there was Avar Zachlow to be a 3-0 comeback in this league,
this would be a pretty good candidate
for three reasons from what I saw last night.
And eight seed had the 3-0 lead on a two-seat.
The two-seat is healthier than the eight-seat
and there is some crazy shooting lock
that helps explain why Miami had that 3-0 lead.
That went away in game four as well.
Now, I'm not saying Boston will do this,
but what I'm saying is to be crystal clear,
if I ever had to bet on a team down three to one
in a seven-gamer, this would be attempting candidate.
Remember, Boston ranks second in both offense and defense.
That's juggernaut stuff.
Those teams usually win it all.
And I thought what I saw from their defense
in the second half and Jason Tatum in the second half,
the three-point shooting sort of turned right side out
when you look at these two teams,
regular season shooting profiles.
So for me, it was almost like,
that's the kind of game I predicted
at the beginning of the series.
That's how I thought Boston would win.
Assert themselves on D, make more threes,
have a great score down the stretch.
So that's what I saw.
What did you see though?
Well, so a lot of it is make-miss, right?
Like the heat had been out shooting expectations
and the Celtics had been under shooting expectations
for whatever you think those expectations are worth.
18 of 45 on threes for Boston,
eight of 32 from Miami.
That's the game.
Smart makes three.
Grant Williams comes in and makes a few.
Horfford finally shows up and makes shots.
That's the whole game.
And the heater actually getting fewer threes
in this series and fewer shots at the rim
and more mid-range shots than it did in the regular season.
That is something to monitor.
So a lot of that is the game.
I'm glad you brought up the history.
So a couple of days ago when the heat went up 3.0,
I said, look, it just does not look like a Boston team
that has any life left.
And this is off the top of my head
in just rumbling around
because there's no way to quantify this really
and do a deep research dive on it.
I just don't remember a team, like I said,
just letting go of the rope in a series
they were trailing badly and showing up again like that.
Usually that game, that game three
means the game four is Cancun time
and it was not Cancun time.
So, and I said on paper, which is not worth very much paper.
I mean, it's worth something, I don't know.
This is clearly the team with the best chance ever
at coming back from 3.0.
And then I said to myself, you know what?
I should probably have our stats people look that up
just to make sure that's okay.
Because you're like, you said,
we're talking about a number one seed
or a number two seed, number one point differential,
number eight seed with a negative point differential.
Home court is massive, massive.
If they win game five, they just,
they've already got one road game.
They're one road game away
from potentially getting it home for seven.
That's a big, big deal.
So I asked our stats team,
is there any way to look this up,
like whether this is true?
So here's what they did.
They found me every instance of any playoff series
in which a top two seed was down 3.0
and went through them.
And it is crystal clear that this is the best chance ever
on paper Miami people, on paper of a team.
There have been nine instances, here they are, ready?
Yeah.
84, 85, the second seed bucks against the third seed sixers.
A lot of these series are second round series
between two teams of relatively equal caliber.
95 magic finals against six seed rockets.
The magic were the number one seed, the rockets
were the six seed, rockets were defending champion,
had acquired Clyde Drexler in the middle
of the season, totally changed their team.
2000 Utah Jazz, the second seed goes down 3.0
to the third seed blazers, 2.3, right?
Like blah, blah, blah.
2002, the number one seeded New Jersey Nets
go down 3.0 to the number three seed,
Los Angeles Lakers in the finals.
We all know then that's where not favorite in that series.
And that was the best three seed of all time, I think, right?
Probably so.
2007, the number two seed Cleveland Cavaliers
are the young LeBron James go down 3.0
to the number three seed San Antonio Spurs in the finals.
We all know that's not a normal favorite underdog situation.
I'm gonna skip one and come back to it.
2011, the number two seed Lakers go down 3.0
to the number three seed Mavericks,
the eventual champions in the second round,
get swept again, 2.3.
2018, the number one seed Toronto Raptors
go down 3.0 to the number four seed Cleveland Cavaliers
with LeBron James.
We know no, it was LeBron toe for a while there
in those series.
And then in the bubble, the one seed bucks
play the five seed heat and go down 3.0.
And that's the bubble and the honest got injured
in the middle of that series.
The one I skipped is the one that I found myself
actually thinking about in the last couple of days.
2010, the number two seed Orlando Magic go down 3.0
in the conference finals against the four seed Boston Celtics.
And I thought of that series not because
I think it's comparable at all.
You go through, those are the only nine.
That's it.
There has never been a series like this
where a team of Boston's caliber is down 3.0
to a team of Miami's caliber, resume based.
If you want to say this Miami team
has become a completely different animal, that's fine.
You're probably right.
I thought about that 2010 Boston Orlando series
only because it was 3.0 Boston
and Orlando had home court
and Orlando one game for Boston and it was 3.1.
And right away, you just looked at the roadmap
of the series back there and we're like,
ooh, this could get spicy pretty fast.
They won game five in Orlando to make it 3.2.
Something very few teams in the 3.0 hole have ever done.
And it was back to Boston for game six.
And all of a sudden that game six with the KG,
Ray, Pierce team, trying to get back to the finals
after the KG injury the previous year,
trying to, they're older, they're tougher.
They're just not quite as good,
but they have a mental toughness finding a way.
All of a sudden from 3.0 to 3.2,
that game six in Boston felt like all the pressure
was on the Celtics.
It felt like a must win because you lose that game,
you're going down to Orlando for game seven
with the weight of all the world on you.
And that's just a series I thought about
because Boston's going home for game five.
If they win that game, that's what that game six
in Miami is gonna feel like for the heat.
And that's the power of home court advantage.
Like I'm not saying Boston is doing this.
And in fact, part of the punishment
for frittering away games one and two at home,
or letting Miami really seize them from you
with just bad end game execution,
all the stuff that has plagued Boston for years now,
is your margin for error is now nothing.
Like we can sit here and say on paper
and you win game five at home and they'll be favorites
in here and then they have a game seven, blah, blah, blah.
Your margin fair is nothing.
Your margin, you are one max truce seven for 10
from three game away from going home.
You have no margin for an outlier good on their end
or bad on your end.
So there's still obviously massive underdogs to do this,
but I just thought the history was interesting.
Yeah, and we zeroed in on the same concept.
If ever a team was gonna do this through the analogs
of NBA history, hey, this is the best bet.
It's not a good bet necessarily.
It's the best bet though.
I think you mentioned like the weight of the world
with that Celtics magic series.
I feel like that's something that's already transferred here
and it might be too late, but yeah,
if Boston wins game five.
And one of the things that's interesting
about the Celtics is that, you know,
they're now 10 and 11 at home.
The home court advantage that we associate with that building
is somehow depleted over the last few years.
The Celtics are the only team in NBA post-season history
to have an under 500 record over a two post-season span
at home with a minimum of 15 home games.
So it's not that Boston that I grew up going to,
covering the league and just being really intimidating,
those heat games where LeBron had a hard time,
even though they were a better team.
Those are the ones I'll always think back to.
But yeah, I think the weight of the world shifts
to Jimmy Butler and Eric Spolstre's shoulders
if they win that game five, like you're saying
and setting up a game six in Miami,
where the Heat have played really well
until game four of this series, all playoff's long.
