The Drop | NBA Midseason Awards
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Good morning, sweet world, and welcome to the No Dunks Podcast on The Athletic Network. It's Friday, January 17th, 2025. This is The Drop. I'm J.E. Skeets here in the Classic Factory, and alongside me, as always, Tass Mellis. I really liked her voice. Podcast listeners, this is for you. Next to him, it's the bearded one, my top shot hot boy, Trey Kirby. Ayo. Ayo. Ayo.

Over yonder, making the magic happen, super producer JD. Hello. There he is. Here we are. How you feeling, JD? Got the new switcher in? Nope. Nope. Flying blind again. Oh, boy. Oh, yeah. Well, you landed the plane perfectly yesterday. See if you can do it back to back here. We'll see. On today's Drop Podcast, we've got Worst of the Week nominees. We got some rapid fire fun. But the big topic today on The Drop, the NBA's midseason point. It arrived this week.

A majority of the teams have played 40, 41, in some cases 42 games. So we're halfway there. So we got to do some NBA mid-season awards. Don't worry, I'm sure we'll sprinkle in, especially a little Thunder Cavs, the sequel talk when we talk about SGA and his MVP chances. But let's go through all of them. I added even Clutch Player of the Year, which I forgot the last time we did this. That's an award. Just for fun.

dunk of the year so far we'll get to but let's start with the granddaddy of them all most valuable player

Who are you going with, Tass? Make your case. And again, I'll make this clear off the top here. This is MVP right now. I don't think this is projecting to who's going to win the thing. Yeah, that's not fun. It should be who you'd write down for these awards at the halfway point. So what do you got? Yeah, we're going to talk about it in a few weeks again. We're going to pick it then, right? But I'm picking Shea Gildress Alexander right now. Winning matters in the NBA. They're going to win.

69, 70 games, I imagine. That's where they are right now. Whoa, you really believe that? Yeah, well, what are they going to slow down? Nah, this team ain't slowing down. They're on pace for probably 70, where they sit right now. I think winning does matter. If they're going to be at the top, this guy is going to lead them on the offensive end and a fantastic defender. I think that is somewhat important here. He does come up with monstrous plays on that end. That huge chase down block of Jason Tatum,

That guy just won a championship. Does it matter when it comes to MVP? No. But I think the big plays do matter. He is a fantastic on that end. The guy has played in every game. He's the only player to win Player of the Month in the West this season. Twice. Jokic hasn't done that. How weird. Yeah. And listen, it's easy to give it to Jokic. That's totally fair. But part of it is being here, sitting here, talking about it every single month, every single year. Winning three in a row does hurt.

hurt. I mean, it's hard. It hurts his chances, I do think, that he would win three in a row. That's part of it, in a weird way, and I think that's what voters are going to come down to, but right here, right now, SGA. Will I change my mind? Maybe. Is it because they won last night? Maybe. But the guy's an awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome player. Right. MVP feels like a two-man race right now at the mid-season point here. They're

There's no wrong answer. I feel like on Monday you could have SGA as your MVP, and then on Wednesday you could have Jokic, and by the end of the week you're back to SGA. There isn't. You can make a case for both of them. Where are you leaning right now, TK? Are you going with the dominant record of OKC and the stats and the two-way play and the leadership from SGA? Or Jokic, who's won MVPs and has only leveled up statistically-wise, has his team still in the mix there as a top-four team in the West? Where do you look?

It's tough, man, because Jokic is easily still the best player in the league. Like, I mean, Shea's having an incredible season. He is my leader for MVP right now, but he's not as good as Jokic is. That's pretty amazing to say. Jokic is third in the league in scoring, third in rebounding, second in assists. He's shooting 47% from three-point right now. I don't really care about the on-off stats for either of these guys because the Nuggets...

of course they suck when Jokic goes to the bench. Who are they supposed to play? Literally, it's DeAndre Jordan. As on the flip side, though, SGA is playing on a really good team, but they fall off offensively when he goes to the bench. So I think it is between SGA and Jokic. I'm going SGA right now because he's got a better narrative. His team is better. Um, I don't actually think winning matters. It hasn't lately. Uh,

You know, the Nuggets were a three seed last year. Jokic won an MVP when he was a six seed. So if you're the best player, you should win MVP. But that's not usually how it goes. That's totally true. I do think it matters this year if they get to 70. If they get to 68, 69, which projected they will get to. I think that matters when it comes to the voter. They'll just see that and say, wow, 70 wins. That's only been done twice in NBA history.

And then they potentially do it. I mean, both of those teams had an MVP. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, that's where I'm leaning. I guess the Chet Holmgren thing with him absent doesn't matter. But in a way, when it all comes down to picking hairs, it may matter. The fact that.

He's a great defender on the best defense in the NBA without Chet Holmgren right now for such a long period of time, who was arguably their best defender for a long period of time. So I think that will matter when we're starting to get into the nitty gritty. Yeah, I mean, buckle up here because we have the two narratives really that we generally have when it comes to MVP. Oh, he's the best guy on the best team. That's SGA.

by a landslide and yeah they might flirt well very easily we'll probably get to 65 plus wins and could be like 10 wins clear of the Nuggets so there's that case but then there's like but what about the word valuable take Jokic off the floor take Jokic off that team

Are the Nuggets even a play-in team? So we get into that whole debate. And then, you know, on top of it, okay, the guy's already the reigning MVP and he's only gotten better. He's averaging career highs in points, assists in minutes. He's flirting with the triple-double average once again. He's, like you said, Trey, shooting 47% from three. He's only gotten better. And so it's just like...

Which one do you want to lean with? I mean, again, there's no wrong answer, but right now, the team's 34-6, and maybe because they got their revenge last night, SGA going for 40 in 29 minutes against the Cavs, in my guarantee, for a guy that sucks at picking games, I guaranteed that one, I would lean towards him right now. But it's not like a done deal. Remember the Tim Bontemps straw poll, which I guess was done right before Christmas? That was...

That was Jokic leading the way. I think, you know, like more like 50 plus first place votes to like more of a 25 for SGA. I wonder if that'd be flipped right now if Timmy Bontemps sent the text out right in the second. Yeah, people get caught in the moment. Absolutely. They were switching their votes from Shea to Giannis because Giannis won in the cup game. Giannis, he's third, man. And you would probably, if you're drafting these three guys, you'd probably take him second ahead of SGA, I think.

Would you? Interesting. Drafting, we're making just any team. Like if you're just listing, if you're listing the three best players in the league, you're probably, at least for me, I would go Jokic, Giannis, SGA. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, it's about their history about winning when you're drafting. That's for sure. SGA hasn't done it further than a second round. So when you're drafting a team, yeah, that's part of it. There's no doubt. Yeah, I'm with you. It only gets hard after three when you're looking at the MVP ballot, really. I mean, it's hard between one and two. It is hard.

But Giannis is right there. And then it's some guys. What did you think of the ass kicking by the Thunder last night? Again, getting that revenge against Cleveland. They were locked in. They...

Took it personally that they lost to the Cavs in Cleveland. So they came out and played awesome defense. The run they went on at the end of the first quarter was ridiculous because it was like a half bench lineup playing a guy, Brandon Carlson out there looking like he should be playing in a rock and jock basketball game. Him and Max Struess wearing the big headband with the long flowing hair.

We haven't seen two guys like that on the court since the late 90s. There's no way that that happens. It's like Josh McRoberts was carrying the torch for a while of the thick headband, long flow. But yeah, the Thunder looked scary. The way they were able to force the Cavs into so many turnovers, the way they looked completely out of it offensively. The Cavs have been the best offensive team in the league this year, and it seems like they always get good shots. They couldn't score for five straight minutes in the first quarter. Very impressive from OKC.

Yeah, Brandon Carlson had me thinking we're watching a YMCA game sort of like when I've watched the Warriors and see Pat Spencer. I mean, throw those two on the floor together with Max Struess. I mean, you are you are throwing together some teams that you think you're just playing ball against. And then you see these guys come out there. And he obviously was big at deferring shots.

The Cavs got a little caught up into it and rushing some shots. Kevin Mobley missed a one-footer. Darius Garland gave away a ball at the top. Max Struess, we know Max Struess does this from time to time, steps on the sideline or just travels. There were so many turnovers in that first quarter. And obviously OKC was pressuring them. If OKC continues to win like this and they go deep into the playoffs, they will likely be hosting.

anybody when it comes to the playoffs in the Western Conference for sure. And it looks like I'm projecting here, but it looks like they'll have the best record in the NBA as well, especially getting Chet back and Isaiah Hartenstein back. So I say that because it was a tough place to play for the Cavs. And I do think this is, I say that Che hasn't been deep into the playoffs. A lot of these Cavs haven't either. And I think that was part of it yesterday. That was...

