Knicks-Sixers Slugfest, Off-season questions for Philly, Miami, and Milwaukee, and a TWolves-Nuggets Preview
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And now, The Low Post. Welcome to The Low Post Podcast. Oh my God. The Knicks Sixers series is over. The final score after six games. The Knicks win the series by one combined point. Josh Hart.

New York Knicks legend Josh Hart grabbing every rebound, making what essentially became the series clinching three. Jalen Brunson, 35 and a half points per game for the series. 40 plus in the last three. 39 plus in the last four. Willing the shorthanded injury riddled Knicks across the finish line against Tyrese Maxey. A very game. Joel Embiid, 39 points playing with all sorts of maladies. We had the game two, 6-0.

Nick's crazy comeback. We had the game five Sixers crazy comeback. Last two minute reports, everything. I can barely function today and yet it's still time to say the most anticipated three words in niche basketball podcasting. What up Beck?

Good morning, Zach. That was an epic, epic low post intro. That was awesome. I feel dizzy just reliving it just for 30 seconds. Oh my God. I mean, think about the swings of the game. The Knicks come out 33-11. They're up. And it's like, oh wow. Did the Sixers just throw the last and only punch they had left?

In game five in Madison Square Garden when Tyrese Maxey hits the two crazy shots at the end of the game, one of which had a little travel. But, you know, honestly, I don't care. It's all it all evens out in the wash. And then they come roaring back at the end of the first quarter. Nick Batum.

Hits a bunch of threes. The bench brigade starts to show up. Buddy healed, it turns out, is alive and well and damn near saved the Sixers season. Maybe he should have been playing a little more throughout the series, although he didn't do anything before tonight. Maybe he shouldn't have played the entire fourth quarter instead of Tobias Harris, who scored zero points. And he came in for about a two or three minute stint late in the game. Also continued to score zero points and missed a shot during that during that time.

What a coda to the, I'm going to, I'm going to just take a stab at it, Howard, and say that Tobias Harris era in Philadelphia is over. I don't even know. I, I'm not even, it's, are we sure it didn't end two weeks ago?

Three months ago? He had an okay game in game five. And honestly, like these role guys like Devin Shenzo hitting a bunch of threes was huge in game six, including I thought one of the biggest shots of the game talking about the swings. Philly comes roaring back. They're up 71-61 in the third quarter. And now it feels like, man, maybe the Knicks, this is the price you pay for having seven dudes left.

that are playing and all of them playing a thousand minutes a game. Maybe they threw their last best punch earlier in the series and in the first quarter and they just can't get over the finish line. And DiVincenzo hits a three on a dribble handoff for Tobias Harris and somebody else. I can't remember. Boccia switch. And really to DiVincenzo's credit, he pulled up right with the handoff, hits a three, kind of calms the game down. But yeah, the end of the Tobias Harris era, it went out in a blaze.

I don't even remember, honestly, what I was. Oh, and just like the wild swings up and down and the Knicks go up 109-101 on an insane OGN and OB dunk where Joel Embiid in the fourth quarter, every game just can't quite summon the rim protection. Although in his defense in game five, he made three rebounds.

massive defensive plays in overtime of that game. And OGN and OB just detonates all over the city of Philadelphia. The Liberty Bell, Ben Franklin, Franklin the stupid blue dog, everybody. And it feels like it's over. He misses the free throw. Kelly Oubre does some Kelly Oubre stuff. Tyrese Maxey does some Tyrese Maxey stuff. There's a goaltend that was really hard to tell even on slow motion replay if it was a goaltend or not. And suddenly the game is tied and then Josh Hart is like, okay, whatever.

Guess I got to shoot. Guess I got to shoot with the whole goddamn season maybe on the line and I'm going to make it. And then it becomes a free throw contest from there because damn it, Tom Thibodeau was not going to find himself in a situation where his team failed to foul up three, even when there was a lot of time left on the clock. We have more than enough to win. We have more than enough to win. And when they did, by the way, I worry for your vocal cords. Sometimes does your Tibbs, your, your Tibbs impression. I worry it hurts.

I love when they zoom in on Tibbs after the Knicks do something bad. And he's just like, he has this stone face. Like I've talked about the Doc Rivers tension face where his whole face tightens up and it feels like it's just going to crack. Tibbs has this cranky, just it's, it's like a, it's a stone face. Like it doesn't move, but it's just like exasperated Tibbs. And last night the camera caught him at some point after the Knicks made a statement. Come on, man.

Come on, man. Where do you want to start with this? And now, okay, so let's, I mean, on the other side of the bracket, the Pacers eliminate the Bucs. No Giannis. Dame gave it an effort, scored 28 points, did not look anything like Damian Lillard, had no juice, no explosiveness, sending the Bucs plummeting into an offseason of disappointment and maybe uncertainty and rekindling

A 90s rivalry. Pacers-Knicks, the second fastest paced team in the league against the slowest paced team in the league. A physical, nasty offensive rebounding machine against more of a finesse speed team. That's where we are in the East. We got a couple more games today we'll talk about later. We have Clippers on the brink. We have Heat are out facing a whole bunch of uncertainty. Bucks are out facing a whole bunch of uncertainty.

Everything's fine in Phoenix. Everything's going great. Just ask Matt Ishbia. Every GM in the league would trade their situation for the, I actually think he said 26. 26 GMs would trade their situations for our situation. And you know what? If you start counting the teams, don't think so, Matt Ishbia. Darvin Hamm is just hanging in the wind in Los Angeles. We got a lot to talk about, but we got to start Nick Sixers. Where do you want to go?

Uh, real quick, real quick aside on the Ishbia thing. I actually, if we actually could coordinate as the media and we don't and we can't and we're bad at this, I really actually would like all 29 other teams, you know, obviously anonymously. I want to hear all of them weigh in so that we can actually have the 28 out of 29 or 29 of 29 who say absolutely positively not. We do not want to trade places with the Suns.

Hey, do you want a list right off the bat? Boston, Oklahoma City, San Antonio, New York, Denver, probably Houston, probably New Orleans, probably Utah, probably Orlando, San Antonio. They can call San Antonio and say, we will trade you every single player on our team. And all our golf courses. Our arena, our golf courses, an autographed Dan Marley jersey.

A game-worn Cotton Fitzsimmons suit.

Steve Nash's bloody tissue from when he got a bloody nose. The scores table where Robert Ori checked Steve Nash into the... Everything for Wemba Nyama. And the Spurs already hung up the phone 10 things ago. Okay, I'm sorry. Everything's fine. Everything's going great in Phoenix. We won zero playoff games. None. Not one. But really, we're just a tweak away from winning one playoff game? How about not getting blown out in every playoff game? Okay. Nick Sixers. What a...

This takes its place with Celtics Bulls 2009. I'm always partial to Spurs Clippers 2015 because I thought that was just, it was two absolute elite championship level teams playing at such a high level. And a couple others that I'm probably blanking on is just one of the greatest first round series of all time, despite not going to game seven. And it's hard to get that designation, not going to a game seven, just an unbelievable number.

Every single second of it was wrenching and tense and physical. And you're like, man, it's kind of a miracle somebody won this series. It has to continue playing basketball now. That the entire point differential for the entire six game series was a one point difference.

I mean, it literally does not get any closer than that, Zach, mathematically, I believe. I think that is the lowest possible scoring margin you can have in a playoff series. I think so. It's incredible. I might have to check with Matt Ishby on that. Maybe there's something more special than that. He's got a different kind of math he's using. No, absolutely incredible. I was there for two of the three games at the Garden. The place was just absolutely bonkers amazing.

And I credit to the Sixers, at least from what I could tell on TV last night, it seems like the strategy to buy out 2,000, 2,500 tickets from the secondary market and give them to Sixer fans kind of worked. Like you could still hear Knicks fans, but it wasn't nearly like it was prior to that. So that was interesting. Do they get a banner for that?

Sure. Yeah, I think they should, frankly. Why not? Would you rate that as more or less of an accomplishment of finally making the conference finals during the Joel Embiid era? Oh, boy. So, Embiid. You want to start with Embiid? No, I don't. I want to start with Brunson. I want to start with Brunson and the Knicks because they toughed this out. They earned this series victory when it looked like they were on the ropes in Game 3. And you just look at the characters in this series. Jalen Brunson...

Mavs didn't want to overpay him, quote unquote. He just averaged 36 points in a playoff series. And after the first two games, and I said on NBA Today after game two, I like the shots, a lot of the shots that Brunson is getting. After the first two games, he just erupted. And it wasn't the most efficient, but it was efficient enough for a team that without Randall just doesn't have a lot of juice. OGN and OB.

Just the little snippets of self-creation on the pick and roll, a couple of long twos here and there. And I thought Tibbs moving him off of Maxie so that he can be a help defender on the back line was a really nice adjustment. And he made an impact on several pivotal plays as the last line of defense. And Dante DiVincenzo eventually took the Tyrese Maxie assignment and did quite well in the last two games of the series. OG Ananobi and Pascal Siakam

now have a reunion in the second round of the playoffs after the Raptors traded both of them. The Raptors are going to get laughed at over the next two weeks for selling low on these two guys who have been massively impactful in the playoffs and

I think the Siakam trade is going to end up a sell low. Now, we have to see where Siakam... And I think the Raptors would probably admit, like, we waited an extra year on these guys. And maybe that costs us. Siakam is going to end up moving for three potentially bad first-round draft picks. That's not nothing, but there's not a golden chip in there. We'll see if they ever turn Bruce Brown into anything. Anunobi...

Look, I was stunned at the time. I said it at the time. How many people thought the Raptors got the best player in that trade or it was like relatively equal? To me, there was no comparison. OG and Anobi was the best player in the trade. But RJ Barrett played fantastically for the Raptors and Emmanuel Quigley is really good. So we'll see. But I do want to start with the Knicks and just... I mean, it's almost...

The level of toughness and physicality is just incredibly uncomfortable to play against. I mean, they had a 40% offensive rebounding rate in the series and Joel Embiid was very limited. He just could not find Hartenstein and Mitchell Robinson on the glass. Couldn't move to go get them, but they are just unrelenting. And honestly, I don't understand how they're all not physically spent and exhausted. I don't know what the hell they're doing in practice to get ready for this, but Indiana,

is a little less physically tapped out after their first round series. They fly around the floor, but they're about to get hit with a freight train of physicality. And it's going to be a major test for the Pacers. How do they respond to like what's about to collide with them?

So you were, you grew up in the Northeast. So you were around for like the nineties Knicks in a way that I, all my friends were Knicks fans. All of them. Yeah. So I only saw those teams from a distance from California and, but I have a very strong sense, especially having now lived here for 20 years of what the nineties Knicks were partially from watching them in real time at a distance, partially from obviously just being immersed in, in New York sports stuff for the last 20 years.

The beauty of this Knicks team, Zach, they very much feel like this doesn't happen very often. And sometimes we do these dumb thing as sports media where we superimpose things.

certain themes or impressions that it's a little forced. This is not for like the beauty of this next team. They, they didn't know that Brunson was going to be essentially a superstar when they got him. He's so he's not John Starks, right? But every bit of this team feels like it's a second round pick. Actually, it's almost all second round picks right now. It's, it's, it's guys who have bounced around the league.

It's some homegrown guys, but there's nothing about this that felt like manufactured. And the beauty of this next team in terms of especially the way the city has responded to them, partially it's the way they play and a toughness and a grit and a relentlessness. And it's a business-like approach that very much does summon the 90s in a lot of ways, maybe a little less physicality than back then. But there's a genetic strand there that I think people really respond to.

And, yeah, I mean, I don't know what to expect in this series, to be honest. And a lot of that has to do with not knowing what to expect from the Sixers and Embiid in particular. And, you know, look, this thing went down to like one last buddy-heeled heave from possibly going to a Game 7. I do wonder if they're spent. I do sometimes wonder if, you know, especially like last night, I even saw, you know, Knicks fans starting to fret a little bit.

early fourth quarter about Tibbs has tightened the rotation too much. Like these guys are just going to collapse. Well, we didn't, we barely saw Deuce McBride until in the second half, even guy number seven. I know it wasn't their elimination game. It was to eliminate, but like in an elimination game, you've got a chance to put a team away and you want to just go with six guys. Like I get it. If it's, if it's the guys you trust the most, Josh Hart made a comment recently to, uh,

I'm going to screw this up. I can't remember if it was to Fred Katz or Stefan Bondi, or maybe it was the whole Knicks beat, but just about the idea that for all the flack that Tibbs takes,

about minutes and running guys into the ground and this and that. He's saying like, we're good. We're fine. I'm fine right now playing 48 minutes because we conditioned for this all season. And the Knicks now stand as a really interesting kind of counterexample or pushback to the load management era where maybe it is just a matter of being ready for this. It's the readiness, but I was also talking to a couple of agents about this recently and they said, well, Zach, think about it.

