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Episode: A Jokic Fest, the Worry Scale, Rather Have, and Favorite Movie Girlfriends LIVE From Denver With Ryen Russillo

Author: The Ringer
Duration: 01:58:36

Episode Shownotes

The Ringer’s Bill Simmons is joined by Ryen Russillo LIVE from Fillmore Auditorium in Denver, CO, to give Nikola Jokic his flowers and discuss the Nuggets’ NBA Cup win vs. the Warriors, Bill and Ryen’s NBA biases this season, a new segment called the NBA Worry Scale, Bo Nix’s surprising

rookie season, Ryen’s top five TV/movie girlfriends, how Bill and Ryen first met, a sports edition of “would you rather,” and much more! Host: Bill Simmons Guest: Ryen Russillo Producer: Kyle Crichton The Ringer is committed to responsible gaming. Please visit www.rg-help.com to learn more about the resources and helplines available. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Summary

In this live episode from Denver, Bill Simmons and Ryen Russillo celebrate Nikola Jokic's pivotal role in the Nuggets' NBA Cup victory while discussing their personal NBA biases this season. They introduce the new NBA Worry Scale, reflect on Bo Nix's impressive rookie season, and share Ryen's top five favorite movie girlfriends. The conversation also touches on Jokic's evolving perception among fans, the uniqueness of Denver's fanbase, and his basketball IQ, which allows him to strategize like playing chess. They consider Jokic's potential to become one of the NBA's greatest and reflect on the implications of championships for player legacies.

Go to PodExtra AI's episode page (A Jokic Fest, the Worry Scale, Rather Have, and Favorite Movie Girlfriends LIVE From Denver With Ryen Russillo) to play and view complete AI-processed content: summary, mindmap, topics, takeaways, transcript, keywords and highlights.

Full Transcript

00:00:01 Speaker_03
Coming up, Russel and I did a live show in Denver and you're about to listen to it next. This episode is brought to you by Uber Eats. It's football season and Uber Eats is dropping undefeated deals on all your game day favorites.

00:00:14 Speaker_03
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00:00:29 Speaker_03
Uber Eats, official on-demand food delivery partner of the NFL. Order now for game day, terms, taxes, and fees apply. See app for details. This episode is brought to you by Michelob Ultra. It's tip-off time for NBA Cup.

00:00:43 Speaker_03
So I hope you're all ready and stocked up on Michelob Ultra. Notice how I called it NBA cup and not the NBA cup? Trying to get that going. We'll see how it goes.

00:00:53 Speaker_03
I really love how they're getting fans closer to all the action with Michelob Ultra courtside. It has exclusive content and prizes like courtside seats. a trip to the Paris Global Game, or to All-Star Weekend, and much more.

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00:01:24 Speaker_03
Visit michelobultra.com slash courtside for free entry. Entry deadlines and official rules. and void were prohibited. some good pages for pods like mine or for the Rewatchables pod. So please go check it out. TheRinger.com. Everybody did a great job.

00:02:01 Speaker_03
Congratulations. We are eight and a half years in with that website and couldn't be more proud of it. Go check out The Ringer Movies YouTube channel as well. Rewatchables is coming back next week.

00:02:10 Speaker_03
The Bill Simmons YouTube channel where we run all the clips and videos from this podcast. Hey, Million Dollar Picks. So I am going to do a podcast after Packers Lions tomorrow night so that we are ending up doing three episodes this week.

00:02:28 Speaker_03
The one today right now that you're listening to and then After that Packers line's a reaction with some other stuff that I have banked that I'm pretty excited about.

00:02:36 Speaker_03
But I wanted to get a million dollar pick on the board for that game because I'm in Denver right now, Fando is legal here, and I could not resist betting on the Packers plus four and a half adjusted with love to throw at least 200 yards.

00:02:48 Speaker_03
That is minus 101 as a parlay. We are putting $200,000 on that for million dollar picks purposes. Coming off the best week we had all season, we won $870,000. Last week, out of our seven big bets, we hit six.

00:03:03 Speaker_03
And we're up 1.213 million fake dollars for the year. Doing pretty well this year. So we're going to throw 200K on Packers plus four and a half with love to throw for at least 200 yards.

00:03:15 Speaker_03
And the rest of the picks will be in the third podcast of the week tomorrow night. What you're about to listen to is me and Ryan Russillo at the Fillmore in Denver in front of an awesome crowd. So glad we did this and

00:03:30 Speaker_03
If you want to hear two guys talk about Nicola Jokic for a couple of minutes, you've come to the right place. Marcelo and Simmons live from Denver. Next, first our friends from Pearl Jam. I should have worked out today. I feel, I feel scrawny.

00:04:11 Speaker_03
Thanks for coming out. Thank you to State Farm because I always forget to thank them before we start this stuff, but, oh, and Starry. Thank you to Starry. Here's how this show happened.

00:04:23 Speaker_03
I texted Bracillo and I said, Jokic is playing Golden State in the NBA cup game on a Tuesday. Live show? And he was like, fuck yeah. Why do you love Denver so much?

00:04:36 Speaker_02
Uh, you know, I think it was, uh, I had a bunch of friends, like there's a big Vermont, Colorado thing. Right. There you go.

00:04:47 Speaker_02
And I think once they were like, all right, I've kind of done the JV version of things in Vermont, I'm going to head out to Colorado. And when I left ESPN and I was kind of going like, all right, Manhattan beach or Denver, it was like really close.

00:05:01 Speaker_02
Was it a toss up? It was, it was ocean or friendship. And then friendship lost out to the ocean.

00:05:11 Speaker_03
I think that people in Denver, every time I'm here, they're disarmingly nice. That's what I, that's what I noticed over and over again. I'm like, Oh man, people are just nice here.

00:05:20 Speaker_02
But then I wonder, I think those are my friends, by the way.

00:05:27 Speaker_03
Then I wonder if it was just their stone. So, We're going to try to do a version of the pod that we would do on Sunday nights, because we haven't done Sunday nights this year, because we usually wait till when the football season's over.

00:05:43 Speaker_03
We have a lot of basketball stuff to talk about. But the real reason we're here, let's be honest, Russella and I both love Nicole Jokic. We're not going to hide it. We love how the guy plays.

00:05:59 Speaker_03
He's about as reliable as it gets from an entertainment standpoint. Not just sports, music, movies, TV. I feel like Succession got to this point for me, Succession episodes, where I was like, I just know this is gonna be a good episode.

00:06:12 Speaker_03
We just love Jokic and we wanted to surround ourselves with 1,100 people who also loved Jokic. Which is why this first segment is gonna be called Jokic Porn. We're just gonna porn it up. We don't have a slideshow for this show. Oh my God.

00:06:32 Speaker_03
We were sitting behind the scores table yesterday and he came up and we were just kind of marveling at him. We're like, look at that guy. Oh man, just amazing. Where do you want to start? Do you want to start with notes from last night?

00:06:46 Speaker_03
Do you want to go big picture? Where do you want to go?

00:06:48 Speaker_02
I, the only thing I would say is that, you know, Bill and I have been doing this, whether it's together or separately for a really long time, that I know personally, like players that I start to like or start to hate have a lot to do with how the fans talk to us.

00:07:02 Speaker_02
So there's just players I know nothing about and I despise them just because of what their fan base has said the entire time.

00:07:08 Speaker_02
And Denver and Nuggets fans are seriously maybe the only like modern history intensely annoying fan base about one guy and you were totally right about it.

00:07:20 Speaker_02
So, I think that needs to be said, because more often than not, I'm like, nah, you were wrong. You guys are just annoying about the whole thing.

00:07:26 Speaker_02
And I don't think it was ever that we didn't... They just got to appreciate him, I think, quicker than we did, because you were watching it happen, and whether it was the draft, and you're like, hey, that fat guy's kind of, like, fun to watch.

00:07:39 Speaker_05
Yeah.

00:07:39 Speaker_02
But what, like, what's he really gonna be? And then you're like, oh, he's gonna be, like, without question. I mean, the list starts at one, and I don't even...

00:07:47 Speaker_02
Like, I love Giannis, we all love Luka and everything, but the gap between him and the next guy right now, I think is significant.

00:07:56 Speaker_03
This is great. I'm already having a great time. I think what's crazy about this year is he somehow got better. I mean, he already won three MVPs and a title. See, I told you we're going to porn it up with Jokic.

00:08:09 Speaker_03
And I think the best friend of mine described it, and I'm going to steal it from him, where Jokic was always playing chess when he was out there. Right. He was always like two, three moves ahead. He was just so smart.

00:08:18 Speaker_03
It was always so admirable to watch how he just processed the game. But then Minnesota, boo. Minnesota threw some stuff at him, right? They were like, yeah, we're actually fine with you taking those threes. We're going to beat you up.

00:08:33 Speaker_03
We're just going to throw big guys at you. We're going to try to wear you down. And now this season, it feels like he's moved into this speed chess mode where it's not just chess.

00:08:43 Speaker_03
He's now solving stuff instantaneously and watching him in person last night. I mean, Golden State was like, you're not doing the thing you always do. We're not giving you 14 assists tonight.

00:08:53 Speaker_03
You're going to, we're going to take away everybody else and you're going to have to do the thing you hate to do, which is score a lot. And he's like, all right, fine, fuck. And ends up with 38.

00:09:02 Speaker_03
He's six for seven in the fourth quarter, makes all the big shots. But I just feel like he's solving stuff faster. Does that make sense?

00:09:09 Speaker_02
Yeah, because I think he knows he needs to. And I think that first week, like, I both hated it and loved it. Like, we all get geared up for the start of the season. We all know we were worried about the bench.

00:09:19 Speaker_02
Look at me, I'm saying we like I actually moved here.

00:09:21 Speaker_02
But, you know, when you knew there were going to be some serious problems with the depth and letting KCP go and the draft picks, you know, still kind of like a massive question mark about whether or not they're viable rotation pieces.

00:09:34 Speaker_02
And he took, I think, 13 shots in that opener against OKC and it gets smoked. The next two games, he takes 27 and 26 shots.

00:09:42 Speaker_02
And I was so happy about it, because it was like this immediate thing within 48 hours where he went, I guess this is what I'm going to have to do.

00:09:48 Speaker_02
I mean, he's not shooting it that much, but he's shooting it more now this season than at any other point in his career. And yet his efficiency is in line with the best season he's ever had, which is probably the one he had two years ago.

00:09:58 Speaker_02
So he can unlock anything in every single game at that size in a way that I don't know that we've ever seen before.

00:10:07 Speaker_03
I hadn't seen him in Denver. I've seen him obviously all over the place, but not here. He did two things last night. You know, you could pick up most of it on TV.

00:10:15 Speaker_03
One of the things was he was just trying to read what Golden State was going to do from what Kerr was telling his players.

00:10:21 Speaker_03
So he would like run down and he'd be in the paint on the Golden State side, just watching Kerr, what he was saying and what he was flashing. And then he was yelling to his teammates, they're running 5-3. And Kerr would be like, what the fuck?

00:10:32 Speaker_03
Like, you're cheating! He was getting mad. But he was calling out all their plays, everything they were doing with Curry, which has been a recurring theme. So that was one. The other one, they're up two. There's like, what, 16 seconds left.

00:10:45 Speaker_03
They're playing keep away. And he gets the ball at the top of the key. Normally when a guy gets it, They either throw it back out or they dribble out. They're just trying to, they know they're going to get fouled.

00:10:53 Speaker_03
And he was like, oh, they're going to foul me. I'm actually going to lurch forward, drive into this guy and see if I can get a three point play, which I don't think I'd ever seen anyone process it that fast.

00:11:02 Speaker_03
So two little things, but we left, we were just like beaming. We didn't even know what to do. We were like, that was amazing. It was like the Chris Farley show with Paul McCartney. Remember when we saw Jokic? That was awesome.

00:11:15 Speaker_02
Yeah, if he had been in town and would have declined the request, because he would have. If we would ever get the chance, I think I would be such a loser in that interview. I'd be like, remember when you did that thing?

00:11:26 Speaker_02
What were you thinking about when you did it? And I think, honestly, I think like the hard part with it too. And it's the same back to his draft thing.

00:11:34 Speaker_02
Like when the draft comes around, I'm an athlete snob and you go, I don't know, is this, is this going to work? And then it starts working and then you start comparing them.

00:11:42 Speaker_02
And we had all those nasty MVP conversations, which I just made me root for him. I think even more because it just, well, it just was ridiculous.

00:11:50 Speaker_02
Like some of the stuff, and I know it turns into propaganda and it becomes really political and it's like, okay, but if you're any of your points are tearing this guy down, like,

00:11:59 Speaker_02
You just, you're not, you're either not watching or you're not being fair or you're not being honest or you can't see the things.

00:12:03 Speaker_02
And I think it's such a visual thing with him that we've talked about in the past is other basketball players have done things that are just aesthetically more pleasing.

00:12:12 Speaker_02
I've seen him get back in transition where I thought he was going to have a heart attack. I was like, does he have, does he have like polio? Like what the fuck is wrong with him right now? And And yet he's always in position.

00:12:25 Speaker_02
He knows everybody, everybody, what they're going to be doing ahead of time.

00:12:29 Speaker_02
And, you know, when I say nobody's unlocked the game at his size, I mean, certainly LeBron and I'm, I'm just giving, cause Yoko just got an inch on him or two and then magic, the same thing, but like to be straight up a center.

00:12:39 Speaker_02
and then know, okay, well, if they're doubling me, then it's all of these things. If they're not doubling me, he's just sitting there in the triple threat at the free throw line, going up against TJD.

00:12:48 Speaker_02
And he's just, he's just being like, all right, if you're going to give me one-on-one and I'm just going to just jab step you and hit this free throw. Like I would like a night where he just did it 35 times, like score 60. Right.

00:13:01 Speaker_03
a, they won by four last night. He played 40 minutes and was plus 23. So try to figure that one out. Everybody's 19 when you didn't play.

00:13:11 Speaker_02
Well, those first three minutes of the fourth quarter, as you know, are the most horrifying, just panicking. Like there are horror movies that are more fun than those three minutes of every fourth quarter. We're here.

