The Yankees Survive, Milwaukee and Denver Struggle, Paolo’s Thriving, and Boston Is Frightening With John Jastremski and Kirk Goldsberry
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We're also brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. We finished up Scary Month for the rewatchables with Halloween 4, The Return of Michael Myers. It was me and Van Lathan and Chris Ryan. We had a lot of laughs. I know it's a scary movie, but it's also an unintentionally hilarious movie. And we laughed a lot. You can watch it on the Ringer Movies YouTube page because we put the whole video up there. We have a lot of videos going up there, including the Halloween episode that Chris Ryan and I did is going to be going up

Later this week, you can watch all the videos and clips from this podcast on the Bill Simmons YouTube channel. Coming up on this podcast, John Jastrzemski is going to talk World Series with me after the Dodgers blew it. They could have swept the Yankees. They did not. The Yankees fought and they survived. They forced the game five. We're going to talk about the World Series, the state of the New York sports scene with JJ. And then Kurt Goldsberry came on and we talked a lot of basketball.

This is not an overreactions of the first week, just things that jumped out to us, developments, things of note. And, uh, and that is the heart of this podcast. One of the things we talked about was the nuggets. Cause we were both very concerned about what we had seen from the nuggets. We did it before the nuggets nets game tonight.

And after watching that game, as I watched the World Series at the same time, that did not really change my opinion on my concerns about the Nuggets. They barely outlasted a Brooklyn team in overtime. They got 22 points from Westbrook off the bench.

And it's honestly hilarious to watch him on this Nuggets team. I texted Russo in-house that it's like watching Shane Gillis stumble into a Daniel Day-Lewis movie. It's this Nuggets team that has all this ball movement and precision. And, you know, they're just surgically picking apart teams. Then Westbrook comes in like he's shot out of a cannon. He's actually pretty good tonight. But it was...

not opposed to mean facing it and talking shit and, um, you know, anything he gives them as a bonus, but the, the fact that they needed him just to take Brooklyn to overtime, not a great sign. So Kirk and I broke a lot of that down with the nuggets, what we're seeing and all the other teams that we were just kind of intrigued by. So that's coming up. Speaking of Denver, I'm coming to town.

to watch the Nuggets and see Jokic in person in Denver, which I've never seen. I'm bringing Rosilla with me and we're gonna do a live show when we're in town. That's right. It's gonna be in December. The Bill Simmons podcast will be live in Denver on Wednesday, December 4th. We'll be at the Fillmore Auditorium and you can join us. Tickets go on sale this Friday, November 1st, 10 a.m. Mountain Time. All information will be on the ringer.com slash events page. We hope to see you there.

I can almost guarantee we're going to have a special guest, but, uh, Rosillo loves Denver. He's going to be in a great mood. I love Yokeage. I'm going to be in a great mood. I love Colorado. So does Rosillo. Can't wait. So December 4th live show. See you there. All right, let's start the podcast. JJ coming in first, our friends from ProJump. So

All right, taping this 1140 Eastern Time. John Jastrzemski, a.k.a. JJ, my friend, is in New York City right now. Refused to go to Game 4. Abandoned the Yankees. Abandoned them. Left them on the side of the road like a stray dog.

And they went and they kept the World Series alive and they beat the Dodgers. They killed them, actually. It was a bullpen pitching game for the Dodgers. This new 2020s way of how we do World Series games. I still really enjoyed myself. JJ, have you started to talk yourself into 2004 ALCS, the bizarro version, revenge, comeback? Billy, don't let us get hot.

But don't let us get one. Don't let us get one. Look, you're selling me out here, which is a little unfair. I was at game three. I am bringing our esteemed producer, Stefan, who helps me out all the time with New York, New York for game five. And I did a good deed. I didn't want to go to three straight games. I let my mom and dad go to their first ever World Series game. And I get the good karma of the Yankees avoiding the 1976 sweep.

which was their World Series hiatus from, what was it, 64 to 76. They put a big red machine. They get absolutely smoked. They needed to show some pride tonight. They needed to go out and show me a little bit of fight. And I don't care if it's a bullpen game. I don't care who the Dodgers were throwing. We get the result in New York that we desired, at least for putting off elimination for another day.

A lot of people, your Game 3 podcast has only been up for 24 hours. A lot of people are saying it's the saddest content that's been produced since Manchester by the Sea.

the Casey Affleck movie. I don't know. You were really in a dark place after game three. And you've seen me in a dark place before. I mean, I was superimposed on your couch during wildcard weekend after the dolphins played in what negative 20 degrees. Yeah. Like I think you've heard me and we're in our text thread with Jacko where I get very angry and

and ticked off after these games. That's the way I felt after game one when the manager decides to keep Tim Hill in the bullpen and goes to Esther Cortez, which was managerial malpractice. But yeah, game three was just sad. Like the new Yankee stadium bill

Doesn't have the same energy that the old place once did. That said, 30 minutes before the game, which never happens because you have all these corporate seats, the legends, the whole deal. 30 minutes before the game, everybody was in their seat. Everybody's there for introductions. Everybody's there when Jeter's throwing out the first pitch. The place was ready to go berserk for game three. And it just went right out the window when future first ballot Hall of Famer Freddie Freeman said,

See you later. And it was the minute the ball was hit, you know, it was gone. And the Yankees were dead to rights. And I wondered if we were going to get the same thing in game four when, oh, by the way, they pitched the Freddie Freeman, which if the Yankees are smart, stop pitching this guy. I know Teoscar Hernandez is good. I know the Dodgers got a bunch of dudes. You cannot let Freddie Freeman beat you when he's got home runs now in six consecutive World Series games.

but they fall behind, they get off the mat. And how about Volpe, who has been much maligned, big Yankee prospect, didn't have a big regular season, but he's been solid in the postseason. Bill, when he has that base running gaffe and he doesn't score, I'm like, geez, this is going to haunt him now for the offseason. Changes it with one swing and a bat.

Yeah. And by the way, he probably scores anyway after the base running gaffe, right? It was bad. He would have scored, but the problem was Wells would have gotten the third base. Right, right, right. And you would have had a runner on third with one out and that ground ball from Verdugo, which is what he loves to do, by the way. What an absolute stiff that guy is. I know you hated him. You said you're going to hate this guy for

First month of the year, Jacko and I were talking ourselves into Verdugo. He stinks. I can't believe the Yankees are still playing him. But, you know, the ground ball he hit should have tied the game. He had a good at-bat today when you had the lead near the end of the game. So you're down 3-0. A sweep. I got to say, I was like a pig in shit today because I'm thinking like... That's why you booked me. Who are we kidding? That's why you booked me. You were ready for the funeral. We said win or lose, you're coming on. But there was a scenario where you get swept.

Judge goes over again. Soto goes to the Mets. Judge becomes hit or curse shot, basically. And the Yanks missed their window. And it's a whole winter of, oh my God. And now we can't fire Boone or Cashman because we made the World Series. We're stuck with this team. We're not as good as we were last year. So now at least you won a game. Judge gets going with a crucial RBI up six.

Looking good. Uh, you mean Mr. Uh, Mr. June, you mean Mr. June? Did you see the picture by the way in Los Angeles of Winfield and Aaron judge standing literally right next to each other around the cage? Yeah. Mr. May and Mr. June did. Maybe it's like a height thing. Maybe it's like taller slugger people. Um,

But Smoltz, he had that hit and Smoltz was like, maybe that'll get him going. But, you know, sometimes that does happen where these meaningless games and somebody can kind of relax and unlock a tiny bit. I don't know. Tomorrow you've got Cole versus Flaherty and all the Red Sox fans that I'm on the text thread with are like, fuck, this is going back to LA now because Flaherty can't beat Cole. I'm not as, I'm not as sold.

So Flaherty, it's interesting because in the NLCS against the Mets, he threw a gem in game one. He was in the exact situation that he's going to be in in game five, up three to one, and the Mets pounded him. Alonzo hit a home run in the first inning. He was out of the game in the second and the third inning. He had nothing. I think Flaherty can go either way. Here's the thing with Cole, and I know I'm going to come on the New Yorkers making excuses for the ace of the staff. He's not 100% right.

And that's why in game one, you've been saying that for a while, by the way, he's not because he's not missing bats. He's kind of grinding it through. Like, I'm not going to be surprised at the end of this year if something is announced with Cole. I don't know how serious it might be, but he's kind of gutting this out. Like, that's why what was it? Seventh inning. They basically went out to the mound. Boone didn't yank him right away. They kind of conversed when he was only at, what, like 85 or 90 pitches when I'm like, wow, this is a quick hook.

I don't know if you're getting vintage virtuoso Cole, but he needs to give you six strong. That to me is the pathway for the Yankees to win a game. Six strong. Canely, who's good against lefties, who you didn't see tonight. And then your buddy, Luke Weaver, who you could have had in your fantasy league, who is a little...

He's got a little bit of a screw loose, which I like. I think you kind of need that if you're going to be a successful closer. The guy was a failed starter. He was solid in the Yankee bullpen all year, but then kind of got that role in September and it's kind of hit the ground running. He was nails tonight, Simmons. Those were big, big outs he got for him. The case for a possible comeback.

You couldn't have gotten a worse judge performance so far. Maybe he can actually carry. And if he does anything in game five, the crowd's going to go out of their mind. But then Otani is officially not looking right. And Freeman kind of switched bodies with Otani in a lot of ways. And he's been crushing it. But if Freeman cools off at all with the way Otani looks, all of a sudden that Dodger lineup becomes a little more palatable. And I also wonder like,

Is there some weird karma from the fans that interfered with Mookie Betts? By the way, that was one of the- Those guys are now legends. That was one of the worst interferences I've ever seen in my life because watching it live- What was worse? I can't think of one. Unless they punched Mookie in the face. How would that have been worse? I mean, the guy literally is like sticking his fingers in the glove and you could tell Mookie's like, dude, just get the fuck off me, man. Get the fuck off me. But listen, here's the problem.

There's a pathway for the Yankees getting this back to L.A. I think that's very viable. I think it's very feasible. Yankees hit it home, getting a little bit more confidence with the bats. Volpe, Wells down at the bottom of the order and Flaherty being off this game. The problem I have thinking down the road, Rodon against the Dodger lineup and you were a game two.