Wouldn't you love it? You get to play almost the whole game. You get to accumulate these stats that are not inflated, but like Josh Hart wouldn't average like 13 rebounds a game if you were playing a normal amount of minutes. And I was like, that's kind of interesting. That's probably fun to be out there giving everything you got the whole time. And yeah.

Just, I mean, I, to your point, I think game one against the Pacers, Precious Achua's got to play. Like I'm dusting off Alec Burks. I'm stretching out the rotation for the first couple of games of the series, unless it goes really, really bad, because I just got to see in this matchup, can these guys give me something? Particularly with Bogdanovich now joining Randall on the injured list. That's a big deal. Like I got to, I can't go into this game one, like I went into Philly game five and six. Yeah.

This hit me at one point last night. This is going to sound obnoxious, but it hit me, so I'll just say it. For all the great things that the Knicks have done over the last couple of years, not only on the court, but just in terms of the front office and the choices they've made, Obi Toppin looked really good for the Pacers last night. And with no Julius Randle, you can't help but think, man, this is a guy you gave away. And I know. It wasn't working, and there were issues between Tibbs and

And it just was getting a little bit tense and all this stuff. But like, man, what a great backup for he would have been. Well, and ironically, like a lot of Obi Toppin's minutes are coming in a sort of no center alignment with Pascal Siakam as the four and the five, which is what Knicks fans always, and I did too, always clamored for. Like, can we get some Toppin Randall minutes into, oh, I saw the lineup data. Anyone check the lineup data? We try everything in practice.

My Tibbs impression needs to work. I'm telling you. And by the way, I'm not making fun of Tibbs. Like, that's how he talks. And by the way, as I've said many times on this podcast, you want to win basketball games? Hire Tom Thibodeau as your coach because the record suggests you're going to win more basketball games with him than you did before you got him. And now they're in the second round of the playoffs again. The Obi Toppin...

Obviously, we get a Nick Spacer's Reggie Miller reunion. Hopefully, like there's a whole lot of history here. Well, and the ghost of Roy Hibbert blocking Carmelo Anthony in 2014, which I think – what was that? That was game six, I believe. Yeah.

Was it 24? No, 2013? 2013, the 54-win Knicks team that has taken on a slightly outsized place in Knicks lore just because there isn't a lot of Knicks lore since the 1999 finals. No.

But no, I mean, it's it's interesting because you think Nick's paces, of course, of course, of course, immediately it's Reggie Miller versus Spike Lee and it's all the stuff from the 90s. But it's an interesting kind of moment in between. Like they didn't have a whole lot of you know, they haven't had a whole lot to celebrate in the last 20 years. But like that 54 win season was a moment. There was a really big moment. And Roy Hibbert kind of ruined it.

So some belated revenge here potentially for the Knicks. Maybe a little bit of Wally Zerbiak versus Tyrese Halliburton revival. I don't know. Oh, I forgot about that. What did he call him? A fake all-star? Wannabe fake all-star, I believe. Not even just fake, a wannabe fake. That's like when Perk makes his big list of real legit...

playoff stars or something like that. It's real and legit. So he's a wannabe and a fake all-star. Turns out, actually, Tyrese Halliburton is a real all-star and that's kind of awesome, even though he hasn't been the same guy since his hamstring injury. While he did retract or apologize, I believe, after the fact. Well, yeah, if you call someone a fake all-star, like...

A fake all-star and they're not a fake all-star. You kind of got to own on that one. And that was about Brunson. That was about Brunson that like that competition for an all-star spot. And so here they are again, too. I mean, it's hard to think of two teams who are more of a contrast in styles and two point guards who are more of a contrast in styles than these two guys.

Yeah. And of course, uh, Halliburton also taken after OB Toppin. So there's that thing I should, it sounds obnoxious. Now I'm just, it's, I don't want to nitpick the Knicks. They've done an incredible job. Um, but, but for the last couple of years, especially before the Knicks rose again, Knicks fans were like, and fans of a lot of teams were like, my God, we could have had Halliburton. Um,

Have they done such an incredible job, though, Howard, that they wouldn't trade teams with the Phoenix Suns? They're not one of the 26 teams? Would Man City trade teams with the Phoenix Suns? I don't think the bodega around the corner from me is trading places with the Phoenix Suns right now. Let's talk about Embiid. I said earlier this week that it's like I called him the tragic hero of the NBA before the series. I said, you know, actually in the early part of the series.

that it's every year with these ill-timed injuries and broken faces and knee injuries and face masks and obviously the organizational trauma that the Philadelphia 76ers and their slew of failed number one picks have inflicted upon Joel Embiid is the stuff of NBA anti-legend at this point. The playoff flameouts, the pass...

The inability to get out of the conference finals, the Kawhi shot, the Jimmy Butler, the Jimmy Butler on the team looks awesome. Suddenly plays for the heat. Al Horford suddenly plays for the Sixers. That didn't work out great. Then I said, after all of the grabbing of the legs and the stepping on the legs and the groin kick and hitting Brunson in the face, that he was almost kind of becoming the tragic villain of the NBA in the span of a week, uh,

And part of that was, I think, the perception that, once again, he shrunk a little bit in the absolute biggest moments of a playoff series. Now...

I don't know that outside of game five when he just threw the ball all over the gym and looked like a train wreck in Madison Square Garden. I don't know how fair that was considering he's clearly hampered by a knee injury. He has Bell's palsy. Like just the mad libs of crap that happens to Joel Embiid in the playoffs is crazy. By the way, Bell's palsy.

He averaged 33 points a game in the series, 11 rebounds, 6 assists, 4 turnovers, 44% shooting, 33% on threes, just 49% on twos.

The Sixers, for what feels like the gazillionth straight playoff series, plus 47 with Embiid on the floor, minus 46 with Embiid off the floor. Just can't ever do anything when Embiid's off the floor, despite the fact that they stack the deck in those lineups. Every other good player on the team is on the floor when Embiid's on the bench, and it still doesn't matter. He had issues defensive rebounding. We talked about it. I think...

He had 50 points in game three of the series. He had 50 points. Like I'm, I'm okay with his performance in the series, given the maladies. I will say this. So he was six of 26 in the fourth quarter for the series and more problematic to me. And I don't know if you felt this. I saw a couple of people on Twitter saying this. So, so maybe I'm not crazy. It didn't look like he really wanted the ball or wanted to look at the rim late in game five, but,

And late last night in game six, it just it felt like he didn't want to shoot. And what he wants to do is get off the ball and and or try to draw fouls like grift for fouls a little bit. And that happened in game four to remember he had that wide open mid range jumper off and out of bounds play, passed it up and just sort of like ran into precious to chew a hoping for a foul.

He doesn't seem super comfortable, as comfortable, shooting and looking at the rim and playing normal offensive basketball in the hottest, hottest moments of these games. And that's a very human thing. I get it. But that's something that I'm bookmarking for the future. But I thought all things considered...

he's gonna get crapped on a little bit for losing in the first round again for shooting poorly by his standards for turning the ball over all the time i thought he gave it everything his body would allow him to give it there were some hiccups here and there for sure the turnovers were a disaster even yesterday he had like four and just insane like how did what happened on that pass who were you passing to why did it go 10 rows into the crowd turnovers um you know

Ultimately, the Sixers just didn't have enough talent around Maxie and Embiid, I think, to make a really long playoff run. And the question now becomes in the offseason, do they get that talent? How long do they really have now with Joel Embiid, both in terms of his health? Is his desire to ever remain in Philadelphia for the rest of his career? And...

Just sort of just like how long does this window actually stay open? We know they have a gazillion dollars of cap space We know Paul George has not signed an extension with the Clippers and by the way, we'll talk about the Clippers but all indications I've had and I haven't checked in in the last 10 days where a lot of stuff has changed for the Clippers is Yeah, they're negotiating if the Clippers had offered a deal that Paul George would take he would have taken it by now He hasn't still think

He chose that place. He's from the LA area. I think he wants to be there. But if I'm him, I'm starting to look around. This is just me. This is just purely me, Zach Lowe, imagining being Paul George. This other guy is hurt every year. If I want to win, is this the best place for me? And if I'm the Sixers and I get a chance to meet with him in free agency, that's what I'm pitching. I'm pitching like...

Your guys hurt all the time. We got two guys here. One of them's hurt a lot, but he's also awesome. But they got to – like the clock is ticking one way or another on the Sixers and Beat Era, and this summer is make or break, I think. I think this is – if it's not it already, this summer is it. They have to nail it, and I don't know what the solution is. So I'll start with this. I –

I feel like I was very much the minority view here. And I felt this start from the start of this series between the Knicks and Sixers that while Joel Embiid was taking all these shots from people for like, oh, he's fading in fourth quarters and he's not, you know, he's losing the rebounding battle to Hartenstein and Mitchell Robinson and everything else. And plus all the antics and like that, you know, there's like, there's no waving away the antics and antics doesn't even do it justice because there was some pretty obnoxious and, um,

And dangerous stuff in there, right? He could have really hurt Mitchell Robinson badly on the leg grab and all that. There was just a lot of stuff going on. But where I think I saw this differently, Zach, is that, like, do you see how big that freaking brace is on his knee? Do you know how many games he played over the last, like, three months of the season? Also, he came back and saved your season. As soon as he came back, he went eight. No, he couldn't win any games. They were like a 33% winning percentage team without him.

Um, Joel Embiid came back on April 2nd after all those months off, uh, and played five regular season games before the playoffs. Um, so the idea that he maybe wasn't going to be in great shape come the fourth quarter, especially as much like, um,

You have to acknowledge, if the fourth quarters looked really bad, it's partially because the first three quarters in a lot of those games looked really good. And you'd think, well, why can't he sustain? Well, because I don't think the conditioning is there. And the knee, everybody tells me the knee is sound. He did not come back too soon or anything like that. But...

He did come back at a time where he did not have a lot of time to get back to 100% conditioning or get comfortable with it. It's clear that he was bothering him. I don't know about you, Zach. I was watching game one from home, but when Embiid threw the ball off the backboard to himself and then came down and was laying on the court, I thought that was it. I thought we weren't going to see him again until November at the earliest. And...

Like, I just... Perspective is important here. I could not believe, and I was talking to the Philly writers a lot during the games that I was at at the Garden, and like...

It sounds like there's a lot of Sixer fans who are just really down on Embiid, and I get it. It's a Groundhog Day thing. It's like every year something goes wrong. Every year he's hurt. Every year we lose sooner than we should in the playoffs and all this. But to me, I don't think Joel Embiid's actually getting enough credit for just gutting through the knee, the Bell's palsy, and God only knows what else was going on. He was...

mostly awesome. And then in fourth quarters and especially some tight moments, he was not. But I think that that's not an indictment of his character or his play or his competitiveness or being afraid of the moment. I think that's, this was not 100% Joel Embiid unless we forget he actually looked better than he did in his MVP season before he got hurt earlier this year. Well, we had this whole discussion on Get Up yesterday. Like, is this Tyrese Maxey's team now? Is Embiid the Robin of this team?

Everyone loves the Batman and Robin. Is there another superhero duo that we can go to where there's a clear 1A and 1B? There's got to be something else because Robin stinks. Nobody likes Robin. Does anybody like Robin? Has anyone ever been like, you know who's awesome? Robin. Nobody likes Robin. Robin sucks. Batman should have ditched Robin many iterations of Batman ago. Robin's nothing without Batman. He's been riding his coattails for a long time. Imagine if Batman was just like, you know what, Robin?