So I think it comes down to game five.
And there's two things I'm looking at
aside from the shooting, which I wanna talk about
a little bit more.
Jaylen Brown's offense and Jason Tatum's defense
have to get better for the Celtics
to reassert themselves at home in game five.
And if both of those things happen,
I think we're gonna be talking about history
if there's a game six talking about it,
again, not projecting it.
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So you mentioned the shooting.
I said eight of 32 Heat 3s.
I thought particularly in the first quarter,
Boston had some defensive hiccups chasing their shooters
around and the Heat missed three or four good threes.
You're not going to make all of them.
You make two of them.
The game starts to feel a little different.
They missed them.
And after that, I thought Boston's defense
was pretty clean the rest of the game.
Just if you were of those hiccups
that have marked their bad performances,
miscommunications, blow-in switches,
just going under screens against guys.
You can't go under screens against all that.
That kind of went away.
The difference I really noticed from Boston
was in their passing.
I thought it was their best passing game of the series.
And I thought schematically,
they made a very clear emphasis on
when Zeller or BAM blitz the pick and roll.
And they put two on the ball against Tatum.
We're not going to drive into the teeth of that blitz
because BAM's going to snatch the ball from us.
We're not going to lob this lollipop into Rob Williams
at the foul line and ask him to make a play in space,
which he's okay at, but not great at.
We're going to have a guy ready on the wing next to you
as an outlet right away.
That trap comes, boom, hit that guy on the wing.
Sometimes it was jail and Brown in the corner
if the first pick and roll was on the sideline.
And just hit him for the sake of hitting him.
Just hit him for the sake of keeping the ball moving
and making Miami's defense execute
four and five rotations in a possession.
It was a clear plan of just release valve passing.
Get the ball moving.
Play kind of like Miami plays.
Just movement for the sake of movement.
Movement for the sake of, let's see what happens
if we make them do three or four different things
at a fast pace.
Maybe they'll make a mistake.
And it wasn't anything fancy, but that release valve pass
was there and I thought it worked and it got Boston into gear
and it got them some good looks that sustain them
until the thing that they just really need
and the way they won Game 6 and Philly,
Game 7 against Philly was just making Tatum shots.
And he hunted the game Vincent mismatch much more
than he had in the previous games and just shot over him.
And that's what great players do.
And the Celtics if they're gonna actually pull that off,
pull this off or extend it to six, whatever,
they're gonna need Jason Tatum and NGL and Brown 2
although he looks kind of shaky on offense.
They're just gonna need him to make shots like that
that he hadn't been making in the first three games.
But I thought their process was with intentionality
much better and much more team oriented
than it had been in the previous couple of games.
The passing thing is huge.
I did a piece on quote unquote quantifying heat culture
last week, a lot of that coming from the hustle stats
but largely Zach, they're really good at deflecting passes
and turning those into live wall turnovers
and getting loose balls.
These guys are built for that.
Tatum, I wanna come back to something you just said.
Like Jimmy Butler on Jason Tatum
is not a winning match up for the Boston Celtics
and they have to find ways to get Jason Tatum
on Kayla Martin on Max Drew's on Gabe Vincent.
I have some numbers to back it up.
Start with Jimmy who is acting as his primary defender.
According to Second Spectrum,
Tatum is six of 17 this whole series.
That's his primary defender with Jimmy Butler
as the closest defender.
That's not good.
That field goal percentage of 35 is not a winning number.
He's shooting over 50% against Kayla Martin on 23 attempts,
over 50% against Max Drew's on just 11
but over 50% against Gabe Vincent.
Much more efficient offense.
You said it yourself, they need to hunt those Mitch Matt
because he can't get going but Butler.
Like that's the wrong thread to pull on
in these half court offense sets.
And to me, he's the only all NBA player in the series
and he didn't play like it through three games.
And again, first team all.
First team, first team.
Okay, I was gonna say Jimmy Butler,
Jimmy Butler might come through your laptop
and punch you in the face just upon you
uttering that sentence.
Watch out.
Thank you for correcting me.
And so I think getting Jason Tatum
going against these secondary defensive options
is a huge thing for Joe Missoula
and that half court offense to figure out.
No disrespect to the great Jimmy Butler
or Jalen Brown in the second team, right?
So this is particularly important to me,
Zach to watch for another reason
because I don't know if Jalen Brown's hand is hurt or what
but I had this this stat for you.
He's made seven of his 37 jump shots in this series.
That's 19%.
That's like Josh Smith stuff.
That's like, let this guy.
Oh, Josh Smith catching strays unexpectedly.
Sorry, Josh Smith.
I always liked you, Josh.
Hey, he's an avid listener of the low post.
We all know that.
Great passer.
I love to watch Josh Smith pass.
All right, words, I'm sorry.
So what are we doing?
If I'm Miami, am I approaching let Jalen shoot territory?
Maybe I'm not going there,
but it's not as scary as I thought it was
coming into this series.
Again, that just puts extra burden on Jason Tatum
getting going on offense in a world where Jalen is either hurt
or just really cold with his shot.
So I think that you brought that up
and I'm glad you did.
How do the Celtics continue to get Jason Tatum
against these secondary defenders in the half court?
Well, and the guy they targeted early in every game
and are targeting early in every game is love,
who's guarding Horford because they don't want him
on any of the Celtics perimeter players.
And if the Celtics continue to start small
with Horford as the only big and Derek,
what in the starting five?
Which that line is actually plus nine in the series.
So I would expect them, I guess, to continue doing it.
That's the primary reason
is because it's hard for love defensively.
And so one of the things I'm wondering is,
should the heat either start Caleb Martin
or just play Caleb Martin more?
Love is minus one for the series.
Caleb Martin is plus 25 and 132 minutes
or the heat are plus 25.
Wow.
And Butler Martin Bamb as a trio
is plus 34 in 59 minutes.
Both those numbers are striking to me
because I don't think that 59 is not as high
as I expected it to be
because those have been their three best players
in this series.
I think they might just have to play together
a little bit more.
I also would expect like the heat watched the film
and saw that the Celtics were prepared for them
to put two on the ball and blitz
and how they passed out of it.
You saw the heat start switching more with BAM
toward the end of the game.
They actually switched more screens in that game
than they had in any prior game
in the series according to second spectrum.
That was maybe a hint of something.
Similarly, the return of the zone at the end of the game
and Tatum heard it with one little flash mid-range jumper
as a way to just sort of,
it was sort of that to me signaled A,
were behind try something new and B,
Boston was ready for us to come out
and play one style of defense.
Let's mix it up a little bit.
Yeah, I noticed that same Tatum flashed the free throw line
and put a puncture wound right into that zone right away.
And I do think when Boston struggles on offense,
it's turnovers, it's turnovers.
And you mentioned the crisp passing
and the smart half court sets.
And when Miami is thriving on defense,
they're forcing those exact turnovers.
So that's an indicator species
in this weird Eastern Conference Finals
ecosystem for me to watch going forward.
The other one, I wanna come back to this,
is the three-point shooting.