That environment was tough. Yeah. Crazy to see Donovan Mitchell back in the Dorcher chamber again, too. And then Dort giving them points on the other end as well. And missing some clunkers. I didn't mention Mitchell. He missed some gimme's at the rim. Yeah, but I mean, that's back-to-back games now where Dort has completely just shut him off. Yes, he missed some, but still, that's a lot of credit to Dort and the Thunder defense and how they go about taking away the best player. And then, yeah, Jared Allen, Evan Mobley, just non-factors in this one.

despite the Thunder missing their two bigs. Obviously going with the other Jalen Williams as their big. So impressive win and got their revenge. The sequel's rarely as good as the original, right? So we sort of knew that heading in.

Yeah, this was Moana too. Big disappointment. Damn. Totally forgettable. Oh, not bad. Yeah. Shit. Are the little coconut guys bad? The coconuts are maybe the best part, the Kakamora. They're great in this one. They're the minions of the Moana world. Yeah, I'm with you. Yeah, I probably won't remember it. You're totally right. I'll remember number one.

Classic. All-time classic. A lot of, yeah. One small thing, you know, from this Cavs game where they get bombarded, they turn over and over and over. Now the rumors are, some rumors out there, Joe Varno of The Athletic reporting that executives have told him that the Cleveland Cavaliers are going after Cam Johnson to be their, I would say, if they were able to get him, their starting small forward over Dean Wade, the Max Truce, Isaac Okoro, little three guys that they throw in there.

It, you know, theoretically, it makes sense. I don't know if they can outbid other teams because if it's a first round pick, they can trade their own first round pick in 2031. But that's about it. Kim Johnson would be an upgrade. There's no doubt. He was a guy in the finals in 2021 for the Phoenix Suns that got them there. So that would be complimentary. But I don't know if they have enough. We'll see.

Let's hear from you guys in the stream team, though. Right now, halfway through the season, is it SGA for MVP? Is it Jokic once again for MVP? Maybe you want to make a case for Giannis or somebody else. Let us know. Let's go to Rookie of the Year, which is a very weird race. We've talked about it a lot this season, especially when you think about the top three picks. You know, Rishashay with the Hawks, he's like their seventh leading scorer. He's good. He's good.

He's very solid. He probably will be a really good pro, but okay. Alex Saar shooting 41% from the field. Now he's gotten better. He's leading all rookies in scoring. Exactly. But he's on the bottom dwelling wizards. And then Reed Shepard, and you called this one, Tass. I mean, this guy's been deployed to the G League because they don't really have the minutes and opportunity for him. So he's like lighting up fools there. I think he just had like a 40 burger in the G League. So those are the top three guys. And then we had Jaron McCain.

as the leader he was what the 16th pick for the for the Sixers he was like the front runner for rookie of the year and then he goes down with the uh torn meniscus and he's out for the rest of the well he's been out since and he's going to be probably out for the rest of the season so he's off the board so like where do you go here for rookie of the year I'll go to you Trey because Trey called it this earlier this week he's a big Jalen Wells guy

He's damn good. I'm Grizzlies pilled right now. It's Jalen Wells for me is the rookie of the year right now. 12 points per game, three rebounds, two assists. He's been starting basically since day one for the Grizzlies, 43 from the field, 37 from three. Like he just looks like a good three and D player. He takes the toughest assignment on the perimeter, which is pretty impressive for a Grizzlies team. That is an awesome defensive team. He's brought something to the team that they didn't have. Uh,

with Marcus Smart being out for so long. Like he's an awesome perimeter defender. He's their best guy and he's getting praise. I feel like from other players around the league, Steph Curry talking about the way that he's never been guarded the way that Jalen Wells does. Anthony Edwards was bigging him up. I heard Ryan Hollins on the broadcast. He's like, man, every time Jalen Wells took a shot, he's like, man,

He's nice, man. And they're play-by-play. I was like, yeah, he is nice, man. He's just a nice man. He's having a nice season. And I'm happy to see. I just looked this up because I was curious. Would 12 points per game be the fewest points per game that a rookie of the year scores? Brogdon, 10 points per game. Wow. The year he won rookie of the year. So, you know.

It's along the same case. Like, Wells is a guy, I do think Stephon Castle is making a little bit of a run at Rookie of the Year, but Wells has outplayed him just a little bit and has been a little bit more efficient. And third on my ballot would be Yves Misi, who's been a starter since I think probably the second game for the Pelicans. That guy is damn good. We talk about Dunks of the Year. Yves Misi had a monstrous one. He is a very, very solid player. Yeah, the one, because he is getting a lot of love from other guys, and Jalen Wells is

That helps him. There's no doubt. And that's why I look at Alex Saar of the Washington Wizards, who's been improving and will get headlines, especially if he leads in scoring by more because it's super close. And he had a good December when he had 14 points and shot 45 percent from three on five threes per game. He was balling and he's come back to earth a little bit. So I'm not sure if it lasts, but I think he would get a lot of headlines if he wins.

Jalen Wells by a few points instead of .1 as he is now or whatever it is. It's super, super, super close. It was Jared McCain's until he got there. There's no doubt. I was surprised to see on BetMGM at least that Saar is the current favorite.

for Rookie of the Year at plus 140. I was like, wow. That's the name. I know. Higher pick. It's the number two pick and all that. And he has. He's starting to put it together. I think the game has slowed down a little bit for him. So he's gotten better and maybe he'll improve as the season goes on. I'm with you. I would pick Jalen Wells right now. Some stats here about the lottery picks from our guy Zach Harper in the Bounce newsletter. Only four, if we get rid of Jeremy McCain who's out, only four are averaging double digit points this season. That's it. Of the lottery picks, only Bub Carrington and...

and Castle are averaging at least three assists per game. Just seven players are shooting above 40%, three of them are big men. Two lottery picks are shooting league average or better on threes, and only three lottery selections are playing at least 24 minutes a night.

It's a rough start here for the 2024 class. But there's players in the mix. I think that if you were to ask people at the beginning of the season compared to now, they would say this has been a great performance for this rookie class. People are showing that there are actually going to be players like Rishashay is proving that he was worthy of the number one pick. Like we're saying Sar...

is one of the better players on the Wizards. He's going to finish top five in scoring and rebounding amongst rookies. Like there are guys that are guys coming out of this draft. I think that was a question mark in the summertime when people were saying this is the worst draft of all time. Maybe it is. Maybe it still is, but at least there's some dudes who can play. Yeah, there's a lot of contributors that are going to be part of rotations for a long time. It sure feels like.

even the young guys like SAR who's freaking 19 or resus, who's 19, who says he was watching movies to learn English and he's learning it a lot better here in Atlanta. I say that because these guys are developing and they're kids. They're both 19 year old kids. Those top two. Uh, and Jalen Wallace has been around here for a while as the number 39 pick. Uh,

Been around here, I mean, the United States of America. He's been alive for a little bit. So, yeah. No, I just mean he knows how to play American ball, and he's ready. But, yeah, Risa Shea playing 24 minutes a game, starting every single game until recently, until he got banged up. He shows he's going to be around for a long time. A lot of these guys. And I think that's what a lot of people were waiting for.

Are these guys just going to be bounced from the league? No. I mean, even we see, of course he's going to be around. He's just damn good. But how many of these guys will be all NBA, you know, all star level talents? Who knows? Of course, it's impossible to say, but it doesn't feel like there's going to be, there's not locks where you're like that guy guaranteed will be a 10 time all NBA player or whatever. It's like, we'll get some all stars. Sure. Yeah.

Yeah, I think that if you were to ask people in July, they would say zero All-Stars. But now you look at them like, Castle can be an All-Star at some point in his career, especially playing next to Wemby. Like, they'll be a good team at some point. They'll probably get more than one All-Star. Maybe he's the second guy there. I think Sar has All-Star potential. Risa Shea has All-Star potential. And of course, Matas Buzelis as well.

with the Chicago Bulls, the new Andre Kirilenko. Last guy I'll throw into the mix, I do think Zach Eadie still has a chance to win Rookie of the Year. Oh, 100%. But he's like half the minutes of the top three candidates right now. So if he's able to stay on the court second half of the season, he'll make a run. Yep. All right, let's hear from you guys, Rookie of the Year. Let's move to Defensive Player of the Year. And before I get your picks for this, I wanted to get your take on something Jalen Williams, J-Dub of the Thunder, recently said on a podcast. He pitched the idea...

of creating two defensive players, Defensive Player of the Year awards. One for perimeter defensive players, and then one for, generally, the big guys, interior defensive players, aka, I guess, the Wemby award. He later then suggested that the league expand to three all-defensive teams. He's like, we do it for all NBA, why don't we do it on the other side of the ball? What do you think specifically about the

and then interior sort of split that into two awards. Do you like that concept or no? I got two thoughts for that. First, Jalen Williams getting quotes from somebody on podcasts. Awesome. That means that good podcasts are being made. That's my first thought. My second thought is, yes, it's a great idea. I thought looking at all these candidates, it's hard to give it to a perimeter guy. There's no doubt about it. There's other things that are hard about it. It's hard to give it to a guy that's middle of the pack.

In terms of defensive rating, his team, like a middle-of-the-pack defensive team, I think that's hard as well. You're talking about Webb and Yama, of course. Yeah, sure. No, but lots of guys. Dyson Daniels is also... He's on the 20th best team in the NBA defensively. And yeah, you see the stat going around about Wemby. When he goes to the bench, the Spurs defense stinks.