He does not match up well. And I think he is mentally weak. I don't trust him at all. And the Yankees have seen Yamamoto twice. I went to the Friday night game in the regular season. He mowed him. You went to the game, game two on Saturday night. He mowed him. That is not a game where I say, wow, the Yankees are set up for success. However, if they get there,

I'll take my chances. Why not? Can I get there? Can I get that? I may actually get on the plane Friday. Well, join the Yankees. They might let me on the charter. You never know. I'll tell you, somebody has been in this spot as a fan, JJ, when you're down three, nothing, and you feel like all hope is gone. And then you steal that fourth game. And then all of a sudden that fifth game, and then you're hopping on a plane. That pressure for the home team in that game six is pretty intense. That was the famous game.

where A-Rod slapped Arroyo. Well, I was there. You don't have to tell me. I was in the right field bleachers. And this is pre-cell phone. This is pre-Twitter. So being in crummy seats at the old Yankee Stadium, even though I love the right field bleachers, there was nothing like it. One of the most rowdy places you'll ever watch a game. Nobody knew that A-Rod slapped the ball. And as you know, as a diehard Red Sox fan and somebody who filmed a documentary on the 2004 ALCS,

They had two replay reviews before replay reviews were a thing. I mean, they didn't do this in baseball. They did it on the bell horn play down the left field line. And then everyone at Yankee stadium is like, wow, this is, this is how the Red Sox are going to lose this year with A-Rod slapping a ball. Cause in the outfit, you're thinking he just ran right into him. And we know unfortunately how that went, but when was it for you?

that you start because you had 86 years it is your father all the history in New England when was the moment for you it wasn't in game four I don't believe it was in game four when did you start to believe game five

At some point in game five. That was an epic game. Maybe because I was like almost, my nervous system was shutting down. But by the time we got to game six, when that review happened of the A-Rod play, that was where the 86 years of history comes in, where of course they're going to review it and decide it's, oh no, it's fine. And then the Yankees get the play and that's just how it goes with the Red Sox. That brought back like Ed Armbrister and Carlton Fisk, like all this shit from the past.

And when that went the Red Sox way, it became one of those, oh, yeah.

Okay. But I mean, the way we were running through pitchers in those four games, you just felt, you never felt safe. Even when we had that huge lead in game seven, didn't feel safe because we just, we had put so much miles on the pitching staff, which I think you're going to be in the same situation if this keeps going because you're going to need 40 pitches from Leiter and from Weaver every game. And that's just the way it's going to go if you win four straight. They have an off day if they could ever win game five.

And if I'm not mistaken, the Red Sox and the Yankees did not have an off day. No, no, no, because we had the rain. The rain before game three, yeah. And I remember that game was an afternoon game, game five. It was like a four or five o'clock game. I remember I ran a track meet, hustled home, watched the game. It was like four or five o'clock.

Simmons, the game was going until like 11, 30, 12 o'clock. And then the Red Sox were all giddy. They're chugging their Jack Daniels. And the Yankees had no pitching. That was the dirty little secret for the Yankees. After Messina in game five, they had Lieber who was okay. But game seven, it was either the corpse of Kevin Brown, who was a stiff. And then they're going to Vasquez out of the bullpen because El Duque was hurt. El Duque getting hurt was a huge underrated factor that cost the Yankees that series. But

But yeah, it's problematic. But the off day, get length out of Cole, find a way, and then, hey, put all the pressure on the Dodgers. So this is even better than a sweep that you got sucked back in after your Manchester by the Sea podcast. It beats the alternative. I'd rather have the hope and be sucked in going to a game than get swept. I mean, they got swept by the Astros two years ago, and it was like,

It felt different because it was like, put me out of my misery. I know I'm going to sound like a spoiled rotten Yankee fan. That's fine. I'm going to do that. 15 years, not going to the World Series, Bill.

That's a long time, man. There's 20 year olds that don't remember Yankees World Series. You will not believe. So I did a show Saturday night after the Yankees clinched the pennant. And I had so many young Yankee fans calling in Yankee fans like under the age of 27 that were just like head over heels. So giddy and so excited because they're like, JJ, you don't get it. We don't know what this feels like. The last time we were in the World Series as Yankee fans.

I was six. I was seven. I was eight. I'm like, right. You guys are making it as someone that lived through the whole nineties and the two thousands. And now I'm getting up there in age. Kind of made me feel old, Bill. I'm not going to lie, man. It's like when you talk to the Dolphin fans who remember the last time they won a playoff game.

In 1994. No, 2001. Thanks. Thanks. 2001. It was the idiot, liquored-up kicker game with Vandercat. Yeah, that's right. Peyton Manning. Dolphins and Fielder beating Peyton Manning. May never see another one again. On a scale of 1 to 10, how much do New York Yankee fans like this Yankee team? Like a 7? It's somewhere in the middle. I think...

They're never going to be in love with management. And I think it's kind of, for those of you who watch the Simpsons, you know, when Mr. Burns puts the sign up in Homer's office, don't forget you're here forever. That's kind of how they feel with Cashman and Boone. They're here forever. And now that they've gone to the World Series, you don't love it. It's another four years at least. No, guaranteed. Every bit of it. But the Yankee fan loves Soto. Not likes. Loves Soto. They like Cole. They want Judge to be the man. And

I think everything about Aaron Judge is amazing. He's a great dude. He's a great leader. All the kids want to be him. He's performed in the regular season, but I think he's the guy now that whenever this goes south, he's going to get his MVP award. You know, he's going to be doing the media tour in a month from now. But if he does not have another moment or two in this postseason, it's going to be such a classic. Yeah, but yeah. And that, yeah, but

would only go up times one million if he's not teammates with Juan Soto. I think, Bill, if the Yankees re-sign Juan Soto in the offseason, because there's this angst

The Mets weren't a serious player for Judge because Cohen got the team. I think he wanted to play nice with Hal. They were never really in on Judge. Yeah. They will be really in on Soto. They're going to offer Soto $550, $600 million. It's going to be an outrageous contract. And what choice do the Yankees have? You're going to let this guy who's 25 and is a future Hall of Famer as a hitter leave when you're not trying to win a championship. So I gave you a long-winded answer. The

The Yankee fan, I think, is going to like this team that much more once they know Soto is going to be a part of it for years to come. I think there's that angst at the moment. I think the Dodgers have to be considered to be in play for Soto too, right? I can't see it, man. They have all that Otani money deferred. It's basically like they have money to spend right now on somebody. But if they win the World Series this year,

If we're living in a world where they go and they win the World Series, are they going to have that sense of urgency? I kind of get the sense that Boris, that was a John Heyman story. Kind of feel like Boris leaked that to his pal. Oh, I do. I think it's like, hey, everyone's saying Yankees, Mets. Come on, Johnny. Go drum up the Dodger interest in Soto. I'd be stuck. Giants to me are more feasible because they're desperate.

The Giants have not gotten a big free agent in forever. They missed out on Aaron Judge. I'd be more worried about them than the Dodgers, personally. So I heard the vibe, the like hour and a half to an hour to a half hour before the game today was that the vibe was weird in the stadium. What is game five going to be like now? Oh, I think far more energetic. Yeah. Because you're coming off a win. Like,

I don't expect the vibe in any stadium to be good if you're down 3-0. I mean, you've been in a ton of buildings where you're down 3-0. What do you expect the fan to be? In 0-4, the vibe was we don't want to get fucking swept. That's the way I felt tonight. Don't get swept. Don't get swept.

But I don't think anybody had illusions of if we get this three more, it was just like they beat us 19, eight game three. And it was like, please don't get swept. Don't get embarrassed. These guys beat us last year. Let's not get swept. And then it just kind of builds from there. But that's the, that's the genesis of it. And the problem for me with the Yankees, you guys are so bad at certain things that are these key essential playoff baseball things like the base running and defense and,

you know, the manager, the fundamentals, just like basic shit. You need to just keep winning playoff rounds and you're just kind of winning despite all of these things as I keep watching.

And it would just be weird if that was a World Series team that makes this many self-inflicted mistakes. I think it's totally fair. And listen, it was very costly in game one. I know the decision that Boone made going to Cortez is something that I roasted him on for an hour and a half. It was horrible. It's as bad as it gets, but it should have never gotten to that point. Soto, who I love, and I want to resign him and I give him a zillion dollars.

He is a butcher in the outfield. The idea that he was nominated for a gold glove is an outcry.

absolute farce. How can anybody watch that guy and tell me he's a gold glove caliber outfielder? Quique Hernandez hit a ball game one. Should have been a double. He misplays it into a triple. And then in the eighth inning, they scored the tying run because Gleyber Torres, who I got to be fair, he's been very good this postseason. He had a big home run tonight. He's done a good job in the leadoff spot. His baseball IQ stinks, whether it's in the field, whether it's on the bases. This is something that has drove Yankee fans crazy for the last five years.

He doesn't block a ball. And yeah, you're right. Like they run the bases terribly. They're an average defensive team. They have some really good defenders. Like it's not that they're all butchers. Like Rizzo is a very good first baseman. Volpe defensively is a very good shortstop. You could throw out base runners. Yeah. Wells behind a point is a good catcher. And I give Chisholm a lot of credit. He's never played third base before. And they literally traded for him and said, Hey, you're the third baseman. And yeah,

It's not been perfect, but he hasn't made a total ass of himself. But yeah, that's not a team from like a base running fundamentals, baseball IQ standpoint that you say, wow, that looks like a World Series winner. Totally fair. So you've had this pod with us for like three, four years. I can't even remember. At least three, right? 2011. 2021. Yeah. Yeah. So this New York stretch, this has been by far the most fun stretch of the pod. But where does it rank now?

like last 25 years for New York sports with all the shit going on, because even the teams, like you have the jets who are two and six, but have been like a content machine. You have the giants who have the hard knocks that the unintentional comedy is through the roof. Um, there, there,

The owner claims he's not getting rid of the coach in the gym, but he probably is. You have the Knicks with all the big trades. You have the Nets basically gutting their team and trying to go for a draft. Like, it's just everywhere. And you have the Mets making the run. Everywhere you look, there's like New York storylines, which is kind of what we were hoping when we launched the pod, right? I mean, this is like the nirvana. So...

I always was jealous of our buddy Francesca and doggy that they got to live through the late nineties where they got the Knicks with Riley into Van Gundy, the Yankees dynasty, the Mets with Piazza. And I'm like, when am I going to get that in my career? Cause I go back to 20, 2011 is when I started doing radio. So I've been doing stuff in the market for a decade, been doing the pod here with the ringer for three and a half years doing TV and

This has been my favorite time as a sports professional in New York City. It's not even close, Bill. It's not even close. You had the Yankees in the World Series.

You had the Mets come out of nowhere, absolute nowhere, double-digit games under .500, winning the playoffs to get in the playoffs on the final day of the year in like the most dramatic way imaginable with Lindor. Then Alonzo in the wild card, they're down to their last out, and he hits a home run to go and give him the lead, and you get a crazy grimace, OMG, all that stuff. The Knicks are the most fun they've been since the Patrick Ewing days.

Not that I'm a big hockey guy, but the Rangers were in the cup final. And you're right. The football teams, as crummy as they may be, it always seems to be something. So yeah, full circle. This is the most enjoyable, like 12 month run I've had doing New York sports content as a broadcaster. As good as it gets. Just wait until the Giannis Nicks trade rumors start as soon as OG's contract is tradable.

And now all of a sudden you got little towns and OG for Giannis and a contract. And that, that momentum starts. Talk to your buddy, doc, about that one. Try to make that one happen. It might be happening if they keep looking like a absolute crap. All right. So predictions, when do the Yankees get bounced? Like they're going to get it back. No, I'm going to be honest. I'm going to be very honest. They're going to get it back to California and lose game six. Okay. I think they will have a moment with Cole.

Maybe Judge actually has a moment. What a concept that would be. They'll get the off day. I'll really start to believe. And Rodan will get shelled for seven runs. That's my prediction. Dodgers in six. So game tomorrow, off day, 24 hours of hype, hope. Are you going to go to LA? Well, I don't want to miss it. This happened 20 years ago. Blah, blah, blah.