I have another sort of dumb guy stat here,
but Boston is now nine and two
when they make 12-three pointers
and they're 0-6 when they dumped.
Last night they made 18.
In the first two or three,
the first three games, I think they averaged 10.3 made three
as they lost all three of those games obviously.
But that's more of a dumb guy stat
because again, I think it points to clean looks
for the role players and the role players knocking them down.
So I picked Parjes and Tatum and Jalen Brown a little bit,
but the Al Horford threes that they lived on all season,
Marcus Smart, hit and won.
To his credit, Derek White has been very good
shooting the ball.
Grant Williams has been very good shooting the ball.
And again, it's sort of,
that's what I came to expect from the Missoula Aeroseltics
was our three-point machine,
I think they ranked second and three-point makes per game.
And sixth and three-point percentage,
one of the best three-point shooting offenses in the NBA
just laid an egg in the first three games.
And last night they showed us what they look like
when they're making those threes
and they're hard to keep up with as a scoring team
when they're making those threes, Zach.
And that's why I'm sort of really zeroing in on that too
when Boston has the ball.
All very good points.
I think the Boston lineup questions
are really, really interesting in part
because I don't really feel like I know the answers to them.
Clearly, Joe Missoula prefers starting small.
And like I said, that lineup is plus nine.
Rob Williams, I thought his impact on the game
and stretches last night,
particularly on defense got better as the game went on.
The Celtics are minus 30 in 83 minutes with Rob
on the floor and they were minus six last night.
I don't quite know what to read into that.
And just every combination is bad.
Now and Rob together, the double big look,
minus 20 and 15 minutes.
Grant Williams and Rob Williams, just minus three.
So that's kind of neutral.
Rob is the only big man in this series
has been kind of minus five per 100 possessions
according to Ben Falk at cleaning the glass.
Good for the whole playoffs.
So maybe that's something to look at too.
And the Grant Williams ingredient,
which was just so long overdue, I never understood it.
Has been huge, the last two or three games
was big against Philly.
And I just thought it was interesting
that they closed with him on the floor last night
in place of Derek White.
And you could feel the heat searching around
on offense and be like, huh, we no longer have
the lighter guy, the skinnier guy for Jimmy DePocat.
And now we don't really have anybody for Jimmy DePocat.
And Derek White's an all defense player,
Adam first team all defense.
But in this matchup, he's the guy that's getting bullied.
And it just felt, you could feel the heft
of the Celtics without him and with Grant Williams
on the floor at the four.
And Miami kind of searching around for like,
huh, we don't really have any place to go here.
So I don't know what the right answer is.
It's probably a mix of everything depending
on who's on the floor.
Like Rob can play when Zeller's on the floor.
The brief Rob Williams guarding Caleb Martin experiment
has failed in this series.
I would be wary of that.
And the other thing you mentioned, Jaelin Brown.
Team worst minus 40 with Jaelin Brown on the floor
in this series.
And they are losing the Brown not Tatum minutes
by, I had Ben Falk look this up.
It's only 40 possessions.
So it's not very many minutes
because Tatum's obviously playing a ton of minutes.
The Celtics in those minutes with Brown and not Tatum
78 points per 100 possessions.
135 points allowed per 100 possessions.
So that's like minus a gazillion.
Those minutes are nervy minutes.
And I don't know what the proper alignment is.
I do know that I get nervous when it's Brown,
not Tatum and Rob Williams is the only big man
because I just don't think there's enough playmaking
on the floor.
I would like Horford and or Grant Williams
to be out there for a little bit more playmaking.
But I don't, I finding the right balance of when to play
who is going to be really interesting in game five
for Joe Missoula who called an emergency timeout
in the middle of a possession that was dying out.
Oh, there we go.
The most anticipated and hyped timeout of the season
by any coach, I think.
It was, yeah, it was a real moment there.
I think that I'm a fan of the double big lineup.
And I know when I'm coming on Professor Lowe's podcast,
you can't roll up on vibes alone.
I did a little research that line of has.
I don't know, I don't know, I don't know how to feel about it.
It's that I've been a fan of it too.
I thought it was really good against Philly.
I don't think it fits this series quite as well
as I said after the first game,
but I'm interested to hear your take.
Please go.
I just, I mean, I look at the numbers and it's obvious
that the smaller lineup is doing very well
and the double big lineup is not.
And I don't know if that's because when Jalen is not scoring
and now you have both Jalen and Rob out there,
you're too weak offensively.
Because when you look at Jimmy
and who he's picking onto your other point,
Rob Williams is doing his job
protecting the pain against Jimmy Butler.
And so is Al Horford, by the way.
Derek White, you mentioned they're targeting Derek White
on defense.
So really this self-exposed season,
I think the most too common starters
that are sort of toggling spots is Derek White and Rob.
Grant Williams being this sort of wild card there.
But yeah, Jimmy does go at Derek the most.
He's eight of 15 against Derek.
He hasn't shot that many times against anybody else
in this series, even though Derek's not really
his primary match.
But Rob is four or 14.
So I look at Rob obviously as a rim protector.
My biggest question is,
what the heck is going on with Jalen Brown, dude?
You just mentioned those stunning stats.
I mentioned the stunning jump shooting stats.
If the Celtics want to come back in this series,
they're going to need Jalen Brown to be Jalen Brown.
That's it.
And he has not been that guy.
Well, that's what I meant by your margin for error
is down to zero.
Your ability to absorb another Jalen Brown clunker
is very, very low.
And in fact relies on other things happening.
Like the heat having a clunker,
Jimmy having another blog game,
although he finished the 29 last night.
He missed a lot of bunnies I think
that he would normally make.
Tade him having a monster game, whatever it is.
But yeah, they're not winning three more games
if Jalen Brown doesn't have a game in there somewhere.
And in the other games is at least like okay to good.
The other small stat that I'll throw out
that's sort of a red flag for Jalen.
He's four and nine from the free throw line.
And he missed a free throw last night.
And Reggie Miller who knows a thing or two
about shooting on the broadcast
is like I think his hands bother
and something like that.
That tracks with the jump shooting numbers.
He looks like Jalen Brown athletically.
The shots just aren't going in.
But this is the, the Joe Missoula's leaned into jump shooting
with this team, with this rotation.
So exactly right.
They're gonna need more from Jalen's jump shooting.
And they got 45 threes last night
because of the ball movement.
Because they played with pace.
I thought that was big.
Not just off the turnovers, off makes, off misses.
And one of my favorite possessions was
I think Tade him was bringing the ball up after a miss.
And Grant Williams just waited for him at half court
and set a pick for him at half court.
And he didn't see it coming.
Caleb Martin got stuck on the pick
and the chain reaction from that led to someone else
getting an open three.
I thought their pace was snappy, their variety was snappy.
And they're gonna need to play like that.
Like the heat will not allow for anything less.
The heat will not allow for a C plus.
Oh, we kind of just kind of lost our plot on offense
for a quarter and a half.
You know, maybe we can get it back in the fourth quarter.
Oh, we made 10 defensive mistakes.
Just sloppy miscommunications, but we'll get it.
Well, that's all right.
Where the Celtics like the heat are not allowing for that.