00:13:20 Speaker_02
Like they, they were minus eight in those three minutes. I'm like, golden state has to win this and they want it. And then they still lose the game because he comes back in.

00:13:28 Speaker_03
One thing, sorry to get big picture on this, but one thing I was thinking with him, there's still like mystery with him. I don't know a lot about him. And people are trying to figure out like NBA ratings are going down a little bit.

00:13:39 Speaker_03
What does this mean to people like the product as much? Is it too easy to follow the sport without actually watching the games game in and game out? But I do think a piece of it is there's no mystery with any of these guys. They're all on social media.

00:13:54 Speaker_03
They're doing like the infomercial documentaries about themselves. They're all over the place. They're super available. And I feel like I know all of them.

00:14:01 Speaker_03
And when you think like when we were growing up, we didn't know anything about anybody we watched. And Jokic is like one of the last. I know he's got two brothers. I know. I know he likes horses. I know he goes to Serbia as soon as the season ends.

00:14:16 Speaker_03
And that's it. Like, I don't even know. Like, what kind of car does he drive? Nothing. Right. What do you know? Do you know anything other than that?

00:14:26 Speaker_02
I know I think it pisses everybody else off. That this guy is this dominant and there's not going to be a workout program that he's going to share with you. Right?

00:14:35 Speaker_02
Like there's not going to be a mama mentality ripoff of Jokic that it's like, you know, I remember, I know Mike Singer wrote the book about him and I was listening to an interview that he did. So there were some excerpts and it was, he hated practice.

00:14:48 Speaker_02
He didn't want to do any of these things. So it's, it's like the opposite of everything that you would tell your kid.

00:14:55 Speaker_02
Like this guy hated all of the extra stuff and yet he's this dominant, but it's it's about his instincts and his vision and just simple things like watching people play basketball like I have now for for like 40 years.

00:15:07 Speaker_02
And you watch the ball come out of his hands and like even when it's off, it's like now it's just soft. It's perfectly soft and it like cuddles with the rim a little bit and then it falls back in.

00:15:16 Speaker_02
It's his hands like I know that it was the water polo thing, but like however he was taught to look at the game.

00:15:24 Speaker_02
It's really special stuff because he just sees it in a way that you have to kind of be born with that I just don't, I don't even know if that can be taught.

00:15:33 Speaker_03
See, I told you it was going to be yokage porn. You guys didn't believe me. You guys were like, ah, they'll do five minutes.

00:15:40 Speaker_03
Yeah, it would be interesting if Jokic started doing stuff that the other players do, how startling it would be, where it's like, Jokic just formed a production company. Like, what? He wants to make independent movies. He does?

00:15:52 Speaker_02
I want to tell stories about underserved stories. Or he has an IT band thing on Instagram. All of a sudden, he's running. No days off. And you're like, what?

00:16:02 Speaker_03
Jokic just bought a women's soccer team. He did? Big picture, well, it's 20 games. We're not going to do the, he's going to win the MVP. He's certainly on pace. He's averaging 30 and 13 and 10. He's shooting 56%.

00:16:16 Speaker_03
He's shooting 52% from three, which is more than half in case you can't do math. And if he gets a fourth MVP here, now we're in the club with Jordan, LeBron, Bill Russell, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Will Chamberlain, and that's it.

00:16:36 Speaker_03
What's interesting, two things are in play now. Well, one, he's kind of clinched, the best guy of the 2020s, because now- Well, we have some time still. Well, we got, so we're halfway through the decade. We're heading toward the second half.

00:16:51 Speaker_03
I don't know who could make a run at him in the second half, if you just look at the candidates. Like the resume he already has, if he won four MVPs, like who would be able to match that in the second half of the decade?

00:17:01 Speaker_03
We're talking, this is a lot to ask for LaMelo Balls, my point.

00:17:07 Speaker_02
Yeah. He has some work to do scoring a lot. I think we'll get to him maybe later in the show, but yeah, you're right. I mean, that's kind of why it gets back to even, you know, I've never rooted for the nuggets necessarily.

00:17:18 Speaker_02
Like I've never, I don't have some thing that back in the day, I would have probably started two years ago and tapped out after this off season, but that's coming up later too.

00:17:32 Speaker_02
There could be somebody that gets, well, you're right, we're halfway through it, so who gets a second ring? That would be the dumb ring count thing that gets in the way, I think, of just being honest about who players are sometimes.

00:17:43 Speaker_02
So you're right, you might be right.

00:17:44 Speaker_03
You would have to be a guy that is in their 20s that makes a huge leap over the next three years. So like, well, Wemby, would he have enough time? So you guys are gonna laugh, but the only guy I think could be in the running is my guy, Jason Tatum.

00:18:02 Speaker_03
Yeah, I said it. I'm getting booed? Just if the Celtics won a bunch of titles, that's it. But I don't think that's gonna happen.

00:18:14 Speaker_02
All right, settle down. Is Tatum a more athletic yolkitch on tomorrow's pod?

00:18:17 Speaker_03
There's no bad ideas in a brainstorm, come on.

00:18:20 Speaker_02
Yeah, but no one has ever, look, Tatum I think is actually underrated at this point, but don't worry, don't worry, don't worry. Wow. He's never once and never will be considered the best player in the world.

00:18:32 Speaker_03
Right. That's why it's not gonna happen. Best center since Kareem is in play for him too.

00:18:37 Speaker_02
But yeah, I was looking back at the- What else is in play? You're good at, I think you update this stuff a lot.

00:18:44 Speaker_03
I do. But I like it, you're keeping track. It's one of my things when I'm bored on an airplane when we haven't taken off yet. I'm like, I think I'll work on the Pantheon.

00:18:52 Speaker_02
How many times have you ranked the top 20 players of all time in your life? I just did it four hours ago.

00:19:01 Speaker_03
He sent me the text. It's interesting. I mean, doing best player by decade isn't totally fair because sometimes people can peak starting in the middle of the decade or whatever. But if you go back, like 2010s is LeBron and Curry.

00:19:16 Speaker_03
and probably in that order, right?

00:19:18 Speaker_01
It's LeBron, yeah. LeBron, Curry second.

00:19:19 Speaker_02
We knew the ring count thing, but even if Curry was winning MVPs, and I thought he had better seasons, he was never- Yeah, somebody at a sports bar could make a Curry case, he wouldn't be right.

00:19:28 Speaker_03
In 2000s, it's Duncan and Kobe, and that's a bloodbath argument that we're not gonna have right now.

00:19:34 Speaker_02
Shouldn't be.

00:19:34 Speaker_03
Yeah, I have Duncan, but other people would say Kobe. 1990s is MJ alone. There's no other person in the convo. 80s is Magic and Bird. 70s is Kareem. Is it Magic? And 60s is Russell Wilt.

00:19:55 Speaker_02
Longer run, those Pistons finals.

00:20:02 Speaker_03
Kareem in the 70s, Russell Wilt in the 60s. The point is, Jokic doesn't even really have a rival for the 2020s yet, which I think is interesting.

00:20:11 Speaker_02
I guess it would be Giannis if he could. I think Giannis is the second best player. As much as I'm in love with the Jokic part of it, there's a health element to the Giannis discussion, how he'll age.

00:20:23 Speaker_03
The playoffs last couple of years were tough.

00:20:25 Speaker_01
Yeah.

00:20:27 Speaker_03
Well, here's the problem. Dramatic pause. I think he's had the worst luck with teammates of any great player, if you're talking about the top 15. Never played with an RLNBA guy. Murray gets hurt. When he got hurt, cost two playoffs.

00:20:44 Speaker_03
Now he's got Murray and Porter taking up 40% of the cap. And I hate to say it, I hope he's not here. I doubt he is, but the owner was a fucking cheapskate. Like, spend some money. You have Nicoli Okic on your team.

00:20:57 Speaker_03
You have one of the best 15 players of all time in his prime. Go into the second apron, motherfucker. So you have him 14th as of today. For all time? Yeah. I need to see how this plays out, but he is in the 9-to-13 range for me now.

00:21:16 Speaker_02
You could make an argument for him as the ninth best player of all time today.

00:21:20 Speaker_03
If he wins a fourth MVP, I think it's in play. Here's where I landed, though.

00:21:24 Speaker_02
Can we hear the eight and see who he's hypothetically in range with?

00:21:27 Speaker_03
I'll give you the list. Just because you guys all... Jordan first, because he's the GOAT until I die. LeBron, Russell, Kareem, that would be the Mount Rushmore, Magic Bird, Duncan, Wilt.

00:21:43 Speaker_03
And then it's like, I originally had Curry, Kobe, West, and then Hakim, Shaq, Moses, and Jokic is somewhere in that last six.

00:21:53 Speaker_03
But if he wins a fourth MVP and he carries this Denver team to like the Western finals or better with what we watched last night, where he can't even come out of the game for two and a half minutes,

00:22:03 Speaker_03
Like, he literally couldn't come out of the gate, like, blowing in a call timeout, because the team was cratering. So I think he's somewhere in that range.

00:22:11 Speaker_03
But I think for me, just as somebody who's watched basketball my whole life, like, he does the same stuff Bird of Magic did, and he's been doing it now for six, seven years.

00:22:22 Speaker_02
Do you think he, see, this is the ring counting thing. But this matters.

00:22:26 Speaker_03
The ring part matters though.

00:22:27 Speaker_02
All those other guys won rings. Especially when you put together that list. I mean, Moses just has the one. Right. Hakeem's got the two. Shaq's got three or four. Right. He has the fourth.

00:22:39 Speaker_03
West only had one though.

00:22:41 Speaker_02
Yeah, but the West won when you're losing to the Celtics every single year in the finals. Like I almost think we should just round it up to three for him. Yeah.

00:22:51 Speaker_02
When it's all said and done, if he stays in this pace, say another four years as the MVP, I think the simpletons will just count the rings and be like, you can't put him ahead of those guys.

00:23:01 Speaker_02
But from just impacting a game at that level, and again, we're assuming a lot in the next few years, but the guy stays healthy. It's not like he's this wiry dude who has all these muscle pulls all the time, right?

00:23:13 Speaker_03
Well, what happens if he does, remember Larry Bird that one year when he came, I think it was the 87, 88 season?

00:23:18 Speaker_02
Not as well as you do, I think.

00:23:21 Speaker_03
all of a sudden there was the big off season storyline was Larry bird has quit drinking beer and he's in phenomenal shape. And he showed up for the season. He had this followup two hand dunk at a preseason game.

00:23:32 Speaker_03
We're like, Oh my God, the legend he's in shape. And then he got hurt with it. I don't know if I believe the quit drinking beer part. Well, probably not. But to me, Jokic, like apparently, has never really lifted.

00:23:44 Speaker_03
I don't even know what his offseason change program would be.

00:23:48 Speaker_02
Whatever he's doing, it's fine. Yeah, keep it going, Jokic. Sometimes I think the guys, it's like the old quarterback thing, where Dilfer used to tell me, like, I wanted to come in, like, 20 pounds overweight.

00:23:59 Speaker_02
He's like, I wanted a little spare tire down there so that I could, as I tapered off, I at least had something to take the damage. I'm not necessarily saying, like, that's what... And B does that, too, I think. And Bean's been trying.

00:24:10 Speaker_02
He's like, this is ridiculous. You know, those next five guys that when you get to eight or whatever, like, it's just a player. I don't know.

00:24:20 Speaker_02
I mean, it's tough for me to put anybody above Duncan just because of how perfect he was and how sustained it was and how long it went. But the fact I'm even suggesting it's possible is the win as of today.

00:24:32 Speaker_03
So you loved Moses and you loved Hakeem.

00:24:36 Speaker_02
I love Moses and Shaq, but he's at least swimming in that. I don't think I appreciated Shaq enough, but I was also like a shithead kid and he was on the Lakers.

00:24:44 Speaker_03
Yeah. We had some weird things against Shaq where he was like, he made a rap album. We're like, what's he doing? He made Shazam or Kazam, whatever that movie was. They're like, what a dick.

00:24:57 Speaker_02
And then Dwight tried to do all of it. And we're like, all right, you're definitely a dick. Yeah, you were the dick. I actually appreciate Shaq like way more now than I think I did.

00:25:05 Speaker_02
And that might've been just a Boston weirdo thing that some of us grow out of.

00:25:08 Speaker_03
All right, last section of Jokic porn. We were saying, like, we try not to have biases, especially because we have votes for OMBA. And I like to think I'm level-headed, even, like, with the Celtics. Like, I know in the Celtics.

00:25:31 Speaker_03
Now, listen, let me talk this out. Right down the middle. There's been seasons where I'm like, they don't have it this year. Something's wrong. I don't like this. Like I tried to be objective. Um, it's really hard for me to be objective with, with Yokage.

00:25:46 Speaker_03
And I think it is you too. So what are your other actual basketball biases that you can admit? Do you want to go back and forth?

00:25:54 Speaker_02
Yeah. So we're admitting that we both want Yokage to get that second ring. So the commoners. As long as it's not at the expense of the Celtics.

00:26:01 Speaker_03
Yeah. Like if the Celtics can't win, I would hope that he would be the one that one would be my bias.

00:26:07 Speaker_02
Yeah. Cause like the Curry fourth ring for me was such a big deal and him too. But, um, I felt that order. I felt like it just changed. I don't even know that that many people hate her. I mean, if you want to find, Hey, it's pretty easy to find right now,

00:26:26 Speaker_02
with Curry, it just kind of changed. I think it changed a lot of the way he was looked at. He needed it.

00:26:31 Speaker_03
Yeah, it was very similar to like the John Elway Super Bowl. Oh, I forgot we're in Denver, the John Elway Super Bowl.

00:26:39 Speaker_03
But John Elway was like this stats, couldn't get it done and they could drag a team to the precipice, but not, and then all of a sudden he won and we never talked about it again. And Curry was the same thing.

00:26:48 Speaker_03
It's like, ah, well, he had Duran and that one year in 2015, all the Cavs got hurt and there was always an excuse. Now there's no excuses.

00:26:58 Speaker_03
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00:27:09 Speaker_03
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00:27:25 Speaker_03
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00:30:41 Speaker_02
All right, so bias. Give me another bias. Let's go back and forth. I'll give you a small one. I'm rooting for the Pistons. I have a lot invested in my K to Cunningham position. I think that that's come around after some scary, like early developments.