Sure. When he's out there, it's like top three. Well, I didn't see that one. Maybe I'm reading and listening to the wrong podcast. But he was top six I saw. But either way, yeah, I like the perimeter one. It's hard to give it to a perimeter player, and that's why you see it so infrequently. And Marcus Smartz is almost ridiculed that it should have been given to somebody else on Boston. So, yeah, I'm with it. I'm with the perimeter. And it's just impossible even to get into the nitty-gritty of numbers with defense. It's just...

It doesn't mean as much. So I do think, yeah, Dyson Daniels, Amin Thompson, those perimeter guys, yeah, they should be awarded. Would you pick Wenbanyama as your defensive player of the year halfway through, though, despite the Spurs, I guess, ranking 13th in defensive efficiency? I would. Okay. I would, yeah. I think a lot of people will and would. What do you think about Jalen Williams' idea, and who do you have for your DPOI? I think they should do it, and I think they will do it because Wenbanyama is going to break the record for defensive player of the years by the time he's 25 years old.

There's no debate now about who could be defensive player of the year. It's Wemby, by far, and he's going to win it until he's hurt or until he's old. So they'll probably do it so we can give some other awards because right now you look at the all-defensive team last year, Bam, Anthony Davis, Rudy Gobert, Wemby, and Herb Jones. Literally one perimeter player got on there. It just is set up for it to be a big man award. So it always goes to big men. And then there's one guy who stands out.

ahead of all those guys. Like, there's Wemby as a defender, and then there's everybody else in the league who might have a chance. Wemby is on pace to become the first player since Mutombo in 95-96 to average four blocks per game. He also has, like, a 10.7 block percentage, which is, like, minute bowl-type numbers that are just sort of next level here. But you brought up, like, the team defense...

I saw that the past 17 winners of this award have played for teams that ranked in the top five of defensive efficiency. Because what we say, like, this is almost a team award in a weird way. It's like, do you have an elite team defense? Okay, now who's the best player on your team of defense? Okay, it goes to them, or they're in the running. But yeah, Spurs are sort of middle of the pack, but when Wemby sits, they're garbage. When he's out there, they're elite. So he's going to win this. That's an interesting point about how many will he win. Like, Gobert didn't win his first one until he was like 25. Yeah.

Ben Wilson win probably till he's 27, 28. Same with Mutombo. He was old too. Dwight was probably young when he was winning early. He was younger. It doesn't matter. Wemby's 21. He's going to win his first one this year. Yeah. And he called it. Yeah. He's like, you can win it this year. I'm going to win it from here on out. Like,

Like, the real question is how many straight could he win? We'll see. We'll see how healthy he stays. That's the only question. Well, how healthy he stays, and then we are really putting voters' fatigue to the test with Wenmin Yama in Defensive Player of the Year. Will people just be like, no, anybody but him. He's won six in a row. Just give it to somebody else. I think it would work to his favor to be like, this guy is clearly the best defender that has ever existed in the NBA, so we're going to vote for him every year. Yeah. Yeah.

Possibly. Possibly. Because people don't care about Defensive Player of the Year that much. Yeah, no. There's no fatigue. I think that helps, yeah. There won't be much fatigue. It's true. It really hasn't been when we have three guys that have won four, you know, and like you said, Dwight winning three in a row. Yeah. So... I mean...

there needs to be some sort of compilation of like nightmare fuel that when because is on the floor as well, because people are going into the lane and passing the heck out. Yeah. And people are scared. And so that has to be a part of it, but that ain't in a stat. And as far as yeah, team defense, good team event, team defense is winning. I think that's a factor, I guess for voters. Um, but who knows? I think it just helps voters like whittle down your list. It's like, okay, who are the best defensive teams? Okay.

Okay, it's these five. Okay, now within that, who am I picking as my guy for DPOY? If you picked a perimeter defensive player of the year, who would you go with at the midseason point here? Ahman Thompson. Okay, yeah. I think he's on a lot of people's lists. I think Dyson Daniels, like you said. I'm digging Dyson Daniels. I think Lou Dort has to be involved in this discussion. And then Chris Dunn has been incredible for the Clippers.

as a sort of defensive wrecking ball as well. Advanced numbers love Chris Dunn defensively. I would have Mobley number two on the ballot. He's not a perimeter guy, but I would have him on the list. Yeah, it is good. You mentioned Chris Dunn. I think Ivica Zubac deserves some recognition because that Clippers defense is freaking awesome and he's a big part of it. They're third in the league. But as far as defensive numbers go, yeah, Amin Thompson is loved, but

You get to the geeky stats, Dyson Daniels is ridiculously good. Six and a half deflections a game. That's damn good. Leading the league in that, leading the league in steals per game. He's just damn good. And he's been doing it night in and night out. It's funny to think about Rudy Gobert winning it last year and thinking there's no way he wins it this year. Third defense has dropped off a bit. There's no doubt. But their top six, they're still pretty good. But they don't rebound like they used to, and that's a problem.

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Let's go to sixth man of the year.

It's a fun one. Yeah, there's like four or five guys right now halfway through that you can maybe convince yourself deserving of sixth man, though some of them are like getting pulled from the list. Like Amin Thompson is now a starter and might continue to be a starter for the Rockets. He probably was on the short list for sixth man of the year, but might be disqualified now. But you get a start here, TK. Who you got? No, I'm going to pull a Tass Mellis. I'm going to pass it on over because he called it. He already called who the sixth man of the year is.

DeAndre Hunter is a new man. Now, some people are taking him off their sixth man of the year because they think he should be most improved, which, come on. Come on, Judge Schumann. There's people who think, well, he's just so good. He's going to win this one, so he can't get this one. He's not going to win either of them, unfortunately. Well, he's not going to. Because he never plays, and he's once again hurt. Well, I'm sorry. Is he going to make the mark for games played? Well, he's played 25 games off the floor.

So he just has to play 16 of the next 40. And he's good. He can do that. I mean, he just has to play half, right? Or that's it. Well, he's got to get to 65 games. Oh, the 65 rule. That's a problem. That's a problem, yeah. Oh, yeah, I guess he's not going to make it. This guy has feet issues. I mean, I swear he's always injured with a foot injury.

Yeah. I'm serious. But he hasn't missed 17 games yet, so he is still eligible. That's right. That's right. And he's leading the NBA in points per game off the bench, 19 and a half, shooting 48 from the field and 44 from three, and has been a huge part of the Hawks being good, especially in December, you know, when they had their best run, went to the NBA Cup.

What? They went to the semifinals? They went to the semifinals in Las Vegas. We saw it. It was because their bench was so good, and Hunter is the leading guy off the bench for them. Yeah, but I think Peyton Pritchard's going to win it, and that's okay with me because he's been doing it for longer. He's been doing it since the beginning of the season. His numbers have dropped off a little bit, but he's actually more efficient because he's 62% on twos. If you want to geek it out, his true shooting percentage is higher, and he's just not going to get...

his bench is also better overall than the Hawks bench. I mean, the team bench is great. Pritchard is like so important to the Celtics formula to try and win games, which is obviously jack up a bunch of threes. He's the one guy that's still maintaining a pretty good percentage. He's shooting 41% from deep and he shoots over eight a game. Uh,

While a lot of the other guys right now especially are like falling off. We talked about Derek White and Jalen Brown, stuff like that. So he's maintaining that level. I think I'd have him right now. Hunter's been lights out like you guys said though. And he's played enough to warrant this at the midseason point. He only had 20 points per game. It's pretty crazy. Yeah.

He's scoring 19 and a half points per game off the bench. So he would be automatic. It's just a funny one because it's like he was a starter for a long time. And it's not like he's aged out of starting. It's just like, hey, man, you're not really consistent as a starter. Let's try you off the bench. And it's worked. And he seems to have taken to the role as well. Yeah. Like a Jordan Clarkson. There's been guys. J.R. Smith. Yeah. Yeah. Who've been awesome. Yeah.

He's the only... Yeah, he started two games at the beginning of the season. And I wondered when Zachary Risache would start. And it just happened because he got hurt. And yeah, those numbers are... They're probably not going to drop off that much, but I guess he's just not going to qualify. Period. He's not going to be there. He's not going to make 65 games. But you said there's other guys in the conversation. Malik Beasley. Definitely. 100%. Third in bench points per game. 15. Shooting 40% from three. Also 40% from the field.

Makes sense. Yeah. And the other two guys I would throw in the mix, Santi Aldama for the Grizzlies. He's been awesome. And Daquan Plowden shooting 88% from the field, 83% from three, scoring 19 a game. Will he get to the game? Yeah. Play the game. Uh,

And Karis Levert, maybe, further down the list. Just that's a bit of like, look how good the team is. And he's a huge part of it coming off the bench for the Cavs. So I'd show him a little love as well. Yeah, the team benches, I guess, are important. Peyton Pritchard is important to the Celtics bench. You look at which team actually outscores the other team's bench, and the Celtics are just awesome. And so he could be the guy, and that's fair. Although...