I think it's time to go our separate ways. You can fight crime by yourself or find another... Robin would be like, I guess I'm just going to go get a job at the bank. I can't do this. I can't wait for the backlash that's coming from the Robin stance. There's going to be some little pocket of Robin apologists out there who are going to come for you now. Literally no one has ever been like, Robin is my guy. And I said...

like I get that Tyrese Maxey just had an insane awesome crunch time game and the guy wants the wants the moment like he's ready for them he's a superstar that's the long if if one good thing happened to the Sixers this year it's a Tyrese Maxey is a minted superstar in the NBA also by the way incredibly magnetic personality as a player and and overall like there's I've run this by a few people just as I don't want to

sound like I'm crazy and people like, no, no, that's, that's right. Like there's a little bit of a Steph Curry vibe, not playing style by any stretch. They're very, very different players, but the joy thing, right? We use that term all the time with the Warriors and Steph, but,

And like, there's something about Maxie, the way he plays the game. It's not just that he's amazing and you're constantly sitting there going, wow, I cannot believe he just, you know, made this like running 15 footer fading over the baseline. It's that there's just this kind of magnetism about his game and his personality. It just seems like, it seems like he'd be a lot of fun to have as your teammate, which is no small thing. And he and Embiid gradually developed relationships.

What is now, I would say, A minus to A level chemistry on the pick and roll. The Knicks didn't really have a great answer for their two man game. And that's also massively encouraging. But I said, like on the Robin thing, like I understand he had a huge game. Game five was unbelievable. He wants all all of it.

We're two months removed, three months removed from Joel Embiid averaging the most points per minute of any player ever to play basketball in the NBA. Like let's, let's pump the brakes a little bit on like, has this have the Sixers and Maxie kind of passed him by as a number one option. I will say if he's on the team next year and is on the team for the next two, three years, and they continue to tweak around him and Maxie, um,

It's time for him to be a 50-55 game regular season player. It's just every year with this. And the only thing, if they want to win a title, he just has to be healthy in the playoffs. And whatever you can do to make that happen, I don't care if it's about the 65-game rule and MVPs. You just got to make that happen.

Look, Dale Morey gets tagged a lot for just chasing superstars. Of course, every GM in the league wants superstars. If you have one, you try to get two. If you have two, you try to get three and all that stuff. That's why 26 GMs would trade places with the Suns right now, Howard. But one, part of the reason I think that the Sixers were in a little bit of a bind with Embiid-Hobbled is that this was almost by design, right? There are moves they probably could have made last summer at the trade deadline, but

Daryl clearly was aiming for this offseason and trying to protect their cap room. And not necessarily because you're going to sign somebody in free agency, although maybe, because guys don't change teams in free agency very often anymore, superstars. But they've got the ability to take on money in trades too and make imbalanced trades. This is the first summer...

I shouldn't say it as first summer. But this is the summer where we're going to really start to see the effects of this new CBA and second apron and all this stuff. Like, I'm wondering, like...

It's part of the strategy here simply for the Sixers to say, you know what? Teams are going to have to sell for pennies on the dollar on some of these players. And whether that's a star or whether that's a collection of higher level role players than what we've got, they're going to be in a position to help teams out who are suddenly facing money crunches, tax crunches, apron crunches, all that stuff. So...

But they planned for this. And so I think maybe they hurt themselves in the short term by not having enough to lean on, especially once Embiid was banged up. But they're in a great position. I can't even believe that there are people who are suggesting that this is the summer that they should be trading Embiid and getting out of the Joel Embiid business and pivot to Max. I think that's insanity. Joel Embiid, if not for the knee, we might be sitting here talking about him as a two-time MVP. Yeah.

Maxie is just now becoming the superstar that he is. And they've got the ability to go out and get, whether it's Paul George, whether maybe they sweep in and steal Ananobi. I don't think that's going to happen, but that's a name that was floated to me. There are options for them, all kinds of options. Brandon Ingram, the Pelicans breakup seems to be imminent. I'll tell you this. I know knowing Daryl Morey,

He'll call about Durant. The vultures of Circle Phoenix, he'll be a vulture. But the who is important because a lot of the who's were taken up by extensions and trades and we don't need to go through all the who's. But they need... Part of the reason... They need to nail this offseason for lots of reasons. Number one... Number three on the list is probably like... I do wonder if the...

Well, we can always, if he ever asked for it or wanted out or we decided it was time, well, we know we can trade Embiid for two A-plus young players, four first-round picks, unprotected, four pick swaps. Obviously, they would get a lot for Joel Embiid. I do wonder if just the endless injuries and the fact that a lot of them are now repetitive with the knee,

I don't, I, I, I, Derek definitely going to be some teams who are like, he's 30, 31 now with all this mileage. Like, I don't know that we can, I, you gotta be ready to win day one. If you're going to fork over all that for him beat. And we've seen with these teams who think they're ready to win day one. It ain't that easy. The sun's one, no playoff games.

The Bucs won two playoff games. Obviously, injuries for them were – it's just – it's not that simple as, oh, Kevin Durant's available. We get Kevin Durant. That's it. Okay. I mean, there are costs to it. There's optionality out the window. There's future out the window. There's age. There's injuries. I don't remember. Oh, I mean, you mentioned their cap space. I'm just going to throw this out, the options. You know, they've got to find some options, Howard, because I don't think Ananobi's going to leave the Knicks. I don't think Siakam's going to leave the Pacers. Drew Holiday's been extended. Paul George, you know, L.A.'s sitting there.

I'm just going to say they do have enough cap space to absorb Ben Simmons' contract. Markel Fultz is also entering free agency this summer. Any other thoughts on the Sixers and the Knicks? I mean, it's one of these series we're going to talk about forever. It was just a delight from start to finish. It was the best kind of delight because it was a delight but also kind of agonizing for everybody involved.

Yeah. And, you know, it's, first of all, rare. You listed a bunch of them at the top of the show, but it's rare, like, that we're...

Thinking about, wow, an all-time classic and it was a first-round series, right? The stakes are necessarily lower. And part of this is that the Sixers should have never been a seventh seed in the first place. They're not your average seventh seed. And so there's that aspect of it. Joel Embiid laboring and at times looking like a shadow of himself and at times looking like Wilt Chamberlain. He was incredible at times. And so there were just so many things happening.

The finishes to these games, I don't know, you listed it all at the top. It was incredible. And the Knicks have been absolutely amazing.

they have the right to throw their own what-ifs into this, starting with Julius Randle being hurt. Although, more than one person I've talked to around the league in the last several weeks has brought up the idea that maybe they're not getting this level of Brunson if Randle's there, which is fair. Randle takes up some space and usage and possessions, and their spacing is better, arguably, without him.

But, you know, that's a discussion for another day and for the Knicks to discuss whenever their offseason may arrive, which is not going to be soon. I don't think their spacing is markedly better without them just because of the way teams are going to guard Josh Hart. I do think I've said all year, I understand that their record with Brunson and Ananobi is unbelievable.

with or without Randall. I've said all year for them to make the finals, I think they need Randall just the extra bit of shot creation. You feel it. They're so, I mean, this was a good offensive series. I think they put up a one 17 offensive rating in the series, which would have been like fifth or fourth or eighth, seventh or something in the regular season. They put up a one 29 last night. It didn't feel like that. That's a monster number.

A lot of that is offensive rebounding. They're very dependent on offensive rebounding. And if they can ever find a team who takes that away, they're going to be in trouble. The Pacers are 26th in defensive rebounding for the season. So the Pacers are probably not that team, at least in that aspect, that would give the Knicks trouble. I do think they, to beat Boston,

they would need everybody all hands on deck. And the biggest, I mean, it's, it sounds crazy because Porzingis is hurt and we don't know exactly when Porzingis is going to come back. I think they're being intentionally vague about it. I don't think the Celtics need Porzingis to make the finals. I think they need them to win the finals. The East is such a mash unit, right? I mean, Milwaukee's gone. Philly's gone. The Knicks are playing seven guys. Cleveland is just trying to gut out this Orlando series right now and looks good one night.

like a lottery team the next night. I think the Celtics can survive the East without Porzingis. I don't think whether it's Denver, Minnesota, whoever Dallas Clipper, Oklahoma city, whoever ends up coming out, I think they'll need Porzingis for that series, but they're looking around the East. Like, man, it's, it's like this heat series. They lost that game too. The rest of it was like preseason games for them basically.

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Bad news. Dame got hurt and is only going to get older. Giannis missed the entire series and their young players contributed next to nothing. Part of that is on Doc Rivers. I couldn't believe that Andre Jackson Jr. did not get in the game last night until it was essentially over. Beauchamp has just vanished from the earth.

Uh, they don't have a ton of draft assets. They don't have a ton of young players. They're just older and thinner. And Bobby Portis is extension eligible. Brooke Lopez is a year older. And look, Dame was pretty eloquent after the game last night, talking about how he's excited for next season. Um, that, uh,

They needed time and rhythm, and they didn't get it. And he still thinks that there's something here. And clearly there is. When their best players are all on the floor, their four best guys, they were a dominant team. They're just never on the floor together. And they were never an elite team for more than four games at a time at any point this season. Their defense, their offense, it was one thing. It was another thing. They were under .500 against Doc Rivers. It's very hard to look at the full...

dossier of evidence of Milwaukee Bucks 23-24 and say, oh yeah, if this, this is a championship team. It just isn't there. And

It's nice that Dan is talking about next year. It's nice that Ishbia is talking about next year and how the expectation was never to win in year one. We can't microwave it. It's year two, year three. When you trade all this stuff, it is year one. You can't afford to have a slip up in year one. It is win now immediately. You can spin it the other way when you don't win now in year one, but...

Look, I don't know. I know all the other people have said the other 29 teams are going to be crossing their fingers, hoping Giannis saw all this and is like, oh, maybe maybe I do need to look around elsewhere.

I don't know what is going to happen. I know that if I'm a Bucs fan, I'm hoping he just looks at this season and is like, I just got to throw this one in the trash bin of history and come back next year. It's a wash. Like we just, we fired our coach. It was a disaster. We made a big trade. I was hurt. Dame was hurt. Chris was hurt. Like next year will be better. Let's give it another shot. And I do think this nucleus is very, very good if they can ever stay healthy together, but they're getting older and

And the Celtics ain't going anywhere. And other teams are coming for them. And we're going to wash our hands of the Bucs pretty fast here and move on to the second round of the playoffs. And I think the washing of the hands will be of the ilk of like, well, you know, we just never saw the team. Tough luck. Giannis got hurt. Dave got hurt. Yeah, tough luck. Really, really bad season for the Bucs. Just all the way around. Just from top down. Really, really bad season.

The easiest thing to do is to wipe it away and say, well, Giannis was hurt, especially Giannis, obviously Dame too. And just say, you know what, you can't draw any conclusions based on that. But that was the case a year ago when they lost in the first round. And it resulted in them making what turned out to be a not so great swap of Drew Holiday for Damian Lillard. I will die on the hill just like I died on Julius Randall Hill, just like I'll die on all the hills that I will die on. I pick them very selectively.

I will die on the hill of that was a good trade for the Bucs. I understand that Drew Holiday went to the worst possible place for them, but

I think they had to do something. I think the theory of it was correct. I'm actually kind of surprised that we got to May 3rd and the Damianis two-man game just never caught the kind of rhythm that we all anticipated it would. I still think it could. I will die on the hill that that trade was a good trade. It made sense. It has not worked out yet. I think it was still a good move for them. I may be an idiot. I've been wrong about a lot of things. My wife would say that I am an idiot. Maybe I'm just an idiot.

I understood it at the time, and I'll be honest. I cheered it like I think most people did at the time. I talked to a couple people around the league who were a little bit, I won't say less enthused. One person I talked to at the time it happened outright said they're going to

regret this because whatever gains they make on offense they're going to more than lose in what they lose on defense and in trading okay well the question i would ask that person is was the previous version of the team winning a title and what version of what version i think that previous version of the team had hit its wall and what other version is there a third is there a third way i don't know what that way is maybe there was by the way i'm not sure if there's a there's probably precedent for this

Are we seeing the curse of the 2021 finals? The coming out of COVID, buildings still only half full, third full or whatever, even in the finals. Like the Suns have just, the Suns already are unrecognizable. Devin Booker's the only guy left and they've just been like, you know, withering ever since the finals. The Bucks win a championship and it's just been one thing after another. You know who's not suffering that curse?