00:30:53 Speaker_02
Jade and Ivy being allowed to play in front of Killian Hayes seems to be the right decision. I wonder if Monte Williams has watched one Pistons game on league pass because I know he didn't watch one before he got the head coaching job.

00:31:06 Speaker_02
If I own the Pistons, I might've been like, we're going to fire. You're going to keep the 75 million, but you're going to be an analyst for 45 games this year. killing Hayes is done in the league. No.

00:31:17 Speaker_02
And they had the same records, the wizards last year. Think about that. The same record. And like, nobody wants to hear your pistons are sneaky kind of good. You know, we never did that monologue luckily, but I would go, how? There's no way.

00:31:31 Speaker_02
Like, just even if all these guys are morons, they're way more talented. There's no way they're the wizards. And we've seen with a little shooting balance, a little spacing, that if you don't lace them up for the Pistons on the wrong night, Yeah.

00:31:46 Speaker_03
So I just like that this year.

00:31:47 Speaker_02
I like seeing a team that is the more like I just I just like them being somewhat more entertaining because I probably watch too many business game because it's always the first game on the West Coast like a four o'clock when I don't want to be inside.

00:32:01 Speaker_03
My first bias that I'll admit won't be a surprise to interview hates a strong word with sports. I was like the word sports hate. I don't actually hate anything. So it's in the context of anything. I hate the Lakers. I just I just do.

00:32:17 Speaker_03
And I think it's healthy. I think it's a good thing. I think there should be teams that you just don't like. And part of it's their fans. Like they started out well, right.

00:32:27 Speaker_03
First couple of weeks and their fans got super chirpy about how we took the under, right. Yeah. They lost by 40 tonight. Maybe like 41. But it's just more, it's more fun for me personally when they're not doing well. And I might be a bad person.

00:32:45 Speaker_03
Not gonna apologize.

00:32:46 Speaker_02
It is weird. You know, when you're from the Northeast, you don't think anybody cares about sports as much as you do. And there's some elements of that.

00:32:53 Speaker_02
But then when you go out to LA and you're like, oh, these guys are all soft or whatever, the Lakers thing is very real. Yeah.

00:32:59 Speaker_03
They have good, passionate fans. I gotta hand it to them.

00:33:02 Speaker_02
The other thing I've never understood is that there's just Kobe fans that aren't Lakers fans. Yeah. They just hang out, you know, and I remember there was like a Lakers, like it was a big Lakers game and I think I was recording it.

00:33:14 Speaker_02
So I was like, I'm going to go out, get outside. I'm going to go to the beach. And then I just see all these guys in Kobe jerseys at the beach. And I'm thinking like, this is a huge game. Yeah. What are you guys doing?

00:33:23 Speaker_02
It's like, well, you know, talking Kobe. Yeah. One bias we have together. is there was nothing else that Lakers thing. There's no, like, is there a version of that that you want?

00:33:35 Speaker_02
Like, do you have kind of a thing you don't want to share what you hope happens this season?

00:33:48 Speaker_03
The Lakers panic trade would be really fun. Like if they talked themselves into, you know, Zach Levine's contract, something like that, just like taking more money on to try to save. But I think they know, I think they're so bad on defense.

00:34:02 Speaker_03
They're one of the top four worst defenses in the league.

00:34:04 Speaker_02
That'll be a weird time though, before the deadline, because when you're 30 and you're LeBron or hell, even when you're 35 and LeBron, you can kind of get away with putting the pressure on them.

00:34:13 Speaker_02
So far, the Lakers have kind of shown like, yeah, we're not like the picks became eligible. They didn't do anything. I actually think they did a great job in the draft. There's yeah, me too. There's a version of a rotation here that should work.

00:34:25 Speaker_02
where they're in the playoffs, but if they go through a weird stretch and they're not active or anything, the subliminal messages and that kind of stuff, you're gonna have a good couple weeks.

00:34:35 Speaker_03
If you're a scoring point guard or a scoring wing and the Lakers are on your schedule, you're fucking pumped. You're calling family members, like, hey, make sure you watch tonight. I'm gonna have 48. One of our biases we share.

00:34:48 Speaker_03
We both are rationally rooted for Scoot Henderson. Russel and I have a pretty big scoop position.

00:34:55 Speaker_03
And unfortunately we live in the era of people could just cut out clips from your video podcast and then torment you with them over the next two to 20 years.

00:35:05 Speaker_03
And we had some, some pretty passionate pro scoop takes during the draft and they're not aging well.

00:35:14 Speaker_02
You got off to a good start. I thought he looked bigger. I'm like, this is great. They're bringing it off the bench, sort of like a mental reset. the numbers are just as bad as they were last year. Yeah. Uh, I even got so desperate.

00:35:26 Speaker_02
I called like one GM that I'm, I'm pretty close with what I don't think lies to me. I was like, you liked scoot too though. Right. He's like, is this off the record? Yeah. I'm like, no, I just, just tell me that you liked him too. Right.

00:35:37 Speaker_02
It's like, well, a team took them third. So I think a lot of people liked him. I'm not giving up, but I, I'm not giving up on preparing myself for the day. I have to, like when I had Jalen Suggs on last year, cause Jalen Suggs had,

00:35:50 Speaker_02
whatever it was, it was like the worst offensive rating of any single player, his rookie or like anybody that actually played. And then I was looking up historically, like who else had done it? Scoot did.

00:35:59 Speaker_02
And then I was like, oh, well, Jalen Suggs did, you know, and then we had Jalen Suggs on after that and he's turned it around. And I brought up that entire like stat profile to him. And then I was like, what do you think about Scoot?

00:36:09 Speaker_02
And he was like raving about Scoot. He's like, he's going to be so good. I was like, all these guys, what is he going to say? Like, no, he actually sucks, dude.

00:36:17 Speaker_03
So you don't think like eight years from now we'll be in Portland doing a scoot porn intro to our live podcast? Probably not ruling that out. We probably get the venue now. Yeah. If tickets are available.

00:36:32 Speaker_01
What else? Give me another bias.

00:36:36 Speaker_02
I'm not sad about the Sixers. And it actually circles back to the Embiid-Yokich propaganda year, where I don't, I don't even know who I'm really mad at. You know, I think Daryl's a great GM.

00:36:58 Speaker_02
He and I don't exactly, I don't think we like each other that much anymore, but it's okay. We'll get through it. But he, they did such a good job. And yet all of us that have been around it long enough, you're like, all right,

00:37:16 Speaker_02
Like I can see the good version of this, but are you investing in the right people? But you also do have a choice to invest in other people and you don't.

00:37:24 Speaker_02
And then when MB took the extension like that and it was kind of lost in all the mayhem, I think it may have been lost in the woge wake of him being, you know, and then the MB extension happens and it's almost one of those extensions where when it's done, you wonder if you're the team, you're like, he took it.

00:37:38 Speaker_02
Like he was like, yeah, sure. With tack on three more years.

00:37:41 Speaker_03
Yeah. Keep adding them. Um, I, we were texting a lot during that time and the Sixers were checking a lot of boxes that I would say would, would, I would call Rosillo trigger boxes.

00:37:52 Speaker_03
Um, the guy saying just openly that it's all about April now and not playing back to backs anymore. The off season workout stuff. victory lapping before we've seen the team yet is when that will trigger you from time to time. What else did they do?

00:38:09 Speaker_02
Well, then they also had, um, and bead everybody kind of knew that he wasn't really the locked in guy that you need to be like, if you look, it's a very simple timeline in the NBA. top draft pick, score a bunch of points.

00:38:25 Speaker_02
You're going to get your max extension. And then it's like you're seven or eight. I think something kicks in for a lot of the special players.

00:38:31 Speaker_02
We're like, okay, maybe it's not about all the points and I'm going to get the accolades and I'm going to make all star and all this stuff. But like, I almost have to figure out a way to be a more productive basketball player.

00:38:41 Speaker_02
That's not just about the stat line. And I think there's a lot of stat line players out there that people talk about being really special that I'm like, I don't know. I know they're good at scoring, but I don't know that they're great at like,

00:38:50 Speaker_02
all the things that you need.

00:38:51 Speaker_03
Do they affect winning?

00:38:52 Speaker_02
Right. And as talented as Embiid is, and I've always really liked his game, I loved him before the draft, but we knew there was the weird injury stuff with him. I actually always loved his personality.

00:39:03 Speaker_02
I liked that he cried after the Kawhi shot losing to Toronto when he got shit for that. I was like, that's ridiculous. Like this, this matters to him. That's a great sign. So there was all these things for him that I was kind of rooting for.

00:39:14 Speaker_02
And then you started hearing more and more of like, he's actually not taking this stuff serious enough. And you were wondering if that story was going to get out. And then it gets out within the own team meeting leaking.

00:39:25 Speaker_02
And then he's like, I don't know who said this. I'm like, you know what? He got mad about the leak. Yeah. You can be mad about the leak, but even that, like you, at some point you have to get more mad at yourself.

00:39:34 Speaker_02
And I know he's had all these different injuries and all these things, but I've just, there was like a tipping point for me and you when I did the preview show with you where I went, I cleared the floor for you. Cause I remember Zach Lowe.

00:39:44 Speaker_02
Like, yeah, I just was waving everybody to the side. Yeah. Well, just like Lomelo, but I, I, I remember Zach Lowe, who we love, like did his top five players. And it was this like,

00:39:58 Speaker_02
unarguable list of the five guys of Jokic, Giannis, Luka, SGA, and Embiid. And I went, I think we need to stop just penciling him in despite that we know what he was statistically to start that year.

00:40:09 Speaker_02
And I think people are starting to, like, it's not like, hey, finally, we're all on the same page. We're realizing, but, you know, get out of the second round. That's it.

00:40:16 Speaker_03
We don't, we don't value durability enough. When we talk about players is one of my big lessons of the 2020s. That's why Boston is all hypothetical.

00:40:25 Speaker_02
And that, yeah. Those two guys for Boston play take it seriously.

00:40:29 Speaker_03
Yeah. They want to show up. They play back to backs, quick biases for me. I want Seattle to have an NBA team again and I'll root for that team. And along what you just said, if you're not in shape, it's really hard for me to like you that much.

00:40:46 Speaker_03
And I feel that way about Luca, too.

00:40:47 Speaker_01
Thanks, man.

00:40:48 Speaker_03
No, not you. But I just feel like when these guys are making the money they're making, it'd be nice if you worked out in the off season. Doesn't seem crazy to me, right? It's your job. Which is weird, because Ben Simmons works out more than anybody.

00:41:08 Speaker_03
Right. My other bias is quickly, I still defend Kevin Durant, I don't know why. It's like being in a bad marriage, like he flies out the annual social and I'm like, you don't understand, he was upset they lost last night.

00:41:24 Speaker_02
Because if you wanted to just, like if you were forced in like debate class, like you have to be the anti-Durant guy, this is going to be easy actually. Right. And I don't want to be that guy, so I understand that bias.

00:41:36 Speaker_03
I have two more biases. What do you have before? Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead. Well, one of them is yours too. I hate heliocentric basketball. I'm just never going to like it. I'm just not. And I really respect what hard and the Clippers are doing this year.

00:41:48 Speaker_03
It's, it's way better than I thought the road runner was 37 and a half. They, I, it was almost a lock for me and he's playing great. I just don't personally like watching it that much. And that's not going to change.

00:41:59 Speaker_03
And then my last one is I want Jordan to stay the GOAT. And I just, I just feel like he's the best and the years pass and people forget. And I just think he's still levitates above anyone I've seen in person, even Jokic.

00:42:13 Speaker_02
I have one last one little off the menu. I was so happy that you were able to witness not just the greatness of Jokic. It wasn't the best curry game, but it's all right. We'll get through it. to see Tyler Ford handle a review.

00:42:26 Speaker_02
He's he's my favorite official in the NBA. And we had a front row seat to it. And I kept nudging the group. I'm like, watch this. He doesn't fuck around.

00:42:36 Speaker_03
Yeah. I didn't realize you had a referee bias.

00:42:38 Speaker_02
Yeah. Well, I mean, he knows how much I love him. Like he gave me the shout out before the game starts. My friends are like the officials say hi to you.

00:42:45 Speaker_03
And yeah, he asked us when the Sunday pod was coming back. I was fired up.

00:42:50 Speaker_02
Yeah. And I think the other guy I tweeted a picture of being like, I like French fried potatoes or whatever. And then I was like, and so then he was kind of like, fuck him, Priscilla.

00:42:59 Speaker_02
But Tyler, you know, bill Kennedy, I think as a sag card when he's doing the reviews and he's doing a one man show. Right. And then Tyler Ford is like efficiency, efficiency, efficiency.

00:43:14 Speaker_03
If you don't know who Tyler Ford is, he looks a lot like Jim from The Town, which is one of the reasons Priscilla loves him. It's also a plus. Because he looks like he's going to, at any time, say, who's cow we taking? All right, new gimmick here.

00:43:29 Speaker_03
We're moving out of yokeage porn. We're moving to what we're calling the worry scale, where I'm going to list some topics. You were having fun the first 30 minutes. I didn't want to lose the crowd, but he might be coming up at some point.

00:43:48 Speaker_03
The worry scale, one to 10. Curry ever getting a fifth title?

00:43:55 Speaker_02
One to 10, how worried are you? Well, worried because it's probably not going to happen, but the fourth one, like I don't worry about his next ring the way I would about somebody who I think deserves the recognition. Ty's Kobe though. Yeah.

00:44:10 Speaker_02
But, well, I guess the number one option thing, Kobe was the number one option for what? Two of them. Yeah. Two for Steph.

00:44:19 Speaker_03
I'm a nine out of 10. I don't know how they do it with this Warriors team.

00:44:22 Speaker_02
I don't know how they do it either. Do you think you'll ever be on another team?

00:44:27 Speaker_03
I don't. Do you think Lake up is just... I got to say, I think not to suck up to the crowd, but I don't think Jokic is ever not going to be on Denver. I don't think, I don't think Curry will ever not be on Golden State.

