Welcome into Clippers Talk. I'm Adam Osland, and all right, giving the magnitude of our guests today, I'm gonna cut the shit and not get into a bunch of stuff, and I'm gonna tease out for later in the show. We're just gonna dive right in here as I'm joined by a comedian for the people who's genuine, relatable and down to earth, blue collar you could say, but hell no, I'm not talking about. Jeff Boxworthy joining the podcast right
now is one of our own Clipper Nation. He's a Clipper super fan that we are lucky to have on our side. Of course, you know him from shows like The League, Human Giant, Beep, Black Monday, The Popular How Did This Get Made? Podcasts, and of course he's the only legacy character. He's been in both Twister movies, some say. Plus, he's got a New York Times best seller out titled Joyful Recollections of Trauma. It's the wonderfully talented Paul's here
joining me here on Clippers Talk. Paul, thanks so much for doing this.
Adam, I am thrilled to be here, and I gotta tell you, you know, this is maybe the first time that we've really talked talk to seeing each other of talk, but you have accompanied my rides home from the stadium in moments of joy and defeat. You have been a consistent voice for me, and I just want to say thank you. I think Clipper Nation need to say thank you for an even keeled voice in the times of despair and even in the times of triumph. We have
to just ride. We got a long ride ahead of us, and you are always guiding that train perfectly.
You know, those times of despair are usually when I'm talking to Sean from Englewood, so I appreciate the kind words. We're hoping for better rides home this upcoming season. We're going to get into all of that, because if you guys weren't familiar enough, Paul is a real hooper. He knows ball. We were talking the DMS during the playoffs. He has a high level basketball mind. So I'm gonna
pepper him with a ton of Clippers questions here. But I do want to start with your career, and I want to start with the league.
Now.
Admittedly I had a bit of a strain relationship with fantasy football and stop playing in two thousand and seven, the scoring system. Oh yeah, yeah, you know, I would say I started the rehabilitation a little bit sooner than some maybe, Okay, but I didn't watch the show because I heard how good it was for my best friend, who religiously watched it, and I was scared if I did, I'd get back on the train be addicted once again to playing fantasy football and the scoring system, the head
to head scoring system, I just hated. I couldn't take it because I'd end up like thirteen points and then still miss the playoffs somehow, Paul.
Look, this is no nothing incap plated sports more than fantasy football. Right. You could have everything on your side, one thing goes south and you're done. You're just done. And you know, it's something that I have been doing now for a long time. I never played fantasy football before the show started. Now I can't stop playing fantasy football, mainly because people keep on asking me to be in
their leagues. But it really there's so many variables to this game, and it's not unlike it's not unlike basketball, it's not unlike any sport where like it can go south at a moment's notice. You could come in a percentage point behind and lose that week. It's infuriating. It's frustrating. You could have a great season and just have one weekend where somebody goes off and knocks you out of
the playoffs. It is a disgusting sport. And the worst part about it is listening to other people talk about it because it's it's so personal. It's like listening to somebody tell you their dreams. It only matters to you, but we all can understand the pain and the anguish of subbing. And thank god sleeper. I love the sleeper app for Fantasy. Tried it for basketball, don't know how I feel about it, but love the sleeper app for NFL. Now they have an auto sub, and thank God for
auto sub. So now I don't have to worry if if I woke up ten minutes later and somebody is inactive who was supposed to be active the entire week. Like finally, I have a little bit of like okay, like I can rest easy. But this is a panic that just sets in and lives with me all year round.
You mentioned you're in a few different leagues because people ask you. You're probably too nice. I know, our guy Chuck Mockler has you in one of his leagues. How many leagues are you in now? When you went from none to what ten thousand?
Yeah, you know, I've cut it down in the years that post week because honestly, at a certain point, I'm just I'm not there. I'm not mentally there. Plus, I have two kids. I have an eight year old and a ten year old. I'm not sitting on the couch watching football all sunday. I would love to, It's not an option that's afforded to me as a parent. I gotta go out. I'm going to soccer games, I'm going
to basketball tournaments. I'm out and about. I'm not like and I'm not gonna come home and watch them on tape. So I'm really like, it's not like Clippers. My wife, my kids like Clippers. They'll let me get away with that football. I can't just be like. So my knowledge of football has suffered for sure. I have like ct from playing fantasy. So I think I'm about I'm in about like five leagues now, four or five. Yes, man,
you know some are gonna like. But my only requirement now is if you're you have to be on the sleeper app for me to join your thing. Because I can't be jumping around to Yahoo and then going over to ESPN and then no one stop shopping for me is what I need?
So I think you had people hooked with the league starting with the Eskimo Brothers.
What Yeah, When did you know you.
Had something special here that could last seven seasons?
You know? It was always something in the back of my mind that I had confidence in because the creators of the show, Jeff Shaffer and Jackie Marcus Shaffer, they're married couple, both brilliant writers, but Jeffy come out of Seinfeld and Curb, and his approach to the show was very similar to Curb, just having a great premise, you know, terms like the Eskimo Brothers and stuff like that, and then letting us improvise around it. So we really got
to bring a lot of ourselves to it. But then when you look at like the work that He's come from and Jackie come from this giant comedy movie background, they were they had the football goods and they had the comedy goods, and very rarely do those two paths
kind of cross. I've seen a lot of mediocre fantasy football comedy content, so I felt like when I knew something happened was in the second season because everyone had watched the first season on Netflix and after we had already been off the air, and it felt like there was an energy Oh when you guys coming back, when you're coming back so much so that when it hits like August September, everyone seems to be rewatching it again, which is which is something I love. You know, it
really is truly a show that I love doing. I love that cast. I miss it. But we kind of got out when the getting was good. It was in a little dark in the football world for a bit, like it was Goodell, you know, look, there's a lot of things going on, and you know, I think the last season had me reenacting like a fight that ray Rice had with his girlfriend and an elevator in Las Vegas.
