Who Can Rise in the Eastern Conference? and Will Jayson Tatum Ever Win an MVP?
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And now, The Low Post. Welcome to The Low Post podcast. It's a beautiful Thursday afternoon in New England. Moe DeKeele, how are you, sir? I'm doing great. It's so just great to hear those words. We're back, Zach. We are back. You're married now. You might remember Moe. He was on the pod a bunch last year. He used to work for the Spurs and the Clippers. Now we can read him at Bleacher Report, The Athletic. What's new as we come into the season? The

You've got your Twitch account, which I still don't understand. Yeah, it's still Twitch is going to be going, I think, a lot stronger this season. I think we're going to make a big push there. So I'll be doing a lot more breakdowns there on Twitch. Just mode to kill. You'll find me there on Twitch. If you search that, we're going to have a good time this season.

I you are one of the people I said every time I have you on if you want to understand what's happening in the game like the game that we're watching where we care about which team wins and loses and why Mo is one of the people that you should follow he'll explain what's going on and we're going to talk about some interesting teams today you ready Mo I'm ready to go.

So every year I write my version of power rankings, which is tiers. I try to categorize the teams into tiers. And I think in both the East and the West, people have kind of put in pen a top four in each conference, varying degrees of pen. In the East, which we're going to talk about later today, Boston,

Obviously, they won the conference by 14 games. They won the championship 14 games. New York, Philly, Milwaukee still has to be considered in that group. I think with the second, the New York and Philly, I'm going to grandfather in Milwaukee, although I feel like nausea whenever I think about their season. I feel a little bit nauseous. My face gets like the Doc Rivers tense face, the Doc Rivers. Oh, my God, the game. The game is going haywire face where his face just gets so tight. It looks like he's going to burst.

And then in the West, it's Oklahoma City, who I think is going to potentially run away with the number one seed. Denver, Dallas, Minnesota. Those are the consensus top four.

History suggests that those will not be the top four in either conference, that there will be interlopers from below, that one of those teams, if not more in each conference, will have puzzling chemistry problems, will take injuries, will just not play up to expectations, and somebody below them will snag one of those spots. Yeah.

And that's just what happens. I mean, Cleveland's been the four seed the last two years. And I think in the East, which we're going to talk about now, that next tier of teams is one of my most interesting spots in the league this year. Orlando, Indiana, and Cleveland are kind of grouped together as this

And rising young teams who, you know, Cleveland finally won a round last year. Indiana got all the way to the conference finals, benefiting from injuries to Milwaukee, who was just decimated. Giannis missed the whole series. Dame missed portions of it. And then New York essentially ran out of players. And Indiana, to their credit, advanced. They did what they're supposed to do.

And Orlando, there's a million reasons to be excited about Orlando. I am putting Miami in this tier of teams in terms of team quality. They're at a very different stage of their sort of team trajectory. They have an older star player in Jimmy Butler who is potentially entering the final year of his contract. I will say, Mo, there's been so much focus on Jimmy Butler's future. I have been guilty of it too.

The lack of an extension at Riley's comments after the season last year about, yeah, we got to be available. Like, it's just like, that's just the fact of life. You want to pay. Essentially, you want to get paid. You got to play, got to play more than 53 games or whatever. And what does that mean? Is he going to get traded? What is blah, blah, blah. Is he going to play out the season?

I don't know what's going to happen. I just know that I would not just throw the $52 million player option he has for 25, 26 into the garbage. It's like a non thing. That's a, that's a big safety net just sitting there. But I have learned over the years to never bury Miami, never doubt Miami to always have the requisite respect for the heat. So I am putting them in this same tier of teams. And I'll tell you this,

Like not only is it, does history suggest one of these teams is going to snag a top four seed, which means Milwaukee or Philly, New York, God forbid, Boston is not going to be in the top four. History suggests one of these two teams is going to win. One of these three or four teams is going to win a playoff series like that. These did that. It's just not going to line up with the four favorites with chalk all the way through. So I'm really excited to talk about these teams because they're, they're very interesting. Are you ready? I'm ready to go. I'm going to start big picture.

I polled about just informally over the last few days, like 20 front office people around the league, few agents also. Let's leave Miami to the side for a second. Cleveland, Orlando, Indiana. Which team do you think is best positioned for the next medium term is how I put it, like three, four or five years? Which team, if you had to be the GM of one, who do you think is in the best position? What is your answer to that question? For me, my answer is the Orlando Magic.

Please defend yourself. I'm fascinated by this team. I think they have two stars in waiting, and I think Paolo Boncero has a chance to just be great. And I think he's got to work a little bit on his efficiency, but his all-around game, I think, is really strong. I think Franz's year last year was a down year, but I expect him to be a better player than he was then. I just expect him to come back to form.

I love the guys that they have all along their roster, though. Like Jalen Suggs really stepped up last year. I loved the signing of Katavius Caldwell-Pope. In fact, they have Jonathan Isaacs. And even if we just get 20 minutes a game of just pure defensive, I'm going to lock everybody the hell up.

you know, for 20 minutes and you're just, it's going to be impossible for you guys to score freely. It's huge. And I think he's massively big for them. They have holes on the roster. We're going to get into all of that stuff. But I think just having two star players as your tentpole guys right off the bat, you're ready to go. And they're young. Franz just signed the extension. We know Paolo's extension is coming down the road. I think next season.

All that stuff in the roster gets a little bit more expensive, but I think they're better positioned to pounce and move as they go forward and be able to adjust and move around the cap and whatnot. I like where they're at right now. I like where they're sitting, and I think Jamal Mosley is a hell of a coach.

So the answers to my question were all over the place. I would say, and some, I didn't even make a tally because some people sort of couched it like, well, if this, then this team, if this, then that team, I would say Indiana finished third in the polling, which kind of surprised me because even some people who voted them third conceded,

They may have, they may or do have the best young player of all of these teams in Tyrese Halliburton. Now that depends on how you qualify Donovan Mitchell's age. Like there's a whole, but like best young franchise player and they made the conference finals. I was a little surprised at how distantly they finished third. And I think it was because they have Siakam great number two guy and no one quite knows what to make of the next big move.

around those guys. They have a bunch of really good players, a bunch of good, solid players that we'll talk about their team. And I think there was some concern that Siakam is six years older than Tyrese Halliburton. How does that work? And just sort of, you know, they needed an injection of another

big talent around Tyrese Halliburton, Pascal Siakam. How are they going to do that? I think they have plenty of tools to do that, but there are some skepticism about it. I actually probably would put Indiana third. My personal choice, and I almost was surprised at myself, was also the Orlando Magic. It feels like it should be Cleveland because Cleveland has the best top end talent currently in terms of their big four guys. They're all young.

But you just, you know, I think the fit questions, at least in the short term, are a little bit overblown because I just think the talent is the talent. I think Cleveland's going to win a lot of games this year. I didn't look up what their most recent...

uh, over under is on ESPN bet, but it was one of the ones I would absolutely hammer the over. I think it was like 46 and a half or 47 and a half. The last time I checked, I think people are sleeping on Cleveland as just a regular season wins machine kind of team. Um, but longterm, it feels a little bit more volatile. Orlando may have the lowest, uh,

2024 2025 ceiling of all three of these teams because their offense has been in the toilet for like 12 consecutive seasons literally they've had a 20th or worse offense in 12 straight seasons i call it the joe dimaggio streak of it incompetent offense in the nba and yet they're young i love bank carol i think franz wagner is going to have a bounce back season

I think the complimentary pieces, including Jalen Suggs, who looks like kind of a super duper complimentary piece in the making, all fit really well. They don't have much cap flexibility coming up in that if there's one to pick with them, it's that their window to use caps.

cap room before all their young guys get expensive has yielded pretty much just Contavious Caldwell Pope, who's fine and I think fits fine with their starting five. That's a little bit disappointing, but they have all their draft picks. They have an extra draft pick from Denver. They're a sneaky, attractive market that players will look at when they agitate for trades, when whatever. So I think long-term, like two, three, four, five years, I also picked the Magic and I was surprised that

at how kind of good I felt about that pick, despite like, I think Cleveland's really, really good. And I love Tyrese Halliburton. I love what Indiana did. And my general point is, I think these three teams are looked at as kind of like cute, frisky teams. And, but look at the pedigree above them. Boston just won the championship. And I do agree. Boston's over here. Boston's just every discussion. Boston is just over at the side, looking down at the rest of the league. New York, love the Knicks. I love everything they did.