00:44:39 Speaker_03
And I honestly don't think Tatum will ever not be on Boston. I think, I think those are the three that I see stay in whole career. Luca, Luca is an interesting one. I don't, I don't know if I would bet on Luca staying in Dallas.

00:44:52 Speaker_02
I keep waiting for the first mad international guy. because it hasn't really happened yet. Yeah, who's to blame? I mean, Nerkic seems to get upset, but he's not really on the level of what we're talking about here.

00:45:02 Speaker_02
But when you look at the next pissed off NBA star that forces his way out of something, I don't say this because I think it'll never happen, but it's just something that you notice that it hasn't happened yet.

00:45:13 Speaker_02
I think you're nuts to put Tatum in that group with the other two guys, by the way. You think he would leave? I just think he's still so young. Never on another team?

00:45:21 Speaker_03
I just think those would be my three if I had to pick three.

00:45:26 Speaker_02
Trae Young Hawks, because if they haven't traded them yet.

00:45:29 Speaker_03
LaMelo Charlotte. Next worry scale. Houston fucking up this cool Rockets roster that we love.

00:45:37 Speaker_02
How worried are you on a scale of one to 10? It's a three because it's an awesome problem to have, but I like you. They're one of my favorite league pass. They might be my go-to they're the MVP, right? Cause I'm not only entertained.

00:45:50 Speaker_02
I'm trying to figure out how they're going to figure it out. And EMA is the best coach for this. Cause it's just like, Hey, guess what? You're benched for the fourth quarter. And he'll bench Jalen green. He'll bench Jabari. They have to play van Vliet.

00:46:03 Speaker_02
They kind of make this defensive decision where they'll go with Thompson over Jalen in some of these spots. And then Tari Eason comes into rec shop and they're like, all right, we don't need Jabari spacing.

00:46:11 Speaker_02
So there's lineup stuff that they're matching their long-term. I don't know how, like, they're probably better off getting out of the depth for the next guy. I don't know who the next guy is.

00:46:21 Speaker_02
Cause what'll happen is you're going to end up ruining the value of your own guys. Cause there's just not going to be enough minutes for dudes. So it's a concern, but not concerning enough that look, they're winning games too. So it's like a three.

00:46:33 Speaker_03
So the Rockets, they're in the, they're in the NBA cup, they play Golden State. And I think they're seven to one on FanDuel to win it. I think they're a pretty live bet.

00:46:42 Speaker_03
I was, I watched their OKC game on Sunday, the next day, cause it was against football. And they reminded me a lot of Minnesota last year where we, nobody wanted to say that Minnesota was ready in like December, January, but they kind of were.

00:46:56 Speaker_03
And it was like, wow, this would be soon. And then it just kept going. And I think Houston, that's how I feel when I watch them.

00:47:02 Speaker_03
They're so good defensively and they're so athletic and they have so many different lineups that there's just a bitch to play.

00:47:08 Speaker_02
I love that game because it was one of those, you know, we've had some really cool regular season games.

00:47:13 Speaker_02
And I feel like Houston's in a lot of them just because of the effort alone, but with no chat, like I didn't, that game will be so different with the check decision and how they want to pull Shingun away. Or maybe they close with Jabari.

00:47:25 Speaker_02
Like, that's what I love is that email is like, I know where you were drafted. I know you get paid this, you don't get paid. Right. He didn't get care of this. This is what I'm going to do tonight. And it's, he's actually the tough love.

00:47:34 Speaker_02
No bullshit thing is the best version when normally it's like the hand holder for all the young guys.

00:47:39 Speaker_03
that game, if you guys didn't see it, you ever see those Instagram videos when the two cats are fighting and it's just like amazing to watch the F how athletic the cats are. And you're like, Oh my God, wow. They just jumped off a table.

00:47:51 Speaker_02
You watching a lot of cat videos.

00:47:54 Speaker_03
I think the algorithm knows that I liked them, but they, he picks up your phone.

00:47:59 Speaker_02
You're like, I'm no longer worried.

00:48:03 Speaker_03
Uh, but they were just so young and athletic. It was, uh, it was a treat to watch next warrior scale towns in New York. I was probably an eight before the season. I think I'm like a two now. It seems like they like them and he's playing really well.

00:48:17 Speaker_02
I think the defensive part of it though, like their identity, their identities entirely changed.

00:48:21 Speaker_03
So maybe that's what happens when you trade for Carl Anthony towns.

00:48:24 Speaker_02
True. Which is funny, which is funny that he's not on Minnesota and now their defense isn't what it's supposed to be, which doesn't really make a ton of sense. Even though I think

00:48:33 Speaker_02
Like, look, nobody stops Jokic, but in that series, like, he bodied him up, and the fact that it stayed in front of him is better for Towns than having to move around.

00:48:41 Speaker_02
The Mitchell thing is another one of those things I can't wait to see, because Tibbs won't care. The cat's already paid, you know?

00:48:50 Speaker_02
He might have closing lineups where he's like, I don't want spacing, I don't want five out, I want some resistance at the rim, or maybe the Knicks are like, as long as we're top five in offense and 15th on defense, we have a chance.

00:49:01 Speaker_02
But, yeah, and he hasn't, look, if they lose, then they're going to get on his case. They'd be like, well, what's up with these interviews? But right now everybody likes it. He's kind of thrown in a no hitter right now.

00:49:13 Speaker_02
I don't think he's had one weird interview yet. I keep waiting for it. Maybe the PR just keeps turning down all of these invites and not even telling them smart.

00:49:21 Speaker_03
Well, conversely, you mentioned Minnesota. Ant Minnesota Warriors scale, I'm like an eight and a half. That team, the body language doctor does not like what he's seeing with Minnesota. And then Ant called it out.

00:49:35 Speaker_03
Ant had that press conference after, he was like, we're too negative, we're all doing our own thing. It was really kind of crazy.

00:49:45 Speaker_02
Yeah, look, they started 16 and four last year. Yeah, and they were the best defensive team in the NBA. So I mean, this is like Knicks. Like to another level of disappointment to who they are defensively, but they moved out cat.

00:49:59 Speaker_02
They didn't bring him in, so that part of it's really weird. But look, there's nights where Ant doesn't look like he loves playing defense and even though he's making a ton of threes, I'd rather him not take 11 a game.

00:50:08 Speaker_02
Steven Genso hasn't been good and Randall puts up numbers, but it's it's all kind of on his terms a little bit. So they look very disconnected.

00:50:17 Speaker_02
And it's a team offensively that I thought may get in their way of preventing them even making it to the Western Conference Finals as much as I like some of the guys on the team.

00:50:24 Speaker_03
Last year, it really felt like they had an identity. I knew what it was. I didn't know if it was going to translate to winning four playoff rounds, but there was something unique about them. They sure, I don't know when I watched them. I don't know.

00:50:35 Speaker_03
They just seem like another team. Well, at least they had the defense. They knew they could rely like that. They could take out yoke edge as well as anyone. Nobody takes them out, but they were at least, you know, big guys.

00:50:47 Speaker_03
They had a real effect on and they could guard Jalen and Jason as well as anybody. Now it's, I don't know. I don't see it. I don't think it gets better either. Where does Randall rank for you on guys?

00:50:57 Speaker_03
You wouldn't want to play pickup basketball with four hours a week. It's like, Oh man, I'm on Julius's team. Fuck. Oh, he saw me, you know, waving me over.

00:51:08 Speaker_02
Ah, I always think it's funny is when like people just knock the NBA product and you know, there's always like this weird push.

00:51:16 Speaker_02
There was even an NFL push this year, even though there was a few Sundays where I was like, this wasn't that much fun, but it's like, Hey, the NFL product. And it's always somebody with some kind of agenda, but there's a lot of the NBA part of it.

00:51:26 Speaker_02
And I'll have nights too, where I'll watch a game and I'm like, there's way too much three-point shooting tonight, or why is that guy taking that shot? And then I'll go, do you miss post-ups? Do you miss them? Do you watch these games?

00:51:35 Speaker_02
You'll be like, I miss an Al Jefferson entry pass. So bad. And Randall backs guys down. It's like, Hey, it's right there for you. Right? Like, there you go.

00:51:46 Speaker_03
If you miss it, I had this coming up later, but I'm glad you're bringing it up now. They, this became that there, that one clip went around. That was like two minutes.

00:51:54 Speaker_02
It was terrible. It was bad.

00:51:56 Speaker_03
You guys must've seen that. Right. And it was just terrible. Three terrible three. And people were like, this is basketball now. And I'm watching it because I'm old.

00:52:05 Speaker_03
And I'm like, you guys don't understand how bad the nineties were like watching Bobby Phil's trying to post up whoever watching Anthony Mason, trying to split a double team.

00:52:16 Speaker_02
Like they had a Mark Jackson rule because your post-ups took too long and how slow it was like that.

00:52:22 Speaker_03
Remember that Cleveland team with Brevin night where they for tello like goal. No, remember he slowed it down. slowed it down and try to have like 65 field goals a game. Like there's 90.

00:52:33 Speaker_02
I hope there's one person in this audience is YouTubing Brevin night possessions.

00:52:38 Speaker_03
No, someone in the backs, like finally Brevin night has been, but I was thinking like that clip sucked.

00:52:43 Speaker_02
All right. And if you show that clip and there's plenty of games, there's some D'Angelo Russell warriors games where I go, I might have to take a year off from this team before they get rid of them.

00:52:52 Speaker_02
But then I think like, okay, what are you talking about that you miss? and it, there was no movement so much slower. Like even last night's a nice reminder. I hate this. This is my thing.

00:53:03 Speaker_02
But somebody posts one clip of a Pistons hard foul and they act like that was every fucking possession of every game from like 1978 to 1996. And you're like, actually that's just a really hard foul.

00:53:17 Speaker_02
And we thought that was hard when it happened at the time. And then you're watching guys cut and how physical even last night's game is with two teams that wouldn't even be suggested as like, oh, those are the two most physical basketball teams.

00:53:28 Speaker_02
The guys are so much bigger. They're so much fat, like they're hitting each other off the ball. The game is so physical. And yet these dudes on TV just never want to admit that it might be as tough, even if there's more space.

00:53:41 Speaker_03
Somebody did a study about how much more running there is now. And it's, I just think basketball, it's way harder to play basketball now.

00:53:50 Speaker_02
As great as that stuff and how much we can get nostalgic over it. Like I'll watch a Celtics playoff game from the eighties. Once the ball is crossed half court, everyone stops, everybody stops.

00:54:03 Speaker_02
There's times I'm talking about like big playoff moments where they're not picking somebody up who has the ball in transition. They're letting them because there wasn't, you know, the, the

00:54:14 Speaker_02
I would say the lengthening of the quarter, the threat of deeper shots, because people just didn't take shots back then the way they do now, but they would just almost let people get in to setting up what they wanted to do.

00:54:25 Speaker_02
And I would challenge anybody, go watch some of that stuff for 30 minutes, and it's hysterical how different it actually is in the way people talk about it today.

00:54:34 Speaker_03
Yeah, we have a league where somebody's trying to win the fourth MVP, and he's shooting 52% on threes, and he's a tennisist, and he's a center. People are like, this sucks.

00:54:44 Speaker_03
And everyone forgets that the mid 2000s when we, we actually, it was like a crisis with the pace of the game and just how much it sucked to watch that they had to change these rules. Anyway, next one for the, the worry scale.

00:54:58 Speaker_03
We just got to get it over with. Jamal Murray. Listen, we're all friends here. Let's talk it out. I don't want this to be like the Sopranos intervention where somebody charges me. Let's just, let's talk it out. Jamal Murray, how worried are you?

00:55:17 Speaker_02
Not as worried as you are. You, I don't know if I'm bad at it or you're dangerous, but you went in and you were like, I don't think he's moving well. And I went, I, he's not peak Westbrook. So it's, it's always a bit shifty into his, I studied a lot.

00:55:35 Speaker_03
I studied how he couldn't walk.

00:55:36 Speaker_02
He couldn't stop talking about him. He actually, I think the quote was, He's not the same anymore. And I went forever. And then he goes now. So we decided.

00:55:47 Speaker_03
No, that was a game. Doesn't have it right now or doesn't have it anymore.

00:55:51 Speaker_02
Right.

00:55:52 Speaker_03
Are two separate things. Right. But you said right now, because he looks slow. It doesn't look like he's in the same shape.

00:55:58 Speaker_02
He was bad last night. It was bad to see live. He walks.

00:56:01 Speaker_03
I'm going to do some walking for.

00:56:03 Speaker_02
Here we go.

00:56:04 Speaker_03
He does. He just looks, looks creaky. Like I, you know, I want my guys to walk around the court, like guys making 40 million a year with their chests out. I just was, I just was worried.

00:56:21 Speaker_03
I left the game thinking that guy doesn't seem a hundred percent healthy to me. That was that. I don't know if I'm right or wrong, but that was what I saw.

00:56:29 Speaker_02
Beginning of last year when he came back, it looked different because he was coming off the injury. Right. Yeah. I think you could tell when it, when, you know, you try not to just go by like, Oh, he's scoring more.

00:56:39 Speaker_02
Everything is fine now, but he's a tougher one. I'm not as good at this as you are. I'm admitting I, I can't cause he is not somebody.

00:56:47 Speaker_03
It's not like I have my own CBS show where I'm like the mentalist.

00:56:52 Speaker_02
Would you turn it down?

00:56:53 Speaker_03
Mentalist? That sounds great. The T here are the two things I noticed that he used to have elevator pitch. Doesn't seem to have the same way when he's going coast to coast and he's going fast and he's got the defender on his hip.

00:57:05 Speaker_03
He always had like a little super blast where he could get ahead of that guy and get his shot. And he doesn't seem like he totally has that yet.

00:57:12 Speaker_03
And then he has that little, where he goes to his right, that little 12 footer, the Chris Paul shot, which always used to go in and was like his kind of like, that was his shot. and it's not going in anymore.

00:57:23 Speaker_03
And it doesn't seem like he has the same lift on it. So that's just what I saw in person.

00:57:28 Speaker_03
We'll see if it's fixed, but it's fear the nuggets like your ceiling depends on what happens with him over the next four months because you know, yeah, but the other guys.