Dominating baby dominating. I don't know if you saw his numbers from the last month of the season in Portland, the blazers, they're still in the NBA, the blazers and Deandre dominating is put, is putting up numbers, man. He actually, I'm being slightly facetious, but he is, nobody cares, but he is, he cares. He's dominating. He's a max player. Never ask him another question about it. I'm going to always hate that finals anyway, because when I broke my shoulder in Milwaukee, but, um,

I wonder where... So let's start here. There's all the rumors of, is John Horst, the GM, potentially going to leave the Bucs to go to Detroit? He's been there throughout this whole thing. And obviously he was in that front office as like, I don't know, the third or fourth guy on the flow chart when Giannis was drafted. So you're losing potentially some continuity in leadership. So that's, I think, at least interesting or worth noting. Yeah.

Mark Lazzari, one of their primary owners, sold his share a year or so ago. It does feel like there's, you know...

Like this is an inflection point for them. And Giannis signed that extension after they got Dame, just as he signed an extension after they got Drew. And it runs through 26-27, to be clear, guaranteed through that. After that, it's player option. So that's three more seasons. As I wrote at the time last fall, it made some Bucs fans very cranky with me, but I said like, this is great. And it's nice that it looks like Giannis wants to be there through it all, but...

There's no permanency in today's NBA. Nothing means... I don't want to sound real nihilist here, but nothing means anything. Like, guys sign extensions and ask out the next day. It happens. Guys opt in and ask out the next day. Like, I'm not predicting it and I'm not hoping for it. I would love to see Giannis spend his whole career in Milwaukee because I think it's better for small markets and for the league's health that stars stay in small markets. But they're teetering here. Like...

Like, let's be clear. Like, it's not just Giannis being hurt. It's Brooke Lopez having a ton of miles on him. It's that, you know, Drew Holiday, they've already traded Chris Middleton miles and injuries. They have not developed their youth very well. That's something else that, that another, you know, somebody else from, from around the league had flagged to me. Did Jake Crowder even get in the game last night? I don't think so. I mean, if he did, I didn't notice.

But yeah, there's not a lot of options here in terms of tools to work with, but they're kind of old and creaky and with a thin bench and haven't done a great job of developing their youth. And they've had three coaches in a year. I don't know where they go from here. I know that's not great podcast content, but I honestly don't know how you...

Fix this thing. And look, the good news is Giannis is still one of the best two, three players in the NBA when healthy. And, you know, he turns 30, I think, in December. But Dame's turning 34 in July. Like the window for those two isn't great. I also do wonder, by the way, like there have been, you know, like these weren't like...

red flags, but there were moments over the course of the season where there seemed to be some rumblings of Dame unhappiness, whether it was just being in Milwaukee or just the situation or whatever. He and Giannis had their moments, but is that partnership so great that we think that's permanent? Could Dame get moved again this summer? I don't think that's crazy to entertain. Well, Dame was also just...

this year. Not an all-NBA player. I didn't have him on. Maybe I did have him as the last guy on my All-Star team. I can't remember. But they can't... This doesn't work with a good Dame. They need one year of great peak Portland Dame, and they did not get it this year. And there may be a lot of reasons. He's talked a lot about his...

personal challenges in his life and adapting to a new place and maybe it was that maybe it was just sort of it's harder than we thought to for these two guys to find a rhythm together who has the ball who gets to run the offense what's what's that look like um i don't know i just think the fix is cross your fingers everybody comes back healthy and give it one more go and maybe we get a little lucky and blah blah blah the other team um that's going to be left in the dust here uh

They're gone from the playoffs. They had no chance against Boston with Jimmy Butler hurt and Terry Rozier hurt. And then how my hockey junior hurt and Duncan Robinson dealing with a back injury is the heat. I think people need to pay a lot of attention to the heat this off season. I have no idea what the hell is going to happen there. I never discount the heat as an on-court product. Like if they had Jimmy Butler and Terry Rozier, we don't really know how, how much of a threat they might've posed, but they didn't have them.

And this is a play in team every year. Now, to their credit, they got out of the play in and made the finals last year, which was incredible. And it's also a year old now. I think this I think there's some potential for major fireworks with the heat this summer, in part because there's always the potential for major fireworks with the heat. They're always looking around. They're linked to every superstar. They know that they know what what they're doing. But it starts with Jimmy Butler, right?

who just wasn't the same guy this year, even when he was healthy. He wasn't as efficient from two. He just wasn't... There were too many games, and he, again, did not play enough games for the Heat this year. There were just too many games where it felt like he was...

where you watch him like, man, he's just not impacting the game the same way. I mean, his impact always transcends his stats, um, is, is counting stats. It did. It didn't this year in the same way. And there were too many games where it's like, is he just saving himself? Like, is he just like, this is just a, this is just a night in the regular season. This team can't really afford that. Um,

He has one guaranteed year left on his contract and then a player option for 25-26. I think he's 34 years old. I don't have it in front of me. 35 in September. 35 in September. He is eligible, according to Bobby Marks, for a one-year extension. So that would be opt into his 25-26 player option and tack on one year 59 million onto that. Or...

a two-year extension that runs through the same amount of time, but you wipe away that player option. It's two years, 113 million. I would love to be in the room for those negotiations because I think that is about as dicey an extension proposition as there is in the NBA, given his age, his injury history, the fact that the team has had these crazy playoff runs, but also just hasn't been that good on the court in the regular season. And yeah,

The good news for the Heat is those are short contracts, but they're big. They're big, big numbers for a guy who's aging the wrong way. And they would nip away at your optionality.

It would not surprise me if there were some Jimmy Butler trade rumblings this offseason, if those extension talks don't go well. Because if I'm Jimmy Butler, I want all the money. I want all the money. I saved your franchise. You guys were dead in the water trying to figure out how to dig out of Hassan Whiteside and Justice Winslow and Dion Waiters and all of that. And I want all the money. And I don't know how this is going to go. I know that – I just don't know.

There are scenarios where, let's just say, the Heat trade Jimmy Butler for some future assets and some other stuff. Like, it's not just future assets. And that gives them the ammo to go out and call the Cavs and say, hey, what about Donovan Mitchell or somebody like that? And then the other going forward is the Heat try to reimagine their team is, you know, Bam, although he stretched out his shot a little bit this year, took some threes, good mid-range shooter.

he's a paint guy. And so you, he, you have to find a peculiar, a particular kind of player to fit next to him. But I think this is a potentially explosive off season for the heat. And I've, I've,

Just for my own mental preparation, started to imagine what fake Jimmy Butler trades could look like and who makes sense for him. And our producer, Dan, just said, trade him back to Philly in the chat. And that's the three teams on my tentative Jimmy Butler list. I mean, you can go farther and further than that. Our Philly, the Lakers. And I've always kind of been enamored with like, what if the Kings are just like...

it let's go like we got Fox and Sabonis we're just kind of okay we need a shake up we need some toughness we need some defense and we could go on I mean I think I don't think he's a fit there but I think the Rockets are going to be aggressive this summer looking for a star player I think it's going to be a wild summer but do not take your eyes off the heat the heat are always active and this is a pivot point for the Jimmy Butler era absolutely positively agree with all of that and I

speculation about Jimmy's future began long ago, before this flame out, before the injuries, everything else. Like there's been, people have felt like the clock was maybe ticking anyway. And listen, like Jimmy Butler's not your prototypical superstar in this league, right? He's not a, you know, 35 usage heliocentric, put up a bazillion points a night, shoot it. Like he's, he's, he's so different and hard to define, but what he brought to the heat is,

was enough to make them not just relevant for the last five years after, as you note, they were kind of dead in the water, but got them to a couple of finals, made them fun and exciting and interesting. And we could all hashtag heat culture all day, every day. And he, he epitomized it, but there's a lot that comes with Jimmy Butler. I'll just leave it at that. And so there's been speculation around the league that maybe this relationship has run its course and, and maybe, and,

This is the summer when they when they pivot. It would be the smart time to do it, both for all the reasons you outlined, Zach, about the extension and the cost and weight of that. And I believe just to add to make sure I add, I believe they're right at the edge of the second apron already going into next season, according to Bobby.

And this is a franchise like, you know, the Heat are really smart. The idea that they might be, you know, try to be one step ahead, sell on Jimmy while you can before holding on for too long, realizing that maybe you've already gotten...

Maybe more than you ever could have expected when you went down this road in 2019. Like they've, they've done pretty well with it. I know it's championship or bust for certain teams. And, and I don't know if that really applies to the heat, but yeah, like that's, that's, you know, they're, they're all about Larry O'Brien trophies there, but they did pretty well. They made a couple of finals with teams that, you know, arguably had very little right to get there. And yeah,

They've got some interesting young players and they've got Bam. And I mean, the easy thing to say would be, well, see what you can get for a hero and do some like little stuff around the edges. But I think this is a really strong argument to be made for the idea that they've already gotten as far as they're going to in the Jimmy Butler era. And it's time to pivot. You mentioned them wanting to go get Donovan Mitchell. And of course, like that's the other piece here, right? Like if they, if they kept Butler, do they still have the means to go,

make a trade for donovan mitchell or maybe maybe they're back in the dame lillard uh business or something um if they're good i think they might need more because that that pick they traded for rogier yeah it's just another thing out the door i like that trade for them i thought that was a worthy move for them and i think he would have helped them see you were saying butler for assets which assets that you then pivot into or or parlay as a general as a general as a

Well, I don't know that the Cavs are interested in that. No, but look, if there's one thing about the Cavs that's been kind of glaring last year or this year in the playoffs, it's that it seems like they're sometimes a little bit scared of the moment or just a little shaky. Maybe Butler's the guy that Garland and Evan Mobley need next to him. I don't know.

Well, look, we're not going to talk. The Cavs and the Magic play tonight in about nine hours. So there's no point in really talking about a game that's going to be on the horizon by the time this podcast goes up. But yeah,

um they really responded in game five that was a tough game uh without jared allen evan mobley got to move to center and defended bank harrow at the end of the game switched on him it was great they have a chance to wrap up that series tonight they need obviously as i've said with the calves all year they need to win the series it's a must win and we'll see if they win it tonight um the other team that plays later tonight which we should at least address a little bit is the clippers um

They are on the brink after they followed a really spirited game four win in Dallas where James Harden was not just clutch but super duper clutch down the stretch, making literally every basket except for one, the Paul George corner three. The two of them each had 33 points, I think, in that game. With such a dud in game five at home in L.A. that I was astonished watching it. They had absolutely nothing. No juice, no life, no flow whatsoever.

seemingly no idea what to do on offense after one action just one thing okay I got this switch and then nothing happens a lot of Norm Powell just a lot of Norm Powell on the ball in this series and I realized that the Clippers best player is not playing has played one game in the series that's Kawhi or two games rather sorry played one game where he looked decent in one game where he looked in game three just that his knee did not respond well to playing in game two

But just absolutely no life. Russell Westbrook has been on tilt the entire series. He's shooting 26%. He has more turnovers than assists. I just don't even know what he's doing out there now half the time. There was a stretch in game five where Ty Lue had Russell Westbrook, Mason Plumlee, and Amir Coffey on the floor together and thought that maybe the Clippers could score some baskets in that alignment. I don't know how that was possible.

they just laid down and died. They didn't lay down and die. They just came out with no energy and just farted through four quarters in that game. And Dallas blew the out of them. And now they play tonight and maybe they'll win tonight in Dallas. As Ty Lou has said, we've been down three, two to Dallas before going to Dallas. Yeah. It took one of the greatest games of Kawhi Leonard's career. One of the greatest individual games I've ever seen anybody play in the playoffs to win that game. But yes, you did do that. If they're, if they lose tonight, this will be five seasons of PG and Kawhi.

If they lose tonight or they lose this series, it will be five seasons and three playoff series wins total over five seasons. If you had told me on that morning in July 2019 when there was a literal earthquake in Las Vegas and they signed Kawhi Leonard and traded for Paul George, that five years later they would have won three playoff series and zero since 2021, I would have said,

well, that's a disaster. You're insane. Something horrible must've happened. And what has happened is that Kawhi just doesn't finish any seasons. And like I said before, in regards to Paul George, like, I don't know. I, they're kind of, I just like, well, James Harden's a free agent. Paul George could be a free agent. Kawhi has been extended. They've traded most of their picks. Um, I think they have the 2031 pick is still sitting there. Um,

It looked like this was going to be their best shot at it when they went 26 and five in the middle of the season. They've never been able to recapture that. Now Kawhi's hurt and they're on the ropes and man, what a gut punch it would be to go out in the first round. I don't know what's going to happen tonight, but that's, that's what's at stake. Three playoff series wins in five years is at stake.

