On this emergency episode of The Heat Check. Oh my god, it happened.
It happened.
Damian Lillard has been traded to the Little Walky fucking Bocks.
Oh my god.
And we also have a special interview by the way with Keith Smith, NBA insider and CAP expert, to break it all down, folks from the perspective of every teen involved and not involved. Here's looking at You might drop everything that you're doing because we need to get into this episode right now. Got that beat, Rihanna, the drop that beat, William the chimby Rihanna.
I'm so excited.
Break was breaking down all the biggest NBA storylines.
We're tuned in to The Heat Check.
The Heat Check was just a crack the best podcast covering all the drama around the association.
It's breaking, it's breaking news. I know it happened yesterday, but I had to do some other work and then come home and then record this.
It is breaking news to me.
At about two pm Eastern Standard time, we got the I mean, this is the the taj Mahal of WOJ bombs. Let's be honest, right, like, this is the one that's made up. This is the WOJ Mary, You've been getting your ass fucking handed to you by Sham's for the last I don't know three months, and you know what. Here we are the redemption arc of Adrian war Janowski.
It is Dame Lollard.
The trade is here to the Milwaukee Bucks.
This is the bomb. This is the sound of the WOJ bomb.
Because Damian Lillard is not a Miami heat Damian Lillard is not a Toronto raptor. Like a thief in the night, they say, real GE's move in silence, likeless. That is John Horst and the Milwaukee Bucks. There's so much to process there just is. Let's collectively though, take a deep breath because it's been a long summer for this. Inhale, exhale, pause the podcast and download your favorite meditation app and know, feel your body, Feel every every inch of your body.
Start with your toes, go all the way to your ankles, to your knees, to your thighs, to your elbows, to your neck, feel your head and say, oh my god, Damian Luller's a Milwaukee Buck. Now that we're as cool and calm as the Arctic breeze, I will break down the deal. We will then go ape shit again, because it's gonna happen and we will dissect it. It's a three team deal involving the Blazers of course, the Phoenix Suns. Yes, yes, because DeAndre Ayton did it was real, and the Milwaukee Bucks.
Note the one.
Team missing is the Miami Heat, who said, listen, it's all all you can fight and scream. It's like when you're on death row and they're like, it's coming, the needle is coming for you. Whatever you want to do. You can think it it's nappening. You can pretend, you can appeal, you can try to run away. But at the end of the time, the Miami Heat are inevitable. They try to act like there was nothing we could do.
Portland Trailblazer fans they were just gonna hold us down and they were just gonna put a pillow on our face into our bodies went lifeless, and they took Damian Lollard for us. Anyway, they didn't so much to get to on that soon the trade, the Blazers get DeAndre Ayton, Drew Holiday, Toumani Kamara Kamari nobody cares about him, a twenty twenty nine first round pick unprotected, which By that point,
Dame will probably be out of the league. Two picks would and Giannis will probably force his way to another team, and two pickswaps in twenty twenty eight and twenty thirty, the Suns get Yusuf Nurkic Grayson, Allen, Nicirlittle, Keon Johnson, The Bucks get Dame Lollard. I didn't see this coming.
Did you see this coming?
I don't know that anyone whispered about it. I heard like, oh, that would make sense. Jannis wants maybe this team to go all in. But no one thought that they would get rid of their golden child that they paid for four first round picks for Drew Holliday. Not a whisper, not from Mark Spears, not from Chris Haynes, no one, not a ripple, not a peep, Quiet as church mouses. So yeah, I think we were all kind of floored by the news. My initial reaction, I love it. I can't,
I mean, inject it into my veins. You know me, longtime Bucks fan, a legend at Deer Park.
Come on, let's get with it.
Let me rephrase that, though as much as you can love, as much as you can love, letting go of your favorite blazer in your team's history.
Just given the options, he was out.
He was outro right like there was unless you were getting honest to the Portland Trail Blazers.
He was gone. He was giggity gone.