00:57:36 Speaker_02
Yeah, and he's been so great and huge playoff spots. Everybody knows that.

00:57:39 Speaker_02
And like when you can do that, that tells me everything about you that even if you don't have the accolades of the other guys, I think that no all star team thing is completely overblown because if you go through it like every year, it was and.

00:57:50 Speaker_02
when he was healthy and when he wasn't, the other guards that made the team, it's, it's not as egregious as it's always pitched every time it's a national broadcast, which seems to be some rule like Jalen hurts squatting.

00:57:59 Speaker_02
You have to bring up that Jalen, uh, Jamal Murray hasn't made an all-star game, but the other one's like that. Uh, well the all-timer was Kershaw and Stafford went to high school together. Oh, that's a good one.

00:58:13 Speaker_02
Jim Harbaugh and John Harbaugh are brothers. What Russell Wilson one? Did you just yell Russell Wilson?

00:58:20 Speaker_03
Trying to throw us off. I have a, I'm an eight and a half for Jamal Murray for word. Put me down as a 6.5. He's too young. He's too young. You're always conservative with this. I'm always like more panicky and you're more conservative. Yeah. Yeah.

00:58:38 Speaker_03
And be George Philly just as a group.

00:58:44 Speaker_02
Removing all your whatever. I'm like an eight and a half. See, I think you're right. This is why it's an eight. It's not a 10. Okay. The Pelicans are an 11. Yeah.

00:58:53 Speaker_02
Philly, there is, despite the time we just spent talking to him, there's a version of it coming together.

00:59:01 Speaker_03
Well, the thing is they only have to be like the 10 seed. That could be 34 wins with Maxie, George and bead.

00:59:08 Speaker_02
Yeah.

00:59:10 Speaker_01
And McCain.

00:59:11 Speaker_02
Yeah. They have talent. I mean, Uber, who I can't stand is been pretty good for them for a couple of years. I'm not crossing them off any, but it's not great.

00:59:19 Speaker_02
Like when Uber has to play somebody tough defensively with all that length, like he's, he's into it. He's kind of a different cat now. So I got to give it to him. So at least with Philadelphia, as bad as it is, it's kind of like the Clippers thing.

00:59:28 Speaker_02
Yes, it's a huge worry, but dot, dot, dot.

00:59:31 Speaker_02
Now, it never worked out for them, and maybe it doesn't where the odds are against Philadelphia, but there's something there is in place where I don't see why they couldn't put together a couple of months and we start talking about them being like, hey, that's gonna be a weird, that could be a weird 1A.

00:59:44 Speaker_03
Here's why eight and a half might be low, because Embiid was in the Olympics, looked slow, looked creaky. Do his walk. That one would be tough. I don't know if I could do that one.

00:59:57 Speaker_03
Then before the season, it's like, we're taking it easy with him, but he's doing great. His knee's good. Signed the extension. That was a red flag. It was like, why did he grab that extension so fast? That was weird.

01:00:09 Speaker_03
Then it was the ESPN sent, who was at Bon Temps, to write the big feature about their whole master plan for it's all about April, May, and June now. I was like, that's weird. Why are they telling us that? And then all of a sudden, Embiid,

01:00:25 Speaker_03
Not playing tonight. It's like, ah, the season started. That seems like a problem. And then he played, he looked terrible. Then he got hurt. Then he was mad at his team. The team meeting happened.

01:00:38 Speaker_02
And then we haven't seen him since. He got suspended for shoving.

01:00:42 Speaker_03
Oh, and he got in a fight with the reporter. Not the fight, but the shoving thing. And then I saw today, another red flag and Beat is ramping up. What does that mean?

01:00:54 Speaker_02
It generally means you've been disappointing. Parents should start using it. How's Doug? Ramping up this summer.

01:01:07 Speaker_03
Like if my son's grades, if I'm like, hey Ben, how are your grades? And he's like, yes, I'm ramping up. But how are your grades? As long as you're ramping up. Like how's it going with the ladies? I'm ramping up. So you're single.

01:01:30 Speaker_03
LaMelo Ball, worry scale, where are you?

01:01:33 Speaker_02
Really high.

01:01:35 Speaker_03
You're high. He's averaging 30 a game.

01:01:38 Speaker_02
He's second in the league in scoring and I'm worried. Now I know there's a large segment, not the great city of Denver, never want to hear Bill and I talk about LaMelo, speaking of scoot takes. And that's totally fair.

01:01:49 Speaker_02
I didn't like the Australia footage. Don't know how many times I can say it. Having said that, he's a incredibly talented guy at that size, the passing, the, I talk about the time, like his size, the start, stop, start again thing is, is just stupid.

01:02:05 Speaker_02
But when I watched the games and I see like, he took 35 the other night and I'm like, you know, what's not a good shot is a one foot three from 30 feet out with 16 seconds left in the shot clock.

01:02:17 Speaker_02
And I think when you're allowed to just do that forever, cause he is their attraction. He is kind of the tray young thing in Atlanta where this may not be great, but the kids love I wonder now on another coach who was supposed to be the guy.

01:02:30 Speaker_02
And by the way, when he benched him in that Nets game, I don't think it was about the fourth quarter. Cause I went back, I was like, where is the moment where Charles Lee's like, I'm benching you in a tight game.

01:02:40 Speaker_02
He made nine more substitutions in under four minutes. He was subbing in for offense. He was subbing in for defense and he never put LaMelo back in the game. And I thought it was about the overall approach that he has to have.

01:02:52 Speaker_02
He's obviously more talented and a more productive player than I thought he would be before the draft. But I think there's a tendency of like, he just kind of gets out there and does his own thing. I think it sucks to play with.

01:03:02 Speaker_02
And I think it's losing basketball. And this is a habit that he has to break to be something in this league other than just a box score guy.

01:03:10 Speaker_03
Year five. Good stats, bad team guy. He's probably the captain.

01:03:15 Speaker_02
And his stats are awesome. Stats are great. Like even with the bad threes, like look at the three point, like the numbers. He's a better shooter in the NBA now than he was at any other level. Like, and it was immediate.

01:03:26 Speaker_03
I've made this joke before and I'm going to make it again. His destiny might be social media 15 years from now with clips of people saying the mellow ball was a problem. And just like a one minute highlight tape of crazy shots he made.

01:03:39 Speaker_03
And that's where we land. We'll see. Uh, next one, worry scale, a stringer Avon situation with Franz and Paolo and Paolo comes back. are they going to be in the balcony together? Francis is kind of my team now.

01:03:58 Speaker_02
Here's why I'm not worried about it at all. Because when you watch Palo at Duke, he actually wanted to get other guys involved, even though he was clearly the best player. It was going to be the number one pick.

01:04:07 Speaker_03
Yeah.

01:04:08 Speaker_02
So he likes this hollow is totally fine. Getting other people involved, which is why I like him probably. I mean, women, Yama's in his own planet, right?

01:04:18 Speaker_02
hollow to be that good, that young and not have to have the seven year run of, I guess I have to kind of find a way to play with other people like that's in him already.

01:04:28 Speaker_02
So with this front, I think this is just a nice Franz reminder tour of what he is and how pissed people got the calves series. So I, I'm not worried. I think this is actually one of those weird injuries where it may be better for the rest of the magic.

01:04:41 Speaker_03
It certainly helped Franz.

01:04:43 Speaker_02
Yeah.

01:04:43 Speaker_03
Cause he Olympics wasn't great for start of the season. Wasn't great. The cat series. People were acting like he sucked. I was one of them. No, it's good. Orlando's on my radar.

01:04:56 Speaker_03
I'm the most worried about the calves in the east, obviously, cause I think they're really good.

01:05:02 Speaker_03
But I think I'd put Orlando next for teams I'm worried about because if Franz keeps up for Boston or in general Boston, so you keep this up, the Boston threats are Cleveland, Orlando to you.

01:05:14 Speaker_03
I think Orlando, cause of the defense and because if Franz can be the second guy that you never know who's going to have the 35 point game, I'm not as, I just can't be as scared of Milwaukee with the, with not knowing what I'm getting from Middleton.

01:05:28 Speaker_03
I just don't know if we're ever seeing, but it's good to see that they turn it around.

01:05:31 Speaker_02
Cause Giannis has been insane.

01:05:33 Speaker_03
And the Knicks are honestly just not good enough defensively. It's never worked. Once you get to round three, round four, you have to be able to get stops. And I don't know if they can. Next one, worry scale.

01:05:47 Speaker_03
LeBron going 89 Kareem on us as this year goes along.

01:05:53 Speaker_02
Revisit 89 Kareem for those that don't remember.

01:05:59 Speaker_03
So it was 36 years ago, it was the farewell tour season. Kareem was amazing. I mean, he had one of the most amazing careers in any sport. He was the finals MVP, I think in 71 and 85. In 87, they ran the biggest play of the game for him.

01:06:17 Speaker_03
In game four, he made it, he got fouled. 88, Pistons series, biggest play of the entire series. They ran for him. He was like 42. So he was an amazing aging player, but he was obviously old. And then all of a sudden 89, it was grim. It was, it was bad.

01:06:35 Speaker_03
And LeBron, like he put up 29 today and offensively he can still do it. The defense is, you can't even call it defense because he's not playing it. So he's basically, he's become a DH. in basketball and you still play pickup.

01:06:53 Speaker_03
And I think you have a lot of pride in your pickup. I, you're trying to figure out how to be insulted by that. I had a run in pickup when I was in my early forties where I really tried to keep it going.

01:07:08 Speaker_03
And then eventually you start learning all these tricks to survive in a pickup game when you're old. And LeBron's doing a lot of those tricks now where I'm like, I used to do that.

01:07:19 Speaker_03
where he'd be like on defense, under the basket, where he's just kind of doing this. And then, no, get that, get that guy. And he's just not covering ground.

01:07:34 Speaker_02
This is the worst comparison you've ever made.

01:07:38 Speaker_03
Thank you. Look, I can tell when somebody's trying to conserve their energy in a basketball court.

01:07:44 Speaker_02
Yeah, but you could have done it without comparing it to your pickup game in the 40s. I'm an only child. What do you want? I hope someone that despises you tweets that you said this at this show tonight. with no context whatsoever.

01:07:59 Speaker_02
I might even retweet it. I know exactly what you mean. I know exactly what you mean, but it's just supposed to be my friend on stage undermining me.

01:08:07 Speaker_02
Well, I think it's always good to be, you know, every now and then I got to, I got to disagree, but you know what I mean though, when I do know what you move, I know what you mean.

01:08:15 Speaker_02
But I mean, if I said like, Hey man, I always hit the cutoff guy in softball. nobody trusts me as somebody that tried to do that a few times. Like I was trying to explain why my Tyson's pick up. What's that? Do you still move on defense and pick up?

01:08:34 Speaker_02
I mean, it depends on, I usually will. Like if you make three, I'm like shit. Like Matt liner's kid just destroyed me a couple of weeks ago.

01:08:44 Speaker_03
So how many years left for LeBron in your opinion?

01:08:48 Speaker_02
Well, everything you said is right, but don't you feel guilty holding them to a standard that we shouldn't hold them to? Well, it's year 22. Yeah. That's what I mean. So, I mean, some of this defensive stuff he's been, he's been doing for a while.

01:08:59 Speaker_02
I mean, he's had the worst defensive assignment for years, which I think is smart to try to pace him.

01:09:04 Speaker_03
I mean, but now they have Austin Reeves and connect out there too. And it's like, ah,

01:09:09 Speaker_02
and D'Angelo Russell lock it down. No, I think I'm at a stage and I I've, I've talked about this before, but I'm, I'm with you. Everything you said is right. And when Denver played them, they had LeBron's guy stay baseline.

01:09:25 Speaker_02
So LeBron was the baseline help kind of in the dunker spot. and they were running these cuts, like it was a handoff at the high post. And then somebody would cut down off of it. And LeBron just never, ever rotated over.

01:09:35 Speaker_02
And they're like, we're just going to keep doing this over and over and over again. He's had some tough, fast break defense plays.

01:09:42 Speaker_02
I mean, I thought he'd be, I thought he'd be on TV three years ago, you know, go back to 2010 and we're talking about him and holding him to the standard defensively. So this part, I actually feel guilty about, even though you're right.

01:09:53 Speaker_03
I guess my reaction is based on the dialogue about him heading into the season and all the people in the media were like, he's still a top five guy.

01:10:01 Speaker_01
The answer is no. Where do you have him in your top 100?

01:10:08 Speaker_03
He was not in the top 20. Whoa, that seems low. I'm sorry, I like defense. You have Rudy three? Next worry scale. You still have worries? I have one more. All right. The Celtics ending up with a crappy owner.

01:10:31 Speaker_02
Oh, all right. I'm, I'm laying out. Let's talk this out. Well, no go. Cause this is your world. This is, I don't know what's going to happen. Owner's insider.

01:10:40 Speaker_03
I'm always nervous when I have a good owner and now I don't know what I'm getting with the next owner. I'm just going to naturally be nervous about that. So I'm like a seven. What if the next guy comes in and it's like a A-Rod Mark Laurie situation?

01:10:56 Speaker_03
Like, Hey, we got to trade towns. We got to trade towns. He's too expensive. Like that. That's the shit that's happening.

01:11:04 Speaker_02
What if it's John Henry? Those guys have won. We're moving on.

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Be a finance and HR rockstar with Workday. Visit workday.com to learn more. I'm going to save, rather have right now, because I want to get to your top five movie TV girlfriends. I asked for a silo.

01:12:52 Speaker_03
We're going to break up the hoop of the little pop culture. Five movie TV girlfriends that when you watch the show or the movie, you were like, I'm in.

01:13:10 Speaker_02
Well, Meghan Mark is available again, right? Is she available? Is that the word in the street? After I think that podcast thing didn't work out. I think she's still married though.

01:13:23 Speaker_02
No, but it was, it was, uh, we played in a celebrity flag football game together and it was all of the swimsuit models. So nobody was really paying any attention to Markle. So I was like, that's my lane.

01:13:37 Speaker_02
Like she's probably, she's probably down herself a little bit right now. And, She's never been more obtainable. And then, I mean, I got the game-winning touchdown over Deion Sanders. No big deal. And I was like, yeah, you know, uh, I shot her a DM. Yeah.