And then, uh, I mean, even making it to a game six has never happened in world series history, but 21 teams just finished the sweep three, got it to game five and then, and then, uh, won it. And no team has been down three, nothing even gotten a game six.

So that's not nothing, but not something you'll be telling your grandkids about either. No, I get that. But they'll save some face, this team, at least if they're down three, I want to get it back to LA. Like I, I'm not saying it will be easy to stomach, but it won't diminish the achievement. I know the bar has been lowered considerably in Yankee land, like getting to the world series. Now you're like, are you?

They haven't made the World Series in 15 years. Ask Jacko. He came on with you last week. I don't think you understand how bad it's been for Yankee standards here. He's caught it in achievement to make the World Series, though. The New York Yankees. It's a step in the right direction. 27 World Series? Yeah. I can't say it's a fail. And unlike the Lakers, you don't cheat and count, like, titles from other cities. Minnesota titles. Yeah. Minnesota titles. But, like, you can't say it's a failed season, can you?

No, you made the World Series. That's what I mean. I'm not saying that I'm pumping my chest saying, yeah, A.L. Pennant, A.L. Chance. Well, that's great because now I know that the 2003 losing to Florida, I guess, was now a huge success. By the way, that World Series bothers me

so much and it never gets talked about. That 2003 World Series made me so sick to my stomach. David Wells out of shape, not being able to pitch in game five. And they all we were we were hung over from the Red Sox. Finish the damn series. He wants to the Florida Marlins. I see Beckett with a lot of everyone killed McKee and he started Beckett on three days rest in game six. Everyone was like, are you nuts? This is the dumbest managerial move ever.

He throws a complete game shutout. McKeon is smoking cigars on a Yankee stadium field. So, listen, let's get to tomorrow. That's where I'm focused, Simmons. The most shocking Yankees one was when the Diamondbacks actually beat Rivera. I think that's the most shocked I've ever been by a baseball game, that somebody could actually make Rivera...

just get winning runs off of Rivera when he was at the all-time invincible, unhittable. And just even as it was happening, it was like, I just can't believe what I'm watching right now. And that was when Soriano in the eighth inning hit a ball off of Curt Schilling. The ball was literally at his ankles. Hits the home run, gives the Yankees the lead. It's like, holy shit, they're going to win again. But they got so outplayed in that series. Like they won game four last out.

Came five, last out, be young, young Kim. Remember him melting down on the Yankees? Well, that is the thing. They had the melting down closer and you also had all the 9-11 stuff that it just felt like it was team destiny. Inevitable. Yeah, inevitable. And Rivera on the mound, three more outs and we're done. And I just, my jaw was dropped. And even I, as much as I hate the Yankees, was kind of

semi-rooting for them. Yeah, that was one you would have been okay with. You would have been okay with that one. I really, I got caught up a little bit, like the two comebacks, the Brocious and Tino. And, you know, it was cool. I thought the city really needed it. They did. And that game five, no better sporting event I've ever attended. And that includes the six overtime game. Doesn't get better than that. JJ, John Jastrzemski, who hosts the New York, New York podcast. Hope you're listening to it as well as

the ringer gambling show and the ringer Sunday pregame show, which we do on Sundays with the cuz and with house and with Raheem. Who knows? I might even make a stop by this week. Uh, you want some advice? Unload your mortgage on Buffalo against Miami this week. I don't care how ratty it might be. Have you Buffalo, Miami? You know, what's gone on the last 10 years. Come on. Easy money. All right, JJ. Good to see you. Where's the black belt? Thanks. I know. Thanks bud.

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This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. The NBA is back and you know what that means. So is Michelob Ultra Courtside. It gets fans closer to the game, the stories, the players, the celebrations, and it's a pretty damn good beer. Stock up your fridge with Michelob Ultra and be ready for the big plays all season long. Learn how to get closer to the action by visiting MichelobUltra.com slash Courtside.

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What do you want to be? I'm a professor. Yeah, I like that. Let's do that. I am technically a professor here at the University of Texas. So maybe that's not even a gimmick, but I like it. Well, I like it for the pod. Like the professor is here. We want to talk NBA. We've had a week not counting tonight's games. You know, everybody does like overreactions. And to me, it's more of trying to stay calm.

and noticing things that have jumped out of the TV to me one way or the other. So we're going to get into a whole bunch of that. But I just asked you, come up with five things. It could be any list you want. You wanted to do five important developments, even though we're only one weekend. But the thing is, what is the season? Like 25 weeks?

Yeah, I was trying to think. Yeah, I was trying to think about that in NFL terms. They have 17 weeks now. I feel like we have to have like 30 weeks or something. Yeah, whatever it is. I mean, the thing about overreactions, you can see some things that go, ooh.

Like Denver's bench is like, oh, anyway, five important developments. Start us off. What do you want to hit first? Well, you just started us off. I have the Denver Nuggets, Bill Simmons. The Denver Nuggets might be in big trouble. That's my first development. And I think it has a lot to do with something I wouldn't have predicted with any Nikola Jokic team just a few years ago. And that's their shooting numbers. They ranked 28th.

an effective field goal percentage. You mentioned they're very thin. I think they're particularly thin when it comes to one emerging skill in pro basketball, which is shooting three-point shots. They let KCP go famously. This is after letting Jeff Green and Bruce Brown get away previous to that. And then, of course, they imported Russell Westbrook to a team that already ranked last in three-point attempts

last season. So here we are with Westbrook on that team. And the numbers maybe shouldn't have surprised us. But the Russell Westbrook thing, especially has been a debacle in the 58 minutes he's played. They have a net rating of negative 30. And in 91 minutes, he hasn't played their plus 11, which is a lot more nuggets like. So that's my first one. I mean, this is a team that a lot of us thought could compete for the championship. And certainly early, it doesn't look like they have the offense to do that.

Yeah, it's a respect for the stuff they've done the last few years, respect for the fact that they have one of the three or four best players in the league. Depending where you want to put them, you could put them first. When we did the over-under odds,

I ended up going over, did not feel great about it. It was really just a respect for Jokic thing. But, you know, when, when the over under was, I think it was 51 and a half, something like that. As we were like a month away from the season, it seemed really high with all the things that were in flux. What's interesting though, every single thing that was in flux or I'm a little worried about this or, eh, what if that doesn't,

It feels like they're nine for nine with it going the wrong way against them, right? Murray looks okay. He doesn't look like the Murray from, you know, two years ago. Porter does not look the same. Gordon, the shooting thing becomes even more drastic when nobody can shoot. All the guys they were counting on off on the bench of the role players, uh,

I don't really think any of their shots are going to go in. Like Brown had that big shot in the overtime game last night in the corner wide open. I didn't think it was going in. And then you see Jokic having to take this huge offensive burden now where he's 40, 40 both nights. That's not who he wants to be. No.

No, it's almost like those LeBron teams in Cleveland where he had nothing the first time he was in Cleveland. He can do that, but he's not put on this earth to do that. He's put on his earth to make everybody else around him better. And they're really sort of Peter principling Christian Brown. He's he's he's being promoted to this level of expectation that it is not suited for him. And again, it goes back to this front office thing.

Not being able to build a really deep bench around somebody I would say is the best player in the world right now, particularly on offense. So I think this is a failure for us.

a front office to build particularly spacing around this offensive savant, a guy that almost beat Team USA single-handedly in the Olympics this summer, Bill. And we show up. Yeah, Jamal Murray's not who he used to be. Michael Porter Jr.'s off to a slow start. Aaron Gordon's never been a floor spacer. So what do you do around that? You got to find shooting. And they just haven't done it. And in fact, they did the opposite by importing probably the most

infamous jump shooter of our time in Russell Westbrook. And it's been woeful and it's been really harsh to see. And so I just don't think they're a contender with this group we've seen in week one. It really bums me out. And they've taken some swings because on the one hand, you could call them a little cheap for having, I think he's the best player in the world. I would also understand if somebody else wanted to really make a strong Luka case, whatever. But I still think Jokic has the belt.

But, you know, they gave Zeke Najee, gave him this four year deal, right? That he's making nine million a year. You look even like, how do they fix this? It's really hard to make trades with them, you know, because I thought like the trade that made the most sense in my head right away was something with Michael Porter and Zach Levine.

I was like, Zach Levine's kind of, this is a different look for them. Makes them a little smaller, but he brings some stuff that they need. He can create his own shot. Not everything has to go through Jokic. He's a good three point shooter. He's not good defensively, but that's fine because maybe your offense will get so much better. It's not going to matter.

but you can't even do trade. That's not a straight up trade that works. You have to put Zeke Najee in it. You have to use like the bulls trade exception. And then the question is, well, why would the bulls want Michael Porter and Zeke Najee? So I don't even really know how they make the team better. They don't have anybody in that mid range level, like that 12 to 20 million type of player that you could flip. And the bucks are in a similar position too, but, uh,

I don't know what the move is to fix this, I think is a bigger issue for me. I don't see one and I don't think there is one coming. And I think one of the only moves is to make Jokic do all of the stuff that he doesn't like to do, specifically the three-point shooting. And if you look at their three-point shooting without Jokic, the numbers get even bleaker. So I know that you've been talking a little bit about Jokic losing his three-point shot in the summer. It looks like it's back.

It's unfair for this dude to also be the Steve's best floor spacer. That can't be, that can't be the answer. We can't have the guy being the best rebounder, the best playmaker and your best three point shooter. He is the MVP three of the last four years, but even that's too much to ask for Nicole. The Oakish at this point. Well, the other thing with that, it looks good now because it's we're four games into this season.

But you saw it last year, like his legs started to go during the playoffs and he, he just, the three point shot wasn't the same. He defenses are clearly like, we want you to shoot this now. Right. It's a, go ahead and knock yourself out. If you go four for 10 from there, fine, whatever. Cause we, we're also covering all this other stuff.

But the fact that Porter hasn't gotten better. And I really wonder like, did the stuff that happened with his brother, like how much did that affect them? How much off court baggage is in there with how he just doesn't look the same. He's had a bunch of injuries over the years, but,

To me, he just doesn't look like dynamic. Like I would take, I really like watching the Hawks, even though they're not that good. You could talk me into like four Hawks wings over Michael Porter Jr. At this point. So the fact that he's just not even an impact player in any way combined with all this other stuff, it's, I know everybody's been talking about the nuggets, but this is really important. This is one of the, this is probably the best part of his generation is

I also feel like that might have chipped out. They won the title 17 months ago. They won the title 17 months ago. We're going to talk about them. They have the best player in the world, according to many of us. And then one of the weirdest things I've seen early this season is a head coach pining for a player that left the team, a Contavious called Will Pope, who would solve some of these problems, but he's repeatedly mentioned this, and there's some tension reportedly between the coaching staff and the front office. By the way, that's not reported. I think...

there's definitely tension because those rumors were flying around. And then right as the season starts, he comes out and it's like, you know, it'd really be nice. Contavious Caldwell Pope. Like you don't do that shit unless there's some deep rooted stuff going on. Yeah, I agree. And I'd never seen, I don't know. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong. I haven't seen a coach be like, man, we really could use that guy back. Like that just, that's just, you know, nobody does that. So I think there's,

I think there's a revelation there that they just don't have enough pieces, particularly on that perimeter. And then Michael Porter Jr. is being asked to be more than he is because Contavious isn't there anymore. So it's just all a symptom, I think, of poor team building there. Yeah, Michael Porter is basically 13-7.