I'm like, I don't know. Now, we got out before we had to make any comment that we might regret about Colin Kaepernick, Like, like, I feel like we we avoided some of the bigger controversies that happened for a couple of years there.
How do you guys take me behind the scenes a little bit with that process of scripted but semi scripted where you're still ad libbing a lot. How does that work? How do you find that balance? I guess, well, you know, it's.
An interesting way of doing a show. It actually is something that that is not really done. You know, it's basically Curb in the League and maybe like a little bit of Reno NW one one. We're really base in this. But I would almost say that Curb in the League fall in different category because they are tightly scripted episodes as far as what is the plot, who's in this scene,
where are we going? Like the episodes. You know, I've written a handful of League episodes, and it was harder to write than an actual script because what you really had to do was create enough stuff so the actors myself included, when you got on set you had enough to work off of, but also not enough that you couldn't go off and explore tangents like stuff like I think in like like I think I did this thing about like oh I'm Jack the Ripper, I'm cutting up
losers and stuff like that's not in the script, but then we get to go off on that or like there was a thing where I'm running a marathon. Now, like when I said I'm running a marathon, They're like, oh, what a marathon. That bit was in the script. But then because I had this prop in my pocket called like like, it was like it was a gunk or junk like and I was born junk a spunk in my mouth, like that became a thing that we would
run with. So really it was like if you just improvise the beats that were in the exact script, not the lines, because there were really no lines. There was more of a suggestion of dialogue. You would have a really funny script, but the power of the show was having a really funny outline that then we could expand and find different things on. Sometimes we'd stay very clean
to script. Other times we'd go off on these big tangents, and then those tangents would actually develop into other plotlines. Like there was a joke I made one time with one of the girls in the show, the young girl, and I said, she said, oh, you're bald. I'm like, actually, I'm not bald. I have clear hair. It was just like a joke that I made to make Jeff and Jackie laugh, and then they left that in the show, and then like five episodes later that is now a
part of my character. So that was something that was really funny, Like they would really always be incorporating stuff that we used into the show, and it was this really amazing process, and you never knew what they were going to use until you WoT to show that weekend or you know, that Wednesday, or whenever it came out. You'd be like, oh, well they use that instead of that, Oh they should have used this. There's so much stuff
that was, you know, on the editing room floor. If you ever got the DVDs, you'd see tons of extended episodes and deleted scenes.
Speaking of DVDs, I feel like some are missing from your catalog. I'm still trying to find Human Giant Volume two stuff in high quality, because I swear to God, the rob hu will skit where he cut his junk off for social media cloud. I know where I was, I know who I watched that with the first time. Like that is probably one of the funniest things I've ever seen in my life.
And it's hard to find. It's incredibly hard to find. I mean, we're in this world right now where if you're if you're even a casual fan of Hollywood, you will know that these big streamers are essentially just big corporations that are looking to cut costs wherever they can. So you have a show like Willow on Disney Plus, a week after it finishes airing, they pull it off Disney Plus. You can't get it anywhere else. It's just
gone or raised from existence. And you know, we were a little bit of a victim of that because they offered us a third season. Aziz had gotten parks and rec we were a little bit nervous about, well, do we have enough to do a third season? We said no, and they said, all right, well we're gonna pull off season two. So season two is lost to the masses, but we have the masters. We recently found them in
a storage closet on Broadway in fifty second Street. But we were hoping that, you know, like a place like Shout Factory that does like these amazing re releases of like UHF and stuff like that will come and we could actually put together like a definitive Blu Ray Season one season two. I keep on saying it until somebody hears it, but we're going to try to really release it and give it its proper due with tons of extra stuff that we have.
Let them know because it is a legendary sketch comedy show. Those who saw it remember it. Well, it's interesting you bring that up, and it's hard to find. I'm a weirdo, so I get upset when I hear like music overdubbed, of this generic stuff over DVDs because they couldn't get the royalties for the original music on like a d Austin's Creek episode or something.
Even that bothers me. Well, here's the thing, and the State, the sketch comedy show. The State fell victim to that. So when you watch their show, it's completely overdubbed. They're even dubbing their voices because they were mixed in with the music. It's a mess. We came in at Human Giant right at the time of iTunes starting and YouTube starting, and there was a big mandate you have to clear all your music. So everything that we have is completely cleared.
It is completely free and legally we own it. It's the right We did it the right way, and we still can't get it out. But I know what you're saying. Like shows like Moonlighting and SETV, they all kind of fall into this. They did for a long time into this category where you. Yeah, you had to change everything, you know, so you have that, you have shows just being disappeared, to mean, even Black Monday, which is a show we did for three seasons on Showtime. When Showtime folded,
Black Monday just went away. I mean, hopefully we'll go to Hulu, We'll go to Netflix. But it was one of those it's a bummer because it's a great show with great guests, and you know, going back to great guests, a Human Giant we had everybody will aren't at Michael Sarah, Fred Armissen, Andy Samberg, Like we were packing that show with like all these amazing comedy people. So even from that perspective, when you look at it, you're like, holy shit,
these guys really like we did. We hosted MTV for twenty four hours and people were just coming in that were just watching live on TV in their hotel rooms, like it was. John Krazinski came in and took the studio hostage. We had bands like masted On playing, and we had like actors from the Wire just because we liked the Wire. You know, it was it was a real wild.