01:14:01 Speaker_02
And, um, then somebody was like, do you know who she's dating? I was like, I don't know. I don't pay attention to any of this stuff. And, uh, it didn't work out. And no, it's the funniest thing.

01:14:11 Speaker_02
And so then the joke kept going because when Pierce Morgan would lose his shit about it, I would always quote tweet above and be like, it gets better, man. Like, don't worry.

01:14:19 Speaker_02
And I was basically only doing it for like Sarah Walsh and Carissa Thompson because they knew the story. They thought it was so funny. So like nobody really knew what the joke was.

01:14:26 Speaker_02
And I kept doing it over like, again, I don't do it that often, but maybe once a year, Pierce Morgan would have some other Meghan Markle thing come up. And then I would just be like, don't worry, dude, I'm here. If you need to talk ever.

01:14:37 Speaker_02
And he never responded. And the funniest person You would never guess this. The funniest person ever to reach out to me after one of those Piers Morgan tweets was like, dude, what is wrong with you? She's not that great.

01:14:49 Speaker_02
Like, have you paid attention to this Harry thing? Like, you're way better. And first of all, you realize she wasn't going to go out with me, right? So there's that part. Jeff Van Gundy. Come on.

01:15:02 Speaker_02
Jeff Van Gundy texted me to tell me that I was better off without Meghan Markle. That's a thing that actually happened. And I was so like, I was at home solo and I'm, I'm on, you know, I'm like, what's Van Gundy want?

01:15:23 Speaker_02
Cause I don't, we don't text a lot. And I was like, Oh no, he thinks that Pierce Morgan tweet is real. So then I had to explain the whole thing to him. And he was like, I've lost interest now.

01:15:36 Speaker_03
Then Mark Jackson texted, hand down, man down.

01:15:39 Speaker_02
I don't think Mark Jackson, I don't think he was ever going to text me after that, that one monologue that I did where I was like, why does everyone keep asking why he's not getting a head coaching job? And I just went through like a 10 year timeline.

01:15:51 Speaker_02
So not, not on your speed dial. Thing is too, is I loved him. He's a Johnny.

01:15:55 Speaker_03
Wait, one more question. Yes. What was the DM to Megan Margo? Was it like, was it like what shaken? It was not what shaken.

01:16:03 Speaker_02
How are ya? No, it was really, it was- Hey, it's Ryan? No, it was a soft, very soft sell. It was, hey, I know the new season of Suits is coming out. If you ever want to come on the show.

01:16:15 Speaker_01
Oh, it's one of those.

01:16:16 Speaker_02
Oh, come on the show. Yeah, it was really professional. And it was like a gauging of interest. Like if I got an emoji back, who knows? And I didn't. It was ice cold. It was, oh, I don't know anything about sports, but thanks for the offer.

01:16:32 Speaker_03
Next one.

01:16:32 Speaker_02
So Meg and Marco, who else? Well, is it weird to go all the way back to the Goonies? No. I left the movie theater in love with that girl. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? Not not the one with the glasses.

01:16:50 Speaker_02
But the other one, like, yeah, I don't I don't know what the deal was, but it's never happened. Yeah. And who was that? Brolin was rolling the back.

01:16:59 Speaker_03
Brolin might have stepped in. Yeah.

01:17:00 Speaker_02
It's like, what's she seeing him? He had a car, though. And I think I was like 10. So I think that was the first one where like I went to a movie and felt a little different after I left. Yeah. You know what I'm saying?

01:17:12 Speaker_02
You don't know what the hell's going on, but you're like, why do I, why am I looking at Bob magazine at the CVS the next week with her on the cover of that? So that's one. Did you have ones that we, we don't have a slideshow for this, right?

01:17:26 Speaker_02
Cause this now feels incredibly awkward after I told the Markle thing. Slideshow would have been good.

01:17:31 Speaker_03
Um, my moment for that was the Charlie's angels Hawaii episode. I was like, I'm just a different person now.

01:17:45 Speaker_02
What about the town? All right. Let's just get to it instead. Cause I don't, I don't. So Blake Lively in that movie, like I had a stretch where I was in Boston where I would see the Blake Lively's

01:18:00 Speaker_02
And it's one of the most accurate characters in the history of movies. When you guys do the Oscar revisit thing, have you ever nominated her for like supporting actress? I mean, you don't even need to, it's just a given.

01:18:13 Speaker_02
She nails it because she's so dangerous. She's the worst idea ever. And you know that you're in and I thought, and has a kid. with one of the most dangerous gang members in town. I love kids. So is somebody smoking? We're in Denver. Everything's possible.

01:18:33 Speaker_02
I think she might be back there smoking. She would smoke in the car when she met your parents the first time.

01:18:39 Speaker_02
Uh, the reason why she was modeled that she was modeled after these girls that like, none of us really knew how to talk to, but at the same time, like you never, I wanted to date one and have every one of my friends tell me how terrible it was.

01:18:52 Speaker_02
I wanted to lie to my parents that I wasn't seeing anybody and I wanted to date her all the time. And I wanted to go up to like Medford. I wanted to go to these dangerous, like I went to Revere one night when I was in my twenties to scope this out.

01:19:05 Speaker_02
Like I was like, I'm going to Revere. I just want to see it for real. And I was like, I think I'm going to get my ass kicked here tonight. So I'm going to have to leave. So it never really quite worked out for me.

01:19:15 Speaker_02
I knew what kind of hair was going to be like a bad dye job, like sort of a Jennifer Aniston thing that was way out of style. And then the streaks that weren't blended properly because she went to some cheap place in a strip mall.

01:19:25 Speaker_02
Like I had I was like, look, I'm on TV for the Celtics. There has to be something like, oh, he gets he gets fucking great seats. Yeah. You know, but I was losing my hair and I was losing my confidence a little bit. So. Never happened.

01:19:40 Speaker_02
She's still the ideal, though, right? I think I have a little different standards now.

01:19:48 Speaker_03
Should we tell the story about when we met? Yeah. Cause that guy, that guy would have loved the Blake Lively character.

01:19:57 Speaker_02
That guy, I actually was, to be totally honest, there was one deal that was sort of close and I got dumped because she got on a reality show. I wasn't bummed out. That was the best thing is that, you know, it's bad for you.

01:20:10 Speaker_02
And when you get dumped, you don't even care. Like a cable show or a network show. No, it was like fairly, fairly popular.

01:20:15 Speaker_03
Prominent show.

01:20:16 Speaker_02
Yeah. And then when she was, I was like, you didn't even win. Now you want me back?

01:20:23 Speaker_03
Yeah. So we met.

01:20:26 Speaker_02
Do you remember it?

01:20:28 Speaker_03
Well, it was, it was the first great Celtics moment in nine years. It was the game when the playoff game against the Nets game three, where they were down like 25 came back really ugly game, but really fun. And it was, everyone was just so happy.

01:20:42 Speaker_03
The Celtics had a nice, happy playoff moment. It was like, it just literally nine years is forever. And it was a day game. and everyone went out. And it was one of those just drunk, drunk, drunk Boston days. And that's where I met Rosillo.

01:21:00 Speaker_03
And he was not sober.

01:21:05 Speaker_02
It wasn't that game. I thought it was. No. Was it a different game? It was a Pacers playoff game. You're right.

01:21:15 Speaker_03
That was also a great game. That was the Paul Pierce over. I knew it was a playoff game from back then. So are you sure it wasn't that night? I think I might be right.

01:21:27 Speaker_02
No. Cause you were getting married that week. You're right. And I had just started at that station, the zone in Boston, and you had just left and gone on to other things. And so we had just kind of missed each other, like just missed each other.

01:21:47 Speaker_02
He came on, like did a phoner. He was nice enough to find some time for us.

01:21:53 Speaker_02
And then I hadn't actually met him, and a bunch of my guys from Vermont came down, because it was like the first time I had ever been able to like do my friends a favor with a hookup. So I got us like four, seats in the suite.

01:22:07 Speaker_02
And like, you know, that age, you're just going to get after it because your friends are in town. And then I was like, tight white T-shirt. I mean, I looked like an extra and that I remember the outsiders.

01:22:19 Speaker_02
Bill's there with his soon-to-be wife, I think, her parents, your parents. It was at the Fours, I think. It was at the Fours. I have a completely different memory. This is great. It's like one of those movies where it's two different stories.

01:22:31 Speaker_02
He was down a few tables, and I was like, well, we're colleagues. I'll go say something. And I was like, Hey, the Heathcliff Slocum trade for Veritech and low was the best since Andy Dufresne bought that rock hammer from red line, man.

01:22:49 Speaker_02
I'm like, that was, that was something else, you know? And I've got like a Coors light and I'm like, you know, like, yeah, well, we're getting married tomorrow. You were nice, but it was, it was over.

01:23:02 Speaker_02
And I, I didn't, I realized 30 seconds later after it was over, I was like, Oh, I guess this is over now. And that was the beginning. That's funny.

01:23:09 Speaker_03
That's not what I remembered. This is what happens when you get old. You have these memories and then they morph into a different memory.

01:23:17 Speaker_02
It'd be really weird if we had met after that Nets game and then the, but I know where I was after the Nets game.

01:23:23 Speaker_03
Can we play some rather have right now?

01:23:25 Speaker_02
Yeah, I got a list. I'm excited.

01:23:29 Speaker_03
Embiid or Kawhi, who would you rather have?

01:23:31 Speaker_02
I have the same one down for you. That's hilarious.

01:23:38 Speaker_01
Embiid, because he doesn't have a ring. I think I would rather have Embiid too.

01:23:46 Speaker_03
What's the Kawhi argument? My Clippers guy was telling me Kawhi's coming back before Christmas. Is he ramping up? I think he's ramped up. He's ramped up, ready to go. I don't, the NB thing just doesn't feel like it's headed toward a good place. Right?

01:24:04 Speaker_03
Like what, what, give me the best case scenario for the NB situation. Like comes back. He's like, you know, the team meeting, I really, I did some soul searching. He needs to follow the Duncan model. He has to get lighter. All right.

01:24:18 Speaker_02
Well, that's not gonna be this season.

01:24:21 Speaker_03
Zion or Trey.

01:24:24 Speaker_02
Yeah. It's actually Trey. I mean, it's Zion.

01:24:27 Speaker_03
Can you believe that? You were like Zion's number one guy.

01:24:30 Speaker_02
I'm no longer his number one guy. What about Zion or Jha? Jha. August, would you have said Jha? See, to me, though. Shaka and Willys.

01:24:44 Speaker_03
Yeah! Should we have done the live show with Shaka and Willys? Oh! I know a guy. Apparently, yes. Jesus.

01:24:57 Speaker_02
See, I had John jar Halliburton jar Halliburton. I think this room's a little high on jaw. I'm still in on jaw. He's he's awesome. But I mean, he basically said the other day, he's going to stop dunking. That seems alarming. Yeah. Because I do.

01:25:18 Speaker_02
I would like every time I'd watch him, I go, I love this. And like those grizzlies, like spikes that didn't really amount to anything because they were always hurt. Like they put together some really nice stretches.

01:25:29 Speaker_00
Yeah.

01:25:29 Speaker_02
Maybe this five. And I think the front office does a really good job with everybody. But I thought there was like a jaw Zion off the court thing. Do you see Zion hit up that ring girl from Alabama? I did. Well.

01:25:48 Speaker_03
I guess the question for me is who knows, maybe I could take a couple of lessons. If they could get out of the Zion contract after this year, do you do it is a question I can't believe we're even asking, but I think it's a serious question.

01:25:59 Speaker_02
He's going to be reevaluated in two weeks. So I'm excited for that. But that story today that the Pelicans aren't going to wave them like there's sometimes you're like, maybe this isn't really updated information. Like no shit. You're not going to wave.

01:26:11 Speaker_02
Right.

01:26:13 Speaker_03
Next rather have Bo Nix or Jaden Daniels. I agree, but can you believe this is an argument? No. Next looks like drew breeze. Like it's like Peyton is just sprinkled drew breeze Kool-Aid all over him for eight weeks.

01:26:44 Speaker_02
Well, think about this. Like McShane, I did this two weeks ago of the, all right. So it's six quarterbacks in the top 12 panics hasn't played JJ was hurt.

01:26:53 Speaker_02
So we've got Caleb, we've got Jaden, we've got Drake, we've got, Oh, and if I asked you right now, Hey, if in five years, any one of them were the best of this group, it's all still on the table, right? Except it's not. Cause it's going to be Drake.

01:27:14 Speaker_03
Hey, I'll fucking leave. Drake Bay is amazing. I'll say this with next. I watched that jets game. What do you have? 60 yards and the bad weather and the jets kicker missed the field goal.

01:27:29 Speaker_03
And the Broncos somehow one was before the Broncos turned the season around. And it looked like he was going to be like out of the league in three weeks. And you watch the guy the last couple of weeks, And he just looks completely legit to me.

01:27:42 Speaker_03
Like he can make every throw. He runs around. He'll make like two mistakes, but I like his leadership. I like that. He gets in fights with the other team, starts barking at defensive linemen. He just has it. I, I, I think he's got it.

01:27:56 Speaker_03
I think he's got charisma. I like him. I don't know what the ceiling is and that I know he's like 25 and maybe this is the ceiling already, but he's, he's, he's an average to above average starting quarterback.

01:28:10 Speaker_02
Like if he ends up being like a real guy, you know what I mean? You and I were talking about here signing up for 10 years.

01:28:15 Speaker_02
I, you know, I don't know if we started counting Superbowl rings here, but he answers your quarterback question for a decade, which is really what you're hoping for with, with any of these guys.

01:28:26 Speaker_02
You may have to just start drafting guys, but like how many games have you played? You haven't played 15 college, right? We don't want anything to do with you because.

01:28:32 Speaker_02
How many reps did wrong and when you look at how many games he's played, how many games Jaden's played like maybe it's just trends and it all kind of changes year to year, but it seems like there's real value in avoiding at least avoiding the guys that have like 25 starts to their their career in college.