Philadelphia has got an MVP. They won free agency in every possible way, including Paul George and the roster around Paul George. They kind of scrounge. They have trade assets. There's pedigree there. And I think the consensus is these other three teams, let's leave Miami to the side for a bit, are just kind of frisky and fun and young. I think they're all pretty damn good teams right now. I think at least one of them is going to push 50 wins. I think they're all going to be in the high 40s.

I think they're just rock solid teams who all are going to finish the season with the ability to push and or upset anyone but Boston in a first round playoff series. I think that's the ceiling for all three of these teams. I don't think they're just cute or frisky. I think they're pretty goddamn good right now.

Yeah, my former colleague, Seth Partnow, used to call these types of teams the pat on the head teams. You know, like, oh, you're so cute or whatnot. But this team is not that. Remember when Pau Gasol patted Chris Paul on the head? They're Chris Paul. Yeah, they're looking right back at you going, we can take you and we can really give it to you in every which way. You know, and they're all different styles in the way they play and whatnot. But I'm with you in the sense of like, you can't take these teams for granted. First off, the talent.

on all of these teams is pretty high. You know, when you look at it across the board, especially Cleveland, where we talk about therefore, and then Indiana as well. Like, I think there's a lot of things to like about these teams. It's some of it is maturity. Some of it is, can they get to that next level as being young teams and young guys? Can they be comfortable in that sense? Yeah.

But I think if you go into these games and thinking, oh, it's Orlando, we got them. We just got to be able to handle their defense. They can't score with us and all that.

going to come back to bite you. You know, if you're going in lightly against Indiana and, you know, forget about the starting five, you don't pay attention. TJ McConnell's coming in and changing the game by pure chaos when he comes in, you know, off the bench. You know, if you're not paying attention with Cleveland, you know, they got twin towers defensively. Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell is a backcourt playing off of each other. And you're looking at, you know, some real interesting stuff there. And I'm excited for Kenny Atkinson there because I think they get a bump just on that side alone. Like,

All three of these teams will be a problem in the Eastern Conference. This isn't going to be one of those years where you're saying, oh, it's a night off. No game against these teams on the road, at home, doesn't matter. It's not a night off. You have to take them serious and you have to have the respect for them because they've all gotten better. And that's the one thing that's been fun to watch these teams is they've all improved each year.

the top eight in the east is and i'm including miami is is really really good and that crit now below that the east is still the east um and there's like again the people are going to make the play in tournament by default and perhaps against their will in some cases although i think some teams at the bottom would be psyched to make the playoff play in tournament charlotte for instance

I think Charlotte has a chance to be a little frisky. They're a pat on the head team. I think Charlotte has a chance to be a little friskier. I had a nice conversation today with Mark Williams, who is just chomping at the bit to get back on the floor and prove what he is.

uh, in the league. But, um, and that creates a lot of cool sub races within the East, right? Like the race for the fourth seed and above is going to be really fun. The race for the sixth seed to get out of the play in tournament entirely and just remove that risk is going to be a barn burner. The race for, you know, seven, eight, who gets home court in that first playing game. That's going to be a lot of fun. Just to clarify why Orlando, I,

Look, you could argue any of these teams for the next five years. They're all set up pretty well. I mentioned how Orlando has all of its picks to trade still. Cleveland has traded most of its picks for Donovan Mitchell. I don't think they can trade a pick until like the 2031 pick maybe. Um,

And, but obviously they could recoup a lot of picks if they decide, Hey, these pieces don't fit. We have to trade one of them in Indiana. It feels like they traded a lot of stuff for Pascal Siakam. They kind of did. They only owe one pick left from that trade. Two of the three picks they traded conveyed already last year. And they've got a million midsize contracts, which are going to become more and more valuable on the trade market. Indiana's flexibility to make another move, I think is a little bit underrated. Um, and, and,

Both Orlando and Indiana have big looming questions at the center position for the next two or three years. Miles Turner expires this year. He's not extension eligible. Wendell Carter Jr. has two years left. Is he going to be able to sign an extension? Are they going to be able to? Is that raise going to be enough for him? The 140% raise on his salary. It's big, big, quite more. Mo Wagner is their backup. He's a very good backup. He expires. I think it's the same time as Wendell Carter Jr. So interesting, interesting.

Interesting questions, but I leaned Orlando. I was surprised. I was surprised because their offense has been so punchless for so long. By the way, did you realize...

I Markel Fultz never signed anywhere, did he? Yeah, that's I'm actually finding this with some other guys where I'm also looking around going like, wow, there are still some guys available. I think it really I really noticed it once Lonnie Walker signed with the Celtics. And I was like, oh, wow, there's there's there are. Yeah, that's right. Free agency is still going. There's still guys that are open. It's still available. Like, I'm shocked.

I had a coffee with an NBA source yesterday, and it devolved into, it literally empathetically devolved into the meme of guys can just start naming random dudes who played a particular sport. Because we were talking about like somehow Mike Scott came up

And I was like, where's Mike Scott today? Like, what's going on with Mike Scott? And then we started naming all of these guys who fell out of the league. And you kind of forget to take like DeAndre. But there was a three minute DeAndre Bembry sidebar. Remember DeAndre Bembry? What happened? Anyway, you can go places with that game. You can go places.

I think it was the Buffalo Bills on their media day just had some of their players just start naming random NBA guys. It went on for like six minutes. It was delightful. Okay, let's go through each of these teams one by one, including Miami now. And I will let you take the lead. You can pick a team. And I asked you, give me Mo's one big question for this team in the 2024-25 season. One big question they're going to have to answer today.

If they are indeed going to hit their kind of ceiling where, hey, oh my God, they're up 3-2 against Philly in the first round. Philly's in trouble. Pick a team and pick a question. Let's go with just Orlando since we've already kind of started in on that. I think just the biggest question is where is the playmaking going to come from?

And I think that's kind of the one thing I thought in the offseason I thought they missed on. You know, like I was begging them. Tyus Jones was sitting right there. Get us a point guard. Get more playmaking. Somebody to take the pressure off of Paolo to always have to kind of create because he's really their main playmaker. But I'd rather him get moved to being the secondary playmaker. And I don't know if Jalen Sugg has that.

In his game, yeah, even with the improvements that he's made. So for me, my big question, and if they answer it and allows them to hit their ceiling, is going to be they're going to find a playmaker, whether it's somebody on their roster now or somebody they bring in during the season. Yeah, I mean, it's the offense. It's just what you're talking about is, like, can this team generate enough good shots? And they were, I think, first in shots at the rim. And this is a team that also –

The scuttlebutt coming out of Board of Governors this week in New York, one of the trails of scuttlebutt was, I think that sort of physicality that was allowed in the second half of last season when the NBA wink-wink kind of changed the rules midstream, I

I think that's going to carry over into this season. I think people liked that and liked the flow and liked the toughness that it enabled. And Orlando is one of the teams that benefited from that because they are just a battering ram at both ends of the floor. They foul the hell out of everybody, but they make up for it by getting to the line at one of the highest rates in the league. They are a monster rebounding team, particularly defensively, and they just bombard the rim on offense. But...