Joe Cronin knew GM did his best and did about as well as you could even expect against all the odds. He did the following he protected his team's interest in the face of, let's be honest, a disinformation campaign that rivals the election in twenty sixteen by Russia. That's where we're at, Like the Facebook campaign where it was like
Nancy Pelosi had a straight like what was it? Human trafficking ring inside of a pizza shop in the garage, Like that's where we're at in terms of comparable disinformation campaigns. Because they said that Dame would only play for one team, and one team only matter where he went, no matter if it was a.
Really good contender.
He was going to ask to Miami anyway he was, he was going to be traded to that one place. And you know what Portland said, We are unfazed. We are unfazed by this, Honest to god. It was like a Cold war Soviet propaganda campaign. Being waged against Joe Cronin personally never seen any I think these Miami Heat fans were actually rushing bots. I honestly, we need to check what their follower accounts really were, who they were, where their followers real I don't know they were mad
at me though. Two. Once Drew is traded, it's going to result in a hall commensurate with the superstar you get eighton you get likely because you have two.
Pick swaps and a first round pick.
So and remember they traded for Drew with two first and two pickswaps, so as of now, it's the same as the Drew trade minus one first round pick, so you're probably getting one or two first round picks back for you're likely getting three first rounders and two pickswaps.
Joe three protected the interest of young guards by not adding another one right because you don't want that, and moving Dame out, not saddling them with a broken down player with like Kyle Lowry who will only hinder their development, or that you have to worry about having on this team, and telling him to make eighty two t times because he's not planning for your squad. Just don't show up. Four. They get out from under a very bad Nurkic contract.
I mean Nurkic is represented by Clutch Sports, so you know the deal wasn't great, very underrated move placed Dame in a winning position, and everyone said, oh, Portland poverty franchise all they're not going to do right by Dame. Who's talking about that now, no one. It's a much better situation for Dame than Miami was sands no state taxes. That one hurts, and then fine, only my favorite one. It's not really my favorite one, but we'll just say
it is he screwed Miami. Joe Cronin said, you know what, if it's jump ball, fuck you.
And he was.
He was saying it and he was doing it. That, my friends, is a six part win with a capitol w and with every winner there's got to be losers. And the losers in this situation not Dame, but Dame's agent, Aaron Goodwin, the hyper aggressive agent who spent the last two months telling the world that he was going to get exactly what he wanted for his client there was nothing that anybody could do about it, trying to convince a very increasingly skeptical world that Dame was not going
to do anything other than play for the Heat. Imagine Dame going to Milwaukee and being like at media Day Monday, Yeah, I still want the Heat, though not gonna. I know, I said I wanted to play for you with you, but I'm not really I'm not really about that. Cronin destroyed Aaron Goodwin's reputation based on the fact that everything that he's been claiming for the last sixty days just
completely false. Mark Spears just reported the following, with Miami talks going nowhere, Agent Goodwin privately told the Bucks and Nets ten days ago that Dame would be interested in the deal there. Oh that's interesting. Oh, the Raptors were a real contender to land the ex Trailblazer Star, but ultimately the Bucks got it done. Per WOJE report. Even Aaron Goodwin at the end knew the end was coming.
You know.
I know that this is a gigantic al for the Heats and Goodwin because Goodwin came out with the white flag. He said, the Heat did everything that they could do acquire Dame. It takes two to get a deal done. I appreciate all that Pat, Andy and Mickey did to try to make this happen, folks. Here's something that just came to my mind as I was reading this. Aaron Goodwin has I would say, a very small collection of assets. So him playing nicey nicy with the Miami Heat, to me.
Means one thing.
He's gonna try to get DeMar de Ro's in there. Yes, he is one of his other few clients that he has on this team besides Trendon Watford and Dame's cousin is DeMar Deroz and that's the other marquee player of no just watch it is now September twenty seventh, Do
not sleep DeMar DeRozan. Heat Talks will heat up the other big loser, Miami Heat Reddit, Miami Heat Twitter, the wildly arrogant fan base that lives on the Internet because no one gas let us harder, no one gas let us more feverishly, and no one is more gut punched
as result than Twitter Heat fans. Immediately, news leaked after the deal went down, probably from Blazer's camp, that not only did the Blazers not reach out to the Heat to match Milwaukee's offer, but also that pat Riley found out that Dame got traded to Milwaukee on Twitter with
everyone else through social media. Just brutal, Just a very very bad beat for pat Riley, for this fan base, especially for a guy who is pushing in his eighties right, who tried to bully, intimidate play chicken with the Blazers because he was like, well, what other options do you have? I'm not giving you Haimi hawkas, I'm not giving you Nikoli Jovich. I'm not giving you anything other than Talerio in.