It's staggering. I'll preface this by just saying this. No matter how this ends, and maybe this is the end, and maybe Paul George leaves, and who knows how we'll finally define this particular era. But I will say, as I've said before, this was still a success on some level. I know the playoff success is not there. The Clippers were never a destination. Never, ever, ever, ever. Even when Chris Paul landed there and Lob City became a thing, Chris Paul was trying to get to the Lakers, not the Clippers.

Getting Paul George and Kawhi Leonard in the summer of 2019, in addition to, of course, having flushed Donald Sterling and everything that went with him prior to that, the Clippers are different now. And I think, you know, you can't underestimate how important it was, I think, that two of the best players in the NBA at that time wanted to go there, did go there. Injuries happened. Yes, Kawhi was already like there was there were physical concerns at the time that they acquired him. Like it was baked in.

You can't foresee all of this. You can't foresee that Kawhi is going to have this kind of... Just this annual thing. This freaking Groundhog's Day that they've gone through. And it's torture for the organization and for their fans and everything else. But it was the right move. It was the right move to go get those two guys. And I think it's changed the way they're perceived. And I think others will now see them as a destination in a way that the Clippers never, ever, ever, ever were. And...

That's not nothing. They're not a championship team or anything close to it without Kawhi Leonard at 100%. That's a given. Paul George is really good. Kawhi Leonard's the one who makes them a potential contender. And so...

Unfortunately, this postseason, it looks like if they somehow survive this series and move on, do we think Kawhi is going to come back and be anywhere near 100 percent to try to get to the next round? Like that seems like a stretch. So I feel like whether it's tonight or whether it's sometime soon, this thing is ending. And I think Paul George, if they gave him if they offered him max years at max money, I think he stays.

I think the fact that he has not signed anything yet means that they have not offered him max years at max money and he's keeping his options open. I think they want Harden back, um, as, as much, uh, flack as he's taken. He was incredible for them, uh, for, you know, for a lot of the season, they're not here without him. Um, and there aren't that many other directions they can go, especially heading into a new arena in the fall. But, um,

It seems to me like Paul George is going to at least consider his options. Fun dark horse candidate somebody suggested to me, the Indiana Pacers. That would be interesting. Of all the homecomings we've had in this league. I don't know that they can open up the space. I don't know that they can either. I thought you were going to say Orlando, which is... Orlando, I think, was also on the list. But it does feel like this thing is...

It's on life support this era. It's interesting how things change in the playoffs. After the first two games of the Magic Cavs series, you would have walked away thinking, well, Orlando has learned they just need a dramatic injection of talent on offense, even if it takes the ball out of Paolo's hands and Franz's hands. And then they win two games and are competitive in game five. And it's like, you know what?

Maybe we kind of hit the brakes on that and more of a hybrid, somewhat off-ball threat like Paul George or somebody of that ilk might be a better fit. The last thing I want to hit, I just really want to quickly say,

Look, I don't think Darvin Hamm did a great job this year for the Lakers. I was on it from the beginning in saying that I just don't understand why they're not starting Reeves and Hachimura together and starting their best five players. It took way too long to do that. Timeout management, whatever. It's all hindsight with the timeout management with these coaches, like fouling up three, not fouling up three. I haven't liked the coverage of –

the Darvin Ham situation since the season ended for a lot of different reasons. Number one, the Lakers just can't fire a coach in a normal way. Like it seems like Darvin Ham is probably going to get fired today, tomorrow. Like when, when people are reporting, he's like potential firing timelines, uh,

And it's the opposite of when Frank Vogel was just instantly fired after winning a championship. Not directly after, but they just can't fire a coach normally. Number two, there's been some words in some of the Darvin Ham analysis that I have not liked and have not... Some descriptive words that I don't think are fair at all. And he's clearly being scapegoated. Yeah.

you know, it's always interesting how there's these anonymous grumblings from players and stuff that come out only after the season. I thought one of Anthony Davis's, to his credit, on the record comments that was in the athletic story of the Lakers obituary was,

I'm talking about how, you know, all these players, all these role players who shoot 10% against other teams seem to shoot 40% for us. And I think the implication that the athletic was trying to suggest was he was kind of criticizing Darvin Ham for being slow to adjust to guys having hot shooting nights against them. Every coach does that.

Every coach, the Sixers just did it to Josh Hart in every single playoff game and paid the price. That's every single coach is going to say, well, don't guard that guy. I just feel like he's been, I don't think he did. Like I said, I don't think he did a great job. I think he was way too slow to start the guys, but they did make the conference finals last year. They're just not that good. Like they're just a nice NBA basketball team. They won one playoff game.

They're not a coach away from winning three playoff series, from winning 11 more playoff games. I think they could have done a better... I think Darby could have done a better job. I think another coach, some coaches might have done a better job. Some coaches might have done a worse job. I don't like the way that he was instantly scapegoated. I don't like the way that he's been written about in some corners. And I just... I'm not quite going Charles Barkley where it's like, it's the players. It's the players that are the reason that this and that because...

I used to have this back and forth with Van Gundy where it's like, where it's like never the coach's fault. I would poke at him about it. It's like never the coach's fault.

But if it's never the coach's fault and it's all about the players and no coach can win without the players, but then what does actually a coach do? You come to this cross, what is their job then? If it's all the players, then why even have a coach? But I do think Darvin Ham has been unfairly scapegoated to an unusual degree, I think. I think a lot of the specific criticisms of Darvin Ham –

have been fair um there have been all kinds of things uh that people have have said written suggested that you know on on the the merits uh have some um have something to them but i agree with you he's being scapegoated and the the rumors of of them their intent to fire him were starting even before they were eliminated and you know that's kind of crappy um

But, yeah, I mean, look, it's been pretty evident for, I think, most people for a while here that aside from LeBron, who just had one of the most incredible seasons we've ever seen, well, the most incredible season we've ever seen for a guy 39 years old, there is no precedent, aside from LeBron and Anthony Davis, who, again, also had a great year,

How many of those players are guys that other teams would really be clamoring for? I think Reeves. I think Reeves on his contract is. But is Austin Reeves really – if Austin Reeves is your third best player, you're probably already having some issues, right? Like here's a fun thing. Take the Lakers Nuggets series and do a draft and how many of the top seven or eight are from the Nuggets roster? Like after LeBron and Anthony Davis, it's a bunch of Nuggets. I mean it's obviously Jokic and then LeBron and Anthony Davis and then it's all Nuggets for a while.

They just don't have that much talent. They don't have two way players. And to be clear, they're good. The Lakers are good. Yeah. They're a good basketball team. Yes, but not a contender. And there's a lot of debates going on about like how close, I mean, they played the nuggets really well. They led for 75% of the series. They can hang that banner next to the in-season tournament banner if they want. Um,

Did you see the mayor got in trouble for saying she tweeted, at least we won the in season tournament and had to delete it. Oh God. I didn't see that. It's a good tweet though. Um, that is a good tweet. A good X. Um, uh, like that's all true. They were competitive. Um,

That doesn't mean they're close to winning a title. Like, they won one playoff game. And I understand they drew the worst possible matchup for them. I don't think they'd beat Minnesota. I don't think they'd beat Oklahoma City. I certainly don't see a roadmap in which the Lakers can win three playoff series again.

I think that's a very tall order and much different than winning one playoff game and being competitive in the others. And by the way, LeBron's going to be a year older. Anthony Davis is going to be a year older. And you are never, ever, ever going to get this level of health and availability for both of them in the same season again. So...

I do think they're going to try to do some dramatic stuff in the offseason because they should. Their takeaway from this season should not be, oh, we're just a small tweak away from getting right back to the finals. It's more than that. But that's all I want to say about the Lakers. Enough Lakers. Howard Beck, what are we looking at from you at TheRinger.com? I love saying that. Howard Beck of TheRinger.com. I love saying that. Thank you. No, working on something fun. A couple of pieces, actually, for next week. One for sure, I think, coming in.

Tuesday. You know me. I'm weird about actually saying what the story is about. So just something coming up on Twitter.com on Tuesday. Every Monday on The Real Ones podcast with my buddies Logan Murdoch and Raja Bell. Yeah. And always on Twitter. It's still Twitter. It's not. Nobody calls it X. Nobody said, you know, I saw a really interesting thing on X.com.

Did you see that X? No. It will always and forever be Twitter. Twitter at Howard Beck. Howard Beck, it's great to see you. Read all his stuff. Listen to him on Mondays. Thank you for spending a little time on the good old Low Post podcast, sir. Thank you, my friend.

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Everyone's been waiting for this one. The teams have been waiting for this one ever since their first round matchup last year. No Jada McDaniels, no Nas Reed. But when I started seeing people from the Nuggets during the finals and later in the offseason, they kept saying to me, something about what that Minnesota team did to us in the playoffs kind of impressed us. Like, that's in...

That's in our heads a little bit going forward. Like, that's a team we're monitoring. They figured something out with this Rudy Gobert on Aaron Gordon, Carl Towns on Jokic, have Rudy roam around. And then you throw in the connections between these two teams. And it's actually kind of crazy how incestuous this really is. We know about Tim Connolly moving from Denver to Minnesota. Calvin Booth moving.

Worked for the Timberwolves before he worked for the Nuggets. Brought there by Tim Connolly. Tim Connolly's first draft in Denver. The Nuggets sold the pick that became Rudy Gobert. Tim Connolly's first move in Minnesota was acquiring Rudy Gobert. The Denver Nuggets coaching staff has two names.

of former Minnesota Timberwolves head coaches, basketball royalty in Minnesota, one of whom, Ryan Saunders, was also the head coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves. The Minnesota Timberwolves head coach, Chris Finch, was an assistant in Denver during the year of Yolkmus, the year that Nikola Jokic became...

The starting center in Denver. Mike Ganori, who will be something like the acting sideline head coach if poor, injured Chris Finch can't be on the sidelines, was an assistant under Michael Malone in Denver. I'm probably missing some. Not only that, I mentioned their first round series last year. If there is a defining problem

free championship moment for the Denver Nuggets it's either Yolkmus as the official kickoff of this era or game 82 in 2018 winner take all for the number eight seed between Denver and Minnesota and Minnesota won the game and Denver vowed after the game we're not going to risk it again we're going to be better than that we're not going to be here and here we are a

A year after that first round series, a year after the Undermann Wolves 4-1. I don't want to read too much into it, but if you watch the games, you saw something. The Nuggets saw something and they've been quietly eyeing each other all season. I think three of the four regular season matchups were largely useless because players were out, major players were out. But we are here, Denver, with a, you know, another competitive season.

over the Lakers, competitive but short. And the Wolves announced themselves as, oh yeah, we're ready for this. We're ready for all the smoke. Punched the Phoenix Suns in the face. Punched them again. The Phoenix Suns fell over. The Wolves just punched and punched and punched until the Phoenix Suns quit. And here we are. I could not be more excited for a second round playoff series. This is the NBA Nerds Playoff Series. Adam Morris from DNVR Sports representing the Nuggets fan community. How are you, sir?

I'm doing great. That was a hell of an elite, and I think you touched on all points. You set the table great. This is like Bob Costas back in the day. I'm ready. John Krasinski from The Athletic, guru of all things Minnesota. How are you, sir? I'm great, Zach. Now I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop for the Timberwolves since I'm on this pod with you, and we're waiting for what tragedy is going to befall them going into game one since I'm on this pod like less than 48 hours before that's going to happen.

Glenn Taylor versus A-Rod in a fist fight? Who wins? Glenn Taylor gets his pick of any weapon that he wants to use against A-Rod? I don't know what's going to happen. I'll just go one by one to each of you. I'll start with you, Adam, because Denver is the defending champions. They're the favorites coming into this series despite looking...

just okay by their standards against the Lakers, despite Jamal Murray nursing a calf injury, which did not prevent him, of course, from making two absolutely monstrous game-winning shots in that series. How have you had your eyes on this Minnesota team, too, as a Denver guy and a Nuggets guy for the whole season? And what did that first-round series, like, how did it resonate for you? How are you approaching this series?

So many of the nuggets that were on the team last year echoed, which is that that did feel like the most competitive series, even though it was only five games. They disrupted them in a way that Denver rarely gets disrupted. Now, the Lakers just disrupted Denver in the first round series. So that's kind of interesting. I think it actually mirrors last year's first round series with Minnesota quite a bit. But when you contrast...