They're not a particularly good shooting team from anywhere, including at the rim. And they were 27th in three point attempts. It's just hard to score enough points when you don't have either the shooting or the shot creation to create those easy looks for people. And so really that's kind of what we're talking about. And, and,

I think their defense is completely legitimate. I don't think there was anything fluky about this team being a top three, top five defense wherever they finished. I love their starting five is going to be Suggs, KCP, Franz Wagner, Banquero, and Wendell Carter Jr. I love that lineup. It's going to be a good lineup. It's going to be a great defensive lineup. And there is nothing in the data in terms of where they allowed shots from.

and what opponents shot field goal percentage wise, nothing in the data to suggest that anything Orlando did last year was a fluke. Yeah, they foul you. They put you on the line a lot, but they get to the line themselves. They also take the ball away from you a lot. They were second in forcing turnovers behind only Oklahoma City, which was a steals machine. I just think this is an awesome defensive team. Is it just, is it,

they didn't really do anything to juice the shot creation. So they're really just relying on internal improvement. And I guess KCP kind of just floating around creating some more space. I think the hope is that with the space that KCP will theoretically provide is that will create more lanes for guys like Paolo for Franz. And again, if Franz has a better season, we're, we're, we're,

probably looking at it a little bit differently as well. If he has a bounce back season that I think we're both predicting, you know, it's, it's their offense ticks up a little bit better, probably not massively, but I think the spacing that they're banking on from KCP is going to open up driving lanes. I think that's the bet they're making. I don't know necessarily if it's true. Again, I would have wanted to at least bolster it and bring in one guy as a playmaker, as a guard that I can trust that can get the ball in the right spots and

and get us going and get us a good look one way shape or form like i would have been happy if they had gotten chris paul like that would have been a guy that i thought would have been a fun spot you know for him there and and all everything that would have worked with it i think there would have been interesting places for them to go with it and like you said it's going to come down to their development let's see how the staff has kind of worked together it's obviously something that they know as well as we do that this is something they have to improve upon so

Let's see. Maybe they know something about Suggs or Cole Anthony are going to come in and make some plays. Maybe we're going to see more Corey Joseph or who knows. But I think that's kind of the question. And we're not going to know until we start playing games. I don't mind them...

Slow rolling it, although this has been just a slow roll, like slow stay of the course, internal improvement because Suggs made a leap last year. Hopefully the shooting is legit. Franz and Paolo are playmaking forwards, and I think the organization was justifiably hesitant to take the ball out of their hands too much.

They began kind of scratching the surface about how they could complement each other and work in tandem. They would engage sometimes in some Golden State style split actions where they would screen for each other off the ball. The problem is they're kind of switchable as a tandem. They tend to be guarded by like-sized players. But I think Paolo already for his size is a major plus passer. I expect that to just continue. So I don't mind...

on internal improvement. Their bench is going to be Cole Anthony, Jonathan Isaac, Mo Wagner. The other two spots we'll see. I mean, Gary Harris, you can pencil in. He's a vet. And then they got to start seeing what they have internally.

In some of these kids like Anthony Black, who's shooting, although he shot a good percentage, he barely takes any threes and he's not guarded. Jed Howard didn't play last year, essentially on the big club. This De Silva kid they just drafted. They're super high on. He's interesting. And then they have questions like how often can they play Isaac at center? Remember, they started Isaac at center in the first two games against Cleveland in the first round and then pivoted back to Wendell Carter Jr.,

Um, and, or how often can they go super gigantic with Franz Wagner, Bankero, Isaac, and Wendell Carter jr. Or Mo Wagner. Those lineups were pretty bad. We're very bad actually offensively last season. Both of those looks, they haven't gotten to explore enough just because Isaac has not been available. And I mentioned Carter, um,

Carter has quietly in the last two years become a pretty good three-point shooter. 36% two years ago, 37% last year. On like three and a half attempts a game, which for a center is fine. Now his shot, like everybody's, fell apart in the playoffs against Cleveland because they just could not make any shots. Right.

Um, I think it's fine to slow roll it and just say, Hey, maybe we can get up from our, our perch at 22nd where we are in good years on offense. Maybe we can get up to 15th and our defense is third. And that makes us a dangerous 48 to 50 win team. I think that's cool. See how the young guards develop the guard, the mystery, the mystery basket of guards. I just mentioned who we just know nothing about, but it still feels like.

They are at some point going to have to do something bold. Like I wanted them to chase Donovan Mitchell when Donovan Mitchell went to Cleveland. They were on my list of teams like that's the kind of player that I would love them. I just thought that was a good fit. Trey Young, not as much. It just feels like at some point, unless this year goes even better than expected,

this front office which has been cautious and and that's fine like they they earn themselves a lot of rope with the bulls trade particularly for vujovic um it's been very slow and very cautious and that's totally fine at some point they're gonna have to strike i think but this year's team

I don't think that last year was a fluke at all. Like I was surprised by them early in the season. I think they're legit and dangerous. Yeah, no, I agree with you. But I want to touch on the point, too, about the front office does have to strike because at a certain point you wait too long and the moment has passed you by. And now you're not able to make the moves you need to. And then you're in a situation where it's like, OK, now we're stuck.

And now what do we do? And then you have guys that are going to be frustrated with us being the same place we're always are in. And I already think it's disappointing. It's slightly disappointing that they had all this when all these windows of cap room and it did not yield as much as it should have. Yeah. And I think that's a fair criticism for their their offseason. It's I think that's those things like they have to be at a point you've got to be.

You got to throw caution to the wind. I mean, don't be wild, but you got to go and try to make the move and you just can't sit and wait too long because this isn't a situation, especially nowadays in the NBA. Everything changes so quickly that if you if you blink, you might just be all suddenly going, hey, now we're on the bottom, you know, or now we're an eight seed and we're fighting right now to just kind of

stay above nine. And I think that's the stuff you have to be aware of as a front office. And I think that's the one thing I want to see from Orlando's front office at a certain point, just recognizing like, yeah, we have to act because we only have so much time. And that center position question for them,

is really interesting not as interesting as it is for indiana because i don't think they need that position to be as big of a foundational anchor on defense as the pacers need miles turner to be because of the infrastructure around them around wendell carter jr is so strong but i do think that's interesting

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All right, pick another team and give me your big question for that team. Yeah, I think it is. Indiana is the next team I want to go with. And I think the real question for them is, you know, are you going to be able to defend? And can you be rock solid defensively? Seems like a big question. Are you going to be able to defend? Seems like a pretty big question. Kind of important, right? In that sense, you know, I think you have a lot of guys you got to make up for defensively that are playing. They're going to be on the floor a lot for you.

you know, and, and how much can Pascal and, and miles Turner make up, you know, cause like those are, you're going to be your, your star defenders, but really like, where else can you go? I know knee Smith was pretty good, but like you, you gotta really figure out, can we play our fast style and play defense at the same time? They're also, I mean, they're a speed team, which is fine. That's how they're built. They're kind of a state. They play out as a small team. Um,

is a little undersized for just apex wing defender guy. He's the best wing defender in Siakam is actually probably the best wing defender of wings in the starting five to review. The starting five is, is almost certainly Halliburton, Nem hard, knee Smith, Siakam, Turner. That lineup was plus seven and a half per 100 possessions last season. Remember when they got Siakam, Halliburton was not healthy and he was not really, he was not playing. And then he was not really fully healthy there.