Time hashtag Human Giant Forever. And then the movie that could have been the laptop gets stolen multiple times.
My gosh, yeah, you know the store. This is a nuts story. So you know, one of our fans of the show was Ben Stiller and this producer that Ben worked with, Mike Rosenstein. He's amazing. He produces the Eric Andre Show. Now made this great movie called Have a Good Trip, all about like LSD and mushrooms, and Mike showed it to Ben. Ben was like, we are one hundred percent on board. Whatever you guys want to do,
let's go do it. And we had this idea, like a an idea that took place at a comic con where you know, I played my own twin Rob was like a like a Michael Knight from Night Writer type of like David Hasselff kind of hacked an actor and it was just kind of like heist and in kind of a little bit of like using internet fame to get back in the good races of America. So that was like the plan and asas was kind of behind this big giant issue that we had.
Oh it's a damn shame the what If series?
Oh yeah, and it got And so both times we've written a bunch our laptop got stolen and this is again before the iCloud and all this sort of stuff, like we didn't back anything up, we lost it. So then we got another computer started doing it, and then our director's car got broken into and that loptop was stolen, and we're like, all right, if this start has been stolen twice, maybe it wasn't the movie for us to do.
This is fair. The movie gods have spoken here. Yeah, the podcast gods have spoken, and they have declared how did this get made to be one of the greatest shows of all time? Oh? Earlier today I'm listening to because I watched a lot of stupid movies, like you guys doing the Room, and I know you have a virtual live tour right now, and Troll two's coming up on Friday, which of course is an all timer that you're doing. I was listening to Shark Attack three meg ladon.
I think you're.
Alive internationally over in Europe for that one.
Yeah, I mean, what a poll by you guys.
I love that.
Oh my gosh, well, you know, actually that was a all right. So we have an amazing producer. Her name is April Hallie. She has been finding these movies for us. Now. The interesting thing about that that Shark Attack three that was actually in the States. But here's the thing that was interesting. It was the only show that we ever have done where we were a part of a festival. So people weren't buying tickets to come see how did this get made? They were just coming to see a show.
And I think they saw, Oh, it's Jason Manzukis, it's June Diane Rayfield, it's Paul Sheer, let's go see this comedy show. And we were so nervous, right, I don't know, like what this is. We we did a little informal poll like the audience. It was like, you know, of the small house as far as how many people could actually even fit in there. And I would say like one third of the audience knew what the show was. The rest of them did it. And we're like, oh man,
we got to walk them through Shark Attack three. Thank god. Shark Attack three is pretty easy to explain. Tsunami happens, Sharks get stuck in a supermarket. There's your movie, and then a bunch of supermarket workers, including a a guy who's holding a supermarket up for ransom or taking you know, stealing the cash registers. Is in there as well, wild movie absurd.
I would like to pitch you something since I have you locked in the elevator for a second. I would love to hear a how did this get made? Type of episode regarding a Clippers roster, maybe, like how did this team get put together? Why are they drafting all over Candy? Why is Pete Chill cut on this team?
Brian? Like, what are we doing? Guys? I don't know. Here was the thing. Here's what I'll say about that. It would we would have the same amount of confusion as we did about Shark Attack Free. Like sometimes there are no good answers to these questions like this is it? Like, I mean, it's amazing. I came from New York. I grew up in New York. I was a Knicks fan my entire life. Came out to LA and really wanted to have a team that I would you know, that would be a part of my life as I lived
out here. I knew I wasn't going to go back and wanted my kids to be invested in the team. And you know, so I got involved with the Clippers, but I had no knowledge of like their history. I was like, oh, I like Blake Griffin. He seems cool. This is interesting, Like you know, there was like a newness to it. And man, when I read The Curse, that is a that book is just I mean that is talking about it. I mean that is a how
to this get made? Of the Clippers? The every element of it is like I had to put it down at points back. I can't take any more of this. This is just It is a tragedy. I mean, this is put this up next to like Shakespeare's greatest works.
It seemed to be cruel and unusual punishment until Steve Balmer came along with this scene. In the last ten years, he has them pointed in the right direct.
You mentioned coming over from New York.
Did you have to shed any past fan ships or allegiances to the Knicks or the Nets, or was it that easy to come as a no?
I mean, look, I will always be a Knicks fan at heart in the sense that I love the Knicks. I grew up with the Knicks. But I love like Patrick Ewing, John Starks, you know, Charles Oakley, like that those were my Knicks, right, I love like that team was amazing, and then the Knicks kind of did that thing to me. That almost it's almost an unlike. Well, it's interesting because it's very similar to the Clippers. You know, you have this weird owner that's kind of manipulating things.
Sometimes they're reaching the right way, sometimes they're not. They're so close, they're so far away. And it was a given, you know, give and take. And I thought when I came to LA that, oh the Clippers, what what a relief. They're on the upward. You know, got Doc, got Blake, We're going and and you know, still there were some issues. You know. The one that I have had the hardest time kicking ultimately is the Jets. I haven't really found my team. My kids love the Kansas City Chiefs, so
I'm like, I'm a Chiefs fan. I'll be a Chiefs fan. I don't have an LA team. I would like to have an LA team. My wife won't let me root from Matt Stafford because he didn't like Matt the way that Matt Stafford laughed when that purporter fell off stage after they won the Super Bowl. Like She's like, Noah, I can't room for that guy. So we are a
little teamless. But Aaron Rodgers, you know, look, I could check in on the Jets like Aaron Rodgers perfect example, like, you know, just like that's Jets in a nutshell from Gino Smith and every person that was going to be something it turned out to be nothing. And I was
a Yankee fan growing up. But Yankees now I feel like it's too cliche to even like because when I was growing up, it was like Dave Winfield and Don and and you know, it's like and it wasn't like the you know, and then of course it became like the Derek Jeter. But now it's like, oh, it's it's like the Lakers. The Lakers of baseball is the Yankees, you know, And so it's hard to be like, I'm a Yankees fan baseball kind of an I'm out the door on.