Just like the second Defensive Player of the Year award was born, I think we should get a new award. We got Clutch Player of the Year. Why not an End of Quarter Shooter Award or Midcourt Shot Awards? It's Payne Pritchard. He is good. He's a damn good seed. Run away with that one. Bring him in for five seconds. I thought you were getting ready to say, what about Seventh Man of the Year and then Eighth Man of the Year? No.

Not going to be able to do it. We've got to do it. How about fourth man of the year? Who's the fourth best starter in the game? There we go. Somebody on the Celtics. Derek White, actually. That's your winner. I'm going to Cavs.

Oh, that's a good point. Jared Allen. Jared Allen, yeah. Take your pick. He's playing better right now. I was going to say, you were joking about that. We could do 10 minutes on that easily, man. Best end of first quarter interviews, Jared Allen. Going with Jared Allen. See him yesterday with Jared Greenberg? Jared on Jared. They're getting bombarded. They're losing by like 20 points. Hey, can we get Jared Allen to do an interview, please?

Yeah, sure. No problem. Oh, man. What kind of guy steps up and does that? A professional. That's a pro. Yeah, right there. Okay, so a lot of votes for Hunter. I'll go Pritchard right now, mid-season point. Okay, most improved player. I will ask you guys who wants to start this. I will not...

Right here, buddy. Right here, buddy. All right, Trey Kirby, most improved. I know you know who it is. It's Tyler Hero. Tyler Hero, most improved player. Career highs in points, rebounds, assists, all percentages, and all advanced stats. He's got better numbers this year than Steph Curry and Damian Lillard. He's going to be an all-star, so this is another reason he should win it. You make your first all-star game, you're probably going to win most improved player. If it was the year 20...

2007? Norm Powell would be your guy. Back when it was about players improving, not just like taking a leap and becoming great. Norm Powell scoring 24 per game plus 10 points per game compared to last season when he was coming off the bench. He's really helped the Clippers as well keep afloat while Kawhi Leonard was out, but he's at a career high points per game at 31 years old. And my third on the ballot, Evan Mobley, who is the similar case to Tyler Hero. He's probably been a top 20 player this year and just looks so much better offensively specific.

How are you approaching this award? Because Trey just gave you the two options. Is it the way it has gone recently where a good player, dare I say even a great player sometimes, goes to like all-star, all-NBA level, whatever, or back to those 2000s where Norm, the true spirit of the award, man, has this guy just been lights out. He's shooting 49% from the field, 45% from three on over eight three-point attempts per game, and he's 83% of the line. You go more towards him. Yeah.

Yeah, just because of the narrative right now. I think that story is just a little more fun to go with. Year 10 here, 24 points per game, way, way higher than his career high coming into this season, 45% from three. Also, his career high true shooting percentage is freaking good. I kind of go with the guy who's going to make the all-star team. I think that's important. And Norm Powell,

He's dark horse. They're fifth in the West. They deserve an all-star. I don't think we're going to see an all-star from the LA Clippers. If it ain't Norm Powell, it ain't going to be James Harden. It ain't going to be Kawhi. It's going to be Zuboff. Nah. I don't think we're going to see one. I just like when it comes to the end of the year.

I mean, Hero's going to be an all-star, so it's probably going to go to him. Cade Cunningham deserves some recognition as well. He could easily win this thing too. I think he's an all-star. Jalen Johnson could have been an all-star if he stuck around and was healthy, but that's not going to happen. And that's that. Yeah, it's young for me. The young guys were Hero, Jalen Johnson, and Cade, and then Normie.

But, you know, I'm just on Normie's back. I'm riding him. But it's going to go away. I think that story is going to...

subside in a while. Yeah, the making the star leap is Mobley, Cade Cunningham, or Tyler Hero. Like, because they're very likely all three going to be all-stars. So I get that. And Norman Powell, yeah, that's interesting. Will he make it? Probably not. But it is wild that Norman Powell is averaging more points per game than Donovan Mitchell, Jalen Brown, Steph Curry, Trey Young, LeBron James. Like, this is wild that Norm has continued to do this. I think when we saw it for a couple weeks, I was like, oh, that's a fun, cute story. Norm will quiet down a little bit. And he hasn't. In fact,

If anything, he's sort of just like maintained and sort of gone up in efficiency. So I would have him right now because I love that MIP narrative. Jalen Johnson's averaging 19, 10, and 5, one and a half steals per game in a block. Those are crazy numbers. Apparently those are numbers like only like Garnett has ever done, Weber, Barkley, maybe Larry Bird, and then like DeMarcus Cousins. So like that's like...

rare there for those type of stats across the board. He's a little injured right now, so maybe that hurts his chances for the All-Star game and for getting this, but I will go Norm for MIP.

And just to throw one in there, he's kind of like DeAndre Hunter because he could be in two awards. Dyson Daniels could be most improved along with most or best defensive player. But I think we should create a new award for him that people have now heard of him award because he was playing for a couple of years in New Orleans. Nobody knew about him. He was playing backup. And now he's he hasn't improved all that much. He's just playing more. I mean, he's a very good player, period. So D.D. deserves a little love, but he's probably not going to win.

any award. The more I think about Hero is it makes sense because he's like increased his volume maintained his efficiency which has only actually gone up as well and he's really become the vote sorry the focal point of every team's defensive game plan with no Jimmy there now it's like try and stop Tyler Hero and you have a pretty good chance to maybe beat the Heat but he's maintained these high scoring games and numbers and efficiency so that's a good case for him as well. All right a few more coach of the year Tass I'm throwing to you man.

Oh, no, I hate this one. I'm kidding. There's so many guys, though. There's so many guys. I'd go with Jamal Mosley in Orlando because if I'm the opposing coach, like I'm the guy watching the TV, I just would hate to play this team. And I hate the idea of trying to come up with a game plan to beat this defense who is just so freaking good.

And, you know, they're up there in the Eastern Conference standings, despite Paolo Bancaro playing only 20% of their games. He has them to play every single game. But I could give it to easily to so many guys, you know, Atkinson, Udoka, Bickerstaff, I think Ty Lue we just talked about. Taylor Jenkins would be up there for me, though, as well. Top two. I mean...

He's got Morant playing the fewest minutes of his career by far, 28 minutes per game. He's got two rookies starting. Yeah, and he's got guys that are going to come join the rotation. Vince Williams hasn't played. He's going to be part of the rotation. Gigi Jackson is going to be around. I don't know if he's going to be part of this rotation. It's so good. He plays 11 guys, no one even close to 30 minutes per game. He says, Jaron Jackson Jr., I know you want defense player there. John Morant, I know you want to be a superstar after that injury year, failed year, but...

You got to sit. You got to sit. And he's helping them. They're going to unpace to win 52 games. So he's done a great job. Lots of great coaches. But you'd go Mosley. Yeah, I think so. This is tough, man. This is a very tough one. Trey, who are you going with? Kung Fu Kenny. Kung Fu Kenny Atkinson. Because to me, his imprint is clearest. The Cavs were 18th in offense last year. And it looked like the only way they're going to be able to figure out how to play offense is if they get one of their big guys out of there.

That was the only way they were able to score last year. Four shooters, one big. This year, they're first in offense, and it's because Jared Allen and Evan Mobley have figured out how to play together. Kenny Atkinson has gotten the best out of Darius Garland. He's gotten the best out of Donovan Mitchell. They're on pace for 70 wins, if you want to call it that, as well. So for me, it's Atkinson in a blowout. Though I've got Mosley second on the list. You doke a third. Yep. Okay. I have the exact same list as you. I would have Kenny right now. I mean, I...

I don't think either of these teams, I guess, in the Thunder or the Cavs are going to get to 70. They're not. Yeah, it's amazing where they are at halfway point being 34-6, I guess they both are right now. So Kenny Atkinson would get my vote right now. But he's done a lot with, unfortunately, a little at times with his star players. Kenny's great in a way that Steve Kerr came to Golden State and did what he did with them. The thing I...

I could see the voters saying and just waiting for another year to give it to Kenny for some reason, because Steve Kerr didn't win it the year he got there and they won 67 games the year he got there. So there's that. I mean, does it really matter to voters anymore? I don't know. But Steve Kerr did the exact same thing. I mean, he changed the offense step. Don't bring the freaking ball up or if you do pass it and run. So I think that's a that's emblematic. It's so, so similar.

Do voters still vote the same when it comes to coach of the year? Who won coach of the year in 2015? There's no way anybody remembers this. No. I did not. Even on the basketball reference page.

I have it here in front of me. If you want to take a guess. I mean, can we get it? Of course. Let me just look at the records. So you said Kerr wins 67 games with the Warriors but doesn't get it. Yeah. Mike Budenholzer. That's the one. Hawks won 60 games. Oh, okay. That's that year. That's also a Kenny Atkinson case. Very similar. They were fine the year before and then they exploded offensively and won 60 games. Yeah. Kenny Atkinson might have been a bench coach for the Hawks at that point. I don't know.