the rest of the year, including in the playoffs. Uh, and the bench is just super deep. I mean, you could build a five man bench lineup of McConnell, Matherin, Ben Shepard, Obi Toppin, Isaiah Jackson, which doesn't even get you to Jairus Walker, James Wiseman, or Furphy who they drafted, um, at the beginning of the second round, I think. Right. Yeah. Um,

that's we just named 15 or what one two three the 13 13 dudes um that's that's a quality team and depth does a lot for you in the regular season um you mentioned defense i mean

It's almost refreshing. Probably you were, you were on coaching staffs. It's, is it refreshing to have like very obvious weak points to like low hanging fruit to pluck? Like, okay, we were so bad at this that we can't help, but get better. Yeah. You just, well, you know, like again, you, you walk into the meeting or this is the time of year where a lot of coaching staffs go on coaching retreats. And this is one of those things you walk in and it's like, Hey, how

How do we fix our defense? Like, that's the big question. That's this is what our retreat is. If we're Indiana, you know how you want to play on offense. What are we doing defensively? What are the rotations? How do we protect guys who aren't so good defensively, but we need on the floor, all of those types of questions. It is nice to at least know that this is the question we need to answer. Now it's also hard because it's not an easy question to answer.

Well, I mean, look, how LaBurton got the trial by fire last year in the playoffs where teams are just going to go at him. Teams with the right kind of big wings are just going to go at him every single possession. Nembhard is game and good and tough and just...

Kind of not big enough to make an impact against even someone like Jalen Brunson, who's smaller than him. Now, Jalen Brunson is a superstar, but certainly Tatum, Brown, those guys are tough matchups for him. And Turner, I think, has regressed to being just pretty good. I don't think he's the all defensive level player that he almost was three seasons ago, maybe, and looked like he was on track to be coming. But the low hanging fruit, Moe,

30th in free throws allowed. So that's last in a 30-team league. That's last. So just stop fouling. And I think part of the fouling is their undersized teams tend to foul. They're young. They're kind of feisty. Like Aaron Neesmith is feisty and physical. And when you're desperate, when you're compromised on the perimeter, everyone else has to rotate and reach. I mean, you can't get worse. You can chip away at it.

26th in defensive rebounding. I don't, I don't know what the, what the solution is there. Yeah. It's hard. Cause like you said, they're, they're still somewhat undersized. You know, they're, you can't look at their guards and say, go get the rebounds. They're still smaller. You know, knee Smith starting at the wing is still a smaller wing player. It's hard in that area to get rebounds. It's, it's got to come down to gang rebounding. I mean, it's again, only so much Siakam and Turner are going to be able to do on that front, but yeah,

it's it's a gang rebounding thing and it has to be a focal point of none of us are leaking out which again slows down this team which is a team that yeah they want to be slowed down slow them down yeah they want to they want to play fast so you need the leak out so now it's it's it's such a tough situation in terms of like i said it's a tough question to find the answer to and how do we improve our rebounding in that sense of you know it's

you know, we want to run. So we do, we're not going to have five guys rebounding defensively. We're going to have somebody leaking out after they contest and do a flyby. All of those things come down to it. It's, it's,

It's just got to be a lockdown focus, but there's no guarantee. And just that's going to improve it. And you just, I think they get a little bit of a bump if they stop fouling, like you said, but I also think this is a team that gambles a little bit defensively for steals and things like that, that puts you out of position and then pulls over Turner who ends up having to meet somebody at the rim and is going to end up drawing a foul. Like you're in a difficult position as a coaching staff. You don't have, I mean,

Really just looking at their backcourt, you don't have a lot of guys that I go, that's the guard that's going to get them five or six rebounds a game. They just don't have that. And I think it's a problem that they're just going to have to sort of try to work around because I don't think there's a way they're really going to improve that.

Turner is not a good rebounder for a center. Siakam is a pretty good rebounder. He's not like a great rebounder. Uh, I saw Caitlin Cooper who covers this team amazingly well for her newsletter basketball. She wrote, uh, she had a piece this week, subscribe to it. Um,

about, well, is part of the solution maybe playing two centers together? And she kind of answered it, eh, I don't think that's going to work offensively. And I don't think the backup centers are good enough, frankly, to justify that or good enough as rebounders even for that to make a difference.

I've talked aloud and she's talked about, you know, can you monkey around with the matchups a little bit where maybe you make Miles Turner a rover and put Pascal Siakam more at the point of attack in pick and roll. So Miles Turner is maybe in better rebounding position among other benefits of such a scheme. You know, your only goal is.

I think they were 18th in the second half of the season. And obviously Siakam is a plus defender. If you can hang around 18th to 20th, this is going to be a top five offense. Halliburton is that good. And they have the depth to withstand injuries. That's a formula, again, to be a very dangerous team. And we saw they ran Milwaukee off the floor in the regular season. I know the playoffs is a different animal.

I don't think they would have beat the Bucs in the playoffs if the Bucs were healthy, and I don't think they would have beat the Knicks in the playoffs if the Knicks were healthy. But health is part of it, and this team is going to be better, should be better this year than it was last year. Just a full season of Siakam and healthy Halliburton. So really, this is a really good team.

I do think the next move and that center position with Turner is one of the more interesting questions in the league. But again, I'm not patting them on the head. They're not a pat on the head team. No, not at all. They're a team that can definitely... We don't talk about it enough, but they were really in all those games in the conference finals against the Celtics apart from one.

Like it's, you know, they had leads with two minutes left in the fourth quarter. I think in three of those four games, like it's, it's, they're right in the mix. Like they're a very dangerous team. Again, their style of play forces you to play that way. And I think that's the thing that gets a lot of teams is then they start trying to run with them and they're not equipped to be as good of a running team as the Indiana Pacers are. I almost forgot the most interesting part of their defense question. Last year, Rick Carlisle clearly decided that,

almost to the degree of gimmickry, we're just taking away threes. We're going to take away threes. I don't really care about anything else. Like step one is we're going to not give up threes. And indeed they allowed the lowest three point rate in the league. So at least we're going to bring the math back.

into, I was going to say their favor. I don't think it was their favor because the cost of that was they were, they allowed the most shots at the rim in the entire NBA. They just were not going to help from the perimeter. They were going to let drivers go and just hope that Miles Turner could clean up a lot of messes. Hope that even as he cleans up those messes, someone else is behind him to get rebounds. Spoiler alert, that did not happen enough.

I would expect them to say, okay, that was an interesting experiment for a year. We learned the pluses of it. We learned the minuses of it. We changed our personnel. I don't expect them to sell out to that degree to limit threes this year. And it'll be interesting to see how that works out schematically and if they can find a better balance, because I don't remember a team just going that extreme of, we'll even roll out the red carpet to the rim because we just don't want you to shoot threes.

Yeah, I think that's the wild thing there. And I think that's also the big thing you mentioned there is that nobody was there to back up Turner if he did make the play and was able to stop you because there's nobody there to get the rebounds because they're all hanging on the perimeter defending their guy. I think that's probably the biggest problem with that kind of philosophy is it puts you in a bad rebounding position, hence your 30th in the rebounding numbers. Like, I think that's the question they got to answer. I wouldn't be surprised if we see more zone rebounds

From them this year, I think kind of trying to tweak that in and throw that in. And I think teams just in general, throwing it in more often to throw an offense off balance is something. I think this is a team I would look at as a candidate. Obviously, we know Carlisle's history with the Mavs and playing zone won them the finals in 2011. Like, granted, that was a long time ago, but he has that history and that knowledge with it. It wouldn't be something if we if we see a little bit more of that this season wouldn't surprise me. I should say I'm going off the top of my head.