Is it strange at all? Have you caught any agree for taking any s from Lakers fans celebrity friends, because the majority of them are Lakers fans. Here, if you are famous in LA, you're a Laker fan. You're not with the Clippers. How's that relationship been like for you? Have you had any interesting interactions?
You know, when my when the Clippers do something that is bad or bad to my Laker fan friends, I get my phone's blowing up everything. You know, it's like what you signed hard and what you got Westbrook like that kind of you know, everyone's got a pipe in, you know, even like Bomber says, there's too many yurinals. What you know, it's like it's anything to engage and enrage me. I will say this in the comedy scene, there are a lot of Clippers fans. I think that's
because comedy people are underdogs. They root for the underdogs. It's hard to root for like the the jock, right, you want to be the person who kind of comes up. And you know, I've said too much. I'm gonna keep on repeating it because people hate it when I say it. But I would say this, the Lakers are a Hollywood team and the Clippers are an LA team, and and
there is I think there's a truth to that. I think even now at the into a dome like that is I think very much what we're trying, what we're kind of pulling across, it's like it it does feel like you're going to a movie premiere. Sometimes when you go to the Lakers games, they drop the curtains. You're watching a trailer for you know, you know whatever some
you know Michael Bischer battleship too, you know. And and then meanwhile you have the Clippers who you go to into a dome and they have every jersey of every like high school squad and and you know, you have Bomber like working about buses and getting people into the stadium in thirty dollars seats and about the fans. They're redoing the the the parks across the country, like you know,
I've made across LA. It's like they're investing in LA and I think that that actually is paying off huge dividends with kids and everything.
Yeah, it feels like a ground roots movement. We know the Lakers have the past, who's going to have the future. And with the Clippers having their own home now with into a dome, I believe I had some intel on this. You've gotten a tour, a private tour of into a dome? Is that has that occurred yet?
Well, like so I not as so much a private tour, but I got to be at the end of a dome the night that it opened, the Bruno Mars night, so I got there before anyone was let in and to see it completely like literally completely empty, but ready, like ready to go was a mind blown experience. You know, of course check out my seats, my season tickets. I
you know, I love the club level stuff. I the screen, I don't I can't express to you why it's so amazing, but holy cow, when you see that screen, it is unbelievable. I don't know. I don't like it sounds silly, like when I heard people talking about the screen, Oh, the screen and the screen, like, yeah, who cares the screen? I've been to Doubt, I've been to the Cowboys Stadium. I've seen that screen is unlike anything I've ever seen. I don't know the clarity, it's close, it's small, it's intimate,
the remote controls and the like. Everything is done to perfection. And I love that they are just rocking through concerts right now to get it ready. Like I feel like by game day it's everything's gonna be ironed out and ready to go.
It's almost feeling like augmented reality, like we have some other lens when we go into that arena and we're seeing something that is not supposed to be real. But caliper Nation is benefiting.
When I got a last year, maybe two years ago, my friend Phil Lord, who you often will see court side there Lord Miller. They you know, Lego movie twenty one, Jump Street, Spider Verse. They invited him because he has these amazing seats to take a look at the boxes,
you know, at the into a Dome. So they basically created an into a dome across the street from Crypto and you could walk around and that was really interesting because you know, they're selling this high level boxes and what you saw on there was I mean, it really blew my mind and it got me excited about this world that Bomber was building because the person said, you know, Steve Bomber is the type of guy where you'll say, well this, we love this, and we also love this,
like pick one, and he's like both. And that's what it feels like. When you're in the into a Dome. It's like, oh, it's not like no expense was spared. It was like no two expenses were spared. Like every thing feels like it's this and that, you know, And I think that that's what is kind of overwhelming about it, but also incredibly personal and small and fun.
He's delivered on everything within his control. There's nothing you can do about some of the injury luck the Clippers have had, but when it is in their control, I feel like they have had this franchise you know, at the top when it comes to taking care of the fans here, I want to get you.
I will say this taking care of the players, Like again,
injury things are out of our control. But practice facilities, the way that they built this facility, the stuff they have there, Like you know, when you talk to like people like Reggie Jackson would say, like what goes on you know, behind the scenes in that you know, Like it sounds silly to say, but like every type of peanut butter you would possibly want when you make a peanut butter and jelly, these small things that I think make a huge difference to players, like like it makes
you not only you know, it's a reason to play there, it's a reason to do it for me. I know, when I get to work on a set that's got great stuff, it's like it just makes the entire experience more enjoyable. And when you're busting your ass like these guys are, to also be taken care of on that level too, is pretty amazing.
Great selling point for free agents and Clippers. I hear the uh, the road locker room team is actually well taken care of too.
Yeah, of course, because that's that's how you do your fishing, right You get people go, oh man, what's going on here? Right? Like and and of course it would be it's only smart to really take care of both sides because you like, you know, Bomber can't go out, no one can make a you can go out and say, oh hey, come over to us, come come play, you know whatever it is, but you can show them what it would be like, you know.