Interesting. Clutch player of the year.

that's been around for a few years now. Who do you have, Trey? Who's leading right now? Clutch player of the year, huh? I'm going with Nikola Jokic. This is hard to figure out, though. So you go to NBA.com slash stats. You look at the clutch stats. He's second in clutch scoring this year behind Tyrese Maxey. Jokic shooting 54% from the field in clutch situations, 50% from three with a two-to-one assist-to-turnover ratio. Plus his team is 10-7 in 17 clutch games. Sure, sure. Yeah.

I, too, took this to NBA.com slash stats and was looking at that and see, whoa, Torrey Craig is leading in clutch minutes because he's only played one game. He doesn't qualify yet. Paulo Boncaro could get there. He's actually second in terms of guys scoring seven points in clutch minutes, but he hasn't played enough to qualify. So that's why it's Maxey and then Jokic, although...

The guy's last name that I don't remember. You said him last week when he plays for Brooklyn Tosan Airways.

Awoma. Awoma, yeah. That's how you say his name. He's up there. What a year. He's been having a great year. He's only played one game. There's lots. They do have a filter button. Yeah. Yeah, who qualifies? Actually, one of my worst of the week candidates that I didn't include. Have you seen Brooklyn? Awoma reminded me of this. Have you seen in Brooklyn? They kind of have like a penalty box for their players. They sit in the second row when they're playing. That's crazy. That is weird.

They had Boyan Bogdanovich not playing Ben Simmons, not playing, sitting in the first row, and everybody else go to the second row. That's weird. Very strange looking. What about Darius Garland for clutch play of the year? Sure.

Cavs are 14-2 in clutch games, so that's the best record there in the league, and he's been amazing. Schumann with the stat that he was 19-29 from the field, an assist to turnover ratio of 10-1 in clutch play, good on you, Garland. He's a plus 62 as well. I think he leads everybody just in terms of plus minus in clutch play, so I would probably go Garland. Wouldn't be upset with Jokic.

Funny award, the more I think about it. Garland probably scores like three points a game in clutch minutes. Like, who cares? I know, who cares when you get into the stats? I know, and that's why this is actually sort of stupid. It's a little silly, especially when it's like, well, okay, I guess we'll just fire up mb.com slash stats and just sort of see who's dominating. Now, the flip side of it, I can't recall too many game winners this year, right? Like, multiple game winners by the same guy.

Hasn't happened, I don't think, so far yet. At least not buzzer beaters. Yeah. If you're a basketball reference, you can check the all-time buzzer beaters. Clutch shot of the year, Trae Young from 43 feet. Okay. Ooh, baby. Okay. That was a nice shot. But, yeah, it's sort of just silly. I don't know. I also, why would I care if somebody gets a Voss? As long as Victor Solomon is getting more work, I'm happy. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, like the guys who won, they deserve it, though. You know? Yeah. It's nice for Steph to win and Fox to win it. Yeah.

So if it was guys who didn't deserve it, then you'd say, okay, that stinks. That's a weird award. Stinks. Why would you give it to that guy? But they were really good. But it is stats-based. I think that's what it's going to come down to. All right, final one here. Dunk of the year.

Who has, so far, the dunk of the year to you? Now, will you be using dunk score? That is what I need to know. I know Trey Kirby won't. He hates a John Collins. I'll tell you what I like about dunk score. It's a good way to remember dunks. It is. Even if you don't agree with the scoring, you're like, wow, here's a literal database of dunks. They're sorted in a way that at least surfaces the top ones. You might not think number one is number one, and it ain't. It ain't John Collins. It ain't the dunk of the year. Okay. Come on. Dunk of the year is John Wembley.

It is. It is. Good luck to anybody beating that dunk. It will count if you do beat it. So I'm going to give John Morant the dunk of the year regardless for the baseline reverse. He went, I forget who it was against, but he went baseline. Basically did a Vince Carter up, down, finished it with his head facing the other way. That was an awesome dunk as well. Both of these came after Joss said, I'm not dunking anymore. Maybe he just said that so that people wouldn't jump with him.

Wow. NBA conspiracy. I like it. Oh, I like it a lot. All right. And he had the other great one where he was just picturesque, that alley-oop where he got so high and he was cocked back. There's nobody around, but it's just picture perfect. And that's why Moran has the best compilation. That's for sure. Who are you going with, though? I found this one actually hard. I found this one.

The need to not go to stats, obviously. Dunk score stats? Are you kidding me? No. Just to see the compilation of the best ones. And I think this is where compilations are benefiting from today and from now. Just the ones that are put together that are so much better. Even than a few years ago, I'd say. They're just good compilations. I went through them. There's a ton. I mean, yes.

John Morant, his dunk that didn't happen on Wemby was good. But Kobe White dunked on Wemby. That was freaking awesome. DeAndre Hunter, time ticking down in a game. He lined up a dunk on Wemby with five seconds left. Nobody talks about that one. They won't talk about that one. But it was straight at Wemby. And then he looked at him. He stared him down. I think that was an incredible dunk. But there's so many. Even Misi, I mentioned earlier, a spin and then punched it right in Zach Eadie's face.

That was a freaking great one. Wemby threw it off the board to himself. First, the Hawks. Cade threw one to Sart Thompson off the glass. That was good. LeBron's left-hand dunk around Lively was good. That was good.

I think Kuminga had a different type of dunk where he was able to just fight through. It was Max Christie and then dunk on Christie and Rui Echimura. And that was cool. Keontae George dunked on Jalen Dern. That was cool. Christian Brown dunked on Rudy Klober. That was cool. Jalen Green dunked on Luke Cornett. That was freaking awesome. His best one is on Cade Cunningham, I think, on a fast break. I think it's maybe number two in dunk score right now.

Oh, is it? Yeah, it is. He flies on that one. So that guy soars when he takes flight, man. It looks awesome. Yeah, he was early. It looked like he was going to have dunk of the year, and then that changed right quick. I feel like he's going for it right now. He had that game against the Grizzlies where he was just trying to dunk on Edie the entire night. He missed two of them, got fouled on both of them. But he's got a chance to do a Jama rant, sort of crazy cock back on a big guy as well. Yeah, his are picturesque. And last one I'll mention was Zion's 360 windmill last week. That was very...

That was cool. It was great to see Zion do that again. I mean, there was nobody around. It was a breakaway dunks. Hey, man, we're called No Dunks here, man. This guy's going through every book. I love it. That was it. That's why YouTube videos are good.

Trying to watch a four-minute clutch moments of a basketball game. Did you see the headlines of the last 2.30 of the Warriors-Rockets game? Here it is. That ain't watching a basketball game. But watching a compilation of just the best talks. Yeah. Do you want to see the best? What are you talking about? I'm saying YouTube ain't useful, I don't think, for really enjoying a basketball game. Enjoying a game is best.

than watching a four-minute YouTube video. That's all I got to say about that. But the compilation of dunks is useful. That's all I got to say. So true. Yeah, I mean, it's useful. It is useful. Thanks, YouTube. I'll tell you what's not useful, though. The NBA releasing a video was about a month ago now. The top dunks of the 24-25 NBA season, part one.

Sounds useful, right? Okay. Not when it's an hour long. Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Come on. Yeah. Come on. There's a... Literally pick some. You're showing us basically every dunk. Part one, I said. Part one of every dunk in the NBA. Yeah. Call it that then. Yeah. Call it every dunk, not top dunks. Yeah, they do some crazy stuff on the NBA. They're too long. Like hour plus long videos. You're like every wild ending from November. Huh?

Yeah, I know. Can't do it, man. Can't do it. One you didn't say that I would put into the running here. Oh, damn. I don't think you did. I know. You did say a lot. I missed it. Anthony Edwards on... He's got a couple, actually. He had a big one against the Kings. He did. Yeah, bodies sort of got out of the way. They made some business decisions on that one, wisely. But the one on Anthony Black recently was pretty huge. Anthony on Anthony. Now, Black, he...

He cowered. He was laughing while the dunk was happening, but it was a massive dunk from Anthony Edwards, who I also, like Jalen Green, I just love how they look. And John Morant, those three especially. They just look badass when they dunk on guys. They do. They have the power. They float. They obviously have the hop. Let's hear from you. Dunk of the year. Are you using dunk score or not? I love that we still talk about it. I love that we're called No Dunks and we talk about dunk score more than anyone else.

It's too perfect. All right, those are the awards. Let's hear your picks, guys.

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Let's get to Worst of the Week. Ladies and gentlemen, the Worst of the Week.

First nominee this week is a courtside fan getting hit right in the face by a Jordan Poole pass. Jordan Poole throws it. It is deflected by Jayden McDaniels. It goes courtside. There is a fan walking past, but he sees that ball coming, so he matrixes it. He leans back real quick, and it goes directly into the face of a fan who's looking...

And somewhere else, his glasses fly off his face. Yeah. And actually, Jim Peterson, who was calling the game for the Timberwolves, said his glasses turned into contacts. Oh, they broke. Yeah. They did break. They just shattered. I don't think I noticed that. Yeah. This guy's laughing. Yeah. The guy that dodged it is literally just like, ah!