Two first round picks.
Why because I got you over the barrel? Goodness, gracious, what's that old saying about karma that it's a dish. What's that saying about revenge, that that's a dish best served cold? Because Joe Conan served up a full plate of frozen revenge to pat Riley. The Heat did not do anything, certainly did not do anything to acquire dame, and you can argue that they almost did nothing to get them. It was almost like they didn't want them.
Like I said, their offer was Tyler Hero and two first round picks, a player that the Blazers did not want, did not need, and they said, if you can get us multiple firsts for him and its four first round picks, then maybe what happened is that pat Riley tried to play hardball and it didn't. It did not work. Classic case of fuck around and fine out. The other minor loser was Toronto. They just do not want to get rid of their assets and get anything back.
They just don't.
They are actually like the worst at this. They did one good thing to get Kawhi Leonard Massai Ujuri, and they let Kyle Lowry go for almost nothing. They're gonna let they let Fred van Fleet go for nothing. They're
going to let Ogn and Obi go for nothing. They're probably gonna let Pascal Siakam go for nothing, because why they would not let Ogn and Obi go for Damian Lillard even though Ognnobi is on an expiring Everyone said that Portland would have lost that trade because og no way would have stayed with Portland and they would have just gotten I don't know, Grady Dick to first round picks and a guy who doesn't want to be there. But guess what Toronto said. No, let's look at the
reaction from the respective teams fan bases. Starting in Portland, things are looking good. Things are rosy, universal celebration. People are buying Milwaukee Bucks jerseys probably tickets to Deer Park. We all wanted to do right by Dame as long as it was right for the Blazers. And guess what here it is. And on top of that, big fuck you to the heat fans. Vast majority of Blazer fans are excited. They have four reactions. One Relief it's over. It's over, Blazer fans, It's done. We don't have to
think about this ever again. Genuine relief from rip City that Portland was not bullied into taking a bad deal and they no longer have to worry about Damian Lillard saying mean things about us on media Day.
Two.
Appreciation for Joe Cronin. He was put in a terrible position and somehow found a path so that all the people who mattered actually became happy moderately at least. Three. Of course we're putting out memes, We're putting out tweets, appreciation posts, gratitude for Dame. He's the best, He's the best. It was the best a Blazer fan could ever hope for. Ten toes down was here a decade, did everything that he could to win us a ring. I loved Dame
as a person, I love Dame as a player. He's the best Blazer in my mind to ever suit up. And I loved Arvitus a bonus I loved I loved Clyde Drexler, But boy, oh boy, were they not Dame so many moments that he gave us. I infamously said that I don't want Dame to win a chip if he goes anywhere else. Really, what I meant is I don't want a Dame to I didn't want Dame to win a chip if he went to Miami. That's really what I meant. That was just me being bitter about Miami.
I couldn't stomach the fact that pat Riley would win because he always wins. Watch winning time. It's just gross, a little slick back. He just smuck. And for Portland fans feel happiness over the fact that Nurk is not there anymore and that contract's not there anymore.
And you get a young number one overall.
Draft pick from a few years ago who's got a lot left of potential in the tank. DeAndre Ayden didn't get a great shake in Phoenix, and now you get him and Drew who will result in a Hall. And yes, I think that that's a great way to set the Blazers up for the future. So I say, I think it's safe to say that Blazer Nation is pretty good. If you're a Mowahi Ho fan, you've gotta be fucking stunned.
You're stunned. How did we get this? We didn't even know. We thought it was July and it's Christmas.