Not tampering, just to have locker room for the road team exactly speaking about this Clippers team, what's to come this season? But also I want to go back a little bit because my last episode we were talking a lot about Paul George in recent comments he made or his father made on podcast P and some of the disappointing comments he made regarding them being the B team in LA.
Let me tell you this, you will not find a bigger PG defender. I love PG. I think that PG stepped up when Kawhi went down. I thought PG took the leadership role on his back. He led the team, made people play well, He had an energy, he had fun I was a supporter of PG. Were there issues with him, absolutely, like anybody right, No one's perfect, right. But he did his job. I thought he was a
team player. Everything that he has done in this offseason has soured me so greatly on him because it's revisionist history. I know as a podcast P fan, he's gonna talk some stuff, and you would say, like PG, go to media training, figure out what your thing is, because here's the thing.
LA.
We're chill, it's cool, nice weather, weed is available. You go to Philly, those fans are cold. They got an edge. I'm from the East coast. Philly's got an edge. New York we think we got an edge. Philly got an edge. Right, it's cold, and they take it's it's what they got. There's no two teams, you know, even in LA. Even in California we got like five teams. They was like, it's all or nothing. He makes one comment on one podcast and then a week later pulls it back and
says something else like they're gonna eat him alive. And I feel like there's a part of me it's like somebody send up a warning flag to PG because his exit here has been bad. I also think and I'm gonna go out on a limb and say one more thing. I know you don't want to talk about it. I do, I do, please, I will say this. Where I find it to be irresponsible is as somebody who has a podcast go back and edit it out, go back and
say not everything is for air, you know what. We may be pushed too hard there because I think at the end of the day, when the facts are there, the facts are there, and I think that a lot of people have. If you it's just like do you want to dig a little bit deeper? I think everyone wants to make a point. You let them go for nothing. It's like, well, but what what was the other option? Right? We get tied up in contracts that then we can't make another move, And in my opinion, we ran it back.
We ran back three times. It didn't work. It couldn't work. Did it work in moments, yes? Could it work maybe, but we tried it for three times. Like at a certain point you have to go, maybe we should date somebody else. Has nothing to do with PG. It is about the organization. And we made a move that yes we got nothing back, but we do have next year next free agency where We're not going to be tied up in contracts like we have an old team. I
mean that's everything too, we have an old team. Like that was I think a forward thinking move, and everyone looks at it so myopically like we should have just, you know, we should have just gotten something. We should have gotten a why don't get a you know, it's like it's like it's it's not like it's like it's a lack of knowledge of even how like contracts and the NBA works. It's who was even out there that we're gonna get this package from Golden State That is nothing.
I mean, is that would be like, oh, well, you got this kind of crap package. It's like, all right, I don't know.
Better to get flexibility. That's what they got and Nick batoon back Aaron Derek Jones Junior, a guy who just locked up Paul George Chris Dunns.
A great move.
Looks like they actually have an identity for the first time I can say in a while, Paul, because to me, it's always felt like they have one with overwhelming talent when it's available. But I don't exactly know what type of team they are now they're leaning into defense.
Well, let me let me bring one thing to you, because somebody articulated it to me the other day and I thought it was a beautiful way of talking about this team. There. I think, well, I'm gonna I'm gonna review what this person said because I think it's just a good point and I hadn't really heard it say. The team really was built around Kawhi, And the mistake with that is that Kawhi fits in wherever he is fit in on the Raptors kind of perfectly. He fit
into their system. It wasn't built around him, and the team probably should have been building around uh PG in a weird way, right, and then Kawhi could have just sought it in and fit really well. Instead, they kind of built around Kawhi. I think for Kawhi's style of play, Harden is a better partner for him. I think that Harden played really well for us last year. It took him a beat to get used to it. But I also think it was tricky to figure out where his
place was within those three. I think this year is gonna be a lot cleaner. I think when you look at the playoffs, I think Harden PG had no excus use not to step up with Harden, who was playing at I thought max efficiency in the playoffs except for one game, you know, Harden at one bad game, because
the same can't be said for Peach had two good games. Yeah, and so now I feel like, all right, we're gonna be like these are guys Harden will take that, like Harden will play his side, or you can play hard offense. And I like it. And then we have these guys who actually want to play defense, because that's been this argument, right, Like I'm too tired to do both, you know, we need to. Like, so we got Harden, who's gonna be our point guard, you know, got that. We got Kawi
will do his thing. But I like this build. It reminds me of not in well, I mean a little bit. It reminds me of the twenty eighteen twenty nineteen team where you have like these guys you know, like Trez and uh you know and Pat Bev. You know, these guys who are you know, just pushing their way in making it known, being a menace, making it hard on other teams. I still think we're lacking that, like powder Keg guy who I think and I would love it to be bones, you know. I I hope there's I
hope there's room for bones on this team. I think there could be, you know, I don't know. I mean, but we have a lot, We have a lot of guys. Unfortunately, our young guys get kind of tossed to the side. I love tea man. There's a lot of good stuff surrounding this team. It's just like, can we get over whatever issues held us back? We know that during the doc era there were locker room issues, right, I feel like, if I'm reading the tea leaves a little bit, there
were locker room and front office issues last year. I don't know if that's gone away, but maybe it is. I think we've we've gotten rid of some stuff we've had some like was it addition by some traction we've you know, And and I think we're playing with a bunch of guys who just want to prove a point. And I'm glad that we kept Norm Powell. I'm glad that we've kept a bunch of these guys.
I like, sorry to tell you guys, Paul Sheer knows the ball. Yeah, it's a great analysis. I feel in a similar similar way with you about more defined roles with Kawhi next to James Harden, where you know who James Harden is. I don't know, or I didn't know who Paul George was going to be each and every night.