The guy in the face. I wonder if he was... That's an all-time great clip. I can see that was so good. The replays. I would watch the live, and he looked at his phone like three minutes later, so I wonder if he was actually looking at the video already. Oh, sure. He knew it went viral for sure. Because he likes to look at his phone. When he was walking by, he was looking at his phone and somehow was able to see that the ball was coming to the side of his vision. He just turned back.

Awesome awareness. Which fan is to blame? Well, I was going to say a couple of days ago, I wanted to put some blame on the guy that dodged it. Like, come on, man. You could have maybe helped the guy out, kept his glasses on his face if you had just sort of caught it, hit it, whatever. But he did have popcorn in one hand. JD pointed that out at the time. He did have his phone in the other hand.

It's suddenly coming at him. Get out of the way. I mean, it would be your first reaction probably. Sure. Move. And the fan who gets hit right in the face isn't watching the play. No, he has no clue. Well, there's two fans. What he's looking at specifically is another fan who's walking by. There's two fans walking by. You know those fans who walk by the front row of people in the middle of a play, which is a weird thing that happens at NBA games.

Yeah, why a baseball stadium? They won't let me walk back to my seat. See, he's looking at his friend. He's looking at his friend. He's basically saying hi to his buddy and then takes it right in the kisser as he's walking. It is amazing that the arm of his glasses goes flying. His glasses are done. Do you think he got new glasses? He can afford them.

He's sitting front row. Shout out to Jim Peterson who said, yeah, his glasses became contacts. That's a good line. Good line. Good line. Great stuff there. That's awesome. It was also deflected. Does that matter to anybody? Yeah, a little bit. I mean, it takes the blame off pool a little bit. Otherwise, it's like, who the hell are you passing to? But, yeah.

It got tipped. Yeah, that guy wasn't looking anyways. That's just bad luck, man. That's all that is for that guy. Like, what was he supposed to do? Yeah. Like, because, like, we've seen people get hit in the face before, and they're, like, on their phone at the game. It's like, maybe keep your head up, right? But the guy was getting blocked, and he was talking to somebody. Well, no, he was just looking at the fans that were coming and walking in front of him, and you can blame that for...

So the ushers. The ushers for allowing those fans during play to go back to their seats. Okay. That happens in so many arenas, and the idea is basically, wow, these guys give us lots of money. They can walk whenever they want. I think that's the premise. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So true. They wouldn't let us get back to our seats at a baseball game. They wouldn't let us get back to our seats at my high school basketball game. That's what I'm saying. Wait until the timeout. Yeah. It's like, what? What?

Nothing's going to happen. I still do that. I will sit in stairs waiting until a break in play. Yeah, I'll do it. A baseball, a foul ball, maybe I'll run it. It is a respectful thing to do to generally the people around you, right? So you're not blocking them. Yeah, I guess. I guess that's what I'm doing. I guess I'm being rude. Yeah. No, there isn't. Second nominee.

is a kid's dad. Because dad got his son to exchange a jersey with Victor Wembynjama. Victor Wembynjama gave him a gorgeous Wemby jersey. You see that baby blue jersey? It's amazing. What a photo. But then the dad put it up for auction. Wemby found out and he tweeted about it. He tweeted a crying emoji saying,

Devastating. Well, he was, yeah. I don't know for sure that the dad, number one, did this or that he planned it, but I'm pretty damn certain that he did that. I mean, the person who brought that kid to the game...

is like a lot of people who get autographs for their kids like yeah yeah okay hey well i shouldn't say that they don't get autographs for their kids they put their kid up in front and say they use an autograph get an autograph get an autograph we're gonna sell this and i'm not gonna go and check how much money he got for it because i'm i'm disgusted i'm disgusted by that whole thing you stand outside a hotel you put your kid up in front so he can get an autograph

That's why players occasionally, they know. They're obviously smart enough to know that it ain't just going to the kid. Yeah. Exactly. It's going to make people not want to do it. Exactly. So big time worst of the week here. Yeah. This is going to be in the running for worst of the year in my opinion. Honestly, even if you want to sell it, okay? Like whatever. You want to sell it, shameful stuff. Wait a couple of years. Yes. It's going to be worth more even. Good point.

Yeah, let him win a defensive play of the year. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, a game-worn jersey by Victor Wambanyama. Yeah, as he gets better and better and better. Yeah. And you know, you got a point there. For some reason, it's not as bad, like down the line, if, okay, we decide to sell it now. But to do it, like, this happened, like, less than a week later. Yeah, everybody's like, this is the coolest picture I've ever seen. This is the greatest jersey swap. And this dad's like, let me hit the auction site. But I had

I hadn't thought about, like, until you brought it up there, like, you're saying this is maybe premeditated. Oh, yeah. Which you're probably right, which makes it ten times worse. I didn't even think about that. It's like, oh, okay, he happened to obviously have this exchange with Wemby and took the funny photo, and then he was like, oh, crap, man, this has gone viral, I guess.

I see how many thousands I can get for this, but he may have been thinking about that all along. Yeah, I'm definitely going... I'm creating this on my own and saying that the dad planned it all, but it's an NBA conspiracy. But yeah, I definitely think it's... They brought a sign...

And it is a cute photo, if you're not watching on YouTube, that the kid is able to do that courtside and stand beside Wemby. And it is a great photo. Oh, my God. It's amazing. A little tiny jersey that Wemby's holding. So good. He's got to auction that one off. Wow. Turnabout is fair play. Yeah. And get way more. Yeah. Yeah. I hope so. Rub it in his face. Hopefully, Wem and Yama, of course, other players continue to, obviously, take the photos, give the jerseys, sign the autographs. But, yeah. Yeah.

I don't know. Tarnishes it a bit for sure. That dad was ready. He helped make that sign for him that Wemby saw or the Spurs saw and said, go up to that kid who's got something. Yeah, come on. Gross. Anyways, third nominee. This is going back to the floor. The Bulls allowed the easiest rebound on a free throw attempt. And then the easiest...

putback score as Dyson Daniels shot this free throw and then the ball just went to him and he said, whoa, whoa, I got it. I'm going to score. And then the layup. That's the cherry on top. Three guys. He's laughing. Literally laughing as he goes off the court. It's a two-parter because, number one, how easy was that rebound? The rebound is worse. Oh, I don't know. I think the layup's worse. Okay, like...

They're all three. They just like, it hits the floor and they all like, then you could react. Like you see Dyson has the ball and then they're just, they just,

He got his arms up going, what the hell's going on? Yeah. Yeah, and Kobe White. I love this guy. I love him. I love the way he plays. The fire in his belly. Yeah. And Dyson Daniels. Hands up as the shot is going. We're on to the second part of the play. Yeah, that's nuts to me, man. Yeah, Kobe White steps out and I think is looking at the guy he thought should come into the lane and box out Dyson Daniels. That's what it looks like. So he's blaming somebody else, but...

You're blaming that guy. There's a play happening in front of you. There's a weird... That's just weird. That's two-parter. And then the Hawks just have a good giggle about it. Oh, yeah. Dyson Daniels on Yakai Kong. We're like, wow. Okay. Here's the other part of this, though. That's not Chris Paul at the line, who has missed one free throw all year. That's not Steph Curry, the greatest free throw shooter of all time. That's Dyson Daniels. Yeah. I just checked.

He's missing one out of every two, basically. He shoots 56% of the line. Like, you should be, of all guys in the NBA, you should be maybe a little ready to go and get the rebound because chances are he's missing it.

So that's an insult to injury there. Yeah, Kobe White is specifically looking at somebody who's not in the free throw lane, not at the three-point line. I don't know who it is, but deep. Someone deep at midcourt to say, you're supposed to box out. You're supposed to come run in and box out. I was on the wing. He was boxing out Keaton Wallace. Yeah, he was boxing out somebody else. I think it's Kobe White. It has to be on Daniels there. Yeah, I sort of think so too. Yeah.

I think so. At least how I was taught when we lined up for free throws. I mean, it didn't look like the pitch was calling for the pinch, but I don't know. I don't know. All right. Three good nominees. Wow, that's a good week for Horse of the Week. Very good. Those were three bangers. Three bangers, yeah. You guys threw some other ones in. The Kyle Kuzma...

Inbound from one side to the other backboard. And it turned into a three-point opportunity, which was, if it went down, that would have been really good. But it didn't go in for the opposing player. Was there another one? Benedict Matherin did get suspended one game for bumping the ref, but he was very apologetic. A team lost by 60 this month, or this week. Yeah, that's true.

Those are a couple things you're going to remember forever. The doinker, the guy right in the face. The Wemby thing. Yeah, the Bulls one definitely is not going to win. It's not going to win. There was one more that I'm surprised you didn't include. What's that? The Raptors making a kid who was going to be involved in one of the timeout games. They made him take off his Steph Curry Warriors jersey or at least put on a Raptors shirt.

Yeah, I hear what you're saying. I do think that was pregame. And I think it was basically pregame warm-ups. And a kid comes on the floor with a Steph Curry jersey. So I allowed the Raptors' idea there to say you don't wear opposing teams. Isn't that stranger though pregame? It's like who gives a shit?