Is Miami the only team in the last, let's say, eight to 10 years in the NBA for whom there's maybe Toronto for part of the Toronto is another one for part of the Nick Nurse, you know, triangle into box in one. You say for who the zone was like a legitimate weapon and not a well, we can't think of any other good ideas. Let's try zone. That's what zone feels like for Indiana. Like we can't. Nothing else works. Let's try zone. Maybe that'll work.

Yeah, I mean, that's really what it is for them. I mean, that is actually the way I would look at it with them is that is one of your options. One other team I throw in there is Boston, I thought did a good job with the zone last year. They used it more in the regular season, but they had Drew Holiday playing the center position.

And, you know, in their two, three, and obviously you have a guy like Drew and basically all their other defenders. It allows you to kind of play around and tinker with zone more often. But I think those are probably the teams. And I think Miami and Toronto would be the two teams we'd associate with it the most over the past few years. They're so good, man. It's going to be hard. I know no team is repeated since the KD Steph Warriors in twenty eighteen.

It's going to be hard for me to pick anybody but Boston to win the title this year. And I know that East got better right underneath. It's still going to be hard. Okay, we're down to Cleveland and Miami for Moe's one big question. Let's go Cleveland. Let's just knock out all these young teams. Okay, what's your big question? My big question is, is Evan Mobley going to shoot threes?

It's really just locked in on him for the most part. I think the spacing and the twin towers that they have there, I think it becomes too difficult for them offensively if if Mobley is not going to be able to stretch out his game to this point or at this point, he should be able to get to the should have worked on it enough. I think that hopefully you develop somewhat of a shot.

there in that sense but I think if he does that that opens up the floor it allows them to play this twin towers thing because for me otherwise you need to put Mobley as the five and you need to find a way to get off Jared Allen because I just think that's really the answer for me it's it's almost beyond just this season it's more like the big picture question for them of like this will decide if they're able to have Mobley and Allen together or if they need to separate them

I mean, this is not me reporting. This is just my total speculation. I don't think it's a coincidence that they extended Jared Allen before the date at which he would not have been trade eligible this season, i.e. the Lowry-Markinan date.

that doesn't mean they're going to trade Jared Allen because I think the team is going to win a ton of basketball games this year. Kenny Atkinson loves Jared Allen from Brooklyn. In fact, Jared Allen is like part of the reason Kenny Atkinson got fired in Brooklyn because the, the vets and Deandre Jordan wanted Deandre Jordan to start over Jared Allen. Um, you know, this is one of those ones, Mo, where the basketball estate in me, if I'm saying that word, right. Uh,

um wants this to be a more complicated question like oh but if cleveland ran more split actions when evan mobley had the ball and darius garland and donovan mitchell ran around and set screens like the warriors and that could help and you know if they ran this kind of intricate stuff that kenny atkinson could introduce that could help the two bigs uh work together maybe more four or five pick and rolls which you've seen them do and you could diversify the office more pace and

And then I'm like, it actually just kind of has to be Evan Mobley. It's like all of that stuff can help. And the minute staggering, I think is the ultimate fail safe for them. If it doesn't work, they can just separate, you know, play the bigs together for the first five minutes of each half and then separate them the rest of the way as they will do with the guards, the star guards too. But their ceiling defensively is so high with the two bigs together that they

If this team, if this foursome is actually going to develop into a championship level team, not this year, because I don't think that's even possible, but in two, three, four years, as much as I would like all these other cool little intricate tools you could use to work, I just, Evan Mobley is going to have to become a better perimeter player.

Yeah, it's just that simple and it opens up stuff. I think also with him a little more on the perimeter, it opens up his passing. I think he's a better passer than he gets credit for working out of the high post and whatnot. But that only matters if they have to respect your shot at the high post.

I mean, or the three-point line. Like, I think there's just a lot of things that go with it. I think sometimes we do try to overcomplicate these things, and I think Kenny's going to help them a lot. I think he's going to bring in a lot of the stuff that they ran in Golden State, and they're going to get a little bit of a bump from that. But for it to reach its peak and its ceiling, to be that level of a team where we're looking at them going like, you know, this is the team we envisioned when they got Donovan Mitchell,

He's got to be able to help spread the floor with what they have. And I think that's just the most important thing because, like you said, it allows them to play the defense the way they want to play it.

It's one thing if you're able to play the defense, but you can't get what you want offensively. And I think they get more flow offensively. It looks cleaner. It's harder to defend, which is a big thing that I think teams are always looking for if he can do that. And I think we got to start to see that. Otherwise, you got to start looking at your blueprint.

So those four together last season, the Cavs were only plus two per 100 possessions with those four guys on the court, which is disappointing. However, in a much larger sample the year before, they were almost plus 10 per 100 possessions with those four on the court. It can work. Of course, that was the season that it cratered spectacularly against the Knicks in the playoffs. A lot of that was about their complete inability to rebound, but their offense stunk too. To review,

Cleveland starting five Garland Mitchell, Max Struess, who I think he didn't shoot a good percentage for them by his standards last year. I think he brought everything they needed in terms of movement, handoff game, one dribble, pull up, one dribble pass. And just the more you can occupy the defense, the more you can make them look around and track people running around, the easier it gets for the two bigs to coexist your bench. Look, it,

It doesn't have if they're healthy, it doesn't have to be that deep because you want one of Garland and Mitchell and one of Mobley and Allen on the floor at all times. So you could argue you really only need three bench guys. And in Karis Levert, George Niang and Dean Wade, they they have that. And then Sam Merrill becomes a wildcard. Isaac Okoro still hasn't signed. He would probably I would probably put him above Dean Wade in the hierarchy. Right.

That's just a good, solid team. Karis LeVert's going to be a free agent after this year, by the way. That's a sneaky big spot for them. Feels redundant with Garland and Mitchell, but they've needed his pop and his playmaking now and then. And there's some Ty Jerome buzz from the summer workouts that maybe Ty Jerome can reclaim a rotation role for them and help their offense a little bit. Again, we can get caught up in the fit and the overlapping skills,

I just think talent is, is just as important. They have a big raw talent quotient and I, I am Garland is going to have a bounce back year. That was a nightmare season last year. Health wise for Garland, I would expect a much better year from him. I like this team a lot, just long-term we'll see.

Yeah. I mean, I think that's really what it is. It's there. Like you said, the talent level is very high, like just the four of those guys on the court together. And I like what you, everything you said about Max Bruce, what he brought last season was pretty big.

I have no qualms about them being a very good team this year. It's hitting that ceiling. It's hitting that mark that we're talking about them and looking at them going like, hey, can you break into that top four? Can you be a top three team? Or maybe even the two seed. It's going to require the things we talked about where it starts with Mobley. And listen, he's a Trojan, as am I. I want him to rep my school properly. Hit some shots.

I look, I don't know what's going to become of Evan Mobley's three point shot, right? Like he's still very young. That's it's not just put it in the microwave and you become a good three point shooter. I liked that he dipped his toe into taking more of them a little bit more of them last year. I just know whether it's as a five on this team in some other era where Jared Allen's gone or

Or I just, I think Evan Mobley is going to be a star. I'm keeping my Evan Mobley stock. I don't know what that stardom, I don't know what three-time all-star Evan Mobley in six years looks like in terms of what position he plays and what his skills are. But the explosiveness, the face-up game, and the all-court defense are enough where I'm, I know everyone is kind of like weirdly disappointed in Evan Mobley.

I understand it on some level. I'm fine with Evan Mobley. And just one thing, if he doesn't improve and doesn't develop the shot, this is still a hell of a player. Everything that he has. It's just in the context of how it works with this team. And I think that's kind of the, when you're looking at the player and you're looking at him in terms of the team, I think that's the things I think fans have to understand. Because he's still a hell of a player. What if you could hear your favorite song for the first time again?