You know, you brought all, I like how you set the table with all the different guys on different sides. You also got Monte Morris there. These two teams have played each other more than anyone. I think if you add like Jokic on court minutes, who has he gone against most in his career? It's probably Rudy Gobert, Mike Conley, Carl Anthony Towns. So you're talking about teams and players who are very familiar, but it was fun to watch the contrast between these two teams in the first round because the Nuggets won last year.

And they played with the excitement that Minnesota brought to the table, I thought, this year. Whereas Denver, a more veteran team now, the Monkees are off their back. They've won a title. The first round almost felt like a slog, like a chore, like something they had to endure. And I don't know if that is a sign of what will, you know, the energy they'll bring to this next one. But I have a sense that watching Minnesota and watching Denver, you just saw a team that had the excitement of, it's our time. We want to get there versus Denver, who looked a little worn down and like they had to get through it.

John, the Wolves couldn't have been more impressive in the first round. And in particular, you know, my question for them all season about their viability as championship contenders is,

And I was high on them before the season. I had you on. I said, they're going to get home court in the first round. This is going to be a good team. This is going to work this year. Now, I didn't think it would work quite this good, but I was high on them. But all year, I said, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to trust Ant and Cat with the ball in their hands under pressure against an elite postseason defense. Now, Phoenix was not an elite postseason defense, but Anthony Edwards just dissected the Suns by just...

doing the simple thing every time calm cool not forcing it not trying to be fancy you put two on me and Nikhil Alexander Walker's over here open I'm just gonna hit it to him and he's gonna make the right play and the ball might come all the way back to me Carl Towns some dumb fouls so

Some dumb fouls, but also a little bit of calm on offense, not forcing it in the post, not bulldozing people with his limbs flailing and hitting everything in the vicinity and falling over onto the ground. Usage rate a little lower, recognizing his role. Couldn't have been more impressed. The whole Gobert trade was a bet on Gobert, obviously, but it was a bet on Anthony Edwards being ready in short order.

Are you surprised how ready they looked in the first round? Are they surprised? And have they been eyeing this matchup just the same way the Nuggets have too? Yeah, I mean, first of all, personally, I was surprised at...

not that they beat the Phoenix suns. I think I picked them in seven to start the series. I just think, I thought that this was a resilient team that was going to be tougher, especially defensively and get through Phoenix. But I thought given what we saw in the regular season with how the sons owned them, that this was going to be a tough matchup, especially when you're going up against shot makers like Durant and Booker and the fourth quarters and all those things, it turned out to be an absolute wipeout. So that was a surprise to me. Um,

I don't think it was a big surprise to the Timberwolves themselves, to those players. They were ready for this. And like Adam said, they have come into this playoffs with an enormous chip on their shoulder, with a big hunger to experience something that this organization just almost has never done. And they feel like they have been discounted and overlooked and disrespected.

and all of those things. And so I do think that they are ready for this moment. They, you know, they're clubber laying in Rocky three before he faces Rocky the first time, like he wants all of it. And so you, you hit on it though, crucially Zach the stretch of this season when Carl Anthony towns went out with the knee meniscus surgery,

Anthony Edwards to take that leap. He had to be on his own a little bit in that stretch. And he figured out because he got so much attention with cat out, he learned how to handle it, how to make the simple pass, how to get the offense moving and how to trust that if he makes that simple play, he's going to get it back.

later in the possession often in a more advantageous position to do real damage we all saw in game four against phoenix the dunk in the fourth quarter the turnaround jumper over beal that you know everyone says looks like you know someone wearing 23 the the deep three like all those things are fantastic they're dynamic they're jaw-dropping but what makes this team the most dangerous is the

Two people are coming in and I'm going to make a quick pass to Nikhil Alexander Walker. I'm going to drive and make a quick kick to Carl Anthony Towns. And that creates so much easier offense for a team that frankly struggled a lot of the regular season to get that easy offense. So it's been the biggest maturation in his game and it happened very, very quickly. And I do think it has taken some people by surprise, but it's here now. And I think it's legit. This is not a flash in the pan. He really has an understanding of things right now.

In breaking down the series, let's start with that half of the game. You know, both these teams can win the title. We've reached now a point where this is a series between teams we know with almost 100% certainty. This is two championship level teams. The way Minnesota played in the first round certainly announced themselves. They were third and fourth in the regular season in net rating. And their pedigree with Denver speaks for itself.

I want to start on that half because that's the quote-unquote weaker half for either of these teams. Denver was a top 10 team on both ends of the floor, but ninth on defense, a little bit better than that on offense. And Minnesota was an average kind of clunky offense for a lot of the season, but absolute apex elite number one by far defense. So we'll get to that half of it. I want to start with Minnesota's offense against Denver's defense and what to watch for there.

In the past, the matchups have generally been KCP on Ant, Jokic on Gobert, and obviously the offense will center around Edwards, Gobert, pick and rolls. And we can talk about how Jokic will defend those and how Denver will defend those. Aaron Gordon, who was...

I mean, you just can't say enough about what a monster that dude was in the first round. It seemed like every single contested rebound they needed, he got, including the most important rebound of the whole series leading to Jamal Murray's go-ahead three in game five. Aaron Gordon on Towns, Michael Porter Jr. on McDaniels, and Jamal Murray on Mike Conley. Adam Morris, I'll start with you. Denver has...

Over five, six years now, refined and tweaked, settled on kind of a default scheme, which is Jokic coming up to the point of the screen and being pretty aggressive on the pick and roll, but added some stylistic variability that has been critical in some of their playoff series, including last year against the Wolves where they mixed up tactics. But that's what they default with. We're going to put two on the ball. We're going to rotate behind it. Those are what the matchups are going to be. What do you see? What do you anticipate from

as the biggest challenge Minnesota's offense presents? Or like, what are you going to be watching for those first few Minnesota possessions? How do they attack? How does Denver respond? I don't even know if it's the first few possessions because these teams have played each other so much that a lot of the default stuff I think is going to go back to default stuff. What's different is,

And Anthony Edwards is too big for KCP. And that was even true last year. And, but the gap and all the other margins I think was wider that it was like, okay, he's going to go off and he had a great series 40 point game, you know, a bunch of 30 point games. He was great in that series, but you could live with it.

This year, Anthony Edwards is a better player and he's a better playmaker to John's earlier point. So now is KCP a guy that you can put on him and trust him to guard? If not, does Aaron Gordon, because of his size, his strength and his mobility, does he need to switch over there? And now you have to figure out who's going to guard Carl Anthony Towns. Is it Michael Porter? Are you going to have to stagger more? And then the third layer to all of this is that the Nuggets like to play Aaron Gordon as the backup center.

in the playoffs which means okay whatever the matchup is yoke comes off the court even if it's only six seven minutes aaron gordon's there now now you especially need that because of naz reed and the ability to play two bigs off the bench you're not only going to have to play aaron gordon it's possible in the series deandre jordan zeke nagy somebody else gets a a stab at guarding the other big because of how big they are so now you look at it i say all that to say

If KCP can guard Anthony Edwards and hold Minnesota's defense to a standard that they think they can outscore, that would be a huge win for Denver. But if not, as I suspect is not the case, who do you go to? Do you play more staggered minutes? Something Michael Malone has never liked to do in the Jokic era where you're bringing a sub out. Maybe it's a Michael Porter early or Jamal Murray early so that you can put a Christian Brown or Peyton Watson on there. So you have more defenders to guard all of their players.

I think that's going to be one of the real questions early on. So I don't think we'll see it in the first five minutes of this game, but certainly in game one, you're going to see how early does, can Aaron Gordon, does he have to come on the court when Jokic is off? And if so, what, what does that do to the Anthony Edwards, Carl Anthony town defense and all the other minutes? Yeah. If, if KCP is just physically overwhelmed, uh,

The whole series flips on its head right away. I mean, I rewatched a lot of the film from this season and last season's playoffs. And again, this season, there were a lot of injuries dotting all the games except the very first one. They've still stuck with KCP on Ant for the most part because it's a regular season game. We're not going to play all these cards now. If that changes fast...

That's, I think, a bad sign for Denver. John, when Minnesota has the ball, what are you going to be looking for? Yeah, what I want to see is exactly what Adam hinted at. Will they ever get to a point where they put Gordon on and...

and try to use that size and strength to match up with him. And then, you know, if I'm Denver, I'm looking at that and I'm saying, hey, let's give this a shot and let's see if Carl Anthony Towns will beat us. And, you know, he carries a lot of baggage. He played very, very well, especially in game four against Phoenix. And I think really under control, mature, disciplined, all of those things. If he can keep that composure,

in this series, then the Wolves have a real shot to really kind of have a counter to whatever Denver wants to throw at them defensively because of all of that scoring talent and that shooting talent. But I could see a scenario where Denver says, all right,

if Ant is really murdering us and he, if he's flinging it around and Conley's hitting open threes and Nikhil Alexander Walker's hitting open threes and all this, let's try and take that away and make Carl Anthony Towns then be the guy. And, and let's see if he can take that pressure on his shoulders and respond. And so I think that's going to be a,

The other thing that the Wolves will try to do, which they have not always had success with and didn't in the last season, was take advantage of the few minutes that Jokic is off the court. When you have Nas Reed, when you have Nikhil Alexander-Walker, when you have Imante Morris, they have much more reliable players.

explosive bench players than Denver does. They have to win those. And just like Jamal Murray will be on the floor for those minutes that Jokic is off the floor, one of Ant and Cat is essentially always on the floor, barring foul trouble, which Cat's got to stay out of. Obviously, it goes without saying at this point that Cat has got to stay out of foul trouble. You almost don't even have to say it. But to your point on the Ant, Aaron Gordon, KCP thing, it's been interesting because even though KCP has been the primary defender on Ant,

They're fine and have been fine switching any ant cat two man game, even if it means a guard is on cat. And I think part of the reason for that is just to your point, you guys want to break your offense to post up this dude who's out of control all the time and knocking people over all the time. Go ahead and do it. We don't care.

And if he's more polished at that now, if he plays this series like he did the Phoenix series where he's calm, just take a beat, man. To take a beat, get your elbows and arms under control and calm down. Then that becomes a dicier strategy. Adam, do you think, you know, last year,

Jokic, again, aggressive at the point of attack. Take the ball out of Ant's hands. Play three on four behind the play. Rotate like madmen. Force the Wolves to force Gobert to make plays on the roll like Anthony Davis did in the first round. Can he finish enough plays? Force them to pass it and pass it and pass it until, oh, Jaden McDaniels has to make a play with seven on the shot clock. Now, they varied that up sometimes. On the side, they'll drop Jokic back.

Against Conley, they'll drop Jokic back. Against Ant, they're afraid to do that up the middle because he'll just run him over. But do you anticipate them playing that kind of aggressive style? And I guess from what you've seen, like, are the Wolves ready as a collective unit to make all those reads and hurt the Nuggets and make all the passes to get to the right shot?

What I think is interesting about that question is, if we just stick with the basic pick and roll, which is Rudy Gobert, he's the screener. Denver's gone against Gobert so much that I actually think the details are such. You want him to catch outside the foul line, so you don't want him to allow him to catch too deeply in the paint on those rotations. But then...

On the catch, I don't think you want to meet him at the foul line. You almost have to push him up. But he is at his worst when he has to take a dribble and pass. So it's almost like you want him to catch, have to put the ball on the floor, and then read the defense. And Denver, I think, has gotten really good at this, again, because they're so familiar with each other. These types of subtle details are just almost ingrained in the core guys that are playing.

Where it gets different is that I think Minnesota now is more equipped with the other guys who screen and roll. By the way, Dallas is the number one team that does this. Their pick and roll with Lively and with Gafford, that's great. Traditional pick and roll. But they run it with Derek Jones. They run it with Dante Exum. They run it with...

non-center guys. And those guys are so good at making plays. So for me, Nikhil Alexander, Walker, Jada McDaniels represent opportunities of this. I think Denver's going to try to switch those, but there's things you can do to get Rudy rolling and get the ball swinging quickly to those other guys. And that's where I think Minnesota is different than last year is if you can attack four on three, even if it's not a role, it's more of a

draw the double out and then swing it to those guys they're more equipped than they were last year to attack four on three and find the open man and i think they have guys who are more capable of finishing those plays at the rim or behind the three-point line we saw in the first round against the lakers and we've seen it year and there before sometimes opportunistically by the nuggets and sometimes out of a position of vulnerability we saw um in game two in particular the nuggets move yokich off of anthony davis and say we're guarding rui hachimura with yokich

If you want to hurt Jokic in the screen and roll, you've got to use this guy who's not as good as the guy you were using before. And it's going to screw up your spacing. We even saw him guard Gabe Vincent a little bit in the Lakers series when Rui was not on the floor and they didn't want him guarding AD. And again, we've seen that in a lot of other matchups over the years. He'll guard Kyle Anderson sometimes in this series when slow-mo is on the floor.

