You're tuned into Heat Check with Trystal Quick.
On this episode of a Heat Check, we are now at the halfway point of the.
Regular NBA season. Can you believe it? Time is going best, folks.
It is time for me, Professor Crick, to give out some grades some guys. Some teams are getting the ruler, folks, Smack smack. This episode, we're gonna break down the Eastern Conference. We're gonna grade every team from Atlanta down to the Washington Wizards. So let's get right to it, Nick, we don't have much time drop that generic gass beat. All right, So we've reached halfway throughout the season. Actually, last Thursday, I could have done it, but I didn't feel like
it was too much work. It's a lot you gotta go into all these ratingsts. I don't mean to make it sound like my job's like super complicated.
It's not.
I do this for the love of the game. So I wanted to do it. I want to do it right. And now it's just like college. It's like the midterm exams and we're giving out mid semester grades. Some teams I think will be very happy with their scores. Kids that came into the classroom. They had a backpack with no books in it, and you said to yourself, oh boy, this is gonna be a doozy, And.
All of a sudden they became one of the best.
Students in the whole damn classroom. And then others will probably be very sad.
But them's the breaks.
I am just the instructor, and I call it like I see it.
So let's start out East. Let's break it down.
Next episode will break down the West, because, like I said, these stats are hard to come by. So let's start in the Atlantic Division. The Atlantic Division is a wagon by the way you look at it. I think it's the best division in the entire NBA. What you may not think about it because who does who is in the Atlantic Division. It's the Nets, It's the Sixers, it's the Celtics, it's the Knicks.
That's a good ass, good ass division. And listen, like, most.
Of these teams have had various degrees of dysfunction throughout this offseason and into the season itself. So I mean these teams were seen as toxic full rebuild situations like the Brooklyn Nets. Four of these teams right now, though four of these teams are top six in the East. So it's a wagon that's unreal. So let's start with the Brooklyn Nets. I mean, that's the kid that came in with the backpack that was empty, and you were like, this kid's going to fail, Like, this kid's probably gonna
withdraw the class. In the first month of the season, they look like they were headed for a full teardown, didn't They kd wanted out.
Kyrie was a mess.
He gets suspended, he wants a max deal, they say no. In the offseason, there's just cascating thing after cascading thing, the whole yahweh issue. Oh my god, Joe sigh. They wanted to fire Sean Marks.
Oh yeah. By the way, they fired their coach in the middle of the season.
Try to hire em Udoka. That didn't work because the league shut that down. They brought in Jacques Vaughn, who was the interim head coach the last time they fired their coach.
So it was a world class distraction.
You were like, okay, this is we had the ghost of Nick Claxton.
What's he gonna be? Like, what's TJ. Warren gonna be? Ben Simmons, Is he gonna be himself?
He had been in his own mind, just very broken, and so you're thinking to yourself at this point, this team steering at a full rebuild, especially when Kevin Durant wanted out and you look up after they fired Steve and their second in the East.
You gotta give the Brooklyn Nets an a plus. You have to.
They are the second best defensive team in the last fifteen games.
They went eighteen and.
Two after they brought on Jacque Vaughn KD until his injury became probably at the peak of his powers. Nick Claxton, by the way, who no one is talking about as a real defensive Player of the Year. He's like plus fourteen hundred right now, which is worth a little sprinkle if you want to put a little money on it for that award. He's got twelve double doubles so far. He's dominating in six of the seven interior categories in the league. He leads the league in blocks. Ben Simmons
has been a game changer. And it's not just the defense either. They've been very good in terms of their bench. Edmund Sumner, TJ. Warren, My Guy, John Utah, Wattnabe, Joe Harris coming back from injury, p Mills, cam Thomas, Royce O'Neil, all of whom have stepped up now that Kevin Durant is out after you know, for another month.
Oh yeah.
By the way, Kyrie Irving is taking accountability for not playing well in fourth quarters, tweeting.
Out, I me, Kyrie Irving have to be better.
When have we seen that? Hey, I gotta be a better leader. Did someone take over this man's account? You can't get I ed gray than the Brooklyn Nets. Boy, I swear I thought that was a shit show. And they have vastly overperformed expectations.
This team could win at all?
What Boston Celtics less excited about them? Why they went to the finals?
They went to the finals.