01:28:50 Speaker_03
The situation piece, which everyone talks about, I mean, he came into an incredible spot too, which can't be understated, right? Like Sean Payton is like, I'm taking this guy 12th. I'm making this work. I'm going to turn him into a QB.

01:29:04 Speaker_03
This is all I care about. And it actually happened. I also thought it was going to be, he's going to be in the playoffs.

01:29:10 Speaker_02
Yeah. Like when he got a new, it was Sean Payton and it kind of turned into a thing where it was like, Oh, so Bo Nix can do this, but Russell Wilson can't. And I just want to be like, maybe Bo Nix isn't the most annoying human being in the NFL.

01:29:23 Speaker_02
What did you have? All right. Um, Matherin or Peyton Pritchard.

01:29:34 Speaker_03
let's just say I handed in a ringer 100 top players list.

01:29:38 Speaker_01
No, you didn't.

01:29:39 Speaker_03
Oh, not only did I, I put them in the eighties. He's been incredible. He's the best. He's the best bench guy in the league.

01:29:53 Speaker_02
He's been awesome. I mean, there's metric when I was going through my top 100 and doing it. And I was looking at like, you know, just all the different things you want to prioritize. Are there any secrets in here? Some of the metric stuff for Pritchard.

01:30:03 Speaker_02
I'm like, how is he? He's up here with these guys.

01:30:06 Speaker_03
And by the way, scratch the other day. And I was like, Pritchard's going off, man. Watch that. And he had like 29. I can't believe you're not in on this. He's been the best bench guy in the league. It's 20 games, 80th best player in the NBA.

01:30:21 Speaker_01
It's a 350 player league. It's in the top quarter. Or 450. McCain or Scoot? Pass.

01:30:35 Speaker_03
Okay.

01:30:37 Speaker_01
We don't pass, Tina.

01:30:40 Speaker_03
How about Tatum or SGA?

01:30:46 Speaker_01
SGA.

01:30:47 Speaker_03
The advanced stuff is like, you used to be on the Tatum side of that.

01:30:55 Speaker_02
No, I love Tatum. I think Tatum doesn't get enough credit for sorry to steal your routine here, but

01:31:03 Speaker_02
his, his setting the table, like even some of the bad shooting nights through the playoffs last year, like watching those, you know, the Curry MVP thing in 15 to this day, it's going to bother me the rest of my life.

01:31:14 Speaker_02
When I die, I hope the first thing someone says will be, he was still really mad about Iguodala getting the 2015 MVP because everything that happened was dictated off of what they were doing to Curry.

01:31:27 Speaker_02
Like, you know, and Iguodala got it because LeBron was held the 40. And so

01:31:32 Speaker_02
When I think about Tatum's impact versus all the other people that benefit from it, I think that part of Tatum's game isn't discussed enough because he also, you know, can be a bucket whenever he wants.

01:31:42 Speaker_02
But the SGA thing is it's kind of hard to deny some of the advanced stuff there that he's just at a different level than Tatum. I have Tatum's slight edge. All right. Shocked.

01:31:54 Speaker_03
I had SGA over him. I thought the last month Tatum played was the best I've seen him play on both ends, everything he's doing. I just feel like he's gotten to another level. His shot, he fixed it. Rebounds, he plays hard every night.

01:32:07 Speaker_03
I just think it's harder to find six, nine guys than guards. And that's it.

01:32:11 Speaker_02
Is he East Coast Jokic?

01:32:13 Speaker_03
No, I would never say that.

01:32:15 Speaker_02
Played center on defense in the NBA finals, played point guard on offense. Does he love horses? I got one for you, Jordan Poole or Draymond Green? As a roommate.

01:32:32 Speaker_03
I think that would be a fun one for road trip, Jordan Poole. On my basketball team, probably Draymond Green. Dinner? Interesting. Maybe Draymond.

01:32:45 Speaker_02
Draymond, definitely.

01:32:46 Speaker_03
Might have a couple of good stories. Yeah. How about Otani or Connor McDavid?

01:32:52 Speaker_02
give me McJesus. I think I agree. I started like putting Oilers games up on while they're NBA playoffs games. And I had this, I had to turn off McJesus because I would turn back to the NBA games. You haven't watched it.

01:33:08 Speaker_02
I was like, I haven't watched 20 minutes. I have no idea what happened.

01:33:11 Speaker_03
Anthony Edwards or Drake may

01:33:15 Speaker_02
I don't care about the Patriots anymore. So, um, post Brady don't care. And a hundred times out of a hundred has it. You've heard me. Um, did you say any of these things about Mac Jones?

01:33:29 Speaker_03
He's comparing him to rookie Mac Jones is insane. He's so much better than Mac Jones. Matt's had a good first three months. He was good.

01:33:38 Speaker_02
I remember hearing like a little Mac is giving off early Brady vibes.

01:33:43 Speaker_03
It was 2001 Brady vibes.

01:33:45 Speaker_02
That's right. Game manager vibes game. I always loved that. It's amazing. It's a great Peyton Manning rule. And I need to do these. I'm going to track these, maybe write a small book on it.

01:33:53 Speaker_02
But whenever a rookie QB has a million interceptions, they're like, well, Peyton had 30. I'm like, okay, I guess he's going to be Peyton Manning. And anytime a quarterback didn't do a ton, but they just won games. You're like Tom Brady, 2001. Like great.

01:34:05 Speaker_02
No, I guess it'll be Tom Brady. You or me here? I got a couple left.

01:34:11 Speaker_01
I got like two left. Go ahead. Mobley or Lively? Mobley. You like Lively that much?

01:34:21 Speaker_02
I just wanted to see where you were at with it. I'm still, I kept my Mobley position. But you're aware he's not going to be like that, right? I'm not giving up.

01:34:31 Speaker_03
I'm an optimistic guy. We'll see. Okay. Team's playing well. How about this one? Sean Payton or Jim Harbaugh? Wow. A lot of Harbaugh's.

01:34:46 Speaker_02
Harbaugh's my new neighbor.

01:34:47 Speaker_01
Uh, give me Harbaugh.

01:34:56 Speaker_03
I think I would take Harbaugh too, but I think Payton's done a really good job with the Broncos. Um, Jamal Murray or Dame Lillard?

01:35:12 Speaker_02
I thought Malone's comments last night were pretty interesting. Cause like Jamal was getting hunted late in the game. Like that was the primary thing that golden say wanted to get into. And then Malone was like, I hope he knows.

01:35:24 Speaker_02
And he takes pride in the fact and like make sure that doesn't keep happening. Having said that game will be hunted defensively. He's hunted on the way to the game. So he's probably a better, like, peak holy shit score.

01:35:38 Speaker_02
But see, as I say that, like, Dame's had more of that in his career, but those Jamal playoff games are a huge deal for me. So Jamal and the age thing.

01:35:48 Speaker_03
I would take Jamal because I feel like there's another level to where he can get to where Dame is where he is now at the age he's at and who he is.

01:35:57 Speaker_02
Dame's a much worse foul baiter, too. It drives me crazy.

01:36:00 Speaker_03
Roger Goodell or Adam Silver?

01:36:07 Speaker_02
Well, if we both pick silver, people are going to think we're doing, although if you pick silver, I think people would understand why I'm going to go with silver just because I felt like the NFL had a stretch there.

01:36:20 Speaker_02
And again, the commissioner is the mouthpiece of ownership. So you always have to remember that. But the NFL ownership run there was just so gross and so arrogant and so dismissive of people like the NBA has never had a run like that.

01:36:33 Speaker_03
That's well put. I think if I was an owner, I would rather have Goodell. But as a human being, I would rather have Adam Silver. But if it's somebody to run my business, like right now, like, uh, cause Paramount got bought.

01:36:50 Speaker_03
The NFL has it out in their deal. And you just know Goodell is going to be like fucking Tony Soprano with it. Like, He's like, you're going to pay us more and that's how it's going to play out. And he's just, it's who he is.

01:37:00 Speaker_02
Yeah. The TV thing is a lot like college football to me.

01:37:03 Speaker_02
Cause anybody that's heard this rant, I'm not, I promise I'm not going to do it again right now, but like there has to be a point of diminishing returns of having, I don't know, Cal play SMU in an ACC fucking game. All right.

01:37:14 Speaker_02
So when I look at people losing track of who's where and how dumb and imbalanced the schedules are and leading to all sorts of nonsensical results from the season, it's like, okay, how much further can college football push the money grab to where maybe start turning people off?

01:37:29 Speaker_03
And clearly the NFL is there.

01:37:31 Speaker_02
Well, no, because I think the live rights thing is we both know, you know, whether it's our time at ESPN and understanding of being the priority, which it should have been, but

01:37:40 Speaker_02
they are treating it like cocaine and they are cutting it up as much as they possibly can. And they're putting it on every single corner. And you're like, I still have an NBC streaming subscription. I'm like, how, how did that happen?

01:37:58 Speaker_02
And when they did that last round of packages, it's like, they don't even care. And it's actually kind of smart. It's like, why are we doing deals with two or three networks?

01:38:07 Speaker_02
Put it on eight and everybody will get their little piece and that'll drive up the price. And I always wonder if there's a moment in time where it's like, we did too much of it and it actually kind of hurt it. I don't know. I don't know.

01:38:19 Speaker_03
I wondered that as well. And then I was so excited. There was a black Friday game. I was like, Hey, I, apparently they can have the NFL every day of the week. Three Thanksgiving games. There's like, wait, the Raiders are playing.

01:38:31 Speaker_03
I get to watch Aiden O'Connell.

01:38:34 Speaker_02
It's a chief's team that doesn't care. I'm in. Do you guys remember that Denver Thursday night or two years ago? The Colts, right? Denver Colts. I was in Vermont. I was in a hotel room. I'm watching it on my laptop because I couldn't get prime on the TV.

01:38:51 Speaker_02
And it was one of the worst things I've ever watched. And I remember this amazing, empowering moment where I went, I'm going to turn this off.

01:39:02 Speaker_03
Yeah. I don't have to watch. I think they've done a better job with the Thursday schedule this year. It's Packers lions on Thursday.

01:39:12 Speaker_02
The NFL is like, as soon as you get a couple of games, you're like, we're going to give you some really weak product. Yeah. The first we've been like the Christmas games, the games are pretty good.

01:39:22 Speaker_03
Well, Casey Pittsburgh might actually matter.

01:39:24 Speaker_02
The nice thing about the NFL doing their Christmas thing is that Goodell told us that that was because football is family.

01:39:33 Speaker_03
I'll say this. It really bothered me that the NBA got rid of Thanksgiving games and that there's so scared of the NFL now.

01:39:40 Speaker_02
What about the Thursday TNT thing? Like we have to wait basically now is that, and look, I used to love betting on Aaron Brooks at UVA and in college when it was the Virginia Thursday night, ACC thing, like that was my shit.

01:39:52 Speaker_02
And that was one of the great college games. And it was so awesome to have that on a Thursday. And now again, everyone's just so terrified of them.

01:39:59 Speaker_03
But I thought the NBA, I thought it was nice to have those two. And instead they have 15 games on a Wednesday. You can't watch, you know, as you can't watch all of them at the same time.

01:40:08 Speaker_03
And I just, I don't know, like, I feel like they've moved too far away. They already got the TV deal. It's not like, oh, ratings are down. People always love to do this with the email. The ratings are down. Well, who cares?

01:40:19 Speaker_03
They just signed an 11 year deal. You think they give a shit? Like they got the money already.

01:40:23 Speaker_02
So put more games on times when I want to watch. I don't even know what ratings being down means. Cause every time it happens, then the TV deal triples the previous one. I don't either. I don't know.

01:40:34 Speaker_03
I've never been a ratings guy.

01:40:37 Speaker_02
When you have them.

01:40:37 Speaker_03
No, I'm just like when it became like a thing about, Oh, ratings are down 12%. I was like, all right.

01:40:44 Speaker_02
I like fastest growing show in America. Oh, that's a good one. There was a couple of shows at ESPN that just were at a zero. and they were ramping up. Or they replaced the worst show possible.

01:40:55 Speaker_01
Yeah.

01:40:55 Speaker_02
Right. And then I'd be like, who keeps track of fasting show in America? That would seem like a huge deal. It's like, well, if you start at zero, who can really say, I have one more for you. Yeah.

01:41:05 Speaker_02
Would you rather watch nineties NBA players at the TNT desk after a wizard's Hornets game? or an MSNBC panel after the election?

01:41:22 Speaker_03
Can I pass up both? I got one more for you. Yellowstone or Landman?

01:41:30 Speaker_02
Early Yellowstone, there's a version of events where if I had moved out here, I would have modeled my entire thing after Rip. dually super inefficient gasoline. The wind visor hat probably would definitely get my ass kicked more than rip did. But.

01:41:55 Speaker_02
You know, there's sort of like we're all, you know, we can be a certain age, but this is all a little make believe I would hope some of us.

01:42:02 Speaker_02
So yeah, earlier Yellowstone rip is really high up there for me, although I think that the show it's tentacles went into a bunch of different directions there. I love Landman. Have you watched? I've seen the clips. I've not, I've not dug in yet.

01:42:18 Speaker_03
Landman is unbelievable. It's Billy Bob Thornton clearing out LaMelo on the Charlotte Hornets style. He's just like, can I shoot 35 times today? And Taylor Sheridan's like, you can.

01:42:32 Speaker_03
And Allie Larder comes in and she's like, can I just be like a way crazier Varsity Blues, older person version of that? He's like, absolutely.

01:42:41 Speaker_03
And then they're like, should we do stuff with the daughter that's kind of inappropriate with older characters on the show? And Taylor Sheridan's like, done. And then things blow up every once in a while.

01:42:51 Speaker_02
It's great. Where are you with Jon Hamm texting? Can you text him after an episode?

01:42:56 Speaker_03
I would not.

01:42:57 Speaker_02
I would not.

01:42:58 Speaker_03
Yeah, but I think that's like a real... I would text him if I liked it, but I wouldn't be like, I don't know about episode four.

01:43:05 Speaker_02
Well, I didn't expect you to do that. That would actually be an amazing friendship. The funniest thing is like, did you realize you peaked?

01:43:14 Speaker_03
The funniest thing is Demi Moore's in this show. Good for her. I actually like what Sher, Sheridan's casting is awesome. Let me finish. She doesn't have any lines.