It's hard for them to do that against the Wolves starters, though. I mean, the only reasonable place they could really put them is McDaniels, who, like you said, has gotten better offensively this year. And then you've got to juggle the matchup so that Porter's got to guard somebody you may not want Porter guarding. Is there any sort of matchup flexibility for Jokic in this series? Or do you just think this was the ninth rated defense in the NBA? Like defense is no longer an issue in Denver. Do you just think you just roll it out like you'd normally roll it out?

I think Denver will have to in moments put Jokic on like you're saying. I don't know if it'll be Jaden McDaniels. I think there's other guys. I mean, certainly if Kyle Anderson's ever on the court while Jokic is on the court, that would be the guy. If you're going to kill Alexander Walker, I know he makes a lot of his threes, but

Denver, I think, has to trust their offense to gain a lead because there's something different about being up 10 against the Suns in Game 3 and Nikhil Alexander-Walker making those threes versus being down 0-1 and down 8 points in the third quarter and making those threes. And I think Denver will take those calculated risks and say...

you know, we'll win the way you're least comfortable. If you think about this last series with Denver, by the way, the Lakers did this, the Lakers made a conscious decision for all five games to quickly double Jokic and say, Jokic is so good at beating everyone. But what happens if we compromise our defense in a way, but it'll make somebody else beat us. And Jokic was a rare example of a guy that did it for five games. It looked like he was being passive, but I honestly just think he was thinking if they're going to do this, I have to trust everyone else to beat them.

And, and that's what we're going to do. Does Minnesota have that in them? Because I've been so impressed with how connected they are, how much they seem to play for each other and believe each other, but they haven't been behind in a series yet. And they haven't been underdogs in a series. And it's going to be harder for them to make those plays, swing it to Nikhil Alexander Walker and trust that he's going to make the right play when you're down eight points and down in a series.

Nikhil Alexander Walker has been a revelation for the Wolves. And I've said for a year plus now, like I couldn't believe that two bad teams in Utah and Portland just decided like, man, where's young guard who can play defense really well. Like we're just not interested with was thrown to the side. A couple of things that the Wolves offense again, which was their shakier half this season have have has going for them.

they get to the foul line a lot in Denver has been a little foul prone this year. They also, the wolves can get a little sloppy with the basketball as we know, and Denver does not force turnovers. Denver forced the fourth fewest turnovers in the league. So like the little edges of this series, you can talk yourself into kind of like this adds up to something for the wolves. Before we switch sides, John, any, anything else you're going to be watching wolves offense, a player we didn't talk about a play. We didn't talk about anything you want to hit. Well,

Well, I do think that one thing that we didn't talk about a lot yet is Jaden McDaniels, because I do think that a lot of times what you see with opposing defenses is they put their worst defender on McDaniels and say, we're going to dare you to beat us. Now, he did not have a good season offensively through the regular season, but

he had a hard time finding his role as the fifth option in the starting group. His, his shots were, were kind of coming here and there and he couldn't get into a rhythm. He also did not rebound the ball very well at all. Um,

For most of the season. And what we saw was a totally different McDaniels offensively against Phoenix. Attacking the rim, getting offensive rebounds, coming from the corner and crashing, using his length to create second chances. And if you get that kind of activity and some efficiency in scoring from McDaniels,

that makes it a much harder to hide whoever your worst defender is. It also makes it much harder to double either towns or, or ant on the touch. And so if McDaniels can continue this offensive momentum from Phoenix and

into Denver that really I think would would be a huge thing for the Wolves if he kind of regresses to the relative non-factor he was offensively in the regular season then I can see that this offense getting stagnant having a harder time kind of getting things going because he's also one of their best cutters he breathes some motion into it and and I think that'll be a big key for them

You hinted on one thing real quick, John, I wanted to touch on, which is Jade McDaniels rebounding, because I think that's the last leg of this when Denver's on the defensive end is as defensive rebounding for Denver and offensive rebounding for the Wolves. Not necessarily a strength, but these things are less about regular season strengths and weaknesses and more about.

Can you get him into rotation? We're talking about Jokic being out on the trap and the team working the ball around. Scramble defenses don't rebound well, and that's going to be one edge here because, again, I think Denver's offense is going to score on Minnesota more than Minnesota will score on Denver, but rebounding is going to be a vulnerability, and if you gain six, seven extra points than expected off of those, that tilts everything else in Minnesota's favor. And McDaniels, you mentioned, is cutting.

You know, he's at his best when he remembers how big he is. And if you try to hide a point guard on me, I can kind of cut. I don't even have to like cut ahead of him. I can kind of cut through him and finish through him. And he's starting to sort of internalize that.

Let's flip to the other end, which is, I think, almost a more interesting tactical battle because it's the best offensive player in the world against one of the best defensive players in the world, although they will not be guarding each other. Gobert will not guard Jokic all the time. Some of the time he will, and I think those times are going to be important too. But we talked about, you know, you talked about, Adam, how the Lakers –

I mean, those were the quickest double teams. They were doubling him when the pass to him was in the air. The double team was already coming. And then rotating to the guy who was one pass away from Jokic to take that away. Jokic can solve that. He's seen that a million times. The Wolves don't want to do that. They don't want to double from in front like that and leave that pass on the perimeter open for him. What they want is, okay, enter it to Jokic in the post. And we'll talk about the pick and roll later.

Towns will be on him or Nas Reid will be on him or Slo Mo will be on him. Sometimes we'll front him and try to mess it up that way. But, and then Aaron Gordon will be somewhere and Rudy will be lurking behind Jokic, both doing two things at the same time. Number one, if you try to get anywhere near the rim, I'm going to come over and block this shot. And I'm so long that,

I can do that while interfering with the passing lane to Aaron Gordon, who's unbelievable at like just ducking in a little, little skulking around. And I'm going to force you. The only pass we're going to kind of give you is all the way across the floor where we can rotate in while the ball is in the air. Now, I think there's, there's no stopping the nuggets. The nuggets have answers to everything. I think Minnesota's hope is like,

Slow them down three percentage points and our defense will then put us in range to win. I also think Denver has been holding some cards...

for this series all season long that they have not used. And those cards will involve where Aaron Gordon is, what he's doing, what Jokic is doing during the stuff that Aaron Gordon is doing, whether Aaron, well, I'll just go to you then. Like, what are you looking for? Is this Gobert on Gordon Gambit now take center stage?

Honestly, such an astute observation because I feel the exact same way. And we'll see what happens. The pick and roll we'll get to in a little bit. But you're talking about Jokic's post-touches. And Goberon and Aaron Gordon. Last year, the Rui adjustment was this idea. We're going to put Anthony Davis off of Jokic. You saw also in the Philly game late in the season, P.J. Tucker guards him. Denver...

had seen that in small doses, but it felt like a defense that gained momentum against Denver last year. And every team thought, can we do this? Are we equipped to do it? Minnesota, obviously the most equipped, but I think Denver has spent the last year working on this very adjustment, this, how do we attack it? And to your point, number one, I think Jokic individually has learned, okay, if he's going to be on the right side and I'm posting on the left side, how do I do all of my work on the left side? So that if he is going to double, I'm not going to the middle of the court.

he's going to have to come all the way out and fully compromise his ability to recover. That's half of it. And then the other half is...

If you watch the very first play of this last series or the last game against Minnesota, I think it's a very revealing one. Jokic catches it on the right block. He attacks middle and Aaron Gordon sets a flare screen rather than stand in the corner to space or stand in the dunker. He sets a flare screen. So now go bear who's low. It's not guarding Gordon in the corner. It's do I help out now or just stay there so I can get, you know, Michael Porter running to the corner. And if not,

I'm still staying low along the baseline. And Aaron Gordon, after the flare screen releases to the middle of the court. So it almost puts Gobert in a decision place where he has to make the read before Jokic does. And then it makes Jokic's read obviously a lot easier. So it's little things like that, that I think Denver has figured out. Okay. If Gobert is going to try to help off, use Aaron Gordon as something else and then cut him to the middle of the basket where Gobert is not trying to recover. And it's had some success, but to your point,

It's interesting to me too that Denver didn't do it very much. And I did take note of it of, wow, that works so well. You got an Aaron Gordon dunk out of it. You got this out of it three, four times. And then they go away from it. It definitely felt like something they were saying, we're going to save this for later.

We haven't seen Aaron Gordon as a pick and roll ball handler hardly at all in the playoffs or even in leading into the playoffs. I think we're going to see it more in this series for this reason to engage Gobert, get him away from the rim a little bit. And to your point, I mean, this is the easy, these are the easy solutions. Like Gobert is ignoring Gobert.

Aaron Gordon, use him as a ball screener. Use him as a ball screener for Jokic. Use him as a ball screener for Jamal Murray. Use him as a flare screener off the ball. Like you're 15 feet away from me. I'm going to hit Anthony Edwards with a flare screen and Michael Porter Jr. is going to be open. And by the way, the one weak spot in Anthony Edwards' defense is losing track of shooters and expect Denver to really test that out with him on Michael Porter Jr. But that's where the chess match kind of really starts. And I just think

It's not even just Gobert who's huge and Towns who's huge. But John, you can speak to that. It's that...

other than Conley, they're huge across the board. And so even if Jokic finds some solutions, even if a screen cracks open some daylight off the ball, no team is better equipped than the Wolves to close those openings faster and with longer arms and everything than Minnesota is. I mean, this is good. When Denver has the ball, I mean, anytime Jokic is involved, it's like a chess master solving a puzzle from 10 steps ahead. This is the challenge of,

that Jokic and the Nuggets have been waiting for and the Wolves have been waiting for too. This is the most interesting half of the series. Without question. And I think that here is where, what has been most successful for the Timberwolves with this grand experiment of all going big. I think conventional wisdom would be, if you go this big, you're going to be slow.

And that is not what this wolves defense is because they're so connected, not necessarily that Carl Anthony towns is super mobile or Rudy or, or whatever. It's that all five pieces on the floor, whether it is Conley at the point or Nikhil or whoever you want to put there, they all know where each other is going to be after playing so much together over the last year and a half since Conley arrived in the trade and Nikhil arrived with him. Um,

So when you watch this team rotate and recover and scramble, they are not scrambling with their heads cut off. They are not trying to just guess where the ball is going to go. And they're not losing each other and saying, wait, I thought you were going to be there and I'm supposed to be here. They are connected now.

And so that allows them to use their length to the greatest advantage because they are generally in the right positions as well. And you can see, you know, I think it will be different. This will be by far their biggest challenge with Denver. But with the with the offenses that they play, the longer the shot clock goes, the more of these you can see a look in the offensive players eyes of where do we go? We can't find the opening. Right.

It's some of the only moments where I've ever been able to see Jokic thinking from, if not a step behind, then in sync with the defense. Like, oh, okay, I got to find something. They're one of the only teams that makes his decision-making even a teensy, teensy bit difficult.

um cloudy i'm sorry you were you were gonna yeah and building on that though zach building on that point where you saw the lakers do things philosophically where it seemed like we're doubling quick we're gonna try and get him moving it sooner the wolves in general have done it a little differently uh in the four games this year this season yoka chad let's see three assists two assists um

And then he had seven assists and five assists. That is not the Jokic that we're used to seeing. We're used to seeing him orchestrate 12 assists, 15, 10, you know, just rack those things up. And so it seems like so far the Wolves have said,

we are going to put Carl Anthony Towns on him. And if he scores 40, just like kind of Kevin Durant, Kevin Durant, if you score 35, okay, we just can't let Devin Booker and Eric Gordon and Bill go off. Like, I think it'll be a little bit similar approach here where

If Jokic scores a lot, and he did, he had the one huge game, the 41-point game late in the season, but they're going to try and say, okay, we can't have Michael Porter Jr. having 25. You know, we can't have Jamal Murray being super comfortable and being settled in that way. And so...