Yes, they had their share of dysfunction as well. They fired he may Udoka. Let's be real to firing He's never coming back to this team. They bring on a guy with his own set of scandals, a bunch of skeletons in his closet, a religious sellate that he is who I'm not completely sold on.
And the team was in need of a prayer and they found one.
They went obviously, and they had a bunch of key pieces that they still had two of the best wings in the league with Jason Tatum and Jalen Brown. Rob Williams, though missed twenty nine games start of the season, and the fact that they're still number one in the East feels very impressive to me. They pick up Malcolm.
Brogden probably would have been a shoe in to win.
Six Man of the Year if Russell Westbrook didn't become whatever we're seeing. If he gets traded, Malcolm Brogden will win six Man of the Year. But the only thing that I can't give him an A plus or an A solid a their name minus for me. They lost to the Magic twice. They got stomped by the Dubs. They got stomped by the Clippers. They lost to the Thunder, the OKC Thunder, who is largely considered to be one
of the biggest egregious tankers in the league. They lost to them by almost fifty points, fifty of them half of one hundred. So I don't really know what else to say other than the motivation of this team can sometimes be called into question, and that, my friends, is a coaching problem and something that.
Even Joe Mizula is making fun of.
That he doesn't take timeouts and maybe he should, and that the momentum shifts.
Et cetera, et cetera.
Boston Celtics are gonna be fine. But I can't give him an A plus or an A minus because largely.
The pieces are the same.
Let's move on to the New York Knicks. New York Knicks gotta give them B minus B minus, which is pretty damn good, right, pretty damn good for the New York Knicks. Halfway point, specifically, Jalen Brunson has been a monster. He has worked out. He is averaging thirty two points in the month of January, what, fifty percent from three point range, almost six rebounds, almost six assists per game. They've got one of the best road records in the NBA,
fourteen and eight. Do you know what the Golden State Warriors would do to be fourteen and eight on the road. Julius Randall right now is playing out of his mind for the most part. And the young guys they're developing into contributors as well, right, Like, Yeah, we may not see ob topping much, but he's been injured. RJ Barrett on the other end, hasn't been great despite his stats, saying that he has been okay, he just hasn't really been there.
He's gotten injured.
I would imagine the one downside that the Knick sea is Wow, Donovan Mitchell really is him. We probably should have traded Quinton, Like I can't believe that Quinton Grimes held this fucking trade up Quinton Grimes.
Do we see what Donovan Mitchell is doing? He has seventy one points.
If you would have said to Leon Rose, this man's gonna score seventy one in the garden, are you willing to trade Quinton Grimes and RJ Beart, I think that they regret that decision. Fucking her extending RJ. Barrett trying to play little games with our man, Danny Ainge. You can't play games with Ange. Uh. They've blown On the other side, that's also bad. They've blown seven double digit leads and lost those games. Remember the game that Luca had like one of his.
Best performances ever.
They scored like they were down nine with thirty seconds or nineteen seconds to.
Go, and the MAVs won that game. Yeah, that was against the Knicks.
That was against them, And when it comes down to crunch time, the offense goes stagnant.
They miss a bunch of free throws.
I think they were like eleven for forty one a couple of games ago. Certainly a fun team, definitely overperformed, but some flaws, some bad decisions where I feel like, man, would they be good with Donovan Mitchell moving forward in the Atlantic Division. Philadelphia seventy six Ers, who to me, they are a B plus. They are very interesting. I think this is the same sort of team as they were last year, where I don't know if they're good or not.
I don't know.
I'm not sure they could go to the Eastern Conference Finals.
They could flame out in the first round.
All of that depends on the two key pieces, which is James Harden and Joe l emb Are they healthy, are they in shape, do they have a connection?
Can they be stopped? How is the defense doing well? They brought on PJ.
Tucker, the guy who was considered it would be one of the best point of attack defenders in the league.
He has stunk.
He has stunk so bad that people within the blogosphere of Philadelphia seventy six Ers media are calling for him to be sitting his ass on the bench. So all that considered for the Sixers to still be fourth in the league in defensive rating with PJ. Tucker largely being not very effective, is pretty good because of the Anthony Mountain that the Anthony Mountain trade that they made with
the Memphis Grizzlies is unreal. The Anthony Mountain is one of the top leaders and steals per game and deflections. If you look at Embiid and Harden, their connection has been elite. They've also had their fair share of injuries, though, so you can't give them an eight right because all those things that we worry about have already reared their ugly head. Embiid has missed time. He's missed nine games,
Harden has missed fourteen games in a row. He's back and somehow a player that they did not account to lose. Tyrese Maxey missed nineteen games, but all of that considered, the Sixer still managed to go thirteen and six without him and they're healthy now. So with Maxi and Embiid and Harden, the Anthony Mountain all in the court.