We woke up in the middle of July and there's a room full of presents for us under a tree we didn't even know should be there. Every Buck site, every Bucks podcast is like, huh, how what we thought we were losing Giannis? And all I see is how GM John big Balls Horse pulls some shit off like this. Although Mark Spears mentioned that the Bucks had preliminary talks with the Blazers, no one saw it coming. Just like with the Drew trade. La la la la, Holy shit
woj bomb. Bucks fans also appreciative. They love Drew Holliday, they don't want to let him go. But you can't say no to Dame time AKA it's now called freak time, Pauls.
No one thinks it's bad trade.
The idea of Dame keeping defenses from collapsing on Giannis is going to be great of course, they've got unbridled giddy excitement. They've moved from the fourth favorite plus six hundred to the leader in the clubhouse in one minute, in literally a minute. If I didn't know how happy this fan base was, the hundreds of variations of I'm glad I wore white pants today joke would have been a dead giveaway. And rightly so, this combo is going to be deadly number one duo in the East, probably
number one duo in the NBA. If you're a Sixers and Celtics fan, you're like, how are we guarding that? We used to just build a wall around Giannis and now like this, the wall doesn't work anymore, does not work? A brief pit stop. Also in Phoenix, as facilitators of this deal, they it was just never gonna work with DeAndre aid and they hated them. I don't know why, but they did. They got Vogel. Vogel was saying all
the right things. I think Vogo could have turned eight and into a nice center, and they just they just were like, yeah, let's stop trying to make DeAndre Ayton happen. It's not happening.
I love him, I love Ayton. I think he's awesome.
I've always loved Dayton since he was I loved Dayton since he was fifteen years old when I saw him at the Adida's Nations. That's how long. So this is a fresh start for him. He finally gets the respect he wants. He's already changed his two K jersey and putting it online to Portland. Hell yeah, the Suns pick up badly needed depth. They get in this yere little They get Keon Johnson and they get NRK's gonna know his role. He's gonna shut his mouth and he's gonna
play with KD. He's gonna love it too. Everyone's everyone in Phoenix has got to be pretty much over the mood. Finally we end in Miami, where fans are starting to cannibalize on one another. It's bad out there on the streets. They're like ready to turn on pat Riley. They're saying he's a slappy when they were saying he was the smartest facilitator League exec Ever, how much changes in an hour as why it's WHOA. The entire fan base was
convinced they were getting damned. They would have staked their beating heart on it, and now rug is out from under them, and they're looking around like Will Smith in an empty room. How is the heat in their fan base taking the news. Let's look into it. What's the emotions? Do we really care what their emotions are? Do we really care about them? No, but we'll go into it. Number one is anger. They're just shocked and angry. A whole lot of angry posts across social meeting like how
did this happen? They've whiffed on one star after another to add to Jimmy and bam Nobile even though that what Phoenix got him for peanuts. There were some pat Riley as eighty and he's lost his fastball. He needs to retire posts. Someone tweeted that it was Joe Cronin's fault, It was Danny Ainge's fault, it was Clutch's fault, It was everybody's fault except for pat Riley's. If the whole league is against them, maybe we should replace him with someone that can actually get along with people.
Whoa WHOA hold on?
Now, settle down, Heat fans. Remember you told me everything was fine, and you were just in the finals last year, so seems like everything's fine. Number two emotion is rage. Rage at the Blazers, which I gotta say is my favorite emotion of them all. Much more common were Heat fans believing that the Blazers did this out of straight pettiness, which I don't know whether that's true, but if it is, that's awesome. That's awesome. They're big mad folks, big mad,
and they're blaming Joe Cronin. This fan base is delusional. They really, they really are. The fact that Joe Cronin would take a worse deal just screw over Miami is ridiculous. Like I said, if it's a jump ball, it's fuck you. Number three is resignation. I think they're starting to realize that.
They've got nothing.
They've lost multiple role plays, guys that played, two guys that played in the starting lineup for the entire playoffs, and those guys are gone. The Heat, heatles, heat over heat a verse. I guess we'll call it felt a whole lot of uh, just resignation over the news. They kept being told that they can't go all in on a superstar because the next star down the road is
the one. That's what the genius about Joe Cronin really is though, because the next Domino was supposed to be honest, and now they've taken them both away and one fell swoop, and they've actually taken three away because let's be real, the next Domino guard that they wanted was Drew Holliday, and guess what, you're not getting him either. So option one gone, Option two gone, Option three gone fuck you.