During the game, I sort of get it. The crowd is full of Raptors fans in theory, and it's like, let's have them repping the home team. We don't have opposing fans here on the floor in pregame. We're just warming up here. The entire pregame fans are Steph Curry fans to see him warm up. Yeah, maybe. Good point. Anyway, it's funny. Yeah, I think it is pregame. I think it is pregame, but...

So they told the kid who's there to see Steph Curry warm up, hey, kid, if you're going to be here on the floor, you got to rep a Raptors shirt. That's what they did. And afterwards, when they took it off him, it's on the scoreboard beside a Warriors hat. So I don't know if the kid wore a hat, too. And they told him, take off that hat. I don't know. That's too far from me, but no.

Do you think that Doinker will replace the Gerald Henderson Doinker as the number one Doinker we remember in our lives? No. No? No, because the Gerald Henderson Doinker, it's an older woman, if I remember correctly. Also glasses? Glasses?

I think so. And there's just a better shot. The camera angle is like just, and it's square in the face. It is true. This one was an angle one. This one's like a straight across. I love that one. All right. Maybe a best drinkers of all time compilation. Hour plus long though. Yeah. Part one.

Yeah, I don't know who this fan is because you don't really see his face like the woman who she got. The Dodger is almost the star, yeah. The Dodger is the star. I haven't seen the clip where he's like, ha ha ha, suck up a great dodge. Gotcha, man. All right, let's hear who deserves worst of the week from Tass's three nominees. There are lots to pick from. Okay, pick them tonight. Where are we going, Tass? Lots of games on? Well, I had to pick...

Jimmy Butler. Maybe playing, maybe not playing. What's going on? Suspension is done. Although, as we heard from Chris Haynes earlier this week, maybe they're changing that type of suspension. Although, from the other perspective, Kevin Love just put on Instagram, Kevin Love, obviously, Jimmy Butler's teammate, he put, uh,

A video of Leo DiCaprio, the Wolf of Wall Street, where he's in front of everybody and he screams, I'm not leaving. So, so does Kevin Love know that Jimmy Butler is staying in Miami? Because Kevin Love has been posting a lot of things through Jimmy Butler's few weeks here. He's loving it. So I don't know. I mean, you know that scene where, why would he post that?

And the caption, Jimmy after his meeting with Mickey Arison, owner of the team. He sure seems like he's playing tonight. Doesn't he have like a, he's got like some sort of hashtag get my joy back joke at the end of it as well. Yeah, good call. Things ended up good for Leonardo DiCaprio at the end of that movie, if I'm not mistaken, right? Oh, yeah. Him not leaving was good for that company. So, anyways, to get back to the game, the Miami Heat are hosting the Denver Nuggets.

The heater only favored by one and a half, so basically, pick me up. Oh. Oh.

How is this the line? I'm baffled. This is why I'm taking Miami, by the way, and you guys are taking everyone else's on Denver. Because the line's off. I'm like, this is perplexing to me. Like, we don't know the Jimmy Butler factor, or maybe they do. I mean, is Jokic playing? I know he's sort of been hit or miss here. It's like the heat of just got back from a long road trip. There's that part. I don't know. So I'm like, what do they know that we don't know? That's why I'm taking Miami. I'm telling you. Friday night at home, too. You know I love that.

Yeah, I'm checking the status. I think he's just questionable right now. Elbow. Okay. Probable for Murray and questionable for Gordon. Okay. I guess they do have a lot of question marks. Yeah. Literal questionable marks. But you never know. Five-game road trip, first game back for the Miami Heat. It's always tough to come home. Tough sledding. Not with Jimmy fresh, though. No, yeah, that's true. He didn't go.

They should do that. They should do that. The whole arena is pounding the chest. Get it going. All right. So I have the heat. I got to hope they win by two or more. And you guys have the nuggets with the point to play with there, as well as the dogs on the road. How about that guarantee last night, though? Damn good about that. I don't think Isaiah Joe lit it up, but oh well. That's okay. One for two. Uh,

All right. Before we go, oh, my God, we're not done. We got rapid fire. JD, you got the questions. We got the answers. Yes, this first one comes from Blueski. I call it Blueski, guys. All right. Read it, and it looks like Blueski to me. This one's from Nightfox7 on Blueski. This week, the Chicago Bulls introduced the Sacramento Kings roster with this graphic.

And it's got Keegan Murray as Scar, Malik Monk as King Bob from the Minions, Demontis Sabonis as Bowser, De'Aaron Fox as King Julian from Madagascar, and DeMar DeRozan as King Neptune from SpongeBob. All the lamest kings, guys. I'm sorry to say it. I'm sorry to say it, but it's true. Guys, what fictional king are you? Skeets. Skeets.

This was a tough question, man. But I'm going with King Ralph, the 1991 American comedy featuring John Goodman. Yeah. Okay? And the only reason why is if you remember that movie, he was a fired American lounge singer who then becomes the king of the UK.

because an electrical accident wipes out the British royal family. Like, they're all gone, and then, you know, through the lineage, find out, like, that he's related somehow, so he'll take over. But at the end of the movie, as the credits roll...

Ralph and his wife perform Duke of Earl. I've always loved that song. Duke, Duke, Duke of Earl. So that's the only reason I want to be King Ralph. That's the plot to King Ralph. I've never seen it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's not good. John Goodman's awesome. John Goodman's great. He's awesome. So King Ralph is my answer. Great stuff. Great answer. I got to look up King Ralph. I didn't even realize that movie existed. I'm going with another movie. It's far more recent.

Lucius from Gladiator 2. Now, I don't know if he becomes king. I don't know it. Because I've only watched half. I'm midway through, so don't spoil the ending. It sure feels like Lucius is going to become king. Okay. The TBD for me. We'll leave it there. You don't want to be those twin kings? The twin kings? Oh, yeah. Those guys are crazy. You be one, I can be one. Those are hilarious. Those guys are funny. Yeah, I didn't realize that that one guy was in...

Oh, God. One of these emperors? One of the emperors, yes, was in... Oh, God, I'm throwing a blank. Lotus, Lotus. Yes, the white Lotus. He's the kid, yes. Yeah, I didn't realize it. But, yeah, those guys are too good. They look like the... They remind me of the Winklevoss twins for some reason. That's it. Awesome. Well, hold on. Quick question before we move on. Bowser is a king? Why is he a king? Yeah, great question. I didn't know. I guess he is in the castle. Yeah. Yeah.

So he's a king. A bit of a despot. You call them a lame king? I mean, Bowser? I would have Bowser and Scar as the top two kings that we saw. Yeah. I think Scar, you know, he's just misunderstood. Yeah.

Well, he did murder his brother. Bad for the realm. Did murder his brother, but that's what kings do. Yeah, you're right. That's where kings, you're right. Not King Ralph. No, he didn't kill anybody. No, he just sings. What a weird story. Trey, what fictional king would you be? I'm an animated king. I'm King Triton from The Little Mermaid. Good one. Lives in the water, big old beard, and has daughters.

That's you. I think it's me. You love the pool. I do love the pool. I was talking about this with Laura. She's like, he's so controlling, though. He never wants the kids to leave home. I was like, well, you're right. I'm not going to be like that. Get out of here. I'm good. Can't try to do that.

Well, there's a fine line between controlling and protective. That's true. He would say I'm protective for sure. Yeah. She grew legs. Yeah. You don't want that if you're a mermaid king, you know? That's the last thing you want. That's the last thing you want. Okay, next one. According to basketball reference, I guess, I don't know. This is a tweet that was put in the Slack. No, it is. It is? Okay, okay, okay. Victor Weminyama has a new nickname. It's Hector Banana Bread. That's right.

Any idea why? He must love banana bread. Anyways, if you had to give yourself a food-related nickname, what would it be? Taco Trade Kirby, you're exempt from this one. So skeets. Wow, he doesn't have to answer that part. Well, we know he's going to say taco, right? The reason for Hector Banana Bread, it's someone on Reddit, a girlfriend of a guy, was trying to figure out an NBA player. She wanted to get a particular jersey for her boyfriend, but she couldn't remember the player's name. And then so she had all these like

I think he's this and I think he does this and then I think his name sounds like Hector Banana Bread or something like that. That's sort of where it came from. Sure. Everybody figured out it was Victor Weminyama. It's a real biscuits and gravy. Yeah, Gravis Vasquez, who just had a birthday yesterday, I think.

Great Biscuit's dad twist. So, okay. What's your food-related nickname? Food-related nickname. Call me Sweet Baby Jay. I love Sweet Baby Ray's. Yeah. I'm almost Zuckerberg-like about it. That's good. So, yeah, Sweet Baby Jay.