Gelling and meshing, this team could be really, really dangerous.
Tobias Harris, he doesn't even have to do much now that Tyrese Maxey is good he's a very solid fourth option. Considering that his stats have declined and plummeted.
Off of a cliff.
It's okay because you don't need him to score a bucket. When Embiid is out sitting on the bench, it's like, that's fine. Just spot up, shoot threes, catch and shoot, maybe do a little dribble drive pass back to James and let the offense flow. So this team could be dangerous or like I said, they could be a first or second round exit.
Toronto Raptors. What's stopping me from giving you an F Hope, good roster, good GM, good coach. They're a D minus.
This is a team that you could say is one of the most disappointing teams in the NBA. I thought they would be like a top four, top five seed. When you have current players like CJ. McCollum commenting about the Toronto Raptors generally speaking in like nobody speaks about them, right, But when.
You have them talking about the Toronto Raptors on.
An ESPN hit with i Isy Gutierrez and speaking of them in negative terms, not in the fact that they're the gold standard, which is what they have been for recruiting and scouting and developing talent and making talent gel and mesh, finding guys that came from the G League.
All that is what Toronto is known for. Right now, they are known.
For their dysfunction and now that means it is bubbled up to be mainstream news quickly. As an aside, does anyone find it weird that CJ. McCollum, who's not just a player, he is the president of the NBA Players Union, is commenting on this on ESPN, like, I don't know, like just feeding chum to the aggregators, the bloggers for drama purposes and driving ESPN's ratings at the detriment of other NBA teams as a whole. Like I feel like Kevin Durant would not like that.
I don't feel like the pure Hoopers would want to do that.
That's kind of the icky thing where it feels like these players are start towing the line between player and like media personality, Like you can't on one hand be CJ. The New Orleans Pelican Hooper mid range master and on the other hand hot take men stephen A.
Smith wannaby, I don't like that. I don't like that. But here's what he had to say when he was spilling the team.
I think in terms of what they need or what they're lacking, something's gonna happen. I don't know what. There's rumblings about certain players on the team not being happy and due to tampering. I can't speak to that, but I think they're gonna move someone.
So let's break this down.
The Raptors came to the season and we all thought that they were on the rise. Scotty Barnes wins Rookie of the Year. He looks to emerge as a real superstar playmaker, can do multiple things on the court. Siakam We knew he was gonna take a step up, and he did take a step up. He's been insane this year, absolutely incredible. Og Nnobi was supposed to break out. He's actually leading the league in deflections right now, so defensively, he's been amazing. And they got out from under Kyle
Lowry's contract. They had Fred van Fleet, who.
Is an All Star.
Like, all of this gave us vibes of improvement. Right, you've got to bring in another heavy hitter. Okay, okay, it's all good, but no, halfway through the season, despite a team of six to seven to six to nine guys, with the with the best steal rate in the league, allowing the fifth least points in the paint, the fourth lowest second chance points in the league. The Raptors are only fifteenth in the league in defensive rating. So why folks,
They're five games under five hundred. They are out of the play in tournament, and I am not sure that they will sneak into the play in tournament. And now you've got rumblings about various players wanting out. Fred van Fleet wanted to get paid, them not wanting to pay him because he is undersized and has somewhat of a ball dominant attitude. Pascal Siakam is one of the only guys that is untradeable, but does he want to be traded. I've heard that Ogannobi is unhappy with his role and
how he's being used on this team. Who is not unhappy? Scotty Barnes doesn't look happy. You've got Nick Nurse throwing Gary Trent under the bus and saying, listen, if he can't play defense, he's of no use to us. He's yelling at players on the coach, I mean, on the bench. There's just so much going on with this team, safe to say this is not the way anybody thought it would go, not the way that anybody would want it to go, which is why.
They get a failing grade.
They can't get enough because I love Missiu Jerry, and I think he's too smart to let this shit happen. Still time for things to turn around. But when you only have two guys on this roster who are untouchable, that's a rut row. That is a massive, massive rut row.