And the being down three oh and now three one
doesn't allow for that either.
And I thought they hit a lot of the right buttons on offense
and kept hitting them.
Didn't stop pressing them.
Didn't forget they were there.
Kept hitting them.
And if they keep doing that, if they,
you're not always gonna make shots.
But if they keep hitting the right buttons,
they got a chance to win game five obviously.
And if you win game five, you're in the game now.
Like that's, then it's just everything comes down
to that game six.
Just keep pressing the right buttons.
If they throw the joystick in the garbage
and forget that the buttons are there,
the heat are gonna go to Boston and win game five
and go to the finals.
Yeah.
And for me, there is a good trend again to alarm the heat fans.
The Celtics are getting more and more threes
as this series continues to go.
And I think they had their series high 45 three points
hence last night forget the makes.
Like they're feeling good about getting those shots.
And this team is very difficult to beat
when they get those shots.
Cause generally speaking, they make them at a high rate.
Again, they rank second in the league
and three pointers made in sixth in the league
and three point percentage.
A lot of volume and efficiency.
If they get going at home, that's a win for them
from the three point line.
But from Miami's perspective,
they're gonna need another dud from the three point line,
you know, game one, 10 threes, game two, 10 threes,
game three, 11 made threes for Boston.
They need another one of those and the series is over.
There's no room for error, but how do you do that?
And I think what we've seen some of the defenses
against the Boston Celtics do over the last few years
is yeah, force them to beat you inside the arc.
And we've seen the Warriors do that.
We've seen the Sixers even try to do that to a degree.
And Miami win one of these games
with a defensive adjustment.
I don't know.
Last question.
Many are aware that you spent several seasons
with the San Antonio Spurs.
Yeah. Without naming names.
What's the first phone call you had
post the Spurs winning the lottery
with anybody from that organization?
Was it just someone screaming into the phone
incoherently?
I mean, they're getting Wembanyama, man.
Like that's like, I just need to know,
because you still got a lot of friends there.
I just need to, with someone weeping,
you know, I just remember like when Croatia made
its run to the World Cup final in 2018,
obviously we're watching all these YouTube videos
of Croatia celebrating.
And they beat England.
Maybe it was when they won the quarter finals
on penalty kicks.
This video went viral of a Croatian guy
opening his window, picking up an armchair
and just throwing it out the window.
Like he just completely lost.
He picked up like a giant recliner
and just threw it out the window.
And I was like, I love this guy.
I picture like somebody doing that
is basically what I want.
This is the guy, my friend,
he runs the Spurs draft model, close friend of mine.
And he went from one of the most stressful,
hardest jobs of his career to,
I don't really have to come into work
for the next month or two.
And he went for like reasons to not like when Vignon,
oh, you know, like we're not gonna get the pick.
And these guys are obviously analytical thinkers, Zach.
And they're the first to remind you,
we only have a 14% chance.
We actually have a 16% chance of getting four or five,
whatever the numbers were at the time.
These dudes were the happiest.
I called them right away
because you can put down the draft model,
at least for the first round,
because we know what we're gonna do.
And that is a huge load.
And then, you know, I tried to call RC,
but it was his birthday,
and he had better people to talk to than me.
So then I called my friend and your friend,
Shay Serrano, who's sort of the mascot of Spurs fandom
in San Antonio.
And he was ecstatic,
and we screamed at each other on the phone for a while.
It was a great moment.
A lot of people from every corner of the city
in the organization are thrilled.
Apologies to the rest of the NBA
who thinks this was fixed or were spoiled
or luck is struck too many times.
But it was a great moment for a proud organization
and a proud set of basketball fans.
But yeah, I think you would appreciate the draft model guy.
Essentially Evan Ray's work done for him now.
He usually has the hardest job in June.
I think he should go the other way
and rework his draft model
so that it has when Benyama as like the seventh pick
and submitted to RC,
but for him Brian Wright and be like,
hey, you know, I've raised some concerns here.
I really think you guys need to look at this methodology.
And it's all faulty and he just like rigs it.
But just to see, just to see their reaction.
Yeah, one of the things that he has to do right now
is look at all these weird inputs too.
His job gets harder and harder
because now he has like guys from the G League,
obviously, Scoot, the Thompson's that what stats
are we using for these guys?
It's all unreliable, but to your point,
we can turn knobs and levers to make this thing say
what we want.
Turns out, you know, the Thompson's are the best,
or the Scoot is the best, Brandon Miller's the best.
That's not gonna happen though.
We have another European prospect coming to San Antonio
and that usually spells good things for the Spurs
and the city of San Antonio.
Kurt Goldsberry, thank you for your time.
We will eagerly be watching game five tomorrow.
I will be in the building at whatever the TD Garden
is called now.
It's gonna be fun.
Thank you, sir.
Stay quiet on the quiet car.
♪♪
All right, let's deviate from the conference finals for a bid
and talk about the conference finals that just ended.
Dave McMahon, our Lakers, ace reporter, how are you, sir?
I do well, Zach.
Great to be here with you.
So I want the full scene of when LeBron says at the podium,
expresses some uncertainty that he would play next season,
that he might retire, hinting that he did the R word
I don't think was ever said, but hinted that retirement
was a possibility.
And then you track him down somewhere in the bowels
of crypto.com, somewhere in the crypt.
I want the whole scene.
Are you running?
Where is the side conversation you have with him?
What is your reaction and the room's reaction
when he says what he says at the podium?
I need to know who is there or any Ramby around
or is Polinka nearby?
Is Adam Sandler lurking?
I need all of it.
So Zach, start with the podium.
My initial question to him was when you look at what you have
with this group, do you feel like you kind of
have the pieces in place moving forward next year
to compete for a championship?
Because obviously he's made it clear that that is the priority
number one, so long as he's going to continue to play.
And basically, my head's not even there yet.
So I quickly pivoted, asked about the Denver he gave,
and I answered, Chris Haynes ended up
asking about next year later on in the presser.
And again, he was like, well, I don't know how many guys
we have on our contract.
And so it was very much evasive towards next year.
And then I think Melissa Rowland's question ultimately
led to his answer saying, well, I just
got a lot to think about.
Now, I had planned to try to get him after game four
to ask about the foot.
Because I kind of checked in on that at various times.
And it was basically, it wasn't the right time.
He didn't feel like he wanted to talk about it.
I was like, well, it's the last time I'm going to see him.
Maybe until he plays a Julie game or something like that
again this summer.
So I might as well ask it.
So I got into a couple of quick questions.
As we were walking, the big auxiliary press room
set up for the conference finals,
that there's hundreds of media members in town,
the Los Angeles, to cover it.
He comes out of the room.
He's greeted by Randy Mims.
He's greeted by Damon Jones, who was a assistant
on the staff this year for teammate of his.
He's greeted by a Nike executive.
And then he kind of makes his way out.
As John Ireland, the Lakers play by play man,
mentioned on a podcast recently.
And it kind of got some buzz.
He has his documentary crew also following him on this way out.
Andy Thompson, who's played Thompson's uncle, long time,
a great, great videographer and journalist
for NBA Entertainment.
It's kind of behind the camera.