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Ryan Reynolds here for, I guess, my 100th Mint commercial. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I mean, honestly, when I started this, I thought I'd only have to do like four of these. I mean, it's unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month. How are there still people paying two or three times that much? I'm sorry, I shouldn't be victim blaming here. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash save whenever you're ready. For

$45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes. See details. All right, Miami. Mo's big question for the team that feels quite fraught is the word I've used for them this summer. The Miami Heat.

Yeah, like my big question really is, is what are we getting from Jimmy Butler? And really, as a whole, are they going to care about the regular season? Like, I think they've kind of gotten into this whole idea of we can flip the switch. We can be that stuff. And we saw Pat Riley's press conference afterwards of like, you have to be on the floor. You got to play in the regular season. I think they're kind of tired of that. So I think we kind of have what the front office and the organization wants.

But are we going to see that translate on the court? Because they got the talent, I think, with what they have to be a tough team in the Eastern Conference. It's just, can we get them on the floor consistently? Because then it becomes a situation, when I was trying to figure out their starting lineup, I'm like, well, you could do this. They have a lot of options if they have everybody available and how they can play, how they want to do things, how they want to adjust things. But the most important thing is availability. I like what you said about their talent.

Because they're not as alluring anymore as these younger, graduated from Pat on the head status teams we're talking about. Tyler Hero has kind of plateaued. Bam is exactly who he is. He's not going to be a 25 point a game scorer. I think that's totally fine. He's worth every dollar they paid him. He's a winner. The allure, the upside, the mystery has kind of vanished from the heat.

but I like what you said about their talent because I think because of that, people are sleeping a little bit on the talent that is here. So if you look at, here's just one iteration of their starting five, and I'll bet you if you gave their coaches and their executives truth serum, they would root for this to be their starting five out of camp. They would root for all these guys to win the spots around Jimmy and Bam. Rogier, people forget Terry Rogier's on the team. Hero, Butler,

hawk as bam i think they want jaime hawkins jr to assert himself as that's a small group right jaime hawkins jr is a small ball four jimmy butler will guard a lot of fours whatever i think they'd like that to be their starting five even though a lot of ball handling a lot of dudes that need the ball and part of the way i solved that problem is here then my bench becomes my bench mainstays become duncan robinson who i who i need because of his shooting

Nikola Jovic, who made a huge leap in the second half last season, made me eat crow for questioning why Spoh was bothering to start him. Whoever is the backup five, let's say Kevin Love and Haywood Highsmith. Those are my four bench mainstays. And I sprinkle in one of Rozier and Hero so they can run the show. And I sprinkle in one of Butler and Bam because you kind of need one of them on the floor at all times. I hate when they play without both of them.

That's a good NBA rotation. That is a tough as hell, rock solid, a lot of strengths, a lot of stuff to play with. That's not a shallow team.

No, that's a good team right there with the rotation. I think that's the stuff you're looking at going like, yeah, that's a problem. And the way that he play in their toughness and everything that they come into and bring on the floor, like that's the type of war type team you're dealing with. Right. Like Hawkins, if he wins that spot, you know, it's the power forward like he's a beast.

He's incredibly difficult and he's crafty and he's talented and he plays hard. All five of those guys you named as the starters and really even the bench guys, they're all competitors. Like that's really what the heat want. There are competitors. And if they're able to find something in that kid, where, uh,

You know, and the rookie there, like that's a big boost for them and something that helps them a little bit with their depth at the center position and maybe even opens up an opportunity. We get a little bit of bam and wear together, you know, for a couple of minutes a game. And I think see how that kind of shakes out. I think there's a lot of different things they can do, but this is a tough ass team. And this is what you said about them in the beginning. It just reminds me of just.

They're Michael Myers, man. Every time you think he's dead, he's still alive. And I'm sure there's another Halloween movie coming out at some point. But like he's just they never die. They never die. They find a way every time.

I don't think I've seen a Halloween movie after Halloween proper. I bet there's so many now. There was the Rob Zombie one that came and went. I bet the next couple are good, right? I mean, they're fun, I guess. I'm not a big horror movie guy. I tend to skip these, but I always see the commercials and go, oh, we're doing this again. And it's always the continuation. It's another paycheck for Jamie Lee Curtis. And they just continue to roll. But they got a good run with them.

My wife thinks I'm a little off. I love, and I know I'm not because I know a lot of people share this sentiment. I love being scared. I love when a movie can actually frighten me and not just in a jump scare. Like those are cool, whatever. In a, I'm legitimately nervous about what is going on in this movie for whatever reason. What is the most scared you've ever been in a movie?

Weirdly enough, my answer is also the Blair Witch Project.

I was terrified like the whole time. And I remember I saw the movie and then I was home from college then. And I was to make some money on the side. I was tutoring some high school kids and one of them lived in a house in the woods, kind of like it. I had to drive through a long driveway. And the next day I got out of the car. It was nighttime. It was dark. And I was like,

I just couldn't stop thinking about the Blair Witch Project. The other one was I was about maybe too young for the movie. Maybe a sleepover at age 11 or something. Aliens. Aliens. Not alien, which is amazing. Aliens. I might have been traumatized by aliens. I was so frightened the entire... Anyway, we're off on a...

A tangent about horror. But I love being... I love the sensation. I don't like being scared on theme park rides. I don't like that. That doesn't do it for me. But movies that can scare me, I love. Well, early in my days in San Antonio, I was still finding my way around the city after moving there. And it was raining. It was pouring. And I somehow ended up on a dirt road. Like...

lightning flashes. I see a tree or whatever. It all looks scary. And I'm like, oh, so yeah, Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Like it's here, right? Like this is, I came to work for the Spurs and I got chopped up somewhere because I'm lost. Never saw it. I never saw that movie. Never saw it. That one's deranged. That one, the,

Even the old, the old ones like really scary. Maybe I need to. Yeah, that'd be a, that's a good date night for me on the way. Hey honey, you want to see NBA season is still six weeks away. How about we go through Texas chainsaw massacre movies tonight? Um, so Miami, obviously look, they're at a crossroads with Jimmy Butler, right? Like, like we all know that, uh,

One way or another, that's going to have to resolve itself. And it's either going to resolve itself in he has a great season. He resigns on a short term extension. That makes sense for everybody. They keep on trucking with this team that has made, you know, two finals in the last five years.

Or there's a trade and the heat don't like to make trades that send them backwards, but they may not have a choice in this case, or they may somehow finagle in the very heat way, a trade that kind of keeps them, brings in another big name and keeps them moving. I've speculated about, you know, would they take a shot on one of these sort of

i don't even know if they're by low guys but like an ingram you know whoever like monitor knock on the door of trey young i've mentioned like hey if milwaukee goes south do you do you try to restart the dame stuff i there we'll see um and that i don't think jim butler goes out in those deals to be clear i think those are like win now bring in guys deal their offenses they were 21st in offense last year and i'm

they're sort of have the opposite problem of the Pacers defense where they're

Their shot location just reached a point of crisis through a point of no return. Like you, they were, they were dead last and expected effective field goal percentage, which is basically where do you take your shots from? They don't get to the, they're, they were near the bottom and shots at the basket and they were average or worse in three point shots. And I know Spoh wants to get up threes. They took more mid range shots than anybody. The rest of their offensive numbers are fairly healthy other than offensive rebounding. They just didn't,

took too many long twos, too many floaters. They crossed whatever Rubicon there is of like, when you cross this Rubicon, you're just mathematically too far behind. I don't know how you, I don't know how you fix that other than Rozier, Hero, Butler, Bam. They only played 120 minutes together due to injury. Maybe there's enough pop in that group to get the ball moving a little bit more.