He's not going to create shots for anybody else. His three point shot is going to have a little variance to it. Murray's at 17 a game through the three games. He did get the game time basket that sent the game to overtime last night where he looked like old school Murray a little bit. But I wonder, like, do you feel when somebody is doing the same thing over and over and over and over again for years?

I'm not saying the play is stoppable now, but we've just had so many reps with it that the defenses at least have somewhat of a sense of what to do. And then when they're shooting around Murray and Jokic together as an awesome, it just feels like not as unstoppable as it did two years ago to me. Dude, when that ball is falling, find in Russell Westbrook after those passing sequences, it's just not as scary. Yeah. There's a, there's a,

there's another defender that doesn't really have to you know pay attention to the corner or to the wing than normally had to so yeah it's a lot easier to defend when there's not contavious out there and i know i'm beating a dead horse but that's the thing it's not just the possessions where they end up draining the three it's the one where they thin you out uh and it's a backdoor cut for aaron gordon and suddenly that plays easier to defend so yeah i think there's these ecological impacts

But the bottom line is you're not going to win the NBA title, Bill Simmons, in 2025 if you're the worst three-point shooting team in the NBA. You're not going to do it. And I'm not saying that's where they're going. Especially when OKC and Boston are in the league. 100%. And yeah, I just think it's a tale of two cities in terms of building a deep roster over the last two NBA championship teams. Boston has done it. Credit to Brad Stevens. Denver has not. The other thing I wonder...

So you're talking about the Cronkies who own multiple sports franchises who won a team, won a title a couple years ago, right? So it's not like they're like, oh man, we're going to do whatever it takes for Nuggets to win a title. They won the title. They also have a best player

who is not going to be exactly leaking stuff to reporters and doing passive aggressive or being like i don't know i don't know how long i'm going to be here if we're not committed to winning they're spending money but they're not really spending money and the people i've talked to in the league everyone's kind of shocked that they weren't more all in on this yokage murray window you know and caldwell pope there's been reports about oh he took

You know, he basically could have had either offer. He chose the Orlando offer, but that's also one they maybe could have locked up a year ago or done a better job. But they clearly thought, no, no, our young guys can step up into that spot. He only averaged eight points a game in the playoffs last year. It just feels like they're not lavishly spending the way like the Celtics are spending right now. Maybe that's not the perfect path either. Celtics are going to be 100 million, you know,

over the luxury tax, whatever the hell it is. But at least as a Celtics fan, I'm like, my owners give a shit. They're spending. They want to win the title again. I don't think Denver fans can say that. It certainly doesn't. And that KCP transaction or lack thereof, I think is a very good sort of proving point for that. And yeah, they just don't have

the aaron gordon yes great transaction a few years ago jamal murray is slipping michael porter jr isn't as good as i thought he'd be at this point in his career uh and and below that line of four guys that we can all picture that's that's the exact part that the the celtics have gotten right the spurs used to get right the fourth through twelve yeah because

because you have to have those guys. And a lot of times, Bill, those guys are your shooters. Those are your spacers. You mentioned the bench early. That's just the exact part where they're letting Jokic and the fans down is they're just not doing four through 12, right? I still love watching Jokic. I watched a lot of the game last night.

This is a fascinating version of him because like, if you look at the scoring title right now, and that was one of the things I wrote down, I was just like, Hmm, um, the scoring title has Yoke, agent Davis near the top after a week. I don't think that's going to last. I think Luca is going to end up winning it. But Cam Thomas shoots 28 times a game. Like the, to me, the scoring title could go nine directions. I do wonder, will this be a career high for Yoke edge from a scoring standpoint? Like, will he get to like 29 a game? Cause I think he's going to have to.

If he didn't score 41 the other night against the Clippers, they were going to be in bigger trouble than they already were. And he had to score 40 for them to win an OT in Toronto, which isn't exactly a juggernaut right now. He has to do this. There's just no other options. And again, I think the analogy is LeBron in the pre-Miami era where he had to do a lot of the work as a scorer himself. So I think

So you're talking about Mo Williams, Antoine Jamison, Blashtop Shack. Yeah, that era. Was Drew Gooden? I can't remember if it was something. Definitely Drew Gooden. Yeah, so I think that's not a good comp. Anytime we're talking about that roster for that player who is a very gifted player at that time in the 2000s, that's not a good comp for Calvin Booth and the Denver Nuggets front office.

Well, here's my question. And the Bucs might be coming up as one of your other developments. Are you more worried about the Bucs or the Nuggets? Because I'm more worried about the Nuggets than the Bucs. Because with the Bucs, you can at least talk yourself into it. Well, when Chris Middleton comes back, they'll at least be able to defend wings. Maybe not that great, but way better than how they're doing it. Right now, the Bucs problem is...

Any guard who can get into the paint and any wing who can get in the paint can do whatever the fuck they want against the bucks. It's like, it's like an all you can eat buffet. What do you want to do? Do you want to shoot a floater? Do you want to get to the rim? Do you want to do a stop? And then a step back three, everything's that you want to post somebody up, come play the bucks. And I don't know how they fix it. They're atrocious defensively. Middleton will make it a little better. I don't know what the fix is for the nuggets.

Yeah, well, I think one of those two stars is more likely to ask out than the other one. So I'm going to say I'm more worried about the Milwaukee Bucks. And that is my actually my next developing friend. So I don't know if you want to do that now. Let's do it now. Yeah.

because it is a very similar situation, but on the opposite end of the court. I mean, just like we sort of started to associate Nikola Jokic with just offensive efficiency in a can. If you have them on the court, you're a top 10 offense. That's somehow not happening in Denver this year. The opposite was true, I thought, with Giannis and Brooke in Milwaukee, especially in the Bud era. But their defense is garbage right now, Bill. And I think

They have a good chance of starting two and five or one in six. And they are losing to teams, including the Chicago Bulls. They couldn't stop Kobe White or Zach Levine in that game. They lost to the Brooklyn Nets, which was one of the more eye-popping results of this young season. But also not eye-popping because I was like, I forget what the line was, but it was high for the Bucs. And I'm like,

Man, I bet the Nets could like give the Bucs a game. I just feel like anybody who has wing scores and point guards that can create are a problem for the Bucs. They should never be favored by 11 over anybody. Well, then Peyton Pritchard comes out and looks like Klay Thompson against them from 2015. So you're exactly right. You nailed it. They can't stop perimeter offense, which is not Mike Budenholzer's era.

uh, Bucs team and certainly not drew holidays or a Bucs defense. Uh, last year, I think, well, and buds last year, Milwaukee ranked number one. This is an ancient history. They ranked number one in defense two years ago. Yeah. They ranked 19 last year. That was a lost season, but early this year, they're 26. Uh, and it's, it's the nature of it. It's

It's the open threes they're giving up. It's the drive and finish from the perimeter players. It's Damian Lillard not doing his job and nobody covering up in rotations. The lack of Chris Middleton is being felt to some extent.

But this is an Eastern Conference that's less forgiving than it has been. And I'm pretty worried about the Milwaukee Bucks because I've also heard some intel that the vibes aren't great there either with some of their top tier talent. And, you know, I don't know if it's Giannis or Damian or Chris or whatever. The bottom line is they might start one and six and their defense might be bottom 10. And that's not a recipe for long term success.

And the big picture question, did they just get passed by a couple of teams? Like I watched that Orlando, Indiana game last night, which I want to talk about at some point as we're talking here. And those teams are just really young and really athletic and have multiple options and really fun lineups they can put together. And they're built around guys who can create shots. And if Paolo is going to keep doing what he's doing,

I just like Orlando ceiling more than Milwaukee as a regular season team, much less a playoff team. I, we talked about it before the season when we did the over under pod and I brought up Yana straight stuff a couple of times. And I think people thought I was being a dick about it. This is stuff that's been going around for a year and they can deny it. He can deny it, but it comes down to the basic premise of the guy wants to compete for titles. And if he doesn't feel comfortable,

like everything around him is title worthy. At some point, he's going to go to a place that he wants to compete, that he'll be able to compete for titles. I look at this Bucks team and I, and it's really hinging on Middleton who hasn't been a hundred percent healthy in three years. Right. And he's 33 years old. They have an old team in general. And now you're putting all this pressure on the Middleton piece, which it can't be ruled out, but

I wouldn't bet on it. And I love what you said with Sal the other day about our LeBron and Tom Brady sort of deforming our ideas of aging curves. You know, like there are these two examples of just once in a generation competitors that...

also just broke aging curves. And Chris Middleton's a great example. This is a normal 33, 34-year-old season. Like there's going to be this, Brooke Lopez is getting up there, like under normal circumstances, we would be ready for this. And I think age is a big factor. By the way, Damian Lillard, not exactly a young player anymore. I think

this is an old basketball team and you've studied this for years they don't do well especially aging guards like damian lillard this is not unusual to see this exact thing happen and i hate trade demand stuff i hate trade demand gossip but that intel is out there folks the the honest stuff is out there

leave it to other people to talk about the deals and stuff like that. But you're exactly right. I think there's a world where, where this, he's the next big domino to drop in that kind of trade demand. Um, you know, the Knicks were waiting on it last year.

And then he ended up doubling down. They did the Dame trade and I think they had to audible to other stuff they had planned. I also wouldn't rule the Knicks out long-term with Giannis to begin with. Like they have the Towns piece that would work as the contract. I don't, I went through all the teams again. I was on a text thread with some friends talking about it today. And I don't really know what the team is if you're talking about titles, which we talked about when we did the over-under pod last month. There's not like the perfect fit

But I know that dude doesn't want to be irrelevant. And just like little shit like him not being on the Christmas Day game, it's not nothing, right? You're not on one of the 10 most interesting teams in the league anymore. Also, you don't really have a chance, doesn't seem like, to win a title unless there's some roster changes. But the Dame, the one thing with this is the Dame thing I feel like was...

Pretty predictable because he had stopped playing defense for a few years. And then the Middleton...

Just him getting hurt three years in a row. Like he hasn't been healthy since that 2021 playoffs. So, um, and they missed on some draft picks, which is the other piece of this. The Celtics did a good job with a couple of their fringe guys that they found Hauser, Cornette, Pritchard, like guys that even the Tillman trade last year, guys, they can plug in who can eat some innings for them. And the Bucks haven't found that.