They had the boom mic going.
And so as I've asked him in various situations
over the last several years, what the documentary crew is
going, more often than not, he will say,
yeah, because he's gathering material.
So usually if I want to ask him something, like, nature,
I've got to check to see if he's willing to go there
and talk about it.
And he's like, yeah, OK, what do you got?
And so we're making our way out the tunnel down
towards the stairs that you take from the street level
down into the bowels of the arena.
And then you follow down the ramp to where
the player vehicles are.
And I'm like, so what am I supposed to do with that?
You've got stuff to think about.
What's the thread I'm supposed to pull at it?
And then if I want to play or not,
I'm like, as in next year, he goes, yeah, I go,
so you'd really walk away.
Because that's what I got to think about.
And it was almost like, all right,
I walk back up the ramp.
I'm processing what he just told me.
I know I have sports center hits to do.
I know I have a new story to write
and what happened in the game.
But it's like, what do I do with this information?
And immediately found Marcus Vandenberg, my editor.
And we started the wheels turning on the story.
Are you guys in motion walking and talking during this brief?
Is he serious?
Is he smiling at you?
Like, you got to ask me this, huh?
Or is he dead serious?
No, I'm pretty dead serious.
And there's times when certainly he'll
have a twinkle in his eye.
As he said something, it wasn't that.
So it wasn't like his tone was devastated.
And certainly I've seen LeBron drop hints or drop information,
knowing how the wheels of the media machine
works, hoping where it goes places.
It didn't feel like that either.
Felt like a guy who was exasperated, both mentally
and physically from a long season.
And is recognizing as things like his idol in the NFL, Tom Brady,
or I don't know if it was the right word,
but it's contemporary who he drew inspiration from.
And Tom Brady retired.
He's a longtime friend.
Carmel Anthony retired.
And his kids are getting older.
And there's less and less chances
to spend time with him around the house.
LeBron, he's now going to be the college freshman at USC.
Just kind of assessing, is it all worth it?
Everything I go through, all the sacrifices I make,
what's that carrot left on the stick?
And it had been over the last several years
that the carrot on the stick was I
want to play with my son, Bronnie, in the NBA.
But in the second round against the Warriors,
he even softened that stance.
He said, listen, that's my goal.
But I don't know if that's Bronnie's goal.
And I'm here to support whatever Bronnie wants to do.
And so I think it's very natural.
Now, I actually was almost surprised
that it took till year 20 till we have these conversations.
Because think of NFL quarterbacks,
think of, obviously, I'm a Syracuse alum and Coach Beheim
retired this year.
And for years, that was the annual conversation.
Phil Jackson, I covered him late in his career.
It was almost an annual conversation.
Will he want to come back again?
I'm surprised that it took to this moment
where we opened up the door for that LeBron conversation.
Yeah, I mean, he's played 20 seasons.
I mean, the dialogue about LeBron
for a lot of these playoffs, including here,
although I hope reasonably, was how he's got to parcel out
the full throttle, paint, bully ball, freight train,
LeBron, he can't do that every quarter, every game,
every possession anymore.
And there's always these demands in the game,
like, why isn't he going in the paint more?
Why is he going in the paint more?
And that's why.
I mean, he is 20 seasons in.
He's within 600 minutes of passing Kareem
for the most minutes ever played regular season
and playoffs combined.
So if he comes back, he's going to pass him
within half a season as playing more minutes
of NBA basketball than any human has ever played.
He is the leader in postseason minutes by a mile.
He has played the equivalent of four extra regular seasons
of playoff basketball.
So yeah, I mean, it's like, yeah,
you can't go to the paint all the time anymore.
You can't just like back down Andrew Wiggins
a hundred times a game.
He just doesn't have that in him
because he's played more basketball
than any human ever in the history of earth has played.
All of that said, you and I have probably spent a lot
of the last 24 hours talking to people.
Do you actually think he's going to retire after the season?
Mike Gutt says no.
I had a source close to LeBron.
I spoke to him yesterday.
So the day after I spoke to LeBron
about those retirement comments and he said,
he's been around LeBron for years.
And this time of year, he's just very raw,
like coming off a losing season.
And obviously a successful season in many people's eyes
but losing season meaning like he wasn't holding up
Larry O'Brien trophy at the end of it.
And all sorts of thoughts run through his head.
He's like, I've had conversations about him this time of year
and it's roster moves, you know,
that he thinks in the moment need to be made
and settles down a bit and, you know, the mind frame changes.
And so, you know, I think we will know for sure.
Probably won't be for a month, maybe even two months.
He's going to take some time here to be away from it.
You know, get that put checked out.
He told me he's going to get an MRI on it
and check to see how the tendon's healing.
Obviously, he was recommended surgery back in February
and we'll see if that ends up being the route that he has to go.
And as we've seen over, you know, several of the last summers,
he starts following his children on their basketball,
a U tournaments in the summertime
and he's told me about how that reinvigorated
his love of the game lights that spark again.
So I imagine come, you know, come July, if not sooner,
he'll be champion at the bit to go in for season 21.
But I certainly, you know, I've seen some people interpret it
as words as a leverage play.
I've seen it interpreted as a cry for attention.
I really don't, I really don't believe
it was either of those two things.
I think it was a guy who is openly starting to question
his basketball existence and that's something
that he was able to keep at bay for so long.
But that's why guys do retire
because ultimately you can't keep those thoughts at bay
at some point.
Do we know what the time table, a recovery time table
would be if he has foot surgery, what that would be?
I don't.
Back in February, it was suggested that, you know,
if he got it done, it'd be, you know,
very dicey whether he'd be able to return
in time for the playoffs or not.
So I think you're probably looking at a couple months
in range.
You know, there's reason to be skeptical
of LeBron's motivations in saying something like this
because he has not been shy in the past about
sometimes passive aggressively,
sometimes aggressively aggressively tweaking
his respective front offices to do stuff.
But I actually like, it's not like I know LeBron
and spend an enormous amount of time physically
in LeBron's orbit talking to people,
but I didn't have that reaction to these comments.
Like, oh, he's trying to seize the attention
from the nuggets and the finals or,
oh, he's leveraging Rob Polinka into trading
two first round picks in Ruhi Hachimura,
sign and trade for blah, blah.
I actually don't, I think LeBron's views on the roster
are pretty well known.
Like I think his urgency to win now,
his potential interest in playing with Kyrie Irving,
like that, I think we all know that.
Like I don't really think there's much leveraging
left for him to do.
I think Rob Polinka is well aware
that LeBron would like him to construct
a championship ready roster one way or another next year.
And if LeBron thinks that that roster
should include Kyrie Irving,
I think he's probably already made that known.
If he thinks it should not include X, Y, and Z,
I think he's probably made that known.
I don't really think any more public pressure
is super necessary.
So I did not, I, from afar and then having talked
to people around him, just interpreted as sort of the
post game musings of a guy who just played
47 minutes and 56 seconds and scored 40 points
in an elimination game and had nothing left.
Probably had felt like if there were a game five,
man, that would be a tough recovery process for me.
And he, and he did, you know, he did leave it all,
he did leave it all out there.