That means there's only one possibility for them on the table and the Jimmy bam Era, and that's Joel Embiid And folks, if that's your backup plan, I hate to tell you the seventy six ers are in the market for.
Drew Holliday and boil boy.
Do I see Joe Cronin making that move, which would be about checkmate?
Check mate?
I think there are two things Heat fans can take away from today. One, this team signed our j Hampton, which is a personal favorite player of mine, considering that I watched Davion Mitchell cook him for an entire Summer League game telling us about all of the ways he was just trash. You got that going for you, which is nice. And the team tweeted out that Josh Richardson will wear the number zero for the Heat.
Wow, if that's not putting.
Oh god, if that's not throwing in the towel, I don't know what is silver linings, heat fans, silver linings. My personal feeling on a more we'll call it Sincere and Ote is that I'm incredibly happy that this is the duo we got because these are two of the most loyal guys in the NBA, and they both were kind of pushed to the brink. And now because they said something, Hey, I need to win, they got put
together Dame and Joannie. And the truth is, Dame, no matter how much he said he wanted to be in Miami, said this a long time ago about Yiannis, and I think it still rings true today.
If you were to pick a player that would help you win a championship.
Who would you pick?
I would pick I hope people get to play with Giannis at some point. Those two would be a very very nice come bo. I mean, I would say, just the dominance. You know, somebody that's you know, gonna get to the rim. He's a good playmaker, a good defender, disruptive, and the way he plays compliments the way I play.
Yes, sir, and so I like that for Dame a lot.
I think he deserves.
Maybe you guys thought I really meant that he did not deserve to have basketball happiness. But I really think this is good for both of them. They're two of the most likable guys in the league. I wish them all the best.
It's a lot easier.
Also, another thought that I had about this is just it was so much easier for Milwaukee to do this for you, honest, than it was for Portland to do this for Dame, because big guys like Giannis really really hard to find, hence the reason he's a two time MVP, Defensive Player of the Year and Greek freak. Than it is to do that when you've got a guard, which are a lot easier to replace. And I think Dame obviously I consider him a top three guard in the league.
But star players ask out a lot more when they're guards. That's just the truth.
Embeid.
As much as he's been quote unquote unhappy, he's been rocking. You're not getting a Yo Kic. You're not getting a y honest, because teams don't want to give up on those dudes. I am also happy that Miami did not get what they wanted. I think I've said that multiple times on this podcast, but it's worth saying again, I
am happy that they are left holding their dicks. Their fans were insufferable and guess what, Like, I'm more upset that there were legit Miami quote unquote journalists that were trying to manipulate the information to make it seem like there was nothing that Portland could do. I do hope that if Dame gets a ring in my Milwaukee, that he gets multiple. I hope that they stay together forever. I would not mind if they were title contenders and
they were running through the East. For a minute, I thought that Cronan as a new GM, did a fantastic job. He played his cards to his vest. There was no leaks. There were plenty of people who were saying that Joe Conan had dick, and you know what, he knew he didn't, but he didn't say a word. He kept things closed and that's what good gms do. It's a great day
also for the NBA. Why if Dame had gone to Miami, every star player would be like yeah, and every agent would say I can get my client wherever I want to go and wherever they want to go, whenever I want to go, and that's just what you cannot have if you're Adam Silver. So a good day for the logo, great day for the logo. I am happy for Dame. I really don't think the Blazers did right by Dame, and that's not Joe Cronin's fault, so I'm glad that they have found.
An end to this chapter.
I am happy for watching Dame on the East Coast because ten pm from the East Coast is a rough fucking beat forty one times. For Dame to play at ten thirty is disgusting. And it's a great day for the league, good day for Blazer fans, good day for Dame, and good day for fans of the entire league.
And if it's not.
A good day for you, you're a Heat fan.
That was That's the end of this portion.