It's so funny to bring that up because I remember in 2022, May of 2022, not ancient history, sitting at TD before that Grant Williams game, right? And you think back to that. I remember talking to people around me and being like, it feels like we're going to watch these two teams play big playoff games for the entire decade, doesn't it? And it just felt like that. Like that was just a rivalry we were going to get started.

the thing and and what did brad stevens do in the last few years he turned grant williams and time lord and smart and brogdon into this new deeper than ever basketball team that won the championship and milwaukee's kind of gone the other way in that same time period um and i i just it just doesn't feel right and they're old and the other thing about the damien deal much like the beal

deal is that paralyzes your ability to trim around the edges, to build small pieces around there. That's a big number. And in this new CB era, Bill, nobody wants to talk about the nerdy stuff. Just know that it's really hard to build a team when you have one of these $60 million players on your cap. Right. And the Celtics got off two guys when their value was probably higher than who they were as players, right? Grant

And most importantly, Marcus Smart, who I think had a lot of miles on him. They sniffed it out. Everyone went nuts when they traded him. I was probably on the side of people defending it because I was just like, I just think he's hitting maybe a different point in his career. And he gets hurt last year, which is fluky. But this year you watch him and it's not the Marcus Smart from three, four years ago. This is the shit that happened. So one of the Bucks mistake was they moved on. It feels like the wrong guy.

Right. They used drew, they basically drew became the fall guy for the two disappointing playoff performances. And then they kept the rest of the nucleus and maybe they would have been better off, uh,

I don't know, come up with a different plan. It's hard to rule out Giannis. He still won it, just like it's hard to rule out Jokic. But dude, yeah, I think they, yeah, so they lost the 1-8 series and Miami just destroyed Drew Holiday. I mean, Jimmy Butler did do a lot of damage to Drew Holiday in that series. And Milwaukee overreacted. I mean, I'm a Spur guy, you know that.

Spurs lost an 8-1 series at some point during their run to Memphis. They lost to Memphis. Yeah, it was in 2011. Did they fire Pop? Did they trade Tony? No, they didn't do that stuff. They said, God, that sucked. Like, we got our asses kicked. Let's get better and come back next year. They didn't overreact. And I think Milwaukee kind of... You know what they did? Is that they did the George Hill trade that year. That was their overreaction was they traded their fifth best player, not their second best player.

But yeah, I don't think that's going to age well, that period. Because Giannis was hurt in that series too. And it's like, okay, guys, you're not going to win the championship every year. Like even the Spurs dynasty, they won five out of like 16 chances. Like you're not going to do it. You're not going to do Jordan once. The other thing I think they missed, I was talking to somebody about this the other day, that I just, as I've said a million times, I think the league is better. And these teams that you would put together that would look like a 2018 contender,

I don't think that's conceivable anymore. Even look at like the Lakers have looked pretty good for the first four games.

That's not just about LeBron and AD. Reeves is playing really well. Rui is playing really well. The coach is a huge upgrade from last year's coach, it seems like so far. Some of their role guys have been okay, but it's not just the two guys. And that was what made the Celtics so special last year. That's what made the Mavs have realized we got to go nine deep. You got to use the regular season a certain way.

And then you see the Bucs and it's like so much pressure is on Giannis and Dame having like a 35 point game. And then what's plan B if those things don't happen? I don't know. I still like their ceiling with the Middleton piece, but you could also tell me he's never gonna be the guy again. And I would believe that too. The Nuggets, I have a much harder time. The Nuggets basically come down to, can Murray get back to where he was?

And if you're going to tell me he's going to get back to where he was, I'm feeling better even with the lack of shooting. He saved their asses in that Toronto game in his home area there. That was a good sign. He is one of the, yeah, he has a gear and he has that clutch gene that so many guys don't have, but he hasn't looked good in a while, particularly in the field of play. He doesn't look good for what we're, you know, I had him probably like 22nd in the ringer hundred this summer, you know, and I don't know if I'd put him in the top 25. All right, let's take a quick break.

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Well, you're just talking about it. And our friend JJ Redick looks like a good NBA coach. And you were talking about it. I think the Lakers look like a different group.

And it's really interesting. I think JJ has found something. And if you followed it closely or even talked to him in the summer, he was obsessed with how can I get more out of Anthony Davis, Bill? And early on, one of the developing things right now is that he's found a way. And Anthony looks as good as he's ever looked as a Laker, maybe outside of the bubble so far. And I think

you know playing through anthony on offense giving him more responsibility has worked so far but it's more than that i think jj's also done a great job of getting the role players to feel invested um to feel like they're part of the the group and i think he's designing atos that end with you know austin reeves or ruey getting a good look uh he knows the tricks i know he's been a role player uh and i think

that you couldn't ask for a better first week. I know they're three and one and not four and O, but this is a great start for JJ Redick. And not everybody was predicting that, by the way. You didn't have to look very far in our world to find somebody who's like, oh, JJ doesn't know what he's doing. This is gonna be a disaster. Well, through one week at least, it's not a disaster in Los Angeles. Yeah, if you had to tell me...

bet on disaster or a great coach, I probably would have bet on disaster just because I just think it's really hard to be a coach. And there's a whole bunch of stuff that goes with it, including how you deal with your best players, how you deal with the media day in, day out. I've been super impressed and I haven't gone to a game yet, so I haven't seen it in person, but they look really crisp.

I like the plays that he designs coming out of timeouts. Like there's just little subtle shit where you can tell, oh, this team knows what they're doing. Last night against the Suns, LeBron had a bad game. He didn't have it last night. And I think in the past, they wouldn't have kind of moved the car keys away from him.

And JJ has already shown to me, he's not afraid to be like, Hey LeBron, you don't really have it tonight. Let's toss the car keys over there. Cause I felt like their last couple of years, I felt like there were games where like Reeves as crazy as this sounds was probably a better creator matchup for them.

right? He just had a worse part of guarding him. He, he could run pick and roll with Davis better. And maybe we don't need it. LeBron as much this game, but LeBron, cause he's LeBron. I think the previous coaches were kind of paralyzed by it. JJ is clearly like, we're going with the matchups that are going to win this game. LeBron was like to the side last night. It was really, it was really interesting to watch. And I,

I, what he's done for Davis is like undeniable. Now Davis could get hurt tomorrow, but, uh, but he's, he's as invested and as competitive as I've seen. And the last thing I'm, cause I'm doing a rambling monologue.

I really like how intense he is on the sidelines in a good way. And I have a lot of different thoughts about what coach behavior should be on a sideline because I think these guys are all adults. They don't need Rick Pitino yelling and slamming the clipboard and they don't need somebody yapping the whole time. He's more intense in like a locked in way. Like if they get fucked on a call, he's going right at the refs. He's he's, you can see him pacing on the sidelines when it gets to the last two minutes, it's almost like he's playing and,

And I think they kind of needed that. Don't you feel like they, they kind of needed that energy. And I think they've, they've been in every one of these games, even the sun's game, they almost won. Yeah. The sun's game on the road against the team that also looks like they have a good new coach and is playing better than they had been. But yeah, I think JJ couldn't, couldn't be. And I think the energy is a great point. I think he is a leader.

and I do not diminish his preexisting relationship with LeBron James, albeit on a podcast, but dude, it helps. It helps. You can tell that LeBron, he started here on second base with LeBron James, and we've watched LeBron run through coaches in his career, Bill. He's starting at a better...

He's starting in a better place. And he's raising his role players in the media, Austin Reeves notably. But the AD thing is the headline. I mean, he currently leads the NBA in scoring. He's averaging 33 and 12. He's ruined this. I mean, he's played the Suns twice and Nurkic for whatever reason, he just demolishes Nurkic. They don't. So we'll see when we get to some other centers, but offense, defense, he's been great.

He looks like the guy when we're writing about him in Grantland, he looks like the guy we all thought he was going to be, you know, in 2013 and 2014 when he was this youngster in New Orleans. In fact, his usage rate is higher right now.

Speaking to JJ and running the team through Anthony Davis, his usage rate hasn't been this high since he's gotten to Los Angeles. So the numbers back up the idea, too, that the team is running through Anthony Davis and it's working early. He's one of the best two way players in the league when he is healthy. And you mentioned this earlier, but he's got to stay healthy. And one of the things I would say is he he's looked healthy since the Olympics.

He, he, he, he, it looks sustainable. I don't want to, I don't want to. Yeah, that's true. I don't want to jinx anything. Uh, but he looks like he is, is a reliable sort of, uh, sustainable, uh, presence in this rotation. Yeah. There's one other thing going on with this team that I didn't realize fully until I was watching them. Cause I, they've actually been pretty fun to watch. I took the under for them at 42 and a half.

I thought, you know, new coach, LeBron, hitting age 40. Like I did so many good teams in the West. Just didn't seem like a great bet. I went over on them the last couple of years. Now their over is up to 44 and a half. And I would probably take the over on the 44 and a half at that point. Here's the other reason other than the ones we mentioned. I think the Bronny thing's been good for LeBron.

being part of that team. Oh, that's interesting. He, I think there's a real energy and a real joy he gets from it. Um, now I sound like I'm an ESPN talking head, just praising LeBron. Um, but I really think like there's just something different about the investment when your son's there every night. Right. And I, I just seems like he's responded in all the right ways to it. I have no idea if it's going to last, if it's sustainable, but yeah,

I don't know if we're going to see some of the passive aggressive stuff that he was doing the last couple of years with the roster because he seems way more invested in the roster and the guys that he's playing with.

That's a great point. I never thought about it. It's so primitive. But as a dad, like it's kind of harder to be a jerk to the waiter at the restaurant if your kid's at the table. If your kid's at the table. No, it's really true. He's just being a pro. You're setting a dad example. You're still like, whether, I know Bronny's a grown ass man now. He's like 20, but he's still a kid. Like my son turns 17 next week. I still look at him like he's a six year old that I'm trying to teach him right from wrong.

I don't know. I might be wrong, but I do, I do feel like the energy from that has been a positive and I thought it was going to go the other way. I thought it was, this is going to be a soap opera. This is, they're going to be asking about every game, but it really seems like they've navigated correctly. Bronny's there probably in the G league. He's definitely not going to help that team in any way this year, but I think he's been good to have around. I think it's, it's given everybody a boost. It's weird.

I love that take. And I think, you know, the other thing is he is starting to slip. You know, he needed a late three in that Phoenix game. And I know they lost to get to 10 points just to keep his 3000 year old streak of 10 points in every game alive. He needed to hit that three pointer. Yeah. Um,

I think, again, we're overreacting here. It's week one. But, you know, LeBron's going to have more and more nights like this. This is what it's going to look like. And JJ, to his credit, saw this and was like, I got to get more out of AD if this is going to work. And AD is leading the league in points in the paint, as we said, leading the league in points per game. And, you know, it's a kinder, gentler LeBron James, whatever. But this is very encouraging. And I know you're a Celtics guy.

but the league is more interesting when the Lakers are good. And JJ looks to have righted the ship here a little bit in Los Angeles. And Davis is really hard to play against, defend, handle, right? When he's playing at this level, he's one of the six, seven best guys in the league. It makes me think like...

They have some draft capital. They have some young players. There's some sort of move they could make. Obviously, D'Angelo Russell is going to be on eBay for the next four months as they shop him to anybody. But it makes me think if I'm them...

The way Davis is playing combined with that, you still have LeBron on the team this year and next year. Maybe you do sacrifice one of those extra assets. Cause I, I look at the West and okay. Okay. See in the Celtics to me are levitating above everybody else in the week. It's, it's like they're in their own league. Then it's a drop off. And the Lakers with,

you know, one more guy, especially if it was a point guard slash shooter. I think if Davis is going to play like this, you have to think you could swim in that pool. I didn't think they could swim in that pool a month ago.