But that's how I, that's how I mean,
LeBron's wishes are not gonna be secret.
The other thing that I, someone told me yesterday was,
by the way, I've heard the same as you.
Like, you can't, it's actually interesting
how this was a bombshell for like a second.
And then it became like not a bombshell.
Like you, it's hard to find anyone around the league
who actually thinks he's going to retire.
I did have one person tell me that
if they had won the title this year,
it wouldn't have surprised him if LeBron had just decided,
I'm going out on top, that's it for me, bye.
But they didn't.
And so I mean, I'm operating under the assumption
that he's coming back next year.
I think the Lakers were and are, and if he's not,
then a whole like a lot of other questions
start to come to like you just trade Anthony Davis
and get out of this whole thing.
But I'm assuming he's coming back.
Yeah.
And just on the other point, I wanted to bring up
the Denver, try to take attention from Denver.
He went above and beyond in my estimation
in praising Denver in the game four post game.
And I've been at the finale of countless playoff series
LeBron was involved with,
whether he lost to the team or beat the team.
And there are many instances where he showers praise
and gives respect.
And there's other times when he just keeps him moving.
He stopped in the moment.
He literally tipped his cap to Denver, took off,
his honor up to that and to show respect,
said that that team was in his estimation,
the best team that him and Anthony Davis
have faced in their four years together as teammates
with the Lakers.
So I just wanted to put a point on that,
that it wasn't in my estimation about trying to take
attention or credit or anything away from the Denver Nuggets.
He also has never been shy about tweaking a team
that he feels was beneath his team after elimination,
most famously the Raptors when he said,
yeah, I've been in adverse situations before.
That wasn't one of them.
That was an all time, that was an all time like,
whoa, like you kind of didn't notice it at first,
how bad of a dig it was at the poor Raptors didn't add,
the Raptors didn't ask to run into the little
LeBron train every year.
They're just trying to build a nice basketball team in Canada.
Let's talk about the Lakers future.
They made the conference finals, this year was a success.
Like it was a success based on where they started.
It was a success even based on where they ended
the regular season to get to the conference finals.
They beat the Grizzlies and I know the Grizzlies
are missing players and going through some turmoil,
but they beat them.
They beat the Warriors, who won the championship last year,
like those are quality series wins.
I don't think, and you know, going into the offseason,
LeBron Davis, Reeves is coming back by hooker by crook.
And if you end up going a little bit into the tax
to build this next version of the team,
there's no point in having LeBron James on your team
if you're not willing to go a little bit into the tax.
If that's what it ends up being,
it might actually be hard for them to do that.
LeBron Davis reaves, and then from there,
I think they have some decisions to make.
But I don't think, like if they're healthy
and they build it out the right way,
look, they're not gonna be favorites
in the West next year.
The Nuggets are not going anywhere,
but the Suns are not going anywhere.
You have to see how they build out their team,
and you just go up and down the standings,
like Memphis, turmoil, Kings, good.
Let's see how much better they get.
Clippers, I'm just, we all, I don't even have to say
what the question about the Clippers is.
Warriors, you know, run it back.
What does that look like?
I'm just going straight down the standings.
Timberwolves, okay.
Thunder, I expect them to get a lot better next year,
that much better.
Pelicans, the big fella ever gonna play.
Dallas and Portland, I think,
Loom is interesting how aggressively do they try to go for it?
You know, are their picks gonna be in play?
And obviously, Dallas has a much discussed point guard
free agent on their team.
Like, I don't think it's crazy to look at that landscape
and think, if we build it out the right way,
we're not gonna be favorites,
barring injury to somebody else.
We're gonna have our own injury concerns always
with LeBron and Anthony Davis.
That's just a way of life for us.
They're not as bad as the Clippers' endless injury concerns,
but they're pretty, they're pretty,
they're, they're, they are complicating factors.
But hey, let's, we got enough goods to make a run
to give ourselves a shot.
You're in the conference finals against the Denver Nuggets.
All four of the games were close.
Didn't win any of them, but they were all close.
Not like they were like outclassed by a mile as a team.
I think they have their pick this year.
They have a 20, 29 pick to trade.
They have potential cap room,
although it's really hot chamora or cap room.
That's really the choice.
They have some optionality.
I know Rob Palinka has said,
we're gonna try to build with what we've got.
We're gonna, we're gonna prioritize continuity.
I've interpreted that as his wishes are,
we wanna bring back Reeves and his cap hold is so low
that that's a no brainer.
His cap holds low, you save him for last.
You have a lot of room.
If you renounce hot chamora and you renounce a rustle.
Now to me, I just don't,
DeAngelo Russell has taken or leave it to me.
I don't, I don't, I'm not prioritizing him.
I understand I need ball handling around the bran.
If it's him or cap space, I'm taking cap space
and see what I can get.
Obviously you do, do, do diligence first
to see what your cap space can get.
Hot chamora is an interesting one
because it really is a cold, calculating choice.
If you re-sign hot chamora, you do not have cap space.
And the only way you turn that slot into another player
is then signing and trading, maybe double sign and trade.
And hot chamora's probably gotta be involved in that too.
He was great in the playoffs, great.
Like making Wiz fans vomit in their bathrooms, great.
His skill sets are interesting.
Size, some shootings, some mid-range scoring.
I don't know if the three-point shooting was real.
It was a little bit crazy, but I mean, is that,
is that, is that Plan A?
Plan A is that.
And Adrian Wojanowski and I spoke about on his podcast.
I wrote it yesterday after the XA interviews,
but the Lakers have intentions of bringing both those guys
back Austin and Roy and doing whatever,
I don't know, whatever it costs.
But really that's what they want to happen,
because they view them both as young culture pieces
who are tangible representations
of who they wanna be as a franchise,
going forward and players that they view
that can be LeBron and AD players,
or beyond LeBron and AD players as well.
And listen, I understand the reticence when you describe it,
it really means taking yourself out
of the potential Kyrie Irving's sweepstakes,
like that's punitive in a way.
But I guess it comes down to how realistically view
the Kyrie Irving sweepstakes to be in the first place.
Yeah, and you do your, you know that answer
before you make any kind of decision on Ruwee, obviously.
So there's Kyrie, there's Red Man Vleet,
who is another clutch client,
and there's what the Lakers want,
and there's what LeBron wants,
and those may not always be aligned.
So I'm like, LeBron, I mean, when they had Russ on the team,
LeBron publicly begged them to go acquire Kyrie Irving,
like it was not subtle.
I just, and I don't know what Kyrie Irving wants,
I know what Dallas wants,
they wanna bring Kyrie Irving back,
and maybe they just offer so much money.
And so many years that this becomes a non-starter.
But I do think, like I don't know what LeBron wants,
I don't know what LeBron's team wants,
but I don't get the sense that that side of the equation
has shut the door on a Kyrie Irving pursuit,
at least like, not signing,
but at least like investigating the possibility of it.
I think there's a certain level of confidence
that yes, that thing has failed in Boston, in Brooklyn,
and for a brief time so far in Dallas,
we can make it work.
And to me, it's only, like I've been team,
I don't, I've, when Dallas traded for Kyrie,
I was like, I'm just out, I'm out,
like I'm just, I wouldn't have him on my team.