01:43:24 Speaker_02
Oh, I haven't watched it.

01:43:26 Speaker_03
I think she's had like five lines in four episodes, but they make it seem like she's in it, but she's kind of like Joel Embiid on the Sixers, where it's like, he's not playing again?

01:43:37 Speaker_03
So I don't know whether they were doing her a favor or she couldn't be for the first five episodes or what's going on. Maybe it's game management.

01:43:43 Speaker_02
Here's the deal, we want your comeback story to be this, but you don't have to do anything. I haven't watched it. I'm in a deficit here. I really liked it. But you do watch old succession episodes. Yeah, I love it.

01:43:55 Speaker_02
I think I had an epiphany recently where it has surpassed everything else as my favorite show. And like, we could all go with The Wire and Sopranos, and I loved Mad Men. I loved it.

01:44:04 Speaker_02
But there's something about succession where the show found a way to put stuff in it that it didn't need. Like, I'll use a small example here. I promise not to go too long on it.

01:44:15 Speaker_02
But the election night episode, where they already have everything they need, right? It's going to be this close election.

01:44:21 Speaker_02
The Roys are going to have to be put in a situation where they're going to have to make this decision and call the election for Mencken and Shiv is going to fight against them. So they got the back and forth and Tom is just lost in all of it.

01:44:30 Speaker_02
But the fact that in that dramatic, I don't know, hour long show, but in that moment, it's a few minutes that Greg gets wasabi. on something so that their data guy, like their Nate silver, it's wasabi in his eyes.

01:44:46 Speaker_02
And Greg is dumping lemon flavored LaCroix into his eyes. And in the script, Greg is yelling, it's not that lemony. It's just a hint of lemon.

01:44:59 Speaker_02
The brilliance to be able to write like all the stuff that matter and that that episode could have not had that. And it still would have been a great episode and the tension of the election night.

01:45:07 Speaker_02
And now what's at stake and how wrong they could have got it and everything that develops off of that, that they were like, let's just have a moment where Greg gets wasabi in the data guy's eyes. It's just not a lot of shows. It's great.

01:45:18 Speaker_03
So you've been binging succession. I've been binging Sopranos. And I might have to, I did the full circle. I started on writer at the end of season four, went all the way through to finish, because there was a marathon.

01:45:33 Speaker_03
I'm like, all right, I want to keep watching. And I got to the end and I was like, season one? And my wife is just furious now. She's like, what the, really again? You just did this two years ago. So maybe I need to shift the succession.

01:45:49 Speaker_03
Cause I feel the same way about The Sopranos that you do about Succession, where I can just watch the same episode over and over again and just learn, find new things, you know?

01:45:57 Speaker_02
You know what I love about a rewatch? And I think AJ was awesome. Yeah, he really was. He was so good. He gained steam. AJ got booed.

01:46:06 Speaker_03
That doesn't seem very nice. He didn't- No. Well, let's end with this. How many cities could you have actually lived in?

01:46:13 Speaker_03
And I mean, actual cities, they can't be like, you can't say off the beaten path, like cities that have to have at least one sports team. How many could you have lived in? You have to have at least one professional sports team. Yeah, Hartford's out.

01:46:28 Speaker_02
Hartford was going to be one of my go-to's. Well, I always wanted to move to Manhattan Beach, accomplished. I did want to live here. It was close, but I could live here. I love it here. Great group of friends.

01:46:41 Speaker_02
I've just never had a bad time coming to Colorado, so. Wyoming, we're 0 for 1.

01:46:49 Speaker_03
I just got that one. Thanks. For me, Boston and LA, which I've already done. I absolutely could live here. I really like it here. Um, what about San Antonio, Texas? I'm out Chicago, the extreme weather. I'm out. That's why I love Boston, Seattle.

01:47:11 Speaker_03
If they had an NBA team, I'd really consider it. Um, and that's, that's about it. It would take a lot to get me to leave LA just for like, it was on Thanksgiving. It was 70 degrees.

01:47:24 Speaker_02
What about where the Panthers play?

01:47:27 Speaker_03
Where's that?

01:47:29 Speaker_02
I don't know. So that's it. So you could move here, but you, well, once you said NBA town, it screwed up my whole St. Barts thing.

01:47:39 Speaker_03
I didn't say NBA. You could have any team. No, because I think Nashville's getting momentum now.

01:47:45 Speaker_02
No. Cause you guys think I bought this boat for like luxury purposes and it's actually my exit strategy. St. Barts, Rye, Bo captain. NBA pod once a week to cover the boat excise tax.

01:48:00 Speaker_02
No, it just needs something to cover the taxes, which I know I'm not supposed to bring up anymore, but so you'd have the boat in St.

01:48:08 Speaker_03
Barts. I don't know. I would live there, but you'd have YouTube TV.

01:48:12 Speaker_02
Yeah. Unless they do some weird thing of like, are you here permanently? Because you just keep clicking on visiting.

01:48:21 Speaker_03
This would all lead to you disappear and we do like an eight episode ringer podcast. Well, there was a thing about what happened to you.

01:48:28 Speaker_02
There was a South of France thing where I was looking at something on Zillow where I was like, I could just have the worst schedule ever and do NBA pods from here. Like at five in the morning, I don't have anything telling me I can't do it.

01:48:41 Speaker_02
And then, um, I think something came up and I was like, I can't, what was the shortest amount of time where you decided that you were flying somewhere?

01:48:49 Speaker_03
that wasn't in this country. And then you were actually going on the plane.

01:48:54 Speaker_02
All right. This is actually kind of funny. Cause when I flew to Reykjavik in Iceland, the flight from Minneapolis to Reykjavik is like five hours, four 45. And I was like, dude, if I meet, just some smoke show from Reykjavik.

01:49:07 Speaker_02
Like I could just, it's not that bad of flight. It's, it's two and a half to Minneapolis from LA. And then he could live in Minnesota. You get the timber. Well, I could live in LA and I could commute through and then I could be a Reykjavik.

01:49:21 Speaker_02
We'd split time. you went through this thought process. I just couldn't. It was, it was like you sit in the, I remember when I flew to Greece once I was like all pumped up and I like turned to the guy next to me. I was like, what do we got?

01:49:37 Speaker_02
Like six, seven hours here. Cause I was so used to the East coast Europe thing. The guy's like 11. And I went, fuck, I have not mentally prepared myself for 11. So what was the fastest you've gone on a trip though? Right, so that was the Iceland one.

01:49:53 Speaker_02
Once I sat down and I saw the thing on the graphic, I'm like, 4.45? Should I look at property? Yeah. And it was all because it wasn't seven hours, it was under five. It was really stupid. I mean, all these things are stupid that I do.

01:50:09 Speaker_02
San Sebastian, applying for a job.

01:50:11 Speaker_03
Do you tell people when you're like all of a sudden on your way to some country? Do you, are there five people you're like, Hey, just FYI, I'm going to be in Spain for a while.

01:50:22 Speaker_02
No, I actually was in New Zealand hopping on, um, like this, this prop plane over Milford Sound, and you had to sign all these waivers. And I was like, I probably should tell somebody.

01:50:32 Speaker_02
So I remember I forwarded my trust and will to my brother, and I was like, hey, I'm in New Zealand. I was like, did you get that email? And he's like, what the fuck are you doing right now? He's like, are you all right? I was like, no, I'm fine.

01:50:45 Speaker_02
I'm going to where they film Lord of the Rings.

01:50:48 Speaker_03
You were like, so Scoot Henderson gets 10%, you get 40. 5% to Yoko just so you can buy another horse.

01:50:59 Speaker_02
I just hope Scoot gets a second contract and he won't need any of my money.

01:51:04 Speaker_03
Last thing, what's your prediction for the Denver Nuggets this season? How many rounds?

01:51:12 Speaker_02
I don't know. I don't know what you're trading unless you just pull the flag of Michael Porter Jr. and you think it's an upgrade.

01:51:18 Speaker_03
You look at the contracts, it's...

01:51:22 Speaker_02
It's gotta be Porter. Who's, who's the impactful person that then makes you better? Cause Gordon, like I love Gordon on this team so much.

01:51:30 Speaker_02
I don't know that I would, there actually, there's no version of him I would like as much as this one because of Jokic and the baseline stuff and all that stuff.

01:51:36 Speaker_03
Well, the other thing is it's harder to make trades now, which I didn't, I'm still kind of figuring out the machinations cause we gotta get ready for when we start doing fake trades in about a month.

01:51:45 Speaker_02
Yeah, but it's not even what the penalties are in place. It's the fear of what the next one will do to you. Yeah.

01:51:49 Speaker_03
But even also just matching the contracts and being like, no, no, you actually can't do that because you're over this apron. So you can only... I didn't get into sports to actually have to figure out fucking math. I'll tell you that much.

01:52:02 Speaker_03
And it's the most confusing it's ever been. You look at it and go, well, why wouldn't they trade Michael Porter for Zach Levine? That would be an interesting trade, right? And it's like, no, you can't. Cause then you got to give him Zeke Najee.

01:52:13 Speaker_03
It's a hypothetical. Some Porter fans, huh?

01:52:18 Speaker_02
I think it's a matchup thing. Like I think some teams still have real like question mark. There's some teams that want to close small all the time.

01:52:28 Speaker_02
Like I'm noticing the more and more where teams will just like match each other with small lineups and like, Hey, here we go again. It depends on the draw, but they're certainly not the favorites, but here's Phoenix. Who's falling apart again.

01:52:38 Speaker_03
Well, how many West teams do you really like? Cause for me, it's like assuming check comes back, which we have no idea. Okay. C is the only one I feel great about.

01:52:47 Speaker_02
Yeah. Dallas is turning it around. They're going to be good, but I don't know if they're locked into as a seed, but if it were Dallas Denver, I mean, it also has to see how it looks in March and April.

01:52:58 Speaker_03
I'm trying to think of a single team in the West that would be psyched to see Jokic. I'm going to say the answer is zero, but OKC would be, you know, they're just like, take your 40. We'll take out everybody else. We have a way better team than you.

01:53:12 Speaker_03
And that would be a really tough one. So I would have OKC, and then I just think it's TBD. I liked Phoenix, and we went big on them in the over-unders, and Durant's been hurt twice now already. We're not even in mid-December.

01:53:26 Speaker_03
Yeah, but it might be one of those. One of the things I'm thinking about with this season is just, do we count on these mid-30s guys too much? you know, forget about LeBron, the age he's at, but do even Curry 36 Durant and the 2007 draft on and on.

01:53:44 Speaker_03
And we see like the best case version of them when they're actually playing. But the season's like too fucking hard. Now all these teams are good. The style of play is really hard to play and flying up and down. Then you got four playoff rounds.

01:53:57 Speaker_03
It's like maybe you know, somebody like Curry, how realistic is it that he could get through a season like this where he's carrying the burden he's carrying and then win four straight playoff rounds?

01:54:07 Speaker_02
No way. Look, I want to defend Curry all the time. The second player isn't good enough.

01:54:10 Speaker_02
I don't even know who it is for a playoff team to get through multiple rounds in this West two years ago or two and a half years ago, they barely got there and they got a lot of luck.

01:54:19 Speaker_03
You know, I just wonder if this is the year where it's like Boston, Cleveland, OKC, these young, talented, hungry teams. And it's just, those are going to be the three. I think Cleveland's in the conversation though. I believe in them.

01:54:31 Speaker_02
I do, but I do think it's going to be tough to close those two bigs. And that's why they're benching Jared Allen down those stretches. And I think that's what it looked like.

01:54:38 Speaker_02
And that's probably the best chance to not, I just don't know how you can play three out with two non-shooters in a game in the playoffs in today's league, but I'm not done with Minnesota. Phoenix is a tough gamble.

01:54:47 Speaker_02
Denver Denver's in that mix with those teams. You're not done with Minnesota. No, it's December 4th.

01:54:54 Speaker_03
I'm done. If this is the roster, I'm not who booed. you guys all hated Minnesota. It knocked you out last year.

01:55:04 Speaker_02
A lot of, there's a lot of transplants in Denver bill.

01:55:07 Speaker_03
I do not like the body language or the ball movement on the Minnesota Timberwolves.

01:55:13 Speaker_02
You know what I want for me?

01:55:14 Speaker_03
I don't like the dueling banjos. Your turn, my turn. I'm out.

01:55:17 Speaker_02
When we get ready, when we do our first NBA Sunday pod, I want your five favorite body language teams.

01:55:24 Speaker_03
Five favorite bad body language.

01:55:26 Speaker_02
No, five favorite body language. Oh, like raving about high fives.

01:55:30 Speaker_03
Oh my God. I thought golden state was great last night there. Everybody was standing body language. Doctor noticed that. Okay. See, I like when they all do the postgame interview together. Heartwarming. Uh, Boston I think has, has great stuff.

01:55:45 Speaker_03
Everybody's pulling for each other. You can see, you can tell which teams like each other.

01:55:48 Speaker_02
It looks like you already did the segment.

01:55:51 Speaker_03
Be easy to prep. Hey, Denver, this was great. I'm glad we came. We got an incredible Jokic game. That was the other reason we came. He delivered. He was great to watch in person. What a treasure. I hope you guys appreciate him. We love being here.

01:56:10 Speaker_03
Any last words? We'll see you at the gun. We will not see you at Shotgun Willie's. Thank you, Denver. All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Kyle Creighton and Steve Cerruti for producing. Thanks to Rosillo for joining me in Denver.

01:56:33 Speaker_03
Thanks to Elizabeth Fearman as well. Uh, thanks to everybody who came out for the show. It was great. Don't forget to check out the ringer.com's relaunch and don't forget third podcast of the week.

01:56:46 Speaker_03
Come in Thursday night, well after that Packers-Lions game, and don't forget, million dollar picks. Packers plus four and a half would love to throw for at least 200 yards, but 200K and that, that is a very, very nice parlay.

01:56:59 Speaker_03
Minus 101 on Fandle, wherever you can find Fandle. That's it, I will see you in 24 hours.

01:57:04 Speaker_04
♪ I wanna see them, wanna waste all that I say ♪ on the wayside