No, I'm with you. I think one of my first piece for the ringers come out this week, but we're looking at depth and I'm arguing the depth. Bill Simmons is the new MVP of the NBA and it's harder to achieve in this new CBA. But when we look at what separates the Celtics and the Thunder right now and teams like the Wolves is that they go seven, eight, nine deep. And that is very hard. That is that.

That is evidence of a very good front office. And that is what we're seeing separating the teams because everybody has a superstar now, it seems. All the contenders, I have one or two superstars. Okay, cool. What do you have? And what you talked about in Milwaukee and what we talked about in Denver is they don't have that. The Lakers and Suns also struggle a little bit in that department. Would you put the Knicks in there?

The Knicks are pretty good in depth. Obviously, I think they're starting fives about as good as it gets. No, I'm saying putting them in the not enough depth camp. Yeah, so it depends on what you define depth. I think their fourth and fifth guys are great, but below that, Deuce McBride, we're asking a lot of Deuce McBride now. Once Mitchell Robinson gets back, I think they're relatively deep. So he's hurt, though.

But I brought this up because you said there's Boston and OKC. And I think that's what it is. And when you look at depth, it's those guys by a long shot. I mean, we're talking about Peyton Pritchard and Sam Houser and Al Horford coming off your bench. That's a different world.

than these struggling teams with superstars, including the Lakers, have in those slots. That's why I loved OKC's over under one seed. Every bet that had them winning the West and winning 60-plus games. But I also ended up going over with the Celtics, too, because when you have, we can give this guy a day off depth, that's like the last frontier of depth.

The Celtics and OKC could basically... OKC lost Hartenstein for five weeks. They're like, all right, next guy up. And they have guys... And you watch the way Wiggins and Wallace have been playing in this first week. And they go deep with dudes that can come in and actually flip a game, which is what the Celtics have too. The Lakers, though, if Connect can become...

Something of a guy for them, like a 15 to 18 minute ninth man type guy. And if Rui, if this is real and I don't trust Rui at all, but maybe this is a little bit real. And then one more trade, like they might actually have enough depth to sustain LeBron games like last night where it's just like, Ooh, he looks 40 tonight.

I'll represent Rui. Rui's a shooter, man. Rui can fill it up. And LeBron is one of the best three-point creators the world's ever seen. They just need a couple other guys around that. But Rui can shoot the ball. And if Kinect, like you said, if he becomes a reliable off-ball threat, I think they can have a good offense. And with AD, they're going to be in good shape on defense. All right, so if I gave you... I know it's too fucking early.

Eight playoff teams, OKC, Minnesota, Phoenix. Would you have all three of those in? Definitely. And Dallas? Oh, yeah. That's four. Those are four definites. Any team I name after that, you'd be like, I don't know. There might be a playing team, including Denver. It's like, I don't know. There might be a seven seed. If Jokic got hurt for 12 games, that might be a 41 and 41 team.

Until Stefan got hurt, Golden State was looking good too. And I think the West and the Houston, who knows what we have there? Who knows if Wemby's going to turn it on? Yeah, the second half of the West is going to be a lot of... There's a lot of question marks. Yeah, 5-12. I don't think San Antonio is here. Sacramento...

I would have been if they had beaten the Lakers like they should have on Saturday night where they're just in control of the first three quarters. And then LeBron just leaves his body for 20 minutes and just puts the game. That was unbelievable. All right. What's your fourth thing? Well, let's I got two Eastern Conference ones. I'll save the Celtics for last. We're going to go to Cleveland.

I think Cleveland, you mentioned Orlando. I love this point. I think these small market teams emerging in the Eastern Conference, Indiana, Orlando, but I'm going to talk about Cleveland. I think they all have a chance to sort of upset the Knicks and Sixers and slide in. One of those teams could slide into that two slot. And if I had to say right now, I like all three of them. Indiana has been off to a rocky start and hasn't looked great a couple of times. If I had to pick one right now, I'm picking Cleveland.

Kenny and the Cavaliers. I'm picking the Cleveland Cavaliers, Bill. They're 4-0. They've won handily. They had a good roster to begin with. It felt like they were underachieving for a minute there. You remember a couple years ago, it felt like they were on the brink of becoming sort of perennial contenders. Last year, it felt that way. Yeah. But, you know,

I think they're a really good two-way team. Jared Allen is a monster. Evan Mobley gives you like two rim protectors on the court at the same time. And obviously their backcourt. If Darius Garland's as good as this, and he's had a hot start. He was great in New York.

But if Darius Garland's playing this well, and Donovan Mitchell's playing this well, they're as good as anybody competing for that second spot in the East. And I do believe in Kenny Atkinson. And I do believe that this Cavaliers team might be a surprise two or three seed in that Eastern Conference. The Mitchell signing with them long term, I think, really helps. The fact that Garland's healthy this year really helps.

Knicks game, granted, first week of the season. Not going to overreact to it. But I like that they went in there and fucking... They were up five, up six, the whole second half of the fourth quarter. And they just... That was it. They got stopped. Brunson missed a couple shots that he normally makes. But they had a real hard time stopping Garland. And there was a couple moments near the end where...

Garland had the ball like, and he, they Mitchell, like throw him the car keys a couple of times and let him do stuff. I also like, this is one of the reasons we were so high in them in the, uh, over under pod. And I have a lot of Cleveland bets. I have them for the division. Um,

They've been playing together now for a couple of years, which I think it's like the most simple point you could possibly make. But I do think it matters. Like these guys, it's really hard to have any kind of continuity in the NBA anymore. So I see that with them. And then Orlando is the other one that they have Palo, who's better than anyone on the Cavs, I think. Apologies to Donovan Mitchell, but Palo's talent ceiling, I would put higher than anyone on the Cavs roster.

And then this Anthony black thing that happened last night, I was Joel. They put him out there and crunch time. He made two big threes. He gives them size. They weren't afraid to go to him when it mattered. And, uh, that was kind of a game changer for me. Cause I was like, Oh, I wasn't, I didn't know he was coming to the party. I liked the magic anyway. So, uh,

I don't know. I'd like both of those teams, certainly more than Philly as a regular season team and certainly more than Milwaukee as a regular season team.

Well, if the best ability is availability, then Orlando has more abilities than those two older teams in Philadelphia and Milwaukee. So, yeah, I think when we talk about depth, Orlando is in that conversation. They just have different looks they can throw at you. They seem to be really willful defenders up and down the roster. I like that team a lot.

And I think because they're in a small market, nobody talks about the Magic, just like the Cavs. - The ringer talks about the Magic 'cause we have Steve Cerruti on board. So we've been carrying most of the Magic national torch. Now that the Lakers are good, nobody's ever gonna talk about the Magic on any national TV station. - Well, who do you like better if you had to overreact to one week, Cleveland or Orlando, for sneaking into the two or the three seed in the Eastern Conference?

Good question. Thank you for asking. I thought Cleveland really had a chance to be the two seed. And I'm not surprised by what's happened with them because I just thought they were going to be good. I wasn't prepared for the Palo leap that I feel like might be happening. To me last night, he looked a lot like Tatum, like year five, year six Tatum, like

figuring out stuff at the foul line, top of the key, how to set up other guys, how to know what the right time is to just, Oh, I'm just going to the basket. Now I have a lane versus like, Oh, I'm going to pull this double team over and find somebody. I thought there were a lot of similarities with those guys. And I didn't know if Paolo a hundred percent had that in him yet. Cause he's so young. Like that took Tatum probably until the 2022 playoffs to even get

really hinted becoming that guy in a real way. I felt like Paolo's like might be that guy now. I don't, I was just blown away by the game he had yesterday. I granted it's against Indiana. Indiana sucks defensively. I get it. But, uh, that was a higher level than I was expecting. Yes. I, I don't mean to just agree with you on that, but it's, it's totally true. I was not ready for a 50 point game from, from Paolo. He has nine rebounds, nine assists. Yeah.

It's a crazy stat line. He has tremendous feel for the game. And then when you watch him in person, it does feel like he's gonna be one of these guys the game slows down for. He makes the right read. He makes the right play. He can go get his own. He can make people around him better.

And the good news for Orlando is the guys, there's a really good supporting cast already in place there. We talked about KCP enough in this podcast, but that's a nice ad to have on the perimeter, a veteran who knows how to win. And, you know, I think because the magic, the thing that jumps out with them is how competitive those dudes are. Suggs is another borderline. If you're doing your all NBA sociopath team, I think he would have to be first team guard. Yeah.

He's a maniac. Like black hit that go ahead three. And he was, he ran over him during the timeout and he's just like screaming at him. Like he was like a boxing hype man or something. He's a maniac, but that, that whole team is wired that way.

Yeah, I think so. And so I think it's going to be I think they're deeper than the Cavs, which I love the Cavs roster. I think there's a little bit of weakness in Cleveland at the wing position. I liked how they use Dean Wade to guard Brunson a little bit. But I wish they had.

another sort of three and D wing in that starting group or in their rotation to go to. But yeah, I think those two teams aren't getting enough respect. And if the first week is an India, any indication that might change here in the first month of the season bill. I, so Franz only played 11 minutes in the game yesterday and it, and they were able to, to kind of, I'm looking at the minutes now still feels like they're one guy short.

in that Gary Harris, Jed Howard kind of area. But I also feel like there's a lot of trade bait possibilities of this team. It's also a team that has all their picks. So there's moves that they can make. But if you were going to give me Orlando and Cleveland on this end and Philly and Milwaukee on the other end, I would just pick the Orlando Cleveland thing, not just for the regular season, but for playoffs too. I love young durability and competitiveness. Those are all things that we know works. It worked with OKC last year.

Every time we say, no, no, they're not going to be ready yet. It always happens a year earlier than a year later. So the Palo piece though, remember last year they lose the game seven and the excuse after the game, which is wasn't even really an excuse. It was like, man, that did too much on Palo too much. He had to create everything. It was such a burden on him. Last thing he looked like he was, he was like, I've spent the whole summer being ready to be the guy. And now I'm going to be ready for this. But yeah, I, I,

he's better, certainly better than I ever thought he was going to be. Remember we were arguing about him versus Chet versus Jabari. I don't think anybody saw this. I know people love Palo, but nobody saw like what happened last night as the ceiling. I thought that was, so Rudy, are you on this? So Rudy, did anyone see this with Palo? Like even like the most bullish, crazy Palo fan, did anyone see what happened last night as a ceiling?

I think Rosillo before the draft, because I mean, infamously, I guess I was a check guy. I still feel good about that. Not a bad opinion. Could it be a good player? I think that's fine. My thing is, I just feel like both teams got the player that they probably needed long term. But no, I mean, I think the thing that the worry about Apollo was like, was he going to be like this inefficient, mellow type score? And I think, you know, early on, so much was thrust upon him that he was like, oh, no, is this going to be like just a high volume everything guy?