Since that was so much fun, we needed someone to come in and give us a full on breakdown. I'm excited to bring on Keith Smith for a special Dame centric interview. If you don't know Keith, you don't know anything. He's the insider insider from Spowtrack. He came ont of the show bet MGM tonight to give his candid reaction to the Dame Trade. The other voices that you hear are my co host Nick Ashy and Ryan Horvat. He also breaks down what happens now with Miami and with
Drew Holliday. So let's get into it all right.
Keith Smith jumps on. It's been a while since we've talked, Keith. It's been quiet in the NBA for a while, and then boom, we get this bomb today, Damian Lillard's off to the Bucks. Let's just I guess paying a big picture for not just the Bucks, but really all three teams involved here and sort of what your takeaways were from the trade?
Yeah, very unexpected. You know, we'd heard over the last few days that Toronto was getting close, and then there were some buds that maybe Miami might re engage. And I think there's some spin going on now on exactly you know, what the Heat did and didn't offer, and what they did and didn't do in the last couple
of days. But it's you know, the Bucks are in a position where they were looking to make a big splash to try to convince Jianna, hey, we're committed, and we're not just committed for another year or so, we're really trying to lock in for the next several years to try to keep winning. And that's what he said that do, and that's what they'd gone out and done for Portland. Clearly, you're rebuilding, so you're going to get the young player and DeAndre eight and you're getting the
draft picks coming in from Milwaukee. We'll see what happens with Drew Holiday. He's probably never even going to show up in Portland at this point. They're probably going to work a trade before that happens. And then the Phoenix Suns a bit of an odd edition in here, but they wanted to get move on from DeAndre eat and break that contract up into several smaller contracts. They get use of Nurkics coming in and will step in at their starting five, and then we'll see where they go
with the other guys. They got like Chrason Allen in this here.
Little You're a I would call you a professional. You're a real deal journalist, Keith. I have been sickened by Miami media not doing real journalism, and I'm okay with that normally, but they've actually tried to bully and strong arm the Portland Trailblazers into taking that terrible deal. What's your perspective on kind of how this whole thing is played out, because it looks looks very silly in hindsight in terms of what they were doing.
Yeah, I think, you know, anytime you start taking the approach of trying to negotiate for a team, it's gonna be a little backwards. Then you know, we're we're in this world now of fans covering teams, and that that's, you know, kind of a thing that happens. I'm often
I did it. I grew up a Celtics fan. I covered the Celtics for years, but I like to think I tried to stay fairly objective about it, even you know, at times, I know my fandom leaked in there for sure, but there's never a point where I was out there saying, you know, like, right now there's reports Boston wants Strew holiday, but I'm not gonna pitch. You know, well, the trouble Azers should absolutely take Malcolm Brogden. He'd be great for that. He doesn't make any sense for them, just like Tyler
Hero wouldn't have made any sense. So yeah, it was definitely one of those things where you know, if anything I'm almost glad this is over so we don't have to listen to and hear that kind of stuff on it any basis anymore, all across social media.
So what happened with the Portland and Miami negotiations in terms of what you know because we're hearing a lot of different information about Portland didn't go back.
To Miami when they had other deals on the table.
Originally there was no deals that were outside of Miami.
Aaron Goodwin, Now I hear.
We're report there were some reports that he went to Milwaukee and Brooklyn and said Dame actually would go there, Like, what are you hearing?
Yeah? What I heard was, you know, Miami obviously engaged them right away, and it openly said, hey, we know, you know, this may take the thirteen. There may not be a direct two team match here because any trade they did was going to involve either Kyle Lowry or Tyler Hero as the primary salary matching Pete in the Blazers that they're not in a position where they really
want to take on either of those guys. Miami also was capped out at offering two draft picks in a lot of teams view of the Miami heat draft picks similar to the Los Angeles Lakers, where yeah, it sounds good to have them, but it's pretty rare when those teams are bad and bad for very long. So what it turns into is do we really want all all
of those picks, you know, from them? And you know, then we're gonna have to turn around and move Hero or move Lowry and that's going to be a complicated process. So everything sounds like there was no real two team match there, and then what ultimately happened was Portland was, hey, we're gonna move on. If you want to make this work, you got to find the third team. We're not going to be the ones that go out there and find that third team to make this happen. You're you're gonna
have to, you know, figure this out. So I think we're in a spot where it just wasn't a match for and a lot got made of you know, Portland's unwillingness to be reasonable when it's not on them to be the team that puts together the full trade when they had other options and obviously took one.