I understand why LeBron, his experience might make him
feel differently about his confidence level,
but I do think the interesting thing
about the two paths is,
is Reeves and whatever I can get on the point guard market
for the minimum, truder, you know,
whoever the next guy is,
is that enough ball handling around LeBron?
Like if all we're talking about right now is,
LeBron can't do it every possession.
AD doesn't have like a lot of,
enough self-creation to his game as much as,
as much as people dream of him maybe becoming an upbeat
or a yokech type of, just give me the ball,
let me create a shot, that's just not who he is.
Is that enough ball handling?
Because that's the piece that Kyrie brings
that I think LeBron part of him probably craves.
And there's the recognition of,
we can exist in each other's orbits,
and that's very important,
because we've seen some other high profile players
not work alongside LeBron,
and that has to be a consideration here.
And I think there would also be the unification of purpose
if it was to occur, you know,
LeBron is desperate to get a fifth ring,
and it seems based on the stories we heard about Brooklyn
that Kyrie really wanted to win another one.
He was trying to do it with KD,
and KD could do it without the Warriors,
and Kyrie could do it without LeBron,
well guess what, that didn't work.
And so you go get another little bit of a fault.
It did not work, it didn't work.
That is a correct assessment of the Brooklyn that's super team.
For a brief time it was the best offensive team
in NBA history as you have so often reminded of the NBA.
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
It was the age of belief, it was the age of incredulity,
tale of two cities, including tale of two cities.
So somehow Kyrie has gotten me there.
But I think the distillation of purpose
that the Lakers had last season, from the one meeting
as a group to make the play in and dig out of that hole,
and then beyond that, some of these role players,
like in Austin Reeves,
Rui HaChamora, like fighting for their futures,
and recognizing every time they perform in this spotlight,
there's gonna be financial security on the other end.
How do you recreate that, right?
If you just brought the same group back and you're zero and zero,
you say, yeah, we got a training camp this time,
but can you get that shared purpose going again?
And that's why I do think there has to be something
to jumpstart this, beyond just the average roster tweaks
that every franchise goes through.
And that's perhaps why Kyrie edition could make sense
because it would shift the energy and add some urgency
versus we got some conversations with this group.
We get to know each other even better,
we're gonna get back there.
I think that's kind of folly.
I love what Rui did in the playoffs.
If it comes down to Rui HaChamora or Fred Van Vliet,
I'm taking Fred Van Vliet.
I think I might just rather have Fred Van Vliet
than Kyrie Irving, because again,
I can't go back on my stance that if I were running a team,
I just wouldn't have him on it.
That's my personal, whatever.
I understand I'm sacrificing size.
I'm not sacrificing that much depth though.
If I can bring back Reeves, if I hit a draft pick
or if Max Christie's ready to do something,
I keep Vander built around,
it's just to pop up some regular season minutes
and be a Swiss army knife matchup-wise.
Maybe the room exception allows me to bring back
Lonnie Walker or another quality player.
I think I'd rather go the ball handling, not Star.
Fred Van Vliet's not a star star,
I realize he's an all star, but good dependable ball handler.
Take a lot of the burden off LeBron,
not shift too much of it to Reeves, not overburden Reeves.
I think I like that a little bit better, but again,
this is all very fresh.
I haven't thought it out that much.
So just a quick aside on Max Christie,
he finishes his exit interview, press time yesterday
and is walking out and we kind of say our pleasantries
before go away from summer.
I think he's going to play like a summer league team,
so I'll see him there.
But still often my conversations with him
over the last several months have been him sitting
at his locker at least, yeah.
In this case, we're both standing up
looking at each other in the face.
And I'm like, did you grow taller?
He's like, yeah, I grew a little bit this year.
So maybe he could help with the size,
I mean, he keeps growing, but I mean,
he's already put on muscle.
But he looks like more like a, you know, a rangy wing
than strikes you as a guard,
than he was a Michigan State, just a quick aside.
What's the organization's view on Anthony Davis right now?
Because in my opinion, the media discourse
around Anthony Davis has just spun into La La Land,
no pun intended.
Like what's the organization's like take?
I mean, injuries are one thing.
He's, he falls a lot.
He's going to get injured.
He's going to miss 25, 30, whatever games.
But like, do they, like there's all these people out there.
What trade could they make like for Anthony Davis?
What fake trade is out there like, okay, I mean,
what's their internal view?
Rob Lincoln has said this yesterday based off of question
I asked them, LeBron James and Anthony Davis
is a tandem they view as unmatched in the league
on parallel.
And obviously that's a very rosy way to look at it.
Cause the rest of us do know the injury history.
We do know the age of LeBron, but,
Anthony Davis was so vital to Divingham
being able to implement his defensive system
and have that team adopt the mentality
that really was, you know,
the entire presentation that Darvin brought with him
in order to kind of get the job
as they went through several candidates was
we can be dominant defensively around Anthony Davis.
Anthony Davis allowed that vision to occur.
And yeah, there was some internal kind of murmuring
use the word that I think I've heard you used before that.
And I'm talking a year ago, whatever,
that can this ever happen again,
that AD can't stay right.
And is some of him not staying right bad luck.
And some of it, him not doing the same things
prepares body the way like a LeBron James does.
Those murmurs have gotten quieter over the last year
the people I speak to.
And I think there's a recognition that
he has made strides in terms of his program
away from game days in order to keep his body
in the best possible position to perform.
And some of that is the influence factor from LeBron James,
which, you know, that's all you want, right?
If you're gonna invest in a LeBron
and invest in a trade sacrificing young talent
to get a guy like Anthony Davis,
you hope that Anthony Davis can benefit
from everything that LeBron has to offer.
And at this stage, that appears to be lockstep.
You know, will Anthony Davis be the 15th, 20 guy?
He was for that, you know, beautiful spell in the Orleans.
I don't think so for the rest of his Laker days.
No, but, you know, the on again, off again narrative,
I push back against that throughout the playoffs.
He doesn't control the ball.
He needs to get it from others.
And his defensive impact was consistently fantastic.
And so the Lakers feel very good
about Anthony Davis right now.
Yeah, I'm tired of the subject matter, frankly.
One of my pet peeves about it is that defense
is just kind of like squeezed in to a mini clause
of a longer sentence at the end of the fifth paragraph
about Anthony Davis.
And it's like, no, it's actually kind of a big deal
that he was the best defensive player in the entire playoffs.
And the Lakers could construct entire defensive game plans
around him and other teams had to change their entire
offensive game plans to account for him.
That's not a dot, dot, dot,
parenthetical in the midst of like,
why doesn't he score 30 points every game?
Now, the why doesn't he score 30 points every game?
Discussion is an interesting one.
And I think one worth having because he is not.
And I don't think ever was someone who was going to be
the number one ball handling ball control option
on an offense and take the baton from LeBron in that sense.
As you just said, like many, like basically every big man
except him, be it in Yogech,
he's gonna need people to feed him floaters,
pick and pop jumpers, lobs, all of that big man stuff.