Will that work? I don't know, but that's generally, it seems like the approach that they have taken is trying to change Jokic from the puppet master into more of a score-heavy guy and limit the damage that others can create. If we concede that, though, and we just said that Karl-Anthony Towns' foul trouble is an issue here, there's can Karl-Anthony Towns guard Jokic, and then there's can he guard him

while being extra careful not to foul. That even lowers his effectiveness another 20% or so. So I think that is one of the battlegrounds for me because I agree with you that I think that is largely their strategy. But when Jokic sees that strategy, he becomes hyper-aggressive. And if Kat is trying to not to foul, those are easy points for Jokic. So that'll be an interesting dynamic as well. And the problem with that...

Sorry, the problem with that with Cat is, yeah, he may commit fouls on Jokic on defense, but he also generally commits a lot of fouls offensively. And that's what makes it so hard. That's why he has to be in control and composed. He cannot pick up two charges, hook the guy as he goes by, because that's taking away from fouls that he's going to commit on Jokic on the other end.

Those are the ones you can't have. Like the illegal screens, the dumb offensive fouls. You're going to commit fouls on defense. That's the reality of being a big man in the NBA playing against a guy like Jokic. You're going to commit fouls. You're going to need to commit fouls. You just can't commit them on offense in situations where you're really not even accomplishing anything by doing it. We need an acronym for

That just stand like we need to turn like Carl Anthony Townsies to avoid foul trouble, whatever that acronym is. Everybody can just put that in their columns. It's just a standalone in every playoff series. A couple other things that I think we're going to see.

I think we're going to see a little bit more Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon pick and roll to involve Gobert and bring him up a little bit. And if you can get around him or get by him, then there's not as much resistance at the rim. Now you say that and you think, well, Jamal Murray, Aaron Gordon pick and roll. That's a cool play. Like what's the best offensive player on the planet?

doing during all that. We're not just going to make Nikola Jokic a floor spacer. And I think, and there's just little glimpses of it here and there. I think what we'll see when Denver is really engaged is,

When Jokic is not directly involved in the on-ball action, it's either the ball handler or the screener or whatever, something else is going to be happening with Jokic at the same time as the on-ball action is going to happen. So I can see things like Murray, Gordon, pick and roll at the same time across screen under the rim for Jokic so that Murray turns the corner, Jokic pops into post-up position, everybody's occupied on the defense. I can see a Murray, Gordon, pick and roll or a Murray post-up. He's had success posting up Conley defensively.

and Jokic flare screen or Aaron Gordon flare screen, or you saw Aaron Gordon pin down for Jokic. Like he's so versatile. I think we'll see a lot of simultaneous stuff from the Nuggets when they're really engaged. And then the other thing that's obvious is, and I think this is a big pivot point, is Jokic is going to guard Gobert on defense.

That means when they get stops, Gobert is going to be on Jokic a lot. They're not going to be able to get to the Gobert on Gordon thing every single time. When Gobert is on Jokic, that's when I'm spamming the Murray Jokic pick and roll. I'm putting Gobert in every pick and roll. He can do it. He's capable of it. He's been awesome this year in open space. But I'm going to make him guard a lot in space. And I'm going to mix in a lot of pops for Jokic. I'm going to mix in a lot of pops. I'm going to see how Gobert responds. Is he going to close out short?

And a lot of these games, some of these games might come down to like Jokic has historically been an incredible postseason three-point shooter. I don't know what happens to him. And then if Gobert starts to close out, the pump and go and drive. But like when that matchup happens...

that's what I that's what I would do if I were Denver I would just spam that pick and roll even more than usual but Adam what else are we what are what are we missing on on Denver offense we've been focusing on this Jokic chess match what else should we be looking at well two notes on that real quick I do think cross matches will make a big difference I would suspect that Denver's offensive rating is going to be significantly higher this series when they get a stop and go the other way Anthony Edwards and you know we already talked about KCP guarding Anthony Edwards and how that

create some things and then the yokich go bear part uh and then the other part is i agree with you about putting go bear in the pick and roll even if you think what is the best player in the world doing he's offensive rebounding which is also one of his elite skills that he does less of you know nowadays because he's the fulcrum of the offense but if you bring go bear out there all of a sudden that becomes a strength for denver uh crashing the board so that's one of them but the big story for me of this whole series all this stuff we talked about to me is secondary to this one point

Jamal Murray is such an important part. He's half of Denver's offense. Even if he looks the best player on earth, Jamal Murray is half of the dance that they do in that pick and roll. And he did not look like himself in that first round. He got hurt after the all-star, but Denver played. I was certain Denver was winning the title back to back after the all-star break 15 games after the all-star break, they look that good on both ends of the floor. And then Murray gets hurt.

He misses nine games. He comes back at the very end, has a couple good games, and you say, okay, he got it. But in that first round, he clearly didn't have the explosiveness that he had had in previous seasons. Is that because he's working his way back? Then he gets the calf strain?

That to me is going to be such a big story because Jaden McDaniels is a better defender than anybody that was on the Lakers. I think Nikhil Alexander Walker is a better defender than anybody that was on the Lakers. And both of those guys are so good specifically at the pick and roll. And that's obviously where Denver starts.

If those guys are able to get through screens the way I think they will be able to, and if they are able to stay connected enough, you don't have to get into major rotation if you are the Minnesota Timberwolves. And more to the point, that means Murray has to punish guys that are a quarter or half step behind, which he's very capable of when he's fully healthy. But he did not do that against the Lakers. You know, I got guy on my hip. So now how do I punish him?

there's little shimmy moves that he does. His nickname is glitch. He's so good at those like four or five quick moves in a row. And then he generates separation. He had none of those in the first round outside of two game winners. But other than that, I think he's going to have to do that seven, eight, nine, 10 times a game in this series. And I'm just not sure if he's healthy enough for it. It's one of my big questions. To your point, if Murray is healthy,

I'm pretty confidently picking Denver in this series, probably in six. I might even flirt with five just because just not disrespectfully to Minnesota, just because home court, like it's just more likely if I'm not going to pick seven and I want to pick Denver to close at home, that's what I would pick with Jamal Murray in his current state.

I think this is a winnable series for Minnesota. I'm not sure it's quite a toss-up, but I think the Wolves can absolutely win this series. Before we make our picks, a couple of things. You mentioned transition. I've said this before. The scariest sight in the NBA is Jokic getting a defensive rebound, twirling, and going up court in a five-on-four. You are dead. Your only recourse at that point is to pray that somebody misses an open three or a layup at the rim. You're dead.

And Minnesota's biggest leap from good defense to great defense was cleaning up all the sloppy stuff that used to undo them. And number one was bad transition defense, which is sometimes endemic to being a bigger team, a slower team. They've been good in transition. They're going to have to be buttoned up there. They're going to have to be buttoned up on the boards, which again, they're ninth in defensive rebounding this year. John, you know well, that was one of their many weaknesses previously.

Even last year with Gobert, Denver is an elite offensive rebounding team with Jokic on the floor, not with Jokic off the floor. They got to clean those up. And the last thing on Denver's offense is, you know, we're talking about Murray's health and all this chess match. They shot horribly from three against the Lakers. I think 31% on threes. They took the fewest threes in the entire league this year. It's incredible how good they are at offense because, again,

if they shoot like they shot against the Lakers and they take so few threes, they are even with the best offensive player in the world, nearing this like critical threshold of modernity where you're just not taking or making enough threes. They're going to have to make more threes in this series than they did against the Lakers. Uh,

I have nothing else to say. Do you guys want to make picks? Is there any final point that you wanted to make that we didn't hit? Yeah, Zach. I mean, I would just say quickly, like one thing that is going to be crucial for the Timberwolves in this series is to try to have a lead late in games. Because when you get into the last five minutes, four minutes against Jokic and Murray, they are going to get a great shot every single time. And one of...

Minnesota's bugaboos has been generating good looks late in games against set defenses. And so if it turns into that, if it turns into an execution match, the wolves are going to get executed. Like that's the, that's the big thing. But unless, unless, and just goes ham and crunch time, which like he does ants reached a point where,

He could just single handedly win a high leverage playoff game against even a team as good as this. He can win a game, but it's just it's not I don't know if it's a recipe for winning a series. So I just think that's going to be crucial for them, you know, being being in a position of strength so that they can set their defense in the half court and lock in in those five minutes, last five minutes and just make it really, really tough on them.

All right. I'm going to make a pick. Are you guys going to make picks? Do you make picks? I don't want to force you into picks if you're not going to make picks. Why not? Let's have some fun. Why not? Let's do it. Adam, you get the call. As the resident of the team that won the championship, of the city of the team that won the championship, you get to defer or accept the ball, so to speak, in making picks.

I've been surprised at how bullish a lot of even like the gambling sharps and even in Vegas has been on, on the nuggets here. I'm going to pick nuggets and I'm going to say nuggets in seven, but I think that this is an incredible series and it really comes down to me for Jamal's health. Jamal,

To me, game five was a symbolic game for him because he wasn't healthy, but he overcame it. And I think that is a trait of the Denver Nuggets is they are a team that adjusts to whatever the circumstances call for. They don't always do it the way that they do it, but they find a way to get through it. I think this is the biggest challenge they will have faced between last year and this year, but I'm going to pick them to get it done. I think both teams split their home, their first two home games, and this becomes a three game series and Denver closes it out with their home wins.

Mr. Krasinski. Yep. I will probably not surprisingly. I just think that the wolves have been resilient all year. They've never lost three in a row. Um, they,

They have, I think that they have more options to go to if things go wrong than Denver does. And so I think that they'll have a little bit more flexibility and versatility to combat whatever happens in the series. I love the way that Ant's playing at this point. And so I think he can take over a game or two. And so I'm going to say Wolves in seven. And

And, you know, I think conventionalism would be Wolves in six if you're going to pick the Wolves, have them win at home. But I just think that this series is going to be so close. And I love the Nuggets. I think they're so well coached. I think they're so just freaking good, especially late in games, that I just can't see this not going the distance. And I think these two are going to slug it out. And the Wolves are just going to find one little bit of extra defensive intensity to push them over the top.

I'm going to go Nuggets in seven. I think this is absolutely on the table for the Wolves to win. To Adam's point, I should have said this at the open. This is the best team Denver has faced in the playoffs across these last two seasons. And I'm not even sure it's close. It's a completely winnable series for Minnesota. They're healthier. They're probably deeper. They have elite high-end talent. They have everything you need.

I'm going Denver just because they have championship experience. They have home court advantage, and they have a great home court advantage. They have the best player in the world, and Minnesota's best player is 22. It is a huge ask for Anthony Edwards to carry this team over the Denver Nuggets in the second round. He doesn't have to carry them. He's going to get a lot of help, and I'm picking Nuggets in seven. He can obviously do it.

It would be so goddamn impressive if Minnesota would win this series, even if Jamal Murray is 75%, 80%, whatever he is. And maybe this layoff helped him a little bit. I don't know if that's the case or not. I just don't know.

I'm just going to default to the champs in seven at home. But I think this is going to be an unbelievable series, a battle. And the winner is going to come out of it, maybe favored to make the finals, maybe favored to win the championship. Maybe not. You know, you can't discount Oklahoma City or whoever gets out of that Clippers match series. But this is going to be a war. And it's one that it just it just seemed inevitable. Like these teams are going to face off again. And I'm super duper excited for it.

You guys, thank you so much for your time. I know you're busy. Your teams are gearing up for this. The teams that you cover, the beats that you cover. Adam Morris, DNVR Sports, John Krasinski at The Athletic. There just aren't guys doing a better job than you guys do covering your teams and covering the league at whole. But like everything you guys do. I mean, Adam, I can't even keep up with all your podcast. You stole Tim Legler from us. That's how goddamn good you are. John, your coverage of the Wolves is unbelievable. Guys, buckle up. This is going to be fun. You guys ready to have some fun?

I cannot wait. I've been waiting for this all season as well. It's a nice rivalry because there's history here. It's going to be so fun. I love going to Denver. I love all that. So I'm ready, man. It's going to be awesome. It's going to be a great series. I'm really excited, and I think the NBA is going to enjoy this one. NBA fans. Thank you, guys. Adam Morris, John Krasinski, thank you for your time. I will see you down the road. For the first time, Monday Night Football streams exclusively on ESPN+.

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