You have to pause. KBJ. I love it. Sweet Baby Rice. Great sauce. Tassie. My name is Tassus Molasses because I love molasses. Actually, my man Ryan Sutton calls me this sometimes. Anyways, I love a ginger molasses cookie. I love a snickerdoodle. Get some molasses in there. And I love a black trap. Black trap. Black strap molasses.

cocktail which is few and far between yeah I don't think I've ever had one they're dying they're dying off and every time I make it for somebody they say oh this is disgusting it's bitter it's bitter that's for sure yeah Tass's molasses is what we gotta call Tass when like we're trying to leave somewhere and he's lingering behind yeah and we go like come on let's go let's go

Slow like molasses. Slow like molasses. That's good. We were going to call you that. I like that. He's being real Tess's molasses right now. It was like JD and I when we wouldn't leave the White House. We were the last ones to leave the White House.

That was a long hour and 20 minutes. We wanted the most of it. We did. We got our money's worth on that one. Trey, I assume you're sticking with taco, right? Yeah, but if I changed it, it would be beef roll. Really? Yeah. It's a delicacy served in Sandwich, Illinois, a place called Brothers, home of the beef roll. I've just seen the success of that guy, Jelly Roll. I don't know what he does. He sings. He sings, yeah. Yeah, he sings. He's got songs. I don't know what they are. He performs at every event.

Yeah, he does. He works hard, that guy. He works hard. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's in a lot of commercials. But I'm a beef man, so I'm a beef roll. Our friend Jared saw him at one of those TNT activations. He was the performer, as you would imagine, and he won Jared over. He's good. He said he's amazing. Yeah. Incredible stage presence. Like, was really good with the crowd. Did a bunch of covers as well as his own music, so.

Jelly roll. I'm going to cover his songs as beef roll. Okay, I like it. Nice. Okay, last one. This week, a camera operator fell down in front of Nikola Jokic, and I've never seen him so delighted. Here's a little taste of it. Down she goes. He sees it. She's fine. And he can't handle it.

He is just delighted. I relate to this clip so much. This is like the most Gru he's ever been to. Yes. Laughing at somebody else. I love this part. I love this part. He imitates him. Reenacts the fall, yeah.

And he forgets the question. Anyways, guys, when's a time when you laughed at something you probably shouldn't have? Skeets. Okay, I got a bit of a story here. Apologies if I've shared this before. If I did, it was a long time ago. But grade six, Mr. Graham's class. It's me and a few friends, including my good friend Dub, you guys know. We're performing, for some reason, the final scene from Treasure Island. What?

Why? I don't know. I grew up in Stratford, Ontario is the only reason I can come up with. Wait, you and Dub are just doing this on your own. It's me and Dub. I think Rob Armstrong is a part of the crew. I think there's another guy. It's something to do with a project in class. Oh, okay. And, you know, we're singing the old 15 men on a dead man's chest. Ho, ho.

and a bottle of rum. I always say that, by the way. Inexplicably, I don't know if we were the best in our class or the school or whatever, we were entered in to like the Kiwanis music festival or theater festival, whatever it was. It was an annual event where you got to perform in front of judges and it was sort of a big deal, I guess. So anyway, a few weeks go by. We're now there somehow. We suck. I don't know why we're there.

And while we're waiting, we're in a small theater. There are people there watching other people perform their plays or whatever. And someone we went to school with, she was a classmate. Her name was Erin. She was doing a play on stage and she was at a part where she was like doing the most like dramatic part of the play. Like I just remember her. She was on her knees and she just every we say this to each other all the time. She was like, oh, Johnny, Johnny.

Johnny! Johnny! And like, we were grade six. Like, we're 11 years old, right? Or whatever. You know, it's that thing where like, we know we're not supposed to laugh and we're trying to keep it in and we're like looking at each other and it's like, it's bubbling and bubbling and bubbling. Finally, whoever it was that broke first just lets out the biggest laugh ever and that set off everybody to the point where

Where they had to stop her play and turn to us and say, if you guys can't keep it together, get out. A couple of us left. I did stay. But a couple got up. We couldn't stop laughing. They left. Now, the whole point of the story is we had to perform right after to the same judges who are now pissed off with us. Needless to say, we did not win this and did not get a good score. And, you know.

I like can picture it like we I just like that that way you're trying to hold it in so much and we couldn't and felt bad shouldn't have laughed it was a great performance Did she win? I can't remember. She did. Why didn't she win? One of the judges Canadian actor Colin Fior. Do you remember him? Yeah, the name sounds familiar. Yeah, like if you pictured him, if you see him he's um He was in Beachcombers now. No, he was uh, he's been in movies. I want to say uh, he may have been in Titus.

He's been in a ton of things. I get to Google so many things. He's like a long-time actor in the theater. He's been in some stuff. Looks like a guy that would be named Colin. 100%. Yeah, totally. Looks totally like a Colin. So thanks to my buddy Dub for helping me remember that story. I was like, give me the details on that again. I know we wouldn't stop laughing. I like the people who are like...

I'm going to just keep laughing. Oh, yeah. I'm going to leave and just be laughing at this. Yeah, I'll see myself out. I'm not getting it together. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, to get up and leave, yeah. Yeah, for sure. Oh, keep laughing? I'll see you later. But then you had to come back in and do, you know, ho, ho,

And no laughs for you guys, I assume. No, nothing. It was pathetic. Why did they send us to it? I don't know. Desperate. These kids seem like they have talent. All right, Tassie. What's something you shouldn't have laughed at? Well...

As you said that you were 11, it occurred to me I was 43 when this happened, as in it just happened. And I feel like I shouldn't have laughed at this even more when I play it out in my head. My mother-in-law told me that my father-in-law had to go to the doctor. And I said, well, why does he have to go to the doctor? And she said, he's got a disturbing wart on the bottom of his foot that has to be addressed.

I just couldn't stop laughing. I would laugh, I am laughing. A disturbing award. The way to call it disturbing is a good vibe. Yeah, it was just too good. Everything okay? Yeah. TBD. Oh, this just happened. Mere minutes ago. It was this morning. Yeah, it literally was this morning. Wow. You know, I don't, I didn't want to say this morning because you never know what happens. Right. Once you've got a war issue. Yeah, true. Get a look at it. But it's probably just a war. Yeah.

Like on the bottom of his butt? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Weird. Did you, have you seen it? I saw it from like 15 feet away, so I couldn't really make it out. Yeah. Weird. You saw it from 15 feet away, yeah. It needs to be addressed. It does need to be addressed. Well, no, somebody was looking at it 15 feet away, and so I saw it from, no, no, sorry, sorry. Somebody was looking at it from beside him, and I was 15 feet away, so I just had to look.

From where I was. Gotcha. I was 15 feet away. Yeah. So I didn't really have a great look. I guess not. I got you. Hopefully it's okay. It's just a wart. Hopefully. Hopefully, yeah. Yep, anyway. TBD. I'll let you guys know. I'll follow up. Please do. Uh,

Trey, when's the time you laughed at something you probably shouldn't have? Well, we got a hater in the stream team by the name of Leo Gohmann. And I laugh at every single thing he says at the start of the show. This guy's the most miserable guy on the world. Loyal, though. There's only one. There's only one Leo Gohmann. He's loyal, my man. Every morning, everybody's like,

Good morning. Good morning. Let's have a great show. Let's have a great show. And Leo comes in. Leave it to TAS to be 30 minutes late and deliver the worst opening podcast line again and again. I said to TAS, what did you do to this guy in a previous life? Apparently, like, man.

Holy shit! He gives it. Chill! He's got the same thing. Every morning. Yeah, and then he'll keep it going throughout the show. I know! It's like...

You have to almost respect his commitment to the bit. Yeah, exactly. So weird though. Hates Survivor. Oh yeah. Hates people mentioning Survivor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Does not like podcast listeners. He seems to hate the show. But it's here every morning for an hour.

I love it. Love you, Leo. Respect. Yeah, I agree. I respect him, too. Nobody cares what the temperature is. John Horne's update from Victoria's List. I love it. I love it. We care. Everybody does. Except for one. Except for one. Oh, it's so good. Shout out to the stream team. We love you. All right. That's rapid fire. Not so rapid at all. That's the drop. That's a week of No Dunks Classics.

If you liked it. Hey, Leo, if you liked it, hit the like button. Does Leo hit the like button? Let us know. I mean, I assume he's subscribed. He's here every day. He hates when people ask to like a podcast. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He hates that. Leo, do you ever listen to the podcast? Go leave us a five-star rating and review. Appreciate that.

Thanks, everybody, for joining us all week long. So no show on Monday. We got the MLK Day here in the States. A lot of games on during the day. But we will be back on Tuesday to recap those, maybe do like an elongated version of NBA Weekend Winners and Losers. So we'll see you at 10 a.m. on Tuesday. Otherwise, everybody have a great weekend. Stay safe. Enjoy yourself. Clipper Bros. You heard it here first. Have a great time. Turn up. Love you guys. Awesome. Thanks for joining us. And remember, Leo...

You keep going, man. I don't have a good... I don't have a good pun. I don't have a good... That was great. That was great. That was solid. I thought you were going to call Leo a disturbing ward. Maybe he's got an issue that he's dealing with, so every day he comes on and says, God, I've got to deal with that, and I've got to deal with this other guy talking about podcasts off the top of this show. This ain't a podcast. Embrace the day, people.

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