And that's why I got so defensive in the playoffs last year about the turnovers. Cause I'm like, cool. He's playing in this hostile Cleveland environment. And in his second year where he's the, I arguably at times the best player on the floor, as you said, Donovan Mitchell has an argument, but like that's wild stuff. Like that's, there are not that many guys in the history of the league that have been asked to do that and have like met the challenge in year two. So yeah,

You know, I think everybody thought he was going to put up numbers, but like, was the efficiency and the winning going to be behind it? So that's the question of that. And it's coming this early. That's what's so crazy about it. Yeah. What is he? 20? He's 22, right? Yes.

Yeah. I, it feels like the basketball, the sport of basketball has slowed down for him a tiny bit. And this is why it's so dangerous to do the overreactions after week one. I don't think that's an overreaction. Like he, you can tell sometimes when a guy has gone from point B to point C or point D to point D, whatever, it feels like he's at a different point of whatever the journey was than he was in that Cleveland series. Yeah.

22 in two weeks, by the way. So still 21. Oh my God. It's wild. Kirk, where is he in the trade value rankings now? Dude, a 21-year-old with a 50-point game is pretty high. He's got to be top five to seven now. Now it makes me want to do another rankings. I think you had him eight last year. I had him eight, but I think he's got to be higher. To me, Paolo versus Edwards...

I would have had Edwards ahead of him, no question, last summer. And now it's like, all right, I got to really sit down and sketch this out and look at their ages. And I just, we saw it happen with the Celtics last year. You can build an actual championship team around a guy with this specific set of skills. The difference is he's not as good of a defender as Tatum is, at least not yet.

Tatum was always like a really good defensive player. Did you expect that Anthony Black hitting the two threes piece of the season? I mean, I don't want to toot my own horn, but like kind of. So,

I literally called Russillo after the game last night because we were both so excited about it. And I was calling for Anthony Black to play in the playoffs last year. I was like, what's the worst that could happen? I mean, nothing against Gary Harris. I know he's not your favorite player, but it can't get much worse offensively than what it was in some of those games when he's 0-7 from three. So it's like, throw Black out there, see what could happen. I mean, when he was coming out of the draft, it was like, hey, high IQ player, big player.

you know, can guard multiple positions, but like the shot is atrocious. So the fact that he's even like the shot looks pretty good. And the fact that he's making them semi consistently and two, as you said, two big threes last night, that he's going to be a factor. He should be a factor. And I, I'm, you throw like trade ships. I mean, it depends where the guy is, but like, I'm kind of, I'm holding that guy close to the vest. Yeah. Cause he fits in with the identity they have. As you know, Kirk, you know, I'm the body language doctor.

I thought it was very instructive how Orlando's bench was reacting to the black threes. That's right. They, they were fucking losing their shit. It was like combination. We love this guy, but also like, yo, if he's going to make those, holy shit, we might actually be really good this year. So I thought I was really encouraging when, what I know Franz left the game last night. What, what's the Franz updates Rudy?

I don't, it doesn't seem like it's anything serious, but, uh, how's he looked heading into this? Like, did he carry over the Germany love or no? So here's the thing is like,

Paulo's become a better shooter, a more efficient shooter. Suggs has improved his three-point shooting every single year. I mean, he's like a 40% three-point shooter taking like, what, over five a game or something? It's absurd. Anthony Black has become a better shooter. We can't get this guy to figure out, bronze a shot? Who's the shooting coach? I don't know. I should know the name, but he's the one guy where it's like, what's kind of going on? And it is a little weird. Suggs is kind of ascending to that

Number two guy? Oh, wow. Not in points. It'll never be in points, but just as an all-around feel for the game because of the defensive end. I still believe in Franz. I think it's going to be fine, but it is a little weird because everybody else seems to be kind of growing, especially in the shooting department. He's the one that's kind of regressed. So if Black comes through for you, maybe you don't need Dennis Schroeder because he was auditioning for you this week with the 29-point game.

It's like, hey, Orlando. We're good. We're good. Unless it's an obvious upgrade. There's not. I like the core, man. This team loves playing. And you mentioned the Suggs thing and him running over to Anthony Black. They genuinely love playing with each other. The wins are great. It's cool. But the vibes are just... There might not be a better vibe, seemingly. Yeah, Suggs is like a Wolf of Wall Street character. Kirk, when you were in front office...

Did you guys that you were with the Spurs, did they, did they like look for stuff like bench chemistry, bench reactions as something that actually mattered? Dude, I remember when we drafted Derek, uh, in whatever year that was, we watched all of his clips for when he got fouls called on him and we watched his body language reacting to all

all the ref calls against him. And what we didn't like, he was very demonstrative after all these calls. He was like one of these guys that, but yeah, body language is really important to people like Pop and RC, of course. So you try to gain insights into the psyche and competitive nature of all these guys

And the body language doctor has known this for years. But yeah, we watch that stuff. One of the reasons you scout and you go to games early, Bill, is you watch how guys warm up, you interact with their coaches, you talk, you see how these guys are as employees, as teammates.

as leaders, as followers. That stuff is very important. And I agree with Saruti. The vibes in this group, maybe with the exception of Gary Harris, am I allowed to say that? It feels like they love each other. They're young. They're fun loving. I wouldn't trade anybody, by the way, including Gary Harris. But I think this team has the body language doctor I would confer with, but it feels like they would be near the top of his power rankings.

No question. I think they're right in the same spot OKC was in last year. Let's see how well we can do. Let's see how many wins we can bank. Let's let Paolo cook. Everything's a bonus. Can we get to round two? Can we put together some playoff wins? But let's not really figure out what we have until the next offseason would be my recommendation. But all right, we're going to take one more break and then do Goldsberry's last thing.

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all season long. Uber Eats, official on-demand food delivery partner of the NFL. Order Taco Bell for game day now through 11-17-24. Second item of equal or less of value. Terms apply. See app for details. All right, coming back, you want to talk about the Celtics. What do you got? I have to talk. It's what I've been writing about for 10 years now with you and other places and in books. It's like these guys are elevating three-point shooting to another level. Like,

If we go from the Splash Brothers to the D'Antoni Hardin Industrial Complex in Houston, we think it can't get any higher.

Your team, Bill Simmons, is taking it higher. They are shooting over 53s a game and they're making 43% of them. I'm not sure either of those numbers are sustainable, but I'm not copping out here. I expect this team to break three-point shooting records by the end of the season. I think they'll break the record for most attempts and most makes. And Missoula ball is

has not only won a championship, but it's doing it by extending Daryl Morey and Stephen Curry's legacy deep into the 2020s and proving once and for all the three-point revolution isn't dead. In fact, the best teams in the league are still finding ways to leverage three-point shooting in profound new ways. So your team, I think, is becoming the new Splash Brothers or sort of Harden Rockets. It's like the Splash family.

Yeah, it was interesting. Last night they brought against the Bucks, they brought in Jordan Walsh. And I was like, what the fuck, man? This guy, he's not a good enough three-point shooter. He doesn't fit into our system. And he took a couple. He missed a couple. But it's surprising when they play anyone. Yeah, well, it's shocking when they put anyone in who can't make an open three. And they have an embarrassment of riches all over the place. It's...

The three point shooting, the fact that they don't have poor Zingas and you don't even really notice, they just have so much depth that now they're paying for the depth. They're going to have a crazy luxury tax bill. I love, uh, I love what I've seen from Tatum and Brown early on. Tatum fixed the hitch, which thank God.

I think he's a legitimate MVP candidate. Michael Pina wrote about that for the ringer.com today. And I completely agree. If, if they're going to be in the sixties for wins, you got to really seriously look at whoever the best players, but I love everything I've seen from Tatum. Um, and then Jalen, I feel like has taken all the shit that he was doing last year. And it's,

maybe even like just a hair better. And the two of them together, it's everything Steve Kerr always told me about the year after you win the title, that first two months, the next season, you're just like, you're so locked in. You have so much confidence. And that's, that's, it's gotten to the point. Like I would be surprised when they lose, you know, which I feel the same way about OKC. We're like, Oh, OKC lost last night. That's usually when you know, you have a 60 win team. It's like, Whoa, shit.

The Celtics lost two in a row. Like it's shocking. Yeah. Yeah. And I think like when Sam, Sam Hauser, but I mean, Peyton Pritchard scores 28 points. That's a classic indicator too. I think when you have a bench player come out and just change a game like that, and somebody who could, you would count on doing that more than once or twice a month. Yeah. And, and I just think they are the deepest team in the NBA, not to beat a dead horse, but as you, as you mentioned earlier, the,

It's the three point depth in particular. If you want to play for for Joe Missoula, you have to be able to shoot from 25 feet. You have to you have to want to shoot it. He gets mad at his players when they don't shoot them, which is kind of the mentality that you need to have. It's a lot of guys in the league want to pass up those shots. And he actually reprimands his guys. And you'll hear them talking about that.

He gets mad when we pass up an open look. That's very different than what was happening just 10 years ago around this league. But I think they're gonna break records in three-point shooting, potentially offensive efficiency again, and challenge conventional wisdom further. How many threes can we do here? I think over half of their shots are three-point shots at this point, which is crazy. Yeah, so you figure they're taking 53 as a game

and making 40% of them. That's 20, that's 23 is a game, right? 82 games in a year. So could they get to like 1700 threes for the season? Like it's,

It's conceivable. I don't know what the record is, but I guarantee nobody's ever had 1600. Do they have five guys shooting seven or more in a game right now? Um, I think clay Thompson's only done seven or more in a game, like half of his years in the NBA. So it's like, it's like a normal clay Thompson year, but they have five of them. So it is sort of like the splash family. Um, and,

Do you subscribe to the... I remember first talking about this two years ago. There was some dialogue about it the last couple of days on the internets that there's a sameness to all of these styles now that becomes boring during the regular season. I'm so used to it now, it doesn't seem any different to me. And I still feel like there's enough aberration type of players ranging from John Morant to...

Cam Thomas to there's some post up guys. We still have like the Shangoon types. It's still, it doesn't feel like just up. Everybody's chucking up threes. We'll see who wins. But do you see any of that?

Yeah, I play both sides of that. I think there's never been this much talent in the league. And ultimately, that's why I turn on the TV set. I love watching the guys, but I'd love to see the NBA move the line. I think it's time to move the line. I think the shot has become too easy for too many guys. I've been really vocal about that. I think the first time I wrote about it was in 2014 at Grantland after the Spurs won the title. And I think it's only...

I don't say it's ugly. I don't want to say that, but I think the shot has become too easy for too many. And I'd like to see it a little more difficult for the average player. And it's only going to make Stephen Curry and Damian Lillard more valuable or Jason Tatum. Guys who can shoot from deeper will become more valuable in a world where the shot's harder. So I think it actually celebrates those guys a little bit more.

I don't know. I think, I don't know. What do you think? You think it's okay. You think everything is hunky-dory. You don't think it's too many threes. I always joke, Bill, that it should be called the two-point line once we take more than half of our shots from behind it. But yeah, I'm eager to hear what you think on this one, actually. This is the first time I've seriously started thinking about do we have to fix the corner three a little bit? Do you make the arc, you change it a little bit so when it goes right to the corner...