Is he going to play like a superstar?
Is he going to just try to blend him play like a role player?
Who is he?
And then you have this I don't know, redundant or similar skill set with Kawhi Leonard where James Harden and Kawhi are so different in the way they play, and Harden has always elevated guys around him so well. Before it beats Zooboss went down with that cap injury I think in early January where the Clippers went to that rut for about a month and a half playing five hundred ball, he and Harden had a great connection going. I'm looking forward to that now with Big Zoo being back.
Well Zoo you know has been I mean knock on wood like, he's very injury not and the team that gets a lot of injuries, he is very very rare to get him that one playoffs with the Sons. I forget the year, I mean all the years blend together now, But but I agree with you. I think the thing that again, I don't know that. I watched PG talk to Serge Ibaka about a game, and it was like watching two people speak a foreign language. I did not
understand what they were like. I'm like, wow, they are at such a high level of discourse about what's happening. But I can say that it felt to me always like PG needed permission to step up. I think Harden
reads the room and goes, Okay, that's not working. I'll take over and and you know, and I think that you know where we'd gotten into trouble in the past two is you know, Kaui is known for that amazing shot that they took on the you know it was in Toronto that you know, following that fade it goes in, you know, that beautiful shot. But there was a period of time where we're like, just give the ball to Kwai,
let it go. And I don't think that Harden will always give it to him, nor do I think that Kawhi will take it from him to be like I got this last shot. I think that there's a little bit of a different mentality between those two guys. It's like they're both not afraid to take the shot. They both can give and take, but they're not waiting for somebody to say, Okay, it's your turn, now it's my turnout where I felt like sometimes the PG Kawhi connection felt a little like Tiki Taky like that.
Yeah, and you know it's underscored by coach flu having it to tell Paul George, you're one of the best players in the league. I need you to be that guy, not somebody who thinks of himself as a number two. Because skill set wise, you can do everything. So what's the issue here? So no one should have to tell a guy that you're paying that much money to be a superstar, that you are a superstar. It is clear
to everyone, so take over in those moments. And I do think that two man game people are calling it twenty one with Uno, with James Harden, with those number two with Kawhi Leonard. I don't know what the new nicknames are going to be. Two and three connection era is over, So yeah, uh, what did you think about if East a Zoo Boss Game resigned on that deal, because to me that it still feels like a steal having him on the team, even for this number that's coming in after this season.
A no brainer, A no brainer right the to me, Zoo is a completely underrated player, even though when you look at like the list of stats, when you look at the rebounds, when you look at his percentage points across the board, he is in like the top five. Like it's like it's interesting. He doesn't make noise, but he is a dominant force in the league that no one really recognizes. I think he is amazing for a team.
I think that whatever Harden did with him. I had heard that Hardened after practice would be all right, Zoo, you're with me, and they would practice for two more hours. And he saw that out there. You saw that connection between the two of them and only going to get better, you know. And I just hope that we still have more years of Harden kind of being as good as he is. But here's the thing. I've grown to like Harden. If you told me two years ago like Harden, I
wouldn't be so psyched. But I do believe that like his style play fits in really good here. He's somebody who's happy here and he doesn't play like this is gonna say that people will roast me for this, but I don't feel like he plays hardball, like where it's like, oh, I'm worried about him getting like he's got his own pace and static. He's somebody that I feel like can exist a little bit longer in this game. Like so his age doesn't worry me. I'm not like, oh, he's
only got one or two more seasons left. I don't know. Maybe I'm wild for saying that. Maybe I've just drunk drunk the because I have to. You know, it's a vision.
It's not getting worse, Like he can read the game as well as.
Ever, and I just feel like he he sets a tone and in a great way, the way that you know, the way Step sets a tone, Like he just has a a confidence to him, and even when it's not working, there is something like like I don't there's moments with certain players on this team in the past where I'm like it's not working, but yet like they don't seem to acknowledge it's not working, like I think Harden does seem to. Like Harden will be like, oh, yeah, this
is not working for me. I'm gonna not take fifteen more shots. You know. It's like it's like he like, you know, and that's what I what I really love about this past season was like the way that norm would we would be tanking, you know, it would be up, we'd be down, and then you know, and then and then norm would come in and just be this silent, this this assassin just get us back in the game every time. But it was like that was you know, for them to just be like, we're just feeding, We're
gonna feed you. And he That's what I love about Norma is that he could just come off the bench and and knows his role gets right in. It doesn't need any ego stroking. He's just he's a player.
Really interested to see how he We mentioned Zobots, Terrence Man, guys like that having bigger roles this season, you would assume, of course without Paul George or more opportunities to score and get buckets. What are your overall expectations for this season? What's their ceiling you think, Paul, because we mentioned James Harden and Kawhi Leonard, I don't think when either of those guys have been relatively healthy in their careers, their
teams have missed the playoffs. So this is you would hope that they're healthy enough they can both play sixty plus games this season. Should that be the case, where do you think this team ends up.