Would I like if someone with his level of feel
and athleticism and speed had developed
a more reliable face up game,
something that I can bank on a well,
I can go down more often than they can with AD?
Sure, I would, it hasn't happened.
So it's not going to happen, I don't think.
And that's fine.
He still puts up like 25, 27, 29 in the playoffs 23 a game.
It's not, that's not eight points a game.
That's like a lot of points.
I wish that he had evolved in some way,
like 5% more in that way a little bit more.
That's fine, that's fair, that's a fair criticism.
To me, the real fair criticism
and why he has been inconsistent on offense
and why everybody longs for bubble Anthony Davis
to return again, the bulwark
against that level of inconsistency is his jump shot.
And his jump shot has just fallen off since the bubble.
It's never come back to its peak form
and it used to be a semi-reliable weapon for him.
And if you want to know why he's 30, 18, 23, 25, 16,
it's that his jumper is not reliable.
And so I don't know how to fix that.
I hear everyone talking about his conditioning
and getting his body in peak shape
and that's obviously important and more important as you go.
I don't know what he's got to do to get that jumper
to be better back to where it was five years ago.
I don't know, but if you want Anthony Davis
to be a more consistent source of points,
if it bothers you on some fundamental level
that he goes from 40 to 15 to 23, whatever it is,
that to me is the riddle that the Lakers
and he have to solve.
And I just don't know what the answer to that is.
And it's bizarre because his free throw shooting
really hasn't fallen off.
And his free throw, you see his form.
It's a really nice shooting form.
And you can extend that from 15 feet to the mid-range
and then you can get that.
Amari Stottamaro, Carl Malone, Patrick Ewing,
extend your career for the mid-range game thing.
The three would be nice and we saw it obviously
in the bubble and prior to that,
I wish I had an explanation for it
because it doesn't make sense to me.
Even in that Denver game game two, he hits the corner three.
The next two looks might have been as open or even better.
Misses the one for the top of the key.
Misses another one from the corner.
There has to be some level of,
because he's missed so many at this point
that there's a mental block that he has to get through as well.
That's my theory there, he's never told me that,
but because the form still looks good.
And it doesn't change from the free throw to the three.
So there has to be some level of,
he doesn't believe he's gonna make it
when he lets it go and confidence
this is the biggest X factor in the NBA.
Well, and he has, I actually think he has
a face-up game and not just like in the post
or the triple threat position,
but a face-up game that I think he doesn't utilize enough
and I don't know if it's the Lakers or him,
but he can bring the ball up the floor rake and take.
He can run like an occasional pick and roll.
I would try to do that five or six times a game.
Just give him the ball and see what happens.
And sometimes he's not gonna look like super graceful doing it,
but he can do it and he's fast and athletic.
And I think maybe if the jumper never comes back to where it was
or back to where you're saying maybe it could be,
maybe that's another ingredient to tap into.
It doesn't, maybe it doesn't look like classic big man center
self-creation or whatever, but it's something.
I think it's fair to nitpick like he's never become X, Y, and Z.
And I think there was a hope early in his career
that he could develop that kind of one-on-one,
really deep fountain of moves and stuff.
But I don't know, to me it's more about the jump shot
than anything else.
And the defense is like, you can't,
you just can't wave it away.
Like it's a huge deal.
And this team was not a good offensive team,
really for any point this season.
They got where they got because of their defense.
And maybe he's a part of why the team is not
a good offensive team or a great offensive team.
Part of it is also like they just don't have great spacing
about the LeBron, around the LeBron AD two man game.
And if they did, it would look a lot better.
That's why they had to minimize Vanderbilt's limits
as they went, but you also can't just not credit him
for what their defense was.
Yeah, and there's one more point on his offense.
The face up game you did see it some,
where he would get the ball and the foul line extended
and kind of be able to survey things.
Face up, use the pivot foot.
But I know, I don't know if this was the first coach
to exploit that, but I know from that point on,
other coaches did as well.
Ty Lou started throwing doubles in that Clippers game
where they beat the Lakers on second level
back to back after they played the Jazz
in an overtime win whenever AD would catch it.
And it kind of showed other teams that
if AD is gonna play that way and doesn't
have quick decision making,
you can really disrupt the Lakers offense
by doubling them in that moment.
And it led the turnovers, it led
the offense of fouls sometimes trying to split the double.
It led to just poor spacing, bad rhythm.
And so if he is going to adopt that
as part of his offensive practice moving forward,
and of course, I think it would benefit the Lakers,
diversify him more so part of it's got to be
the quick decision making.
Agreed.
The other thing just lastly,
I mean, the very simple fundamental problem
about everyone, not everyone,
but people trying to find fake AD trades is
as long as the little round James is on your team
or trying to win tomorrow.
If you're trading Anthony Davis,
you're gonna trade him to a team
that's trying to win the next game,
just trying to win right now
because no team that's in a rebuild mode
is trading for Anthony Davis.
So teams trading with each other on the same timetable
is a tricky thing to do,
particularly the better the player gets.
The other thing is if you trade Anthony Davis,
you're going to need a big man.
You're going to need to find a good big man
somewhere along the line,
which means you're either trading him for a big man
in a win now, win now trade involving players
at the same position, which is very rare,
or you have to concoct a multi-trade scenario
where you trade AD for X and somehow acquire
another big man from over here.
Like these are very hard things to do
and it's much easier to just sort of rev up
the trade machine that it is to actually find something
that works in real life.
So my assumption is we will see the new big three in LA
of LeBron AD and Reeves surrounded by whatever
they're surrounded by.
Maybe it's a star, maybe it's not,
but I think all in all,
this has to count as a successful season for the Lakers
and maybe a very successful one.
I know they got swept, I know they're gone
and LeBron dropped a little bit of a mini bomb
shell this week with you,
but it kind of has faded away a little bit.
So Dave McMinnam and any parting thoughts
before you turn your attention to teams
who are not the Lakers?
I guess I'll just say this,
Lakers as an organization, it's all about 18th banner
and it's about championships and LeBron has made it known
that this is why he still plays the game.
And I hope this doesn't sound like I'm advocating
for participation trophies, but the version of Lakers life
that this team was able to provide for everyone involved
for the front office, for the fans, for the players,
for the coaches, yeah, they came up eight wins away
from the title, but it's just a much better existence.
So just be careful about shooting for the moon
like they did with Russell Westbrook
and they put themselves in the basement.
It's okay to have a really good team
and most teams around the NBA are just hoping to have that
and only one team's gonna win it all.
And certainly it should be on everyone's minds
to get this team as good as possible,
but I think they have the bones in place
to be a really good team.
And that will allow LeBron James to play meaningful basketball
as his career continues versus a guy like Kobe
or many other stars we've seen the games
at the end of their career.
It's performance art because you're so far down the standings
that it just becomes about, hey, I hope he can make a fade away
and my team's gonna be his team by 20, you know,
like right now they have a really good team
and hopefully they can continue just to be a really good team.
If they become a great team, that's awesome,
but being a really good team is a pretty good thing.
Dave McVenneman, thank you for your outstanding work
all year and we will hear more from you soon.
I'll see you soon, buddy.
Yeah, it sounds good, thanks man.
♪♪