Maybe the line goes so that a corner three no longer exists and you have to be three, four feet over from the corner for it to be a corner three. That would be the only thing that I could see five, six years from now if they're going to tweak it. I could see the whole arc of the three point line instead of it just being like almost like a semicircle the way it looks now.

being different where it kind of, it hits the corner in a way that you corner threes are gone. It goes up higher and,

So that like the peak of it is like 28 feet instead of 24 or whatever. And maybe that's where we're heading. But I also, I don't, I don't know if that would help the product because then it's like just guys heaving these long shots and these long rebounds. And I think that would cause too many unintended consequences, but you could tell me like, could they experiment with the corner three for preseason? See what it looks like. I wouldn't be against it.

I don't think I've ever shared this, but in 2019, after my book came out, Adam Silver reached out to me and said, will you come present some of this stuff to the league? And we had suggested two different three-point lines. We got to the competition committee and we were going to try it in the G League, Bill.

We're going to try two or three different looks in the G League, and I'd love for them to revisit. One was to get rid of the corner three entirely, which is very drastic. And in fact, I think it was Brad Stevens who was on the competition committee. He was like, hell no, you'll never see a slam dunk again. This is going to ruin spacing. So, you know, you have to see it. You have to see how...

the league reacts to these things because it could end up making the product worse. Like hand up, like some of these ideas might not be good ideas for the product. And I think the better one is to keep the corners where they are, but extend the three-point arc, which is currently 23.75%.

get it out to 25 or 26 feet like you described. But again, you're exactly right. Does that just mean we're watching more missed threes? The same number of threes but fewer makes? 'Cause that's not great. So I think we'd have to see it in practice to see what it would look like before we would sort of engineer the right product. What I would say is every other league on the planet that matters, the W, college basketball, FIBA, they've all moved the line back this century. The NBA's the only one that hasn't.

But yeah, I think that's going to be a bigger conversation as your Celtics continue to rain down dozens of threes on their opponent on a nightly basis. One other thing I was thinking is maybe there's a limit for threes. Once you make 20, you just can only make two pointers from that point on. You basically used up your 20 and that's it. Like maybe that's where it goes. That would be awesome. You kind of like that one.

I like that one. I like it. It's like, I don't like timeouts. Uh, sorry. That's your last three. So I hope you're ready to post up Porzingis for the rest of the game. You know, it's going to be, it would be wild to see how teams would change their offense. Yeah. Maybe they wouldn't shoot threes in the, in the first quarter. We didn't, I don't feel like we vehemently disagreed on anything. Do you have anything you want to vehemently disagree on? Because unfortunately we see a lot of basketball the same way. Um,

I'll just throw a couple things out of you and you can tell me if you vehemently disagree. Ryan Dunn in the running for most impactful rookie? They knew this kid could defend. They knew the kid could defend. The shot is a, let's just say, a work in progress. And I think- Looks way better.

Dude, Lou Dort, same thing, right? Now Lou Dort makes a lot of money because why? He made the shot work. So I think this kid could be a long-term NBA player, a rotation player for a very good Phoenix team, but he's got to be able to start making some shots. He's been making them. Yeah, so I think if his three-point shot is real, that was the only question in my mind.

The defense was NBA ready. So I think they got something if he's making those threes. My guy, Eddie Johnson, that cranky homer who's also on Sirius XM radio, he flagged the Ryan Dunn thing like a month ago. And he was like... We have a really fun relationship, but...

He was so adamant and excited about how good this kid was in preseason. I was like, I don't feel like Eddie's making this up. Like he's like super duper, duper excited. And it turns out like, you know, you see him out there and crunch time for them. Interesting wrinkle for them. I still don't, I don't know what they're going to do about a center and I'm not sure it's going to matter in the regular season. I still think they'll get to a 50 plus wins. All right. Next. I'll try to start one more argument here. Chicago,

A more pleasant league pass experience than you were expecting? DeMar DeRozan is not there anymore. And I don't know if it's the Ewing theory or the DeMar theory or whatever you want to say here. They're definitely playing harder on defense. Um,

Kobe White feels like a more enjoyable presence. The more time he's getting in this offense, the more he's a fun guy. Zach Levine, maybe not Vucevic. You know, I don't know. What are you going to say? I'll say no. I think I'm going to say no. If I have five games to watch and they're probably not in my four box. You know what I mean? I'll just say no. And for the sake of starting an argument, they were a cross off for me as a league past him.

But I actually like the ball. The Giddy Vucevic still feels like there's this little tiny...

foreign center thing to be unlocked with him with passing at the top of the key. And now guys are moving around. It's not so like old school DeRozan gets the ball and everybody kind of stands around. I don't know. They're on my radar. They have some players I like watching. I, and, uh, and I, I'm still rooting for Gideon to, to become a guy. Cause I like, I just think he's so different than all the other players. It's like, we need, you need weird players to succeed like him with his kind of skillset. So, um, we'll see. Uh,

Could Cam Thomas lead the league in scoring for real? I think the number has to be at least 32 a game. Cause there's no way Luca goes under 32 a game. The only, the only way it would happen is if Dallas is just blowing teams out and he's not playing the same minutes per game. He's just an established 33 a game now. So let's say he drops to 32. I think that's the number.

There is a way, but I think it's very, very unlikely. But Brooklyn, in part because Brooklyn's playing better than I thought they would be, Bill, they're playing harder. They got a new coach, too, and it looks like they have new vibes. They're frisky. They're frisky, and all Ben Simmons jokes aside, he's looked okay. He just won't shoot. And they have to take him out with six minutes left because he's just not going to ever want to take a foul shot ever.

It is wild. But Cam Thomas is not afraid to shoot Mr. Greenlight. I think there's a path there, but I would be shocked. I would say this is Lucas. This is Lucas here to win. Well, they're playing tonight after we tape this. So you talked about American stars being worried about them. Counter. A lot of American stars I like watching right now. Tatum and Brown, Edwards, Palo, Brunson, Halliburton, Ja, Lamello.

Rumors of a Lamello comeback? Booker and Fox, Mitchell, Zion, when he plays? I'm feeling better about the Americans. Well, so are the casinos. I noticed that both Jason Tatum and Anthony Davis have rightfully surged up the MVP futures list. And I think Tatum is playing better. He looks a lot better. You know better than anybody when he's taking...

Good shots, and they're going in, the three-point shots especially. John Morant. LaMelo has been one of the best stories of the first week. Again, new coach, new vibes. I think that's one of the themes of our podcast today. And Charlotte has new coach, new vibes. And he's benefited from that. And I can't wait to see him and Brandon Miller playing together. Tatum is 5-1, by the way.

He was 13 to one before the season started and it's dropped now to five to one third best odds on Fandle. There you go. And I think, Hey, as a hardworking American myself, I love to watch Americans dominate. You counted out the Americans. I don't know. Um, Houston needs to make a trade. Yes or no.

Houston has one of the weirdest rosters in the league. I need to see a little bit more, but for the sake of argument, yes, they have tradable pieces. I'm not sure which of these young players is really going to stay there. It doesn't feel like Shangoon and Jalen Green should be on the same basketball team. Fred Van Fleet, Dylan Mitchell. And yet they extended both of them.

Yeah, I just they couldn't be. And then one of the cool things about weird, you said weird basketball guys like these are guys that the fact that they're on the same team and they're from such different parts of the world and they play well together. But Freddie Van Fleet, Dylan Brooks, like these guys are just how are they all on the same team? So I'll go with yes. They need to make some changes there. I think there are two for one or three for one. But I felt that way before the season. Memphis is not a playoff team.

I'm just throwing that out there for argument's sake. I'm not saying whether I believe it or not. I can get there. I'll just for the sake of argument, I say they are a playoff team. I think they have too much talent. I don't think they're as good as they were a few years ago. I think Steven Adams remains sort of an unheralded piece of their success from two years ago with just the physicality and the rebounding, particularly the second chance points that they really just

depended on. And we'll see what Edie can do. But I think they're a 60. I think the Memphis Grizzlies are going to be the 60, the last non-playing team in the West, if I had to say. I'm less bullish on them than I was. And I went under on their over-under because I thought it was too high. But this is why it's the first week of the season. I'm just watching them. I'll have a harder opinion than them in the 20 game. Are you worried about New Orleans yet, by the way?

A little bit, but this Jordan Hawkins kid has caught my eye. And this kid, he looks like a natural shooter. Yeah, what do they do? It just feels like he needs to play.

He needs to play. And I mean, I don't know if that factors into the Ingram decision they have or trying to get off of that. But dude, I love that kid. And he looks like a shooter, like one of the best jump shooters early in the season. And it doesn't look like an accident. He was one of the best shooters coming out of the draft.

I'm not worried about them. I'm always worried about Zion staying healthy, but I'm not worried about them. I think they're going to figure it out. But they have like a couple pieces. They just need to figure out rotations, in my opinion. What are your thoughts? Too early. I want to, I'm with you on Hawkins. I just feel, I was talking to somebody about it today. Somebody has to be disappointed in the West. We're not going to have 11 playoff teams. There's got to be somebody who, when we get to mid-December, we're like, holy shit.

I can't believe that team is, you know, 10 and 15.

It's going to be somebody, and I have a couple suspects, but I want to watch for another week. The Clippers being a little better, at least in week one, than I expected is another monkey wrench because I just had them penciled in as a bottom three team. But Harden's like, this is great. I have the ball all the time. They have a bunch of defensive guys who are like, this is great. Harden has the ball all the time. All I have to do is worry about this. And then Norm Powell's like, this is great. Every once in a while, they just let me cook.

So I still don't know if they're good, but I'm also a little concerned that, because that was one of my locks. I had them under 37 and a half. I'm a little concerned they might be more of a professional basketball team than that. Well, Ty Lue is a great coach, and I think James Harden's in his happy place. He sort of alluded to it. He seems super pumped.

undeniably the leader of the team right now. And, you know, if he feels that way and Ty lose the coach and their defense is playing like this. Yeah, I agree. Like you're saying, there's six guaranteed spots. There's the two play in playoff spots of four playing teams. I think Denver, Denver and the Clippers, I think I would say a playing team that that's probably my biggest overreaction from week one.

I find it hard to believe they're going to be one of the six best teams in the West because I don't know what the fixes are for them. Milwaukee, you can talk yourself into it a little faster because the East is such a, you know, once you get past the top eight, it's just there's seven crummy teams in there. Have you been to the Intuit facility yet? No, I'm going this weekend. Okay. We look forward to a thorough report.

I hope it's a better experience than Neapolis. Kurt Goldsberry, so your first piece is this week on TheRinger.com? I hope so, yeah. We got to make sure that our editors agree with that. But yeah, I'll file it tomorrow. Okay. Great to see you. Thanks for coming on. Thanks, Bill.

All right. That's it for the podcast. Thanks to John Jastrzemski. Thanks to Kurt Goldsberry. Thanks to Kyle Creighton and Steve Cerruti as well. Thanks to Cerruti for popping on the podcast too. Don't forget to check out the rewatchables Halloween four. Don't forget about the live show in Denver, which tickets will be going on sale on Friday at the ringer.com slash events. Look forward to seeing you and I will see you on this podcast next

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