Keith really quick moving over to the West because the Sun's also obviously involved in the deal, and they're the favorites right now, even over the Nuggets in the West. So do you think they're a better team after these moves? Obviously they needed death, but they moved DeAndre, and you bring in Grayson Allen, you bring in Little, you already added Eric Gordon. Do you think the Suns are a better team today on Wednesday than they were on Tuesday after this deal?
You know, I don't know. It's tough because as much as I like Yusef Nurkic, and he's a better offensive player than DeAndre Ayton, I look at him. How much more offense do you need? You have Kevin Durant, you have Devin Booker, you have Bradley Deal. If you're really feeling like you need to add more offense, well then you you you better be planning on outscoring teams, you know, one,
forty one twenty five every night. And and Ayton, he's not a great defender, but he's a better defender than Nurkic. He's got more potential to be a better defender in Nurkic. I think Frank Vogel was going to be able to pull that out of him. He's some wonders with big men throughout the course of his career. But I kind of get it. They wanted more of a short thing
with Nurkic. They are a guy they weren't gonna probably worry at all about his his you know, buy in and really want to work and do all the things. He knows he's a role player and he's going to come in and play that role great fan Allen will help because he can play both guard positions. They're a little weak at guard depth behind the two primary guys and Booker and Beale. Eric Gordon is a veteran but a little bit older. He's had some injury issues, so
that's something to watch. And then if you're little just a player I really like. But we'll see. There's there's kind of a you know, mix of guys that are going to be in there battling for minutes in the starting five and alongside Kevin Durant, you know, in that group, and behind Durant as well. So we're gonna see. I think they're probably better. I don't know that they're appreciably better. I've still got them behind Denver, but they're right there.
They were already number two, and I don't know that this changes much from the being number two for.
Me talking to Keith Smith bet MGM tonight. So obviously a lot of reports that Drew Holliday may get just flipped by Portland. Where do you see him or what are some the maybe the most likely landing spots for him? And could Portland make any other moves after that?
Yeah, to answer the second part, I don't think oregan to see Portland do much else because they're pretty well fent. Now you basically got your young core in place with Scoot Henderson, Shaden Sharp Anfony Simon. Now you're at DeAndre Ayton for that mix, got Chris Murray who also drafted. Basically everybody outside of Drew Holiday is under thirty on this roster. Jeremy Grant will turn thirty in season, but you know he's locked into such a long term contract.
Nothing's gonna happen with that one anytime soon. So it's gonna be Drew Holiday after Who could trade for any team that has title aspirations? I could use A guard is probably picked up the phone and called. Whether it's Philadelphia, Boston or Toronto or maybe the La Clippers. I'm sure all those teams are looking at it. And saying, hey,
what did it take. And one of the things I was told, you know, in the aftermath of the trade was hey, it's easier to trade for Drew Holiday than it is to trade for Damian Liller because he makes a lot less money. And you know, the teams are going to look at it and say, yeah, he's a very good player, but he's not Damian Lillard. So I think you're gonna see a lot of teams making offers
and getting involved. And I do think Kortan will get him traded, probably before everything kicks off next week, because one of the motivating factors in all of this was given Chauncey Billips the roster, who is going to have to start the year without a whole bunch of stuff hanging over him of yeah we'll get fifth guy, my trade him and all that. They want him to be able to start fresh with that young group, and I think that's gonna be a big part to get a Holiday moved fairly quickly.
There's a lot of teams that want Holiday, not a lot of teams that have what it takes to get Holiday. Who do you think is the most likely team to get him? Who are some dark horses and who would you absolutely rule out.
I would keep an eye on Philadelphia to get him. He was one of the players that they were talked about maybe trying to go after or with this whole cap space plan for next summer. And I think people maybe have forgotten that we started his career and that they loved him. They just basically said, hey's too good for what we're going to be. He has a team as we start the process years so we got to move on. And they've obviously jinks Harden becomes the immediate
easy salary match. Not direct to Portland. They'd have to be a third team. So maybe the Clippers get in there, and the Clippers and Philly both send a pick to Gill Portland's way, or you know, we get you know, some a couple of players moved on, and that's how this happens. That there definitely could be something there with that team. I know Boston would love to have them. Their challenge is it's Malcolm Brogden and then putting together.