I think we've opened ourselves up to a really interesting roster. It feels like an ego less roster in a way. I'm curious about, you know, Button coming back. I love him. Interesting they came back, When he came back, and how he came back. I don't know if there's anything more there underneath it, but he's back, and I'm excited for that. We need that. We've missed that last year. I think that it will be a fun season for everyone who's predicting that we're going to be twelfth or thirteenth, I
think that's absolute insanity unless something goes horribly wrong. But this is a team that is going to be a defensive pest. You are not going to want to play us, and I think that that's what we need to lean into. That identity is what we need to figure out. I think that Tie, in a weird way, has a lot more landscape to play with. He doesn't have to worry about a dissatisfied Russ. He doesn't even have to even
worry about it. Dissatisfied Marcus Morris, I know, has been gone for a little bit, but like you know, or and he doesn't have to know PJ Tucker, Well, yeah, but PJ. Like, here's the thing about PJ. It feels like PJ could be dissatisfied and they're like that whatever. You know, it's like you know, and by the way they put him in, they put they played plaoffs and he wasn't bad, like like you know, he wasn't but yeah, you know, right, it could have been worse. And I
but I feel like some egos have been released. I think that it's a cleaner relationship with our two guys, and I don't see anyone else on the team worried about it. I feel like what I'm actually interested in is what what are the who am I looking out for? I'm looking out for too. Mobamba does like that's interesting to me. You know, I want to see if that's
a guy that we can really rely on. I mean, I still miss Hertenstein, you know, I feel like, you know, what a bummer, I mean to trade him for a while, I mean, and then you know, and by the way, I've never heard picked all your guys. Man, we took all your guys. I love Reggie, love Reggie. Reggie worked out, Reggie worked out. But you know, but I'm looking at it. I'm like, all right, this is this is this is an interesting team. You know. I love how co You know, Coffee to me is a fun guy. He I think
really stepped up last year. I love the new guys. I'm curious camp Christy, like, there's a lot of lot of interesting stuff. By the way, and now this is where I get to be a bad Clippers fan. Who is the dude who went off in Summer League that we all loved? And Jordan Miller? Jordan Miller? What's going on with Jordan Miller right now? And I'm sorry that I'm not I am Do we know as he is?
Hey, you were the one with him on the red carpet. No, I think he's a training camp guy. He's on a two way contract right now. I think it's gonna depend on how this season goes. Like he's in a position on the team where there are some wings that he'd have to fight through to get playing talent. But I think Paul, if he bawls out a training camp, if he looks good at Hawaii after dominating in the G League last year, it wasn't just Summer league.
He was averaging twenty two points in the G League, that's eighth in the league.
Then he dominates summer league. It's like you have to throw more challenges at him and see where his ceiling is. I think if he plays really well on training camp, he's gonna get a shot.
That And that's the attitude that I want this team to have, right And I feel like that's what we get with Derek Jones, with you know, Chris Dunn. Like I feel like, you know, we're in the zone where it's like all right, and I do and I look, there's a lot you know, there's some been some tricky pickups too that we've had, right, some pickups of guys who have a little bit of a pass that's like oof, you know, and you know, or or it's like is
this second chance a minute? Like you know, we can lean into and find some some you know, sign find some diamonds in the in the in the rough, you know. And I just feel like chips when we are playing not for the chip, but with a chip on our shoulder, we're a better team totally.
They have been able to outperform expectations. You mentioned guys talking about them being the twelfth seed, not even being a playing team this season. I don't think that bulletin
board material will be lost on this Clippers team. I don't think missing out on playing in Team USA, even for someone who is so hyper focused and meticulous about everything he does and doesn't hear the outside noise and isn't on social media, I don't think Kawhi Leonard is gonna forget about missing out on that time at TMOSA.
Here's the thing, chances are there is going to be a season where Kawhi is rare to go. And by the way, last season he was great, you know in that new blow up, like what he's got, like, let's just call it. Let's call it out for what it is. He is. You know, he's got a degenerative knee disease. Right, that's just that's just the what it is, right, It's it's not can't heal, It's got to be managed. I think he's doing a great job at it. So anytime
anyone goes, oh, he sits, he sits, he sits. But every person that wants to talk about Kawhi, why would you sign that guy? He's always getting injured. Every person who says that is also the same person who says, well, they should trade him to the Warriors. Oh, they should
trade him over here. Why we would take him? The reason why you want to take him is because you know what we know, which is but the one year where it doesn't happen or you know, it's the year that you have to be like whoa, And it sucks. It sucks for him that he is so good and is dealing with this chronic thing. But that's what it is. It's not He's not streak closed, He's not anything. He's the only guy I've seen that like I feel like like Lebron like understands his body, but he just has
dealt that hand. That's his hand, unfortunately. But the upside is just as high as the downside.
You know, when Kawhi is healthy. I think Lawrence Frank said it best when they signed him to that three year extension this past season, is like anybody can get hurt, but not everyone. When they're healthy, can be a top five player in the league and be I think a top ten player all time when it comes to a playoff series. I don't know if there's ten guys I would take over Kawhi Leonard in that setting, like he is a killer.
Absolutely, and we're talking about a killer at this age. Like, again, you take away the injury of the same injury, it's always the same injury. It's a variation of the same injury, right, you know. It's like like but it's like he was putting up those numbers, he was playing to that high level. It's not like he's getting worse. The injury is what has to be managed, not It's not like, oh, well he's getting slower, he's getting his this he's he's the guy.
When he's the guy, he's the guy. And you know, honestly, like, if you're betting on this team, that's the bet you gotta take.
Yeah, I'm with you. I don't want to let you go before asking you about the book, not that you need any help promoting it for me. You've been on Compare and everything, and it's a New York Times bestseller, but Joyful Recollections of Trauma, Yes, because it's an autobiography and I know there was some heavy content in there and difficult subject matter, and you were very revealing, like is there a balance between the cathartic nature of it and just being so open and vulnerable.