Yeah, I mean, that's the thing is they didn't really get a lot of time together last year. It really felt like, you know, every time you turn on the heat game, I had no idea who the hell was playing till the game turned like who was available to them until you turned it on. And it was always kind of this guy's in tonight, this guy's out, you know, oh, this guy came back and that this one's coming off. Yeah.

injury and whatnot. I think it's, it's finding that consistency for them as a team where they can get more than 120 minutes together. Cause like offensively, just when you look at those names offensively, you're like, you guys should be able to get enough shots up. You should be able to put a cohesive offense together. That's that's,

difficult to defend. And then when you bring Robinson off the bench, you should be able to get more threes going with everything you have. I think the long twos is really the thing that kills them. And I think that what they probably have to make a point and emphasis to stay away from, I think, you know, just like coaches retreat, that's got to be part of the meeting. It's like, how do we eliminate these long twos or turn them into threes? And I think that's really got to be maybe one of the focal points is the coaching staff.

It's not even a bold prediction to say one of these four teams is going to be in the second round of the playoffs next year, which means which which doesn't sound bold, but it does mean one of Milwaukee, Philadelphia, New York or Boston would not be. I would throw Boston out of that list. Boston is going to be in the second round. The bold prediction would be that two of them make the second round because that means two of those teams don't make the second round. One of them is going to make it because that's just what happens. I don't know who it is. I don't know who the hell it's going to be. I don't know which one is going to have to come through the play in tournament, but one of them is going to make it.

Yeah, I think it's it would be asinine to think that it's not just again, the way a course of the whole NBA season goes, it's so long. And at the same time, it goes by so quickly, but it changes so rapidly. And I think, you know, the way we looked at Milwaukee after they made the Dame trade to the way the season went is completely different, you know, and I think.

I don't know how many people had the Knicks finishing as the two seed. I mean, people had Cleveland finishing as the four seed again, Orlando making the rise and being a five seed. Like, I think there's going to be a lot of that stuff that we're going to see. It's just the variance that happens throughout the season. I want you to travel down to Jason Tatum rabbit hole with me to wrap this up. Can we, can we do that? Yes, please. Um,

Ricky O'Donnell, who's a writer that I quite like for SB Nation, wrote a piece today on the nine players who could realistically win the MVP this season. Jason Tatum was not one of the nine. The nine included Devin Booker and John Morant, but not Jason Tatum.

Jason Tatum famously got benched for Team USA this summer, which surprised me. I proposed a starting lineup that included Jason Tatum. Steve Kerr ended up falling head over heels for Devin Booker and putting him in that spot. And Devin Booker made jump shots. Jason Tatum did not. Then on NBA Today, we do the production call. And one of the topics is, has Jason Tatum's window opened?

to win the MVP already closed. Now he was my preseason pick to win the MVP last year. He finished sixth, um, despite being the best player on the team that won seven more games than anybody else in the NBA and 14 more games than anybody else in their conference, 14. And I, as, as I often am to a fault initially was sort of dismissive of the whole topic. Like I don't really care that much whether he ever wins an MVP, he's going to be in all time. He's going to be a hall of fame player. We know that, um,

He already, by the way, if they have another long playoff run this year, he's already going to be around the top 25 in playoff scoring all time. And he's 27 years old, I think. And then Perk got on the call and Perk said, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second.

What does it mean for Jason Tatum's legacy, which is a word I hate, but Perk uses it. And this got me thinking and it got me down the rabbit hole. If he never wins an MVP, because when we talk about the greatest players ever, the top 15, top 20, don't all of them have MVPs? And that actually got my brain. That was like, okay, there's a kick in the pants. That's interesting. I will say, I do think it's probably much more likely than not.

that Jason Tatum never wins an MVP. That's the most likely scenario for his career. He was already the best player on the best team and finished sixth. It's going to take a perfect storm of...

Now, he just doesn't put up the same kind of numbers as Jokic, Embiid, SGA, Giannis. Probably had a couple of guys to that list that are coming. And it's not just raw counting stats. He wasn't as efficient as those guys from the field last year, and he doesn't create as many assists for his teammates as some of those other guys did.

Some of that is because he's being unfairly penalized for being on the best team, the team with the most depth, the team with the most really good players. And I don't think that's particularly fair to him. He's also a great defensive player, which Luka is not. Jokic is, I don't think is. Some analytics people would argue that he is. I disagree. He's fine. But I think it would take a perfect storm of the Celtics again lapping the field, Tatum amping up his production closer to the universe that those other guys are in.

A couple of those other guys getting injured to the point where they not necessarily don't get to 65 games, but are at like 68, you know, enough where you think about it and their teams disappoint. And I think given how many of those guys are kind of above him in the pecking order of MVP voting, that's unlikely. And then you have the young guys that are coming for this kind of candidacy that we don't need to talk about. And it just it got me thinking, like, do I actually care? Like, will it affect?

It's too early for this discussion, but what it did is get me down a rabbit hole of who is the best player to never win an MVP, and I have a tentative answer. Okay, okay. So you told me this earlier, and so I started going down the rabbit hole a little bit later than you in that regard, but I think I have an answer. My answer is Jerry West. Okay. My answer is Elgin Baylor. Oh, okay.

That's a good one. Yeah. And part of it, too, is I've looked at the list and I'm like, oh, wait, they didn't win an MVP. Like, I'm a little bit shocked. You know, like when you mentioned Jerry West, I was like, I had just automatically assumed he had won an MVP somewhere in his career and all that. But it's interesting when you go through the list and it's there are quite a few guys. But I'm astonished that Elgin Baylor has never won an MVP. And for me, I think that's the that's the guy I'm going with.

But I think these names are proof of... I don't know where people are going to... Look, Jerry West finished second four times and third once. And Jason Tatum has never finished higher than fourth. So it's apples to some other kind of fruit. But I think some of these names are proof that

Maybe it will matter a little bit, but given that he's made three straight first-team All-NBAs, I don't remember how many. I think he's made every All-Star team since 2019, so that would be six All-Star teams. So what is he going to be, a 15-time All-Star if he's healthy? He's going to be in the top five. If he stays healthy, he's going to make more All-Star games than all but five, six, seven players, whatever. He's already won a championship. He's on a team that's got a chance to repeat.

um you know if they win it if they win again you'd be the favorite to win finals mvp jalen brown obviously got it this time you know and then you go through like here are some other guys who never won mvp because i went down the rabbit hole right the hoop collective i don't know if you listened to them this week they went down a rabbit hole of people's dunk numbers yes i enjoyed the hell out of it how many kyle lowry hasn't dunked since 2007 i think that was hilarious duane wade

Chris Paul, John Stockton, Carmelo Anthony, Isaiah Thomas, Rick Barry, Patrick Ewing. Then you get into some sidekick types like Scottie Pippen, but like, those are all like all time. Great. Wherever you rank them, they're all all time. Great players. It's interesting. Like when we talk about the best point guard ever debate, you know, we talk about Isaiah Thomas. We talk about Chris Paul. We talk about John Stockton, you know, uh,

None of them have ever won the MVP, but we talk about them as the greatest point guards ever. And I think that's something that's really kind of interesting as they're in that mix. So it's a kind of just to the way you went down the rabbit hole with Tatum. I don't think it makes a difference. I think it's just incredibly hard to win the MVP in any year.