The other piece is that you've got to trade you know, either Robert Williams Al Horford or a whole bunch of guys a depth, and then you can have to make it up the difference with draft picks, and that becomes a little bit of a challenge for the Celtics. But I you know one thing, Drew Holliday, the agent, has done a lot of work with Boston over the years. So I wouldn't rule them out that they're being aggressive. They're trying to, you know, make things to happen if
they can. So you know what we're gonna see. You know, I think we're in a spot where this is going to be really interesting to watch this playoff. Who would absolutely rule out the Lakers aren't going to get them. Of course, they're fans of media who want to, oh well we'll get them, We'll trade you know, D'andelo, Russell and other stuff, without any regard of why would Portland want those things. But that's just feel what Laker fans.
Do You think there's any chance that Orlando tries to get in the mix, because that's what Kevin O'Connor thinks is a good look.
Yeah, I don't think so. It just doesn't scream what they're trying to do. They're trying to build something that can be sustainable for years here in Orlando. That's where I am and where I'm located, So I know that front office that they're they're content to just keep building with what they've got. They're very happy with the players that they have. And this would mean, all right, we got to start cashing in some guys. There's no organizational push to you got to be a playoff team this
year or anything like that, Cummings. So there's no motivation from that side to make a trade like this, and I'm not ready to cash in. They're young players and their young assets to make something like this happen right now. So I think we're in a spot where you know the magic I get it there. It could make sense, but I just don't see that being something that happens.
Keith.
In my perfect world, Drew Holliday goes to the Clippers, they get an actual point guard.
Kawhi and Paul George stay healthy. So that means so that.
Means Philadelphia gets nothing. And that's what I wanted to ask you really quick about. So if Philadelphia strikes out on everything this offseason, any chance, and like they get off to a slow start, that Embiid maybe asks to get moved.
I don't think he'll see that in season, but I think if they flame out early again in the playoffs and he's like, man, we just kind of punt it a little bit on this year, and now it's this cap space stuff and what are we going to do with it? Because the free agent market isn't great and I know you can use cap space to make trades obviously, but that's become a whole other thing. I could see at the end of the season Jill Embiid saying, hey, what are we doing? Hey, I want to win before
it comes out, because you know, Jolan Bead's thirty. Now, he's you know, in I believe this is your ten or eleven for him, like he's not. You know, I think there's still because he missed all that time early. There's a thought of that he's still like twenty five, twenty six years old and he's only been around for you know, seven years or something. But he's starting to, you know, hit the point where hey, if I'm not gonna win here, I want to do it somewhere and
let's let's get this figured out. So I think maybe after this year you see him start asking some questions and it might be as simple as hey, Yannis said, he wanted guys, and the Bucks went and got them. Damian Lillard, I want guys to and what are we doing here?
Got about a minute left or so here James Harden, I mean, like, what the hell is gonna happen with this?
Yeah, I don't know. I think we might be in for an ugly media day. There's talks he may not even show up, which if you're Philadelphia that may answer it be for the best. Just you know, let's hit him with a fine and he doesn't show up and and go, And then it turns to or what a training camp looks like because they're headed out to Colorado Springs for training camp. Is he gonna be there working out with him? Do you want him there? Is he gonna show up and do what he did at the
end of his next tenure. That's the messy stuff that could happen with James Harden unless there's a trade found here in the next few days. And it just doesn't seem like anybody's jumping at the opportunity to trade for him.
Keith Smith, I know you've been busy. Really appreciate the time man, Thanks for coming on with us.
I appreciate it. Thank you for having me.
That's all the time that we have for this episode of The Heat Check. Come back next week for an all new episode. Many thanks to Keith as my co hosts Nick Ashew and Ryan Horbite, and producer Scott Lynn from bed MGM Tonight. Check out the feed for past episodes that drop unexpectedly and follow the Heat Check as
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