Oh yeah, you know. Look, my goal is this. I am a comedian, I'm an actor. I'm first and foremost. My job is to entertain, right, And that's how I took this book. I'm gonna talk about stuff that's maybe dark, maybe a little bit difficult, but I give you one sentence of that and the next sentence is going to be a joke. It's a balance, right, And I feel like that's what I really strove to do. Like I when I was writing it, I was thinking about how would I tell you this story. I'm gonna make it fun.
I'm not gonna just sit here and trauma dump on you. The book isn't therapy. The book is, if anything, a reflection of therapy. And also like looking back and having these kind of insane fun moments and different backdrops are put behind them. So you know that was my job is to make this book a fun read and maybe it will take you to different spots. And that's good too. I think that, you know, I think you can. You know,
it's joyful recollections. Trauma not just trauma. You're just trauma recollections. You know. The audiobook is super fun because we pop in clips from how did this get made? There's some live readings of it, but yeah, it's it. To me, it's it's I've been so thrilled to hear people's reactions to it, and everyone's reactions are completely different. The only person that I need a reaction from, though, is the people I dedicated it to, which was I dedicated it
to Steve Bomber, Tylu and the Clippers organization. I put it. It's in the back of the book, you know, and I and I made sure it's in there. I wanted to tell Bomber and Tie that when I saw them at the Bruno Mars thing, but I acted too cool. And I appreciate how I acted because there's also a whole section in that book about how I embarrassed myself in front of people I really like. So I played it good. I got a high five from Bomber because
I fact checked or I name checked. Go Factor Yourself or his new web series, which is amazing to watch. If you've not watched it, get on his fact based YouTube channel show where he's just like laying down information. It is awesome and I love time. I love time.
God bless Steve ballmer TYLERU, the Clippers organization. I wanted to ask you this because I've always wondered this with comedians and I've never had a chance to really talk to anyone like this in this format. How do you decide?
You know?
I know it's different for everyone. Louis c. K may say some stuff that nobody else is gonna say. Uh, how do you decide where your threshold is, what's permissible, what you're okay with? Like obviously no Clippers shokes, But how do you decide?
You know? I think you know, for me, different points in my life, I will probably find different things funny. Right. I hope to always mature, help to always grow. But I think I was taught very early on that you punch up, you don't punch down. And and I hope that if I am if I'm saying something that might be controversial, if I'm saying something that may not be a popular opinion, that I am smart enough to defend it and not just take a very cliche point of
view about it. I think a person that I look to, and again I'm not a stand up, but the person I look to that does that really well is Bill Burr. Like he will say some very divisive things, right, But at the end of fifteen minutes, when he explains why he said that thing, if you don't agree with him, you at least see his point. And I feel like
that's like and I think that. I think where comedy goes bad is when it's lazy, like and oftentimes lazy points of view, like when you look through your history of oh that person was canceled for this joke or this. I don't think you're finding anybody can't for any jokes. I think what you're finding people getting ripped apart for is being lazy, not actually having a fully defined point
of view. It's like it's like there are these hack jokes, you know, like I when I was growing up, it was like, oh, these types of people are bad drivers. It's like it's it's like where I grew up with like polish jokes. It's like, well, what are we doing? Like it's like it's just it's not interesting. It's not a point of view, it's it's it's just kind of
like different, different, different, different is bad. And so yeah, so I think as long as you you could say anything you want, as long as you aren't lazy about you know about saying it, and I think that that. I think a lot of people are go, kude, there anything anymore. It's like you could say whatever you want because there are movies like you know, you look at like something like Bruno or Borat, and like these movies are saying the people always said like, oh, you can't
make Blazing Saddles again you could. That movie has a defined point of view. Borat has a defined point of view. South Park has a defined point of view. Like these shows know what they're saying. I think where comedy gets in trouble is when you don't know what you're saying and you're just saying something for a reaction, for titillation, beautifully put.
I don't know if I'm gonna use that for the teas or the Paul George Parker, I've got a lot to pick at here he is the great pulse Here again. The book is Joyful Recollections of Trauma and check it out on Friday. How did this get made? Virtual live tour? They're doing troll too, which if you didn't know, it's an all time banker. When it comes best of the worst movies.
Well, thank you so much for having me. This was a blast, Like I said, keep on doing what you're doing. I love this new layout. By the way, I noticed that I've been psyched to see it, and yeah, I mean this we got any exciting season here, so I'm I'm I'm ready for it. I'm ready. I know football season starting, but I'm like, let's go. I need I need to get I need to see these guys back out there again.
Well, you're helping me greatly with the show, not just by coming on, but now it's like, oh, I'd go to Frankie Muons and be like I had Paul Sharon.
You know, I know you have Carl tart on all the time, and Carl is the best Carl. Julie Bowen, Yeah, Julie Bowen. I just did Hollywood Squares with Julie Bowen.
It's good. It's I know there are there are Clipper fans out there, and I will say that, you know, if I could ever get to talk to to Jillian, I would be like, you lose us, Like you you have people like like I'm not looking for free tickets, like I don't care about it, but like, there are there's talent there, there's stuff to jump off of, you know, and you know. I think there's a lot of diverse faces.
I think there's a lot of fun faces. It's like you got it, Like just lean into us, you know, because it's like we're there and we are passionate Clippers fans.
Paul, she's a part of clipernation and willing to help in any way he can. This Clippers team is gonna be a fun season. We're all looking forward to it. I was looking forward to this all day long. Paul, you more than delivered for me. I don't deserve you. Thank you so much for doing this. Yere our Clippers Talk. So man uh for Paul's sheer, I'm out a mouslins hit the subscribe button or something.
I don't know.
This has been another episode of Clippers Talk. We'll talk to you guys next time.