And I think you just need to have everything kind of go right and go perfectly for you to win it that particular year. And I think that's the challenge. And then with him being on such a good team,

I don't think it's good for Boston if he's, you know, so to the point where he's in the MVP race, because that means maybe Jalen Brown isn't producing the way he's supposed to or is out knock on wood and all of those things. And I think that would hurt the team in terms of their performance as a whole. You know, in the finals, remember, you know, he had some press conference where he said he always felt

Like he was part of some discussion about him being, you know, I don't know if he used the word disrespected or whatever. And I had, you know, I would, I had said that I got aggregated for saying he wasn't one of the top five players in the NBA this past season. And it was interesting because, you know, the consensus sort of top five is, is in whatever order, Jokic, Embiid, Giannis, Luka, SGA, and, and,

Then there's this sort of morass of players, including LeBron still, but I'm going to forget somebody cause I'm just going off the top of my head, but LeBron Durant Booker, some people put ant. I thought that was a little premature. Um, Curry who, you know, sometimes by the numbers, those guys are quote unquote, they may have as good or better numbers than Tatum in the Olympics. They all played over Tatum. Um,

but tatum is younger than them better defensively than all or most of them and durability like kawaii kawaii when he's healthy i said it in the middle of last year healthy kawaii in that that stretch where he was on a tear for 40 games i think is a better player one for one than jason tatum a more destructive player on both ends of the floor

But healthy quiet doesn't exist at the end of the year. Jason Tatum plays all the time. He's really good. He's getting better. I, you know, that top five thing, it's an artificial thing. Like it's a hard group to crack.

SGA was, you know, like kind of got bottled up a little bit for part of that Dallas series. Oklahoma city's half court offense kind of got bottled up a little bit. He doesn't have Tatum size. He's he's, but he was a more efficient player. Let's say, I think Jason Tatum was onto something when he said that he seems his name just seems to be mentioned in funny ways. Like this MVP list I mentioned by SB nation, where he's not even on the list of nine guys. I dismissed it.

six months ago as a kind of a straw man that he was trying to burn down. He, I was wrong. He was onto something. The discourse around him has become quite interesting. And this MVP thing today just got me thinking like, what, what, what if he never wins one? It's just, I don't know. It's just interesting food for thought. Yeah. I mean, listen, he's still an unbelievable player, but like the way he went through in the playoffs of the nitpicking of his game,

I thought he was really good in the playoffs, even though maybe the efficiency wasn't there. I thought he did a great job defensively. I thought he did a great job playmaking for the team and playing kind of a great role of, hey, let me see what the defense gives me and let me make the right decision. And I thought he did that way more than we're even used to from him. And I think that was a big thing for him. But I understand where he's coming from because it did seem like

they were winning games and he was getting criticized throughout the course of the playoffs last year, all the way to the finals. And I think that's the, uh, um, almost a burden you carry to when you are the number one guy on the best team. And I think, I think we did the podcast, you and I, after game three in Dallas, I wasn't in Dallas. I didn't travel to Dallas for that portion of the series. Um,

and that was the game where the celtics were up by 21 i think in the fourth quarter and dallas came it's a game luca fouled out yeah right and dallas came all the way back from 21 down because boston just went through this eight minute stretch of one bizarre awful possession after another and it brought up all these ghosts of the warriors finals from two years ago where they got iso'd iso'd iso and didn't get anywhere i remember on that podcast we started with luca fouling out because it was we knew was gonna be the headline

And Boston's offense going into a ditch in all the, Oh, is Boston like when they lost to Denver twice in the regular season, it was all Boston's late game offense. Is this going to be their fatal flaw? And I got some pushback, including from some people in the league who were like,

you know they did win the game like they're going to win the championship like you got like 28 minutes into the podcast before you talked about like how they won the game and and tatum kind of gets colored with that like jason tatum is awesome and i don't know if he's ever going to make a run at mvp he was my preseason pick last year but it's i don't know just do we care too much about mvp we did we unquestionably do care too much about mvp i think i think we do i think it's uh uh

an award where you have an incredible year and, and you know, how many times it'd probably be fun to just go look at the numbers of how many times the MVP has won the championship, you know? And I think, do we value, what do we value more? And I think it's obviously the championship. And I think when we look back at this season, like sure, we'll talk about Jokic being the MVP, but you said it many times on this podcast, Boston was 14 games better than their peers in the Eastern conference and seven games better than the West. Like,

That's an absurd stat. Like when you go back, like everyone, you go look at the standings. It's so funny where you just look at it and you see how far ahead they are from everybody. I think we just value the VP a little bit too much. It's great. It's, it's, it's fun in that sense. And it's fun to reward a guy who has an unbelievable season.

But we kind of get lost in like, this is still a team sport and it's about winning the championship. And I think that's the most important. Those guys who are on that list, you know, who never won an MVP, you know, when we asked them, would you trade in your championships for an MVP? Or if you've never won either, which one would you want more? I think they're all going to pick the championships.

I think this is coming up today because in one of his – he wrote this children's book, Tatum did. And in one of the interviews, they asked him about MVP. Did he want to win MVP? And he talked about – gave a great answer how he talked about kind of, of course, he'd like to win it, but –

When you play the right way and your team wins and you win championships, those individual accolades tend to follow, which is exactly what you want your superstar player to say. Yeah, I had the ambition, but it's not going to come at the expense of this other thing. I remember the first year Tata made the all-star team. It might have been 2019-20, actually.

If you go back and watch like games from November, December of that year, maybe December, January, it was very clear. And the Celtics were talking about it privately that he was pressing to try to make his first all-star team. He was taking bag shots. He was forcing it. Like we've seen what it looks like when Jason Tatum and other players sort of chase and honor. He doesn't play anything like that anymore. He's an incredible player. He's in, in,

I mean, Shaq, the MVP is funny. Shaq only won one MVP. And we could go back year by year by year by year by year. And in every individual year, and you could do this with LeBron, quote unquote, only winning five or whatever he's won.

And make the case of like, well, this is why I didn't win it this year. People only played 69 games this year and this guy played whatever. But then they zoom out and it's like, Shaq only won one MVP? How is that even possible? It was unguarded. They changed the rules. You know, they allowed zone defenses because of him. I think that's sort of the deal. And again, that's why I just think we value maybe the MVP a bit more than we should.

i'm gonna have to do this same podcast from the western conference because i mentioned earlier that you know the top four have been kind of penned in as oklahoma city dallas denver minnesota

It just never goes. It just never goes that way. It's never, it's never that that easy in the regular season or in the playoffs. And the West has a bunch of teams where you just look around like, okay, well maybe could David, could Phoenix be in the conference finals? Sure. Could Memphis be in the conference finals or who knows? Like it depends. Motakil where, what else do we need to look for from you as the, as we get started to get ramped up here, just get ready to check out the athletic NBA show podcasts. Uh,

Been doing a lot of stuff with Dave Dufour. Just look out for more X's and Mo's on The Athletic. And also just what I'm writing on Bleacher Report in my Twitch stream. Please come check out the Twitch stream. We have a lot of fun there. So I'm not going to do that part, but I will do the other parts. I'm too old. You know how old I am, Mo? I had a birthday two weeks ago, three weeks ago.

I turned 47 years old. You're not that much older than me. Dude, 47 is the first age. I didn't care when I turned 30. I didn't even care when I turned 40 because you kind of turn those ages when you turn 29 and 39. You see it coming. I didn't care when I turned 45. I didn't care when I turned 46. Seven is officially like 50 is right over there. And 50 is my dad.

And so I'm too old for it. You look good, though. You look good, Zach. Well, no one is going to disagree with that. No, a lot of people would disagree with that. But I do feel too old for Twitch. Anyway, Moe, you're one of the best. If you want to understand basketball, Moe DeKeele is one of the guys to follow. Thank you for your time here on this silly podcast. Thank you for having me.

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